Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n
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A40759
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A sermon preached upon the 29th of May, in the parish-church of St. Margaret in Lyn-Regis in Norfolk, in a great presence by Tho. Fysh ...
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Fysh, Thomas.
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1685
(1685)
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Wing F2569; ESTC R17652
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17,320
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47
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Powers do represent that it is by the Beams of his Majesty they shine that He has said They are Gods that he puts the Sword of Justice in their Hands that 't is his Throne they fill and that Obedience to them is enforc'd upon their Subjects by virtue of a Divine Authority and Command And the Skilful in our Laws say That the Common Law by way of Similitude attributes to the King a Shadow of Divine Excellencies because he represents the Person of God and bears his Image As for instance Soveraignty all Lands being held of him Power he commanding his Subjects to go out of the Realm to War or making Foreign Coin Current by his Proclamation Majesty he neither taking nor parting with any Thing without Matter of Record except Chattels or such like below the Regard of Law Infiniteness after a certain manner being present in all his Courts and as it were in all places of his Dominions Perpetuity having perpetual Succession and being not subject to dye Perfection for no Laches Folly Infancy or Corruption of Blood can be judged in him Truth he cannot be estopped Justice He cannot be a Disseizor or do any Wrong These things I find vouch'd from such Authorities as that they seem to me to be Essential to our Constitution and to be as good a Comment as one would wish on that Branch of the Text now under Consideration that The House of David should be as God intimating many high and excellent Prerogatives they were invested in and encircled withal But I must confine my Discourse to narrower Bounds and therefore shall insist only on these two things 1. That in the Monarchy resembling God the Persons in Power were truly Supream 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unaccountable to any as God can be compelled by none nor be made accountable to them 2. That they resembled him in a kind of Immortality The King never died the Monarchy was Successive and Hereditary 1. They resemble God in being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 truly Supream and Unaccountable Some learned Men will have this to have been the main difference betwixt the Judges that governed Israel and the Kings of the House of David That the former were to render an Account to the State of the Administration of their Government which the latter were not to do but to God only The very nature of the thing indeed proves it self sufficiently For wherever Soveraign Power is once lodged because for the Spartan Shadows of a King and the Dukes of Venice I am not concerned to account here there is evidently vested a Freedom from all forcible Controll or Coertion And if David and his Race were Kings over all Israel they had the eminent controlling Authority over the scattered or united Power of the Body-Politick and so no Sanhedrim no Assembly no Consent of the People no Officers of State can be above them in the way of proper Rule or Jurisdiction and violently to touch them in the very Skirts of their Mantle is hugely culpable and criminal On the account of this Eminence they are fenced and immured by the Laws both of Earth and Heaven from the undutiful Thought and the sawcy Tongue as well as the rebellious and assassinating Hand We are not to curse the King so much as in Thought and we are not to revile the Gods or speak Evil of the Rulers of the People And blaspheming God and the King were Crimes that went coupled and hand in hand and St. Paul recanted a rash Word spoken against a Person in Power though horribly abusing it And 't is supposed that the old War of the Giants against the Gods meant no more than Insurrections of mighty Subjects against their Kings Sure we are that in a Divine Sense 't is no less than Resisting the Ordinance of God to resist them and They that resist shall receive to themselves Damnation And the Christian Duty of Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance has unshaken Foundations and inviolable Grounds in the Eternal Laws of Nature and Equity in the Essential Frame and Subordination of Politick Societies to some Supream in the Inspired Writings of the Old and New Testament in the Examples of the Holy Jesus and his meek Disciples in the Canons of the Church and the Statutes of the Realm in the Monuments of Primitive Christianity and the Sufferings of the most celebrated Martyrs As to this last I confess some have gone about to blast the Martyrs Lawrels and represent them to have undergone their Sufferings because they were weak in their Force or in their Understandings and so they foolishly or helplesly submitted to what could not be redrest And thus their Memories are Martyr'd as their Bodies were before and those illustrious passive Graces of Meekness and Resignation of Christian Patience and Taking up the Cross which are the bright Enamel of their Heavenly Crowns which are the just Imitation of our Suffering Lord which are the Eternal Theme of our Wonder and our Praise which in the Opinion of truly Good Men do embalm their Names below and which above have preferred them to the highest Seats in the Church Triumphant These I say are made to dwindle into mere politick Compliance with a helpless Necessity or are arraigned as Arguments of the Weakness of their Party or their Ignorance of their Rights and Privileges which Modern Professors it seems pretend now far better to understand in these Days of New-Light and by those extraordinary late Discoveries that have been made to the Kingdom of the Saints Suffice it us that we know the ancient Channel wherein Christianity ran how it was propagated and prevailed in the World when it went forth conquering and to conquer and yet knew nothing of making its Way by Violence or Armies by deposing of Kings or fighting for Privileges by Alterations of Governments or Dis-inherison of Princes that is in plain English when it was not acquainted with advancing Christ's Cause by reproaching his Religion or breaking any of his Commandments As for us who adhere to the Establishment in the Church of England It has hitherto been our just Glory of which none hereafter I hope shall deprive us that like the Wisdom from above our Doctrines are pure and our Principles and Practices peaceable opposite to Idolatry against God and Sedition against the King And as this Church has hitherto been so may it for ever stand the just Dread and Envy of our Enemies on either hand and be a lasting Monument of the true Temper and Genius of the Christian Religion till Time shall be no more But now because we have exempted Soveraigns from being justly obnoxious to Outward Force or Violence have we therefore cancell'd all Obligations upon them Have we made mere Power to be Right or Passion to be Law or left Appetite to range without either Rule or Bounds and so put them into such a State as is proper to none but the Great Leviathan who with full and Arbitrary Liberty rowls and sports himself
