with lands and houses and officers and revenues set apart from all other humane uses that is consecrated and made holy to those their Idols as Caverns Groves Woods Mountains and whole Ilands and have attributed to them not onely the shapes some of Men some of Beasts some of Monsters but also the Faculties and Passions of men and beasts as Sense Speech Sex Lust Generation and this not onely by mixing one with another to propagate the kind of Gods but also by mixing with men and women to beget mongrill Gods and but inmates of Heaven as Bacchus Hercules and others besides Anger Revenge and other passions of living creatures and the actions proceeding from them as Fraud Theft Adultery Sodomie and any vice that may be taken for an effect of Power or a cause of Pleasure and all such Vices as amongst men are taken to be against Law rather than against Honour Lastly to the Prognostiques of time to come which are naturally but Conjectures upon the Experience of time past and supernaturally divine Revelation the same authors of the Religion of the Gentiles partly upon pretended Experience partly upon pretended Revelation have added innumerable other superstitious wayes of Divination and made men believe they should find their fortunes sometimes in the ambiguous or senslesse answers of the Priests at Delphi Delos Ammon and other famous Oracles which answers were made ambiguous by designe to own the event both wayes or absurd by the intoxicating vapour of the place which is very frequent in sulphurous Cavernes Sometimes in the leaves of the Sibills of whose Prophecyes like those perhaps of Nostradamus for the fragments now extant seem to be the invention of later times there were some books in reputation in the time of the Roman Republiques Sometimes in the insignificant Speeches of Mad-men supposed to be possessed with a divine Spirit which Possession they called Enthusiasme and these kinds of foretelling events were accounted Theomancy or Prophecy Sometimes in the aspect of the Starres at their Nativity which was called Horoscopy and esteemed a part of judiciary Astrology Sometimes in their own hopes and feares called Thumomancy or Presage Sometimes in the Prediction of Witches that pretended conference with the dead which is called Necromancy Conjuring and Witchcraft and is but juggling and confederate knavery Sometimes in the Casuall flight or feeding of birds called Augury Sometimes in the Entrayles of a sacrificed beast which was Aruspicina Sometimes in Dreams Sometimes in Croaking of Ravens or chattering of Birds Sometimes in the Lineaments of the face which was called Metoposcopy or by Palmistry in the lines of the hand in casuall words called Omina Sometimes in Monsters or unusuall accidents as Ecclipses Comets rare Meteors Earthquakes Inundations uncouth Births and the like which they called Portenta and Ostenta because they thought them to portend or foreshew some great Calamity to come Somtimes in meer Lottery as Crosse and Pile counting holes in a sive dipping of Verses in Homer and Virgil and innumerable other such vaine conceipts So easie are men to be drawn to believe any thing from such men as have gotten credit with them and can with gentlenesse and dexterity take hold of their fear and ignorance And therefore the first Founders and Legislators of Common-wealths amongst the Gentiles whose ends were only to keep the people in obedience and peace have in all places taken care First to imprint in their minds a beliefe that those precepts which they gave concerning Religion might not be thought to proceed from their own device but from the dictates of some God or other Spirit or else that they themselves were of a higher nature than mere mortalls that their Lawes might the more easily be received So Numa Pompilius pretended to receive the Ceremonies he instituted amongst the Romans from the Nymph Egeria and the first King and founder of the Kingdome of Peru pretended himselfe and his wife to be the children of the Sunne and Mahomet to set up his new Religion pretended to have conferences with the Holy Ghost in forme of a Dove Secondly they have had a care to make it believed that the same things were displeasing to the Gods which were forbidden by the Lawes Thirdly to prescribe Ceremonies Supplications Sacrifices and Festivalls by which they were to believe the anger of the Gods might be appeased and that ill success in War great contagions of Sicknesse Earthquakes and each mans private Misery came from the Anger of the Gods and their Anger from the Neglect of their Worship or the forgetting or mistaking some point of the Ceremonies required And though amongst the antient Romans men were not forbidden to deny that which in the Poets is written of the paines and pleasures after this life which divers of great authority and gravity in that state have in their Harangues openly derided yet that beliefe was alwaies more cherished than the contrary And by these and such other Institutions they obtayned in order to their end which was the peace of the Commonwealth that the common people in their misfortunes laying the fault on neglect or errour in their Ceremonies or on their own disobedience to the lawes were the lesse apt to mutâ—…ny against their Governors And being entertained with the pomp and pastime of Festivalls and publike Games made in honour of the Gods needed nothing else but bread to keep them from discontent murmuring and commotion against the State And therefore the Romans that had conquered the greatest part of the then known World made no scruple of tollerating any Religion whatsoeuer in the City of Rome it selfe unlesse it had somthing in it that could not consist with their Civill Government nor do we read that any Religion was there forbidden but that of the Jewes who being the peculiar Kingdome of God thought it unlawfull to acknowledge subjection to any mortall King or State whatsoever And thus you see how the Religion of the Gentiles was a part of their Policy But where God himselfe by supernaturall Revelation planted Religion there he also made to himselfe a peculiar Kingdome and gave Lawes not only of behaviour towards himselfe but also towards one another and thereby in the Kingdome of God the Policy and lawes Civill are a part of Religion and therefore the distinction of Temporall and Spirituall Domination hath there no place It is true that God is King of all the Earth Yet may he be King of a peculiar and chosen Nation For there is no more incongruity therein than that he that hath the generall command of the whole Army should have withall a peculiar Regiment or Company of his own God is King of all the Earth by his Power but of his chosen people he is King by Covenant But to speake more largly of the Kingdome of God both by Nature and Covenant I have in the following discourse assigned an other place From the propagation of Religion it is not hard to understand the causes
him with his corporall liberty For Slaves that work in Prisons or Fetters do it not of duty but to avoyd the cruelty of their task-masters The Master of the Servant is Master also of all he hath and may exact the use thereof that is to say of his goods of his labour of his servants and of his children as often as he shall think fit For he holdeth his life of his Master by the covenant of obedience that is of owning and authorising whatsoever the Master shall do And in case the Master if he refuse kill him or cast him into bonds or otherwise punish him for his disobedience he is himselfe the author of the same and cannot accuse him of injury In summe the Rights and Consequences of both Paternall and Despoticall Dominion are the very same with those of a Soveraign by Institution and for the same reasons which reasons are set down in the precedent chapter So that for a man that is Monarch of divers Nations whereof he hath in one the Soveraignty by Institution of the people assembled and in another by Conquest that is by the Submission of each particular to avoyd death or bonds to demand of one Nation more than of the other from the title of Conquest as being a Conquered Nation is an act of ignorance of the Rights oâ—… Soveraignty For the Soveraign is absolute over both alike or else there is no Soveraignty at all and so every man may Lawfully protect himselfe if he can with his own sword which is the condition of war By this it appears that a great Family if it be not part of some Common-wealth is of it self as to the Rights of Soveraignty a little Monarchy whether that Family consist of a man and his children or of a man and his servants or of a man and his children and servants together wherein the Father or Master is the Soveraign But yet a Family is not properly a Common-wealth unlesse it be of that power by its own number or by other opportunities as not to be subdued without the hazard of war For where a number of men are manifestly too weak to defend themselves united every one may use his own reason in time of danger to save his own life either by flight or by submission to the enemy as hee shall think best in the same manner as a very small company of souldiers surprised by an army may cast down their armes and demand quarter or run away rather than be put to the sword And thus much shall suffice concerning what I find by speculation and deduction of Soveraign Rights from the nature need and designes of men in erecting of Common-wealths and putting themselves under Monarchs or Assemblies entrusted with power enough for their protection Let us now consider what the Scripture teacheth in the same point To Moses the children of Israel say thus Speak thou to us and we will heare thee but let not God speak to us lest we dye This is absolute obedience to Moses Concerning the Right of Kings God himself by the mouth of Samuel saith This shall be the Right of the King you will have to reigne over you He shall take your sons and set them to drive his Chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots and gather in his harvest and to make his engines of War and Instruments of his chariots and shall take your daughters to make perfumes to be his Cookes and Bakers He shall take your fields your vine-yards and your olive-yards and give them to his servants He shall take the tyth of your corne and wine and give it to the men of his chamber and to his other servants He shall take your man-servants and your maid-servants and the choice of your youth and employ them in his businesse He shall take the tyth of your flocks and you shall be his servants This is absolute power and â—…ummed up in the last words you shall be his servants Againe when the people heard what power their King was to have yet they consented thereto and say thus We will be as all other nations and our King shall judge our causes and goe before us to conduct our wars Here is confirmed the Right that Soveraigns have both to the Militia and to all Judicature in which is conteined as absolute power as one man can possibly transferre to another Again the prayer of King Salomon to God was this Give to thy servant understanding to judge thy people and to diâ—…cerne between Good and Evill It belongeth therefore to the Soveraigne to bee Judge and to praescribe the Rules of discerning Good and Evill which Rules are Lawes and therefore in him is the Legislative Power Saul sought the life of David yet when it was in his power to slay Saul and his Servants would have done it David forbad them saying God forbid I should do such an act against my Lord the anoynted of God For obedience of servants St. Paul saith Servants obey your masters in All things and Children obey your Parents in All things There is simple obedience in those that are subject to Paternall or Despoticall Dominion Again The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses chayre and therefore All that they shall bid you observe that observe and do There again is simple obedience And St Paul Warn them that they subject themselves to Princes and to those that are in Authority obey them This obedience is also simple Lastly our Saviour himselfe acknowledges that men ought to pay such taxes as are by Kings impoâ—…ed where he sayes Give to Caesar that which is Caesars and payed such taxes himselfe And that the Kings word is sufficient to take any thing from any Subject when there is need and that the King is Judge of that need For he himselfe as King of the Jewes commanded his Disciples to take the Asse and Asses Colt to carry him into Jerusalem saying Go into the Village over against you and you shall find a shee Asse tyed and her Colt with her unty them and bring them to me And if any man ask you what you mean by it Say the Lord hath need of them And they will let them go They will not ask whether his necessity be a sufficient title nor whether he be judge of that necessity but acquiesce in the will of the Lord. To these places may be added also that of Genesis You shall be as Gods knowing Good and Evill And verse 11. Who told thee that thou wast naked hast thou eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee thou shouldest not eat For the Cognisance or Judicature of Good and Evill being forbidden by the name of the fruit of the tree of Knowledge as a triall of Adams obedience The Divel to enflame the Ambition of the woman to whom that fruit already seemed beautifull told her that by tasting it they should be as Gods knowing Good
of the resolution of the same into its first seeds or principles which are only an opinion of a Deity and Powers invisible and supernaturall that can never be so abolished out of humane nature but that new Religions may againe be made to spring out of them by the culture of such men as for such purpose are in reputation For seeing all formed Religion is founded at first upon the faith which a multitude hath in some one person whom they believe not only to be a wise man and to labouâ—… to procure their happiness but also to be a holy man to whom God himselfe vouchsafeth to declare his will supernaturally It followeth necessarily when they that have the Government of Religion shall come to have either the wisedome of those men their sincerity or their love suspected or that they shall be unable to shew any probable token of Divine Revelation that the Religion which they desire to uphold must be suspected likewise and without the feare of the Civill Sword contradicted and rejected That which taketh away the reputation of Wisedome in him that formeth a Religion or addeth to it when it is allready formed is the enjoyning of a beliefe of contradictories For both parts of a contradiction cannot possibly be true and therefore to enjoyne the beleife of them is an argument of ignorance which detects the Author in that and discredits him in all things else he shall propound as from revelation supernaturall which revelation a man may indeed have of many things above but of nothing against naturall reason That which taketh away the reputation of Sincerity is the doing or saying of such things as appeare to be signes that what they require other men to believe is not believed by themselves all which doings or sayings are therefore called Scandalous because they be stumbling blocks that make men to fall in the way of Religion as Injustice Cruelty Prophanesse Avarice and Luxury For who can believe that he that doth ordinarily such actions as proceed from any of these rootes believeth there is any such Invisible Power to be feared as he affrighteth other men withall for lesser faults That which taketh away the reputation of Love is the being detected of private ends as when the beliefe they require of others conduceth or seemeth to conduce to the acquiring of Dominion Riches Dignity or secure Pleasure to themselves onely or specially For that which men reap benefit by to themselves they are thought to do for their own sakes and not for love of others Lastly the testimony that men can render of divine Calling can be no other than the operation of Miracles or true Prophecy which also is a Miracle or extraordinary Felicity And therefore to those points of Religion which have been received from them that did such Miracles those that are added by such as approve not their Calling by some Miracle obtain no greater beliefe than what the Custome and Lawes of the places in which they be educated have wrought into them For as in naturall things men of judgement require naturall signes and arguments so in supernaturall things they require signes supernaturall which are Miracles before they consent inwardly and from their hearts All which causes of the weakening of mens faith do manifestly appear in the Examples following First we have the Example of the children of Israel who when Moses that had approved his Calling to them by Miracles and by the happy conduct of them out of Egypt was absent but 40. dayes revolted from the worship of the true God recommended to them by him and setting up a Golden Calfe for their God relapsed into the Idolatry of the Egyptians from whom they had been so lately delivered And again after Moses Aaron Joshua and that generation which had seen the great works of God in Israel were dead another generation arose and served Baal So that Miracles fayling Faith also failed Again when the sons of Samuel being constituted by their father Judges in Bersabee received bribes and judged unjustly the people of Israel refused any more to have God to be their King in other manner than he was King of other people and therefore cryed out to Samuel to choose them a King after the manner of the Nations So that Justice fayling Faith also fayled Insomuch as they deposed their God from reigning over them And whereas in the planting of Christian Religion the Oracles ceased in all parts of the Roman Empire and the number of Christians encreased wonderfully every day and in every place by the preaching of the Apostles and Evangelists a great part of that successe may reasonably be attributed to the contempt into which the Priests of the Gentiles of that time had brought themselves by their uncleannesse avarice and jugling between Princes Also the Religion of the Church of Rome was partly for the same cause abolished in England and many other parts of Christendome insomuch as the fayling of Vertue in the Pastors maketh Faith faile in the People and partly from bringing of the Philosophy and doctrine of Aristotle into Religion by the Schoole-men from whence there arose so many contradictions and absurdities as brought the Clergy into a reputation both of Ignorance and of Fraudulent intention and enclined people to revolt from them either against the will of their own Princes as in France and Holland or with their will as in England Lastly amongst the points by the Church of Rome declared necessary for Salvation there be so many manifestly to the advantage of the Pope and of his spirituall subjects residing in the territories of other Christian Princes that were it not for the mutuall emulation of those Princes they might without warre or trouble exclude all forraign Authority as easily as it has been excluded in England For who is there that does not see to whose benefit it conduceth to have it believed that a King hath not his Authority from Christ unlesse a Bishop crown him That a King if he be a Priest cannot Marry That whether a Prince be born in lawfull Marriage or not must be judged by Authority from Rome That Subjects may be freed from their Alleageance if by the Court of Rome the King be judged an Heretique That a King as Chilperique of France may be deposed by a Pope as Pope Zachary for no cause and his Kingdome given to one of his Subjects That the Clergy and Regulars in what Country soever shall be exempt from the Jurisdiction of their King in cases criminall Or who does not see to whose profit redound the Fees of private Masses and Vales of Purgatory with other signes of private interest enough to mortifie the most lively Faith if as I sayd the civill Magistrate and Custome did not more sustain it than any opinion they have of the Sanctity Wisdome or Probity of their Teachers So that I may attribute all the changes of Religion in the world to one and the same cause and
that the end of Miracles was to beget beleef not universally in all men elect and reprobate but in the elect only that is to say in such as God had determined should become his Subjects For those miraculous plagues of Egypt had not for end the conversion of Pharaoh For God had told Moses before that he would harden the heart of Pharaoh that he should not let the people goe And when he let them goe at last not the Miracles perswaded him but the plagues forced him to it So also of our Saviour it is written Mat. 13. 58. that he wrought not many Miracles in his own countrey because of their unbeleef and in Marke 6. 5. in stead of he wrought not many it is he could work none It was not because he wanted power which to say were blasphemy against God nor that the end of Miracles was not to convert incredulous men to Christ for the end of all the Miracles of Moses of the Prophets of our Saviour and of his Apostles was to adde men to the Church but it was because the end of their Miracles was to adde to the Church not all men but such as should be saved that is to say such as God had elected Seeing therefore our Saviour was sent from his Father hee could not use his power in the conversion of those whom his Father had rejected They that expounding this place of St. Marke say that this word Hee could not is put for He would not do it without example in the Greek tongue where Would not is put sometimes for Could not in things inanimate that have no will but Could not for Would not never and thereby lay a stumbling block before weak Christians as if Christ could doe no Miracles but amongst the credulous From that which I have here set down of thenature and use of a Miracle we may define it thus A MIRACLE is a work of God besides his operation by the way of Nature ordained in the Creation done for the making manifest to his elect the mission of an extraordinary Minister for their salvation And from this definition we may inferre First that in all Miracles the work done is not the effect of any vertue in the Prophet because it is the effect of the immediate hand of God that is to say God hath done it without using the Prophet therein as a subordinate cause Secondly that no Devil Angel or other created Spirit can do a Miracle For it must either be by vertue of some naturall science or by Incantation that is vertue of words For if the Inchanters do it by their own power independent there is some power that proceedeth not from God which all men deny and if they doe it by power given them then is the work not from the immediate hand of God but naturall and consequently no Miracle There be some texts of Scripture that seem to attribute the power of working wonders equall to some of those immediate Miracles wrought by God himself to certain Arts of Magick and Incantation As for example when we read that after the Rod of Moses being east on the ground became a Serpent the Magicians of Egypt did the like by their Enchantments and that after Moses had turned the waters of the Egyptian Streams Rivers Ponds and Pooles of water into blood the Magicians of Egypt did so likewise with their Enchantments and that after Moses had by the power of God brought frogs upon the land the Magicians also did so with their Enchantments and brought up frogs upon the land of Egypt will not a man be apt to attribute Miracles to Enchantments that is to say to the efficacy of the sound of Words and think the samâ—… very well proved out of this and other such places and yet there is no place of Scripture that telleth us what an Enchantment is If therefore Enchantment be not as many think it a working of strange effects by spells and words but Imposture and delusion wrought by ordinary means and so far from supernaturall as the Impostors need not the study so much as of naturall causes but the ordinary ignorance stupidity and superstition of mankind to doe them those texts that seem to countenance the power of Magick Witcheraft and Enchantment must needs have another sense than at first sight they seem to bear For it is evident enough that Words have no effect but on those that understand them and then they have no other but to signifie the intentions or passions of them that speak and thereby produce hope fear or other passions or conceptions in the hearer Therefore when a Rod seemeth a Serpent or the Waters Bloud or any other Miracle seemeth done by Enchantment if it be not to the edification of Gods people not the Rod nor the Water nor any other thing is enchanted that is to say wrought upon by the Words but the Spectator So that all the Miracle consisteth in this that the Enchanter has deceived a man which is no Miracle but a very easie matter to doe For such is the ignorance and aptitude to error generally of all men but especially of them that have not much knowledge of naturall causes and of the nature and interests of men as by innumerable and easie tricks to be abused What opinion of miraculous power before it was known there was a Science of the course of the Stars might a man have gained that should have told the people This hour or day the Sun should be darkned A Juggler by the handling of his goblets and other trinkets if it were not now ordinarily practised would be thought to do his wonders by the power at least of the Devil A man that hath practised to speak by drawing in of his breath which kind of men in antient time were called Ventriloqui and so make the weaknesse of his voice seem to proceed not from the weak impulsion of the organs of Speech but from distance of place is able to make very many men beleeve it is a voice from Heaven whatsoever he please to tell them And for a crafty man that hath enquired into the secrets and familiar confessions that one man ordinarily maketh to another of his actions and adventures past to tell them him again is no hard matter and yet there be many that by such means as that obtain the reputation of being Conjurers But it is too long a businesse to reckon up the severall sorts of those men which the Greeks called Thaumaturgi that is to say workers of things wonderfull and yet these do all they do by their own single dexterity But if we looke upon the Impostures wrought by Confederacy there is nothing how impossible soever to be done that is impossible to bee beleeved For two men conspiring one to seem lame the other to cure him with a charme will deceive many but many conspiring one to seem lame another so to cure him and all the rest to bear witnesse will
