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THE LAW AND THE PRINCE: 



LEX, REX, 



OA 




A DISPUTE FOR 



THE JUST PREROGATIVE OF KING AND PEOPLE : 

CONTAINING 

THE REASONS AND CAUSES OF THE MOST NECESSARY DEFENSIVE WARS 

OF THE KINGDOM OF SCOTLAND, 

AND OF THEIR 

EXPEDITION FOR THE AID AND HELP OF THEIR DEAR BRETHREN 

OF ENGLAND; 

Ut WHICH THEIR INNOCENCT IB ASSERTED, AND A FULL ANSWER IS GIVEN TO A SEDITIOUS PAMPHLET, 

ENTITULED, 

« SACRO-SANCTA REGUM MA JEST AS," 

OR 

THE SACRED AND ROYAL PREROGATIVE OF CHRISTIAN KINGS ; 
UNDER THE NAME OF J. A., BUT PENNED BT 

JOHN MAXWELL, THE EXCOMMUNICATE POPISH PRELATE ; 

WITH A SCRIPTURAL CONFUTATION OF THE RUINOUS OROUNDS OF W. BARCLAT, H. OROTIUS, H. ARNISiEUS, 

ANT. DE DOMI. POPISH BISHOP OF SPALATO, AND OF OTHER LATE ANTI-MAOISTRATICAL 

ROYALISTS, AS THE AUTHOR OF OSSORIANUM, DR FERNE, E. SYMMONS, 

THE DOCTORS OF ABKRAEEN, ETC. 

IN FORTY-FOUR QUESTIONS. • ' 



BY THE 

REV. SAMUEL RUTHERFORD. 

SOMETIME PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF ST. ANDREWS. 



** But if yon shall still do wickedly, ye shall be consumed, both ye and your king." — I Sam. xii. 25. 



EDINBURGH: 
ROBERT OGLE AND OLIVER & BOYD. 

M. OGLE & SON AND WILLIAM COLLINS, GLASGOW. 

p. DEWAR, PERTH. A. BROWN & CO., ABERDEEN. W. M'COMB, BELFAST. 

HAMILTON, ADAMS & CO., AND JAMES NISBET & CO., LONDON. 

MDCCCXLIIL 



[London : Printed for John Field, and are to be sold at his house upon Addle-hill, 

near Baynards-Cas^le. Octob. 7» 1644.] 



EDINBURGH; 

ftXPRINTED BT A. MVRBAT, MILUE SQUA ttS. 



I 



PREFACE. 



In issuing a new edition of Lex^ Bex^ it has been considered advisable to print along 
with it Buchanan's De Jure Hegni aptid Scotos. This work, on its first appearance, gave 
great oifence to ihe government of the time, as containing principles which were opposed 
to the established monarchy ; and was consequently condemned by the parliament of 
ifi, 1^4. In 1664 there was a proclamation issued against any translation of it being in the 
possession of any person. " This proclamation," says Wodrow, " is every way singular ; 
for any thing Ihat appears, this translation of that known piece of the celebrated Bu- 
chanan was not printed, but only, it seems, handed about in manuscript ; while, in the 
meantime, thousands of copies of it in the Latin original were in everybody's hands. 
It had been more just to have ordered an answer to have been formed to the solid argu- 
ments in that dialogue against tyranny and arbitrary government." Again, in 1688, an- 
other proclamation was published by the Council, prohibiting every person from selling, 
dispersing, or* lending such books as Buchanan's " De Jure Regni apud Scotos" " Lex, 
J^eaj," " Jtis Populi Naphtali" along with some others which were considered as having 
a treasonable tendency. The same principles are advocated in Lex, Hex, that are held 
by Buchanan : both works are equally opposed to that absolute and passive obedience • 
required from the subject to a royal prerogative. A modem writer* well remarks, " That 
resistance to lawful authority — even when that authority so called has, in point of fact, 
set at nought all law — is in no instance to be vindicated, will be held by those only who 
are the devotees of arbitrary power and passive obedience. The principles of Mr Kuther- 
ford's Lex, ReXy however obnoxious they may be to such men, are substantially the prin- 
ciples on which all government is founded, and without which the civil magistrate would 
become a curse rather than a blessing to a country. They are the very principles which 
lie at the basis of the British constitution, and by whose tenure the house of Bruns- 
wick does at this very moment hold possession of the throne of these realms." 

* Rev. Robert Bums, D.D., in his Preliminary Dissertation to Wodrow's Chureli History. 



L 



CONTENTS. 



Sketch of the Life ot Rutherford, 
Author's Preface, 



Page 

XV. 

zxi. 



QUESTION I. 
"Whether government be by a divine law, ..... 1 

How government is from God. — Civil power, in the root, immediately from God. 

QUESTION II. 
Whether or no government be warranted by the law of nature, ... 1 

Civil society natural in radic€, in the root, voluntary in modOj in the manner. — Power of govern- 
ment, and power of government by such and such magistrates, different. — Civil subjection not 
formally from nature's laws. — Our consent to laws penal, not antecedently natural. — Government 
by such rulers, a secondary law of nature. — Family government and politic different. — Govern- 
ment by rulers a secondary law of nature ; family government and civU different. — Civil govern- 
ment, by consequent, natural. 

QUESTION III. 
Whether royal power and definite forms of government be from God, . . 3 

That kings are from God, understood in a fourfold sense. — The royal power hath warrant from 
divine institution. — The three forms of government not different in specie and nature. — How every 
form is from God. — How government is an ordinance of man, 1 Pet. ii. 13. 

QUESTION IV. 

Whether or no the king be only and immediately from Grod, and not from the people, 6 

How the king is from God, how from the people. — Royal power three ways in the people. — How 
royal power is radically in the people. — The people maketh the king. — How any form of govern- 
ment is from God. — How government is a human ordinance, 1 Pet. ii. 3. — The people create the 
king. — Mf^ng a king, and choosing a king, not to be distinguished. — David not a king formally, 
because anointed by God. 



QUESTION V. 

Whether or no the P. Prelate proveth that sovereignty is immediately from God, not 
from, the people, ....«.•• 

Kings made by the people, though the office, in abatraetOf were immediately from God. — The people 
^^ have a r^ action, more than approbation, in making a king. — Ringing of a person ascribed to the 
people. — Kings in a special manner are from God, but it tbllowcth not ; therefore, not from the 
people.^ — The place, Prov. viii. 15, proveth not but kings are made by the people. — Nebuchad- 
nezzar, and other heathen kings, had no just title before God to the kingdom of Judah, and divers 
other sabdued kingdoms. 



9 



VI 



CONTENTS. 



Page 



16 



QUESTION IX. 

Whether or no sovereignty is so in and from the people, that they may resmne their 
power in time of extreme necessity, . * . . . 

How the people is the subject of sovereignty. — No tyrannical power is from God. — People cannot 
alienate the natural power of selfnlefence. — The power of parliaments. — The Parliament hath 
more power than the king. — Judges and kings differ. — People may resume their power, not be- 
cause they are infallible, but because they cannot so readily destroy themselves as one man may 
do. — That the sanhedrim punished not David, Bathsheba, Joab, is but a fact, not a law^ — There is 
a subordination of creatures natural, government must be natural ; and yet this or that form is 
voluntary. 



22 



QUESTION VI. 

Whether or no the king be so allenarly from both, in regard of sovereignty and desig- 
nation of his person, as he is noway from the people, but only by mere approba- 
tion, ...•■«.,. 

The forms of government not from God by an act of naked providence, but by his approving will. 
— Sovereignty not from the people by sole approbation. — Though Gk)d have peculiar acts of pro- 
vidence in creating kings, it followeth not hence that the people maketh not kings. — The P. Pre- 
late exponeth prophecies true only of David, Solomon, and Jesus Christ, as true of pro&ne hea- 
then kings. — The P. Prelate maketh all the heathen kings to be princes, anointed idth the holy 
oil of saving grace. 

QUESTION VII. 

Whether the P. Prelate conclude that neither constitution nor designation of kings is 
from the people, ........ 

The excellency of kings maketh them not of God*s only constitution and designation. — How sove- 
reignty is in the people, how not. — ^A community doth not surrender their right and liberty to 
their rulers, so much as their power active to do, and passive to suffer, violence.— God's loosing of 
the bonds of kings, by the mediation of the people's despising him, proveth against the P. Prelate 
that the Lord taketh away, and giveth royal majesty mediately, not immediately. — The subordina- 
tion of people to kings and rulers, both natural and voluntary ; the subordination of beasts and 
creatures to man merely natural. — The place, Gen. ix. 5, " He that sheddeth man's blood," &o. 
discussed. 

QUESTION VIII. 

Whether or no the P. Prelate proveth, by force of reason, that the people cannot be 

capable of any power of government, .... ^ 28 

In any community there is an active and passive power to government. — Popular government is not 
that wherein the whole people are governors. — People by nature are equally indifferent to all 
the three governments, and are not under any one by nature. — The P. Prelate denieth the Pope 
his father to be the antichrist. — The bad success of kings chosen by people proveth nothing 
against us, because kings chosen by God had bad success through their own wickedness. — The 
P. Prelate condemneth king Charles' ratifying (Pari. 2, an. 1641) the whole proceedings of Scot- 
land in this present reformation. — That there be any supreme judges is an eminent act of divine 
providence, which hindereth not but that the king is made by the people. — The people not pa- 
tients in making a king, as is water in the sacrament of baptism, in the act of production of 
grace. 



33 



QUESTION X. 

Whether or not royal birth be equivalent to divine unction, 

Impunged by eight arguments. — Royalty not transmitted from father to son. — ^A family may be 
chosen to a crown as a single person is chosen, but the tie is conditional in both. — The throne, by 
special promise, made to David and his seed, by Gk>d, (Psal. Izxxix.,) no ground to make birth, in 
foro Dei, a just title to the crown. — ^A title by conquest to a throne must be unlawful, if birth be 
God's lawful title. — Royalists who hold conquest to be a just title to the crown, teach manifest 
treason against king Charles and his royal heirs. — Only, b<mafortunm, not honour or royalty, pro- 



39 



CONTENTS. 



VU 



Page 
perly transmitable from father to son. — Violent cooqaest cannot regulate the consciences of people 
to submit to a conqueror as their lairfnl king. — Naked birth is inferior to that yery diyine unction, 
that made no man a king without the people's election. — If a kingdom were by birth the king might 
sell it. — The crown is the patrimony of the kingdom, not of him who is king, or of his father. — 
Birth a typical designment to the crown in Israel. — The choice of a family to the crown, resoWeth 
upon the nree election of the people aa on the fonntaln cause. — ^Eketion of a laonily to the crown 
lawful. 

QUESTION XI. 

Whether or no he be more principally a king who is a king by birth, or he who is a 

king by the free election of the people, . . , . . 46 

The elective king cometh nearer to the first king. (Deut. xtU.) — If the people may limit the king, 
they give him the power. — A community have not power formally to punish themselves. — The 
hereditary and the electiye prince In divers considerations, better or worse, each one than another. 

QUESTION XII. 
Whether or no a kingdom may lawfully be purchased by the sole title of conquest, 48 

A Twofold right of conquest. — Conquest turned in an after-consent of the people, becometh a just 
title. — Conquest not a signification to us of God's approving will. — Mere violent domineering con- 
trary to the acts of governing. — Violence hath nothing in it of a king. — A bloody conqueror not 
a blessing, joer se, as a king is. — Strength as prevailing is not law or reason. — Fathers cannot dis- 
pose of the liberty of posterity not born. — A father, as a father, hath not power of life and death. 
Israel and David's conquests of the Canaanites, Edomites, Ammonites not lawful, because con- 
qaest, but upon a divine title of God's promise. 

QUESTION XIII. 

Whether or no royal dignity have its spring from nature, and how it is true " Every 

man is bom free," and how servitude is contrary to nature, . . 50 

Seven sorts of superiority and inferiority. — Power of life and death from a positive law. — A dominion 
antecedent and consequent. — Kings and subjects no natural order. — A man is born, consequenter, 
in politic relation. — Slavery not natural from four reasons. — Every man bom free in regard of 
civil subjection Cnot in regard of natural, such as of children and wife, to parents and husband) 
proved by seven arguments. — Politic government how necessary, how natural. — That parents 
should enslave their children not natural. 



QUESTION XIV. 

Whether or no the people make a person their king conditionally or absolutely ; and 
whether the king be tyed by any such covenant,- .... 

The king under a natural, but no civil obligation to the people, as royalists teach. — The covenant 
civilly tyeth the king proved by Scriptures and reasons, by eight arguments. — If the condition, 
without which one of the parties would never have entered into covenant, be not performed, that 
party is loosed from the covenant. — The people and princes are obUged in their places for justice 
and religion, no less than the king. — In so far as the king pressetb a false religion on the people, 
eotCMiu, in so far they are understood not to have a king. — The covenant giveth a mutual coiac- 
tive power to king and people to compel each other, though there be not one on earth higher than 
both to compel each of them. — The covenant bindeth the king as king, not as he is a man only.-^ 
One or two tyrannous acts deprive not the king of his royal right — Though there were no posi- 
tive written covenant (which yet we grant not) yet there is a natural, tacit, implicit covenant tying 
the king, by the nature of his office. — If the king be made king absolutely, it is contrary to Scrip- 
ture and the nature of his office. — The people given to the king as a pledge, not as if they became 
his own to dispose of at his absolute will. — The king could not buy, sell, borrow, if no covenant 
should tie him to men. — The covenant sworn by Judah (2 Chron. xv.) t^^ed the king. 



54 



QUESTION XV. 

Whether the king be univocally, or only analogically and by proportion, a father, 

Adam not king of the whole earth because a father. — The king a father metaphorically and impro> 
perly, proved by eight arguments. 



62 



■ J. 




QUESTION XVI. 

Page 
Whether or no a despotical or masterly dominion agree to the king, because he is king, 64 

The king hath no masterly dominion over the subjects as if they were his servants, proved by four 
arguments. — The king not over men as reasonable creatures to domineer. — The king cannot give 
avay his kingdom or his people as if they were his proper goods.— rA violent surrender of liberty 
tyeth not. — ^A surrender of ignorance is in so far involantarily as it oblige not. — The goods of the 
subjects not the king's, proved by eight arguments. — All the goods of the subjects are the king's 
in a fourfold sense. 

QUESTION XVII. 

Whether or no the prince have properly the fiduciary or ministerial power of a tutor, 

husband, patron, minister, nead, master of a family, not of a lora or dominator, 69 

The king a tutor rather than a father as these are distinguished. — ^A free community not properly 
and in all respects a minor and pupil. — The king's power not properly marital and husbandly. — 
The king a patron and servant. — The royal power only from God, imfMdiatione nmplieU eontti- 
UttiontBf et tolum soUtudine catuoB primoB, but not immediatione appUcationu dignitatis ad penO' 
nam. — The king the servant of the people both objectively and subjectively. — The Lord and the 
people by one and the same act according to the physical relation maketh the king. — The king 
head of the people metaphorically only, not essentially, not univocally, by six arguments. — His 
power fiduciary only. 



QUESTION XVIII. 

What is the law or manner of the king (1 Sam. viii. 9, 11) discussed fully, 



badly differenced by Barclay. — ^What is TtV^Qp] riQK^D *^® manner of 
ony of interpreters, ancient and modern, 'protestants and papists. — Crying 



The power and the office 

the king, by the harmony 

out (1 Sam. viii.) not necessarily a remedy of tyranny, nor a praying with faith and patience. — Re- 
sisting of kings that are tyrannous, and patience, not inconsistent. — The law of the king not a per- 
missive law, as was the law of divorcement. — The law of the king (1 Sam. xil. 23, 24) not a law of 
tyranny. 



72 



QUESTION XIX. 

Whether or no the king be in dignity and power above the people, . . 77 

In what consideration the king is above the people, and the people above the king. — A mean, as a 
mean, inferior to the end, how it is true- — The king inferior to the people. — The church, because 
the church, is of more excellency than the king, because king. — The people being those to whom 
the king is given, worthier than the gift. — And the people immortal, the king mortal. — The king 
a mean only,not both the efficient, or author of the kingdom, and a mean ; two necessary distinc- 
tions of a mean. — If sin had never been, there should have been no king. — The king is to give his 
life for his people. — The consistent cause more excellent than the effect — The people than the 
king. — Impossible people can limit royal power, but they must give royal power also. — The peo- 
ple have an action in making a king, proved by four arguments. — Though it were granted that 
God immediately made kings, yet it is no consequent, God only, and not the people, can unmake 
him. — The people appointing a king over themselves, retain the fountain-power of making a king. 
— The mean inferior to the end, and the king, as a king, is a mean. — The king, as a mean, and 
also as a man, inferior to the people. — To swear non-self-preservation, and to swear self-murder, 
all one. — The people cannot make away their power, 1. Their whole power, nor 2. Irrevocably to 
the king. — The people may resume the power they give to the commissioners of parliament, when 
it is abused. — The tables in Scotland lawful, when the ordinary judicatures are corrupt. — Qaod 
eficit tale id ipntm magia tale discussed, the fountain-power in the people derived only in the king. 
— The king is a fiduciary, a life-renter, not a lord or heritor. — How sovereignty is in the people. 
— Power of life and death, how in a community. — A community void of rulers, is yet, and may 
be a politic body. — Judges gods analogically. 

QUESTION XX. 

Whether inferior judges be essentially the immediate vicegerents of Grod, as kings, not 

differing in essence and nature trom kings, .... 88 

Inferior judges the immediate vicars of God, no less than the king. — The consciences of inferior 
judges, immediately subordinate to God, not to the king, either mediately or immediately. — How 



CONTBNTS. IX 



Pa0B 
the inferior judge is the deputy of the king. — ^He may pnt to death murderers, as having GkKi's 
sword committed to him, no less than the king, eyen though the king command the contrary ; for 
he is not to execute judgment, and to relieve the oppressed conditionally, if a mortal king give 
him leave ; but whether the king will or no, he is to obey the King of kings. — Inferior judges are 
ministri rtgni^ non fwinUtri regis, — The king doth not make judges as he is a man, by an act of 
private good-will ; but as he is. a king by an act of royal justice, and by a power that he hath ftx>m 
the people, who made himself a supreme judge. — The king's making inferior judges hindereth 
not, but they are as essentially judges as the Ung who maketh them, not by fountain-power, but 
power borrowed fh>m the people. — The judges in Israel and the kings diifer not essentially. Aris- 
tocracy as natural as monarchy, and as warrantable* — Inferior judges depend some way on the 
king injleri, but not in faeto e$M. — The parliament not judges by derivation from the king. — The 
king cannot make or unmake judges* — ^No heritable judges. — Inferior judges more necessary than 
aUng. 

QUESTION XXI. 

What power the people and states of parliament hath over the king and in the state, 96 

The elders appointed by God to be judges* — Parliaments may convene and judge without the king. 
— ^Parliaments are essentially judges, and so their consciences neither dependeth on the king, 
quoad vpeeifieaition&my that is, that they should give out this sentence, not that, nee quoad exerd' 
tiuMf that they, should not in the morning execute judgment. — Unjust judging, and no judging at 
all, are sins in the states. — The parliament co-ordinate judges with the king, not advisers only ; by 
eleven arguments. — Inferior judges not the king's messengers or legates, but public governors. — 
The Jews' monarchy mixed. — ^A power executive of laws more in the king, a power legislative 
more in the parliament. 

QUESTION XXII. 

Whether the power of the king, as king, be absolute, or dependent and limited by 

God's first mould and pattern of a king, ..... 99 

The royalists make the king as absolute as the great Turk. — The king not absolute in his power, 
proved by nine arguments. — ^Why the king is a living law. — Power to do ill not from God. — Roy- 
alists say power to do ill is not from God, but power to do ill, as punishable by man, is from God. 
— ^A king, aetuprimo, is a plague, and the people slaves, if the king, by God*s institution, be abso- 
lute. — ^Absoluteness of royalty against justice, peace, reason, and law. — Against the king's relation 
of a brother. — A damsel forced may resist the king. — The goodness of an absolute prince hinder- 
eth not but he is oAtuprimo a tyrant. 

QUESTION XXIIL 
Whether the king hath a prerogative royal above law, . . . 106 

Prerogative taken two ways. — Prerogative above laws a garland proper to infinite majesty. — ^A three- 
fold dispensation, 1. Of power ; 2. Of justice ; 3. Of grace. — Acts of mere grace may be acts of 
blood. — ^An oath to the king of Babylon tyed not the people of Judah to all that absolute power 
could command. — The absolute prince is as absolute in acts of cruelty, as in acts of grace. — Ser- 
vants are not (1 Pet. ii. 18, 19) interdicted of self-defence. — The parliament materially only, not 
formally, hath the king for their lord. — Reason not a sufficient restraint to keep a prince from 
acts of tyranny. — Princes have sufficient power to do good, though they have not absolute to do 
eviL — ^A power to shed innocent blood can be no part of any royal power given of God. — The 
king, because he is a public person, wanteth many privileges that subjects have. 

QUESTION XXIV. 
What relation the king hath to the law, . . . . . 113 

Human laws considered as reasonable, or as penal.^ — The king alone hath not a nemothetic power.— 
Whether the king be above parliaments as their judge. — Subordination of the king to the parlia- 
ment and co-ordination both consistent. — ^Each one of the three governments hath somewhat from 
each other, and they cannot any one of them be in its prevalency conveniently without the mix- 
ture of the other two. — The king as a king cannot err, as he erreth in so far, he is not the remedy 
of oppression intended by God and nature. — In the court of necessity the people may judge the 
king. — Human laws not so obscure as tyranny is visible and discernible. — It is more requisite 
that the whole people, church, and religion be secured than one man. — If there be any restraint 
by law on the king it must be physical, for a moral restraint is upon all men. — To swear to an ab- 
■otnte prince as absolute, is an oath eot^ntw, in so far unlawful, and not obligatory. 
• b 



■ ^ • 




QUESTION XXV. 

Whether the supreme law, the safety of the people, be above the king, 



Page 
119 



The safety of the people to be preferred to the king, for the king is not to seek himself, bnt the 
good of the people. — Royalists make no kings but tyrants. — ^How the safety of the king is the 
safety of the people. — ^A king, for the safety of the people, may break through the letter and 
paper of the law. — The king's prerogatiye above law and reason, not comparable to the blood that 
has been shed in Irehmd and England. — The power of dictators prove not a prerogattve abOYe law. 



QXJESTION XXVI. 



Whether the king be above the law, ...... 

The law abOYC the king in four things, 1. in constitution ; 2. direction ; 3. limitation ; 4. co-action. — 
In what sense the king may do all things. — The king under the morality of laws ; under fnnda- 
mentiEd laws, not under punishment to be inflicted by himself, nor because of the eminency of his 
place, but for tiie physical incongruity thereof. — ^If, and how, the king may punish himself. — ^That 
the Ung transgressing in a heinous manner, is under the co-action of law, proved by seven argu- 
ments. — The coronation of a king, who is supposed to be a just prince, yet proveth aiter a tyrant, 
is conditional and from ignorance, and so involuntary, and in so far not obligatory in law. — Roy- 
alists confess a tyrant bi exercise may be dethroned. — ^How the people is the seat of the power 
of sovereignty. — The place, Fsal. li., " Against thee only have I sinned," &c. discussed. — Israel's 
not risbig in arms against Pharaoh examined. — ^And Judah's not working their own deliver- 
ance under Gyms.— A covenant without the king's concurrence lawful. 

QUESTION XXVII. 
Wliether or no the king be the sole, supreme, and final interpreter of the law, . 

He is not the supreme and peremptory interpreter. — ^Nor is his will the sense of the law. — Nor is 
he the sole and oi^y judidal interpreter of the law. 



125 



136 



QUESTION XXVIII. 

Whether or no wars raised by the estates and subjects for their own just defence 

against the king's bloody emissaries be lawful, . . . .139 

The state of the question. — If kings be absolute, a superior judge may punish an inferior judge, not 
as a judge but an erring man. — By divine institution all covenants to restrain their power must be 
unlawful. — Resistance in some cases lawful. — Six arguments for the lawfulness of defensive wars. 
— ^Many others follow. 

QUESTION XXIX. 

Whether, in the case of defensive wars, the distinction of the jjerson of the king as a 
man, who may and can commit hostile acts of tyranny agamst his subjects, and of 
the office and royal power that he hath from Grod and the people, can haye place, 143 

The king's person in eonoreto, and his ofElce in ahstraeto, or, which is all one, the king using his 
power lawfully to be distinguished (Rom. xiu). — To command unjustly maketh not a higher power. 
— The person may be resisted and yet the office cannot be resisted, proved by fourteen argu- 
ments. — Contrary objections of royalists and of the P. Prelate answered. — ^What we mean by the 
person and office in ahstraeto in this dispute; we do not exclude the person in eonereto altogether, 
but only the person as abusing his power; we may kUl a person as a man, and love him as a son, 
father, wife, according to Scripture. — ^We obey the king for the law, and not the law for the king. 
— The losing of habitual and actual royalty different.--John xix. 10, Pilate's power of crucifying 
Christ no law-power given to him of Giod, is proved against royalists, by six arguments. 

QUESTION XXX. 

Whether or no passive obedience be a mean to which we are subjected in conscience by 
virtue of a divine commandment ; and what a mean resistance is. That fiying is 
resistance, ......... 152 

The place, 1 Pet. ii. 18, discussed. — ^Patient bearing of injuries and resistance of injuries compatible 
in one and the same subject. — Christ's non-resistance hath many things rare and extraordinary, 



Paob 
and is no leading rnle to ns.— Suffering ii either eommanded to ns comparatiTely only, that we 
rather choose to suffer than deny the truth ; or the manner only is commanded, that we suffer 
with patience. — The physical act of taking away the life, or of offending when commanded by the 
law of self-defence, is no murder.— We haTS a greater dominion oyer gtwds and members, (except 
in case of mutilatioti, which is a little death,) than over our life. — To kill is not of the nature 
of self-defence, but accidental thereunto. — DefensiTe war cannot be without offending. — The na- 
ture of defensiTe and offenslTo wan^— Flying is resistanoe. 

QUESTION XXXL 

'Whether self-defence, by opponng violence to unjust violence, be lawful, by the law of 
God and nature, ........ 159 

Self-defence in man natural, but moclitf, the way, must be rational and just. — The method of self- 
defence. — ^Violent re-offending In self-defence the last remedy. — It is physically impossible for a 
nation to fly in the case of persecution for religion, and so they may resist in their own self-de- 
fence. — Tviela viUBprogrima and rwnoUi, — In a remote posture of self-defence, we are not to take 
us to re-offending, as DaTid was not to kiU Saul when he was sleeping, or ia. the ca^e, for the 
same cause.— DaTid would not kill Saul because he was the Lord's anointed. — The king not lord 
of chastity, name, conscience, and so may be resisted. — By universal and particular nature, self- 
defence lawful, proTcd by divers arguments. — ^And made good by the tosUmony of jurists. — The 
love of ourselves, the measure of the love of our neighbours, and enforceth self-defence. — Nature 
maketh a private man Us own judge and magistrate, when tiie magistrate is absent, and violence 
is offered to his life, as the law saith. — Self-defence, how lawful it is. — ^MThat presumption is from 
the king's carriage to the two kingdoms, are in law sufficient grounds of defensive wars. — Offen- 
sive and defensive wars differ in tiie event and intentions of men, but not in nature and specie, 
nor physically. — Bavid's case in not killing Saul nor his men, no rule to us, not in our lawful de- 
fence, to Idll tiie king's emissaries, the cases far different 

QXIESTION XXXII. 

Whether or no the lawfulness of defensive wars can be proved from the Scripture, 
from the examples of David, the people's rescuing Jonathan, Elisha, and the 
eighty valiant priests who resulted Uzziah, ..... 166 

David warrantably raised an army of men to defend himself against the unjust violence of his prince 
SauL — ^David's not invading Saul and his men, who did not aim at arbitrary government, at sub- 
version of laws, religion, and extirpation of those that worshipped the God of Israel and opposed 
idolatry, but on)y pursuing one single person, far unlike to our case in Scotland and England 
BOW. — ^David's example not extraordinary. — ^EUsha's resistance proveth defensive wars to be war- 
rantable. — ^Besistance made to Ung Uzziah by eighty valiant priests proveth the same. — The peo- 
ple's rescuing Jonathan proveth &e same.— liibnah's revolt proveth this. — The city of Abel de- 
fended themselves against Joab, Ung David's general, when he came to destroy a city for one 
wicked conspirator, Sheba's sake. 

QUESTION XXXIII. 

Whether or no Eom. xiii. 1 make any thing against the lawfulness of defensive wars, 172 
The king not only understood, Bom. ziiL— And the place, Rom. ziiL, discussed. 

QUESTION XXXIV. 

Whether royalists prove, by cogent reasons, the unlawfulness of defensive wars, 175 

Objections of royaUsts answered. — The place, Exod. xxii. 28, ** Thou shalt not revile the gods," &e. 
answered. — And Eccles. x. 20. — The place, Eccles. viii. 3, 4, *' Where the word of a king is," &c. 
answered. — The place. Job. xxxiv. 18, answered^ — ^And Acts xxiiL 3, ** God shall smite thee, thou 
whited wall," &c. — The emperors in Paul's time not absolute by their law. — That objection, that 
we have no practice for defensive resistance, and that the prophets never complain of the omis- 
sion of the resistance of princes, answered. — The prophets cry against the sin of non-resistance, 
when they cry against the judges, because they execute not judgment for the oppressed — Judah's 
subjection to Nebuchadnessar, a conquering tyrant, no warrant to ns to subject ourselves to ty- 
rannous acts. — Christ's subjection to Caesar nothing against defensive wars. 



xu 



CONTENTS. 



QUESTION XXXV. 



Paoe 



Whether the sufferings of the martyrs in the primitive church militant be against the 
lawiiihiess of delusive wars, ...... 182 

Tertnlliftn neither ours nor theirs in the question of defensiTO irars. 



QUESTION XXXVI. 



184 



Whether the king have the power of war only, ..... 

Inferior judges have the power of the svord no less than the king. — The people tyed to acts of cha> 
rity, and to defend themselyes, the church, and their posterity against a foreign enemy, though 
the king forbid. — Flying unlawful to the states of Scotland and England now, God's law tying 
them to defend their country.— Parliamentary power a fountain-power above the king. 

QUESTION XXXVII. 

Whether the estates of Scotland are to help their brethren, the protestants of England, 

against cavaliers, proved by argument 13, . . . . . 187 

Helping of neighbour nations lawful, diyers opinions concerning the point. — The law of Egypt 
a^inst those that helped not the oppressed. 



QUESTION XXXVIII. 



190 



Whether monarchy be the best of governments, .... 

Whether monarchy be the best of governments hath divers considerations, in which each one may 
be less or more convenient. — ^Absolute fnonarchy is the worst of governments. Better want 
power to do ill as have it. — ^A mixture sweetest of all governments — Neither king nor parliament 
have a voice against law and reason. 

QUESTION XXXIX. 

Whether or no any prerogative at all above the law be due to the king. Or if jura 

majestatis be any such prerogative, . . . . . .193 

A threefold supreme power. — ^What he jura regdUa, — ^Kings confer not honours from their pleni- 
tude of absolute power, but according to the strait line and rule of law, justice, and good observ- 
ing. — The law of the king, 1 Sam. viii. 9, 11. — ^Difference of kings and judges. — The law of the 
king, (1 Sam. vilL 9, 11,) no permissive law, such as the law of divorce.— What dominion the king 
hath over the goods of the subjects. 

QUESTION XL. 

Whether or no the people have any power over the king, either by his oath, covenant, 
or any other TOy/ . . . .. . -. .198 

The people have power over the king by reason of his covenant and promise. — Covenants and pro- 
mises violated, infer co-action, dejure, by law, though not de /octo.-r-Mutual punishments may be 
where there is no relation of superiority and inferiority. — Three covenants made by Arnisssus. — 
The king not king while he swear the oath and be accepted as king by the people. — The oath of the 
kings of France. — ^Hugo Grotius setteth down seven cases in which the people may accuse, punish, 
or dethrone the king. — The prince a noble vassal of the kingdom upon four grounds. — The cove- 
nant had an oath annexed to it. — The prince is but a private man in a contract. — ^How the royal 
power is immediately from God, and yet conferred upon the king by the people. 

QUESTION XLI. 

Whether doth the P. Prelate with reason ascribe to us doctrine of Jesuits in the 

question of lawful defence, ....... 204 

The sovereignty is originally and radically in the people, as in the fountain, was taught by fothers, 
ancient doctors, sound divines, lawyers, before there was a Jesuit or a prelate whelped, in rerum 



Paoi 
fuOura. — Tbtt P. Prelate holdeth the Pope to be the iricar of CbrUt.— JesnitB* tenets concernixig 
kings. — The king not the people's deputy by onr doctrine, it is only the oalnmny of the P. Pre- 
late. — The P. Prelate will ha^e power to act the bloodiest tyrannies on earth upon the chnrch of 
Christ, the essential power of a Ung. 

QUESTION XLIL 

Whether all Christian kings are dependent from Christy and may be called his vice- 
gerentSy •....••.. 210 

Why Qod, as €k>d, hath a man a Tieegerent under him, but not as mediator^ — The king not headof the 
church. — The king a sub-mediator, and an nnder-redeemer, and a sub-priest to oner sacrifices to 
God for us if he l^ a Tieegerent. — The king no mixed person. — Prelates deny kings to be subject 
to the gospel. — By no prerogatiTe royal may the king prescribe religious obseryances and human 
ceremonies in God's worship. — The P. Prelate gireth to the king a power arbitrary, supreme, and 
independent, to gOTcm the church. — ^Reciprocation of subjections of the king to the church, and of 
the church to the king, in diyers kinds, to wit, of ecclesiastical and dTU subjection, are no more 
absurd than for Aaron's priest to teach, instruct and rebuke Moses, if he turn a tyrannous Acl&ab, 
and Moses to punish Aaron if he turn an obstinate idolator. 

QUESTION XLIIL 

Whether the king of Scotland be an absolute prince, having a prerogative above laws 
and parliaments, ,«•••••• 216 

The king of Scotland subject to parliaments by the fundamental laws, acts, and constant practices 
of parliaments, ancient and late in Scotland.— The king of Scotland's oath at his coronation. — ^A 
pretended absolute power giren to James Y I. upon respect of personal endowments, no ground of 
absoluteness to the king of Scotland. — ^By laws and constant practices the kings of Scotland sub- 
ject to laws and parliaments, proved by tiie fundamental law of electiTe princes, and out of the 
most partial historians, and our acts of parliament of Scotland. — Corona^on oath. — ^And again at 
the coronation of James YI. that oath sworn ; and again, 1 Pari. James YI. ibid and seq^ — How 
the king is supreme judge in all causes. — The power of the parliaments of Scotland. — The Confes- 
sion of the ftdth of the church of Scotland, authorised by divers acts of parliament, doth ctI- 
dently hold forth to all the reformed churches the lawfulness of defensiYe wars, when the supreme 
magistrate is misled by wicked counsel. — The same proved from the confrasions of faith in other 
reformed churches. — The place, Bom. xiii., en>oned in our Confession of fsith. — The confession, 
not only Saxonic, exhibited to the Council of Trent, but also of Helvetia, France, England, Bohe- 
mia, prove the same. — ^William Laud and other prelates, enemies to parliaments, to states, and to 
the fundamental laws of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland. — The parliament 
of Scotland doth regulate, Umit, and set bounds to the king's power. — Fergus the first king not a 
conqueror. — The k&ig of Scotland below parliaments, con^derable by them, hath no negative 
voice. 



QUESTION XLIV. 

General results of the former doctrine in some few corollaries, in twenty-two ques- 
tions, ......... 227 

Concerning monarchy, compared with other forms — How royalty Is an issue of nature. — ^And how 
magistrates, as magistrates, be natural. — How absoluteness is not a ray of God's majesty. — ^And 
reidstance not unlawful, because Christ and his apostles used it not in some cases^^-Coronation is 
no ceremony. — ^Men may limit the power that they gave not. — The commonwealth not a pupil or 
minor properly. — Subjects not more obnoxious to a king than clients, vassals, children, to their 
superiors.^ — If subjection passive be natural. — ^Whether king Uzziah was dethroned. — Idiots and 
chUdren not complete kings, children are kings in destination only. — ^Denial of passive subjection 
in things unlawful, not dishonourable to the king, more than doiial of active obedience in the 
same things. — The king may not make away or sell any part of his dominions. — People may in 
some cases convene without the king. — ^How,and in what meaning subjects are to pay tiie king's 
debts. — Subsidies the kingdom's due, rather than the king's. — How the seas, ports, forts, castles, 
ndlitia, magwlne, are the king's, and how they are the kingdom's. 



SKETCH OF THE LIFE 



OF 



SAMUEL RUTHERFORD. 



l: 



The more prominent features of a man's public life are generally characterised by the 
spirit of the tunes in which he lived. If the period has been peaceM and undisturbed 
by party controversy and the disputes of opposing factions, then all iSows smoothly and 
quietly on ; the minds of the people repose unharassed and unexcited by public conten- 
tions and quarrels ; there is opportunity for the cultivation of the useful oris ; a taste is 
displayed in the pursuit of learning and literature^ and improvements and discoveries, in 
every branch of science and art, advance with rapid strides. Such a state of things men 
of civilized nations in general desire. Yet a pericMl like this, when there has been " peace 
in the land," looked back upon irom a succeeding age, or resA as a chapter of history, ap- 
pears tame and monotonous. There is nothing to arouse the attention or awaken the 
feelings, when the only record we have of a man is, that he lived, died, and was buried. 
But it is otherwise when the times have been the scene of anarchy, civil war, or persecu- 
tion. Then the calmness and repose of the community is broken up ; men are excited 
and roused by the spirit-stirring events that are passing around them ; each must take 
their side ; — ^it is then that their characters are drawn out and shown in a true light ; the 
weak, the timid and undecided, keep the back ground, while men of courage and daring 
stand forward in bold relief. 

There has been in the history of mankind, in all ages, two great contending principles 
at issue — ^the contest of error against truth, and the struggle of truth with error. On the 
one side— error, with the violence of oppression, doing aUthat persecution can accomplish, 
in endeavouring to exterminate virtue &om the moral universe ; and on the other — truth, 
with noble courage and exalted firmness, maintaining the purity of her principles in oppo- 
sition to ignorance and persecution. For upwards of four thousand years she has grap- 
pled with superstition, idolatry, and bigotry, and, with moral weapons, she has vindicated 
the justice of her principles, which her enemies have found easier to answer with the sword 
than by argument. In every age error has had the majority, for truth has bad few fol- 
lowers ; but, in the end, she has been triumphant even at the stake, or on the scaffold. 
Tet the faggot will bum with a fiercer flame, and the guillotine will be deeper dyed with 
the martyr's blood than it has ever yet been, ere the world assent to the truth of her doc- 
trines. On looking back, and reviewing the civil and religious history of our own land, 
we observe the mighty contest between Popery and the Reformed Doctrine — ^we see the 
fearful conflict of right and wrong — ^and we see truth, with a gigantic effort, burst the fet- 
ters which had so long held the people in mental bondage and ignorance. Again, we ob- 
serve the struggles between Presbytery and Episcopacy, during most of the mter half of 
the seventeentli century ; one party urged on by a spirit of opposition and bigotry, to 
trample on the religious rights and privileges of the people, and doing all in their power 
to bnng them again under the iron sway of the Church of Kome ; the other, with moral 



courage and firmness, standing boldly forward, in the front of persecution, tyranny, and 
oppression, for the cause and promotion of true religion ; and from the martyrdom of 
Hamilton, Scotland's first martyr, many a noble spirit has been immolated and set free, 
for the cause, and at the shrine of Truth ; — 

" Tet fev remember them. They liTed unknown 
Till persecution dragg'd them into fame. 
And chased them np to heayen." 

Samuel Rutherfokd was bom in the parish of Kisbet, in Itoxburghshire, in the year 
1600. Of the sphere in life occupied by his parents, we have no means of correctly ascer- 
taining. He is mentioned by Reid " to have been bom of respectable parents,"* and Wod- 
row states that he came of " mean, but honest parents." It is probable, however, that his 
father was engaged in agricultui^ pursuits ; at all events, he must have held a respectable 
rank in society, as he otherwise could not have given his son so superior an education. At 
an early period of his life he discovered a precocious talent, and nis parents consequently 
destined him for the ministry. 

In 1617 he was sent to Edinburgh, and entered the University as a student, where he 
appears to have excelled in the studies in which he was engaged, for, in four years, he 
took his degree of Master of Arts ; and in 1623, after a severe contest with three compe- 
titors, he was elected one of the Regents of the College. The acquirements he displayed 
at this early period were justly appreciated by his contemporaries. We are told that 
" the whole E^gents, out of their particular knowledge of Mr Samuel Rutherford, demon- 
strated to them [the Judges] his eminent abilities of mind and virtuous dispositions, 
wherewith the Judges, being satisfied, declared him successor in the Professor of Humani- 
ty."t He, however, only acted in the capacity of Regent about two years, and, on leaving 
his charge, he devoted himself to the study of Theology, imder Mr Andrew Ramsay. 

The Church of Scotland was at this period almost entirely under the jurisdiction of 
Episcopal bishops. The establishment of Episcopacy had been gradually going on since 
the accession of James to the throne of England, who lent all his aid and authority to the 
furtherance of that end. The Presbyterians who would not conform to the discipline of 
church government which had been obtmded upon them, were cruelly oppressed. Many 
were imprisoned, and their goods confiscated ; others were banished from their native 
land ; and not a few were dragged to the scaffold or the stake. At the death of King 
James, in 1625, his son Charles succeeded to the throne, and the people hoped that their 
grievances would now be listened to, and their wrongs redressed ; but they were disap- 
pointed. *' The &ther's madness," says Stevenson, '^ laid the foundation for his succes- 
sor's woes, and the son exactly followed the father's steps." | James held the principles 
of a royal prerogative, and required absolute and implicit obedience in too strict a manner. 
These he instilled into the mind of his son, and was, unhappily, too successM ; for, on 
Charles' succession, he carried out the same principles to a most intolerant degree, which 
was the cause of so much anarchy and confusion in the nation, and entailed upon himself 
those misfortunes which rendered his reign so unhappy, and his end so miserable. 

In 1627, Rutherford was licensed as a preacher of the Gospel, and through the influ- 
ence of John Grordon of Kenmure, (afterwards Viscount Kenmure,) appointea to a church 
in the parish of Anwoth, in Kirkcuabright. There is sufficient authority to show that he 
was not inducted by Episcopal ordination. Being firmly attached to the Presbyterian 
form of Grovemment from his youth, he manifested great dislike to Prelacy, and could 
never be induced to stoop to the authority of the bishops, which, at that time, was a very 
difficult matter to evade. We are told by Stevenson, that " imtil the beginning of the 
year 1628, some few preachers, by influence, were suffered to enter the ministry without 
conformity, and in this number we suppose Mr Rutherford may be reckoned, because 
he was ordained before the doors came to be more closely shut upon honest preachers." 
Other authorities might be quoted to the same effect. Here he discharged the duties of 

* Lires of the Westminster Divines. t Crawford's History of the University. 

