"I should think it a high sin and treason
against heaven,if,believing that baptism signifies immersion only,I should pretend to administer it by sprinkling.Or,believing that baptism pertains to believers only,I should consider myself a criminal in the sight of God if I should give it to any but those who believe."
"Nothing is more plainly taught in the New Testament than that it is the duty of every believer in Christ to be baptized."
"I think I could as soon doubt that the diety of Christ is declared as doubt that the baptism of believers is enjoined,for the one thing appears to me as plainly revealed in Scripture as the other."
"I am informed,however,that the reason why children are baptized is that we are told in the Bible that Abraham's children were circumcised.But why were they circumcised?Because they were Israelites.I would not hesitate to baptize any Christian,though he be a babe in Christ,as soon as he knows the Lord Jesus Christ."
"As long as you give baptism to an unregenerate child,people will imagine that it must do the child good.They will ask,'If it does not do the child any good,why is it baptized?'The statement that it puts children into the covenant,or renders them members of the invisible church,is only a veiled form of the fundamental error of Baptismal Regeneration.If you keep up the ordinance,you will always have men superstitiously believing that some good comes to the baby thereby.And what is that but popery?"
"I am amazed that an unconscious babe should be made the partaker of an ordinance which,according to the plain teaching of the Scriptures,requires the conscious and complete heart-trust of the recipient.Very few,if any,would argue that infants ought to receive the Lord's Supper.But there is no more scriptural warrant for bringing them to the one ordinance than there is for bringing them to the other."
against heaven,if,believing that baptism signifies immersion only,I should pretend to administer it by sprinkling.Or,believing that baptism pertains to believers only,I should consider myself a criminal in the sight of God if I should give it to any but those who believe."
"Nothing is more plainly taught in the New Testament than that it is the duty of every believer in Christ to be baptized."
"I think I could as soon doubt that the diety of Christ is declared as doubt that the baptism of believers is enjoined,for the one thing appears to me as plainly revealed in Scripture as the other."
"I am informed,however,that the reason why children are baptized is that we are told in the Bible that Abraham's children were circumcised.But why were they circumcised?Because they were Israelites.I would not hesitate to baptize any Christian,though he be a babe in Christ,as soon as he knows the Lord Jesus Christ."
"As long as you give baptism to an unregenerate child,people will imagine that it must do the child good.They will ask,'If it does not do the child any good,why is it baptized?'The statement that it puts children into the covenant,or renders them members of the invisible church,is only a veiled form of the fundamental error of Baptismal Regeneration.If you keep up the ordinance,you will always have men superstitiously believing that some good comes to the baby thereby.And what is that but popery?"
"I am amazed that an unconscious babe should be made the partaker of an ordinance which,according to the plain teaching of the Scriptures,requires the conscious and complete heart-trust of the recipient.Very few,if any,would argue that infants ought to receive the Lord's Supper.But there is no more scriptural warrant for bringing them to the one ordinance than there is for bringing them to the other."
