Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A67247
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The antidote: or, a seasonable discourse on Rom. 13. 1 Shewing the necessity and reasonableness of subjection to the higher powers. With an account of the divine right or original of government. By John VValker, M.A.
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Walker, John, 1650-1730.
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1684
(1684)
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Wing W392; ESTC R222266
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59,633
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307
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them when He hath so liberally the Fleece This may with more reason and truth be expected from a necessitous Prince who to supply His wants is forced to use Arts and Stratagems to squeeze some full Spunges that He may not be quite drain'd and dried Himself and to extort that by Power and in an Arbitrary manner which Disloyalty and Undutifulness do rob and deprive Him of A strong and healthy Head in the political sence of it is always a sure indication and sign of a strong and healthy Body in that there is an immediate dependance and communication between the one and the other And when 't is otherwise in the natural and proper meaning of it 't is generally an undoubted symptom that both are disaffected the Body as well as the Head So that these men are as much out in their Physicks as Politicks 2. And as it is Unreasonable so is it Unchristian 'T is a Law of our Religion that we should pay unto Caesar his due of Tribute and less than what is sufficient to maintain His Crown and Dignity cannot be supposed to be His due And then if we do not give Him that but default from and pinch Him of it we act contrary to our Religion and Christianity We are to do our duty and leave the issue and event of things to God Let Him be never so bad Preces Lachrymae Prayers and Tears are all that we are to oppose against Him as I above inform'd you and most certain is it that Non sunt facienda mala ut eveniant bona We are not to do any unjust and evil thing in behalf of an undeniable and real good but when that we propose to our selves here is very uncertain and yet the sin and iniquity of our actings certain 'T is madness 't is presumption 't is the height of Impiety to abett and avow such wicked and irreligious courses and ways Add to this that we have had the woful experience how bad a sign of health a little Head is to the Body Politick or State how ill it secures the welfare and good of a Kingdom or People For when the Royal Martyr had with too great Condescentions too much lessened Himself did not some of the inferiour Members presently shoot up to a preternatural growth and bigness and as quickly draw away that juice and nourishment by which He should have been sustain'd Was not the Nation soon divided and in a tottering falling condition Were not Liberty and Property lost and the felicities of Peace exchang'd into a bloody War This was all the healthiness these Mens Policy procured us then I hope the Burn'd Child will dread the Fire Say then Supposing with them that Ship-money had been a publick Nusance and illegal had it not been better to have endur'd and undergone that than so many miseries and calamities that came rowling in upon us like a mighty torrent However it was not as illegal and unjustifiable as the Vote of Non-Addresses as making Laws and Ordinances without a King as erecting a High-Commission Court and Arraigning their Sovereign as cutting off His Head and plundering and sequestring whom they would without any truth of Law and Justice But it is always lawful 't is still just and Christian 't is still our duty to help and relieve the necessities and distresses of our lawful King and Governor even without forms of Law but never so to let both King and Kingdom fall and perish through our fears and jealousies our covetousness our pride and ambition This then is another duty we owe and are to pay unto them 4. The Fourth and last is our Prayers for Them And whether we consider Them in Their more private capacity as Men and Christians or in their more publick as Governors the reasonableness and necessity of this part of our duty will be very manifest and evident If as Men and Christians they generally and for the most part lye more open and exposed to the calamities and miseries incident to mankind to the assaults and batteries of the World the Flesh and the Devil than others whose greater privacy is a rampart and security against a great many temptations and dangers their more publick state and condition of Life renders them subject and obnoxious to They like the tall Cedars and high Turrets are sure to meet with every impetuous shock and blast of wind and foul weather when others as lower Trees and Structures by their being so escape their force and severity So that in this respect as They want greater strength and larger supplies of Grace to support and keep Them from falling so more prayers than their own and of these a greater proportion and measure answerable to their greater needs that by a kind of holy violence we may open the flood-gates of Heaven and derive the Divine Assistance Protection and Blessing upon Their Heads and Hearts Their Lives and Actions And this is no more than what our common Christianity suggests and a piece of Charity we owe unto the whole Race of Mankind Let him be Iew Infidel or Turk we are to pray for him It is that our Saviour enjoyns us as to our Enemies Pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you Mat. 5.44 And 't is St. Paul's Doctrine I exhort therefore that first of all supplications prayers intercessions and giving of thanks be made for all men for Kings and all that are in authority for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour who will have all men to be sav'd and to come to the knowledge of the truth 1 Tim. 2.1 2 3 4. But if he be a Christian King one who hath submitted his Scepter to that of Christ and is partaker of the same Faith and Hope of Salvation then as we have new Reasons added to the former in as much as we are Members of the same mystical Body and so to be compassionate tender concern'd and careful for one anothers Good which is to be express'd as in other things so in an entercourse of Prayer one for another and the Apostle hath made it a necessary part of the Christian Armour Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all Saints so is the Obligation enhans'd and the Duty the more indispensable And this will yet farther appear to be the more so if we consider them as actually governing as those who have so great a People committed to their Charge and so wanting a greater and more excellent Spirit and Wisdom Judgement and Discretion Foresight and Prudence to assist direct and help them in all the great Affairs and Transactions of the Publick Now every good and every perfect gift being from above and coming down from the Father of Lights as St. Iames tells us and we are to ask to beg this wisdom and gift of God before we can have it and the effectual fervent prayers of
