was used, long before temples were either built or thought lawful. The reason of this seems to be, because those places could not be thought to shut up or confine the immensity of God, as they supposed a house did; and withal gave his worshippers a nearer approach to heaven by their height. Hence we read that the Samaritans worshipped upon mount Gerizim, John iv. 20; and Samuel went up to the high place to sacrifice, 1 Sam. ix. 14; and Solomon sacrificed at the high place in Gibeon, 1 Kings iii. 1; yea, the temple itself was at length built upon a mount or high place, 2 Chron. iii. 1. You will say then, Why are these places condemned? I answer, That the use of them was not condemned, as absolutely and always unlawful in itself, but only after the temple was built, and that God had professed to put his name in that place and no other: therefore, what was lawful in the practice of Samuel and Solomon before the temple was in being, was now detestable in Jeroboam, since that was constituted by God the only place for his worship. To bring this consideration to the times of Christianity: because the apostles and primitive Christians preached in houses, and had only private meetings, in regard they were under persecution, and had no churches; this cannot warrant the practice of those now-a-days, nor a toleration of them, that prefer houses before churches, and a conventicle before the congregation.

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2. For the second thing, which is the consecration of the priests; it seems to have been correspondent to ordination in the Christian church. Idolaters themselves were not so far gone, as to venture upon the priesthood without consecration and a call. To show all the solemnities of this, would be tedious, and here unnecessary the Hebrew word which we render to consecrate, signifies to fill the hand, which indeed imports the manner of consecration, which was done by filling the hand: for the priest cut a piece of the sacrifice and put it into the hands of him that was to be consecrated; by which ceremony he received right to sacrifice, and so became a priest. As our ordination in the Christian church is said to have been heretofore transacted by the bishop's delivering of the bible into the hands of him that was to be ordained, whereby he received power ministerially to dispense the mysteries contained in it, and so was made a presbyter. Thus much briefly concerning consecration.

There remains nothing else to be explained in the words: I shall therefore now draw forth the sense of them into these two propositions.

I. The surest means to strengthen, or the readiest to ruin the civil power, is either to establish or destroy the worship of God in the right exercise of religion.

II. The next and most effectual way to destroy religion, is to embase the teachers and dispensers of it.

Of both these in their order.

I. For the prosecution of the former we are to show,

1. The truth of the assertion, that it is so. 2. The reason of the assertion, why and whence it is so.

1. For the truth of it: it is abundantly evinced from all records both of divine and profane history, in which he that runs may read the ruin of the state in the destruction of the church; and that not only portended by it, as its sign, but also inferred from it, as its

cause.

2. For the reason of the point; it may be drawn,

(1.) From the judicial proceeding of God, the great King of kings, and Supreme Ruler of the universe: who for his commands is indeed careful, but for his worship jealous: and therefore in states notoriously irreligious, by a secret and irresistible power, countermands their deepest project, splits their counsels, and smites their most refined policies with frustration and a curse; being resolved that the kingdoms of the world shall fall down before him, either in his adoration or their own confusion.

(2.) The reason of the doctrine may be drawn from the necessary dependence of the very principles of government upon religion. And this I shall pursue more fully. The great business of government is to procure obedience, and keep off disobedience: the great springs upon which those two move are rewards and punishments, answering the two ruling affections of man's mind, hope and fear. For since there is a natural opposition between the judgment and the appetite, the former respecting what is honest, the latter what is pleasing; which two qualifications seldom concur in the same thing; and since, withal, man's design in every action is delight; therefore, to render things honest also practicable, they must be first represented as desirable, which cannot be but by proposing honesty clothed with pleasure; and since it presents no pleasure to the sense, it must be fetched from the apprehension of a future reward: for, questionless, duty moves not so much upon command as promise. Now therefore, that which proposes the greatest and most suitable rewards to obedience, and the greatest terror and punishments to disobedience, doubtless is the most likely to enforce one and prevent the other. But it is religion that does this, which to happiness and misery joins eternity. And these, supposing the immortality of the soul, which philosophy indeed conjectures, but only religion proves, or (which is as good) persuades: I say these two things, eternal happiness and eternal misery, meeting with a persuasion that the soul is immortal, are without controversy, of all others, the first the most desirable, and the latter the most horrible to human apprehension. Were it not for these, civil government were not able to stand before the prevailing swing of corrupt nature, which would know no honesty but advantage, no duty but in pleasure, nor any law but its own will. Were not these frequently thundered into the understandings of men, the magisVOL. I.-8

