according to the variety of times and other occurrences We have such footsteps remaining of the name of Baron as plainly shew the signification of it The Barons of London and the Cinq Ports are known to be only the Freemen of those places In the petty Court-Barons every man who may be of a Jury is a Baron These are Noblemen for there are noble Nations as well as noble men in Nations The Mammalukes accounted themselves to be all noble tho born slaves and when they had ennobled themselves by the use of Arms they look'd upon the noblest of the Egyptians as their slaves Tertullian writing not to some eminent men but to the whole People of Carthage calls them Antiquitate Nobiles Nobilitate felices Such were the Saxons ennobled by a perpetual application to those exercises that belong to Noblemen and an abhorrence to any thing that is vile and sordid Lest this should seem far fetch'd to those who please themselves with cavilling they are to know that the same General Councils are expressed by other Authors in other words They are called The General Council of the Bishops Noblemen Counts all the wise men Elders and People of the whole Kingdom in the time of Ina. In that of Edward the elder The Great Council of the Bishops Abbots Noblemen and People William of Malmsbury calls them The General Senat and Assembly of the People Sometimes they are in short called Clergy and People but all express the same power neither received from nor limitable by Kings who are always said to be chosen or made and sometimes deposed by them William the Norman found and left the Nation in this condition Henry the second John and Henry third who had nothing but what was conferred upon them by the same Clergy and People did so too Magna Charta could give nothing to the People who in themselves had all and only reduced into a small Volume the Rights which the Nation was resolved to maintain brought the King to confess they were perpetually inherent and time out of mind enjoyed and to swear that he would no way violate them if he did he was ipso facto excommunicated and being thereby declared to be an execrable perjur'd Person they knew how to deal with him This Act has bin confirmed by thirty Parliaments and the proceedings with Kings who have violated their Oaths as well before as after the time of Henry the third which have bin already mentioned are sufficient to shew that England has always bin governed by it self and never acknowledged any other Lord than such as they thought fit to set up SECT XXIX The King was never Master of the Soil THOSE who without regard to truth resolve to insist upon such points as they think may serve their designs when they find it cannot be denied that the powers before mentioned have bin exercised by the English and other Nations say that they were the concessions of Kings who being masters of the Soil might bestow parcels upon some Persons with such conditions as they pleased retaining to themselves the supreme dominion of the whole and having already as they think made them the Fountains of Honour they proceed to make them also the Fountains of Property and for proof of this alledg that all Lands tho held of mean Lords do by their Tenures at last result upon the King as the Head from whom they are enjoyed This might be of force if it were true but matters of the highest importance requiring a most evident proof we are to examine First if it be possible and in the next place if it be true 1. For the first No man can give what he has not Whoever therefore will pretend that the King has bestowed this propriety must prove that he had it in himself I confess that the Kings of Spain and Portugal obtained from the Pope grants of the Territories they possessed in the West-Indies and this might be of some strength if the Pope as Vicar of Christ had an absolute dominion over the whole earth but if that fail the whole falls to the ground and he is ridiculously liberal of that which no way belongs to him My business is not to dispute that point but before it can have any influence upon our Affairs our Kings are to prove that they are Lords of England upon the same Title or some other equivalent to it When that is done we shall know upon whom they have a dependence and may at leisure consider whether we ought to acknowledg and submit to such a Power or give reasons for our refusal But there being no such thing in our present case their property must be grounded upon something else or we may justly conclude they have none In order to this 't is hardly worth the pains to search into the obscure remains of the British Histories For when the Romans deserted our Island they did not confer the right they had whether more or less upon any man but left the enjoyment of it to the poor remainders of the Nation and their own established Colonies who were grown to be one People with the Natives The Saxons came under the conduct of Hengist and Horsa who seem to have bin sturdy Pirats but did not that I can learn bear any Characters in their persons of the so much admired Sovereign Majesty that should give them an absolute dominion or propriety either in their own Country or any other they should set their feet upon They came with about a hundred men and chusing rather to serve Vortigern than to depend upon what they could get by rapine at Sea lived upon a small proportion of Land by him allotted to them Tho this seems to be but a slender encouragement yet it was enough to invite many others to follow their Example and Fortune so that their number increasing the County of Kent was given to them under the obligation of serving the Britans in their Wars Not long after Lands in Northumberland were bestowed upon another company of them with the same condition This was all the Title they had to what they enjoyed till they treacherously killed four hundred and sixty or as William of Malmsbury says three hundred principal men of the British Nobility and made Vortigern Prisoner who had bin so much their Benefactor that he seems never to have deserved well but from them and to have incens'd the Britans by the favour he shew'd them as much as by the worst of his Vices And certainly actions of this kind composed of falshood and cruelty can never create a right in the opinion of any better men than Filmer and his Disciples who think that the power only is to be regarded and not the means by which it is obtained But tho it should be granted that a right had bin thus acquired it must accrue to the Nation not to Hengist and Horsa If such an acquisition be called a Conquest the benefit must belong to
as much as to say that they were ruin'd when they fell from their own unnatural Inventions to follow the Law of God and of Nature that Luxury also through which they fell was the product of their Felicity and that the Nations that had bin subdued by them had no other way of avenging their Defeats than by alluring their Masters to their own Vices This was the Root of their Civil Wars When that proud City found no more resistance it grew wanton Saevior armis Luxuria incubuit victumque ulciscitur orbem Lucan Honest Poverty became uneasy when Honours were given to ill-gotten Riches This was so Monarchical that a People infected with such a Custom must needs fall by it They who by Vice had exhausted their Fortunes could repair them only by bringing their Country under a Government that would give impunity to Rapine and such as had not Virtues to deserve Advancement from the Senate and People would always endeavour to set up a Man that would bestow the Honours that were due to Virtue upon those who would be most abjectly subservient to his Will and Interests When mens minds are filled with this Fury they sacrifice the common Good to the advancement of their private Concernments This was the temper of Catiline expressed by Sallust Luxuria principi gravis paupertas vix à privato toleranda and this put him upon that desperate extremity to say Incendium meum ruinâ extinguam Others in the same manner being filled with the same rage he could not want Companions in his most villanous Designs 'T is not long since a Person of the highest Quality and no less famous for Learning and Wit having observed the State of England as it stood not many years ago and that to which it has bin reduc'd since the year sixty as is thought very much by the Advice and Example of France said That they now were taking a most cruel vengeance upon us for all the Overthrows received from our Ancestors by introducing their most damnable Maxims and teaching us the worst of their Vices 'T is not for me to determine whether this Judgment was rightly made or not for I intend not to speak of our Affairs but all Historians agreeing that the change of the Roman Government was wrought by such means as I have mentioned and our Author acknowledging that change to have bin their ruin as in truth it was I may justly conclude that the overthrow of that Government could not have bin a ruin to them but good for them unless it had bin good and that the Power which did ruin it and was set up in the room of it cannot have bin according to the Laws of God or Nature for they confer only that which is good and destroy nothing that is so but must have bin most contrary to that good which was overthrown by it SECT XVI The best Governments of the World have bin composed of Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy OUR Author's cavils concerning I know not what vulgar Opinions that Democracies were introduc'd to curb Tyranny deserve no answer for our question is Whether one form of Government be prescribed to us by God and Nature or we are left according to our own understanding to constitute such as seem best to our selves As for Democracy he may say what pleases him of it and I believe it can sute only with the convenience of a small Town accompanied with such Circumstances as are seldom found But this no way obliges men to run into the other extream in as much as the variety of forms between meer Democracy and Absolute Monarchy is almost infinite And if I should undertake to say there never was a good Government in the world that did not consist of the three simple Species of Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy I think I might make it good This at the least is certain that the Government of the Hebrews instituted by God had a Judg the great Sanhedrin and General Assemblies of the People Sparta had two Kings a Senate of twenty eight chosen Men and the like Assemblies All the Dorian Cities had a chief Magistrate a Senate and occasional Assemblies The Ionian Athens and others had an Archon the Areopagi and all Judgments concerning matters of the greatest importance as well as the Election of Magistrates were referr'd to the People Rome in the beginning had a King and a Senate whilst the Election of Kings and Judgments upon Appeals remained in the People afterwards Consuls representing Kings and vested with equal Power a more numerous Senate and more frequent meetings of the People Venice has at this day a Duke the Senate of the Pregadi and the Great Assembly of the Nobility which is the whole City the rest of the Inhabitants being only Incolae not Cives and those of the other Cities or Countries are their Subjects and do not participate of the Government Genoa is governed in like manner Luca not unlike to them Germany is at this day governed by an Emperor the Princes or great Lords in their several Precincts the Cities by their own Magistrates and by general Diets in which the whole power of the Nation resides and where the Emperor Princes Nobility and Cities have their places in person or by their Deputies All the Northern Nations which upon the dissolution of the Roman Empire possessed the best Provinces that had composed it were under that form which is usually called the Gothick Polity They had King Lords Commons Diets Assemblies of Estates Cortez and Parliaments in which the Sovereign Powers of those Nations did reside and by which they were exercised The like was practised in Hungary Bohemia Sweden Denmark Poland and if things are changed in some of these places within few years they must give better proofs of having gained by the change than are yet seen in the World before I think my self obliged to change my opinion Some Nations not liking the name of King have given such a power as Kings enjoy'd in other places to one or more Magistrates either limited to a certain time or left to be perpetual as best pleased themselves Others approving the name made the Dignity purely elective Some have in their Elections principally regarded one Family as long as it lasted Others consider'd nothing but the fitness of the Person and reserved to themselves a liberty of taking where they pleased Some have permitted the Crown to be hereditary as to its ordinary course but restrained the Power and instituted Officers to inspect the Proceedings of Kings and to take care that the Laws were not violated Of this sort were the Ephori of Sparta the Maires du Palais and afterwards the Constable of France the Justicia in Arragon Rijckshofmeister in Denmark the High Steward in England and in all places such Assemblies as are before-mentioned under several names who had the Power of the whole Nation Some have continued long and it may be always in the same form others have changed
de Moret and other Bastards of the Royal Family following their example the Houses of Guise D' Elbeuf Bouillon Nemours Rochefocault and almost all the most eminent in France with the Parliaments of Paris Bourdeaux and some others joining with them I might alledg many more Examples to shew that this Monarchy as well as all others has from the first establishment bin full of blood and slaughter through the violence of those who possessed the Crown and the Ambition of such as aspired to it and that the end of one Civil War has bin the beginning of another but I presume upon the whole these will be thought sufficient to prove that it never enjoyed any permanent domestick quiet The Kingdoms of Spain have bin no less disturbed by the same means but especially that of Castille where the Kings had more power than in other places To cite all the Examples were to transcribe their Histories but whoever has leisure to examine them will find that after many troubles Alphonso the II notwithstanding his glorious sirname of Wise was deposed by means of his ambitious Son Don Alonso sirnamed El Desheredado supplanted by his Uncle Don Sancho el bravo Peter the Cruel cast from the Throne and killed by his bastard Brother the Conde de Trastamara From the time of the above-named Alphonso to that of Ferdinand and Isabella containing about two hundred years so few of them passed without Civil Wars that I hardly remember two together that were free from them And whosoever pretends that of late years that Monarchy has bin more quiet must if he be ingenuous confess their Peace is rather to be imputed to the dexterity of removing such Persons as have bin most likely to raise disturbances of which number were Don John of Austria Don Carlos Son to Philip the second another of the same name Son to Philip the third and Don Balthazar Son to Philip the sourth than to the rectitude of their Constitutions He that is not convinced of these Truths by what has bin said may come nearer home and see what Mischiefs were brought upon Scotland by the Contests between Baliol and Bruce with their consequences till the Crown came to the Stuart Family the quiet Reigns and happy Deaths of the five James's together with the admirable Stability and Peace of the Government under Queen Mary and the perfect Union in which she lived with her Husband Son and People as well as the Happiness of the Nation whilst it lasted But the Miseries of England upon the like occasions surpass all William the Norman was no sooner dead but the Nation was rent in pieces by his Son Robert contesting with his Sons William and Henry for the Crown They being all dead and their Sons the like happen'd between Stephen and Maud Henry the second was made King to terminate all disputes but it proved a fruitless Expedient Such as were more scandalous and not less dangerous did soon arise between him and his Sons who besides the Evils brought upon the Nation vexed him to death by their Rebellion The Reigns of John and Henry the third were yet more tempestuous Edward the second 's lewd foolish infamous and detestable Government ended in his deposition and death to which he was brought by his Wife and Son Edward the third employ'd his own and his Subjects Valour against the French and Scots but whilst the Foundations were out of order the Nation could never receive any advantage by their Victories All was calculated for the Glory and turned to the Advantage of one man He being dead all that the English held in Scotland and in France was lost through the baseness of his Successor with more blood than it had been gained and the Civil Wars raised by his wickedness and madness ended as those of Edward the second had done The Peace of Henry the fourth's Reign was interrupted by dangerous Civil Wars and the Victory obtained at Shrewsbury had not perhaps secured him in the Throne if his death had not prevented new Troubles Henry the fifth required such reputation by his Virtue and Victories that none dared to invade the Crown during his life but immediatly after his death the Storms prepared against his Family broke out with the utmost violence His Son's weakness encouraged Richard Duke of York to set up a new Title which produced such mischiefs as hardly any people has suffer'd unless upon the like occasion For besides the slaughter of many thousands of the people and especially of those who had bin accustom'd to Arms the devastation of the best parts of the Kingdom and the loss of all that our Kings had inherited in France or gained by the blood of their Subjects fourscore Princes of the Blood as Philip de Commines calls them died in Battel or under the hand of the Hangman Many of the most noble Families were extinguished others lost their most eminent Men. Three Kings and two presumptive Heirs of the Crown were murder'd and the Nation brought to that shameful exigence to set up a young Man to reign over them who had no better cover for his sordid extraction than a Welsh Pedigree that might shew how a Tailor was descended from Prince Arthur Cadwallader and Brutus But the wounds of the Nation were not to be healed with such a plaister He could not relie upon a Title made up of such stuff and patch'd with a Marriage to a Princess of a very questionable Birth His own meanness enclin'd him to hate the Nobility and thinking it to be as easy for them to take the Crown from him as to give it to him he industriously applied himself to glean up the remainders of the House of York from whence a Competitor might arise and by all means to crush those who were most able to oppose him This exceedingly weakned the Nobility who held the Balance between him and the Commons and was the first step towards the dissolution of our antient Government but he was so far from setling the Kingdom in peace that such Rascals as Perkin Warbeck and Simnel were able to disturb it The Reign of Henry the eighth was turbulent and bloody that of Mary furious and such as had brought us into subjection to the most powerful proud and cruel Nation at that time in the world if God had not wonderfully protected us Nay Edward the sixth and Queen Elizabeth notwithstanding the natural excellency of their Dispositions and their knowledg of the Truth in matters of Religion were forced by that which men call jealousy of State to foul their hands so often with illustrious Blood that if their Reigns deserve to be accounted amongst the most gentle of Monarchies they were more heavy than the Government of any Commonwealth in time of Peace and yet their lives were never secure against such as conspired against them upon the account of Title Having in some measure shew'd what miseries have bin usually if not perpetually brought upon Nations subject to
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
latter Kings hath bin so gracious as to allow always of the intire Bill as it passed both Houses He judiciously observes when our Kings began to be gracious and we to be free That King excepting the persecution for Religion in his time which is rather to be imputed to the ignorance of that age than to any evil in his own nature governed well and as all Princes who have bin virtuous and brave have always desired to preserve their Subjects Liberty which they knew to be the mother and nurse of their Valour fitting them for great and generous Enterprizes his care was to please them and to raise their Spirits But about the same time those detestable Arts by which the mixed Monarchies in this part of the world have bin every where terribly shaken and in many places totally overthrown began to be practised Charles the seventh of France under pretence of carrying on a War against him and his Son took upon him to raise Mony by his own Authority and we know how well that method has bin pursued The mischievous sagacity of his Son Lewis the 11th which is now called King-Craft was wholly exerted in the subversion of the Laws of France and the Nobility that supported them His Successors except only Lewis the 12th followed his example and in other Nations Ferdinand of Arragon James the third of Scotland and Henry the seventh of England were thought to imitate him the most Tho we have little reason to commend all the Princes that preceded Henry the fifth yet I am inclined to date the general impairing of our Government from the death of that King and his valiant Brothers His weak Son became a prey to a furious French woman who brought the Maxims of her own Country into ours and advanced the worst of villains to govern according to them These measures were pursued by Edward the fourth whose wants contracted by prodigality and debauchery were to be supplied by fraud and rapine The ambition cruelty and persidiousness of Richard the third the covetousness and malicious subtilty of Henry the seventh the violent lust rage and pride of Henry the 8th and the bigotted fury of Queen Mary instigated by the craft and malice of Spain perswaded me to believe that the English Liberty did not receive birth or growth from the favour and goodness of their gracious Princes But it seems all this is mistaken Henry the sixth was wise valiant and no way guided by his Wife Edward the sourth continent sober and contented with what the Nation gave him Richard the third mild gentle and faithful Henry the 7th sincere and satisfied with his own Henry the 8th humble temperate and just and Queen Mary a friend to our Country and Religion No less praises sure can be due to those who were so gracious to recede from their own right of picking what they pleased out of our Laws and to leave them intirely to us as they passed both Houses We are beholden to our Author for the discovery of these mysteries but tho he seems to have taken an Oath like that of the Gypsies when they enter into that virtuous Society never to speak one word of truth he is not so subtle in concealing his Lies All Kings were trusted with the publication of the Laws but all Kings did not falsify them Such as were not wicked and vicious or so weak as to be made subservient to the malice of their Ministers and Flatterers could never be drawn into the guilt of so infamous a cheat directly contrary to the Oath of their Coronation They swear to pass such Laws as the People chuse but if we will believe our Author they might have pick'd out whatever they pleased and falsly imposed upon the Nation as a Law made by the Lords and Commons that which they had modelled according to their own will and made to be different from or contrary to the intention of the Parliament The King's part in this fraud of which he boasts was little more than might have bin done by the Speaker or his Clerks They might have falfified an Act as well as the King tho they could not so well preserve themselves from punishment 'T is no wonder if for a while no stop was put to such an abominable Custom 'T was hard to think a King would be guilty of a fraud that were infamous in a Slave But that proved to be a small security when the worst of Slaves came to govern them Nevertheless 't is probable they proceeded cautioufly the first alterations were perhaps innocent or it may be for the best But when they had once found out the way they stuck at nothing that seemed for their purpose This was like the plague of Leprosy that could not be cured the house infected was to be demolished the poisonous plant must be torn up by the root the trust that had bin broken was to be abolished they who had perverted or frustrated the Law were no longer to be suffered to make the least alteration and that brave Prince readily joined with his People to extinguish the mischievous abuse that had bin introduced by some of his worthless Predecessors The worst and basest of them had continual disputes with their Parliaments and thought that whatever they could detract from the Liberty of the Nation would serve to advance their Prerogative They delighted in frauds and would have no other Ministers but such as would be the instruments of them Since their Word could not be made to pass for a Law they endeavoured to impose their own or their Servants inventions as Acts of Parliaments upon the deluded people and to make the best of them subservient to their corrupt Ends and pernicious Counsels This if it had continued might have overthrown all our Rights and deprived us of all that men can call good in the world But the Providence of God furnished our Ancestors with an opportunity of providing against so great so universal a mischief They had a wise and valiant Prince who scorned to encroach upon the Liberties of his Subjects and abhorred the detestable Arts by which they had bin impair'd He esteemed their courage strength and love to be his greatest advantage riches and glory He aimed at the conquest of France which was only to be effected by the bravery of a free and well-satisfied People Slaves will always be cowards and enemies to their Master By bringing his Subjects into that condition he must infallibly have ruined his own designs and made them unfit to fight either for him or themselves He desired not only that his People should be free during his time but that his Successors should not be able by oblique and fraudulent ways to enslave them If it be a reproach to us that Women have reigned over us 't is much more to the Princes that succeeded our Henry that none of them did so much imitate him in his Government as Queen Elizabeth She did not go about to mangle Acts
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
DISCOURSES CONCERNING GOVERNMENT BY Algernon Sidney Son to Robert Earl of Leicester and Ambassador from the Commonwealth of England to Charles Gustavus King of Sweden Published from an Original Manuscript of the Author LONDON Printed and are to be sold by the Booksellers of London and Westminster MDCXCVIII THE PREFACE HOW highly the Writings of wise and good Men concerning Government have bin esteemed in all Ages the testimony of History and the preservation of so many Books composed by the Antients on that Subject do sufficiently manifest And it may be truly said that unless men have utterly abandon'd themselves to all that is detestable they have seldom attempted to detract from the worth of the Assertors of Liberty tho Ambition and other passions have influenced them to act in opposition to it When Augustus had surprised a young Roman who was related to him reading a political Discourse of Cicero he commended his judgment in that choice The History of France written by the President de Thou with a spirit of Freedom that might have bin worthy of those who had liv'd before the violation of their Liberty has bin so generally valued by men of all ranks in that Nation that'tis hard to find a Book on any important Subject which has had so many Editions And the just esteem that the Emperor Charles the fifth made of the Memoirs of Philip de Commines tho that Author has given so many instances of his detestation of Tyranny may be enough to put this matter out of dispute But if all other proof were wanting the implacable hatred and unwearied industry of the worst of men to suppress such Writings would abundantly testify their excellency That Nations should be well informed of their Rights is of the most absolute necessity because the happiness or infelicity of any People intirely depends upon the enjoyment or deprivation of Liberty which is so invincibly proved in the following Discourses that to endeavour to make it more clear would be an unpardonable presumption If any man think the publication of this Work to be unseasonable at this time he is desired to consider that as men expect good Laws only from a good Government so the Reign of a Prince whose Title is founded upon the principle of Liberty which is here defended cannot but be the most proper if not the only time to inform the People of their just Rights that from a due sense of their inestimable value they may be encouraged to assert them against the attempts of ill men in time to come 'T is not necessary to say any thing concerning the Person of the Author He was so well known in the world so universally esteemed by those who knew how to set a just value upon true Merit and will appear so admirable in the following Discourses as not to stand in need of a flattering Panegyrick But it may not be amiss to say something of the Discourses now published The Paper delivered to the Sheriffs immediately before his death informs us that he had left a Large and a Lesser Treatise written against the Principles contained in Filmer's Book and that a small part of the lesser Treatise had bin produced for evidence against him at his Trial. 'T is there also said that the lesser Treatise neither was nor probably ever should have bin finished This therefore is the Large Work mentioned in that Paper and not the Lesser upon part of which the wicked Sentence pronounc'd and executed against him was grounded It remains only to add a few words for satisfaction of the Publick that these Discourses are genuine And here I shall not need to say that they were put into the hands of a Person of eminent Quality and Integrity by the Author himself and that the Original is in the judgment of those who knew him best all written by his own hand His inimitable manner of treating this noble Subject is instead of a thousand demonstrations that the Work can belong to no other than the Great Man whose name it bears DISCOURSES CONCERNING GOVERNMENT CHAP. I. SECTION I. INTRODUCTION HAVING lately seen a Book intituled Patriarcha written by Sir Robert Filmer concerning the Universal and undistinguished Right of all Kings I thought a time of leisure might be well employed in examining his Doctrine and the Questions arising from it which seem so far to concern all Mankind that besides the influence upon our future Life they may be said to comprehend all that in this World deserves to be cared for If he say true there is but one Government in the World that can have any thing of Justice in it and those who have hitherto bin esteemed the best and wisest of Men for having constituted Commonwealths or Kingdoms and taken much pains so to proportion the Powers of several Magistracies that they might all concur in procuring the Publick Good or so to divide the Powers between the Magistrates and People that a well-regulated Harmony might be preserved in the whole were the most unjust and foolish of all Men. They were not builders but overthrowers of Governments Their business was to set up Aristocratical Democratical or mixed Governments in opposition to that Monarchy which by the immutable Laws of God and Nature is imposed upon Mankind or presumptuously to put Shackles upon the Monarch who by the same Laws is to be absolute and uncontrolled They were rebellious and disobedient Sons who rose up against their Father and not only refused to hearken to his Voice but made him bend to their Will In their opinion such only deserved to be called Good Men who endeavoured to be good to Mankind or to that Country to which they were more particularly related and in as much as that Good consists in a felicity of Estate and perfection of Person they highly valued such as had endeavoured to make Men better wiser and happier This they understood to be the end for which Men enter'd into Societies And tho Cicero says that Commonwealths were instituted for the obtaining of Justice he contradicts them not but comprehends all in that word because 't is just that whosoever receives a Power should employ it wholly for the accomplishment of the Ends for which it was given This Work could be performed only by such as excelled in Virtue but lest they should deflect from it no Government was thought to be well constituted unless the Laws prevailed above the Commands of Men and they were accounted as the worst of Beasts who did not prefer such a Condition before a subjection to the fluctuating and irregular Will of a Man If we believe Sir Robert all this is mistaken Nothing of this kind was ever left to the choice of Men. They are not to enquire what conduces to their own good God and Nature have put us into a way from which we are not to swerve We are not to live to him nor to our selves but to the Master that he hath set over us One Government
Generations We see nothing in Scripture of Precept or Example that is not utterly abhorrent to this Chimera The only sort of Kings mentioned there with approbation is such a one as may not raise his Heart above his Brethren If God had constituted a Lord Paramount with an absolute Power and multitudes of Nations were to labour and fight for his Greatness and Pleasure this were to raise his Heart to a height that would make him forget he was a Man Such as are versed in Scripture not only know that it neither agrees with the Letter or Spirit of that Book but that it is unreasonable in it self unless he were of a Species different from the rest of Mankind His exaltation would not agree with God's Indulgence to his Creatures tho he were the better for it much less when probably he would be made more unhappy and worse by the Pride Luxury and other Vices that always attend the highest Fortunes 'T is no less incredible that God who disposes all things in Wisdom and Goodness and appoints a due Place for all should without distinction ordain such a Power to every one succeeding in such a Line as cannot be executed the Wise would refuse and Fools cannot take upon them the burden of it without ruin to themselves and such as are under them or expose Mankind to a multitude of other Absurdities and Mischiefs subjecting the Aged to be governed by Children the Wise to depend on the Will of Fools the Strong and Valiant to expect defence from the Weak or Cowardly and all in general to receive Justice from him who neither knows nor cares for it SECT VII Abraham and the Patriarchs were not Kings IF any Man say that we are not to seek into the depth of God's Counsels I answer That if he had for Reasons known only to himself affixed such a Right to any one Line he would have set a Mark upon those who come of it that Nations might know to whom they owe Subjection or given some testimony of his Presence with Filmer and Heylin if he had sent them to reveal so great a Mystery 'Till that be done we may safely look upon them as the worst of men and teachers only of Lies and Follies This perswades me little to examine what would have bin if God had at once created many Men or the Conclusions that can be drawn from Adam's having bin alone For nothing can be more evident than that if many had bin created they had bin all equal unless God had given a Preference to one All their Sons had inherited the same Right after their death and no Dream was ever more empty than his Whimsey of Adam's Kingdom or that of the ensuing Patriarchs To say the truth 't is hard to speak seriously of Abraham's Kingdom or to think any Man to be in earnest who mentions it He was a Stranger and a Pilgrim in the Land where he lived and pretended to no Authority beyond his own Family which consisted only of a Wife and Slaves He lived with Lot as with his Equal and would have no Contest with him because they were Brethren His Wife and Servants could neither make up nor be any part of a Kingdom in as much as the despotical Government both in Practice and Principle differs from the Regal If his Kingdom was to be grounded on the Paternal Right it vanished away of it self he had no Child Eliezer of Damascus for want of a better was to be his Heir Lot tho his Nephew was excluded He durst not own his own Wife He had not one foot of Land till he bought a Field for a burying place His three hundred and eighteen Men were Servants bought according to the custom of those days or their Children and the War he made with them was like to Gideon's Enterprize which shews only that God can save by a few as well as by many but makes nothing to our Author's purpose For if they had been as many in number as the Army of Semiramis they could have no relation to the Regal much less to the Paternal Power for a Father doth not buy but beget Children Notwithstanding this our Author bestows the proud Title of Lord Paramount upon him and transmits it to Isaac who was indeed a King like his Father great admirable and glorious in Wisdom and Holiness but utterly void of all worldly splendor or power This spiritual Kingdom was inherited by Jacob whose Title to it was not founded on Prerogative of Birth but Election and peculiar Grace but he never enjoyed any other worldly Inheritance than the Field and Cave which Abraham had bought for a burying place and the Goods he had gained in Laban's Service The Example of Judah his Sentence upon Thamar is yet farther from the purpose if it be possible for he was then a Member of a private Family the fourth Son of a Father then living neither in possession nor under the promise of the Privileges of Primogeniture tho Ruben Simeon and Levi fell from it by their Sins Whatsoever therefore the Right was which belonged to the Head of the Family it must have bin in Jacob but as he professed himself a keeper of Sheep as his Fathers had bin the exercise of that Emploiment was so far from Regal that it deserves no explication If that Act of Judah is to be imputed to a Royal Power I have as much as I ask He tho living with his Father and elder Brothers when he came to be of Age to have Children had the same Power over such as were of or came into his Family as his Father had over him for none can go beyond the Power of Life and Death The same in the utmost extent cannot at the same time equally belong to many If it be divided equally it is no more than that Universal Liberty which God hath given to Mankind and every Man is a King till he devest himself of his Right in consideration of something that he thinks better for him SECT VIII Nimrod was the first King during the Life of Chush Cham Shem and Noah THE Creation is exactly described in the Scripture but we know so little of what passed between the finishing of it and the Flood that our Author may say what he pleases and I may leave him to seek his Proofs where he can find them In the mean time I utterly deny that any Power did remain in the Heads of Families after the Flood that dos in the least degree resemble the Regal in Principle or Practice If in this I am mistaken such Power must have been in Noah and transmitted to one of his Sons The Scripture says only that he built an Altar sacrificed to the Lord was a Husbandman planted a Vineyard and performed such Offices as bear nothing of the Image of a King for the space of three hundred and fifty Years We have reason to believe that his Sons after his Death continued in the same manner of
