Men are gods, or, The dignity of magistracy, and the duty of the magistrate…

The meaning of the holy Scriptures is far different from the sense which the Apostate Julian put on them. When he had taken away their estates, he put them off with a mock, Your Master said, Blessed are the poor: and when he had sorely beaten them with his hands, he would wound them with his tongue saying, Your Master said If one beat you on one cheek turn to him the other. The Gospel certainly was never intended for a cross, but a comfort to a Christian, and though its principal aim be to further him spiritually, yet it never designed to hinder him corporally by any of those commands.¹ Christ is more tender of his people, then to thrust them into the world like sheep among ravenous Wolves, and to deny them leave of calling to those civil shepherds to take care of them. God hath for that end appointed Magistrates to be nursing-Fathers, and nursing-Mothers ⟨p. 218⟩to the children of God, to be as tender of them, as provident for them, as helpful to them as Parents to their children, as Nurses to their Babes. They are set up by God himself to be a wall upon which the weak Ivy of the Church may lean, and by which it may be supported.

The meaning of the holy Scriptures is far different from the sense which the Apostate Julian put on them. When he had taken away their estates, he put them off with a mock, Your Master said, Blessed are the poor: and when he had sorely beaten them with his hands, he would wound them with his tongue saying, Your Master said If one beat you on one cheek turn to him the other. The Gospel certainly was never intended for a cross, but a comfort to a Christian, and though its principal aim be to further him spiritually, yet it never designed to hinder him corporally by any of those commands.¹ Christ is more tender of his people, then to thrust them into the world like sheep among ravenous Wolves, and to deny them leave of calling to those civil shepherds to take care of them. God hath for that end appointed Magistrates to be nursing-Fathers, and nursing-Mothers ⟨p. 218⟩to the children of God, to be as tender of them, as provident for them, as helpfull to them as Parents to their children, as Nurses to their Babes. They are set up by God himself to be a wall upon which the weak Ivie of the Church may lean, and by which it may be supported.