Order d 1 Cor. 14.32.40 and as his Power made all in Number Weight and Measure e Wisd 11.20 so his Providence upholds all according to the same Model by setting a kind of Hierarchy and Regiment amongst all the several Societies of the Creatures even from the lowest to the highest Story of created Beings so that levelling is contrary to his Design and by a sweet subordination and symbolizing quality and affection even amongst Contraries preserves the whole First In the Inanimate Creatures For the Heavens have the Sun and Moon inthroned there to govern in their several Spheres the one over the Day and the other over the Night which with the Stars though differing from one another in glory make one uniform and glorious Structure f Is 60.13 and though of several proportions states and inequalities maintain a happy harmony amongst themselves Secondly In the Unreasonable Creatures As in Bees which of all others maintain a most perfect Polity of Monarchical Government amongst them and are the best Emblems of good Subjects painful in their labour dutiful in their life all uniting in Obedience to the service of their King and supplying his weakness with their Wings when he is unable to fly with his own as some observe Nay all other Creatures from a Natural Principle mould themselves into a sociable subordination Thus the Lyon is King of all the salvage Regiments of the Forest the Eagle of Birds Nay even Sholes of Fishes Heards of Beasts Flocks of Fowls and the rest have their Heads and Leaders Thirdly In Man's Soul by placing the Understanding in it as the Sun in its Orb the Moon and lesser Lights as the Will and Affections inferior to it in their Sphere and Station to follow its Influences and derive all their light and direction from it Nor is it otherwise in the Body which is compact of many Members one more noble than another yet all united under one Head as supreme from whence they receive Laws and to which they pay Obedience there being not the least Sinew String or Part unuseful Fourthly In the Church State and all Societies there being in all by his Ordination superior and less Noble Offices as in great Buildings Rooms for State others for more ordinary use and conveniency In Clocks greater and lesser Wheels every one like Stones in an Ark being of equal necessity though not beauty with the rest yet all making but one Uniform and Glorious Structure g Isa 60.13 Fifthly In Heaven it self For there amongst the Angels there is a Gabriel and in other Orders Cherubim Seraphim Thrones Principalities and Powers teaching us that the more things draw to Unity the nearer they are to Perfection and Assimilation with God himself who is not only a strict Unity but Oneness in himself Now upon this fundamental Principle and according to these Natural Productions God doth will in his voluntas signi or beneplaciti a Conformity to them in all things but chiefly amongst Men rational Creatures if not believing Christians by centring all Power of Families Societies Kingdoms in one Supreme and Paternal Head both for perfection and permanence So as all other Forms argue not only weakness in but tend to the perversion nay subversion of the Fabrick the several Policies of Men would seem to raise because not agreeing to the Model which God first erected in Adam For even there he established Regal and Paternal Power that differ only in proportion not similitude it being the same as a Child is a Man in little For all Government was virtually and seminally in him though spreading and propagating with the growth and Generations of Men being first founded in Families and with Ezekiel's Waters rising by degrees from thence to the uniting of many and incorporating them into Societies under one Head till at last many Heads did center in one Supreme many natural Parents chose one common Parent to them all one Pater Patriae to whom they submitted the exercise of the Legislative Power which was before in every Father of a Family who over his own Children and Servants had a Power even to Life and Death and was their King being guided to it both by dictates of right Reason God's over-ruling Providence the guidance of his Spirit and immediate designation of the Person from him as in the Jewish Common-wealth till he setled it in a lineal Succession That of Parents Patriarchs Kings being but the same Power under several Dresses and Appellations the same Beams of Majesty though reflecting several Lusters and challenging a-like Obedience from all that are subjected to them from one and the same Divine Right So as the Duty of the fifth Commandment had been as binding upon Adam's posterity in the State of Innocency had he stood as upon us though not promulgated till a thousand years after but there would have been none of that reluctancy and opposition in us nor of that oppression and irregularity in our Superiours which we are now subjected to by our Sins and his first disobedience to God So that I conceive it can neither be rationally nor upon grounds of Religion denyed that all just Power especially the Government by Kings derives its pedigree from Paternal and is an Ordinance of God springing out of a Natural and Eternal Principle which hath ever been owned First In the exemptive Precept of their persons to be free from all other Power h Prov. 21.3 Isa 10.5 Pro. 8.15 Eccles 8. 