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A89005 Ochlo-machia. Or The peoples war, examined according to the principles of Scripture & reason, in two of the most plausible pretences of it. In answer to a letter sent by a person of quality, who desired satisfaction. By Jasper Mayne, D.D. one of the students of Ch. Ch. Oxon. Mayne, Jasper, 1604-1672. 1647 (1647) Wing M1472; Thomason E398_19; ESTC R201695 27,844 40

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fault of the power but of the Persons whose power 't is it makes much more for the Peace of the publique that one or Few should in some things be allowed to be unjust then that they should be liable to be Questioned by an Ill. Judgeing-Multitude in All. The third thing which you may please to observe from that peece of Scripture is The Creation of Magistrates or Governours who are there said to be sent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 By Him Where a Moderne Writer applyes the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or By Him to God As if all other Governours were sent by Him not by the King Which Interpretation of the place I would admit for currant if by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Governours so sent he did understand the Rulers in an Aristocracie or Free-state which being a Species of Government Contradistinct to Monarchy cannot be denyed to have God as well as the other for it a Founder But then the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the peculiar Epithet of Monarchy will beare another sence then I have hitherto given it And will not only signifie the King to be Supream for so the Rulers of a Free State are within their owne Territories but compared with other Formes of Supremacy to be the most excellent Monarchy being in it selfe least subject to Disunion or civill Disturbance And for that Reason pronounced by the wisest Stateists to be that Forme of Government into which all other incline naturally to resolve themselves for their perfection But by Governours in that place understanding as he doth not the Senate in a Free-state but the Subordinate Magistrates under a Prince the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 most certainly belongs to the King To whom the Apostle there assignes the Mission of Governours as one of the Essentiall Markes and Notes that He is in His owne Realm Supream And thus Sir having drawne the portraiture of Regall Power to you by the best Light in the world but with the meanest Pencill I know you expect that in the next place I should shew you what Rayes or Beames of this power are Jnherent in our King Which being a taske fitter for one of our greatest Sages of the Law then for me who being One who doe not pretend to any exact knowledg in the Fundamentall Lawes or Customes of this Kingdome which are to stand the Land-marks and markes of partition between the Kings Prerogative and the Liberty of the Subject may perhaps be thought by drawing a line or eircle about either to limne Figures in the Dust whose fate hangs on the Mercy of the next Winde that blowes the steps by which I will proceed leaving you to the late writings of that most learned and honest Judge Ienkins for your fuller satisfaction in this point shall be breifly these two First I will shew you what are the Genuine markes and properties of Supream power Next how many of them have been challenged by the King and have not hitherto been denyed Him by any Publique Declaration of the Parliament Sir if you have read Aristotles Politicks as I presume you have you may please to remember that he * there divides the Supream Powere of a State Lib. 4. c. 4. into three generall parts The Ordering of Things for the publique the Creation of Magistrates and the Finall resolution of Judgment upon Appeales To which he afterwards addes the power of Levying Warre or concluding of Peace of making or breaking Leagues with forraigne Nations of enacting or abrogating Lawes of Pardoning or Punishing Offenders with Banishment Confiscation Imprisonment or Death To which Dyonisius Halicarnassensis addes the power to call or dissolve Comitia or publique Assemblies As well Synods and Councells in Deliberations concerning Religion as Parliaments or Senates in Deliberations secular concerning the State To all which markes of Supreame power a * Moderne Lawyer who only wants their Age to be of as great Authority as either addes the power to exact Tribute Gret lib. 1. c. 3. de Jure Belli pacis and to presse Souldiers It the exercise of which two Acts consists that Dominium Eminens or Dominion Rara mount which the State when ever it stands in need And that too to be the Judge of its owne Necessity hath not only over the Fortunes but the Persons of the Subject In a measure so much greater then they have over themselves as the publique