particulars of that Honour we are to pay the King by the Law of Christ The Honour of Obedience of Faith and Allegiance of Supplies and Tributes of Candour and charitable Thoughts and lastly of our Prayers of all kinds Obj. 1. And all this is true will some say yes it were fit too to be practised were Kings such as they should be Answ 1. As to this vile Suggestion which it is too plain many more men harbour than dare speak out I might only give again the same Answer I have formerly given and say in one word we can find no fault in our King but what is more the three Nations than his own Guilt Our former Crimes therefore and the Effects they have had upon him cannot but most iniquitously and unchristianly be made Arguments for withdrawing our present Duties Answ 2. But once again Secondly Consider I pray you the Text and Context the emphasis both bear the Time in which and the Persons to which both were spoken and if we have not such an Answer hence to this Objectin as will make us all ashamed so much as to think of withholding any branch of the Honour mentioned due to our King I am much mistaken As to the Time it is most certain this Epistle must be writ either in the time of Claudius or Nero's Empire according to Baronius in the formers be it under whichsoever of the two they were both not only Heathens and Enemies to Christianity but villanously vitious Then as to the Persons if we consider to whom the Apostle directs these his Commands not only in general to all the Christian multitude but more especially to the dispersed Christian Jews in Pontus Asia c. this contributes further to the utter avoiding all the force can be conceived in this Objection The Jews we know were a people peculiarly chosen by God and by him priviledged above all Nations amongst other Promises made them that of dominion over the Nations was one especially eyed by them and nothing did they expect more constantly or passionately by the Messias then temporal Empire But even to this people and to the Christian that is the best part of them doth the very Apostle of the Circumcision preach Subjection Honour and Obedience even towards Heathen Emperours and Princes Now weigh the whole Emphasis Was it thus particularly and expresly commanded to the primitive that is the purest and most excellent Race of Christians that have lived in any ages of the world that they should be dutiful and obedient to their Princes though the worst of men Were these same Commands too in common without any exemption imposed upon the Jews that people peculiarly priviledged as it would seem to the contrary Nay were they as by name required to be subject and obedient to all the Kings of the Nations they should live under Were the Sons of God as I may stile them thus required to yield Subjection to Aliens and men without God in the world and can now any of us think that upon some private Reasons of our own we may forbear or do not owe like Duty to our Native Liege-Lord and Sovereign the same a moâ—â— Gracious Wise Just and Virtuous Prince for shame let us banish out of our Souls such Suggestions Object 2. But it may be further urged 'T is not impossible that a Princes Title may be disputable and what will you say in such a case Are we to obey Intruders against tht rightful Heir Answ 1. I answer first there was never any Title so just and indisputable but some unreasonable men have contested it We find by the sacred Story that when God appointed Kings by immediate nomination from Heaven there arose certain men Sons of Beliel who refused to own them yet was their Title no less Divine and just for all that But as to the Title of our present Sovereign I protest before God I cannot see any colour any shadow of plausible appearance that can be brought against it What man of any Face Reason or Conscience can disbelieve our late Gracious Kings voluntary Protestation both by Word of Mouth and under his Hand to his Privy Council and after publisht to the World Consider at what time it was made on what Inducements possible it could be made Had he not the Affections of a Father as well as of a Brother Was he likely to gain any thing by violating Honour and Conscience in avowing a falshood Or could any thing but Justice Care of his Peoples Peace and Safety together with pure Conscience and an entire regard of Truth move him to give his Royal Word Hand and in a sort Oath and that of his own accord to attest the No-title of the present Rebellious Pretender and the most just and full Title of our present Sovereign Lord and King This one thing in may apprehension must for ever stop the mouths and satisfie the Minds of any that will hear Reason Answ 2. Again as to all that can be done by way of Ratification or to speak more properly Recognition of our Sovereigns just Title has it not been done If you consider the way of his coming to the Crown can it at all be said that he set up himself Was he not immediately recognized and proclaimed by the Nobility Privy Council and the whole body of his People as far as then appeared from the chief City of his Kingdoms throughout City and Country every where in the whole three Kingdoms Then to wave the Solemnities of his most August Coronation have not the full Houses of Parliament recognized declared and avowed him as their only right-right-Lord and King Are not all degrees and sorts of men concluded in and by their Representatives in Parliament 'T is rescinding and giving the Lye to our own act nay pardon the expression 't is Rebellion against the Laws and Statutes of the Realm against Acts of Parliament if such a thing as Rebellion against them be possible as well as Rebellion against the King for us to stagger or be falling off now But I hope I did not need to have been so particular and earnest in this place However the matter coming in my way I was unwilling to be wanting to my Duty and that any of you should be wanting to yours Wherefore to enforce now what I have been so long teaching and asserting dâ—e Honour to our King let us now consider the other point remaining the Connexion betwixt these two Duties Fear God honour â—he King The putting them thus immediately together seems to suggest that if we do fear God we shall honour the King and that by giving him all these branches or kinds of Honour mentioned Now the general Ground of this Conclusion is that the Fear of God is an universal and invariable Principle of most impartial Obedience to the whole Law of Christ He who fears God makes no such difference between the Commands of God as to account any small or such which he may wave at pleasure without
desire at least which you can prove to be a publick Blessing what Blessing I say could you desire to enjoy from or under any Prince which is not at present indulged under our Gracious Sovereign Have we not Property and Liberty and if we will not break it our selves sacred as well as civil Peace In a word we are either stupid or besides our selves with prejudices if we are not sensible what Complications of Blessings we enjoy and we are most vilely ungrateful if being sensible thereof we pay not our ardent and cordial Praise to God for His Majesty under whom we enjoy them 2. Because true Gratitude lies not only in Words and Professions nor yet in some high-flown Ceremonies and Rodomontades amidst our Jollities and Revels let us be careful what we have been often exhorted to do that both our selves and all under us maintain unspotted Loyalty to our King This will be real Thankfulness to him and the contrary thereto which I hope we all abhor would be the highest and most unnatural Ingratitude both to God and him To be plain I do not believe as to the business of Rebellion there is any fear we of these parts shall ever break out into it or side with those who do I cannot be so unjust as so much as to surmise it but give me leave to tell you there are other Violations of Loyalty besides running out into open Arms or Warlike Hostility against our Kings to which Violations the Manners and Humours of the late Age have rendred most of us of the present Age too much addicted I will reckon up three of them and I in the name of God as you would not approve your selves unthankful to God and the King warn you all of them In the first place I name unreasonable fears so unreasonable indeed as to be grosly unjust because they are both against what His Majesty has promised and against what we yet find he does perform Now shall we neither believe a King upon his Word nor upon his Performances What a miserable condition are Princes in if they of all men are the persons who on no terms may be credited or trusted Let us in the name of God take heed of such monstrous Disloyalty Akin hereunto are Secondly Those abominable Misconstructions which too commonly the generality of men are apt to put upon particular acts of the Government If a Prince take but a prudential course to secure his Authority there are many shall say he makes preparation to destroy his People Now what an unreasonable thing is it to imagine any Prince should wittingly set himself to destroy his People Does he not thereby not only manifestly every minute hazard his own Life for every minute may malice be working but even directly destroy himself as a Prince In the multitude of People is the Kings Honour but in the want of People is the Destruction of the Prince Prov. xiv 28. to destroy therefore his People is I say to destroy himself And certainly if there be any Prince living that by his Actions may seem to have been prodigal of his peoples Lives of all the Princes in Christendom our present Sovereign never did nor indeed any of this Line ever give any reasons to be suspected hereof Wherefore let us abhor also this degree of Disloyalty And the same let me say Lastly As to Misreports which are as frequent as Misconstructions and but the effects of them for still Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth will speak This is an Evil expresly forbidden within two verses of my Text. Curse not the King no not in thy thought ver 20. Cursing in the Hebrew Idiom usually signifies only speaking evil of Now so