A92147:880
A treatise of civil policy
A treatise of civil policy: being a resolution of forty three questions concerning prerogative, right and privilege, in reference to the supreme prince and the people. / By Samuel Rutherford professor of divinity of St Andrews in Scotland.A treatise of civil policy: being a resolution of forty three questions concerning prerogative, right and priviledge, in reference to the supream prince and the people. / By Samuel Rutherford professor of divintiy of St Andrews in Scotland.
London, : Printed and are to be sold by Simon Miller at the Star in St Pauls Church-yard near the West end., 1657 i.e. 1656
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.
as they fall under a formal commandment of God, or words of action, not of any Chimerical passive obedience, as we are not to resist actively Gods ordinance, as his ordinance, ver. 1. 2. that is, to resist God actively. 2. We are to do good works, not evil, if we would have the ruler no terror to us, ver. 3. 3. We must not do ill, if we would be free of vengeances sword: ver. 7. we are to pay tribute and to give fear and honour to the ruler, ver. 7. all which are evidently actions, not passive subjection, and if any passive subjection be commanded, it is not here, nor in the first commandment, commanded, but in the first commandment under the hand of patience and submission under Gods hand in sufferings, or in the third commandment under the hand of rather dying for Christ, or denying his truth before men; hence I argue here Rom. 13. and 1 Pet. 2. and Tit. 3. is nothing else, but an exposition of the fifth commandment, but in the fifth commandment only active obedience is formally commanded, and the subordination of inferiors to superiors is ordained, and passive obedience is no where commanded, but only modus rei, the manner of suffering, and the occasion of the commandment, here it is thought that the Jews converted under this pretext, that they were Gods people, believed that they should not be subject to the Romans. A certain Galilean made the Galileans believe that they should not pay tribute to Strangers, and that they should call none Lord, but the God of heaven, as Joseph. saith, Antiq. Judaic. l. 20. c. 2. and De bell. Judaic. l. 7. c. 29. yea and Hieron. Come. in 3. Tit. saith, At this time the sect of the Galileans were on foot. It is like the Jews were thought to be Galileans, and that their liberty purchased in Christ could not consist with the order of master and servant, King and subject. And to remove this, Paul establisheth Magistracy, and commandeth obedience in the Lord; and he is more to prove the office of the Magistrate to be of God, then any other thing; and to show what is his due, then to establish absoluteness in Nero to be of God; yea to me, every word in the Text speaketh limitedness of ⟨p. 320⟩Princes, and crieth down absoluteness: 1. No power of God, 2. No ordinance of God, 3. Who is a terror to evil, but a praise to good works, 4. No minister of God for good, &c.