valiant and industrious when they fight for themselves and their Country they prove excellent in all the Arts of War and Peace when they are bred up in virtuous Exercises and taught by their Fathers and Masters to rejoice in the Honors gained by them they love their Country when the good of every particular man is comprehended in the publick Prosperity and the success of their Atchievements is improved to the general advantage They undertake hazards and labours for the Government when 't is justly administred when Innocence is safe and Virtue honour'd when no man is distinguish'd from the vulgar but such as have distinguish'd themselves by the bravery of their actions when no honor is thought too great for those who do it eminently unless it be such as cannot be communicated to others of equal merit They do not spare their Persons Purses or Friends when the publick Powers are employ'd for the publick Benefit and imprint the like affections in their Children from their Infancy The discipline of Obedience in which the Romans were bred taught them to command and few were admitted to the Magistracies of inferior rank till they had given such proof of their Virtue as might deserve the Supreme Cincinnatus Camillus Papirius Mamercus Fabius Maximus were not made Dictators that they might learn the Duties of the Office but because they were judged to be of such Wisdom Valour Integrity and Experience that they might be safely trusted with the highest Powers and whilst the Law reigned not one was advanced to that honour who did not fully answer what was expected from him By this means the City was so replenished with men fit for the greatest employments that even in its infancy when three hundred and six of the Fabii Quorum neminem says Livy ducem sperneret quibuslibet temporibus Senatus were killed in one day the City did lament the loss but was not so weakned to give any advantage to their Enemies and when every one of those who had bin eminent before the second Punic War Fabius Maximus only excepted had perished in it others arose in their places who surpassed them in number and were equal to them in Virtue The City was a perpetual spring of such men as long as Liberty lasted but that was no sooner overthrown than Virtue was torn up by the roots the People became base and sordid the small remains of the Nobility slothful and effeminate and their Italian Associates becoming like to them the Empire whilst it stood was only sustained by the strength of Foreigners The Grecian Virtue had the same fate and expired with Liberty instead of such Souldiers as in their time had no equals and such Generals of Armies and Fleets Legislators and Governors as all succeeding Ages have justly admired they sent out swarms of Fidlers Jesters Chariot-drivers Players Bawds Flatterers Ministers of the most impure Lusts or idle babling hypocritical Philosophers not much better than they The Emperors Courts were always crouded with this Vermin and notwithstanding the necessity our Author imagines that Princes must needs understand matters of Government better than Magistrates annually chosen they did for the most part prove so brutish as to give themselves and the World to be governed by such as these and that without any great prejudice since none could be found more ignorant lewd and base than themselves 'T is absurd to impute this to the change of times for time changes nothing and nothing was changed in those times but the Government and that changed all things This is not accidental but according to the rules given to nature by God imposing upon all things a necessity of perpetually following their Causes Fruits are always of the same nature with the Seeds and Roots from which they come and Trees are known by the fruits they bear As a Man begets a Man and a Beast a Beast that Society of Men which constitutes a Government upon the foundation of Justice Virtue and the common Good will always have men to promote those ends and that which intends the advancement of one man's desires and vanity will abound in those that will foment them All men follow that which seems advantagious to themselves Such as are bred under a good discipline and see that all benefits procured to their Country by virtuous Actions redound to the honour and advantage of themselves their Children Friends and Relations contract from their infancy a love to the Publick and look upon the common Concernments as their own When they have learnt to be virtuous and see that Virtue is in esteem they seek no other preferments than such as may be obtained that way and no Country ever wanted great numbers of excellent men where this method was established On the other side when 't is evident that the best are despised hated or mark'd out for destruction all things calculated to the humour or advantage of one man who is often the worst or govern'd by the worst Honours Riches Commands and Dignities disposed by his Will and his favour gained only by a most obsequious respect or a pretended affection to his person together with a servile obedience to his commands all application to virtuous Actions will cease and no man caring to render himself or his Children worthy of great Imployments such as desire to have them will by little intrigues corruption scurrility and flattery endeavour to make way to them by which means true Merit in a short time comes to be abolish'd as fell out in Rome as soon as the Cesars began to reign He who dos not believe this may see whether the like did not happen in all the other Commonwealths of Italy and Grecce or if modern examples are thought to be of more value let him examin whether the Noblemen of Venice who are born and bred in Families that never knew a Master who act for themselves and have a part in all the good or evil that befals the Commonwealth and know that if it be destroy'd they must perish or at least that all changes are to their prejudice do neglect the publick interests as thinking that the whole not depending upon any one of them things will be well enough governed tho they attend only their private benefit Let it be observed whether they do better understand the common concernments than the great men of France or Spain who never come to the knowledg of any thing unless they happen to be favour'd by the King or his Ministers and know themselves never to be more miserable than when their Master is most prosperous For my own part I cannot think it necessary to alledg any other proof of this point than that when Maximilian the Emperor Lewis the twelfth of France the fierce Pope Julius the second and Ferdinand the subtil powerful and bold King of Spain had by the League of Cambray combin'd against the Venetians gained the Battel of La Ghirad'adda taken Alviano their General prisoner deprived them of all
put the whole Nation into blood Absalom with a few fair words was able to raise all Israel against his Father Sheba the Son of Bichri with as much ease raised a more dangerous Tumult David by Wisdom Valour and the blessing of God surmounted these difficulties and prepared a peaceable Reign for Solomon but after his death they broke out into a Flame that was never quenched till the Nation was so dispersed that no man knew where to find his Enemies Solomon by his Magnificence had reduced Israel to such poverty as inclined them to revolt upon the first offer of an opportunity by Jeroboam From that time forward Israel was perpetually vexed with Civil Seditions and Conspiracies or Wars with their Brethren of Judah Nine Kings with their Families were destroyed by the first and the latter brought such Slaughters upon the miserable People as were never suffer'd by any who were not agitated by the like Fury and the course of these mischiefs was never interrupted till they had brought the Nation into Captivity and the Country to Desolation Tho God according to his promise did preserve a light in the House of David yet the Tribe of Judah was not the more happy Joash was slain by a private Conspiracy and Amaziah as is most probable by publick Authority for having foolishly brought a terrible Slaughter upon Judah Athaliah destroyed the King's Race and was killed her self by Jehoiada who not having learnt from our Author to regard the Power only and not the ways by which it was obtained caused her to be dragg'd out of the Temple and put to a well-deserved Death The whole Story is a Tragedy and if it be pretended that this proceeded rather from the wrath of God against his People for their Idolatry than from such causes as are applicable to other Nations I answer that this Idolatry was the production of the Government they had set up and most sutable to it and chusing rather to subject themselves to the Will of a man than to the Law of God they deservedly suffer'd the evils that naturally follow the worst Counsels We know of none who taking the like course have not suffer'd the like miseries Notwithstanding the admirable Virtue and Success of Alexander his Reign was full of Conspiracies and his knowledg of them prompted him to destroy Parmenio Philotas Clitus Calisthenes Hermolaus and many more of his best Friends If he escaped the Sword he fell by Poison The Murder of his Wives Mother and Children by the rage of his own Soldiers the Fury of his Captains imployed in mutual Slaughters till they were consumed his paternal Kingdom after many Revolutions transferred to Cassander his most mortal Enemy the utter extinction of his conquering Army and particularly the famous Argyraspides who being grown faithless and seditious after the death of Eumenes were sent to perish in unknown parts of the East abundantly testify the admirable stability good order peace and quiet that is enjoy'd under absolute Monarchy The next Government of the like nature that appeared upon the stage of the World was that of Rome introduced by Wars that consumed two thirds of the People confirmed by Proscriptions in which all that were eminent for Nobility Riches or Virtue perished The peace they had under Augustus was like that which the Devil allow'd to the Child in the Gospel whom he rent sorely and left as dead The miserable City was only cast into a Swound after long and violent vexations by Seditions Tumults and Wars it lay as dead and finding no helper like to him who cured the Child it was delivered to new Devils to be tormented till it was utterly destroy'd Tiberius was appointed as a fit instrument for such a purpose It was thought that those who should seel the effects of his Pride Cruelty and Lust would look upon the Death of Augustus as a loss He performed the work for which he was chosen his Reign was an uninterrupted Series of Murders Subornations Perjuries and Poisonings intermixed with the most detestable Impurities the revolts of Provinces and Mutinies of Armies The matter was not mended by his Successors Caligula was kill'd by his own Guards Claudius poison'd by his Wife Spain Gaul Germany Pannonia Maesia Syria and AEgypt revolted at once from Nero the People and Senate followed the example of the Provinces This I think was in our Author's sense Sedition with a witness Nero being dead by the hand of a Slave or his own to prevent that of the Hangman Galba enter'd the City with Blood and Slaughter but when his own Soldiers found he would not give the Mony for which they intended to sell the Empire they killed him and to shew the stability of absolute Monarchy it may be observed that this was not done by the advice of the Senate or by a conspiracy of great men Suscepére duo manipulares Populi Romani Imperium transferendum transtulerunt Two Rascals gave the Empire to Otho and the whole Senate was like to be butcher'd for not being so ready to follow their venerable Authority as they ought to have bin and hardly escaped the fury of their mad and drunken Companions As a farther testimony that these Monarchies are not subject to Seditions and Tumults he had at once only two Competitors against whom he was to defend the well-acquired Empire His Army was defeated at Brescia he kill'd himself and his Successor Vitellius was soon after thrown into the Common Shore The same method still continued Rome was fill'd with Blood and Ashes and to recite all the publick Mischiefs would be to transcribe the History For as Pyrrhus being asked who should succeed him answered He who has the sharpest Sword that was the only Law that governed in the following ages Whoever could corrupt two or three Legions thought he had a good title to the Empire and unless he happen'd to be kill'd by Treachery or another Tumult of his own Soldiers he seldom receded from it without a Battel wherein he that was most successful had no other security than what the present temper of the Soldiers afforded him and the miserable Provinces having neither Virtue nor Force were obliged slavishly to follow the fury or fortune of those Villains In this state did Rome dedicate to Constantine the Triumphal Arch that had bin prepared for Maxentius and those Provinces which had set up Albinus and Niger submitted to Septimius Severus In the vast variety of Accidents that in those Ages disturbed the World no Emperor had a better title than what he purchased by Mony or Violence and enjoyed it no longer than those helps continued which of all things were the most uncertain By this means most of the Princes perished by the Sword Italy was made desolate and Rome was several times sackt and burnt The Mistress of the World being made a Slave the Provinces which had bin acquir'd by the Blood of her antient virtuous Citizens became part of an Usurper's Patrimony who without
kill'd his Children and not long after his own Son Rhadamistus also Louis the eleventh of France James the third of Scotland Henry the seventh of England were great Masters of these Arts and those who are acquainted with History will easily judg how happy Nations would be if all Kings did in time certainly learn them Our Author as a farther testimony of his Judgment having said that Kings must needs excel others in Understanding and grounded his Doctrin upon their profound Wisdom imputes to them those base and panick fears which are inconsistent with it or any royal Virtue and to carry the point higher tells us There is no Tyrant so barbarously wicked but his own reason and sense will tell him that tho he be a God yet he must die like a Man and that there is not the meanest of his Sabjects but may find a means to revenge himself of the Injuries offer'd him and from thence concludes that there is no such Tyranny as that of a Multitude which is subject to no such fears But if there be such a thing in the World as a barbarous and wicked Tyrant he is something different from a King or the same and his Wisdom is consistent or inconsistent with Barbarity Wickedness and Tyranny If there be no difference the praises he gives and the rights he ascribes to the one belong also to the other and the excellency of Wisdom may consist with Barbarity Wickedness Tyranny and the panick fears that accompany them which hitherto have bin thought to comprehend the utmost excesses of Folly and Madness and I know no better testimony of the truth of that Opinion than that Wisdom always distinguishing good from evil and being seen only in the rectitude of that distinction in following and adhering to the good rejecting that which is evil preferring safety before danger happiness before misery and in knowing rightly how to use the means of attaining or preserving the one and preventing or avoiding the other there cannot be a more extravagant deviation from Reason than for a man who in a private condition might live safely and happily to invade a Principality or if he be a Prince who by governing with Justice and Clemency might obtain the inward satisfaction of his own Mind hope for the blessing of God upon his just and virtuous Actions acquire the love and praises of men and live in safety and happiness amongst his safe and happy Subjects to fall into that Barbarity Wickedness and Tyranny which brings upon him the displeasure of God and detestation of men and which is always attended with those base and panick fears that comprehend all that is shameful and miserable This being perceiv'd by Machiavel he could not think that any man in his senses would not rather be a Scipio than a Cesar or if he came to be a Prince would not rather chuse to imitate Agesilaus Timoleon or Dion than Nabis Phalaris or Dionysius and imputes the contrary choice to madness Nevertheless 't is too well known that many of our Author 's profound wise men in the depth of their Judgment made perfect by use and experience have fallen into it If there be a difference between this barbarous wicked Tyrant and a King we are to examine who is the Tyrant and who the King for the name conferred or assumed cannot make a King unless he be one He who is not a King can have no Title to the rights belonging to him who is truly a King so that a People who find themselves wickedly and barbarously oppressed by a Tyrant may destroy him and his Tyranny without giving offence to any King But 't is strange that Filmer should speak of the barbarity and wickedness of a Tyrant who looks upon the World to be the Patrimony of one man and for the foundation of his Doctrin afferts such a power in every one that makes himself master of any part as cannot be limited by any Law His Title is not to be questioned Usurpation and Violence confer an incontestable Right the exercise of his Power is no more to be disputed than the Acquisition his will is a Law to his Subjects and no Law can be imposed by them upon his Conduct For if these things be true I know not how any man could ever be called a Tyrant that name having never bin given to any unless for usurping a Power that did not belong to him or an unjust exercise of that which had bin conferred upon him and violating the Laws which ought to be a rule to him 'T is also hard to imagin how any man can be called barbarous and wicked if he be obliged by no Law but that of his own Pleasure for we have no other notion of wrong than that it is a breach of the Law which determines what is right If the lives and goods of Subjects depend upon the Will of the Prince and he in his profound Wisdom preserve them only to be beneficial to himself they can have no other right than what he gives and without injustice may retain when he thinks fit If there be no wrong there can be no just revenge and he that pretends to seek it is not a free man vindicating his Right but a perverse slave rising up against his Master But if there be such a thing as a barbarous and wicked Tyrant there must be a rule relating to the acquisition and exercise of the Power by which he may be distinguish'd from a just King and a Law superior to his Will by the violation of which he becomes barbarous and wicked Tho our Author so far forgets himself to confess this to be true he seeks to destroy the fruits of it by such flattery as comprehends all that is most detestable in Profaneness and Blasphemy and gives the name of Gods to the most execrable of men He may by such language deserve the name of Heylin's Disciple but will find few among the Heathens so basely servile or so boldly impious Tho Claudius Cesar was a drunken sot and transported with the extravagance of his Fortune he detested the impudence of his Predecessor Caligula who affected that Title and in his rescript to the Procurator of Judea gives it no better name than turpem Caii insaniam For this reason it was rejected by all his Pagan Successors who were not as furiously wicked as he yet Filmer has thought fit to renew it for the benefit of Mankind and the glory of the Christian Religion I know not whether these extreme and barbarous Errors of our Author are to be imputed to wickedness or madness or whether to save the pains of a distinction they may not rightly be said to be the same thing but nothing less than the excess of both could induce him to attribute any thing of good to the fears of a Tyrant since they are the chief causes of all the mischiefs he dos Tertullian says they are Metu quam furore saeviores and Tacitus speaking of a most
