A76157:572
Confirmation and restoration the necessary means of reformation, and reconciliation; for the healing of…Confirmation and restauration the necessary means of reformation, and reconciliation; for the healing of…
Confirmation and restoration the necessary means of reformation, and reconciliation; for the healing of the corruptions and divisions of the churches: submissively, but earnestly tendered to the consideration of the sovereign powers, magistrates, ministers, and people, that they may awake, and be up and doing in the execution of so much, as appeareth to be necessary as they are true to Christ, his Church and Gospel, and to their own and others souls, and to the peace and welfare of the nations; and as they will answer the neglect to Christ, at their peril. / By Richard Baxter, an unworthy minister of Christ, that longeth to see the healing of the churches.Confirmation and restauration the necessary means of reformation, and reconciliation; for the healing of the corruptions and divisions of the churches: submissively, but earnestly tendered to the consideration of the soveraigne powers, magistrates, ministers, and people, that they may awake, and be up and doing in the execution of so much, as appeareth to be necessary as they are true to Christ, his Church and Gospel, and to their own and others souls, and to the peace and wellfare of the nations; and as they will answer the neglect to Christ, at their peril. / By Richard Baxter, an unworthy minister of Christ, that longeth to see the healing of the churches.
London: printed by A.M. for Nevil Simmons book-seller, 1658
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.
Answ. Call any thing under Heaven by the name of Faith, so you will but explain your meaning, and we will quarrel as little as may be with you about words: But little know we what you mean by Relative or Federal Faith, unless it be plainly, to be semen fidelium, the seed of believers: that there is a Relative and Federal Holiness, is Scripture Doctrine, and good sense: For the formal nature of the thing is a relation which commonly is expressed by the name of Holiness, ⟨image 185⟩and which in that phrase is implied. But I remember not that Scripture ever speaks of a Relative or Federal Faith: For I believe not that it was Infants, that Christ calls the little o•es that believe in him. And Faith being an act or habit, you must mean some other species of Faith, which consisteth in relation. I know it not, nor will I use your Language; though I think it more tolerable to call the Infant Relatively a Believer, then to say he hath Relative Faith; for in so saying, no more is meant, but that he is a Disciple of Christ, or belongs to him as he is the Seed of a Believer in Covenant. But let this word of Federal Relative Faith be used by you as you please: If the thing signified by it be any more then I have expressed, you should tell us what you mean: If it be no more but to be the Seed of a Believer, then we doubt not but thi• continueth when they come to age: but it doth them no good at age, as to the continuing of their Title to Church-membership before God without a Faith of their own, nor before the Church without a profession of it. That the Infant himself is the Subject of h•s own Right, is a thing that no man, that I know makes doubt of, that believeth him to have any Right: But the active main condition of that right is not to be performed by himself ⟨image 186⟩but by the Parent; and only the Passive Condition is to be found in himself, that he be the Seed of that Parent: If he must be a Believers Seed, its the Parent that must Believe: But that will not serve his turn at age, if he do not also believe himself.
Answ. Call any thing under Heaven by the name of Faith, so you will but explain your meaning, and we will quarrell as little as may be with you about words: But little know we what you mean by Relative or Faederall Faith, unless it be plainly, to be semen fidelium, the seed of believers: that there is a Relative and Faederall Holiness, is Scripture Doctrine, and good sense: For the formall nature of the thing is a relation which commonly is expressed by the name of Holiness,