II. In the second place, it being clear from these forementioned instances, that tyrants and usurpers have been disowned; and it being also as clear as light can make any thing, from the foregoing account of their government, and all the characters of truculency, treachery and tyranny, conspicuously relucent therein, that these two gentlemen, whose authority we are pressed to own, were tyrants and usurpers: it remains therefore to prove from all dictates of reason about government, that their pretended authority could not nor cannot be owned.
For the argument runs thus; the authority of tyrants and usurpers cannot be owned; but the authority of Charles and James was and is the authority of tyrants and usurpers, therefore their authority cannot be owned. Now it is the major of this syllogism that I undertake to prove, the minor being so clear from their history, that to prove it by witnesses were to do what is already done.
1. All authority to be owned of men must be of God, and ordained of God: for so the apostle teacheth expresly, Rom. xiii. 1. &c. which is the alone formal reason of our subjection to them, and that which makes it a damnable sin to resist them; because it is a resisting the ordinance of God. The Lord owns himself to be the author of magistrates, Prov. viii. 15. By me kings reign and princes decree justice.
As he is the author of man, and hath made him a sociable creature, so he is the author of the order of human society, which is necessary for the preservation of mankind, he being the God of order and not of confusion.
And this must hold not only of the supreme authority, but of subordinate magistrates also; for they must be included in the higher powers, to whom we must be subject, Rom. xiii. and they that resist them, resist God's ordinance too. Their judgment is God's, as well as the judgment of the supreme magistrate, Deut. i. 17. 2 Chron. xix. 6, 8. They are called gods among whom the Lord judgeth, Psal. lxxxii. 1. He speaketh not there of a congregation of kings.
We are to be subject to them for the Lord's sake, as well as to the supreme magistrate, 1 Pet. ii. 13. therefore all magistrates, superior and inferior, are ordained of God in the respective places. It is true, Peter calls every degree of magistracy an ordinance of man, not that he denies it to be an ordinance of God for so he would contradict Paul, Rom. xiii. but terms it so emphatically, to commend the worth of obedience to magistrates, though but men, when we do it for the Lord's sake: not effectively, as an invention of men, but subjectively, because exercised by men, and created and invested by human suffrages, considered as men in society, and objectively, for the good of man, and for the external peace and safety of man, thereby differenced from the ministry, an ordinance of Christ, for the Spiritual good of mens souls. Hence, those rulers that are not of God, nor ordained of God, cannot be owned without sin; but tyrants and usurpers are the rulers, that are not of God, nor ordained of God, but are set up, and not by him, &c. Hos. viii. 1.-4. therefore they cannot be owned without sin.
I refer it to any man of conscience and reason to judge, if these scriptures, proving magistracy to be the ordinance of God, for which alone is to be owned, can be applied to tyrants and usurpers. How will that, Rom. xiii. read of tyrants? Let every soul be subject to tyrants, for they are ordained of God as his ministers of justice, &c. and are a terror to good works, and a praise to the evil. Would not every man nauseate that as not the doctrine of God? Again, how would that sound, Prov. viii. By me tyrants reign, and usurpers decree injustice? Harsh to Christian ears. Can they be said to be gods among whom the Lord judgeth? If they be, they must be such as the witch of Endor saw, gods coming out of the earth, when she raised the devil; in a very catechrestical meaning, as the devil is called the god of this world. And indeed they have no more power, nor otherwise to be owned, than he hath: for this is a truth, tyranny is a work of satan, and not from God; because sin, either habitual or actual, is not from God; tyranny is sin in habit and act: therefore——The magistrate, as magistrate, is good in nature and end, being the minister of God for good, a tyrant as a tyrant, is quite contrary. Lex Rex saith well, 'A power ethical, politic or moral, to oppress, is not from God, and is not a power, but a licentious deviation of a power, and no more from God, but from sinful nature, and the old serpent, than a licence to sin,' quest. 9. p. 59. Hence sin, a licence to sin, a licentious sinning, cannot be from God; but tyranny, usurpation, absolute power enaroaching upon all liberties, laws, divine and human, is sin, a licence to sin, a licentious sinning: therefore——But, to make this clear, and to obviate what may be said against this, let it be considered, how the powers that be are of God, and ordained of God. Things are said to be of God and ordained of God, two ways; by his purpose and providence, and by his word and warrant.
Things may be of God, either of his hand working, or bringing them about, ordaining and ordering them to be to his glory, either by a holy over-ruling providence, as Samson's desire of a wife was of God, Judg. xiv. 4. and Amaziah's insolent and foolish rejection of Joash's peaceable overture, 2 Chron. xxv. 20. or by a powerful effective providence; so Rom. xi. 36. Of him and through him are all things, 1 Cor. viii. 6. One God, of whom are all things. Or things be of God, of his word warranting and authorizing. So we are commanded to try the spirits; whether they be of God (1 John iv. i.) So in this sense, sin, tentation, lust, corruptions of the world are not of God, Jam. i. 13, 1 John ii. 16.