in his Watry Kingdom and at pleasure Preys upon all the Lesser and Defenceless Fry Surely 't is not reasonable thus to understand us May not their Consciences be bound though their Hands cannot Is not every lower Orb limited and circumscribed by that which is above it and though they be higher than the highest on Earth yet still in Heaven is there not one higher than they Seneca of old hath wisely and gravely told them Quicquid a vobis minor extimescit major hoc vobis Dominus minatur Omne sub Regno graviore Regnum est However they have no Peer on Earth in their own Dominions they are nevertheless Subjects of Heaven and therefore they may on that Score lye under the the Obligation of publick Promises and solemn Acts of Condescension They may be tyed by sacred Vows and Oaths by the Sense of Honour and Religion by the prudent Care of their Temporal and an awful Regard to their Eternal Interests by the Engagements of Justice and Wisdom and Tenderness and Humanity for even God himself the great Potentate of the whole Universe is not Arbitrary in any Exorbitant way but he forms the Awful Decrees and Resolves of his Almighty Will and Pleasure by the Eternal Laws and Measures of Rectitude and Goodness and Holiness and Compassion 2. The House of David resembled God in a kind of Immortality The King never dyed the Monarchy being Successive and Hereditary As Monarchy is the best of Governments for Order Peace Strength Steadiness and Fixation so the Descent of this high Office in the way of an Inheritance is the best of Monarchies And therefore when God established a Government among his own People he setled it in David's House for many future Years and a great while to come he promised that when his own Days were fulfilled and he should sleep with his Fathers yet he would set up of the Royal Progeny and Seed after him and establish the Throne of his Kingdom for ever and this that holy Prince magnifies very much in the Favour of God towards him that he had not only brought him to the Crown that was but a small thing in comparison of establishing the Kingdom in his Line and his House in longinquum for many succeeding Ages and Generations And thence it is that we meet so often with the mention of the Blood-Royal the Seed the Progeny and the Race of Kings in the Historical Books of the Old Testament Hereby God wisely prevents a Vacuum or Gap in Government which in Polities and Societies does oftimes breed as preposterous and violent Changes as it does in Nature and at which much Disorder and Confusion is too apt to enter Which must be confessed by all who remember the many Tumults dangerous Ferments and Convulsions that inseparably wait upon the Intervals of Government in Elective Kingdoms or Principalities So that if on one hand there be a hazard of personal Insufficiency for the high Charge on the other there is almost a Certainty of lasting Mischiefs by the high Animosities of clashing Factions and different Pretenders and the notorious Sway and mighty Ascendant that Interest and partial Affections have in the Management of Elections and free Choices do ballance at least the personal Defects or Inconveniences in the way of Descent and Succession And when the Trees went out to chuse their King the Bramble carried it from the fat Olive the sweet Fig-Tree and the gladsom Vine But further It ought to be considered that if Children and the Fruit of the Womb be in general a Gift and Heritage that cometh of the Lord that then it seems utterly unlikely that God should abandon to Nature and the fickle Laws of Generation the Disposal of and Succession into that high Office which is the Instrument of so many of his Providences to this lower World and of so mighty Importance and Concernment to the Affairs of his Church and his Religion So that if by such special Direction and Superintendence of Providence it may be rationally concluded that the Matter is from God then we may be confident it will be more blessed than the wisest of Men's Expedients or Inventions without or against him And there must surely be somewhat extraordinary in it that when God threatens his severest Vengeance against the Nation of the Philistins one part of it should be to have the King perish from Gaza and a Bastard to dwell in Ashdod They who set up the Spuriout Abimelech rejoyced in him for a while and Abimelech rejoyced in them but this Sun-shine ended in very foul Weather and the Matter had a sad and Tragical Period and Catastrophe for a Fire was enkindled in short time between them and devoured and consumed them both and revenged the Injuries they had done by their wicked Combination against Jerubbaal and his House with whom they had dealt untruly and unsincerely How much better then is it when God takes the Matter into his own Hand and together with Inherent Blood and Birthright conveys and entails the Right to a Crown and the same Providence that designs the Being assigns the Station he must hold and the great Character he must sustain and manage This of old I am sure was frankly owned and recognized by St. Ambrose and St. Augustine Learned as well as Good Men Cujus jussu nascuntur Homines ejus jussu constituuntur Principes inde illis Potestas unde Spiritus They thought that God not only instituted the Office and was the Fountain of the Authority but was interessed too in the Designation of the Person in whom it should be invested Nor did they think it such a horrid Impeachment of a wise and gracious Providence that Princes were sometimes sent to fill the Throne who in Piety or Gentleness or other Princely Vertues fell far short of the Perfections of a Constantine or a Theodosius But the great Iniquity in the canvasing Questions of this sort seems to be That Men consider only the present Advantage or Security they propose not the lasting Settlement or true Right of things for if those were search'd into methinks 't is palpable and plain that Foundations can neither be safely nor justly altered Not Safely because they who new model Kingdoms must first force them and crumble them into pieces ere they can fit and dispose them for a new Fabrick and this will bring in such dreadful Shakings and Convulsions as may endanger the very Being of the Body Politick and raise such violent Fermentations as may go near to dissipate and destroy the whole Not Justly because Fundamental Laws that concern the Rights of Empire and that relate to the Original Constitution of Things and that fix and cut out the Channels wherein for ever they were to run These I say cannot be altered without the Violation of those Grounds and Laws of Reason and Equity and Social Life which support and protect all Publick Establishments and Intercourses of Men. And if this might be attempted at