Maxim of Tyranny only to keep the Subject poor To which auri vis Arist l. 5. pol. c. 11. Annal. l. 11. c. 1. opes infensae saith Tacitus Nero never gave to any Favorite any great employment but he added Thou knowst what we want Let us take care Sueton in Neron ne quis quidquam habeat And it is a Proverb relating to the great Turk That where he has once trampl'd there neither grow Leaves nor Grass On the other side we find with what a torrent the Portugals bore down all before e'm to recover their ancient Laws and the Soveraignty of their lawful Princes from the servitude and oppression of the Spaniards insomuch that when the Duke of Braganca had once declar'd his mind the revolt was universal and with such a rapid motion that one single day determin'd the contention with little blood so swift and astonishing was the surprize Nor must we forget how impatiently this Nation bow'd under Usurpation how hainously they bore the exilement of his present Majesty and the loss of their ancient Liberties almost buryed in a most impious Tyranny not ceasing till they had recover'd both their Prince and their Laws to the unspeakable joy of the whole Kingdom In France the King is Absolute and Arbitrary His word is the Law He may thank Lewis the XI for laying the Foundations and Richlieu and Mazarine for perfecting the work However Olden T. 2. as it is brought about the Final cause of the French Government at present is the Grandeur of the Monarch for the support of which the welfare of the People is but trampled under Foot The King squeezes with his Exactions the great Lords and Gentry for their Rents till the Commonalty are reduc'd to utmost penury For which reason France is compar'd to a most flourishing plain that feeds innumerable Flocks of Sheep which are to be fleec'd when the Shepherd pleases He is never safer than when he is in War to keep his haughty Nobility from hatching mischief But his own Subjects being so cow'd and out of heart for Infantry he is forc'd to hire among his Neighbours and Skins the servile Peasant for their pay by that means dilating his Territories to the intolerable detriment of his enslav'd People Only they are happy because they know no better In Swedeland it is quite otherwise Olden T. 2. for there the King is bound to govern by the Laws of the Country which he has no power to alter without the consent of the People So that the Character of the Swedish Government is this That it aims more at the welfare of the Subject than the Interest of the Prince And therefore it is observed that no Commonalty in the World live more happy than they Which renders them stout defenders of their Country and formidable to the most formidable of their Neighbours The Danish Government regards the Common Interest of the People who are govern'd by the ancient Laws of the Country which the King is sworn to observe at his Coronation Therefore the People thrive and live in a plentiful and flourishing condition Whether the English imbib'd their love of Liberty from their ancient Ancestors the Danes is not material here to discuss Yet certainly no Nation under Heaven enjoys those Rights those Priviledges that uncontroul'd Propriety with more ample provision and careful circumspection of Law or a more equal ballance between the Prince and the Subject than the People of England which makes them jealous of their infringement sometimes even to excess For the Laws of England are made with the consent of the People themselves By which means they prevent the imposing any oppressive Burden upon their own Shoulders So that it may well be said that the safety and security of the English People their Lives their Liberties and peculiar Proprieties are as it were entrusted to the Guardianship and deposited in the keeping and defence of Laws and Constitutions of their own framing Not of yesterday but deriv'd from the provisions of distinct Legislators and Princes from the most ancient to these present times carefully deliberated and debated among the most eminent for Wisdom and Counsel in the Nation The want of Laws in the greatest part of those Governments already recited sufficiently declare how little the People have to trust to that are only govern'd by Will and Power On the other side those People who are govern'd by Kings not Tyrants are the most happy and those Kings approach nearest to the King of Kings who govern like Shepherds not like Wolves Which is the reason that David calls God himself the Shepherd of Israel Now then the Common good being the Rule and Quadran of good Government the better the Laws are and the more they tend to the Common good their ultimate end the better must that Government be in regard that where the Law is predominant the Common good can receive no injury and where the Common good is so secur'd there the People are safe in