| 308 and the inspired ones fled. It was well for them that it did, for the people were about adopting such measures as would protect their wives and daughters from the insults of these deluded men.
I have not told you the half, nor need I. Are these doctrines of the Bible, and is this Millerism carried out?
* This was said to be the Millerites, one of the latter day signs and wonders which the world could not understand.
† We leave this name blank because the writer has not given us his own name, which he should have done for our private information, that we might know the degree of confidence to which the letter is entitled. We never make public use of the names of correspondents except with their own consent. Eds Jour. Com.
COMMUNICATIONS.
[For the Times and Seasons.]
BAPTISM-THE MODE OF ITS ADMINISTRATION-ITS EFFICACY-DR. MOSHIEM-STATE OF THE RELIGIOUS WORLD-THE APOSTACY [APOSTASY], &c. &c.
BROTHER TAYLOR:-
The subject of baptism is a topic of considerable controversy in the religious world. Religionists entertain various conflicting opinions as regards the mode of its administration, the efficacy of the ordinance, and the essential nature of the same. Ever since the first century this has been one heated tome of controversy, and has afforded a wide spread field of argument to biblical commentators, and ecclesiastical historians. It is an item of so much importance in the religious theory, and involving considerations of such great moment, that the world has become flooded with dissertations upon the subject; all advocating such a lengthy train of conflicting views and doctrines, that the readers and writers themselves, have become lost upon the wide sea of metaphysics and engulphed [engulfed] in the yawning labyrinth of that mental darkness which now seems to brood so generally over the religious world. The scriptural blindness of men has grown so great that they have wandered off into the bewildering mazes of their own folly, until their countless theories, and chequered [checkered] sea of dogmas, flow down upon the present age, as regardless of the doctrines of the apostles, taught in the primitive church, as the burning lava from the cratar [crater] of Mount Vesuvius is of the tender plant that here and there springs up during the intervals of its periodical overflow. The spirit of enthusiasm has become so heated in the great oven of contest, that when they get some plausible theory into their heads, they become desperate; and if they cannot bend scripture into unison with their opinions, it is thrown aside, and by some glare of vague philosophy, or species of literary legerdemain, they work out the great problem under investigation, in as reasonable a light as the rotten premises will allow. Some hold that baptism is essential to salvation, others that it is not,-some hold to immersion, and others contend that sprinkling is the correct mode of administering this ordinance. But we are under the positive conviction that there is not, and never has been, but one true and legitimate way by which penitents are received into the kingdom of Christ. There is but one channel through which aliens or foreigners are received and made citizens of the government of the United States, and that particular channel is clearly defined in the constitution. Upon the same principle we argue that there is but one door through which aliens from the government of heaven can be received and made legal citizens thereof, and that particular door is defined in the Bible, that great constitution of the kingdom of God. The Bible holds precisely the same relation to the government of heaven, as the constitution does to the United States. The latter binds together the great compact of States; provides for the protection of the government against foreign innovations; points out the modes by which official duties are to be performed in its various departments; defines the ceremonies constituting men legal agents to legislate or perform any duties of a national character, and defines the power and authority delegated to each.-The constitution of the government of Heaven, (the Bible) provides for the same things. If a legislative body enacts laws derogatory to the provisions of the constitution, upon those laws being carried before the supreme court of the United States, for a decision upon their constitutionality, when the fact appears to the mind of the court that they are unconstitutional, it is so entered upon the record, and they consequently become null and void. Upon the same principle we argue, if the officers of the government of heaven, in their deliberative councils, enact laws which the constitution of that government, (the Bible) does not guarantee, they are pronounced unconstitutional by the high court of heaven, and they consequently become illegal, and loose their force. These conclusions are certainly logical and the arguments incontrovertible.
Then some of the religionists of the day should be careful how they proceed, lest their religious theories be pronounced illegal when their constitutionality comes to be tried, for
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