The two Twins could not agree Jacob was sent away by his Mother he reigned over Esau only and 't is not easy to determine who was the Heir of his worldly Kingdom for the Jacob had the birth-right we do not find he had any other Goods than what he had gotten in Laban's service If our Author say true the right of Primogeniture with the Dominion perpetually annexed by the Laws of God and Nature must go to the eldest Isaac therefore tho he had not bin deceived could not have conferred it upon the younger for Man cannot overthrow what God and Nature have instituted Jacob in the Court Language had bin a double Rebel in beguiling his Father and supplanting his Brother The blessing of being Lord over his Brethren could not have taken place Or if Isaac had Power and his Act was good the Prerogative of the elder is not rooted in the Law of God or Nature but a matter of conveniency only which may be changed at the Will of the Father whether he know what he do or not But if this Paternal Right to Dominion were of any value or Dominion over Men were a thing to be desired why did Abraham Isaac and Jacob content themselves with such a narrow Territory when after the death of their Ancestors they ought according to that rule to have bin Lords of the World All Authors conclude that Shem was the eldest by birth or preferred by the appointment of God so as the Right must have bin in him and from him transmitted to Abraham and Isaac but if they were so possessed with the contemplation of a Heavenly Kingdom as not to care for the greatest on Earth 't is strange that Esau whose modesty is not much commended should so far forget his Interest as neither to lay claim to the Empire of the World nor dispute with his Brother the possession of the Field and Cave bought by Abraham but rather to fight for a dwelling on Mount Seir that was neither possessed by nor promised to his Fathers If he was fallen from his Right Jacob might have claimed it but God was his Inheritance and being assured of his Blessing he contented himself with what he could gain by his Industry in a way that was not at all sutable to the Pomp and Majesty of a King Which way soever theresore the business be turned whether according to Isaac's Blessing Esau should serve Jacob or our Author's opinion Jacob must serve Esau neither of the two was effected in their Persons And the Kingdom of two being divided into two each of them remained Lord of himself SECT IX The Power of a Father belongs only to a Father THIS leads us to an easy determination of the Question which our Author thinks insoluble If Adam was Lord of his Children he doth not see how any can be free from the subjection of his Parents For as no good Man will ever desire to be free from the respect that is due to his Father who did beget and educate him no wise Man will ever think the like to be due to his Brother or Nephew that did neither If Esau and Jacob were equally free if Noah as our Author affirms divided Europe Asia and Africa amongst his three Sons tho he cannot prove it and if seventy two Nations under so many Heads or Kings went from Babylon to people the Earth about a hundred and thirty years after the Flood I know not why according to the same rule and proportion it may not be safely concluded that in four thousand years Kings are so multiplied as to be in number equal to the Men that are in the World that is to say they are according to the Laws of God and Nature all free and independent upon each other as Shem Ham and Japhet were And therefore tho Adam and Noah had reigned alone when there were no Men in the World except such as issued from them that is no reason why any other should reign over those that he hath not begotten As the Right of Noah was divided amongst the Children he left and when he was dead no one of them depended on the other because no one of them was Father of the other and the Right of a Father can only belong to him that is so the like must for ever attend every other Father in the World This paternal Power must necessarily accrue to every Father He is a King by the same Right as the Sons of Noah and how numerous soever Families may be upon the increase of Mankind they are all free till they agree to recede from their own Right and join together in or under one Government according to such Laws as best please themselves SECT X. Such as enter into Society must in some degree diminish their Liberty REASON leads them to this No one Man or Family is able to provide that which is requisite for their convenience or security whilst every one has an equal Right to every thing and none acknowledges a Superior to determine the Controversies that upon such occasions must continually arise and will probably be so many and great that Mankind cannot bear them Therefore tho I do not believe that Bellarmin said a Commonwealth could not exercise its Power for he could not be ignorant that Rome and Athens did exercise theirs and that all the Regular Kingdoms in the World are Commonwealths yet there is nothing of absurdity in saying That Man cannot continue in the perpetual and entire fruition of the Liberty that God hath given him The Liberty of one is thwarted by that of another and whilst they are all equal none will yield to any otherwise than by a general consent This is the ground of all just Governments for violence or fraud can create no Right and the same consent gives the Form to them all how much soever they differ from each other Some small numbers of Men living within the Precincts of one City have as it were cast into a common Stock the Right which they had of governing themselves and Children and by common Consent joining in one body exercised fuch Power over every single Person as seemed beneficial to the whole and this Men call perfect Democracy Others chose rather to be governed by a select number of such as most excelled in Wisdom and Vertue and this according to the signification of the word was called Aristocracy Or when one Man excelled all others the Government was put into his hands under the name of Monarchy But the wisest best and far the greatest part of mankind rejecting these simple Species did form Governments mixed or composed of the three as shall be proved hereafter which commonly received their respective Denomination from the part that prevailed and did deserve Praise or Blame as they were well or ill proportioned It were a folly hereupon to say that the Liberty for which we contend is of no use to us since we cannot endure the Solitude Barbarity Weakness Want Misery and Dangers
that accompany it whilst we live alone nor can enter into a Society without resigning it for the choice of that Society and the liberty of framing it according to our own Wills for our own good is all we seek This remains to us whilst we form Governments that we our selves are Judges how far 't is good for us to recede from our natural Liberty which is of so great importance that from thence only we can know whether we are Freemen or Slaves and the difference between the best Government and the worst doth wholly depend upon a right or wrong exercise of that Power If Men are naturally free such as have Wisdom and Understanding will always frame good Governments But if they are born under the necessity of a perpetual Slavery no Wisdom can be of use to them but all must for ever depend on the Will of their Lords how cruel mad proud or wicked soever they be SECT XI No Man comes to command many unless by Consent or by Force BUT because I cannot believe God hath created Man in such a state of Misery and Slavery as I just now mentioned by discovering the vanity of our Author 's whimsical Patriarchical Kingdom I am led to a certain conclusion That every Father of a Family is free and exempt from the domination of any other as the seventy two that went from Babel were 'T is hard to comprehend how one Man can come to be master of many equal to himself in Right unless it be by Consent or by Force If by Consent we are at an end of our Controversies Governments and the Magistrates that execute them are created by Man They who give a being to them cannot but have a right of regulating limiting and directing them as best pleaseth themselves and all our Author's Assertions concerning the absolute Power of one Man fall to the ground If by Force we are to examine how it can be possible or justifiable This subduing by Force we call Conquest but as he that forceth must be stronger than those that are forced to talk of one Man who in strength exceeds many millions of Men is to go beyond the extravagance of Fables and Romances This Wound is not cured by saying that he first conquers one and then more and with their help others for as to matter of fact the first news we hear of Nimrod is that he reigned over a great multitude and built vast Cities and we know of no Kingdom in the World that did not begin with a greater number than any one Man could possibly subdue If they who chuse one to be their Head did under his conduct subdue others they were Fellow-conquerors with him and nothing can be more brutish than to think that by their vertue and valour they had purchased perpetual Slavery to themselves and their Posterity But if it were possible it could not be justifiable and whilst our Dispute is concerning Right that which ought not to be is no more to be received than if it could not be No Right can come by conquest unless there were a Right of making that Conquest which by reason of the equality that our Author confesses to have bin amongst the Heads of Families and as I have proved goes into Infinity can never be on the Aggressor's side No man can justly impose any thing upon those who owe him nothing Our Author therefore who ascribes the enlargement of Nimrod's Kingdom to Usurpation and Tyranny might as well have acknowledged the same in the beginning as he says all other Authors have done However he ought not to have imputed to Sir Walter Raleigh an Approbation of his Right as Lord or King over his Family for he could never think him to be a Lord by the right of a Father who by that rule must have lived and died a Slave to his Fathers that overlived him Whosoever therefore like Nimrod grounds his pretensions of Right upon Usurpation and Tyranny declares himself to be like Nimrod a Usueper and a Tyrant that is an Enemy to God and Man and to have no Right at all That which was unjust in its beginning can of it self never change its nature Tempus in se saith Grotius nullam habet vim effectricem He that persists in doing Injustice aggravates it and takes upon himself all the guilt of his Predecessors But if there be a King in the World that claims a Right by Conquest and would justisy it he might do well to tell whom he conquered when with what assistance and upon what reason he undertook the War for he can ground no title upon the obscurity of an unsearchable antiquity and if he does it not he ought to be looked upon as a usurping Nimrod SECT XII The pretended paternal Right is divisible or indivisible if divisible 't is extinguished if indivisible universal THis paternal right to Regality if there be any thing in it is divisible or indivisible if indivisible as Adam hath but one Heir one man is rightly Lord of the whole World and neither Nimrod nor any of his Successors could ever have bin Kings nor the seventy two that went from Babylon Noah survived him near two hundred years Shem continued one hundred and fifty years longer The Dominion must have bin in him and by him transmitted to his Posterity for ever Those that call themselves Kings in all other Nations set themselves up against the Law of God and Nature This is the man we are to seek out that we may yield obedience to him I know not where to find him but he must be of the race of Abraham Shem was preferred before his Brethren The Inheritance that could not be divided must come to him and from him to Isaac who was the first of his descendants that outlived him 'T is pity that Jacob did not know this and that the Lord of all the Earth through ignorance of his Title should be forced to keep one of his Subjects Sheep for wages and strange that he who had wit enough to supplant his Brother did so little understand his own bargain as not to know that he had bought the perpetual Empire of the World If in conscience he could not take such a price for a dish of Pottage it must remain in Esau However our Lord Paramount must come from Isaac If the Deed of Sale made by Esau be good we must seek him amongst the Jews if he could not so easily divest himself of his Right it must remain amongst his Descendants who are Turks We need not scruple the reception of either since the late Scots Act tells us That Kings derive their Royal Power from God alone and no difference of Religion c. can divert the right of Succession But I know not what we shall do if we cannot find this man for de non apparentibus non existentibus eadem est ratio The Right must fall if there be none to inherit If we do not know who he is that hath the
must perpetually spring First if there be such a Law no Human Constitution can alter it No length of time can be a defence against it All Governments that are not conformable to it are vicious and void even in their root and must be so for ever That which is originally unjust may be justly overthrown We do not know of any at least in that part of the World in which we are most concerned that is established or exercised with an absolute power as by the Authors of those opinions is esteemed inseparable from it Many as the Empire and other States are directly contrary and on that account can have no justice in them It being certain therefore that he or they who exercise those Governments have no right that there is a Man to whom it doth belong and no man knowing who he is there is no one man who has not as good a title to it as any other There is not therefore one who hath not a right as well as any to overthrow that which hath none at all He that hath no part in the Government may destroy it as well as he that has the greatest for he neither has that which God ordained he should have nor can shew a title to that which he enjoys from that original Prerogative of Birth from whence it can only be derived If it be said that some Governments are arbitrary as they ought to be and France Turky and the like be alledged as instances the matter is not mended for we do not only know when those who deserve to be regarded by us were not absolute and how they came to be so but also that those very Families which are now in possession are not of very long continuance had no more title to the original right we speak of than any other men and consequently can have none to this day And tho we cannot perhaps say that the Governments of the barbarous Eastern Nations were ever other than they are yet the known Original of them deprives them of all pretence to the Patriarchical Inheritance and they may be as justly as any other deprived of the Power to which they have no title In the second place tho all mens Genealogies were extant and fully verified and it were allowed that the Dominion of the World or every part of it did belong to the right Heir of the first Progenitor or any other to whom the first did rightly assign the parcel which is under question yet it were impossible for us to know who should be esteemed the true Heir or according to what rule he should be judged so to be for God hath not by a precise word determined it and Men cannot agree about it as appears by the various Laws and Customs of several Nations disposing severally of Hereditary Dominions 'T is a folly to say they ought to go to the next in blood for 't is not known who is that next Some give the preference to him who amongst many Competitors is the sewest degrees removed from their common Progenitor who first obtained the Crown Others look only upon the last that possessed it Some admit of representation by which means the Grandchild of a King by his eldest Son is preferred before his second Son he being said to represent his dead Father who was the eldest Others exclude these and advance the younger Son who is nearer by one degree to the common Progenitor that last enjoyed the Crown than the Grandchild According to the first rule Richard the second was advanced to the Crown of England as Son of the eldest Son of Edward the third before his Uncles who by one degree were nearer to the last Possessor And in pursuance of the second Sancho sirnamed the Brave second Son of Alphonso the Wise King of Castile was preferred before Alphonso Son of Ferdinand his elder Brother according to the Law of Thanestry which was in sorce in Spain ever since we have had any knowledg of that Country as appears by the contest between Corbis and Orsua decided by Combat before Stipio Africanus continued in full force as long as the Kingdom of the Goths lasted and was ever highly valued till the House of Austria got possession of that Country and introduced Laws and Customs formerly unknown to the Inhabitants The Histories of all Nations furnish us with innumerable Examples of both sorts and whosoever takes upon him to determine which side is in the right ought to shew by what authority he undertakes to be the Judg of Mankind and how the infinite breaches thereby made upon the rights of the governing Families shall be cured without the overthrow of those that he shall condemn and of the Nations where such Laws have bin in sorce as he dislikes and till that be done in my opinion no place will afford a better lodging for him that shall impudently assume such a Power than the new buildings in Moor-Fields 'T is no less hard to decide whether this next Heir is to be sought in the Male line only or whether Females also be admitted If we follow the first as the Law of God and Nature the title of our English Kings is wholly abolished for not one of them since Henry the 1 st has had the least pretence to an inheritance by the masculine Line and if it were necessary we have enough to say of those that were before them If it be said that the same Right belongs to Females it ought to be proved that Women are as fit as Men to perform the Office of a King that is as the Israelites said to Samuel to go in and out before us to judg us and to fight our Battels for it were an impious folly to say that God had ordained those for the Offices on which the good of Mankind so much depends who by nature are unable to perform the duties of them If on the other side the sweetness gentleness delicacy and tenderness of the Sex render them so unfit for manly exercises that they are accounted utterly repugnant to and inconsistent with that modesty which does so eminently shine in all those that are good amongst them that Law of Nature which should advance them to the Government of Men would overthrow its own work and make those to be the heads of Nations which cannot be the heads of private Families for as the Apostle says The Woman is not the head of the Man but the Man is the head of the Woman This were no less than to oblige Mankind to lay aside the name of reasonable Creature for if Reason be his Nature it cannot enjoin that which is contrary to it self if it be not the definition Homo est animal rationale is false and ought no longer to be assumed If any man think these Arguments to be mistaken or misapplied I desire him to enquire of the French Nation on what account they have always excluded Females and such as descended from them How comes the House of Bourbon to
have bin peculiarly reserved to compleat the infamy of our Author for he only could acknowledg a cooptitious Father or give to another man the power of chusing him I confess that a man in his infancy may have bin exposed like Moses Cyrus Oedipus Romulus He may have bin taken in War or by the charity of some good person saved from the teeth of wild Beasts or from the Sword by which his Parents fell and may have bin educated with that care which Fathers usually have of their Children 't is reasonable that such a one in the whole course of his life should pay that veneration and obedience to him who gave him as it were a second birth which was due to his natural Father and this tho improperly may be called an Adoption But to think that any man can assume it to himself or confer it upon another and thereby arrogate to himself the Service and Obedience which by the most tender and sacred Laws of Nature we owe to those from whom we receive Birth and Education is the most preposterous folly that hitherto has ever entered into the heart of man Our Author nevertheless is not ashamed of it and gives Reasons no way unsutable to the Proposition Men are says he adopted Fathers of Provinces for their Abilities Merits or Fortunes But these Abilities can simply deserve nothing for if they are ill employed they are the worst of Vices and the most powerful Instruments of Mischief Merits in regard of another are nothing unless they be to him and he alone can merit from me the respect due to a Father who hath conferred Benefits upon me in some measure proportionable to those which we usually receive from our Fathers and the world may judg whether all the Court-Ministers and Favorites that we have known do upon this account deserve to be esteemed Fathers of Nations But to allow this on account of their Fortunes is if possible more extravagant than any thing that hath bin yet utter'd By this account Mazarin must have bin Father of the French Nation The same Right was inherited by his chast Niece and remained in her till she and her silly Husband dissipated the Treasures which her Uncle had torn from the Bowels of that People The Partizans may generally claim the same Right over the Provinces they have pillaged Old Audley Dog Smith Bp Duppa Brownloe Child Dashwood Fox c. are to be esteemed Fathers of the People of England This Doctrine is perfectly Canonical if Filmer and Heylin were good Divines and Legal if they judged more rightly touching matters of Law But if it be absurd and detestable they are to be reputed Men who by attributing the highest Honours to the vilest Wretches of the world for what they had gain'd by the most abominable means endeavour to encrease those Vices which are already come to such a height that they can by no other way be brought to a greater Daily experience too plainly shews with what rage Avarice usually fills the hearts of men There are not many destructive Villanies committed in the World that do not proceed from it In this respect 't is called Idolatry and the Root of all evil Solomon warns us to beware of such as make haste to grow rich and says they shall not be innocent But 't is no matter what the Prophets the Apostles or the wisest of men say of Riches and the ways of gaining them for our Author tells us that men of the greatest Fortunes without examining how they came to them or what use they make of them deserve to be made Fathers of Provinces But this is not his only quarrel with all that is just and good His whole Book goes directly against the Letter and Spirit of the Scripture The work of all those whom God in several Ages has raised up to announce his Word was to abate the Lusts and Passions that arise in the hearts of men to shew the vanity of worldly Enjoyments with the dangers that accompany Riches and Honours and to raise our hearts to the love of those Treasures that perish not Honest and wise men following the Light of Nature have in some measure imitated this Such as lived private lives as Plato Socrates Epictetus and others made it their business to abate mens Lusts by shewing the folly of seeking vain Honours useless Riches or unsatisfying Pleasures and those who were like to them if they were raised to supreme Magistracies have endeavoured by the severest Punishments to restrain men from committing the Crimes by which Riches are most commonly gained but Filmer and Heylin lead us into a new way If they deserve credit whosoever would become supreme Lord and Father of his Country absolute sacred and inviolable is only to kill him that is in the head of the Government Usurpation confers an equal Right with Election or Inheritance We are to look upon the Power not the Ways by which it is obtained Possession only is to be regarded and men must venerate the present Power as set up by God tho gained by Violence Treachery or Poison Children must not impose Laws upon nor examine the Actions of their Father Those who are a little more modest and would content themselves with the honour of being Fathers and Lords only of Provinces if they get Riches by the favour of the King or the favour of the King by Riches may receive that honour from him The Lord Paramount may make them peculiar Lords of each Province as sacred as himself and by that means every man shall have an immediate and a subaltern Father This would be a Spur to excite even the most sleeping Lusts and a Poison that would fill the gentlest Spirits with the most violent Furies If men should believe this there would hardly be found one of whom it might not be said Hac spe minanti fulmen occurret Jovi No more is required to fill the World with Fire and Blood than the reception of these Precepts No man can look upon that as a Wickedness which shall render him Sacred nor fear to attempt that which shall make him God's Vicegerent And I doubt whether the wickedness of filling mens heads with such Notions was ever equalled unless by him who said Ye shall not die but be as Gods But since our Author is pleased to teach us these strange things I wish he would also have told us how many men in every Nation ought to be look'd upon as adopted Fathers What proportion of Riches Ability or Merit is naturally or divinely required to make them capable of this sublime Character Whether the Right of this Chimerical Father dos not destroy that of the Natural or whether both continue in force and men thereby stand obliged in despite of what Christ said to serve two Masters For if the Right of my Artificial Father arise from any Act of the King in favour of his Riches Abilities or Merit I ought to know whether he is to excel in
or Fraud Or is it possible that any one man can make himself Lord of a People or parcel of that Body to whom God had given the liberty of governing themselves by any other means than Violence or Fraud unless they did willingly submit to him If this Right be not devolved upon any one Man is not the invasion of it the most outragious Injury that can be done to all Mankind and most particularly to the Nation that is enslaved by it Or if the Justice of every Government depends necessarily upon an original Grant and a Succession certainly deduced from our first Fathers dos not he by his own Principles condemn all the Monarchies of the World as the most detestable Usurpations since not one of them that we know do any way pretend to it Or tho I who deny any Power to be just that is not founded upon consent may boldly blame Usurpation is it not an absurd and unpardonable impudence in Filmer to condemn Userpation in a People when he has declared that the Right and Power of a Father may be gained by Usurpation and that Nations in their Obedience are to regard the Power not the Means by which it was gained But not to lose more time upon a most frivolous fiction I affirm that the Liberty which we contend for is granted by God to every man in his own Person in such a manner as may be useful to him and his Posterity and as it was exercised by Noah Shem Abraham Isaac Jacob c. and their Children as has bin proved and not to the vast Body of all Mankind which never did meet together since the first Age after the Flood and never could meet to receive any benefit by it His next Question deserves scorn and hatred with all the effects of either if it proceed from malice tho perhaps he may deserve compassion if his Crime proceed from ignorance Was a general Meeting of a whole Kingdom says he ever known for the Election of a Prince But if there never was any general Meetings of whole Nations or of such as they did delegate and entrust with the Power of the whole how did any man that was elected come to have a Power over the whole Why may not a People meet to chuse a Prince as well as any other Magistrate Why might not the Athenians Romans or Carthaginians have chosen Princes as well as Archons Consuls Dictators or Suffetes if it had pleased them Who chose all the Roman Kings except Tarquin the proud if the People did not since their Histories testify that he was the first who took upon him to reign sine jussu populi Who ever heard of a King of the Goths in Spain that was not chosen by the Nobility and People Or how could they chuse him if they did not meet in their Persons or by their Deputies which is the same thing when a People has agreed it should be so How did the Kings of Sweden come by their Power unless by the like Election till the Crown was made hereditary in the time of Gustavus the First as a Reward of his Vertue and Service in delivering that Country from the Tyranny of the Danes How did Charles Gustavus come to be King unless it was by the Election of the Nobility He acknowledged by the Act of his Election and upon all occasions that he had no other right to the Crown than what they had conferred on him Did not the like Custom prevail in Hungary and Bohemia till those Countries fell under the Power of the House of Austria and in Denmark till the Year 1660 Do not the Kings of Poland derive their Authority from this popular Election which he derides Dos not the stile of the Oath of Allegiance used in the Kingdom of Arragon as it is related by Antonio Perez Secretary of State to Philip 2d shew that their Kings were of their own making Could they say We who are as good as you make you our King on condition that you keep and observe our Privileges and Liberties and if not not if he did not come in by their Election Were not the Roman Emperors in disorderly times chosen by the Souldiers and in such as were more regular by the Senate with the consent of the People Our Author may say the whole Body of these Nations did not meet at their Elections tho that is not always true for in the Infancy of Rome when the whole People dwelt within the Walls of a small City they did meet for the choice of their Kings as afterwards for the choice of other Magistrates Whilst the Goths Franks Vandals and Saxons lived within the Precincts of a Camp they frequently met for the Election of a King and raised upon a Target the Person they had chosen but finding that to be inconvenient or rather impossible when they were vastly increased in number and dispersed over all the Countries they had conquered no better way was found than to institute Gemotes Parliaments Diets Cortez Assemblies of Estates or the like to do that which formerly had bin performed by themselves and when a People is by mutual compact joined together in a civil Society there is no difference as to Right between that which is done by them all in their own Persons or by some deputed by all and acting according to the Powers received from all If our Author was ignorant of these things which are the most common in all Histories he might have spared the pains of writing upon more abstruse Points but 't is a stupendous folly in him to presume to raise Doctrines depending upon the universal Law of God and Nature without examining the only Law that ever God did in a publick manner give to Man If he had looked into it he might have learnt That all Israel was by the command of God assembled at Mispeth to chuse a King and did chuse Saul He being slain all Judah came to Hebron and made David their King after the death of Ishbosheth all the Tribes went to Hebron and anointed him King over them and he made a Covenant with them before the Lord. When Solomon was dead all Israel met together in Shechem and ten Tribes disliking the proceedings of Rehoboam rejected him and made Jeroboam their King The same People in the time of the Judges had general Assemblies as often as occasion did require to set up a Judg make War or the like and the several Tribes had their Assemblies to treat of Businesses relating to themselves The Histories of all Nations especially of those that have peopled the best parts of Europe are so full of Examples in this kind that no man can question them unless he be brutally ignorant or maliciously contentious The great matters among the Germans were transacted omnium consensu De minoribus consultant Principes de majoribus omnes The Michelgemote among the Saxons was an Assembly of the whole People The Baronagium is truly said
is much too great for them they would soon free themselves And those who are under such Governments do no more assent to them tho they may be silent than a man approves of being robbed when without saying a word he delivers his purse to a Thief that he knows to be too strong for him 'T is not therefore the bear fufferance of a Government when a disgust is declared nor a silent submission when the power of opposing is wanting that can imply an Assent or Election and create a Right but an explicit act of approbation when men have ability and courage to resist or deny Which being agreed 't is evident that our Author's distinction between eligere and instituere signifies nothing tho if the power of instituting were only left to Nations it would be sufficient for he is in vain elected who is not instituted and he that is instituted is certainly elected for his institution is an Election As the Romans who chose Romulus Numa and Hostilius to be Kings and Brutus Valerius or Lucretius to be Consuls did make them so and their Right was solely grounded upon their Election The Text brought by our Author against this doth fully prove it Him shalt thou set King over thee whom the Lord shall chuse for God did not only make the institution of a King to be purely an act of the People but left it to them to institute one or not as should best please themselves and the Words whom the Lord shall chuse can have no other signification than that the People resolving to have a King and following the Rules prescribed by his Servant Moses he would direct them in their choice which relates only to that particular People in covenant with God and immediately under his Government which no other was But this pains might have bin saved if God by a universal Law had given a rule to all The Israelites could not have bin three hundred years without a King and then left to the liberty of making one or not if he by a perpetual Law had ordained that every Nation should have one and it had bin as well impertinent as unjust to deliberate who should be King if the Dominion had by right of Inheritance belonged to one They must have submitted to him whether they would or not No care was to be taken in the election or institution of him who by his birth had a Right annexed to his person that could not be altered He could not have bin forbidden to multiply Silver or Gold who by the Law of his Creation might do what he pleased It had bin ridiculous to say he should not raise his Heart above his Brethren who had no Brethren that is no Equals but was raised above all by God who had imposed upon all others a necessity of obeying him But God who dos nothing in vain did neither constitute or elect any till they desired it nor command them to do it themselves unless it so pleased themselves nor appoint them to take him out of any one Line Every Israelite might be chosen None but Strangers were excluded and the People were left to the liberty of chusing and instituting any one of their Brethren Our Author endeavouring by Hooker's authority to establish his distinction between eligere and instituere destroys it and the paternal Right which he makes the foundation of his Doctrine Heaps of Scripture are alledged says he concerning the solemn Coronation and Inauguration of Saul David Solomon and others by Nobles Antients and People of the Commonwealth of Israel which is enough to prove that the whole work was theirs that no other had any title more than what they bestowed upon him They were set up by the Nobles Antients and People Even God did no otherwise intervene than by such a secret disposition of the Lots by his Providence as is exercised in the Government of all the things in the World and we cannot have a more certain evidence that a paternal right to Dominion is a meer Whimsy than that God did not cause the Lot to fall upon the eldest of the eldest Line of the eldest Tribe but upon Saul a young man of the youngest Tribe and afterwards tho he had designed David Solomon Jeroboam and others who had no pretence to the paternal Right to be Kings he left both the election and institution of them to the Elders and People But Hooker being well examined it will appear that his opinions were as contrary to the Doctrine of our Author as those we have mentioned out of Plato and Aristotle He plainly says It is impossible that any should have a compleat lawful power over a multitude consisting of so many Families as every politick Society doth but by consent of Men or immediate appointment from God Because not having the natural Superiority of Fathers their Power must needs be usurped and then unlawful or if lawful then either granted or consented unto by them over whom they exercise the same or else given extraordinarily by God And tho he thinks Kings to have bin the first Governors so constituted he adds That this is not the only Regiment that hath bin received in the World The inconveniences of one kind have caused sundry others to be devised So that in a word all publick Regiment of what kind soever seemeth evidently to have risen from deliberate advice consultation and composition between men judging it convenient and behoofeful And a little below Man's Nature standing therefore as it doth some kind of regiment the Law of Nature doth require yet the kinds thereof being many Nature tyeth not to any one but leaveth the choice as a thing arbitrary And again To live by one mans will became all mens misery This constrained them to come unto Laws c. But as those Laws do not only teach that which is good but enjoin it they have in them a constraining force To constrain men to any thing inconvenient seemeth unreasonable Most requisite therefore it is that to devise Laws which all men should be forced to obey none but wise men should be admitted Moreover that which we say concerning the power of Government must here be applied unto the power of making Laws whereby to govern which Power God hath over all and by the natural Law whereunto he hath made all subject the lawful power of making Laws to command whole politick Societies of men belongeth so properly unto the same intire Societies that for any Prince or Potentate of what kind soever upon Earth to exercise the same of himself and not either by express commission immediately from God or else by authority derived at the first from their consent upon whose persons they impose Laws it is no better than meer Tyranny Laws therefore they are not which publick consent hath not made so The humour of our Age considered I should not have dared to say so much but if Hooker be a man of such great authority I cannot offend in
Sons of Vespasian and Constantine inherited the Roman Empire tho their Fathers had no such title but gaining the Empire by violence which Hooker says is meer Tyranny that can create no right they could devolve none to their Children The Kings of France of the three races have inherited the Crown but Meroveus Pepin and Hugh Capet could neither pretend title nor conquest or any other Right than what was conferred upon them by the Clergy Nobility and People and consequently whatsoever is inherited from them can have no other Original for that is the gift of the People which is bestowed upon the first under whom the Successors claim as if it had bin by a peculiar Act given to every one of them It will be more hard to shew how the Crown of England is become hereditary unless it be by the Will of the People for tho it were granted that some of the Saxon Kings came in by inheritance which I do not having as I think proved them to have bin absolutely elective yet William the Norman did not for he was a Bastard and could inherit nothing William Rufus and Henry did not for their elder Brother Robert by right of inheritance ought to have bin preferred before them Stephen and Henry the second did not for Maud the only Heiress of Henry the first was living when both were crowned Richard John and those who followed did not for they were Bastards born in adultery They must therefore have received their Right from the People or they could have none at all and their Successors fall under the same condition Moreover I find great variety in the deduction of this hereditary Right In Sparta there were two Kings of different Families endowed with an equal power If the Heraclidae did reign as Fathers of the People the AEacidae did not if the right was in the AEacidae the Heraclidae could have none for 't is equally impossible to have two Fathers as two thousand 'T is in vain to say that two Families joined and agreed to reign jointly for 't is evident the Spartans had Kings before the time of Hercules or Achilles who were the Fathers of the two Races If it be said that the regal power with which they were invested did entitle them to the right of Fathers it must in like manner have belonged to the Roman Consuls Military Tribunes Dictators and Pretors for they had more Power than the Spartan Kings and that glorious Nation might change their Fathers every year and multiply or diminish the number of them as they pleased If this be most ridiculous and absurd 't is certain that the Name and Office of King Consul Dictator or the like dos not confer any determined Right upon the Person that hath it Every one has a right to that which is allotted to him by the Laws of the Country by which he is created As the Persians Spartans Romans or Germans might make such Magistrates and under such names as best pleased themselves and accordingly enlarge or diminish their Power the same Right belongs to all Nations and the Rights due unto as well as the Duties incumbent upon every one are to be known only by the Laws of that place This may seem strange to those who know neither Books nor Things Histories nor Laws but is well explain'd by Grotius who denying the Soveraign Power to be annexed to any Man speaks of divers Magistrates under several names that had and others that under the same names had it not and distinguishes those who have the Summum Imperium summo modo from those who have it modo non summo and tho probably he looked upon the first sort as a thing meerly speculative if by that summo modo a right of doing what one pleases be understood yet he gives many Examples of the other and among those who had liberrimum imperium if any had it he names the Kings of the Sabeans who nevertheless were under such a condition that tho they were as Agatharchidas reports obeyed in all things whilst they continued within the Walls of their Palace might be stoned by any that met them without it He finds also another obstacle to the Absolute power Cum Rex partem habeat summi Imperii partem Senatus sive Populus which parts are proportioned according to the Laws of each Kingdom whether Hereditary or Elective both being equally regulated by them The Law that gives and measures the Power prescribes Rules how it should be transmitted In some places the supreme Magistrates are annually elected in others their Power is for life in some they are meerly elective in others hereditary under certain Rules or Limitations The antient Kingdoms and Lordships of Spain were hereditary but the Succession went ordinarily to the eldest of the reigning Family not to the nearest in Blood This was the ground of the Quarrel between Corbis the Brother and Orsua the Son of the last Prince decided by Combat before Scipio I know not whether the Goths brought that custom with them when they conquered Spain or whether they learnt it from the Inhabitants but certain it is that keeping themselves to the Families of the Balthei and Amalthei they had more regard to Age than Proximity and almost ever preferred the Brother or eldest Kinsman of the last King before his Son The like custom was in use among the Moors in Spain and Africa who according to the several Changes that happened among the Families of Almohades Almoranides and Benemerini did always take one of the reigning Blood but in the choice of him had most respect to Age and Capacity This is usually called the Law of Thanestry and as in many other places prevailed also in Ireland till that Country fell under the English Government In France and Turky the Male that is nearest in Blood succeeds and I do not know of any deviation from that Rule in France since Henry the First was preferred before Robert his elder Brother Grandchild to Hugh Capet but notwithstanding the great veneration they have for the Royal Blood they utterly exclude Females lest the Crown should fall to a Stranger or a Woman that is seldom able to govern her self should come to govern so great a People Some Nations admit Females either simply as well as Males or under a condition of not marrying out of their Country or without the consent of the Estates with an absolute exclusion of them and their Children if they do according to which Law now in force among the Swedes Charles Gustavus was chosen King upon the resignation of Queen Christina as having no Title and the Crown setled upon the Heirs of his Body to the utter exclusion of his Brother Adolphus their Mother having married a German Tho divers Nations have differently disposed their Affairs all those that are not naturally Slaves and like to Beasts have preferred their own Good before the personal Interests of him that expects the Crown so as upon no pretence
