se, which Irenæus only hints at, Tertullian broadly states, and assigns two reasons for it :-the first of them is evidently the old philosophical notion of the superior excellence of the element of water, in a Christian dress.77 Tertullian, like the other authors of this century, had been a heathen philosopher; he threw aside his heathenism, but, though by no means erring in this direction to the extent of some of them, he did not, or would not, perceive that Christianity required the sacrifice of his philosophy also. He gives another reason for the efficacy of the outward rite in baptism; the agency of the baptismal angel for this he is indebted to that fabulous system of demonology wherewith (as we have seen) Christianity was so early intermingled and corrupted.

:

Clement of Alexandria, a writer greatly the inferior of Tertullian, both in the force and vigour of his conceptions and in the orderly arrangement of his thoughts, has written much, but really said very little, upon baptism. The following passage, however, will show that he yielded to none of his cotemporaries in the high estimation in which he held the outward rite: after asserting that our Saviour was necessitated to submit to baptism, as the only means whereby he could have been perfected and consecrated by the advent of the Spirit, he proceeds thus,78_" That, then, whereof the Lord was the exemplar, comes to pass also in us.-When we are baptized we are enlightened; when we are enlightened we are made sons; when we are made sons we are perfected; when we are perfected we become immortal. This operation is

77 ̓Αρισον μὲν ὕδωρ. Pind. Olym. I. 1. ἀρχὴ δή τῶν πάντων ὕδωρ ὑπεςήσατο (ὁ Θαλῆς) καὶ τὸν κόσμον ἔμψυχον καὶ δαιμόνων πλήρη.—Diog. Laert. lib. 1., p. 18.

78 Pæd. 1. 6.

named variously, grace, illumination, perfection, or completion, the laver.79 The laver, wherein our sins are washed away; grace, whereby the punishments due to our sins are remitted; illumination, whereby we behold the holy and saving light: that is, whereby we discern divine things. We call that perfect to which nothing is wanting: -and what doth he want who knows God ?" After some remarks upon perfection he returns to baptism,-“ He who is regenerated and illuminated, is immediately delivered (as the word imports) from darkness, and sees the light from that time; for as they who undertake to remove a cataract from the eye, do not supply the organ with an external light which it had not before, but only remove an opacity in order that the pupil may be free to receive the impression of light, so, when we are baptized, our sins, which like a mist darkened the Divine Spirit, are dispelled, and the eye of the soul is clear, and unclouded, and brilliant; by this alone we discern divine things when the Holy Ghost pours down upon us from heaven: this is the immortal eye-water which fits the eye to gaze upon immortal light."80 Then follows a digression at some length upon light as identified with knowledge, and darkness with ignorance; after which he returns once more to baptism." But the chains of ignorance are soon struck off, by faith in man and grace from God: that is, when our sins are remitted by the one salutary medicine, even baptism, according to the word.82 For then we are

79 λετρον.

80 There is an exactly similar figure in Tertullian, de Baptismo, c. 41. -“Proinde cum ad fidem pervenit (anima) reformata per secundam nativitatem ex aqua et superna virtute detracto corruptionis pristinæ aulæo ; totam lucem suam conspicit."

81

avios. There is an allusion here to one of the names of Apollo. 82 λογικῷ βαπλίσματι.

washed from all our sins, and walk no more in evil

ways: for this is one of the graces of illumination that our manner of life is no longer that which it was before we were washed." He then proceeds to enforce the necessity of that system of previous catechetical discipline used by the early church, on the ground that it leads to faith; "and that faith as well as baptism is needful, the Holy Spirit himself teaches." After another digression upon the necessity of faith, not unmixed with his own peculiar errors, wherein he quotes and comments upon Gal. iii. 23-29, he thus concludes his account of baptism,-" Nor is there any impropriety in calling good thoughts the infiltrations 83 of the Holy Ghost. For that may be called filtration which precipitates evil thoughts from the mind by the remembrance of good ones; but he who returns to better thoughts necessarily repents him of his former evils; and it is acknowledged that the Spirit himself brings back those who come to repentance. In like manner we also, repenting of our former sins, renouncing our evil courses, and being percolated by baptism, are brought back to the eternal light, as sons to the Father." We observe here exactly the same opinions regarding the necessity of faith to the beneficial reception of the ordinance as in the preceding writers; and we also discover the same notions of an efficacy in the outward rite, perfectly independent of the Spirit's influences, still more forcibly illustrated. But in addition to this, the present writer greatly exaggerates the inward grace of the sacrament. With him it is not merely spiritual regeneration or change of heart, as the Scriptures define it; but it is illumination, perfection,

