Barbarous Nations that have no other jurisdiction but what is Paternal the question is not what jurisdiction those Parents have that are Subjected to the Laws of a Civil Society but what they have by those of nature and 't is as absolute a lye when he says 't is not abated by the Soveraign power for were it not the Parent had a power over the life of his off-spring as the Patriarchs had of old and some Barbarous Nations that are at present unciviliz'd And for the Statute of the 25 which Mr. Hunt brings as an Argument against it because 〈◊〉 is not made by that petit Treason is as pertinent perhaps as ifhe had told us that every Father of a Family was not included in that of Edward the first that settles the Militia in the King for sure 't is not possible to suspect how they can be considered asso many Soveraigns in the very Civil Sanctions that establish a much more 〈◊〉 Soveraignity whose Supremacy in their several Families is founded on the Law of Nature tho we have seen that they are confirm'd too by the general Laws of Nations and the Hypothesis favour'd from our own But as it is impertinently applyd to this purpose so is it as falfely infer'd from that Statute for tho Parricide be omitted and the Judges by that act restrained to interpret its extent from the paty of reason or à Fortiori yet no Man in hissenses can imagin that it was therefore omitted because there was no Relation of Subjection or Soveraignty between the Father and the Son when a Master and a Servant are exprest in the very Letter of the Law when a Prelate and a Priest a Husband and a Wife And is it not against Sense to imagin a Man has not as much Soveraignty over his Son as over his Wife that sits always with him as his Equal and to whom our Courtesie of England gives the Precedence and the Laws of the Land make but one as well as those of God and if the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Impetus of Love and Affection will supersede the Servitude and Subjection I think that by Mr. Hunt's leave is more abundantly exprest to the Wife especially in that point upon which he himself puts it the work of Generation And can it be imagin'd that even a regular or secular Priest whose Subjection to his Primate or Rector is only the result of the Statutes of the Society or the resolution of the Common Law can denote more Soveraignty then the Filial Obedience required by the Laws of God Nature and Nations the citing this Statute of Edward for having omitted the making Parricide Petty-Treason because it argues they had no opinion of the Soveraignty of the Father is the greatest Argument that they had for since they have suppos'd a Soveraign Power which from the suggestiing of such an Argument here themselves do seem to allow and tacitly to Confess in those Authorities the Destroying of which is made Treason by this Act they 〈◊〉 conclude a greater So veraignty to reside in him that has really a GREATER POWER then those that in that Act are exprest for were it 〈◊〉 any impartial Person living Whether a Man has not a greater Power over his Son then his Wife or Servant it would soon be resolv'd that he has he being impower'd only from some civil Constitutions to govern the latter but the former from the Laws of Nature and Nations both so that in Common Reason and Common Equity Parricide must be concluded in the Chapter of Treason according to the receiv'd Rule of Natural as well as Artificial Logick that every greater Crime must be Punishable by that Law that punishes a less of the like Nature and the true Reason why in this very Case the Judges do not make the like Conclusion from the Similitude or Aggravation of the sin is as my Lord Coke Insinuates because the words of the Act it self declare that nothing but what is their 〈◊〉 and exprest shall be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but even that very Act foreseeing they might have 〈◊〉 several things that by the same parity of Reason might be included does provide with a sort of reserve that at any time the Parliament might make it more Inclusive and I dare Swear had it it been propos'd to any Session that has sat since the Statute was first Enacted whether by Parity 〈◊〉 was not fit to be made Petty-Treason not a man of Sense in the Senate but would have consented And this Construction of a Parliament is what Mr. Sidney himself forsooth so much rely'd upon who if they will but put upon this branch of the Statute according to his own words a construction agreeable to Reason or Common Sense must conclude that he certainly is as much a Traytor that Murders his own Father as the Servant that kills his Soveraign Master or a Priest that makes away with his Lord the Prelate But besides if this Letter of our Law does not include the 〈◊〉 of the Parent in Petty-Treason yet the 〈◊〉 of my Lord Coke upon this Case will go near to conclude it for he says 't is out of the Statute 〈◊〉 the Son serve the Father for Wages Meat or Drink or Apparel and I cannot see how any Son till he is Emancipated by 〈◊〉 or Marriage or the like can be said to be any other then his Fathers Servant and that for all four for as the Father requires of him filial Obedience so he can and they Commonly do Command their Sons in the Offices of Servants and that Arbitrarily in whatsoever he pleases and find him accordingly the fore-mention'd necessarys to the performance of his duty and above all this it is the opinion of a good Historian recorded by my Lord Coke that before this Statute Parricide was Petty-Treason by the Common Law and then what will become of Mr. H. Triumphant Appeal to the Laws as well as his impertinent applycation to Reason and before this Statute too such a signal sign of Soveraignty was supposed to reside in the Father of a Family That it was Petty Treason too to 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 or Signet of the Lord of the Family wherein he liv'd a Signature of Royalty indeed and almosta mark of Majesty it self and the Reason my Lord Coke resolves it into their own omission of this Reasonable part of the Statute is so far from the Postscript impertinency of the Parliaments opinion against the paternal Power that he says those Law makers could never imagin that any Child could be guilty of such a sort of Barbarity and seems to insinuate the pretermission to have been the result of such a probable piece of presumption and that I remember was the very reason among the Romans that there was no punishment for such a sin as superseded a Sentence They had a Law supposed to be made in 〈◊〉 Caesar the Dictators time against those that attempted
