David was the magistrate, and yet Absalom possessed the place, 2 Sam.

xv. xvi. xvii. xviii. xix. chap. Sheba also made a revolt and usurped

the possession in a great part, and yet David was king, 2 Sam. xx. 2.

Adonijah got the start in respect of possession, exalting himself

saying, I will be king: yet the kingdom was Solomon's from the Lord, 1

Kings 1. The house of Ahaziah had not power to keep still the kingdom, 2

Chron. xxii. 9. and Athaliah took the possession of it, yet the people

set up Joash, xxiii. 3. Next we have many examples of such who have

invaded the possessor, witness Jehoram and Jehoshaphat's expedition

against Mesha, king of Moab, Elisha being in the expedition, 2 Kings,

iii. 4, 5. Hence we see the first pretence removed.

The second is no better; which Augustine calls Magnum Latrocinium, a

great robbery; I mean conquest, or a power of the sword gotten by the

sword; which, that it can give no right to be owned, I prove That which

can give no signification of God's approving will, cannot give a title

to be owned: but mere conquest can give no signification of God's

approving will, as is just now proven about possession: for then the

Lord should have approven all the unjust conquests that have been in the

world. 2. Either conquest as conquest must be owned, as a just title to

the crown, and so the Ammonites, Moabites, Philistines, &c. prevailing

over God's people for a time, must have reigned by right, or as a just

conquest. In this case, conquest is only a mean to the conquerors

seizing and holding that power, which the state of the war entitled him

unto; and this ingress into authority over the conquered, is not

grounded on conquest but on justice, and not at all privative, but

inclusive of the consent of the people; and then it may be owned; but

without a compact, upon conditions of securing religion and liberty, and

posterity, cannot be subjected without their content; for whatever just

quarrel the conqueror had with the present generation, he could have

none with the posterity, the father can have no power to resign the

liberty of the children. 3. A king as king, and by virtue of his royal

office, must be owned to be a father, tutor, protector, shepherd, and

patron of the people; but a mere conqueror, without consent cannot be

owned as such.

Can he be a father and a patron to us against our will, by the sole

power of the sword? A father to these that are unwilling to be sons? An

head over such as will not be members? And a defender thro' violence? 4.

A king, as such, is a special gift of God, and blessing, not a judgment:

but a conqueror, as such, is not a blessing, but a judgment, his native

end being not peace, but fire and sword. 5. That which hath nothing of

a king in it, cannot be owned to make a king; but conquest hath nothing

of a king in it: for it hath nothing but violence and force, nothing but

what the bloodiest villain that was never a king may have, nothing of

God's approving and regulating will, nothing of institution or

constition; and a plain repugnancy to the ordination of God, for God

hath said, Thou shalt not kill; conquest says, I will kill, and prosper,

and reign. 6. A lawful call to a lawful office may not be resisted; but

a call to conquest, which is nothing but ambition or revenge, ought to

be resisted; because not of God's preceptive will, otherwise he should

be the author of sin. 7. That power which we must own to be the

ordinance of God, must not be resisted, Rom. xiii. 2.

But conquest may be resisted in defence of our king and country:

therefore it must not be owned to be the ordinance of God. 8. That which

God condemns in his word, cannot be owned; but dominion by the sword God

condemns in his word, Ezek. xxxii. 26. "Ye stand upon the sword,----and

shall possess the land," Amos vi. 13. "Ye rejoice in a thing of naught,

which say, Have we not taken to us horns by our own strength?" Habbak.

ii. 5, 6.----"Wo to him that encreaseth that which is not his, how

long," &c. 9. We have many examples of invading conquerors; as Abraham,

for the rescue of Lot, pursued the conquering kings unto Dan, Gen. iv.

4. "Jonathan smote a garrison of the conquering Philistines," 1 Sam.

xiii. 3. The Lord owning and authorising them so to do. The people did

often shake off the yoke of their conquerors in the history of the

judges: but this they might not do to their lawful rulers. What is

objected from the Lord's people conquering Canaan, &c. is no argument

for conquest: for he, to whom belongs the earth and its fulness,

disponed to Israel the land of Canaan for their inheritance, and

ordained that they should get the possession thereof by conquest; it

followeth not therefore, that kings now, wanting any word of promise, or

divine grant to any lands, may ascend to the thrones of other kingdoms

than their own, by no better title than the bloody sword. See Lex Rex,

quest. 12. The third pretence of hereditary succession remains to be

removed; which may be thus disproven, 1. This classes with the former,

though commonly asserted by royalists.

For either conquest gives a right, or it does not; if it does, then it

looses all allegiance to the heirs of the crown dispossessed thereby: if

it does not give a right, then no hereditary succession founded upon

conquest can have any right, being founded upon that which hath no

right: and this will shake the most part of hereditary successions that

are now in the world. 2. If hereditary succession have no right but the

people's consent; then of itself it can give none to a man that hath not

that consent; but the former is true. For, it is demanded, how doth the

son or brother succeed? By what right? It must either be by divine

promise; or by the father's will, or it must come by propagation from

the first ruler, by a right of the primogeniture; but none of these can

be. For the first, we have no immediate divine constitution tying the

crown to such a race, as in David's covenant: it will easily be granted,

they fetched not their charter from heaven immediately, as David had it,

a man of many peculiar prerogatives, to whose line the promise was

astricted of the coming of the Messias, and Jacob's prophecy that the

sceptre should not depart from Judah until his coming, Gen. xlix. 10.

was restricted to his family afterwards: wherefore he could say, The

Lord God of Israel chose me before all the house of my father, to be

king over Israel for ever; for he hath chosen Judah to be the ruler; and

of the house of Judah, the house of my father; and among the sons of my

father, he liked me to make me king over Israel; and of all my sons he

hath chosen Solomon, 1 Chron. xxviii. 4, 5. All kings cannot say this;

neither could Saul say it, tho' immediately called of God as well as

David: yet this same promise to David was conditional, if his children

should keep the Lord's ways, 2 Chron. vi. 16. Next, it cannot be said

this comes from the will of the father; for according to the scripture,

no king can make a king, though a king may appoint and design his son

for his successor, as David did Solomon, but the people make him. The

father is some way a cause why his son succeedeth, but he is not the

cause of the royalty conferred upon him by line: for the question will

recur, who made him a king, and his father, and grandfather, till we

come up to the first father? Then, who made him a king? Not himself;

therefore it must be resounded upon the people's choice and

constitution: and who appointed the lineal succession, and tied the

crown to the line, but they? It is then, at the best, the patrimony of

the people, by the fundamental law of the kingdom, conferred upon the

successor by consent.

And generally it is granted, even where the succession is lineal, he

that comes to inherit, he does not succeed by heritage, but by the force

of law; the son then hath not his kingdom from his father, but by law,

which the people made and stand to, as long as it may consist with the

reasons of public advantage, upon which they condescended to establish

such a family over them. Neither can it be said, it is by a right of

primogeniture, propagated from the first ruler; for this must either be

Adam the first of the world or Fergus for example, the first of this

kingdom. It could not come from Adam as a monarch and father of all: for

that behoved to be, either by order of nature, or his voluntary

assignment: it could not be transferred by order of nature; for besides

the difficulty to find out Adam's successor in the universal monarchy,

and the absurdity of fixing it on Cain, (who was a cursed vagabond,

afraid of every man and could not be an universal monarch, yet Adam's

first born.) It will be asked, how this passed from him unto others?

Whether it went by fatherhood to all the sons, fathers to their

posterity? Which would multiply as many commonwealths, as there have

been fathers since: or if it went, by primogeniture, only to the

first-born, that he alone could claim the power which would infer the

necessity of an universal monarchy, without multiplication of

commonwealths.

If it was by his voluntary assignment, to whom, and in what proportion,

he pleased; then the universal monarchy died with himself, and so could

not be conveyed at all: for, either he behoved to give each son a share,

to be conveyed downwards to their children in that proportion; or whole

and solid to one: so also the former dilemma recurs, for if the first be

said, it will make as many little kingdoms as there have been sons of

Adam; if the second, the world should be but still one kingdom. But

however it be, this could never be the way that God appointed, either

for raising a magistratical power where it is wanting, or deriving a

right to any in being; considering the multiplication, division,

confusion, and extinction of families that have been. If it be from

Fergus the first of his line; then either it comes from him as a king,

or as a father: not the first, for the reason above hinted: nor as a

father; for a father may defraud his son of the heritage, a king cannot

divide the kingdom among his sons; it must then be length refounded on

the peoples consent. 3. If even where lineal succession is constituted

by law, for eviting the inconveniencies of frequent elections, people

are not tied to admit every first born of that line; then that

birth-right, where there is no more, cannot make a king; but the former

is true; for they are tied only conditionally, so he be qualified, and

have a head to sit at the helm, and not a fool or monster; neither are

they free to admit murderers or idolaters by the laws of God, and of

the land: it is not birth then, but their admission being so qualified,

that makes kings. Hence, 4. That which takes away the peoples

birth-right, given them of God to provide for their liberties in the

fittest government, and that is not to be owned; but to make birth alone

a title to the crown, takes away the peoples birth-right given them of

God of providing for their liberties in the fittest government, fetters

their choice to one destructive to these. Certainly where God hath not

bound the conscience, men may not bind themselves nor their posterity;

but God hath never fettered men to a choice of a government or governing

line; which, contrary to the intention of the oath, may prove

destructive to the ends thereof. Nor can the fathers leave in legacy, by

oath, any chains to fetter the after wits of posterity to a choice

destructive to religion and liberty. Israel was bound, by covenant, not

to destroy the Gibeonites; but if they had risen to cut off Israel, Who

can doubt but they were loosed from that obligation? For to preserve

cut-throats was contrary to the intention of the oath: so when either

monarchy, or the succeeding monarch, proves destructive to the ends of

government, the choice, law, or oath of our fathers, cannot bind us. 5.

If we are tied to the hereditary succession, not for the right the

successor hath by birth, but for our covenanted allegiance to them whose

successor he is; then cannot his birth-right be the ground of our

allegiance, and consequently hereditary succession cannot make a king;

but the former is true; for in hereditary crowns, the first family being

chosen by the suffrages of the people, for that cause the hereditary

successor hath no privilege or prerogative, but from him who was chosen

king: therefore the obligation to the son, being no greater than the

obligation to the father, which is the ground of that, if the father

then was owned only because he was chosen, and qualified for government,

the son cannot be owned for any other cause, but as chosen in him, and

also qualified and admitted with consent. We cannot choose the father as

qualified, and tie ourselves to the successors, be what they will. 6. If

a king be not born heir of a kingdom, then is he not king by birth; but

he is not born heir of a kingdom; for, a mean cannot be born to inherit

the end, the king is but a mean for the kingdom's preservation. If the

kingdom be his, by birth, as an inheritance, why may he not upon

necessary occasions sell his inheritance? But if he sell it, then all

confess he is no more king. 7. If that which makes a king cannot be

transmitted from father to son; then succession, by birth, cannot make a

king; but the former is true. The royal faculty of governing cannot be

transmitted: Solomon asked it from God, he had it not from his father:

nor can he be born to the honour of a king, because not born with either

the gift or honour to be a judge. God maketh high and low, not birth.