much as a thought hereto we may not advance much less may we directly break that Command transumed from the Old Testament into the New and strictly exemplified by the great Apostles practice Act. xxiii Thou shalt not speak evil of the Ruler of thy People though as in that case a Jew Infidel or vilest enemy to Christianity I pray you let us all be tender of these three lesser instances as to some they may seem of Disloyalty as knowing that they lead to greater indeed to direct and the highest Treason To conclude the whole Let us first of all keep close each of us to God in a conscientious discharge of our Duty to him trusting in him at all times and pouring out our hearts before him especially whensoever we are amused or afraid Psal lvi 3. What time I am afraid I will trust in God Let us next maintain our Duty to our King trusting him also as under God our Safeguard and Defender conceiving of interpreting and reporting all his Actions as fairly as we can which is no more than both in Loyalty Justice and Charity we are bound to Let us lastly be as helpful sweet and obliging to one another as we would have others to be to our selves In a word let us be easie to our selves and others and by this means as we are at present so I doubt not but we may continue a blessed Land under Kings the Sons of Nobles and Princes who eat for Strength and not for Drunkenness The continuance of which Mercy God grant to us through Jesus Christ our Lord. To whom c. FINIS THE Christian Law OF THE SWORD Both as to its Publick Private Use Briefly stated in a SERMON AT Christchurch in the City of Cork Preached upon Octob. 23. being by Statute an Anniversary Thanksgivng in the Kingdom of Ireland In the year 1685. By Edward Lord Bishop of Cork and Rosse Dublin Printed by A. Crook and S. Helsham for William Norman Samuel Helsham and Eliphal Dobson Booksellers 1686. Advertisement THis Sermon being drawn up at first in haste I had once thought to have alter'd some small Irregularities in its Method which that haste occasioned Of the seven Points which in a general sense I call Conclusions I would have advanced three under the style of Propositions namely these First That God alone Originally and Sovereignly has the Power of Humane Life and Death Secondly That the Derivative or Delegated Power hereof in every Kingdom or Commonwealth is immediately from and under God in the supreme Magistrate alone Thirdly That the supreme Magistrate exerciseth this Power either in the Administration of Civil Justice or of Lawful War And from these three I would have deduced the other Points viz. That no one of himself is Lord of his own Life and the rest as Conclusions in a stricter sense and by a closer method of consequence But upon better consideration as I think I resolved not to alter the Frame of the Discourse from that wherein it was at first contrived and delivered but to publish it nakedly such as it was born Besides the grand Design here carried on all along which is to assert the Sovereign Power of the Sword under God to the supreme Magistrate alone there are several lesser ones
save not only their Lives but their Estates they will and do pray for the King yet do it not either out of good Affection or Conscience of their Christian Duty Wherefore give me leave here besides the meer Evidence of the Text to add some other that the Duty we hence learn may appear to be of no such indifferent or inferiour rank as that men may omit or forbear it with a Salvo to their Integrity and good Conscience And though I know my Audience too well to judge them of this kind yet will not this be an unprofitable labour for certainly none of us can have too deep or quick a sense of any point of our Christian Duty Now in the entrance on this Evidence I will say in general we have all the Obligation to this Duty that we can have to any Duty in the World Besides the Obligation from human Laws which I will not yet touch on we have all obligation I can conceive possible 1. From Scripture and our common Christianity And 2. From Reason and Prudence And 3. From Equity and good Nature From Scripture or common Christianity The sum of the Obligations we can have thence can well amount no higher than express Commands and them urged with the greatest instance and constant Practice or Example As to Command Nothing can be as already said more express nothing more emphatical than the Text of which one thing remains that I have not yet noted namely how the Apostle in the progress of his Discourse presses this Practice with sundry Arguments and the greatest earnestness That we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all Godliness and Honesty ver 2. Here he presses it from the Fruits of this Practice This good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour ver 3. Here from the Will of God who would have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the Truth ver 4. Here from the Divine Nature or Philanthropy and Goodness of God which we ought to imitate and ver 8. he concludes the Subject I will therefore that men pray every where namely in the kinds and ways before directed Again I say nothing can easily be more emphatical But we may look much further back Eccles. x. 20. Curse not the King no not in thine heart If negative Precepts as Divines tell us include the opposite affirmative this will be a Command to pray for Kings in our Souls as well as in our words and in secret as well as in our Churches However 't is well worthy our notice what sense the Jewish Doctors had of this Precept who tell us generally that throughout their whole Law Thoughts are no were forbidden nor can Sin be committed by them meerly except in the present case and in that other of worshipping false Gods And pursuant hereto which is very wonderful was their general practice yea even towards the Heathen Emperors When they chose all of the rather to dye than place Caius's Statue in their Temple they at the same time professed that they daily offered Sacrifice to the true God in their Temple for him Joseph de Bello Judaic lib. 2. c. 9. On such Practice now a long time received in the Jewish Church before Christ was it that the Apostles here so earnestly gives this in charge to Timothy We have seen thus the Christian Law oâ— Command and the ancient occasion therâ—of Now as to Christian Example There can be no doubt but that the Apostles Practice was agreeable to their own Doctrine And as for the succeeding ages of the Christian Church one passage of Chrysostom has been produced already and to wave that multitude of other Testimonies and some of the very Forms of Prayer which might be produced in this case we will content our selves with that known and most full one of undoubted authority in Tertullian who wrote about 200 years after Christ Thither that is to Heaven saith he we Christians looking up with hands or arms stretched open because innocent with heads and faces uncovered because we blush not without any instigator because from our hearts we pray for all Emperors beseeching to them a long Life a secure Reign a safe Family valiant Armies a faithful Senate a loyal Commonalty and a peaceable World and whatsoever are the wishes of men or of the Cesars themselves This was he able then most truly to plead in apology for Christianity and at that time and for above an hundred years after such a thing as a Christian King was not known When the Emperors became Christian you cannot but conclude it was much more so In sum then as to Obligation from Scripture and the common Chistianity if either express or importunate Command or constant Practice of the Christian Church which is the sum of what Obligations we can have thence will make it an indispensible Duty to pray for Kings we have both Now as to Obligations from Reason and Prudence perhaps that of our own Interest the Benefit which hence amounts to the publick and so to all private persons of whom the publick body is made up may be looked upon as the most effectual reason or best prudential ground assignable Interest commonly fails not to more let it then prevail here Let it therefore be considered 1. Kings and Governours are the Safeguard of the People the great Security of the publick Weal The Scripture expresly calls the Rulers of a Nation its Shields in Hos iv 18. We indeed in our Translation have the word Rulers there but in the original Hebrew it is the Shields which Text most naturally explains Psal xlvii 10. The Shields of the Earth belong unto the Lord that is the Kings of the Earth who are its Shields are Gods Subjects and peculiar right which is most plain by the foregoing verses ver 7. God is King over all the Earth Then he divides Earth into the Heathen and Jews ver 8. God reigneth over the Heathen ver 9. The Princes of the people are gathered together even of the peâ—ple of the God of Abraham Finally in the tenth verse he conjoyns or puts all together again The Shields of the Earth belong unto God he is greâ—tly exalted namely he is King of Kings and Lord of Lords Nor will any doubt the truth of this Scripture assertion or justice of the phrase who shall but think with himself what a forlorn helpless despicable thing the most populous Nation is without an Head In 1 Sam xi we have a Story which will fully illustrate this matter ver 2. Nahush the King of the Ammonites offers these insolent Conditions to the Israelites upon which he will accept them for his Servants On this Condition will I make a Covenant with you that I may thrust out all your right Eyes and lay it as a Reproach upon Israel And what said all the mighty men of Israel to this All the people lift up their voice and wept ver 4 All the people were not a few
