of Lindisfarne, eleven years after his death, which took place in the desert island of Farne, in the year 687, and that on this occasion, it is reported by Ven. Bede, in his Ecclesiastical History, and in both his Prose and his Metrical Life of St. Cuthbert, to have been found incorrupt. Having been afterwards removed, together with the episcopal see, to Durham, it was, with great pomp and publicity, exa-pectation of the Lord Cromwell's mined by the then bishop of that see, visitors, (whose intention it was to a second time, 418 years after the burn the bones, had they found nodeath of St. Cuthbert, which corres- thing but bones in the coffin,) the ponds with the year 1105, during the said visitors wrote up to Cromwell, in reign of Henry I. at which time it was London, to know what they were to again found incorrupt, with the limbs do in this extraordinary case. In the flexible and the vestments entire, as mean time, we are informed, that Simeon of Durham testifies, who de- some of the monks contrived to steal clares that he not only saw, but han- away the body, which they buried in dled the body. The same facts are re- a private place, yet so as to transmit ported by William of Malmesbury, the secret to some of their successors, Roger Hoveden, and other original to be communicated to others after Writers, who were either contempo- them, as long as Christianity should raries with these facts, or lived very continue to be professed at Durham. near the times when they happened. Thus much I can say, from my cerThe above-mentioned authors report tain knowledge, that there are always that, amongst other things found in three gentlemen of the Benedictine the tomb of St. Cuthbert, at this se- order, who profess to know the idencond translation of his body, was a tical spot, at Durham, where the body chalice, the cup of which was gold, of St. Cuthbert rests, and who, as one and the lower part onyx, as likewise of them dies, choose another to whom the head of the great and good king they impart the secret. of the Northumbrians, Oswald, who lost his life, fighting against the traces the history of it up to the aforesaid dissolution of monasteries, in the reign of Henry VIII. The said ring is still preserved at the house of the canonesses of St. Augustine, Rue Fossèe St. Victor, at Paris, at which house Dr. Smith died.With respect to the body of St. Cuthbert, having, as we are told, been found incorrupt, contrary to the ex Danes. The third and last time when the body was examined, was at the dissolution of the greater monasteries, in the reign of Henry VIII. on which occasion, as on the two former, the body is said by Harpsfield, who lived at the time of this event, and who afterwards became archdeacon (I think) of Canterbury, in his Latin Ecclesiastical History, in folio, to have been still found incorrupt. He mentions a sapphire ring that was taken out of the tomb, which he says he had seen. Dr. Rich. Smith, bishop of Chalcedon, who wrote his Flores Historic Anglicana (a thin folio) in the reign of Charles I, declares that he was in possession of that ring, and To speak now of the present M. S.; when I first heard of a Gospel that had been buried with St. Cuthbert, (in consequence, as may be supposed, and as is now reported, of the value which the saint set upon it,) I own I rejected the whole story as a fabrication, because I was well aware of what Simeon of Durham relates in his history of that Church, namely, that St. Cuthbert caused a beautiful M. S. copy of the Evangelists to be executed by the monk Ealfrid, (who afterwards succeeded him in the See of Lindisfarne,) and that Ethelwald, who was placed in the same see, in the year 721, caused this M. S. book to be illuminated with various figures in the inside, and to be magnificently bound with gold and precious stones on the outside. I had read the story, related by the aforesaid Simeon, (or) rather by Turgotus of Durham, whose work he transcribed and continued, of this book's falling into the sea, as certain monks were endeavouring to transport the saint's body into Ireland, and of its being recovered from thence, without any damage, several days afterwards. Lastly, I had examined and subscribed to the proofs adduced by the learned Selden, in his preface to the Decem Scriptores; as likewise to those adduced by Smith, in his preface to the Catalogus Librorum M. S. S. Bibliotheca Cottonianæ, from which it appears, that this identical book is now preserved in the British Museum. But when I had examined and compared my different authorities, as well as the manuscripts themselves, together, I found that the claims of the large book in the Museum, no way interfere with the pretensions of my small book, now before the Society. For it is no where recorded that the former was buried with St. Cuthbert, though it was written for his use; and his being possessed of a folio copy of the four Evangelists, with various appendixes, &c. annexed to them, is no argument against his prizing, and frequently reading in a portable duodecimo sized copy of the Gospel of St. John, as his master, Boisil, the Prior of Mailross, is said to have done before him. That this manuscript is not mentioned amongst the things found in his tomb by William of Malmesbury and other writers, is no argument against the presumed fact, because the last-mentioned historian speaks of the chalice of gold and onyx, and of the head of King Oswald, as being found at the second visitation; of which fact, Simeon of Durham makes no mention. The chief arguments, of