ESSAY ON BAPTISM 577

of Baptismal Regeneration, understand by Regeneration the Saving Unity with Christ, the final conversion of the sinner to God, the consummate Grace after the bestowal of which they cannot perish.

It is nevertheless as clear as noonday, since it is admitted that the greater number of baptized persons throughout Europe are Godless sinners, that the Church (if you suppose her to assert Regeneration to be the necessary consequence of the Baptismal Rites) does Not mean by Regeneration anything of this kind. Quarrel with her, therefore, if you will for improper use of the English language, and for attaching to the word Regeneration a sense different from yours; but do not quarrel with her doctrine until you quietly reflect what she really means: it may be that after reflection, you will have two quarrels with her instead of one-one for unscriptural doctrine, another for inaccurate language-only do not confound your two accusations together. Examine her doctrine first, and if you can accept that, for the sake of peace in Christendom, forgive her language.

§ 8. Now there are three distinct ways in which the Church’s words may be understood: since that all baptized persons are saved, she cannot mean-

(1) She may be understood that a certain degree of Grace is given at Baptism, but a degree not amounting to entire conversion.

(2) She may be understood that all persons are regenerated or converted at Baptism, but that regenerate persons are not safe for ever, some or many of them afterwards falling away from Christ.

(3) She may be understood that conversion entire and secure is the result of Baptism, but only of some Baptism; that is to say, of Baptism “rightly received.”¹

That these several views may each be supposed consistent with acceptance of the Church’s words, is evident from the tone of the disputes on this subject, which presume sometimes one to be her doctrine-sometimes another.

Whichever view be right, it is certain that the Church’s words ought not to bear interpretation into all or any. Examine, therefore, these several creeds. If you can hold none of them, you can be no member of the Church of England (though I do not see why that should be a reason for your contradicting her, or shortening her powers). But if you can conscientiously hold any one of them, express that one clearly both to yourself and others, and be ready to give your support in case of need, distinctly and calmly to that particular view, considering at the same time how far you may esteem those as fellow Churchmen or fellow Christians, who hold in sincerity some other of the above Creeds, and how far it would be right to break with them in order to formally establish your own.

§ 9. And in first approaching the subject take care of two things. Do not confuse the question “What Baptism is and conveys?” with the question

Titus iii. 5: “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost.” See below, § 15, p. 581.]

¹ [Article xxvii.: “Baptism is not only a sign of profession, and mark of difference, whereby Christian men are discerned from others that be not christened, but it is also as a sign of Regeneration or new Birth, whereby, as by an instrument, they that receive Baptism rightly are grafted into the Church,” etc.]

XII. 2O

[Version 0.04: March 2008]