for the direction of the clergy of the Church of England, who could not be ignorant, that the services of the church belong only to its members.'-p. 42. The right to burial, in particular, rests on the circumstance of the party dying in communion with the church.'-p. 48. 'Therefore an express exclusion of dissenters would have been a needless waste of words.'-p. 42.

In answer to this, the archdeacon will first permit us to ask, why then is there an express exclusion of the excommunicate? for surely the clergy could not be ignoraut, that they are not members of the church; or that if the right to burial belongs only to persons dying in actual communion with the church, the excommunicate are not of this description. Here, therefore, is that needless waste of words which seems to be considered incompatible with the true meaning of the rubric. We might cite again, the law which compels the executors of Papists to carry them to the church for burial, and assumes, as a matter of course, that they will be there buried. We might also again insist on an infant's not being a dissenter. But more than enough has already been adduced to prove, that there is no solid reason for denying that the case falls within the canon and the rubric; and, consequently, that we are not released from the duty of attending the archdeacon through the remainder of his argument.

Now if the canon and rubric be applicable to the matter in question, the only point to be decided is, whether the child whom the ministers refused to bury, did die unbaptized.' Dr. Daubeney maintains the affirmative; and the following is his reasoning.

The place in which the word occurs, viz. a rubric, or order made by the governors of the Church of England for the direction of the clergy in the discharge of their minsterial office, shews, that it must be taken in connection with the other rules and ordinances of the church. Comparing then the 19th and 23d articles with the 11th canon, and thence proceeding to the ordination service, he concludes, that the word 'unbaptized' in the rubric, must be understood in an ecclesiastical sense, according to which sense all are considered to be unbaptized, who have not been baptized by persons to whom, in conformity with the articles of the Church of England, the office of ministering in the congregation has been lawfully committed.'-p. 24.

Here then we are presented with a short method of dispatching the whole question, if the argument be correct. We will examine it impartially, and see how far it will carry us. It may, however, be right previously to remark, that the words of the archdeacon seem to take for granted that which is really the only matter in dispute, namely, that the ecclesiastical sense of the word 'unbaptized' is what he states it to be. For we apprehend, that no one is so weak as to contend, that the word in the rubric, may be construed

strued in any other than its ecclesiastical meaning: certainly the whole argument of Sir John Nicholl is employed in ascertaining what that meaning is. The archdeacon therefore will, we are persuaded, feel obliged to us for understanding his words, as if they ran thus, that the word "unbaptized," in the rubric, must be understood in an ecclesiastical sense, and that according to this sense all are to be considered as unbaptized, &c.'

We proceed to inquire how far the ordinances referred to by the archdeacon, prove this to be the ecclesiastical meaning of the word. The 19th and 23d articles state, 'that one of the consti tuents of the visible church is, that the Sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ's ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same: that it is not lawful for any man to minister the sacraments in the congregation, till he be lawfully called and sent to execute the same; and that those are lawfully called and sent, who are chosen by men who have public authority given to them for that purpose." The canon denounces excommunication against all who maintain, that any other congregations of the king's subjects within this realm, than such as by the laws of this land are held and allowed, may rightly challenge to thems selves the name of true and lawful churches.' And in the ordination service, the bishops, who alone have public authority in this country to call and send forth ministers, do so send those, whom they ordain.

Such is the sum and substance of the premises, from which the archdeacon concludes, that the ecclesiastical sense of the word " unbaptized' is that which has been stated above. For ourselves we confess, not only that we cannot deduce any thing like this conclusion, but that we cannot even perceive the process by which other minds are enabled to arrive at it.

If it be meant, that a lawful minister' is essential to baptism, we can only request the archdeacon to be more explicit in detailing his mode of reasoning. Meanwhile, we will adduce certain considerations, which satisfy us, that that mode of reasoning, whatever it be, was not adopted by those who composed our articles. Let it be remembered, then, that these articles were framed A. D. 1562, and that the rubric, at that very time, authorized lay persons to baptize in case of necessity. Let it be remembered too, that in the convocation, at which these articles were agreed on, a paper was brought in by Sandys,* then Bishop of Worcester, and its averment admitted without remark from any one, the first head of which was, that the rubric, which gives women a liberty to baptize in case of necessity, might be altered.'

* See Collyer's Ecclesiastical History, Vol. I. p. 485,

VOL. VII. NO. XIII.

His

His reason was, 'because the Holy Scriptures declare women incapable of administering the sacraments.' With this reason we have here nothing farther to do, than as it shews what were the sentiments of convocation respecting the rubric at a time when it was directly brought under their view; and how little it was then imagined that baptism by men, though laics, could be deemed by the church to be no baptism. As far, therefore, as the articles are concerned, and if they are to be understood in the sense of those who framed them, it is plain, that unless we suppose that they were framed to contradict the rubric, there is nothing in them which declares a lawful minister' essential to baptism.