1 Pet. 2. Rom. 3. Secondly In the designation of the person i Deut. 17.15 Job 36.7.34.30 Hos 13.11 Wisd 6.3 Thirdly In the punishment of Rebellion against his sacred Ordinance k Num. 16. 2 Sam. 1.4.14.15 Fourthly By the command of our Prayers for and Obedience to them he hath set over us though Wicked and Tyrants l 1 Tim. 2.2 1 Chron. 12.1 â— Jer. 29.7.25.9 Dan. 3.21 Gen. 20.27 Bar. 1.15 Mat. 22.21 1 Sam. 24.4.6.8.9 1 Pet. 2.27 for since the loss of our first Estate wherein all should have continued in a sweet harmony and orderly subordination and lived in an happy subjection without any Schisms or mutinous irregularities we must submit to them even in their Aegyptian Tasks as the just punishment of our Rebellions against God and not Rebel against his Ordinances And upon these grounds saith Optatus David in fearing the Anointed spared his Enemy King Saul as he was God's breathing Image the mortal picture of the immortal God a piece made for lasting wrought in Oyl at his Inauguration and not to be defaced by any hand A president worthy the imitation of these apostate times wherein mens speculative Atheism hath made them such Monsters in Wickedness as to attempt to depose the King to root up the tallest Cedars to pull down and level all the high Mountains of greatness God hath set up that they might introduce and usher in an Anarchy or make the Bramble to Reign bearing no Fruit but Thorns to tear and wound
or any other Form When instead of a Mushroom the growth of one night that springs perhaps out of the basest Excrements and of such a lazy despondency of Mind as sinks him into the next degree to a Beast making him to have no designs generous and noble to carry him beyond his own felicity we shall have one whose blood is derived to him through the Veins of many Noble Heroick and Vertuous Progenitors who becomes all Spirits refined from those marish and terrene parts which weigh down or raise Vapours to eclipse others of a more base Extraction when they aspire to great and generous actions Nay this makes Princes live in their Posterities when dead and brings reverence to the very Swadling-Cloaths and Cradles of their Successors as if they might Command Obedience before they could speak as Barclay observes Nor can it be imagined but that their high and vertuous Educations should infuse a Gallantry into them above Pride saith the same Author having been always used to the greatest outward Observances and by being so placed above all Contempt so as it cannot but nourish in them higher thoughts than either Hatred Emulation or Avarice produces and free them from those self-reflections private Families are subject to as I have touched before because they are secured against the fears of Competitors in rule and have setled supplies for their wants enjoying in the Stream what others have but in the Cistern and conveying it to their posterity as their Patrimony and Inheritance making them many times Heirs of the Goods of their minds as well as Bodies and to reap the Harvest and crop of all their noble and growing Designs which as Seed sown by them will not perhaps ripen into Fruit in many years after For it is probable such will manure and nurse up with Industry and Care what their Predecessors planted Nor can the Infancy and weakness of a Prince be of so bad a Consequence as a Popular State because he is then in Guardian to the most able and faithful Great Ones or the great Council of the Kingdom it self which the wisest and best of Kings do always make use of to steer their Actions by Nay if that Government should for a time degenerate it is more likely soon to recover and unite again in one when broken into many Interests equally tainted with malignant Influences and self-seeking designs But not with the Mole to lose my self upon the face and superficies of things when I may make my Habitation safe by digging deeper the best Foundations being lowest laid I shall return to my first design and go to the Root of all endeavouring to show that Regal Power was a Plant of Paradise of God's own setting and so of Divine Right and that the Sword which contends with the Scepter and raises it self upon the ruines of just Power cannot be free from all the fore-mentioned sad Effects which must eclipse the Glory of every Nation and leave it no Trophies but such as Pyrrhus once said of his Victories as would undoe the Conquerour and appear best when shrouded under the Vail of true Repentance and offered up again by a holy Restitution to the Altar from which they were sacrilegiously taken Such successes being our greatest vanquishments and leaving us no just Title to make other use of our unjust acquisitions Though Abishai would have preached David into a Murder and Rebellion at once upon no better grounds than Gods delivering Saul into his power o 1 Sam. 26.9.10.24.12 had he not learnt a better Divinity measuring his Actions by Gods revealed Will not outward Events knowing he there writes in Characters shewing us his hand only but not letting us at all read his meaning in them p Deut. 9. 2 Chron. 