either now living or in the memory of many of us dead If our King be not fully of our Religion who were they that when they had by rebellious Arms first deposed then murdered the Father afterwards drove the whole Royal Progeny into strange Countries where they found more kindness from them of a foreign Religion than from the body of their native Subjects God divert from the three Nations the Plagues yet due to that Rebellion and its consequent Villanies In the mean while let the present consideration how Princes miscarriages light heavy and that most justly on their Subjects as well as on the contrary their prudent and pious Conduct so vastly advanceth both the spiritual and temporal Prosperity of their people let I say this most reasonable consideration move all of us to be duly devout in offering Supplications Prayers and Intercessions for our King and all sent by him Those great Rationalists who scarce will admit any other Law of Nature allow Self-preservation to be such I say even this obliges us to pray for Kings and that most ardently 't is an act in our own defence and for our own advantage But I trust we are most of us acted by more generous Principles let me therefore propound such also I say then lastly we are obliged in charity and good nature to this Duty And truly there is something of this in what I said but just now Who will not think himself bound to pity and as long as he lives pray for those whom his own Sins have provoked God to suffer to fall into Sin But to wave any such consideration put the case Kings were advanced so far above the race of Mankind that they could not either through human frailty or Gods vengeance on their peoples Sins fall themselves into any sin or do any thing amiss yet are they not thereby supposed impossible or uncapable of feeling their proper miseries And who knows not that all Crowns have their Weight and I may say their Thorns too Pardon that expression who knows not I must recall it Indeed none know the pressures of Crowns but those who wear them The infelicities of being in power especially in the highest place of power are greater than can be easily accounted To make a good man great is but to desire or necessitate him to be miserable for the publick Good to say nothing of perpetual cares waking nights and thoughts which the hearing of Chronicles read will not always divert of the most poynant sense of publick Straits national Affronts and a thousand things that will not enter into my head this one misery is enough to make any earthly Throne eternally uneasie that upon the poor Prince ever was and will be charged all publick Evils either his male-administration or some other his Personal guilt is still cryed out of though he in the mean time be never so wise vigilant virtuous or innocent Thus 1 Sam. xxx 6 the Amalekites invade Ziklag and carry the Women away captive and the people instead of rescuing them talk of stoning David These and such like miseries whoso consider will surely never think he can pray too often for his King I might speak of Obligations from humane Laws for humane Laws to this effect have there ever been not only in Christian but in Jewish and even in Heathen Countries Thus Darius when he ordered a kind of Endowment of the Jewish Temple required that the Priests should offer Sacrifices of sweet Savours unto the God of Heaven and pray for the Life of the King his Sons Ezr. vi 9 10. And it may be collected by parity of Reason from 1 Macc. xii 11. as well as more expresly by what is above said out of Josephus that the Jews practised accordingly The primitive Christians we have seen did it without any Imperial Laws and sine Monitore But what should I speak of such Laws amongst us In a word and to conclude the whole Evidence for this Duty If there may be any Obligation laid upon us which is not grounded upon Scripture Reason or humane Laws that is upon divine moral or political Principles of Justice Charity and Equity all which it is plain we have in the present case then I shall confess there is some Obligation wanting which might have been laid upon us to be assiduous or instant in Prayer for our King But because if even new Grounds of Duties could be assigned and humane Nature and Society should come hereafter to be regulated according to other measures than the World has hitherto known yet these will be obligatory still Therefore I must say after the Apostle I exhort that Supplications and Prayers Intercessions and giving of Thanks be made for all men For Kings and them that are in Authority And when I have in a very few words press'd the Practice of what I have hitherto been demonstrating to be our Duty I shall conclude First therefore in the name of God let none of us in what capacity soever whether private or publick persons be wanting to this Duty Be we what we will we are or would be looked upon as Christians or Friends to humane Society We are not such as plead for mens living wild and savage upon the face of the Earth If we be not such we are then concerned and held fast in the Tyes before-mentioned Wherefore In those publick Prayers which the Church has provided for us and most Christianly according to the Apostolical Injunction and primitive Pattern put into our mouths let us be cordial and sincere let them not pass over with us as matter of meer Form and Custom but honestly engage our Hearts in zealous desires and fixt resolutions of Loyalty I have heard it has been objected against our Liturgy that Prayers for the King occur therein too often that there is in this behalf a great deal of vain Repetition a Fault taxed by our Lord in the Prayers of Heathens It were an easie thing to vindicate our Service-Book from Tautology even in this regard were there now either Time or Need. In a word there never comes two Prayers for the King in the same Office of the same kind or to the same purpose And it is to be remembred diverse kinds of Prayers are commanded Supplications Petitions Intercessions and giving of Thanks are to be made for all men For Kings and them in Authority Or if there were any such yet new Affections still added to Prayers coming over again at some distance will as much make them new Prayers as our Lords greater Earnestness in the Garden made the Prayer which he uttered the third time in the same words no vain Repetition If we have any sparks of Reason in us let us be ashamed of such pretences We will tell the world that what some scrupulous persons thus plead against our Liturgy that it too frequently applies to God in behalf of the King will ever we hope operate to the maintaining it What these account its Fault may
perfectly practised by any but such Serpents will slipperily insinuate themselves into your Company be sure then as soon as you know them to discover both them and whatever you know of their Projects Councils that immediately In the name of God let nothing of this kind sleep with you Let not that false opinion of I know not what vain honour which has made some men to their costs shy of impeaching others betray you to conceal what may operate to your own and the publick Ruine Certainly my King my Countrey the Church or if these be less dear to any my Family and my self ought to be loved first and before any particular Friend or Associate Consult therefore chiefly the welfare of these And I pray you remember concealing Treason is Treason not only by the Laws of England but by the Old Judicial Law amongst the Jews which derived from God himself According to this Divine Law or the Mishpat Hammeluchah the Statutes of the Kingdom a Book written by Samuel at the command of God and said to be laid up before the Lord 1 Sam. x. 25. Saul pronounces them guilty of High-Treason who knew when David fled and did not shew it 1 Sam. xxii 17. And his Sentence had undoubtedly been just had either David or the Priests been guilty of the matter of Fact charged respectively on them Even the principles of common reason and justice the grounds of all good Laws will conclude as much Wherefore we ought to look upon it as a matter against good Conscience as well as against Prudence and Common Law to conceal such treasonable discourses or designs as come to our knowledge 5. Spread not those Idle Stories or Suspicions which go up and down of publick Dangers If you can in the beginning trace them to their head to any true or probable Original so as to fix them on their malicious Authors do so and as before said discover them Then in all likelyhood you have put an end both to the Lye and its Mischief You have crusht the Cockatrice in its Egg. Otherwise know they are devised by cunning and ill-affected Men and put into Fools Mouths to report that the Devisers may take their advantages of those reports either by affixing their own Malice on innocent Men or by gaining some plausible pretence for the Spleen they would wreak so that they may be able when time comes with some colour to call Spite and Wrong by the names of Justice or Self-Defence In Levit. xix 16. we have a peculiar precept which explains the ninth Commandment fitly to our present purpose Thou shalt not go up and down as a Talebearer amongst thy People nor shalt thou stand against the Blood of thy Neighbour To spread Reports and Tales is one of the most mischievous kinds of bearing false witness And there are publick Tale-bearers as well as private ones Truely there are some that seem to make it not so much a Trade as the Business of their Lives they catch up all the Rumours that are going and have their Customers both to bring them in and to vent them too These people are ill members both of Church and State Particularly I cannot but take notice of a Story very fresh and brisk in the Country That the English are combining in a design to rise and cut all the Throats of the Irish And on the other side many of the English are told and believe as much of the Irish towards them What are these but Devices of wicked men or of the Devil by them to put us upon the imbruing our hands mutually in one anothers Bloud On neither side in the present circumstances of both is the thing either probable or so much as possible As to the English was there ever yet such a thing heard of upon the face of the Earth as a Massacre by Protestants Those men who know our Religion know the Principles of our Religion will not suffer it Nay further it is not possible at present as were easie to shew 'T is well if we are able to defend our selves Is it not a pleasant thing to see in a Parish between three or four hundred people ly by night out of their