way should oppose us in helping which blessed be the Lord the honourable houses of the Parliament of England hath not done though Malignant spirits tempted them to such a course what in that case we should owe to the afflicted members of Christs body is a case may be determined easily The fift and last opinion is of those who think if the King command Papists and Prelates to rise against the Parliament and our dear brethren in England in warres that we are obliged in conscience and by our oath and covenant to help our native Prince against them to which opinion with hands and feet I should accord if our Kings cause were just and lawfull but from this it followeth that we must thus far judge of the cause as concerneth our consciences in the matter of our necessary duty leaving the judiciall cognizance to the honourable Parliament of England But because I cannot returne to all these opinions particularly I see no reason but the Civil Law of a Kingdom doth oblige any Citizen to help an innocent man against a murthering robber that he may be judicially accused as a murtherer who faileth in his duty that Solon said well beatam remp esse illam in quâ quisque injuriam alterius suam estimet It is a blessed society in which every man is to repute an injury done against a brother 〈…〉 injury done against himself As the Egyptians had a good law by which he was accused upon his head who helped not one that suffered wrong and if he was not able to help he was holden to accuse the injurer if not his punishment was whips or three dayes hunger it may be upon this ground it was that Moses flew the Egyptian Ambrose commendeth him for so doing Assert We are obliged by many bands to expose our lives goods children c. in this cause of religion and of the unjust oppression of enemies for the safety and defence of our deare brethren and true religion in England 1. Prov. 24. 11. If thou forbear to deliver them that are drawn to death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taken as captives to be killed and those that are ready to be slaine 12. If thou say behold we know it not doth not he that pondereth the heart consider it and he that keepeth thy soul doth he not know it and shall he not render to every man according to his work Master Iermin on the place is too narrow who commenting on the place restricteth all to these two that the priest should deliver by interceding for the innocent and the King by pardoning only But 1. to deliver is a word of violence as 1 Sam. 30. 18. David by the sword rescued his wives Hos 5 14. I will take away and none shall rescue 1 Sam. 17. 35. I rescued the lambs out of his mouth out of the Lyons mouth which behoved to be done with great violence 2 King 18. 34. They have not delivered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Samaria out of my hand So Cornel. à Lapide Charitas suadâ—â— ut vi armis eruamus injuste ductos ad mortem Ambros lib. 1. offic c. 36. citeth this same text and commendeth Moses who killed the Egyptian in defending a Hebrew man 2. It is an act of Charity and so to be done though the judge forbid it when the innocent is unjustly put to death Object But in so doing private men may offer violence to the lawfull magistrate when he unjustly putteth an innocent man to death and rescue him out of the hands of the magistrate and this were to bring in anarchy and confusion for if it be an act of charity to deliver the innocent out of the hand of the Magistrate it is homicide to a private man not to do it for our obedience to the law of nature tyeth us absolutely though the Magistrate forbid these acts for it is known that I must obey God rather then man Answ The law of nature tyeth us to obedience in acts of charity yet not to performe these acts after any way and manner in a meere naturall way impetu naturae but I am to performe acts of naturall charity in a rationall and prudent way and in looking to Gods law else if my brother or father were justly condemned to die I might violently deliver him out of the Magistrates hand but by the contrary my hand should be first on him without naturall compassion As if my brother or my wife have been a blasphemer of God Deut. 13. 6 7 8. and therefore am I to do acts naturall as a wise man observing as Solomon saith Eccles 8. 5. both time and judgement Now it were no wisdom for one private man to hazard his own life by attempting to rescue an innocent brother because he hath not strength to do it and the law of nature obligeth me not to acts of charity when I in all reason see them unpossible but a multitude who had strength did well to rescue innocent Ionathan out of the hands of the King that he should not be put to death yet one man was not tyed by the law of nature to rescue Ionathan if the King and Prince had condemned him though unjustly 2. The hoast of men that helped David against King Saul 1 Sam. 22. 2. entered in a lawfull war and 1 Chron. 12. 18. Amasa by the spirit of the Lord blesseth his helpers peace peace be unto thee and peace be to thy helpers for thy God helpeth the. Ergo Peace must be to the Parliament of England and to their helpers their brethren of Scotland 3. Numb 32. 1. 2. 3. 16. 17. 18. 19. Iosh 1. 12. 13. 14. The children of Gad and of Reuben and the half tribe of Manasseh though their inheritance fell to be in this side of Iordan yet they were to goe over the river armed to fight for their brethren while they had also possession of the land at the commandement of Moses and Joshua 4. So Saul and Israel helped the men of Iabesh Gilead conjoyned in blood with them against Nahash the Ammonite and his unjust conditions in plucking out their right eyes 1 Sam. 11. 5. Iephtha Iudg. 12. 2. justly rebuketh the men of Ephraim because they would not help him and his people against the Ammonites 6. If the communion of Saints be any bound that England and we have one Lord one faith one Baptisme one head and Saviour Iesus Christ then are we obliged to help our bleeding sister Church against these same common enemies Papists and Prelates but the former is undenyably true for 1. We send help to the Rotchel if there had not been a secret betraying of our brethren we send help to the recovery of the Palatinate and the aide of the confederat Princes against Babels strength and power and that lawfully but we did it at great leisure and coldly Q. Elizabeth helped Holland against the King of Spain And beside the union in Religion 1. We sayle in one
1. 2. and the law of Nature and therefore they having made such a man their King they have given him power to be their father feeder healer protector and so must only have made him King conditionally so he be a father a feeder and tutor Now if this deed of making a King must be exponed to be an investing with an absolute and not a conditionall power this fact shall be contrary to Scripture and to the law of Nature for if they have given him Royall power absolutely and without any condition they must have given to him power to be a father protector tutor and to be a tyrant a murtherer a bloody lyon to waste and destroy the people of God 3. The Law permitteth the bestower of a benefit to interpret his own mind in the bestowing of a benefit even as a King and State must expone their own Commission given to their Ambassadour so must the Estates expone whether they bestowed the Crown upon the first King conditionally or absolutely For the 4th if it stand then must the people give to their first elected King a power to wast and destroy themselves so as they may never controle it but only leave it to God and the King to reckon together but so the condition is a Chimera We give you a Throne upon condition you swear by him who made heaven and earth that you will govern us according to Gods Law and you shall be answerable to God only not to us whether you keep the covenant you make with us or violate it but how a covenant can be made with the people and the King obliged to God not to the people I conceive not 2. This presupposeth that the King as King cannot doe any sin or commit any act of tyranny against the people but against God only because if he be obliged to God only as a King by vertue of his covenant How can he faile against an obligation where there is no obligation but as a King he owe no obligation of duty to the people and indeed so doe our good men expound that Psal 51. Against thee thee only have I sinned not against Vriah for if he sinned not as King against Vriah whose life he was obliged to conserve as a King he was not obliged as a King by any royall duty to conserve his life Where there is no sin there is no obligation not to sin and where there is no obligation not to sin there is no sin By this the King as King is loosed from all duties of the second Table being once made a King he is above all obligation to love his neighbour as himselfe for he is above all his neighbours and above all mankind and only lesse then God 4. Arg. If the people be so given to the King that they are committed to him as a pledge oppignorated in his hand as a pupill to a Tutor as a distressed man to a Patron as a flocke to a Shepheard and so as they remaine the Lords Church his people his flocke his portion his inheritance his vineyard his redeemedones then they cannot be given to the King as Oxen and Sheepe that are freely gifted to a man or as a gift or summe of gold or silver that the man to whom they are given may use so that he cannot commit a fault against the oxen sheepe gold or mony that is given to him how ever he shall dispose of them But the people are given to the King to be tutored and protected of him so as they remaine the people of God and in covenant with him and if the people