Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	civil_a	ecclesiastical_a	king_n	2,836	5	4.0953	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49699	The power of kings from God a sermon preached in the Cathedral Church of Sarum the XXIX day of June, 1683 upon occasion of the detection of the late horrid plot against the life of His Scared Majesty / by Paul Lathom.	Lathom, Paul.	1683 (1683)	Wing L574; ESTC R25132	20,903	43

choose their Mayor this choice doth indeed design the Person but not confer the Power which descends by virtue of the Kings Charter So when the Seven Electors choose an Emperour of Germany or those that usually choose a King in Poland they onely design the Person his power is not from them but immediately from God The third Question Whether supposing that the People did confer the Power upon the Prince in the First Institution of Monarchy it doth now lie in the Power of the People to revoke it This Question seems needful to be handled not only because in the late days of Rebellion it was maintained but because it may be feared that those Seeds are not yet quite rooted out especially seeing the holding the Kings Power to be a Trust committed to him by the People doth seem to design to prove it revokable In Answer hereto 1. I have already shewed that the Supposition which is the Foundation of this that the People confer the Power upon the Prince is false and consequently the Superstructure that is reared upon it must fall of course 2. Supposing but not granting the Princes power to be conferred by the People yet the Revokableness of it will not follow For 1. Both Law and Reason say that what is Absolutely conferred in any Compact or Donation is not to be revoked Against the reasonableness whereof I cannot see what can be alledged 2. Instances in other Cases of like Nature do shew the truth of this When the Dean and Chapter have chosen their Bishop for their Ordinary or the Aldermen and Commons of a City have chosen a Mayor to govern them it doth not lie in either of them afterward to recal the Exercise of this power or to reassume the Trust into their own hands When the Freeholders of a County have chosen their Knights to represent them it will not afterward lie in their power to recall this trust They might have forborn to commit the Trust but being committed they cannot re-call it The same is applicable to the Case in hand if the supposition were true which yet is not to be granted The Fourth Question Whether the Power of Kings be so immediately subordinate to God and depending upon him that no earthly Power whatsoever can call them to account for the administration of their Government and discharge of their Trust The accountableness of Princes to the People in their Representatives hath passed for currant doctrine in the days of imprisoning our late Sovereign That Reason and Conscience may be satisfied of the falseness and dangerousness of such affections I shall offer what follows to prove that God Almighty is the onely Ruler of Princes and that to him onely they owe their Accounts 1. In Reason it is a contradiction after we have owned the King to be Supreme in all Causes and over all Persons both Ecclesiastical and Civil afterwards to affirm that there is any other Power that hath Right to call him to an account and consequently is in that respect his Superiour That we have owned the King as Supreme I suppose all men will confess and the Apostle St. Peter calls him so 1 Pet. 2.13 And that his accountableness to any other on Earth would render those persons that may demand his account eo nomine Superiour to him is grounded upon that known Maxim Par in parem non habet potestatem If therefore the King be Supreme and yet hath others on Earth that are Superiour to him then is he Supreme and not Supreme a palpable contradiction both branches whereof cannot be true Now the Kings Supremacy both the Law hath setled and every good Subject hath owned and therefore must disown the Supremacy of the People either Collectively or in their Representatives as a spurious off-spring descended from Salus populi and Universis minor 2. If we consult the Scriptures when David had committed those two great sins of Adultery and Murder either of which singly was Capital by the Jewish Laws yet do we not find him called to account for them but onely by the great King of Kings If any man here will reply in the Country Proverb of the Author of Julian the Apostate that the People would if they could have called David to an account and punished him too but that David had the Sword as well as Scepter and therefore was above their reach I answer there was then a Sanhedrim among the Jews whose Authority was as venerable as that of a Parliament and yet we neither find them challenging an account of Davids Actions nor God who then made familiar converse with men either summoning the King to submit himself to a Legal Trial or stirring up the Sanhedrim or the Princes of the Tribes to call him to account by judicial Process No the Onely Ruler of Princes takes the matter into his own hands sends his Prophet to him summons him before himself as his Judge brings him to Repentance accepts his Confession and remits his Trespass as to the Eternal Punishment And David appears very sensible of his being subordinate and accountable to God onely when in his most penitent Confession he looks up wholly unto him Against thee thee onely have I sinned Psal 51.3 If therefore we own the Scriptures for our Guide in all doubtful and important points here is an instance to guide us in a matter of this great and weighty moment 3. To hold a Power in the People to call the Prince to account for the administration of his Government is most highly inconsistent with the Law of Nature and all the Reason and Conscience imaginable For it makes the People at once the Complainants the Witnesses the Jury and the Judge For when we speak of the King and the People they are but two Parties If therefore the King must be Impleaded who must be the Complainants and Prosecutors the People Who Witnesses the People Who must be the Jury to enquire of Matter of Fact the People Who must be the Judge to determine whether he hath broken a Law and be obnoxious to punishment the People At last when Sentence is passed upon him who must execute it still the People A thing never heard of in any Judicial Proceedings even in the most barbarous Nations and that which must needs preclude the doing of Justice when Passion or Interest in the Mobile would carry all things according to their own Lusts and Humours 4. The Judgments of God have dogged at the heels in all Ages those Subjects that have risen up in Rebellion against their lawful Kings and either secretly or openly taken away their lives Had Zimri peace who slew his Master 2 Reg. 9.31 And how Gods Justice hath become the Avenger of Bloud and pursued at the heels those who had killed and taken possession and after they had boasted of their wickedness for several years together and some of them desired it might be written on their Tombs Here lies one of the late Kings Judges at last brought