us yet I cannot see why a Prince shou'd be deny'd the priviledge of a private Person And the Brother of our King the claiming his Right in Equity what is allow'd the meanest Subject when forecluded by the Law The next immediate Succession of the Crown descends as immediately to the next of Blood and as for the most part it has done since the time of the Saxons from Father to Son the Fifth Edward as hopeful as unfortunate and the more in affording our Factious fellow another president for an Assembly of Rebels that prefer'd the very Murderer of their Soveraign and a pretended Parliament that plac't the Butcher of his Brothers Children on the Throne And truly this Monster might be said to be Elected by the People whom no God or Nature design'd for the Crown and who was forc't to break the Laws of both to come at it and a sort of Election it was like those we had of late in the City with Rout and Ryot and that in the same place too at their Guild-hall where the Duke of Buckingham very solemnly convenes the Mayor and Aldermen and there propounds to them and the rabble their new King Richard and it was like to be a fine sort of National Choice that was to be decided by the Freemen of London But whatever Influence as this Gentleman observ'd they had on the Succession nothing of their consents could be gather'd but from their silence for suffrages they had none they being all surpriz'd with so strange a Proposition Their Buckingham Elector with his Aldermen and some of their Retinue cry up a Richard and so carry'd all with a House of Commons Nemine contradicente And now for his Bill in Parliament made rather by a pack't Convention of Buckinghams for the Bastardizing of his Soveraign's Issue that very Roll of Rebellion acknowledges his right by Lawful Inheritance grounded upon the Laws of Nature and Custom and God himself also this which was rather a Convocation of Rebels than a Convention of States acknowledgd what this inconsiderate Author cites them to Contradict the Lineal and Legal discent of the Crown by Proximity of Blood but in this acknowledging of an Usurper the good Bishop of Ely then oppos'd and for it was Committed to Buckingham's Custody and Stow calls it all a meer mock-Election And here enters all in blood that of the Blood Royal and Innocents the meer Monster of a man that beyond her intention seem'd to crawl into the World while nature lay asleep with a distorted Body the proper receptacle for as perverse a Soul and in him the third great Example that our Impious Author vouches for the Practicable Presidents of a Parliaments abetting the plain Usurpation of a Rebel to the Rebellious deposition of a King that Reign'd and consequently the subsequent Murders of those that had the right and those damnable Proceedings against Edw. 2d and Richard 2d and these poor Infants has he more Elaborately handled than all the rest of his abominable Treatise and the Contradictory Wretch calls the Murder of the Nephews Barbarous yet pleads for the power of a Parliament that Introduc'd the Tyrant for their Murder for they were as much dispatch't by their suffrages in the senate as by Tyrrel in the Tower they were the Ministers of Injustice that sentenc'd them out of their Right and that other only an Executioner to dispatch them of their Life for the History of all Nations and too sadly that of our own verifies it for an experienc'd truth that the Destruction of those that have right certainly follows in all Monarchies the bloody Vsurpation or the popular Election of him that has none an Association will needs follow an Exclusion for whom they have expell'd they must destroy for such Murders as are grounded upon MAXIMS of State must as necessarily follow the Foundations upon which they are lay'd for whatever Usurpers undermine an old frame of Government their Interest obliges them to remove as rubbish all that shall obstruct the raising of the new and the dangers and fears from excluded deposed Princes or the poor injur'd Heirs soon makes it absolute necessity to cement the Walls with their Blood The best remarks that can be gathered from the following Reign of Harry the Seventh are to be found in the Lord Bacon's History the best account of that King and he tells us he had no less then three Titles to the Crown whatever that Italian States-man Commines could conceive to the contrary first his Title in 〈◊〉 of the Lady Elizabeth whom he was resolv'd to marry secondly that of the Line of Lancasters long disputed both by Plea and Arms thirdly the Conquest by his own But the Learned Historian observes the first was look't on the fairest and Yorks line been always lik't as the best Plea in the Crowns descent and for Confirmation of it the Learned Lord tells us that this Henry knew the Title of Lancaster Condemn'd by Act of Parliament and prejudic'd in the Common opinion of the Realm and that the root of all the Mischiefs that befel him was the discountenancing of the house of York whom the General body of the Kingdom still affected and whatever stress and reliance this Prince might place in the PARLIAMENT's power this able states-man observes there is still a great deal of difference 'twixt a King that holds by civil Act of State and him that holds Originally by the Law of NATURE and DISCENT of BLOOD so that we have here a Person vers'd in our own Laws an excellent and allowed Scholar by the whole World and not only Lauds and Bishops as our bigotted Author would have it allowing a Divine right by the Laws of Nature and who I am sure was so good a Naturalist as best understood her Laws and that Natural discent by blood to be much more preferable than any other Human title given by such Inferiour powers of a Parliament whom the most zealou's adorerssure won't acknowledg more Omnipotent then the God of Nature himself I shall observe another Historical Instance that a true lineal discent was then taken for the best title and even in those times had the greatest Influence which was the Lord Stanley's Case who tho the very Person that plac'd the Crown on this Princes head yet suffer'd the loss of his own only for saying somewhat that savoured of his kindness to the Succession and that if he was sure the Children of Edward were alive he would not bear Arms against them so mightily did the sense of the right blood prevail with him that he sacrified all his own for it and rather than recant what he so well resolv'd seem'd no way sollicitous for his Life But that which this Historian might have observ'd too in this Reign as a discouragement to the designs of some of their popular Patriots then afoot when he pen'd this his presumptuous piece was the ill success that two several impostures met with
