tree, boast not against the branches,"* &c. This place is deservedly of great value with us, to prove, that we Gentile believers^ with our infant-seed, are invested under the gospel with the same substantial privileges that the Jews and their infdnts formerly enjoyed. Here, without opening one term, you proceed, in your wonted manner, confidently to deny the arguments of our learned divines from this place. I shall therefore open this famous text, and regularly deduce the right of Gentile believers infants to baptism from it. And here, keeping to the rules above ;
(i.) I note, that verses 13, 14, 15. give us the true level and scope of the apostle's argument, which is to prove the calling in again of the Jews, though for the present broken off; and on this ground to excite hin^self to all diligence for their conversion, and suppress all glorying and boasting in the Gentile believers, as if they were more worthy than those, because they fill their rooms and places.
(2.) To prove the calling again of the Jews, he argues strongly, ver. 16. from the Jwdej-al holiness derived to the branches from their root or ancestors ; namely, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with whom the covenant was made, Gen. xvii. ' For if the first-fruit be holy, the lump is also holy ; and if the root be holy, so are the branches ;' i. e. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, being in covenant with God, ajbederal holiness is from them derived to the branches. And this can be no other than ajcederal holiness,heca.use those their ancestors were utter- ly incapable to transmit any inherent holiness to them, that being the incommunicable prerogative of God. This/cederal holiness lying still in the root (the covenant with Abraham) will recover the branches again to life, though at present many of them be broken off; as Job speaks in another case. Job xiv. 7, 8, 9. ' There is hope of a tree, though it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease ; though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof dry in the ground ; yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant.'
(3.) We affirm, by the authority of this text. That all the Jewish nation was not broken off, but only a part of it: So the 17th verse plainly declares ; * And if some of the branches be broken off,' &c. Not all, but some ; for many of them were converted to Christ ; we read of three thousand at one sermon, Actsii. and multitudes more at other times. All these converted Jews stood in the apostle's time as branches in the true olive, still enjoying all their privileges ; and that which brake off them that were broken off, was nothing else but their own unbelief: Ver. 20. ' Well then, because of unbelief they were broken oft.' For at the promulgation of the gospel, a new arti- cle was added to their creed ; namely, That this same Jesus, whom they had crucified, is the promised and true Messiah. This some be- lieved, and so stood by faith, still enjoying all their ancient privileges of the covenant: Others believed not, and their unbelief broke them off.
(4.) We find in this place two sorts of branches growing upon this
A llErLY TO MK. CARy's SOLEMN CALL. 367
root Abraham ; some natural branches ; namely, Jews by nature, embracing Christ by faith ; others wild and foreign branches, viz. Gentiles by nature, but ingrafted by faith, and by their ingrafture growing among the natural branches, and with them partaking of the root and fatness of the olive-tree, verse 17. that is, the rich privileo-es of the covenant and promise to Abraham, Gen. xvii. ' I will be a God to thee, and to thy seed.' This is the sweet juice and fatness of the olive-tree, which both sort of branches live upon, ver. 17. some on the external, others on the internal ; some on both.
(5.) These naturally wild, but now ingrafted branches, viz. thebe^ Uevinp' Gentiles^ being grafted by faith amongst the natural branches, and with them sucking the fatness of the same root and olive ; that is to say, the privileges, ordinances, and franchises of the church ; we cannot but judge it to be a natural, clear, and necessary consequent, that the same privileges the natural branches once had, and the re- maing branches (amongst whom the Gentile believers were ingrafted) then had ; the very same the Gentile believers^ and their children, do now enjoy, by virtue of their interest in the same root ; else we can- not understand how we should be said to partake with them of the root and fatness of the olive. Certainly the sap is the same which the root sends into all the branches, whether they be natural or in- grafted ones; and is as plentifully communicated to the ingrafted, as to the natural branches : For the watering of this olive with the more rich and plentiful grace of the gospel, must make the olive- tree as fat and flourishing as ever it was, to supply all its branches, and more than ever before.
Seeing then we Gentiles have (1.) the same grafting into the true olive ; and (2.) that our present grafting in, is answerable to their present casting out ; and (3.) that their re-ingrafting, in the end of the world, shall be the same for substance that ours now is, and their own first was : For when they were first taken in, they, and their children, were taken in together; when they were broken off, they and their children were broken off together ; and when they shall be taken in again, they and their children shall be taken in ao-ain ; And (4.) seeing all these their expected mercies are secured to them by the covenant made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which will extend again to them when their unbelief ^viSS, be taken away; me-. thinks (as was said before) nothing can be clearer than this conclu- sion. That we Gentile believers are now invested with the same pri- vileges they once enjoyed ; and our children have the s'dmc fjuderal holiness or relation to the covenants theirs had, by being grafted, amongst them, and living on the same sap they did, and that by the same promise. Acts ii. 39.
But you will say. There is no mention here made of the graft- ing in of our children w^th us. We reply, Neither is there any men- tion here made of the breakingoff of their children with them ; which yet was so. Nor was there need to say it, ^eing both their infants
368 A RErLY TO MR. CAUy's SOLEMN CALL-