15 - Of subjection in general, and the subjects of a civil state

Summary

In the former part I have, according to my poor ability, declared, […] what the act of government is. […] That the subject of it being a commonwealth both civil and ecclesiastical, it hath two parts: […] the constitution [and] the administration of the same. [I have argued] that the matter of a commonwealth is the community, and the form, an order of superiority and subjection; […] that there are two integral parts of a commonwealth, […] pars imperans, the sovereign, [and] pars subdita, the subject. [I have declared] what the power of a sovereign is, how it is acquired, how disposed, and that both in a civil state and church. Now according to order comes in pars subdita, to be considered both in a civil and an ecclesiastical notion. What a subject in a civil state is cannot be known in particular, except we know the nature of subjection in general. The word in Greek, which signifies to be subject is [hypotassesthai] to be subordinate. For subjection presupposeth order, not physical and local, but moral of superior and inferior. That which makes a superior is power, and power over another, which is not invested with it; in which respect he is inferior in relation to him that hath power over him. And so soon as God hath made one superior to another instantly, the party inferior is bound to subjection, which is a thing due unto this superior.