Passive Obedience and accept in it what is to be accepted and take the freedom to oppose what I judge not defensible As for the Sayings of our excellent Divines I will not prejudice my Thoughts by the Reverence I have for their Authority I will not therefore consult their Words lest I should be tempted in the proceed of the Dispute to shelter my self under their great Names and so perhaps I may engage a whole Army to fight when a single Duel or a small Skirmish may put an end to the Action First then I and my Adversary must shake hands we will agree as far as we can and where we cannot we must wrestle it out I will therefore grant several things that are in his Preface according as they appear in the Pages as pag. the 1st First That the Doctrine of Passive Obedience or Non-resistance of our lawful Superiours has been a Doctrine founded in the holy Scriptures and recommended to the Christian World by the practices of our Saviour's more immediate followers and that the Church of England hath asserted the Principles of obedience to Princes as the best Ages of Christianity owned and practised it Secondly P. 2d I will grant too That it is the duty of every Christian actively to obey his Superior in things lawful so that the last word be duly interpreted and that it is the duty of every Christian in things unlawful to suffer rather than obey And I will grant further all that S. Paul says Rom. 13. 2. Whosoever resisteth the power resisteth the Ordinance of God and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation Thirdly P. 4th I will grant too That these Doctrines are not Apostolical and such as ought to be preached in all the World First That Power is originally in the body of the People Secondly That the foundation of all Government is laid in Compact c. Thus much we give and that freely and it is enough to satisfie any fair Adversary But yet I must tell him That when he has all this he has no reason to censure reproach and blacken the Lives and Actions of so many excellent Persons He has no ground from thence to disparage the late Revolution or to think himself able to wheedle us into an opinion that we have done ill and that we ought to repent much rather than give thanks to God or Man for the happiness we enjoy Certain it is that when the effects and consequences of those general Doctrines come to be seen in the practice of Men as some may slinch from their Duties and do too little so others may require more than Duty and expect too much For the Interests of this World blinds as well on one side as on the other and he that censures most boldly is not always the most just and impartial Man Defeated Ambition can easily charge Ambition and worldly mindedness upon a prevalent Party and Spite will throw out as freely and as goodly words as plain downright Honesty can Let us then consider these three things again First Obedience Secondly Non-resistance Thirdly The Origination of Power and see if we can frame clear Notions of these and find out the particular distinct Duties which Men must be obliged to in consequence of them 1. Then as to Obedience It 's plain that this is due to Kings to all that are in Authority and that by Laws by Oaths by the Laws of God by the Laws of Men the publick good and the interests of Nations require it Without this there can be no Government and the People have more need to be governed than a King can have to Govern therefore they must obey not so much for wrath out of fear of punishment but for their own sake for Conscience sake for God's sake and for their Countries sake This is to be given frankly and fully with all chearfulness and upon all occasions in all instances where it is possible Nothing can be pleaded in bar to it but onely want of Power If the Laws of God or the Laws of the Country which oblige us to obey our Kings make obedience in some instances morally impossible then we must not obey because we cannot for what we cannot lawfully do we cannot do at all But where we are at our own disposal not under previous necessary Obligation there publick good Law and Reason require us to obey without reserve trick or device For we must do what we can to support Government and to carry on the ends for which Men are incorporated into Bodies Politick Therefore in doubtful matters we must obey as far as ever we can and never omit our Obedience but where the Cause is most clear and most urgent there is no excuse no exchange to be made but the Duty must be paid in kind Suppose that a great part of the People should take up a resolution not to do but to suffer a Prince would have a very ill bargain if he accept the one in exchange for the other For their sufferings can do him no good and he and his People too may be undone for want of their doings He must have assistance to repress the Thief the Robber the Murtherer to secure his People from Pyracies and Invasions Besides what a shame it is that Princes should be so basely employed to find Racks and Gibbets and Halters and Hangmen for their People They have their Power for nobler ends to defend to save to do good to give praise to them that do good Rom. 13. 