Cassiopoeia Pub. VALERIUS if the Major of the Petition extends as far as is warranted by SOLOMON I mean that there is nothing new under the Sun what new things there may be or have bin above the Sun will make little to the present purpose Val. It is true but if you have no more to say they will take this but for shifting Pub. Where there is Sea as between Sicily and Naples there was antiently Land and where there is Land as in Holland there was antiently Sea Val. What then Pub. Why then the present posture of the Earth is other than it has bin yet is the Earth no new thing but consists of Land and Sea as it did always so whatever the present posture of the Heavens be they consist of Star and Firmament as they did always Val. What will you say then to the Star in Cassiopoeia Pub. Why I say if it consisted of the same matter with other Stars it was no new thing in nature but a new thing in Cassiopoeia as were there a Commonwealth in England it would be no new thing in Nature but a new thing in England Val. The Star you will say in Cassiopoeia to have bin a new thing in nature must have bin no Star because a Star is not a new thing in nature Pub. Very good Val. You run upon the matter but the newness in the Star was in thâ— manner of the generation Pub. At Putzuoli near Naples I have seen a Mountain that rose up from under water in one night and pour'd a good part of the Lake antiently call'd Lucrin into the Sea Val. What will you infer from hence Pub. Why that the new and extraordinary generation of a Star or of a Mountain no more causes a Star or a Mountain to be a new thing in nature than the new and extraordinary generation of a Commonwealth causes a Commonwealth to be a new thing in nature ARISTOTLE reports that the Nobility of Tarantum being cut off in a Battel that Commonwealth became popular And if the Pouder Plot in England had destroy'd the King and the Nobility it is possible that Popular Government might have risen up in England as the Mountain did at Putzuoli Yet for all these would there not have bin any new thing in nature Val. Som new thing thro the blending of unseen causes there may seem to be in shuffling but Nature will have her course there is no other than the old game Pub. VALERIUS let it rain or be fair weather the Sun to the dissolution of Nature shall ever rise but it is now set and I apprehend the mist Val. Dear PUBLICOLA your Health is my own I bid you goodnight Pub. Goodnight to you VALERIUS Val. One word more PUBLICOLA Pray make me a present of those same Papers and with your leave and license I will make use of my Memory to commit the rest of this Discourse to writing and print it Pub. They are at your disposing Val. I will not do it as has bin don but with your name to it Pub. Whether way you like best most noble VALERIUS Octob. 22. 1659. Chap. 1 A System of Politics Delineated in short and easy APHORISMS Publish'd from the Author 's own Manuscript CHAP. I. Of GOVERNMENT 1. A PEOPLE is either under a state of Civil Government or in a state of Civil War or neither under a state of Civil Government nor in a state of Civil War 2. CIVIL Government is an Art wherby a People rule themselves or are rul'd by others 3. THE Art of Civil Government in general is twofold National or Provincial 4. NATIONAL Government is that by which a Nation is govern'd independently or within it self 5. PROVINCIAL Government is that by which a Province is govern'd dependently or by som foren Prince or State 6. A PEOPLE is neither govern'd by themselves nor by others but by reason of som external Principle therto forcing them 7. FORCE is of two kinds Natural and Unnatural 8. NATURAL Force consists in the vigor of Principles and their natural necessary Operations 9. UNNATURAL Force is an external or adventitious opposition to the vigor of Principles and their necessary working which from a violation of Nature is call'd Violence 10. NATIONAL Government is an effect of natural Force or Vigor 11. PROVINCIAL Government is an effect of unnatural Force or Violence 12. THE natural Force which works or produces National Government of which only I shall speak hereafter consists in Riches 13. THE Man that cannot live upon his own must be a Servant but he that can live upon his own may be a Freeman 14. WHERE a People cannot live upon their own the Government is either Monarchy or Aristocracy where a People can live upon their own the Government may be Democracy Chap. II 15. A MAN that could live upon his own may yet to spare his own and live upon another be a Servant but a People that can live upon their own cannot spare their own and live upon another but except they be no Servants that is except they com to a Democracy they must wast their own by maintaining their Masters or by having others to live upon them 16. WHERE a People that can live upon their own imagin that they can be govern'd by others and not liv'd upon by such Governors it is not the Genius of the People it is the Mistake of the People 17. WHERE a People that can live upon their own will not be govern'd by others lest they be liv'd upon by others it is not the Mistake of the People it is the Genius of the People 18. OF Government there are three Principles Matter Privation and Form CHAP. II. Of the Matter of Government 1. THAT which is the Matter of Government is what we call an Estate be it in Lands Goods or Mony 2. IF the Estate be more in Mony than in Land the port or garb of the Owner gos more upon his Monys than his Lands which with privat Men is ordinary but with Nations except such only as live more upon their Trade than upon their Territory is not to be found for which cause overbalance of Riches in Mony or Goods as to the sequel of these Aphorisms is altogether omitted 3. IF the Estate be more in Land than in Goods or Mony the garb and port of the Owner whether a Man or a Nation gos more if not altogether upon his Land 4. IF a Man has som Estate he may have som Servants or a Family and consequently som Government or somthing to govern if he has no Estate he can have no Government 5. WHERE the eldest of many Brothers has all or so much that the rest for their livelihood stand in need of him that Brother is as it were Prince in that Family 6. WHERE of many Brothers the eldest has but an equal share or not so inequal as to make the rest to stand in need of him for their livelihood that Family is as it
is another thing but not always another Creature tho the Corruption of one coms at length to be the Generation of another The Corruption then of Monarchy is call'd Tyranny that of Aristocracy Oligarchy and that of Democracy Anarchy But Legislators having found these three Governments at the best to be naught have invented another consisting of a mixture of them all which only is good This is the Doctrin of the Antients BUT LEVIATHAN is positive that they are all deceiv'd and that there is no other Government in Nature than one of the three as also that the Flesh of them cannot stink the names of their Corruptions being but the names of mens Phansies which will be understood when we are shown which of them was Senatus Populusque Romanus TO go my own way and yet to follow the Antients the Principles of Government are twofold Internal or the goods of the Mind and External or the goods of Fortune The goods of the Mind are Goods of the Mind and of Fortune natural or acquir'd Virtues as Wisdom Prudence and Courage c. The goods of Fortune are Riches There be goods also of the Body as Health Beauty Strength but these are not to be brought into account upon this score because if a Man or an Army acquires Victory or Empire it is more from their Disciplin Arms and Courage than from their natural Health Beauty or Strength in regard that a People conquer'd may have more of natural Strength Beauty and Health and yet find little remedy The Principles of Government then are in the goods of the Mind or in the goods of Fortune To the goods of the Mind answers Authority to the goods of Fortune Power or Empire Empire and Authority Wherfore LEVIATHAN tho he be right where he says that Riches are Power is mistaken where he says that Prudence or the reputation of Prudence is Power for the Learning or Prudence of a Man is no more Power than the Learning or Prudence of a Book or Author which is properly Authority A learned Writer may have Authority tho he has no Power and a foolish Magistrat may have Power tho he has otherwise no Esteem or Authority The difference of these two is observ'd by LIVY in EVANDER of whom he says * Regebat magis Autoritate quam Imperio that he govern'd rather by the Authority of others than by his own Power Empire TO begin with Riches in regard that Men are hung upon these not of choice as upon the other but of necessity and by the teeth for as much as he who wants Bread is his Servant that will seed him if a Man thus seeds a whole People they are under his Empire Division of Empire EMPIRE is of two kinds Domestic and National or Foren and Provincial Domestic Empire Dominion DOMESTIC Empire is founded upon Dominion DOMINION is Property real or personal that is to say in Lands or in Mony and Goods Balance in Lands LANDS or the parts and parcels of a Territory are held by the Proprietor or Proprietors Lord or Lords of it in som proportion and such except it be in a City that has little or no Land and whose Revenue is in Trade as is the proportion or balance of Dominion or Property in Land such is the nature of the Empire Absolute Monarchy IF one Man be sole Landlord of a Territory or overbalance the People for example three parts in four he is Grand Signior for so the Turk is call'd from his Property and his Empire is absolute Monarchy Mix'd Monarchy IF the Few or a Nobility or a Nobility with the Clergy be Landlords or overbalance the People to the like proportion it makes the Gothic balance to be shewn at large in the second part of this Discourse and the Empire is mix'd Monarchy as that of Spain Poland and late of Oceana Popular Government AND if the whole People be Landlords or hold the Lands so divided among them that no one Man or number of Men within the compass of the Few or Aristocracy overbalance them the Empire without the interposition of Force is a Commonwealth Tyranny Oligarchy Anarchy IF Force be interpos'd in any of these three cases it must either frame the Government to the Foundation or the Foundation to the Government or holding the Government not according to the balance it is not natural but violent and therfore if it be at the devotion of a Prince it is Tyranny if at the devotion of the Few Oligarchy or if in the power of the People Anarchy Each of which Confusions the balance standing otherwise is but of short continuance because against the nature of the balance which not destroy'd destroys that which opposes it BUT there be certain other Confusions which being rooted in the balance are of longer continuance and of worse consequence as first where a Nobility holds half the Property or about that proportion and the People the other half in which case without altering the balance there is no remedy but the one must eat out the other as the People did the Nobility in Athens and the Nobility the People in Rome Secondly when a Prince holds about half the Dominion and the People the other half which was the case of the Roman Emperors planted partly upon their military Colonies and partly upon the Senat and the People the Government becoms a very shambles both of the Princes and the People Somwhat of this nature are certain Governments at this day which are said to subsist by confusion In this case to fix the balance is to entail misery but in the three former not to fix it is to lose the Government Wherfore it being unlawful in Turky that any should possess Land but the Grand Signior the balance is fix'd by the Law and that Empire firm Nor tho the Kings often fell was the Throne of Oceana known to shake until the Statute of Alienations broke the Pillars by giving way to the Nobility to sell their Estates * Si terra recedat Ionium Aegaeo frangat mare While Lacedemon held to the division of Land made by LYCURGUS it was immovable but breaking that could stand no longer This kind of Law fixing the balance in Lands is call'd Agrarian and was first introduc'd by God himself who divided the Land of Canaan to his People by Lots and is of such virtue that wherever it has held that Government has not alter'd except by consent as in that unparallel'd example of the People of Israel when being in liberty they would needs chuse a King But without an Agrarian Government whether Monarchical Aristocratical or Popular has no long Lease AS for Dominion personal or in Mony it may now and then stir up a MELIUS or a MANLIUS which if the Commonwealth be not provided with som kind of Dictatorian Power may be dangerous tho it has bin seldom or never successful because to Property producing Empire