all things that concern their Civil welfare And in this appears the excellency of those Laws that mainly design the common Benefit that they resemble nearest the Laws of God whose Dispensations of Justice were the same to the Peasant as to the Prince And as it was most certainly a greater Prerogative of the Hebrew Kings above all other Kings and Monarchs whatsoever that they govern'd by the Law of God so does it not admit of much dispute whether the Monarchs of England may not claim a Prerogative of the same kind over all other Potentates by governing by a Law the nearest to Divine of any extant more justly far deserving the Title of most Christian Kings than they who glory only in commanding numerous swarms of Slaves But where the National Constitutions of a Kingdom have so interwoven and twisted the Interest of Prince and People that they are inseparable without detriment to both there the Laws are the safety of the Prince and the security of the People and as the ballance kept but duly even render's the Obligation and reciprocal relation between the one and the other indissoluble so it perpetuates their mutual happiness and tranquility Now the People claim their security by the Law from the equal distribution of Justice the preservation of their Freedom and Proprieties and protecting the publick Peace from Tumult and Disorder On the other side the Prince expects all due Obedience from the People in the execution of the Law and an exact condescension to his just Prerogatives without which his Authority lessens and grows into contempt The Laws of England ordain to these ends a limited Authority to the Prince and a consin'd freedom to the Subject thereby providing at one and the same time for the safety of the Prince and the security of the People For it is as equally dangerous and wicked for the People to deny the Prince his just Prerogatives as it is of ill consequence to deny the People their Freedoms
while Men in Holy Orders deviate and maintain the forbidden Interest of Worldly Glory while they seek to support the name and shew of Religion they Adulterate Justice and many times become the main disturbers of the publick Peace Whence Matchiavel makes this observation Matchiavel disâ—câ—â—si l. 1. c. 12. That those People who inhabit nearest to the Church of Rome have the least Religion and ascribes the Bad Estate of Italy to the Roman See And for this he gives two invincible as he calls them Reasons First for that by the evil and wicked Examples of that Court the whole Nation have lost all their Piety and Devotion The next Reason proceeds from the different Interest of Christian Humility and Antichristian Vain-glory. For the Roman Court to maintain the Pomp and Splendour of a Temporal Hierarchy is forc'd to keep not only Italy but all Europe in Division and sometimes to League even with the Turk for its own preservation by which means unhappy Italy being prevented from uniting under their own supream Prince and one frame of Law is expos'd to all the Pretences of her more powerful Neighbours and her pettie Princes are but the precarious Tenants at Will to more mighty Potentates Nor does the Exaltation of the Church encourage the Priesthood to move irregularly out of their Sphere or to lead an Amphibious Life sometimes in the running Streams of the Gospel sometimes upon the Terra Firma of Temporal Government Nor is it in Scripture a warrantable method of seeking Church preferment to oblige the secular Interest by strain'd and wrested Interpretations of the Immaculate Scripture Like Shaw Preaching up the Title of Richard the Third and Latimer the right of Jane Seymour For if the Kingdom of their Lord and Master be not of this World no more does temporal preferment belong to the Ministers of his Doctrine But the true Exaltation of the Church is to protect it's Ministers in the Preaching of sound Scripture to the Conversion of Souls to the building up the new Jerusalem and advancing the future Kingdom of Christ by their endeavouring to increase the number of his Celestial Subjects The Exaltation of the Church protects her neat and pure and exactly cleans'd and swept from all the Cobwebbs of Babylonish Superstition For then will Rome despair of ever setting Foot in England more when with grief she beholds all her Follies and inveigling Allurements Root and Branch extirpated To which end the same resolution might well become the Clergy of England in reference to the Relicks of Popish Ceremonies which was applauded in King Stephen in relation to the Roman Laws who hearing that they were brought into England and lodg'd in the custody of Theobald Archbishop of Canterbury commanded them out of his House publish'd an Edict against the Laws of Italy and banish'd them out of his Realm Not enduring tho' a Forraigner himself any other then the