Chapter 26 [XX.]—No One, Except He Be Baptized, Rightly Comes to the Table of the Lord.

Now they take alarm from the statement of the Lord, when He says, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God;”82    John iii. 3. because in His own explanation of the passage He affirms, “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”83    Ver. 5. And so they try to ascribe to unbaptized infants, by the merit of their innocence, the gift of salvation and eternal life, but at the same time, owing to their being unbaptized, to exclude them from the kingdom of heaven. But how novel and astonishing is such an assumption, as if there could possibly be salvation and eternal life without heirship with Christ, without the kingdom of heaven! Of course they have their refuge, whither to escape and hide themselves, because the Lord does not say, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot have life, but—“he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” If indeed He had said the other, there could have risen not a moment’s doubt. Well, then, let us remove the doubt; let us now listen to the Lord, and not to men’s notions and conjectures; let us, I say, hear what the Lord says—not indeed concerning the sacrament of the laver, but concerning the sacrament of His own holy table, to which none but a baptized person has a right to approach: “Except ye eat my flesh and drink my blood, ye shall have no life in you.”84    John vi. 53. What do we want more? What answer to this can be adduced, unless it be by that obstinacy which ever resists the constancy of manifest truth?

CAPUT XX.

26. Ad mensam Domini nemo rite nisi baptizatus accedit. Terrentur autem isti sententia Domini dicentis, Nisi quis natus fuerit denuo, non videbit regnum Dei. Quod cum exponeret, ait, Nisi quis renatus fuerit ex aqua et Spiritu, non intrabit in regnum coelorum (Joan. III, 3, 5). Et propterea conantur parvulis non baptizatis innocentiae merito salutem ac vitam aeternam tribuere; sed quia baptizati non sunt, eos a regno coelorum facere alienos: nova quadam et mirabili praesumptione, quasi salus ac aeterna vita possit esse praeter Christi haereditatem, praeter regnum coelorum. Habent enim videlicet quo confugiant, atque ubi delitescant, quia non ait Dominus, Si quis non renatus fuerit ex aqua et Spiritu, non habebit vitam; sed ait, non intrabit in regnum Dei . Nam si illud dixisset, nulla hinc dubitatio posset oboriri. Auferatur ergo dubitatio: jam Dominum audiamus, non suspiciones conjecturasque mortalium; Dominum audiamus, inquam, non quidem hoc de Sacramento lavacri dicentem, sed de Sacramento sanctae mensae suae, quo nemo rite nisi baptizatus accedit: Nisi manducaveritis carnem meam, et biberitis sanguinem meum, non habebitis vitam in vobis. Quid ultra quaerimus? Quid ad hoc responderi potest, nisi pertinacia pugnaces nervos adversus constantiam perspicuae veritatis intendat?