Calvin, it would seem then, came nearer to teaching the actual salvation of all infants, than the damnation of any. For, sweep a compass round all infants who die within a thousand generations of a pious ancestor, and how many will fall without the blessed circumference of mercy? Not a syllable, then, has been produced from Calvin, which proves that he taught that infants are damned. Hitherto, the reviewer has made the charge without evidence. And I now call upon him, by all the sanctions of violated justice, to retract the slander which he has so wantonly cast upon the memory of the holy dead. TURRETTIN, as quoted by the reviewer, teaches the following things. 1. That the guilt of original sin is sufficient for the condemnation of infants. 2. That infants have been infected with original sin. 3. That infants, though not subjects of law as regards action, are as regards disposition; and that volition in infants is not necessary to the contagion and guilt of original sin. This is all the evidence which the quotation from Turrettin furnishes that infants are, in fact, damned; and it is gravely quoted as if too plain to need a comment, and too irresistible to be denied. But we take the liberty to suggest to the reviewer, that his quotation from Turrettin is nothing to his purpose. He might as well have quoted "Adam, Seth, Enoch," to prove that infants are damned. And, lest he should doubt our word, we will try again to show him, by the help of a syllogism, what an incorrigible aversion his premises and his conclusion have to come together: Original sin deserves damnation. And whoever deserves damnation, will certainly be damned. But Turrettin teaches that infants, as corrupted by original sin, do deserve damnation, Therefore, as we have abundantly proved, Turrettin teaches the actual damnation of infants. And now, elated by such a victory, in true Bonapartean style, he follows us up in our discomfiture, to make an end of us, by pouring in upon us the testimony of AUGUSTINE, a man who lived some ten centuries before Calvin was born, in order to prove that the Calvinists of New England and the United States, between whom and Augustine fifteen centuries have intervened, do believe, nevertheless, that infants are damned. This is the greatest march of mind that I have met with in these marching days; the most fearless act of mental agility, I cannot but think, ever attempted,-to make the premises and conclusion leap a ditch of fifteen centuries to come together. Now let us see how they succeed. At two leaps it is done. Calvin thought highly of Augustine, and constantly (often) cited him as the highest authority; therefore, on the subject of infant damnation, Calvin must have believed as Augus tine did. But Calvinists of the present day think highly of Calvin, and often quote him as the highest authority; therefore, they believe, on the subject of infant damnation, as Calvin believed.' Now then for the syllogism: He that highly esteems and almost constantly quotes an author as of the very highest authority, must be supposed to believe exactly as he does on all points. But Calvin thus esteemed and quoted Augustine; therefore, as Augustine believed in the damnation of infants, so did John Calvin. But modern Calvinists highly esteem and often quote Calvin as of the highest authority; therefore, modern Calvinists, like him, believe in the damnation of infants. Now if we were in a court of justice, we should be permitted to cross-question these witnesses. And, as a "deep stain" is likely to be fixed on our character, should we be convicted, I know not why legal evidence should not be demanded. I would take the liberty, therefore, to ask John Calvin a few questions. Ques. Has your high estimation of Augustine led you anywhere to avow, that you believed in every sentiment which he taught? Ans. Never. Ques. Have you anywhere avowed your belief in the particular sentiment ascribed to Augustine-that infants are damned? Ans. Never. "The strongest passages" in my writings, however tortured, cannot be made to teach any such opinion. We would now put a few questions also to Augustine. Ques. Did you, Sir, believe and teach that infants are damned; meaning by the term damnation, what it is now in common use understood to mean-a condition of excessive and unmingled suffering, bodily and mental? AUG. Horresco! Nunquam, nunquam. Dixi "Contra Julianum, lib. i. cap. 16. Potest proinde recte dici parvulos sine baptismo de corpore exeuntes in damnatione omnium mitissime futuros;" et lib. v. cap. 8, dixi "Ego non dico parvulos sine baptismo Christi morientes, tanta pœna esse plectendos ut eis non nasci potius expediret." Miror! Indignor! O tempora! O mores!