the Pest and Plague of the People are priz'd with our Republicans as the Philosophers and the Schools do their propositions of Eternal truths they imbibe the Poyson and exalt improve it too they sublimate the very Mercury of Mr. Hobs and whereas he equals us only in a state of Nature our Levellers will lay us all Common under the Inclosures of a Society and the several restrictions of so many Civil Laws But to what tends this their turning all the Power of a Parent into Tyranny as if a Father could not have an Authority over his Child unless he be bound to make it his Slave as if the Chastisement of a Father could not Evidence his Supremacy over his Son unless like the Saturn of the Easterlings he Sacrifice him to the Fire and torment it in the Flame But this paternal Right of the Father must suffer by these Factious Fools from the same sort of Inferrences they bring against the Divine Right of their King which may only serve with some Loyal Hearts to confirm the great sympathy there is between them for as by the Law of Nature a Father can't be said to injure his Son so neither by those of the Land can our Soveraign wrong his Subjects For say these Seditious ones your Divinest Monarchs by that Doctrine can Hang Burn Drown all their Subjects they should put in Damn too for once since they may as well infer from it his sending them to the Devil but cannot common Sense obtain amidst these transports of Passion can they not apprehend a Father to have any paternal Authority over his Family unless he be able to Murder every Man of it The Civil Laws the municipal ones of his Land if a Member of a Society supersede such a feverity and if a Patriarchal Prince must be supposed as were several of old after the 〈◊〉 then the Affection of a Father And the Laws of Nature were sufficient to fecure the Son or 〈◊〉 the Servant from any 〈◊〉 but what some proportionable 〈…〉 so also did this Divine Right 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Soveraign as entirely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great Turk yet the 〈◊〉 part of those Civil Sanctions to which the Divinest of them all would be 〈◊〉 or at least the precepts of the Divinity their God under 〈◊〉 they 〈◊〉 that will oblig'd them both 〈◊〉 Justice and Mercy the two great Attributes of him whom they represent But since they would make this Empire of a paternal Power so 〈◊〉 in Reason let us see how it has all along 〈◊〉 in the Letter of the Law and if it has there 〈◊〉 been 〈◊〉 upon as a Notion so 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 The most illuminated Reason of our eminent 〈◊〉 must submit to be much in the dark The Romans from the result of their Imperial Sanctions look'd upon themselves to have such an absolute Power and Authority over their Sons and Daughters that they tell us expressly it was a peculiar Prerogative and privileg'd of the Citizens of Rome and that there was no other Nation that could Exercise such a Jurisdiction they could 〈◊〉 for ever by this Power of the Parent any thing that was acquired by the Son and give it to any whom they pleas'd whereas it might have been an Argument enough of a paternal Power had they been but only usufructuaries and the Dominion remained in the Child and such a Sense of Soveraignty do the Civilians express to reside in the Father of a Family that they gave him the same Appellation with that of a King and tell us by the name of a Family the Prince of it is also understood and tho Mr. Hunt tells us a Story out of the Cabala of the Jews Laws and the Tract of Maimonides that they lookt upon their Children 〈◊〉 of Course when they came to Thirteen and that then they could claim it as their right to be free I must tell him from the Constitutions of the Imperial that must be of more force among us unless we resolve still that even Christians shall Judaize that no Sons were ever emancipated or emitted out of the power of the Parent unless they could prevail upon him for his own consent that by no meanshe could be compell'd to it and they had no freedom de Jure till their Fathers were de facto dead And tho 〈◊〉 in his Comment on that part of the Institution says They became sui Juris at 25 from their Manner and Custome yet concludes the Law of Nature oblig'd them still to their Parent which no civil one could disanull The Duty that their Digests say was due to this Paternal power which they 〈◊〉 almost as Sacred was exprest by the word piety and a learn'd Civilian of our own laments that there is no more provisions 〈◊〉 in our English Laws for the Duty of the Child and the protection of the Parent and with them so great was the crime of parricide that they could not a long time invent an adequate punishment for such an unproportionable Guilt tho they had one for Treason against the Prince And tho our own Laws do not make the Paternal power savour so much of Soveraignty yet we shall see they sufficiently evince that the Parent has a power very Analogous too it whereas Mr. Hunt will not allow it to have the least Relation which remisness of our Civil Institutions might well proceed from a presumption of our knowledge of the express command in the Decalogue of which the Romans were ignorant tho we have no formal Emancipation now in use which does imply a power of Government yet our old Lawyer tells us still that Children are in the power of their Parents till they have extrafamiliated them by giving them some portion or Inheritances and the Custody of them while minors which 〈◊〉 went to the King upon the presumption I suppose of his only ability to be a second Father that was settled in the Parent both by Common-Law and Statute for there lay a good action against any one for seducing a Mans Son as well as Servant out of his power which does imply that there is a power out of which he may be seduced and thus I have endeavor'd to shew the first Foundation of power to have been in the Fathers of Families And it signifies nothing whither every Father of it Reigns in it as a King now and therefore Mr. Hunt his impertinence is inconclusive and part of his Assertion a plainly when he would infer from the continuance of the Parents Authority over their Children together with the Soveraign power distinct that therefore there was never any Foundation of a Patriarchal power for he might as well tell us That because we have no Parents now but what are Subject to the Municipal Laws of the Land therefore there was never any Patriarch in the Bible never an Abraham an Isaac or a Jacob that had an absolute Dominion over their own Families or none now amongst some
