_Answ._ There is much difference in the cases, though the soul be more precious than the body: for, 1. Here there is supposed to be so much leisure and space as that you may have time to tell the magistrate of it, whose duty primarily it is: whereas in the other case it is supposed that so much delay would be a man's death. Therefore your duty is to acquaint the magistrate with the sin and danger, and not to anticipate him, and play the magistrate yourself. Or in the case of cards, and dice, and hurtful books, you may acquaint the persons with the sin, and persuade them to cast them away themselves. 2. Your taking away these instruments is not like to save them: for the love of the sin, and the will to do it, remain still; and the sinner will but be hardened by his indignation against your irregular course of charity. 3. Men are bound to save men's bodies whether they will or not, because it may be so done; but no man can save another's soul against his will! And it is God's will that their salvation or damnation shall be more the fruit of their own wills, than of any other's. Therefore, though it is possible to devise an instance, in which it is lawful to steal a poisonous book or idol from another, (when it is done so secretly as will encourage no disobedience or disorder; nor is like to harden the sinner, but indeed to do him good, &c.) yet ordinarily all this is unlawful for private men, that have no government of others, or extraordinary interest in them.[155]
_Quest._ XV. May not a magistrate take the subjects' goods, when it is necessary for their own preservation?
_Answ._ I answered this question once heretofore in my "Political Aphorisms:" and because I repent of meddling with such subjects, and of writing that book, I will leave such cases hereafter for fitter persons to resolve.
_Quest._ XVI. But may I not take from another for a holy use; as to give to the church or maintain the bishops? If David took the hallowed bread in his necessity, may not hallowed persons take common bread?
_Answ._ If holy persons be in present danger of death, their lives may be saved as other men's on the terms mentioned in the first case. Otherwise God hath no need of theft or violence; nor must you rob the laity to clothe the clergy; but to do such evil on pretence of piety and good, is an aggravation of the sin.
[155] A wife or near friend that is under no suspicion of alienating the thing to their own commodity, nor of ill designs, may go somewhat further in such cases, than an inferior or a stranger.