Anti-Paedobaptism Part 2, Section 21
SECT. XXI.
That 1 Cor. 10. 2. proves not the practice of infant-baptism against Mr. Bailee, Mr. Cobbet, &c.
THere is another Text which is by Mr. Cobbet, Mr. Bailee, Dr. Homes, Mr. Philips, and others produced for the practice of infant-baptism, and it is 1 Cor. 10. 2. Mr. Bailee in his Anabaptism, pag. 149. argues thus, Infants were baptized as well as their Parents by Moses baptism, Ergo, Infants as well as their Parents ought to be baptized by Christs baptism. The Antecedent is the Apostles, 1 Cor. 10. 1, 2▪ The Fathers baptized in the Cloud, and in the Sea, were the whole People as well young as old; for no doubt the infants went as well through the Cloud and the Sea as their Parents.
Answ. 1. The Antecedent may be denied, because it is sayd [our Fathers] not infants. But sayth Mr. Cobbet, This is spoken of the Church Fathers to Paul and the Gentile Church-members, and the young ones were in after ages instruments to convey Church-truths and blessings.
Refut. 1. It is not sayd our Fathers as we are a Church, none but Abraham that I know is termed a Father to the Church of Christ, he being onelyonly named the Father of the faithfull, and they his seed: but either [our Fathers] notes simply the Ancestors that went before, as it is usual to call those our forefathers who were before us in former generations, though they begat us not; or else if it note their fathers in respect of natural generation, it notes as Grotius in his Annot in locum, the Fathers of us, to wit, Hebrews. But it may be sayd, that cannot be, …ith Paul onelyonly was an Hebrew, and then it should be my Fathers.
Refut. 1. It is not unusual to speak of persons in the second person by figure of Communication or Enallage of persons, when the thing is not true of them but our selves, and when the thing is not true of us but others; as when we say, we have preached, it is meant of one person that speaks, and 1 Thess. 4. 17. it is sayd, [we which are alive, and remain] and yet none of those that wrote were such, and so [our Fathers] is no more than the Fathers. 2. But there's no need of a figure: For the Epistle was written by Paul and Sosthenes, 1 Cor. 1. 1. And for Paul there's no question he was an Hebrew, and Sosthenes being a Ruler of the Synagogue, Acts 18. 17. And in like manner Crispus, v. 8. and Apollo, v. 24. whom he mentions 1 Cor. 1. 14. & 4. 6. were Hebrews, and therefore he saying, [our Fathers] might well mean our Fathers as Hebrews. 2. It doth appear the infants were not meant in that they are onelyonly meant, who were in a state of pleasing or displeasing God, as appears by v. 5. but so were not infants. 3. They onelyonly are sayd to be baptized to whom the same thing was signified by the cloud, that is, signified by our baptism; but to the infants nothing was signified by the cloud and sea, and passing through or under them, for they were not subjects of instruction▪ capable to know a resemblance, Ergo, infants▪ were not baptized. But sayth Mr. Bailee, They went through the Sea, Ergo, they were baptized.
Answ. So did the beasts also, and yet are not sayd to have been baptized, but those that did or might understand the signification of it. 4. They that are sayd to be baptized, v. 2. are all sayd to eat and drink Manna and Water, and that it was or might have been to them spiritual meat or drink, v. 3, 4. But this is not to be said of their infants. For as Dr. Homes and Mr. Cobbet grant, the infants did not eat Manna cakes, nor is it likely they did drink water, having breast milk, much less is it true that they were spiritual meat or drink to them, or might have been, Ergo, they are not meant by the Fathers baptized.
Nor is Mr. Bailees consequence good. For if the infants might be sayd to be baptized with Moses baptism, yet it follows not they are to be baptized with Christs, sith Moses his baptism was not formal baptism, but similitudinary after a sort, they were baptized, that is, as Grotius Annot in locum quasi baptiz…ti, as if they had been baptized; but a Rule holds not from similitudinary to formal baptism. But Mr. Bailee would prove the consequence thus, The Reasons which may be brought for the exclusion of infants from being baptized with their Parents by Christs baptism, militate as much against their being baptized with their Parents by Moses baptism. Therefore if nowithstanding they were admitted to the one baptism, they may as well be admitted to the other.
Answ. The antecedent of this proof is false; for in that of Moses, the baptism is onelyonly similitudinary in respect of a fact or event, which was no duty: but formal baptism of Christ is a duty of the person baptized, Mark 16. 16. Acts 2 38. & 22. 16. which cannot agree to an infant though the other should. Nor is such kinde of shadowy, typical, analogical, similitudinary baptism any more a rule about Christian baptism than Noahs Ark, which had the like resemblance, 1 Pet. 3. 21. And this Reason is confirmed from the Text. For if by [Fathers] are meant infants, v. 2. and they were baptized, and this must be a rule to us now about baptism of water appointed by Christ, which was sayd of het similitudinary baptism, then sith the same are meant by [Fathers, v. 3, 4.] and they are sayd to eat the same spiritual meat and drink, which was Christ, which is manifestly meant of the Lords Supper, by the same reason which Mr. Bailee brings, infants must not be excluded from the Lords Supper. Yea, but saith Dr. Homes, They did not eat all the Lords Supper.
Refut. They did all eat the same spiritual meat, and drink the same spiritual drink, which if he deny to be meant of the Lords Supper he deserts Protestants and other Divines acknowledging it, and may be refuted from the scope of the Apostle, which is, to shew that they had in a sort, in respect of signification and use the same Sacraments with ours, and yet were not secured thereby when they sinned. But Mr. Cobbet says, There must be a Synecdoche in the later, not all the Fathers simply being meant, but such as were capable of making a spiriual use thereof.
Refut. If [all our Fathers] must be meant Synecdochically, v. 3, 4. then also in v. 2. it being the same term in either, and the sense of them, v. 5. being meant of as many, v. 3 4 as v. 2. Yea, but there's a bar put against infants receiving the Lords Supper, 1 Cor. 11. 28.
Refut. There are more bars, and more express put against infants baptism, Acts 8. 37. Matth. 28. 19. Mark 16. 16. Acts 2. 38. Ephes. 4. 5 &c. which it seems Paedobaptists will leap over, or break down, notwithstanding they are so plainly set up by Christ and his Apostles to prevent their infant-baptism.
That which Mr. Ainsworth in his Dialogue brings out of Psalm 77. 17. to prove that the Israelites were indeed formally baptized with water, is upon mistake, that the water there poured out was on the Israelites, whereas his own Annotations on the places, and the words of the Psalm refer it to what was done to the Egyptians, Exod. 14. 24, 25. And thus Junius and others conceive it. Yet were it granted him, there must be a Synecdoche in the term [all the Fathers] for the reasons given, and otherwise beasts as well as infants must be sayd to be baptized.