DABNEY 
 Fiction Ho Defence of Troth. 
 
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 DM- 
 
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 in 2011 with funding from 
 
 Princeton Theological Seminary Library 
 
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 Fiction, No Defence of Truth: 
 
 OR A 
 
 EEVIEW 
 
 OF 
 
 THEODOSIA EARNEST, 
 
 Reprinted from the Central Presbyterian. 
 
 ; 
 
 RICHMOND: 
 
 WILLIAM II. CLEMMITT, PRINTER. 
 1859. 
 

Note.— The following Review is reprinted from the 
 '•Central Presbyterian," in which it appeared first in weekly 
 numbers. This is the apology offered to the reader, for the 
 few typographical error*, which have been transferred from i-irivf 
 
 the hurried forms of the newspaper press, into this more 
 permanent publication. The following Table of Errata will 
 enable the reader to correct them for himself— 
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 On Title Page, and heading of each page, for "Theodosia 
 Earnest," read, "Theodosia Ernest." 
 
 On p. 5, for "role," read "r<Tte." 
 
 On p. 5, for "redoutable," read "redoubtable." 
 
 On p. 12, for "prosecute," read "persecute." 
 
 On p. 12, tor " Presbyterian works," read " Presbyterian 
 words." 
 
 On p. 22, for "heroines." read " heroine's." 
 
 On p. 55, for "Jews," read "Jew." 
 
 On p. 64, for "eklesia," read "ekklesia." 
 
 On p. 86, for "breed," read "Creed." 
 
 On p. 116, for "Let us see Bingham," &c., read, "Let us 
 see — Bingham concurs," &c. 
 
 On p. 133. for "illustratrate," read "illustrate." 
 
 On p. 140, erase the marks of quotation from the author's 
 synopsis of R. flail's argument. So, on p. 141. 
 
 On p. 148, line 4, erase words : "the principles of." 
 
 
Fiction, No Defence of Truth; 
 
 OR A 
 
 REVIEW 
 
 OF 
 
 THEODOSIA EARNEST. 
 
 RICHMOND: 
 
 CLEMM 
 
 1859. 
 

 EEVIEW. 
 
 A Friend having recently urged us 
 to read some of the remarkable Immer- 
 sionist Novels of which we have heard so 
 much for a few years, we have procured 
 a couple, and perused them with great 
 amusement. One of them is a Novel by a 
 lady, in which the heroine marries a Pres- 
 byterian youth, son of a sturdy old ruling 
 elder, adheres to her close communion prin- 
 ciples in her father-in-law's house, in spite 
 of the most ruthless persecution, and at 
 length by dint of perseverance, patience, 
 and the irresistible logic of an old, illiterate, 
 negro woman, conquers her husband and a 
 whole batch of Presbyterians including a 
 parson to her own narrow creed. Surely 
 our immersionist neighbors must consider 
 this the era of the third Punic war of their 
 spiritual commonwealth, their approaching 
 ultima dies; that their very women leave the 
 nursery and the kitchen, and come forth to 
 
4 REVIEW OE 
 
 the combat, armed with their trenchant pens 
 dipped in the concentrated gall of Drs. 
 Carson, Booth and Campbell! Yet the sorry 
 luck of the Amazon whose polemic emprize 
 we have witnessed, we think, should be a 
 warning to the rest of "the Sex," to abide 
 by the spirit of Horace's wise advice Ne 
 sutor ultra creyidam: "Mistress; better stick 
 to your thimble." The paltry style, the 
 literary blunders, and the feeble argument 
 of this work which our gallantry requires us 
 to leave nameless, place it beneath criticism. 
 Next, we have the famous Romance, of. 
 "Theodosia Earnest orthe Heroine of Faith," 
 from the press of Graves, Marks & Co., 
 Nashville, Tenn. 1857. Eighteenth Thou- 
 sand. This is a work ad captandum vulgus, 
 badly printed on mean paper; and illustrated 
 with execrable daubs of wood cuts represent- 
 ingthe absurdities of "baby-sprinkling-, "and 
 the contrasted glories of dipping; and adorn- 
 ed with a frontispiece which exhibits the 
 lovely Theodosia herself. The book is evi- 
 dently gotten up "for the million." The 
 last mentioned picture, at least, deserves to 
 be called "a speaking portrait." While we 
 cannot compliment the artist on having 
 successfully reproduced the maidenly lovli- 
 ness which the "Heroine of Faith" is said 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. O 
 
 to have possessed: (inasmuch as the face is 
 most decisively ill-favoured,) yet he deserves 
 the higher praise of having accurately em- 
 bodied the ideal of the young she-polemic 
 expressed in the author's narrative. The 
 brazen pertness, the vixenish tenacity, the 
 self-conceit, appropriate to the role which 
 she is represented as playing, are all, most 
 truthfully represented, in a coarse face, be- 
 dizzened profusely with limp ringlets. 
 
 In order that the reader may at once fa- 
 miliarize himself with the new gospel of these 
 polemic fictions, he must understand that 
 the Faith for which Theodosia exhibits her 
 heroism, is not faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, 
 but faith in dipping. The author himself 
 represents her as being eminently possessed 
 of the former, while still a benighted Pres- 
 byterian, and as being entirely undisturbed 
 in its exercise. No, henceforth simple faith 
 on the Saviour does not constitute any one 
 a moral hero, but confidence in the dogma- 
 tism of this water-gospel. And this is the 
 first foretaste of the impieties with which the 
 reader will be nauseated as he proceeds. 
 
 In a preface, to a sort of appendix, con- 
 tained in the latest edition (as we suppose 
 it to be) the publisher, Mr. J. R. Graves, 
 rather complains that the redoutable book 
 
6 EEVIEW OF 
 
 had received no notice from the hands of 
 Presbyterians up to that time, with the ex- 
 ception of a slight (and slighting) article 
 from Dr. N. L. Eice, in the St. Louis Pres- 
 byterian. It seems, he fears we poor Pres- 
 byterians will scarcely make a resistence 
 stout enough to give the combativeness of 
 the author and his publishers a satisfactory 
 glow, in drubbing us. Now we felt upon 
 coming to this, that we had reached the 
 point where forbearance ceases to be a vir- 
 tue. The temptation became irresistible to 
 undeceive Mr. J. E. Graves & Co. by in- 
 forming him and all the world, that what he 
 had mistaken for fear or the part of Pres- 
 byterians, was only contempt. Seeing that 
 our Christian forbearance, and our disgust 
 at an assault so unworthy of a Christian 
 denomination, have been thus misunder- 
 stood, we feel that it is both a right and 
 duty to speak out, and we hereby assure 
 Mr. J. E. Graves & Co. and their anony- 
 mous author, that when we have done with 
 them they will no longer have any ground 
 to complain of being unnoticed by Presby- 
 terians. 
 
 1. The tenor of both these works is to re- 
 present Presbyterians as given to persecu- 
 tion, intolerant, ignorant of the reasons of 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 7 
 
 their own faith, and almost stupidly foolish 
 in their defence of them, an easy prey to 
 proselyters, and priest-ridden by their doc- 
 tors of divinity. In the work first described^ 
 the immersionist young lady is pictured as 
 subjected to a most painful persecution by 
 her Presbyterian father-in-law, because she 
 could not conscientiously commune with 
 him. In Theodosia Earnest, the Presbyte- 
 rian pastor is described, with his people, in 
 *all the colors above mentioned. Now there 
 are doubtless individual Presbyterians who 
 are intolerant, and others who are ill-inform- 
 ed, gullible, prejudiced as there are such 
 unfortunate persons in all other denomina- 
 tions, even the purest. But is it truthful to 
 embody such cases, as representative of 
 Presbyterianism? A representative case 
 must be so chosen, as to be true to the 
 general average, at least, of the class. It is 
 perfectly well known to this anonymous 
 scribbler and his publishers, that Presbyte- 
 rians are not, as a denomination intolerant 
 or persecuting towards other evangelical 
 Christians, nor less informed of the reasons 
 for their own tenets; nor are they usually 
 an easy prey to the sectarian proselyter. 
 When that traitorous Mother of Mischief, 
 Harriet Beecher Stowe, launched her in- 
 
8 EEVIEW OF 
 
 famous "Uncle Tom's Cabin" against the 
 slaveholders, this was just the ground upon 
 which all fair men condemned it, as a vil- 
 lainous slander. There have been individual 
 slaveholders, who have been unjust enough 
 to sell industrious and honest slaves to slave 
 dealers. There have been such cases at the 
 South, as that of the monster Legare who 
 tormented his slave to death. Who denies 
 it? So there have been men at the North, 
 who have abused domestic relations, to tor- 
 ment their children and murder their wives. 
 But herein, we urged and with irrefragra- 
 ble justice, is the wickedness and false- 
 hood of this abolition novel, that it takes 
 the rare outrages of southern society, and 
 makes them representative of our customary 
 state. So we reason concerning these pole- 
 mical novels. They select the rare excep- 
 tions of Presbyterian character, for the 
 representative cases; they are therefore but 
 slanders, they deserve to be judged by the 
 same rule with the vile and malignant as- 
 sault of the above mentioned high priestess 
 of discord. 
 
 2. But the disposition to misrepresent 
 Presbyterians is still more openly manifest- 
 ed in the details of the work. One of the 
 charges again and again made against them 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 9 
 
 is, that they expel from their communion, those 
 who propose to seek immersion, and the 
 fellowship of immersionist congregations. 
 On page 102 of Theodosia Earnest, the 
 Presbyterian pastor is represented as threat- 
 ening her in the following terms, to deter 
 her from the farther investigation of the 
 question : 
 
 "And now, before I take my leave, I 
 feel it my duty solemnly to warn you before 
 God, to take heed where you are going. I 
 should be greatly pained, if we should find 
 it necessary to expel you from the church." 
 
 "Expel me from the church i Why Mr. 
 Johnson,'* &c. 
 
 Again: on page 269, the church session 
 of the Presbyterian church is represented 
 as holding a meeting, with a Doctor of Di- 
 vinity and President of College, and another 
 minister besides Mr., Johnson, as advisers — 
 Theodosia has now been dipped: and the 
 pastor is represented as stating the case 
 thus: 
 
 "We understand that Miss Earnest, while 
 her name was still standing as a member 
 upon our record, has gone to a Baptist so- 
 ciety, solicited immersion, and has actually 
 been immersed by a Baptist preacher. By 
 this act she has undoubtedly severed all 
 
10 EEVTEW OF 
 
 connexion with our church, and must of ne- 
 cessity be excluded from our communion. 
 The only question is, whether we are bound 
 to make the usual citation to appear, and 
 answer to the charge." 
 
 Now it is possible that in so large a de- 
 nomination as the Presbyterian, some case 
 may have happened, where a church session 
 so far misunderstood our polity, as to pro- 
 pose discipline against a member who de- 
 signed to leave his church for some other 
 branch of the church catholic. But we do 
 not believe there ever was such a case. If 
 there was, it was a rare exception. This 
 religious novel, by introducing the incident 
 as a part of the tale, evidently designs to 
 represent it as regular Presbyterian usage. 
 The whole scope of the book is to exemplify 
 Immersionism versus Presbyterianism; and 
 therefore, unless the instance were a fair 
 representation of our usage, it should have 
 no place in the story. But if the reader 
 would know how just this representation is, 
 let him consult the Minutes of our General 
 Assembly for the year 1839, page 177. 
 This Judicatory, the supreme regulator in all 
 our denomination, resolves; "That in all 
 cases where members of any of our churches 
 apply for dismission to unite with a church 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 11 
 
 of another denomination, the proper course 
 is to give a certificate of Christian charac- 
 ter only." 
 
 The Presbytery of Hudson requesting the 
 rule to be rescinded, as being not sufficient- 
 ly courteous to other denominations, the 
 Assembly of 1848, Minutes, p. 22, reply: 
 
 "The Presbytery of Hudson has misap- 
 prehended the spirit and scope of the reso- 
 lution in question. It is neither a censure 
 on the individuals, nor the churches to 
 which they seek to be dismissed, but sets 
 forth the only fact which it is important 
 that those churches should know." 
 
 The Assembly here declares, (it does not 
 institute de novo,) the proper usage. And 
 such is the liberal and fraternal spirit in 
 which our denomination has always, so far 
 as we know, recognized the Christian cha- 
 racter of all other evangelical churches, 
 and the right of Presbyterians to go from 
 us to them if they see fit. We cheerfully 
 commend them, by testimonials of their 
 good standing, to the brethren with whom 
 they wish to unite; and then as they are no 
 longer exclusively ours, we of course remove 
 their names from our communion roll. 
 TVhere a member does as Theodosia is re- 
 presented as doing, goes away without 
 
12 REVIEW OP 
 
 deigning to say "Good-bye;" of course we 
 can only do the latter act of the two, re- 
 move the name from our communion roll. 
 We are allowed no opportunity to give the 
 testimonials, for they are not asked. Where 
 then, did the author of Theodosia get the 
 notion of our excommunicating such a mem- 
 ber? The reader may find it in the cur- 
 rent usage of the Immersionist churches, 
 which, as is well known, do expel those 
 members who commune with the other 
 branches of Christ's church — that the Pres- 
 byterian church should be represented as 
 guilty of such intolerance as the author's 
 church currently practices, we justly resent, 
 as an odious slander. 
 
 In this connexion we will notice another 
 trait of injustice in this romance; the insin- 
 uation that the Presbyterians of the United 
 States would fain prosecute Immersionists 
 for their denial of infant baptism, if they 
 dared. Let the reader note the deceitful 
 form in which the charge is suggested. 
 Theodosia, page 167. Mr. Courtney, the 
 Immersionist schoolmaster says: 
 
 "I have it over the signatures of Koman 
 Catholic, Episcopalian, Lutheran, Dutch 
 Reformed, and Presbyterian writers, who, 
 while they have been in full connexion with 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 13 
 
 those very establishments, all of which have 
 (when they could,) been the most virulent 
 and cruel persecutors of the Baptists," &c. 
 On page 308, the same spokesman says: 
 
 "The most bitter and relentless persecu- 
 tion was directed especially against those 
 who denied infant baptism. This has con- 
 tinued through every age. It has not been 
 confined to the Eoman Catholics. It nas 
 been practised by all the so-called churches 
 that received infant members, (your own in- 
 cluded,) whenever and wherever they have 
 been able to obtain the power," &c. The 
 speaker is addressing a family of Presby- 
 terians in our country. And once more : 
 on page 339, speaking of the persecution 
 of Donatists in Africa in the 5th century, 
 he says: 
 
 "From this day down to the present, in 
 every country where Peedobaptists have had 
 the power, our brethren have been the sub- 
 jects of bitter and unrelenting persecution." 
 
 On the same page, this speaker claims 
 the "Donatists, Novatianists, Cathari, Pau- 
 licians, Henricans, Petrobrussians, Menno- 
 nites, Allegences, Waldenses, &c," as sub- 
 stantially of his church. Let us remark in 
 passing, the evidence both of profound ig- 
 norance, and unprincipled recklessaess of 
 
14 REVIEW OF 
 
 assertion, contained in the last sentence. 
 Every well informed student of Church His- 
 tory knows, that, of all the sects named ; 
 only the Petrobrussians, and Mennonites, 
 with perhaps the Henricians, held any im- 
 portant peculiarity in common with the mo- 
 dern Immersionsts. The Waldenses always 
 declare that they have practised infant bap- 
 tism in all ages, as they do now. The 
 Donatists and Novatians declared for them- 
 selves, that they only differed from the 
 Catholic Christians of their own day, on the 
 question of communion with certain Bishops 
 whose ordination they considered as cor- 
 rupt. It seems that this author of Theodo- 
 sia, in his raking together of ready-made 
 falsehoods at second and third hand, is too 
 ignorant to know even how to spell the 
 names of the sects about which he professes 
 to be informed. Students of history are 
 accustomed to hear of Henricians, and Al- 
 bigenses; not of Henricans and Allegences. 
 But this is by the way. It was seen that 
 this writer does not dare to charge Ameri- 
 can Presbyterians with having actually per- 
 secuted Immersionists. But he obviously 
 designs to make the impression on ignorant 
 readers, that the only reason we have not 
 done so is, that our free government has not 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 15 
 
 permitted us. Else why the reiterated as- 
 sertion, that Psedobaptist churches, (includ- 
 ing our own) have persecuted them whenever 
 and wherever they had the power? 
 
 But now, what are the facts? The Pro- 
 testant churches of the 16 th and 17th cen- 
 turies, unfortunately holding the doctrine 
 of persecution, did, to a very limited extent, 
 punish sectaries with civil pains; and among 
 others, Anabaptists. Some Presbyterian 
 churches in Europe were implicated in this 
 guilt. But the Presbyterian church of 
 America is in no closer sense a descendant 
 of those European churches, or responsible 
 for their misdeeds, than the Immersionistg 
 of America are descendants of the German 
 Anabaptists and responsible for their frantic 
 anarchy. Our church in America is an in- 
 dependent and original body. And from 
 the very day of the first organisation of its 
 first Presbytery, it has been the consistent 
 and uniform friend of the widest religioug 
 liberties to all equally. In the forming 
 times of our Eepublic, the Presbyterian de- 
 nomination led the van, in this glorioug 
 cause, and were the exemplars of that zeal 
 with which Immersionists, (we mention it 
 to their credit) asserted the same rights of 
 religious liberty. Werepeat; Presbyterians 
 
16 REVIEW 01 
 
 led the van, in claiming the widest liberty 
 for all others equally with themselves. Had 
 this unscrupulous scribbler intended to speak 
 the truth, he would have said : 'The most 
 of the churches of the Keformation, includ- 
 ing several of the Presbyterian, were guilty 
 of persecuting sectaries, and among others, 
 Immersionists, when they had the power: 
 But in this country, the Presbvterian church 
 has never had either the power or the wish 
 to do so.' In one word, the Presbyterian 
 church in the United States is at least, as 
 clear from the desire to persecute Immer- 
 sionists, as Immersionists are of the desire 
 to persecute them. We denounce, there- 
 fore, with deserved indignation, this odious, 
 false and wicked attempt, to create angry 
 blood in Immersionists against Presbyte- 
 rians. Heaven knows, there is heat enough 
 already, while the question of baptism is 
 debated in the fiery and reckless spirit of 
 this novel. Its unholy purpose, it seems, 
 demanded the inflaming of bad passions, 
 in order to blind its readers to the wildness 
 of its assertions and the flimsiness of its 
 arguments. 
 
 It may be said, by the way, that the au- 
 thor puts nearly all his arguments and as- 
 sertions on the Immersionist side, into the 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 1? 
 
 mouth of a little schoolmaster, a Mr. Court- 
 ney, a man of infinite pertness, and rabid 
 fluency. Courtney is evidently the nom de 
 guerre of the author's self; and the tirades 
 with which he overwhelms [at least the ears 
 of] the dramatis persona, are, as evidently, 
 the staple of the harangues which the author 
 (an Immersionist preacher, no doubt,) is in 
 the habit of fulminating from his pulpit. 
 We shall therefore, for convenience sake, 
 employ the name of Courtney sometimes as 
 representing the Immersionist advocate. 
 
 3. The folly and unfairness of such a 
 mode of inculcating or defending what is 
 supposed to be religious truth, can scarcely 
 be too strongly represented. In the first 
 place, a moment's consideration should have 
 taught the author, that his selecting such a 
 vehicle for his discussion was really a con- 
 fession of weakness and defeat. Having 
 failed to overthrow the sturdy Presbyterian 
 champions in the fields of true and legiti- 
 mate discussion, he is compelled to manu- 
 facture fictitious adversaries, in the pretend- 
 ed persons of Pastor Johnson, Dr. Mc- 
 Kought, and elder Jones, who should be 
 stupid and foolish enough to give this 
 doughty Don Quixote a chance to claim the 
 victory — If he wished to try conclusions 
 2 
 
18 REVIEW OF 
 
 with a veritable Presbyterian champion, 
 why did he not select a bona fide and live 
 controversialist, in the person of some N. 
 L. Eice, or Wm. L. McCalla? Ah; it was 
 easier to gain a seeming victory over a man 
 of straw! And this is not all : Conscious, 
 as it seems, of the intrinsic weakness of 
 his argument, the author must needs throw 
 around it the factitious and illegitimate in- 
 terest of a love-story. He did not believe, 
 it seems, that his principles were important 
 and interesting enough, to make Christian 
 people read an honest and straightforward 
 discussion of them for its own sake : he must 
 needs sugar the nauseous dose, to make it 
 go down. And then, one of his foremost 
 champi ns forsooth, is a young, pretty and 
 ingenue, i girl, who is painted as attrac- 
 tively as the author's bungling hand knew 
 how ; in 01 der to gain the unfair advantage 
 of the feelings of readers for youth, beauty 
 and sex. Sophistries from the mouth of a 
 bearded man would be handled as they de- 
 served ; but when they drop from the pretty 
 mouth of a pretty woman, gallantry forbids 
 our testing them too narrowly ! So that the 
 author, afraid to meet men, and as a man, 
 skulks behind the petticoats of his heroine. 
 And indeed ; what is the intrinsic absurdi- 
 
THEODOSTA EARNEST. 19 
 
 ty of sending Christian people to hunt for 
 truth (and that sacred truth,) in a work of 
 fiction ? It is an insult to the understand- 
 ings of readers ; and a disgrace to the de- 
 nomination which is judged to need such a 
 mode of defence. No seeming triumph 
 gained over an imaginary antagonist can 
 prove any thing ; for, as the same author 
 constructed both his adversary's argument 
 and his own, of course he would make the 
 victory fall on his side. iEsop tells us, in 
 one of his fables, how the man and the lion 
 were once, during a truce in their warfare, 
 amicably walking out together to take the 
 air. They passed a picture where a lion 
 was represented as bound, and crouching 
 under the cudgel of a man. The man says 
 to his lion friend: -'You see there the su- 
 periority of our race to yours." "Nay," 
 quoth the lion, "it is because a man was the 
 painter. If a lion had held the brush, the 
 parties would have been in a rather differ- 
 ent position." Let the reader make the 
 application. 
 
