Scripture- Warrant SUFFICIENT PROOF FOR INFANT-BAPTISM: BEING A REPLY to Mr. Grantham's Presumption no Proof.  
Wherein his pretended Answer to Two Questions propounded to the Anabaptists by G. F. is Examined, and found to be no Answer.  
With a brief DISCOURSE upon INFANT-REGENERATION, denied by Anabaptists. BAPTISM without Dipping Valid.  
By GILES FIRMIN.  That which is born of the Flesh, is Flesh. John 3.6. Omnes enim venit per semetipsum salvare: omnes inquam qui per eum renascuntur in Deum, Infantes,& Parvulos,& Pueros,& Juvenes& Seniores. Ideò per omnem venit aetatem;& Infantibus Infaus factus sanctificans Infantes: in parvulis parvulus, sanctificans hanc ipsam habentes aetatem, &c. Irenaeus advers. Haeres. l. 2. c. 39. 
London, Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns at the lower end of Cheapside, 1688.   

TO THE READER.  
I Did not know that the Question about the Conveniency or Inconveniency of Dissenters writing against Dissenters in this juncture of time, had been discussed by our Brethren; till having drawn up a few Arguments against Positions which some Anabaptists, coming down from London into these parts, had asserted, I sent them up to have them published: but Mr. Faldo, my worthy Friend( whom for his great pains in promoting Unity among Dissenters, I shall ever Honour) wrote me word, the Brethren there, had concluded, this was not a convenient time for Dissenters to writ against Dissenters. I submitted to their judgement, and recalled my Copy.  
When I had done this, word was brought me from a young furious Zealot against Infant Baptism,( calling it an Antichristian Cheat,) that there was an Answer printing to my two Questions, which I had propounded to the Anabaptists four years past; which proved true: for he sends me the Book, and gets the Books to be sold in our Town. So that now I hope my Brethren cannot blame me, that I endeavour to vindicate the Truth of God, and defend myself.  
Before the Book was sent me, this young Teacher, tells in this, and other Towns, what this Authors Name was, what a great Writer he was, and that against Learned men,[ that now I must expect a formidable Adversary to encounter withall,] and gave this description of him.  
Mr. Grantham is a person descended from a worshipful Family, but in the time of the Civil Wars his Parents suffered much loss for the King. Being brought low, his Father puts out this his Son to a tailor; and observing his Son inclining to Fanaticism( as some call it) he choose such a Master for him, as he thought would stifle those Principles: but his Son continues sober, and helps to Reform those who wrought with him. His apprenticeship being out, he gave himself to study, and becomes a great Proficient in Learning: Disputed with the present Bishop of Norwich, before he was Bishop, at which Disputation, several Priests were got behind the Hangings; with other Circumstances he mentioned, but the issue was, he worsted the Doctor so, that he quitted the room.  
If there be any error in this, let not Mr. Grantham blame me: for it came from one that is an Admirer of him. That he was a tailor, I do not look at this, as being any real disparagement to him; it hath been the Case of others, that have descended from as good Families as his: But if Mr. Grantham will be dealing in Polemical Divinity, and there scoff at his Opponent, use provoking terms, writ in some places absurdly,( as he doth against me) he must expect to hear of it sometimes.  
What the two Questions are I gave then to answer, the Reader will find them repeated in the following Discourse. I stated the Question firstly, with respect to the Jews, requiring him that answers, to set down the Scriptures, upon which he grounded his answer for the Negative, but he hath not name so much as One.  
I will give him for the Affirmative, these, first, for the Jews: Acts 2.39. Acts 3.25. Rom. 11.15, 16, 28, 29.[ Of the two last I make use.] I need not mention any for the Gentiles, yet I will give him these. Ephes. 2.12.& 19. compared. 1 Cor. 7.14. Gal. 3.14. By these I will defend my Question, yet he calls it an unlearned Question. What, when I have Scripture-grounds for it, and he cannot produce one for the contrary?  
As for that Experience which I have given of the benefit of Improving Abrahams and our Infant Baptismal-Covenant, in my former little Treatise, which Learned and Godly Divines, say, cannot be without Grace,( and I will appeal to all the Learned and godly Divines in England, or elsewhere, that have experience of Gods work on their own hears,) this Mr. Grantham scoffs at. I shall meet with him in his place.  
This onely I will say as to his Book: If my two Questions meet with no Better Answer than Mr. Grantham hath given, I will go on to baptize the Infants of Believing Parents, without the Least Scruple.  
6 Jan. 87. The Servant to the Seed of Believers, Giles Firmin.   

READER,  
AFter I had finished my Copy, there was another Book of Mr. Grantham's sent to me: The title, Hear the Church. Where he hath several things, new fancies, to take with them who have a mind to Admire him. He talks of Church-Officers which he calls Messengers. All Gospel Preachers I hope are Messengers in one sense: If orderly called, they are all sent. Rom. 10. 15. {αβγδ}. I know very well, there are Messengers, properly so called, and have known the practise about Fifty years since: but for Messengers in his sense, they are but his new invented Officers. I would have spoken to his Text in Revel. 2. Angels, but 'tis not worth the while; the man mistakes the Texts much, to make them serve his Notion.  
He tells his Brethren( as he calls them) p. 41. Our Learned Adversaries, are wont to amuse weak Christians, by telling them they know not the Originals; there he gives them help, by telling them how vain and pernicious this talk is about the Originals.  
If that be Vain and Pernicious, I am sure what he writes about the Hebrew and the Greek, is so Vain and Ridiculous, that I would not foul Paper to give him an Answer to it.  
But p. 43. there is something requires an Answer: There he falls upon Papists and most Paedobaptists, Who while they seem to admire General Councils and Fathers, regard not the Decrees of the best Councils and Fathers in Act. 15. but without all Conscience of these Decrees, seed upon blood: On the other side, how rigidly do they impose the Decrees of the Council of Trent, in the Case of Transubstantiation, though never heard of before it was there invented, &c. Let the Papists bear their shane for their Persecution.  
For eating of Blood( in that manner we eat it) a few words. Considering, First, That the not eating of Blood was one of the seven Laws of Noah, without the observance of which, no gentle was admitted to be so much as a proselyte of the Gate. Considering Secondly, what James saith, Act. 15.21. which was the ground of the decree, Moses was red every Sabbath day in the Synagogues, where they heard eating of Blood forbidden. Now lest the eating of Blood should be a stumbling-block to the unbelieving Jews, and hinder their coming in to the Gospel, and an offence to the believing Jew, who did not as yet so clearly see the mind of God in that Law, no not( I believe) so long as the Temple stood, the head of the Ceremonial Law; therefore they made those Decrees, and sent them to the Believing Gentiles to forbear Blood.  
But let the Reader observe Levit. 17.10. where the eating of Blood is the most severely prohibited, in the 11 v. the Lord gives the reason of the Prohibition, the end of it, The Blood maketh the Atonement for the Soul: The end was, that men might be kept in Faith and Expectation of the Blood of Christ, by which our Atonement is made, Col. 1.20. Eph. 2.13, 14.  
1. Hence Now, let them who say that the Blood whereby our Atonement is made with God, is not yet  shed, let them, I say, forbear to eat Blood.  
2. Let those that say Christ hath not taken down the Partition-wall( in which Wall, Blood was one ston) between Jew and gentle, Eph. 2.14. let them forbear Blood.  
3. Let them that believe some things are unclean of themselves, across to the Apostle, Rom. 14.14. and that Blood is so, let them forbear Blood.  
But I believe in the Blood of Atonement  shed; I believe the Partition-wall is broken down, and that nothing is unclean of itself; therefore I will eat a Blood-pudding, if it be prepared S. A. and Bless God for it.  
As for Transubstantiation, which you say was never heard of before it was invented in the Council of Trent; what gross Ignorance does Mr. Grantham declare in the Councils? let him but red the Lateran Council held under Pope Innocent the 3d, in the Year 1215. about three hundred and thirty Years before the Council of Trent, which began Anno 1545. and let him there see if he cannot find Transubstantiation, as well as that Cursed Doctrine of the Pope's Power to Depose Kings determined: Yet this is the Man whom his Creatures admire.   

Scripture-Warrant SUFFICIENT PROOF FOR INFANT-BAPTISM: BEING A Reply to Mr. GRANTHAM's Presumption no Proof.  
IN your Preface to your Reader, you tell him, I hold it no convenient time for Dissenters to writ one against another; why then did you not hold to your own Opinion? but it seems you can hold, and not hold: Or if Mr. Petto upon a Schismatical and very Irregular Act of one of your persuasion in his Church, wrote a small Treatise very soberly to stablish his People in the Lawfulness of Infant-Baptism, and you must therefore writ against him; yet why must you needs writ against me, since it was four years, as you tell your Reader, since I wrote that small Treatise upon the Question; which I had not then done, had not one of yours required me in way of common Justice to Mr. Danvers, to Publish- what I had delivered against his Book; nor had I concerned myself with his Book( for I did grudge the time I spent about it) but that a young Anabaptist, who had been my Hearer, boasted it was unanswerable.  
In the end of that small Treatise, I propounded two Questions,( if men would be Writing) to have them answered: In your Preface, you tell your Reader, They seem to be serious and considerable; and in pag. 2. you tell us, Some said they were unanswerable; yet in pag. 3. you call the first an unlearned Question 
Senties qui vir sum. ; how well your great Learning have answered these, the sequel will declare.  
Before you come to my Question, you tell your Reader, He plays a little with some Arguments, rather of other mens devising than his own.  
One Argument I borrowed from Mr. Baxter, and tell you so, but I improved it another way different from Mr. B. and so that all you have said against it signifies nothing; for any other Arguments, I know not one that I have took from others. I have several Books against Anabaptists sent me, I know not that I have red four Leaves in any of them together; it's well known I have not time to red Books: I scorn to do as Mr. Wills tells Mr. Danvers he hath done, to take 43 Pages together, for the substance, out of Mr. tombs, all the while concealing his Name, contrary to the Law of Ingenuity; and calls him therefore a Notorious Plagiarie.  
As for an Anabaptist, you tell me, You know no such Creature, &c. Though Presumption be no Proof, as you say, yet understanding what your Parents were, I may presume strongly that they would have you baptized when you were an Infant; and if you were then Baptized, and Baptized again afterwards, then I may well join the Preposition {αβγδ}, with Baptist: But you deny your Infant-Baptism( as you do mine) to be Baptism, that was Sprinkling; I shall talk with you about this anon, when I answer for myself.  
You tell me, I have got Infant-Baptism into a little Corner: Not so little as your Mr. Danvers, who tells us, The Elect-regenerate are the subjects of Baptism; which caused those Reflections you tell me of.  
For Baptism being a visible Ordinance, belonging to a visible Church, visible Believers in Christ, who do not by a scandalous Conversation give the lie to their Profession, these with their Seed have a right to the Ordinance of Baptism; and this is not so little a Corner as Elect-regenerate.  
As to what you tell me, We do not find one Infant in the Jewish Church, nor in any other, during the Apostles dayes, Baptized; this, with Where do you find a Positive Command to Baptize Infants? is the sum of all you can say, and have been answered so often, that it is a tedious thing to writ any more about it: Yet premising some things,( not stolen out of other Authors, as you falsely charge me) I will give my Answer, though it is very like some have given at least some of the Answers before.  
That some Infants have been under a Church-Ordinance, is agreed on both sides; now what our Lord did in answering the Pharisee's Question about Divorce, I will do the same here: He Math. 19.8. leads them to the Beginning; so I will go to the Beginning, and inquire, how came this about, what was the Foundation of it? we find it a Covenant God made with Abraham and his Seed, Gen. 17.7. Here's the Beginning.  
Let me with humble Reverence to that Tremendous Majesty, conceive the great God thus Treating with Abraham.  