other Pastors are bidden to esteem those Christians that disobey the Church that is that disobey the Christian Soveraigne as Heathen men and as Publicans Seeing then men challenge to the Pope no authority over Heathen Princes they ought to challenge none over those that are to bee esteemed as Heathen But from the Power to Teach onely hee inferreth also a Coercive Power in the Pope over Kings The Pastor saith he must give his flock convenient food Therefore the Pope may and ought to compell Kings to doe their duty Out of which it followeth that the Pope as Pastor of Christian men is King of Kings which all Christian Kings ought indeed either to Confesse or else they ought to take upon themselves the Supreme Pastorall Charge every one in his own Dominion His sixth and last Argument is from Examples To which I answer first that Examples prove nothing Secondly that the Examples he alledgeth make not so much as a probability of Right The fact of Jehoiada in Killing Athaliah 2 Kings 11. was either by the Authority of King Joash or it was a horrible Crime in the High Priest which ever after the election of King Saul was a mere Subject The fact of St. Ambrose in Excommunicating Theodosius the Emperour if it were true hee did so was a Capitall Crime And for the Popes Gregory 1. Greg. 2. Zachary and Leo 3. their Judgments are void as given in their own Cause and the Acts done by them conformably to this Doctrine are the greatest Crimes especially that of Zachary that are incident to Humane Nature And thus much of Power Ecclesiasticall wherein I had been more briefe forbearing to examine these Arguments of Bellarmine if they had been his as a Private man and not as the Champion of the Papacy against all other Christian Princes and States CHAP. XLIII Of what is NECESSARY for a Mans Reception into the Kingdome of Heaven THe most frequent praetext of Sedition and Civill Warre in Christian Common-wealths hath a long time proceeded from a difficulty not yet sufficiently resolved of obeying at once both God and Man then when their Commandements are one contrary to the other It is manifest enough that when a man receiveth two contrary Commands and knows that one of them is Gods he ought to obey that and not the other though it be the command even of his lawfull Soveraign whether a Monarch or or a soveraign Assembly or the command of his Father The difficulty therefore consisteth in this that men when they are commanded in the name of God know not in divers Cases whether the command be from God or whether he that commandeth doe but abuse Gods name for some private ends of his own For as there were in the Church of the Jews many false Prophets that sought reputation with the people by feigned Dreams and Visions so there have been in all times in the Church of Christ false Teachers that seek reputation with the people by phantasticall and false Doctrines and by such reputation as is the nature of Ambition to govern them for their private benefit But this difficulty of obeying both God and the Civill Soveraign on earth to those that can distinguish between what is Necessary and what is not Necessary for their Reception into the Kingdome of God is of no moment For if the command of the Civill Soveraign bee such as that it may be obeyed without the forfeiture of life Eternall not to obey it is unjust and the precept of the Apostle takes place Servants obey your Masters in all things and Children obey your Parents in all things and the precept of our Saviour The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses Chaire All therefore they shall say that observe and doe But if the command be such as cannot be obeyed without being damned to Eternall Death then it were madnesse to obey it and the Counsell of our Saviour takes place Mat. 10. 28. Fear not those that kill the body but cannot kill the soule All men therefore that would avoid both the punishments that are to be in this world inflicted for disobedience to their earthly Soveraign and those that shall be inflicted in the world to come for disobedience to God have need be taught to distinguish well between what is and what is not Necessary to Eternall Salvation All that is NECESSARY to Salvatian is contained in two Vertues Faith in Christ and Obedience to Laws The latter of these if it were perfect were enough to us But because wee are all guilty of disobedience to Gods Law not onely originally in Adam but also actually by our own transgressions there is required at our hands now not onely Obedience for the rest of our time but also a Remission of sins for the time past which Remission is the reward of our Faith in Christ. That nothing else is Necessarily required to Salvation is manifest from this that the Kingdome of Heaven is shut to none but to Sinners that is to say to the disobedient or transgressors of the Law nor to them in case they Repent and Beleeve all the Articles of Christian Faith Necessary to Salvation The Obedience required at our hands by God that accepteth in all our actions the Will for the Deed is a serious Endeavour to Obey him and is called also by all such names as signifie that Endeavour And therefore Obedience is sometimes called by the names of Charity and Love because they imply a Will to Obey and our Saviour himself maketh our Love to God and to one another a Fulfilling of the whole Law and sometimes by the name of Righteousnesse for Righteousnesse is but the will to give to every one his owne that is to say the will to obey the Laws and sometimes by the name of Repentance because to Repent implyeth a turning away from finne which is the same with the return of the will to Obedience Whosoever therefore unfeignedly desireth to fulfill the Commandements of God or repenteth him truely of his transgressions or that loveth God with all his heart and his neighbor as himself hath all the Obedience Necessary to his Reception into the Kingdom of God For if God should require perfect Innocence there could no flesh be saved But what Commandements are those that God hath given us Are all those Laws which were given to the Jews by the hand of Moses the Commandements of God If they bee why are not Christians taught to Obey them If they be not what others are so besides the Law of Nature For our Saviour Christ hath not given us new Laws but Counsell to observe those wee are subject to that is to say the Laws of Nature and the Laws of our severall Soveraigns Nor did he make any new Law to the Jews in his Sermon on the Mouut but onely expounded the Laws of Moses to which they were subject before The Laws of God therefore are none but the Laws of Nature whereof the principall is that we
Reason and â—…loquence though not perhaps in the Naturall Sciences yet in the Morall may stand very well together For wheresoever there is place for adorning and preferring of Errour there is much more place for adorning and preferring of Truth if they have it to adorn Nor is there any repugnancy between fearing the Laws and not fearing a publique Enemy nor between abstaining from Injury and pardoning it in others There is therefore no such Inconsistence of Humane Nature with Civill Duties as some think I have known cleernesse of Judgment and largenesse of Fancy strength of Reason and gracefull Elocution a Courage for the Warre and a Fear for the Laws and all eminently in one man and that was my most noble and honored friend Mr. Sidney Godolphin who hating no man nor hated of any was unfortunately slain in the beginning of the late Civill warre in the Publique quarrell by an undiscerned and an undiscerning hand To the Laws of Nature declared in the 15. Chapter I would have this added That every man is bound by Nature as much as in him lieth to protect in Warre the Authority by which he is himself protected in time of Peace For he that pretendeth a Right of Nature to preserve his owne body cannot pretend a Right of Nature to destroy him by whose strength he is preserved It is a manifest contradiction of himselfe And though this Law may bee drawn by consequence from some of those that are there already mentioned yet the Times require to have it inculcated and remembred And because I find by divers English Books lately printed that the Civill warres have not yet sufficiently taught men in what point of time it is that a Subject becomes obliged to the Conquerour nor what is Conquest nor how it comes about that it obliges men to obey his Laws Therefore for farther satisfaction of men therein I say the point of time wherein a man becomes subject to a Conquerour is that point wherein having liberty to submit to him he consenteth either by expresse words or by other sufficient sign to be his Subject When it is that a man hath the liberty to submit I have shewed before in the end of the 21. Chapter namely that for him that hath no obligation to his former Soveraign but that of an ordinary Subject it is then when the means of his life is within the Guards and Garrisons of the Enemy for it is then that he hath no longer Protection from him but is protected by the adverse party for his Contribution Seeing therefore such contribution is every where as a thing inevitable notwithstanding it be an assistance to the Enemy esteemed lawfull a totall Submission which is but an assistance to the Enemy cannot be esteemed unlawful Besides if a man consider that they who submit assist the Enemy but with part of their estates whereas they that refuse assist him with the whole there is no reason to call their Submission or Composition an Assistance but rather a Detriment to the Enemy But if a man besides the obligation of a Subject hath taken upon him a new obligation of a Souldier then he hath not the liberty to submit to a new Power as long as the old one keeps the field and giveth him means of subsistence either in his Armies or Garrisons for in this case he cannot complain of want of Protection and means to live as a Souldier But when that also failes a Souldier also may seek his Protection wheresoever he has most hope to have it and may lawfully submit himself to his new Master And so much for the Time when he may do it lawfully if hee will If therefore he doe it he is undoubtedly bound to be a true Subject For a Contract lawfully made cannot lawfully be broken By this also a man may understand when it is that men may be said to be Conquered and in what the nature of Conquest and the Right of a Conquerour consisteth For this Submission is it implyeth them all Conquest is not the Victory it self but the Acquisition by Victory of a Right over the persons of men He therefore that is slain is Overcome but not Conquered He that is taken and put into prison or chaines is not Conquered though Overcome for he is still an Enemy and may save himself if hee can But he that upon promise of Obedience hath his Life and Liberty allowed him is then Conquered and a Subject and not before The Romanes used to say that their Generall had Pacified such a Province that is to say in English Conquerea it and that the Countrey was Pacified by Victory when the people of it had promised Imperata facere that is To doe what the Romane People commanded them this was to be Conquered But this promise may be either expresse or tacite Expresse by Promise Tacite by other signes As for example a man that hath not been called to make such an expresse Promise because he is one whose power perhaps is not considerable yet if he live under their Protection openly hee is understood to submit himselfe to the Government But if he live there secretly he is lyable to any thing that may bee done to a Spie and Enemy of the State I say not hee does any Injustice for acts of open Hostility bear not that name but that he may be justly put to death Likewise if a man when his Country is conquered be out of it he is not Conquered nor Subject but if at his return he submit to the Government he is bound to obey it So that Conquest to define it is the Acquiring of the Right of Soveraignty by Victory Which Right is acquired in the peoples Submission by which they contract with the Victor promising Obedience for Life and Liberty In the 29. Chapter I have set down for one of the causes of the Dissolutions of Common-wealths their Imperfect Generation consisting in the want of an Absolute and Arbitrary Legislative Power for want whereof the Civill Soveraign is fain to handle the Sword of Justice unconstantly and as if it were too hot for him to hold One reason whereof which I have not there mentioned is this That they will all of them justifie the War by which their Power was at first gotten and whereon as they think their Right dependeth and not on the Possession As if for example the Right of the Kings of England did depend on the goodnesse of the cause of William the Conquerour and upon their lineall and directest Descent from him by which means there would perhaps be no tie of the Subjects obedience to their Soveraign at this day in all the world wherein whilest they needlessely think to justifie themselves they justifie all the successefull Rebellions that Ambition shall at any time raise against them and their Successors Therefore I put down for one of the most effectuall seeds of the Death of any State that the Conquerors require not onely a Submission of mens actions to them
Non est postestas Super terram quae Comparetur ei Iob. 41.24 LEVIATHAN Or THE MATTER FORME and POWER of a COMMON-WEALTH ECCLESIASTICALL and CIVIL By THOMAS HOBBES of MALMESBURY London Printed for Andrew Crooke 1651 LEVIATHAN OR The Matter Forme Power OF A COMMON-WEALTH ECCLESIASTICALL AND CIVILL By THOMAS HOBBES of Malmesbury LONDON Printed for ANDREW CROOKE at the Green Dragon in St. Pauls Church-yard 1651. FIDE ✚ ET ✚ FORTITUDINE The Right Hon. ble Algernon Capell Earl of Essex Viscount Maldon and Baron Capell of Hadham 1701. TO MY MOST HONOR'D FRIEND Mr FRANCIS GODOLPHIN of Godolphin Honor'd Sir YOur most worthy Brother Mr Sidney Godolphin when he lived was pleas'd to think my studies something and otherwise to oblige me as you know with reall testimonies of his good opinion great in themselves and the greater for the worthinesse of his person For there is not any vertue that disposeth a man either to the service of God or to the service of his Country to Civill Society or private Friendship that did not manifestly appear in his conversation not as acquired by necessity or affected upon occasion but inhaerent and shining in a generous constitution of his nature Therefore in honour and gratitude to him and with devotion to your selfe I humbly Dedicate unto you this my discourse of Common-wealth I know not how the world will receive it nor how it may reflect on those that shall seem to favour it For in a way beset with those that contend on one side for too great Liberty and on the other side for too much Authority 't is hard to passe between the points of both unwounded But yet me thinks the endeavour to advance the Civill Power should not be by the Civill Power condemned nor private men by reprehending it declare they think that Power too great Besides I speak not of the men but in the Abstract of the Seat of Power like to those simple and unpartiall creatures in the Roman Capitol that with their noyse defended those within it not because they were they but there offending none I think but those without or such within if there be any such as favour them That which perhaps may most offend are certain Texts of Holy Scripture alledged by me to other purpose than ordinarily they use to be by others But I have done it with due submission and also in order to my Subject necessarily for they are the Outworks of the Enemy from whence they impugne the Civill Power If notwithstanding this you find my labour generally decryed you may be pleased to excuse your selfe and say I am a man that love my own opinions and think all true I say that I honoured your Brother and honour you and have presum'd on that to assume the Title without your knowledge of being as I am SIR Your most humble and most obedient servant THO. HOBBES Paris Aprill 15 25. 1651. The Contents of the Chapters The first part Of MAN Chap. Introduction Page 1 Chap. 1. Of Sense Page 3 Chap. 2. Of Imagination Page 4 Chap. 3. Of the Consequence or Train of Imaginations Page 8 Chap. 4. Of Speech Page 12 Chap. 5. Of Reason and Science Page 18 Chap. 6. Of the interiour Beginnings of Voluntary Motions commonly called the Passions And the Speeches by which they are expressed Page 23 Chap. 7. Of the Ends or Resolutions of Discourse Page 30 Chap. 8. Of the Vertues commonly called Intellectuall and their contrary Defects Page 32 Chap. 9. Of the severall Subjects of Knowledge Page 40 Chap. 10. Of Power Worth Dignity Honour and Worthinesse Page 41 Chap. 11. Of the Difference of Manners Page 47 Chap. 12. Of Religion Page 52 Chap. 13. Of the Naturall Condition of Mankind as concerning their Felicity and Misery Page 60 Chap. 14. Of the first and second Naturall Lawes and of Contract Page 64 Chap. 15. Of other Lawes of Nature Page 71 Chap. 16. Of Persons Authors and things Personated Page 80 The second Part Of COMMON-WEALTH Chap. 17. Of the Causes Generation and Definition of a Common-wealth Page 85 Chap. 18. Of the Rights of Soveraignes by Institution Page 88 Chap. 19. Of severall Kinds of Common-wealth by Institution and of Succession to the Soveraign Power Page 94 Chap. 20. Of Dominion Paternall and Despoticall Page 101 Chap. 21. Of the Liberty of Subjects Page 107 Chap. 22. Of Systemes Subject Politicall and Private Page 115 Chap. 23. Of the Publique Ministers of Soveraign Power Page 123 Chap. 24. Of the Nutrition and Procreation of a Common-wealth Page 127 Chap. 25. Of Counsell Page 131 Chap. 26. Of Civill Lawes Page 136 Chap. 27. Of Crimes Excuses and Extenuations Page 151 Chap. 28. Of Punishments and Rewards Page 161 Chap. 29. Of those things that Weaken or tend to the Dissolution of a Common-wealth Page 167 Chap. 30. Of the Office of the Soveraign Representative Page 175 Chap. 31. Of the Kingdome of God by Nature Page 186 The third Part. Of A CHRISTIAN COMMON-WEALTH Chap. 32. Of the Principles of Christian Politiques Page 195 Chap. 33. Of the Number Antiquity Scope Authority and Interpreters of the Books of Holy Scripture Page 199 Chap. 34. Of the signification of Spirit Angell and Inspiration in the Books of Holy Scripture Page 207 Chap. 35. Of the signification in Scripture of the Kingdome of God of Holy Sacred and Sacrament Page 216 Chap. 36. Of the Word of God and of Prophets Page 222 Chap. 37. Of Miracles and their use Page 233 Chap. 38. Of the signification in Scripture of Eternall life Hel Salvation the World to come and Redemption Page 238 Chap. 39. Of the Signification in Scripture of the word Church Page 247 Chap. 40. Of the Rights of the Kingdome of God in Abraham Moses the High Priests and the Kings of Judah Page 249 Chap. 41. Of the Office of our Blessed Saviour Page 261 Chap. 42. Of Power Ecclesiasticall Page 267 Chap. 43. Of what is Necessary for a mans Reception into the Kingdome of Heaven Page 321 The fourth Part. Of THE KINGDOME OF DARKNESSE Chap. 44. Of Spirituall Darknesse from Misinterpretation of Scripture Page 333 Chap. 45. Of Daemonology and other Reliques of the Religion of the Gentiles Page 352 Chap. 46. Of Darknesse from Vain Philosophy and Fabulous Traditions Page 367 Chap. 47. Of the Benefit proceeding from such Darknesse and to whom it accreweth Page 381 A Review and Conclusion Page 389 Errata PAge 48. In the Margin for love Praise râ—…d love of Praise p. 75. l. 5. for signied r. signified p. 88. l. 1. for performe r. forme l. 35. for Soveraign r. the Soveraign p. 94. l. 14. for lands r. hands p. 100. l. 28. for in r. in his p. 102. l. 46. for in r. is p. 105. in the margin for ver 10. r. ver 19. c. p. 116. l. 46. for are involved r. are not involved p. 120. l. 42. for Those Bodies r. These Bodies p. 137. â—… a. for in generall r. in generall p. 139.
summs of all the bills of expence into one sum and not regarding how each bill is summed up by those that give them in account nor what it is he payes for he advantages himself no more than if he allowed the account in grosse trusting to every of the accountants skill and honesty so also in Reasoning of all other things he that takes up conclusions on the trust of Authors and doth not fetch them from the first Items in every Reckoning which are the significations of names settled by definitions loses his labour and does not know any thing but onely beleeveth When a man reckons without the use of words which may be done in particular things as when upon the sight of any one thing wee conjecture what was likely to have preceded or is likely to follow upon it if that which he thought likely to follow followes not or that which he thought likely to have preceded it hath not preceded it this is called ERROR to which even the most prudent men are subject But when we Reason in Words of generall signification and fall upon a generall inference which is false though it be commonly called Error it is indeed an ABSURDITY or senslesse Speech For Error is but a deception in presuming that somewhat is past or to come of which though it were not past or not to come yet there was no impossibility discoverable But when we make a generall assertion unlesse it be a true one the possibility of it is unconceivable And words whereby we conceive nothing but the sound are those we call Absurd Insignificant and Non-sense And therefore if a man should talk to me of a round Quadrangle or accidents of Bread in Cheese or Immateriall Substances or of A free Subject A free-will or any Free but free from being hindred by opposition I should not say he were in an Errour but that his words were without meaning that is to say Absurd I have said before in the second chapter that a Man did excell all other Animals in this faculty that when he conceived any thing whatsoever he was apt to enquire the consequences of it and what effects he could do with it And now I adde this other degree of the same excellence that he can by words reduce the consequences he findes to generall Rules called Theoremes or Aphorismes that is he can Reason or reckon not onely in number but in all other things whereof one may be added unto or substracted from another But this privedge is allayed by another and that is by the priviledge of Absurdity to which no living creature is subject but man onely And of men those are of all most subject to it that professe Philosophy For it is most true that Cicero sayth of them somewhere that there can be nothing so absurd but may be found in the books of Philosophers And the reason is manifest For there is not one of them that begins his ratiocination from the Definitions or Explications of the names they are to use which is a method that hath been used onely in Geometry whose Conclusions have thereby been made indisputable The first cause of Absurd conclusions I ascribe to the want of Method in that they begin not their Ratiocination from Definitions that is from settled significations of their words as if they could cast account without knowing the value of the numerall words one two and three And whereas all bodies enter into account upon divers considerations which I have mentioned in the precedent chapter these considerations being diversly named divers absurdities proceed from the confusion and unfit connexion of their names into assertions And therefore The second cause of Absurd assertions I ascribe to the giving of names of bodies to accidents or of accidents to bodies As they do that say Faith is infused or inspired when nothing can be powred or breathed into any thing but body and that extension is body that phantasmes are spirits c. The third I ascribe to the giving of the names of the accidents of bodies without us to the accidents of our own bodies as they do that say the colour is in the body the sound is in the ayre c. The fourth to the giving of the names of bodies to names or speeches as they do that say that there be things universall that a living creature is Genus or a generall thing c. The fifth to the giving of the names of accidents to names and speeches as they do that say the nature of a thing is its definition a mans command is his will and the like The sixth to the use of Metaphors Tropes and other Rhetoricall figures in stead of words proper For though it be lawfull to say for example in common speech the way goeth or leadeth hither or thither The Proverb sayes this or that whereas wayes cannot go nor Proverbs speak yet in reckoning and seeking of truth such speeches are not to be admitted The seventh to names that signifie nothing but are taken up and learned by rote from the Schooles as hypostatical transubstantiate consubstantiate eternal-Now and the like canting of Schoolemen To him that can avoyd these things it is not easie to fall into any absurdity unlesse it be by the length of an account wherein he may perhaps forget what went before For all men by nature reason alike and well when they have good principles For who is so stupid as both to mistake in Geometry and also to persist in it when another detects his error to him By this it appears that Reason is not as Sense and Memory borne with us nor gotten by Experience onely as Prudence is but attayned by Industry first in apt imposing of Names and secondly by getting a good and orderly Method in proceeding from the Elements which are Names to Assertions made by Connexion of one of them to another and so to Syllogismes which are the Connexions of one Assertion to another till we come to a knowledge of all the Consequences of names appertaining to the subject in hand and that is it men call SCIENCE And whereas Sense and Memory are but knowledge of Fact which is a thing past and irrevocable Science is the knowledge of Consequences and dependance of one fact upon another by which out of that we can presently do we know how to do something else when we will or the like another time Because when we see how any thing comes about upon what causes and by what manner when the like causes come into our power wee see how to make it produce the like effects Children therefore are not endued with Reason at all till they have attained the use of Speech but are called Reasonable Creatures for the possibility apparent of having the use of Reason in time to come And the most part of men though they have the use of Reasoning a little way as in numbring to some degree yet it serves them to little
Man is distinguished not onely by his Reason but also by this singular Passion from other Animals in whom the appetite of food and other pleasures of Sense by praedominance take away the care of knowing causes which is a Lust of the mind that by a perseverance of delight in the continuall and indefatigable generation of Knowledge exceedeth the short vehemence of any carnall Pleasure Feare of power invisible feigned by the mind or imagined from tales publiquely allowed RELIGION not allowed SUPERSTITION And when the power imagined is truly such as we imagine TRUE RELIGION Feare without the apprehension of why or what PANIQUE TERROR called so from the Fables that make Pan the author of them whereas in truth there is alwayes in him that so feareth first some apprehension of the cause though the rest run away by Example every one supposing his fellow to know why And therefore this Passion happens to none but in a throng or multitude of people Joy from apprehension of novelty ADMIRATION proper to Man because it excites the appetite of knowing the cause Joy arising from imagination of a mans own power and ability is that exultation of the mind which is called 〈◊〉 which if grounded upon the experience of his own former actions is the same with Confidence but if grounded on the flattery of others or onely supposed by himself for delight in the consequences of it is called VAINE-GLORY which name is properly given because a well grounded Confidence begetteth Attempt whereas the supposing of power does not and is therefore rightly called Vaâ—…ne Griefe from opinion of want of power is called DEIECTION of mind The vain-glory which consisteth in the feigning or supposing of abilities in our selves which we know are not is most incident to young men and nourished by the Histories or Fictions of Gallant Persons and is corrected oftentimes by Age and Employment Sudden Glory is the passion which maketh those Grâ—…aces called LAUGHTER and is caused either by some sudden act of their own that pleaseth them or by the apprehension of some dâ—…ed thing in another by comparison whereof they suddenly applaud themselves And it is incident most to them that are conscious of the fewest abilities in themselves who are forced to keep themselves in their own favour by observing the imperfections of other men And therefore much Laughter at the defects of others is a signe of Pusillanimity For of great minds one of the proper workes 〈◊〉 to help and free others from scorn and compare themselves onely with the most able On the contrary Sudden Deâ—…ction is the passion that causeth Wâ—…PING and is caused by such accidents as suâ—…ly â—…ake away some vehement hope or some prop of their poweâ—… And they are most subject to it that rely principally on helps externall such as are Women and Children Therefore some Weep for the losse of Friends Others for their unkindnesse others for the sudden stoâ—… made to their thoughts of revenge by Reconciliation But in all cases both Laughter and Weeping are sudden motions Custome taking them both away For no man Laughs at old 〈◊〉 or Weeps for an old calamity Griefe for the discovery of some defect of ability is SHAME or the passion that discovereth it selfe in BLUSHING and consisteth in the apprehension of some thing dishonourable and in young men is a signe of the love of good reputation and commendable In old men it is a signe of the same but because it comes too lâ—…e not commendable The Contempt of good Reputation is called IMPUDENCE Griefe for the Calamity of another is PITTY and ariseth from the imagination that the like calamity may befall himselfe and therefore is called also COMPASSION and in the phrase of this present time a FELLOW-â—…ING And therefore for Caâ—…y â—…ving from great wickedness the best men have the least Pitty â—…nd for the same Calamity those have least Pitty that think themselves least obnoxious to the same Contempt or little sense of the calamity of others is that which men call CRUELTY proceeding from Security of their own fortune For that any man should take pleasure in other mens great harmes without other end of his own I do not conceive it possible Griefe for the successe of a Competitor in wealth honour or other good if it be joyned with Endeavour to enforce our own abilities to equall or exceed him is called EMULATION But joyned with Endeavour to supplant or hinder a Competitor ENVIE When in the mind of man Appetites and Aversions Hopes and Feares concerning one and the same thing arise alternately and divers good and evill consequences of the doing or omitting the thing propounded come successively into our thoughts so that sometimes we have an Appetite to it sometimes an Aversion from it sometimes Hope to be able to do it sometimes Despaire or Feare to attempt it the whole summe of Desires Aversions Hopes and Fears continued till the thing be either done or thought impossible is that we call DELIBERATION Therefore of things past there is no Deliberation because manifestly impossible to be changed nor of things known to be impossible or thought so because men know or think such Deliberation vain But of things impossible which we think possible we may Deliberate not knowing it is in vain And it is called Deliberation because it is a putting an end to the Liberty we had of doing or omitting according to our own Appetite or Aversion This alternate Succession of Appetites Aversions Hopes and Fears is no lesse in other living Creatures then in Man and therefore Beasts also Deliberate Every Deliberation is then sayd to End when that whereof they Deliberate is either done or thought impossible because till then wee retain the liberty of doing or omitting according to our Appetite or Aversion In Deliberation the last Appetite or Aversion immediately adhaering to the action or to the omission thereof is that wee call the WILL the Act not the faculty of Willing And Beasts that have Deliberation must necessarily also have Will. The Definition of the Will given commonly by the Schooles that it is a Rationall Appetite is not good For if it were then could there be no Voluntary Act against Reason For a Voluntary Act is that which proceedeth from the Will and no other But if in stead of a Rationall Appetite we shall say an Appetite resulting from a precedent Deliberation then the Definition is the same that I have given here Will therefore is the last Appetite in Deliberating And though we say in common Discourse a man had a Will once to do a thing that neverthelesse he forbore to do yet that is properly but an Inclination which makes no Action Voluntary because the action depends not of it but of the last Inclination or Appetite For if the intervenient Appetites make any action Voluntary then by the same Reason all