J Stevenson's Church History, Vol. I. 



his BBcred calling with great dili^nce ; and, no doubt, with suooess. He was aocnstomed 
to rise so early as three o'clock m the morning, and devoted his whole time to the srori- 
toal wants of his flock and his own private rel^ous duties. His laboors were not confined 
to his own parishioners, many persons resorted to him from surrounding parishes. " He 
was," says Livingston, " a great strengthener of all the Christians in that country, who 
had been the fruits of the ministry of Mr John Welsh, the time he had been at Kirkeud- 
brkht." 

In 1630, Rutherford experienced a severe affliction by the death of his wife, after a 
painful and protracted illness of thirteen months, scarcely five years after their marriage. 
Her death seems to have been the source of much sorrow to mm, as he frequently takes 
notice of it in his letters with much feeling, long after his painfiil bereavement. To add 
to his distress, he was himself afflicted with a fever, which lasted upwards of three months, 
by which he was so much reduced, that it was long ere he was able to perform his sacred 
duties. 

John Gordon, Viscount Kenmure, who had long been the friend and patron of Ruther- 
ford, for whom he entertained the greatest respect and esteem, was in August 1634, seized 
with a disease which caused his death on September following, to the deep sorrow of 
Rutherford, who was with him at his last moments. Kenmure was a nobleman of an 
amiable and pious disposition ; and, as may be supposed, experienced much pleasure in 
his intercourse with Kutherford. To Lady Kenmure, Rutherford wrote many of his 
famous " Letters." 

About this time, the doctrines of Arminius began to spread to an alarming extent 
amongst the Episcopalians. His tenets were espoused by Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
and a&) by many of the Scottish prelates, headed by Maxwell, Bishop of Ross, as those 
only who held the same principles had any chance of preferment in the Church. Ruther- 
ford viewed the promulgation of these dangerous tenets with great anxiety, and did all in 
his power to controvert and oppose them. In 1636, appeared his learned treatise, en- 
titled, '* JExercitationes Apologeticce pro Divina Gratia^ which was dedicated to Vis- 
count Kenmure, but was not published till eighteen months after his death. This work 
gave great offence to the government : he was in consequence summoned to appear before 
a Hi^ Commission Court, which had been constituted by Thomas Sydseri^ Bishop of 
Galloway, a man of Arminian principles, which met at Wigton in June (1636), and there 
deprived of his office. Sydseni, who had imbibed an inveterate hatred against him, was 
not satisfied with this, but had him again summoned before the High Commission Court at 
Edinburgh, which met in July followmg, and he was there accused " of non-conformity, 
for preadiing against the Perth Articles, and for writing a book, entitled, Exerdtatumedi 
ApohgiticcB pro Divina Grcntiay which they alleged did reflect upon the Church of Scot- 
land ; but the truth was, the arguments in that book did cut the sinews of Arminianism, 
and galled the Episcopal clergy to the quick, and therefore Bishop Lydserff could no 
longer abide him." Here many other false, frivolous, and extravagant charges were 
brought against him, but being firm in his innocence, he repelled them all. Lord Lorn 
(bromer to Lady Kenmure), and many others, endeavoured to befriend him ; but such was 
the malevolence of Sydserff, that he swore an oath, if they did not agree to his wishes, he 
would write to the king. After three days' trial, sentence was passed upon him, that he 
be deprived of his pastoral office, and discharged from preaching in any part of Scotland, 
under pain of rebellion, and to be confined ^fore the 20th oi August 1636, within the 
town of Aberdeen during the king's pleasure. This sentence he obeyed, but severe and 
unjust as it was, it did not discourage him, for in one of his letters, he says, '* I go to my 
ki^'s palace at Aberdeen ; tongue, pen, nor wit, cannot express my joy." 

Burmg his confinement in Aberdeen, he wrote many oi his well-lmown '* Letters," 
which have been so popular. Lideed, there are few cottage libraries in Scotland in which 
they do not find a place among the scanty but select collection. Episcopacy and Arminian- 
ism at this time held the sole sway in Aberdeen, and it was with no gracious feeling that 
the learned doctors beheld the arrival of Rutherford. They had all imbibed the principles 
of their great patron, Laud, and manifested great hostility to Fresbyterianism, which was 
the principal cause of his being sent to that town. He met at first with a cold reception, 
and nis opponents did all in their power to operate on the minds of the people against him. 



>!■-*■ 



XYUl SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 



1 



He says himself, that " the people thought him a strange man, and his cause not good." 
His innocencj, however, and the truth of his cause, began at last to be known, and his 
popularity was spreading daily ; — ^which so much alarmed the doctors, that they wished he 
might be banished from the kingdom. They entered into several disputations with him, 
but he appears to have proved himself a match for them. " I am here troubled," says he, 
'^ with tne disputes of the great doctors, (especially with Dr Barron, on ceremonial and 
Arminian controversies — for all are corrupt here,) but, I thank Grod, with no detriment to 
the truth, or discredit to my profession." 

About this period, great confusion and commotion reigned in Scotland. It had long 
been the wish of King Charles to introduce the Church of England Service-book and 
Canons into the worship of the Presbyterians of Scotland. He accordingly, in April 1636, 
with ai-judged poUc7, commenced arrangements for its accomplishment, and cave com- 
mands to Archbishop Laud, Bishops Juxon and Wren, to compile a liturgy for the special 
use of the Church of Scotland. Consequently, one was soon framed, which was nearly similar 
to that used in the Church of England, excepting a few alterations ; and, wherever these 
occurred, the language was almost synonimous with the Eoman Missal. In 1637, a pro- 
clamation was issued, commanding the people's strict observance of this new form of 
worship, and a day was accordingly fixed for its introduction into Edinburgh, — on which 
it was presumed that compliance would follow throughout all the land. The feeUngs of 
the people, as may be supposed, were roused to a high pitch; — they stood boldly forward in 
opposition to such a tyrannical encroachment on their religious liberty, and manifested 
such a firm and determined spirit of resistance, that Charles soon began to see, when too 
late, that he had drawn the reins too tight. They would accept of no measure short 
of an entirely fi:ee and unfettered Presbyterian form of worship, and a chain of events 
followed which led to a renewal of the National Covenant and the abohtion of 
Episcopacy. 

During these tumults, Rutherford ventured to leave the place of his, confinement in 
Aberdeen, and returned to his parishioners in Anwoth about February 1638, after an 
absence of more than eighteen months. They did not, however, long enjoy his ministra- 
tions, as we find him, in the same year, actively engaged in Glasgow in forwarding the 
great covenanted work of reformation. Rutherford was deputed one of the commissioners 
from the Presbytery of Kirkcudbright to the famous General Assembly of 1638, which was 
convened at Glasgow on the 21st ol November. He was called upon to give an account of 
the accusations which had been preferred against him by the high commission court. 
After deliberation, a sentence was passed in his favour, and he, along with some others who 
were in the same circumstances, were recognised as members of the Assembly. Soon 
after this, an application was made to the Assembly's commission to have him trans- 
ferred to Glasgow, and another by the University of St. Andrews, that he might be elected 
professor of divinity in the New College there. The commission appointed him to the 
professorship in St. Andrews, as his learning and talents fiilly qusdified him for that 
important situation. He manifested, however, great reluctance to leave Anwoth, and 
pleaded, in a petition, his " bodily weakness and mental incapacity." There were several 
other petitions presented from the county of Galloway against his leaving Anwoth, but to 
no eifect ; the Court sustained his appointment. In October 1639, he removed to the 
scene of his future labours, and was appointed colleague to Mr Robert Blair, one of the 
ministers of St. Andrews. 

Rutherford was nominated one of the commissioners to the General Assembly of divines 
held at Westminster in 1643. His colleagues were — Alexander Henderson, Robert 
Baillie, George Gillespie, and Robert Doug£s, ministers ; — ^the Earl of Cassilis, Lord 
Maitland, (afterwards Ihike of Lauderdale^ and Sir Archibald Johnston, of Warriston, 
elders. He took a prominent part in all the discussions in that famous council, and pub- 
lished several works of a controversial and practical nature. About this time, he wrote 
liis celebrated work entitled Lex Hex, in answer to a treatise by John Maxwell, the 
excommunicated Bishop of Ross, entitled " Sacro-Sancta Begum Majestas, or the sacred 
and royal prerogative of Christian kings, wherein soveraigntie is, by Holy Scripture, reve- 
rend antiquitie, and sound reason asserted," 4to., Oxford, 1644. This work endeavours to 
prove, that the royal prerogative of kingly authority is derived alone from God ; and it 



SAMUEL RUTHERFORD. XIX 



demandB an absolute and passive obedience of the sabject to the will of the sovereign. The 
arguments in Lex Rex completely refute all the wild and absurd notions which Maxwell*8 
work contains, although some of the sentiments would be thought rather democratical 
in modem times. The author displays an intimate knowledge of the classics and the writings 
of the ancient fathers and schoolmen. The work caused great sensation on its appearance. 
Bishop Guthrie mentions, that every member of the assembly *' had in his hand that book 
lately published by Mr Samuel Rutherford, which was so idolized, that whereas Buchanan's 
treatise {de jure Regni apud Scotos) was looked upon as an oracle, this coming forth, it 
was slighted as not anti-monarchical enough, and Kutherford's Lex Rex only thought 
authentic." 

Rutherford, who was anxious to return to Scotland, on account of bad health, had made 
an application to the Assembly for permission to leave ; but it was not granted till their 
business was finished, as his services were very valuable to them ; and it was not till 1647 
that he was permitted to revisit his native land. On his return to Scotland, he resumed 
his labours in St. Andrews, and was in December of the same year appointed Principal of 
the New College, in room of Dr Howie, who had resigned on account of old age. In 
1651 he was elected Rector of the University, and was now placed in situations of the 
hid^est eminence to which a clergyman of the Church of Scotland can be raised. The fame 
of Rutherford as a scholar and divine, had now spread both at home and abroad. In the 
Assembly of 1649, a motion was made, that he would be removed to Edinburgh as Pro- 
fessor of Divinity in the University ; and about the same time he received a special invita- 
tion to occupy the chair of Divinity and Hebrew in the University of Harderwyck ; and 
also another from the University of Utrecht, both of which he respectfully declined. He 
had too much regard for the interests of the Church of Scotland to leave the kingdom, 
considering the critical position in which it was at that time placed. 

During the period which followed the death of Charles I. to the restoration, Rutherford 
took an active part in the struggles of the church in asserting her rights. Cromwell had 
in the meantime usurped the throne, and independency held the sway in England. On 
the death of Cromwell in 1658, measures were taken for the restoration of Charles 
II. to the throne. The Scottish Parliament met in 1651, when the national covenant 
was recalled — Presbyterianism abolished — and all the decrees of Parliament, since 1638, 
which sanctioned the Presbyterian system, were rescinded. The rights of the people were 
thus torn from them — ^their liberties trampled upon — and the whole period which follow- 
ed, till the martyrdom of Renwick in 1688, was a scene of intolerant persecution and 
bloodshed. Rutherford, as may be supposed, did not escape persecution in such a state 
of things. His work, Lex, Rex, was considered by the government as " inveighing against 
monarchie and laying ground for rebellion;" and ordered to be burned by the hand of the 
common hangman at Edinburgh. It met with similar treatment at St Andrews, and also 
at London ; and a proclamation was issued, that every person in poss3ssion of a copy, who 
did not deliver it up to the king's solicitor, should be treated as an enemy to the govern- 
ment. Rutherford himself was deprived of his offices both in the University and the 
Church, and his stipend confiscated ; he was ordered to confine himself within his own 
house, and was summoned to appear before the Parliament at Edinburgh, to answer a 
charge of high treason. It may be easily imagined what his fate would have been had 
he lived to obey the mandate ; but ere the time arrived he was summoned to a far higher 
than an earthly tribunal. Not having a strong constitution, and being possessed of an ac- 
tive mind, he had evidently overworked himself in the share he took in the struggles and 
controversies of the time. Although not an old man, his health had been gradually de- 
cHning for several years. His approaching dissolution he viewed with Christian calmness 
and fortitude. A few weeks before his death, he gave ample evidence of his faith and 
hope in the Gospel, by the Testimony which he left behind nim.* On his death-bed he 
was cheered by the consolations of several Christian friends, and on the 20th of March 
1661, in the sixty-first year of his age, he breathed his last, in the full assui*ance and hope 
of eternal life. His last words were, ** Glory, glory, dwelleth in Emmanuel's land." 



* A Testimony left by Mr Samuel Rutherford to the Work of Reformation in Qreat Britain and Ireland, 
before hUi death, 8to. 



■J., .tf. 



On April 28th, 1842, the foundation-stone of a colossal monument, called the " Ruther- 
furd Monument," was laid to his memory ; it is erected on the ferm of Boreland, in the 
parish of Anwolli, about half-a-mile from where he used to preach. The monument is of 
granite ; height, from the surface to the apex, sixty feet ; square of the pedestal, seven 
leet, with throe rows of steps. 

Of the character of Butherford — ^as to his talents and piety, nothing need be here said. 
AU who know his writings, will be at a loss whether most to admire his learning and depth 
of reasoning, or his Ghnstian graces. We give the following list of his wo^, which is 
appended to a memoir* by a talented gentleman of this city ; a work compiled with great 
research and discrimination, and which will amply repay a perusal by all who feel an inte- 
rest in the remembrance of an individual so mstinguished for learning, uprightness, and 
piety, as was Samuel Rutherfobd. — Exerdtationes ApologeticcB pro JDxwmx, Crratia : 
Amst., 12mo., 1636. A Pecuseable and Temperate Plea for PauVs Preshyterie in Scot- 
land : Lend., 4to., 1642. A Sermon preached to the Honourable House of Commons^ 
JantMry 31, 1643. Daniel vi. 26 ; Lond., 4to., 1644. A Sermon preached h^ore the 
Honourable House of Lords ^ the 26th day of June 1645. Luke vii. 22 — 25. mark iv. 
88 — 40. Matt. viii. 26 .• Lond., 4to., 1646. Lex^ Rex ; or the Law and the Prince ; a 
discourse for the just prerogative of king and people : Lond., 4to., 1644. The Due 
Right of Presbyteries, or a 'Peaceable Plea for the government of the Church of Scot- 
land : Lond., 4to., 1644. The Tryal and Triumph of Faith : Lond., 4to., 1645. The 
Divine Right of Church Govenmient and Excommunication : Lond., 4to., 1646. Christ 
Dying and Drawing to Himself: Lond., 4to., 1647. A Survey of the Spiritual Anti- 
christ , opening the secrets of Familisme and Antinomianisme : Lond., 1648. A Free 
Disputation against Pretended Liberty of Conscience : Lond., 4to, 1649. The Last arid . 
Heavenly Speeches^ and Glorious Departure of John Grordoun, Viscount Kenmuir : 
Edin., 4to., 1649. Disputatio Scholastiea de iHvina Providentia : Edin., 4to, 1651. 
The Covenant of Life opened: Edin., 4to., 1655. A Survey of the Survey of that 
Summe of Church Discipline penned by Mr Thomas Hooker : Lond., 4to., 1658. Influ- 
ences of the Life of Chrace : Lond., 4to., 1659. Joshua Redivimts, or Mr Rutherford^s 
Letters, in three parts : 12mo., 1664. Examen Arminianismi, conscriptum et discipulis 
dictatum a doetissimo clarissimoque viro, D. Samuele Rhetorforte, SS, TheoL in Aea- 
demia Scotiae Sanetandreana Doctore et Professore: Ultraj., 12mo., 1668. 

* Life of Samnel Kntherford, by Thomas Murray, L.L.I). Edin., 1827. 



THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 



Who donbteth (Christian Reader^ but innocency 
must be under the courtesy and mercy of malice, 
and tliat it is a real martyrdom to be brought under 
the lawless inquisition of the bloody tongue. Christ, 
the prophets, and apostles of our Lord, -vent to 
heayen with the note of traitors, seditious men, and 
such as turned the world upside down : calumnies 
of treason to Csssar were an ingredient in Christ's 
cup, and therefore the author is the more willing to 
drink of that cup that touched his lip, who is our 
glorious Forerunner: what, if conscience toward 
God, and credit with men, cannot both go to heaTen 
with the saints, the author is satisfied with the for- 
mer companion, and is willing to dismiss the other. 
Truth to Christ cannot be treason to Caesar, and for 
his choice he judgeth truth to have a nearer relation 
to Christ Jesus, than the transcendent and bound- 
less power of a mortal prince. 

He considered that popery and defection had made 
a large step in Britain, and that arbitrary govem- 
ment had over-swelled all banks of law, that it was 
now at the highest float, and that this sea approach- 
ing the farthest border of fancied absoluteness, was 
at the score of ebbing : and the naked truth is, pre- 
lates, a wild and pushing cattle to the lambs and 
flock of Christ, had made a hideous noise, the wheels 
of their chariot did run an equal pace with the 
blood-thirsty mind of the daughter of Babel. Pre- 
lacy, the daughter planted in her mother's blood, 
must verify that word, As is the mother, so is the 
daughter : why, but do not the prelates now suffer ? 
True, but their sufferings are not of blood, or kin- 
dred, to the calamities of these of whom Lactantius 
saith, (1. 6, e. 19,) qwun honetta vohmtaU miseri 
trant. The causes of their suffering are, 1. Hope 
of gain and glory, steering their hehn to a shore 
they much affect ; even to a church of gold, of pur- 
ple, yet really of clay and earth. 2. The lie is more 
active npon the spirits of men, not because of its 
own weidcness, but because men are more passive in 
receiving the impressions of error than truth ; and 
opinions lying in the world's &t womb, or of a con- 
quering nature, whatever notions side with the 
world, to prelates and men of their make are very 
efficacious. 

There is another cause of the sickness of our 
time, God plagued heresy to beget Atheism and se- 
curity, as atheism and security had begotten heresy, 
even as clouds through reciprocation of causes en- 
gender nun, rain begat vapours, vapours clouds, and 
clouds rain, so do sins overspread our sad times in a 
drcnlar generation. 

And now judgment presseth the kingdoms, and 
of afl the heaviest judgments the sword, and of 
swords the civil sword, threateneth vastation, yet 



not, I hope, like the Roman civil sword, of which it 
was said, 

Bella geri placuit nullos habitura triumphos. 

I hope this war shall be Christ's triumph, Baby- 
lon's ruin. 

That which moved the author, was not (as my ex- 
communicate adversary, like a Thraso, saith) the 
escapes of some pens, which necessitated him to 
write, for many before me hath learnedly trodden in 
this path, but that I might add a new testimony to 
the times. 

I have not time to examine the P. Prelate's pre- 
face, only, I give a taste of his gall in this preface, 
and of a virulent piece, of his agnosco stylwn et ge- 
nitun Thr€uoniSy in which he laboureth to prove how 
inconsistent presbyterial government is with mon- 
archy, or any other government. 

1. He denieth that the crown and sceptre is under 
any co-active power of pope or presbytery, or cen- 
surable, or dethroneable ; to which we say, presby- 
teries profess that kings are under the co-active 
power of Christ's keys of discipline, and that pro- 
phets and pastors, as ambassadors of Christ, have 
the keys of the kingdom of God, to open and let in 
believing princes, and also to shut them out, if they 
rebel against Christ; the law of Christ excepteth 
none, (Mat. xvi. 19; xviii. 16, 16; 2 Cor. x. 6; Jer. 
i. 9,) if the king's sins may be remitted in a ministe- 
rial way, (as Job xx. 23, 24,) as prelates and their 
priests absolve kings ; we think they may be bound 
by the hand that loosed; presbyteries never de- 
throned kings, never usurped that power. Your 
fother, P. Prelate, hath dethroned many kings ; I 
mean the Pope, whose power, by your own confes- 
sion, (c. 6, p. 58,) differeth from yours by divine 
right only in extent. 

2. When sacred hierarchy, the order instituted by 
Christ, is overthrown, what is the condition of 
sovereignty ? — Ant, — Surer than before, when pre- 
lates deposed kings. 2. I fear Christ shall never 
own this order. 

3. The mitre cannot suffer, and the diadem be 
secured. — Ana, — Have kings no pillars to their 
thrones but antichristian prelates. Prelates have 
trampled diadem and sceptre under their feet, as 
histories teach us. 

4. Do they not (puritans) magisterially determine 
that kings are not of God's creation by authorita- 
tive commission ; but only by permission, extorted 
by importunity, and way given, that they may be a 
scourge to a sinful people? — Am. — ^Any unclean 
spirit from hell, could not speak a blacker lie ; we 
hold that the king, by ofl&ce, is the church's nurse 
father, a sacred ordinance, the deputed power of 



MMH. 



xxii 



PREFACE. 



God ; but by the Prelate's way, all inferior judges, 
and God's deputies on earth, who are also our fathers 
in the fifth commandment style, are to be obeyed by 
no diyine law ; the king, misled by p. prelates, shall 
forbid to obey them, who is in downright truth, a 
mortal ciTil pope, may loose and liberate subjects 
from the tie of a divine law. 

6. His iuTeighing against ruling elders, and the 
rooting out of antichristian prelacy, without any 
word of Scripture on the contrary, I pass as the 
extravagancy of a malcontent, because he is de- 
servedly excommunicated for perjury, popery, So- 
cinianism, tyranny over men's conscience, and invad- 
ing places of civil dignity, and deserting his calling, 
and the camp of Christ, &c. 

6. None were of old anointed but kings, priests, 
and prophets ; who, then, more obliged, to maintain 
the Lord's anointed, than priests and prophets? 
The church hath never more beauty and plenty un- 
der any government than monarchy, which is most 
countenanced by God, and magnified by Scripture. 
— An$, Pastors are to maintain the rights of peo- 
ple, and a true church, no less than the right of 
kings ; but prelates, the court parasites, and crea- 
tures of the king, that are born for the glory of 
their king, can do no less than profess this in words, 
yet it is true that Tacitus writeth of such, (Hist. 1. 
1,) Libentitis cum fortuna principia, quam cumprin- 
eipe loquuntvr : and it is true, that the church hath 
had plenty under kings, not so much, because they 
were kings, as because they were godly and zealous : 
except the P. P. say, that the oppressing kings of 
Israel and Judah, and the bloody horns that made 
war with the lamb, are not kings. In the rest of 
the epistle he extols the Marquis of Ormond with 
base flattery, from his loyalty to the king, and 
his more than admirable prudence in the treaty 
of cessation with the rebels ; a woe is due to this 
false prophet, ^ho calleth darkness light, for the 
former was abominable and perfidious apostacy from 
the Lord's cause and people of God, whom he once 
defended, and the cessation was a selling of the 
blood of many hundred thousand protestants, men, 
women, and sucking children. 

This cursed P. hath written of late a treatise 
against the presbyterial government of Scotland, in 
which there is a bundle of lies, hellish calumnies, 
and gross errors. 

1. The first lie is, that we have lay elders, where- 
as, they are such as rule, but labour not in the word 
and doctrine (1 Tim. v. 7, p. 8). 

2. The second lie, that deacons, who only attend 
tables, are joint rulers with pastors (p. 3). 

3. That we never, or little use the lesser excom- 
munication, that is, debarring from the Lord's Sup- 
per (p. 4;. 

4. That any church judicature in Scotland exact- 
eth pecuniary mulcts, and threaten excommunica- 
tion to the non-payers, and refuseth to accept the 
repentance of any who are not able to pay : the 
civil magistrate only fineth for drunkenness, and 
adultery, blaspheming of God, which are frequent 
sins in prelates. 

6, A calumny it is to say that ruling elders are 
of equal authority to preach the woid as pastors 
(p. 7). 

6. That laymen are members of presbyteries or 
general assemblies. Buchanan and Mr Melvin were 
doctors of divinity ; and could have taught such an 
ass as John Maxwell. 

7. That expectants are intruders upon the sacred 
function, because, as sons of the prophets, they exer- 
cise their gifts for trial in preaching. 

8. That the presbytery of Edinburgh hath a super- 
intending power, because they communicate the af- 
fairs of the church, and write to the churches, what 



they hear prelates and hell devise against Christ and 
his church. 

9. That the king must submit his sceptre to the 
presbytery; the king's scepti*e is his royal office, 
which is not subject to any judicature, no more than 
any lawful ordinance of Christ ; but if the king, as a 
man, blaspheme God, murder the innocent, advance 
belly-gods, (such as our prelates, for the most part, 
were,) above the Lord's inheritance, the ministers of 
Christ are to say, " The king troubleth Israel, and 
they have the keys to open and shut heaven to, and 
upon the king, if he can offend." 

10. That king James said, a Scottish presbytery 
and a monarchy agreeth as well as God and the 
devil, is true, but king James meant of a wicked 
king ; else he spake as a man. 

11. That the presbytery, out of pride, refused to 
ans\^er king James's honourable messengers, is a 
lie ; they could not, in business of high concern- 
ment, return a present answer to a prince, seeking 
still to abolish presbyteries. 

12. Its a lie, that all sins, even all civil business, 
come under the cognizance of the church, for only 
sins, as publicly scandalous, fall under their power. 
(Matt, xviii. 16—17, &c. ; 2 Thess. iii. 11 ; 1 Tim. v. 
20.) It is a calumny that they search out secret 
crimes, or that they ever disgraced the innocent, or 
divided families ; where there be flagrant scandals, 
and pregnant suspicions, of scandalous crimes, 
they search out these, as the incest of Spotswood, 
P. Prelate of St Andrews, with his own daughter ; 
the adulteries of Whiteford, P. Prelate of Brichen, 
whose bastard came weeping to the assembly of 
Glasgow in the arms of the prostitute : these they 
searched out, but not with the damnable oath, ex 
OjfficiOf that the high commission put upon inno- 
cents, to cause them accuse themselves against the 
law of nature. > 

13. The presbytery hinder not lawful merchandise; 
scandalous exhortation, unjust suits of law, they may 
forbid ; and so doth the Scripture, as scandalous to 
Christians, 2 Cor. vi. 

14. They repeal no civil laws ; they preach against 
unjust and grievous laws, as, Isaiah (x. 1) doth, and 
censure the violation of God's holy day, which pre- 
lates profaned. 

15. We know no parochial popes, we turn out no 
holy ministers, but only dumb dogs, non-residents, 
scandalous, wretched, and apostate prelates. 

16. Our moderator hath no dominion, the P. Pre- 
late absolveth him, while he saith, " All is done in 
our church by common consent" (p. 7). 

17. It is true, we have no popish consecration, 
such as P. Prelate contendeth for in the mass, but 
we have such as Christ and his apostles used, in con- 
secrating the elements. 

18. If any sell the patrimony of the church, the 
presbytery censures him ; if any take buds of malt, 
meal, beef, it is no law with us, no more than the 
bishop's five hundred marks, or a year's stipend 
that the entrant gave to the Lord Bishop for a 
church. And whoever took buds in these days, (ai 
king James by the earl of Dunbar, did buy episco- 
pacy at a pretended assembly, by foul budding,) 
they were either men for the episcopal way, or per- 
fidiously against their oath became bishops, all per- 
sonal faults of this kind imputed to presbyteries, 
agree to them under the reduplication of episcopal 
men. 

19. The leading men that covered the sins of the 
dying man, and bo lost his soul, were episcopal 
men ; and though some men were presbyterians, 
the faults of men cannot prejudice the truth of 
God; but the prelates always cry out against the 
rigour of presbyteries in censuring scandals ; because 
they themselves do ill, they hate the light ; now here 



• r "^ 



PREFACE. 



XXIU 



the Prelate condemneih tliem of remlMneis in dis- 
cipline. 

20. Satan, a liar from the beginning, saith, The 
presbytery was a seminary and nursery of fiends, 
contentions, and bloods, because they ezcommuni- 
cated murderers against king James' will ; which is 
all one to say, prophecying is a nurse of bloods, 
because the prophets cryed out against king Achab, 
and the munierers of innocent Naboth : the men of 
God must be either on the one side or the other, 
or then preach against reciprocation of injuries. 

2L It is false that presbyteries usurp both 
Bwords ; because they censure sins, which the civil 
magistrate should censure and punish. Elias might 
be said then to mix himself with the ciyil business 
of the kingdom, because be prophecied against ido- 
laters' killing of the Lord's prophets ; which crime 
the civil magistrate was to punish. But the truth 
is, the assembly of Glasgow, 1637, condemned the 
prelates, because they, being pastors, would be also 
lords of parliament, of session, of secret council, of 
exchequer, judges, barons, and in their lawless high 
commission, would fine, imprison, and use the 
svord. 

22. It is his ignorance that he saith, a provincial 
synod is an associate body chosen out of all judi- 
cial presbyteries ; for all pastors and doctors, with- 
out delegation, by virtue of their place and office, 
repair to the provincial synods, and without any 
choice at all, consult and voice there. 

23. It is a lie that some leading men rule all 
here; indeed, episcopal men made factions to rent 
the synods ; and though men abuse their power to 
factions, this cannot prove that presbyteries are in- 
consistent with monaixby ; for then the Prelate, the 
monarch of his diocesan rout, should be anti-mo- 
narchical in a higher manner, for he ruleth all at his 
vilK 

24. The prime men, as Mr R. Bruce, the faithful 
servant of Christ, was honoured and attended by all, 
because of his suffering, zeal, holiness, his fruitful 
ministry in gaining many thousand souls to Christ. 
So, though king James cast him off, and did swear, 
by 6od*s name, he intended to be king, (the Prelate 
maketh blasphemy a virtue in the king,) yet king 
James swore he could not find an honest minister in 
Scotland to be a bishop, and therefore he was neces- 
sitated to promote false knaves ; but he said some- 
times, and wrote it under his hand, that Mr R. Bruce 
was worthy of the half of his kingdom ; but will this 
prove presbyteries inconsistent with monarchies ? 
I should rather think that knave bishops, by king 
James' judgment, were inconsistent with monarchies. 

25. His lies of Mr R. Bruce, excerpted out of the 
lying manuscripts of apostate Spotswood, in that 
he would not but preach against the king's recalling 
from exile some bloody popish lords to undo all, are 
nothing comparable to the incests, adulteries, blas- 
phemies, perjuries. Sabbath-breaches, drunkenness, 
profanity, &c., committed by prelates before the sun. 

26. Our General Assemby is no other than Christ's 
court, (Acts XV.) made up of pastors, doctors, and 
brethren, or elders. 

27. They ought to have no negative vote to impede 
the conclusions of Christ in his servants. 

28. It is a lie that the king hath no power to ap- 
point time and place for the General Assembly ; but 
his power is not privative to destroy the free courts 
of Christ, but accumulative to aid and assist them. 

29. It is a lie that our General Assembly may re- 
peal laws ; command and expect performance of the 
king, or then excommunicate, subject to them, force 
and compel king, judges, and all, to submit to them. 
They may not force the conscience of the poorest 
beggar, nor is any Assembly infallible, nor can it lay 
bounds upon the souls of judges, which they are to 



obey with blind obedience — ^their power is ministe- 
rial, subordinate to Christ's law ; and what civil lawB 
parliaments make against God's word, they may 
authoritatively declare them to be unlawful, as 
though the emperor (Acts xv.^ had commanded for- 
nication and eating of blood. Might not the Assem- 
bly forbid these in the synod ? I conceive the pre- 
lates, if they had power, would repeal the act of par- 
liament made, anno 1641, in Scotland, by his majesty 
personally present, and the three estates concerning 
the annulling of these acts of parliament and laws 
which estabUshed bishops in Scotland; therefore 
bishops set themselves as independent monarchs 
above kings and laws ; and what they damn in pres- 
byteries and assemblies, that they practise them- 
selves. 

30. Commissioners from burghs, and two from 
Edinburgh, because of the largeness of that church, 
not for cathedral supereminence, sit in la^semblies, 
not as sent from burghs, but as sent and' authorised 
by the church session of the burgh, and so they sit 
there in a church capacity. 

31. Doctors both in academies and in parishes, 
we desire, and our book of discipline holdeth forth 
such. 

32. They hold, (I believe with warrant of God's 
word,) if the king refuse to reform religion, the in- 
ferior judges, and assembly of godly pastors, and 
other church-officers may reform ; if the king will 
not kiss the Son, and do his duty in purging the 
House of the Lord, may not Eliah and the people 
do their duty, and cast out Baal's priests. Refor- 
mation of religion is a personal act that belongeth 
to all, even to any one private person according to 
his place. 

33. They may swear a covenant without the king, 
if he refuse ; and build the Lord's house (2 Chron. 
XV. 9) themselves ; and relieve and defend one an- 
other, when they are oppressed. For my acts and 
duties of defending myself and the oppressed, do not 
tye my conscience conditionally, so the king con- 
sent, but absolutely, as all duties of the law of na- 
ture do. (Jer. xxii. 3 ; Prov. xxiv. 11 ; Isa. Iviii. 6 ; 
i. 17.) 

34. The P. Prelate condemneth our reformation, 
because it was done against the will of our popish 
queen. This showeth what estimation he hath of 
popery, and how he abhorreth protestant religion. 

36. They deposed the queen for her tyranny, but 
crowned her son; all this is vindicated in the fol- 
lowing treatise. 

36. The killing of the monstrous and prodigious 
wicked cardinal in the Castle of St Andrews, and 
the violence done to the prelates, who against all 
law of God and man, obtruded a mass service upon 
their own private motion, in Edinburgh anno 1637, 
can conclude nothing against presbytcrial govern- 
ment except our doctrine commend these acts as 
lawful. 

37. What was preached by the servant of Christ, 
whom (p. 46) he calleth the Scottish Pope, is 
printed, and the P. Prelate durst not, could not, 
cite any thing thereof as popish or unsound, he 
knoweth that the man whom he so slandereth, 
knocked down the Pope and the prelates. 

38. The making away the fat abbacies and bishop- 
rics is a bloody heresy to the earthly-minded Prelate ; 
the Confession of Faith commended by all the pro- 
testant churches, as a strong bar against popery, 
and the book of discipline, in which the servants of 
God laboured twenty years with fasting and pray- 
ing, and frequent advice and counsel from the whole 
reformed churches, are to the P. Prelate a nega- 
tive faith and devout imaginations; it is a lie that 
episcopacy, by both sides, was ever agreed on by law 
in Scotland. 



i<^A 



%. 



XXIV 



PBSFACE. 



39. And it vaa a heresy that Mr MelTin taught, 
that presbyter and bishop are one function in Scrip- 
ture, and that abbots and priors were not in God's 
books, die t^ legit; and is this a proof of incon- 
sistency of presbyteries with a monarchy ? 

40. It is a heresy to the P. Prelate that the 
church appoint a fast, when king James appointed 
an unseasonable feast, when God's wrath was upon 
the land, contrary to God's word (Isa. xxii. 12 — ^14) ; 
and what ! will this prove presbyteries to be incon- 
sistent with monarchies ? 

41. This Assembly is to judge what doctrine is 
treasonable. What then ? Surely the secret coun- 
cil and king, in a constitute church, is not synodi- 
cally to determine what is true or false doctrine, 
more than the Roman emperor could make the 
church canon, Acts xt. 

42 Mr Gibson, Mr Black, preached against king 
James' niaintaining the tyranny of bishops, his 
sympathizing with papists, and other crying sins, 
and were absolved in a general Assembly ; sba^ this 
make presbyteries inconsistent with monarchy ? Nay, 
but it proveth only that they are inconsistent with 
the wickedness of some monarchies ; and that pre- 
lates have been like the four hundred false prophets 
that flattered king Achab, and those men that 
preached against the sins of the king and court, by 
prelates in both kingdoms, have been imprisoned, 
banished, their noses ript, their cheeks burnt, their 
ears cut. 

43. The godly men that kept the Assembly of 
Aberdeen, anno 1603, did stand for Christ's Prero- 
gative, when king James took away all General As- 
semblies, as the event proved ; and the king may, 
with as good warrant, inhibit all Assemblies for 
word and sacrament, as for church discipline. 

44. They excommunicate not for light faults and 
trifles, as the liar saith : our discipline saith the 
contrary. 

45. This assembly never took on them to choose 
the king's counsellors ; but those who were in au- 
thority took king James, when he was a child, out 
of the company of a corrupt and seducing papist. 



Esme Duke of Lennox, whom the P. Prelate nam- 
eth noble, worthy, of eminent endowments. 

46. It is true Glasgow Assembly, 1637, voted 
down the high commission, because it was not con- 
sented unto by the church, and yet was a church 
judicature, which took upon them to judge of the 
doctrine of ministers, and deprive them, and did 
encroach upon the liberties of the established law- 
ful church judicatures. 

47. This Assembly might well forbid Mr John 
Graham, minister, to make use of an unjust decree, 
it being scandalous in a minister to oppress. 

48. Though nobles, barons, and burgesses, that 
profess the truth, be elders, and so members of the 
general Assembly, this is not to make the church 
the house, and the commonwealth the hanging; 
for the constituent members, we are content to be 
examined by the pattern of synods. Acts xv. 22, 23. 
Is this inconsistent with monarchy ? 

46. The commissioners of the General Assembly, 
are, 1. A mere occasional judicature. 2. Appointed 
by, and subordinate to the General Assembly. 3. 
They have the same warrant of God's word, that 
messengers of the synod (Acts. xv. 22—27) hath. 

50. The historical calumny of the 17th day of De- 
cember, is known to all : 1. That the ministers had 
any purpose to dethrone king James, and that they 
wrote to John L. Marquis of Hamilton, to be king, 
because king James had made defection from the 
true religion : Satan devised, Spotswood and this P. 
Prelate vented this ; I hope the true history of this 
is known to all. The holiest pastors, and professors 
in the kingdom, asserted this government, suffered 
for it, contended with authority only for sin, never 
for the power and office. These on the contrary 
side were men of another stamp, who minded earth- 
ly things, whose God was the world. 2. All the 
forged inconsistency betwixt presbyteries and mo- 
narchies, is an opposition with absolute monarchy 
and concluded with a like strength against parlia- 
ments, and all synods of either side, against the law 
and gospel preached, to which kings and kingdoms 
are subordinate. Lord establish peace and truth. 



LEX, REX. 



; 



QUESTION I. 

WHETHER GOVERNMENT BE WARRANTED BY 
A DIVINE LAW. 

I REDUCE all that I am to speak of the 
power of kingg, to the author or efficient, — 
the matter or subject,— the form or power, 
— ^the end and fruit of their government, — 
and to some cases of resistance. Hence, 

The question is either of government in 
general, or of particular species of govern- 
ment, such as g*ovemment by one only, 
called monarchy, the government by some 
chief leading men, named aristocracy, the 
government by the people, going under the 
name of democracy. We cannot but put 
difference betwixt the institution of the of- 
fice, viz, government, and the designation 
of person or persons to the office. Wliat is 
warranted by the direction of nature's light 
is warranted by the law of nature, and con- 
sequently by a divine law ; for who can deny 
the law of nature to be a divine law ? 

That power of government in general 
must be from God, I make good, 1st, Be- 
cause (Rom. xiii. 1) *' there is no power 
but of God; the powers that be are or- 
dained of God." 2d, God commandeth 
obedience, and so subjection of conscience 
to powers ; Rom. xiii, 6, " Wherefore ye 
must needs be subject, not only for wrath, 
(or civil punishment) but also for conscience 
sake;" I Pet, ii. 13, ** Submit yourselves 
to every ordinance of man, for the Lord's 
sake, whether it be to the king as supreme," 
&c, Now God only by a divine law can 
lay a band of subjection on the conscience, 
tying men to guilt mi punishment if they 
tranfgpess, 



Conclus. All civil power is immediately 
from God in its root ; in that, 1st, God 
hath made man a social creature, and one 
who inclineth to be governed by man, then 
certainly he must have put tliis power in 
man's nature: so are we, by good reason, 
taught by Aristotle.^ 2d, God and nature 
intendeth the policy and peace of mankind, 
then must God and nature liave given to 
mankind a power to compass this end ; and 
this must be a power of government. I see 
not, then, why John Prelate, Mr Maxwell, 
the excommunicated prelate of Ross, who 
speaketh in the name of J. Armagh,? had 
reason to say. That he feared that we fan- 
cied that the government of superiors was 
only for the more perfect, but had no au- 
thority over or above the perfect, nee rejpj 
nee leXf justo posita. He might have im^ 
puted this to the Brazillians, who teach, 
that every single man hath the power of 
the sword to revenge his own injuries, as 
Molina saith.^ 



QUESTION II. 

WHETHER OR NOT GOVERNJiCElfT BE WAR- • 
JIANTED BY THE LAW OF NATURE. 

As domestic society is by nature's instinct, 
so is civil society natural in radice, in the 
root, and voluntary in modo, in the man- 
ner of coalescipg, PoUtic power of govern- 
ment agreeth not to man, singly as one 
man, except in tbftt root of reasonable iia- 



1 Aristot. Polit. lib.l, c.2. 

9 Sacro Sane, Reg. Majestas, c. 1, p< \% 

3 Molina, torn, 1, de justit disp. 23. 



R 



>t IT " p t i m iiiw n >.i»i.wi^ »»ii.i»i I 



2 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



ture ; but supposing that men be combined 
in societies, or that one family cannot con- 
tain a society, it is natural that they join in 
a civil society, though the manner of union 
in a poHtic body, |as Bodine saith,^ be vo- 
luntary, Gren. X. 10; xv. 7; and Suarez 
saith," That a power of making laws is given 
by God as a property flowing from nature. 
Qui dat fonnaniy dot consequentia adfov' 
not by any special action or grant, 



mam 



different from creation, nor will he have it 
to result from nature, while men be united 
into one politic body: which union being 
made, that power followeth without any new 
action of the will. 

We are to distinguish betwixt a power of 
government, and a power of government by 
magistracy. That we defend ourselves from 
violence by violence is a consequent of un- 
broken and sinless nature ; but that we de- 
fend ourselves by devolving our power over 
in the hands of one or more rulers seemeth 
rather positively moral than natural, except 
that it is natural for the child to exjpect help 
against violence from his father : for which 
cause I judge that learned senator Ferdin- 
andus Vasquius said well,* That princedom, 
empire, kingdom, or jurisdiction hath its 
rise from a positive and secondary law of 
nations, and not from the law of pure na- 
ture. 1st, The lav saith* there is no law 
of nature agreeing to all living creatures for 
superiority ; for by no reason m nature hath 
a boar dominion over a boar, a lion over a 
Hon, a dragon over a dragon, a bull over a 
bull : and if all men be bom equally free, 
as I hope to prove, there is no reason in na- 
ture why one man should be king and lord 
over another; therefore while I be other- 
wise taught by the aforesaid Prelate Max- 
well, I conceive all jurisdiction of man over 
man to be as it were artificial and positive, 
and that it inferreth some servitude whereof 
nature from the womb hath freed us, if you 
except that subjection of children to parents, 
and the wife to the husband ; and the law 
saith,* De jure gentium secundarius est 
omnia principatus. 2d, This also the 
Scripture proveth, while as the exalting of 
Saul or David above their brethren to be 



J Bodin. de rep. lib. 1, c. 6. 

