if this principle had been but acted upon by those who now separate from our Church, on account of her abuses and want of discipline; and if instead of abstracting their persons and prayers from her support, and thus increasing the very mischief of which they complain, they had still continued to uphold her by their piety and prayers, healing where they have but irritated the wound, and restoring where they have but enlarged the rent; the Reformed Church of England might have presented to the world a lovely Communion of Saints, which might have challenged the admiration of mankind. But the Devil well knows the efficacy of the Gospel principle of PROMISE, when it is embraced by a lively faith, and carried out with corresponding love; and he has awfully succeeded in confounding and obscuring the Baptismal principle of the Reformation, which he as well knows to be the initiatory exemplification of salvation by promise; and by thus shutting the door, he has closed up the main access to the building.

LETTER IV.

THE INFANT.

THE Infant baptised can justly expect the benefits of Baptism in no other way than by faith in the promise. He is taught, that when his name was given him at his Baptism by his Sponsors, he was as a professed Christian admitted into all the privileges of that high character, that he was then "made a member of Christ," incorporated into his body the Church, by faith expressed for him by his Sponsors, thence "the child of God" by adoption and grace: and thence "an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven,"-if a son, then an heir of God through Christ. He is then taught to walk worthy of his calling as a "Child of God," to renounce the world, the flesh, and the devil, to believe the Articles of the Christian faith, and to keep and walk in God's holy will and commandments all the days of his life. And he "heartily" thanks his "Heavenly Father that he has called " him "to this state of salvation through Jesus

Christ" his "Saviour," and it is his prayer to "God, to give " him "his grace that" he "may continue in" this state to which he has been thus graciously called, "unto his life's end." He is then taught "to believe in God the Father who hath made" him "and all the world; in God the Son who hath redeemed" him " and all mankind;" and "in God the Holy Ghost, who sanctifieth" him" and all the elect people of God." Not who may sanctify or shall sanctify, or whose office it is to sanctify, but is then presently engaged in sanctifying him, together with "all the elect people of God;" of which it is strongly implied that he is one, since all who are sanctified are " God's elect." He is then taught the particulars of the will of God which constitute the rule of his obedience, in the ten commandments, of which an epitome is given in the two great branches of his duty. Then the duty and necessity of prayer are insisted on: and the "Instruction" concludes with an explanation of the Sacraments, which, as means of grace, are, under the blessing of the Spirit, to nourish and confirm his graces.

Here the construction and form, as well as the subject matter of the Catechism, go to instruct the Child, that he is "a member of Christ," &c.: that God has called him into a state of salvation by grace through Jesus Christ his Saviour; and that the Holy Ghost is even then sanctifying him, together with all the elect people of God. And is not all this in perfect consistency with the prayers and

praises of his Baptism which has preceded, and the prayers of the Bishop at Confirmation, which succeeds his Catechetical Instruction? In the former we say, "grant that this child now to be baptized therein, may receive the fulness of thy grace, and ever remain in the number of thy faithful and elect children:" and we "yield hearty thanks" to our "most merciful Father, that it hath pleased"him" to regenerate this infant with " his "holy Spirit, to receive him for" his "own child by adoption, and to incorporate him into " his "holy Church." And in the latter, the child having "renewed the solemn promise and vow made in" his "name at" his "baptism;" the Bishop opens his prayer with an acknowledgment of the regeneration and justification of the child, "Almighty and everliving God who hast vouchsafed to regenerate these thy servants by water and the Holy Ghost, and hast given unto them forgiveness of all their sins," &c. And is not this in perfect accordance with the Scriptures? On what ground does St. Paul call upon the Romans for sanctification? "I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God," &c.: the duties of the five last chapters of the epistle, are built on the mercies of the eleven first; and the important illative "therefore" is the cement which binds the superstructure of duties and graces to the foundation of "mercies." On what ground does he call upon the Colossians to

exercise graces or to discharge relative duties, but as "risen with Christ," and as "the elect of God?"

And have we not ample reason to take this encouraging view of the subject, both from the letter of our formularies, so perfectly according with that of Scripture, and the ill success which has hitherto attended our legal mode of enforcing Catechetical Instruction? Let us no longer educate our children in the persuasion that they have an ability to do good "which by nature" they "cannot have." Let us no longer, when a child is in fault, exact a promise from him, made in the fidence of his own natural strength, that he will not repeat it. Let us be consistent, and no longer teach the child, that he has "no power of" himself "to help" himself, and yet conconstantly make demands upon the exercise of a strength, as though it were his own, which we know ourselves, and also teach him, that he has not. Let us rather encourage him to faith and good works, by showing him that he is under a covenant of grace; that what his own "ungodly" nature, without any strength to good, cannot do, Jesus Christ has done, and will do, both for him and in him that what the Law demands of him, Christ has done for him, both in his life and death; and that what the Law demands in him, Christ has engaged to impart by his Spirit; that his constant prayer must be "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me;" (Psalm li. 10.) that his coldness in prayer, his trifling and