Page:Complete Works of Menno Simons.djvu/340

40 When I perceived that they wanted to find an excuse by means of the use of the participle, I proposed the following, If I command my servant and say, Go and plow the ground, sowing it with wheat; as the Lord said, "Go and teach all nations, baptizing them," &c., have I not, I now ask, commanded my servant to plow the land and to sow it with wheat, although I use the participle sowing, the same as baptizing was used. They answered that this was using philosophy and not the Scriptures. Behold my reader, thus boldly they sought to deny the truth.

Seeing that they, although convinced, obstinately persevered in falsehood and would not receive the powerful and plain truth, as did the Pharisees, I was much grieved and said, Men! men! Since I find it to be a fact that you, in perversity of heart, reject God's truth, and delight in falsehood, I will be silent and not speak another word with you concerning this matter; for, alas, it is all in vain! Reader, in the day of the appearance of Jesus Christ, before his impartial and eternal judgment, it will be found true as I here write.

Behold, so dishonestly do they deal with God's precious and eternal truth, that they then pretended that there was no command to baptize the believing, and now they have an abundance of commands to baptize the unconscious children. O, God! thus they mock with the souls of men, and they know not how much to garble, bend and break the sure foundation of truth, that they may remain on the broad road, without the cross, that they may please the world and that they may lead a careless life according to the lusts of the flesh.

Answer. His commencement is unscriptural and his end will be unscriptural. Observe, the word of God shall be our judge. Say, beloved, is it not a great blindness in him to undertake to include unconscious children in the preaching of repentance? and a little further on admits himself that they cannot, in their feeble understanding, understand the doctrine, which is a doctrine of penitence. If they cannot understand the doctrine how can they then believe; if they do not believe how can they then repent, and if they do not repent how can they be included in the preaching of repentancerepentence [sic]. If they, then, have neither doctrine, faith, nor repentance, which he admits they have not, on account of their feeble understanding, and which is not necessary for them to have, while they are God's own and while sin has not become alive in them to bring forth fruit, therefore all of sound judgment must admit he reproves himself and acknowledges that he wrongfully accuses us, when he says, that we speak blasphemously against the holy church, because we say that the unconscious children cannot repent, believe, nor obey; for he admits that they, in the feebleness of their understanding, cannot understand the doctrine, from which faith, repentence, and obedience originate, as has been already said.

Answer. I understand it that all those who, from the time of Adam to the present time, and also hereafter, had, have, and shall have the Spirit, mind, and nature of Jesus Christ, and who did, do, and shall walk as obedient children by virtue of such a spirit, in truth, were, are, and shall be the Lord's church, kingdom, and people. But we would have reasonably expected that Gellius would have added that each in his times had a peculiar doctrine, ordinance, and usage. That from the time of Adam to Abraham no ceremony was practiced on the children because the Lord had not commanded it; and that circumcision was commanded from Abraham to the time of Christ. But now we have Christ, the promised prophet, Deut. 18: 15; Acts 7: 37, to whom all the Scriptures pointed that we should obey and follow him. He is the eternal Word and wisdom of God; all that abide in his