* 8uarez, torn. 1, de legib. lib. 3, c. 3. 

8 Vasquez illust. quaest. lib. 1, c. 41, num. 28, 29. 

4 1b. lib. 2, in princ. F. de inst. et jur. et in princ. 
In»t. Cod. tit. c. jus. nat. 1. disp. 

^ Dominium est jus qnoddam. lib. fin. ad med. C. 
de long. temp, prest. 1, qui usum fert. 



kings and captains of the Lord's people, is 
ascribed not to nature (for king and beggar 
spring of one clay), but to an act of divme 
bounty and grace above nature, 1 Sam. xiii. 
13 ; Ps. Ixxviii. 70, 71. 

1. There is no cause why royalists should 
deny government to be natural, but to be 
altogether from Grod, and that the kingly 
power is immediately and only from Grod, 
because it is not natural to us to be subject 
to government, but against nature for us to 
resign our liberty to a king, or any ruler 
or rulers; for this is much for us, and 
proveth not but government is natural ; it 
concludeth that a power of government tali 
modoj by magistracy, is not natural ; but 
this is but a sophism, a »««*« r< ad illud 
quod est dictum iTkHs^ this special of 
government, by resiguation of our Hberty, 
IS not natural, therefore, power of govern- 
ment is not natural ; it followeth not, a ne- 
gations speciei non sequitv/r negatio ge- 
neris^ non est homo, ergo non est animal. 
And by the same reason I may, by an an- 
tecedent will, agree to a magistrate and a 
law, that I may be ruled in a politic soci- 
ety, and by a consequent will only, yea, and 
conditionally only, agree to the penalty and 
punishment of the law ; and it is most true 
no man, by the instinct of nature, giveth 
consent to penal laws as penal, for nature 
doth not teach a man, nor incline his spirit 
to yield that his life shall be taken away by 
the sword, and his blood shed, except on 
this remote ground : a man hath a disposi- 
tion that a vein be cut by the physician, or a 
member of his body cut off, rather than the 
whole body and life perish by some conta- 
gious disease ; but here reason in cold blood, 
not a natural disposition, is the nearest pre- 
valent cause and disposer of the business. 
When, therefore, a community, by the in- 
stinct and guidance of nature, incline to 
government, and to defend themselves from 
violence, they do not, by that instinct, for- 
mally agree to government by magistrates ; 
and when a natural conscience giveth a de- 
liberate consent to good laws, as to this, 
" Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man 
shall his blood be shed," Gen. ix. 6, he 
doth tacitly consent that his own blood shall 
be shed ; but this he consenteth unto conse- 
quently, tacitly, and conditionally, — if he 
snail do violence to the life of his brother : 
yet so as this consent proceedeth not from 
a disposition every way purely natural. I 
grant reason may be necessitated to assent 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



to the conclusion, being, as it were, forced 
by the prevalent power of the evidence of 
an insuperable and invincible light in the 
premises, yet, from natiiral affections, there 
resulteth an act of self-love for self-preser- 
vation. So David shall condenm another 
rich man, who hath many lambs, and rob- 
beth his poor brother of his one lamb, and 
yet not condemn himself, though he be most 
deep in that fault, 1 Sam. xii. 5, 6 ; yet 
all this doth not hinder, but government, 
even by rulers, hath its ffround in a secon- 
dary law of nature, which lawyers call secun' 
dario jits naturale, or jus gentium secun-» 
darium; a secondary law of nature, which is 
granted by Plato, and denied by none of 
sound judgment in a sound sense, and that 
is this, Licet vim virepellerej It is lawful to 
repel violence by violence ; and this is a 
special act of the magistrate. 

2. But there is no reason why we may 
not defend by good reasons that political 
societies, rulers, cities, and incorporations, 
have their rise, and spring from the secon- 
dary law of nature. 1st, Because by nature's 
law family-government hath its warrant ; 
and Adam, though there had never been 
any positive law, had a power of governing 
his own family, and punishing mal^actors ; 
but as Tannerus saith well,^ and as I shall 
prove, God willing, this was not properly a 
royal or monarchical power ; and I judge by 
the reasoning of Sotus,* Molina,^ and Victo- 
ria.^ By what reason a family hath a power 
of government, and of pimishing malefac- 
tors, that same power must be in a society 
of men, supposing that society were not 
made up of families, but of single persons ; 
for the power of punishing ill-doers doth 
not reside in one single man of a family, or 
in them all, as they are single private per- 
sons, but as they are in a family. But this 
argument holdeth not but by proportion ; for 
paternal government, or a fatherly power 
of parents over their families, and a politic 
power of a magistrate over many famihes, 
are powers different in nature, — ^the one be- 
ing warranted by nature's law even in its 
species, the other being, in its specie and 
Kind, warranted by a positive law, and, in 
the general only, warranted by a law of na- 
ture. 2d, If we once lay the supposition, 



1 Ad Tannerus, m. 12, torn. 2, disp. 5. de peccatis, 
q. 5, dub. 1, num. 22. 
^ Sotus, 4. de juBtit. q. 4, art. 1. 
3 Lod. Molina, torn. 1, de just. disp. 22. 
* Victoria in relect. de potest civil, q. 4, art, 1. 



that God hath immediately by the law of 
nature appointed there should be a govern- 
ment, and mediately defined by the dictate 
of natural light in a community, that there 
shall be one or many rulers to govern a com- 
munity, then the Scripture's arguments may 
well be drawn out of the school of nature : 
as, (1,) The powers that be, are of God 
(Rom. xii), therefore nature's Hght teach- 
eth that we should be subject to these 
powers. (2.) It is against nature's light to 
resist the ordinance of Grod. (3.) Not to 
fear him to whom God hath committed the 
sword for tlie terror of evil-doers. (4.) Not 
to honour the public rewarder of well-doing. 
(5.) Not to pay tribute to him for his work. 
Therefore I see not but Govarruvias,^ Soto,* 
and Suarez,* have rightly said, that power 
of government is immediately from God, and 
this or that definite power is mediately from 
Grod, proceeding from God by the mediation 
of the consent of a community, which resign- 
eth their power to one or more rulers ; and 
to me, Barclaius saith the same,^ Quamvis 
populus potentice largitor videatuvy &c. 



QUESTION III. 

WHETHER ROYAL POWER AND DEFINITE 
FORMS OF GOVERNMENT BE FROM GOD. 

The king may be said to be from God 
and his word in these several notions : — 

1. By way of permission, Jer. xhii. 10, 
" Say to them, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, 
the God of Israel, Behold I will send and 
take Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, 
my servant, and will set his throne upon 
these stones tliat I have hid, and he shall 
spread his royal pavilion over them." And 
thus God made him a catholic king, and gave 
him all nations to serve him, Jer. xxvii. 6 
— 8, though he was but an unjust tyrant, 
and his sword the best title to those crowns. 

2. The king is said to be from Grod by 
way of naked approbation ; God giving to a 
people power to appoint what government 
they shall think good, but instituting none 
in special in his word. This way some 
make kingly power to be from God in the 



1 Govarruvias, tr. 2, pract. quest. 1, n. 2, 3, 4. 

8 Soto, loc. ett. 

3 Suarez de Reg. lib. 3, c. 4, n. 1, 2. 

* Barclaius con. Monarchoma, 1. 3, c. 2. 



4 



LEX, REX ; ORj 






general, but in the particular to be an in- 
vention of men, negatively lawful, and not 
repugnant to the word, as the wretched 
popiSi ceremonies are from God. But we 
teach no such thing : let Maxwell^ free his 
master Bellarmine,* and other Jesuites with 
whom he sideth in Romish doctrine : we 
are free of this. Bellarmine saith thiat" po- 
litic power in general is warranted by a di- 
vine law ; but the particular forms of politic 
power, (he meaneth monarchyj with the 
nrst,) is not by divine right, but de jure 
gentium^ by the law of nations^ and floweth 
immediately from human election^ as all 
thingSj saith he, that appertain to the law 
of nations* So monarchy to Bellarmine is 
but an human invention, as Mr Maxwell's 
surplice is; and Dr Feme, sect* 3, p. 13j 
saitn with Bellarmine. 

3. A king is said to be from God, by 
particular designation, as he appointed Saul 
by name for the crown of Israel. Of this 
hereafter. 

4. The kingly or royal office is from God 
by divine institution, and not by naked 
approbation ; for, 1st, we may well prove 
Aaron's priesthood to be of divine institu- 
tion, because God doth appoint the priest's 
qualification from his family, bodily perfec- 
tions, and his charge. 2d, We take the 
pastor to be by divine law and God's insti- 
tution, because the Holy Ghost (1 Tim* iii. 
1 — 4) describeth his qualifications ; so may 
we say that the royal power is by divine in- 
stitution, because God mouldeth him : Deut. 
xvii. 16) " Thou shalt in any wise set him 
king over thee, whom the Lord thy Grod 
shall choose, one from amongst thy breth- 
ren," &c. ; Rom. xiii. 1, " There is no power 
but of God, the powers that be are ordained 
of God." 3d) That power must be ordained 
of God as his own ordinance, to which we 
owe subjection for conscience^ and not for 
fear of punishment ; but every power is 
such) Rom. xiii. 4th, To resist the kingly 
power is to resist God. Sth, He is the min- 
ister of God for our good. 6th) He beareth 
the sword of God to take vengeance upon 
ill-doers. 7th, The Lord expressly saith, 
1 Pet. ii. 17, " Fear God, honour the king ;" 
ver. 13^ 14, " Submit yourselves to every 
oi-dinance of man for the Lord's sake, whe*- 



1 SacrosaAk Reg. Maji the Sacred and Royal PiJ'e- 
gative of Christian kings, ic. 1, q. 1, p. 6, 7. 

2 Bellarm. de locis, lib. 5, c. 6, not. 5. Politica 
universe considerata est de jure divino, in particu- 
lari considek'ata est de jure gentium. 



ther it be to the king as supreme, or unto 
govemorSj as those wiat are sent by him/' 
&c. ; Titi iiii 1, '* Put them in mind to be 
subject to principalities and powers ;" and so 
the fifth commandment layeth obedience to 
the king on us no less than to our parents ; 
whence, I conceive that power to be of God, 
to which, by the moral mw of God, we owe 
perpetual subjection and obedience. 8th, 
Khigs and magistrates are God's, and God's 
deputies and lieutenants upon earth, (Psalm 
Ixxxii. 1, 6, 7 ; Exod. xxii* 8 ; iv. 16,) and 
therefore their office must be a lawfiil ordi- 
nance of God. 9th, By their office they are 
feeders of the Lord's people. Psalm Ixxviii. 
70-^72, the shields of the earth, Psal. xlvii. 
9, nursing fathers of the church, Psal. xlix* 
23, captains over the Lord's people, 1 Sam^ 
ix. 19i 10th, It is a great judgment of 
God when a land wanteth the benefit of such 
ordinances of God, Isa* iii. 1- — 3, 6) 7, 11. 
The execution of their office is an act of the 
just Lord of heaven and earth, not only by 
permission, but according to God's revealed 
will in his word ; their judgment is not the 
judgment of meU) but of the Lord, 2 Chron. 
xix. 6, and their throne is the throne of 
God, 1 Chron* xxii. 10* Jerome saith,^ to 
punish murderers and sacrilegious persons is 
not bloodshed) but the ministry and service 
of good laws* So, if the king be a living 
law by office, and the law put in execution 
which God hath commanded, then, as the 
moral law is by divine institution, so must 
the officer of God be, who is custos et vin^ 
dex legis divinvb, the keeper, preserver, 
and avenger of God's law. Basilius saith,* 
this is the prince's office, Ut opem ferat 
virtuti, malitiam vera im/pugneU When 
Paulinus Treverensis, Lucifer Metropoli- 
tane of Sardinia, Dionysius MediolanensiS) 
and other bishops, were commanded by 
Constantino to write against Athanasius, 
they answered, Regnum non ipsitts esse, 
sed dei, a quo acceperit, — ^the kmgdom was 
God's, not his ; as Athanasius saith,® Opta- 
tus Milevitanus* helpeth us in the cause, 
where he saith with Paul, " We are to pray 
for heathen kings." The genuine end of 
the magistrate, saith Epiphanius,* is ut ad 
honum ordinem universitatis mundi omnia 
ex deo bene disponantur atque administren*- 



1 Jerome in 1. 4, Comment, in Jerem. 

s Basilius, epist. 125. 

3 Athanasius, epist. ad solita. 

* Optat. Melevitanns, lib. 3. 

* Epiphanius, lib. 1, torn. 3, Heres. -10. 



I - - 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



6 



tur. But some object, If the kingly powei* 
be of divine institution, then shall any other 
government be unlawfiil, and contrary to a 
divine institution, and so we condemn aris-> 
tocracy and democracy as unlawful. Ans, 
This consequence were good, if aristocracy 
and democracy were not also of divine insti- 
tution, as all my arguments prove ; for I 
judge they are not governments diflFerent in 
nature, ii we speak morally and theologi- 
cally, only they differ politically and posi- 
tively ; nor is aristocracy any thing but 
diffused and enlarged monarcny, and mo- 
narchy is nothing but contracted aristocracy, 
even as it is the same hand when the thumb 
and the four fingers are folded together and 
when all the five fingers are dilated and 
stretched out ; and wherever God appoint- 
ed a king he never appointed him absolute, 
and a sole independent angel, but joined al- 
ways with him judges, who were no less to 
judge according to the law of God (2 Chron. 
xix. 6,) than the king, Deut. xvii. 16. And 
in a moral obligation of judging righteous- 
ly) the conscience of the monarch and the 
conscience of the inferior judges are equally 
under immediate subjection to the King 
of kings ; for there is here a co-ordination 
of consciences) and no subordination, for it 
is not in the power of the inferior judge to 
judge, quoad speci/lcationem, as the xing 
commandeth him, beca.use the judgment is 
neither the king's, nor any mortal man's, 
but the Lord's, 2 Chron* xix. 6, 7. 

Hence all the three forms are from Grod ; 
but let no man say, if they be all indiffer- 
ent, and equally of God, societies and king- 
doms are left in the dark, and know not 
which of the three they shall pitch upon, 
because Grod hath given to them no special 
direction for one rather than for another. 
But this is easily answered. 1st, That a re- 
pubHc appoint rulers to govern them is not 
an indifferent, but a moral action, because 
to set no rulers over themselves I conceive 
were a breach of the fifth commandment, 
which commandeth government to be one 
or other. 2d, It is not in men's free will 
that they have government or no govern- 
ment, because it is not in their free will 
to obey or not to obey the acts of the court 
of nature, which is God's court ; and this 
court enacteth that societies suffer not man- 
kind to perish, which must necessarily fol- 
low if they appoint no government ; also it 
is proved elsewhere, that no moral acts, in 
their exercises and use, are left indifferent 



to us ; so then, the aptitude and temper of 
every commonwealth to monarchy, rather 
than to democracy or aristocracy, is God's 
warrant and nearest call to determine the 
wills and liberty of people to pitch upon a 
monarchy, hie et nunc, rather than any 
other form of government, though all the 
three be from 6od, even as single life and 
marriage are both the lawful ordinances of 
God, and the constitution and temper of the 
body is a calling to either of the two ; nor 
are we to think: that aristocracy and de- 
mocracy are either unlawfiil ordinances, or 
men's inventions, or that those societies 
which want monarchy do therefore five in 
sins. 

But some say that Peter calleth any 
form of government an human ordinance, 
1 Pet. ii. 13, MftM'tfn »tW, therefore mo- 
narchy can be no ordinance of God. Ans, 
Rivetus saith,^ — " It is called an ordinance 
of man, not because it is an invention of 
man, and not an ordinance of God, but re- 
spectu subjecti;" Piscator,^ — " Not because 
man is the efficient cause of magistracy, but 
because they are men who are magistrates ;" 
Diodatus,* — " Obey princes and magistrates, 
or governors made by men, or amongst men ;" 
Oecumenius,* — " An human constitution, 
because it is made by an human disposition, 
and created by human suffrages ;" I^dimus, 
— Because over it " presides presidents made 
by men ;" Cajetanus,* Estius,^ — " Every 
creature of God (as, preach the gospel to 
every creature) in authority." But I take 
the wopd, " every creature of man," to be 
put emphatically, to commend the worth of 
obedience to magistrates, though but men, 
when we do it for the Lord's sake ; there- 
fore Betrandus Cardinalis Ednensis saith,® 
" He speaketh so for the more necessity of 
merit ;" and Glossa Ordinaria saith, " Be 
subject to all powers, etiam ex infidelihus 
et incredulisj even of infidels and unbe- 
lievers." Lyranus, — " For though they be 
men, the image of God shineth m them ;" 
and the Syriac, as Lorinus saith,^ leadeth us 

thereunto, NB^JK Oil nH^iS Lechulle- 
chum benai anasa : Obey all the children of 



1 Rivetus in decal. Hand, 5, p. 194. 
8 Piscator in loc. ^ Diodatus, annot. 

* Oecumenius qnod hominum dispositione con- 
sistit, et hnmanis siiffragiis crcatur. 

5 Cajetanus, officiuiu regiminis, quia hnmania 
snfifragiis creatur. 

6 Estius in loc. 7 Betrandus, torn* 4, Bib. 
8 Lorin. in. lo. 



6 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



men that are in authority. It is an ordinance 
of men, not effectively, as if it were an inven- 
tion and a dream of men ; but subjectively, 
because exercised by man. Objectively, and 
riXijftAJf , for the good of men, and for tne ex- 
ternal man's peace and safety especially ; 
whereas church-officers are for the spiri- 
tual good of men's souls. And Durandus 
saith well,^ " Civil power according to its 
institution is of God, and according to its 
acquisition and way of use is of man." And 
we may thus far call the forms of magis- 
trates a human ordinance, — that some ma- 
gistrates are ordained to care for men's lives 
and matters criminal, of life and death, and 
some for men's lands and estates ; some for 
commodities by sea, and some by land ; and 
are thus called magistrates according to these 
determinations or numan ordinances. 



QUESTION IV. 

WHETHER THE KING BE ONLY AND IMME- 
DIATELY FROM GOD, AND NOT FROM THE 
PEOPLE. 

That this question may be the clearer we 
are to set down these considerations : — 

1. The question is, Whether the kingly 
office itself come from God. I conceive it 
is, and floweth from the people, not by for- 
mal institution, as if the people had by an 
act of reason devised and excogitated such 
a power : God ordained the power. It is 
from the people only by a virtual emana^ 
tion, in respect that a community having no 
government at aU may ordain a king or ap- 
point an aristocracy. But the question is 
concerning the designation of the person : 
Whence is it that this man rather than 
that man is crowned king ? and whence is 
it — from God immediately and only — that 
this man rather than that man, and this 
race or family rather than that race and 
family, is chosen for the crown ? Or is it 
from the people also, and their free choice ? 
For the pastor's and the doctor's office is 
from Christ only ; but that John rather 
than Thomas be the doctor or the pastor is 
from the will and choice of men — ^the pres- 
byters and people. 

2. The royal power is three ways in the 
people : 1st, Radically and virtually, as in 



1 Durandus lib. de orig. juris. 



the first subject. 2d, Collative vel com- 
municative, by way of free donation, they 
giving it to this. man, not to that man, that 
he may rule over them. 3d, Limitate, — 
they giving it so as these three acts re- 
main with the people. (1.) That they may 
measure out, by ounce weights, so much 
royal power, and no more and no less. (2.) 
So as they may limit, moderate, and set 
banks and marches *to the exercise. (3.) 
That they give it out, conditionate, upon 
this and that condition, that they may take 
again to themselves what they gave ovii, 
upon condition if the condition be violated. 
The first I conceive is clear, 1st, Because 
if all living creatures have radically in 
them a power of self-preservation, to defend 
themselves firom violence, — as we see lions 
have paws, some beasts have horns, some 
claws, — men being reasonable creatures, 
united in society, must have power in a 
more reasonable and honourable way to put 
this power of warding off violence in the 
hands of one or more rulers, to defend 
themselves by magistrates. 2d, If all men 
be bom, as concerning civil power, alike, — 
for no man cometh out of the womb with a 
diadem on his head or a sceptre in his hand, 
and yet men united in a society may give 
crown and sceptre to this man and not to 
that man, — then this power was in this 
united society, but it was not in them for- 
mally, for they should then all have been 
one king, and so both above and superior, 
and below and inferior to themselves, which 
we cannot say ; therefore this power must 
have been virtually in them, because neither 
man nor community of men can give that 
which they neither have formally nor vir- 
tually in them. 3d, Boyalists cannot deny 
but cities have power to choose and create 
inferior magistrates ; therefore many cities 
united have power to create a higher ruler ; 
for royal power is but tlie united and super- 
lative power of inferior judges in one greater 
judge whom they call a king. 

Conclus, The power of creating a man 
a king is i'rom the people. 

1. Because those who may create this man 
a king rather than that man have power 
to appoint a king ; for a comparative action 
doth positively infer an action. If a man 
have power to marry this woman and not 
that woman, we may strongly conclude that 
he hath power to marry ; now, 1 Kings xvi. 
the people made Omri king and not Zimri, 
and his son Achab rather than Tibiii the 



son of Sinath. Nor can it be replied that 
this was no lawful power that the people 
used, for that cannot elude the argument; 
for (1 Kings i.) the people made Solomon 
king and. not Adonijah, though Adonijah 
was the elder brother. They say, Grod did 
extraordinarily both make the office, and 
design Solomon to be king, — the people 
had no hand in it, but approved Grod's act. 
Aiis. This is what we say, God by the 
people, by Nathan the prophet, and by the 
servants of David and the states crying, 
" God save king Solomon ! " made Solomon 
king ; and here is a real action of the peo- 
ple. God is the first agent in all acts of the 
creature. Where a people maketh choice 
of a man to be their king, the states do no 
other thing, under God, but create this man 
rather than another; and we cannot here 
find two actions, one of God, another of the 
people ; but in one and the same action, 
God, by the people's free suffrages and 
voices, createth such a man king, passing 
by many thousands ; and the people are not 
passive in the action, because by the autho- 
ritative choice of the states the man is made 
of a private man and no king, a public per- 
son and a crowned king : 2 Sam. xvi. 18, 
" Hushai said to Absalom, Nay, but whom 
the Lord and the people, and all the men 
of Israel choose, his will I be, and with him 
will I abide ;" Judg. viii. 22, " The men of 
Israel said to Gideon, Rule thou over us ;" 
Judsf. ix. 6, " The men of Sechem made 
Abimelech king ;" Judg. xi. 8, 11 ; 2 Kings 
xiv. 21, " The people made Azariah king;" 
1 Sam.'xii. 1 ; 2 Chron. xxiii. 3. 

2. If God doth regulate his people in 
making this man king, not that man, then 
he thereby insinuatetn that the people have 
a power to make this man king, and not 
that man. But God doth regulate his 
people in making a king ; therefore the 
people have a power to make this man king, 
not that man king. The proposition is 
clear, because Grod's law doth not regulate 
a non-enSy a mere nothing, or an unlawftil 
power ; nor can Grod's holy law regulate an 
unlawful power, or an unlawful action, but 
quite aboHsh and interdict it. The Lord 
setteth not down rules and ways how men 
should not commit treason, but the Lord 
commandeth loyalty, and simply interdict- 
eth treason. If people have then more 
power to create a long over themselves 
than they had to make prophets, then Grod 
forbidding them to choose such a man for 



their king should say as much to his people 
as if he would say, " I command you to 
make Isaiah and Jeremiah prophets over 
you, but not these and those men." This, 
cei-tainly, should prove that not Grod only, 
but the people also, with Grod, made pro- 
phets. I leave this to the consideration of 
the godly. The prophets were immediately 
called of God to be prophets, whether the 
people consented that they should be pro- 
phets or not ; therefore Grod immediately 
and only sent the prophets, not the people ; 
but though Grod extraordinarily designed 
some men to be kings, and anointed uiem 
by his prophets, yet were they never ac- 
tually installed kings till the people made 
Uiem kings. I prove the assumption, Deut. 
xvii. 14, 15, " When thou shalt say, I will 
set a king over me, like as all the nations 
that are about me, thou shalt in any wise 
set him king over thee whom the Lord thy 
God shall choose ; one from amongst thy 
brethren shalt thou set king over thee : thou 
mayest not set a stranger over thee, which 
is not thy brother." Snould not this be an 
unjust charge to the people, if God only, 
without any action of the people, should 
immediately set a king over them ? Might 
not the people reply. We have no power at 
all to set a king over ourselves, more than 
we have power to make Isaiah a prophet, 
who saw the visions of God. To what end 
then should Grod mock us, and say, " Make 
a brother and not a stranger king over you ?" 
3. Expressly Scripture saitn, that the 
people made the king, though under God : 
Judg. ix. 6, " The men of Sechem made 
Abimelech king ;" 1 Sam. xi. 15, " And 
all the people went to Gilgal, and there 
they made Saul king before the Lord ;" 
2 King. X. 5, "We will not make any 
king." This had been an irrational speech 
to Jehu if both Jehu and the people held 
the royalists* tenet, that the people had no 
power to make a king, nor any active or 
causative influence therein, but that God 
immediately made the king : 1 Chron. xii. 
38, " All these came with a perfect heart 
to make David king in Hebron ;" and all 
the rest were of one heart to make David 
king. On these words Lavater saith,^ The 
same way are magistrates now to be chosen ; 
now this day God, by an immediate oracle 

^ Lavater com. in part 12, 38. Hodie qnoque in 
liberis urbibus, et gentibus, magistratas secundum 
dei yerbum, £xo<l. xTiii, Deut. L, eligendi sunt, non 
ex affectibns. 



/ 



8 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



j&x>m heaven, appointeth the office of a king, 
but I am sure he doth not immediately de- 
sign the man, but doth only mark him out 
to the people as one who hath the most royal 
endowments, and the due qualifications re- 
quired in a lawM magistrate by the word 
of God: Exod. xviii. 21, "Men of truth, 
hating covetousness," &c. ; Deut. i, 16, 17, 
Men who will judge causes betwixt their 
brethren righteously, without respect of per- 
sons ; 1 Sam. x. 21, Saul was chosen out of 
the tribes according to the law of Grod ; 
Deut. xvii., They might not choose a stran- 
ger; and Abulensis, Serrarius, Comehus 
a Lapide, Sancheiz, and other popish wri- 
ters, think that Saul was not only anointed 
with oil first privately by Samuel, (1 Saiy. 
X. 1, 2,) but also at two other times before 
the people, — once at Mizpeh, and another 
time at Gilgal, by a parliament and a con- 
vention of the states. And Samuel judged 
the voices of the people so essential to make 
a king that Samuel doth not acknowledge 
him as formal king, (1 Sam. x. 7, 8, 17, 
18, 19,) though he honoured him because 
he was to be king, (1 Sam. ix. 23, 24,) 
while the tribes of Israel and parliament 
were gathered together to make him king 
according to God's law, (Deut. xvii.) as is 
evident. 1st, For Samuel (1 Sam. v. 20,) 
caused all the tribes of Israel to stand be- 
fore the Lord, and the tribe of Benjamin 
was taken. The law provided one of their 
own, not a stranger to reign over them ; 
and, because some of the states of parlia- 
ment did not choose him, but, being chil- 
dren of Belial, despised him in their hearts, 
(v. 27,) therefore after king Saul, by that 
victory over the Ammonites, had conquered 
the affections of all the people fully, (v. 10, 
11,) Samuel would have his coronation and 
election by the estates of parliament re- 
newed at Gilgal by all the people, (v. 14, 
15,) to establi^ him king. 2d, The Lord 
by lots found out the tribe of Benjamin. 
3d, The Lord found out the man, by name, 
Saul the son of Kish, when he did hide 
himself amongst the stuff, that the people 
might do their part in the creating of the 
king, whereas Samuel had anointed him 
before. But the text saith expressly that 
the people made 6aul king ; and Calvin, 
Martyr, Lavater, and popi^ writers, as 
Serrarius, Mendoza, Sancheiz, Cornelius a 
Lapide, Lyranus, Hugo Cardinalis, Carthu- 
sius, Sanctius, do all hence conclude that 
the people, under God, make the king. 



1 



I see no reason why Barclaius should 
here distinguish a power of choosing a king, 
which he granteth the people hath, and a 
power of making a king, which he saith is 
only proper to God.^ Ans, Choosing of a 
king is either — a comparative crowning of 
this man, not that man ; and if the people 
have this it is a creating of a king under 
God, who principally disposeth of kings and 
kingdoms ; and this is enough for us. The 
want of this made Zimri no king, and those 
whom the rulers of Jezreel at Samaria (2 
King. X.) refused *to make kings, no kings. 
This election of the people made Athaliah 
a pi^ncess ; the removal oi it, and translation 
01 the crown by the people to Joash made 
her no princess ; for, I ask you, what other 
calling of God hath a race of a family, 
and a person to the crown, but only the 
election of the states ? There is now no 
voice from heaven, no immediately inspired 
prophets such as Samuel and Elisha, to 
anomt David, not Eliab, — Solomon, not 
Adonijah. The ^^Wpf or the heroic spirit 
of a royal faculty of governing, is, I gi-ant, 
from God only, not from the people ; but 
I suppose that maketh not a king, for then 
many sitting on the throne this day should 
be no kings, and many private persons 
should be kings. If they mean by the peo- 
ple's choosing nothing but the people's ap- 
probative consent, posterior to Grod's act of 
creating a king, let them show us an act of 
Grod making xings, and establishing royal 
power in this family ];ather than m that 
family, which is prior to the people's con- 
sent,-~distinct from the people's consent I 
believe there is none at ail. 

Hence I argue : If there be no caUing 
or title on earth to tie the crown to such a 
family and person but the suffrages of the 
people, then have the line of such a family, 
and the persons now, no calling of God, no 
right to tne crown, but only by the suffrages 
of the people, except we say that there be 
no lawful kings on earth now when prophe- 
tical unction and designation to crowns are 
ceased, contrary to express scripture ; Rom. 
xiii. 1— 3; 1 Pet. ii. 13^17. 

But there is no title on earth now to tie 
crowns to families, to pei'sons, but only the 
suffrages of the people ; for, 1st, Conquest 
without the consent of the people is but 
royal irobbery, as we shslll see. 2d, There 
is no prophetical and immediate calling to 



i i m ■ ■■ I 



1 Barclains, lib. 3, cont. Monarchomach. 8. c. 3, 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



9 



kingdoms now. 3d, The Lord's giving of 
re^ parts is somewhat ; but I hope roy« 
alists will not deny but a child, young m 
yean and judgment, may be a lawnil king. 
4th, Mr Maxwell's appointing of the kingfy 
office doth no more make one man a lAwml 
king than another; for this were a wide 
consequence. Grod hath appointed that 
kin^ should be ; llierefore John k Stiles is 
a kmg ; yea, therefore David is a king. It 
followedi not. Therefore it remaineth only 
that the suffrages of the people of God is 
that just title and divine caihng that kings 
have now to their crowns. I presuppose 
they have gifts to govern firom God. 

If the Lord's munediate dedgnation of 
David, and his anointing by the divine au« 
thority of Samuel, had been that which 
alone, without the election of the people, 
made David formally king of Israel, then 
there were two kings in I^iel at one time ; 
for Samuel anoint^ David, and so he was 
formally king upon the ground laid by roy- 
alists, that tiie king ha^ no royal power 
&om the people ; and David, aft;er he him* 
self was anomted by Samuel, divers times 
calleth Saul the Lord's anointed, and that 
by the inspiration of God's Spirit, as we 
and royalists do both agree. Now two law- 
M supreme monarchs in one kingdom I 
conceive to be most repugnant to God's 
truth and sound reason ; for they are as re- 
pugnant as two most highs or as two in- 
finites. It shall follow that David all the 
while betwixt his anointing by Samuel and 
his coronation by the suffrages of all Israel 
at Hebron, was in-lacking in discharging 
and acquitting himself or his roval duty, 
God having made him formally a Ung, and 
so laying upon him a charge to execute 
justice and ludgment, and defend religion, 
which he did not discharge. All David's 
suffering, upon David's part, must be un- 
just, for, as king, he should have cut off 
the murderer Saul, who killed the priests of 
the Lord ; especially, seeing Saul, by this 
ground, must be a private murderer, and 
David the only lawml king. David, if he 
was formally xing, deserted his calling in 
flying to the FhiSstines ; for a king should 
not rorsake his calling upon any hazard, 
even of his life, no more than a pUot should 
give over the helm in an extreme storm ; 
but certainly God's dispensation in this war- 
ranteth us to say, no man can be formally 
a lawM king vrithout the suffrages of the 
people: for Saul, after Samuel from the 



Lord anointed him, remained a private 
man, and no king, till the people made him 
king, and elected him ; and David, anointed 
by tliat same divine authoritv, remained 
formally a subject, and not a khig, till all 
Israel made him king at Hebron ; and So- 
lomon, though by God designed and or- 
dained to be king, yet was never king un- 
til the people made him so, {1 Kings i.) ; 
therefore there floweth something from the 
power of the people, by which he who is no 
King now beoometh a k^g formally, and by 
Grod's lawAil call ; whereas before the man 
was no king, but, as touching all royal 
power, a mere private man. And I am 
sure birth must be less than God's desig* 
nation to a crown, as is clear,^~-Adonijali 
was older than Solomon, yet God will have 
Solomon, the younger by birth, to be king, 
and not Adonijah. And so Mr Symons, 
and other court prophets, must prevaricate, 
who wiU have birth, without the people's 
election, to make a king, and the people's 
voices but a ceremony, 

I think royalists cannot denv but a peo» 
pie ruled by aristocratic magistrates may 
elect a king, and a king so elected is for- 
mally made a lawM king by the people's 
election; for of six willing and giftied to 
reign, what maketh one a king and not the 
other five? Certainly by wi's disposing 
the people to choose this man, and not an- 
other man. It cannot be said but God giveth 
the kindy power immediately ; and by him 
kitiKS jli^fthat i8 true. The office U im. 
meaiately from God, but the question now 
is, What is that which formally appUeth 
the office and royal power to this person 
rather than to the other five as meet? 
Nothing can here be dreamed of but God's 
inclining the hearts of the states to choose 
this man and not that man. 



QUESTION V. 

WHBTHEB OB NO THE POPISH PRELATE, THE 
AUTHOR O? "SAC. SAN. REGXJM MAJESTAS," 
CALLED THE SACRED AND ROTAL PRERO- 
GATIVE OF KJNGS, PROVETH THAT GOD IS 
THE IMMEDIATE AUTHOR OP SOVEREIGNTY, 
AND THAT THE KING IS NO CREATURE OF 

' THE people's making. 

Consider, 1. That the excommunicated 
prelate saith, (c. 2, p. 19,) <^ Eongs are not 

D 



10 



LEX, REX ; OB, 



immediatidly firom €rod as by any (special or- 
dinance sent from heaven by the ministry of 
angels and prophets ; there were but some 
few such ; as Moses, Saul, David, &c. ; yet 
something may immediately proceed fix)m 
God, ana be his special work, without a re- 
velation or manifestation extraordinary from 
heaven ; so the designation to a sacred func- 
tion is from the church and from man, yet 
the power of word, sacraments, binding and 
loosing, is immediately, from Jesus Cnrist. 
The apostle Matthias was from Christ's 
immediate constitution, and yet he was de- 
signed by men, Acts i. The soul is by 
creation and infusion, without any special 
ordinance from heaven, though nature be- 
getteth the body, and disposeth the matter, 
and prepareth it as fit to be conjpined with 
the soul, so as the father is said to beget the 
son." Ans, 1st, The unchurched Prelate 
striveth to make us hateful by the title of 
the chapter, — That God is, by his title, the 
immediate author of sovereignty ; and who 
denieth that? Not those who teach that 
the person who is king is created king by 
the people, no more Sban those who deny 
that men are now called to be pastors and 
deacons immediately, and by a voice from 
heaven, or by the ministry of angels and 
prophets, because the office of pastors and 
deacons is immediately from Grod. 2d, 
"When he hath proved that God is the im- 
mediate author of sovereignty, what then ? 
Shall it follow that the sovereign in concreto 
may not be resisted, and that he is above all 
law, and that there is no armour against his 
violence but prayers and tears? Because 
God is the immediate author of the pastor 
and of the apostle's office, does it therefore 
follow that it is unlawfiil to resist a pastor 
though he turn robber ? If so, then the 
pastor is above ajl the king's laws. This is 
the Jesuit and all made, and there is no ar- 
mour against the robbing prelate but prayer 
and tears. 

2. He saith in his title, that '' the king is 
no creature of the people's making." If he 
mean the king in the abstract, tnat is, the 
royal dignity, whom speaketh he against? 
Not against us, but against his own father, 
Bellarmine, who saith,^ that "sovereignty 
hath no warrant by any divine law." IF he 
mean that the man who is king is not cre- 
ated and elected king by the people, he con- 
tradicteth himself and idl the court doctors. 



1 Bellarmine, lib. 5, c. 6, not 5, de Laicis. 



3. It is false that Saul and David's call 
to royalty was only from God, " by a special 
ordinance sent from heaven," for their office 
is (Deut. xvii. 14) from the written word of 
Grod, as the killing of idolaters, (ver. 3, 7)) 
and as the office of the priests and Levites, 
(ver. 8 — 10,^ and this is no extraordinary 
office from neaven, more than that is from 
heaven which is warranted by the word of 
God. If he mean that these men, Saul and 
David, were created kinss only by the ex- 
traordinary revelation of God iom heaven, 
it is a He ; for besides the prophetical anoint- 
ing of them, they were made kings by the 
people, as the Word saith expressly ; except 
we say that David sinned in not setting him- 
self doWli on the throne, when Samuel first 
anointed him king ; and so he should have 
made away with his master, king Saul, out 
of the world ; and there were not a few 
called to the throne by the people, but 
many, yea, all the kings of Israel and of 
Judah. 

4. The prelate contendeth that a king is 
designed to his royal dignity '* immediately 
from Grod, without an extraordinary revela- 
tion from heaven," as the man is '^ designed 
to be a pastor by men, and yet the power of 

E reaching is immediately from Grod," &c. ; 
ut he proveth nothing, except he prove 
that all pastors are called to be pastors im- 
mediately J and that God calleth and design- 
eth to the office such a person immediately 
as he hath immediately instituted by the 
power of preaching and the apostleship, and 
hath immediately infiised the soul in the 
body by an act of creation ; and we cannot 
conceive how God in our days, when there 
are no extraordinary revelations, doth im- 
mediately create this man a king, and im- 
mediately tie the crown to this family rather 
than to that. This he doth by the people 
now, without any prophetical unction, and 
by this medium, viz., the free choice of the 
people. He need not bring the example of 
Matthias more than of any ordinary pastor ; 
and yet an ordinary pastor is not immediate- 
ly called of God, because the office is from 
Grod immediately, and also the man is made 
pastor by the church. 

The P. Prelate saith, (c. 2, p. 20—23,) 
A thing is immediately from God three 
ways. 1st, When it is solely from Grod, and 
presupposeth nothing ordinary or human an- 
tecedent to the ob&ning of it. Such was 
the power of Moses, Saul and David ; such 
were the apostles. 2d, When the collation 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



11 



of the power to each a person is immediatelj 
from 6od, thot^h 8(Hne act of man be ante- 
cedent, as Mattnias was an aposde. A bap- 
tised man obtaineth remission and regenera- 
tion, jet aspersion of water cannot produce 
these excellent effects. A king givetn power 
to a £i.yourite to make a lord or a baron, jet 
who is so stupid as to aver, that the honour 
of a lord cometh immediatelj from the &- 
vourite and not frx>m the king. 3d, When 
a man hath, bj some ordinary human right, 
a full and just right, and tne approbation 
and oonfrrmation of this right is immediate'^ 
ly from Grod. 

The first waj, sovereigntj is not from 
God. The second waj, sovereientj is con- 
ferred on kings immediatelj : mough some 
created act of election, succession or con- 
quest intervene, .the int^posed act contain- 
eth not in it power to confer sovereigntj ; 
as in baptism, regeneration) if there be no- 
thing repugnant ia the recipient, is con« 
ferr3, not bj water, but immeduitelj bj 
God. In sacred orders, deeognation is from 
men, power to supernatural acts from Gh)d. 
Election, succession, conquests^ remotelj and 
improperlj constitute a King. To saj in the 
third sense, that sovereiffn^ is immediatelj 
from God bj approbation or confirmation 
onlj, is against Scripture, Proy. yiii. 16 ; 
Psal. Ixxxviii. 8 ; John xix. ; then the peo- 
ple saj. You are God's, jour power is from 
below* And Paul's " ordained of God," is 
" approved and confiimed onlj of Grod ;" the 
power of designation, or application of the 
person to rojaltj, is from man ; the power 
of conferring royal power, or of applying the 
person to rojal power, is from God. A 
man's hand may apply a &ggot to the fire, 
the fire onlj mskketn tne faggot to bum. 

