Selected quad for the lemma: justice_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
justice_n	king_n	law_n	right_n	3,390	5	7.1155	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44619	The character of a trimmer his opinion of I. The laws and government, II. Protestant religion, III. The papists, IV. Foreign affairs / by ... Sir W.C.	Halifax, George Savile, Marquis of, 1633-1695.; Coventry, William, Sir, 1628?-1686.	1688 (1688)	Wing H296; ESTC R38783	43,501	48

THE CHARACTER OF A TRIMMER HIS OPINION OF I. The Laws and Government II. Protestant Religion III. The Papists IV. Foreign Affairs By the Honourable Sir W. C. LONDON Printed in the Year M DC LXXXVIII The PREFACE IT must be more than an ordinary provocation that can tempt a Man to Write in an Age over-run with Scriblers as Egypt was with Flyes and Locusts That worst Vermin of swall Authours hath given the World such a Surfeit that instead of desiring to Write a Man would be more inclin'd to wish for his own ease that he could not Read but there are some things which do so raise our Passions that our Reason can make no Resistance and when Madmen in the two Extreams shall agree to make common sense Treason and joyn to fix an ill Character upon the only Men in the Nation who deserve a good one I am no longer Master of my better Resolution to let the World alone and must break loose from my more reasonalble Thoughts to expose these false Coyners who would make their Copper Wares pass upon us for good Payment Amongst all the Engines of Dissention there hath been none more powerful in all Times than the fixing Names upon one another of Contumely and Reproach and the reason is plain in respect of the People who are generally uncapable of making a Syllogism or forming an Argument yet they can pronounce a word and that serves their turn to throw it with their due malice at the head of those they do not like such things ever begin in just and end in Blood and the same word that maketh the Company merry grows in time to a Military Signal to cut one anothers Throats These Mistakes are to be lamented tho' not easily cured being suitable enough to the corrupted Nature of Mankind but 't is hard that Men will not only invent ill Names but they will wrest and misinterpret good ones so afraid some are even of a reconciling sound that they raise another noise to keep it from being heard lest it should set up and encourage a dangerous sorts of Men who prefer Peace and Agreement before Violence and Confusion Were it not for this why after we have play'd the Fool with throwing Whig and Tory at one another as Boys do Snow Balls do we grow angry at a new Name which by its true signification might do as much to put us into our Wits as the other hath done to put us out of them This innocent word Trimmer signifies no more than this That if Men are together in a Boat and one part of the Company would weigh it down on one side another would make it lean as much to the contrary it happens there is a third Opinion of those who conceive it would do as well if the Boat went even without endangering the Passengers now 't is hard to imagine by what Figure in Language or by what Rule in Sense this cometh to be a fault and it is much more a wonder it should become a Heresy But so it happens that the poor Trimmer hath all the Powder spent upon him alone while the Whig is forgotten or at least a neglected Enemy there is no danger now to the State if some Men be believ'd but from the Beast called a Trimmer take heed of him he is the Instrument that must destory Church and State a strong kind of Monster whose deformity is so expos'd that were it a true Picture that is made of him it would be enough to fright Children and make Women miscarry at the sight of it But it may be worth the examining whether he is such a Beast as he is Painted I am not of that Opinion and am so far from thinking him an Infidel either in Church or State that I am neither afraid to expose the Articles of his Faith in Relation to Government nor to say I prefer them before any other Political Creed that either our angry Dons or our refined States-men would impose upon us I have therefore in the following Discourse endeavour'd to explain the Trimmer's Principles and Opinions and then leave it to all Discerning and Impartial Judges whether he can with Justice be so Arraign'd and whether those who deliberately pervert a good Name do not very justly deserve the worst that can be put upon themselves THE Trimmer's Opinion OF THE LAWS and GOVERNMENT OUR Trimmer hath a great Veneration for Laws in general as he hath more particularly for his own he looketh upon them as the Chains that tye up our unruly Passions which else like Wild Beasts let loose would reduce the World into its first State of Barbarism and Hostility all the good things we enjoy we owe to them and all the ill things we are freed from by their Protection God himself thought it not enough to be a Creator without being a Law-giver and his goodness had been defective towards Mankind in making them if he had not prescrib'd Rules to make them happy All Laws flow from that of Nature and where that is not the Foundation they may be legally impos'd but they will be lamely obey'd By this Nature is not meant that which Fools and Madmen would misquote to justify their Excesses it is innocent and uncorrupted Nature that which disposeth