SECTION III. 15 nor insist upon a vindication of our conduct in the several parti- culars, that go to make up the grounds of non- conformity. You may find them put together and well -supported by other wri- ters, and particularly by Dr. Calamy in his three volumes of Moderate Non-conformity; and the chief heads of them, so far as they relate to the people, are well abridged in a very little ,book called Lay-non -conformity Justified, to which I refer my readers, who desire to take a more particular notice of the rea- sons of our separation. My only design in this place, is to mention some of those advantages, which you protestant dissenters are generally sup- 'posed to enjoy above your neighbours in the affairs of religion ; and even these I shall cite and borrow from those books which were written several years ago, to make it appear that I design no contention ; and if I am necessitated to speak of some of the differences that lie between us, the reader will see that I repre- sent them not in the language of dispute, nor pursue them any farther than to chew mere matter of fact, that I may thence de- rive more forcible and pungent warnings and reproofs to those of our own communion, who are negligent of piety and virtue under all their supposed advantages. Advantage L You are not in so much danger of taking up with the outward forms of 'religion, instead of the inwardpower and more spiritualpdrts of it, as your neighbours may be, and that particularly in the two following instances : First, You are in no such danger of mistakingbaptism for inward and real rege- neration5, as those who are educated in the established church. You are not in the least tempted or encouraged in any of our ministrations to suppose, that your souls are regenerated by the outward ceremony of baptism, or that you are really bornagain, and made new creatures by being baptized with water ; to which unhappy and dangerous mistake, the office of baptism in the church of England, has been thought to give too much counte- nance, in the plain sense of the expressions, and without any sufficient guard or caution ; and the answer in the catechism which children are taught, sloes but too much confirm and estab- lish them in this mistake : read the second question in the church catechism; Quest. Who gave you this name? lln.s. Illy God- fathers and Godmothers in my baptism, wherein I was made a member of Christ, a childof God, and an inheritor of theking- dom of heaven. And when their parents hear it mentioned so expressly at the baptism, that the child, after it is baptised, is regenerate andgrafted into the body of Christ's church, and that this infant is regenerated with the Holy Spirit, it is no wonder, if they encourage children to believe in a most literal sense what their catechism expressly teaches them, that they are all' born t, See Dr. Calamy of Moderate Noncoof. Vol. II. p. 1St.
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