A27004:747
The reasons of the Christian religion the first part, of godliness, proving by natural…
The reasons of the Christian religion the first part, of godliness, proving by natural evidence the being of God ... : the second part, of Christianity, proving by evidence supernatural and natural, the certain truth of the Christian belief ... / by Richard Baxter ... ; also an appendix defending the soul's immortality against the Somatists or Epicureans and other pseudo-philosophers.
London: printed by R. White for Fran. Titon, 1667
Part 1 › Chapter 14: That there is a Life of Retribution after this.
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.
2. Yea, no tolerable Government at all could be kept up, (I speak not of God's Physical motion by Omnipotency.) For, 1. The Rulers of the world, that have none above them would have little or no restraint; and their examples would form the people to all abomination. If they feared insurrections, they would oppress them the more to disable them. And what a world must it be, when Lust is the Law to all the Governors? And the people would have nothing but the hopes and fears of temporal good or evil, to restrain them from any Treason or Rebellion or villainy. And all those that Princes cannot please, would plot,1 revenge or play their game another way: and subtle men would think it easy to poison or murder secretly Princes and Nobles, and any enemy that stood in the way of their own designs,2 if once they were out of fear of a life to come.
2. Yea, no tolerable Government at all could be kept up, (I speak not of God's Physical motion by Omnipotency.) For, 1. The Rulers of the world, that have none above them would have little or no restraint; and their examples would form the people to all abomination. If they feared insurrections, they would oppress them the more to disable them. And what a world must it be, when Lust is the Law to all the Governours? And the people would have nothing but the hopes and fears of temporal good or evil, to restrain them from any Treason or Rebellion or villany. And all those that Princes cannot please, would plot,1 revenge or play their game another way: and subtil men would think it easie to poison or murder secretly Princes and Nobles, and any enemy that stood in the way of their own designs,2 if once they were out of fear of a life to come.
- 1A fortnight after the writing of this London was burnt.
- 2Qui nihil alterius causa sacit, & metitur suis commodis omnia, videtis credo quid sit acturus— si negabit illi vitam erepturum, & aurum ablaturum, non quod turpe judicet, sed quod metuat ne emanet, id est, ne malum habeat. Cic. ibid.