13.8 But to be a little more plain and perspicuous in so necessary a Truth I shall endeavour as in an Epitome or Index to those many large and learned Discourses that have been written upon this subject to sum up the best Collections I can and to digest them into this Method First To shew that Kings are the Ordinance of and hold their Supreme Power from God not Man and that they are only accountable to him for the use of it Secondly What that Power is and how limited Thirdly That resistance in the Subject against that Power is in no Case warrantable Fourthly What Duties Kings owe to their Subjects Fifthly What the Subject's Allegiance consists in to them First That Kings are the Ordinance of God contrary to that of the Romanists and our new Statists Reges coronas sceptra ab hominibus recipiunt ad eorum placita tenent q Bellarm. lib. 5. de Rom. Pon. cap. 7. So Buchanan r De Jure Reg. apud Scotos Populus Rege praestantior etiam major Rex igitur cum ad Populi Judicium vocatur minor ad majorem in jus vocatur For they are called God's by Institution and Appropriation from God For By me Kings reign saith he s Prov. 8.15 Rom. 13. 1 Pet. 2. Jo. 14.30 Hos 13.11 Wis 6.13 and with my holy Oyl have I anointed him t Ps 89.20 not only to rule by but for God too as the most express Character of him upon Earth Which made him lead his people by the hand of Moses and Aaron one Chief in Civil matters the other in things concerning the Priest's Office though with subordination Not one People by many Rulers much less the Ruler by the People but by one in Chief under the conduct of God himself and by his Authority as may appear in that and all other Instances of Regal Power So as Kings are to be reverenced and distinguished from others in regard of that Natural and Paternal Power God planted in Adam and caused immediately after to derive from many Heads into one Chief in one place a cause of the division of the Nations amongst the Sons of Noah as Monarch of the whole Earth after the Flood u Gen. 10.32 So as Kings are Gods and to be obeyed First In regard of their Attribute of Power For where the word of a King is there is Power w Eccles 8.4 that he might be feared x Pro. 24.21 and who may say unto him what dost thou Secondly In that of Mercy For there is Mercy with him that he may be feared in that he beareth not the Sword in vain y Rom. 13. 1 Pet. 2. but doth whatsoever pleaseth him z Eccle. 8.3 1 Sam. 8. in giving gracious Indulgences Thirdly In regard of Majesty and Soveraignty For God expresseth them by those highest Titles saith Calvin a Inst 4. l. cap. 20. to affect us with the awful sence of the Divinity it self and our Duty to them in putting the Glory of his own name upon them For b Ps 82.6 I have said ye are Gods and not only so but decreed and ordained it it shall be so even Gods before Men though Men before God 1st
or lawful Magistrate in Israel Nay even in Popular States so natural a thing is Monarchy in what hands soever the Power is one Finger will still as in natural Bodies be found longer than the rest and become a Kingly Tyrant by his over-swaying Interest And therefore let us not cast Pelion upon Ossa heap Sin upon Sin by countenancing such mushroom Alterations Nay he that is not against them is with them in this case and so becomes guilty of their unfruitful deeds of Darkness if not discountenancing and preventing them by all lawful wayes according to that of the Apostle t 1 Thes 5. avoid all appearance of evil by appearing to disallow of it never concurring actively with it though we suffer to Bonds and death For that will in the end prove our Crown of rejoycing though the Absoloms of these times would with fair and specious pretences seduce us from our Allegiance For it is better in this Case contrary to David's choice to fall into the hands of Men embalmed with Innocence to preserve our names from Infamy and our Souls from Damnation than into the hands of God besmeared with the Leprosie of Sin that must needs cause his rejection of us But if the Despisers of God and their King will still pertinaciously maintain the black and horrid Sins of Oppression Sacriledge Murder and the like not only deposing but despoyling them as the greatest Delinquents of all their just Patrimonies and Rights by plundering the one and vilifying the other in all things sacred whether Places Persons or Revenues sanctified and discriminated by Gods own Institution by prophaning his Sanctuaries and despising his Priests and Ordinances d Lam. 31. Ps 74. they may be assured of a certain if not swift destruction to overtake them from the Authority of the like Precedents in all Ages and the Word of God it self For their Posterity here like a Plague-sore in the Body growing out of their own putrefaction their soul and ulcerous Sins as the meritorious cause of Judgments will hasten them Nor can they account themselves free from the other's guilt who have not acted in their Crimes if they have not some way opposed them e Judg. 5.23 according to their several Callings and Capacities being bound to it by the Laws of God the Kingdom and that of Natural Obligation to their Civil Parents and common Charity to their engaged Brethren in that Damnation will be chiefly pronounced against Sins of Omission at the last day which I express not to upbraid any but to convince