3. And when they execute wrath they must do it upon the Evil-doer and that with this design that they may save many by taking off a few or else all their Executions are stark naught There cannot therefore be a bargain driven between King and People of giving and taking sufferings instead of doing for Kings must be obeyed and the People must obey the one cannot punish and the other cannot suffer but upon account of Transgression and the Law declares the greatness of the fault and the extent of the Punishment But yet some are apt to think that Subjects may be acquitted of their Duty to their Prince by suffering as well as by doing and when they have called the one Passive Obedience and the other Active they say the Prince is obeyed and has his due and ought to be satisfied This seemed once to be a fundamental in the Quakers Doctrine who would take a Cudgelling a Whipping a slashing or Imprisonment with a great deal of satisfaction whilst they would make themselves a distinguish'd People from others by unaccountable humors and fansies and tho they gave disturbance to their Neighbours and trouble to the Government yet they would think themselves good Subjects and very much obedient to the Prince only because they suffered This was and is a gross mistake for they that suffer suffer because they do not obey the Prince the Judg the Executioner they themselves all think they do not obey for neither would he punish nor
Preachers suffered in King James his Time all that he laid upon them and that with patience enough and since his Descrtion they have had no Temptation to speak either of Resistance or Non-resistance for the truth is that this is one of those sort of Doctrines which is in the Text but is not yet got into the Creed it may come into the Pulpit and may be kept out of it it will neither do King nor People good but when external Emergencies call for it In peaceable and quiet Times when Law and Justice flourish and there is little complaining either in House or Street if Preachers harangue upon Non-resistance they puzzle and confound the People and give 'em ill Work to find out possible Causes of Resistance and to examine the Grounds and Reasons for Non-resistance But when the People grow peevish and froward quarrelling and complaining against daring and designing upon the Government then the Doctrine of Non-resistance and S. Paul's Text for it may be brought forth to awe and scare them to terrifie and affrighten them to allay their heat and fury and to bring them to a more discreet Temper to the Exercise of Christian Patience and Modesty Upon this account many have much commended the Labors of the Church of England Divines in the late Times of Contrasts and Oppositions of Plottings and Counter-plottings because they did much good in supporting of the Government and for the restraining of the Madness of People and toward the prevention of Intestine Broils and Civil War But yet seeing the Preaching or not Preaching upon that Subject is matter of Prudence and depends upon times and seasons and many by considerations from whence it may either do good or harm it must be confess'd that Sermons of that sort were not every where received with the like favour and submission Because some feared that great Evil to the Kingdom and Nation might come from them inasmuch as they naturally tended not only to tame and subdue the People by allaying their zeal for their Civil Rights and Interests but likewise they might embolden evil Ministers and Counsellors to set the King upon the pernicious Project of making his advantage of the Subjects good nature and easiness toward the subverting of their Religion Laws Rights and the enslaving of the whole People For that reason many said that the Preachers were too warm and went beyond their boundaries for they ventured sometimes to treat upon matters that were only to be concerted betwixt the King and his People in a Parliament they did not think that the Magna Charta was against the Law of God tho it is not altogether the same with Samuel's Declaration 1 Sam. 8. They did not think that God would damn Men for defending and securing in all just and fair ways those Rights which they have received from their Forefathers by vertue of a National Constitution that has remained one and the same for some Hundreds of years They observed that there is but one Text declaring the damnation of Subjects resisting but there are Hundreds that threaten as highly Kings and Governors and Potentates who are injurious and oppressive of those that are under them Now if Charity govern Men in the choice of that Subject and it be designed to save the Souls of the People from damnation they wished that there were intermixed a little Charity toward the Souls of Kings that they too might be rescued from the damning sin of Oppression And it was thrown our with an under Correction that if Kings would venture against so many Texts upon Gods pardon to enlarge their Powers the People might as well venture against one to preserve their Rights Besides it was somewhat sharply and angrily said by the Men who had been intrusted in Parliaments and in the management of publick Affairs That seeing the Clergy challenged spiritual Powers by vertue of the Text and would not allow Kings or Parliaments to limit abridge or straiten their Rights They might well leave the temporal Power to the Text too which is the Law of the Land and the proper Interpreters of it which is a Parliament and not presume dogmatically to determine against the use of that which at sometimes is the onely natural and necessary means to obtain and secure to themselves Right and Justice Thus Men differed and spake their thoughts freely concerning the usefulness and effects of those Discourses especially as to the point of Prudence in the timing of them But yet whatever they said it is manifest that the Preachers designed no base or mean thing to betray their Countrey their Religion or the Laws to the arbitrary disposition of the King whilst they persuaded to Christian Patience and Submission because the same Men that preached