Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A42953
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The demeanour of a good subject in order to the acquiring and establishing peace
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Goodwin, Thomas, 1586 or 7-1642.
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1681
(1681)
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Wing G975; ESTC R22752
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33,660
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45
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that they may be well directed to a Publick Good have their certain Rules whereby the design of them cannot Fail But if they are done according to those Rules are certainly of General advantage So that a Good Subject is one that is Regular and constant that knoweth his Place and Duty prescribed and persisteth in maintaining his Station and so becometh useful abroad happy at home His good Acts are not a Distemper which after extremity of chilness Fly out into a High Feaver and relapse again into the former Shivering condition But are promoted by a considerate Vigour of mind which compelling him to be dutifull for Gods sake sheweth him withall the Divine Wisdome which has mixed Obedience and Profit most inseperably While his Ingenious Subjection is of concern to others it is cheifly so to himself For as his strict observance of Duty conduceth to his Princes peace and is his Neighbours Example and Tranquillity so is it of much more advantage to the Authour then others who as a Member of the Body shares in the Publick Good and moreover besides the satisfaction and joy thereof hath from the Treasures of Divine Bounty an unconceivable reward In fine he is justly to be Termed Good because his Sole aim is to please God and imitate his communicative Property of Goodness he readily Executing the Good which he desireth or commendeth either by himself or his Vicegerents And this he doth so joyfully that he accounteth Submission and Obedience no Yoke or Burden but the most August assertion of his Liberty and Propriety CHAP. II. What Peace it is which a Good Subject would Obtain and Settle WE commonly observe that nothing is so Universally desired and despised as Peace earnestly longed for upon the least absence and welcomed frequently with full Testimonies of gratitude and admiration but scarce enjoying the entertainment so usual to things of least consequence and easier Purchase a nine days wonder The want of her is wont even to Murmuring to be Lamented the return Admired Magnified and the short Solemnities thereof over a suddain forgetfulness overwhelmeth her Favours But this is no other then the common course of Mankind to prize what is Courted and Villifie the same grown Familliar as if we longed chiefly for disatisfaction or Loved a short enjoyment only in order to long abstinence But that an ill Trouble of any thing wanting in Substance or Value possesseth us is certainly an affliction proceeding from our selves and is the want of discretion and Piety which makes the most desirable Goods first uneasie to us and quickly intollerably Our continually Whirling fancies make us suppose Changes in what continueth most the same and when we will not see our own Folly we must be Sensible of Misery And truly dissatisfaction is a weighty one But it is in our own Pleasure to Lighten or Aggravate it no Mischief being more easily Contracted or Removed For if we set our selves Industriously to look into the Causes of things begining first with our selves we shall Seldom see any reason to search any farther The wanton undervaluing the Blessings of Peace is alway the first breach of Peace ingratitude being the Root of disorder distempering the Mind with Groundless Jealousies and the Brain with extravagancies But this Mischief befalleth no discreet or good Man who by putting a true estimate upon things is inoffensive to himself and others The way to preserve Peace is for each Man Seriously to enquire whether himself hath been constantly just in his esteem of her and by Rectifying the apprehended Injustice every Man in himself lost Peace is restored And thus we remove disatisfaction without that Tumult and amusing Agitation wherein our Pollititians are at this day so much concerned By being considerate we are either in it or soon reduced to a true State of happiness and need no Laborious Care or desperate Councels to keep or repair that which is so much in our own Power which cannot be wanting nor rendered infirm without our being Foolishly unthankfull By keeping his thoughts quiet every Man contributeth to the Publick Peace and the Private perfecteth the Common Security But the diversity of Dispositions causeth a diverse construction of Peace which too too frequently is not given according to what it self is but what the Speaker would