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mutual promise." Assuredly. But are there no such things as engagements, even of the highest magnitude, such as no man of virtue or honour could violate, but which rest on no express promise? We are not concerned to defend the word "stipulation." It is clear what our Church requires from sponsors, when she addresses them "Ye must remember that it is your PARTS and DUTIES to see that this infant be taught, &c." Are we to understand that, if Mr. Towgood could have taken part in such a ceremony, he would have considered this "no stipulation, neither explicit NOR IMPLICIT?" In other words, are we to suppose that he would not have considered himself bound, BY THE MOST SACRED OBLIGATIONS, to fulfil the duties specified in the exhortation? And if so, what have we to do with hairsplitting definitions of the word stipulation?

But sponsors too often neglect their duty. Alas! it must be allowed. And so the Church is to be charged with this! After the Church has taken every pains, in the most solemn and distinct language, and in the very house and especial presence of God,* to call their attention to their duty, she must be accused for their delinquencies! This is indeed reversing the divine system of justice: "if thou warn the wicked, and he turn not from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity, BUT THOU HAST DELIVERED THY SOUL."+

A grand mistake of Mr. Towgood respects the very nature of the baptismal covenant. To have been consistent, he should have been an Anabaptist. He denies that infant baptism is a covenant at all. What then is the very substance of baptism? Mr. Towgood, speaking concerning Mr. White's parallel instance of an infant covenanting in the manorial court, says,

That he does not covenant, I prove by a very plain and incontestible argument, which is, that he cannot. There is no sense at all, no religious or moral sense, in which the infant can with any truth or propriety be said to covenant.—P. 149.

One

A most extraordinary slip, indeed, for a man who pretended to be a minister of the Gospel! Had Mr. Towgood wholly forgotten the seventeenth chapter of Genesis?-a portion of Scripture which our readers, to see the emphatic falsehood of Mr. Towgood's "very plain and incontestible argument," might advantageously peruse. passage alone we will adduce for it, from which we refer our readers to verse 14. "The uncircumcised man CHILD"-" that soul shall be cut off from his people. HE HATH BROKEN MY COVENANT." If Scripture be as plain and incontestible" as Mr. Towgood, it appears that a child may break a covenant; and how he can break a covenant which he has never made, and can never make, we leave to Mr. Towgood s advocates to explain.

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That a covenant may be made in the name of an infant, is evident from the legal practice of every day. Mr. Towgood's opponent had instanced the cases of an infant doing homage by his attorney for

To Mr. Towgood's friends, who are sufficiently enlightened to discover that Churches are "timber and walls," (p. 54), this may be no argument; but the less illuminated, though not, perhaps, less religious, feel an awe in a Church, and would reflect there, when, elsewhere, they might only hesitate.

+ Ezek. ii. 19.

his copyhold, and of a King, who, by the Regent, covenants to observe the laws of his country. To this Mr. Towgood first replies by ASSERTIONS, that "the child does not covenant to do homage," and the regent does not promise for the king, but for himself; and, though every attorney's clerk knows better than this, Mr. Towgood maintains that it must be so, by virtue of the " very plain and incontestible argument,” which we have just overturned by the help of Scripture. Here, therefore, further reply is unnecessary. The homage and the oaths are made in the name of the child; and the only reason which Mr. Towgood's ingenuity could furnish, to show that they do not mean what they say, has been cleared out of our path. This being once established, Mr. Towgood's second argument is worthless.

These cases (he says) widely differ from that of the baptized infant, because, in both of them, there are several important services and actions to be done (which must be performed by some one) whilst the minority continues. In the first, there are suits and services in the lord's court, and quit-rents to be paid. In the other, there are acts of regal power to be continually exerted for the due government of the people, even whilst the infancy remains. These, therefore, being indispensably necessary to be done, and the infant being utterly incapable of doing them; hence arises a necessity of some person's undertaking to discharge these offices for him, and to act in the infant's stead. But is there any thing like this in the case of baptized infants? Is there any service, or homage, any faith or vows, which God expects from them whilst their infancy lasts? You know there is not. If God then expects no such services from the infant, why are sponsors called forth to pretend to perform them for it; and this when the pretence is in every view ridiculous; because, in things of religion, it is utterly absurd for one man to pretend to promise to repent, to believe, in the name of another.P. 150.