the doctrine and practice of Christ and this his truly worthy Predecessor What! Are the Truths and Graces of those times grown obsolete and out of use And the Faith once delivered to the Saints antiquated and out-dated at Rome Hath the Pride and Ambition the Avarice and Iniquity of the Man justled out the Humility and Modesty the Self-denial and Holiness of the Bishop Or to say truth are not the Times and the Bishops chang'd Do they not differ as much as white and black and are they not as opposite as East and West Yes certainly they are for then and a great while after they were truly pious and devout Christians good and Loyal Subjects they Preach'd and Taught the Gospel of Christ truly and sincerely they lived and acted honestly and conscionably they Honour'd all Men they Lov'd the Brother-hood they Fear'd God they Honour'd their King But now instead of Honour and Love Reproach and Hatred is the Lot and Portion of their fellow-Christians and Brethren instead of fearing God they trample under foot and vilifie his Words and Truths and instead of honouring and obeying they despise reject disobey and scorn their rightful Lord and Sovereign In a word for a modest Clergy-man and Bishop we have a proud temporal Prince and Lord for a true and sincere Disciple of Christs one who by Injustice and Oppression Usurpations and Encroachments hath chang'd the Episcopal Chair into a Regal Throne the Pastoral Staff into a Powerful Scepter and the Mitre into a Crown 'T is true he sits in the House of God no longer as Bishop and Subject but as God as an Imperial Monarch But the Question is not What he is but what he should be whether Christ or St. Peter ever gave him such Authority and Pre-eminence ever taught and acted so If they did not as hath been evinc'd and shew'd his Pretences and Plea as to it must be for ever null'd and evacuated And therefore if he will not do as as he should if he will not obey and be subject but proceed to domineer and usurp this doth not prejudge the Truth this doth not falsifie the Apostle's Assertion and 't will be always wicked unjust and unchristian in him so to act And if it is so in him it cannot be otherwise in his Clergy who have as little Scripture and Reason to plead in their behalf as he hath For if they are to be exempted from Subjection as spiritual Persons they are no more spiritual than Christ and his Apostles and the Bishops and Ministers of the first 600 years who yet in all that time never made use of or pretended to such a Claim or Right That Christ and his Apostles did not is very manifest and that their Successors the Bishops with the rest of the inferiour Clergy of those Ages did not is not less apparent to any that shall consult the Annals and Records of those Times They all as acknowledg'd and confess'd so paid and perform'd the Duty of Subjection and Obedience to the supream Magistrate and Governour They look'd upon and consider'd themselves as Members of the Commonwealth and Kingdom where they liv'd and so believed and thought it but just and reasonable that they should be subject to the Laws of the Government that protected them in their Rights and Liberties Nay they were perswaded of the necessity of the Obligation and Duty upon a much higher account that God had bound it upon their Consciences by a standing irreversible Law And so St. Chrysostom expounds the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every Soul in my Text i. e. if thou be an Apostle an Evangelist a Prophet or whatsoever thou art thou must be subject and these things are commanded to all both Priests and Monks and not only to Seculars and Lay-men And to this agrees that large account we meet with of the Judgement Piety and Practice of the primitive Christians Clergy and Laity as to this particular in the ancient Apologists and Writers of those best and purest Ages of the Church The truth is a long prosperity and ease from Persecution had not so much abus'd their Understandings and perverted their Wills as to have instill'd this Doctrine into their Heads and made it the practice of their Lives They liv'd too near the Fountain of Christianity in its purity and unmixedness to be yet so earth'd and mudded as against Law and Gospel to set up for a secular Pomp and Greatness Domineering and Grandeur of their own This was to be the work and iniquity of worser Men and worser Times one of the Devil's Master-pieces in the Ages of Antichrist and the Beast and how very successful it hath been to uphold and support his weakned Power in the Christian World the horrid Opinions Doctrines and Practices of that See and Church is but too undeniable aproof and demonstration And whether this immoderate Love and Affectation of Worldly Glory and Greatness and consequent hereunto the despising of Dominions and speaking evil of Dignities their refusing and denying to be subject to the Higher Powers did not prepare the way for that Judgment mentioned by the Apostle 2 Thess. 2.11 That God should send them strong delusion to believe a Lye I shall leave to others peremptorily to define and determine However this we may affirm that till they did believe this Lye that the Pope was above Kings and Emperors and so they not to obey Them but him there was not the tenth part of those abominable Heresies and Doctrines that have been since to the dishonour of Christ and Christianity and the disturbance and disquiet of the Christian World But whatever was the cause either of this or that most certain is it that neither the one nor the other is true Catholick Christian Doctrine or true Catholick Christian Practise Not Christian Doctrine because we are to put them i. e. every Soul in mind to be subject to Principalities and Powers and to obey Magistrates Titus 3.1 Not Christian Practise because that is to be subject to the Higher Powers and that Clergy-men are to be so is by the Apostles performing and acting it rendred undeniably true especially when it had been laid down in Thesi for a Christian Doctrine before And so S. Bernard though he lived in corrupt times understood it For writing to a Clergy-man a Bishop He thus speaks Si omnis vestra Quis vos excipit ab Universitate Si quis tentat excipere conatur decipere If every Soul is to be subject then you are Who hath excepted you from this number He that endeavours to except you endeavours to deceive you Absurd then and wicked is it to pretend and plead for exemption as Ministers when the Apostles of Christ in their Lives and Doctrines taught and exemplified the contrary And what hath been said here in defence of the truth against the Pope and his Clergy doth as much impugn all others whatever they call themselves that have drank of the Roman Cisterns