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and check the career of wickedness by the wholesome restraints of religion; by turning the rising generation to seek that grace, and assistance, which alone can purify the corrupt principles of our nature; and to use the power of knowledge to their own salvation and to the glory of God.

Nearly the whole of their former collections, excepting what is requisite for carrying on the Central School, has been expended, in giving aid for the building of schools, and in other expences connected with the views of the Society.

The result of their truly Christian exertions, as appearing in the education of between three and four hundred thousand children, presents a picture truly gratifying to every one, who takes pleasure in contemplating the improvement of his fellow creatures. As they have sown, so may they also reap. May the seeds of religion, abundantly scattered by them, produce abundantly their blessed fruits. May this Society, supported by the zeal and beneficence of their fellow Christians, long continue to 66 plant and water;" and may the grace of God give the "increase," to his glory, and to the salvation of many through the knowledge and faith of Christ Jesus.

APPENDIX

TO THE

SERMON ON REGENERATION.

THIS Appendix is not professedly a systematic dissertation, but rather a selection from some notes and memoranda collected on the subject of regeneration. It is hoped, that its desultory nature, its occasional repetitions and notices of texts and statements not essentially connected with its main point, will be atoned for by some originality of argument, and in one or two instances by placing texts in a point of view, in which they are not commonly considered.

It has, however, principally reference to the bearing of certain arguments, relative to circumcision, upon the question; whether persons, having been initiated into Christ's religion, by the rite which he appointed, are to be exhorted as thereby placed in a state, in which (with proper diligence and with prayer for supplies of grace) they are capable of working out their salvation; or are to be addressed, as still incapable of this, till they shall have undergone, at some indefinite time, a "new creation;" to which their baptism gives them no claim; and which is the privilege of only persons elected by a decree before they were born. The five propositions of Mr. Scott's, set forth at the end of this Appendix, will shew the importance of the points now to be examined.

APPENDIX.

CONSIDERABLE stress seems to be laid on the arguments against baptismal regeneration, which are supposed to be deducible from certain points of analogy between baptism and circumcision. But I shall endeavour to shew, that the passages of Scripture on which these analogical reasonings profess to be founded, are erroneously interpreted; and when considered with their context, will not bear the construction which the impugners of baptismal regeneration endeavour to put upon them.

The specimen of the arguments founded upon these passages, I extract from the late Rev. T. Scott's "Remarks" upon the "Refutation of Calvinism." My reasons for selecting his statements for examination, are-1st, That he appears to be the ablest and most celebrated writer of his party, and was, I am induced to believe, tacitly acknowledged as their leader;-2dly, Because he has thought fit to put himself forward as their Goliah;-3dly, As he was the editor of a very

Vide conclusion of his preface to the second edition of his Remarks, &c. With respect to Mr. S.'s rather vaunting challenge, and his assumption that, because no specific answer to his work had been undertaken, it was therefore unanswerable, the following observations may be made.

1. Those who differ from him upon the controverted points, do not consider his work as either so successful or so conclusive, as he does.

2. Many able writers have discussed these points since the first publication of the Bishop of Winchester's Refutation of Calvinism; and Mr. S. at

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widely-circulated Bible. And it may not be useless to caution the theological student that, as an annotator, he is not to be implicitly relied upon, in those passages which have reference to the peculiar, and, in my opinion, erroneous tenets of his party. Mr. Scott's character for sincerity and Biblical knowledge, stands high; nor do I wish to detract one tittle from his just claims; but he was, as well as others, liable to error and imperfection; and, upon certain questions, appears to me influenced by the bias of particular opinions, to misconceive, and to mistate the import of several passages of Scripture.

Whether I am correct in my judgment relative to this bias of Mr. Scott's mind, let the reader decide, when we examine the texts adduced by him.

I quote the following words from his Remarks: I shall make a few observations upon his reasonings and statements; and shall then endeavour to shew, that the several passages of Scripture, referred to by him in support of them, are generally applied in a sense totally different from that in which they are respectively used by the writers, or which they bear when referred to their context.

"It scarcely admits of a doubt, but that circumcision was the initiatory ordinance, or sacrament, of the old the publication of the second edition of his "Remarks," says, that he does not find that " any or all of them have added any thing very material, to the first assault made in the Refutation." A person, then, replying to Mr. S.'s diffuse work, would have to publish one equally or more voluminous, containing little or nothing in addition to what has already been urged by the writers upon these points, and would publish with the agreeable prospect, (which Mr. S. himself seems not only to have had in view, but to have realized), of not finding readers sufficient to pay the expense of printing.

3. There is no apparent necessity for incurring this trouble and expense when the "Refutation," to which the "Remarks" profess to be an answer, has passed through seven copious editions, and is in (or, for aught I know, through) an eighth, while the "Remarks," though entirely recast, have not been able to pass a second edition, notwithstanding the notoriety the author has acquired by the circulation of his Bible.

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