Again, things are ordained of God, ether by the order of his counsel or providential will; either effectively, by way of production, or direction; or permissively, by way of non-impedition: or they are ordained by the order of his word and preceptive will. The former is God's rule, the latter is ours: the former is always accomplished, the latter is often contradicted: the former orders all actions, even sinful; the latter only that which is good and acceptable in the sight of God: by the former Israel rejected Samuel, by the latter they should have continued Samuel's government, and not sought a king: by the former Athaliah usurped the government, by the latter she should have yielded obedience, and resigned the government to the posterity of Ahaziah: by the former, all have a physical subordination to God at creatures, subject to his all disposing will; by the latter, those whom he approves have a moral subordination to God, as obedient subjects to his commanding will. Now magistrates are of God, and ordained by him both these ways, tyrants but one of them. I say, magistrates, the higher powers, to whom we owe and must own subjection, are of God both these ways; both by his purpose and providence; and that not merely eventual, but effective and executive of his word, disposing both of the title and right, and possession of the power, to them whom he approves, and bringing the people under a conscientious subjection, and by his word and warrant. So Adonijah the usurper (though he had the pretence of hereditary right, and also possession by providence) was forced to own king Solomon in these terms, upon which only a magistrate may be owned: 'the kingdom' says he, 'was mine, and all Israel set their faces on me that I should reign: howbeit the kingdom is turned about, and become my brother's, for it was his from the Lord,' 1 Kings ii. 15. He had both providence turning about the kingdom to him, and also the warrant of the Lord's approbative and preceptive will. But tyrants and usurpers are only of God, and ordained of God, by his over-ruling purpose and permissive providence, either for performing his holy purpose towards themselves, as Rehoboam's professing he would be a tyrant, and refusing the lawful desires of the people was of God, 2 Chron. x. 15. or for a judgement and vengeance upon them that are subject to them, Zech. xi. 6. whereby they get a power in their hand, which is the rod of the Lord's indignation, and a charge and commission against a hypocritical nation, Isa. x. 5, 6. This is all the power they have from God, who 'gives Jacob to the spoil, and Israel to the robbers, when they sin against him,' Isa. xlii. 24. This doth not give these robbers any right, no more than they whose 'tabernacle prosper, into whose hand God bringeth abundantly,' Job xii. 6. Thus all robbers, and the great legal robbers, tyrants and their authorized murderers, may be of God, viz. by his providence. Hence those that are not ordained of God's preceptive will, but merely by his providential will; their authority is not to be owned; but tyrants and usurpers are not ordained of God's preceptive, but merely by his providential will. The minor needs no proof, yet will be cleared by many following arguments, the major will be afterwards more demonstrated. Here I shall only say, they that have no other ordination of God impowering them to be rulers, than the devil hath, must not be owned; but they that have no other than the ordination of providence, have no other ordination of God impowering them to be rulers, than the devil hath: therefore they that have no other than the ordination of providence, must not be owned.
2. But let us next consider what is comprehended in the ordination of that authority which is to be owned as of God: and it may be demonstrated, there are two things in it, without which no authority can be owned as of God, viz. institution and constitution so as to give him, whom we must own as God's minister, authority both in the abstract and concrete, that is, that he should have magistracy by God's ordination, and be a magistrate by and according to the will of God. All acknowledge that magistracy hath God's institution, for the powers that be are ordained of God: which contains not only the appointment of it, but the qualification and form of it. That government is appointed by divine precept all agree, but whether the precept be moral natural, or moral positive, whether it was appointed in the state of innocency, or since disorder came into the world, whether it be primario or secundario, from the law of nature, is not agreed upon. It may possibly be all these ways; government in the general may be from the law and light of nature appointed in innocency, because all its relative duties are enjoined in the fifth command, and all nations naturally have an esteem of it, without which there could be no order, distinction, or communion in human societies but the specification or individuation may be by a postnate, positive and secondary law, yet natural too, for though there be no reason in nature why any man should be king and lord over another, being in some sense all naturally free, but as they yield themselves under jurisdiction the exalting of David over Israel is not ascribed to nature, but to an act of divine bounty, which took him from following the ewes, and made him feeder of the people of Israel, Psal. lxxviii. 70, 71. yet nature teacheth, that Israel and other people should have a government, and that this should be subjected to. Next, not only is it appointed to be, but qualified by institution, and the office is defined, the end prescribed, and the measures and boundaries thereof are limited, as we shall hear. 'Again, the forms of it though politically, they are not stinted, that people should have such a form and not another; yet morally, at least negatively, whatever be the form it is limited to the rules of equity and justice, and must be none other than what hath the Lord's mould and sanction. But there is no institution any of these ways for tyranny. Hence, that power hath no institution from God, cannot be owned as his ordinance; but the power of tyrants is that power, being contrary in every respect to God's institution, and a mere deviation from it, and eversion of it: Ergo—To the minor it may be replied; though the power which tyrants may exercise, and usurpers assume, may be in concrete contrary to God's institution, and so not to be owned; yet, in the abstract, it may be acknowledged of God. It is but the abuse of the power, and that does not take away the use. We may own the power, though we do not own the abuse of it. I answer, 1. I acknowledge the distinction as to magistrates is very pertinent; for it is well said by the congregation in a letter to the nobility, Knox's History of Scotland, Book 2. 'That there is a great difference betwixt the authority, which is God's ordinance, and the persons of these who are placed in authority; the authority and ordinance of God can never do wrong, for it commandeth that vice be punished, and virtue maintained; but the corrupted person placed in this authority may offend.'