A47591:808
Light broke forth in Wales, expelling darkness, or, The Englishman's love to the ancient…Light broke forth in Wales, expelling darkness, or, The Englishman's love to the antient…
Light broke forth in Wales, expelling darkness, or, The Englishman's love to the ancient Britons [sic] being an answer to a book, intituled [sic] Children's baptism from Heaven, published in the Welsh tongue by Mr. James Owen / by Benjamin Keach.Light broke forth in Wales, expelling darkness, or, The Englishman's love to the antient Britains [sic] being an answer to a book, iutituled [sic] Children's baptism from Heaven, published in the Welsh tongue by Mr. James Owen / by Benjamin Keach.
London: printed by William Marshall, 1696
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
If (saith he) the Infants of Christian Parents are federally holy, then they are Subjects qualified for Baptism: But the Scripture pronounces such Children federally holy; therefore they are qualified for Baptism, and may be admitted, Rom. 11. 16. If the Root be holy, the Branches are also holy, &c. Where by the Root, saith he, we are to understand Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and by the Branches, their Posterity, the People of the Jews. Now forasmuch (saith he) as the Jews, the Natural Branches, are for their Unbelief broken off, and the believing Gentiles are grafted in their stead, and succeed in their Privileges, in the sense that they were holy, not with an internal and inherent Holiness, passing by Natural Generation from Parent to Child, but with an external Relative Covenant-Holiness, grounded on the Promise made to the Faithful and their Seed.
If (saith he) the Infants of Christian Parents are federally holy, then they are Subjects qualified for Baptism: But the Scripture pronounces such Children federally holy; therefore they are qualified for Baptism, and may be admitted, Rom. 11. 16. If the Root be holy, the Branches are also holy, &c. Where by the Root, saith he, we are to understand Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and by the Branches, their Posterity, the People of the Jews. Now forasmuch (saith he) as the Jews, the Natural Branches, are for their Unbelief broken off, and the believing Gentiles are graffed in their stead, and succeed in their Privileges, in the sense that they were holy, not with an internal and inherent Holiness, passing by Natural Generation from Parent to Child, but with an external Relative Covenant-Holiness, grounded on the Promise made to the Faithful and their Seed.
Answ. 1. I deny the Major, and say, If Children of Believers were federally holy under the Gospel, yet they are not qualified for Baptism, because 'tis not that which gives them right thereto, or qualifies them for it, but what Christ hath ordained and appointed, as the alone proper and meet Qualification, which is not that External, Relative Covenant-Holiness he talks of, which the New Testament speaks nothing of, as I shall show by and by, but actual Faith, Regeneration, or inherent Holiness, which is the Thing signified by Baptism; therefore a thousand such Arguments will do no good, since Baptism is of mere Positive Right. 'Tis Christ's own Law must decide the Controversy, viz. What Qualifications are required of such, who by his Authority and Law ought to be baptized. Let any Pedo-baptist prove, if he can, that such an External Federal Holiness qualifies any Person for Gospel-Baptism; for if such Federal and External Holiness qualifies Persons for Baptism, then the Jews, before cast off, might have been admitted to Baptism, since they had then such a kind of