Opening…

THE FIRST NIGHT’S STUDY

The book of testimony.

The question stated.

Meaning of the word baptize as settled by Christ himself.

Value of Lexicons.

A mother’s arguments.

The daughter’s answer.

First Night’s Study.

“Now, Miss Theodosia,” said he, “let us begin by examining the witnesses. When we have collected all the testimony, we shall be able to sum up on the case, and you shall bring in the verdict.”

“That is right,” said she, with a smile the first that had illumined her face since she stood by the water. “‘To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.’ Here (may it please the court) is the record,” handing him a well-worn copy of the New Testament.

“Well, how are we to get at the point about which we are at issue? It is agreed, I believe, that Jesus Christ commanded his disciples in all ages, to be baptized.”

“Yes, sir, I so understand it.”

“Then it would seem that our question is a very simple one. It is, whether you and I, and others who, like us, have been sprinkled in their infancy, have ever been baptized? In other words, Is the sprinkling of infants, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the baptism which is required in this book?”

“That is the question,” she replied. “I merely want to know if I was ever baptized. I was sprinkled in the church. That lady, to-day, was immersed into the river. If she was baptized, I was not. That is the point. There is but one baptism. Which is it? the sprinkling or the dipping?”

“Oh, if that is all, we can soon settle the question. Sprinkling and pouring and dipping are all baptism. Baptism is the application of water as a religious ordinance. It don’t matter as to the mode of application. It may be done one way or another, so that it is done with the right design. I see from what your difficulty has arisen. You have misapprehended the nature of the word baptize. You have considered it a specific, rather than a generic term.”

“I don’t know, Mr. Percy, whether I quite comprehend you. My difficulty arose from a conviction that the baptism, which we witnessed to-day, was just such a one as is described in the Scriptures, where they went down into the water and came up out of the water—whereas my baptism had nothing about it that at all resembled the scriptural pattern. Please don’t try to mystify the subject but let us see which was the real baptism.”

“I did not design to mystify the subject, but to bring it into a clearer light. The meaning expressed by some words, is rather a result than an act. If I say to my servant, go down to the office, he may run there, or walk there, or ride there, and he obeys me, equally, whichever he does—so that he gets there, it is all I require of him. Go, then, is a generic or general word, including a possible variety of acts. If I say to him, run down to the office, he does not obey unless he goes in this specified manner. So we call run a specific term. That is very plain, is it not?”

“Certainly, Mr. Percy; I comprehend that.”

“Well, then, I say that baptize is a generic term. Jesus Christ said, baptize all nations. He does not say whether you shall do it by sprinkling, or pouring, or dipping; so that you attain the end proposed, you may do it as you please. If he had said, sprinkle all nations; that is specific, and his ministers must have sprinkled. If he had said pour upon them with water, that is a specific act, and they must all have poured. If he had said, dip them in water, then they must all have dipped. The word would have required it. But he used the general term baptize, which signifies any application of water as a religious ordinance, and of course it does not matter as to the mode. You may take your choice.”

“But I should, even in that case,” said she, “feel inclined to choose the same mode that HE did, and which the early disciples did. There must have been some reason for his preference. But how do you determine that the word baptize is a generic term, as you call it—having three or four different meanings?”

“Simply by reference to the dictionary. Look at Webster. He is good authority; is he not. He defines baptism to be the application of water as a religious ordinance. What more do you want?”

“But, Mr. Percy,” said Edwin, who had been a silent, but very attentive listener, “the Baptist preacher told Mr. Anxious, the other day, that baptize and baptism were not English words at all, but the Greek words baptizo and baptismos, transferred into the English Bible and not translated. He said that King James would not permit the translators to translate all the words, for fear of disturbing the faith and practice of the church of England, and so they just kept the Greek word—but if they had translated it at all, it must have read dip or immerse instead of baptize.”

“Very well, Edwin, but it is not likely that the Baptist preacher is much wiser than Presbyterian preachers, or Methodist preachers, or Episcopal preachers. If dip had been the necessary, or even the common meaning of the word, it is very improbable that it would have remained for this unlearned and obscure sect to have discovered it. Such statements may do very well to delude their simple followers, but they cannot be expected to impose upon the educated world.”

“But, Mr. Percy, I have looked up the words in my Greek Lexicon, and I find it is just as he said—Baptizo does mean to immerse. Baptismos does mean immersion.

“Oh, as to that, I suppose you got hold of a Baptist Lexicon.”

“Well, here it is; Donegon’s Greek Lexicon You can look for yourself.”

Mr. Percy (who, if he was not a thorough Greek scholar, yet knew enough of the language to read it readily,) glanced at the word where Edwin had marked it, and ran his eye along the cognate words.

“Baptizo—To immerse repeatedly into a liquid, to submerge, to soak thoroughly, to saturate.

“Baptisis or Baptismos, immersion; Baptisma, an object immersed; Baptistes, one who immerses; Baptos, immersed, dyed Bapto to dip, to plunge into water, etc.”

He was astonished. The thought had never occurred to him before, that baptize was not an English, but a Greek word; and that he should look in the Greek Lexicon, rather than Webster’s Dictionary, to ascertain its real meaning, as it occurred in the New Testament. He turned to the title page and preface for some evidence that this was a Baptist Lexicon, but learned that it was published under the supervision of some of the Faculty of the Presbyterian Theological Seminary at Princeton, N. J.; the very headquarters of orthodox Presbyterianism.

Here was a new phase of the subject. He could only promise to look into this point more particularly the next day; when, he said, he would procure several different Lexicons, by different authors, and compare them with each other.

“In the meantime,” said Theodosia, “there is an idea that strikes my mind very forcibly; and that is, that the Saviour himself has fixed, by his own act, the meaning of the word as he employed it.”

“How so, Miss Theodosia?”

“Just in this way; suppose we admit that it had a dozen meanings before he used it, and that in other books it has a dozen meanings still, yet it is certain that he was baptized. Now, in HIS BAPTISM a certain act was performed. It may have been sprinkling, pouring, or dipping; but whatever it was, that act was what HE meant by baptism. That act was what HE commanded. His disciples must so have understood it. He gave (if I may speak so) a Divine sanction to that meaning. And when the word was afterward used in reference to his ordinance, it could never have any other. If he was immersed, then the question is decided; baptism is immersion. If he was sprinkled, baptism is sprinkling. If he was poured upon, baptism is pouring. So we need not trouble ourselves about the Lexicons, but can get all our information from the Testament itself.”

“There is a great deal of force in that suggestion, Miss Theodosia. It is a pity you could not be a lawyer. (And he thought what a partner for a lawyer she would be, and how happy it was for him that he had been able to persuade her to promise to become Mrs. Percy.) But while it is true that we may find all the testimony that we need within the record, yet it is important that we get at the real meaning of the record. And as that was written in Greek, I see no reason why we should not seek in the Greek for its true sense. If baptizo means to dip, and baptismos means a dipping, an immersion, we shall be obliged to rest our cause upon some other ground. There must, however, be some mistake about this. I will look into it to-morrow.”

“I do not care what the Lexicons say,” rejoined Theodosia, “I want to get my instructions entirely out of the word of God. I don’t wish to go out of the ‘record,’ as you lawyers say.”

“You are right in that; but how are we to learn the meaning of the record? If any document is brought into court, it is a rule of law, founded on common sense, that the words which it contains are to be understood in their most common, every-day sense, according to the usage of the language in which they are written. Now this document, the New Testament, it seems, was written in Greek, and we are in doubt about the meaning of one of the words. We go to the Lexicon, not for any testimony as to the facts of the case, but only to learn the meaning of a very important word used by the witnesses. Matthew and several other witnesses depose that Jesus and others were baptized. If they were present in court, we would ask them what they mean by that word, baptize. We would require them to describe, in other language, the act which was performed—to tell us whether it was a sprinkling, a pouring, or a dipping. But as we cannot bring them personally into court, we must ascertain what they meant in the best way we can; and that is by a careful examination of the words which they used, and the meaning that would have been attached to them at the time they used them, by the people to whom they were addressed. Now as the documents were written in Greek, of course they used words in the common Greek sense. And we must ascertain their meaning just as we would any other Greek word in any other Greek author; and that is by reference to the lexicons or dictionaries of the Greek language.”

“Very well, Mr. Percy; you talk like a judge. But what if you find all the lexicons agree with this? What if they all say that the word means dip, plunge, immerse?”’

“Why then, we must either admit that those who are said to have been baptized, were plunged, dipped, immersed, or deny the correctness of the Lexicons.”

“But if you deny the correctness of the Lexicons in regard to this word, what confidence can we have in them in regard to other words? Brother Edwin is studying Greek, and as often as he comes to a word which he has not met with before, he finds it in the Lexicon, and so learns its meaning; but if the Lexicons are wrong in this word, they may be wrong in all. Is there no appeal from the authority of the Lexicons?”

“Certainly, we may do in Greek as we do every day in English studies; we appeal from Johnson to Webster, and from Webster to Walker, and from Walker to Worcester. If one does not suit us we may go to another.”

“One more question. Are any of these Lexicons Baptist books, made for the purpose of teaching Baptist sentiments? If so, you know they might be doubtful testimony.”

“On the contrary, the Lexicons are made by classical scholars, for the sole purpose of aiding students in the acquisition of the Greek language. I do not suppose any one of them was made with any reference to theological questions, and probably no one of them by a person connected with the Baptist denomination. It is certain most of them were not, and if they all agree in regard to this word, it must be conceded that they did not give it a meaning to suit their personal theological views. There are a number of them in the College library, and I will examine them all to-morrow, and tell you the result.”

Mr. Percy went back to his office studying the new phase of the question presented in the meaning of the word. “If baptizo in the Greek means to dip, in its primary, common, every-day use, then Jesus Christ was dipped. Then every time the record says a person was baptized, it expressly says he was dipped. I wonder if it can possibly be so. If so, why have our wise and talented preachers never discovered it? or, knowing it, can it be possible that they have systematically concealed it?”

Theodosia retired to her chamber, where she spent a few moments in prayer to God for the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and then took her Testament and read how they were baptized of John in the river of Jordan. How Jesus, after he was baptized, came up out of the water. How they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him, and when they were come up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord caught away Philip. She compared these statements with what she had seen at the river, and did not need any testimony from the Lexicons to satisfy her that John’s baptism and Philip’s baptism was immersion. Why else did they go into the water? Why else was it done in the river? Ministers don’t go into the river to sprinkle their subjects now-a-days. There was no reason for doing it then. Must I then unite with this obscure sect and be immersed? Must I break away from the communion that I love so dearly—from all my friends and relatives? Must I part from my dear old pastor, who was, under God, the means of my conversion—who has so often counselled me, prayed with me and for me, wept over me, and cherished me as though I had been his own child? The very thought was terrible. She threw herself on her bed and wept aloud. Her crying brought her mother to her side. She kneeled beside the bed, took the poor girl’s hand in both of hers, and bade her try to banish this distressing subject from her thoughts. It was not worth while, she said, for a young girl like her to set up her own opinions, or even to entertain doubts in opposition to her minister and others who had spent their lives in the study of this very thing. As for herself, if her pastor, Mr. Johnson, said any thing was in the Bible, she always took it for granted it was there. He had more time to look into these things than she had. It was his business to do it; and he was better qualified to do it than any of his people. And of course, if sprinkling was not true baptism, he would never have practiced it.

“But, mother,” sobbed the weeping girl, “I must answer to God, and not to pastor Johnson. Much as I love him, I trust I love my Saviour better; and if my pastor says one thing, and Jesus Christ another, Mr. Johnson himself has often told us to obey God rather than man. I have no choice; I must obey my Saviour.”

“Of course you must, my child; but Mr. Johnson knows better what the Saviour commands than you do. He understands all about these questions. And he will assure you that you have been properly baptized. I know that he agrees exactly with Dr. Fisher, who baptized you, as you yourself well remember.”

“I remember that he sprinkled a little water in my face, mother; but if that was baptism which I witnessed to-day, he certainly did not baptize me.”

“Well, my dear, try and compose yourself, and go to sleep; and I will send for our pastor to come and see you to-morrow. It will soon satisfy your mind.”

“I hope he may; and I will try to sleep. Good-night, mother.”

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

THE SECOND NIGHT’S STUDY

In which Theodosia is assisted by Mr. Percy, the pastor, and the schoolmaster.

Presbyterian Authorities: Mr. Barnes; or, explaining scripture by scripture.

Theodosia’s opinion of theological writers.

More authorities: Dr. McKnight, Dr. Chalmers, John Calvin, Prof. Stewart, John Wesley, &c.

Second Night’s Study.

Punctual to his promise, Mr. Percy came in soon after supper on the next evening, and found the Rev. Mr. Johnson, the pastor of the church, already there. He had called early to take a social cup of tea, having learned that Theodosia was “like to go crazy about these new-fangled Baptist notions.”

He did not think she looked much like a maniac, however, though there was a deep saddened seriousness about her face. Nor did she act like a maniac, for never before had she seemed so respectfully affectionate to him and to her mother.

He had not said a word upon the subject of dispute, and seemed reluctant to approach it; but when Mr. Percy came in, it could no longer be postponed.

“I am very glad to meet you here, Mr. Johnson,” said the young man. “Miss Theodosia and I had quite a discussion yesterday evening on the subject of baptism. She has taken a fancy that she has never been baptized; and I believe that I nearly exhausted my logic in trying to convince her that she had. I hope your arguments will be more effectual than mine.”

“Really, my children, I don’t know,” said the old man, “what I may be able to do; I have never studied these controversies much; I think it is better to live in peace and let every one enjoy his own conscientious opinion. These discussions are apt to run into disputes and quarrels, and often occasion a great deal of ill feeling. I have known them to divide churches, and even families. It is better to avoid them.”

“But what are we to do with such lovely heretics as this?” said the young man, with a smile and a sly glance toward her mother. “She must be satisfied that she has been baptized, or you will have her running to the school-house next Sunday to hear that uneducated Baptist preacher, and ten to one, she will ask him to go down into the water and baptize her according to the New Testament model. She says she wants to be baptized as Jesus Christ was, and that was in the river, you know.”

“Oh, as to that,” rejoined the pastor, “there is no evidence that Jesus Christ was immersed in the river at all. It has been satisfactorily proved that he was sprinkled or poured upon; and it is very certain that sprinkling was practiced by the apostles and early Christians.”

“Oh, I am so glad to hear you say that,” replied the young lady. “You don’t know what a load it has taken off my mind. Do tell me how it is ascertained that Christ did not go into the river, and what evidence there is that he was sprinkled, and it was sprinkling which he commanded. You can’t imagine how anxious I am to know.”

“Well, I don’t know that I can call up all the evidence just at this time, and we would not have time to go over it, if I could; but you may be assured that there is such evidence, and that of the most satisfactory character, or else all the learned and talented theological scholars of the various Pedobaptist churches would not have continued for so many ages, to teach and practice it.”

“Certainly, I have no doubt the evidence exists, since you say so; but can’t you tell me what it is, or show me where to find it? I shall never be able to rest in peace till I am convinced that I have been baptized. And if that which I witnessed at the river yesterday was baptism, I am sure I never was.”

“Oh, don’t be so confident, my daughter. There are more modes of baptism than one. That was, perhaps, one mode (though of that I have some doubt). You were baptized by another mode. That may have been baptism. Yours certainly was.”

“Well, do please prove it to me some way, Mr. Johnson. What you say is something like what Mr. Percy said yesterday. He told me that baptize was a generic term, expressing rather a certain result than any specific act. I think that was the idea, was it not, Mr. Percy?”

