was made with them, and nearly all of them under twenty years old: these were those little ones whom their parents had said should become a prey, and the grown persons of the nation died in the wilderness, because of their murmuring in fulfilment of the Almighty's threat with regard to them. (Numb. xiv.) When God promised to Abraham, upon his circumcision and that of his males, I will be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, (Gen. xvii. 17.) does not this teach us, that the infants of that nation, when circumcised, should be in the number of God's people, and, consequently, members of his church? Is God, according to the meaning of this promise, a God to any in the world but to his people, and to the members of his church?

Again, when the covenant, in which the infants were engaged at Horeb on Mount Sinai, (Exod. xix.) admitted them, with the rest of the nation, to be a peculiar treasure to God above all people; when the covenant, mentioned in Deut. xxix, which included their little ones, admitted them with the rest to be people to God, and to the privilege of having him a God to them; can it be justly and truly said that infants could not become his people, or members of his church? It may here be seen what manifest falsehoods our deluded brethren receive either from the ignorance or deceitfulness of their teachers, while these speak

perverse things to draw away discioles after

them.

Further, infants are not only qualified to come under the engagement, which is man's part in the sacrament of baptism, but they are also capable of having a right to the mercies promised on God's part in the covenant, and which that sacrament is appointed to confer. Now, that they are competent to be taken into a state of peculiar favour, and to be reckoned members of the church of God, and included amongst his peculiar people, has been already rendered sufficiently clear I trust. And this state includes the privileges to which, it has been said, this sacrament admits the person so baptized.

But, to make this matter the more evident, I will particularly shew that little children are capable of all the privileges already mentioned. And I think it cannot be denied, that they are capable also of remission of sins. If they may be said to be under the influence of any degree of guilt, they are capable of receiving pardon for their transgression. They cannot, then, be withheld from this sacrament upon the account of any incapacity in this case.

They are qualified also for receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost to sanctify them, and to dispose and enable them to live well, in proportion as they shall become "capable of understanding "

and regulating their own actions. No one surely will be rash enough to say that the Holy Spirit cannot operate in the souls of infants; this would be to limit the infinite power of the Spirit of God, and to contradict what is said of our Saviour in Holy Scripture. For we therein read that He was a holy Being even from his conception and first formation, being conceived of the Virgin Mary by the Holy Ghost. Luke, i. 35. That children are capable of the grace of the Holy Spirit, and of his operations in them, is undeniably proved by that history in the gospel, which we have in Mark, x. from verse 13 to 16. Our Saviour laid his hands on the infants that were brought to him, and prayed; and then he certainly obtained and conferred some spiritual blessings and gifts of the Holy Ghost upon them, and then infants are capable of receiving these spiritual blessings.

They are capable, lastly, of being in a state of salvation in this life, while infants, and of being saved and brought to the happiness of the next life, if they die such. They may be in covenant with God, it appears; then they may come to have a covenant right to his favour, and consequently possess a title to eternal happiness, which is a state of salvation. This cannot be denied by those who maintain, that all infants, both of Christains and Heathens, shall be saved by what Christ has

done for mankind, without baptism, or any means to bring them into an union and communion with him. And it is proved, indeed, that they are fit to become participators in God's heavenly promises by our Saviour's words concerning them, Mark, x. 14, of such is the kingdom of God. By these words their title to eternal life, which is evidently included in the phrase of the kingdom of God, is most satisfactorily established; though they do not prove that they can obtain this right without this sacrament of baptism; nor indeed can these words be interpreted in such a sense, without making them contradict what our Saviour says in John, iii. 5. For in this passage our Lord unequivocally asserts that none can enter into the kingdom of God unless they be born of water and of the Spirit; and we must never put such an interpretation on any words or doctrine of our Saviour as would make him contradict himself.

Thus it appears that infants are capable of all that for which the sacrament of baptism is appointed by our Lord; and why then may we not believe he has appointed this sacrament for them, as well as others? There is nothing in such an appointment unbecoming the wisdom or any attribute of God, nothing in it disagreeing with the nature of things and then there is no absurdity, nor any thing unreasonable in the belief of this

appointment, from the incapacity in infants for what the sacrameut is appointed to impart.

Again, when we see a general command to the ministers of the Church to make disciples to Christ by baptism, as in Matt. xxviii. 19, which does not particularly mention either young or old, men or women, but orders this to be done among all nations, without the special mention of any particular sorts among them; we must necessarily believe, that the command provides that all shall receive the sacrament that are qualified for it. Infants, then, must be included in that command, since they are capable of the purposes" for which it is appointed; they are competent to become disciples of Christ by baptism, because they are capable of being engaged to learn and obey the doctrine and laws of Christ. This is further supported by the strong confirmation which the words of Scripture give to that great principle of reason and common feeling of our nature, by which we are inclined to regard the religious privileges of our children as inseparable from our own. It is forcibly observed by Archdeacon Pott, in his admirable Charge on Infant Baptism, already alluded to, that it is plain "from the early pages of the Scripture, and throughout all the tenor of its sacred testimonies in successive ages, that the care for the joint interests of the families of men, was most