Infants
Infants [1]
Salvation of. "Various opinions, " says an acute writer, "concerning the future state of infants have been adopted. Some think, all dying in infancy are annihilated; for, say they, infants, being incapable of moral god or evil, are not proper objects of reward or punishment. Others think that they share a fate similar to adults; a part saved, and a part perish. Others affirm all are saved because all are immortal and all are innocent. Others, perplexed with these diverse sentiments, think better to leave the subject untouched. Cold comfort to parents who bury their families in infancy! The most probable opinion seems to be, that they are all saved, through the merits of the Mediator, with an everlasting salvation. This has nothing in it contrary to the perfections of God, or to any declaration of the Holy Scriptures; and it is highly agreeable to all those passages which affirm where sin hath abounded, grace hath much more abounded. On these principles, the death of Christ saves more than the fall of Adam lost." If the reader be desirous of examining the subject, we refer him to p. 415, vol. 2: Robinson's Claude; Gillard and William's Essays of Infant Salvation; An Attempt to elucidate Romans 5:12 , by an anonymous writer; Watts's Ruin and Recovery, p. 324, 327; Edwards on Original Sin, p. 431, 434; Doddridge's Lect. lect. 168; Ridgley's Body of Div. vol. 1: p. 330 to 336.