were the goods of fortune as Heathens say he could no more sinne against the people then a man can sin against his gold now though a man by adoring gold or by lavish profusion and wasting of gold may sin against God yet not against gold nor can he be in any covenant with gold or under any obligation of either duty or sin to gold or to livelesse and reasonlesse creatures properly therefore he may sin in the use of them and yet not sin against them but against God Hence of necessity the King must be under obligation to the Lords people in another manner then that he should only answer to God for the losse of men as if men were worldly goods under his hand and as if being a King he were now by this Royall Authority priviledged from the best halfe of the law of nature to wit from acts of mercy and truth and covenant keeping with his brethren 5. Arg. If a King because a King were priviledged from all covenant obligation to his subjects then could no Law of men lawfully reach him for any contract violated by him then he could not be a debtor to his subjects if he borrowed mony from them and it were utterly unlawfull either to crave him mony or to sue him at Law for debts yet our Civill Lawes of Scotland tyeth the King to pay his debts as any other man yea and King Solomons traffiquing and buying and selling betwixt him and his owne subjects would seeme unlawfull for how can a King buy and sell with his subjects if he be under no covenant obligation to men but to God only Yea then a King could not marry a wife for he could not come under a covenant to keepe his body to her only nor if he committed adultery could he sin against his wife because being immediate unto God and above all obligation to men he could sin against no covenant made with men but only against God 6. If that was a lawfull covenant made by Asa and the States of Iudah 2 Chron. 15. 13. That whosoever would not seeke the Lord God of their fathers should be put to death whether small or great whether man or woman this obligeth the King for ought I see and the Princes and the people but it was a lawfull covenant ergo the King is under a covenant to the Princes and Iudges as they are to him it is replyed If a Master of a Schoole should make a law whoever shall goe out at the Schoole doores without liberty obtained of the Master shall be whipped it will not oblige the Schoole-master that he shall be whipped if he goe out at the Schoole doores without liberty so neither doth this Law oblige the King the supreame Law-giver Ans Suppose that the Schollars have no lesse hand and authority magisteriall in making the law then the Schoole-master as the Princes of Iudah had a collaterall power with King Asa about that law it would follow that the Schoole-master is under the same law 2. Suppose going out at Schoole doores were that way a morall neglect of studying in the Master as it is in the Scholars as the not seeking of God is as hainous a sinne in King Asa and no lesse deserving death then it is in the people then should the Law oblige Schoolmaster and Scholler both without exception 3. The
the Kings and Iudges which I shall make good by these places Deut. 21. 19. The rebellious Son is brought to the Elders of the Citie who had power of life and death and caused to stone him Deut. 22. 18. The Elders of the Citie shall take that man and chastise him Iosh 20. 4. But beside the Elders of every Citie there were the Elders of Israel and the Princes who had also judiciall power of life and death as the Iudges and King had Josh 22. 30. Even when Ioshua was Iudge in Israel the Princes of the Congregation and heads of the Thousands of Israel did judicially cognosce whether the Children of Reuben of Gad and of halfe the tribe of Manasseh were apostates from God and the Religion of Israel 2 Sam. 5. 3. All the Elders of Israel made David King at Hebron and Num. 11. They are appointed by God not to be the advisers only and helpers of Moses but v. 14 17. to beare a part of the burden of ruling and governing the people that Moses might be eased Jeremiah is accused c. 26. 10. upon his life before the Princes Iosh 7 4. The Princes sit in judgement with Ioshua Iosh 9. 15. Ioshua and the Princes of the Congregation sware to the Gibeonites that they would not kill them The Princes of the house of Israel could not be rebuked for oppression in judgement Mic. 3. 1 2 3. if they had not had power of judgement So Zeph. 3. 3. And Deut. 1. 17. 2. Chron. 19. 6 7. They are expresly made Iudges in the place of God And 1 Sam. 8. 2. without advise or knowledge of Samuel the supreme Iudge they conveene and ask a King and without any head or superior when there is no King they conveene a Parliament and make David King at Hebron And when David is banished they conveen to bring him home againe when Tyrannous Athalia reigneth they conveene and make Ioash King and that without any King And Iosh 22. there is a Parliament conveened and for any thing we can read without Ioshua to take cognisance of a new Altar It had been good that the Parliaments both of Scotland and of England had conveened though the King had not indicted and summoned a Parliament without the King to take order with the wicked Clergie who had made many idolatrous Altars And the P. Prelate should have brought an argument to prove it unlawfull in foro Dei to set up the Tables and Conventions in our Kingdome when the Prelates were bringing in the grossest idolatrie into the Church a service for adoring of Altars of Bread the worke of the hand of the Baker a God more corruptible then any god of silver and gold And against Achabs will and minde 1 King 18 19. Elias causeth to kill the Priests of Baal according to Gods expresse law It is true it was extraordinary but no otherwise extraordinary then it is at this day When the supreme Magistrate will not execute the judgement of the Lord Those who made him supreme Magistrate under God who have under God soveraigne libertie to dispose of crownes and kingdomes are to execute the judgement of the Lord when wicked men make the law of God of none effect 1 Sam. 15. 32. so Samuel killed Hagage whom the Lord expresly commanded to be killed because Saul disobeyed the voyce of the Lord. I deny not but there is necessitie of a cleere warrant that the Magistrate neglect his duty either in not conveening the States or not executing the judgement of the Lord. 3. I see not how the conveening of a Parliament is extraordinarie to the States for none hath power ordinary when the King is dead or when he is distracted or captive in another land to conveene the Estates and Parliament but they only and in their defect by the law of Nature the people may conveene But 4. If they be essentially Iudges no lesse then the King as I have demonstrated to the impartiall Reader in the former Chapter I conceive though the State make a positive law for Orders cause that the King ordinarily conveene Parliaments Yet if we dispute the matter in the court of Conscience the Estates have intrinsecally because they are the Estates and essentially Iudges of the Land ordinary power to conveene themselves 1. Because when Moses by Gods rule hath appointed seventie men to be Catholike Iudges in the Land Moses upon his sole pleasure and will hath not power to restraine them in the exercise of judgment given them of God for as God hath given to any one Iudge power to judge righteous judgement though the King command the contrary so hath he given to him power to sit down in the gate or the bench when and where the necessitie of the oppressed people calleth for it For 1. the expresse commandement of God which saith to all Iudges Execute judgement in the morning involveth essentially a precept to all the Physicall actions without which it is impossible to execute judgement As namely if by a divine precept the Iudge must execute judgement ergo he must come to some publique place and he must cause partie and witnesses come before him and he must consider cognosce examine in the place of judgement things persons circumstances and so God who commandeth positive acts of judgeing commandeth the Iudges locomotive power and his naturall actions of compelling by the sword the parties to come before him even as Christ who commandeth his servants to preach commandeth that the Preacher and the People goe to Church and that he stand or sit in a place where all may heare and that he give himselfe to reading and meditating before he come to preach And if God command one Iudge to come to the place of judgement so doth he command seventie and so all Estates to conveen in the place of judgement It is objected That the Estates are not Iudges ordinary and habitually but only Iudges at some certaine occasions when the King for cogent and weighty causes calleth them and calleth them not to judge but to give him advise and counsell how to judge Ans 1. They are no lesse Iudges habitually then the King when the common affaires of the whole Kingdome necessitateth these Publique Watchmen to come together for even the King judgeth not actually but upon occasion 2. This is to beg the question to say that the Estates are not Iudges but when the King calleth them at such and such occasions for the Elders Princes and Heads of families and Tribes were Iudges ordinarie because they made the King And 2. the Kingdome by God yea and Church Iustice and Religion so far as they concerne the whole Kingdome are committed not to the keeping of the King only but to all the Iudges Elders and Princes of the Land And they are rebuked as evening wolves lyons oppressors Ezech. 22. 27. Zaca 3. 3. Esa 3. 14 15. Mic. 3. 1 2 3. when they oppresse the people in judgement So are they Deut.