Nor can the call and constitution of a king, according to the will of

God, be transferred from father to son, for that cannot be in God's way

without the intervening consent of the people, that cannot make him a

born king. 8. If no dominion can come by nature, as is proven before,

then can no man be a born king: nature and birth cannot give them a

sceptre in their hand, nor kingly majesty, they must have that alone

from God and the people, and may only expect honour from their own good

government: kings (as Plutarch says) must be like dogs that are best

hunters, not these who are born of best dogs. 9. The peculiar

prerogative of Jesus Christ must not be ascribed to any other; but this

is his peculiar prerogative, to be born a king, of whom it might be

truly said, Where is he that is born king of the Jews? And for this end

was he born, who came out of the womb with a crown on his head, which no

creature can bear. 10. In scripture we find that a king was to be so and

so qualified, not a stranger, but a reader of God's word, &c. Deut.

xvii. 15, &c. he was not qualified by naked birth. Hence, if all the

qualifications requisite in an heir cannot make a king qualified

according to the institution of God, then his being heir cannot make him

king: but the first is true, an heir may be an heir without these

qualifications. 11. We find in the scripture, the people were to make

the kings by that law, Deut. xvii. 15. Thou shalt choose him whom the

Lord chooseth: yea, neither Saul nor David were kings, till the people

met to make them: therefore birth never made them kings, even though the

kingdom was tied to David's line. That was only a typical designment by

special promise, because Christ was to come of that line; it was

therefore established in David's family for typical reasons, that cannot

be now alledged. 12. We find in the disposal of government among

brethren, this birth order was not seldom inverted; as when Jacob was

preferred before Esau, Judah before all the elder sons of Jacob, Ephraim

before Manasseh, Solomon before Adonijah. Hence if this gentleman, now

regnant, have no better pretences than these now confuted, we cannot

recognize his right to reign; yea, though this last were valid, yet he

cannot plead it, it being expresly provided in our laws against the

succession of a papist. But there is one grand objection against all

this. The Jews and other nations are commanded to bring their necks

under the yoke of the king of Babylon, and to serve him, and yet he had

no other right to these kingdoms; than the Lord's providential disposal,

because the Lord had "given all these lands into his hand," Jer. xxvii.

6, 7, 12. Ans. 1. He was indeed an unjust usurper, and had no right but

the Lord's providential gift; which sometimes makes "the tabernacles of

robbers prosper, into whose hand God bringeth abundantly, Job xii. 6.

And gives Jacob sometimes for a spoil, and Israel to the robbers, Isa.

xlii. 24. And giveth power to the beast to continue forty and two

months, and to have power over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations,"

Rev. xiii. 5, 7. His tyranny also was very great extensively, in respect

of his oppressions and usurpations by conquest; but it was not so great

intensively, as our robbers and spoilers may be charged with; he was

never such a perverter of all the ends of government, nor a treacherous

overturner of all conditions, he was never a persecutor of the Jewish

religion, he never oppressed them upon that account, nor endeavoured its

extirpation, he never enacted such mischiefs by law. The Lord only made

use of him to bring about the holy ends of the glory of his justice and

wisdom, in which respect alone he is called his servant, as elsewhere

his rod and hammer, having given him a charge against an hypocritical

nation, to trample them down in his holy providence; and accordingly

there was no resistance could prevail, they must be trampled upon, no

help for it; but no subjection was required, acknowledging his

magistratical right by divine ordinance, but only a submissive stooping

to the holy disposal of divine providence; no owning was exacted either

of the equity of that power, or of fealty to the administrator. 2. This

behoved to be a particular command, by positive revelation given at that

time, not binding to others in the like condition; which I refer to the

judgment of the objectors: put the case, and make it run parallel, if

the king of England were in league with the king of France, and breaking

that league, should provoke that aspiring prince, growing potent by many

conquests to discover his designs, make preparations and give out

threatnings for the conquest of England and all Britain; were the people

of England bound to surrender themselves as servants and tributaries to

him for 70 years, or for ever, under pain of destruction, if they should

not? This were one of the most ridiculous inferences that ever was

pleaded; nay, it would make all refusal of subjection to invaders

unlawful. 3. I will draw an argument from this to confirm my plea: for

these commands of subjection to Babylon, were not delivered, until after

the king of Judah had surrendered to Nebuchadnezzar, and entred into

covenant with him to be subject to him, 2 Kings xxiv. chap. in keeping

which covenant the kingdom might have stood, and after he had rebelled

against him, and broken that covenant, "when lo, he had given his hand,"

after which he could "not prosper, or escape, or be delivered," Ezek.

xviii. 14, 15, 18, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 13. Then the commandment came, that

they should disown their own king Zedekiah, now forfeiting his right by

breach of covenant, and be subject to Nebuchadnezzar, whence I argue, if

people are commanded to disown their covenant-breaking rulers, and

subject themselves to conquerors, then I have all I plead for; but the

former is true, by the truth of this objection: therefore also the

latter. There is a 2d Objection from Rom xiii. 1. "Let every soul be

subject to the higher powers, the powers that be are ordained of God;"

yet the Roman emperor, to which they were to be subject, was an usurper.

Ans. It cannot be proven, that the apostle intendeth here the Roman

emperor as the higher power: there were at this time several

competitions for the empire, about which Christians might have their own

scruples whom to own; the apostle does not determine their litigations,

nor interest himself in parties but gives the general standard of God's

ordinance they had to go by. And the best expositors of the place do

alledge, the question and doubt of Christians then was not so much in

whom the supremacy was, as whether Christians were at all bound to obey

civil power, especially Pagan? Which the apostle resolves, in giving

general directions, to obey the ordinance of magistracy, conform to its

original, and as it respects the end for which he had and would set it

up: but no respect is there had to tyrants. 2. It cannot be proven, that

the supreme power then in being was usurped, there being then a supreme

Senate, which was a lawful power; nor that Nero was then an usurper, who

came in by choice and consent, and with the good liking of the people.

3. The text means of lawful powers, not unlawful force, that are

ordained of God by his preceptive will, not merely by his providential

disposal, and of conscientious subjection to magistracy, not to tyranny,

describing and characterizing the powers there, by such qualifications

as tyrants and usurpers are not capable of. But I mind to improve this

text more fully hereafter, to prove the quite contrary to what is here

objected.

8. From the right of magistracy, flows the magistratical relation, which

is necessary to have a bottom, before we can build the relative duties

thereon. This brings it under the fifth commandment, which is the rule

of all relative duties between inferiors and superiors, requiring honour

to be given to fathers, masters, husbands, &c. and to rightful

magistrates, who are under such political relations, as do infer the

same duties; and prohibiting not only the omission of these duties, but

also the committing of contrary sins; which may be done, not only by

contrary acts, as dishonouring and rebelling against fathers,

magistrates, &c. but also by performing them to contrary objects, as by

giving the father's due to the father's opposite, and the magistrates

due to tyrants who are their opposites. Certainly this command,

prescribing honour, does regulate to whom it should be given; and must

be understood in a consistency with that duty and character of one that

hath a mind to be an inhabitant of the Lord's "holy hill," Psal. xv. 4.

"In whose eyes a vile person is contemned, but he honoureth them that

fear the Lord." So that we sin against the fifth command, when we honour

them that we are obliged to contemn by another command. Hence I argue,

if owning or honouring of tyrants be a breach of the fifth command, then

we cannot own their authority: but the former is true: therefore the

latter. I prove the assumption: a honouring the vile, to whom no honour

is due, and who stand under no relation of fathers as fathers, is a

breach of the fifth command; but the owning of tyrants authority is a

honouring the vile, to whom no honour is due, and who stand under no

relation of fathers, and is yet a honouring them as fathers: therefore

the owning of tyrants authority is a breach of the fifth command. The

major is clear: for if the honouring of these to whom no honour is due,

were not a breach of the fifth command, that precept could neither be

kept at all or broken at all. It could not be kept at all; for, either

it must oblige us to honour all indefinitely, as fathers, and other

relations, which cannot be; or else it must leave us still in suspense

and ignorance, who shall be the object of our honour; and then it can

never be kept: or finally, it must astrict our honouring to such

definite relations, to whom it is due; and then our transgression of

that restriction shall be a breach of it. Next, if it were not so, it

could not be broken at all: for if prostituting and abusing honour be

not a sin, we cannot sin in the matter of honour at all; for if the

abuse of honour be not a sin, then dishonour also is not a sin: for that

is but an abuse of the duty, which is a sin as well as the omission of

it. And what should make the taking away of honour from the proper

object to be sin, and the giving it to a wrong object to be no sin?