Abraham, thou( with thy Father Terah) livest here in Mesopotamia 
Acts 7.2. , among Idolaters, and thou servest other gods as they do 
Josh. 24.2, 14, 15. ; but from my own free Love to thee 
Deut. 4.37. , I that am the only living and true God do now appear unto thee 
Acts 7.2. : Come out of Haran, and follow me to a Land which I will show thee; there will I bless thee, make thee a Blessing; yea, so bless thee, that in thee shall all Families of the Earth be blessed 
Gen. 12.1, 2, 3. : And though I am the absolute Sovereign of the whole World, and need not be tied to any Creature, yet for the sake of him that shall come from thee according to the flesh 
Rom. 9.5. , in whom all the Families shall be blessed; I will make a Covenant with thee 
Gen. 17.4. , and not only with thee, but I will make an everlasting Covenant to be a God to thee and thy Seed 
Gen. 17.7. ; yea, with thy little ones 
Deut. 29.11, 12, 13. , they shall be mine 
Ezek. 16.20.21. : And though you may trust me upon my Word, yet to tie myself more sure to thee and thy Seed, and to strengthen your Faith in my Covenant, I will add a Seal to my Covenant, and this shall be administered to thy Seed when they are but eight dayes old 
Gen. 17.10, 11, 12. : To your seed will I give my Statutes and my Judgments, which I will not do to other Nations 
Psal. 147.19, 20. : Now upon my dealing thus with your Seed, I require that they shall cleave only to me their God, and have nothing to do with the gods of the other Nations about them: Observe the Statutes and Judgments which I shall give them 
Deut. 10.12, 20. Exod. 23.13.  And as for me, I know your Seed shall meet with abundance of troubles; but as they have me an All-sufficient God 
Gen. 17.1.  in Covenant with them, so in all their troubles, be they National or Personal, be they Bodily, be they Spiritual, let them look no further than their God in Covenant with them. If any of them sin against me, as be sure they will, and their Consciences accuse them, and fill them with the fears of my Wrath, let them repent, and lay hold upon me in this Covenant, and they shall find me a merciful God, pardoning Iniquity, Transgression and Sin 
Exod. 34.6, 7. Mica. 7.18. 2 Chron. 33.12. He humbled himself greatly before the God of his Fathers; with whom God was in Covenant. : Are any of them afflicted and wounded with the vileness and corruption of their Hearts, they cannot purge them, they cannot love me, and walk with me as they would do? let them come to me their God in Covenant, consider the Seal of my Covenant, and I their God can and will help them: I will circumcise their Hearts to love me 
Deut. 30.6. , &c. And thus, Abraham, what I do with thee and thy Seed, the same will I do with others that are not thy Seed after the flesh, but they own and give up themselves to me thy God, and shall endeavour to keep my Statutes, as I require of thee and thy Seed, they shall partake, and their Seed with them, of the same Covenant, and Seal of my Covenant which thou dost 
Gen. 17.12, 13.   
Many Believers in Christ to come, there were before Abraham, why did not God make this Covenant with Enoch, Noah, or some others of them? What is that to us? Elihu tells us, Job 33.13. He giveth not account of any of his matters?  
Here we have the beginning where the Lord expressly declares the Seed of Believing Abraham, to be visible members of the visible Church with him, sealing both Him and Them with the same seal of the Covenant, which was made both with Him and Them. If God hath now since Christ is come, nulled and repealed this Covenant with Abraham and his Seed, I say, if this can be infallibly proved, the controversy between us and the Anabaptists is at an end; for then, no Covenant, no Seal.  
But this the Anabaptists must prove by express Scriptures, else we shall not believe them. For,  
1. They require of us positive command, to administer the Seal of the Covenant to Infants. Baptism is a Seal of the Covenant of Grace: Gods Covenant with Abraham and his Seed was no Covenant of Works I am sure. To be a God to a Soul, is the Highest God can go; there is nothing above God. This is wont to be called Anima Faederis, the Soul of the Covenant of Grace; remove the Covenant then first by express Scriptures. They who will buy by one Bushel, and sell by a less, we know what we call them in English. If you will buy by express and positive weights, then sell by such weight.  
2. God never made any Covenant with his people, but if he repealed the Covenant, he did it himself expressly, and not leave it to us to prove the repealing of it by consequences, which we frame.  
( 1.) He makes a Covenant with Abraham and his Seed, Gen. 17.7.  
( 2.) He makes a Covenant with Israel, Deut. 5.2, 3. God made a Covenant with us in Horeb, God made not this Covenant with our Fathers but with us, Exod. 20. and Ch. 24.7, 8.  
( 3.) God made another Covenant with Israel, in the Land of Moab, beside the Covenant he made with them in Horeb, Deut. 29.1. from 9. to the 16. v.  
As to the Covenant made at Horeb, or Sinai, the Lord expressly repeals it, Hob. 8.13. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old, is ready to vanish away.  
As to the Covenant in Exodus, and Deuteronomy; when this people rejected the promised Seed to Abraham, the Lord Jesus, Away with him, crucify him, Luke 23.18, 21. and continued in hardness and unbelief, God breaks his Covenant with them, expressly, Zech. 11.10. This Covenant of God with them, was their Beauty. This staff cut asunder, that I might break my Covenant, which I had made with all the people. Rom. 11.19, 20. The Branches were broken off because of unbelief. Hos. 1.9. Call his name Lo-ammi, for ye are not my people, and I will not be your God.  
1. But with whom did God break this Covenant? not with the poor of the flock, who believed in Christ, and waited upon him, Zech. 11.11. Not with those whom he had command to Feed, v. 7. The little remnant with whom the Covenant stood firm, thô the body of the Nation were rejected.  
2. Nor doth he break this Covenant with the Children first, but he cast off the Parents first, and with them their Children.  
As for the Children of Abraham actually believing in Christ come, that God indeed will continue to be their God, and seal the Covenant to them, as he was and did before, but not to their seed, as he was and did before Christ came, name the Scripture that expressly speaketh this.  
3ly. If God hath repealed this Covenant with Believers Seed, then Paul was quiter out, Eph. 2.12. in his setting forth the miserable state of us Gentiles, compared with the Jews, viz. That we were strangers from the Covenants of Promise. And in Rom. 9.4. amongst the privileges the Jewish Church had, the Covenants are numbered for one; and among those Covenants I am sure this with Abraham and his Seed is one; yea the Covenant and the Seal are so conjoined, that the Seal is called the Covenant, Gen. 17.10. Act. 7.8. But as for us, not one Covenant did ever God make with us, thô three times at least, we find him Covenanting with them. But it seems that part of our misery is still upon us, and not only so, but the believing Jews themselves have this misery befallen them by embracing Christ, as to their Seed, from which they were free before: They have lost their privilege, and their Children as well as ours, are now become, Strangers to the Covenants of Promise: But will any man that is not corrupt, but believes the Scriptures; say, that Paul was out, he erred in this.  
4ly. There is such a dishonour offered to Christ, that he by his Sacrifice should break down the middle wall of Partition, Eph. 2.14, 15. between the Jews and us Gentiles, and make of twain, One; and now set up the Partition wall between the Believing Jew and his Seed, and make of One, twain, dividing between the root and the branch, and now their Seed are no part of the House, v. 19. So expressly contrary to the discourse of the Apostle from the 13th. v. to the end of the Chapter, that unless God had expressly revealed it( then I am sure these verses had never been written) they must be given up to a strange Delusion, that can receive these Anabaptists Doctrine.  
From these grounds I answer, to your Positive Command to baptize Infants.  
( 1.) There was no need that Christ should give any such Command. For,  
1. There is nothing more in Baptism, which should make Children Subjects more uncapable of receiving it, and us to Administer it to them, than was in Circumcision.  
2. All Christs Apostles were Jews, bread up in the Jewish Church, and they knew very well the Covenant of God with Abraham and his Seed, and what their daily practise was in administering Circumcision to Infants, a Seal to the same Covenant that Baptism is.  
3. Infants now have as much need of the benefits signified and sealed in Baptism, as they had then under Circumcision.  
4. The business then, and what took up the minds of the Apostles, was not baptizing of Infants, as how to bring men over to the Faith of the Gospel, to believe in this Christ, the promised Seed; they who did believe in Christ, did declare their Faith in him, by being baptized into him: But believing was the business above baptizing. So the Apostle, 1 Cor. 1.17. Christ sent me not to Baptize, but to Preach the Gospel: That Baptizing of Adult Persons, was not the thing they so much laboured in, as to have men believe in Christ, thò they did baptize Believers, 'tis true.  
5. Had the Apostles removed Circumcision, and left no ordinance for their Infants in the room of it, but shut the door against them, who had been a thousand years in the Church with their Parents under an Ordinance; this would have been an Objection of weight against the Apostles, and hindered the Gospel spreading; they should have heard of it with both ears, and we should have red of it, who red so much what a stir there was for removing, and changing a Bloody and Painful Ordinance for a Better.  
6. We red of the Baptizing of whole Housholds. Children use to be reckoned as members of our Houses, they were of Gods House once, and are still, if I mistake not the Text, Ephes. 2.19. While Paul tells us, We Gentiles who were before Aliens from the Common-wealth of Israel, v. 12.( and were not Children then members of the Commonwealth of Israel?) are now fellow Citizens— and of the household God. And it is much that in all the Housholds Paul baptized, there should be no Children.  
7. Baptizing of the Children of proselytes in their admission into the Jewish Church, Dr. Lightfoot,( a great searcher into the practices of that Church) tells us, was so known, so frequent, and usual, that there is scarce any thing more known and usual. And if so, no wonder thô we red nothing of the Baptizing of Infants; the Baptizing of the Parents who were not so, that is chiefly Recorded, and their Baptizing into the Christian Faith.  
( 2.) As there was no need of a new positive Command, so had our Lord intended that the Seed of the Jews believing in Christ now come, should be denied to be visible members of the Church, as they were before, and debarred from the initiating ordinance which they had before; I am assured and confident, he would have declared it expressly. It being so contrary to Abrahams Covenant, under which all his Seed had lived to this day, wherein Christ suffered from Abrahams time. In him all the Nations of the Earth shall be blessed, he  told Abraham; and is this a blessing, to turn all our Seed out of the Covenant, and deny then the Seal of it to them, which we enjoyed before he suffered? Verily, he that was so careful to remove a Mosaical Law out of the way, about the eating of unclean Creatures, Acts 10.14, 15, 16. that it might not be a stumbling block to Peter now going to the Gentiles, and by this repeal of that Law, the Jews might admit, and eat Swines flesh at their Table; would he I say be so clear and express, to tell the Jews, they might bring a Hog into their House, and would he not be as clear and express, in turning the Seed of Abraham out of his House, in which they had been longer than Moses Law against Hogs, and deny them the Seal of his Covenant, which so long they had enjoyed? Let any considerate man who is not miserable blinded, judge.  
( 3.) From that Text, Acts 2.38, 39. Monsieur claud, a very learned French-man, and Sufferer in this last French-Persecution, but now dead, answered his Popish adversary, telling him, That remaining in the Principles of his Sect, he could have no rational assurance of the validity of his Baptism; that the Baptism of Infants was good, and that the Anabaptists were in an error, hence he must return to the Communion with the Church of Rome.  
He tells him, he need say but a word to that, Acts 2.38, 39. This Scripture, saith he, hath clearly established Infant. Baptism. For since Baptism ought to be given to them to whom the Promise is made, and that is made to our Children as well as to us, it ought to be given not only to us, but unto our Children.  
Your Mr. Grif.  told us this was no command to baptize, but an encouragement. But I pray do the Scriptures use to encourage us to that, which is not our Duty? When God made that Everlasting Covenant as he calls it, between Abraham and his Seed, there is command strict enough given to Seal it, Gen. 17.9, 10, 11, 14. And thô the Seal be changed, as the Worship of God in the New Testament is changed from what it was in the Old Testament; yet the second Command binds us to observe it, and keep it pure; so that command binds us to Seal the Covenant, v. 9. for he calls the Seal the Covenant.  
And because the word {αβγδ} Children, is used in this Text, I shall give the Reader notice how you would cheat him, in telling him the signification of the Word, p. 5. {αβγδ} signifies Offspring of growth or Stature, but {αβγδ} signifies an Infant; say you. But does it signify onely so; you would persuade your Reader so, telling him but {αβγδ} signifies an Infant.  
Let the Reader that hath skill in the Greek tongue, see where the word is the first time ●used in the New Testament, Math. 2.18. Did Rachel weep only for her Children of growth and Stature? what age these Children were of, v. 16. tells us, from two years old, {αβγδ}, and not any above two, but under two downward, if to a fortnight or week old; thus again, 1 Thess. 2.7. as a Nurse cherisheth her {αβγδ} Children. What onely her Children of growth and stature? I  told over two and twenty Texts more where the word is used properly, and signifies little Children as well as Children of growth; and two or three of them principally, little Children; and that {αβγδ} signifies onely an Infant; then Timothy knew the Scriptures when he was an Infant, 2 Tim. 3.15. Thô this word we never contend about.  
