The Sun.
London, England, 1850-04-11 00:00:00

GORHAM v. THE BISHOP OF
EXETER.
(From the Dublin Evening Mail.)

TO THE HON. AND REV. THE ARCHDEACON OF KILMORE.
My dear Sir,—l have seen in the newspaper of yes-
terday resoulutions signed by a few archdeacons,
professors, clergymen, and laymen of the Church, in
England, respecting the sentence delivered on appeal
in the case of Gorham v. the Bishop of. Exeter, and
as the subscribers have published them with the view
of obtaining the assent and consent of the archdeacons,
clergy, and laity of the United Church in general, I
feel it right to tell you why I, for one, cannot sign
them.

The resolutions, amongst other things, statr, " that
the remission of original sin to all infant., in
and by the grace of baptism, is an essential part of
the article one baptism for the remission of sins."
That such sentence, while it does not deny the
liberty of holding that article in the sense heretofore
received, does equally sanction the assertion, that ori-
ginal sin is a bar to the right reception of baptism,
and is not remitted except when God bestows regene-
ration beforehand .by an act of preveninent grace,
whereof Holy Scripture and the Church are wholly
silent, thereby rendering the benefits of holy baptism
altogether uncertain and precarious.
That, inasmuch as the faith is one, and rests upon
one principle of authority, the conscious, wilful, and
deliberate abandonment of an article of the creed,
forfeits not only the Catholic doctrine in that article,
but also the office and authority to witness and teach
is a member of the universal church.
And, finally, they intimate that measures ought
promptly to be taken to obtain an authoritative decla-
ration by the Church of the doctrine of holy baptism,
either by praying license for the Church in convoca-
tion to declare that doctrine, or by obtaining an Act
of Parliament to give legal effect to the decisions of
the collective episcopate ; or by obtaining a re-affirma-
tion of the doctrine from the said episcopate, act-
ing only in its spiritual character.
Such are the resolutions now publicly propounded,
and upon which, accordingly, I beg leave, as a cler-
gyman concerned, to make the observations fol-
lowing :-
1. It is not clear that the article—" one baptism
for the remission of sins," although contained in
what is called the Nicene Creed—and, like the other
articles in that creed, to be thoroughly received and
believed—for they may all be proved by most
certain warrants of Holy Scripture—is, strictly
speaking, an article of the faith at all ; for it unques-
tionably was not an article, either expressed or im-
plied, in the declaration of the Catholic faith set forth
at Nice, A.D. 325, by the three hundred and
eighteen bishops there assembled ; nor was it an
article in the ancient creed of Alexandria, pro-
duced in the Nicene council; nor was it
an article in the creed of ancient Rome, when
its faith was spoken of throughout the whole
world ; nor is it an article in the confession com-
monly called the creed of St. Athanasius, although
professing to declare the Catholic faith, " which faith,
except every one do keep whole and undefiled, without
doubt he shall perish everlastingly;" nor is it, finally,
an article set forth in the catechism of this
United Church when teaching its children to re-
hearse the articles of their belief, and there-
by explaining to them how to believe all the
articles of the Christian faith, pursuant to their bap-
tismal vow. The article on baptism for the remis-
sion of sins may therefore b', strictly speaking, not
an article of the faith at all, but only like our article
" of the Lord's Supper," or of " the justification of
man," a true and holy doctrine of the Ohurch, agree-
able to God's word.
2. Granting the " one baptism for the remission of
sins" to be an esential article of the faith, then as
there is but one faith which rests upon one principle
of authority—namely, the authority of Holy Scrip-
ture—for " whatever is not read therein, nor may be
proved thereby, is not to be required by any
man that it should be believed as an article
of the faith :" these gentlemen will do well to point
out the precise texts of Scripture which plainly
state, or clearly prove, that remission of original sin
to all infants in, baptism, and their full and complete
regeneration must also bo received as an article of the
faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation ;
for unless they can do this, their resolutions must
pass for mere assertions; and, notwithstanding the
late sentence, our Church may still retain its office and
authority to teach and witness as a member of the
universal church.
3. If the subscribers cannot produce clear Scrip-
ture, can they show any primitive or early council,
setting forth the remission of original sin to all in-
fants in baptism as an essential article of the faith ;
and if so, what is the council, and what its precise
words ?

