A26939:157
How to do good to many, or, The public good is the Christians life…How to do good to many, or, The publick good is the Christians life…
How to do good to many, or, The public good is the Christians life directions and motives to it, intended for an auditory of London citizens, and published for them, for want of leave to preach them / by Richard Baxter.How to do good to many, or, The publick good is the Christians life directions and motives to it, intended for an auditory of London citizens, and published for them, for want of leave to preach them / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for Rob. Gibs, 1682
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
7. Every true Christian is absolutely devoted to do good. What else is it to be devoted to God our Creator and Redeemer? Wha• live we for, or what should we desire to live for, but to do good?
II. But this Exhortation is especially applicable to them that have special opportunity.
1. Magistrates are the Capitals in the Societies and Public Affairs ⟨p. 36⟩of mankind. They are placed highest that they may have an universal influence. Tho it be too high a word to call them Gods, or Gods Vice-gerents (unless secundum quid) yet they are his Officers and Regent Ministers; but it's for the common good. In them God shows what Order can do in the Government of the World: As the placing of the same figure before many, doth accordingly advance its value in signification, so it is a wonder to Note, what the Place of one man signifieth at the Head of an Army, of a City, of a Kingdom. They are appointed by God to govern men in a just subordination to Gods Government, and no otherwise. To promote obedience to Gods Laws by theirs, and by their Judgment and Execution to give men a foretaste, what they may at last expect from God. And by their Rewards and Punishments to foretell men whom God will Reward and Punish: And by their own Examples to show the Subjects, how temperately, and soberly, and godly, God would have them live. Atheists can see and fear a Magistrate, that fear not God, because they know him not.
1. Magistrates are the Capitals in the Societies and Publick Affairs ⟨p. 36⟩