A SERMON

FOR THE REFORMATION OF MANNERS.

ROMANS XIII. 4.

FOR HE IS THE MINISTER OF GOD TO THEE FOR GOOD.

mit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether to the king as supreme, or to governors sent by him, for the punishment of evil-doers, and for the praise of them that do well. The words fovrial, and doxorres, used in this context, admit of the same extent. So, among others, that great man Grotius understands this place also, not only of kings and princes, but whosoever are the Tulores status publici, (borrowing that expression from Seneca,) any that are to take care of the public state, by whatsoever name they are designed. Indefinitely, any magistrate whatsoever. That which is said of such a one, contains an account of the original, and the end, of his office and power. The original of it, that he is the minister of God, which signifies he is, as such, to act only by his authority, derived from him; as ver. 1. There is no power but from God, and the powers that be, are ordained of God. Which also implies, that such power is to be used for God, and that consequently God is to be the ruler's first and last; and he isto be subordinate to God, both as his principle and end. Arting by his authority, he is by consequence to act for his interest; his minister, or servant, is to serve him.

THE temper of this our present assembly ought to be not | for a comment upon this, is expressed, 1 Pet. ii. 13, 14. Sub only serious, but also mournful; for the occasion it hath reference to, is both very important, and most deplorable, and requires to be attended to, as with very intense consideration, so with deep sorrow. Even rivers of tears running down our eyes, as the words are, Psal. cxix. 136. could not more than equal the sadness of the case, i. e. the same there mentioned; because men (as is meant by the indefinite they) kept not God's law. That there should be such disorders in the intellectual world! That reasonable creatures should be so degenerate, that 'tis become hardly accountable why they are called so! They are said to be constituted and distinguished by reason, but disdain to be governed by it, accounting their senses and their vices their better and wiser directors. With us the case is yet worse! that in a Christian city and kingdom the insolencies of wickedness are so high, tumultuate at such a rate, and so daringly assault heaven, that the rigour of laws, the severity of penalties, the vigilancy and justice of magistrates, with the vigorous assisting diligence of all good men, in their several stations, are more necessary, than sufficient to repress them. The same considerations that should excite our zeal, ought also to influence our grief; and the more apparently necessary it is that all possible endeavours be used for redress, and the stronger and more convictive arguments can be brought to evince it, the deeper sense we ought to have of the evils that create this necessity, and the more feelingly we should lament them. And if this be the temper of this assembly, and of all other, upon this occasion, this would give us measures, and set us right, as to the whole business of such a season. Nobody will then think it should be the business of the sermon, to please curious ears, or of the hearers to criticise upon the sermon, or that it ought to be my present business to compliment the worthy persons that have associated on this account, how laudable soever their undertaking is. But it will be the common agreed business of us all, to take to heart the sad exigency of the case, to be suitably affected with it, and quickened to what shall appear to be our duty in reference thereto. And though the words I have read do more directly respect the part and office of rules, yet since there is that relation between them that govern, and those that are under government, that the duty of the one will plainly imply and connote the duty of the other; I shall so consider the words, as they may have a direct or collateral reference to all sorts of hearers; and do point out the duty, as well of them that live under government, as of them that govern.

We are therefore to take notice, that the text admits, either of an absolute consideration, or a relative. Absolutely considered, 'tis in assertion; relatively, it is in an argument, as the introductive particle, for, shows, 1. For the absolute consideration of the words, as they are an assertion, we are to see what they assert. The person spoken of under the term He, is any ruler, supreme or subordinate, as in that parallel text, which we may take

But besides what is thus implied of the general and ultimate end of the magistrate's power, in what is more directly said of the original of it; we have also a more explicit account of the end of it, viz. the next, and more particular end, which is two-fold. The end for whom, indefinitely expressed. For thee, i. e. for every, or any one that lives under government; and by consequence, the whole governed community. For all the parts make up the whole. And further we have the end for what, viz. for good, the good of each individual, and of the whole community, as comprehending all the individuals. Thus we see what the words contain absolutely considered, as they are an assertion.

2. We are to consider them relatively, as they are ar argument. So the particle, for, shows their relation, and directs us backward, where we shall see what they argue. And we find they are brought in to enforce the duty before enjoined, which is two-fold.-Primary, and more principal.

