[The character] of a good ruler as it was recommended in a sermon [preached…

THE CHARACTER OF A GOOD RULER.

II. SAMUEL XXIII. III. He that Ruleth over men, must be just, Ruling in the Fear of God.

Whether the Ordination of Civil Government be an Article of the Law of Nature, and it should accordingly have been established upon the Multiplication of Mankind, although they had retained their Primitive Integrity: Or whether i• have only a Positive right, and was introduced upon mans Apostasy; is a question about which all are not agreed. The equity of it, to be sure, is founded in the Law natural, and is to ⟨p. 2⟩be discovered by the light of Nature, being accordingly acknowledged by such as are strangers to Scripture Revelation; and by Christians it is reducible to the first Command in the Second Table of the Decalogue; which is supposed to be a transcript of the Law given to Adam at the first, and written upon the Tables of his Heart. For tho▪ had man kept his first state, the Moral Image Concreated in him, consisting in, Knowledge, Righteousness, and True Holiness, would have maintained him in a perfect understanding of, and Spontaneous Obedience to the whole duty incumbent on him, without the need of civil Laws to direct him, or a civil Sword to lay compulsion on him; and it would have been the true Golden Age, which the Heathen Mythologists are so Fabulous about. yet even then did the All-Wise God Ordain Orders of Superiority and Inferiority among men, and required an Honour to be paid accordingly. But since the unhappy fall hath Robbed man of that perfection, and filled his heart with perverse and rebellious principles, tending to the Subversion of all Order and the reducing of the World to a Chaos; necessity requires, and the Political happiness of a People is concerned in the establishment of Civil Government. The want of it hath