AN ESSAY Concerning the POWER of the MAGISTRATE and the Rights of Mankind in Matters of Religion With some Reasons in particular for the Dissenters not being obliged to take the Sacramental Test but in their own Churches and for a General Naturalization Together with a Postscript in Answer to the Letter to a Convocation-Man LONDON Printed by J. D. for Andrew Bell at the Cross-Keys and Bible in Cornhil 1697. THE CONTENTS of the CHAPTERS PART I. Chap. 1. THAT Government is from the People who had a Right to invest the Magistrate with a Power in those Matters of Religion which have an Influence on Humane Societies but not in others that are meerly Religious or have no such Influence Page 1 Chap. 2. That God has not either by the Law of Nature or his positive Law given the Magistrate a Power in Matters meerly Religious Pag. 17 Chap. 3. That a Power in the Magistrate to use Force in Matters of meer Religion tends to Mens Eternal Ruin Pag. 27 Chap. 4. That Compulsion is inconsistent with all those Duties that God for the sake of Mens Temporal Happiness requires of one towards another P. 30 Chap. 5. That the Doctrine of Compulsion is directly contrary to the Honour of God Pag. 47 PART II. Chap. 1. AN Answer to Arguments from Scripture on behalf of Persecution Pag. 68 Chap. 2. Arguments from Humane Authority answered Pag. 78 Chap. 3. Object That Compulsion tends to make People impartially consider examined Pag. 87 Chap. 4. Object That the Magistrate has a Right to use Force to prevent the Increase to those Erroneous Opinions that a Toleration would produce examined Pag. 103 Chap. 5. That all Force upon the Account of meer Religion is inconsistent with the Principles of the Protestant Religion Pag. 117 Chap. 6. Of the Method to destroy not only Schisms and Heresies but Hatred and Vncharitableness amongst Christians notwithstanding their different Opinions Pag. 124 Chap. 7. That the Good of the Society obligeth the Magistrate to hinder different Professions of Religion examined Pag. 144 Chap. 8. Some few Reasons for the Dissenters not taking the Sacramental Test but in their own Churches and for a General Naturalization Pag. 168 Postscript Pag. 176 Errata Page 28. line 5. for Truth read Lawfulness P. 42. l. 12. r. seventy times P. 48. l. ult r. Notion P. 73. l. 21. r. one P. 99. l. 19. r. betrayed him P. 103. l. 22. r. if Force should P. 144. l. 1. r. Chap. VII P. 190. l. 10. r. creating An ESSAY Concerning the Power of the MAGISTRATE c. CHAP. I. That Government is from the People who had a right to invest the Magistrate with a Power in those Matters of Religion which have an Influence on Humane Societies but not in others that are meerly Religious or have no such Influence 1. A Discourse on this Subject cannot be unseasonable whilst so many instead of shewing their Gratitude to the Government for rescuing them from the apparent Danger of Popish Persecution are so disaffected for being depriv'd of the Power of persecuting their Brethren that they had rather run the risque of the Nation 's being ruined by the French and themselves under Popish Persecution than to be without that Power and for want of it do in their daily invective Discourses and Sermons besides a great many other malicious Insinuations pretend the Church now to be nearer its Ruin than it was in the late Reign I cannot but be sensible I incur a great hazard of exposing my self by writing on a Subject in a manner wholly exhausted by the three incomparable Letters concerning Toleration which yet I had rather do than be wanting in my Endeavours to encourage impartial Liberty and mutual Toleration which instead of ruining is the only way to preserve both Church and State Yet this was not the only Motive that engag'd me in this Design for intending to write concerning what is commonly called Church or Ecclesiastical Power I thought it necessary for the better handling that Subject first to examine the Extent of the Magistrate's Power in Matters of Religion lest the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power should in my Discourse what in the World they frequently do clash one with the other I shall therefore without further prefacing attempt to shew what Power the Magistrate has in Matters of Religion Tho to prevent all occasion of Mistake or Cavil I shall first explain those Terms 2. By the Magistrate I mean the Person or Persons who in every Society have the Supream Power which consists in a Right to make Laws and by Force without which all Laws would be to no purpose to oblige the Unwilling and Disobedient to govern their Actions according to them 3. By Religion I understand the Belief of a God and the Sense and Practice of those Duties which result from the Knowledg we have of him and our selves and the Relation we stand in to him and our fellow Creatures or in short whatever appears to us from any convincing Evidence to be our Duty to believe or practise 4. In things relating to our selves or what is in our disposal any Action is lawful where there is no Law to forbid it But there is more than this required to invest a Man with a Right to deprive others of their natural Freedom and make Laws that in Conscience oblige them Whoever pretends to this must have a Commission either from God or Men but there is no Person that can pretend to have an immediate Commission from God therefore they that lay the Foundation of any Magistrate's Power not on a Humane but a Divine Right destroy all Obligation of Obedience to him for why should I be oblig'd to obey him on the account of a Divine Commission when he can neither show