Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1890-01-30
There Are No Infants in He'll.


In Mondays debate by the New York pres
bytery on the proposed revision Of the West
minister confession of faith Rev. Drs. Crosby
and Van Dyke both spoke against the doc trine
Of Reproduction. Rev. DR.. Van Dyke began one
OF the most striking speeches of the entire dis
cussion with DR.. Paxtons parable about the
dog which had "eat his tag for his text. He
| said The Westminster confession az 1T now
stands affixes a tag to the human race to this
effect: Part is consigned to Heaven and part
to hell and no man can find out to which part
he belongs, nor would it make any difference
il he could Now. il were an expressman I
would refuse to forward a tagless dog; SO
/ refuse to believe this unintelligible impos-
sible dogma, and yet my refusal makes no
difference! We have voted for revision. Now,
what is the revision to be? l am in favor
Of the committees report because it elm
| mates Reproduction from the confession
and suggests the formation of a new
| creed more scriptural than the confession
| as q basis Of union with other reformed
churches. The first, the elimination of
reprobaton, should be done as soon as posi-
BILE, If not sooner. We want to get rid Of repro
baton because it is superfuous and not essen
| tial even to Calvinisu, as 1t ID not contained in
any Calvinistic creed except our own and the
Irish articles, formulated in 1915 only to fall
into innocuous desuetude in 1885. Ante natal
damnation! No man ever died for that doc
his bosom and weep tears at the thought Of
losing it, as il it had been bathed in the blood
Of martyrs2 Such position is like that of the
| old woman who said: There's that blessed doc
trine Of universal depravity. What a comfort
it is II we only lived up to itr The Heavenly
Father spreads feast for all; is it for Us to say
that He refuses to let the poor sinner eat of the
crumbs which fall from His table? And for
| what reason2 To satisfy our logic? It is but
measuring the mind Of the Almighty with the
| wisdom of the seventeenth century. The
doctrine is unscriptural As for the text
| about the potter, who ever heard of q potter
making 9 vessel merely to destroy iH The
doctrine Of ante natal perdition makes
| the Bible a mass Of contradictions. Il is un-
evangelical II Is in alliance today with the
anti Christian forces Of modern thought We
must be driven into pantheism and materialism
ours Reproduction Is q horrible doctrine.
| The adjective is not mine, but Calvin's, who
pushed it to its logical conclusion and laugh,
the damnation of infants. don't weep for the
tears shed over the destruction Of part of the
confession, but for the tears OF the mothers who
have been taught to believe that their harmless
newborn babes were torn from their breasts 10
be plunged into everlasting perdition; weep
| for the unhappy creatures in mad houses whose
light OF reason has been put out by the heresy
Of ante natal perdition." In conclusion DR..
Van Dyke said II know not what others may
do, but, as for me, / intend to keep on disbe.
iievimg, ignoring, and denying the doctrine OF
| reprobation. intend TO teach that there are
there II salvation open to all mankind, and tina,
| no man is punished but for his own sin. Is that
Calvinism9 Before God, l don't know or care
| II is Christianityr'