Moreover, if this command do not restrict honour to the proper object,

we shall never know who is the object. How shall we know who is our

father, or what we owe to him, if we may give another his due? The minor

also is manifest: for if tyrants be vile, then no honour is due to them,

according to that, Psal. xv. 4. and yet it is a honouring them as

fathers; if they be owned as magistrates; for magistrates are in a

politic sense fathers; but certain it is, that tyrants are vile, as the

epithets and characters they get in scripture prove. But because, in

contradiction to this, it may be said, though fathers be never so

wicked, yet they are to be honoured, because they are still fathers; and

though matters be never so vile and froward, yet they are to be

subjected unto, 1 Pet. ii. 18-20. and so of other relations, to whom

honour is due by this command; therefore though tyrants be never so

vile, they are to be owned under these relations, because they are the

higher powers in place of eminency, to whom the apostle Paul commands to

yield subjection, Rom. xiii. and Peter to give submission and honour, 1

Pet. ii. 13, 17. Therefore it must be considered, that as the relative

duty of honouring the relations to whom it is due, must not interfere

with the moral duty of contemning the vile, who are not under these

relations; so this general moral of contemning the vile, must not

cassate the obligation of relative duties, but must be understood with a

consistency therewith, without any prejudice to the duty itself. We must

contemn all the vile, that are not under a relation to be honoured, and

these also that are in that relation, in so far as they are vile. But

now tyrants do not come under these relations at all, that are to be

honoured by this command. As for the higher powers that Paul speaks of,

Rom. xiii. they are not those which are higher in force, but higher in

power, not in authority, but in power, not in a celsitude of prevalency,

but in a pre-excellency of dignity; not in the pomp and pride of their

posterity, and possession of the place, but by the virtue and value of

their office, being ordained of God not to be resisted, the ministers of

God for good, terrors to evil doers, to whom honour is due; those are

not tyrants but magistrates. Hence it is a word of the same root which

is rendered authority, or an authorized power, 1 Tim. ii. 2. and from

the same word also comes that supreme, to whom Peter commands subjection

and honour, 1 Pet. ii. 13. Now these he speaks of have the legal

constitution of the people, being the ordinance of man, to be subjected

to for the Lord's sake, and who sends other inferior magistrates for

the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them that do well,

who are to be honoured as kings or lawful magistrates; this cannot be

said of tyrants. But more particularly, to evince that tyrants and

usurpers are not to be honoured according to this command, and that it

is a breach of it so to do; let us go through all these relations of

superiority, that come under the obligation of this command, and we

shall find tyrants and usurpers excluded out of all. First, They cannot

come under the parental relation: we are indeed to esteem kings as

fathers, though not properly, but by way of some analogy, because it is

their office to care for the people, and to be their counsellors, and to

defend them, as fathers do for children: but roaring lions and ranging

bears, as wicked rulers are, Prov. xxviii. 15. cannot be fathers. But

kings cannot properly be owned under this relation, far less tyrants

(with whom the analogy of fathers cannot consist) there being so many

notable disparities betwixt kings and fathers. 1. A father may be a

father to one child; but a king cannot be a king or politic father to

one only, but his correlate must be a community; a tyrant can be a

father to none at all in a politic sense. 2. A father is a father by

generation to all coming out of his loins; a king not so, he doth not

beget them, nor doth their relation flow from that; a tyrant is a

destroyer, not a pro-creator of people. 3. A father is the cause of the

natural being of his children, a king only of the politic well being of

his subjects; but tyrants are the cause of the ill being of both. 4. A

father, once a father, as long as his children live, retains still the

relation, though he turn mad and never so wicked; a king turning mad may

be served as Nebuchadnezzar was, at least all will grant in some cases

the subjects may shake off the king; and if in any case, it is when he

turns tyrant. 5. A father's relation never ceases, whithersoever his

children go; but subjects may change their relation to a king, by coming

under another king in another kingdom; a tyrant will force all lovers

of freedom to leave the kingdom where he domineers. 6. A father's

relation never changes, he can neither change his children, nor they

change their father; but a king may naturalize new subjects, and

subjects may also change their sovereign. Royalists will grant a state

or commonwealth may make a king, and there is great reason sometimes

that a monarchy be turned into a commonwealth; but a tyrant changes

those that are under him, expels the natives, brings in foreigners, and

all good patriots do pant for a change of him every day. 7. A father

hath no power of life and death over his children; a king hath it over

his subjects according to law; a tyrant usurps it over the innocent

against law. 8. A father is not a father by consent of his children; as

a king is by consent of his subjects; a tyrant is neither a father with

it nor without it. 9. A father is not made by the children, as a king is

by his subjects, as was shewed: a tyrant is neither a natural, nor by

compact, but a self created power. 10. A father is not chosen

conditionally upon compact, as a king is by the free suffrages of the

community; a tyrant in this differs from a king that he is not chosen,

and in tyranny from a father. 11. Children wanting a father cannot

choose whom they will to be their father; as subjects wanting a king may

choose whom they will, and what form they please; but though they can,

yet if they be rational, they will never choose a tyrant, nor a

tyrannical form of government. 12. Children cannot restrict their

father's power to what degrees they please; as subjects may limit their

kings, at their first erection; but a tyrant, though he ought, yet he

will not be limited, and if he might, he should be restrained. 13.

Children cannot set bounds how long they will have their fathers to

continue; subjects may condescend upon the time, in making laws how long

such an one shall be their sovereign, during life, or while faultless,

according as the fundamental law is made at first; tyrants ought every

day to be repressed that they should not continue at all. Yet giving and

not granting, that a king were to be owned under the relation of a

father; though every man be bound to own and maintain his father's

parental authority, yet let the case be put, that the father turns a

robber, murderer, an avowed enemy to God and the country, is his person

and authority in that case to be owned, to the dishonour of God, and

hurt and hazard of the country? or ought he not rather to be delivered

up even by the son to justice? Much more then will it follow, that a

king who turns the more dangerous, because the more powerful robber, and

legal murderer, and enemy to God and the country, cannot be owned seeing

the relation between father and son is stronger and stricter as having

another original, than can be betwixt king and subjects, and stands

unremoved as long as he is father, though turning such, they ought to

contribute, (in moral duty, to which their relative duty must cede) that

he should no more be a father, nor no more a living man, when dead by

law. Secondly, They cannot come under the herile or masterly relation,

though analogically also sometimes they are stiled so, and subjects are

called servants, by reason of their subjection, and because it is the

office of kings to command, and subjects to obey, in this there is some

analogy. But kings cannot properly be owned under this relation, as

masters over either persons or goods of subjects, far less tyrants, yea

kings assuming a masterly power turn tyrants. Now that the magistratical

relation is not that of a master, is clear from many disparities and

absurdities, whether we consider the state of hired servants or slaves.

For hired servants, the difference is vast betwixt them and subjects. 1.

The hired servant gets reward for his service, by compact; the subjects

none, but rather gives the royal reward of tribute to the king for his

service; the tyrant exacts it to maintain his tyranny. 2. The hired

servant is maintained by his master; the subjects maintain the king;

the tyrant robs it from them by force. 3. The hired servant bargains

only for a time, and then may leave him; the subject cannot give up his

covenanted allegiance, at that rate and for these reasons as the servant

may his service; a tyrant will make nor keep no such bargain. 4. The

hired servant must have his master's profit mainly before his eyes, and

his own secondarily; but the magistrates power is primarily ordinated to

the public good of the community and only consequentially to the good of

himself. 5. The master hath a greater power over the hired servant, to

make and give out laws to him, which if they be lawful he must obey;

than the king hath over the nation, to which he is the sole lawgiver, as

is shewed. 6. The hired servant's subjection is mercenary and servile;

but the subject's subjection is civil, free, voluntary, liberal, and

loving to a lawful king. Again for slaves, the difference between them

and subjects is great. 1. Slavery, being against nature, rational people

would never choose that life, if they could help it; but they gladly

choose government and governors. 2. Slavery would make their condition

worse than when they had no government, for liberty is always

preferable; neither could people have acted rationally in setting up

government, if to be free of oppression of others they had given

themselves up to slavery, under a master who may do what he pleases with

them. 3. All slaves are either taken in war, or bought with money, or

born in the house where their parents were slaves, as Abraham and

Solomon had of that sort; but subjects are neither captives, nor bought,

nor born slaves.--4. Slavery is not natural, but a penal fruit of sin,

and would never have been if sin had not been; but government is not so,

but natural and necessary. 5. Slaves are not their master's brethren,

subjects are the king's brethren, "over whom he must not lift up

himself," Deut. xvii. 20. 6. Masters might purchase and sell their

slaves, Abimelech took sheep and men servants and gave them unto

Abraham, Gen. xx. 14. Jacob had maid-servants, and men-servants, and

asses, Gen. xxx. 43. no otherwise than other goods, Solomon got to

himself servants and maidens, and servants born in his house, Eccles.

ii. 7. a king cannot do so with his subjects. 7. Princes have not this

power to make the people slaves, neither from God, nor from the people:

from God they have none, but to feed and to lead them, 2 Sam. v. 2. to

rule them so as to feed them, 1 Chron. xi. 2. Psal. lxxviii, 71, 72.

From the people they have no power to make slaves, they can give none

such. 8. Slavery is a curse: it was Canaan's curse to be a servant of

servants, Gen. ix. 25. but to have magistrates is a promised blessing,

Jer. xvii. 25. 9. To be free of slavery is a blessing, as the redemption

from Egypt's bondage is every where called, and the year of redemption

was a jubilee of joy, so the freedom of release every seven years a

great privilege, Jer. xxxiv. 9. but to be free of government is a

judgment, Isa. iii. 4, 5. 'tis threatened, "Israel shall abide without a

king and without a prince;" Hos. iii. 4. In the next place, they cannot

be owned as masters or proprietors over the goods of the subjects;

though in the case of necessity, the king may make use of all goods in

common, for the good of the kingdom; for, 1. The introduction of kings

cannot overturn nature's foundation; by the law of nature property was

given to man, kings cannot rescind that. 2. A man had goods ere ever

there was a king; a king was made only to preserve property, therefore

he cannot take it away. 3. It cannot be supposed that rational people

would choose a king at all, if he had power to turn a great robber to

preserve them from lesser robberies and oppressions; would rational men

give up themselves for a prey to one, that they might be safe from

becoming a prey to others? 4. Then their case should be worse, by

erecting of government, if the prince were proprietor of their goods,

for they had the property themselves before. 5. Then government should

not be a blessing, but a curse, and the magistrate could not be a

minister for good. 6. Kingdoms then should be among the goods of

fortune, which the king might sell and dispone as he pleased. 7. His

place then should not be a function, but a possession. 8. People could

not then, by their removes, or otherwise, change their sovereigns. 9.

Then no man might dispose of his own goods without the king's consent,

by buying or selling, or giving alms; nay, nor pay tribute, for they

cannot do these things except they have of their own. 10. This is the

very character of a tyrant, as described, 1 Sam. viii. 11. "He will take

your sons," Zeph. iii. 3. "Her princes are roaring lions, her judges are

evening wolves." 11. All the threatnings and rebukes of oppression

condemn this, Isa. iii. 14, 15, Ezek. xlv. 9. Mic. iii. 2, 3. Ahab

condemned for taking Naboth's vineyard. 12. Pharaoh had not all the land

of Egypt, till he bought it, Gen. xlii. 20. So the land became Pharaoh's

not otherwise. Yet giving, and not granting that he were really a master

in all these respects; notwithstanding if he turn to pursue me for my

life, because of my fidelity to my master and his both, and will

withdraw me from the service of the supreme universal master, I may

lawfully withdraw myself from his, and disown him for one, when I cannot

serve two masters. Sure he cannot be master of the conscience. Thirdly,

they cannot come under the conjugal relation, though there may be some

proportion between that and subjection to a lawful ruler, because of the

mutual covenant transacted betwixt them; but the tyrant and usurper

cannot pretend to this, who refuse all covenants.

Yet hence it cannot be inferred, that because the wife may not put away

her husband, or renounce him, as he may do her in the case of adultery;

therefore the people cannot disown the king in the case of the

violation of the royal covenant. For the king's power is not at all

properly a husband's power, 1. The wife, by nature, is the weaker

vessel, but the kingdom is not weaker than the king. 2. The wife is

given as an help to the man; but here the man is given as an help to the

common-wealth. 3. The wife cannot limit the husband's power; as subjects

may limit their sovereigns. 4. The wife cannot prescribe the time of her

continuing under him; as subjects may do with their sovereigns. 5. The

wife cannot change her husband; as a kingdom can do their government. 6.