 It is said indeed, that Immersionists justi- 
 fy the circulation of the work by saving, 
 that though there is a fictitious plot to make 
 the book readable, all is fair, because the 
 arguments put into the mouths of the Pres- 
 
20 REVIEW OF 
 
 byterian characters are the standard argu- 
 ments which we use when defending our- 
 selves, and that they are fairly stated. But 
 we beg leave to dispute both facts. Ac- 
 cording to all fair forensic rules, our mere 
 word, repudiating those arguments as fair 
 and full statements of our side, entitles us 
 to arrest a debate conducted on such a plan. 
 When plaintiff and defendant come into 
 court, each party has a sovereign discretion 
 in selecting his own advocate. If the de- 
 fendant says that the counsel who has vo- 
 lunteered in his cause is not the man of his 
 choice; and that, instead of representing 
 him fairly, he is betraying him, this is 
 enough. It is only necessary for the de- 
 fendant to say that he considers this volun- 
 teer-advocate as unfaithful; it is not neces- 
 sary for him to prove him such. He is 
 entitled to make his own selection of a de- 
 fender. So, we Presbyterians now and here- 
 by notify Messrs. Graves, Marks & Co., and 
 Messrs. Sheldon, Blakeman & Co., and all 
 Immersionist preachers, colporteurs, mem- 
 bers and proselyters, in these United States 
 and the British Provinces, and wherever 
 the far famed Theodosia may be running, 
 that we do not consider, and never have 
 considered the fair water-nymph (who was 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 21 
 
 a full blooded Immersionist before she be- 
 gan the investigation) nor the Presbyterian 
 elder, Uncle Jones, (who was evidently fishy, 
 i. e. indulging partial tendencies to go un- 
 der the water, from the beginning,) nor 
 poor, old parson Johnson, (who confesses 
 he had never examined the subject much,) 
 as suitable advocates of our cause ; that we 
 hereby repudiate them as such; and that we 
 now lay our formal "injunction" on the pro- 
 gress of the discussion in such feeble and 
 treacherous hands. Now, will our Immer- 
 sionist neighbors arrest the debate; will 
 they suspend the circulation of the ex 'parte 
 and repudiated discussion, until the justice 
 of our assertion can be tested ; as they are 
 forensically bound to do, in all fairness and 
 honesty? We shall see. But if they are 
 very anxious to prosecute this great cause 
 of Immersionism versus Presbyterianism, at 
 once ; let them take the arguments of some 
 real, actual Presbyterians, such as Dr. John 
 H. Rice's Irenicum, Dr. John M. Mason's 
 Treatise on the Church of God, or Dr. N. L. 
 Rice's Debate with Campbell; print the whole 
 of the Presbyterian argument in Presbyte- 
 rian works, [and not a few disjointed scraps, 
 falsely and treacherously torn from them] 
 along with the best refutations they can 
 
22 BE VIEW OF 
 
 get ; and lay these two pleas before the 
 great jury of the Keligious Public. This, 
 if fairly done, might be fair. 
 
 The real motive and design of this advo- 
 cacy of pretended truth by fiction, is this: 
 It was hoped that the love-tale, the picto- 
 rial illustrations, the influence of sex and 
 youth in the heroines favor, would make a 
 multitude of ignorant people swallow the 
 book, with its whole dose of misrepresenta- 
 tions, false issues, and unfounded assertions; 
 who would never have taste, patience, or 
 capacity, to read any such reply as Presbyte- 
 rians could condescend to write. These read- 
 ers would gulph down the low novel, but 
 they w r ould be very secure from the danger 
 of reading a manly, straight-forward dis- 
 cussion of its pretended arguments and 
 statements, unseasoned with fiction ©r dema- 
 gogueism. The whole enterprise is a cal- 
 culation on the gullibility of mankind; and 
 it must be confessed, a calculation which 
 was certain of realization to a large degree. 
 But then it is also true, that the very ele- 
 ment which ensures this partial success to 
 the book, is the element also of its unfair- 
 ness. It is successful because it is so unfair. 
 So, in crimes of blacker character, the very 
 treachery of the assault is oftentimes the 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 23 
 
 thing which makes resistance ineffectual. 
 When an honorable enemy meets us fairly 
 by daylight, and face to face, we have a 
 chance of successful self-defence, according 
 to that measure of prowess which God has 
 given us. But if our adversary is wicked 
 enough to turn assassin, and waylay our 
 path, we are very free to confess that we 
 are in his power; except so far as a good 
 Providence interposes, the strength and 
 skill of a Hercules will not avail. 
 
 Let it be distinctly understood then, that 
 we neither hope nor expect to be attentive- 
 ly and dispassionately read by the persons 
 for whom the shrewd managers of Theodosia 
 Earnest have set their trap. People who 
 are foolish enough to go to a work of fiction 
 to learn sacred truth, are not likely to at- 
 tend to a scholarly and solid discussion. 
 (But it may be added that such people are 
 hardly fit material to make Presbyterians 
 of, at any rate.) We do not write for such. 
 Our object is defensive. Learning that this 
 novel is not only circulated among Immer- 
 sionists, but obtruded very actively on Pres- 
 byterians, our purpose is, only to give our 
 own people the means of knowing and ex- 
 posing its true character, when they are as- 
 sailed. 
 
24 REVIEW OP 
 
 4. This book bears on its face another 
 evidence of dishonesty. It comes forth to 
 the world wholly without any responsible 
 name. By this, we do not mean to com- 
 plain of the fact that its authorship is not 
 made known to the public; but that while it 
 is anonymous in its parentage, no Editor, 
 nor religious denomination, nor agency, 
 stands god-father for it. A polemical work, 
 especially one which so aggressively assaults 
 other Christians, ought to have some re- 
 sponsible party to be held answerable for 
 its statements. But a still stronger trait of 
 dishonesty is the absence of all reference- 
 marks to the books and other authorities 
 cited, in a majority of cases. In some cases, 
 such references are given ; but in far more, 
 authors are quoted in the most positive tone 
 of assertion, and no clue is given, by chap- 
 ter, section, or page, to the part of the 
 works where the quotations may be verified. 
 Are we to account for this peculiarity, which 
 is as unscholarly as it is fraudulent, by the 
 author's ignorance ? That ignorance is mani- 
 fest enough ; but it is a very imperfect ex- 
 cuse; because mere common sense would 
 have taught him that every writer, and es- 
 pecially one who, like Mr. Courtney, boasts 
 frequently that it was not his wont to assert 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 25 
 
 things, but to prove them, is bound to give 
 his readers the means of reading his cita- 
 tions for themselves, and judging of their 
 relevancy and fidelity. The advocate who 
 refuses to subject his witnesses to his oppo- 
 nent's cross-examination, is justly thrown 
 out of court. Literary usage would justify 
 us in summarily throwing out far the larger 
 part of this author's citations, on this sole 
 ground. We might justly say ; "We do not 
 listen to your witnesses ; we count them as 
 non-existent ; because you have not given 
 us chapter, or page, or section." But let 
 not the reader suppose that we make these 
 complaints, because there is any serious 
 difficulty in rebutting or exploding the au- 
 thorities of Theodosia and her schoolmaster. 
 They are easily caught, notwithstanding 
 their attempted skulking, as the reader will 
 see. 
 
 Our plan in the remainder of this review 
 will be, to take up, nearly at random, a 
 part of the writer's false issues and sophis- 
 tries, and expose them ; and to show the 
 treacherous use of authorities and testimo- 
 nies cited by him, in a sufficient number of 
 cases to enable the reader to estimate his 
 trustworthiness. It is not our purpose to 
 write a connected treatise on baptism. This 
 
REVIEW OF 
 
 won, is not now needed. The many sound 
 and irrefragable arguments already con- 
 structed by our divines leave little to be de- 
 sired, except their diligent circulation and 
 study by our own people. Certainly, there 
 is no peculiar force or originality in this 
 pretentious work, to create an occasion for 
 a new handling of the great question. The 
 author advances nothing new. The familiar 
 old grounds of discussion are brought in 
 review. The only peculiarity is that the 
 solid proofs on which Psgdobaptists have 
 usually and justly relied, are here obscured 
 by a new batch of sophistries and misstate- 
 ments. The only force which these sophis- 
 tries have, is the impudent hardihood with 
 which they are asserted. 
 
 5. As one specimen of a critical argu- 
 ment, let the reader take the following. 
 On page 83, good old Mr. Johnson is re- 
 presented as citing the well known and un- 
 answerable argument against immersion 
 that John the Baptist, (in Matt, iii: 11,) is 
 represented as saying: "I indeed baptize 
 you with water, unto repentance ; but he 
 that cometh after me is mightier than I, 
 whose shoes I am not worthy to bear ; he 
 shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and 
 with fire." Hence, argues old Mr. Johnson, 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 2 1 
 
 it was not immersion, but sprinkling or 
 pouring; for one would not so naturally 
 speak of immersing with water. Now we 
 beg our readers to notice the dishonesty of 
 this novel-writer. Instead of representing 
 the Presbyterian pastor as going further, 
 to substantiate this argument by the addi- 
 tions usually made to it by Psedobaptists 
 when they employ it (additions in which its 
 chief force consists,) the author distinctly 
 indicates that the above contains the whole 
 strength of the position of Presbyterians. 
 Miss Theodosia and her lover seem to be 
 for a moment somewhat posed by the ar- 
 gument; and just then the ubiquitous Mr. 
 Courtney drops in. They tell him the sub- 
 stance of Mr. Johnson's words ; (page 86,) 
 adding that they do not well know how to 
 get over it. 
 
 '•Is that all?" asks Mr. Courtney? 
 
 "Yes;" (says Mr. Percy the lover,) "that 
 is the substance of the argument." 
 
 Thus the author of the novel endeavors 
 to produce the impression that this argu- 
 ment, in the hands of Presbyterians, is sus- 
 tained solely by the criticism of the preposi- 
 tion in the phrase "baptism with water." 
 He makes his dramatis personal say ; That 
 is in substance, all of the argument. But 
 
28 EEVIEW OF 
 
 he knew perfectly well, (or else his assump- 
 tion to debate baptism is impudent charla- 
 tanry,) that this is not all : that this is but 
 the beginning of the statement of the case 
 as Presbyterians put it. He took good 
 care not to let his parties proceed to collate 
 this passage with Acts i : 5, ii : 3 and 4, 
 17, 18, 38; x: 44; and xi: 15, 16. For 
 then, it would have appeared that Mr. John- 
 son's interpretation of the baptism with 
 water, and with the Holy Ghost must be 
 correct ; because the Holy Ghost is there 
 said with immediate reference to John's 
 language, again and again, to fall on the 
 disciples, and to be poured out, and the fire 
 with which they were baptized, sat on each 
 of them like cloven tongues. But this by 
 the way: Mr. Courtney thereupon expresses 
 his amazement that Mr. Johnson should be 
 so unfair as to take advantage of the Eng- 
 lish version, reveals to them the fact that 
 the preposition translated with in Matt, ii : 
 11, is en, and appeals to Mr. Percy (a Greek 
 scholar,) for the admitted fact, that en in 
 classic Greek usually means in, and not 
 with; so that had not King James' naughty 
 translators, to the perpetual anguish of all 
 English and American Immersionists, ob- 
 scured the sense, the passage should have 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 29 
 
 read: "1 indeed baptize you in water; . . 
 . . he shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost, 
 and in fire." He then proceeds to remark, 
 (page 89,) that en is used two thousand, 
 seven hundred and twenty times in the New 
 Testament; that in about twenty-five hun- 
 dred of these places, it does of necessity 
 mean in and not with; that in twenty other 
 places, in would better express the meaning 
 of the original than with, while with (in 
 the sense of instrument or material) is the 
 necessary meaning in only forty places. 
 Therefore argues Mr. Courtney ; "The 
 chances are as twenty-seven hundred to 
 forty, that an argument based on the word 
 <"witti (where it stands for the Greek word 
 'en') will lead to a false conclusion; and the 
 chances are as twenty-seven hundred, to 
 forty, that an argument based on 'z'«,' as 
 the real meaning of the word, will lead to a 
 true conclusion." 
 
 Now, in the first place; what think you, 
 good reader, of such a critical argument as 
 this? Let us apply it fairly to another case : 
 The Greek word stauros ('cross,') occurs 
 twenty-eight times in the New Testament. 
 In nineteen of these cases, it means unmis- 
 takeably, the wooden crucifix, on which 
 Christ (or the two thieves) was executed. 
 
30 REVIEW OF 
 
 In six places it is used with that sense which 
 it bears in Luke xiv : 27. "And whosoever 
 doth not bear his cross, and come after me, 
 cannot be my disciple." Therefore, accord- 
 ing to Mr. Courtney's marvellous rule of 
 interpretation, the probabilities would be 
 as nineteen to six, that in these passages 
 our Saviour means : "Whosoever will not 
 bear on his shoulder a wooden cross, and 
 come after me, cannot be my disciple." 
 But does not every reader in his senses 
 know, that the word stauros must here be 
 taken in the allied sense, not of a literal 
 wooden cross, but of the burden of Christ's 
 service, or some similar derived meaning? 
 Does any body believe that there are nine- 
 teen chances to six, or that there is one to a 
 million, that Christ here meant to announce 
 the preposterous assertion, that the test of 
 Christian character was to be carrying a 
 log of wood on the back? Farther illus- 
 tration of the ridiculous nature of this ar- 
 gument is not needed. The truth is, as 
 every sensible person well understands, in 
 every language, many words bear more 
 than one sense, in different connexions, 
 v those senses being usually allied to each 
 other in some way, though not the same : 
 that any honest and sensible writer or 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 31 
 
 speaker nevertheless uses all sucli words in 
 such a way that it may be certainly seen 
 what meanings he intends them to bear in 
 given connexions; and that when once it is 
 discovered a given word may be grammati- 
 cally used in a certain sense, its meaning 
 in a particular place must be determined, 
 not by inquiring which of its meanings most 
 frequently occurs, but by inquiring only 
 which suits this connexion most obviously. 
 Every language in the world is built on 
 these principles : every man in the world, 
 (including even the remarkable Courtney) 
 interprets language habitually on these 
 principles, wherever prejudice does not 
 blind him. And it does indeed look like 
 the madness of despair, that Drs. Carson 
 and Fuller, the British and American ad- 
 vocates whom Immersionists now chiefly 
 follow, should stake their cause on the criti- 
 cal rule ; that when once a given sense has 
 been established for a word of scripture, as its 
 primary sense, that meaning; and no other, 
 must be gotten out of it wherever it occurs. No 
 man on earth interprets language on this 
 rule: no man can carry it out consistently, 
 in his understanding of the scriptures. And 
 yet, Dr. Carson concedes no more than he 
 is obliged, when he virtually admits that 
 
32 KEVIEW OF 
 
 this is the only theory of interpretation on 
 which immersion can be proved to be the 
 only baptism. For that point cannot be 
 proved, unless it can be proved that baptizo, 
 and baptismos in the scriptures always mean 
 dip and dipping, and nothing else. 
 
 But in the second place, we request the 
 reader to note that Mr. Courtney accuses 
 good old Mr. Johnson of great unfairness 
 in employing the English version, which 
 represents John as speaking of baptism with 
 water, with the Holy Ghost, and with fire, 
 when the preposition in Greek is en. And 
 the veracious paedagogue grounds his as- 
 sertion of the evident error of this transla- 
 tion on this fact : that little Master Edwin 
 Earnest informs them en is in classic Greek 
 to be translated by *«*' and not 'with.' 
 Now, without pausing to prove that this is 
 not universally true even in classic Greek, 
 we would remind Mr. Courtney, that the 
 Evangelists did not write in classic, but in 
 Hebraistic Greek. They, being native He- 
 brews, employed many Greek words and 
 constructions according to the usages of 
 their own language. And moreover, in the 
 Septuagint, the Greek translation made by 
 Jews, of the Hebrew Scriptures, and in the 
 New Testament, the preposition en is not 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST* 33 
 
 used by the rules of a classic Greek; but is 
 also employed universally as the word to 
 translate the Hebrew preposition {beth.) 
 In Greek written by a Jew therefore, en 
 may be expected to be found meaning any 
 thing which beth might mean. These as- 
 sertions no scholar will venture to dispute. 
 The correspondence of the two prepositions 
 in the usage of Jews writing Greek is ex- 
 pressly asserted by Gesenius, in his Hebrew 
 Lex: which the reader may consult, if he 
 chooses. It is not necessary to multiply 
 authorities on so plain a case. But what 
 does beth mean? Gesenius tells us, at the 
 very outset of his article on the word, that 
 the various significations of the preposition 
 are grouped under three classes, 1st, beth 
 meaning "in" 2nd, beth meaning i at > or 
 '&/,' 3d, beth meaning 'with 1 — Consequent- 
 ly, the same may be true of en, when used 
 by a Jew. Gesenius then, to illustrate what 
 he means by the second use oi^betK' refers 
 to 1 Sam. xxix: 1. "The Israelites pitched 
 (their camp) beth hayin which is in Jesreel." 
 (Hayin means spring of water.) This 
 the Septuagint translates; "The Israelites 
 pitched en Aendoor: And the English ver- 
 sion; "The Israelites pitched by a fountain 
 which is in Jesreel." (Mr. Courtney, we 
 3 
 
34 REVIEW OF 
 
 suppose, would have us believe that the 
 Israelite army pitched their camp in the 
 spring literally.) Gesenius also refers to 
 Ezek. x : 15, where "beth nehar Chebar" 
 is by him translated in Greek en potamo, 
 and in English, "By the river Chebar." 
 (So that when it is said John was baptizing 
 en Jordanee^ this language in a Jews's mouth 
 might just as well mean at Jordan as in 
 Jordan.) As an illustration of the 3d use, 
 he gives among other places, Levit. viii: 32, 
 "shall burn l wit1i fire;" which the Hebrew 
 expresses by ^bettC and the Septuagint by 
 en. So that it is not true there is any pro- 
 bability arising from the usage of the pre- 
 position e?i, in Jewish hands, that the words 
 "baptized en to pneumati hagio, kai en puri" 
 mean baptized 'zV rather than baptized 
 hc'tiliS But then also, to make it perfectly 
 plain; the sacred writers show that they use 
 en in the sense of baptizing i witli > water, 
 by using as an equivalent expression, the 
 ablative of instrument (liudate baptizoj with- 
 out any preposition at all. This is the case 
 for instance, in Luke iii : 16; Acts i : 5; Acts 
 xi: 16. Is not the indignant astonishment 
 of the reader now rather turned on the 
 schoolmaster, for thus hoodwinking his ig- 
 norant victims, than on Mr. Johnson, for 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 35 
 
 claiming the propriety of the English ver- 
 sion? Or was the author ignorant of the 
 well known distinction between classic and 
 Hebraistic Greek? Then is he not a pretty 
 man, to presume to discuss the language of 
 the original scriptures, and to hurl his scur- 
 rilities broadcast, at all the wise and good 
 men who have ventured to speak the truth 
 about baptism? 
 
 But in the third place, when this prophe- 
 cy of John : "There cometh one after me . 
 ... he shall baptize you with the Holy 
 Ghost and with fire," is seen in the light of 
 its fulfilment in the book of Acts, at the 
 places above cited, the meaning appears 
 without the possibility of a doubt. There 
 the Holy Ghost, which baptized them is 
 "youredout" "poured forth?' "fell on them, 
 as on us at the beginning;" and the fire 
 which baptized them "sat on each of them as 
 it had been cloven tongues." No matter 
 what the usage of the preposition might be, 
 every man in his senses would see that the 
 Holy Ghost was applied to their persons, 
 and not their persons dipped into the Holy 
 Ghost. But then, if John, and the Book of 
 Acts quoting John speak of baptism with 
 the Spirit, and with water in the same 
 breath, the inference is unavoidable, that 
 
36 REVIEW OF 
 
 the two baptisms were similar in their mode. 
 Hence it was, that it suited the purpose of 
 the author of Theodosia, not to have pastor 
 Johnson quote the Acts in connexion with 
 John the Baptist. 
 
 But the author could not avoid, in such 
 a work, touching upon so well known a 
 passage, and he therefore introduces it in 
 the next chapter of his book, after he had, 
 as he hoped, broken the force of the argu- 
 ment from it, by deceiving his readers con- 
 cerning the usage and meaning of the pre- 
 position. On page 97, pastor Johnson is 
 represented as employing the argument we 
 have stated above ; that the prediction con- 
 cerning the baptism i witK > the Holy Ghost, 
 is seen in the second chapter of Acts, to be 
 fulfilled by 'pouring out 1 and ' 'shedding; forth,' 1 
 Hence the inference that water baptism was 
 by the same mode. And what, does the 
 reader suppose is the Immersionist's re- 
 ply? On page 98, Miss Theodosia explains 
 the case thus: 
 
 "As Christ had told James and John that 
 they should be immersed or overwhelmed 
 by sufferings and sorrows, so now he tells 
 all the disciples that they shall in a few 
 days be immersed or overwhelmed by the 
 influences of the Holy Spirit. That these 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 3T 
 
 influences should cover, overpower, and 
 swallow up their minds, as the water in bap- 
 tism did their bodies. It is no more a lite- 
 ral baptism, than the baptism of suffering 
 in Matthew. It is a metaphor; and the 
 allusion is not to the act done in baptism, 
 so much as to the result; that is, the swal- 
 lowing up and overwhelming of their minds 
 by the flood of life, and light, and joy, and 
 heavenly influence which that day came 
 upon their souls." On page 99, the fair, 
 (yet most unfair) polemic strengthens her 
 position by saying: "The Holy Spirit can- 
 not be literally poured out or sprinkled out, 
 nor could the disciples be literally immersed 
 in him any more than they had already been; 
 for He is, and always was, every where 
 present and had always surrounded them on 
 every side," &c. 
 
 The first thing to be noticed in this pre- 
 cious piece of exposition, is the complete- 
 ness with which Theodosia tangles herself 
 in her own net. She is very careful to 
 show that the baptism 'in? (as she will have 
 it,) the Holy Ghost, is a thorough "covering 
 up" a "swallowing up," of the Apostles. 
 But, if the whole thing is merely a meta- 
 phor, and contains no "allusion to the act 
 done in baptism," why need she care wheth- 
 
38 REVIEW OF 
 
 er the application of the Holy Ghost was a 
 pouring or a covering up? She knows she 
 is not telling the truth, when she says there 
 is no allusion to the mode; and hence her 
 anxiety to make that mode a dipping as 
 nearly as possible. The reasoning is as 
 perfect a jewel of consistency as that of the 
 old lady, who being charged with cracking 
 a borrowed kettle, asserted first that the 
 kettle was not cracked at all, and second 
 that it was already cracked when she got it. 
 See also Mr. Courtney, pp. 151, 152. 
 
 Next, is there not a spice of impiety and 
 infidelity in asserting, in the teeth of the 
 word of God, that there was no literal bap- 
 tism at all, but only a 'mere metaphor?' 
 If this baptism of the Holy Ghost was not 
 a literal reality, then several things, oh 
 Theodosia, inevitably follow; as for instance, 
 that the predictions of John the Baptist and 
 Christ were false; that the Apostles received 
 no spiritual qualifications and authority for 
 setting up the new dispensation, for legislat- 
 ing for the church, and for completing the 
 canon of Scripture; which would leave thee, 
 unhappy maid, as well as the rest of us un- 
 dipped Christians, in rather a sorry case. 
 No, you should have said, if you had been 
 as thorough a dialectician as dipper; that 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 39 
 
 there was here no material baptism; although 
 there was a literal and real baptism of spirit- 
 ual influences. But then, inasmuch as ma- 
 terial, water baptism is but a symbolical 
 rite, in which the signiflcancy depends 
 wholly on the faithfulness with which it re- 
 presents to the senses the spiritual reality; 
 and inasmuch as the Holy Spirit was pleased 
 to use the very word, baptism, of this literal 
 and real, spiritual blessing; it is God's own 
 definition of baptism as a pouring out of the 
 element on the person baptized. 
 
 Again, when Miss Theodosia argues that 
 it could not be a literal pouring, because 
 the disciples were always equally surround- 
 ed by the omnipresent essence of God the 
 Spirit, this fact, if it proves any thing, 
 equally proves that it could not be an im- 
 mersion. Why then did she trouble her- 
 self, seeing she acknowledges this in ex- 
 press words on page 99, to argue on page 
 88, that the figure was expressive of ''cover- 
 ing upV It would not be expressive of 
 mode at all. 
 
