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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Woiuler : at Ufny interpretation being ] ptit tiffon it , ( short of Athanasianism itself * which in assuming the equality of the enumerated Three , boldly and rbundly gives the lie to the whole doctrine of Christ and of his apoetles ? For one , I *¦¦ am forward to confess ,
that if I believed in the authenticity of the text , I should blush to find myself in . spite of it an Unitarian . An Athanasian , indeed , I could not be , tvitVmnt : fir * rfi » ttintt » inrrttr rfwxrn rfcT \ irnrm without forfeitingin own inion
, ray op , every pretension to the title of Christian . But , baptized at the immediate fiat of my Saviour , not simply and solely in that Saviour ' s riame , but in the name of the Father , and in the
name of the Son , and in the name of the Holy Spirit , admitted into the Christian church by a ceremony in hsec verfia instituted / at parting , by the 6 ecbiid of these three names , —so
denominated , so placed , could I believe myself a member of that church , without becoming , under some modification of the strange term , a Trinitarian ? I confess honestly I could not . Anomaly , be thou my polar star , I should exclaim , and put to sea
upon the trackless oce&n of conjecture , almost careless upon what theological Scylla or Charybdis I might be wrecked . For , to t > e baptized in the name of any . one , wliat is * it but , in other Words , to be baptized unto him ? By a formal act , I recognize
and avo \ v my relation to him for the first time in some way or other . That slich , atleast , was the import of the phrase , as used by the historian , such the purpose and effect of the rite as administered by the disciples
immediately after its institution , is evident from the Epistles of St . Paul compared with the Acts of the Apostles . Were ye baptized in the name of Paul ? remonstrates with pious wonder and indignation the apostle to his would-be-sectarian converts . What
original allegiance do you Owe to me ? Was I crucified for you ? Is it I that died for your sins ? Am I he who is able to save to the uttermost those who come unto God through him ? Gan I save from the wrath to come ? No , there is no other name given under heaven whereby we may be savedbut his , whose ye are by ^ baptism , even Jesus Christ the Lord . * * It seems probable from this remark ,
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fthe ' next thifrs * you will sag , d $ 9 : that you tvere baptized : tp me ^^ r / in " mjr namlp , ) and set me up asi tie leader of ybur particular religious denomination . Verily , under the unexpebtted and so-m uch-to-be-deprecated cirtomstance of your late prefeiferides , I thank my God that I scarcely so much
as coihrnitted myself by the mere act of baptism ; lest you mistake the iiiere instrument of that rite for its object * Again : " KtiQw ye not , that as many of you as were baptized into Jesus Christ , were baptized into his death V *
Your immersion in water is an apt emblem of your phmging into the grave , of being buried with him * The same roetaphar occurs again an 3 again on the t mention of the ceremony . That mention is never but associated
in the apostle ' s mind with the name of the single party . " As many of you as have been baptized- into Christ ; have put on Christ . " Your baptism is the seal of your faith in him , of your future devotion to him , of your
identity as it were with him . There is" but one baptism , as there is but one faith , one Lord . * Instances might be multiplied , but they would be supernumerary . But what now becomes of all this peculiarity and exclusiveness of baptism , if the form
of it embrace not one only , but three several names ? Could any honest man of any creed lay his hand to his heart , and affirm that such a form ( and a form it is upon the face of it ) as that prescribed in the disputed text , would or could suggest upon every review no other recollections than
those of the solitary name of Christ , of our single relation to him , of the circumstance of his death , and all Its associated ideas ? I venture to say roundly and at once , absolutely impossible .
A very ingenious discourse preached before the University of Oxford , May 31 , 1818 , has this remarkable pasthat no precise form of words was ; enjoined by Christ , but that the injunction , was only generally to him or in his name , ( i . e . ) his religion . '
* £ dp not adduce the phrase of being baptized vice ? psKpocv , though I entertain myself littje doubt of the reasoning here being parallel with the reasoning in ver . 16 ; referring in both , to Christ as being one of the quondam dead .
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Matt , xxviii . 19 , inconsistent with Umtarianism . 25
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vol . xrx . e
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1824, page 25, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2520/page/25/
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