Men to chuse Vertue without its being prescrib'd and which is so far from inspiring ill thoughts into us that we take pains to suppress the good ones it infuseth The Civil World has ever paid a willing subjection to Laws even Conquerours have done homage to them as the Romans who took Patterns of good Laws even from those they had subdued and at the same time they Triumph'd over an enssav'd People the same Laws of that Place did not only remain safe but became Victorious their new Masters instead of suppressing them paid them more respect than they had from those who first made them and by this wise method they arriv'd to such an admirable Constitution of Laws that to this day they Reign by them the Excellency of them Triumpheth still and the World payeth now an acknowledgment of their obedience to that Mighty Empire tho' so many Ages after it is dissolved and by a better instance the Kings of France who in practice use their Laws pretty familiarly yet think their Picture is drawn with most advantage upon their Seals when they are plac'd upon the Seat of Justice and tho' the Hieroglyphick is not there of so much use to the People as they would wish yet it shews that no Prince is so Great as to think fit for his own Credit at least to givean outward when he refuseth a real worship to the Laws They are to Mankind that which the Sun is to the Plants as it cherisheth and preserveth them so where they have their force and are not clouded every thing smileth and slourisheth but where they are darkned and are not suffered to shine out it maketh every thing to wither and decay They serve Men not only against

one another but against themselves too they are a Sanct●●ry to which the Crown hath occasion to resort as often as the People ●o that it hath an Interest as well as a Duty to preserve them There would be no end of making a Panegyrick of Laws let it be enough to add that without Laws the World would become a Wilderness and Men little less than Beasts but with all this the best things may come to be the worst if they are not in good hands and if it be true that the wisest Men generally make the Laws it is as true that the strongest do often misinterpret them and as River belong as much to the Chanel where they run as to the Spring from whence they first rise so the Laws depend as much upon the Pipes thro' which they are to pass as upon the Fountain from whence they flow The Authority of a King who is Head of the Law as well as the Dignity of Publick Justice is debased when the clear stream of the Law is puddled and distrub'd by Bunglers or convey'd by unclean Instruments to the People Our Trimmer would have them appear in their full lustre and would be grieved to see the day when instead of speaking with Authority from the Seats of Justice they should speak out of a Grate with a lamenting voice like Prisoners that desire to be rescu'd He wisheth that the Bench may have a Natural as well as a Legal Superiority to the Bar he thinketh Mens abilities much misplac'd when the Reasons of those that Plead is visibly too strong for those who Judge and give Sentence When those from the Bar seem to dictate to their Superious upon the Bench their Furrs will look scurvily about them and the respect of the World will leave the bare Character of a Judge to follow the Essential knowledge of a Lawyer who may be greater in himself than others can be with all their Trappings An uncontested Superiority in any Calling will have the better of any distinct Name that Authority can put upon it and therefore if ever such an unnatural Method should be produc'd it is then that Westminster-Hall might be said to stand upon its Head and though Justice it self can never be so yet the Administration of it would be rendered Ridiculous A Judge hath such a Power lodg'd in him that the King will never be thought to have chosen well where the Voice of Mankind hath not before-hand recommended the Man to his Election when Men are made Judges of what they do not understand the World censures such a Choice not out of ill-will to the Men but fear to themselves If the King had sole Power of chusing Physicians Men would tremble to see Bunglers preferred yet the necessity of taking Physick from a Doctor is generally not so great as that of receiving Justice from a Judge the Inferences will be very severe in such cases for either it will be thought that such Men bought what they were not able to deserve or which is as bad that Obedience shall be look'd upon as a better Qualification in a Judge than Skill or Integrity when such sacred things as the Laws are not only touch'd but guided by prophane hands Men will fear that out of the Tree of the Law from whence we expect Shade and Shelter such Workmen will make us Cudgels to beat us with or rather that they will turn the Canon upon our Properties that were intrusted with them for their Defence To see the Laws Mangled Disguised Speak quite another Language than their own to see them thrown from the Dignity of protecting Mankind to the disgraceful Office of destroying them and notwithstanding their Innocence in themselves to be made the worst Instruments that the most refined Villany can make use of will raise Mens Anger above the power of laying it down again and tempt them to follow the Evil Examples given them of Judging without Hearing when so provoked by their desire of Revenge Our