up Non-resistance did with Courage and Spirit enough in proper time and place appear in the behalf of the Laws and the established Religion both against Popery and against all unjust usurpation of the peoples Rights and if at other times they did any thing toward the correcting a tumultuous and rebellious humor to prevent Civil War and Confusion the Nation has the benefit of their labours and all persons of Justice and Equity owe them due thanks But yet our Historian is as angry as if a Hare had crossed him in the way something has happened which he thought not of and who can help that He might have thought better They are in and perhaps he is out for that reason he will think that they have changed their Principles Alas this is gross mistake They did their duty in declaring to the people that they ought not to resist but they never became Warrantees to the late King that in case of Wrong and Injury they would not All the World knows that it is good for a Nation that the People should think that they ought not upon any pretence whatsoever resist their King so that the King does but at the same time remember that Oppression makes a wise Man mad and that an injured people always did and always will endeavour to recover or secure their Rights as well against their King as against their Neighbours He must have rare Skill in Language and Argument who can prevail upon a people to be willing to be Slaves when they may and ought to be free or to stand still and see their Goods taken from them merely because another has a mind to them If they must lose in one kind they expect to gain some other way for generally they are of Saint Peter's mind when he said to our Saviour Matth. 19. 27. We have forsaken all and followed thee what shall we have therefore The Question deserved an Answer and upon it our Saviour gave a most gracious promise of advantages in this World and in the other too Had we the like Promise in the Case of Submission or Non-resistance to Princes who will be Absolute and Arbitrary Divines would have a better Argument and might expect better effects of their
have an Historian or Advocate for the Cause of King James who thinks to be friend him by telling the World that so many of the chief of the Clergy for so long time together did preach Passive Obedience Now it is as clear as the day that there can be no exercise of this Duty nor ought there be any popular Exhortation to it but at such a time when there is a very ill Prince and a miserable People what then would our Author have does he design to publish an everlasting blot upon the memory of the late King James does he design to tell the World that he was resolved to do mischief to his People That nothing could correct or retain him That he would go on tho the Pulpits sounded out Passive Obedience and his People were taught that there was no hope of Justice or Equity from him and that they must think of suffering and dying rather than obey him This is severe it will furnish out a worse Character of King James than any of his Adversaries have yet given him it will justifie the Recession of his People from him and show to Posterity how it came to pass that so easily and suddenly he fell to the ground For who can read all these so many Pleas Advices Instructions Exhortations to Passive Obedience but he must reflect upon the Causes and Reasons of them and if he does so he will be forced to think that at that time wicked Counsels governed and lawless Violence prevailed and that the whole Nation was clouded with a dismal Appearance of Oppression Persecution and Tyranny For seeing that a Prince ruling by Law and with Justice cannot be put off with any thing less than Active Obedience and nothing can exercise the Passive Obedience of Subjects but vile and base and wicked Commands contrary to Law and Religion we must either blame those Preachers for amusing their Auditors with needless Thoughts of unjust Sufferings or we must blame the late King for giving too much cause for just and reasonable fears of them Now what can be said in his behalf to acquit him no Man has yet told us But our Historian has effectually vindicated the Preachers he every where commends them and their Writings this he tells us was well said that excellently that incomparably He likes their Doctrine and finds no fault in the timing of it and likely enough he had reason to believe the Doctrine as proper to the Time in which it was delivered as it was true in it self If so the late King is again deserted by this Historian as well as by the rest of his People and his Cause like himself falls to the ground for why must he do ill things and why must he load his People with dreads of worse Why did not all this noise about Passive Obedience awaken him Why did he not give stop to his Proceedings when his People owned so loudly their fears of Mischief Could he think it a small thing to make his People miserable or to be thought one that would do so All this was intimated by those Sermons and Tracts From thence he ought to have taken warning to desist and his Counsellors ought to have persuaded him to it for certainly popular Discourses about Passive Obedience are as instructive to a Prince to move him from designs of doing ill as they are to the People to engage them to be willing to suffer wrong From hence I am forced to blame our Historian for perpetuating the Memory of these Discourses it were for the honor of the late King that they were forgotten Those excellent Divines would never have revived past Actions or the grievous sad Thoughts which they had when they composed or delivered