it is requir'd that it should have som certain root or foothold which except in Land it cannot have being otherwise as it were upon the Wing Balance in Mony NEVERTHELESS in such Cities as subsist mostly by Trade and have little or no Land as Holland and Genoa the balance of Treasure may be equal to that of Land in the cases mention'd BUT LEVIATHAN tho he seems to scew at Antiquity following his furious Master CARNEADES has caught hold of the public Sword to which he reduces all manner and matter of Government as where he affirms this opinion that any Monarch receives his Power Pag. 89. by Covenant that is to say upon conditions to procede from the not understanding this easy truth That Covenants being but Words and Breath have no power to oblige contain constrain or protect any Man but what they have from the public Sword But as he said of the Law that without this Sword it is but Paper so he might have thought of this Sword that without a Hand it is but cold Iron The Hand which holds this Sword is the Militia of a Nation and the Militia of a Nation is either an Army in the field or ready for the field upon occasion But an Army is a Beast that has a great belly and must be fed wherfore this will com to what Pastures you have and what Pastures you have will com to the balance of Property without which the public Sword is but a name or mere spitfrog Wherfore to set that which LEVIATHAN says of Arms and of Contracts a little streighter Arms and Contracts he that can graze this Beast with the great belly as the Turk dos his Timariots may well deride him that imagins he receiv'd his Power by Covenant or is oblig'd to any such toy it being in this case only that Covenants are but Words and Breath But if the Property of the Nobility stock'd with their Tenants and Retainers be the pasture of that Beast the Ox knows his Master's Crib and it is impossible for a King in such a Constitution to reign otherwise than by Covenant or if he breaks it it is words that com to blows Pag. 90. BUT says he when an Assembly of Men is made Soverain then no Man imagins any such Covenant to have past in the Institution But what was that by PUBLICOLA of appeal to the People or that wherby the People had their Tribuns â—y says he no body is so dull as to say that the People of Rome made a Covenant with the Romans to hold the Soverainty on such or such conditions which not perform'd the Romans might depose the Roman People In which there be several remarkable things for he holds the Commonwealth of Rome to have consisted of one Assembly wheras it consisted of the Senat and the People That they were not upon Covenant wheras every Law enacted by them was a Covenant between them That the one Assembly was made Soverain wheras the People who only were Soverain were such from the beginning as appears by the antient stile of their Covenants or Laws * Censuere patres jussit populus The Senat has resolv'd the People have decreed That a Council being made Soverain cannot be made such upon conditions wheras the Decemvirs being a Council that was made Soverain was made such upon conditions That all Conditions or Covenants making a Soverain the Soverain being made are void whence Pag. 89. it must follow that the Decemviri being made were ever after the lawful Government of Rome and that it was unlawful for the Commonwealth of Rome to depose the Decemvirs as also that CICERO if he wrote otherwise out of his Commonwealth did not write out of Nature But to com to others that see more of this balance B. 5 3. 3 9. YOU have ARISTOTLE full of it in divers places especially where he says that immoderat Wealth as where One Man or the Few have greater Possessions than the Equality or the Frame of the Commonwealth will bear is an occasion of Sedition which ends for the greater part in Monarchy and that for this cause the Ostracism has bin receiv'd in divers places as in Argos and Athens But that it were better to prevent the growth in the beginning than when it has got head to seek the remedy of such an evil D. B. 1. c. 55. MACCHIAVEL has miss'd it very narrowly and more dangerously for not fully perceiving that if a Commonwealth be gall'd by the Gentry it is by their overbalance he speaks of the Gentry as hostil to popular Governments and of popular Governments as hostil to the Gentry and makes us believe that the People in such are so inrag'd against them that where they meet a Gentleman they kill him which can never be prov'd by any one example unless in civil War seeing that even in Switzerland the Gentry are not only safe but in honor But the Balance as I have laid it down tho unseen by MACCHIAVEL is that which interprets him and that which he confirms by his Judgment in many others as well as in this place where he concludes That he who will go about to make a Commonwealth where there be many Gentlemen unless he first destroys them undertakes an Impossibility And that he who goes about to introduce Monarchy where the condition of the People is equal shall never bring it to pass unless he cull out such of them as are the most turbulent and ambitious and make them Gentlemen or Noblemen not in name but in effect that is by inriching them with Lands Castles and Treasures that may gain them Power among the rest and bring in the rest to dependence upon themselves to the end that they maintaining their Ambition by the Prince the Prince may maintain his Power by them WHERFORE as in this place I agree with MACCHIAVEL that a Nobility or Gentry overbalancing a popular Government is the utter bane and destruction of it so I shall shew in another that a Nobility or Gentry in a popular Government not overbalancing it is the very life and soul of it The right of the Militia stated BY what has bin said it should seem that we may lay aside further disputes of the public Sword or of the right of the Militia which be the Government what it will or let it change how it can is inseparable from the overbalance in Dominion nor if otherwise stated by the â—aw or Custom as in the Commonwealth of Rome * Consules sine lege Curiata rem militarem attingere non potuerunt where the People having the Sword the Nobility came to have the overbalance avails it to any other end than destruction For as a Building swaying from the Foundation must fall so it fares with the Law swaying from Reason and the Militia from the balance of Dominion And thus much for the balance of National or Domestic Empire which is in Dominion The Balance of
the People which concurring make a Law The Magistracy BUT the Law being made says LEVIATHAN is but Words and Paper without the Hands and Swords of Men wherfore as those two Orders of a Commonwealth namely the Senat and the People are Legislative so of necessity there must be a third to be executive of the Laws made and this is the Magistracy in which order with the rest being wrought up by art the Commonwealth consists of the Senat proposing the People resolving and the Magistracy executing wherby partaking of the Aristocracy as in the Senat of the Democracy as in the People and of Monarchy as in the Magistracy it is complete Now there being no other Commonwealth but this in Art or Nature it is no wonder if MACCHIAVEL has shew'd us that the Antients held this only to be good but it seems strange to me that they should hold that there could be any other for if there be such a thing as pure Monarchy yet that there should be such a one as pure Aristocracy or pure Democracy is not in my understanding But the Magistracy both in number and function is different in different Commonwealths Nevertheless there is one condition of it that must be the same in every one or it dissolves the Commonwealth where it is wanting And this is no less than that as the hand of the Magistrat is the executive Power of the Law so the head of the Magistrat is answerable to the People that his execution be according to the Law by which LEVIATHAN may see that the hand or sword that executes the Law is in it and not above it The Orders of a Commonwealth in experience as that NOW whether I have rightly transcrib'd these Principles of a Commonwealth out of Nature I shall appeal to God and to the World To God in the Fabric of the Commonwealth of Israel and to the World in the universal Series of antâ—ent Prudence But in regard the same Commonwealths will be open'd at large in the Council of Legislators I shall touch them for the present but slightly beginning with that of Israel Of Israel THE Commonwealth of Israel consisted of the Senat the People and the Magistracy THE People by their first division which was genealogical were contain'd under their thirteen Tribes Houses or Familys wherof the firstborn in each was Prince of his Tribe and had the leading of it Numb 1. the Tribe of LEVI only being set apart to serve at the Altar had no other Prince but the High Priest In their second division they were divided locally by their Agrarian or the distribution of the Land of Josh ch 13 to ch 42. Canaan to them by lot the Tithe of all remaining to LEVI whence according to their local division the Tribes are reckon'd but twelve The People THE Assemblys of the People thus divided were methodically gather'd by Trumpets to the Congregation which was it should seem Numb 10. 7. of two sorts For if it were call'd by one Trumpet only the Princes of the Tribes and the Elders only assembl'd but if it were call'd Numb 10. 4. with two the whole People gather'd themselves to the Congregation Numb 10. 3. for so it is render'd by the English but in the Greec it is call'd Ecclesia Judg. 20. 2. or the Church of God and by the Talmudist the great Synagog The word Ecclesia was also antiently and properly us'd for the Civil Congregations or Assemblys of the People in Athens Lacedemon and Ephesus where it is so call'd in Scripture tho it be otherwise render'd Acts 19. 23. by the Translators not much as I conceive to their commendation seeing by that means they have lost us a good lesson the Apostles borrowing that name for their spiritual Congregations to the end that we might see they intended the Government of the Church to be Democratical or Popular as is also plain in the rest of their Constitutions THE Church or Congregation of the People of Israel assembl'd in a military manner and had the result of the Commonwealth or Judg. 20. 2. the power of confirming all their Laws tho propos'd even by God Exod. 19. himself as where they make him King and where they reject or depose him as Civil Magistrat and elect Saul It is manifest 1 Sam. 8. 7. that he gives no such example to a Legislator in a popular Government as to deny or evade the power of the People which were a contradiction but tho he deservedly blames the ingratitude of the People in that action he commands SAMUEL being next under himself Supreme Magistrat to hearken to their Voice for where the suffrage of the People gos for nothing it is no Commonwealth and comforts him saying They have not rejected thee but they have rejected me that I should not reign over them But to reject him that he should not reign over them was as Civil Magistrat to depose him The Power therfore which the People had to depose even God himself as he was Civil Magistrat leaves little doubt but that they had power to have rejected any of those Laws confirm'd by them throout the Deut. 29. Scripture which to omit the several parcels are generally contain'd under two heads those that were made by Covenant with the People in the Land of Moab and those which were made by Covenant with the People in Horeb which two I think amount to the whole body of the Israelitish Laws But if all and every one of the Laws of Israel being propos'd by God were no otherwise enacted than by Covenant with the People then that only which was resolv'd by the People of Israel was their Law and so the result of that Commonwealth was in the People Nor had the People the result only in matter of Law Josh 7. 16. Judg. 20. 8 9 10. 1 Sam. 7. 6 7 8. 1 Chron. 13. 2. 2 Chron. 30. 4. Judg. 11. 11. 1 Sam. 10. 17. 1 Mac. 14. Exod. 9. 3 4 5. Josh 7. 1 Sam. 10. but the Power in som cases of Judicature as also the right of levying War cognizance in matter of Religion and the election of their Magistrats as the Judg or Dictator the King the Prince which functions were exercis'd by the Synagoga magna or Congregation of Israel not always in one manner for somtimes they were perform'd by the suffrage of the People vivâ voce somtimes by the Lot only and at others by the Ballot or by a mixture of the Lot with the Suffrage as in the case of ELDAD and MEDAD which I shall open with the Senat. The Senat. THE Senat of Israel call'd in the Old Testament the seventy Elders and in the New the Sanhedrim which word is usually translated the Numb 11. Council was appointed by God and consisted of Seventy Elders besides Deut. 1. MOSES which were at first elected by the People but in what Numb 11. manner is rather
Spiritual or Temporal for not only the Thane Lands but the Barons by their Possessions possessions of Bishops as also of som twenty six Abbats and two Priors were now erected into Baronys whence the Lords Spiritual that had suffrage in the Teuton Parlament as Spiritual Lords came to have it in the Neustrian Parlament as Barons and were made subject which they had not formerly bin to Knights service in chief Barony coming henceforth to signify all honorary possessions as well of Earls as Barons and Baronage to denote all kinds of Lords as well Spiritual as Temporal having right to sit in Parlament the Baronys in this sense were somtimes more and somtimes fewer but commonly about 200 or 250 containing in them a matter of sixty thousand feuda militum or Knights Fees wherof som twenty eight thousand were in the Clergy It is ill luck that no man can tell what the Land of a Knights Fee reckon'd in som Writs at 40 l. a year and in others at 10 was certainly worth for by such a help we might have exactly demonstrated the Balance of this Government But says COOK it contain'd Cook 11. Inst pag. 596. twelve Plow Lands and that was thought to be the most certain account But this again is extremely uncertain for one Plow out of som Land that was fruitful might work more than ten out of som other that was barren Nevertheless seeing it appears by BRACTON Balance of the Neustrian Monarchy that of Earldoms and Baronys it was wont to be said that the whole Kingdom was compos'd as also that these consisting of 60000 Knights Fees furnish'd 60000 men for the King's service being the whole Militia of this Monarchy it cannot be imagin'd that the Vavasorys or Freeholds in the People amounted to any considerable proportion Wherfore the Balance and Foundation of this Government was in the 60000 Knights Fees and these being possest by the 250 Lords it was a Government of the Few or of the Nobility wherin the People might also assemble but could have no more than a mere name And the Clergy holding a third to the whole Nation as is plain by the Parlament Roll it is an absurdity seeing the Clergy of France came first thro their Riches to be a State of that Kingdom to acknowlege the People to have bin a State of this Realm and not to allow it to the Clergy who were so much more weighty in the Balance which is 4 Rich. 2. Num. 13. that of all other whence a State or Order in a Government is denominated Wherfore this Monarchy consisted of the King and of the three ordines Regni or Estates the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons It consisted of these I say as to the balance tho during the Reign of som of these Kings not as to the administration Administration of the Neustrian Monarchy during the reign of the first Kings FOR the ambition of TURBO and som of those that more immediatly succeded him to be absolute Princes strove against the nature of their Foundation and inasmuch as he had divided almost the whole Realm among his Neustrians with som incouragement for a while But the Neustrians while they were but foren Plants having no security against the Natives but in growing up by their Princes sides were no sooner well rooted in their vast Dominions than they came up according to the infallible consequence of the Balance domestic and contracting the National interest of the Baronage grew as fierce in the vindication of the antient Rights and Liberties of the same as if they had bin always Natives Whence the Kings being as obstinat on the one side for their absolute Power as these on the other for their Immunitys grew certain Wars which took their denomination from the Barons THIS fire about the middle of the Reign of ADOXUS began to break out And wheras the Predecessors of this King had divers times bin forc'd to summon Councils resembling those of the Teutons to Barons by Writ which the Lords only that were Barons by Dominion and Tenure had hitherto repair'd ADOXUS seeing the effects of such Dominion began first not to call such as were Barons by Writ for that was according to the practice of antient times but to call such by Writs as were otherwise no Barons by which means striving to avoid the consequence of the Balance in coming unwillingly to set the Government streight he was the first that set it awry For the Barons in his Reign and his Successors having vindicated their antient Authority restor'd the Parlament with all the Rights and Privileges of the same saving that from thenceforth the Kings had found out a way wherby to help themselves against the mighty by Creatures of their own and such as had no other support but by their favor By which means this Government being indeed the Masterpiece of modern Prudence has bin cry'd up to the Skys as the only invention wherby at once to maintain the Soverainty of a Prince and the Liberty of the People Wheras indeed it has bin no other than a wrestling match wherin the Nobility as they have bin stronger have thrown the King or the King if he has bin stronger has thrown the Nobility or the King where he has had a Nobility and could bring them to his party has thrown the People as in France and Spain or the People where they have had no Nobility or could get them to be of their party have thrown the King as in Holland and of later times in Oceana But they came not 49 11. 