of the Emperors in other respects excellent Men most foully polluted themselves and their Government with innocent Blood Antoninus Pius was taken in this snare and Tertullian bitterly derides Trajan for glorying in his Clemency when he had commanded Pliny who was Proconsul in Asia not to make any search for Christians but only to punish them according to Law when they should be brought before him No Municipal Law can be more firmly established by human Authority than that of the Inquisition in Spain and other places And those accursed Tribunals which have shed more Christian blood than all the Pagans that ever were in the world is commonly called The Holy Office If a Gentleman in Poland kill a Peasant he is by a Law now in use free from punishment if he lay a Ducat upon the dead Body Evenus the third King of Scotland caused a Law to pass by which the Wives and Daughters of Noblemen were exposed to his Lust and those of the Commons to the Lust of the Nobility These and an infinite number of others like to them were not right Sanctions but such as have produced unspeakable mischiefs and calamities They were not therefore Laws The name of Justice is abusively attributed to them Those that govern by them cannot be the Ministers of God and the Apostle commanding our obedience to the Minister of God for our good commands us not to be obedient to the Minister of the Devil to our hurt for we cannot serve two Masters SECT XI That which is not just is not Law and that which is not Law ought not to be obeyed OUR Author having for a long time pretended Conscience now pulls off his Mask and plainly tells us that 't is not on account of Conscience but for fear of punishment or hopes of reward that Laws are to be obeyed That familiar distinction of the Schoolmen says he whereby they subject Kings to the directive but not to the coactive Power of the Law is a confession that Kings are not bound by the positive Laws of any Nation since the compulsory Power of Laws is that which properly makes Laws to be Laws Not troubling my self with this distinction of the Schoolmen nor acknowledging any truth to be in it or that they are competent Judges of such matters I say that if it be true our Author's conclusion is altogether false for the directive Power of the Law which is certain and grounded upon the inherent good and rectitude that is in it is that alone which has a power over the Conscience whereas the coercive is merely contingent and the most just powers commanding the most just things have so often fallen under the violence of the most unjust men commanding the most execrable villanies that if they were therefore to be obeyed the Consciences of men must be regulated by the success of a Battel or Conspiracy than which nothing can be affirmed more impious and absurd By this rule David was not to be obeyed when by the wickedness of his Son he was driven from Jerusalem and deprived of all coercive Power and the conscientious obedience that had bin due to him was transfer'd to Absalom who sought his life And in St. Paul's time it was not from him who was guided only by the Spirit of God and had no manner of coercive Power that Christians were to learn their duty but from Caligula Claudius and Nero who had that Power well established by the mercenary Legions If this were so the Governments of the World might be justly called Magna Latrocinia and men laying aside all considerations of Reason or Justice ought only to follow those who can inflict the greatest Punishments or give the greatest Rewards But since the reception of such opinions would be the extirpation of all that can be called good we must look for another rule of our obedience and shall find that to be the Law which being as I said before Sanctio recta must be founded upon that eternal Principle of Reason and Truth from whence the rule of Justice which is sacred and pure ought to be deduced and not from the depraved will of man which fluctuating according to the different Interests Humors and Passions that at several times reign in several Nations one day abrogates what had bin enacted the other The Sanction therefore that deserves the name of a Law which derives not its excellency from Antiquity or from the dignity of the Legislators but from an intrinsick equity and justice ought to be made in pursuance of that universal Reason to which all Nations at all times owe an equal veneration and obedience By this we may know whether he who has the Power dos justice or not Whether he be the Minister of God to our good a protector of good and a terror to ill men or the Minister of the Devil to our hurt by encouraging all manner of evil and endeavouring by vice and corruption to make the people worse that they may be miserable and miserable that they may be worse I dare not say I shall never fear such a man if he be armed with power But I am sure I shall never esteem him to be the Minister of God and shall think I do ill if I fear him If he has therefore a coercive Power over me 't is through my weakness for he that will suffer himself to be compell'd knows not how to die If therefore he who dos not follow the directive Power of the Law be not the Minister of God he is not a King at least not such a King as the Apostle commands us to obey And if that Sanction which is not just be not a Law and can have no obligation upon us by what Power soever it be established it may well fall out that the Magistrate who will not follow the directive Power of the Law may fall under the Coercive and then the fear is turned upon him with this aggravation that it is not only actual but just This was the case of Nero the coercive Power was no longer in him but against him He that was forced to fly and to hide himself that was abandoned by all men and condemned to die according to antient Custom did as I suppose fear and was no way to be feared The like may be said of Amaziah King of Judah when he fled to Lachish of Nabuchodonosor when he was driven from the society of men and of many Emperors and Kings of the greatest Nations in the world who have bin so utterly deprived of all Power that they have bin imprisoned deposed confined to Monasteries kill'd drawn through the Streets cut in pieces thrown into Rivers and indeed suffer'd all that could be suffer'd by the vilest Slaves If any man say these things ought not to have bin done an answer may be given in a proper place though 't were enough to say that the Justice of the world is not to be overthrown by a meer Assertion without proof but
No man has yet observed the Moderation of Gideon to have bin in Abimelech the Piety of Eli in Hophni and Phineas the Purity and Integrity of Samuel in Joel and Abiah nor the Wisdom of Solomon in Rehoboam And if there was so vast a difference between them and their Children who doubtless were instructed by those excellent men in the ways of Wisdom and Justice as well by Precept as Example were it not madness to be confident that they who have neither precept nor good example to guide them but on the contrary are educated in an utter ignorance or abhorrence of all virtue will always be just and good or to put the whole power into the hands of every man woman or child that shall be born in governing Families upon a supposition that a thing will happen which never did or that the weakest and worst will perform all that can be hoped and was seldom accomplished by the wisest and best exposing whole Nations to be destroy'd without remedy if they do it not And if this be madness in all extremity 't is to be presumed that Nations never intended any such thing unless our Author prove that all Nations have bin mad from the beginning and must always continue to be so To cure this he says They degenerate into Tyrants and if he meant as he speaks it would be enough For a King cannot degenerate into a Tyrant by departing from that Law which is only the product of his own will But if he do degenerate it must be by departing from that which dos not depend upon his will and is a rule prescribed by a power that is above him This indeed is the Doctrine of Bracton who having said that the Power of the King is the Power of the Law because the Law makes him King adds That if he do injustice he ceases to be King degenerates into a Tyrant and becomes the Vicegerent of the Devil But I hope this must be understood with temperament and a due consideration of human frailty so as to mean only those injuries that are extreme for otherwise he would terribly shake all the Crowns of the World But lest our Author should be thought once in his life to have dealt sincerely and spoken truth the next lines shew the fraud of his last Assertion by giving to the Prince a power of mitigating or interpreting the Laws that he sees to be rigorous or doubtful But as he cannot degenerate into a Tyrant by departing from the Law which proceeds from his own will so he cannot mitigate or interpret that which proceeds from a superior Power unless the right of mitigating or interpreting be conferred upon him by the same For as all wise men confess that none can abrogate but those who may institute and that all mitigation and interpretation varying from the true sense is an alteration that alteration is an abrogation for whatsoever is changed is dissolved and therefore the power of mitigating is inseparable from that of instituting This is sufficiently evidenced by Henry the Eighth's Answer to the Speech made to him by the Speaker of the House of Commons 1545 in which he tho one of the most violent Princes we ever had confesses the Parliament to be the Law-makers and that an obligation lay upon him rightly to use the power with which he was entrusted The right therefore of altering being inseparable from that of making Laws the one being in the Parliament the other must be so also Fortescue says plainly the King cannot change any Law Magna Charta casts all upon the Laws of the Land and Customs of England but to say that the King can by his will make that to be a Custom or an antient Law which is not or that not to be so which is is most absurd He must therefore take the Laws and Customs as he finds them and can neither detract from nor add any thing to them The ways are prescribed as well as the end Judgments are given by equals per Pares The Judges who may be assisting to those are sworn to proceed according to Law and not to regard the King's Letters or Commands The doubtful Cases are reserved and to be referred to the Parliament as in the Statute of 35 Edw. 3d concerning Treasons but never to the King The Law intending that these Parliaments should be annual and leaving to the King a power of calling them more often if occasion require takes away all pretence of a necessity that there should be any other power to interpret or mitigate Laws For 't is not to be imagined that there should be such a pestilent evil in any antient Law Custom or later Act of Parliament which being on the sudden discover'd may not without any great prejudice continue for forty days till a Parliament may be called whereas the force and essence of all Laws would be subverted if under colour of mitigating and interpreting the power of altering were allow'd to Kings who often want the inclination and sor the most part the capacity of doing it rightly 'T is not therefore upon the uncertain will or understanding of a Prince that the safety of a Nation ought to depend He is sometimes a child and sometimes overburden'd with years Some are weak negligent slothful foolish or vicious others who may have something of rectitude in their intentions and naturally are not uncapable of doing well are drawn out of the right way by the subtilty of ill men who gain credit with them That rule must always be uncertain and subject to be distorted which depends upon the fancy of such a man He always fluctuates and every passion that arises in his mind or is infused by others disorders him The good of a People ought to be established upon a more solid foundation For this reason the Law is established which no passion can disturb 'T is void of desire and fear lust and anger 'T is Mens sine affectu written reason retaining some measure of the Divine Perfection It dos not enjoin that which pleases a weak frail man but without any regard to persons commands that which is good and punishes evil in all whether rich or poor high or low 'T is deaf inexorable inflexible By this means every man knows when he is safe or in danger because he knows whether he has done good or evil But if all depended upon the will of a man the worst would be often the most safe and the best in the greatest hazard Slaves would be often advanced the good and the brave scorn'd and neglected The most generous Nations have above all things sought to avoid this evil and the virtue wisdom and generosity of each may be discern'd by the right fixing of the rule that must be the guide of every mans life and so constituting their Magistracy that it may be duly observed Such as have attained to this perfection have always flourished in virtue and happiness They are as Aristotle
Othniel was of Judah Ehud of Benjamin Barak of Napthalim and Gideon of Manasseh The other Judges were of several Tribes and they being dead their Children lay hid amongst the common People and we hear no more of them The first King was taken out of the least Family of the least and youngest Tribe The second whilst the Children of the first King were yet alive was the youngest of eight Sons of an obscure man in the Tribe of Judah Solomon one of his youngest Sons succeeded him Ten Tribes deserted Rehoboam and by the command of God set up Jeroboam to be their King The Kingdom of Israel by the destruction of one Family passed into another That of Judah by God's peculiar promise continued in David's race till the Captivity but we know not that the eldest Son was ever preferred and have no reason to presume it David their most reverenced King left no precept for it and gave an example to the contrary he did not set up the eldest but the wisest After the Captivity they who had most wisdom or valour to defend the People were thought most fit to command and the Kingdom at the last came to the Asmonean Race whilst the posterity of David was buried in the mass of the common People and utterly deprived of all worldly Rule or Glory If the Judges had not a regal Power or the regal were only just as instituted by God and eternally annexed to Paternity all that they did was evil There could be nothing of Justice in the Powers exercised by Moses Joshua Gideon Samuel and the rest of the Judges If the power was regal and just it must have continued in the descendants of the first Saul David and Solomon could never have bin Kings The right failing in them their descendants could inherit none from them and the others after the Captivity were guilty of the like injustice Now as the Rule is not general to which there is any one just exception there is not one of these Examples that would not overthrow our Author's doctrine If one deviation from it were lawful another might be and so to infinity But the utmost degree of impudent madness to which perhaps any man in the world hath ever arrived is to assert that to be universal and perpetual which cannot be verified by any one Example to have bin in any place of the World nor justified by any precept If it be objected That all these things were done by God's immediate disposition I answer that it were an impious madness to believe that God did perpetually send his Prophets to overthrow what he had ordained from the beginning and as it were in spite to bring the minds of men into inextricable confusion and darkness and by particular commands to overthrow his universal and eternal Law But to render this point more clear I desire it may be considered That we have but three ways of distinguishing between good and evil 1. When God by his Word reveals it to us 2. When by his deeds he declareth it because that which he does is good as that which he says is true 3. By the light of Reason which is good in as much as it is from God And first It cannot be said we have an explicit word for that continuance of the power in the eldest for it appears not and having none we might conclude it to be left to our liberty For it agrees not with the goodness of God to leave us in a perpetual ignorance of his Will in a matter of so great importance nor to have suffered his own people or any other to persist without the least reproof or admonition in a perpetual opposition to it if it had displeased him To the 2d The Dispensations of his Providence which are the emanations of his Will have gone contrary to this pretended Law There can therefore be no such thing for God is constant to himself his works do not contradict his Word and both of them do equally declare to us that which is good Thirdly If there be any precept that by the light of Nature we can in matters of this kind look upon as certain 't is that the Government of a People should be given to him that can best perform the duties of it No man has it for himself or from himself but for and from those who before he had it were his Equals that he may do good to them If there were a Man who in Wisdom Valour Justice and Purity surpassed all others he might be called a King by Nature because he is best able to bear the weight of so great a charge and like a good Shepherd to lead the People to good Detur digniori is the voice of Reason and that we may be sure Detur seniori is not so Solomon tells us That a wise Child is better than an old and foolish King But if this pretended right do not belong to him that is truly the eldest nothing can be more absurd than a fantastical pretence to a right deduced from him that is not so Now lest I should be thought to follow my own inventions and call them reason or the light of God in us I desire it may be observed that God himself has ever taken this method When he raised up Moses to be the leader of his people he endowed him with the most admirable gifts of his Spirit that ever he bestowed upon a man When he chose seventy men to assist him he endowed them with the same spirit Joshua had no other title to succeed him than the like evidence of God's presence with him When the People through sin fell into misery he did not seek out their Descendants nor such as boasted in a prerogative of Birth but shewed whom he designed for their Deliverer by bestowing such gifts upon him as were required for the performance of his work and never fail'd of doing this till that miserable sinful people rejecting God and his Government desired that which was in use among their accursed Neighbours that they might be as like to them in the most shameful Slavery to Man as in the worship of Idols set up against God But if this pretended Right be grounded upon no word or work of God nor the reason of Man 't is to be accounted a meer figment that hath nothing of truth in it SECT XIV If the paternal Right had included Dominion and was to be transferred to a single Heir it must perish if he were not known and could be applied to no other person HAving shewed that the first Kings were not Fathers nor the first Fathers Kings that all the Kings of the Jews and Gentiles mentioned in Scripture came in upon titles different from and inconsistent with that of Paternity and that we are not led by the Word nor the Works of God nor the Reason of Man or Light of Nature to believe there is any such thing we may safely conclude there never was any such thing or that