The husband hath not power of life and death; but the sovereign hath it

over malefactors. Yet giving, and not granting, his power were properly

marital: if the case be put, that the man do habitually break the

marriage-covenant, or take another wife, and turn also cruel and

intolerable in compelling his own wife to wickedness; and put the case

also, that she should not get a legal divorce procured, who can doubt

but she can disown him, and leave him? For this case is excepted out of

that command, 1 Cor. vii. 10. Let not the wife depart from her husband,

meaning for mere difference in religion, or other lesser causes; but

adultery doth annul the marriage relation. See Pool's Synopsis critic,

in locum. So when a prince breaks the royal covenant and turns tyrant,

or without any covenant commits a rape upon the common-wealth, that

pretended relation may and must be disowned. Hence, we see, there is no

relation can bring a king or ruler under the object of the duty of the

fifth command, except it be that of a fiduciary patron, or trustee, and

public servant: for we cannot own him properly either to be a father, or

a master, or a husband. Therefore what can remain, but that he must be a

fiduciary servant? Wherefore if he shall either treacherously break his

trust, or presumptuously refuse to be entrusted, upon terms and

conditions to secure and be accountable for, (before God and man)

religion and liberty, we cannot own his usurped authority. That

metaphor which the learned Buchanan uses, de jure regni, of a public and

politic physician, is not a relation different from this of a fiduciary

servant; when he elegantly represents him as entrusted with the

preservation and restoration of the health of the politic body, and

endowed with skill and experience of the laws of his craft. If then he

be orderly called unto this charge, and qualified for it, and discharges

his duty faithfully, he deserves, and we are obliged to give him the

deference of an honoured physician; but if he abuse his calling, and not

observe the rules thereof, and instead of curing, go about wilfully to

kill the body he is entrusted with, he is no more to be owned for a

physician: but for a murderer.

9. If we enquire further into the nature of this relation between a

king, (whose authority is to be owned) and his subjects; we can own it

only as it is reciprocal in respect of superiority and inferiority; that

is, whereby in some respects the king is superior to the people, and in

some respects the people is inferior to him. The king is superior and

supreme as he is called, 1 Pet. ii. 13. In respect of formal

sovereignty, and executive authority, and majestic royal dignity,

resulting from the peoples devolving upon him that power, and

constituting him in that relation over themselves, whereby he is higher

in place and power than they, and in respect of his charge and conduct

is worth ten thousands of the people, 2 Sam. xviii. 3. and there is no

formally regal tribunal higher than his; and though he be lesser than

the whole community, yet he is greater than any one, or all the people

distributively taken; and though he be a royal vassal of the kingdom,

and princely servant of the people; yet he is not their deputy, because

he is really their sovereign, to whom they have made over their power of

governing and protecting themselves irrevocably, except in the case of

tyranny; and in acts of justice, he is not accountable to any, and does

not depend on the people as a deputy.

But, on the other hand, the people is superior to the king, in respect

of their fountain power of sovereignty, that remains radically and

virtually in them, in that they make him their royal servant, and him

rather than another, and limit him to the laws for their own good and

advantage, and though they give to him a politic power for their own

safety; yet they keep a natural power which they cannot retract, the

power of justice to govern righteously, yet it is not so irrevocably

given away to him, but that when he abuseth his power to the destruction

of his subjects, they may wrest a sword out of a mad man's hand, though

it be his own sword, and he hath a just power to use it for good, but

all fiduciary power abused may be repealed. They have not indeed

sovereignty, or power of life and death formally; yet, in respect, they

may constitute a magistrate with laws, which if they violate they must

be in hazard of their lives, they have this power eminently and

virtually. Hence, in respect, that the king's power is, and can be only

fiducial, by way of trust reposed upon him, he is not so superior to the

people, but he may and ought to be accountable to them in case of

tyranny; which is evident from what is said, and now I intend to make it

further appear. But, first, I form the argument thus; we can own no king

that is not accountable to the people: ergo, we cannot own this king. To

clear the connexion of the antecedent and consequent, I add; either he

is accountable to the people, or he is not: if he be accountable to all,

then he is renouncible by a part, when the community is defective as to

their part, it is the interest of a part, that would, but cannot, do

their duty, to give no account to such as they can get no account from

for his maleversations. This is all we crave: if he be not accountable,

then we cannot own him, because all kings are accountable: for these

reasons, 1. The inferior is accountable to the superior; the king is

inferior, the people superior: ergo, the king is accountable to the

people. The proposition is plain; if the king's superiority make the

people accountable to him in case of transgressing the laws; then, why

should not the peoples superiority make the king accountable to them, in

case of transgressing the laws? Especially, seeing the king is inferior

to the laws: because the law restrains him, and from the law he hath

that whereby he is king; the law is inferior to the people, because they

are as it were its parent, and may make or unmake it upon occasion: and

seeing the law is more powerful than the king, and the people more

powerful than the law, we may see before which we may call the king to

answer in judgment, Buchan. jure regni apud Scot. That the king is

inferior to the people is clear on many accounts: for these things which

are institute for others sake, are inferior to those for whose sake they

are required or sought; a horse is inferior to them that use him for

victory; a king is only a mean for the peoples good; a captain is less

than the army, a king is put a captain over the Lord's inheritance, 1

Sam. x. 1. He is but the minister of God for their good, Rom. xiii. 4.

Those who are before the king, and may be a people without him: let the

king be considered either materially as a mortal man, he is then but a

part inferior to the whole; or formally under the reduplication as a

king, he is no more but a royal servant, obliged to spend his life for

the people, to save them out of the hand of their enemies, 2 Sam. xix.

9: A part is inferior to the whole, the king is but a part of the

kingdom: a gift is inferior to them to whom it is given, a king is but a

gift given of God for the peoples good: that which is mortal, and but

accidental, is inferior to that which is eternal, and cannot perish

politically; a king is but mortal, and it is accidental to government

that there be a succession of kings; but the people is eternal, one

generation passeth away, and another generation cometh, Eccl. i. 4.

especially the people of God, the portion of the Lord's inheritance, is

superior to any king, and their ruin of greater moment than all the

kings of the world; for, if the Lord for their sake smite great kings,

and slay famous kings, as Sihon and Og, Psal. cxxxvi. 17,--20. if he

give kings and famous kingdoms for their ransom, Isa. xliii. 3, 4. then

his people must be so much superior than kings, by how much his justice

is active to destroy the one, and his mercy to save the other. All this

proves the people to be superior in dignity; and therefore, even in that

respect, it is frivolous to say, the king cannot be accountable to them,

because so much superior in glory and pomp; for they are superior every

way in excellency; and though it were not so, yet judges may be inferior

in rank considered as men, but they are superior in law over the

greatest as they are judges, to whom far greater than they are

accountable.

The low and mean condition of them to whom belongs the power of

judgment, does not diminish its dignity; when the king then is judged by

the people, the judgment is of as great dignity as if it were done by a

superior king; for the judgment is the sentence of the law. 2. They are

superior in power: because every constituent cause is superior to the

effect, the people is the constituent cause, the king is the effect, and

hath all its royalty from them, by the conveyance God hath appointed; so

that they need not fetch it from heaven, God gives it by the people, by

whom also his power is limited, and, if need be, diminished from what

they gave his ancestors: hence, if the people constitute and limit the

power they give the king, then they may call him to an account, and

judge him for the abuse of it; but the first is true, as is proven

above: ergo.----The major is undeniable, for sure they may judge their

own creature, and call him to an account for the power they gave him,

when he abuses it, though there be no tribunal formally regal above

him, yet, in the case of tyranny, and violating his trust, there is a

tribunal virtual eminently above him, in them that made him, and reposed

that trust upon him, as is said. 3. The fountain power is superior to

the power derived: the people, though they constitute a king above them,

yet retain the fountain power, he only hath the derived power: certainly

the people must retain more power eminently, than they could give to the

king, for they gave it, and he receives it with limitations; if he turn

mad or incapable, they may put curators or tutors over him; if he be

taken captive, they may appoint another to exercise the power; if he

die, then they may constitute another, with more or less power; so then

if they give away all their power, as a slave selleth his liberty, and

retain no fountain power or radical right, they could not make use of it

to produce any of these acts: they set a king above them only with an

executive power for their good, but the radical power remains in the

people, as in an immortal spring, which they communicate by succession

to this or that mortal man, in the manner and measure they think

expedient; for otherwise, if they gave all their power away, what shall

they reserve to make a new king, if this man die? What if the royal line

surcease, there be no prophets now sent to make kings; and if they have

power in these cases, why not in the case of tyranny? 4. If the king be

accountable by law, for any act of tyranny done against one man, then

much more is he accountable for many against the whole state: but the

former is true; a private man may go to law before the ordinary judges,

for wronging his inheritance, and the king is made accountable for the

wrong done by him. Now, shall the laws be like spiders webs, which hold

flies, but let bigger beasts pass through? Shall sentence be past for

petty wrongs against a man, and none for tyrannizing over religion,

laws, and liberties of the kingdom? Shall none be past against

parricide or fratricide, for killing his brother, murdering the nobles,

and burning cities? Shall petty thieves be hanged for stealing a sheep;

and does the laws of God or man give impunity for robbing a whole

country of the nearest and dearest interests they have, to crowned

heads, for the fancied character of royalty, which thereby is forfeited?

5. If there be judges appointed of God independently, to give out and

execute the judgment of the Lord on all offenders, without exception of

the highest; then the king also must be subject to that judgment; but

there are judges appointed of God independently, to give out and execute

the judgment of the Lord on all offenders, without exception of the

highest. Two things must be here proved; first, that in giving judgment

they do not depend on the king, but are the immediate vicars of God.

Secondly, that the king is not excepted from, but subject to their

judgment, in case he be criminal.

First, They cannot depend upon the king, because they are more necessary

than the king; and it is not left to the king's pleasure whether there

be judges or not. There may be judges without a king, but there can be

no king without judges, nor no justice, but confusion; no man can bear

the people's burden alone, Numb. xi. 14, 17. If they depended on the

king, their power would die with the king; the streams must dry up the

fountain; but that cannot be, for they are not the ministers of the

king, but of the kingdom, whose honour and promotion, though by the

king's external call, yet comes from God, as all honour and promotion

does, Psal. lxxv. 7. The king cannot make judges whom he will, by his

absolute power, he must be tied to that law, Deut. i. 13. To take wise

men and understanding, and known: neither can he make them during

pleasure; for if these qualifications remain, there is no allowance

given for their removal. They are gods, and the children of the most

high, appointed to defend the poor and fatherless, as well as he, Psal.

lxxxii. 3, 6. They are ordained of God for the punishment of evil doers,

in which they must not be resisted, as well as he, Rom. xiii. 1, 2. By

me (saith the Lord) rule--all the judges of the earth, Prov. viii. 16.

To them we must be subject for conscience sake, as being the ministers

of God for good; they must be obeyed for the Lord's sake, as well as the

king; though they are sent of him, yet they judge not for man, but for

the Lord, 2 Chron. xix. 6. hence they sit in his room, and are to act as

if he were on the bench; the king cannot say, the judgment is mine,

because it is the Lord's; neither can he limit their sentence (as he

might, if they were nothing but his deputies) because the judgment is

not his: nor are their consciences subordinate to him, but to the Lord

immediately; otherwise if they were his deputies, depending on him, then

they could neither be admonished, nor condemned for unjust judgment,

because their sentence should neither be righteous nor unrighteous, but

as the king makes it; and all directions to them were capable of this

exception, do not so or so, except the king command you; crush not the

poor, oppress not the fatherless, except the king command you; yea, then

they could not execute any judgment, but with the king's licence, and so

could not be rebuked for their not executing judgment.

