remember the covenant sealed in baptism, that you may keep-up your faith in God through Christ, who pardoneth all your sins, and hath "begotten us again unto a lively hope." We must expect to be tempted: the devil tempted Christ after his baptism to question his filiation so solemnly attested. (Compare Matt. iii. 17 with Matt. iv. 6.) Luther saith of himself, that when the devil tempted him to despair, or to any doubts and fears about the love of God or his mercy to sinners, he would always answer, Ecce, ego baptizatus sum, et credo in Christum crucifixum : "Behold, I am baptized, and believe in Christ crucified." And he telleth us also of a holy virgin, who gave this reply, when the devil abused her solitudes, and injected any despairing thoughts into her mind, Baptizata sum, "I am baptized, and entered into God's covenant, and will expect the pardon of my sins by Jesus Christ."

Thus should we all the days of our life improve our baptism, till we have the full of that holy and happy estate, for which we were first purified and washed in God's laver.

BIBL

OTHE

SERMON XI.

BY THE REV. THOMAS LYE, A.M.

BY WHAT SCRIPTURAL RULES MAY CATECHISING BE SO MANAGED, AS THAT IT MAY BECOME MOST UNIVERSALLY PROFITABLE?

"Train up," or catechise, “a child in the way he should go," or in his way : “and when he is old, he will not depart from it."-Proverbs xxii. 6.

THIS most excellent book of sacred aphorisms, or divine proverbs, is by some not unfitly compared to a costly chain of orient pearls; among which, though there be a fair connexion, yet there is little or no coherence. I shall therefore immediately enter on the words themselves; and in them I observe a precept and a promise; an important duty, and a persuasive motive.

1. A grand, important, necessary duty enjoined.-"Train up," or catechise, 66 a child in the way he should go." In which words we have, (1.) The act or duty prescribed.-" Train up," or catechise; piously and prudently instruct and educate.

(2.) The object or person that is to be trained up.—“A child." By a synecdoche, all such younger ones and inferiors as are committed to the care and conduct of their superiors.

(3.) The subject-matter wherein these inferiors are thus to be trained up." In the way he should go," in that way or manner of life which most suits and becomes him, that makes most for God's glory and his own temporal, spiritual, and eternal good.

2. A cogent argument or prevalent motive to excite and quicken to the faithful discharge of this important duty." And when he is old, he will

not depart from it;"* that is, not easily, not ordinarily depart from it. He will be the better for it as long as he lives.†

From the first of these, namely, the precept that enjoins the duty, I infer, OBSERVATION. That it is the great and indispensable duty, and therefore ought to be the serious and constant care, of superiors, prudently and piously to train up or catechise, to instruct and educate, all such inferiors as are committed to their care and conduct.

In the pursuing of this momentous truth, I shall tread in this method, laying before you these five things:

I. What it is to train up or catechise.

II. What is meant by that "way," wherein persons are to be trained up. III. Who they are, that are to be trained up or catechised.

IV. Who they are, that are to train up or catechise, and why.

V. How the whole affair may be so prudently, piously, spiritually managed, as that it may be crowned with such a blessed success, as to become most universally profitable.