Thus you do with the word Baptize; but of this in its place.  

CHAP. II.  
NOw I come to my unlearned Question, as you call it.  
Q. Since God was so gracious to make a Covenant with Abraham and his Seed, and it did then consist with his Wisdom to constitute his Church of Parents and Children, while the Parents did Believe in Christ to come; why may it not consist with his Grace to continue that Covenant, and with his Wisdom still to constitute his Gospel Church of Parents and Children, the Jews now believing in Christ, come?  
I might have added in my Question, that Covenant Sealed 
Gen. 17.9. Will force it seems to carry, If no Seal no Covenant, the Seal being called the Covenant. ; but Mr. Tombs, who is the strongest adversary to Infant-Baptism that ever wrote, he yields that if Children be members of the Church with Parents, then they must be Baptized; for I grant( saith he) that Baptism is the way and manner of solemn Admission into the Church, I mean the Regular way. And we were  told by one of this party, that Baptism is the Form of a Church; and would bear us down that Dr. own hath delivered the same, and this he urged with great zeal.  
If then no Baptism, no Church: for forma est causa per quam res est, id quod est. The same Person denied all Baptism but by Dipping: Whence it follows clearly, there are no Churches in the world, but these dipped Churches; hence they deny Communion with all Churches, for they want the Form.  
Let me before I come to consider his Answer, to add one Scripture more besides what I have mentioned before, that is, Rom. 11.28, 29. which speaks of these Jews broken off. Touching the Election( I conceive thô it be true as to eternal Election, yet that is not here properly meant, but that choice of them for his peculiar people, which Moses mentions twice together, Deut. 7.6, 7.) they are beloved( with a Love of good will to them still) for their Fathers sake( not merit of them, but because he loved thy Fathers, Deut. 4.37. And because he made his Covenant with their Fathers to be a God to them, and their Seed, which these Jews are; descending from th●●● Fathers, even in the latter daies if they return to the Lord their God 
Return they shall. Rom. 11.26. 2 Cor. 3.16. , he will not forget the Covenant of thy Fathers.) Deut. 4.30, 31.  
For the gifts and calling of God, &c. v. 29. Take the words with respect to the Jews of whom he spake before, choosing and Adopting the Posterity of Abraham, and engaging himself by Covenant to them, are inviolable; their privileges shall be as high as ever, not shut out of the Church from their Parents, and denied an Ordinance, as now the Anabaptists do.  
I demanded a Scripture to prove, it doth not consist with the Grace and Wisdom of God, &c. I have given you several Scriptures, after the Constitution of the Church in Abraham, and you tell me of a Covenant of grace made with the whole world in the promised Seed to Adam, and that Adam, Noah and all little Children lived under a Covenant of Grace more than 2000. years, during all which time no Infant( you might as well say neither Adam, or Noah) was concerned in Circumcision or Baptism, and yet were as much of the Church as was needful for their Salvation, &c.  
And to what purpose is all this? your learned answer to my unlearned question signifies nothing. Was that my Question, Whether there were any Covenant of grace before this with Ahraham? or whether any were saved before Abrahams Covenant? I pray Mr. Grantham study your logic better, and understand what that fallacy Ignoratio Elenchi is, which now is yours, before you make such a noise of disputing Doctors out of the room.  
One word about Noah, then I will tell you what my Question is. If by Noah's Covenant you understand a Covenant of Grace, I am not clear in that: I take that to be a Covenant with all the Creatures as well as with Noah, that God will drown the world no more: So the Rainbow which commonly appears with rain, is both a sign and seal of this Covenant. God use to seal his Covenants. But why should God make a Covenant and seal it with Creatures that do not understand it? red our first Annotations on Gen. 9.10. And you shall find this: The Covenant of God may be made with, and the Seal of the Covenant applied to Creatures that have not the use of reason; which may serve to refute the Anabaptists fancy in denying the Administration of Baptism no Infants.  
Hence I put the Attribute of Wisdom, as well as Grace into my question, because the Arguments which the Anabaptists bring against Infant-baptism, do as much strike at the wisdom of God, in making a Covenant with the seed of Abraham, and commanding them to be Circumcised on the eighth day. What? to make a Covenant with them that do not understand it? to Circumcise and seal a Covenant with them at eight days old, when they do not understand it? what to have children members of the Church with parents, when they do not understand it? Let them stay for this Covenant, Circumsicion, and Church-membership, till they be rather eighteen years old, that they may understand these things, and see whether they do believe, repent, and walk as their Father did with God; then admit them. This is the Anabaptists wisdom in denying Infant-Baptism.  
Now I come to my question, and shall make it appear your answer signifies nothing. You tell me of a Covenant of grace made with the whole world in the promised seed to Adam, &c. I tell you, while Adam, Noah, and Abraham lived under that Covenant made with the whole world, God was pleased to make a Covenant with Abraham, and with none other but Abraham, that he would be his God, and the God of his Seed, and sealed this Covenant: by which Covenant God did separate, and Divide all Abrahams seed from the world, living under that Covenant you speak of. Hence we poor Gentiles believing in Christ, are called Abrahams Seed, Gal. 3.29. not Adam's Seed. Hence Abraham is called the Father of all Believers three times in Rom. 4.11.16.18. not Adam, nor Noah. Hence believing Gentiles, are said to be grafted into Abrahams stock, Rom. 11.17. not into Adam's, nor Noah's.  
Hence my question is, By what Scripture warrant you Reduce our children into the State of the Children of Adam, or Noah, &c. since we are never called any of their Children, but only Abrahams; whose seed differ from theirs by a special Covenant made with them, and sealed to them? To which of them did God say, I will be the God of thy Seed, and I will seal to it?  
Now suppose that were true, which is the great business of your Pomphlet, to prove, That all Infants dying such are saved; that thereby you might take off the Odium which lies upon you, for shutting the Children of Believers out of the Church, and denying them Baptism, they being all under a Covenant of Grace made with Adam, as you say; yet tell me,  
1. Is this Covenant of God with Abraham's seed in Vain? does the Holy One make vain Covenants? As to his Seed, they were well enough before under Adam's Covenant; if they die, or if Isaac die before he be eight daies old he is saved, so that this Covenant might have been spared.  
2. If their seed die while little ones, I hope they are not further from Salvation by this Covenant, nor have Parents the less hope of their Salvation by it, but I think much more. Two strings to a bow are good.  
3. Doth God discover his Grace to Sinners more than needs? I am sure this Covenant, and Seal manifest Grace.  
4. Can poor, lost, undone Sinners have too many ways to lay hold upon a Holy, Just God, when they are under their fears and sense of Sin? And have not the Seed of Believers one way to lay hold upon God by this Covenant made with their believing Parents, when their hearts would be returning to God? I appeal to all judicious Christians, sound in judgement, and upright in heart. As to the experience I have found, and declared it to others, you make a scoff at me. p. 6. I will be with you by and by, Mr. Grantham.  
Yet again, as to that notion wherein you so much glory, and have made five remarkable Demonstrations, as you call them, to prove it; you must make three more Demonstrations or else these five will not do the feat.  
1. That God saves those who are under that Covenant, without any Condition; that Covenant having no Condition in it. Name the Text I pray. Some of yours have name Rom. 5.18. but the Righteousness of Christ mentioned in that Text, is the material or meritorious cause of our justification from all Sin, Adams Sin, Original Sin, and Actual Sin. But how this righteousness comes to be Ours, whether with a Condition, or not, it speaks nothing. So that from that Text an Infant can argue no more for its Justification and Salvation, than an Adult person. It onely tells us there is such a righteousness provided by Christ, by which we are justified, but if it be not imputed to us, neither Infant nor Adult person is the better. How it comes to be Ours, other Texts tells us. Rom. 3.30. Rom. 5.1. Rom. 10.4. &c. 2. If we be justified from Adams Sin onely, are we then justified to life, as the Text speaks? I think not. I Suppose we shall find some other Sin in Infants tho' Mr. Grantham and his followers deny it.  
Hence Mr. Griffiin, when he had  told me, tho' I was an old Man, yet I might learn; very true, Mr. Griffin, but what shall I learn? This? God saves Infants dying such, out of the Covenant of Grace. Not by it; or under it, but out of it? This was News indeed, I never heard it before, nor believe it after: But by this, he avoids( if it were true) Faith and Repentance, the Conditions of the Covenant.  
2. You must Demonstrate, that by this Covenant he saves those who have lost the Image of God, and are corrupt by nature, for Infant Regeneration, and Heart circunctsing is denied by yours, and you.  
3. You must Demonstrate, that tho' Infants have not actually sinned, against the Covenant of Grace, yet they have not Unbelief and Impenitency seminally, which are quiter opposite to the Covenant of Grace.  
You ask, at the end of your first Demonstration, p. 21. As for poor Infants, what evil have they done? but I ask,  
1. How are Infants born?[ of this afterwards.]  
2. Do you ask what have they done? Did you never see Revenge, Wrath, Pride, Envy, Self-Love, Rebellion against, and striking of Parents, acting in little Children? Blessed Austin observed a sucking Child, that was not able to articulate a word, look with a Countenance even pale with envy upon his fellow suckling, which shared with him in the same milk; which made that Holy Man cry out, Ubi Domine? quando Domine? Where was the Place, when was the Time, that I was an Innocent Creature?  
Yes, Sir, Mr. Grantham will tell you, Infants are innocent. p. 13. This is the first part of your Answer.  
2. Then you come to a Second, and that is, by putting a Question to me; therein telling me, my unlearned Question is guilty of no more Reason than this: Since God was so Gracious, and it did consist with his Wisdom, to give Abraham a Command to offer up his beloved Son, as a sign of Christ to Come; why may it not consist with his Grace and Wisdom, for us of our own heads, without any Command from God, to offer up every one his dearest Child, in remembrance that Christ is come?  
Ay, now you stitch it, Mr. Grantham; you tell me, p. 6. That I was asleep when I was Baptized: You do so jog me, Mr. Grantham, with these words, Fables, Fancy, Conceit, and your Scoffs, with which you are pleased to fill up your Lines, that I think I shall be awake by that time I come at it, to Answer it: But for the present, you have laid such a Question to mine, to illustrate how much Reason my Question was guilty of, that if when you laid your Pieces together to make up any Garment, you did not lay them more even together, you were but a plain Botcher.  
Come, lay the Questions together.  
1. My Question is about a Gracious Covenant, lay your Question to it, Is it a Gracious Covenant? Did God give this Commandment to Abraham to offer up Isaac, that it should be an Example to us, to cut our Childrens Throats when he commands it? Did God ever command others to do it? But God made this Covenant with all Abraham's Seed, and strictly commanded them all to keep the Seal of it, upon the danger of Cutting them off else, as Moses had like to have found it.  
2. How do you prove that the end of God in Commanding Abraham to offer his Son, was, that it should be a Sign of Christ to come? the Text saith plainly, Gen. 22.1. The Lord tempted Abraham: The end was to try Abraham's Obedience; whence v. 12. he saith, Now I know thou fearest God. 2. If so, then Isaac's Throat must have been Cut and die: As all the Sacrifices which did typify Christ, they were all killed; though it was in his Will, so it was in Christs Will, and Actually done.  
3. Gods Act towards Abraham in this Case was an Act of mere sovereignty, but his Act in my Question was an Act of mere Grace: You say so indeed, but 'tis not true, it was a great Tempting of Abraham.  
4. There is a vast difference between a Command and a Promise: In my Question it runs thus, Abraham, I will be thy God and Isaac's God; in your Question it is, Abraham, go Cut Isaac's Throat: A great difference between what God will do and we should do.  
5. Come we then to Circumcision, which was a painful Ordinance, and therein the sovereignty of God and his Command did appear; yet considering it as it was a Seal added to the Covenant, and did thereby help to confirm their Faith, in the Grace and Faithfulness of God, so it was also an Act of Grace; insomuch that,  
First, The Jews did glory in it, and did reproach the Gentiles that had it not, 1 Sam. 14.6. and 17.26. Ephes. 2.11.  
Secondly, They did so prise it, that it made a heavy stir in the Churches, when the Apostles went about to remove it; and to this day they do tenaciously retain it.  