their excellent Arguments and Persuasions for Passive Obedience They could wish from their Souls that they never had occasion for them tho they are ready to morrow to write the same things upon the same grounds which with good reason they hope that they are not like to see as long as they live Why then does the Historian take pains to collect all these things together He can do no Service to the late King by it and he does not seem to design the Honor of the Preachers It is hard to guess his meaning but if he tempts out an ill Thought he must blame himself He gives us nothing else to think but that he might be one of the Adepti one of those who knew the Secret for in the late Times they tell us there was a Secret The Ministers of State they say who knew the Resolves of the Court to be harsh and severe made it their business to persuade Men to preach and talk up Passive Obedience that what could not be done by the Power of the King might be gained by the easie Submissions of the People This was Machiavel to purpose It is sad and lamentable that so excellent a Doctrine should be abused by such designs of naughty Men. If our Author was one of their Instruments and knew what he did he can neither excuse himself to God nor Man I will undertake for our excellent Divines whom he commends and I and all others must do the same that they were never thought so base as to be trusted with the Knowledge of such a pernicious Design They out of Honesty and Sincerity preached against Rebellion and persuaded Men rather to suffer than obey evil Commands but they would not for all the World that the innocent and conscientious should be cheated of their Lives and Fortunes by any Discourses of theirs Therefore when it was proper they preached up this Doctrine but when it was not they let it alone because they would not have the People to rebel nor would they give Encouragement to such as might be willing to oppress them in both these things they did their Duty both to the King and to the People It had been well if others would have done the same and spoke as plainly to the King as they did to the People But it was very ill done if done at all to persuade the King that the People of England were so subdued by the Doctrine of Passive Obedience grown so tame and easie that he might do what he would pull down and set up what Religion what Law he pleased It is certain that all the Preachers in the World could never persuade them to this for tho the People be Loyal and willing enough that the King should have his Dues yet they were never thought a Nation of Asses fit only to bear Burdens As they are not born Slaves and by the Constitution of the Nation ought not to be made Slaves so they have more Spirit and Wit than to suffer themselves to be cheated into Slavery Their Forefathers for many Ages have made a difference between the King and his Counsellors tho they would suffer the one yet they would not suffer the other and certainly the Men of this Age should not be thought so dull
ought they to suffer if they did obey But because they will not obey their Prince he punishes and they suffer The Prince therefore in this case has no manner of Obedience But let us consider further tho we cannot barter with a Prince and give him Suffering instead of Doing yet we may be obliged to suffer and we may obey in doing and obey in suffering for so doing and that Obedience may be called Passive Obedience tho in truth and reality all the Obedience which we perform in this case is Active For we obey one and suffer from another we obey God and suffer from Man or we obey Man and suffer from God But because God hath commanded us not only to do our Duties but likewise has commanded us in certain cases not only to do but to be ready to suffer for so doing our obedience to this Command of suffering has been called by some Passive Obedience Now this is Great and Noble and speaks an excellency of Spirit which is most admirable for Men to do well and to continue in so doing whatever they suffer upon that account But as it is Noble so it is hard and difficult It is hard to be bound to confess Christ before Men that we may gain Heaven and at the same time to be forced to lose all that we have on Earth for so confessing This sets Body and Soul at variance nay the Soul is confounded in it self whilst hopes and fears engage one another in a severe conflict the one would gain and the other would not lose the one pulls upwards and the other downwards upon this account the thing is difficult But yet we must remember that for all the difficulty it is very practicable because it has been always required and always expected No Philosopher would ever allow him to be a good Man who would flinch from his Duty upon the account of suffering To do so they say is slavish and it is one of the Rules of the Pythagoreans that in the exercise of Vertue a Man must have nothing of the Slave in him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he must have no regard for any thing but his Duty Hierocles p. 209. Tully in the 2d of his Offices will not allow it possible for a Man to be just or honest or good who fears either poverty or pain or banishment or death it self so as to be warped from right by the fears of them or by the hopes of any advantages that are contrary to them Horace that very easie Man who can never be thought by a Heathen to be an over-severe directer of Conscience expects from his just and good Man that he should bear up against Tyrant and Rabble and suffer all that their rage and fury can throw upon him and yet not veer in the least from his point but go on