by FREE CONVENTION AND MUTUAL COMPACT: because whatever is sovereign and independent can be brought to no act without its own consent: but nothing can give birth to a free convention, but a sense of mutual wants which may be supplied, or a view of mutual benefits which may be gained, by it. Such, then, is the nature of that UNION which produceth a CHURCH BY LAW ESTABLISHED; and which is indeed no other than a politic league and alliance for mutual support and defence. For the state not having the care of souls, cannot, of itself, inforce the influence of religion; and therefore seeks aid of the church: and the church having no coercive power (the consequence of its care not extending to bodies) as naturally flies for protection to the state*. This being of the nature of that alliance which Grotius calls, FŒDUS INÆQUALE. "Inæquale "foedus (says he) hic intelligo quod ex ipsa vi pac" tionis manentem prælationem quandam alteri donat: "Hoc est ubi quis tenetur alterius imperium ac majes"tatem conservare UT POTENTIORI PLUS HONORIS, INFERIORI PLUS AUXILII DEFERATUR †."

From whence it is seen, that, were those common notions true, which we have been at so much pains to confute, concerning the nature of a church and state, there could be neither room nor motive for this alliance. Were they not independent on each other, there could be no ROOM; because freedom of will, the very essence of this alliance, would be wanting on one part;

Hæc extant præclara Arnulfi Lexovensis Episcopi verba, "Dignitas ecclesiastica regiam provehit potius quam adimit dig"nitatem, et regalis dignitas ecclesiasticam conservare potius "consuevit quam tollere libertatem. Equidem quasi quibusdam "sibi invicem complexibus dignitas ecclesiastica & regalis concurrent; cum nec reges salutem sine ecclesia, nec ecclesia pacem "sine protectione regia consequatur." Marca, 1. ii. c. 12. F. T. + De Jure Belli & Pac. Lib. i. cap. iii. § 21.

F.T.

and

and had the state the care of souls, or the church the care of bodies, there could be no mutual MOTIVE; for, in the first case, the state, by its own authority, might apply religion to civil purposes in the latter, the church, having, in consequence of the care of bodies, an inherent coercive power, might, by its authority, provide for its own security.

An ALLIANCE then, by free convention, being in its nature such that each party must have its motives for contracting; our next enquiry will be, first,

I. What those motives were, which the state had for seeking, and the church for accepting, the offers of an Union. And, secondly,

II. What were the mutual benefits and advantages arising therefrom.

By the first part of which enquiry, we hope to make it appear, THAT THIS ALLIANCE WAS INDISPEN

SABLY NECESSARY FOR SECURING THE WELL-BEING

AND HAPPINESS OF CIVIL SOCIETY: And by the second, THAT NO COMMON RIGHT OF MAN, CIVIL OR RELIGIOUS, IS IMPEACHED BY IT. To demonstrate which is one of the principal ends of this discourse.

CHAP. II.

OF THE MOTIVES THE STATE HAD TO SEEK, AND THE CHURCH TO ACCEPT, AN ALLIANCE.

THE motives the magistrate had to seek this Alliance were these:

I. To preserve the essence and purity of Religion.

II. To improve its usefulness, and apply its influence in the best manner.

III. To

1

III. To prevent the mischief which, in its natural independent state, it might occasion to civil society.

I.

I. The Magistrate was induced to seek it,

1. As the necessary means of preserving the very BEING of Religion. For though, as hath been shewn, Religion constitutes a Society; and that this society will indeed, for some time, support Religion, which, without it, would soon vanish from amongst men: yet, if we consider, that this society is made up of the same individuals which compose the civil; and destitute likewise of all coercive power; we must needs see, that a society, thus abandoned to its own fortune, without support or protection, would, in no long time, be swallowed up and lost. Nor can we reasonably hope that this danger might be averted, by that inherent power, we have shewn, to be in the state of restraining the oppugners of the three fundamental principles of natural religion; because that power could only prevent these principles from being directly depraved or subverted; not from gradually decaying and falling into oblivion. Of this opinion was an able writer, whose knowledge of human nature will not be disputed: "Were it not, says he, for that sense of virtue which "is principally preserved, so far as it is preserved, by NATIONAL FORMS AND HABITS of Religion, men would soon lose it all, run wild, prey upon one "another, and do what else the worst of savages do*.”

2. But of whatever use an alliance may be thought, for preserving the being of religion; the necessity of it, for preserving its PURITY, is very evident. For if TRUTH and PUBLIC UTILITY coincide, the nearer any

• Wollaston's Religion of Nature Delineated, p. 124.

religion

religion approaches to the truth of things, the fitter that religion is for the service of the state. That they do coincide, that is, that truth is productive of utility, and utility indicative of truth, may be thus proved. That truth is productive of utility, appears from the nature of the thing. Observing truth, is acting as things really are: He who acts as things really are, must gain his end; all disappointment proceeding from acting as things are not; just as in reasoning from true or false principles, the conclusion which follows must be, as the principles, necessarily right or wrong. But gaining the end of acting is utility or happiness; disappointment of the end, hurt or misery. If then truth produce utility, the other part of the proposition, that utility indicates truth, follows of course. For not to follow, supposes two different kinds of general utility relative to the same creature, one proceeding from truth, the other from falsehood; which is impossible; because the natures of those utilities must then be different; that is, one of them must, and, at the same time, must not, be utility. Wherever then we find UNIVERSAL UTILITY, we may certainly know it for the PRODUCT OF TRUTH, which truth it indicates. Let us then consider the danger which religion runs, of deviating from truth, when left, in its natural state, to itself. In these circumstances, the men of highest credit are such as are famed for greatest sanctity. This sanctity hath been generally understood to be then most perfect when most estranged from the world, and all its habitudes and relations. But this being only to be acquired by secession and retirement from human affairs; and that secession rendering man ignorant of civil society, of its rights and interests; in place of which will succeed, according to his natural temper, the destructive follies either

of

of superstition or fanaticism; we must needs conclude that Religion, under such directors and reformers (and God knows these are too commonly its lot) will devi-. ate from truth; and consequently from a capacity, in proportion, of serving Civil Society. I wish I could say, we had not fact to support this speculation. The truth is, we have seen, and yet do see, Religious Societies, some grown up, and continuing unsupported by, and ununited with the state; others that, when supported and united, have by strange arts brought the state into subjection, and become its tyrants and usurpers; and thereby defeated all the good that can arise from this alliance; such societies, I say, we have seen, whose religious doctrines are so little serviceable to civil government, that they can prosper only on the ruin and destruction of it. Such are 'those which teach the sanctity of celibacy and asceticism; the sinfulness of defensive war, of capital punishments, and even of civil magistracy itself.

On the other hand, when religion is in ALLIANCE with the state, as it then comes under the magistrate's direction, those holy leaders having neither credit nor power to do mischief, its purity must needs be reasonably well supported and preserved *. For, truth and public utility coinciding, the civil magistrate, as such, will see it for his interest to seek after, and promote TRUTH in religion: and, by means of public UTILITY, which his office enables him so well to understand, he will never be at a loss to know where such truth is to be found. So that it is impossible, under this civil influence, for religion ever to deviate far from truth; always supposing (for on such supposition this whole

Imminuta esset libertas ecclesiæ, si a principum secularium imperio libera, ab episcopis iniqua servitute premeretur. Marca, 1. iii. c. 1. F. T.

theory