PLACES AND EXAMPLES OF SCRIPTURE OF THE RIGHTS
OF GOVERNMENT, AGREEABLE TO WHAT HATH
BEEN SAID BEFORE.
1. The beginning of institutive government from the consent of the
people. 2. Judicature and wars depend on the will of supreme
commanders. 3. That they who have the chief authority, are by
right unpunishable. 4. That without a supreme power there is no
government, but anarchy. 5. That from servants and sons there is
a simple obedience due to their lords and parents. 6. Absolute
authority proved by most evident places, as well of the New as
the Old Testament.
[Sidenote: The beginning of institutive government from the consent
of the people.]
1. We have, in the sixth chapter and the second article, so derived
the original of institutive or political government from the consent
of the multitude, that it appears they must either all consent, or
be esteemed as enemies. Such was the beginning of God’s government
over the Jews instituted by Moses, (Exod. xix. 5-8): _If ye will
obey my voice indeed_, &c. _Ye shall be unto me a kingdom of
priests_, &c. _And Moses came and called the elders of the people_,
&c. _And all the people answered, and said: All that the Lord hath
spoken we will do._ Such also was the beginning of Moses’s power
under God, or his vicegerency, (Exod. xx. 18-19): _And all the
people saw the thunderings and lightenings, and the noise of the
trumpet_, &c. _And they said unto Moses, speak thou unto us, and we
will hear._ The like beginning also had Saul’s kingdom, (1 Sam. xii.
12, 13): _When ye saw that Nahash king of the children of Ammon came
out against you, ye said unto me, nay, but a king shall reign over
us, when the Lord your God was your king. Now therefore behold the
king whom ye have chosen, and whom ye have desired._ But the major
part only consenting, and not all; for there were certain _sons of
Belial_, who said, (1 Sam. x. 27), _How shall this man save us? And
they despised him_; those who did not consent, were put to death as
enemies. And the people said unto Samuel (1 Sam. xi. 12): _Who is he
that said, shall Saul reign over us? Bring the men, that we may put
them to death._
[Sidenote: The power of judicature, and determination of wars,
depend on the will of the supreme officer.]
2. In the same sixth chapter, the sixth and seventh articles, I have
showed that all _judgment_ and _wars_ depend upon the will and
pleasure of him who bears the supreme authority; that is to say, in
a _monarchy_, on a monarch or king; and this is confirmed by the
people’s own judgment. 1 Sam. viii. 20; _We also will be like all
the nations, and our king shall judge us, and go out before us, and
fight our battles._ And what pertains to _judgments_, and all other
matters whereof there is any controversy, whether they be _good_ or
_evil_, is confirmed by the testimony of King Solomon, (1 Kings iii.
9): _Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart to judge thy
people, that I may discern between good and evil._ And that of
Absolom, (2 Sam. xv. 3): _There is no man deputed of the king to
hear thee._
[Sidenote: They who have the supreme authority are by right
unpunishable.]
3. That kings may not be punished by their subjects, as hath been
showed above in the sixth chapter and the twelfth article, King
David also confirms; who, though Saul sought to slay him, did
notwithstanding refrain his hand from killing him, and forbade
Abishai, saying, (1 Sam. xxvi. 9): _Destroy him not; for who can
stretch forth his hand against the Lords anointed, and be innocent?_
And when he had cut off the skirt of his garment, (1 Sam. xxiv. 6):
_The Lord forbid_, saith he, _that I should do this thing unto my
master the Lord’s anointed, to stretch forth mine hand against him_.
And (_2 Sam._ i. 15) commanded the Amalekite, who for his sake had
slain Saul, to be put to death.
[Sidenote: That without a supreme power there is no government, but
confusion.]
4. That which is said in the seventeenth chapter of _Judges_, at the
sixth verse: _In those days there was no king in Israel, but every
man did that which was right in his own eyes_: as though where there
were not a _monarchy_, there were an _anarchy_ or confusion of all
things: may be brought as a testimony to prove the excellency of
monarchy above all other forms of government; unless that by the
word _king_ may perhaps be understood not _one man_ only, but also a
_court_; provided that in it there reside a supreme power. Which if
it be taken in this sense, yet hence it may follow, that without a
supreme and absolute power (which we have endeavoured to prove in
the sixth chapter) there will be a liberty for every man to do what
he hath a mind, or whatsoever shall seem right to himself; which
cannot stand with the preservation of mankind. And therefore in all
government whatsoever, there is ever a supreme power understood to
be somewhere existent.
[Sidenote: That servants and sons owe their lords and parents simple
obedience.]