Answer, 1st, Apostles, both according to 
their ofiice and the designation of their per- 
son to the office, were immediately and onlj 
from God, without anj act of the people, 
and therefore are badlj coupled with the 
rojal power of David and kmg Saul, who 
were not formallj made kings but bj the 
people at Mizpeh and Hebron. 2d, The se- 
cond waj Go<i giveth rojal power, bj mov- 
ing the people's nearts to confer rojal power, 
and this is virtually in the people, formallj 
from Grod. Water nath no influence to pro- 
duce grace, God's institution and promise 
doth it ; except jou dream with jour Je- 
suits, of omw operatumy that water sprin- 
kled, bj the domg of the deed, conferreth 
grace, nisi pondtur obex, what can the child 



do, or one baptised child more than another, 
to hinder the flux of remission of sins, if jou 
mean not that baptism worketh as phjsic on 
a sick man, except strength of humours hin- 
dei:? and therefore this comparison is not 
alike. The people cannot produce so noble 
an effect as rojaltj, — a beam from God. 
True, formally thej cannot, but virtually 
it is in a societj of reasonable men, in whom 
are left beams of authoritative maj est j, which 
bj a divine institution thej can give (Deut. 
xvii. 14) to this man, to IJavid, not to Eliab. 
And I could well saj the fitvourite made the 
lord, and placed honour in the man whom 
he made lord, bj a borrowed power firom 
his prince ; and jet the honour of a lord is 
principallj frx)m the king. 3. It is true the 
election of the people containeth not formal- 
lj rojal dignitj, but the Word saith, thej 
made Saul, thej made David king ; so vir- 
tuallj election must. contain it. Samuel's 
oil maketh not David king, he is a subject 
afrer he is anointed; the people's election 
at Hebron maketh him king, differeth him 
from his brethren, and putteth him in royal 
state ; jet God is the prmcipal agent. "V^^at 
immediate action God hath nere, is said and 
dreamed of, no man can divine, except Pro- 
phet P. Prelate. The l5«w/«, rojal author- 
itj, is given organicallj bj that act bj which 
he is made kmg: another act is a night- 
dream, but bj uie act of election, David is 
of no king, a xing. The collation of itrmfus^ 
rojal gimi, is immediatelj from God, but 
that formallj maketh not a king, if Solo- 
mon saw right, ^' servants riding on horses, 
princes going on foot." 4th, Judge of the 
rrelate's subtiltj, — I dare saj not nis own ; 
he stealeth from Spalato, but telleth it not, 
— " The appljing of the person to rojal au- 
thoritj is from the people; but the appljing 
of rojal authorit J to the person of the king, 
is immediatelj and onlj from Grod ; as the 
hand putteth the faggot to the fire, but the 
fire maketh it bum." To applj the subject 
to the accident, is it anj thing else but to 
applj the accident to the subject ? Eojal 
authoritj is an accident, the person of the 
king the subject. The appljing of the fag- 
got to the fire, and the appljing of the fire 
to the faggot, are all one, to anj one not 
forsaken of common sense. When the peo- 
ple appljeth the person to the royal autho- 
ritj, tnej but put the person in tne state of 
rojsJ authoritj ; this is to make an union 
betwixt the man and rojal authoritj, and 
this is to applj rojal authoritj to the per- 



12 



LSX, REX ; OR, 



son. 5th, The third sense is the Prelate's 
dream, not a tenet of ours. We never said 
that sovereignty in the king is immediately 
from Qod By approbation or confirmation 
only, as if the people first made the king, 
and G<h1 did only by a posterior and latter 
act say Amen to the deed done^ and sub- 
scribe, as recorder, to what the people doth: 
so the people should deal cro¥ms and king- 
doms at their pleasure, and Grod behoove to 
ratify and make good their act. When Qod 
doth apply the person to royal power, is this 
a different action from the people's applying 
the person to royal dimiity ? It is not ima« 
ginable» But the people, by creating a king, 
applyeth the person to royal disnlty; and 
God, by the people's act of oonstS^uting the 
man king, doth by the mediation of tins act 
convey royal authority to the man, as the 
church by sending a man and ordaining him 
to be a pastor) doth not by that) as God's 
instruments, infuse supernatural powers of 
preaching; these supernatural powers may 
be, and often are in nim before ne be in or- 
ders. And sometimes God infiiseth a super- 
natural power of government in a man when 
he is not yet a ling, as the Lord turned 
Saul intQ another man, (1 Sam. x. 5, 6,) nei- 
ther at that point of time when Samuel a- 
nointed him, but afterwards: *' After that 
thou shalt come to the hill of God, the Spi- 
rit of the Lord shall come upon thee, and 
thou shalt prophesy with them, and shalt be 
turned into another man ;" nor yet at that 
time when he is formally made king by the 
people ; for Saul was not king formally be- 
cause of Saitiuel's anointing, nor yet was he 
king because another spirit was infused into 
him, (v. 6, 6) for he was yet a private man 
till the states of Israel chose hun king at 
Mizpeh. And the word of God used words 
of action to express the people's power: 
Judg. ix. 6, And all the men of oechem 
gathered together^ and all the men of Millo^ 

O* Son regna/re fecerunty they caused him 
to be king. The same is said 1 Sam. x* 15, 
They caused Saul to reign ; 2 Kings x. 15, 

2^*K'^^)33 t*^ We shall not king any 

man ; 1 Chron. xii. 38, They came to He- 

• » 

bron n^an- nN^^San? to king David 

over all Israel ; Deut. xvii. three times the 

making of a king is given to the people. 

When thou shalt say, H^D ^Sv nO^B^l* 
I shall set a king over me. If it were not 
in their power to make a king no law could 



be imposed on them not to make a stranger 
their Idngi 1 Kings xii. 20, All the con- 
gregation kinged «ieroboam, or made him 
king over all Israel ; 2 Kings xi. 12, They 
kinged Joash) or made Joatti to reign. 6, 
the people are to say. You are God's, and 
your power is below, saith the Prelate: 
What then ? therefore their power is not 
from God also ? It followeth not subordi'- 
ndta rum pugnant* The Scripture saith 
both, the Lord exalted David to be king, 
and) all power is from Qod^ and so the 
power of a lord mayor of a city ! the people 
made David king) and the people maketh 
such a man lord mayor. It is the Anabap- 
tists' argument,-^God writeth his law in our 
heart, and teacheth his own children \ there- 
fore books and the ministry of men are need- 
less. So all sciences and lawfiil arts are from 
God ; therefore sciences applied to men are 
not from men's free will, industry and studies. 
The prelate extolleth the king when he will 
have his royalty from God, the way that 
John Stiles is the husband of such a woman. 

P. Pretoe.-^Kings are of (Jod, they are 
God's, children of the Most High, his ser* 
vants, public ministerS)^-their sword and 
judgment are Grod's. This he hath said of 
their royalty in abstracto and in concreto ; 
their power, person, charge, are all of divine 
extract, and so their authority and person 
are both sacred and inviolable.^ 

Ans. — So are all the congregation of the 

~ res ; Fsal* Ixxxii. 1, 6, All of them are 
I's ; for he speaketh not there of a con- 
gregation of kings. So are apostles, their 
office and persons of Grod ; and so the pre- 
lates (as they think), the successors of the 
apostles, are God's servants ; their ministry, 
word, rod of discipline, not theirS) but of 
Grod. The judgment of judgeS) inferior to 
the king) is the Lord's judgment) not men's. 
Deut* i% 17 ; 2 Chron. xix. 6, Hence by the 
Prelate's logic, the persons of ^relateS) ma- 
yors) bailiff) constables, pastors, are sacred 
and inviolable above all lawS) as are kings. 
Is this an extolling of kings ? But where 
are kings' persons, as men, said to be of God, 
as the royalty in abstracto is ? The Pre- 
late seeth beside his book, (Psal. Ixxxii. 7,) 
" But ye shall die like men." 

P, Prelate.-— We begin with the law, in 
which, as Grod by himseu prescribed the es- 
sentials, substantials, and ceremonies of his 
piety and worship, gave order for piety and 

1 Sacro. Sa. Reg. Ma. c. ^4. 




I~^ 



n -111 ii !<•! 



THE lAW AND tHS PRINCE. 



13 



justice ; Deut. xviu 14^ 15, the king is here 
originallj and immediately from God, and 
independent from all othfers* " Set over 
ihem^^-^thenH is collective) that is, all and 
every one. Scripture knoweth not this 
state principle,— Aea) est singulis major, 
univefsis rMnor^ The person is expressed 
in concretOy " Whom tne Lord thy Grod 
shall choose." This peremptory precept 
dischargeth the people, all and every one, 
diffiisively) representatively, or in any Ima- 
ginable capacity to attempt the appointing 
of a kingi but to leave it entirely and totally 
to Grod Almighty^ 

-4n«.*--Begin with the laW) but end not 
with traditions. If God by himself pre- 
scribed the essentials of piety and worsnip, 
the other part of your distinction is, that 
God, not by himself^ but by his prelates, 
appointed the whole Romish rites, as acci- 
dentals of piety. This is the Jesuits' doc- 
trine. This place is so far from proving the 
king to be independent, and that it totally 
is God's to appoint a king, that it expressly 
giveth the people power to appoint a king ; 
K>r the settmg of a king over themselves, 
this one and not that one, makes the people 
to appoint the king, and the king to be less 
and dependent on the people, seeing God 
intendeth the king for the people's good, 
and not the peome for the king's good. 
This text shametn the Prelate, who also 
confessed, (p% 22,) that remotely and im- 
properly, succession, election, and conquest 
maketh the king, and so it is lawM for men 
remotely and improperly to invade God's 
chair^ 

P. Prelate,-^ em\t& and puritans say, it 
was a privilege of the Jews that God chose 
their king. So Suarez, Soto, Navarra. 

Ans, — The Jesuits are the Prelate^s bre- 
thren, they are under one banner, — ^we are 
in contrary camps to Jesuits* ^ The Prelate 
said himself, (p* 19,) Moses, Saul, and Da- 
vid, were by extraordinary revelation from 
Grod. Sure I am kings are not so now. 
The Jews had this privuege that no nation 
had. God named some mngs to them, as 
Saul, David,-->he doth not so now* God did 
tie royalty to David's house by a covenant 
till Christ should come, — ^he doth not so 
now ; yet we stand to Deut. xvii. 

P. Prelate^ — Prov. 8. 16, " By me kin^ 
reign." If the people had right to consti- 
tute a king, it had not been king Solomon, 
but king Adonijah. Solomon saith not of 
himself, but indefinitely, " By me," as by 



T 



the Author, Efficient, and Constituent, 
kings reign. Pef is by Chri$t, not by 
the people, not by the high priest, state or 
presbytery, — not per me tratum, by me in 
my anger, as some sectaries say. Paul's 
hmrm^ «i» i^5, an ordinance by high autho- 
rity not revocable. Sinesius so useth the 
word, Aristotle, Lucilius, Appian, Plutarch, 
••3 in me and by me, and also Doctor An- 
drews. Kin^ indefinitely, aU kings: none 
may distinguish where the law distinguish- 
eth not,-^they reign in concreto. That 
same power that ms^eth kings must unmake 
them. 

Ans, — 1. The prelate eannot restrict this 
to kings only ; it extendeth to parliaments 

also. Solomon addeth, tD*3ni and con- 
suls, t3**ltfi^ all the sirs, and princes, 
tD^i^njI 2und magnificents, and nobles, 
and more V"iK *D2B^ ^3 and aU the 
judges of the earth, they reign, rule, and 
decree justice by Christ. Here, then, ma- 
yors, sheriffs, provosts, constables, are by the 
Prelate extolled as persons sacred, irresis- 
tible* Then, (1.) the judges of England rule 
not by the king of Britain, as their author, 
efficient, constituent, but by Jesus Christ 
immediately ; nor doth the commissary rule 
by the prelate. (2.) All these, and their 
power, and persons, rule independently, and 
immediately by Jesus Christ. (3.) All in- 
ferior judges are &««y«e) rw Si*S, the ordi- 
nances of Grod not revocable. Therefore 
the king cannot deprive any judge under 
him ; he cannot declare the parliament no 
parliament I once a judge, and always and 
irrevocably a judge. This Prelate's poor 
pleading for kings deserves no wages. La- 
vater intelligit superiores et infertores ma- 
gistratus, non est potestas nisi a deo, Vata- 
blus consiliarios, 2. If the people had 
absolute right to choose kings by the law of 
Israel, they might have chosen another than 
either Adonyah or Solomon ; but the Lord 
expressly put an express law on them, that 
they should make no king but him whom 
the Lord should choose, Deut. xvii. 4. Now 
the Lord did either by his immediately in- 
spired prophet anoint the man, as he anoin- 
ted David, Saul, Jehu, &c., or then he re- 
stricted, by a revealed promise, the royal 
power to a family, and to the eldest by 
birth ; and, therefore, the Lord first chose 
the man and then the people made him 
king. Birth was not their rule, as is clear, 
in mat they tnade Solomon their king, not 



•b^i^a^MMI^ 



Hi * I I I ■ Jll^»^i*»*d 



14 



"LSXf REX ; OR, 



Adonijah, the elder ; and this proveth that 
Grod tud both ordain kingly government to 
the kingdom of Israel, and chose the man, 
either in his person, or tied it to the first- 
bom of the Ime. Now we have no Scrip- 
ture nor law of Grod to tie royal dignity to 
one man or to one &mily ; produce a war- 
rant for it in the Word, for that must be a 
privilege of the Jews for which we have iio 
word (» Grod. We have no immediately in^ 
spired Samuels to say^ "Make David, or 
this man king ;" and no word of Grod to say, 
" Let the first«-bom of this &mily rather 
than another £unily sit upon the throne ;" 
therefore the peojde must make such a man 
king, following the rule of God's word, 
(Deut. xvii. 14,) and other rules showing 
what sort of men judges must be, as Deut. 
i. 16—18 ; 2 Chron. xix. 6, 7. 3. It is 
true, kings in a special manner reign by 
Christ; merefore not by the peopled free 
election ? The P. Prelate argueth like 
himself: by this text a mayor of a city by 
the Lord decreeth justice ; therefore he is 
not made a mayor of a city by the people 
of the city. It followeth not. None of us 
teach that kings reign by God's anger. We 
judge a king a great mercy of Grod to church 
or state; but the text saith not. By the 
Lord kings and judges do not only reign and 
decree ji^ice, but also murder protestants^ 
by raising against them an army of papists. 
And the word Ji««t>«), powers, doth m no 
Greek author signify irrevocable powers ; for 
Uzziah was a lawful king, and yet (2 Chron» 
xxvi.) lawfully put from the throne, and 
" cut off from the house of the Lord." And 
interpreters of this passage deny that it is to 
be understood of tyrante. So the Chaldee 
paraphrase turns it well, Potentes virga 
justttioR :^ so Lavater and Diodatus saiui, 
this place doth prove, *' That all kings, 
judges and laws, derivari a lege cetema^ 
are derived from the Eternal Law." The 
prelate, eating his tongue for anger, striveth 
to prove that all power, and so royal power, 
is of God ; but what can he make of it ? 
We believe it, though he say (p. 30,) secta* 
ries prove, by i*" ^*» " That a man is justi- 
fied by faith only ;" so there is no power but 
of Grod only : but feel the smeU ot a Jesuits 
It is the sectaries' doctrine^ that we are jus- 
tified by faith only, but the prelates and the 
Jesuits go another way, — not by faith only, 
but by works also. And all power is from 

1 Aquinas, 12, q. 93, artk 3. 



Grod only, as the first Author, and from no 
man. What then? Therefore men and 
people interpose no human act in making 
this man a kmg and not that man. It fol- 
loweth not. Let us with the Prelate join 
Paul and Solomon together, and say, *' That 
sovereignty is from Gkni, of Grod, by Grod, as 
Grod's appointment irrevocable." Then shall 
it never follow i it is inseparable from the 
person unless you make the king a man im- 
mortal. As God only can remove the crown, 
it is true Grod only can put an unworthy and 
an excommunicated prelate from office and 
benefice ; but how ? Doth that prove that 
men and the church may not also in their 
place remove an unworthy churchman, when 
the church, following God's word, delivereth 
to Satan? Christ only, as head of the 
church, excommunicateth scandalous men; 
therefore the church cannot do it. And yet 
the argument is as good the one way as the 
other ; for all the cnurches on earth cannot 
make a minister properly, — ^they but design 
him to the minisUy whom GKkL hath gifted 
and called. But shall we conclude that no 
church on earth, but Q(A only, hj an im- 
mediate action from heaven, can deprive a 
minister? How, then, dare prelates excom- 
municate, unmake, and imprison so many 
ministers in the three kingdoms ? But the 
truth is, take this one arguinent from the 
Prelate, and all that is in his book &lleth to 
the ground, — ^to wit. Sovereignty is firom 
Grod only. A king is a creature of God's 
making only ; and what then ? Therefore 
sovereignty cannot be taken from him: so 
Grod only made Aaron's house priests. So- 
lomon had no law to depose Abiathar from 
the priesthood. Possibly tlie Prelate will 
grant all. The passage, Rom. xiii., which he 
saith hath torturod us, I refer to a fitter place 
-—it will be found to torture court parasites. 

I go* on with the Prelate, (<5. 3,) " Sacred 
sovereignty is to be preserved, and kings 
are to be prayed for, that we may lead a 
godly life," 1 Tim. iii. What then? AU 
m authority are to be prayed for,— even 
parliaments ; by that text pastors are to be 
prayed for, and without them sound religion 
cannot well subsist. Is this questioned, that 
kings should be prayed for ; or are we want- 
ing in this duty ? but it followeth not that 
all dignities to be prayed for are imme- 
diately from Grod, not worn men. 

P. Prelate. — Prov. viii., Solomon speak- 
eth first of the establishment of government 
before he speaks of the works of creation ; 



Mm 



THB LAW AND THE PRINCB. 



16 



therefore better not be at all as be without 
eovemment. And Grod fixed government 
in the person of Adam before Eve, or any 
one else, came into the world ; and how 
shall government be, and we enjoy the fruits 
of it, except we preserve the king's sacred 
authority inviolable ? 

Ans. — 1. Moses (Gen. i,) speaketh of 
creation before he speaketh of xin^, and 
he speaketh (Gren. iii.) of Adam's sms be- 
fore ne speaks of redemption through the 
blessed Seed ; therefore better never be re- 
deemed at all as to be without sm. 2. If 
Grod made Adam a governor before he made 
Eve, and any of mankind, he was made a 
father and a husband before he had either 
son or wife. Is this the Prelate's logic? 
He may prove that two eggs on his father's 
table are three this way. 3. There is no 
government where sovereignty is not kept 
mviolable. It is true, ^ere there is a 
king, sovereignty must be inviolable. What 
then? Arbitrary government is not sove- 
reignty. 4. He intimateth aristocracy, and 
democracy, and the power of parliaments, 
which ms^eth kings, to be nothing but anar- 
chy, for he speaketh here of no government 
but monarchy. 

P. Prelate, — There is need of grace to 
obey the king, Psal. xviii. 43 ; cxliv, 2. It 
is God who subdueth the people under Da- 
vid. Rebellion gainst the kmg is rebellion 
gainst Grod. 1 Pet. ii. 17 ; Prov. xxiv. 12. 
Tnerefore kings have a near alliance with 
God. 

Ans. — 1. There is much grace in papists 
and prelates then, who use to write and 
preacn against grace. 2. Lorinus your bro- 
ther Jesuit wiU, with good warrant of the 
texts infer, that the king may make a con- 
quest of his own kingdoms of Scotland and 
England by the swora, as David subdued the 
heathen. 3J Arbitrary governing hath no 
alliance with Qod ; a rebel to Gk^ and his 
country, and an apostate, hath no reason to 
term lawful defence against cut-throat Irish 
rebellion. 4. There is need of much grace 
to obey pe£tors, inferior judges, masters, fCol. 
iii. 22, 23,^ therefore their power is m>m 
God immediately, and no more from men 
than the king is created king by the people, 
according to the way of roysQists. 

P. Prelate. — God saith of Pharaoh, (Ex. 
ix. 17,) I have raised thee up. Elisha, di- 
rected by Grod, constituted the king of Sy- 
ria, 2 Kings viii. 13. Pharaoh, Abime- 
lech, Hiram, Hazael, Hadad, are no less ^ 



honoured with the appellation of kings, than 
David, Saul, &c., Jer. xxix. 9. * Nebuchad- 
nezzar is honoured to be called, by way of 
excellency, Grod's servant, which Grod givetih 
to David, a king according to his own neart. 
And Isa. xlv. 1, " Thus saith the Lord to 
his anointed, Gyrus ;" and Grod nameth him 
near a hundred years before he was bom ; 
Isa. xliv. 28, " He is my ^epherd ;" Dan. 
V. 21, Grod giveth kingdoms to whom he 
will; Dan. v. 21, empires, kingdoms, roy- 
alties, are not disposed of by tlie composed 
contracts of men, but by the immediate 
hand and work of God ; Hos, xiii. 11, ** I 
gave thee a king in my anger, I took him 
away in my wrath ;" Job, He places kings 
in the throne, &c. 

Ans. — ^Here is a whole chapter of seven 
pages for one raw argument ten times before 
repeated. 1. Exod. ix. 7, I have raised up 
Pharaoh ; Paul expoundeth it, (Bom. ix.) 
to prove that king Pharaoh was a vessel of 
wrath fitted for. destruction by Grod's abso- 
lute will; and the Prelate foUovring Ar- 
minius, with treasonable charity, applieth 
this to our king. Can this man pray for 
the king ? 2. Elisha anointed, but did not 
constitute, Hazael king ; he foretold he 
should be king; and n he be a king of 
Grod's making, who slew his sick prince and 
invaded the mrone by innocent blood, judge 
you, I would not take kings of the Pre- 
late's making. 3. If Grod give to Nebu- 
chadnezzar tne same title or the servant of 
God, which is given to Daniel, (Psal. xviii. 
1, and cxvi. 16 ;) and to Moses, (Jos. i. 2,) 
all kings, because kings, are men according 
to God's heart. Why is not royalty then 
founded on grace ? Nebuchadnezzar was 
not otherwise his servant, than he was the 
hammer of the earth, and a tyrannous con- 
queror of the Lord's people. All the hea- 
tnen kings are called kmss. But how came 
they to their thrones for the most part? 
As David and Hezekiah ? But Grod anoint- 
ed them not by his prophets ; they came to 
their kingdoms by tne people's election, or 
by blood and rapine ; tne latter way is no 
ground to you to deny Athaliah to be a law- 
nil princess — she and Abimelech were law- 
fiil princes, and their sovereignty, as imme- 
diately and independently from God, as the 
sovereignty of many heathen kings. See 
then how justly Athaliah was kiUed as a 
bloody usurper of the throne ; and this 
would licence your brethren, the Jesuits, to 
stab heathen kings, whom you will have as 




well kings, as the Lord's anointed, though 
Nebuchadnezzar and many of them made 
their way to the throne, against all law of 
God and man, through a bloody pitent. 4. 
Gyros is God's anointed and his shepherd 
too, therefore his arbitrary government is 
a sovereignty immediately depending on 
Grod, and above all law; it is a wicked 
consequence. 5. God named Gyrus near 
a hundred years ere he was bom; God 
named and desired Judas very individu- 
ally, and named the ass that Christ should 
ride on to Jerusalem, (Zach. ix. 9,) some 
more hundred years than one. What, will 
the Prelate make them independent kings 
for that? 6. God giveth kingdoms to whom 
he will. What then ? This will prove king- 
doms to be as independent and immediately 
from God as kings are ; for as God givetn 
kings to kingdoms, so he giveth kingdoms 
to kings, and no doubt he giveth kingdoms 
to whom he will. So he giveth prophets, 
apostles, pastors, to whom he will ; and he 
giveth tyrannous conquests to whom he will ; 
and it is Nebuchadnezzar to whom Daniel 
speaketh that from the Lord, and he had 
no just title to many kingdoms, especially 
to the kingdom of Judah, which yet God, 
the King of kings, gave to him because it 
was his good pleasure ; and if God had not 
commanded tnem by the mouth of his pro- 
phet Jeremiah, might they not have risen, 
and, with the swora, have vindicated them- 
selves and their own liberty, no less than 
they lawfully, by the sword, vindicated 
themselves from under Moab, (Judges iii.,) 
and from under Jabin, king of Canaan, 
who, twenty years, mightily oppressed the 
children of Israel, Judges iv. Now this P. 
Prelate, by all these instances, making hea- 
then kings to be kings by as good a title as 
David and Hezekiah, condemneth the peo- 
ple of Grod as rebels, if, being subdued and 
conquered by the Turk and Spanish king, 
they should, by the sword, recover their 
own liberty; and that Israel, and the sa- 
viours which God raised to them, had not 
warrant from the law of nature to vindicate 
themselves to liberty, which was taken from 
them violently and unjustly by the sword. 
From all this it shall well follow that the 
tyranny of bloody conquerors is immediately 
and only dependent firom God, no less than 
lawM sovereignty ; for Nebuchadnezzar's 
sovereignty over the people of God, and 
many other kingdoms also, was revenged of 
(}od as tyranny, Jer. 1. 6, 7 ; and therefore 



the vengeance of the Lord, and the ven- 

feance of his temple, came upon him and 
is land, Jer. 1. 16, &c. It is true the peo- 
ple of God were commanded of €rod to sub- 
mit to the king of Babylon, to serve him, 
and to pray for nim, and to do the contrary 
was rebellion ; but this was not because the 
king of Babylon was their king, and because 
the King of Babylon had a command of Grod 
so to bring under his yoke the people of God. 
So Christ had a commandment to suffer the 
death of the cross, (John x, 18,) but had 
Herod and Pilate any warrant to crucify 
him? None at all. 7. He saith. Royal- 
ties, even of heathen kings, are not disposed 
of by the composed contracts of men, but by 
the immediate hand and work of Gk)d. But 
the contracts of men to give a kingdom to a 
person, which a heathen community may 
lawfully do, and so by contract dispose of a 
kingdom, is not opposite to the immediate 
hand of God, appointing royalty and mo- 
narchy at his own blessed liberty. Lastly 
he saith, God took away Saul in his wrath ; 
but I pray you, did God only do it ? Then 
had Saul, because a king, a patent royal 
from God to kill himself^ for so God took 
him away ; and we are rebels by this, if we 
suffer not the king to kill himself. Well 
pleaded. 



QUESTION VI. 

WHETHER THE KING BE SO FROM GOD ONLY, 
BOTH IN REGARD OF HIS SOVEREIGNTY AND 
OF THE DESIGNATION OF HIS PERSON TO 
THE CROWN, AS THAT HE IS NO WAY FROM 
THE PEOPLE, BUT BY MERE APPROBATION. 

Dr Feme, a man much for monarchy, 
saith, Though monarchy hath its excel- 
lency, being first set up of God, in Moses, 
yet neither monarchy, aristocracy, nor any 
other form, is jure divino^ but " we say 
(saith heV- the power itself, or that suffi- 
ciency of authority to govern that is in a 
monarchy or aristocracy, abstractly consi- 
dered from the qualification of other forms, 
is a flux and constitution subordinate to that 
providence ; an ordinance of that dixi or si- 
lent word by which the world was made, 
and shall be governed under God." This 
is a great debasing of the Lord's anointed, 
1 1 II ^^^^^ . " 

1 Dr Feme, 3, 8. la 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



17 



for sa sovereignty hath no warrant in God's 
word, formalfy as it is sach a government, 
hut is in the world bj providence, as sin is, 
and as the falling of a sparrow to the ground : 
whereas God's word hath not only command- 
ed that ffovemment should be, but that fa* 
thers ana mothers should be ; and not only 
that politic rulers should be, but tiso kings 
by name, and other judges aristocratic^ 
should be. Bom. xiii. 3 ; Dent, xvii. 14 ; 
1 Pet. ii, xvii, ; Prov. xxiv, 21 ; Prov. xv. 
16, If the power of monarchy and aristo- 
cracy, abstracted from the forms, be firom 
Grod, then it is no more lawful to resist aris- 
tocratical government and our lords of par- 
liament or judges, than it is lawful to resist 
kings. 

nut hear the Prelate's reasons to prove 
that the king is from the people by appro- 
bation only, *' The people (Deut, xvii.) are 
said to set a king over them only as (1 Cor. 
vi.) the saints are said to judge the world, 
that is, by consenting to Cmist s judgment : 
80 the people do not make a king by trans- 
ferring on him sovereignty, but by accept- 
ing, acknowledging, and reverencing him as 
king, whom G^ nath both constituted and 
designed king." 

Ans.^^h This is said, but not a word 
proved, fer the Queen of Sheba and Hiram 
acknowledged, reverenced and obeyed Solo* 
mon as kmg, and yet they made him not 
king, BS the princes of Israel did. 2, Beve- 
rence and obedience of the people is relative 
to the king's laws, but the people's making 
of a king is not relative to the laws of a 
king ; for then he should be a king giving 
laws and commanding the people as king, 
before the people m^e him king, 3, If 
the people's approving and oonsenting that 
an elected kin^ be their king, presupposeth 
that he is a kmg, designed and constituted 
by God, before the people approve him as 
kdnff, let the P, Prelate give us an act of 
Gol now designing a man king, for there 
is no immediate voice hxm heaven saying 
to a peor4e. This is your king, before the 
people elect one of six to be their king. 
And this in&llibly proveth that Grod de- 
signeth one of six to be a king, to a people 
wno had no king before, by no other act but 
by determining the hearts of the states to 
elect and des^ this man king, and pass 
any of the other five, 4, When Gk)d (Deut, 
xvii.) forbiddeth them to choose a stranger, 
he presupposeth they may choose a stran- 
ger ; for God's tew now given to man in the 



state of sin, presupposeth he hath corruption 
of nature to do contrary to Grod's kw. Now 
if God did hold forth that their setting a 
king over them was but the people's approv- 
ing the man whom God shall both consti- 
tute and design to be king, then he should 
presuppose that God was to design a stran- 
ger to be the tew^ king of Israel, and the 
people should be interdicted to approve and 
consent that the man should be kmg whom 
God should choose; for it was impossible that 
the people should make a stranger king (God 
is the only immediate king-creator), the peo- 
ple should only approve and consent that a 
stranger should be Jdng ; yet, upon supposi- 
tion uiat Grod first constituted and designed 
the stranger king, it was not in the people's 
power that the kmg should be a brother ra- 
ther than a stranger, for if the people have 
no power to make a king, but do onlv ap- 
prove him or consent to him, when he is 
both made and designed of Grod to be king, 
it is not in their power that he be either 
brother or stranger, and so Grod command- 
eth what is simp^ impossible. Consider the 
sense of the command by the Prelate's vain 
logic: I Jehovah, as I only create the world 
ofnothing, so I only constitute and design a 
man, whether a Jew or Nebuchadnezzar, a 
stranger, to be your king ; yet I inhibit you, 
under the pain of my curse, that you set 
any king over yourselves, but only a brother. 
What is this, but I inhibit you to be crea- 
tors by omnipotent power ? 5. To these 
add the reasons I produced before, that the 
people, by no shaclow of reason, can be com- 
manded to make this man king, not that 
man, if they only consent to the man niade 
king, but have no action in the making of 
the Jdng. 

P. Prelate. — All the acts, real and ima- 
ginable, which are necessary for the making 
of kings, are ascribed to God. Take the 
first kmg as a ruling case, 1 Sam. xii. 13, 
^' Behold the king whom ye have chosen, 
and whom ye have desired; and, behold, 
the Lord hath set a king over you !" This 
election of the people can be no other but 
their admittance or acceptance of the king 
whom Grod hath chosen and constituted, as 
the words, " whom ye have chosen," imply. 
1 Sam. ix. 17 ; 1 Sam. x, 1, You have 
Saul's election and constitution, where Sa- 
muel, as priest and prophet, anointeth him, 
doing reverence and obeisance to him,, and 
ascribing to God, that he did appoint him 
supreme and sovereign over his iimerltance. 



E 



kAri^i^M^i** 



18 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



And the same expression is, (1 Sam. xii. 
18,) ** The Lord hath set a king over you ;" 
which is, Psal. ii. 6, " I have set my king 
upon my holy hill of Zion." Neither man 
nor angel hath any share in any act of con- 
stituting Christ king. Deut. xvii. the Lord 
vindicateth, as proper and peculiar to him- 
self, the designation of the person. It was 
not arbitrary to the people to admit or reject 
Saul so designed. It pleased God to con- 
summate the work by the acceptation, con^ 
sent and approbation of the people, ut sua-* 
more modo, that by a smoother way he might 
encourage Saul to undergo the hard charge, 
and make his people the more heartily, with-> 
out grumbling and scruple, reverence and 
obey him. The people's admittance possi- 
bly added something to the solemnity and 
to the pomp, but nothing to the essential 
and real constitution or necessity; it only 
puts the subjects in mala Jide, if they 
should contravene, as the intimation of a 
law, the coronation of an hereditary king, 
the enthronement of a bishop. And 1 Kings, 
iii. 7, " Thou hast made thy servant king;" 
1 Sam. xvi. 1, " I have provided me a king;" 
Psal. xviii. 60, He is God's king ; Ps. Ixxxix. 
19, " I have exalted one chosen out of the 

eople ;" (ver. 20,) He anointeth them ; 

ver. 27,) adopteth them : " I will make him 
my first-bom." The first-bom is above every 
brother severally, and above all, though a 
thousand jointly. 

Ans, — 1. By this reason, inferior judges 
are no less immediate deputies of God, and 
so irresistible, than the xing, because God 
took off the spirit that was on Moses, and 
immediately poured it on the seventy elders, 
who were judges inferior to Moses, Num. ii. 
14 — 16. 2. This P. Prelate cannot make a 
syllogism. If all the acts necessary to make 
a king be ascribed to God, none to the peo- 
ple, then God both constituteth and design- 
eth the king — ^but the former the Scrip- 
ture saith ; merefore, if all the acts be as- 
cribed to God, as to the prime king-maker 
and disposer of kings and kingdoms, and 
none to the people, in that notion, then God 
both constituteth and designeth a king. 
Both major and minor are false. The ma- 
jor is as false ajs the very P. Prelate him- 
self. All the acts necessary for war-mak^ 
ing are, in an eminent manner, ascribed to 
God, as (1.) The Lord fighteth for his own 
people. (2.) The Lord scattered the ene- 
mies. (3.) The Lord slew Og, king of Ba- 
shan. (4.) The battle is the Lord's. (6.) 



f 



The victory the Lord's; therefore Israel 
never fought a battle. So Deut. xxxii.. 
The Lord alone led his people — the Lord 
led them in the wilderness — their bow and 
their sword gave them not the land. God 
wrought all Sieir works for them, (Isa. xxvi. 
12 ;) therefore Moses led them not ; there- 
fore the people went not on their own legs 
through the wilderness; therefore the people 
never shot an arrow, never drew a sword. It 
followeth not. God did all ttiese as the first, 
eminent, principal, and efficacious pre^eter'- 
minator of the creature (though this Armi- 
nian and popish prelate mind not so to hon- 
our God). The assumption is also false, for 
the people made Saul and David kings ; and 
it were ridiculous that God should command 
them to make a brother, not a stranger, king, 
if it was not in their power whether ne should 
be a Jew, a Scythian, an Ethiopian, who was 
their king, if God did only, without t^em, 
both choose, constitute, design the person, 
and perform all acts essential to make a 
king ; and the people had no more in them 
but only to admit and consent, and that for 
the solemnity and pomp, not for the essen- 
tial constitution of the king. 1 Sam. ix. 
17; 1 Sam. x. 1, we have not Saul elect- 
ed and constituted king. Samuel did obeis- 
ance to him and kissed him, for the honour 
royal which God was to put upon him ; for, 
before this proj)hetical unction, (1 Sam. ix, 
22,) he made him sit in the chief place, and 
honoured him as king, when as yet Samuel 
was materially king and the Lord's vice- 
gerent in Israel. If, then, the Prelate con^ 
elude any thing from Samuel's doing reve- 
rence and obeisance to him as king, it shall 
follow that Saul was formally king, before 
Samuel (1 Sam. x. 1) anointed him and 
kissed him, and tl^at must be before he was 
formally Mng, otherwise he was in God's 
appointment king, before ever he saw Sa- 
muel's face ; and it is true he ascribeth hon- 
our to him, as to one appointed by God to 
be supreme sovereign, for that which he 
should be, not for that which he was, as 
(1 Sam. ix. 22) he set him in the chief 

Elace; and, therefore, it is false ^at we 
ave Saul's election and constitution to be 
king, (1 Sam. x.,) for after that time the 
people are rebuked for seeking a king, and 
that with a purpose to dissuade them fi:om 
it as a sinful desire : and he is chosen by 
lots after that and made king, and after Sa- 
muel's anointing of him he was a private 
man, and did hide himself amongst the stuff. 



THE LAW A2n> THE PRINCE. 



19 



ver. 22. 3. The Prelate, from ignorance or 
vdlfuUy, I know not, saith, The expreaiion 
and phrase is the same, 1 Sam. xii. 13, and 
Psal. ii. 6, which is false ; for 1 Sam. xii, 13, 

it is ^*?D DySy mn» ma • mm 

Behold the Lord hath given you a king, 
such is the expression ; Hos. xiii. 11, 1 gave 
them a king in my wrath, hut that is not the 

expression in Psalm ii, 6, hut this, O /D 
*nDD3 ONI "But I have estabhshed 
him my king;" and though it were the 
same expression, it followeth not that the 
people Imve no hand any other way in ap- 
pointing Christ their head, (though that 
phrase also be in the Word, Hos. i. 11,) 
than by consenting and believing in him as 
king ; but this proveth not that the people, 
in appointing a king, hath no hand but na- 
ked approbation, for the same phrase doth 
not express the same action ; nay, the judges 
are to kiss Christ, (Psal. ii. 12,) the same 
way, and by the same action, that Samuel 
kissed Saul, (1 Sam. x. 1,) and the idolaters 
kissed the calves, (Hos. xiii. 2 ;) for the same 
Hebrew word is used in all the three places, 
and yet it it certain the first kissing is spiri- 
tual, the second a kiss of honour, and the 
third an idolatrous kissing. 4. The anoint- 
ing of Saul cannot be a leading rule to the 
making of all kings to the wond's end ; for 
the P. Prelate, forgetting himself, said, that 
only some few, as Moses, Saul, and David, 
&c., by extraordinary manifestation from 
heaven, were made kings, (p. 19.) 5. He 
saith it was not arbitrary for the people to 
admit or reject Saul so designed. What 
meaneth he. It was not morally arbitrary, 
because they were under a law (Deut. xvii. 
14, 15) to make him king whom the Lord 
should choose. That is true. But was it 
not arbitrary to them to break a law phy- 
sically ? I think he, who is a professed Ar- 
minian, will not so side with Manicheans 
and fatalists. But the P. Prelate must prove 
it was not arbitrary, either morally or phy- 
sically, to them not to accept Saul as their 
king, because they had no action at all in 
the making of a king. God did it all, both 
by constituting and designing the king. 
Why then did God (Deut. xvii!) give a law 
to them to make this man king, not that 
man, if it was not in their free wiU to have 
any action or hand in the making of a king 
at all ? But that some sons of Belial would 
not accept him as their king, is expressly 
said, (1 Sam. x. 27 ;) and how did Israel 



conspire with Absalom to unking and de- 
throne David, whom the Lord nad made 
king ? If the Prelate mean it was not arbi- 
trary to them physically to reject Saul, he 
speaketh wonders ; the sons of iBelial did re- 
ject him, therefore they had physical power 
to do it. If he mean it was not arbitrary, 
that is, it was not lawful to them to reject 
him, that is true ; but doth it follow they 
had no hand nor action in making Saul 
king, because it was not lawful for them to 
make a king in a sinful way, and to re^e 
him whom God choose to be king ? Then 
see what I infer. (1.) That they had no 
hand in obeying him as king, because they 
sinned in obeymg unlawful commandments 
against God's law, and so they had no hand 
in approving and consenting he should be 
king ; the contrary whereof the P. Prelate 
saith. (2.) So might the P. Prelate prove 
men are passive, and have no action in vio- 
lating all the commandments of Grod, be- 
cause it is not lawful to them to violate any 
one commandment. 6. The Lord (Deut. 
xvii.) vindicates this, as proper and peculiar 
to himself, to choose the person, and to 
choose Saul. What then ? Therefore now 
the people, choosing a king, have no power 
to choose or name a man, because God 
anointed Saul and David by immediate 
manifestation of his will to Samuel ; this 
consequence is nothing, and also it follow- 
eth in nowise, that therefore the people 
made not Saul king. 7. That the people's 
approbation of a kmg is not necessary, is the 
saying of Bellarmine and the papists, and 
that tne people choose their ministers in the 
apostolic church, not by a necessity of a di- 
vine commandment, but to conciliate love 
betwixt pastor and people. Papists hold 
that if tne Pope msike a popish king the 
head and king of Britain, agsunst the peo- 
ple's will, yet is he their king. 8. David 
was then kmg all the time Saul persecuted 
him. He sinned, truly, in not discharging 
the duty of a king, only because he wanted 
a ceremony, the people's approbation, which 
the Prelate saith is required to the solemnity 
and pomp, not to the necessity, and truth, 
and essence, of a formal king. So the king's 
coronation oath, and the people's oath, must 
.be ceremonies; and because the Prelate is 
perjured himself, therefore perjury is but a 
ceremony also. 9. The. enthronement of 
bishops is Uke the kinging of the Pope. The 
apostles must spare thrones when they come 
to heaven, (Luke xxii. 29, 30 ;) the popish 



20 



LEX, REX ; OR) 



prelates, with theii* head the Pope, must be 
enthroned. 10. The hereditary king he 
niaketh a king before his coronation^ and 
his acts are as valid before as after his coro* 
nation. It might cost him his head to say 
that the Prince of Wales is now king of 
Britain, and his acts acts of kingly royalty^ 
no less than our sovereign is king of Britain, 
if laws and parliaments nad their own vigour 
from royal authority. 1 1 . I allow that kings 
be as high as God hath placed them, but 
that Grod said of all kings, ** I will make him 
my first-born/' &c., Pral. Ixzzix. 26, 27,' — 
which is true of Solomon as the type, 2 Sam. 
vii. ; 1 Chron. xvii. 22; 2 Sam. vu, 12 ; and 
fiilfilled of Christ) and by the Holy Ghost 
spoken of him, (Heb. i. 6, 6,)— is blasphem- 
ous ; for God said not to Nero, Julian^ tHo* 
clesian, Belshazzar, £vil-merodach, who were 
lawful kings, " I will mi^e him my first* 
bom ;" and that any of these blasphemous 
idolatrous princes should cry to God, " He 
is my fadier, my Grod," &c., is divinity well* 
beseeming an excommunicated prelate. Of 
the king°s dignity above the kingdom I 
speak not now } the Prelate pulled it in by 
the hair, but hereafter we shall hear of it. 

P. Prelate (p. 43, 44). — God only anoin- 
ted David, (1 Sam. xvi. 4,) the men of Beth- 
lehem, yea, Samuel knew it not before. God 
saith, " With mine holy oil have I anointed 
him," Psal. Ixxxix. 91 . 1 . He is the Lord's 
anointed^ 2. The oil is Grod's, not from the 
apothecary's shop, nor the priest's viaJ^ — ^this 
on descended frota the Holy Ghost, who is 
no less the true olive than Girist is the true 
vine ; yet not the oil of saving grax^e, as some 
fantastics say, but holy. (1.) From the au- 
thor, God. (2.) From influence in the per- 
son, it maketli the person of the king sacred. 
(3.) From influence on his charge^ his fimc- 
tion and power is sacred. 