 But on page 101, she proceeds to cap the 
 climax of self-contradictions by introducing 
 that famous passage, Rom. vi : 3, and claim- 
 ing that the "burial with Christ by bap- 
 tism," clearly proves immersion was the 
 
40 REVIEW OF 
 
 mode of water baptism. Where now is the 
 argument that a figurative reference can 
 prove nothing as to mode, because it is 
 "merely a metaphor?'' The same pretty 
 mouth which then blew hot, now blows cold. 
 In Acts, where a 'pouring down of the influ- 
 ences of the Holy Ghost is expressly called 
 a baptism, there can be no indication of the 
 mode of water baptism. But in Eomans, 
 where Christians are figuratively said (for 
 in this case the burial is only figurative) to 
 be "buried with Christ by baptism, "(It is 
 not said that the baptism was the burial, 
 but only its sign,) there forsooth, the allu- 
 sion to immersion is indisputable ! Nay, 
 verily, you shall not thus play fast and loose 
 with us, at the convenience of your inconsis- 
 tent theory. Fie on you, fair Sophist; Or, 
 we should rather say; Fie on the author, for 
 filling the lips of his lovely heroine with such 
 a batch of absurdities. 
 
 As we have thus introduced Rom. vi: 3 — 
 we may as well call the reader's attention 
 to a remark of the veracious pedagogue, 
 Courtney at the bottom of page 154, "That 
 the allusion here is to the act of immersion 
 is so evident that none but t!ie most deter- 
 mined and unreasonable cavillers pretend 
 to deny it. I do not know of any single 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 41 
 
 commentator, whose opinions are entitled to 
 any respect, who has ventured to differ in 
 regard to this point from Luther and Cal- 
 vin, and Doddridge and McKnight, and 
 Chalmers — who all agree that the allusion 
 is to the ancient form of baptism by immer- 
 sion," &c. Now will not the reader be sur- 
 prised, when he learns that it is utterly false, 
 that Calvin in his commentary on this pas- 
 sage, "agrees" to any such thing? There 
 is not one word in his whole remarks, which 
 even implies such an admission ; and their 
 whole tenor strongly implies the contrary. 
 TV ell, before we are done with Mr. Court- 
 ney, the reader will cease to be surprised 
 at any thing which he asserts. But again : 
 the learned pedagogue "does not know of 
 any single commentator, whose opinions are 
 entitled to any respect," that dares to differ 
 from him on this point. We can inform 
 him and his readers, that both Beza and 
 Brown, of Haddington, Calvin and Henry, 
 and Scott and Hodge, and Stuart and Hal- 
 dane, the eight commentaries which we 
 happened to have at hand, all differ from 
 him; and expressly or tacitly discard his 
 view of the passage. No doubt a little ex- 
 amination might increase the number to 
 twenty. Shall we conclude that the opin- 
 
42 review or 
 
 ions of these eminent men "are entitled to 
 no respect ; or that they were not known to 
 Mr. Courtney's ignorance. The public will 
 judge. As Dr. Scott has been mentioned, 
 it may be added that this well known and 
 judicious writer, in a few simple lines effec- 
 tually refutes the idea that the passage 
 contains any reference to the mode of bap- 
 tism. He shows that not water baptism, 
 nor its mode, but that union to Christ which 
 it signifies, is the thing upon which the 
 Apostle reasons, in order to prove that he 
 who truly partakes of Christ's justifying 
 righteousness will also certainly partake of 
 His deadness to sin, so that introducing a 
 reference to the mode of baptism here really 
 spoils the beauty of the Apostle's meaning. 
 And then, if burial, the first of the three 
 figures by which our spiritual baptism into 
 Christ is here illustrated, must be interpre- 
 ted as indicating the mode of water bap- 
 tism, the other two figures ought, in all con- 
 sistency to be so interpreted likewise, so as 
 to make our water baptism not only like a 
 burial, but like a planting, and like a cru- 
 cifixion. We suggest to our Immersionist 
 neighbors that they shall amend their sec- 
 tarian psalmody, so as to sing not only 
 about the "liquid grave," but also about 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 43 
 
 the "liquid soil," and the "liquid cross and 
 nails." 
 
 6. Another specimen of false issues may 
 be found in the manner in which the fishy 
 Uncle Jones is made to state the argument 
 against immersion from the baptism of the 
 three thousand on the day of Pentecost; 
 page 114, &c. (Of the false citations here, 
 more hereafter.) The good Uncle suspends 
 the question chiefly on these two points, 
 that there was not water enough accessible, 
 nor time enough for twelve men to immerse 
 three thousand persons. To these two 
 points Theodosia replies, that there was 
 plenty of water; and proves it to her own 
 satisfaction (by false quotations.) She then 
 argues (page 116 ) that they were not all 
 baptized the first day ; and then proves that 
 they were all baptized the first day by the 
 Twelve; and that with ease. She must re- 
 concile her own contradictions; we cannot. 
 But the author takes excellent care not to 
 let foolish Uncle Jones utter, what is the 
 decisive point in the argument : that even 
 if two hundred and fifty adults could be 
 immersed in one afternoon, one by one; 
 (This being the number which would have 
 fallen to each of the Twelve,) one man could 
 not immerse two hundred and fifty adults 
 
44 REVIEW OF 
 
 in immediate succession, without being com- 
 pletely exhausted. Dipping is excessively 
 hard work, to subject and operator; (Is not 
 its popularity with self-righteous mind3 due 
 to this?) and it is therefore mere trickery 
 for the author to tell us that twenty persons 
 can be immersed in fifteen minutes; (page 
 118,) when every Immersionist preacher 
 knows, after a half-hour of such work, he is 
 so thoroughly exhausted, that he must come 
 out of the water. 
 
 The reasonableness of this assertion, that 
 three thousand adults could find the means 
 of an extemporary immersion in Jerusalem, 
 in one afternoon, may be brought to a very 
 practical test. Well watered as the City of 
 Eichmond is, with water-pipes, creeks, and 
 wells; was there ever a "Baptizing" of any 
 extent, among our modern Immersionists 
 there, before baptisteries were expressly 
 provided in their churches, that they were 
 not compelled to adjourn to the noble 
 James? Now if Richmond did not afford 
 the means of giving an extempore dip to a 
 company of twenty or thirty converts, is it 
 even plausible to assert, that Jerusalem, in 
 a most dry climate and season, could pro- 
 vide them for three thousand? It had no 
 great river running just outside of its walls. 
 
THEODOSTA EARNEST. 45 
 
 Outside, it was dry ; (says Dr. Kobinson,) 
 so totally dry, that every besieging army 
 which has surrounded it has had to bring 
 its water from a distance. Within, it had 
 sufficient rain water cisterns and open re- 
 servoirs, to supply the population with wa- 
 ter for domestic purposes. 
 
 7. On the 207th and following pages of 
 Theodosia, the reader will find a similar in- 
 stance, affecting the argument for the far 
 more important doctrine of infant baptism. 
 Silly old Mr. Johnson is represented as ad- 
 vancing the instance of Christ's blessing 
 infants, (recorded in Matt, xix: 13, 14; 
 Mark x: 13, &c; Luke xviii : 15. &c.,) in 
 proof of their title to baptism. The courte- 
 ous Courtney replies ; page 208. 
 
 "I can't see one word about baptism in it." 
 
 "Oh," (says the pastor,) I do not say that 
 baptism is expressly named in it; but sir, the 
 inference is irresistible, that these children 
 were brought to be baptized, and that the 
 people were accustomed to bring their chil- 
 dren for that purpose, and that Jesus com- 
 manded his disciples never to forbid it, as 
 you Baptists have done, but to suffer the 
 little children to come to him, and make a 
 part of his visible church." 
 
 Thus the author deceitfully represents, 
 
46 REVIEW OF 
 
 that this is the main argument which 
 Presbyterians found on this passage; when 
 he knew perfectly well, that the use which 
 all intelligent Paadobaptists make of the 
 passage is totally different, that they do not 
 undertake to prove here that those infants 
 were baptized by Christ; for indeed, they 
 do not believe that Christian baptism was 
 yet instituted. Of course any juggling chop- 
 per of logic can win an apparent victory, by 
 thus putting into the mouth of imaginary 
 adversary a false and foolish issue, and 
 then refuting it. But what must be his 
 impudent contempt for readers whom he 
 expects to gull by so coarse a trick ! The 
 true manner in which Psedobaptists argue 
 from this passage is this: That it is impious 
 to suppose this blessing of Christ futile, or 
 misplaced, or inoperative. So that, here is 
 a total refutation given by Jesus Christ him- 
 self to the main rational objection of Im- 
 mersionists against infant baptism. Their 
 objection is, that it is absurd to administer 
 a religious rite to a little senseless infant ; 
 because he is too young to profit by it. But 
 here Jesus Christ administers a religious 
 rite, which undoubtedly was profitable to 
 infants. The objection is swept away. Here 
 we see that the grace of God can benefit in- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 47 
 
 fants. If they can partake gospel blessings, 
 (as all must, who die in infancy, unless we 
 are willing to teach infant damnation,) 
 where is the absurdity of their partaking in 
 gospel ordinances, should God so ordain? 
 Between pages 206, 207, of Theodosia, 
 the publishers have introduced two wood 
 cuts, which they doubtless thought very 
 witty, exhibiting as they supposed, the ab- 
 surdity of administering the water of bap- 
 tism to a little squalling, frightened baby. 
 Kow we suggest that in their next edition, 
 they substitute another subject for pictorial 
 satire, which every one will perceive to be 
 precisely as just and appropriate, as this 
 burlesque cut of an infant baptism. It 
 should represent the folly of the pious Jew- 
 ish mothers, in bringing their little sense- 
 less babies to be blessed by our Redeemer, 
 when they were too young to comprehend 
 his language or acts: and should exhibit 
 them frightened nearly into fits by the 
 strange actions of the strange man, Jesus; 
 and struggling back out of his arms into 
 their mothers,' with their faces distorted 
 with screams. We propose to Messrs. 
 Graves, Marks & Co., to try their hands at 
 this : then perhaps the world will compre- 
 
48 REVIEW OF 
 
 hend whether their present caricatures are 
 witty or impious. 
 
 But our main inference is more important 
 still. Our Saviour defends his blessing 
 them, by saying : "For of such is the king- 
 dom of heaven." That is: He has blessed 
 them because, of such is the kingdom of 
 heaven. To give to the words ' kingdom of 
 heaven' here, any other sense than that of 
 Christ's Church, makes absolute nonsense : 
 (as even the audacious Courtney does not 
 venture to deny, when on page 209, he al- 
 ludes in a meagre and partial manner to 
 this argument.) Our Saviour, then, express- 
 ly calls infants a portion of his church. But 
 as all admit that baptism is the initiatory 
 ordinance by which members enter the 
 church, infants who are church members 
 are of course entitled to baptism. This 
 argument the author takes good care not 
 to state fairly. (We do it for him.) He 
 does indeed endeavor to parry it, by saying 
 that our Saviour does not say infants belong 
 to his church, but that persons who would 
 truly enter it must be such as infants ; that 
 is, must be lowly, harmless and amiable. 
 And this interpretation he professes to sup- 
 port by the concessions of two Peedobap- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 49 
 
 tists. Barnes and Olsbausen. If Mr. Court- 
 ney had bad the honesty to quote all that 
 Mr. Barnes says, in his notes on Matt, xix: 
 13, 14, the reader would have seen that his 
 remarks (ill judged and uncritical; as Barnes 
 often is.) give the Immersionist no support. 
 For Mr. Barnes also says substantially that 
 the Jews had always been accustomed to 
 bring their children to God by circumci- 
 sion, and therefore it did not seem to them 
 unnatural to bring them now to Christ. As 
 for Olshausen, a German Rationalist, be he 
 bepraised or not bj injudicious Englishmen 
 and Americans, we suspect we know much 
 more about him than Mr. Courtney. Does 
 Mr. Courtney say that he endorses him as 
 CJrrect and reliable? If he does not, he 
 has no business to quote his interpretation 
 as authority. If he does, then we tell him 
 that he has endorsed a batch of theological 
 errors, which would result justly in his ex- 
 pulsion froai any respectable Immersionist 
 church. When will this author learn, that 
 Presbvterians do not hold themselves re- 
 sponsible for the false glosses of commen- 
 tators, rationalistic or pious? We interpret 
 the Scriptures for ourselves, [diligently 
 using all helps, indeed] in the exercise of 
 common sense and the fear of God. But 
 i 
 
50 KEVIEW OF 
 
 if quoting learned names is worth anything, 
 we might quote great men, from Calvin 
 down to Dr. Rudolph Stier, a German, too, 
 and a more recent and learned expositor 
 than Olshausen, who expressly contradict 
 the latter. (See for instance, Stier's words 
 of Jesus, edition of T. T. Clark, Edinburg, 
 vol. 3, p. 21.) 
 
 But, away with all this: let the reader 
 fairly consider the words of our Saviour 
 under remark, for himself: he will see that 
 they must be interpreted as we have done 
 above. The plain reasons are as follows. 
 "When Christ says: "Of such are the king- 
 dom,' 7 the word i such > must be fairly un- 
 derstood to mean the infants and persons 
 resembling them. It does not exclude the 
 former. For this is its common meaning 
 in the gospels. When for instance Luke 
 says, Acts xxii: 22, that the Jews, about to 
 attempt St. Paul's life, "'lifted up their voices 
 and said ; away with such a fellow from the 
 earth;" does any one suppose they meant, 
 not Paul, but other persons resembling Paul? 
 No, it is as though they had said; "Away 
 with this fellow from the earth." Let the 
 reader also examine Matt, ix: 8, xviii : 5; 
 Mark vi: 2, ix : 37; Luke ix : 9, xiii : 2; 
 John iv: 23, ix: 16; Acts xvi: 24, &c. It 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 51 
 
 is needless to multiply cases. So in our 
 text; when Christ says : "Of such is the 
 kingdom," his fair meaning is : "Of THESE 
 (in part,) is the kingdom." That this was 
 his meaning is proved, second by this: that 
 the other idea, of presenting little ones as 
 symbols or resemblances of what a Chris- 
 tian should be, is out of place here, because 
 Matthew has a little before recorded Christ's 
 use of that comparison. In Matt, xviii: 2, 
 4, "Jesus called a little child, and set him 
 in the midst, and said ; except ye be con- 
 verted, and become as little children, ye shall 
 not enter into the kingdom of heaven." 
 That matter having been so lately recorded, 
 it is unreasonable to suppose that the sacred 
 writer meant no more by introducing a new 
 and different incident. Bat third, and chief- 
 ly : If it is said that Christ put his hands 
 on children and blessed them, only because 
 their infantile state is a pretty illustration of 
 what the Christian character should be, his 
 act and language are turned into sheer non- 
 sense. God often compares his Christians 
 to sheep and sometimes to doves. Is this a 
 reason why Christ should take up young 
 lambs into his arms and bless them? Noth- 
 ing but the utmost heedlessness, or most 
 stubborn prejudice, could ever lead anyone 
 
52 REVIEW OF 
 
 to put such an argument in the Saviour's 
 mouth. That they aptly symbolized true 
 subjects of his kingdom is no reason what- 
 ever why they should be suffered to come 
 to him and receive his divine blessing. That 
 they were themselves among the subjects of 
 his kingdom was a good reason why they 
 should receive his blessing. But if some 
 infants' are members of his church, some 
 infants should receive baptism, the acknowl- 
 edged mark of membership. 
 
 8. We shall find another glaring instance 
 of sophistry on pages 236, &c; where Court- 
 ney is introduced as discussing with Mr. 
 Johnson the argument from household bap- 
 tisms in favor of the baptism of infants. 
 After professing to convince himself, by a 
 series of perversions of scripture, and hardy 
 assertions without evidence, that none of 
 the families baptized by the Apostles or 
 their order happened to have infants in 
 them, the irate pedagogue proceeds : (page 
 235, bottom ) 
 
 '•But I am not willing to pass so readily 
 from these passages. You are accustomed, 
 Mr. Johnson, and so are all your ministers, 
 to present these as proof texts for infant 
 baptism. You will probably go and do it 
 again : though I pray that God may give 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 53 
 
 you a better mind." (Very charitable, 
 most meek master ; to pray that we may 
 not be given up to the enormous wicked- 
 ness of saving that God's word means a 
 given thing, after your infallibility has pro- 
 nounced that it does not!) "They stand as 
 proof texts in your 'Confession of Faith ;' 
 and yet in truth, neither they nor you have 
 ever believed them to be such, or else you are 
 more inconsistent in your conduct than sen- 
 sible men are often found to be." (Oh 
 courteous Courtney!) 
 
 He then proceeds to say that, if these in- 
 stances of household baptism were believed 
 by us to prove any thing, we should also 
 baptize all the domestics and adult children, 
 slaves and even wives, on the faith of the 
 father. As we "do not dare" to do this ; 
 it shows that even we do not truly find any 
 evidence here for infant baptism. 
 
 Now our first remark on this angry de- 
 monstration is: that it proceeds on this pos- 
 tulate : That no man is to be supposed to 
 be sincerely convinced of a principle, ex- 
 cept he acts it out consistently "? That is; 
 partial inconsistency with one's own princi- 
 ples sincerely held, is never seen among 
 sensible men! Well, by this way of argu- 
 ing, we shall prove that the Courtney's 
 
54 REVIEW OP 
 
 "pure mind" has never truly seen or felt 
 any evidence for the propositions, that rail- 
 ing, false witness, and malignity towards 
 brethren, are sins. For he is indubitably 
 found indulging pretty freely in all three 
 practices in these pages. Again : we shall 
 prove that Immersionists usually "have 
 never believed'' what they themselves say, 
 when they teach that dipping a believer is 
 the only valid baptism. For if they really 
 believed it, consistency would require them 
 to hold that nobody but Immersionists are 
 church members, that consequently, there 
 are no churches except theirs ; and that 
 consequently Pgedobaptist ministers are no 
 ministers at all ; and their preaching is 
 nothing but impudent presumption. Where- 
 as in fact, Immersionists usually treat Pse- 
 dobaptist churches practically as true 
 churches, everywhere except at the Lord's 
 Table; and are usually very glad to have 
 Presbyterian ministers preach for them, in 
 seasons of revival. Why, oh consistent 
 Courtney, is not the one argument as good 
 as the other ? 
 
 But our second remark is: that according 
 to the Jewish institution of circumcising 
 households, no kind of servants, domestics, 
 or retainers were allowed to be circumcised 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 55 
 
 upon the faith of their masters, except 
 literal slaves belonging to the masters. See 
 Exodus xii: 44, 45. Now, as we suppose 
 the Abrahamic institution to be still sub- 
 stantially in force, none but slaves could by 
 any construction, even the loosest, be em- 
 braced in " the household." The objec- 
 tion, therefore, applies to none but Paedo- 
 baptist slaveholders in these Southern States; 
 a very small corner of Pasdobaptist Christ- 
 endom. In every other part of the world, 
 the incautious Courtney would find his no- 
 table demonstration worthless. But now 
 if Paedobaptism is a sound doctrine all 
 over Christendom except among American 
 slaveholders, we pray does the inconsisten- 
 cy of that little fragment make it unsound 
 to all the world ? As to the case of the 
 wife, whom Mr. Courtney thinks, we ought 
 to baptize, though unbelieving, on the 
 faith of the husband, we remark that wo- 
 men, under the Abrahamic covenant, were 
 not circumcised at all. But more : the 
 Jews could not lawfully have a wife who 
 was not also a member of the visible 
 church ; for he was not allowed to marry 
 any other. — See Nehemiah xxiii : 23 — 27. 
 In the institution from which we suppose 
 11 household baptisms " arose, such a case 
 
58 REVIEW OF 
 
 as Mr. Courtney imagines conld not arise ; 
 and, therefore, the Apostles naturally would 
 not baptize the unbelieving wife on the 
 faith of the husband, even though they 
 baptize the children.^ 
 
 Onee more ; the polemical pedagogue 
 studiously keeps out of view the fact, that 
 Presbyterians usually show from the Scrip- 
 tures that in every case of "household 
 baptism," it was the oikos which was bap- 
 tized on the faith of the father, and not 
 the oikia ; the family proper, and not the 
 household ! And we prove, by unmistake- 
 able usage, New Testament, and classic, 
 that the Greek writers of that age, usually 
 made the distinction irr the use of the two 
 words. The oikos, in its literal sense was 
 the dwelling proper of the husband, wife, 
 and offspring; and in its derived, or figu- 
 rative sense, it was the family strictly ; that 
 is, the children. The oikia was the pre- 
 mises or curtilage (including outhouses, 
 barn, stables,) in its literal sense, and 
 hence, in its figurative sense, embraced 
 both children and dependents. That the 
 English version does not make this dis- 
 tinction apparent, is no fault of ours. — 
 Now, the Holy Spirit has not said that any 
 oikia was baptized in the New Testament 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 57 
 
 on the faith of its head ; but it has said 
 that the oikos was. This is the reason of 
 the conduct which the indignant Courtney 
 considers so inconsistent in us Presbyte- 
 rians. " Ah, but," he urges : " You don't 
 baptize the adult children on the faith of 
 the father!" and yet they belong to the 
 oikos, as well as the oikia. Well, perhaps 
 if patriarchal government still subsisted in 
 the world, as it did among the Hebrews ; 
 so that the pious father had the means of 
 securing the use of the means of grace, 
 and a religious life, from his adult children, 
 we would baptize them also. But in a 
 country like ours, where both custom and. 
 law make the adults social equals to their 
 parents, we submit, they hardly form a part 
 of the oikos, in the Abrahamic sense. — 
 Presbyterians are not quite so easily 
 caught, Oh, sapient schoolmaster ! They 
 have thought over these things before you 
 were born. 
 
 9. We shall conclude this part of our re- 
 view, by referring the reader to an admis- 
 sion made by the author's mouth piece, on 
 page 292. By this time, the tishiness of 
 Uncle Jones is developed into a positive 
 aquatic propensity ; he has pretty much 
 made up his mind to go under the water — 
 
58 REVIEW OF 
 
 but the church session to which he belongs, 
 and his colleagues in the Presbyterian 
 Faculty, have been remonstrating and argu- 
 ing with him. His prompter (the ever prompt 
 psedagogue,) is listening to his account of 
 the conversation, and advising the proper 
 replies to their arguments. Concerning 
 the well known and irrefragable arguments 
 that as children were embraced under the 
 Abrahamic covenant, and as the Abrahamic 
 covenant still subsists, children are of 
 course, to be included, until a positive en- 
 actment is given from the Head of the 
 Church excluding them; this reply is ad- 
 vised.— (p. 292.) 
 
