For all purposes of criticism the Offices for "Public Baptism of
Infants, to be used in the Church," for "Private Baptism of Children in
houses," and "Baptism to such as are of riper years, and able to answer
for themselves," may be treated as one and the same, the leading idea
of each service being identical; this idea is put forward clearly and
distinctly in the preface to the Office: "Dearly beloved, forasmuch
as all men are conceived and born in sin; and that our Saviour Christ
saith, None can enter into the kingdom of God, except he be regenerate
and born anew of water and of the Holy Ghost; I beseech you to call upon
God the Father, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that of his bounteous
mercy he will grant to this Child that thing which by nature he cannot
have." According to the doctrine of the Church, then, baptism is
absolutely necessary to salvation: "_None can enter_... except he be...
born anew of water;" thus peals out the doom of condemnation on the
whole human race, save that fragment of it which is sprinkled from the
Christian font; there is no evasion possible here; no exception made
in favour of heathen peoples; no mercy allowed to those who have no
opportunity of baptism; none can enter save through "the laver of
regeneration." Can any words be too strong whereby to denounce a
doctrine so shameful, an injustice so glaring? A child is born into the
world; it is no fault of his that he is conceived in sin; it is no fault
of his that he is born in sin; his consent was not asked before he was
ushered into the world; no offer was made to him which he could reject
of this terribly gift of a condemned life; flung is he, without his
knowledge, without his will, into a world lying under the curse of God,
a child of wrath, and heir of damnation. "By nature he _cannot_ have."
Then why should God be wrath with him because he hath not? The whole
arrangement is of God's own making. He fore-ordained the birth; he gave
the life; the helpless, unconscious infant lies there, the work of his
own hands; good or bad, he is responsible for it; heir of love or of
wrath, he has made it what it is; as wholly is it his doing as the
unconscious vessel is the doing of the potter; as reasonably may God
be angry with the child as the potter swear at the clay he has clumsily
moulded: if the vessel be bad, blame the potter; if the creature be
bad, blame the Creator. The congregation pray that God "of his bounteous
mercy," "for thine infinite mercies," will save the child, "that he,
being delivered from thy wrath," may be blessed. It is no question of
mercy we have to do with here; it is a question of simple justice, and
nothing more; if God, for his own "good pleasure," or in the pursuance
of the designs of his infinite wisdom, has placed this unfortunate child
in so terrible a position, he is bound by every tie of justice, by every
sacred claim of right, to deliver the blameless victim, and to place him
where he shall have a fair chance of well-being. "It is certain by
God's Word," says the Rubric, "that children _which are baptized_, dying
before they commit actual sin, are undoubtedly saved." And those which
are not baptized? The Holy Roman Church sends these into a cheerful
place called Limbo, and the baby-souls wander about in chill twilight,
cursed with immortality, shut out for ever from the joys of Paradise.
Many readers will remember Lowell's pathetic poem on this subject, and
the ghastly baptism; they will also know into what devious paths of
argumentative indecency that Church has wandered in deciding upon the
fate of unbaptized infants;--how, when mothers have died in childbirth,
the yet unborn children have been baptized to save them from the
terrible doom pronounced upon them by their Father in heaven, even
before they saw the light;--how it has been said that in cases where
mother and child cannot both be saved the mother should be sacrificed
that the child may not die unbaptized. Into the details of these
arguments we cannot enter; they are only fit for orthodox Christians,
in whose pages they may read them who list. Truly, the Lord is a jealous
God, visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children, since unborn
children are condemned for the untimely death of their mother, and
unbaptized infants for the carelessness of their parents or nurses. Of
course, the majority of English clergymen believe nothing of this kind;
but then why do they read a service which implies it? Why do they use
words in a non-natural sense? Why do they put off their honesty when
they put on their surplices?
