MR. MACCALLA, July 14th, 1823. SIR-I wrote you on the 16th ult. an answer to your favor of May last; I also directed a letter on the same subject to Dr. Keith. To these communications I have received no reply. A letter having been due before this date, I feel anxious to know, whether my letter was received, and whether you have answered it. I would send a copy of my reply per the bearer, but time forbids, as he is now on his way. You will please inform me on Mr. Logan's arrival, whether my letter was received.-And if you should have written a reply, at a date authorizing me to have received it, you must consider your letter as miscarried, and will, therefore, have the goodness to write again; as my business and arrangements require me to know the result as soon as possible, respectfully your's, &c. A. CAMPBELL, MR. CAMPBELL, Your letter of the 14th inst. sent by mr. Logan, was received yesterday at church, and of course not opened until this morning. If my former one had obtainedas speedy a passage as this of your's, it must have arrived on the day of your writing; and but for the Jate departure of the mail, much sooner. As correspondence with this place by mail is generally tedious, it is probable that my letter has not yet miscarried. If it arrives, you will find that I am willing, with the help of God, to meet you on fair and practicable terms, in any city in America, and I may add, in England, Scotland or Ireland. But your terms I decline, for the present, because they are unfair and inconsistent. The only condition annexed to your public invitation, was that you should have an equal vote in determining the time and place. After I had accepted your challenge, as you expressly called it, you add in your letter to me, as another condition, that you must have the last speech: although the fact of mr. Walker's giving the challenge, was the reason which you gave for your having the last speech at Mount-Pleasant. You appear to think, with the lawyers, that the last speech is a matter of some importance, and that it must be gained, if possible, whether you give or receive a challenge, and whether you assume the affirmative or the negative of the proposition in dispute. You do not object to the discussion of the questions which I sent to you, and therefore suggest the propriety of having the meeting notified to the public forth with. Yet your letter is so constructed that you would consider this publication a virtual agreement on my part to discuss an equal number of questions written by yourself, which I have never seen, and to which I might have very serious objections, after seeing them. My desire is, that with the grace of Christ in my heart, my lips may be consecrated to the defence of truth and righteousness. He who disputes from ambition or ostentation, may promise you a debate at random: but shew me the questions first, as I have shewn you mine, and I hope that God will direct me to a suitable answer. If you cannot agree to discuss my questions without obtrusive conditions, and if after examining your questions, I should not approve of them, the proposal of my letter was, that we should dis cuss "the subject and the mode of Baptism” without any question,— or that we should meet upon the proposition contained in your challenge, to the discussion of which you have dared the Paidobaptist world. As you gave the challenge, and as you take the affirmative of your own proposition, both your rules give to me the closing speech. This however my letter does not ask, but requests that both parties may have liberty to speak until they are satisfied. As Dr. Keith by showing your correspondence with him to the citizens, has made it public, it is not improper for me to observe that it was premature in you to tell him that your proposals could not be manfully or justly rejected by me. I am informed that in his answer he has represented me as a forward enemy of the Baptists, and as disposed to retreat from this controversy. No person acquainted with the state of things here, could expect him to give me a favorable character. I am constitutionally timid, but I hope that through grace, I am not malicious. This same grace has also strengthened my heart against the fear of man, so that although I have not the talents and preparation to be desired in such a controversy, I am willing to trust in the Lord, and encounter even the hero of Mount-Pleasant. At least the question, who has acted manfully and generously? and who wishes to retreat? will one day be submitted to the judgment of the United States. Augusta, July 21st, 1823. W. L. MACCALLA Augusta, Ky, August 8th, 1823. MR. CAMPBELL-In the progress of our correspondence, it is a pleasure to me to remember that this controversy is not of my own seeking. Mine is a defensive attitude. Your challenge was bold, public and general: neither did it exhibit on its face the least design to take advantage of any stripling who might, in the faith of Israel's God, step out to meet you. You did not enumerate rules of debate-you did not prescribe weapons to your antagonist-you did not lay down, what he was, and what he was not to defend-you did not require the last blow as a sine qua non to an encounter; but you simply stated what you would undertake to prove, and left your opponent to choose his own position, to which he certainly has a right. You expressly renounced all other restrictions to your challenge, except the right of an equal vote as to the time and place of meeting. Two years after the publication of the debate you reiterate your defiance, without adding any farther conditions. In the first page of your strictures on Father Ralston's Review, after complaining that mr. Walker's friends under-rated his talents, you add "who on his side of the question, since or before that debate, has done better? or who can do better?