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i. The Church is faithful to her Lord in bringing "little children" to him, in Infant Baptism. I assume that she has right to do so. I undertake no defence of the grounds and reasons of this sacrament. I enter into no argument to prove that the Gospel is more comprehensive, more benevolent, more regardful of human infirmity, than the Law. I can conceive of no necessity to show that He, who, before his crucifixion, said, "Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God," did not afterwards, when he had risen from the dead, exclude them from the initiatory rite of his religion, or forbid that they should "be born of water and of the Spirit," without which, he declared to Nicodemus, none can "enter into the kingdom of God." But, the authority conceded, how benign, how beautiful, how admirable for wisdom and benevolence, the uses of the ordinance! The infant sufferer is born into a world of sorrow and of sin, the heir at once of both. At the first threshold of his being, the Saviour's spouse comes out to meet him. She bears him to the bleeding Cross. She layes him in the fountain that forever flows from it, "for [5/6] sin and for uncleanness." She signs him with its sacred sign. It is the signature of heaven upon his brow and in his heart. He is "born again" "of water and of the Spirit." He is the child of God, by "adoption and grace." He is an heir, through hope, of the eternal kingdom, by the merits of the most precious death of the only-begotten Son of God.

ii. When she has brought the little children thus to Christ, and made them by adoption members of the family of God, does she so leave them to the sinful bias of their fallen nature, and the corrupting influence of the wicked world? No! She bears them gently in a mother's arms. She clasps them fondly to a mother's breast. They are nurtured at her bosom. They are led by her hand. They are fed "with milk, and not with meat." There is ever in her ear the touching charge of her dear Lord, "take this child, and nurse him for me;" and the thought is ever foremost in her heart, to bring them up, whom He has so acknowledged, in His nurture and holy admonition. Admirable for this end, is the "Catechism" which she has provided,--a "form of sound words"--Scripture, or strictly scriptural--the work of men, giants in intellect, and saints in piety--"so concise that the youngest child may learn it by heart, and yet so copious as to contain all things necessary to salvation." [*Jenkin on the Liturgy, pp. 225, 226.] Admirable is the provision which she has made, that this unrivalled summary of Christian faith and practice may not remain as a dead letter in the Prayer Book,--her rubrics requiring "the minister of every parish" "diligently upon Sundays and [6/7] Holy-days" to "instruct or examine" the "children of his parish," "openly in the Church," in some part of it; and "all fathers, mothers, masters and mistresses" being enjoined to "cause their children, servants and apprentices, who have not learned their Catechism, to come to the Church, at the time appointed, and obediently to hear, and to be ordered by the minister" [*At the end of the Catechism.] her canons directing that the ministers who have charge of parishes "shall not only be diligent in instructing the children in the Catechism, but shall also by stated catechetical lectures and instruction be diligent in informing the youth and others in the doctrines, constitution, and liturgy of the Church" [* Canon xxviii.]--nay the very title of the Catechism bearing with it this direct and positive injunction, "that is to say, an instruction to be learned by every person, before he be brought to be confirmed by the Bishop."

Such is an outline, brief and rapid, of the beautiful and merciful provision by which the Church demonstrates and exerts her care for little children. How true to nature! How profound in philosophy! In piety how elevated! How instinct with charity! She "knows whereof we are made, and remembers that we are but dust." She sees that "of ourselves we are not sufficient to any good thing, as of ourselves." She bears in mind that for the race of man, so weak, so lost, so "dead in trespasses and sins," the Saviour died, that he might redeem them from all iniquity, and purify them to himself, as "a peculiar people, zealous of good works." A work so great cannot begin too soon. In such an enterprize, so mighty, so momentous, involving the eternal welfare of immortal souls, no moment must be lost. In resisting the whole bent and bias of an evil nature, reclaiming it from the control and thraldom of a power to which its will consents, transforming it--to use the only word which tells us all--creating it anew, so that from being sinful and loving sin, it shall become holy and in love with holiness, there must be need of time, and influence, and energy, and patience, and perseverance, and true love that never fails nor falters, [9/10] nor grows weary,--and there needs above them and beyond them all, without which all the rest are vain, the sanctifying grace of the divine and holy Spirit. And she brings them all to bear--commences with the babe just born--secures for him, while worldlings would be caring for his fortune or his rank, a title to the purchase of the Cross, a portion in the heritage of heaven--lays her wait for the first dawning of his moral nature, and has prepared her pious hymn and holy prayer, to catch his infant heart--leads him gently by the hand to tender pastures and still waters--teaches him diligently, while he sits in the house and when he walks by the way, when he lies down and when he rises up--plies him with "line upon line, line upon line, precept upon precept, precept upon precept"--has patience with his weakness, with his slowness of heart, with his impatience, with his perversity, with his ingratitude--and supplicates, with fervent and continual prayers, the blessing of that gracious Spirit, who alone can bless her care, and crown her toil with increase.