Now all this is contrary to scripture, which makes the sentence of the

judges undeclinable, when just, Deut. xvii. 11. The Lord's indignation

is kindled, when he "looks for judgment, and behold oppression, for

righteousness, and behold a cry," Isa. v. 7. Neither will it excuse the

judges to say, the king would have it so; for even they that are

subservient to "write grievousness, to turn aside the needy from

judgment," &c. are under the wo, as well as they that prescribe it, Isa.

x. 1, 2. The Lord is displeased when "judgment is turned away backward,

and judgment stands afar off,"----and when there is no judgment,

whatever be the cause of it, Isa. lix. 14, 15. The Lord threatens he

will be "avenged on the nation," when a man is "not found to execute

judgment," Jer. v. 1, 9. And promises, if they "will execute judgment and

righteousness, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the

oppressor," he will give them righteous magistrates, Jer. xxii. 3, 4.

but if they do not, he will send desolation, ibid. He rebukes those that

"turn judgment to wormwood, and leave off righteousness in the earth,"

Amos v. 7. He resents it, when "the law is slacked, and judgment doth

not go forth" freely, without overawing or over-ruling restraint, Hab.

i. 4.

Can these scriptures consist with the judges dependence on the king's

pleasure, in the exercise and execution of their power? therefore, if

they would avoid the Lord's displeasure, they are to give judgment,

though the king should countermand it. Secondly, That the king is not

excepted from their judgment, is also evident from the general commands,

Gen. ix. 6. "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be

shed:" there is no exception of kings or dukes here: and we must not

distinguish where the law distinguisheth not, Numb. xxxv. 30, 31. Whoso

killeth any person, the murderer shall be put to death by the mouth of

witnesses,--ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer

which is guilty of death, but he shall be surely put to death. What

should hinder then justice to be awarded upon a murdering king? Shall it

be for want of witnesses? It will be easy to adduce thousands. Or, shall

this be satisfaction for his life, that he is a crowned king? The law

saith, there shall be no satisfaction taken. The Lord speaketh to under

judges, Levit. xix. 5. Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, thou

shalt not respect the person of the poor, nor honour the person of the

mighty. If kings be not among the mighty, how shall they be classed?

Deut. i. 17. Ye shall not respect persons in judgment, but you shall

hear the small as well as the great; you shall not be afraid of the face

of man, for the judgment is God's. If then no man's face can outdare the

law and judgment of God, then the king's majestic face must not do it;

but as to the demerit of blood, he must be subject as well as another.

It is no argument to say, the Sanhedrim did not punish David for his

murder and adultery; therefore it is not lawful to punish a king for the

same; a reason from not doing is not relevant. David did not punish Joab

for his murder, but authorized it, as also he did Bathsheba's adultery;

will that prove, that murders connived at, or commanded by the king,

shall not be punished? Or that whores of state are not to be called to

an account? Neither will it prove, that a murdering king should not be

punished; that David was not punished, because he got both the sin

pardoned, and his life granted from the Lord, saying to him by the mouth

of the prophet Nathan, Thou shalt not die. But as for the demerit of

that fact, he himself pronounced the sentence out of his own mouth, 2

Sam. xii. 15. "As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing

shall surely die." 'So every king condemned by the law, is condemned by

his own mouth: for the law is the voice of the king. Why then do we so

much weary ourselves concerning a judge, seeing we have the king's own

confession, that is, the law?' Buchanan de jure regni.

And there needs be no other difficulty to find a tribunal for a

murdering king, than to find one for a murderer; for a judgment must

acknowledge but one name, viz. of the crime. If a king then be guilty of

murder, he hath no more the name of a king, but of a murderer, when

brought to judgment; for he is not judged for kingship, but for his

murder; as when a gentleman is judged for robbery, he is not hanged,

neither is he spared, because he is a gentleman, but because he is a

robber. See Buchanan above. 6. If the people's representatives be

superior to the king in judgment, and may execute judgment without him,

and against his will, then they may also seek account of him; for if he

hath no power but from them, and no power without them to act as king,

(no more than the eye or hand hath power to act without the body) then

his power must be inferior, fiduciary, and accountable to them; but the

former is true, the peoples representatives are superior to the king in

judgment, and may execute judgment without him, and against his will. In

scripture we find the power of the elders and heads of the people was

very great, and in many cases superior to the king; which the learned

Dr. Owen demonstrates in his preliminary exercitations on the epistle to

the Hebrews, and proves out of the Rabbins, that the kings of the Jews

might have been called to an account, and punished for transgressing of

the law. But in the scripture we find, (1.) They had a power of judgment

with the supreme magistrate in matters of religion, justice and

government. Hamor and Shechem would not make a covenant with Jacob's

sons, without the consent of the men of the city, Gen. xxxiv. 20. David

behoved to consult with the captains of thousands, and every leader, if

it seemeth good to bring again the ark of God, 1 Chron. xiii. 1, 2, 3.

So also Solomon could not do it without them, 1 Kings viii. 1. Ahab

could not make peace with Benhadad against the consent of the people, 1

Kings xx. 8. The men of Ephraim complain that Jephthah, the supreme

magistrate, had gone to war against the children of Ammon without them,

and threatned to burn his house with fire, which he only excuses by the

law of necessity, Judges xii. 1, 2, 3. The seventy elders are appointed

of God, not to be the advisers only and helpers of Moses, but to bear a

part of the burden of ruling and governing the people, that Moses might

be eased, Numb. xi. 14, 17. Moses upon his sole pleasure, had not power

to restrain them in the exercise of judgment given of God.

They were not the magistrate's depending deputies, but in the act of

judging, they were independent, and their consciences as immediately

subjected to God as the superior magistrate, who was to add his

approbative suffrage to their actings, but not his directive nor

imperative suffrage of absolute pleasure, but only according to the law;

he might command them to do their duty, but he could do nothing without

them. (2.) They had power, not derived from the prince at all, even a

power of life and death. The rebellious son was to be brought to the

elders of the city, who had power to stone him, Deut. xxi. 18, 24. They

had power to punish adultery with death, Deut. xxii. 21. They had power

to cognosce whom to admit into, and whom to seclude from the cities of

refuge: so that if the king had commanded to take the life of an

innocent man, they were not to deliver him, Josh. xx. throughout. But

besides the elders of cities, there were the elders and heads of the

people, who had judicial power to cognosce on all criminal matters, even

when Joshua was judge in Israel we find they assumed this power, to

judge of that matter of the two tribes and the half, Josh. xxii. 30. And

they had power to make kings, as Saul and David, as was shewed: and it

must needs follow, they had power to unmake them in case of tyranny.

(3.) They had power to conveen, even without the indiction of the ruler,

as in that, Josh. xxii. They conveen without him; and without advice or

knowledge of Samuel, the ruler, they conveen to ask a king, 1 Sam. viii.

And without any head or superior, they conveen and make David king,

notwithstanding of Ishbosheth's hereditary right. Without and against

tyrannous Athaliah's consent, they conveen and make Joash king, and

cared not for her Treason, treason, 2 Kings xi. But now the king alone

challenges the prerogative power of calling and dissolving parliaments

as he pleases, and condemns all meetings of estates without his warrant,

which is purely tyrannical; for, in cases of necessity, by the very law

of nature, they may and must conveen. The power is given to the king

only by a positive law, for order's sake; but otherwise, they have an

intrinsical power to assemble themselves. All the forecited commands,

admonitions, and certifications, to execute judgment, must necessarily

involve and imply a power to conveen, without which they could not be in

a capacity for it: not only unjust judgment, but no judgment, in a time

when truth is fallen in the streets, and equity cannot enter, is charged

as the sin of the state; therefore they must conveen to prevent this

sin, and the wrath of God for it: God hath committed the keeping of the

commonwealth, not to the king's only, but also to the people's

representatives and heads. And if the king have power to break up all

conventions of this nature, then he hath power to hinder judgement to

proceed, which the Lord commands: and this would be an excuse, when God

threatens vengeance for it. We would not execute judgment, because the

king forbade us. Yet many of these forementioned reproofs, threatnings,

and certifications were given, in the time of tyrannous and idolatrous

kings, who, no doubt, would inhibit and discharge the doing of their

duty; yet we see that was no excuse, but the Lord denounces wrath for

the omission. (4.) They had power to execute judgment against the will

of the prince. Samuel killed Agag against Saul's will, but according to

the command of God, 1 Sam. xv. 32. Against Ahab's will and mind Elijah

caused kill the priests of Baal, according to God's express law, 1 Kings

xviii. 40. It is true it was extraordinary, but no otherwise than it is

this day; when there is no magistrate that will execute the judgment of

the Lord, then they who have power to make the magistrate, may and ought

to execute it, when wicked men make the law of God of none effect. So

the princes of Judah had power, against the king's will, to put Jeremiah

to death, which the king supposes, when he directs him what to say to

them, Jer. xxxviii. 25. They had really such a power, though in

Jeremiah's case it would have been wickedly perverted. See Lex Rex, q.

19, 20. (5.) They had a power to execute judgment upon the king himself,

as in the case of Amaziah and Uzziah, as shall be cleared afterwards. I

conclude with repeating the argument: if the king be accountable,

whensover this account shall be taken, we are confident our disowning

him for the present will be justified, and all will be obliged to

imitate it: if he be not, then we cannot own his authority, that so

presumptuously exalts himself above the people.

10. If we will further consider the nature of magistracy, it will appear

what authority can conscientiously be owned, to wit, that which is

power, not authorised power, not might or force; moral power, not merely

natural. There is a great difference betwixt these two: natural power is

common to brutes, moral power is peculiar to men; natural power is more

in the subjects, because they have more strength and force; moral power

is in the magistrate, they can never meet adequately in the same

subject; natural power can, moral only may warrantably exercise rule;

natural power is opposed to impotency and weakness, moral to illicitness

or unlawfulness; natural power consists in strength, moral in

righteousness; natural power may be in a rout of rogues making an

uproar, moral only in the rulers; they cannot be distinguished by their

acts, but by the principle from which the acts proceed; in the one from

mere force, in the other from authority. The principle of natural power

is its own might and will, and the end only self; moral hath its rise

from positive constitution, and its end is public safety. The strength

of natural power lies in the sword, whereby its might gives law; the

strength of moral power is in its word, whereby reason gives law, unto

which the sword is added for punishment of contraveeners: natural power

takes the sword, Matth. xxvi. 52. Moral bears the sword, Rom. xiii. 4.

In natural power the sword is the cause; in moral it is only the

consequent of authority; in natural power the sword legitimates the

sceptre; in moral the sceptre legitimates the sword: the sword of the

natural is only backed with metal, the sword of the moral power is

backed with God's warrant: natural power involves men in passive

subjection, as a traveller is made to yield to a robber; moral power

reduces to conscientious subordination. Hence the power that is only

natural, not moral authority, not power, cannot be owned; but the power

of a tyrant's and usurper's is only natural, not moral, authority, not

power: Ergo it cannot be owned. The major cannot be denied; for it is

only the moral power that is ordained of God, unto which we must be

subject for conscience sake. The minor also; for the power of tyrants is

not moral, because not authorized, nor warranted, or ordained of God by

his preceptive ordinance, and therefore no lawful magistratical power.