pure and jealous eyes of Almighty God so both Prince and People are bound by that love they owe to God to delight to see it suppressed As it tends to bring down Gods Judgments upon a Nation so it promotes the interest of the Community to root it out and thereby to prevent or remove the Calamity As it corrupts the Morals of men so 't is for the honour and interest of all that it be extirpated that the People may be sound and healthy in their Souls and Princes have the glory of reigning over a vertuous people And as divers sorts of vices do naturally tend to disturb the peace and to hinder the welfare of the Nation so it is for the common good that this weed be cut down by the Sword of Justice 2. Preserving of Peace among men and securing each mans Liberty and Property unto him If we were here so free from the dominion of of Passions and inordinate Affections as we hope to be hereafter when we come to Heaven there would then be little need of the Magistrates Power or Office But the activeness of Interest and the unruliness of Passion produce such exorbitancies among men that if it were not for the Rods and the Axes of the Magistrate men would be too prone to live upon Earth as the Fishes in the Sea where the less are a prey to the greater The Law therefore was made for the lawless and the Magistrate bears not the Sword in vain but brings the very Sons of Belial to endure a Yoke and to the great good of the people takes care that the Kings peace be preserved 3. Stirring up the people and encouraging them to Industry Sloth and Vice and Poverty and Ruine are so nearly related that one doth almost unavoidably follow upon the other It is therefore for the interest and security of a People that the Prince doth with the Sword of Justice cut off those Vices that hinder men from being ingenious and industrious and by providing for their peaceable and quiet enjoying the fruit of their labours doth encourage them to industry by convincing them that their labour will not be thrown away And this tends at once to keep people orderly employed and thereby prevents their doing worse and it sharpens their intellectuals which are commonly dulled and rusted by sloth and desuetude and withal it brings Riches and Wealth as its attendant 4. Advancing the Interest and Honour of the Nation by forein Correspondencies and Leagues God Almighty hath so disposed of the good things of this World that what abounds in one place is wanted in another And if Commerce were not maintained with Forein Nations many of Gods good Creatures would be depretiated and disesteemed This forein Trade therefore lays a foundation of Wealth and Plenty in a Nation And without publick correspondence between the Kings of those Nations whose Subjects have Commerce together this Trade could not be allowed nor secured to them For what Nation doth ever make Capitulations of Peace or Trade with the Common People of another Country The Correspondence and agreement is with the Prince and not the Multitude And this maintains the Honour of that Nation and secures its interest in trading to the great enriching of a Land These are some of those blessings which a People reap by the Government of a good King assigned by the King of Kings to promote these good ends And these are some of those advantages which we in particular have so long enjoyed under the happy Reign of a gracious wise and Christian King namely by promoting those wise and just Ends which God himself hath designed which was the second branch of my Discourse Thirdly by the powerful and gracious providence of the All-wise God Kings are set upon their Thrones and upheld and continued there That there is 1. A special hand of divine providence seen in setting Kings in their Thrones is very evident Psal 75.6 7. Promotion cometh neither from the East nor from the West nor from the South but God is the Judg he putteth down one and setteth up another He is said to have given Nebuchadnezzar a Kingdom Power and Strength and Glory Dan. 2.37 And his hand is more especially seen in preserving the rights of those that have a just title to a Crown As in respect of our gracious King in particular Indeed he suffered him for a time to know affliction before he advanc'd him to glory as he dealt with David long since He suffered his Throne to be invaded and those that had killed to take possession For the iniquities of the Land many were the Princes thereof Prov. 28.2 But he was not long wanting to a righteous cause He suffered not the Hypocrite long to reign that the People might not be too much ensnared Job 34.30 And how wonderful were the workings of his Providence both in preserving the sacred person of our gracious King as under his own wings until the Tyranny of the wicked was overpast and also in his happy and peaceable Restauration at last unto the Throne of his Forefathers this generation I hope will never forget and generations to come will be informed of it We must needs say this was the Lord's doing and it is marvellous in our eyes and it is by him that our King reigneth 2. And as eminently is the hand of divine Providence seen in upholding and continuing Kings upon their Thrones as Kings are for the praise of them that do well and such need not to fear the Power for they shall have praise of the same so are they a terrour to evil doers for they know that the sword is not born in vain and of this sort are a great part of mankind who together with those that ambitiously aspire to be catching the Sword out of the Prince's hand do create much trouble to the reign and hazard to the life especially of a Good and Religious King and as it may be said of all men that we are encompassed with so many dangers daily that without God's good Providence upholding us we should not be able to subsist one moment In him we all live and move and have our being Act. 17.28 so it may more especially said of Princes that their Office exposeth them to so many dangers that without great help from God they could not escape And certainly as Kings are great Ministers of the Divine Providence and eminently useful to promote the Glory of God and the Good of the People so the same Providence doth concern it self more especially about the protection and preservation of them If it may be supposed that the Stars have influence upon all men for the lengthning or shortning their lives certainly stars of the greatest magnitude do attend Kings with their eminent influences to protect their persons and prolong their reigns How remarkably was this seen in preserving that wise and pious Princess Q. Elizabeth so that no weapon formed against her could prosper she appeared to be the