 '• I should have said to them further : 
 Gentlemen, you call the Jewish nation the 
 Church of God — and tell us that the Chris- 
 tian Church is the same under a different 
 dispensation. But Christ calls the nation 
 the world in opposition to his Church. The 
 disciples to whom Christ spake, (John xv : 
 19.) were men in good and regular stand- 
 ing in the Jewish nation, which you call the 
 Church. Yet Christ says: ' I have chosen 
 you out of the world; and, therefore, the 
 world, (that is the Jewish nation,) hateth 
 you.' * * * The cases of Nicodemus and 
 Paul are also cited, and the author pro- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 59 
 
 ceeds: "The Jews needed conversion as 
 much as any, before they could make any 
 portion of the Church of God. This Church 
 God set up for the first time when John be- 
 gan to preach. There were good men, 
 pious, devoted men among the Jews, but 
 they were not gathered into a church. The 
 Jewish nation had some religious privileges; 
 but it was not in the gospel sense a church?"* 
 We have quoted these repetitious state- 
 ments at large, that the reader may see 
 how fully and emphatically it is asserted 
 that God had no church in the world, till 
 the days of John Baptist. But before we 
 proceed to the use which we intend to make 
 of this fatal admission, let us sweep away 
 the little cobweb of argument founded on 
 our Saviour's words to his disciples : •* I 
 have chosen you out of the world" One 
 remark accomplishes tnis — that the argu- 
 ment assumes the point in debate. If the 
 Church of the New Testament is such that 
 worldly — that is unconverted people cannot 
 be in it, then it follows that Christ would 
 not speak of choosing out of the world, one 
 of its members. But to assume that 
 Christ's Church is such, is the very thing 
 which remains to be proved, by the exclu- 
 sive advocate of u believer's baptism." — 
 
60 REVIEW OF 
 
 Let us see how far this notable argument 
 would cut. In Phil, iii : 18, Paul says; 
 " For many walk, of whom I have told you 
 often, and now tell you even weeping, that 
 they are the enemies of the cross of Christ, 
 whose end is destruction, whose god is their 
 belly, and whose glory is in their shame, 
 who mind earthly (worldly) things." We 
 rather think that, had Christ chosen to call 
 one of these professors to true conversion, 
 he would have "chosen them out of the world" 
 Yet they were also members already of the 
 Phillipian Christian Society. Therefore, 
 that society was not a Christian Church ! — 
 Ah ! true enough it was not an Immersion- 
 ist church. 
 
 Again, — according to Mr. Courtney and 
 all his brethren, Peter and his friends were 
 already in the Church (founded by John the 
 Baptist,) when Christ first called them. — 
 For it is very clear that if John's baptism 
 of them is admitted not to be christian 
 baptism, we are utterly without evidence 
 that Peter was ever baptized at all, and 
 then we should have Peter, in this very 
 16th chapter of John, partaking of the 
 first Lord's Supper, administered by the 
 hands of our Saviour himself, while Peter 
 .was still unimmersed; together with sundry 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 61 
 
 other consequences enormous and dreadfnl 
 in the Courtney's eyes. He must hold, 
 therefore, that Peter had gotten into the 
 church " through the door," by the help 
 of John and the Jordan, before that selec- 
 tion of him by Christ to which our Saviour 
 refers. Why multiply instances, as we 
 easily might do! In one word, does any 
 body deny that, in true gospel churches 
 there may usually be found worldly mem- 
 bers ; so that if God's grace should effectu- 
 ally call one of them out of his worldliness 
 to genuine holiness, his conversion might 
 provoke the carnal opposition of other un- 
 converted members like himself? When 
 God, by his grace, raised up Andrew Ful- 
 ler, to preach the great truth in the Iminer- 
 sionist churches of Great Britain of which 
 he was a member, that " the gospel is wor- 
 thy of all acceptation ;" did he not meet 
 the hatred and opposition of worldly, Anti- 
 nomian members of that denomination? — 
 Therefore, Mr. Courtney should reason be- 
 cause there was worldliness in that denomi- 
 nation, to hate that holy man when follow- 
 ing Christ's call, the English Immersionists 
 were not a true church ! This is the con- 
 sistent Courtney's arguing, not ours. 
 
 A very zealous immersionist lady once 
 
62 REVIEW OF 
 
 told us, that she witnessed a conversational 
 discussion on infant baptism, in a stage- 
 coach, between a distinguished Episcopal 
 divine, and a famous Immersionist cham- 
 pion, (to whom we recognize the indebted- 
 ness of the author of Theodosia in this, 
 and other lucky loans.) The Episcopalian 
 advanced the usual argument from the sub- 
 stantial identity of the Abrahamic, with 
 the New Testament church. The Immer- 
 sionist replied by saying: "How then 
 could our Lord say to Peter and his breth- 
 ren, ■ I have chosen you out of the world? 1 " 
 " Whereupon," said our informant, *' the 
 Episcopalian was struck dumb !" We sur- 
 mised in ourselves, that the reason was, not 
 that the marvellous reply was unanswera- 
 ble ; but that politeness forbade its being 
 dealt with as it deserved, and that, finding 
 the unscrupulous character of his antago- 
 nist, he wisely concluded to discontinue the 
 discussion. Similar politeness, of course, 
 forbade us from exposing the nonsense of 
 the argument to our fair friend ; so that 
 ■we left her in unconscious ignorance, sup- 
 posing that it was as unanswerable to us, as 
 to the Episcopal divine. 
 
 But this is by the way. We beg our 
 readers to observe that this favorite Im- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 63 
 
 mersionist advocate, the author of Theodo- 
 sia, has found it necessary, deliberately to 
 deny the existence of any proper Church of 
 God in the earth before the Christian era. 
 To the Jews, he says, there never was a 
 Church. Israel was only a nation, not a 
 church ; and in Israel there was no proper 
 church ! Very well ; we take it for grant- 
 ed that, had there been any other way to 
 evade the inevitable result of our argu- 
 ment from the perpetuity of the Gospel 
 covenant made with Abraham, the cautious 
 Courtney would not have resorted to this 
 desperate position. We accept it, there- 
 fore, as the implied (yet clear) admission 
 of the highest Immersionist authorities, 
 that either infant baptism is right, or it 
 must be denied that God had any church 
 among the Jews. 
 
 Now then, let us see how directly Im- 
 mersionism has to fly into the teeth of the ex- 
 press word of God. The reader of the Eng- 
 lish Bible sees that God's professed people 
 are called in the Old Testament, " the con- 
 gregation of the Lord." Let him see for 
 instance, how the word is used in Nehemiah 
 xiii : 1 — Psalms xxii ; 22 — Joel ii : 16. — 
 In these places, and many others, the Sep- 
 tuagint Greek version renders it church 
 
64 REVIEW OP 
 
 (flclcsia.) Is not this evidence enough that 
 the words are the same ; that the Lord's 
 congregation of the Old Testament was the 
 Lord's church? But again, — in Actsvii: 
 38, the inspired Stephen says, speaking of 
 Moses : " This is he that was in the church 
 in the wilderness," &c. In Hebrews ii : 
 12, the Apostle represents David as say- 
 ing, (in the Psalm xxii : 22,) *' In the 
 midst of the church will I sing praise unto 
 Thee." True, if the English reader will 
 turn to the English version of that Psalm, 
 he will find the word congregation. But we 
 presume the Apostle knew what David 
 
 meant as well, at least, as the English trans- 
 is 
 
 lators. Again, — Hebrews iii : 5 — 6, it is 
 said : "And Moses verily was faithful in all 
 his house, as a servant, for a testimony of 
 those things which were to be spoken after ; 
 but Christ as a Son, over his own house, 
 whose house are we if we ho'd fast the con- 
 fidence." Judicious commentators, for in- 
 stance, Dr. Gill, the great Immersiouist, 
 agree that the house means the church, in 
 which Moses was a servant, and Christ a 
 Prince, (being the King's Son.) and to this 
 house we belong, says the Apostle, if we do 
 not apostatize. So then, it seems there 
 was an Old Testament church ; and it is 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 65 
 
 that which New Testament believers join ! 
 Once more ; let the reader examine Rom. 
 xiv : 17 — 24, and he will find the Apostle 
 presenting these ideas in substance to Gen- 
 tile believers : the one common church of 
 both dispensations is a good olive tree ; 
 from which the rejected Jews were broken 
 off, for their unbelief, when they rejected 
 and crucified Christ, and into which Gen- 
 tiles were engrafted. But at length Israel 
 will be brought into the church again ; and 
 this will be a re-engrafting of them (at the 
 approach of the millennium) into " their 
 own olive tree." 
 
 But perhaps the author of Theodosia 
 may avail himself of the plea, (which he 
 so strenuously condemned, when trying to 
 make baytizo mean dip only ;) that the 
 same word may bave more than one mean- 
 ing; so Stephen's calling Israel the "church 
 in the wilderness," may not necessarily 
 prove that it was properly a church in the 
 Bible sense. Verv well : by what attri- 
 butes, or marks, can a society be identified 
 as a church of God ? Is a church a body 
 which is separated by profession from the 
 world, to the service of God ? So was 
 Israel. Is a church a body marked by the 
 use of divinely appointed Sacraments ! So 
 5 
 
66 REVIEW OF 
 
 was Israel. It had its circumcision and 
 passover. Is a church a body organized 
 under a ministry ? So was Israel. Does a 
 church statedly maintain the worship of 
 God ? So did Israel. Is a church a school 
 in which the teaching of God's revealed 
 word is maintained from age to age ? So 
 was Israel. See Rom. iii : 2. Yea more : 
 the society founded in the family of Abra- 
 ham enjoyed that most peculiar privilege of 
 the Gospel church, the preaching of the 
 Go.«peL St. Paul tells us (Gal. iii: 8,) 
 that " the Scripture preached before the 
 Gospel unto Abraham." Yea, our Saviour 
 himself says : " Your Father Abraham re- 
 joiced to see my day ; and he saw it and was 
 glad" John viii : 56. So that Israel has 
 every mark of a true church. Yea, of be- 
 ing the true Gospel church, except this : it 
 did not exclude infants. It would not 
 stickle for " believer's baptism," (or cir- 
 cumcision.) There, Mr. Courtney, is the 
 fatal thing which unchurches it, in your 
 eyes ! But whether this state of facts 
 proves that Israel was no church, or that 
 you are wrong in your dogma, the intelli- 
 gent reader may decide. 
 
 But upon what age of the world have we 
 fallen, that there should be occasion for a 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 67 
 
 Christian to set again about proving that 
 God had a church under the old Dispensa- 
 tion ? We seem to ourselves to have gone 
 back three hundred years, to some of those 
 "times of ignorance which God winked 
 at," when the Reformers were fast emerg- 
 ing from the mists of Popery, and had all 
 the wildness and fanaticism of Anabaptism 
 to resist. 
 
 10. We now proceed to another part of the 
 work which we proposed to ourselves, for 
 the righteous chastisement of this wicked 
 publication. We have given our readers 
 specimens enough of its false and dishonest 
 arguing. We have shown them in a num- 
 ber of instances, that the seeming triumph 
 of its logic is procured by the low artifices 
 of raising false issues, and assuming the 
 point in debate. So we might extend our 
 refutations and exposures throughout the 
 book, till the reader was wearied and dis- 
 gusted even to nausea, with the exhibition 
 of such unvarying sophistry. We pause in 
 this series of exposures, not because mate- 
 rial is wanting ; but because we believe that 
 every reasonable reader is sufficiently sat- 
 isfied of the recklessness of the author, 
 and of his utter unworthiness to be trusted. 
 
 We shall now exhibit in a number of in« 
 
68 REVIEW OF 
 
 stances, selected very much at random, the 
 unprincipled manner in which historical 
 facts, and literary authorities are misrepre- 
 sented, or actually falsified, by the author. 
 And here again ; we would assure our read- 
 er that we do not expose the half of the 
 instances which admit and deserve such ex- 
 posure. We spare him the weariness and 
 disgust of such an exhibition. Our pur- 
 pose is only to give instances enough to en- 
 able him to judge, for himself, the trust- 
 worthiness of the book : and to see that its 
 facts are usually as false as its arguments. 
 Let us, in this connexion remind the reader 
 of the circumstance already noted, that this 
 falsifyer of history has endeavored to cover 
 up his tracks by omitting, in a majority of 
 cases, all reference to editions, chapters, 
 and pages of the authors he professes to 
 quote. But it has been in vain. 
 
 Once more ; a word must be premised 
 concerning the favorite trick of this author; 
 the quoting of Psedobaptist commentaries 
 and doctors on his side of the question. — 
 He claims sweeping admissions, as having 
 been made, not only by those crotchety and 
 fantastic (though learned) minds, wli.se 
 soundness of judgment all orthodox Chris- 
 tians are compelled utterly to distrust, on all 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 69 
 
 subjects as well as on baptism, such as Mc- 
 Knight, Campbell, Olshausen, Barnes ; but 
 also from Luther, Calvin, Chalmers, Miller, 
 &c, Some he cites as giving up this proof- 
 text, and some as surrendering that. Some, 
 he says, admit that baptizo means primari- 
 ly nothing but dip ; and some that dipping 
 was the undoubted mode of the ancient 
 church. Now concerning all these citations 
 (omitting for the present misrepresenta- 
 tions,) we have three remarks to offer. — 
 First ; were not all these men steady Predo- 
 baptists in their practices, notwithstanding 
 these pretended admissions? Were they 
 not men of undoubted intelligence and 
 holiness ? Then every fair reader will 
 take it for granted that they at least sup- 
 posed they saw consistent and solid grounds 
 for not being Immersionists, although this 
 fiery slanderer declares it impossible.-— 
 Now, good reader, we suggest, that per- 
 haps it is at least as probable these great 
 men, whose undoubted wisdom, learning, 
 and holiness, all the world venerates, were 
 right, as that this unscrupulous sophist and 
 defamer, already detected in so many 
 breaches of confidence, is just in charging 
 them with conscious inconsistency. Second, 
 Presbyterians do not pin their faith to the 
 
10 REVIEW OF 
 
 rotions of any uninspired teacher, however 
 good. But if human authorities were to 
 decide the question, it would be perfectly 
 easy for us to show a still greater number 
 cf learned men, who contradict Theodosia's 
 authorities. But we shall not insult the un- 
 derstandings of Protestant readers to of- 
 fering such a settlement. It is amusing to 
 see how, when Psedobaptist doctors seem to 
 say anything that favors immersion, this 
 author is almost ready to say : " It is the 
 voice of a God and not of a man ;" but if 
 they oppose immersion, at once they are 
 scoundrels and hypocrites, who practise all 
 the arts of priestcraft, and hoodwink inno- 
 cent souls to their ruin. 
 
 But third ; We submit it : Is it fair to 
 quote and apply a concession of a Psedo- 
 baptist thus ? These commentators honest- 
 ly believe that baptizo, whatever may have 
 been its primary, classical meaning, has 
 come to have a generic, sacramental mean- 
 ing, in the New Testament; that baptism, 
 in that sense is any symbolic washing with 
 water, of a proper subject, by a proper ad- 
 ministrator, in the name of the Trinity ; 
 that according to the teachings of God's 
 word, in such a symbolic sacrament, the 
 more or less water, and the mode in which 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 71 
 
 it is applied to the body, or the body to it, 
 cannot be of importance ; and that God has 
 signified the sufficiency of sprinkling or 
 pouring as a sacrament, by always repre- 
 senting the blood of Christ and the grace 
 of the Holy Spirit, (the two things which 
 the water represents) as poured, shed, or 
 sprinkled down. Now a commentator hold- 
 ing these views might admit (what we and 
 the great majority of Psedobaptists utterly 
 deny,) that many or all of the baptisms of 
 the New Testament were by immersion, and 
 yet consistently deny that immersion is ne- 
 cessary or obligatory on us. Now is it fair 
 to quote such authors as giving up the point 
 to the Immersionists? 
 
 Old Wall, (author of a Treatise on In- 
 fant Baptism ) who is himself so abused by 
 the cunning Courtney, gives us an amusing 
 instance to show that the trick of mis-quo- 
 ting Psedobaptists by Immersionists is not 
 a new one in our day. Speaking of a 
 learned and accurate Psedobaptist writer, 
 Mr. VValker, he says : 
 
 " Here by the way, I cannot but take 
 notice how much trouble such an adventu- 
 rous author as this Danvers (an Immer- 
 sionist.) is able to give to such a careful 
 and exact answerer as Mr. Walker, Dan- 
 
72 REVIEW OF 
 
 vers does in this place deal with above 
 twenty other writers after the same rate as 
 he does with the two I have mentioned, 
 viz : Scapula^ Stephanus, Pasor, Vossius, 
 height Casaubon, Beza, Chamier, Ham- 
 mond, Cajelan, Musculus, Piscator, Calvin, 
 Keckerman, Diodat, Grotius, Davenant, Si- 
 lenus, Dr. Cave, Wiel, Strabo, and Arch- 
 bishop Tillotson. He does in the space of 
 twelve pages, quote all these in such words 
 as if they had made dipping to be of the 
 essence of baptism. Mr. Walker shows 
 that he has abused every one of 'em ; by 
 affixing to some of 'em words that they 
 never said, by adding to others, by alter- 
 ing and mistranslating others, and by cur- 
 tailing the words of the rest. But what a 
 Trouble is this, to go upon such a man's 
 errand from Book to Book, search the 
 chapters, (which he commonly names 
 wrong,) recite the words first as he quotes 
 'em, and then as they really are in the 
 Book ! This cost Mr. Walker three large 
 chapters. And what would it have been to 
 answer the whole book, which is all of a 
 piece ? This is the book which is so much 
 handed about among the Anti-psedobaptists 
 of England."— Wall's History of Infant 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 73 
 
 Baptism, vol. 2, p. 371, 2nd London Edi- 
 tion of A. D., 1720. 
 
 But to our task. On p. 136. The divers 
 " baptisms " of the Pharisees when they 
 come from market, and of the cups, pots, 
 brazen vessels, and of tables, (Mark vii : 
 3 — 4,) are under discussion. (The word 
 rendered "washings'" is in the original 
 " baptisms") Even the fishy Uncle Jones 
 seems to think these baptisms squint aw- 
 fully towards pouring. But the crafty 
 Courtney comes to the rescue, with a pre- 
 tended extract from a famous Rabbi Mai- 
 monides (without means of verifying it by 
 the name of his work, or volume, chapter, 
 or page,) who asserts that the Pharisees 
 always dipped themselves, their vessels, and 
 their couches on such occasions. 
 
 11 That will indeed remove every shadow 
 of doubt," said the Professor; •■ but have 
 you indeed such testimony?" 
 
 *' Certainly we have," replies the con- 
 venient Courtney ; " There was a very 
 learned Jew, who wrote a very elaborate 
 commentary on the Jewish customs and 
 traditions. Dr. Adam Clarke, the great 
 commentator, recognizes his authority, and 
 calls him " (where ; in what volume, chap- 
 ter, page ? Oh, cunning Courtney!) "the 
 
74 REVIEW OF 
 
 great expounder of the Jewish Law ; and 
 as he comes thus ■ properly vouched for,' I 
 trust his evidence will not be disputed. — 
 This learned and eminent Rabbi, commonly 
 called Rabbi Maimonides, says, in his com- 
 mentary, ? Every vessel of wood, as a table 
 or bed, receives defilement, and these were 
 washed by covering in water, and very nice 
 and particular they were,' he adds, * that 
 they might be covered all over,' " &c, &c. 
 
 Now good reader, does not this paragraph 
 make the impression that " Dr. Adam 
 Clarke the great commentator," (not con- 
 sidered sound by any good scholars, by the 
 way,) " recognizes the authority " of Mai- 
 monides in connexion with this subject? — 
 Did not the author intend it to make this im- 
 pression ? He does not say so, sly fellow ; 
 for then he might be caught. Now we turn 
 to Dr. Adam Clarke's commentary on Mark 
 vii 3 — 4; read the whole of it, and find not 
 one word of Maimonides, or any Jewish Rabbi, 
 as teaching that these Pharisees and their 
 couches were dipped, and see that Clarke 
 roundly asserts all through, that these baptisms 
 we/e net, and could not be, by immersion! — 
 Now after such an imposture has been at- 
 tempted on us as this; we cannot believe 
 that the citation from Maimonides is true, 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 15 
 
 on this author's * say-so.' We do not be- 
 lieve that the author of Jheodosia ever saw 
 these statements in the book of Maimoni- 
 des or in any translation even, that he ever 
 saw the place in Adam Clarke where he 
 "properly vouches for him," that he could 
 tell us where to look for the citation from 
 either Clarke or Maimonides, or that he 
 has ever had any means of knowing per- 
 sonally whether these statements were ever 
 uttered as he quotes them by the two writers. 
 We will tell the author, and his Immersion- 
 ist friends who and what Maimonides was ; 
 and they will then see on what ground we 
 think so. 
 
 Certain it is, Clarke makes no admission 
 of Maimonides' authority at the place in 
 question. The nearest approach which we 
 can find to it is the following ; Clarke, in a 
 sort of Bibliographical work, entitled " Suc- 
 cession of Sacred Literature,'' p. 56, de- 
 scribes a copy of the Mischna, or text of the 
 Babylonish Talmud, published at Amster- 
 dam in 1698, with the whole comments of 
 Maimonides and Bartenora thereon. And 
 concerning this collection, he says : " This 
 is a very beautiful and correct work, neces- 
 sary to the library of every biblical critic 
 and divine. He who has it need be soli- 
 
76 REVIEW OP 
 
 citous for nothing more on this subject." — 
 Does this vouch for the correctness of Mai- 
 monides' statements, or the correctness 
 with which they are edited and translated? 
 In the next place, Maimonides, a Spanish 
 Jew by birth was born in the year of our 
 Lord 1131. (Did not the reader suppose 
 that he was almost a cotemporary with 
 Christ?) The Babylonian Talmud, on 
 which he wrote both annotations and an 
 abridgement, was not compiled till the year 
 500 or after. Now is this an authority to 
 be set up against God's word, as to Jew- 
 ish usages at the Christian era? If the 
 Jews had departed so widely from Sa- 
 cred writ in their traditions, in the four 
 hundred years between the prophets and 
 Christ; how much more widely may they 
 not have departed in the next five hundred 
 years of growing apostacy and supersti- 
 tion ? But a word as to these baptisms of 
 the Pharisees, when returning from the 
 markets; and of cups, pots, couches! — 
 This author claims Old Testament evidence 
 for the dipping of them, by referring to the 
 numerous ceremonial washings enjoined, for 
 instance in Levit. xv : ■« He shall bathe in 
 water." But the word "bathe"* is always 
 " rahatz" which does not mean dip, as all 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 77 
 
 know ; and the preposition is * beth,' which 
 may as justly be rendered " wash with 
 water." Again ; Levit. xi ; 32, is referred 
 to, where it is provided that when the dead 
 body of an unclean animal falls on a gar- 
 ment, brazen vessel, &c, u it shall be put 
 into water.*' But this is evidently a soaking, 
 and not a mere dipping. But, that these 
 daily immersions of whole persons and bul- 
 ky furniture could not be practised in a 
 country of few fountains and running 
 streams, is plain from this. When water 
 which had come in contact with anything un- 
 clean stood at all in a vessel, the vessel it- 
 self became unclean, and must be broken. 
 Levit. xi : 31 — 36. Nothing except a 
 flowing fountain, or pit in which was much 
 water, could submit to the immersion of an 
 unclean object, without becoming itself un- 
 clean, with all its water. Hence pouring 
 must have been the customary mode, for 
 the lesser, daily uncleanesses, at least. — 
 And of this we have Bible proof. See 2 
 Kings iii : 11. — " Here is Elisha the son of 
 Shaphat, which poured water on the hands of 
 Elijah. 1 ' The reference is to the time when 
 Elisha, as a pupil of Elijah, ministered to 
 him in his religious purifications. In John 
 ii : G, we are told ; at the wedding at Ca- 
 
78 REVIEW OP 
 
 na, there stood " six water pots of stone, 
 after the manner of the purifying of the 
 Jews, containing two or three firkins 
 apeice." These pots the women were ac- 
 customed to carry on their heads. They 
 held two or three firkins, (metretas) and 
 were too small to admit an adult's whole 
 body. But they were provided for the 
 Jews' customary ceremonial baptisms ; that 
 is, to afford a sufficient supply of water, 
 not ceremonially polluted by the immersion 
 of any unclean thing, to be poured upon 
 the hands of the household and the guests. 
 As the company had already assembled and 
 the eating begun, the water had already 
 been thus used ; hence (John ii : 7.) Jesus 
 had to cause the jars to be filled with 
 water. 
 