“Exactly; and if so, I leave it to Mr. Johnson if the manner of reaching the result is not a matter of indifference.”

“Certainly,” said the pastor; “‘baptism is the application of water as a religious ordinance.’ It does not matter about the quantity of water or the mode of applying it.”

“Yes; that is what mother said yesterday. And we looked in Webster, and found that such was, indeed, the present English use of the word baptize. But brother says baptize is a Greek word slightly modified, and transferred from the Greek Testament to the English. It is the New Testament meaning in the time of Christ, and among the people for whom the Gospels were first written, that we want, not the meaning that it has acquired in the English since its transfer to our language.”

“You see, pastor, she is going to be hard to satisfy. She pleads her cause like a lawyer.”

“No, no, Mr. Percy, I will not be hard to satisfy. I desire, I long, I pray to be satisfied. I can never rest till I am satisfied. I only ask for the evidence. You said yesterday that baptizo was a generic term meaning to sprinkle; to pour, or to dip; but we found it in the Lexicon, and it proved to be a specific term meaning only to dip. Not a word was there about sprinkling or pouring. It was simply and only dipping. To-day, Mr. Johnson tells me about several modes—but they are not modes of dipping. And yet if the Greek word baptismos, baptism, means dipping, then they must, in order to be modes of baptism, be modes of dipping. But, Mr. Percy, you have not yet told us the result of your examination of other Lexicons.”

“We can make nothing out of them. I am sorry to say they all agree substantially with the one you have in the house. If we trust to them we must grant that the word means primarily and ordinarily to dip, to plunge, to immerse. Of this there is no doubt.”

“Then I am more perplexed than ever. You said yesterday that in order to know what the act was which the disciples performed and Christ commanded, we must ascertain the precise meaning of baptize, as they employed it in the Greek language. You have examined all the Lexicons (the highest authorities) and find they all agree in saying it was dip, plunge, immerse. You admitted yesterday that if they should agree in this, the question was settled. If they said baptize meant to dip, and baptismos a dipping or immersion, then every time we read that one was baptized, we must understand that he was immersed. I thought that was a plain, straightforward case. I felt that I could understand it. Well, now you say you have examined carefully the other Lexicons, and they all agree with this. No one says sprinkle, no was says pour—all say dip, and consequently the Gospel says that Jesus was dipped of John in the river of Jordan. But then our pastor says that he has evidence that Jesus did not enter the river at all, and that he was sprinkled, and not dipped. Of course he would not say it, unless it was so, but I really don’t understand how it could be so.”

“I have some curiosity on that point myself,” said Mr. Percy, evidently relived to find he could (for the moment at least), take the other side of the question. “I find myself in a very close place. These Lexicons have killed me. I don’t know what to say. I suppose, of course, there is some way to get around the difficulty; but I must leave it to our pastor to point it out. For my part, I submit the case.”

“Really,” said Mr. Johnson, “the question never presented itself to me in just this light before. You must give me a little time to consider about it. And in the meantime let me beg of you both that you will examine some of the standard writers upon the subject. I do not think you have done this yet. What have you in the house?”

“Not a book upon the subject, except it be the Bible, and I don’t much care to read any other till we have examined that. If sprinkling is there, it ought to be so plainly taught that I can see it for myself. If I can’t find it, I will always doubt if it is there,” rejoined the young lady.

“True, my child,” said the pastor; “but we often fail to see things at first glance, which are very evident when they have once been pointed out, and our attention fixed upon them. This is the advantage of using proper helps to understand the Scriptures. Those not familiar with the language in which they were written, and with the customs and manners of the people to whom they were originally addressed, will derive great assistance from judicious criticisms. I like, myself, always to read a commentary on every chapter that I attempt to understand.”

“Oh, as to commentaries, we have Barnes’ Notes on the Gospels, and on some of the Epistles. And we have McKnight’s exposition and new translation of the Epistles. Uncle Jones admires these old volumes of McKnight’s very much, but they always seemed very dry to me. I love Mr. Barnes, and have studied his notes in Sunday-school and Bible class all my life.”

“Mr. Barnes is a very learned and eminent divine,” replied the pastor. “His notes have attained a wide circulation, and won for him an enduring reputation. You cannot follow a safer guide. Have you examined him upon the subject?”

“I suppose,” said she, “that I have read it a dozen times, but I never thought any thing particularly about it, and don’t recollect a word.”

“Suppose, then, you get his Notes, and let us look at them a moment before I leave. I can stay but a few minutes longer.”

Edwin had found the volume while they were talking of it, and now handed it to the pastor.

“I suppose we shall find it here, Matthew iii. 6, as this is the place where the word baptize first occurs. Mr. Percy, will you have the kindness to read it aloud for our common benefit?”

Mr. Percy read: “And were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins.” “The word baptize signifies, originally, to tinge, to dye, to stain, as those who dye clothes. It here means to cleanse or wash any thing by the application of water. (See note, Mark vii. 4.)

“Washing or ablution was much in use among the Jews, as one of the rites of their religion. It was not customary, however, to baptize those who were converted to the Jewish religion until after the Babylonish captivity.

“At the time of John, and for some time previous, they had been accustomed to administer a rite of baptism or washing to those who became proselytes to their religion, that is, who were converted from being Gentiles.” … “John found this custom in use, and as he was calling the Jews to a new dispensation, to a change in the form of their religion, he administered this rite of baptism or washing to signify the cleansing from their sins, and adopting the new dispensation, or the fitness for the pure reign of the Messiah. They applied an old ordinance to a new purpose; as it was used by John it was a significant rite or ceremony, intended to denote the putting away of impurity, and a purpose to be pure in heart and life.”

Mr. Percy stopped reading, and looking up at Mr. Johnson, said, “Pardon me, pastor, but if Mr. Barnes were present here as a witness in this case, I would like to ask him a single question by way of a cross-examination. He says that ‘Washing or ablution was much in use among the Jews as one of the rites of their religion,’ and yet he tells us that baptism was not in use till after the captivity. Must not baptism then have been something new and different from the washing or ablution?”

“And I,” said Theodosia, “would like to ask a question too; perhaps pastor Johnson can answer it as well as Mr. Barnes. He says, when they received a convert from the Gentiles, they baptized him; John found this rite in use, and merely applied an old ordinance to a new purpose. Now, I want to know how this ordinance was administered. What was the act which they performed upon the proselyte? Did they sprinkle him, or pour upon him, or was he immersed? If this can be ascertained, it will of course determine what it was that John did when he baptized. Can you tell us, Mr. Johnson, which it was?”

“Yes, my child; it was universally conceded that the Jewish proselyte baptism was immersion. I do not know that this has ever been denied by any writer on either side of the controversy. It is distinctly stated to have been immersion by Dr. Lightfoot, Dr. Adam Clarke, Prof. Stuart, and others who have espoused our cause.”

“How then do you get rid of the difficulty? If, as Mr. Barnes says, ‘John applied an old ordinance to a new purpose,’ and that old ordinance was immersion, it is absolutely certain that John was immersed. There is not room for even the shadow of a doubt.”

“It would seem to be so indeed,” said the pastor. “I never thought of it just in that light before. But though it is admitted by all that the proselyte baptism was immersion, it is doubted by many whether it existed at all before the time of John. Some think it originated about the time of Christ, and that the Jews practiced it in imitation of John’s baptism.”

“I do not see,” rejoined Mr. Percy, “how it can make the slightest difference in the result of the argument, whether it was in use before the time of John, or was borrowed from him. If they immersed before the time of John, and he borrowed his rite from them, of course it was immersion that he borrowed. If they immersed after the time of John, and borrowed their rite from him, of course John immersed, or they could not have borrowed immersion from him.”

“But if John immersed,” said Theodosia, “then Jesus was immersed by John. This immersion was called his baptism. The disciples saw it, and spake of it as such; and ever afterward, whenever baptism was mentioned, their minds would revert to this act; and so, when Jesus said to them, ‘Go and baptize,’ they must have understood him to mean, that they should go and repeat on others the rite which they had seen performed on him. And not only so,” added the young lady, “but Christ’s disciples had themselves been accustomed to practice the same baptism under his own eye. If John immersed, they had not only witnessed his immersion of Jesus, but they had themselves immersed hundreds, if not thousands, under the personal direction of Jesus himself.”

“That would certainly settle the question. But where did you make that discovery?” asked Mr. Percy, incredulously.

“Oh, it is in the record,” she replied. “Here is the testimony, John iii. 22, 23: ‘After these things, came Jesus and his disciples into the land of Judea, and there he tarried with them, and baptized. And John also was baptizing in Ænon, near to Salim, because there was much water there; and they came, and were baptized.’ And in the next chapter it says that the ‘Pharisees heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John.’ Now John baptized and Jesus baptized. They both did the same thing; that is as plain as words can make it: as plain as though it said Jesus walked, and John also walked; or Jesus talked, and John also talked. Whatever it was that John did, Jesus was doing the same thing. “If John’s baptism was immersion, then Jesus and his disciples were immersing, and they immersed more than John.”

“That is really,” said Mr. Percy, “a complete demonstration. Don’t you think so, Mr. Johnson?”

“Well, I must confess it looks so at the first glance. We must look into this matter another time. Let us, for the present, see what Mr. Barnes says further. Please read on, Mr. Percy; I have not much more time to spare this evening.”

Mr. Percy read on:

“The Hebrew word (tabal) which is rendered by the [Greek] word baptize, occurs in the Old Testament in the following places:—Lev. iv. 6; xiv. 6, 51; Num. xix. 18; Ruth ii. 14; Ex. xii. 22; Deut. xxxiii. 24; Ezk. xxiii. 15; Job ix. 31; Lev. ix. 9; 1 Sam. ix. 27; 2 Kings v. 14; viii. 15; Gen. xxxvii. 31; Joshua iii. 15. It occurs in no other places; and from a careful examination of these passages, its meaning among the Jews is to be derived.”

“Oh,” said the young lady, “that is what I like; I like to find the meaning in the Scriptures, then I know I can rely upon it. Just wait a minute, Mr. Percy, if you please, till I can get my Bible and hunt out those place, and see how it reads. If it reads sprinkle, then it is all right—sprinkling is baptism; if it reads pour, then pouring is baptism; if it reads dip, then dipping is baptism. We will soon see.”

“Let me read a little further, Miss Theodosia, and perhaps you may not think it necessary to examine the texts.”

She had, however, got her Bible, and was getting ready to turn to each text in order, when he resumed as follows:

“From these passages, it will be seen that its radical meaning is not to sprinkle or to immerse. It is to dip. Commonly for the purpose of sprinkling or for some other purpose.”

“What? Do let me see that. Pardon me, pastor, but what does the good man mean? It is not to sprinkle; it is not to immerse; it is to dip! Edwin, please get Webster’s Dictionary, and tell us the difference between the meaning of dip and immerse.”

“Here it is. Immerse is to plunge into a fluid. Dip is to plunge any thing into a fluid, and instantly take it out again.”

“Why, Mr. Percy, that just describes the act of baptism which we saw at the river. It was not an immersion, strictly speaking, but a dipping, a plunging beneath the water, and a raising out again. ‘It is not to sprinkle or to immerse; it is to dip! Commonly for the purpose of sprinkling, or for some other purpose.’”

“What are you laughing at, brother Edwin?”

“I was only thinking how a preacher would look, dipping a man ‘for the purpose of sprinkling’ him. But see! there goes my teacher, and I believe he is a Baptist. At any rate he goes to all their meetings. Let me call him in; he can tell us something more about these things.”

And before any one could interfere, he had run to the door and hailed Mr. Courtney.

Seeing this, the Rev. Mr. Johnson arose, and reminding the company that he had an engagement at that hour, promised to call again and talk over the matter more, at another day, and took his leave, passing out just as the teacher was coming in.

“Mr. Courtney,” said Mr. Percy, “perhaps you can help us a little. We were just looking at Barnes on Baptism.”

“I did not know he had ever written on the subject, except some very singular remarks he made in his Notes on the third chapter of Matthew.”

“It was those we were examining, and I infer that you do not think very favorably of his argument.”

“I think he makes a very strong argument for the Baptists.”

“How so?”

“Simply thus: It is an axiom in logic as well as in mathematics, ‘that things which are equal to the same thing, are equal to one another.’ Now he states a very remarkable and exceedingly significant fact, when he says that the Hebrew word tabal is rendered by the word baptize. It occurs, he says, fifteen times in the Hebrew Bible. Now when the Jews translated their Scriptures into Greek, whenever they came to this word, they rendered it baptize; and when our translators came to this same word, they rendered it by the English word dip. It follows, therefore, since dip in English and baptize in Greek are both equivalent to tabal in Hebrew, they must be equivalent to each other.

“Mr. Barnes says further, that the true way to ascertain the meaning of this word among the Jews, is to examine carefully the fifteen places where it occurs in the Old Testament. I see, Miss Ernest, that you have the Bible in your hand; suppose you turn to those places, and let us see how they read. It will not take more than a few minutes of our time.”

“I had gotten the book for that very purpose, sir. I like this way of study, comparing Scripture with Scripture. I always feel better satisfied with my conclusions when I have drawn them for myself directly from the Bible.”

“Well, here is the first place, Leviticus iv. 6: ‘And the priest shall dip his finger in the blood.’

“The second, Leviticus xiv. 6: ‘And shall dip them into the blood of the bird that was killed over running water.’

“The third, Leviticus xiv. 51: ‘And dip them in the blood of the slain bird and in the running water.’

“The fourth, Numbers xix. 18: ‘And a clean person shall take hyssop, and dip it into the water.’

“The fifth, Ruth ii. 14: ‘And Boaz said unto her at meal time, come thou hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar.’

“The sixth, Exodus xii. 22: ‘And ye shall take a bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood.’

“The seventh, Deuteronomy xxxiii. 24: ‘And let him dip his foot in oil.’

“The eighth, Ezekiel xxiii. 15: ‘Exceeding in dyed attire.’

“The ninth, Job ix. 31: ‘Yet shalt thou plunge me in the ditch.’

“The tenth, Leviticus ix. 9: ‘And he dipped his finger in the blood.’

“The eleventh, 1 Samuel xiv. 27: ‘And he (Jonathan) put forth the end of the rod that was in his hand, and dipped it in the honey comb.’

“The twelfth, 2 Kings viii. 16: ‘And he (Hazael) took a thick cloth, and dipped it in the water, and spread it on his face.’

“The thirteenth, Joshua iii. 15: ‘The feet of the priests that bare the ark were dipped in the brim of Jordan.’

“The fourteenth, 2 Kings v. 14: ‘And he went down and dipped himself seven times in Jordan.’

“The fifteenth, Genesis xxxvii. 31: ‘And they took Joseph’s coat, and killed a kid, and dipped the coat in the blood.’

“The passage in the 2 Kings v. 14, is very remarkable, since it corresponds precisely in the Septuagint to the text in Matthew. The Septuagint says of Naaman, Ebaptizato en to Jordane. Matthew says of the people baptized by John, Ebaptisonto en to Jordane. Nobody has ever questioned the correctness of the translation in Kings. He dipped himself in Jordan; and had Matthew been translated by the same rule, it must have read, they were dipped by John in Jordan.

“But I fear this subject may be disagreeable to you. Mr. Barnes, I know, is a most eminent minister of your own denomination, and I ought probably to have avoided speaking thus in your presence.”

“Oh, no, sir,” said the young lady; “I want to learn the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, on this subject. I am glad to learn it from any source, and in any way. Perhaps you can assist us further; but let us see what further Mr. Barnes has to say.”

