people, it is generally allowed, that the people may get redreſs, by reſiſtance, if other methods prove ineffectual. And if any officers in a kingly government, go beyond the limits of that power which they have derived from the crown, (the ſuppoſed original ſource of all power and authority in the ſtate) and attempt, illegally, to take away the properties and lives of their fellow ſubjects, they may be forcibly reſiſted, at leaſt till application can be made to the crown. But as to the ſovereign himſelf, he may not be reſiſted in any caſe; nor any of his officers, while they confine themſelves within the bounds which he has preſcribed to them. This is, I think, a true ſketch of the principles of thoſe who defend the doctrine of paſſive obedience and nonreſiſtance. Now there is nothing in Scripture which ſupports this ſcheme of political principles. As to the paſſage under conſideration, the apoſtle here ſpeaks of civil rulers in general; of all perſons in common, veſted with authority for the good of ſociety, without any particular reference to one form of government, more than to another; or to the ſupreme power in any particular ſtate, more than to ſubordinate powers. The apoſtle does not concern himſelf with the different forms of government.[1] This he ſuppoſes left intirely to human prudence
- ↑ The eſſence of government (I mean good government; and this is the only government which the apoſtle treats of in this paſſage) conſiſts in the making and executing of good laws—laws attempered to the common felicity of the governed. And if this be, in fact, done, it is evidently, in it ſelf, a thing of no conſequence at all, what the particular form of government is;—whether the legiſlative and executive power be lodged in one and the ſame perſon,
