Birthright was not presently executed which did in their civilaffairs appertaining to themselves bear some chief sway amongst them And touching the Priesthood although the People were then generally much polluted with Idolatry yet therein also they had some most likely the first-born who although they durst not there offer Sacrifices to God as they should in that servitude yet some of them we doubt not instructed the people in matters concerning the Promises of the blessed Seed and perform'd as they might the other Offices of their Priesthood although many of the People and of the Priests as it seemeth were then greatly polluted with Idolatry CANONES IX and X. IX IF any Man therefore shall affirm either that the uniting of the Children of Jacob into one Nation or the severing of the Civil and Ecclesiastical Functions the Prerogatives of Birthright from Reuben the first-born and dividing of them from one person was made by themselves X. Or that their servitude in Aegypt was unjustly suffer'd to lie upon them so long by Almighty God or that they being his Church he left them destitute of such comforts of direction and instruction as were necessary those times consider'd for their Civil or Ecclesiastical Estate or that the People took upon them the appointing of the heads of their Tribes and Families or the choice of their civil Superiours or of the Priests or that the Example of those wicked Kings may be any lawful Warrant for any other King so to oppress the People and Church of God he doth greatly Erre Placet eis CAP. XI WHen the time came that God in mercy was pleased to deliver the Children of Israel out of Egypt and to place them in the Land which he had promised them he raised up his Servants Moses and Joshua to take that charge upon them and accordingly Moses being made their Prince or as the Scripture speaks their King did not only by God's Appointment and Assistance lead them out of Egypt but governed them being 600000 Men on foot besides Women and Children forty years by his Authority in the Wilderness and Joshua likewise succeeding Moses in the same Princely Power and Authority did after many difficulties bring them into the Land of Canaan and gave them lawful possession thereof So that although formerly the Children of Israel were kept in such great Servitude and Bondage whilst they were in Aegypt as notwithstanding their number they were no way able like a free People to lift up their Heads yet now they are knit together in one Body and setled as a particular State and free Nation in their own Countrey being rul'd and govern'd successively after a mild and temperate manner first by Moses in the Wilderness as is aforesaid and then by Joshua in Canaan whilst he lived CAN. XI IF any Man therefore shall affirm either that the Children of Israel were delivered out of Aegypt by their own strength and not by God's special Direction and mighty Power or that it had been lawful for them not warranted by God to have departed thence as they did without Licence first obtained of King Pharaoh or that Moses and Joshua were not called to that high Authority by God himself but received the same from the People as depending upon their choice or that Dathan and Abiram descended from Reuben can be justified in challenging of Moses that he took too much upon him in executing only that Authority which God hath given him he doth greatly Erre Placet eis CAP. XII AS Almighty God took order for the setling of his People in the Land of Canaan and established a Princely Authority to rule and govern them civilly so was he no less careful of his Church For however the Priesthood was disposed of before this time yet now it is apparent in the Scriptures that the same was after setled in the Tribe of Levi and Aaron was made by God's appointment for the better Government of the Church the Chief and High Priest the whole Priesthood being assigned to his Children and their Off-spring as well to succeed him in the said highest place as also to execute the other inferiour Functions belonging to Priests and the rest of the Tribe of Levi were to attend other Ecclesiastical Services CAN. XII IF any man therefore shall affirm either that the Tribe of Levi was assigned by the People to undertake the said Ecclesiastical Offices or that Aaron and his Posterity were chosen by the People to be their Priests or that they were not chosen directly by God himself or that the People had any lawful Interest at any time afterward either to chuse their Priests or they being appointed of God as is aforesaid to deprive them of their places or that Corah of the Tribe of Levi can be justified in saying That Aaron took too much upon him thereby repining either that Aaron was rather made High Priest than he himself or that the Priesthood was annexed to Aaron's Posterity whereas the rest of the Levites were to serve in inferiour places he doth greatly Erre Placet eis CAP. XIII BEfore Moses's Death God had appointed Joshua to succeed him but in Joshua's days he appointed none to follow him immediately whereupon after his Death the Israelites were left