To Conclude, my Question is grounded upon an everlasting Covenant, proceeding from the pure Grace of God, comfortable to Parents, comfortable and advantageous to ●oor Children, when they come to understand it; with a strict Command to have this Covenant upon their hearts, by impressing the Seal of it upon their Children in all their generations; which Covenant was never repealed to this day, and therefore that being in force, there is still a Seal belonging to it; which Seal is Baptism, in the room of Circumcision, as is clear, Col. 2.11, 12.  
[ As for your Carping at the Word, Command to Circumcise, I have spoken to it before.]  
Your Question is grounded upon a sovereign Command of God given to Ahraham in particular, without any Command to his Posterity to observe; nor ever was observed, but only by Abraham.  
Now, how this Question of yours serves to demonstrate the little Reason my Question is guilty of, as you tell me, let all men judge.  
The next three Paragraphs afford but little to take notice of: For,  
1. As for our keeping our Baptized Children so long from the Lords Table, I hope they must first be able to Discern the Lords Body, and to Examine themselves, 1 Cor. 11.28, 29. Though the Children were Circumcised at eight dayes old, yet they were not to eat the Passover till they came to such years of discretion, as to understand the meaning of the Ordinance; therefore their Fathers did teach them the meaning of it, when they took up the Lamb. But our Question is about the Initiating Ordinance, we would have our Children under that betimes, under a blessed Covenant sealed. God would not have them stay above eight dayes, unless the Child were Sick: And why eight? we let the Jewish reasons alone, leaving it with his Wisdom. God lays claim to them betimes; they are Mine, Ezek. 16.21. I and they are in Covenant. Sensible things, as their Afflictions in Egypt were, and set forth in the bitter Herbs which they eat, were sooner understood by Children, than spiritual things.  
2. Whereas he saith, Repentance and Faith were required of those who were Baptized: Very true, of Adult Persons, with whom Peter was Treating, Act. 2. who had Crucified that Christ in whom they now were to believe, and into whose Name they were to be Baptized, well might he call for Repentance. When Philip Baptized the Eunuch, Act. 8.37. If thou Believest, &c. in the Messiah now come: So was Abraham a Believer in Christ to come, before this Covenant was made with him and his Seed: Isaac was reputed with his Father a Believer in Christ, when he was Circumcised. So I have taught, and it was my practise, when I claimed the Covenant for my Child, and so dedicated my Child to him; to examine my Covenant-Interest, my Faith and Repentance, as well as if I were going to the Lords Supper; but that actual Faith and Repentance are required of Infants before Baptism, I know no Text nor Reasou, more than before Circumcision.  
3. He saith, We do not deny Infants to be of the Church.  
Yea, that is the Church I would fain have Mr. Grantham define, and tell us where it is: So far as I can learn by his Book, It is a Company of Innocents, without Sin, without Ordinances;( for so he speaks of Infants, as we shall see anon) but what next, I know not; nor do I know Churches without Ordinances; where the Gospel speaks of such, I keep myself to the revealed will of God, leaving secret things to him.  
Let him tell us how the word {αβγδ}, which comes {αβγδ}, ab evocando; because the Church is a Company Called out from the rest, as Mr. Grantham knows, being a learned graecian. How this agrees with this Innocent and Sinless Company, to be Called out!  
If you ask me, how it agrees with our Baptized little ones to be Called? I Answer. By being Branches of such a root as is called out of the World, they are called with him the Root and Branches going together, and they Members of the same Church with their Parents under Ordinances. As Isaac was reputed a Person called out in his Father Abraham, who was called out from the Idolaters, and was Circumcised under the same Ordinance with his Father.  
Therefore the Gospel gives to Parents and Children the same denomination: The Church is a Company of Saints, 1 Cor. 1.2. and 2 Cor. 1.1. So the Children of these Saints are called Saints, 1 Cor. 7.14. But now they are Saints, {αβγδ}: To Interpret this of Legitimacy, is so gross and absurd a Conceit, that I wonder it should come into any rational mans Thoughts: I have spoken to this in my little Treatise, and many other worthy Divines before me, have given the sense very clear and plain; but when God will blind mens eyes,( when before they will shut their eyes against the Light) how shall they see? But this Text will also warrant our practise.   

CHAP. III.  
HAving done with my first Question, you say, Let us hear your second Question; you shall Mr. Grantham, 'tis this.  
Q. If God hath repealed his Covenant with the believing Jews seed, turned their Children out of the Church, and deny them Baptism, though the Jews truly believe in Christ come; What hath God left in the room of these, that carry any show of his Blessing, or good will towards their Children during their Infant-state?  
Here you tell your Reader, there is Ambiguity in the Words, Covenant and Church: None at all, Mr. Grantham, you know the Covenant, and what the Church of the Jews was. You say, That I yield they were in the Covenant, and Church-members, before they were Circumcised: Very true, I hope we do not set our Seals before our Covenants; first Covenant, then Seal. Also, if they were not Members of the Church, they should not have the privilege of the Church; only their Membership is completed and Declared, when the Initiating Seal is applied to them. As it is in Corporations, the eldest Son of a Free-man, born in the Corporation, was a Member, and had a right to Freedom, but not complete, nor acted till he took his Oath; so the High Priest, Levit. 4.3. was not a complete High Priest, till he was Anointed.  
Then you come to tell me, what privileges the Jews Infants have now.  
( 1.) They were free from their Jewish Churchstate, Gal. 5.1.  
A. 1. What is this to the Infant that understands nothing of it, but was in as safe an Estate before, yea, and better? that Freedom is nothing to it while an Infant.  
A. 2. And they were free from Abraham's Covenant, That God was now none of their God, and also from a Seal of that Covenant: This is a privilege with a witness; do you and yours take it for me and mine. O wretched privilege! Do you call this Freedom?  
( 2.) They are devoted to God, by the Prayers of the Church; warranted therein by the example of Christ, when little Children were brought to him,— And accordingly we dedicate them to God, according to our Capacity.  
A. 1. If Praying for Children be a Dedication of them, then almost fifty years I have been Dedicating of Children to God; but I red of no Dedication that lasted one Month together in the Word. What, are you the People that only Devote and Dedicate your Children to God? I hope others as well as you, Pray and Fast for them as well as you. Do you think that Abraham, and those Holy Men of old did not pray for their Children, as well as Circumcise them? A pitiful answer.  
2. As for the example of Christ, it seems he will bless them; and blessed be his name he will do it. But one thing here, Mr. Grantham, I must put you in mind of, which I forgot, when you answered my first Question; Viz. Christ did not appoint those very Infants who were brought to him, to have his Ordinances imposed upon them, say you.  
A. Very true, Mr. Grantham, because they were under Ordinances already; these were Jews Children, not Gentiles, he was not sent to them as yet, nor must his Apostles go among them yet: As for Christian Baptism it was not yet instituted, and would you have him impose it before the institution.  
3. You tell me, by the Blessing of Education, some Children of 7. or 8. years old, have attained to more knowledge, and experience of the Work of Grace, who yet were never sprinkled, than multitudes of 70, or 80 years who were sprinkled.  
Ans. As for your word sprinkling, I will talk with you anon.  
1. And of those Children who were circumcised, multitudes of them, thô they attained not to such a knowledge of Christ;( he was not then so clearly revealed to their Fathers) yet for Knowledge and saving Grace, they had it as early as yours every whit; for all that we red of, that were godly in Scripture, were so from their Childhood; we red only of Manasseh, that was converted when Adult. So among us, many Infants baptized, before and since your error rose up to trouble the peace of the Churches, and to be an inlet to other errors; I say many Instances might be given of Children that before the age you mention, have discovered the sparklings of Grace. Old Mr. Blackerby that man of God, when he preached the Funeral Sermon for his own Daughter, Mr. Faircloughs first Wife, gave this Testimony of her, That from three years old, she did sincerely fear God. A Child of four years old of a Neighbour by me, when it went to School to learn its letters, when it came from School, would often go to the Father with these words, Father, I Love God, I love my Father, I love my Mother; but always first, I love God; the Child falls sick, the Mother asked it, Art willing to die? Yes, said the Child, I will go lie in Abrahams bosom. A Minister dining there, and returning thanks after dinner, the Child lying in the Cradle by, of its own accord lifted up its hands, while he was speaking, when he had done, let fall its hands and died. You that tell us, God does not circumcise the Hearts of Children, because they cannot love him: God confutes you.  
2. I deny not but God doth overlook the Infirmities of his People, and his Grace is Free, and so works in what Children he please.  
3. But still you declare a slighting of the Grace of God in that Covenant of God with Abraham and his Seed, which we do reverence, and bless his Name for; you take away that which is comfortable to godly Parents, and to poor Children be sure a great advantage; reducing the Children of the soundest believing Jews, into the same state with their Children who are the haters of Christ at this day.  
( 3.) The third privilege you tell me, is this, Our gracious God by Jesus Christ hath left us an open Declaration, that the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to Infants; in which Declaration he hath not excepted so much as one of them.  
A. 1. What is this to the Infant state of the believing Jew, when as the Jew that hates Christ at this day may say, This is as much Comfort to me; thô I hate and abhor to believe in your Messiah, and my Child is in as hopeful state as yours: yea so are all Pagans and mahometans.  
2. What, doth our Lord d●●●are, That all the Infants of the World dying such, are members of the Kingdom of Glory? It is not all one to say, the Kingdom of Heaven consists, as of Adult Persons, so, of little Infants; and to say, All Infants are members of the Kingdom of Heaven; these two Propositions differ, Mr. Grantham.  
3. If it be true, it was true before God Covenanted with Abraham to be the God of his Seed; surely there was some benefit to Abrahams Seed, more than was in that Covenant you talk of, else the Covenant was in vain. Did God say to Adam, I am the God of thee and thy Seed, and I will Seal my Covenant with thee, and thy Seed?  
4. What Comfort is this to the Seed of a believing Jew, when grown up, and hath the Sense of Sin and Apprehensions of the anger of God against him? Comfort? O what a Torment doth this prove to think, When I was an Infant if I had died, I had been saved: O that I had died then, but now I am grown up I shall be damned! so that 'tis a great misery to mankind, that God lets them live beyond the state of Infants; for let them die while Infants they are all saved, and what Parent that wisheth the happiness of Children, would not say, Let all my Children die while they are Infants, for then they are Innocent; if Mr. Granthams Doctrine be true; they should never sin against God, and certainly be saved. But the Child of a Believing Jew grown up, and his Conscience awakened, now repenting hath a God in Covenant with him by Abrahams Covenant, to lay hold upon. Only Mr. Granthams Wisdom scoffs at it.  
These be your privileges; and now you add, From all which you may see, God hath left us in the room of Circumcision( and of the Covenant of being their God; why is this left out and Circumcision onely put in? This is Taylour-like indeed, when they carry home a Garment, and stolen out cloath, that is kept behind. So you are summing up your discourse, and tell your Reader of a Legal Rite, and keep back the Covenant, the main of all, this is base Theft indeed:) a far more excellent Testimony of his saving Pleasure concerning Infants, than that was or any legal Rite whatsoever.  
And I say, by all which your Reader, if he be not blind, may see, how you labour to delude your silly People with words; pretending to show your great learning in answering my two unlearned Questions, when as they stand unanswered; and I doubt not but the Seed of a believing Jew in Christ may well say, If this be all we get by our Parents believing in Christ come, which this Anabaptist talks of, give us the old Dispensation again: When we had a God in Covenant to go too, and a Seal of his Covenant to help our Faith; for now we have neither, and so our state is more miserable by Christs coming than it was before.  
As for your Book of your Anti-Quaeries, to which you refer me; I will not give so much as a small Needle for it, I have enough of you, by what I red in this.  
As for Bishop Barlow, if he be of your judgement, as you present him, yet I Question whether he be dipped: Ask him I pray, and bid him not reject the Counsel of God against himself, as you tell me I do.   

CHAP. IV.  
I Thought I had done with you, when you had answered my Questions, but it seems no: There are several other faults you find with me, and the first is about Election in my Sense.  
I do not find the word Election mentioned in the p. 90. which you direct me to; how then can you know my Sense of it? nor do you tell me what is your Sense; this would run us into another controversy, and then my Book would swell into that bigness, which I resolve it shall not.  
Then you tell your Reader, Whilst his Book may cause many weak Readers to think that Circumcision did, and that Infant Baptism doth great things towards their Salvation, &c.  