Consequential, deduced from the former.-The primary duty is that ver. 1. Let every soul be subject to the higher powers, or to the powers that are above us. Some blame the comparative expression, sublimioribus, higher, for which there is no pretence, from the word vrepé xovea, that only signifies the powers mentioned, to be over us, whether in a higher or lower degree. Let them be less or more above us, we are to be subject to them.-The subsequent duty is double: first, that they are not to be resisted. A doctrine which from the terms of the context is capable of being so stated, as neither to be just matter of reproach or scandal to the wise and good, nor of sport and laughter to another sort of men. But that is not my present business. And secondly, that they are not to be (unduly) dreaded; or apprehended as a terror, i. e. not otherwise, than (in the design of their appointment) they are so, viz. to evil works and the workers of them, not to

the good, ver. 3. A fear of reverence is indeed due from all to their character, and the dignity of their station: a filial fear, that of children, for they are the fathers of their country; not a servile, or that of slaves, except from such as are so; evil-doers, who are slaves of the vilest and more ignoble sort; to their own lusts, that enslave their minds, which might otherwise enjoy the most generous liberty, under the meanest and more oppressive external servitude. The text, according to its immediate reference, is but an amplification of the reason alleged, why the magistrate is not to be looked upon with terror and affright, by any but such as resolve upon a profligately wicked course of life, not by such as intend only a course of well-doing. For, if thou be such, he is the minister of God to thee for good; his sword is only formidable when it fetches its blow from above, when it is bathed in heaven, as we may borrow the words, Isa. xxxiv. 5. when it is wielded according to divine appointment, and God and he concur in the same stroke. When it is otherwise, 'tis true that the fallible or unrighteous human ruler may for well-doing afflict thee, and therein do thee wrong, but he can do thee no hurt, even though the stroke were mortal, Luke xii. 4. for our Lord forbids the fear of what is no worse; so said Socrates of them that persecuted him to death, They can kill me, but cannot hurt me. Who is it that can harm you (saith a great apostle) if ye be followers of that which is good? 1 Pet. iii. 13. And 'tis added, ver. 14. If ye suffer for righteousness sake, happy are ye-And hath any man reason to be afraid of being happy?

by him, whom God hath deputed to be his minister, as he is to promote common good, and be a terror to them that do evil. This was the just claim and demand of that excellent prince, Psal. xciv. 16. Who will rise up for me against the evil-doers, and stand up for me against the workers of iniquity? This, according to lexicographers of good note, is the import of that word, which we lay such weight upon, and accordingly very valuable expositors understand this place. By this time therefore you may see what place and order these words, I pitched upon, have in the series of the apostle's discourse; and thereupon what aspect they have upon the design for which we are met; pursuant whereto, they admit of being thus summed up. That for this reason, and under this notion, as the magistrate is to be a terror to them that do evil, and therein God's minister for good to them over whom he is set; it belongs to every soul, or to all persons under his government, to be each one in his station, and according to his capacity, actively, and with their own design, subordinate and subservient to him herein.-In speaking to this I shall show,-I. That the magistrate is God's minister, upon the mentioned account. II. That therefore such duty is incumbent upon all that live under government. The former whereof is a doctrinal proposition, the other the use of it. I. That the magistrate is the minister of God for the good of them over whom he is set. This we are to consider by parts.