Direction to some End a great Fancy is one kind of Madnesse such as they have that entring into any discourse are snatched from their purpose by every thing that comes in their thought into so many and so long digressions and Parentheses that they utterly lose themselves Which kind of folly I know no particular name for but the cause of it is sometimes want of experience whereby that seemeth to a man new and rare which doth not so to others sometimes Pusillanimity by which that seems great to him which other men think a trifle and whatsoever is new or great and therefore thought fit to be told withdrawes a man by degrees from the intended way of his discourse In a good Poem whether it be Epique or Dramatique as also in Sonnets Epigrams and other Pieces both Judgement and Fancy are required But the Fancy must be more eminent because they please for the Extravagancy but ought not to displease by Indiscretion In a good History the Judgement must be eminent because the goodnesse consisteth in the Method in the Truth and in the Choyse of the actions that are most profitable to be known Fancy has no place but onely in adorning the stile In Orations of Prayse and in Invectives the Fancy is praedominant because the designe is not truth but to Honour or Dishonour which is done by noble or by vile comparisons The Judgement does but suggest what circumstances make an action laudable or culpable In Hortatives and Pleadings as Truth or Disguise serveth best to the Designe in hand so is the Judgement or the Fancy most required In Demonstration in Councell and all rigourous search of Truth Judgement does all except sometimes the understanding have need to be opened by some apt similitude and then there is so much use of Fancy But for Metaphors they are in this case utterly excluded For â—…eeing they openly professe deceipt to admit them into Councell or Reasoning were manifest folly And in any Discourse whatsoever if the defect of Discretion be apparent how extravagant soever the Fancy be the whole discourse will be taken for a signe of want of wit and so will it never when the Discretion is manifest though the Fancy be never so ordinary The secret thoughts of a man run over all things holy prophane clean obscene grave and light without shame or blame which verball discourse cannot do farther than the Judgement shall approve of the Time Place and Persons An Anatomist or a Physitian may speak or write his judgement of unclean things because it is not to please but profit but for another man to write his extravagant and pleasant fancies of the same is as if a man from being tumbled into the dirt should come and present himselfe before good company And 't is the want of Discretion that makes the difference Again in profest remissnesse of mind and familiar company a man may play with the sounds and aequivocall significations of words and that many times with encounters of extraordinary Fancy but in a Sermon or in publique or before persons unknown or whom we ought to reverence there is no Gingling of words that will not be accounted folly and the difference is onely in the want of Discretion So that where Wit is wanting it is not Fancy that is wanting but Discretion Judgement therefore without Fancy is Wit but Fancy without Judgement not When the thoughts of a man that has a designe in hand â—…unning over a multitude of things observes how they conduce to that designe or what designe they may conduce unto if his observations be such as are not easie or usuall This wit of his is called PRUDENCE and dependeth on much Experience and Memory of the like things and their consequences heretofore In which there is not so much difference of Men as there is in their Fancies and Judgements Because the Experience of men equall in age is not much unequall as to the quantity but lyes in different occasions every one having his private designes To govern well a family and a kingdome are not different degrees of Prudence but different sorts of businesse no more then to draw a picture in little or as great or greater then the life are different degrees of Art A plain husband-man is more Prudent in affaires of his own house then a Privy Counseller in the affaires of another man To Prudence if you adde the use of unjust or dishonest means such as usually are prompted to men by Feare or Want you have that Crooked Wisdome which is called CRAFT which is a signe of Pusillanimity For Magnanimity is contempt of unjust or dishonest helps And that which the Latines call Versutia translated into English Shifting and is a putting off of a present danger or incommodity by engaging into a greater as when a man robbs one to pay another is but a shorter sighted Craft called Versutia from Versâ—…a which signisies taking mony at usurie for the present payment of interest As for acquired Wit I mean acquired by method and instruction there is none but Reason which is grounded on the right use of Speech and produceth the Sciences But of Reason and Science I have already spoken in the fifth and sixth Chapters The causes of this difference of Witts are in the Passions and the difference of Passions proceedeth partly from the different Constitution of the body and partly from different Education For if the difference proceeded from the temper of the brain and the organs of Sense either exterior or interior there would be no lesse difference of men in their Sight Hearing or other Senses than in their Fancies and Discretions It proceeds therefore from the Passions which are different not onely from the difference of mens complexions but also from their difference of customes and education The Passions that most of all cause the differences of Wit are principally the more or lesse Desire of Power of Riches of Knowledge and of Honour All which may be reduced to the first that is Desire of Power For Riches Knowledge and Honour are but severall sorts of Power And therefore a man who has no great Passion for any of these things but is as men terme it indifferent though he may be so farre a good man as to be free from giving offence yet he cannot possibly have either a great Fancy or much Judgement For the Thoughts are to the Desires as Scouts and Spies to range abroad and find the way to the things Deâ—…ired All Stedinesse of the minds motion and all quicknesse of the same proceeding from thence For as to have no Desire is to be Dead so to have weak Passions is Dulnesse and to have Passions indifferently for every thing GIDDINESSE and Distraction and to have stronger and more vehement Passions for any thing than is ordinarily seen in others is that which men call MADNESSE Whereof there be almost as many kinds as of the Passions themselves Sometimes the extraordinary
WORTHINESSE is a thing different from the worth or value of a man and also from his merit or desert and consisteth in a particular power or ability for that whereof he is said to be worthy which particular ability is usually named FITNESSE or Aptitude For he is Worthiest to be a Commander to be a Judge or to have any other charge that is best fitted with the qualities required to the well discharging of it and Worthiest of Riches that has the qualities most requisite for the well using of them any of which qualities being absent one may neverthelesse be a Worthy man and valuable for some thing else Again a man may be Worthy of Riches Office and Employment that neverthelesse can plead no right to have it before another and therefore cannot be said to merit or deserve it For Merit praesupposeth a right and that the thing deserved is due by promise Of which I shall say more hereafter when I shall speak of Contracts CHAP. XI Of the difference of MANNERS BY MANNERS I mean not here Decency of behaviour as how one man should salute another or how a man should wash his mouth or pick his teeth before company and such other points of the Small Moralls But those qualities of man-kind that concern their living together in Peace and Unity To which end we are to consider that the Felicity of this life consisteth not in the repose of a mind satisfied For there is no such Finis ultimus utmost ayme nor Summum Bonum greatest Good as is spoken of in the Books of the old Morall Philosophers Nor can a man any more live whose Desires are at an end than he whose Senses and Imaginations are at a stand Felicity is a continuall progresse of the desire from one object to another the attaining of the former being still but the way to the later The cause whereof is That the Object of mans desire is not to enjoy once onely and for one instant of time but to assure for ever the way of his future desire And therefore the voluntary actions and inclinations of all men tend not onely to the procuring but also to the assuring of a contented life and differ onely in the way which ariseth partly from the diversity of passions in divers men and partly from the difference of the knowledge or opinion each one has of the causes which produce the effect desired So that in the first place I put for a generall inclination of all mankind a perpetuall and restlesse desire of Power after power that ceaseth onely in Death And the cause of this is not alwayes that a man hopes for a more intensive delight than he has already attained to or that he cannot be content with a moderate power but because he cannot assure the power and means to live well which he hath present without the acquisition of more And from hence it is that Kings whose power is greatest turn their endeavours to the assuring it at home by Lawes or abroad by Wars and when that is done there succeedeth a new desire in some of Fame from new Conquest in others of ease and sensuall pleasure in others of admiration or being flattered for excellence in some art or other ability of the mind Competition of Riches Honour Command or other power enclineth to Contention Enmity and War Because the way of one Competitor to the attaining of his desire is to kill subdue supplant or repell the other Particularly competition of praise enclineth to a reverence of Antiquity For men contend with the living not with the dead to these ascribing more than due that they may obscure the glory of the other Desire of Ease and sensuall Delight disposeth men to obey a common Power Because by such Desires a man doth abandon the protection might be hoped for from his own Industry and labour Fear of Death and Wounds disposeth to the same and for the same reason On the contrary needy men and hardy not contented with their present condition as also all men that are ambitious of Military command are enclined to continue the causes of warre and to stirre up trouble and sedition for there is no honour Military but by warre nor any such hope to mend an ill game as by causing a new shuffle Desire of Knowledge and Arts of Peace enclineth men to obey a common Power For such Desire containeth a desire of leasure and consequently protection from some other Power than their own Desire of Praise disposeth to laudable actions such as please them whose judgement they value for of those men whom we contemn we contemn also the Praises Desire of Fame after death does the same And though after death there be no sense of the praise given us on Earth as being joyes that are either swallowed up in the unspeakable joyes of Heaven or extinguished in the extreme torments of Hell yet is not such Fame vain because men have a present delâ—…ght therein from the foresight of it and of the benefit that may redoâ—…nd thereby to their posterity which though they now see not yet they imagine and any thing that is pleasure in the sense the same also is pleasure in the imagination To have received from one to whom we think our selves equall greater benefits than there is hope to Requite disposeth to counterfeit love but really secret hatred and puts a man into the estate of a desperate debtor that in declining the sight of his creditor tacitely wishes him there where he might never see him more For benefits oblige and obligation is thraldome and unrequitable obligation perpetuall thraldome which is to ones equall hatefull But to have received benefits from one whom we acknowledge for superiour enclines to love because the obligation is no new depression and cheerfull acceptation which men call Gratitude is such an honour done to the obliger as is taken generally for retribution Also to receive benefits though from an equall or inferiour as long as there is hope of requitall disposeth to love for in the intention of the receiver the obligation is of ayd and service mutuall from whence proceedeth an Emulation of who shall exceed in benefiting the most noble and profitable contention possible wherein the victor is pleased with his victory and the other revenged by confessing it To have done more hurt to a man than he can or is willing to expiate enclineth the doer to hate the sufferer For he must expect revenge or forgivenesse both which are hatefull Feare of oppression disposeth a man to anticipate or to seek ayd by society for there is no other way by which a man can secure his life and liberty Men that distrust their own subtilty are in tumult and sedition better disposed for victory than they that suppose themselves wife or crafty For these love to consult the other fearing to be circumvented to strike first And in sedition men being alwayes in
Idea of him in their mind answerable to his nature For as a man that is born blind hearing men talk of warming themselves by the fire and being brought to warm himself by the same may easily conceive and assure himselfe there is somewhat there which men call Fire and is the cause of the heat he feeles but cannot imagine what it is like nor have an Idea of it in his mind such as they have that see it so also by the visible things of this world and their admirable order a man may conceive there is a cause of them which men call God and yet not have an Idea or Image of him in his mind And they that make little or no enquiry into the naturall causes of things yet from the feare that proceeds from the ignorance it selfe of what it is that hath the power to do them much good or harm are enclined to suppose and feign unto themselves severall kinds of Powers Invisible and to stand in awe of their own imaginations and in time of distresse to invoke them as also in the time of an expected good successe to give them thanks making the creatures of their own fancy their Gods By which means it hath come to passe that from the innumerable variety of Fancy men have created in the world innumerable sorts of Gods And this Feare of things invisible is the naturall Seed of that which every one in himself calleth Religion and in them that worship or feare that Power otherwise than they do Superstition And this seed of Religion having been observed by many some of those that have observed it have been enclined thereby to nourish dresse and forme it into Lawes and to adde to it of their own invention any opinion of the causes of future events by which they thought they should best be able to govern others and make unto themselves the greatest use of their Powers CHAP. XII OF RELIGION SEeing there are no signes nor fruit of Religion but in Man onely there is no cause to doubt but that the seed of Religion is also onely in Man and consisteth in some peculiar quality or at least in some eminent degree therof not to be found in other Living creatures And first it is peculiar to the nature of Man to be inquisitive into the Causes of the Events they see some more some lesse but all men so much as to be curious in the search of the causes of their own good and evill fortune Secondly upon the sight of any thing that hath a Beginning to think also it had a cause which determined the same to begin then when it did rather than sooner or later Thirdly whereas there is no other Felicity of Beasts but the enjoying of their quotidian Food Ease and Lusts as having little or no foresight of the time to come for want of observation and memory of the order consequence and dependance of the things they see Man observeth how one Event hath been produced by another and remembreth in them Antecedence and Consequence And when he cannot assure himselfe of the true causes of things for the causes of good and evill fortune for the most part are invisible he supposes causes of them either such as his own fancy suggesteth or trusteth to the Authority of other men such as he thinks to be his friends and wiser than himselfe The two first make Anxiety For being assured that there be causes of all things that have arrived hitherto or shall arrive hereafter it is impossible for a man who continually endeavoureth to secure himselfe against the evill he feares and procure the good he desireth not to be in a perpetuall solicitude of the time to come So that every man especially those that are over provident are in an estate like to that of Prometheus For as Prometheus which interpreted is The prudent man was bound to the hill Caucasus a place of large prospect where an Eagle feeding on his liver devoured in the day as much as was repayred in the night So that man which looks too far before him in the care of future time hath his heart all the day long gnawed on by feare of death poverty or other calamity and has no repose nor pause of his anxiety but in sleep This perpetuall feare alwayes accompanying mankind in the ignorance of causes as it were in the Dark must needs have for object something And therefore when there is nothing to be seen there is nothing to accuse either of their good or evill fortune but some Power or Agent Invisible In which sense perhaps it was that some of the old Poets said that the Gods were at first created by humane Feare which spoken of the Gods that is to say of the many Gods of the Gentiles is very true But the acknowledging of one God Eternall Infinite and Omnipotent may more easily be derived from the desire men have to know the causes of naturall bodies and their severall vertues and operations than from the feare of what was to be fall them in time to come For he that from any effect hee seeth come to passe should reason to the next and immediate cause thereof and from thence to the cause of that cause and plonge himselfe profoundly in the pursuit of causes shall at last come to this that there must be as even the Heathen Philosophers confessed one First Mover that is a First and an Eternall cause of all things which is that which men mean by the name of God And all this without thought of their fortune the solicitude whereof both enclines to fear and hinders them from the search of the causes of other things and thereby gives occasion of feigning of as many Gods as there be men that feigne them And for the matter or substance of the Invisible Agents so fancyed they could not by naturall cogitation fall upon any other conceipt but that it was the same with that of the Soule of man and that the Soule of man was of the same substance with that which appeareth in a Dream to one that sleepeth or in a Looking-glasse to one that is awake which men not knowing that such apparitions are nothing else but creatures of the Fancy think to be reall and externall Substances and therefore call them Ghosts as the Latines called them Imagines and Umbrae and thought them Spirits that is thin aëreall bodies and those Invisible Agents which they feared to bee like them save that they appear and vanish when they please But the opinion that such Spirits were Incorporeall or Immateriall could never enter into the mind of any man by nature because though men may put together words of contradictory signification as Spirit and Incorporeall yet they can never have the imagination of any thing answering to them And therefore men that by their own meditation arrive to the acknowledgement of one Infinite Omnipotent and Eternall God choose rather to confesse he is Incomprehensible and
be Unjust But when a Covenant is made then to break it is Unjust And the definition of INIUSTICE is no other than the not Performance of Covenant And whatsoever is not Unjust is Just. But because Covenants of mutuall trust where there is a feare of not performance on either part as hath been said in the former Chapter are invalid though the Originall of Justice be the making of Covenants yet Injustice actually there can be none till the cause of such feare be taken away which while men are in the naturall condition of Warre cannot be done Therefore before the names of Just and Unjust can have place there must be some coërcive Power to compell men equally to the performance of their Covenants by the terrour of some punishment greater than the benefit they expect by the breach of their Covenant and to make good that Propriety which by mutuall Contract men acquire in recompence of the universall Right they abandon and such power there is none before the erection of a Common-wealth And this is also to be gathered out of the ordinary definition of Justice in the Schooles For they say that Justice is the constant Will of giving to every man his own And therefore where there is no Own that is no Propriety there is no Injustice and where there is no coërceive Power erected that is where there is no Common-wealth there is no Propriety all men having Right to all things Therefore where there is no Common-wealth there nothing is Unjust So that the nature of Justice consisteth in keeping of valid Covenants but the Validity of Covenants begins not but with the Constitution of a Civill Power sufficient to compell men to keep them And then it is also that Propriety begins The Foole hath fayd in his heart there is no such thing as Justice and sometimes also with his tongue seriously alleaging that every mans conservation and contentment being committed to his own care there could be no reason why every man might not do what he thought conduced thereunto and therefore also to make or not make keep or not keep Covenants was not against Reason when it conduced to ones benefit He does not therein deny that there be Covenants and that they are sometimes broken sometimes kept and that such breach of them may be called Injustice and the observance of them Justice but he questioneth whether Injustice taking away the feare of God for the same Foole hath said in his heart there is no God may not sometimes stand with that Reason which dictateth to every man his own good and particularly then when it conduceth to such a benefit as shall put a man in a condition to neglect not onely the dispraise and revilings but also the power of other men The Kingdome of God is gotten by violence but what if it could be gotten by unjust violence were it against Reason so to get it when it is impossible to receive hurt by it and if it be not against Reason it is not against Justice or else Justice is not to be approved for good From such reasoning as this Succesfull wickednesse hath obtained the name of Vertue and some that in all other things have disallowed the violation of Faith yet have allowed it when it is for the getting of a Kingdome And the Heathen that believed that Saturn was deposed by his son Jupiter believed neverthelesse the same Jupiter to be the avenger of Injustice Somewhat like to a piece of Law in Cokes Commentaries on Litleton where he sayes If the right Heire of the Crown be attainted of Treason yet the Crown shall descend to him and eo instante the Atteynder be voyd From which instances a man will be very prone to inferre that when the Heire apparent of a Kingdome shall kill him that is in possession though his father you may call it Injustice or by what other name you will yet it can never be against Reason seeing all the voluntary actions of men tend to the benefit of themselves and those actions are most Reasonable that conduce most to their ends This specious reasoning is neverthelesse false For the question is not of promises mutuall where there is no security of performance on either side as when there is no Civill Power erected over the parties promising for such promises are no Covenants But either where one of the parties has performed already or where there is a Power to make him performe there is the question whether it be against reason that is against the benefit of the other to performe or not And I say it is not against reason For the manifestation whereof we are to consider First that when a man doth a thing which notwithstanding any thing can be foreseen and reckoned on tendeth to his own destruction howsoever some accident which he could not expect arriving may turne it to his benefit yet such events do not make it reasonably or wisely done Secondly that in a condition of Warre wherein every man to every man for want of a common Power to keep them all in awe is an Enemy there is no man can hope by his own strength or wit to defend himselfe from destruction without the help of Confederates where every one expects the same defence by the Confederation that any one else does and therefore he which declares he thinks it reason to deceive those that help him can in reason expect no other means of safety than what can be had from his own single Power He therefore that breaketh his Covenant and consequently declareth that he thinks he may with reason do so cannot be received into any Society that unite themselves for Peace and Defence but by the errour of them that receive him nor when he is received be retayned in it without seeing the danger of their errour which errours a man cannot reasonably reckon upon as the means of his security and therefore if he be left or cast out of Society he perisheth and if he live in Society it is by the errours of other men which he could not foresee nor reckon upon and consequently against the reason of his preservation and so as all men that contribute not to his destruction forbear him onely out of ignorance of what is good for themselves As for the Instance of gaining the secure and perpetuall felicity of Heaven by any way it is frivolous there being but one way imaginable and that is not breaking but keeping of Covenant And for the other Instance of attaining Soveraignty by Rebellion it is manifest that though the event follow yet because it cannot reasonably be expected but rather the contrary and because by gaining it so others are taught to gain the same in like manner the attempt thereof is against reason Justice therefore that is to say Keeping of Covenant is a Rule of Reason by which we are forbidden to do any thing destructive to our life and consequently a Law of Nature There be some that proceed
