Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n
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A51230
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A sermon preach'd before the House of Lords in the abby-church at Westminster, upon Monday January 31, 1697 / by John Lord Bishop of Norwich.
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Moore, John, 1646-1714.
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1697
(1697)
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Wing M2555; ESTC R26202
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18,373
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42
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THE Bishop of NORWICH's SERMON Preach'd before the House of LORDS On JANUARY 31. 1697. Die Lunae 7 o Februarii 1697. IT is Ordered by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament Assembled That the Thanks of this House be and are hereby given to the Lord Bishop of Norwich for his Sermon Preach'd before this House the One and Thirtieth Day of January last in the Abby-Church and he is hereby desir'd to Print and Publish the same MATTH JOHNSON Cler ' Parlamentor ' A SERMON Preach'd before the House of Lords IN THE Abby-Church at Westminster UPON Monday January 31. 1697. By the Right Reverend Father in God JOHN Lord Bishop of NORWICH LONDON Printed by R. R. for W. Rogers at the Sun against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetstreet MDCXCVII 1 TIM II. 1 2. I exhort therefore that first of all supplications prayers intercessions and giving of thanks be made for all men for kings and for all that are in authority that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty NOtwithstanding the Care at first which was taken in planting the Gospel of Christ and that the Doctrines and Precepts thereof were publish'd by Men divinely inspired yet Errors of a dangerous nature did early creep into the Church Two of which are opposed by St. Paul in the Text the one concerned the Extent of the Christian Religion and the other related to the Subjection due to the Civil Magistrate It was a prevailing Opinion among the Jews who were the first Converts to Jesus Christ That his Gospel was only to be preached to themselves and that the Infinite Happiness promised in it should be limited to the People of their own Nation They were puff'd up with the long Course of Favours God had been pleas'd to vouchsafe unto them and could not endure with patience to hear and think that under the Dispensation of the Gospel the Gentiles should stand on a Level with them and become equally capable of the hopes and means of Salvation And as the Epicureans would have shut the Providence of God out of the World so They would have confined the illustrious Manifestations of it by Jesus Christ to the Seed of Abraham While indeed the Jews were under the peculiar Care of God the Laws he made to govern them were chiefly Political and had regard to their Publick Good and Safety as a Nation and Community like the Civil Laws of other Countries and Submission to them was enforced by Temporal Rewards and Punishments But when it pleased him to enact Laws which were for the Reformation of the Minds and Affections as well as the Manners of Men and which would not only advance their general Good in this Life but procure their Eternal Welfare in the next it seemed agreeable to his boundless Goodness and Wisdom that what he intended for the Advancement of Human Nature and the Reparation of his own Image in the Souls of Men which was defaced by Adam's Fall and Man 's own wilful Transgressions should reach to all who did partake of that Nature And this being the highest Favour his poor revolted Creatures were capable of receiving it was his merciful Resolution not to deny any of them the Means to obtain it Insomuch that the Merit of Christ's Death was to extend not only to the Seed of Abraham but to the whole Posterity of Adam That as in Adam all dye even so in Christ shall all be made alive And that God's designed Bounty by the coming of the Messiah should comprehend all Nations the Jews had sufficient notice from the Inspired Writers of their own Country And I will shake all nations and the desire of all nations shall come I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth And in support of this great Truth St. Paul doth exhort Timothy That Supplications be made for all Men Whether Jews or Gentiles Believers or Infidels of what Country of what Rank or Quality soever they be But the Occasion of our being at this time assembled will not permit me longer to insist upon the Refutation of this first Mistake of the Jewish Christians against which St. Paul's Exhortation is here directed I proceed therefore to the Consideration of the other immediately following which was Their Averseness to live in Subjection to the Civil Magistrate Their Untractableness and Disrespect to Rulers had appeared on several occasions especially since they were brought under the Roman Yoke and may probably be in some measure imputed to a wrong Interpretation which they had put upon a Precept that God gave them by Moses God had required them to make no King but of their own People One from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee thou mayest not set a stranger over thee which is not thy brother This made them unwilling to submit to any Foreign Power It is true while a liberty of Election continued they were to chuse a King of their own Nation but after God for the hardness of their hearts did suffer them to be subdued by their Neighbours and to be carried Captive into a strange Land it became their Duty to be subject to them who had brought them under their Power and to conform themselves to the Laws of the Emperors and Kings who protected them Now St. Paul having some cause to suspect since their Conversion to the Christian Religion that they had not quitted all their Prejudices and false Notions about Obedience and Submission to the higher Powers which they held under the Mosaick Dispensation does in the Text exhort and desire Timothy that as Prayers should be made for all kinds of Men so chiefly and in the first place for Kings and all that are in Authority In treating of which Argument I shall endeavour to shew 1. That it is not foreign to the Office of the Ministers of the Christian Church to remind the People of their Duty to the Civil Power 2. That the People are bound by the Laws of God and Nature to pray for those in Authority and to live in due Subjection to them 1. That it is not foreign to the Office of the Ministers of the Christian Church to remind the People of their Duty to the Civil Power Which Proposition may be grounded on the Exhortation of St. Paul to Timothy The Apostle did not think it sufficient when he writ to whole Churches to injoyn them to render Tribute 〈◊〉 and Service to Chief Governors and all in Authority under them but in his Epistle to Timothy who being made Bishop of Ephesus was about to order and establish the Worship of God in the Assemblies of the New Christians he does exhort and beseech him that their Publick Service should begin with Prayers for all Men and particularly for Kings And with equal Care and Zeal to preserve Christians from Seditious Designs and Plots against the Magistrate in his Letter to