That, 1. He is God's minister. Hereof none can doubt, who doubt or deny not the being of God. His being But though this be the more immediate reference of these God's minister, signifies his deriving his power from him. words, "He is the minister of God to thee for good," and Who else can be the fountain of power, but he who is the is, therefore, not to be unduly feared, they do yet ultimately fountain of all Being? 'Tis true, the governing power hath and more principally respect the grand precept first laid not been always derived the same way, but it hath been down, of being subject to the powers over us. Which is always from the same fountain. When God was pleased evident, for that upon this very ground, and the interven- to have a people within a peculiar sort of enclosure, more ing consideration, which further illustrate it, this same especially appropriate to himself; he was very particular precept is resumed and pressed upon conscience, and a in signifying his will, concerning all material things that necessity is put upon it, on the same account, viz. that concerned their government. What the form of it should because the magistrate is the minister of God for good, be. What persons should govern, or in what way the and is to be a terror to evil-doers, and hath a sword put power and right to govern should descend, and be conveyinto his hands for that purpose, which he is not to bear ined to them. What laws they should be governed by. vain, but must be the minister of God in this kind, viz. What the methods should be of governing, according to as a revenger, to execute wrath, upon such as do evil; that those laws. therefore we must needs be subject, and that not only for Since it is very evident much is left to the prudence of wrath, but also for conscience sake. This is therefore the men, always to be directed by general rules of equity, and principal relation of these words, viz. as an argument to as these allow, by immediate interpositions of his own proprove that he, the magistrate, is the minister of God to us vidence; I resolve this discourse shall be involved in no for good; that therefore we ought not only not to resist controversies, and therefore shall not determine, nor go him, when he is doing his duty, nor be afraid of him when about to dispute as to what is so left, how much or how we are but doing ours; but that we also ought to be sub- little that may be. But it is plain and indisputable, that ject to him; and that, not only that we may escape wrath, the governing power he reserves, and claims to himself; but that we may satisfy conscience. This is therefore the i. e. not to exercise it himself immediately, in a political relation, according whereto we shall consider these words, way; but to communicate and transmit it to them that viz. as they are an argument to enforce the required sub- shall. So that in what way soever it is derived to this or jection. Which subjection, that we may the more fully that person, or under whatsoever form, the conferring of apprehend, 'twill be requisite with the more care to consider it he makes his own act: as we find it said to Nebuchadthe propriety of the word used to express it. It is a word nezzar, Dan. ii. 37. The God of heaven hath given thee that carries order, rášis, in the bowels of it, broraccio0w, a kingdom. And he is told, ch. iv. 32. The Most High ver. 1. and Toráneoba, ver. 4. and with the preposition ruleth in the kingdoms of men, and giveth them to whombrò, it signifies order under another, as of inferiors under soever he will. And so much, you see, is in this context superiors; it imports therefore not to be subject only, but asserted to him over and over. Two things are plain in subordinate and subservient. And the form wherein it is this matter-That it is the mind of God there should be here used, admitting of its being taken not strictly in the such a thing as magistracy and government in this world passive sense, but in the middle, whereupon it may be in--And again, that men shall be governed by men, by some differently capable of being rendered actively, viz. not only or other of themselves; who shall be, as the text speaks, to be subordinate, but by your own act, and with your own God's ministers. As he is the original of the governing design, subordinate yourselves to the magistrate, come into power, the administration shall be in them. And of the order under him, as he is God's minister invested by him mind of God in both these there is sufficient indication by with power for such and such purposes. This, without the very law of nature; how is it conceivable such sentistraining, carries the sense yet higher. ments should be so common, if they were not from a common cause? He seems to me to have determined well (if it be considered in what way the course of nature is now continued, and by whom all things consist) that makes the governing power to be from God, as the Author of nature; and that though government, as it is such and such, be juris humani, it is juris divini absolutely considered, or as it is government. It was most apparently a thing worthy of God, when he peopled this world with such a sort of creatures as man, to provide for the maintaining of

And whereas ráis is a word of known military import, and signifies the order of an army formed for battle, wherein every one knows his own rank, place, and station, 'tis as if it were said, take your place, come into rank, that you may, under the commander's conduct, in acie stare, stand in order of battle; as the word vrirágocolat, rendered to resist the ruler, is ex adverso in acie stare, to stand in rank, or in battalia, against him. You are not only not to resist, but you are to assist, and in your place and station stand

a Suar. de Leg. Lib. 3. C. 3, 4.

of wrath; when a fixed, though most sedate and calm resolution to punish hath the same effect, this most different cause is called by the same name. In this allusion is wrath ascribed to God, the most serene and dispassionate of all beings; and hence they who represent him among men in authority, ought in this respect to be God-like too. Magistratus non debet irasci, judges (as Cicero most aptly speaks) ought to be legum similes, like the laws themselves, which are moved by no passion, are angry with no man, but keep one steady tenor, so as neither to despite an enemy, nor indulge a friend. To this temper it well agrees to design good (as in lancing a tumour) where one does a present hurt. Two ways may punishment be a proper and apt, though it be not always an effectual, means of doing good.