nor ever had any such Commission And there are none of his Subjects but what have as good a Pretence that is just none at all to a Divine Right Therefore since no Man can pretend an immediate Right from Heaven all the Right that one more than another has to command must be the Consent of the Governed either explicitly or implicitly given But it 's said the Powers that be are ordain'd of God which may very fitly and justly be said since they are chosen and appointed by those who had not only a Power from God to chuse them but were absolutely required by the Law of Self-preservation imprinted by God on their Natures to avoid the Inconveniences and Dangers of an unsafe State of Nature by placing the Power of governing them in one or more Hands in such Forms and under such Agreements as they should think fit To suppose the Powers that be to be otherwise from God than as they are the Creatures of the People made by them and for them is not only to contradict St. Peter who calls Government 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Creature or Contrivance of Man but the Experience of all Ages wherein Men have contrived and framed various sorts
for judging for others and punishing them for not acting according to their Judgments are unwilling that others when the Scales of Authority are turned should judg for them in like manner Tho then there 's nothing they can plead for themselves but what before they condemned in others and it would be as ridiculous to request those that they before ill used to have regard to the common Rules of Justice as it would have been in those Scythians who sacrificed all Strangers to their Gods to desire others to have respect to the Laws of Hospitality 5. It may be objected That the Rule of doing as you would be done unto does not hold because one Magistrate is in the Right and the other not and consequently he that is in the Right himself has a Right to judg but not vice versa Answ. But since the Dispute is who is in the Right it 's ridiculous to say he that 's only in the Right has a Power to judg except there were some Superiour to determine which of them is in the Right but there being no such Superiour every Magistrate is to judg for himself who to be sure will judg himself in the Right and consequently those that differ from him in the Wrong And there can be no reason why one Magistrate as well as another has not a Right to judg since that Right is founded in being a Magistrate which is common to them all And there can be no Reason for the Orthodox punishing Schismaticks Hereticks Mahometans Jews Pagans c. but what will equally oblige them as long as they believe themselves to be Orthodox to punish those that really are so Therefore the Defenders of any Persecution are guilty of encouraging and abetting all Persecution whatsoever even that under which themselves suffer since they can frame no Arguments to justify the using Force to promote the true Religion but what will equally serve in behalf of any Religion that 's believed to be true As we find the loose Harangues of Austin upon that Subject are urged by the Patrons of Persecution of what Sect or Denomination soever And since there can be no Argument to prosecute Error but what will be turned upon Truth it self let the Persecutors themselves judg whether it 's not better to leave all such disputable Points to the only just Judg than to take them into their own Hands who were they wholly ignorant in what part of the World their Station was to be would be glad there was no such thing as Persecution rather than run the risque of being persecuted themselves which shows that even they look on it in general as an ill thing and it 's better certainly that a particular Inconvenience supposing Toleration to be such should be permitted than such a Universal Mischief as Persecution is should prevail It 's said do as you would be done unto is not properly a Law to warrant the thing we are about but only a Rule to direct us what Measures we ought to observe in our acting with others when the thing it self is lawful Which granting to be true yet for a Man to judg which is the true Religion and act according to that Judgment all agree is not only lawful but a Duty because all agree themselves are obliged to act so and therefore if I desire this Liberty for my self I ought not to deny it to my Brother seeing he is a Man and I am no more and therefore no more infallible than he and for that reason can have no more Right to persecute him into my Opinion than he has to force me into his for between Equals there ought to be an equal Measure Now by Nature all Men are equal and have an equal and natural Right of serving God as they think best and no accidental Difference as to other Matters can deprive them of this Right In a word there can be no reason to deny the Obligation of this Rule in this Case but what will equally destroy it in any other But 6. Persecution destroys not only natural Equity and Justice but breaks all the Ties of Kindred Blood Gratitude Merit because let a Man be never so nearly related to one of persecuting Principles or have done him all the important Kindnesses imaginable or have never so much Merit be never so useful to the Publick or be never so exemplary in his Life and Conversation that will but the sooner expose him to suffer not only because People are apt to be influenced by such a one but because according to the Persecutor's Principles he is obliged to harass him sooner than another out of pure love to him it being the kindest thing he is capable of doing him So that without