much esteemed for Valour and Wisdom God's peculiar People had a peculiar regard to that Wisdom and Valour which was accompanied with his Presence hoping for deliverance only from him The second is known by the name of the great Sanhedrin which being instituted by Moses according to the command of God continued till they were all save one slain by Herod And the third part which is the Assembly of the People was so common that none can be ignorant of it but such as never looked into the Scripture When the Tribes of Reuben Gad and half that of Manasseh had built an Altar on the side of Jordan The whole Congregation of the Children of Israel gathered together at Shiloh to go up to war against them and sent Phineas the Son of Eleazer and with him ten Princes c. This was the highest and most important action that could concern a People even War or Peace and that not with Strangers but their own Brethren Joshua was then alive The Elders never failed but this was not transacted by him or them but by the collected body of the People for They sent Phineas This Democratical Embassy was Democratically received It was not directed to one man but to all the Children of Reuben Gad and Manasseh and the answer was sent by them all which being pleasing to Phineas and the ten that were with him they made their report to the Congregation and all was quiet The last eminent Act performed by Joshua was the calling of a like Assembly to Sechem composed of Elders Heads of Families Judges Officers and all the People to whom he proposed and they agreeing made a Covenant before the Lord. Joshua being dead the Proceedings of every Tribe were grounded upon Counsels taken at such Assemblies among themselves for their own concernments as appears by the Actions of Judah Simeon c. against the Canaanites and when the Levite complained that his Wife had bin forced by those of Gibeah the whole Congregation of Israel met together at Mispeth from all parts even from Dan to Beersheba as one man and there resolved upon that terrible War which they made against the Tribe of Benjamin The like Assembly was gathered together for the Election of Saul every man was there and tho the Elders only are said to have asked a King of Samuel they seem to have bin deputed from the whole Congregation for God said Hearken to the voice of the People In the same manner the Tribe of Judah and after that the rest chose and anointed David to be their King After the death of Solomon all Israel met together to treat with Rehoboam and not receiving satisfaction from him ten of the Tribes abrogated his Kingdom If these Actions were considered singly by themselves Calvin might have given the name of a Democracy to the Hebrew Government as well as to that of Athens for without doubt they evidently manifest the supreme Power to have bin in the supreme manner in these General Assemblies but the Government as to its outward order consisting of those three parts which comprehend the three simple species tho in truth it was a Theocracy and no times having bin appointed nor occasions specified upon which Judges should be chosen or these Assemblies called whereas the Sanhedrim which was the Aristocratical part was permanent the whole might rightly be called an Aristocracy that part prevailing above the others and tho Josephus calls it a Theocracy by reason of God's presence with his People yet in relation to man he calls it an Aristocracy and says that Saul's first Sin by which he fell from the Kingdom was that Gubernationem optimatum sustulit which could not be if they were governed by a Monarch before he was chosen Our Author taking no notice of these matters first endeavours to prove the excellency of Monarchy from natural instinct and then begging the question says that God did always govern his People by Monarchy whereas he ought in the first place to have observed that this instinct if there be any such thing is only an irrational appetite attributed to Beasts that know not why they do any thing and is to be followed only by those men who being equally irrational live in the same ignorance and the second being proved to be absolutely false by the express words of the Scripture There was then no King in Israel several times repeated and the whole series of the History he hath no other evasion than to say That even then the Israelites were under the Kingly Government of the Fathers of particular Families It appears by the forementioned Text cited also by our Author that in the Assembly of the People gathered together to take counsel concerning the War against Benjamin were four hundred thousand Footmen that drew Sword They all arose together saying Not a man of us shall go to his Tent. So all the men of Israel were gathered together against the City This is repeated several times in the relation The Benjamites proceeded in the like manner in preparing for their defence and if all these who did so meet to consult and determine were Monarchs there were then in Israel and Benjamin four hundred and twenty six thousand seven hundred Monarchs or Kings tho the Scriptures say there was not one If yet our Author insist upon his notion of Kingly Government I desire to know who were the Subjects if all these were Kings for the text says that the whole Congregation was gathered together as one man from Dan to Beersheba If there can be so many Kings without one Subject what becomes of the Right of Abraham Isaac and Jacob that was to have bin devolved upon one man as Heir to them and thereby Lord of all If every man had an equal part in that inheritance and by virtue of it became a King why is not the same eternally subdivided to as many men as are in the World who are also Kings If this be their natural condition how comes it to be altered till they do unthrone themselves by consent to set up one or more to have a power over them all Why should they devest themselves of their natural Right to set up one above themselves unless in consideration of their own good If the 426700 Kings might retain the power in themselves or give it to one why might they not give it to any such number of men as should best please themselves or retain it in their own hands as they did till the days of Saul or frame limit and direct it according to their own pleasure If this be true God is the Author of Democracy and no assertor of human Liberty did ever claim more than the People of God did enjoy and exercise at the time when our Author says they were under the Kingly Government which Liberty being not granted by any peculiar concession or institution the same must belong to all Mankind 'T is in vain to say the 426700 men
orderly chosen by a willing People were the true Shepherds who came in by the gate of the Sheepfold and might justly be called the Ministers of God so long as they performed their duty in providing for the good of the Nations committed to their charge SECT XVII Good Governments admit of Changes in the Superstructures whilst the Foundations remain unchangeable IF I go a step farther and confess the Romans made some changes in the outward Form of their Government I may safely say they did well in it and prosper'd by it After the Expulsion of the Kings the Power was chiefly in the Nobility who had bin Leaders of the People but it was necessary to humble them when they began to presume too much upon the advantages of their Birth and the City could never have been great unless the Plebeians who were the Body of it and the main strength of their Armies had bin admitted to a participation of Honours This could not be done at the first They who had bin so vilely opprest by Tarquin and harass'd with making or cleansing Sinks were not then fit for Magistracies or the Command of Armies but they could not justly be excluded from them when they had men who in courage and conduct were equal to the best of the Patricians and it had bin absurd for any man to think it a disparagement to him to marry the Daughter of one whom he had obey'd as Dictator or Consul and perhaps follow'd in his Triumph Rome that was constituted for War and sought its Grandeur by that means could never have arriv'd to any considerable height if the People had not bin exercised in Arms and their Spirits raised to delight in Conquests and willing to expose themselves to the greatest fatigues and dangers to accomplish them Such men as these were not to be used like Slaves or opprest by the unmerciful hand of Usurers They who by their sweat and blood were to defend and enlarge the Territories of the State were to be convinced they fought for themselves and they had reason to demand a Magistracy of their own vested with a Power that none might offend to maintain their Rights and to protect their Families whilst they were abroad in the Armies These were the Tribunes of the People made as they called it Sacrosancti or inviolable and the creation of them was the most considerable Change that happened till the time of Marius who brought all into disorder The creation or abolition of Military Tribunes with Consular Power ought to be accounted as nothing for it imported little whether that Authority were exercised by two or by five That of the Decemviri was as little to be regarded they were intended only for a Year and tho new ones were created for another on pretence that the Laws they were to frame could not be brought to perfection in so short a time yet they were soon thrown down from the Power they usurped and endeavoured to retain contrary to Law The creation of Dictators was no novelty they were made occasionally from the beginning and never otherwise than occasionally till Julius Cesar subverted all order and invading that supreme Magistracy by force usurped the Right which belong'd to all This indeed was a mortal Change even in root and principle All other Magistrates had bin created by the People for the publick good and always were within the power of those that had created them But Cesar coming in by force sought only the satisfaction of his own raging Ambition or that of the Soldiers whom he had corrupted to destroy their Country and his Successors governing for themselves by the help of the like Raskals perpetually exposed the Empire to be ravaged by them But whatever opinion any man may have of the other Changes I dare affirm there are few or no Monarchies whose Histories are so well known to us as that of Rome which have not suffer'd Changes incomparably greater and more mischievous than those of Rome whilst it was free The Macedonian Monarchy fell into pieces immediately after the death of Alexander 'T is thought he perished by Poison His Wives Children and Mother were destroyed by his own Captains The best of those who had escaped his fury fell by the Sword of each other When the famous Argyraspides might have expected some reward of their labours and a little rest in old age they were maliciously sent into the East by Antigonus to perish by hunger and misery after he had corrupted them to betray Eumenes No better fate attended the rest all was in confusion every one follow'd whom he pleased and all of them seemed to be filled with such a rage that they never ceased from mutual slaughters till they were consumed and their Kingdoms continued in perpetual Wars against each other till they all fell under the Roman Power The fortune of Rome was the same after it became a Monarchy Treachery Murder and Fury reigned in every part there was no Law but Force he that could corrupt an Army thought he had a sufficient Title to the Empire by this means there were frequently three or four and at one time thirty several Pretenders who called themselves Emperors of which number he only reigned that had the happiness to destroy all his Competitors and he himself continued no longer than till another durst attempt the destruction of him and his Posterity In this state they remained till the wasted and bloodless Provinces were possess'd by a multitude of barbarous Nations The Kingdoms established by them enjoy'd as little Peace or Justice that of France was frequently divided into as many parts as the Kings of Meroveus or Pepin's Race had Children under the names of the Kingdoms of Paris Orleans Soissons Arles Burgundy Austrasia and others These were perpetually vexed by the unnatural fury of Brothers or nearest Relations whilst the miserable Nobility and People were obliged to fight upon their foolish Quarrels till all fell under the power of the strongest This mischief was in some measure cured by a Law made in the time of Hugh Capet that the Kingdom should no more be divided But the Appannages as they call them granted to the King's Brothers with the several Dukedoms and Earldoms erected to please them and other great Lords produced frequently almost as bad effects This is testified by the desperate and mortal Factions that went under the names of Burgundy and Orleans Armagnac and Orleans Montmorency and Guise These were followed by those of the League and the Wars of the Huguenots They were no sooner finish'd by the taking of Rochel but new ones began by the Intrigues of the Duke of Orleans Brother to Lewis the 13th and his Mother and pursued with that animosity by them that they put themselves under the protection of Spain To which may be added that the Houses of Condé Soissons Montmorency Guise Vendosme Angouleme Bouillon Rohan Longueville Rochfocault Epernon and I think I may say every one that is of great
say Saisit le vif There can be therefore no such Law or it serves for nothing If there be Judges to interpret the Law no man is a King till judgment be given in his favour and he is not King by his own Title but by the Sentence given by them If there be none the Law is merely imaginary and every man may in his own case make it what he pleases He who has a Crown in his view and Arms in his hand wants nothing but success to make him a King and if he prosper all men are obliged to obey him 'T is a folly to say the matter is clear and needs no decision for every man knows that no Law concerning private Inheritances can be so exactly drawn but many Controversies will arise upon it that must be decided by a Power to which both Parties are subject and the disputes concerning Kingdoms are so much the more difficult because this Law is no where to be found and the more dangerous because the Competitors are for the most part more powerful Again this Law must either be general to all mankind or particular to each Nation If particular a matter of such importance requires good proof when where how and by whom it was given to every one But the Scriptures testifying to the contrary that God gave Laws to the Jews only and that no such thing as hereditary Monarchy according to proximity of Blood was prescribed by them we may safely say that God did never give any such Law to every particular nor to any Nation If he did not give it to any one he did not give it to all for every one is comprehended in all and if no one has it 't is impossible that all can have it or that it should be obligatory to all when no man knows or can tell when where and by what hand it was given nor what is the sense of it all which is evident by the various Laws and Customs of Nations in the disposal of hereditary Successions And no one of them that we know has to this day bin able to shew that the method follow'd by them is more according to nature than that of others If our Author pretend to be God's Interpreter and to give the solution of these doubts I may ask which of the five following ways are appointed by God and then we may examine Cases resulting from them 1. In France Turky and other places the Succession comes to the next Male in the streight eldest Line according to which the Son is preferr'd before the Brother of him who last enjoy'd the Crown as the present King of France before his Uncle the Duke of Orleans and the Son of the eldest before the Brothers of the eldest as in the case of Richard the second of England who was advanced preferably to all the Brothers of the black Prince his Father 2. Others keep to the Males of the reigning Family yet have more regard to the eldest Man than to the eldest Line and representation taking no place among them the eldest Man is thought to be nearest to the first King and a second Son of the person that last reigned to be nearer to him than his Grandchild by the eldest Son according to which Rule any one of the Sons of Edward the third remaining after his death should have bin preferr'd before Richard the second who was his Grandchild 3. In the two cases beforementioned no manner of regard is had to Females who being thought naturally uncapable of commanding men or performing the Functions of a Magistrate are together with their Descendents utterly excluded from the supreme as well as from the inferior Magistracies and in Turky France and other great Kingdoms have no pretence to any Title But in some places and particularly in England the advantages of Proximity belong to them as well as to Males by which means our Crown has bin transported to several Families and Nations 4. As in some places they are utterly rejected and in others received simply without any condition so those are not wanting where that of not marrying out of the Country or without the consent of the Estates is imposed of which Sweden is an Example 5. In some places Proximity of Blood is only regarded whether the Issue be legitimate or illegitimate in others Bastards are wholly excluded By this variety of Judgments made by several Nations upon this Point it may appear that tho it were agreed by all that the next in Blood ought to succeed yet such Contests would arise upon the interpretation and application of the general Rule as must necessarily be a perpetual Spring of irreconcilable and mortal Quarrels If any man say The Rule observed in England is that which God gave to Mankind I leave him first to dispute that point with the Kings of France and many others who can have no right to the Crowns they wear if it be admitted and in the next place to prove that our Ancestors had a more immediate communication with God and a more certain knowledge of his Will than others who for any thing we know may be of Authority equal to them but in the mean time we may rationally conclude that if there be such a Rule we have had no King in England for the space of almost a thousand years having not had one who did not come to the Crown by a most manifest violation of it as appears by the forecited Examples of William the first and second Henry the first Henry the second and his Children John Edward the third Henry the fourth Edward the fourth and his Children Henry the seventh and all that claim under any of them And if Possession or Success can give a right it will I think follow that Jack Straw Wat Tyler Perkin Warbeck or any other Rascal might have had it if he had bin as happy as bold in his Enterprize This is no less than to expose Crowns to the first that can seize them to destroy all Law and Rule and to render Right a slave to Fortune If this be so a late Earl of Pembroke whose understanding was not thought great judged rightly when he said his Grandfather was a wise man tho he could neither write nor read in as much as he resolved to follow the Crown tho it were upon a Coalstaff But if this be sufficient to make a wise man 't is pity the secret was no sooner discovered since many who for want of it liv'd and died in all the infamy that justly accompanies Knavery Cowardice and Folly might have gained the reputation of the most excellent Men in their several ages The bloody Factions with which all Nations subject to this sort of Monarchy have bin perpetually vexed might have bin prevented by throwing up cross or pile or by battel between the Competitors body to body as was done by Corbis and Orsua Cleorestes and Polinices Ironside and Canutus it being most unreasonable or rather impiously absurd for any to
venture their Lives and Fortunes when their Consciences are not concern'd in the Contest and that they are to gain nothing by the Victory If reason teaches that till this expeditious way of ending Controversies be received the ambition of men will be apt to imbroil Nations in their Quarrels and others judging variously of those matters which can be reduced to no certain Rule will think themselves in Conscience obliged to follow the Party that seems to them to be most just experience manifests the same and that Ambition has produced more violent mischiefs than all the other desires and passions that have ever possessed the hearts of men That this may appear it will not be amiss to divide them into such as proceed from him who is in possession of the Power through jealousy of State as they call it to prevent the enterprizes of those who would dispossess him and such as arise between Competitors contending for it Tarquin's Counsel concerning the Poppies and Periander's heads of Corn is of the first sort The most eminent are always most feared as the readiest to undertake and most able to accomplish great Designs This eminence proceeds from Birth Riches Virtue or Reputation and is sometimes wrought up to the greatest height by a conjunction of all these But I know not where to find an example of such a man who could long subsist under Absolute Monarchy If he be of high Birth he must like Brutus conceal his Virtue and gain no reputation or resolve to perish if he do not prevent his own death by that of the Tyrant All other ways are ineffectual the suspicions fears and hatred thereupon arising are not to be removed Personal respects are forgotten and such services as cannot be sufficiently valued must be blotted out by the death of those who did them Various ways may be taken and pretences used according to the temper of Times and Nations but the thing must be done and whether it be colour'd by a trick of Law or performed by a Mute with a Bowstring imports little Henry the fourth was made King by the Earl of Northumberland and his brave Son Hotspur Edward the fourth by the valiant Earl of Warwick Henry the seventh by Stanley but neither of them could think himself safe till his Benefactor was dead No continued fidelity no testimonies of modesty and humility can prevent this The modesty of Germanicus in rejecting the Honours that were offer'd to him and his industry in quieting the mutinied Legions accelerated his ruin When 't was evident he might be Emperor if he pleased he must be so or die There was no middle station between the Throne and the Grave 'T is probable that Caligula Nero and other Beasts like to them might hate Virtue for the good which is in it but I cannot think that either they their Predecessors or Successors would have put themselves upon the desperate design of extirpating it if they had not found it to be inconsistent with their Government and that being once concluded they spared none of their nearest Relations Artaxerxes killed his Son Darius Herod murder'd the best of his Wives and all his Sons except the worst Tiberius destroy'd Agrippa Posthumus and Germanicus with his Wife and two Sons How highly soever Constantine the Great be commended he was polluted with the Blood of his Father-in-law Wife and Son Philip the second of Spain did in the like manner deliver himself from his fears of Don Carlos and 't is not doubted that Philip the fourth for the same reasons dispatched his Brother Don Carlos and his Son Balthasar The like cases were so common in England that all the Plantagenets and the noble Families allied to them being extinguish'd our Ancestors were sent to seek a King in one of the meanest in Wales This method being known those who are unwilling to die so tamely endeavour to find out ways of defending themselves and there being no other than the death of the Person who is in the Throne they usually seek to compass it by secret Conspiracy or open Violence and the number of Princes that have bin destroy'd and Countries disturb'd by those who through fear have bin driven to extremities is not much less than of those who have suffer'd the like from men following the impulse of their own Ambition The disorders arising from Contests between several Competitors before any one could be settled in the possession of Kingdoms have bin no less frequent and bloody than those above-mention'd and the miseries suffer'd by them together with the ruin brought upon the Empires of Macedon and Rome may be sufficient to prove it however to make the matter more clear I shall alledg others But because it may be presumption in me to think I know all the Histories of the World or tedious to relate all those I know I shall content my self with some of the most eminent and remarkable And if it appear that they have all suffer'd the same mischiefs we may believe they proceed not from Accidents but from the power of a permanent Cause that always produces the same or the like Effects To begin with France The Succession not being well settled in the time of Meroveus who dispossess'd the Grandchildren of Pharamond he was no sooner dead than Gillon set up himself and with much slaughter drove Chilperic his Son out of the Kingdom and he after a little time returning with like fury is said to have seen a Vision first of Lions and Leopards then of Bears and Wolves and lastly of Dogs and Cats all tearing one another to pieces This has bin always accounted by the French to be a representation of the nature and fortune of the three Races that were to command them and has bin too much verified by experience Clovis their first Christian and most renowned King having by good means or evil exceedingly enlarged his Territories but chiefly by the murders of Alaric and Ragnacaire with his Children and suborning Sigismond of Metz to kill his Father Sigebert left his Kingdom to be torn in pieces by the rage of his four Sons each of them endeavouring to make himself Master of the whole and when according to the usual fate of such Contests success had crown'd Clothaire who was the worst of them all by the slaughter of his Brothers and Nephews with all the flower of the French and Gaulish Nobility the advantages of his Fortune only resulted to his own person For after his death the miserable Nations suffer'd as much from the madness of his Sons as they had done by himself and his Brothers They had learnt from their Predecessors not to be slow in doing mischief but were farther incited by the rage of two infamous Strumpets Fredegonde and Brunehaud which is a sort of Vermin that I am inclin'd to think has not usually govern'd Senates or Popular Assemblies Chilperic the second who by the slaughter of many Persons of the Royal Blood with infinite numbers of the Nobility
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
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
were in them Secondly Neither Plato nor Aristotle acknowledg either reason or justice in the power os a Monarch unless he has more of the Virtues conducing to the good of the Civil Society than all those who compose it and employ them for the publick advantage and not to his own pleasure and profit as being set up by those who seek their own good for no other reason than that he should procure it To this end a Law is set as a rule to him and the best men that is such as are most like to himself made to be his Assistants because say they Lex est mens sine affectu quasi Deus whereas the best of men have their affections and passions and are subject to be misled by them Which shews that as the Monarch is not sor himself nor by himself he dos not give but receive power nor admit others to the participation of it but is by them admitted to what he has Whereupon they conclude that to prefer the absolute power of a man as in those Governments which they call Barbarorum regna before the regular Government of Kings justly exercising a power instituted by Law and directed to the publick good is to chuse rather to be subject to the lust of a Beast than to be governed by a God And because such a choice can only be made by a Beast I leave our Author to find a description of himself in their Books which he so often cites But if Aristotle deserve credit the Princes who reign for themselves and not for the People preferring their own pleasure or profit before the publick become Tyrants which in his language is Enemies to God and Man On this account Boccalini introduces the Princes of Europe raising a mutiny against him in Parnassus for giving such definitions of Tyrants as they said comprehended them all and forcing the poor Philosopher to declare by a new definition that Tyrants were certain men of antient times whose race is now extinguished But with all his Wit and Learning he could not give a reason why those who do the same things that rendred the Antient Tyrants detestable should not be so also in our days In the third place The Scriptures declare the necessity of setting bounds to those who are placed in the highest dignities Moses seems to have had as great abilities as any man that ever lived in the world but he alone was not able to bear the weight of the Government and therefore God appointed Seventy chosen men to be his assistants This was a perpetual Law to Israel and as no King was to have more power than Moses or more abilities to perform the duties of his Office none could be exempted from the necessity of wanting the like helps Our Author therefore must confess that they are Kings who have them or that Kingly Government is contrary to the Scriptures When God by Moses gave liberty to his People to make a King he did it under these conditions He must be one of their Brethren They must chuse him he must not multiply Gold Silver Wives or Horses he must not lift up his Heart above his Brethren And Josephus paraphrasing upon the place says He shall do nothing without the advice of the Sanhedrin or if he do they shall oppose him This agrees with the confession of Zedekiah to the Princes which was the Sanhedrin The King can do nothing without you and seems to have bin in pursuance of the Law of the Kingdom which was written in a Book and laid up before the Lord and could not but agree with that of Mosis unless they spake by different Spirits or that the Spirit by which they did speak was subject to error or change and the whole series of God's Law shews that the Pride Magnificence Pomp and Glory usurped by their Kings was utterly contrary to the will of God They did lift up their hearts above their Brethren which was for bidden by the Law All the Kings of Israel and most of the Kings of Jadah utterly rejected it and every one of them did very much depart from the observation of it I will not deny that the People in their institution of a King intended they should do so they had done it themselves and would have a King that might uphold them in their disobedience they were addicted to the Idolatry of their accursed Neighbours and desired that Government by which it was maintained amongst them In doing this they did not reject Samuel but they rejected God that he should not reign over them They might perhaps believe that unless their King were such as the Law did not permit he would not perform what they intended or that the name of King did not belong to him unless he had a power that the Law denied But since God and his Prophets give the name of King to the chief Magistrate endow'd with a power that was restrain'd within very narrow limits whom they might without offence set up we also may safely give the same to those of the same nature whether it please Fihner or not 4. The practice of most Nations and I may truly say of all that deserve imitation has bin as directly contrary to the absolute power of one man as their Constitutions or if the original of many Governments lie hid in the impenetrable darkness of Antiquity their progress may serve to shew the intention of the Founders Aristotle seems to think that the first Monarchs having bin chosen for their Virtue were little restrain'd in the exercise of their Power but that they or their Children falling into Corruption and Pride grew odious and that Nations did on that account either abolish their Authority or create Senates and other Magistrates who having part of the Power might keep them in order The Spartan Kings were certainly of this nature and the Persian till they conquer'd Babylon Nay I may safely say that neither the Kings which the frantick people set up in opposition to the Law of God nor those of the bordering Nations whose example they chose to follow had that absolute power which our Author attributes to all Kings as inseparable from the name Achish the Philistin lov'd and admir'd David he look'd upon him as an Angel of God and promised that he should be the keeper of his head for ever but when the Princes suspected him and said he shall not go down with us to Battel he was obliged to dismiss him This was not the language of Slaves but of those who had a great part in the Government and the Kings submission to their will shows that he was more like to the Kings of Sparta than to an absolute Monarch who dos whatever pleases him I know not whether the Spartans were descended from the Hebrews as some think but their Kings were under a regulation much like that of the 17 of Deut. tho they had two Their Senate of twenty eight and the Ephori
had a power like to that of the Sanhedrin and by them Kings were condemned to fines imprisonment banishment and death as appears by the examples of Pausanias Clonymus Leonidas Agis and others The Hebrew Discipline was the same Reges Davidicae stirpis says Maimonides judicabant judicabantur They gave testimony in judgment when they were called and testimony was given against them Whereas the Kings of Israel as the same Author says were superbi corde elati spretores legis nec judicabant nec judicabantur proud insolent and contemners of the Law who would neither judg nor submit to judgment as the Law commanded The Fruits they gathered were sutable to the Seed they had sown their Crimes were not left unpunish'd they who despised the Law were destroy'd without Law and when no ordinary course could be taken against them for their excesses they were overthrown by force and the Crown within the space of sew years transported into nine several Families with the utter extirpation of those that had possess'd it On the other hand there never was any Sedition against the Spartan Kings and after the moderate Discipline according to which they liv'd was established none of them died by the hands of their Subjects except only two who were put to death in a way of Justice the Kingdom continued in the same races till Cleomenes was defeated by Antigonus and the Government overthrown by the insolence of the Macedonians This gave occasion to those bestial Tyrants Nabis and Machanidas to set up such a Government as our Author recommends to the World which immediately brought destruction upon themselves and the whole City The Germans who pretended to be descended from the Spartans had the like Government Their Princes according to their merit had the credit of perswading not the power of commanding and the question was not what part of the Government their Kings would allow to the Nobility and People but what they would give to their Kings and 't is not much material to our present dispute whether they learnt this from some obscure knowledg of the Law which God gave to his People or whether led by the light of reason which is also from God they discovered what was altogether conformable to that Law Whoever understands the affairs of Germany knows that the present Emperors notwithstanding their haughty Title have a power limited as in the days of Tacitus If they are good and wise they may perswade but they can command no farther than the Law allows They do not admit the Princes Noblemen and Cities to the power which they all exercise in their general Diets and each of them within their own Precincts but they exercise that which has bin by publick consent bestow'd upon them All the Kingdoms peopled from the North observed the same rules In all of them the powers were divided between the Kings the Nobility Clergy and Commons and by the Decrees of Councils Diets Parliaments Cortez and Assemblies of Estates Authority and Liberty were so balanced that such Princes as assumed to themselves more than the Law did permit were severely punished and those who did by force or fraud invade Thrones were by force thrown down from them This was equally beneficial to Kings and People The Powers as Theopompus King of Sparta said were most safe when they were least envied and hated Lewis the 11th of France was one of the first that broke this Golden Chain and by more subtil Arts than had bin formerly known subverted the Laws by which the fury of those Kings had bin restrain'd and taught others to do the like tho all of them have not so well saved themselves from punishment James the third of Scotland was one of his most apt Scholars and Buchanan in his life says That he was precipitated into all manner of Infamy by men of the most abject condition that the corruption of those times and the ill Example of neighbouring Princes were considerable motives to pervert him for Edward the fourth of England Charles of Burgundy Lewis the 11th of France and John the second of Portugal had already laid the Foundations of Tyranny in those Countries and Richard the third was then most cruelly exercising the same in the Kingdom of England This could not have bin if all the Power had always bin in Kings and neither the People nor the Nobility had ever had any For no man can be said to gain that which he and his Predecessors always possessed or to take from others that which they never had nor to set up any sort of Government if it had bin always the same But the foresaid Lewis the 11th did assume to himself a Power above that of his Predecessors and Philip de Commines shews the ways by which he acquir'd it with the miserable effects of his Acquisition both to himself and to his people Modern Authors observe that the change was made by him and for that reason he is said by Mezeray and others to have brought those Kings out of Guardianship they were not therefore so till he did emancipate them Nevertheless this Emancipation had no resemblance to the unlimited Power of which our Author dreams The General Assemblies of Estates were often held long after his death and continued in the exercise of the Sovereign Power of the Nation Davila speaking of the General Assembly held at Orleans in the time of Francis the second asserts the whole Power of the Nation to have bin in them Monsieur de Thou says the same thing and adds that the King dying suddenly the Assembly continued even at the desire of the Council in the exercise of that Power till they had setled the Regency and other Affairs of the highest importance according to their own judgment Hottoman a Lawyer of that Time and Nation famous for his Learning Judgment and Integrity having diligently examin'd the antient Laws and Histories of that Kingdom distinctly proves that the French Nation never had any Kings but of their own chusing that their Kings had no Power except what was conferr'd upon them and that they had bin removed when they excessively abused or readred themselves unworthy of that Trust. This is sufficiently clear by the forecited examples of Pharamond's Grandchildren and the degenerated Races of Meroveus and Pepin of which many were deposed some of the nearest in Blood excluded and when their Vices seemed to be incorrigible they were wholly rejected All this was done by virtue of that Rule which they call the Salique Law And tho some of our Princes pretending to the Inheritance of that Crown by marrying the Heirs General denied that there was any such thing no man can say that for the space of above twelve hundred years Females or their Descendents who are by that Law excluded have ever bin thought to have any right to the Crown And no Law unless it be explicitly given by God can be of greater Authority than one which