Honesty of the English Constitutions An Act of his not recorded by any of our Historians but by the Learned Selden in his Notes upon Fortescue cited from Roger Bacon's Compendium Theologiae and John of Salisbury in his Treatise de nugis Curiaticum On the other side the Wolf in Sheeps cloathing outwardly Meek and insinuating Heresie and Schisme are equally dangerous and contagious For Heresie the Illegitimate Brat of Contumacy while it labours to shake off from the minds of Men the easie Yoke of Christ at the same time teaches Men to violate their Allegiance to their lawful Princes and they that strive to bring in the Innovations of obstinate Opinion if they get the upper hand seldom change the Religion alone Therefore the Exaltation of the Church defends and guards those Men that give themselves to compose the breaches of Ecclesiastical Differences and labour to beget a harmony and unity of Faith and Devotion which then Religion most truly useful and the most unblemish'd Aid of Civil Justice The second final Cause of this Great Charter was the Amendment of the Kingdom The miscarriages of those times are by our Historians said to be the Cancelling of the Great Charter by the advice of Hubert de Burgh Chief Justiciary of England as first confirm'd by the King during his Nonage The displacing the English Nobility and admitting Poictovins and Forraigners into the Chief employments of the Kingdom and the Impoverishment of the Nation by vast and continual Taxations By the means of which undue proceedings the ancient Laws of the Realm were render'd useless and the Liberty of the People lay at the Mercy of Evil Ministers The amendment of which Grievances as being an Act due to the Honour of God the Salvation of the Kings Soul and the Exaltation of the Church is now intended by the Confirmation of this Great Charter From whence it is inductively demonstrable that if the Establishment of good Laws be the way to procure such inestimable Happiness to a Prince the continuance of bad Customs and Oppression inclines to all the contrary consequences that is to be dishonourable to God hazardous to Salvation and injurious to the Church Which considerations of Eternal Detriment or Felicity when they come to be the inducements to Reformation must certainly be a great advantage to such Reformation that it may prove effectual to all its purposes And then such Act of Reformation is of that high Merit that it produces a benefit of the good exceeding the mischief of the Evil the reason perhaps why Machiavel ascribes a more Exalted renown to those Princes who reform the corruptions of a disorder'd State then to those who only continue the Good Government which they found E veramente saith he un Prencipe cercando la gloria del mondo doverebbe desiderare di possedere una Citta corrotta non par guastarlo come Caesare ma per riordinarla come Romulo A Prince Ambitious of the Honour of this World would desire to come to a Kingdom under the corruption of ill Customs not to ruine it like Caesar but reform it like Romulus For as it is impossible but that Ambition desire of absolute Dominion and many other oversights of Government will many times disturb the Courts of Justice and let in confusion at the Breaches of the Law so is that Prince the more highly to be honour'd who reforms those abuses and restores exiled Justice by how much such Reformation must needs be the more welcome and acceptable even as health is more valued by such as know the Inconveniencies of Sickness then by those who never understood the want of Cure and by how much the Joy is greater for the recovery of the lost Sheep then for those that never went astray Now this Amendment of the Kingdom imply'd the defect of Government and such a defect which endanger'd the Estates Lives and Liberties of the Subject which since they could be no way secur'd but by the Recovery of the Ancient Laws of the Kingdom it follows that seeing the Rights and Liberties of the English People are
warranted by the National and Fundamental Laws of the Land We are then to believe that the Princes just Prerogatives and the Peoples safety are the common Good of this Nation and that their Lives and Fortunes equally depend upon those Provisions which the Law has so equally made for the security of the whole Body of the Commonweal of which the Soveraign Prince is the Head It is one of the Excellencies then of the English Laws that they provide for the Common good which is the end of all true Law For this is the general Axiom That the Reason and Substance of Law demands that every part should be fram'd for the Common Benefit Greg. Lop. in l. 9 â—â—t 1. part 1. which was the Condition that Alphonsus King of Spain requir'd also in his Laws And thus it is understood by the Interpreters of the Civil Law who affirm that the Law is a common