Mr. Percy read again:

“In none of these cases can it be shown that the meaning of the word is to immerse entirely. But in nearly all the cases the notion of applying the water to a part only of the person or object, though it was by dipping, is necessarily supposed.… It cannot be proved, from an examination of the passages in the Old and New Testaments, that the idea of a complete immersion ever was connected with the word, or that it ever in any case occurred.”

“Stop, Mr. Percy,” said the young lady. “Pray stop, and let me think a moment. Can it be possible that a good man, a pious minister of Jesus Christ, could dare to trifle thus with the holy Word of God? Oh, it is wonderful! I cannot understand it! He said just now, that the meaning of the word ‘was to dip for the purpose of sprinkling, or for some other purpose.’ To dip means to plunge any thing into a fluid, and immediately take it out again. To immerse means merely to plunge the object in the fluid. Whatever is dipped, therefore, is of necessity immersed, to the same extent that it is dipped; and yet he says these things which the Word says were dipped, were none of them entirely immersed.”

“Do not think too hardly of him,” said Mr. Percy. “An advocate who has a bad cause to sustain (I know from experience), is sometimes obliged to resort to just such a jumble, to cover the weak points of his argument.”

“Perhaps,” said Theodosia, “it might be excusable in a lawyer, though even of that I am doubtful; but that a minister of the holy Word of Jesus should thus stoop to ‘darken counsel with words without knowledge,’ is something I never conceived of till now.”

“When you have become more familiar with the influence which passion and prejudice, and especially early education and church attachments, exert upon the minds of even the wisest and best of men,” said Mr. Courtney, “these things will not appear so strange to you. Mr. Barnes doubtless believes that sprinkling is baptism. He was taught so in early life, and has for many years taught others so. To convince him of the contrary, would now be almost or quite impossible, and when any text of Scripture comes in opposition to this opinion, he can hardly help perverting or misunderstanding it. You desired to know the true meaning of the word baptize, as it was used in our Saviour’s time among the Jews; and you applied to him for information. He told you very properly that you must go to those places where it occurs in the original of their own Scriptures, and pointed out to you the fifteen places, which he assures you are the only places in which it occurs. He has thus given the matter into your own hands. You turn to the places, one by one, and find that in fourteen out of the fifteen it clearly means to dip. That such is the case, he does not deny. He is obliged to grant that ‘its radical meaning is to dip.’ This, now, he has proved from the Scriptures themselves. But this overthrows his sprinkling, so he must get rid of its force. This he undertakes to do—1. By intimating that there is some important difference between dipping and immersion. ‘It is not sprinkling nor immersion,’ he says; ‘it is dipping.’ And then he tries to confuse the matter by mixing in the object, ‘for the purpose of sprinkling, or for some other purpose,’ as though the purpose modified the act performed. The baptism mentioned in these fourteen places was equally dipping, whether it was performed for the purpose of sprinkling, as when the priest dipped the hyssop; or for the purpose of smearing, as when the priest dipped the tip of his finger in oil; or for the purpose of cleansing, as when Naaman dipped himself in Jordan; or for the purpose of pollution, as when Job was plunged in the ditch; or merely for the purpose of wetting, as when Ruth dipped her morsel, or Hazael his thick cloth. The wetting, the defiling, the cleansing, the smearing, were not the baptism; they were not the dipping, but a consequence of it. The sprinkling was not the baptism, the dipping, but a subsequent and altogether a different act. Then to make ‘confusion worse confounded,’ he intimates some vast distinction between entire immersion and dipping. These things, said to be baptized in these fourteen places, he can’t deny were dipped; but ‘none of them,’ he says, ‘were entirely immersed.’ But the extent of the immersion does not affect the meaning of the word. The word immersed expressed only the act of plunging the object into the fluid. The word dip expressed this act, and the additional one of taking it out again; and this, he said and proved, was the Scriptural meaning of baptize. As far, then, as they were baptized, they were dipped; and as far as they were dipped, they were immersed. We learn the extent of the dipping from other words, not from this one. If Naaman is said to have dipped himself, or Hazael the cloth, there is not the slightest reason to doubt that the whole person and the whole cloth were immersed. If Jonathan dipped the end of his staff, why the end only was immersed. It was immersed, however, just as much as it was dipped or baptized.”

“But,” said Mr. Percy, “what will you do with the hyssop, and the living bird, etc., that were to be baptized into the blood of the slain bird, and where Mr. Barnes says it is clearly impossible that they all should be immersed in the blood of the single bird.”

“I simply say that they could be immersed in it as easily as they could be dipped in it. If you will turn to Leviticus xiv. 6, you will see that the blood of the slain bird was to be caught over running water; and as it rested on, or mixed with the water, these things could all be entirely immersed, if need be. You will remember, however, that in common language the whole of a thing is often mentioned when a part is only meant. I say, for instance, that I dipped my pen in ink, and wrote a line; you do not understand that I dipped more than the point—enough to take up the ink to write. If I tell you that I dipped my hair brush in water, and smoothed my hair, you do not understand that I dipped it in, handle and all, but only the bristles. So only enough of the cedar wood, and hyssop, and scarlet, etc., may have been dipped to take up enough to sprinkle with; but as much as they were baptized, so much were they dipped; and so far as they were dipped, just so far were they immersed. But it does not make any difference to Mr. Barnes or his sprinkling brethren, whether the dipping was partial or complete; for they do not dip their subjects of baptism at all, in whole or in part, for the purpose of sprinkling, or for any other purpose; and, therefore, if the Scriptural meaning of the word baptize is to dip, as Mr. Barnes has so clearly proved by Scripture itself, then they do not baptize at all.”

“Oh, yes, I see now how it was,” said Theodosia, “when Dr. Fisher performed this ceremony upon me. He baptized his own hand; for he dipped that in the bowl, but he only sprinkled me; and therefore, according to the showing of Mr. Barnes himself, I have never been baptized.”

“Do not put down the book yet,” said Mr. Courtney. “Just turn to Matthew xx. 22, and you will find that Mr. Barnes has no more difficulty than the greatest Baptist in the land, in understanding the word baptism to signify not only immersion, but complete immersion, whenever it does not refer to the ordinance.

“The baptism that I am baptized with.” On this Mr. B. remarks as follows: ‘Are ye able to suffer with me the trials and pains which shall come upon you in endeavoring to build up my kingdom? Are ye able to be plunged deep in afflictions? to have sorrows cover you like water, and to be sunk beneath calamities as floods, in the work of religion? Afflictions are often expressed by being sunk in the floods and plunged in the deep waters.’ (Ps. lix. 2; Isa. xliii. 2; Ps. cxxiv. 4, 5; Sam. iii. 54.)

“You see Mr. Barnes has no more difficulty than the translators of the Old Testament, in giving the word its true meaning—to dip, to plunge, to sink beneath the waters, etc., when it does not refer to the ordinance; but when it does, all is confusion and mystery.”

“I begin to think,” said Theodosia, “that theological writers are not to be relied upon at all. And I feel more than ever inclined to trust to the Bible alone, and study it for myself. When such a man as Mr. Barnes can be so far blinded by education and prejudice as to come so near the truth and not see it—to point out the way toward it so plainly, and yet refuse to walk in it, and endeavor to hide it from others by such a strange medley of words, I have no further use for any book on the subject but the word of God. I will study that; and it shall be my only guide. If I find that Jesus was sprinkled in Jordan, I will be content. If I find that he was poured upon, I must be poured upon. If I find that he was dipped, then I must be dipped.”

“Oh, no, Miss Theodosia; you are decidedly too hasty. I have often found in court, that a witness whom I expected to testify in my favor, and who evidently desired and intended to do so, has nevertheless, on a cross-examination, given such testimony as was altogether favorable to the opposite party. But I did not abandon my client, and give up my suit. I sought for other witnesses. Our information on this subject is, as yet, very limited. There are other sources of evidence; let us examine them. Something may yet turn up to change your opinion of theological writers. Did you not say you had McKnight on the Epistles in the house?”

“Yes; and uncle Jones, who you know is one of the Elders in our church, says it is one of the best, if not the very best of commentaries.”

“Well, let us see what he says. How will we find the place?”

“Take a concordance,” suggested Edwin, “and look at every place where the word baptize occurs.”

“That is a first-rate idea. Well, here is the first place. Romans vi. 4. Buried with Christ by baptism. In the note he says: ‘Christ’s baptism was not the baptism of repentance, for he never committed any sin. But he submitted to be baptized—that is, to be buried under the water by John, and to be raised out again—as an emblem of his future death and resurrection. In like manner, the baptism of believers is emblematical of their own death, burial, and resurrection; perhaps, also, it is a commemoration of Christ’s baptism.’”

“Stop, Mr. Percy, are you sure you are not reading falsely?”

“Yes, I am perfectly certain. Here is the book, you can see for yourself.”

“No; but I thought you must be playing some trick on me. At any rate, McKnight must have been a Baptist. No one who believed in, and practiced sprinkling, could have written in that way.”

“Perhaps he was a Baptist. Let us look at the title page and preface, and see who and what he was. It appears from this, that James McKnight, D.D., was born Sept. 17, 1721. Licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Irwine of the Scotch Presbyterian church. Ordained at Maybole in 1753. Chosen Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian church in 1769, which position he held for more than twenty years. This brief history of his life, prefixed to the first volume of his Notes, informs us further, that he spent near thirty years of his life in preparing these Notes, and ‘that the whole manuscript was written over and over, by his own hand, no less than five times.’ They were therefore the deliberate and carefully expressed opinions of a most eminent and very learned Presbyterian Doctor of Divinity, and presiding officer of the Presbyterian church in the country where he lived. Of course he cannot be suspected of any bias toward the obscure and despised sect called the Baptists.”

“Well, read on then. Theologians are mysterious men.”

“That is all he says on this verse. But here is verse 5th. ‘Planted together,’ etc.

“‘The burying of Christ and of believers, first in the water of baptism, and afterward in the earth, is fitly enough compared to the planting of seeds in the earth, because the effect in both cases is a reviviscence to a state of greater perfection.’”

“Surely, he must consider baptism to be a burial in water. But perhaps he thinks there were several baptisms, and that dipping was one form or mode, while sprinkling was another.”

“No, for here is his note on Ephesians iv. 5. One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism.

“‘Ye all,’ says he, ‘serve one Lord, and all have the same object of faith, and have all professed that faith by the same form of baptism.’”

“Has he any thing else on the subject?”

“Yes, here, on 1 Cor. x. 2, ‘And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea.’

“‘Because the Israelites, by being hidden from the Egyptians under the cloud, and by passing through the Red Sea, were made to declare their belief in the Lord and his servant Moses, the Apostle very properly represents them as baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea.’

“And here again—1 Cor. xv. 29—‘Else what shall they do who are baptized for the dead.’

“‘Otherwise what shall they do to repair their loss who are immersed in sufferings for the resurrection of the dead.’

“And here again—Heb. ix. 10—‘Divers washings (Baptismos).’

“‘With nothing but meats, and drinks, and divers immersions, and ordinances respecting the body.’

“One more place, and we have all that he says upon the subject.

“1 Peter iii. 21, ‘The like figure whereunto baptism doth now save us, etc.’

“The water of baptism is here called the anti-type of the water of the flood, because the flood was a type or emblem of baptism in three particulars:

“1. ‘As by building an ark and entering into it, Noah showed strong faith in the promise of God, concerning his preservation, by the very water which was to destroy the Antediluvians for their sins. So by giving ourselves to be buried in the water of baptism, we show a like faith in God’s promise, that though we die and are buried, he will save us from death and the punishment of sin, by raising us up from the dead at the last day.’

“2. ‘As the preserving of Noah alive during the nine months of the flood, is an emblem of the preservation of the souls of believers while in the state of the dead, so the preserving believers alive while buried in the water of baptism, is a prefiguration of the same event.’

“3. ‘As the water of the deluge destroyed the wicked, but preserved Noah by bearing up the ark, in which he was shut up, till the waters were assuaged, and he went out to live again upon the earth; so baptism may be said to destroy [or represent the destruction of] the wicked, and to save the righteous, as it prefigures both these events. The death of the wicked it prefigures by the burial of the baptized person in the water, and the salvation of the righteous by the raising of the baptized person out of the water.’”

“Well, Mr. Percy,” said Theodosia, “what do you make of this witness? Do you wish to cross-examine him, or ask him any further questions?”

“Yes, I would like to ask the Rev. Dr. McKnight if he practiced sprinkling for baptism; and if he did, upon what grounds he could sustain a practice so different from his own exposition of the teachings of the Scripture.”

“As Dr. McKnight has not answered in his writings, and is not present in person, it may be satisfactory,” suggested Mr. Courtney, “to inquire of some other representative of the same church establishment. If you have Dr. Chalmers’ Lectures on Romans, you will find the question answered.”

“Yes, sister, don’t you know mother bought Chalmers’ Lectures only the other day? I will go and get the book,” said Edwin.

“Ah, here it is—page 152; Romans vi. 4–7. ‘The original meaning of the word baptism, is immersion; and, though we regard it as a point of indifferency whether the ordinance so named be performed in this way or by sprinkling, yet we doubt not that the prevalent style of the administration, in the apostle’s days, was by the actual submerging of the whole body under water. We advert to this for the purpose of throwing light on the analogy which is instituted in these verses. Jesus Christ, by death, underwent this sort of baptism, even immersion under the surface of the ground, whence he soon emerged again by his resurrection. We, by being baptized into his death, are conceived to have made a similar translation—in the act of descending under the water of baptism, to have resigned an old life; and in the act of ascending, to emerge into a second or new life.’ Here we have a distinct avowal of the well-established fact that the meaning of the word baptism is immersion, and that the practice of the Apostolic church was conformable to this truth. But in the very face of it we have the candid declaration ‘that we (Presbyterians) regard it as a matter of indifferency whether the ordinance so named be performed in this way or by sprinkling.’”

“But, Mr. Courtney, how can it be a matter of ‘indifferency?’ If the word means immersion, then immersion was what Christ commanded—then the ‘ordinance so-called’ is ‘immersion.’ How can immersion be performed by sprinkling? Really, these theologians are a strange, mysterious people. I cannot comprehend them. Christ commands me to be baptized—baptism means immersion—then, of course, if he meant any thing, he meant immersion. But these great and good men tell me it is a matter of ‘indifferency’ whether I do what he commanded, or something else altogether different from it.”

“Pardon me, Miss Theodosia; it is only when the theologians are in error, and blinded by their educational prejudices, or attachment to their church forms and dogmas, that they are so unreasonable and so mysterious.”

“Yet I have been accustomed to think they could hardly be in error at all. I have taken it for granted, until yesterday, that what the ministers of our church said about the teachings of the word of God, was all true, as a matter of course. I can hardly believe now that it is not so. I can’t understand how those, who are so wise, so learned, so pious, so anxious to know the truth, and who spend all their time in learning and teaching it, can be wrong; or how a simple girl like me, may differ from them and yet be right. I am afraid to take a single step in opposition to my pastor’s teaching, though I see clearly (as I think) that I shall step upon the rock of God’s unfailing truth! How can it be, that such good men talk one way and act another? How do they try to justify their ‘indifferency’ to the commands of Christ? They give some reason, do they not?”

“I think most of them don’t trouble themselves on the subject: they think little, and care little about it—not deeming it essential to salvation. When they do think or read upon the subject, it is in order to quiet their minds, or reply to an opponent. They have the practice of their church, received by tradition; they take it for granted it is right. They are where you were a day or two since, when you took it for granted that the ministers of your denomination could not be wrong. They don’t think their church can be wrong; and they twist, pervert, and torture the Scriptures, as you have seen Mr. Barnes do, or openly set aside their teachings as a matter of ‘indifferency,’ as we have seen Dr. Chalmers do, in order to continue the usage of the church.”