I do not make your Baptism by Dipping to be of that concernment to Salvation, that none shall be saved without it: but a few words to both.  
And first for Circumcision, because your party  told me, God circumcised the Heart of no Infants, and will not have them to be included in the Seed, Deut. 30.6. but onely Adult persons; for Infants cannot love God, as it is there set down. No more can you, thô you be Adult, answer it, Legally. But that God did not circumcise the Hearts of any Infants, then, this I do not believe, upon this ground.  
I cannot conceive, how it can consist with the Wisdom, Holiness, and Goodness of God, to Institute an Ordinance in his Church, for Spiritual and Saving Ends, and strictly to command this Ordinance to be administered to such subjects( as Children of eight dayes old) which are not capable to understand the ordinance, nor Co-work with God in the ordinance; and he himself not to work with his own Institution, when and where he pleaseth, to the good and benefit of that Subject to whom it is administered, this Subject having need of the Spiritual good Signified and Sealed thereby. It doth implicitly charge the Institution with Vanity: And I am confirmed the more in it, because all the godly mentioned in the old Testament, except Manasseh, were such as from their Childhood grew up in the service of God; so that I Question not, while man did circumcise the Flesh, God did circumcise the Heart. I gave you an instance of a Child that died before it was five years old, that did express this love to God. Your reason hath thus much strength in it, Because Infants express not the Acts of Rational Love, therefore they have not the principle of Rational Love in them.  
The same I may say for Baptism, being Christs own Institution, this in the hand of his Spirit accompanying it, when and where he pleaseth, shall be the mean to convey spiritual blessings to the Hearts of some Infants, and prove to them the true washing of Regeneration; which I ground upon, Eph. 5.26. Tit. 3.5. 1 Pet. 3.21. Where Sanctification, and Salvation twice, are given to Baptism as an Instrument in the Hand of the Spirit. How he doth it, I do not trouble myself to answer, I leave that to him that Institutes: If you can tell me how the water of Jordan cleansed Naamans leprosy, then possibly I may tell you. The word {αβγδ}, I do not now trouble myself about the signification, merely because I aim at brevity. How often do we meet with Christians educated under godly Parents, troubled, because they could not tell the Time, when God first began to work upon them; it hath proved to them a great objection against the soundness of their Work. But if God did begin his Work in their Baptism, and Parents followed God by Prayer, for the blessing of his Ordinance, and remembrance of his Covenant, how could they know it, by reflection upon themselves?  
As for that Joh. 3.5. Whether Baptism be meant by the Water there, is a Question very much controverted; I marvel to red Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Origen, &c. All that lived next the Apostles, yea Totus chorus Antiquitatis, as Marlorate saith, understanding Baptism by it, and yet all to be mistaken, our first Annotatours upon the Bible seem to speak well upon it: This I am satisfied in, that the common answer given to it, that it is but of the import with Mat. 3.11. Holy Ghost and Fire, is no answer to it. For God did never institute Fire, as he hath done Water to be an Element to constitute a Sacrament. But of all men the Anabaptists that put Salvation in Dipping,( whence that silly woman, who  told a Friend of mine, Had I died before I had been baptized( by Dipping she meant) I had perished;) they had need understand it so; then tho' Faith come by Hearing ordinarily,( I hope all born deaf shall not therefore be damned because they cannot hear, and so not believe) yet God hath not so tied up himself to one Instrument to work Grace by, because a Carpenter is tied to his Axe if he will hue his Timber.  
Obj. If so, then baptize all Children, yea and Men too.  
Ans. I deny the consequence. For Baptism is a privilege belonging to the Church, whereof the Children of visible Believers( being Saints, 1 Cor. 7.14.) are Members with their Parents; and therefore have a right to this initiating Ordinance, which Children out of the visible Church have not.  
Next you fall upon me for the Experience I have found of the benefit of the improving Abrahams and my Baptismal-Covenant( which I never thought the World should know, nor ever should have known it, had I not contrary to my own thoughts been drawn forth to appear publicly in this controversy,) your Sentence upon it is this.  
It would make a well man sick to see what work he makes of it, for after all his shifting from Post to Pillar, he only gets stomach to reject the Counsel of God against himself, Luke 7.30.  
For my rejecting the Counsel of God, the Holy God shall judge between you and me; and for what you scoff at, I leave it to learned, sound, and holy men to judge. But did all Children under Abraham, and their Baptismal-Covenant, improve them, and feel the advantage they have by them, in the time of their fears from sin, they would slight all the Anabaptists Books against Infant-Baptism as much as I do; and they might sell their Books to the Tobacco Shops for other uses.  
Come on then, Mr. Grantham, I will take your Sentence into pieces, and consider your words, Sickness, Post, and Pillar.  
Mr. Grantham is Sick, how shall we get him Cured? After some years Study of physic, I have been a Practitioner of it thirty years, and tho' I have not attained the skill in it some men have, yet if you dare trust yourself with me, I will assure you I will do you no harm, if I cannot do you good. But what is your disease, Mr. Grantham? I preached your writing to find it out; and at first I thought the signs did not agree; for in one place, p. 11. you writ thus: Infants, have no Iniquities for God to Remember, but only Original Sin to Pardon; and in several places you tell us, Infants are Innocent; now he must be a more cunning tailor than I am, who can stitch these two words, Innocency and Pardon together. I never knew Innocency needed pardon before; that Adam needed it before his Fall while he was Innocent, is a New Notion to me; but notwithstanding you would have us think you aclowledge Original Sin, that Infants are guilty of, yet this is only Peccatum Originans, by Imputation, but for that which is Peccatum Originatum( as Divines do distinguish) the inherent Corruption of our fallen Nature; this you plainly deny, by telling us they are Innocent, and corrupting that Text, Ephes. 2.3. And were by Nature the Children of wrath, most grossly and absurdly; so that I find your disease ly in your head, and you are very sick of the Disease called Pelagianism. A proud disease, to lift up sinful man, and debase the Grace of God; for you tell us that Text, Ephes. 2.3. p. 30. Is best interpnted of the Adult, and quoting the verses before, with some variation from the Text too, which ought not to be in Quotations, then you add, and so were by Nature Children of Wrath. I have not yet met with a man so audacious to put a word into a Text, which quiter varies the sense of the Text; yea and makes the Text speak absurdly. This is sure, they cannot be Children of Wrath by Nature, who are not Children of Sin against God by Nature; Sin onely causeth Wrath: But I pray tell us, Mr. Grantham, what is Nature? I thought Natura had been a Nascor, Natus. Which is first I pray, Nature, or Walking, and Working, which the verses before speak of? Can any Creature move from place to place, unless it be first an Animal, hath not an Animal a Locomotive Nature or Principle, and so this nature be the cause of the walking? The Child in the Lap hath a locomotive faculty, tho' as yet it cannot walk, it hath the nature; and so the corrupt nature is the cause of its walking Corruptly: this is excellent logic, the effect to be before the cause. If you consult learned Men, they tell you, That Nature, {αβγδ}, the word in the Text, Primo fignificat generationem ipsam, seu nativitatem. Ephes. 2.3. Secundo ipsam rei essentiam. Gal. 4.8. Tertio significat proprietatis rei essentiales. 2 Pet. 1.4.  
This is your Diseale Mr. Grantham, and I will give you a Receipt for the Cure of it, infallible I warrant you.  
R. Gen. 5.3. Adam begot a Son in his own Likeness, after his Image: The Hebrew words for Likeness, and Image, are both the same in Gen. 1.26, 27. God Created Man in his own Image, &c. These words, His own, in these two Texts are quiter opposite.  
Gen. 17.12. No need of circunctsing Isaacs Flesh at eight days old, if his Heart needed no Curcumcising at the same time. Deut. 10.16.& Ch. 30. v. 6. Add to these Job 14.4. Job. 15.4. Job 25.4. Psal. 51.5. John 3.6. Eph. 2.3. This is Divine Authority, Mr. Grantham.  
As for human Authority, Grotius on Luke 2.22. names several of the Learned Grecians, and their sayings, which show they were not ignorant of the Corrupt nature of Man; other learned Men, quote many places out of Plato, where he speaks the same thing. So Stobeus, yea Aristotle, tho' a great Friend to corrupt nature, yet aclowledge, there is in us somewhat {αβγδ}, naturally repugnant to right Reason. As for the Romans, there are Tully and Seneca, who speak so clearly of it, that I can but wonder at that judgement of God, in giving up Christians now, to such Blindness, that they cannot see that Evil which the Heathen who had onely the Light of nature, could see, and leave their Testimony against it; yet these men did not know that Original Sin by Imputation, which is all you aclowledge.  
One word more, Mr. Grantham, and so I will leave you as to this point; you have been a great Professor so long, a Teacher, a great Writer: I do but ask you, Were you never sensible of, humbled, and abased under the sense of this corrupt Nature? Then God keep me from the Conversion of those men, who never were so convinced of their vile nature, as to abhor and loathe themselves before God, under the Sense of it: as also from them, who are the chief cause of their own Conversion.  
I know well, you will allow Gods Grace and Help some room in Conversion: but there must be something of our own above that, else no Conversion, this Similitude will show it clearly. After the House of Commons have been a long time consulting about a Bill, red it over three times; sent it to the House of Lords, they have done so too, both Houses met in the Painted Chamber, and agreed; yet here is no Law, it must now be carried to the King, and if he saith, Le Roy le Veut, now it is a Law, and carrieth power with it, before it had no power; by this we see where the supreme Power lieth. Thus let the great God set himself to convert a Sinner, use all his moral Arguments, from Himself, Promises, Threats, &c. yet if it doth not please the Imperial Highness of the Will, to declare and give her Consent, all Gods Actings come to nothing; if it doth, then Conversion is wrought. Let God heal the understanding of its Blindness,( which is done by a Physical act) and now lay Divine objects before it clearly, that it seeth them as they are, God, Christ, Holiness, in their adequate goodness, Sin in its evil, and now work so sweetly and rationally, affecting the Will also by his gracious Presence with it, that now Sensu Composito, there is a consequential Necessity for the Will to follow the judgement, else it were Brutish; to talk of any kind of necessity, it is such an affront offered to the prerogative, and intolerable breach of the privileges of the Will, that there must be a Liberty left to her, to admit, or reject all Gods workings, else our ears are filled with out-cries. The way of working I speak of, gives too much Honour to Grace; and that God doth manifest Grace to one man more than to another, and consequently it would argue an Individual personal Election. Hence these men deny Regeneration to Infants, because the Honour of their great Diana, the Liberty of the Will, would be Eclipsed; for their Wills are not thought to act in their Regeneration. We shall hear you speak plain anon.  
Now for the Post, which is that, Mr. Grantham? you name this first, and it stands first in my Book, Gods Covenant with my Father Abraham; tho' you scoff at it, yet you spake very true, it is a Post indeed, not an Egyptian Reed, 2 King. 18.21. on which if a man lean, it will go into his hand. No, Mr. Grantham; I will venture still to trust and lean upon it, a very strong Post to lean on, when a Man is weak.  
Which is the Pillar? The next is my Baptismal Covenant, of which the Post was the ground: then this Post and Pillar, in which the Grace, goodness, faithfulness and Truth of God are engaged; the Blood and Spirit of Jesus, signified and Sealed unto my Faith embracing both, shall be to me as Jachin and Boaz the two Pillars in Solomon's Porch, 1 King. 7.21. to help bear up my infirm weak Soul in times of Temptation, for to them I hold. Now, mock on Mr. Grantham.  
One of your Tribe, a young confident Anabaptist, tells me, If you have nothing more to show for your Covenant Interest in God, as being your God, than that,( he refers to that experience I declare in my short Treatise, which made Mr. Grantham Sick;) it would be no better than a lye in your right hand: but I have better hopes of you. What are the sure Notes of our interest in God, I shall not come to you to learn; but I look upon those notes as good as your Self-Regeneration and Better.  
Next he falls upon me for being asleep when I was Sprinkled and Crossed, and desires to know of me, what ground any man hath, his Parents or himself, to Baptize any person when they are asleep? this is no idle enquiry, but calls for the Consideration of all serious Christians. Thus Mr. Grantham.  