Precept respecting the Benefit of all Aristotle observes that the chief end of a Commonweal is to live well and happily And therefore adds Ethied 4. c. 1. That the Laws are to be accommodated to the Commonweal not the Common-weal to the Laws In my opinion saith Plato the Law is made for Benefits sake In Dialog Hippias as intended by the Legislator to be the supream happiness of a Commonweal for the Law being taken away there is no well being in a City And in another place he shews at large that the end of Law is the common safety and felicity And Plutarch tells us In Problem tit 40. That Laws are then accompted good and wholsome when they procure the public Benefit Which is evident from the most sacred Laws of the Almighty For though they be ordain'd to the honour of God for that God cannot will any thing without himself nor operate but for himself yet in those Laws the great Monarch of Monarchs seeks not his own Benefit but the good and felicity of Mankind Suarez l. 1. c. 7. Which then also the Laws of Man most nearly imitate when they drive nearest to the same Perfection Therefore as Laws are impos'd upon a Community so are they to be fram'd for the good of that Community otherwise they are irregular For it is against all rectitude and justice to direct the Common good to private Interest or to make the whole relate to the part for the parts sake And therefore when the Law is fram'd for a public Society the good of that Society ought primarily and principally to be procur'd The same thing is apparent from the Order of small Causes For the end ought to be proportionate to the act its beginning and its virtual efficacy Now the Law is the common rule of moral actions and therefore the first principle of moral actions ought to be the first beginning of the Law For in Morals the End is the beginning of Operation and so the ultimate end is the first beginning of such Operations But common good and felicity is the ultimate end of a Commonweal therefore that also ought to be the beginning of the Law and therefore the Law ought to aim at the Common good This is illustrated by St. Austin who collecting a Consequence from the Relation of the part to the whole argues that a Master of a Family ought to take his pattern from the public Laws and so to govern his House as to be conformable and agreeable to the public Peace Therefore ought the public Laws to give a good Example of public Benefit and common Safety that Domestic Government may not be ruin'd by a bad President Suarez brings another reason from the Original of Law For that the ruling power which is in Men is either immediately from God as in spiritual Power or from men as in Power purely temporal But both ways Suarez l. 1. c. 7. such Authority is given for the public advantage of all in general For therefore are the Rulers of the Church call'd Pastors because it behoves them to lay down their Lives for their Sheep and Dispencers not Lords and Ministers not Primary causes and therefore they are oblig'd to be conformable to the Divine Intention in the use of such Authority Therefore also are the supream Magistrates call'd the Ministers of the Public as not being created for their own benefit but for the advantage of them from whom they derive their Power They are also call'd the Ministers of God and therefore ought to use the Power entrusted in their hands in imitation of the King of Kings who in his Government solely respects the common good of Mankind For which reason St. Basil makes this distinction between a Tyrant and a King that the one seeks his own proper advantages the other labours chiefly for the common good and benefit of all his Subjects not excluding himself as being the supream Member and consequently the first that ought to share in the publick and general Emolument The reason why so few People attain this summum bonum of Government appears by the ways of practizing Dominion already recited the want of a due poyse between Rule and Subjection For in the Arbitrary Eastern Monarchies the People are altogether Slaves and may be only said to live not to live with any comfort or enjoyment of themselves In the Elective Kingdom of Poland the Nobility carry such an unbridl'd sway that the King is but a Cypher a King and no King which subjects the Royal Soveraignty to such an insufferable Bondage that the Title is hardly worth the acceptance of an English Knight A King in subjection to many Kings And all this while the People live miserably under the Slavery of a many-headed Tyranny The Emperor is so overmaster'd by his Golden Bull and so hamper'd with Electors and Dyets that in the most emergent affairs the slowness of deliberation many times renders him useless to his Friends and his Authority cumbersome to himself So that he never moves but like a Clock when his weights are hung