the whole church, consisting of women as well as men? When he further says, We, being many, are one bread and one body; for we are all partakers of that one bread; does he not speak of women as well as of men?—5. Again, are there any pre-requisites for the holy supper, of which women are not equally as capable as men? 6. And are not male and female one in Christ?" This is the whole of the defence, and I confess I have been often diverted in reading it; I thought it a curiosity, as it came from the pen of Mr. B. who is so great an enemy to all inference and analogy respecting positive institutes.

The whole of this defence I have divided into six parts, and these, for the sake of greater plainness, are distinguished by strokes and fig ures. Mr. B. in these six parts, aims at three distinct arguments. The first is taken from the word anthropos, man, which includes the three first parts; the second is taken from Paul's address to the church as a body, and takes in the fourth part; the third is from the condition and qualification of females, and comprehends the two last parts.

Since Mr. B. offers this defence to the public as proving an explicit warrant for female communion; we must, therefore, first of all, lay down the precise idea of the term explicit. Explicit denotes that which is direct, open and plain; and which immediately strikes the mind without reasoning upon it. e. g. Acts viii. 12.

They were baptized, both men and women.' Here the reader instantly discerns both sexes, without inferring from any other place. And

hence the term explicit is opposed to implication, i. e. any thing included under a general word. And it is likewise opposed to inference, i. e proof drawn from some other place. An explicit warrant, therefore, is such as strikes at once; and precludes the necessity of implication, reasoning, or inferring from some other topic. Such a warrant Mr. B. insists upon for infant baptism; and this brings him under the necesity of producing the same for feinale communion. Which if he be unable to do, all he has said against infants will literally stand for nothing, and his books on that subject will be even worse than waste-paper-Now for the explicit warrant for female communion.

1. We begin with the argument from the word anthropos, man, concerning which Mr. B. says three things to evince an explicit warrant. And first, Does not the term anthropos, man, often stand as a name of our species without regard to sex? What a lame set out towards an explicit warrant! OFTEN stand as a name of our species! That's admirable on our side! This is what the learned call presumptive evidence, and this is what Mr. B. produces towards an explicit warrant. Does he think presumptive and explicit are the same? Whatever advantage Mr. B. may wish to take, yet I would not grant this, were I in his place, lest some Pædobaptists should take an advantage of it too.This presumptive mode of arguing on a positive institute will not do Mr. B. much credit; he must certainly put on a better appearance than this.

Well then, in the second place; "Have we not," says Mr. B. the authority of lexicographers, and, which is incomparably more, the sanction of common sense, for understanding it thus in that passage ?,' 1 Cor. xi. 28. The authority of lexicographers, and common sense!— Here is help for the learned, and unlearned, that both may be able, after consultation had, to pick out an explicit warrant! For my own part, I do not much like the labour of turning over lexicographers at the best of times, and especially for an explicit warrant; i. e. a warrant that strikes the mind at once. I rather think Mr. B. if he wished people to labour for that which should be had without any labour at all, should have sent his inquirers to commentators as well as to lexicographers, to know how the apostle used the word in question. But suppose we depend on the authority of these lexicographers, it may still be proper to ask, How it is they know in what manner the apostle used this word? they know by analogy, or by inferring from other premises? Ah! Mr. B.! I fear these gentry would betray you. And to give you your due, you do not seem to place much confidence in them; for you say, that the authority of common sense is incomparably more.

Do

Common sense! Hardly one in five hundred is able to consult a lexicographer, and therefore Mr. B. in order to make his explicit warrant explicit, furnishes help to the unlearned. Well, common sense, since it pleases Mr. B. though you do not understand Greek, to submit to your determination, whether anthropos be an explicit

word for a woman; and so, whether there be any explicit warrant for female communion; I will take the liberty of asking a few questions. Do you know what Mr. B. means to prove from 1 Cor. xi. 28. Let a man, anthropos, examine himself, &c.? Yes, he means to prove an explicit warrant for female communion. Very well. What is an explicit warrant? It is that, the sense of which you instantly perceive, without the necessity of reasoning upon it, or inferring it from some other part. Can a warrant be deemed explicit, if it be not founded on explicit words: Certainly not; for the words constitute the warrant. If the word anthropos, man, be used sometimes for a male infant of eight days old, John vii. 22, 23; and perhaps a hundred times in the New Testament for a male adult only; and nineteen times in the Septuagint and New Testament, to distinguish the male from the female, when both are named; would you, after all this, consider it an explicit word for a woman? No, it is impossible. Mr. B. says, he has your authority for understanding it as a name of our species, i. e. comprehending male and female, in this place; but if this word be not an explicit word for a woman, how do you know that women as well as men are included in it? I conclude it from this, that women as well as men were baptized; that they were received into the church; and therefore must be implied in this word --So, so! You conclude it by analogy, implication and inference! These are fine materials for an explicit warrant. Cito in cellam abi, and take your au

thority with you, lest Mr. B. should flog you in his next publication for talking so much like a Pædobaptist.

.But if the authority of lexicographers and common sense will not bring the business home, Mr. B. is determed to make use of his own authority. He has no other way of preserving the credit of his book; and, therefore, he will even risk his own reputation, rather than lose his explicit warrant. He ventures in the third part, to say, that," when the sexes are distinguished and opposed, the word for a man is not anthrōpos, but aneer." This is Mr. B.'s own, and he himself is accountable for it. The assertion is made use of, to give a colour to his explicit warrant; and it was, no doubt, the necesity of his case that drove him to this. He has pressed the Pædobaptists, through a great part of his 875 pages, to produce an explicit warrant for infant baptism; and having thereby forged a chain for himself, he is now entangled in his turn.

It is

sufficient for me in this place to say, that this assertion of Mr. B. is utterly false. I have already presented the reader with nineteen instances out of the Septuagint and New-Testament, which lie directly against him. Mr. B. in order to pass off this assertion of his with a better grace, has given us a quotation, though not at all to the point, from Diogenes, out of his Life of Thales. What I have to say respecting the quotation, is that, had Diogenes, or any one else, affirmed the same as Mr. B. (which he has not, nor Thales neither) I would have linked them together as two false witnesses. And I say farther, it seems a marvellous