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So much for the word parvulus . But further still ; had the word used by Tertullian been really infans , I am baptistse pueros excludunt , a quibus initium Jteri debebat . He had before said , Itaque hunc clypeum Anabaptistis oppo-Dem as . Never was shield or a non temere
more wantonly placed ; before passages , Matt . xix . 13—15 ; Mark x . 13—16 ; Luke xviii . 15 , 16 , 18 , where there is not the slightest mention , nor , in my bumble opinion , the most distant allusion to water , even as those passages are harmonized by himself . Harmonia ex Tribus Evange * list is Composita * cum comment , p . 244 ,
The word m each of the above verses , in the Greek Testament by Dr . Harwood , ( who professes to have followed in his edition the Cambridge and Clermont MSS . ** approaching- the nearest of any MSS . now known in the world to the original
text of the Sacred Records , " ) is txrccihcc , which the Latin Vulgate translates parvuli , vrith the exception of Luke , where it has infantes , to correspond to £ pe < £ ^ , which some MSS . have in Luke , and which Griesbach has in his text of that place . Some versions have pueri and pueruli .
With respect to ftpe < pQ <;) it must be admitted that it is more commonly used in its lowest form for , recens-natus , and even lower still , for the foetus in the womb , the human species , ( en ventre sa mere ) etrntpTqcre to € § € ( po <; ev tyj v . o \\ iq . ccvty ] <; 9
. Luc . i . 41 , and of mere animals , as in Homer , f } pe ( f ) O $ qfjuovov . Iliad . * $ * % Still even tZpefaq has its vagueness . In Ana * ere 011 Cupid talks like a sufficiently stout boy , / 3 g € ( f ) O <; ei / uu , [ ayi < f ) o € Y } 0 'a , if and does execution enough for a man , € § e < poq pev eO-QQV p < j ) € p WTOC > TofoW
Avoc 8 * ocWerai Kayjxtfiov * £ l > 5 e Kafliyv tffQvq < r € k $ . Od . iii . The English word child , is Jiahle to the same ambiguity ; it is used by ancient writers for boys of almost any age , and particularly for a noble youth , or son of a
king * : thus in Spenser we have Child Arthur and Child Tristram , in Shakespeare ' s King-Lear we have Child Roland ; hence , , Cbilde Harold 5 though child ( oylde , Saxon , probably from the Hebrew word chily filius ) is analogous to the
Scotch word barne , which means not only one in a state of childhood , but often one advanced in life , as implying relation to a parent-, Bainii , ( says SanctPaul , ) " obey your father and mother in all points , for this i » God ^ s command . See Janaieson ' s
Scotch Dictionary : and yet bavno is used for a young * man , and for one of almost any tlge ; thus John Baptist is called a barne
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not aware that your Correspondent could have reasoned from it , in favour of his new-born babe ,, unless some adjective had been placed beside it , determining its limits , as Cyprian applies recens-natus , or unless some
circumstance preceding or accompanying or following infans , determined its meaning , as we have seen in the example of parvus , from Virgil . We have already spoken of irifantuli martyres and infantult lee to res , and that is a diminutive of a lower order than
iufans . If infans should be what they call in Scotland a wee thing , infantulus would be a wee , wee thing . Infans is undoubtedly used for wj-snos , one who cannot speak , or speak plainly , corresponding to our word babe , bambino , bauibolo . bambolino ,
babct £ e «/ , tat , % a £ , € w , loquor , to speak indistinctly as children do ; and even so used , it would not carry precision , as our old English words s \ tchling % cradle-child , would . Infans , too , was taken fof one who could not speak his
mind in lata ; and by the Roman law , ( under which Africa , as a Roman province , was , ) though males arrived at puberty at 14 , and therefore a tutelS . erant liberati ; yet they were not of complete age till 25 , being then under curators , that is , they were infants or minors . In this sense the word has
passed into different languages , as we know it has into our own , in which a minor * is , in law , an infant ; at 14 in one of our old legends , quoted by Mr , Itobittson , ( and innumerable passages of a similar import might be produced from old English and Scottish \ yriters . )
Seint Johari was the beste bern , the iioli baptist , That of wonimen was i bore , withoute Jliesvi Crist .
In short , nothing- but circumsfances can limit the meaning ' of ail such-like vague words . * Blaekstone observes , ( Commentaries , B . iv \ Ch . i . ) that the civil law distinguished the age of minors , or those undfer 25 year * ol < 3 , into three stages ; " wfantia . from the
birtk till seven years of age 3 pueritiay from 7 to 14 ; and pubertas , from 14 years upwards . ' * Mr . Robinson refers to some Digest or some African Code , with the distinct titles of de TuteM , de Injantid , &c .: and , I doubt not , he i * correct both as to the titles and the reason of the reference , though he does not specify
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/ * '—614 On Mr . ttobin $ on s History of Baptism . "
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1819, page 614, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1777/page/26/
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