For the clearer understanding of this, let it be observed, there are

four things required to the making of a moral or lawful power; the

matter of it must be lawful, the person lawful, the title lawful, and

the use lawful. 1. The matter of it, about which it is exerted, or the

work to be done by it, must be lawful and warranted by God: and if it be

unlawful it destroys its moral being. As the pope's power, in dispensing

with divine laws, is null and no moral power; and so also the king's

power, in dispensing with both divine and human laws is null. Hence that

power, which is, in regard of matter unlawful, and never warranted by

God, cannot be owned; but absolute power, which is the power of tyrants

and usurpers, (and particularly of this of ours) is in regard of matter

unlawful, and never warranted by God: Ergo--2. The person holding the

power must be such as not only is capable of, but competent to the

tenure of it, and to whom the holding of it is allowed; and if it be

prohibited, it evacuates the morality of the power. Korah and his

company arrogated to themselves the office of the priesthood, this power

was prohibited to them, their power then was a nullity. As therefore a

person that should not be a minister, when he usurps that office is no

minister; so a person that should not be a magistrate, when he usurps

that office, is no magistrate. Hence, a person that is incapable and

incompetent for government cannot be owned for a governor; but the duke

of York is such a person, not only not qualified as the word of God

requires a magistrate to be, but by the laws of the land declared

incapable of rule, because he is a papist, a murderer, an adulterer, &c.

5. There must be a moral power, a lawful title and investiture, as is

shewed above; which, if it be wanting, the power is null, and the person

but a scenical king, like John of Leyden. This is essentially necessary

to the being of a magistrate; which only properly distinguishes him from

a private man; for when a person becomes a magistrate, what is the

change that is wrought in him? what new habit or endowment is produced

in him? he hath no more natural power than he had before, only now he

hath the moral power, right and authority to rule, legally impowering

him to govern. Let it be considered, what makes a subordinate

magistrate, whom we own as such; it must be only his commission from a

superior power, otherwise we reject him; if one come to us of his own

head, taking upon him the stile and office of a bailiff, sheriff or

judge, and command our persons, demand our purses, or exact our oaths;

we think we may deny him, not taking ourselves to owe him any

subjection, not owning any bond of conscience to him; why? because he

hath no lawful commission. Now, if we require this qualification in the

subordinate, why not in the supreme? Hence, that magistrate, that cannot

produce his legal investiture, cannot be owned; but the duke of York

cannot produce his legal investiture, his admission to the crown upon

oath and compact, and with the consent of the subjects, according to the

laws of the land, as is shewed above: therefore----4. There must also be

the lawful use of the power; which must be not only legal for its

composure, but right for its practice; its course and process in

government must be just, governing according to law, otherwise it is

mere tyranny: for what is government, but the subjecting of the

community to the rule of governors, for peace and order's sake, and the

security of all their precious interests? and for what end was it

ordained, and continued among men, but that the stronger may not

domineer over the weaker? and what is anarchy, but the playing the rex

of the natural power over the moral? Hence, that power which is contrary

to law, evil and tyrannical, can tie none to subjection; but the power

of the king, abused to the destruction of laws, religion and liberties,

giving his power and strength unto the beast, and making war with the

Lamb, Rev. xvii. 13, 14. is a power contrary to law, evil and

tyrannical: therefore it can tie none to subjection: wickedness by no

imaginable reason can oblige any man. It is objected by some, from Rom.

xiii. 1. There is no power but of God; the usurping power is a power:

therefore it is of God, and consequently we owe subjection to it. Ans.

1. The original reading is not universal, but this: for there is no

power if not from God: which confirms what I plead for, that we are not

to own any authority, if it be not authorized by God.

The words are only relative to higher powers, in a restricted sense and

at most are but indefinite, to be determined according to the matter;

not all power simply, but all lawful power. 2. It is a fallacy from what

is said according to a certain thing, there is no power but of God, that

is no moral power, as universal negatives use to be understood, Heb. v.

4. No man taketh his honour unto himself, but he that is called of God;

which is clear, must not be understood for the negation of the fact, as

if no man at all doth or ever did take unto himself that honour, for

Korah did it, &c. but, no man taketh it warrantably, with a moral right

and God's allowance without God's call: so also the universal

imperative, in that same text, must not be taken absolutely without

restriction; for if every soul without exception were to be subject,

there could be none left to be the higher powers; but it is understood

with restriction to the relation of a subject. So here, no power but of

God, to be understood with restriction to the relation of a lawful

magistrate. It is also to be understood indiscriminately, in reference

to the divers species, sorts and degrees of lawful power, supreme and

subordinate, whether to the king as supreme, or to governors, &c. as

Peter expresses it: or whether they be Christian or pagan; it cannot be

meant of all universally, that may pretend to power, and may attain to

prevailing potency; for then by this text, we must subject ourselves to

the papacy now intended to be introduced; and indeed if we subject

ourselves to this papist, the next thing he will require will be that.

3. To the minor proposition, I answer, the usurping power is a power; it

is power, I grant, that it is power, or authority, I deny.

Therefore it is of God by his providence, I concede; by his ordinance, I

deny. Consequently we owe subjection to it, I deny. We may be subject

passively, I grant. Actively, out of conscience, I deny. But some will

object, 2. Though the power be usurped, and so not morally lawful in all

these respects; yet it may do good, its laws and administrations may be

good. Answ. I grant all is good that ends well, and hath a good

beginning. This cannot be good which hath a bad principle, good from the

entire cause. Some government for constitution good, may, in some acts,

be bad; but a government for constitution bad cannot, for the acts it

puts forth, be good. These good acts may be good for matters but

formally they are not good, as done by the usurper: they may be

comparatively good, that is better so than worse; but they cannot be

absolutely, and in a moral sense good: for to make a politic action

good, not only the matter must be warrantable, but the call also. It may

indeed induce subjects to bear and improve to the best, what cannot be

remedied; but cannot oblige to own a magistratical relation.

II. The nature of the power thus discovered, let us see the nature of

that relative duty, which we owe and must own as due to magistrates, and

what sort of owning we must give them; which, to inquire a little into,

will give light to the question. All the duty and deference the Lord

requires of us, towards them whom we must own as magistrates, is

comprehended in these two expressions, honour required in the fifth

command, and subjection required in Rom. xiii. 1. &c. 1 Pet. ii. 13. &c.

Whomsoever then we own as magistrates, we must own honour and subjection

as due to them: and if so be, we cannot, upon a conscientious ground,

give them honour and subjection, we cannot own them as magistrates. The

least deference we can pay to magistrates is subjection, as it is

required in these words; Let every soul be subject to the higher powers,

and, submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake.

But this cannot be given to tyrants and usurpers; therefore no deference

can be paid to them at all: and consequently they cannot be owned. That

this subjection, which is required to the higher powers, cannot be owned

to tyrants, will be apparent, if we consider, 1. The subjection required

is orderly subjection to an orderly power, that we be regularly under

him that is regularly above; but usurpation and tyranny is not an

orderly power, orderly placed above us; therefore we cannot be orderly

under it. This is gathered from the original language, where the powers

to be subjected to, are ordained of God and the ordinance of God, and

he that resisteth the power is counter-ordered, or contrary to his

orderly duty; so the duty is to be subject. They are all words coming

from one root, which signifies to order; so that subjection is to be

placed in order under another relative to an orderly superiority; but,

to occupy the seat of dignity unauthorized, is an ataxy, a breaking of

order, and bringing the commonwealth quite out of order. Whereby it may

appear, that, in relation to an arbitrary government, there can be

properly no orderly subjection. 2. The thing itself must import that

relative duty which the fifth command requires; not only a passive

stooping endurance, or a feigned counterfeit submission, but a real

active duty including obedience to lawful commands; and not only so, but

support and maintenance; and that both to the acts of his

administration, and to his standing and keeping his station, assisting

him with all our abilities, both human and Christian; and not only as to

the external acts of duties, but the inward motions of the heart, as

consent, love, reverence, and honour, and all sincere fealty and

allegiance.

But can a subjection of this extent be paid to a tyrant or usurper? Can

we support those we are bound to suppress? Shall we love the ungodly,

and help those that hate the Lord? Can we consent, that we and our

posterity should be slaves? Can we honour them who are vile, and the

vilest of men; how high soever they be exalted? 3. The ground of this

subjection is for conscience sake, not for wrath, that is, so far and so

long as one is constrained by fear, and, to avoid a greater evil, to

stoop to him, but out of conscience of duty, both that of piety to God

who ordained magistracy, and that of equity to him who is his minister

for good, and under pain of damnation if we break this orderly

subjection, Rom. xiii. 2, 5. But can it be imagined, that all this is

due to a tyrant and usurper? Can it be out of conscience, because he is

the Lord's minister for good? The contrary is clear, that he is the

devil's drudge serving his interest: Is resistance to tyrants a damnable

sin? I hope to prove it to be a duty. 4. If subjection to tyrants and

usurpers will inveigle us in their snares, and involve us in their sin

and judgment, then it is not to be owned to them; but the former is

true; therefore the latter. In the foregoing head I drew an argument,

for withdrawing from and disowning the prelatic ministers, from the

hazard of partaking in their sin, and of being obnoxious to their

judgment, because people are often punished for their pastor's sins;

Aaron and his sons polluting themselves, would have brought wrath upon

all the people, Lev. x. 6. because the teachers had transgressed against

the Lord, therefore was Jacob given to the curse, and Israel to

reproaches, Isa. xliii. 27, 28. and all these miseries lamented by the

church, were inflicted for the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities

of her priests, Lam. iv. 13. the reason was, because they owned then,

followed them, countenanced them, complied with them, or connived at

them, or did not hinder, or else disown them. The same argument will

evince the necessity of withdrawing our subjection from, and disowning,

usurping, and tyrannical rulers, when we cannot hinder their wickedness,

nor give any other testimony against them, to avert the wrath of the

Lord. If the defections of ministers will bring on the whole nation

desolacing judgments; then much more have we reason to fear it, when

both magistrates and ministers are involved in, and jointly carrying on,

and caressing and encouraging each other in promoting a woful apostasy

from God: when the heads of the house of Jacob and princes of the house

of Israel, abhor judgment, and pervert all equity. The heads judge for

reward, and the priests teach for hire, and the prophets divine for

money, and yet lean upon the Lord, and say, is not the Lord among us:

none evil can come upon us. Then we can expect nothing, but that Zion

for their sake shall be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem become heaps,

and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest, Mic.

iii. 9, 11, 12. Certain it is, that subjects have smarted sore for the

sins of their rulers: for Saul's sin, in breaking covenant with the

Gibeonites, the land suffered three years famine, 2 Sam. xxi. 1. and the

wrath of the Lord could not be appeased, till seven of his sons were

hanged up unto the Lord. What then shall appease the wrath of God, for

the unparalleled breach of covenant with God in our days? For David's

sin of numbering the people, 70,000 men died by the pestilence, 2 Sam.

xxiv. 5. For Jeroboam's sin of idolatry, who made Israel to sin, the

Lord threatens to give Israel up, because of the sins of Jeroboam, I

Kings xiv. 16. only they escaped this judgment, who withdrew themselves

and fell into Judah. For Ahab's sin of letting go a man whom the Lord

had appointed to utter destruction, the Lord threatens him, thy life

shall go for his life, and thy people for his people, 1 Kings xx. 42.

