BAPTISMAL RITUALS.

The subject of baptism having recently been pressed prominently upon public attention, it has been thought that a few curious particulars relating exclusively to the rite as anciently performed would be interesting.

In the earliest days of the Christian Church those who were admitted into it by baptism were necessarily not infants but adolescent or adult converts. These previously underwent a course of religious instruction, generally for two years. They were called during their pupilage, ‘catechumens,’^[2] a name afterwards transferred to all infants before baptism. When such candidates were judged worthy to be received within the pale of the Church, their names were inscribed at the beginning of Lent, on a list of the competent or ‘illuminated.’ On Easter or Pentecost eve they were baptised, by three solemn immersions, 107the first of the right side, the second of the left, and the third of the face. They were confirmed at the same time, often, in addition, receiving the sacrament. Sprinkling was only resorted to in cases of the sick and bedridden, who were called clinics,^[3] because they received the rite in bed. Baptism was at that early period accompanied by certain symbolical ceremonies long since disused. For example, milk and honey were given to the new Christian to mark his entrance into the land of promise, and as a sign of his spiritual infancy in being ‘born again;’ for milk and honey were the food of children when weaned. The three immersions were made in honour of the three persons of the Trinity; but the Arians having found in that ceremony an argument favouring the notion of distinction and plurality of natures in the Deity, Pope Gregory by a letter addressed to St. Leander of Seville, ordained that in Spain, the then stronghold of Arianism, only one immersion should be practised. This prescription was preserved and applied to the Church universal by the 6th canon of the Council of Toledo in 633. The triple immersion was, however, persisted in in Ireland to the 12th century. Infants were thus baptised by their fathers, or indeed by any other person at hand, either in water or in milk; but the custom was abolished in 1172 by the Council of Cashel.

The African churches obliged those who were to be baptised on Easter eve to bathe on Good Friday, ‘in order,’ says P. Richard, in his Analyse des Conciles, ‘to rid themselves of the impurities contracted during the observance of Lent before presenting themselves at the sacred font.’ The bishops and priesthood of some of the Western churches, as at Milan, in Spain, and in Wales, washed the feet of the newly baptised, in imitation of the humiliation of the Redeemer. This was forbidden in 303 by the 48th canon of the Council of Elvira.

The Baptistery of the early church was one of the exedræ, or out-buildings, and consisted of a porch or ante-room, where adult converts made their confession of faith, and an inner room, where the actual baptism took place. Thus it continued till the sixth century, when baptisteries began to be taken into the church itself. The font was always of wood or stone. Indeed, we find the provincial council held in Scotland, in 1225, prescribing those materials as the only ones to be used. The Church in all ages discouraged private baptism. By the 55th canon of the same Council, the water which had been used to baptise a child out of church was to be thrown into the fire, or carried immediately to the parish baptistery, that it might be employed for no other purpose; in like manner, the vessel which, had held it was to be either burnt or consecrated for church use. For many centuries superstitious virtues were attributed to water which had been used for baptism. The blind bathed their eyes in it in the hope of obtaining their sight. It was said to ‘drown the devil,’ and to purify those who had recourse to it.

Baptism was by the early Church strictly forbidden during Lent. The Council of Toledo, held in 694, ordered by its 2nd canon, that, from the commencement of the fast to Good Friday, every baptistery should be closed, and sealed up with the seal of the bishop. The Council held at Reading, Berkshire, in 1279, prescribed that infants born the week previous to each Easter and Pentecost, should be baptised only at those festivals. There is no restriction of this kind preserved by the Reformed Church; but we are admonished in the rubric that the most acceptable place and time for the ceremony is in church, no later than the first or second Sunday after birth. Sundays or holidays are suggested, because ‘the most number of people come together,’ to be edified thereby, and be witnesses of the admission of the child into the Church. Private baptism is objected to, except when need shall compel.

The practice of administering the Eucharist to the adult converts to Christianity after baptism, was in many churches improperly, during the fourth century, extended to infants. The priest dipped his fore-finger into the wine, and put it to the lips of the child to suck. This abuse of the Holy Sacrament did not survive the twelfth century. It was repeatedly forbidden by various Councils of the Church, and at length fell into desuetude.

