VI. CHAP. illness, could not be immersed or plunged (which, properly speaking, is to be baptized ;) they had the salutary water poured upon them, or were sprinkled with it. For the same reason, I think, the custom of sprinkling now used, first began to be observed by the western church; namely, on account of the tenderness of infants, seeing the baptism of adults was now very seldom practised." " m GROTIUS: "The custom of pouring or sprinkling seems to have prevailed in favour of those that were dangerously ill, and were desirous of giving up themselves to Christ; whom others called clinics. See the Epistle of Cyprian to Magnus." " n VON COELLN: "Baptism was by immersion; only in cases of the sick was it administered by sprinkling. It was held necessary to salvation, except in cases of martyrdom." " RHEINWALD : 66 Baptism was administered by immersion, only in cases of necessity by sprinkling." P NEANDER, vol. i. p. 361, remarks: "Only with the sick was there an exception," in regard to immersion. WINER, in his Lectures on Archæology, in manuscript, says: "Affusion was at first applied only to the sick, but was gradually introduced for others after the seventh century, and in the thirteenth became the prevailing practice in the West. But the Eastern church has retained immersion alone as valid." STROTH'S EUSEBIUS, vol. i. p. 506. "Baptism was administered to those on beds of sickness by sprinkling and pouring; in other cases, it was at that time by immersion." m n GEISELER'S Ch. Hist. Ger. Ed. vol. ii. p. 274: "For Apud Forbesium, Instruct. Hist. Theo. L. X. C. v. § 57. Apud Poli Synop. ad. Mat. iii. 6. • Hist. Theol. Opin. vol. i. p. 459. P Christian Archeology. Berlin, 1830, p. 302. the sake of the sick, the rite of sprinkling was intro- SECT. duced." DU FRESNE'S Lat. Glossary, on the word clinici; "From the custom of baptizing by pouring or sprinkling the sick, who could not be immersed (which is properly baptism,) was introduced the custom which now prevails in the Western church.' "q BP. BURNET: " The danger of dipping in cold climates, may be a very good reason for changing the form of baptism to sprinkling." : r DR. TOWERSON "The first mention we find of aspersion in the baptism of the elder sort, was in the case of the clinici, or men who received baptism upon their sick beds and that baptism is represented by S. Cyprian as legitimate, upon the account of necessity that compelled it, and the presumption there was of God's gracious acceptation thereof, because of it. By which means the lawfulness of any other baptism than by immersion, will be found to lie in the necessity there may sometimes be of another manner of administration of it." s SIR JOHN FLOYER: "The church of Rome hath drawn short compendiums of both sacraments; in the eucharist, they use only the wafer; and instead of immersion, they introduced aspersion. . . I have given now what testimony I could find in our English authors, to prove the practice of immersion from the time the Britons and Saxons were baptized, till king James's days; when the people grew peevish with all ancient ceremonies, and through the love of novelty, and the niceness of parents, and the pretence of modesty, they laid aside. immersion." t VII. CHAP. DR. R. WETHAM: "The word baptism signifies a washing, particularly when it is done by immersion, or by dipping, or plunging a thing under water, which was formerly the ordinary way of administering the sacra ment of baptism. But the church, which cannot change the least article of the Christian faith, is not so tied up in matters of discipline and ceremonies. Not only the ca. tholic church, but also the pretended reformed churches, have altered this primitive custom in giving the sacra ment of baptism, and now allow of baptism by pouring or sprinkling water on the person baptized. Nay, many of their ministers do it now-a-days, by fillipping a wet finger and thumb over a child's head, or by shaking a wet finger or two over the child, which is hard enough to call a baptizing in any sense!" u DR. WALL:"" In the case of sickness, weakness, haste, want of quantity of water, or such like extraordinary occasions, baptism by affusion of water on the face, was, by the ancients, counted sufficient baptism. France seems to have been the first country in the world, where baptism, by affusion, was used ordinarily to persons in health, and in the public way of administering it. There had been some synods, in some diocesses of France, that had spoken of affusion, without mentioning immersion at all, that being the common practice; but for an office or liturgy of any church, this is, I believe, the first in the world, that prescribes aspersion absolutely; and for sprinkling, properly called, it seems it was, at sixteen hundred and forty-five, just then beginning, and used by very few. It must have began in the disorderly times u Annot. on New Test. Matt. iii. 6.-A catholic author, surely an impartial witness.-This and several of the preceding quotations are from Booth's Podobaptism Examined. V Referring to Calvin's "Form of administering the Sacraments." : VII. after forty-one. But then came The Directory, which SECT. says: Baptism is to be administered, not in private places or privately; but in the place of public worship, and in the face of the congregation,' and so on. And 'not in the places where fonts, in the time of popery, were unfitly and superstitiously placed.' So they reformed the font into a basin. This learned Assembly could not remember, that fonts to baptize in, had been always used by the primitive Christians, long before the beginning of popery, and ever since the churches were built but that sprinkling, for the common use of baptizing, was really introduced (in France first, and then in other popish countries) in time of popery; and that accordingly, all those countries in which the usurped power of the pope is, or has formerly been, owned, have left off dipping of children in the font; but that all other countries in the world, which had never regarded his authority, do still use it; and that basins, except in case of necessity, were never used by papists, or any other Christians, whatsoever, till by themselves. What has been said of this custom of pouring or sprinkling water in the ordinary use of baptism, is to be understood only in reference to the western parts of Europe; for it is used ordinarily no where else."" x It is singularly unfortunate for the advocates of pœdobaptism, that the very quotations to which they refer us for proof that sprinkling was an apostolical practice, clearly evince that the contrary was the fact. In the case of Novatian, for instance, "Eusebius in- Case of Noforms us, that when he received baptism by pouring, it vatian. was on account of his sickness.' It is natural to inquire, why aspersion, if it was of apostolical origin, should be * Hist. of Inf. Bap. Part II. chap. ix. CHAP. limited to the sick? What objection could there be, that VI. any one in health should be so baptized ?" w Arguments The case of Cyprian, the father of sprinkling, is of Cyprian. greatly relied upon by podobaptist writers; but this also is only a broken staff that pierces the hand. The writer in the Christian Review, we believe President Sears, (to whom our readers are already much indebted, for the translations from modern German writers, presented in this and previous sections,) has treated this point in a manner so condensed, yet clear and satisfactory, that I prefer its insertion to any comments of my own. 66 Magnus inquired of Cyprian (see Epist. 76,) whether persons thus baptized were to be regarded as legitimate Christians, inasmuch as they were not baptized by bathing, but by affusion.' Cyprian is not prepared to give a decisive answer, but expresses his opinion, and says each one must settle this question for himself. His own views are stated thus: When there is a pressing necessity, with God's indulgence, the holy ordinances, though outwardly abridged, confer the entire blessing upon those who believe.' y We have given Neander's translation, as the two last words cannot be expressed in English without a paraphrastic rendering. Wall has translated this passage, as he has many others, so as to cover up its true meaning. In the same letter, Cyprian, speaking of those who supposed themselves empty and devoid of a blessing, because they were not immersed, but merely sprinkled,' says, 'let them not imagine, that they can be rebaptized when they recover.' w Christian Review, vol. iii. p. 106. "Eo quod aqua salutari non loti sunt sed perfusi." y "Necessitate cogente, et Deo indulgentiam suam largiente, totam credentibus conferunt divina compendia." |