 It would seem therefore that (supposing 
 Maimonides does assert the daily purifica- 
 tions of the Jews were by dipping the whole 
 body, which we feel not a partiele of inte- 
 rest in denying ;) these apostate, supersti- 
 tious Jews, in the course of five or eleven 
 hundred years after Christ, had " improved 
 upon" the Bible institutions concerning 
 their ceremonial baptisms, very much as 
 Immersionists have done in the supersti- 
 tious ages of Romanism, and in these last 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. ^9 
 
 (enlightened ?) ages. The Hijdromania 
 has been a growing disease. 
 
 We now request the reader to accompa- 
 ny us to Theodosia's 115th page : where it 
 is desired to force Pseilobaptist authority 
 to prove that there was plenty of water 
 about Jerusalem at harvest, to immerse 
 three thousand adults at once. Dr. Ed- 
 ward Robinson, an eminent living scholar, 
 Professor in the Presbyterian (New School) 
 Seminary in New York is quoted. He 
 made a tour of the holy regions with the 
 express view of illustrating biblical antiqui- 
 ties, and published his observations in three 
 valuable volumes. In vol. 1, p. 4b0 — 586, 
 we find the passages from which the sharp 
 schoolmaster quotes as follows : 
 
 " Dr. Robinson, one of these travellers, 
 speaks of ■ immense cisterns now, and an- 
 ciently, existing within the area of the Tem- 
 ple, supplied partly from rain water, and 
 partly by the aqueduct;' and tells us also 
 that 4 almost every private house had a cis- 
 tern in it,' — p. 480. Speaking of the re- 
 servoirs, he says, p. 483, * with such reser- 
 voirs, Jerusalem was abundantly supplied, 
 to say nothing of the immense pools of 
 Solomon beyond Bethlehem, which were 
 
80 REVIEW OP 
 
 no doubt constructed for the benefit of the 
 Holy City.' 
 
 " ' There are,' he says, ' on the north 
 side of the city, outside the walls, two very 
 large reservoirs, one of which is over three 
 hundred feet long, and more than two hun- 
 dred feet wide, and the other nearly six 
 hundred feet long by over two hundred and 
 fifty feet wide ;' and besides these he men- 
 tions the pool of Siloam, and two others as 
 being without the walls. Within the walls 
 he mentions * the pool of Bathsheba,' ' the 
 pool of Hezekiah,' and ' the pool of Beth- 
 ezda.' The pool of Hezekiah he says was 
 about two hundred and forty feet long by 
 about one hundred and forty-four feet 
 broad ; the pool of Bethesda three hun- 
 dred and sixty feet long by one hundred 
 and thirty wide ; and besides these he men- 
 tions an aqueduct and numerous other foun- 
 tains." So far the Psedagogue quoting 
 Dr. Robinson. 
 
 The first fact, wh'ch damages the utility 
 of this citation, and the honesty of the au- 
 thor in making it, is this ; that while the 
 scraps he has picked out of Dr. Robinson's 
 Eesearches, over a space of thirty-six 
 pages, may all be found there ; they were 
 picked out of the very midst of other state- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 81 
 
 ments ; such as these ; that the " numerous 
 other fountains " are either, veins of water 
 at the bottom of very deep wells, (as the 
 fountain En Rogel,) or small springs either 
 walled in, or arched over, the thin streams 
 of water flowing from which are carefully 
 conducted into some subterranean recepta- 
 cle ; and that those cisterns in almost every 
 private house, were just as available for 
 purposes of immersion as a common well in 
 Virginia. Mr. Robinson says, (p. 480 — 
 481.) " The cisterns have usually merely 
 a round opening at the top, sometimes built 
 up with stone work above, and furnished 
 with a curb and a wheel for the bucket ; so 
 that they have externally much the appear- 
 ance of an ordinary well." * * * * "In 
 this manner most of the larger houses and 
 public buildings are supplied." * * * * 
 " Most of these cisterns have undoubtedly 
 come down from ancient times ; and their 
 immense extent furnishes a full solution as 
 to the supply of water for the city." Now 
 how could this writer select his scraps, de- 
 signed to make Dr. Robinson seem to say 
 that there were abundant means at Jerusa- 
 lem for immersing the three thousand, with- 
 out seeing these statements which show that 
 6 
 
82 REVIEW OF 
 
 his use of them is deceptive? His is not a 
 sin of ignorance. 
 
 The second fact which we wish the read- 
 er to take along is this ; that Dr. Eobinson 
 in another work, tenfold more known than 
 his Eesearches in Palestine, and quoted by 
 this very Courtney, his Lexicon of the New 
 Testament Greek, does explicitly and di- 
 rectly give in his testimony as to the mode 
 in which the Pentecostal baptisms must have 
 been performed. This is appended to his 
 definition of the word baptizo. See Har- 
 per's Edition of 1850. When the school- 
 master examined Dr. Eobinson to extract 
 that testimony as to the meaning of the 
 word, with which he twits us he must have 
 seen this passage. If then he had wished 
 to tell his readers honestly, what Dr. Eo- 
 binson thought of the matter, why did he 
 not give this statement? We will do it 
 for him. Dr. E. says baptizo in New 
 Testament means, * ablution or effusion.' — 
 b.) "In Acts ii; 41, three thousand persons 
 are said to have been baptized at Jerusa- 
 lem apparently in one day at the season of 
 Pentecost in June ; and in Acts iv : 4, the 
 same rite is necessarily implied in respect to 
 five thousand more. Against the idea of 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 83 
 
 full immersion in these cases there lies a 
 difficulty, apparently insuperable, in the 
 scarcity of water. There is in summer no 
 running stream in the vicinity of Jerusa- 
 lem, except the mere rill of Siloam a few 
 rods in length ; aud the city is and was 
 supplied with water from its cisterns and 
 public reservoirs. See Bibl. Researches in 
 Palest. I, p. 479 — 516. From neither of 
 these sources could a supply have been well 
 obtained for the immersion of eight thous- 
 and persons. The same -scarcity of water 
 forbade the use of private baths as a gene- 
 ral custom ; and thus also further precludes 
 the idea of bathing in the passages referred 
 to in letter a,) (Luke xi : 38, Mark vii : 2, 
 4, 8.) c.) In the earliest Latin versions of 
 the New Testament as for example the 
 Itala, which Augustine regarded as the best 
 of all (de Doctr. Christ, ii : 15) and which 
 goes back apparently to the second centu- 
 ry and to usage connected with the apostol- 
 ic age, the Greek verb baptizo is uniform- 
 ly given in the Latin form baptizo, and is 
 never translated by immergo or any like word; 
 showing that there was something in the 
 rite of baptism to which the latter did not 
 correspond. See Blanchini. Evangeliarntm 
 Quadruplex, etc. Rom. 1.749. d.) The 
 
84 REVIEW OP 
 
 baptismal fonts still found among the ruins 
 of the most ancient Greek churches in Pa- 
 lestine, as at Tekoa and Gophna, and going 
 back apparently to very early times, are 
 not large enough to admit of the baptism 
 of adult persons by immersion ; and were 
 obviously never intended for that use. See 
 Bibl. Kes. in Palest. II., p. 182, III., p. 
 78." Thus Dr. Robinson speaks for him- 
 self. 
 
 We pass now to another perverted wit- 
 ness on the subject of infant baptism. On 
 pages 323, 324 of Theodosia, Courtney, the 
 corruptor of facts, cites Dr. Mosheim's 
 Church History as follows : 
 
 "Dr. Mosheim, who is universally known 
 and regarded as high Psedobaptist authori- 
 ty, says, in his Ecclesiastical History of the 
 first century; 'No persons were admitted to 
 baptism but such as had been previously 
 instructed into the principal points of Chris- 
 tianity, and had also given satisfactory proof 
 of pious disjjositions and upright intentions.' 
 Of the second century he says : 'The sacra- 
 ment of baptism was, during this century, 
 administered publicly twice a year at the 
 festivals of Easter and Whitsuntide. The 
 persons to be baptized, after they had re- 
 peated the creed, confessed and renounced 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 85 
 
 their sins, particularly the devil and his 
 pompous allurements, were immersed under 
 water, and received into Christ's kingdom 
 by a solemn invocation.' Of course they 
 were not unconscious infants." 
 
 Thus far the smart schoolmaster. His 
 obvious intention is to represent Dr. Mos- 
 heim as explicitly implying that infants 
 were excluded from baptism by the current 
 usage of the first and second centuries. 
 But how would the learned German be 
 amazed to hear himself quoted for such an 
 assertion. We shall now place over against 
 Mr. Courtney's pretended citation, the whole 
 passage as it is translated by Dr. Murdock, 
 far the most accurate of his translators, and 
 printed in Murdock's Mosheim, Harper's 
 edition, 1844, page 137. Even the very 
 passage which the Immersionists thus per- 
 vert will then be found to contain sufficient 
 evidence, without looking farther into Mos* 
 heim's opinions, that this learned antiqua- 
 ry was speaking, not of Christian infants, 
 but of accessions from Judaism and Pa- 
 ganism. 
 
 "§. 13. Twice a year, namely, at Easter 
 and Whitsuntide, (Paschatis et Pentecostis 
 diebus.J baptism was publicly administered 
 by the Bishop, or by the presbyters acting 
 
8ft REVIEW OF 
 
 by his command and authority. The candi- 
 dates for it were immersed wholly in water, 
 with invocation of the sacred Trinity, ac- 
 cording to the Saviour's precept, after they 
 had repeated what they called the breed 
 (Symbolum,) and had renounced all their 
 gins and transgressions, and especially the 
 devil and his pomp. The baptized were 
 signed with the cross, anointed, commended 
 to God by prayer and imposition of hands, 
 and finally directed to taste some milk and 
 honey. The reasons for these ceremonies, 
 must be sought in what has already been 
 said about the causes of the ceremonies. 
 Adults were to prepare their minds express- 
 ly, by prayers, fasting, and other devotional 
 exercises, Sponsors or Godfathers were, as 
 I apprehend, first employed for adults, and 
 afterwards for children likewise." 
 
 Thus Mosheim himself indicates that 
 when he spoke of candidates for baptism 
 repeating the creed, renouncing the devil, 
 etc., he intended only that these prelimina- 
 ries were exacted of adults. That infants 
 were baptized without them, he implies, 
 and that intentionally, when he says; "Adults 
 were to prepare their minds expressly, by 
 prayers, fasting, and other devotional ex- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 87 
 
 also : at first for adults ; because at first the 
 pious parents of the children of the church 
 stood for their own infants, and no other 
 infants were admitted to baptism ; but by 
 degrees, as superstition grew, these spon- 
 sors were also admitted to stand for the 
 infants of those out of the church. The 
 above passage which we have faithfully 
 quoted from Mosheim also presents the 
 reader with a specimen of the manner in 
 which the German antiquaries usually state 
 the testimony of the 2nd and 3d centuries 
 concerning the mode of baptism; as being 
 by a trine immersion, accompanied with 
 several superstitious rites of crossing, lay- 
 ing on hands, tasting honey, milk and salt, 
 and putting on a white garment. There 
 are two reasons why we do not consider 
 this testimony of any importance. First, 
 the New Testament mode was evidently 
 different ; and we do not feel bound by mere 
 human authority, however primitive; and 
 more thorough researches (for a specimen 
 of which see Taylor's Apostolic Baytism,,) 
 have shown that the early usages of the 
 2nd and subsequent centuries were not uni- 
 formly, nor even chiefly, in favor of baptism 
 by immersion, as was supposed by Mos- 
 heim, Neander, Schaff, &c. Second, this 
 
88 REVIEW OF 
 
 patristic usage, if undisputed, is worthless 
 to a Protestant, because it shows just aa 
 strongly that we ought to baptize all per- 
 sons, infants and adults, naked, by a trine 
 immersion, in water previously consecrated, 
 and to accompany it with all the above 
 mentioned unscriptural additions. Immer- 
 sionists, if they will use the testimony of 
 the Fathers, have no right to retain what 
 suits them and reject the rest. 
 
 We now proceed to another little taste, 
 somewhat more pungent, of the incorrigible 
 Courtney's fidelity. Let the reader turn 
 to Theodosia, page 322, and he fwill find 
 the statements of the Magdeburg Century 
 (a Lutheran work of the 16th century,) in- 
 troduced with a great pretence of learned 
 familiarity with it and its authors. The 
 knight of the Ferule states it thus: 
 
 "They (the Apostles) baptized only the 
 adult or aged, whether Jews or Gentiles, 
 whereof we have instances in &cts 2, 8, 10, 
 16, and 19th chapters. As to the baptism 
 of infants we have no example. As to the 
 manner of baptizing, it was by dipping or 
 plunging into the water, in the name of the 
 Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, according to 
 the allusions contained in the 6th of Eo- 
 mans, and 2nd of Colossians." They speak 
 
THEODOSTA EARNEST. 89 
 
 of the first century: and of the second cen- 
 tury they say: "It does not appear from 
 any approved authors, that there was any 
 change or variation from the former century 
 in regard to baptism." The italics, let the 
 reader note, are Mr. Courtney's own. 
 
 Now, courteous reader, turn with us to 
 Semler's edition of the Magdeburg Centu- 
 ries, published in Nuremburg 1758. The 
 cute Courtney, according to his wont, has 
 suppressed all reference to chapter and 
 page ; but by internal marks, we recognize 
 the body of his quotation in Century 1, Book 
 II, chapter 6, section entitled Ritas circa 
 Baptisma. The authors, after speaking of 
 the places, days, &c, in which, and persons 
 by whom baptism was anciently adminis- 
 tered, say: 
 
 "That adults were baptized, as well Jews 
 as Gentiles, the examples of Acts 2, 8, 10, 
 16, 19th prove. Of infants baptized, par- 
 ticularized examples are indeed not found 
 (in the Scriptures;) but Origen, and Cyprian 
 and other fathers are authority that infants 
 were baptized in the time even of the Apos- 
 tles. This also appears from the writings 
 of the Apostles, that they do not exclude 
 infants from baptism. For while Paul 
 teaches, Colos. 2nd chapter, that baptism 
 
90 REVIEW OP 
 
 supplies the place of circumcision, he indi- 
 cates that infants and adults ought equally 
 to be admitted to baptism. Likewise 1 
 Cor. 2nd chapter, calls the children of be- 
 lievers saints, not indeed on account of their 
 nativity, but because Christian parents com- 
 mit them to God in their prayers, and offer 
 them to baptism and the washing of regene- 
 ration and sanctification, more promptly 
 than Gentile parents." 
 
 The mistake which the authors (or their 
 printers) make in referring to 1 Cor. 2nd 
 chapter, where chapter 7th is intended, will 
 not affect the case. The reader will see 
 that the word only, which the author of 
 Theodosia introduces, and italicizes, is ut- 
 terly wanting, in the true reading. But it 
 makes all the difference in the passage, 
 which exists between 'yes? and '?*o.' And 
 then the authors are found, so far from 
 saving that "only adults were baptized by 
 the Apostles," to assert and argue, both 
 from the inspired and uninspired records, 
 that infants also were baptized. They do 
 indeed say that no example is found par- 
 ticularized of an infant baptism ; but this 
 is not what they are quoted as saying, in 
 Theodosia. Now whether the author of 
 this wretched story book, manufactured this 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 91 
 
 misrepresentation for himself, or borrowed 
 it ready manufactured from some other Im- 
 mersionist raver as unscrupulous as himself, 
 we care not to inquire. Perhaps the latter 
 is true. Most probably he really knows 
 nothing of the Magdeburg Centuriators, and 
 never saw the outside, much less examined 
 the interior of a volume of this work. But 
 why then did he preface his introduction of 
 their pretended testimony with his flippant 
 description of the work and its authors ? 
 thus seeking to make the impression that 
 he was entirely familiar with both. Any 
 way, we nail the imposture down, as an at- 
 tempt to perpetrate an unmitigated lie ; an 
 evidence that this scribbler is utterly treach- 
 erous, and deserving only of a dismissal 
 from every honest man's attention, with all 
 his pretended facts and arguments. 
 
 Next we must beg the reader to bear 
 with us, while we again refute the oft-refu- 
 ted slander, that the Westminster Assem- 
 bly, the authors of the Presbyterian Con- 
 fession and Catechisms, came within one 
 vote of adopting immersion instead of 
 sprinkling. One would think that this tale 
 had been often enough advanced, and often 
 enough proved false, for even the ignorance 
 of this author to be enlightened on the sub- 
 
92 REVIEW OF 
 
 ject. For instance, in the famous Lexing- 
 ton debate of Rice and Campbell, Mr. 
 Campbell advanced this charge against the 
 "Westminister Assembly ; and Mr. Rice dis- 
 proved it nearly in the words which we are 
 about to employ from Lightfoot's works, in 
 such a triumphant way, that Mr. Campbell 
 himself tacitly withdrew the charge. Now, 
 is it likely that the author of Theodosia, 
 himself a Western man, never saw this book, 
 so famous especially throughout the West? 
 Did he again publish the statement after 
 having seen its utter refutation? This is a 
 question which we leave to his own con- 
 science to answer. On page 178 of Theo- 
 dosia we find it again; as follows: — 
 
 "You will there" (Edinb. Encycl) "learn 
 that in England the Westminster Assembly 
 of Divines had a warm discussion whether 
 immersion or sprinkling should be adopted. 
 But by the earnest efforts of Dr. Lightfoot, 
 who had great interest in the Assembly, 
 sprinkling was adopted by a majority of 
 one. The vote stood, 24 for immersion, and 
 25 for sprinkling. This was 1643 years 
 after Christ. The next year an act of par- 
 liament was passed requiring the parents 
 of all children born in the realm to have 
 them sprinkled, &c." 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 93 
 
 As Dr. Lightfoot's name has been men- 
 tioned in connexion with this ridiculous 
 story, we may as well "scotch" it by a re- 
 ference to his life. See London edition of 
 Lightfoot's works, 1684. Author's life, p. 
 5. The tale is there told thus : 
 
 "Upon that proposition relating to Bap- 
 tism; it is lawful and sufficient to sprinkle the 
 child, our author opposed them that worded 
 it in that manner: it being unfit to vote 
 that as lawful only, which every one grants 
 to be so. And whereas one of that Assem- 
 bly attempted in a large discourse, to prove 
 that (Tebeylah) (which signifies Baptism) 
 imports a dipping overhead; our author 
 replied at large, and proved the contrary. 
 1. From a passage of Aben Ezra on Gen. 
 38. 2. From Rabbi Solomon Jarchi, who, 
 in his commentary on Exod. 24, saith that 
 Israel entered into covenant with sprink- 
 ling of blood, and Tebeylah; which the au- 
 thor of the Epistle to the Hebrews expound- 
 ed by sprinkling; Heb. 9th. 3. From this, 
 that Jo/m the Baptist sometimes preached 
 and baptized in places where he could not 
 possibly dip those who were baptized. In 
 conclusion he proposed to that Assembly 
 to show him in all the Old Testament, any 
 one instance where the word used de Sacris 
 
94 REVIEW OF 
 
 et in actu transcunto, implied any more than 
 sprinkling. It is said indeed that the priests 
 washed their bodies, and that the unclean 
 washed himself in water; but this was not a 
 transient action. And when they came to 
 the vote whether the Directory should run 
 thus : The minister shall take the water and 
 sprinkle or pour it with his hand upon the 
 face or forehead of the child, some were un- 
 willing to have dipping excluded, so that 
 the vote came to an equality within one; 
 Tor the one side there being twenty-four, 
 and for the other twenty-five. The busi- 
 ness was therefore recommitted and re- 
 sumed the day following; where our author 
 demanded of them who insisted upon dipping 
 the reason of their opinion, and that they 
 would give their proofs: Hereupon it was 
 thus worded ; That pouring on of water or 
 sprinkling, in the administration of baptism, 
 is lawful and sufficient. Where our author 
 excepted against the word lawful, as being 
 all one as if it should be determined to be 
 lawful to use bread and wine in the Lord's 
 Supper; and he moved that it might be ex- 
 pressed thus ; It is not only lawful but also 
 sufficient. And it was done so accordingly." 
 If the reader has the means of consulting 
 the Westminster Directory, he will find that 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 95 
 
 the whole article, as it was finally adopted 
 reads thus: "As he (the minister) pro- 
 nounceth these words, he is to baptize the 
 child with water; which, for the manner of 
 doing it, is not only lawful but sufficient, 
 and most expedient to be, by pouring or 
 sprinkling of the water on the face of the 
 child, without adding any other ceremony/' 
 It thus appears that the only subject upon 
 which the Assembly was divided, was this; 
 not whether dipping should be named as 
 the only proper mode; but whether dippi?ig 
 should be named along with sprinkling and 
 pouring, as one of the admissible modes. A 
 very different affair this, truly ! The whole 
 of the difference which the large minority 
 of twenty-four made was, not that they wish- 
 ed to exclude affusion ; but that they were 
 unwilling to totally exclude dipping. Thus 
 this slander is again killed : but perhaps 
 only to be again revived in the next Im- 
 mersionist novel. It may also be remark- 
 ed, in dismissing this point, that Dr. 
 Lightfoot, the strength of whose views in 
 favor of affusion may be seen in the above 
 extract, is the great channel, through which 
 English scholars ever since have received 
 a partial knowledge of the Talmudical lite- 
 rature of the Jews. There was then no 
 
96 REVIEW OF 
 
 man in Great Britain, who had made him- 
 self such a master of it. Subsequent scho- 
 lars who profess to know something of it 
 have mostly done nothing more than bor- 
 row from him. We doubt not that there 
 are nine chances to one that whatever the 
 author of Theodosia (or more properly, the 
 predecessors from whom he plagiarized) has 
 picked up about the learned Maimonides, was 
 gotten from the Talmudical illustrations of 
 the New Testament written by this very 
 Dr. Lightfoot. And seeing Dr. Lightfoot 
 taught these pretentious liter ateurs what 
 little they know of the matter, it seems to 
 us, the former is more likely to have been 
 a sound judge of the bearing of the Hebrew 
 usages on the mode of Baptism. He, who 
 had thoroughly mastered all the Talmudists 
 had to say of it, was, as we saw above, only 
 strengthened in his belief that affusion was 
 the Bible mode. 
 
 Let the reader now advance a little, to 
 pages 179, 180 of Theodosia. He will 
 there find that the fishy Uncle Jones is re- 
 presented as asking this question: "Did 
 not Cyprian, one of the ancient fathers ex- 
 pressly declare that sprinkling was practised 
 in his day, and was considered valid bap- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 97 
 
 tism ? I am sure I have received such an 
 impression from some source." 
 
 "You probably received it from some 
 Doctor of Divinity," replies the pert peda- 
 gogue, — "they are accustomed to make such 
 impressions ; but Cyprian says no such 
 thing," &c. &c. 
 