a Figure it may justly be said of all Persecutors that their very Mercies and Kindnesses are Cruelties But 7. This is not all this Doctrine of Compulsion annuls all Obligations of the most Sacred Oaths for if the Magistrate is obliged by God to use Force on his dissenting Subjects no Promises to indemnify them tho sworn to with the most solemn Oaths ought to be kept because all such Oaths are void from the beginning the Magistrate being under a prior Obligation to God which is not in his Power to dispense with to punish them which must make all Quarrels between the Magistrate and his dissenting Subjects immortal since there can be no Security given that they shall not be punished for their Religion when-ever it is in the Magistrate's Power and by the same Reason all Articles and Covenants that Towns or Countries make for Liberty of Conscience upon their submitting themselves are null and void and so are all the Promises which Popish Kings have made to their Protestant Subjects because they are obliged to punish Hereticks which they suppose Protestants to be and consequently cannot but think their Oaths unlawful And all our late Laws for Liberty of Conscience are in themselves void because he that has the Power of the Sword is required by God's Laws which no Human Ones can supersede to punish Dissenters from the true Church And if all these Obligations are void in themselves what Reason is there that those between Sovereign and Sovereign should be more firm when either of them judg the breaking them will tend to advance the Honour of God since as they cannot pretend to have so great a tenderness for the Right of Foreigners as of their own Subjects so they cannot but know that God is equally dishonoured by false Religions in one Place as in another And it 's but a poor Zeal for his Honour that looks no farther than such a Lake River or Mountain the usual Boundaries of Kingdoms which would be the way to set all Mankind together by the Ears But 8. Suppose it should not always have that Effect yet it must necessarily destroy all Trade and Commerce between Nations of different Perswasions for who would venture into a Foreign Nation except he were of the same Perswasion
Countreymen barbarously used for serving God according to the Dictates of their Consciences And there 's no Person where he has not a direct Interest to the contrary as the Body of the People have not but would wish that Men had the choice of serving God as they think best rather than that any one Way even that which himself at present espouses should be forced on them by Penal Laws because not only his own but any of those Magistrates he may chance to be subject to changing their Opinions neither of which is in his Power to hinder must subject him to Punishment beside the thing in general being so prejudicial to the Publick must make them abhor it therefore it 's Madness to suppose they are fond of any persecuting Laws much less that they will create a Civil War to obtain them but on the contrary by a Toleration all colour and pretence is taken away from those that might be supposed to desire Civil Commotions and the more People are used to Liberty of Conscience the greater and more irreconcileable will their dislike be of Imposition and consequently will the more heartily unite in a general abhorrence of Popery as the grand Promoter of it and by no pretences whatever will be brought to endure the Thoughts of Popish Kings and Princes 4. It may be urged That tho the People of themselves will be content that others should have the same freedom of judging for themselves and acting according to that Judgment yet that the Clergy by the great Influence they have over them may engage them in Commotions c. Where Men have liberty to examine what the Priests teach and dissent from them if they think fit they will never be able so far to impose on them as to oblige them to act so directly contrary to their Interest It 's Persecution that chiefly supports a blind implicit Faith and Obedience but an entire Liberty will put a Necessity on the People their Guides differing amongst themselves of judging and examining for themselves and the longer Toleration continues the more will they be freed from a blind implicit Obedience And in these Days where Light and Knowledg does so much aboud it 's impossible they should be so grosly imposed on by the Clergy whose Conduct especially in Points relating to their Interests have given them too just an Occasion not to give a blind Assent to what they affirm And whoever does but consider with what Zeal and Fury the Clergy are for persecuting Men for a dissent in Speculative Points or a Matter of Form above what they are in Matters of Vice and Immorality nay that they are for caressing even very wicked Persons if they appear but zealous for their Interest will quickly see it 's not a Sense of Religion that hurries them on and consequently how little Reason People have to be blindly guided by them in those Points Besides the Magistrate may make the Clergy be for Liberty of Conscience by not suffering them to enjoy any Preferment except they will declare their Abhorrence of Force in Matters meerly Religious and then they will be as much for Liberty as now they are against it except we can suppose that they will be true to their Interest only when that is against the Truth 5. On the contrary Let us suppose the most favourable that can happen to a persecuting Magistrate that he destroys all Sects but his own All that he would get by it would be to make himself a Property to his Priests to whom then it