Ans. — 1. The Prelate said before, David's 
anointing was extraordinary ; here he draw- 
eth this anointing to all kings. 2. Let Da- 
vid be formally both constituted and design- 
ed king divers years before the states made 
him king at Hebron, and then (1.) Saul was 
not king, — the Prelate wiU term that trea- 
son, (2.) This was a dry oil. David's per- 
son was not made sacred, nor his authority 
sacred by it, for he remained a private man, 
and called Saul his king, his master, and 
himself a subject. (3.) This oil was, no 
doubt, Grod's oil, and the Prelate will have 
it the Holy Ghost's, yet he denieth that 
saving grace, yea, (p. 2. c. i.) he denieth 



that any supernatural gift should be the 
foundation of royal di?mty, and that it is 
a pernicious tenet, do to me he would 
have the oil from heaven, and yet not from 
heaven. (4.) This hcAj oil, wherewith Da- 
vid was anointed, (Psal* Ixxxix. 20,) is the 
oil of saving grace ;^ his own dear brethren, 
the papists, say so, and especially Lyranus,* 
Glossa ordinaria, Hugo C^rdinalis,' his be- 
loved Beilarmine, and Lorinus, Galvin, Mus- 
culus, Marl(»*atus. If these be fanatics, if as 
I think they are to the Prelate,) yet tke 
text is evident that this oil of God was the 
oil of saving grace, bestowed on David as on 
a spedal t3rpe of Christ, who received the 
Spirit above measure, and Ivas the anointed 
of God, (Psal. xlv, 7,) whereby all his "gar- 
ments smell of myrrh, aloes and cassia," (ver. 
6,) and '* his name Messiah is as ointment 
poured out, (Song, i.) This anointed shall be 
head of his enemies. " His dominion shall 
be fiK>m the sea to the rivers,^' ver. 25. He 
is in the covenant of grace, ver. 26. He is 
*^ higher than the kings of the earth." The 
grace of perseverance is promised to his 
seed, ver. 28'^80. His kingdom is eternal 
" as the days of heaven," ver. 85, 86. If 
the Prelate will look under himself to Dio- 
<[atus and Ainsworth,^ this holy oil was 
poured on David by Samuel, and on Ghrist 
was poured the Holy Ghost, and that by 
warrant of Scripture, (1 Sam. xvi. 1 ; xiii. 
14 ; Luke iv. 18, 21 ; John iii. 84,) and 
Junius^ and MoUerus* saith with them. 
Now the Prelate taketh the court way, to 
pour this oil of grace on many dry princes, 
who, without all doubt, are kings essentially 
no less than David. He must see bett^ 
than the man who, finding Pontius Pilate in 
the Creed, said, he behooved to be a good 
man ; so, because he hath found Kero the 
tyrant, Julian the apostate, Nebuchadnez- 
zar, £vil-merodach, Hazael, Hagag, all the 
kings of Spain, and, I doubt not, the Great 
Tuft, in rsal. Ixxxix. 19, 20, so all tkese 
kings are anointed with the oil of grace, and 
all these must make their enemies' necks 
their footstool. All these be higher than 
the kings of the earth, and are nard and 
fast in the covenant of grace, &c. 



.MSB«iidlrikiMlB 



1 Aug. in locnm, nnki maniim forteni, serrum 
obedientexn ideo in eo posni ftdjntorinm. 

9 Lyranns Gratia 68t habitnalis, quia Btat pngil 
contra diabolnm. 

s Hngo Cardinalis, Oleo latitiae quo pras oonsor- 
tibns nnctns fnit Christns, Pa, llr. 

* Ains worth, Annot. 

Junius Annot. in loc. • MoUettts Com. lb. 



THB LAW AXD THE PRINCE. 



21 



P. Prelate. — All the royal ensigns and 
acts of kings are ascribed to God. The 
crown is ot Grod, Isa. bdi. 3 ; Fsal. xxi. 3. 
In the em^^eron^ coin was a hand patting a 
erown on their head. The heathen said 
they were ^Mmfuf , as holding their crowns 
&om God. Fsal. xviii. 39, Thou hast ^rt 
me with strength (the sword is the emblem 
of strength) unto battle. See Judff. vii. 17, 
Their sceptre God's sceptre. £xod. iv. 20 ; 
Tm. 9, We read of two rods, Moses' and 
Aaron's ; Aaron's rod budded : G^ made 
both the rods. Their judgment is the Lord's, 
2 C^iroB. xix. 6 ; their throne is God's, 1 
Giron. xix. 21. The fathers called them, 
sacra vestigia^ sacra majestas, — ^their oom- 
mandment, divalis jussto* The law saith, 
all their goods are res sacras. Therefore 
our new statists disgrace kings, if they bias- 
pheme not God, in makmg them the deri- 
vativeB of the people, — the basest extract (^ 
the basest of irrational creatures, the multi- 
tude, the commonalty. 

Aiujs, — This is all one argument from the 
Prelate's beginning of his book to the end : 
In a most special and eminent act of God's 
pravidence xings are from God ; but, there- 
fore, they are not from men and men's con* 
sent. It foUoweth not. From a most spe- 
cial and eminent act of God's providence 
Christ came into the world, and took on 
him our nature, therefore he came not of 
David's loins. It is a vain consequence. 
Th^re could not be a more eminent act 
than this, (Fsal. xl.) " A body thou hast 
given me;" therefore he came not of Da- 
vid's house, and from Adam by natural 
generation, and was not a man like us in all 
things except sin. It is tyrannical and do- 
mineering logic. Many (imigB are ascribed 
to God only, by reascm c« a special and ad- 
mirable act of providence,-'-<a8 the saving of 
the world by Christ, the giving of Caiman 
to Israel, the bringing his people out from 
Egypt and from Chaldee, the sending of the 
gospel to both Jew and G-entile, &c. ; but, 
mm we say that Grod did none of these 
things by tiie ministry of men, and weak 
and trail men? 1, How proveth the Pre- 
late that all royal ensigns are ascribed to 
God, because (Isa. Ixii.) the church univer- 
sal shall be as a crown of glory and a royal ; 
diadem in the hand of the Lord ; therefore, 
bcBcultis in angulo, the church shall be as a 
seal on the heart of Christ. What then ? 
Jerome, Procopius, Cyrillus, with ^od rea- 
son, render the meaning thus: Thou, 



Zion and church, shalt be to me a royal 
priesthood, and a holv people. For that he 
speaketh of his own kingdom and church is 
most evident, (ver. 1, 2,) " For Zion's sake 
I will not hold my peace," &c. 2. Grod 
put a crovm of pure gold on David's head, 
(Psal. xxi. 3,) therefore Julian, Nero, and 
no elective kings, are made and designed to 
be kings by the people. He shaU never 
prove this consequence* The Chaldee pa- 
raphrase applietn it to the reign of Kmg 
Messiah ; Diodatus speaketh of we kingdom 
of Christ; Ainsworth noaketh this crown 
a sign of CSirist's victory ; Athanasius, £u- 
sebius, Origen, Augustine, Dydimus, ex- 
pound it of Cluist and his kingdom. The 
rrekte extendeth it to all kmgs, as the 
blasphemous rabbins, especially Rabbin Salo- 
mon, deny that he speaketh of Christ here. 
But what more reason is there to expound 
this of the crowns of all kings given by God, 
(which I deny not,) to Nero, Julian, &c., 
than to expound the foregoing and following 
verses as appUed to all kmgs ? Did Julian 
rejoice in God's salvation? did God grant 
Nero his heart's desire ? did Grod grant (as 
it is, ver. 4,) life eternal to heathen kings as 
kings ? which words all interpreters expound 
of me etemitv of David's throne, tiU Christ 
come, and of victory and life eternal pur- 
chased by Christ, as Ainsworth, with good 
reason, expounds it. And what though Grod 
gave David a crown, was it not by second 
causes, and by bowing all Israel's heart to 
come in sincerity to Hebron to make Da- 
vid king ? 1 Kings xii. 38. God gave com 
and wine to Israel, (Hos. ii.) and shall the 
prelate and the anabaptist infer, therefore, 
he giveth it not by plou^ng, sowing, and 
the art of the husbandman ? 3. The hea- 
then acknowledgeth a divinity in kings, but 
he is blind who readeth them and seeth not 
in thmr writings that they teach that the 
people maketh kings. 4. God girt David 
with strength, while he was a private man, 
and persecuted bv Saul, and fought with 
Golian, as the title of the same beareth; 
and he made him a valiant man of war, to 
break bows of steel ; therefore he ^veth the 
sword to kings as kings, and they receive no 
sword from me people. This is poor logic. 
5. The P. Prelate sendeth us (Judg. vii. 
17,) to the singular and extraordinary power 
of God with Gideon ; and, I say, that same 
power behooved to be in Oreb and Zeeb, 
(ver. 27,) for they were ♦njj^ princes, and 
such as the Prelate, from Prov, vii. 15, 




saith have no power from the people. 6* 
Moses' and Aaron's rods were miraculous. 
This will prove that priests are also God's, 
and their persons sacred. I see not (except 
the Prelate would he at worshipping of re-^ 
lies) what more royal divinity is in Moses' 
rod, because he wrought miracles by his rod, 
than there is in Eujah's staff, in Peter's 
napkin, in Paul's shadow* This is like the 
strong symbolical theology of his fathers the 
Jesuits, which is not argumentative, except 
he say that Moses, as king of Jeshurun, 
wrought miracles ; and why should not Neg- 
ro's, Caligula's, Pharaoh's, and all kings' 
rods then dry up the Red Sea, and work 
miracles? 7. We give all the styles to 
kings that the fathers gave, and yet we 
think not when David commandeth to kill 
Uriah, and a king commandeth to murder 
his innocent subjects in England and Scot- 
land, that that is divalis jussio, the com* 
mand of a god ; and that this is a good con- 
sequence — -Whatever the king Commandeth, 
though it were to kill his most loyal sub- 
jects, is the commandment of Grod ; there- 
foi-e the king is not made king by the peo- 
ple. 8. Therefore, saith he, these new sta- 
tists disgrace the king. If a new statist, 
sprung out of a poor pursuivant of Crail — 
from Sie dunghill to the court — could have 
made himself an old statist, and more ex- 
pert in state affairs than all the nobles and 
soundest lawyers in Scotland and England, 
this might have more weight* 9» Thei'e- 
fbre the king (saith P. P.) is not "the ex- 
tract of the basest of rational creatures*" 
He meanethj fex populiy his dwn house and 
lineage ; but God calleth them his own peo- 
ple, '* a royal priesthood j a chosen genera- 
tion ;" and Psal. Ixxviii. 71, will warrant 
us to say, the people is much worthier be- 
fore God than one man, seeing God chose 
David for " Jacob his people, and Israel his 
inheritance," that he might feed them. 
John Pi P*'s father's suffrage in making a 
king will never be sought. We make not 
the multitude) but the three estates, includ>- 
ing the nobles and gentry, to be as rational 
creatures as any apostate prelate in the 
three kingdoms* 



QUESTION VII. 

WHETHER Oft NO THE POPISH PRELATE, THE 
AFORESAID AUTHOR, DOTH BY FORCE OP 
REASON EVINCE THAT NEITHER CONSTITU- 
TION NOR DESIGNATION OF THE KING IS 
FROM THE PEOPLE* 

The P. Prelate aimeth (but it is an 
empty aim) to prove that the people are 
wholly excluded. I answer* only arguments 
not pitched on before, as the Prelate saith. 

Jr. Prelate, — 1. To whom can it be more 
proper to give the rule over men than to 
Him who is the only king truly and properly 
of the whole world ? 2. God is the imme- 
diate author of all rule and power that is 
amongst all his creatures, above of below* 
3. Man before the fall received dominion 
and empire over all the creatures below im- 
mediately, as Gen. i. 28 ; Gen. ix. 2 ; there- 
fore we cannot deny that the most noble 
government (to wit monarchy) must be im- 
mediately from Grod, without any contract 
ot compact of men. 

AnSi — 1. The first reason ooncltideth not 
what is in question; for God only giveth 
rule. and power to one man over another; 
therefore he giveth it immediately. It fol- 
loweth not. 2. It shall as well prove that 
God doth immediately constitute all judges, 
and therefore it shall be unlawful for a city 
to appoint a mayor, or a diire a justice of 
peace* 3. The second argument is in- 
consequent also, because God in creation is 
the immediate author of all things, and, 
therefore, without consent of the creatures, 
or any act of the creature^ created an angel 
a nobler creature than man, and a man than 
a woman, and men above beasts; because 
those that are not can exercise no act at all. 
But it followeth not that all the works of 
providence, such as is the government of 
kingdoms, are done immediately by God; 
for m the works of providence, for the most 
part in ordinaryj God worketh by means. 
It is then as good a consequence as this: 
Grod immediately created man, therefore he 
keepeth his Hfe immediately also without 
food and sleep ; Grod immediately created 
the sun, therefore God immediately, without 
the mediation of the sun, giveth light to the 
world. The making of a king is an act of 
reason, and God hath given a man reason to 
rule himself; and therefore hath given to a 
society an instinct of reason to appoint a 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



23 



governor over theinselves ; but no act of rea- 
son goeth before man be created, therefore 
it is not in his power whether he be created 
a creature of greater power than a beast or 
no. 4. Grod by creation gave power to a 
man over the creatures, and so immediately ; 
but I hope men cannot say, God by creation 
hath made a man king over men. 5. The 
excellency of monarchy (if it be more excels 
lent than any other government, of which 
hereafler) is no ground why it should be im^* 
mediately from Uod as well as man's domi* 
nion over the creature ; for then the work 
of man's redemption, being more excellent 
than the raising of Lazarus, should have 
been done immediately without the incar^ 
nation, death and satiaaction of Christ, (for 
no act of Grod without himself is comparable 
to the work of redemption, 1 Pet. i. 11, 12 ; 
GoL i. 18 — 22,) and God's less excellent 
works, as his creating of beasts ^nd worms, 
should have been done mediately, and his 
creating of man immediately. 

P. Prelate, — They who execute the judg-* 
ment of God must needs have the power to 
judge from God ; but kings are deputies in 
the exercise of the judgments of God, there- 
fore the proposition is proved. How is it 
imaginable that Grod reconcileth the world 
by ministers, and saveth man by them, (1 
Cor. V. ; 1 Tim. iv, 16,) except they receive 
a power so to do from Grod ? The assump- 
tion is, (Deut. i. 17 ; 1 Chron, xix. 6,) Let 
none say Moses ai^d Jehosaphat spake of in- 
ferior judges ; for that which the king doth 
to others he doth by himself. Also, the 
execution of the kingly power is from Grod ; 
for the king is the servant, angel, legate, 
minister of God, Bom. xiii. 6, 7. God pro- 
perly and primarily is King, and King of 
kings, and Lord of lords (1 Tim. vi. 16 ; 
Eev. i. 6) ; all kings, related to him, are 
kin^ equivocally, and in resemblance, and 
he me only King, 

An8,'—r\^ That which is in question is 
never concluded, to wit, that " the king is 
both immediately constituted and designed 
king by God only, and not by the mediation 
of the people ;" for when God reconcileth 
and saveth men by pastors, he saveth them 
by the 'intervening action of men ; so he 
scourgeth his people by men as by his sword, 
(Psal, xvii. 14,) hand, staff, rod, (Isa. x, 5,) 
and his hammer. Doth it follow that Goa 
only dpth immediately scourge his people, 
and that wicked men hav^ no more hand 
and action in scourging his people than the 



Prelate saith the people hath a hand in 
making a king ? and that is no hand at all 
by the Prelate's way. 2. We may borrow 
the Prelate's argument : — Inferior judges 
execute the judgment of the Lord, ^nd 
not the judgment of the king ; therefore, 
by the Prelate's argument, C^ doth only 
by immediate power execute judgment in 
them, and the mferior judges are not God's 
ministers, executing the judgment of the 
Lord. But the conclusion is against all 
truth, and so must the Prelate's argument 
be ; and that inferior judges are the imme- 
diate substitutes and deputies of Grod, is 
hence proved, and shall be hereafter made 
good, if God will. 3. God is properly King 
of kings, so is Grod properly causa causa- 
rumj Sie Cause of causes, the Life of lifes, 
the Joy of joys. What ! shall it then fol- 
low that he worketh nothing in the crea- 
tures by their mediation aa causes? Be- 
cause God is Light of lights, doth he not 
enlighten the earth and air by the media- 
tion of the sun ? Then God communicateth 
not life mediately by generation, he causeth 
not his saints to rejoice, with joy unspeak- 
able and glorious, by the intervening medi- 
ation of the Word. These ar^ vain conse- 
quences. Sovereignty, and all power and 
virtue is in God infinitely; and what vir- 
tue and power of 'action is in the creatures, 
as they are compared with Grod, are in 
the creatures equivocally and in resem- 
blance, and «««*« iciiin in opinion rather than 
really. Hence it must follow that second 
causes work none at all, — ^no more than the 
people hath a hand or action in makingthe 
xing, and that is no hand at all, as the Pre- 
late saith. And God only and immediately 
worketh all works in the creatures, because 
both the power of working and actual work- 
ing Cometh irom God, and the creatures, in 
all their working, are God's instruments. 
And if the Prelate argue so frequently fropi 
power given of Grod, to prove that actual 
reigning is from Grod immediately ,'^^Deut. 
viii. 18, The Lord ** giveth the power to 
get wealth,"-^wiU it foUpw that Isr3«l get- 
teth no riches at all, or that God doth not 
mediately by them and their industry get 
them ? I think not. 

P. Prelate,^^To whom can it be due to 
give the kingly office but to Him only who 
IS able to give the endowment and ability 
for th^ office ? Now God only and imme- 
diately giveth ability to be a king, as the 
sacramental anointing proveth, Josh. iii. 10. 



-rrsf 



24 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



Othniel is the first judge after Joshua ; and 
it is said, " And the Spirit of the Lord 
came upon him, and he judged Israel :" the 
like is said of Saul and Dayid. 

Ans, — 1. God gare royal endowments 
immediately, therefore he immediately now 
maketh the king. It foUoweth not, for the 
species of government is not that which for- 
mally constituteth a king, for then Nero, Ca- 
ligula, Julian, should not have heen kings ; 
and those who come to the crown by con- 
quest and blood, are essentially kings, as the 
Prelate saith. But be all these Othniels upon 
whom the Spirit of the Lord cometh ? Then 
they are not essentially kings who are babes 
and children, and foolish sum. destitute of the 
royal endowments ; but it is one thing to have 
a royal gift, and another thing to be formally 
called to the kingdom. I)avid had royal 
gifts aftier Samuel anointed him, but if you 
make him king, before Saul's death, Saul 
was both a traitor all the time that he per- 
secuted David, and so no king, and also king 
and God's anointed, as Davia acknowledgetn 
him ; and, therefore, that spirit that came 
on David and Saul, maketh nothing against 
the people's election of a king, as the Spirit 
of God is given to pastws under the New 
Testament, as Christ promised ; but it will 
not follow that the designation of the man 
who is to be pastor shomd not be from the 
church and from men, as the Prelate denieth 
that either the constitution or designation of 
the king is ftom the people, but trom God 
only. 2. I beHeve the inftision of the Spi- 
rit of God upon the judges will not prove 
that kings are now both constituted and de- 
signed of God solely, only, and immediately; 
for the judges were indeed immediately, and 
for the most part extraordinarily, raised up 
of Grod ; and God indeed, in the time of the 
Jews, was the king of Israel in another man- 
ner than he was me king of all the nations, 
and is the king of Christian realms now, 
and, therefore, the people's despising of Sa- 
muel was a refusing that G^ shouQ reign 
over them, because God, in the ^judges, re- 
vealed himself even in matters oi poBcy, as 
what should be done to the man that ga- 
thered sti<^ on the Sabbath-day, and me 
like, as he doth not now to kings. 

' P. Prelate. — Sovereignty is a ray of di- 
vine glory and maiesty, but this cannot be 
found in people, whether you consider them 
jointly or singly ; if you consider them sin- 
gly, it cannot be in every individual man, for 
sectaries say, That all are bom equal, with 



a like freedom ; and if it be not in the peo- 
ple singly, it cannot be in them jointly, for 
all the contribution in this compact and con- 
tract, which they &ney to be human c(Hnpo- 
sition and voluntary constitution, is only by 
a surrender of the native right that every 
one had in himself. From whence, then, 
can this majesty and authority be derived ? 
Again, where me obligation amongst equals 
is by contract and compact, violation oi the 
^th plighted in the contract, cannot in 
proper terms be called disobedience or con- 
tempt of authority. It is no more but a re- 
ceding from, and a violation of, that which 
was promised, as it may be in states or 
countries con^erate. Nature, reason, con- 
science. Scripture, teach, that disobedience 
to sovereign power is not only a violation of 
truth and breach of covenant, but also high 
disobedience and contempt, as is clear, 1 Sam. 
X. 26. So when Saul (chap, xi.) sent a yoke 
of oxen, hewed in pieces, to all the tribes, 
the fear of the Lord fell on the people, and 
they came out with one consent, 1 Sam. xi. 
7 ; also, (Job xi. 18,) He looseth the bonds 
of kings, that is, he looseth their authority, 
and bringeth them into contempt ; and he 
girdeth tneir loins with a girdle, that is, he 
strengtheneth their authority, and maketh 
the people to reverence them. Heathens 
observe that there is ^««r W, some divine 
thing in kings. Profane histories say, that 
this was so eminent in Alexander the Great, 
that it was a terror to his enemies, and a 
powerful loadstone to draw men to compose 
the most seditious councils, and cause his 
most experienced commanders embrace and 
obey his counsd and command. Some sto- 
ries write that, upon some great exigency, 
there i/ras some resplendent majesty m the 
eyes of Scipio. This kept Pharaoh flrom 
liftii^ his hand against Moses, who charged 
him so boldly with his sins. When Moses did 
speak with God, face to face, in the mount, 
this resplendent glory of majesty so awed 
the people, that they durst not behold his 
glory, iixod. xxxiv. ; this repressed the fiiry 
of the |)eople, enraged against Gideon from 
destroying their idd, Judg. vi.; and the fear 
of man is naturally upon all living creatures 
below, Cren, ix. So what can this reverence, 
which is innate in the hearts of all subjects 
toward their sovereigns, be, but the ordinance 
unrepealable of God, and the natural effect 
of that majesty of princes with which they 
are endowed from above ? 

Ans.-^l. I never heard any shadow of rea- 



son till now, and yet (because the lie hath 
a latitude) here is but a shadow, which the 
Prelate stole from M. 'Anton, de Dom. Ar- 
chienisc. Spalatensis ;^ and I may say, confi- 
dently, this Plasiarius hath not one line in 
his book which is not stolen ; and, for the 
present, Spalato's argument is but spilt, and 
the nerves cut from it, while it is botn bleed- 
ing and lamed. Let the reader compare 
them, and I pawn my credit he hath igno- 
rantly clipped Spalato. But I answer, ** So- 
yereigntv is a beam and ray (as Spalato 
saith) ot divine majesty, and is not either 
formally or virtually in the people." It is 
false t£at it is not virtually in the people ; 
for there be two things in the judge, either 
inferior or supreme, for the argument hold* 
eth in the majesty of a parliament, as we 
shall hear. (1.) The gift or grace of go- 
yeming (the Arminian Prelate will be of- 
fended at this). (2.) The authority of go- 
verning. The gift is supernatural, and is 
not in man naturaUy, and so not in the 
king; for he is physically but a mortal 
man, and this is a ^ft received, for Solo- 
mon asked it by prayer from Grod. There 
is a capacity passive in all individual men 
for it. As for the official authority itself, 
it is virtually in all in whom any of Grod's 
image is remaining since the fall, as is clear, 
as may be gatheml from Gren. i. 28 ; yea, 
the &ther, the master, the judge, have it 
by Grod's institution, in some measure, over 
son, servant, and subject, though it be more 
m the supreme ruler ; and, for our purpose, 
it is not requisite that authoritative majesty 
should be in all, (what is in the father and 
husband I hope to clear,) I mean, it needeth 
not to be formally in all, and so all are bom 
alike and equal. But he who is a Papist, a 
Socinian, an Arminian, and therefore de- 
livered to Satan by his mother church, must 
be the sectary, for we are where this Pre- 
late left us, maintainors of the Protestant re- 
ligion, contained in the Confession of Faith 
and National Covenant of Scotland, when 
this Demas forsook us and embraced the 
world. 2. Though not one single man in 
Israel be a judge or king by nature, nor 
have in them formally any ray of royalty 
or magistratical authority, yet it followeth 
not that Israel, parliamentarily convened, 
hath no such authority as to name Saul 
king in Mizpeh, and David king in Hebron, 



1 Afftonin. de pomiois Archiepis. de dom. lib. 6, 
c. 2, n. ff, 6, seq. 



1 Sam. X. 24, 25 ; 1 Chron. xi. 12 ; xii. 38, 
39, One man alone hath not the keys of 
the kingdom of heaven; (as the Prelate 
dreameth) but it followeth not that many, 
convened in a church way, hath not this 
power. Matt, xviii. 17 ; 1 Cor. v^ 1 — 4, 
One man hath not strength to fight against 
an army of ten thousand ; doth it follow, 
therefore, that an army of twenty thou- 
sand hatJi not strength to fight against 
these ten thousand? Though one Paul 
cannot synodically determine the question, 
(Acts XV,) it followeth not that the apos- 
tles, and elders, and brethren, convened 
from divers churches, hath not power to 
determine it in a lawful synod ; and, there- 
fore, from a disjoined and scattered power, 
no man can aigue to a united power, do not 
any one man is an inferior ruler, or hath 
the rays and beams of a number of aristo- 
cratical rulers ; but it followeth not that all 
these men, combined in a city or society, 
have not power, in a joint political body, 
to choose inferior or aristocratical rulers. 
3. The P, Prelate's reason is nothing. All 
the contribution (saith he) in the compact 
body to make a king, is only by a surrender 
of tiie native right of every single man (the 
whole being only a voluntary contribution). 
How, then, can there be any majesty de- 
rived from them ? I answer. Very weU ; 
for the surrender is so voluntary, that it is 
also natural, and founded on the law of na- 
ture, that men must have governors, either 
many, or one supreme ruler. And it is vo- 
luntary, and dependeth on a positive institu- 
tion of Grod, whether the government be 
by one supreme ruler, as in a monarchy, or 
in many, as in an aristocracy, according as 
the necessity and temper of the common- 
wealth do most require. This constitution is 
so voluntary, as it hath below it the law of 
nature for its general foundation, and above 
it, the supervenient institution of God, or- 
daining that there should be such magis- 
trates, both kings and other judges, because 
without such, all human societies should be 
dissolved, 4, Individual persons, in creat- 
ing a magistrate, doth not properly surren- 
der their right, which can be called a right ; 
for thev do but surrender their power of do- 
ing violence to those of their fellows in that 
feame community, so as they shall not now 
have moral power to do injuries without 
punishment ; and this is not right or Hberty 
properly, but servitude, for a power to do 
violence and injuries is not liberty, but ser- 



26 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



vitude and bondage. But the Prelate talk- 
eth of royalty as of mere tyranny, as if it 
were a proper dominion and servile empire 
that the pnnce hath over his people, and not 
more paternal and fatherly, than lordly or 
masterly. 6. He saith, " Violation of faith, 
pHghted in a contract amongst equals, can- 
not be called disobedience ; but disobedience 
to the authority of the sovereign is not only 
breach of covenant, but high disobedience and 
contempt." But violation of faith amongst 
equals, as equals, is not properly disobe- 
dience ; for disobedience is betwixt a supe- 
rior and an inferior : but violation of faith 
amongst equals, when they make one of their 
equals their judge and ruler, is not only vio- 
lation of truth, but also disobedience. All 
Israel, and Saul, while he is a private man 
seeking his father's asses, are equals by cove- 
nant, obliged one to another ; and. so any in- 
jury done by Israel to Saul, in that case, is 
not disobedience, but only violation of faith. 
But when all Israel maketh Saul their king, 
and sweareth to him obedience, he is not 
now their equal ; and an injury done to him 
now, is both a violation oi their faith, and 
high disobedience also. Suppose a city of 
aldermen, all equal amongst themselves in 
dignity and place, take one of their number 
and make him their mayor and provost — a 
wrong done to him now, is not only against 
the rules of fraternity, but disobedience to 
one placed by God over them. 6. 1 Sam. 
xi^ 7, " The fear of the Lord fell on the 
people, and they came out with one consent 
to obey Saul;" therefore God hath placed 
authority in kings, which is not in people. 
It is true; because G^d hath transferred the 
scattered authorities that are in all the peo- 
ple, in one mass ; and, by virtue of his own 
ordinance, hath placed them in one man, 
who is kiijg. What foUoweth ? That God 
conferretb this authority immediately upon 
the king, without the mediation of any ac- 
tion of the people ? Yea, the contrary ra- 
ther followeth. 7. God looseth the bond of 
kings ; that is, when God is to cast off kings, 
he causeth them to loose iall authority, and 
maketh them come into contempt with the 
people.. But what doth this prove ? That 
God taketh away the majesty and authority 
of kings immediately; and therefore God 
gave to kings this authority immediately, 
without the people's conveyance? Yea, I 
take the Prelate's weapon from him. God 
doth not take the authority of the king 
from him immediately, but mediately, by the 



people's hating and despising him, when 
they see his wickedness, as the people see 
Nero a monster — a prodigious blood-sucker. 
Upon this, all the people contemn him and 
despise him, and so the majesty is taken 
from Nero and all his mandates and laws, 
when they see him trample upon all laws, 
divine and human, and that mediately by 
the people's heart despising of his majesty ; 
and so they repeat, and take again, that awe- 
some authority that they once gave him. 
And this proveth that God gave him the 
authority mediately, by the consent of man, 
8. Nor speaketh he of kings only, but (ver. 
21) he poureth contempt 0^3**^11" vV ***- 
per munijicos, Pineda, Aria, Mont, super 
PrincipeSy upon nobles and great men ; and 
this place may prove that no judges of the 
earth are made by men. 9, The heathen 
say. That there is some divinity in princes, 
as in Alexander the Great and Scipio, to- 
ward their enemies ; but this will prove that 
princes and kings have a superiority over 
those who are not their native subjects, for 
something of God is in them, in relation to 
all men mat are not their subjects. If this 
be a ground strong and good, because God 
only, and independently from men, taketh 
away this majesty, as God only and inde- 
pendently giveth it, then a king is sacred to 
all men, subjects or not subjects. Then it 
is unlawful to make war against any foreign 
king and prince, for in invading him or re- 
sistmg him, you resist that divine majesty of 
God that is in him ; then you may not law^ 
fully flee from a tyrant, no more than you 
may lawfiilly flee from God, 10. Scipio 
was not a king, therefore this divine majesty 
is in all judges of the earth, in a more or 
less measure ; — ^therefore God, only and im- 
mediately, may take this spark of divine ma<- 
jesty from inferior judges. It followeth not. 
And kingS) certainly, cannot infuse any spark 
of a divme majesty on any inferior judges, 
for God only immediately infuseth it in men ; 
therefore it is unlawful for kings to take this 
divinity from judges, for they resist God who 
resist parliaments, no less than those who re- 
sist kings. Scipio hath divinity in him as 
well as Csesar, and that immediately from 
God, and not from any king, 11. Moses 
was not a king when he went to Pharaoh, 
for he had not, as yet, a people. Pharaoh 
was the king, and because Pharaoh was a 
king, the divines of Oxford must say. His 
majesty must not, in words of rebuke, be re- 
sisted more than by deeds. 12. Moses' face 



THB LAW AND THB PRINCE. 



27 



did shine as a prophet receiving the law 
from Grod — not as a king. And is this sun- 
shine from heaven upon the face of Nero 
and Julian ? It must be, if it be a beam of 
royal majesty, if this pratler say right, but 
(2 Cor. iii. 7) this was a majesty typical, 
which did adumbrate the glory of the law 
of €rod, and is far from being a royalty due 
to all heathen kings. 13. I would our king 
would evidence such a majesty in breaking 
the images and idols of his queen, and of 
papists about him. 14. The iear of Noah, 
and the regenerated who are in covenant 
with the beasts of the field, (Job v. 23,) is 
upon the beasts of the earth, not by appro- 
bation only, as the people maketh kings by 
the Prelate's way ; nor yet by free consent, 
as the people freely transfer their power to 
him who is king. The creatures inferior to 
man, have, by no act of free will, chosen 
man to be their ruler, and transferred their 
power to him, because they are, by nature, 
inferior to man ; and God, by nature, hath 
subjected the creatures to man, (Gen. i. 28,) 
and so this proveth not that the king, by na- 
ture, is above the people^I mean the man 
who is king; and, therefore, though God 
had planted in the hearts of all subjects a 
fear and reverence toward the king, ujpon 
supposition that they have made him king, 
it foUoweth not that this authority and ma- 
jesty is immediately given by Grod to the 
man who is king, wiuiout the intervening 
consent of the people, for there is a native 
fear in the scholar to stand in awe of his 
teacher, and yet the scholar may willingly 
give himself to be a disciple to his teacher, 
and so give his teacher power over him. 
Citizens naturally fear their supreme gover- 
nor of ttie city, yet they give to the man 
who is their supreme governor, that power 
and authority which is the ground of awe 
and reverence. A servant naturally feareth 
his master, yet often he giveth his liberty, 
and resigneth it up voluntarily to his mas- 
ter; and this was not extraordinary amongst 
the Jews, where the servant did entirely love 
the master, and is now most ordinary when 
servants do, for hire, tie themselves to such 
a master. Soldiers naturally fear their 
commanders, yet they may, and often do, 
by voluntary consent, make such men their 
commanders; and, therefore, from this, it 
followeth in no way that the governor of a 
city, the teacher, the master, the comman- 
der in war, have not their power and autho- 
.; rity only and immediately from God, but 



from their inferiors, who, by their free con- 
sent, appointed them for such places. 

P. Trelate (Ai^. 7, p. 61, 62).— This 
seemeth, or rather is, an unanswerable argu- 
ment, — ^No man hath power of Hfe and 
death but the Sovereign Power of life and 
death, to wit, God, G^n. ix. 6. God saith 
thrice he will require the blood of man at 
the hands of man, and this power God hath 
committed to God's deputy : whoso sheddeth 
man's blood mS{3 by man shall die, — by 
the king, for the world knew not any kind 
of government at this time but monarchical, 
and this monarch was Noah ; and if this 
power be from God, why not all sovereign 
power? seeing it is homogeneous, and, as 
jurists say, in indivisibili positay a thing in 
its nature indivisible, and that cannot be 
distracted or impaired, and if every man 
had the power of life and death, God should 
not be the God of order. 

The P. Prelate taketh the pains to prove 
out of the text that a magistracy is estab- 
lished in the text. Ans. 1. Let us consi- 
der this unanswerable argument. (1.) It is 
grounded upon a lie, and a conjecture never 
taught by any but himself, to wit, that 
DHNS by, or in, or through man, must 
signify a magistrate, and a king only. This 
kmg was Noah. Never interpreter, nay, 
not common sense can say, that no magis- 
trate is here understood but a king. The 
consequence is vain : His blood snail be 
shed by man ; therefore by a magistrate ? it 
followeth not; therefore by a kmg? it fol- 
loweth not. There was not a king in the 
world as yet. Some make Belus, the father 
of Ninus, the first king, and the builder of 
Babylon. This Ninus is thought the first 
builder of the city ailber called Nineveh, and 
the first king of the Assyrians. So saith 
Quintus Curtms^ and others ; but grave au- 
thors believe that Nimrod was no other than 
Belus the father of Ninus. So saith Augus- 
tine,^ Eusebius, Hieronym. ;^ and Eusebius^ 
maketh him the first founder of Babylon : 
so saith Clemens,^ Pirerius,^ and Josephus 
saith the same. Their times, their cruel 
natures are the same. Calvin saith ,^ Noah 



1 Quintias Curtius, lib. 5. 

' Aug. de civ. Dei, lib. 16, c. 17. 

s Hieron. in Hos. ii. 

* Euseb. lib. 9, de prepar. Evan. c. 3. 

^ Clemens recog. lib. 4. 

^ Pirerius in Gen. x. 8, 9, disp. 3, n. 67. Illnd qno- 
qae mihi fit percredible, Nimrod fuisse eundem, at- 
qne enim qnem alii appellant Belum patrem Nini. 

7 Calvin Com. in Gen. ix. 



28 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



' »« 



yet lived while Nimrod lived ; and the 
Scripture saith, "Nimrod began to reign, 
and be powerful on the earth." And Babel 

?^^ ^inD^DD n^ti^al the beginning of 
his kingdom. No writer, Moses nor any 
other, can ^ow us a king before Nimrod. 
So Eusebius,^ Paul Orosius,' Hieronym.,^ 
Josephus,^ say that he was the first king ; 
and Tostatus Abulens.,' and our own Gal* 
vin, Luther,® Musculus on the place, and 
Ainsworth, make him the first king and the 
founder of Babylon» How Noah was a king, 
or there waiS any monarchical government 
in the world then, the Prelate nath alone 
dreamed it. There was but lamily'^vem- 
ment before this. 2. And if there oe ma- 
gistracy here established by Gk)d, there is 
no warrant to say it is only a monarchy ; 
for if the Holy Ghost intendeth a policy, it 
i^ a policy to be established to the world's 
end, and not to be limited fas the Prelate 
doth) to Noah's days* All interpreters,, 
upon good ground, establish the same po- 
licy that our Saviour speaketh of, when he 
saith, ** He shall perish by the sword who 
taketh the sword,'^Matt. xxvi. 52. So the 
Netherlands have no lawM magistrate who 
hath power of Hfe and death, l^cause their 
government is aristocratical, and they have 
no king. So all acts of taking away the lives 
of ill-^loers shall be acts of homicide in Hol- 
land. How absurd I 3. Nor do I see how 
the place, in the native scope, doth establish 
a magistracy. Calvin saith not so ;^ and in- 
terpreters deduce, by consequence, the power 
of the magistrate worn this place. But the 
text is general, — He who killeth man shall 
be killed by man : either he shall fall into 
the magistrate's hand, or into the hand of 
some murderer; so Calvin,® Marlorat, &c. 
He speaketh, saith Pirerius, not of the fact 
and event itself, but of the deserving of 
murderers ; and it is certain all murderers 



1 Euseb. prolog. 1 Chron. 

> Paul Orosias, lib. 1, do Ormeeta mundi. 

s Hieron. in traditio Hebrei in Gen. 

* Tostat. Abnlens. in Gen. x. 9. 
9 Josephus in Gen. x. 

* Lath. Com. ib. 

7 Calvin Com. Qaanqnam hoc loco non almpliciteiT 
fertur lex politica, ut plectantur homicide. 

B Calvin in lect. 

9 Pirerius in Gen. ix. 3^ 4, n. 37. Vatablns hath 
divers interpretations : In homine, i. e. in conspectn 
omnium et publice, ant in homine, i. e. hominibns 
testificantibus ; alii, in homirie^ i. e. propter homin- 
em, quia occidit hominem, jussa magistratns. Caje- 

tan expoundeth Q^tC^ contra hominem, in de- 
spite of man. 



fall not into the magistrate's hands ; but he 
saith, by Crod and man's laws they ought to 
die, though somethne one murderer Slleth 
another. 4. The sovereign power is given 
to the king, therefore, it is given to him im- 
mediately without the consent of the people. 
It followeth not. 6. Power of life and death 
is not given to the king only, but also to 
other magistrates, yea, and to a single pri- 
vate man in the just defence of his own life. 
Other arguments are but what the Prelate 
hath said already. 



QUESTION VIII. 

WBETHXtl THB PRELATE PROTETH BY FORCE 
OF REASON THAT THE PEOPLE CANNOT BE 
CAPABLE OF ANT POWER OF GOVERNMENT. 

P. Prelate, — God and nature giveth no 
power in vain, and which may not be re- 
duced into action ; but an active power, or 
a power of actual governing, was never acted 
by the community; therefore this power can- 
not be seated in the community as in the 
prime and proper subject, and it cannot be 
m every individual person of a community, 
because government intrinsically and essen- 
tially includeth a special distinction of go- 
vernors, and some to be governed ; and, to 
speak properly, there can no other power be 
conceived in the community, naturally and 
properly, but only potestas pcusiva regimi- 
nisj a capacity or susceptibility to be go- 
verned, by one or by more, just as the first 
matter desireth a form. This obligeth all, by 
the dictate of nature's law, to submit to ac- 
tual government ; and as it is in every indi- 
vidual person, it is not merely and* properly 
voluntary, b^use, howsoever nature dictates 
that government is necessary for the safety of 
the society, yet every singular person, by cor- 
ruption and self-love, Lath a natural aver- 
sion and repugnance to submit to any : every 
man would be a king himself. This univer- 
sal desire, appetitue universalia aut natU' 
ralis, or universal propension to government, 
is like the act of the understanding assenting 
to the first principles of truth, and to the 
will's general propension to happiness in ge- 
neral, which propension is not a free act, ex- 
cept our new statists, as they have changed 
their faith, so they overturn true reason. It 
will puzzle them infinitely to make anything, 
in its kind passive, really active and coUative 



of positive acts and effects. All know no 
man can give what he hath not. An old 
philosopher would laugh at him who would 
say, that a matter perfected and actuated 
by union with a form, could at pleasure 
shake off its form, and marry itself to an* 
other. They may as well say, every wife 
hath power to resume her freedom and 
marry another, as that any such power ac- 
tive is in the community, or any power to 
cast off monarchy. 

An8, — 1. The P. Prelate might have 
thanked Spalato for this ar^^ument, but he 
doth not so much as cite mm, for fear his 
theft be apprehended ; but Spalato hath it 
set down with stronger nerves than the Pre- 
late's head was able to copy out of him. But 
Jac. de Almain,^ and iNavarrus,' with the 
Parisiaii doctors, said in the Council of Pa- 
ris, " that politic power is inmiediately from 
God, but first from the community ;" but so 
that the community apply their power to 
this or that government — ^not of liberty, but 
by natural necessity — ^but Spalato and the 
plagiary Prelate do both look beside the 
book. The question is not now ccmceming 
the vis rectvoa^ the power of governing in 
the people, but concerning the power otjgo- 
vemment ; for these two differ much. Tne 
former is a power of ruling and monarchical 
commanding of themselves. This power is 
not formally in the people, but only virtu- 
ally ; and no reason can say that a virtual 
power is idle because it cannot be actuated 
by that same subject that it is in ; for then 
it should not be a virtual, but a formal 
power. Do not philosophers say such an 
' herb virtually maleth hot? and can the 
sottish Prelate say this virtual power is idle, 
and in vain given of Grod, because it doth 
not formally Seat your hand when you touch 
it. 2. The P. Prelate, who is excommuni- 
cated for Popery, Socinianism, Arminianism, 
and is now turned apostate to Christ and his 
church, must have changed his faith, not we, 
and be unreasonably ignorant, to press that 
axiom, ^' That the power is idle that cannot 
be reduced to acts ; for a generative power 
is given to living and sensitive creatures, 



^ M. Anto. de domini. Arch. SpalatenSk lib. % c. 
2, n. 6, 6. Plebs potins habet a natura, non tarn vim 
active rectiyam ant gabernativam, qnam inclinatio- 
nem passive regibUem (nt ita loquar) et gabernabi- 
lem, qua volens et Ubeas sese submittit rectoribus, 
&c. 

* Almain de potest et La. 1, q. 1, c» 1> 6, et q. 2, 3, & 

' Nem. don jad. not. 3, n. 85. 