strictest municipal Laws of a mixt Monarchy and as the People themselves to the very Penal Statutes of the Land and therefore for that Reason the very same Civil Sanctions of their Imperial Law that allow such a Latitude to their boundless Prince abound too with this Restriction that still it becomes him to observe those very Laws to which he is not oblig'd And for the spilling of Blood or Robbing of Churches and the like unnatural enormities which they say by the Soveraigns being thus absolv'd might become Lawful did not the very Directive part of some of their Municipal Laws forbid them in it the precepts of God and Nature the Unresistable Impulse of Eternal Equity and Reason to which the Mightiest Monarch must ever submit and themselves did ever own a Subjection those will always tye the hands of the most Absolute from Committing such Crimes as well as the Common Lictors do the meanests people for being by them perpetrated and Committed and 't is a great Moral Truth grounded upon as much Reason and Experience That those dissolute Princes that did Indulge themselves in the Violating the Divine Laws of God and Nature could never have been constrain'd to the Observance of our Human Inventions the Municipal Acts of any Kingdom or Country And therefore I cannot but smile to see the Ridiculous Insinuations of some of our Republicans endeavouring to maintain that by such silly suggestions which they can't defend with Sense and Reason for rather than want an Objection they 'll put us too suppose some Kings endeavouring to destroy their Subjects and alienating of their Kingdoms and then put their Question Whether the People shall not Judge and Punish them for it but in this they deal in their Argumentation against their King as some Seditious Senates of late indeavoured to Impose upon him to pass Bills by tacking two together A popular encroachment with an Asserting the Prerogative Just such another business was bandied about by that baffler of himself that pretious piece of Contradiction Will. Prin. Who tells us out of Bracton That GOD the Law and the Kings Courts are above the King where if you take all the Connexion Copulatively 't is not to be contradicted because no King but will allow his God to be above him under whom he Rules yet even there it may be observ'd that the Lower House he so much Labour'd for is not so much as mention'd So do these Sophisters in the Politick's here proceed just like those Jugglers in the House they couple a supposititious piece of Premis'd Nonsense and then draw with it a pretty plausible Conclusion for what man can Imagin if he be but in his Wits that his Monarch unless he be quite out of them and Mad would destroy those over whom he is to Reign none but the Bosan in the Tempest with his Bottle of Brandy was so besotted as to think of Ruling alone and setting up for a Soveraign without so much as a single Subject so that should these peevish Ideots have their silly Supposition granted still they would be prevented from obtaining their end at which they aim for first if we must suppose all the Subjects to be destroy'd where would there be any left to judge this Author of their Destruction if they 'll suffer us only to suppose the Major part or some few certain Persons to besacrific'd to his Fury then still that Soveraign that would destroy the most part or some certain number of his Subjects without Sense or Reason must at the same time be suppos'd to be out of his Senses and then no Law of any Land will allow the People to punish a Lunatick But if a King must be call'd a Destroyer of his People only for letting the Laws pass upon such Seditious Subjects that would destroy him which is all the Ground they can have here for branding with it their present Princes and for which these exasperated rebels really suggest it then in Gods name let the Latin Aphorism take place too Then let such Justice for ever be done upon Earth and trust the Judgments of Heaven for their falling Then let them deprecate as a late Lady did the Vengance of the Almighty upon the Head of the Chief Minister of the Kings but let there be more such Hearts to administer as much Justice and the hands will hardly receive much harm for holding of the Scales And for that others silly supposition of these Seditious Simpletons of a Kings Alienating of his Kingdom they must suppose him at the same time as simple as themselves that suggest it and could they give us but a single Instance or force upon us any President all they would get by it is this That as their supposition was without sense so their Application would be nothing to the purpose for such a matter of Fact of their Kings would make him de Facto none at all I know they can tell us of one of our own that lies under that Imputation of making over his to the Moor And of others that in the time of the Popes Supremacy resign'd themselves with submission to the Holy See for the first the most Authentick Historians not so much as mention it and were it truly matter of Fact that King had really nothing to resign for the Republicans of those times were the good Barons that Rebel'd and had seated themselves in a sort of 〈◊〉 before in short if it were solemnly done it would look like the Act of a Lunatick if not at all as is much more likely their Historians Labour in a lye and for the other we never had a Soveraign that Submitted the Power of his Temporal Government of the state to the Pope's See but only as it related to the Spiritual Administration of the Affairs of the Church and the Religion of the Times These sort of Suppositions have so much Nonsense in them especially when apply'd to Human Creatures and more then when to Monarchs that have commonly from Birth and Education more Sense than common Mortals that there is not so much as a Natural Brute but will use what he can manage as his own with all imaginable Care and Discretion How tender and fond are the most stupid Animals how do they most affectionately express that paternal Love for the Preservation of their little Young how abundantly do they Evidence that Natural 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with which Mr. Hunt gives us such a deal of impertinent disturbance and why cannot the King of a Country whom the Civil and Imperial Sanctions represent as the Father of it too be supposed to retain as much a paternal Care for its Conservation we do not find even in that their Free-State of Nature or that Common-wealth of Wars the Republick of unruly Beasts where there is the least Relation or resemblance tho perhaps they have power and opportunity that they delight to devour and destroy and much less do they covet the