in some cases to join with the greater than the smaller number because there is more strength it is not so always But however every man must therein be his own judg since if he mistake the hurt is only to himself and the ten may as justly resolve to live together frame a Civil Society and oblige themselves to Laws as the greatest number of men that ever met together in the world Thus we find that a few men assembling together upon the Banks of the Tiber resolved to build a City and set up a Government among themselves And the Multitude that met at Babylon when their design of building a Tower that should reach up to Heaven failed and their Language was confounded divided themselves as our Author says into seventy two parcels and by the same Right might have divided into more as their Descendents did into almost an infinite number before the death of their common Father Noah But we cannot find a more perfect Picture of Freemen living according to their own Will than in Abraham and Lot they went together into Canaan continued together as long as was convenient for them and parted when their Substance did so increase that they became troublesom to each other In the like manner Ismael Isaac and Abraham's six Sons by Keturah might have continued together and made one Nation Isaac and Esau Moab and Ammon might have done so too or all of them that came of the same Stock might have united together but they did not and their Descendents by the same rule might have subdivided perpetually if they had thought it expedient for themselves and if the Sons of Jacob did not do the like 't is probable they were kept together by the hope of an Inheritance promised to them by God in which we find no shadow of a despotical Dominion affected by one as Father or Heir to the first Father or reputed to be the Heir but all continued in that fraternal equality which according to Abraham's words to Lot they ought to do There was no Lord Slave or Vassal no strife was to be among them They were Brethren they might live together or separate as they found it convenient for themselves By the same Law that Abraham and Lot Moab and Ammon Ismael Isaac and the Sons of Keturah Jacob Esau and their Descendents did divide and set up several Governments every one of their Children might have done the like and the same Right remained to their Issue till they had by agreement engaged themselves to each other But if they had no dependence upon each other and might live together in that fraternal equality which was between Abraham and Lot or separate and continue in that separation or reunite they could not but have a right of framing such conditions of their reunion as best pleased themselves By this means every number of men agreeing together and framing a Society became a compleat Body having all Power in themselves over themselves subject to no other human Law than their own All those that compose the Society being equally free to enter into it or not no man could have any Prerogative above others unless it were granted by the consent of the whole and nothing obliging them to enter into this Society but the consideration of their own Good that Good or the opinion of it must have been the Rule Motive and End of all that they did ordain 'T is lawful therefore for any such Bodies to set up one or a few men to govern them or to retain the Power in themselves and he or they who are set up having no other Power but what is so conferred upon them by that Multitude whether great or small are truly by them made what they are and by the Law of their own Creation are to exercise those Powers according to the proportion and to the ends for which they were given These Rights in several Nations and Ages have bin variously executed in the establishment of Monarchies Aristocracies Democracies or mixed Governmeuts according to the variety of Circumstances and the Governments have bin good or evil according to the rectitude or pravity of their Institution and the vertue and wisdom or the folly and vices of those to whom the Power was committed but the end which was ever proposed being the good of the Publick they only performed their duty who procured it according to the Laws of the Society which were equally valid as to their own Magistrates whether they were few or many This might suffice to answer our Author's Question but he endeavours further to perplex it by a fiction of his own brain That God gave this Power to the whole Multitude met and not to every particular Assembly of Men And expects a proof That the whole Multitude met and divided this Power which God gave them in gross by breaking it into parcels and by appointing a distinct Power to each Commonwealth He also fathers it upon the Assertors of Liberty and dos not see as he says how there can be an Election of a Magistrate by any Common-wealth that is not an Vsurpation upon the Privilege of the whole World unless all Mankind had met together and divided the Power into parcels which God had given them in gross But besore I put my self to the trouble of answering that which is but an Appendix to a whimsy of his own I may justly ask What hurt he finds in Usurpation who asserts that the same Obedience is due to all Monarchs whether they come in by Inheritance Election or Usurpation If Usurpation can give a Right to a Monarch why dos it not confer the same upon a People Or rather if God did in gross confer such a Right upon all Mankind and they neither did nor can meet together by consent to dispose of it for the good of the whole why should not those who can and do consent to meet together agree upon that which seems most expedient to them for the Government of themselves Did God create Man under the necessity of wanting Government and all the good that proceeds from it because at the first all did not and afterwards all could not meet to agree upon Rules Or did he ever declare that unless they should use the first opportunity of dividing themselves into such parcels as were to remain unalterable the right of reigning over every one shall fall to the first Villain that should dare to attempt it It is not more consonant to the Wisdom and Goodness of God to leave to every Nation a liberty of repairing the Mischiefs fallen upon them through the omission of their first Parents by setting up Governments among themselves than to lay them under a necessity of submitting to any that should insolently aspire to a Domination over them Is it not more just and reasonable to believe that the universal Right not being executed devolves upon particular Nations as numbers of the great Body than that it should become the reward of Violence
Monarchies by the violence of some Princes and the baseness folly and cowardice of others together with what they have suffer'd in contests for the several Crowns whilst men divided into divers Factions ftrive with as much vehemency to advance the Person they favour as if they or their Country were interested in the quarrel and fight as fiercely for a Master as they might reasonably do to have none I am not able to determine which of the two evils is the most mortal 'T is evident the Vices of Princes result to the damage of the People but whether Pride and Cruelty or Stupidity and Sloth be the worst I cannot tell All Monarchies are subject to be afflicted with Civil Wars but whether the most frequent and bloody do arise from the quarrels of divers Competitors for Crowns before any one gain the possession of them or afterwards through the fears of him that would keep what he has gained or the rage of those who would wrest it from him is not so easily decided But Commonwealths are less troubled with those Distempers Women Children or such as are notoriously foolish or mad are never advanced to the supreme Power Whilst the Laws and that Disciplin which nourishes Virtue is in force Men of Wisdom and Valor are never wanting and every man desires to give testimony of his Virtue when he knows 't will be rewarded with Honour and Power If unworthy persons creep into Magistracies or are by mistake any way prefer'd their Vices for the most part turn to their own hurt and the State cannot easily receive any great damage by the incapacity of one who is not to continue in Office above a year and is usually encompassed with those who having born or are aspiring to the same are by their Virtue able to supply his defects cannot hope for a reward from one unable to corrupt them and are sure of the favour of the Senate and People to support them in the defence of the publick Interest As long as this good Order continues private quarrels are suppress'd by the authority of the Magistrate or prove to be of little effect Such as arise between the Nobles and Commons frequently produce good Laws for the maintenance of Liberty as they did in Rome for above three hundred years after the expulsion of Tarquin and almost ever terminated with little or no blood Sometimes the errors of one or both parties are discovered by the discourse of a wise and good man and those who have most violently opposed one another become the best Friends every one joining to remove the evil that causes the division When the Senate and People of Rome seemed to be most furiously incensed against each other the creation of Tribuns communication of Honours and Marriages between the Patrician and Plebeian Families or the mitigation of Usury composed all and these were not only harmless things but such as gave opportunities of correcting the defects that had bin in the first Constitution of the Government without which they could never have attained to the Greatness Glory and Happiness they afterwards enjoy'd Such as had seen that People meeting in tumult running through the City crying out against the Kings Consuls Senate or Decemviri might have thought they would have filled all with blood and slaughter but no such thing hapned They desired no more than to take away the Kingdom which Tarquin had wickedly usurped and never went about so much as to punish one Minister of the mischiefs he had done or to take away his Goods till upon pretence of treating his Ambassadors by a new treachery had cast the City into greater danger than ever Tho the Decemviri had by the like Villanies equally provoked the People they were used with the like gentleness Appius Claudius and Oppius having by voluntary death substracted themselves from publick punishment their Collegues were only banished and the Magistracies of the City reduced to the former order without the effusion of more blood They who contended for their just Rights were satisfied with the recovery of them whereas such as follow the impulse of an unruly Ambition never think themselves safe till they have destroyed all that seem able to disturb them and satiated their rage with the blood of their Adversaries This makes as well as shews the difference between the Tumults of Rome or the secession of the common People to Mount Aventine and the Battels of Towton Teuxbury Eveshal Lewes Hexham Barnet St. Albans and Bosworth 'T is in vain to say these ought rather to be compared to those of Pharsalia Actium or Philippi for when the Laws of a Commonwealth are abolish'd the name also ceases Whatever is done by force or fraud to set up the Interests and Lusts of one man in opposition to the Laws of his Country is purely and absolutely Monarchical Whatsoever passed between Marius Sylla Cinna Catiline Caesar Pompey Crassus Augustus Antonius and Lepidus is to be imputed to the Contests that arise between Competitors for Monarchy as well as those that in the next age happened between Galba Otho Vitellius and Vespasian Or which is worse whereas those in Commonwealths fight for themselves when there is occasion and if they succeed enjoy the fruits of their Victory so as even those who remain of the vanquished party partake of the Liberty thereby established or the good Laws thereupon made such as follow'd the Ensigns of these men who sought to set up themselves did rather like beasts than men hazard and suffer many unspeakable evils to purchase misery to themselves and their Posterity and to make him their Master who increasing in Pride Avarice and Cruelty was to be thrown down again with as much Blood as he had bin set up These things if I mistake not being in the last degree evident I may leave to our Author all the advantages he can gain by his rhetorical Description of the Tumults of Rome when Blood was in the Market-place suckt up with Sponges and the Jakes stuffed with Carcases to which he may add the crimes of Sylla's Life and the miseries of his Death but withal I desire to know what number of Sponges were sufficient to suck up the Blood of five hundred thousand men slain in one day when the Houses of David and Jeroboam contended for the Crown of Israel or of four hundred thousand who fell in one battel between Joash and Amaziah on the same occasion what Jakes were capacious enough to contain the Carcases of those that perished in the quarrels between the Successors of Alexander the several Competitors for the Roman Empire or those which have happened in France Spain England and other places upon the like occasions If Sylla for some time acted as an absolute Monarch 't is no wonder that he died like one or that God punished him as Herod Philip the second of Spain and some others because the hand of his fellow-Citizens had unjustly spar'd him If when he was become detestable to God
against them and placed the only hopes of their safety in the publick Calamity and lawful Kings when they have fallen into the first degree of madness so as to assume a power above that which was allowed by the Law have in fury proved equal to the worst Usurpers Clonymus of Sparta was of this sort He became says Plutarch an Enemy to the City because they would not allow him the absolute Power he affected and brought Pyrrhus the fiercest of their Enemies with a mighty and excellently well disciplin'd Army to destroy them Vortigern the Britan call'd in the Saxons with the ruin of his own People who were incensed against him for his Lewdness Cruelty and Baseness King John for the like reasons offer'd the Kingdom of England to the Moors and to the Pope Peter the Cruel and other Kings of Castille brought vast Armies of Moors into Spain to the ruin of their own People who detested their Vices and would not part with their Privileges Many other examples of the like nature might be alledged and I wish our own experience did not too well prove that such designs are common Let him that doubts this examin the Causes of the Wars with Scotland in the Years 1639 1640 the slaughters of the Protestants in Ireland 1641 the whole course of Alliances and Treaties for the space of fourscore Years the friendship contracted with the French frequent Quarrels with the Dutch together with other circumstances that are already made too publick if he be not convinced by this he may soon see a man in the Throne who had rather be a Tributary to France than a lawful King of England whilst either Parliament or People shall dare to dispute his Commands insist upon their own Rights or defend a Religion inconsistent with that which he has espoused and then the truth will be so evident as to require no proof Grotius was never accused of dealing hardly with Kings or laying too much weight upon imaginary cases nevertheless amongst other reasons that in his opinion justify Subjects in taking arms against their Princes he alledges this propter immanem saevitiam and quando Rex in Populi exitium fertur in as much as it is contrary to and inconsistent with the ends for which Governments are instituted which were most impertinent if no such thing could be for that which is not can have no effect There are therefore Princes who seek the destruction of their People or none could be justly opposed on that account If King James was of another opinion I could wish the course of his Government had bin suted to it When he said that whilst he had the power of making Judges and Bishops he would make that to be Law and Gospel which best pleased him and filled those places with such as turned both according to his Will and Interests I must think that by overthrowing Justice which is the rule of civil and moral Actions and perverting the Gospel which is the light of the spiritual man he left nothing unattempted that he durst attempt by which he might bring the most extensive and universal evils upon our Nation that any can suffer This would stand good tho Princes never erred unless they were transported with some inordinate Lusts for 't is hard to find one that dos not live in the perpetual power of them They are naturally subject to the impulse of such appetites as well as others and whatever evil reigns in their nature is fomented by education 'T is the handle by which their Flatterers lead them and he that discovers to what Vice a Prince is most inclin'd is sure to govern him by rendring himself subservient In this consists the chief art of a Courtier and by this means it comes to pass that such Lusts as in private men are curbed by fear do not only rage as in a wild Beast but are perpetually inflamed by the malice of their own Servants their hatred to the Laws of God or Men that might restrain them increases in proportion with their Vices or their fears of being punished for them And when they are come to this they can set no limits to their fury and there is no extravagance into which they do not frequently fall But many of them do not expect these violent motives the perversity of their own nature carries them to the extremities of evil They hate Virtue for its own sake and virtuous men for being most unlike to themselves This Virtue is the dictate of Reason or the remains of Divine Light by which men are made beneficent and beneficial to each other Religion proceeds from the same spring and tends to the same end and the good of Mankind so intirely depends upon these two that no people ever enjoyed any thing worth desiring that was not the product of them and whatsoever any have suffer'd that deserves to be abhorr'd and feared has proceeded either from the defect of these or the wrath of God against them If any Prince therefore has bin an enemy to Virtue and Religion he must also have bin an enemy to Mankind and most especially to the People under him Whatsoever he dos against those that excel in Virtue and Religion tends to the destruction of the People who subsist by them I will not take upon me to define who they are or to tell the number of those that do this but 't is certain there have bin such and I wish I could say they were few in number or that they had liv'd only in past ages Tacitus dos not fix this upon one Prince but upon all that he writes of and to give his Readers a tast of what he was to write he says that Nobility and Honours were dangerous but that Virtue brought most certain destruction and in another place that after the slaughter of many excellent men Nero resolved to cut down Virtue it self and therefore kill'd Thraseas Patus and Bareas Soranus And whosoever examines the Christian or Ecclesiastical Histories will find those Princes to have bin no less enemies to Virtue and Religion than their Predecessors and consequently enemies to the Nations under them unless Religion and Virtue be things prejudicial or indifferent to Mankind But our Author may say these were particular cases and so was the slaughter of the Prophets and Apostles the crucifixion of Christ and all the Villanies that have ever bin committed yet they proceeded from a universal principle of hatred to all that is good exerting it self as far as it could to the ruin of mankind And nothing but the over-ruling Power of God who resolved to preserve to himself a People could set bounds to their Rage which in other respects had as full success as our Author or the Devil could have wished Dionysius his other example of Justice deserves observation More falshood lewdness treachery ingratitude cruelty baseness avarice impudence and hatred to all manner of Good was hardly ever known in a mortal Creature For this reason