Trimmer therefore as he thinketh the Laws are Jewels so he believeth they are no better set than in the Constitution of our English Government if rightly understood and carefully preserved It would be too great Partiality to say it is perfect or liable to no Objection such things are not of the World but if it hath more Excellencies and sewer Faults than any other we know it is enough to recommend it to our Esteem The Dispute which is a greater Beauty a Monarchy or a Common-wealth hath lasted long between their contending Lovers and they have behav'd themselves so like who in good Manners must be out of their Wits who used such Figures to exalt their own Idols on either side and such angry Aggravations to reproach one another in the Contest that moderate Men have at all times smil'd upon this eagerness and thonght it differ'd very little from a downright Frenzy we in England by a happy use of the Controversie conclude them both in the wrong and reject them from being our Pattern taking the words in the utmost extent which is a thing that Monarchy leaveth them no Liberty and a Common-Wealth such a one as allows them no Quiet We think that a wise Mean between these two barbarous Extreams is that which self-Preservation ought to dictate to our Wishes and we may say we have attained this Mean in a greater measure than any Nation now in being or perhaps any we have read of tho' never so much Celebrated for the wisdom or plenty of their Constitutions we take from one the too great power of doing hurt and yet leave enough to govern and protect us we take from the other the Corfusion the Parity the Animosities and the License and yet reserve a due care of such Liberty as may consist with Mens Allegiance but it being hard if not impossible to be exactly even our Government has much the stronger Biass towards Monarchy which by the more general Consent and practice of Mankind seemeth to have the Advantage in dispute against a Commonwealth The Rules of a Commonwealth are too hard for the Bulk of Mankind to come up to that Form of Government requireth such a spirit to carry it on as doth not dwel in great Numbers but is restrain'd to so very few especially in this Age that let the Methods appear never so much reasonable in Paper they must fail in Practice which will ever be suited more to Mens Nature as it is than as it should be Monarchy is lik'd by the People for the Bells and the Tinsel the outward Pomp and the Gilding and there must be milk for Babes since the greatest part of Mankind are and ever will be included in that List and it is approv'd by wise and thinking Men Circumstances and Objections impartially consider'd that it hath so great an advantage above all other Forms when the Administration of that Power fal eth in good hands that all other Governments look out of Countenance when they are set in

be in the right who are too hard upon us there is a deformity in every thing that doth us hurt it will look scurvily in our Eye while the smart continues and a Man must have an extraordinary Measure of Grace to think well of a Religion that reduceth him and his Family to Misery in this respectour trimmer would consent to the mitigation of such Laws as were made as it 's said King Henry VIII got Queen Elizabeth in heat against Rome It may be said that even States as well as private Men are subject to Passion a just indignation of a villainous Attempt produceth at the time such Remedies as perhaps are not without some mixture of Revenge and therefore tho' time cannot Repeal a Law it may by a Natural Effect soften the Execution of it there is less danger to rouse a Lyon when at Rest than to wake Laws that intended to have their time of Sleeping nay more than that in some cases their Natural periods of Life dying of themselves without the Solemnity of being revok'd any otherwise than by the common consent of Mankind who do cease to Execute when the Reasons in great Measure fail that first Created and Satisfyed the Rigour of unusual Penalties Our Trimmer is not eager to pick out some places in History against this or any other Party quite contrary is very sollicitous to find out any thing that may be healing and tend to an Agreement but to prescribe the Means of this Gentleness so as to make it effectual must come from the only place that can furnish Remedies for this Cure viz. a Parliament in the mean time it is to be wished there may be such a mutual calmness of Mind as that the Protestants might not be so jealous as still to smell the Match that was to blow up the King and both Houses in the Gunpowder Treason or to start at every appearance of Popery as if it were just taking Possession On the other side that the Papists may not suffer themselves to be led by any hopes tho' never so flattering to a Confidence or Ostentation which must provoke Men to be less kind to them that they may use Modesty on their sides and the Protestants Indulgence on theirs by this means there will be an over-looking of all Venial Faults atacit connivance at all things that do not carry Scandal with it and it would amount to a kind of Natural Dispensation with the severe Laws Since there would be no more Accusers to be found were the occasions of Anger and Animosity once remov'd let the Papists in the mean time remember that there is a respect due from all lesser numbers to greater a deference to be paid by an