"It is for a reason no less important that unmarried persons, both those who were never married, and those who have been deprived of their partners, should, on account of their exposure to temptation, be kept waiting," &c.
As these extracts prove that the institution of marriage existed in Tertullian's day, so they prove the existence then of infant baptism. Nothing can be more conclusive. How pertinent and useful to his object would it have been, could he have assailed the practice of infant baptism as a human invention! He would not have failed to use that line of attack, had it been possible. Now, as certain articles in the newspapers, in a distant part of the country, remonstrating against the street-railroads, for example, prove that street-railroads exist there, so does Tertullian's argument against infant baptism prove that it was practised within one hundred years after the apostles.
_Mr. M._ Is not this stronger, if anything, than Origen's testimony, being so much nearer the apostolic age?
_Dr. D._ For that reason it may have more weight; but Origen's testimony, being direct and positive, is most easily quoted. He was near enough to the apostolic age for all the purposes of credible testimony.
There is another historical testimony, if you wish to hear of more, which has great weight.
THE COUNCIL OF CARTHAGE, one hundred and fifty years after the apostles, and composed of sixty-six pastors, has given us full testimony on the subject. A country presbyter, by the name of Fidus, had sent two cases for their adjudication. One was, "Whether an infant might be baptized before it was eight days old?" Here is the answer:
CYPRIAN, and the rest of the presbyters who were present in the council, sixty-six in number, to Fidus our brother, Greeting:
"---- As to the case of Infants: whereas you judge that they must not be baptized within two or three days after they were born, and that the rule of circumcision is to be observed,--we are all in the Council of a very different opinion." "This, therefore, was our opinion in the Council, that we ought not to hinder any person from baptism, and the grace of God. And this rule, as it holds for all, is, we think, more especially to be observed in reference to infants, even to those who are newly born."