If, however, the archdeacon means that these articles, &c. prove that all are considered by the church as unbaptized,' who are baptized in this country by persons not of her communion, we must then entreat him to account for some other phænomena apparently at variance with his theory. In the analysis of Sir John Nicholl's argument, it has already been noticed, that at the time of passing this law there were many inhabitants of this country, who, during the Usurpation, had received baptism from the hands of men not episcopally ordained; and we may now add, that a large proportion of them must have received it from those who were not members of the Church of England. Yet it has been seen, that these persons were confirmed by the bishops of that time without scruple. This, therefore, is, of itself, a strong reason for supposing that those very bishops in framing the rubric, did not mean to designate all such, as unbaptized.' But a still stronger reason is derived from the consequence which must follow from the rubric, if such be the meaning of unbaptized;' namely, that all these persons were deprived by law of Christian burial. Is it credible that such could be the intention with which the word was inserted by convocation? If so intended, could parliament have endured to give the force of law to an ordinance, by which many of its members, in communion with the church, must have seen their families cut off from all participation in the most interesting of religious rites? Could this have been done without opposition, and even without remark? Yet the history of that, not distant, period is without the smallest trace of any emotions excited by an enactment, which, if Dr. Daubeney rightly interprets it, must have operated in so powerful a manner. We do not read of any persons being impelled by the rubric or any other cause, to seek re-baptism from a minister of the Church of England for nearly half a century; and when at length the instance of Mr. Lawrence occurred, we do not find it was even then pretended, that the judgment of the church in 1661, had been thus decisive. If, indeed, such a plea could have been established,

there

there would have been no longer any ground of controversy between him and his opponents.

We are aware, that the archdeacon has armed himself with an answer to all remarks of this sort, by admitting that there may be 'exceptions to his conclusion, and that such exceptions may furnish a field for the exercise of discretionary judgment in ecclesiastical governors.'-p. 24. But thus peremptorily to assign meanings, and thus imperfectly to provide for objections which start up at every step, is not so much to interpret as to make laws. And who is it, that here attributes this enormous and indefinite power to ecclesiastical governors? The same person, who, in p. 110, denies that the opinions of Bishops Fleetwood and Warburton are of any value in the question; and who, p. 115, as has been already observed, triumphantly quotes the saying of Lord Camden,' that the discretion of a judge is the law of tyrants: in the best, it is oftentimes caprice; in the worst, it is every vice, folly, and passion, to which human nature is liable.'

But what does Dr. Daubeney say to the acknowledged practice of admitting converts from among the dissenters to all the privileges of the Church of England, and even to its orders, without being re-baptized? a practice, to which it is owing, that our church numbers among its members the two greatest ornaments of this or any other church during the last century, Bishop Butler and Archbishop Secker. Why it seems, that their baptism is, under circumstances, capable of being recognized as valid.'-p. 45. Of the meaning of the word recognized, Dr. Daubeney has, in another part of his book, favoured us with a very accurate definition, which we beg leave to insert in this place, as explanatory of the sentence just quoted. By recognizing any thing, we do not change either its nature or character, but only renew our knowledge of it as it is.'-p. 103. The baptism of dissenters, therefore, is under circumstances (e. g. their conversion) capable of being again known by us to be, what we indeed knew it to be before, but with a knowledge requiring renovation, namely, that it is in itself, in its own nature and character, valid baptism.

Must we trespass on the patience of our readers any longer? yes, we will not leave the archdeacon room to say, that we condemn him for one or two instances of confusion both of sentiment and language, however gross, or for the weakness of a single part of his argument, however necessary to his conclusion. We proceed, therefore, to his more direct attack on Sir John Nicholl's reasoning.

After a few preliminary observations, he proposes to 'state the nature of the ground on which the judgment has been built.' And here we have seriously to complain of the extremely inadequate,

0 2

confused,

confused, and erroneous view of the learned judge's argument, which his analysis presents. Whatever may be thought of some of the incidental positions advanced in that argument, whatever difference of opinion may be entertained of the truth of some of its premises, or the soundness of its conclusion, at least it must be allowed, by every candid reader, that the general course of the reasoning is luminous and powerful. Yet those who acquire their notion of it only from the pages of Dr. Daubeney, would naturally suppose, that the learned judge is as ignorant of the rules of logic, as he is represented to be of the law which he administers. In p. 15 Sir John Nicholl purposes to examine the history of the law, in order to see whether any argument can thence be drawn either for or against the general meaning of the word 'unbaptized.' 'If,' says he, the Church of England has recognized lay-baptism, &c. &c. it will necessarily follow, that it cannot mean (by the word "unbaptized") to exclude from burial all persons who have not been baptized according to the forms of its liturgy.' Accordingly, he proceeds to inquire, from history, whether the Church of England has thus recognized lay-baptism or not. Nothing, surely, can be more plain or logical than such a course; yet, in the 9th page of the archdeacon, all this is given as an inference from what has preceded. From these premises' (that is, from the statement of the general meaning of the term unbaptized, and from a view of the context) you draw the following conclusion; that if the Church of England has recognized lay-baptism,' &c. Such a perversion of a very plain passage, if we could believe it intentional, would call forth our loudest reprobation; as it is, we cannot but express our astonishment, that so practised a controversialist, as Archdeacon Daubeney, should have erred so grossly in apprehending the argument of his adversary. But this, we are sorry to say, is not the only instance of the same kind to be met with in the tract before us. In p. 63, inconsistency is insinuated against the learned judge, where not only there is no foundation for the charge, but the very words adduced to establish do, in fact, disprove it. By the law of the English Church,' says Sir John Nicholl, down to the Reformation, lay-baptism was allowed and practised; it was regular, and even prescribed in cases of necessity. Were I disposed to cavil,' says his censor, I should object to the word regular in the above sentence; and I might quote you against yourself, where you say, "That the Church of England has recognized lay-baptism to be, though irregular, yet valid." Now, in truth, Sir John Nicholl, in the passage thus referred to, does not say what is here said for him; his words are If the Church of England has recognized, &c.' meaning that it would be sufficient for his purpose that laybaptism should have been recognized as valid, even though it were

considered