every city, and the triumvirates of judges constituted almost in
every village, which were parts of the executive magistracy
subordinate to the Sanhedrim, I shall take them at better
leisure, and in the larger discourse; but these being that part
of this commonwealth which was instituted by Moses upon the
advice of Jethro the priest of Midian (as I conceive a heathen),
are to me a sufficient warrant even from God himself, who
confirmed them, to make further use of human prudence, wherever I
find it bearing a testimony to itself, whether in heathen
commonwealths or others; and the rather, because so it is, that
we who have the holy Scriptures, and in them the original of a
commonwealth, made by the same hand that made the world, are
either altogether blind or negligent of it; while the heathens
have all written theirs, as if they had had no other copy; as, to
be more brief in the present account of that which you shall have
more at large hereafter:

Athens consisted of the Senate of the Bean proposing, of the
Church or Assembly of the people resolving, and too often
debating, which was the ruin of it; as also of the Senate of the
Areopagus, the nine archons, with divers other magistrates,
executing.

Lacedaemon consisted of the Senate proposing, of the Church
or congregation of the people resolving only, and never debating,
which was the long life of it; and of the two kings, the court of
the ephors, with divers other magistrates, executing.

Carthage consisted of the Senate proposing and sometimes
resolving too, of the people resolving and sometimes debating