“But,” asked Theodosia, “does not Dr. Chalmers stand alone upon this point of ‘indifferency?’ It surely is not common for the ministers of our church (who in learning and piety I have always thought had no superiors in the world) to speak of literal obedience to Christ’s commandments as a matter of no consequence. To me it seems to border upon absolute impiety, almost upon sacrilege. I am in a maze of astonishment.”

“If you will continue your investigations for a little time, you will cease to be astonished at almost any sort of assertions made by the advocates of sprinkling,” said Mr. Courtney. “You will, for instance, find them admitting, in one sentence, that immersion was submitted to by Christ, and practiced by the Apostles; and in another, holding it up to the reprobation and abhorrence of every Christian as an indecent and abominable rite. But, in regard to your question. Dr. Chalmers, so far from standing alone, simply echoes the sentiments of Calvin, the founder of your church, and others of its most eminent supporters. ‘It is of no consequence at all,’ says Calvin, as quoted by Prof. Stuart, ‘whether the baptized person is totally immersed, or whether he is merely sprinkled by an affusion of water. This should be a matter of choice to the churches in different regions, although the word baptize signifies to immerse, and the rite of immersion was practiced by the ancient church.’ ‘To this opinion,’ says Prof. Stuart, ‘I do most fully and heartily subscribe.’”

“Well, I declare! these Presbyterian Doctors of Divinity are the most mysterious of people to me. They freely admit that the meaning of the word is to immerse, or to dip, and that immersion was practiced by the first churches—(and of course, if such is the meaning of the word, it must have been practiced by the first churches, as they could not misunderstand the commandment). Yet they tell us that it is of ‘no consequence at all’ whether we obey the commandment or not. Do the other denominations opposed to the Baptist occupy the same position?”

“I cannot answer for all,” said Mr. Courtney; “I can for some. I have here a transcript of some of the writings of Mr. John Wesley, who was the founder of the Methodists, the most numerous of the Pedobaptist sects in this country. He says, in his notes on Romans vi. 4—‘The allusion is to the ancient manner of baptizing, by immersion.’ And he relates in his journal, vol. 3, page 20, ‘that Mary Welch, aged eleven days, was baptized according to the custom of the first church, and the rule of the church of England, by immersion.’

“On page 24 of the same volume, he says—‘I was asked to baptize a child of Mr. Parker’s, second bailiff of Savannah; but Mrs. Parker told me, neither Mr. P. nor I will consent to its being dipped. I answered, if you certify that the child is weakly, it will suffice (the Rubric says) to pour water on it. She replied nay, the child is not weak, but I am resolved it shall not be dipped. This argument I could not confute, so I went home, and the child was baptized by another.’”

“It would seem, then,” said Theodosia, “that Mr. Wesley conformed his practice to his belief. He believed that baptism was immersion, and refused to baptize at all unless he could do it according to the word of God. I honor the man for his consistency.”

“Still,” said Mr. Percy, “it does not seem that he was influenced by the word of God, but by the ‘Rubric.’ The word of God makes no exception in favor of those who may be certified to ‘be weak,’ but yet on the authority of ‘the Rubric,’ or formula of the church of England, Mr. Wesley was perfectly ready to dispense with the dipping, and employ pouring, if the parents would only certify.”

“Moreover,” added Mr. Courtney, “it seems, from his conduct afterward, that he felt as much at liberty himself to change the ordinance of Christ, as the makers of the Rubric had done; for when he organized his societies, and gave them ‘the Discipline’ as their organic law, he directed baptism to be performed by sprinkling or pouring, if the parties preferred it.

“And though Mr. Wesley once refused to baptize a person at all unless he could do it by dipping, ‘according to the custom of the first church,’ or under a certificate of weakness, his followers, by his direction and by authority of his Discipline, employ sprinkling almost exclusively, and call immersion a vulgar and indecent practice; although they will sometimes perform it to satisfy a weak conscience, rather than lose a member.

“Martin Luther, the great reformer and founder of the Lutheran church, evidently entertained the same opinion with the other noted Pedobaptists we have been speaking of. After speaking of baptism as a symbol of death and resurrection, he says, ‘On this account I could wish that such as are to be baptized, should be completely immersed into the water, according to the meaning of the word and the signification of the ordinance, as also, without doubt, it was instituted by Christ.’ Yet Luther is the father of a sprinkling church—the Lutheran; and whether he did so or not, it is evident that his followers, like Drs. Chalmers and Calvin, regard it as a ‘point of indifferency.’”

“That is sufficient, Mr. Courtney,” replied the young lady; “I merely wish to know if the other denominations were guilty of the same inconsistency with our own.”

After a little further conversation, Mr. Percy and Mr. Courtney took their leave.

Mrs. Ernest, the mother, had, during the time of this interview, been sitting quietly in a corner, very busily engaged in hemming some ruffles. She took no part in the discussion, but as soon as the gentlemen were gone, she turned to Theodosia, and said—

“My dear child, I am perfectly astonished at your behavior this evening.”

“Why, mother,” said the young lady, in amazement, “what have I done? I am not conscious of any impropriety.”

“Do you think, then, that it is perfectly proper and becoming in you to talk as you did this evening about the good and eminent clergymen of our church? It made my flesh quake and my heart burn to hear that impertinent little Baptist pedagogue accuse such a man as Dr. Albert Barnes of perverting the scriptures and mystifying the truth. I wonder if he thinks a learned and pious Presbyterian minister, like Mr. Barnes, is more likely to be ‘blinded by prejudice and passion’ than an ignorant Baptist schoolmaster. You thought I was not listening; but, though I did not take any part in your conversation, I assure you I heard every word of it, and if it had not been for the presence of Mr. Percy, I do believe I would have been tempted to order the fellow out of my house. How could you be so destitute of every particle of self-respect, and of all regard for your own church—the church of your mother and your grand parents, in which you was born and raised, as to permit a man to talk in that way in your presence? I declare I was perfectly ashamed of you! If that Mr. Courtney ever shows his face in my house again, I do think I shall insult him.”

“Mother, what was it that Mr. Courtney said that was so unbecoming and offensive? I am sure he seemed to me only as one anxious to get at the truth.”

“Why! did he not say that our preachers perverted the Scripture? Did not he say that they set aside the commandments of Christ as matters of ‘indifferency?’ I wonder if he thinks he knows more about the Scriptures than Dr. Chalmers or Mr. Barnes, or even the weakest preacher in our church? I always heard that the Baptists were an ignorant, bigoted, and intolerant sect, and I believe it now more than ever. Just to think that—”

“But, mother, please let me say one word. Mr. Courtney did, indeed, intimate that Mr. Barnes had mystified and perverted the Scripture, but did he not prove it before he said it? It was Mr. Percy who read in Mr. Barnes’ notes that we must look in the Old Testament at those fifteen places, to learn the meaning of the word baptize. We looked, and found that in fourteen of the fifteen, the action was dipping, and in none of them sprinkling or pouring. It was Mr. Percy who read that ‘the meaning of the word is not to sprinkle or to immerse, but it is to dip for the purpose of sprinkling, or for some other purpose.’ It was Mr. Percy who read in Dr. Chalmers that ‘we (Presbyterians) consider it a point of indifferency’ whether the ordinance of Christ is performed as he commanded, or in some other way. Now, if Mr. Barnes does prove that the word means ‘to dip,’ for the purpose of sprinkling, or for some other purpose, and yet tells us that it can be done by pouring, does he not mystify the subject by a strange medley of words? Was it so very wrong in Mr. Courtney to point out these self-evident prevarications of Mr. Barnes, or the openly avowed disregard to the commandment of Jesus Christ and the practice of the Apostolic churches in Dr. Chalmers?

“If Presbyterians are guilty of such inconsistency I am sorry for it, and ashamed of it, but I can’t help seeing it when my attention is directed to it; and I really do not see how it could have been becoming in me to get angry with those who were so kind as to point it out to me. On this subject I feel that I would be willing to learn the truth even from an infidel or an idiot, if they could aid me.”

“It is the part of a true friend,” said the mother, “to hide a friend’s infirmities, not to divulge and glory in them. And even if our ministers have done and said some thoughtless and silly things, it is not for a Presbyterian like you, to speak of them, or permit others to speak of them so contemptuously, in your presence. If you have no spirit of resentment, I’ll let you know that I have, and Mr. Courtney too, if he comes here with any more of his Baptist abuse of our pious and learned ministers.”

“But, mother, if our ministers are wrong (as being human they surely may be) how can it be wrong to point out their errors, and guard inquirers after truth from falling into them?”

“I don’t say,” replied the mother, “that it is wrong to point out any trifling errors, which they may have inadvertently taught; provided it were done in a mild, gentlemanly, courteous, and Christian manner. But is it kind, is it courteous, is it Christian-like, to accuse a great and good man like Mr. Barnes, of torturing, perverting, and mystifying the Word of God, to sustain some church dogma or church practice? Do you call that gentlemanly?”

“My dear mother, please don’t be so angry with me; I really can’t see why we should not call things by their real names. And I must confess that so far as I can understand the meaning of the words, Mr. Barnes does, on this subject, mystify and pervert the language of Scripture, and Dr. Chalmers does clearly intimate that it is no matter whether we do what Christ commanded in this ordinance, or something else—which he did not command. And I begin to fear that others on our side of this controversy are in the same predicament. Whether those on the other side are not equally inconsistent, I have yet to learn.”

“Well, my child, I don’t know what to do with you. You have no more respect for the opinions of the learned and excellent ministers of our church, than for those of the most ignorant people.”

“I am determined, mother, that I shall never trust any more to the mere assertions of any man, or set of men, except those holy men who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. Whatever I can find for myself clearly put down in The Book, that I will believe. Henceforth, the Bible is my only guide, and I will myself judge of its meaning for myself.”

“But, my child, do you, can you, think that you are as competent to judge of the true interpretation of the Word as the great and good men who have given all their lives to its study?”

“No, mother; but how if these great and good men disagree? Must I turn Catholic, and so secure an infallible priest? If I don’t do this, I must maintain my right to my own private judgment. I am accountable only to God; I will be guided only by his Word. I thought you and pastor Johnson would have encouraged and assisted me in the investigation of this or any other question connected with my religious faith and practice. I know that he has always told us to examine the Scripture for ourselves—and ‘each to be fully persuaded in his own mind.’”

“Certainly, my child; but then we thought that your investigations would tend to confirm rather than shake your faith in our doctrines; but you seem to be losing confidence rather than increasing it. These studies seem only to disturb and unsettle your mind; and I fear, if you continue them, they will end in your separation from us all. How, then, can I help desiring that you should leave off these distressing investigations? Till you do so, I can hardly feel that you are my own dear Theodosia. You begin almost to feel like a stranger to me now. I declare, I believe you will break my heart.” And, overcome by her maternal feelings, she burst into a flood of tears, in which the daughter freely joined.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

THE THIRD NIGHT’S STUDY

Which contains the testimony of the pastor’s witnesses, to prove that John did not immerse at all, and that Christ did not go down into the water, but was baptized by sprinkling on the bank of the river.

Third Night’s Study.

The Rev. Mr. Johnson had been the pastor of a large and wealthy congregation for more than, twenty years. Most of the young people of his charge had grown up under his pastoral supervision, and old and young had been accustomed to regard his word as Gospel truth; and when Miss Ernest ventured to suggest that she had never been baptized, and asked him for the proof, it was probably the first time that one of the “baptized children of his church” had ever expressed in his presence any serious doubt of the full authority of his bare and unsupported word.

After the brief visit at Mrs. Ernest’s which we have recorded, he went to his study and commenced the preparation of a sermon, which he hoped and intended should prevent any others of his congregation from any attempt to investigate this subject for themselves.

He did not propose in this discourse to mention the Baptists by name, or to make any attempt to refute, or even to denounce their opinions or practices. (To do so might direct attention to them, whereas he desired to divert it from them.) But he determined to describe, and denounce as degenerate and vile apostates, all those who, reckless of the obligations which had been placed upon them in early infancy, and all the thousand nameless ties which had, in childhood and youth, bound them to the church in which they had been born, and solemnly dedicated to God in baptism, in whose doctrines they had been instructed by parental lips, and into whose communion they had been received by a public profession of their faith, and who should, after all, be induced by some new coming proselyter to abandon the faith of their fathers, and the communion of their own church, and break off like wandering stars, to be lost in the darkness of anti-Presbyterian errors.

This course, he was confident, would be more effectual in preserving the peace and unity of his church, and the dignity of its pastor, than any attempt to reason about the doctrines of this obscure sect of Baptists, who had so suddenly begun to attract attention in his village. He would overwhelm the doubters and inquirers with such a storm of public indignation, that hereafter no one would dare to doubt; but in the meantime it was necessary, privately, to satisfy such doubts as had already been expressed.

When, therefore, he had arranged the heads of his discourse, he repaired to his book-case, and took down such authorities as would refresh his memory on the subject of baptism—especially in regard to the points of difficulty suggested by Theodosia and Mr. Percy. The examination of these occupied the time till in the night, and was resumed again the next morning.

Very early the next evening, having his mind fully charged with all the “strong reasons” upon which Pedobaptists are accustomed to rest their cause, he called on Mrs. Ernest and her daughter again.

“Well, madam,” said he, “how has our conversation the other evening affected your daughter? I trust she has ceased to be so much distressed about these new notions as she was.”

“Indeed, Mr. Johnson, she gets worse and worse, and I begin to think Mr. Percy is going the same way. I am so sorry Edwin called in that little Baptist schoolmaster. It made my heart burn to hear them talk as they did about the good and pious ministers of our church. It seemed to me they had no more respect for a minister of the Gospel, or even a Doctor of Divinity, than they had for a house carpenter, or a French dancing-master.”

“How so, Mrs Ernest? I am sure your daughter has been too well raised to speak disrespectfully of any minister of the Gospel, or permit another to do it in her presence.”

“That is just what I told her. I said I was ashamed of her, and—”

“But pray tell me, madam, what has happened? What was said that was so improper?”

“Why, only to think that that little impertinent Baptist pedagogue had the impudence to say, sir, here in my house, that our ministers perverted the Scriptures, deluded their hearers, set aside the ordinances of Christ, and substituted others in their place, and I don’t know what all. I was so angry I could hardly see.”

“Is it possible! and your daughter heard all of this?”

“Yes, sir; and the worst of it is, I do fear, sir, she more than half believes it. You can’t think how changed she is, sir! I never knew her to have a particle of self-will before. She was always so gentle and affectionate, and ready to yield every thing to any body; but on this subject she is very stubborn, and declares she won’t believe a single thing but what she can see in the Bible for herself, even though she had it from your own lips, and all the rest of the preachers in our church.

“Oh, sir,” she continued, sobbing (for her maternal feelings had begun to overcome her), “if you don’t do something for her she will be lost to us all! Do try to show her where that sprinkling is in the Bible. If she can see it there, she will believe it.”

Mr. Johnson was fully resolved to make her see the sprinkling, if he could; but was not quite certain as to the place where he would find it; and before he had time to reflect much upon the subject, the young lady came into the parlor.