Opinion that is Exploded to one that is Established such things well digested will have an influence upon their Behaviour and produce such a Temper as must win the most eager Adversaries out of their ill Humour to them and give them a Title to all the Favour that may be consistent with the Publick Peace and Security The Trimmer's Opinion in Relation to things abroad THE World is so compos'd that it is hard if not impossible for a Nation not to be a great deal involv'd in the fate of their Neighbours and tho'by the felicity of our Scituation we are more Independent than any other People yet we have in all Ages been concern'd for our own selves in the Revolutions abroad There was a time when England was the over-Ballancing Power of Christendom and that eitherby Inheritance or Conquest the better part of France receiv'd Laws from us after that we being reduc'd into our own Limits France and Spain became the Rivals for the Universal Monarchy and our third Power tho' in it self less than either of the other hapned to be Superiour to any of them by that choice we had of throwing the Scales on that side to which we gave our Friendship I do not know whether this Figure did not make us as great as our Formal Conquest to be a perpetual Umpire between the two great contending Powers who gave us all their Courtship and offer'd all their Incense at our Altar whilst the Fate of either Prince seemed to depend upon the Otacles we delivered for the King of England to sit on his Throne as in the Supream Court of Justice which the two last Appeal the two great Monarchs pleading their Cause and expecting their Sentence declaring which side was in the right or at least if we pleas'd which side should have the better of it was a piece of Greatness which was peculiar to us and no wonder if we endeavour to preserve it as we did for a considerable time it being our Safety as well as Glory to maintain it but by a Fatality upon our Councils or by the refin'd Policy of this latter Age we have thought fit to use industry to destroy this mighty Power which we have so long enjoyed and that equality between the two Monarchs which we might for ever have preserved hath been chiefly broken by us whose Interest it was above all others to maintain it when one of them like the overflowing of the Sea had gained more upon the other than our conveniency or indeed our safety would allow instead of mending the Banks or making new ones we our selves helpt to cut them to invite and make way for a farther Inundation France and Spain have had their several turns in making use of our Mistakes and we have been formerly as deaf to the Instances of the then weaker part of the World to help them against the House of Austria as we can now be to the Earnestness of Spain that we would assist them against the Power of France Gondamar was as sawcy and as powerful too in King James his Court as any French Ambassadour can have been at any time since when men talkt as wrong then on the Spanish side and made their Court by it as any can have done since by talking as much for the French so that from that time instead of weighing in a wise Balance the Power of either Crown it looketh as if we had meant only to weigh the Pensions and take the heaviest It would be tedious as well as unwelcome to recapitulate all our wrong steps so that I will go no farther than the King's Restauration at which time the Balance was on the side of France and that by the means of Cromwell who for a separate Interest of his own had sacrificed that of the Nation by joyning with the stronger side to suppress the Power of Spain which he ought to have supported Such a Method was natural enough to an Usurper and shew'd he was not the Father of the People by his having so little care for them and the Example coming from that hand one would think should for that Reason be less likely to be solIow'd But to go on here cometh the King follow'd with Courtships of all Nations abroad of which some did it not only

ease than we are to Rob an House with a devout intention of giving Plunder to the Poor in this case our Compassion would be as ill directed as our Charity in the other In that the veneration due to the Laws is never to be thrown off let the Pretences be never so specious yet with all this he cannot bring himself to think that an extraordinary diligence to take the uttermost penalyt of the Laws upon the Poor offending Neighbour is of it self such an all-sufficient vertue that without something else to recommend Men it should Entitle them to all kind of preferments and Rewards he would not detract from the merits of those who execute the Laws yet he cannot think such a piece of service can entirely change the Man or either make him a better Divine or a more knowing Magistrate than he was before especially if it be done with a partial and unequal hand in Reference to greater and more dangerous Offenders Our Trimmer would have those mistaken Men ready to throw themselves into the arms of the Church and he would have those arms as ready to receive them he would have no supercilious look to fright those strayed Sheep from coming into the Fold again no ill-natur'd maxims of an Eternal suspicion or a belief that those who have once been in the wrong can never be in the right again but a visible preparation of mind to receive with joy all the Proselites that come amongst us and