— ^this power is not idle though it be not 
reduced in act by all and every individual 
sensitive creature. A power of seeing is 
given to all who naturally do, or ought to 
see, yet it is not an idle power because di- 
vers are blind, seeing it is put forth in action 
in divers of the kind ; so this power in the 
community is not idle because it is not put 
forth in acts in the people in which it is vir- 
tually, but is put forth in action in some of 
them whom they choose to be their gover- 
nors ; nor is it reasonable to sav that it 
should be put forth in action by all the peo- 
ple, as if all should be kings and governors. 
But the c[uestion is not of the power of go- 
verning m the people, but of Uie power of 
government, that is, of the power of making 

fovemors and kings; and the community 
oth put forth in u^^ this power, (is a free, 
voluntary, and active power ; for (1.) a com- 
munity transplanted to India, or any place 
of the world not before inhabited, have a 
perfect liberty to choose either a ^lonar- 
chy, or a democracy, or an aristocracy ; for 
though nature incline them to government 
in general, yet are they not naturally de- 
terminated to any one of those three more 
than another. (2.) Israel did of their own 
free will choose the change of government, 
and would have a king as the nations had ; 
therefore they had free will, and so an ac- 
tive power so to do, and not a passive in- 
clination only to be governed, such as Spa- 
lato saith agreeth to the first matter. (3.) 
Royalists teach that a pe(»>le under demo- 
cracy or aristocracy have liberty to choose 
a king ; and the Romans did this, there- 
fore they had an active power to do it, — 
therefore the Prelate's simile crooks : the 
matter at its pleasure cannot shake off its 
form, nor the wife cast off her husband be- 
ing once married; but Barclaius, Grotius, 
Amissens, Blackwood, and all the royalists, 
teach that the people under any of these 
two forms of democracy or aristocracy may 
resume their power, and cast off these forms 
and choose a monarch ; and if monarchy be 
the best government, as royalists say, they 
may choose the best. And is this but a pas- 
sive capacity to be governed ? (4.) Of ten 
men fit for a kingdom they may design one, 
and put the crown on his head, and refuse 
the other nine, as Israel crowned Solomon 
and refiised Adonijah. Is this not a volun- 
tary action, proceeding from a free, active, 
elective power ? It will puzzle the preten- 
ded Prelate to deny this, — that which the 



■«*aw4Mp*>*a 



lull inn 




I_ 



community doth freely, they do not from 
such a passive capacity as is in the first 
matter in regard of the form. 3. It is true 
that people, through corruption of nature, 
are averse to submit to governors " for con» 
science sake, as unto the Lord," because the 
natural man, remaining in the state of na^ 
ture, can do nothing that is truly good, but it 
is false that men have no active moral power 
to submit to superiors, but only a passive ca- 
pacity to be governed. He quite contradict- 
eth himself; for he said before, (c. 4j p. 49,) 
that there is an " innate fear ana reverence 
in the hearts of all men naturally, even in 
heathens, toward their sovereign 5" yea, as 
we have a natural moral active power to 
loVe our parents and superiors, (though it 
be not evangehcally, or legally in God's 
court, good) and so to obey their command- 
ments, only we are averse to penal laws of 
superiors. But this proveth no way that we 
have only by nature a passive capacity to 
government ; for heathens have, by instinct 
of nature, both made laws morally good, 
submitted to them, and set kings and judges 
over them, which clearly proveth that men 
have an active power of government by na- 
ture. Yea, what difference maketh the 
Prelate betwixt men and beasts ? for beasts 
have a capacity to be governed, even lions 
and tigers ; but here is the matter, if men 
have any natural power of government, the 
P. Prelate would have it, with his breth- 
ren the Jesuits and Arminians, to be not 
natural, but done by the help of universal 
grace ; for so do they confound nature and 
grace. But it is certain our power to sub- 
mit to rulers and kings, as to rectors, and 
guides, and fathers, is natural ; to submit to 
tyrants in doing ills of sin is natural, but in 
suffering ills 01 punishment is not natural. 
" No man can give that which he hath not," 
is true, but that people have no power to 
make their governors is that which is in 
question, ana denied by us. This argu- 
ment doth prove that people hath no power 
to appoint aristocratical rulers more than 
kings, and so the aristocratical and demo- 
cratical rulers are all inviolable and sacred 
as the king. By this the people may not 
resume their freedom if they turn tyrants 
and oppressors. This the Prelate shall deny, 
for he averreth, (p. 96,) out of Augustine, 
that the people may, without sin, change a 
corrupt democracy into a monarchy. 

P. Prelate (pp. 95, 96). — If sovereignty 
be originally innerent in the people, then 



democracy, or government by the people, 
were the best government, because it com- 
eth nearest to the fountain and stream of 
the first and radical power in the people, 
yea, and all other forms of government were 
unlawful ; and if sovereignty be natively in- 
herent in the multitude it must be proper 
to every individual of the community, which 
is against that false maxim of theirs, Quisque 
nascitur liber. Every one by nature is bom 
a free man, and the posterity of those who 
first contracted with their elected king are 
not bound to that covenant, but, upon their 
native right and Hberty, may appoint an- 
other king without breach of covenant. The 
posterity of Joshua, and the elders in their 
time, who contracted with the Gibeonites to 
incorporate them, though in a serving con- 
dition, might have tnme their fathers' go- 
vernment nothing. 

Ans,-^1, The P. Prelate might thank 
Spalato for this argument also,^ for it is 
stolen ; but he never once named him, lest 
his theft should be apprehended. So are 
his other arguments stolen from Spalato; 
but the Pirelate weakeneth them, and it is 
seen stolen goods are not blessed. Spalato 
saith, then, by the law of nature every com- 
monwealth should be governed by the peo- 
ple, and by the law of nature the people 
should be under the worst government ; but 
this consequence is nothing ; for a commu- 
nity of many families is formally and of 
themselves under no government, but may 
choose any of the three ; for popular govern- 
ment is not that wherein all the people are 
rulers, for this is confiision and not govern- 
ment, because all are rulers, and none are 
governed and ruled. But in popular go- 
vernment many are chosen out of the peo- 
ple to rule ; and that this is the worst go- 
vernment is said gratis, without warrant ; 
and if monarchy be the best of itself, yet, 
when men are in the state of sin, in some 
other respects it hath many inconveniences. 
2* I see not how democracy is best because 
nearest to the multitude's power of making 
a king ; for if all the three depend upon the 
free will of the people, all are alike afar off, 
and ahke near hand, to the people's free 
choice, according as they see most conducive 
to the safety and protection of the common- 
wealth, seeing the forms of government are 
not more natural than politic incorporations 
of cities, yea, than of shires ; but from a po- 

1 Spalatensis, p« 6-48. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



31 



sitive institution of God, who erecteth this 
rather than that, not immediately now, but 
mediately, by the free will of men ; .no one 
Cometh ibrmally, and ex natur o, ret, nearer 
to the fountain than another, except that 
materially democracy may come nearer to 
the people's power than monarchy, but the 
excellency of it above monarchy is not hence 
concluded ; for by this reason the number of 
four should be more excellent than the num- 
ber of five, of ten, of a hundred, of a thou- 
sand, or of millions, because four cometh 
near to the number of three, which Aristotle 
calleth the first perfect number, cui addi- 
tur ri ir»9 of which yet formally all do alike 
share in the nature and essence of number. 
2. It is denied that it followeth from this 
antecedent, that the people have power to 
choose their own governors; therefore all 
governments except democracy, or govern- 
ment by the people, must be sinful and un- 
lawful, (1.) jBecause government by kings 
is of divine institution, and of other judges 
also, as is evident from Grod's word. Bom. 
xiii. 1' — 3 ; Deut. xvii, 14 ; Prov. viii. 15, 
16; 1 Pet. ii. 13. 14; Psal. ii. 10, 11, &c. 
(2,) Power of choosing any form of govern- 
ment is in the people ; therefore there is 
no government lawful but popular govern- 
ment. It followeth no ways; but presup- 
poseth that power to choose any form of 
government must he formally actual go- 
vernment; which is most feJse, yea, they 
be contrary, as the prevalency or power and 
the act are contrary ; so these two are con- 
trary., or opposite. Neither is sovereignty, 
nor any government, formally inherent in 
either the community by nature, nor in any 
one particular man by nature ; md that 
every man is bom free, so as no man, ra- 
ther than his brother, is bom a king and a 
ruler, I hope, God willing, to make good, 
so as the Prelate shall never answer on the 
contrary. 3. It followeth not that the pos- 
terity living, when their fathers made a co- 
venant with their first elected king, may 
without any breach of covenant on the king's 
part, make void and null their fathers' elec- 
tion of a king, and choose another king, be- 
cause the lawful covenant of the fathers, in 
point of government, if it be not broken, 
tyeth the children, but it cannot deprive 
them of their lawful liberty naturally inhe- 
rent in them to choose the fittest man to be 
king ; but of this hereafter more fiilly. 4. 
Spdato addeth, (the Prelate is not a faith- 
ftil thief,) " If the community by the law of 



nature have power of all forms of govern- 
ment, and so should be, by nature, under 
popular government, and yet should refuse 
a monarchy and an aristocracy," yet, Au- 
gustine addeth,* ** If the people should pre- 
fer their own private gain to the pubUc good, 
and sell the commonwealth, then some good 
man might take their liberty from them, 
and, against their will, erect a monarchy or 
an aristocracy." But the Prelate (p. 97) 
and Augustine supposeth the people to be 
under popular government. This is not our 
case ; for Spalato and the Prelate presupr 
poseth by our grounds that the people by 
nature must be under popular government, 
Augustine dreameth no such thing, and we 
deny that by nature they are under any 
form of government. Augustine, in a case 
most considerable thinketh one good and 
potent man may take the corrupt people's 
power of giving honours, and making rulers 
from them, ana give it to some good men, 
few or many, or to one ; then Augustine 
layeth down as a ground that which Spalato 
and the Prelate denieth, — that the people 
hath power to appoint their own rulers ; 
otherwise, how could one man take that 
power from them ? The Prelate's fifth ar^ 
gument is but a branch of the fourth argu- 
ment, and is answered already. 

P. Prelate (chap. 11 J. — He would prove 
that kings of the people's making are not 
blessed of Grod, The first creature of the 
people's making was Abimelech (Judg. ix. 
22), who reigned only three years, well near 
Antichrist's time of endurance. He came 
to it by blood, and an evil spirit rose betwixt 
him and the men of Sechem, and he made 
a miserable end. The next was Jeroboam, 
who had this motto. He made Israel to sin. 
The people made him king, and he made the 
same pretence of a glorious reformation that 
our reformers now make : new calves, new al- 
tars, new feasts are erected ; they banish the 
Levites and take in the scum and dross of the 
vulgar, &c. Every actipn of Christ is our in-;- 
struction. Christ was truly bom a king, not*- 
withstanding, when the people would make 



1 Spalato, 16. 

3 An^st. de lib. arb., lib. 1, c. 6. Si depravatns 
popnlus rem privatum Reipub. preferat. atque ha- 
beat venale 8uffragi^m cor ruptueque ab iis qui ho- 
norea am9,nt, regnum in sefactiosis consecleratisque 
committat ; non ne item recte, si quia tunc extilerit 
Tir bonus qui plurimum possit, adimat huic populo 
potestatem dandi hpnores, e% in paveomm bouorum, 
▼el etiam unjus redregat arbitrium ? 



him a king, he disclaimed it — he would not 
be an arbiter betwixt two brethren differ- 
ing. 

Ans, — I am not to follow the Prelate's 
order every way, though, God willing, I 
shall reach him in the forthcoming chapters. 
Nor purpose I to answer his treasonable 
railing against his onm nation, and the 
judges of the land, whom €rod hath set over 
this seditious excommunicated apostate. He 
layeth to us frequently the Jesuit's tenets, 
when as he is known himself to be a papist. 
In this argument he saith, Abimelech did 
reign only three years, well near Anti- 
christ's reicrn. Is not this the basis and 
the mother principle of popery. That the 
Pope is not the Antichrist, for the Pope 
hath continued many ages? He is not 
an individual man, but a race of men ; but 
the Antichrist, saith Belarmine, Staple- 
ton, Becanus, and the nation of Jesuits and 
poplings, shall be one individual man — a 
bom Jew, and shall reign only three years 
and a haJf. But, 1. The argument from 
success provetti nothing, except the Prelate 
prove their bad success to be from this, be- 
cause they were chosen of the people. When 
as Saul chosen of God, and most of the kings 
of Israel and Judah, who, undeniably, had 
God's calling to the crown, were not blessed 
of God ; and their government was a ruin to 
both people and religion, as the people were 
removed to all the Kingdoms of the earth, 
for the sins of Manassen, Jer. xv. 4. Was 
therefore Manasseh not kwAiUy [called to 
the crown? 2. For his instance of kings 
unlawfully called to the throne, he brinff- 
eth us whole two, and telleth us that he 
doubteth, as many learned men do, whe- 
ther Jeroboam was a king by permission 
only, or by a commission from God. 3. 
Abimelech was cursed, because he wanted 
God's calling to the throne; for then Is- 
rael had no £ng, but judges, extraordinarily 
raised up by Godi ; and Grod did not raise 
him at all, only he came to the throne by 
blood, and carnal reasons moving the men 
of Sechem to advance him. The argument 
presupposeth that the whole lawful c^ling of 
a king is the voices of the people. This we 
never taught, though the Prelate make con- 
quest a jiut title to a crown, and it is but a 
title of blood and rapine. 4. Abimelech 
was not the first king, but only a judge. 
All our divines, with the word of Grod, m^- 
eth Saul the first king. 5. For Jeroboam 
had God's word and promise to be king, 



1 Kings xi. 34 — 38. But, in my weak 
judgment, he waited not God's time and 
way of coming to the crown ; but that his 
coming to the throne was unlawful, because 
he came by the people's election, is in ques- 
tion. 6. That the people's reformation, and 
their making a new king, was like the king- 
dom of Scouand's reformation, and the par- 
liament of England's way now, is a traitor- 
ous calumny. For, 1. It condemneth the 
king, who hath, in parliament, declared all 
theu" proceedings to be legal. Rehoboam 
never declared Jeroboam's coronation to be 
lawful, but, contrary to Grod's word, made 
war against Israel. 2. It is false tiiat Israel 
pretended religion in that change. The 
cause was the rough answer given to the 
supplication of the estates, complaining of 
the oppression they were under m &lo- 
mon's reign. 3. Religion is still subjected 
to policy by prelates and cavaliers, not by 
us m Scotland, who sought nothing but re- 
formation of religion, and of laws so far as 
they serve religion, as our supplications, de- 
clarations, and the event proveth. 4, We 
have no new calves, new lutars, new feasts, 
but profess, and really do hazard, life and 
estate, to put away the Prelate's calves, 
images, tree-worship, altar-worship, saints, 
feast-days, idolatry, masses ; and nothing is 
said here but Jesuits, and Canaanites, and 
Baalites, might say, (though falsely) against 
the reformation of Josiah. Truth and pu- 
rity of worship this year is new in relation 
to idolatry last year, but it is simpliciter 
older. 5. We have not put away the Lord's 
priests and Levites, and taken in the scum 
of the vulgar, but have' put away Baal's 
priests, sucn as excommunicated Prelate 
Maxwell and other apostates, and resumed 
the faithful servants of Grod, who were 
deprived and banished for standing to the 
Protestant faith, sworn to by the prelates 
themselves. 6. Every action of Christ, such 
as his walking on the sea, is not our mstruc- 
tion in that sense, that Christ's refusing a 
kingdom is directly our instruction. And 
did Christ refuse to be a king, because the 
people would have made him a king ? That 
IS, non causa pro causae he refused it, be- 
cause his kingdom was not in this world, and 
he came to suffer for men, not to reign over 
man. 7. The Prelate, and others who were 
lords of session, and would be judges of men's 
inheritances, and would usurp the sword by 
being lords of council and parliament, have 
refused to be instructed by eveiy action of 



Christ, who would not judge betwixt bro- 
ther and brother. 

P. Preia<«.— ^ephthah came to be jud^e 
by covenant betwixt him and the Gilead- 
ites. Here you have an interposed act of 
man, yet the Lord himself, in authorising 
him as Judge, vindioateth it no leas to him- 
self, than when extraordinarily he autho- 
rised Gideon and Samuel, 1 Sam. xii. 11 ; 
therefore, whatsoever act of man intervene 
eth, it contributeth nothing to royal autho<« 
rit — ^it cannot weaken or repeal it. 

Ans, — 'It was as extraordmary that Jeph- 
thah, a bastard and the son of an harlot, 
should be judge, as that Gideon should be 
judge. Cm. vindicateth to himself, that he 
giveth his people favour in the eyes of their 
enemies. But doth it follow that the ene- 
mies are not agents, and to be commended 
for their humanity in favouring the people 
of God ? So Psal. Ixv. 9, 10, God maketh 
com to grow, therefore clouds, and earth, 
and sun, and summer, and husbandry, con- 
tributeth nothing to the growing of com. 
But this is but that which he said before. 
We grant that this is an eminent and singu- 
lar act of God's special providence, that he 
moveth and boweth the wills of a great mul- 
titude to promote such a man, wno, by na» 
ture, Cometh no more out of the womb a 
crowned king, than the poorest shepherd in 
the land ; and it is an act of grace to endue 
him with heroic and royal parts for the go-» 
vemment. But what is all this ? Doth it 
exclude the people's consent ? In no ways. 
So the works of supematural grace, as to 
love Christ i^bove all things, to believe in 
Christ in a singular manner, are ascribed to 
the rich grace of God. But can the Pre- 
late say uiat the understanding and will, in 
these acts, are merely passive, and contri-* 
buteth no more thaa the people contribu- 
teth to royal authority in the king? and 
that is just nothing by the Prelate s way. 
And we utterly deny, that as water in bap- 
tism hath no action at all in the working of 
remission of sins, so the people hath no in-* 
fluence in making a king ; for the people are 
worthier and more excellent than the king, 
and they have an active power of ruling and 
directing themselves toward the intrinsical 
end of human policy, which is the external 
safety and peace of a society, in so far as 
there are moral principles of the second ta- 
ble, for this effect, written in their heart ; 
and, therefore, that royal authority which, 
by God's special providence, is united in one 



king, and, as it were, over-gilded and lus- 
tred with princely grace ana roval endow- 
ments, is diffused in the people, for the peo- 
ple hath an after-<approbative consent in 
making a king, as royalists confess water 
bath no such action in producing grace. 



QUESTION IX. 

WHITHBR OR NO SOYERBiaNTT IS SO FROM 
THE PEOPLE, THAT IT REMAINETH IN THEM 
IN SOME PART, SO AS THET MAY, IX CASE 
OF NECESSITY, RESUME IT. 

The Prelate will have it Babylonish con- 
fusion, that we are divided in opinion. Je- 
suits (saith he) nlace all sovereignty in the 
community. Of the sectaries, some warrant 
aqy one subject to make away his king, and 
such a work is no less to be rewarded than 
when one killeth a wolf. Some say this 
power is in the whole community ; some 
wiU have it in the collective body, not con* 
vened by warrant or writ of sovereignty ; 
but when necessity (which is often fancied) 
of reforming state and church, calleth them 
together ; some in the nobles and peers ; 
some in the three estates assembled by the 
king's writ ; some in the inferior judges, 

I answer, If the Prelate were not a Je* 
suit himself, he would not bid his brethren 
take the mote out of their eye ; but there is 
nothing here said but what Barclaius^ said 
better before this plagiarius. To which I 
answer. We teach that any private man 
may kill a tyrant, void of all title ; and that 
great RoyaHst saith so also. And if he have 
not the consent of the people, he is an usur- 
per, for we know no external lawful calling 
that kings have now, or their family, to the 
crown, but only the call of the people. All 
other calls to us are now invisible and un- 
known ; and Grod would not command us to 
obey kings, and leave us in the dark, that 
we shall not know who is the king. The 
Prelate placeth his lawful calling to the 
crown, in such an immediate, invisible, and 
subtle act of omnipotency, as that whereby 
Grod conferreth remission of sins, by sp ink» 
ling with water in baptism, and that where- 



1 Barclaias contr. Monarch, lib. 4, c. 10, p. 268, 
at hostes publicos non solum ab universo populo, 
sed a singulis etiam impeti osdique jure optimo 
posse tota Antiquitas censuit. 

6 



34 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



by God directed Samuel to anoint Saul and 
David, not Eliab, nor any other brother. 
It is the devil in the P. P,, not any of us, 
who teach that any private man may kill a 
lawM king, though tyrannous in his go- 
vernment. For the subject of royal power, 
we affirm, the first, and ultimate, and native 
subject of all power, is the community, as 
reasonable men naturally inclining to a so- 
ciety ; but the ethical and politi«d subject, 
or the legal and positive receptacle of this 
power, is various, according to the various 
constitutions of the policy. In Scotland and 
England, it is the three estates of parlia- 
ment ; in other nations, some other judges 
or peers of the land. The Prelate had no 
more common s^ise for him to object a 
confiision of opinion to us, for this, than to 
all the commonwealths on earth, because 
all have not parliaments, as Scotland hath. 
All have not constables, and officials, and 
churchmen, and barons, lords of council, 
parliaments, &c., as England had : but the 
truth is, the community, orderly convened, 
as it includeth all the estates civil, have 
hand, and are to act in choosing their ru- 
lers. I see not what privilege nobles have, 
above commons, in a court of parliament, 
by God's law ; but as they are judges, all 
are equally judges, and sul make up one 
congregation of God's. But the question 
now is, If all power of governing (tne Pre- 
late, to make all the people kings, saith, if 
all sovereignty) be so in the people that they 
retain power to jguard themselves against ty- 
ranny ; and if they retain some of it, habitu, 
in habit, and in their power. I am not now 
unseasonably, according to the Prelate's or- 
der, to dispute of the power of lawful defence 
against tyranny; but, I lay down this maxim 
ot divinity : Tyranny being a work of Satan, 
is not from God, because sm, either habitual 
or actual, is not from God : the power that 
is, must be from Grod; the magistrate, as 
magistrate, is good in nature of office, and 
the intrinsic end of his office, (Rom. xiii. 4) 
for he is the minister of God for thy good ; 
and, therefore, a power ethical, politic, or 
moral, to oppress, is not fbm God, and is 
not a power, but a licentious deviation of a 
power ; and is no more from God, but from 
sinful nature and the old serpent, than a li- 
cense to sin. God in Christ giveth pardons 
of sin, but the Pope, not Grod, giveth dis- 
pensations to sin. To this add, if for na- 
ture to defend itself be lawful, no commu- 
nity, without sin, hath power to alienate 



and give away this power ; for as no power 
OTven to man to murder his brother is of 
Sod, so no power to suffer his brother to be 
murdered is of (xod ; and no power to suf- 
fer himself, a fortiori^ fer less can be from 
God. Here I speak not of physical power, 
for if free will be the creature of God, a 
physical power to acts which, in relation to 
Grod's law, are sinfiil, must be from God. 

But I now follow the P. Prelate (c. ix., 
p. 101, 102). — Some of the adversaries, as 
Buchanan, say that ^e parliament hath no 
power to make a law, out only w^tUvUvfut 
without the approbation of the community. 
Otliers, as the Observator, say, that the right 
of the gentry and commonalty is entirely in 
the kmghts and burgesses of the House of 
Commons, and will nave their orders irre- 
vocable. If, then, the common people can- 
not resume their power and oppose the par- 
liament, how can tables and parliaments re- 
sume their power and resist tne king ? 

Ans, — Tne ignorant man should have 
thanked Barclaius for this argument, and 
vet Barclaius need not thank him, for it 
hath not the nerves that Barclaius gave it. 
But I answer, 1. If the parliament should 
have been corrupted by feir hopes (as in our 
age we have seen the like) the people did well 
to resist the Prelate's obtruding the Mass 
Book, when the lords of the council pressed 
it, against all law of God and man, upon 
the Bngdom of Scotland ; and, therefore, it 
is denied that the acts of parliament are ir- 
revocable. The observator said they were 
irrevocable by the king, he being but one 
man ; the P. Prelate wrongeth him, for he 
said only, they have the power of a law, 
and the king is obliged to consent, by his 
royal office, to all good laws, and neither 
king nor people may oppose them. Buch- 
anan said, Acts of parliament are not laws, 
obliging the people, till they be promul- 
gated ; and the people's silence, when they 
are promulgated, is their approbation, and 
maketh them obligatory laws to them ; but 
if the people speak against unjust laws, they 
are not laws at all: and Buchanan knew 
the power of the Scottish parHament better 
than this ignorant statist. 2. There is not 
like reason to grant so much to the king, as 
to parliaments, because, certainly, parlia- 
ments who make kings under Grod, or above 
any one man, and they must have more au- 
thority and wisdom than any one king, ex- 
cept Solomon (as base flatterers say) ^ould 
return to the tarones of the earth. And as 



THK LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



35 



the power to make just laws is all in the 
parliament, only the people have power to 
resist tyraimical laws. The power of all 
the parliament was never given to the king 
hy God. The parliament are as essentially 
judges as the king, and, therefore, the king's 
deed may well be revoked, because he acteth 
nothing as king, but united with his great 
or lesser council, no more than the eye can 
see, being separated from the body. The 
peers and members of parliament have more 
than the king, because they have both their 
own power, being parts and special members 
of the people, and, also, they have their 
high places in parliament, either from the 
people's express or tacit consent. 3. We 
allow no arbitrary power to the parliament, 
because their just laws are irrevocable ; for 
the irrevocable power of making just laws 
doth argue a legal, not an irrevocable, ar- 
bitrary power ; nor is there any arbitrary 
power in the people, or in any mortal man. 
But of the covenant betwixt king and peo- 
ple hereafter. 

P. Prelate (c» 10, p. 105). — If sovereign 
power be habitually m the community, so 
as they may resume it at their pleasure, 
then nothing is given to the king but an 
empty title ; for, at the same instant, he 
receiveth empire and sovereignty, and lay- 
eth down the power to rule or determine 
in matters whidn concern either private or 
public good, and so he is both a kmg and a 
subject. 

Ans, — This naked consequence the Pre- 
late saith and proveth not, and we deny it, 
and give this reason, The king receiveth 
royal power with the states to make good 
laws, and power by his royalty to execute 
those laws, and this power the community 
hath devolved in the bands of the king and 
states of parliament ; but the community 
keepeth to themselves a power to resist 
tyranny, and to coerce it, and eatenus in 
so far is Saul subject, that David is not to 
compear before him, nor to lay down Go- 
liah's sword, nor disband his army of de- 
fence, though the king should command 
him so to do. 

X P. Prelate (c. xvi. pp. 105— 107).— By 
aU poUticians, kings anilnferior magjstnttes 
are differenced by their different specific en- 
tity, but by this they are not differenced ; 
nay, a magistrate is in a better condition 
than a king, for the mamstrate is to judge 
by a known statute and law, and cannot be 
censured and punished but by law. But the 



king is censurable, yea, disabled by the mul- 
titude ; yea, the basest of subjects may cite 
and convent the king, before the underived 
m^esty of the community, and he may be 
judged by the arbitrary law that is in the 
closet of their hearts, not only for real mis- 
demeanour, but for fancied jealousies. It will 
be said, good kings are in danger ; the con- 
trary appeareth uas day, and ordinarily the 
best are in greatest danger. No govern- 
ment, except Plato's republic, wantetli in- 
commodities : subtle spirits may make them 
apprehend them. The poor people, bewitch- 
ed, follow Absalom in his treason; they strike 
not at royalty at first, but labour to make the 
prince naked of the good council of great 
statesmen, &c. 

Ans, — Whether the king and the under 
madstrate differ essentially, we shall see. 
1. The P. Prelate saith all politicians grant 
it, but he saith untruth. lie bringeth the 
power of Moses and the judges to prove 
the power of kings ; and so either the judges 
of Israel and the kings differ not essential- 
ly, or then the Pre&te must correct the 
spirit of .God, terming one book of Scrip- 
ture DO /D ^I'^gSj and another £3*1331 B^ 
Judges, and make the book of Kings the 
book of Judges. 2. The magistrate's con- 
dition is not better than the king's, because 
the magistrate is to judge by a known sta- 
tute and law, and the ^iug not so. God 
moulded the first king, (Ceut. xvii. 18,) 
when he sitteth judging on his throne, to 
look to a written copy of the law of God, as 
his rule. Now, a power to follow Grod's law 
is better than a power to follow man's sinfiil 
will ; so the Prelate putteth the king in a 
worse condition than the magistrate, not we, 
who will have the king to judge according 
to just statutes and laws. 3. Whether the 
king be censurable and deposable by the 
mimitude, he cannot determine out of our 
writings. 4. The community's law is the 
law 01 nature — not their arbitrary lust. 5. 
The Prelate's treasonable railings I cannot 
follow. He sajth that we agree not ten of 
us to a positive faith, and that our faith is 
negative ; but his faith is Privative, Popish, 
Socinian, Arminian, Pelagian, and worse, for 
he was one of that same faith that we are 
of. Our Confession of Faith is positive, as 
the confession of all the relbrmed churches; 
but I judge he thinketh the Protestant faith 
of all the reformed churches but negative. 
The inoommodities of government, before 
our reformation, were not fancied, but prin- 



36 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



ted by authority. All the bady of popery 
was printed and avowed as the doctrine of 
the Church of Scotland and England, as 
the learned author, and my much Respected 
brother, evidenceth in his Ltzdensium, »*»'* 
%ttvax^i^ the Canterburian Self»conviction. 
The parliament of England was never yet 
found guilty of treason. The good counsel- 
lors of great statesmen, that parliaments of 
both kmgdoms would take from the king's 
majesty, are a faction of pexjured Papists, 
Prelates, Jesuits, Irish cut-*throats, Stra- 
fords, and Apostates ; subverters of all laws, 
divine^ human, of Grod, of church, of state. 

P. Prelate (c. 16, pp. 147, 148).— In 
whomsoever this power of government be it 
is the only remedy to supply all defects, and 
to set right whatever is disjointed in church 
and state, and the subject of this superin* 
tending power must be free fi^m all error 
in judgment and practice, and so we have a 
pope %n temporalibusi and if the parlia^ 
ment err the people must take order with 
them, else Grod hath left church and state 
remediless. 

Ans, — 1. This is stolen from Barclaius 
also, who saith,^ Si Bex regnum suum ali" 
ence ditioni manciparit, regno cadit : " If 
the king shall sell his kingdom, or enslave it 
to a foreign power, he faUeth from all right 
to his kingdom." But who shall execute 
any such law against him ?-*-not the people, 
not the peers, not the parliament ; ^r this 
nttavrnfium, ventris et aulce, this slave saith, 
(p. 149,) " I know no power in any to pun- 
ish or curb sovereignty but in Almighty 
Grod." 2» We see no superintending power 
on earth, in king or people, which Is infal- 
lible, nor is the last power of taking order 
with a prince who enslaveth his kin^om to 
a foreign power, placed by us in the people 
because thev cannot err» C!ourt flatterers, 
who teach that the will of the prince is the 
measure of all right and vrrong, of law and 
no law, and above all law, must hold that 
the king is a temporal pope, both in eccle** 
siastical and civil matters ) but because they 
cannot so readily destroy themselves (the 
law of nature having given to them a con- 
trary internal principle of self-preservation) 
as a tyrant who doth care for nimself, and. 
not for the people. 3. And because Eos- 
tremis morhis extrema remedia, in an ex- 
traordinary exigent, when Ahab and Jeze- 



1 Barclaius contra Monarchum. lib. 5, c. 12, idem, 
lib. 3, c. ult. p. 2, a 



bel did undo the church of Grod, and tyran-» 
nise over both the bodies and consciences of 
priest, prophet and people, Elijah procured 
the convention of the states, and Elijah, 
with the people*s help, killed all Baal's 
priests, the kmg looking on, without ques- 
tion, against his neart. In tliis case I think 
it is more than evident that the people re- 
sumed their powen 4, We teach not that 
people should supply all defects in govern- 
ment, nor that they should use their power 
when anything is done . amiss by the king, 
no more than we king is to cut off the whole 
people of Grod when they refuse an idolatrous 
service, obtruded upon them against all law. 
The people are to suffer much before they 
resume their power ; but this court slave will 
have the people to do what he did not him- 
self ; for when king and parliament sum- 
moned him, was he not obliged to appear ? 
Non*compearance when lawtiil, royal, and 
parliamentary power Bummoneth, « no less 
resistance than taking of ports and castles. 

P. Prelate,-— Then this superintending 
power in people may call a king to account, 
and puni^ him for any misdemeanour or 
act of iniustice. Why might not the people 
of Israel's peers, or sanhedrim, have con- 
vented David before them, judged and pun- 
ished him for his adultery with Bethsheba, 
and his murder of Uriah. But it is held 
by all that tyranny should be an intended 
universal, total, manifest destruction of the 
whole commonwealth, which cannot fall in 
the thoughts of any but a madman* Wbat 
is recorded in the story of Nero's wish in 
this kind, may be rather judged the expres- 
sion of transported passion than a fixed reso- 
lution, 

^*w.*— The P. Prelate, contrary to the 
scope of his bo<^, which is all for the subject 
and seat of sovereign power, against all or- 
der, hath plunged himself in the deep of 
defensive arms, and yet hath no new thing. 
1, Our law of ScoUand will warrant any 
subject, if the king take from him his heri- 
tage, or invade his possession against law, to 
resist the invaders, and to summon the king's 
intruders before ihe lords of session for that 
act of injustice* Is this against God's word, 
or conscience ? 2. The sionhedrim did not 
punish David, therefore, it is not lawful to 
challenge a king for any one act of injustice: 
from the practice of the Sanhedrim to con- 
clude a thing lawful or unlawful, is logic we 
may resist. 3. By the P. Prelate's doctrine, 
the law might not put Bathsheba to death. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



37 



nor yet Joab, the nearest agent of the. mur- 
dering of innocent Uriah, because Bathshe- 
ba's adultery was the king's adultery — she 
did it in obedience to king David; Joab's 
murder was royal murder^ as the murder of 
all the cayaliers, for he had the king's hand- 
writing for it. Murder is murder, and the 
murderer is to die, though the king by a se- 
cret letHiloney a private and illegal warrant, 
command it; therefore the Sanhedrim might 
have taken Bathsheba's life and Joab's head 
also; and, consequently, the parliament of 
England, if they be judges, (as I conceive 
Goa and the law oi tlmt ancient and re- 
nowned kingdom maketh them,) may take 
the head ot many Joabs and Jermines for 
murder ; for the conunand of a king cannot 
legitimate murden 4» David himself, as 
kmg, speaketh more for us than for the 
Prdate,— 2 Sam, xii. 7, " And David's an- 
ger was greatly kindled against the man, 
(the man was himself, ver. 7> * Thou art 
the man,') and he said to Nathan, as the 
Lord liveth, the man that hath done this 
thing shall surely die." 5. Every act of 
injustice doth not imking a prince before 
God, as every act of uncleanness doth not 
make a wife no wife before God. 6. The 
Prelate excuseth Nero, and would not have 
him resisted, if *' all Bome were one neck 
that he midit cut it off with one stroke (I 
read it of ualigula ; if the Prelate see more 
in history than I do, I yield)> 7. He saith, 
the thoughts of total eversion of a kingdom 
must onfy ML on a madman. The king of 
Britain was not mad when he declared the 
Scots traitors (because they resisted the ser- 
vice of the mass) and raised an army of pre- 
latical cut-throats to destroy them, if all the 
kingdom should resist idomtry (as all are 
obliged). The king slept upon this prela- 
tical resolution many monthiB : passions in 
fervour have not a day's reign upon a man ; 
and this was not so clear aa the sun, but it 
was as clear as written, printed proclama- 
tions, and the pressing ot soldiers, and the 
visible marching of cut-throats^ and the 
blocking up of Scotland by sea and land, 
could be visible to men having five senses. 

Covarruvias, a great lawyer, saith,^ that 
all civil power is penes remp. in the hands 
of the commonwealth ; because nature hath 
given to man to be a social creature, and 
unpos^ble he can preserve himself in a so- 
ciety except he, being in community, trans- 



1 Covarraviaa. torn. 2, pract. quest, c. 1, n. 2— 4» 



form his power to an head. He saith : Hu- 
jus vero civilis societatis et resp, rector ab 
alio quam ab ipsamet repuh. constitui non 
potest juste et absq. tyrannide. Siquidem 
ab ipso Deo constitatits non est^ nee electus 
cuiltbet civili societati immediate Hex aut 
Princeps. Arist. (polit. 3, c. 10) saith, " It 
is better that kings be got by election than 
by birth; because kingdoms by succession 
are vere regia, truly kingly : these by birth 
are more tyrannical, masterly, and proper 
to barbarous nations. And Covarruv. ^tom. 
2, pract. quest, de jurisd. Castellan. Beip. c. 
1, n. 4,) saith, " Hereditary kings are also 
niade hereditary by the tacit consent. of the 
people, and so by law and consuetude.*' 

Dpalato saith, " Let us grant that a so- 
ciety shall refuse to have a governor over 
them, shall they be for that iree ? In no 
sort. But there be many ways by which a 
people may be compelled to admit a gover- 
nor; for then no man might rule over a 
community against their will% But nature 
hath otherwise disposed, ut qvod singuli 
nollenty universi vellentj that which every 
one will not have, a community naturally 
desirethk" And the Prelate saith, *' God is 
no less the author of order than he is the 
author of being ; for the Lord who createth 
all conserveth all ; and without government 
all human societies should be dissolved and 
go to ruin : then government must be natu- 
ral, and not depend upon a voluntary and 
arbitrary constitution of men. In nature 
the creatures inferior give a tacit consent 
and silent obedience to their superior, and 
the superior hath a powerful influence on 
the interior. In the subordination of crea- 
tures we ascend from one superior to an- 
other, till at last we come to one supreme, 
which, by the way, pleadeth for the excel- 
lency of monarchy. Amongst angels there 
is an order ; how can it then be supposed 
that Grod hath left it to the simple consent 
of man to establish a heraldry of sub et su^ 
pra^ of one above another, which neither 
nature nor the gospel doth warrant? To 
leave it thus arbitraiy, that upon this sup- 
posed principle mankind may be without 
government at all, is vain; which paradox 
cannot be maintained. In nature God hath 
established a superiority inherent in supe- 
rior creatures, which is no ways derived from 
the inferior by communication in what pro- 
portion it will, and resumeable upon such 

1 Spalato de rep. ecclcs. lib. 6, c. 2, n. 32. 



>«.Mi>M.i>a— MIM« 




exigents as the inferior listeth; therefore 
neitner hath Gkxl left to the multitude, the 
community, the collective, the representa- 
tive or virtual hodjj to derive from itself 
and communicate sovereignty, whether in 
one or few, or more, in what measure and 
proportion pleaseth them, which they re* 
sume at pleasure." 

Ans.—^To answer Spalato: No society 
hath liberty to be without all government, 
for " Grod hath given to every societyj" saith 
Covatruvias, " a faculty of preserving them- 
selves, and warding off violence and in- 
juries; and this they could not do except 
they gave their power to one or many ru- 
lers."^ But all that the Prelate buildeth 
on this false supposition, which is his fic- 
tion and calumny^ not oUr doctrine, to wit, 
" that it is voluntary to man to be with- 
out all government, because it is voluntary 
to them to give away their power to one or 
more rulers," is a mere non*conBequence. 1. 
We teach that government is natural, not 
voluntary ; but 3ie way and manner of go- 
vernment is voluntary. All societies should 
be quickly ruined if there were no govern- 
ment ; but it followeth not, therefore, God 
hath made some kings, and that immediate- 
ly, without the intervening consent of the 
people, and) therefore^ it is not arbitrary to 
the people to choose one supreme ruler, and 
to erect a monarchy, or to choose more 
rulers, and to erect an aristocracy. It fol- 
loweth no way. It is natural to men to ex- 
press their mind by human voices. Is not 
speaking of this or that language^ Greek ra- 
ther than Latin, (as Aristotle saith,) ««r« 
fvf6«tM,h by human institution ? It is natural 
for men to eat, therefore election of this or 
that meat is not in their choice. What rea- 
son is in this consequence? And so it is a 
poor consequence also, Power of sovereign- 
ty is in the people naturally, therefore it is 
not in their power to give it out in that 
measure that pleaseth them, and to resume 
it at pleasure. It followeth no way. Be- 
cause the inherency of sovereignty is natural 
and not arbitrary, therefore, the alienation 
and giving out of the power to one> not to 
three, thus much, not thus much^ condition- 
ally, not absolutely and irrevocably, must be 
also arbitrary. It is as if you should say, a 
father having six children, naturally loveth 
them all, therefore he hath not freedom of 
will in expressing his affection, to give so 

1 Covarr. torn. 4, pract. quest, c. 1, n. 2. 



much of his goods to this son, and that con- 
ditionally, if Tie use these goods well ; and 
not more or less of his goods at his pleasure. 
2* There is a natural subordination in na- 
ture in creatures superior and inferior, with- 
out any freedom of election. The earth 
made not the heavens more excellent than 
the earth, and the eart^ by no freedom of 
will made the heavens superior in excellency 
to itself. Man gave no superiority of excel- 
lency to angels above himself. The Creator 
of aU beings did both immediately, without 
freedom of election in the creature, create 
the being of all the creatures, and their es- 
sential degrees of superiority and inferiority, 
but God created not Saul by nature king 
over Israel ; nor is David by the act of ere*- 
ation by which he is made a man, created 
also king over Israel ; for then David should 
from the womb and by nature be a king, 
and not by God's free gift. Here both the 
free gift of God, and the free consent of the 
people intervene. Indeed God made the of- 
fice and royalty of a king above the dignity 
of the people, but he, by the intervening 
consent of the people, maketh David a king, 
not Eliab ; and the people maketh a cove- 
nant at David's inauguration, that David 
shall have so much power, to wit, power to 
be a father, not power to be a tyrant, — power 
to fight for the people, not power to waste 
and destroy them. The inferior creatures 
in nature give no power to the superior, and 
therefore 3iey cannot give in such a propor- 
tion power. The denial of the positive de- 
gree is a denial of the comparative and su- 
perlative, and so they cannot resume any 
power ; but the designing of these men or 
those men to be kings or rulers is a rational, 
voluntary action, not an action of nature, — 
such as is Grod's act of creating an angel a 
nobler creature than man, and the creating 
of man a more excellent creature than a 
beast ; and, for this cause, the argument is 
Vain and foolish ; for inferior creatures are 
inferior to the more noble and superior by 
nature, not by voluntary designation, or, as 
royahsts say, by naked approbation, which 
yet must be an arbitrary and voluntary ac- 
tion. 3. The P. Prelate commendeth order 
while we come to the most supreme ; hence 
he commendeth monarchy above all govern- 
ments because it is Grod's government. I 
am not against it, that monarchy well-tem- 
pered is the best government, though the 
question to me is most problematic ; but be- 
cause God is a monarch who cannot err or 



THE LAW AND THE PRIXCE. 



39 



deny himself, therefore that siniiil mim be a 
monarch is miserable logic ; and he must ar- 
gue solidly, forsooth, by this, because there is 
order, as he saith, amongst angels, will he 
make a monarch and a King'-angel ? His 
argument, if it have any weight at all in it, 
dnveth at that, even that there be crowned 
kings amongst the angels. 



QUESTION X. 

WHETHER OR NOT ROTAL BIRTH BE EQUIVA- 
LENT TO DIVINE UNCTION. 