Christening fees originated at a very early date. At first, bishops and those who had aided in the ceremony of baptism were entertained at a feast. This was afterwards commuted to an actual payment of money. Both were afterwards forbidden. The 48th canon of the Council of Elvira, held in 303, prohibits the leaving of money in the fonts, ‘that the ministers of the Church may not appear to sell that which it is their duty to give gratuitously.’ This rule was, however, as little observed in the Middle Ages as it has been since. Strype says, that in 1560 it was enjoined by the heads of the Church that, ‘to avoid contention, let the curate have the value of the “Chrisome,” not under 4d., and above as they can agree, and as the state of the parents may require.’ The Chrisome was the white cloth placed by the minister upon the head of a child, which had been newly anointed with chrism, or hallowed ointment composed of oil and balm, always used after baptism. The gift of this cloth was usually made by the mother at the time of Churching. To show how enduring such customs are, even after the occasion for them has passed away, we need only quote a passage from Morant’s ‘Essex.’ ‘In Denton Church there has been a custom, time out of mind, at the churching of a woman, for her to give a 108white cambric handkerchief to the minister as an offering.’ The same custom is kept up in Kent, as may be seen in Lewis’s History of the Isle of Thanet.

The number of sponsors for each child was prescribed by the 4th Canon of the Council of York, in 1196, to be no more than three persons;—two males and one female for a boy, and two females and one male for a girl;—a rule which is still preserved. A custom sprung up afterwards, which reversed the old state of things. By little and little, large presents were looked for from sponsors, not only to the child but to its mother; the result was that there grew to be a great difficulty in procuring persons to undertake so expensive an office. Indeed, it sometimes happened that fraudulent parents had a child baptised thrice, for the sake of the godfather’s gifts. To remedy these evils, a Council held at l’Isle, in Provence, in 1288, ordered that thenceforth nothing was to be given to the baptised but a white robe. This prescription appears to have been kept for ages; Stow, in his Chronicle of King James’s Reign, says, ‘At this time, and for many ages, it was not the use and custom (as now it is) for godfathers and godmothers to give plate at the baptism of children, but only to give christening shirts, with little bands and cuffs, wrought either with silk or blue thread, the best of them edged with a small lace of silk and gold.’ Cups and spoons have, however, stood their ground as favourite presents to babies on such occasions, ever since. ‘Apostle spoons’—so called because a figure of one of the apostles was chased on the handle of each—were anciently given: opulent sponsors presenting the whole twelve. Those in middling circumstances gave four, and the poorer sort contented themselves with the gift of one, exhibiting the figure of any saint, in honour of whom the child received its name. Thus, in the books of the Stationers’ Company, we find under 1560, ‘a spoone the gift of Master Reginald Woolf, all gilte, with the picture of St. John.’

Shakspeare, in his Henry VIII., makes the king say, when Cranmer professes himself unworthy to be sponsor to the young princess:—

‘Come, come, my lord, you’d spare your spoons.’

Again, in Davenant’s Comedy of ‘The Wits,’ (1639):

‘My pendants, cascanets, and rings;

My christ’ning caudle-cup and spoons,

Are dissolved into that lump.’

The coral and bells is an old invention for baptismal presents. Coral was anciently considered an amulet against fascination and evil spirits.

It is to be regretted that, at the present time, the grave responsibilities of the sponsors of children is too often considered to end with the presentation of some such gifts as we have enumerated. It is not to our praise that the ties between sponsors and god-children, were much closer, and held more sacredly in times which we are pleased to call barbarous. God-children were placed not only in a state of pupilage with their sureties, but also in the position of relations. A sort of relationship was established even between the Godfathers and Godmothers; insomuch, that marriage between any such parties was forbidden under pain of severe punishment. This injunction, like many others, had it appears been sufficiently disobeyed to warrant a special canon (12th) of the Council of Compiègne, held so early as 757, which enforced the separation of all those sponsors and God-children of both sexes who had intermarried, and the Church refused the rites of marriage to the women so separated. A century after (815) the Council of Mayence not only reinforced these restrictions and penalties, but added others.