Vol. II, page 79: 'For to baptize in Greek is
to dip, and baptizing is dipping. Being moved by this reason I would
have those who are to be baptized to be altogether dipped in the water
as the Word doth express and as the mystery doth signify.'"

"You mentioned Cardinal Gibbons, the head of the Catholic Church in this
country," said Mr. Page. "Do the Catholics immerse?"

"Oh, no," said Mr. Sterling. "What does Cardinal Gibbons have to say?"

"In his book, 'Faith of our Fathers', page 275, he writes: 'For several
centuries after the establishment of Christianity baptism was usually
conferred by immersion, but since the twelfth century the practice of
baptism by affusion has prevailed in the Catholic Church, as this manner
is attended with less inconvenience than baptism by immersion.'"

"Well, gentlemen, I am amazed," said Mr. Sterling.

"Mr. Sterling," said Dorothy, "can it be a fact that the founders of
these denominations declare for immersion and yet the denominations
follow some other mode? Do you suppose that it is possible that these
denominations, like the Catholics, have adopted pouring because it was
more convenient?"

"That is just how the practice has come into existence," said Mr.
Walton. "Cardinal Gibbons lets the whole secret out when he states that
in the twelfth century pouring was adopted as the mode of baptism
because of its convenience. Now remember that at that time there were no
Presbyterians, nor Methodists, nor hardly anybody except the
Catholics--except, of course, the Baptists," Mr. Walton remarked with a
smile in which all the others joined.

"Yes," said Dorothy, "you remember it was stated tonight that in every
century there were bands of Christians worshiping by themselves and
protesting against the practices of the Catholic Church, and that these
people seemed to believe, in substance, the principal doctrines held by
the Baptists today."

"The point I was making," continued Mr. Walton, "is that all of these
Protestant denominations, either directly or indirectly, came out of the
Catholic Church three or four hundred years after the twelfth century,
when the Catholic Church abandoned immersion, and when they did come out
they brought with them the custom of pouring, which at that time was
practiced in the Catholic Church. If the Reformation had come, however,
before the twelfth century, then the Protestant denominations would be
practicing immersion, because before the twelfth century