y make no profession.'
He replies, 'They are not cast out, because it is a matter held in
suspense whether they do cordially consent to the covenant or not; or
whether their making no profession does not arise from some other cause;
and none are to be excommunicated without some positive evidence against
them.'"

"My dear sir," said Mr. A., "Mr. Edwards is there speaking of those who
merely refuse to own the covenant, without being guilty of scandalous
sin."

_Mr. S._ It is evident, nevertheless, that Hopkins goes further than he,
and requires that those who, at years of full responsibility, refuse to
own the covenant, shall be cut off. Modern writers on this subject,
while insisting on the church-membership of children, draw back from
this position, and are more in harmony with what, it seems to me, may be
said to be the general sense of the churches on this subject. I feel
glad, when reading such passages as those from Hopkins, that we have
liberty of opinion, and are not compelled to swear by the words of any
master. I bow to such a divine as Dr. Hopkins, but he fails to satisfy
me that he is right in these views of church-discipline for children.

Mr. R., who was the oldest man of the company, now returned to the
discussion, and said: "It is clear that one cannot be dispossessed of
that which he never possessed, except as in the case of a minor, who may
have his claim to a future possession wrested from him. Of what is a
child of the covenant, allowing him to be, while a child, a member of
the church,--of what is he in possession? Not of full communion, not of
access to the Lord's table, not of the right to a voice in the call and
settlement of a pastor, nor in any other church act. From what, then, is
he turned out by being cut off? He has never arrived at anything from
which he can be separated, except the covenant of God with him through
his parents, and its attendant privileges of watch and care. If, then,
we excommunicate an unconverted child, we can only declare the covenant
of God with him, henceforth, to be null and void,--an assumption from
which, probably, Christian parents and ministers would shrink. The same
long-suffering God, who bears and forbears with ourselves, we shall be
disposed to feel, is the God of this recreant child, and no good man
would dare to pronounce the child to be separated from the mercies of
'the God of patience and hope.' One who, being in a church, breaks a
covenant to which h