tic question. When we
shall have thrown sufficient light upon it to convince the Christian
parent, that it is a duty to have little children dedicated to God in
baptism, our plan shall be fully executed. We must either admit infant
baptism, or deny that the Christian covenant includes children, and that
the parent is bound to dedicate them to God. Hence the objection brought
against infant baptism can, with equal propriety, be urged against
circumcision; for the latter is the type of the former. In baptism Christ
places Himself in true organic relations to the child, and thus opens up to
it the sources from which alone the Christian life can proceed and develop
itself.

The baptism of our children is grounded in their need of salvation at every
age and stage of development. It is also based upon the very idea of Christ
Himself; upon primitive christianity; upon the extent and compass of the
Christian covenant; and upon those vital relations which believing parents
sustain to their offspring. It might be proven from the commission given by
Christ to His disciples to "preach the gospel to every creature;" from His
language and conduct in reference to children; from the usage of the
Apostles and of the apostolic church. The idea and mission of Christ
Himself, we think, would be a sufficient argument in favor of infant
baptism. He included in His life the stage of childhood, and came to save
the child as well as the man. His own infancy and childhood are securities
for this. He entered into and passed through all the various states and
stages of man's development on earth, and thus became adapted to the wants
of every period of our life,--man's infancy as well as man's maturity.
Ireneus says, "Christ Jesus became a child to children, a youth to youth,
and a man to man." The fact, too, that the blessings of the covenant of
grace are extended to the children of believing parents, is sufficient to
prove the validity of infant baptism. Peter said on the day of Pentecost,
when he called upon his hearers to be baptized: "for the promise is to you,
and your children, and all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our
God shall call."

Thus His gospel excludes none, neither is it restricted to a certain age or
capacity. As the child, as well as the man, fell and died in the first
Adam, so the child, as well as the man, can be made alive in the second
Adam. As infants, therefore, are subjects of grace, why not subjects also
of