of the word as a foreshowing dimly to the antediluvians of Christian baptism or its meaning, is a principle utterly without support.

It is however right to say that there is another reading which, since the MSS. of the New Testament have been more carefully collated than they had been when our excellent version was made, has been generally preferred by the most learned and judicious scholars and which gives this rendering, "which," referring to water, "which also saves us,-baptism which is the antitypewhich corresponds to, or is figuratively represented by, the water of the deluge." It is as if the apostle had said, "water saved the family of Noah and, it may be said, water also saves us;—I refer to baptism which IN THIS RESPECT resembles the waters of the deluge, both being connected by divine appointment with salvation or deliverance."

How the water of the deluge was connected with the salvation of Noah's family we have already seen; how baptism is connected with our salvation we are now to inquire. The apostle has answered the question both negatively and positively, but before entering on the consideration of his answer, it deserves remark that the very comparison shows that baptism has but an indirect influence on our salvation, an influence which is emblematized not by the ark, but by the water which in itself was rather fitted to destroy than to save.

Let us now hear the apostle. He first tells us how baptism does not save. It does not save as it is a "putting away of the filth of the flesh." That is the physical effect of the application of water to the body. It removes whatever soils the body and thus produces cleanliness. This is all that it can do as an external application. It does not, it cannot save us. The idea that the external rite of baptism can save, can communicate spiritual life, can justify and regenerate is equally absurd, unscriptural and mischievous. Moral effects must have moral causes. It has been justly said, "even the life of a plant or an animal, far more the life of thought, taste, affection and conscience, cannot be produced by the use of mere lifeless matter. He who should assert this would be considered as little better than a madman, but is not the statement still more irrational and unintelligible, that the life of the soul, by which it is united to God and secured of salvation, is produced by sprinkling or pouring water on an individual or by immersing him in it." A man must be "given up to strong delusion before he can believe a lie" like this.

The positive part of the apostle's answer is however the most

1847.1

Consistency of Various Statements.

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important part of it. Baptism saves us as it is "the answer of a good conscience towards God by the resurrection of Jesus Christ." Before entering on the exposition of this statement, which is encumbered with some verbal difficulties, it will, I am persuaded, serve a good purpose, to state in the fewest words, to whom and to what salvation is attributed in the New Testament. God is said to save us. "All things" in the new creation "are of him." He is the Saviour of all men especially of them who believe." We are said to be saved by " grace," by God's grace. Christ is said to save us. "All things" in the new creation "are by him." One of his most common names is "our Saviour" The blood of Christ is said to save us. "Redemption" is "through his blood." The resurrection of Christ is said to save us. We are saved by his life." The Holy Spirit is said to save us. "We are saved by the renewing of the Holy Ghost." The gospel is said to save men. The words which Peter was to speak to Cornelius were words which were to " save him and his family." We are said to be saved by faith. "By grace are ye saved through faith." "Thy faith," said our Lord on numerous occasions, "hath saved thee." "He that believeth shall be saved." Men are said to be saved by confession of the truth in connection with faith. "With the heart man believeth unto righteousness," i. e. justification, "and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." Men are said to be saved by baptism in connection with faith. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved," and here "baptism saves us."

These statements are all perfectly consistent with each other, and he alone understands how sinful men are saved who sees the meaning and apprehends the consistency of these statements. Here they are in one sentence,-God in the exercise of sovereign grace saves men through the mediation of his Son who died as an atoning victim, and rose again to the possession of all power in heaven and in earth, that he might save all coming to the Father by him, who being led by the operation of the Holy Ghost to believe the gospel of salvation become personally interested in the blessings procured through the mediation of the Son; and wherever men are made really to believe the gospel, they, as the natural result of that faith and in obedience to the divine command, make a profession of that faith, the commencement of which profession is, in the case of those who in mature life are brought from a false religion to the knowledge and belief of the gospel, baptism or the "being washed with pure water."

If this statement is understood there is little difficulty in answering the question, "how does baptism save?" It is an emblematical representation of what saves us, viz. the expiating, justifying blood of Christ, and the regenerating, sanctifying influence of the Spirit, and a corresponding confession of the truth thus represented. Let us look at the apostle's answer and see if it is not substantially the same as that to which we have been led. I have stated that there are verbal difficulties. The principal of these are two, the first referring to the meaning of the word rendered "answer," and the other referring to the connection of the concluding clause "by the resurrection of Jesus Christ." The word rendered" answer" occurs nowhere else either in the New Testament or in the Greek translation of the Old Testament. From its etymology and its use in classic writers we should say its meaning is "question" not "answer." Many interpreters suppose that there is a reference to an ancient custom of making the baptismal profession in reply to questions put by the administrator, but we have no evidence that this practice existed in the apostles' time, and supposing that it did, the fact would not account for a word meaning “question" being used to signify “answer.” Others have rendered the word "inquiry,” “application to," the application of a good conscience to God for salvation, the sincerely seeking salvation from God. I am persuaded that the word is here employed as equivalent to expression, confession or declaration. Some interpreters connect the concluding clause with the word "save," thus "baptism saves us through the resurrection of Jesus Christ;" others with the phrase "a good conscience towards God" others with the whole expression, “answer of a good conscience towards God." The second of these seems the most natural mode of connection. What the apostle's words bring before the mind is this: A man has a good conscience, he has obtained this good conscience by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, he makes a declaration of this good conscience in his baptism, and it is in this way, the apostle declares, that baptism saves.