 Now good reader, go with us to the ori- 
 ginal works of Cyprian, letter 69, of the 
 Oxford edition of 1682, page 185, &c; a 
 letter addressed to a Christian named Mag- 
 nus; and you will see a case of brazen and 
 hardy impudence detected, which you will 
 scarcely believe a bad man could be shame- 
 less enough to adventure, in a printed book. 
 We give a translation of Cyprian's own 
 words, rigidly faithful; and we give them 
 somewhat fully, at the risque of tediousness, 
 in order that every one may see for himself 
 the whole connexion and bearing. 
 
 u Thou hast inquired also, dearest son, 
 what I think of those who obtain the grace 
 of God in weakness and disease, whether 
 th^y are to be esteemed legitimate Chris- 
 tians, seeing that they have not been wash- 
 ed with the saving water, but sprinkled. 
 In which particular our modesty and mo- 
 deration prejudices the opinion of no one, 
 as to his believing whatever he esteems 
 7 
 
98 KEVIEW OF 
 
 true, and practising what he believes. So 
 far as our mediocrity hath apprehended the 
 matter, we judge that the divine benefits 
 can in no case be mutilated and weakened, 
 and that no smaller gift which is drawn 
 from the divine munificence, can possibly 
 be bestowed in that case, where it (baptism) 
 is received with the full and entire faith of 
 administrator and recipient. For in the 
 saving sacrament the stain of sins is not 
 washed away, like the soil of the skin and 
 body in a material and secular bath, so that 
 there must needs be nitre, and a vat, a 
 swimming-pool, and the other appurtenances 
 by which the poor body can be washed and 
 cleaned. The breast (heart) of the believer 
 is washed in another wise; the soul of man 
 is cleansed in a different way, by the merits 
 of faith. On the saving sacraments, where 
 necessity compels, and God bestows his in- 
 dulgence, the abbreviated methods of God 
 confer on those who believe, the whole." 
 
 '*Nor should the fact, that it appeared 
 the sick person was sprinkled or poured on, 
 when he obtained the Lord's grace, move 
 any one; since the sacred Scripture, by the 
 prophet Ez» kiel (36, 25,) speaks and says; 
 'Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, 
 and ye shall be clean; from all your filthi- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 99 
 
 ness, and from all your idols will I cleanse 
 you. A new heart also will I give you, 
 and a new spirit will I put within you," &c. 
 Likewise in Numbers, xix: 7 and 19: "Then 
 the priest shall wash his clothes, and he 
 shall bathe his flesh in water, and afterward 
 he shall come into the camp," &c. "And 
 the clean person shall sprinkle upon the 
 unclean the third day and on the seventh 
 day." And again; Numb, viii: 7. "And 
 thus shalt thou do unto them to cleanse 
 them : Sprinkle water of purifying upon 
 them, and let them shave all their flesh, and 
 let them wash their clothes, and so make 
 themselves clean." And again; "The water 
 of sprinkling is purification." Whence it 
 appears that the aspersion of water likewise 
 holds good just as the saving r washing ; and 
 when these things are done under the 
 church, where the faith of both administra- 
 tor and recipient is sound, all (the effects) 
 can hold sjood, and be consummated and 
 perfected by the majesty of God, and by 
 the truth of faith. Moreover; as to their 
 calling them not Christians, but Clinics, 
 who have obtained the grace of Christ by 
 the saving water and legitimate faith, I 
 do not find whence they borrow that name; 
 unless perhaps, persons who have been 
 
100 REVIEW OF 
 
 reading the larger and more private trea- 
 tises of Hipocrates or Soranus, (two medical 
 writers) have discovered (the idea of call- 
 ing) them Clinics. For I, when I read of 
 a Clinic in the Gospel, learn that his weak- 
 ness was no obstacle to that paralytic and 
 weak man, who lay on his bed through the 
 courses of a long life, to hinder his attain- 
 ing most fully a heaven-born health ; Not 
 only was he raised from his bed by the 
 Lord's mercy, but carried his own bed with 
 his renovated strength. And therefore, so 
 far as it is granted to me by faith to ap- 
 prehend and feel, this is my opinion : That 
 whosoever hath obtained the divine grace 
 of baptism, by the legitimate rule of faith, 
 under the church, be adjudged a legitimate 
 Christian. Or if any one supposes that 
 they (these sprinkled persons) have obtained 
 nothing, but are empty and void, for the 
 reason that they were only sprinkled with 
 the saving water, let them not be so de- 
 ceived as to be baptized (again) when they 
 shall have escaped the affliction of sickness, 
 and convalesced. But if those cannot be 
 baptized (again) who have been already 
 sanctified by ecclesiastical baptism, why are 
 they scandalized in their faith and the mer- 
 cy of the Lord? Or have they, indeed, re- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 101 
 
 ceived the Lord's grace, but in a shorter 
 and scantier measure of the gift of the di- 
 vine and sacred Spirit: so as to be esteemed 
 Christians indeed, but Christians who must 
 not be equalled to others? Nay, but the 
 Holy Ghost is not given from a measure, 
 but is poured out entire on the believer. 
 For if the day rises equally upon all, and 
 if the sun is diffused over all with equal and 
 similar light, how much more does Christ, 
 the true Sun and Day, bestow his light of 
 eternal life in the church with a similar 
 equality," &c. 
 
 The reader ean now see for himself, 
 whether Cyprian did, as Uncle Jones sup- 
 posed he had somewhere heard, "expressly 
 declare that sprinkling was practised in his 
 day, and was considered valid baptism ;" 
 and whether the author has acted honestly 
 in thus roundly denying it. St. Cyprian was 
 converted A. D. 215, martyred 258. Dur- 
 ing his episcopate in Carthage, he was, on 
 the whole, the most prominent, influential, 
 and able divine in all the Latin part of 
 Christendom. We may safely assume that 
 his opinions were those generally adopted. 
 We do not of course adopt all his argu- 
 ments, nor his obvious belief in baptismal 
 regeneration; what we wish the reader to 
 
102 REVIEW OF 
 
 consider is his testimony as to the state of 
 opinion. One thing is obvious, that al- 
 though unscriptural superstitions about bap- 
 tism had already proceeded so far, this 
 great and good man regards the position 
 ■which is now the shibboleth of Immersion- 
 ists, that any baptism but dipping is not only 
 irregular, but worthless, with a disapproba- 
 tion near to contempt. That was a super- 
 stition too rank even for the rapidly cor- 
 rupting church of the third century. The 
 author says that the Christians of the first 
 three centuries were Baptists. Would any 
 Immersionist preacher now use the above 
 liberal expressions of Cyprian, concerning 
 a man baptized by affusion ? 
 
 On page 180, Theodosia, the attempt is 
 slyly made to insinuate another erroneous 
 statement concerning the usages of antiqui- 
 ty upon the same subject of clinic baptisms. 
 The schoolmaster continues: 
 
 "It appears that a certain man, named 
 Kovatian, was taken sick, and was appa- 
 rently nigh unto death. In this condition 
 he became, as many others have done, 
 greatly alarmed about his condition ; and 
 professing faith in Christ, desired to be 
 baptized. But he was too weak to be taken 
 out of bed and put into the water. The 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 103 
 
 water was therefore, poured around him in 
 his bed. He afterwards recovered, and 
 devoting himself' to the ministry, applied 
 for priestly orders, and the question arose, 
 whether one thus 'poured upon' in his bed 
 could be accounted a Christian. Now, it 
 is evident, that if pouring or sprinkling had 
 been a common mode of administering the 
 ordinance, this question would never have 
 been asked.'' 
 
 Here the impression is obviously intend- 
 ed to be made, that the church of the third 
 century considered the insufficiency of No- 
 vatus' clinic baptism as a difficulty in the 
 way of his ordination to clerical office; be- 
 cause it seemed doubtful "whether one thus 
 poured upon in his bed could be accounted 
 a Christian." Now we turn to Wall's His- 
 tory of Infant Baptism, (from whom this 
 author doubtless picked out the little and 
 confused knowledge which he has of Nova- 
 tus' case.) London edition of 1720, vol. II, 
 page 353; and we there find the following 
 testimony — '*Tis true, the Christians had 
 then a Rule among themselves, that such 
 an one, if he recovered, should never be 
 preferred to an \ Officein the Church. Which 
 Rule they made, not that they thought that 
 
104 review or 
 
 manner of baptism to be less effectual than 
 the other ; but for the Keason expressed by 
 the Council of Neoccssarea, held about 80 
 years after this Time: The 12th Canon 
 whereof is : He that is baptized when he is sick, 
 ought not to be made a Priest (for his coming 
 to the Faith is not voluntary, but from Ne- 
 cessity,) unless his Diligence and Faith do 
 afterwards prove commendable, or the Scarci- 
 ty of Men fit for the office do require it." 
 
 Bingham, in hie Origines Sacra, book IV, 
 chap. 3, $. 11, bears precisely the same 
 testimony — Why did not the author, when 
 borrowing this story of Novatus from Wall, 
 tell the whole truth ? 
 
 Bear with us, kind reader, if disgust at 
 this man's conduct will permit, while we dis- 
 close another instance of his reckless disre- 
 gard of truth. At the bottom of page 324, 
 he asserts most roundly, in these words: 
 that "there is not on record a single, soli- 
 tary instance of the baptism of a child, till 
 the year of our Lord three hundred and 
 seventy, and that was the son of the Empe- 
 ror Vallens, which was thought to be djing, 
 and was baptized by the command of his 
 Majesty, who swore he would not be con- 
 tradicted," &c. &c. (The fellow does nob 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 105 
 
 even falsify neatly, for he is too ignorant 
 to be able to spell the name of the Emperor 
 Valens.) 
 
 Now if the reader will turn to pages 333, 
 and 337, of Theodosia, he will find that the 
 author actually refers to two or three docu- 
 ments, of the dates, A. D. 200, and 250 
 nearly: (respectively 170, and 120 years 
 before the year 370) the genuineness of 
 which he himself admits ; and of which even 
 the wretchedly perverted extracts which he 
 gives clearly imply the habitual baptism of 
 infants at those dates. One of these is 
 called by the most inept psedagogue, the 
 Letter of Tertullian Bishop of Carthage, to 
 the lady Quintilla; whereas it is in fact not 
 a letter, but a Book or Treatise, of Tertul- 
 lian, not Bishop of Carthage, but presbyter, 
 on Baptism; and not addressed to anybody 
 in particular. In this treatise, the super- 
 stitious but learned author takes the ground 
 that the baptism of little children, then ad- 
 mitted by plain inference to be prevalent, 
 ought to be delayed, because baptism washes 
 away all sins committed previously, whereas 
 those committed afterwards are peculiarly 
 damning. And he argues for the delay of 
 baptism by every argument he can think of, 
 with great zeal. But why did he not cut 
 
106 REVIEW OF 
 
 the matter short by saying, that early bap- 
 tism was an unscriptural irnovation? No 
 doubt he would have done so, if he could. 
 Another of these documents is the testimony 
 of Irenagus, (who is even earlier than A. D. 
 200) to the fact that many infants had been 
 "regenerated" The clamorous Courtney 
 disputes that by the phrase "regenerated" 
 Irenseus meant the baptism. of the infants; 
 but every good scholar knows that the 
 clamorous Courtney is wrong. A denial so 
 marked by brazen ignorance and impudence 
 deserves no other reply than contempt. The 
 third document is a letter of St. Cyprian, 
 whose acquaintance we have already made, 
 to Fidus — Fridus, the accurate knight of 
 the birch makes it; thereby betraying, what 
 is apparent to the intelligent reader all 
 through ; that he really knows nothing 
 about the history of which he professes to 
 descant, but is borrowing at second or third 
 hand, from some bungler like himself. — 
 Fidus' question is: Whether the baptism 
 of infants might not to be postponed till the 
 eighth day, as circumcision was? Cyprian 
 answers, No; and the whole tenor of his 
 answer shows that on the question of bap- 
 tizing infants, there was no dispute. 
 
 Now what must be the hardihood of this 
 
THEODOSTA EARNEST. 107 
 
 scribbler, how profound his belief in the 
 stupidity of those for whom he writes ; that 
 he should make an assertion on page 324, 
 and himself furnish the refutation of it on 
 page 337? Or did he think to avail him- 
 self of the mean quirk, that whereas he had 
 said there was "not on record a single, 
 solitary instance of the baptism of a child" 
 till A. D. 370. Tertullian's and Cyprian's 
 testimony only prove the general baptism 
 of infants, not the baptism of a single child 
 by name? Does the value of the historical 
 testimony, as to the customs of the church 
 before A. D. 370, depend on the giving of 
 the name, and parents' name, of some child 
 baptized? If the testimony mentioned 
 above does not record a single, solitary in- 
 stance of infant baptism, it is only because 
 it evidences what is a thousand times more 
 destructive to the author's assertion, a gene- 
 ral prevalence of infant baptism. The au- 
 thor does indeed answer, with equal feeble- 
 ness and effrontry, to the question : 
 
 "What was the effect of this decree of 
 the African Council?" (which concurred 
 with Cyprian in the answer.) 
 
 "It seems to have had none. It is likely 
 that it relieved the doubts of Fridus; and 
 infants were probably baptized in Africa to 
 
108 REVIEW OF 
 
 some limited extent, but we have no record 
 of any such baptism," &c. 
 
 That the reader may see for himself; we 
 now insert a faithful translation of that por- 
 tion of Cyprian's letter to Fidus, which 
 bears on the subject. In the Oxford edi- 
 tion of Cyprian's works, 1682, it is the 64th 
 Epistle, and may be found at page 158. It 
 appears that sixty-six clergymen joined 
 Cyprian in the consultation. 
 
 "As relates to the cause of the infants, 
 who, you say, should not be baptized within 
 the second or third day of their birth, and 
 that the law of ancient circumcision ought 
 to be observed, so as to determine that he 
 who is born must not be baptized and sanc- 
 tified within the eighth day ; it seemed far 
 otherwise to all in our Council. For no one 
 agreed with you in this which you thought 
 ought to be done; but the whole of us rather 
 judged that the mercy and grace of God 
 should be denied to none that are born of 
 mankind. For since the Lord saith in his 
 Gospel; 'The Son of Man came not to de- 
 stroy the souls of men but to save,' no soul 
 ought to be lost if it can be, so far as lies 
 in us," * * * * &c. &c. 
 
 After some matter not important to our 
 point; Cyprian proceeds: 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 109 
 
 "For, as for the fact that the eighth day 
 was observed in the Jewish carnal circum- 
 cision, it is a sacrament (i. e. baptism) pre- 
 figured in a shadow and type, but com- 
 pleted in its truth when Christ came. For, 
 because it was destined to be the eighth 
 day, that is, the first day after the Sab- 
 bath, on which our Lord should rise, and 
 revivify us and give us the spiritual circum- 
 cision, this eighth day, that is, the first day- 
 after the Sabbath, and the Lord's day, was 
 prefigured in the type; which type ceased 
 when the reality supervened afterwards, and 
 spiritual circumcision was given to us," &c. 
 
 With the soundness of Cyprian's argu- 
 ment in the last paragraph we have no con- 
 cern; but only with his historical evidence. 
 And now, is there a man in his senses, who 
 will deny that infant baptism must have 
 been practised before ? Or else a clergyman 
 would never have penned such a question, 
 nor would sixty-seven other clergymen have 
 ever penned such an answer — That in- 
 fants should be of course baptized, is as- 
 sumed as a postulate, by both questioner 
 and respondents, without a hint of the 
 slightest demurring. The only difficulty is, 
 whether the precedent of circumcision did 
 not require its postponement to the eighth 
 
110 REVIEW OF 
 
 day. Would such a question and answer 
 ever have been uttered, if infant baptism 
 had not been already common? "Credat 
 Judceus Apellcs: non Ego." And second : 
 it is evident that both Fidus and Cyprian's 
 Council understood that it was an admitted 
 truth, baptism came in place of circumcis- 
 ion, as is taught by Paul, Colossians ii : 11, 
 12. Fidus' question is based on that belief. 
 And Cyprian and his colleagues, though 
 differing in the answer, did not say, as they 
 would have done had they disbelieved the 
 relation between circumcision and baptism; 
 "No, baptism is not tied to the eighth day, 
 because it has nothing to do with circum- 
 cision." They argue that, though the rela- 
 tion does exist between circumcision and 
 baptism, Fidus' conclusion does not follow. 
 That we may more fully rebut the asser- 
 tions of this author concerning the early 
 prevalence of infant baptism, we will briefly 
 add: that Bingham (Origines Sacra, book 
 XI, chap. 4, §. 5 to 12) cites the very 
 words of eight authors, all of whom lived 
 before the year of our Lord 250, and some 
 of whom were cotemporary with the Apos- 
 tles, from whom he irrefragably argues that 
 infant baptism was prevalent when they 
 wrote. And Wall, in his history of infant 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. Ill 
 
 baptism, which this author seems to have 
 used only to pervert, cites seven of the same 
 authorities, with an eighth not cited by 
 Bingham. So thai out of the very scanty 
 literature of the first 250 years, here are 
 nine authors of antiquity, who present good 
 ground for asserting the prevalence of in- 
 fant baptism. From the year 250 onward, 
 the number of witnesses is vastly increased. 
 If the reader would comprehend the strength 
 of this early testimony, he must remember 
 this fact, that of authors who flourished and 
 wrote prior to the year 250, and any of 
 whose works are now extant, Mosheim 
 mentions only about twenty. His list is 
 nearly exhaustive. ? these, there are 
 several whose extant works are exceedingly 
 brief, a mere letter, or fragment. This 
 being the amount of the early literature 
 still surviving, could more testimony to in- 
 fant baptism be reasonably expected? 
 
 We shall close this department of our re- 
 view by reference to one more assertion of 
 the railing pedagogue, whose cool impu- 
 dence really quite took away our breath 
 when we read it. See pages 166, 167. 
 
 "The fathers, (as they are called,) that 
 is, the earliest writers among the Christians, 
 
112 REVIEW OF 
 
 whose works have come down to us, were 
 all Baptists. It was near three hundred 
 years before there were any professed Chris- 
 tians who were not Baptists." Now, as we 
 read these astonishing words, we thought 
 to ourselves; This is but a play upon the 
 word Baptist; He means no more than to 
 state in an ad-captandum way (very far, in- 
 deed, from being honest) the fact that 
 many of the fathers, among their numerous 
 and more important points of difference 
 from modern Immersionists, agreed with 
 them in this one, that they also were infect- 
 ed with the Hydromania. On this supposi- 
 tion, the assertion seemed rash enough, and 
 we thought that surely; ''the force of na- 
 ture could no farther go." But no: on the 
 next page he adds that Roman Catholic, 
 Episcopalian, Lutheran, Dutch Reformed, 
 and Presbyterian writers, "have openly, 
 plainly, and repeatedly declared, as histo- 
 rians, that the Apostolic churches were, in 
 their membership — ordinances, organiza- 
 tion, and government, just such as the Bap- 
 tist churches are now — I say I might give 
 this authority, but 1 will refer you to the 
 same source from which they, as historians, 
 derived their information. I say the Chris- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 113 
 
 tian fathers, for the first three centuries, 
 were Baptists, because these fathers say so 
 themselves." 
 
 Whew! ! This then, is the sweeping pro- 
 position ; that the fathers themselves say the 
 Apostolic churches were, and continued for 
 three centuries, just such as the modern Im- 
 mersionist churches, in their membership, or- 
 dinances, organization, and government. Ah, 
 incautious Courtney, if you had known any- 
 thing at all of these fathers, of whom you 
 pretend to know so much before these in- 
 nocent, gullible souls; even your immea- 
 surable brass, and reckless hardihood in 
 fibbing, would not have thrust you into 
 such an unfortuate assertion. But let us 
 see what these fathers of the first three 
 centuries were, as to the particulars above 
 named. That the most of them stickled 
 for much water in baptism is true; bat it 
 was rather a good scouring than a complete 
 immersion, which they liked. The views of 
 the great body of them as to the necessity 
 of an immersion or washing all over, to 
 constitute a valid baptism, we have seen 
 stated by Cyprian. The bulk of them also 
 practised and applauded infant baptism ; 
 (baptizing the infants by immersion more 
 uniformly than the adults.) Here then, is 
 8 
 
114 REVIEW OF 
 
 one great difficulty between you, Brother 
 Courtney, and your ancient brethren — In 
 spite of all your scolding, the fact remains, 
 that they were usually guilty of all the 
 enormities of Baby-dipping. And then, as 
 to the mode of baptism, it is indisputable 
 that these primitive "Baptists," differed 
 from their modern brethren, in the follow- 
 ing particulars, (which the schoolmaster of 
 course considers wholly trivial, yea micro- 
 scopic in importance.) They accompanied 
 their baptism with an anointing with oil, 
 (Do you, oh Pedagogue?) See Bingham, 
 Origines Sacra, Book XI, chapter 9, §. 1. 
 They also signed the baptized person with 
 the sign of the Cross. See §. 3. They 
 consecrated the water beforehand with which 
 the person was to be baptized, by pronounc- 
 ing an invocation over it, and marking it 
 with the sign of the Cross. Chapter 10, §. 
 1, 3. Again ; all persons, men, women, 
 children, were baptized stark naked, as 
 modern Immersionist writers expressly ad- 
 mit. (Does the Psedagogue advocate this?) 
 See chapter 11, §. 1, 2, and Book II, chap. 
 22, §. 8. The subject was dipped three 
 times usually ; once at the name of each 
 person of the Trinity — §. 6. The baptism 
 was then followed by an imposition of the 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 115 
 
 Bishop's hands, connected with another 
 unction, to confer the Holy Ghost. Chap. 3. 
 Then the baptized person was clothed in a 
 white garment, sometimes carried lighted 
 candles in his hands, received the kiss of 
 peace, and tasted a little honey and milk. 
 See chapter 4. Such was the baptism of 
 Mr. Courtney's primitive brethren! All 
 these superstitious additions were invented 
 before the expiration of that third century, 
 within which he claims all the good people 
 as of his sect. Such is the suspicious com- 
 pany in which we first find the practice of 
 dipping unmistakeably described. Does it 
 not seem very probable that the dipping 
 originated in the same growing supersti- 
 tion, which invented the chrism, the cross- 
 ing, the stripping, the blessing of the wa- 
 ter, and the white robe? 
 
 But we proceed: whereas the schoolmas- 
 ter claims that all these churches of the 
 first three centuries were just such as his 
 own, in their membership, all the ancient 
 writers concur in saying that the members 
 were universally divided into two classes, 
 full communicants and Catechumens. See 
 Bingham, Book X, chap. 1, the latter of 
 whom were subject to church discipline, and 
 were carried through a separate course of 
 
116 REVIEW OF 
 
 religious instruction, but were never allowed 
 to witness a baptism or Lord's Supper. 
 This is very much like the modern Immer- 
 sionist churches, is it not? Again; not to 
 repeat the fact that infant baptism intro- 
 duced multitudes of infants into the mem- 
 bership, it is abundantly testified by most 
 respectable writers from the year 250 down- 
 wards, that the Lord's Supper was common- 
 ly given to infants; (another irrefagable 
 proof of the prevalence of infant baptism, 
 by the way,) and that, with the approba- 
 tion of nearly all. See Bingham, Book XII, 
 chap. 1, §. 3, and Book XV, chap. 4. §. 7. 
 Does brother Courtney "fellowship" this? 
 But the hardy Courtney asserts also that 
 the primitive church of the first three cen- 
 turies was identical with his, in its ordinances. 
 Let us see Bingham (Book XV, chap. 7,) 
 concurs with all the other learned antiqua- 
 ries in saying, that these Christians cele- 
 brated love/easts in their churches for seve- 
 ral centuries, beginning from a very early 
 date. Do modern Immersionists practise 
 this? Little need be said about the early 
 observance of Easter and Whitsuntide; to 
 which after a little, Christmas and Epiphany 
 were added; or of the Lenten fast preceding 
 Easter, of which we find traces almost as 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. ill 
 
 early as the first uninspired literature. The 
 first two festivals were generally observed 
 as early as A. D. 150. (See Bingham, Book 
 XX, chap. 5.) And then, time would fail 
 us to recite all the superstitious fasts ; (as 
 the Wednesday and Friday fasts) the ritual 
 of penance and absolution ; the repeated im- 
 positions of handsand confirmations, &c. <%c, 
 of which the prevalence before A. D. 300, 
 is testified by the general current of fathers. 
 Of course, as the consistent Courtney claims 
 all the Catholic churches as exactly like 
 himself, he also practises all these ! 
 