poole is to be preferr'd before the private Cisterne Now Sir if you please to apply this to the King though good Lawyers will tell you that the power of making or repealing Laws be not solely in Him but that the two Houses have a concurrent right in their production and Abolishment yet they will tell you too that His power extends thus farre that no Law can be made or repealed without Him Since for either or both Houses to produce a Statute Law by themselves hath alwaies in this State been thought a Birth as Monstrous as if a Child should be begotten by a Mother upon her selfe They usually are the Matrice and Womb where Lawes receive their first Impregnation and are shap't and formed for the publique But besides the opinion of all present Lawyers of this Kingdome who like that great * Judg Ienkins example of Loyalty dare speak their knowledge it hath alwaies been acknowledged by the Law made 2. H. 5. By the sentence of Refusall Le Roy S' Avisera and indeed by all Parliaments of former Ages That the King is thus farre Pater Patria that these Lawes are but abortive unlesse his Consent passe upon them A Negative power He hath then though not an out right Legislative And if it be here objected by your Friend that the two Houses severally have so too I shall perhaps grant it if in this particular they will be modest and content to go sharers in this Power And no longer challenge to their Ordinances the legality force of Acts of Parliament As for the other parts of Royalty which I reckoned up to you As the Creation of Officers and Counsellours of State of Iudges for Law and Commanders for Warre the Ordering of the Militia by Sea and Land The Benefit of Confiscations and Escheats where Families want an Heyre The power to absolve and pardon where the Law hath Condemned The power to call and disolve Parliaments As also the Receipt of Custome and Tribute with many other particulars which you are able to suggest to your selfe They have alwaies been held to be such undoubted Flowers of this Crowne that every one of them like his Coyne which you know Sir is by the Law of this Land Treason to counterfeit which is an other mark of Royalty hath in all Ages but Ours worne the Kings Image and superscription upon it Not to be invaded by any without the crime of Rebellion And though as your Friend saies this be but a regulated power and rise no higher in the just exercise of these Acts then a Trust committed by
the Lawes of this Kingdome for the Governement of it to the King for I never yet perceived by any of His Declarations That His Majesty claimed these as due to Him by Right of Conquest or any other of those Absolute and Vnlimited waies which might tender His Crowne Patrimoniall to Him or such an out-right Allodium that He mi ht Alienate it or chuse His Successour or Rule as He pleased Himselfe yet as in the making of these Lawes He holds the first place so none of these Rights which he derives from them can without His own Consent be taken from Him For proofe hereof I will only instance in three particulars to you for I must remember that I am now writing a Letter to you not penning a Treatise which will carry the greater force of perswasion because confest by this Parliament The first was an Act presented to the King for the setling of the Militia for a limited time in such Hands as they might confide in A clear Argument that without such an Act past by the King the two Houses had nothing to do with the Ordering of it Another was one of the Nineteen Propofitions where t was desired that the Nomination of all Officers and Counsellours of State might for the future go by the Maior part of Voyces of both Houses Another Argument That the King hath hitherto in all such Nominations been the only Fountaine of Honour The third was the passing of the Act for the Continuation of this Parliament Another Argument that nothing but the Kings consent could ever have made it thus Perpetuall as it is Many other Instances might be given but foundoubtedly acknowledged by Bracton By Him that wrote the Book call'd The Prerogative of Parliaments who is thought to be Sir Walter Raleigh By Sir Edward Cooke by the stiles and Formes of all the Acts of Parliament which have been made in this Kingdom and by that learned * Sir Iohn Banks Iudge who wrote the Examination of such particulars in the Solemne League and Covenant as concerne the Law And who in a continued Line of Quotation and Proofe derives along these and the other parts of Supreme power in the King from Edward the Confessour to our present Soveraigne King Charles that to prove them to you were to adde beames to the Sunne Here then For the better stating of the Third thing I pro osed to you which was That granting the King to be Supreme in this Kingdome at least so farre as I have described him how farre He is to be Obeyed and not