1. The ancient and excellent institution of Catechising has suffered much depreciation from prevailing errors, as to its exact NATURE and intention. It has been supposed that these were both fulfilled when, now and then,--on rare occasions, as if an irksome task; when the whole congregation had retired, as if a work affording neither interest nor profit--its words, committed all to memory, were said by rote,--the questions asked exactly as they stand, no less, no more,--the answers rendered to the letter, and too often with but little more of understanding or of application than a well-instructed parrot might attain to. Who can wonder, if the institution, so administered, should suffer disrepute--if a duty discharged with so little interest, should be interesting to few or none--if an office, so reduced and dwindled to a bare [11/12] and barren form, should fail of any useful purpose, and fall into neglect? In the beginning it was not so. By catechising, beyond a question, the faith and practice of the Gospel first gained an introduction among men. "It was principally by catechising," says Bishop Mant, on the authority of Hegesippus, "that the religion of Jesus was in a few years spread over the known world." [* Notes on the Catechism.] "By catechising, under heaven," says Archdeacon Bayley, "was planted the apostolic Church; by catechising, the sound of the Gospel was sent forth into all lands." [* Charge to the Clergy of the Archdeaconry of Stow.] "St. Paul's converts," says the present Bishop of Chester, "had all been instructed in the faith, as the custom was, catechetically." [* J. B. Sumner, Apostolical Preaching, fourth London edition, p. 308.] "Clemens Alexandrinus, Heraclias, afterwards Bishop of Alexandria, and Origen, were catechists; and the latter was so eminently successful in proceeding upon the golden rule, "line upon line and precept upon precept," that he not only achieved conversions among the more ignorant and uninformed, but among accomplished scholars." [* Gilly's Horae Catecheticae, pp. 70, 1.] It follows from these statements, and from many more that might be made, that catechetical instruction could not have been in earlier days that mere mechanical procedure which some appear to think it. "Sure I am," says Bishop Edmund Law, "catechising in its original, true sense, implies something more than a bare running over an old form, though that consist of proper questions and answers, and contain whatever is needful to believe or practice." [* Dissertation on the nature and necessity of Catechising.]

ii. [29] Nor, less effectual is the public Catechising, as an instrument of Christian education, than in its influence on the pastoral bond. To suppose that the capacity to comprehend sermons, or even to understand the sacred Scriptures, can be had, without some previous preparation, is an obvious error. For want of elementary knowledge, much preaching is in vain. We take for granted that the people know much more than they have ever had the opportunity to learn. Hence the necessity of Catechising to supply the first principles, to familiarize with terms and forms, to discipline the understanding and prepare the heart. "There is no employment in the world," says Bishop Hall, "wherein God's ministers can employ themselves so profitably as in this of plain and familiar Catechism. What is a building without a foundation? If this ground work be not surely laid, all their divine discourses lie but upon shifting sand." [* The Peace-maker, section 2-Works, viii. 90.] "Great scholars," said Archbishop Usher, "possibly may think that it stands not so well with their credit to stoop thus low, and to spend so much of their time in teaching these rudiments and first principles of the doctrine of Christ. But they should consider that the laying of the foundation skilfully, as it is the matter of greatest importance in the whole building, so it is the very master-piece of the wisest builder." [* Sermon before King James I.] And Bishop Wilson, in his primitive administration of the diocese of Sodor and Man, having established Catechising as the general usage of the Churches, after prayers in the afternoon, instead of a sermon, refused [29/30] permission, in a single instance, to depart from this arrangement, on the ground that he considered it of more use to the souls both of the learned and the ignorant than the very best sermon from the pulpit. And in a Charge delivered in his eighty-fifth year, he states his opinion, as "a truth not to be questioned, that the plainest sermon from the pulpit will not be understood, nor profit any who has not been well instructed in the principles of Christianity contained in the Church Catechism." "These," he continues, "are foundation principles, and such as every pastor of souls is obliged to explain, as he hopes ever to do good by his other sermons and labours. We say to explain, not only in set discourses from the pulpit, but in a plain familiar manner, where questions may be asked, and things explained, so as both old and young may be edified. Preaching will always be our duty, but of little use, to those who understand not the meaning of the words which we make use of in our sermons, as, God knows, too many must be supposed to do for want of being instructed in their younger years."--Now against the evil thus earnestly deprecated by one, than whom there never was a wiser or better man, the office of Catechising presents a double barrier--first, as it makes the learners intimately familiar with the Scriptures, and then with the Scriptures as received and set forth in the Church. The Scriptures are the truth, containing all things necessary for salvation. The Church is the ground and pillar of the truth--on which it rests, by which it is sustained and guarded, from which it is presented to mankind, in due connection with the ministry, the [30/31] ordinances, the institutions and the worship of the Apostles. And the true use and value of her catechetical instructions is well stated by the last biographer of our illustrious Hobart--who was himself not only a great admirer of this good old form of teaching, but a great friend also to the old-fashioned mode of catechising in the Church--as designed to attach her members, "by the power of early habit, to her doctrines, her discipline, and her worship; making them not theologians but Christians, and not Christians in a vague and general sense, but Christians in the Church: recognizing in what it teaches the doctrines of the Gospel--in the sacraments which it administers the covenanted means of grace--in its ministry, a divine commission from Christ and his Apostles--and in its services a rational, and heart-felt worship offered to Almighty God." [* McVickar's Professional Years of Hobart, p. 71.] 041b061a72