not absolutely destroyed because some Persons can maintain another no more than the Systeme of Plolomy was presently False only because Copernicus had invented his for True for the bare contradiction and Clashing of positions convinces no more than the giving the Lye but when it is prov'd upon them in one that even from their own Principles and Premisses they cannot draw the very Conclusion they design as it was since in the other that from their own Hypothesis they could not solve all the Phrases and Phaenomenons themselves would make to appear then certainly they must allow that themselves are in the wrong tho they will not Confess their Foes in the Right And now having at lenght examin'd their Original Power of People let us a little consider how long and from whence our Kings have had their Original If we must make words only instead of an Argument and cavil about an Idiom in Speech as some of their critical Contenders about this Origen of Kings have very vainly and as Foolishly quarrel'd at then we must consult our Dictionaries and the Dutch Tongue for without doubt till the Saxons settled here they had some other appellation and were only from them call'd Konyngs and since Kings but if we consider the Nature of the Government it is that which from the Greeks we call Monarchy which from its own Etymology best signifies and expresses the Sense that it bears which is the Governing part and the Supream power plac'd in the sole hands of some single Person and then the Queston will be only this how long that has obtain'd in the World by whom first instituted and in whom it first commenc'd For the first 't is undeniable that its Original was with that of the World and God himself gave it by the Name of Dominion to his Adam he had Created which in express Terms was given him first over all the Living Creatures and then over the product of his own Loins his Wife and after that as if Providence did design to prevent the dispute about the Precedency of Primogeniture it gave in express words a Superiority to Cain that the younger should be in some sense his Subject that to him should be his desire and that he should Rule over him from whence it was assoon Communicated to the Several Heads of the Families that were the product of their Loins and so succeeded in a sort of subordinate Government according to the Antiquity of the Tribe or Family That this was then such Authority as we now call Kingly is both nonsense to assert and as great a Folly for any to require that we should maintain for they may as well quarrel with us when we say there were Kings of Israel and Judah and yet cannot prove that there Courts and Revenues were as Stately and Great as now they are in England and France 't is enough if the Government of those Primitive times was but Analogous to what we call Kingly now And now that we have brought it both to a right of Primogeniture and a Paternal Right from whence will result the Divine we 'll consider what it is Mr. Sidney and his Advocates can say against it and see if there be any such absurdities in it as they more Seditiously then with any Sense and Reason suggest first for the right of Primogeniture that themselves will allow but 't is only because not able to contradict and besides as they imagin it makes for them and their Cause for by that course of descent they think our Asserters of a Divine right are oblig'd to deduce their Pedigree of their Kings form the Creation of the World in a right Line and therefore Mr. Sidney says that such a supposition makes no King to have a Title to his Crown but what can deduce his Pedigree from the Eldest Son of Noah But for that absurdity which is truly their own by supposing it ours when it can't be truly deduced from the Doctrine and defence of a Divine Right we shall answer anon when we come to treat of the Paternal That Primogeniture had the Preheminence in the very Worlds Infancy if we do but believe the word of God which tells us that himself told Cain he should Rule over his younger Brother we cannot doubt of the truth of it besides Abraham's being a Prince and having a Precedence to his Brother Lot is also there recorded and Esau selling of his Birth-right Condemn'd as a Contempt of that preheminence to which God and Nature had prefer'd him and which himself only disposed of when he presum'd he was upon the point to dye and for his disregard of this Priviledge was he punisht too in the prevention of the Blessing and which is perhaps the only Instance in Sacred writ where a Lineal Discent and the Succession was interrupted and this too only occasion'd by his own Act. And that God himself did appropiate this precedency to the first-born may be gathered out ofall the History of the Old Testament the only account that is extant and from which Authors gather all the Authentick Relation of the two first Epooches and most Memorable Periods or Interals of time viz. That from the Creation to the Flood and from the Flood to the first Olympiad i.e. to Ann. Mund. 3174. for the profane History of those times is accounted Fabulous and by Historians call'd so and from those Sacred Oracles it will appear that all their Kings of Israel and Judah succeeded according to this Right of Primogeniture or where that fail'd by Proximity of Blood And as the Almighty Countenanc'd such a Succession So does Nature it self which among Heathens was distinguisht from the Deity and may be so amongst Christians too if they consider it asthe Work and Order of the Divine will for if she shall decide it she presumes the Eldest in years to be always the wisest too and 't is not Nature but a chance preternatural when it happens to be otherwise for if we should conceive no disparity between Brothers and Sons then all Right and Superiority must be decided by Lot but Nature giving a precedency by Birth makes Naturalist to call Primogeniture the Sors naturalis In the next place the Laws confirm it and the Practise of most Nations as well our own so that when Mr. H tells us the Succession to the Crown is of a Civil Nature not establisht by any Divine right he will find and must needs know that such a Succession by Primogeniture or Proxiof Blood even by almost all Civil Institutions is allowed the precedency and that even in the Discent of Common Inheritance and Private Estates and as I have said before I look upon the Crown to have a stronger Entail and more oblig'd to discend in a direct Line if it were not from any Divine Institution of God but from a bare Human Policy to prevent the Blood and Confufion that attends always a Competition of