in his Duty steddily and firmly Justum tenacem propositi virum Non civium ardor prava jubentium Non vultus instantis Tyranni Mente quatit solidâ This Principle of suffering in a good Cause for the sake of Vertue Goodness and Righteousness or of doing our Duties notwithstanding that we must suffer lies so open and clear to the reason of mankind that Men of worth and honour in every Age could not fail to practise it And we Christians are bound to the observance of this Duty as others were before by the reason of the thing as well as by precepts of Christianity Whatever principle a Man has and whatever he accounts a Duty if he will be true and faithful just and upright it may sometime or other bring him under suffering and he must be content with it because it is base and unworthy in certain cases not to do it it is a betraying of our Consciences a forfeiture of all the good opinion that we can have of our selves Now if this be true and this be called Passive Obedience that must not be looked upon as a peculiar of Christianity or a new Doctrine introduced since our Saviour's days much less can any particular Church appropriate the Rule to it self because it lies in common to all mankind and has sometimes been practised by the little as well as by the great Some perhaps may have just cause to complain of false Casuists and base corrupters of the genuine sense of right Reason and true Christianity but when they have done it they have onely reproved a gross fault they must not expect any great honour for having had a right notion of a plain Truth If we would speak clearly we must confess that our blessed Lord has not heightened this Duty for he can expect no more sufferings than what Pain and Beggery and Death signifie but as a most gracious and tender Master he has made all these much more easie and portable than ever they were before and that in several ways As first by giving us most gracious Promises of Reward in another World in case we are called to suffer Matth. 5. 9 10 11. Secondly By assuring us that assistances of God's grace come in to our help whenever we do suffer Matth. 10. 18 19 Phil. 1. 29. Thirdly By giving us such thoughts of God as are most powerful to support us under all sufferings For what can dismay him that will think with S. Peter that he who suffers as a Christian or suffers according to the Will of God he may commit the keeping of his Soul to God in well doing as unto a faithful Creator 1 Pet. 4. 16 19. These things are beyond Philosophy and they are mighty supports to all Christians who must suffer for well doing These would acquit the justice of God if he had required sufferings as sufferings and made them so necessary means of Salvation that he would accept of none into Heaven but such as came thither as Martyrs through a flaming fire or a Sea of bloud But God is not so fond of suffering as to require them for their own sakes We are not bound like Baal's Priests to cut and flash our selves that we may please our God We are not bound to move others to cut our Throats or to threaten to kill them if they won't kill us as S. Augustine tells the Circumcellions did We ought not to give advantages and opportunities to wicked Men to execute their wicked purposes upon us In times of Persecution we are not bound to go out of our Houses and provoke an inraged multitude to throw us in the Fires or to the Lions This rashness has been condemned by whole Councils though at some time we may and must leave Father and Mother and House and Land and Life it self for Christ's sake and for the Gospels yet at other times we may keep them as well Tho the first Christians Acts 5. 41. did rejoice that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for Christs Name and as it is Heb. 10. 34. they took joyfully the spoiling of their goods Yet they did as much rejoice and gave hearty thanks
each strove to outvy the other in Loyalty and Dutifulness He had the best opportunity that ever Man had to be great if he could have been contented to have been King of England or would have considered that he was a King of Englishmen Why should he think his People to be Fools or Rascals that they would part with their Laws or Religion for an Humor merely because he thought that they might be as well without them Their Forefathers had for many Ages past laboured hard to get their Laws fixed fairly and evenly betwixt Prince and People for the good of both And their Religion at the Reformation had singular Advantages to be cleansed from all the Corruptions which Folly and Vanity had brought upon other Churches and the Professors of it have in all Times since been as industrious and curious to find out and as free and impartial to discover any thing that looked like Mistake or Error in the first Settlement as ever Men were We have all that Christ and his Apostles taught all that the Primitive Fathers recommended as Christian Doctrine We can part with nothing as the Papists own because all we profess is pure and simple Christianity and if we would take in what they have superadded we must submit to a most heavy Burden of gross Cheats and Errors But yet the late King would try he would make the Experiment whether we would be willing to part with our Laws and our Religion he would use his Art and Policy to get them from us and he has had the unhappy Fate of Projectors Upon this Account our Historian is not satisfied with what we have done or suffered He thinks himself concerned to lay before us so many Sayings of our eminent Divines on purpose to convince us that we have not yet fulfilled all the Measures of a Passive Obedience