without a Chief Head or Prince to govern them They had then remaining the particular Officers and Judges appointed by Moses at Jethro's Council in their several Tribes as also the general Senate of Seventy Elders ordained by God upon Moses's complaint over all the Nation Yet there fell very great Disorders and Confusions amongst them for want of a chief Judge and Governour whereby they might see their own Disabilities and Errors and find by experience what it was to want a chief Governour and furthermore be moved when they were in distress to fly unto God and depend only upon him for the raising up of One from time to time to deliver and defend them and it is apparent that the People shortly after Joshua's time falling most strangely into gross Idolatry and being from time to time during the History of the Judges very grievously afflicted by the bordering Nations and such as dwelt amongst them when they found themselves still unable to withstand their Enemies using any great Force against them then they had for the most part recourse to God by Prayer who did at such times appoint one for their Prince chief Captain and Ruler to deliver them from their said Enemies we say for the most part because sometimes they attempted some matters of Importance without seeking any chief Governour from God as at one time the People of Sichem presumed to chuse them a Prince of their own after Gideon's Death which turned both to his Ruine and their Destruction And it is here generally to be observed that when there was the greatest liberty among the Israelites during the time from Joshua to Saul whatsoever the People thought of their own Courses
Ecclesiastically and to instruct them in the Mysteries of their Salvation through the blessed Seed of the Woman according to the Doctrine of the Gospel which was from time to time in divers Manners delivered by the Son of God unto them This Priestly Office and Ecclesiastical Authority was yet joyned as before the Flood with the Office of the chief Fathers and civil Governours Noah himself was both a Prince and a Priest he built Altars offered Sacrifices and taught the Church after the Flood 350. Years all that which he had learnt from his Fathers concerning the Creation of the World the Fall of Man and of his Restitution by Christ and generally all that did concern necessarily either civil Societies and Government or Ecclesiastical Assemblies and Authority not omitting the very Ceremonies After Noah the chief Fathers Sem Abraham Isaac and Jacob did execute that Office God himself renewing unto them this Promise of Salvation through the blessed Seed and not only confirming the same to Abraham and his Posterity by the Sacrament of Circumcision but likewise teaching and instructing them in that Heavenly Mystery sometimes by his own Voice and sometimes by Visions and divers other ways whereof the Scriptures make more plain mention than they do of the delivery of the same Evangelical Doctrine before the Flood CAN. VII IF any Man shall therefore affirm either that the Priestly Office and Authority Ecclesiastical which Noah had before the Flood was by that Deluge determin'd or that it was by the Election of his Off-spring confer'd again upon him or that Sem Abraham Isaac and Jacob were neither Priests nor had any Ecclesiastical Authority until they were chosen thereunto by their Children and Nephews or that the Priesthood and Ecclesiastical Authority were not the Ordinances of God for the governing and instructing of the Church according to the Will and direction of God himself delivered and revealed unto them as is aforesaid he doth greatly Erre Placet eis CAP. VIII AS before the Flood Cain and his Posterity were opposite to the Posterity of Seth and might therefore generally have been called the Church Malignant so fell it out after the Flood in the Generations of Japhet but especially of Cham against the Posterity of Sem in whose Lineage the true worship of God through the blessed Seed was especially continued and not that only but in like manner as the Children of Seth in process of time provok't against them the wrath of God by corrupting their ways and following in their Conversations the Generations of Cain and were in that respect all of them with the rest of Cain's Off-spring justly punisht and drown'd by the Flood saving eight Persons Noah and his Wife Sem Cham and Japhet and their three Wives so did the Posterity not only of Cham and Japhet as well before as after the confusion of Tongues and the death of Noah but likewise the Off-spring of Sem who were called more effectually to the knowledge of the Mysteries of Christ and right service of the true God leave the ways of Noah and Sem and gave just occasion to Almighty God had he not bound himself by his Covenant to the contrary to have drowned them all again Nimrod descended of Cham not contenting himself with the Patriarchal or Regal mild Government ordain'd of God by the Laws of Reason and Nature became a Tyrant and Lord of Confusion and by Histories it is apparent that within few Ages after the Death of Noah's Sons great