sinfull man which must be idolatrie But to doe Royall acts out of an absolute power above Law and Reason is such a power as agreeth to God as is evident in positive lawes and in acts of Gods meere pleasure where we see no reason without the Almightie for the one side rather than for the other as Gods forbidding the eating of the tree of knowledge maketh the eating sinne and contrary to reason but there is no reason in the object for if God should command eating of that tree not to eat should be also sinne So Gods choosing Peter to glory and his refusing Judas is a good and a wise act but not good or wise from the object of the act but from the sole wise pleasure of God because if God had chosen Judas to glory and rejected Peter that act had been no lesse a good and a wise act then the former For when there is no law in the object but only Gods will the act is good and wise seeing infinite wisdome cannot be separated from the perfect will of God but no act of a mortall King having sole and only will and neither law nor reason in it can be a lawfull a wise or a good act Assert 2. There is something which may be called a Prerogative by way of dispensation There is a threefold dispensation one of power another of justice and a third of grace A dispensation of power is when the will of the Law-giver maketh that act to be no sinne which without that will would have been sinne As if Gods commanding Will had not interveened the Israelites borrowing the eare-rings and jewels of the Egyptians and not restoring them had been a breach of the 8 Commandement and in this sense no King hath a Prerogative to dispence with a Law 2. There is a dispensation of law and justice not flowing from any Prerogative but from the true intent of the Law And thus the King yea the inferiour Judge is not to take the life of a man whom the letter of the Law would condemne because the Justice of the Law is the intent and life of the Law and where nothing is done against the intent of the Law there is no breach of any Law The Third is not unlike unto the Second when the King exponeth the Law by Grace and this is twofold 1. Either when he exponeth it of his wisdome and mercifull nature inclined to mercy and justice yet according to the just intent native sense and scope of the Law considering the occasion circumstances of the fact and comparing both with the Law aud this dispensation of grace I grant to the King As when the tribute is great and the man poor the King may dispense with the custome 2. The Law saith In a doubtfull case the Prince may dispense because it is presumed the Law can have no sense against the principall sense and intent of the Law But there is another dispensation that Royalists doe plead for and that is a power in the King ex mera gratia absolutae potestatis regalis Out of meere grace of absolute Royall power to pardon crimes which Gods law saith should be punished by death Now this they call a power of Grace but it is not a power of meere Grace But 1. Though Princes may doe some things of Grace yet not of meere Grace because what Kings doe as Kings and by vertue of their Royall office that they do ex debito officii by debt and right of their office and that they cannot but do it not being arbitrarie to them to doe the debtfull acts of their office But what they doe of meere grace that they doe as good men and not as Kings and that they may not doe As for example Some Kings out of their pretended prerogative have given foure pardons to one man for foure murthers Now this the King might have left undone without sinne But of meere grace he pardoned the murtherer who killed foure men But the truth is the King killed the three last because he hath no power in point of Conscience to dispute with blood Num. 35. 31. Gen. 9. 6. These pardons are acts of meere grace to one man but acts of blood to the Communitie 2. Because the Prince is the Minister of God for the good of the subject and therefore the Law saith He cannot pardon and free the guilty of the punishment due to him Contra l. quod favore F. de leg l. non ideo minus F. de proc l. legata inutiliter F. de lega 1. And the reason is cleare He is but the minister of God a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doth evill And if the Judgement be the Lords not mans not the Kings as it is indeed Deut. 1. 17. 2 Chron. 19. 6. he cannot draw the sword against the innocent nor absolve the guiltie except he would take on himselfe to carve and dispose of that which is proper to his master Now certaine it is God only univocally and essentially as God is the Judge Ps 75. 7. and God only and essentially King Ps 97. 1. Ps 99. 1. and all men in relation to him are meere ministers servants legates deputies and in relation to him equivocally and improperly Iudges or Kings and meere created and breathing shadowes of the power of the King of Kings And looke as the Scribe following his own device and writing what sentence he pleaseth is not an officer of the Court in that point nor the pen and servant of the Iudge so are Kings and all Iudges but forged intruders and bastard Kings and Iudges in so far as they give out the sentences of men and are not the very mouthes of the King of Kings to pronounce such a sentence as the Almighty himselfe would doe if he were sitting on the Throne or Bench. 3. If the King from any supposed prerogative Royall may doe acts of meere grace without any warrant of Law because he is above Law by office then also may he doe acts of meere rigorous Iustice and kill and destroy the innocent out of the same supposed Prerogative For Gods word equally tyeth him to the place of a meere minister in doing good as in executing wrath on evill doers Rom. 13. 3 4. And reason would say he must be as absolute in the one as in the other seeing God tieth him to the one as to the other by his office and place yea by this acts of Iustice to ill-doers and acts of reward to well-doers shall be arbitrary morally and by vertue of office to the King and the word Prerogative Royall saith this for the word Prerogative is a supreme power absolute that is loosed from all Law and so from all reason of Law and depending on the Kings meer and naked pleasure and will and the word Royall or Kingly is an Epithete of office and of a Iudge a created and limited Iudge and so it must tye this
supposed Prerogative to Law Reason and to that which is debitum legale officii and a legall duty of an office and by this our masters the Royalists make God to frame a rationall creature which they call a King to frame acts of Royalty good and lawfull upon his own meer pleasure and the super-dominion of his will above a Law and Reason And from this it is that deluded Counsellours made King James a man not of shallow understanding and King Charls to give pardons to such bloody murtherers as James a Grant and to go so far on by this supposed Prerogative Royall that King Charls in Parliament at Edinburgh 1633. did command an high point of Religion That Ministers should use in officiating in Gods service such Habits and Garments as he pleaseth that is all the Attire and Habits of the idolatrous Masse-Priests that the Romish Priests of Baal useth in the oadest point of idolatry the adoring of Bread that the earth has and by this Prerogative the King commanded the Service Book in Scotland An. 1637. without or above Law and Reason And I desire any man to satisfie me in this If the Kings Prerogative Royall may over-leap Law and Reason in two degrees and if he may as King by a Prerogative Royall command the body of Popery in a Popish Book If he may not by the same reason over-leap Law and Reason by the elevation of twenty degrees And if you make the King a Iulian God avert and give the spirit of revelation to our King may he not command all the Alcaron and the Religion of the Heathen and Indians Royalists say The Prerogative of Royalty excludeth not reason and maketh not the King to â—â— as a brute beast without all reason but it giveth a power to a King to do by his Royall pleasure not fettered to the dictates of a Law for in things which the King doth by his Prerogative Royall he is to follow the advice and counsell of his wise counsell though their counsell and advice doth not binde the Royall will of the King I answer it is to me and I am sure to many Learneder a great question If the will of any reasonable creature even of the damned angels can will or chose any thing which their reason corrupted as it is doth not dictate hic nunc to be good For the object of the will of all men is good either truely or apparently good to the doer for the devill could not suite in marriage souls except he war in the cloths of an Angel of light sin as sin cannot sell or obtrude it self upon any but under the notion of good I think it seemeth good to the great Turk to command innocent men to cast themselves over a precipie two hundreth fadom high in the Sea and drown themselves to pleasure him So the Turks reason for he is rationall if he be a man dictateth to his vast pleasure that that is good which he commandeth 2. Counsellours to the King who will speak what will please the Queen are but naked empty Titles for they speak que placent non que prosunt what may please the King whom they make glad with their lies not what law and reason dictateth 3. Absolutenesse of an unreasonable Prerogative doth not deny Counsell and Law also for none more absolute de facto I cannot say de jure then the Kings of Babylon and Persia for Daniel saith of one of them Dan. 5. 19. Whom he would he slew and whom he would he kept alive and whom he would he set up and whom he would he put down and yet these same Kings did nothing but by advice of their Princes and Counsellors yea so as they could not alter a decree and law as is clear Ester 1. 14 15 16 17 21. Yea Darius de facto an absolute Prince was not able to deliver Daniel because the Law was passed that he should be cast into the Lions den Dan. 6. 14 15 16. 4. That which the spirit of God condemneth as a point of Tyranny in Nebuchadnezzar that is no lawfull Prerogative Royall but the spirit of God condemneth this as Tyranny in Nebuchadnezzar That he slew whom he would he kept alive whom he would he set up whom he would he put down this is too God-like Deut. 32. 