King in Parliament And in some places of the world men have the Liberty of many wives in other places such Liberty is not allowed If a Subject have a controversie with his Soveraigne of debt or of right of possession of lands or goods or concerning any service required at his hands or concerning any penalty corporall or pecuniary grounded on a precedent Law he hath the same Liberty to sue for his right as if it were against a Subject and before such Judges as are appointed by the Soveraign For seeing the Soveraign demandeth by force of a former Law and not by vertue of his Power he declareth thereby that he requireth no more than shall appear to be due by that Law The sute therefore is not contrary to the will of the Soveraign and consequently the Subject hath the Liberty to demand the hearing of his Cause and sentence according to that Law But if he demand or take any thing by pretence of his Power there lyeth in that case no action of Law for all that is done by him in Vertue of his Power is done by the Authority of every Subject and consequently he that brings an action against the Soveraign brings it against himselfe If a Monarch or Soveraign Assembly grant a Liberty to all or any of his Subjects which Grant standing he is disabled to provide for their safety the Grant is voyd unlesse he directly renounce or transferre the Soveraignty to another For in that he might openly if it had been his will and in plain termes have renounced or transferred it and did not it is to be understood it was not his will but that the Grant proceeded from ignorance of the repugnancy between such a Liberty and the Soveraign Power and therefore the Soveraignty is still retayned and consequently all those Powers which are necessary to the exercising thereof such as are the Power of Warre and Peace of Judicature of appointing Officers and Councellours of levying Mony and the rest named in the 18th Chapter The Obligation of Subjects to the Soveraign is understood to last as long and no longer than the power lasteth by which he is able to protect them For the right men have by Nature to protect themselves when none else can protect them can by no Covenant be relinquished The Soveraignty is the Soule of the Common-wealth which once departed from the Body the members doe no more receive their motion from it The end of Obedience is Protection which wheresoever a man seeth it either in his own or in anothers sword Nature applyeth his obedience to it and his endeavour to maintaine it And though Soveraignty in the intention of them that make it be immortall yet is it in its own nature not only subject to violent death by forreign war but also through the ignorance and passions of men it hath in it from the very institution many seeds of a naturall mortality by Intestine Discord If a Subject be taken prisoner in war or his person or his means of life be within the Guards of the enemy and hath his life and corporall Libertie given him on condition to be Subject to the Victor he hath Libertie to accept the condition and having accepted it is the subject of him that took him because he had no other way to preserve himself The case is the same if he be deteined on the same termes in a forreign country But if a man be held in prison or bonds or is not trusted with the libertie of his bodie he cannot be understood to be bound by Covenant to subjection and therefore may if he can make his escape by any means whatsoever If a Monarch shall relinquish the Soveraignty both for himself and his heires His Subjects returne to the absolute Libertie of Nature because though Nature may declare who are his Sons and who are the nerest of his Kin yet it dependeth on his own will as hath been said in the precedent chapter who shall be his Heyr If therefore he will have no Heyre there is no Soveraignty nor Subjection The case is the same if he dye without known Kindred and without declaration of his Heyre For then there can no Heire be known and consequently no Subjection be due If the Soveraign Banish his Subject during the Banishment he is not Subject But he that is sent on a message or hath leave to travell is still Subject but it is by Contract between Soveraigns not by vertue of the covenant of Subjection For whosoever entreth into anothers dominion is Subject to all the Laws thereof unlesse he have a privilege by the amity of the Soveraigns or by speciall licence If a Monarch subdued by war render himself Subject to the Victor his Subjects are delivered from their former obligation and become obliged to the Victor But if he be held prisoner or have not the liberty of his own Body he is not understood to have given away the Right of Soveraigntie and therefore his Subjects are obliged to yield obedience to the Magistrates formerly placed governing not in their own name but in his For his Right remaining the question is only of the Administration that is to say of the Magistrates and Officers which if he have not means to name he is supposed to approve those which he himself had formerly appointed CHAP. XXII Of SYSTEMES Subject Politicall and Private HAving spoken of the Generation Forme and Power of a Common-wealth I am in order to speak next of the parts thereof And first of Systemes which resemble the similar parts or Muscles of a Body naturall By SYSTEMES I understand any numbers of men joyned in one Interest or one Businesse Of which some are Regular and some Irregular Regular are those where one Man or Assembly of men is constituted Representative of the whole number All other are Irregular Of Regular some are Absolute and Independent subject to none but their own Representative such are only Common-wealths Of which I have spoken already in the 5. last precedent chapters Others are Dependent that is to say Subordinate to some Soveraign Power to which every one as also their Representative is Subject Of Systemes subordinate some are Politicall and some Private Politicall otherwise Called Bodies Politique and Persons in Law are those which are made by authority from the Soveraign Power of the Common-wealth Private are those which are constituted by Subjects amongst themselves or by authoritie from a stranger For no authority derived from forraign power within the Dominion of another is Publique there but Private And of Private Systemes some are Lawfull some Unlawfull Lawfull are those which are allowed by the Common-wealth all other are Unlawfull Irregular Systemes are those which having no Representative consist only in concourse of People which if not forbidden by the Common-wealth nor made on evill designe such as are conflux of People to markets or shews or any other harmelesse end are Lawfull But when the
not a Common benefit to the whole Body which have in this case no common stock but what is deducted out of the particular adventures for building buying victualling and manning of Ships but the particular gaine of every adventurer it is reason that every one be acquainted with the employment of his own that is that every one be of the Assembly that shall have the power to order the same and be acquainted with their accounts And therefore the Representative of such a Body must be an Assembly where every member of the Body may be present at the consultations if he will If a Body Politique of Merchants contract a debt to a stranger by the act of their Representative Assembly every Member is lyable by himself for the whole For a stranger can take no notice of their private Lawes but considereth them as so many particular men obliged every one to the whole payment till payment made by one dischargeth all the rest But if the debt be to one of the Company the creditor is debter for the whole to himself and cannot therefore demand his debt but only from the common stock if there be any If the Common-wealth impose a Tax upon the Body it is understood to be layd upon every Member proportionably to his particular adventure in the Company For there is in this case no other common stock but what is made of their particular adventures If a Mulct be layd upon the Body for some unlawfull act they only are lyable by whose votes the act was decreed or by whose assistance it was executed for in none of the rest is there any other crime but being of the Body which if a crime because the Body was ordeyned by the authority of the Common-wealth is not his If one of the Members be indebted to the Body he may 〈◊〉 sued by the Body but his goods cannot be taken nor his person imprisoned by the authority of the Body but only by Authority of the Common-wealth for if they can doe it by their own Authority they can by their own Authority give judgement that the debt is due which is as much as to be Judge in their own Cause Those Bodies made for the government of Men or of Traffique be either perpetuall or for a time prescribed by writing But there be Bodies also whose times are limited and that only by the nature of their businesse For example if a Soveraign Monarch or a Soveraign Assembly shall think fit to give command to the towns and other severall parts of their territory to send to him their Deputies to enforme him of the condition and necessities of the Subjects or to advise with him for the making of good Lawes or for any other cause as with one Person representing the whole Country such Deputies having a place and time of meeting assigned them are there and at that time a Body Politique representing every Subject of that Dominion but it is onely for such matters as shall be propounded unto them by that Man or Assembly that by the Soveraign Authority sent for them and when it shall be declared that nothing more shall be propounded nor debated by them the Body is dissolved For if they were the absolute Representative of the people then were it the Soveraign Assembly and so there would be two Soveraign Assemblies or two Soveraigns over the same people which cannot consist with their Peace And therefore where there is once a Soveraignty there can be no absolute Representation of the people but by it And for the limits of how farre such a Body shall represent the whole People they are set forth in the Writing by which they were sent for For the People cannot choose their Deputies to other intent than is in the Writing directed to them from their Soveraign expressed Private Bodies Regular and Lawfull are those that are constituted without Letters or other written Authority saving the Lawes common to all other Subjects And because they be united in one Person Representative they are held for Regular such as are all Families in which the Father or Master ordereth the whole Family For he obligeth his Children and Servants as farre as the Law permitteth though not further because none of them are bound to obedience in those actions which the Law hath forbidden to be done In all other actions during the time they are under domestique government they are subject to their Fathers and Masters as to their immediate Soveraigns For the Father and Master being before the Institution of Common-wealth absolute Soveraigns in their own Families they lose afterward no more of their Authority than the Law of the Common-wealth taketh from them Private Bodies Regular but Unlawfull are those that unite themselves into one person Representative without any publique Authority at all such as are the Corporations of Beggars Theeves and Gipsies the better to order their trade of begging and stealing and the Corporations of men that by Authority from any forraign Person unite themselves in anothers Dominion for the easier propagation of Doctrines and for making a party against the Power of the Common-wealth Irregular Systemes in their nature but Leagues or sometimes meer concourse of people without union to any particular designe not by obligation of one to another but proceeding onely from a similitude of wills and inclinations become Lawfull or Unlawfull according to the lawfulnesse or unlawfulnesse of every particular mans designe therein And his designe is to be understood by the occasion The Leagues of Subjects because Leagues are commonly made for mutuall defence are in a Common wealth which is no more than a League of all the Subjects together for the most part unnecessary and savour of unlawfull designe and are for that cause Unlawfull and go commonly by the name of Factions or Conspiracies For a League being a connexion of men by Covenants if there be no power given to any one Man or Assembly as in the condition of meer Nature to compell them to performance is so long onely valid as there ariseth no just cause of distrust and therefore Leagues between Common-wealths over whom there is no humane Power established to keep them all in awe are not onely lawfull but also profitable for the time they last But Leagues of the Subjects of one and the same Common-wealth where every one may obtain his right by means of the Soveraign Power are unnecessary to the maintaining of Peace and Justice and in case the designe of them be evill or Unknown to the Common-wealth unlawfull For all uniting of strength by private men is if for evill intent unjust if for intent unknown dangerous to the Publique and unjustly concealed If the Soveraign Power be in a great Assembly and a number of men part of the Assembly without authority consult a part to contrive the guidance of the rest This is a Faction or Conspiracy unlawfull as being a fraudulent seducing of the Assembly for their particular
is once settled then are they actually Lawes and not before as being then the commands of the Common-wealth and therefore also Civill Lawes For it is the Soveraign Power that obliges men to obey them For in the differences of private men to declare what is Equity what is Justice and what is morall Vertue and to make them binding there is need of the Ordinances of Soveraign Power and Punishments to be ordaine d for such as shall break them which Ordinances are therefore part of the Civill Law The Law of Nature therefore is a part of the Civill Law in all Common-wealths of the world Reciprocally also the Civill Law is a part of the Dictates of Nature For Justice that is to say Performance of Covenant and giving to every man his own is a Dictate of the Law of Nature But every subject in a Common-wealth hath covenanted to obey the Civill Law either one with another as when they assemble to make a common Representative or with the Representative it selfe one by one when subdued by the Sword they promise obedience that they may receive life And therefore Obedience to the Civill Law is part also of the Law of Nature Civill and Naturall Law are not different kinds but different parts of Law whereof one part being written is called Civill the other unwritten Naturall But the Right of Nature that is the naturall Liberty of man may by the Civill Law be abridged and restrained nay the end of making Lawes is no other but such Restraint without the which there cannot possibly be any Peace And Law was brought into the world for nothing else but to limit the naturall liberty of particular men in such manner as they might not hurt but assist one another and joyn together against a common Enemy 5. If the Soveraign of one Common-wealth subdue a People that have lived under other written Lawes and afterwards govern them by the same Lawes by which they were governed before yet those Lawes are the Civill Lawes of the Victor and not of the Vanquished Common-wealth For the Legislator is he not by whose authority the Lawes were first made but by whose authority they now continue to be Lawes And therefore where there be divers Provinces within the Dominion of a Common-wealth and in those Provinces diversity of Lawes which commonly are called the Customes of each severall Province we are not to understand that such Customes have their force onely from Length of Time but that they were antiently Lawes written or otherwise made known for the Constitutions and Statutes of their Soveraigns and are now Lawes not by vertue of the Praescription of time but by the Constitutions of their present Soveraigns But if an unwritten Law in all the Provinces of a Dominion shall be generally observed and no iniquity appear in the use thereof that Law can be no other but a Law of Nature equally obliging all man-kind 6. Seeing then all Lawes written and unwritten have their Authority and force from the Will of the Common-wealth that is to say from the Will of the Representative which in a Monarchy is the Monarch and in other Common-wealths the Soveraign Assembly a man may wonder from whence proceed such opinions as are found in the Books of Lawyers of eminence in severall Common-wealths directly or by consequence making the Legislative Power depend on private men or subordinate Judges As for example That the Common Law hath no Controuler but the Parlament which is true onely where a Parlament has the Soveraign Power and cannot be assembled nor dissolved but by their own discretion For if there be a right in any else to dissolve them there is a right also to controule them and consequently to controule their controulings And if there be no such right then the Controuler of Lawes is not Parlamentum but Rex in Parlamento And were a Parlament is Soveraign if it should assemble never so many or so wise men from the Countries subject to them for whatsoever cause yet there is no man will believe that such an Assembly hath thereby acquired to themselves a Legislative Power Item that the two arms of a Common-wealth are Force and Justice the first whereof is in the King the other deposited in the hands of the Parlament As if a Common-wealth could consist where the Force were in any hand which Justice had not the Authority to command and govern 7. That Law can never be against Reason our Lawyers are agreed and that not the Letter that is every construction of it but that which is according to the Intention of the Legislator is the Law And it is true but the doubt is of whose Reason it is that shall be received for Law It is not meant of any private Reason for then there would be as much contradiction in the Lawes as there is in the Schooles nor yet as Sr. Ed. Coke makes it an Artificiall perfection of Reason gotten by long study observation and experience as his was For it is possible long study may encrease and confirm erroneous Sentences and where men build on false grounds the more they build the greater is the ruine and of those that study and observe with equall time and diligence the reasons and resolutions are and must remain discordant and therefore it is not that Juris prudentia or wisedome of subordinate Judges but the Reason of this our Artificiall Man the Common-wealth and his Command that maketh Law And the Common-wealth being in their Representative but one Person there cannot easily arise any contradiction in the Lawes and when there doth the same Reason is able by interpretation or alteration to take it away In all Courts of Justice the Soveraign which is the Person of the Common-wealth is he that Judgeth The subordinate Judge ought to have regard to the reason which moved his Soveraign to make such Law that his Sentence may be according thereunto which then is his Soveraigns Sentence otherwise it is his own and an unjust one 8. From this that the Law is a Command and a Command consisteth in declaration or manifestation of the will of him that commandeth by voyce writing or some other sufficient argument of the same we may understand that the Command of the Common-wealth is Law onely to those that have means to take notice of it Over naturall fooles children or mad-men there is no Law no more than over brute beasts nor are they capable of the title of just or unjust because they had never power to make any covenant or to understand the consequences thereof and consequently never took upon them to authorise the actions of any Soveraign as they must do that make to themselves a Common-wealth And as those from whom Nature or Accident hath taken away the notice of all Lawes in generall so also every man from whom any accident not proceeding from his own default hath taken away the means to take notice of any particular Law is excused if
all written Lawes that may concerne his own future actions The Legislator known and the Lawes either by writing or by the light of Nature sufficiently published there wanteth yet another very materiall circumstance to make them obligatory For it is not the Letter but the Intendment or Meaning that is to say the authentique Interpretation of the Law which is the sense of the Legislator in which the nature of the Law consisteth And therefore the Interpretation of all Lawes dependeth on the Authority Soveraign and the Interpreters can be none but those which the Soveraign to whom only the Subject oweth obedience shall appoint For else by the craft of an Interpreter the Law may be made to beare a sense contrary to that of the Soveraign by which means the Interpreter becomes the Legislator All Laws written and unwritten have need of Interpretation The unwritten Law of Nature though it be easy to such as without partiality and passion make use of their naturall reason and therefore leaves the violaters thereof without excuse yet considering there be very few perhaps none that in some cases are not blinded by self love or some other passion it is now become of all Laws the most obscure and has consequently the greatest need of able Interpreters The written Laws if they be short are easily mis-interpreted from the divers significations of a word or two if long they be more obscure by the diverse significations of many words in so much as no written Law delivered in few or many words can be well understood without a perfect understanding of the finall causes for which the Law was made the knowledge of which finall causes is in the Legislator To him therefore there can not be any knot in the Law insoluble either by finding out the ends to undoe it by or else by making what ends he will as Alexander did with his sword in the Gordian knot by the Legislative power which no other Interpreter can doe The Interpretation of the Lawes of Nature in a Common-wealth dependeth not on the books of Morall Philosophy The Authority of writers without the Authority of the Common-wealth maketh not their opinions Law be they never so true That which I have written in this Treatise concerning the Morall Vertues and of their necessity for the procuring and maintaining peace though it bee evident Truth is not therefore presently Law but because in all Common-wealths in the world it is part of the Civill Law For though it be naturally reasonable yet it is by the Soveraigne Power that it is Law Otherwise it were a great errour to call the Lawes of Nature unwritten Law whereof wee see so many volumes published and in them so many contradictions of one another and of themselves The Interpretation of the Law of Nature is the Sentence of the Judge constituted by the Soveraign Authority to heare and determine such controversies as depend thereon and consisteth in the application of the Law to the present case For in the act of Judicature the Judge doth no more but consider whither the demand of the party be consonant to naturall reason and Equity and the Sentence he giveth is therefore the Interpretation of the Law of Nature which Interpretation is Authentique not because it is his private Sentence but because he giveth it by Authority of the Soveraign whereby it becomes the Soveraigns Sentence which is Law for that time to the parties pleading But because there is no Judge Subordinate nor Soveraign but may erre in a Judgement of Equity if afterward in another like case he find it more consonant to Equity to give a contrary Sentence he is obliged to doe it No mans error becomes his own Law nor obliges him to persist in it Neither for the same reason becomes it a Law to other Judges though sworn to follow it For though a wrong Sentence given by authority of the Soveraign if he know and allow it in such Lawes as are mutable be a constitution of a new Law in cases in which every little circumstance is the same yet in Lawes immutable such as are the Lawes of Nature they are no Lawes to the same or other Judges in the like cases for ever after Princes succeed one another and one Iudge passeth another commeth nay Heaven and Earth shall passe but not one title of the Law of Nature shall passe for it is the Eternall Law of God Therefore all the Sentences of precedent Judges that have ever been cannot all together make a Law contrary to naturall Equity Nor any Examples of former Judges can warrant an unreasonable Sentence or discharge the present Judge of the trouble of studying what is Equity in the case he is to Judge from the principles of his own naturall reason For example sake 'T is against the Law of Nature To punish the Innocent and Innocent is he that acquitteth himselfe Judicially and is acknowledged for Innocent by the Judge Put the case now that a man is accused of a capitall crime and seeing the power and malice of some enemy and the frequent corruption and parâ—…iality of Judges runneth away for feare of the event and afterwards is taken and brought to a legall triall and maketh it sufficiently appear he was not guilty of the crime and being thereof acquitted is neverthelesse condemned to lose his goods this is a manifest condemnation of the Innocent I say therefore that there is no place in the world where this can be an interpretation of a Law of Nature or be made a Law by the Sentences of precedent Judges that had done the same For he that judged it first judged unjustly and no Injustice can be a pattern of Judgement to succeeding Judges A written Law may forbid innocent men to fly and they may be punished for flying But that flying for feare of injury should be taken for presumption of guilt after a man is already absolved of the crime Judicially is contrary to the nature of a Presumption which hath no place after Judgement given Yet this is set down by a great Lawyer for the common Law of England If a man saith he that is Innocent be accused of Felony and for feare flyeth for the same albeit he judicially acquitteth himselfe of the Felony yet if it be found that he fled for the Felony he shall notwithstanding his Innocency Forfeit all his goods chattells debts and duties For as to the Forfeiture of them the Law will admit no proofe against the Presumption in Law grounded upon his flight Here you see An Innocent man Judicially acquitted notwithstanding his Innocency when no written Law forbad him to fly after his acquitall upon a Presumption in Law condemned to lose all the goods he hath If the Law ground upon his flight a Presumption of the fact which was Capitall the Sentence ought to have been Capitall if the Presumption were not of â—…he Fact for what then ought he to lose his goods This therefore is