Barbarism and confusion fell among their Generations through their Pride and dissoluteness in that they thought scorn to be govern'd either Civilly or Ecclesiastically as God himself by Noah had ordain'd or to be ruled otherwise than as they list themselves and touching the Service of God and the Ecclesiastical Authority they mingled with true Religion many false worships and chose Priests among themselves to serve God after their own Fashions or rather they devis'd to themselves many Gods and found out Priests accordingly such as were content to train them up in those kinds of Impiety In Chaldea it self and the places adjacent the Children of Sem were all of them almost grown to be Idolaters insomuch as God himself to keep a remnant more carefully that should through the publick profession of his name be partakers of his Mercies in Christ called Abraham with his Family from the habitation of his Fathers to become a Stranger in the Land of Canaan CAN. VIII IF therefore any Man shall affirm That the said Posterity of Noah's Children did well in altering either the manner or form of civil Government which God had appointed by bringing in of Tyranny or factious Popularity or of the Ecclesiastical by framing unto themselves a new kind of Priesthood and worship after their own humours or that it was lawful for such as then served God upon any pretence to have imitated their Examples in either of those courses he doth greatly Erre Placet eis CAP. IX IT is apparent in the Scriptures That although God was not pleased that the Issue of Jacob's Children should by the Example of the Sons of Noah grow up to become the heads of so many several Nations but continuing together should make one People and Nation to be ruled and governed by the same Laws and Magistrates yet it seemed good to his Heavenly Wisdom that in so great a People as should descend from Jacob's Children no one Tribe or Family should continue charg'd both with the Civil or Regal and Ecclesiastical Function and therefore Jacob making way to the fulfilling of the will of God herein did take just occasion moved thereunto by the Spirit of God to deprive his eldest Son Reuben of his Interest by Birthright in both those Prerogatives to be disposed afterward by God unto other of his Brethren Now after Jacob's Death the former thereof viz. the Scepter in process of time fell to Judah as Jacob before had Prophesied and the other also viz. the Priesthood was afterwards given to Levi by God's Ordinance CAP. X. AFter Jacob's Death till Moses was sent to deliver the Children of Israel out of Egypt there is little in the Scriptures touching either the Civil or Ecclesiastical Government It appeareth that Joseph being a great Prince in Aegypt by the King's Authority was whilst he lived chief amongst his Brethren but after his Death through the Tyranny of the Kings of Aegypt which God suffer'd to lie heavily upon them for many Years the civil Authority which any of the Tribes had was very small there was such jealousy of their number which daily encreast above all ordinary expectation as it is not likely that the Kings successively would suffer any great Authority to rest in them howbeit we think they had some either the chief heads of the Tribes generally or of the Tribe of Ephraim and Reuben for it may be Jacob's Prophecy of Reuben's losing the Prerogatives of his
dispose both the Rebellion of Subjects and the Malice and Greediness of encroaching Kings upon their Neighbours as albeit such their attempts of all sorts were in themselves very wicked and detestable in his sight yet he having the skill to bring Light out of Darkness and to use wicked Instruments and Actions for a good purpose did always frame and apply them to execute his own just Judgments When the Sins of a Nation but principally of his own People were of that Nature Height and Ripeness as his Justice could not fitly be put in execution by any other but by the wicked for example in the overthrowing of Hierusalem God's own City in burning of the Temple that was the place of his Glory and carrying his own People into Captivity though never so much by them deserved no godly King could well have been employed but such a One only as the King of Babylon was In respect of which their Imployment such wicked Instruments to execute God's just Judgments are called sometimes his Servants and the Rods of his Wrath or as Attila termed himself the Scourge of God And when having attained their ungodly desires whether ambitious Kings by bringing any Countrey into their subjection or disloyal Subjects by their rebellious rising against their natural Sovereigns they have established any of the said degenerate Forms of Government amongst their People the Authority either so unjustly gotten or wrung by force from the true and lawful Possessor being always God's Authority and therefore receiving no impeachment by the wickedness of those that have it is ever when any such alterations are throughly setled to be reverenced and obeyed and the People of all sorts as well of the Clergy as of the Laity are to be subject unto