common order among them; who without government | cause when men afflict one another, 'tis usually the effect were but a Turba, a Colluvies, as a noted heathen speaks on a different account, a rout of men. Had man continued in unstained innocency, 'tis concluded on all hands there must have been a government among them; i. e. not punitive or coercive, for which there could have been no occasion; but directive and conservative of superiority and inferiority, as it is also even among the angels of heaven, where are no inordinate dispositions to be repressed. Much more is government, in the severer parts of it, necessary for lapsed man on earth; the making of restrictive laws, and governing by them. And that God should design the governing of men by men, was also most agreeable to the perfections of his nature; especially his wisdom and his goodness, considered in comparison to the imperfection of this our present state. When the government over Israel was a theocracy, God used the ministry of men in the management of it. That it should be his ordinary stated course to govern by voices or visions, or by frightful appearances, such as those on mount Sinai, had been very little suitable to this our state of probation; as his accurate wisdom we find hath determined; and was less agreeable to his benignity and goodness, which would not amazingly terrify, where he designed more gently to admonish and instruct. Hence had he regard to their frailty, who so passionately supplicated; let not God speak to us lest we die; and this his compassionate goodness we are led to consider, being next to treat of the end of this his constitution, viz.

2. That the magistrate is God's minister to men, for their good. Next to the sweet airs and breathings of the Gospel itself, where have we a kinder or more significant discovery of God's good will to men? Here we are to stay and wonder, not to assent only, but admire! To behold the world in a revolt! The dwellers on earth in arms, against heaven! And the counsels that are taken above are how to do them good! How God-like is this! How suitable to magnificent goodness! or beneficent greatness! being secure from hurt by their impotent attempts, and when revenge was so easy, to study not only not to harm them, nor also how they might less harm and mischief themselves; but how to do them good: this was every way great and most suitable to the greatness of God; wherein it falls into conjunction with so immense and absolute goodness, as doth beyond what any created mind would ask or think. This imports not implacableness, or destructive design towards the generality of mankind; but great benignity even to every soul, in as full extent as the command runs to be subject to the higher powers. This is, we find, another medium by which God testifies, or leaves not himself without witness, besides what we have elsewhere; that he gives men rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons.

The most compassionate eye of God beholds men, under the power of vicious inclination, bent upon destructive ways; whereas by the course of nature, which he hath fixed, he should give them ordinarily competent time, as he hath given them breath and being, and all things, Acts xvii. that they might seek after him, and labour to feel and find him out. They live in a contemptuous neglect of him, and are cruel to themselves, oft shorten their own time, live too fast, and make too much haste to dig their own graves, and turn their habitation into a charnel house; yea even bury themselves alive, in stupifying sensuality and vice. God, though provoked, hastens not their destruction by sudden revenge; he animadverts not upon them by flames and thunderbolts, nor amazes them by astonishing appearances; his terrors make them not afraid. He only clothes some, from among themselves, with his authority, who shall appear on the stage with them, as gods among men, resembling themselves in human nature, and God in power, as they should in other God-like excellencies; if men would so far co-operate towards their own welfare, as they ought, that by such gentler methods some stop might be put to the stream and flood of miseries, wherewith otherwise unrestrained wickedness is continually ready to deluge the world. The magistrate is herein an instrument of good and of wrath at once; these two things disagree not, to be a minister for good, and to execute wrath. This latter is said, in conformity to vulgar apprehension, be

1. As it may work the good of the offenders themselves. To which it hath in itself a tendency, if the disease be not so strong and stubborn, as to defy the remedy; as it puts them upon reflecting, and should awaken in them their considering power. As in the matter of treason against a rightful power, deliberasse est descivisse, to deliberate whether to be loyal, or no, is to revolt, so it is in the just and glorious rupture that is to be made of the bonds of vice, whereby men are held as slaves under the usurped power of the devil's kingdom. If once they come duly to consi der, they will disdain so vile a servitude; when they meet with a check in their way, it may occasion them to check themselves, and consider their ways. No external means do any good to the minds of men, otherwise than as they themselves are engaged, drawn in, and made parties, in some sense against, but (as we are compounded) in a higher and nobler for, ourselves. This comes in as ote among external means of that kind, as do give some present uneasiness, but in order to after-advantage; it afflicts, 'tis true, and no affliction is for the present joyous bai grievous, but yields afterwards a peaceable fruit. When the magistrate's power is called a sword, it signifies its business is to wound; but as wounds are generally painful, some are sanative healing wounds, and so are these designed and apt to be. They vex a while, but vexatio det intellectum, it rouses the understanding, and is most apt to do so to good purpose in plain and undisputed cases; and where there is no pretence for conscience, in the cause one suffers for.