resisted Two things will fall under Inquiry First supposing the King not to have kept Himselfe to that Circle of power which the Lawes have drawn about Him but desirous to walke in a more Absolute compasse That He hath in somethings invaded the Liberty of his People whither such an Jncroachment can justifie their Armes Next If it be proved that He hath kept within his Life and only made the Law the Rule of His Governement whether a bare Fear or Iealousie That when ever he should be able He would change this Rule which is the most that can be pretended could be a Just cause for an Anticipating Warre The Decision of the first of these Inquiries will depend wholly upon the Tenure by which he holds His Crowne If it were puerly Elective or were at first set upon His Head by the Suffrages of the people And if in that Election His power had been limited Or if by way of paction it had been said Thus farre the King shall be Supreme thus farre the people shall be Free If there had been certaine Expresse conditions assigned Him with his Scepter that if he transgrest not his limites He should be Obeyed if He did it should be lawfull for the people to resist Him Lastly if to hinder such Exorbitances there had been certaine Ephori or Inspectours or a Co-ordinate Senate placed as Mounds and Cliffes about Him with warrant from the Electours that when ever he should attempt to overflow his Bankes it should be their part to reinforce Him back into his Channell I must confesse to you being no better then a Duke of Venice or a King of Sparta In truth no King but a more splendid Subject I think such a Resistance might be Lawfull Since such a Conveyance of Empire being but a conditionall contract as in all other Elections the chusers may reserve to themselves or give away so much of their Liberty as they please And where the part reserved is invaded 'T is no Rebellion to defend But where the Crowne is not Elective but hath so Hereditarily descended in an ancient line of succession from King to King that to finde out the Originall of it would be a taske as difficult as to find out the Head of Nilus where the Tenure is not conditionall nor hangs upon any contract made at first with the people nor is such a reciprocall Creature of their Breath as to be blowne from them and recalled like the fleeting Ayre they draw as often as they shall say it returnes to them worse then as first they sent it forth In short Sir Where the only Obligation or Tye upon the Prince is the Oath which He takes at his Ceronation to rule according to the knowne Lawes of the place Though every Breach of such an Oath be an Offence against God to whom alone a Prince thus independent is accountable for his Actions yet 't will never passe for more then perjury in the Prince No Warrant for Subiects to take up Armes against Him Here then Sir should I suppose the worst that can be supposed that there was a time when the King misled as your Friend sayes by Evill Counsellours did actually trample upon the Lawes of the Kingdome and the Liberty of his Subiects derived to them by those Lawes yet unlesse some Originall compact can be produced where 't is agreed That upon every such Incroachment it shall be lawfull for them to stand upon their Defence unlesse some Fundamentall Contract can be shewen where 't is clearely said that where the King ceaseth to governe according to Law He shall for such misgovernment cease to be King To urge as your Friend doth such vnfortunate precedents as a Deposed Richard or a Dethroned Edward Two disproportion'd examples of popular Fury The one forced to part with his Crowne by Resignation the other as never having had legall Title to it may shew the Iniustice of former Parliaments growne strong never justifie the Pitcht-feilds which have been fought by this Since If this supposition were true the King being bound to make the Law His Rule by no other Obligation but His Oath at His Coronation Then which there cannot be a greater I confesse and where 't is violated never without Repentance scapes vnpunish't yet 't is a trespasse of which Subiects can only complaine but as long as they are Subiects can never innocently revenge But this all this while Sir is but