3. to this strength but by such approaches and degrees as remain to be further open'd For wheras the Barons by Writ as the sixty four Abbats and thirty six Priors that were so call'd were but pro tempore DICOTOME being the twelfth King from the Conquest began to Barons by Letters Patents make Barons by Letters Patents with the addition of honorary Pensions for the maintenance of their Dignitys to them and their Heirs so that they were hands in the King's Purse and had no shoulders for his Throne Of these when the House of Peers came once to be full as will be seen hereafter there was nothing more emty But for the present the Throne having other supports they did not hurt that so much as they did the King For the old Barons taking DICOTOME'S Prodigality to such Creatures so ill that they depos'd him got the trick of it and never gave over setting up and pulling down their Kings according to their various interests and that faction of the White Dissolution of the late Monarchy of Oceana and Red into which they had bin thenceforth divided till PANURGUS the eighteenth King from the Conquest was more by their Favor than his Right advanc'd to the Crown This King thro his natural subtilty reflecting at once upon the greatness of their Power and the inconstancy of their favor began to find another Flaw in
Prudence of Venice in her contrary practice affirming it to have bin no small step to the ruin of the Roman Liberty that these having tasted in their Youth of the supreme Honors had no greater in their age to hope for but by perpetuating of the same in themselves which came to Blood and ended in Tyranny The opinion of VERULAMIUS is safe The Errors says he of young men are the ruin of business wheras the Errors of old men amount but to this that more might have bin don or sooner But tho their Wisdom be little their Courage is great Wherfore to com to the main Education of this Commonwealth the Militia of Oceana is the Province of Youth THE distribution of this Province by the Essays is so fully describ'd in the Order that I need repeat nothing the Order it self being but a Repetition or Copy of that Original which in antient Prudence is of all others the fairest as that from whence the Commonwealth of Rome more particularly deriv'd the Empire of the World And there is much more reason in this age when Governments are universally broken or swerv'd from their Foundations and the People groan under Tyranny that the same causes which could not be withstood when the World was full of popular Governments should have the like effects THE Causes in the Commonwealth of Rome wherof the Empire of the World was not any miraculous but a natural nay I may safely say a necessary consequence are contain'd in that part of her Disciplin which was domestic and in that which she exercis'd in her Provinces or Conquest Of the latter I shall have better occaon to speak when we com to our provincial Orbs the former divided the whole People by Tribes amounting as LIVY and CICERO shew at their full growth to thirty five and every Tribe by the Cense or Valuation of Estates into five Classes for the sixth being Proletary that is the Nursery or such as thro their poverty contributed nothing to the Commonwealth but Children was not reckon'd nor us'd in Arms. And this is the first point of the Militia in which modern Prudence is quite contrary to the antient for wheras we excusing the rich and arming the poor becom the Vassals of our Servants they by excusing the poor and arming such as were rich enough to be Freemen became Lords of the Earth The Nobility and Gentry of this Nation who understand so little what it is to be Lords of the Earth that they have not bin able to keep their own Lands will think it a strange Education for their Children to be common Soldiers and oblig'd to all the Dutys of Arms nevertheless it is not for 4 s. a week but to be capable of being the best man in the Field or in the City the latter part of which consideration makes the common Soldier herein a better man than the General of any monarchical Army And wheras it may be thought that this would drink deep of noble Blood I dare boldly say take the Roman Nobility in the heat of their fiercest Wars and you shall not find such a shambles of them as has bin made of ours by mere Luxury and Slothfulness which killing the Body kill the Soul also Animasque in vulnere ponunt Wheras common Right is that which who stands in the vindication of has us'd that Sword of Justice for which he receives the Purple of Magistracy The Glory of a man on Earth can go no higher and if he falls he rises again and coms sooner to that reward which is so much higher as Heaven is above the Earth To return to the Roman Example Every Classis was divided as has bin more than once shewn into Centurys and every Century was equally divided into Youth and Elders the Youth for foren Service and the Elders for the guard of the Territory In the first Classis were about eighteen Centurys of Horse being those which by the Institution of SERVIUS were first call'd to the Suffrage in the * * Centuriatis Centurial Assemblys But the Delectus or Levy of an Army which is the present business proceded according to POLYBIUS in this manner Upon a War decreed the Consuls elected four and twenty military Tribuns or Colonels wherof ten being such as had merited their tenth Stipend were younger Officers The Tribuns being chosen the Consuls appointed a day to the Tribes when those in them of military age were to appear at the Capitol the day being com and the Youth assembl'd accordingly the Consuls ascended their Tribunal and the younger Tribuns were straight divided into four parts after this manner four were assign'd to the first Legion a Legion at the most consisted of 6000 Foot and 300 Horse three to the second four to the third and three to the fourth The younger Tribuns being thus distributed two of the elder were assign'd to the first Legion three to the second two to the third and three to the fourth And the Officers of each Legion thus assign'd having drawn the Tribes by Lots and being seated according to their divisions at a convenient distance from each other the Tribe of the first Lot was call'd wherupon they that were of it knowing the business and being prepar'd presently bolted out four of their number in the choice wherof such care was taken that they offer'd none that was not a Citizen no Citizen that was not of the Youth no Youth that was not of som one of the five Classes nor any one of the five Classes that was not expert at his Exercises Moreover they us'd such diligence in matching them for Age and Stature that the Officers of the Legions except they happen'd to be acquainted with the Youth so bolted were forc'd to put themselves upon fortune while they of the first Legion chose one they of the second the next they of the third another and the fourth Youth fell to the last Legion and thus was the Election the Legions and the Tribes varying according to their Lots carry'd on till the Foot were complete The like course with little alteration was taken by the Horse Officers till the Horse also were complete This was call'd giving of Names which the Judg. 20. 9. Children of Israel did also by Lot and if any man refus'd to give his Name he was sold for a Slave or his Estate confiscated to the Commonwealth When * * Marcus Curius Consul cum subitum delectum edicere coactus esset juniorum nemo respondisset conjectis in sortem omnibus Polliae quae proxima exierat primum nomen urna extractum citari jussit neque eo respondente bona adolescentis hastâ subjecit Val. MARCUS CURIUS the Consul was forc'd to make a sudden Levy and none of the Youth would give in their Names all the Tribes being put to the Lot he commanded the first Name drawn out of the Vrn of the Pollian Tribe which happen'd to com first to be call'd but the Youth not answering he
considerable People If your Liberty be not a Root that grows it will be a Branch that withers which consideration brings me to the Paragon the Commonwealth of Rome THE ways and means wherby the Romans acquir'd the Patronage and in that the Empire of the World were different according to the different condition of their Commonwealth in her rise and in her growth in her rise she proceded rather by Colonys in her growth by inequal Leagues Colonys without the bounds of Italy she planted none such dispersion of the Roman Citizen as to plant him in foren parts till the contrary Interest of the Emperors brought in that Practice was unlawful nor did she ever demolish any City within that compass or devest it of Liberty but wheras the most of them were Commonwealths stir'd up by emulation of her great felicity to war against her if she overcame any she confiscated som part of their Lands that were the greatest Incendiarys or causes of the Trouble upon which she planted Colonys of her own People preserving the rest of their Lands and Libertys for the Natives or Inhabitants By this way of proceding that I may be as brief as possible she did many and great things For in confirming of Liberty she propagated her Empire in holding the Inhabitants from Rebellion she put a curb upon the incursion of Enemys in exonerating her self oâ— the poorer sort she multiply'd her Citizens in rewarding her Veterans she render'd the rest less seditious and in acquiring to her self the reverence of a common Parent she from time to time became the Mother of newborn Citys IN her farther growth the way of her Propagation went more upon Leagues which for the first division were of two kinds Social and Provincial AGAIN Social Leagues or Leagues of Society were of two kinds THE first call'd Latinity or Latin the second Italian Right THE League between the Romans and the Latins or Latin Right approach'd nearest to Jus Quiritium or the Right of a native Roman The Man or the City that was honor'd with this Right was Civitate donatus cum suffragio adopted a Citizen of Rome with the right of giving Suffrage with the People in som cases as those of Confirmation of Law or Determination in Judicature if both the Consuls were agreed not otherwise wherfore that coming to little the greatest and most peculiar part of this Privilege was that who had born Magistracy at least that of Aedil or Quaestor in any Latin City was by consequence of the same a Citizen of Rome at all points ITALIAN Right was also a donation of the City but without Suffrage they who were in either of these Leagues were govern'd by their own Laws and Magistrats having all the Rights as to Liberty of Citizens of Rome yielding and paying to the Commonwealth as head of the League and having in the conduct of all Affairs appertaining to the common Cause such aid of Men and Mony as was particularly agreed to upon the merit of the Cause and specify'd in their respective Leagues whence such Leagues came to be call'd equal or inequal accordingly PROVINCIAL Leagues were of different extension according to the Merit and Capacity of a conquer'd People but they were all of one kind for every Province was govern'd by Roman Magistrats as a Praetor or a Proconsul according to the dignity of the Province for the Civil Administration and Conduct of the Provincial Army and a Quaestor for the gathering of the public Revenue from which Magistrats a Province might appeal to Rome FOR the better understanding of these Particulars I shall exemplify in as many of them as is needful and first in Macedon THE Macedonians were thrice conquer'd by the Romans first under the Conduct of TITUS QUINTUS FLAMINIUS secondly under that of LUCIUS AEMILIUS PAULUS and thirdly under that of QUINTUS CAECILIUS METELLUS thence call'd MACEDONICUS FOR the first time PHILIP of Macedon who possest of Acrocorinthus boasted no less than was true that he had Greece in fetters being overcom by FLAMINIUS had his Kingdom restor'd to him upon condition that he should immediatly set all the Citys which he held in Greece and in Asia at liberty and that he should not make war out of Macedon but by leave of the Senat of Rome which PHILIP having no other way to save any thing agreed should be don accordingly THE Grecians being at this time assembl'd at the Isthmian Games where the Concourse was mighty great a Crier appointed to the office by FLAMINIUS was heard among them proclaiming all Greece to be free to which the People being amaz'd at so hopeless a thing gave little credit till they receiv'd such testimony of the truth as put it past all doubt wherupon they fell immediatly on running to the Proconsul with Flowers and Garlands and such violent expressions of their Admiration and Joy as if FLAMINIUS a young man about thirty three had not also bin very strong he must have dy'd of no other death than their kindness while every one striving to touch his hand they bore him up and down the field with an unruly throng full of such Ejaculations as these How Is there a People in the world that at their own charge at their own peril will fight for the Liberty of another Did they live at the next door to this fire Or what kind of men are these whose business it is to pass the Seas that the World may be govern'd with Righteousness The Citys of Greece and of Asia shake off their Iron Fetters at the voice of a Cryer Was it madness to imagin such a thing and is it don O Virtue O Felicity O Fame IN this Example your Lordships have a donation of Liberty or of Italian Right to a People by restitution to what they had formerly injoy'd and som particular Men Familys or Citys according to their merit of the Romans if not upon this yet upon the like occasions were gratify'd with Latinity BUT PHILIP'S share by this means did not please him wherfore the League was broken by his Son PERSEUS and the Macedonians therupon for the second time conquer'd by AEMILIUS PAULUS their King taken and they som time after the Victory summon'd to the Tribunal of the General where remembring how little hope they ought to have of Pardon they expected som dreadful Sentence When AEMILIUS in the first place declar'd the Macedonians to be free in the full possession of their Lands Goods and Laws with Right to elect annual Magistrats yielding and paying to the People of Rome one half of the Tribute which they were accustom'd to pay to their own Kings This don he went on making so skilful a division of the Country in order to the methodizing of the People and casting them into a form of popular Government that the Macedonians being first surpriz'd with the Virtue of the Romans began now to alter the scene of their Admiration that a Stranger should do such things for them in their own