"A good conscience" is a right and happy state of thought and feeling in reference to our relations and duties to God,-confidence in God, love to God. This is obtained by a man's conscience being sprinkled with the atoning blood of Jesus, or in other words, by his experiencing the power of Christ's atoning blood to pacify the conscience and purify the heart through the faith of the truth respecting it,-by his being transformed through

· ἐπερώτημα.

1847.] General Analogy between the Deluge and Baptism.

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"the renewing of the mind" produced by the "Holy Ghost shed forth abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour."

This good conscience is said to be "by the resurrection of Jesus Christ." The resurrection of Christ is the grand proof of the divinity of his mission, the truth of his doctrine, and especially of the efficacy of his atoning sacrifice. It is truth regarding these, apprehended in its meaning and evidence under the influence of the Holy Spirit which produces the good conscience towards God. "I trust in God, seeing he has brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus; I love him who gave his Son for my offences and who raised him again for my justification."

Of this good conscience, of a mind at peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, and a heart with the love of God shed abroad in it, the converted Jew or Pagan made a profession when in obedience to the command of Christ he submitted to baptism. Thus confessing by an external act what he believed in his heart that God had raised Christ from the dead, he was saved. In this way, in this way alone can it be said that "baptism saves us.”

Much ingenuity has been discovered in attempting to trace the analogy between the waters of the deluge saving Noah's family, and the water of baptism saving those who in it make an enlightened profession of a "good conscience towards God through the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ." I apprehend we are not to seek anything more than that general analogy which we have already illustrated. The following illustration is at any rate ingenious and the sentiment it conveys indubitably true and fearfully important. "The flood of waters displayed the divine indignation, and executed the threatened vengeance against the wickedness of an ungodly world while they yet bore up in safety the eight persons enclosed in the ark, so the blood of Christ shed for sin emblematically represented in baptism, while it has effected the eternal redemption and salvation of all in Him, 'the remnant according to the election of grace,' is at the same time the most dreadful manifestation of the righteous judgment of God, as well as the surest pledge of its execution against the world which lieth under the wicked one."

Though I do not think we have been able to clear the difficult passage we have been considering of all its obscurity, I think we have succeeded to a considerable extent, and I am sure we have made it plain enough, that what Paul says of all Scripture given by divine inspiration is true of this. "It is profitable for doctrine,

1 John Walker.

for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness." I shall notice only one very important practical conclusion to which it very directly leads us,-the folly and danger of trusting in the mere external rite of baptism or in anything that is external. Happily we are not taught the soul-deluding doctrine of the efficacy of the sacraments, as they are called, and of baptismal regeneration as a part of the general dogma. On the contrary we are taught that "the sacraments become effectual means of salvation not from any virtue in those, or in them who administer them, but only by the blessing of Christ and the working of his Spirit in them that by faith receive them," and that no baptism saves but that which is connected with "engrafting into Christ, and partaking of the benefits of the covenant of grace," and that it is an "engagement to be the Lord's."

But though we are thus taught, and I believe few of us would call these principles in question, yet there is a natural tendency in the human mind to rest in what is external. Let us beware then of supposing that we are safe because we have been baptized, whether in infancy or on our personal profession of faith. The apostle Paul's declaration respecting circumcision and Judaism is equally true of baptism and Christianity. He is not a true Christian who is one outwardly, neither is that saving baptism which consists merely in the application of water to the body. He is a Christian who is one inwardly, who has a good conscience towards God, and saving baptism is the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost.' Let all remember, that if they would be saved, if they would "enter in the kingdom of God," they "must be born again," "born not of water only but of the Spirit;" and let all who have profession of a good conscience remember that where there is a good conscience there will be a good conversation, and that if a "man is in Christ a new creature" he will "put off the old man who is corrupt in his deeds, and put on the new man who after Christ Jesus is renewed in knowledge and in true holiness." Professing to be saved from the fiery deluge which is coming on the unbelieving, disobedient world, by the blood of Christ represented in baptism, he will show that he is delivered from that world's power; redeemed by the same "precious blood" from the "vain conversation" received by tradition from his fathers, and freed from spiritual captivity, he will walk at liberty; brought into a new world, " all old things will pass away," and "all things will become new."

Westminster Shorter Catechism.