You forgot yourself, will you allow us to Baptize, I was Sprinkled, you tell me: but was I asleep? Why would not you wake me? Say, I was not born then. Your excuse is sufficient, but how do you know I was asleep then? I presume so; but remember your Book, Presumption is no proof: and sure I am all Children are not asleep when they are brought to be Baptized. The last Child I Baptized was awake, so might I be.  
Baptism, is in the Application of the Water, and its odds( to use your words) but the Water did wake me, if I were asleep. If Isaac were asleep when he was brought to be Circumcised, its odds, but the cutting of his Fore-skin did wake him; but suppose he had not, was it therefore no Circumcision, did it take away the efficacy of the Ordinance? This is a profound Question, where shall we have a place to dispute, and determine it? The Theatre at Oxford, is not worthy of such a question; it shall be Merchant-Taylours Hall in London.  
Then you fall upon me, about falling away.  
I do not remember any word I had about it. But this shortly I say, If it be true what yours prate about here, that a Person truly regenerate may fall away totally and finally; I would never preach Comfort to any regenerate Person, till I see him Dying, and sure he could not live; now I see he hath persevered to the end, now I will preach Comfort: So that all the Exhortations of Christians to rejoice, Phil. 4.4. 1 Thes. 5.16. &c. all the Consolations of the Gospel, may be laid by, for they all depend upon my Will. Suppose I have walked fifty years with God, and have but one month to live, threescore temptation to sin may befall me in that month, I cannot tell; and what my Will may do I cannot tell; Grace with Mutability would not keep me in my Innocent estate, then Grace, Mutability, and Sin, will not keep me in fallen estate; take away Mutability out of the first Covenant, fix the Will, there will be no need of a second Covenant; and if this Covenant doth not provide some help against Mutability, we are but miserable under it. Alas, what tormenting fears do many Christians live under for fear of Non-perseverance, notwithstanding all the Promises of the Gospel for their support!  
The Doctrine of Damning of Infants, you cry out upon, and ashamed you are, you say, that the Presbyterians and Independents should be of that opinion, for others it seems 'tis no matter.  
I have red eight Opinions about the state of Infants after death, Baptized and unbaptised, but I have not spoken one Word about them: I leave secret things to God.  
Then you are ashamed of my Conceit, and Dr. Ames Fancy, about the Soul being Passive in Regeneration. I shall let it alone to another place: How do you look when you are ashamed, Mr. Grantham? do you blushy? If you make me one of the Adulterous Generation, that will not believe without a Miracle, as you speak, yet I will not be ashamed to say, Regeneration is a Miracle.  
Some indeed do abuse, Ephes. 1.19, 20. to uphold this false Opinion, that none can believe without such a power as by which Christ was raised from the dead; whereas the Apostle onely shows that the Faith of Christians doubts not at all, but that the same God which had power to raise up Christ from the dead, has power to raise us up also; this Power is irresistible that raised Christ from the dead, Men and Devils cannot resist it. But the Power of Gods Grace by which God works in men in an ordinary way is not irresistible, Act. 7.51.  
Indeed and indeed you abuse the Text in restraining the sense to the Resurrection of our bodies onely, for Paul puts himself in {αβγδ}. Considering himself as a Believer in Christ, but Paul was a Pharisee, and the Pharisees did believe the Resurrection of the Dead, Acts 23.6, 8. So that Paul did believe your Interpretation, before he was a Believer in Christ; but to make him a true Believer, yea to make Jews and Gentiles to believe in a crucified Christ savingly, to raise us up from the Death of Sin, to the Life of Holiness, it will require as great a power, as that power which raised Christ from the Dead. Col. 2.12. speaks the sense clearly. For the resistance spoken of, Act. 7.51. A man hath many Children, he commands them things just and good, he exhorts them to obey him, he promiseth, he threatens, he corrects, still they resist him, and will not obey; thus did God with these Children, and they resist; what then, what do you infer hence? Tho' God intends the Conversion of a Soul, and works to attain his End, yet mans will may so Resist him, that God shall fail of the end he intended: This must be the thing you would maintain, else the Text will not serve your opinion; but God saith, Isa. 43.13. I will work, and who shall let it? who? any mans Will: Take you him, Mr. Grautham for your God, whose will you can so resist as to make him fail of his end, when he Wills and Intends a gracious work upon the Soul; and by this Resistance of yours, Demonstrate( to use your own word) that God is not most Blessed: to fail of ones Will and Intention is the want of a degree of Blessedness: my Will is Crost, I cannot have my Will. I will say with profound Bradwardin 
De causa Dei, l. 3. C. 29. , Illum nolo, &c. I will not have him for my God, who cannot most omnipotently make me both to Will, and do, what he Wills.  
The following Paragraph speaks strangely; This strange Doctrine of damning the greatest part of the World, and that before the World was, is so pernicious, that it makes God the Author of all Sin; and more such stuff, that I care not for transcribing it.  
What did you find in my Book, that you writ at this rate? you run into other Questions, that have no ground for them in my Book.  
I shall not concern myself to give you any Answer: Only thus,  
I know none that say, that God made Men to Damn them; that Damnation was the End wherefore he made them.  
As for the greater part of the World being Damned, this offends you: I pray whose Opinion are you of? Huberus? The Promiscuous Salvation of All: Or are you of Caelius Secundus Curio's Opinion, That the number of the Elect and Saved, is much greater than the number of the Reprobate and Damned? whether you, or these, or Christ be truest( Math. 7.14. Few find it;) the Day of judgement will determine.   

CHAP. V.  
NOw for a few words about Sprinkling, which about ten or eleven times you mention in your four leaves against me: Twice you tell me, I Sprinkle Children; and I tell you Once, it is very false, I never Sprinkle any: If you prove it; either you Sprinkle or Dip; but you do not Dip, Ergo, you Sprinkle: I deny your Disjunction, so your Syllogism is false: Datur Tertium; there is a third: I do always in my Administraction, pour such a quantity of Water as may clearly hold forth Washing, which is the largest signification of the worp Baptize; we Wash by Dipping, and we Wash by Fowring of Water. When you Baptize your Tables, Mar. 7.4. do you carry them to your pounds or Rivers, and there dowze them under Water? I never saw that practise yet; but to Baptize them, by Powring Water on them, is common: So did Elijah Baptize his Hands, when Elisha Powred Water upon them, Luk. 11.38. with 2 Kings 3.11. Had the meaning of Baptize been only to Plunge under Water, the Spirit would not have directed his Pen-men to use the word to Tables,( or Beds,) Hands, Vessels, which I see often cleansed without Plunging under Water: The Greeks are no so scanty for words that signify Washing, as {αβγδ}, which word the Pen-man used Mar. 7.3. {αβγδ} yet in the 4th v. he uses {αβγδ}; the Spirit of God is not so nice as you are. Hence Castalio, a Learned critic, whom Arminius did much Honour, therefore you have cause to honour him; he on Math. 3.13. saith, Beza rejects the words Baptizo, and Baptismus, used by holy Writers, and useth Lavo, and Lotio, Washing; for which he blames him; not because Beza denies the word Baptizo to signify Washing, but because he departed from other Writers in that place. Thus we red, Heb. 9.10. {αβγδ}, Divers Baptisms: Dipping was but one kind of Baptism; there were divers others, but still they were Baptisms. We have then Divine Authority for our signification of the Word.  
Nor do I see how that 1 Cor. 10.1, 2. which your admired Plagiary, Mr. Danvers, makes so much of, serves his turn for Dipping. Two things we are sure of from Scripture: 1. They walked through the Sea upon dry ground; this is four times recorded: Is the ground dry when you Dip? 2. It is said, Exod. 15.8. The Floods stood upright as an heap, the Depths were Congealed,( like Ice;) whence, Chap. 14.22. it is said, The Waters were as a Wall unto them, &c. Then the Waters did not touch them: Do you Dip, and the Waters not touch them whom you Dip? As for the Cloud Powring down Water, that agrees with our Baptizing.  
One Question, I Pray; Were there no Children passed through the Sea at this time? Yes, no question, thousands; then Children were now Baptized: Were they then Baptized with their Parents unto Moses, and shall they not now unto Christ? Baptized they were; that's the Question.  
But you tell me in your Preface, how Christ was Baptized by Dipping; and so others.  
I Pray tell me, for I profess seriously, I could not tell how to Baptize by Dipping; for a little Child I could tell, but not an Adult Person: Did they go into the Water, be it half way, or what you please, and then the Baptist dipped the other part? I would never thus be Baptized myself, nor would I so Baptize. When you Bury, do your Dead cover themselves half way, and then you cover the rest? If I were to Baptize, being the Administrator, I must take the Person, and Plunge him wholly myself under Water, but then I must leave him at the bottom, for my strength could not take him up.  
Again, Though I know we may Bury a Man in his clothes, are you sure they dipped them all in their clothes? these things are material to know: Because we know that in Chysostom's time, as Vossius tells us, upon a tumult that rose about him, Women that were to be Baptized ran away Naked;( your young rustic Anabaptist tells me, What if Chrysostom tells a lying Story? though it were Vossius tells it, but you may judge the Man by his Language,) so that they then Baptized Men, Women and Children Naked;( something before their shane we conceive.) The Lord would not allow the Priest to go up by Steps to his Altar, That thy Nakedness be discovered thereon, Exod. 20.26.  
I hear you now Baptize your Females when it is duskish; but why so? Baptism is a holy Institution, 
I hope they have no Garment appropriated to Dipping; bad John so? then a Surplice may as well, &c.  fit to be celebrated at Noon-time; why do you not then Baptize your Women, and the Younkers stand and look on? how comely this will be! they must also be some time under the Water, that the Water may soak through their clothes.  
Yet as to this manner of Baptizing; had the Lord Commanded Baptism to be performed by plunging the whole Body under Water, in a country could, and where it was not the Custom of the People to wash themselves,( unless some Boys and young Fellows in the heat of Summer, as in our Country, I never heard of one Woman that did wash her self in this manner in our Nation) then there had been more reason to urge this manner of Baptizing; but for the Lord to Institute it first in a hot country, where this dowzing under Water had been in practise a thourand years before his Institution, so that now it was onely his pleasme to make it his Institution, that this plunging under water which hath been in practise so long, shall be done in my Name, &c. the Water having this signification, by my Authority, this alters the Case very much: This washing among them, being, partly for Pleasure, for Coolness, for Health, and fiequent for Legal Impurities. I red in Levit. 15. three or four Cases in which those Bathings or Washings were commanded at all times; and the Jews tell us, the whole Body must be baptized, if but a finger were above water it was not rightly performed,( which it seems one of your Baptists observed, having failed in his Act, tells the man he must be dipped again, as one that stood by relates; I had it from a Friend who knew the mau a zealous Professor before his dipping, but after it fell into gross Vices, and so died;) had the Lord given those Commands in England, many men and women must have lost their Lives, in an ordinary way.  
Hence though we red twice of being butted in Baptism, yet I deny that therefore we are always bound to Baptize by Dipping; because that Mode in that Country was Practised many hundred Years before the Institution, so that they did but keep their former practise, it was nothing to them. But the word signifying Washing, as we have Divine Authority for it, which is done as well by Powring as by Plunging; and we red so often of the Powring of the Spirit, and of Washing by the Spirit and Blood of Jesus, Washing of Regeneration, Prov. 1.23. Isa. 32.15. Isa. 44.3. Joel 2.28, 29. Ezek. 36.25.( the Geneva Translation,) Eph. 5.26, 27. Tit. 3.5. Apoc. 1.5. 1 Cor. 6.11. He that obtains these Washings, is as well as he that hath the same Blessings by Dippings. That Text Mr. Petto quoteth, Luk. 16.24. {αβγδ}, is very considerable: Besides what is commonly said, the Baptizing of the three thousand in Acts 2. it cannot be proved to be by Dipping: these thoughts I have. When there have been a multitude to be Baptized, the Text have  told us where they were Baptized, as Jordan Water, Aenon Water; so in Jerusalem, if there were such deep Waters to dip so many thousands, whereabouts was it? The People holding John for a Prophet, and there being such Rivers in Jerusalem, why do we not red that John Baptized there, as well as at Jordan and Aenon? We red of a contemptible Brook or River, Isa. 8.6. about Jerusalem; a Brook Kidron, 2 Sam. 15.23. After John and the Commission given to the Apostles, we do not red of any Baptizing in the Scripture which do invincibly prove it was by Dipping; No, not the Eunuch; the going down to a Spring of Water, does not prove his being dowz'd under Water. And for the Baptizings in Houses, so often mentioned, that there should be so much Water in their Houses, is unlikely: And the Apostles to take up lusty Men in their Arms, and Plunge them in those Waters, is more than my Strength could do, and more than any can prove they did. The jailor, Act. 16. an ordinary Person in a City, to have so much Water in his House, is unlikely; we should not find so much Water in many great Mens Houses in London.  