Where indeed a formed and fixed judgment of conscience. once hath place, for the practice which exposes a man to suffering; mulets and prisons, gibbets and fagots, are very improper means of illumination, or of public utility; if the civil peace, and the substance of religion, be not hurt by such practice. And the sincerity of that conscience is much to be suspected, that is ever altered by such methods; but no man will pretend it is against his conscience, not to be drunk, not to debauch, or to be sober, chaste, and virtuous. Therefore a man's way lies open to that consideration which is most immediately to influence his practice, to correct a lewd, and begin a regular good course. He needs not be detained with any subtle disputes, or be put to solve perplexed doubts, or answer specious arguments and objections. It is obvious to him to bethink himself: "What a strange sort of anomalous creature am I become, whom the law of mine own nature remonstrates against! How degenerate a thing! that have forsaken my own noble order of intelligent creatures, to herd with brutes! That have made myself unfit for human society, otherwise than as one that must bear a mark, wear a disgraceful sear, from the wound of a sword, not that of a public enemy, or my own; but a sword drawn in defence of the sacred rights of God, and to vindicate the honour of mankind!” And hereupon, if the crime be not capital, with the concarrent use of other appointed means, and the blessing of God upon all, (from whence only the good issue can be hoped for,) may a vicious person be so reclaimed, as to become of great use in the world. Yea, and if the crime be capital, such as that the criminal survives not the punishment, but the sword of justice must cut him off from the land of the living; our charity will not let us doubt but there have been instances, wherein a prison and arraignment, and the sentence of death, have been the best effectual means to the offenders, of their escaping the more terrible sentence, and

of obtaining eternal life. But however, though the ministry of civil justice doth often fail of its most desirable effects, as to the particular persons that suffer it; (as even the ministration of the Gospel of grace proves also ineffectual to many;) yet,

verned than as slaves or brutes, who have learnt nothing of self-government; and are at the next step of being slaves to other men, who have first made themselves slaves to their own vicious inclinations. Thus are such liable to all sorts of temporal calamities and miseries in this world. Besides, what is of so far more tremendous import, that the same vile and stupifying lusts tend to infer an utter indisposition to comport with, or attend to, the glorious Gospel of the blessed God; and so to ruin men's hopes for the other world, and make their case unconceivably worse, in the judgment of the great day, than theirs of Tyre or Sidon, Sodom or Gomorrha. But how much may a just, prudent, well tempered vigilaney and severity do, towards the prevention of all this! and so much the more, by how much public animadversions, shall render the things men incur punishment for, not only in common estimate unrighteous, but ignominious things.

