On Baptism 3

Mindful of this pronouncement as of a prescription, we nonetheless consider how foolish and impossible it is to be remade by water. Why, of course, did this material deserve a service of such honor? I think the authority of the liquid element must be examined. And there is abundant authority, and that from the beginning. For it is one of those things which, before the whole furnishing of the world, rested with God in a form still unshaped. “In the beginning,” it says, “God made heaven and earth. But the earth was invisible and unformed, and darkness was over the abyss, and the Spirit of the Lord was borne over the waters.” You have, O man, first of all to revere the age of the waters, because theirs is an ancient substance; then their dignity, because they were the seat of the divine Spirit, more pleasing, no doubt, than the other elements then. For the darkness was still total, formless, without the adornment of the stars; the abyss gloomy, the earth unprepared, the heaven unwrought; the liquid alone, always a perfect material, joyous, simple, pure in itself, provided a worthy vehicle for God. What of the fact that thereafter the arrangement of the world was established for God with the waters, in a manner, as regulators? For to suspend the heavenly firmament in the middle, he did it by dividing the waters; to suspend the dry land, he accomplished it by separating the waters. Then, when the world had been ordered through its elements and inhabitants were being given, the first waters were commanded to bring forth living creatures. The liquid first produced what lived, so that it should be no wonder in baptism if waters know how to give life. For was not the work of fashioning man himself also completed with the waters as partners? The material was taken from the earth, yet not fit unless moist and juicy; which, of course, the waters separated off before the fourth day into their own place had tempered into clay with the moisture that remained. If I were then to pursue all, or more, of what I could recount of the authority of this element, how great its power or grace, how many its capacities, how many its services, how much equipment it furnishes to the world, I fear I might seem to have collected praises of water rather than reasons for baptism: although I would teach all the more fully that there should be no doubt that the material which God has arranged in all his things and works he has made obedient in his own sacraments too; that what governs earthly life also procures heavenly life.