* You see, Sir, how Augustine feels at your misrepresentation of him as if he taught that infants were sent to the gloom and torments of a "Calvinistic hell;" when what he taught in fact was, the damnation of infants as consisting chiefly, if not entirely, in the loss of that holy enjoyment in heaven for which their depravity disqualified them; and if they suffered a positive evil at all, it was of the very mildest kind; and such as rendered their eternal * I am horror struck! Never, never. I said in my book, Contra Julianum, lib. i. cap. 16, "It may, therefore, be truly said, that infants, departing from the body without being baptized, will be in a condemnation of all most mild ;" and in lib. v. cap. 8. I have said, "I do not say that infants, dying without Christian baptism, will be filled with such punishment as will make it expedient rather that they had never been born." I am astonished-I am indignant-that I should be represented as having taught that infants suffer the full torments of hell. Oh, the degeneracy of the times! existence, on the whole, a blessing. A state much happier than that in which thousands and millions of infants have lived in this world; for there have been multitudes so circumstanced in time as that their existence was no blessing to them. And yet this sentiment of Augustine you have quoted to prove that Calvin believed, and that those who are called by his name, now believe, that infants not a span long are sent to the fierce torments of an eternal hell! And it is after such splendid exhibitions of knowledge in ecclesiastical history, and of skill in translation, and accuracy in reasoning, that the reviewer celebrates his triumph in the following strains of exultation: So much for Calvin, his master, and one of his most approved' expositors. How a man ambitious of being considered a leader of the Calvinistic party in this country, could hazard such assertions as those contained in the Note under review, it is difficult to imagine. The damnation of infants is a doctrine so revolting to all the better feelings of our nature, a doctrine so 'monstrous,' to use Dr. Beecher's own word, that we do not wonder Calvinists are anxious to have it considered a 'slander' to charge it upon them or their system; and, if it were a mere remote inference drawn by their opponents from some acknowledged part of their belief, the denial of it might be accounted for and excused. But in the present instance, it is disavowed in the name of a party, the very head of which preached it, and the most approved' apostle of which did not hesitate to advance it; and the case is to us inexplicable. The next evidence relied on is to be found in the extracts "from the most approved Calvinistic writers of later date," quoted in the very heat of the late Unitarian controversy, when it is not to be supposed for an instant, or by any stretch of charity, they did not meet the eye or ear of him who had never seen nor heard of any book which contained such a sentiment." These quotations from approved Calvinistic writers of later date are contained, we suppose, in Professor Norton's Views of Calvinism. Whether we had read it or not, we shall not now stop to say. We certainly have read it since, with a full purpose, if such quotations as he alleges were contained in it, to admit frankly our mistake. But we find no such passages; and Professor Norton is hereby requested to state the passages on which he relies, and to state, in logical form, the manner in which, to him, they appear conclusive. Especially do I call for the proof that EDWARDS gives up infants to "the full torments of hell." The passage quoted from Edwards in proof contains no such sentiment. He is replying to two " dissenting divines, of no inconsiderable note," one of whom supposed that only so much sin of Adam was imputed, as justified the miseries of this life, and of death, or annihilation; the other supposing that no imputation can be consistent with the divine perfections which avers that the future state of infants should be worse than nonexistence. "But this to me," he says, "appears plainly to be giving up that grand point of the imputation of Adam's sin, both in whole and in part. For it supposes it to be not right for God to bring any evil on a child of Adam, which is innocent as to personal sin, without paying for it, or balancing it with good; so that still the state of the child shall be as good as could be demanded in justice, in case of mere innocence. Which plainly supposes that the child is not exposed to any proper punishment at all, or is not at all in debt to divine justice, on account of Adam's sin." But, in this passage, what does Edwards say? Simply and only, as all the Reformers had said, that infants are exposed justly to eternal death on account of original sin; but that they suffer this deserved punishment HE DOES NOT SAY. And yet, such is the authority which the reviewer claims, as "directly and completely to his purpose," to prove that Edwards gave up infants to the torments of hell. BELLAMY is the next witness whose testimony demands our scrutiny. "It is plain and evident from facts, that Adam was considered and dealt with under the capacity of a public head, and that death, natural, spiritual and eternal were included in the threatening; for all his posterity are evidently dealt with just as if that had been the case. They are born spiritually dead, as has been proved in the former discourse. They are evidently liable to natural death, as soon as they are born. And if they die and go into eternity with their native temper, they must necessarily be miserable."