our Lord was pleased, in his conference with Nicodemus, to adopt the same kind of language, applying it to the case of admitting converts both from Judaism and Paganism into Christianity; transferring and sanctifying the rite, the figure, and the name to higher and holier, but still similar purposes. Such is the account given of this matter by many learned and judicious writers*. It appears extremely probable from the authorities commonly cited for it; and it is particularly favoured by those words of our Lord to Nicodemus, expressing some kind of marvel at his slowness of apprehension: Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these thingst? Some doubts have been raised on this head, and some very learned persons have expressed their diffidence about it: but all things considered, there does not appear to be sufficient reason to make question of it. So

* Selden. de Jur. Nat. & Gent. 1. ii. c. 2—4.—Elderfield of Regeneration, Hebrew and Christian.-Wall, Inf. Bapt. introd. p: 95, &c. Defence, p. 22, 26, 35, 211, 318.-Wotton, Miscellan. Disc. vol. i. p. 103, &c.-Vitringæ Observ. Sacr. 1. ii. c. vi. p. 322.-Others referred to in Fabricius, Bibl. Antiq. p. 386.-Archbishop Sharpe, vol. iii. serm. xiii. p. 280.-Deylingii Observ. Sacr. part. iii. dissert. xxxiv. p. 323, 324. -Wesselii Dissert. xv. de Bapt. Proselytorum, p. 444, &c.

† John iii. 10.

1

The very learned Wolfius several times speaks doubtfully of it, Cur. Critic. vol. i. p. 53, 815. vol. ii. p. 445. But it will

much for the name and notion of regeneration, and the original of it, together with the occasion of our Lord's applying it to this case. Indeed, he inproved the notion, by the addition of the Spirit: and he enlarged the use of the rite, by ordering that every one, every convert to Christianity, every candidate for heaven, should be baptized*. Every one must be born of water and the Spirit: not once born of water, and once of the Spirit, so as to make two new birthst, or to be regenerated again and again; but to be once new-born of both, once born of the Spirit, in or by water; while the Spirit primarily or effectively, and the water secondarily or instrumentally, concur to one and

be proper to compare Wesselius, who has appeared since, and who has professedly treated this argument, and done it in a very accurate way, recapitulating all that had been urged on both sides the question, and at length deciding in favour of what I have mentioned. The title of the book is, Johannis Wesselii Dissertationes Academicæ ad Selecta quædam Loca V. & N. Testamenti. Lugd. Bat. 1734.

* 66 What alterations were intended to be made by our Lord, 66 he himself declared: he told Nicodemus, that except a man (tis, i. e. every one,

without distinction of seres,) be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. He there shews, “that baptism was instituted for all mankind, in opposition to “their doctrine, who taught that children of proselyles, born 6 after proselytism, needed not to be baptized.” Wotton, Miscell. Disc. vol. i. p. 111.

+ Vid. Marckii Dissertat. Syllog. ad N. Test. dissert. xxi. P. 355, 356.

the same birth, ordinarily the result of both*, in virtue of the divine appointment.

Hence it was that the ancient doctors of the church, in explaining this article, were wont to consider the Spirit and the water under the lively emblem of a conjugal union, as the two parents; and the new-born Christian as the offspring of botht. The Holy Spirit was understood to impregnate, as it were, the waters of the font, (like as he once overshadowed the Blessed Virgin,) in order to make them conceive and bring forth that holy thing formed after Christ; namely, the new man. Whatever aptness or justness there may or may not be in the similitude, (for figures of speech ought not to be strained to a rigorous exactness,)

yet one thing is certain, that the ancients took in baptism to their notion of regeneration. A learned writer has well proved at large, beyond all reasonable contradiction, that both the Greek and Latin fathers not only used that word for baptism, but so appropriated it also to baptism, as to exclude any other conversion, or repentance, not considered with baptism, from being signified by that name*; so that, according to the ancients, regeneration, or new birth, was either baptism itself, (including both sign and thing,) or a change of man's spiritual state considered as wrought by the Spirit in or through baptism. This new birth, this regeneration, could be but once in a Christian's whole life, as baptism could be but once and as there could be no second baptism, so there could be no second new birth. Regeneration, with respect to the regenerating agent, means the first admission; and with respect to the recipient, it means the first entrance into the spiritual or Christian life and there cannot be two first entrances, or two admissions, any more than two spiritual lives, or two baptisms. The analogy, which this

* Wall, Inf. Bapt. part. i. p. 22, 25, 28, 29, 30. Defence, p. 12, 34, 41, 277, 318, 323, 327, 329, 333, 343. Append. p. 4, 6.Comp. Archbishop Sharpe, vol. iii. serm. xiii. p. 280, &c.-Suicer. Thesaur. tom. i. p. 243, 396, 639, 1352. tom. ii. p. 278, 549, 554.-Cangii Glossar. Græc. p. 1084.-Bingham, xi. 1, 3. p. 462.

new spiritual life bears to the natural, demonstrates the same thing*. There are, in all, three several Lives belonging to every good Christian, and three births of course, thereto corresponding t. Once he is born into the natural life, born of Adam; ence he is born into the spiritual life, born of water and the Spirit; and once also into a life of glory, born of the resurrection at the last day. I mention that third birth into a life above, because that birth also seems to have the name of regeneration, in the New Testament t. But my present concern is only with the regeneration proper to this life, which comes but once, and admits not of a second,

* Cum ergo sint duæ nativitates una est de terra, alia de cœlo ; una est de carne, alia de Spiritu; una est de mortalitate, alia de æternitate; una est de masculo & fæmina, alia de Deo & ecclesia. Sed ipsæ duæ singulæ sunt; nec hæc potest repeti, nec illa.Jam natus sum de Adam, non me potest iterum generare Adam : : jam natus sum de Christo, non me potest iterum generare Christus. Quomodo uterus non potest repeti, sic nec baptismus. Augustin. in Johann. Tract. xi. p. 378. tom. iii. par. ii. ed. Bened.. -Conf. Prosper. Sentent. cccxxxi. p. 246. apud Augustin. tom. x. in append.-Aquin. Summ. par. q. lxvi. art. ix. p. 150.

+ Vid. Greg. Nazianz. Orat. xl. p. 637.—Origen. in Matt. Orat. ix. f. 23. Lat. ed. p. 391. ed. Huet.-Augustin. contra Julian. I. ii. p. 540, 541.

Matt. xix. 28. See commentators, and Bishop Pearson on the Creed, art. i. p. 28. and particularly Olearius in Matt, p. 540.