POETRY. THE RETURNING HEBREW. His feet had wandered o'er the earth, That could not be exiled from home. And now as closed a life of toil, A life of long self-banishment, That clime all-lovely, save in him,— In man--to whom its charms were given, That beauteous clime, where heaven and earth, * He stood upon a hilly spot, Which over-hung Jerusalem; And mourned his own and country's lot-- O'er Judah's hills the fading beam Of summer's sun was fast declining; Of summer's sun was faintly shining. Now opened in the dark blue skies, To keep their sleepless watch by night. It was the hour when setting sun Behind the mountains of the west, "I left thee, oh Judah, ere childhood could tell, But though 'tis in gladness our thoughts turn to thee, Where the prayers of thy people were wont to ascend, Breathes light thro' the air, and sheds warmth o'er the ground; * Homerton. THE ACANTHUS. "A crown of Acanthus."--Matt. xxvii. 29. PROUD regal plant! thy leaves were wont to twine The crown and wreathed majesty of Kings, And round Corinthian capitals combine Their deep jagg'd foliage in symmetric rings; It was, when HE, the taunted Nazarene, God in his soul, though man of lowly mein! JAMES EDMESTON. THE DESERT SHALL BLOSSOM. (ISAIAH XXXV. 1, 2.) THE desert shall blossom--the wilderness bloom, *The mosque of Omar, which is built on the site of Solomon's temple. REVIEW OF BOOKS. A Dissertation on the Scriptural Authority, Nature, and Uses of Infant Baptism. By Ralph Wardlaw, D. D. Glasgow, 1825. 12mo. A Letter to the Rev. Ralph Wardlaw, D. D. on some Passages in his Dissertation on Infant Baptism. By John Birt. London: 1825. pp. 31. A Reply to the Letter of the Rev. John Birt, of Manchester, to Dr. Wardlaw, "On some Passages in his Dissertation on Infant Baptism." By Ralph Wardlaw, D.D. Most of our readers will recollect that in our review of Mr. Cox's work on Baptism, about a year ago, we abstained from all reference to that part of the controversy which relates to the Abrahamic covenant, in anticipation (as we stated at the close of the review) of the new edition of Dr. Wardlaw's Lectures, which it was understood would distinctly reply to that part of Mr. Cox's work in which he had professed to treat this branch of the subject. The expected work has now made its appearance, and we are happy to find it is very far from being a mere reprint of the former publication. The arguments themselves, for the most part, of course remain the same, but the work is completely re-modelled. Every thing that was extraneous or irrelevant in the former production has been carefully expunged, and thus the reasoning bears a more close and consecutive appearance, while the latter portion of the work, which treats of the USES of Infant Baptism, and occupies some fifty pages, is entirely new. Dr. Wardlaw's work is divided into three sections; and it is with the first of them that we shall principally have to do. In this he endeavours to prove, that the covenant into which God entered with Abraham-that covenant, of which the sign and seal was circumcision, was essentially the covenant of grace-that consequently children, while yet mere infants, partook with their parents in the privileges of the covenant of grace, became enrolled amongst number to whom its blessings were dispensed, and received its ratifying seal: that, as there is no law by which children can now be excluded from it-by which that connection which anciently subsisted between believing parents and their offspring can be abolished, it follows that it still exists, however, the "sign and seal," the initiatory rite, may be altered. the That the Abrahamic covenant was, in effect, that of grace, the most decisive proof is found in Gal. iii. 17, 18. " And this I say, that the covenant which was confirmed before of God in Christ,—the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul that it should make the promise of God of no effect. For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise ; but God gave it to Abraham by promise." Now the Apostle plainly declares that the covenant entered into with Abraham, was not of a temporary nature; that it was entirely independent of the law, (which was not promulgated until four hundred and thirty years afterwards), that it could neither be abrogated by it, nor cease with it; that it could not, like the Mosaic institutions "wax old and vanish away." That this covenant, however, to which the Apostle alludes, was the same as that, of which circum cision was the "sign and seal," our Antipædobaptist friends deny, and they have two theories of explanation by which they give colouring to their denial. We shall briefly examine them both; GENESIS xii. 2. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shall be a blessing. 3. