are of God, Rom. 13.1 and the ordinance of God, v. 2. S. Peter indeed saith, every ordinance of man, I Epist. 2. but of man there, and of God here is much differing; there it is ἀνθρωπίνῃ, of man, subjective, that is, every ordinance or power set up amongst men; but here it is ἀπὸ θεοῦ, of God, causaliter,3 that is, from him, his ordinance; and if in that ἀνθρωπίνῃ there be implied any creation or causality, or invention of man, it respects the qualification of the power according to the forms of severall governments and offices in them, which are from the invention of man; it does not make the power itselfe the creation of man, which is the constitution and ordinance of God. And men are not only naturally bent to society, but also are bound, as they are reasonable creatures, to set up and live under government, as under an order of that providence by which the world is governed.
2. He is called the minister of God, v. 4. but if so from the people and no otherwise from god than they would have him, he should be minister populi rather; he is indeed their minister for their good, which makes the people to be the end of this governing power, not the fountain and originall of it. Therefore the necessity of subjection urged in v. 5. has a double ground the ordinance of God, whose ministers Rulers are, there’s the fountain and originall of power to govern; then the people’s good, upon which Rulers ought to attend, that is an end of the governing power.
3. To the same purpose speake those other places, by me Kings reign: and, I have said, ye are Gods, Psa. 82. in relation to which our Saviour saith, Joh. 10. they are called Gods to whom the word of God came, that dixi, that word is the command, the issuing out as it were the commission for the setting up of a governing power among the people.
These places cannot be satisfied with that poor part, they on the other side leave to God in the setting up of power for the governing of men, that is, to approve it when the people have created or invented it. Indeed if we consider the qualification of this governing power, and the manner of executing it according to the severall formes of government, we granted it before to be the invention of man, and when such a qualification or forme is orderly agreed upon, we say it hath God’s permissive approbation.
And therefore the imputation is causeless which the Pleaders on the other side doe heedlessely and ignorantly lay upon us Divines, as if wee cried up Monarchy, and that only government to be jure divino. For although Monarchy has this excellency, that the Government God set up over his people in the person of Moses, the Judges, and the Kings, was Monarchicall; yet we confesse that neither that, nor Aristocracy, or any other forme is jure divino, but we say the power itself, or that sufficiency of Authority to govern, which is in Monarchy or Aristocracie, abstractly considered from the qualifications of either form, is an efflux or constitution subordinate to that providence, an ordinance of that Dixi, that silent Word by which the world was at first made, and is still governed under God.
Secondly, as this appeares by the former places of Scripture, so is it also suitable to Reason. Because God doth govern all creatures, Reasonable as well as Unreasonable; the inferiour or lower world he governs by the heavens or superiour bodies, according to those influences and powers he has put into them; and the reasonable creatures, Men, he governs too by others set up in his stead over them: for which they are called Gods, because in his stead over the people: and the powers are said to be ὑπὸ θεοῦ τεταγμέναι, Rom. 13.1. not only ἀπὸ θεοῦ from God, but also as orders ranked under him too, subordinate to that providence by which all creatures are governed.
These his Ministers he sometimes designed immediately by himself, as Moses, the Judges, Saul, David, &c. Now he designes his Vicegerents on earth mediately as by election of the people, by succession or inheritance, by conquest, &c. To conclude, The power itselfe of government is of God, however the person be designed, or that power qualified according to the severall formes or government by those Lawes that are established, or those grants that are procured for the people’s security. Thus much of the originall of Power.
Sect. IIII.
Now we come to the Forfeiture, as I may call it, of this power. If the Prince, say they, will not discharge his trust, then it falls to the people or the two Houses (the representative body of the people) to see to it, and to reassume that power, and thereby to resist. This they conceive to follow upon the derivation of power from the people by vertue of election, and upon the stipulation or covenant of the Prince with the people, as also to be necessary in regard of those meanes of safety, which every State should have within itself. We will examine them in order, and shall find the arguments inconsequent.
Concerning the derivation of power, we answer, First, if it be not from the people, as they will have it, and as before it was cleared, then can there be no reassuming of this power by the people; that’s plaine by their own argument.
Secondly, if the people should give the power so absolutely as they would have it, leaving nothing to God in it but approbation, yet could they not therefore have right to take that power away. For many things which are altogether in our disposing before we part with them, are not afterward in our power to recall; especially such in which there redounds to God an interest by the donation as in things devoted, though afterward they come to be abused. So although it were, as they would have it, that they give the power and God approves; yet because the Lord’s hand also and his oile is upon the person elected to the Crown, & then he is the Lord’s anointed, & the minister of God, whose hands of the people which were used in lifting him up to the Crown, may not again be lifted up against him, either to take the Crown from his head, or the sword out of his hand. This will not a true informed Conscience dare to doe.
Thirdly, how shall the Conscience be satisfied that this their argument, grounded upon election and the derivation of power from the people, can have place in this kingdom, when as the Crown not only descends by inheritance, but also has so often been setled by Conquest in the lines of Saxons, Danes, and Normans? In answering to this they look beyond all these, and say, the right is still good to the people by reason of their first election. I answer, So then that first election must be supposed here, & supposed good against all other titles, or else this power of resistance falls to the ground. It is probable indeed that Kings at first were by choice here as elswhere; but can Conscience rest upon such remote probabilities for resistance, or think that first election will give it power against Princes that do not claim by it. We tell them the Roman Emperours were not to be resisted, Rom. 13.2. They reply, as we had it above, that they were absolute Monarchs. But how came they of subjects to be absolute Monarchs? Was it any otherwise than by force and arms? The way that the Saxons, Danes, and Normans made themselves masters of this people, & was not the right of the people as good against them for the power of resistance by virtue of the first election, as well as of the people of this Land, against their Kings after so many conquests? This I speak, not as if the Kings of this Land might rule as conquerors, God forbid. But to shew this slender plea of the first election can no more take place against the Kings of this Land, than it could against the Roman Monarchs, especially according to their argument, that hold all power originally from the people, & that (as we observed above) to be the fundamentall of all government. Therefore whether Kings were in this Land at first by election or no, we acknowledge what belongs to the duty of a Prince in doing justice and equity. What Grants also, Lawes, Priviledges have since those conquests beene procured or restored to the people, unto all those the King is bound. But yet not bound under forfeiture of this power to the people, which now comes to be examined in that capitulation or convenant he is said to enter with the people.
In the next place therefore, That capitulation or covenant, and the oath which the Prince takes to confirme what he promiseth, are so alledged, as if the breach or non-performance on the Prince’s part were a forfeiture of his power. But we answer, the words capitulation or covenant are now much used to make men believe the King’s admittance to the Crown is altogether conditionall, as in the meerly elective kingdoms of Polonia, Swedeland,