I. What it is to train up or catechise.

SOLUTION. The word it in the text is very pregnant, and greatly significant: Primùm imbue; "Give the first dip, dye, tincture, seasoning." Hence, by a metaphor, the word is diversely translated. Initia; so Arias Montanus: "Begin, or give the first instruction; lay the groundwork, foundation, or first stone." Deduc: So [the] Chaldee Paraph. Version. Instrue: "Set in order or array, arm, train up, instruct." Thus Abraham armed, or led forth his "trained" or "instructed servants." (Gen. xiv. 14.) § The word is also translated, dedicavit, consecravit; that is, "to set a person or thing apart, and to devote it to the true God in a right manner, for holy uses and ends, with solemn prayer and praise.” Thus the word is used, Deut. xx. 5; in the title of Psalm xxx.; 1 Kings ix. 7; 2 Chron. vii. 5; 1 Kings viii. 63; 1 Chron. xviii. 11. The Greeks render the word μυσταγωγει, προπαιδευε, κατηχιζε: [which last is] a word of a peculiar signification, and imports a plain and familiar teaching and instructing of the ignorant by word of mouth, in the first grounds and fundamental principles of the true, and (in the strictest sense) the Christian, religion. Thus the word is used, Luke i. 4; Acts xviii. 25; 1 Cor. xiv. 19; Gal. vi. 6. Hence it may be supposed it was that our translators, in the margin, render the word "catechise," as being prompted thereunto by the Jewish rabbins, who style their form of catechism "a book of first instruction."

II. What is meant by that "way" wherein persons are to be trained up, or catechised and initiated.

SOLUTION. 17 by "In the way he should go;" in the way or

Quo semel est imbuta recens servabit odorem

Testa diu.-HORATII Epist. lib. i. Ep. ii. 69.

"Now suck-in wisdom: for the vessel well

With liquor season'd, long retains the smell."-FRANCIS'S Translation.

Ad plurimum.-So HILDersham. 14 Initia, primùm imbue, institue, dedica.-Buxtorf. "Initiate, early imbue, instruct, dedicate."-Edit.

Instructos, expeditos, incipientes suos pueros, fidos, initiatos, quos domi nutriverat, et quos arte bellica et lege Divind instruxerat. "Instructed, equipped, his rising young men, who were trustworthy, initiated, whom he had cherished and brought up in his house, and whom he had instructed in the art of war, and in the law of the Lord."-EDIT.

by way of question and answer.-Vide page 105.

| Whether

manner of his life, (Gen. xliii. 7,) in viá suá, “in his way," in his kind, and according to his capacity and measure, and suitably to the weakness and tenderness of his years; in the sound knowledge and practice of those truths and principles which may fit him for the service of his God and generation here, and for the eternal enjoyment of his God hereafter. Let Paul interpret Solomon in his "way." 1. "In the nurture and admonition of the Lord;" (Eph. vi. 4;) ev aldera, that is, in all profitable instruction suitable to a child's age and state, for the framing and moulding of him by knowledge unto a commendable and virtuous carriage, and for the doing of greater good in human society when he comes to write himself MAN. 2. But especially in religious instruction, in "instruction in righteousness;" (2 Tim. iii. 16;) "in the words of faith and of good doctrine;" (1 Tim. iv. 6;) "the first principles of the oracles of God, and of the doctrine of Christ." (Heb. v. 12; vi. 1.) There is something more yet in the words: by Ad os, supra os, (ARIAS MONTANUS,) "upon the mouth of his way:" a form of speaking frequently used in scripture to note the suitableness or proportion of the thing: "according to the mouth of his eating;" (Exod. xvi. 21;) that is, according to the measure of his eating. So Num. vii. 5: "To every Levite according to the mouth," that is, the condition and degree, “of his service." Thus here, "Train up a child upon the mouth of his way," that is, in such a way as is not only good and honest in itself, but most proper and suitable to the spirit, disposition, end, and capacity of the child.† As children are to be fed with such meat, so they are to be taught in such a manner, as they can most easily and profitably digest. Teach them but thus "upon the mouth," and then out of their mouth shall come praise. (Psalm viii. 2.)

III. Who they are that are thus to be trained up or catechised.

SOLUTION. All younger ones and inferiors that are committed by God or men to the care and conduct of superiors; all included in the name "child."-The original word y admits of several significations: "An infant newly born; (Judges xiii. 7;) of three months old; (Exod. ii. 6;) a child as soon as he begins to speak and exert his reason." Thus it runs parallel with the Greek word ßpepos; and so we find Timothy instructed ano ẞpepovs, "from a child," a babe, a suckling. (2 Tim. i. 5, with iii. 15.) It takes-in boys, also, and girls, sons and daughters of somewhat riper age, youths, as Shechem, (Gen. xxxiv. 19,) damsels and those marriageable. § (Deut. xxii. 19.) The word is also applied to Abraham's men-servants; (Gen. xxii. 3;) and to Boaz's maid-servants; (Ruth ii. 22; Esther iv. 4;) to such as, though they may be men in years, are “children in understanding." (Jer. i. 6; 2 Chron. xiii. 7; Isai. iii.