Houses for fear of two or three Families in which there are not Seven persons able to bear Arms For shame let not people suffer themselves to be thus abused Then as to the other side touching the rumoured danger of a Massacre upon the English by the Irish Is not this at present a plain abominable Device to put us together by the Ears set on foot by them who desire an advantage against us to the end that if by these affrightments they can tempt any weak persons of us to any irregular actions they may more justly seek occasion of Revenge by their own hands or otherwise accuse and misrepresent us I confess this is out of my Province a little but I could not forbear it For Gods sake and our Countreys sake and our own sake let us all joyn together to bring to light the Authors of these Reports but however let us not suffer our selves to be so far ridden by them as to be their Juments or Beasts of burden to carry such forged Wares up and down the Countrey Sixthly as another Preservative of publick Peace I take it to be good Advice that we pass not bad Interpretations on the Acts of the Government a fault that more people are guilty of then I am willing so much as to characterize I pray you remember Charity ever requires us to think the best 1 Cor. xiii 5 6 7. Charity thinketh no evil rejoyceth not in iniquity which as appears by the opposites may be interpreted maketh not advantage of falshoods but rejoyceth in the truth beareth all things believeth all things hopeth all things does not readily give men up for desperate and incorrigible endureth all things or grows not impatient upon every matter of suspicion that offers it self Some haply will say this Text treats only touching the Duties of private Charity towards one another Be it so but do I owe all these Offices of Charity to each private man and not to the most considerable body of men which I can pick out in the Kingdoms to Magistrates and Governours To deal more roundly Must I have Charity for every particular man yea even for Enemies and none for my King and his Council To be short then if we love the publick Peace let us neither make ill constructions our selves of publick Actions nor silently admit them when we hear them made by others Let us at least profess our Charity and that we hope better than some interpret or others fear Lastly and to conclude all the advice on this Head for the possessing our own and one anothers minds with Quiet Let t is remember what I have formerly prest God rules over all His hand is in all And let us be content he should govern Herewith let us still any risings in our
impress'd upon the poorest which whoso observes or acknowledges must needs pay an Esteem and Respect that is an Honour thereto But in the present case more signally Kings are Gods Image doubly or trebiy First as Men by Creation Then as Christians by Regeneration And further by by their Office as Gods Vicegerents They represent him and are as in the place of God within their Dominions and Countries They are the Ordinance of God Rom. xiii 2. the Ministers or immediate Agents of God ver 4. and therefore frequently in Scripture called Gods twice even in one Psalm lxxxii 1 and 6. Now because greater Excellency cannot be in any than in God therefore to no other belongs greater or equal Honour And because Kings on Earth are Gods Vicegerents therefore to none on Earth is greater Honour due than unto Kings so much reason for this Duty do the very terms in which it is expressed most evidently and intimately import But it is requisite we take a more distinct view of the particulars which this comprehensive general in the Text doth involve We will therefore expresly put the Question What are the great Branches of that Honor which by the Christian Law Subjects ow to their Prince In answer whereto I conceive the sum of all may be reduced to the save following heads 1. We owe to our King by the Law of Christ the Honour of Obedience And for proof hereof because some people will admit nothing to be our Duty which is not plainly made so by one of the Ten Commandments I could be content at present to go no further than the Fifth Commandment Honour thy Father and Mother Civil as well as Natural Thy King as well as Parents That Father and Mother ought to be interpreted here with this Latitude I prove from hence that there is no other of the Ten Commandments which will take in the Sixth of these Seven Precepts which the Jewish Doctors call the Precepts of the Sons of Noah and tell us they were in the world as the great Rule of Life or Manners long before Moses's Law That Precept is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Judgments or Obedience to the Civil Magistrate and must I say be included in the Fifth Commandment or else which is not credible is totally omitted and reducible to none Whence would follow that the Law written by Gods own Finger were more imperfect than the Traditionary one which was in the world before it which I presume all whom I have to deal with abhorr to think Then that the Honour here required will extend to Obedience there can be no clearer proof than the most exemplary instance of the Rechabites keeping this Commandment in observing their Father Rechabs Injunctions so much celebrated by God himself Jer. xxxv so that in short they who contend for withdrawing Obedience to Kings out of the List of Christian Duties as far as in them lies take away a main branch of one of the Ten Commandments But if we please to look into the New Testament and will take satisfaction thence of our Christian Duty as I think is most proper we need not go so far about Hear what Doctrine St. Paul requires Titus whom he ordained Bishop of Crete to preach to his Flock Tit. II. last and III. 1. These things saith he speak and exhort with all Authority Let no man despise thee Put them in mind to be subject to Principalities and Powers and what he means by that Subjection immediately he expresses in the next word To obey 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which our Translators indeed have rendred To obey Magistrates And if we understand the words as we ought and as parallel places enforce of submitting our selves or being obedient to the King as Supream and Governours or Magistrates as sent by him 1 Pet. II. 13 14. there is no danger in the Translation But if any of us should be infected with the Humour of some men that there is a sort of Magistrates which are coordinate or all taken together superiour to the King and that 't is these Magistrates only which we owe Obedience to and another kind of Honour may serve the King then it is fit we be admonsht that the word Magistrates is not in the Original nor indeed in any Translation that I can find before those of Calvin Geneva And whether put in only that the Text might more expresly favour the popular Government here may be worth consideration This only I avow the Text naturally runs thus Put them Quomodo hic se habeat Magni Erasmi versio mihi compertum non est nec enim ed manum est ut consulam Certe quod Erasmus in Annotatis suis aliique eum forsan secuti asseruerint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 proprie esse parere Magistratibus id gratis dictum est Nam cum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sit ad Literam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Principium Principatum Imperium soneâ— non Magistratus reddendum potius foret parere imperie vel principatui At hoc prius positum erat quam proxime viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cujus rei memor forte Interpres vulgatus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 reddâ—dit dicto obedire nihilo sane felicius Constat enim ex usu Novi Test 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 significare simpliciter parere obedire Videatur Actorum cap. v. 29 32. xxvii 21. in mind to be subject to Principalities and Powers and to obey There is no other Object specified of Obedience but that before named of Subjection And if we will have any critical difference betwixt the two Verbs To be subject and To obey the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies more strictly Being subject out of necessity and for Wrath as our Apostle elsewhere expresses it and this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To obey voluntarily and out of choice for Conscience sake It is Promptè libenter ex animo obedire says Cornel à Lapide And thus taken as thus it ought to be taken there cannot be a Text more express for any Christian Duty than this is for Obedience to Kings But some of you haply have by this time cast your Eyes on the last words of the Verse it is said not only Put them in mind to be subject and obey but to be ready to every good work And this limits our Obedience Yes and God forbid but all Obedience to Man should be constantly charged with this Reserve or Condition its consistency with our Obedience to God Children obey your Parents in the Lord Ephes vi 1. not in things by God forbidden and so this Text is express you see as to our Obedience to the King that we obey and be ready in every good work Yet we must know Actions in themselves but indifferent become good works when done in Obedience to lawful Authority such as I hope none of us doubt His Majesties to be As for instance It is an indifferent action generally taken whether I go abroad
