teach that God looks upon the heart ; that He requires of fallen men simply faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and repentance to- ward God as the only indispensable conditions of salvation ; that all men have free access to God, through the mediation of Christ, to obtain at his hands the remission of sins and all the benefits of redemption ; that they need no intervention of priests to secure for them this access or the communication of those benefits ; and that no external rites have power in themselves to confer grace. God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life. He that believeth on Him is not condemned ; but he that believeth not is condemned already. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Whosoever calleth on the name of the Lord, shall be saved. Whoso believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of God. The Scripture cannot be broken. It can- not be that he who truly believes the record which God has given of his Son should fail of eternal life. We become the sons of God by faith in Jesus Christ. It is true we are commanded to be baptized, as we are commanded to confess Christ before men or to love the brethren. But these are duties to which faith secures obedience ; they are not the means of salvation.
2. This ritual system is utterly inconsistent with- the whole genius of Christianity. God is a Spirit, and He requires those who worship Him, to worship Him in spirit and in truth. Ex- ternal rites are declared to be nothing. Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing. " He is not a Jew, which is one outwardly ; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh : but he is a Jew, which is one inwardly ; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter ; whose praise is not of men, but of God." (Rom. ii. 28, 29.) This is not merely a fact, but a principle. What St. Paul here says of cir- cumcision and of Jews, may be said, and is substantially said by St. Peter in reference to baptism and Christianity. A man who is a Christian outwardly only, is not a Christian ; and the bap- tism which saves, is not the washing of the body with water, but the conversion of the soul. (1 Peter iii. 21.) The idea that a man's state before God depends on anything external, on birth, on membership in any visible organization, or on any outward rite or ceremony, is utterly abhorrent to the religion of the Bible. It did not belong to Judaism except in the corrupt form of Phari- saism. It is true, that under the old dispensation a man could not be saved unless he belonged to the commonwealth of Israel,
522 PART in. Ch. XX. — the means of grace.
and was one of the children of Abraham. But according to St. Paul (Rom. ix. 8 ; Gal. iii. 7 and 29), this only meant that they must believe in Abraham's God and the promise of redemption through his seed. If a man of heathen birth and culture came to the knowledge of the truth, believed the doctrines which God had revealed to his chosen people, relied on the promise of salva- tion through Christ, and purposed to obey the law of God, then he was a Jew inwardly and one of Abraham's seed. His circum- cision was only " a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had, yet being uncircumcised." (Rom. iv. 11.) The doctrine that such a man, notwithstanding this thorough change in his inward state in knowledge, conviction, and character, is under the wrath and curse of God, until a little piece of flesh is cut from his body, never was a part of the religion of God. It is part and parcel of the religion of his great adversary. Any one, therefore, who teaches that no man can be saved without the rite of baptism, and that by receiving that rite he is made a child of God and heir of heaven, is antichrist, and "even now are there many anti- christs." (1 John ii. 18.)
3. This ritualistic system, which makes the sacraments the only channels of grace, and consequently absolutely necessary to salva- tion, naturally leads to the divorce of religion and morality. A man, according to this system, may be in the true Church a child of God, and assured of heaven, and yet utterly frivolous, worldly, and even immoral in his inward and outward life. This is illus- trated on a large scale in every Roman Catholic country. In such countries some of the greatest devotees are openly wicked men. And wherever this system prevails we find its most zealous advo- cates among people of the world, who live at ease in full security of salvation, because they are in the Church and faithful in ob- serving " days, and months, and times, and years ; " and are punctiliously " subject to ordinances, touch not, taste not, handle not." 2 The great question at issue in the controversy with ritu- alism is, Whether a man's salvation depends on his inward state, or upon outward rites ; or, as some would give it, Whether his state is determined by outward rites, or whether the rites depend for their value and efficacy on his inward state. In either form the question is, Are we saved by faith or by sacraments ? The Apostle teaches us that " in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creature." (Gal. vi. 15.)
1 A gentleman of discrimination and candour, not long since said to a fnend,N" You are very pious, but you have no religion. I am religious, but I have no piety."