trate might enact, order, and proclaim; proclamations might be hung upon walls and posts, and there they might hang, seen and despised, more like malefactors than laws: but when religion binds them upon the conscience, conscience will either persuade or terrify men into their practice. For put the case, a man knew, and that upon sure grounds, that he might do an advantageous murder or robbery, and not be discovered; what human laws could hinder him, which he knows cannot inflict any penalty, where they can make no discovery? But religion assures him, that no sin, though concealed from human eyes, can either escape God's sight in this world, or his vengeance in the other. Put the case also, that men looked upon death without fear, in which sense it is nothing, or at most very little; ceasing while it is endured, and probably without pain, for it seizes upon the vitals and benumbs the senses, and where there is no sense there can be no pain I say, if while a man is acting his will towards sin, he should also thus act his reason to despise death, where would be the terror of the magistrate, who can neither threaten or inflict any more? Hence an old malefactor in his execution at the gallows made no other confession but this, that he had very jocundly passed over his life in such courses; and he that would not for fifty years' pleasure endure half an hour's pain, deserved to die a worse death than himself. Questionless this man was not ignorant before that there were such things as laws, assizes, and gallows; but had he considered and believed the terrors of another world, he might probably have found a fairer passage out of this. If there was not a minister in every parish, you would quickly find cause to increase the number of constables; and if the churches were not employed to be places to hear God's law, there would be need of them to be prisons for breakers of the laws of men. Hence it is observable that the tribe of Levi had not one place or portion together like the rest of the tribes; but because it was their office to dispense religion, they were diffused over all the tribes, that they might be continually preaching to the rest their duty to God; which is the most effectual way to dispose them to obedience to man: for he that truly fears God cannot despise the magistrate. Yea, so near is the connection between the civil state and religious, that heretofore, if you look upon well regulated, civilized heathen nations, you will find the government and the priesthood united in the same person: Anius, rex idem hominum, Phæbique sacerdos. En. 3, ver. 80. If under the true worship of God: "Melchisedec, king of Salem, and priest of the most high God,” Heb. vii. 1. And afterwards Moses (whom as we acknowledge a pious, so atheists themselves will confess to have been a wise prince), he, when he took the kingly government upon himself, by his own choice, seconded by divine institution, vested the priesthood in his brother Aaron, both whose concernments were so coupled,

that if nature had not, yet their religious, nay, civil interests would have made them brothers. And it was once the design of the emperor of Germany, Maximilian the first, to have joined the popedom and the empire together, and to have got himself chosen pope, , and by that means derived the papacy to succeeding emperors. Had he effected it, doubtless there would not have been such scuffles between them and the bishop of Rome; the civil interest of the state would not have been undermined by an adverse interest, managed by the specious and potent pretences of religion. And to see, even amongst us, how these two are united, how the former is upheld by the latter: the magistrate sometimes cannot do his own office dexterously, but by acting the minister. Hence it is that judges of assizes find it necessary in their charges to use pathetical discourses of conscience; and if it were not for the sway of this, they would often lose the best evidence in the world against malefactors, which is confession: for no man would confess and be hanged here, but to avoid being damned hereafter.

Thus I have, in general, shown the utter inability of the magistrate to attain the ends of government, without the aid of religion. But it may be here replied, that many are not at all moved with arguments drawn from hence, or with the happy or miserable state of the soul after death; and therefore this avails little to procure obedience, and consequently to advance government. I answer by concession, That this is true of epicures, atheists, and some pretended philosophers, who have stifled the notions of Deity and the soul's immortality; but the unprepos sessed on the one hand, and the well disposed on the other, who both together make much the major part of the world, are very apt to be affected with a due fear of these things; and religion accommodating itself to the generality, though not to every particular temper, sufficiently secures government: inasmuch as that stands or falls according to the behaviour of the multitude. And whatsoever conscience makes the generality obey, to that prudence will make the rest conform. Wherefore, having proved the dependence of government upon religion, I shall now demonstrate, that the safety of government depends upon the truth of religion. False religion is, in its nature, the greatest bane and destruction to government in the world. The reason is, because whatsoever is false is also weak. Ens and verum in philosophy are the same; and so much as any religion has of falsity, it loses of strength and existence. Falsity gains authority only from ignorance, and therefore is in danger to be known; for from being false, the next immediate step is to be known to be such. And what prejudice this would be to the civil government is apparent, if men should be awed into obedience, and affrighted from sin by rewards and punishments, proposed to them in such a religion, which afterwards should be detected, and found

a mere falsity and cheat; for if one part be but found to be false, it will make the whole suspicious. And men will then not only cast off obedience to the civil magistrate, but they will do it with disdain and rage, that they have been deceived so long, and brought to do that out of conscience, which was imposed upon them out of design; for though men are often willingly deceived, yet still it must be under an opinion of being instructed. Though they love the deception, yet they mortally hate it under that appearance: therefore it is noways safe for a magistrate, who is to build his dominion upon the fears of men, to build those fears upon a false religion. It is not to be doubted, but the absurdity of Jeroboam's calves made many Israelites turn subjects to Rehoboam's government, that they might be proselytes to his religion. Herein the weakness of the Turkish religion appears, that it urges obedience upon the promise of such absurd rewards, as that, after death, they should have palaces, gardens, beautiful women, with all the luxury that could be: as if those things, that were the occasions and incentives of sin in this world, could be the rewards of holiness in the other: besides many other inventions, false and absurd, that are like so many chinks and holes to discover the rottenness of the whole fabric, when God shall be pleased to give light to discover and open their reasons to discern them. But you will say, What government more sure and absolute than the Turkish, and yet what religion more false? Therefore certainly government may stand sure and strong, be the religion professed never so absurd. I answer, that it may be so by accident, through the strange peculiar temper and gross ignorance of a people, as we see it happens in the Turks, the best part of whose policy, supposing the absurdity of their religion, is this, that they prohibit schools of learning; for this hinders knowledge and disputes, which such a religion would not bear. But suppose we, that the learning of these western nations were as great there, as here, and the Alcoran as common to them as the bible to us, that they might have free recourse to search and examine the flaws and follies of it, and withal that they were of as inquisitive a temper as we: and who knows, but as there are vicissitudes in the government, so there may happen the same also in the temper of a nation? If this should come to pass, where would be their religion? And then let every one judge, whether the arcana imperii and religionis would not fall together? They have begun to totter already; for Mahomet having promised to come and visit his followers, and translate them to paradise, after a thousand years, this being expired, many of the Persians began to doubt and smell the cheat, till the mufti, or chief-priest, told them that it was a mistake in the figure, and assured them, that upon more diligent survey of the records, he found it two thousand, instead of one. When this is expired, perhaps they will not be able to renew the fallacy. I say there