She seemed for the moment sightly embarrassed, evidently from the conviction that she had been the object of remark, but greeted her pastor cordially and respectfully. It seemed to him, though she was paler than before, that she had grown more beautiful in the last few days. The unusual mental activity, the excitement of a new object of investigation, and the calm, yet firm and solemn determination to learn and to do her whole duty, had imparted to her eye a new and intenser light, and to her countenance a strange, unwonted brightness, as though the spirit, stirred to its inmost depths by these new impulses, and burning with celestial fire, shone through its covering of flesh, and illuminated her face with almost more than mortal radiance.

Could it be possible, he asked himself, that this lovely young creature could speak irreverently of sacred things?

Alas! how much her mother and himself had misapprehended the nature of her feelings. Never in her life had sacred things appeared to her so sacred. It was because those great and good men, whom she had been accustomed from her infancy to look upon with reverence, now seemed to her, themselves, to trifle with sacred things, that she could no longer regard them as she had done. The Word of God; the commandments of Jesus Christ; the ordinances of the Gospel; these were sacred things. Never so fearfully sacred as now. And what could she think of those, who, ministering at the altar of God, perverted and mystified his Word, to hide the truth from those who sought for knowledge? What could she think of those who counted the commandments of Christ, and the ordinances which he had instituted, a “matter of indifferency?” She had, indeed, in some degree, ceased to reverence the (so-called) ministers of Christ, who could be so false to their sacred obligations as to trifle with God’s holy Word, in order to sustain a creed or a custom of their church; but oh! how deep, how ardent, how unutterable was her reverence for the Word itself! How anxious, how agonizing her desire to know what it required her to believe and to perform.

It may be that the pastor had some suspicion of the true state of her mind in this respect, for when he addressed her, it was with an expression of unusual and most respectful consideration. He felt instinctively that she was not now to be rated like a school-girl, or convinced by unsustained assertions.

Indeed, he felt a strange restraint in the presence of the earnest-hearted, strong-minded girl; and was revolving in his mind how he could best introduce the subject which he came to talk of, when she relieved him by introducing it herself.

“You did not have time the other evening,” said she, “to finish your remarks on the subject of baptism. You told me, you will recollect, that there was good and sufficient evidence to show that our Saviour was not baptized in the river at all, and that he was baptized by sprinkling, and, of course, if this was so, sprinkling is the Christian baptism.”

“You state the case a little too strongly, my daughter; I meant to say only that there is no evidence that he was baptized in the river; and that the baptism which he commanded (the baptism of the Gospel dispensation) was performed by sprinkling.”

“Please, Mr. Johnson, don’t try to mystify me. Do you mean to say that the baptism which Christ submitted to, and the baptism which he commanded, were two different things, and that one was immersion, and the other sprinkling?”

“Not exactly, my daughter; I only meant to say they might be different. John’s baptism was not Christian baptism. It was the baptism of repentance, designed to introduce Christianity. It prepared the way for the Gospel, but was itself no part of the Gospel dispensation.”

“And yet, Mr. Johnson, Mark says it was ‘the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.’ But it does not make any difference to me whether it was Christian baptism or not. I simply want to know about the act performed. John did something, which is called baptism. Multitudes came to him, and were baptized by him in the river of Jordan. Jesus also came to him, and was baptized in the river of Jordan. Then Jesus went himself into Judea, and there he tarried and baptized; and at the same time John also was baptizing in Ænon, near Salim; and Jesus baptized more than John baptized. These baptisms were confined to the Jews; but after his death, Jesus told the disciples to go and preach his Gospel to all other nations, and baptize them; and we learn from the Acts that they who gladly received the Word were baptized, both Jews and Gentiles.

“Now, what I want to know is this: when John baptized, he performed a certain act. When Jesus and his disciples baptized, did they not perform the same act? and when he commanded to baptize the Gentiles also, did he not command the same act to be performed, and did not the disciples perform the same act, in obedience to that command? The same word is used, does it not mean the same thing?”

“If it does, my child, it must mean something else besides immersion, for in many of these cases of baptism, immersion was out of the question. In fact, it is very certain that John did not immerse those whom he baptized; though if he had, it would not follow that Christ commanded immersion. John may have done one thing, and Christ may have commanded something else.”

“Very true, Mr. Johnson; he may have done it, but where is the proof that he did? My name might have been Susan, but then I would not have been called Theodosia. If he had meant another act, he would have used a different word.”

“Not if the word might mean either one or the other. You know that we contend that the word baptize means to sprinkle, to pour, to wet, to wash,[1] as truly as it means to dip or to immerse.”

“Well, Mr. Johnson, even supposing it does have all these meanings, the disciples must have understood the Saviour to use it (when speaking in reference to his ordinance) in some one of them, and that one would be fixed by his own example. What he received as baptism from John in Jordan, they would ever after consider to be baptism; and would necessarily suppose he meant that act when he used the word, even though it had a hundred meanings. But if you will pardon me for being so troublesome, I would like to know what proof there is that baptize in the Greek language has all these various meanings? We looked into a Greek Lexicon the other day to find the meaning of the word, and we could not find any thing at all about sprinkling or pouring among the definitions there.”

“You looked in a Greek Lexicon. You can’t read Greek, can you?”

“No, sir; but brother Edwin is studying the language, and he found the word, and I could read the definition.”

“And so you think you and Edwin are competent critics of a disputed point in the Greek language?”

“Oh, no! Mr. Johnson, don’t laugh at me. If you knew how anxious I am to learn the truth, I am sure you would sympathize with me and assist me. We did not think we knew any thing about it, and that is the reason that we went to the Lexicon to learn. It is not Edward’s opinion that I referred to, but that of the learned Prof. Donegan. And Mr. Percy has since examined quite a number of other Greek scholars upon the same subject, and he has not found that any one of them gives sprinkling as one of the meanings of baptize, though all agree in dipping.”

“And so you, and Edwin, and Mr. Percy set yourselves up to teach such men as Dr. Miller and other learned theological writers of our church, the meaning of the Greek language! Don’t you intend presently to write a commentary on the Scriptures? or a book of Practical Divinity? Edited jointly by Miss Ernest and Mr. Percy!”

The young lady looked at her pastor in astonishment. She blushed deeply; tears filled her eyes, and her utterance was choked. She had expected sympathy and assistance; she met with ridicule and rebuke. Poor girl, she did not know how hard it is for one who has long been accustomed to rule other minds, and have his bare assertion received as unquestionable truth, to be called on for proof. If he said baptize meant to sprinkle, what right had she, poor, simple girl, to doubt his word or ask for evidence? Why, even he, a minister of the Gospel, had never asked for proof when Dr. Miller said it. He had always taken it for granted that baptism was sprinkling, or such men as Dr. Miller would not have asserted that it was; nor would the church have enjoined or permitted it.

There was an awkward pause in the conversation, for Theodosia was too deeply mortified and embarrassed to know how to begin again.

Mr. Johnson saw that he had made a deep impression, though he did not feel quite certain of its nature. And he said, very mildly, “My dear child, don’t pretend to be wiser than your teachers. I can solemnly assure you, as a Christian man and a Christian minister, that the word we render baptize does legitimately signify the application of water in any way as well as by immersion, no matter what the Lexicons may say; and if so, sprinkling is as much baptism as dipping. The quantity of water used does not affect the validity of the ordinance.”

To this Theodosia did not reply. She felt that it was useless to ask again for proof; and if she did not feel disposed to trust even her pastor’s solemn declaration in regard to the meaning of baptize, it was because she remembered that Dr. Barnes had proved it to mean “not to sprinkle,” but “to dip;” that Stuart admitted this to be its prevalent and common signification; that the great Dr. Chalmers expressly asserted that its meaning was to dip, and that it was immersion which was practiced in the early churches; that McKnight and other most eminent and learned Pedobaptists all agreed perfectly with the Lexicons in giving immersion as its true meaning, and proving that such was the understanding and practice of the apostolic churches. What Baptists might teach she did not know, for as yet she had not read a Baptist book. She had common sense enough to understand that if there had been any sprinkling or pouring in the Word, such men as Stuart, and Chalmers, and McKnight, would have been sure to find it and parade it before the world as a justification of their practice. Though she was silent, therefore, she was far from being satisfied.

Mr. Johnson, acting on the adage that “silence gives consent,” considered this point as settled; “and now,” he continued, “if this be the case, if the word means to sprinkle or to pour, as well as to immerse, it is evident that John might have dipped, and Christ might have commanded sprinkling, and yet have used the same word which is used to describe John’s baptism. I might rest the case here; but I will go farther, and assert that John’s baptism was not immersion at all.”

“Good evening, Mr. Johnson, I am glad to hear you say that,” said Mr. Percy, who chanced to come in at the moment, and heard this strange assertion. “If we can only establish that position we will throw the Baptists out of court.”

“Nothing is easier done, Mr. Percy,” said the pastor. “It could not have been immersion, in the first place, because immersion was impossible.”

“Of course,” said Mr. Percy, “if immersion was impossible, it could not have been immersion. What was impossible could not have been done.”

“Very well, then, that settles the question, for it was clearly impossible for John to have immersed the thousands and thousands (not to say the millions) that resorted to him for baptism.”

“I don’t know about that,” said Mr. Percy. “In the first place, we must determine just how many there were, and then just how many John was able to dip. Do you know how many there were?”

“Not precisely,” said the pastor, “but there were great multitudes. The Evangelist says, Jerusalem and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan, went to him and were baptized. Now the population of Jerusalem itself was a prodigious multitude, and that of all Judea added to it would surely be more than one man could dip in the time of John’s public ministry.”

“But,” said Mr. Percy, “it does not say that all the inhabitants went. It says the places went; by which we are to understand, that some of each place mentioned went. Just as if I should say, that in the great political Convention of 1840, all Tennessee was gathered at Nashville to hear Henry Clay. I would not mean that every man, woman, and child in the State was there, but only that there were some from every part of it. Just so, Matthew says Jerusalem came—that is, a great many people from Jerusalem and Judea, and the country round about Jordan came; that is to say, the country as well as the city was fully represented in the crowd. Besides, John did not baptize all who came. He positively refused the Pharisees and Sadducees, who composed a great part of the Jewish nation. I do not see, therefore, that we have any means of knowing the exact number of the baptized.”

“But it can’t be denied,” said the pastor, “that it was an immense multitude, too many for one man to have immersed.”

“Will you permit me to ask a question?” said Theodosia, timidly (for she had become almost afraid to speak at all, since that suggestion of the pastor about a joint editorship with Mr. Percy in a body of divinity.) “Will you permit me to ask how much longer it would take to immerse them, one at a time, than it would to sprinkle them one at a time, in a decent and reverent way?”

“We do not know,” said the pastor, “that they were sprinkled one at a time. They might have stood in regular ranks along the bank, and John taking a bunch of hyssop might have dipped it in the river and sprinkled them by dozens as he passed along.”

“Or,” suggested Mr. Percy, “he might have provided himself with a large sized syringe or squirt gun, and filling it from the river have turned its stream along the ranks, as I have seen the boys do at school, sprinkling a whole bench of boys before the master could see who did it.”

This was uttered with such a perfectly serious air that the pastor was obliged to receive it as an amendment to his own supposition, though he could not help seeing in what a ridiculous light it placed both the baptizer and his subjects; and surely, there is, in the narrative of the Evangelists, quite as much evidence of the use of the squirt as of the hyssop.

“There is another thought,” said Theodosia, “which it seems to me, will obviate all the difficulty in the way of either a personal dipping or a separate sprinkling of each individual. The Evangelist says that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John—and when the disciples were gathered together after his death, there does not seem to have been a very great multitude. So it is probable, I should think, that though great multitudes came to John, and great multitudes followed Christ, yet comparatively few brought forth fruit to justify their baptism. And besides this, as Jesus is said to have baptized, though he did not do it personally, but by his disciples, so John may have done a portion of his baptizing by his disciples.”

“Spoken like yourself, Miss Theodosia,” said Mr. Percy. “That does indeed obviate all difficulty. The baptism, whatever it was, must have been a personal, individual transaction; and as it would take as long to sprinkle a person, and say over the proper formula of words, as it would to dip him, one is just as possible as the other, and either entirely practicable with the aid of the disciples. Don’t you think so, Mr. Johnson?”

“No, I do not; but let it pass. I have another reason for believing that John did not immerse. It says expressly that he baptized in Bethabara, beyond Jordan—and in the wilderness, as well as at the much waters or many waters of Ænon, and at the river Jordan. Now, as there is no mention made of a river at Bethabara, or of a lake in the wilderness, it is fair to infer that no great quantity of water was required—and, consequently, whatever he may have done in Jordan, he did not immerse in Bethabara or in the wilderness.”

“Why not, Mr. Johnson? I can easily understand that he was baptizing in the wilderness, Bethabara, and Jordan at one and the same time. The Jews (as I have learned in my Sunday-school lessons) called any sparsely settled place a wilderness; and Bethabara was a ford or a ferry-house, on the east bank of the Jordan. If the neighborhood was lonely, it would be said to be in the wilderness; and a baptism performed in the Jordan, at that place, might be said with equal propriety to be performed in the wilderness; in Bethabara, or in Jordan. Just as I might say that a person was baptized in Davidson county, or in the city of Nashville, though the act was performed in the Cumberland river, where it passes the city.”

“Well,” said Mr. Johnson, “I do not insist on this point; and I leave it more readily, as I have an argument that is perfectly unanswerable; and that is, that John says himself that he did not immerse—over and over again he repeated this testimony: ‘I indeed baptize you with water, but he that cometh after me shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire.’ ‘I am come,’ he says, ‘baptizing with water;’ and again: ‘he that sent me to baptize with water.’ Now, when I want to know how John baptized, I go right up to the reverend man with the hairy garment, and ask him to tell me for himself. ‘Did you baptize by immersion?’ ‘No, sir; I baptize with water, not in water. I was sent to baptize with water, not in water—as he that cometh after me baptizes with the Holy Ghost, not in the Holy Ghost, and with fire, not in fire. So I baptize with water, not in the water. I apply the water to the subject, not the subject to the water.’”

“There does seem to be some force in that,” said Mr. Percy.

“To be sure, there not only seems to be, but there is a world of force in it. It is perfectly unanswerable, sir. I am willing to rest our cause on this one point alone. You can easily understand how one can sprinkle with water, or pour upon with water, but no one would ever speak of immersing =with= water.”

Theodosia began to think of her pastor as she had done before his visit. He was not, after all, disposed to rest every thing on his bare word. He had the proof, and had produced it, and that, too, just as she desired, from the Book itself. Still there was a difficulty. If John did not immerse, why did he baptize in the river? Why did Jesus, after he was baptized, come up out of the water?

These were insuperable difficulties, but she knew not how to present them without seeming wiser than her teacher.

Mr. Johnson, seemingly satisfied with the victory he had won, was about to take his leave, although it was yet early, promising to call again soon, and show that there was no instance of immersion as baptism recorded in the whole New Testament.

“Not only is it true,” said he, “that John did not immerse, but there is no recognition of immersion as baptism in the Book. Neither before the death of Christ, nor afterward, did the disciples ever dip the baptized person in the water.”

“Please stop a minute longer,” said Mr. Percy. “While we are on John’s baptism, I want to ask a single question. If John did not immerse, why did he baptize in the river? If Jesus was not immersed, how does it happen that he had been in the water? If Philip did not immerse the Ethiopian Eunuch, for what reason did they go down both of them into the water, before the baptism, and come up out of it after it was done? Nobody in these days goes down into the water to baptize unless he is a Baptist.”

“They did not go into the water, then,” replied Mr. Johnson, “any more than we Presbyterians do now. There is no proof that John, or Jesus, or Philip, or the Eunuch, ever went into the water at all.”