Riches in general have Wings and be apt to bate yet those in Land are the most hooded and ty'd to the Perch wheras those in Mony have the least hold and are the swiftest of flight A Bank where the Mony takes not wing but to com home seiz'd or like a Coyduck may well be great but the Treasure of the Indys going out and not upon returns makes no Bank Whence a Bank never paid an Army or paying an Army soon became no Bank But where a Prince or a Nobility has an Estate in Land the Revenue wherof will desray this Charge there their Men are planted have Toes that are Roots and Arms that bring forth what Fruit you please THUS a single Person is made or a Nobility makes a King not with difficulty or any great prudence but with ease the rest coming home as the Ox that not only knows his Master's Crib but must starve or repair to it Nor for the same reason is Government acquir'd with more ease than it is preserv'd that is if the Foundation of Property Book I be in Land but if in Mony lightly com lightly go The reason why a single Person or the Nobility that has one hundred thousand men or half so many at command will have the Government is that the Estate in Land wherby they are able to maintain so many in any European Territory must overbalance the rest that remains to the People at least three parts in four by which means they are no more able to dispute the Government with him or them than your Servant is with you Now for the same reason if the People hold three parts in four of the Territory it is plain there can neither be any single Person nor Nobility able to dispute the Government with them in this case therfore except Force be interpos'd they govern themselves So by this computation of the Balance of Property or Dominion in Land you have according to the threefold Foundation of Property the Root or Generation of the threefold kind of Government or Empire Oceana p. 39. IF one man be sole Landlord of a Territory or overbalance the whole People three parts in four or therabouts he is Grand Signior for so the Turc not from his Empire but his Property is call'd and the Empire in this case is absolute Monarchy IF the Few or a Nobility or a Nobility with a Clergy be Landlords to such a proportion as overbalances the People in the like manner they may make whom they please King or if they be not pleas'd with their King down with him and set up whom they like better a HENRY the Fourth or the Seventh a GUISE a MONTFORT a NEVIL or a PORTER should they find that best for their own ends and purposes For as not the Balance of the King but that of the Nobility in this case is the cause of the Government so not the Estate or Riches of the Prince or Captain but his Virtue or Ability or fitness for the ends of the Nobility acquires that Command or Office This for Aristocracy or mix'd Monarchy But if the whole People be Landlords or hold the Land so divided among them that no one man or number of men within the compass of the Few or Aristocracy overbalance them it is a Commonwealth Such is the Branch in the Root or the Balance of Property naturally producing Empire which not confuted no man shall be able to batter my Superstructures and which confuted I lay down my Arms. Till then if the cause necessarily precede the effect Property must have a being before Empire or beginning with it must be still first in order PROPERTY coms to have a being before Empire or Government two ways either by a natural or violent Revolution Natural Revolution happens from within or by Commerce as when a Government erected upon one Balance that for example of a Nobility or a Clergy thro the decay of their Estates coms to alter to another Balance which alteration in the Root of Property leaves all to confusion or produces a new Branch or Government according to the kind or nature of the Root Violent Revolution happens from without or by Arms as when upon Conquest there follows Confiscation Confiscation again is of three kinds when the Captain taking all to himself plants his Army by way of military Colonys Benefices or Timars which was the Policy of MAHOMET or when the Captain has som Sharers or a Nobility that divides with him which was the Policy introduc'd by the Goths and Vandals or when the Captain divides the Inheritance by Lots or otherwise to the whole People which Policy was instituted by GOD or MOSES in the Common-wealth Chap. 3 of Israel This triple distribution whether from natural or violent Revolution returns as to the generation of Empire to the same thing that is to the nature of the Balance already stated and demonstrated Now let us see what the Prevaricator will say which first is this Consid p. 14. THE Assertion that Property producing Empire consists only in Land appears too positive A Pig of my own Sow this is no more than I told him only there is more imply'd in what I told him than he will see which therfore I shall now further explain The balance in Mony may be as good or better than that of Land in three cases First where there is no Property of Land yet introduc'd as in Greece during the time of her antient Imbecillity whence as is noted by THUCYDIDES the meaner sort thro a desire of Gain underwent the Servitude of the Mighty Secondly in Citys of small Territory and great Trade as Holland and Genoa the Land not being able to feed the People who must live upon Traffic is overbalanc'd by the means of that Traffic which is Mony Thirdly in a narrow Country where the Lots are at a low scantling as among the Israelits if care be not had of Mony in the regulation of the same it will eat out the balance of Land For which cause tho an Israelit might both have Mony and put it to Usury Thou shalt lend upon usury to many Nations yet Deut. 15. 6. 23. 19. might he not lend it upon usury to a Citizen or Brother whence two things are manifest First that Usury in it self is not unlawful And next that Usury in Israel was no otherwise forbidden than as it might com to overthrow the Balance or Foundation of the Government for where a Lot as to the general amounted not perhaps to four Acres a man that should have had a thousand Pounds in his Purse would not have regarded such a Lot in comparison of his Mony and he that should have bin half so much in debt would have bin quite eaten out Usury is of such a nature as not forbidden in the like cases must devour the Government The Roman People while their Territory was no bigger and their Lots which exceded not two Acres a man were yet
scantier were flead alive with it and if they had not help'd themselves by their Tumults and the Institution of their Tribuns it had totally ruin'd both them and their Government In a Common-wealth whose Territory is very small the Balance of the Government being laid upon the Land as in Lacedemon it will not be sufficient to forbid Usury but Mony it self must be forbidden Whence LYCURGUS allow'd of none or of such only as being of old or otherwise useless Iron was little better or if you will little worse than none The Prudence of which Law appear'd in the neglect of it as when LYSANDER General for the Lacedemonians in the Peloponnesian War having taken Athens and brought home the spoil of it occasion'd the Ruin of that Commonwealth in her Victory The Land of Canaan compar'd with Spain or England was at the most but a Yorkshire and Laconia was less than Canaan Now if we imagin Yorkshire divided as was Canaan into six hundred thousand Lots or as was Laconia into thirty thousand a Yorkshire man having one thousand Pounds in his Purse would I believe have a better Estate in Mony than in Land wherfore in this case to make the Land hold the Balance there is no way but either that of Israel by forbidding Usury or that of Lacedemon by forbidding Mony Where a small Sum may com to Book I overbalance a man's Estate in Land there I say Usury or Mony for the preservation of the Balance in Land must of necessity be forbidden or the Government will rather rest upon the Balance of Mony than upon that of Land as in Holland and Genoa But in a Territory of such extent as Spain or England the Land being not to be overbalanc'd by Mony there needs no forbidding of Mony or Usury In Lacedemon Merchandize was forbidden in Israel and Rome it was not exercis'd wherfore to these Usury must have bin the more destructive but in a Country where Merchandize is exercis'd it is so far from being destructive that it is necessary else that which might be of profit to the Commonwealth would rust unprofitably in privat purses there being no man that will venture his Mony but thro hope of som Gain which if it be so regulated that the Borrower may gain more by it than the Lender as at four in the hundred or therabouts Usury becoms a mighty Profit to the Public and a Charity to privat Men in which sense we may not be persuaded by them that do not observe these different causes that it is against Scripture Had usury to a Brother bin permitted in Israel that Government had bin overthrown but that such a Territory as England or Spain cannot be overbalanc'd by Mony whether it be a scarce or a plentiful Commodity whether it be accumulated by Parsimony as in the purse of HENRY the 7 th or presented by Fortune as in the Revenue of the Indys is sufficiently demonstrated or shall be FIRST by an Argument ad hominem one good enough for the Consid p. 12. Prevaricator who argues thus The Wisdom or the Riches of another man can never give him a Title to my Obedience nor oblige Mr. HARRINGTON to give his Clothes or Mony to the next man he meets wiser or richer than himself IF he had said stronger he had spoil'd all for the parting with a mans Clothes or Mony in that case cannot be help'd now the richer as to the case in debate is the stronger that is the advantage of Strength remains to the Balance But well he presumes me to have Clothes and Mony of my own let him put the same case in the People or the similitude dos not hold But if the People have Clothes and Mony of their own these must either rise for the bulk out of Property in Land or at least out of the cultivation of the Land or the Revenue of Industry which if it be dependent they must give such a part of their Clothes and Mony to preserve that dependence out of which the rest arises to him or them on whom they depend as he or they shall think fit or parting with nothing to this end must lose all that is if they be Tenants they must pay their Rent or turn out So iâ— they have Clothes and Mony dependently the Balance of Land is in the Landlord or Landlords of the People but if they have Clothes and Mony independently then the Balance of Land must of necessity be in the People themselves in which case they neither would if there were any such nor can because there be no such give their Mony or Clothes to such as are wiser or richer or stronger than themselves So it is not a mans Clothes and Mony or Riches that oblige him to acknowlege the Title of his Obedience to him that is wiser or richer but a man 's no Clothes or Mony or his Poverty with which if the Prevaricator should com to want he could not so finely prevaricat but he must serve som body so he were rich no matter if less wise than himself Wherfore seeing the People cannot be said to have Clothes and Mony of their own without the balance in Land Chap. 3 and having the balance in Land will never give their Clothes or Mony or Obedience to a single Person or a Nobility tho these should be the richer in Mony the Prevaricator by his own Argument has evinc'd that in such a Territory as England or Spain Mony can never com to overbalance Land FOR a second Demonstration of this Truth HENRY the Seventh tho he miss'd of the Indys in which for my part I think him happy was the richest in Mony of English Princes Nevertheless this accession of Revenue did not at all preponderat on the King's part nor change the balance But while making Farms of a Standard he increas'd the Yeomanry and cutting off Retainers he abas'd the Nobility began that Breach in the balance of Land which proceding has ruin'd the Nobility and in them that Government FOR a third the Monarchy of Spain since the Silver of Potosi sail'd up the Guadalquivir which in English is since that King had the Indys stands upon the same balance in the Lands of the Nobility on which it always stood Consid p. 16. AND so the learned Conclusion of the Prevaricator That it is not to be doubted but a Revenue sufficient to maintain a Force able to cry ware horns or beat down all opposition dos equally conduce to Empire whether it arises from Rents Lands Profits of ready Mony Dutys Customs c. asks you no more than where you saw her Premises For unless they ascended his Monti and his Banks it is not to be imagin'd which way they went and with these because he is a profest Zealot for Monarchy I would wish him by no means to be montebanking or meddling for the purse of a Prince never yet made a Bank nor till spending and trading Mony be all one ever shall The
