promise?  How much honester would it be to say, that extreme cases are ‘ipso nomine’ not generalizable, —­therefore not the subjects of a law, which is the conclusion ’per genus singuli in genere inclusi’.  Every extreme case must be judged by and for itself under all the peculiar circumstances.  Now as these are not foreknowable, the case itself cannot be predeterminable.  Harmodius and Aristogiton did not justify Brutus and Cassius:  but neither do Brutus and Cassius criminate Harmodius and Aristogiton.  The rule applies till an extreme case occurs; and how can this be proved?  I answer, the only proof is success and good event; for these afford the best presumption, first, of the extremity, and secondly, of its remediable nature—­the two elements of its justification.  To every individual it is forbidden.  He who attempts it, therefore, must do so on the presumption that the will of the nation is in his will:  whether he is mad or in his senses, the event can alone determine.

Ib. p. 398.

  The governing power and obligation over the flock is essential to the
  office of a Pastor or Presbyter as instituted by Christ.

There is, [Greek:  hos emoige dokei], one flaw in Baxter’s plea for his Presbyterian form of Church government, that he uses a metaphor, which, inasmuch as it is but a metaphor, agrees with the thing meant in some points only, as if it were commensurate ‘in toto’, and virtually identical.  Thus, the Presbyter is a shepherd as far as the watchfulness, tenderness, and care, are to be the same in both; but it does not follow that the Presbyter has the same sole power and exclusive right of guidance; and for this reason,—­that his flock are not sheep, but men; not of a natural, generic, or even constant inferiority of judgment; but Christians, co-heirs of the promises, and therein of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and of the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures.  How then can they be excluded from a share in Church Government?  The words of Christ, if they may be transferred from their immediate application to the Jewish Synagogue, suppose the contrary;—­and that highest act of government, the election of the officers and ministers of the Church, was confessedly exercised by the congregations including the Presbyters and Arch-presbyter or Bishop, in the primitive Church.  The question, therefore, is:—­Is a national Church, established by law, compatible with Christianity?  If so, as Baxter held, the representatives (King, Lords, and Commons,) are or may be representatives of the whole people as Christians as well as civil subjects;—­and their voice will then be the voice of the Church, which every individual, as an individual, themselves as individuals, and, ‘a fortiori’, the officers and administrators appointed by them, are bound to obey at the risk of excommunication, against which there would be no appeal, but to the heavenly Caesar, the Lord and Head of the universal Church.  But whether as the accredited representatives