Diogenes seeing him at Corinth tho in a poor and contemptible condition said he rather deserved to have continued in the misery fears and villanies of his Tyranny than to be suffer'd peaceably to converse with honest men And if such as these are to be called observers of Justice it must be concluded that the Laws of God and of Men are either of no value or contrary to it and that the destruction of Nations is a better work than their preservation No Faith is to be observed Temples may be justly sack'd the best men slain for daring to be better than their Masters and the whole World if it were in the power of one Man rightly torn in pieces and destroy'd His Reasons for this are as good as his Doctrin It is saith he the multitude of people and abundance of riches that are the glory and strength of every Prince the bodies of his Subjects do him service in War and their goods supply his wants Therefore if not out of affection to his people yet out of natural love unto himself every Tyrant desires to preserve the lives and goods of his Subjects I should have thought that Princes tho Tyrants being God's Vicegerents and Fathers of their People would have sought their good tho no advantage had thereby redounded to themselves but it seems no such thing is to be expected from them They consider Nations as Grasiers do their Herds and Flocks according to the profit that can be made of them and if this be so a People has no more security under a Prince than a Herd or Flock under their Master Tho he desire to be a good Husband yet they must be delivered up to the slaughter when he finds a good Market or a better way of improving his Land but they are often foolish riotous prodigal and wantonly destroy their Stock tho to their own prejudice We thought that all Princes and Magistrates had bin set up that under them we might live quietly and peaceably in all godliness and honesty but our Author teaches us that they only seek what they can make of our Bodies and Goods and that they do not live and reign for us but for themselves If this be true they look upon us not as Children but as Beasts nor do us any good for our own sakes or because it is their duty but only that we may be useful to them as Oxen are put into plentiful Pastures that they may be strong for labour or fit for slaughter This is the divine Model of Government that he offers to the World The just Magistrate is the Minister of God for our good but this Absolute Monarch has no other care of us than as our Riches and Multitude may increase his own Glory and Strength We might easily judg what would be the issue of such a Principle when the Being of Nations depending upon his will must also depend upon his opinion whether the Strength Multitude and Riches of a People do conduce to the increase of Glory and Power or not tho Histories were silent in the case for these things speak of themselves The judgment of a single man is not to be relied upon the best and wisest do osten err the foolish and perverse always and our discourse is not of what Moses or Samuel would do but what may come into the fancy of a furious or wicked man who may usurp the supreme Power or a child a woman or a fool that may inherit it Besides the Proposition upon which he builds his Conclusion proves often false for as the Riches Power Number and Courage of our Friends is for our advantage and that of our Enemies threatens us with ruin those Princes only can reasonably believe the strength of their Subjects beneficial to them who govern so as to be assured of their Affection and that their Strength will be employ'd for them But those who know they are or deserve to be hated cannot but think it will be employ'd against them and always seek to diminish that which creates their danger This must certainly befal as many as are lewd foolish negligent imprudent cowardly wicked vicious or any way unworthy the places they obtain for their Reign is a perpetual exercise of the most extreme and ruinous Injustice Every man that follows an honest Interest is prejudic'd Every one who finds the Power that was ordained for his good to be turned to his hurt will be angry and hate him that dos it If the People be of uncorrupted manners this hatred will be universal because every one of them desires that which is just if composed of good and evil the first will always be averse to the evil Government and the others endeavouring to uphold it the safety of the Prince must depend upon the prevalence of either Party If the best prove to be the strongest he must perish and knowing himself to be supported only by the worst he will always destroy as many of his Enemies as he can weaken those that remain enrich his Creatures with their Spoils and Confiscations by fraud and rapine accumulate Treasures to increase the number of his Party and advance them into all places of power and trust that by their assistance he may crush his Adversaries and every man is accounted his Adversary who has either Estate Honor Virtue or Reputation This naturally casts all the Power into the hands of those who have no such dangerous qualities nor any thing to recommend them but an absolute resignation of themselves to do whatever they are commanded These men having neither will nor knowledg to do good as soon as they come to be in power Justice is perverted military Discipline neglected the publick Treasures exhausted new Projects invented to raise more and the Prince's wants daily increasing through their ignorance negligence or deceit there is no end of their devices and tricks to gain supplies To this end swarms of Spies Informers and false Witnesses are sent out to circumvent the richest and most eminent men The Tribunals are fill'd with Court-Parasites of profligate Consciences Fortunes and Reputation that no man may escape who is brought before them If Crimes are wanting the diligence of well-chosen Officers and Prosecutors with the favour of the Judges supply all defects the Law is made a Snare Virtue suppress'd Vice fomented and in a short time Honesty and Knavery Sobriety and Lewdness Virtue and Vice become Badges of the several Factions and every man's conversation and manners shewing to what Party he is addicted the Prince who makes himself head of the worst must favour them to the overthrow of the best which is so streight a way to an universal ruin that no State can prevent it unless that course be interrupted These things consider'd no general Judgment can be made of a Magistrate's Counsels from his Name or Duty He that is just and become grateful to the People by doing good will find his own Honour and Security in increasing their Number
take it This defect may possibly be repair'd in time but to conclude it must be so is absurd for no one has this use and experience when he begins to reign At that time many Errors may be committed to the ruin of himself or people and many have perish'd even in their beginning Edward the fifth and sixth of England Francis the second of France and divers other Kings have died in the beginning of their youth Charles the ninth lived only to add the furies of youth to the follies of his childhood and our Henry the second Edward the second Richard the second and Henry the sixth seem to have bin little wiser in the last than in the first year of their Reign or Life The present Kings of Spain France and Sweden came to the Crowns they wear before the sixth year of their Age and if they did then surpass all annual Magistrates in Wisdom and Valour it was by a peculiar Gift of God which for any thing we know is not given to every King and it was not use and experience that made them to excel If it be pretended that this experience with the Wisdom that it gives comes in time and by degrees I may modestly ask what time is requir'd to render a Prince excellent in Wisdom who is Child or a Fool and who will give security that he shall live to that time or that the Kingdom shall not be ruin'd in the time of his folly I may also doubt how our Author who concludes that every King in time must needs become excellent in Wisdom can be reconciled to Solomon who in preferring a wise Child before an old and foolish King that will not be advised shews that an old King may be a Fool and he that will not be advised is one Some are so naturally brutish and stupid that neither education nor time will mend them 'T is probable that Solomon took what care he could to instruct his only Son Rehoboam but he was certainly a Fool at forty years of age and we have no reason to believe that he deserved a better name He seems to have bin the very Fool his Father intended who tho brayed in a mortar would never leave his folly He would not be advised tho the hand of God was against him ten Tribes revolted from him and the City and Temple was pillaged by the Egyptians Neither experience nor afflictions could mend him and he is called to this day by his own Countrymen Stultitia Gentium I might offend tender ears if I should alledg all the Examples of Princes mentioned in History or known in our own Age who have lived and died as foolish and incorrigible as he but no man I presume will be scandalized that the ten last Kings of Meroveus his Race whom the French Historians call Les Roys faineants were so far from excelling other men in understanding that they liv'd and died more like to beasts than men Nay the Wisdom and Valour of Charles Martel expired in his Grandchild Charles the Great and his Posterity grew to be so sottish that the French Nation must have perished under their conduct if the Nobility and People had not rejected them and placed the Crown upon a more deserving head This is as much as is necessary to be said to the general Proposition for it is false if it be not always true and no conclusion can be made upon it But I need not be so strict with our Author there being no one sound part in his Assertion Many Children come to be Kings when they have no experience and die or are depos'd before they can gain any Many are by nature so sottish that they can learn nothing Others falling under the power of Women or corrupt Favorites and Ministers are perswaded and seduced from the good ways to which their own natural understanding or experience might lead them the Evils drawn upon themselves or their Subjects by the Errors committed in the time of their ignorance are often grievous and sometimes irreparable tho they should be made wise by time and experience A person of royal Birth and excellent Wit was so sensible of this as to tell me That the condition of Kings was most miserable in as much as they never heard Truth till they were ruin'd by Lies and then every one was ready to tell it to them not by way of advice but reproach and rather to vent their own spite than to seek a remedy to the evils brought upon them and the people Others attain to Crowns when they are of full Age and have experience as Men tho none as Kings and therefore are apt to commit as great mistakes as Children And upon the whole matter all the Histories of the world shew that instead of this profound Judgment and incomparable Wisdom which our Author generally attributes to all Kings there is no sort of men that do more frequently and intirely want it But tho Kings were always wise by nature or made to be so by experience it would be of little advantage to Nations under them unless their Wisdom were pure perfect and accompanied with Clemency Magnanimity Justice Valour and Piety Our Author durst hardly have said that these Virtues or Graces are gained by Experience or annexed by God to any rank of Men of Families He gives them where he pleases without distinction We sometimes see those upon Thrones who by God and Nature seem to have bin designed for the most sordid Offices and those have bin known to pass their lives in meanness and poverty who had all the Qualities that could be desir'd in Princes There is likewise a kind of ability to dispatch some sort of Affairs that Princes who continue long in a Throne may to a degree acquire or increase Some men take this for Wisdom but K. James more rightly called it by the name of King-craft and as it principally consists in Dissimulation and the arts of working upon mens Passions Vanities private Interests or Vices to make them for the most part instruments of Mischief it has the advancement or security of their own Persons for object is frequently exercised with all the excesses of Pride Avarice Treachery and Cruelty and no men have bin ever found more notoriously to deflect from all that deserves praise in a Prince or a Gentleman than those that have most excelled in it Pharasmenes King of Iberia is recorded by Tacitus to have bin well vers'd in this Science His Brother Mithradates King of Armenia had married his Daughter and given his own Daughter to Rhadamistus Son of Pharasmenes He had some Contests with Mithradates but by the help of these mutual Alliances nearness of Blood the diligence of Rhadamistus and an Oath strengthen'd with all the Ceremonies that amongst those Nations were esteemed most sacred not to use Arms or Poison against him all was compos'd and by this means getting him into his power he stifled him with a great weight of clothes thrown upon him
from a foreign Country was immediately made King of a fierce People that had already conquer'd many of their Neighbours and was grown too boisterous even for Romulus himself The like may be said of the first Tarquin and of Servius they were Strangers and tho Tullus Hostilius and Ancus Martius were Romans they had as little title to a Dominion over their Fellow-Citizens or means of attaining to it as if they had come from the farthest parts of the Earth This must be in all places unless one man could prove by a perfect and uninterrupted Genealogy that he is the eldest Son of the eldest Line of Noah and that Line to have continued perpetually in the Government of the World for if the Power has bin divided it may be subdivided into infinity if interrupted the chain is broken and can never be made whole But if our Author can perform this for the service of any man I willingly surrender my Arms and yield up the Cause I defend If he fail 't is ridiculous to pretend a Right that belongs to no man or to go about to retrieve a Right which for the space of four thousand years has lain dorment and much more to create that which never had a subsistence This leads us necessarily to a conclusion That all Kingdoms are at the first erected by the consent of Nations and given to whom they please or else all are set up by force or some by force and some by consent If any are set up by the consent of Nations those Kings do not confer Liberties upon those Nations but receive all from them and the general Proposition is false If our Author therefore or his Followers would confute me they must prove that all the Kingdoms of the World have their beginning from force and that Force doth always create a Right or if they recede from the general Proposition and attribute a peculiar right to one or more Princes vvho are so absolute Lords of their People that those under them have neither Liberty Privilege Property or Part in the Government but by their Concessions they must prove that those Princes did by force gain the Power they have and that their Right is derived from it This force also must have bin perpetually continued for if that force be the root of the Right that is pretended another force by the same rule may overturn extinguish or transfer it to another hand If Contracts have interven'd the force ceases and the Right that afterwards doth accrue to the persons must proceed from and be regulated according to those Contracts This may be sufficient to my purpose For as it has bin already proved that the Kingdoms of Israel Judah Rome Sparta France Spain England and all that we are concerned in or that deserve to be examples to us did arise from the Consent of the respective Nations and were frequently reduced to their first Principles when the Princes have endeavour'd to transgress the Laws of their Institution it could be nothing to us tho Attila or Tamerlan had by force gained the Dominions they possess'd But I dare go a step further