Against this 'tis Objected, Act. 16.34. saith, The jailor brought them into his House after Baptism, v. 33.  
A. 1. But the Text mentions nothing of their going out of the House, to any other place to be Baptized, that time in the night.  
2. The word {αβγδ}, there used, signifies, to Cause to Ascend; and so is used, Luk. 4.5. Act. 9.39. and in other places: The Syriac word in the Text signifies the same, being the same word with {αβγδ} in the Hebrew, which is used, Psal. 139.8. If I ascend into Heaven: So the arabic word in the Text, which the Lexicon translates, Ascendit per Scalas, to Ascend by a Ladder or Stairs: So that the word may refer to his bringing of them up out of the Dungeon, where he had put them for security.  
For my part, I am of their opinion, whom I see to be the most Learned and pious, that the Apostles were Indifferent in the manner of Administration, whether by Dipping under water, to hold forth the Burying with Christ,( so am I willing to Administer it, if Parents will,) or by Pouring on of water, to signify the Washing of Regeneration and pouring of the Spirit, Tit. 3.5, 6. {αβγδ}, and Washing with the Blood of Christ: That Blood which cleanseth from all Sin, 1 Joh. 1.7. Onely let me add this, as we pour upon the Face immediately by which persons are known, so we can pour it all over the clothes, which doth more resemble the manner of Burial through the whole world, for ought I know, than the other: When we bury men, we do not use to run them into the Earth, but first dig the Grave, then power Earth upon them. But for men to be so het upon a Mode of Administration, when the word signifies but Washing, whether it be by Pouring or Dipping, it is but a kind or degree of Superstition.  
It is not baptizing this way or that way, but our improving of the Ordinance; and the Spirits accompanying the Ordinance, which must do us good. God hath blessed the Ordinance, when administered by pouring on of water. A Gentlewoman( whom I name not) when the wretched Doctrine,( as that man of God Mr. Thomas Hooker calls it) of Anabaptism first came up in England, hearing of it: Is this( said she) the Doctrine now coming up? The greatest Comfort that ever I had from God was from my Infant Baptism: A Gentlewoman so eminent in Holiness, that few that are dipped must come near her. One of yours  told me it is no Baptism: but we shall not go to Anabaptists, to learn any thing that belongs to God. Water is essential to Baptism, not Dipping. Dip a man over head and ears in Milk or Wine in the Name of the Father, &c. here is no Baptism: pour Water upon the Person, in the Name of the Father, &c. here is Baptism. This signifies something.   

CHAP. VI.  
I Have a little Reckoning with one of your Disciples, who makes a great noise about us; brought up to the Plough, but being of good natural parts, hath devoted himself so to the reading your, and other Books, that he never laboured more in sowing his Wheat, than he hath in sowing this darnel. Infant-Baptism, he tells us, is an Antichristian Cheat.  
Help us I pray in this juncture of time, tell us, who is this Antichrist? What kind of Creature is he? where dwells he? There is a great pudder about him; some say he is come: others say he is not come. You tell me of your judgement, in your scribbling; I pray give me your judgement here. If you say he is come, when was the time he Appeared? None of all the Authors, that I have red, and I have red divers upon that subject, say that he was come so long as the Ten Persecutions lasted; no, nor so long as the Emperour kept his Seat in Rome. But we find Infant-Baptism practised above a hundred years before the ten Persecutions ended; nor was Infant-Baptism the least advantage to his rising. Irenaeus lived near the Apostles time, and then it was in practise: he tells us Christ was an Infant, and sanctified Infants. Origen was born about 186. and in the year 203. when his Father Leonides suffered Martyrdom under Severus; he wrote to his Father, and encouraged him to suffer it cheerfully. He was then about Seventeen years of Age; and he writes, that the Church received the Baptism of Infants from the Apostles. How then can this be an Antichristian Cheat, when Antichrist was not come above a hundred years after it was in practise, as we red in them, and they writ they had it from the Apostles? Cyrpian was Martyred under the Eighth Persecution; if you can red his Epistle to Fidus, you may then see whether Infant-Baptism was not in practise. By this you declare yourself to be a Cheater.  
You tell me, Your way of application of water to the body( in Baptism) is a fine flesh-pleasing way.  
A. 1. What do you mean by Flesh? Corrupt Flesh? O what a high degree of the mortification of the Flesh is this, for a person to be dipped! Is that the reason that Anabaptists are such mortified Pervons above others? If it had been so, it had been the better for some of my Relations, which is one reason why I shall not be in love with Anabaptism in hast.  
2. Do you mean Natural Flesh? We red in the Scripture, so soon as any were made Believers in Christ, they were presently Baptized; why do not you so soon as you have made a Proselyte, presently Dip him, or her, tho' it be a hard Frost and Snow? will you not stay till the season be warmer? and is not this a little pleasing to the Flesh?  
I could not tell upon what Scripture ground these Anabaptists denied Communion with all Churches but themselves. I instanced in some, that I am sure there are none such amongst the Anabaptists, nor hath the Sun shined upon better since the Apostles daies: the Question was not, Why not communion with me? But your Answer which you learned from your Masters, is this:  
You are Rantized, not Baptized, and such you admit to your Communion, but the Apostle chargeth us, 2 Thes. 3.6. that we withdraw from every brother that walketh disorderly. This Rantizing was brought in by Rome and the Church of England.  
A. What a graecian are you become on a sudden; Rantizing, Rantiz'd, Rantism, I red in your Letters. Decline {αβγδ}. For myself first; how do you know I was Rantized? did you see it? It was forty years before you were born, if it were so. For others; how do you know they were Rantized? All your ground is from the Common-Prayer Book. But what if there be no such word as Sprinkling or Rantizing in the Administration of Baptism? You that can charge the Ancient Fathers with Ignorance,( as we shall hear anon) and Chrysostom with Lying, you should speak and writ nothing but Truth; but there is no such word: for in both Editious the words are these; The Minister naming the Child, shall dip it in the water, so it be discretely and warily done. And if the Child be weak, it shall be sufficient to power water upon it.  
Where is Sprinkling? is powring and sprinkling the same? I am ashamed, saith Mr. Grantham, &c. You have cause to be so, and all the Anabaptists, whose mouths are full of a word to reproach us by, when there is no such thing.  
1. As to your Text, 2 Thes. 3.6. Baptism is not so much as mentioned in neither of the Epistles: Now it lies upon your party to prove, that Paul left this Tradition with the Church, to Baptize no Infants, and to Baptize onely by Dipping. Which I am sure all the Anabaptists in the World can never do.  
2. To walk disorderly here, is not to walk after the Tradition; what the Apostle aims at, you may see, 1 Thes. 4.11. To work with your own hands, as we commanded you. Now compare this Tradition with the 11. vers. of this Chapter which you quote against us, and red their disorderly walking, what it was: For we hear there are some walk disorderly among you, working not at all: This was contrary to his Command, and Tradition; this the Apostle condemns from his own practise, v. 7. Thus from the 6. vers. to the 13th v. the Apostle tells you what he means by disorderly walking, and this is contrary to the Light of Nature. But the Light of Nature teacheth us, in all Religions, the Children are reckoned with the Parents.  
For other sins, the Apostle hath given us directions what to do in other places, 1 Cor. 5.11. &c.  
3. It is well known, those Churches, do maintain the Ordinance of Baptism, use it reverently, teach the improvement of it; suppose there were some defect in the mode of Administration( here is no Imposition upon you, of any thing human,) is this a sufficient ground to unchurch all the Churches in the world but yourselves? The Lord require this at your hands.  
When I framed this Argument from Mark 16.16. which was urged against Infant-Baptism:  
If Children must not be baptized because they cannot believe, then neither can they be saved because they do not believe. Both Baptism and Salvation depend upon one and the same Condition, i.e. Believing.  
Mr. Grif: denied the Consequence, telling me that Text speaks onely of Adult persons. So does 3 Joh. 3.& 5. Hence two Positions he gave me.  
1. God regenerates no Infants.  
2. God doth not Circumcise the hearts of any Infants. By this it seems, no not the heart of John Baptist. I have spoken to this before, onely I add to this, Dr. Homes conceives that Text Deut. 30.6. to have its fulfilling chiefly, when the Jews shall be called. When I observed well the Verses going before, and consider Rom. 11.26. I should not oppose him, then the great Body of the Infant-Seed of the Jews shall experience the truth of the Promise, and Anabaptism shall be exploded.  
I asked, If God Regenerates no Children, how shall they be saved? He answered, All Infants dying such are Justified and Saved. Rom. 5.18.( To this Text I spake before.)  
The young scribbler was so full with this notion, that thus he writes to me.  
The ignorance there was in some you reckon as great Fathers, of the Justification that is by the Blood of Christ for Infants, caused them to invent their Infant Rantism, to take away Original Sin, and they together with the Church of England, and Church of Rome, if not some of the Presbyterians, do reckon it a Regenerating Ordinance.  
What stuff is here! The Reader may judge the spirit of this Anabaptist, how proud, bold, and confident it is; that if he had the Books of these learned, ancient, godly Men laid before him, he could not red one line to understand it, ye the dares charge them with Ignorance, and Lies beside. Could this young Fellow that charges these ancient Fathers with Ignorance, but red Justin Martyr, Athanasius, Hierom, Epiphanius, Augustin, Ambrose, Gregory Nyss. Basil, Macarius, &c. I would point him to places in their Books, where he should find, they understood, our Justification, I mean of all persons before God, to be onely by Christs Righteousness. As for Dipping, we know it was their practise, thô in some Cases they did allow the Baptizing by Powring of water,( for so the words in Crypian, eo quod aqua salutari, non loti sint, said perfusi. So Augustin. In those hot Countries, they did ordinarily use Dipping, we do not deny;) but from the signification of the word, we judge it Indifferent. I add but this, thô I aclowledge Christs Burial to be a part of his Humiliation, yet our Redemption, Justification, Reconciliation, Mortification of Sin, are all given to the righteousness, Blood, Sacrifice, cross of Christ: His Death, before his Burial. It is finished, said Christ upon the across, Joh. 19.30. before they butted him.  
As for Original Sin, indeed they were sound and clear in that Doctrine, and the Church of England, in their Homiles and Articles, are very full and clear, thô you be rotten. What God doth in Baptism, we leave to his Wisdom.  
But at this rate doth his Pen run in his Letters to me. And this is the Spirit of the Arminian-Anabaptists in other places; as I know the Town, where the Minister gave them a Meeting to discourse them. One that was an Auditor  told me, the worst term the Minister used was Friend, but their Carriage towards him very unworthy. As to his Conformity they might have spared him. For he did no more than Mr. tombs, the Antesignanus of all Anabaptists, hath written in defence of it. When they urged him for a positive Command for Infant-Baptism; he  told them, If we must have a Positive Command for all things we practise, or lay it by, then we must lay by the Observation of the Lords day: They yielded this, saying, All daies were alike with them.  
But since you are so charitable to Insants, how far will you extend your Charity? It must go further than Infants. You tell me, To preach the Gospel to a Child in the Cradle, were ridiculous: and that they are Disciples who hear, learn, and embrace the doctrine they hear. But Children are not capable of these; hence exclude them from Baptism.  
But doth Scripture own none other for Disciples? Compare Acts 15. vers. 10. with Acts 21.21. the Question was about Circumcision, Act. 15. v. 1. In the 10. v.— to put a yoke upon the neck of the Disciples: They upon whose necks they would impose Circumcision were Disciples, this is clear. Now in Act. 21.21. they tell Paul what is reported of him, viz. That he did teach the Jews, they ought not to Circumcise their children. Then Children are Disciples, at eight daies old.  
I desire your wisdom would determine, what years Children must or may be of, before they come to that capacity, to understand, learn, and embrace the doctrine they hear, as to an outward appearance.  
