Three things present themselves for the vindication of the equity of God's righteous judgments, in the recompensing the sins of the king upon the people.
1. The concurrence and influence of the people's power into their rule and government : — they that set him up may justly be called to answer for his miscarriage. The Lord himself had before made the sole bottom of that political administration to be their o^vn wills : " If thou wilt have a king, after the manner of the nations," Deut. xvii. 1 4 ; 1 Sam. viil 7. Though for particulars, himself (according to his su- preme sovereignty) placed in many [appointed many of the kings], by peculiar exemption ; otherwise his providence was served by their plenary consent, or by such dispensation of things as you have related, 1 Kings xvi. 21, 22, " Then were the people of Israel divided into two parts : half of the people followed Tibni, the son of Ginath, to make him king ; and half followed Omri. But the people that fol- lowed Omri prevailed against the people that followed Tibni ; so Tibni died, and Omri reigned." Now, they who place men in authority to be God's vicegerents, do undertake to God for their deportment in that authority, and therefore may justly bear the sad effects of theu- sinful miscarriages.
2. Because, for fear of Manasseh's cruelty, or to flatter him in his tyranny for their own advantage, the greatest part of the people had apostatized from the ways and worship of Hezekiah, to comply with him in his sin ; as at another time " they willingly walked after the commandment," Hos. v. 11. And this is plainly expressed, 2 Kings xxi. 9, " Manasseh seduced the people to do more evil than the na- tions." When kings turn seducers, they seldom want good store of followers. Now, if the blind lead the bhnd, both will, and both justly may, fall into the ditch. When kings command uni-ighteous things, and people suit them with willing comphance, none doubts but the de- struction of them both is just and righteous. See verse 6 of this chapter.
3. Because the people, by virtue of their retained sovereignty, did not restrain him in his provoking ways. So Zuinglius, Artie. 42, " Qui non vetat, cum potest, jubet." When Saul would liave put Jonathan to death, the people would not suffer him so to do, but de- livered Jonathan, that he died not, 1 Sam. xiv. 45. When David pro- posed the reducing of the ark, his speech to the people was, " If it seem good unto you, let us send abroad to our brethren eveiTwhere, that tliey may gather themselves to us : and all the congi-egation said that they would do so : because the thing was right in the eyes of all the people," 1 Chron. xiii. 2,4. So they bargain with Rehoboam about their subjection, uj^on condition of a moderate rule, 1 Kings, xii. By
BY DIVINE PROTECTION. IS 7
virtue of which power, also, they delivered Jeremiah from the prophets and priests that would have put him to death, Jer. xxvi. 16. And on this ground might they justly feed on the fruit of their own ne- glected duty. See Bilson on Obed., part iii. page 271.
Be it thus, or otherwise, by what way soever the people had their interest therein, certain it is, that for the sins of Manasseh, one way or other made their own, they were destroyed. And therefore, these things being written for our example, it cannot but be of great con- cernment to us to know what were those sins which wrapped up the people of God in irrevocable destruction. Now, these the Holy Ghost fully manifesto th in the story of the life and reign of this Manasseh, and they may all be reduced unto two chief heads.
(1.) False worship or superstition : "He built high places, made altars for Baal, and a grove, as did Ahab," 2 Kings xxi. 3.
(2.) Cruelty : " He shed innocent blood very much, till he had filled Jerusalem with blood from one end of it to another," verse 16.
Whether this cruelty be to be ascribed to his tyranny in civil af- fairs, and so the blood shed is called innocent because not of male- factors; or to his persecution in subordination to his false worship, instituted as before (as the pope and his adherents have devoured whole nations "in ordine ad spiritualia"), is not apparent; but this is from hence and other places most evident, that superstition and persecution, will-worship and tyranny, are inseparable concomitants.^
Nebuchadnezzar sets up his great image, and the next news you hear, the saints are in the furnace, Dan. iii. 20. You seldom see a fabric of human-invented worship, but either the foundation or top- stone is laid in the blood of God's people. " The wisdom" (religion, or way of worship) " that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy," James iii. 1 7 ; — when the other is " earthly, sensual, devilish, bringmg along envying, strife, confusion, and every evil work," verse 16. Persecution and blood is the genuine product of all invented worship. I might from hence name and pur- sue other observations, but I shall only name one, and proceed.