 They were exactly like him, he says also, 
 in organization and government. Now it is 
 well known that modern Immersionists are' 
 Independents in Church Government; and 
 most strenuous assertors of the parity of 
 the ministry; which they carry so far as to 
 exclude ruling elders. Nor do they attri- 
 bute any authority than that of mere fra- 
 ternal advice, to any representative church 
 court above the simple church meeting. 
 Now the very earliest uninspired remains, 
 (See Epistles of Ignatius, A. D. 117.) de- 
 scribe all the churches as having the three 
 orders of Bishops, Elders, and Deacons. 
 When we come down to the times of Mr. 
 Courtney's very familiar friends, Cyprian 
 
118 REVIEW OF 
 
 and F(r)idus, Cornelius and Novatus, about 
 A. D. 245, we find Diocesan Episcopacy al- 
 most universal. We need hardly insult the 
 reader by offering proof of this; but for the 
 benefit of those who mav be as ignorant aa 
 the Pedagogue, we cite Bingham, Book IX, 
 chap. 6; Eusebius Hist. Eceles., Book VI, 
 chap. 43. At the latter place, the Peda- 
 gogue may find a letter from his friend Bp. 
 Cornelius of Rome, against the clinically 
 baptized Novatus, in which a statement of 
 the organization of the Church of Rome 
 is given — says Cornelius: ''This assertor 
 of the gospel then did not know that there 
 should be but one Bishop in a Catholie 
 church! In which however, he well knew, 
 (for how could he be ignorant?) that there 
 were forty-six Elders, seven Deacons, seven 
 sub- Deacons, forty-two Acolyths, Exorcists, 
 readers and Janitors in all hfty-two»" &c. 
 Of course the Immersionist church (or do 
 they not say churches ?) of Nashville is or- 
 ganized on this primitive Baptist model, 
 with a prelatic Bishop (Rev. J. R. Graves 
 is the man, perhaps!) Elders, Deacons, 
 sub-Deacons, Acolyths, Exorcists, Readers 
 and Janitors. If so, then, we pray you, 
 good Exorcists of Nashville, why did you 
 not cast out the lying spirit out of the mouth 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 119 
 
 of your prophet Courtney, before he was 
 regenerated in the holy water of baptism? 
 And then, not only was the church govern- 
 ment of the third century prelatic, there 
 were the councils, which met frequently, 
 and legislated for the churches in a most 
 un- congregational manner. If the good 
 reader would know something of them, let 
 him consult Bingham, Book II, chapters 14 
 to 16. He will there find that they met 
 statedly, from an early date, in every arch- 
 bishoprick, and legislated authoritatively 
 for the churches under their care. 
 
 But we fear our refutation grows tedious 
 by its very fulness: we will therefore briefly 
 close by remarking that the doctrines of 
 baptismal regeneration, and in general, of 
 sacramental grace, of the real presence in 
 the Lord's Supper, of penance and purgato- 
 rial sufferings beyond the grave, were ge- 
 nerally held before the end of the third 
 century. Such were the churches which we 
 hear thus claimed as the same in member- 
 ship, ordinances, organization and govern- 
 ment, with the modern Immersionists? The 
 inference which is to be drawn as to the 
 ignorance and recklessness of thi3 author, 
 need hardly be stated. But there is an- 
 other inference which we will state. See- 
 
120 REVIEW OF 
 
 ing that corruptions and departures from 
 the Bible model early became so numerous, 
 so great, and so general, how much is the 
 testimony worth, which the fathers of the 
 third and fourth centuries bear in favor of 
 their general (not universal) attachment to 
 dipping? It is worthless. The authority of 
 these fathers is of little value for determin- 
 ing apostolic usages and doctrines: and 
 when it comes in collision with the more 
 sure word of Scripture, as in this case of 
 trine immersion, it is worthless. Paedobap- 
 tists therefore depend chiefly on the Bible 
 argument. 
 
 11. We suppose that the historical and 
 literary unfaithfulness of this book is now 
 sufficiently exposed, as well as its unscru- 
 pulous sophistries. Many other arguments 
 remain unnoticed by us, and many other 
 falsifications of testimony; of which the ex- 
 posure would be just as easy for us, and 
 crushing for the author, as of those above 
 mentioned. We beg our readers to be- 
 lieve, that if there is any other bold asser- 
 tion or pretended argument in the book, 
 which strikes him as unfavorable to Pres- 
 byterians, if true; we have passed it over, 
 not because there is any difficulty in dis- 
 proving it; but because we suppose enough 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 121 
 
 has been said. Why should the intelligent 
 reader be led through a longer series of 
 detected falsehoods, and sophistries, to the 
 increase of his weariness and disgust? — 
 Doubtless he is, before this time, sufficient- 
 ly nauseated with the "Heroine of Faith/' 
 to be ready to thrust her into the fire, pic- 
 ture, ringlets and all! 
 
 But the ends of righteousness would be 
 betrayed if we did not advert to another 
 glaring feature of this evil book. This is 
 its harsh invective, aimed at most respecta- 
 ble Protestant denominations, and at many 
 of the best and holiest men whom God has 
 given to the church. Let me give only a 
 few specimens among many. On page 50, 
 (Theodosia Earnest.) the heroine exclaims: 
 ''Stop Mr. Percy ! Pray stop, and let me 
 think a moment. Can it be possible that 
 a good man, a pious minister of Jesus 
 Christ, could dare to trifle thus with the 
 holy Word of God? Oh it is wonderful!" 
 &c. The civil Courtney then proceeds to 
 relieve her astonishment, by assuring her 
 that she is only beginning to get a little 
 taste of the iniquities of her Psedobaptist 
 Doctors of Divinity. Again; page 52, — 
 Theodosia is made to say; "I begin to 
 think that Theological writers are not to 
 
122 REVIEW OP 
 
 be relied on at-all" — (Right: sapient maid; 
 especially if they are of the Carson-Court- 
 ney school.) On page 60, the latter au- 
 thority says: "They" (Presbyterian Doc- 
 tors) "don't think their church can be wrong; 
 and they twist, pervert and torture the 
 Scriptures, as you have seen Mr. Barnes 
 do, or openly set aside their teachings as a 
 matter of 'indifterency,' as we have seen 
 Dr. Chalmers do. in order to continue the 
 usage of the church" Again: on page 176, 
 the uncle of the niece, Prof. Jones, is made 
 to exclaim in italics, "Can it be possible that 
 Doctors of Divinity will impose such falsehoods 
 on their people in order to sustain the practice 
 of the church?''' 
 
 But the gall of the pious Pedagogue is 
 more especially stirred when he comes to 
 denounce the practice of infant baptism. 
 Having then an audience of women before 
 whom to display his prowess, his crustiness 
 mounts up to actual profanity; and he fairly 
 earns for himself a crowning title. Hear 
 then the cursing; Courtney, as his indigna- 
 tion waxes dire against the enormities of 
 "baby-sprinkling," on pages 302, 304, 309. 
 
 "In the first place, if you will excuse me 
 for talking so plainly, infant baptism^ as 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 123 
 
 practised by Presbyte?ia.ns in this country, is 
 a continually repeated falsehood !" 
 
 "I say in the next place that, the baptism 
 of an infant is an act of high-handed rebel- 
 lion against the Son of God." 
 
 "I will now say even more than this; in- 
 fant baptism is impious — it is an act of sa- 
 crilege." 
 
 We can hardly surmise whether the read- 
 er will feel most of indignation or disgust, 
 when he finds the author, amidst the clos- 
 ing sentences of his book, concluding this 
 tirade of misrepresentations and denuncia- 
 tions with a mock-sanctimonious modera- 
 tion. 
 
 '•We have finished our ten night's study 
 of Scripture baptism. We have examined 
 it in regard to its mode, its subjects, and 
 its results. We have endeavored to do it 
 plainly and candidly, but if w T e know our 
 own hearts, we have tried to do it kindly — 
 and in the spirit of that 'charity' which 're- 
 joices in the truth.' " 
 
 Reader, is not this cool? Does it not re- 
 mind you of the audacity described by the 
 wise man, Prov. xxx: 20, "Such is the way 
 of an adulterous woman; she eateth, and 
 wipeth her mouth, and saith, I have done 
 no wickedness." As to the fiery denuncia- 
 
124 REVIEW OF 
 
 tions of the sacrament of baptism applied, 
 according to God's ordinance, to the seed 
 of believers, we are not concerned to rebut 
 them. If the reader will turn to the pages 
 indicated, he will find that infant baptism 
 is charged as "a falsehood," "a rebellion," 
 "an impiety," because we administer it, 
 among other meanings, to signify admission 
 to church-membership, regeneration, and 
 remission of sins, in all of which applica- 
 tions to infants the author holds it to be an 
 absurdity. But will even the bold school- 
 master deny that God commanded circumcis- 
 ion to be administered to infants? Then let 
 him turn to Gen. xvii: 11 ; Deut. xxx: 6; 
 Rom. iv: 11; Col. ii: 11, and he will see that 
 the Holy Ghost declares circumcision to have 
 been a sign and seal of membership in the 
 visible church, of regeneration, and of justifi- 
 cation. Was infant-circumcision therefore, 
 also a "continually repeated falsehood," an 
 "act of high handed rebellion," an "impiety 
 and sacrilege?" "He that rcproveth God, let 
 him answer it! Job. xl: 2. We now take our 
 farewell of this author, leaving him to set- 
 tle his grievous accusations against the ad- 
 mission of infants to this sacrament, with 
 the Almighty. 
 
 We do not profess to have dealt tenderly 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 125 
 
 with this work; for it deserves and demands, 
 not forbearance, but righteous indignation 
 and chastisement. Our only scruple has 
 been whether it truly deserves so much no- 
 tice as the effectual exposure of its errors 
 has required, or whether it should be left 
 to run its ignominious course, and work its 
 temporary mischiefs, unchecked save by its 
 own outrages and the contempt which they 
 will ultimately awaken. But we wish here 
 expressly to remind the reader that we have 
 diligently distinguished between this wicked 
 book, and the religious denomination, of 
 whose peculiarities it is an attempted de- 
 fence. The book we denounce as an out- 
 rage, of the denomination we wish we could 
 say nothing, but that we regard it as a true 
 branch of Christ's Church, containing a 
 multitude of true children of God, whom 
 we would fain honor and love as such, not- 
 withstanding our differences. We would be 
 glad to hold this author and his publisher 
 alone responsible for the sin and disgrace 
 of such a publication as Theodosia Earnest. 
 But alas; the Immersionist churches of our 
 country have unfortunately chosen to make 
 a use of it which renders this forbearance 
 impossible. We are told on all hands that 
 the denomination generally have circulated 
 
120 REVIEW OF 
 
 it with diligence, that they have obtruded 
 it on Presbyterians in an offensive and 
 proselyting spirit, and that not only indi- 
 viduals, but their church colporteurs circu- 
 late it with a zeal hardly second to that 
 with which they diffuse the VVord of God ! 
 The volume in our possession claims to be 
 the eighteenth thousand. A colporteur of 
 that noble and Catholic Society, the Ameri- 
 can Tract Society told us, that he once en- 
 tered the house of a decent family in Vir- 
 ginia, and offered to its mother, his Evan- 
 gelical stores — "I have a book," replied 
 the old lady, "which I would not give for 
 all yours, which I got from a colporteur 
 lately." Here she produced Theodosia Earn- 
 est. "I do think it is the best book I ever 
 read in my life, except the Bible!" Thus 
 it seems, Ecclesiastical agencies are employ- 
 ed by one of the sisterhood of religious de- 
 nominations, [professing to serve the same 
 Saviour, and aspire to the same heaven,] 
 not in the work of self-defence, and of in- 
 structing her own members in her sincerely- 
 held peculiarities, (for this would be legiti- 
 mate;) but in the propagation of abuse, 
 prejudices and hatred in uninformed minds 
 against their Pa?dobaptist brethren, and in 
 the most aggressive and discourteous as- 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 127 
 
 sault possible, against others outside their 
 pale. We shall not characterize this action 
 of the Immersionist denomination — let us 
 treat it with the forbearance due to breth- 
 ren misguided. But fidelity requires us to 
 call the reader's attention to its features, 
 that he may estimate its character for him- 
 self. This is the chosen vehicle then, for 
 the propagation of Immersionist views: a 
 work of fiction the vehicle of sacred truth; 
 and. that a work most offensively aggressive 
 in its whole aim and structure, of which the 
 very plot is an insulting bravado over Pres- 
 byterians, founded as it is on a case of fic- 
 titious triumph over them ; a work marked 
 by the most disgraceful dishonesty and per- 
 version of facts ; a work of fiery invective 
 and malignant slander ; and withal a work 
 as disgraceful to the denomination by its 
 lack of scholarship as by its indecency. 
 Have the Immersionists no scholars to fight 
 their battles, who have knowledge enough 
 to escape the absurd literary blunders we 
 have noted? -'Walls History of John the 
 Baptist." "The Pope's Legislature at 
 Ravema, A. D. 1311," (a title, we venture 
 to affirm, which would astonish every Papal 
 Canon Lawyer, when applied to a Metro- 
 politan Council,) "Tertullian Bishop of 
 
128 REVIEW OP 
 
 Carthage," (an office he never held,) "Cyp- 
 rian's letter to Fridus," (for Fidus,) &c.,&c. 
 The ignorance of early authorities which 
 are used with so much pretended familiari- 
 ty, while rothing was really known of them 
 by the author has been already exposed. 
 Those citations were evidently picked up at 
 third, or possibly, at tenth hand, from 
 wretched, compilations of pretended histo- 
 ry, whose literary credit was exploded again 
 and again, and so long ago, that all scholars 
 had dismissed them to the subterranean 
 caverns of forgetfulness. 
 
 Now we ask: Reader, is this the sort of 
 weapon which Immersionists put forward, 
 as their best implement of denominational 
 warfare? Then they must think that their 
 cause is at a low ebb indeed ! Surely noth- 
 ing less than desperation would have led 
 them to clutch so sorry a dependence, and 
 so to violate the courtesies and amenities of 
 denominational intercourse! Let us illus- 
 trate the nature of this polemic assault. 
 The High Church Episcopalians are not 
 noted for peculiar courtesy and forbearance 
 towards other Protestant churches, in their 
 denominational warfare. But some years 
 ago when similar objections were urged 
 against the official circulation of a polemic 
 
ffiEObOSIA EAfeNESl?. 129 
 
 work, not one-ten th part so offensive to 
 Presbvterians, as this Theodosia Earnest, 
 the book of Mr. Flavel S. Mines, that cir- 
 culation was discontinued by the Episcopal 
 authorities, and the book was suppressed-, 
 so far as the ecclesiastical publication of it 
 went. Mr. Mines professed to give the 
 reasons which had influenced him, and, he 
 surmised, were influencing three hundred 
 other Presbyterian ministers, to pass into 
 the Episcopal communion. Presbyterians 
 objected that his tone was offensive to us, 
 that his statements of fact were heedless 
 and inaccurate, and that the very form of 
 the book was aggressive towards us. The 
 consequence was, that High Church au- 
 thorities retracted their use of it against 
 us 5 although they deny to us validity of 
 ministry and ordinances, and the very cha- 
 racter of a church. Now, will our protest 
 against a case ten times a* offensive as Mr. 
 Mines' book, induce the High Church Im- 
 mersionist to recede? We shall see. 
 
 12. Our readers were informed at the 
 outset, that we did not propose to write a 
 complete argument on baptism, because we 
 considered it unnecessary. But we shall 
 beg leave to state with some degree of ful- 
 ness three ideas, to which as we suppose, it 
 9 
 
130 REVIEW OF 
 
 is desirable the minds of Presbyterians 
 should be very distinctly directed at this 
 time. 
 
 (a.) A part of the boldness and success of 
 Immersionists has been occasioned by the 
 indifference of Presbyterians to the narrow 
 and comparatively trivial subject of the 
 inode of baptism. This, indifference, though 
 injurious in its results, was in truth noble 
 in its motive. It is not the spirit of Pres- 
 byterians, to attach importance to ritualism; 
 and the question of the more or less water 
 in baptism, where the substance and mean- 
 ing of the sacrament were retained t we pro- 
 perly regarded as a matter of ritualism. 
 To attach importance to such things, was 
 alien from the temper of Presbyterianism, 
 as it is from the temper of the N. Testament. 
 The liberal principles of Presbyterians, 
 one of the most catholic of all denomi- 
 nations in its admission of all other denomi- 
 nations which retain any substance of sav- 
 ing truth, as sisters in the visible church 
 Catholic, also induced us to treat the pe- 
 culiarities of other classes of brethren in the 
 body of Christ, with a forbearance which 
 seemed almost to overlook the right of self- 
 defence against them. But now we must 
 treat immersion as an important matter, not 
 
THE0D03U EAENEST. 131 
 
 because it is so in itself; but because Ini- 
 mersionists will persist in making it so, by 
 assailing "the liberty wherewith Christ has 
 made us free." Presbyterians should there- 
 fore be better informed concerning the 
 modes in which their usage is attacked and 
 defended. We would say emphatically that 
 one of the prominent objects now in our 
 view, is to call attention to the many ex- 
 cellent and accessible works (the existence 
 of which has rendered a formal argument 
 -of the merits of the question unnecessary on 
 our part:) and to urge Presbyterian read- 
 ers to procure and study some of them. 
 We shall be pardoned for calling attention 
 just here, to a very clever and creditable 
 book, published by a "member of the Ala- 
 bama Conference," in answer to Theodosia 
 Earnest. It is entitled "Theoph'lt/s Wal- 
 ton;" and under the cover of. a very simple 
 plot, introduces a discussion of most of the 
 points made by the Immersionist. While 
 we d<> not approve of the imitation of the 
 bad precedent of teaching truth by hVtion, 
 not even for purposes of refutation, it must 
 still be said that the expedient is usnd by 
 the author of Theophilus Walton in an in- 
 offensive mannpr: the plot is so simple that 
 it is but little more than a thread to connect 
 
1#2 KEflEW Ofl" 
 
 the successive discussions? and tile? temped 
 of the book is eminently pleasant and for-* 
 bearing. While we would not vouch for 
 the soundness of all the positions assumed, 
 the argument is generally sound and inge-* 
 nious. We can assure the reader that if 
 he has been vexed at the glaring sophistries 
 and falsehoods of Theodosia Earnest, he 
 will find in the perusal of this reply, amuse- 
 ment and satisfaction, which will fully com- 
 pensate his previous annoyance. 
 
 There are then, several other work?/ 
 which can be procured at almost any book- 
 store, which will be found timely and con- 
 clusive. Among the smaller of these may 
 be mentioned Hunt's Bible Baptist, and Dr. 
 Daniel Baker's treatise on Baptism. Next 
 will be found a small duodecimo volume, 
 published by the Presbyterian Board of 
 Publication, and written by Dr. Fairchild. 
 This little work can hardly be too much 
 commended, for its simplicity of atyJe, con- 
 densation of matter, and Christian temper* 
 Here, in the compass of a hundred and 
 seventy-five little pages, and expressed with 
 a perspicuity level to the capacity of a child, 
 the reader will find a discussion which meets 
 almost every point usually advanced by Im- 
 tnersionists, and meets them triumphantly. 
 
t:hboposia earnest. 133 
 
 If the reader wishes to pursue his examina- 
 tion farther, we would commend to him 
 Taylor'' s Apostolic Baptism, a work of un=- 
 surpassed vigor of logic, and profound 
 learning. Yet this also is a duodecimo vo== 
 ume, written by the learned Editor of Cal- 
 met's Dictionary, and published in America 
 in cheap form. So far as we are informed, 
 both English and American Immersionista 
 have treated this work ever since its publi- 
 tion with a prudent silence; although invited 
 to disprove its facts or refute its rea&onjngs, 
 by the author. 
 
 But last., and ehiefest, we would commend 
 to our readers another work produced by 
 one of our living ministers in Virginia; 
 Armstrong on Baptism. In this book, ad- 
 mirable alike for its plan, its temper, its 
 ability, and its manly scholarship, the au- 
 thor leaves aside all the learned lumber of 
 Rabbinical and Patristic usages,, except so 
 far as they illustratrate Scripture., and pro- 
 ceeds to expound one by one the passages 
 of the Word of God, where the Sacrament 
 of baptism enters. When he has completed 
 this, he stops ; and leaves the faith of his 
 reader resting upon the word of God alone. 
 E^ery Presbyterian in the land should pro*- 
 cure this work, and master its contents, 
 
134 REVIEW OF 
 
 These works we mention, not as exclusive 
 of others, but as the most accessible, brief, 
 and appropriate to the present stage of the 
 discussion. 
 