he would have it thought that we have apostatised from the Doctrine of this Church or as he says that this Doctrine is more illustrious 〈◊〉 our Books than in our Lives The Truth is we are not hanged the Northern Heresie is not yet extirpated we are not put into the condition of French Refugees that we should be forced to leave our Goods and fly from our Country to save out Lives Our Church is preserved and we are delivered from the Rage and Fury of petulant Enemies We bless God for this If he be grieved let him find out that Fool who is willing to be hanged to gratifie his Humor with a scurvy Sight or to put him into a better Mood Neither can God nor Man please some Persons Passive Obedience is a Duty but it is no further a Duty than God hath made it to be so it is large enough of it self it will not endure to be put upon the Tenters if you stretch it never so little you will make that which is good in it self to be stark naught it is a Vertue as long as it stands upon its own grounds if it steps beyond those it is no longer a Vertue but a Fury We must Obey we confess and submit to Suffering as far as God and Reason call for it as far as publick Good and the Constitution of the Government requires it But must we not only submit but court Suffering must we expose our selves to it run upon it make it our care and business to find it A certain Divine has said and Hand in Margin directs us to note it That Obedience we must pay either active or passive if we can't do one we must the other But it was not his Mind that we should pay Sufferings just as we do Money go at a certain Time and Place and tender it and then be sure to give good Coin and full Tale. We may not pay we may escape we may get away from mischief our Savior has given us leave when they persecute uâ— in one City to 〈◊〉 into another Can any Man be so barbarous as to blame the French Refugees for following that Rule of our Saviour They have fled out of the Dominions of their Prince and saved their Lives and if they could they would have saved their Fortunes â—oo and not paid him one Farthing of that Passive Obedience Do they sin in this Are they disobedient for this Men submit to the Outrages of a Prince and so they do to a Fever or the Plague and tho they submit to God's Providence under those Calamities yet they use all fit and proper means to lessen to abate them and if possible to be recovered from them In the utmost Extremities of Subjects and highest Insults of Princes against Religion and Right many things may and ought to be done 1. They may make their Defences and plead their Causes Thus did S. Peter and thus did S. Paul and thus did the Primitive Fathers when they could be heard and when they could not they published their Apologies and made the People Judges between their Prince and them by disclosing the merits of their Cause to all the World Our Savior himself encouraged them to this by promising to give them a Mouth and Wisdom which all their Adversaries could not gainsay He promised them too the best Advocate that can be the Holy Spirit to speak in them and for them and that too when Rulers and Governors Kings and Princes should appear against them Matt. x. 18. 20. Ye shall be brought before Governors and Kings for my sake Take no thought what ye shall speak for it is not ye that speak but the Spirit of your Father Our Reverend Bishops when of late they were brought before Judges I think for Christ's sake and the Gospel's sake they did not wholly abandon themselves to the Will of their Prince nor so act as if they thought it Duty forthwith either to do or to submit either to pay him Active or Passive Obedience for when they could not do the first they did what they could to avoid the second They stood upon the Defence and used the best Mouths and best Wisdoms the best Pleaders and Advocates in the Nation to justifie their Actions to clear up their Innocence And tho that Vindication of themselves did more affect the Interests of the late King than if they had raised up Arms against him yet do I not hear that any one of them has repented of it nor do I see cause why he should 2. But then further they may pray to God to find a way for their Deliverance All grant that Preces Lachrymae Prayers and Tears are Weapons which the Christian always may and upon all occasions ought to use but yet the Stretchers of this Doctrine ere they are aware seem to extort these from us for if it be our Duty to give unto our Prince either so much in Active Obedience or in lieu of that so much as is equivalent in his Opinion of Passive we cannot pray to God for deliverance because we cannot pray to God to free us from giving to our Prince his
Rights or to deliver us from doing our Duties 3. We may accept of deliverance and that in ways extraordinary without making the strictest examination of all the niceties doubts scruples which may occur in the case Thus certainly St. Peter did in that remarkable action related Acts 12. He left his Chains his Goal his Guards and followed his Deliverer tho he had all and many more causes for scruple than those which now adays give so much trouble and seem so insuperable For First He was committed to Prison by his King upon that account he might have thought it his Duty to obey in all things lawful and patiently to submit in the rest or else according to the other way of expressing it That what he could not give to his Prince in Active obedience he ought to make up in the Passive Secondly His King went in the way of Justice and designed to bring him to a Tryal Upon that he might have thought that a secret withdrawing of himself would disparage his Cause and in the Opinion of others speak him guilty Thirdly His King acted in behalf of the established Law and Religion Josephus tells us he was one who had a great zeal for the Jewish Constitution Polity and Worship Upon that account St. Peter might think that his King acted from Conscience according to his Duty in prosecuting of him and therefore he was bound at the command of his King to declare plainly and openly upon what grounds he a private person undertook to draw people off from the settlement and a long and most legally established Worship to a new one especially he could not but see what himself taught 1 Pet. 3. 