39. So Polanus Rollocus on the place say he did these things Vers 19. Ex abusu legitime potestatis for Nebuchadnezzars will in matters of death and life was his Law and he did what pleased himself above all Law beside and contrary to it and our flatterers of Kings draw the Kings Pretogative out of Vlpians words who saith That is a Law which seemeth good to the Prince but Vlpian was far from making the Princes will a rule of good and ill for he saith the contrary That the Law ruleth the just Prince 5. It is considerable here that Sanches defineth the absolute power of Kings to be a plenitude and fulnesse of power subject to no necessity and bounded with rules of no publick Law and so did Baldus before him but all Politicians condemn that of Caligula as Suetonius saith which he spake to Alexander the Great Remember that thou maist do all things and that thou hast a power to do to al men what thou pleasest And Lawyers say that this is Tyranny Chilon one of the seven wise of Greece as Rodigi saith better Princes are like gods because they onely can do that which is just And this power being meerly Tyrannicall can be no ground of a Royall Prerogative There is another power saith Sanches absolute by which a Prince dispenseth without a cause in a humane law and this power saith he may be defended but he saith What the King doth by this absolute power he doth it validè validly but not jure by Law but by valid acts the Iesuite must mean Royall Acts but no acts void of Law and Reason say we can be Royall Acts for Royall Acts are acts performed by a King as a King and by a Law and so cannot be Acts above or beside a Law It is true a King may dispence with the breach of an humane Law as a humane Law that is If the Law be death to any who goeth up on the Walls of the Citie the King may pardon any who going up discovereth the enemies approach and saveth the Citie But 1. The inferiour Iudge according to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that benigne interpretation that the soul and intent of the Law requireth may do this as well as the King 2. All acts of independent Prerogative are above a Law and acts of free-will having no cause or ground in the Law otherwayes it is not founded upon absolute power but on power ruled by Law and Reason but to pardon a breach of the letter of the Law of man by exponing it according to the true intent of the Law and benignly is an act of legall obligation and so of the ordinary power of
threatning 4. To be a King and an absolute Master to me are contradictory a King essentially is a living Law An absolute man is a creature that they call a Tyrant and no lawfull King yet doe I not meane that any that is a King and usurpeth absolutenesse leaveth off to be a King but in so far as he is absolute he is no more a King then in so far as he is a Tyrant But further the King of England saith in a Declaration 1. The Law is the measure of the Kings Power 2. Parliaments are essentially Lord Iudges to make Lawes essentially as the King is ergo the King is not above the Law 3. Magna Charta saith the King can doe nothing but by Lawes and no obedience is due to him but by Law 4. Prescription taketh away the title of conquests Obj 3. The King not the Parliament is the Anoynted of God Ans The Parliament is as good even a Congregation of Gods Psalme 82. 1. Obj. 4. The Parliament is the Court in their Acts they say with consent of our Soveraigne Lord. Ans They say not at the Commandement and absolute pleasure of our Soveraigne Lord. 2. He is their Lord materially not as they are formally a Parliament for the King made them not a Parliament but sure I am the Parliament had power before he was King and made him King 1 Sam. 10. 17 18. Obj. 5. In an absolute Monarchy there is not a resignation of men to any will as will but to the reasonable will of the Monarch which having the law of reason to direct it is kept from injurious acts Ans If reason be a sufficient restraint and if God hath laid no other restraint upon some lawfull King yee reason Then is Migistracy a lame a needlesse ordinance of God for all Mankind hath reason to keepe themselves from injuries and so there is no need of Iudges or Kings to defend them from either doing or suffering injuries But certainly this must be admirable If God as Author of nature should make the Lyon King of all beasts the Lyon remaining a devouring beast and should ordaine by nature all the sheepe and Lambs to come and submit their corps to him by instinct of nature and to be eaten at his will and then say The nature of a beast in a Lyon is a sufficient restraint to keepe the Lyon from devouring Lambs Certainly a King being a sinfull man and having no restraint on his power but reason he may thinke it reason to allow rebells to kill drowne hang torture to death an hundred thousand Protestants men women infants in the wombe and sucking babes as is clere in Pharaoh Manasseh and other Princes Obj. 6. There is no Court or Iudge above the King ergo he is absolutely supreame Ans The Antecedent is false The Court that made the King of a private man a King is above him and here are limitations laid on him at his Coronation 2. The States of Parliament are above him to censure him 3. In case of open Tyranny though the States had not time to conveen in Parliament if he bring on his people an hoast of Spaniards or forraine Rèbells his owne conscience is above him and the conscience of the people farre more called conscientia terrae may judge him in so farre as they may rise up and defend themselves Obj. 7. Here the Prelate borrowing from Grotius Barclay Arnisaeus or it s possible he be not so farre travelled for Doct. Ferne hath the same Soveraignty weakned in Aristocracy cannot do◠its worke and is in the next place to Anarchy and confusion When Zedekiah was over Lorded by his Nobles he could neither save himselfe nor the people nor the Prophet the servant of God Ieremiah nor could David punish Ioab when he was over-awed by that power he himselfe had put in his hand To weaken the head is to distemper the whole body if any good Prince or his Royall Antecessors be cheated of their sacred right by fraud or force he may at his fittest opportunity resume it What a sinne is it to rob God or the King of their due Ans Aristocracy is no lesse an ordinance of God then Royalty for Rom. 13. 1. and 1 Tim. 2. 1. All in Authority are to be acknowledged as Gods Vice-gerents the Senate the Consuls as well as the Emperour And so one ordinance of God cannot weaken another nor can any but by a lawlesse Animall say Aristocracy bordereth with confusion but he must say Order and Light are sister Germanes to confusion and darknesse 2 Though Zedekiah a man voyd of God were over-awed with his Nobles and so could not help Ieremiah it followeth not that because Kings may not do this and this good therefore they are to be invested with power to doe all ill if they doe all the good that they have power to doe they 'l finde way to helpe the oppressed Jeremiahes and because power to doe both good and evill is given by the Divell to our Scottish Witches it s a poore consequent that the States should give to the King power absolute to be a Tyrant 3. A State must give a King more power then ordinary especially to execute Laws which requireth singular wisdom when a Prince cannot alwayes have his great Councell about with him to advise him But 1. That is power borrowed and by loan and not properly his own and therefore it is no sacriledge in the States to resume what the King hath by a fiduciary Title and borrowed from them 2. This power was given to do good not evill David had power over Joab to punish him for his murther but he executed it not upon carnall fears and abused his power to kill innocent Vriah which power neither God nor the States gave him But how proveth he the States took power from David or that Ioab took power from David to put to death a murtherer that I see not 3. If Princes power to do good be taken from them they may resume it when God giveth opportunity But this is to the Prelate Perjury that the people by Oath give away their power to their King and resume it when he abuseth it to Tyranny But it is no perjurie in the King to resume a taken away power which if it be his own is yet lis sub judice a great controversie Quod in Cajo licet in Nevio non licet So he teacheth the King That Perjurie and Sacriledge is lawfull to him If Princes power to do ill and cut the whole Land off as one neck which was the wicked desire of Caligula be taken from them by the States I am sure 1. This power was never theirs and never the peoples and you cannot take the Princes power from him which was never his power 2. I am also sure the Prince should never resume an unjust power though he were cheated of it P. Prelate It is a poor shift to acknowledge no more for the
18. 4 5 6 7. 2. They may prove that people sought by a Tyrant to be crucifyed for the Cause of God or to reveale and discover themselves to an Armie of men who come to seek them Ioh. 13. 1 2. Ioh. 18. 4 5 6 7. 3. That Martyrs are of purpose to goe to the place where they know they shall be apprehended and put to death for this Christ did and are willingly to offer themselves to the enemies Armie for so did Christ Ioh. 14. 3. Mar. 14. 41 42. Mat. 26. 46 47. and so by his example all the Parliament all the Innocents of the Citie of London and Assemblie of Divines are obliged to lay downe Armes and to goe to their owne death to Prince Rupert and the bloody Irish Rebels 4. By this example it is unlawfull to resist the cut-throats of a King for Cesar in his owne Royall person the High Priest in person came not out against Christ Yea it is not lawfull for the Parliament to resist a Iudas who hath fled as a traiterous Apostate from the Truth and the Temple of Christ 5. It is not lawful for innocents to defend themselves by any violence against the invasion of superiours in D. Fernes three cases in which he alloweth resistance 1. When the Invasion is sudden 2. Vnavoidable 3. Without all colour of Law and Reason In the two last cases Royalists defend the lawfulnes of self-defence 6. If the example be pressed Christ did not this and this he resisted not with violence to save his owne life therefore we are to abstaine from resistance and such and such meanes of self-preservation then because Christ appealed not from inferiour Judges to the Emperour Caesar who no doubt would have shewne him more favour then the Scribes and Pharisees did and because Christ conveyed not a humble supplication to his Soveraigne and Father Caesar then because he proffered not a humble petition to Prince Pilate for his life he being an innocent man and his cause just because he neither conduced an Orator to pleade his owne just cause nor did he so plead for himselfe and give in word and writ all lawfull and possible defences for his own safety but answered many things with silence to the admiration of the Judge Marke 15. 