 The forbearance of Presbyterians has not 
 only led them to neglect the study of this 
 subject, but also to yield tacitly to the ver- 
 bal assumptions of which Immersionistshave 
 made such successful use. It is not wonder- 
 ful indeed, that they should be aggressive, 
 boastful, rampant; when Paidobaptists ao 
 neglect the duties growing out of infant 
 baptism, and so looaeiy grant the perverted 
 and unscriptural use of language propaga- 
 ted in the Protestant world by the preva- 
 lence of Anabaptist sentiments. How often 
 d© we hear Presbyterians, thoughtlessly 
 and inconsistently speak of a baptized per- 
 son as joining the church, when he comes to 
 his first communion? He has been a mem- 
 ber of the church from his birth ! How 
 often do we hear the term baptism conceded 
 to Immersionists as they use it for their 
 exclusive dipping? Yea we have even 
 heard an adult Presbyterian say: "Did you 
 know that Miss was baptized last Sab- 
 bath ?" when the meaning of the question 
 was, that, the misguided young person had 
 committed the great sin of attempting to 
 
THEODOSlA EARNEST. 135 
 
 discredit and annul the holy sacrament of 
 baptism administered to her in infancy by 
 pious parents, by causing herself to be 
 dipped by an Immersionist! If God's peo- 
 ple will thus betray God's truth, by a heed- 
 less or ignorant use of terms; what is the 
 wonder, that general misunderstanding and 
 scorn of the truth should prevail? Let our 
 phraseology be strictly reformed ; it will be 
 a preparation for the more important re- 
 form of that neglect of the baptized mem- 
 bers of God's Church, by which, as parents, 
 communicants, and churcb-officers, we so 
 much discredit this important and benefi- 
 cent institution of our God. In the very 
 name which the Immersionists arrogate, and 
 which we (with insensate stupidity) concede 
 to them, there is contained a petifio prtrrcb- 
 pii, an assumption of the point in debate, 
 which has gained them hundreds of thou- 
 sands of converts. They call themselves 
 Baptists; as if they forsooth, alone of all 
 Christians, had that sacrament of God's 
 house ! And we re-echo the title, and speak 
 of tire in as Baptists ; as if forsooth, we ac- 
 knowledged the arrogant assumption! But 
 the truth is, that all the true branches of 
 the Protestant family, are at least as much 
 Baptists, as those who dip. For they use 
 
136 JtEYIEW OS 
 
 a mode, valid indeed, but less strictly scrip-* 
 tural than ours; and they only baptize a 
 part of those whom God commands to bap- 
 tize. Nay, Presbyterians are the Baptists; 
 and they are Immersionists. We owe it to 
 ourselves; yea, we owe it to God's truth, to 
 correct our language. Nor can these breth- 
 ren complain of the title of Immersionists, 
 inasmuch as they themselves clamorously 
 declare that immersion alone is baptism. 
 Least of all can they complain now, when 
 they are actually engaged in manufacturing 
 a new Bible, thus violating the catholicity 
 of the Protestant family of churches, in 
 order to get the word Baptize out of the 
 English Scriptures. They berate King 
 James' translators without end, because they 
 retained this wicked Greek word 'baptize* 
 dressed up in English letters, in their trans- 
 lation, instead of translating it *$»* as» 
 they say, should have been done. And yet 
 Baptist is their chosen title for themselves! 
 Now we are determined, for one, gentlemen 
 Dippers, that you "shall not eat your cake 
 and have it too." If you say 'Dip' is the 
 word, i dip' > let it be, throughout the chap- 
 ter; and while we call ourselves Presbyte- 
 rian, Bible Baptists, you shall be Immer- 
 §ionitis % or if it likes \ou better, l)<pi>er$t 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 13f 
 
 and nothing else. The latter is indeed the 
 proper word ; for those who object to 'hup- 
 tkse,' as a Greek word in English dress, 
 should still more object to the barefaced^ 
 and more recent foreigner, immerse; which 
 is jet more Latin, than baptize is Greek, 
 How vastly would the great Immersionist 
 denomination be shorn of its arrogant pres- 
 tige, if all the Protestant world should take 
 them at their word, and compel them to 
 the consistency of going by the name of 
 The Religious Denomination of Dijjpers? 
 Words have potent influence; as these dip- 
 ping Christians know. 
 
 Ard here a word may properly be intro- 
 duced to show the folly and insincerity of 
 all this movement for Bible Revision. The 
 plea is, that the Greek word must be trans- 
 lated into '•immerse,'' and not transferred. 
 Now if it were true that immerse is its pro- 
 per equivalent (which we utterly deny as to 
 the Bible,) the plea would be false: for 
 whenever any word receives an established 
 use as the name of an ecclesiastial ordi- 
 nance, it has thereby undergone a change 
 of signification; it has become a technical 
 word; it has passed out of its general into a 
 special application— Even the Immersionist 
 does not in truth regard \d#p % as equivalent 
 
138 kEVlEW OF 
 
 to 'baptize. 1 He thinks baptizing is by dipp- 
 ing, but is a dipping of different sort, mean- 
 ing and intent, from dipping in general. 
 So that were their pretended desire grant- 
 ed; were the word immerse used throughout 
 God's word; and the popular language of 
 the church, as the sacramental word; it 
 would immediately pass into a sacramental 
 meaning, and would no longer be significant 
 merely of node, as Immersionists assert 
 bajifizo was. It would forthwith require, 
 and receive, its definition as to mode. 
 Hence, and because of the success which the 
 Immersionists gain by their unauthorized 
 assumption of the exclusive name of Bap- 
 tists, we do not believe that they mean to 
 give up the word 'baptize'' in their English 
 Scriptures. They are not foolish enough to 
 do it: We wish they would. We venture 
 the prediction, that the famous English Ver- 
 sion of the Baptist Version Society will never 
 be put into the hands of their people as a 
 Bible for use. Come gentlemen: We dare 
 you to the venture! Expunge your pre- 
 tended eye-sore, "Baptize*' out of )our 
 popular version, if you will; but then re- 
 member that when you do that, you also 
 surrender that unauthorized title, snatched 
 by a glaring sophistry from your brother 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 130 
 
 Christians, the title of Baptists; which has 
 won you more accessions from the ignorant 
 and unthinking, than ever Constantine's 
 Legend, read as he pretended in the skies, 
 (In hoc siar/io vlnce) secured for him from 
 superstitious Rome. No. you will not do it; 
 you will use the revision movement as a 
 good stone to pelt Piedobaptists with, as 
 long as it serves this turn ; and then the 
 unuttered and unutterable labors of Messrs. 
 Conant & Co., will be consigned to 'the 
 tomb of all the Capulets.' 
 
 (6) The controversy now exciting atten- 
 tion in America, between the advocates of 
 open and close Communion, furnishes us 
 with a most just and unanswerable urgu- 
 mentiim ad hominem, against the Immer- 
 sionist dog-ma. The party of close com- 
 munion argue in substance thus' "Nothing 
 is valid baptism but immersion; therefore 
 all unimmersed persons are unbaptized. — 
 But baptism is the initiatory sacrament, as 
 all Christians, in all ages agree. None (in 
 customary cases at leas*) can properly ap- 
 proach the Lord's Table, except through 
 the door of baptism. Therefore, whatever 
 our personal esteem and love for the unim- 
 mersed Christians, we have no option to 
 admit them to the Lord's Table." This 
 
140 REVIEW OF 
 
 argument Inimersionists say they regard as 
 unanswerable; yea, they say Predobaptists 
 themselves cannot dispute the conclusion if 
 the premise is admitted. So be it, say we; 
 for the present. 
 
 Then on the other hand, we have the im- 
 mortal argument of Eobert Hall, which 
 begins from premises which Immersionists 
 least of all, can dispute, and proves to a de- 
 monstration the opposite conclusion. "The 
 visible church should consist of true be- 
 lievers; and should be the organized coun- 
 terpart of that portion of the spiritual body 
 of Christ which is on earth, the effectually 
 called. The Lord's Supper symbolizes the 
 communion of true believers in the spiritual 
 feeding upon the atonement and redemption 
 of Christ. Who, then, should partake of 
 the bread and wine? Those obviously, who 
 feed on Christ by faith. But multitudes of 
 Paedobaptists are obviously true believers, 
 whose eminent faith and holiness we Im- 
 mersionists might well emulate. They are 
 not immersed, but they obviously consider 
 themselves as baptized ; and their error is 
 one of those unconscious misunderstandings, 
 to which human infirmity subjects good men. 
 Ten thousand noble instances of their con- 
 scientiousness prove that they would dia 
 
ffltfOfcOSfA EARNEST. 141 
 
 sooner than disobey the Saviour's command 
 to be baptized, if they apprehended it a9 
 we do. In a word, Christ accepts them* 
 and we cannot reject whom he accepts. Hosv 
 can we, how dare we, debar from his Sup- 4 
 per on earth, those beloved ones whom we 
 assuredly belieye He will welcome to the 
 marriage supper of the Lamb? Is the poor 
 earthly table, the symbol of the true, more 
 holy than that celestial Board, at which the 
 Redeemer and his glorified saints will drink 
 the wine new in his kingdom? How can we 
 thus rend the united body of Christ, and be 
 innocent?" 
 
 To this argument also, all the best and 
 noblest of Immersionists minds have yield- 
 ed, as unanswerable. And ten thousand of 
 those who were too bound by their narrow 
 system to obey it, have yet responded to its 
 force, by the anguish, and ineradicable dis- 
 satisfaction with which their generous Chi is- 5 
 tian hearts have bowed to the iron trammels 
 of their rule. Ever since the days when 
 those two giants, Hall and Fuller, repre- 
 sented the two sides of open and close com- 
 munion, the great cause has remained un- 
 decided before the lmmersionist public. — ■ 
 From their premises, neither argument can, 
 be overthrown; and yet both cannot be true I 
 
142 REVIEW OF 
 
 for they assert contradictions. How then, 
 is the strange result to be explained"? The 
 answer is very plain to the dispassionate 
 mind ; Since both trains of reasoning are 
 correct, the error must be in the premises. 
 But the premises of Hall's argument are as 
 indisputable as the Gospel: they are but 
 the Gospel itself. Then the premises of the 
 other must be false. It cannot be true that 
 immersion is the only valid baptism ; that 
 he who has sincerely, honestly complied with 
 Christ's institution as he supposed, by affu- 
 sion, is wholly unbaptized in fact. Thus, 
 the insuperable difficulties with which the 
 close communion theory is burdened in every 
 right mind, remain a standing evidence of 
 the error of its first principles. 
 
 (c,) Our third remark is one of which the 
 practical importance can scarcely be over- 
 estimated by PresDyterians in their argu- 
 ment with the Immersionists. We should 
 always insist upon their carrying out their 
 principles with consistency, to their legiti- 
 mate conclusions: and then the enormity and 
 error of those principles will be revealed, 
 to their own minds perhaps; more certainly 
 to the minds of the dispassionate public. 
 Jjet the reader bear in mind then, that all 
 parties are agreed, baptism is the initiatory 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 143 
 
 sacrament, which gives membership in the 
 visible Church of Christ. The great Com- 
 mission was: Go ye and disciple all nations, 
 baptizing them in the name of the Trinity. 
 Baptism constitutes the outward disciple- 
 ship. Least of all will any Immersionist 
 dispute this ground. Now if nothing is 
 baptism except immersion, if all other sup- 
 posed forms are not only irregular, but null 
 and worthless, all unimmersed persons are 
 out of the visible Church of Christ. They 
 have no membership in it whatever. But 
 if each and every member of the Presbyte- 
 rian body is unchurched, that whole body 
 is of course unchurched. When the potent 
 fairy in the fable turned each soldier of the 
 advancing army to a mouse, of course there 
 was no longer an army at all. If each se- 
 parate block in the walls of a house, which 
 is claimed to be a stone house, is proved to 
 be a brick, the house is not a stone house. 
 No Immersionist therefore can admit that 
 there is any such thing as a Presbyteria?i 
 church. The same argument applies simi- 
 larly to all Episcopalians, Lutherans, Me- 
 thodists, Congregationalists; in a word, to 
 all the bodies called Pa)do baptist. They 
 are not churches; their claim to be such is 
 a mistake, an assumption, an intrusion. AH 
 
144 REVIEW otf 
 
 are unchurched. And of course, they have 
 no ministry. How can a man hold office in 
 that commonwealth in which he has not ob- 
 tained citizenship? And how can an unau- 
 thorized herd of individuals, aggregated 
 illegally and irregularly, confer valid office? 
 There are then, no ministers of the gospel 
 in the world, except Immersionist ministers. 
 The assumption of all others to act as God's 
 ambassadors, and to perform the ordinances 
 of His House, is therefore unauthorised, 
 yea profane and wicked. Ought a good 
 church-member then, to countenance them 
 as ministers, to encourage them in their 
 profane intrusions, by their presence, ap- 
 probation, and respect? Surely not: such 
 intruders must be treated by consistent 
 servants of God. in all their protended 
 official doings, as they are treated when 
 they propose to come to the Lord's (Im- 
 mersionist) Table; firmly repelled. The 
 title of Reverend ought not to be conceded 
 to them, lest we should become partakers 
 of their sins. And as to the practice of 
 some misguided Christians, the practice of 
 employing these unbaptized intruders to 
 preach and labor in union-meetings, of in- 
 viting them to ascend the pulpits of God's 
 true (Immersionist) churches* to profane a 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 145 
 
 sacred spot and sacred function, of sitting 
 with pleased and respectful attention under 
 their pretended preaching; it is naught 
 but a glaring inconsistency. No thinking 
 and honest church member can be betrayed 
 into it. And whenever a P&dobaptist 
 minister sees the error of his ways, and 
 comes into the true (Immersionist) church, 
 he must of course be re-baptized, and re- 
 ordained. 
 
 Again ; if these unauthorized societies are 
 not churches, of course they have no sacra- 
 ments; for sacraments are ordinances of God's 
 House. They can not go outside of the 
 pale of his visible church. The same severe 
 sentence should therefore be passed by Im- 
 mersionists on all instances where they pre- 
 tend to celebrate the Lord's Supper, which 
 the fiery pedagogue passed upon the bap- 
 tism of infants. Since Christ has ordained 
 that (usually at leas ) the emblems of his 
 body and blood shall be given to none ex- 
 cept those who have "followed him in bap- 
 tism," all these sacraments are just so pro- 
 fane, just so false, just so truly a rebellion 
 against the King of Zion, just so impious 
 and sacrilegious, as is "baby-sprinkling." 
 For a member of the true ([mmersionist) 
 church to countenance these abominations 
 10 
 
146 REVIEW OF 
 
 by participating, ought therefore to be in 
 every case, ground of stern discipline; and 
 no plea of the soft influences of fraternity 
 and love should be permitted to interfere 
 with the dictates of high principle. All 
 these profane intrusions of the un baptized 
 into 'things too high for them,' should in- 
 deed not be visited with persecution and 
 civil penalties, enormous as they are; for 
 Christ has said; "Vengeance is mine; I will 
 repay." But his servants are bound to 
 testify their disapprobation of them, in all 
 their religious acts when they are brought 
 into contact with these misguided, sprinked 
 people, falsely called Christians. Som of 
 them may be at bottom good people; bufc 
 such cases must be the exception and l t 
 the rule, as in that Synagogue of Satan, the 
 Romish Communion; for whatever their 
 feelings, they are outside of the visible 
 church; and out of this there is no ordinary 
 possibility of salvation. It is to the church* 
 not the world, that "the oracles of God are 
 committed," with all their promises and 
 provisions of grace. 
 
 Such are the fair and inevitable results 
 of the dogma that nothing but immersion 
 is valid baptism. We defy human wit to 
 evade them successfully. All Paedobaptists 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 14? 
 
 therefore should press the Immersionists 
 with these odious consequences, (as it is 
 perfectly fair and righteous we should) until 
 they either avow them, or give up their 
 odious dogma. They should be made to 
 shoulder the consequences of their own 
 principles like men ; or else repudiate those 
 principles like men. Ljet us say to every 
 Immersionist; '<You must treat me in alt 
 respects as no church member, my minister 
 is no minister, my sacraments and ordinances 
 as profanations of sacred things; or else, 
 shall I say to you in the elegant and frater- 
 nal language of the author of Theodosia 
 Earnest? 'These stand as your dogmas in 
 your Confession of Faith,' and yet, in truth, 
 neither your ministers nor you have ever be- 
 lieved them to be such; or else you are more 
 inconsistent in your conduct than sensible 
 men are often found to be.'" (Page 236.) 
 Come, gentlemen Immersionists; 'face the 
 music;' act up to your principles; let us have 
 no temporizing for popularity's sake. Such 
 skittishness in acting consistently, does not 
 become those who have given that super- 
 eminent evidence of faith, obedience to 
 principle, and moral heroism, "following 
 their Lord into the liquid grave." 
 
 Yes; let Immersionists be forced, by the 
 
148 REVIEW OF 
 
 righteous pressure of truth and reason, to 
 act up to their professed principles, and the 
 unthinking public will awaken to an indig- 
 nant discovery, that the principles of this 
 denomination, so given to make capital 
 among soft hearts and heads, by calling 
 itself a 'poor and humble flock every where 
 spoken against,' is in fact, in its principles 
 most intensely arrogant of all Hii>h Church 
 Sects, not excepting Prelatists; and that 
 this denomination, professedly most Pro- 
 testant and thoroughly reformed, is in fact 
 most intensely formalistic. A clerical Ish- 
 maelite, Elder Sledge, lately screwed his 
 courage up to the point of acting out his 
 principles, just as all Immersionists should 
 act them out. in the city of Memphis ; and 
 the award of the Christian public was one 
 of universal reprobation. Even an Immer- 
 sionist Editor (good thoughtless soul ; he 
 had not comprehended the consequences of 
 his professed principles:) at a distance, de- 
 clared that the story must be a quiz ; be- 
 cause it was incredible that any professed 
 Protestant minister could be guilty of such 
 a piece of atrocity, worthy only of a Fejee 
 Islander. Let the religious public look at 
 the conclusion to which Imtnersionisui con- 
 ducts us! Jt is this: that such men as John 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 149 
 
 Owen, Kichard Baxter, George Whitefield, 
 John Wesley, Summerfield,Brainerd, Henry 
 Martyn, Schwartz, were not ministers of 
 Jesus Christ; while such blots on the Chris- 
 tian name as the Fejee Sledge, and the 
 rabid author of Theodosia Earnest, and 
 every whiskey distilling, and whiskey drink- 
 ing Ironside, were. True, God gave to the 
 former every gift and grace which can ap- 
 proximate man to the Seraphs ; true the bap- 
 tism of the Holy Spirit and of fire was theirs; 
 true they wore out laborious lives in imita- 
 tion of the Divine Prophet who "went about 
 doing good;" true, listening thousands 
 drank from their lips the streams of truth 
 and salvation which make glad the city of 
 our God ; true, Jesus Christ set the seal of 
 his approbation upon their service by pour- 
 ing forth the Holy Spirit through their 
 word, and giving them a multitude of souls 
 for their hire; true, the sanctity of their 
 lives, and triumphs of their holy deaths, 
 were ensamples for which the people of God 
 will bless him to the latest age, and every 
 one believes that they have received the 
 award: "Well done good and faithful ser- 
 vant," and have entered into the joy of 
 their Lord, where they ever wear a crown 
 starred with ransomed souls. But for all 
 
i50 REVIEW Otf 
 
 this, they were not ministers of Chrises 
 Church; because, although they supposed 
 they had complied fully with Christ's com* 
 mand to be baptized, enough water had not 
 been used ! And the same condemnation 
 must also be passed upon the communions 
 in which they lived and labored. Those 
 bodies hold fast the Word of God, on all 
 essential points except this one point of ritu* 
 alism; they are orthodox in doctrine, and 
 comparatively pure in morals; their mem- 
 bers have been as abundant in every good 
 fruit of sanctity and benevolence; their as- 
 semblies are the chosen scenes for the effu* 
 sions of God's regenerating Spirit; around 
 those communion tables, and baptismal 
 founts, where are enacted their unauthorized 
 and profane mimickries of God's sacraments, 
 have flowed the purest floods of penitential 
 sorrow, of fraternal love, of fragrant contri- 
 tion, of adoring gratitude, of rapturous joy, 
 of heavenly hope; their preachers are the 
 ornaments of the pulpit, and the literary 
 lights of the religious world; their gifts and 
 labors have spread Bibles and missionaries 
 into a thousand of the dark places of hea- 
 thenism, and are doing the chief part of all 
 that is done to conquer an apostate world 
 to King Emmanuel ; in their houses of wor- 
 
^HEODOStA EARNEST. lol 
 
 ship tens of thousands of souls are born 
 into the church Invisible and General As- 
 sembly of the First Born; and they send up 
 to heaven from rejoicing death beds, crown- 
 ed with the richest consolations of the Holy 
 Ghost, a continuous harvest of ransomed 
 souls. But they are not true churches of 
 Christ, for all that ! They are effecting, in 
 as good measures as any other society on 
 this earth, all the purposes for which God 
 founded his church; but they are not true 
 churches: because, in an unconscious and 
 honest mistake, they use too little water in 
 the outward part of the sacrament of bap- 
 tism. Yet, every Immersionist society in- 
 fected with the barbarity of the Fejee 
 Sledge; every Ironside, Antinomian congre- 
 gation, where the very name of discipline 
 and sanctity is forgotten, all the colored 
 churches of the Southern States, oversha- 
 dowed as they are with semi-^pagan igno- 
 rance and delusion, are true churches of our 
 Holy Redeemer, because forsooth they have 
 been baptized with enough water! Is this, 
 we pray, the spirit of Protestantism of the 
 New Testament, of a spiritual dispensation ? 
 Is it by such a test as this that the pure 
 spouse of Jesus Christ is to De discerned 
 from the world? If so, what is there of 
 
152 EEVIEW OF 
 
 more intense ritualism, what more profound- 
 ly furmalistic in the dogmas of old, dead, 
 wooden, superstitious Popery I Not only 
 does the understanding reject such a con- 
 clusion: the moral sense abhors it. But 
 this is the conclusion to which every Immer- 
 sionist must inevitably come, who consis- 
 tently holds that nothing is baptism except 
 immersion. 
 
 Our policy then should be to hold them 
 to this consequence of their creed, until 
 thev are villus to disavow that creed- Let 
 the whole community be made to see this 
 new form of Hign Cnurchism unmasked, 
 and to comprehend its deformity. Sudi is 
 our confidence in tae solid good sense and 
 right moral instincts of the people, we be- 
 lieve this one view will be more rffrcf I to 
 give them proper views of Immersion, than 
 all the volumes of verbal criticism which 
 ha>e ever been written on the subject. Let 
 tne High Cnurcnisin of this water-doctrine 
 be understood; and the — fjy s^n>e ol jag- 
 lice of the American people will consign ita 
 advocates ultimately into that lean minori- 
 ty, iu which we now rind those ecclesiastical 
 Cninacnen, the Puseyites. One of the most 
 significant traiu uf tne novel under review 
 is us evident squinting towards the extreme 
 
THEODOSIA EARNEST. 153 
 
 view on this subject. We notice that the 
 word church is never, or very rarely, ap- 
 plied to Paedobaptist communities. No 
 doubt, its anonymous author, like its pub- 
 lisher, rejoices in the invidious title of an 
 Old-Landmark-man. And this is one among 
 the many symptoms which appear in this 
 work and its circulation, portending, not 
 that rapid spread of Immersionism, and new 
 access of successful activity, which some 
 Presbyterians seem to anticipate, but ap- 
 proaching confusion and defeat. These ex- 
 travagances of denominational pride and 
 zeal are rather the indications of dissatis- 
 faction, conscious failure, and internal dis- 
 order, than of secure strength. u Pride 
 goeth before destruction, and a haughty 
 spirit before a fall." 
 
 In conclusion, we have only to say that 
 the reprobation which has been candidly 
 expressed in this Review, is aimed, not at 
 the Immersionist denomination, but at those 
 individuals in it, who discredit and injure it, 
 by odious sentiments or acts. We repeat, 
 that for that church, we desire to express 
 only Christian respect. If in any thing we 
 are compelled to disapprove their denomi- 
 national action, we would wish to utter that 
 disapproval in the language of oaoderatioa 
 
154 REVIEW OF THEODOSIA EARftESf. 
 
 and peace. Many of its members, whom 
 we have the privilege to know, we honor for 
 their orthodoxy and piety, and for a spirit 
 more generous than their technical creed. 
 Doubtless there are multitudes of such. 
 
 We have, as we conceive justly, objected 
 to the anonymous and irresponsible charac- 
 ter of the book criticised. It is but right 
 therefore that we should add; if any person 
 feels aggrieved by those criticisms, the Edi* 
 tors of the Central Presbyterian are au- 
 thorized to inform him who is to be held 
 responsible therefor. While we do not af- 
 firm that everything in temper, manner, and 
 expression, has been what it should be, we 
 hold ourselves ready to maintain the facts 
 and arguments asserted in the above pages, 
 "against all comers."