LECTURE XXIV.

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The Sixth Commandment.

AVING fet before you, under the Fifth Commandment, the particular Duties, which Inferiors and Superiors owe each to the other; I proceed now to those remaining Precepts, which express the general Duties of all Men to all Men.

Amongst these, as Life is the Foundation of every Thing valuable to us, the Prefervation of it is justly intitled to the first Place. And accordingly the Sixth Commandment is, Thou shalt do no Murder. Murder is taking away a Person's Life, with Defign, and without Authority. Unless both concur, it doth not deserve that Name.

1. It is not Murder, unless it be with Defign. He, who is duly careful to avoid doing Harm, and unhappily, notwithstanding that, kills another, though he hath Caufe

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Cause to be extremely forry for it, yet is entirely void of Guilt on Account of it. For his Will having no Share in the Action, it is not, in a moral Senfe, his. But if he do the Mischief through Heedleffnefs, or Levity of Mind, or inconfiderate Vehemence, here is a Fault. If the Likelihood of Mischief could be foreseen, the Fault is greater; and. the highest Degree of fuch Negligence, or impetuous Rafhnefs, comes near to bad Intention.

2. It is not Murder, unless it be without. Authority. Now a Perfon hath Authority, from the Law both of God and Man, to defend his own Life, if he cannot do it otherwife, by the Death of whoever attacks it unjustly whofe Destruction, in that Cafe, is of his own seeking, and his Blood on his own Head. But nothing, fhort of the most imminent Danger, ought ever to carry us to fuch an Extremity: and a good Perfon will spare ever, fo bad an one, as far as he can with any Profpect of Safety. Again, proper Magiftrates have Authority to fentence Offenders to Death, on fufficient Proof

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2 Sam. i. 16. Kings ii. 37. Ezek. xxxiii. 4.

of

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But in

of fuch Crimes as the Welfare of the Community requires to be thus punished; and to employ others in the Execution of that Sentence. And private Perfons have Authority, and in proper Circumstances are obliged, to feize and profecute fuch Offenders for all this is only another Sort of SelfDefence; defending the Public from what elfe would be pernicious to it. And the Scripture hath faid, that the Sovereign Power beareth not the Sword in vain. whatever Cafes gentler Punishments would fufficiently anfwer the Ends of Government, furely capital ones are forbidden by this Commandment. Self-Defence, in the laft Place, authorizes whole Nations/ to make war upon other Nations, when it is the only Way to obtain Redress of Injuries, which cannot be supported; or Security against impending Ruin. To determine, whether the State is indeed in these unhappy Circumftances, belongs to. the fupreme Jurifdiction: and the Question ought to be confidered very confcientioufly.. For Wars begun or continued without.

Rom. xiii. 4.

Neceffity,

Neceffity, are unchriftian and inhuman: as many Murders are committed, as Lives are loft in them; befides the innumerable Sins and Miseries of other Sorts, with which they are always attended. But Subjects, in their private Capacity, are incompetent Judges of what is requifite for the public Weal: nor can the Guardians of it permit them to act upon their Judgment, were they to make one. Therefore they may lawfully ferve in Wars, which their Superiors have unlawfully undertaken, except→ ing perhaps fuch offenfive Wars as are notoriously unjust. In others, it is no more the Business of the Soldiery to consider the Grounds of their Sovereign's taking up Arms, than it is the Business of the Executioner to examine whether the Magistrate hath paffed a right Sentence.

You fee then, in what Cafes killing is not Murder in all, but these, it is. And you cannot fail of feeing the Guilt of this Crime to be fingularly great and heinous. It brings defignedly upon one of our Brethren, without Caufe, what human Nature abhors and dreads moft. It cuts him off from all the Enjoyments

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Enjoyments of this Life at once, and fends him into another, for which poffibly he was not yet prepared. It defaces the Image, and defeats the Defign, of God. It overturns the great Purpofe of Government and Laws, mutual Safety. It robs the Society of a Member, and confequently of Part of its Strength. It robs the Relations, Friends, and Dependants, of the Perfon destroyed, of every Benefit and Pleafure, which elfe they might have had from him. And the Injury done, in all these Respects, hath the terrible Aggravation, that it cannot be recalled. Moft wifely therefore hath our Creator furrounded Murder with a peculiar Horror; that Nature, as well as Reafon, may deter from it every one, who is not utterly abandoned to the worst of Wickednefs: and most justly hath he appointed the Sons of Noah, that is, all Mankind, to punish Death with Death. Whofo fheddeth Man's Blood, by Man fhall his Blood be fhed: for in the Image of God made He Man. And that nothing may protect fo daring an Offender, he enjoined the fews, in the Chapter which fol

• Gen. ix. 6.

lows