A discourse about civil government in a new plantation whose design is religion written…

The Assumption (That the Form of Government described in the tr•• stating of the Question, doth give unto Christ his due preeminence) will easily be granted by those that shall consider what Civil Magistrates and Rulers in the Common wealth those are, who are fittest to serve to Christ's ends for the good and welfare of his Church; which will be evident from two places of Scripture: First, in Psa. 2.10, 11, 12. you have a description of those that are fitted to order Civil Affairs in their Magistracy to Christ's ends; they are such as are not only wise and learned in matters of Religion but also do reduce their knowledge into practise: they Worship the Lord in fear▪ and not only so, but Kiss the So•, which was a solemn & outward P•• fession of love^(a), and of Subjection^(b), and of Religions Worship^(c), and so fitly serveth to express their joining themselves to the Church of Christ. Secondly, in Isa. 49.23. it is promised to the Church, that Kings and Queens shall be their nursing-fathers and nursing-mothers, and therefore it is added, They shall worship with their faces to the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; which is a proverbial expression of their voluntary humbling of themselves to Christ in his Ordinances, (taken from the manner of the Persians, in declaring their Subjection to their Emperor^(d), which the Apostle calls a voluntary submission to the Gospel^(e), which is the spirit of the Members of the Churches of Christ. And for this Reason it is, that the Lord, when he moulded a Communion among his own People, wherein all Civil Administrations should serve to holy ends, be described the men to whom that Trust should be committed, by certain Properties, which also qualified them for fellowship in Church-Ordinances, as Men of ability and power over their own affections