Book 4, Chapter 16 (2)

VIII. Now, every one must perceive, that the baptism of infants, which is so strongly supported by the authority of Scripture, is very far from being an invention of men. Nor is there much plausibility in the objection, that it is nowhere stated that even a single infant was baptized by the hands of the apostles. For though no such circumstance is expressly mentioned by the evangelists, yet, on the other hand, as they are never excluded when mention happens to be made of the baptism of any family, who can rationally conclude from this, that they were not baptized? If there were any force in such arguments, women might as well be interdicted from the Lord’s supper, because we have no account of their having been admitted to it in the days of the apostles. But in this we are content with the rule of faith. For when we consider the design of the institution of the Lord’s supper, the conclusion is easy respecting the persons who ought to be admitted to a participation of it. We observe the same rule also in the case of baptism. For when we consider the end of its institution, we evidently perceive that it belongs to infants as well as to adults. Therefore they cannot be deprived of it without a manifest evasion of the will of the Divine Author. What they circulate among the uninformed multitude, that after the resurrection of Christ, a long series of years passed, in which infant baptism was unknown, is shamefully contrary to truth; for there is no ancient writer who does not refer its origin, as a matter of certainty, to the age of the apostles.

IX. It remains for us briefly to show what advantage results from this ceremony, both to believers who present their children to the Church to be baptized, and to the infants themselves who are washed in the holy water; to guard it from being despised as useless or unimportant. But if any man takes it into his head to ridicule infant baptism on this pretext, he holds the command of circumcision, which was given by the Lord, in equal contempt. For what will they allege to impugn the baptism of infants, which may not be retorted against circumcision? Thus the Lord avenges the arrogance of those, who forthwith condemn what their carnal sense does not comprehend. But God furnishes us with other weapons to repel their folly; nor does this sacred ordinance of his appointment, which we experience to be a source of peculiar support and consolation to our faith, deserve to be called unnecessary. For this sign of God, communicated to a child, like the impress of a seal, ratifies and confirms the promise given to the pious parent, declaring that the Lord will be a God, not only to him, but also to his seed, and that he is determined to exercise his goodness and grace, not only towards him, but towards his posterity even to a thousand generations. The manifestation here given of the mercy of God, in the first place, furnishes the most abundant matter for the celebration of his glory; and in the second place, fills pious breasts with more than common joy, by which they are excited to a more ardent return of affection to such an indulgent Father, in whom they discover such care of their posterity on their account. Nor shall I regard an objection, if it should be urged, that the mere promise of God ought to be sufficient to assure us of the salvation of our children; since God, who knows our weakness, and has been pleased in this instance to indulge it, has decided otherwise. Let those, therefore, who embrace the promise of God that he will perpetuate his mercy to their offspring, consider it their duty to present them to the Church to be signed with the symbol of mercy, and thereby to animate their minds to stronger confidence, when they actually see the covenant of the Lord engraven on the bodies of their children. The children also receive some advantage from their baptism, their ingrafting into the body of the Church being a more peculiar recommendation of them to the other members; and afterwards, when they grow to years of maturity, it operates upon them as a powerful stimulus to a serious attention to the worship of God, by whom they were accepted as his children by the solemn symbol of adoption, before they were capable of knowing him as their Father. Finally, we ought to be alarmed by the vengeance which God threatens to inflict, if any one disdains to mark his son with the symbol of the covenant; for the contempt of that symbol involves the rejection and abjuration of the grace which it presents.

X. Let us now discuss the arguments with which some violent disputants continue to impugn this holy institution of God. In the first place, finding themselves very hardly pressed and exceedingly embarrassed by the similarity of baptism and circumcision, they labour to establish a considerable difference between these two signs, that one may appear to have nothing in common with the other. For they affirm, first, that different things are signified; secondly, that the covenant is entirely different; and thirdly, that the children are mentioned in a different manner. But when they endeavour to prove the first point, they allege that circumcision was a figure of mortification, and not of baptism; which we most readily grant, for it is an excellent argument in our favour. We urge no other proof of our sentiment, than that baptism and circumcision are equally signs of mortification. Hence we conclude, that baptism was introduced in the place of circumcision, and represents to us the very same thing which that formerly did to the Jews. In asserting a difference of the covenant, with what presumption and absurdity do they corrupt the Scripture, and that not in a single passage, but without leaving any part of it secure from their perversions. For they represent the carnality of the Jews to be such, as to give them a greater resemblance to brutes than to rational beings; contending that the covenant made with them was limited to a temporary life, and that the promises given to them were all confined to present and corporeal enjoyments. If this notion be admitted, what remains but to consider the Jewish people as pampered for a season by the Divine bounty, (like a herd of swine, fattened in a sty,) to perish at length in eternal ruin? For whenever we adduce circumcision and the promises annexed to it, they reply, that circumcision was a literal sign, and that the promises connected with it were all carnal.