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed. but for this purpose, it will be first necessary to place in juxta-position those verses of the 12th, 15th, and 17th chapters of Genesis, which mention the several communications of God to Abraham. GENESIS XV. 5. And he brought him forth abroad, and said, look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them. So shall thy seed be. 6. And he believed in the Lord; and he counted it to him for righteousness. GENESIS Xvii. 2. And I will make my covenant between me and thee, and I will multiply thee exceedingly. 4. . . . Behold my covenant is with thee, and thou shalt be a father of many nations. 5. ... For a father of many nations have I made thee. 7. And I will establish my covenant between me and thee.... for an everlasting covenant. 8. And I will give unto thee, and unto thy seed after thee... all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession, and 1 will be their God. 10. This is my covenant which ye shall keep between me and you, and thy seed after thee; every man child among you shall be circumcised. 11. . . . . . and it shall be a token of THE covenant betwixt me and you. seed, and that it is to this the Apostle alludes, while that in the 17th, and to which circumcision was annexed, was one of purely temporal signification. The very phraseology of the Apostle, when alluding to the covenant as a spiritual and an eternal one, (Rom. iv.) tallies with the terms used in the 17th Genesis, and which eminent Baptist writers represent as having only a temporal meaning. But we must again have recourse to apposition. But the other theory of explanation alluded to, and that most generally adopted by our opponents, is this. They allow, indeed, that the passages we have cited from Genesis, all relate to the same general covenant, but that that covenant is divided into two distinct parts; one of a spiritual, and the other of a temporal import; and that it is with the latter of these that the rite of circumcision stands connected. But is any thing of this kind implied in the account we have just quoted from Genesis? The language there is" and it (circumcision) shall be a token of THE COVENANT betwixt me and you." Does St. Paul countenance such a supposition as that of our adversaries? No. On the contrary, so far from representing circumcision as the token of temporal blessings only, he expressly says of Abraham, "that he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith, which he had, being yet uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised, that righteousness might be imputed unto them also."* Rom. iv. 11. The import of circumcision was strictly spiritual, and the temporal good connected with it only typical. *The promise "that Abraham should be the heir of the world," which our opponents, we should think, will scarce deny, must be of spiritual import. HEBREWS XI. 16. But now they desire a better country, that is a heavenly; wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city. 9. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country. 10. For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. (This text, we think, proves that the promise of Canaan in the 17th, had not an exclusively temporal signification.) And now, we ask, where is the law by which the primeval constitution of the covenant of grace is altered, and children excluded from receiving the "token" of its privileges? If this cannot be produced, and we know it cannot, we may legitimately conclude that our opinions have foundations in Scripture. But Dr. Wardlaw goes on to prove, in his second section, which, had we room, we should wish to epitomize as we have the first, that not only is there no law of the New Testament dispensation, which can exclude children from their ancient privileges, but that there is sufficient evidence that the ancient principle was still proceeded upon, baptism being substituted for circumcision. But we must pass over the first part of the second section without comment, to make room for the following interesting passage. "I have before observed, how the burden of proof lies on the side of the opponents of infant baptism. They seek a children of proselytes to the faith of the precept in positive terms. Let the infant gospel, be baptized with their parents. But we demand a precept in similar positive terms. Let the children of proselytes be no longer admitted, as formerly, to the sign and seal of the blessings of the covenant of God. We call for the production of an express declaration, that such admission is inconsistent with the spirituality of the new dispensation. But no such thing is ever said, no hint of such a thing is ever given. So far from it, let us mark, in general terms, how the case stands. After finding the connection in question pervading the Old Testament, in the manner we have stated; the children |