"The question respecting the propriety of admitting infants to the sacrament of baptism must, I conceive, before long, become a subject of grave discussion _within_ the church. Then the real importance of the question will become manifest, and it will be found necessary that it should be more comprehensively considered in all its bearings, than it has hitherto been. With regard to the question, as it stands between the church and the Antipaedobaptist party, excepting the question--whether it is the duty of Christian governors to promote Christianity--this, respecting infant baptism, is of more real importance than _all others_ in dispute between the church and _orthodox_ dissenters. "The reading of the papers in an early volume of your work, on Dr. Taylor's Key to the Apostolical Writings, first excited the reflections which led to my determination to offer, for the consideration of the Christian public, some thoughts on the subject of infant baptism." Again, in this introductory letter, we read:-- "Never before, in any way, were so large a number of persons, so competent to the task, brought together for its consideration. In your volumes, men of the deepest piety, of fine talents, and with minds every way prepared for the consideration of the subject, have laboured to produce the scriptural elucidation of the baptismal grace. I am persuaded that I should not exaggerate, if I were to say that if all the divines in Christendom had been assembled at the commencement of the present century, and had held as many sessions as the council of Trent, for the purpose of settling this question, the controversy would not have been so happily conducted as it has been in your pages, nor pursued to a more satisfactory result. But what is the result? Notwithstanding that nothing is so manifest as the effects of the operation of divine grace, for wheresoever it does operate the effects are 'known and read of all men,' yet in answer to the inquiry, 'What are the nature and consequences of the grace communicated by the Holy Spirit in baptism?' the Christian Observer, with all its voices united, declares, 'We cannot tell.' This issue of the matter is virtually avowed by yourself incidentally in a short sentence in the number for October, 1833, where you say, 'The Church of England certainly assumes far more than the _nudum signum_, though it does not go to the length of the _opus operatum_.' Within these boundaries, then, it is admitted that the proper place of rest is not yet discovered." And yet once more: