Selected quad for the lemma: enemy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
enemy_n	david_n	hand_n	saul_n	2,591	5	9.7819	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A61099	Certain considerations upon the duties both of prince and people written by a gentleman of quality ...	Spelman, John, Sir, 1594-1643.	1642 (1642)	Wing S4937; ESTC R28174	19,781	30

meer constitution or agreement of men This case of Davids further teaches that if when the sinnes of the people be grown high it be any way necessary that the King be let fall into sinne before the People be punished then are Kings immediatly between God and the people and stand there like Moses in the gap to with-hold the hand of God from the people untill that they also by falling someway be removed Again if the Kings transgression in government has the originall from the sinnes of the people then are the People the prime offendors and first agents in the Kings transgression and He himselfe is as it were accessary and in a manner passive in it We see that God himselfe here judged so and laid the reall punishment upon the people whom he accounted the originall sinners as for the King to whom the sinne is verbally ascribed we see God reckons as if he were only passive in committing it and therefore inflicts no punishment on him but what he voluntarily took upon him an humbling of himself and a compassionate fellowfeeling of punishment such as a good common father has alwaies by the sense of his peoples suffering It now followes plainly that the people that have their hands in sinne are no competent Iusticiars for hearing judging and reforming of any misdemeanours especially of those in which they themselves having the principall hand are the principalls and lesse where the person questioned is but an accessary drawn in by them and least of all where he is a person sacred and one so much superiour as by Gods ordinance to stand immediatly betwixt God and them sure he that would not suffer one with a beam in his eye to pull a moat out of the eye of his brother does not permit him to doe it toward one so much superiour as his Prince nor suffer guilty Subjects to arraigne their soveraigne guilty servants their Lord nor guilty sonnes their common father To conclude we may consider the unlawfulnesse of popular animadversion into the manners and government of Princes especially of Princes that are lawfull Christian Monarchs even in this alone that there are no received nor known bounds of limitation how farre people may walk in the way of questioning and reforming the errours of Princes but that if any thing at all be lawfull for them to doe therein then may they without restraint proceed so farre as to depose Princes and deprive them of their lives if according to the doctrine of the Iesuite they finde it for the good and reformation of the Church and Commonwealth which how well it is warranted by the word of God we may see plainly enough in the case between Saul and David Saul was King but misgoverning himself and the Kingdom became as bad as excommunicate and deposed for he was rejected of God and David was by Gods expresse command annoynted to be King all which notwithstanding neither David nor the people ever sought to depose him to renounce obedience unto him to combine against him question his government or so much as meddle with ordering any of the affaires that belonged to the King Nay Saul after this persecuted David unjustly and in the midst of his unjust and hostile persecution was delivered into Davids hand and it was of necessity that David should take the advantage and kill him for he could not otherwise have any assurance of his owne life David did then but even cut of the skirt of Sauls garment to the end it might witnesse his faithfull loyalty because it made it manifest he could as easily have cut the thread of his life and even for this his heart so smote him as that he cries out The Lord forbid that I should doe this thing to my Maister the Lords annointed to stretch forth my hand against him That was not all neither but there were more circumstances in the case Saul was not yet reformed and going on still was another time delivered into Davids hands and the people both times understood it the speciall delivery of his enemy into his hands by God and would have embraced the opportunity and have made him away David restraines them still with the same bridle The Lord forbid c. and tells them Who can lay his hands on the Lords annointed and be guiltlesse No David though already annointed would tary Gods time the Lord should smite Saul or his day should come or he should descend into battaile and perish but Davids hand should not be against him No whatsoever Saul was or whatsoever he had done neither his falling from God nor Gods declaring him rejected nor Davids annointing by Gods command nor Sauls unjust persecution of David the Lords annointed in future could dissolve the duty of his Subjects nor make it lawfull for them to lay their hands on him no not when he was in wicked hostility against them But Saul in Davids account was still the Lords annointed still a sacred person still Davids maister notwithstanding the circumstances which might seeme to have discharged the tyes of duty which David and the people did formerly owe unto him Neither is the annointing of Kings a thing sacred as to their own Subjects only but the regard thereof is required at the hands of strangers also because of the prophanation and sacriledge that in the violation of their persons is committed even against God Wherefore we see that though the Amalekite were a stranger and made a faire pretence that he had done Saul a good office when at his own request he dispatched him of the paine of his wounds and of the pangs of his approaching death yet David taking his fact according to his owne confession makes a slight account of the causes which he pretended as a frivolous extenuation of an haynous fact and condemnes him though a stranger as an hainous Delinquent against the Majesty of God How wert thou not afraid saith he to stretch forth thy hand to destroy the Lords annointed neither his being a stranger nor any of the other circumstances were so availeable but that his bloud fell deservedly upon his own head The act is in it selfe perfectly wicked and in the degree hainous altogether against the word of God and therefore all actions of Subjects that in the progresse of them tend or by the way threaten to arrive at that upshot are all unlawfull fowle and wicked and not only the actors themselves wicked but their assistants favourers those that wish them well or as St Iohn speakes That bid them God speed are partakers of their evill deeds But errour in this point has made such impressions in the mindes of many as that they will never be perswaded but that they may disobey and resist Authority if ever they finde it faulty or the commaunds thereof not agreeing with their consciences They will grant that they may not disobey Authority in the lawfull commaunds thereof neither doe evill that good may come thereon but then they themselves will