tism of Christ, he says, "Let us contemplate the image of our own regeneration, which is shadowed out in those waters; and he seems to have considered the baptism, by which we are admitted into the Church, to be compounded of the three particulars mentioned in the Gospel-water, the Holy Ghost, and fire; the office of the water being to wash away the corruption of sin; of the Holy Ghost, to make us spiritual instead of earthly; of fire, spiritual fire, to burn up the briars of wickedness.1 All these effects, therefore, though distributed to their several agents, were combined in baptism as a whole. Neither was Gregory insensible to the importance of the Deluge, as a type of baptism and regeneration; for he observes, that "the Father, by sending the Holy Ghost in the form of a Dove, pointed out the new Noah-Noah, the author of a new world, and a good pilot of nature in peril of shipwreck.' Whatever may be the inaccuracy of the similitude, which I am not at all bound to defend, it is plain that the regeneration of nature by the Deluge was transferred in this author's imagination to the regeneration of Christians by baptism.

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6. Methodius fills up the remainder of this century. He maintains, by a somewhat whimsical line of argument, the undoubted truth, that every one who is born again becomes a member of Christ. Upon the principle that the second creation must correspond to the first, he contends that as Eve was

1 Greg. Sermo de Christi Baptismo. Bib. Pat. tom. iii. p. 315. 2 Ibid.

taken out of the side of the first Adam, so the Church, being the spouse of the second Adam, must be taken out of the side of Christ; for "the Church," says he, "cannot as a mother conceive believers, and regenerate them by the laver of regeneration, unless Christ adhering to his spouse had allowed them to be formed out of his side; for the rib is his Spirit, by partaking of which they are regenerated to incorruption." In perfect conformity with the same rule of belief he holds that St. Paul was renewed through baptism; which in that case must mean regeneration; for though a man may be and must be renewed frequently after baptism, yet renovation through baptism must mean something more than an outward sign, or a seal of foregone blessings.

1 Method. Convivium Virginum. Orat. iii. Bib. Pat. tom. iii. p. 682.

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CHAP. XXIX.

TESTIMONIES FROM THE FOURTH CENTURY, AND

CONCLUSION.

In the fourth century, the number of writers increases so much, together with their distance from the Apostolic age, that short extracts from the works of each will suffice, except that at the close of that period, the opinions of the two Fathers, who have exercised the greatest influence upon the Christian Church, Jerome and Augustine, will require a more attentive consideration. 1. Then Lactantius wrote under the Emperor Diocletian about the year 303. His works are more philosophical than theological; but in discussing the nature of man, he observes, that "he is born mortal, but afterwards becomes immortal; which happens, when any one being purified by the heavenly washing, puts off his infancy with every stain of his preceding life, and by receiving increase of divine strength becomes a full and perfect man." The two states of life, through which every Christian passes, are here distinctly marked-the one into which he is born, polluted, and under sentence of death; the other into which he is born again, by the washing of regeneration, purified and admitted into the hope of immortality.

2. Eusebius, the historian, was bishop of Casarea, twelve years afterwards. He, after reciting the

1 Lactant. Instit. Divin. lib. vii. c. 5.

command to baptize all nations in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, adds, "This gracious gift of the knowledge of the Holy Trinity, Jesus alone has granted us by that mystical regeneration." And in another place, he speaks again of the mystical regeneration of saving faith, which takes place in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. The sense, therefore, in which he understood that term, is still the same.

And since he maintains that the sins of the earth were washed away by the Deluge, it is at least probable, that he also believed it to be a type of Christian baptism.

3. Athanasius, who was elected to fill the see of Alexandria in 326, having introduced the form of baptism in one of his Orations, immediately subjoins, "Thus we, who are one part of the creation, being perfected, are made the children of God":" and in another passage he urges the same thing as an admitted fact, that in baptism we are made complete Christians." Since, therefore, adoption into the family of God implies reconciliation and grace, and we cannot become his children and complete Christians, without being born again of the Spirit, we need look no further for a proof of his concurrence in the opinion here maintained; neither would he have urged the point so confidently in favour of his argument, in a controversy with not very scrupulous opponents, unless he had

1 Euseb. contra Marcellum, lib. i. c. 1. 2 Ibid. ad finem.

3 Opuscula, lib. vii. 4 Athanas. Orat. contra Arianos, tom. i. p. 341. 5 Athanas. Dial. i. contra Macedonium, tom. ii. p. 265.

known perfectly well, that it was a doctrine universally received.

4. Before the middle of this century, Cyril exercised the office of a Catechist in the Church of Jerusalem, to the bishopric of which he succeeded in the year 350. He taught that the love of Christ would be lighted up in those who were baptized by the washing of regeneration.' But since he was addressing himself to Catechumens of riper years, we must inquire whether he intended to confine his views to them alone; and if we shall find that he explains them in language which will also include infants, that evasion will be fruitless. "Look not to this washing," says he, "as if it consisted of mere water, but look to the spiritual grace, which is given with the water; for as the offerings upon heathen altars, though harmless in themselves, became polluted by the invocation of idols, so, by the invocation of the Trinity, mere water acquires a power of sanctification."" In his opinion, therefore, the form of baptism implies a prayer; and to the efficacy of that prayer in conformity with the will of God, the sacramental grace is ascribed: the opinion may be right or wrong; but that he considered himself pronouncing the voice of the Church, in which he officiated, when he annexed a spiritual grace to the act of baptism, is a fact beyond dispute.

Neither can it be objected that his doctrine is contrary to reason and experience, because plenary sanctification does not always, or perhaps, 1 Cyril. Catech. xviii. 300.

2 Ibid. iii. 40.