sponsors for children, were obliged first to answer in their names to all the interrogatories that were usually put in baptism, and then to be guardians of their Christian education. Some will also needs have it, that they were obliged to give them a perfect maintenance, and take them as it were for their own children by adoption, in case their parents failed, and left them destitute in their minority.

SECT. 2.-Parents commonly Sponsors for their own Children. But this I take to be a mistake. For whoever were sponsors for children, if ever they became destitute, the burden devolved upon the Church in general, and not upon any others. Which will be evidenced by these two considerations: first that parents were commonly sponsors for their own children: and in that case there can be no dispute where the obligation of maintenance lay, so long as they were alive. For they were obliged to maintain their own children by a natural law, not because they were sponsors, but because they were parents to them. It was not indeed absolutely necessary that parents should be sponsors for their own children, though some in St. Austin's days were inclined to think so, which he reckons an error, and shews', that in many cases there was a necessity it should be otherwise. But yet in most cases the parents were sponsors for their own children, as appears from St, Austin, who speaks of parents in all ordinary cases offering their own children to baptism, and making the proper responses for them: and the extraordinary cases, in which they were presented by others, were commonly such cases, where the parent could not or would not do that kind office for them: as when slaves were presented to baptism by their masters; or children, whose

1 Aug. Ep. 23. ad Bonifac. Illud autem nolo te fallat, ut existimes reatûs vinculum ex Adam tractum, aliter non posse dirumpi, nisi parvuli ad percipiendam Christi gratiam â parentibus offerantur.. Aug. ibid. Quid

est illud, quod quando ad baptismum offeruntur, parentes pro eis tanquam fidedictores respondent, &c. 8 Aug. ibid. Videas multos non offerri à parentibus, sed etiam à quibuslibet extraneis, sicut à Dominis servuli aliquando offeruntur. Et nonnunquam mortuis parentibus suis, parvuli baptizantur, ab eis oblati, qui illis hujusmodi misericordiam præbere potuerunt. Aliquandò etiam quos crudelitèr parentes exposuerunt, nutriendos à quibuslibet, nonnunquam à sacris virginibus colliguntur, et ab eis offeruntur ad baptismum.

parents were dead, were brought by the charity of any who would shew mercy on them; or children exposed by their parents, which were sometimes taken up by the holy virgins of the Church, and by them presented unto baptism. These are the only cases mentioned by St. Austin, in which children seem to have had other sponsors, and not their parents. Which makes it probable, that in all ordinary cases parents were sureties for their own children. Which may be collected also from the author of the Hypognostics, under the name of St. Austin,' who speaks of infants being presented to baptism by the hands of their parents, and some of them dying in their arms before the priest could baptise them. Whilst parents therefore were sureties for their own children, they were obliged to maintain them, but this not by the law of sureties, but by the law of nature; and if they failed, this duty devolved upon the whole Church.

Sect. 3.-2. Other Sureties not bound to maintain the Children for whom they were Sponsors.

Secondly, in other cases, where strangers became sureties for children, the burden of maintenance did never devolve upon them by any law of suretiship, except they were obliged by some antecedent law to take care of them. In case a master was sponsor for his slave, he was obliged to maintain him, because he was antecedently in the nature of a father to him: and this obligation arose, not from his suretiship, but from his being his master. But in other cases it was not so. For sometimes children that were exposed, were taken up and presented to baptism by mere strangers, and in that case the burden of maintenance fell upon the Church, and not upon the sponsors. And in some cases, as St. Austin informs us, such children were presented unto baptism by the sacred virgins of the church, who had no other maintenance but what they themselves received from the church:

1 Aug. Hypognostic. contra Pelag. lib. vi. cap. 7. tom. vii. p. 633. Novimus etiam parvulos, quibus usus liberi arbitrii non est, ut de bonis aut malis eorum meritis judicemus, parentum manibus ad gratiam sacri baptismatis deportatos: et cùm in uno eorum per manus sacerdotis mysterium fidei adimpleretur, aliquotiens alterum in parentum manibus factum exanimem, fraudatum gratiâ Salvatoris. 2 Aug. Ep. 23, ad Bonifac.

and in that case it is evident the children's maintenance must be derived from the same fountain, as the virgit.s' was, that is, from the public stock of the Church. So that in all cases the Church was charged with this care, and not the sponsors, except there was some antecedent obligation. And there was good reason for this; for, as St. Austin observes,1" children were presented to baptism not so much by those in whose hands they were brought, (though by them too, if they were good and faithful men,) as by the whole society of saints. The whole Church was their mother; she brought forth all and every one by this new birth. "And therefore if any were to be charged with maintenance, it was but reasonable that the Church should maintain her own children. So that they, who lay so much stress upon sponsors undertaking for children, as if they thereby undertook to give them maintenance too, have no grounds for their assertion, since it appears from the best light, that we have, to have been otherwise in the practice of the primitive Church. I have not said this to excuse sponsors from any duty that properly belongs to them, but only to take off the force of an unreasonable objection, which some have made against the present use of sponsors in baptism, as if they were of a different sort from those of the ancient Church, because they are not under this particular obligation, which appears not to have any other foundation but the bare surmise of those, who make the objection.

as

SECT. 4.-But only to answer for them to the several Interrogatories in Baptism.