—" God must necessarily look upon them in everlasting abhorrence."+ "So that, to a demonstration, God's thoughts of mercy towards a guilty, undone world, did not in any measure take their rise from any notion that mankind had been hardly dealt with, or that it would be anything like cruelty and unmercifulness, to damn the whole world for Adam's first sin." "Mankind were by their fall brought into a state of being infinitely worse than not to be. The damned in hell, no doubt, are in such a state, else their punishment would not be infinite; as justice requires it should be. But mankind, by the fall, were brought into a state, for substance, as bad as that which the damned are in. For the damned undergo nothing in hell, but what, by the constitution with Adam, and the law of nature, all mankind were and would have been, for substance, exposed unto, if mere grace had not prevented." "As to godly parents, they have such a spirit of love to God, and resignation to his will, and such an approbation of his dispensations towards mankind, and such a liking to his whole scheme of government, that they are content that God should govern the world as he does; and that he should have subjects to govern; and that themselves and their posterity should be under him, and at * Edwards on Original Sin. Works, vol. vi. p. 462. + Ibid. p. 321. § 1bid. p. 333. his disposal. Nor are they without hopes of mercy for their children, from sovereign grace through Christ, while they do, through him, devote and give them up to God, and bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. And thus they quiet themselves as to their souls."* "It was at God's sovereign election, to give every child of Adam, born in a Christian land, opportunity, by living, to hear the glad tidings, or only to grant this to some, while others die in infancy, and never hear. Those who die in infancy, may as justly be held under law in the next world, as those that live may in this. God is under no more obligations to save those that die, than he is to save those that live; to grant the regenerating influences of his Spirit to them, than he is to these."+ Now all which is contained in these passages, is, 1. That infants, as the subjects of original sin, are depraved, born spiritually dead. 2. That if they should die, and go into eternity with this depraved nature, they could not be admitted to heaven, and would be wicked and miserable. 3. That godly parents have hope for their children, through Christ, who are given to him in faith. But he nowhere, in these quotations, expresses the opinion that infants are lost; for we have shewn it to have been the common opinion of the Reformers, so happily expressed by Dickinson, the cotemporary of Bellamy, that some infants are elected certainly; viz. the children of believers, dying in infancy. Yet there is no "evidence from Scripture or the nature of things, that any of these [infants] will eternally perish. All those that die in infancy may, or aught we know, belong to the election of grace, and be predestinated to the adoption of children."‡ Dr. Twiss, though held in high estimation in his day, as a man of a powerful mind, and an able controvertist, belonged to the class of Calvinists denominated Supralapsarian, a very small proportion of the whole body, in any age, and to which, in this country, not one, probably, in ten thousand belong. He was of that class of divines denominated now Hyper-calvinistic and Antinomian, between whom and the great body of Sublapsarian Calvinists, there are almost as few points held in common, and as little affinity of feeling, as between evangelical Christians and Unitarians; and whose system, upon the principle that extremes meet, we regard as being as fatal to the souls of men as Unitarianism itself. If he was ever, in this country, regarded as a standard writer, of which I have no proof, he has long ceased to be considered such; as many other ancient Calvinistic authors have been superseded, as authorities, by later and better writers. *Bellamy's Works, vol. i. p. 336. + Vol. ii. pp. 369, 370. |