would be too late to deny any thing and who will not fail to advance such Antichristian Doctrines as shall exalt them above all that 's called God and make all the Bigotted and Superstitious which would then be the greatest part of their Side So that all the Magistrate would get by persecuting his Subjects would be to enslave himself And what other I pray was the Effect of the Christian Kings and Emperors persecuting their Subjects but to make themselves Vassals to the Pope the Head and to the rest of the Clergy And had it not been for the Toleration without which a Reformation was impossible that was allowed the first Protestants they had been daily more and more enslaved so that it 's owing to those Hereticks the Popish Magistrates are for extirpating that the Chains are filed off from their Hands and Necks and that they no longer lie prostrate at the Feet of an insolent Priest or are obliged to hold his Bridle or Stirrup c. And tho since the Reformation much of the extravagant Pretences of the Popish Clergy are abated yet it 's observable that in those Places where Persecution is highest the Magistrates are most subject to the Power of the Priests And if the Magistrates themselves are thus dealt with what Usage must the People have who are indeed made most miserable and wretched Slaves as tho Nature had intended them to be what the Clergy there suppose they are Asini ad portenda onera Clericorum 6. It may be said This will only happen in Popish Countries But if Persecution was the Cause of these most pernicious Effects in the more early Times of Christianity when Men were supposed to be better What Reason is there to imagine that in these latter and worser Times it will not have as bad if not worse Effects And if the Protestant Clergy can perswade the Magistrate to use Force to hinder People from examining or even knowing any Doctrine but what they have a mind to impose on them a thing so contrary to the Light of Nature the Gospel and their own Principles what is there that by their joint Endeavours they could not or would not introduce when it served to promote their Interest Nay have not the Protestant Clergy been every jot as much if not more zealous and industrious than the Popish to enslave the People and promote Arbitrary Power and have preached up absolute Passive Obedience even as much as Faith in Christ as knowing that the only way to secure Tyranny in the Church was first to get it established in the State because Tyranny by bringing the generality to Poverty and Slavery must depress their Minds and debase their Thoughts and make them ready blindly to submit to the Determinations of the Clergy And tho some would be in better Circumstances yet what they enjoy would be so precarious that they could not be secure without they comply with the Religion of the Prince who if he be a great Bigot as the Clergy would do their utmost to make him so would be sure to use all the Violence Arbitrary Power could give him to force Men to profess the Court Religion Or if he should turn to the other Extream and instead of being Superstitious should have little or no regard for Religion yet if he should sometime or other be troubled in Conscience as even the most vicious often are the Clergy would be sure to perswade him that the
or indeed any thing else that does not invade the Right of others or is consistent with the Welfare of the Society And if it be unreasonable that he should harass Men about these things which have some relation to the Civil Society tho not sufficient to erect Courts of Judicature about them is it not much more so to molest them about nice Controversies Speculative Points meer Ceremonies or Forms of outward Worship in which the Interest of the Society is not at all concerned In a word If the Magistrate is to punish for some things in Religion and not for others what other Rule can there be to know what belongs to his Jurisdiction and what not but that about those things of Religion which relate to the Civil Society he is to use the Force of the Society and that what do not ought wholly to be left to God and the Parties concerned For as it 's absurd that the Force of the Society should be imployed about things that do not belong to it so it 's very unjust that a Man should not be suffered to act as he judgeth best in those things wherein no other has an Interest but his own eternal Good or Ill is only concerned 11. God who does not require of Men to be infallible but to do their best to discover Truth can never be supposed to be willing that they should be punished for invincible Error But the Magistrate who by reason of the infinite Variety of Mens Parts and Apprehensions does not know what Errors are invincible and what not cannot but punish unjustly since he cannot tell whether the Person he punisheth supposing him in an Error is in a Fault or if in a Fault cannot know what degrees of Weakness or Wilfulness it has or how to proportion his Punishment according to the different Abilities of every individual Person which he ought to do since where much is given much is required and where little is given as little is required But as he is not capable of doing this so he cannot tell after he has done his best but that he has made them guilty of a much greater Fault than what he pretends to correct by forcing them to act against their Consciences All which no less than demonstrates that the Magistrate is not qualified and therefore not ordained to punish such Offences but that they are to be left to the Searcher of Hearts the great and righteous Judg of all Men who