served the Common-wealth are with as little expence of the Common Treasure as is possible so well recompenced as others thereby may be encouraged both to serve the same as faithfully as they can and to study the arts by which they may be enabled to do it better To buy with Mony or Preferment from a Popular ambitious Subject to be quiet and desist from making ill impressions in the mindes of the People has nothing of the nature of Reward which is ordained not for disservice but for service past nor a signe of Gratitude but of Fear nor does it tend to the Benefit but to the Dammage of the Publique It is a contention with Ambition like that of Hercules with the Monster Hydra which having many heads for every one that was vanquished there grew up three For in like manner when the stubbornnesse of one Popular man is overcome with Reward there arise many more by the Example that do the same Mischiefe in hope of like Benefit and as all forts of Manifacture so also Malice encreaseth by being vendible And though sometimes a Civill warre may be differred by such wayes as that yet the danger growes still the greater and the Publique ruine more assured It is therefore against the Duty of the Soveraign to whom the Publique Safety is committed to Reward those that aspire to greatnesse by disturbing the Peace of their Country and not rather to oppose the beginnings of such men with a little danger than after a longer time with greater Another Businesse of the Soveraign is to choose good Counsellours I mean such whose advice he is to take in the Government of the Common-wealth For this word Counsell Consilium corrupted from Considium is of a large signification and comprehendeth all Assemblies of men that sit together not onely to deliberate what is to be done hereafter but also to judge of Facts past and of Law for the present I take it here in the first sense onely And in this sense there is no choyce of Counsell neither in a Democracy nor Aristocracy because the persons Counselling are members of the person Counselled The choyce of Counsellours therefore is proper to Monarchy In which the Soveraign that endeavoureth not to make choyce of those that in every kind are the most able dischargeth not his Office as he ought to do The most able Counsellours are they that have least hope of benefit by giving evill Counsell and most knowledge of those things that conduce to the Peace and Defence of the Common-wealth It is a hard matter to know who expecteth benefit from publique troubles but the signes that guide to a just suspicion is the soothing of the people in their unreasonable or irremediable grievances by men whose estates are not sufficient to discharge their accustomed expences and may easily be observed by any one whom it concerns to know it But to know who has most knowledge of the Publique affaires is yet harder and they that know them need them a great deale the lesse For to know who knowes the Rules almost of any Art is a great degree of the knowledge of the same Art because no man can be assured of the truth of anothers Rules but he that is first taught to understand them But the best signes of Knowledge of any Art are much conversing in it and constant good effects of it Good Counsell comes not by Lot nor by Inheritance and therefore there is no more reason to expect good Advice from the rich or noble in matter of State than in delineating the dimensions of a fortresse unlesse we shall think there needs no method in the study of the Politiques as there does in the study of Geometry but onely to be lookers on which is not so For the Politiques is the harder study of the two Whereas in these parts of Europe it hath been taken for a Right of certain persons to have place in the highest Councell of State by Inheritance it is derived from the Conquests of the antient Germans wherein many absolute Lords joyning together to conquer other Nations would not enter in to the Confederacy without such Priviledges as might be marks of difference in time following between their Posterity and the Posterity of their Subjects which Priviledges being inconsistent with the Soveraign Power by the favour of the Soveraign they may seem to keep but contending for them as their Right they must needs by degrees let them go and have at last no further honour then adhaereth naturally to their abilities And how able soever be the Counsellours in any affaire the benefit of their Counsell is greater when they give every one his Advice and the reasons of it apart than when they do it in an Assembly by way of Orations and when they have praemeditated than when they speak on the sudden both because they have more time to survey the consequences of action and are lesse subject to be carried away to contradiction through Envy Emulation or other Passions arising from the difference of opinion The best Counsell in those things that concern not other Nations but onely the ease and benefit the Subjects may enjoy by Lawes that look onely inward is to be taken from the generall informations and complaints of the people of each Province who are best acquainted with their own wants and ought therefore when they demand nothing in derogation of the essentiall Rights of Soveraignty to be diligently taken notice of For without those Essentiall Rights as I have often before said the Common-wealth cannot at all subsist A Commander of an Army in chiefe if he be not Popular shall not be beloved nor feared as he ought to be by his Army and consequently cannot performe that office with good successe He must therefore be Industrious Valiant Affable Liberall and Fortunate that he may gain an opinion both of sufficiency and of loving his Souldiers This is Popularity and breeds in the Souldiers both desire and courage to recommend themselves to his favour and protects the severity of the Generall in punishing when need is the Mutinous or negligent Souldiers But this love of Souldiers if caution be not given of the Commanders fidelity is a dangerous thing to Soveraign Power especially when it it is in the hands of an Assembly not popular It belongeth therefore to the safety of the People both that they be good Conductors and faithfull Subjects to whom the Soveraign Commits his Armies But when the Soveraign himselfe is Popular that is reverenced and beloved of his People there is no danger at all from the Popularity of a Subject For Souldiers are never so generally unjust as to side with their Captain though they love him against their Soveraign when they love not onely his Person but also his Cause And therefore those who by violence have at any time suppressed the Power of their lawfull Soveraign before they could settle themselves in his place have been alwayes put to the trouble of
a man should say an Incorporeall Body But in the sense of cōmon people not all the Universe is called Body but only such parts thereof as they can discern by the sense of Feeling to resist their force or by the sense of their Eyes to hinder them from a farther prospect Therefore in the common language of men Aire and aeriall substances use not to be taken for Bodies but as often as men are sensible of their effects are called Wind or Breath or because the same are called in the Latine Spiritus Spirits as when they call that aeriall substance which in the body of any living creature gives it life and motion Vitall and Animall spirits But for those Idols of the brain which represent Bodies to us where they are not as in a Looking-glasse in a Dream or to a Distempered brain waking they are as the Apostle saith generally of all Idols nothing Nothing at all I say there where they seem to be◅ and in the brain it self nothing but tumult proceeding either from the action of the objects or from the disorderly agitation of the Organs of our Sense And men that are otherwise imployed then to search into their causes know not of themselves what to call them and may therefore easily be perswaded by those whose knowledge they much reverence some to call them Bodies and think them made of aire compacted by a power supernaturall because the sight judges them corporeall and some to call them Spirits because the sense of Touch discerneth nothing in the place where they appear to resist their fingers So that the proper signification of Spirit in common speech is either a subtile fluid and invisible Body or a Ghost or other Idol or Phantasme of the Imagination But for metaphoricall significations there be many for sometimes it is taken for Disposition or Inclination of the mind as when for the disposition to controwl the sayings of other men we say a spirit of contradiction For a disposition to uncleannesse an unclean spirit for perversenesse a froward spirit for sullennesse a dumb spirit and for inclination to godlinesse and Gods service the Spirit of God sometimes for any eminent ability or extraordinary passion or disease of the mind as when great wisdome is called the spirit of wisdome and mad men are said to be possessed with a spirit Other signification of Spirit I find no where any and where none of these can satisfie the sense of that word in Scripture the place falleth not under humane Understanding and our Faith therein consisteth not in our Opinion but in our Submission as in all places where God is said to be a Spirit or where by the Spirit of God is meant God himselfe For the nature of God is incomprehensible that is to say we understand nothing of what he is but only that he is and therefore the Attributes we give him are not to tell one another what he is nor to signifie our opinion of his Nature but our desire to honor him with such names as we conceiv◅ most honorable amongst our selves Gen. 1. 2. The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the Waters Here if by the Spirit of God be meant God himself then is Motion attributed to God and consequently Place which are intelligible only of Bodies and not of substances incorporeall and so the place is above our understanding that can conceive nothing moved that changes not place or that has not dimension and whatsoever has dimension is Body But the meaning of those words is best understood by the like place Gen. 8. 1. Where when the earth was covered with Waters as in the beginning God intending to abate them and again to discover the dry land useth the like words I will bring my Spirit upon the Earth and the waters shall be diminished in which place by Spirit is understood a Wind that is an Aire or Spirit moved which might be called as in the former place the Spirit of God because it was Gods work Gen. 41. 38. Pharaoh calleth the Wisdome of Joseph the Spirit of God For Joseph having advised him to look out a wise and discreet man and to set him over the land of Egypt he saith thus Can we find such a man as this is in whom is the Spirit of God And Exod. 28. 3. Thou shalt speak saith God to all that are wise hearted whom I have filled with the Spirit of VVisdome to make Aaron Garments to consecrate him Where extraordinary Understanding though but in making Garments as being the Gift of God is called the Spirit of God The same is found again Exod. 31. 3 4 5 6. and 35. 31. And Isaiah 11. 2 3. where the Prophet speaking of the Messiah saith The Spirit of the Lord shall abide upon him the Spirit of wisdome and understanding the Spirit of counsell and fortitude and the Spirit of the fear of the Lord. Where manifestly is meant not so many Ghosts but so many eminent graces that God would give him In the Book of Judges an extraordinary Zeal and Courage in the the defence of Gods people is called the Spirit of God as when it excited Othoniel Gideon Jephtha and Samson to deliver them from servitude Judg. 3. 10. 6. 34. 11. 29. 13. 25. 14. 6 19. And of Saul upon the newes of the insolence of the Ammonites towards the men of Jabesh Gilead it is said 1 Sam. 11. 6. that The Spirit of God came upon Saul and his Anger or as it is in the Latine his Fury was kindled greatly Where it is not probable was meant a Ghost but an extraordinary Zeal to punish the cruelty of the Ammonites In like manner by the Spirit of God that came upon Saul when hee was amongst the Prophets that praised God in Songs and Musick 1 Sam. 19. 20. is to be understood not a Ghost but an unexpected and sudden Zeal to join with them in their devotion The false Prophet Zedekiah saith to Micaiah 1 Kings 22. 24. Which way went the Spirit of the Lord from me to speak to thee Which cannot be understood of a Ghost for Micaiah declared before the Kings of Israel and Judah the event of the battle as from a Vision and not as from a Spirit speaking in him In the same manner it appeareth in the Books of the Prophets that though they spake by the Spirit of God that is to say by a speciall grace of Prediction yet their knowledge of the future was not by a Ghost within them but by some supernaturall Dream or Vision Gen. 2. 7. It is said God made man of the dust of the Earth and breathed into his nostrills spiraculum vitae the breath of life and man was made a living soul. There the breath of life inspired by God signifies no more but that God gave him life And Job 27. 3. as long as the Spirit of God is in my nostrils is no more then to say as long as I live So
and gave it to the Seventy Elders But as I have shewn before chap. 36. by Spirit is understood the Mind so that the sense of the place is no other than this that God endued them with a mind conformable and subordinate to that of Moses that they might Prophecy that is to say speak to the people in Gods name in such manner as to set forward as Ministers of Moses and by his authority such doctrine as was agreeable to Moses his doctrine For they were but Ministers and when two of them Prophecyed in the Camp it was thought a new and unlawfull thing and as it is in the 27. and 28. verses of the same Chapter they were accused of it and Joshua advised Moses to forbid them as not knowing that it was by Moses his Spirit that they Prophecyed By which it is manifest that no Subject ought to pretend to Prophecy or to the Spirit in opposition to the doctrine established by him whom God hath set in the place of Moses Aaron being dead and after him also Moses the Kingdome as being a Sacerdotall Kingdome descended by vertue of the Covenant to Aarons Son Eleazar the High Priest And God declared him next under himself for Soveraign at the same time that he appointed Joshua for the Generall of their Army For thus God saith expressely Numb 27. 21. concerning Joshua He shall stand before Eleazar the Priest who shall ask counsell for him before the Lord at his word shall they goe out and at his word they shall come in both he aâ—…d all the Children of Israel with him Therefore the Supreme Power of making War and Peace was in the Priest The Supreme Power of Judicature belonged also to the High Priest For the Book of the Law was in their keeping and the Priests and Levites onely were the subordinate Judges in causes Civill as appears in Deut. 17. 8 9 10. And for the manner of Gods worship there was never doubt made but that the High Priest till the time of Saul had the Supreme Authority Therefore the Civill and Ecclesiasticall Power were both joined together in one and the same person the High Priest and ought to bee so in whosoever governeth by Divine Right that is by Authority immediate from God After the death of Joshua till the time of Saul the time between is noted frequently in the Book of Judges that there was in those dayes no King in Israel and sometimes with this addition that every man did that which was right in his own eyes By which is to bee understood that where it is said there was no King is meant there was no Soveraign Power in Israel And so it was if we consider the Act and Exercise of such power For after the death of Joshua Eleazar there arose another generation Judges 2. 10. that knew not the Lord nor the works which he had done for Israel but did evill in the sight of the Lord and served Baalim And the Jews had that quality which St. Paul noteth to look for a sign not onely before they would submit themselves to the government of Moses but also after they had obliged themselves by their submission Whereas Signs and Miracles had for End to procure Faith not to keep men from violating it when they have once given it for to that men are obliged by the law of Nature But if we consider not the Exercise but the Right of Governing the Soveraign power was still in the High Priest Therefore whatsoever obedience was yeelded to any of the Judges who were men chosen by God extraordinarily to save his rebellious subjects out of the hands of the enemy it cannot bee drawn into argument against the Right the High Priest had to the Soveraign Power in all matters both of Policy and Religion And neither the Judges nor Samuel himselfe had an ordinary but extraordinary calling to the Government and were obeyed by the Israelites not out of duty but out of reverence to their favour with God appearing in their wisdome courage or felicity Hitherto therefore the Right of Regulating both the Policy and the Religion were inseparable To the Judges succeeded Kings And whereas before all authority both in Religion and Policy was in the High Priest so now it was all in the King For the Soveraignty over the people which was before not onely by vertue of the Divine Power but also by a particular pact of the Israelites in God and next under him in the High Priest as his Vicegerent on earth was cast off by the People with the consent of God himselfe For when they said to Samuel 1 Sam. 8. 5. make us a King to judge us like all the Nations they signified that they would no more bee governed by the commands that should bee laid upon them by the Priest in the name of God but by one that should command them in the same manner that all other nations were commandcd and consequently in deposing the High Priest of Royall authority they deposed that peculiar Government of God And yet God consented to it saying to Samuel verse 7. Hearken unto the voice of the People in all that they shall say unto thee for they have not rejected thee but they have rejected mee that I should not reign over them Having therefore rejected God in whose Right the Priests governed there was no authority left to the Priests but such as the King was pleased to allow them which was more or lesse according as the Kings were good or evill And for the Government of Civill affaires it is manifest it was all in the hands of the King For in the same Chapter verse 20. They say they will be like all the Nations that their King shall be their Judge and goe before them and fight their battells that is he shall have the whole authority both in Peace and War In which is contained also the ordering of Religion for there was no other Word of God in that time by which to regulate Religion but the Law of Moses which was their Civill Law Besides we read 1 Kings 2. 27. that Solomon thrust out Abiathar from being Priest before the Lord He had therefore authority over the High Priest as over any other Subject which is a great mark of Supremacy in Religion And we read also 1 Kings 8. that hee dedicated the Temple that he blessed the People and that he himselfe in person made that excellent prayer used in the Consecrations of all Churches and houses of Prayer which is another great mark of Supremacy in Religion Again we read 2 Kings 22. that when there was question concerning the Book of the Law found in the Temple the same was not decided by the High Priest but Josiah sent both him and others to enquire concerning it of Hulda the Prophetesse which is another mark of the Supremacy in Religion Lastly wee read 1 Chron. 26. 30. that David made Hashabiah and his brethren Hebronites Officers of Israel
take with thee one or two more And if he shall neglect to hear them tell it unto the Church but if he neglect to hear the Church let him be unto thee as an Heathen man and a Publican By which it is manifest that the Judgment concerning the truth of Repentance belonged not to any one Man but to the Church that is to the Assembly of the Faithull or to them that have authority to bee their Representant But besides the Judgment there is necessary also the pronouncing of Sentence And this belonged alwaies to the Apostle or some Pastor of the Church as Prolocutor and of this our Saviour speaketh in the 18 verse Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven And conformable hereunto was the practise of St. Paul 1 Cor. 5. 3 4 5. where he saith For I verily as absent in body but present in spirit have determined already as though I were present concerning him that hath so done this deed In the name of our Lord Iesus Christ when ye are gathered together and my spirit with the power of our Lord Iesus Christ To deliver such a one to Satan that is to say to cast him out of the Châ—…rch as a man whose Sins are not Forgiven Paul here pronounceth the Sentence but the Assembly was first to hear the Cause for St. Paul was absent and by consequence to condemn him But in the same chapter ver 11 12. the Judgment in such a case is more expressely attributed to the Assembly But now I have written unto you not to keep company if any man that is called a Brother be a Fornicator c. with such a one no not to eat For what have I to do to judg them that are without Do not ye judg them that are within The Sentence therefore by which a man was put out of Church was pronounced by the Apostle or Pastor but the Judgment concerning the merit of the cause was in the Church that is to say as the times were before the conversion of Kings and men that had Soveraign Authority in the Common-wealth the Assembly of the Christians dwelling in the same City as in Corinth in the Assembly of the Christians of Corinth This part of the Power of the Keyes by which men were thrust out from the Kingdom of God is that which is called Excommunication and to excommunicate is in the Originall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to cast out of the Synagogue that is out of the place of Divine service a word drawn from the custome of the Jews to cast out of their Synagogues such as they thought in manners or doctrine contagious as Lepers were by the Law of Moses separated from the congregation of Israel till such time as they should be by the Priest pronounced clean The Use and Effect of Excommunication whilest it was not yet strengthened with the Civill Power was no more than that they who were not Excommunicate were to avoid the company of them that were It was not enough to repute them as Heathen that never had been Christians for with such they might eate and drink which with Excommunicate persons they might not do as appeareth by the words of St. Paul 1 Cor. 5. ver 9 10 c. where he telleth them he had formerly forbidden them to company with Fornicators but because that could not bee without going out of the world he restraineth it to such Fornicators and otherwise vicious persons as were of the brethren with such a one he saith they ought not to keep company no not to eat And this is no more than our Saviour saith Mat. 18. 17. Let him be to thee as a Heathen and as a Publican For Publicans which signifieth Farmers and Receivers of the revenue of the Common-wealth were so hated and detested by the Jews that were to pay it as that Publican and Sinner were taken amongst them for the same thing Insomuch as when our Saviour accepted the invitation of Zacchaeus a Publican though it were to Convert him yet it was ohjected to him as a Crime And therefore when our Saviour to Heathen added Publican he did forbid them to eat with a man Excommunicate As for keeping them out of their Synagogues or places of Assembly they had no Power to do it but that of the owner of the place whether he were Christian or Heathen And because all places are by right in the Dominion of the Common-wealth as well hee that was Excommunicated as hee that never was Baptized might enter inter into them by Commission from the Civill Magistrate as Paul before his conversion entred into their Synagogues at Damascus to apprehend Christians men and women and to carry them bound to Jerusalem by Commission from the High Priest By which it appears that upon a Christian that should become an Apostate in a place where the Civill Power did persecute or not assist the Church the effect of Excommunication had nothiug in it neither of dammage in this world nor of terrour Not of terrour because of their unbeleef nor of dammage because they are retâ—…rned thereby into the favour of the world and in the world to come were to be in no worse estate then they which never had beleeved The dammage redounded rather to the Church by provocation of them they cast out to a freer execution of their malice Excommunication therefore had its effect onely upon those that beleeved that Jesus Christ was to come again in Glory to reign over and to judge both the quick and the dead and should therefore refuse entrance into his Kingdom to those whose Sins were Retained that is to those that were Excommunicated by the Church And thence it is that St. Paul calleth Excommunication a delivery of the ExcoÌ„municate person to Satan For without the Kingdom of Christ all other Kingdomes after Judgment are comprehended in the Kingdome of Satan This is it that the faithfull stood in fear of as long as they stood Excommunicate that is to say in an estate wherein their sins were not Forgiven Whereby wee may understand that Excommunication in the time that Christian Religion was not authorized by the Civill Power was used onely for a correction of manners not of errours in opinion for it is a punishment whereof none could be sensible but such as beleeved and expected the coming again of our Saviour to judge the world and they who so beleeved needed no other opinion but onely uprightnesse of life to be saved There lyeth Excommunication for Injustice as Mat. 18. If thy Brother offend thee tell it him privately then with Witnesses lastly tell the Church and then if he obey not Let him be to thee as an Heathen man and a Publican And there lieth Excommunication for a Scandalous Life as 1 Cor. 5. 11. If any man that is called a Brother be a Fornicator or Covetous or an Idolater