disputable Titles which will needs be the result of any alter'd Succession and what now do these Laws affirm to which Mr. H. must affix his discent of the Crown by his own words when he says 't is of a Civil Nature why the Civil and Imperial 't is true differ from our own in this that with them he is lookt upon an Heir that is left so by the Testator in his Will and by them a Testamentary Succession was more esteem'd then a Legitimate and Lawful one yet even that imply'd there was one that was Legitimate or born so and the Reason why they rely'd so much upon Testamentary Inheritances was I believe because those were confirm`d by the very Laws of their 12. Tab. which was their first and Fundimental and therefore as long as the Testamentary was valid they would by no means admit the Legitimate one But still even in those Testamentary donations I believe they for the most part 〈◊〉 most of their Patrimony to the Eldest as well as we see among our selves our Tenants in fee simple that have as absolute a disposition of it by Will or those that have recover'd against the tail by fine or the like still leave their Eldest their Heir tho Impower'd to give it to whom they please And then for our own Law the very Custom of the Realm by which we must be more immediately Govern'd that makes the Eldest Son the only Heir to his Ancestor or else the next of Kin to the Predecessor deceas'd and that is the Reason an old Aphorism obtain'd even with our own Antient Lawyers that expressly insinuates such an Hereditary Succession to be by Divine Institution when they tell us that 't is not mankind but the Almighty makes them Heirs I know that the saying more properly refers to the Order or appointment of the Divine Will that such an one shall be the First-Born because it makes him to come into the World first but if it can be prov'd from the Text as in many places it may and in some we have shown that God himself in express Terms made the younger Subject we may be so bold to say that he instituted too such a Subjection to be paid to the Eldest And now let us consider the paternal Right which our Republicans so much deride which Mr. Sidney in ridicule would force us to derive from the Eldest Son of Noah which Plato Redivivus would expose in the Empire of Reuben the Brief History calls a new Notion of the present Age and Mr. Hunt laughs at in the merry conceit of calling it the Court of King Adam and King Father 't is true the most Sacred and Divinest truth may be made Ridiculous only by laughing at it and the World has not wanted even such a Blasphemous Buffoon to burlesque the whole Bible but I shall shew them here as in the most proper place in what Sense those Fathers might be said to be Kings and that the Absurdities they suggest are sar from any Consequences of such a Supposition And why for Gods sake must we be put to prove only for Asserting that the first Man had a Monarchichal Dominion tho it were at first over Beasts why must we therefore make out too that he kept up his Majesty after the manner of our Kings And that Adam in his Garden of Eden in the first Year of the World had built him an House like a Solomon that was hardly finish'd in Fifteen That he that had but Fig-Leaves to cover him had laid the Foundations of his Court in costly Stone and erected a Pile whose Porches and Pillars were of pure Caedar and all the Building built up out of Caedar Beams they may as well expect we should make out this too 〈◊〉 bring all the Forrest of Lebanon to be laid out in a Palace of Paradice Is it not enough for us to maintain that the first Government in the World was Monarchial when we can prove all the Dominion and Power was imparted to a single Person and when God himself seem'd to make but that one Man to prevent even a possibility of a Competitor and a Division of the Soveraignty without being obliged to make the very Origen of Monarchy adaequate to the Improvement of it and that a Soveraign for almost seven thousand year agon had the same Pompous and Imperial sway that a series of time and a Revolution of Ages has settled in the King of Great-Britain Many things are clear from Analogy of Reason tho they cannot be demonstrated to Sense the naturalist and Chymical Operators may well conclude that the mineral Vermilion is made by some 〈◊〉 Subterraneous heat that 〈◊〉 the sumes of Mercury and Sulphur in which Mines 't is found from their being able to make the Cinnabar its Resemblance by an Artificial 〈◊〉 out of the Butter of Antimony in which is both Sulphur and Mercury tho themselves were never working under ground and in the Mines If we must be put upon such a piece of Impertinence as the Postscript would have it to find out this King Adam's Court too I 'll just take the Liberty to put them to just such another task They will have their instituted Common-wealth to Commence from the World's insancy even before that of Israel before that Moses as they say had divided their Land unto them by Lot and turned the several Tribes into so many Republicks And then let them tell me what sort of a Republick it was that the Patriarchs liv'd under and were ruled by where it was that Abraham and his Fellow Citizens consulted to make Laws for the Benefit of the Common-wealth of his Family so great that his train'd Servants 318 sought 4 Kings where it was that Lot and his Herds-men when they pitch'd their Tents in the Plain set up their Stadthouse and commenced Burgomasters if in those days there was any Government purely Democratical that is 〈◊〉 Licentious it must have been seen in the Cities and Towns of those times some Sodom or Gomorrah yet even there the Text tells us Bera was King of the one and Birsha of the other let them tell us where Isaac when he settled in the Valley of Gerar set up his Servants for Senators tho he was grown so great since they will have it so in the Common-wealth of his Houseshold that a mighty King of those times whom the Text expresly calls so Abimilech told him that he was much mightier than he and the Philistines envyed and 〈◊〉 him too for it Let them tell us how Jacob liv'd in the Republick of his Sons and Servants in Succoth tho such a numerous train that they could venture to invade the City of the Shechemites inhabited by the Subjects of Hamor the Hivite whom the Scripture calls the Prince of the Country and sure these Patriarchs were somewhat more than the ordinary Fathers of Families as Plato would make them when their Forces were so