Symmons holdeth that birth is as good a 
title to the crown, as any given of €rod. 
How this question can be cleared, I see not, 
except we dispute that, Whether or not 
kingdoms be proper patrimonies derived 
&om the father to the son. I take there 
is a large difference betwixt a thing trans- 
mitable by birth from the father to the son, 
and a thing not transmitable. I conceive, 
as a person is chosen to be a king over a 
people, so a family or house may be chosen ; 
and a kingdom at first choosing a person to 
be their lung, may also tie tnemselves to 
choose the first-bom of his body, but as they 
transfer their power to the father, for their 
own safety and peace, (not if he use the 
power they give nim to their destruction,) 
the same way thev tie themselves to his 
first-born, as to their king. As they choose 
the father not as a man, but a man gifled 
with royal grace and a princely faculty for 
government, so they can out tie themselves 
to his first-born, as to one graced with a 
faculty of governing; and if^his first-bom 
shall be bom an idiot and a fool, they are 
not obliged to make him king ; for the ob- 
ligation to the son can be no greater than 
the obligation to the father, which first obli- 
gation is the ground, measure, and cause, of 
all posterior obligations. If tutors be ap- 
pointed to govern such an one, the tutors 
nave the royal power, not the idiot ; nor 
can he govern others who cannot govern 
himself. That kings go not as heritage 
from the father to the son, I prove, 

1. God (Pent, xvii.) could not command 
them to choose such an one for the king, and 
such an one who, sitting on his throne, shall 

1 Edward Symmons, in hia Loyal Subjects Be- 
leefe, sect. 3, p.X6. 



follow the direction of God, speaking in his 
word, if birth were that which gave him 
Grod's title and right to the crown ; for that 
were as much as such a man should be heir 
to his father's inheritance, and the son not 
heir to his father's crown, except he were 
such a man. But Grod, in all the law moral 
or judicial, never required the heir should be 
thus and thus qualified, else he should not be 
heir; but he requireth that a man, and so 
that a family, should be thus and thus quali- 
fied, else they should not be kings. And I 
confirm it thus : — The first king of divine 
institution must be the rule, pattern, and 
measure, of all the rest of tne kings, as 
Christ maketh the first marriage (Matt. xix. 
8,^ a pattern to all others ; and Paul reduc- 
etn the right administration of the Supper 
to Christ's first institution, 1 Cor. ^xi. 23. 
Now, the first king (Deut. xvii. 14, 16) 
is not a man qualined by naked birth, for 
then the Lord, in describing the manner of 
the king and his due qualifications, should 
seek no other but this, You shall choose only 
the first-bom, or the lawful son of the for^ 
mer king. But seeing the king of Grod's 
first moulding is a king by election, and 
what Grod did after, by promises and free 
grace, give to David and his seed, even a 
tnrone till the Messiah should come, and did 
promise to some kings, if they would walk 
m his commandments, that their sons, and 
sons' sons, should sit upon the throne, in my 
judgment, is not an obliging law that sole 
birth should be as just a title, in foro D^i^ 
(for now I dispute the question in point of 
conscience,) as royal unction. 

2. If, by divine institution, Grod hath imi- 
pawned in the people's hand a subordinate 
power to the Most High, who giveth king- 
doms to whom he will, to make and create 
kings, then is not sole birth a just title to 
the crown. But the former is true. By pror 
cent (Deut. xvii. 15) Grod expressly saith, 
" Thou shalt choose him king, whom the 
Lord shall choose." And if it had not been 
the people's power to create their own kings, 
how doth Qodj after he had designed Saul 
their king, yet expressly (1 Sam. x.) inspire 
Samuel to call the people before the Lord 
at Mizpeh to make Saul king? And how 
doth the Lord (ver. 22) expressly shew to 
Samuel and the people, the man that they 
might make him king? And because all 
consented not that SaS should be king, Grod 
will have his coronation renewed. Ver. 14, 
" Then said Samuel to the people, come and 



40 



LEX, EEX; OR, 



t go to Gilgal, and renew the kingdom 
;" ver. 15, " And all the people went 



let us 

there 

to Gilgal, and there they made Saul king 

before the Lprd in Gilgal." And how is it 

that David, anointed hj Grod, is yet no king, 

but a private subject, while all Israel make 

him king at Hebron ? 

3. If royal birth be equivalent to royal 
unction and the best title ; if birth speak and 
declare to us the Lord's will and appoint- 
ment, that the first-bom of a king should be 
king, as M. Symmons and others say, then 
is wl title by conquest, where the former 
king standeth in title to the crown and hath 
an heir, unlawful. But the latter is against 
all the nation of the royalists, for Amisseus, 
Barclay, Grotius, Jo. Rossensis Episco., the 
Bishop of Spalato, Dr Feme, M. Symmons, 
the excommunicate Prelate, if his poor learn- 
ing may bring him in the roll, teach that 
conquest is a lawful title to a crown. I 
prove the proposition, (1.) because if birth 
speak God's revealed will, that the heir of a 
king is the lawM king, then conquest can- 
not speak contrary to the will of God, that 
he is no lawful king, but the conqueror is 
the lawM king. Gted's revealed will should 
be contradictory to himself, and birth should 
speak, it is God's will that the heir of the 
former king be king, and the conquest being 
also God's revealed will, should also speak 
that that heir should not be king. (2!) If 
birth speak and reveal Grod's win that the 
heir be king, it is unlawAil for a conquered 
people to give their consent that a conque- 
ror be their king ; for their consent being 
contrary to God's revealed will, (which is, 
that birth is the just title,) must be an un- 
lawful consept. If royalists say, God, the 
ELing of kings, who immediately maketh 
kings, may and doth transfer kingdoms to 
whom he will; and when he putteth the 
sword in Nebuchadnezzar's hand to con- 
quer the king and kingdom of Judah, then 
Zedekiah or his son is not king of Judah, 
but Nebuchadnezzar is king, and Grod, be- 
ing above his law, speaketh in that case his 
will by conquests, as before he spake his 
will by birth. This is all can be said. Ans, 
They answer black treason in saying so, for 
if Jeremiah, from the Lord, had not com- 
manded expressly, that both the king and 
kingdom of Judah should submit to the king 
of Babylon, and serve him, and pray for 
him, as their lawful king, it had been as 
lawfiil for them to rebel against that tyrant, 
as it was for them to fight against the Phi- 



listines and the king of Ammon ; but if birth 
be the just and lawfiil title, in foro Dei, 
in Grod's court, and the only thing that evi- 
denceth God's will, without any election of 
the people, that the first-bom of such a 
king is their lawful king, then conquests can* 
not now speak a contradictory will of God ; 
for the question is not, whether or not God 
giveth power to tyrants to oonquer kingdoms 
from the just heirs of kings, which did reign 
lawfully before their sword made an empty 
throne, but whether conquest now, when 
Jeremiahs are not sent immetfately from 
Grod to command, for example, Britain to 
submit to a violent intruder, who hath ex- 
pelled the lawful heirs of the royal line of 
the king of Britain, whether, I say, doth 
conquest, in a such a violent way, speak that 
it is God's revealed will, called Voluntas 
signi, the will that is to rule us in all our 
moral duties, to cast off the just heirs of 
the blood royal, and to swear nomage to a 
conqueror, and so as that conqueror now 
hatn as just right as the king of Britain 
had by birth. This cannot be taken off by 
the wit of any who maintain that conquest 
is a lawful title to a crown, and that royal 
birth, without the people's election, speaketh 
God's regulating will in his word, tnat the 
first-bora of a kmg is a lawful king bv birth, 
for Grod now-a-days doth not say the con- 
trary of what he revealed in his word. If 
birth be God's regulating will, that the heir 
of the king is in Grod's court a king, no act 
of the conqueror <5an annul that word of 
God to us, and the people may not lawfully, 
though they were ten times subdued, swear 
homage and allegiance to a conqueror against 
the due right ot birth, which by royalists' 
doctrine revealeth to us the plain contradic- 
tory will of God, It is, I grant, often Grod's 
decree revealed by the event, that a conque- 
ror be on the throne, but this will is not our 
rule, and the people are to swear no oath of 
allegiance contrary to God's Voluntcts signi, 
which is his revealed will in his word regu- 
lating us. 

4. Things transferable and communicable 
by birth from father to son, are only, in 
law, those which heathens call honafortunce 
riches, as lands, houses, monies and heri- 
tages; and so saith the law also. These 
thmgs which essentially include gifts of the 
mind, and honour properly so called — I 
mean honour founded on virtue^~as Aris- 
totle, with good reason, maketh honour prcB- 
minum virtutis^ cannot be communicated by 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



41 



m^^rrnm^-f 



birth from the fikther to the son ; for royal 
dignitj indadeth these three constituent 
parts essentially, of which none can be com- 
municable by birth, (1,) The royal faculty 
of governing, which is a special gift of Grod 
above nature, is from Goa. Solomon asked 
it from God, and had it not by generation 
from his &ther David, {%) The royal hon<<- 
our to be set above the people because of 
this royal virtue is not from the womb, for 
then Grod's Spirit would not have said, 
<* Blessed art Ibou, O land, when thy king 
h the son of nobles," £ool. x. 17 ; this bon* 
our, springing from virtue, is not bom with 
any man, nor is any man bom with either 
the gift or honour to be a judge, God 
makef^ high and low, not birth, pTobles are 
bom to great estates. If judging be heri* 
tage to anv, it is a municipal p<«tive law, 
I now speak in point of conscience, (3.) The 
external lawfrd title, before men come to a 
crown, must be God's will, revealed by such 
an external sign as, by God's aopointment 
and warrant, is to regulate our wul ; but ac- 
cording to Scripture, nothing regulateth our 
will, and leadeth the people now that they 
cannot err following God's rule in making a 
king, but the free suffrages of the states 
choosLOg a man whom they conceive Grod 
hath endued with these roytd dfts required 
in the king whom €rod holdeth tbrth to them 
in his word, (Deut. xvii.) Now there be but 
these to regulate the people, or to be a rule 
to any man to ascend tEbimdly, in foro Dei^ 
in God's court to the throne, (1.) GM's 
immediate designation of a man by prophe- 
tical and divinely-inspired unction, as Sa- 
muel anointed Saul and David ; this we are 
not to expect now, nor can royalists say it, 
(2,) Conquest, seeing it is an act of violence, 
and Goers revenging justice for the sins of 
a people, caimat ffive m Qod's court such a 
jugt title to the t&one as the people are to 
sabnut their consciences unto, except Crod 
reveal bis regulating will by some immediate 
voice from heaven, aa he conimanded Judah 
to submit to Ndbuchadn^zar as to their 
king by the mouth of Jerenuah. Now this 
is not a rule to us ; for then, if the Spanish 
king should invade this Iand| and, as Kebu- 
chaonezzar did, deface the t^ple, and in» 
strumentfl and means of God's worship, and 
aboHs^ the true worship of God, it should 
be unlawfrii to resist him, after he had once 
conquered the land ; neither God's word, nor 
the law of nature could permit this, I sup- 
pose, even by grant of adversaries, now no 



act of violence done to a people, though in 
Grod's court they have deserved it, can be a 
testin^ony to us of Grod's regulating will ; ex» 
cept it have some warrant from the law and 
testimony, it is no rule to our conscience to 
acknowledge him a lawful magistrate, whose 
sole law to the th^ne is an act of the bloody 
instrument of divine wrath, I mean the 
sword. That, therefore, Judah was to sub* 
mit, according to God's word, to Nebuchad* 
nezzar, whose conscience and best warranted 
calling to the kingdom of Judah was his 
bloody sword, even if we suppose Jeremiah 
bad not commanded them to submit to the 
king of Babylon, I think cannot be said. 
(3) Naked birth cannot be this external 
signification of God's regulating will to war* 
rant the conscience of any to ascend to the 
throne, for the authors of this opinion make 
royal birth equivalent to divine unction ; for 
David anointed by Samuel, and so anointed 
by God, is not king, — Saul remained the 
Lord's anointed many years, not David, tl^ 
though anointed by Grod ; the people's mak«« 
ing him king at Sebron, founded upon di* 
vine unction, was not the only external law-r 
M calling that we read of that David had 
to the throne ; then royal birth, because it is 
but equivalent only to divine unction, not 
superior to divine unction, it cannot have 
more force to make a king than divine unc« 
tion. And if birth was equivalent to divine 
unction, what needed Joasn, who had royal 
birth, be made king by the people? and 
what needed Saul and David, who bad 
more than royal birth, even divine unc» 
tion, be made kings by the people? and 
Saul, having the vocal and infallible testi- 
mony of a prophet, needed not the people's 
election-^the one at Mizpeb and Gilgal, 
and the o^er at Hebron, 

5, K roj^al birth be as just a title to tb? 
crown as divine unction, and so as the peoi* 

Ele's election is no title at all, then is it pnr 
kw&l that there should be a king by elec? 
tion in the world now; but the latter is 
absurd,-^^so is the former. X prove the 
proposition, because where conquerors are 
wanting, and there is no king for the pre? 
sent, but the people governing, and so much 
confusion aboundeth, they cannot lawftiUy 
appoint a king, for his fftwftd title before 
God must either be conquest — ^which to n^e 
is no title — (and here, and in this case, there 
is no conquest) or the title must be ^VVO^ 
phetical w(»rd immediately inspired of God, 
tNit this IS now ceased ; or the title i^ust be 

H 



42 



L£X, RSX ; OR, 



royal birth, but here there is no royal birth, 
because the government is popular ; except 
you imagine that the society is obliged m 
conscience to go and seek the son of a fo- 
reign king to be their king. But I hope 
that such a royal birth should not be a just 
title before (xod to make him- king of that 
society to which he had no relation at all, 
but is a mere stranger. Hence in this case 
no title could be given to any man to make 
him king, but only the people's electioui 
which is that which we say. And it is most 
unreasonable that a people under popular 
government cannot lawfully choose aiding to 
uiemselves, seeing a kinj^ is a lawful magis- 
trate, and warranted by Grod's word, he* 
cause they have not a king of royal birth to 
sit upon tne throne. 

Mr Symmons saith^ that birth is the best 
title to the crown, because after the first of 
the &mily had been anointed unction was 
no more used in that family, (unless there 
arose a strife about the kingdom, as betwixt 
Solomon and Adonijah, Joam and Athaliah) 
the eldest son of the predecessor was after- 
ward the chosen of the Lord, his birthright 
spake the Lord's appointment as plainly as 
ms father's unction. — Ans, 1. It is a con- 
jecture that unction was not used in the fa- 
mily, afler the first unction, except the con- 
test was betwixt two brethren : that is said, 
not proved ; for 2 Kings xxiii. 30, when 
good Josiah was kiUed, and there was no 
contest concerning the throne of that be- 
loved prince, the people of the land took Je- 
hoahaz his 8(»i, and anointed him, and made 
him king in his father's stead ; and the 
priests were anointed, (Lev. vi. 22,) yea, all 
the priests were anointed, (Numb. iii. 3,) 
yet read we not in the history, where this 
or that man was anointed. 2. In that 
Adonijah, Sobmon's elder brother, was not 
king, it is cbar that Grod's anointing and 
the people's electing made the right to the 
crown, and not births 3, Birth de facto 
did design the man, because of God's special 
promises to David's hpuse ; but how doth a 
typical descent made to David, and some 
others by Grod's promise^ prove, that birth 
is the birthright and lawful call of God to 
a crown in all after ages? For as df^s to 
reign goeth not by birth, ^o neither doth 
God's title to a crown go. 

M. Symmons. — A prince opce possessed 
of a kingdom coming to him by inheritance, 

1 Symmons' Loyal Subjects Beleefe,. sect^ 3, p, 16. > 



can never, by any, upon any occasion be dis- 
possessed thereof, without horrible impiety 
and injustice. Boyal unction was an mde- 
lible character of old : Saul remained the 
Lord's anointed till the last gasp. David 
durst not take the right of government ac- 
tually unto him, although he had it in re- 
version, being already anointed thereunto, 
and had received the spirit thereof. 

Ans. — 1. This is the question^ J£ a prince, 
once a prince by inheritance, cannot be dis- 
possessed thereof without injustice ; for if a 
kingdom be his by birth, as an inheritance 
transmitted from the faUier to the son, I 
see not but any man upon necessary occa- 
sions may sell his inheritance ; but if a 
prince seU his kingdom, a very Barclay and 
a Grotius with reason will say, he may be 
dispossessed and dethroned, and take up his 
indelible character then. (2.) A kingdom 
is not the prince's own, so as it is injustice to 
take it from him, as to take a man's purse 
from him ; the Lord's church, in a Christian 
kingdom, is Grod's heritage, and the king 
only a shepherd, and the sheep, in the court 
of conscience, are not his. (3.) Boyal unc- 
tion is not an indelible character ; for nei- 
ther Saul nor David were all their days 
kings thereby, but lived many days private 
men afler divine unction, while the people 
anointed them kings, except you say that 
there were two kings at once in Israel ; and 
that Saul, killing I^vid, should have killed 
his own lord, and his anointed. (4.) If Da- 
vid duiHt not take the right of government 
actually on him, then divine unction made 
him not king, but only designed him to be 
king : the people's election must make the 

king. 

M. Syntmons addeth, " He that is bom 

a king and a prince can never be unborn. 
Sem^T Augustus semper Auaustus; yea, X 
believe the eldest son t)f such a king is, in 
respect of birth, the Lord's anointed in his 
Other's life-time, — even as David was be- 
fore Saul's death, and to deprive him of his 
right of reversion is as true injustice as to 
dispossess him of it." 

Ans. — It is proper only to Jesus Christ 
to be bom a king. Sure I am no man 
bringeth out of the womb with him a scep- 
tre, and a crown on his head. Divine unc- 
tion giveth » right infallibly to .a crown, but 
birth doth not so ; for one may be bom heir 
to a crown, as w^s hopeful prince Henry, 



'I » 



1 Symmoiut, sect. 3, p. 7. 



THB LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



43 



and yet never live to be king. The eldest 
son of a king, if he attempt to kill his father, 
as Absalom did, and raise forces against the 
lawful prince, I conceive he may be killed in 
battle without any imustice. If in his fa- 
therms time he be the Lord's anointed, there 
be two kings ; and the heir may have a son, 
and so there shall be three kmgs, possibly 
four, — all kings by divine right. 

The Prelate of Rochester saith,! " The 
people and nobles give no right to hinx who 
18 bom a king, they only dedare his right." 

Ans, — This is said, not proved. A man 
bom for an inheritance is by birth an heir, 
because he is not bom for these lands as a 
mean for the end, but by the contrary, these 
lands are for the heir as the mean for the 
end ; but the king is for his kingdom as a 
mean for the end, as the watchman for the 
city, the living law for peace and safety to 
God's people; and, therefore, is not heres 
hominumf an heir of men, but men are ra- 
ther heredes regis, heirs of the king. 

Amisseus saith,' ''Many kingdoms are 
purchased by just war, and transmitted by 
the law of heritage from the father to the 
son, beside the consent of the people, because 
the son receiveth right to the crown not 
from the people, but from his parents ; nor 
doth he possess the kingdom as the patri«* 
mony of the people keeping only to himself 
the burden ot protectmg and goveramg the 
people,- but as a propriety given to him lege 
regniy by his parents, wmch he is obliged to 
defend and rule, as a father looketh to the 
good and welfare of the family, yet so also 
as he may look to his own good. 

Ans. — We read in the word of God that 
the people made Solomon king, not that 
David, or any king, can leave in his testa- 
ment a kingdom to his son. He saith, the 
son hath not the right of reigning as the 
patrimony of the people, but as a propriety, 
given by the law of the kingdom by his pa- 
rents. Now this is all one as if he said the 
son hath not the right of the kingdom as 
the patrimony of the people, but as the pa- 
trimony of the people — ^which is good non- 
sense ; for the propriety of reignmg given 
from &ther to son by the law of the king- 
dom, is nothing but a right to reign given 
by the law of me people, and the very gift 
and patrimony of the people; for lex regni, 
this law of the kingdom is the law of the 



1 Joan. Episco. Roffens. de potest. PapsB. lib. 2, c. 5. 
' Amisaeus de sttthoHt. princip. c. 1, n. 13. 



people, tying the crown to such a royal &- 
mily; and this law of the people is prior 
and more ancient than the kmg, or the 
right of reigning in the king, or which the 
king is supposed to have from his royal &- 
ther, because it tnade the first &ther the 
first king of the royal line. For I demand, 
how dom the son succeed to his father's 
crown and throne ? Not by any promise of 
a divine covenant that the Lord maketh to 
the father, as he promised that David's seed 
should sit on his throne till the Messiah 
should come. This, as I conceive, is van- 
ished with the commonwealth of the Jews ; 
nor can we now find any inunediate divine 
constitution, tying the crown now to such a 
race,— nor can we say this cometh from the 
will of the &,iher-king making his son king. 
For, 1. There is no Scripture can warrant 
us to say the king maketh a king, but the 
Scripture holdeth forth that the people 
made Saul and David kings. 2. This may 
prove that the father is some way a cause 
why this son succeedeth king ; but he is not 
the cause of the royalty conferred upon the 
whole line, because the question is. Who 
made the first father a king ? Not himself ; 
nor doth God now immediately by prophets 
anomt men to be kings, — then must the 
people choose the first man, then must the 
people's election of a king be prior and more 
ancient than the birth-law to a crown ; and 
election must be a better right than birth. 
The question is. Whence cometh it that not 
only tne first father should be chosen king ; 
but also whence is it, that whereas it is m 
the people's free will to make the succession 
of kmgs go by free election, as it is in Den- 
mark and Poland, yet the people doth fireely 
choose, not only the first man to be king, 
but also the whole race of the first-bom of 
this man's famQy to be kings. All here 
must be resolved in the free nvSl of the com- 
munity. Now, since we have no immediate 
and prophetical enthroning of men, it is evi- 
dent that the Hneal deduction of the crown 
from father to son, through the whole line, 
is from the people, not from the parent. 

6. Hence, ladd this as my sixth argu- 
ment. That which taketh away that natural 
aptitude and nature's birthright in a com- 
munity, given to them by G^ and nature, 
to provide the most efficacious and prevalent 
mean for their own preservation and peace 
in the fittest govemment, that is not to be 
holden ; but to make bir^ the- best title to 
the crown, and better than free election, 



44 



LEX, BEX ; OR, 



taketh AYmj and impedeth that natural ap- 
titude and nature's birthtight of choosing^ 
not simpiy a governor, but the best, the 
justest) the more righteous^ and tjeth and 
fettereth their choSe to one of a house, 
whether he be a wise man, and just, or a 
fool and an unjust man ; therefore to make 
birth the best title to the crown, is not to be 
holden» 

tt is objected, That parents may bind their 
after generations to choose one of such a line, 
but by this argument, their natural birth'- 
right of a free choice to elect the best and 
fittest, is abridged and clipped, and so the 
posterity shall not be tjed to a king of the 
royal line to which the ancestors did swear. 
See for this the learned author of " Scrips 
ture and Beasons pleaded for Defensive 
Arms." . 

An$, — Frequent elections of a king, at 
the death of every prince, may have, by ac«^ 
cident, and through the corruption of our 
nature, bloody and tragical sequels ; and to 
eschew these, people may tie and oblige their 
children to choose one of the first-born, 
male or female, as in Scotland and England, 
of such a line ; but I have i^ken of the ex- 
cellency of the title by election above that 
of birdi, as comparmg things according to 
their own nature together, but give me 
leave to say, that the posterity are tied to 
that line, — 1. Conditionally t so the first- 
born, ceteris pcMribus^ be qualified, and have 
an head to sit at the heliUk 2. Elections of 
governors would be performed as in the sidit 
of Qod, and, in my weak apprehension, the 
person coming nearest to God's judge, fear- 
ins God) htthng covetousness ; and to Mo*- 
se? king, (Deut. xvii.) one who shall read in 
the booK of the law ; and it would seem now 
that gracious tnovals are to us inistead of 
God's immediate designation. 3. The gen- 
uine and intrinscal ^d of making Mngs 
is not simply govemifig, but govemmg the 
best way, in peace, honesty, and godhness, 
(1 Tim» iiv) therefore, these are to be made 
kings who may most expeditely procure this 
eno. Neither is it my purpose to make him 
no king who is not a gracious man, only here 
I compare title with title> 

Arg^ 7* Where God hath not bound the 
conscience, men may not bind themselves, or 
the consciences of the posterity. But God 
hath not bound any nation irrevocably and 
unalterably to a royal line^ or to one kmd of 
• ■ ■ • ■ ■■ — 

1 Sect» 4, p. 39. 






government ; therefore, no nation can bind 
their conscience, and the conscience of the 
posterity, either to one royal line, or irrevo- 
cably and unalterably to monarchy. The 
proposition is clear. 1. No nation is tyed, 
jure divino, by the tie of a divine law, to a 
monarchy, ramer than to another eovem- 
ment. the Parimn doctors prove, £at the 
precept of having a pope is amrmative, and 
so tyeth not the 3iurch, ad semper ^ for ever; 
and so the church is the body of Christ, 
without the Pope t and all oaths to things 
of their nature mdifferent, and to things tSe 
contrary whereof is lawfiil and may l^ ex- 
pedient and necessary, lav on a tie only con- 
ditionally, in so &r as they conduce to the 
end« If the Gibeonites had risen in Jo- 
shua's days to cut off the people of Grod, I 
think no wise man can think that Joshua 
and the people were tyed, by the oath of 
Crod, not to cut off the Gibeonites in that 
case; for to preserve them alive, as ene- 
mies, was against the intent of the oath, 
which was to preserve them alive, as Mends 
demanding and supplicating peace, and sub" 
mittingt The assumption is clear. If a na* 
tion seeth that aristocratical government is 
better than monarchy, hie et nunc, that the 
sequels of such a monarchy is bloody, destruc* 
tive, tyrannous ; that the monarchy compel- 
leth the free subjects to Mahomedanism, to 
gross idolatry, tney cannot, by the divine 
bond of any oath, captive their natural firee- 
dom, which is to choose a government and 
govemoi8 for their safety, and for a peace- 
able and godly life ; or fetter and cham the 
wisdom (? the posterity unalterably to a 
government or a royal line, which, Ate et 
ntenc, contrary to the mtention of their oath, 
proveth destructive and bloody. And in this 
case, even the king, though tyed by an oath 
to govern, is obliged to the practices of the 
Emperor Otho ; and as Speed saith of Rich- 
ard the second,^ to resign the crown for the 
eschewing of the efi^sion of blood» And who 
doubteth but the second wits of the expe- 
rienced posterity may correct the first wits 
of their fathers; nor shall I ever believe 
that the fathers can leave in legacy by oath^ 
any chains of the best gold to fetter the af- 
ter wits of post^ty, to a choice destructive 
to peace and true godliness* 

jirg. 8t An hentor may defraud his first'* 
bom of his heritage, because of his dominion 
he hath over his heritage: a king cannot de- 

— rrfir - i —t t 

1 Speed, Histt p. 757. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



45 



fraud his first-bom of the crown. An heritor 
maj divide his heritage equally amongst his 
twelve sons : a king cannot divide his royal 
donunions in twelve parts^ and give a part to 
every son ; for so he mi^ht turn a monarchy 
into an aristocracy, ana put twelve men in 
the place of one king. Any heritor taken 
captive may lawfully oppignerate, yea^ and 

give all his inheritance as a ransom for his 
berty ; for a man is better than his inheri- 
tance : but no king may give his 8al(jectB as 
a price or ransomk 

1 et I shall not be against the succession 
of kings by birth with good limitations ; and 
shall agree) that through the corruption of 
man's naturCi it may be in so far profitable^ 
as it is peaceabloi and preventeth bloody tu- 
multSy which are the bane of human socie- 
ties* Consider fiirther for this, ^^* B«o- 
manus, lib. 3» de reg. princi. cap. 5, aurrec* 
remat. and Joant de teme Beubese, 1 tract, 
contr. Bebelles, ar» 1> con. 4. Yet Aristo- 
tle, the flower of nature's wit, (lib. 3. poUt. 
c. 10,) preferreth election to succession. He 
preferreth Carthage to Sparta, though their 
kings came of Herenles. r lutarch in ScyUa, 
saiw, he would have kinss as dogs, that is, 
best hunters, not those who are bom of best 
dogs. Tacitus, lib. 1, Nad et generari a 
PrindpibuSf fartuitum^ nee uUra ce^timan' 
tur. 



QUESTION XL 

WHSTHSR OB NO HS BB MOBB PBINCIPAIiLY ▲ 
KINO WHO IS A KING BY BIBTH, OB HE 
WHO IS A KING BY THE FBEB ELECTION 
AND 8U7FBAGBS OF THE FBOPLE% 

Assert. 1. — ^Without detaining the reader, 
I desire liberty to assert that, where God es- 
tablisheth a kingdom by birth, that govern- 
ment, hie et nunCf is best ; and because Grod 
principally distributeth crowns, when Crod es- 
tablisheth the royal line of I>ftvid to rei^, 
he is not principally a king who cometh near- 
est and most immediately to the fountain of 
royalty, which is Grod's immediate will ; but 
God ^tabliidied, Ate et nuno, for typical rea^ 
sons (with reverence of the learned) a king 
by birth* 

AsserU 2% — But to speak of them, ex no- 
tur a reiy and according to the first mould 
and pattern of a kins by law, a king by elec- 
tion is more prindp^y king (magxs univoce 



etperse^ ihan an hereditary prince. (1.) 
Because m hereditary crowns, the first fami- 
ly being chosen by uie free suffrages of the 
people, for that cause ultitnate, the heredi- 
tary prince cometh to the throne, because 
his first father, and in him the whole line 
of the family, was chosen to the crown, and 
propter quod unumquodq'ue tale^ id ipsum 
magis tale, (2.) The first king ordained 
bv God's positive law, must be the measure 
of all kincs, and more principally ^e king 
than he I'mo is such by aerivation. But the 
first king is a kinff by election, not by birth, 
Deut. xvii. 16, Thou shalt in any wise set 
him kins over thee, whom the Lord thy 
God shau choose; one from amoi^st thy 
brethren shalt thou set over thee. (3.) The 
law saith, Surrogatum fruitier privilegiis 
ejue^ in cujxM locum swrrogatur^ he who 
is substituted in the place of another, enjoy- 
6th the privileges of him in whose place ne 
succeedethk But the hereditary king hath 
royal privileges firom him who is chosen king. 
Solomon ham the royal privileges of David 
his &ther, and is therefore king by birth, 
because his &ther David was kmg by elec- 
tion ; and this I say, not because I think sole 
birth is a just title to the crown, but because 
it detdgneth him who indeed virtually was 
chosen, when the first king of the race was 
chosen. (4.) Because there is no dominion of 
^either royalty, or any other way by nature, 
no more than an eagle is bom king of eagles, 
a lion king of hons ; neither is a man by na- 
tnr« bom kina rf men ; and, Uierefore, he 
who is made king by sufi&ages of the peo- 
ple, must be more principally king tnan 
he who hath no title but the womb of his 
mother. 

Dr Feme is so far with us, to fiither roy- 
alty upon the people's free election as on 
the fermal cause, that he saith. If to design 
the person and to procure limitation of the 
power, in the exercise of it, be to give the 
power, we grant the power is from the peo- 
ple ; but (saith he) you will have the power 
originally from themselves, in another sense, 
for you say, they reserve power to depose 
and displace the magistrate; sometimes they 
make the monarchy supreme, and then they 
divest th^nselves of ail power, and keep 
none to themselves; but, before establish- 
ed govemment, they have no politic power 
whereby they may lay a command on others, 
but only a natural power of private resist- 

1 Br Fern, part 3> lect. 3, p. 14. 




ance, which thej cannot use against the ma- 
gistrate. 

Ans.—^But to take off those by the way. 
1. If the king may choose A. B. an ambas- 
sador, and limit him in his power, and say, 
Do this, and say this to the foreign state you 

fo to, but no more, half a wit will say the 
ing createth the ambassador, and the am- 
bassador's power is originally from the king ; 
and we pi*ove the power of the lion is origi- 
nally from God, and of the sea and the fire is 
originally from Gk)d, because Grod limiteth 
the lion in the exercises of its power, that 
it shall not detour Daniel, and limiteth the 
sea^ as Jeremiah saith, when as he will have 
its proud waves to come thither and no far* 
ther, and will have the fire to bum those 
who threw the three children into the fiery 
furtiacej and yet not to bum the three chil- 
dren ; for this is as if Dr Feme said, The 
Eower of the king of six degrees, rather than 
is power of five, is from the people, there- 
fore the powei^ of the king is not from the 
people ; yea, the contrary is true. 2. That 
the people can make a kmg supreme, that is, 
ahsoiiJLte, and so resign nature's birthright, 
that is, a power to defend themselves, is not 
lawfiil, for if the people have not absolute 
power to destroy themselves, they cannot 
resign such a power to their prince. 3. It 
is fsdse that a community, before they be es- 
tablished with formal mlers, have no politic 
power ; for consider them as men only, and 
not 3i& associated, they have indeed no politic 
power: but before magistrates be estabushed, 
they may convene and associate themselves 
in a body, and appoint magistrates; and this 
they cannot do u they had no politic power 
at all. 4. They have virtually a power to 
lay on commandments, in tl]^t they have 
power to appoint to themselves rulers, who 
may lay commandments on others^ 6. A 
community hath not formally power to pun- 
ish themselves, for to punish, is to inflict ma>^ 
lum disconveniens naturce, an evil contrary 
to nature ; but, in appointing rulers and 
in agreeing to laws, they consent they shall 
be punished by another, upon supposition of 
transgression, as the child willingly going to 
school submitteth himself in that to school 
discipline, if he shall fail against anv school 
law ; and by all this it is clear, a iing by 
election is pnncipally a king. Barclay then 
faileth, who saith,^ No man denieth but sue- 
cession to a crown by birth is agreeable to 

^ Barcla. cont. Monafcham. c. 2, p. 56. 



nature. It is not against nature, but it is no 
more natural than for a lion to be bom a 
king of lions. 

Obj. — ^Most of the best divines approve an 
hereditary monarch, rather than a monarch 
by election. 

Ans. — So do I in some cases. In re- 
spect of empire simply, it is not better ; in 
respect of empire now, under man's fall 
in sin, I grant it to be better in some re- 
spects. DO Salust in Jugurth. Natura 
mortalium imperii avida, Tacitus^ Hist 
2. Minore dtacnmine princeps swmtur, 
quam queritUy there is less danger to ac- 
cept of a prince at hand, than to seek one 
afar off. In a kingdom to be constituted, 
election is better ; in a constituted kingdom, 
birth seemeth less evil. In respect of liberty, 
election is more convenient; in respect of 
safety and peace, birth is safer and the near- 
est way to the well. See Bodin. de Hep. 
lib. 6, c, iv. ; Thol. de Rep. lib. 7, c iv. 



QUESTION XIL 

WrtETflEA OR NOT A KINGDOM MAY LAWFUL- 
LY BE PX7BCHASED BY THE SOLE TITLE OF 
CONQXJEST. 

The Prelate averreth confidently (c. 17i 
p. 58) that a title to a kingdom by conquest, 
without the consent of a people, is so just and 
evident by Scripture, that it cannot be denied ; 
but the man bringeth no Scripture to prove 
it. Mr Marshall saith, (Let. p. 7,) a con^ 
quered kingdom is but continuata injuria, 
a continuea robbery. A right of conquest 
is twofold. 1. When there is no just cause. 
2. AVhen there is just reason and ground of 
the war. In this latter case, if a prince 
subdue a whole land which justly deserveth 
to die, yet, by his grace, who is so mild a 
conqueror, they may be all preserved alive; 
now, amongst those who have thus injurdd 
the conqueror, as they deserve death, we are 
to difference the persons offending, and the 
wives, children — especially those not bom — 
and such as have not offended. The former 
sort may resign their personal liberty to the 
conqueror, that the sweet life may be saved. 
He cannot be their king properly ; but I con- 
ceive that they are obliged to Consent that 
he be their king, upon this condition, that 
the conqueror put not upon them violent and 
tyrannical conditions that are harder than 



\ ■ " 



THB LA.W AND THB PRINCS. 



47 



death. Now, in reason, we cannot think 
that a tjrannous and unjust domineering can 
be Gfod's lawful mean of translating king- 
doms ; and, for the other part, the conqueror 
camiot domineer as king over the innocent, 
and especiallj the chil<&en not jet bom. 

Assert. 1. — A people may be, by God's 
special commandment, subject to a conquer- 
ing Nebuchadnezzar and a Caesar, as to their 
king, as was Judah commanded by the pro- 
phet Jeremiah to submit unto the yoke of 
the king of Babylon, and to pray for him, 
and the people ol the Jews were to give to 
CsBsar the things of Ce^sar ; and yet both 
those were unjust conquerors ; for those ty- 
rants had no command of God to oppress 
and reign over the Lord's people, yet were 
they to obey thoM kings, so the passive sub- 
jection was just and commanded of God, 
and the active, unjust and tyrannous, and 
forbidden of Grod. 

Assert. 2. — This title by conquest, through 
the people's afber consent, may be turned 
mto a just title, as in the case of the Jews 
in Gasttur's time, for which cause our Saviour 
commanded to obey Ceesar, and to pay tri* 
bute unto him, al X)r Feme confesseth, (sec. 
vii. p. 30). But two things are to be con- 
demned in the Doctor. 1. That God mani- 
festeth his will to us in this work of provi- 
dence, . whereby he translateth kingdoms. 
2. That this is an over-awed consent. Now 
to tke former I reply, — 1. If the act of con- 
quering be violent and unjust, it is no mani- 
festation joi God's regulating and approving 
will, and can no more prove a just title to a 
crown, because it ill an act of divine provi- 
dence, than Pilate And Herod's cmcifying 
of the Lord of glory, which was an act of 
divine providence, flowing from the will and 
decree of divine providence, (Acts ii. 23 ; 
iv. 28,) is a manifestation that it was God's 
approving w^ that they should kill Jesus 
Oirist. 2^ Though the consent be some 
way over-^wed, yet is it a sort of contract 
and covenant of loyal subjection made to the 
conqueror, and therefore jsufficient to make 
the title just ; otherwiso, if the people never 
dve their consent, the conqueror, domineer- 
ing over them by violence, nath no just title 
to the crown. 

Ajseert. 3. — Merid conquest by the sword, 
without the consent of the pieople, is no just 
title to the crown. 

Arg. h — Because the lairfiU title that 
God's word holdeth forth to us, beside the 
Lord's choosing and calling of a man to the 



crown, is the peope's election, Deut. xvii. 15, 
all that bad any lawful calling to the crown 
in God's word, as Saul, David, Solomon, &c., 
were called by the people ; and the first law* 
ful calling is to us a rule and pattern to all 
lawful caOings. 

Arg, 2. — A king, as a king, and by virtue 
of his royal office, is the father of the king<p 
dom, a tutor, a defender, protector, a shield, 
a leader, a shepherd, a husband, a patron, a 
watchman, a keeper of the people over which 
he is king, and 90 the office essentially in*- 
cludeth acts of fatherly affection, care, love 
and kindness, to those over whom he is set, 
so as he, who is clothed with all these rela-^ 
tions of love to the people, cannot exercise 
those official acts on a people against their 
vriil, and by mere violence. Can he be a 
father, a guide and a patron to us against 
our will, and by the sole power of the bloody 
sword ? A benefit conferred on any against 
their will is no benefit. Will he by the 
awesome dominion of the sword be our far- 
ther, and we unwilling to be his sons — an 
head over such as wiU not be members? 
Will he guide me as a father, a husband, 
against my will ? He cannot come by mere 
violence to be a patron, a shield, and a de^ 
fender of me through violence. 

Ara, 3. — It is not to be thought that 
that IS Grod's just title to a crown which 
hath nothing in it of the essence of a king, 
but a violent and bloody purchase, which is 
in its prevalency in an oppressing Nimrod, 
and the crudest tyrant that is hath nothing 
essential to that which constituteth a king ; 
for it hath nothing of heroic and royal wis- 
dom and gifts to govern, and nothing of 
God's approving and regulating will, which 
must be manifested to any who would be a 
king, but by the contrary, cmelty hath ra- 
ther baseness and witless fiiry, and a plain 
reluctancy with God's revealed will, which 
forbiddem murder. Grod's law should say, 
" Murder thou, and prosper and reign ;" 
and by the act of violating the sixth com- 
mandment, God should declare his approv- 
ing will, to wit, his lawful call to a throne. 

Arg, 4. — 'There be none under a law of 
God who may resist a lawful call to a lawful 
office, but men may resist any impulsion of 
God stirring them up to murder the most 
numerous and strongest, and chief men of a 
kingdom, that they may reign over the few- 
est, the Weakest, and the young, and lowest 
of the people, against their wul ; therefore 
this call by the sword is not lawful. If it 



48 



LEX, REX ; OB, 



be said that the divine impulsion, stirring op 
a man to make a bloody oonquest, that the 
ire and just indignation of God in justice 
may be declared on a wicked nation, is an 
extraordinary impulsion of Grod, who is above 
a law, and therefore no man may resist it ; 
then all bloody conquerors must have some 
extraordinary revelation from heaven to war* 
rant their yielding of obedience to such an 
extraordinary impulsion. And if it be so, 
they must show a lawful and immediate ex* 
traordinary impulsion now, but, it is certain, 
the sins of the people conquered, and their 
most equal and just demerit bef(»e Grod, 
cannot be a iust plea to legitimate ,the con* 
quest; f(Nr tnousii the people of God de« 
served devastation and captivity by the 
heathen, in regard of their sins, before the 
throne of divine justice, yet &e heathen 
grievously siimed in oonqu«ring them, Zech. 
1. 15, "And I am very sore displeased 
with the heathen that are at ease; for I 
was but a little displeased, and they helped 
forward the affliction." So thougn Judah 
deserved to be made captives, and a con- 
quered people, because of their idolatry and 
other sins, as Jeremiah had prophecied, yet 
God was highly displeased at babylon for 
their unjust and bloody conquest, Jer. 1. 17, 
18, 33, 34 ; li. 35, '' The vidence done to 
me and to my flesh be upon Babylon, shall 
the inhabitants of Zion say ; and my blood 
upon the inhabitants of Ghaldea, shaa Jeru- 
salem say." And that any other extra^T 
dinary impulsion to be as lawM a call to 
the throne as the people's free election, we 
know not from Grod's word ; and we have 
but the naked word of our adversaries, that 
William the Conqueror, vdthout the people's 
consent, made himself, by blood, the lawful 
king of Endand, and also of all their poste- 
rity ; and ^t king Fergus conquered Scot- 
land^ 

Arg, 5.— A king is a special gifl; from 
Grod, nven to feed and defend the people 
of G<3, that they may lead a godly and 
peaceable life under him, (Psal. Ixxviii. 71, 
72 ; 1 Tim. ii. 2 ;^ as it is a judgment of 
Grod that Laael is without a king many 
days, (Hos. iii. 4,) and that there is no 
judge, no king, to put evil-doers to shame. 
fJudg. xix. l!) But if a king be giten of 
God as a king, by the acts of a bloody con- 
quest, to be avenged on the sinM land over 
which he is made a kin^, he cannot be given, 
€tctu primo^ as a speciiu gift and blessmg of 
Grod to feed, but to murder and to destroy ; 



for the genuine end of a conqueror, as a 
conqueror, is not peace, but fire and sword. 
K Uod change his heart, to be of a bloody 
devastator, a father, prince, and feeder of 
the people, e» oMdo^ now he is not a violent 
conqueror, and he came to that meekness by 
contraries, which Is the proper wori^ of the 
omnipotent Crod, and not proper to man, 
who, as he cannot work miracles, so neither 
can he lawfiilly work bv ocHitraries, And so 
if conquest be a lawftil title to a crown, and an 
ordinasy calling, as the opponents presume, 
every bloody conqueror must be changed 
into a loving father, prince and feeder ; and 
if Crod call him, none should oppose him, but 
the whole land should dethrone their own 
native sovereign' (whom they are obliged be* 
fore the Lord to defend) and submit to the 
bloody invadon of a strange lord, presumed 
to be a just conqueror, as if he were lawfully 
called to the throne both by birth and the 
voices (rf the people. And truly they de» 
serve no wages who thus defend the king's 
prerogative royal ; for if the sword be a law« 
ful tiue to the crown, suppose the two gene* 
rals of both kingdoms should conquer the 
most and the ohiefest of the kingdom now, 
when they have so many forces in the field, 
by this wicked reason the one should have 
a lawful call of Grod to be king of England 
and the other to be king <^ Scotland ; mich 
is absurd. 