Because Manasseh, king of Judah, did many abominations, therefore the

Lord threatened to bring such evil upon Jerusalem and Judah, that

whosoever heard it, his ears should tingle, &c. 2 Kings xxi. 11, 12. and

notwithstanding of his repentance and the reformation in the days of

Josiah, notwithstanding the Lord turned not from the fierceness of his

great wrath, wherewith his anger was kindled against Judah, because of

all the provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withal, 2 Kings

xxiii. 26. which was accomplished by the hands of the Chaldeans, in

Jehoiakim's time. Surely, at the commandment of the Lord, came this upon

Judah, to remove them out of his sight, for the sins of Manasseh

according to all that he did, and also for the innocent blood which he

shed,----which the Lord would not pardon, 2 Kings xxiv. 3, 4. And

Jeremiah further threatens, that they should be removed into all

kingdoms of the earth, because of Manasseh for that which he did in

Jerusalem, Jer. xv. 4. Certainly passages were recorded for our

learning, Rom. xv. 4. and for our examples, to the intent we should not

do as they did, 1 Cor. x. 6. and for our admonition, ver. 11. Whence we

may be admonished, that it is not enough to keep ourselves free of

public sins of rulers; many of those then punished, were free of all

actual accession to them; but they became accessory to, and involved in

the guilt of them, when they did not endeavour to hinder them, and bring

them to condign punishment for them, according to the law of God, which

respecteth not persons; or, at least, because they did not revolt from

them, as Libnah did: there might be other provocations on the peoples

part, no doubt, which the Lord did also punish by these judgments; but

when the Lord specifies the sin of rulers as the particular procuring

cause of the judgment; it were presumption to make it the occasion only

of the Lord's punishing them: for plain it is, if these sins of rulers

had not been committed, which was the ground of the threatening and

execution, the judgment would have been prevented; and if the people had

bestirred themselves as became them, in repressing and restraining such

wickedness, they had not so smarted; and when that sin, so threatened

and punished, was removed, then the judgment itself was removed or

deterred. It is just and necessary, that the subjects, being jointly

included with their rulers in the same bond of fidelity to God, be

liable to be punished for their rebellion and apostacy, when they

continue under the bond of subjection to them. But how deplorable were

our condition, if we should stand obnoxious to divine judgments, for the

atheism, idolatry, murders, and adulteries of our rulers, and yet be

neither authorized nor capacitated to hinder it, nor permitted to

withdraw ourselves from subjection to them? But it is not so; for, the

Lord's making us responsible for their debt, is an impowering us either

to repress their wickedness when he gives us capacity, or at least to

save ourselves harmless from their crimes, by disowning them; that being

the only way of standing no longer accountable for their souls.

12. It remains to consider the ends for which government was institute

by God, and constitute by men; from whence I argue, that government,

that destroys the ends of government, is not to be owned; but tyranny,

and especially this under which we howl, destroys all the ends of

government; therefore it is not to be owned. The minor I prove thus,

That government, that destroys all religion and safety, destroys all the

ends of government; but this popish and arbitrary absolute power,

destroys religion and safety; therefore--it is evident, both from the

laws of nature and revelation, that the ends of government are the glory

of God, and the good of mankind. The first is the glory of God, the

ultimate end of all ordinances; to which whatever is opposite, is not to

be owned by them that fear him: whatever power then is destructive to

religion, and is applied and employed against the glory of the universal

King, and for withdrawing us from our fealty and obedience to him, is

nothing but rebellion against the supreme Lord and Lawgiver, and a

traiterous conspiracy against the Almighty, and therefore not to be

owned: and they are enemies to religion, or strangers to it, who are not

sensible this hath been the design of the present government, at least

these twenty-seven years, to overturn the reformed covenanted religion,

and to introduce popery. Hence, seeing a king at his best and highest

elevation, is only a mean for preserving religion, and for this end only

chosen of the people to be keeper of both tables of the law, he is not

to be regarded, but wholly laid aside, when he not only moves without

his sphere, but his motion infers the ruin of the ends of his erection,

and when he employs all his power for the destruction of the cause of

Christ, and advancement of antichrist, giving his power to the beast; he

is so far from deserving the deference of the power ordained of God,

that he is to be looked upon, and treated as a traitor to God, and

stated enemy to religion and all righteousness. The second end of

government is the good of the people, which is the supreme and cardinal

law; the safety of the people is the supreme law. Which cannot be

denied, if it be considered, 1. For this only the magistrate is

appointed of God to be his minister for the people's good, Rom. xiii. 4.

and they have no goodness but as they conduce to this end: for all the

power they have of God is with this proviso, to promote his people's

prosperity. (It were blasphemy to say, they are his authorised ministers

for their destruction) to which if their conduct degenerate, they

degrade themselves, and so must be disowned. He is therefore, in his

institution, no more than a mean for this end; and himself cannot be

either the whole or half of the end; for then he should be both the end

and the mean of government; and it is contrary to God's mould to have

this for his end, to multiply to himself silver and gold, or lift up

himself above his brethren, Deut. xvii. 17, 20. If therefore he hath any

other end than the good of the people, he cannot be owned as one of

God's moulding, 2. This only is the highest pitch of good princes

ambition, to postpone their own safety to the peoples safety. Moses

desired, rather than the people should be destroyed, that his name

should be razed out of the book of life. And David would rather the

Lord's hand be on him and his father's house, than on the people, that

they should be plagued, 1 Chron. xxi. 17. But he that would seek his own

ambitious ends, with the destruction of the people, hath the spirit of

the devil, and is to be carried towards as one possessed with that

malignant spirit. 3. Originally their power is from the people, from

whom all their dignity is derived, with reserve of their safety, which

is not the donative of kings, nor held by concession from them, nor can

it be resigned or surrendered to the disposal of kings; since God hath

provided, in his universal laws, that no authority make any disposal,

but for the good of the people. This cannot be forfeited by the

usurpation of monarchs, but being always fixed in the essential laws of

government, they may reclaim and recover it when they please. Since then

we cannot alienate our safety, we cannot own that authority which is

inconsistent with it. 4. The attaining this end was the main ground and

motive of peoples deliberating to constitute a government, and to choose

such a form, because they thought it most conducible for their good; and

to admit such persons as fittest instuments for compassing this end; and

to establish such a conveyance, as they thought most contributive for

this end. When therefore princes cease to be what they could be

constitute for, they cease to have an authority to be owned; but ceasing

to answer these ends of government, they cease to be what they could be

constitute for. 5. For no other end were magistrates limited with

conditions, but to bound them, that they might do nothing against the

peoples good and safety.

Whosoever then breaking through all legal limitations, shall become

injurious to the community, lists himself in the number of enemies, and

is only to be looked upon as such. 6. For this end all laws are ratified

or rescinded, as they conduce to this end, which is the soul and reason

of the law: then it is but reason, that the law establishing such a

king, which proves an enemy to this, should be rescinded also. 7.

Contrary to this end no law can be of force; if then, either law or king

be prejudicial to the realm, they are to be abolished. 8. For this end,

in cases of necessity, kings are allowed sometimes to neglect the letter

of the laws, or private interests, for the safety of the community: but

if they neglect the public safety, and make laws for their own

interests, they are no more trustees but traitors. 9. If it were not

for this end, it were more eligible to live in desarts, than to enter

into societies. When therefore a ruler, in direct opposition to the ends

of government, seeks the ruin, not only of religion, but also of the

peoples safety, he must certainly forfeit his right to reign. And what a

vast, as well as innocent number, have, for religion, and their

adherence to their fundamental rights, been ruined, rooted out of their

families possessions, oppressed, persecuted, murdered, and destroyed by

this and the deceased tyrant, all Scotland can tell, and all Europe hath

heard. If ever the ends of government were perverted and subverted in

any place. Britain is the stage where this tragedy has been acted.

13. I may argue from the covenant, that to own this authority is

contrary to all the articles thereof. 1. That authority which overturns

the reformation of religion in doctrine, worship, discipline and

government, which we are sworn to preserve against the common enemies

thereof, in the first article, cannot be owned; but the present

pretended authority overturned (and continues more to overturn) the

reformation of religion, &c. therefore it cannot be owned. For against

what common enemy must we preserve it, if not against him that is the

chief enemy thereof? And how can we own that authority, that is wholly

employed and applied for the destruction of religion? 2. If we are

obliged to extirpate popery, without respect of persons, lest we partake

in other mens sins; then we are obliged to extirpate papists without

respect of persons; and consequently the head of them. (For how

otherwise can popery be extirpated? Or how otherwise can we cleanse the

land of their sins?) But in the 2d article we are obliged to extirpate

popery without respect of persons, lest we partake in others mens sins:

therefore we are obliged to extirpate papists without respect of

persons, and consequently the crowned Jesuit, and therefore cannot own

him: for how can we own him, whom we are bound to exstirpate? 3. If we

be engaged to preserve the rights and liberties of parliaments, and the

liberties of the kingdoms, and the king's authority only in the

preservation and defence of the true religion and liberties of the

kingdoms, then we cannot own his authority, when it is inconsistent

with, opposite to, and destructive of all these precious interests, as

now it is with a witness. But in the 3d article we are engaged to

preserve the rights and privileges of parliaments, and the liberties of

the kingdoms, and the king's authority only in the preservation and

defence of the true religion and liberties of the kingdoms: therefore

all allegiance that we can own to any man, must stand perpetually thus

qualified, in defence of religion and liberty; that is, so far as it is

not contrary to religion and liberty, and no further; for if it be

destructive of these, it is null. If we should then own this man, with

this restricted allegiance, and apply into his own authority (as we must

apply it to all authority that we can own) it were to mock God and the

world, and own contradictions: for can we maintain the destroyer of

religion, in defence of religion, and the destroyer of all our rights

and liberties, and all our legal securities for them, in the

preservation of these rights and liberties? That were pure nonsense. 4.