3 4. 5. and was thrice pronounced by the Judge to be innocent Luke 22. ver 23. because I say Christ did not all these for his owne life therefore it is unlawfull for Scotland and England to appeale to the King to supplicate to give in Appologiâ—s c. I thinke Royalists dare not say so But if they say he would not resist and yet might have done all these lawfully because these be lawfull meanes and resistance with the sword unlawfull because He that taketh the sword shall perish by the sword Let me Answer then 1. They leave the argument from Christs example who was thus farre subject to higher powers that he would not resist and plead from the unlawfulnesse of resistance this is petitio principii 2. He that taketh the sword without Gods warrant which Peter had not but the contrary he was himselfe a Sathan to Christ who would but councell him not to die but there is no shadow of a word to prove that violent resisting is unlawfull when the King and his Irish cut-throats pursue us unjustly onely Christ saith when God may deliver extraordinarily by his Angels except it be his absolute will that his Son should drink the cup of death then to take the sword when God hath declared his will on the contrary is unlawfull and that is all Though I doe not question but Christs asking for swords and his arresting all his enemies to the ground Ioh. 18. 6. backward is a justifying of selfe-defence But hit herto it is cleare by Christs example that he onely was commanded to suffer Now the second case in which suffering falleth under a Commandement is indirectly and comparatively when it commeth to the election of the witnesse of Jesus that it is referred to them either to deny the truth of Christ and his name or then to suffer death the choise is apparently evident and this choise that persecuters referre us unto is to us a Commandement of God that we must choose suffering for Christ and refuse sinning against Christ but the supposition must stand that this alternative is unavoydable that is not in our power to decline either suffering for Christ or denying of Christ before men otherwayes no man is to expect the reward of a witnesse of Iesus who having a lawfull possible meanes of eschewing suffering doth yet cast himselfe into suffering needlesly But I prove that suffering by men of this world falleth not formally and directly under any divine positive Law for the Law of nature what ever Arminians in their Declaration or this Arminian excommunicate think with them for they teach that God gave a Commandement to Adam to abstaine from such and such fruit with paine and trouble to sinlesse nature doth not command suffering or any thing contrary to nature as nature is sinlesse I prove it thus 1. What ever falleth under a positive Commandement of God I may say here under any Commandement of God is not a thing under the free will and power of others from whom we are not discended necessarily by naturall generation but that men of the world kill me even these from whom I am not discended by naturall generation which I speake to exclude Adam who killed all his posterity is not in my free will either as if they had my common nature in that act or as if I were accessory by counsell consent or approbation to that act for this is under the free-will and power of others not under my owne free-will Ergo that I suffer by others is not under my free-will and cannot fall under a Commandement of God And certainly it is an irrationall Law glorified be his name that God should command Antipas either formally to suffer or formally not to suffer death by these of the Synagogue of Sathan Revel 2. 13. because if they be pleased not to kill him it is not in his free-will to be killed by them and if they shall have him in their power except God extraordinarily deliver it is not in his power in an ordinary providence not to be killed 2. All these places of Gods word that recommendeth suffering to the followers of Christ do not command formally that we suffer Ergo suffering falleth not formally under any Commandement of God I prove the Antecedent because if they be considered they prove only that comparatively we are to choose rather to suffer then to deny Christ before men Mat. 10 28 32. Revel 2. 13. Mat. 10. 37. Mat. 16. 24. c. 19. 29. or then they command not suffering according to the substance of the passion but according to the manner that we suffer willingly cheerfully and patiently Hence Christs word to take up his Crosse
holy things from him especially since by the law the leper was to be put out of the congregation Ans 1. He contradicteth the text it was not a resistance by words for the text saith they withstood him and they thrust him out violently 2. He yeeldeth the cause for to withdraw the holy things of God by corporall violence and violently to pull the censer out of his hand that he should not provoke Gods wrath by offering incense to the Lord is resistance and the like violence may by this example be used when the King useth the sword and the Militia to bring in an enemy to destroy the kingdom it is no lesse injustice against the second table that the King useth the sword to destroy the innocent then to usurpe the câ—nsor against the first table But Doctor Ferne yeeldeth that the censor may be pulled out of his hand lest he provoke God to wrath Ergo by the same very reason a fortiore the Sword the Castles the Sea-ports the Militia may be violently pulled out of his hand for if there was an expresse Law that the leper should be put out of the congregation and therefore the King also should be subject to his Church-censor then he subjecteth the King to a punishment to be inflicted by the subjects upon the King Ergo the King is obnoxious to the coactive power of the law 2. Ergo subjects may judge him and punish him 3. Ergo he is to be subject to all Church-censors no lesse then the people 4. There is an expresse law that the leper should be put out of the congregation What then flattering court Divines say the King is above all these lawes for there is an expresse law of God as expresse as that ceremoniall on touching lepers and a more binding law that the murtherer should die the death Will Royalists put no exception upon a ceremoniall law of expelling the leper and yet put an exception upon a Divine morall law concerning the punishing of murtherers given before the law on Mount Sinai Gen. 6. 9. They so declare that they accept the persons of men 5. If a leper King could not actually sit upon the throne but must be cut off from the house of the Lord because of an expresse law of God these being inconsistent that a King remaining amongst Gods people ruling and raigning should keep company with the Church of God and yet be a leper who was to be cut off by a Divine law from the Church now I perswade my self that far lesse can he actually raigne in the full use of the power of the sword if he use the sword to cut off thousands of innocent people because murthering the innocent and fatherles and Royall governing in Righteousnesse and Godlinesse are more inconsistent by Gods law being morally opposite then remaining a governour of the people and the disease of leprosie are incompatible 6. I think not much that Barcley saith cont Monar l 5. c. 11. Vzziah remained King after he was removed from the congregation for leprosie 1. Because that toucheth the question of dethroning Kings this is an argument brought for violent resisting of Kings and that the people did resume all power from Vzziah and put it in the hand of Iotham his son who was over the Kings house judging the people of the land ver 21. And by this same reason the Parliaments of both Kingdomes may resume the power once given to the King when he hath proved more unfit to governe morally then Vzziah was ceremonially that he ought not to judge the people of the land in this case 2. If the priests did execute a ceremoniall law upon King Vzziah Far more may the three estates of Scotland and the two houses of Parliament of England execute the morall law of God on their King If the people may covenant by oath to rescue the innocent and unjustly condemned from the sentence of death notoriously known be to tyranous and cruel then may the people resist the King in his unlawfull practises But this the people did in the matter of Ionathan M. Symmons saith pag. 32. and Doctor Ferne § 9. 49. That with no violence but by prayers and teares the people saved Jonathan as Peter was rescued out of prison by the prayers of the Church King Saul might easily be intreated to break a rash vow to save the life of his eldest son Ans 1. I say not the common people did it but the people including proceres regni the Princes of the land and captaines of thousands 2. The text hath not one word or syllable of either prayers supplications or teares but by the contrary They bound themselves by an oath contrary to the oath of Saul 1 Sam. 14. 44. and swear ver 45. God forbid as the Lord liveth there shal not one hair of his head fall to the ground so the people rescued Ionathan The Church prayed not to God for Peters deliverance with an oath that they must have Peter saved whether God will or no. 2. Though we read of no violence used by the people yet an oath upon so reasonable a ground 1. without the Kings consent 2. contrary to a standing law that they had agreed unto ver 24. 3. contradictory to the Kings sentence and unjust oath 4. spoken to the King in his face all these prove that the people meaned and that the oath ex conditione operis tended to a violent resisting of the King in a manifestly unjust sentence Chrysostom hom 14. ad Pop. Antioch accuseth Saul as a murtherer in this sentence and praiseth the people So Iunius Peter Martyr whom Royalists impudently cite so Cor. à lap Zanch. Lyra and Hug. Cardinalis say it was Tyranny in Saul and laudable that the people resisted Saul and the same is asserted by Iosephus l. 6. antiquit c. 7. so Althus Polyt c. 38. n. 109. We see also 2 Chron. 21. 10. That Libnah revolted from under Iehoram because he had forsaken the Lord God of his fathers It hath no ground in the text that Royalists say that the defection of Lybnah is not justified in the text but the cause is from the demerit of wicked Iehoram because he made defection from God Libnah made defection from him as the ten tribes revolted from Rehoboam for Solomons idolatry which before the Lord procured this defection yet the ten tribes make defection for oppression I answer where the literall meaning is simple and obvious we are not to go from it The text sheweth what cause moved Libnah to revolt it was a town of the Levites and we know they were longer sound in the truth then the ten tribes 2. Chron. 13. 8 9 10. Hos 11. 12. Lavater saith Iehoram hath pressed them to idolatry and therefore they revolted Zanch. Cor. à Lap. saith this was the cause that moved them to revolt and it is cleare ver 13. he caused Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to go a whoring from God and no doubt tempted