• Juxta viam suam, id est, juxta vitæ genus quod ipsum sequi velis. "According to his way; that is, according to the way in which you wish him to proceed."-EDIT. † Pro captu ingenii ejus infirmioris, ut non eum plus oneres, quàm ætas fert. "According to the capacity of his more infirm genius, so as not to burden him with more than his age is capable of bearing."-EDIT. Ay Excussit: puerum, puerulum, infantem ex utero nuperrimè excussum. "It is derived from a root signifying, he shook off; and its meaning is, a child, a little child, an infant just born."-EDIT. Ita hodie Rabbini puerum quinque annorum ad Biblia, decem ad Mischna seu textum Talmudicum, tredecim ad Precepta, quindecim ad Talmud. "Thus in modern times, the Rabbins direct a boy of five years of age to read and study the Bible; one of ten years, the Mischna, or the text of the First Talmud; one who is thirteen years old, the Precepts; and one of fifteen years, the Second Talmud or Gemara."- EDIT.

4; viii. 4.) These all, and every one of these, come within the list of those that Solomon and his God would have trained up and catechised. (Prov. xxii. 6.) Nay, let me add, there is not "a younger son of the prophets;" not one that sits at the feet of those learned Gamaliels, those truly reverend Elijahs, that can justly plead exemption from this (seeming task, shall I say? or) real honour of being clearly taught in, and firmly fixed upon, those everlasting foundations, "the first principles of the oracles of God." (Heb. v. 12; vi. 1.)

IV. Who they are that are thus to train up or catechise these inferiors and younger ones, and why.

SOLUTION. All their respective superiors in [the] church or family.

(I.) SUPERIORS IN THE CHURCH.-These, under what name or title soever the scripture presents them, are all bound to catechise; that is, in a most plain and sound manner, publicly to instruct the most ignorant of their charge in the first principles of the Christian religion. This duty so peculiarly belongs to them, that their whole work and office is set down under the name of catechising. "Let him that is taught," (in the Greek it is ó κατηχούμενος, "catechised,") "communicate unto him that teacheth;" in the Greek, тw xaτηxouvTI, "that catechiseth." (Gal. vi. 6.) But, to speak closely :

1. Was not Paul a great apostle, yea, the grand doctor of the Gentiles? and yet he professeth himself a catechist. Paul's work was to plant, as well as to water; and to beget, as well as to bring up. (1 Cor. iii. 6, 7 ; iv. 15.) Paul compares himself to a nurse; (1 Thess. ii. 7;) the saints to babes, such as had need of milk, and not of stronger meat. (1 Cor. iii. 1; Heb. v. 12, 13.) Paul professeth himself to be one of God's "stewards;" (1 Cor. iv. 1, 2;) and, if “ faithful," he will see that the meanest, the weakest, in the family hath his due allowance. In a word, Paul styles himself "a master-builder." (1 Cor. iii. 10.) And wherein lies the art and honour of "a master-builder" so much as in solidly laying the foundation-stone, lest, for want of it, the building totter? (Matt. vii. 26, 27,)

2. Was not Peter a great officer in the church? and yet, sure I am, that, whatever dispensation Peter's pretended successor, or any of his allies, may boast and crack of, Peter himself stands charged with feeding "lambs" as well as "sheep." (John xxi. 15—17.) In the church there are not only adult and perfect fathers, and strong in faith, but infants and babes, weak in faith, such as are ignorant of the word of righteousness, "lambs" to be carried in the bosom. (Isai. xl. 11.)