or follow my business at home But if the King commands me abroad to serve him it is now a good work and my Duty to go abroad and serve him And so in other like cases But will some say What if the King should command us any thing that is unlawful What then must our Obedience be I answer 1. The King cannot be conceived to command us that is any men in our circumstances and conditions any thing but what he commands according to Law that is he can be conceived to command us nothing but what the Law commands And I must stand to it our Laws are good nay they are most excellent at least I could never find an ill one amongst those now in force This Supposition therefore is you see unreasonable and not to be put But you will say What if an ill Law should be made and our Obedience to it required These things are not in themselves impossiible I answer Under our Constitution and as the Frame of our Government stands if they be not impossible yet God be blessed they are most highly improbable and most unlikely But 2. And which for ever answers all There are few of us but have heard there is a double Obedience which may be paid to Governours Active or Passive Where the thing commanded is lawful to be done we ought to do it we owe active Obedience Eccles viii 2. I counsel thee to keep the Kings Commandment and that in regard of the Oath of God Thy Allegiance binds thee to it But in case the thing commanded be unlawful that is against any plain Command of God or that thou without Fraud or Dissimulation apprehendest and believest it to be so there is then passive Obedience that thou art to pay that is thou must meekly and patiently submit thy self to suffer whatever Penalty the Lawgiver thinks fit to inflict for the breach of his Law We may petition and supplicate for Forbearance and Mercy but in case we cannot obtain it we may not resist For whosoever resisteth the Power resisteth the Ordinance of God and they that resist shall receive to themselves Damnation Rom. xiii 2. This is the Doctrine of St. Paul and it ever has been the Doctrine of our Church See the Book of Homilies And thus as to the first branch of Honour due to the King the Honour of Obedience A second Honour which we owe to him is that of Fealty and Allegiance The word Fealty signifies only Fidelity or Faithfulness and what the particulars of the Faith we owe to our Sovereign Lord the King are we know all of us by the Oath of Allegiance In particular as we are not to be false Traytors our selves so neither are we to connive at or conceal those whom we have reason to suspect to be such And hereunto we are all of us bound First By the Oath aforementioned which that none may think an Imposition upon us or contrary to the Laws of God or to our Christian Liberty behold it in the very Kingdom of Judah that is in the Kingdom which of all ever on Earth was that of Gods most peculiar Erection and Care We had just now one proof of it out of Ecclesiastes I counsel thee to keep the Kings Commandment by reason of the Oath of God that Oath we cannot well conceive to be any other than the Oath of Allegiance which they to whom he speaks had taken to their King and particularly to King Solomon the Penman of that Book But in 1 Chron. last 24. You have both the time and manner or ceremony of taking it Then Solomon sat on the Throne of the Lord as King instead of David his Father And all the Princes and the mighty Men and all the Sons of King David gave the Hand under Solomon so the Text runs in the Hebrew as you may see in the Margin of your Bibles And what that kind of speech signifies you may learn out of the Story of Abrahams Servant Gen. xxiv 2 3. Put I pray thee saith Abraham to his Servant thine Hand under my Thigh and I will make thee swear by the Lord the God of Heaven and the God of Earth The giving the Hand under one was the Ceremony of a most solemn Oath By the Lord that is By Jehovah the God of Heaven and the God of Earth So again when Jacob was dying in the Land of Egypt he sent for his Son Joseph and said unto him Put I pray thee thine Hand under my Thigh and deal kindly and truly with me Bury me not in Egypt but I will lie with my Fathers c. And he said swear unto me and he sware unto him Genes xxvii 29 30 31. So that this their giving their Hand under King Solomon was swearing to him in person their Faith and Allegiance You see then Divine Warrant for an Oath of Allegiance And hereby first I say are we bound to pay our King the Honour of Fidelity for this Oath we have all of us taken or if any of us be so young as not to have taken it such are to be minded that we here all of us call our selves English-men And every English-man is born as I may say with the Oath of Allegiance in his mouth our Fathers took it and stand bound for us and we therefore bound in them 2. We are bound hereto by the Principles of Equity and Justice those common grounds of the Laws of Nations and indeed the true Law of Nature We expect Protection from the King his Laws and Government and God be blessed we do enjoy it Now is it not just that as we have Safety from him so he should have Security from us What Nation is there which gives not this Security to their Government Indeed it is the very Bond of Government without which it cannot subsist but all must run into Seditions Bloudshed Confusion Anarchy And therefore 3. We are bound to pay our King the Honour of Faith and Allegiance in our own Defence There are many who pretend and have long pretended God forgive them to be afraid of their Property Liberties and Religion My Brethren what can more certainly and fatally expose or destroy all these than Civil Wars And Civil Wars must needs immediately come in upon us if any of us at least any number of us start or swerve from our Allegiance Our King under God alone is able to protect us our Properties Liberties Religion and besides his Force Power he has manifested to the World Courage Will and Resolution enough to protect us In standing stedfast therefore we secure and preserve our selves and ours but if we stagger or fall off which God forbid we may weaken him but we shall destroy our selves I will add no more on this Point I trust I do not need Thus then as to the second branch of Honour due to the King the Honour of Fealty and Allegiance and our Obligations thereto The third follows Thirdly then We owe to our King by
the Laws of Christ the Honour of Supplies and of paying Tribute Kings must not be kept poor for this is the way to make them useless and to expose both them and their Subjects to the common Enemies of both You know whose Command it is Render unto Cesar the things that are Cesars and unto God the things that are Gods Matth. xxii 21. The Justice of which debt the Apostle gives us an account Rom. xiii 6. For this cause pay we Tribute also for they are Gods Ministers attending continually upon this very thing the thing he had spoken of in the fourth Verse namely the publick Good or in his language to minister to every one for good for the private good of each who doth good and for the publick good of all by executing Wrath upon such as do evil Now there is no greater burden than the perpetual Care Toil and Difficulty which lies on Kings and Persons in the highest Power in reference to such Administration of Justice and other like publick affairs And if our own private business and concerns cannot be carried on without Expence what must be the Charge of the Concerns of a Kingdom Wherefore as the undergoing such publick Cares and perpetual Anxieties deserves a publick and ample Reward greater Wealth and Revenues than those of any private man so the Necessiities of publick Business require greater Treasures to discharge them Hence I say is most evident the Justice of the case that Tributes and Supplies should be paid to Kings Let them be paid then will some say by them that reap the great benefit of the Government but how will it be proved to be every mans Duty to pay them The Answer is easie 1. Who reaps not the benefit of the Government and particularly the benefit of Protection by the Laws both as to his Person Fortunes Liberty good Name and the like except he have deserved otherwise He owes therefore for these his share towards the defraying the publick Expences But there is yet a farther Answer 2. We must know the King has the same right to such Supplies as we speak of to Tributes and his Revenues as any of us have to our Estates Nam propriae Telluris herum natura neque illum Nec me nec quenquam statuit Nature gives no man a property to his House or Lands or like possessions It is the Law that determines and sets out each mans property And the same Law that metes out to me what is mine assigns to the King what is his The same Law that gives me liberty to traffick to buy up and export and import Commodities allots to the King his Customes and it is as much a breach of the eighth Commandent whatsoever some men think of it to steal Custome as to pick a mans pocket of the two in some regard a greater I know the ordinary Evasion many have with which they do not so much quiet as for a while cheat or stifle their Consciences The Laws in this case say they are penal if we submit to the Penalty of the Law as we are content to do when we are caught which I must suspect and they who say it would do well to consider whether they so contentedly submit to legal Forfeitures as they pretend in this plea if we submit to the Penalty say they we are guiltless we have fulfilled the Law I utterly deny this and so will any man who understands any thing of Casuastical Divinity The Law by commanding me to do what will secure me from Penalty or Forfeiture commands me not to incur that Penalty or Forfeiture if therefore I wittingly incur it I break the Law except there were more particular Salvo's than I have seen in any of our penal Laws But because some will not understand this in the general let me put a particular case Suppose a man by defrauding the King of some comparatively small Dues incurs a Forfeiture which undoes him Who now is guilty of undoing this man the Law or himself If he would have honestly paid the King such Dues as he might have done and yet been an honest Gainer which was the thing commanded by the Law and by the Law his Duty he had been in a good condition but he chooses to break the Law and so has undone himself Is he not now doubly gulty first of a sin against the Law and the King Secondly is he not in some measure a Felo de se at least a Robber of himself and Family and the Guilt must needs bear its proportion and be Guilt still though not so great in case of lesser Penalties and Forfeitures Wherefore we see we owe the King the Honour of Supplies Custom or Tribute Fourthly We owe him the Honour of Candour and charitable Construction of thinking and speaking the best we can of him and all his actions You never knew a person who truly honoured