choise of his person This is non-sense for the peoples choosing of David at Hebron to be King and their refusing of Sauls seed to be King what was it but an act of God by the free suffrages of the people conferring royall power on David and making him King whereas in former times David even anointed by Samuel at Bethleem 1 Sam. 16. was onely a private man the subject of King Saul and never tearmed by the Spirit of God a King nor was he King till God by the peoples consent made him King at Hebron for Samuel neither honoured him as King nor bowed to him as King nor did the people say God save King David but after this David acknowledged Saul as his Master and King Let Royalists shew us any act of God making David King save this act of the people making him formally King at Hebron and therefore the people as Gods instrument transferred the power and God by them in the same act transferred the power and in the same they chose the person the Royalists affirm these to be different actions affirmanti incumbit probatio 4. This power is the peoples radically naturally as the Bees as some think have a power naturall to choose a King-Bee so hath a communitie a power naturally to defend and protect themselves and God hath revealed in Deut. 17. 14 15. the way of regulating the act of choosing Governours and Kings which is a speciall mean of defending and protecting themselves and the people is as principally the subject and fountain of Royall power as a fountain is of water I shall not contend if you call a Fountain Gods Instrument to give water as all creatures are his Instruments 5. For Spalato's comparison he is far out for the people choosing one of ten to be their King have freewill to choose any and are under a Law Deut. 17. 14 15. In the manner of their choosing and thought they erre and make a sinfull choice yet the man is King and Gods King whom they make King but if the King command a servant to make A. B. a Knight if the servant make C. D. a Knight I shall not think C. D. is a valid Knight at all and indeed the honour is immediately here from the King because the Kings servant by no innate power maketh the Knight but Nations by a radicall and naturall and innate power maketh this man a King not this man and I conceive the man chosen by the people oweth thanks and gratefull service to the people who rejected others that they had power to choose and made him King 6. The light immediately and formally is light from the Sun and so is the Office of a King immediately instituted of God Deut. 17. 14. Whether the institution be naturall or positive it is no matter 2. The man is not King because of Royall indowments though we should say these were immediately from God to which instruction and education may also conferre not a little but he is formally King ratione 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in regard of the formall essence of a King not immediately from God as the light is from the Sun but by the mediation of the free consent of the people 2 Sam. 5. 1 2 3. nor is the people in making a King as the man who onely casteth Wood in the fire the Wood is not made fire formally but by the fire not by the approach of fire to Wood or of Wood to fire for the people do not apply the Royaltie which is immediately in and from God to the person explicate such an application for to me it is a Fiction unconceiveable because the people hath the Royaltie radically in themselves as in the Fountain and Cause and conferreth it on the man who is made King yea the people by making David King confer the Royall power on the King this is so true that Royalists forgetting themselves inculcate frequently in asserting their absolute Monarch from Vlpian but misunderstood that the people have resigned all their power libertie right of life death goods chastitie a potency of rapine homicides unjust wars c. upon a creature called an absolute Prince even saith Grotius as a man may make himself a slave by selling his liberty to a master Now if the people make away this power to the King and this be nothing but the transcendent absolutenesse of a King certainly this power was in the people for how can they give to a King that which they have not themselves As a man cannot make away his liberty to a master by becoming a slave to him if his libertie were immediately in God as Royalists say Soveraigntie is immediately in God and people can exercise no Act about Soveraignty to make it over to one man rather then to another People onely have an after-approbation that this man to whom God hath given it immediately shall have it Furthermore they say people in making a King may make such conditions as in seven cases a King may be dethroned at least resisted saith Hu. Grotius Ergo people may give more or lesse half or whole limited or absolute Royall power to the Prince but if this power were immediately in God and from God how could the people have the husbanding of it at their need to expend it out in ounce weights or pound weights as they please And that the people may be Taverners of it to sell or give it is taught by Grotius de jur bel pac l. 1. c. 4. Barclai advers Monarch l. 4. c. 6. Arnisae cap. 6. de majest an princeps qui jurat subditis c. n. 10. n. se Aventiun Anal. l. 3. Chytreus l. 23. l. 28. Saxon Sleid. lib. 1. in fi yet Arnisaeus is not ashamed to cite Arist po c. 12. l. 3. That he is not a true and absolute King who ruleth by Laws The point black contrary of which Aristotle saith QUEST XLI Whether doth the P. Prelate upon good grounds ascribe to us the doctrine of Jesuites in these Questions of lawfull defensive Wars THe P. Prelate without all ground will have us all Iesuites in this point but if we make good that this Truth was in Scripture before a Iesuite was in the earth he falleth from his Cause P. Prelate The Begardi saith There was no Government no Law given to the just It feareth me this age fancieth to it self some such thing and have learned of Core Dathan c. Ans This Calumniator in the next words belieth himself when he saith We presuppose that these with whom we are to enter in Lists do willingly grant That Government is not onely lawfull and just but necessary both for Church and Common-wealth then we fancie no such thing as he imputeth to us P. Prelate Some said that the right of Dominion is founded on grace whether the Waldenses and Hus held any such Tenet I cannot now insist to prove or disprove Gerson and others held that there must be a new Title and
are for the heir as the mean for the end But the King is for his Kingdom as a mean for the end as the watch-man for the Citie the living Law for peace and safetie to Gods people and therefore is not heres hominum An heir of men but men are rather heredes regis heirs of the King Arnisaeus Many Kingdoms saith he are purchased by just war and transmitted by the Law of heritage from the father to the son beside the consent of the people because the son receiveth right to the Crown not from the people but from his parents nor doth he possesse the Kingdom as the patrimony of the people keeping onely to himself the burden of protecting and governing the people but as a proprietie given to him lege regni by his parents which he is obliged to defend and rule as a father looketh to the good and welfare of the family yet so also as he may look to his own good Answ We read in the Word of God That the people made Solomon King not that David or any King can leave in his Testament a Kingdom to his son 2. He saith The son hath not the right of reigning as the patrimony of the people but as a proprietie given by the Law of the Kingdom by his parents Now this is all one as if he said The son hath not the right of the Kingdom as the patrimony of the people but as the patrimony of the people which is good non-sense For the proprietie of reigning given from father to son by the Law of the Kingdom is nothing but a right to reign given by the Law of the people and the very gift and patrimony of the people for Lex regni This Law of the Kingdom is the Law of the people tying the Crown to such a Royall Family and this Law of the people is prior and ancienter then the King or the right of reigning in the King or which the King is supposed to have from his Royall father because it made the first father the first King of the Royall Line For I demand How doth the son succeed to his fathers Crown and Throne Not by any promise of a divine Covenant that the Lord maketh to the father as he promised that Davids seed should sit on his throne till the Messiah should come this as I conceive is vanished with the Common-wealth of the Iews nor can we now finde any immediate divine constitution tying the Crown now to such a race nor can we say this cometh from the will of the father King making his son King For 1. there is no Scripture can warrant us to say The King maketh a King but the Scripture holdeth forth that the people made Saul and David Kings 2. This may prove That the father is some way a cause why this son succeedeth King but he is not the cause of the Royaltie conferred upon the whole Line because the question is Who made the first father a King Not himself nor doth