Two things indeed were anciently required of sponsors their proper duty: 1. To answer in their names to all the interrogatories of baptism. This seems to be intimated by Tertullian, where he speaks of the promises which the

Aug. Ep. xxiii. ad Bonifac. Offeruntur quippe parvuli ad percipiendam spiritalem gratiam, non tam ab eis quorum gestantur manibus, quamvis et ab ipsis, si et ipsi boni fideles sunt, quàm ab universâ societate sanctorum atque fidelium.—Tota hoc mater Ecclesia, quæ in sanctis est, facit: quia tota omnes, tota singulos parit. 2 Tertul. de Bapt. cap. xviii. Quid enim necesse est sponsores etiam periculo ingeri? Quia et ipsi per mortalitatem destituere promissiones suas possint, et proventu malæ indolis falli.

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sponsors made in baptism, and of the danger there was of their failing to fulfil them, either by their own mortality, or by the untoward disposition of the party. But if any one thinks these promises related only to what the sponsors promised for themselves, and not in the name of the child, he may be informed more clearly from others. Gennadius1 tells us, these promises for infants and such as were uncapable of learning, were made after the usual manner of interrogatories in baptism. And St. Austin more particularly acquaints us with the form then used, which was, "doth this child believe in God? Doth he turn to God?" Which is the same as renouncing the devil, and making a covenant with Christ. In other places he tells us more expressly," that the sponsors answered for them, that they renounced the devil, his pomps, and his works." And disputing against the Pelagians, he proves by this argument, that children were under the power of Satan and the guilt of original sin, and needed pardon; because if a Pelagian himself brought a child to baptism, he must answer for him, because he could not answer for himself, that he renounced the devil, that he turned to God, and that among other things he believed the remission of sins; all which would only be fallaciously said, if children had no concern in them. And he professes, he would not admit any child to baptism, whose sponsor he had reason to believe did not make these promises and responses sincerely for him. Of the form and practice then there is no dispute. Only it

1 Gennad. de Eccles. Dogmat. cap. lii. Si verò parvuli sunt, vel hebetes, qui doctrinam non capiant, respondeant pro illis qui eos offerunt, juxta morem baptizandi. 2 Aug. Ep. xxiii. ad Bonifac. Interrogamus eos à quibus offeruntur, et decimus, Credit in Deum? de illâ ætate, quæ utrùm sit Deus, ignoret; respondent, Credit. Et ad cætera sic respondent singula quæ quæruntur, &c. 8 Aug. Serm. cxvi. de Tempore, tom. x. p. 304. Fidejussores pro ipsis respondent, quòd abrenuncient diabolo, pompis, et operibus ejus.-Ser. 14. de Verb. Apost. c. xi. p. 124. Aug. de Peccator. Meritis, lib. i. cap. xxxiv, Vellem aliquis istorum, qui contraria sapiunt, mihi baptizandum par. vulum afferret. Ipse certè mihi erat responsurus pro eodem parvulo quem gestaret, quia ille pro se respondere non posset. Quomodò ergo dicturus erat, eum renunciare diabolo, cujus in eo nihil esset? Quomodò converti ad Deum, à quo non esset aversus? Credere inter cætera remissionem peccatorum, quæ illi nulla tribueretur? Ego quidem si contra eum hæc sentire existimarem, nec ad sacramenta cum parvulo intrare permitterem.

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seemed a great difficulty to bishop Boniface, and as such he proposed it to St. Austin, how it could be said with truth, that a child believed, or renounced the devil, or turned to God, who had no thought or apprehension of these things; or if any, yet secret and unknown to us? If any one should ask us concerning a child, whether he would prove chaste or a thief, when he became a man? we should doubtless in that case answer, we know not. Or if the question was, whether a child in his infancy thought good or evil? we should make the same answer, we know not. Since therefore no one would promise either for his future morals, or his present thoughts, how is it that when parents present their children as sponsors in baptism, they answer and say, the children do those things which that age does not so much as think of? As, that they believe in God, and are turned unto him, &c. To this St. Austin answers, that the child is only said to believe, because he receives the sacrament of faith and conversion, which entitles him to the name of a believer. For the sacraments,1 because of the resemblance between them and the things represented by them, do carry the name of the things represented. "Christ was but once offered in himself, and yet is offered not only on the annual solemnity of the Passover, but every day for the people; and no one tells a lie, that says, he is offered. As therefore the sacrament of Christ's body after a certain manner is called his body, and the sacrament of his blood is called his blood; so the sacrament of faith is faith. And upon this account, when it is answered, that an infant believes, who has not yet any

he

1 Aug. Ep. xxiii. ad Bonifac. Nonne semel immolatus est Christus in seipso? Et tamen in sacramento non solùm per omnes Paschæ solennitates, sed omni die populis immolatur; nec utique mentitur qui interrogatus eum responderit immolari. Si enim sacramenta quandam similitudinem earum rerum quarum sacramenta sunt non haberent, sacramenta non essent. Ex hâc autem similitudine plerumque etiam ipsarum rerum nomina accipiunt, Sicut ergo secundum quendam modum sacramentum corporis Christi corpus Christi est, sacramentum sanguinis Christi sanguis Christi est, ita sacramentum fidei fides est. Ac per hoc cùm respondetur parvulus credere, qui fidei nondum habet affectum, respondetur fidem habere propter fidei sacramentum, et convertere se ad Deum propter conversionis sacramentum, quia et ipsa responsio ad celebrationem pertinet sacramenti.-Ser. 14. de Verb. Apost. c. xix. He says, they believe, fide Parentum.