another but he would be so far from thinking vilely of his indifferent actions mean of such actions which might be capable of being done wisely or to a good end as well as otherwise that he would find out excuses for his bad ones I pray you let us all pay our Prince this Honour at least let none of us be guilty of interpreting to the worst such Counsels and Actions the reasons of which we do not yet and perhaps it is not fit we should at present understand This very practice besides that it is most certainly our Duty to our King would be no small service to our selves and neighbours for it would prevent a multitude of those causeless but very tormenting Fears and Jealoufies nay even many divers reports too which are very frequent all over the Kingdoms But this I have formerly otherwise prest Lastly We owe to our King the Honour of our Prayers * These passages were put in when the Sermon was preached a second time in another place and on another occasion and of our Praises too in his behalf True Honour and Love are inseparable And 't is most sure no person of any serious Religion ever honoured and loved any man whom he did not pray for * and in whose good he would not cordially rejoyce and praise God for it Remember that most solemn passage of the Apostle 1. Tim. II. 1 2 3. I exhort therefore first of all that 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 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour It is plain hence that in the settling of the Service of God in the Church of Ephesus one of St. Pauls first and chiefest cares one of his strictest Injunctions was that all sorts of Prayers should be offered up in the behalf of Kings which I have otherwise more largely discoursed and therefore for the present more briefly pass We see then now the main
guilt For he that said do not commit Adultery said also do not kill now if thou commit no Adultery yet if thou kill thou art become a Transgressor of the Law Jam. II. 11. And the same God you have heard said further Honour thy Father and thy Mother that is in one sense of the Command Pay thy King as well as Parents the Honour of Obedience together with the other points of Honour mentioned Wherefore if the Fear of God so far sway in our hearts that it control govern and direct our Actions we shall be loyal as well as devout for there is the same Divine Law and Authority for both and if in one point we cast off the Fear of God 't is vain to pretend it in another the same Fear were it sincere and real would operate to all cases as well as one When Herod i◠tender of breaking his Oath but not o◠Murder and guiltless Bloud it is sure he i◠such a Judg which fears not God however for some vain Honours sake he may regard Men. When Judas is thrifty and cannot endure that so much waste should be made of a Box of Ointment though it was a kind of fore-embalming his Master but in Charity had much rather it had been sold and given to the poor yet can upon the first occasion play the Traytor in the vilest and most mercinary sort we may be sure the Devil has entred him the Fear of God possesseth him not such damn'd Partiality could not consist with that Fear And so in the present case they are only such Apostles as Judas who can at once pretend to the Spirit of Christ and yet joyn with assist and animate Rebels nay which is more deplorable imagine contrive hatch and bring forth Rebellion But we have not so learned Christ if so be that we have heard him and been taught by him as the Truth is in Jesus This is the general Ground and as to more particular ones they have been already toucht For 1. We have heard that Kings are on Earth Gods Vicegerents now can any man pretend Faith and Duty to his Sovereign in person and at the same time defie vilifie or depose him in his Viceroy Is it not the same Royal Power that resides in both as such And is not the Undutifulness and Disloyalty to the Kings Majesty in his Viceroy still an Offence against the Kings Majesty Hear God himself deciding the case expresly 1 Sam. viii 7. They have not rejected thee but they have rejected me that I should not reign over them And 2. Can any of us after such express Texts produced doubt but it is Gods declared Will and peremptory Command that we should be obedient to the King and them which are sent by him Is the fifth Commandment no part of the Moral Law Or are the 13th of the Romans Let every Soul be subject to the higher Powers and this Paragraph of St. Peters Epistle whence the Text is taken no Gospel Did not Christ and his Apostles and the whole body of primitive Christians thus live and thus teach Was there in those days any such thing heard of as Resistance of Powers or Plots and Designs against Government though then the Government was in the hands of the unjustest and most tyrannical persons the Earth ever bore Did not Christianity grow up under Persecutions and was not the Bloud of the Martyrs the Seed of the Church This Scripture this all Antiquity teacheth us And herein indeed I must commend the Ingenuity of some of the Rebellious Saints of the late Age when particularly prest to produce Divine Warrant for Subjects taking Arms against the King or to shew where it might be found written in the Gospel that it was lawful to rise up against the Government * John Goodwin particularly some of them ingenuously confest that there was no Text for it nor was it a Doctrine of the ancient Christianity but they had it from the Spirit of God dwelling in themselves and it was a secret reserved by God to be revealed in the later age of the world when it would come to be more seasonable than it would have been in the Infancy of Christianity Ingenuè Peribonius a fair Confession indeed But I beseech you Brethren keep to the old and undoubted Christianity Be followers of Christ Jesus and if you are so the Fear you have of God the Faith you have of Christ will certainly lead you as Christ did to give unto Cesar the things that are Cesars as well as unto God the things that are Gods that is you will conclude the Duty to your God and to your King thus far inseparable To shut up all briefly in a double Exhortation First As the foundation of all Sincerity of all Honesty and Duty both to God and Man study and endeavour above all things to possess your hearts with a fixed and unmovable Fear of God The way and means thereto has been most plainly laid open in the beginning We have seen the true rise of that Fear and its genuine Nature It is a lasting sense of the Being Sovereignty Omniscience Justice and Power of God Inure your selves then to think much hereon and to attend hereto in all your actions Let these thoughts lie down with you by night and awake with you in the morning and accompany you in all your ways and business God sees God will bring to account By this means the Wisemans Advice will have effect upon you you will be in the Fear of the Lord all the day long Proverbs xxiii 17. Secondly Let the Fear of God have its perfect work Be not so false to your selves as to have the Fear of God with partiality but whatsoever you see is matter of his Will Command and Law and so consequently of your Duty do you honestly and without picking and choosing settle to and be conscientious in all and every such thing How canst think to answer at the great Tribunal of God the laying aside any of his Laws And particularly if Damnation be dreadful as what can be so if that be not remember who has said they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation Now thou canst not partake with those who do resist but thou must resist also Certainly if these things be laid to heart we shall all be no less good Subjects to our King than to God that is we shall be loyal and faithful unto both Now God make us all such and keep us faithful unto Death that we may receive the Crown of Life Which God grant c. FINIS REX REGIUS KINGS Succeeding in a Right Line A National Blessing Proved in a SERMON Preached at Cork Octob. 14. 1685. to a very full Assembly there met to solemnize THE BIRTH-DAY OF His Gracious Majesty James II. By Edward Lord Bishop of Cork and Rosse Dublin Printed by A. Crook and S. Helsham for William Norman Samuel Helsham and Eliphal Dobson Booksellers 1686. Advertisement THis Sermon was
fit for the righting or defending himself or people And his people are to be obedient to him to stand by him with Lives and Estates and to serve him in the War And whomsoever he Commissions not only may according to the tenor of their Commission which by the way they are to take care they do not exceed but ought to use the Sword for supposing the War lawful the Duty of the Subject in this case follows by necessary consequence Now you 'l say when is a War lawful 1. When there is such necessity of it as before suggested that is when Publick Justice or Right cannot take place without it and when the Benefit which is sought by it is ample enough to countervail all the visible mischiefs of the War In which case the Supreme Power is Judge not the people who cannot be supposed competently to understand the publick state of things and circumstances 2. When the War is made by the Authority that has Power to make it namely by the Supreme in every Nation For we have heard though the Cause be just every one may not of his own head take the Sword but a lawful Commission is to be expected 3. In the general it is requisite also to a lawful War that it be publickly proclaimed that is Justice should be demanded the obstinate summoned to their Duty and no proceeding till such Duty or Justice be refused Somewhat very near this God expresly commanded the people of the Jews Deuteronom xx 10 11 c. When thou comest to a City to fight against it thou shalt proclaim Peace to it And if it will make no Peace with thee but will make War against thee thou shalt besiege it c. But if Justice may be had with Peace Peace certainly is to be preferred Lastly Even War it self should be managed lawfully and Justice Redress or Safaction only sought not Revenge Cruelty should be as much forborn and Mercy as much exercised as publick Safety would admit These things will be further useful to us by and by In the mean while let this stand as our fifth Conclusion The Magistrate exercises the Power of the Sword either in Civil Justice or lawful War Sixthly All designed taking away the Life of man otherwise than in a way of Civil Justice or lawful War and that also unless by such only as are respectively commissioned by the Magistrate is Murder yea the very Attempt of it Murder in the Eye of God For out of these two cases no man can have any thing to do lawfully with the Sword You 'l say What should a man do in case of his own ntcessary Defence I answer 1. I may not directly and ordinarily design to take away anothers Life in my own defence It may so come to pass that I may be so unhappy as to be necessitated to do that from whence it may ensue but if I be guiltless of Bloud therein my killing the man was indirectly by accident and consequent not by design The thing I designed or ought to have designed was only disabling him and thereby securing my self the killing the man in this behalf falls out beyond my intention in case I am innocent And even this the utter disabling a man to hurt me ought not ordinarily I say to be done for ordinarily a man may defend himself if he will be prudent and use all advantages he has without hazarding his own or his Neighbours Life and perhaps without muâ—ilating eithers person But it will be said This case of Self-Defence comes neither under Civil Justice nor Lawful War I answer therefore 2. 