N00041:170
Another essay for investigation of the truth, in answer to two questions, concerning I.…
Another essay for investigation of the truth, in answer to two questions, concerning I. The subject of baptism. II. The consociation of churches. / By John Davenport B. of D. and Pastor of the Church of Christ, at New-Haven, in New-England. ; [Twenty-four lines of quotations]
printed by Samuel Green and Marmaduke Johnson, 1663
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.
Propos. 7. The Members of Orthodox Churches, being […] in the Faith, and not scandalous in life, and presenting […] testimony thereof, these occasionally coming from one Church to another, may have their children baptized in the Church whither they come, by virtue of Communion of Churches. But if they remove their habitation, they ought orderly to Covenant, and to submit themselves to the Government of Christ in the Church-where they settle their abode, and so their children to be baptized: It being the Churches duty to receive such into communion, so far as they are regularly sit for the same.
Propos. 7. The Members of Orthodox Churches, being 〈…〉 in the Faith, and not scandalous in life, and presenting 〈…〉 testimony thereof, these occasionally coming from one Church to another, may have their children baptized in the Church whither they come, by virtue of Communion of Churches. But if they remove their habitation, they ought orderly to Covenant, and to submit themselves to the Government of Christ in the Church-where they settle their abode, and so their children to be baptized: It being the Churches duty to receive such into communion, so far as they are regularly sit for the same.
Reply. The regular Communion of approved Churches, I look at as the Ordinance of Christ, according to the 11th and 12th Positions premised: but this Proposition is so ambiguously expressed, that it leaves me in the dark, till some Questions be answered, that the extent and compass of the sense and meaning of it may be better cleared. They distribute it into two parts, which they endeavour to prove severally: but neither of them are sufficiently explained. In the first part, I Enquire; What Churches they account Orthodox? whether such only as have the Truth of Doctrine, as it is opposed to Heterodoxies and Errors about the Doctrine of Faith, viz. Churches that are Heretical; or such also which are right in Judgement and Practice in matters of Church Order. For both these the Church at C••osse was praised by Paul, in Col 2.5,6. 2. What course the Church, where the Members of such Churches desire to have their children baptized, do take to know that such Members are sound in the Faith? For a Member of an Orthodox Church may hold and maintain dangerous Errors, contrary to the Faith,