or a Drunkard or an Extortioner with such a one yee are not to eat But to Excommunicate a man that held this foundation that Iesus was the Christ for difference of opinion in other points by which that Foundation was not destroyed there appeareth no authority in the Scripture nor example in the Apostles There is indeed in St. Paul Titus 3. 10. a text that seemeth to be to the contrary A man that is an Haeretique after the first and second admonition reject For an Haeretiqne is he that being a member of the Church teacheth neverthelesse some private opinion which the Church has forbidden and such a one S. Paul adviseth Titus after the first and second admonition to Reject But to Reject in this place is not to Excommunicate the Man But to give over admonishing him to let him alone to set by disputing with him as one that is to be convinced onely by himselfe The same Apostle saith 2 Tim. 2. 23. Foolish and unlearned questions avoid The word Avoid in this place and Reject in the former is the same in the Originall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but Foolish questions may bee set by without Excommunication And again Tit. 3. 9. Avoid Foolish questions where the Originall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 set themby is equivalent to the former word Reject There is no other place that can so much as colourably be drawn to countenance the Casting out of the Church faithfull men such as beleeved the foundation onely for a singular superstructure of their own proceeding perhaps from a good pious conscience But on the contrary all such places as command avoiding such disputes are written for a Lesson to Pastors such as Timothy and Titus were not to make new Articles of Faith by determining every small controversie which oblige men to a needlesse burthen of Conscience or provoke them to break the union of the Church Which Lesson the Apostles themselves observed well S. Peter and S. Paul though their controversie were great as we may read in Gal. 2. 11. yet they did not cast one another out of the Church Neverthelesse during the Apostles times there were other Pastors that observed it not As Diotrephes 3 Iohn 9. c. who cast out of the Church such as S. John himself thought fit to be received into it out of a pride he took in Praeeminence so early it was that Vain-glory and Ambition had found entrance into the Church of Christ. That a man be liable to Excommunication there be many conditions requisite as First that he be a member of some Commonalty that is to say of some lawfull Assembly that is to say of some Christian Church that hath power to judge of the cause for which hee is to bee Excommunicated For where there is no Community there can bee no Excommunication nor where there is no power to Judge can there bee any power to give Sentence From hence it followeth that one Church cannot be Excommunicated by another For either they have equall power to Excommunicate each other in which case Excommunication is not Discipline nor an act of Authority but Schisme and Dissolution of charity or one is so subordinate to the other as that they both have but one voice and then they be but one Church and the part Excommunicated is no more a Church but a dissolute number of individuall persons And because the sentence of Excommunication importeth an advice not to keep company nor so much as to eat with him that is Excommunicate if a Soveraign Prince or Assembly bee Excommunicate the sentence is of no effect For all Subjects are bound to be in the company and presence of their own Soveraign when he requireth it by the law of Nature nor can they lawfully either expell him from any place of his own Dominion whether profane or holy nor go out of his Dominion without his leave much lesse if he call them to that honour refuse to eat with him And as to other Princes and States because they are not parts of one and the same congregation they need not any other sentence to keep them from keeping companywith the State Excommunicate for the very Institution as it uniteth many men into one Community so it dissociateth one Community from another so that Excommunication is not needfull for keeping Kings and States asunder nor has any further effect then is in the nature of Policy it selfe unlesse it be to instigate Princes to warre upon one another Nor is the Excommunication of a Christian Subject that obeyeth the laws of his own Soveraign whether Christian or Heathen of any effect For if he beleeve that Iesus is the Christ he hath the Spirit of God 1 Joh. 4. 1. and God dwelleth in him and he in God 1 Joh. 4. 15. But hee that hath the Spirit of God hee that dwelleth in God hee in whom God dwelleth can receive no harm by the Excommunication of men Therefore he that beleeveth Jesus to be the Christ is free from all the dangers threatned to persons Excommunicate He that beleveeth it not is no Christian. Therefore a true and unfeigned Christian is not liable to Excommunication Nor he also that is a professed Christian till his Hypocrisy appear in his Manners that is till his behaviour bee contrary to the law of his Soveraign which is the rule of Manners and which Christ and his Apostles have commanded us to be subject to For the Church cannot judge of Manners but by externall Actions which Actions can never bee unlawfull but when they are against the Law of the Common-wealth If a mans Father or Mother or Master bee Excommunicate yet are not the Children forbidden to keep them Company nor to Eat with them for that were for the most part to oblige them not to eat at all for want of means â—…o get food and to authorise them to disobey their Parents and Masters contrary to the Precept of the Apostles In summe the Power of Excommunication cannot be extended further than to the end for which the Apostles and Pastors of the Church have their Commission from our Saviour which is not to rule by Command and Coaction but by Teaching and Direction of men in the way of Salvation in the world to come And as a Master in any Science may abandon his Scholar when hee obstinately neglecteth the practise of his rules but not accuse him of Injustice because he was never bound to obey him so a Teacher of Christian doctrine may abandon his Disciples that obstinately continue in an unchristian life but he cannot say they doe him wrong because they are not obliged to obey him For to a Teacher that shall so complain may be applyed the Answer of God to Samuel in the like place They have not rejected thee but mee Excommunication therefore when it wanteth the assistance of the Civill Power as it doth when a Christian State or Prince is Excommunicate by a forain Authority is without effect and consequently ought
ordained And therefore in all Common-wealths of the Heathen the Soveraigns have had the name of Pastors of the People because there was no Subject that could lawfully Teach the people but by their permission and authority This Right of the Heathen Kings cannot bee thought taken from them by their conversion to the Faith of Christ who never ordained that Kings for beleeving in him should be deposed that is subjected to any but himself or which is all one be deprived of the power necessary for the conservation of Peace amongst their Subjects and for their defence against foraign Enemies And therefore Christian Kings are still the Supreme Pastors of their people and have power to ordain what Pastors they please to teach the Church that is to teach the People committed to their charge Again let the right of choosing them be as before the conversion of Kings in the Church for so it was in the time of the Apostles themselves as hath been shewn already in this chapter even so also the Right will be in the Civill Soveraign Christian. For in that he is a Christian he allowes the Teaching and in that he is the Soveraign which is as much as to say the Church by Representation the Teachers hee elects are elected by the Church And when an Assembly of Christians choose their Pastor in a Christian Common-wealth it is the Soveraign that electeth him because t is done by his Authority In the same manner as when a Town choose their Maior it is the act of him that hath the Soveraign Power For every act done is the act of him without whose consent it is invalid And therefore whatsoever examples may be drawn out of History concerning the Election of Pastors by the People or by the Clergy they are no arguments against the Right of any Civill Soveraign because they that elected them did it by his Authority Seeing then in every Christian Common-wealth the Civill Soveraign is the Supreme Pastor to whose charge the whole flock of his Subjects is committed and consequently that it is by his authority that all other Pastors are made and have power to teach and performe all other Pastorall offices it followeth also that it is from the Civill Soveraign that all other Pastors derive their right of Teaching Preaching and other functions pertaining to that Office and that they are but his Ministers in the same manner as the Magistrates of Towns Judges in Courts of Justice and Commanders of Armies are all but Ministers of him that is the Magistrate of the whole Common-wealth Judge of all Causes and Commander of the whole Militia which is alwaies the Civill Soveraign And the reason hereof is not because they that Teach but because they that are to Learn are his Subjects For let it be supposed that a Christian King commit the Authority of Ordaining Pastors in his Dominions to another King as divers Christian Kings allow that power to the Pope he doth not thereby constitute a Pastor over himself nor a Soveraign Pastor over his People for that were to deprive himself of the Civill Power which depending on the opinion men have of their Duty to him and the fear they have of Punishment in another world would depend also on the skill and loyalty of Doctors who are no lesse subject not only to Ambition but also to Ignorance than any other sort of men So that where a stranger hath authority to appoint Teachers it is given him by the Soveraign in whose Dominions he teacheth Christian Doctors are our Schoolmasters to Christianity But Kings are Fathers of Families and may receive Schoolmasters for their Subjects from the recommendation of a stranger but not from the command especially when the ill teaching them shall redound to the great and manifest profit of him that recommends them nor can they be obliged to retain them longer than it is for the Publique good the care of which they stand so long charged withall as they retain any other essentiall Right of the Soveraignty If a man therefore should ask a Pastor in the execution of his Office as the chief Priests and Elders of the people Mat. 21. 23. asked our Saviour By what authority dost thou these things and who gave thee this authority he can make no other just Answer but that he doth it by the Authority of the Common-wealth given him by the King or Assembly that representeth it All Pastors except the Supreme execute their charges in the Right that is by the Authority of the Civill Soveraign that is Iure Civili But the King and every other Soveraign executeth his Office of Supreme Pastor by immediate Authority from God that is to say in Gods Right or Iure Divino And therefore none but Kings can put into their Titles a mark of their submission to God onely Dei gratiâ Rex c. Bishops ought to say in the beginning of their Mandates By the favour of the Kings Majesty Bishop of such a Diocesse or as Civill Ministers In his Majesties Name For in saying Divinâ providentiâ which is the same with Dei gratiâ though disguised they deny to have received their authority from the Civill State and sliely slip off the Collar of their Civill Subjection contrary to the unity and defence of the Common-wealth But if every Christian Soveraign be the Supreme Pastor of his own Subjects it seemeth that he hath also the Authority not only to Preach which perhaps no man will deny but also to Baptize and to Administer the Sacrament of the Lords Supper and to Consecrate both Temples and Pastors to Gods service which most men deny partly because they use not to do it and partly because the Administration of Sacraments and Consecration of Persons and Places to holy uses requireth the Imposition of such mens hands as by the like Imposition successively from the time of the Apostles have been ordained to the like Ministery For proof therefore that Christian Kings have power to Baptize and to Consecrate I am to render a reason both why they use not to doe it and how without the ordinary ceremony of Imposition of hands they are made capable of doing it when they will There is no doubt but any King in case he were skilfull in the Sciences might by the same Right of his Office read Lectures of them himself by which he authorizeth others to read them in the Universities Neverthelesse because the care of the summe of the businesse of the Common-wealth taketh up his whole time it were not convenient for him to apply himself in Person to that particular A King may also if he please sit in Judgment to hear and determine all manner of Causes as well as give others authority to doe it in his name but that the charge that lyeth upon him of Command and Government constrain him to bee continually at the Helm and to commit the Ministeriall Offices to others under him In the like manner our Saviour who surely had
Laws if any else can make a Law besides himselfe all Common-wealth and consequently all Peace and Justice must cease which is contrary to all Laws both Divine and Humane Nothing therefore can be drawn from these or any other places of Scripture to prove the Decrees of the Pope where he has not also the Civill Soveraignty to be Laws The last point hee would prove is this That our Saviour Christ has committed Ecclesiasticall Iurisdiction immediately to none but the Pope Wherein he handleth not the Question of Supremacy between the Pope and Christian Kings but between the Pope and other Bishops And first he sayes it is agreed that the Jurisdiction of Bishops is at least in the generall de Iure Divino that is in the Right of God for which he alledges S. Paul Ephes. 4. 11. where hee sayes that Christ after his Ascension into heaven gave gifts to men some Apostles some Prophets and some Evangelists and some Pastors and some Teachers And thence inferres they have indeed their Jurisdiction in Gods Right but will not grant they have it immediately from God but derived through the Pope But if a man may be said to have his Jurisdiction de Jure Divino and yet not immediately what lawfull Jurisdiction though but Civill is there in a Christian Common-wealth that is not also de Jure Divino For Christian Kings have their Civill Power from God immediately and the Magistrates under him exercise their severall charges in vertue of his Commission wherein that which they doe is no lesse de Jure Divino mediato than that which the Bishops doe in vertue of the Popes Ordination All lawfull Power is of God immediately in the Supreme Governour and mediately in those that have Authority under him So that either hee must grant every Constable in the State to hold his Office in the Right of God or he must not hold that any Bishop holds his so besides the Pope himselfe But this whole Dispute whether Christ left the Jurisdiction to the Pope onely or to other Bishops also if considered out of those places where the Pope has the Civill Soveraignty is a contention de lana Caprina For none of them where they are not Soveraigns has any Jurisdiction at all For Jurisdiction is the Power of hearing and determining Causes between man and man and can belong to none but him that hath the Power to prescribe the Rules of Right and Wrong that is to make Laws and with the Sword of Justice to compell men to obey his Decisions pronounced either by himself or by the Judges he ordaineth thereunto which none can lawfully do but the Civill Soveraign Therefore when he alledgeth out of the 6 of Luke that our Saviour called his Disciples together and chose twelve of them which he named Apostles he proveth that he Elected them all except Matthias Paul and Barnabas and gave them Power and Command to Preach but not to Judge of Causes between man and man for that is a Power which he refused to take upon himselfe saying Who made me a Iudge or a Divider amongst you and in another place My Kingdome is not of this world But hee that hath not the Power to hear and determine Causes between man and man cannot be said to have any Jurisdiction at all And yet this hinders not but that our Saviour gave them Power to Preach and Baptize in all parts of the world supposing they were not by their own lawfull Soveraign forbidden For to our own Soveraigns Christ himself and his Apostles have in sundry places expressely commanded us in all things to be obedient The arguments by which he would prove that Bishops receive their Jurisdiction from the Pope seeing the Pope in the Dominions of other Princes hath no Jurisdiction himself are all in vain Yet because they prove on the contrary that all Bishops receive Jurisdiction when they have it from their Civill Soveraigns I will not omit the recitall of them The first is from Numbers 11. where Moses not being able alone to undergoe the whole burthen of administring the affairs of the People of Israel God commanded him to choose Seventy Elders and took part of the spirit of Moses to put it upon those Seventy Elders by which is understood not that God weakned the spirit of Moses for that had not eased him at all but that they had all of them their authority from him wherein he doth truly and ingenuously interpret that place But seeing Moses had the entire Soveraignty in the Common-wealth of the Jews it is manifest that it is thereby signified that they had their Authority from the Civill Soveraign and therefore that place proveth that Bishops in every Christian Common-wealth have their Authority from the Civill Soveraign and from the Pope in his own Territories only and not in the Territories of any other State The second argument is from the nature of Monarchy wherein all Authority is in one Man and in others by derivation from him But the Government of the Church he says is Monarchicall This also makes for Christian Monarchs For they are really Monarchs of their own people that is of their own Church for the Church is the same thing with a Christian people whereas the Power of the Pope though hee were S. Peter is neither Monarchy nor hath any thing of Archicall nor Craticall but onely of Didacticall For God accepteth not a forced but a willing obedience The third is from that the Sea of S. Peter is called by S. Cyprian the Head the Source the Roote the Sun from whence the Authority of Bishops is derived But by the Law of Nature which is a better Principle of Right and Wrong than the word of any Doctor that is but a man the Civill Soveraign in every Common-wealth is the Head the Source the Root and the Sun from which all Jurisdiction is derived And therefore the Jurisdiction of Bishops is derived from the Civill Soveraign The fourth is taken from the Inequality of their Jurisdictions For if God saith he had given it them immediately he had given aswell Equality of Jurisdiction as of Order But wee see some are Bishops but of own Town some of a hundred Towns and some of many whole Provinces which differences were not determined by the command of God their Jurisdiction therefore is not of God but of Man and one has a greater another a lesse as it pleaseth the Prince of the Church Which argument if he had proved before that the Pope had had an Universall Jurisdiction over all Christians had been for his purpose But seeing that hath not been proved and that it is notoriously known the large Jurisdiction of the Pope was given him by those that had it that is by the Emperours of Rome for the Patriarch of Constantinople upon the same title namely of being Bishop of the Capitall City of the Empire and Seat of the Emperour claimed to be equall to him it followeth that all other Bishops
Article Iesus is the Christ. The summe of St. Matthews Gospell is this That Jesus was of the stock of David Born of a Virgin which are the Marks of the true Christ That the Magi came to worship him as King of the Jews That Herod for the same cause sought to kill him That John Baptist proclaimed him That he preached by himselfe and his Apostles that he was that King That he taught the Law not as a Scribe but as a man of Authority That he cured diseases by his Word onely and did many other Miracles which were foretold the Christ should doe That he was saluted King when hee entred into Jerusalem That he fore-warned them to beware of all others that should pretend to be Christ That he was taken accused and put to death for saying hee was King That the cause of his condemnation written on the Crosse was JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEVVES All which tend to no other end than this that men should beleeve that Iesus is the Christ. Such therefore was the Scope of St. Matthews Gospel But the Scope of all the Evangelists as may appear by reading them was the same Therefore the Scope of the whole Gospell was the establishing of that onely Article And St. John expressely makes it his conclusion Iohn 20. 31. These things are written that you may know that Iesus is the Christ the Son of the living God My second Argument is taken from the Subject of the Sermons of the Apostles both whilest our Saviour lived on earth aud after his Ascension The Apostles in our Saviours time were sent Luke 9. 2. to Preach the Kingdome of God For neither there nor Mat. 10. 7. giveth he any Commission to them other than this As ye go Preach saying the Kingdome of Heaven is at hand that is that Iesus is the Messiah the Christ the King which was to come That their Preaching also after his ascension was the same is manifest out of Acts 17. 6. They drew saith St. Luke Iason and certain Brethren unto the Rulers of the City crying These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also whom Iason hath received And these all do contrary to the Decrees of Caesar saying that there is another King one Iesus And out of the 2. 3. verses of the same Chapter where it is said that St. Paul as his manner was went in unto them and three Sabbath dayes reasoned with them out of the Scriptures opening and alledging that Christ must needs have suffered and risen againe from the dead and that this Iesus whom hee preached is Christ. The third Argument is from those places of Scripture by which all the Faith required to Salvation is declared to be Easie. For if an inward assent of the mind to all the Doctrines concerning Christian Faith now taught whereof the greatest part are disputed were necessary to Salvation there would be nothing in the world so hard as to be a Christian. The Thief upon the Crosse though repenting could not have been saved for saying Lord remember me when thou commest into thy Kinâ—…dome by which he testified no beleefe of any other Article but this That Iesus was the King Nor could it bee said as it is Mat. 11. 30. that Christs yoke is Easy and his burthen Light Nor that Little Children beleeve in him as it is Matth. 18. 6. Nor could St. Paul have said 1 Cor. 1. 21. It pleased God by the Foolishnesse of preaching to save them that beleeve Nor could St. Paul himself have been saved much lesse have been so great a Doctor of the Church so suddenly that never perhaps thought of Transubstantiation nor Purgatory nor many other Articles now obtruded The fourth Argument is taken from places expresse and such as receive no controversie of Interpretation as first Iohn 5. 39. Search the Scriptures for in them yee thinke yee have eternall life and they are they that testifie of mee Our Saviour here speaketh of the Scriptures onely of the Old Testament for the Jews at that time could not search the Scriptures of the New Testament which were not written But the Old Testament hath nothing of Christ but the Markes by which men might know him when hee came as that he should descend from David be born at Bethlem and of a Virgin doe great Miracles and the like Therefore to beleeve that this Jesus was He was sufficient to eternall life but more than sufficient is not Necessary and consequently no other Article is required Again Iohn 11. 26. Whosoever liveth and beleeveth in mee shall not die eternally Therefore to beleeve in Christ is faith sufficient to eternall life and consequently no more faith than that is Necessary But to beleeve in Jesus and to beleeve that Jesus is the Christ is all one as appeareth in the verses immediately following For when our Saviour verse 26. had said to Martha Beleevest thou this she answereth verse 27. Yea Lord I beleeve that thou art the Christ the Son of God which should come into the world Therefore this Article alone is faith sufficient to life eternall and more than sufficient is not Necessary Thirdly Iohn 20. 31. These things are written that yee might beleeve that Iesus is the Christ the Son of God and that beleeving yee might have life through his name There to beleeve that Iesus is the Christ is faith sufficient to the obtaining of life and therefore no other Article is Necessary Fourthly 1 Iohn 4. 2. Every spirit that confesseth that Iesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God And 1 Ioh. 5. 1. Whosoever beleeveth that Iesus is the Christ is born of God And verse 5. Who is hee that overcommeth the world but he that beleeveth that Iesus is the Son of God Fiftly Act. 8. ver 36 37. See saith the Eunuch here is water what doth hinder me to be baptized And Philip said If thou beleevest with all thy heart thou mayst And hee answered and said I beleeve that Iesus Christ is the Son of God Therefore this Article beleeved Iesus is the Christ is sufficient to Baptisme that is to say to our Reception into the Kingdome of God and by consequence onely Necessary And generally in all places where our Saviour saith to any man Thy faith hath saved thee the caâ—…se he saith it is some Confession which directly or by consequence implyeth a beleef that Jesus is the Christ. The last Argument is from the places where this Article is made the Foundation of Faith For he that holdeth the Foundation shall bee saved Which places are first Mat. 24. 23. If any man shall say unto you Loe here is Christ or there beleeve it not for there shall arise false Christs and false Prophets and shall shew great signes and wonders c. Here wee see this Article Jesus is the Christ must bee held though hee that shall teach the contrary should doe great miracles The second place is Gal. 1. 8. Though
single Texts without considering the main Designe can derive no thing from them cleerly but rather by casting atomes of Scripture as dust before mens eyes make every thing more obscure than it is an ordinary artifice of those that seek not the truth but their own advantage OF THE KINGDOME OF DARKNESSE CHAP. XLIV Of Spirituall Darknesse from MISINTERPRETATION of Scripture BEsides these Soveraign Powers Divine and Humane of which I have hitherto discoursed there is mention in Scripture of another Power namely that of the Rulers of the Darknesse of this world the Kingdome of Sâ—…tan and the Princpality of 〈◊〉 over Daemons that is to say over Phantasmes that appear in the Air For which cause Satan is also called the Prince of the Power of the Air and because he ruleth in the darknesse of this world The Prince of this world And in consequence hereunto they who are under his Dominion in opposition to the faithfull who are the Children of the Light are called the Children of Darknesse For seeing Beelzebub is Prince of Phantasmes Inhabitants of his Dominion of Air and Darknesse the Children of Darknesse and these Daemons Phantasmes or Spirits of Illusion signifie allegorically the same thing This considered the Kingdome of Darknesse as it is set forth in these and other places of the Scripture is nothing else but a Confederacy of Deceâ—…vers that to obtain doâ—… over men in this present world endeavour by dark and erroneons Doctrines to extinguish in them the Light both of Nature and of the Gospell and so to dis-prepare them for the Kingdome of God to coâ—… As men that are utterly deprived from their Nativity of the light of the bodily Eye have no Idea at all of any such light and no man conceives in his imagination any greater light than he hath at some time or other perceived by his outward Senses so also is it of the light of the Gospel and of the light of the Understanding that no man can conceive there is any greater degree of it than that which he hath already attained unto And from hence it comes to passe that men have no other means to acknowledge their owne Darknesse but onely by reasoning from the un-foreseen mischances that befall them in their ways The Darkest part of the Kingdom of Satan is that which is without the Church of God that is to say amongst them that beleeve not in Jesus Christ. But we cannot say that therefore the Church enjoyeth as the land of Goshen all the light which to the performance of the work enjoined us by God is necessary Whence comes it that in Christendome there has been almost from the time of the Apostles such justling of one another out of their places both by forraign and Civill war such stumbling at every little asperity of their own fortune and every little eminence of that of other men and such diversity of ways in running to the same mark Felicity if it be not Night amongst us or at least a Mist wee are therefore yet in the Dark The Enemy has been here in the Night of our naturall Ignorance and sown the tares of Spirituall Errors and that First by abusing and putting out the light of the Scriptures For we erre not knowing the Scriptures Secondly by introducing the Daemonology of the Heathen Poets that is to say their fabulous Doctrine concerning Daemons which are but Idols or Phantasms of the braine without any reall nature of their own distinct from humane fancy such as are dead mens Ghosts and Fairies and other matter of old Wives tales Thirdly by mixing with the Scripture divers reliques of the Religion and much of the vain and erroneous Philosophy of the Greeks especially of Aristotle Fourthly by mingling with both these false or uncertain Traditions and fained or uncertain History And so we come to erre by giving heed to seducing Spirits and the Daemonology of such as speak lies in Hypocrisie or as it is in the Originall 1 Tim. 4. 1 2. of those that play the part of lyars with a seared conscience that is contrary to their own knowledge Concerning the first of these which is the Seducing of men by abuse of Scripture I intend to speak briefly in this Chapter The greatest and main abuse of Scripture and to which almost all the rest are either consequent or subservient is the wresting of it to prove that the Kingdome of God mentioned so often in the Scripture is the present Church or multitude of Christian men now living or that being dead are to rise again at the last day whereas the Kingdome of God was first instituted by the Ministery of Moses over the Jews onely who were therefore called his Peculiar People and ceased afterward in the election of Saul when they refused to be governed by God any more and demanded a King after the manner of the nations which God himself consented unto as I have more at large proved before in the 35. Chapter After that time there was no other Kingdome of God in the world by any Pact or otherwise than he ever was is and shall be King of all men and of all creatures as governing according to his Will by his infinite Power Neverthelesse he promised by his Prophets to restore this his Government to them again when the time he hath in his secret counsell appointed for it shall bee fully come and when they shall turn unto him by repentance and amendment of life and not onely so but he invited also the Gentiles to come in and enjoy the happinesse of his Reign on the same conditions of conversion and repentance and hee promised also to send his Son into the world to expiate the sins of them all by his death and to prepare them by his Doctrine to receive him at his second coming Which second coming not yet being the Kingdome of God is not yet come and wee are not now under any other Kings by Pact but our Civill Soveraigns saving onely that Christian men are already in the Kingdome of Grace in as much as they have already the Promise of being received at his comming againe Consequent to this Errour that the present Church is Christs Kingdome there ought to be some one Man or Assembly by whose mouth our Saviour now in heaven speaketh giveth law and which representeth his Person to all Christians or divers Men or divers Assemblies that doe the same to divers parts of Christendome This power Regal under Christ being challenged universally by the Pope and in particular Common-wealths by Assemblies of the Pastors of the place when the Scripture gives it to none but to Civill Soveraigns comes to be so passionately disputed that it putteth out the Light of Nature and causeth so great a Darknesse in mens understanding that they see not who it is to whom they have engaged their obedience Consequent to this claim of the Pope to Vicar Generall of Christ in the present
