Truth. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1901-1908, 1905-02-18
T r II T H.

Stlll later in 1929, the PreSbyterianS
adopted it as a whole, excepting GER
tain clauses that referred to civil
magistrates. | will again quote from
the Westminster Catechsm or the
confession of faith of the Presbyte-
rian Church. 1t is a revised, copy
right edition of 1897, published by the
Presbyterian Board of Publication and
Sabbath School Work, Philadelphia.
You will note that it was published
seven years after MILFORD Woodruff's
manifesto, and one year after Utah
became a state. On page 20, chapter
3, verse |, it says: God from all
eternity did, by his own will, freely
and unchangeably ordain whatever
comes to pass: yet so as thereby
neither is God the author of sin, nCr
is violence offered to the will of the
creatures, nor is the liberty or con.
| tingency of the second causes taken
away, but rather established" Verse
3, page %. BY the decree of God for
the manifestation of his glory, some
men and angels are predestinated un-
to everlasting life and others foreor-
dained to everlasting DEATH" Verse
| 4. These angels and men thus pre-
destinated and foreordained are par
ticularly and unchangeably designed
and their number is so certain and
definite that it can not be either in
creased or diminished" Page 49,
chapter 5, verse 1. God, the great
creator of all things, doth uphold, di-
rect, dispose and govern all creatures
actions, and things from the
| tn hn l.
most wise and holy providence, ac-
cording to his infallible fore knowl-
edge, and the free and immutable
council of his own will to the praise
OF the glory of his wisdom, power
justice, goodness and mercy"
Page 81, verse 3: ELECT infants
| dying in infancy are regenerated and
saved by Christ through the spirit,
who worketh when, and where and
how he pleaseth, SO also are all other
elect persons, who are incapable of
being outwardly called by the minis
try of the word" Verse 4: "Others
not elected, although they may be
called by the ministry of the word,
and may have some common opera
ton of the spirit, yet they never truly
come to Christ, and therefore cannot
be saved"
| Now, Brother Wishard, the above
is to me very plain English and you
cannot smother it with excuses or
white-wash it with argument. The
paragraph on infants plainly states
Elect Infants" are saved, others not
elected cannot be saved. You try to
excuse your article on Gods eternal
decree by saying that at was forged
in the heat of great reformation and
was aimed directly at the Pope who
claimed authority to bind or loose to
send men to heaven or hell" Here
again / see you have shifted ground
for all the power that you say the
Pope claimed you have put in the
hands of church officers, called "cen
sures." From page 1919, chapter 80, in
your confession of faith, | will quote
as follows, verse 1: "The Lord Jesus
as king and head of his church hath
therein appointed a government in the
hand of church officers distinct from
the civil magistrate" Verse 2: etc
these officers the keys of the kingdom
of heaven are by virtue committed
whereof they have the power respect
lively to retain and remit sins, to shut
that kingdom against the impenitant
both by word and censures, and tC
open it unto penitent sinners by the
ministry of the gospel and by abso