5. We have, in chap. VIII. art. 7 and 8, said that _servants_ must
yield a simple obedience to their _lords_, and in chap IX. art. 7,
that _sons_ owe the same obedience to their _parents_. Saint Paul
says the same thing concerning servants (Coloss. iii. 22): _Servants
obey in all things your masters according to the flesh, not with
eye-service, as men-pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing
God._ Concerning sons (Colos. iii. 20): _Children obey your parents
in all things, for this is well-pleasing unto the Lord._ Now as we
by simple obedience understand all things which are not contrary to
the laws of God; so in those cited places of St. Paul, after the
word _all things_, we must suppose, _excepting those which are
contrary to the laws of God_.
[Sidenote: The absolute power of princes proved by most evident
testimonies of the Scripture, as well New as Old.]
6. But that I may not thus by piecemeal prove the right of princes,
I will now instance those testimonies which altogether establish the
whole power; namely, that there is an absolute and simple obedience
due to them from their subjects. And first out of the New Testament:
Matth. xxiii. 2, 3: _The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat;
all therefore, whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do.
Whatsoever they bid you_ (says Christ) _observe_, that is to say,
_obey simply_. Why? Because they _sit in Moses’ seat_; namely, the
_civil magistrate’s_, not Aaron, the priest’s. Rom. xiii. 1, 2: _Let
every soul be subject to the higher powers; for there is no power
but of God; the powers that be are ordained of God; whosoever
therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God; and
they that resist, shall receive to themselves damnation._ Now
because the powers that were in St. Paul’s time, were ordained of
God, and all kings did at that time require an absolute entire
obedience from their subjects, it follows that such a power was
ordained of God. 1 Peter ii. 13-15: _Submit yourselves unto every
ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, whether it be to the king as
supreme, or unto governors as unto them that are sent by him for the
punishment of wicked doers, and for the praise of them that do well;
for so is the will of God._ Again St. Paul to Titus, (chap. iii. 1):
_Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to
obey magistrates, &c._ What principalities? Was it not to the
principalities of those times, which required an absolute obedience?
Furthermore, that we may come to the example of Christ himself, to
whom the kingdom of the Jews belonged by hereditary right derived
from David himself; he, when he lived in the manner of a subject,
both paid tribute unto Cæsar, and pronounced it to be due to him,
Matth. xxii. 21: _Give unto Cæsar_ (saith he) _the things which are
Cæsar’s, and unto God the things which are God’s_. When it pleased
him to show himself a king, he required entire obedience, Matth.
xxi. 2, 3: _Go_ (said he) _into the village over against you, and
straight-way ye shall find an ass tied, and a colt with her; loose
them, and bring them unto me; and if any man say aught unto you, ye
shall say the Lord hath need of them_. This he did therefore by the
right of being lord, or a king of the Jews. But to take away a
subject’s goods on this pretence only, because _the Lord hath need
of them_, is an absolute power. The most evident places in the Old
Testament are these: Deut. v. 27: _Go thou near, and hear all that
the Lord our God shall say; and speak thou unto us all that the Lord
our God shall speak unto thee, and we will hear it, and do it._ But
under the word _all_, is contained absolute obedience. Again to
Joshua (Joshua i. 16-18): _And they answered Joshua, saying, all
that thou commandest us, we will do; and whithersoever thou sendest
us, we will go; according as we hearkened unto Moses in all things,
so will we hearken unto thee; only the Lord thy God be with thee, as
he was with Moses; whosoever he be that doth rebel against thy
commandment, and will not hearken unto thy words in all that thou
commandest him, he shall be put to death._ And the parable of the
bramble (Judges ix. 14, 15): _Then said all the trees unto the
bramble, Come thou and reign over us. And the bramble said unto the
trees, If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then come and put
your trust in my shadow; and if not, let fire come out of the
bramble, and devour the cedars of Lebanon._ The sense of which words
is, that we must acquiesce to their sayings, whom we have truly
constituted to be kings over us, unless we would choose rather to be
consumed by the fire of a civil war. But the regal authority is more
particularly described by God himself, in 1 Sam. viii. 9, &c.: _Show
them the right of the king that shall reign over them, &c. This
shall be the right of the king that shall reign over you; he will
take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and
to be his horsemen, and some shall run before his chariots, &c. And
he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, &c. And he will
take your vineyards, and give them to his servants, &c._ Is not this
power absolute? And yet it is by God himself styled the _king’s
right_. Neither was any man among the Jews, no not the _high-priest_
himself, exempted from this obedience. For when the king, namely,
Solomon, said to Abiathar the priest (1 Kings ii. 26, 27): _Get thee
to Anathoth unto thine own fields; for thou art worthy of death; but
I will not at this time put thee to death, because thou barest the
ark of the Lord God before David my father, and because thou hast
been afflicted in all wherein my father was afflicted. So Solomon
thrust out Abiathar from being priest unto the Lord_; it cannot by
any argument be proved, that this act of his displeased the Lord;
neither read we, that either Solomon was reproved, or that his
person at that time was any whit less acceptable to God.
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