Romans 13:5

“ Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only because of the wrath, but also for conscience' sake. ”

If the state were only armed with means of punishing, it would be enough to regard it with fear; but it is the representative of God to assert justice among men; and hence it is from a principle of conscience that submission must be given to it. It is obvious that the apostle has a much nobler idea of the state than those who make this institution rest on utilitarian grounds. As its foundation he lays down a divine principle, and sees in it an essentially moral institution. This teaching was the more necessary as the Christians were daily witnesses of the corruption which reigned in heathen administration, and might be led to involve in one common reprobation both the institution and its abuses. But it must not be forgotten that, in assigning conscience as a ground for obedience, the apostle is in the very act indirectly tracing the limit of this obedience. For the very reason that the state governs in God's name, when it comes to order something contrary to God's law, there is nothing else to be done than to make it feel the contradiction between its conduct and its commission (see above, the example of the apostles), and that while still rendering homage to the divine principle of the state by the respect with which the protest in the case is expressed and the calmness with which the punishment inflicted is borne.

In the two following verses the apostle confirms by a particular fact of public life the notion of the state which he has just been expounding (Romans 13:6), and passes from the principle to its practical applications (Romans 13:7).