instead of them who profess their faith and desires to be baptized to take a small sucking babe out of their armes and dat him with a drop or two on the face and send away all the other unbaptized Babist The sureties or parents in so saying do but represent the child that could not speak for it self and expresse his good resolutions to forsake the divel c. and his desires to be baptized Baptist How reasonless is it to put questions to infants through their parents ears and then very gravely suppose them answering again through their parents mouthes yea as reasonless as to suppose that all people should see through none but the blind priests eyes nor yet to stand reasoning how reasonless a thing it is to signifie things to sucklings while they understand them not and that too by such a vanishing visible sign that when they can understand they neither see nor never shall and such like Trumpioall transactions to which there are as few grains of reason concurring as there are inches in an Apes tail even your selves however it happens that you so contradict your selves yet that is no news with you as to sound it out here how Reason fights on your sides for infant baptism are even in this very cause found falling out with and fighting down right against reason hand smooth but some four or five pages below this why else is there such a reasonles reply made to seven or eight several objections which byyour own confession p. 16. reason makes against infant baptism but I le spare you till I come thither 3ly That the practise and authority of the Church of God you so much boast of from the beginning and the Fathers thereof which you complain and grumble much p. 1. 11. 12. that t was set aside and might not be admitted into your assistance at the Disputation is so utterly against your infant baptism that even this alone were it of any esteem with you had bin enough to have silenced all your disputes for it and laid the itch and quencht the heat of your hearts after that meer novelty is most manifest if by the Church of God and the Fathers therof you mean what I do viz. the Church of God in the primitive which were the best and purest times of the Gospel whose practise in this particular is set out in the word but specially in the Acts of the Apostles the fathers of which Church and of the Church in after ages too were the Apostles themselves viz. Father Peter Father Paul Father Barnabas Father Iames Father Iohn and the â—…est whose authority from Christ was great indeed and adequate with the Scriptures then written and the foundation for all the Churches to build on and such was not the authority of the Churches then much less since which are to be subjected to their word in Scripture this Church and these fathers never knew such a baptism as yours nor is there the least tittle of talk concerning any such matter to be found among them Or if by the Church and Fathers of it whose authority and practise you build on you mean those of the ages next to the Apostles Then first I marvel why you should put your selves upon the triall by succeeding ages and decline the first and purest age of the Gospel of all specially since there 's as clear history and more infallible testimony given in the word of what was done by the Church and the first fathers the Apostles then ever was in any age inferiour to it whatsoever and more specially yet since its being in after ages is no palpable argument of its being in the first age for the mystery of iniquity was at work from the very Apostles t is now Ergo it was then is not so good a wherefore to our why as we look for besides t is ingenuously confest by your own writers viz. Mr. Blake in answer to Mr. Blackwood p. 58. that faith can hang on the humane testimony of the succeeding fathers in whose daies infant baptism was no further then de facto viz. that it was onely and not de jure that it ought to be and Mr. Marshal p. 5. of his sermon that the practise of the thing in their dayes proves not the truth of it at all Secondly neither doth the second Century help you so much as to a proof de facto For First as much as you would seem to be verst among the fathers in which many Priests are better read then in the Scriptures and some to seem to be better read there then they are will quote the fathers when they have not read them but by snaches and pickt a few fine phrases out of them to make their sermons the more sententious yea and sometimes for those very sentences for which they might more truly quote the Apostles that primitively pend them witnesse one of your tribe whom I heard with my own ears say of Heb. 2. 16. he took not on him the nature of Angels thus viz. for as Saint Barnard saith when as he might as well have said as the spirit or as the Scripture saith He took not on him c. if yet he knew that t was in the Scripture as much I say as you are versed in the fathers you are desired by Mr. Blackwood a man better read in those fathers then either you or I yea you and Mr. Marshall also who quotes Iustin Martyr are defired by him in his storming of Antichrist p. 25. 26. 27. to prove if you can out of any place of Iustins genuine works who is the antientest father extant next the Apostles whose works are accounted on that there is so much as the name of infant baptism much more the thing yea he tells you ye may as soon find a Dolphin in the woods as any such thing save onely that t is once mentioned in a spurious book falsely called his out of which book Mr. Marshalls quotation is neither doth Mr. Blake gainsay this nor yet Mr. Marshall in their replies nay they rather seem to grant that it s to be doubted it was so which makes me as well as Mr. Blackwood not a little wonder that Mr. Marshall should quote it with so much confidence I mean so as to assert it thereupon as a matter manifest that the Church counting from the time of Iustin Martyr viz. 150 hath bin possest of the priviledg of infant baptism for the space of 1500 years and upwards for had he not doubted but that the words the cites were without question the words of Iustin himself he had not had sin but now he hath no cloak sith he demonstrates to all men Dubitatum per magis dubium and tells the world to make them believe that Iustin disputes the condition of children that dye baptized and unbaptized when yet it s not believed but much doubted by himself whether Iustin did any such thing yea or no as to the words Mr. Marshal p. 4. of his sermon cites