And why will the laity not give utterance to their thoughts on these and
all such objectionable parts of the Service? In the Office for adults,
as regards the necessity of the Sacrament, the words come in: "where it
may be had;" but the phrase reads as though it had been written in the
margin by some kindly soul, and had from thence crept into the text, for
it is in direct opposition to the whole argument of the address wherein
it occurs and to the rest of the office, as also to the other two
offices for infants. The stress laid upon right baptism, i.e., baptism
with water, accompanied by the "name of the Father, and of the Son,
and of the Holy Ghost," appears specially in the office to follow
the private baptism of a child, should the child live; for the Rubric
directs that if there be any doubt of the use of-the water and the
formula, "which are essential parts of Baptism," the priest shall
perform the baptismal ceremony, saying, "If thou art not already
baptized, I baptize thee," &c. Surely such care and pains to ensure
correct baptism speak with sufficient plainness as to the importance
attached by the Church to this initiatory rite; this importance she
gives to it in other places: none, unbaptized, must approach her altar
to take the "bread of life:" none, unbaptized, must be buried by her
ministers, "in sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal
life." The baptized are within the ark of the Church; the unbaptized
are struggling in the waves of God's wrath outside; no hand can be
outstretched to save them; they are strangers, aliens, to the covenant
of promise; they are without hope. The whole office for infants reads
like a play: the clergyman asks that the infant "may receive remission
of his sins;" what sins? The people are admonished "that they defer not
the Baptism of their children longer than the first or second Sunday
next after their birth." What sins can a baby a week old have
committed? from what sins can he need release? for what sins can he
ask forgiveness? And yet, here is a whole congregation prostrate before
Almighty God, praying that a tiny long-robed baby may be forgiven, may
be pardoned his sins of--coming into the world when God sent him! The
ceremony would be ludicrous were it not so pitiful. And supposing that
the infant does need forgiveness, and has sins to be washed away, why
should a few drops of water, sprinkled on the face--or bonnet--of the
baby, or even the immersion of his body in the font, wash away the sins
of his soul? The water is "sanctified;" we pray: "Sanctify this water to
the mystical washing away of sin." As the hymn sweetly puts it:
"The water in this font
Is water, by gross mortals eyed;
But, seen by faith, 'tis blood
Out of a dear friend's side."
Blood once more! how Christians cling to the revolting imagery of a
bygone and barbarous age of gross conceptions. And, applied by faith,
it cleanses the soul of the child from sin. Well, the whole thing is
consistent: the invisible soul is washed from invisible sin by invisible
blood, and to all outward appearance the child remains after baptism
exactly what it was before--except it chance to get inflammation of
the lungs, as we have known happen, from High Church free use of water,
which is, perhaps, the promised baptism of fire. The promises of the
sponsors are in full accordance with the rest of the services; promises
made by other people, in the child's name, as to his future conduct,
over which they have no control. The baby renounces the devil and all
his belongings, believes the Apostles' Creed, and answers "that is my
desire," when asked if he will be baptized; all which "is very pretty
acting," but jars somewhat on the feeling of reality which ought surely
to characterize a believer's intercourse with his God. The child being
baptized and signed with the Cross, "is regenerate," according to the
declaration of the priest. Some contend that the Church of England does
not teach baptismal regeneration, but it is hard to see how any one can
read this service, and then deny the teaching; it is clearer and fuller
than is the teaching of her voice upon most subjects. The ceremony
of baptism and the idea of regeneration are both derived from the
sun-worship of which so many traces have already been pointed out: the
worshippers of Mithra practised baptism, and it is common to the various
phases of the solar faith. Regeneration, in some parts, especially in
India, was obtained in a different fashion: a hole through a rock, or
a narrow passage between two, was the sacred spot, and a worshipper,
squeezing himself through such an opening, was regenerated, and was, by
this literal representation of birth, born a second time, born into a
new life, and the sins of the former life were no longer accounted to
him. Many such holes are still preserved and revered in India, and there
can be little doubt that the ancient Druidic remains bear traces of
being adapted for this same ceremony, although a natural fissure appears
ever to have been accounted the most sacred.*
* Even in this country, at Brimham Rocks, near Ripon, in
Yorkshire, the dead form of the custom is, or was, until
very lately, kept up by the guide sending all visitors, who
chose to avail themselves of the privilege, through such a
fissure.
One ought scarcely to leave unnoted the preamble to the first prayer in
the baptismal service: "Who of thy great mercy didst save Noah and his
family in the ark from perishing by water; and also didst safely lead
the children of Israel thy people through the Red Sea, figuring thereby
thy holy baptism; and by the baptism of thy well-beloved Son Jesus
Christ, in the river Jordan, didst sanctify water to the mystical
washing of sin." In the two first examples given the choice of the
Church appears to be peculiarly unfortunate, as in each case water was
the element to be escaped _from_, and it was a source of death, not
of life; perhaps, though, there is a subtle meaning in the Red Sea,
it points to the blood of Christ: but then, again, the Red Sea drowned
people, and surely the anti-type is not so dangerous as that? It must
be a mystery. It would be interesting to know how many of the educated
clergymen who read this prayer believe in the story of the Noachian
deluge, and of the miraculous passage of the Red Sea; and further,
how many of them believe that God, by these fables, figured his holy
baptism. Will the nineteenth century ever summon up energy enough to
shake off these remnants of a dead superstition, and be honest enough to
stop using a form of words which is no longer a vehicle of belief? When
the Prayer Book was compiled these words had a meaning; to-day they have
none. Shall not a second Reformation sweep away these dead beliefs,
even as the first away for its own age the phrases which represented an
earlier and coarser creed?