alone discerns all the Powers and Workings of Mens Minds when they sincerely seek after Truth or by what if by any Default they miss it and who alone knows whom to punish and how to proportion his Punishments 12. To suppose God has constituted the Supream Powers to judg not only concerning Civil Crimes for which he has sufficiently qualified them but also meerly Religious Ones is inconsistent with the Justice as well as Wisdom and Goodness of God For if we cannot suppose so very unjust and foolish a thing of a King on Earth as that he should constitute for his Vicegerents those of whom he certainly knew not one in a thousand but would punish his Faithful Subjects and that for no other Reason but because they were so and reward those that were not so How then can we suppose so very absurd a thing of the King of Kings that he should appoint them for his Vicars in spiritual Matters and arm them with a Coercive Power to punish those Offences that relate solely to himself who as he could not but infallibly foreknow would make use of their Power to encourage even their rebelling against him by setting up of false Gods in his stead for Idolatry was every where quickly the Publick Religion of their Dominions except amongst God's own People the Jews and even there very often it was the National Religion And after their Captivity until Constantine's Time not one of God's supposed Vicars in Matters of meer Religion but were themselves Idolaters and did all of them discountenance and several of them persecute the Worshippers of the true God And when the Christians if Persecutors deserve that Name made use of Force upon Christians what did it produce but Popish Superstition and Idolatry 13. Persecution is so far from being a Means to promote the true Religion that it must necessarily hinder its progress because the Infidels must think themselves as much obliged to hinder the preaching of the Gospel amongst them as the Christians their Religion here And in vain do we pray for their Conversion whilst we assert such a Doctrine as will not let us suffer them to live here in order to their Conversion nor them to suffer us to preach the Gospel there But this is not all for had this Doctrine of promoting the true Religion by Force been believed by the Heathen it would have obliged them to have extirpated the Christian Religion and certainly that can scarce be thought to be a Christian Doctrine which if practised would have destroy'd the very Name of Christian. 14. It may be said no Persecution could extirpate the Christian Religion because the severest Methods were so far from destroying it that they were the Occasion of its encreasing the faster Not to mention if this were so and the Magistrate was to persecute it ought to be the true Religion because it 's the way to make it increase and by Parity of Reason use a contrary Method with false Religions I say that Persecution if it continues but a short time will make any Religion to increase and flourish the more because the Bravery the Courage of those that suffer prepares People to have a good Opinion of the Cause they suffer for But if it continue for an Age or Ages so that the old Professors are all destroyed the succeeding Generations will all be of the Religion they are educated in Thus we find Christianity by the continued Cruelty of its Enemies rooted out of the greatest Part of Africa and other Places it entirely possessed And should the Persecution in France continue the next Generation would be all Papists as they are in Spain and Portugal So that the Reason why Persecution had not the like Effect under the Pagan Emperors was because God did not permit it to continue long at a time and not without great intermissions But had all those Emperors been for promoting by Force what according to their Sentiments was the true Religion they had utterly extirpated the very Name of a Christian 15. Nay had the Heathen Emperors abhorr'd Persecution as all but what were Monsters did yet they had been under an indispensible Duty as they valued the Peace and Welfare of Mankind in general and of their Subjects in particular to root out a Religion which when it got Power into its Hands would have no other measure of Justice and Equity than its own Interest and would deprive Men tho never so strict Observers of the Laws of Morality and the Society of their Properties and
even Lives as the Christian Emperors did for acting according to their Consciences And the Heathens who in spight of their Religious Differences cultivated Peace and Friendship amongst themselves could not but have a just Indignation for a Religion that had Compulsion been a part of it brought with it so many horrid Consequences which were sufficient to make them not only reject it as contrary to the Light of Nature but to treat the Professors of it as publick Enemies of Mankind who like Vipers could make no other return to those that nourish them but the sooner to sting them And it 's for the sake of this Doctrin that the Christians instead of propagating their Religion have been so cruelly persecuted of late Years in several Places As in Japan where it 's evident they were not so rigorously dealt with upon account of any aversion the Japoneses had to the Christian Religion for they suffered it quietly a good while to grow amongst them who were not so zealous for a Uniformity since they had seven or eight Sects as different as the Mortality and Immortality of the Soul No it was the Doctrines and Practices of the persecuting Christians that made them believe the Christian Religion was dangerous