ht),(831) it is peculiar unto our Saviour
Christ, used neither by his disciples nor his apostles, either before or
after his ascension, whereunto maketh that the children being brought,
that he should pray over them, he did not pray for them, but blessed them,
that is to say, commended them to be blessed, thereby to show his divine
power. These being also yet infants, and in their swaddling clouts, as by
the word which the evangelist useth, and as by our Saviour Christ's taking
them into his arms, doth appear, being also, in all likelihood,
unbaptised. Last of all, their confirmation is a notable derogation unto
the holy sacrament of baptism, not alone in that it presumeth the sealing
of that which was sealed sufficiently by it; but also in that, both by
asseveration of words, and by speciality of the minister that giveth it,
it is even preferred unto it.

_Sect._ 5. The act of Perth about kneeling would draw some commendation to
this ceremony from those words of the psalm, "O come let us worship and
bow down, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker," Psal. xcv. 6. Which is
as if one should argue thus: We may worship before the Lord, therefore
before a creature; we may kneel in an immediate worship of God, therefore
in a mediate; for who seeth not that the kneeling there spoken of is a
kneeling in the action of solemn praise and joyful noise of singing unto
the Lord? I wish you, my masters, more sober spirits, that ye may fear to
take God's name in vain, even his word which he hath magnified above all
his name. Dr Forbesse goeth about to warrant private baptism,(832) by
Philip's baptising the eunuch, there being no greater company present, so
far as we can gather from the narration of Luke, Acts viii.; as likewise
by Paul and Silas's baptising the jailer and all his in his own private
house, Acts xvi. Touching the first of those places, we answer, 1. How
thinks he that a man of so great authority and charge was alone in his
journey? We suppose a great man travelling in a chariot must have some
number of attendants, especially having come to a solemn worship at
Jerusalem. 2. What Philip then did, the extraordinary direction of the
Spirit guided him unto it, ver. 29, 39. As to the other place, there was,
in that time of persecution, no liberty for Christians to meet together in
temples and public places, as now there is. Wherefore the example of Paul
and Silas doth prove the lawfulness of the like deed in the like case.

_