3. The great dulness, incapacity, and slowness of heart, that is in the people to understand by any other way of teaching, calls aloud for this elementary way of teaching. By this means, those that in vain do hear those elaborate labours of the learned in a more full and copious dilating on the articles of faith, are, by these little morsels of catechising, (as it were, chewed for them,) nourished-up unto salvation. This manner of teaching the prophet hints, like a discreet schoolmaster, not to pour-in his precepts all at once; (Isai. xxviii. 10, 13;) for then, like water poured on narrow-mouthed vessels, it would mostly run over; but instil drop by drop. It becomes pastors to be frequent in preaching, to be accurate in their sermons; but yet they may by no means forget the shallow,

indocible, intractable temper of their hearers. It is in vain to give great gobbets of meat to an infant; so far from feeding of him, that is a ready way to choke him.* That ministry usually proves the most effectual that drops as the rain, and distils as the dew.† (Deut. xxxii. 2; Ezek. xx. 46.)

(John

4. The want and neglect of catechism [are] confessed to be one of the principal causes of all those desperate defections that have been made from the faith in this our English Africa, and of those insolent invasions that have been made upon it by loose tongues and lewder pens. What blasphemous disputes against the infinite merit and Deity of our Saviour! as if we intended to justify the Jews in condemning him to the cross, for avouching himself the co-essential and co-eternal Son of God! xix. 7.) How audaciously have they proceeded in the like sacrilegious attempts against the Holy Ghost! What proud brags of the purity of man's nature, and the sufficiency of his power to save himself! How daring have men been to decry the scriptures, the Lord's day, and all the ordinances of God's institution! to despise the sacraments, as if they were as beggarly elements as the Jewish ceremonies! to deride singing of psalms, as if David's harp were out of tune! to reject prayer, as if they were raised to such a plentiful measure of spiritual riches, that it were a shame for them to crave any further supply! In a word, scarce any article of the Christian religion which hath not received many a desperate stab under its fifth rib, and that from the hand of those whose hearts did erewhile seem ready to expose their heads to the greatest hazard, for the least tittle of sacred truth. And whence all this, but from ignorance of truth? Had truth been clearly understood, it could never have been so unworthily undervalued, much less so treacherously undermined, and least of all so impudently affronted, as, woe is us! we behold it, both to our grief and horror. And whence this barbarous ignorance, but from want of due catechising? Hinc illæ lachrymæ. §

OBJECTION. "True: the laying of foundations, instructions in the first principles of religion, [is] a most useful, necessary work; but what ground is there in the holy scriptures for that form or manner of catechising as is now in use; namely, by way of question and answer?"

SOLUTION 1. There are several texts of scripture from which the learned conclude that this mode of catechising was used in the apostles' days, and by the apostles themselves and their immediate successors; and this in imitation of the Jews, who had την μορφωσιν της γνωσεως και της αληθειας εν τω νομῳ, a form of knowledge and of the truth in the law," (Rom. ii. 20,) out of which they instructed the ignorant, and taught babes. Thus, the apostle had given the Romans TUTOν didaɣns, a "form of doctrine;" (Rom. vi. 17;) and to Timothy, úлотUTTWOIN ὑγιαινοντων λογων, a form of sound words;" (2 Tim. i. 13 ;) "a form of sound words," which contained "the principles of the doctrine of

• Laterem lavat.-BOWLES, Pastor Evangel. lib. ii. "He who expects by washing a brick to change its colour, labours to no purpose."-EDIT. + Serpendum humi, et cum suis quasi balbutiendum.—Ibid. "The pastor who looks for success among a dull and uneducated people, must be content to speak in lowly strains, as if his words crept along the ground, and BIDDLE'S "Catechism." appear only to be prattling among his children."-EDIT.

"This is the source of all our grief."—EDIT,