and boldly assert that there never was or can be a man in the world that did or can subdue a Nation and that the right of one grounded upon force is a meer whimsey It was not Agathocles Dionysius Nabis Marius Sylla or Cesar but the mercenary Soldiers and other Villains that joined with them who subdued the Syracusans Spartans or Romans And as the work was not performed by those Tyrants alone if a right had bin gained by the violence they used it must have bin common to all those that gained it and he that commanded them could have had no more than they thought fit to confer upon him When Miltiades desired leave to wear an Olive Garland in commemoration of the Victory obtained at Marathon and Athenian did in my opinion rightly say If you alone did fight against the Persians it is just that you only should be crowned but if others did participate in the Victory they ought also to have a part in the Honour And the principal difference that I have observ'd between the most regular proceedings of the wisest Senats or Assemblies of the people in their Persons or Delegates and the fury of the most dissolute Villains has bin that the first seeking the publick good do usually set up such a Man and invest him with such Powers as seem most conducing to that Good whereas the others following the impulse of a bestial rage and aiming at nothing but the satisfaction of their own lusts always advance one from whom they expect the greatest advantages to themselves and give him such Powers as most conduce to the accomplishment of their own ends but as to the Person 't is the same thing Cesar and Nero did no more make themselves what they were than Numa and could no more confer any Right Liberty or Privilege upon the Army that gave them all they had than the most regular Magistrate can upon the Senat or People that chose them This also is common to the worst as well as the best that they who set up either do as into a publick Treasury confer upon the Person they chuse a Power of distributing to particular men or numbers of men such Honors Privileges and Advantages as they may seem according to the Principles of the Government to deserve But there is this difference that the ends of the one being good and those of the other evil the first do for the most part limit the Powers that something may remain to reward Services done to the Publick in a manner proportion'd to the merit of every one placing other Magistrates to see it really performed so as they may not by the weakness or vices of the Governor be turned to the publick detriment the others think they never give enough that the Prince having all in his power may be able to gratify their most exorbitant desires if by any ways they can get his favour and his infirmities and vices being most beneficial to them they seldom allow to any other Magistrate a power of opposing his Will or suffer those who for the publick good would assume it The World affords many examples of both sorts and every one of them have had their progress sutable to their Constitution The regular Kingdoms of England France Spain Poland Bohemia Denmark Sweden and others whether elective or hereditary have had High Stewards Constables Mayors of the Palace Rixhofmeisters Parliaments Diets Assemblies of Estates Cortez and the like by which those have bin admitted to succeed who seemed most fit for the publick Service the unworthy have bin rejected the infirmities of the weak supplied the malice of the unjust restrained and when necessity required the Crown transferr'd from one Line or Family to another But in the furious Tyrannies that have bin set up by the violence of a corrupted Soldiery as in the antient Roman Empire the
ever were committed may pass for laudable and innocent But if Saul were not to be blamed for killing the Priests why was David blamed for the death of Uriah Why were the Dogs to lick the blood of Ahab and Jezebel if they did nothing more than Kings might do without blame Now if the slaughter of one man was so severely avenged upon the Authors and their Families none but such as Filmer can think that of so many innocent men with their Wives and Children could escape unreproved or unpunished But the whole series of the History of Saul shewing evidently that his Life and Reign were full of the most violent cruelty and madness we are to seek no other reason for the ruin threatned and brought upon him and his Family And as those Princes who are most barbarously savage against their own people are usually most gentle to the Enemies of their Country he could not give a more certain testimony of his hatred to those he ought to have protected than by preserving those Nations who were their most irreconcileable Enemies This is proved by reason as well as by experience for every man knows he cannot bear the hatred of all mankind Such as know they have Enemies abroad endeavour to get Friends at home Those who command powerful Nations and are beloved by them fear not to offend Strangers But if they have rendred their own people Enemies to them they cannot hope for help in a time of distress nor so much as a place of retreat or refuge unless from strangers nor from them unless they deserve it by favouring them to the prejudice of their own Country As no man can serve two Masters no man can pursue two contrary Interests Moses Joshua Gideon and Samuel were severe to the Amorites Midianites and Cananites but mild and gentle to the Hebrews Saul who was cruel to the Hebrews spared the Amalekites whose preservation was their destruction and whilst he destroyed those he should have saved and saved those that by a general and particular command of God he should have destroyed he lost his ill-govern'd Kingdom and left an example to posterity of the end that may be expected from pride folly and tyranny The matter would not be much alter'd if I should confess that in the time of Saul all Nations were governed by Tyrants tho it is not true for Greece did then flourish in Liberty and we have reason to believe that other Nations did so also for tho they might not think of a good Government at the first nothing can oblige men to continue under one that is bad when they discover the evils of it and know how to mend it They who trusted men that appeared to have great Virtues with such a power as might easily be turned into Tyranny might justly retract limit or abolish it when they found it to be abused And tho no condition had bin reserved the publick Good which is the end of all Government had bin sufficient to abrogate all that should tend to the contrary As the malice of Men and their Inventions to do mischief increase daily all would soon be brought under the power of the worst if care were not taken and opportunities embraced to find new ways of preventing it He that should make War at this day as the best Commanders did two hundred years past would be beaten by the meanest Souldier The Places then accounted impregnable are now slighted as indefensible and if the Arts of defending were not improved as well as those of affaulting none would be able to hold out a day Men were sent into the World rude and ignorant and if they might not have used their natural Faculties to find out that which is good for themselves all must have bin condemn'd to continue in the ignorance of our first Fathers and to make no use of their understanding to the ends for which it was given The bestial Barbarity in which many Nations especially of Africa America and Asia do now live shews what human Nature is if it be not improved by art and discipline and if the first errors committed through ignorance might not be corrected all would be obliged to continue in them and for any thing I know we must return to the Religion Manners and Policy that were found in our Country at Cesar's landing To affirm this is no less than to destroy all that is commendable in the world and to render the understanding given to men utterly useless But if it be lawful for us by the use of that understanding to build Houses Ships and Forts better than our Ancestors to make such Arms as are most fit for our defence and to invent Printing with an infinite number of other Arts beneficial to mankind why have we not the same right in matters of Government upon which all others do almost absolutely depend If men are not obliged to live in Caves and hollow Trees to eat Acorns and to go naked why should they be for ever obliged to continue under the same form of Government that their Ancestors happened to set up in the time of their ignorance Or if they were not so ignorant to set up one that was not good enough for the age in which they lived why it should not be altered when tricks are found out to turn that to the prejudice of Nations which was erected for their good From whence should malice and wickedness gain a privilege of putting new Inventions to do mischief every day into practice and who is it that so far protects them as to forbid good and innocent men to find new ways also of defending themselves from it If there be any that do this they must be such as live in the same principle who whilst they pretend to exercise Justice provide only for the indemnity of their own Crimes and the advancement of unjust designs They would have a right of attacking us with all the advantages of the Arms now in use and the Arts which by the practice of so many ages have bin wonderfully refined whilst we should be obliged to employ no others in our just defence than such as were known to our naked Ancestors when Cesar invaded them or to the Indians when they fell under the dominion of the Spaniards This would be a compendious way of placing uncontrol'd Iniquity in all the Kingdoms of the World and to overthrow all that deserves the name of Good by the introduction of such accursed Maxims But if no man dares to acknowledg any such except those whose acknowledgment is a discredit we ought not to suffer them to be obliquely obtruded upon us nor to think that God has so far abandoned us into the hands of our Enemies as not to leave us the liberty of using the same Arms in our defence as they do to offend and injure us We shall be told that Prayers and Tears were the only Arms of the first Christians and that Christ commanded his Disciples to pray
doing the like unless they have made municipal Laws of their own to the contrary which our Author and his Followers may produce when they can find them His next work is to go back again to the Tribute paid by Christ to Cesar and judiciously to infer that all Nations must pay the same Duty to their Magistrates as the Jews did to the Romans who had subdued them Christ did not says he ask what the Law of the Land was nor inquire whether there was a Statute against it nor whether the Tribute were given by the consent of the People but upon sight of the superscription concluded c. It had bin strange if Christ had inquired after their Laws Statutes or Consent when he knew that their Commonwealth with all the Laws by which it had subsisted was abolished and that Israel was become a Servant to those who exercised a most violent domination over them which being a peculiar punishment for their peculiar sins can have no influence upon Nations that are not under the same circumstances But of all that he says nothing is more incomprehensible than what he can mean by lawful Kings to whom all is due that was due to the Roman Usurpers For lawful Kings are Kings by the Law In being Kings by the Law they are such Kings as the Law makes them and that Law only must tell us what is due to them or by a universal Patriarchical Right to which no man can have a title as is said before till he prove himself to be the right Heir of Noah If neither of these are to be regarded but that Right follows Possession there is no such thing as a Usurper he who has the Power has the Right as indeed Filmer says and his Wisdom as well as his Integrity is sufficiently declared by the Assertion This wicked extravagancy is followed by an attempt of as singular ignorance and stupidity to shuffle together Usurpers and Conquerors as if they were the same whereas there have bin many Usurpers who were not Conquerors and Conquerors that deserved not the name of Usurpers No wife man ever said that Agathocles or Dionysius conquer'd Syracuse Tarquin Galba or Otho Rome Cromwel England or that the Magi who seiz'd the Government of Persia after the death of Cambyses conquer'd that Country When Moses and Joshua had overthrown the Kingdoms of the Amorites Moabites and Cananites or when David subdued the Ammonites Edomites and others none as I suppose but such Divines as Filmer will say they usurped a Dominion over them There is such a thing amongst men as just War or else true Valour would not be a Virtue but a Crime and instead of glory the utmost infamy would always be the companion of Victory There are says Grotius Laws of War as well as of Peace He who for a just Cause and by just Means carries on a just War has as clear a right to what is acquired as can be enjoy'd by Man but all usurpation is detestable and abominable SECT X. The words of St. Paul enjoying obedience to higher Powers favour all sorts of Governments no less than Monarchy OUR Author's next quarrel is with St. Paul who did not as he says in enjoyning subjection to the higher Powers signify the Laws of the Land or mean the highest Powers as well Aristocratical and Democratical as Regal but a Monarch that carries the Sword c. But what if there be no Monarch in the place or what if he do not carry the Sword Had the Apostle spoken in vain if the liberty of the Romans had not bin overthrown by the fraud and violence of Cesar Was no obedience to be exacted whilst that people enjoy'd the benefit of their own Laws and Virtue flourished under the moderate Government of a legal and just Magistracy established for the common good by the common consent of all Had God no Minister amongst them till Law and Justice was overthrown the best part of the people destroy'd by the fury of a corrupt mercenary Souldiery and the world subdued under the Tyranny of the worst Monsters that it had ever produced Are these the ways of establishing God's Vicegerents and will he patronize no Governors or Governments but such as these Do's God uphold evil and that only If the world has bin hitherto mistaken in giving the name of evil to that which is good and calling that good which is evil I desire to know what can be call'd good amongst men if the Government of the Romans till they entred Greece and Asia and were corrupted by the Luxury of both do not deserve that name or what is to be esteemed evil if the establishment and exercise of the Cesars Power were not so But says he Wilt thou not be afraid of the Power And was there no Power in the Governments that had no Monarchs Were the Carthaginians Romans Grecians Gauls Germans and Spaniards without Power Was there no Sword in that Nation and their Magistrates who overthrew the Kingdoms of Armenia Egypt Numidia Macedon and many others whom none of the Monarchs were able to resist Are the Venetians Switzers Grisons and Hollanders now lest in the same weakness and no obedience at all due to their Magistrates If this be so how comes it to pass that justice is so well administred amongst them Who is it that defends the Hollanders in such a manner that the greatest Monarchs with all their Swords have had no great reason to boast of any advantages gained against them at least till we whom they could not resist when we had no Monarch tho we have bin disgracefully beaten by them since we had one by making Leagues against them and sowing divisions amongst them instigated and assisted the greatest Power now in the world to their destruction and our own But our Author is so accustom'd to fraud that he never cites a passage of Scripture which he does not abuse or vitiate and that he may do the same in this place he leaves out the following words For there is no power but of God that he might intitle one sort only to his protection If therefore the People and popular Magistrates of Athens the two Kings Ephori and Senate of Sparta the Sanhedrims amongst the Hebrews the Consuls Tribuns Pretors and Senate of Rome the Magistrates of Holland Switzerland and Venice have or had power we may conclude that they also were ordained by God and that according to the precept of the Apostle the same obedience sor the same reason is due to them as to any Monarch The Apostle farther explaining himself and shewing who may be accounted a Magistrate and what the duty of such a one is informs us when we should fear and on what account Rulers says he are not a terror to good works but to the evil Wilt thou then not be afraid of the Power do that which is good and thou shalt have praise of the same for he is the Minister of God a revenger to execute wrath
