ewith compare Exod. viii. 25, 26. Or whether the
offences be against the third commandment, "And thou shalt speak unto
the children of Israel, saying, Whosoever curseth God shall bear his
sin: and he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord he shall surely be put
to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him, as well
the stranger as he that is born in the land, 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