have it thought As was before observed the desire of being accounted Good Subjects is great even in those who run Courses contrary to the Rules of Obedience so is the name of Peace Coveted as a Reconciling Ornament by those whose affections are Monstrously inform and Brutish whose Sanguinary perverseness makes them the Scandal of Mankind For so Numerous so Delicious Rich and Weighty are the benefits which Peace brings so Amiable and Divine those minds wherein she resideth and such a Flourishing Beauty encompassing her Habitations that he who is her Professed Enemy must by reason of the general hatred abandon humane Society Thence it is that the very affronts and Injuries which compel her to seek Heaven for Refuge walk under the Disguises of Peaceable designes and Peaces Vindication and promotion And because there is Visibly a breach of Concord the Authours thereof not able to bear the blame with a mischeivous industry Shift it upon such as are most jealous of attempts against Peace So that upon cautious Vertue which by prudent Love and Innocence seeks to retain her are thrown the imputations of Treachery and Discord And in the mean time between those who on one Side aloud plead her Cause and on the other hand Act according to her Discipline Peace is lost and Union dissolved Now the Cause is in the credulity of unwary Men who are the most of any Age who by Turbulent Men imposed upon think many things wanting to them and most of what they enjoy Deficient that Supplies and Stores would abound were not the Care of them committed to heavy and unseeing Men Moreover they are affrighted with a Puppetry of dangers represented as Real and Gigantine which the Drowsiness of their Protectors suffereth to invade them without endeavour of prevention At the beginning of Conspiracies and Disorder the wisest desires of Peace are only called Neglect and Stupidity and the People intoxicated with Plenty are perswaded to believe themselves Poor Wretched and in danger and by Mutinous Clamours to awake their careless Governours and animate them to diligence But if their insolent behaviour be repressed and Fortitude the blest Guardian of Peace appeareth to check the contrivances of Sedition presently this is Termed War Oppression and Tyranny and the Peoples condition becometh Lamented as if they were immediately to be Subjected to Slaughter because required to be Quiet and Prosperous And here nothing can be allowed to be Peace but what an impracticable Lenity shall permit to the impudent requests or rather demands of Men destitute of Sobriety But such requests being a Manifest Violation of Peace the consenting and yielding to them is no other then an invitation of disorder and every Subject
sent by God with an especial Commission to lead an Army against the Amalekites and utterly destroy all that they had Man and Woman Infant and Suckling Oxe and Sheep Camel and Asse But after Victory obtained the People Murmur that so chargeable an Expedition of two Hundred and ten Thousand Men should have no Recompence That the Spoils of a Rich Eastern Country and such Plenty of Fat Sheep and Oxen Younger Fatlings and Lambs should all while they had neglected their Farms Flocks and Herds at Home Perish to no Mans benefit That at their return there must be Publick Thanksgivings Sacrifices and Feastings with their Wives Children and Relations at Home which they judged would prove a Lean and Barren joy if the Sacrifices and Beasts to be Slaughtered must be fetched from their own Folds and Stalls These or the like were the Voices of the Multitude and were specious Arguments used by the Nobles Rulers and Chief-Captains to perswade the King to neglect his Duty towards God for the good of the People They all concluded that the present Interest was the best Religion and that the shew and noise of Sacrifice would Silence Heavens Decree pronounced for the Contempt of its Laws Neither was this easily obtained of the King who although a Valiant Man was forced to yield for the Murmurs and Mutiny had proceeded so High that he was put into a great fear such as Subjected him in the meanest sort to the Raving Populacy for as he saith of himself he Feared the People and Obeyed their Voice But thus the King pleased the People to his own and their Ruine For God immediately commanded the Kingdome to be Rent from him And although some Years Intervened between the Sentence and Execution yet the rest of his Reign was but improsperous and at length upon Mount Gilboa the King his Sons and People fell down grievously Slaughtered by a Forreign Enemy and Invasion and the Victory over them was used most Savagely and Insolently Such are the usual Harvest which Subjects Reap from their undutiful behaviour wherein the more Successful they are the more inevitable is their destruction Miscarriages in any such attempts are most happy which instruct them what should