at his comming again gloriously to reign over his Elect and to save them from their Enemies eternally To which the opinion of Possession by Spirits or Phantasmes are no impediment in the way though it be to some an occasion of going out of the way and to follow their own Inventions If wee require of the Scripture an account of all questions which may be raised to trouble us in the performance of Gods commands we may as well complaine of Moses for not having set downe the time of the creation of such Spirits as well as of the Creation of the Earth and Sea and of Men and Beasts To conclude I find in Scripture that there be Angels and Spirits good and evill but not that they are Incorporeall as are the Apparitions men see in the Dark or in a Dream or Vision which the Latines call Spectra and took for Daemons And I find that there are Spirits Corporeall though subtile and Invisible but not that any mans body was possessed or inhabited by them And that the Bodies of the Saints shall be such namely Spirituall Bodies as St. Paul calls them Neverthelesse the contrary Doctrine namely that there be Incorporeall Spirits hath hitherto so prevailed in the Church that the use of Exorcisme that is to say of ejection of Devills by Conjuration is thereupon built and though rarely and faintly practised is not yet totally given over That there were many Daemoniaques in the Primitive Church and few Mad-men and other such singular diseases whereas in these times we hear of and see many Mad-men and few Daemoniaques proceeds not from the change of Nature but of Names But how it comes to passe that whereas heretofore the Apostles and after them for a time the Pastors of the Church did cure those singular Diseases which now they are not seen to doe as likewise why it is not in the power of every true Beleever now to doe all that the Faithfull did then that is to say as we read Mark 16. 17. In Christs name to cast out Devills to speak with new Tongues to take up Serpents to drink deadly Poison without harm taking and to cure the Sick by the laying on of their hands and all this without other words but in the Name of Iesus is another question And it is probable that those extraordinary gifts were given to the Church for no longer a time than men trusted wholly to Christ and looked for their felicity onely in his Kingdome to come and consequently that when they sought Authority and Riches and trusted to their own Subtilty for a Kingdome of this world these supernaturall gifts of God were again taken from them Another relique of Gentilisme is the Worship of Images neither instituted by Moses in the Old nor by Christ in the New Testament nor yet brought in from the Gentiles but left amongst them after they had given their names to Christ. Before our Saviour preached it was the generall Religion of the Gentiles to worship for Gods those Apparences that remain in the Brain from the impression of externall Bodies upon the organs of their Senses which are commonly called Ideas Idols Phantasmes Conceits as being Representations of those externall Bodies which cause them and have nothing in them of reality no more than there is in the things that seem to stand before us in a Dream And this is the reason why St. Paul says Wee know that an Idol is Nothing Not that he thought that an Image of Metall Stone or Wood was nothing but that the thing which they honored or feared in the Image and held for a God was a meer Figment without place habitation motion or existence but in the motions of the Brain And the worship of these with Divine Honour is that which is in the Scripture called Idolatry and Rebellion against God For God being King of the Jews and his Lieutenant being first Moses and afterward the High Priest if the people had been permitted to worship and pray to Images which are Representations of their own Fancies they had had no farther dependence on the true God of whom their can be no similitude nor on his prime Ministers Moses and the High Priests but every man had governed himself according to his own appetite to the utter eversion of the Common-wealth and their own destruction for want of Union And therefore the first Law of God was They should not take for Gods ALIENOS DEOS that is the Gods of other nations but that onely true God who vouchsafed to commune with Moses and by him to give them laws and directions for their peace and for their salvation from their enemies And the second was that they should not make to themselves any Image to Worship of their own Invention For it is the same deposing of a King to submit to another King whether he be set up by a neighbour nation or by our selves The places of Scripture pretended to countenance the setting up of Images to worship them or to set them up at all in the places where God is worshipped are First two Examples one of the Cherubins over the Ark of God the other of the Brazen Serpent Secondly some texts whereby we are commanded to worship certain Creatures for their relation to God as to worship his Footstool And lastly some other texts by which is authorized a religious honoring of Holy things But before I examine the force of those places to prove that which is pretended I must first explain what is to be understood by Worshipping and what by Images and Idols I have already shewn in the 20 Chapter of this Discourse that to Honor is to value highly the Power of any person and that such value is measured by our comparing him with others But because there is nothing to be compared with God in Power we Honor him not but Dishonour him by any Value lesse than Infinite And thus Honor is properly of its own nature secret and internall in the heart But the inward thoughts of men which appeare outwardly in their words and actions are the signes of our Honoring and these goe by the name of WORSHIP in Latine CULTUS Therefore to Pray to to Swear by to Obey to bee Diligent and Officious in Serving in summe all words and actions that betoken Fear to Offend or Desire to Please is Worship whether those words and actions be sincere or feigned and because they appear as signes of Honoring are ordinarily also called Honor. The Worship we exhibite to those we esteem to be but men as to Kings and men in Authority is Civill Worship But the worship we exhibite to that which we think to bee God whatsoever the words ceremonies gestures or other actions be is Divine VVorship To fall prostrate before a King in him that thinks him but a Man is but Civill Worship And he that but putteth off his hat in the Church for this cause that he thinketh it the House of
if one being no Pastor nor of eminent reputation for knowledge in Christian Doctrine doe the same and another follow him this is no Scandall given for he had no cause to follow such example but is a pretence of Scandall which hee taketh of himselfe for an excuse before mâ—…n For an unlearned man that is in the power of an Idolatrous King or State if commanded on pain of death to worship before an Idoll hee detesteth the Idoll in his heart hee doth well though if he had the fortitude to suffer death rather than worship it he should doe better But if a Pastor who as Christs Messenger has undertaken to teach Christs Doctrine to all nations should doe the same it were not onely a sinfull Scandall in respect of other Christian mens consciences but a perfidious forsaking of his charge The summe of that which I have said hitherto concerning the Worship of Images is this that he that worshippeth in an Image or any Creature either the Matter thereof or any Fancy of his own which he thinketh to dwell in it or both together or beleeveth that such things hear his Prayers or see his Devotions without Ears or Eyes committeth Idolatry and he that counterfeiteth such Worship for fear of punishment if he bee a man whose example hath power amongst his Brethren committeth a sin But he that worshippeth the Creator of the world before such an Image or in such a place as he hath not made or chosen of himselfe but taken from the commandement of Gods Word as the Jewes did in worshipping God before the Cherubins and before the Brazen Serpent for a time and in or towards the Temple of Jerusalem which was also but for a time committeth not Idolatry Now for the Worship of Saints and Images and Reliques and other things at this day practised in the Church of Rome I say they are not allowed by the Word of God nor brought into the Church of Rome from the Doctrine there taught but partly left in it at the first conversion of the Gentiles and afterwards countenanced and confirmed and augmented by the Bishops of Rome As for the proofs alledged out of Scripture namely those examples of Images appointed by God to bee set up They were not set up for the people or any man to worship but that they should worship God himselfe before them as before the Cherubins over the Ark and the Brazen Serpent For we read not that the Priest or any other did worship the Cherubins but contrarily wee read 2 Kings 18.4 that Hezekiah brake in pieces the Brazen Serpent which Moses had set up because the People burnt incense to it Besides those examples are not put for our Imitation that we also should set up Images under pretence of worshipping God before them because the words of the second Commandement Thou shalt not make to thy selfe any graven Image c. distinguish between the Images that God commanded to be set up and those which wee set up to our selves And therefore from the Cherubins or Brazen Serpent to the Images of mans devising and from the Worship commanded by Godâ—… to the Willâ—… Worship of men the argument is not good This also is to bee considered that as Hezekiah brake in pieces the Brazen Serpent because the Jews did worship it to the end they should doe so no more so also Christian Soveraigns ought to break down the Images which their Subjects have been accustomed to worship that there be no more occasion of such Idolatry For at this day the ignorant People where Images are worshipped doe really beleeve there is a Divine Power in the Images and are told by their Pastors that some of them have spoken and have bled and that miracles have been done by them which they apprehend as done by the Saint which they think either is the Image it self or in it The Israelites when they worshipped the Calfe did think they worshipped the God that brought them out of Egypt and yet it was Idolatry because they thought the Calfe either was that God or had him in his belly And though some man may think it impossible for people to be so stupid as to think the Image to be God or a Saint or to worship it in that notion yet it is manifest in Scripture to the contrary where when the Golden Calfe was made the people said These are thy Gods O Israel and where the Images of Laban are called his Gods And wee see daily by experience in all sorts of People that such men as study nothing but their food and ease are content to beleeve any absurdity rather than to trouble themselves to examine it holding their faith as it were by entaile unalienable except by an expresse and new Law But they inferre from some other places that it is lawfull to paint Angels and also God himselfe as from Gods walking in the Garden from Jacobs seeing God at the top of the ladder and from other Visions and Dreams But Visions and Dreams whether naturall or snpernaturall are but Phantasmes and he that painteth an Image of any of them maketh not an Image of God but of his own Phantasm which is making of an Idol I say not that to draw a Picture after a fancy is a Sin but when it is drawn to hold it for a Representation of God is against the second Commandement and can be of no use but to worship And the same may be said of the Images of Angels and of men dead unlesse as Monuments of friends or of men worthy remembrance For such use of an Image is not Worship of the Image but a civill honoring of the Person not that is but that was But when it is done to the Image which we make of a Saint for no other reason but that we think he heareth our prayers and is pleased with the honour wee doe him when dead and without sense wee attribute to him more than humane power and therefore it is Idolatry Seeing therefore there is no authority neither in the Law of Moses nor in the Gospel for the religious Worship of Images or other Representations of God which men set up to themselves or for the Worship of the Image of any Creature in Heaven or Earth or under the Earth And whereas Christian Kings who are living Representants of God are not to be worshipped by their Subjects by any act that signifieth a greater esteem of his power than the nature of mortall man is capable of It cannot be imagined that the Religious Worship now in use was brought into the Church by misunderstanding of the Scripture It resteth therefore that it was left in it by not destroying the Images themselves in the conversion of the Gentiles that worshipped them The cause whereof was the immoderate esteem and prices set upon the workmanship of them which made the owners though converted from worshipping them as they had done Religiously for Daemons to retain them still in their
equally applicable to any difficulty whatsoever For the meaning of Eternity they will not have it to be an Endlesse Succession of Time for then they should not be able to render a reason how Gods Will and Praeordaining of things to come should not be before his Praescience of the same as the Efficient Cause before the Effect or Agent before the Action nor of many other their bold opinions concerning the Incomprehensible Nature of God But they will teach us that Eternity is the Standing still of the Present Time a Nunc-stans as the Schools call it which neither they nor any else understand no more than they would a Hic-stans for an Infinite greatnesse of Place And whereas men divide a Body in their thought by numbring parts of it and in numbring those parts number also the parts of the Place it filled it cannot be but in making many parts wee make also many places of those parts whereby there cannot bee conceived in the mind of any man more or fewer parts than there are places for yet they will have us beleeve that by the Almighty power of God one body may be at one and the same time in many places and many bodies at one and the same time in one place as if it were an acknowledgment of the Divine Power to say that which is is not or that which has been has not been And these are but a small part of the Incongruities they are forced to from their disputing Philosophically in stead of admiring and adoring of the Divine and Incomprehensible Nature whose Attributes cannot signifie what he is but ought to signifie our desire to honour him with the best Appellations we can think on But they that venture to reason of his Nature from these Attributes of Honour losing their understanding in the very first attempt fall from one Inconvenience into another without end and without number in the same manner as when a man ignorant of the Ceremonies of Court comming into the presence of a greater Person than he is used to speak to and stumbling at his entrance to save himselfe from falling le ts slip his Cloake to recover his Cloake le ts fall his Hat and with one disorder after another discovers his astonishment and rusticity Then for Physiques that is the knowledge of the subordinate and secundary causes of naturall events they render none at all but empty words If you desire to know why some kind of bodies sink naturally downwards toward the Earth and others goe naturally from it The Schools will tell you out of Aristotle that the bodies that sink downwards are Heavy and that this Heavinesse is it that causes them to descend But if you ask what they mean by Heavinesse they will define it to bee an endeavour to goe to the center of the Earth so that the cause why things sink downward is an Endeavour to be below which is as much as to say that bodies descend or ascend because they doe Or they will tell you the center of the Earth is the place of Rest and Conservation for Heavy things and therefore they endeavour to be there As if Stones and Metalls had a desire or could discern the place they would bee at as Man does or loved Rest as Man does not or that a peece of Glasse were lesse safe in the Window than falling into the Street If we would know why the same Body seems greater without adding to it one time than another they say when it seems lesse it is Condensed when greater Rarefied What is that Condensed and Rarefied Condensed is when there is in the very same Matter lesse Quantity than before and Rarefied when more As if there could be Matter that had not some determined Quantity when Quantity is nothing else but the Determination of Matter that is to say of Body by which we say one Body is greater or lesser than another by thus or thus much Or as if a Body were made without any Quantity at all and that afterwards more or lesse were put into it according as it is intended the Body should be more or lesse Dense For the cause of the Soule of Man they say Creatur Infundendo and Creando Infunditur that is It is Created by Powring it in and Powred in by Creation For the Cause of Sense an ubiquity of Species that is of the Shews or Apparitions of objects which when they be Apparitions to the Eye is Sight when to the Eare Hearing to the Palate Tast to the Nostrill Smelling and to the rest of the Body Feeling For cause of the Will to doe any particular action which is called Volitio they assign the Faculty that is to say the Capacity in generall that men have to will sometimes one thing sometimes another which is called Voluntas making the Power the cause of the Act As if one should assign for cause of the good or evill Acts of men their Ability to doe them And in many occasions they put for cause of Naturall events their own Ignorance but disguised in other words As when they say Fortune is the cause of things contingent that is of things whereof they know no cause And as when they attribute many Effects to occult qualities that is qualities not known to them and therefore also as they thinke to no Man else And to Sympathy Antipathy Antiperistasis Specificall Qualities and other like Termes which signifie neither the Agent that produceth them nor the Operation by which they are produced If such Metaphysiques and Physiques as this be not Vain Philosophy there was never any nor needed St. Paul to give us warning to avoid it And for their Morall and Civill Philosophy it hath the same or greater absurdities If a man doe an action of Injustice that is to say an action contrary to the Law God they say is the prime cause of the Law and also the prime cause of that and all other Actions but no cause at all of the Injustice which is the Inconformity of the Action to the Law This is Vain Philosophy A man might as well say that one man maketh both a streight line and a crooked and another maketh their Incongruity And such is the Philosophy of all men that resolve of their Conclusions before they know their Premises pretending to comprehend that which is Incomprehensible and of Attributes of Honour to make Attributes of Nature as this distinction was made to maintain the Doctrine of Free-Will that is of a Will of man not subject to the Will of God Aristotle and other Heathen Philosophers define Good and Evill by the Appetite of men and well enough as long as we consider them governed every one by his own Law For in the condition of men that have no other Law but their own Appetites there can be no generall Rule of Good and Evill Actions But in a Common-wealth this measure is false Not the Appetite of Private men but
for the future but also an Approbation of all their actions past when there is scarce a Common-wealth in the world whose beginnings can in conscience be justified And because the name of Tyranny signifieth nothing more nor lesse than the name of Soveraignty be it in one or many men saving that they that use the former word are understood to bee angry with them they call Tyrants I think the toleration of a professed hatred of Tyranny is a Toleration of hatred to Common-wealth in generall and another evill seed not differing much from the former For to the Justification of the Cause of a Conqueror the Reproach of the Cause of the Conquered is for the most part necessary but neither of them necessary for the Obligation of the Conquered And thus much I have thought fit to say upon the Review of the first and second part of this Discourse In the 35. Chapter I have sufficiently declared out of the Scripture that in the Common-wealth of the Jewes God himselfe was made the Soveraign by Pact with the People who were therefore called his Peculiar People to distinguish them from the rest of the world over whom God reigned not by their Consent but by his own Power And that in this Kingdome Moses was Gods Lieutenant on Earth and that it was he that told them what Laws God appointed them to be ruled by But I have omitted to set down who were the Officers appointed to doe Execution especially in Capitall Punishments not then thinking it a matter of so necessary consideration as I find it since Wee know that generally in all Common-wealths the Execution of Corporeall Punishments was either put upon the Guards or other Souldiers of the Soveraign Power or given to those in whom want of means contempt of honour and hardnesse of heart concurred to make them sue for such an Office But amongst the Israelites it was a Positive Law of God their Soveraign that he that was convicted of a capitall Crime should be stoned to death by the People and that the Witnesses should cast the first Stone and after the Witnesses then the rest of the People This was a Law that designed who were to be the Executioners but not that any one should throw a Stone at him before Conviction and Sentence where the Congregation was Judge The Witnesses were neverthelesse to be heard before they proceeded to Execution unlesse the Fact were committed in the presence of the Congregation it self or in sight of the lawfull Judges for then there needed no other Witnesses but the Judges themselves Neverthelesse this manner of proceeding being not throughly understood hath given occasion to a dangerous opinion that any man may kill another in some cases by a Right of Zeal as if the Executions done upon Offenders in the Kingdome of God in old time proceeded not from the Soveraign Command but from the Authority of Private Zeal which if we consider the texts that seem to favour it is quite contrary First where the Levites fell upon the People that had made and worshipped the Golden Calfe and slew three thousand of them it was by the Commandement of Moses from the mouth of God as is manifest Exod. 32. 27. And when the Son of a woman of Israel had blasphemed God they that heard it did not kill him but brought him before Moses who put him under custody till God should give Sentence against him as appears Levit. 25. 11 12. Again Numbers 25. 6 7. when Phinehas killed Zimri and Cosbi it was not by right of Private Zeale Their Crime was committed in the sight of the Assembly there needed no Witnesse the Law was known and he the heir apparent to the Soveraignty and which is the principall point the Lawfulnesse of his Act depended wholly upon a subsequent Ratification by Moses whereof he had no cause to doubt And this Presumption of a future Ratification is sometimes necessary to the safety a Common-wealth as in a sudden Rebellion any man that can suppresse it by his own Power in the Countrey where it begins without expresse Law or Commission may lawfully doe it and provide to have it Ratified or Pardoned whilest it is in doing or after it is done Also Numb 35. 30. it is expressely said Whosoever shall kill the Murtherer shall kill him upon the word of Witnesses but Witnesses suppose a formall Judicature and consequently condemn that pretence of Ius Zelotarum The Law of Moses concerning him that enticeth to Idolatry that is to say in the Kingdome of God to a renouncing of his Allegiance Deut. 13. 8. forbids to conceal him and commands the Accuser to cause him to be put to death and to cast the first stone at him but not to kill him before he be Condemned And Deut. 17. ver 4 5 6. the Processe against Idolatry is exactly set down For God there speaketh to the People as Judge and commandeth them when a man is Accused of Idolatry to Enquire diligently of the Fact and finding it true then to Stone him but still the hand of the Witnesse throweth the first stone This is not Private Zeale but Publique Condemnation In like manner when a Father hath a rebellious Son the Law is Deut. 21. 18. that he shall bring him before the Judges of the Town and all the people of the Town shall Stone him Lastly by pretence of these Laws it was that St. Steven was Stoned and not by pretence of Private Zeal for before hee was carried away to Execution he had Pleaded his Cause before the High Priest There is nothing in all this nor in any other part of the Bible to countenance Executions by Private Zeal which being oftentimes but a conjunction of Ignorance and Passion is against both the Justice and Peace of a Common-wealth In the 36. Chapter I have said that it is not declared in what manner God spake supernaturally to Moses Not that he spake not to him sometimes by Dreams and Visions and by a supernaturall Voice as to other Prophets For the manner how he spake unto him from the Mercy-Seat is expressely set down Numbers 7. 89. in these words From that time forward when Moses entred into the Tabernacle of the Congregation to speak with God he heard a Voice which spake unto him from over the Mercy-Seate which is over the Arke of the Testimony from between the Cherubins he spake unto him But it is not declared in what consisted the praeeminence of the manner of Gods speaking to Moses above that of his speaking to other Prophets as to Samuel and to Abraham to whom he also spake by a Voice that is by Vision Unlesse the difference consist in the cleernesse of the Vision For Face to Face and Mouth to Mouth cannot be literally understood of the Infinitenesse and Incomprehensibility of the Divine Nature And as to the whole Doctrine I see not yet but the Principles of it are true and proper and the Ratiocination solid For I ground the Civill Right