of them who have the Legislative Power to make Laws to describe the Property of single Persons to try the Justice and Equity of Bargains and Contracts to estimate the Losses and Damages men suffer one by another By these Laws mens Labours and Service are to be rated Rewards or Punishments are to be measured out to Persons according as they shall advance the Welfare of the Society or it shall receive Detriment from them In a word the Civil Laws do allot what Tributes and Taxes each man shall pay to defend and preserve the Body Politick whereof he is a Part. 2. It is necessary that in all Societies there should be a Chief Governor to interpret the Laws and according to them to decide the Controversies between particular men without Favour and Affection or Prejudice and Hatred to any Party But if there was no Publick Person to expound the Laws every Private Man might understand them in his own Sense and make them bend to his peculiar Interest And hence it would follow that there would be as great and endless Strifes about the meaning of the Laws as would have been about the several Portions of Land in a Country before a general Division was made And therefore it is very clear and manifest in the Third Place 3. That all the Members of a Community are bound to submit to the Laws and Decrees of their Chief Governor For neither Laws nor a Governor can constitute a Society if private Men have Liberty not to submit to them Of what Use would Laws be if every one might interpret them to his own particular Advantage To what purpose should a Governor undertake to hear Causes if the People were not bound to stand to his Determinations This therefore never can happen in any Place without a Dissolution of the Government and the bringing all things into Confusion And Men in a State where every one presumes a Right in himself to oppose what he mislikes must not be thought an orderly and regulated Society but a disjointed and lawless Multitude Wherefore no one is to doubt but that God who is Author of Societies has given the Supreme Rulers in every Society a Right to so much Power as is sufficient to compel men to yield Obedience to the Laws and that he has obliged all Persons belonging unto it to submit to their Authority But now let us observe in the Revealed Will of God what further Approbation he has given of the Sovereign Powers over Nations and Kingdoms through his Providence settled in the World for the Good and Welfare of Men. When God did put the Children of Israel under his immediate Government we may take notice how severely he punished those who did mutiny against the Rulers that by his Commission acted under him Miriam was smitten with the Leprosy because she unadvisedly spoke against Moses Korah seduced some Malecontents into an Insurrection and the Earth opened and swallowed him and his Company for their Rebellion God so far countenanced the Erection of Sovereign Power over his own People the Jews as to grant their Petition for a King notwithstanding they did sin in rejecting him when they desired a king to judge them like all the nations And what is remarkable he caused their two first Kings to come to the Throne by his special Choice and Designation It is also worthy of noting That the usual Title and Stile of Kings in Holy Scripture is The Anointed of the Lord In which he forbids the reviling of Rulers and the cursing of the King even in our Thoughts he declares them his Representatives that by him they rule and decree Justice Nay he threatneth to pour his Judgments upon Jerusalem for their revolting from the King of Babylon after he had conquered their Countrey Our Saviour likewise whose Kingdom was not of this World was so far from designing any Alteration in the Forms of Government and Civil Laws of Nations that were agreeable to Reason and Morality that he confirmed their Establishment and did subject himself to the Supreme Authority of his own Time and Country by ordering Tribute to be paid to Caesar and in acknowledging to Pilate That his Power was given him from God Subjection to Kings and Governors is more largely and distinctly asserted by the Apostles who in their Divine Writings were assisted with his Holy Spirit And to render their Precepts concerning Obedience to those who preside at the Helm and direct and rule Kingdoms and Nations the more effectual they back them with strong Arguments taken from the Profit which accrues to Societies through their respectful and dutiful Behaviour to the Civil Authority and from the Judgments God will bring upon Men of a rebellious and untractable Spirit St. Paul requires every Christian Soul to be subject to the Higher Powers because those Powers are ordained of God and because they that resist them do resist the Ordinance of God and by his Decree who will maintain his own Ordinances shall for their Sin of Resistance receive to themselves Damnation St. Peter enjoins Christians in general to be subject to the King who is Supreme and to Governors that are deputed by him for the Lord's sake and because so is the Will of God and both point to the Blessings and Benefits that will therefrom proceed to Men The one says Rulers are not a Terror to good Works but to the Evil And the other That they are for the Punishment of Evil-doers and for the Praise of them that do well St. Paul affirms That the Magistrate is the Minister of God to thee for Good that is for the support of Justice and Honesty and Peace among Men and that in defending the Authority of Governors we shall include our own Quiet and Safety It is not unworthy of notice when St. Paul urged the Duty of Subjection that Nero was Emperor one of the worst of Men and to obviate an Objection made by some since who had more regard to their own Will than the Word of God That the Primitive Christians did submit to the Authority of the Emperors because they being but a handful of Men had not Force sufficient to oppose them he adds That they were to be subject not only for Wrath but also for Conscience sake that is not only for Fear of the Emperors who in their Rage might let loose their Armies upon them but upon a Principle of Duty and Justice in Consideration of the Advantage and Profit they gain by their Government And if we are to be Obedient to the Higher Powers for sake of Conscience then by Rule of Contraries we shall contract a guilty Conscience by our Disobedience The Sum of all is That we ought to pray for both in Publick and Private to Fear and Respect and Honour in our Behaviour Kings and Princes and other Magistrates and to submit to their Righteous Laws and Constitutions not only in regard they are set over us by God and Reign by his Commission but out of