on Such clogs upon Soveraignty are frequently the ruine of great Atchievments Neither do the Laws of God any where enjoyn the Kings of Judah when they should make either War or Peace The Ephori were added as a check to the Lacedemonian Kings Which tho' it grieved the Wife of Theopompus who upbraided her Husband for suffering such an Eclipse of his Authority yet was not Theopompus of her mind who return'd her answer So much the greater by how much the more lasting And this Remedy saith Plutarch was invented by the Lacedaemonians to prevent the evil accidents and ruine that befell the Kings of the Messenians and Argines who lost all for obstinately refusing to condescend a little to the Grievances of the People Plut. in vit Lyc. The Romans were terribly pester'd about keeping the ballance even between the People and the supream Magistrate For after they had ingratefully thrown out the Regal Government which had laid the Foundations of all their Grandeur they
betook themselves to their Annual Consuls but when the Nobility had engross'd that Office to themselves the Plebeians began to wince at their Oppression and departing to Mount Aventino threatned the Roman Nobility to forsake the City unless they releas'd them of their Burthens Thereupon the Tribunes of the People were invented to be Protectors of the Commons for I omit the Consular Pretors and Decemvirs as of no continuance but their Power was over-large and they rastl'd with Authority at too high a rate Sometimes the Tribunes saith Tacitus were mutinous and head-strong sometimes the Consuls prevail'd whence Civil bloodshed and slaughter even in the heart of the City Till at length Marius one of the meanest rank of Plebeians and Sylla the most cruel of the Nobility turn'd the Roman Liberty vanquish'd at length by both their Arms into Arbitrary Dominion After which no other Contests but those of Ambition So that it is apparent that the Romans lost their Liberty for want of the Tribunes prudent management of the Ballance which was put into their hands whereas the Ephori knew the Limits of their own Authority as well as the Bounds of that Power to which they were appointed as Assistants and Moderators Nor is this Equilibrium in Government an airy Notion or Idea It may easily be found in the moderation of our own Laws wherein there is that veneration of Just Prerogative and that care of the Peoples Rights and Liberties that did not sometimes Popular Affectation sometimes the Ambition of evil Ministry shog the Beam it would be a difficult thing for Soveraignty to find an occasion to complain or subjection to murmur And for this excellency of our Laws we are chiefly beholding to the prudence and moderation of our own Princes Two such Celestial Virtues that of the whole Succession of Roman Emperors they render'd only Vespasian his Son Titus and Antoninus Pius the most Illustrious Monuments of the Imperial Dignity Neither is good Government any other thing than Justice by another name which is always pictur'd with an even Ballance in her hand And that high Character sounds like somewhat immortal given of Hiero King of Sicily that he was justus in negotio in imperio moderatus Of whom Livy also reports Justin l. 23 c. 24. that he would have made the Romans his Heirs that he might leave the Syracusans in the same Liberty which for fifty years he had maintain'd among them l. 24. c. 4. In all which time his Subjects had not beheld him nor his Son Gelo aut vestis habitu Justin l. 7. c. 6.16 aut alio ullo insigni differentes And it is reckon'd among the Elogies of Philip of Macedon that he was not only moderatus verum etiam mitis adversos victos It is farther said of Valerius Poblicola that when he was advanc'd to the highest degree of Roman Honour he lessen'd his own Authority by degrees that the Law of the whole City might appear more free To which we may add the saying of Theopompus a King himself who being ask'd by his Intimate which was the most severe method for a Prince to preserve his Dignity made answer If he made his Friends sharers of his Prerogative and Authority and took care that no injury were done to his Subjects Nor can any thing more brightly illustrate the moderation of ancient Legislators than the Laws themselves which they have left behind so easie and gentle so tender of Life and Limb so indulgent to reputation so strict in the preservation of Liberty and Propriety so equal to the highest to the lowest to the most wealthy and the poorest that if they fail of their aim the Common good and welfare of All 't is when they fall into the hands of bad interpretation and such as wrest their sincere and just intention Which creates no little astonishment in the brests of many judicious men that the Remedy of their strictness should be so highly advanc'd which frequently proves worse