“How can that be,” asked Theodosia, “when the Scripture says expressly that they were baptized ‘in the river of Jordan,’ and that Jesus ‘came up out of the water,’ and that both Philip and the Eunuch ‘went down into the water,’ and ‘came up out of the water?’”

“I know it reads so in our version,” said the pastor, “but in the original it reads near or at the river, not in it. And down to the water, not into it, and up from the water, not out of it.”

“Were the translators of our version Baptists?” asked Mr. Percy.

“No, sir. It is well known that they were of the Church of England.”

“Had they any motive to favor the cause of the Baptists?”

“Nome at all, that I can conceive of.”

“How, then, did they come to make such blundering work?” “I cannot tell; but if they had known that the Baptists would make such a handle of these little words ‘in, and out of,’ I have no doubt they would have been more cautious. I hope now, Miss Theodosia, that your mind is relieved. I will try to see you again to-morrow, when we will finish the subject. For the present, I must bid you good-night.”

Theodosia accompanied him to the door, to light him out, and glancing up the street in the opposite direction to that which he took, she discovered Edwin and Mr. Courtney returning from an evening recitation, and could not resist the desire to hear what the teacher might have to say about baptizing with the water at the bank of the river. She accordingly waited till he came by, and invited him in.

“Well, Courtney,” said Mr. Percy, as he entered the parlor, “we have got you in a tight place now.”

“Why? what has happened? Any thing wonderful? You look as though you thought so.”

“Yes, sir. The truth is, Mr. Johnson did have some strong reasons, and he has brought them out on us to-night. He has in fact proved what he said, and what you seemed to think impossible; that John’s baptism was not immersion, and that the Saviour never went into the water at all, but was sprinkled on the bank.”

“Well, how did he make all that out?”

“From the testimony of John himself. John says that he baptized not in but with water. It is easy to conceive of sprinkling with water, but no one ever heard of immersing with water.”

“Is that all?”

“Yes, that is the substance of the argument.”

“Is it possible,” said Mr. Courtney, “that a minister of Jesus Christ can take such liberties with the Word of God!”

“What do you mean? Mr. Courtney. Is it not all so?” asked Theodosia, in alarm, for she felt that if her pastor had deceived her, even in this point, she could never trust the word of any one again upon this subject.

“Mr. Percy,” said Mr. Courtney, “can you read Greek? But never mind, Edwin shall set us right.”

“I can read a little, and, when in practice, could do as well as most of our graduates,” said Mr. Percy.

“Well, then, you can judge if I attempt to deceive you. Now, what will you say if you find that John’s assertion, so often repeated, reads in the Greek Testament, in every instance, I baptize you ‘in’ water, never ‘with,’ in a single case? What will you say if you read, not only that Christ was baptized ‘in’ Jordan, but ‘into’ the river of Jordan?”

“Why, I will say that you have gained a victory over all the doubts and difficulties which remained in my mind, and I will be convinced that John immersed, and that Jesus was immersed by him in Jordan.”

“And I,” said Theodosia, “will be convinced that theologians are the strangest people in the world.”

“Say rather, Presbyterian or Pedobaptist theologians, Miss Ernest, for the Baptists do not have to bear up and twist about under such a load of error and inconsistency, and can consequently afford to talk, right out, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. They can afford to take the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible, with every word translated into plain English, and abide by its decisions. They shun on investigation, avoid no controversy, and have no need to change or keep concealed one single word of the holy record. But let us to our task, for it is growing late. Edwin, have you your Greek Testament here?”

“Yes, sir; and my Lexicon and Grammar.”

“Please bring them in.”

“Edwin, can you tell us what is the primary and ordinary meaning of the Greek preposition ‘en’?”

“It means in, sir; or within, with the idea of rest in a place.” (See Bullion’s Greek Grammar, p. 170.)

“What is the difference between en and eis?”

“Eis signifies motion from without to within. En corresponds to the English preposition in—eis corresponds to the English into.”

“I asked those questions, Mr. Percy, not on your account, but to satisfy Miss Ernest. You are perfectly aware (as every school-boy who has gotten through his Greek Grammar must be) of the correctness of Edwin’s answers.

“Now be kind enough to take the Greek Testament, and find John i. 26—‘I baptize with water.’ How does it read?”

“It reads, ‘baptizo en udati,’ in water, true enough.”

“And so you will find it in every place. See the 31st verse, ‘en’ again; so in the 33d, and every place where this expression, which your pastor so much relies upon, can be found.

“In any other Greek book, any school-boy would, without hesitation, translate it, ‘I immerse you in water.’ ‘I am come immersing in water,’ etc. But now, if you will turn to Mark i. 9, you will find that the preposition is not ‘en,’ but ‘eis.’ So that Jesus is said to have been baptized or dipped, not merely in but (‘eis’) into the river of Jordan.

“Now these two words, en and eis, are the only words by which the Greek language could express, without circumlocution, the idea of going into, or being in a thing or place; and therefore, if neither of them says that the baptism was done in the river, I do not see how it could be said to have been done there.

“Now I grant that, very rarely, en does mean with, and that it sometimes, though very seldom, does mean at, or near; but neither of these is the primary, common, every-day use of the word. En means in, in Greek, as much as in does in English. Eis means into, in Greek, as much as into does in English.”

“But, Mr. Courtney, there must be some foundation for Mr. Johnson’s supposition, that en means with, or it would not have been so translated.”

“Very true, Miss Ernest. En does sometimes (though very rarely) mean with in the sense of the instrument—by which an action is accomplished. But when a man would found an argument on its having that meaning in every particular case, he must first prove that such is OR NECESSITY ITS MEANING IN THAT INSTANCE. If ‘En udati?’ necessarily meant with water—if that was even its common, primary meaning, as it would be naturally understood in any other book, or in connection with any other subject, then it might form the basis for an argument; but no school-boy would think of any thing else but in water, whenever he would see it; and, consequently, for a classical scholar, like your pastor, to form an argument upon ‘with,’ as the common meaning of ‘en,’ is indicative either of great carelessness, or wilful perversion of the Word of God.

“Here is a fact which will enable you to form some more definite conception of the nature of the case. Some very industrious gentleman has counted the places, and so ascertained that this little preposition ‘EN’ occurs no less than two thousand seven hundred and twenty times in the New Testament. In about twenty-five hundred of these places, it is in our version correctly rendered IN. In over twenty other places, in would better express the evident meaning of the original. In only about forty places, out of over twenty-seven hundred, does it of necessity mean with, in the sense of the instrument or material with which any thing is done. The chances, therefore, are as twenty-seven hundred to forty, that an argument based on the word ‘with’ (where it stands for the Greek word ‘en’) will lead to a false conclusion, and the chances are as twenty-seven hundred to forty that an argument based on ‘in,’ as the real meaning of the word, will lead to a true conclusion. I baptize you in water, or, if we translate both words, I immerse, or more properly, I dip you in water, is therefore the true reading.”

“But why, Mr. Courtney, should our translators have employed ‘with’ whenever ‘en’ occurs in connection with baptize?”

“Tor the same reason, Miss Ernest, that they refused to translate baptize. They were forbidden by King James to change the ‘Ecclesiastical words.’ They must not teach immersion. But if they had said baptize ‘in’ water, it would have been just as plain that there was no sprinkling or pouring in the ordinance, as though they had translated ‘baptize’ in the New Testament, in the same way that you have seen they did in the Old, in all the places where (according to Mr. Barnes) the word occurs.

“But they did not use ‘with,’ in every case, because that construction would have been, in some instances, such a monstrous perversion, that every one could see it. They did not venture to say that the people were baptized WITH the river of Jordan, confessing their sins; or that Christ was baptized WITH the Jordan; or that John was baptizing WITH the wilderness. Mark i. 4. It was only where the connection did not make the meaning clearly obvious to the unlearned, that they ventured to mystify the ordinance by the substitution of with, in the place of the common and primary meaning of the ‘en.’”

“If I do not forget,” said Mr. Percy, “with, when signifying the instrument by which any thing is done, is in the Greek language, commonly expressed by ‘dia’ construed with the genitive.”

“Yes; but even if John had said ‘dia,’ instead of ‘en,’ the pastor would have had no sufficient basis for his argument; for even ‘dia’ would have been a very slight, and very narrow, and very sandy foundation. It would only have told that it was water, and not oil, or mud, or sand, or any other instrument or material with which the baptism was performed. It would have said nothing at all about the mode of performing the act. If I say that the cloth of which my coat was made was colored with a solution of indigo, I don’t even intimate that the solution was sprinkled on it or poured on it. The cloth was dipped in it. I only mean that it was dipped in indigo, not in logwood, or madder, or any other dye-stuff. If I say that the leather of which my boots are made, was tanned with an infusion of hemlock bark, I don’t deny that it was dipped in the infusion, I only mean that it was hemlock, not black oak, or red oak, or any other kind of material that was used.”

“Oh, yes!” exclaimed Edwin, who all the time had been a most attentive, though a silent listener. “I asked old aunt Chloe, the cook, only this morning, how she would get the feathers off the chicken she was killing for dinner. ‘I will scald it,’ said she, ‘with hot water.’ And I went into the kitchen, and saw her doing it by putting it into the water. And big Joe, the butcher, when he killed our hogs last Christmas, loosened the bristles and hair with hot water, but he did it by immersion, for he dipped them several times into the barrel and then pulled them out and scraped them.”

“That will do, Edwin,” said Mr. Percy, laughing. “I see we must give it up. If you won’t give us any more illustrations, I will promise never to mention ‘with’ again, by way of argument on this subject, as long as I live; and seriously, Mr. Courtney, I feel that I have reason to be ashamed of myself for having been so easily imposed upon by this mere semblance of argument, presented with so much parade, and such an air of confidence, by our pastor, Mr. Johnson. I shall soon begin, like Miss Ernest, to lose confidence in all teachings but those of the Bible, and in all teachers but my own judgment.”

“These, sir, are your only safeguards,” replied Mr. Courtney; “but it is well to remember, that, though God’s word is infallible, our judgment may be biased by our feelings; and when we study the Word, therefore, we should pray for a heart willing to receive, and a will ready to obey all the commandments of our Heavenly Master. The difficulty with many persons is not so much that they cannot understand as they are unwilling to obey. You will, I fear, find it much easier to satisfy your mind that immersion is the only scriptural baptism, than to abandon your church connections, and submit to be baptized according to the commandment of Jesus Christ. But I must bid you good-night. It is time I was at home.”

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

THE FOURTH NIGHT’S STUDY

Which begins in the day, and includes, among other strange things, the pastor’s proof that immersion was not practiced by the apostles any more than it had been by John.

The baptism of the Holy Ghost.

The baptism of the three thousand.

Fourth Night’s Study.

On the following day, the Rev. Mr. Johnson called at Mrs. Ernest’s cottage soon after dinner. Mrs. E. was delighted with this evident token of his interest in her daughter’s welfare. She had now given up all hope of inducing her to abandon the investigation; and was only anxious to get through with it as soon as possible. Much as she had disliked Mr. Courtney’s remarks at the time of his first call, she made no objection to the second visit; and even went so far as to ask her daughter why she did not invite some of the Baptists to meet Mr. Johnson face to face, when she would see what would become of all their hard sayings about the “Ministers of our church.”

“That little Baptist pedagogue,” said she, “would no more dare to say such things as he did about Dr. Barnes, and Dr. Chalmers, and Dr. McKnight, in the presence of Mr. Johnson, than he would to put his head into the lion’s mouth. He finds that he can twist you and Mr. Percy about his thumb just as he pleases, but let him come where Mr. Johnson is, or any body else who has studied this subject, and I’ll warrant you he will be as mute as a mouse.”

“Well, Miss Theodosia,” said the pastor, as soon as the young lady came in, and had exchanged with him the compliments of the morning, “I proved to you last evening, I trust beyond the shadow of a doubt, that John’s baptism was not immersion. And now, as I have an hour to spare, I will, if you can give me your attention, show you that we have quite as good ground for believing that the Apostles did not immerse any more than John did; and that in fact there was never any such a thing as even a single instance of immersion as baptism mentioned in the sacred Scriptures.”

(Theodosia was about to interrupt him, and ask some further explanation concerning the Greek preposition “en,” and the English preposition “with;” but remembering the “Book of Divinity,” and thinking it safer not to seem “wiser than her teacher,” she continued silent. He went on, therefore, in blissful ignorance of the utter overthrow of all the beautiful edifice which he had so ingeniously erected the night before.)

“Now be kind enough to get your Bible, and turn to Acts i. 5.”

“Yes, yes, Mr. Johnson,” said the mother, “that is the way to study the subject. Show it to her in the Bible itself, for she declares she won’t believe a single word but what she can see in the Bible with her own eyes.”

“Well, then, here it is; just read it, my child.”

Theodosia read, “For John indeed baptized with water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost, not many days hence.” And as she read, she could not help giving the passage, in her mind, the true rendering, “John indeed immersed you in water,” etc.

“You see from this,” resumed the pastor, “that not only John himself said that he baptized with water, but that Jesus Christ also declared the same thing. But that is not the point to which I wish now to direct your attention. We settled that point yesterday. (Yes! thought Theodosia, but it did not continue settled.) What I want you to notice now is the prophetic declaration in this text: ‘Ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.’ Now turn to the second chapter, and you will see the fulfilment of this prediction. When the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place, and then and there they received this baptism of the Holy Spirit. Now tell me how this baptism was performed. Just read the 17th verse and you will see. ‘And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, that I will pour out of my spirit,’ etc. And now read the 33d verse: ‘Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear.’ Here then you see that the influences of the Spirit are called a baptism, and they are distinctly said to be ‘poured out,’ and to be ‘shed forth.’ And from this it follows, as a matter of course, that baptism is pouring and shedding forth or sprinkling. I do not see how it is possible for any thing to be clearer or more convincing than this.”

“Certainly,” exclaimed Mrs. Ernest, the mother; “that must convince any body in the world. I should like to know what the schoolmaster could say to that. I do wish, Mr. Johnson, you would preach a sermon on this subject, and just set the matter at rest.”

“Pardon me, Mr. Johnson,” said Theodosia, “if this argument does not appear so conclusive to me as it seems to you. I was reading this very chapter this morning, and the same difficulty came into my mind then which you have presented now. It was on my mind when I engaged in prayer, and it was not until nearly dinner time that I was able to see clearly how it could be that baptism is immersion, and yet the Spirit be said to be poured out in this most remarkable baptism. Now it is all perfectly plain.”

“Well, Miss Ernest, will you please favor us with your explanations?”

“Certainly,” she replied. “Mr. Barnes, in his Notes on Matthew xx. 29, explains baptism in suffering and distress, to be an overwhelming of the soul with great and intense afflictions. ‘Are you able,’ he says, ‘to be plunged deep in afflictions, and to have sorrows cover you like water, and to be sunk beneath calamities as a flood?’ Now in this there is no literal immersion, but the sorrow is represented as covering and swallowing up the mind as water does the body in the act of baptism. It is a metaphorical but not a real baptism.

“So in the case before us. As Christ had told James and John that they should be immersed or overwhelmed by sufferings and sorrows, so now he tells all the disciples that they shall in a few days be immersed or overwhelmed by the influences of the Holy Spirit. That these influences should cover, overpower, and swallow up their minds, as the water in baptism did their bodies. It is no more a literal baptism than the baptism of suffering in Matthew. It is a metaphor; and the allusion is not to the act done in baptism, so much as to the result; that is, the swallowing up and overwhelming of their minds by the flood of life, and light, and joy, and heavenly influence which that day came upon their souls.”