Majesty and a severe one too besides its being Capital to have his Goods confiscated his Children 〈◊〉 and his very Memory damn'd and one would think it might have serv'd for Parricide too but they 〈◊〉 upon that Treason so gross such a Traytor so great that for a 〈◊〉 time he superseded even the Invention of a Torment from his Insuperable quiet Mr. Hunt would do well and like himself that is to 〈◊〉 very Foolishly even from this too that the Romans had once no Regard no respect for this paternal Right because the Punishment of Parracide was once left out of their Laws and yet at last that it might be no longer unpunishable only upon the same presumption that there could not be found such Criminals one Cnej. Pompeius is said to have been the Author and Inventor of a Natural Punishment if possible for a Crime so unnatural that is as he had Rebell'd against the Laws of Nature in this his Crime so he should be depriv'd while living of the benefit of all her Elements and neither her Heaven or Earth receive him after Death but to be Buried alive with wild Beast in a Bag and set a floating in the midst of the Sea whereas if they kill'd any other Kindred or Relation like Common Felons they were only punisht by the Cornelian Law And now by this time I hope I may with modesty maintain whatever our mighty 〈◊〉 do say to disprove 〈◊〉 that I 've shown the Paternal Power in the begining of the World to have been patriarchal and Absolute And in all succeeding Ages to have been sub ordinately Soveraign in the respective Families and several Households in which the Parent does preside and that asserted from the very Civil 〈…〉 that establish a Supream 〈◊〉 Paramount and some Measure demonstrated this from the very Word of God the course of Nature Light of Reason Laws of Nations and the Statutes of the Land And as I 've done with this paternal Right in Fathers so I shall consider now in the next place the Divine of my King a Right that none but Republicans dispute none but Rebels will really oppose and they deal with this Divine Doctrine not so kindly as some Indians are said to do with the Devil who paint him most ugly and 〈◊〉 only that he 〈◊〉 be the more ador'd whereas these dress up somewhat of Divinity it self in the most frightful form to make it 〈◊〉 and Contemn'd they tell us 't is Monstrous Trayterous Papal Divelish and this is the 〈◊〉 Varnish these Villains 〈◊〉 over it when all the while the Colours are only of their own 〈◊〉 This is their Trojan Horse that must 〈◊〉 Popery and Arbitrary Power and carries Fire and Sword in its Belly but in these their aspersions as they 〈◊〉 the Bible and 〈◊〉 the very Book of Life that in several places 〈◊〉 to us the very Divinity of Kings so they Libel the works of that Learned Person they so much oppose in a misrepresentation of his very principles and positions about it and then 't is no difficult matter to render an Hypothesis puzzel'd senseless and absur'd when with their own Pens they put upon it the Nonsense and absurdity for thus they deal injuriously even with the dead and disingenuously detract from the Learned dust of that Loyal Subject Sir Robert Filmer Thus Sidney says and endeavours to deduce from his Doctrine what was never lain down that all mankind was born by the Laws of God and the 〈◊〉 of Nature to submit to an absolute Kingly Government not restrainable by Law or Oath Thus the Postscript will draw from it that it 〈◊〉 such a Government to be Establisht by God and Nature for all mankind that it proves a Charter to Kings Granted by God Almighty But such 〈◊〉 were barr'd from being so much as Evidence by the Civil Law they were forc't to subscribe their accusations and be 〈◊〉 if their Falsehoods were detected with a retaliation and our own Statutes of King Edward provided once against such false suggesters with an incurring the like Punishment they would have brought others to suffer and 〈◊〉 pity but those 〈◊〉 ones or the like should be revived for the prevention of Perjury it would be no discouragement to good Evidence tho deterring to the bad and these detractors and false Accusers of a person in his principles deserve in a Moral Sense as much Animadversion as those Perjur'd ones in the Civil why did not Mr. 〈◊〉 or the 〈◊〉 their subscription too Why were they not so fair as to cite the 〈◊〉 out of Filmer wherein these puzzel'd Senseless positions were asserted The Substance the whole design of that Loyal and 〈◊〉 piece is only to expose the Natural Liberty of the People or as they would make 〈◊〉 the Subjects Divine 〈◊〉 to 〈◊〉 us the Royal Authority of the 〈◊〉 before the Flood that Fathers were first Kings of Families that the People were not concern'd as far as can be learnt from the Scriptures in the chusing of Kings That Monarchy has been always found more excellent 〈◊〉 Democracy and popular Government more Bloody 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That People cannot 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or punish their Kings That neither those of Israel or Judah were bound by their Law but were always 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that our own have always been so too This is the Substance that by all the acquaintance I have had with his works I could ever collect out of them and as I remember from some particular passages he tells us That he does not quarrel at the Privileges and Immunities of the People but only question whither they have them from a Natural Liberty or the Bounty of the Prince He tells us tho Kings be not bound by the Laws yet will they rule by them and that they degenerate into Tyrants when they do otherwise where then is this Bugbear Arbitrary Slavery Misery the result of a Doctrine full of an easie Government Freedom and Felicity the most that can be gathered from him is That Monarchys as well as other Estates do and ought to descend from some supream Father and common Ancestor and that there is some paternal Right by which the several Kingdoms of the Earth are Govern'd although by the Secret Will of God the long series of time the several Successions are altered and Usurp'd And then what must be meant by this Divine Right but what is consistent with the safety of the Subject and the Will and Intimation of the Almighty That God has made it part of the Decalogue That Moses had it delivered to him in his Tables on the Mount that it is a positive Divine Precept that all the wide World should be govern'd by nothing else but a Succession of absolute Kings and as they would make every Monarch by a Divine Entailment of perpetual Tyrants these are only the Conclusions of rage and transports of those that are 〈◊〉 and prejudic'd against such a Notion