God now immediately by Prophets anoint men to be Kings then need force the people choose the first man then must the peoples election of a King be prior and more ancient then the birth-law to a Crown And election must be a better right then birth 2. The question is Whence cometh it that not onely the first father should be chosen King but also whence is that whereas it is in the peoples freewill to make the succession of Kings go by free election as it is in Denmark and Pol yet the people doth freely choose not only the first man to be King but also the whole race of the first born of this mans Family to be Kings All here must be resolved in the free will of the Communitie now since we have no immediate and propheticall enthroning of men it is evident That the lineall deduction of the Crown from father to son through the whole line is from the people not from the parent Hence I adde this as my sixth Argument That which taketh away that naturall aptitude and natures birth-right in a Communitie given to them by God and nature to provide the most efficacious and prevalent mean for their own preservation and peace in the fittest Government that is not to be holden but to make birth the best title to the Crown and better then free election taketh away and impedeth that naturall aptitude and natures birth-right of chosing not simply a Governour but the best the justest the more righteous and tyeth and fettereth their choice to one of a house whether he be a wise man and righteous and just or a fool and an unjust man therefore to make birth the best title to the Crown is not to be holden It is objected That parents may binde their after Generations to choose one of such a line But by this Argument their naturall birth-right of a free choice to elect the best and fittest is abridged and clipped and so the posterity shall not be tyed to a King of the Royall Line to which the Ancestors did swear See for this the learned Author of Scripture and Reasons pleaded for defensive Arms. Answ Frequent elections of a King at the death of every Prince may have by accident and through the corruption of our nature bloody and tragicall sequels and to eschew these people may tie and oblige their children to chose one of the first born Male or Female as in Scotland and England of such a line but I have spoken of the excellencie of the title by election above that of birth as comparing things according to their own nature together but give me leave to say That the posterity are tyed to that Line 1. Conditionally So the first born ceteris paribus be qualified and have an head to sit at the helm 2. Elections of Governours would be performed as in the sight of God and in my weak apprehension the person coming neerest to Gods judge Fearing God hating covetousnesse and to Moses his King Deut. 17. one who shall read in the Book of the Law and it would seem now that gracious morals are to us insteed of Gods immediate designation 3. The genuine and intrinsecall end of making Kings is not simply governing but governing the best way in peace honesty and godlinesse 1. Tim. 2. Ergo These are to be made Kings who may most expeditely procure this end neither is it my purpose to make him no King who is not a gracious man onely here I compare title with title 7. Argument Where God hath not bound the conscience men may not binde themselves or the consciences of the posterity But God hath not bound any nation irrevocably and unalterably to a Royall Line or to one kinde of Government Ergo No nation can binde their conscience and the conscience of the posterity either to one Royall Line or irrevocably and unalterably to Monarchy The proposition is clear 1. No Nation is tyed jure divine by
a praise to good Pilates power to crucifie Christ was the contrary 4. A Law-power is to execute wrath on ill-doing a power to crucifie Christ is no such 5. A Law-power conciliateth honour fear and veneration to the person of the Iudge a power to crucifie Christ conciliateth no such thing but a disgrace to Pilate 6. The Genuine Acts of a lawfull power are lawfull Acts for such as is the Fountain-power such are the Acts flowing therefrom good Acts flow not from bad powers neither hath God given a power to sin except by way of permission QUEST XXX Whether or no Passive Obedience be a meane to which we are subjected in conscience by vertue of a Divine Commandement and what a meane Resistance is That Flying is Resistance MUch is built to commend patient suffering of ill and condemne all resistance of Superiors by Royalists on the place 1 Pet. 2. 18. Where we are commanded being servants to suffer buffets not onely for ill doing of good masters but also undeservedly and when we doe well we are to suffer of these masters that are evill and so much more are we patiently without Resistance to suffer of Kings But it is cleare the place is nothing against Resistance as in these Assertions I cleare Assertion 1. Patient suffering of wicked men and violent resisting are not incompatible but they may well stand together So this consequence is the basis of the argument and it is just nothing To wit Servants are to suffer unjustly wounds and buffeting of their wicked Masters and they are to bear it patiently Ergo Servants are in conscience obliged to non-resistance Now Scripture maketh this clear The Church of God is to bear with all patience the indignation of the Lord because she hath sinned and to suffer of wicked enemies which were to be troden as mire in the streets Micah 7. 9 10 11 12. but withall they were not obliged to non-resistance and not to fight against these enemies yea they were obliged to fight against them also If these were Babilon Iudah might have resisted and fought if God had not given a speciall commandement of a positive law that they should not fight if these were the Assyrians and other enemies or rather both the people were to resist by fighting and yet to endure patiently the indignation of the Lord. David did bear most patiently the wrong that his own son Absolon and Achitophel and the people inflicted on him in pursuing him to take his life and the kingdom from him as is cleare by his gracious expressious 2 Sam. 15. 25 26. chap. 16. ver 10 11 12. Psal 3. 1 2 3. Yea he prayeth for a blessing on the people that conspired against him Psal 3. 8. Yet did he lawfully resist Absalom and the conspiratours and sent out Ioab and a huge army in open battel against them 2 Sam. 18. 1 2 3 4 c. and fought against them And were not the people of God patient to endure the violence done to them in the wildernes by Og king of Bashan Siho◠king of Heshbon by the Ammorites Moabites c I think Gods law tyeth all men especially his people to as patient a suffering in wars Deut. 8. 16. God then trying and humbling his people as the servant is to endure patiently unjustly inflicted buffets 1 Pet. 2. 18. And yet Gods people at Gods command did resist these Kings and people and did fight and kill them and possesse their land as the history is cleare See the like Iosh 11. ver 18 19. 2. One act of grace and vertue is not contrary to another Resistance is in the Children of God an innocent act of self-preservation as is patient suffering and therefore they may well subsist in one And so saith Amasa by the spirit of the Lord 1 Chro. 12. 18. Peace peace be unto thee and peace to thy helpers for God helpeth thee Now David in that and all his helpers were resisters of King Saul 3. The scope of the place 1 Pet. 2. is not to forbid all violent resisting as is clear he speaketh nothing of violent resisting either one way or other but onely he forbiddeth revengefull resisting of repaying one wrong with another from the example of Christ who when he was reviled reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not Therefore the argument is a falacy ab eo quod docitur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ad illud quod dicitur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Though therefore the master should attempt to kill an innocent servant and invade him with a weapon of death 1. Suddenly 2. Without all reason or cause 3. Vnavoidably Doctor Ferne in that case doth free a Subject from guiltynesse if he violently resist his Prince Ergo the servant who should violently resist his Master in the aforesaid case should and might patiently suffer and violently resist notwithstanding any thing that Royalists can conclude on the contrary 4. No Prince hath a Masterly or herile dominion over his subjects but onely a free ingenious paternall and tutorly over-sight for the good of the people Rom. 13. 4. The Master especially in the Apostle Peters time had a dominion over servants as over their proper goods 2. Assertion Neither suffering formally as suffering and so neither can non-resisting passive fall under any morall law of God except in two conditions 1. In the point of Christs passive obedience he being the eternall God as well as Man and so Lord of his owne blood and life by vertue of a speciall commandement imposed on him by his Father was commanded to lay downe his life yea and to be an Agent as well as a Patient in dying Ioh. 10. 18. Yea and actively he was to contribute somthing for his own death and offer himself willingly to death Mat. 28. 20. And knowing the houre that he was to depart out of this world unto the Father Iohn 13. 1. would not onely not flee which is to Royalists lawfull to us a speciall point of resistance Ioh. 14. 31. Ioh. 18. 4 5 6 7. and but upbraided Peter as the Agent of Sathan who would disswade him to die Mat. 16. 22 23. and would fight for him And he doth not fetch any argument against Peters drawing of his sword from the unlawfulnesse of self-defence and innocent resistance which he should have done if Royalists plead with any colour of reason from his example against the lawfulnesse of Resistance and self-defence but from the absolute power of God 2. From Gods positive wil who commanded him to die Mat. 26. 53 54. if therefore Royalists prove any thing against the lawfulnesse of resisting Kings when they offer most unjustly violence to the life of Gods servants from this one meerly extraordinary and rare example of Christ the like whereof was never in the world they may from the same example prove it unlawfull to flee for Christ would not flee Psal 40. 6 7. Heb. 10. 6 7 8 9. Ioh. 14. 31. Ioh.