a positive nature, in favour of the fact in question, are the three following: first, the inscription at the beginning of the work; secondly, tradition; thirdly, the intrinsic evidence, arising from the writing itself. The inscription, which is on the leaf opposite to the beginning of the Gospel, is as follows: Ewangelium Johannis quod inventum fuerat ad capud Beati Patris nostri Cuthberti, in sepulchro jácens anno translationis ipsius. This inscription is in a very. ancient hand-writing, though vastly inferior to that of the Gospel itself It is of a later date than the charac ter of Magna Charta, with which Mr. Planta and myself compared it but is it not very much inferior to it Probably it is as ancient as the reign of Edward I. or Edward II. By the very terms of it, in which St. Cuthbert is called Patris nostri, it is traced to the church, of which that saint was the patron, viz. to Durham. I may add, that its binding, which seems to be of the time of Queen Elizabeth, is in part composed of parchments, which all relate to persons or things connected with Durham. and for Hence we may rationally suppose that the present book was preserved the treasury at Durham, till the disso lution of monasteries; when, for the sake of its costly binding, or some other cause, like the copy at the Mu seum, it got into private hands; became the property of the ancient family of the Lees, one of whom, in the reign of Charles II. became Earl of Lichfield. Thus much is certain, that the book in question was, time immemorial, preserved in the aforesaid family as the undoubted Manual, or Vade Mecum of St. Cuth bert, during his lifetime, and as hav ing been buried with him at his death. The last Earl of Lichfield, as a paper at the end of the book testifies, gave it to the Rev. Thomas Philips, the well-known writer of the Life of Car dinal Pole, who bestowed it on the college of the Jesuits, at Leige, in the year 1769. From the said college it was brought to England by some of the members of it, after the suppres sion of their order. The characters of the manuscript, and the mode of writing, bear intrinsic evidence of an antiquity as high as the out chapters, verses, dipthongs, or points of any kind. The letters are all uncial, or capitals, being for the most part Roman, with a mixture of the Saxon. Mr. Planta, who assisted me in comparing this manuscript with the one in the Museum, is decidedly of opinion, that it is, of the two, the more ancient. Now the latter is demonstratively of the time of St. Cuthbert. age of St. Cuthbert. The text is with- | twelve years ago, when I published my Tracts on Baptism, that Infant Baptism is taught in Scripture. I grant, that no particular instance of it is recorded in the New Testament; but its necessity, and consequently its institution, are clearly expressed in the words of our Saviour to Nicodemus, Except any one be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. John, iii. 5. 6. That our Saviour speaks in this text of Christian baptism, of the same baptism which he afterwards sent his apostles to administer among all nations, no Catholic ever doubted. The institution of baptism, at least in general, may therefore clearly and invincibly be deduced from this text. The question now is, for whom was baptism instituted by Christ? For the adult only, or both for the adult and infants? I suppose nobody will contest that Christ instituted it for all those for whom he declares it in this text to be necessary. But does Christ speak of adult persons only, when he says, that any one who is not born of water and the Holy Ghost cannot enter into the kingdom of God? It is evident that he speaks of infants as well as of the adult, since he grounds The text is the latin vulgate; but, as in the few passages I have compared with the present vulgate, there are certain various readings, differing from it; I am inclined to think it is of the old italic vulgate, which existed previously to the corrections of St. Jerome. It perfectly agrees with the text of St. John, in the said Liber Evangeliorum S. Cuthberti, now in the Museum, as far as my leisure would allow me to compare them together. I shall conclude with remarking, that the history of the Woman taken in Adultery, which is wanting in many ancient copies of St. John, both the Latin and the Greek, is found both in the present manuscript, and that of the Museum. INFANT BAPTISM. To the Editor of the Orthodox Journal. SIR-In a work published this year by a person of our communion, writer of great and well-merited fame, and for whom I personally entertain the greatest esteem, I meet with the following assertion. "They (the founders of the modern Church of England) had agreed to retain infant baptism: it was therefore necessary to rest it on some ground. On Scripture they could not; for is is not taught in Scripture. On tradition ey dared not; for tradition they had already rejected." Now, Sir, the necessity of his baptism upon a circumstance which affects them both equally, that is their being flesh, because born of the flesh. I shall now observe, in support of my opinion, that whenever the divine institution of infant baptism has been attacked, which was chiefly on two occasions, the church in her councils never failed to vindicate it by the authority of scripture, especially by the text above quoted. The council of Lombez, which Binius calls Concilium Gallicanum, and which he places an. 1176, but was held, according to the authors of L'Art de verifier les Dattes, I beg leave to say, that I