much greater earnestness to reclaim than punish them It is to be confess'd there is a great deal to forgive a hard task enough for a Church so provoked but that must not cut off all hopes of being reconciled yet if there must be some anger left still let it break out into a Christian Revenge and by being kinder to the Children of Disobedience than they deserve let the injur'd Church Triumph by throwing shame and confusion of face upon them there should not always be Storms and Thunder a clear Sky would sometime make the Church more like Heaven and would be more towards the reclaiming those wanderers than a perpetual terrour which seemeth to have no intermission for there is in many and particularly in English Man a mistaken pleasure in resisting the dictates of Rigorous Authority a Stomach that riseth against a hard imposition nay in some raise even a lust in suffering from a wrong point of Honour which doth not want her greater applause from the greater part of Mankind who have not learnt to distinguish constancy will be thought a vertue even where it is a mistake and the ill Judging World will be apt to think that Opinion in thought which produceth the greatest number of those who are willing to suffer for it all this is prevented and falleth to the ground by using well-timed Indulgence and the stubborn Adversary who values himself upon his resistance whilst he is oppress'd yieldeth insensibly to kind Methods when they are apply'd to him and the same Man naturally melteth into Conformity who perhaps would never have been beaten into it We may be taught by the Compassion that attendeth the most Criminal Men when they are Condemned that Faults are more natural things than Punishments and that even the most necessary acts of severity do some kind of violence to our Nature whose Indulgence will not be confin'd within the strait bounds of inexorable Justice so that this should be an Argument for gentleness besides that it is the likeliest way to make Men asham'd of their Separation whilst the pressing them too hard tendeth rather to make them proud of it Our Trimmer would have the Clergy supported in their lawful Rights and in all the Power and Dignity that belongeth to them and yet he thinketh possibly there may be in some of them a too great eagerness to extend the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction which tho' it may be well intended yet the straining of it too high hath an appearance of Ambition that causeth many Objections to it and it is very unlike the Apostolick Zeal which was quite otherwise employ'd that the World draweth inferences from it which do the Church no service He is troubled to see Men of all sides sick of a Calenture of a mistaken Devotion and it seemeth to him that the devout Fire of mutual Charity with which the Primitive Christians were inflam'd is long since extinguish'd and instead of it a devouring Fire of Anger and Persecution breaketh out in the World we wrangle now one with another about Religion 'till the Cloud cometh whilst the Ten Commandments have no more authority with us than if they were so many obsolete Laws or Proclamations out of date he thinks that a Nation will hardly be mended by Principles of Religion where Morality is made a Heresy and therefore as he believeth Devotion misplac'd where it getteth into a Conventicle he concludeth that Loyalty is so when lodg'd in a drunken Club those Vertues deserve a better Seat of Empire and they are degraded when such Men undertake their defence as have so great need for an Apology themselves Our Trimmer wisheth that some knowledge may go along with the Zeal on the right side and that those who are in possession of the Pulpit would quote at least so often the Authority of the Scriptures as they do that of the State there are many who borrow too often Arguments from the Government to use against their Adversaries and neglect those that are more proper and would be more powerful a Divine grows less and putteth a diminution on his own Character when he quoteth any Law but that of God Almighty to get the better of those who contest with him and it is a sign of a decay'd Constitution when Nature with good diet cannot expel noxious Humours without calling Foreign Drugs to her Assistance So it looketh like want of health in a Church when instead of depending upon that Truth which it holdeth and the good Examples of them that teach it to support it self and to suppress Errors it should have perpetual recourse to the secular Authority and even upon the slightest occasions Our Trimmer hath his Objections to the too hasty diligence and to the overdoing of some of the dissenting Clergy and he doth as little approve of those of our Church who wear God Almighty's Liveries as some old Warders in the Tower do the Kings who do nothing in their place but receive their Wages for it he thinketh that the Liberty of the late times gave Men so much Light and diffused it so universally amongst the People that they are not now to be dealt with as they might have been of less enquiry and therefore tho' in some well chosen and dearly beloved Auditories good resolute Nonsence back'd with Authority may prevail yet generally Men are become so good Judges of what they hear that the Clergy ought to be very wary how they go about to impose upon their Understandings which are grown less humble than in former times