Genoese which the King of Spain could never do with the Indys can make you a Bank out of Letters of Exchange and the Hollander with Herrings Let him com no more here where there is a Bank ten to one there is a Commonwealth A King is a Soldier or a Lover neither of which makes a good Merchant and without Merchandize you will have a lean Bank It is true the Family of the MEDICI were both Merchants and made a Bank into a Throne but it was in Commonwealth of Merchants in asmall Territory by great purchases in Land and rather in a mere confusion than under any settl'd Government which Causes if he can give them all such another meeting may do as much for another man Otherwise let it be agreed and resolv'd that in a Territory of any extent the balance of Empire consists in Land and not in Mony always provided that in case a Prince has occasion to run away as HENRY the Third of France did out of Poland his Balance in ready Mony is absolutely the most proper for the carrying on of so great and sudden an Enterprize IT is an excellent way of disputing when a man has alleg'd no experience no example no reason to conclude with no doubt Certainly upon such occasions it is not unlawful nor unreasonable to be merry Reasons says one Comedian are not so common as Blackberrys For all that says another Comedian no doubt but a Revenue in Taxes is as good as a Revenue in Feesimple for this in brief is the sense of his former particular or that part of it which the Monti and the Banks being already discharg'd remains to be answer'd Yet that the Rents and Profits of a man's Land in Feesimple or Property com Book I in naturally and easily by common consent or concernment that is by virtue of the Law founded upon the public Interest and therfore voluntarily establish'd by the whole People is an apparent thing So a man that will receive the Rents and Profits of other mens Land must either take them by mere force or bring the People to make a Law devesting themselves of so much of their Property which upon the matter is all one because a People possest of the Balance cannot be brought to make such a Law further than they see necessary for their common defence but by force nor to keep it any longer than that Force continues It is true there is not only such a thing in nature as health but sickness too nor do I deny that there is such a thing as a Government against the Balance But look about seek find where it stood how it was nam'd how lik'd or how long it lasted Otherwise the comical Proposition coms to this It is not to be doubted but that Violence may be permanent or durable and the Blackberry for it is because Nature is permanent or durable What other construction can be made of these words It is not to be doubted but a Revenue sufficient to maintain a Force able to beat down all opposition that is a Force able to raise such a Revenue dos equally on which word grows the Blackberry conduce to Empire that is as much as could any natural Balance of the same He may stain mouths as he has don som but he shall never make a Politician The Earth yields her natural increase without losing her heart but if you com once to force her look your Force continue or she yields you nothing and the balance of Empire consisting of Earth is of the nature of her Element DIVINES are given to speak much of things which the Considerer balks in this place that would check them to the end he may fly out with them in others wherto they do not belong as where he Consid p. 23. says that Government is founâ—ed either upon Paternity and the natural Advantage the first Father had over all the rest of Mankind who were his Sons or else from the increase of Strength and Power in som Man or Men to whose Will the rest submit that by their submission they may avoid such mischief as otherwise would be brought upon them Which two Vagarys are to be fetch'd home to this place FOR the former If ADAM had liv'd till now he could have seen no other than his own Children and so that he must have bin King by the right of Nature was his peculiar Prerogative But whether the eldest Son of his House if the Prevaricator can find him at this time of day has the same right is somwhat disputable because it was early when ABRAHAM and LOT dividing Territorys became several Kings and not long after when the Sons of JACOB being all Patriarchs by the appointment of God whose Right sure was not inferior to that of ADAM tho he had liv'd came under Popular Government Wherfore the advantage of the first Father is for grave men a pleasant fancy nevertheless if he had liv'd till now I hope they understand that the whole Earth would have bin his Demeans and so the Balance of his Property must have answer'd to his Empire as did that also of ABRAHAM and LOT to theirs Wherfore this way of Deduction coms directly home again to the Balance Paterfamilias De jure belli l. 1. c. 3. Latifundia possidens neminem aliâ lege in suas terras recipiens quam ut ditioni suae qui recipiuntur se subjiciant est Rex says GROTIUS Fathers of Familys are of three sorts either a sole Landlord as ADAM and then he is an absolute Monarch or a few Landlords as LOT and ABRAHAM with the Patriarchs of those days who if Chap. 3 they join'd not together were so many Princes or if they join'd made a mix'd Monarchv or as GROTIUS believes a kind of Commonwealth administer'd in the Land of Canaan by MELCHISEDEC to whom as King and Priest ABRAHAM paid Tithes of all that he had Such a Magistracy was that also of JETHRO King and Priest in the Commonwealth of Midian Fathers of Familys for the third sort as when the Multitude are Landlords which happen'd in the division of the Land of Canaan make a Commonwealth And thus much however it was out of the Prevaricator's head in the place now deduc'd he excepting no further against the Balance than that it might consist as well in Mony as in Land had confest before HIS second Vagary is in his deduction of Empire from increase of Strength for which we must once more round about our â—oalsire The strength wherby this effect can be expected consists not in a pair of Fists but in an Army and an Army is a Beast with a great Belly which subsists not without very large pastures so if one man has sufficient pasture he may feed such a Beast if a few have the pasture they must feed the Beast and the Beast is theirs that feed it But if the People be the Sheep of their own pastures they are not only a flock of Sheep but
French Monarchy to which the Peasant holding nothing but living tho in one of the best Countrys of the World in the meanest and most miserable condition of a Laborer or Hynd is of no account at all THE Partys that hold the Balance in a Territory are those of whom the Government dos naturally consist wherfore these are call'd Estates so the Clergy the Nobility and the Commons are the three Estates of France Tho the third because the Peasant partaking not of the Balance can in relation to Government be of no account is not call'd the Commons but only the third Estate wheras the Yeomanry and Gentry in England having weigh'd as well in the Balance as the Church and the Nobility the three Estates of England while the Monarchy was in vigor were the Clergy the Nobility and the Commons The Consent of Nations evinces that the Function Grotius de Imp. Sum. Pot. circa sacra C. 2. S. 4. of the Clergy or Priest except where otherwise determin'd by Law appertains to the Magistrat By this right NOAH ABRAHAM JOB with the rest of the Patriarchs instructed their Familys or sacrific'd There seems to have bin a kind of Commonwealth in Canaan while MELCHISEDEC was both King and Priest Such also was MOSES till he consecrated AARON and confer'd the Priesthood upon the Levits who are expresly said to succede to the firstborn that is to the Patriarchs who till then exercis'd that Function Nor was it otherwise with the Gentils where they who had the Soverain Power or were in eminent Magistracy did also the Priestly Office omnino apud veteres qui rerum potiebantur iidem Auguria tenebant ut enim sapere sic divinare regale ducebant says CICERO and VIRGIL REX ANIUS Rex idem hominum PHOEBIQUE Sacerdos You find the Heros that is Princes in Poets sacrificing The Ethiopian Egyptian Lacedemonian Kings did the like In Athens constantly and in Rome when they had no Kings occasionally they elected a Rex sacrorum or King Priest So that a free People had thus far Power of electing their Priests is not deny'd by any man This came it should seem to be otherwise Original of a Landed Clergy establish'd by the Law in Egypt where the Priests whose Lands JOSEPH when he bought those of the People did not buy being Gen. 47. 22. great Landlords it may be to the Third of the whole Territory were one of the three Estates of the Realm And it is clear in Scripture that the People till they sold their Lands became not Servants to Book I PHARAOH While AGESILAUS was in Egypt they depos'd their Xenoph. in Orat. de Ages King which implys the recovery of their Balance but so seeing they set up another as withal shews the Balance of the Nobility to have bin predominant These Particulars seem to com near to the account of DIODORUS SICULUS by whom the Balance of Egypt should L. 1. have stood thus The whole Revenue was divided into three Parts wherof the Priest had the first the King had the second and the Nobility had the third It seems to me that the Priests had theirs by their antient Right and Title untouch'd by JOSEPH that the Kings had all the rest by the purchase of JOSEPH and that in time as is usual in like cases a Nobility came thro the bounty of succeding Kings to share with them in one half But however it came about Egypt by this means is the first example of a Monarchy upon a Nobility at least distributed into three Estates by means of a Landed Clergy which by consequence came to be the greatest Counsillors of State and fitting Religion to their uses to bring the People to be the most superstitious in the whole World WERE it not for this Example I should have said that the Indowment of a Clergy or religious Order with Lands and the erecting of them into an Estate of the Realm or Government were no antienter than the Goths and Vandals who introducing a like Policy which to this day takes place throout the Christian World have bin the cause FIRST Why the Clergy have bin generally great Counsillors to Kings while the People are led into Superstition SECONDLY By planting a religious Order in the Earth why Religion has bin brought to serve worldly ends AND Thirdly by rendring the Miter able to make War why of latter Ages we have had such a thing as War for Religion which till the Clergy came to be a third State or Landlords was never known in the World For that som Citys of Greece taking Arms upon the Thucyd. l. 1. Usurpation or Violation of som Temple have call'd it the Holy War such Disputes having bin put upon matter of Fact and not of Faith in which every man was free came not to this account MOSES was learn'd in all the Learning of the Egyptians but a Landed Clergy introduc'd he not in Israel nor went the Apostles about to lay any such Foundation of a Church Abating this one example of Egypt till the Goths and Vandals who brought in the third Estate a Government if it were inequal consisted but of two Estates as that of Rome whether under the Kings or the Commonwealth consisted of the Patricians and Plebeians or of the Nobility and the People And an equal Commonwealth consists but of one which is the People for example of this you have Lacedemon and Venice where the People being few and having many Subjects or Servants might also be call'd a Nobility as in regard of their Subjects they are in Venice and in regard of their Helots or Servants they might have bin in Lacedemon That I say which introducing two Estates causes Division or makes a Commonwealth inequal is not that she has a Nobility without which she is depriv'd of her most special Ornament and weaken'd in her Conduct but when the Nobility only is capable of Magistracy or of the Senat and where this is so order'd she is inequal as Rome But where the Nobility is no otherwise capable of Magistracy nor of the Senat than by Election of the People the Commonwealth consists but of one Order and is equal as Chap. 9 Lacedemon or Venice BUT for a Politician commend me to the Considerer he will have Rome to have bin an equal Commonwealth and Venice to be an inequal one which must be evinc'd by wiredrawing For having elswhere as has bin shewn admitted without opposition that the Balance of Empire is well divided into national and provincial the humor now Consid p. 16. 69. 70. takes him to spin that wedg into such a thred as by intangling of these two may make them both easy to be broken Hereto he betakes himself in this manner As Mr. HARRINGTON has well observ'd p. 40. where there are two Partys in a Republic with equal Power as in that of Rome the People had one half and the Nobility had the other half Confusion and Misery are there intail'd