-Is there no man in all the hosts of Pedo-baptists of greater capacity and industry than mr. Walker? If there be, let the cause be maintained, and let not mr. W. bear all the blame, as if the whole cause rested on him." While thus bravely exuling over our armies, who, (as you imagined,) were panic struck at your superior prowess; why did you hotinform that besides an equal vote in the time and place, you must choose the position and weapons of your opponent, and that in addition to this, you must have the last fire? Why did you not tell us that you must have exclusive privileges, and not only choose your own theses, but you must also indite the identical words which we are to defend, although, in our conception, they may countenance errors which our souls abhor. With an invitation thus restricted, I have never complied, for such an one was never given; but, remember, sir, that the challenge actually published by yourself, has been ac cepted, with its accompanying condition. Although I cannot admit the right of an antagonist to direct what shall defend, yet when he gives a reason for preferring one proposition to another, I am willing to listen. Some of your reasons are as follows: "Why then object to defend the precise thing which you practise?-And if the whole proposition cannot be proven, viz. that infant affusion is a Divine institution, to cut it into pieces, and to divide it into words, syllables, vowels or consonants, and prove it in piece-meal, will, every logician knows, avail nothing." To your question I answer, that I am willing to defend the precise thing which I practise. I practise the Baptism of believer's and their seed; whereas I am sorry to observe that you with the world think that these two stand in opposition to each other. I practise asper vion, though I equally approve of ablution and affusion: yet I am not willing to defend the latter to the exclusion of the former, nor even in oppugnation of immersion. In your remark concerning the cutting of a proposition into pieces, I scarcely know whether to consider you in earnest. It is hardly possible that I can have the honor of giving you the first information that some questions may be divided, and that this is practised by all eminent deliberative bodies, whether ecclesiastical or political. Do you think it derogatory to the logical or grammatical or rhetorical character of the Senate of the United States, that their ninth rule says, "If the question in debate contain several points, any member may have the same divided." You will agree, it is to be hoped, that the subject and the mode of Baptism are distinct points, and that the question may be so divided, without making each word, syllable and letter, a distinct subject of discussion. Much of your letter is spent to establish your claims to the grand desideratum, the last speech. The fitness of things and long prescription are the pillars upon which the fabric rests. These, you say, give to the negative the right of closing. The negative, therefore, you are determined to have. Recollecting, however, that you have to take the affirmative of the proposition contained in your challenge, you bring the fitness of things, as (you there call it,) the nature of things, to a bearing upon the affirmative proposition, " En fant affusion is a human tradition," and you shew, or think you shew that it "will force the proposition into the form of a direct nega tive in the discussion." If you can force one affirmative into a negative in order to secure the closing speech, it seems to me that very little more force would prove that I ought not to speak at all. This additional force is probably the very thing which caused Bishor, Gunning of England, a hundred and fifty years ago, to deny these whom he had challenged, the liberty of replying. In establishing a right upon the ground of prescription, you are aware that the custom must be made to appear. For this purpose you refer me to certain nameless occurrences in Du Pin's Ecclesiastical History, vol. III. p. 162--200. Will you be so kind as to send me so particular a reference that the place may be found in the London edition of 1698, as that contains nothing of the sort, in the pages marked, and the index refers to no conferences except those of Carthage and Jerusalem, p. 220, 321. The latter. A. D. 415, has nothing to the purpose. Neither has the former, which oc curred four years sooner, except that the long disputes of the Donatists about the qualities of opposers and defenders, may appear to authorize the pertinacity of some with regard to the privileges confessed by affirmatives and negatives. At last Augustine obliged them to come to the main question which was, "Where was the Catholic church?" The Donatists opened and Augustine closed. Nothing can be gathered from such facts, unless the fitness of things can extract a favorable conclusion. If we had Seekendorf's History of Lutheranism, and Loscheim's Acts and Documents of the Reformation, referred to in Maclaine's Mosheims (4. 