The word {αβγδ}, which signifies a Child, Paul useth five times in one verse, 1 Cor. 13.11. He spake, he understood, he reasoned, {αβγδ}, as a Child. The Jews tell us, a Child is so accounted until he be nine years old and a day: Sure I am, there are many Children who before they be capable to understand, learn, and embrace Gospel-Doctrine, can rebel against Parents, Curse Swear, speak Filthily, &c. and if these dy● under that incapacity, their incapacity it seem makes them to be justified and saved by Christs Righteousness: O Happy Childre● who die in such a State.  
But hold a little, are they all justified, and saved? then it must be by the Covenant of Grace, and shall they be under the Covenant so, as to be in a justified and saved state by it, and not have the Seal of the Covenant? You may say what you please, but give a solid reason why you yield a Person the Covenant, and deny the Seal; when did you ever know it among men? but this we have gained now, that not only the Infant Seed of Abraham, but all Infants in the World have a right to Baptism.  
As for your Texts, by which you prove Infants can have no Faith, Rom. 10.17. nor be regenerated, because we are begotten by the Word, Jam. 1.18, &c.  
I had prepared several Answers to them, but I saw my book grew too big, and omit them. I shall give you but your own answer, which you give to John 3.3. and 5. and Mar. 16.16. The Texts speak only of Adult Persons, but that God can infuse Grace no way into the Heart but by the ear, and that he hath tied up himself to one Instrument, this you are to prove. Divers learned Divines, and I believe some of your own party, conceive, that the conversion of the Jews shall be, not by Hearing, but by Sight, as Pauls was; Christ appearing in the Clouds, Rev. 1.7. compared with Zech. 12.10. Hence Isa. 66.8, 9. Shall a Nation be born at once? However, can you tell how that Wise one frames the Body of the Child, and infuseth( according to most mens opinions) the Soul into the Body, while it is in the womb? If not that, can you tell what he doth with the Soul? Can he not infuse Grace into the Soul, as the Soul into the Body? which is hardest?  
To prove then Infants may be regenerated, three or four Arguments I shall use, beside what I spake before of Heart-circumcising, from Deut. 30.6.  
( 1.) If all, even Adult Persons, are Passive in the Work of Regeneration, then Infants are capable of Regeneration: But the Antecedent is true.  
Some Ladies have their Husbands Pictures drawn at large, these hang up in the Parlour; they have them also drawn in a Little compass, and hang them upon their breasts: This Blessed Limner draws his Image upon little Children, as well as upon Adult Persons. The Shunamites Child lies Dead, 2 King. 4.20. Lazarus lies dead, John 11.14. Lazarus tho' Adult doth no more towards his quickening, the receiving of his Soul into Union with his Body, than the Shunamites Child did, they were equally Passive; so are all they who are dead in trespasses and sins, Eph. 2.1, 5. Col. 2.13.  
To this you answer, What you say of the Adult being Passive in the work of Regeneration, I know that you and others say so; but from what ground I know not; Is not Hearing and Receiving an Active work? is not Faith and Repentance which are the two parts of Regeneration, Acts of the Soul.  
A. Your false Grammar I let pass, and for brevity sake, let Hearing alone. But for Faith and Repentance, the two parts of Regeneration, are Acts of the Soul; but tell me, whether of a Soul Dead or quickened? If quickened, how comes this Soul to be quickened, that it might have a Principle or Power to put forth these Acts? Were you Active or Passive in the work of quickening? It seems by your Answer you were Active; then you were never Dead, or else Death is active to Life, Corruption to Grace, Hell to Heaven. Much good may your Self-Regeneration do you: So your Self-Creation; for so the work is called, Ephes. 2.10. and 14. v. {αβγδ} 2 Cor. 5.17.  
You tell me, Seminal Faith and Repentance, which I affirm, is but the Fiction of mens brains, and so of my brain; let me try it.  
They who are regenerated have Faith and Repentance.  
But all Infants saved, are regenerated. Therefore, All Infants saved, have. Faith and Repentance; but these do not show themselves in Act, then it must be but Seminal.  
The mayor is clear from your own Confession, who tell me, they are the two parts of Regeneration, now where the whole is, the parts must needs be.  
The Minor, I prove.  
They who are born unclean, that are sinful and corrupt by Nature, must be regenerated before they can be saved: But so are all Infants born. Therefore, &c.  
The Minor is the part to be proved. For this I gave your Master Divine Authority, and human Authority, red the Texts.  
To this you Answer, Children being Justified from Adams Sin,( which is not yet proved) no other Sin they are guilty of,( say you in another Letter;) What other Sin have they committed, that should hinder them from coming to Heaven?  
How finely you answer! Does my Argument speak of Committing Sin? tho' as I have  told your Master, Children do that too. I argued from their Birth Sin; our Lord lays the necessity of Regeneration, from our Birth Sin, Joh. 3.5, 6. That which is Born of the Flesh is Flesh. If we are born Clean, Spiritual, Sinless, then give all the Texts I have there mentioned the lye.  
As to Seminal Faith, Repentance, and so of all Graces; if of any Grace, then of Faith and Repentance as well. I thought always, that Seeds or Roots had been before Fruits; Principles before Operations, Habits before Acts. I red indeed of one Act without a Habit, but it was Miraculous, Numb. 22.28, 30. Balaams Ass speaks, and Discourses with Balaam, a Rational Act; but it hath no Rational Soul. When God regenerates an Adult Person, he doth first infuse the Principles, Seeds, Habits, of all the Graces of the Spirit, before he can act and bring forth the Fruits of the Spirit: When the sour went out to Sow, Mat. 13.3. it was but the Seed of Faith, Repentance, which he did sow, and which was first received; and these Seeds grow up, Mar. 4.27. It is the Seed which remains, 1 Joh. 3.9. Peters Faith failed fadly as to the Act, but the Seed remained.  
Since then this is but a Fiction of my brain, do you Twi-fallow and Tri-fallow your Ground, but Sow no Seed, for according to your Doctrine you may have a Crop without it: If you do cast in Seed, look for the Fruit next day, according to your Doctrine, for if God sow in the Hearts of little Ones the Seeds of all the Graces of his Spirit, they must show themselves presently in Fruits.  
( 2.) Argument. No unclean Person shall ever see God, Heb. 12.14.  
But Infants by Nature are born Unclean, if the Scripture may be believed: they must bear that Image in which they were created by God, that ever see the face of God.  
All the members of the Kingdom of Heaven are Holy, but Children are members of the Kingdom of Heaven: Therefore Holy, but not by Birth, it is by Regeneration.  
The Foundation of Anabaptism, lies in denying Original Sin, as did Pelagius, and he was against Baptizing Infants upon this Ground.  
( 3.) If Adam had continued in Innocency, his Children had born the Image of God from the Birth: I never heard it denied, that which I infer hence, is, That Children are capable of the Image of God, and receiving the Seeds of all Grace; it was so then, why not now? Shall the Sin of one Person be so mischievous to deprive Adam, and all his Posterity of the Image of God, and bring the Seeds of all Corruption into their Nature; and shall the Grace of God be denied to renew his Image in little Children, when and where he pleaseth? Children being a great part of the World, shall the Spirit of God have nothing to do in their Hearts? Adams Disobedience far exceeds the Obedience of Christ, which the Apostle compares in Justification, Rom. 5.16, 17, 18. For his Disobedience could defile all his Posterity, but Christs Obedience doth not cleanse and regenerate one Child: Our Regeneration is as truly the purchase of Christ as our Justification. The Spirit of the second Adam repairs that Image in those Subjects which the first Adam hath defaced, when and where he pleaseth; but he hath defaced it in Infants, if the Scriptures may be believed, before this kind of Anabaptists, which you and your Master are of: I do not think all Anabaptists, deny Original Sin, or Sin of our Nature.  
( 4.) If all Children dying such are justified and saved, then there will be Millions in Heaven in whom the Spirit of God, as the Third Person in the Blessed Trinity, had nothing to do in their Salvation: That Rule, Omnes Operationes ad extra, &c. does not take off my Argument. For the Distinct Subsistences, have their Distinct Manner of Working; and I speak of the Spirit under that Consideration. The Father Decrees Redemption. The Son( assuming our Nature) works out, and lays down the Price for our Redemption. The Spirit Applies Redemption. The Consummation of things is given to the Spirit: so Regeneration is given to the Spirit, Joh. 3.5, 8. Tit. 3.5. 2 Thes. 2.13. So 1 Cor. 6.11. There is Christ for Justification, and Spirit for Sanctification.  
I add no more, these with what I mentioned before are enough.  
Because you find I am not for sprinkling, you hope I may be brought over to be dipped, and tell me, you should therein greatly rejoice.  
A. If you do not rejoice before, you shall not rejoice in hast. For,( 1.) Were I waver●ng, I know no right administrator: for, ●ake up your Principles. 1. Baptism is the Form of a Church. 2. No Baptism but by Dipping. 3. You grant Pastours must be ●alled by the Church, then there must be a Church onely by Dipping to call these Patours; now according to Scripture, these Pastours must be Able men, 2 Tim. 2.2. And ●o Ordination, there must be a Presbytery( or Bishop over Presbyters, but the Bishop dipped, I will yield that too,) of Able Men dipped: Now where were there such Churches ●t first, with such Presbyteries, or Bishop ●ver Presbyters to call, and ordain, is more ●●an ever I heard of; and if not such, I know ●o right administrator, and if not so, I ●alue all your Dipping not worth a Rush.  
( 2.) Thô God overlooks the Infirmities of ●… s, and I doubt not some are sound in ●… her points, and Conscientious, yet to very any, it hath proved a Blasting error. How many have proved Corrupt in Doctrines, and Immoral in their Conversations, who were not so before Dipping. mayor Packer, thô an Anabapist, yet a sober Man, complained to a worthy Friend of mine: 'tis our unhappiness, that a man cannot be an Anabaptist, but presently he must be an Arminian. So it seems by you. And now men have Repentance pinned upon their sleeves. A friend of mine discoursing with an Anabaptist, asked him, If you sin can you repent when you list? Yes, said he. Sin he could be sure, for he could be drunk: for his Repentance, which he found so easy, let him look that it be as found. That is very observable which Dr. Winter relates, of that Anabaptist, executed for a Capital Crime, who confessed, That from the time of his going under water, he sensibly found God Departing from him. I spare to writ what Corruptions in Doctrine I have heard among them besides these: Out of whose Hive the Quakers swarmed for the greater part, is well known, going from Gospel Light to Natural Light, and further they cannot go.  
That Hypocrites, and Apostates may be found in other Churches, who doubts it? but when men put such a stress upon a Mode of the Administration of an Ordinance, as i● Salvation depended on it, and keep such a stir to make Proselytes, and joy so if they get one, and tell us they must be Regenerate, Israel according to the Spirit, Saints by Calling, they must do the work of Abraham, that now are Abrahams Seed, these must be the Baptized ones, and hence exclude all Infants; yet after these, to prove so corrupt in Doctrine, as very many of them are, and too many vicious in Conversation, I may well call it a Blasting Opinion.  
3. I shall be wary of that German error, which made such work there, and would make little better here were the Power in your hands, if all be of the same spirit with those who by Marriage bear some Relation to me; and I am confirmed in it the more from that passage of Mr. Hutcheson to Mr. Baxter, calling upon him to Repent of that absurd and Heretical Position of a Baptismal Covenant of Grace, running in a Fleshly( 'tis false, for 'tis a Believing) Line, &c. If Infant-Baptism be a heresy, let Ministers look to themselves, if Anabaptists get the power.  
To conclude: When Mr. Tombes's book first came out, and made such a noise in the Kingdom, two other Ministers being with me, we got his Book, laid it upon the Table, but they would not open it, till first we bowed our knees to the Father of Lights, begging of him that he would please to enlighten us, that we might know his Mind, and if he had revealed his Truth to this Man, that we might see it: Engaging to God, that whatever had been the Opinion of our Fore-fathers, or our own Opinion to the contrary; and tho' this Doctrine was a Novelty, odious, and would render them contemptible who did practise it, yet if it were his Truth, his Mind and Will, we would yield up ourselves and practise it. Prayer being ended, we opened the Book, the first thing we met with was Abrahams Covenant, this we liked well. We red him with great Intention of mind, examined every line, and found him fall very short of proving the Repeal of Abrahams Covenant; failing here, we laid by his Book, and regard him no more. They persisted in their practise of Infant-Baptism to their Dying daies, and so shall I.   
FINIS.