exercife of government; the law has provided a remedy. The administration falls into the hands of a regency, in whom the nation may confide, as being appointed by the nation itself. If our king fhould ever happen to be a weak man, the Parliament are his hereditary council; and he will be affifted by all the wifdom of the nation. If he should even be a man of an arbitrary and tyrannical difpofition, the law has cut off the claws of the lion. The fate of the firft Charles, and the fecond James, will teach him to restrain himself within the bounds prefcribed by law. Or if he does not, he breaks the contract; his right to the crown ceafts; and the nation will provide him a fucceffor. Before people decide, with regard to hereditary fucceffion, they would need to know more of the matter, than what is to be learned from Paine's invectives. Suppofe a chief magiftrate were to be elected by the whole nation, would not that man who knew how to flatter the vanity, and humour the prejudices, of the populace, however profligate his character, be as likely to be chofen, as a man of wisdom and prudence, free from resiless ambition, and above sacrificing the public intereft, to his own, or that of his family? Is it of no confequence, that he who is to be a king have fuch an education as may qualify him for the du ties of his high ftation? Does not the limitation of the fucceffion to one family tend to prevent our kings from being infected with thofe little jealousies, and party connections, which are fo favourable to felfishnefs, avarice, and cruelty and fo repugnant to that magnanimity, justice, and mercy, that ought to diftinguish the man who rules a great nation? Would not the election of a king give much more scope to corruption, than that of members of Parliament, or of perfons in any inferior office? Or has ever an executive government been e rected rected or maintained, with fo little animofity, disturbance, or danger to public liberty, as by a limited hereditary monarchy ? Such a hereditary fucceffion as we have, is likewife agreeable to fcripture; and is plainly exemplified in that government, which God himself fet up. Though the government in Ifrael was a theocracy, that is, though God himself was their king, and therefore might have appointed whom he would for his deputy, without confulting the people, and actually did fo in the days of the judges; yet no kings were ever impofed upon them, without their confent, nor any but fuch as themselves had chofen. Saul was exprefsly chofen by the people *. And though David had been previously anointed by Samuel, at the command of God; yet he did not think himself authorised to take upon him the adminiftration, even after the death of Saul, till the people had invested him with it. Accordingly, he was chofen and anointed king, by the tribe of Judah affembled at Hebron †: and over them only he claimed any right to reign, till he was also chofen by the people of Ifrael, feven years afterwards . And though God had promised that the throne should be hereditary in David's line, upon certain conditions; yet this was not confidered as legally fixing the fucceffion, till it was done by a deed of the people. Accordingly, when Solomon died, all Ifrael affembled at Shechem, to make Rehoboam king; and when he refu fed to comply with the conditions which they ftipulated, ten tribes rejected him, and he reigned over two only. It deferves particular notice, that it is not faid, in the hiftory of that tranfaction, that the tribe of Judah clave to Rehoboam, or followed him; but they followed the houfe of David. From hence it would appear, that after the ten tribes were gone, the people of Judah and Benjamin, juftly apprehenfive of the renovation of fuch a fcene as they had just witneffed, agreed, by a folemn national deed, to fix the fucceffion in the family of David. Accordingly, we hear no more of their affembling again for the choice or inauguration of Rehoboam's fucceffors: but the fon regularly occupied his father's throne, without any further interpofition of the people; unless when the fucceffion was interrupted by Athaliah's ufurpation. At any rate, we are fure, that the fucceffion in that line was hereditary: that it was fo by the appointment of God, and with the confent of the people: and therefore, that all the fcurrility, fpued out by our modern reformers, against hereditary fucceffion, applies equally to the constitution of the kingdom of Judah, as to that of Britain. If the one is inconfiftent with reafon, with common fenfe, or with the rights of man, fo was the other: Confequently, God, the Fountain of reafon, the Creator of man, and the Giver of all his rights, not only fet up a government among his chosen and beloved people, that was deftructive of all these, but continued to fupport it for nearly five hundred years! To take off the force of this argument, we are told, that God gave them this form of government, as a punifhment; because they rejected him from being their King, and would needs have a king like the other nations and what was a punishment to them can never : be * 1 Kings xii, 20. be a bleffing to any other people. In fupport of this the words of God by the prophet Hofea, are often quoted: I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath. But it is plain that these words were addressed . to the ten tribes: and all interpreters understand them either of Saul, in whom they were literally fulfilled, or elfe of that race of kings, who had reigned in Ifrael, from the time of their revolt from David's family, and from the worship of the true God; and whom God was juft about to take away by the hand of the king of Affyria. But until the prefent time, it never yet entered into the mind of any person, who had a right publicly to interpret fcripture, to understand these words of David or of his family. How could it? In what fenfe was ever David given in anger? Or how could his family bé faid to have been taken away in the days of Hofea, when it continued to reign an hundred and fifty years after? The fetting up of that family was ever confidered by the people of God, as an act of fingular favour, and was celebrated, as fuch, in their public praises †. It may be faid, that the people were mistaken: and that the Queen of Sheba was alfo mistaken, when she said to Solomon," Because the Lord thy God loved Ifrael for ever, therefore made he thee king, to do judge"ment and juftice !" But was the fpirit of God miftaken, when he indited the pfalms referred to in the margin? Or has the church, from the days of David to the prefent time, been publicly praifing God, for setting up and maintaining among his people, a government inconfiftent with reafon and common fenfe! Chriftians fhould alfo confider, that in thofe injunc tions, which are laid upon us in the New Testament, to be fubject to the higher powers, kings are expressly mentioned: that we are specially called to pray, and even to give thanks for kings: That Jefus Chrift himfelf is a king, though his kingdom is not of this world: and that if the kingly office among men had been a thing difagreeable to God, or to reafon, the fon of God had never been disgraced with the name, or with the office. Chrift is even a hereditary king, fitting" on the throne "of his father David, to order it, and to establish it, "from henceforth and for ever." They fhould confider, that there are many promifes and prophecies, contained in the word of God, and which we hope to fee accomplished in due time, more fully than they have ever yet been, that plainly and neceffarily fuppofe the continued existence of kings, and their activity in promoting the interests of Chrift. Kings fhall be nurf"ing fathers, and their queens nurfing mothers" to the church. "All kings fhall bow down before Chrift, " and all nations fhall ferve him. The kings of the "earth fhall bring their glory and honour into" the new Jerufalem *. In anfwer, therefore, to those who exprefs their hopes, that monarchy fhall foon be abolished, in all the nations of the world, we rejoice in declaring our firm affurance, that while Chrift has a church upon earth, and while there are nations to ferve him, there shall alfo be kings to bow down, and they fhall bow down before him. Thefe arguments from fcripture, are fo plain and conclufive, in favours of limited royalty, that Mr Paine himself, * See Ifa. xlix. 23. Pfal. lxxii. 11. Rev. xxi. 24. |