Thirst. Aversion Love Hate Contempt Good Evill Pulchrum Turpe Delightfull Profitable 〈◊〉 Unprofitable Delight Displeasure Pleasure Offence Pleasures of sense Pleasures of the Mind Joy Paine Griefe Hope Despaire Feare Courage Anger Confidence Diffidâ—…nce Indignation Benevolence Good Nature Covetousnesse Ambition Pusillanimity Magnanimity Valour Liberality Miserablenesse Kindnesse Naturall Lust. Luxury The passion of Love Jealousie Revengefulnesse Curiosity Religion Superstition True Religion Panique Terrour Admiration Glory Vain-glory. Dejection Sudden Glory Laughter Sudden Dejection Weeping Shame Blushing Impudence Pitty Cruelty Emulation Envy Deliberation The Will Formes of Speech in Passion Good and Evill apparent Felicity Praise Magnification 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Judgement or Sentence â—…inal Doubt Science Opinioâ—… Consciâ—…ce Beliefe Faith Intellectuall Vertue defined Wit Naturall or Acquired Naturall Wit Good Wit or Fancy Good Judgement Discretion Prudence Craft Acquired Wit Giddinesse Madnesse Rage Melancholy Insignificant Speech Power Worth Dignity To Honour and Dishonour Honourable Dishonourable Coats of Armes Titles of Honour Worthinesse Fitnesse What is here meant by Manners A restlesse desire of Power in all men Love of Contention from Competition Civil obedience from love of Ease From feare of Death or Wounds And from love of Arts. Love of Vertue from love Praise Hate from difficulty of Requiting great Benefits And from Conscience of deserving to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Promptnesse to hurt from Fear And from distrufl of their own wit Vain undertaking from Vain-glory. Ambition from opinion of sufficiency Irresolution from too great valuing of small matters Conâ—…idence in others â—…rom Ignorance of the marks of Wisdome and Kindnesse And from Ignorance of naturall causes And from want of Understanding Adhaerence to Custome from Ignorance of the nature of Right and Wrong Adhaerence to private men From ignorance of the Causes of Peace Credulity from Ignorance of nature Curiosity to know from Care of future time Naturall Re ligion from the same Religion in Man onely First from his desire of knowing Causes From the consideration of the Begining of thingâ—… From his observation of the Sequell of things The naturall Cause of Religion the Anxiety of the time to come Which makes them fear the Power of Inuisible things And suppose them Incorporeall But know not the way how they effect any thing But honour them as they honour mâ—…n And attribute to them all extraordinary events Foure things Naturall seeds of Religion Mide different by Culture The absurd opinion of Gentilisme The designes of the Authors of the Religion of the Heathen The true Religion and the lawes of Gods kingdome the same Chap. 35. The causes of Change in Religion Injoyning beleefe of Impossibilities Doing contrary to the Religion they establish Want of the testimony of Miracles * Exod. 32. 1 2. * Judges 2. 11. * 1 Sam. 8. 3. Men by nature Equall From Equâ—…lity proceâ—…ds Diâ—…idence From Diffidence Warre Out of Civil States there is alwayes Warre of every one against every one The Incommodities of such a War In such a Warre nothing is Unjust The Passions that incline men to Peace Right of Nature what Liberty what A Law of Nature what Difference of Right and Law Naturally every man has Right to everything The Fundamentall Law of Nature The seoond Law of Nature What it is to lay down a Right Renouncing a Right what it is Transferring Right what Obligation Duty Injustice Not all Rights are alienable Contract what Covenant what Free-gift Signes of Contract Expresse Signes of Contract by Inference Free gift passeth by words of the Present or Past. Signes of Contract are words both of the Past Present and Future Merit what Covenants of Mutuall trust when Invalid Right to the End Containeth Right to the Means No Covenant with Beasts Nor with God witâ—…out speciall Revelation No Covenant but of Possible and Future Covenants how made voyd Covenants extorted by feare are valide The former Covenant to one makes voyd the later to another A mans Covenant not to defend himselfe is voyd No man obliged to accuse himself The End of an Oath The forme of an Oath No Oath but by God An Oath addes nothing to the Obligation The third Law of Nature Justice Justice and Jnjustice what Justice and Propriety begin with the Constitution of Common-wealth Justice not Contrary to Reason Covenants not discharged by the Vice of the Person to whom they are made Justice of Men Iustice of Actions what Iustice of Manners and Iustice of Actions Nothing done to a man by his own consent can be Injury Justice Commutative and Distributive The fourth Law of Nature Gratitude The fifth Mutuall accommodetion or Compleasance The sixth Facility to Pardon The seventh that in Revenges men respect onely the future good The eighth against Contumely The ninth against 〈◊〉 The tenth against Arrogance The elevâ—…nth Equity The twelfth Equall use of things Common The thirteenth of Lot The fourteenth of Primogeniture and First seising The â—…fteenth of Mediators The sixteenth of Submission to Arbitrement The seventeenth No man is his own Judge The eighteenth no man to be Judge that has in him a natural cause of Partiality The nineteenth of Witnesses A Rule by which the Laws of Nâ—…ture may eâ—…sily be examined The Lawes of Nature oblige inConscience alwayes but in Effect then onely when there is Security The Laws of Nature are Eternal And yet Easie The Science of these Lawes is the true Morall Philosophy A Person what Person Naturall and Artificiall The word Person whence Actor Author Authority Covenants by Authority bind the Author But not the Actor The Authority is to be shewne Things personated Inanimate Irrational False Gods The true God A Multitude of men how one Person Every one is Author An Actor may be Many men made One by Plurâ—…lity of Voyâ—… Representatives when the number is even unprofitable Negativâ—… voyce The End of Commonweâ—…th particular Security Chap. 13. Which is not to be had from the Law of Nature Nor from the conjunction of a few men or familyes Nor from a great Multitude unlesse directed by one judgement And that continually Why certain creatures without reason or speech do neverthelesse live in Society without any câ—…rcive Power The Generation of a Common-wealth The Definition of a Common-wealth Soveraigne and Subjeâ—…t what The act of Instituting a Common-wealth what The Consequences to such Institution are 1. The Subjects cannot change the forme of government 2. Soveraigne Power cannot be forfeited 3 No man can without injustice protest against the Institution of the Soveraigne declared by the major part 4 The Soveraigns Actions cannot be justly accused by the Subject 5. What soever the Soveraigne doth is unpunishable by the Subject 6. The Soveraigne is judge of what is necessary for the Peace and Defence of his Subjects And Iudge of what Doctrines are fit to be taught them 7 The Right of making Rules whereby the Subjects may every man know what is so his owne as no other Subject can without injustice take it from him 8 To
â—…im also belongeth the Right of all Judicature and decision of Controversise 9. And of making War and Peace as he shall think best 10. And of choosing all Counsellours and Ministers both of Peace and Warre 11. And of Rewarding and Punishing and that where no former Law hath determined the measure of it arbitrary 12. And of Honour and Order These Rights are indivisible And can by no Grant passe away without direct renouncing of the Soveraign Power The Power and Honour of Subjects vanisheth in the presence of the Power Soveraign Soveraigne Power not so hurtfull as the want of it and the hurt proceeds for the greatest part from not submitting readily to a lesse The different Formes of Common-wealths but three Tyranny and Oligarchy but different names of Monarchy and Aristocracy Subordinate Representatives dangerous Comparison of Monarchy with Soveraign Assemblyes Of the Right of Succession The present Monarch hath Right to dispose of the Succâ—…ssim Succession passeth by expresse Words Or by not controlling a Custome Or by presumption of naturall affecâ—… To dispose of the Succession though to a King of another Nation not unlawfull A Common-wealth by Acquisition Wherein 〈◊〉 from a Common-wealth by Insâ—…on The Rights of Soveraignty the same in both Dominion Paternall how attained Not by Gâ—…neration but by Contract Or Education Or Precedent subjection of one of the Parents to the other The Right of Succession followeth the Rules of the Right of Possession Despoticall Dominion how attained Not by the Victory but by the Consent of the Vanquished Difference between a Family and a Kingdom The Rights of Monarchy from Scripture * Exod. 20. 19. * Exod. 20. 19. * 1 Sam. 8. 11 12 c. * Verse 10. * 1 Kings 3. 9. * 1 Sam. 24. 9. * Coll. 3. 20. * Verse 22. * Math. 23. 2 3. * Tit. 3. 2. * Mat. 21. 2 3. * Gen. 3 5. Soveraign Power ought in all Common-wealths to be absolute Liberty what What it is to be Free Feare and Liberty consistent Liberty and Necessity Consistent Artificiall Bonds or Covenants Liberty of Subjects consisteth in Liberty from covenants Liberty of the Subject consistent with the unlimited power of the Soveraign The Liberty which writers praise is the Liberty of Soveraigns not of Private men Liberty of Subjects how to be measured Subjects have Liberty to defend their own bodies even against them that lawsully invade them Are not bound to hurt themselves Nor to warfare unlesse they voluntarily undertake it The Greatest Liberty of Subjects dependeth on the Silence of the Law In what Cases Subjects are absolved of their obedience to their Soveraign In case of Captivity In case the Soveraign cast off the government from himself and his Heyrs In case of Banishment In case the Soveraign render himself Subject to another The divers sorts of Systemes of People In all Bodies Politique the power of the Representative is Limited By Letters Patents And the Lawes When the Representative is one man his unwarranted Acts are his own onely When it is an Assembly it is the act of them that assented onely When the Representative is one man if he borrow mony or owe it by Contract he is lyable onely the members not When it is an Assembly they onely are liable that have assented If the debt be to one of the Assembly the Body onely is obliged Protestation against the Decrees of Bodies Politique sometimes lawful but against Soveraign Power never Bodies Politique for Government of a Province Colony or Town Bodies Politique for ordering of Trade A Bodie Politique for Counsel to be given to the Soveraign A Regular Private Body Lawfull as a Family Private Bodies Regular but Unlawfull Systemes Irregular such as are Private Leagues Secret Cabals Feuds of private Families Factions for Government * Acts 19. 40. Publique Minister Who. Ministers for the generall Administration For speciall Administration as for Oecoâ—…my For instruction of the People For Judicature For 〈◊〉 Counsellers without other employment then to Advise are not Publique Ministers The Nourishment of a Common-wealth consisteth in the Commodities of Sea and Land And the right Distribution of them All private Estates of land proceed originally from the Arbitrary Distribution of the Soveraign Propriety of a Subject excludes not the Dominion of the Soveraign but onely of another Subject The Publique is not to be dieted The Places and matter of Traffique depend as their Distribution on the Soveraign The Laws of transferring propriety belong also 〈◊〉 the Soveraign Mony the Bloud of a Common-wealth The Conduits and Way of mony to the Publique use The Children of a Common-wealth Colonies Counsell whaâ—… Differences between Command and Counsell Exhortation and Dehortation what Differennceâ—… of fit and unfit Counsellours Civill Law what The Soveraign is Legistator And not Subject to Civill Law Use a Law not by vertue of Time but of the Soveraigns consent The Law of Nature and the Civill Law contain each other Provinciall Lawes are not made by Custome but by the Soveraign Power Some foolish opinions of Lawyers concerning the making of Lawes Sir Edw. Coke upon Lâ—…tleton Lib. 2. Ch. 6. 〈◊〉 97. b. Law made â—…f not also made known is no Law Unwritten Lawes are all of them Lawes of Nature * Prov. 7. 3. Deut. 11. 19. * Deut. 31. 12. Nothing is Law where the Legislator cannot be known Difference between Verifying and Authorising The Law Verifyed by the subordinate Judge By the Publique Registers By Letters Patent and Publique Seale The Interpretation of the Law dependeth on the Soveraign Power All Lawâ—… need Interpretation The Aâ—…thenticall Interpretation of Law is not that of writers The Interpreter of the Law is the Judge giving sentence vivâ voce in every particular case The Sentence of a Judge does not bind him or another Judge to give like Sentence in like Cases ever after The difference between the Letter and Sentence of the Law The abilities required in a Judge Divisions of Law Another Division of Law Divine Positive Law how made known to be Law Gen. 17. 10. Another division of Lawes A Fundamentall Law what Difference between Law and Right And between a Law and a Charter Sinne what A Crime what Where no Civill Law is there is 〈◊〉 Crime Ignorance of the Law of Nature excuseth no man Ignorance of the Civill Law excuseth sometimes Ignorance of the Soveraign excuseth not Ignorance of the Penalty excuseth not Punishments declared before the Fact excuse from greater punishments after it Nothing can be made a Crime by a Law made after the Fact False Principles of Right and Wrong causes of Crime False Teachers mis-interpreting the Law of Nature And false Inferences from true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Teachers By their Passions Presumption of Riches And FrieÌ„ds Wisedome Hatred Lust Ambition Covetousnesse causes of Crime Fear sometimes cause of Crime as when the danger is neither present nor corporeall Crimes not equall Totall Excuses Excuses against the Author Preseumption of Power aggravateth Evill Teachers Extenuate
contriving their Titles to save the People from the shame of receiving them To have a known Right to Soveraign Power is so popular a quality as he that has it needs no more for his own part to turn the hearts of his Subjects to him but that they see him able absolutely to govern his own Family Nor on the part of his enemies but a disbanding of their Armies For the greatest and most active part of Mankind has never hetherto been well contented with the present Concerning the Offices of one Soveraign to another which are comprehended in that Law which is commonly called the Law of Nations I need not say any thing in this place because the Law of Nations and the Law of Nature is the same thing And every Soveraign hath the same Right in procuring the safety of his People that any particular man can have in procuring the safety of his own Body And the same Law that diâ—…tateth to men that have no Civil Government what they ought to do and what to avoyd in regard of one another dictateth the same to Common-wealths that is to the Consciences of Soveraign Princes and Soveraign Assemblies there being no Court of Naturall Justice but in the Conscience onely where not Man but God raigneth whose Lawes such of them as oblige all Mankind in respect of God as he is the Author of Nature are Naturall and in respect of the same God as he is King of Kings are Lawes But of the Kingdome of God as King of Kings and as King also of a peculiar People I shall speak in the rest of this discourse CHAP. XXXI Of the KINGDOME OF GOD BY NATURE THat the condition of meer Nature that is to say of absolute Liberty such as is theirs that neither are Soveraigns nor Subjects is Anarchy and the condition of Warre That the Praecepts by which men are guided to avoyd that condition are the Lawes of Nature That a Common-wealth without Soveraign Power is but a word without substance and cannot stand That Subjects owe to Soveraigns simple Obedience in all things wherein their obedience is not repugnant to the Lawes of God I have sufficiently proved in that which I have already written There wants onely for the entire knowledge of Civill duty to know what are those Lawes of God For without that a man knows not when he is commanded any thing by the Civill Power whether it be contrary to the â—…aw of God or not and so either by too much civill obedience offends the Divine Majesty or through feare of offending God transgresses the commandements of the Common-wealth To avoyd both these Rocks it is necessary to know what are the Lawes Divine And seeing the knowledge of all Law dependeth on the knowledge of the Soveraign Power I shall say something in that which followeth of the KINGDOME OF GOD. God is King let the Earth rejoyce saith the Psalmist And again God is King though the Nations be angry and he that sitteth on the Cherubins though the earth be moved Whether men will or not they must be subject alwayes to the Divine Power By denying the Existence or Providence of God men may shake off their Ease but not their Yoke But to call this Power of God which extendeth it selfe not onely to Man but also to Beasts and Plants and Bodies inanimate by the name of Kingdome is but a metaphoricall use of the word For he onely is properly said to Raigne that governs his Subjects by his Word and by promise of Rewards to those that obey it and by threatning them with Punishment that obey it not Subjects therefore in the Kingdome of God are not Bodies Inanimate nor creatures Irrationall because they understand no Precepts as his Nor Atheists nor they that believe not that God has any care of the actions of mankind because they acknowledge no Word for his nor have hope of his rewards or fear of his threatnings They therefore that believe there is a God that goeverneth the world and hath given Praecepts and propounded Rewards and Punishments to Mankind are Gods Subjects all the rest are to be understood as Enemies To rule by Words requires that such Words be manifestly made known for else they are no Lawes For to the nature of Lawes belongeth a sufficient and clear Promulgation such as may take away the excuse of Ignorance which in the Lawes of men is but of one onely kind and that is Proclamation or Promulgation by the voyce of man But God declareth his Lawes three wayes by the Dictates of Naturall Reason by Revelation and by the Voyce of some man to whom by the operation of Miracles he procureth credit with the rest From hence there ariseth a triple Word of God Rational Sensible and Prophetique to which Correspondeth a triple Hearing Right Reason Sense Supernaturall and Faith As for Sense Supernaturall which consisteth in Revelation or Inspiration there have not been any Universall Lawes so given because God speaketh not in that manner but to particular persons and to divers men divers things From the difference between the other two kinds of Gods Word Rationall and Prophetique there may be attributed to God a twofold Kingdome Naturall and Prophetique Naturall wherein he governeth as many of Mankind as acknowledge his Providence by the naturall Dictates of Right Reason And Prophetique wherein having chosen out one peculiar Nation the Jewes for his Subjects he governed them and none but them not onely by naturall Reason but by Positive Lawes which he gave them by the mouths of his holy Prophets Of the Naturall Kingdome of God I intend to speak in this Chapter The Right of Nature whereby God reigneth over men and punisheth those that break his Lawes is to be derived not from his Creating them as if he required obedience as of Gratitude for his benefits but from his Irresistible Power I have formerly shewn how the Soveraign Right ariseth from Pact To shew how the same Right may arise from Nature requires no more but to shew in what case it is never taken away Seeing all men by Nature had Right to All things they had Right every one to reigne over all the rest But because this Right could not be obtained by force it concerned the safety of every one laying by that Right to set up men with Soveraign Authority by common consent to rule and defend them whereas if there had been any man of Power Irresistible there had been no reason why he should not by that Power have ruled and defended both himselfe and them according to his own discretion To those therefore whose Power is irresistible the dominion of all men adhaereth naturally by their excellence of Power and consequently it is from that Power that the Kingdome over men and the Right of afflicting men at his pleasure belongeth Naturally to God Almighty not as Creator and Gracious but as Omnipotent And though Punishment be due for Sinne onely because by
power to Baptize Baptized none himselfe but sent his Apostles and Disciples to Baptize So also S. Paul by the necessity of Preaching in divers and far distant places Baptized few Amongst all the Corinthians he Baptized only Crispus Cajus and Stephanus and the reason was because his principall Charge was to Preach Whereby it is manifest that the greater Charge such as is the Government of the Church is a dispensation for the lesse The reason therefore why Christian Kings use not to Baptize is evident and the same for which at this day there are few Baptized by Bishops and by the Pope fewer And as concerning Imposition of Hands whether it be needfull for the authorizing of a King to Baptize and Consecrate we may consider thus Imposition of Hands was a most ancient publique ceremony amongst the Jews by which was designed and made certain the person or other thing intended in a mans prayer blessing sacrifice consecration condemnation or other speech So Jacob in blessing the children of Joseph Gen. 48. 14. Laid his right Hand on Ephraim the younger and his left Hand on Manasseh the first born and this he did wittingly though they were so presented to him by Joseph as he was forced in doing it to stretch out his arms acrosse to design to whom he intended the greater blessing So also in the sacrificing of the Burnt offering Aaron is commanded Exod. 29. 10. to Lay his Hands on the head of the bullock and ver 15. to Lay his Hand on the head of the ramme The same is also said again Levit. 1. 4. 8. 14. Likewise Moses when he ordained Joshua to be Captain of the Israelites that is consecrated him to Gods service Numb 27. 23. Laid his Hands upon him and gave him his Charge designing and rendring certain who it was they were to obey in war And in the consecration of the Levites Numb 8. 10. God commanded that the Children of Israel should Put their Hands upon the Levites And in the condemnation of him that had blasphemed the Lord Levit. 24. 14. God commanded that all that heard him should Lay their Hands on his head and that all the Congregation should stone him And why should they only that heard him Lay their Hands upon him and not rather a Priest Levite or other Minister of Justice but that none else were able to design and demonstrate to the eyes of the Congregation who it was that had blasphemed and ought to die And to design a man or any other thing by the Hand to the Eye is lesse subject to mistake than when it is done to the Eare by a Name And so much was this ceremony observed that in blessing the whole Congregation at once which cannot be done by Laying on of Hands yet Aaron Levit. 9. 22. did lift up his Hand towards the people when he blessed them And we read also of the like ceremony of Consecration of Temples amongst the Heathen as that the Priest laid his Hands on some post of the Temple all the while he was uttering the words of Consecration So naturall it is to design any individuall thing rather by the Hand to assure the Eyes than by Words to inform the Eare in matters of Gods Publique service This ceremony was not therefore new in our Saviours time For Jairus Mark 5. 23. whose daughter was sick besought our Saviour not to heal her but to ay h is Hands upon her that shee might bee healed And Matth. 19. 13. they brought unto him little children that hee should Put his Hands on them and Pray According to this ancient Rite the Apostles and Presbyters and the Presbytery it self Laid Hands on them whom they ordained Pastors and withall prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Ghost and that not only once but sometimes oftner when a new occasion was presented but the end was still the same namely a punctuall and religious designation of the person ordained either to the Pastorall Charge in general or to a particular Mission so Act. 6. 6. The Apostles Prayed and Laid their Hands on the seven Deacons which was done not to give them the Holy Ghost for they were full of the Holy Ghost before they were chosen as appeareth imdiately before verse 3. but to design them to that Office And after Philip the Deacon had converted certain persons in Samaria Peter and John went down Act 8. 17. and Laid their Hands on them and they received the Holy Ghost And not only an Apostle but a Presbyter had this power For S. Paul adviseth Timothy 1 Tim. 5. 22. Lay Hands suddenly on no man that is designe no man rashly to the Office of a Pastor The whole Presbytery Laid their Hands on Timothy as we read 1 Tim. 4. 14. but this is to be understood as that some did it by the appointment of the Presbytery and most likely their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Prolocutor which it may be was St. Paul himself For in his 2 Epist. to Tim. ver 6. he saith to him Stirre up the gift of God which is in thee by the Laying on of my Hands where note by the way that by the Holy Ghost is not meant the third Person in the Trinity but the Gifts necessary to the Pastorall Office We read also that St. Paul had Imposition of Hands twice once from Ananias at Damascus Acts 9. 17 18. at the time of his Baptisme and again Acts 13. 3. at Antioch when he was first sent out to Preach The use then of this ceremony considered in the Ordination of Pastors was to design the Person to whom they gave such Power But if there had been then any Christian that had had the Power of Teaching before the Baptizing of him that is the making him a Christian had given him no new Power but had onely caused him to preach true Doctrine that is to use his Power aright and therefore the Imposition of Hands had been unnecessary Baptisme it selfe had been sufficient But every Soveraign before Christianity had the power of Teaching and Ordaining Teachers and therefore Christianity gave them no new Right but only directed them in the way of teaching Truth and consequently they needed no Imposition of Hands besides that which is done in Baptisme to authorize them to exercise any part of the Pastorall Function as namely to Baptize and Consecrate And in the Old Testament though the Priest only had right to Consecrate during the time that the Soveraignty was in the High Priest yet it was not so when the Soveraignty was in the King For we read 1 Kings 8. That Solomon Blessed the People Consecrated the Temple and pronounced that Publique Prayer which is the pattern now for Consecration of all Christian Churches and Chappels whereby it appears he had not only the right of Ecclesiasticall Government but also of exercising Ecclesiasticall Functions From this consolidation of the Right Politique and Ecclesiastique in Christian Soveraigns it is evident they