what is said nor cares what he says to affirm that a Commonwealth was never conquer'd by any Monarch and that a Commonwealth has conquer'd many Monarchs or frequently led mighty Kings in triumph is to run upon the foil the second Proposition being with him no more than only the conversion of the first As if that Rome was not conquer'd by Consid p. 55. the World and that the World was conquer'd by Rome were but a simple conversion So the World having not conquer'd Venice it must follow that Venice has conquer'd the World Do we take or are we taken Nor is he thus satisfy'd to burn his fingers but he will blister his tongue WHERE I said that the Commonwealth of Venice consisting of all them that first fled from the main Land to those Ilands where the City is now planted at the Institution took in the whole People he would make you believe I had said that the Senat of Venice at the first Institution took in the whole People It is matter of fact and that in Consid p. 70. Oceana p. 43. which his Integrity will be apparent to every man's judgment I pray see the places And yet when he has put this trick upon me he tells me perhaps it is not true and this only I grant him past peradventure is false whether that I said it or that the thing is possible For how is it possible that the Senat which is no otherwise such than as it consists of the Aristocracy or select part of the People should take in the whole People It is true that good Authors both antient and modern when they speak of the Senat of Rome or of Venice historically imply the People MACCHIAVEL speaks of the Magistracy of PUBLILIUS PHILO as prolong'd by the Senat of Rome without making any mention of the People by whom nevertheless it was granted the like is usual with other Authors THUANUS seldom mentions the Commonwealth of Venice but by the name of the Senat which not understood by the learned Considerer where CONTARINI speaks in the same manner of the Courses taken by the Commonwealth of Venice for withholding the Subject in the City from Sedition he takes him to be speaking of the means wherby the Senat an 't please you keeps the People under and so having put one trick upon me and another upon Book I CONTARINI these two are his Premises whence he draws this Conclusion That Venice is as much as any in the World an inequal Common-wealth Now the Conclusion you know no body can deny CHAP. XI Whether there be not an Agrarian or som Law or Laws of that nature to supply the defect of it in every Commonwealth and whether the Agrarian as it is stated in Oceana be not equal and satisfactory to all Interests IN this Chapter the Prevaricator's Devices are the most welfavor'd for wheras the Agrarian of Oceana dos no more than pin the basket which is already fill'd he gets up into the Tree where the Birds have long since eaten all the Cherrys and with what Clouts he can rake up makes a most ridiculous Scarcrow This pains he needed not to have taken if he had not slighted overmuch the Lexicon of which he allows me to be the Author yet will have it that he understood the words before som of which nevertheless his ill understanding requires should be further interpreted in this place as Property Balance Agrarian and Levelling PROPERTY is that which is every mans own by the Law of the Land and of this there is nothing stir'd but all intirely left as it was found by the Agrarian of Oceana PROPERTY in Mony except as has bin shewn in Citys that have little or no Territory coms not to the present account But Property in Land according to the distribution that happens to be of the same causes the political Balance producing Empire of the like nature that is if the Property in Lands be so diffus'd thro the whole People that neither one Landlord nor a few Landlords overbalance them the Empire is popular If the Property in Lands be so ingrost by the Few that they overbalance the whole People the Empire is Aristocratical or mix'd Monarchy but if Property in Lands be in one Landlord to such a proportion as overbalances the whole People the Empire is absolute Monarchy So the political Balance is threefold Democratical Aristocratical and Monarchical EACH of these Balances may be introduc'd either by the Legislator at the institution of the Government or by civil Vicissitude Alienation or Alteration of Property under Government EXAMPLES of the Balance introduc'd at the Institution and by the Legislator are first those in Israel and Lacedemon introduc'd by GOD or MOSES and LYCURGUS which were Democratical or Popular Secondly Those in England France and Spain introduc'd by the Goths Vandals Saxons and Franks which were Aristocratical or such as produc'd the Government of King Lords and Commons Thirdly Those in the East and Turky introduc'd by NIMROD and MAHOMET or OTTOMAN which were purely Monarchical EXAMPLES of the Balance introduc'd by civil Vicissitude Alienation or Alteration of Property under Government are in Florence where the MEDICI attaining to excessive wealth the Balance alter'd Chap. 11 from Popular to Monarchical In Greece where the Argives being lovers Pausan Corinth of Equality and Liberty reduc'd the Power of their Kings to so small a matter that there remain'd to the Children and Successors of CISUS little more than the Title where the Balance alter'd from Monarchical to Popular In Rome about the time of CRASSUS the Nobility having eaten the People out of their Lands the Balance alter'd from Popular first to Aristocratical as in the Triumvirs CESAR POMPEY and CRASSUS and then to Monarchical as when CRASSUS being dead and POMPEY conquer'd the whole came to CESAR In Tarentum not long after the War with the Medes Arist Pol. L. 5. c. 3. the Nobility being wasted and overcom by Iapyges the Balance and with that the Commonwealth chang'd from Aristocratical to Popular The like of late has discover'd it self in Oceana When a Balance coms so thro civil Vicissitude to be chang'd that the change cannot be attributed to human Providence it is more peculiarly to be ascrib'd to the hand of God and so when there happens to be an irresistible change of the Balance not the old Government which God has repeal'd but the new Government which he dictats as present Legislator is of Divine Right THIS Volubility of the Balance being apparent it belongs to Legislators to have eys and to occur with som prudential or legal Remedy or Prevention and the Laws that are made in this case are call'd Agrarian So An Agrarian is a Law sixing the Balance of a Government in such a manner that it cannot alter THIS may be don divers ways as by intailing the Lands upon certain Familys without power of Alienation in any case as in Israel and Lacedemon or except with leave
of the Magistrat as in Spain But this by making som Familys too secure as those in possession and others too despairing as those not in possession may make the whole People less industrious WHERFORE the other way which by the regulation of Purchases ordains only that a mans Land shall not excede som certain proportion for example two thousand Pounds a year or exceding such a proportion shall divide in descending to the Children so soon as being more than one they shall be capable of such a division or subdivision till the greater share excedes not two thousand pounds a year in Land lying and being within the native Territory is that which is receiv'd and establish'd by the Commonwealth of Oceana BY Levelling they who use the word seem to understand when a People rising invades the Lands and Estates of the richer sort and divides them equally among themselves as for example No where in the World this being that both in the way and in the end which I have already demonstrated to be impossible Now the words of this Lexicon being thus interpreted let us hearken what the Prevaricator will say and out it coms in this manner Consid p. 73. TO him that makes Property and that in Lands the Foundation of Empire the establishing of an Agrarian is of absolute necessity that by it the Power may be fix'd in those hands to whom it was at first committed WHAT need we then procede any further while he having no where disprov'd the Balance in these words gives up the whole Cause For as to that which he says of Mony seeing neither the vast Treasure of HENRY the 7 th alter'd the Balance of England nor the Revenue of Book I the Indys alters that of Spain this Retrait except in the Cases excepted is long since barricado'd But he is on and off and any thing to the contrary notwithstanding gives you this for certain THE Examples of an Agrarian are so infrequent that Mr. HARRINGTON is constrain'd to wave all but two Commonwealths and can find in the whole extent of History only Israel and Lacedemon to fasten upon A MAN that has read my Writings or is skill'd in History cannot chuse but see how he slurs his Dice nevertheless to make this a Pol. L. 2. C. 5. little more apparent It has seem'd to som says ARISTOTLE the main point of Institution in Government to order Riches right whence otherwise derives all civil Discord Vpon this ground PHALEAS the Chalcedonian Legislator made it his first work to introduce equality of Goods and PLATO in his Laws allows not increase to a possession beyond certain bounds The Argives and the Messenians had each their Agrarian after the manner of Lacedemon If a man shall translate the words Plut. Lycurg 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 virtus facultas civilis Political Virtue or Faculty where he finds them in ARISTOTLE'S Politics as I make bold and appeal to the Reader whether too bold to do by the words Political Balance understood as I have stated the thing it will give such a light to the Author as will go nearer than any thing alleg'd as before by this Prevaricator to deprive me of the honor Pol. L. 3. C. 9. of that invention For example where ARISTOTLE says If one man or such a number of men as to the capacity of Government com within the compass of the Few excel all the rest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in balance or in such a manner that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Political Facultys or Estates of all the rest be not able to hold weight with him or them they will never condescend to share equally with the rest in power whom they excel in Balance nor is it to any purpose to give them Laws who will be as the Gods their own Laws and will answer the People as the Lions are said by ANTISTHENES to have answer'd the Hares when they had concluded that every one ought to have an equal Portion For this cause he adds Citys that live under Popular Power have instituted the Ostracism for the preservation of Equality by which if a man increase in Riches Retinue or Popularity above what is safe they can remove him without loss of Honor or Estate for a time IF the Considerer thinks that I have strain'd courtesy with ARISTOTLE who indeed is not always of one mind further than is warrantable in relation to the Balance be it as he pleases I who must either have the more of Authority or the less of Competition in the point shall lose neither way However it is in this place enough that the Ostracism being of like nature was that which supply'd the defect in the Grecian Citys of an Agrarian To procede then to Rome that the People there by striving for an Agrarian strove to save their Liberty is apparent in that thro the want of such a Law or the nonobservance of it the Commonwealth came plainly to ruin If a Venetian should keep a Table or have his House furnish'd with Retainers he would be obnoxious to the Council of Ten and if the best of them appear with other State or Equipage than is allow'd to the meanest he is obnoxious to the Officers of the Pomp which two Orders in a Commonwealth where the Gentry have but small Estates in Land are as much as needs be in lieu of an Agrarian But the German Republics have no more to supply the place of this Law than that Estates descending are divided among the Children which sure no man but will say must needs be Chap. 11 both just and pious and we ask you no more in Oceana where grant this and you grant the whole Agrarian Thus had I set him all the Commonwealths in the World before and so it is no fault of mine that he will throw but at three of them These are Israel Lacedemon and Oceana Consid p. 77. FIRST at Israel Mr. HARRINGTON says he thinks not upon the Promise of GOD to ABRAHAM whence the Israelites deriv'd their Right to the Land of Canaan but considers the division of the Lands as a Politic Constitution upon which the Government was founded tho in the whole History of the Bible there be not the least footstep of such a design WHAT means the man the Right of an Israelite to his Land deriv'd from the Promise of GOD to ABRAHAM therfore the Right of an Oceaner to his Land must derive from the Promise of GOD to ABRAHAM Or why else should I in speaking of Oceana where Property is taken as it was found and not stirr'd a hair think on the Promise to ABRAHAM Nor matters it for the manner of division seeing that was made and this was found made each according to the Law of the Government But in the whole Bible says he there is not the least footstep that the end of the Israelitish Agrarian was Political or that it was intended to be the Foundation of the Government THE
Authority of Israel with which she is arm'd Cap a Pe. It is true as the Prevaricator says in another place that Law can oblige only those Consid p. 36. to whom it was given and that the Laws of Israel were given as to the Power or Obligation of them only to the Children of Israel But the Power as has bin shewn of a Commonwealth and her Authority are different things her Power extends no further than her own People but her Authority may govern others as that of Athens did Rome when the latter wrote her twelve Tables by the Copy of the former In this manner tho a Man or a Commonwealth writing out of antient Governments have liberty to chuse that which sutes best with the occasion out of any yet whether we consider the Wisdom and Justice of the Legislator supremely good or the excellency of the Laws the Prerogative of Authority where the nature of the thing admits it must needs belong to Israel That this opinion should go sore with Divines is strange and yet if there be any feeling of their pulse by this their Advocat or Attorny it is as true In his Epist FOR while he finds me writing out of Venice he tells me I have wisely put my self under her Protection or Authority against whom he dares not make War lest he should take part with the Turk Consid p. 39. BUT when he finds me writing out of Israel he tells me that he is not aware of any Prerogative of Authority belonging to the Israelitish more than any other Republic which is to take part with the Devil SO much for Israel Now for Lacedemon but you will permit me to shake a Friend or two by the hand as I go THE first is ARISTOTLE in these words Pol. L. 5. c. 3. INEQUALITY is the source of all Sedition as when the Riches of one or the few com to cause such an Overbalance as draws the Common-wealth into Monarchy or Oligarchy for prevention wherof the Ostracism has bin of use in divers places as at Argos and Athens But it were better to provide in the beginning that there be no such Disease in the Commonwealth than to com afterwards to her Cure Book I THE second is PLUTARCH in these words Plut. Lycur LYCURGUS judging that there ought to be no other inequality among Citizens of the same Commonwealth than what derives from their Virtues divided the Land so equally among the Lacedemonians that on a day beholding the Harvest of their Lots lying by Cocks or Ricks in the field he laughing said that it seem'd to him they were all Brothers THE third should have bin the Considerer but he is at feud with us all Consid p. 78. THE Design of LYCURGUS he professes was not so much to attain an Equality in the frame of his Government as to drive into exile Riches and the effects of them Luxury and Debauchery GENTLEMEN What do you say you have the Judgment of three great Philosophers and may make your own choice only except he that has but one hundred pounds a year can have Wine and Women at as full command and Retainers in as great plenty as he that has ten thousand I should think these advantages accru'd from Inequality and that LYCURGUS had skill enough in a Commonwealth to see as much No says the Prevaricator it appears far otherwise in that he admitted of no Mony but old Iron a Cartload of which was worth little Well but in Israel where Silver and Gold was worth enough my Gentleman would have it that one man in the compass of fifty years might purchase the whole Land tho that Country was much larger than this and yet where if the People had us'd Mony they would have us'd Trade and using both such a thing thro the straitness of the Territory might have happen'd he will not conceive the like to have bin possible No tho he has an example of it in LYSANDER who by the