'T is mixt of both In case I am set upon by Robbers or by like unreasonable men who attempt my Life besides that the Law of Nature gives me a Warrant to defend my self against lawless Violence every honest peaceable Subject may in such circumstances where other Officers cannot be had be supposed by an implicit or virtual Concession or Commission of the Magistrate to be an Officer to bring such miscreants to Justice which bringing them to Justice next to our own Defence should be a principal part of every mans design in repelling Violence by Violence Again it is fairly enough reducible to lawful War For I am supposed in the present case In reos Majestatis publicos hostes omnis homo miles est Tertullian Apolog. assaulted with Weapons of War and the Prince has not opportunity to command Civil Officers or armed men to my Relief and Protection I cannot therefore but interpret I have his Leave to fight in Defence of the Peace and my self against the Enemies of the Prince of his Laws and Government for such all Robbers and Hectors are If there were in the case any opposing of those who were sent by the Magistrate though by abuse of his Power as it was in St. Peters case in the Text I could pretend to no right in my own Defence but I must submit In like manner if I my self begun the Quarrel and were the first assailant for in both these cases I were injurious to the Magistrate and could not reasonably interpret any such Favour from him belonging to me But being thus illegally attempted I have Justice the Law of Nature and of my Prince upon my side I act under and not against the Equity of this sixth Conclusion Seventhly and lastly It being evident by what has been abovesaid that the Military as well as Civil Sword belongs only to the Supreme Magistrate therefore the levying or waging War without or against his Commission is by the Text Murder and perhaps upon other grounds more It is certainly such a taking the Sword as deserves perishing by the Sword To speak the same thing in terms more accommodate to our Government For any person or persons to levy or make War within these Kingdoms without the Kings Commission or against those who are commissionated by him is I say and ever has been by the Evangelical Law in the Text Murder and certainly by right Reason as well as by other Law somewhat more than Murder namely Rebellion and Treason It is indeed the most dreadful and complicate Murder imaginable It is first direct and plain Murder of all who fall by our hands It is further Murder of our selves of our Souls by Sin of our Bodies by exposing our own Lives Lastly it is Murder of all we draw in with us and that as of our selves both as to Soul and Body without Gods great Mercy But it is besides all these most proper and plain Rebellion for it is a plain invading the Kings Right and in part or so far forth a dethroning him and there 's no doubt but if it succeed it ends in total dethroning and murdering him too After all which said I may challenge both our old and later our open-faced and our demure Rebels to make better of it if they can Upon the whole the sum is the Kings Majesty is amongst us the Fountain of all Power
only Kings-men not to contradict two of their and our most gracious Kings And here not to speak of several Proclamations and Statutes made by the Authority of King Charles the First of ever blessed memory in which this War as these Gentlemen would style it is expresly called a Rebellion with some aggravating Epithets and its Authors Rebels not to speak I say of these because some may say a Fanatick Parliament pen'd them what will they say of that now blessed Kings dying Penitentials Did he in them utter any thing but the sincere conceptions of his holy Soul Let then any one peruse Chap. 12. of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and see if he speaks not there in the express terms we use Nay let any one look upon the Statute for the observing of this Day made in the Reign of our late gracious Sovereign Charles the Second which according to Order was even now read see what terms are used there Now this being the Kings Law must be taken to be the Kings Language See in the name of God not to call one another names but to give our Sins the true names in our Confessions and Penitentials for them before God But I have dwelt long enough on this I will only add that I am my self far from thinking and would have others far from believing that all the Irish Nation are people of such an Humour as those whose Cruelty we give God thanks we were delivered from or as those others who will not allow this Days-work to have been Cruelty and Rebellion There are undoubtedly a multitude of them harmless people and many others generous good-natured loyal and brave-spirited persons And if after all there be any of a contrary strain whom what hath been said will not convince of their Sin I only pray the Lord have mercy on them To proceed Secondly From the whole Tenour of this Discourse appears the utter unlawfulness of Subjects resisting the Prince or Magistrate whom God has set over them yea though it be in the Abuse of his Power If in such case our Lord Jesus had resisted Mankind had never been Redeemed Yet had it been most easie for him had it been consistent with the Laws which he was to enact to have baffled all the Violence with which he was or could be assaulted For though he had but twelve Apostles even at first and of them only one that dared to fight for him yet could not I saith he have asked of my Father and he would have given me more than twelve Legions of Angels But this would neither have stood with his Sufferings nor with the other Ends of his coming the Doctrine and Example of most holy Life which he was to leave unto the World And therefore as in the Text he most expresly delivers the Doctrine of Non-resistance Put up thy Sword into its Sheath so in the whole Context he practiseth it Wherefore none can esteem themselves Followers either of Christs Doctrine or Example that is none can esteem themselves Christians who shall in the hardest circumstances they can be put resist their Prince or those that are sent by him Thirdly Upon consideration of what has been said let us be moved to put a due value both upon our own and others Lives Let us not at least so vainly and trivially expose them as in every mad and rash fit we are apt to do I will not speak at present of those manifold indirect ways of Murder that are in the world When men do any unlawful or unwarrantable act to themselves or others by which though not intentionally the untimely End of either ensue as drinking themselves or others into mortal Fevours Frenzâ—â—s and a hundred like acts this is Murther before God though indirect indeed and only by consequence yet really and truly such My Text confines me more to the Sword-work And give me leave here a little to insist expresly against that abominable and most unreasonable but frequent practice of Duelling I beseech and conjure all men to consider neither the Old Law of God nor the Gospel make any difference betwixt Murder and what our Common Law calls Man-slaughter To attempt or design taking away the Life of any though in never so violent and transient a Passion is by Gods Law and by the Gospel Murder And no Murderer shall enter into the Kingdome of Heaven that is most surely none who dyes impenitently such Now 't is seldome or never that any man dyes in a Duel but there dyes one singly or doubly a Murderer and impenitent For though murdered he dyes a Murderer at least of himself because he had no right to take the Sword and according as beforesaid by his taking it unwarrantably has brought his own Death upon himself Further 't is of all Duellists generally sure enough neither but would have sped the other the person slain would as truly have sped his Adversary as his Adversary has sped him could he have done it Wherefore in Will and Intention he that falls is a Murderer of the Surviver that is doubly a Murderer and in both cases too commonly impenitent as dying before he comes to Temper sedate enough for Repentance So that I say for the most part such persons die doubly Murderers and impenitent and then Good God! what is their estate Consider this in the name of God all ye that are so wickedly prodigal of your own and others both Bloud and Souls On what Trifles and ridiculous Punctiâ—io's do you generally venture both For when was there almost any private Duel heard of the Occasion whereof was such a wrong as the Law assigns a man Satisfaction for This is the general Resolution in these cases I can have no Satisfaction by Law therefore I 'll fight him Now let us