As long as you ask:
'How can he give, who has not anything to give?'
understand that it is the Lord who is the giver, understand that it is God who cleanses each man, whoever he may be; for no one can wash away the defilement and stains of the mind, but God alone, who is also the Maker of the mind. Or, if you think that |222 it is your washing [that cleanses], tell us what is the nature of this mind, which is washed through the body, or what 'form' it has, or in what part of a man it dwells. To know this has not been granted to any. How, then, do you think that it is you who cleanse, when you do not know the nature of that which you cleanse? It belongs not to man, but to God to cleanse, for He has Himself promised that He will cleanse, through the Prophet Isaiah, when He said:
'Even though your sins are like scarlet, I will make you white as snow.'
He said:
'I will make you white,'
and not:
'I will cause you to be made white.'
If this has been promised by God, why do you wish to give that which it is not permitted to you either to promise, or to give, or to have? Behold by Isaiah God has promised Himself to wash those stained by sin, not through a man.
Go back to the Gospel, and see what Christ has promised for the salvation of the human race. When |223 the Samaritan woman refused water to the Son of God, then He said that which gives His answer to your contentions :
'He who shall drink the water which I give shall not thirst for ever.'
He said:
'the water which I give.'
He did not say:
'which they shall give, who deem themselves holy ,'
as you think yourselves to be; but He did say that He would give. He Himself, therefore, it is who gives, and that which is given is His own. What, therefore, is it which you strive, with absolute unreasonableness, to vindicate for yourselves?
V. Why and when the Baptism of Christ was conferred.
To give the final proof concerning this matter, John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Saviour, when he was baptising many to repentance and the remission of their sins, declared that the Son of God was about to come. These are his words:
'Behold, He cometh to baptise you.'
Yet we do not read that Christ rebaptised anyone after John. With regard, therefore, to these words:
'He cometh to baptise you,'
Christ coming after John baptised no one. This |224 promise was made for our times, that He might give what is given to-day, according to His Word:
'He who shall drink the water which I give shall not thirst for ever.'
And although the disciples of John said to their master:
'Behold He, whom thou hast baptised, baptises.'