THE MYSTERY OF MAGISTRACY UNVAILED:
OR,
GOD’S ORDINANCE OF MAGISTRACY
ASSERTED, CLEARED, AND VINDICATED,
FROM HEATHENISH DOMINION, TYRANNOUS
AND ANTI-CHRISTIAN USURPATION, DESPISERS
OF DIGNITIES, AND CONTEMNERS OF AUTHORITIES.
 
 
 
Isaiah 57:4. Cast ye up, prepare the way, take up the stumbling-blocks out of the way of my people.

Isaiah 5:10. Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.

Matthew 19:8. But from the beginning it was not so.

Isaiah 33:22. For the Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King, he will save us.

Isaiah 9:6. And the Government shall be upon his shoulders.

Isaiah 1:26. And I will restore thy Judges as at first, and thy Counselors as at the beginning: afterwards thou shalt be called the City of Righteousness, the Faithful City.
 

TABLE OF CONTENTS
 
CHAPTER I.-Of the Original and First Institution of Magistracy.

CHAPTER II.-Of the Orders or Kinds of Rulers.

CHAPTER III.-Of the Qualifications Required in the Judge or Ruler.

CHAPTER IV.-Of the Electors, Who Were to Apply the Foresaid Qualifications in the Choice
of Rulers, and the Manner of Election.

CHAPTER V.-Of the Dignity of the Office.

CHAPTER VI.-Of the Ruler’s Duty to Enable Him to the Office.

CHAPTER VII.-Of the Ruler’s Duty (in General) in the Discharge of his Trust,
Wherein Government Principally Consists.

CHAPTER VIII.-Of the Ruler’s Duty in Particular, as to the Manner of the
Discharge of his Trust, viz.

CHAPTER IX.-Of the People’s Duty to their Magistrates in the Rules Following.

CHAPTER X.-Of the Great Blessing Righteous Rulers are to a People; Held Out in the Characters and Resemblances Following.

CHAPTER XI.-Of the Promised Blessing that is to Attend the Latter Days in a Righteous Rule and Ruler.

CHAPTER XII.-Of the Judgment and Curse Attending No Rule, or an Evil Ruler.

CHAPTER XIII.-Of the People’s Duty Under Wicked Rulers, Both Towards God and Them.
 
 
 

[The following work first appeared in print ca. 1708.  Although the author of the work is anonymous, it has been attributed to George Gillespie, the Westminster divine.  Whether or not this is true is of little concern to us.  The fact remains that, regardless of author, the contents of this work express the central tenets of the Reformed Presbyterian view of civil magistracy.  The Act, Declaration and Testimony (1761)  of the Reformed Presbytery refers those interested in additional reading on the subject to this and several other works of like content.  The text for this page has been taken from the copy re-issued in 1797 in the back of another Covenanter classic A Hind Let Loose.]
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