and pious father opposed them, and gave it as his opinion, that in extraordinary cases, as, for example, when the parents were dead; when they were not professing Christians; when they cruelly forsook and exposed their offspring; and when masters had young slaves committed to their charge, in these cases, (and the pious Father mentions no others,) he maintains that any professing Christians, who should be willing to undertake the benevolent charge, might with propriety, take these children, offer them in baptism, and become responsible for their Christian education. This, every one will perceive, is in strict conformity with the principles maintained in the foregoing essay, and with the doctrine and habits of the Presbyterian church.

The learned Bingham, an Episcopal divine of great learning, seems to have taken unwearied pains, in his "Ecclesiastical Antiquities," to collect every scrap of testimony within his reach, in favour of the early origin of sponsors. But he utterly fails of producing even plausible evidence to that amount; and at length candidly acknowledges that in the early ages, parents were, in all ordinary cases, the presentors and sureties for their own children; and that children were presented by others only in extraordinary cases, such as those already alluded to. It is true, indeed, that some writers, more sanguine than discriminating, have quoted Dionysius, Tertullian, and Cyril of Alexandria, as affording countenance to the use of sponsors in early times. Not one of those writers, however, has written a sentence which favours the use of any other sponsors than parents, when they were in life, and of a proper character to offer their children for the sacramental sealin question. Even Dionysius, whose language has, at first view, some appearance of favouring such sponsors; yet, when carefully examined, will be found to speak only of sponsors who undertook to train up in the Christian religion some of the children of Pagans, who were delivered, for this purpose, into the hands of these benevolent sureties, by their unbelieving parents. this, surely, is not inconsistent with what has been said. And, after all, the writings of this very Dionysius are given up by the learned Wall, and by the still more learned and illustrious Archbishop Usher, as a "gross and impudent forgery," unworthy of the least credit.

But

It was not until the council of Mentz, in the ninth century, that the church of Rome forbade the appearance of parents as sponsors for their own children, and required that this service be surrendered to other hands.

Mention is made, by Cyril, in the fifth century, and by Fulgentius in the sixth, of sponsors in some peculiar cases of adult baptism. When adults, about to be baptized, were dumb, or under the power of delirium, through disease, and of course unable to speak for themselves, or to make the usual profession; in such cases it was customary for some friend or friends to answer for them, and to bear testimony to their good character, and to the fact of their having before expressed a desire to be baptized. For this, there was, un doubtedly, some reason; and the same thing might, with propriety, in conceivable circumstances be done now. From this, however, there was a transition soon made to the use of sponsors in all cases of adult baptism. This latter, however, was upon a different principle from the former. When adults had the gifts of speech and reason, and were able to answer for themselves, the sponsors provided for such, never answered or professed for them. This was invariably done by the adult himself. Their only business, as it would appear, was to be a kind of curators or guardians of the spiritual life of the persons baptized. This office was generally fulfilled, in each church, by the deacons when adult males were baptized; and by the deaconesses when females came forward to receive this ordinance.

Among the pious Waldenses and Albigenses, in the middle ages, no other sponsors than parents seem to have been in common use. In one of their catechisms, as preserved by Perrin, and Morland, they ask, "By whom ought children to be presented in baptism?" Answer, "By their parents, or by any others who may be inspired with this charity;" which is evidently intended to mean, as other documents respecting them show, that where the parents were dead, or absent, or could not act, other pious professors of religion might take their places.

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According to one of the canons of the church of England, parents are not to be urged to be present when their children are baptized, nor to be permitted to stand as sponsors for their own children." In the Protestant Episcopal church in this country, parents "shall be admitted as sponsors if it be desired." But in both countries it is required that there be godfathers and godmothers for all adults, as well as for infants

The baptismal service of the Methodist church in the United States, for infants, does not recognise the use of any sponsors at all, excepting the parents, or whatever other "friends" may present them.

It is plain then, that the early history of the church, as

well as the word of God, abundantly sustains the doctrine and practice of the Presbyterian church in this matter. We maintain, that as the right of the children of believers to baptism, flows from the membership and faith of their parents according to the flesh; so those parents, if living, are the only proper persons to present them for the reception of this covenant seal. If, however, their proper parents, on any account, cannot do this, they may, upon our principles, with propriety, be presented by any professed believers, who, quoad hoc, adopt them as their children, and are willing to engage, as parents, to "bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."

If, indeed, nothing else were contended for in this case, than that, when believing parents have pious and peculiar friends who are willing to unite with them in engagements to educate their children in the true religion, such friends might be permitted to stand with them; there might not be so much to condemn. Even then the solemn question might be asked; "Who hath required this at your hands?" But when the system is, to set aside parents; to require that others take their places, and make engagements which they alone, for the most part, are qualified to make; and when, in pursuance of this system, thousands are daily making engagements which they never think of fulfilling, and in most cases, notoriously have it not in their power to fulfil, and, indeed, feel no special obligation to fulfil; we are constrained to regard it as a human invention, having no warrant whatever, either, from the word of God or primitive usage; and as adapted, on a variety of accounts, to generate evil, much evil, rather than good.