2. It is not only apt, but effectual, to do much good to others, and generally to the community. Punishment is justly said to be, in its proper design, medicinal to the delinquents; yet not always in the event.b But the common good it may serve, when contumacious offenders perish under the deserved infliction of it. This was the thing designed by the righteous Judge of all the earth, when he gave so particular directions how to punish offenders in such and such kinds, that others might hear and fear, and do no more so wickedly. And in all equal government, it is the design of penal laws that the terror might reach to all, the punishment itself but to a few. And when the utmost endeavours that can be used, shall That principle of shame in the nature of man, if by have had that happy success to reduce a vast number of proper applications it were endeavoured to be wrought offenders to a paucity, we should rejoice to see that thereupon, would contribute more to the reforming a vicious needed to be but few examples made in such kinds. In world, than most other methods that have ever been tried the mean time where this sword of the Lord, in the hands to that purpose. "Tis a tender passion, of quick and most of his ministers of justice, is unsheathed, and used ac- acute sense; things that are thought opprobrious, have so cording to the exigency of the case; it is an apt and like- sensible a pungency with them, that (though all tempers ly means to have a happy effect, for the good of the com- are not herein alike) many that can feel little else, reckon munity; both as it may put a stop to the prevailing wick- a disgrace an unsufferable thing. And I little doubt but edness of men, and may avert from a nation the provoked if punishments for grosser vices were more attempered to wrath of God. this principle, they would have much more effect. This 1. As it may give some check to the daringness and tri- hath been too much apprehended by the usurping god of umph of unrebuked wickedness, which, indeed, naturally this world; this engine he hath made it his business to carries in it a pusillanimous meanness, and a vile abjec- turn, and manage to the contrary purpose, to drive or keep tion of mind, so as no where to insult, but where it meets, serious religion out of the world; yea, to make men in those who should oppose it, a timorous fainting and ashamed of being sober, temperate, and regular in their succumbency; it so far resembles the devil, whose off- conversation, lest they should also be thought religious, spring it is, that being resisted it flees. When men find and to have any thing of the fear of God in them, and that while they dare to affront the universal Ruler, and make them debauch, to save their reputation. A plain offer indignities to his throne; there are those, that, cloth- document to such as covet to see a reformation of maned with his authority, and bearing his character, dare toners in our days, what course ought to be endeavoured in vindicate the injury; when they feel the smart and cost of order thereto. A great apprehension to this purpose that open wickedness, it will, no doubt, become at least less noble pagane seems to have had, who inquiring whence open, and seek closer corners. They will not long hold legislation had its rise, from some man or from God? up the head, in so hopeless and deplorate a cause, that and determining from God, if we will give the most rightcan afford them no support, no relief to their abject sinking eous judgment that can be given; doth elsewhere write to spirits, in suffering for it. What encouraging testimony this effect: that Jupiter pitying the miseries of men, by of conscience can they have, that not only act from no di- their indulgence to vice, lest mankind should utterly perection of conscience, but in defiance of it? What god rish, sent Mercury to implant in them, together with jus can they hope will reward their sufferings which they in- tice, shame, as the most effectual means to prevent the cur by highest contempt of God? And if such gross im- total ruin of the world. moralities be somewhat generally redressed, as more directly fall under the magistrate's animadversion, how great a common good must it infer, inasmuch as those evils, in their own nature, tend to the detriment, decay, and ruin of a people where they prevail! They darken the glory of a nation, which how great a lustre hath it cast abroad in the world from the Romans and Spartans, and other civilized people! when their sumptuary and other laws were strictly observed, that repressed undue excesses; and when temperance, frugality, industry, justice, fidelity, and consequently fortitude, and all other virtues, excelled and were conspicuous among them. It were a great thing we should have to transmit to posterity, might we see England recover its former, or arrive to the further glory, which it is to be hoped it may acquire in these kinds!

Yea, and the vices which are endeavoured to be redressed, are such as not only prejudice the reputation, but the real welfare of any nation. Profane swearing tends gradually to take away the reverence of an oath; which, where it is lost, what becomes of human society? And more sensual vices tend to make us an effeminate, meanspirited, a desident, lazy, slothful, unhealthful people, useless to the glorious prince and excellent government we live under, neither fit to endure the hardships nor encounter the hazards of war, nor apply ourselves to the business nor undergo the labours that belong to a state of peace, and do consequently tend to infer upon us a deplorable, but unpitied, poverty; and (which all will pretend to abhor) slavery at length. For they are most unfit for an ingenuous, free sort of government, or to be otherwise go

e

And so inseparable is the connexion between being wicked and being miserable, that whatsoever molestation and uneasiness tends to extinguish dispositions to wickedness, ought to be reckoned given with very merciful intentions. It is no improbable discourse which an ingenious modern writer f hath to this purpose, (for I pretend not to give his words, not having the book now at hand,) that though the drowning of the world was great severity to them who did then inhabit it, yet it was an act of mercy to mankind. For hereby (he reckoned) the former more luxuriant fertility of the earth was so far reduced and checked, as not, so spontaneously, to afford nutriment to vice; that men in after-time must hereby be more constrained to labour and industry, and made more considerate, and capable of serious thoughts; and that when also they should find their time by this change of the state of the world naturally contracted within narrower limits, they would be more awakened to consider and mind any overtures should be, in following time, made to them in order to their attaining a better state in another world; and consequently the more susceptible of the Gospel, in the proper season thereof. If God were severe with so merciful intentions, what lies within the compass of these ministers of his justice, appointed for common good, ought certainly to be endeavoured; in imitation of him, whom they represent.

2. The administration of punitive justice, when the cecasion requires it, tends also to the common good; as it may contribute towards the appeasing of God's anger against a sinful people, and the turning it away from them.