world, he manifests the same regard to little children that he had shown from the beginning. When they were brought to him, “he took them up in his arms;” not indeed to baptize them, for he never baptized any one, either infant or adult; but to acknowledge their continued connection with his kingdom, and their capacity for receiving, not only an important sign, but the spiritual blessings which that sign denoted. “Of such,” says he, “is the kingdom of God,” or, as the phrase signifies, of such is _the church_ of God; and their being thus of his church, is given as the reason why they should be brought to him as the head of the church. Having thus declared that infants, under the gospel dispensation, sustained the same relation to his spiritual kingdom which Jewish infants had sustained, he proceeds to treat them accordingly. “He put his hands on them;” which was a sign, as significant as the token of circumcision or of baptism; for it was the sign of his own blessing. “He put his hands on them,” as Jacob put his hands on Ephraim and Manasseh, when he lifted up his voice to heaven and said, “the angel that redeemed me from all evil bless the lads;” or as the high priest put his hands on the people, when he blessed them in the name of the Lord; or as this great High Priest himself afterwards lifted up his hands and blessed his disciples, when he ascended from mount Olivet to heaven. True it is, that, as infants, they could not understand the meaning of this sign, any more than they could understand the meaning of circumcision or of baptism. They knew it not then, but they would know it hereafter. Yet, notwithstanding their present ignorance, he did not refrain; he put his hands upon them. And not only so, but as a manifestation of his power and grace, he accompanied the sign with the thing signified, “and he blessed them;” he baptized them, not with water, but with his own blessing; and thereby fulfilled his gracious promise, “I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thy offspring.”