entirely dif- in 1165, argued from scripture against fer from the elegant and learned controvertist. I still believe, as I did the Manichean Anabaptists of the twelfth century, who affirmed, that all | all have sinned, is no otherwise to h understood, than as the Catholi church spread every where has alway understood it. For upon this rule faith, even infants, who cannot ha committed any personal sin, are, the tradition of the apostles, tru baptized unto remission of sins, th in them, what has been contracted generation, may be cleansed by reg neration. For except any one be bo again of water and the Holy Gho he cannot enter into the kingdom God." No. 4. From these quotatin it is evident that the fathers of council of Trent believed, that infe baptisni was taught in scripture. The appeal indeed to tradition, as Catholi divines do in all controversies, to fi the sense of scripture, but still ground the divine institution of infant bap tism on scripture. I do the same, an adhering to the excellent meth adopted by those learned fathers, a before them, by the fathers of council of Lombez, I lay down the three scriptural principles, from whi the institution of infant baptism cessarily follows. 1st. By the offe of one unto all men, condemnatio 2d. So also by the justice (or right. ousness) of one unto all men unto ja tification. Rom. v. 18. 3d. Exce auy one be born of water and the Ho Ghost he cannot enter into the king dom of God. Infants are include in the first of those principles; are so in the second ; and so they a in the third. Indeed, if it is evide that Christ died for infants, when died for all, it is equally evident, title when he instituted baptism for the sa vation of those for whom he died, instituted it for infants. infants were damned, and would not have them baptised. They begin their third canon thus; "Under the third head we convince and judge them to be heretics, by authorities from the New Testament;" then, after having quoted scripture to prove, that God would have all men to be saved; that Christ died for all, they proceed, "But Christ would not have been crucified for all, if salvation was obtained only by persons of riper years, who have added to original sin actual transgressions-Baptism has been deli- | vered generally for all, whether adult or infants, as the Lord says to his disciples, Go teach all nations, baptizing them, &c. and again, If any one be not born again, &c. (Binius, Tom. viii. p. 643.)-When the Anabaptists of the 16th century revived the heresy of the ancient Manichees, the fathers of the council of Trent followed the same method, and refuted them by scripture. (Sess. v. Decret. Pec. orig.) "Whoever denies that the merits of Christ, which are conferred by baptism rightly administered in the form of the church, are applied both to infants and adult persons, let him be anathema; Because there is no other name under heaven given to men whereby we must be saved. Hence this declaration, Behold the Lamb of God; behold him who takes away the sins of the world; and this too, As many of you, as have been baptised in Christ have put on Christ." No. 3. ،، Who | soever denies that new born children, even those born of baptized parents, are to be baptized, or says, that they indeed are baptized unto remission of sins, but yet have contracted nothing of original sin from Adam, which needs be washed away by the laver of regeneration, to the end that they may obtain eternal life; whence it must follow, that, in their regard, the form of baptism, unto remission of sins, is not true but false, let him be anathema; for what the apostle says, By one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death, and thus death passed upon all men, in whom the But, Sir, although I am convince that infant baptism is taught in scri ture, yet I truly believe that mot Protestants have lost the power proving it by scripture; since it is come fashionable among its necessity. The first reformers were not of that opinion; they in general believed the necessity of baptism for the salvation of infants; them to deny and as they ome 66 If By would not admit the existence of a | anum.) But this wise divine has found T N. G. SECOND LETTER TO LAICUS. rebit. better, and which is the reason they Calumniare audacter: semper aliquis adhæ eed it not." So, according to this rotestant Doctor of Divinity, innoce is become a title to baptism. SIR,-In my last I engaged myself Augustine has long since refuted to say a word on your Monita Secreta. Pelagian heresy, by asserting, This rancid libel, indeed, refutes iteably to scripture and to the faith self. No man of common sense will the Catholic church, that no one allow even the possibility of a large comes to baptism in a state of in- body of men being governed, or of atcence: "Who ever came to baptism taining to credit and power upon such ocent, except He who came not to absurd maxims, under the inspection ptism to have his sins washed away, of so many powerful Princes, wise example of humility? Ministers, and learned Prelates. Cerst thou not hear the scripture say, tainly these Lords of Church and State free from sin in thy could not be so blind, during 150 years, resence, nor even the child whose life as to tolerate, to cherish a gang of one day upon earth. And thieves, to intrust to them the public instruction of the people, the education of youth. Such a set of maxims would not have connected together a band of professed forgerers and swiu to give us an here is not one but of hy do they ORTHOD, JOUR. VOL. III. 2C |