A Christian Directory, Part 4: Christian Politics. Richard Baxter

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СКАЧАТЬ God's laws are the measure and bound of human laws; against which no man can have power.

      4. Because God's rewards and punishments are incomparably more regardable than man's; eternal joy or misery being so much more considerable than temporal peace or suffering; therefore though it be a dishonour to lawyers to be ignorant of languages, history, and other needful parts of learning, yet it is much more their dishonour to be ignorant of the universal government and laws of God.115

      Direct. II. Be sure that you make not the getting of money to be your principal end in the exercise of your function; but the promoting of justice, for the righting of the just, and the public good; and therein the pleasing of the most righteous God.116 For your work can be to you no better than your end. A base end doth debase your work. I deny not, but your competent gain and maintenance may be your lower end, but the promoting of justice must be your higher end, and sought before it. The question is not, Whether you seek to live by your calling; for so may the best; nor yet, Whether you intend the promoting of justice; for so may the worst (in some degree). But the question is, Which of these you prefer? and which you first and principally intend? He that looketh chiefly at his worldly gain, must take that gain instead of God's reward, and look for no more than he chiefly intended; for that is formally no good work, which is not intended chiefly to please God, and God doth not reward the servants of the world; nor can any man rationally imagine, that he should reward a man with happiness hereafter, for seeking after riches here. And if you say that you look for no reward but riches, you must look for a punishment worse than poverty; for the neglecting of God and your ultimate end, is a sin that deserveth the privation of all which you neglect; and leaveth not your actions in a state of innocent indifferency.

       Direct. III. Be not counsellors or advocates against God, that is, against justice, truth, or innocency. A bad cause would have no patrons, if there were no bad or ignorant lawyers. It is a dear-bought fee, which is got by sinning; especially by such a wilful, aggravated sin, as the deliberate pleading for iniquity, or opposing of the truth.117 Judas's gain and Ahithophel's counsel will be too hot at last for conscience, and sooner drive them to hang themselves in the review, than afford them any true content: as St. James saith to them that he calleth to weep and howl for their approaching misery, "Your riches are corrupted, and your garments moth-eaten, your gold and silver is cankered, and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire: ye have heaped treasure together for the last days." Whatever you say or do against truth, and innocency, and justice, you do it against God himself. And is it not a sad case that among professed christians, there is no cause so bad but can find an advocate for a fee? I speak not against just counsel to a man that hath a bad cause (to tell him it is bad, and persuade him to disown it); nor do I speak against you for pleading against excessive penalties or damages; for so far your cause is good, though the main cause of your client was bad; but he that speaketh or counselleth another for the defence of sin, or the wronging of the innocent, or the defrauding another of his right, and will open his mouth to the injury of the just, for a little money, or for a friend, must try whether that money or friend will save him from the vengeance of the universal Judge (unless faith and true repentance, which will cause confession and restitution, do prevent it).

      The Romans called them thieves, that by fraud, or plea, or judgment got unlawful gain, and deprived others of their right.

      Lampridius saith of Alexander Severus, Tanti eum stomachi fuisse in eos judices qui furtorum fama laborassent, etiamsi damnati non essent, ut si eos casu aliquo videret, commotione animi stomachi choleram evomeret, toto vultu inardescente, ita ut nihil posset loqui. And afterwards, Severissimus judex contra fures, appellans eosdem quotidianorum scelerum reos, et solos hostes inimicosque reipublicæ. Adding this instance, Eum notarium, qui falsum causæ brevem in consilio imperatorio retulisset, incisis digitorum nervis, ita ut nunquam posset scribere, deportavit. And that he caused Turinus one of his courtiers to be tied in the market-place to a stake, and choked to death with smoke, for taking men's money on pretence of furthering their suits with the emperor; Præcone dicente, Fumo punitur, qui vendidit fumum. He strictly prohibited buying of offices, saying, Necesse est ut qui emit, vendat: Ego vere nin patiar mercatores potestatum: quos si patiar, damnare non possum. The frowns or favour of man, or the love of money, will prove at last a poor defence against his justice whom by injustice you offend.118

      The poet could say,

      Justum et tenacem propositi virum,

      Non civium ardor prava jubentium

      Non vultus instantis tyranni,

      Mente quatit solida: – Horat.

      But if men would first be just, it would not be so hard to bring them to do justly; saith Plautus,

      Justa autem ab injustis petere insipientia est:

      Quippe illi iniqui jus ignorant neque tenent.

      Direct. IV. Make the cause of the innocent as it were your own; and suffer it not to miscarry through your slothfulness and neglect.119 He is a lover of money more than justice, that will sweat in the cause of the rich that pay him well, and will slubber over and starve the cause of the poor, because he getteth little by them. Whatever your place obligeth you to do, let it be done diligently and with your might; both in your getting abilities, and in using them. Scævola was wont to say, (ut lib. Pandect. 42. tit. refer.) Jus civile vigilantibus scriptum est, non dormientibus. Saith Austin, Ignorantia judicis plerumque est calamitas innocentis. And as you look every labourer that you hire should be laborious in your work, and your physician should be diligent in his employment for your health; so is it as just that you be diligent for them whose cause you undertake, and where God who is the lover of justice doth require it.

      Direct. V. Be acquainted with the temptations which most endanger you in your place, and go continually armed against them with the true remedies, and with christian faith, and watchfulness, and resolution. You will keep your innocency, and consequently your God, if you see to it that you love nothing better than that which you should keep. No man will chaffer away his commodity for any thing which he judgeth to be worse and less useful to him. Know well how little friends or wealth will do you in comparison of God, and you will not hear them when they speak against God, Luke xiv. 26; xvii. 33. When one of his friends was importunate with P. Rutilius to do him an unjust courtesy, and angrily said, "What use have I of thy friendship, if thou wilt not grant my request?" He answered him, "And what use have I of thy friendship, if for thy sake I must be urged to do unjustly?" It is a grave saying of Plutarch, Pulchrum quidem est justitia regnum adipisci: pulchrum etiam regno justitiam anteponere: nam virtus alterum ita illustrem reddidit, ut regno dignus judicaretur; alterum ita magnum ut id contemneret. Plut. in Lycurg. et Numa. But especially remember who hath said, "What shall it profit a man to win all the world, and lose his soul?" And that temptations surprise you not, be deliberate and take time, and be not too hasty in owning or opposing a cause or person, till you are well informed; as Seneca saith of anger, so say I here, Dandum semper est tempus: veritatem enim dies aperit. Potest pœna dilata exigi; cum non potest exacta revocari. It is more than a shame to say, I was mistaken, when you have done another man wrong by your temerity.120

      CHAPTER V.

      THE DUTY OF PHYSICIANS

      Neither is it my purpose to give any occasion to the learned men of this honourable profession, to say that I intermeddle in the mysteries of their art. I shall only tell them, and that very briefly, what God and conscience will expect from them.

      Direct. I. Be sure that the saving of men's lives and health, be first and chiefly in your СКАЧАТЬ