and will govern you as I please But I doubt whether he would have succeeded till that Kingdom was joined to others of far greater strength from whence a power might be drawn to force them out of their usual method That which has bin said of the Governments of England France and other Countries shows them to be of the same nature and if they do not deserve the name of Kingdoms and that their Princes will by our Author's Arguments be perswaded to leave them those Nations perhaps will be so humble to content themselves without that magnificent Title rather than resign their own Liberties to purchase it and if this will not please him he may seek his glorious soveraign Monarchy among the wild Arabs or in the Island of Ceylon for it will not be found among civiliz'd Nations However more ignorance cannot be express'd than by giving the name of Democracy to those Governments that are composed of the three simple species as we have proved that all the good ones have ever bin for in a strict sense it can only sute with those where the People retain to themselves the administration of the supreme Power and more largely when the popular part as in Athens greatly overbalances the other two and that the denomination is taken from the prevailing part But our Author if I mistake not is the first that ever took the antient Governments of Israel Sparta and Rome or those of England France Germany and Spain to be Democracies only because every one of them had Senats and Assemblies of the People who in their Persons or by their Deputies did join with their chief Magistrates in the exercise of the supreme Power That of Israel to the time of Saul is called by Josephus an Aristocracy The same name is given to that of Sparta by all the Greek Authors and the great contest in the Peloponnesian War was between the two kinds of Government the Cities that were governed Aristocratically or desired to be so following the Lacedemonians and such as delighted in Democracy taking part with the Athenians In like manner Rome England and France were said to be under Monarchies not that their Kings might do what they pleased but because one man had a preheminence above any other Yet if the Romans could take Romulus the Son of a man that was never known Numa a Sabin Hostilius and Aneus Martius private men and Tarquinius Priscus the Son of a banished Corinthian who had no Title to a preference before others till it was bestowed upon them 't is ridiculous to think that they who gave them what they had could not set what limits they pleased to their own gift But says our Author The Nobility will then have one Voice and the People another and they joining may overrule the third which was never seen in any Kingdom This may perhaps be a way of regulating the Monarchical Power but it is not necessary nor the only one There may be a Senate tho the People be excluded that Senate may be composed of men chosen for their Virtue as well as for the Nobility of their Birth The Government may consist of King and People without a Senate or the Senate may be composed only of the Peoples Delegates But if I should grant his assertion to be true the reasonableness of such a Constitution cannot be destroy'd by the consequences he endeavours to draw from it for he who would instruct the world in matters of State must show what is or ought to be not what he fancies may thereupon ensue Besides it dos not follow that where there are three equal Votes Laws should be always made by the plurality for the consent of all the three is in many places required and 't is certain that in England and other parts the King and one of the Estates cannot make a Law without the concurrence of the other But to please Filmer I will avow that where the Nobles and Commons have an equal Vote they may join and over-rule or limit the power of the King and I leave any reasonable man to judg whether it be more safe and fit that those two Estates comprehending the whole body of the Nation in their Persons or by Representation should have a right to over-rule or limit the power of that man woman or child who sits in the Throne or that he or she young or old wise or foolish good or bad should over-rule them and by their vices weakness folly impertinence incapacity or malice put a stop to their proceedings and whether the chief concernments of a Nation may more fasely and prudently be made to depend upon the votes of so many eminent Persons amongst whom many wise and good men will always be found if there be any in the Nation and who in all respects have the same interest with them or upon the will of one who may be and often is as vile ignorant and wretched as the meanest Slave and either has or is for the most part made to believe he has an interest so contrary to them that their suppression is his Advancement Common sense so naturally leads us to the decision of this Question that I should not think it possible for Mankind to have mistaken tho we had no examples of it in History and 't is in vain to say that all Princes are not such as I represent for if a right were annexed to the being of a Prince and that his single judgment should over-balance that of a whole Nation it must belong to him as a Prince and be enjoy'd by the worst and basest as well as by the wisest and best which would inevitably draw on the absurdities above-mention'd But that many are and have bin such no man can deny or reasonably hope that they will not often prove to be such as long as any preference is granted to those who have nothing to recommend them but the Families from whence they derive a continual succession of those who excel in virtue wisdom and experience being promised to none nor reasonably to be expected from any Such a Right therefore cannot be claimed by all and if not by all then not by any unless it proceed from a particular grant in consideration of personal Virtue Ability and Integrity which must be proved and when any one goes about to do it I will either acknowledg him to be in the right or give the reasons of my denial However this is nothing to the general Proposition nay if a man were to be found who had more of the qualities requir'd for making a right judgment in matters of the greatest importance than a whole Nation or an Assembly of the best men chosen out of it which I have never heard to have bin unless in the Persons of Moses Joshua or Samuel who had the Spirit of God for their guide it would be nothing to our purpose for even he might be biassed by his personal Interests which Governments are not established principally to
hope to remove them proving in the first place that several Nations have plainly and explicitly made Contracts with their Magistrates 2. That they are implicit and to be understood vvhere they are not plainly expressed 3. That they are not dreams but real things and perpetually obliging 4. That Judges are in many places appointed to decide the Contests arising from the breach of these Contracts and vvhere they are not or the party offending is of such force or pride that he vvill not submit Nations have been obliged to take the extremest courses To the first I suppose it vvill not be denied that the annual Magistrates of divers Commonwealths are under some Compact and that there is a power of constraining them to perform the contents or to punish them for the violation The modest behaviour of the Roman Consuls and Dictators as long as their Laws vvere in force might not probably proceed from their good nature Tho the people had not bin as our Author says mad foolish and always desirous to chuse the vvorst men for being most like to themselves but admirably vvise and virtuous 't is not to be imagined that in the space of three or four hundred years they should never have fallen upon one vvho vvould have transgressed if he could have done it safely tho they had used the utmost caution in their choice But the power of the Consuls being only for a year that of the Dictator for six months at most and the Commission that he should take care the Commonwealth might suffer no damage show the end and condition upon which they were chosen and tho their Power is by some thought to have bin absolute yet the Consuls were frequently opposed and brought into order by the Senat Tribuns or People and sometimes the Dictator himself Camillus in his fourth Dictatorship was threatned by the Tribuns with a great Fine and by that means obliged to abdicate his Magistracy I have already mention'd Marcus Fabius Maximus who in the behalf of his Son Quintus condemned to die by Papirius the Dictator appealed to the People And when the Conduct of Fabius in the War against Hannibal was not approved Naenius the Tribune thought he made a very modest Proposition in that he did not desire his Magistracy should be abrogated but that the Master of the Horse should be made equal to him in power which was done accordingly 'T is agreed by all that the Consuls were in the place of Kings and that the Power of the Dictator was at the least equal to what theirs had bin If they therefore were under such a rule which they could not transgress or might be reduced to order if they did and forced to submit to the People as the Kings had done the Kings were also made upon the same conditions and equally obliged to perform them The Scripture is more clear in the case The Judges are said to have bin in power equal to Kings and I may perhaps acknowledg it with relation to the Deuteronomical King or such as the people might have chosen without offending God The Gileadites made a Covenant with Jephtha that he should be their Head and Captain He would not return to his Country till they had done it This was performed solemnly before the Lord in Mispeth and all Israel followed them They might therefore make a Covenant with their Kings for the difference of name dos not increase or diminish the Right Nay they were in duty obliged to do it The words of the 17th of Deuter. He shall not multiply Wives c. that his heart be not lifted up above his Brethren can have no other signification than that they should take care he did it not or as Josephus says hinder him if he attempt it for the Law was not given to the King who was not but to those who might make him if they thought fit In pursuance of this Law The rest of this Chapter is wanting in the Original Manuscript CHAP. III. SECT I. Kings not being fathers of their People nor 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 HAVING proved that the right of Fathers is from Nature and incommunicable it must follow that every man doth perpetually owe all love respect service and obedience to him that did beget nourish and educate him and to no other under that name No man therefore can claim the right of a Father over any except one that is so no man can serve two Masters the extent and perpetuity of the Duty which every man owes to his Father renders it impossible for him to owe the same to any other This right of Father cannot be devolved to the Heir of the Father otherwise than as every Son by the Law of Nature is Heir to his Father and has the same right of commanding his Children as his Father had of commanding him when he was a Child no man can owe to his Brother that which he owed to his Father because he cannot receive that from him which he had from his Father but the utmost of all absurdities that can enter into the Heart of man is for one to exact the rights due to a Father who has no other title than force and usurpation it being no less than to say that I owe as much to one who has done me the greatest of all Injuries as to him who has conferred upon me the greatest Benefits or which is yet worse if possible that as these usurpations cannot be made but by robbing spoiling imprisoning or killing the Person in possession that Duty which by the eternal Law of Nature I owe to my Father should oblige me to pay the same veneration obedience and service to the man that has spoiled imprisoned or kill'd my Father as I owed to him or that the same Law which obliged me to obey and defend my Father because he was so should oblige me to obey and defend his enemy because he has imprison'd or kill'd him and not only to pass over the Law of God which makes me the avenger of my Father's Blood but to reward his murderer with the rights that comprehend all that is most tender and sacred in Nature and to look upon one that has done me the greatest of all injustices and injuries as upon him to whom I owe my Birth and Education This being evident to all those who have any measure of common sense I suppose it may be safely concluded that what right soever a Father may have over his Family it cannot relate to that which a King has over his People unless he like the man in the Island of Pines mention'd before be also the Father of them all That which is absolutely unlike in manner and substance institution and exercise must be unlike in all respects and the Conclusions which have their strength from Similitude and Parity can have none when there is
taking upon him to be King till the Tribe of Judah had chosen him that he often acknowledged Saul to be his Lord. When Baanah and Rechab brought the head of Ishbosheth to him he commanded them to be slain Because they had killed a righteous man upon his Bed in his own House which he could not have said if Ishbosheth had unjustly detained from him the ten Tribes and that he had a right to reign over them before they had chosen him The Word of God did not make him King but only foretold that he should be King and by such ways as he pleased prepared the hearts of the People to set him up and till the time designed by God for that work was accomplished he pretended to no other Authority than what the six hundred men who first followed him afterwards the Tribe of Judah and at last all the rest of the People conferred upon him I no way defend Absalom's revolt he was wicked and acted wickedly but after his death no man was ever blamed or questioned for siding with him and Amasa who commanded his Army is represented in Scripture as a good man even David saying that Joab by slaying Abner and Amasa had killed two men who were better than himself which could not have bin unless the People had a right of looking into matters of Government and of redressing abuses tho being deceived by Absalom they so far erred as to prefer him who was in all respects wicked before the man who except in the matter of Uriah is said to be after God's own heart This right was acknowledged by David himself when he commanded Hushai to say to Absalom I will be thy Servant O King and by Hushai in the following Chapter Nay but whom the Lord and his People and all the men of Israel chuse his will I be and with him will I abide which could have no sense in it unless the People had a right of chusing and that the choice in which they generally concurred was esteemed to be from God But if Saul who was made King by the whole People and anointed by the command of God might be lawfully resisted when he departed from the Law of his Institution it cannot be doubted that any other for the like reason may be resisted If David tho designed by God to be King and anointed by the hand of the Prophet was not King till the People had chosen him and he had made a Covenant with them it will if I mistake not be hard to find a man who can claim a right which is not originally from them And if the People of Israel could erect and pull down institute abrogate or transfer to other Persons or Families Kingdoms more firmly established than any we know the same right cannot be denied to other Nations SECT II. The Kings of Israel and Judah were under a Law not safely to be transgress'd OUR Author might be pardon'd if he only vented his own follies but he aggravates his own crime by imputing them to men of more Credit and tho I cannot look upon Sir Walter Raleigh as a very good Interpreter of Scripture he had too much understanding to say That if practice declare the greatness of Authority even the best Kings of Israel and Judah were not tied to any Law but they did whatsoever they pleased in the greatest matters for there is no sense in those words If practice declares the greatness of Authority even the best were tied to no Law signifies nothing for practice cannot declare the greatness of Authority Peter the Cruel of Castille and Christiern the 2d of Denmark kill'd whom they pleas'd but no man ever thought they had therefore a right to do so and if there was a Law all were tied by it and the best were less likely to break it than the worst But if Sir Walter Raleigh's opinion which he calls a conjecture be taken there was so great a difference between the Kings of Israel and Judah that as to their general proceedings in point of Power hardly any thing can be said which may rightly be applied to both and he there endeavours to show that the reason why the ten Tribes did not return to the house of David after the destruction of the houses of Jeroboam and Baasba was because they would not endure a Power so absolute as that which was exercised by the house of David If he has therefore any where said that the Kings did what they pleased it must be in the sense that Moses Maimonides says The Kings of Israel committed many extravagancies because they were insolent impious and despisers of the Law But whatsoever Sir Walter Raleigh may say for I do not remember his words and have not leisure to seek whether any such are found in his Books 't is most evident that they did not what they pleased The Tribes that did not submit to David nor crown him till they thought fit and then made a Covenant with him took care it might be observed whether he would or not Absalom's Rebellion follow'd by almost all Israel was a terrible check to his Will That of Sheba the Son of Bichri was like to have bin worse if it had not bin suppressed by Joab's diligence and David often confessed the Sons of Zerviah were too hard for him Solomon indeed overthrowing the Law given by Moses multiplying Gold and Silver Wives and Horses introducing Idolatry and lifting up his heart above his Brethren did what he pleased but Rehoboam paid for all the ten Tribes revolted from him by reason of the heavy burdens laid upon them stoned Adoram who was sent to levy the Tributes and set up Jeroboam who as Sir Walter Raleigh says in the place before cited had no other Title than the curtesy of the People and utterly rejected the house of David If practice therefore declares a right the practice of the People to avenge the injuries they suffered from their Kings as soon as they found a man fit to be their Leader shews they had a right of doing it 'T is true the best of the Kings with Moses Joshua and Samuel may in one sense be said to have done what they pleased because they desired to do that only which was good But this will hardly be brought to confer a right upon all Kings And I deny that even the Kings of Judah did what they pleased or that it were any thing to our question if they did Zedekiah professed to the great men that is to the Sanhedrin that without them he could do nothing When Amaziah by his folly had brought a great slaughter upon the Tribe of Judah they conspired against him in publick Council whereupon he fled to Lachish and they pursuing him thither killed him avowed the Fact and it was neither question'd nor blamed which examples agree with the paraphrase of Josephus on Deut. 17. He shall do nothing without the consent of the Sanhedrin and if
or Promise be pretended the nature and extent of the Obligation can only be known by the contents expressed or the true intention of it If there be a general form of Covenant set and agreed upon to which all Nations must submit it were good to know where it may be found and by whose Authority it is established and then we may examine the sense of it If no such do appear we may rationally look upon those to be Impostors who should go about from thence to derive a right And as that which dos not appear is as if it were not we may justly conclude there is no other or none that can have any effect but such as have bin made by particular Nations with their Princes which can be of no force or obligation to others nor to themselves any farther than according to the true intention of those that made them There is no such thing therefore as a dutiful obedience or duty of being obedient incumbent upon all Nations by virtue of any Covenant nor upon any particular Nation unless it be expressed by a Covenant and whoever pretends to a right of taking our Sons and Daughters Lands or Goods or to go unpunished if he do must show that these things are expressed or intended by the Covenant But tho Nations for the most part owe nothing to Kings till they are Kings and that it can hardly be conceived that any people did ever owe so much to a man as might not be fully repaid by the honor and advantages of such an advancement yet 't is possible that when they are made Kings they may by their good Government lay such Obligations upon their Subjects as ought to be recompensed by obedience and service There is no mortal Creature that deserves so well from mankind as a wife valiant diligent and just King who as a Father cherishes his People as a Shepherd feeds defends and is ready to lay down his life for his flock who is a terror to evil doers and a praise to those that do well This is a glorious Prerogative and he who has it is happy But before this can be adjudged to belong to all it must be proved that all have the Virtues that deserve it and he that exacts the dutiful Obedience that arises from them must prove that they are in him He that dos this need not plead for impunity when he dos injuries for if he do them he is not the man we speak of Not being so he can have no title to the duty by human Institution or Covenant nor by divine Law since as is already proved God has neither established Kings over all Nations by Precept nor recommended them by Example in setting them over his own People He has not therefore done it at all there is no such thing in nature and Nations can owe nothing to Kings merely as Kings but what they owe by the Contract made with them As these Contracts are made voluntarily without any previous obligation 't is evident men make them in consideration of their own good and they can be of force no longer than he with whom they are made perform his part in procuring it and that if he turn the power which was given to him for the publick good to the publick inconvenience and damage he must necessarily lose the benefit he was to receive by it The word think is foolishly and affectedly put in by our Author for those matters are very often so evident that even the weakest know them No great sagacity is requir'd to understand that lewd slothful ignorant false unjust covetous and cruel Princes bring inconveniences and mischiefs upon Nations and many of them are so evidently guilty of some or all these Vices that no man can be mistaken in imputing them and the utmost Calamities may rationally be expected from them unless a Remedy be applied But says he Samuel by telling them what the King would do instructs them what the Subjects must suffer and that 't is right he should go unpunished But by his favour Samuel says no such thing neither is it to be concluded that because a King will do wickedly he must be suffer'd any more than a private man who should take the same Resolution But he told them that when they should cry to the Lord by reason of their King he would not hear them This was as much as to say their ruin was unavoidable and that having put the power into the hands of those who instead of protecting would oppress them and thereby having provoked God against them so as he would not hearken to their cries they could have no relief But this was no security to the Authors of their Calamity The Houses of Jeroboam Baasha and Omri escaped not unpunished tho the people did not thereby recover their Liberty The Kings had introduced a Corruption that was inconsistent with it But they who could not settle upon a right Foundation to prevent future mischiefs could avenge such as they had suffered upon the heads of those who had caused them and frequently did it most severely The like besel the Romans when by the violence of Tyranny all good Order was overthrown good Discipline extinguished and the People corrupted Ill Princes could be cut in pieces and mischiefs might be revenged tho not prevented But 't is not so every where nor at all times and nothing is more irrational than for one or a few Examples to conclude a general necessity of future Events They alter according to Circumstances and as some Nations by destroying Tyrants could not destroy Tyranny others in removing the Tyrant have cut up Tyranny by the roots This variety has bin seen in the same Nation at different times The Romans recovered their Liberty by expelling Tarquin but remained Slaves notwithstanding the slaughter of Cesar. Whilst the Body of the People was uncorrupted they cured the Evil wrought by the person in taking him away It was no hard matter to take the Regal Power that by one man had bin enjoy'd for life and to place it in the hands of two annual Magistrates whilst the Nobility and People were according to the condition of that Age strong and ready to maintain it But when the mischief had taken deeper root when the best part of the people had perished in the Civil Wars when all their eminent men had fallen in battel or by the Proscriptions when their Discipline was lost and Virtue abolished the poor remains of the distressed people were brought under the power of a mercenary Soldiery and found no relief When they kill'd one Tyrant they osten made room for a worse It availed them nothing to cut off a rotten Branch whilst the accursed Root remained and sent forth new Sprouts of the same nature to their destruction Other generous Nations have bin subdued beyond a possibility of recovery and those that are naturally base slide into the like misery without the impulse of an exterior Power They are Slaves
by nature and have neither the understanding nor courage that is required for the constitution and management of a Government within themselves They can no more subsist without a Master than a flock without a Shepherd They have no comprehension of Liberty and can neither desire the good they do not know nor enjoy it if it were bestowed upon them They bear all burdens and whatever they suffer they have no other remedy or refuge than in the Mercy of their Lord. But such Nations as are naturally strong stout and of good understanding whose vigour remains unbroken manners uncorrupted reputation unblemished and increasing in numbers who neither want men to make up such Armies as may defend them against foreign or domestick Enemies nor Leaders to head them do ordinarily set limits to their patience They know how to preserve their Liberty or to vindicate the violation of it and the more patient they have bin the more inflexible they are when they resolve to be so no longer Those who are so foolish to put them upon such courses do to their cost find that there is a difference between Lions and Asses and he is a fool who knows not that Swords were given to men that none might be Slaves but such as know not how to use them SECT V. 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 IF our Author deserve credit we need not examin whether Nations have a right of resisting or a reasonable hope of succeeding in their endeavours to prevent or avenge the Mischiefs that are feared or suffered for 't is not worth their pains The Inconveniences says he and Miseries which are reckoned up by Samuel as belonging unto Kingly Government were not intolerable but such as have bin and are still born by the Subjects free consent from their Princes Nay at this day and in this Land many Tenants by their Tenures are tied unto the same subjection even unto subordinate and inferior Lords He is an excellent Advocate for Kingly Government that accounts Inconveniences and Miseries to be some of the essentials of it which others esteem to be only incidents Tho many Princes are violent and wicked yet some have bin gentle and just tho many have brought misery upon Nations some have bin beneficial to them and they who are esteemd most severe against Monarchy think the evils that are often suffer'd under that form of Government proceed from the corruption of it or deviation from the principle of its institution and that they are rather to be imputed to the vices of the Person than to the thing it self but if our Author speak truth it is universally and eternally naught inconvenience and misery belong to it He thinks to mend this by saying they are not intolerable but what is intolerable if Inconveniences and Miseries be not For what end can he think Governments to have bin established unless to prevent or remove Inconveniences and Miseries or how can that be called a Government which does not only permit but cause them What can incline Nations to set up Governments Is it that they may suffer Inconveniences and be brought to misery or if it be to enjoy happiness how can that subsist under a Government which not by accident deflection or corruption but by a necessity inherent in it self causes Inconveniences and Miseries If it be pretended that no human Constitution can be altogether free from Inconveniences I answer that the best may to some degree fall into them because they may be corrupted but evil and misery can properly belong to none that is not evil in its own nature If Samuel deserve credit or may be thought to have spoken sense he could not have enumerated the evils which he foresaw the people should suffer from their Kings nor say that they should cry to the Lord by reason of them unless they were in themselves grievous and in comparison greater than what they had suffer'd or known since that would not have diverted them from their intention but rather have confirmed them in it And I leave it to our Author to show why any People should for the pleasure of one or a few men erect or suffer that which brings more of evil with it than any others Moreover there is a great difference between that which Nations sometimes suffer under Kings and that which they willingly suffer most especially if our Author's Maxim be received That all Laws are the Mandates of Kings and the Subjects Liberties and Privileges no more than their gracious Concessions for how patient soever they are under the Evils they suffer it might reasonably be believ'd they are so because they know not how to help it And this is certainly the case of too many places that are known to us Whoever doubts of this if he will not put himself to the trouble of going to Turkey or Morocco let him pass only into Normandy and ask the naked barefooted and half-starved people whether they are willing to suffer the Miseries under which they groan and whether the magnificence of Versailles and the pomp of their haughty Master do any way alleviate their Calamities If this also be a matter of too much pains the Wretches that come hither every day will inform him that it is not by their own consent they are deprived of all Honors and Offices in the Commonwealth even of those which by a corrupt Custom that had gained the force of a Law they had dearly bought prohibited to exercise any trade exposed to the utmost effects of fraud and violence if they refuse to adore their Master's Idols They will tell him that 't is not willingly they leave their Lands and Estates to seek a shelter in the most remote parts of the World but because they are under a force which they are not able to resist and because one part of the Nation which is enriched with the Spoils of the other have foolishly contributed to lay a Yoak upon them which they cannot break To what he says concerning Tenures I answer No man in England ows any service to his Lord unless by virtue of a Contract made by himself or his Predecessors under which he holds the Land granted to him on that condition by the Proprietor There may be something of hardship but nothing of Injustice 'T is a voluntary act in the beginning and continuance and all men know that what is done to one who is willing is no injury He who did not like the Conditions was not obliged to take the Land and he might leave it if afterwards he came to dislike them If any man say the like may be done by any one in the Kingdom I answer That it is not always true the Protestants now in France cannot without extreme hazard go out of that Country tho they are contented to lose their Estates 'T is accounted a Crime for
King is so also if he be and ought to enjoy the Rights belonging to the Father of the People And 't is not less ridiculous to say those who will have a King than it would be to say he that will have a Father for every one must have one whether he will or not But if the King be a Father as our Author from thence infers that all Laws are from him none can be imposed upon him and whatsoever the Subject enjoys is by his concessions 'T is absurd to speak of an Obligation lying upon the people to allow him Royal maintenance by providing Revenues since he has all in himself and they have nothing that is not from him and depending upon his Will For this reason a worthy Gentleman of the House of Commons in the year 1640. desired that the business of the Judges who in the Star-Chamber had given for their Opinion concerning Shipmony That in cases of Necessity the King might provide it by his own Authority and that he was Judg of that Necessity might be first examined that they might know whether they had any thing to give before they should speak of giving And as'tis certain that if the Sentence of those perjur'd Wretches had stood the Subjects of England by consequence would have bin found to have nothing to give 't is no less sure that if our Author's principle concerning the Paternal and Absolute Power of Kings be true it will by a more compendious way appear that it is not left to the choice of any Nation whether they will have a King or not for they must have him and can have nothing to allow him but must receive all from him But if those only who will have a King are bound to have one and to allow this Royal maintenance such as will not have a King are by one and the same act delivered from the necessity of having one and from providing Maintenance for him which utterly overthrows the magnificent Fabrick of Paternal Monarchy and the Kings who were lately represented by our Author placed on the Throne by God and Nature and endow'd with an absolute Power over all appear to be purely the Creatures of the People and to have nothing but what is received from them From hence it may be rationally inferred that he who makes a thing to be makes it to be only what he pleases This must hold in relation to Kings as well as other Magistrates and as they who made Consuls Dictators and Military Tribuns gave them only such Power and for such a time as best pleased themselves 't is impossible they should not have the same right in relation to Kings in making them what they please as well as not to make them unless they please except there be a Charm belonging to the Name or the Letters that compose it which cannot belong to all Nations for they are different in every one according to the several Languages But says our Author 't is for the Honor Profit and Safety of the People that the King should be glorious powerful and abounding in Riches There is therefore no obligation upon them and they are to judg whether it be so or not The Scripture says plainly the contrary He shall not multiply Silver and Gold Wives and Horses he shall not lift up his heart above his Brethren He shall not therefore be glorious powerful or abounding in Riches Reason and Experience teach us the same thing If those Nations that have bin proud luxurious and vicious have desired by Pomp and Riches to foment the Vices of their Princes thereby to cherish their own such as have excelled in Virtue and good Discipline have abhorred it and except the immediate exercise of their Office have kept their supreme Magistrates to a manner of living little different from that of private men and it had bin impossible to maintain that frugality in which the integrity of their manners did chiefly consist if they had set up an Example directly contrary to it in him who was to be an Example to others or to provide for their own safety if they had overthrown that integrity of manners by which it could only be obtained and preserved There is a necessity incumbent upon every Nation that lives in the like Principle to put a stop to the entrance of those Vices that arise from the superfluity of Riches by keeping their Kings in that honest Poverty which is the Mother and Nurse of Modesty Sobriety and all manner of Virtue And no man can deny this to be well done unless he will affirm that Pride Luxury and Vice is more profitable to a Nation than the Virtues that are upheld by frugality There is another reason of no less importance to those Nations who tho they think fit to have Kings yet desire to preserve their Liberty which obliges them to set limits to the Glory Power and Riches of their Kings and that is That they can no otherwise be kept within the Rules of the Law Men are naturally propense to corruption and if he whose Will and Interest it is to corrupt them be furnished with the means he will never fail to do it Power Honors Riches and the Pleasures that attend them are the baits by which men are drawn to prefer a personal Interest before the publick Good and the number of those who covet them is so great that he who abounds in them will be able to gain so many to his service as shall be sufficient to subdue the rest 'T is hard to find a Tyranny in the world that has not bin introduced this way for no man by his own strength could ever subdue a multitude none could ever bring many to be subservient to his ill designs but by the rewards they received or hoped By this means Cesar accomplished his work and overthrew the Liberty of his Country and with it all that was then good in the world They who were corrupted in their minds desired to put all the Power and Riches into his hands that he might distribute them to such as served him And he who was nothing less than covetous in his own nature desired Riches that he might gain Followers and by the plunder of Gaul he corrupted those that betray'd Rome to him And tho I do not delight to speak of the Affairs of our own time I desire those who know the present State of France to tell me whether it were possible for the King to keep that Nation under servitude if a vast Revenue did not enable him to gain so many to his particular service as are sufficient to keep the rest in subjection and if this be not enough let them consider whether all the dangers that now threaten us at home do not proceed from the madness of those who gave such a Revenue as is utterly unproportionable to the Riches of the Nation unsutable to the modest behaviour expected from our Kings and which in time will render Parliaments unnecessary
most opposite to his Maxims He lived says he in Henry the third's time since Parliaments were instituted as if there had bin a time when England had wanted them or that the establishment of our Liberty had bin made by the Normans who if we will believe our Author came in by force of Arms and oppressed us But we have already proved the Essence of Parliaments to be as antient as our Nation and that there was no time in which there were not such Councils or Assemblies of the People as had the power of the whole and made or unmade such Laws as best pleased themselves We have indeed a French word from a People that came from France but the Power was always in our selves and the Norman Kings were obliged to swear they would govern according to the Laws that had bin made by those Assemblies It imports little vvhether Bracton lived before or after they came amongst us His vvords are Omnes sub eo ipse sub nullo sed tantum sub Deo All are under him and he under none but God only If he offend since no Writ can go out against him their Remedy is by petitioning him to amend his Faults which if he will not do it is punishment enough for him to expect God as an avenger Let none presume to look into his Deeds much less to oppose him Here is a mixture of Sense and Nonsense Truth and Falshood the vvords of Bracton vvith our Author's foolish Inferences from them Bracton spoke of the politick capacity of the King vvhen no Law had forbidden him to divide it from his natural He gave the name of King to the sovereign Power of the Nation as Jacob called that of his Descendents The Scepter vvhich he said should not depart from Judah till Shiloh came tho all men know that his Race did not reign the third part of that time over his own Tribe nor full fourscore years over the whole Nation The same manner of speech is used in all parts of the world Tertullian under the name of Cesar comprehended all magistratical Power and imputed to him the Acts of which in his person he never had any knowledg The French say their King is always present sur son lit de justice in all the Sovereign Courts of the Kingdom which are not easily numbred and that Maxim could have in it neither sense nor truth if by it they meant a Man who can be but in one place at one time and is always comprehended within the Dimensions of his own Skin These things could not be unknown to Bracton the like being in use amongst us and he thought it no offence so far to follow the dictates of Reason prohibited by no Law as to make a difference between the invisible and omnipresent King who never dies and the Person that wears the Crown whom no man without the guilt of Treason may endeavour to kill since there is an Act of Parliament in the case I will not determine whether he spoke properly or no as to England but if he did not all that he said being upon a false supposition is nothing to our purpose The same Bracton says the King doth no wrong in as much as he doth nothing but by Law The Power of the King is the Power of the Law a power of right not of wrong Again If the King dos injustice he is not King In another place he has these words The King therefore ought to exercise the Power of the Law as becomes the Vicar and Minister of God upon Earth because that Power is the Power of God alone but the Power of doing wrong is the Power of the Devil and not of God And the King is his Minister whose Work he dos Whilst he dos Justice he is the Vicar of the Eternal King but if he deflect from it to act unjustly he is the Minister of the Devil He also says that the King is singulis major universis minor and that he who is in justitia exequenda omnibus major in justitia recipienda cuilibet ex plebe fit aequalis I shall not say Bracton is in the right when he speaks in this manner but 't is a strange impudence in Filmer to cite him as a Patron of the absolute Power of Kings who dos so extremely depress them But the grossest of his follies is yet more pardonable than his detestable fraud in falsifying Bracton's words and leaving out such as are not for his purpose which shew his meaning to be directly contrary to the sense put upon them That this may appear I shall set down the words as they are found in Bracton Ipse autem Rex non debet esse sub homine sed sub Deo sub Lege quia Lex facit Regem Attribuat ergo Rex Legi quod Lex attribuit ei id est dominationem potestatem Non est enim Rex ubi dominatur volunt as non Lex quod sub Lege esse debeat cum sit Dei vicarius evidenter apparet If Bracton therefore be a competent Judg the King is under the Law and he is not a King nor God's Vicegerent unless he be so and we all know how to proceed with those who being under the Law offend against it For the Law is not made in vain In this case something more is to be done than petitioning and 't is ridiculous to say that if he will not amend 't is punishment enough for him to expect God an Avenger for the same may be said of all Malefactors God can sufficiently punish Thieves and Murderers but the future Judgment of which perhaps they have no belief is not sufficient to restrain them from committing more Crimes nor to deter others from following their example God was always able to punish Murderers but yet by his Law he commands man to shed the blood of him who should shed man's blood and declares that the Land cannot be purged of the Guilt by any other means He had Judgments in store for Jeroboam Ahab and those that were like them but yet he commanded that according to that Law their Houses should be destroy'd from the earth The dogs lick'd up the blood of Ahab where they had licked that of Naboth and eat Jezebel who had contrived his murder But says our Author we must not look into his deeds much less oppose them Must not David look into Saul's deeds nor oppose them Why did he then bring together as many men as he could to oppose and make foreign Alliances against him even with the Moabites and the accursed Philistins Why did Jehu not only destroy Ahab's house but kill the King of Judah and his forty Brothers only for going to visit his Children Our Author may perhaps say because God commanded them But if God commanded them to do so he did not command them and all mankind not to do so and if he did not forbid they have nothing to restrain them from