have been forborn what practised and convince them of a necessity of renouncing all Rude and Irreverent thoughts of their King in order to the establishment of Happiness But that so powerful an Example set down by the Holy Penman must needs be prevalent with Men so much professing Religion I should not have gone farther for one then the so fresh and Sadly memorable of our late times Then were seen the Tides of Popular Fury to Swell to such an excess that they Swallowed up all Government both in Church and State our Kings Princes and most eminently Pious and Loyal Churchmen were either Murthered Banished or driven into Corners and in short after the discontented Rabble had taken the matter into their own hand to which frequent Royal Condescentions did but the more embolden them to Repair Reform Cure and Settle all their miseries and dissatisfactions did even infinitely abound And then to find what they sought for they were compelled to retreat to acknowledge their folly and distress supplicating him whom they most rebelliously and ignominiously dispossessed of his Crown and Dignities Return thou and all thy Servants Until his Peace was restored theirs was in excilement none other with their Boasted Sciences of Government could after a long and wretched experience give any hopes of effecting the publick safety but the same they had rejected Whom with accumulative Honours they Petitioning to return acknowledged that nothing but want of confidence in their lawful Monarchs virtue and judgment had so miserably enslaved them under Anarchical Tyranny nothing but that confidence could revive the Sinking Kingdoms Glory So great a Calamity and unexpected Redemption successively furnishing us with infalliable Rules for prosperous enjoyments our suddain forgetfulness or careless observance of them maketh us appear the most despicably Sottish of Mankind We are uneasy and thoughtful by listning to the Authors of our newly vanquished afflictions who with an ill natured but most genuine Ofspring instill Poysonous Opinions into the minds of their Fellow Subjects in detraction of the present Government I should rationally think their very Persons caution enough against any their insinuations much more when they repeat Rebellion in the same methods and rush on with more impudenoe then their former beginnings knew Nevertheless we have seen divers of them promoted to be of the Grand Council of the Nation and there Principals of such ungrateful and undecent Orations that while they pretended to represent Greivances ought themselves to have been proceeded against as the most intolerable of all Grievances We hope that Members of a Sound constitution may by Gods Blessing succeed them to repair in Truth those breaches which the former vitiated ones have opened to Scandal Confusion and the Terrour of our Prince and all Religious People Otherwise we ought to intercede with God and the King that such Prodigies of State may no more appear among us to Subvert our Peace and Religion with novel and unheard devices of Government and Vnion What considerate Man seeth not the Foundations now stricken at when by the same courses and many of the same Hands they were before Subverted and when the Nation Sinneth again its old Crimes after such a Miraculous Restauration what can hinder the worse thing from befalling it Or where shall we look for a second Redemption who have so Idly undervalued the First In former Ages the Great Assemblies did indeed what they undertook support the Nation by Strengthening their respective Kings but of late they have been so far from treading in the Steps of their Ancestours as that Blessed Prince delivereth it who afterward more sharply felt the mischief of such Parliamentary digressions by dutiful expressions in that kind that contrarily they have introduced a way of bargaining and contracting with their King as if nothing ought to he given him by them but what he should buy and purchase of them either by the quitting somewhat of his Royal Prerogative or diminishing and lessening his Revenues This was spoken of Disrespects and Demeanours inconsiderable in comparison of what himself became afterwards Sensible of and his Royal Son hath lately found too much cause to mention and reprove And each of these disloyal Practises encrease the consternation which hath Seized us and is general though diversly afflicting Men according to their diversity of Humours Some are entangled in Labyrinths of Conceits that their Prince is ill advised and hath no good Councel as if he wanted their judgment in Choosing and all of their Choice and Representatives were endued with Infallibillity some are so fearful of disorder in the State and so jealous of Religion least Superstition should enter in and corrupt it that they presently break the Peace which they only fear may be broken and most Superstitiously Idolize those