them by it to make them steer a more safe course in Emergencies of the like nature if any shall hereafter happen making God's Law the Compass by which they sail even Heavenly Influences not sublunary Agitations However I hope they will keep themselves from a countenancing of or complyance with the Persons and Actings of those that usurp the Supreme Power both in regard of Scandal to others and contracting Crime upon themselves by avoiding all Appearances of Evil f 1 Thes 5. when Vertue and Vice border so upon one another are so near in their Confines and so contiguous as the least excess or defect makes a Natural Action many times an unnatural disorder and a thing indifferent in it self become the parent of a great Sin Therefore he cannot be innocent that holds Communion with those that are guilty of such high Crimes in any thing that seems to countenance them though God's Service be a thing pretended as in their Thanksgivings and Humiliations so St. Augustine g Serm. 6. de verb. Dom. For two will not walk together unless they agree saith the Prophet h Amos 3.3 So as it is the duty of every Christian not to betray the truth by his Silence or Countenance but to contend for it against all Actions that seem to favour the successes of an unjust Cause grounded in Rebellion or tending to the maintaining an Usurped Power i Judg. 3.11 And therefore we ought by separating from them k 2 Cor. 4.17 to reprove their Errours l Eph. 5.7 11 15. in that our Actions have a Tongue in them as well as the Corn Earth and other inanimate Creatures m Psal 19. So that though Humiliations and Thanksgivings are Pious and Religious Duties in themselves yet when called to advance any unjust Interest or to countenance it our presence there intitles us to their Sin though we abhor it and the Minister at that time preach against it in that the end for which it was commanded terminates and specificates the Duty in all ordinary and publick Interpretation and makes us give by our presence Offence to the Innocent confirm the Wicked and partake of their Crimes so as Disobedience in that case is better than Sacrifice n 1 Sam. 15. Nay I may not only appropriate others Sins o Psal 50.28 by Countenance Approbation or Imitation while living but may be guilty of Sin in others many thousand years after I am dead as well as I did Sin before I was born when they sin by Example or Infusion derived from me For as the long precogitation upon any sin with delight makes it an old and inveterate one before it be produced into Act so another's repetition of any sin by my Example or Authority though committed many Ages hence makes it a new sin to me and to increase my Damnation as is deduced most justly by Divines from the Parable of Dives p Luke 16. who reflected upon himself not his Brethren in his charity And therefore let us walk with all preciseness q Psal 119.53.63 hating Evil with a perfect hatred and doing nothing that either may be made an Argument to confirm others in any evil way or action by our complyance or be matter of just scandal to the Innocent and suffering Party especially if our Judgments approve it not For if I ought not to do a good Action nor favour a good Cause if not of Faith r Rom 14. I am much less excusable in countenancing an ill one my Judgment in any thing dissenting So that none can conscientiously and voluntarily act with those that usurp the exercise of Supreme Power in any Kingdom in any thing that gives countenance to such an Authority or is conducing to the establishing or maintaining of it without contracting the guilt of all those sins and irregularities the others smoothed their way by to that assumed Greatness For there are so many ways to contract others Crimes as Junius and Piscator observes s On Isa 10.1 that the very Scribe or Notary of an unjust decree though but instrumental in it is threatned with a Curse a woe being pronounced both against them that decree unrighteous decrees and that write grievous things which the other prescribed as the Prophet expresses it For we are commanded to walk honestly toward them that are without t 1 Pet. 2.12 not giving the least scandal in any thing
recovery of his just Rights Answ In this case Faithfulness implying Trust Duty and Active Obedience as in the Revelations Be faithful unto Death and I will give thee a Crown of Life and so understood in Common Notions you ought not to do it For though you cannot pay the Debt of an Operative Allegiance to the right Owner it is not in your Power to transfer his Right to another the Duty of Subjects to their Kings deriving from God's Precept not Man's Donation so as it falls not under the consideration of things Arbitrary Obedience being simply good or evil as it is objected And therefore all I conceive we can do in this case lawfully is but the giving of a Negative Assurance not to act any thing against them so long as we remain under their protection which once made we ought to be faithful in the observing till our condition be enlarged by Exchange Ransom or some other way of Providence which ever presumes the means to be lawful as well as the end good For this is but a submission to my fate with an Improvement of my Condition no restraint of my Power but the exercise of