spoil of Athens ruin'd the Agrarian first by the overbalance that a mans Mony came to hold to his Lot then by eating out the Lots themselves and in those the Equality of the Commonwealth But these things he interprets pleasantly as if the Vow of voluntary Poverty so he calls it being broken the Common-wealth like a forsworn Wretch had gon and hang'd her self a Phansy too rank I doubt of the Cloyster to be good at this work BUT wheras PLUTARCH upon the narrowness of these Lots which had they bin larger must have made the Citizens fewer than thirty thousand and so unable to defend the Commonwealth and use of this same old and rusty Iron instead of Mony observes Plut. Lycur it came by this means to pass that there was neither a fine Orator Fortuneteller Baud nor Goldsmith to be found in Lacedemon our Considerer professes THAT it is to him as strange as any thing in History that LYCURGUS should find credit enough to settle a Government which carry'd along with it so much want and hardship to particular men that the total absence of Government could scarce have put them into a worse condition the Laws that he made prohibiting the use of those things which to injoy with security is that only to other men that makes the Yoke of Laws supportable HERE he is no Monk again I would ask him no more than that Chap. 11 he would hold to somthing be it to any thing It is true we who have bin us'd to our Plumpottage are like enough to make faces as did the King of Pontus at the Lacedemonian black broth But who has open'd his mouth against Plumpottage gilded Coaches Pages Lacquys fair Mannorhouses good Tables rich Furniture full Purses Universitys good Benefices Scarlet Robes square Caps rich Jewels or said any thing that would not multiply all this Why says he you are so far right that the Voice of LYCURGUS'S Agrarian was Every man shall be thus poor and that of yours is That no man shall be more than thus rich This is an Argument an 't please you by which he thinks he has prov'd that there is no difference between the Agrarian that was in Lacedemon and that which is in Oceana For Sir whatsoever is thus and thus is like But the Agrarian of Lacedemon was thus A man could have no Mony or none that deserv'd that name and the Agrarian of Oceana is thus A mans Mony is not confin'd Therfore the Agrarian of the one and of the other are like Was it not a great grievance in Lacedemon think you that they had no such Logic nor Logician Be this as it will It had bin impossible says he for LYCURGUS to have settl'd his Government had he not wisely obtain'd a Response from the Oracle at Delphos magnifying and recommending it After which all resistance would have bin downright Impiety and Disobedience which concerns Mr. HARRINGTON very little The Bible then is not so good an Oracle as was that
is propos'd Universitys THAT the Vniversitys being prudently reform'd be preserv'd in their Rights and Indowments for and towards the education and provision of an able Ministry Joh. 5. 39. WE are commanded by CHRIST to search the Scriptures The Scriptures are not now to be search'd but by skill in Tongues The immediat gift of Tongues is ceas'd How then should skill in Tongues be acquir'd but mediatly or by the means of Education How should a State expect such an Education particularly for a matter of ten thousand men that provides not for it And what provision can a State make for this Education but by such Schools so indow'd and regulated as with us are the Universitys These therfore are a necessary step towards the prevention of such Ignorance or Interest as thro the infirmitys or biass of Translators Interpreters and Preachers both have and may frequently com to be incorporated with Religion as also to the improvement or acquisition of such Light as is by the command of CHRIST to be attain'd or exercis'd in searching the Scriptures The eighth Parallel 1 Chron. 25. 8. Mal. 2. 12. THE excellent Learning of the Levits in all kinds not ordinarily infus'd but acquir'd there having bin among them as well the Teacher as the Scholar leaves little doubt but their forty eight Citys were as so many Universitys These with their Suburbs or Indowments contain'd in the whole each of their Circuits in Land reckon'd at four thousand Cubits deep about a hundred thousand Acres that is if their measure was according to the common Cubit if according to the holy Cubit as with Levits was most likely twice so much which at the lowest account I conceive to be far above the Revenues of both our Universitys THESE being order'd as has bin said it is propos'd Augmentation of Livings THAT the legal and antient provision for the National Ministry be so augmented that the meanest sort of Livings or Benefices without defalcation from the greater be each improv'd to the Revenue of one hundred pounds at least Book III THIS in regard the way is by Tithes coms up so close to the The ninth Parallel Orders of Israel as in our day may shew that a Commonwealth may com too near that pattern to be lik'd We find not indeed that the Apostles either took or demanded Tithes in which case the Priests who were legally possest of them might have had suspicion that they under color of Religion had aim'd at the violation of Property But putting the case that generally the Priests had bin converted to the Christian Faith whether the Apostles would for that reason have injoin'd them to relinquish their Tithes Or what is there in the Christian Religion to favor any such surmise To me there seems abundantly enough to the contrary For if the Apostles stuck not to comply with the Jews in a Ceremony which was of mere human invention and to introduce this as they did Ordination by imposition of hands into the Christian Church that they would upon a like inducement have refus'd a standing Law undoubtedly Mosaical is in my opinion most improbable So that I conceive the Law for Tithes now in being may or may not be continu'd at the pleasure of the Lawgivers for any thing in this case to the contrary Confident I am that the introducing of this Model in the whole which is thought impracticable were not to willing minds so difficult a work as the abolition of Tithes BUT Benefices whether by way of Tithes or otherwise being thus order'd it is propos'd Ordination THAT a Benefice becoming void in any Parish the Elders of the same may assemble and give notice to the Vice-Chancellor of either Vniversity by a Certificat specifying the true value of that Benefice that the Vice-Chancellor upon the receit of this Certificat be oblig'd to call a Congregation of his Vniversity that the Congregation of the Vniversity to this end assembl'd having regard to the value of the Benefice make choice of a Person fit for the Ministerial Function and return him to the Parish so requiring that the Probationer thus return'd to a Parish by either of the Vniversitys exercise the Office and receive the Benefits as Minister of the Parish for the term of one year that the term of one year being expir'd the Elders of the Parish assemble and put the Election of the Probationer to the Ballot that if the Probationer has three parts in four of the Balls or Votes in the Affirmative he be therby ordain'd and elected Minister of that Parish not afterwards to be degraded or remov'd but by the Censors of the Tribe the Phylarch of the same or the Council of Religion in such cases as shall be to them reserv'd by Act of Parlament That in case the Probationer coms to fail of three parts in four at the Ballot he depart from that Parish and if he returns to the Vniversity it be without diminution of the former Offices or Preferments which he there injoy'd or any prejudice to his future Preferment and that it be lawful in this case for any Parish to send so often to either Vniversity and it be the duty of either Vice-Chancellor upon such Certificats to make return of different Probationers till such time as the Elders of that Parish have fitted themselves with a Minister of their own choice and liking IN case it was thought fit that a Probationer thus elected should before he departs receive imposition of hands from the Doctors of the University I cannot see what the most scrupulous in the matter of Ordination could find wanting But let this be so or otherwise it is indifferent The Universitys by proposing to the Congregation in every Parish do the Senatorian Office and the People thus fitting themselves by their Suffrage or Ballot reserve that Office Chap. 2 which is truly popular that is the Result to themselves The tenth Parallel MOSES for so far back the Divines reach at Ordination in the institution of the Senat of Israel wherin he can never be prov'd to have us'd imposition of hands performing the Senatorian Office caus'd the People to take wise men and understanding and known among Deut. 1. Numb 11. their Tribes wherof the Lot fell upon all but ELDAD and MEDAD And the Apostles doing the Senatorian Office in like manner without imposition of hands caus'd the whole Congregation to take two Acts 1. 26. wherof the lot of Apostleship fell upon MATTHIAS So that this way of Ordination being that which was instituted by MOSES and the chief or first of those which were us'd by the Apostles is both Mosaical and Apostolical Nor has a well order'd Commonwealth See Book 2. chap. 8. any choice left of those other ways of Ordination us'd by the Apostles in complaisance to worse sort of Government but is naturally necessitated to this that is to the very best ORDINATION being thus provided for it is propos'd
That Vulgus is to be understood of the Parlament and the Parlament consisted wholly of the better sort Pub. It is true but then that Commonwealth acted in all things accordingly Val. It was you will say no Democracy Pub. And will you say it was Val. No truly yet this deriv'd in part from the free Election of the People Pub. How free seeing the People then under Lords dar'd not to elect otherwise than as pleas'd those Lords Val. Somthing of that is true but I am persuaded that the People not under Lords will yet be most addicted to the better sort Pub. That is certain Val. How then will you prevent the like in your Institution Pub. You shall see presently The diffusive Body of the People in which the Power is and is declar'd to be consists in the far greater part of the lower sort wherfore their Representative to rise naturally and to be exactly comprehensive of the common Interest must consist also in the far greater part of the lower sort Val. Of what number will you have this Representative Pub. Suppose a thousand or therabout Val. What proportion will you have the meaner sort in it to hold to the better Pub. Suppose about six to four Val. How will you order it that it shall be so constituted Pub. Why thus Let the People in every Precinct or Shire at Election chuse four under one hundred pounds a year in Lands Goods or Mony together with three at or above that proportion Val. I see not but this Representative must be exact Pub. It is yet none at all that is unless you presume Changes for one thousand without change governing the whole People amounts neither to a Representative nor to a Commonwealth but coms still to your hard name Val. How do you order your Changes Pub. By annual election of one third part for three years Val. So that every year one third part of your Assembly fallsout of it and a new third part at the same time enters into the same Pub. Even so Val. This causes the Representative to be perpetually extant Pub. It dos so But to respit that a little I should be glad before I stir farther to know which way the Vote of a Representative thus constituted can go one hairs breadth beside the common and public Interest of the whole diffusive Body of the People Val. No way in the Earth that I can imagin except thro ignorance Pub. No Human Ordinance is infallible and what is don thro mere ignorance or mistake at one time will be found and amended at another Val. A thousand men and six to four of the lower sort perpetually extant this must be a grievous Charge to the most of them it will be hard to bring them and impossible to hold them together Pub. Upon such as are elected and com not considerable Fines must be levy'd and such as com and stay together must have good Salarys Val. Salarys to so many what will that com to Pub. Not with the rest of the Commonwealth to three hundred thousand pounds a year Val. Why the Kings have rarely had above six Pub. And did England ever grudg them any part of that proportion Val. I must confess the Quarrel grew when they would not be contented with so little Pub. Now if England never did nor needed grudg a King six hundred thousand pounds a year to be spent among Courtiers why should we imagin she should grudg a Commonwealth three hundred thousand pounds a year to be spent among Magistrats Val. But Parlamentmen have taken nothing Pub. Have the People given nothing Val. That was for the maintenance of Armys Pub. And whether had you rather maintain Armys or Magistrats Val. But putting the case that this Assembly needed not to be perpetually extant this Charge in the whole or in the far greater part might be abated Pub. I cannot tell for how often think you fit that this Assembly should convene Val. Parlaments at most met not above once a year Pub. If they had bin perpetually extant there would have bin no King Val. No truly except in name only Pub. Therfore the Popular Assembly in a Commonwealth ought not to be perpetually extant Val. To the end you will say that there may be som King Pub. Mock not or what other guard of Liberty is there in any Commonwealth but the Popular Assembly Val. Com let them assemble twice a year upon their ordinary Guard Pub. And what if there be an extraordinary occasion Val. Then as often as there is any such occasion Pub. How much will this abate of their necessary Charge or of the Salarys And how much better were it for a Representative to lead the Life of Statesmen than of Carriers Val. Commonwealths whose Assemblys have bin of the former kind have call'd them no otherwise than at stated times or upon extraordinary occasions Pub. But then their Assemblys were not equal Representatives but consisted of such as being next at hand were still ready upon any occasion Val. That makes indeed a considerable difference But were this Representative always extant I cannot see but it would have nothing to do Pub. And in case it be not always extant you imagin that it may have somthing to do Val. Yes Pub. Then whether gos it better with the Commonwealth when the Representative has somthing to do or when it has nothing to do Val. This is very quaint Pub. No truly VALERIUS it is plain that the Guard of Liberty perpetually extant in doing nothing must do much and not perpetually extant in doing much may do nothing Val. I am afraid that having nothing to do they will make work Pub. Such I warrant you as the Parlament and the Army made the other day Val. Nay I am not so wide A civil Council and a standing Army must needs have Interests much more distinct than two civil Assemblys and where there is not a like cause I know well enough there cannot be the like effect Pub. I shall desire no more than that you will hold to this and then tell me what Disputes there us'd to be between the Senat of Venice and the great Council which is perpetually extant and consists of about two thousand Val. Nay certain it is that between those two there never was any dispute at all Pub. Then tell me for what cause such a thing should any more happen between the Assemblys propos'd or according to your own rule from like causes expect like effects Val. You put me to it Pub. Nay it is you that put me to it for you will be presuming that this Assembly can have nothing to do before we com to consider what are their proper Businesses and Functions Val. I beg your pardon and what are those Pub. Why surely no small matters for in every Commonwealth truly Popular it is inseparable from the Assembly of the People that first they wholly and only have the right of Result in all matters of Lawgiving of making Peace