unduely administred and so it is or rather Rantism instead of it not only at Rome but in England also whilst to Infants therefore as the Church of Rome is but a false Church so the Church of England is no true one I utterly do therefore yea and did then deny that Infant-Baptism is at all practised by the Church of God and yet O full of all fallacy as if your Respondent were agreed with you in 't that the true Church of God did baptize Infants how finely have you foisted in this Epithite to the baptism of little children viz. practised by the Church of God and that in this very Account you give of our agreement about the very form and terms of the question that was yet to be disputed between us Report Thirdly That the Arguments used in the disputation should be only express Scriptures or arguments of necessary consequence from them All Authorities of Fathers and Churches laid aside though the practise of the Church was pleaded for yet would not be yielded to Reply 1. I agree with you that the Arguments should indeed have been such only by agreement but that one of those you then used or any of these few material ones for the immateriall being of no account with your selves you Account not for which you here expose to be perused is grounded upon express Scripture or any good consequence therefrom I deny as will I hope be manifested in my ensuing Re-review of them and Review of your Review it self Secondly if by Fathers whose authority you hang so much on you mean those that were some hundreds of years after Christ and were canonized more lately for such as Father Origen Father Chrysostome Father Ierom Father Cyprian Father Austin and the other objects of the Clergies Dotage and if by Churches you mean those that were in the ages when and places where these Fathers lived or any other since the primitive times which were the purest it is but a follie to stand arguing from them whose words and waies are no more the rule of truth to us then ours are to be to them that succeed us for verily they might and did speak sometimes not according to the word and then they were as Heterodox as others and our selves are in as good possibilities as they to speak according to the word and then we are as Orthodox and Authentick to the full as themselves I did therefore utterly disown all authority of these Fathers and Churches for I knew none they had to be a Standard to after ages yet though I counterpleaded your Plea from their practise it was not least your cause should be advantaged thereby for even the Testimonie of those Fathers is against you but because as they were subjected to the word so were they as subject to error as our selves but if by Fathers you mean the Primitive Prophets and Apostles to whom all your Fore-fathers are but Children viz. Father Peter Father Paul Father Iames Father Iude Father Iohn whose Doctrine was the foundation to the Churches and by Churches those that were then built upon their doctrine as that of Ephesus Corinth Philippi Rome c. before the falling off from the truth the Authority of these Fathers and practise of these Churches is pleaded for as seriously by us as the other superstitiously by your selves Report Fourthly Here you tell us t was propounded That the form of the Disputation should be Syllogisticall which I after many reasons alledged by you the Ministers to inforce the same at last yielded to Reply A very fit phrase for it for 't was inforced by you indeed yet more by strength of resolution than reason that 't was yielded to by my self is as true yet I must profess it was because the Disposition of your wills did put me as as we say to Hobsons Choise for I saw you so desirous to draw your necks out of the coller and to make any thing in excuse to break off the Discourse that I must choose either that way or none and therefore rather than the work of that day should fall as it must have done altogether else for you to the total failing of the expectation and hindering the edification of the people I could not but give way to your desires Nevertheless your many reasons which were but two and those as reasonless too as if you had said nothing were counter-mand with as many more and those also of so much weight that because you began to feel them sit heavy upon your Scholastick skirts you would have obstructed my delivery of them to the people for what great matters did you alledge whereby at that time and place to prove the expediency of such a form First that 't was given out as my desire to them is it never may be again by them of our party that I was a Scholar and durst meet with Scholars in discourse and therefore seeing I now was before Scholars it was expected that I should dispute in the way that 's most usual among them Secondly That the way of Dispute by Syllogisms for which some of you had little need to dispute considering their illogicall and un-syllogisticall doings that day wherein they were all-to-be-puzzled in their matter by fumbling so much about that form was the clearest and most compendious to the proving of things and the preventing of extrravagancies and disorder much what in such a manner did you utter your selves in order to inforcing your Proposition to which the reply was to this purpose Namely First that though I had been in the University and a Graduate there yet I pretended to no great Scholarship yea that I was a Dunce and a fool which very terms and no other I repeated again in my Position and was contented to be counted for no other as to that kind of learning of much of which I was willingly forgetful that I might know more of Christ and the plainness of his Gospel Secondly that I came not thither to dispute nor did I the Lord is my witness in that formal way you stood upon but in plainness to give an account before all to as many as should ask it according to my ability and what liberty you should allot me thereunto which yet was well nigh none at all of the way you call Heresie after which I and many others did worship Thirdly that these Syllogisticall wayes of arguing and the foolish feigned forms of the Scribes and Disputers of this world which men might dispute in about the things of Nature and the world were utterly unsuitable to the seriousness of the things of Christ and the Gospel which were most effectually delievered for so Paul chose to hold them out in all plainness of speech and most commonly hid from people by the Logicall terms and Methods of mans invention and that the wise and prudent men after the flesh Doctors Schoolmen and Casuists had clouded the truth from the world for ages and generations together by these their
