ordinance; on the contrary, in the total absence of scriptural evidence, my opponent contends that he not only baptized in the name of Jesus, but also in that of the Holy Trinity. Supposing such to have been the fact, upon what principle can we account for the silence of the sacred writer on so important a particular? for that it was important, and would have contributed more to elucidate the nature and extent of his mission than all the circumstances combined which they have thought fit to record, will scarcely be denied. What similar example occurs in the whole series of scripture history, of a minute and detailed account of a religious ceremony, in which the mention of its most essential feature is suppressed; or who will believe, that while the minutest particulars respecting John were deemed worthy of being recorded, one so remarkable and unprecedented as that of his baptizing in the name of the Trinity was too trivial to be mentioned? circumstance of much greater moment, surely, than his subsisting on locusts, or his being clothed with a girdle. But beside the silence of scripture, which might of itself be deemed sufficiently decisive, the inconsistency of such a proceeding, with the known reserve our Lord uniformly maintained respecting his Messiahship, and his repeated charges to his disciples not to publish that fact, demonstrate the extreme improbability of his suffering himself to become the avowed object of a religious rite. The employment of his name for such a

purpose, it is obvious, was equivalent to a public declaration of his being the Messiah, and must have defeated his known intention. In the publication On Terms of Communion, this argument was repeatedly insisted on, and pursued to such an extent of illustration, that we should have supposed it impossible it could either be misunderstood or misrepresented. What is the reply of the author of the Plea to this argument? One of the most extraordinary in the annals of controversy: it is neither more nor less than this, that though our Lord frequently enjoined secrecy as to the dignity of his divine character, and the immediate object of his mission, there is not a single instance in which he manifested any delicacy as to his name.* He afterwards proceeds to tell us, with great gravity, that his name Jesus was as well known as that of Peter and John, and that he was addressed under that name equally by friends, enemies, and strangers. My reluctance to inflame this controversy with the language of exacerbation, reduces me, on this occasion, to a perplexitty how to express myself. Is it possible, let me ask, he could so far mistake the scope and bearing of the reasoning, as to confound the use of the term Jesus, as the proper name, by which he was addressed in the ordinary intercourse of life, with the employment of it with that of the Father and the Holy Ghost, in a holy sacrament? Or will he contend that to call a person by the name of

* Plea for Primitive Communion, p. 27.

Jesus, or by any other appellation whatever, is precisely the same thing as to baptize in his name? He who is capable of confounding things so essentially distinct, is beyond the reach of reasoning: and if he did not confound them, but wished to put the change upon his readers, from a despair of being able to answer the argument, he has evinced a want of candour and good faith that merits the severest animadversion. Had his publication been a tissue of nonsense and stupidity throughout, we should have been strongly inclined to the former supposition; but when we reflect on the shrewdness which it occasionally displays, joined to his care not to glance, in the slightest manner, to the true hinge of the controversy, it is difficult not to suspect the latter. It It may be questioned whether another person could have been found, acquainted with the English language, but would have instantly perceived that it was not the author's intention to insinuate a reluctance in our Lord to divulge his name, but the fact of his being the Messiah; and that it was the inseparable connexion of that fact with the practice of baptizing in his name, which was the ground of my objection. As he has not made the slightest attempt to solve the difficulty, it would be trifling with the patience of the reader to attempt to re-enforce it.

IV. The different effects which accompanied baptism, when performed by the apostles, and by John, were urged as a decisive proof that the two

baptisms were essentially distinct, and characteristic of separate economies. To such a distinction our attention is invited by the forerunner, who affirmed himself to baptize in water only, but that "he that came after him should baptize in the Holy Ghost, and in fire." To this the author of the Plea replies, by remarking, " that the argument proceeds on incorrect data: it appears to assume that water baptism, and the baptism of the Holy Ghost, are the same; or that the latter invariably followed the former. It will no doubt be regarded as a remarkable incident, that, in the midst of a zealous effort to separate between what is substantially the same, an attempt should be made to identify what is essentially different."*

After describing the baptism of the Holy Ghost as an effect which ordinarily accompanied immersion in the name of Christ, it will be deemed much more remarkable that the author should be accused of confounding them, or that he should be affirmed to have identified two things which stand to each other in the relation of cause and effect. If it be a fact that the communication of the Spirit usually accompanied the administration of baptism in the apostolic age, while no such communication was annexed to the ceremony of John, the author's position is correct. In proof of this fact, we have only to consult the Acts of the Apostles, which record the history of the first promulgation of the gospel. We there perceive that St. Peter held

* Plea for Primitive Communion, p. 29.

out the promise of the Spirit to the people, as a principal inducement to submit to the baptismal sacrament; and that when St. Paul found certain disciples at Ephesus, who, though baptized, had not heard of those supernatural endowments, he expressed his surprise, saying, "Into what then were ye baptized ?" a question totally irrelevant, but upon the supposition that the reception of miraculous gifts was the stated appendage to that ordinance.

The only inquiry which can possibly arise on this subject is, whether John, in foretelling that the Messiah should baptize with the Holy Ghost, intended to allude to the sacramental water, or whether his attention was directed solely to the effusion of the Spirit, without reference to the external rite. This question, however, admits of easy decision, when we recollect that the corporeal rite was the usual preparative for the reception of spiritual gifts, that they were announced in immediate connexion with the act of baptizing, and that, though the ancient prophets almost universally foretold the abundant effusion of spiritual gifts and graces, which succeeded the advent of the Messiah, none before John made use of a figure, which, viewed apart from the visible action with which it was associated, would have been scarcely intelligible. His suppression of the mention of water is in perfect accordance with the genius of oriental speech, which, in the exhibition of a complex object, is wont to represent it only by its boldest and most impressive feature.