If the mother was surprised at the temerity of her daughter in venturing to differ from her pastor (to her a most unheard-of event), yet her maternal pride was so much gratified by the force and beauty of her reasoning, that she could not be angry, and there was even a smile—a very slight smile of exultation, which crept along the curves of her mouth, as her daughter, with animated face, and a new and strange light in her soul illumining her eyes, entered into the discussion; and from this time forth (though she was determined never to be convinced that her pastor was or could be wrong) she could not help feeling secretly gratified whenever her daughter had the best of the argument; and she inwardly enjoyed the evident amazement and perplexity depicted in the Rev. Mr. Johnson’s face.

He was amazed, that one of the “baptized children of his church” should have ventured not only to differ from his opinions, so forcibly expressed, but even to reason with him out of the Scriptures. He was perplexed, because he could not, for the moment, see what reply he could successfully make.

“Surely, Mr. Johnson,” resumed the young lady, after a moment’s pause, “you do not imagine that there was in this Pentecostal baptism any real, actual, literal pouring out of the Spirit, like water is poured out of a pitcher, or any literal sprinkling of the Spirit, as the minister sprinkles the water off from the ends of his fingers?”

“It does not matter at all,” he replied, “whether it was literal or figurative, actual or metaphorical, the conclusion must be the same in any case. There is here clearly a baptism, a scriptural baptism; a baptism, too, of the Gospel dispensation; and this baptism was performed by pouring. Jesus Christ prophetically foretold that they should be baptized with the Holy Ghost; and when the prophecy was fulfilled, Peter says expressly that the Holy Ghost was poured out.”

“But he does not say, Mr. Johnson, that the pouring out was the baptism. The Holy Spirit cannot be literally poured out, or sprinkled out, nor could the disciples be literally immersed in him, any more than they had already been; for he is, and always was, everywhere present, and had always surrounded them on every side. It was clearly impossible, therefore, that there could be any literal baptism, in any sense of the word, by sprinkling, pouring, or immersion. It was not the third-person of the trinity, the Divine Spirit, that was poured out and shed forth, but the miraculous and wonderful influences of the spirit, operating on the hearts and minds of the disciples and others. And if these influences were so powerful, and so universal, as to surround and overpower the minds of the Apostles, they might most beautifully and appropriately be said to be immersed in them. The baptism of the spirit is a soul baptism, not a baptism of the body; and the minds of the disciples are represented by Christ as about to be taken so completely into the control and direction of the Holy Spirit, that they would, as it were, be immersed in it and swallowed up by it. Such a baptism actually did occur. The minds of the disciples were thus overwhelmed and swallowed up by the wonderful influences of the Spirit of God; and this is what, it seems to me, was intended by Jesus, when he said they would be immersed in the Holy Ghost.”

“Well, as to that,” rejoined the mother (whose heart had begun already to follow her daughter), “I can see that their bodies were immersed too, as well as their souls, for there came a sound as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting; and of course it covered them all up, and entirely surrounded them, and they were in this way immersed in it.”

“If the pouring,” resumed Theodosia, encouraged by this open expression of her mother’s approval, “if the pouring had any thing to do with the baptism at all, it was only by way of preparation; for as water might be poured into a vessel preparatory to immersing any object or person in it, so the preparation of the Holy Spirit for these wonderful influences might be here called his pouring out, as such preparation is sometimes called a coming down, or an entering into, or a springing up.”

“I am ready to admit,” said the pastor, “that these Pentecostal influences were called a baptism by Jesus Christ only in a figure. I hope neither of you think me so silly as to be capable of believing that the personal substance (if I may speak so) of the Holy Spirit could be literally poured out or sprinkled. But while it is true that this baptism was a figure, it is equally true that our baptism is a figure also. It is designed to exhibit in an emblematical manner the cleansing and purifying influences of the Holy Spirit in our hearts; how very beautiful and appropriate is it, therefore, as the Holy Spirit is represented as being figuratively poured out, in this baptism, that the water with represents his influences should be actually poured out on us when we are baptized.”

“It might indeed,” said Theodosia, “have been a very beautiful and appropriate emblem, and had our Saviour thought as highly of it as you do, HE probably would have appointed it. But HE seems to have preferred immersion in water; and this, while it may signify the cleansing of the Holy Spirit, equally well, or better than the other, signifies also our death and burial to sin, and our living again to righteousness; and it is thus that Paul explains it when he says, ‘we are buried with him by baptism into death, that as Christ was raised from the dead, so we should walk in newness of life.’ It serves also to remind us of the burial and resurrection of Jesus, and prefigures also our own coming death, burial, and resurrection.”

“What Baptist book have you been reading to learn all that?”

“I found it, Mr. Johnson, in a Presbyterian book; in the Notes of Dr. James McKnight on the 6th of Romans. I have never read any Baptist book in my life, unless (as I greatly suspect) the Bible is a Baptist book.”

“I fear—I greatly fear, my child,” rejoined the pastor, “that you are running into very serious and alarming errors. I have exhorted you, and reasoned with you, but I fear my labors have been almost in vain. And now, before I take my leave, I feel it my duty solemnly to warn you before God, to take heed where you are going. I should be greatly pained, if we should find it necessary to expel you from the church.”

“Expel me from the church! Why, Mr. Johnson, what do you mean? Have I been guilty of any improper conduct? What have I done?”

“Nothing as yet, my child. I am happy to say, you have always been a faithful and consistent communicant since you first approached the table of the Lord. But now I find you growing wayward and self-willed, whereas, the Scripture says, ‘be not high-minded, but fear—and be in subjection to those who have the rule over you in the Lord.’ As yet, you have only imbibed some false and injurious notions on the subject of one of the ordinances of the church. So far, this has not led you to any overt act of evil which could subject you to the discipline of the church, but if you persevere in this way, and especially, if by your conduct and conversation you lead others to distrust the purity of our doctrines, the propriety of our practice, and validity of our ordinances, it will become our painful duty to deal with you as a disturber of the peace and unity of the church.”

The pastor uttered this significant warning with all due solemnity of countenance and impressiveness of manner, but it did not have the effect upon the young lady which he had expected. A week before this time she would have heard it with very different emotions. Now she had not only learned to fear God rather than man, but she had, upon her bended knees, solemnly resolved before her Maker and Redeemer that, in regard to this subject, she would both learn and do her whole duty, whatever it might cost her.

This was indeed an unexpected, and, to her sensitive spirit, a most terrible test of the sincerity and firmness of that resolution, but it did not cause her to waver even for one moment.

She did, indeed, turn deathly pale. Her chin quivered, and the light for a moment went out in her eye. It was but for a moment, however, and before he had completed the speech, the blood had come back to her face, and her eyes were suffused with tears, which, however, did not overflow; and perfect collectedness of mind and calmness of manner, though with a scarcely perceptible tremulousness of voice, she mildly replied:

“If it was your purpose, Mr. Johnson, to deter me from making a conscientious and complete investigation of this subject, and then governing my conduct by the written word of God, I beg you will remember that you have yourself instructed me that I ought to obey God rather than man—and this, God helping me, I mean to do, whatever may be the consequences to me or others.”

“No, no, my child, you do not understand me. I desire you should be governed by the word of God; but I would have you remember that God has given you teachers to help you to a true understanding of his word. It is for this purpose that he has appointed us his ministers, to guide the young, instruct the ignorant, and make known to all what are the teachings of that word.”

“But what if our ministers should chance to disagree? Am I to remain all my life in doubt, or take the matter into my own hands and decide for myself? Will the ministers answer for me in the day of judgment? You tell me, Mr. Johnson, that Jesus Christ was sprinkled, but James McKnight, another eminent minister of our own church, a Doctor of Divinity, and for twenty years the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian church in the country where he lived, tells me ‘that Jesus submitted to be baptized, that is, to be put under the water and taken out again by John;’ and Dr. Chalmers, another most eminent minister of our church, tells me ‘that the meaning of the word baptism is immersion;’ Martin Luther, the great reformer, says expressly, that it was immersion which was, ‘without doubt, instituted by Christ;’ and John Calvin, the father and founder of our Presbyterian church, distinctly states that ‘the word baptize signifies to immerse, and the rite of immersion was practiced by the ancient church!’”

“Yes, my child, but then do not all these great and good men, at the same time assure you that it is a matter of no importance which way the rite is performed?”

“They do, indeed; but that is only their own private or individual opinion. They don’t even pretend that the word of God teaches that it is of no consequence whether we do what Christ commanded or not. I cannot think, like Dr. Chalmers, that it is a ‘matter of indifferency,’ or like Calvin, that ‘it is of no consequence at all.’ I dare not set aside the commandments of Christ for the doctrines of men; and if you will pardon me for saying it, I do not see how any minister of Jesus Christ can dare to teach such sentiments. If Jesus Christ commanded us to believe and be immersed, I surely did not obey that command by being sprinkled.

“Pardon me, Mr. Johnson, for talking so plainly, but you have driven me to it. You promised, this evening, to show me, out of the Scriptures, that the baptism of the Gospel dispensation was sprinkling, and all you have done was to show me where the Holy Ghost was, by a figure of speech, said to be poured out on the day of Pentecost, and where Christ had prophetically declared that they should, in some sense, that day he metaphorically immersed in the Holy Spirit—for you do not pretend that it was more than a mystical and figurative baptism which the Saviour foretold. You did not, and you cannot prove, that this prophecy referred to the preparatory ‘pouring out’ any more than to any of the wonderful influences that follow the outpouring.

“Now I had learned from ministers of our own church, from Calvin and Chalmers, and as directed by Mr. Barnes, from the word of God itself, that the meaning of the word is a dipping or immersion. I knew that when Jesus was baptized it was done in the river, as immersions are now performed. And that when the Eunuch was baptized they went down into the water, and when the solemn rite was done, they came up out of the water, just as they do in immersions now. I knew that Paul called our baptism a burial. And that our own ministers, as Chalmers and McKnight, explained this as an allusion to the custom of the first Church, of baptizing by immersion, and because, in the face of all this visible and tangible evidence that the real and literal baptism submitted to, and commanded by Christ, and practiced by the apostles in the first church, was immersion, I could not, on the authority of a mere figure of speech, and that of doubtful application, believe it to have been pouring, you tell me I am wayward and self-willed, and intimate that I may expect soon to be dealt with as a disturber of the peace and unity of the church.”

“I think, Mr. Johnson,” said the mother, “that you were a little too hard on Theodosia about that. I never could myself see much force in these figures of speech or metaphors as Theodosia calls them.”

“Why, mother,” resumed the young lady, “if Mr. Johnson will let me reason in the same way that he does, I will prove to him that the poor little boy of whom we were reading this morning, that was drowned in the river, was actually drowned on dry land by a few drops of water sprinkled on his face.”

“I don’t see how, my daughter; but here is the paper containing the account of the accident. I would like to hear you try.”

“‘MELANCHOLY ACCIDENT.

“‘It is our painful duty to announce that little Charlie Freeman, a sprightly lad about nine years old, of a most lovely disposition and extraordinary promise, the only son of his mother, and she a widow, was accidentally drowned this morning in the Cumberland river. We were one of those who recovered the body and bore it to the dwelling of the now doubly-bereaved mother. We cannot describe the sorrow with which this sad event has filled our hearts. We have just left the melancholy scene, where the heart-broken mother is sitting in the midst of a large circle of friends who are all drowned in tears.’

“Now, Mr. Johnson tells me that the disciples, on the day of Pentecost, were figuratively or metaphorically baptized by pouring, and if so, then he asks me to believe that Jesus Christ must have been literally and actually baptized in the same way, that is, by pouring, in the river Jordan. This is the whole argument. Now I say here was a large circle of this poor lady’s friends who were metaphorically said to be drowned in a little water running down their faces out of their own eyes; and if so, then the dear little boy must have been actually and literally drowned by a few drops of water running down his face.”

“But you forget,” said the pastor, “that the lad was said to be drowned in the river.”

“Not at all,” she replied, “for so also Jesus Christ is said to have been baptized in the river; but you try to persuade me that he only stood upon the bank, and John took up some of the water of the river, and sprinkled it on his face. And some of our writers tell me that he might have gone a few steps into the water, and there, standing in the river, John took up a little water and poured it on his head out of a muscle shell, or a cup. So I will grant that this poor little lad may have gone to the bank of the river, and that some of the water of the river was thus splashed up into his face; or that he waded in a little way, and some other boy did the same, took up some water with his hand, and threw it in his face—but that he must have been drowned by a little water running over his face, is perfectly self-evident, for this is the only way in which the large circle of his mother’s friends could have been drowned.”

“I see,” rejoined the pastor, “that your mind is already made up, and it is scarcely worth while to argue the subject with you any further. You have determined that you will not be convinced. But before I leave you to-day, I will suggest one more point for your consideration, which, if you are not already hardened in unbelief, can hardly fail to satisfy you.”

“Oh no, Mr. Johnson, I am ready and anxious to be convinced. What have I to gain by believing that immersion is the only baptism? You have already intimated what I may expect from you and from the church which I have loved so dearly. I fear I have already lost in part the affection of my precious mother”—and her eyes filled with tears.

“No, my daughter,” said Mrs. Ernest, “you have not lost my love, and I will love you still, do what you may. I know you are a dear, good, conscientious child, and would not for the world do what you did not believe to be right. If you leave us, my child, I can’t help mourning over you, but I will love you still. But do listen to Mr. Johnson, my darling, and see if he can’t convince you.”

“Certainly, mother if Mr. Johnson will show me one single place in the Word of God where baptism is called sprinkling or pouring (not in the way of a metaphor or a figure, but literally and plainly), I will be content. If he will show one single instance in which baptism is plainly said to have been done by sprinkling or pouring—not dimly and metaphorically, as those good ladies were drowned in tears, but actually and really, as the dear child was drowned in the river—I will ask for nothing more. But till he can show it show me in the Bible, I can’t believe that it is there.”

“As to that,” said the pastor, “I can show you sprinkling and pouring oftener than I can immersion, for there is no such word as immersion used in the whole book.”

“I know,” said she, “that sprinkling and pouring are mentioned often enough, but not as baptism; what I want is the place where they are literally said to be actual baptism. I know that immerse does not occur in our version, because dip is generally used where the word baptize occurs; but if baptism means immersion, as Calvin, McKnight, Chalmers, and others of our ministers say it does, and as the lexicons of the Greek language say it does, then immerse occurs, in fact, every time baptize occurs.”

“Well, well, I see you are not to be easily satisfied on this point; and I have no more time to spare to-day. I was about to direct your attention to another argument in this same chapter, which will, I trust, set your mind at rest forever.

“You see here that there were no less than three thousand souls converted by Peter’s sermon; and all this vast multitude were added to the church that very day. Now it is clearly impossible that they could have been baptized by immersion, and, therefore, it must have been done by sprinkling or pouring; and if so, then sprinkling and pouring must be the Gospel baptism. I consider this argument entirely conclusive. I want you to examine the record of the transaction carefully and candidly, and if you can believe that these three thousand people were all immersed, you can believe almost any thing. I will call again next week, and you can tell me what you think of it.”

The Rev. Mr. Johnson, as he was saying this, arose and took up his hat to depart.

“Please tell me one thing before you go,” said Theodosia. “You said it was impossible that these three thousand persons could have been immersed. Please tell me why.”

“For two good and sufficient reasons,” he replied. “In the first place, there was not water enough; and, in the second place, there was not time enough. And either one of these circumstances was clearly sufficient to render immersion impossible. We will not discuss the subject any farther at present. Examine it at your leisure, and I trust, when I see you again, I will find your mind entirely satisfied. For the present, I must bid you good evening.”