but attend how unreasonable this Resolution is It amounts plainly to thus much the Affront or pretended Injury I have received is so small that the Law takes no notice of it therefore I 'll exact the greatest Satisfaction by or against any Law in any other case imaginable for greater cannot be given by Man than the mans own Life Nay perhaps what I design as a Satisfaction may be the greatest wrong to my self the loss of Body and Soul I may dye by it in my Sin Now is this reasonable such an one has done me a small wrong perhaps none perhaps has only cross'd me in my humour possibly too only in my Vices but admit he has done me a small wrong what then Why then I will compel him to do me a greater namely to kill me in his own defence Nay therefore will I do my self the greatest I will venture both Body and Soul in a most unchristian and unreasonable Revenge For being in this case I take the Sword of my own rash will without any Warrant from God or Man nay against the Laws of both may I not expect actually to perish by the Sword And because I presumptuously and with an high hand rush on such vile Sins to dye impenitently too and forsaken by Gods Grace which if I do how eternally deplorable but utterly irremediable is my Condition Oh! that men would but consider these things and value their own Lives only as God has valued them At least that they would but keep those Laws which he has made to preserve and secure them If but this could be obtained not one in an hundred of those who do would dye untimely or unnatural Deaths Lastly In case for our Sins God should so punish this Nation that we should live to see the Sword of War drawn again let us remember we have been this day taught our Duty in such times Let us all that are able or qualified to take the Sword take it at his Hands and in his Defence who has received the Sword from God our King 's I mean Let us all stick to the Crown in its true and legal Descent This is the only way to keep good Conscience and the likeliest way to secure or retrieve Peace For if Pretenders find few or no Abetters if the great Body of the Nation take the side which all good men will take namely as said that of the Royal Authority all Civil Wars must quickly be at an and and others I think and hope we need not fear But God keep far from us all Attempts of any War And I know no better Preservative from any than that all would remember what our Saviour in teaching St. Peter here has taught us all They that take the Sword shall perish by the Sword The good Lord give Peace in our days and to the God of Peace be all Honour and Glory now and for ever Amen FINIS ERRATA PReface pag. 3. line 13. read Translation p. 8. l. 1. r. at all Serm. 1. p. 10. l. 14 r. the Frame p. 24. l. 4. r. but he p. 26. l. 21. blot out of the God p. p. 28. l. 7. r. of the most p. 30. l. 11. r. as for Serm. 2. in the Advertisement l. 11. r. 16. How indeed the line at 16. should have been broken off p. 3. margin r. Theophylact. p. 7. l. 16. r. indefeasible p. 12. l. 23. r. may please p. 13. l. penult r. Idolatrae p. 16. l. 19. r. This is ibid. l. 21. r. God Who p. 19. l. 16. for more r. move p. 22. l. 21. r. fatal p. 27. l. ult r. impassible p. 29. l. 25. r. or upon charity Serm. 4. p. 3. l. 25. r. fickle p. 21. l. 6. r. account of p. 23. l. 23. r. Casuistical p. 24. l. 15. r. Guilty p. 30. l. 17. r. in my Serm. 6. p. 4. l. 16. r. on what p. 13. l. 16. r. expiring their souls may p. 19. l. 11. r. Death
Civil and Military Without a Commission from him express or virtual as before determined none may either privately or publickly take the Sword or if they do by the Law of God though they act never so privately they shall perish by the Sword they have run into the Guilt and incur'd the Punishment of Murderers Now by way of Application First for our own Direction in the humbling our Souls before God for our Sins We may see by what has been said the ture Nature and learn the true Names of many of those our Sins in the view of style of which possibly we have been too favourable All the rash Attempts we have made on our own or others Life however they have escaped the Sentence of human Laws are by the Law of God no less than Murder He that taketh the Sword shall perish by the Sword that is as we have heard deserves it as a Murderer All those Duels and Rencounters which our Wine Passions or other disorders nay which the Importunity of Associates which false-named Friendship and vain Honour have at any time engaged us in however we have come off are before God so many acts of Murder and we our selves toties quoties Murderers To which private Sins of our own if we add those direct and actual Murders which are and have been committed in this Nation not only in Duels a barbarous Custome yet in all ages especially these later most impiously frequent but Massacres and Rebellions not to speak of other more private methods of Murders on occasion of Robberies and by malicious lying in wait Poison Trechery false Accusations and some like ways of killing men under pretence of Justice if I say we add all these together good God! under what a weight of Bloudguiltiness does this Nation lye And what need have even the innocent to be in daily Prayers to God that some overflowing Scourge sweep not them away with the guilty But much more then what need have all that have been guilty and particularly if any of them who had their hands in the work of this time was four and forty years do yet survive what need have they to be not only in Prayers but Tears night and day if so be their unchristian taking and inhumane using of the Sword may be forgiven unto them Sure it is whatsoever some men may flatter themselves and others Sins of so deep a dy will never be forgiven without profound Repentance I have heard there are many persons abroad in this Kingdom at present who utterly deny there was any Rebellion of the Irish at the time we assign it nay I have read some of their Papers giving an account of those Commotions as they would be content to have them termed that style them Justissimum sanctimúmque Bellum pro Fide A most just and holy War for the Faith I could wish from my heart that all the Cruelties which were then or have been since acted were utterly forgot and I beseech God forgive them as far as any of the Actors or the Abettors of them are yet in a state remissible But I cannot consent to nor endure to let pass uncontrolled such miscalling of things lest men supposing the things to answer the names carry all away in a course of self-deceit and flattery to their own and others destruction First then admitting but not granting that All That was the true Christian Faith which the Natives generally then professed Did they not then enjoy it and had they not more Liberty of it before they broke out into Arms than ever since This was not then the Reason why they took the Sword But again admit this were the Reason can any Christian man who considers what he says maintain this Doctrine That Subjects of their own heads may take up Arms to obtain what Form of Religion they please for their Country that is for them who like not that Form of Religion as well as for them who like it This is not only unchristian but most unreasonable to affirm But Secondly Was not the Sword taken not only without but against the Kings Commission against those who were actually in Power representing him and commissionated by him It was I confess a Calumny cast upon that glorious King and Martyr Charles the First that one of the Chieftains of the Rebels had produced His Majesties Commission for taking Arms and indeed the person we mean did at first pretend so much But I owe such Justice as well as Veneration to the Memory of that blessed Prince that I cannot forbear openly to avow I my self know the men yet living who can attest they heard that very person before his Execution confess the Royal Seal was taken off from an Instrument of another nature Letters Patents as I remember for some Lands and cunningly affixed to that forged Commission His Majesty having been never in the least acquainted with any of their designs For these two reasons then it could be no lawful War The Aggressors had neither lawful Cause nor lawful Authority their Design I say being without and against the Royal Commission And Thirdly Let me demand Was it a War lawfully proclaimed Or was it not most industriously and marvellously concealed not discovered but in one place and that but a few hours comparatively before it broke out Instead of thinking of any Hostility were not the poor English that suffered secure in the Friendship and Familiarity of their Neighbours when unawares unarmed without any Provocation they were set upon and I will not say how handled Is this either a Just or Honourable way of making War Lastly Was it managed in a lawful and Christian sort Were the Qualities and Condition of the persons who fell in the first five months such as constituted them fit Objects for the Sword of a just War Or were the kinds of Death by which they dyed becoming Christians to inflict Or was the number of the slain proportionable to any damages could be pretended to have been sustained by the assailants even according to the Rules of the most rigorous Justice One hundred and fifty four thousand Protestants Men Women and Children massacred between the Three and twentieth of October and the First of March following by computation of the Priests themselves that were present and were directed by the Principals engaged to take a just computation besides all afterwards when they left off to compute and the multitudes that fell in the War ensuing I will not speak so particularly as I could to all these Points because my design is only to move to Repentance not to refresh the memory of the injured But in a word here is not any one of those points which constitute a War just to be found in this dreadful Insurrection and Massacre Wherefore as to those who are so impenitent and remorsless as not to allow it to have been what it has been proved a Rebellion I will only desire of them because they pretend to be the greatest if not