A27016:501
A saint or a brute the certain necessity and excellency of holiness, &c. ...…
A saint or a brute the certain necessity and excellency of holiness, &c. ... / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed by R.W. for Francis Tyton, 1662
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
And if you say that the ancient Romans had a sufficient Government, I answer, 1. The most of them believed a life to come, and it was but a few that denied the Immortality of the soul: and therefore it was this that Governed the Nations. For those that believed another life, had the Government of the few that did not believe it, or else the Government it self had been more corrupt. 2. And yet the faultiness of their belief appeared in the faultiness of their Government. Every Tyrant took away mens lives at pleasure. Every Citizen that had slaves (which was common) at pleasure killed them, and cast them into the fishponds. The servants secretly poisoned their masters, and that in so great numbers, that Seneca saith, Epist. 4. ad Lucul. that the [Number of those that were killed by their servants, through treachery, deceit, or force, was as great, as of them that were killed by Kings]; which was not a few.
And if you say that the antient Romans had a sufficient Government, I answer, 1. The most of them believed a life to come, and it was but a few that denyed the Immortality of the soul: and therefore it was this that Governed the Nations. For those that believed another life, had the Government of the few that did not believe it, or else the Government it self had been more corrupt. 2. And yet the faultiness of their belief appeared in the faultiness of their Government. Every Tyrant took away mens lives at pleasure. Every Citizen that had slaves (which was common) at pleasure killed them, and cast them into the fishponds. The servants secretly poysoned their masters, and that in so great numbers, that Seneca saith, Epist. 4. ad Lucul. that the [Number of those that were killed by their servants, through treachery, deceit, or force, was as great, as of them that were killed by Kings]; which was not a few.
2. It is apparent that the world would be a Wilderness, and men like wild and ravenous beasts, if they were not Governed by Motives from the Life to come.