resolved upon by another Power The Jewish Doctors generally agree that the Kings of Judah could make no Law because there was a curse denounced against those who should add to or detract from that which God had given by the hand of Moses that they might sit in Judgment with the High Priest and Sanhedrin but could not judg by themselves unless the Sanhedrin did plainly fail of performing their duty Upon this account Maimonides excuses David for commanding Solomon not to suffer the grey hairs of Joab to go down to the grave in peace and Solomon for appointing him to be kill'd at the soot of the Altar for he having killed Abner and Amasa and by those actions shed the blood of war in time of peace the Sanhedrin should have punished him but being protected by favour or power and even David himself fearing him Solomon was put in mind of his duty which he performed tho Joab laid hold upon the horns of the Altar which by the express words of the Law gave no protection to wilful Murderers The use of the military Sword amongst them was also moderated Their Kings might make War upon the seven accursed Nations that they were commanded to destroy and so might any other man for no peace was to be made with them but not against any other Nation without the assent of the Sanhedrin And when Amaziah contrary to that Law had foolishly made war upon Joash King of Israel and thereby brought a great slaughter upon Judah the Princes that is the Sanhedrin combined against him pursued him to Lachish and killed him there The Legislative Power of Sparta was evidently in the People The Laws that go under the name of Lycurgus were proposed by him to the general Assembly of the People and from them received their Authority But the discipline they contained was of such efficacy for framing the minds of men to virtue and by banishing Silver and Gold they so far banished all manner of Crimes that from the institution of those Laws to the times of their Corruption which was more than eight hundred years we hardly find that three men were put to death of whom two were Kings so that it seems difficult to determine where the power of judging did reside tho 't is most probable considering the nature of their Government that it was in the Senate and in Cases extraordinary in the Ephori with a right of appealing to the People Their Kings therefore could have little to do with the Sword of Justice neither the Legislative nor the Judicial Power being any ways in them The military Sword was not much more in their Power unless the excellency of their Virtues gave them the credit of perswading when the Law denied the right of commanding They were obliged to make war against those and those only who were declared Enemies by the Senate and Ephori and in the manner place and time they directed so that Agesilaus tho carrying on a glorious War in Persia no sooner received the Parchment Roll wherein he was commanded by the Ephori to come home for the defence of his own Country than he immediately returned and is on that account called by no less a man than Xenophon a good and faithful King rendring obedience to the Laws of his Country By this it appears that there are Kings who may be feared by those that do ill and not by such as do well for having no more power than what the Law gives and being obliged to execute it as the Law directs they cannot depart from the Precept of the Apostle My own actions therefore or the sense of my own guilt arising from them is to be the measure of my fear of that Magistrate who is the Minister of God and not his Power The like may be said of almost all the Nations of the world that have had any thing of Civil Order amongst them The supreme Magistrate under what name soever he was known whether King Emperor Asymnetes Suffetes Consul Dictator or Archon has usually a part assigned to him in the administration of Justice and making War but that he may know it to be assigned and not inherent and so assigned as to be employ'd for the publick good not to his own profit or pleasure it is circumscribed by such rules as he cannot safely transgress This is above all seen in the German Nations from whom we draw our Original and Government and is so well described by Tacitus in his treatise of their Customs and Manners that I shall content my self to refer to it and to what I have cited from him in the former part of this Work The Saxons coming into our Country retain'd to themselves the same rights They had no Kings but such as were set up by themselves and they abrogated their Power when they pleased Off a acknowledged that he was chosen for the fence of their Liberty not from his own merit but by their favour and in the Conventus Pananglicus at which all the chief men as well Secular as Ecclesiastical were present it was decreed by the King Archbishops Bishops Abbots Dukes and Senators that the Kings should be chosen by the Priests and by the Elders of the People In pursuance of which Egbert who had no right to the succession was made King Ethelwerd was chosen in the same manner by the consent of all Ethelwolf a Monk for want of a better was advanced to the same Honor. His Son Alfred tho crowned by the Pope and marrying without the consent of the Nobility and Kingdom against their Customs and Statutes acknowledged that he had received the Crown from the bounty of the Princes Elders and People and in his Will declared that he left the People as he had found them free as the inward thoughts of Man His Son Edward was elected to be his Successor Ethelstan tho a Bastard and without all Title was elected by the consent of the Nobility and People Eadred by the same Authority was elected and preferred before the Sons of Edmond his Predecessor Edwin tho rightly chosen was deposed for his ill life and Edgar elected King by the will of God and consent of the People But he also was deprived of the Crown for the Rape of a Nun and after seven years restored by the whole People coram omni multitudine populi Anglorum Ethelred who is said to have bin cruel in the beginning wretched in the course and infamous in the end of his Reign was deposed by the same power that had advanced him Canutus made a Contract with the Princes and the whole People and thereupon was by general consent crown'd King over all England After him Harold was chosen in the usual manner He being dead a Message was sent to Hardi Canute with an offer of the Crown which he accepted and accordingly was received Edward the Consessor was elected King with the consent of the Clergy
and People at London and Harold excused himself for not performing his Oath to William the Norman because he said he had made it unduly and presumptuously without consulting the Nobility and People and without their Authority William was received with great joy by the Clergy and People and saluted King by all swearing to observe the antient good and approved Laws of England and tho he did but ill perform his Oath yet before his death he seemed to repent of the ways he had taken and only wishing his Son might be King of England he confessed in his last Will made at Caen in Normandy that he neither found nor left the Kingdom as an Inheritance If he possessed no right except what was conferred upon him no more was conserred than had bin enjoy'd by the antient Kings according to the approved Laws which he swore to observe Those Laws gave no power to any till he was elected and that which they did then give was so limited that the Nobility and People reserved to themselves the disposition of the greatest Affairs even to the deposition and expulsion of such as should not well perform the duty of their Oaths and Office And I leave it to our Author to prove how they can be said to have had the Sword and the Power so as to be feared otherwise than as the Apostle says by those that do evil which we acknowledg to be not only in the King but in the lowest Officer of Justice in the world If it be pretended that our later Kings are more to be seared than William the Norman or his Predecessors it must not be as has bin proved either from the general right of Kings or from the Doctrine of the Apostle but from something else that is peculiar and subsequent which I leave our Author's Disciples to prove and an answer may be found in due time But to show that our Ancestors did not mistake the words of the Apostle 't is good to consider when to whom and upon what occasion he spoke The Christian Religion was then in its infancy his discourses were addressed to the Professors of it who tho they soon grew to be considerable in number were for the most part of the meanest sort of People Servants or Inhabitants of the Cities rather than Citizens and Freemen joined in no civil Body or Society nor such as had or could have any part in the Government The occasion was to suppress the dangerous mistake of many converted Jews and others who knowing themselves to be freed from the power of Sin and the Devil presumed they were also freed from the obligation of human Laws And if this Error had not bin crop'd in the bud it would have given occasion to their Enemies who desired nothing more to destroy them all and who knowing that such Notions were stirring among them would have bin glad that they who were not easily to be discovered had by that means discovered themselves This induced a necessity of diverting a poor mean scatter'd People from such thoughts concerning the State to convince them of the Error into which they were fallen that Christians did not owe the same obedience to Civil Laws and Magistrates as other men and to keep them from drawing destruction upon themselves by such ways as not being warranted by God had no promise of his Protection St. Paul's work was to preserve the Professors of Christianity as appears by his own words I exhort that first of all Supplications Prayers Intercessions and giving of thanks be made for all men for Kings and for all that are in Authority that we may live a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty Put them in mind to be subject to Principalities and Powers to obey Magistrates to be ready for every good work St. Peter agrees with him fully in describing the Magistrate and his Duty shewing the reasons why obedience should be pay'd to him and teaching Christians to be humble and contented with their condition as free yet not using their Liberty for a cover to malice and not only to fear God and honor the King of which conjunction of words such as Filmer are very proud but to honor all men as is said in the same verse This was in a peculiar manner the work of that time in which those who were to preach and propagate the Gospel were not to be diverted from that Duty by entangling themselves in the care of State-affairs but it dos in some sense agree with all times for it can never be the duty of a good man to oppose such a Magistrate as is the Minister of God in the exercise of his Office nor to deny to any man that which is his due But as the Christian Law exempts no man from the Duty he ows to his Father Master or the Magistrate it dos not make him more a Slave than he was before nor deprive him of any natural or civil Right and if we are obliged to pay Tribute Honor or any other thing where it is not due it must be by some Precept very different from that which commands us to give to Cesar that which is Cesar's If he define the Magistrate to be the Minister of God doing Justice and from thence draws the Reasons he gives for rendring Obedience to him we are to inquire whose Minister he is who overthrows it and look for some other reason sor rendring obedience to him than the words of the Apostles If David who was willing to lay down his life sor the people who hated iniquity and would not suffer a liar to come into his presence was the Minister of God I desire to know whose Minister Caligula was who set up himself to be worshipped for a God and would at once have destroyed all the people that he ought to have protected Whose Minister was Nero who besides the abominable impurities of his lise and hatred to all virtue as contrary to his Person and Government set fire to the great City If it be true that contrariorum contraria est ratio these questions are easily decided and if the reasons of things are eternal the same distinction grounded upon truth will be good for ever Every Magistrate and every man by his works will for ever declare whose Minister he is in what spirit he lives and consequently what obedience is due to him according to the Precept of the Apostle If any man ask what I mean by Justice I answer That the Law of the Land as far as it is Sanctio recta jubens honesta prohibens contraria declares what it is But there have bin and are Laws that are neither just nor commendable There was a Law in Rome that no God should be worshipped vvithout the consent of the Senat Upon vvhich Tertullian says scoffingly That God shall not be God unless he please Man and by virtue of this Law the first Christians were exposed to all manner of cruelties and some
that is nothing to the present Question For if it was ill done to drive Nero to despair or to throw Vitellius into the common Shore it was not because they were the Ministers of God for their Lives were no way conformable to the character which the Apostle gives to those who deserve that Sacred Name If those only are to be feared who have the Power there was a time when they were not to be feared for they had none and if those Princes are not obliged by the Law who are not under the coercive Power it gave no exemption to those for they fell under it and as we know not what will befal others who walk in their steps till they are dead we cannot till then know whether they are free from it or not SECT XII The Right and Power of a Magistrate depends upon his Institution not upon his Name 'T IS usual with Impostors to obtrude their deceits upon men by putting false names upon things by which they may perplex mens minds and from thence deduce false Conclusions But the points above mention'd being settled it imports little whether the Governors to whom Peter enjoins obedience were only Kings and such as are employ'd by them or all such Magistrates as are the Ministers of God for he informs us of their Works that we may know them and accordingly yield obedience to them This is that therefore which distinguishes the Magistrate to whom obedience is due from him to whom none is due and not the name that he either assumes or others put upon him But if there be any virtue in the word King and that the admirable Prerogatives of which our Author dreams were annexed to that name they could not be applied to the Roman Emperors nor their substituted Officers for they had it not 'T is true Mark Anthony in a drunken fit at the celebration of the impure Lupercalia did offer a Diadem to Julius Cesar which some flatterers pressed him to accept as our great Lawyers did Cromwel but he durst not think of putting it upon his Head Caligula's affectation of that title and the ensigns of Royalty he wore were taken for the most evident marks of his madness and tho the greatest and bravest of their men had fallen by the Wars or Proscriptions tho the best part of the Senate had perished in Thessaly tho the great City was exhausted and Italy brought to desolation yet they were not reduced so low as to endure a King Piso was sufficiently addicted to Tiberius yet he could not suffer that Germanicus should be treated as the Son of a King Principis Romani non Parthorum regis filio has epulas dari And whoever understands the Latin Tongue and the History of those times will easily perceive that the word Princeps signified no more than a principal or eminent man as has bin already proved and the words of Piso could have no other meaning than that the Son of a Roman ought not to be distinguished from others as the Sons of the Parthian Kings were This is verified by his Letter to Tiberius under the name of Friend and the answer of Tiberius promising to him whatsoever one friend could do for another Here was no mention of Majesty or Soveraign Lord nor the base subscriptions of Servant Subject or Creature And I fear that as the last of those words was introduced amongst us by our Bishops the rest of them had bin also invented by such Christians as were too much addicted to the Asiatick Slavery However the name of King was never solemnly assumed by nor conferred upon those Emperors and could have conferred no right if it had They exercised as they pleased or as they durst the power that had bin gained by violence or fraud The exorbitances they committed could not have bin justified by a Title any more than those of a Pyrat who should take the same It was no otherwise given to them than by way of assimilation when they were guilty of the greatest Crimes and Tacitus describing the detestable Lust of Tiberius says Quibus adeo indomitis exarserat ut more Regio pubem ingenuam stupris pollueret nec formam tantum decora corporis sed in his modestam pueritiam in aliis majorum imagines incitamentum cupiditatis habebat He also informs us that Nero took his time to put Bareas Soranus to death who was one of the most virtuous men of that age when Tiridates King of Armenia was at Rome That he might shew the Imperial Grandeur by the slaughter of the most illustrious men which he accounted a Royal Action I leave it to the judgment of all wise men whether it be probable that the Apostles should distinguish such as these from other Magistrates and dignify those only with the Title of God's Ministers who distinguished themselves by such ways or that the succeeding Emperors should be ennobled with the same Prerogative who had no other Title to the name than by resembling those that had it in such things as these If this be too absurd and abominable to enter into the heart of a man it must be concluded that their intention was only to divert the poor People to whom they preached from involving themselves in the care of Civil matters to which they had no call And the Counsel would have bin good as things stood with them if they had bin under the power of a Pyrat or any other villain substituted by him But tho the Apostles had looked upon the Officers set over the Provinces belonging to the Roman Empire as sent by Kings I desire to know whether it can be imagined that they could think the subordinate Governors to be sent by Kings in the Countries that had no Kings or that obedience became due to the Magistrates in Greece Italy or other Provinces under the jurisdiction of Rome only after they had Emperors and that none was due to them before The Germans had then no King The brave Arminius had bin lately kill'd for aiming at a Crown When he had blemish'd all his Virtues by that attempt they forgot his former Services They never consider'd how many Roman Legions he had cut in pieces nor how many thousands of their Allies he had destroy'd His Valour was a crime deserving death when he sought to make a Prey of his Country which he had so bravely defended and to enslave those who with him had fought for the publick Liberty But if the Apostles were to be understood to give the name of God's Ministers only to Kings and those who are employ'd by them and that obedience is due to no other a domestick Tyrant had bin their greatest Benefactor He had set up the only Government that is authorized by God and to which a conscientious obedience is due Agathocles Dionysius Phalaris Phereus Pisistratus Nabis Machanidas and an infinite number of the most detestable Villains that the world has ever produced did confer the same benefits upon the
continue in any If the Power be not conferred upon them they have it not and if they have it not their want of leisure to do Justice cannot have bin the cause for which Laws are made and they cannot be the signification of their Will but are that to which the Prince ows Obedience as well as the meanest Subject This is that which Bracton calls esse sub lege and says that Rex in regno superiores habet Deum Legem Fortescue says The Kings of England cannot change the Laws and indeed they are so far from having any such Power that the Judges swear to have no regard to the King's Letters or Commands but if they receive any to proceed according to Law as if they had not bin And the breach of this Oath dos not only bring a blemish upon their Reputation but exposes them to capital Punishments as many of them have found 'T is not therefore the King that makes the Law but the Law that makes the King It gives the rule for Succession making Kingdoms sometimes Hereditary and sometimes Elective and more often than either simply Hereditary under condition In some places Males only are capable of inheriting in others Females are admitted Where the Monarchy is regular as in Germany England c. the Kings can neither make nor change Laws They are under the Law and the Law is not under them their Letters or Commands are not to be regarded In the administration of Justice the question is not what pleases them but what the Law declares to be right which must have its course whether the King be busy or at leisure whether he will or not The King who never dies is always present in the supreme Courts and neither knows nor regards the pleasure of the man that wears the Crown But lest he by his Riches and Power might have some influence upon judicial Proceedings the great Charter that recapitulates and acknowledges our antient inherent Liberties obliges him to swear that he will neither sell delay nor deny Justice to any man according to the Laws of the Land which were ridiculous and absurd if those Laws were only the signification of his Pleasure or any way depended upon his Will This Charter having bin confirmed by more than thirty Parliaments all succeeding Kings are under the obligation of the same Oath or must renounce the benefit they receive from our Laws which if they do they will be found to be equal to every one of us Our Author according to his custom having laid down a false proposition gos about to justify it by false examples as those of Draco Solon the Decemviri and Moses of whom no one had the Power he attributes to them and it were nothing to us if they had The Athenians and Romans as was said before were so far from resigning the absolute Power without appeal to themselves that nothing done by their Magistrates was of any force till it was enacted by the People And the power given to the Decemviri sine provocatione was only in private cases there being no superior Magistrate then in being to whom Appeals could be made They were vested with the same Power the Kings and Dictators enjoy'd from whom there lay no Appeal but to the People and always to them as appears by the case of Horatius in the time of Tullus Hostilius that of Marcus Fabius when Papirius Cursor was Dictator and of Nenius the Tribun during that of Q. Fabius Maximus all which I have cited already and reser to them There was therefore a reservation of the supreme Power in the People notwithstanding the creation of Magistrates without Appeal and as it was quietly exercised in making Strangers or whom they pleased Kings restraining the power of Dictators to six months and that of the Decemviri to two years when the last did contrary to Law endeavour by force to continue their Power the People did by force destroy it and them The case of Moses is yet more clear he was the most humble and gentle of all men he never raised his heart above his brethren and commanded Kings to live in the same modesty he never desired the People should depend upon his will In giving Laws to them he fulfill'd the will of God not his own and those Laws were not the signification of his will but of the will of God They were the production of God's Wisdom and Goodness not the invention of Man given to purify the People not to advance the glory of their Leader He was not proud and insolent nor pleas'd with that ostentation of Pomp to which fools give the name of Majesty and whoever so far exalts the power of a man to make Nations depend upon his pleasure dos not only lay a burden upon him which neither Moses nor any other could ever bear and every wise man will always abhor but with an impious fury endeavours to set up a Government contrary to the Laws of God presumes to accuse him of want of wisdom or goodness to his own People and to correct his Errors which is a work fit to be undertaken by such as our Author From hence as upon a solid foundation he proceeds and making use of King James's words infers that Kings are above the Laws because he so teaches us But he might have remembred that having affirmed the People could not judg of the disputes that might happen between them and Kings because they must not be judges in their own case 't is absurd to make a King judg of a case so nearly concerning himself in the decision of which his own Passions and Interests may probably lead him into errors And if it be pretended that I do the same in giving the judgment of those matters to the People the case is utterly different both in the nature and consequences The King's judgment is merely for himself and if that were to take place all the Passions and Vices that have most power upon men would concur to corrupt it He that is set up for the publick good can have no contest with the whole People whose good he is to procure unless he deflect from the end of his Institution and set up an interest of his own in opposition to it This is in its nature the highest of all delinquencies and if such a one may be judg of his own crimes he is not only sure to avoid punishment but to obtain all that he sought by them and the worse he is the more violent will his desires be to get all the power into his hands that he may gratify his lusts and execute his pernicious designs On the other side in a popular Assembly no man judges for himself otherwise than as his good is comprehended in that of the publick Nothing hurts him but what is prejudicial to the Commonwealth such amongst them as may have received private Injuries are so far only considered by others as their Sufferings may have influence upon the
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
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
lose by it and the Lord Chancellor Egerton told a Gentleman who desired relief against his own Deed upon an Allegation that he knew not what he did when he signed it that he did not sit to relieve fools But tho voluntary Promises or Oaths when to use the Lawyers language there is not a valuable consideration were of no obligation or that men brought by force fear or error into such Contracts as are grievous in the performance might be relieved this would not at all reach the cases of Princes in the Contracts made between them and their Subjects and confirmed by their Oaths there being no colour of force or fraud fear or error for them to alledg nor any thing to be pretended that can be grievous to perform otherwise than as it may be grievous to an ill man not to do the mischiefs he had conceived Nations according to their own will frame the Laws by which they resolve to be governed and if they do it not wisely the damage is only to themselves But 't is hard to find an example of any People that did by force oblige a man to take upon him the Government of them Gideon was indeed much pressed by the Israelites to be their King and the Army of Germanicus in a Mutiny more fiercely urged him to be Emperor but both desisted when their Offers were refused If our Kings have bin more modest and our Ancestors more pertinacious in compelling them to accept the Crowns they offer'd I shall upon proof of the matter change my opinion But till that do appear I may be pardoned if I think there was no such thing William the Norman was not by force brought into England but came voluntarily and desired to be King The Nobility Clergy and Commons proposed the Conditions upon which they would receive him These conditions were to govern according to their antient Laws especially those that had bin granted or rather collected in the time of the famous King Edward Here was neither force nor fraud if he had disliked the terms he might have retired as freely as he came But he did like them and tho he was not perhaps so modest to say with the brave Saxon King Offa Ad Libertatis vestrae tuitionem non meis meritis sed sola liberalitate vestra unanimiter me convocastis he accepted the Crown upon the conditions offer'd and swore upon the Evangelists to observe them Not much valuing this he pretended to govern according to his own will but finding the People would not endure it he renewed his Oath upon the same Evangelists and the Reliques of S. Alban which he needed not to have done but might have departed to his Dutchy of Normandy if he had not lik'd the conditions or thought not fit to observe them 'T is probable he examined the contents of Edward's Laws before he swore to them and could not imagine that a free Nation which never had any other Kings than such as had bin chosen by themselves for the preservation of their Liberty and from whose liberality the best of their Kings acknowledged the Crowns they wore did intend to give up their Persons Liberties and Estates to him who was a stranger most especially when they would not receive him till he had sworn to the same Laws by which the others had reigned of which one was as appears by the act of the Conventus Pananglicus that Reges à Sacerdotibus senioribus Populi eligantur The Kings should be elected by the Clergy and Elders of the People By these means he was advanced to the Crown to which he could have no title unless they had the right of conferring it upon him Here was therefore no force deceit or error and whatsoever equity there might be to relieve one that had bin forced frighted or circumvented it was nothing to this case We do not find that William the 2d or Henry were forced to be Kings no Sword was put to their Throats and for any thing we know the English Nation was not then so contemptible but men might have bin found in the world who would willingly have accepted the Crown and even their elder Brother Robert would not have refused but the Nobility and Commons trusting to their Oaths and Promises thought fit to prefer them before him and when he endeavoured to impose himself upon the Nation by force they so severely punished him that no better proof can be required to shew that they were accustomed to have no other Kings than such as they approved And this was one of the Customs that all their Kings swore to maintain it being as antient just and well approved as any other Having already proved that all the Kings we have had since that time have come in upon the same title that the Saxon Laws to which all have sworn continue to be of force amongst us and that the words pronounced four times on the four sides of the Scaffold by the Archbishop Will ye have this man to reign do testify it I may spare the pains of a repetition and justly conclude That if there was neither force nor fraud fear nor error to be pretended by the first there could be none in those that followed But the observation of this Oath may be grievous If I received money the last year upon Bond Promise or sale of a Mannor or Farm can it be thought grievous to me to be compelled to repay or to make over the Land according to my agreement Or if I did not seal the Bond till I had the money must not I perform the condition or at the least restore what I had received If it be grievous to any King to preserve the Liberties Lives and Estates of his Subjects and to govern according to their Laws let him resign the Crown and the People to whom the Oath was made will probably release him Others may possibly be found who will not think it grievous or if none will accept a Crown unless they may do what they please the People must bear the misfortune of being obliged to govern themselves or to institute some other sort of Magistracy that will be satisfied with a less exorbitant Power Perhaps they may succeed as well as some others have done who without being brought to that necessity have voluntarily cast themselves into the misery of living without the majestick splendor of a Monarch or if that fail they may as their last refuge surrender up themselves to Slavery When that is done we will acknowledg that whatsoever we have is derived from the favour of our Master But no such thing yet appearing amongst us we may be pardoned if we think we are Free-men governed by our own Laws and that no man has a power over us which is not given and regulated by them nor that any thing but a new Law made by our selves can exempt our Kings from the obligation of performing their Oaths taken to govern according to the old in the true
better or worse one than another cannot spring from any other root than the consent of the several Nations where they are in force and their opinions that such methods were best for them But if God have made a discrimination of people he that would thereupon ground a Title to the dominion of any one must prove that Nation to be under the curse of Slavery which for any thing I know was only denounced against Cham and 't is as hard to determine whether the sense of it be temporal spiritual or both as to tell preeisely what Nations by being only descended from him fall under the Penalties threatned If these therefore be either intirely false or impossible to be proved true there is no discrimination or not known to us and every People has a right of disposing of their Government as well as the Polanders Danes Swedes Germans and such as are or were under the Roman Empire And if any Nation has a natural Lord before he be admitted by their consent it must be by a peculiar act of their own as the Crown of France by an act of that Nation which they call the Salique Law is made hereditary to Males in a direct Line or the nearest to the direct and others in other places are otherwise disposed I might rest here with full assurance that no Disciple of Filmer can prove this of any people in the world nor give so much as the shadow of a reason to perswade us there is any such thing in any Nation or at least in those where we are concerned and presume little regard will be had to what he has said since he cannot prove of any that which he so boldly affirms of all But because good men ought to have no other object than Truth which in matters of this importance can never be made too evident I will venture to go farther and assert That as the various ways by which several Nations dispose of the succession to their respective Crowns shew they were subject to no other Law than their own which they might have made different by the same right they made it to be what it is even those who have the greatest veneration for the reigning Families and the highest regard for proximity of blood have always preferr'd the safety of the Commonwealth before the concernments of any Person or Family and have not only laid aside the nearest in blood when they were found to be notoriously vicious and wicked but when they have thought it more convenient to take others And to prove this I intend to make use of no other Examples than those I find in the Histories of Spain France and England Whilst the Goths governed Spain not above four persons in the space of three hundred years were the immediate successors of their Fathers but the Brother Cousin German or some other man of the Families of the Balthei or Amalthei was preferred before the Children of the deceased King and if it be said this was according to the Law of that Kingdom I answer that it was therefore in the power of that Nation to make Laws for themselves and consequently others have the same right One of their Kings called Wamba was deposed and made a Monk after he had reigned well many years but falling into a swound and his friends thinking him past recovery cut off his hair and put a Monk's Frock upon him that according to the superstition of those times he might die in it and the cutting off the hair being a most disgraceful thing amongst the Goths they would not restore him to his Authority Suintila another of their Kings being deprived of the Crown for his ill Government his Children and Brothers were excluded and Sisinandus crowned in his room This Kingdom being not long after overthrown by the Moors a new one arose from its ashes in the person of Don Pelayo first King of the Asturia's which increasing by degrees at last came to comprehend all Spain and so continues to this day But not troubling my self with all the deviations from the common rule in the collateral Lines of Navarr Arragon and Portugal I find that by fifteen several Instances in that one series of Kings in the Asturia's and Leon who afterwards came to be Kings of Castille it is fully proved that what respect soever they shew'd to the next in blood who by the Law were to succeed they preferred some other person as often as the supreme Law of taking care that the Nation might receive no detriment perswaded them to it Don Pelayo enjoy'd for his life the Kingdom conferred upon him by the Spaniards who with him retired into the Mountains to defend themselves against the Moors and was succeeded by his Son Favila But tho Favila left many Sons when he died Alphonso sirnamed the Chast was advanced to the Crown and they all laid aside Fruela Son to Alphonso the Catholick was for his cruelty deposed put to death and his Sons excluded Aurelio his Cousin German succeeded him and at his death Silo who married his Wives Sister was preferr'd before the Males of the Blood Royal. Alphonso sirnamed El Casto was first violently dispossess'd of the Crown by a Bastard of the Royal Family but he being dead the Nobility and People thinking Alphonso more fit to be a Monk than a King gave the Crown to Bermudo called El Diacono but Bermudo after several years resigning the Kingdom they conceived a better opinion of Alphonso and made him King Alphonso dying without issue Don Ramiro Son to Bermudo was preserred before the Nephews of Alphonso Don Ordonno fourth from Ramiro left four legitimate Sons but they being young the Estates laid them aside and made his Brother Fruela King Fruela had many Children but the same Estates gave the Crown to Alphonso the Fourth who was his Nephew Alphonso turning Monk recommended his Son Ordonno to the Estates of the Kingdom but they resused him and made his Brother Ramiro King Ordonno third Son to Ramiro dying left a Son called Bermudo but the Estates took his Brother Sancho and advanced him to the throne Henry the First being accidentally killed in his youth left only two Sisters Blanche married to Lewis Son to Philip August King of France and Berenguela married to Alphonso King of Leon. The Estates made Ferdinand Son of Berenguela the youngest Sister King excluding Blanche with her Husband and Children for being Strangers and Berenguela her self because they thought not fit that her Husband should have any part in the Government Alphonso El Savio seems to have bin a very good Prince but applying himself more to the study of Astrology than to affairs of Government his eldest Son Ferdinand de la Cerda dying and leaving his Sons Alphonso and Ferdinand very young the Nobility Clergy and People deposed him excluded his Grandchildren and gave the Crown to Don Sancho his younger Son sirnamed El Bravo thinking him more fit to command them against