(NOTE D.)

CONFIRMATION.

In the apostolic church, there was no such rite as that which under this name has been long established in the Romish communion as a sacrament, and adopted in some Protestant churches as a solemnity, in their view, if not commanded, yet as both expressive and edifying. It is not intended in this note to record a sentence condemnatory of those who think proper to employ the rite in question : but only to state with brevity some of the reasons why the

fathers of the Presbyterian Church, thought proper to exclude it from their ritual; and why their sons, to the present hour, have persisted in the same course.

1. We find no foundation for this rite in the word of God. Indeed our Episcopal brethren, and other Protestants who employ it, do not pretend to find any direct warrant for it in Scripture. All they have to allege, which bears the least resemblance to any such practice, is the statement recorded in Acts viii. 14-17: "Now when the apostles, which were at Jerusalem, heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John, who when they were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost. (For as yet he had fallen upon none of them; only they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus). Then laid they their hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost." That there is here a reference to the extruordinary or miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost, and these conferred by extraordinary officers, is so perfectly apparent, that it is no wonder the advocates of Confirmation do not press it as proof of their point. The only wonder is, that they ever mention it as affording the most remote countenance to their practice. The diligent reader of Scripture will find four kinds, or occasions of laying on hands recounted in the New Testament. The first, by Christ himself, to express an authoritative benediction, Matt. xix. Mark x. 16; the second, in the healing of diseases, Mark xvi. 18, Acts xxviii, 8; the third, in conferring the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, Acts viii. 17, xix. 6; and the fourth, in setting apart persons to sacred office, Acts vi. 6. xiii. 3. 1 Tim. iv. 14, The venerable Dr. Owen, in his commentary on Heb. vi. 2, expresses the opinion, that the laying on of hands there spoken of, is to be considered as belonging to the third class of cases, and, of course, as referring to the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Spirit. Others have supposed that it rather belongs to the fourth example above enumerated, and therefore applies to the ordination of ministers. But there is not a syllable or hint in the whole New Testament which looks like such a laying on of hands as that for which the advocates of Confirmation contend.

2. Quite as little support for Confirmation can be found in the purest and best periods of uninspired antiquity. Towards the close of the second century, several uncommanded and superstitious additions had been made to the ordinance of baptism. Among these were anointing with oil, in avowed imitation of the Jewish manner of consecration; administer›

ing to the baptized individual a mixture of milk and honey as the symbol of his childhood in a new life, and as a pledge of that heavenly Canaan, with all its advantages and happiness, to which the hopes of the baptized were directed; the laying on of the hands of the minister officiating in baptism, for imparting the Holy Spirit; to all which may be added, that immediately after the close of this century, we find the practice of exorcism introduced as a preliminary to baptism, and as a means of expelling all evil spirits from the candidate for this ordinance. These superstitious additions were made to succeed each other in the following order; exorcism, confession; renunciation; baptism; chrismation, or anointing with oil, which was done in the form of a cross; and finally, the laying on of hands, or confirmation, which immediately followed the anointing with oil, and the administration of the simple element above mentioned. "As soon as we are baptized," says Tertullian, "we are anointed with the blessed unction." And he adds, "This unction is according to the Jewish dispensation, wherein the high priest was anointed with oil out of a horn." The laying on of hands, or confirmation, immediately followed the unction. "As soon as we come from the baptismal laver," says Tertullian, "We are anointed, and then hands are imposed." This was considered as essential to the completion of the ordinance. "We do not receive the Holy Ghost," says the same father, "in baptism, but being purified by the water, we are prepared for the Holy Ghost, and by the laying on of hands, the soul is illuminated by the Spirit." The exorcism, then, the anointing with oil, the sign of the cross, the imposition of hands for conveying the Holy Spirit, and the administration of milk and honey to the candidate, were all human additions to baptism, which came in about the same time, and ought, in our opinion, to be regarded very much in the same light with a great variety of other additions to the institutions of Christ, which, though well meant, and not destitute of expressiveness, are yet wholly unauthorized by the King and Head of the Church.

"As

3. When the practice of the laying on of hands, as an ordinary part of the baptismal service, was added, by human invention, to that ordinance, it always immediately followed the application of water, and the anointing with oil. soon as we come from the baptismal laver," says Tertullian "we are anointed, and then hands are laid on." And it is further acknowledged by all, that every one who was competent to baptize, was equally competent to lay on hands.