ildren, to
God, baptism being the ordinance of ratification, and its memorial.

_Dr. D._ Your reference to controversy about baptism makes me think of
one which I listened to in a rail-road station, last winter, while
waiting in a snow-storm, several hours, for the cars. Two students of
divinity, as I took them to be, were discussing their respective tenets
with regard to baptism. I was reading a book, but could not help hearing
what they said. One was decrying infant baptism as a "rag of Popery,"
"the last relic of Rome in Protestantism," "a device of Satan to fill
up the church with unconverted members," and much more to that effect.

His friend, in reply, undertook to give his impressions of immersion. He
spoke of India-rubber bathing-dresses;--a tank in which he saw two or
three men and as many women, one of them a young lady, immersed, to his
apparent disgust;--of Elder some one breaking the ice at some cape on
New Year's Sabbath, and immersing several carriages full of females, who
went back dripping wet, to the carriages, and rode an eighth of a mile
to the vestry;--of several females immersed, in a southern State, going
into a creek with white garments, and with white fillets about their
heads, and coming out yellow; and he asked his fellow whether infant
baptism could be any worse than such things.

_Mr. M._ What did his friend say?

_Dr. D._ O, it was the common talk on both sides, painful and revolting.
I could not help saying to them, as the cars were coming up, and we were
parting, "But, if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be
not consumed one of another."

_Mr. M._ They probably left each other as little convinced of the
opposite opinions, respectively, as when they began.

_Dr. D._ More confirmed and set against each other's views, I have no
question. There has been far too much of this. Ridicule and sarcasm are
Satan's favorite weapons. Good people ought not to use them against each
other, whatever be the temptation. Perhaps, as human nature chooses
variety, and we are differently affected by different presentations of
truth, men must be divided into sects; but intolerance, bigotry,
exclusiveness, in us or in others, cannot stand before the spirit of the
age. We may work better, divided into denominations, forbearing with one
another, and loving one another in Christ, and for his sake.

_Mr. M._ Are you often called upon by persons who are troubled on the
subject of baptism?

_Dr