All this is quite wide of the purpose. Whether these cases differ from that of the baptized infant, in other respects, matters not. The similarity for which we contend, exists. We contend, that there is no abstract absurdity in a child covenanting by proxy, which is the position impugned by Mr. Towgood. We show that it cannot be considered absurd, unless several other ceremonies are objected to on the same ground, which are universally admitted to be highly expedient and useful. Mr. Towgood's concluding distinction about "things of religion" should have been proved: it is certainly no axiom.

That baptism does most widely differ from all other cases, we most certainly admit: but its difference is not that which Mr. Towgood alleges. It differs in this respect. If it is a covenant at all, it is a covenant which cannot be too early embraced. If it is a covenant at all, it is not only lawful, but necessary. If there be any case in which there can be no doubt that the proxies may safely contract, it is this: A guardian may hesitate in some cases to enter into engagement for a ward; not that he believes it to be abstractedly unlawful to engage for another, but because he may have doubts respecting the advantage of the peculiar stipulation. But the sponsor can never doubt on this subject: it is the only covenant which admits of DEMONSTRATIVE expediency and utility.

The last mistake of Mr. Towgood relative to this subject, which we shall notice, is altogether a very extraordinary one, and one which we can scarcely qualify with so delicate a name. He says

Neither Christ nor his apostles ever made the sign of the cross, or other sponsors besides the parents, necessary to a child's baptism; nor did they ever make kneeling a necessary term of receiving the sacrament supper; but both those you make necessary.-P. 12.

To this we shall first reply, in the words of the 30th canon:

The Church of England, since the abolishing of Popery, hath ever held and taught, and so doth hold and teach still, that the sign of the Cross used in Baptism is no part of the substance of that sacrament: for when the Minister dipping the infant in water or laying water upon the face of it-as the manner also is-hath pronounced these words, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, the infant is fully and perfectly baptized. So as the sign of the Cross being afterwards used doth neither add any thing to the virtue and perfection of Baptism, nor being omitted doth detract any thing from the effect and substance of it.

If it were necessary to add any thing to this plain refutation, we might say, that in the office of private baptism, THE SIGN OF THE CROSS IS NOT USED AT ALL, nor are ANY sponsors required; and yet the rubrick in that office expressly says, "let them not doubt, but that the child so baptized is LAWFULLY AND SUFFICIENTLY BAPTIZED, and ought not to be baptized again."

If this assertion of Mr. Towgood, that the Church of England makes the sign of the cross and sponsors necessary to baptism, be merely a mistake, (and we seek not to press it with any heavier charge,) how shall such a mistake be excused, when the authentic formularies of the church, books in the hands of every body, might have corrected it at a glance? How shall such a controversialist obtain the confidence of a reader?

With regard to kneeling at the Sacrament, that subject has been discussed before. Mr. Towgood is MISTAKEN in saying that the Church considers kneeling a part of the Sacrament. The Church, as we think we have shewn, never regarded the posture as a constituent, although Mr. Towgood, indeed, appears sometimes to view it in that light. The Church, as she was bound, prescribes postures throughout her services, regarding them in themselves as non-essential things, but thinking it, if not essential, at least decent and consistent, that all the congregation should observe the same posture, at the same time. With this view she has ordered the posture of kneeling at the time of the Sacrament: not as a necessary part of the Sacrament, but as a significant gesture; and even cautiously explaining herself, to avoid misconception. Besides, if kneeling were necessary to the Sacrament, it could never be administered to the SICK. And if Mr. Towgood, after all this labour to escape mistake, would blunder, the blame must rest upon his own obtuseness or perversity.

FABER'S CALENDAR OF PROPHECY.

MR. EDITOR,-I beg permission, through the medium of your columns, to do an act of literary justice, equally to Mr. Archdeacon Wrangham and to myself. The development of the Apocalyptic number 666 in the Greek word Apostatès, as given without acknowledgment in my Sacred Calendar of Prophecy, is the original property of that gentleman.

It will naturally be asked, why such development was adopted by me, while the due acknowledgment was omitted?

The object of this article is to give the requisite explanation; and I am the more inclined to give it, because the statement will show the close connexion between the actual operation of my own mind, and my full discussion of the Apocalyptic number in question.