only supposition And you now Sir what the Logician saies suppositie nihil p●nit in esse what ever may be supposed is not presently true If Calumny her selfe would turne Informer let her leave out Ship-money a greivance which being fairely laid a fleepe by an Act of Parliament deserved not to be awakened to beare a part in the present Tragedy of this almost ruined Kingdome she must confesse that the King through the whole course of His Raigne was so farre from the Invasion of His Subjects Rights that no King of England before Him unlesse it were Henry the first and King Iohn whom being Vsurpers it concern'd to comply with the People the one having supplanted his Eldest Brother Robers Duke of Normandy the other his Nephew Arthur Prince of Britaine ever imparted to them so many Rights of his owne To that Degree of Infranchisment that I may almost say He exchanged Liberties with them Witnesse the Petition of Right An Act of such Royall Grace that when He past that Bill He almost dealt with His people as Traian did with the Pratorian praefect put his sword into their Hands and bid them use it for Him if he ruled well if not against Him In short Sir Magna Charta was a Vine I confesse cast over the People but this Act enabled them to call the shade of it their owne An Act which if your friend will please to forget Ship mony being in no one particular violated so farre as to be instanced in by those whose present Ingagements would never suffer such Breaches of Priviledge to passe unclamour'd will oblige posterity to be gratefull as often as they remember themselves to be Freemen This then being so the next inquiry will be whether a bare Jealousy that the King would in time have recalled this Grace and would have invaded the Liberty of his Subjects by the change of the Fundamentall Lawes could be a just cause for such a preventive Warre as this To which I answere that such a Faire though built upon strong presumptions cannot possibly be a just cause for one Nation to make Warre upon another much lesse for Subjects to make Warre against their Prince The Reason is because nothing can legitimate such a Warre but either an Injury already offered or so visibly imminent that it may passe for the first Dart or Speare hurled Where the Injury or Invasion is only contingent and conjecturall and wrapt up in the wombe of darke Counsells no way discoverable but by their own revelation of themselves in some outward Acts of Hostility or usurpation to anticipate is to be first injurious and every Act of prevention which hath only Iealousie for its foundation will adde new justice to the enemies Cause who as He cannot in reason be pronounced guilty of anothers Feares so he will come into the Field with this great advantage on his side That his reall wrong will joyne Battle with the others weake suspition But alas Sir Time the best interpreter of Mens Intentions hath at length unsee'ld our eyes and taught us that this hath been a Warre of a quite opposite Nature The Gentleman who wrote the Defence of M. Chaloners Speech and M. Chaloner himselfe if you marke his Speech well will tell you that the quarrell hath not been whether the subject of England shall be Free but whether this Freedome shall not consist in being no longer Subject to the King If you marke Sir How the face of things hath alter'd with successe How the scene of things is shifted And in what a New stile they who called themselves the Invaded have spoken ever since their Victories have secured them against the power of any that shall invade If you consider what a politick use hath been made of those words of Inchantment Law Liberty and Propriety of the Subject by which the People have been musically enticed into their Thraldome If you yet farther consider the more then Decemvirall power which this Parliament hath assumed to it selfe by repealing old Lawes and making Ordinances passe for new If you yet farther will please to consider How much Heavyer that which some call Priviledge of Parliament hath been to the Subject then that which they so much complained of The Kings Prerogative so much heavyer that if one deserved to be called a Little finger the other hath swolne it selfe into a Loyne Lastly if you compare Ship mony with the Excise and the many other Taxes laid upon the Kingdome you will not onely find that a whippe then hath been heightned into a Scorpion now but you will perceive that as these are not the first Subjects who under pretence of Liberty have invaded their Princes Crowne so farre as the Cleaving of Him asunder by a State Distinction which separates the Power of the King from his Person so ours as long as he was able to lead an Army into the Field hath been the first King that ever took up Armes for the Liberty of his Subjects Vpon all which premises Sir I hope you will not think it false Logicke if I build this Conclusion so agreeable to the Lawes of the Kingdome as well as the Lawes of God That supoosing the Parliament all this while to have fought as was at first pretended for the Defence of their assayled Liberty yet fighting against the King whose Subjects they are it can never before a Christian Judge make their Armies passe for just But being no way necessitated to make such a Defence their Liberty having in no one particular been assaulted which hath not been redrest if S. Paul were now on earth againe and were the Iudge of this Controversy between them and their Lawfull Soveraigne I feare he would call their