44. Charlest. ed. 1811.) we might possibly obtain come satisfaction on the other cases referred to. Du Pin is the only author whom you quote, and in the very short abstract which he gives, in half a page, of the dispute between Eckius and Carolostadius, which occupied a week, there is no account of the number or order of their speeches. He does not expressly tell us who closed, or for what reason. The debate which immediately followed between Eckius and Luther, was professedly on twenty-six propositions, half of them produced by each of the disputants, not dictated by one to the other. This debate is divided by Du Pin into a number of conferences. Several of the first were occupied in discussing the supremacy of the Pope, the subject to which your letter refers. You say, that Eckius, having the affirmative, opened the debate. Du Pin's narrative would cacourage the belief that Lather opened. You say that Luther closed. Du Pin intimates that Eckius.closed the first conference, and does not give the least hint who it was that closed the whole dispute on the topic. On the bject of indulgences, Eckius took the affirmative as before, and Du Pin's abstract give any information on this point, Echius both epened and closed. Although he was so remarkable for voice and gesture, for information and readiness of utterance, he was exceed. ngly fond of this same privilege of opening and closing. Like Charles I. in his paper controversy with the noble Henderson, he appeared to think this a privilege due to his dignity. He obtained it in a conference with Melanethon at Ratisbon, as we are informed in a letter from Strasburg by Calvin to Farel. And if, according to Luther, as quoted by Scekendorf, and from him by Milnor, (4-346.) Eckius took another more ungenerous advantage of Carolostadius in the conference above mentioned. I have no doubt that he both opened and closed the contest; although Du Pin, a popish writer, This mentioned meither of these advantages. This author gives no information about the closing speech at Baden, although you say that Eckius opened Oecolampadius closed. The same may be said of the conference at Rome, which occurred. December 17th, 1527: At Marpurgh, (if that be the other instance to which you refer,) Luther produced five articles of exception against the doctrine of the Zuinglians, of whom Oecolampadius was one. Du Pin does not positively say who opened and closed, but from his narrative I should draw a conclusion the very opposite of yours. It is a wonder that you did not add to this case a similar one which occurred at Lambeth in England, about the year 1584. It was a kind of conference between the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Winchester on the one part, and Dr. Spark and Mr. Travers on the other. The latter gentlemen produced articles of exceptions against the church of England. The second of these was on Baptism. They objected to private and lay Baptism,—to their view of its absolute necessity and infallible efficacy,-to certain superstitious interrogatories, and the use of the cross. (Toulmin's Neal, 1.422.) Although I see no evidence of any privilege given to the negative, I have no doubt that much might be obtained by that perspicacity which has discovered such wonders in the foregoing in stances. If I am not as ignorant of arithmetic as you think me to be of logic, the questions contained in your letters and the Appendix to your Debate amount to one hundred and thirty-five. I am willing that you shall appear on the scene of conflict with all these, and I am willing to meet you with the two following or similar propositions. 1st. Faith is not essential to Baptism. 2d. Submersion is not essential to Baptism. You would then have room to display your wit on the number and character of my questions, and I would have an opportunity of giving my opinion of your one hundred and thirty-five questions. Remember, however, my former proposals to meet you on the bare subject and mode, and my agreement to meet you on the proposition contained in your challenge, and the condi tion therein expressed. MR. MACCALLA, W. L. MACCALLA. Buffaloe Creek, August 23d, 1823. SIR-Your's of the 8th inst. was received last night. It differs very much both in spirit and style from your first. In your first you objected to meeting me on the bare ground of my challenge; saying that I should not understand you as professing a willingness to confer with me on the truth or falsehood of the statement in my proclamation; "That infant sprinkling is a human tradition, and injurious to the well-being of society religious and political." Yoy there proposed twenty-one questions. In your next you complain-” ed of the one question I proposed, and because I had not sent you the twenty-one questions, I then promised to send. In my next, I sent you twenty-one questions, and also proposed reducing the topics to four questions. In your last, you profess a willingness to be off both from your own twenty-one questions and mine; and agree to meet me on the bare words of my challenge, or on two propositions, both negatives, and thus to force me to give you the last |