or at least som one of the Jethronian Courts THEY us'd also to confer this Ordination som time occasionally and for a season in this manner Receive the gift of judiciary Ordination Maimon Tit. San. cap. 4. or the right of binding and loosing till such time as you return to us in the City Where the Christian Jews still following their former Customs in higher matters as the observation of the Sabbath and of Circumcision even to such a degree that PAUL not to displease them took TIMOTHY and circumcis'd him seem to me to have follow'd this custom who when the Prophets at Antioch had inform'd them that PAUL and BARNABAS were to be separated to an extraordinary work laid their hands upon them and sent them away for otherwise Acts 13. 3. as to Ordination PAUL and BARNABAS had that before at least PAUL by ANANIAS and for any such Precept in the Christian Religion Acts 9. 17. there was none JOSEPHVS PHILO and other Authors that tell us the Commonwealth of Israel was an Aristocracy look no farther than the introduction of the Chirothesia by the Presbyterian Party which must have taken date som time after the Captivity or the restitution of the Commonwealth by EZRA there being not one syllable for it in Scripture but enough to the contrary seeing God introduc'd the Chirotonia By which it is demonstrable that a Presbyterian Party may bring a Popular Government to Oligarchy and deface even the work of God himself so that it shall not be known to after ages as also that Ecclesiastical Writers for such are the Talmudists may pretend that for many hundred years together as Divines also have don to be in Scripture which neither is nor ever was there But have I yet said enough to shew that Ordination especially as in this Example not of a Clergy but of a Magistracy whether by the Chirotonia or Chirothesia is a Political Institution or must I rack my brains for Arguments to prove that an Order or a Law having such influence upon the Commonwealth that being introduc'd or repeal'd it quite alters the whole frame of the Government must needs be of a political nature and therfore not appertain to Divines or to a Clergy but to the Magistrat unless their Traditions may be of force to alter the Government as they please All is one they can abate nothing of it let what will com of the Government the Chirothesia they must and will have Then let them have Monarchy too or Tyranny for one of these according as the balance happens to stand with or against their Chirothesia is the certain consequence either Tyranny as in Israel or Monarchy as in the Papacy and from that or the like Principle in all Book II Gothic Empires which Examples to begin with Israel well deserve the pains to be somwhat more diligently unfolded ALL Elections in Israel save those of the Priests who were eligible by the Lot being thus usurp'd by the Presbyterian Party and the People by that means devested of their Chirotonia som three hundred years before CHRIST HILLEL Senior High Priest and Archon or Prince of the Sanhedrim found means to draw this Power of Ordination in shew somwhat otherwise but in effect to himself and his Maimon Tit. San. cap. 4. Chirothesia for by his influence upon the Sanhedrim it was brought to pass that wheras formerly any man ordain'd might in the manner shewn have ordain'd his Disciples it was now agreed that no man should be ordain'd without the License of the Prince and that this Power should not be in the Prince but in the presence of the Father of the Sanhedrim or Speaker of the House Thus the Aristocracy of Israel becoming first Oligarchical took according to the nature of all such Governments long steps towards Monarchy which succeding in the Asmonean Family commonly call'd the Maccabees was for their great merit in vindicating the Jews from the Tyranny of ANTIOCHUS confirm'd to them by the universal consent and Chirotonia of the People Nevertheless to him that understands the Orders of a Commonwealth or has read the Athenian Lacedemonian or Roman Story it will be plain enough that but for their Aristocracy they needed not to have bin so much beholden to or to have stood so much in need of one Family It is true both the merit of these Princes and the manner of their free Election by the People seem to forbid the name of Tyranny to this Institution but so it is that let there be never so much Merit in the Man or Inclination of the People to the Prince or the Government that is not founded upon the due balance the Prince in that case must either govern in the nature of a Commonwealth as did those of this Family reforming the policy after the Lacedemonian Model or turn Tyrant as from their time who liv'd in the Age of the Grecian Monarchy did all their Successors till under the Romans this Nation became a Province From which time such Indeavors and Insurrections they us'd for the recovery of their antient Policy that under the Emperor ADRIAN who perceiv'd at what their Ordination being not of Priests but of Magistrats and of a Senat pretending to Soverain Judicature and Authority seem'd to aim there came says the Talmud against the Israelites an Edict out of the Kingdom of the Wicked meaning the Roman Empire wherby whosoever should ordain or be ordain'd was to be put to death and the School or City in which such an Act should be don to be destroy'd wherupon Rabbi JEHUDA BEN BABA lest Ordination should fail in Israel went forth and standing between two great Mountains and two great Citys and between two Sabbathdays journys from Osa and Sephara ordain'd five Presbyters For this Feat the Rabbi is remember'd by the Talmudists under the name of Ordinator but the same as it follows being discover'd by the Roman Guards they shot his Body thro with so many Darts as made it like a Sive Yet staid not the business here but so obstinat continu'd the Jews in the Superstition to which this kind of Ordination was now grown that wheras by the same it was unlawful for them to ordain in a foren Land and at home they could not be brought to abstain the Emperor banish'd them all out of their own Country whence happen'd their total Dispersion That of a Chap. 4 thing which at the first was a mere delusion such Religion should com in time and with education to be made that not only they who had receiv'd advantage could suffer Martyrdom but they that had lost by it would be utterly lost for it were admirable in the case of this People if it were not common in the case of most in the World at this day Custom may bring that to be receiv'd as an Ordinance of God for which there is no color in Scripture For to consult MAIMONIDES a little better upon this point Wheras says he they grant in case it
Halac San. C. 4. S. 11. should happen that in all the Holy Land there remain'd but one Presbyter that Presbyter assisted by two other Israelites might ordain the seventy or great Sanhedrim and the Sanhedrim so constituted might constitute and ordain the lesser Courts I am of opinion that were there no Presbyter in the Land yet if all the Wise Men of Israel should agree to constitute or ordain Judges they might do it lawfully enoug But if so then how coms it to pass that our Ancestors have bin so solicitous lest Judicature should fail in Israel Surely for no other cause than that from the time of the Captivity the Israelites were so dispers'd that they could not upon like occasions be brought together Now I appeal whether the clear Words of MAIMONIDES where he says that our Master MOSES ordain'd the Sanhedrim by the Chirothesia be not more clearly and strongly contradicted in this place than affirm'd in the other since acknowleging that if the People could assemble they might ordain the Sanhedrim he gives it for granted that when they did assemble they had power to ordain it and that MOSES did assemble them upon this occasion is plain in Scripture Again if the power of Ordination falls ultimatly to the People there is not a stronger argument in Nature that it is thence primarily deriv'd To conclude the Chirothesia of the Presbyterian Party in Israel is thus confess'd by the Author no otherwise necessary than thro the defect of the Chirotonia of the People which Ingenuity of the Talmudist for any thing that has yet past might be worthy the imitation of Divines IN tracking the Jews from the restitution of their Commonwealth after the Captivity to their dispersion it seems that the later Monarchy in Israel was occasion'd by the Oligarchy the Oligarchy by the Aristocracy and the Aristocracy by the Chirothesia but that this Monarchy tho erected by magnanimous and popular Princes could be no less than Tyranny deriv'd from another Principle that is the insufficiency of the balance For tho from the time of the Captivity the Jubile was no more in use yet the Virgin MARY as an Heiress is affirm'd by som to have bin marri'd to JOSEPH by virtue of this Law Every Daughter that possesses an Inheritance in any Tribe of the Children of Israel Numb 27. 8. shall be Wife to one of the Family of the Tribe of her Fathers c. By which the Popular Agrarian may be more than suspected to have bin of greater vigor than would admit of a well-balanc'd Monarchy THE second Presbytery which is now attain'd to a well balanc'd Empire in the Papacy has infinitly excel'd the pattern the Lands of Italy being most of them in the Church This if I had leisure might be track'd by the very same steps At first it consisted of the seventy Parish Priests or Presbyters of Rome now seventy Cardinals creating to themselves a High Priest or Prince of their Sanhedrim the Pope but for the Superstition wherto he has brought Religion Book II and continues by his Chirothesia to hold it a great and a Reverend Monarch establish'd upon a solid Foundation and governing by an exquisit Policy not only well balanc'd at home but deeply rooted in the greatest Monarchys of Christendom where the Clergy by virtue of their Lands are one of the three States THE Maxims of Rome are profound for there is no making use of Princes without being necessary to them nor have they any regard to that Religion which dos not regard Empire All Monarchys of the Gothic Model that is to say where the Clergy by virtue of their Lands are a third estate subsist by the Pope whose Religion creating a reverence in the People and bearing an aw upon the Prince preserves the Clergy that else being unarm'd becom a certain Prey to the King or the People and where this happens as in HENRY the Eighth down gos the Throne for so much as the Clergy loses falls out of the Monarchical into the Popular Scale Where a Clergy is a third Estate Popular Government wants Earth and can never grow but where they dy at the root a Prince may sit a while but is not safe nor is it in nature except he has a Nobility or Gentry able without a Clergy to give balance to the People that he should subsist long or peaceably For wherever a Government is sounded on an Army as in the Kings of Israel or Emperors of Rome there the saddest Tragedys under Heaven are either on the Stage or in the Tiring-house These things consider'd the Chirothesia being originally nothing else but a way of Policy excluding the People where it attains not to a balance that is sufficient for this purpose brings forth Oligarchy or Tyranny as among the Jews And where it attains to a balance sufficient to this end produces Monarchy as in the Papacy and in all Gothic Kingdoms THE Priests of Aegypt where as it is describ'd by SICULUS their Revenue came to the third part of the Realm would no question have bin exactly well fitted with the Chirothesia pretended to by modern Divines Suppose the Apostles had planted the Christian Religion in those Parts and the Priests had bin all converted I do not think that Divines will say that having alter'd their Religion they needed to have deserted their being a third Estate their overbalance to the People their Lands their Preeminence in the Government or any part of their Policy for that and I am as far from saying so as themselves ON the other side as PAUL was a Citizen of Rome let us suppose him to have bin a Citizen of Athens and about 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to constitute the Christian Religion in this Commonwealth where any Citizen might speak to the People Imagin then he should have said thus Men of Athens that which you ignorantly seek I bring to you the true Religion but to receive this you must not alter your former Belief only but your antient Customs Your Political Assemblys have bin hitherto call'd Ecclesiae this word must lose the antient sense and be no more understood but of Spiritual Consistorys and so wher as it has bin of a Popular it must henceforth be of an Aristocratical or Presbyterian signification For your Chirotonia that also must follow the same rule insomuch as on whomsoever one or more of the Aristocracy or Presbytery shall lay their hands the same is understood by virtue of that Action to be chirotoniz'd How well would this have sounded in Aegypt and how ill in Athens Certainly the Policy of the Church of CHRIST admits of more Prudence Chap. 5 and Temperament in these things Tho the Apostles being Jews themselves satisfy'd the converted Jews that were us'd to Aristocracy by retaining somwhat of their Constitutions as the Chirothesia yet when PAUL and BARNABAS com to constitute in Popular Commonwealths they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chirotonizing them Elders in every Congregation CHAP. V.