folly than we are to live in that wretched Barbarity in which the Romans found our Ancestors when they first entred this Island If any man say that Filmer dos not speak of Monsters nor of Children Women or Fools but of wise just and good Princes I answer that if there be a right inherent in Kings as Kings of doing what they please and in those who are next in blood to succeed them and inherit the same it must belong to all Kings and such as upon title of blood would be Kings And as there is no family that may not and dos not often produce such as I mentioned it must also be acknowledged in them and that power which is left to the wife just and good upon a supposition that they will not make an ill use of it must be devolved to those who will not or cannot make a good one but will either maliciously turn it to the destruction of those they ought to protect or through weakness suffer it to fall into the hands of those that govern them who are found by experience to be for the most part the worst of all most apt to use the basest arts and to flatter the humors and foment the vices that are most prevalent in weak and vicious Princes Germanicus Corbulo Valerius Asiaticus Thraseas Soranus Helvidius Priscus Julius Agricola and other excellent men lived in the times of Tiberius Caligula Claudius and Nero but the power was put into the hands of Sejanus Macro Tigellinus and other Villains like to them and I wish there were not too many modern examples to shew that weak and vicious Princes will never chuse such as shall preserve Nations from the mischiefs that would ensue upon their own incapacity or malice but that they must be imposed upon them by some other power or Nations be ruined for want of them This imposition must be by Law or by Force But as Laws are made to keep things in good order without the necessity of having recourse to force it would be a dangerous extravagance to arm that Prince with force which probably in a short time must be opposed by force and those who have bin guilty of this error as the Kingdoms of the East and the antient Roman Empire where no provision was made by Law against ill-governing Princes have found no other remedy than to kill them when by extreme sufferings they were driven beyond patience and this fell out so often that few of their Princes were observed to die by a common death But since the Empire was transmitted to Germany and the Emperors restrain'd by Laws that Nation has never bin brought to the odious extremities of suffering all manner of Indignities or revenging them upon the heads of Princes And if the Pope had not disturb'd them upon the account of Religion nor driven their Princes to disturb others they might have passed many ages without any civil Dissension and all their Emperors might have lived happily and died peaceably as most of them have done This might be sufficient to my purpose for if all Princes without distinction whether good or bad wise or foolish young or old sober or mad cannot be intrusted with an unlimited power and if the power they have ought to be limited by Law that Nations may not with danger to themselves as well as to the Prince have recourse to the last remedy this Law must be given to all and the good can be no otherwise distinguished from the bad and the wise from the foolish than by the observation or violation of it But I may justly go a step farther and affirm that this Law which by restraining the Lusts of the vicious and foolish frequently preserves them from the destruction they would bring upon themselves or people and sometimes upon both is an assistance and direction to the wisest and best so that they also as well as the Nations under them are gainers by it This will appear strange only to those who know not how difficult and insupportable the Government of great Nations is and how unable the best man is to bear it And if it surpass the strength of the best it may easily be determined how ordinary men will behave themselves under it or what use the worst will make of it I know there have bin wise and good Kings but they had not an absolute Power nor would have accepted it tho it had bin offer'd much less can I believe that any of them would have transmitted such a power to their posterity when none of them could know any more than Solomon whether his Son would be a wise man or a fool But if the best might have desired and had bin able to bear it tho Moses by his own confession was not that could be no reason why it should be given to the worst and weakest or those who probably will be so Since the assurance that it will not be abused during the life of one man is nothing to the constitution of a State which aims at perpetuity And no man knowing what men will be especially if they come to the power by succession which may properly enough be called by chance 't is reasonably to be feared they will be bad and consequently necessary so to limit their power that if they prove to be so the Commonwealth may not be destroy'd which they were instituted to preserve The Law provides for this in leaving to the King a full and ample power of doing as much good as his heart can wish and in restraining his power so that if he should depart from the duty of his Office the Nation may not perish This is a help to those who are wise and good by directing them what they are to do more certainly than any one mans personal judgment can do and no prejudice at all since no such man did ever complain he was not suffer'd to do the evil which he would abhor if it were in his power and is a most necessary curb to the sury of bad Princes preventing them from bringing destruction upon the people Men are so subject to vices and passions that they stand in need of some restraint in every condition but most especially when they are in power The rage of a private man may be pernicious to one or a few of his Neighbours but the fury of an unlimited Prince would drive whole Nations into ruin And those very men who have lived modestly when they had little power have often proved the most savage of all Monsters when they thought nothing able to resist their rage 'T is said of Caligula that no man ever knew a better Servant nor a worse Master The want of restraint made him a Beast who might have continued to be a Man And tho I cannot say that our Law necessarily admits the next in Blood to the Succession for the contrary is proved yet the facility of our Ancestors in receiving children women or such men as were not more
except such as are like Filmer who by bidding defiance to the Laws of God and Man seems to declare war against both whom I would not trust to determine whether a People that can never fall into Nonage or Dotage and can never fail of having men of Wisdom and Virtue amongst them be not more fit to judg in their own Persons or by Representatives what conduces to their own good than one who at a venture may be born in a certain Family and who besides his own Infirmities Passions Vices or Interests is continually surrounded by such as endeavour to divert him from the ways of Truth and Justice And if no reasonable man dare prefer the latter before the former we must rely upon the Laws made by our Forefathers and interpreted by the Nation and not upon the will of a man 'T is in vain to say that a wise and good Council may supply the defects or correct the Vices of a young foolish or ill disposed King For Filmer denies that a King whatever he be without exception for he attributes profound wisdom to all is obliged to follow the advice of his Council and even he would hardly have had the impudence to say That good Counsel given to a foolish or wicked Prince were of any value unless he were obliged to follow it This Council must be chosen by him or imposed upon him if it be imposed upon him it must be by a power that is above him which he says cannot be If chosen by him who is weak foolish or wicked it can never be good because such virtue and wisdom is requir'd to discern and chuse a few good and wise men from a multitude of foolish and bad as he has not And it will generally fall out that he will take for his Counsellors rather those he believes to be addicted to his Person or Interests than such as are fitly qualified to perform the duty of their places But if he should by chance or contrary to his intentions make choice of some good and wise men the matter would not be much mended for they will certainly differ in opinion from the worst And tho the Prince should intend well of which there is no assurance nor any reason to put so great a power into his hands if there be none 't is almost impossible for him to avoid the snares that will be laid ro seduce him I know not how to put a better face upon this matter for if I examine rather what is probable than possible foolish or ill Princes will never chuse such as are wise and good but favouring those who are most like to themselves will prefer such as second their vices humours and personal Interests and by so doing will rather fortify and rivet the evils that are brought upon the Nation through their defects than cure them This was evident in Rehoboam he had good Counsel but he would not hearken to it We know too many of the same sort and tho it were not impossible as Macchiavelli says it is for a weak Prince to receive any benefit from a good Council we may certainly conclude that a People can never expect any good from a Council chosen by one who is weak or vicious If a Council be imposed upon him and he be obliged to follow their advice it must be imposed by a Power that is above him his Will therefore is not a Law but must be regulated by the Law the Monarchy is not above the Law and if we will believe our Author 't is no Monarchy because the Monarch has not his will and perhaps he says true For if that be not an Aristocracy where those that are or are reputed to be the best do govern then that is certainly a mixed State in which the will of one man dos not prevail But if Princes are not obliged by the Law all that is founded upon that supposition falls to the ground They will always sollow their own humours or the suggestions of those who second them Tiberius hearkned to none but Chaldeans or the ministers of his impurities and cruelties Claudius was governed by Slaves and the profligate Strumpets his Wives There were many wise and good men in the Senate during the reigns of Caligula Nero and Domitian but instead of following their Counsel they endeavour'd to destroy them all lest they should head the People against them and such Princes as resemble them will always follow the like courses If I often repeat these hateful names 't is not for want of sresher examples of the same nature but I chuse such as Mankind has universally condemn'd against whom I can have no other cause of hatred than what is common to all those who have any love to virtue and which can have no other relation to the Controversies of later Ages than what may flow from the similitude of their causes rather than such as are too well known to us and which every man according to the measure of his experience may call to mind in reading these I may also add that as nothing is to be received as a general Maxim which is not generally true I need no more to overthrow such as Filmer proposes than to prove how frequently they have bin found false and what desperate mischiefs have bin brought upon the World as often as they have bin practised and excessive Powers put into the hands of such as had neither inclination nor ability to make a good use of them 1. But if the safety of Nations be the end for which Governments are instituted such as take upon them to govern by what Title soever are by the Law of Nature bound to procure it and in order to this to preserve the Lives Lands Liberties and Goods of every one of their Subjects and he that upon any title whatsoever pretends assumes or exercises a power of disposing of them according to his will violates the Laws of Nature in the highest degree 2. If all Princes are obliged by the Law of Nature to preserve the Lands Goods Lives and Liberties of their Subjects those Subjects have by the Law of Nature a right to their Liberties Lands Goods c. and cannot depend upon the will of any man for that dependence destroys Liberty c. 3. Ill men will not and weak men cannot provide for the safety of the People nay the work is of such extreme difficulty that the greatest and wisest men that have bin in the world are not able by themselves to perform it and the assistance of Counsel is of no use unless Princes are obliged to follow it There must be therefore a power in every State to restrain the ill and to instruct weak Princes by obliging them to follow the Counsels given else the ends of Government cannot be accomplished nor the rights of Nations preserved All this being no more than is said by our Author or necessarily to be deduced from his Propositions one would think he were become as good
2d which he swears to abolish Now what Laws are upright and what evil who shall judg but the King c. So that in effect the King doth swear to keep no Laws but such as in his judgment are upright c. And if he did strictly swear to observe all Laws he could not without Perjury give his consent to the repealing or abrogating of any Statute by Act of Parliament c. And again But let it be supposed for Truth that Kings do swear to observe all Laws of their Kingdoms yet no man can think it reason that the Kings should be more bound by their voluntary Oaths than common Persons Now if a private Person make a Contract either with Oath or without Oath he is no farther bound than the equity and justice of the Contract ties him for a man may have relief against an unreasonable and unjust Promise if either deceit or error force or fear induced him thereunto or if it be hurtful or grievous in the performance since the Law in many cases gives the King a Prerogative above common persons Lest I should be thought to insist upon small advantages I will not oblige any man to shew where Filmer found this Oath nor observe the faults committed in the Translation but notwithstanding his false representation I find enough for my purpose and intend to take it in his own words But first I shall take leave to remark that those who for private interests addict themselves to the personal service of Princes tho the ruin of their Country find it impossible to perswade Mankind that Kings may govern as they please when all men know there are Laws to direct and restrain them unless they can make men believe they have their power from a universal and superior Law or that Princes can attempt to dissolve the obligations laid upon them by the Laws which they so solemnly swear to observe without rendring themselves detestable to God and Man and subject to the revenging hands of both unless they can invalidate those Oaths Mr. Hobbes I think was the first who very ingeniously contrived a compendious way of justifying the most abominable Perjuries and all the mischiefs ensuing thereupon by pretending that as the King's Oath is made to the People the People may absolve him from the obligation and that the People having conferred upon him all the Power they had he can do all that they could he can therefore absolve himself and is actually free since he is so when he pleases This is only false in the minor for the People not having conferred upon him all but only a part of their Power that of absolving him remains in themselves otherwise they would never have obliged him to take the Oath He cannot therefore absolve himself The Pope finds a help for this and as Christ's Vicar pretends the power of Absolution to be in him and exercised it in absolving King John But our Author despairing to impose either of these upon our Age and Nation with more impudence and less wit would enervate all Coronation-Oaths by subjecting them to the discretion of the taker whereas all men have hitherto thought their force to consist in the declared sense of those who give them This doctrine is so new that it surpasses the subtilty of the Schoolmen who as an ingenious Person said of them had minced Oaths so fine that a million of them as well as Angels may stand upon the point of a needle and were never yet equalled but by the Jesuits who have overthrown them by mental reservations which is so clearly demonstrated from their books that it cannot be denied but so horrible that even those of their own Order who have the least spark of common honesty condemn the practice And one of them being a Gentleman of a good family told me he would go the next day and take all the Oaths that should be offer'd if he could satisfy his conscience in using any manner of equivocation or mental reservation or that he might put any other sense upon them than he knew to be intended by those who offer'd them And if our Author's conscience were not more corrupted than that of the Jesuit who had lived fifty years under the worst Discipline that I think ever was in the world I would ask him seriously if he truly believe that the Nobility Clergy and Commonalty of England who have bin always so zealous for their antient Laws and so resolute in defending them did mean no more by the Oaths they so solemnly imposed and upon which they laid so much weight than that the King should swear to keep them so far only as he should think fit But he swears only to observe those that are upright c. How can that be understood otherwise than that those who give the Oath do declare their Laws and Customs to be upright and good and he by taking the Oath affirms them to be so Or how can they be more precisely specified than by the ensuing Clause Granted from God by just and devout Kings by Oath especially those of the famous King Edward But says he by the same Oath Richard the 2d was bound to abolish those that were evil If any such had crept in through error or bin obtruded by malice the evil being discovered and declared by the Nobility and Commons who were concerned he was not to take advantage of them or by his refusal to evade the abolition but to join with his people in annulling them according to the general Clause of assenting to those Quas vulgus elegerit Magna Charta being only an abridgment of our antient Laws and Customs the King that swears to it swears to them all and not being admitted to be the interpreter of it or to determin what is good or evil fit to be observed or annulled in it can have no more power over the rest This having bin confirmed by more Parliaments than we have had Kings since that time the same obligation must still lie upon them all as upon John and Henry in whose time that claim of right was compiled The Act was no less solemn than important and the most dreadful curses that could be conceived in words which were denounced against such as should any way infringe it by the Clergy in Westminster-Hall in the presence and with the assent of K. Henry the 3d many of the principal Nobility and all the Estates of the Kingdom shew whether it was referred to the King's Judgment or not when 't is evident they feared the violation from no other than himself and such as he should employ I confess the Church as they then called the Clergy was fallen into such corruption that their Arms were not much to be feared by one who had his conscience clear but that could not be in the case of perjury and our Ancestors could do no better than to employ the spiritual sword reserving to themselves the use of the other in case that should be