84

83 dió. The same gross notion of spiritual existence as in Tertullian. See above, Note 68.

84 Elsewhere he informs us the origin of the application of this epithet

immortality; in a word, it is the entire life of God in the soul of man, from its commencement to its consummation. Incomprehensibly strange as this notion may seem to a modern reader, it was held by the philosopher of Alexandria as an important part of his theological system; and his purpose in thus framing it, was to make room for the secret or gnostical doctrines, by merging as much of ordinary Bible Christianity as possible in the baptismal font.

We proceed to our summary of the opinions entertained by the church regarding baptism at the close of the second century: and here we cannot refrain from expressing our astonishment at the rapid progress which has been made by the error of the preceding era. Then we had merely to complain that the outward sign was somewhat displaced in relative importance :-now the baptismal waters have acquired a power of communicating both material and spiritual blessings, altogether independent of the present agency of the Holy Ghost and of the inward grace; residing in the inherent holiness of the element of water, and in the agency of an angel. The whole sacrament has also risen very far above the place in Christianity which the Bible had assigned to it. Instead of being the merely initiatory rite of Christ's religion, the outward sign of spiritual regeration, it has become illumination, perfection, yea, immor

to baptism: "Among the barbarous philosophers, to catechise and illuminate their disciples, is called to regenerate them."—5 Strom., § 2. Tapà Tõis βασβάροις φιλοσόφοις, τὸ κατηχήσαι τε και φωτίσαι ἀναγεννήσαι λέγεται. This passage is likewise important as establishing past the possibility of doubt, the sense in which these writers understood the words translated 'regeneration,' which corresponds exactly with that we have endeavoured to gather from other sources. s.-(pp. 76, e. s.) Any act denoting a change for the better in state, or profession, or sentiment, they would have termed, regeneration.

tality! We have pointed out the various mistakes in which these false doctrines have originated; and, by the invariable process of error producing error, they, in their turn, gave rise also to other false doctrines. In the fate of these last, we again recognise that unaccountable principle which so deeply influenced the theology of those times, and which we have already endeavoured to develope ;viz., that the detection of the parent error should in no degree affect the erroneous conclusions which had been drawn from it. Of the working of this principle the false doctrine of baptism furnishes us with an apt illustration. -The ordinance continued to be regarded as illumination, 85 when the Pagan absurdity of a double doctrine was long ago forgotten. The baptismal element retained its spiritual efficacy long after Tertullian's angel of baptism had taken his flight.

But notwithstanding the extent which the error regarding the outward rite attained in the second century, we have shown, by quoting from each author an explicit avowal of the necessity of faith in the candidate, an unanswerable proof that the doctrine of irrespective baptismal regeneration was altogether unknown at that period: but in these errors it certainly originated, though to pursue them through succeeding centuries until this opinion was fully elicited, is not the scope of the present enquiry. We may, however, state in few words, that it was in the change that took place in the age of the candidates for baptism, after Christianity became the established religion of the Roman empire, that the proximate cause of its elicitation is

85 Thus Cyprian: de suo Baptis., Ep. 2.; Chrysostom: Catach. ad illuminandos de baptismo. See also the Oration, or rather rant, of Gregory of Nazianzum, ubi supra. The font is called indifferently owTIOTŃPIOV and Barrio in the baptismal offices of nearly all the ancient liturgies.