Doubtless, other churches may say in their litur-
gies of baptised infants generally, as does our Church,
that " they are regenerate ;" but in such case they
and we also say the same precisely of baptised adults
—in which latter case confessedly we speak the judg-
ment of charity, not of certainty, and enounce a pro.
position not metaphysically (as logicians speak) but
only morally universal.
4. The remission of original sin in baptism to all
infants, so far from being an essential part of the
faith, is neither true, nor taught by any one Scrip-
ture, nor by any one church, nor, I believe, by any
one clergyman in the world ; for neither Scripture,
church, nor, I believe, Christian doctor, ever taught
the remission of original sin in baptism to the baptised
infants of Jew,., Turks, Infidels, or Heathens.
5. I question also whether the doctrines that ori-
ginal sin is a bar (in the ordinary sense of the
term, as something preventing, excluding, shutting
out, destroying, or rendering impracticable) to
the right reception of baptism, was ever held
deliberately by a single clergyman in our Church ?
Nor do I believe that an act of prevenient
grace or prevenient remission, either in infants or
adults, can be, as the resolutions intimate, rightly
considered the same thing as regeneration, which, in
its full meaning, in addition to the grace of remission,
includes the federal sealing of a covenant, and the
formal adoption into a new family, and the spi-
ritual and sanctifying change of heart; and cer-
tainly accuracy of language may fairly be required
from gentlemen who wise for novel declarations of
the faith, and the consequent ejectment of ministers
or members from the Church.
6. Granting that some clergymen of the Church
believe that amongst the children of Christian pa-
rents, some may, in baptism, be only federally, and
not morally regenerated ; yet this doctrine would
not necessarily make the benefits of holy baptism
" altogether uncertain and precarious ;" while it
is also held that if such baptised children
die More they commit actual sin, they are un-
doubtedly saved; and if they live, that although
original sin, which deserves God's wrath, doth re-
main in them, and must, therefore, be remitted sub-
sequently, and by other means than baptism, yet,
still there is no condemnation, whether for original
or actual sin, for those who are baptised, and who
either truly repent or unfeignedly believe the
Gospel. Nor does the Church, which declares that
baptism is generally necessary to salvation, and
which prays for the regeneration of those who in
baptism come to God, and
declares all baptised per-
sons generally to be regenerate, " equally sanction"
the assertion that original sin is a bar to the right
reception of baptism, although she may not eject from
her ministry or communion a man who thinks there
may be some exceptions to moral regeneration in the
case of infants, and in that of adults, as confessedly
there is. To admit the possibility of exceptions, is
not necessarily to cancel a general rule, nor equally
to sanction the assertion of its opposite.
7. The most learned doctors of the Church, whether
ancient or modern, admit
that there may be remis-
sion of original sin without baptism :—in the case,
for example, of unbaptised infants, who, like the
infants of Bethlehem, were martyred and so baptised
in their blood ; or of infants dying naturally but
suddenly before their intended baptism case
discussed by Hooker—or of adults intercepted
from baptism by a violent death, and manifesting
like the penitent thief a previous repentance and faith;
or in the case of catechumens dying while under pre-
paration for baptism, or of believers not rightly bap-
tised, but mistakenly thinking themselves so, and
communicating regularly in the eucharist and other
ordinances of the Church ; and it is because of such
possibilities that our Church declares baptism to be
not absolutely, but only generally, necessary to sal-

vation.
8. The doctrine that many baptised as infants are
still " unregenerate;' and that regeneration may be
possible or necessary after baptism, has been held at
various times by many of the most eminent pre-
lates, doctors, and luminaries of our Church. By
such men, for example, as Archbishops Usher and
Tilotson ; by Bishops Latimer, and Hooker, and
Hall, and llopkins, and Wilkins, and Reynolds,
and Burnet, and Butler, and Beveridge, and
Horsley ; and Doctors Hammond and Whitby, and
a cloud of others. Now, I cannot think that such
learned and renowned loctors, bishops, and archbishops, however liable to mistake on minor points,
can have been all equally ignorant of an essential
article of the faith, or that it is now indispensably
necessary to deny the cure of souls to men merely for
thinking or speaking just as they did.
For myself, indeed, I have on this point invariably