warrant for Naboth's destruction, her directions were, that the formalities of the law should be complied with; that he should be publicly arraigned of blaspheming God and the king, and put to death upon that charges. When Nebuchadnezzar commanded Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah to be cast into the burning fiery furnace, it was on the grounds of their disobedience to the royal decree, and their refusal to serve or worship the national gods h. When Darius condemned Daniel to be thrown into the den of lions, it was for transgressing one of the unalterable statutes of the Medes and Persians'. When Haman induced Ahasuerus to fulminate his edict against the Jews dispersed throughout his empire; it was on the representation, that their laws were diverse from all people, neither did they keep the king's law therefore it was not for the king's profit to suffer them.' When the chief priests and elders and all the council pronounced their verdict against Jesus, "He is guilty of death';" it was in conformity with the High Priest's charge, "He hath spoken blasphemy: what further need have we of witnesses? behold, now ye have heard his blasphemy"." When the Jews prevailed on Pilate to condemn Jesus to be crucified; they indicted their pri 8 1 Kings xxi. k Esther iii. 8. b Daniel iii. 1 St Matthew xxvi. 66. i Daniel vi. m Ibid. 65. soner as "one who perverted the nation and forbade to give tribute to Cesar, saying that he himself was anointed a king ":" and they exclaimed, that "if the governor acquitted the criminal, he was not Cesar's friend; for that whosoever made himself a king spoke against Cesar." The early Christians, in general, suffered persecution, because the doctrines which they propagated went to overthrow the established worship, with all its altars, and temples, and deities. When Nero delivered them over to the flames, he charged them with being fanatical incendiaries, who had conspired to burn the imperial city. When Pliny doomed them to death, he justified this severity by their contumacy and inflexible obstinacy. And Trajan, in sanctioning their punishment, conceived that he was coercing an extravagant and pernicious superstition. It is needless to multiply instances. In all these cases, there was a confounding of good and evil; but in none were the good punished as such, or the evil rewarded as such. In practice, it is next to impossible to determine, with any degree of precision, to what lengths of oppression a government may go without dissolving the obligations which bind the subjects to allegiance; and as such cases "St Luke xxiii. 2, 5. • St John xix. 12. Evidences, vol. i. p. 26. 8vo London, 1811. » Paley's Ibid. p. 40. r Ibid. p. 30. s Ibid. must be of comparatively rare occurrence, to speculate upon them is as idle, as it is mischievous. To busy the mind in imagining circumstances which may loosen the cement which holds together the fabric of society; which may sever (for instance) the bonds that unite the husband and the wife, the parent and the child, the sovereign and the subject; must be prejudicial to that high tone of moral sensitiveness, which ought to esteem these relative ties so sacred, as never to be tampered with; and the disruption of them so serious, as never to be contemplated with levity or indifference, never without repugnance and horror. Not that there can be any doubt, but that when human ordinances clash with divine laws " we must obey God rather than mant.” Still, we must have a moral certainty that this opposition is real and not imaginary"; otherwise, while we fancy we are but giving preference to the more important obligation of the two, we shall in fact be violating both. The Scriptures inculcated submission to authority, at a time when it was held by heathens and usurpers and by monsters proverbial for tyranny and profligacy'. Even in the case of Pontius t Acts v. 29. p. 288. 8vo Oxford, 1807. V Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, vol. i. ▾ Paley's Moral Philosophy, vol. ii. p. 155. 8vo London, 1811. "The supreme civil power is, in every commonwealth, derived from God, and is of the same extent every where; i. e. is Pilate himself, the power of life and death, (which he grossly abused by yielding, in spite of his own conviction and deliberate judgement, to the lawless clamour of the populace, so as to release the guilty and condemn the innocent,) is represented by our Saviour as given from above *." 66 Much of what our Church says of Ministers > will admit of application to Rulers: 6 that the evil be ever mingled with the good and sometimes the former will have the supreme power : yet as they do act, virtually, by God's commission and authority, we ought still to acknowledge them for rulers; forasmuch as God's ordinance is not cancelled by man's wickedness.' We observe, indeed, that Scripture 1812. absolute and unlimited by any thing but the end for which God gave it, viz. the good of the people, sincerely pursued according to the best of the skill of those who share that power, and so not to be resisted." Locke's Works, vol. viii. p. 404. 8vo London, And "whoever (either ruler or subject) by force goes about to invade the rights of either prince or people, and lays the foundation for overturning the constitution and frame of any just government, is highly guilty of the greatest crime (I think) a man is capable of; being to answer for all those mischiefs of blood, rapine, and desolation, which the breaking to pieces of governments bring on a country. And he who does it, is justly to be esteemed the common enemy and pest of mankind, and is to be treated accordingly." Ibid. Essay on Civil Government, § 230. vol. v. p. 475. [Sir James] Mackintosh's Defence of Peltier, 1803. Hume's Hist. of Eng. vol. vii. p. 22. Nothing can be more criminal than an attempt to work a change in the govern. ment by armed force." Curran's Defence of Rowan, 1794. * St John xix. 11. y Article XXVI. " applies the same title to him who preaches the word and to him who bears the sword: both are styled God's ministers: and there is one common end of their ministry, namely, the good and welfare of mankind. Being God's ministers, they must work their heavenly Master's will. They must cooperate with each other and support each other: each keeping to his proper department, and not trenching on the other's province. Thus is formed an alliance between Church and State, to the mutual advantage of both. The nation, which, by its public acts, treats all discrepancies of religious opinions as matters of indifference, or religion itself as a mere provision of civil polity, to be modified or changed as may suit the spirit of the times or the opinions of the majority, is guilty (as it were) of spiritual polygamy, and of insulting him who has pronounced himself" a jealous God"." The supreme Being has two channels by which the knowledge of his will is derived to man; his word and his works : our illumination arises either from the light of revelation or the light of nature. The office of publishing and interpreting the word; and of enforcing obedience to their divine Master's will, with all the earnestness of zealous and faithful servants, is confided to the Clergy. To be 'nursing-fathers' and 'nursing-mothers' of z Exodus xx. 5. Bacon's Essays, xiv. 4. Philosophy, vol. i. p. 64. a Paley's Moral |