the Moors than an old Astrologer or a Child Alphonso and Sancho being dead Alphonso El Desheredado laid claim to the Crown but it was given to Ferdinand the Fourth and Alphonso with his descendents the Dukes de Medina Celi remain excluded to this day Peter sirnamed the Cruel was twice driven out of the Kingdom and at last killed by Bertrand to Guesclin Constable of France or Henry Count of Trastamara his Bastard-Brother who was made King without any regard to the Daughters of Peter or to the House of La Cerda Henry the Fourth lest a Daughter called Joan whom he declared his Heir but the Estates gave the Kingdom to Isabel his Sister and crowned her with Ferdinand of Arragon her Husband Joan Daughter to this Ferdinand and Isabel salling mad the Estates committed the care of the Government to her Father Ferdinand and after his death to Charles her Son But the French have taught us that when a King dies his next Heir is really King before he take his Oath or be crowned From them we learn that Le mort saisit le vif And yet I know no History that proves more plainly than theirs that there neither is nor can be in any man a right to the Government of a People which dos not receive its being manner and measure from the Law of that Country which I hope to justify by four Reasons 1. When a King of Pharamond's Race died the Kingdom was divided into as many parcels as he had Sons which could not have bin if one certain Heir had bin assigned by nature for he ought to have had the whole and if the Kingdom might be divided they who inhabited the several parcels could not know to whom they owed obedience till the division was made unless he who was to be King of Paris Metz Soissons or Orleans had worn the Name of his Kingdom upon his forehead But in truth if there might be a division the Doctrine is false and there was no Lord of the whole This wound will not be healed by saying The Father appointed the division and that by the Law of nature every man may dispose of his own as he thinks fit for we shall soon prove that the Kingdom of France neither was nor is disposeable as a Patrimony or Chattel Besides if that Act of Kings had bin then grounded upon the Law of nature they might do the like at this day But the Law by which such Divisions were made having bin abrogated by the Assembly of Estates in the time of Hugh Capet and never practised since it follows that they were grounded upon a temporary Law and not upon the Law of Nature which is eternal If this were not so the pretended certainty could not be for no man could know to whom the last King had bequeathed the whole Kingdom or parcels of it till the Will were opened and that must be done before such Witnesses as may deserve credit in a matter of this importance and are able to judg whether the Bequest be rightly made for otherwise no man could know whether the Kingdom was to have one Lord or many nor who he or they were to be which intermission must necessarily subvert their Polity and this Doctrine But the truth is the most Monarchical men among them are so far from acknowledging any such right to be in the King of alienating bequeathing or dividing the Kingdom that they do not allow him the right of making a Will and that of the last King Lewis the 13th touching the Regency during the minority of his Son was of no effect 2. This matter was made more clear under the second race If a Lord had bin assigned to them by nature he must have bin of the Royal Family But Pepin had no other Title to the Crown except the merits of his Father and his own approved by the Nobility and People who made him King He had three sons the eldest was made King of Italy and dying before him lest a Son called Bernard Heir of that Kingdom The Estates of France divided what remained between Charles the Great and Carloman The last of these dying in few years left many Sons but the Nobility made Charles King of all France and he dispossessed Bernard of the Kingdom of Italy inherited from his Father so that he also was not King of the whole before the expulsion of Bernard the Son of his elder Brother nor of Aquitain which by inheritance should have belonged to the Children of his younger Brother any otherwise than by the will of the Estates Lewis the Debonair succeeded upon the same title was deposed and put into a Monastery by his three Sons Lothair Pepin and Lewis whom he had by his first Wife But tho these lest many Sons the Kingdom came to Charles the Bald. The Nobility and People disliking the eldest Son of Charles gave the Kingdom to Lewis le Begue who had a legitimate Son called Charles le Simple and two Bastards Lewis and Carloman who were made Kings Carloman had a Son called Lewis le faineant he was made King but afterwards deposed for his vicious Lise Charles le Gros succeeded him but for his ill Government was also deposed and Odo who was a stranger to the Royal Blood was made King The same Nobility that had made five Kings since Lewis le Begue now made Charles le Simple King who according to his name was entrapped at Peronne by Ralph Duke of Burgundy and forced to resign his Crown leaving only a Son called Lewis who fled into England Ralph being dead they took Lewis sirnamed Outremer and placed him in the Throne he had two Sons Lothair and Charles Lothair succeeded him and died without Issue Charles had as fair a title as could be by Birth and the Estates confessed it but their Ambassadors told him that he having by an unworthy Life render'd himself unworthy of the Crown they whose principal care was to have a good Prince at the head of them had chosen Hugh Capet and the Crown continues in his race to this day tho not altogether without interruption Robert Son to Hugh Capet succeeded him He left two Sons Robert and Henry but Henry the younger Son appearing to the Estates of the Kingdom to be more fit to reign than his elder Brother they made him King Robert and his descendents continuing Dukes of Burgundy only for about ten Generations at which time his Issue Male failing that Dutchy returned to the Crown during the Life of King John who gave it to his second Son Philip for an Apannage still depending upon the Crown The same Province of Burgundy was by the Treaty of Madrid granted to the Emperor Charles the fifth by Francis the first but the People resused to be alienated and the Estates of the Kingdom approved their refusal By the same Authority Charles the 6th was removed from the Government when he appeared to be mad and other examples of a like nature
described to be so by the Scriptures and to give another name to those who endeavour to advance their own glory contrary to the precept of God and the interest of mankind But unless the light of reason had bin extinguished in him he might have seen that tho no Law could be made without a supreme Power that Supremacy may be in a body consisting of many men and several orders of men If it be true which perhaps may be doubted that there have bin in the world simple Monarchies Aristocracies or Democracies legally established 't is certain that the most part of the Governments of the world and I think all that are or have bin good were mixed Part of the Power has bin confer'd upon the King or the Magistrate that represented him and part upon the Senate and People as has bin proved in relation to the Governments of the Hebrews Spartans Romans Venetians Germans and all those who live under that which is usually called the Gothic Polity If the single person participating of this divided Power dislike either the Name he bears or the Authority he has he may renounce it but no reason can be from thence drawn to the prejudice of Nations who give so much as they think consistent with their own good and reserve the rest to themselves or to such other Officers as they please to establish No man will deny that several Nations have had a right of giving power to Consuls Dictators Archons Suffetes Dukes and other Magistrates in such proportions as seemed most conducing to their own good and there must be a right in every Nation of allotting to Kings so much as they please as well as to the others unless there be a charm in the word King or in the Letters that compose it But this cannot be for there is no similitude between King Rex and Bazileus they must therefore have a right of regulating the Power of Kings as well as that of Consuls or Dictators and it had not bin more ridiculous in Fabius Scipio Camillus or Cincinnatus to assert an absolute power in himself under pretence of advancing his sovereign Majesty against the Law than for any King to do the like But as all Nations give what form they please to their Government they are also judges of the name to be imposed upon each man who is to have a part in the power and 't is as lawful for us to call him King who has a limited Authority amongst us as for the Medes or Arabs to give the same name to one who is more absolute If this be not admitted we are content to speak improperly but utterly deny that when we give the name we give any thing more than we please and had rather his Majesty should change his name than to renounce our own Rights and Liberties which he is to preserve and which we have received from God and Nature But that the folly and wickedness of our Author may not be capable of any farther aggravation he says That is skills not how he come by the power Violence therefore or fraud treachery or murder are as good as Election Donation or legal Succession 'T is in vain to examine the Laws of God or Man the rights of nature whether Children do inherit the Dignities and Magistracies of their Fathers as patrimonial Lands and Goods whether regard ought to be had to the fitness of the Person whether all should go to one or be divided amongst them or by what rule we may know who is the right Heir to the Succession and consequently what we are in conscience obliged to do Our Author tells us in short it matters not how he that has the power comes by it It has bin hitherto thought that to kill a King especially a good King was a most abominable action They who did it were thought to be incited by the worst of passions that can enter into the hearts of men and the severest punishments have bin invented to deter them from such attempts or to avenge their death upon those who should accomplish it but if our Author may be credited it must be the most commendable and glorious act that can be performed by man for besides the outward advantages that men so earnestly desire he that dos it is presently invested with the Sovereign Majesty and at the same time becomes God's Vicegerent and the father of his Country possessed of that Government which in exclusion to all other forms is only favoured by the Laws of God and Nature The only inconvenience is that all depends upon success and he that is to be the Minister of God and father of his Country if he succeed is the worst of all villains if he fail and at the best may be deprived of all by the same means he employ'd to gain it Tho a Prince should have the wisdom and virtues of Moses the valour of Joshua David and the Maccabees with the gentleness and integrity of Samuel the most foolish vitious base and detestable man in the world that kills him and seizes the power becomes his Heir and father of the People that he govern'd it skills not how he did it whether in open battel or by secret treachery in the field or in the bed by poison or by the sword The vilest slave in Israel had become the Lord 's anointed if he could have kill'd David or Solomon and found villains to place him in the Throne If this be right the world has to this day lived in darkness and the actions which have bin thought to be the most detestable are the most commendable and glorious But not troubling my self at present to decide this question I leave it to Kings to consider how much they are beholden to Filmer and his disciples who set such a price upon their heads as would render it hard to preserve their Lives one day if the Doctrines were received which they endeavour to infuse into the minds of the People and concluding this point only say that we in England know no other King than he who is so by Law nor any power in that King except that which he has by Law and tho the Roman Empire was held by the power of the Sword and Ulpian a corrupt Lawyer undertakes to say that the Prince is not obliged by the Laws yet Theodosius confessed that it was the glory of a good Emperor to acknowledg himself bound by them SECT XXII The rigour 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 OUR Author's next shift is to place the King above the Law that he may mitigate the rigour of it without which he says The case of the Subject would be desperately miserable But this cure would prove worse than the disease Such pious fathers of the People as Caligula Nero or Domitian were not like to mitigate the rigour nor such as inherit Crowns in their infancy as the present
if there be any inconvenience in this 't is because they do not meet so frequently as the Law requires or by sinister means are interrupted in their sitting But nothing can be more absurd than to say that because the King dos not call Parliaments as the Law and his Oath requires that power should accrue to him which the Law and the consent of the Nation has placed in them There is also such a thing in the Law as a general or particular Pardon and the King may in some degree be entrusted with the power of giving it especially for such crimes as merely relate to himself as every man may remit the injuries done to himself but the confession of Edward the third That the Oath of the Crown had not bin kept by reason of the grant of Pardons contrary to Statutes and a new Act made that all such Charters of Pardon from henceforth granted against the Oath of the Crown and the said Statutes should be held for none demonstrates that this power was not in himself but granted by the Nation and to be executed according to such rules as the Law prescribed and the Parliament approved Moreover there having bin many and sometimes bloody contests for the Crown upon which the Nation was almost equally divided and it being difficult for them to know or even for us who have all the parties before us to judg which was the better side it was understood that he who came to be crown'd by the consent of the People was acceptable to all and the question being determined it was no way fit that he should have a liberty to make use of the publick Authority then in his hands to revenge such personal iniuries as he had or might suppose to have received which might raise new and perhaps more dangerous troubles if the Authors of them were still kept in fear of being prosecuted and nothing could be more unreasonable than that he should emplov his power to the destruction of those who had consented to make him King This made it a matter of course for a King as soon as he was crown'd to issue out a general Pardon which was no more than to declare that being now what he was not before he had no enemy upon any former account For this reason Lewis the twelfth of France when he was incited to revenge himself against those who in the reign of his Predecessor Charles the eighth had caused him to be imprisoned with great danger of his life made this answer That the King of France did not care to revenge the injuries done to the Duke of Orleans and the last King of Sweden seemed no otherwise to remember who had opposed the Queens Abdication and his Election than by conferring honours upon them because he knew they were the best men of the Nation and such as would be his friends when they should see how he would govern in which he was not deceived But lest all those who might come to the Crown of England should not have the same prudence and generosity the Kings were obliged by a Custom of no less force than a Law immediately to put an end to all disputes and the inconveniences that might arise from them This did not proceed from the bounty of the Prerogative which I think is nonsense for tho he that enjoys the Prerogative may have bounty the Prerogative can have none but from common sense from his obligation and the care of his own safety and could have no other effect in Law than what related to his person as appears by the forementioned Statute Pardon 's granted by Act of Parliament are of another nature For as the King who has no other power than by Law can no otherwise dispense with the crimes committed against the Laws than the Law dos enable him the Parliament that has the power of making Laws may intirely abolish the crimes and unquestionably remit the punishment as they please Tho some words of Aristotle's Ethicks are without any coherence shuffled together by our Author with others taken out of his Politicks I do not much except against them No Law made by man can be perfect and there must be in every Nation a power of correcting such defects as in time may arise or be discovered This power can never be so rightly placed as in the same hand that has the right of making Laws whether in one person or in many If Filmer therefore can tell us of a place where one man woman or child however he or she be qualified has the power of making Laws I will acknowledg that not only the hard Cases but as many others as he pleases are referr'd to his or her judgment and that they may give it whether they have any understanding of what they do or not whether they be drunk or sober in their senses or stark mad But as I know no such place and should not be much concerned for the sufferings of a People that should bring such misery upon themselves as must accompany an absolute dependence upon the unruly will of such a creature I may leave him to seek it and rest in a perfect assurance that he dos not speak of England which acknowledges no other Law than its own and instead of receiving any from Kings dos to this day obey none but such as have bin made by our Ancestors or our selves and never admitted any King that did not swear to observe them And if Aristotle deserve credit the power of altering mitigating explaining or correcting the Laws of England is only in the Parliament because none but the Parliament can make them SECT XXIII Aristotle proves that no man is to be entrusted with an absolute Power by shewing that no one knows how to execute it but such a man as is not to be found OUR Author having falsly cited and perverted the sense of Aristotle now brings him in saying That a perfect Kingdom is that wherein the King rules all according to his own will But tho I have read his books of Government with some attention I can find no such thing in them unless the word which signifies mere or absolute may be justly translated into perfect which is so far from Aristotle's meaning that he distinguishes the absolute or despotical Kingdoms from the Legitimate and commending the latter gives no better name than that of barbarous to the first which he says can agree only with the nature of such Nations as are base and stupid little differing from Beasts and having no skill to govern or courage to defend themselves must resign all to the will of one that will take care of them Yet even this cannot be done unless he that should take that care be wholly exempted from the vices which oblige the others to stand in need of it for otherwise 't is no better than if a Sheep should undertake to govern Sheep or a Hog to command Swine Aristotle plainly saying That as men are by nature
SECT XXVI Tho the King may be entrusted with the power of chusing Judges yet that by which they act is from the Law I Confess that no Law can be so perfect to provide exactly for every case that may fall out so as to leave nothing to the discretion of the Judges who in some measure are to interpret them But that Laws or Customs are ever few or that the paucity is the reason that they cannot give special rules or that Judges do resort to those principles or Common Law Axioms whereupon former judgments in cases something alike have bin given by former Judges who all receive their Authority from the King in his right to give Sentence I utterly deny and affirm 1. That in many places and particularly in England the Laws are so many that the number of them has introduced an uncertainty and confusion which is both dangerous and troublesom and the infinite variety of adjudged cases thwarting and contradicting each other has render'd these difficulties inextricable Tacitus imputes a great part of the miseries suffer'd by the Romans in his time to this abuse and tells us that the Laws grew to be innumerable in the worst and most corrupt state of things and that Justice was overthrown by them By the same means in France Italy and other places where the Civil Law is rendred municipal Judgments are in a manner arbitrary and tho the intention of our Laws be just and good they are so numerous and the volumes of our Statutes with the interpretations and adjudged Cases so vast that hardly any thing is so clear and fixed but men of wit and learning may find what will serve for a pretence to justify almost any judgment they have a mind to give Whereas the Laws of Moses as to the Judicial part being short and few Judgments were easy and certain and in Switzerland Sweden and some parts of Denmark the whole volume that contains them may be read in few hours and by that means no injustice can be done which is not immediately made evident 2. Axioms are not rightly grounded upon judged Cases but Cases are to be judged according to Axioms the certain is not proved by the uncertain but the uncertain by the certain and every thing is to be esteemed uncertain till it be proved to be certain Axioms in Law are as in Mathematicks evident to common sense and nothing is to be taken for an Axiom that is not so Euclid dos not prove his Axioms by his Propositions but his Propositions which are abstruse by such Axioms as are evident to all The Axioms of our Law do not receive their Authority from Coke or Hales but Coke and Hales deserve praise for giving judgment according to such as are undeniably true 3. The Judges receive their Commissions from the King and perhaps it may be said that the Custom of naming them is grounded upon a right with which he is entrusted but their power is from the Law as that of the King also is For he who has none originally in himself can give none unless it be first conserred upon him I know not how he can well perform his Oath to govern according to Law unless he execute the power with which he is entrusted in naming those men to be Judges whom in his conscience and by the advice of his Council he thinks the best and ablest to perform that Office But both he and they are to learn their duty from that Law by which they are and which allots to every one his proper work As the Law intends that men should be made Judges for their integrity and knowledg in the Law and that it ought not to be imagined that the King will break his trust by chusing such as are not so till the violation be evident nothing is more reasonable than to intend that the Judges so qualified should instruct the King in matters of Law But that he who may be a child over aged or otherwise ignorant and uncapable should instruct the Judges is equally absurd as for a blind man to be a guide to those who have the best eyes and so abhorrent from the meaning of the Law that the Judges as I said before are sworn to do justice according to the Laws without any regard to the King's words letters or commands If they are therefore to act according to a set rule from which they may not depart what command soever they receive they do not act by a power from him but by one that is above both This is commonly confess'd and tho some Judges have bin found in several ages who in hopes of reward and preferment have made little account of their Oath yet the success that many of them have had may reasonably deter others from following their example and if there are not more instances in this kind no better reason can be given than that Nations do frequently fail by being too remiss in asserting their own rights or punishing offenders and hardly ever err on the severer side 4. Judgments are variously given in several States and Kingdoms but he who would find one where they lie in the breast of the King must go at least as far as Marocco Nay the Ambassador who was lately here from that place denied that they were absolutely in him However 't is certain that in England according to the Great Charter Judgments are passed by equals no man can be imprison'd disseiz'd of his Freehold depriv'd of Life or Limb unless by the sentence of his Peers The Kings of Judah did judg and were judged and the Judgments they gave were in and with the Sanhedrim In England the Kings do not judg but are judged and Bracton says That in receiving justice the King is equal to another man which could not be if judgments were given by him and he were exempted from the judgment of all by that Law which has put all judgments into the hands of the People This power is executed by them in grand or petty Juries and the Judges are assistants to them in explaining the difficult points of the Law in which 't is presumed they should be learned The strength of every judgment consists in the verdict of these Juries which the Judges do not give but pronounce or declare and the same Law that makes good a verdict given contrary to the advice or direction of the Judges exposes them to the utmost penalties if upon their own heads or a command from the King they should presume to give a Sentence without or contrary to a Verdict and no pretensions to a power of interpreting the Law can exempt them if they break it The power also with which the Judges are entrusted is but of a moderate extent and to be executed bona fide Prevarications are capital as they proved to Tresilian Empson Dudley and many others Nay even in special Verdicts the Judges are only assistants to the Juries who find it specially
ready to use it and their extravagances having bin often chastised by Law sufficiently proves that their power is not derived from a higher original than the Law of their own Countries If it were true that the answer sometimes given by Kings to Bills presented for their Assent did as our Author says amount to a denial it could only shew that they have a negative voice upon that which is agreed by the Parliament and is far from a power of acting by themselves being only a check upon the other parts of the Government But indeed it is no more than an elusion and he that dos by art obliquely elude confesses he has not a right absolutely to refuse 'T is natural to Kings especially to the worst to scrue up their Authority to the height and nothing can more evidently prove the defect of it than the necessity of having recourse to such pitiful evasions when they are unwilling to do that which is required But if I should grant that the words import a denial and that notwithstanding those of the Coronation Oath Quas vulgus elegerit they might deny no more could be inferred from thence than that they are entrusted with a power equal in that point to that of either House and cannot be supreme in our Author's sense unless there were in the same State at the same time three distinct supreme and absolute Powers which is absurd His cases relating to the proceedings of the Star-Chamber and Council-Table do only prove that some Kings have encroached upon the rights of the Nation and bin suffer'd till their excesses growing to be extreme they turn'd to the ruin of the Ministers that advised them and sometimes of the Kings themselves But the jurisdiction of the Council having bin regulated by the Statute of the 17 Car. 1. and the Star-Chamber more lately abolished they are nothing to our dispute Such as our Author usually impute to treason and rebellion the changes that upon such occasions have ensued but all impartial men do not only justify them but acknowledg that all the Crowns of Europe are at this day enjoy'd by no other title than such acts solemnly performed by the respective Nations who either disliking the person that pretended to the Crown tho next in blood or the government of the present possessor have thought fit to prefer another person or family They also say that as no Government can be so perfect but some defect may be originally in it or afterwards introduced none can subsist unless they be from time to time reduced to their first integrity by such an exertion of the power of those for whose sake they were instituted as may plainly shew them to be subject to no power under Heaven but may do whatever appears to be for their own good And as the safety of all Nations consists in rightly placing and measuring this power such have bin found always to prosper who have given it to those from whom usurpations were least to be feared who have bin least subject to be awed cheated or corrupted and who having the greatest interest in the Nation were most concerned to preserve its power liberty and welfare This is the greatest trust that can be reposed in men This power was by the Spartans given to the Ephori and the Senat of twenty eight in Venice to that which they call Concilio de Pregadi in Germany Spain France Sweedland Denmark Poland Hungary Bohemia Scotland England and generally all the Nations that have lived under the Gothick Polity it has bin in their General Assemblies under the names of Diets Cortez Parliaments Senats and the like But in what hands soever it is the power of making abrogating changing correcting and interpreting Laws has bin in the same Kings have bin rejected or deposed the Succession of the Crown settled regulated or changed and I defy any man to shew me one King amongst all the Nations abovementioned that has any right to the Crown he wears unless such acts are good If this power be not well placed or rightly proportioned to that which is given to other Magistrates the State must necessarily fall into great disorders or the most violent and dangerous means must be frequently used to preserve their Liberty Sparta and Venice have rarely bin put to that trouble because the Senats were so much above the Kings and Dukes in power that they could without difficulty bring them to reason The Gothick Kings in Spain never ventur'd to dispute with the Nobility and Witza and Rodrigo exposed the Kingdom as a prey to the Moors rather by weakning it through the neglect of Military discipline joined to their own ignorance and cowardice and by evil example bringing the youth to resemble them in lewdness and baseness than by establishing in themselves a power above the Law But in England our Ancestors who seem to have had some such thing in their eye as balancing the powers by a fatal mistake placed usually so much in the hands of the King that whensoever he happened to be bad his extravagances could not be repress'd without great danger And as this has in several ages cost the Nation a vast proportion of generous blood so 't is the cause of our present difficulties and threatens us with more but can never deprive us of the rights we inherit from our fathers SECT XXVIII The English Nation has always bin governed by it self or its Representatives HAVING proved that the People of England have never acknowledged any other human Law than their own and that our Parliaments having the power of making and abrogating Laws they only can interpret them and decide hard cases it plainly appears there can be no truth in our Author's assertion that the King is the Author Corrector and Moderator of both Statute and Common Law and nothing can be more frivolous than what he adds that neither of them can be a diminution of that natural power which Kings have over their People as fathers in as much as the differences between paternal and monarchical Power as he asserts it are vast and irreconcileable in principle and practice as I have proved at large in the former parts of this Work But lest we should be too proud of the honour he is pleased to do to our Parliaments by making use of their Authority he says We are first to remember that till the Conquest which name for the glory of our Nation he gives to the coming in of the Normans there could be no Parliament assembled of the General States because we cannot learn that until those days it was intirely united in one Secondly he doubts Whether the Parliament in the time of the Saxons were composed of the Nobility and Clergy or whether the Commons were also called but concludes there could be no Knights of any Shires because there were no Shires Thirdly That Henry the first caused the Commons first to assemble Knights and Burgesses of their own chusing and would make this to be an act
to their Country I say that all Nations amongst whom Virtue has bin esteemed have had a great regard to them and their Posterity And tho Kings when they were made have bin intrusted by the Saxons and other Nations with a Power of ennobling those who by services render'd to their Country might deserve that Honor yet the body of the Nobility was more antient than such for it had bin equally impossible to take Kings according to Tacitus out of the Nobility if there had bin no Nobility as to take Captains for their Virtue if there had bin no Virtue and Princes could not without breach of that trust confer Honors upon those that did not deserve them which is so true that this practice was objected as the greatest crime against Vortigern the last and the worst of the British Kings and tho he might pretend according to such cavils as are usual in our time that the judgment of those matters was reserred to him yet the world judged of his Crimes and when he had render'd himself odious to God and men by them he perished in them and brought destruction upon his Country that had suffer'd them too long As among the Turks and most of the Eastern Tyrannies there is no Nobility and no man has any considerable advantage above the common People unless by the immediate favour of the Prince so in all the legal Kingdoms of the North the strength of the Government has always bin placed in the Nobility and no better defence has bin found against the encroachments of ill Kings than by setting up an Order of men who by holding large Territories and having great numbers of Tenants and Dependents might be able to restrain the exorbitances that either the Kings or the Commons might run into For this end Spain Germany France Poland Denmark Sweeden Scotland and England were almost wholly divided into Lordships under several names by which every particular Possessor owed Allegiance that is such an Obedience as the Law requires to the King and he reciprocally swore to perform that which the same Law exacted from him When these Nations were converted to the Christian Religion they had a great veneration for the Clergy and not doubting that the men whom they esteemed holy would be just thought their Liberties could not be better secured than by joining those who had the direction of their Consciences to the Noblemen who had the command of their Forces This succeeded so well in relation to the defence of the publick Rights that in all the forementioned States the Bishops Abbots c. were no less zealous or bold in defending the publick Liberty than the best and greatest of the Lords And if it were true that things being thus established the Commons did neither personally nor by their Representatives enter into the General Assemblies it could be of no advantage to Kings for such a Power as is above-mentioned is equally inconsistent with the absolute Sovereignty of Kings if placed in the Nobility and Clergy as if the Commons had a part If the King has all no other man nor number of men can have any If the Nobility and Clergy have the power the Commons may have their share also But I affirm that those whom we now call Commons have always had a part in the Government and their place in the Councils that managed it for if there was a distinction it must have bin by Patent Birth or Tenure As for Patents we know they began long after the coming of the Normans and those that now have them cannot pretend to any advantage on account of Birth or Tenure beyond many of those who have them not Nay besides the several Branches of the Families that now enjoy the most antient Honors which consequently are as noble as they and some of them of the elder Houses we know many that are now called Commoners who in antiquity and eminency are no way inferior to the chief of the titular Nobility and nothing can be more absurd than to give a prerogative of Birth to Cr-v-n T-ft-n H-ae B-nn-t Osb-rn and others before the Cliftons Hampdens Courtneys Pelhams St. Johns Baintons Wilbrahams Hungerfords and many others And if the Tenures of their Estates be consider'd they have the same and as antient as any of those who go under the names of Duke or Marquess I forbear to mention the sordid ways of attaining to Titles in our days but whoever will take the pains to examine them shall find that they rather defile than ennoble the possessors And whereas men are truly ennobled only by Virtue and respect is due to such as are descended from those who have bravely serv'd their Country because it is presumed till they shew the contrary that they will resemble their Ancestors these modern Courtiers by their Names and Titles frequently oblige us to call to mind such things as are not to be mentioned without blushing Whatever the antient Noblemen of England were we are sure they were not such as these And tho it should be confess'd that no others than Dukes Marquesses Earls Viscounts and Barons had their places in the Councils mentioned by Cesar and Tacitus or in the great Assemblies of the Saxons it could be of no advantage to such as now are called by those names They were the titles of Offices conserred upon those who did and could best conduct the people in time of War give Counsel to the King administer Justice and perform other publick duties but were never made hereditary except by abuse much less were they sold for money or given as recompences of the vilest services If the antient order be totally inverted and the ends of its institution perverted they who from thence pretend to be distinguished from other men must build their claim upon something very different from Antiquity This being sufficient if I mistake not to make it appear that the antient Councils of our Nation did not consist of such as we now call Noblemen it may be worth our pains to examine of what sort of men they did consist And tho I cannot much rely upon the credit of Camden which he has forfeited by a great number of untruths I will begin with him because he is cited by our Author If we will believe him That which the Saxons called Wittenagemot we may justly name Parliament which has the supreme and most sacred Authority of making abrogating and interpreting Laws and generally of all things relating to the safety of the Commonwealth This Wittenagemot was according to William of Malmsbury The general meeting of the Senat and People and Sir Harry Spelman calls it The General Council of the Clergy and People In the Assembly at Calcuth it was decreed by the Archbishops Bishops Abbots Dukes Senators and the People of the Land Populo terrae that the Kings should be elected by the Priests and Elders of the People By these Offa Ina and others were made Kings and Alfred
of the principal as remained due to them has bin repay'd and the Lands resumed SECT XXX Henry the First was King of England by as good a Title as any of his Predecessors or Successors HAVING made it appear as I suppose that the antient Nobility of England was composed of such men as had bin ennobled by bearing Arms in the defence or enlargement of the Common-wealth that the Dukes Earls c. were those who commanded them that they and their dependents received Lands for such services under an obligation of continuing to render the like and according to their several degrees and proportions to provide and maintain Horses Arms and Men for the same uses it cannot be denied that they were such Gentlemen and Lords of Mannors as we now call Commoners together with the Freeholders and such as in war were found most able to be their Leaders Of these the Micklegemots Wittenagemots and other publick Assemblies did consist and nothing can be more absurd than to assign the names and rights of Duke Earl and Vicount which were names of Offices to those who have not the Offices and are no way fit for them If our Author therefore had said that such as these who had always composed the great Councils of our Nation had in favour of Henry the First bestowed the Crown upon him as they had done upon his Father and Brother I should agree with him but 't is the utmost extravagance to say that he who had neither title nor possession should give the power to those who had always bin in the possession of it and exercised it in giving to him whatsoever he had But I most wonder he should so far forget himself to call this Henry a Usurper and detract from the validity of his Acts because he had no title whereas there neither is was or can be a Usurper if there be any truth in his Doctrine for he plainly tells us we are only to look to the power and not at all to the means and ways by which it is obtained and making no difference between a King and a Tyrant enjoins an equal submission to the commands of both If this were only a slip of his Pen and he did really take this Henry to be a Usurper because he had not a good title I should desire to know the marks by which a lawful King is distinguished from a Usurper and in what a just Title dos consist If he place it in an hereditary Succession we ought to be informed whether this right must be deduced from one universal Lord of Mankind or from a particular Lord of every People If from the universal Lord the same descent that gives him a right to the dominion of any one Country enslaves the whole world to him if from the particular Lord of one place proof must be given how he came to be so for if there was a defect in the first it can never be repaired and the possession is no more than a continued Usurpation But having already proved the absurdity of any pretence to either I shall forbear the repetition and only say that if the course of Succession may never be justly interrupted the family of Meroveus could not have had any right to the Crown of France Pepin was a Usurper if it must for ever have continued in the descendents of Meroveus and Hugh Capet could have no title if the race of Pepin might not be dispossess'd I leave our Author to dispute this point with the King of France and when he has so far convinced him that he is a Usurper as to perswade him to resign his Crown to the house of Austria claiming from Pharamond or to that of Lorrain as descended from Pepin I can give him half a dozen more knots which will not be with less difficulty untied and which instead of establishing the titles of such Kings as are known to us will overthrow them all unless a right be given to usurpation or the consent of a People do confer it But if there is such a thing as a Usurper and a rule by which men may judg of Usurpation 't is not only lawful but necessary for us to examine the titles of such as go under the name of Kings that we may know whether they are truly so or not lest through ignorance we chance to give the veneration and obedience that is due to a King to one who is not a King and deny it to him who by an uninterruptible line of Descent is our natural Lord and thereby prefer the worst of men and our most bitter enemy before the Person we ought to look upon as our Father and if this prove dangerous to one or more Kings 't is our Author's fault not mine If there be no Usurper nor rule of distinguishing him from a lawful Prince Filmer is the worst of all triflers and impostors who grounds his Arguments in the most serious matters upon what he esteems to be false but the truth is he seems to have set himself against humanity and common sense as much as against Law and Virtue and if he who so frequently contradicts himself can be said to mean any thing he would authorize rapine and murder and perswade us to account those to be rightful Kings who by treachery and other unjust means overthrow the right of Descent which he pretends to esteem sacred as well as the Liberties of Nations which by better judges are thought to be so and gives the odious name of usurpation to the advancement of one who is made King by the consent of a willing People But if Henry the First were a Usurper I desire to know whether the same name belongs to all our Kings or which of them deserves a better that we may understand whose acts ought to be reputed legal and to whose Descent we owe veneration or whether we are wholly exempted from all for I cannot see a possibility of fixing the guilt of Usurpation upon Henry the First without involving many if not all our Kings in the same If his title was not good because his Brother Robert was still living that of Rufus is by the same reason overthrown and William their sather being a bastard could have none This fundamental defect could never be repair'd for the Successors could inherit no more than the right of the first which was nothing Stephen could deduce no title either from Norman or Saxon whatsoever Henry the second pretended must be from his Mother Maud and any other might have bin preferred before her as well as he If her title was from the Normans it must be void since they had none and the story of Edgar Atheling is too impertinent to deserve mention But however it could be of no advantage to her for David King of Scotland Brother to her Mother from whom only her title could be derived was then alive with his Son Henry who dying not long after left three Sons and three Daughters whose posterity being