Mr. Johnson walked home, thinking what strange perversity it was in a young girl to venture to form an independent opinion on a theological subject, and to question the infallibility of his reiterated assertions, and even to undertake to argue the matter with her pastor.

The young lady took her Bible, and began to examine again the passages to which the pastor had referred in their conversation; but before she had made much progress, her mother required her assistance in some household duties, which occupied her attention till after supper.

Scarcely was supper over, and the table cleared away, when who should come in but her UNCLE JONES.

“Well, Theo.,” said he, in his unceremonious way, “I am told that I am about to lose my niece, and that you are on the point of turning Baptist.”

“Oh, uncle, don’t say that! I shall not be lost to you or any of those I love, even though I should feel it my duty to be baptized. I will still be your own niece, and love you as well as ever.”

“You will! Then your mind is about made up on the subject, I suppose?”

“Very nearly, uncle. I have some other points yet to examine, which were suggested by pastor Johnson this afternoon, and unless I find them more—”

“Some other points to examine! Suggested by the pastor! Do you, then, undertake to differ with your pastor; and talk about deciding for yourself in regard to one of the most difficult and complicated questions in theology?”

“Oh, please, uncle, don’t be angry; and don’t laugh at me. I know I am only a poor simple girl, but I am accountable only to God, and must be decided by my own understanding of his Word. What I can’t find in the Scripture for myself, I can’t be sure is there. If I don’t examine for myself, how can I know any thing about it?”

“Can’t you take your pastor’s word for it?”

“Yes, if he will show me a ‘thus saith the Lord,’ as his authority.”

“But can’t you take it for granted that he has such authority, without his pointing to the chapter and the verse?”

“It is God’s Word, uncle, that I must obey, not man’s. If it is in the Book, he can’t object to showing me where it is. I want to see it for myself. The Apostle praised the Bereans, not because they took Paul’s word for all he said, but because ‘they searched the Scriptures’ for themselves ‘to see whether these things were so.’”

“But what if you come to a different conclusion from the pastor? Do you think it will be wise to trust your own judgment, rather than that of the many great, and good, and learned men of our church, who have examined this subject more thoroughly, and under much more favorable circumstances, than you can hope to do? Do you think it will be indicative of the humility required by the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for a simple girl not yet out of her teens, and without any theological education, to set up her own opinions against those of the wisest and best men of the age?”

“No, uncle, I don’t intend to set up my opinions against those of the great and good men you speak of. But I find that others, equally great and good men, after a careful examination of the subject, have come to a different conclusion; and that some of these same Doctors of Divinity in our church, while they practice one thing, and instruct us to do it, yet expressly declare that it was another and a very different thing which Christ commanded and the first Christians practiced. Now ‘when the doctors disagree,’ not only with each other, but with themselves, what is a poor, simple girl like me to do? I can’t study theology, but I can study the Bible. If sprinkling, as baptism, is there, I can see it. Pastor Johnson says it is there; other learned theologians say it is not. What can I do? I say to each of them, if sprinkling is commanded, show me where; if pouring is commanded, point out the place; if dipping is commanded, let me see it for myself. If I can’t find it, and you can’t show it to me, I won’t believe it’s in the book at all. I hope, uncle, you don’t really think that I am proud or egotistical; I only want to know just what my Saviour requires. I will believe any thing, and do any thing, if you will only show me that he has said it or commanded it.”

“No, my dear child, I don’t think you are egotistical or proud. I admire your independence, and I wish every person, in every place, would in the same way search the Scriptures, and understand perfectly the grounds on which their faith and practice rests. It is not only the privilege, but the duty of every person, to examine and decide for themselves personally, what the Word of God requires. Religion is a personal thing. It requires personal obedience—and that, too, of the heart, which cannot be rendered without some degree of personal understanding of the Word. If you trust your conscience in any man’s keeping, you place yourself in a dangerous condition. I am rejoiced to see you studying this subject for yourself. And indeed I was only trying your courage a little, when I affected to be surprised at your doing so. But seriously, my dear Theo., why did you not come to your uncle with your difficulties?”

“I did intend to consult you, uncle, before my final decision, but the question came up so unexpectedly, and our investigation has gone on so rapidly, that I have not yet had any very convenient opportunity; and besides, uncle, to tell the truth, I was afraid you would either be angry, or laugh at me.”

“You were! Well, then, I will disappoint you, for so far from laughing at you, I consider it a very serious and most important question; and instead of being angry with you, it will give me great pleasure to assist you in the investigation; and if I can’t show you the sprinkling baptism in the Bible, I will be immersed myself. I will not be like those Doctors of Divinity you spoke of, who say one thing and practice another. If Jesus Christ did not command sprinkling, I for one will neither teach nor practice it. I have felt for some time that it was my own duty to investigate this subject, and I will do it now—and with your assistance.”

“Oh, uncle, don’t talk of my assistance. I am but an ignorant, though anxious inquirer after the truth, and am obliged to call for help on others at every step. If I should speak of rendering assistance to you, I should indeed deserve to be called proud and egotistical.”

“Well, well; any way, my child. If you won’t help me, I will help you. Tell me just how far you have got along, what discoveries you have made, and where you are standing now—and then we will consider of the rest.”

“It will be too long a story, uncle, to go over all the road that I have traveled. But I have learned that there is ‘one Lord, one faith, and ONE BAPTISM.’ I have been inquiring whether that baptism is sprinkling, or pouring, or dipping. I have discovered that baptize, as it is used in the New Testament, is a Greek word, and must be understood as those who read and spoke the Greek language in our Saviour’s time would understand it. Dr. Albert Barnes told me I could learn this by examining the fifteen places where, he says, the word occurs in the Old Testament. I hunted out each place, and found it meant ‘to dip.’ I looked in Webster’s dictionary, and found that to dip in water, was to plunge an object into the fluid and instantly take it out again—the very act which the Baptists perform when they baptize. I got Edwin to look in his Greek Lexicon, and he found that the word had the same meaning there—that baptism was immersion. I read McKnight and Chalmers on the 6th of Romans, and found that these great Doctors of Divinity in the Presbyterian church agreed in declaring the same thing; and further, that it was immersion that was practiced by the first church. I am told that Luther, and Calvin, and Doddridge, and a great many others of the most eminent of our theologians, teach the same things. And I have not yet found in the Word of God a single passage which leads me to any different conclusion. Unless, therefore, I should find, as pastor Johnson assures me I shall, that it was clearly impossible to immerse the three thousand that were added to the church on the day of Pentecost, I must be convinced.”

“On what ground does your pastor think it impossible?”

“He says there was neither water enough, nor time enough.”

“Well, how can you prove that there was?”

“It don’t seem to me, uncle, that it is necessary that I should be able to prove it in any other way than by the mere statement of the Scripture that they were baptized; for if the word baptize means to immerse, then the book says they were immersed; and if they were immersed, there must have been time enough, and water enough, whether I can prove it or not. If I do not believe this, I make God a liar.”

“But what if it can be clearly shown that there was not water enough, or time enough; then would it not be more reasonable to suppose the word has some other meaning, than to believe the record to be false?”

“Perhaps it would, but the pastor only said it. He did not try to prove it. Nor do I see how it would be possible now to determine how much water there was in Jerusalem eighteen hundred years ago, even if we knew the exact number of gallons it would require to immerse three thousand people. I remember that we read in 2 Kings xviii. 17, about the ‘upper pool,’ and in 2 Kings xx. 20, about the ‘pool’ that Hezekiah made, and in Nehemiah about another ‘fountain’ and ‘pool,’ and in Isaiah xxii. 9, about the ‘waters of the lower pool,’ and in John v. 2, about the ‘pool of Bethesda’ that had five porches, and John ix. 7, about the ‘pool of Siloam.’”

“I think the pastor will be obliged to give it up, Theo., so far as the want of water is concerned; for in addition to this testimony from the Scripture, we have that of many distinguished travelers, who were, like ourselves, opposed to the Baptists; and yet all agree that Jerusalem was, and is, one of the best watered cities on the globe. Dr. Robinson, one of these travelers, speaks of ‘immense cisterns now, and anciently, existing within the area of the Temple, supplied partly from rain water, and partly by the aqueduct,’ and tells us also that ‘almost every private house had a cistern in it,’ p. 480. Speaking of the reservoirs, he says, p. 483—‘With such reservoirs, Jerusalem was abundantly supplied, to say nothing of the immense pools of Solomon, beyond Bethlehem, which were no doubt constructed for the benefit of the Holy City.’

“‘There are,’ he says, ‘on the north side of the city, outside the walls, two very large reservoirs, one of which is over three hundred feet long and more than two hundred feet wide, and the other nearly six hundred feet long by over two hundred and fifty feet wide;’ and besides these he mentions the pool of Siloam and two others as being without the walls. Within the walls he mentions ‘the pool of Bathsheba,’ ‘the pool of Hezekiah,’ and ‘the pool of Bethesda.’ The pool of Hezekiah he says was about two hundred and forty feet long by about one hundred and forty-four feet broad; the pool of Bethesda three hundred and sixty feet long by one hundred and thirty feet wide; and besides these he mentions an aqueduct and numerous other fountains. (Rob. Resh. in Pal. pp. 480 to 516.)

“But we might have known, without any of this testimony, that a city to which the whole male population of a vast and fertile country were required to resort several times a year, and whose religious ceremonial required such frequent ablutions as did that of the Jews at the time of Christ, would be abundantly furnished with the means of bathing, and consequently present sufficient facilities for immersion. Moreover, the water would not be destroyed by dipping in it; and therefore the same quantity that would suffice for one would do for a hundred. And it is evident that so far as the water is concerned, any one of these numerous pools, either in or out of the city, would have sufficed. But was there not another and more serious difficulty? These pools and fountains belonged to the Jews. The same men who hated and crucified Christ now had control of the water of the city and the suburbs, and is it probable that they would permit the disciples to use them?”

“Certainly they would,” said Theodosia, “for in consequence of the wonderful events of this day, the Scripture says that ‘fear came upon every soul,’ and that the disciples ‘did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people.’ They gave them the Temple to preach in, and it is not likely that they would refuse the pools to baptize in.”

“Surely,” said Uncle Jones, “that must remove all conceivable difficulty as to the water; but we may not find it so easy to arrange matters in regard to time. Time has always been a very unaccommodating old fellow; and a day among the Jews was only twelve hours, from six in the morning till six at night, and if we can’t get the three thousand into the water within that period, we shall be obliged to leave some or all of them out, and dispose of them in some other way.”

“Well, uncle, I don’t see why we can’t dispose of some of them in some other way, for the Scripture does not say they were all baptized that day, but only all added to the company of the disciples; and some of them may have been baptized by John or by the disciples of Jesus Christ before his death, and now only come out publicly and consorted with the Apostles; and some might have gone up to them and joined their ranks that day and have been baptized afterward. As a person is now said to have joined the Baptists when he makes a profession of religion among them, and is received by them for baptism.

“But is it by any means certain that three thousand could not all have been immersed that day? It would not be hard to tell if we knew how much time there was; how many administrators there were; and just how many each one of them could immerse.”

“Well, stop a little, Theo.; let us take up one point at a time. How many hours had they to go upon? though as to that, I don’t see why it would not take about as long to sprinkle or pour upon them, one at a time, and reverently repeat the formula, ‘I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,’ as it would to immerse them; but we will examine. What says the record? It seems that when Peter commenced his speech, it was not yet nine o’clock in the morning, which, as the Jews counted from six, would be the ‘third hour in the day.’ How long before nine it was we cannot tell. We will suppose it was just nine, and there were, consequently, only nine hours remaining, before six in the evening, which closed the day. Peter’s speech, as it is recorded, would not have occupied a quarter of an hour in its delivery; but it is said that he exhorted them with many other words; so we will suppose he spoke an hour, or we will say two hours. It would then be eleven o’clock. Now we will give them another hour to go to the water, so that it is twelve o’clock when the baptism begins. Now they must finish, you see, in six hours; so that is our limit as to time.”

“Very well, uncle, we will consider it so, though really I can’t see that Peter spoke even one hour, much less two. But now how many administrators were there?”

“This is a question,” said Uncle Jones, “about which there is some difference of opinion. There were certainly the twelve Apostles, and many think also the seventy others whom Jesus sent out two by two—who must have been present, as Luke says ‘they were all with one accord in one place.’ If so, then there were eighty-two authorized administrators. But let us, first, to obviate all difficulties, suppose there were only the twelve, who would each have just two hundred and fifty persons to immerse. So on this supposition, the question is narrowed down to this—can one man immerse two hundred and fifty persons in six hours? I have felt some little curiosity on this subject, and when I have witnessed immersions, have taken out my watch, and observed the time. It has usually required about fifteen minutes to immerse twenty persons; provided the candidates march in two by two, to the place where the administrator is standing. This allowance of time permits the work to be done without any appearance of haste, and with the coolest deliberation.

“I have been told by several Baptist ministers, whose veracity I have no reason to doubt, that they have immersed large numbers at the rate of two in every minute, or sixty in half an hour. At this rate the twelve would have finished the work of this occasion in a little over two hours—two hours and ten minutes. If they only worked half so fast, and baptized but one a minute, they had time to get through, and more than an hour and a half to spare. They could each have stopped every half hour, and rested ten minutes, and then have gotten through in time.”

“So, uncle, it is as I suspected, there is no difficulty as to time, even though only the twelve were engaged in the work; but if the seventy assisted, then how long would it take?”

“In that case, there would have been less than forty persons for each administrator, and of course it could have been done in less than half an hour.”

“But, uncle, is it certain that any one besides the twelve were authorized to baptize?”

“Surely, Theo., others must have been, for it is evident that Aquila, Acts xviii. 2, and Apollos, Acts xviii. 24, and Paul himself, Acts ix. 18, were baptized by others than the twelve. And Peter, when he had preached the Word to the household of Cornelius, did not baptize them himself, but directed it to be done by some one else—Acts x. 14. But whether this baptism was performed by the twelve, or by the twelve assisted by the seventy, does not now concern us, as we find there was no want of time in either case. And so you have found nothing in this case to change your opinion concerning the meaning of the word baptize. Now have you any other difficulties in, your way?”

“Not that I know of now, uncle. The case seems to me to be perfectly plain. But perhaps you can suggest some other source of information which I have not yet explored.”

“Indeed, my dear niece, I am myself in great perplexity upon this very question. I have been some time engaged in its investigation; much longer than you have, and have been compelled to come to about the same conclusions with yourself—though this is the first time I have ever mentioned it.”

“Oh, uncle, is it possible? Oh, if I had only known this four days ago.”

“Oh, yes. If you had known it, I suppose you would have been quoting Uncle Jones as high authority for your heretical opinions. But I beg you will not mention this, even to your mother, until I shall have finally decided the case. But tell me now, Theo., what do you intend to do?”

“There is only one thing, uncle, that I can do. I must obey my Saviour—I must be baptized. There is only one reflection that still casts a shade of doubt across my mind, and that is this: if it was immersion that Christ commanded, and the Apostles and first Christians practiced, how has it so universally been set aside, and sprinkling substituted in its place?”

“A very important point is that, my dear niece, and I hope you will come to no final conclusion till you have investigated thoroughly the whole subject in all its bearings. And be assured, if I can in any way assist you, I will be most happy to do so. But your friend, Mr. Courtney, is much more familiar with these subjects than I am. Suppose I mention your difficulty to him, and request him to call to-morrow evening. Perhaps I may come with him.”

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