than the Disease and proves oft-times more fatal both to Purse and Person than the most grievous sentence that lies in their Power to pronounce The main blot in the fair Scutcheon of our English Constitutions Tho' there may sometimes happen another misfortune to their Noble Characters when Ecclesiastical jealousie seeks to gall the People with spiritual Impositions or Temporal for the sake of spiritual Interest by which means the Yoke of Christ by himself asserted to be light and easie is made like Rehoboams little Finger thicker than the Loyns of humane Sanction Pulton the Laborious Collector of all the Fundamental Laws and Statutes of the Kingdom highly extols them beyond the Constitutions of the Roman Emperours and of all other Nations And before him the Great and Learned Fortescue was also of the same Judgment who prefers the Law of England far beyond the Civil Edicts But above all nothing commends it more than that it preserves the Rights and Liberties of the Subject inviolable and is of that nature that as the same Fortescue affirms the Prince himself cannot change them without the Consent of his Subjects Delaud Leg. Ang. c. 9. nor charge them with strange Impositions against their wills For which reason the People frankly and freely enjoy and occupy their own Goods being rul'd by such Laws as they desire Therefore saith he rejoyce O Soveraign Prince and be glad that the Law of your Realm wherein you shall succeed is such For it shall procure to you and your People no small security and comfort With such Laws should all mankind have bin govern'd if in Paradise they had not transgress'd With such Laws was the Synagogue rul'd while it serv'd under God only as King who adopted the same to him for a peculiar Kingdom Concluding with a short Memorandum of the wealthy and flourishing Condition of the Jews under their good Kings and the Misery and Captivity that attended wilful and Arbitrary Idolatry St. Austins Definition of a People may be rightly apply'd to the English Nation De civit Dei l. 19 A People saith he is a multitude of Men associated by the consent of the Law and Communion of publick Benefit Which as it is most certainly true of the English Nation so may it farther be said that this same Body of Men thus Incorporated within this Island has from the first beginning had that peculiar Felicity never to have had any other Head but what wore a Royal Diadem And these Laws which are the Guard and Muniments of the Common Good may be said to have bin compil'd by a grand Sanhedrim of Soveraign Potentates West Saxon Danish Northumbrian Mercian Ina Ethelwolph Cednulph Alfred Athelstan Edwin and Canute every one throwing the Royal Contributions of his particular Cares and Studies into the publick Treasury of the Common Good which being the Act and Deed of Soveraignty it self it cannot be thought that Regal Power was regardless of its just Prerogative or that Edward the Confessor would have
Realm but a Collection of those ancient Constitutions of the Saxons Danes Mercians and Northumbrians which were by Matthew Paris call'd Bonae adprobatae antiquae Regni leges leges Edvardi Regis quae prius inventae sunt constitutae in tempore Adgari avi sui leges aequissimi Regis Edvardi These the English oppress'd by Norman Tyranny eagerly thirsted to have restor'd and were impatient till they were at length in most solemn manner confirm'd first by King John and afterwards by Henry the Third with the severest Anathama upon the Infringers of it that State or Religion could devise Know ye saith the King that We in the fear of God for the Salvation of our Soul the Exaltation of the Church and the Amendment of the Kingdom In which words are contain'd the Motives inducing the King to make the Grant and next the Final causes of the Grant The first Inducement is the Fear of God And this those Two Great Monarchs Favorites of the Almighty Victorious David and Wise Solomon both conclude to be the beginning of Wisdom Which Wisdom as it can consult nothing but what is good and virtuous in General so when It comes to be chief Privy Counsellour and Minister of State to a Prince in the Establishing a particular National Government can never be suspected to advise otherwise then for the general Good and Preservation of the People from whom Obedience to that Government is requir'd 'T would be impiety to think that the Beginning of Wisdom could have any other aim or intention then what is just and profitable Therefore where a Prince is blessed with the fear of God That Religious Fear instructs him with Heav'nly Wisdom and that Heavenly Wisdom guides him to make and establish such Laws as may come nearest to the Laws of God himself which respected nothing more then the safety repose protection and welfare of his own People Happy then is the English Nation whose Lives