he refused In the same place they met and chose Saul to be their King He being dead the men of Judah assembled themselves and anointed David Not long after all the Tribes met at Hebron made a Contract with him and received him as their King In the same manner tho by worse Counsel they made Absalom King And the like was attempted in favour of Sheba the Son of Bichri tho they then had a King chosen by themselves When they found themselves oppressed by the Tributes that had bin laid upon them by Solomon they met at Shechem and being displeased with Rehoboam's answer to their complaints ten of the Tribes made Jeroboam King Jehu and all the other Kings of Israel whether good or bad had no other Title than was conferred upon them by the prevailing part of the People which could not have given them any unless they had met together nor meet together without the consent and against the will of those that reigned unless the Power had bin in themselves Where Governments are more exactly regulated the power of judging when 't is fit to call the Senate or People together is refer'd to one or more Magistrates as in Rome to the Consuls or Tribuns in Athens to the Archons and in Thebes to the Beotarches but none of them could have these Powers unless they had bin given by those who advanced them to the Magistracies to which they were annexed nor could they have bin so annexed if those who created them had not had the right in themselves If these Officers neglected their duty of calling such Assemblies when the publick Affairs required the people met by their own Authority and punished the Person or abrogated the Magistracy as appears in the case of the Decemviri and many others that might be alledged if the thing were not so plain as to need no further proof The reason of this is that they who institute a Magistracy best know whether the end of the Institution be rightly pursued or not And all just Magistracies being the same in essence tho differing in form the same right must perpetually belong to those who put the Sovereign Power into the hands of one a few or many men which is what our Author calls the disposal of the Sovereignty Thus the Romans did when they created Kings Consuls Military Tribuns Dictators or Decemviri and it had bin most ridiculous to say that those Officers gave authority to the people to meet and chuse them for they who are chosen are the Creatures of those who chuse and are nothing more than others till they are chosen The last King of Sweden Charles Gustavus told a Gentleman who was Ambassador there That the Swedes having made him King when he was poor and had nothing in the world he had but one work to do which was so to reign that they might never repent the good opinion they had conceived of him They might therefore meet and did meet to confer the Sovereignty upon him or he could never have had it For tho the Kingdom be hereditary to Males or Females and his Mother was Sister to the Great Gustavus yet having married a stranger without the consent of the Estates she performed not the condition upon which women are admitted to the Succession and thereby falling from her right he pretended not to any The Act of his Election declares he had none and gives the Crown to him and the Heirs of his body with this farther declaration that the benefit of his Election should no way extend to his Brother Prince Adolphus and 't is confessed by all the Swedish Nation that if the King now reigning should die without children the Estates would proceed to a new Election 'T is rightly observ'd by our Author that if the people might meet and give the Sovereign Power they might also direct and limit it for they did meet in this and other Countries they did confer the Sovereign Power they did limit and direct the exercise and the Laws of each people shew in what manner and measure it is every where done This is as certain in relation to Kings as any other Magistrates The Commission of the Roman Dictators was to take care that the Commonwealth might receive no detriment The same was sometimes given to the Consuls King Offa's confession that he was made King to preserve the publick Liberty expresses the same thing And Charles Gustavus who said he had no other work than to govern in such a manner that they who had made him King might not repent shew'd there was a Rule which he stood obliged to follow and an end which he was to procure that he might merit and preserve their good opinion This power of conferring the Sovereignty was exercised in France by those who made Meroveus King in the prejudice of the two Grandchildren of Pharamond Sons to Clodion by those who excluded his Race and gave the Crown to Pepin by those who deposed Lewis le Debonair and Charles le Gros by those who brought in five Kings that were either Bastards or Strangers between him and Charles le Simple by those who rejected his Race and advanced Hugh Capet by those who made Henry the first King to the prejudice of Robert his elder Brother and continued the Crown in the Race of Henry for ten Generations whilst the Descendents of Robert were only Dukes of Burgundy The like was done in Castille and Arragon by frequently preferring the younger before the elder Brother the Descendents of Females before those of the Male-line in the same degree the more remote in Blood before the nearest and sometimes Bastards before the legitimate Issue The same was done in England in relation to every King since the coming in of the Normans as I shewed in the last Section and other places of this Work That they who gave the Sovereignty might also circumscribe and direct it is manifest by the several ways of providing for the Succession instituted by several Nations Some are merely elective as the Empire of Germany and the Kingdom of Poland to this day the Kingdom of Denmark till the year 1660 that of Sweden till the time of Gustavus Ericson who delivered that Nation from the oppression of Christiern the second the cruel King of the Danes In others the Election was confined to one or more Families as the Kingdom of the Goths in Spain to the Balthei and Amalthei In some the eldest Man of the reigning Family was preferr'd before the nearest as in Scotland before the time of Kennethus In other places the nearest in Blood is preferr'd before the elder if more remote In some no regard is had to Females or their Descendents as in France and Turky In others they or their Descendents are admitted either simply as well as Males or under a condition of marrying in the Country or with the consent of the Estates as in Sweden And no other reason can be given for this almost infinite variety of
Constitutions than that they who made them would have it so which could not be if God and Nature had appointed one general Rule for all Nations For in that case the Kingdom of France must be elective as well as that of Poland and the Empire or the Empire and Poland hereditary as that of France Daughters must succeed in France as well as in England or be excluded in England as in France and he that would establish one as the Ordinance of God and Nature must necessarily overthrow all the rest A farther exercise of the natural Liberty of Nations is discovered in the several limitations put upon the Sovereign Power Some Kings says Grotius have the summum Imperium summo modo others modo non summo and amongst those that are under limitations the degrees as to more or less are almost infinite as I have proved already by the example of Arragon antient Germany the Saxon Kings the Normans the Kings of Castille the present Empire with divers others And I may safely say that the antient Government of France was much of the same nature to the time of Charles the 7th and Lewis the 11th but the work of emancipating themselves as they call it begun by them is now brought to perfection in a boundless elevation of the King's greatness and riches to the unspeakable misery of the people 'T were a folly to think this variety proceeds from the concessions of Kings who naturally delight in Power and hate that which crosses their will It might with more reason be imagined that the Roman Consuls who were brought up in liberty who had contracted a love to their Country and were contented to live upon an equal foot with their fellow Citizens should confine the power of their Magistracy to a year or that the Dukes of Venice should be graciously pleased to give power to the Council of Ten to punish them capitally if they transgressed the Laws than that Kings should put such Fetters upon their power which they so much abhor or that they would suffer them if they could be easily broken If any one of them should prove so moderate like Trajan to command the Prefect of the Pretorian Guard to use the Sword for him if he governed well and against him if he did not it would soon be rescinded by his Successor the Law which has no other strength than the act of one man may be annulled by another So that nothing dos more certainly prove that the Laws made in several Countries to restrain the Power of Kings and variously to dispose of the Succession are not from them than the frequent examples of their fury who have exposed themselves to the greatest dangers and brought infinite miseries upon the people through the desire of breaking them It must therefore be concluded that Nations have power of meeting together and of conferring limiting and directing the Sovereignty or all must be grounded upon most manifest Injustice and Usurpation No man can have a power over a Nation otherwise than de jure or de facto He who pretends to have a power de jure must prove that it is originally inherent in him or his predecessor from whom he inherits or that it was justly acquired by him The vanity of any pretence to an original Right appears sufficiently I hope from the proofs already given that the first Fathers of Mankind had it not or if they had no man could now inherit the same there being no man able to make good the Genealogy that should give him a right to the Succession Besides the facility we have of proving the beginnings of all the Families that reign among us makes it as absurd for any of them to pretend a perpetual right to Dominion as for any Citizen of London whose parents and birth we know to say he is the very man Noah who lived in the time of the Flood and is now four or five thousand years old If the power were conferred on him or his Predecessors 't is what we ask for the collation can be of no value unless it be made by those who had a right to do it and the original right by Descent failing no one can have any over a sree People but themselves or those to whom they have given it If acquisition be pretended 't is the same thing for there can be no right to that which is acquired unless the right of invading be proved and that being done nothing can be acquired except what belonged to the person that was invaded and that only by him who had the right of invading No man ever did or could conquer a Nation by his own strength no man therefore could ever acquire a personal right over any and if it was conferr'd upon him by those who made the conquest with him they were the People that did it He can no more be said to have the right originally in and from himself than a Magistrate of Rome or Athens immediately after his creation and having no other at the beginning he can have none to eternity for the nature of it must refer to the original and cannot be changed by time Whatsoever therefore proceeds not from the consent of the People must be de facto only that is void of all right and 't is impossible there should not be a right of destroying that which is grounded upon none and by the same rule that one man enjoys what he gained by violence another may take it from him Cyrus overthrew the Assyrians and Babylonians Alexander the Medes and Persians and if they had no right of making war upon those Nations the Nations could not but have a right of recovering all that had bin unjustly taken from them and avenging the evils they had suffered If the cause of the war was originally just and not corrupted by an intemperate use of the victory the conquer'd People was perhaps obliged to be quiet but the conquering Armies that had conferred upon their Generals what they had taken from their enemies might as justly expect an account of what they had given and that it should be imploy'd according to the intention of the givers as the People of any City might do from their regularly created Magistrates because it was as impossible for Cyrus Alexander or Cesar to gain a power over the Armies they led without their consent as for Pericles Valerius or any other disarmed Citizen to gain more power in their respective Cities than was voluntarily conferr'd upon them And I know no other difference between Kingdoms so constituted by conquering Armies and such as are established in the most orderly manner than that the first usually incline more to war and violence the latter to justice and peace But there have not bin wanting many of the first sort especially the Nations coming from the North who were no less exact in ordaining that which tended to the preservation of Liberty nor less severe in seeing it punctually performed than the
most regular Commonwealths that ever were in the world And it can with no more reason be pretended that the Goths received their privileges from Alan or Theodoric the Francs from Pharamond or Meroveus and the English from Ina or Ethelred than that the liberty of Athens was the gift of Themistocles or Pericles that the Empire of Rome proceeded from the liberality of Brutus or Valerius and that the Commonwealth of Venice at this day subsists by the favour of the Contarini or Moresini which must reduce us to matter of right since that of fact void of right can signify nothing SECT XXXII 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 IN opposition to what is above said some alledg the name of King as if there were a charm in the word and our Author seems to put more weight upon it than in the reasons he brings to support his cause But that we may see there is no efficacy in it and that it conveys no other right than what particular Nations may annex to it we are to consider 1. That the most absolute Princes that are or have bin in the world never had the name of King whereas it has bin frequently given to those whose powers have bin very much restrained The Cesars were never called Kings till the sixth age of Christianity the Califs and Soldan of Egypt and Babylon the Great Turk the Cham of Tartary or the Great Mogol never took that name or any other of the same signification The Czar of Moscovy has it not tho he is as absolute a Monarch and his People as miserable slaves as any in the world On the other side the chief Magistrates of Rome and Athens for some time those of Sparta Arragon Sweden Denmark and England who could do nothing but by Law have bin called Kings This may be enough to shew that a name being no way essential what title soever is given to the chief Magistrate he can have no other power than the Laws and Customs of his Country do give or the People confer upon him 2. The names of Magistrates are often changed tho the power continue to be the same and the powers are sometimes alter'd tho the name remain When Octavius Cesar by the force of a mad corrupted Soldiery had overthrown all Law and Right he took no other title in relation to military Affairs than that of Imperator which in the time of liberty was by the Armies often given to Pretors and Consuls In Civil matters he was as he pretended content with the power of Tribun and the like was observed in his Successor who to new invented Usurpations gave old and approved names On the other side those titles which have bin render'd odious and execrable by the violent exercise of an absolute power are sometimes made popular by moderat elimitations as in Germany where tho the Monarchy seem to be as well temper'd as any the Princes retain the same names of Imperator Cesar and Augustus as those had done who by the excess of their rage and fury had desolated and corrupted the best part of world Sometimes the name is changed tho the power in all respects continue to be the same The Lords of Castille had for many Ages no other title than that of Count and when the Nobility and People thought good they changed it to that of King without any addition to the power The Sovereign Magistrate in Poland was called Duke till within the last two hundred years when they gave the title of King to one of the Jagellan Family which title has continued to this day tho without any change in the nature of the Magistracy And I presume no wise man will think that if the Venetians should give the name of King to their Duke it could confer any other power upon him than he has already unless more should be conferr'd by the Authority of the Great Council 3. The same names which in some places denote the supreme Magistracy in others are subordinate or merely titular In England France and Spain Dukes and Earls are Subjects in Germany the Electors and Princes who are called by those names are little less than Sovereigns and the Dukes of Savoy Tuscany Moscovy and others acknowledg no Superior as well as those of Poland and Castille had none when they went under those titles The same may be said of Kings Some are subject to a foreign power as divers of them were subject to the Persian and Babylonian Monarchs who for that reason were called the Kings of Kings Some also are tributaries and when the Spaniards first landed in America the great Kings of Mexico and Peru had many others under them Threescore and ten Kings gathered up meat under the table of Adonibezek The Romans had many Kings depending upon them Herod and those of his race were of this number and the dispute between him and his Sons Aristobulus and Alexander was to be determined by them neither durst he decide the matter till it was referred to him But a right of Appeal did still remain as appears by the case of St. Paul when Agrippa was King The Kings of Mauritania from the time of Massinissa were under the like dependence Jugurtha went to Rome to justify himself for the death of Micipsa Juba was commanded by the Roman Magistrates Scipio Petreius and Afranius another Juba was made King of the same Country by Augustus and Tiridates of Armenia by Nero and infinite examples of this nature may be alledged Moreover their powers are variously regulated according to the variety of tempers in Nations and Ages Some have restrained the powers that by experience were found to be exorbitant others have dissolved the bonds that were laid upon them and Laws relating to the institution abrogation enlargement or restriction of the regal Power would be utterly insignificant if this could not be done But such Laws are of no effect in any other Country than where they are made The lives of the Spartans did not depend upon the will of Agesilaus or Leonidas because Nabuchodonosor could kill or save whom he pleased and tho the King of Marocco may stab his Subjects throw them to the Lions or hang them upon tenterhooks yet a King of Poland would probably be called to a severe account if he should unjustly kill a single man SECT XXXIII The Liberty of a People is the gift of God and Nature IF any man ask how Nations come to have the power of doing these things I answer that Liberty being only an exemption from the dominion of another the question ought not to be how a Nation can come to be free but how a man comes to have a dominion over it for till the right of Dominion be proved and justified Liberty subsists as arising from the Nature and Being of a man Tertullian speaking of the
Manners and better enabled them to frame Laws for the preservation of their Liberty but no way diminished their love to it and tho the Normans might desire to get the Lands of those who had joined with Harold and of others into their hands yet when they were settled in the Country and by marriages united to the antient Inhabitants they became true Englishmen and no less lovers of Liberty and resolute defenders of it than the Saxons had bin There was then neither conquering Norman nor conquered Saxon but a great and brave People composed of both united in blood and interest in the defence of their common Rights which they so well maintained that no Prince since that time has too violently encroached upon them who as the reward of his folly has not lived miserably and died shamefully Such actions of our Ancestors do not as I suppose savour much of the submission which patrimonial slaves do usually render to the will of their Lord. On the contrary whatsoever they did was by a power inherent in themselves to defend that Liberty in which they were born All their Kings were created upon the same condition and for the same ends Alfred acknowledged he found and left them perfectly free and the confession of Offa that they had not made him King for his own merits but for the defence of their Liberty comprehends all that were before and after him They well knew how great the honour was to be made head of a great People and rigorously exacted the performance of the ends for which such a one was elevated severely punishing those who basely and wickedly betray'd the trust reposed in them and violated all that is most sacred among men which could not have bin unless they were naturally free for the Liberty that has no being cannot be defended SECT XXXIV No Veneration paid or Honor conferr'd upon a just and lawful Magistrate can diminish the Liberty of a Nation SOME have supposed that tho the people be naturally free and Magistrates created by them they do by such creations deprive themselves of that natural liberty and that the names of King Sovereign Lord and Dread Sovereign being no way consistent with Liberty they who give such Titles do renounce it Our Author carries this very far and lays great weight upon the submissive Language used by the people when they humbly crave that his Majesty would be pleased to grant their accustomed freedom of speech and access to his Person and give the name of Supplications and Petitions to the Addresses made to him Whereas he answers in the haughty Language of Le Roy le veut Le Roy s'avisera and the like But they who talk at this rate shew that they neither understand the nature of Magistracy nor the practice of Nations Those who have lived in the highest exercise of their Liberty and have bin most tenacious of it have thought no Honor too great for such Magistrates as were eminent in the defence of their Rights and were set up for that end The name of Dread Sovereign might justly have bin given to a Roman Dictator or Consul for they had the Sovereign Authority in their hands and power sufficient for its execution Whilst their Magistracy continued they were a terror to the same men whose Axes and Rods had bin a terror to them the year or month before and might be so again the next The Romans thought they could not be guilty of excess in carrying the power and veneration due to their Dictator to the highest And Livy tells us that his Edicts were esteemed sacred I have already shewn that this haughty People who might have commanded condescended to join with their Tribuns in a Petition to the Dictator Papirius for the life of Quintus Fabius who had fought a battel in his absence and without his order tho he had gained a great and memorable Victory The same Fabius when Consul was commended by his Father Q. Fabius Maximus for obliging him by his Lictors to dismount from his Horse and to pay him the same respect that was due from others The Tribuns of the People whe were instituted for the preservation of Liberty were also esteemed sacred and inviolable as appears by that phrase Sacrosancta Tribunorum potest as so common in their antient Writers No man I presume thinks any Monarchy more limited or more clearly derived from a delegated Power than that of the German Emperors and yet Sacra Caesarea Majest as is the publick stile Nay the Hollanders at this day call their Burgermasters tho they see them selling Herring or Tar High and Mighty Lords as soon as they are advanced to be of the 36 42 or 48 Magistrates of a small Town 'T is no wonder therefore if a great Nation should think it conducing to their own glory to give magnificent Titles and use submissive language to that one man whom they set up to be their Head most especially if we consider that they came from a Country where such Titles and Language were principally invented Among the Romans and Grecians we hear nothing of Majesty Highness Serenity and Excellence appropriated to a single Person but receive them from Germany and other Northern Countries We find Majestas Populi Romani and Majestas Imperii in their best Authors but no man speaking to Julius or Augustus or even to the vainest of their Successors ever used those empty Titles nor took upon themselves the name of Servants as we do to every fellow we meet in the streets When such ways of speaking are once introduced they must needs swell to a more than ordinary height in all transactions with Princes Most of them naturally delight in vanity and Courtiers never speak more truth than when they most extol their Masters and assume to themselves the names that best express the most abject slavery These being brought into mode like all ill customs increase by use and then no man can omit them without bringing that hatred and danger upon himself which few will undergo except for something that is evidently of great importance Matters of ceremony and title at the first seem not to be so and being for some time neglected they acquire such strength as not to be easily removed From private Usage they pass into publick Acts and those Flatterers who gave a beginning to them proposing them in publick Councils where too many of that sort have always insinuated themselves gain credit enough to make them pass This work was farther advanced by the Church of Rome according to their custom of favouring that most which is most vain and corrupt and it has bin usual with the Popes and their adherents liberally to gratify Princes for Services render'd to the Church with Titles that tended only to the prejudice of the people These poisonous Plants having taken root grew up so fast that the Titles which within the space of a hundred years were thought sufficient for the Kings and Queens of England have
of late bin given to Monk and his honourable Dutchess New phrases have bin invented to please Princes or the sense of the old perverted as has happen'd to that of Le Roy s'avisera And that which was no more than a Liberty to consult with the Lords upon a Bill presented by the Commons is by some men now taken for a Right inherent in the King of denying such Bills as may be offer'd to him by the Lords and Commons tho the Coronation Oath oblige him to hold keep and defend the just Laws and Customs quas vulgus elegerit And if a stop be not put to this exorbitant abuse the words still remaining in Acts of Parliament which shew that their Acts are our Laws may perhaps be also abolished But tho this should come to pass by the slackness of the Lords and Commons it could neither create a new Right in the King nor diminish that of the People But it might give a better colour to those who are Enemies to their Country to render the Power of the Crown arbitrary than any thing that is yet among us SECT XXXV 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 THEY who have more regard to the prevailing Power than to Right and lay great weight upon the Statute of Henry the seventh which authorizes the Acts of a King de facto seem not to consider that thereby they destroy all right of Inheritance that he only is King de facto who is received by the People and that this reception could neither be of any value in it self nor be made valid by a Statute unless the People and their Representatives who make the Statute had in themselves the power of receiving authorizing and creating whom they please For he is not King de facto who calls himself so as Perkin or Simnel but he who by the consent of the Nation is possess'd of the Regal Power If there were such a thing in nature as a natural Lord over every Country and that the right must go by descent it would be impossible for any other man to acquire it or for the people to confer it upon him and to give the Authority to the Acts of one who neither is nor can be a King which belongs only to him who has the right inherent in himself and inseparable from him Neither can it be denied that the same power which gives the validity to such Acts as are performed by one who is not a King that belongs to those of a true King may also make him King for the essence of a King consists in the validity of his Acts. And 't is equally absurd for one to pretend to be a King whose Acts as King are not valid as that his own can be valid if those of another are for then the same indivisible Right which our Author and those of his principles assert to be inseparable from the Person would be at the same time exercised and enjoyed by two distinct and contrary Powers Moreover it may be observed that this Statute was made after frequent and bloody Wars concerning Titles to the Crown and whether the cause were good or bad those who were overcome were not only subject to be killed in the field but afterwards to be prosecuted as Traitors under the colour of Law He who gained the Victory was always set up to be King by those of his party and he never failed to proceed against his Enemies as Rebels This introduced a horrid series of the most destructive mischiefs The fortune of War varied often and I think it may be said that there were few if any great Families in England that were not either destroy'd or at least so far shaken as to lose their Chiefs and many considerable branches of them And experience taught that instead of gaining any advantage to the Publick in point of Government he for whom they fought seldom proved better than his Enemy They saw that the like might again happen tho the title of the reigning King should be as clear as descent of blood could make it This brought things into an uneasy posture and 't is not strange that both the Nobility and Commonalty should be weary of it No Law could prevent the dangers of battel for he that had followers and would venture himself might bring them to such a decision as was only in the hand of God But thinking no more could justly be required to the full performance of their Duty to the King than to expose themselves to the hazard of battel for him and not being answerable for the success they would not have that Law which they endeavour'd to support turned to their destruction by their Enemies who might come to be the interpreters of it But as they could be exempted from this danger only by their own Laws which could authorize the Acts of a King without a Title and justify them for acting under him 't is evident that the power of the Law was in their hands and that the acts of the person who enjoyed the Crown were of no value in themselves The Law had bin impertinent if it could have bin done without Law and the Intervention of the Parliament useless if the Kings de facto could have given authority to their own Acts. But if the Parliament could make that to have the effect of Law which was not Law and exempt those that acted according to it from the penalties of the Law and give the same force to the Acts of one who is not King as of one who is they cannot but have a power of making him to be King who is not so that is to say all depends intirely upon their Authority Besides he is not King who assumes the title to himself or is set up by a corrupt party but he who according to the usages required in the case is made King If these are wanting he is neither de facto nor de jure but Tyrannus sine titulo Nevertheless this very man if he comes to be received by the People and placed in the Throne he is thereby made King de facto His Acts are valid in Law the same service is due to him as to any other they who render it are in the same manner protected by the Law that is to say he is truly King If our Author therefore do allow such to be Kings he must confess that power to be good which makes them so when they have no right in themselves If he deny it he must not only deny that there is any such thing as a King de facto which the Statute acknowledges but that we ever had any King in England for we never had any other than such as I have proved before By the same means he will so unravel all the Law that no man shall know what he has or what he ought to do or avoid and will find no
or may not be question'd because none have bin questioned But in truth they are frequently questioned The people do perpetually judg of the behaviour of their Deputies Whensoever any of them has the misfortune not to satisfy the major part of those that chose him he is sure to be rejected with disgrace the next time he shalldesire to be chosen This is not only a sufficient punishment for such faults as he who is but one of five hundred may probably commit but as much as the greatest and freest people of the world did ever inflict upon their Commanders that brought the greatest losses upon them Appius Claudius Pomponius and Terentius Varro survived the greatest defeats that ever the Romans suffer'd and tho they had caused them by their folly and perversness were never punished Yet I thing no man doubts that the Romans had as much right over their own Officers as the Athenians and Carthaginians who frequently put them to death They thought the mind of a Commander would be too much distracted if at the same time he should stand in fear both of the Enemy and his own Countrymen And as they always endeavoured to chuse the best men they would lay no other necessity upon them of performing their duty than what was suggested by their own virtue and love to their Country 'T is not therefore to be thought strange if the people of England have follow'd the most generous and most prosperous Examples Besides if any thing has bin defective in their usual proceedings with their Delegats the inconvenience has bin repaired by the modesty of the best and wisest of them that were chosen Many in all Ages and sometimes the whole body of the Commons have refused to give their opinion in some cases till they had consulted with those that sent them The Houses have bin often adjourned to give them time to do it and if this were done more frequently or that the Towns Cities and Counties had on some occasions given instructions to their Deputies matters would probably have gone better in Parliament than they have often done 3. The question is not whether the Parliament be impeccable or infallible but whether an Assembly of Nobility with a House of Commons composed of those who are best esteemed by their Neighbors in all the Towns and Counties of England are more or less subject to error or corruption than such a man woman or child as happens to be next in blood to the last King Many men do usually see more than one and if we may believe the wisest King In the multitude of Counsellors there is safety Such as are of mature Age good Experience and approved reputation for Virtue and Wisdom will probably judg better than children or fools Men are thought to be more fit for War than women and those who are bred up in Discipline to understand it better than those who never knew any thing of it If some Counties or Cities fail to chuse such men as are eminently capable all will hardly be so mistaken as to chuse those who have no more of Wisdom or Virtue than is usually intail'd upon Families But Filmer at a venture admires the profound Wisdom of the King tho besides such as we have known Histories give us too many proofs that all those who have bin possessed of Crowns have not excelled that way He speaks of Kings in general and makes no difference between Solomon and his foolish Son He distinguishes not our Edward the first from Edward the second Edward the third from Richard the second or Henry the fifth from Henry the sixth And because all of them were Kings all of them if he deserves credit must needs have bin endow'd with profound Wisdom David was wise as an Angel of God therefore the present Kings of France Spain and Sweden must have bin so also when they were but five years old Joan of Castille could not be mad nor the two Joans of Naples infamous Strumpets or else all his Arguments fall to the ground For the Solomon's Wisdom surpassed that of all the people yet men could not rely equally upon that of Rehoboam unless it had bin equal And if they are all equal in Wisdom when they come to be equally Kings Perses of Macedon was as great a Captain as Philip or Alexander Commodus and Heliogabalus were as wise and virtuous as Marcus Aurelius and Antoninus Pius Nay Christina of Sweden in her infancy was as fit to command an Army as her valiant Father If this be most absurd and false there can be neither reason nor sense in proposing as our Author dos that the Power should be in the King because the Parliament is not infallible It is says he for the Head to correct and not to expect the consent of the Members or Parties peccant to be Judges in their own cases nor is it needful to confine the King c. Besides that this is directly contrary to his own fundamental Maxim that no man mnst be the Judg of his own case in as much as this would put the Power into the King's hands to decide the Controversies between himself and the people in which his own Passions privat Interest and the corrupt Counsels of ill Ministers will always lead him out of the way of Justice the inconveniences that may arise from a possibility that the Parliament or People is not infallible will be turned to the most certain and destructive mischiefs as must have fallen out in Spain if upon a supposition that the Estates of Castille might err the correction of such Errors had bin lest to the profound Wisdom and exquisit Judgment of Joan their Queen and Head who was stark mad And the like may be said of many other Princes who through natural or accidental infirmities want of age or dotage have bin utterly unable to judg of any thing The matter will not be much mended tho I pass from Ideots and Lunaticks to such as know well enough how to clothe and feed themselves and to perform the ordinary functions of life and yet have bin as uncapable of giving a right judgment concerning the weighty matters of Government as the weakest of Children or the most furious of Madmen Good manners forbid me to enumerate the examples of this kind which Europe has produced even in this Age But I should commit a greater fault if I did in silence pass over the extravagances of those who being most weak in judgment and irregular in their appetites have bin most impatient of any restraint upon their will The brave Gustavus Adolphus and his Nephew Carolus Gustavus who was not inferior to him in Valour Wisdom and love to his people were content with the Power that the Laws of their Country gave to them But Frederick the fourth of Denmark never rested till he had overthrown the Liberty of that Nation Casimir by attempting the like in Poland lost almost half of that Kingdom and flying from the other left all to
his hands it would neither bring inconvenience or danger on the present King He can with patience expect that nature should take her course and would neither anticipate nor secure his entrance into the possession of the power by taking one day from the life of his Brother Tho the Papists know that like a true Son of their Church he would prefer the advancement of their Religion before all other considerations and that one stab with a Dagger or a dose of Poison would put all under his feet not one man would be found among them to give it The Assassins were Mahometans not pupils of the honest Jesuits nor ever employ'd by them These things being certain all our concernments would be secure if instead of the foolish Statutes and antiquated Customs on which our Ancestors and we have hitherto doted we may be troubled with no Law but the King's will and a Proclamation may be taken for a sufficient declaration of it We shall by this means be delivered from that Liberty with a mischief in which our mistaken Nation seems so much to delight This phrase is so new and so peculiar to our Author that it deserves to be written upon his Tomb. We have heard of Tyranny with a mischief Slavery and Bondage with a mischief and they have bin denounced by God against wicked and perverse Nations as mischiefs comprehending all that is most to be abhorr'd and dreaded in the world But Filmer informs us that Liberty which all wise and good men have in all ages esteemed to be the most valuable and glorious privilege of mankind is a mischief If he deserve credit Moses Joshua Gideon Sampson and Samuel with others like them were enemies to their Country in depriving the people of the advantages they enjoy'd under the paternal care of Pharaoh Adonibezek Eglon Jabin and other Kings of the neighbouring Nations and restoring them to that Liberty with a mischief which he had promised to them The Israelites were happy under the power of Tyrants whose Proclamations were Laws and they ought to have bin thankful to God for that condition and not for the deliverances he wrought by the hands of his Servants Subjection to the will of a man is happiness Liberty is a mischief But this is so abominably wicked and detestable that it can deserve no answer SECT XLIV No People that is not free can substitute Delegates HOW full soever the Power of any person or people may be he or they are obliged to give only so much to their Delegates as seems convenient to themselves or conducing to the ends they desire to attain but the Delegate can have none except what is conferred upon him by his Principal If theresore the Knights Citizens and Burgesses sent by the People of England to serve in Parliament have a Power it must be more perfectly and fully in those that send them But as was proved in the last Section Proclamations and other significations of the King's pleasure are not Laws to us They are to be regulated by the Law not the Law by them They are to be considered only so far as they are conformable to the Law srom which they receive all the strength that is in them and can confer none upon it We know no Laws but our own Statutes and those immemorial Customs established by the consent of the Nation which may be and often are changed by us The Legislative Power therefore that is exercised by the Parliament cannot be conferred by the Writ of Summons but must be essentially and radically in the People from whom their Delegates and Representatives have all that they have But says our Author They must only chuse and trust those whom they chuse to do what they list and that is as much liberty as many of us deserve for our irregular Elections of Burgesses This is ingeniously concluded I take what Servant I please and when I have taken him I must suffer him to do what he pleases But from whence should this necessity arise Why may not I take one to be my Groom another to be my Cook and keep them both to the Offices for which I took them What Law dos herein restrain my Right And if I am free in my private capacity to regulate my particular affairs according to my own discretion and to allot to each Servant his proper work why have not I with my Associates the Freemen of England the like liberty of directing and limiting the Powers of the Servants we employ in our publick Affairs Our Author gives us reasons proportionable to his judgment This were liberty with a mischief and that of chusing only is as much as many of us deserve I have already proved that as far as our Histories reach we have had no Princes or Magistrates but such as we have made and they have had no other power than what we have conferred upon them They cannot be the judges of our merit who have no power but what we gave them thrô an opinion they did or might deserve it They may distribute in parcels to particulars that with which they are entrusted in the gross But 't is impossible that the Publick should depend absolutely upon those who are nothing above other men except what they are made to be for and by the Publick The restrictions therefore of the peoples Liberty must be from themselves or there can be none Nevertheless I believe that the Powers of every County City and Borough of England are regulated by the general Law to which they have all consented and by which they are all made Members of one political Body This obliges them to proceed with their Delegates in a manner different from that which is used in the United Netherlands or in Switserland Amongst these every Province City or Canton making a distinct body independent from any other and exercising the sovereign Power within it self looks upon the rest as Allies to whom they are bound only by such Acts as they themselves have made and when any new thing not comprehended in them happens to arise they oblige their Delegates to give them an account of it and retain the power of determining those matters in themselves 'T is not so amongst us Every County dos not make a distinct Body having in it self a sovereign Power but is a Member of that great Body which comprehends the whole Nation 'T is not therefore for Kent or Sussex Lewis or Maidstone but for the whole Nation that the Members chosen in those places are sent to serve in Parliament and tho it be fit for them as Friends and Neighbours so far as may be to hearken to the opinions of the Electors for the information of their Judgments and to the end that what they shall say may be of more weight when every one is known not to speak his own thoughts only but those of a great number of men yet they are not strictly and properly obliged to give account of their actions to any
