obliged to retain them, longer than it is for the public good; the care of which they stand so long charged withal, as they retain any other essential right of the sovereignty. [Sidenote: The pastoral authority of sovereigns only is _jure divino_; that of other pastors is _jure civili_.] If a man therefore should ask a pastor, in the execution of his office, as the chief-priests and elders of the people (_Matth._ xxi. 23) asked our Saviour, _By what authority doest thou these things, and who gave thee this authority?_ he can make no other just answer, but that he doth it by the authority of the commonwealth, given him by the king, or assembly that representeth it. All pastors, except the supreme, execute their charges in the right, that is by the authority of the civil sovereign, that is, _jure civili_. But the king, and every other sovereign, executeth his office of supreme pastor by immediate authority from God, that is to say, in _God’s right_ or _jure divino_. And therefore none but kings can put into their titles a mark of their submission to God only, _Dei gratiâ rex_, &c. Bishops ought to say in the beginning of their mandates, _By the favour of the King’s Majesty, bishop of such a diocese_; or as civil ministers, _in His Majesty’s name_. For in saying, _Divinâ providentiâ_, which is the same with _Dei gratiâ_, though disguised, they deny to have received their authority from the civil state; and slily slip off the collar of their civil subjection, contrary to the unity and defence of the commonwealth. [Sidenote: Christian kings have power to execute all manner of pastoral function.] But if every Christian sovereign be the supreme pastor of his own subjects, it seemeth that he hath also the authority, not only to preach, which perhaps no man will deny, but also to baptize and to administer the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper: and to consecrate both temples and pastors to God’s service; which most men deny; partly because they use not to do it, and partly because the administration of sacraments, and consecration of persons and places to holy uses, requireth the imposition of such men’s hands, as by the like imposition successively from the time of the apostles have been ordained to the like ministry. For proof therefore that Christian kings have power to baptize, and to consecrate, I am to render a reason, both why they use not to do it, and how, without the ordinary ceremony of imposition of hands, they are made capable of doing it when they will.