therefore O thou most miserably be wildred Priesthood of the Nations and understand for so thou shalt if thou return from out of that thick wood of Authors Polemical Tracts Schoolmen Casuists Tomes Volumes of Fathers Councels Commentators Treatises Systemes of Theology framed forms of old and New Creeds long and short Catechismes confessions of Churches c. in which thou hast wandred and lost thy self from the truth to the unfeigned study of that little book of Scriptures which alone if thou wilt be admonished by it is able to make thee and them that hear thee wise enough unto salvation Thou speakest what thou hast seen of thy fathers we speak what we have seen of our Fathers what thine teach in their books we regard not quâ ipsi dixerint unless quâ dictum prius by our Fathers if they teach no other then what our Fathers teach in theirs it is no more then what thou having the same Scripture the same liberty to search the same promise of the same spirit to guide the same accesse to God in prayer for it mayest learn not at second hand from them but at first hand from thence as easily as themselves but when they go aside from that and thou with them and thine with thee a venture this seems no other to me then Ignis fatuus with a false flash going before and Ignoramus fatuus with his false faith and a number of ignorants following after Thou tellest us of thy novel antiquity of Counsels National Oecumenicall of Churches Greek and Latin of Fathes Austin Gregory c. and yet confessest thy self that particular Churches have erred and may erre and if all particulars then why the universal which consists of all particulars cannot thou canst not prove and that generall councels which the School-men term the representative Church are subject to error and have sometimes decreed heresie and falshood for truth thou confessest by Dr. Featley p. 17. of his figment And that none of the fathers nor yet the joint consent of many is a competent judge for faith to hang upon concerning the right of things is confest by Mr. Blake p. 58. of his to Mr. Blackwood and yet to go round again thou ventest thy self out of the mouthes of others as if their verdict were enough to warrant and canonize all that for verity that is vented by them Tell us therefore no more as Dr. Featley doth of Gregory nor yet of Gregory the great whose testimonies if they were for thee but now I think on t they are not for in the place cited by Dr. Featley himself in the very forehead of his book in the next page of all before the first t is evident that Greg. Nazianzen was for infants baptism but in case of danger onely i. e. if they were likely to die in infancy otherwise saith he for so Mr. Den cites Gregories words more fully in the place which the Doctor docks and custs off in the midst p. 49. of his answer to Dr. Featley otherwise let them stay still they be capable to hear and to answer and no more to your purpose speaks Pope Gregory the great whose words are cited out of Mr. Fox by Mr. Cornwell and out of Mr. Cornwell by Dr. Featley p. 63. 64. in way of resolution to Austin the monk are no other then the same viz. that in case of necessity infants might be baptized as soon as they were born yet were their testimonies any more for thee then they are against thee they could make nothing for thee as to evince the equity of thy cause As for our way of baptism if it were our way onely we trust we should be against it our selves but sith it is the onely way of that word by which all works must be tried and all persons judged whose authority alone being absolutely divine if it were of any esteem with the adversaries thereof were enough to silence their disputes against it it will stand though never so many Councels and things which thou callest Churches and a 1000 Gregories were against it By this time you may see O ye Ashford Synodians how little ground you would have gotten by it if the Authorities of the Church of God from the beginning and the fathers of both that and after ages had been used by you to the advantage of your disputation when as not onely the primitive fathers of all i. e. the Apostles and the Church in their daies whose authorities you rebell against are wholly against you but also the prime of those postern fathers and the Church in their daies whose authoritie you so stand upon are nothing for you But if by fathers and Church you should chance to mean either the universall C C Clergy and their C C Christendom or the Christned Emperors Kings and civil governâ—…rs that have thrown down their crowns to the Clergy and according to the C C Clergies cruel sense and wicked will have been hitherto nursing fathers to the Christen Nations which they have reigned over both of which the Clergy hath reigned ore and nursed alias nusled in ignorance to this day Rev. 17. then indeed as Caiaphas did in an another case you speak truer then you are aware of for their authority alone I mean so far forth as it hath acted it self in a way of meer might besides rightâ—… if it were of any esteem with such as chuse to obey God rather then man were enough to silence all disputes against infant-baptism indeed at least to lay the itch and quench the heat of them when not onely the Popes paternal precepts and decretals in the latin Church witnesse that of Innocentius the third who Decret Greg. l. 3. as cited by Mr. Cornwel enacted that the baptism of infants should succeed circumcision but also the imperial lawes and constitutions as well as Synodicall cannons required infant baptism in the Greek Church and that so strictly too as Mr. Marshall himself alledges out of Photius p. 33. 34. to Mr. Tombes that whatsoever baptized persons would not bring their children and wiues too that 's more whereby you may note the goodnesse of those rimes and Churches when a baptizd husband was forct to bring his wife as well as his seed to baptism should be punished and who ever denied baptism to a new born infant should be Anathematized or cursâ—…d with a most bitter curse when also as Dr. Featley boasts out of Gastius p. 68. of his book At Zurick after many disputations between Zwinglius and the gainsayers of infant baptism the Senate made an act that if any presumed to rebaptizâ—… â—…lià s baptized such as were falsely supposed to be baptized before should be drowned and at Vienna many meerly for baptizing such were so tied together in chaines that one drew the other after him into the river wherein they were all suffocated and at Ropolstein the Lords of that place decreed that such should be burnt with an hot Iron and bear the base brands of those Lords in whose