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TAY

CHAP. VII.

FROM 1651 TO 1655.

AYLOR was still in his retirement at Golden Grove, occupied as we have learned in ministering to the spiritual and temporal comfort of those who had given him an asylum; and gaining a subsistence by tuition; in which we may reasonably presume he was successful. Such genius, learning, and piety, could not fail to attract the attention of the superior class of society, even in a time of public discord; and one instance is preserved in the following epitaph, to sanction this remark.

M. S.

"Griffini Lloyd de Cwmgwilly armigeri, qui "honestis parentibus Llanarthneiæ natus, literarum tyrocinia posuit sub summis viris Gul. Nicholsono "ep. postea Glocestrensi & Jer. Tayloro ep. Duno"coronensi, qui grassante Cromwellii tyrannide "pueris instituendis victum in hac vicinia queri"tabant," &c. &c.

Qualified as Taylor was, in a high degree, and anxious, as we may reasonably believe him to have been, to furnish his pupils with the excellences of classical knowledge, we may be well convinced he was still more careful to lay up in their minds the fundamental principles of Christianity and accordingly we find that, in the very next year after he had published his Rule and Exercises. of Holy Dying, he sent out "a short Cate"chism, composed for the use of the Schools "in South Wales,"" conveying his opinion in this impressive passage from Plato, "Let this "truth be confessed and remain for ever, that

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they who are well instructed, easily become "good men." This he afterwards reprinted, placing it under the head "Credenda," in his "Golden Grove."

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In the same year he consented to the pub lication of "a Discourse of Baptism, its institution, and efficacy upon all Believers;" which was only part of a projected work of a larger description. The address to the reader prefixed to this treatise gives the reason for

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• Printed in Lond. 12° 1652. Brit. Mus.

. Ὁ μὲν δὴ λόγος ἡμῖν ὁμολογηθεὶς μενέτω, ως διγε ὀρθῶς πεπαιδευ μένοι, σχεδόν αγαθοι γίγονται. Plato de Legibus.

its appearance before the publick in this separate form, and also throws some light upon his place of residence at that time, and the occupation of his mind. It states that "this portion of his work was not intended by the author to have been sent abroad thus by itself, but was fitted to the air and mode of other discourses, wherewith he had designed it to be joined. But some persons of judg ment, to whose perusal it was committed, supposing that if this should be kept in till those other could be finished, some disadvantage might arise to the cause which it asserts, wished and advised it might be published by itself. To whose desires the author, (against his first design,) condescended, upon this persuasion, that though it appeared thus without some formalities and complements requisite to an entire treatise, yet, as to the thing itself, there was nothing wanting to it which he believed material to the question, or useful to the Church. And as for those arguments which, in "the Liberty of Prophecying," section 18, are alleged against Pædobaptism; and in the opinion of some do seem to stand in need of answering, he had it once in thought to comply with this desire: but upon these considerations he forbore. 1st, Because

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those arguments were not good in themselves, or to the question precisely considered: but only by relation to the preceding arguments there brought for Pædobaptism, they might seem good one against another, but these in the plea for the Anabaptists, had no strength, but what was accidental (as he conceived.) 2dly, Because in this discourse he had really laid such grounds, and proved them, that upon their supposition all those arguments in the "Liberty of Prophecying," and all other which he ever heard of would fall of themselves. 3dly, Because those arguments, to his sense, were so weak, and so relying upon failing and deceitful principles, that he was loath to do them so much reputation, as to account them worthy the answering. 4thly, But because there might be some necessities which he knew not of, and were better observed by them who lived in the midst of them, than by himself, who was thrust into a retirement in Wales, therefore he accounted himself at rest on this particular, because he had understood that his very worthy friend, Dr. H. Hammond, had in his charity and humility, descended to answer that collection; and hoped, that both their hands being so fast clasped in a mutual complication, would

do some help and assistance to this question, by which the ark of the church was so violently shaken."

To this discourse was added a Considera"tion of the Practice of the Church in bap "tizing Infants of believing parents and the

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practice justified," published in the suc ceeding year. And these together form the sixth and seventh discourses in the Great Exemplar; for which they were originally intended.

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After laying down what the rite of Bap tism is, he proceeds to shew what are the benefits arising from it, and points out the first fruit to be, admission into Christ's kingdom; the next, adoption into the covenant; the third, a new birth, by which we enter into the new world, the new creation, the blessings and spiritualties of the kingdom. asserts that," In Baptism all our sins are pardoned; and not only this, but that "it puts us into a state of pardon for the "time to come."Pily an↑ bar

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Lib. Trin. Coll. Camb. G. 14. 50. Lond. by J. Flesher, for R. Royston, at the Angel in Ivie Lane. 1653.

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