The Power of the Magistrate Internal and External

Baxter on magistracy, authority, and conscience

Returning again to Baxter’s Second Part of the Nonconformist Plea for Peace, Chapter III (“Of the Power of Kings, and the people’s obedience”):

All kingly power is derived directly from God and, therefore, subordinate to him. “He is the End as well as the Original of their power; and they have none but for him and his ends, which is His Pleasure and Glory and the publick good.”

“God as the Vniversal Ruler hath signified his will in the nature of man and of things, than he will have the world live in Political order, and have Government and obedience; so that it is Commanded by him in the Law of Nature, antecedently to mens voluntary conjunction. The people therefore give not the King or any other Soveraigns their Power.”

[…]

“Their power resulteth from Gods Law which instituteth Government, under him, and that Immediately, as to any mediate Donor, though not Immediately as without any mediate condition sine qua non. For though Originally the peoples consent was necessary to determine of the person, or in hereditary Government, of the family, that should receive the power from God; yet that is no Donation of the Power it self. Even as the Kings Charter immediately giveth the power of a Mayor or Bailiff to a Corporation, though by the same Charter the people choose that person that shall receive it. Or as a woman chooseth the man that shall be her Husband, but giveth him not the Government of her, for that is given by Gods institution, to that person whom she contracteth with and if she should agree with him that he should not be her Governour, it were a nullity.”

[…]

“The chief use of Kings and Magistrates is, to rule according to Gods Universal Laws, and to see them put in execution as far as the Ends of Government require in this world. To which end they are to make Laws of their own.”

This does not suggest that God’s laws are somehow imperfect, but rather is a manifestation of the God-given power invested in rulers and affirms their duty to the higher law at all times. In context, rulers must apply (determine) the natural law to context without subverting or contradicting scripture.

“Humane Lawgivers may subordinately determine of those things in particular, which God hath only commanded in general; when the ends of Government require a Legal determination of them.”

So too is their power limited by any kind of “Contract with the people, called by some Fundamental or Constitutive Laws,” insofar as a proper commonwealth “is not a society of slaves, but of free subjects and of such a Soveraign as is to Rule for the publick Good of the society.” (This is discussed by Baxter again, and at length, in the Christian Directory; see my three-part series on this and related questions here, here, and here.)  

“He is the wisest and happiest King, that by his Government most promoteth the publick Good; which also is his chiefest Honour.”

Now, what authority do human determinations have on men, on their consciences? What obedience is owed?

Following from above, Baxter affords God’s laws (particular and general) a “primitive power to a conscientious obedience.” Primitive implying original or first, not inferior or unsophisticated. God being the source of kingly power, a king’s laws possess a “derived power” to obedience according to conscience.

Conscience, explains Baxter, is “the judgment of a man of himself, as he is subject to the judgment of God.” Men, earthly powers, may, indeed, bind conscience by a derived authority but it would be a contradiction in terms for them to bind their subjects against conscience, which is to say, against “duty to God, when we do not err.” That latter caveat is important. Conscience can err because, contra our contemporary evangelical discourse, it is not itself a “Law-giver, Governour, or maker of duty, but a discerner of duty made by Laws.” Were the case otherwise, then conscience would actually operate as moderns abuse it, viz., as a sort of “my truth” radar.

In fact, “your knowledge or ignorance changeth not God’s Laws… God will not change his Laws, because men are sinfully indisposed to obey them.” And, “An erring Conscience is improperly called Conscience; because error is not properly science.”

Question: “But how shall a man rectifie his erring judgement?”

Answer: “Gods means are commonly known, though not commonly used. Hear, read, meditate, pray, forbear the sin which grieveth your Guide; cast out corrupt affections, passions and lusts, and lay by carnal interests that would pervert the judgement.”

The equation, for Baxter, is simple:

“So also if the Magistrates commands be lawful (the esse still being antecedent to the scire) and yet the subject think them unlawful, his error will not justifie his disobedience: but he is bound to judge better and to obey. And if the Magistrates commands be against our duty to God, and the subject think them to be lawful, his errors will not make them or his obedience to them to be lawful.”

Baxter addresses some unnamed “muddy-headed troublers of the world” and boils the question down to one: “Who shall be the judge?” Conscience or king?

Well, it depends on a few factors: 1) the relative certainty of the principle in question. Has it been revealed clearly by God or is it adiaphora? 2) The level of evil risked by obeying or disobeying.

First,

“If the matter were unrevealed, and so men were uncertain, because God had not made known his mind, then their Rule of precedency were to be regarded; But if God have sufficiently revealed his will, no vicious uncertainty of it will make it a duty or lawful, to obey the contrary command of man.”

Second, a distinction must be made between greater and lesser evils. Example:

“[I]f I be certain that I who am a poor low subject, am bound to obey a Justice of Peace, in all things lawful (by Gods Laws and the Kings); And a Justice commandeth me to do some little act, which I know not whether the Law forbid or not, I will obey him: But if he bid me do that, which I am in doubt whether it be Treason, and would endanger the life of the King, or the safety of his Kingdoms, though I be uncertain, yet I will forbear.

And if a Ruler bid me read a Chapter in the old Testament to day, and I be uncertain whether God would not have me read one in the New Testament, as fitter to the Auditors, I will obey my Rulers in this case, not because I am certain at all that hic & nunc it is my duty formally to obey them; but because I take the disobeying them, in case it should now prove a sin, to be a Greater sin than the mischoosing of the Chapter would be if that should prove the sin; and to choose the greater sin, is a greater aggravation of that great sin.”

On the other hand,

“[I]f man command me the doings, or the omissions, which if they should prove unlawful would prove to be Perjury… or would prove a murdering of mens souls; and if on the contrary, it should prove lawful to do these things, yet the not doing them will have no other evil, than not obeying the Law; (in such uncertainty) or my own personal suffering; here I would rather not obey, being uncertain of the matter commanded. Not because I am sure which is my duty at all in it self; but that I am sure that to prefer the greater evil, when I know not the good, is an aggravation of that evil: And so to sin, is a double and more dangerous sin.”

That said, “no subject as such, or private man, hath any Publick decisive judgment [by act of private judgment]; nor must in cases Religious or Civil claim the least degree thereof.” For magistracy alone possesses the divine power for public judgment, come what may. [n.b., subjects may disobey when appropriate, adds Baxter, “yet may they not by arms resist authority… When subjects suffer from Kings for obeying God, they must not take occasion by it to dishonour Kings by aggravating the injury: Because the Kings honour is more necessary to the publick peace and welfare, than the righting of a subjects injured reputation is.”]

And this will be tough for modern evangelicals to swallow: “the Power of Magistrates is both Internal and External, that is, They may command inward fidelitie, honour, &c. to God to Parents and to themselves (though they cannot see when it is performed alone;) And they may command outward actions; But the later is their most common work.”

Again, and this is very well put by Baxter,

“[T]he Power of Magistrates is both Internal and external; for they Govern both mind and body: For there is no Ruling of mens Bodies by Laws, unless they first rule the mind: for Laws force not the Locomotive power immediately. And so Pastors have both External and Internal Power, because by Gods word they Rule first the mind, and by that the Body; as to forbear sin, to worship God, &c.”

The Second Part treats this subject more fully still in a subsequent chapter, notes of which I’ll add later.