Union among them and bringing every man to an exact understanding of his own and the publick Rights On the other side he that would introduce an ill Magistrate make one evil who was good or preserve him in the exercise of injustice when he is corrupted must always open the way for him by vitiating the People corrupting their Manners destroying the validity of Oaths and Contracts teaching such evasions equivocations and frauds as are inconsistent with the thoughts that become men of virtue and courage and overthrowing the confidence they ought to have in each other make it impossible for them to unite among themselves The like Arts must be used with the Magistrate he cannot be for their turn till he is perswaded to believe he has no dependence upon and ows no duty to the People that he is of himself and not by their Institution that no man ought to inquire into nor be judg of his actions that all obedience is due to him whether he be good or bad wise or foolish a father or an enemy to his Country This being calculated for his personal interest he must pursue the same designs or his Kingdom is divided within it self and cannot subsist By this means those who flatter his humour come to be accounted his Friends and the only men that are thought worthy of great Trusts whilst such as are of another mind are exposed to all persecution These are always such as excel in Virtue Wisdom and greatness of Spirit they have Eyes and they will always see the way they go and leaving fools to be guided by implicit Faith will distinguish between good and evil and chuse that which is best they will judg of men by their actions and by them discovering whose Servant every man is know whether he is to be obeyed or not Those who are ignorant of all good careless or enemies to it take a more compendious way their slavish vitious and base natures inclining them to seek only private and present advantages they easily slide into a blind dependence upon one who has Wealth and Power and desiring only to know his will care not what injustice they do if they may be rewarded They worship what they find in the Temple tho it be the vilest of Idols and always like that best which is worst because it agrees with their inclinations and principles When a party comes to be erected upon such a foundation debauchery lewdness and dishonesty are the true badges of it Such as wear them are cherished but the principal marks of favour are reserved for those who are the most industrious in mischief either by seducing the People with the allurements of sensual Pleasures or corrupting their Understandings by false and slavish Doctrines By this means a man who calls himself a Philosopher or a Divine is often more useful than a great number of Tapsters Cooks Buffoons Players Fidlers Whores or Bawds These are the Devil's Ministers of a lower Order they seduce single Persons and such as fall into their snares are for the most part men of the simpler sort but the principal supporters of his Kingdom are they who by false Doctrines poison the springs of Religion and Virtue and by preaching or writing if their falshood and wickedness were not detected would extinguish all principles of common honesty and bring whole Nations to be best satisfied with themselves when their actions are most abominable And as the means must always be sutable to the end proposed the Governments that are to be established or supported by such ways must needs be the worst of all and comprehend all manner of evil SECT XX. Unjust Commands are not to be obey'd and no man is obliged to suffer for not obeying such as are against Law IN the next place our Author gravely proposes a question Whether it be a sin to disobey the King if he command any thing contrary to Law and as gravely determines that not only in human Laws but even in Divine a thing may be commanded contrary to Law and yet obedience to such a Command is necessary The sanctifying of the Sabbath is a divine Law yet if a Master command his Servant not to go to Church upon a Sabbath day the best Divines teach us the Servant must obey c. It is not fit to tie the Master to acquaint the Servant with his secret Counsel Tho he frequently contradicts in one line what he says in another this whole Clause is uniform and sutable to the main design of his Book He sets up the authority of Man in opposition to the command of God gives it the preference and says the best Divines instruct us so to do St. Paul then must have bin one of the worst for he knew that the Powers under which he lived had under the severest penalties forbidden the publication of the Gospel and yet he says Wo to me if I preach it not St. Peter was no better than he for he tells us That it is better to obey God than Man and they could not speak otherwise unless they had forgotten the words of their Master who told them They should not fear them that could only kill the Body but him who could kill and cast into Hell And if I must not fear him that can only kill the Body not only the reason but all excuse for obeying him is taken away To prove what he says he cites a pertinent example from St. Luke and very logically concludes that because Christ reproved the hypocrisy of the Pharisees who generally adhered to the external and circumstantial part of the Law neglecting the essential and taking upon themselves to be the interpreters of that which they did not understand the Law of God is not to be obeyed and as strongly proves that because Christ shewed them that the same Law which by their own consession permitted them to pull an Ass out of a pit on the Sabbath day could not but give a liberty of healing the sick therefore the commands of Kings are to be obeyed tho they should be contrary to human and divine Laws But if perversness had not blinded him he might have seen that this very Text is wholly against his purpose for the Magistratical Power was on the side of the Pharisees otherwise they would not have sought an occasion to ensnare him and that power having perverted the Law of God by salse glosses and a superinduction of human Traditions prohibited the most necessary acts of Charity to be done on the Sabbath day which Christ reproved and restored the sick man to his health in their sight But I could wish our Author had told us the names of those Divines who he says are the best and who pretend to teach us these fine things I know some who are thought good that are of a contrary opinion and say that God having required that day to be set apart for his Service and Worship man cannot dispense with the Obligation unless he can abrogate the
dangerous and slavish to depend upon the will of a man which perhaps may be irregular or extravagant in one who is subject to no Law our Author very dexterously removes the scruples by telling us 1. That the Prerogative of the King to be above the Law is only for the good of them that are under the Law and to preserve their Liberties 2. That there can be no Laws without a supreme Power to command or make them In Aristocracies the Noblemen are above the Law in Democracies the People By the like reason in a Monarchy the King must of necessity be above the Law There can be no Soveraign Majesty in him that is under the Law that which gives the very being to a King is the power to give Laws Without this Power he is but an equivocal King It skills not how he comes by this Power whether by Election Donation Succession or any other means I am contented in some degree to follow our Author and to acknowledg that the King neither has nor can have any Prerogative which is not for the good of the People and the preservation of their Liberties This therefore is the foundation of Magistratical Power and the only way of discerning whether the Prerogative of making Laws of being above Laws or any other he may pretend be justly due to him or not and if it be doubted who is the fittest judg to determine that question common sense will inform us that if the Magistrate receive his Power by election or donation they who elect or give him that Power best know whether the good they sought be performed or not if by succession they who instituted the Succession if otherwise that is by fraud or violence the point is decided for he has no right at all and none can be created by those means This might be said tho all Princes were of ripe age sober wise just and good for even the best are subject to mistakes and passions and therefore unfit to be judges of their own concernments in which they may by various means be misguided but it would be extreme madness to attribute the same to Children Fools or Madmen who are not able to judg of the least things concerning themselves or others but most especially to those who coming in by usurpation declare their contempt of all human and divine Laws and are enemies to the People they oppress None therefore can be judges of such cases but the People for whom and by whom the Constitutions are made or their Representatives and Delegates to whom they give the power of doing it But nothing can be more absurd than to say that one man has an absolute power above Law to govern according to his will for the Peoples good and the preservation of their Liberty For no Liberty can subsist where there is such a Power and we have no other way of distinguishing between free Nations and such as are not so than that the free are governed by their own Laws and Magistrates according to their own mind and that the others either have willingly subjected themselves or are by force brought under the power of one or more men to be ruled according to his or their pleasure The same distinction holds in relation to particular persons He is a free man who lives as best pleases himself under Laws made by his own consent and the name of slave can belong to no man unless to him who is either born in the house of a Master bought taken subdued or willingly gives his ear to be nailed to the post and subjects himself to the will of another Thus were the Grecians said to be free in opposition to the Medes and Persians as Artabanus acknowledged in his discourse to Themistocles In the same manner the Italians Germans and Spaniards were distinguish'd from the Eastern Nations who for the most part were under the power of Tyrants Rome was said to have recovered liberty by the expulsion of the Tarquins or as Tacitus expresses it Lucius Brutus established Liberty and the Consulat together as if before that time they had never enjoyed any and Julius Cesar is said to have overthrown the liberty of that People But if Filmer deserve credit the Romans were free under Tarquin enslaved when he was driven away and his Prerogative extinguish'd that was so necessarily required for the defence of their Liberty and were never restored to it till Cesar assum'd all the Power to himself By the same rule the Switzers Grisons Venetians Hollanders and some other Nations are now Slaves and Tuscany the Kingdom of Naples the Ecclesiastical State with such as live under a more gentle Master on the other side of the Water I mean the Turk are free Nations Nay the Florentins who complain of Slavery under the House of Medices were made free by the power of a Spanish Army who set up a Prerogative in that gentle Family which for their good has destroyed all that could justly be called so in that Country and almost wholly dispeopled it I who esteem my self free because I depend upon the will of no man and hope to die in the liberty I inherit from my Ancestors am a slave and the Moors or Turks who may be beaten and kill'd whenever it pleases their insolent Masters are Free men But surely the world is not so much mistaken in the signification of words and things The weight of Chains number of Stripes hardness of labour and other effects of a Master's cruelty may make one servitude more miserable than another but he is a slave who serves the best and gentlest man in the world as well as he who serves the worst and he dos serve him if he must obey his commands and depends upon his will For this reason the Poet ingeniously flattering a good Emperor said that Liberty was not more desirable than to serve a gentle Master but still acknowledged that it was a service distinct from and contrary to Liberty and it had not bin a handsom complement unless the evil of servitude were so extreme that nothing but the virtue and goodness of the Master could any way compensate or alleviate it Now tho it should be granted that he had spoken more like to a Philosopher than a Poet that we might take his words in the strictest sense and think it possible to find such Conveniences in a subjection to the will of a good and wise Master as may balance the loss of Liberty it would be nothing to the question because that Liberty is thereby acknowledged to be destroy'd by the Prerogative which is only instituted to preserve it If it were true that no liberty were to be prefer'd before the service of a good Master it could be of no use to the perishing world which Filmer and his Disciples would by such Arguments bring into a subjection to children fools mad or vicious men These are not cases feigned upon a distant imaginary possibility but so frequently found
most conducing to the good ends to which it was directed As Governments were instituted for the obtaining of Justice and as our Author says the preservation of Liberty we are not to seek what Government was the first but what best provides for the obtaining of Justice and preservation of Liberty For whatsoever the Institution be and how long soever it may have lasted 't is void if it thwarts or do not provide for the ends of its establishment If such a Law or Custom therefore as is not good in it self had in the beginning prevailed in all parts of the world which in relation to absolute or any kind of Monarchy is not true it ought to be abolished and if any man should shew himself wiser than others by proposing a Law or Government more beneficial to mankind than any that had bin formerly known providing better for Justice and Liberty than all others had done he would merit the highest veneration If any man ask who shall be Judg of that rectitude or pravity which either authorises or destroys a Law I answer that as this consists not in formalities and niceties but in evident and substantial truths there is no need of any other Tribunal than that of common sense and the light of nature to determine the matter and he that travels through France Italy Turky Germany and Switzerland without consulting Bartolus or Baldus will easily understand whether the Countries that are under the Kings of France and Spain the Pope and the Great Turk or such as are under the care of a well-regulated Magistracy do best enjoy the benefits of Justice and Liberty 'T is as easily determined whether the Grecians when Athens and Thebes flourished were more free than the Medes whether Justice was better administred by Agathocles Dionysius and Phalaris than by the legal Kings and regular Magistrates of Sparta or whether more care was taken that Justice and Liberty might be preserved by Tiberius Caligula Claudius Nero and Vitellius than by the Senate and People of Rome whilst the Laws were more powerful than the commands of men The like may be said of particular Laws as those of Nabuchodonosor and Caligula for worshipping their Statues our Acts of Parliament against Hereticks and Lollards with the Statutes and Orders of the Inqusition which is called the Holy Office And if that only be a Law which is Sanctio recta jubens honesta prohibens contraria the meanest understanding if free from passion may certainly know that such as these cannot be Laws by what Authority soever they were enacted and that the use of them and others like to them ought to be abolished for their turpitude and iniquity Infinite examples of the like nature might be alledged as well concerning divine as human things And if there be any Laws which are evil there cannot be an incontestable rectitude in all and if not in all it concerns us to examine where it is to be sound Laws and Constitutions ought to be weighed and whilst all due reverence is paid to such as are good every Nation may not only retain in it self a power of changing or abolishing all such as are not so but ought to exercise that Power according to the best of their understanding and in the place of what was either at first mistaken or afterwards corrupted to constitute that which is most conducing to the establishment of Justice and Liberty But such is the condition of mankind that nothing can be so perfectly framed as not to give some testimony of human imbecility and frequently to stand in need of reparations and amendments Many things are unknown to the wisest and the best men can never wholly devest themselves of passions and affections By this means the best and wisest are sometimes led into Error and stand in need of Successors like to themselves who may find remedies for the faults they have committed and nothing can or ought to be permanent but that which is perfect No natural body was ever so well temper'd and organiz'd as not to be subject to diseases wounds or other accidents and to need medicines and other occasional helps as well as nourishment and exercise and he who under the name of Innovation would deprive Nations of the like dos as much as lies in him condemn them all to perish by the defects of their own foundations Some men observing this have proposed a necessity of reducing every State once in an age or two to the integrity of its first principle but they ought to have examined whether that principle be good or evil or so good that nothing can be added to it which none ever was and this being so those who will admit of no change would render Errors perpetual and depriving Mankind of the benefits of Wisdom Industry Experience and the right use of Reason oblige all to continue in the miserable barbarity of their Ancestors which sutes better with the name of a Wolf than that of a Man Those who are of better understanding weigh all things and often find reason to abrogate that which their fathers according to the measure of the knowledge they had or the state of things among them had rightly instituted or to restore that which they had abrogated and there can be no greater mark of a most brutish stupidity than for men to continue in an evil way because their fathers had brought them into it But if we ought not too strictly to adhere to our own Constitutions those of other Nations are less to be regarded by us for the Laws that may be good for one People are not for all and that which agrees with the manners of one Age is utterly abhorrent from those of another It were absurd to think of restoring the Laws of Lycurgus to the present inhabitants of Peloponesus who are accustomed to the most abject slavery It may easily be imagined how the Romans Sabins and Latins now under the tyranny of the Pope would relish such a discipline as flourished among them after the expulsion of the Tarquins and it had bin no less preposterous to give a liberty to the Parthians of governing themselves or for them to assume it than to impose an absolute Monarch upon the German Nation Titus Livius having observed this says that if a popular Government had bin set up in Rome immediately upon the building of the City and if that fierce people which was composed of unruly shepherds herdsmen sugitive slaves and out-law'd persons who could not suffer the Governments under which they were born had come to be incited by turbulent Orators they would have brought all into consusion whereas that boisterous humour being gradually temper'd by discipline under Romulus or taught to vent its sury against foreign enemies and soften'd by the peaceable reign of Numa a new Race grew up which being all of one blood contracted a love to their Country and became capable of Liberty which the madness of their last King and the lewdness of