Defence by a Name which we in our Moderne Cases of Conscience doe call Rebellion And thus Sir having as compendiously as the Lawes of a Letter will permit given you I hope some satisfaction concerning the first part of your zealous Friends dispute with you which was whether the Two Houses which he calls the Parliament have not a Legall power in Defence of their Liberty to take up Armes against the King I will with the like brevity proceed as well as I can to give you satisfaction in the second part of his Dispute also which was whether Religion may not be a just Cause for a Warre The Termes of which Question being very generall and not restrained to any kind of Religion or any kind of Warre whether offensive or defensive or whether of one Nation against another or of a Prince against his Subjects or of the Subjects back again against their Prince allow me a very large space to walk in In which least I be thought to wander and not to prove It will first be necessary that I define to you what Religion in generall is And next that I examine whether every Religion which falls within the Truth of that Definition may for the propagation of it selfe be a just cause of a Warre and so
deluded fancy they must at length confesse unlesse with their Faith they have cast off their Charity too Let your Friend Sir read over any one of His Majesties Declarations and what sacred Thing is there by which he hath not freely and uncompelled obliged and bound Himselfe to live and dye a Protestant By what one Act have these many Vowes been broken Who made that Court Faction which would have miscounselled him to bring in Popery Or let your Friend if he can name who those Miterd Prelates were who lodged a Papist under their Rotchet If he cannot let him forbeare to hold an Opinion of his Prince and Clergy which Time the mother of Truth hath so demonstratively confuted And let him no longer suffer himselfe to be seduced by the malitious writings of those who for so many years and from so many Pulpits have breathed Rebellion and Slander with such an uncontrouled Boldnesse and Sting that I cannot compare them to any thing so fitly as to the Locusts in the * Revel 9. Revelation which crept forth of the Bottomlesse pit every one of which wore the Crowne of a King and had the Tayle of a Scorpion In short Sir If he have not so deeply drunke of the Inchanted cuppe as to forget himselfe to be a Subject let him no longer endanger himselfe to tast of their Ruine too who for so many years have dealt with the best King that this Nation ever had as Witches are said to deale with those whom they would by peece meale destroy first shap't to themselves his Image in waxe then pricks and stab'd it with needles striving by their many Reproaches of his Government and Defamations of the Bishops to reduce his Honour by degrees to a consumption and to make it Languish and pine and wither away in the Hatred and Disaffection of his People But perhaps Sir your Friend and I are not well agreed upon our Termes If therefore he doe once more strive to perswade you that notwithstanding all this which I have said to the contrary the King would if he had not been hindered have destroyed the Protestant Religion pray desire him to let me know what he mean by the Religion which he calls Protestant Doth he mean that Religion which succeeded Popery at the Reformation and hath ever since distinguisht us from the Church of Rome Doth he meane that Religion which so many Holy Martyrs seal'd with their Blood that for which Queene Mary is so odious and Queene Elizabeth so pretious to our memories Lastly Doth he meane that Religion which is comprised in the 39. Articles and confest to be Protestant by an Act of Parliament If these be the Markes these the Characters of it let him tell me whether this be not the Religion which the King in one of his * Cabinet Opened Letters to the Queene calls the only Thing of difference between Him and Her that 's dearest to Him whether this also be not the Religion in which if there be yet any of the old Ore and Drosse from whence 't was extracted Any thing either essentially or accidentally evill which requires yet more sifting or a more through Reformation Any thing of Doctrine to offend the strong or of Discipline or Ceremony to offend the wenke His Majesty have not long since offered to have it passe the fiery Tryall and Disputes of a Synod legally called To all which questions 'till He and his Com presbyters give a satisfying Answer however they may think to hide themselves under their old Tortoise-shell and cry out Templum Domini the Temple of the Lord They must not take it ill if I aske them one question more and desire them to tell me whether this be not the Religion which they long since compelled to take flight with the King and which hath scarce been to be found in this Kingdome