this they say in answer to some who beleeved the Church of England made the King the Head of the Church The Prelates Convocation must be Iesuites to this P. P. also So the 36. Article of the Belgick Confession saith of all Magistrates no lesse then of a King We know for Tyrannie of Soule and Body they justly revolted from their King Idcirco Magistratus ipsos gladio armavit ut malos quidem plectant paenis probos vero tueantur Horum porro est non modo de Civili politia conservanda esse solioitâ—s verum etiam dare operam ut sacrum Ministerium conservetur omnis Idololatria adulterinus Dei cultus è medio tollatur regnum Antichristi diruatur c. Then all Magistrates though inferiour must doe their duty that the Law of God hath laid on them though the King forbid them But by the Belgick Confession and the Scripture it is their duty to relieve the oppressed to use the sword against murthering Papists and Irish Rebels and destroying Cavaliers For shall it be a good plea in the day of Christ to say Lord Iesus we would have used thy sword against bloody Murtherers if thy Anoynted the King had not commanded us to obey a mortall King rather than the King of ages and to execute no judgement for the oppressed because he judged them faithfull Catholike subjects Let all Oxford and Cavalier Doctors in the three Kingdomes satisfie the consciences of men in this that inferior Iudges are to obey a Diviue Law with a proviso that the King command them so to doe and otherwise they are to obey Men rather then God This is evidently holden forth in the Argentine Confession exhibited by foure Cities to the Emperour Charles the Fifth An. M. D. XXX in the same very cause of innocent Defence that we are now in in the three Kingdomes of Scotland England and Ireland The Saxonick Confession exhibited to the Councell of Trent An. M. D. LI. art 23 maketh the Magistrates office essentially to consist in keeping of the two Tables of Gods Law and so what can follow hence but in so far as he defendeth Murtherers or if he be a King and shall with the sword or Armies impede inferior Magistrates for the Confession speaketh of all to defend Gods law and true Religion against Papists Murtherers and bloody Cavaliers and hinder them to execute the judgement of the Lord against evill doers He is not in that a Magistrate and the denying of obedience active or passive to him in that is no resistance to the Ordinance of God but by the contrary the King himselfe must resist the ordinance of God The Confession of Bohemia is clear art 16. Qui publico munere magistratuque funguntur quemcunque graduÌ„ teneant se non suum sed Dei opus agere sciant Hence all inferior or the supreme Magistrate what ever be their place they doe not their own work nor the work of the King but the work of God in the use of the sword Ergo they are to use the sword against bloody Cavaliers as doing Gods worke suppose the King should forbid them to doe Gods worke And it saith of all Magistrates Sunt autem Magistratuum partes ac munus omnibus ex aequo jus dicere in communem omnium usum sine personarum acceptatione pacem ac tranquilitatem publicam tueri ac procurare de malis ac facinorosis hanc inter turbantibus poenas sumere aliosque omnes ab eorum vi injuria vindicare Now this Confession was the faith of the Barons and Nobles of Bohemia who were Magistrates and exhibited to the Emperor An. 1535. in the cause not unlike unto ours now and the Emperor was their Soveraigne yet they professe they are obliged in conscience to defend all under them from all violence and injuries that the Emperor or any other could bring on them and that this is their office before God which they are obliged to performe as a worke of God and the Christian Magistrate is not to doe that worke which is not his own but Gods upon condition that the King shall not inhibite him What if the King shall inhibite Parliaments Princes and Rulers to relieve the oppressed to defend the Orphan the Widow the Stranger from unjust violence Shall they obey man rather than God To say no more of this Prelates in Scotland did what they could to hinder his Majestie to indict a Parliament 2. When it was indicted to have its freedome destroyed by prelimitations 3. When it was sitting their care was to divide impede and anull the course of Iustice 4. All in the P. Prelates booke tendeth to abolish Parliaments and to enervate their power 5. There were many wayes used to break up Parliaments in England And to command Iudges not to judge at all but to interrupt the course of Iustice is all one as to command unrighteous judgement Ier. 22. v. 3. 6. Many wayes have been used by Cavaliers to cut off Parliaments and the present Parliament in England The paper found in William Lauds Studie touching feares and hopes of the Parliament of England evidenceth that Cavaliers hate the Supreme seat of Iustice and would it were not in the World which is the highest rebellion and resistance made against superior Powers 1. He feareth this Parliament shall begin where the last left Ans What ever ungrate Courtier had hand in the death of King Iames deserved to come under Tryall 2. He feareth they sacrifice some man Ans If Parliaments have not power to cut off Rebels and corrupt Iudges the root of their being is undone 2. If they be lawfull Courts none needeth feare them but the guilty 3. He feareth their Consultations be long and the supply must be present Ans Then Cavaliers intend Parliaments for Subsidies to the King to foment and promote the warre against Scotland not for Iustice 2. He that feareth long and serious consultations to rip up and launce the wounds of Church and State is affraid that the wounds be cured 4. He feareth they deny Subsidies which are due by the Law of God Nature and Nations whereas Parliaments have but their deliberation and consent for the manner of giving otherwise this is to sell Subsidies not to give them Ans Tribute and the standing Revenues of the King are due by the Law of God and Nations but Subsidies are occasionall Rents given upon occasion of Warre or some extraordinary necessity and they are not given to the King as Tribute and standing Revenues which the King may bestow for his House Family and Royall Honour but they are given by the Kingdome rather to the Kingdome then to the King for the present warre or some other necessity of the Kingdome and therefore are not due to the King as King by any Law of Nature or Nations and so should not be given but by deliberation and judiciall sentence of the States and they are not sold to the King but given out by the