Princes that have bin in the world who having their power for life and leaving it to descend to their children have wanted the Virtues requir'd for the performance of their duty And I should less fear to be guilty of an absurdity in saying that a Nation might every year change its Head than that he can be the Head who cares not for the Members nor understands the things that conduce to their good most especially if he set up an Interest in himself against them It cannot be said that these are imaginary cases and that no Prince dos these things for the proof is too easy and the examples too numerous Caligula could not have wished the Romans but one Head that he might cut it off at once if he had bin that Head and had advanced no Interest contrary to that of the Members Nero had not burn'd the City of Rome if his concernments had bin inseparably united to those of the people He who caused above three hundred thousand of his innocent unarmed Subjects to be murder'd and fill'd his whole Kingdom with fire and blood did set up a personal Interest repugnant to that of the Nation and no better testimony can be requir'd to shew that he did so than a Letter written by his Son to take off the penalty due to one of the chief Ministers of those cruelties for this reason that what he had done was by the command and for the service of his Royal Father King John did not pursue the advantage of his people when he endeavoured to subject them to the Pope or the Moors And whatever Prince seeks assistance from foreign Powers or makes Leagues with any stranger or enemy for his own advantage against his people however secret the Treaty may be declares himself not to be the Head but an enemy to them The Head cannot stand in need of an exterior help against the Body nor subsist when divided from it He therefore that courts such an assistance divides himself from the Body and if he do subsist it must be by a life he has in himself distinct from that of the Body which the Head cannot have But besides these enormities that testify the most wicked rage and fury in the highest degree there is another practice which no man that knows the world can deny to be common with Princes and incompatible with the nature of a Head The Head cannot desire to draw all the nourishment of the Body to it self nor more than a due proportion If the rest of the parts are sick weak or cold the Head suffers equally with them and if they perish must perish also Let this be compared with the actions of many Princes we know and we shall soon see which of them are Heads of their people If the Gold brought from the Indies has bin equally distributed by the Kings of Spain to the body of that Nation I consent they may be called the Heads If the Kings of France assume no more of the Riches of that great Kingdom than their due proportion let them also wear that honourable name But if the naked backs and empty bellies of their miserable Subjects evince the contrary it can by no means belong to them If those great Nations wast and languish if nothing be so common in the best Provinces belonging to them as misery famine and all the effects of the most outragious oppression whilst their Princes and Favorites possess such treasures as the most wanton prodigality cannot exhaust if that which is gained by the sweat of so many millions of men be torn out of the mouths of their starving Wives and Children to foment the vices of those luxurious Courts or reward the Ministers of their lusts the nourishment is not distributed equally to all the parts of the body the oeconomy of the whole is overthrown and they who do these things cannot be the Heads nor parts of the Body but something distinct from and repugnant to it 'T is not therefore he who is found in or advanced to the place of the Head who is truly the Head 'T is not he who ought but he who dos perform the office of the Head that deserves the name and privileges belonging to the Head If our Another theresore will perswade us that any King is Head of his People he must do it by Arguments peculiarly relating to him since those in general are found to be false If he say that the King as King may direct or correct the people and that the power of determining all controversies must be referred to him because they may be mistaken he must show that the King is infallible for unless he do so the wound is not cured This also must be by some other way than by saying he is their Head for such Powers belong not to the office of the Head and we see that all Kings do not deserve that name Many of them want both understanding and will to perform the functions of the Head and many act directly contrary in the whole course of their Government If any therefore among them have merited the glorious name of Heads of Nations it must have bin by their personal Virtues by a vigilant care of the good of their People by an inseparable conjunction of interests with them by an ardent love to every member of the Society by a moderation of spirit affecting no undue Superiority or assuming any singular advantage which they are not willing to communicate to every part of the political body He who finds this merit in himself will scorn all the advantages that can be drawn from misapplied names He that knows such honor to be peculiarly due to him for being the best of Kings will never glory in that which may be common to him with the worst Nay whoever pretends by such general discourses as these of our Author to advance the particular Interests of any one King dos either know he is of no merit and that nothing can be said for him which will not as well agree with the worst of men or cares not what he says so he may do mischief and is well enough contented that he who is set up by such Maxims as a publick plague may fall in the ruin he brings upon the people SECT XL. Good Laws prescribe easy and safe Remedies against the Evils proceeding from the vices or infirmities of the Magistrate and when they fail they must be supplied THOSE who desire to advance the power of the Magistrate above the Law would perswade us that the difficulties and dangers of inquiring into his actions or opposing his will when employ'd in violence and injustice are so great that the remedy is always worse than the disease and that 't is better to suffer all the evils that may proceed from his infirmities and vices than to hazard the consequences of displeasing him But on the contrary I think and hope to prove 1. That in well-constituted Governments the remedies against ill Magistrates are easy
excelling all others in virtue can have no other just power than what the Laws give nor any title to the privileges of the Lord 's Anointed p. 250. Sect. 2. The Kings of Israel and Judah were under a Law not safely to be transgressed p. 262. Sect. 3. Samuel did not describe to the Israelites the glory of a free Monarchy but the evils the people should suffer that he might divert them from desiring a King p. 264. Sect. 4. No People can be obliged to suffer from their Kings what they have not a right to do p. 266. Sect. 5. The mischiefs suffer'd from wicked Kings are such as render it both reasonable and just for all Nations that have Virtue and Power to exert both in repelling them p. 270. Sect. 6. 'T is not good for such Nations as will have Kings to suffer them to be glorious powerful or abounding in Riches p. 273. Sect. 7. When the Israelites asked for such a King as the Nations about them had they asked for a Tyrant tho they did not call him so p. 277. Sect. 8. Vnder the name of Tribute no more is understood than what the Law of each Nation gives to the supreme Magistrate for the defraying of publick Charges to which the customs of the Romans or sufferings of the Jews have no relation p. 283. Sect. 9. Our own Laws confirm to us the enjoyment of our native Rights p. 288. Sect. 10. The words of St. Paul enjoyning obedience to higher Powers favour all sorts of Government no less than Monarchy p. 292. Sect. 11. That which is not just is not Law and that which is not Law ought not to be obeyed p. 300. Sect. 12. The right and power of a Magistrate depends upon his institution not upon his name p. 302. Sect. 13. Laws were made to direct and instruct Magistrates and if they will not be directed to restrain them p. 305. Sect. 14. Laws are not made by Kings not because they are busied in greater matters than doing Justice but because Nations will be governed by rule and not arbitrarily p. 309. Sect. 15. A general presumption that Kings will govern well is not a sufficient security to the people p. 314. Sect. 16. The observation of the Laws of Nature is absurdly expected from Tyrants who set themselves up against all Laws and he that subjects Kings to no other Law than what is common to Tyrants destroys their being p. 317. Sect. 17. Kings cannot be the interpreters of the Oaths they take p. 322. Sect. 18. The next in blood to deceased Kings cannot generally be said to be Kings till they are crowned p. 330. Sect. 19. The greatest enemy of a just Magistrate is he who endeavours to invalidate the Contract between him and the people or to corrupt their manners p. 341. Sect. 20. Vnjust commands are not to be obey'd and no man is obliged to suffer for not obeying such as are against Law p. 345. Sect. 21. It cannot be for the good of the People that the Magistrate have a Power above the Law And he is not a Magistrate who has not his Power by Law 348. Sect. 22. The rigor of the Law is to be temper'd by men of known integrity and judgment and not by the Prince who may be ignorant or vicious p. 354. Sect. 23. Aristotle proves that no man is to be intrusted with an Absolute Power by shewing that no one knows how to execute it but such a man as is not to be found p. 358. Sect. 24. The Power of Augustus Cesar was not given but usurped p. 360. Sect. 25. The Regal Power was not the first in this Nation nor necessarily to be continued tho it had bin the first p. 361. Sect. 26. That the King may be entrusted with the power of chusing Judges yet that by which they act is from the Law p. 369. Sect. 27. Magna Charta was not the Original but a declaration of the English Liberties The King's Power is not restrained but created by that and other Laws and the Nation that made them can only correct the defects of them p. 370. Sect. 28. The English Nation has always bin governed by it self or its Representatives p. 379. Sect. 29. The King was never Master of the Soil p. 391. Sect. 30. Henry the first was King of England by as good a Title as any of his Predecessors or Successors p. 395. Sect. 31. Free Nations have a right of meeting when and where they please unless they deprive themselves of it p. 399. Sect. 32. The Powers of Kings are so various according to the Constitutions of several States that no consequence can be drawn to the prejudice or advantage of any one merely from the name p. 404. Sect. 33. The Liberty of a People is the Gift of God and Nature p. 406. Sect. 34. No veneration paid or honor confer'd upon a just and lawful Magistrate can diminish the liberty of a Nation p. 409. Sect. 35. The Authority given by our Law to the Acts performed by a King de facto detract nothing from the Peoples Right of creating whom they please p. 411. Sect. 36. The general revolt of a Nation cannot be called a Rebellion p. 413. Sect. 37. The English Government was not ill constituted the defects more lately observed proceeding from the change of manners and corruption of the times p. 418. Sect. 38. The power of calling and dissolving Parliaments is not simply in the King The variety of Customs in chusing Parliamentmen and the Errors a People may commit neither prove that Kings are or ought to be absolute p. 421. Sect. 39. Those Kings only are heads of the People who are good wise and seek to advance no Interest but that of the Publick p. 426. Sect. 40. Good Laws prescribe easy and safe Remedies against the Evils proceeding from the Vices or Infirmities of the Magistrate and when they fail they must be supplied p. 432. Sect. 41. The people for whom and by whom the Magistrate is created can only judg whether he rightly performs his Office or not p. 436. Sect. 42. The Person that wears the Crown cannot determine the Affairs which the Law refers to the King p. 440. Sect. 43. Proclamations are not Laws p. 445. Sect. 44. No People that is not free can substitute Delegates p. 450. Sect. 45. The Legislative Power is always Arbitrary and not to be trusted in the hands of any who are not bound to obey the Laws they make p. 455. Sect. 46. The coercive Power of the Law proceeds from the Authority of Parliament p. 457. ERRATA PAge 77. line 41. for Numbers read Members P. 113. l. 37. read Antiochus P. 197. l. 6. read acquired P. 229. l. 39. for nor read and. P. 269. l. 12. for for read from P. 282. l. 3. read should it P. 285. l. 42. read renounced P. 335. l. 41. for to read de P. 418. l. 20. for have read hâ—â— P. 429. l. 38. for them read him Potentiora Legiun quam hominum
honest and generous do also make them lovers of Liberty and constant in the defence of their Country which savouring too much of a Republican Spirit he prefers the morals of that City since they are become more refined by the pious and charitable Jesuits before those that were remarkable in them as long as they retained any shadow of their antient Integrity which admitted of no equivocations and detested prevarications by that means preserving innocence in the hearts of private men for their inward contentment and in civil Societies for the publick good which if once extinguish'd Mankind must necessarily fall into the condition Hobbes rightly calls Bellum omnium contra omnes wherein no man can promise to himself any other Wife Children or Goods than he can procure by his own Sword Some may perhaps think that the endeavours of our Author to introduce such accursed Principles as tend to the ruin of Mankind proceed from his ignorance But tho he appears to have had a great measure of that quality I fear the evil proceeds from a deeper root and that he attempts to promote the interests of ill Magistrates who make it their business to destroy all good principles in the People with as much industry as the good endeavour to preserve them where they are and teach them where they are wanting Reason and experience instruct us that every man acts according to the end he proposes to himself The good Magistrate seeks the good of the People committed to his care that he may perform the end of his Institution and knowing that chiefly to consist in Justice and Virtue he endeavours to plant and propagate them and by doing this he procures his own good as well as that of the Publick He knows there is no Safety where there is no Strength no Strength without Union no Union with Justice no Justice where Faith and Truth in accomplishing publick and private Contracts is wanting This he perpetually inculcates and thinks it a great part of his duty by precept and example to educate the Youth in a love of Virtue and Truth that they may be seasoned with them and filled with an abhorrence of Vice and Falshood before they attain that Age which is exposed to the most violent temptations and in which they may by their crimes bring the greatest mischiefs upon the publick He would do all this tho it were to his own prejudice But as good Actions always carry a reward with them these contribute in a high measure to his advantage By preferring the interest of the People before his own he gains their affection and all that is in their power comes with it whilst he unites them to one another he unites all to himself In leading them to virtue he increases their strength and by that means provides for his own safety glory and power On the other side such as seek different ends must take different ways When a Magistrate fancies he is not made for the People but the People for him that he dos not govern for them but for himself and that the People live only to increase his glory or furnish matter for his pleasures he dos not inquire what he may do for them but what he may draw from them By this means he sets up an interest of profit pleasure or pomp in himself repugnant to the good of the publick for which he is made to be what he is These contrary ends certainly divide the Nation into parties and whilst every one endeavours to advance that to which he is addicted occasions of hatred sor injuries every day done or thought to be done and received must necessarily arise This creates a most fierce and irreconcileable enmity because the occasions are frequent important and universal and the causes thought to be most just The People think it the greatest of all crimes to convert that power to their hurt which was instituted for their good and that the injustice is aggravated by perjury and ingratitude which comprehend all manner of ill and the Magistrate gives the name of Sedition or Rebellion to whatsoever they do for the preservation of themselves and their own Rights When mens spirits are thus prepared a small matter sets them on fire but if no accident happen to blow them into a flame the course of Justice is certainly interrupted the publick affairs are neglected and when any occasion whether foreign or domestick arises in which the Magistrate stands in need of the Peoples assistance they whose affections are alienated not only shew an unwillingness to serve him with their Persons and Estates but fear that by delivering him from his distress they strengthen their enemy and enable him to oppress them and he fancying his will to be unjustly opposed or his due more unjustly denied is filled with a dislike of what he sees and a fear of worse for the future Whilst he endeavours to ease himself of the one and to provide against the other he usually increases the evils of both and jealousies are on both sides multiplied Every man knows that the Governed are in a great measure under the power of the Governor but as no man or number of men is willingly subject to those who seek their ruin such as fall into so great a misfortune continue no longer under it than force fear or necessity may be able to oblige them But as such a necessity can hardly lie longer upon a great People than till the evil be fully discovered and comprehended and their Virtue Strength and Power be united to expel it the ill Magistrate looks upon all things that may conduce to that end as so many preparatives to his ruin and by the help of those who are of his party will endeavour to prevent that Union and diminish that Strength Virtue Power and Courage which he knows to be bent against him And as truth faithful dealing due performance of Contracts and integrity of Manners are bonds of Union and helps to good he will always by tricks artifices cavils and all means possible endeavour to establish falshood and dishonesty whilst other Emissaries and instruments of Iniquity by corrupting the Youth and seducing such as can be brought to lewdness and debauchery bring the People to such a pass that they may neither care nor dare to vindicate their Rights and that those who would do it may so far suspect each other as not to confer upon much less to join in any action tending to the publick Deliverance This distinguishes the good from the bad Magistrate the faithful from the unfaithful and those who adhere to either living in the same principle must walk in the same ways They who uphold the rightful power of a just Magistracy encourage Virtue and Justice teach men what they ought to do suffer or expect from others fix them upon principles of Honesty and generally advance every thing that tends to the increase of the valour strength greatness and happiness of the Nation creating a good