and destructive to Human Societies 16. Were the Magistrate ordained by God to punish for Matters meerly Religious the Heathen Persecutors supposing they acted according to the best of their Skill were no more to be condemned for punishing the Christians than a Judg is when he acts according to the best of his Knowledg in punishing an innocent Person All that can be said they were faulty in was their being governed by the Prejudices of their Education and influenced by their Priests and not suffering the Christians before they condemned them fairly to represent their Religion nor themselves impartially to consider it If this were the sole Crime of the Heathen Persecutors I am afraid the Christian ones are as much influenced by their Priests or prejudiced by their Education and do as little as they freely permit Men before they condemn them to propose their Opinions back them with their Reasons and answer the Objections of their Adversaries that they may impartially judg whether they ought to receive or reject them And if it be their Duty so to judg all their Subjects ought to do the same which is inconsistent with their hindering any by Penalties from instructing them in those Opinions and the Reasons and Arguments that make for them If the Magistrate without thus examining should condemn Men for professing even an erroneous Opinion that would no more justify him than it would a Judg that condemns a Man without hearing his Defence or a Person that swears a thing to be true without knowing whether it be so or no. 17. Those Matters about which Christians persecute one another are generally such as neither tend to the Honour of God nor the Good of Man and at the best are but Appendices to Religion and withal so perplext mysterious and uncertain that Men of the greatest Learning Judgment and Probity are strangely divided in their Opinions about them and consequently they will not admit of such Proof as in Justice and Equity ought to subject a Man to Punishment for there should be as much certainty and evidence that the Matter one is condemned for is a Crime as that he is guilty of it But can the Magistrate be as sure supposing a meer Error to be a Crime that not only his Subjects are in an Error but himself in the Right as he is that the causless punishing them is Injustice and Tyranny But could he be as certain yet that depends either upon Criticism in the Sacred Tongues and Skill in the Customs and Ways of speaking in use amongst the Jews or in distinguishing between genuine and spurious Readings or upon Metaphysicks School-Divinity Fathers Councils Church History c. which the Supream Powers have neither inclination nor leasure to study and examine and consequently they cannot but act most tyrannically in making Laws for condemning whole Parties of Men at a venture for things that for ought they know may be true and which they do not think worth their while to examine And yet to see them act contrary to their known indispensible Duty in ruining their Subjects about such Points is strangely unaccountable All that can be said is Delirant Reges plectuntur Achivi 18. To prevent the Magistrate's intermedling God has expresly declared That he will have the Tares and Wheat grow together until the Harvest or Day of Judgment where the Angels are the Reapers c. And the Reason is lest the Wheat be rooted up with the Tares which relates not to Civil but only to Matters meerly Religious where Men generally so grosly do they mistake root up the Wheat instead of the Tares and the same Reason will hold not only against the rooting up but any ways molesting them The Magistrate ought to render to God those things which belong to him as well as claim to himself what is Cesar's Due but if he assumes an Absolute viz. a Legislative and Coercive Power in Matters wholly relating to God he leaves nothing to him but usurps his peculiar and inseparable Power and Jurisdiction and is as much guilty of Treason against the King of Heaven as a private Person in assuming a Sovereign Power over his fellow Subjects is guilty of Treason against his King and it will no more excuse the Magistrate if he whom he punisheth should have committed an Offence against God than it would the other if his fellow Subjects had broke the Law of the Land But the Infinite inequality that is between the King of Kings and a King on Earth must strangely aggravate the Magistrate's Crime If God wanted either Skill to judg or Power to punish those Offences that concern himself only there might be some colour for the over-officiousness of the Magistrate if uncommissioned and uncalled for he offers his infallible Judgment and almighty Arm otherwise there can be no Reason as Grotius de jur Bell. Pac. C. 30. l. 2. observes Cur non talia delicta Deo relinquantur punienda qui ad ea noscenda est sapientissimus ad expendenda aequissimus ad vindicanda potentissimus And this I take is sufficient to show that the Magistrate has not only no Right to a Coercive Power in Matters meerly Religious but that such a Power is directly contrary to the Honour of God and most destructive of Mens Eternal and Temporal Happiness and consequently the greatest and most comprehensive of all Sins whatever But because this is a Point of so great a Consequence to Mankind I will most impartially examine the Reasons and Arguments how frivolous soever they are that the Defenders of Persecution urge in its behalf PART II. CHAP. I. An Answer to Arguments from Scripture on behalf of Persecution I Having offered several and if I flatter not my self concluding Arguments against the