when he blasphemeth the name of the Lord shall be put to death,” Lev. xxiv. 15, 16.  Yea, the heathen king Nebuchadnezzar made a notable decree to this purpose, against blaspheming God, saying, “I make a decree, that every people, nation, and language, who speak any thing amiss against the God of Shadrach, Meshech, and Abednego, shall be cut in pieces, and their houses shall be made a dunghill,” Dan. iii. 29:  and the pagan magistrate, king Artaxerxes, made a more full decree against all contempt of the law of God:  “And whosoever will not do the law of thy God,” saith he to Ezra, “and the law of the king, let judgment be executed speedily upon him, whether it be unto death, or to banishment, or to confiscation of goods, or to imprisonment:”  and Ezra blesses God for this, Ezra vii. 26, 27.

Besides all this light of nature, and evidence of the Old Testament, for the ruler’s political punitive power for offences against God, there are divers places in the New Testament showing that a civil punitive power rests still in the civil magistrate:  witness those general expressions in those texts—­Rom. xiii. 3, 4:  “Rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil.  If thou do that which is evil, be afraid, for he beareth not the sword in vain:  for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.” 1 Pet. ii. 13, 14:  “Submit yourselves unto every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, whether it be to the king as to the supreme, or unto governors which are sent for the punishment of evil-doers,[28] and the praise of them that do well.”  Now, (as Mr. Burroughs[29] notes,) seeing the Scripture speaks thus generally, except the nature of the thing require, why should we distinguish where the Scripture doth not? so that these expressions may be extended to those sorts of evil-doing against the first as well as against the second table; against murdering of souls by heresy, as well as murdering of men’s bodies with the sword; against the blaspheming of the God of heaven, as well as against blaspheming of kings and rulers, that are counted gods on earth.  That place seems to have much force in it to this purpose, Heb. x. 28, 29:  “He that despised Moses’ law, died without mercy under two or three witnesses.  Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?” Yea, what deserve such as deny the Spirit to be of God?  Papists exempt their clergy from the judgment of the civil power, though they be delinquents against it; and their states, both civil and spiritual, from civil taxes, tributes, and penalties, both which we deny to ours:  for, 1st, This is repugnant to the law of nature, that church officers and members, as parts and members of the commonwealth, should not be subject to the government of that commonwealth whereof