During the progress of writing my work, a recollection seemed one day to flash across my mind, that I had somewhere seen Apostatès alleged as the real name which contained the fated number 666. I forthwith sat down to calculate its letters, obviously writing the word in full doorárηc. The result was a complete disappointment; for the component letters were found to bring out a totally different number. Upon this, I examined every work on prophecy which I possess, and those works are certainly not a few; but in not one of them could I find the slightest notice of the word Apostatès. Such being the case, I concluded myself to have been mistaken, and entirely dismissed the subject from my thoughts.

After a very considerable interval, an interval (to the best of my recollection) amounting at the least to a year, my eye was accidentally caught by the Greek expression of the number in Rev. xiii. 18: the number is there expressed, not in words, but in the arithmetical letters Xs. It immediately occurred to me to try whether Apostatès, if written with the cipher 5, instead of with the letters σr, would produce the sum of 666. The trial was made, and the success was as complete as the former disappointment. Still, however, I vainly attempted to recollect or to discover where I could have first seen the idea, that the number 666 was contained in the word dñosárηs: but every effort was fruitless; and I at length concluded, that the discovery must have been my own; though, by that singular blending of thoughts, of which (I believe) every person, who had read and written much, is conscious, I had been led to imagine that I had seen it in some professed work on prophecy. The consequence was, that I adopted the word and the calculation, without making that acknowledgment which circumstances rendered impossible.

Several months after I published the Calendar of Prophecy, I happened, while staying with a friend, to lay my hand upon the miscellaneous works of Mr. Archdeacon Wrangham. Here I found the word Apostatès adduced and calculated; and from this source, after an interval of very many years, I immediately perceived that my hitherto inexplicable recollection must have originated. I lost no time in making the requisite private acknowledgment to Mr. Wrangham; and my wish, that this private acknowledgment may become public, simply as an act of justice to both parties, is the reason of my troubling you with the present communication.

I have the honour to be, your obedient humble Servant,
G. S. FABER.

Long-Newton Rectory, May 15, 1829.

PRO-POPERY SOPHISTRY.

MR. EDITOR,-I have already burdened your pages on this subject. But the storm having now blown over, we have more leisure to survey the wrecks which it has left, and to trace the course of its operations. I do not think such an employment unprofitable; inasmuch as moral and political tempests differ in this respect from natural, that they are, in some measure, beneath human control. The power of PUBLIC OPINION is acknowledged even by those who have defied it in every stage of their proceedings. Why otherwise were the petitions of the people checked and discountenanced, and the most indecent and ruinous precipitation incurred, except to escape the castigation of that scourge which, sooner or later, must visit the betrayers of their country? But I am satisfied that such policy was no less shortsighted than pernicious. Public opinion has been defied, but not extinguished; motives and arguments will still be canvassed, and wrong cannot prevail for ever.

With a view to advance the interests of truth, to which every man is bound to contribute his mite, it is my intention, by your permission, to call the attention of your readers, from time to time, to the various sophistical arguments by which, both in and out of Parliament, the cause of religion, of the Church, and of the country, has been betrayed.

:

The sophism which I now wish particularly to consider, is this :THE SPREAD OF KNOWLEDGE, INTELLIGENCE, AND CIVILIZATION (Commonly called "the march of intellect") WILL PREVENT EFFECTUALLY THE RE-ESTABLISHMENT OF POPERY.

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To this I shall, first, reply by a FACT. POPERY HAS BEEN INCREASING TOGETHER WITH THIS SAME MARCH OF INTELLECT." Next, I shall reply by an attempt to explain this phenomenon.

Though I do not consider general civilization incompatible with Popery, I certainly do not suppose that there is any affinity between things apparently so different. But I do not believe that, to use a mathematical phrase, superstition varies inversely as polite knowledge. And here again I appeal to facts. Let any man reflect on the difference between an ancient Athenian and a modern American Indian. In respect of intellectual cultivation, they seem scarcely partakers of the same nature. Now let him compare the RELIGIOUS SYSTEMS of the two. He will be puzzled to determine which is the more absurd, the more removed from truth, and from what, to the less considering Christian, appears only common reason.

Whence, then, is this vast difference? It is evident, at a glance, whatever be the cause, that civilization bears no analogy to religious proficiency. The truth I take to be this:-Superstition must be combated, not by learning, but by RELIGION. The Apostles did not overthrow superstition by preaching worldly wisdom, but quite the contrary; as a means of grace, they discarded and despised it. They did not, as some fanatics have since done, regard temporal learning as useless, but they confined it to its proper use: as an auxiliary to religion, they advocated and employed it; as a substitute for revelation,

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