Misrepresentations corrected, and truth vindicated. In a reply to the Rev. Mr. Solomon Williams's…

Therefore, if it be so, that the Infants of visible Believers are born in the Church, and are already Members in complete Standing, and don't drop out of the Church, and fall from a complete Standing, when they grow up; and therefore if they are not ignorant nor immoral, & desire full Communion, Nothing else can be required of them: And it will hence follow, contrary to my Principles, that they can't be required to make a Profession in Words of discriminate Meaning: But then, it also equally follows, contrary to his Principles, that neither can they be required to make a Profession in Words of indiscriminate Meaning. If nothing else besides ⟨p. 148⟩those forementioned Things is necessary, then no Profession at all is necessary, in any Words at all, neither of determinate nor indeterminate Signification. So that Mr. W. in supposing some personal Profession to be necessary, gives up and destroys this his grand Argument.

Therefore, if it be so, that the Infants of visible Believers are born in the Church, and are already Members in compleat Standing, and don't drop out of the Church, and fall from a compleat Standing, when they grow up; and therefore if they are not ignorant nor immoral, & desire full Communion, Nothing else can be required of them: And it will hence follow, contrary to my Principles, that they can't be required to make a Profession in Words of discriminate Meaning: But then, it also equally follows, contrary to his Principles, that neither can they be required to make a Profession in Words of indiscriminate Meaning. If nothing else besides ⟨p. 148⟩those forementioned Things is necessary, then no Profession at all is necessary, in any Words at all, neither of determinate nor indeterminate Signification. So that Mr. W. in supposing some personal Profession to be necessary, gives up and destroys this his grand Argument.

But if he did not give it up by this Means, it would not be tenable on other Principles belonging to his Scheme; such as its being necessary in order to a being admitted to Sacraments, that Persons should have a Visibility that recommends them to the reasonable Judgment and Apprehension of the Minds of others, as true Christians, really pious Persons, and that there should be such a Profession as exhibits moral Evidence of this. For who will say, that the individual Profession of an Ancestor, a Thousand or fifteen Hundred Years ago, is a credible Exhibition & moral Evidence of the real Piety of his present Posterity, without any personal explicit Profession of any Thing about Religion, in any one of the succeeding Generations. And if Mr. W. had not said, There must be a credible Exhibition of Gospel Holiness, but only some common Faith or Virtue; yet no such Thing is made visible to a rational Judgment and Apprehension of Mind, by this Means. How, for Instance, does it make Orthodoxy visible? What reasonable Ground is there in it, at such a Day as this in England, to believe concerning any Man, that he believes the Doctrine of the Trinity, and all other fundamental Doctrines, with full Conviction, and with all his Heart, because he descended from an Ancestor that made a good Profession, when the ancient Britons or Saxons were converted from Heathenism, and because withal he is free from open scandalous Immorality, and appears willing to attend Duties of public Worship! If an Attendance on these public Duties was in its own Nature a Profession of Orthodoxy, or even Piety; yet the Reason of Mankind teaches them the Need of joining Words & Actions together in public Manifestations of the Mind, in Cases of Importance: Speech being the great and peculiar Talent, which God has given to Mankind, as the special Means and Instrument of the Manifestation of their Minds one to another. Thus, Treaties of Peace among Men are not concluded and finished, only with Actions, without Words. Feasting together