the !tie wers, was, when Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Ne- ro were Roman emperors ; none of whom were the beftg nor near the belt, even of Pagan emperors ; and fome of them were very monfters of men. Only it would be carefully looked to, that foundations be not fhaken and put out of courte, and that ancient boundaries and land- marks be not removed ; which no Chriftian civil love. reigns, in kingdoms or common-wealths, keeping them - felves in the line of due and juff fubordination to the Majefly of God, the great and abfolute Superior and Sovereign, the King of kings, by, and under whom, all kings reign, will allow of, or give way unto, whatever unhallowed Hobbits profanely and impioufly fuggeft to the contrary : Whofe principles (whatever they pretend to grant to the civil fovereigns of kingdoms and com- mon-wealths) have a manifeft tendency to the unhinging and utter diffolving of all government. For, let us in Thort but fuppofe thefe four things, which Hobbs very magilterially, tanquam ex tripode, dietates and takes for granted in his forecited book : ¡fl, That all religion is bottomed on human authority, and precarioufly borrow- ed from the will and pleafure of men, and hath no di- vine authority of its own ; whereby (as ingenuous and acute Sir Charles I'oolfly, in his Unreafonablenefs of Athe- ifm, fays) An inroad is n ade upon its befi defence; for in- deed (faith he) it will never be kept up with any other in- terefl in the ccnfciences of men; and where it is not fuppor- ted by co;nfcience, it is ever tottering, and yields to the blafls of every human pleafure. llc once (faith the fame learned gentleman) it be taken for granted, that the fériptures have no authority but what the civil power gives them, they quill foon come upon a divine account to have none at all. 2dly, That the apoftles could not make their writings obligatory canons without the help of the fovereign ci- vil powers ; and that therefore the fcripture of the new tef}ament is the only law there, where the civil power makes it fo As if, forfoath, the divine authority ifam- ped thereon by the abfblute Sovereign, by the great and -infallible degilator, carried with it no immediate obli- gallon on the confciences of men, to whom it comes, to receive and obey it as his law, knofoever b licvetb (faith Sir
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