it for a time a prudent Election of the least evil of Punishment without any Ingredient of the evil of sin For so we may keep Loyal and strengthen in the Habit when suspended in the Act and interrupted in the mafestation of the Duty a wrong possession de facto never cancelling the Owners right de jure but engages all honest mens Compassions to the oppressed and Prayers for their restitution and not with the Pagan Indians to worship the Devil ne noceat or for the Temptations of Greatness or Power q Mat. 4. So as our Oaths and Engagements must be always as the Casuists determine 1. Super re licita 2. In bonum finem 3. Never contra pactum aliquod prius initum which the equity of the thing and some just occasion may again call me to upon a former tye or Obligation for if otherwise taken they engage us only to an hearty Repentance for having taken them And all this we ought to do out of an humble and reverential awfulness to the Person and Commands of our King not servile Affection as not consisting with a noble and ingenuous nature but a filial one issuing from love For this is grounded upon the Law of Nature and should be filial as Power it self is Paternal r Lev. 19.3 Pro. 14.21 And therefore my Son saith Solomon fear God and the King for as the King to God so the Subjects are to the King and he is a middle thing in regard of just Power between them and God Nay he is so much Gods nay God to us in regard of the immediate Power and delegation he hath from God that Josephus to distinguish Monarchical Government from all others framed by men calls it Theocratie that of God which in the Inventory of all Blessings of this life was by Ezekiel accounted the greatest Ezek. 16.3 And as a Beam from the Sun it is so inseparable from the person where it is once legally setled in a King and his Progenitors as it is with us owned both by the Articles of our Church Canons Homilies Laws and Oaths both of Supremacy and Allegiance that nothing but death can divide them For though some Kings have been deposed by Rebellions and others forced to resign their Crowns as Edward the Second see Baker's Chronicle they were never divested of the Habit of Power de jure but only deprived of its exercises de facto And though that of Resignation can hardly be justifiable in any case it ought never to be done but to his lawful Successor as it was in the Instance mentioned without throwing off God as in the rejection of Samuel where his Providence had otherwayes settled the Right in that where the Divine Constitution hath placed the Supremacy in any God still expects from him a just managing of that Power for the advancement of his Glory and good of his people which he can never cast off no more than a Father Wife or Child can discharge themselves from the mutual duty of those Relations so long as they continue Nor is this slightly to be passed over when the single duty of fear due to the King s Eccl. 12.13 is comprehensive of all others for as Love it is a Catholick Grace runs through all our Actions and is a Watch upon them for their Regulation or as the Life and Soul that animates them and the more it is free the more it dilates to shew it self saith Irenaeus in just duties and makes our Filiation under the Gospel of much more liberty than the condition of Servants under the Law as it imports a voluntary Reverence or Worship for so Fear and Reverence in the Language of the Spirit speak the same thing t Eccl. 1. Ps 5.7 compared with Ps 132.7 Ps Ps 95. Mal. 1.6 But to test our selves in this duty we may know it by our fear of God which includes it as God will know that is take notice of our fear of him by that to our Superiours As in Abraham's Sacrifice where though intuitively and eternally he knew that Abraham feared him yet he would not own it but from the evidence of his outward expressions u Gen. 22.13 And thus our Saviour would only take notice of St. Peter's love to him by feeding his Flock w Joh. 2 P. 17. though he well knew his Affections before which was also the reason of Job's Tryals x Job 1. Nor is this a slight Argument as a Reverend Divine observes but grounded upon an impregnable Reason and Syllogism framed by the Spirit of God y 1 Joh. 4. who concludes by a Topick rule That if we love not the general Image of God in our Brethren whom we do see we cannot love God whom we do not see but in such Shadows and Representations And if by my want of Affection and Charity to my Brother and the fruit of it God concludes against my love to him he will do it much more for the want of our duty of fear to our King who is not only his general but the particular and peculiar Image of his Divine Power and Glory to whom fear is originally due which made Jacob to say of his Lord Esau z Gen. 32.10 vidi faciem ut faciem dei And Moses a Num. 16. Exo. 16.8 Your murmurings are not contra nos sed contra Jehovam Nay thus God himself saith of the ten Tribes revolt b 2 Chr. 13.8 they resisted the Kingdom of God in David's Son and to Samuel c 1 Sam. 8.7 non te sed me So as our failings in this or any other way to our Prince is a disobedience to God himself as their hearts are said to be in his hands by appropriation Therefore my Son says he not Sons give me thy heart d Pro. 24.21 in exchange