all Nations Confirm'd Thirdly that Monarchy or Kingly Government isso far of a Divine Institution as it has receiv'd from God himself an ‖ Express approbation as it has been Intimated to us from the Worlds Creation and its first Regulated Establishment as it is Constantly Visible from all the Phaenomenons of Vnalterable Nature and as it has been Continually transmitted to posterity by the special Appearances of providence for its preservation And Last of all let me but only subjoyn the Excellency of this truly ancient venerable and divine Form of Government a Monarchy and then the many Mischiefs that attend the popular one a Democracy and then let the most prejudic'd and partial person judge not only which of the two has been always reputed most Eligible but which of them he himself would most affect to Chuse Sir Walter Raleigh as Learned an Head-piece perhaps of the last Age as any that he hath left behind him in this a Person rather prejudic'd against Monarchy than bigotted for it no such Court-Favourite as the Mercury makes of Salmasius A Dirty Dissolute Parasite of Kings and Pander of Tyranny this Learned Historian lets us know That the first the most ancient the most general and most approved Government is that of one Ruling by just Laws call'd Monarchy and whatever wits our more modern Commonwealths-men pretend to be this Gentleman that was more sage than the wisest of them does not make paternal Right such a ridiculous thing as they would represent it but tells us that in the beginning the Fathers of Nations were then the Kings and the Eldest of Families the Princes and of such an Excellency is its Form that it is the clear result of unprejudic'd Reason and most agreeable to the sense and security of Mankind For as the natural Intellect it self by which I mean bare humane understanding when in the infancy of the World people were guided more by their own Fancies and the Paternal Power which then was all the Regal from the tenderness it might be suppos'd to have towards those that were their natural issues as well as their civil subjects had indulg'd vice and been less rigorous in Executing impartial Justice on Offenders whereby people were left more at Liberty I say Nature then and Necessity it self made them find the Inconvenience even of too much Toleration and made even the most foolish fellows apprehend as well as the wise that the Condition of reasonable men would be more miserable than that of brute beasts that an Inundation of Anarchy and Confusion would overwhelm them more than the first Flood Did they not by a general Consent submit to Government and obey those that were set over them to Govern For they found that when they were most mighty to oppress others might in time grow more so and do them as much mischief And those that were equal in their strength found themselves equally dangerous and mischievous one to another and that the most unbounded Licenciousness prov'd always to some or other the most miserable Bondage and Slavery And this natural Reason inclin'd them too to acquiesce under those Monarchical Forms that were then the Government of the Times and which the Israelites themselves desired in a more special manner tho' they were forwarn'd of its Absoluteness and told by Samuel that it would be Tyranny it self for the same necessity convenience reason and natural instinct that persuaded them to submit to Government in General did also suggest to them the Excellency of Monarchy in Particular For as by want of all Government their reason told them they could not long possess any right and that Liberty being only a License to do what they list and so left nothing to be wrong So the same reason suggested that these their Rights were best defended and soonest decided by some single Person that was Supreme than when a Multitude had the Supremacy for in that there being so many suffrages as there are men accordingly there might be so many several interests and factions which must both hinder any sudden determination as well as make the sentence liable to more partiality and injustice when it is determin'd This made the Senate of Rome so tedious always in its determinations and the people as uneasie and unsatisfied in their Decrees Their Praetores Quaesitores Judices Quaestionum selecti some of them having under them no * less than an hundred Commissioners might be said to confound Causes instead of determining them Their Agrarian Laws that were made for the Division of their Fields most of them having been given by Romulus and the rest of their Kings resolv'd their rights to them with Justice and satisfaction to the people while their Kings Reign'd that gave them and were the sole Judges of their own Laws But when they were confounded into a Commonwealth and the Senate set themselves to decide the divisions of their Commons and their Fields what Seditions Confusions and Unsettlement did they create So that the Reasonable presumption there is of a more Equitable and speedy distribution of Justice from a single Sovereign because suppos'd to be less prejudic'd and less unable to be prevail'd upon by favour or affection may very well be thought to have recommended at first a Monarchical Form afford us now asmuch reason for the retaining it In the next place A King being a perpetual Heir to the Crown insomuch that the Politick Laws suppose him never to dye and when in a natural sense he does the Crown still descends to his immediate Successor This will make him 〈◊〉 to preserve the Rights of it inviolate and perpetuate the same Prerogative to his Posterity Whereas the people in all their popular 〈◊〉 administer only for years or at most for Life and what should hinder them then from defrauding that Publick whose Administration they must either soon quit or at last leave to those to whom they no way relate I allow in most such Communities there is commonly special provisions made by their Laws that an abusing that power with which they are intrusted or a robbing the Common-wealth of part of its Revenue shall be punish'd with some grievous Fine or perhaps made Capital for which the Romans had their several rules and regulations for their Magistrates and men in Office But there being so many ways to be injurious to the Publick that can so easily by those that administer its affairs be kept private and conceal'd it must certainly be concluded that those that have an Hereditary Power of Publick Administration as all Kings and they alone have that their Interest obliges them to preserve its rights inviolate from an unwillingness that nature it self will implant in them to injure their own Sons Successors and Posterity Whereas the same Interest which certainly is the most powerful Promoter either of good or evil will incite Senators in a Commonwealth more industriously more seriously to endeavour to serve them selves It is the