submit to the ordinance, infants cannot be exempted. But while the inference is perfectly just, the author has omitted evidence more direct, and probably more convincing. We learn from v. 1, referring to the transaction before us, that the Jewish zealots insisted on the Gentiles being circumcised "after the manner of Moses." It was not circumcision limited to adults, but the circumcision of the Mosaic law which they announced to be indispensable. It was emphatically eighth-day circumcision. The yoke, then, was framed for the necks both of infants and adults; but the apostle calls the parties for whom it was intended, disciples, and therefore we are precluded from expounding the term disciples to the exclusion of infants. Nay in succeeding generations, as Dr. Wall observes, the yoke of circumcision "would have fallen on the infant children only;" yet from its connection with the entire Mosaic ritual, the enforcement of the observance would not have ceased to involve the guilt of "putting an intolerable yoke upon the neck of the disciples." Who then will pretend to argue from the usage of the terms that infancy and discipleship are incompatible?

We may now perceive how little ground Dr. Carson had for asserting, that "the word disciple is applied to the followers of Christ, as it DID to the followers of the philosophers." This assertion he has not attempted to prove, intimating that he can do without it. We affirm it to be incapable of proof, except in regard to the twelve disciples of our Lord, to whom it is strictly applicable. In the case of the great mass of Christians, the term is employed in a wider and more generic acceptation, and even infants do not lie beyond the range of its established extension.

The relation of μαθηταὶ to infants may be farther evinced by patristic testimony. In Origen's work against Celsus, B. iii. p. 128, we read as follows:-"A του Θεου Χριστῷ μαθητευθᾶσαι ἐκκλησίαι, - " The churches of God, discipled to Christ." The churches are here represented as μαθητευθᾶσαι, made disciples, implying necessarily that every member was μαθητής a disciple of Christ. Comprehensive in its character, and of no doubtful meaning, the language obviously includes the entire membership of the churches of which Origen speaks. But we have evidence that in the age of this father, infants enjoyed the privilege of church membership, and therefore it follows irresistibly that infants came under the designation of disciples. On the subject of infant discipleship, no testimony could be more distinct and pertinent; though in these respects it cannot claim any superiority over the clear declarations by the same author in support of infant baptism.

The value of this evidence the Baptist may consider lowered, on the alleged ground that in the days of Origen, μαθητεύω, turned aside from its proper meaning, had become accommodated to an unscriptural state of Christian discipleship. But the objector cannot prove the change in meaning which his allegation assumes, and hence the objection is utterly impotent and worthless. Besides we can produce similar testimony from fathers who, according to his chronology, flourished before the rise of infant baptism. Antipædobaptists, as Dr. Wardlaw states, "are accustomed to allege that the first writer by whom infant baptism is expressly mentioned is Tertullian, who lived in the beginning of the third century, a hundred years and more after the apostolic age." Mr. Booth, Dr. Cox and others speak very positively on this point, and the former is pleased to assert, as an affair of great consequence, that "Justin Martyr, in his Second Apology, when describing baptism, mentions only that of adults." If then infant baptism had no existence in the age of Justin, it cannot be charged with corrupting the application of the term μαθηταὶ. What that application was we ascertain from the following testimony contained in his First Apology, near the beginning. -" Numbers of men and women sixty and seventy years old, -οἵ ἐκ παίδων ἐμαθητεύθησαν τῷ Χριστῷ, who from childhood were discipled to Christ, still continue uncorrupt." Justin was for several years contemporary with Polycarp, and Papias, and his First Apology appeared about A.D. 150, or, as some maintain, ten or twelve years earlier. The disciples to whom he refers, must have been, therefore, born within the age of the apostles; and this unspeakably enhances the importance of the testimony. We are disposed to prize it also, as proceeding from a father whose extensive travels and intercourse among the early Christians must have made him perfectly acquainted with the application of ecclesiastical terms.

Let us then endeavour to ascertain Justin's meaning. The writer introduces us to aged persons of both sexes, whose discipleship to Christ had commenced in childhood, instead of being deferred till they arrived at the condition of adults. Dr. Gale was angry with Dr. Wall,

because the latter took the liberty of rendering ἐz παίδων “ in childhood." But his captiousness reflected little credit on his critical acquaintance with the force of the Greek prepositions. That in strictly and properly contemplates the point of departure as within the object denoted by its regimen is demonstrated by our more philosophical grammarians, and ably maintained by Dr. Carson. On this ground we contend that the discipleship of the Christians referred to is viewed by the author as having originated within the period of childhood.

The only exception which a candid opponent will take to the evidence thus contributed to the cause of Pædobaptism, must be founded on the comparative uncertainty of the age indicated by the words ἐκ παίδων. Does the language obviously include infancy, or may it not apply to children over whom a number of years have rolled? Resolved to press no testimony a hair's breadth beyond what we believe to be its true import, we do not affirm that infancy is necessarily included in the testimony of Justin; while on the other hand we maintain resolutely that its exclusion is neither declared nor implied. Taken in their plain unvarnished sense, the terms comprehend the two extremities of human life, the first the time of childhood, the last the advanced age of sixty or seventy years. They also inform us that before the close of the apostolic period, children were numbered among the disciples of Christ, and thus recognized as part of his mystical body. The term πᾶιδες may doubtless be used in such connections as to denote persons who have long bid adieu to their tender years; but, when it is the object of an author to mark distinction of age, its application is no less definite than that of our vernacular childhood as contrasted with manhood, or old age. Under this view, the passage appears to us fairly susceptible of no interpretation which can be reconciled with the doctrine of our opponents respecting exclusive adult discipleship and baptism. Justin's, or to speak more correctly, apostolic discipleship of children they are bound to repudiate, and yet its intimate and evident bearing on the exposition of the apostolic commission they have no adequate means of neutralizing.

That μαθητεύω is applied by this father, in common with other ecclesiastical writers, to disciples in adult life through all its stages, we freely admit, this usage being perfectly consistent with the facts of history, and the laws of interpretation. We do not, of course, argue for the childhood of all disciples: our position is simply that little ones were included in their number;-and hence no imaginable amount of adult discipleship could counterbalance the weight of one example of the admission of children to the same privilege. No considerate man will expect these two classes of facts to be attested by equally copious evidence. In its inroads upon Judaism and idolatry, the gospel would manifestly number among its earliest trophies adult converts, as is now witnessed in the progress of missions among the heathen; and to such conversions would be assigned the chief prominence in the record of its achievements. The Baptist must also remember that in sundry Scripture statements, the omission of all direct reference to children neither implies nor is compatible with the idea of their exclusion.

Finally on this topic, we repel the charge of outraging