Page:Tracts for the Times Vol 2.djvu/309

Rh of this world, yea no outward thing, can cleanse the soul of man. For the purifying of this is the work of Divine grace alone. Baptism then cannot wash away the defilements of sin. But since it was instituted by, and yet does not wash away sin, it is altogether certain that it is no other than a Sacramental sign, whereby the people of are bound and united to one faith and religion." So that his view is just that mentioned by our Articles (Art. 27.) as inadequate. These maxims,—the inadequacy of outward things to wash away sin, and the assumption that Baptism is a sign only, the outward element of water alone,—and the purports of Baptism, which he deduces from these maxims, form the greater part of the statements of Zuingli; and these he inculcates with the utmost earnestness and positiveness. "This conviction abides with me, certain, unshaken, and infallible (which if the authority and power of the whole world would impugn, they will yet effect nothing with me), that no element, outwardly administered, can avail any thing toward the purifying of the soul." And so, assuming as before, the incompatibility of the sign with the thing signified, he argues as if all were outward. "John (whose Baptism he contends to have been the same with that of ) taught amendment and true repentance; and those who, influenced by his teaching, embraced repentance and amendment of life, he signed with the outward water of Baptism, yet they were not any way the better for it; for what