manifest this by the words Be it enacted by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons in Parliament assembled and by Authority of the same But King James says Filmer in his Law of free Monarchy affirms the contrary and it may be so yet that is nothing to us No man doubts that he desired it might be so in England but it dos not from thence appear that it is so The Law of a free Monarchy is nothing to us for that Monarchy is not free which is regulated by a Law not to be broken without the guilt of Perjury as he himself confessed in relation to ours As to the words cited from Hooker I can find no hurt in them To draw up the form of a good Law is a matter of invention and judgment but it receives the force of a Law from the power that enacts it We have no other reason for the paiment of Excise or Customs than that the Parliament has granted those Revenues to the King to defray the publick Charges Whatever therefore King James was pleased to say in his Books or in those written for him we do not so much as know that the killing of a King is Treason or to be punished with death otherwise than as it is enacted by Parliament and it was not always so for in the time of Ethelstan the Estimates of Lives were agreed in Parliament and that of a King valued at thirty thousand Thrymsae And if that Law had not bin alter'd by the Parliament it must have bin in force at this day It had bin in vain for a King to say he would have it otherwise for he is not created to make Laws but to govern according to such as are made and sworn to assent to such as shall be proposed He who thinks the Crown not worth accepting on these conditions may refuse it The words Le Roy le veult are only a pattern of the French fashions upon which some Kings have laid great stress and would no doubt have bin glad to introduce Car tel est nostre plaisir but that may prove a difficult matter Nay in France it self where that Stile and all the ranting expressions that please the vainest of men are in mode no Edict has the power of a Law till it be registred in Parliament This is not a mere ceremony as some pretend but all that is essential to a Law Nothing has bin more common than for those Parliaments to refuse Edicts sent to them by the King When John Chastel had at the instigation of the Jesuits stabb'd Henry the fourth in the Mouth and that Order had designed or executed many other execrable crimes they were banished out of the Kingdom by an Arrest of the Parliament of Paris Some other Parliaments registred the same but those of Tholouse and Bordeaux absolutely refused and notwithstanding all that the King could do the Jesuits continued at Tournon and many other places within their Precincts till the Arrest was revoked These proceedings are so displeasing to the Court that the most violent ways have bin often used to abolish them About the year 1650 Seguier then Chancellor of France was sent with a great number of Soldiers to oblige the Parliament of Paris to pass some Edicts upon which they had hesitated but he was so far from accomplishing his design that the People rose against him and he thought himself happy that he escaped with his Life If the Parliaments do not in all parts of the Kingdom continue in the Liberty of approving or rejecting all Edicts the Law is not altered but oppressed by the violence of the Sword And the Prince of Condé who was principally employ'd to do that work may as I suppose have had leisure to reflect upon those Actions and cannot but find reason to conclude that his excellent valour and conduct was used in a most noble exploit equally beneficial to his Country and himself However those who are skilled in the Laws of that Nation do still affirm that all publick Acts which are not duly examined and registred are void in themselves and can be of no force longer than the miserable People lies under the violence of Oppression which is all that could reasonably be said if a Pirat had the same power over them But whether the French have willingly offer'd their ears to be bor'd or have bin subdued by force it concerns us not Our Liberties depend not upon their will virtue or fortune how wretched and shameful soever their Slavery may be the evil is only to themselves We are to consider no human Laws but our own and if we have the spirit of our Ancestors we shall maintain them and die as free as they left us Le Roy le veut tho written in great Letters or pronounced in the most tragical manner can signify no more than that the King in performance of his Oath dos assent to such Laws as the Lords and Commons have agreed Without prejudice to themselves and their Liberties a People may suffer the King to advise with his Council upon what they propose Two eyes see more than one and human judgment is subject to errors Tho the Parliament consist of the most eminent men of the Nation yet when they intend good they may be mistaken They may sefely put a check upon themselves that they may farther consider the most important matters and correct the errors that may have bin committed if the King's Council do discover them but he can speak only by the advice of his Council and every man of them is with his head to answer for the advices he gives If the Parliament has not bin satisfied with the reasons given against any Law that they offer'd it has frequently pass'd and if they have bin satisfied 't was not the King but they that laid it aside He that is of another opinion may try whether Le Roy le veut can give the force of a Law to any thing conceived by the King his Council or any other than the Parliament But if no wise man will affirm that he can do it or deny that by his Oath he is obliged to assent to those that come from them he can neither have the Legislative power in himself nor any other part in it than what is necessarily to be performed by him as the Law prescribes I know not what our Author means by saying Le Roy le veut is the interpretative phrase pronounced at the passing of every Act of Parliament For if there be difficulty in any of them those words do no way remove it But the following part of the paragraph better deserves to be observed It was says he the antient custom for á long time until the days of Henry the fifth for the Kings when any Bill was brought to them that had passed both Houses to take and pick out what they liked not and so much as they chose was enacted as a Law But the custom of the
whatever to admit of one who is evidently guilty of such Vices as are prejudicial to the State For this reason the French tho much addicted to their Kings rejected the vile remainders of Meroveus his Race and made Pepin the Son of Charles Martel King And when his Descendents sell into the like Vices they were often deposed till at last they were wholly rejected and the Crown given to Capet and to his Heirs Male as formerly Yet for all this Henry his Grandchild being esteemed more fit to govern than his elder Brother Robert was as is said before made King and that Crown still remains in his Descendents no consideration being had of the Children of Robert who continued Dukes of Burgundy during the reigns of ten Kings And in the memory of our Fathers Henry of Navarr was rejected by two Assemblies of the Estates because he differed in Religion from the Body of the Nation and could never be received as King till he had renounced his own tho he was certainly the next in Blood and that in all other respects he excelled in those Vertues which they most esteem We have already proved that our own History is full of the like Examples and might enumerate a multitude of others if it were not too tedious and as the various Rules according to which all the hereditary Crowns of the World are inherited shew that none is set by Nature but that every People proceeds according to their own Will the frequent deviations from those Rules do evidently testify that Salus Populi est Lex suprema and that no Crown is granted otherwise than in submission to it But tho there were a Rule which in no case ought to be transgressed there must be a Power of judging to whom it ought to be applied 'T is perhaps hard to conceive one more precise than that of France where the eldest Legitimate Male in the direct Line is preserred and yet that alone is not sufficient There may be Bastardy in the case Bastards may be thought legitimate and legitimate Sons Bastards The Children born of Isabel of Portugal during her Marriage with John the Third of Castile were declared Bastards and the Title of the House of Austria to that Crown depends upon that Declaration We often see that Marriages which have bin contracted and for a long time taken to be good have bin declared null and the legitimation of the present King of France is founded solely upon the abolition of the marriage of Henry the Fourth with Marguerite of Valois which for the space of twenty seven Years was thought to have bin good Whilst Spain was divided into five or six Kingdoms and the several Kings linked to each other by mutual Alliances incestuous Marriages were often contracted and upon better consideration annulled many have bin utterly void through the preingagement of one of the Parties These are not feigned Cases but such as happen frequently and the diversity of Accidents as well as the humours of Men may produce many others which would involve Nations in the most satal Disorders if every one should think himself obliged to follow such a one who pretended a Title that to him might seem plausible when another should set up one as pleasing to others and there were no Power to terminate those Disputes to which both must submit but the decision must be lest to the Sword This is that which I call the Application of the Rule when it is as plain and certain as humane Wisdom can make it but if it be lest more at large as where Females inherit the difficulties are inextricable and he that says The next Heir is really King when one is dead before he be so declared by a Power that may judg of his Title dos as far as in him lies expose Nations to be split into the most desperate Factions and every man to fight for the Title which he fancies to be good till he destroy those of the contrary Party or be destroyed by them This is the blessed way proposed by our Author to prevent Sedition But God be thanked our Ancestors found a better They did not look upon Robert the Norman as King of England after the death of his Father and when he did proudly endeavour on pretence of Inheritance to impose himself upon the Nation that thought fit to prefer his younger Brothers before him he paid the Penalty of his solly by the loss of his Eyes and Liberty The French did not think the Grandchild of Pharamond to be King after the death of his Father nor seek who was the next Heir of the Merovingian Line when Chilperic the third was dead nor regard the Title of Charles of Lorrain after the death of his Brother Lothair or of Robert of Burgundy eldest Son of King Robert but advanced Meroveus Pepin Capet and Henry the first who had no other Right than what the Nobility and People bestowed upon them And if such Acts do not destroy the Pretences of all who lay claim to Crowns by Inheritance and do not create a Right I think it will be hard to find a lawful King in the world or that there ever have bin any since the first did plainly come in like Nimrod and those who have bin every where since Histories are known to us owed their exaltation to the Consent of Nations armed or unarmed by the deposition or exclusion of the Heirs of such as had reigned before them Our Author not troubling himself with these things or any other relating to the matter in question is pleased to slight Hooker's Opinions concerning Coronation and Inauguration with the heaps of Scripture upon which he grounds them whereas those Solemnities would not only have bin foolish and impertinent but profane and impious if they were not Deeds by which the Right of Dominion is really conferred What could be more wickedly superstitious than to call all Israel together before the Lord and to cast Lots upon every Tribe Family and Person for the election of a King if it had bin known to whom the Crown did belong by a natural and unalterable Right Or if there had bin such a thing in Nature how could God have cauled that Lot to fall upon one of the youngest Tribe for ever to discountenance his own Law and divert Nations from taking any notice of it It had bin absurd for the Tribe of Judah to chuse and anoint David and for the other Tribes to follow their example after the death of Ishbosheth if he had bin King by a Right not depending on their Will David did worse in slaying the Sons of Rimmon saying they had killed a righteous Man lying upon his bed if Ishbosheth whose Head they presented had most unrighteously detained from him as long as he lived the Dominion of the ten Tribes The King Elders and People had most scornfully abused the most sacred things by using such Ceremonies in making him King and compleating their work in a Covenant made between him
and them before the Lord if he had bin already King and if those Acts had bin empty Ceremonies conferring no Right at all I dare not say that a League dos imply an absolute equality between both Parties for there is a Foedus inequale wherein the weaker as Grotius says dos usually obtain protection and the stronger honour but there can be none at all unless both Parties are equally free to make it or not to make it David therefore was not King till he was elected and those Covenants made and he was made King by that Election and Covenants This is not shaken by our Author's supposition That the People would not have taken Joas Manasseh or Josiah if they had had a right of chusing a King since Solomon says Wo unto the Kingdom whose King is a Child For first they who at the first had a right of chusing whom they pleased to be King by the Covenant made with him whom they did chuse may have deprived themselves of the farther execution of it and rendred the Crown hereditary even to Children unless the Conditions were violated upon which it was granted In the second place if the infancy of a King brings Wo upon a People the Government of such a one cannot be according to the Laws of God and Nature for Governments are not instituted by either for the pleasure of a Man but for the good of Nations and their Weal not their Wo is sought by both and if Children are any where admitted to rule 't is by the particular Law of the place grounded perhaps upon an opinion that it is the best way to prevent dangerous Contests or that other ways may be found to prevent the Inconveniences that may proceed from their weakness Thirdly It cannot be concluded that they might not reject Children because they did not such matters require positive Proofs Suppositions are of no value in relation to them and the whole matter may be altered by particular Circumstances The Jews might reasonably have a great veneration for the House of David they knew what was promised to that Family and whatever respect was paid or privilege granted on that account can be of no advantage to any other in the world They might be farther induced to set up Joas in hope the defects of his Age might be supplied by the Vertue Experience and Wisdom of Jehoiada We do not know what good opinion may have bin conceived of Manasseh when he was twelve years old but much might be hoped from one that had bin virtuously educated and was probably under the care of such as had bin chosen by Hezekiah and tho the contrary did fall out the mischiefs brought upon the People by his wicked Reign proceeded not from the weakness of his childhood but from the malice of his riper years And both the Examples of Joas and Josiah prove that neither of them came in by their own right but by the choice of the People Jehoiada gathered the Levites out of all the Cities of Judah and the chief of the Fathers of Israel and they came to Jerusalem And all the Congregation made a Covenant with the King in the House of God and brought out the King's Son and put upon him the Crown and gave him the Testimony and made him King whereupon they slew Athaliah And when Ammon was stain the people of the Land slew them that had conspired against King Ammon and the people of the Land made Josiah his Son King in his stead which had been most impertinent if he was of himself King before they made him so Besides tho Infancy may be a just cause of excepting against and rejecting the next Heir to a Crown 't is not the greatest or strongest 'T is far more easy to find a Remedy against the solly of a Child if the State be well regulated than the more rooted Vices of grown men The English who willingly received Henry the sixth Edward the fifth and sixth tho Children resolutely opposed Robert the Norman And the French who willingly submitted to Charles the ninth Lewis the thirteenth and fourteenth in their Infancy rejected the lewd remainders of Meroveus his Race Charles of Lorrain with his Kindred descended from Pepin Robert Duke of Burgundy with his Descendents and Henry of Navarr till he had satisfied the Nobility and People in the point of Religion And tho I do not know that the Letter upon the words Vaeregnocujus Rex puer est recited by Lambard was written by Eleutherius Bishop of Rome yet the Authority given to it by the Saxons who made it a Law is much more to be valued than what it could receive from the Writer and whoever he was he seems rightly to have understood Solomon's meaning who did not look upon him as a Child that wanted years or was superannuated but him only who was guilty of Insolence Luxury Folly and Madness and he that said A wise Child was better than an old and foolish King could have no other meaning unless he should say it was worse to be governed by a wise Person than a Fool which may agree with the judgment of our Author but could never enter into the heart of Solomon Lastly Tho the practice of one or more Nations may indicate what Laws Covenants or Customs were in force among them yet they cannot bind others The diversity of them proceeds from the variety of mens Judgments and declares that the direction of all such Affairs depends upon their own Will according to which every People for themselves forms and measures the Magistracy and magistratical Power which as it is directed solely for the good hath its exercises and extent proportionable to the Command of those that institute it and such Ordinances being good for men God makes them his own SECT VIII There is no natural propensity in Man or Beast to Monarchy I See no reason to believe that God did approve the Government of one over many because he created but one but to the contrary in as much as he did endow him and those that came from him as well the youngest as the eldest Line with understanding to provide for themselves and by the invention of Arts and Sciences to be beneficial to each other he shewed that they ought to make use of that understanding in forming Governments according to their own convenience and such occasions as should arise as well as in other matters and it might as well be inferr'd that it is unlawful for us to build clothe arm defend or nourish our selves otherwise than as our first Parents did before or soon after the Flood as to take from us the liberty of instituting Governments that were not known to them If they did not find out all that conduces to the use of man but a Faculty as well as a Liberty was left to every one and will be to the end of the world to make use of his Wit Industry and Experience according to present Exigencies to
it Some being incensed against their Kings as the Romans exasperated by the Villanies of Tarquin and the Tuscans by the Cruelties of Mezentius abolished the name of King Others as Athens Sicion Argos Corinth Thebes and the Latins did not stay for such extremities but set up other Governments when they thought it best for themselves and by this conduct prevented the evils that usually fall upon Nations when their Kings degenerate into Tyrants and a Nation is brought to enter into a War by which all may be lost and nothing can be gained which was not their own before The Romans took not this salutary Course the mischief was grown up before they perceived or set themselves against it and when the effects of Pride Avarice Cruelty and Lust were grown to such a height that they could no longer be endured they could not free themselves without a War and whereas upon other occasions their Victories had brought them increase of Strength Territory and Glory the only reward of their Virtue in this was to be delivered from a Plague they had unadvisedly suffered to grow up among them I confess this was most of all to be esteemed for if they had bin overthrown their condition under Tarquin would have bin more intolerable than if they had fallen under the power of Pirrhus or Hannibal and all their following Prosperity was the fruit of their recover'd Liberty But it had bin much better to have reformed the State after the death of one of their good Kings than to be brought to fight for their Lives against that abominable Tyrant Our Author in pursuance of his aversion to all that is good disapproves this and wanting reasons to justify his dislike according to the custom of Impostors and Cheats hath recourse to the ugly terms of a back-door Sedition and Faction as if it were not as just for a People to lay aside their Kings when they receive nothing but evil and can rationally hope for no benefit by them as for others to set them up in expectation of good from them But if the truth be examin'd nothing will be found more orderly than the changes of Government or of the Persons and Races of those that governed which have bin made by many Nations When Pharamond's Grandson seemed not to deserve the Crown he had worn the French gave it to Meroveus who more resembled him in Virtue In process of time when this Race also degenerated they were rejected and Pepin advanced to the Throne and the most remote in blood of his Descendents having often bin preferred before the nearest and Bastards before the legitimate Issue they were at last all laid aside and the Crown remains to this day in the Family of Hugh Capet on whom it was bestow'd upon the rejection of Charles of Lorrain In like manner the Castilians took Don Sancho sirnamed the Brave second Son to Alphonso the Wise before Alphonso el Desheredado Son of the elder Brother Ferdinand The States of Arragon preferred Martin Brother to John the first before Mary his Daughter married to the Count de Foix tho Females were not excluded from the Succession and the House of Austria now enjoys that Crown from Joan Daughter to Ferdinand In that and many other Kingdoms Bastards have bin advanced before their legitimate Brothers Henry Count of Trastamara Bastard to Alphonso the II King of Castile received the Crown as a reward of the good Service he had done to his Country against his Brother Peter the Cruel without any regard had to the House of La Cerda descended from Alphonso el Desheredado which to this day never enjoy'd any greater honour than that of Duke de Medina Celi Not long after the Portuguese conceiving a dislike of their King Ferdinand and his Daughter married to John King of Castile rejected her and her Uncle by the Father's side and gave the Crown to John a Knight of Calatrava and Bastard to an Uncle of Ferdinand their King About the beginning of this age the Swedes deposed their King Sigismund for being a Papist and made Charles his Uncle King Divers Examples of the like nature in England have bin already mentioned All these transportations of Crowns were Acts performed by Assemblies of the three Estates in the several Kingdoms and these Crowns are to this day enjoy'd under Titles derived from such as were thus brought in by the deposition or rejection of those who according ing to descent of blood had better Titles than the present Possessors The Acts therefore were lawful and good or they can have no Title at all and they who made them had a just power so to do If our Author can draw any advantage from the resemblance of Regality that he finds in the Roman Consuls and Athenian Archons I shall without envy leave him the enjoyment of it but I am much mistaken if that do not prove my assertion that those Governments were composed of the three simple species for if the Monarchical part was in them it cannot be denied that the Aristocratical was in the Senate or Areopagi and the Democratical in the People But he ought to have remembred that if there was something of Monarchical in those Governments when they are said to have bin Popular there was something of Aristocratical and Democratical in those that were called Regal which justifies my proposition on both sides and shews that the denomination was taken from the part that prevail'd and if this were not so the Governments of France Spain and Germany might be called Democracies and those of Rome and Athens Monarchies because the People have a part in the one and an image of Monarchy was preserved in the other If our Author will not allow the cases to be altogether equal I think he will find no other difference than that the Consuls and Archons were regularly made by the Votes of the consenting People and orderly resign'd their Power when the time was expir'd for which it was given whereas Tarquin Dionysius Agathocles Nabis Phalaris Cesar and almost all his Successors whom he takes for compleat Monarchs came in by violence fraud and corruption by the help of the worst men by the slaughter of the best and most commonly when the method was once establish'd by that of his Predecessor who if our Author say true was the Father of his Country and his also This was the root and foundation of the only Government that deserves praise this is that which stampt the divine character upon Agathocles Dionysius and Cesar and that had bestow'd the same upon Manlius Marius or Catiline if they had gain'd the Monarchies they affected But I suppose that such as God has bless'd with better judgment and a due regard to Justice and Truth will say that all those who have attained to such greatness as destroys all manner of good in the places where they have set up themselves by the most detestable Villanies came in by a backdoor and that such Magistrates as were
turning his lawful Power into Tyranny disobeying the word of the Prophet slaying the Priests sparing the Amalekites and oppressing the Innocent overthrew his own Right and God declared the Kingdom which had bin given him under a conditional promise of perpetuity to be intirely abrogated This did not only give a right to the whole people of opposing him but to every particular man and upon this account David did not only fly from his fury but resisted it He made himself head of all the discontented persons that would follow him he had at first four and afterwards six hundred men he kept these in Arms against Saul and lived upon the Country and resolved to destroy Nabal with all his House only for refusing to send Provisions for his men Finding himself weak and unsafe he went to Achish the Philistin and offer'd his service even against Israel This was never reputed a sin in David or in those that follow'd him by any except the wicked Court-flatterer Doeg the Edomite and the drunken fool Nabal who is said to have bin a man of Belial If it be objected That this was rather a Flight than a War in as much as he neither killed Saul nor his men or that he made war as a King anointed by Samuel I answer that he who had six hundred men and entertain'd as many as came to him sufficiently shewed his intention rather to resist than to fly And no other reason can be given why he did not farther pursue that intention than that he had no greater power and he who arms six hundred men against his Prince when he can have no more can no more be said to obey patiently than if he had so many hundreds of thousands This holds tho he kill no man for that is not the War but the manner of making it and 't were as absurd to say David made no War because he killed no men as that Charles the eighth made no War in Italy because Guicciardin says he conquer'd Naples without breaking a Lance. But as David's strength increased he grew to be less sparing of Blood Those who say Kings never die but that the right is immediatly transfer'd to the next Heirs cannot deny that Ishbosheth inherited the right of Saul and that David had no other right of making war against him than against Saul unless it were conferred upon him by the Tribe of Judah that made him King If this be true it must be confessed that not only a whole People but a part of them may at their own pleasure abrogate a Kingdom tho never so well established by common consent for none was ever more solemnly instituted than that of Saul and few Subjects have more strongly obliged themselves to be obedient If it be not true the example of Nabal is to be follow'd and David tho guided by the Spirit of God deserves to be condemned as a fellow that rose up against his Master If to elude this it be said That God instituted and abrogated Saul's Kingdom and that David to whom the right was transmitted might therefore proceed against him and his Heirs as privat men I answer that if the obedience due to Saul proceeded from God's Institution it can extend to none but those who are so peculiarly instituted and anointed by his Command and the hand of his Prophet which will be of little advantage to the Kings that can give no testimony of such an Institution or Unction and an indisputable right will remain to every Nation of abrogating the Kingdoms which are instituted by and for themselves But as David did resist the Authority of Saul and Ishbosbeth without assuming the Power of a King tho designed by God and anointed by the Prophet till he was made King of Judah by that Tribe or arrogating to himself a Power over the other Tribes till he was made King by them and had enter'd into a Covenant with them 't is much more certain that the Persons and Authority of ill Kings who have no title to the Privileges due to Saul by virtue of his institution may be justly resisted which is as much as is necessary to my purpose Object But David's Heart smote him when he had cut off the skirt of Saul's Garment and he would not suffer Abishai to kill him This might be of some force if it were pretended that every man was obliged to kill an ill King whensoever he could do it which I think no man ever did say and no man having ever affirmed it no more can be concluded than is confessed by all But how is it possible that a man of a generous Spirit like to David could see a great and valiant King chosen from amongst all the Tribes of Israel anointed by the command of God and the hand of the Prophet famous for victories obtained against the enemies of Israel and a wonderful deliverance thereby purchased to that People cast at his feet to receive Life or Death from the hand of one whom he had so furiously persecuted and from whom he least deserved and could least expect mercy without extraordinary commotion of mind most especially when Abishai who saw all that he did and thereby ought best to have known his thoughts expressed so great a readiness to kill him This could not but make him reflect upon the instability of all that seemed to be most glorious in men and shew him that if Saul who had bin named even among the Prophets and assisted in an extraordinary manner to accomplish such great things was so abandoned and given over to fury misery and shame he that seemed to be most firmly established ought to take care lest he should fall Surely these things are neither to be thought strange in relation to Saul who was God's Anointed nor communicable to such as are not Some may suppose he was King by virtue of God's unction tho if that were true he had never bin chosen and made King by the People but it were madness to think he became God's Anointed by being King for if that were so the same Right and Title would belong to every King even to those who by his command were accursed and destroyed by his Servants Moses Joshua and Samuel The same men at the same time and in the same sense would be both his anointed and accursed loved and detested by him and the most sacred Privileges made to extend to the worst of his enemies Again the War made by David was not upon the account of being King as anointed by Samuel but upon the common natural right of defending himself against the violence and fury of a wicked man he trusted to the promise that he should be King but knew that as yet he was not so and when Saul found he had spared his Life he said I now know well that thou shalt surely be King and that the Kingdom of Israel shall surely be established in thy hand not that it was already Nay David himself was so far from
of Parliament and to pick out what might serve her turn but frequently passed forty or fifty in a Session without reading one of them She knew that she did not reign for her self but for her People that what was good for them was either good for her or that her good ought not to come into competition with that of the whole Nation and that she was by Oath obliged to pass such Laws as were presented to her on their behalf This not only shews that there is no such thing as a Legislative Power placed in Kings by the Laws of God and Nature but that Nations have it in themselves It was not by Law nor by Right but by Usurpation Fraud and Perjury that some Kings took upon them to pick what they pleased out of the publick Acts. Henry the fifth did not grant us the right of making our own Laws but with his approbation we abolished a detestable abuse that might have proved fatal to us And if we examine our History we shall find that every good and generous Prince has sought to establish our Liberties as much as the most base and wicked to infringe them THE END THE TABLE CHAP. I. SEction 1. The Introduction Page 1. Sect. 2. The common notions of Liberty are not from School-Divines but from Nature p. 5. Sect. 3. Implicit Faith belongs to Fools and Truth is comprehended by examining Principles p. 8. Sect. 4. The Rights of particular Nations cannot subsist if general Principles contrary to them are received as true p. 11. Sect. 5. To depend upon the will of a man is slavery p. 12. Sect. 6. God leaves to man the choice of forms in Government and those who constitute one form may abrogate it p. 14. Sect. 7. Abraham and the Patriarchs were not Kings p. 17. Sect. 8. Nimrod was the first King during the life of Chusn Cham Shem and Noah p. 19. Sect. 9. The Power of a Father belongs only to a Father p. 22. Sect. 10. Such as enter into Society must in some degree diminish their Liberty p. 23. Sect. 11. No man comes to command many unless by consent or by force p. 24. Sect. 12. The pretended paternal Right is divisible or indivisible if divisible 't is extinguished if indivisible universal p. 25. Sect. 13. There was no shadow of a paternal Kingdom amongst the Hebrews nor precept for it p. 27. Sect. 14. If the paternal Right had included Dominion and was to be transferr'd to a single Heir it must perish if he were not known and could be applied to no other person p. 30. Sect. 16. The Antients chose those to be Kings who excell'd in the Virtues that are most beneficial to Civil Societies p. 36. Sect. 17. God having given the Government of the World to no one man nor declared how it should be divided left it to the will of man p. 41. Sect. 18. If a right of Dominion were esteemed hereditary according to the Law of Nature a multitude of destructive and inextricable Controversies would thereupon arise p. 45. Sect. 19. Kings cannot confer the Right of Father upon Princes nor Princes upon Kings p. 48. Sect. 20. All just Magistratical Power is from the People p. 54. CHAP. II. SECT 1. That 't is natural for Nations to govern or to chuse Governors and that Virtue only gives a natural preference of one man above another or reason why one should be chosen rather than another p. 59. Sect. 2. Every man that hath Children hath the right of a Father and is capable of preferment in a Society composed of many p. 67. Sect. 3. Government is not instituted for the good of the Governor but of the Governed and Power is not an advantage but a burden p. 70. Sect. 4. The paternal Right devolves to and is inherited by all the Children p. 71. Sect. 5. Free men join together and frame greater or lesser Societies and give such forms to them as best pleases themselves p. 75. Sect. 6. They who have a right of chusing a King have the right of making a King p. 83. Sect. 7. The Laws of every Nation are the measure of magistratical Power p. 87. Sect. 8. There is no natural propensity in man or beast to Monarchy p. 94. Sect. 9. The Government instituted by God over the Israelites was Aristocratical p. 96. Sect. 10. Aristotle was not simply for Monarchy or against Popular Government but approved or disapproved of either according to circumstances p. 102. Sect. 11. Liberty produceth Virtue Order and Stability Slavery is accompanied with Vice Weakness and Misery p. 104. Sect. 12. The Glory Virtue and Power of the Romans began and ended with their Liberty p. 112. Sect. 13. There is no disorder or prejudice in changing the name or number of Magistrates whilst the root and principle of their Power continues intire p. 117. Sect. 14. No Sedition was hurtful to Rome till through their prosperity some men gained a Power above the Laws p. 120. Sect. 15. The Empire of Rome perpetually decay'd when it fell into the hands of one man p. 123. Sect. 16. The best Governments of the World have bin composed of Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy p. 130. Sect. 17. Good Governments admit of changes in the Superstructures whilst the Foundations remain unchangeable p. 134. Sect. 18. Xenophon in blaming the disorders of Democracies favours Aristocracies not Monarchies p. 138. Sect. 19. That corruption and venality which is natural to Courts is seldom found in Popular Governments p. 145. Sect. 20. Man's natural love to Liberty is temper'd by Reason which originally is his nature p. 151. Sect. 21. Mixed and Popular Governments preserve Peace and manage Wars better than Absolute Monarchies p. 154. Sect. 22. Commonwealths seek Peace or War according to the variety of their Constitutions p. 159. Sect. 23. That is the best Government which provides best for War p. 165. Sect. 24. Popular Governments are less subject to Civil disorders than Monarchies manage them more ably and more easily recover out of them p. 172. Sect. 25. Courts are more subject to venality and corruption than Popular Governments p. 200. Sect. 26. Civil Tumults and Wars are not the greatest evils that befal Nations p. 206. Sect. 27. The mischiefs and cruelties proceeding from Tyranny are greater than any that can come from popular or mixed Governments p. 210. Sect. 28. Men living under popular or mixed Governments are more careful of the publick Good than in Absolute Monarchies p. 215. Sect. 29. There is no assurance that the distempers of a State shall be cured by the wisdom of a Prince p. 223. Sect. 30. A Monarchy cannot be well regulated unless the Powers of the Monarch are limited by Law p. 229. Sect. 31. The Liberties of Nations are from God and Nature not from Kings p. 242. Sect. 32. The Contracts made between Magistrates and the Nations that created them were real solemn and obligatory p. 247. CHAP. III. SECT 1. Kings not being Fathers of their People nor