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Show f 16 ] E I7 ll that the term rendered till, ought to have been franlio iated commit murder ; for it is certain that the :lebrew word is of as extenfive {ignilication as the turgid-h, and. applied indifi'erently to lawful as tokunlawéul killing. Children, obey your parcrsz, {LIT-S rue film l8 Yard, KIN flLL THINGS. The fame injunction I: degenerate into tyranny, that all the miferies of a civil war confequent on refiltance, would be leis tsr» rible than the flavery and opprefhon full‘ered under alfo given to fervants in regard to tllCll‘ matters: the government, then, and only then, could re~ This, one would think, excludes all exceotro‘n, if words can exclude it. Yet I believe no chrifirau will urge, that there would be an obligation to fillance be {aid to be either incumbent as a duty, or even lawful. It cannot reafonably be denied that the principle of {elf-defence is as natural and juftiliu obedience from this precept, fhould aparent com- able in communities, as in individuals. mand his child, or a mailer command his fervant, to Thus much I thought it necefliiry to pren‘ir", for the fake of truth, and that it might not be imagined, flml I {hall offer but one other inllance, an. in. fiance which nearly refembles the point in hand". Our Lord has given us this exprefs prohibition, Rzfl/f not twill), and that without any ref'trié'tion whatever. Yet if this were to be underflood by chrillians as admitting no exception, it would among them abolilh magill‘racy itfeh‘. For what is magi/chy, but, it I may be allowed the exprellion, a bulwark erected for the defence of the fociety, and confequently for the very purpofe of re/i/Zz'ng evil, for repelling injuries ofl‘ered molt important ends, the good offociety. If this inflitution therefore fhould, in any inf'tance, fo far I mean to argue on the flavilh, unnatural, ani jullly exploded, principles ofpajzve Media/2w and non-re- , fi/z'nncc; principles whole manifell: tendency is the ellahlilhment and fupport of defpotifin. At the fame time it is but doing juftice to the argument, to take notice, that if there be a danger on the one hand, of tying the knot of allegiance, which binds the fabjcé't to the fovereign too hard, there is no lefs danger on the other, of making it too loofe. Nothing is out, or by its own corrupted members from within? more common than for people to run from one extreme to another. 1We have indeed happily aban- Therefore, nnlcfs the nature of the thing require it, doned the abfurd tenets above-mentioned, but is there We cannot conclude to much from a general pro, no reafon "to dread that many in this ifland are run: ning preeipitately into the oppolite error? an error whole direét tendency is anarcby, which commonly terminates in ufurpation and tyranny, the very thing 0r committed, eitucr by foreign enemies fromwrth. pofinon. And that the nature of the thing does not in this cafe require it, is manifeft from this confideration, that government obliges us in confcience to obedi- propofed to be avoided by refif'tance. That we may ' ence and fubmifhon, only becaufe it is the mean: be properly guarded againft {o fatala millake, I appointed by previdcncc, for promoting one ofthe hope, my brethren, to be indulged oh this head a ‘f t 21‘: 2 " Col. iii. an, 22. b Matt. v. 39. *u .‘l |
