it also in Baptisme." And shall we then dread that they who so realized the spiritual presence of Christ, should forget Christ? Or dread we again that the magnifying of the sign should make them forget the thing signified? Yet the sign was to them so glorious, only because it was identified with that inward grace. "Forasmuch," says Bishop Jewel[1] again, "as these two Sacraments being both of force alike, these men (the Romanists) to advance their fantasies in the one, by comparison so much abase the other, I think it good, briefly and by the way, somewhat to touch what the old Catholike Fathers have written of God's invisible workings in the Sacrament of Baptism. The Fathers in the council of Nice say thus: 'Baptisme must be considered, not with our bodily eies, but with the eies of our minde. Thou seest the water: Thinke thou of the power of God, that in the water is hidden. Thinke thou that the water is full of heavenly fire, and of the sanctification of the Holy Ghost.' Chrysostome speaking likewise of Baptisme, saith thus: 'The things that I see, I judge not by sight, but by the eies of my minde. The Heathen, when he heareth the water of Baptisme, taketh it only for plaine water: but I see not simply, or barely, that I see: I see the cleansing of the soule by the Spirit of God.' So likewise saith Nazianzenus: 'The mystery of Baptisme is greater than it appeareth to the eie.' So S. Ambrose: 'In Baptisme there is one thing done visibly to the eie: another thing is wrought invisibly to the minde.' Again he saith: 'Beleeve not onely the bodily eies (in this Sacrament of Baptisme:) the thing that is not seene, is better seene: the thing that thou seest, is corruptible: the thing that thou seest not, is for ever.' To be short, in consideration of these invisible effects, Tertullian saith: 'The Holy Ghost commeth downe and halloweth the water.' S. Basil saith: 'The Kingdome of Heaven is there set open.' Chrysostome saith: 'God Himselfe in Baptisme, by His invisible power holdeth thy head.' S. Ambrose saith: 'The water hath the grace of Christ: in it is the presence of the Trinitie.' S.
- ↑ Reply to Harding, p. 249, 250.