XI. Certainly, if circumcision was a literal sign, the same opinion must be formed of baptism; for the apostle makes one no more spiritual than the other. He says to the Colossians, “In Christ ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh;” and this he calls “the circumcision of Christ.” In explication of this sentiment, he adds, that they were “buried with Christ in baptism.”[1172] What is the meaning of this language, but that the accomplishment and truth of baptism is the same with the accomplishment and truth of circumcision, since they both represent the same thing? For his design is to show that baptism was to Christians the same that circumcision had before been to the Jews. But as we have now clearly evinced that the promises of these two signs, and the mysteries represented by them, are precisely the same, we shall insist no longer on this point at present. I will only recommend believers to consider, whether that sign ought to be accounted earthly and literal, which contains nothing but what is spiritual and heavenly. But to guard the simple against their fallacies, we shall briefly reply by the way to one objection, by which they endeavour to support this shameful misrepresentation. It is very certain that the principal promises of the covenant, which God made with the Israelites under the Old Testament, were spiritual, and had reference to eternal life; and that they were also understood by the fathers, as they ought to be, in a spiritual sense, and inspired them with confident hopes of the life to come, towards which they aspired with all the powers of their souls. At the same time, we are far from denying that he testified his benevolence to them by terrestrial and carnal advantages, by which we also maintain that their hopes of spiritual promises were confirmed. Thus, when he promised eternal blessedness to his servant Abraham, he added, in order to set a manifest token of his favour before his eyes, another promise respecting the possession of the land of Canaan. In this manner we ought to understand all the terrestrial promises which were given to the Jewish nation; so that the spiritual promise may always be considered as a source and foundation, to which the others may be referred. But having treated these points more at large in discussing the difference of the Old and New Testaments, I touch the more slightly upon them here.

XII. In the mention of the children they find this variety; that under the Old Testament, those were called the children of Abraham, who derived their natural descent from him; but that now this appellation is given to those who imitate his faith; and that, therefore, that carnal infancy, which was ingrafted into the fellowship of the Church by circumcision, prefigured those spiritual infants of the New Testament, who by the word of God are regenerated to an immortal life. In this language we discover, indeed, a small spark of truth; but it is a great error of these persons, that while they lay hold of whatever first comes to their hands, when they ought to pursue it much further, and to compare many things together, they pertinaciously insist on a single word; hence it necessarily happens that they are often deceived, because they acquire no solid knowledge of any thing. We confess that the natural seed of Abraham did for a time hold the place of those spiritual children which are incorporated with him by faith. For we are called his children, notwithstanding there is no natural relationship between him and us. But if they understand, as they certainly do, that no spiritual blessing was ever promised by God to the carnal seed of Abraham, they are greatly deceived. It behoves us to aim at a more correct sentiment, to which we are directed by the certain guidance of the Scripture. The Lord, therefore, promised to Abraham, that he should have a Seed, in whom all the nations of the earth were to be blessed, and accompanied this promise with an assurance that he would be a God to him, and to his seed. All those, who by faith receive Christ, the Author of the blessing, are heirs of this promise, and are therefore denominated “children of Abraham.”

XIII. Though, after the resurrection of Christ, the boundaries of the kingdom of God began to be extended far and wide into all nations, without any distinction, that, according to the declaration of Christ, believers might be collected “from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south,” to “sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,”[1173] in the glory of heaven, yet he had embraced the Jews with this great mercy for many ages before; and because he had passed by all others, and selected this one nation, to be for a season the exclusive objects of his grace, he called them his “peculiar treasure” and “special people.”[1174] In attestation of this beneficence, the Lord gave them circumcision, which was a sign to teach the Jews that he would be their defence and salvation; and the knowledge of this inspired their hearts with the hope of eternal life. For what can be wanting to them whom God has taken into his charge? Wherefore the apostle, with a view to prove that the Gentiles are children of Abraham as well as the Jews, expresses himself in the following manner: “Faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness in uncircumcision. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised; that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised; that righteousness might be imputed unto them also; and the father of circumcision to them who are not of the circumcision only, but who also walk in the steps of that faith of our father Abraham, which he had being yet uncircumcised.”[1175] Do not we see that equal dignity is attributed to Jews and Gentiles? For during the time fixed by the decree of God, Abraham was the father of circumcision. When the “middle wall of partition between” them was “broken down,”[1176] as the apostle says in another place, to give the Gentiles an entrance into the kingdom of God, he became also their father, and that without the sign of circumcision; for instead of circumcision, they have baptism. The express intimation, that Abraham was not a father to them who were of the circumcision only, was introduced by the apostle, to repress the vain confidence of some who neglected all concern about piety, and prided themselves in mere ceremonies. In the same manner, we may now refute the vanity of those who in baptism never carry their thoughts beyond the water.