15. That it is the Duty of every Christian to be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh a reason of the hope that is in him Fourthly The Case of his Guards of the Keepers of the Prison-gates was most deplorable he could not but see that his escape would be charged and revenged upon them upon that he might think that he ought not to do evil that good may come of it to save his own life he ought not to give cause and reason for executing of so many innocent Men. Fifthly There is another thing which though much less yet may give matter of scruple for what will not that in this sudden flight it is not likely that he should pay his Jaylor for Fees or Diet. Upon this account he might think that his Honesty would be questioned and he would be accused of doing wrong and defrauding another of his dues and that other Christians who should afterwards be committed would suffer hardship and ill usage for his sake and therefore he had better stay where he was and give his Jaylor and his Prince and the Law all they could require and take from him and so pay down a compleat Passive Obedience in full measure and tale by dying to gratifie his Prince's humor and expect the Reward of his Action from God This he might have thought but he did not for he followed his Deliverer out of the Prison and took care to make good his deliverance by absconding for near five years after as Computers reckon it Had he been under those strait boundaries of Conscience in this case which others think they are Had he had their Rules of Duty could he have seen it to be his Duty to stay in Prison and suffer according to the will of his King he could not have followed his Deliverer though he had been an Angel Gal. 1. 8. and he could never have prevailed upon himself to have believed that an Angel of God would have moved him to act contrary to his Duty He accepted of deliverance and the whole Church that then was blessed God for it and in like cases so may and ought others to do and that without penetrating into all the grounds of nicety and scruple which Men seldom do but when they design to seem extraordinary and then usually they refine upon Morality and set down Rules of Duty which neither Humane Nature can bear nor Christianity requires and for the most part they are against the good of Societies and do alike mischief to Kings as to Subjects Seeing then we are not by Gods Law so abandoned to the will and humor of a Man though he be our King but that when he proceeds in Methods of doing wrong and injury of ruling by Power against Law we may flee from him we may plead our Cause and Right against him we may pray to God to give a stop to him and we may accept of deliverance from him We must say that the modern Doctrine of Passive Obedience is stretched beyond its bounds for we are not obliged to make it our business to give and pay him that which he has no right to take we are not obliged to put our selves into his way and give him opportunity to cut our throats We are not obliged not to move others to intercede for us and if they can with justice to defend and preserve us we are not obliged to refuse a deliverance if it comes to us But if Force prevails and we are to be knock'd down by Violence against Right and Justice we must take care to fall as decently as we can submitting to God's Providence and giving all respects to our King as far as our Case will allow if our Calamity comes from him For this will bring credit to our Memories and to our Religion and may do good to others who shall be in our condition by appeasing of wrath and displeasure how unjustly soever conceived against them or us I will end this Discourse with one Remark upon the Case of Isaac He was a noble instance of a very extraordinary Obedience he submitted entirely to the Will of his Father and of his King for Abraham was both to him but yet the Praise of that wondrous Action related Gen. 22. falls to the Father and not to the Son Much is said of Abraham's Faith and little of Isaac's Obedience whatever other Reasons there are for it one is very obvious and plain That it might not be a President from whence Kings might measure their Rights and Subjects their Duties So much of Obedience Active and Passive The next thing to be treated of is the Doctrine of Non-resistance This our Historian tells us has been avowed by the Church of England ever since the Reformation Preachers and Writers have declared for it and that with a great deal of warmth and much advantage especially in latter days Upon this Account he would have it thought That Men have swerved from their Principles and that this Doctrine as well as the other is more illustrious in Writings than in Lives Now this Censure I challenge to be very hard and unreasonable because it does not appear that those Men who preached up Non-resistance before have ever preached for Resistance since nor have they who persuaded others to Non-resistance resisted themselves The