Estates and Liberties are wrapt and folded up in such a Charter of Laws which had its Confirmation from the fear of God Certainly their Estates their Lives and Liberties can no where be more safe then in the fear of God by nothing more cordially or warily preserv'd then by the Beginning of Wisdom Which when the late Usurpers violated they soon found it to be the Beginning of Folly The second Inducement was the Good of the Kings Soul Which he well might hope for from the Promises of the King of Kings Himself He might well have a fair prospect of Eternal happiness when he was so largely providing for the Temporal Felicity of his People It was an Argument of the Queen of Sheba That God delighted in Solomon and that the Lord loved the People of Israel because he had made him King to do Judgment and Justice This is the Great Charter of Heaven by which Princes hold their Supream Dignity the Execution of Judgment and Justice is the high Employment to which God has appointed Kings In so doing they observe the Statutes and Ordinances of Heaven The Rock of Israel spoke to David saying Let him that ruleth over Men be just ruling in the fear of God The recompence of which is to be rewarded according to their Righteousness Which is the Guerdon that David acknowledges to have bin the happy retaliation of his Integrity in observing the Precepts and Statutes of God by him fram'd for the publick Benefit of his People and who may be also said to be the Author of all good and wholsome Laws grounded upon Reason and Nature And therefore the King might well hope for the reward of his Equity and Justice from the God of Both. And the People might well hope for security temporal of their Lives and Liberty from Laws confirm'd for the Eternal security of the Confirmer And as the Motives and Incentives to pass this Grant were twofold so were likewise the Final causes of the Grant it self First the Exaltation of the Church Thus Moses provided first for his own Worship in general in the first part of the Decalogue as he also did in his particular Worship in the Erection of the Tabernacle and the Consecration of the High Priest and subordinate Levites And this order and method the very Heathens were prompted to observe by the very Light of Nature The first care of Numa was to settle the Heathen Worship of the Gods the next care of Servius Tullus was to provide for the good Order of the Politic Government And Justin speaking of Moses and a feigned Son of His whom he calls Arnas and the great Benefit which the Jewish Commonweal had reap'd from their good Government Quorum Justitia saith he Religione permixta incredibile quantum coaluere Which mixture of Religion with Justice was by some of the Heathens accompted so absolutely necessary that they would not separate the Priesthood from the Kingly Office as we may read in Virgil Rex Anius Rex idem hominum Phoebique Sacerdos Vittis Aeneâ—d l. 3. sacro redemitus tempora Lauro And it was the Fatherly advice of Charles the Fifth to his Son whereby he might approve himself a worthy Prince Strada l. 1. to be constant in the Patronage of Religion and the protection of the Laws which he calls the true and certain Establishments of all Kingdoms For the Ship of the Common-weal can never Ride safe without the sacred Anchor of Religion For it concerns all Princes that Study the Diuturnity of their Dominions above all things to preserve the Worship of God in its intire purity There being no more dangerous symptoms of a perishing Kingdom then the neglect and contempt of Religion This is easie to be understood if Men would give themselves to understand the Fundamental ground and reason of the Religion where they are born and bred For that Religion has its Birth from some peculiar and awful Original or other The Religion of the Heathens was grounded upon the Answers of the Oracles and the Observations of Diviners and Soothsayers Believing that those Gods which could foretel good and evil could also bequeath them the same Felicities or vex them with the same Misfortunes But the Foundation and Original of Christian Religion it is not to be question'd but that we all know as being establish'd in the World by the Eternal Son of the ever living God And the ends of it are to procure Salvation in Heaven and Tranquility Union and Peace upon Earth And while the Faith and Integrity of Men makes no other use of it the Intermixture of it with secular Justice makes that binding Cement that renders the Bulwark of Government impenetrable to all the assaults of Humane Violence For by the Exaltation of the Church is not meant the Exaltation of Pomp and Gawdy Ceremony and the pampering it up in worldly Honour and exorbitant Wealth quite contrary to the Institutions of the Founder who laid the Foundations of his Doctrine in Humility and Peace From whence