If we be obliged to endeavour, that all incendiaries and malignants, &c.

be brought to condign punishment, then we cannot own the authority of

the head of these incendiaries and malignant enemies; but in the fourth

article, we are obliged to endeavour, that all incendiaries and

malignants, &c. be brought to condign punishment: therefore----The

connexion of the major cannot well be doubted, for is it imaginable,

that the head of that unhallowed party, the great malignant enemy, who

is the spring, and gives life unto all these abominations shall be

exempted from punishment, or owned for a sacred majesty? shall we be

obliged to discover, and bring to justice the little petty malignants,

and this implacably stated enemy to Christ escape with a crown on his

head? Nay, we are by this obliged, if ever we be in case, to bring these

stated enemies to God and the country to condign punishment, from the

highest to the lowest: and this we are to do, as we would have the anger

of the Lord turned away from us, which cannot be, without hanging up

their heads before the Lord against the sun, as was done in the matter

of Peor, Numb. xxv. 4. For hath not he and his accomplices made the

kingdom a curse? and we, with our own consent, have made ourselves

obnoxious to it, if we do not procure, each in our capacities, and

pursue these traitors and rebels, that the judgment of the Lord be

executed upon the accursed. 5. No wilful opposer of peace and union

between the kingdoms is to be owned; but, according to the 5th article,

we are obliged to endeavour, that justice be done upon him: but this man

and his brother have been wilful opposers of peace and union between the

kingdoms, all true peace and union, except an union in confederacy

against the Lord; for they have taken peace from both the kingdoms, and

destroyed and annulled that which was the bond of their union, to wit,

the solemn league and covenant. 6. If we are obliged to assist and

defend all those that enter into this league and covenant, in the

maintaining and pursuing thereof, and never to suffer ourselves to be

divided, to make defection to the contrary part, &c. According to the

6th article then, we must not owt the butcher of our covenanted

brethren, who hath imbrued his hands in their blood, in maintaining and

pursuing thereof, and would have us withdrawn into so detestable a

defection; for we cannot both own him as he requires to be owned, and as

God requires every magistrate to be owned (so as not to resist him under

pain of damnation, Rom. xiii. 2.) and assist our brethren too in

refilling his murders: and our owning of him were a dividing of

ourselves from our brethren that oppose him, into a defection to the

contrary part, whereof he is head and patron. Lastly, In the conclusion,

we are obliged to be humbled for the sins of these kingdoms, and to

amend in a real reformation; whereof this is one to be mourned for, that

after the Lord had delivered us from the yoke of this tyrannical family,

we again joined in amity with the people of these abominations, and took

these serpents into our bosom again, which hath bit us so sore, and

wherewith the Lord hath scourged us severely. And if it was our sin to

engage with them at first, then it is our sin to continue under their

subjection; and is not consistent with that repentance, that the Lord's

contendings call for, to continue owning that power which was our sin to

own at first.

III. In the third place, I promised to confirm my thesis from more

express scripture arguments. Therefore I shall endeavour to gather them

as briefly as may be. 1. From scripture inferences, nearly and natively

consequential. 2. From scripture assertions. 3. From scripture precepts.

4. From scripture practices. 5. From scripture promises. 6. From

scripture threatnings. 7. From scripture prayers.

First, I shall offer some arguments deduced by way of immediate

inference, from the grounds laid before us in scripture about

government: wherein I shall confine my self to these particulars.

1. Let us consider the characters of a magistrate, laid down in

scripture; and we may infer, if tyrants and usurpers are not capable of

these characters, then they cannot be owned for magistrates. For if they

be not magistrates, they cannot be owned as magistrates; but if they be

not capable of the characters of magistrates, they are not magistrates:

Ergo, if they be not capable of the characters of magistrates, they

cannot be owned as magistrates. To find out the characters of

magistrates, we need seek no further than that full place, Rom. xiii.

Which usually is made a magazine of objections against this truth; but I

trust to find store of arguments for it from thence, not repeating many

that have been already deduced therefrom. We find, in this place, many

characters of a magistrate, that are all incompatible with a tyrant or

usurper. 1. He is the higher power, verse 1. Authorities supereminent,

signifying such a pre-excellency as draweth towards it a recognition of

honour; but this is not competent to tyrants and usurpers; for they are

the vilest of men, let them be never so high exalted, Psal. xii. last

verse, and if they be vile then they are to be contemned, Psal. xv. 4.

and no more to be regarded than Herod was by Christ, when he called him

a fox, Luke xiii. 32. But more particularly, let us consider what is the

highness, or dignity of magistrates, set forth in scripture. They are

stiled gods, not to be reviled, Exod. xxii. 28. among whom God judgeth,

Psal. lxxxii. 1. so called, because the word of God came unto them, John

x. 35. But tyrants are rather devils, as one of them is called Lucifer,

Isa. xiv. 12. and they that persecute and imprison the people of God,

because actuated by the devil, and acting for him, do bear his name,

Rev. ii. 10. They are devils that cast the Lord's witnesses into prison.

The magistrate's judgment is God's judgment, Deut. i. 17. because it is

not for man, but for the Lord, 2 Chron. xix. 6. and therefore Solomon is

said to have sat on the throne of the Lord, 1 Chron. xxix. 23. But it

were blasphemy to say, That tyrants judgment, usurping the place without

his warrant, and giving forth judgment against his laws, and cause, and

people, is the Lord's judgment, or for him, or that they sit on the

throne of the Lord. A throne of iniquity is not the throne of the Lord,

for he hath no fellowship with it; the tyrant's throne is a throne of

iniquity, Psal. xciv. 20. Magistrates are truly to be subjected to and

obeyed, as principalities and powers, Tit. iii. 1. it is a sin to speak

evil of them, verse 2. for it is presumption to despise dominion, and

speak evil of dignities, 2 Pet. ii. 10. Jude 8. But tyrants are very

catechrestically and abusively principalities and powers, no otherwise

then the devils are so termed, Eph. vi. 12. and there is no argument to

own or obey the one more than the other: for if all principalities and

powers are to be subjected to and owned, then also the devil must, who

gets the same title. To speak truth of tyrants indignities, cannot be a

speaking evil of dignities; for truth is no evil, nor is tyranny a

dignity. Hence they that are not capable of the dignity of rulers, as

these places prove: Ergo----Against this it is objected. That Paul did

apply this character to the tyrannical high priest Ananias, whom, after

he had objurated for manifest injustice, he honours with that apology,

that he wist not that he was the high priest, for it is written, thou

shalt not speak evil of the ruler of thy people, Acts xxiii. 5. Ans.

Though all should be granted that is in this objection, yet our argument

would not be enervated: for grant we should not speak evil of tyrants,

that does not evince that we should hold them us rulers; for we should

bless our persecutors, Rom. x. 14. and speak evil of no man, Tit. iii.

2. that does not say, We should hold every man, or our persecutors, to

be rulers. The meaning must be, he knew not that he was the high-priest;

that is, he did not acknowledge him to be either high priest or ruler,

he could acknowledge or observe nothing like one of that character in

him: for as the high-priest's office was now null and ceased, so this

Ananias was only an usurper of the office, in place of Ismael and

Joseph, who had purchased it by money: and Paul had learned from his

master Gamaliel, Tit. Talmud. of the Sanhedrim. That a judge who hath

given money for purchasing this honour, is neither a judge, nor to be

honoured as such, but to be held in place of an ass. And it was common

among the Jews to say, If such be gods, they are silver gods, not to be

honoured, as is quoted by Pool's synopsis criticorum, &c. on the same

place. And that this must be the sense of it is plain; for he could not

be ignorant that he was there in place of a judge, being called before

him, and smitten by him authoritatively, whom therefore he did threaten

with the judgment of God; it were wicked to think, that he would retract

that threatning which he pronounced by the Spirit of God. And therefore

this place confirms my thesis: if a tyrannical judge, acting contrary to

law, is not to be known or acknowledged to be a ruler, but upbraided as

a whited wall; then a tyrant is not to be known or acknowledged as such;

but the former is true, from this place: therefore also the latter. Paul

knew well enough he was a judge, and knew well enough what was his duty

to a judge, that he should not be reviled; but he would not acknowledge

this priest to be a judge, or retract his threatning against him.

2. He is of God, and ordained of God; I proved before, tyrants are not

capable of this; yea, it were blasphemy to say, They are authorized, or

ordained of God, by his preceptive will. Hence, take only this argument.

All rulers that we must own are ordained of God, do reign, and are set

up by God, Prov. viii, 15. (for that and this place are parallel) but

tyrants do not reign, nor are set up by God, Hos. viii. 4. They are set

up (saith the Lord) but not by me: Ergo, we cannot own them to be

ordained of God. 3. Whosoever resisteth this power ordained of God,

resisteth the ordinance of God, and they that resist, shall receive to

themselves damnation, verse 2. This cannot be owned of a tyrant, that it

is a damnable sin to resist him, for it is duty to resist, and also

repress him, as is proven already, and shall be afterwards. Hence,

whatsoever authority we own subjection to, we must not resist it; but we

cannot own that we must not resist this authority: therefore we cannot

own it at all. Again, That cannot be the power not to be resisted,

which is acquired and improved by resisting the ordinance or God; but

the power of usurpers and tyrants is acquired and improved by resisting

the ordinance of God: Ergo, their power cannot be the power not to be

resisted. The major is manifest; for when the apostle says, The

resisting of the power brings damnation to the resister, certainly that

resistance cannot purchase dominion instead of damnation: and if he that

resists in a lesser degree, be under the doom of damnation; then

certainly he that does it in a greater degree, so as to complete it, in

putting himself in place of that power which he resisted, cannot be

free. The minor is also undeniable; for, if usurpers acquire their power

without resistance forcible and sensible, it is because they that defend

the power invaded, are wanting in their duty; but however morally the

tyrant or usurper is always, or in contrary order to a lawful power. 4.

Rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil, and they that do

that which is good, shall have praise of the same, verse 3. This is the

character and duty of righteous magistrates, though it be not always

their administration; but an usurper and tyrant is not capable or

susceptible of this character; but, on the contrary, is, and must be a

terror to good works, and a praise to the evil: for he must be a terror

to them that would secure their rights and liberties in opposition to

his encroachments, which is a good work; and he must be a tutor, patron,

and protector of such, as encourage and maintain him in his usurpation

and tyranny, which is an evil work: and if he were a terror to the evil,

then he would be a terror to himself and all his accomplices, which he

cannot be. Therefore, that power which is not capable of the duties of

magistrates, cannot be owned; but the power of tyrants and usurpers is

such: Ergo--We find in scripture the best commentary on this character,

where the duties of a magistrate are described; they must justify the

righteous, and condemn the wicked, Deut. xxvii. 1. They must, as Job

did, deliver the poor that cry, and put on righteousness as a

clothing,----and be eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame, and a

father to the poor----and break the jaws of the wicked, Job xxix. 12,

17. Their throne must be established by righteousness, Prov. xvi. 12. A

king sitting on the throne of judgment must scatter away all evil with

his eyes----then mercy and truth will preserve him, and his throne is

upholden by mercy, Prov. xx. 8, 28. But tyrants have a quite contrary

character; the throne of iniquity frames mischief by a law, and condemns

the innocent blood, Psal. xciv. 20, 21. They judge not the fatherless,

neither doth the cause of the widow come unto them, Isa. i. 23. They

build their house by unrighteousness, and their chambers by wrong, and

use their neighbours service without wages, Jer. xxii. 13. They oppress

the poor, and crush the needy, Amos iv. 1. They turn judgment to gall,

and the fruit of righteousness to hemlock, and say, have we not taken

horns to us by our own strength, Amos vi. 12, 13. These contrary

characters cannot consist together. 5. He is the minister of God for

good, verse 4. not by providential commission, as Nebuchadnezzar was,

and tyrants may be eventually, by the Lord making all things turn about

for the good of the church; but he hath a moral commission from God, and

is entrusted by the people, to procure their public and political good

at least.