ever since the time it was deprived of the Sanctuary it had taken under the Kings Standard This then being so hath your Friend or his fellow Assemblers yet a purer or more primitive Notion of the Protestant Religion which compared with the Religion which we and our Fathers have been of will prove it to be Idolatrous and no better then a hundred years superstition Let them in Charity as they are bound not to let us perish in our Ignorance shew us their Modell If it be more agreeable to the Scripture then Ours have more of the white Robe and not of the new invention we may perhaps be their Converts And their Righteousnesse meeting with out Peace may mutually Kisse each other In the mean time Sir I hope they will not define the Protestant Religion so by Negatives as to make it consist wholly in No Bishops No Liturgy or No Common-Prayer Booke These we not yet convinced to the contrary doe hold to be good Conservatives but not Essentialls of that which we call the Pretostant Religion of our Side Their Negation then can be no true Essentiall Constituent of the same Religion on theirs There is but One positive Notion more in all the world under which I can possibly understand Them when They say They have all this while Fought for the Defence of the Protestant Religion That is that by the Defence of the Protestant Religion if they meane any Thing or if this have not bin the Disguise to a more dangerous secret They meane the Defence of their New Directory and their at length concluded Government of the Church by Presbyters If this be their Meaning And truely if I should rack my Invention I cannot make it find another The Second part of that most Holy and Glorious Cause which hath drawne the eyes of Europe upon it and renderd the Name of a Protestant a Proverbe to expresse Disloyalty by That Pure Chast Virgin without spott or wrinkle-Cause which like the Scythian Diana hath been fed with so many Humane Sacrifices And to which as to another Moloch so many Men as well as Children have been compell'd to passe through the Fire resolves it selfe into this Vnchristian Bloudy conclusion That an Assembly of profest Protestant Divines have advised the Two Parliaments of England and Scotland confest Subjects to take up Armes against the King their Lawfull Soveraigne Have thereby set Three Kingdoms in a Flame been the Authors of more Protestants slaine in a Civill then would have served to recover the Palatinate by a Forraigne Warre for nothing but this vnnecessary novell accidentall Consideration That the King vnlesse compell'd by Forces would never consent 〈◊〉 indeed without Perjury could to the Change of an Ancient Primitive Apostolike Vniversally received Government of this Church by Bishops for a new vpstart Mushrome Calvinisticall Government by a Motley Presbytery of Spirituall Lay-Elders Which being As I have hither to by Principles taken both from Reason and Scripture proved to you in the most favourable sense a Resistance if not an Jnvasion of the Higher Power that Higher Power being * Rom. 13.2 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gods Ordinance must needs be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a Warre made against God Himselfe And the Authors of it unlesle they repent and betake themselves to a timely returne to their Obedience in danger to draw upon themselves this other sad tragicall irresistible Conclusion which St * V. 2. Paul tels us is the inevitable Catastrophe of Disobedience which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you may English it swift Destruction And thus Sir Though all weake Defences have something of the Nature of prevarication in them and he may in part be thought to betray a Cause who feebly argues for it I have return'd you a large Answere to the two Quere's in your sh●●● Letter which if you shall you 〈◊〉 to call Satisfaction you will very much assist my 〈◊〉 which will not suffer me to thinke that I in this 〈◊〉 have said more then Others Only being so fairely invited by you to say something to have remain'd silent had been to have confest my selfe convinced And my Negligence in a Time so seasonable to speak Truth in might perhaps in the Opinion of the Gentleman your Friend have seemed to take part with those of his side against whose Cause though not their Persons I have thus freely armed my Pen. Sir I should think my selfe fortunate if Any Thinge which I have said in this Letter might make him a Proselyte But this being rather my wish then my Hope all the Successe which this Paper aspires to is this that you will accept it as a Creature borne at your Command And that you will place it among your other Records as a Testimony how much greater my Desires then my Abilities are to deserve the stile of being thought worthy to be From my Chamber June 7. 1647. Your affectionate servant JASPER MAYNE