it not only for fear but also for conscience sake the Israelites in Egypt after Joseph's death being oppressed very tyrannically many ways did never rebel against any of those Kings but submitted themselves to their Authority though their Burthens were very intolerable both in respect of the impossible works imposed upon them and because also they might not offer Sacrifices to the Lord a special part of God's Worship without apparent danger of stoning to death Besides it may not be omitted when God himself sent Moses to deliver them from that Servitude he would not suffer him to carry them thence till Pharaoh their King gave them licence to depart Afterward also when the Jews being brought into subjection to the Kings of Babylon did by the instigation of false Prophets rebel against them they were in that respect greatly condemned by the Prophet Jeremy and in their Captivity which shortly after followed they lived by the direction of the said Prophet in great subjection and Obedience they prayed not only for their Kings and for their Children that they might live long and prosper but likewise for the State of their Government the good success whereof they were bound to seek and regard as well as any other of the King 's dutiful Subjects And thus they lived in Babylon and other places of that Dominion till the King gave them leave to depart notwithstanding in the mean time they endured many Calamities and were destitute for many years of the publick Service and Worship of God which was tyed to the Temple and might not elsewhere be practised or attempted CAN. XXVIII IF any Man therefore shall affirm either that the Subjects when they shake off the Yoke of their Obedience to their Sovereigns and set up a Form of Government among themselves after their own humours do not therein very wickedly or that it is lawful for any bordering Kings through Ambition and Malice to invade their Neighbours or that the Providence and Goodness of God in using of Rebellions and Oppressions to execute his Iustice against any King or Countrey doth mitigate or qualifie the Offences of any such Rebels or oppressing Kings or that when any such new Forms of Government begun by Rebellion are after throughly settled the Authority in them is not of God or that any who live within the Territories of such new Governments are not bound to be subject to God's Authority which is there executed but may rebel against the same or that the Jews either in Egypt or Babylon might lawfully for any cause have taken Arms against any of those Kings or have offered any violence to their Persons He doth greatly Erre Placet eis CAP. XXIX ALthough the Jews upon their deliverance out of Captivity and restitution to their own Country received many favours from the Persian Kings and had liberty given them to live in a sort according to their own Laws yet they never recover'd their former Estate but liv'd in great subjection and servitude under them whilst that Monarchy endured The Temple and City of Hierusalem were again built but not with the magnificence which they had before Zorobabel first and then Nehemiah were made successively by the said Kings the Rulers and Governours of the Jews so restored but with divers restraints It was not forgotten what mighty Kings had ruled in Hierusalem and therefore the said Rulers were not permitted to govern any more in that Regal sort They were still subject to the direction of those Kings and paid unto them very large Tribute and Customs insomuch as when the Priests gave publick thanks unto God for his restoring unto them the state which they had they said thus withal unto him as bewailing their condition Behold we are Servants this day in the Land which thou gavest our Fathers it yieldeth much fruit unto the Kings whom thou hast set over us because of our sins and they have dominion over our Bodies and over our Cattel at our pleasure and we are in great affliction The extraordinary favour which was shewed to any was principally extended toward the Priests over whom the said Kings had not so jealous an eye as they had over the Princes and the rest of the People Howbeit the same notwithstanding they the said Priests were subject to their own immediate Princes both in Temporal and Ecclesiastical Causes as formerly the Priests had been to the Kings of Judah before the Captivity Their Governours forbad certain who said they were Priests from eating of the most holy things Nehemiah ministred an Oath unto the Priests he reform'd the abuses of the Sabbath and prescrib'd Orders for the better observing thereof He appointed certain of the Priests to oversee the Tithes in the Treasury He commanded the Levites to cleanse themselves and to keep the Gates and to sanctifie the Sabbath Eliasib the High-Priest having defiled the Temple by letting Tobias a Stranger a Chamber in the Court of the House of God where in afore times the Offerings the Incense the Vessels and such other things used in God's Service had been kept Nehemiah the Governour was greatly offended with it and displacing the said Tobias cast forth all his stuff out