and subjects. Let this be sufficient exhortation; for to draw this out
at length belongs to another time.

The Fifth Commandment.

Thou shalt not kill.

We have now completed both the spiritual and the temporal government,
that is, the divine and the paternal authority and obedience. But here
now we go forth from our house among our neighbors to learn how we
should live with one another, every one himself toward his neighbor.
Therefore God and government are not included in this commandment nor
is the power to kill, which they have taken away. For God has delegated
His authority to punish evil-doers to the government instead of
parents, who aforetime (as we read in Moses) were required to bring
their own children to judgment and sentence them to death. Therefore,
what is here forbidden is forbidden to the individual in his relation
to any one else, and not to the government.

Now this commandment is easy enough and has been often treated,
because we hear it annually in the Gospel of St. Matthew, 5, 21 ff.,
where Christ Himself explains and sums it up, namely, that we must not
kill neither with hand, heart, mouth, signs, gestures, help, nor
counsel. Therefore it is here forbidden to every one to be angry,
except those (as we said) who are in the place of God, that is, parents
and the government. For it is proper for God and for every one who is
in a divine estate to be angry, to reprove and punish, namely, on
account of those very persons who transgress this and the other
commandments.