from his whole book, that he is far from being friendly to the doctrine in question, so that instead of Dr. Rallston's misrepresenting him, he has really misrepresented himself.

It is true that he has, in this debate, offered to concede the point, provided that I will pass on without taking up time in proving it. This, however, has turned out nothing more than a ruse de guerre, to induce me to leave an enemy's garrison in the rear. For when he was called upon to fulfil a stipulation which was of his own asking, he refused, and offered to substitute something of a very different character, viz. "That the Jews, when call"ed out of Egypt, became a church, or a religious "assembly in some sense."(m)- a church, or a

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In what sense,

"religious assembly in some sense." pray? His debate with Mr. Walker tells us. It is in that sense in which the very religious assembly at Ephesus was a church; that assembly which was convened and opened with a Hymn by the zealous Demetrius, and, after much noise and bodily exercise, addressed and dismissed by his Reverence the town-clerk.

But this pretended concession denies that the Jews were a church or a religious assembly in any sense, till called out of Egypt. In accordance with this, he asserts that they were never called a church until in the "wilderness. This," says he, "may be denied, but there "lives not the man that can produce an instance to the 66 contrary." He farther assures us, that "the occur66 rences at Sinai are ever afterwards referred to by

(m) Spurious Debate with me p. 386.

"Jewish and Christian Prophets as the commencement "of their ecclesiastic existence. The covenant at "Sinai, therefore, is the only national or ecclesiastic "covenant from Adam to the Messiah, recorded in the "Bible."n) That the Sinaitic covenant is the constitution of the Jewish Church, (if church he will permit it to be called,) my Opponent endeavours to prove by two positions. One is that "the occurrences at Sinai "are ever afterwards referred to by Jewish and Christian "Prophets as the commencement of their ecclesiastic "existence." As this language plainly intimates that the Old and New Testaments are full of evidence to this effect, you might reasonably expect the author of so bold an assertion to specify a few instances: but he has not here given one; and (to use his own language) I can safely say, "there lives not the man that can produce "an instance." His other argument or assertion that "they were never called a church until in the wilder"ness," "at Sinai," is as irrelevant as it is incorrect. It

goes upon the assumption that churches are made by names and not by acts. It is only a few years since the name of Baptists was given to any body of men on earth; for even the followers of John were not called Baptists. Is my Opponent willing to admit that they are no older than their name? Again; "the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch." Were there no Christians at all, until this name was given to them? This shews the utter irrelevancy of the argument that the Jews were never called a church until" the Sinaitic cove

(7) Spurious Debate, p. 398.

nant, even if this statement were true, which it assuredly is not, although he has affirmed it so roundly. I will not say that our translation of the Old Testament calls them a church before their arrival at Sinai; but neither does it call them a church subsequent to that period. It is remarkable that our translators generally make congregation in the Old Testament correspond with church in the New. This is very much condemned by Dr. George Campbell, my Opponent's favourite critic, who says that "they ought constantly to have rendered "the original expression either church in the Old "Testament or congregation in the New." "What I

"blame, therefore," says he, "in our translators, is the "want of uniformity." In the same connexion, the Dr. repeatedly declares that "the Hebrew word p [rendered congregation in the Old Testament] exactly corresponds to the Greek xxia" [rendered church in the New Testament.](0) Although Dr. Campbell belonged to a Pedobaptist church, I adduce his authority without fear of opposition, because, in the passages quoted, he is, as usual, an advocate for Baptist peculiari-. ties, in opposition to the creed which he had solemnly adopted. A work, however, which my Opponent has quoted against us, (p) states, in the very passages which he has read with approbation, the same thing substantially which Dr. Campbell has declared, with this addition, that another Hebrew word is upon the same footing with p, since both alike are, in our

(0) See his Lectures on Ecclesiastical History. Lecture 10. Pages 163. 164. Philadelphia Edition of 1807. (1) Dr. Mason on the Church.

bible, rendered congregation, and both alike are used to signify the church.

Now it is very easy for my Opponent to prove that they were called and considered a visible church after their arrival at Sinai, by such passages as Lev. iv. 14, 21, where it is said that "p the church shall offer a young bullock for the sin, and bring him before the tabernacle of the church," as "a sin-offering for

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pn the church." It is certainly the true church of God that is here intended, and not a mob like that of Ephesus. But before this church had come to Sinai, or even left Egypt, it is said in Ex. xii. 6, concerning the sacrifice of the Passover, that "the whole ny p assembly of the church, or church of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening." Concerning this also it may be said that the true church of God is here intended, and not a mob like that at Ephesus. An examination of Lev. viii. 3. xvi. 5, with the context, will shew plainly that, after their arrival at Sinai, the Israelites were called the church in the ecclesiastical sense of the word; for they are represented as engaged in ecclesiastical business. But in Ex. xii. 3, 47, the same people are twice called by the same name, and represented as engaged in the same business, before they had set out on their journey to Mount Sinai. After that period, their discipline ordained that "the man that shall "be unclean, and shall not purify himself, that soul ❝ shall be cut off from among the church.”(q) But before they left Egypt, it was similarly ordained con

(9) Num. xix. 20.

cerning the Passover, that "whosoever eateth that "which is leavened, even that soul shall be cut off · from the church of Israel." (r)"

It will be recollected that my Opponent referred to an instance in which he "called the Jews God's people" as a proof that he believed in "their visible church state."(s) According to this, "God's people" must mean the church of God. What is here plainly implied by my Opponent, is expressly declared by Dr. George Campbell, in a Lecture which is intended to build congregationalism (the Baptist form of Government) on the ruins of Presbyterianism. After pointing out several expressions as "confessedly equivalent" to each other, he adds, “The same may be said of the phrases p

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"the church of God and the people of God." (t) This was evidently the understanding of Butterworth, the Baptist writer, when he called the Jews "the church and people of God." This is in conformity with Lev. xvi. 33, which says " He shall make an atonement for the priests, and for all the Oy, people of the church." Moses uses the word people alone, in a sense which cannot easily be misunderstood." Whatsoever soul it be that "eateth any manner of blood, even that soul shall be ❝cut off from his people."(a) The word people here evidently means the same church contemplated in Lev. xix. 20, and Ex. xii. 9, from which church it is ordained that a soul shall be cut off for eating leavened bread, and

Exodus xii. 19.

(s) Spurious Debate with Mr. Walker, p. 223, quoted above.

(t) See his tenth Lecture on Ecclesiastical History, quoted above, Lev. vii, 27.