Arg. 6. — Either conquest, as conquest, is 
a just title to the crown, or as a just con- 
quest. If aa a conquest, then aU conquests 
are just titles to a crown ; then the Ammo* 
nites, Zidonians, Ganaanites, Edomites, &g., 
subduing God's people for a time, have just 
title' to reign over them ; and if Absalom 
had been stronger than David, he had then 
had the just title to be the Lord's anoin- 
ted and king of larael, not David ; and so 
strength actually prevailing should be God's 
lawfiu call to a crown. But strength, as 
strength victorious, is not law nor reason : it 
were then reason that Herod b^ead John 
Baptist, and the Boman Emperors kill the 
witnesses of Christ Jesus. If conquest, as 
just, be the title and lawfid claim before 
Grod's court to a crown, then, certainly, a 
stronger king, for pregnant national injuries, 
may htwfully subdue and reign over an in- 
nocent posterity not yet boni. But what 
word of God can warrant a posterity not 
bom, and so accessory to no offence against 
the conqueror, (but only sin original,) to be 
under a conqueror against their will, and 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



49 



who hath no right to reign over them but 
the bloody swora. ? For so conquest, as eon- 
quest, not as just, maketh him king over 
tne posterity. If it be said. The fathers 
may engage the posterity by an oath to sui^- 
render themselves as loyal subjects to the 
man who justly and deservedly made the 
fathers vassals by the title of the sword of 
justice ; I answer, The fathers may indeed 
dispose of the inheritance of their children, 
because that inheritance belongeth to the 
father as well as to the son ; but because 
the liberty of the son being bom with the 
son, (all men being bom &ee from all civil 
subjection,) the ^ther hath no more power 
to resign the liberty of his chUdren than 
their lives ; and the father, as a father, hath 
not power of the life of his child ; as a magis- 
trate he may have power, and, as something 
more than a father, he may have power of 
life and death, I hear not what Grotius 
saith,^ '• Those who are not bom have no 
accidents, and sp no rights, Non entis nulla 
sunt accidentia ; then children not bom 
have neither right nor liberty." And so no 
injury (may some say) can be done to chil- 
dren not bom, though the Others should 
give away their liberty to the oon^uerors, — 
those who are not oapable of law are not 
capable of injury contrary to law.— r^jw. 
There is a virtual alienation of rights and 
lives of children not bom unlawful, because 
the childrai are not bom. To say that 
children not bom are not capable of law and 
injuries virtual, which become real in time, 
might say, Adam did not any injury to his 
posterity by his first sin, which is contrary 
to Grod's word : so those who vowed yearly 
to give seven innocent children to the Mino- 
taur to be devoured, and to kill their chil- 
dren not bom to bloody Molech, did no acts 
of bloody injury to their children ; nor can 
any say, then, that fathers cannot tie them- 
selves and their posterity to a king by suc- 
cession. But I say, to be tyed to a lawful 
king is no making away of liberty, but a re- 
signing of a power to be justly governed, 
protected and awed from active and passive 
violence. 

Arg. 7. — No la,wful king may be de- 
throned, nor lawful kingdom dissolved ; but 
law and reason both saitn, Qtuxi vi partum 
est imperium^ vi dissolm potest. Every 
conquest made by violence may be dissolved 



^ Hugo Grotiiu de jnre belli et pads, lib. 2, 
e. 4, n. IOl 



by violence : Censetur enim ipsa natura 
jus dare ad id omne, sine quo obtineri non 
potest quod ipsa imperat. 

Obj, — It is objected, that the people of 
Grod, by their sword, conquered seven na- 
tions of the Canaanites; David conquered 
the Ammonites for the disgrace done to his 
ambassadors ; so Grod gave Egypt to Nebu- 
chadnezzar for his hire in his service done 
against Judah. Had David no right over 
the Ammonites and Moabites but by expect- 
ing their consent ? Ye will say, A right to 
their lands, goods and lives, but not to chal- 
lenge their moral subjeotion. Well, we 
doiibt not but such conquerors will chal- 
lenge and obtain their moral consent. But 
if tne people refuse their consent, is there 
no way, for providence giveth no right ? So 
Dr Feme,^ so Amisaeus.* 

Ans, — A facto ad jus non vales conse^ 
quentia, God, to whom belongeth the world 
and the fulness thereof, disponed to Abra- 
ham and his seed the land of Canaan for 
their inheritance, and ordained that they 
should use their bow and their sword, for 
the actual possession thereof; and the like 
divine right had David to the Edomites and 
AmmoniteEi, though the occasion of David's 
taking possession of these kingdoms by his 
sword, did arise from particumr and occa- 
sional exigencies and injuries ; but it foUow- 
eth in no sort that, therefore, kings now 
wanting any word of promise, and so of di- 
vine right to any lands, may ascend to the 
thrones of other kingdoms ^an their own, 
by no other title than the bloody sword. 
That God's will was the chief patent here is 
clear, in that God forbade his people to con- 
quer Edom, or Esau's possession, when as he 
gave them command to conquer the Amo- 
rites. I doubt not to say, if Joshua and 
David had no better title than their bloody 
sword, though provoked by injuries, they 
could have had no right to any kingly po4^er 
over these kingdoms ; and if only success by 
the sword be a right of providence, it is no 
right of precept. God's providence, as pror 
vidence without precept or promise, can oour 
elude a thing is done, or may be done, but 
cannot conclude a thing is lawfully and war- 
rantably done, else you might say the sel- 
ling of Joseph, the cracifying of Christ, the 
spoiling of Job, were lawfully done. Though 
conquerors extort consent and oath of loyS- 



1 Dr Feme part S, seet. 3, p. 2Q. 

3 Arnia89a8 de authoritat princip. c. 1, n. 12L 

I 



50 



LBX, BSX; OR, 






tjj yet that maketh not over a royal li^t 
to the ocmqueror to be king over their pos- 
terity without thdr consent. Though the 
children o£ Ammon did a high injury to 
David, yet no injury can be recompensed in 
justice with the pressore of the constrained 
subjection of loyalty to a violent lord. I£ 
David had not had an hi^ier warrant from 
God than an injury done to his mesaen^rs, 
he could not nave conquered them. J3ut 
the Ammonites were the declared enemies 
of the church of God, and raised forces 
against David when they themselves were 
the injurers and offenders. And if David's 
conquest will prove a lawM titie bv the 
sword to all conquerors, then may all con- 
querors lawfiQly do to the conquered people 
as David did ; that is, they may " put them 
under saws, and under harrows of iron, and 
under axes of iron, and cause them pass 
throu^ the brick-kihie." But, I beseech 
you, will royalists say, that conquerors, who 
make themselves kin£« by their sword, and 
so make themselves fathers, heads, defen- 
ders, and feeders of the people, may use the 
most extreme tyranny in the world, such as 
David used against the children of Ammon, 
which he oouM not have done by the naked 
title of sword-conquest, if Grod had not laid 
a commandment of an higher nature on him 
to serve Giod's enemies so? I shall then 
say, if a conquering king be a lawfid king, 
because a conqueror, then hath God made 
such a lawM xing both a father, because a 
king, and a tyrant, and cruel and hon- 
heaurted oppressor of those whom he hath 
conquered ; for God hath given him royal 
power by this example, (2 &un. xii. 30, 31,) 
to put these, to whom he is a &ther and de- 
fender by office, to torment, and also to be 
a torturer of them by office, by bringing 
their backs under such instruments of cruel- 
ty as '* saws, and harrows of iron, and axes 
of iron." 



QUESTION XIII. 

WHSTHER OR NO BOTAL DIGNITY HAVE ITS 
SPRING FROM NATURE, AND HOW THAT IS 
TRUE, " EVERT MAN IS BORN FREE," AND 
HOW SERVITUDE IS CONTRART TO NATURE. 

I conceive it to be evident that royal dig- 
nity is not immediately, and without the in- 
tervention of the people's consent, given by 



Giod to any one person, and that conquest 
and violence is no just title to a crown. 
Now the question is. If royalty flow from 
nature, if royalty be not a thing merely na- 
tural, neither can subjection to royal power 
be merely natural ; but the form^ is rather 
civil than natural : and the question of the 
same nature is. Whether subjection or servi- 
tude be natural. 

I conceive that there be divers subjections 
to these that are above us some way natural, 
and therefore I rank them in order, thus : — 
1. There is a subjection in respect of na- 
tural being, as the effect to the cause ; so, 
though Adun had never sinned, this mora- 
lity of the fifth command should have stood 
in vigour, that the son bv nature, without 
any positive law, should have been subject 
to the &Uier, because from him he hath his 
being, as from a second cause. But I doubt 
if the relation of a fidher, as a &ther, doth 
necessarily infer a royal or kingly authority 
of the &ther over the son ; or by nature's 
law, that the father hath a power of life and 
death over, or above, his children, and the 
reasons I give «are, (1.) Because power of 
life and death is by a positive law, presup- 
posing sin and the rail of man; and if Adam, 
standmg in innocency, could lawfrdly kill his 
son, though the son ^ould be a malefactor, 
without any positive law of Crod, I mudi 
doubt. (2.J I judge that the power royal, 
and the fatherly power of a father over his 
children, shall be found to be different ; and 
the one is founded on the law of nature, the 
other, to wit, royal power, on a mere posi- 
tive law. 2. The degree or order of sub- 
jection natural is a suQection in respect of 
gifts or age. So Aristotle (1 polit. cap. 3) 
saith, '' that some are by nature servants." 
His meaning is good, — that some gifts of 
nature, as wisdom natural, or aptitude to 
govern, hath made some men of gold, fitter 
to command, and some of iron and day, fit- 
ter to be servants and slaves. But I judge 
this titie to make a king by birtii, seeing 
Saul, whom God by supervenient gifts made 
a king, seemeth to owe small thanks to the 
womb, or nature, that he was a king, for his 
cruelty to the Lord's priests spealKeth no- 
thing but natural baseness. It is possible 
Plato had a good meamng, (dialog. 3, de le- 
gib.) who made six orders here. '^ 1. That 
Stthers command their sons; 2. The noble 
the ignoble ; 3. The elder the younger ; 4. 
The masters the servants ; 5. The stronger 
the weaker; 6. The wise the ignorant." 



THS LAW AND THE PIUNCB. 



51 



Aquinas (22, q. 57, art. 3), Driedo (de li- 
bert. Christ. Kb. 1, p. 8), fcllowing Aristo- 
tle, (polit. lib. 7, c. 14,) hold, though man 
had never sinned there should have been a 
sort of dominion of the more gifted and 
wiser above the less wise and weaker ; not 
antecedent fix)m nature properly, but conse- 
quent, for the utility and good of the weaker, 
in so far as it is good for the weaker to be 
guided by the stronger, which cannot be de-« 
nied to have some ground in nature. But 
there is no ground for kings by nature here. 

1. Because even those who plead that the 
mother's womb must be the best title for a 
crown, and make it equivalent to royal unc- 
tion, are to be corrected in memory thus, — 
That it is merely accidental, and not natu- 
ral, for such a son to be bom a king, because 
the free consent of the people makmg choice 
of the first father of toat line to be their 
king, and in him making choice of the first- 
bom of the family, is merely accidental to 
father and son, and so cannot be natural. 

2. Because royal gifts to reign are not held 
by either us or our adversaries to be the 
specific essence of a kin? ; for if the people 
crown a person their kmg, say we, — ^if the 
womb bnng him forth to be a king, say the 
opponents, — ^he is essentially a kin?, and to be 
obeyed as the Lord's anointed, mough na- 
ture be very pareey sparing, and a niggard 
in bestowing royal gifts ; yea, though he be 
an idiot, say some, if he be the fii^-bom of 
a king, he is by iust title a king, but must 
have curators and tutors to gmde him in 
the exercise of that royal right that he hath 
from the womb. But Buchanan saith well,^ 
" He who cannot govern himself shall never 
govern others." 

Assert. 1. — As a man cometh into the 
world a member of a politic society, he is, 
by consequence, bom subject to the laws of 
that society ; but this maceth him not, from 
the womb and by nature, subject to a king, 
as by nature he is subject to his father who 
begat him, no more than by nature a lion is 
bom subject to another king-lion ; for it is 
by accident that he is bom of parents under 
subjection to a monarch, or to either democra- 
tical or aristocratical governors, for Cain and 
Abel were bom under none of these forms 
of govemmeht. properly; and if he had been 
bom in a new planted colony in a wildemess, 
where no government were yet established, 
he should be under no such government. 

1 Bncban. de jare Regni apad Scotos. 



Assert, 2. — Slavery of servants to lords or 
masters, such as were of old amongst the 
Jews, is not natural, but against nature. 
1. Because slavery is malum naturce, a 
penal evil and contrary to nature, and a 

Eunishment of sin. 2. Slavery should not 
ave been in the world, if man had never 
sinned, no more than there could have been 
buying and selling of men, which is a miser- 
able consequent of sin and a sort of death, 
when men are put to the toiling pains of the 
hireling, who longeth for the shadow, and 
under iron harrows and saws, and to hew 
wood, and draw water continually. 3. The 
original of servitude was, when men were 
taken in war, to eschew a greater evil, even 
death, the captives were willing to undergo 
a less evil, slavery, (8. Servitus, 1 de jure. 
Fers.) 4. A man being created according to 
God's image, he is res sacra^ a sacred thing, 
and can no more, by nature's law, be soM 
and bought, than a religious and sacred 
thing dedicated to God. S. 1. Instit, de 
inutiL scrupL L inter Stipulantem. jS. 
Sacram, F» de verher, Obligat, 

Assert, 3. — Every man by nature is a free- 
man bom, that is, by nature no man cometh 
out of the womb under any civil subjection 
to king, prince, or judge, to master, captain, 
conqueror, teacher, &c. 

Arg, 1. — ^Because freedom is natural to 
all, except freedom from subjection to pa- 
rents ; and subjection politic is merely acci- 
dental, coming from some positive laws of 
men, as they are in a politic society; whereas 
they might have been bom with all concomi- 
tants of nature, though bom in a single 
&mily, the only natursu and first society in 
the world. 

Arg. 2. — ^Man is bom by nature fi*ee fii^m 
all subjection, except of that which is most 
kindly and natural, and that is fatherly or 
filial subjection, or matrimonial subjection of 
the wife to the husband ; and especially hO' 
is free of subjection to a prince by nature ; 
because to be under jurisdiction to a judge 
or king, hath a sort of jurisdiction, (argu- 
ment, X. Si quis sit fugitivus. F, de edil. 
edict, in S. penult, vel fin,) especially to be 
under penal laws now in the state of sin. 
The learned senator Ferdinandus Vasquez 
saith, flib. 2. c. 82. n. 15,) Every subject is 
to lay clown his life for the prince. Isow no 
man is bom under subjection to penal laws 
or dying for his prince. 

Arg, 3. — Man by nature is bom free, and 
as free as beasts ; but by nature no beast, no 



52 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



lion is bom king of lions ; no horse, no bul- 
lock, no eagle^ king of horses^ bullocks, or 
eagles. Nor is there any subjecticm here, 
except that the young Hbn is sul^ect te the 
old, every foal to its d^m i and by th^t same 
law of nature^ no man is hoirn kmg of men, 
nor any man subject to man in a civil sub- 
jection by nature^ (I speak not of natural 
subjection of children to parents,) and there- 
fore Ferdi. Vasquez (illustr. quest, lib* 2^ 
c. 82, n. 6,) said, that kingdoms and empires 
were brought in^ not by nature's law, but by 
the law ofnationSk He expoundeth himself 
elsewhere to speak of the law of nature secon- 
dary> otherwise the primary law of nations is 
indeed the law of nature^ as appropriated to 
maui if any reply. That the freedom natu- 
ral of beasts and birds, who never sinned, can- 
not be one with the natural freedom of man 
who is now under sin, and so under bondage 
for sin, my answer is. That the subjection of 
the misery of man by nature, because of sin, 
is more than the subjection of beasts, com- 
paring species and kinds of beasts and birds 
with mankind) but comparing individuals of 
the same kind am(Hig6t themselves ; as lion 
vrith lion, eagle with eagle, and so man with 
man ; in which respect, because he who is 
supposed to be the man bom free from sub- 
jection politic, even the king bom a king, is 
imder the same state of sin, and so by rea- 
son of siu) of which he hath a share equally 
with all other men by nature, he must be, 
by nature^ bom under as great subjection 
penal for sin (except the king be bom void 
of sin) as other men ; therefore he is not 
bom freer by nature than other men, ex- 
cept he come out of the womb with a king's 
crSwn on his head. ^ 

Arg. 4. — To be a king is a free gift of 
Grod) which God bestoiveth on some men 
above others-, as is evident, (2 Sam^ xii. 7, 8; 
Psal. Ixxv. 6 ; Daai. rv-, 32 ;) and therefore 
aJl must be bom kings^ if any one man be by 
nature a king bom, and another a bom sub- 
ject. But ii some be by Grod's grace made 
kings above others, they are not so by na- 
ture ; for things which agree to man by na- 
ture, agree to all men equally s but all men 
equally are not bom kmgs, as is evident ; 
and aU men are not equally bom by nature 
under politic subjection to kings^ as the ad- 
versaries grant, because those wno are by na- 
ture kings^ cannot be also by nature subjects. 

Arg. br — If men \)e not by nature free 
from politic sulgection, then must some, by 
the law of relation, by nature be kings. But 



none are by nature kings, because none have 
by nature these things which essentially con- 
stitute kings, for th^ have neither by na- 
ture the calling of Uod, nor gifts for the 
throne^ nor the free election of the people, 
nor conquest ; and if there be none a long 
by nature, there can be none a subject by 
nature. And the law saith, Omnes sumtis 
natwa liberi, nullirts ditioni svhfecH, lib, 
Manumiss, F. dejust, etjur. S,ju8 antem 
gentium^ Jus, de jur, naU We are by na- 
ture free, and D. L, ex hoc jure cum simiL 

Arg, ^.-^Politicians agree to this as an un- 
deniable truth) that as domestic society is na- 
tural, being grounded upcm nature's instinct, 
so politic society is voluntary, being ground- 
ed on the consent of men ; and so politic 
society is natural, in radice, in the root, and 
voluntary and free, in modo^ in the manner 
of their union ; and the Scripture cleareth 
to us, that a king is made by the free con- 
sent of the people, (Deut xvii. 15,) and so 
not by nature* 

Arg, 7. — What is from the womb, and so 
natural, is eternal, and agreeth to all socie- 
ties of men ; but a monarchy agreeth not to 
all societies of men ; for many hundred years, 
de facto, there was not a king till Nimrod'i^ 
time, the world being governed by famihes, 
and till Moses' time we find no institution 
for kings, (Gen. vii.) and the numerous mul- 
tiplication of mankind did occasion 'monar- 
chies^ othervnse, fatherly government being 
the first and measure of the rest, must be 
the best ; for it is better that my father go- 
vern me, than that a stranger govern me, 
andj therefore, the Lord forbade his people 
to set a stranger over themselves to be their 
king. The F. Prelate contendeth for the 
contrary, (Ck 12, p* 126,) " Every man 
(saith he) is bom subject to his father, of 
whom immediately he hath his existence in 
nature ; and if his father be the subject of 
another, he is bom the subject of his fa- 
ther's superior. "-^-4»w. But the consequence 
is weak* Every man is bom under natural 
subjection to his father, therefore he is born 
naturally under civil suljection to his father's 
superior or king. It fblloweth notw Yea, 
because his father was bom only by nature 
sul^ject to his own father, therefore he was 
subject to a prince or king only by accident, 
and by the fr^e constitution of men^ who 
freely choose politic government, whereas 
there is no government natural, but fatherly 
or marital, and therefore the contradictory 
consequence is tme. 



M 



zz 



^m 



'' * 'f 'li 



THE LAW AND THS PRINCE. 



53 



P. Prelate, — Evei*y man by nature hath 
immitnity and liberty firom despotical and 
hierarchial empire, and so may dispose of his 
own at will, ana cannot endave himself with^* 
out hig own free will ; but God hath laid a 
necessity on all men to be under goyem-^ 
ment, and nature also laid this necessity on 
him, therefore this sovereignty cannot pro- 
tect us in righteousness and honesty, except 
it be entirdy endowed with sovereign power 
to preserve itself, and protect us^ 

jins.-^l. The Prelate here deserteth his 
own consequence^ which is strong against 
himself, for if a man be naturally subject to 
his father's superior^ as he said before, why 
is not the son of a slave naturally subject to 
his father's superior and master ? 2. As a 
man may not make away his liberty with- 
out his own consent, so can he not^ without 
his own consent, give his liberty to be sub- 
iect to penal laws under a prince, without 
his own consent, either in his father's or in 
the representative society in which he liveth. 
3. God and nature hath laid a necessity on 
all men to be under government, a natural 
necessity from the womb to be under some 
government, to wit, a paternal government, 
uiat is true ; but under this government po- 
litic, and namely under sovereignty, it is 
false; and that is but said : for why is he na- 
turally under sovereignty rather than aris- 
tocracy ? I believe any of the three forms 
are freely chosen by any society. 4. It is 
false that one cannot defend the people, ex- 
cept hd have entire power, that is to say, he 
cannot do good except he have a vast power 
to do both good and ill. 

P. Prelate. — It is accidental to any to 
render himself a slave, being occasioned by 
force or extreme indigence, but to submit to 
government congruous to the condition of 
man, and is necessary for his happy being, 
and natural, and necessary^ by the inviola- 
ble ordinance of God and nature. 

Ans, 1. — If the father be a slave, it is 
natural and not accidental, by the Prelate's 
logic, to be a slave. 2. It is also accidental 
to be under sovereignty, and sure not natu- 
ral; for then aristocracy and democracy must 
be unnatural, and so unlaw^l governments. 
3. If to be congruous to the condition of 
man be all one with natural man, (which he 
must say if he speak sense) to believe in God, 
to be an excellent mathematician ^ to swim 
in deep waters, being congruous to the nature 
of man, must be natursJ. 4. Man by na>» 
ture is under government paternal, not poli- 



tic properly^ but by the free consent of his 
will. 

P. Prelate (p. 126). — Luke xi. 6, Christ 
himself was ^»ru^0fi\nt subject to his pa- 
rents, (the word which is used, Rom. xiii.) 
therefore none are exempted from subjec- 
tion to lawfrl government. 

Ans. — We never said that any were ex- 
empted from lawful government. The Pre- 
late and his fellow Jesuits teach that the 
dei^ are exempted from the laws of the 
dvif magistrate, not we ; but because Qirist 
was subject to his parents, and the same 
word is used, Luke xit, which is in Bom. 
xiii.) it will not follow, therefore^ men are 
by nature subject to kings^ because they are 
by nature subject to parents* 

P» Prelate.-^The &ther had power over 
the children, by the law of God and nature^ 
to redeem himself from debt, or any dis- 
tressed condition^ by enslaving his children 
begotten of his own body ; if mis power was 
not by the ri^t of nature and by the war- 
rant of God, I can see no other, mr it could 
not be by mutual and voluntary contract of 
children and fathers. 

Ans. — 1. Show a law of nature, that the 
father might enslave his children ; by a di- 
vine positive law, presupposing sin, the father 
might do that; and yet I thmk that may be 
questioned, whether it was not a permission 
rather than a law, as was the bill of divorce; 
but a law of nature it was not. 2. The P. 
Prelate can see no law but the law of nature 
here ; but it is because he is blind or will not 
see. His reason is. It was not by mutual 
and voluntary contract of children and fa- 
therS) therefore it was by the law of nature; 
so he that cursed his father was to die by 
God's law. This law was not made by mu- 
tual consent betwixt the father and the son, 
therefore it was a law of nature : the Pre- 
late will see no. better. Nature will teach a 
man to enslave himself to redeem himself 
from death^ but that it is' a dictate of nature 
that a man should enslave his son, I conceive 
not* 3. What can this prove, but that if 
the son may, by the law of nature, be en- 
slaved for the father, but that the son of a 
slave is by nature under subjection to sla- 
very, and that by nature's law ; the con- 

tr^ whereof heUe in d^ep^eprec^- 
mg, and m this same page. 

As for the argument of the Prelate to an- 
swer Suarez, who laboureth to prove monar- 
chy not to be natural, but of free consent, 
because it is various in sundry nations, it 



obia 



54 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



is the Jesuits' argument, not ours. I own 
it not. Let Jesuits plead for Jesuits. 



QUESTION XIV. 

whether or no the people make a per- 
son their kino conditionally, or ab« 
solutelt; and whether there be such 
a thing as a covenant tying the king 
no less than his st7bjects. 

There is a covenant natural, and & cove- 
nant politic and civil. There is no politic or 
civil covenant betwixt the king and his sub- 
jects, because there be no such equaUtj (say 
royaUsts) betwixt the king and nis people, 
as that uie king can be brought under any 
civil or legal obligation in man's court, to 
either necessitate tne king civilly to keep an 
oath to his people, or to tie him to any 
punishment, if he fail, yet (say they) he is 
under natural obligation in Qod.^ court to 
keep his oath, but he is accountable only to 
Grod if he violate his oath. 

Assert, 1 — There is an oath betwixt the 
king and his people, laying on, by reciproca- 
tion of bands, mutual civil obligation upon 
the king to the people, and the people to 
the king; 2 Sam. v. 3, '*,So all the elders of 
Israel came to the king to Hebron, and 
king David made a covenant with them in 
Hebron before the Lord, and they anointed 
David king over Israel." 1 Clin)n. xi. 3, 
" And David made a covenant with them 
before the Lord, and they anointed David 
king over Israel, according to the word of 
the Lord by Samuel." 2 Giron. xxiii. 2, 3, 
" And they went about in Judah, and ga- 
thered the Levites out of all the cities of 
Judah, and the chief of the fathers of Israel, 
and they came to Jerusalem. And all the 
congregation made a covenant with the king 
[Joasl^ in the house of God." 2 Kings xi. 
17) '' Jehoiada made a covenant between the 
Lord and the king and the people, that 
they should be the Lord's people ; between 
the king also and the people." Eccl. viii. 2, 
" 1 counsel thee to xeep the king's com- 
mandment, and that in regard of the oath 
o£ God." Then it is evident there was a 
covenant betwixt the king and the people. 
That was not a covenant that did tie the 
king to Grod wily, and not to the people, — 
1. Because the covenant betwixt the king 
and the people is clearly differenced from 



the king's covenant with the Lord, 2 KitigB 
xi. 17. 2. There was no necessity that 
this covenant should be made publicly be- 
fore the people, if the king did not in the 
covenant tie and oblige himself to the peo- 
ple ; nor needed it be made solemnly before 
the Lord in the house of God. 3. It is 
expressly a covenant that was between Joash 
the king and his people ; and David made a 
covenant at his coronation with the princes 
and elders of Israel, therefore the people 
gave the crown to David covenant-wise, and 
upon condition that he should perform such 
and such duties to them. And this is dear 
by all covenants in the word of God : even 
the covenant between Grod and man is in 
like manner mutual, — ^** I will be your God, 
and ye shall be my people." The covenant 
is so mutual, that if the people break the 
covenant, God is loosed from his part of the 
covenant, Zech. xi. 10. The covenant giv- 
eth to the believer a sort of action of mw, 
and jus quoddamy to plead with God in 
respect of his fidelity to stand to that cove- 
nant that bindeth lum by reason of his fi- 
delity, Isa. xliiL 26 ; Ixiii. 16; Dan. ix. 4, 6; 
and far more a covenant giveth ground of a 
civil action and claim to a people and the 
fi«e estates against a king, seduced by wicked 
counsel to msu^e war against the land, where- 
as he did swear by the most high God, that 
he should be a &ther and protector of the 
church of Grod. 

Assert, 2. All covenants and contracts 
between man and man, yea, all solemn pro- 
mises, bring the covenanters under a law 
and a claim before men, if the oath of Grod 
be broken, as the covenant betwixt Abra- 
ham and Abimelech, (Gen. xxi. 27,) Jona- 
than and David. (1 Sam. xviii. 3.) The 
spies profess to Bahab in the covenant that 
they made with her, (Josh. ii. 20,) " And if 
thou utter this our business, we will be quit 
of thine oath which thou hast made us to 
swear." There be no mutual contract made 
upon certain conditions, but if the conditions 
be not fidfiUed, the party injured is loosed 
from the contract. Barclay saith, ^' That 
this covenant obligeth the king to Grod, but 
not the king to the people."*^— ^n^. It is a 
vain thing to say that the people and the 
king make a covenant, and that David made 
a covenant with the elders and princes of 
Israel ; for if he be obliged to God only, and 
not to the people, by a covenant made with 
the people, it is not made with the people at 
all, nay, it is no more made with the people 



THE LAW AlO) TH£ PRINCE. 



55 



of Israel than with the Chaldeans, for it 
bindeth David no more to Israel than to 
Chahlea, aa a covenant made with men. 
AmissBus saith/ " When two parties con- 
tract, if one perform the duty, the other is 
acquitted." Sect, Oex hujus mod u6t vult 
just, de duob, reis, lib. 3. Dr Feme saith, 
" Because every one of them are obliged 
folly (Sect. 1) Jtist. eod, to God, to whom 
the oath is made (for that is his meaning^, 
and if either the people per&rm what is 
sworn to the Lord or the king, yet (me of 
ike parties remaineth still under obligation ; 
and neither doth the people's obedience ex- 
empt the king from punishment, if he fail, 
nor the king's ob^ence exempt the people, 
if they fail, but every one beareth the pun- 
ishment of his own sin ; and there is no mu- 
tual power in the parties to compel one an- 
other to perform the promised duty, because 
that belongeth to the pretor or magistrate, 
before whom the contract is made. The 
king hath jurisdiction over the people, if 
they violate their oath; but the people hath 
no power over the prince; and the ground 
that AmissBus layeth down is this, — 1. The 
king is not a party contracting with the peo- 
ple, as if there were mutual obli^tions be- 
twixt the king and Uie people, and a mutual 
oo-active power on either side. 2. That the 
care of religion belongeth not to the people, 
for that haw no warrant in the Word (saith 
he). 3. We read not that the people was 
to command and compel the priests and the 
king to reform relijzion and abolish idolatry, 
as it must follow, if the covenant be mutual. 

4. Jehoiada (2 Kings xi.) obHgeth himself, 
and the king, and the people, by a hke law, 
to serve God ; and here be not two parties 
but three — ^the high priest, tho king, and 
the people, if this example prove any thing. 

5. Bodi king and people shall find the re- 
venging hand of God against them, if they 
fail in the breach of their oath ; every one, 
king and people, by the oath stand obliged 
to Uod, the kmg for himself, and the people 
for themselves, but with this difference, the 
king oweth to God proper and due obedience 
as any of the subjects, and also to sovem 
the people according to God's true region, 
(Beut. xvii. ; 2 Chi^n. xxix. ;) and in this 
the king's obligation differeth from the peo- 
ple's OMigation ; the people, as they would 
be saved, must serve God and the king, for 
the same cause. (1 Sam. xii.) But, besides 

^ Amis, de anthorit. prin. c. 1. n. 6, 7. 



this, the king is obliged to rule and govern 
the people, and keep them in obedience to 
God ; but the people is not obhgied to go- 
vern the king, and keep him in obedience 
to Grody for then the people should have as 
great power and jurisdiction over the kinff, 
as the king hath over the people, which is 
aoainst the word of God, and the examples 
of the kings of Judah ; ' but this cometh not 
from any promise or covenant that the king 
hath made with the people, but from a pe- 
culiar obligation wherebv he is obliged to 
Grod as a man, not as a kmg :-— 

Arg, 1. — This is the mystery of the busi- 
ness which I oppose in these assertions. 

Assert, 1. — As the king is obliged to Grod 
for the maintenance of true religion, so are 
the people and princes no less in their place 
obliged to maintain true reli^n; for the 
people are rebuked, because uiey bum in- 
eense in all high places, 2 Kings xvii. II ; 
2 Ghron. xxxiii. 17 ; Hos. iv. lo. And the 
reason why the high places are not taken 
away, is given in 2 Ghron, xx. 33, for as yet 
the people " had not prepared their heart 
unto the God of their rathers ;" but you will 
reply, elicit acts of maintenance of true re- 
ligion are commanded to the people, and 
i£&t the places prove ; but the question is 
de (ictibus imperatisy of commanded acts of 
religion, sure none but the magistrate is to 
command others to worship God aooording 
to his word. I answer, in ordinary only, 
magistrates (not the king only but all the 
princes of the land) and judges are to main- 
tain religiim by their commandments, (Deut. 
i. 16 ; 2 Chron. i. 2 ; Deut. xvi. 19 ; Eccles. 
V. 8 ; Hab. i. 4 ; Mic, iii, 9 ; Zech. vii, 9 ; 
Hos. V. 10, 11,) and to take care of reli- 
gion; but when the judges decline from 
God's way and corrupt the law, we find the 
people punished and rebuked for it : Jer. xv. 
4, *^ And I will cause them to be removed 
to all kingdoms of the earth, because of Ma- 
nasseh, the son of Hezekiah king of Judah, 
for that which he did in Jerusalem ;" 1 Sam. 
xii. 24,' 26, " Only fear the Lord ; but if ye 
shall still do wickedly, ye shall be consumed, 
both ye and your king." And this case, I 
grant, is extraordinaiy ; yet so, as Junius 
Brutus proveth well and strongly, that reli- 
gion is not given only to the xmg, that he 
only should Keep it, but to all the inferior 
judges and people also in their kind; but 
because the estates never gave the king 
power to corrupt religion, and press a false 
and idolatrous worship upon them, therefore 



56 



LSX, REX ; OR, 



when the king defendeth not true religion, 
but preaseth upon the people 4 false and 
idolatrous religion, in that thej are not un- 
der the king, but are presumed to have no 
^ng^lcatentUy so £Gir, and are presumed to 
have the power in themselves, as if thej had 
not appointed anj king at all ; as if we pre- 
sume tne body had given to the right hand 
a power to ward off strokes and to defend 
the body ; if the right hand should by a pal- 
sy, or some other disease, become impotent, 
and be withered up, when ill is ooinmg on 
the body, it is presumed that the power of 
defence is recurred to the lefb hand, and to 
the rest of the body to defend itself in this 
case as if the body had no right hand, and 
had never communicated any power to the 
right hand. So if an incorporation accused 
of treason, and in danger of the sentence of 
death, shall appoint a lawyer to advocate 
their cause, and to give in their just de- 
fences to the judge, if their advocate be 
stricken with dumbness, because they have 
lost their legal and representative tongue, 
none can say that this incorporation hath 
lost the tongues that nature hath given 
them, so as by nature's law they may not 
plead in their own just and lawml defence, 
as if they had never appointed the foresaid 
lawyer to plead for them. The king, as a 
man, is not more obliged to the pubfic and 
regal defence of the true relimon than any 
other man of the land ; but he is made by 
God and the people king, for the church and 
people of God's sake, va&t he may defend 
true religion for the behalf and salvation of 
all. If therefore he defend not religion for 
the salvation of the souls of all in his public 
and royal way, it is presumed as undeniable 
that the people of God, who by the law of 
nature are to care for their own souls, are 
to defend in their wav true religion, which 
so nearly concemeth them and their eternal 
happiness. 

Assert. 2. — ^When the covenant is betwixt 
God, on fhe one part, and the king, priests 
and people, on the other ; it is true, if the 
one perform for his part to God the whole 
duty, the other is acquitted : as if two men 
be indebted to one man ton thousand pounds, 
if the one pay the whole sum the other is ac- 
quitted. But the king and people are not 
so contracting parties m covenant with God 
as that they are both indebted to God for 
one and the same sum of complete obedience, 
so as if the king pay the whole sum of obe- 
dience to God, the people are acquitted ; and 



if the people pay the whole sum, the king is 
acquitted 2 for eyerj one standeth obliged to 
Grod for himself; tor the people must do all 
that is their part in acquitting the king firom 
his royal duty, that they may free him and 
themselves both from punishment, if he dis^ 
obey the King of kings ; nor doth the king's 
obedience acquit the people from their duty. 
Amiseeus dreamed if he believed that we 
make king and people this way party-con^ 
tractors in covenant with Qod. Nor can 
two copartners in covenant with God so mu-!- 
tually compel one another to do their duty; 
for we hold that the covenant is made b&r 
twixt the king and the people, betwixt mor^^ 
tal men ; but they both bind themselves be*f 
fore God to each other. But saith Ami«> 
saeus, " It belongeth to a pretor or ruler, 
who is above both king and people, to com- 
pel each of them, — >the king to perform his 
part of the covenant to the people, and the 
people to perform their part of the covenant 
to the ki^g. Now thwe is no ruler but Grod, 
above both king and people." But let me 
answer. The consequence is not needful, no 
more than when the king of Judah and the 
king of Israel make a covenant to perform 
mutual duties one to another, -1- no more 
than it is necessary that there should be a 
king and superior ruler above the king of 
Israel and tne king of Judah, who should 
compel each one to do a duty to his fellow- 
king; for the king and people are each of 
them above ai^d below others in divers re-^ 
spects : the people, because they create the 
man king, they are so above the king, and 
have a virtual power to compel him to do 
his duty ; and the king, as king, hath an 
authoritative power above the people, be? 
cause royalty is formally in him, and origi-;' 
nally and virtually only in the people, there- 
fore may he compel them to their duty, as 
we shall hear anon ; and therefore there is 
no need of an earthly ruler higher than 
both, to compel both. 

Assert. 3.-^We shall hereafter yrove th& 
power of the people above the king, Grod 
willing ; and so it is false that there is not 
mutu^ Goaotive power on each side. 

Assert. 4. — The obligation of the king in 
this covenant floweth from the peouliar na- 
tion^ obligation betwixt the kmg and the 
estates, and it bindeth the king as king, and 
not tdmply as he is a man. 1. Because it 
is a covenant betwixt the people and David, 
not as he is the son of Jesse, for then it 
should oblige Eliab, or any other of David's 



THE LAW AND THE t>IUNCE. 



57 



' ' V 



'•V 



-i-nr 



brethr^n ; yea, it should qbligp any man if 
it oblige Dayid as a man; but it obligetb 
[Qavid as a king* or as he is to l^e their king, 
because it if) the specific act of a king that 
he is obliged unto, to yrit, tQ goyer^ the 
people in righteousness and religion with his 
roj^ power. And so it is f;^ that Amiv 
S8BUS saith, that ^' the kipg, as s^ m^n, is oh-* 
liged to God by this covenant, not as a kii^g." 
2, He saith, by coyena,nt the king^is boupd 
to Grod as a mani not as 4 king, £lut so the 
man will have the Jd^gy as k^ng* under no 
law of Grod ; and ^ he must either be abov^ 
God, as kii^g, or cQ-e^ua) with Grod ; which 
are manifest blasphemies. For I thQughf 
ever the royalists had nqt denied that t|ie 
kin?, as king, had been obliged to keep hi^ 
oath to his subjects, in relation to God, and 
in regard of natural obligation,— so as, he 
sinneth before God if he break his ooven^t 
with his people,— r-though they deny that he 
is obligea to\eep his covenant i|i relation to 
his ^ufnects, and in regard of politic or ciyjl 
obligation to pien. Sure J am tl^is the roy- 
alists const^tly teach, 3, If e would have 
this covenant sq made with men as it obligr 
eth Qot tbjB king to ipen, but to God, 3ut 
the contrary is true. Besides the ki^g and 
the people's covenant with the Lord, kmg 
Joasn made another cpvenant with the peo- 
ple, and Jehgiad^ the priest was only a wit- 
ness, or pne who, in Grod's name, performed 
the rite of anointing ; otherwise ne was a 
subject Qn the people's side, obliged to keep 
allegia4ce to «7^oash, as to his sovereign and 
master^ But, certainly, whoever maketh a 
Goven^t with the people, promising to gor 
?em then^ accprdmg to G<k1's word, and 
upon tl^t condition and these tern^s re- 
ceiveth a throne and crown fron^ tl^e peo- 
ple, he is obliged to what he pronpseth to 
the people, Omnis promitte^s, fadt aZtefi, 
ctti pron^issio facta est^ jus in prqnhitt^n- 
tern, THioever maketh ^ promiso to an- 
other, giveth to that otjier a sort of right 
or jurisdiction tp phallenge the promise. 
The covenant betwixt Pavid and Israel 
were a shadow^ if it tie th^ people to alle- 
giance to Dayi4 as their king, and jf it tie 
not i)ayi4 ^ kirjg to govern them ip right- 
eousness ; bpt leavQ Sayid loose to th^ peo- 
ple, aQd oply tie him to God, thep it is a co- 
venant betwixt David and God only; but the 
text saith, it is a covepant betwixp the king 
and the people, 2 Kings xi. 17 ; ? Sam. v. 3. 
Ara, 2.— Hence our second argument. 
He who is made a minister of God, not sim- 






ply, but for the good of the subject, and so 
ne take heed to Qod's law as a king, and 
goverp according to God's will, he is in so 
fer oply made kmg by Gfod a^ he fulfilleth 
the condition ; and in so far as he is a minis- 
ter for evii to the subject, and ruleth not ac- 
cording to that which the book of the law 
compiandeth hiip ap king, in so far he is not 
by God appointed king and ruler, and so 
n^ust be maqe a king by Qod conditionally : 
but so hath Grod made kings and rulers, 
Rom. xiii. 4 ; ^ Chron. vi. 16 ; Psal. Ixxxix, 
30, 31 1 2 Sam. vii. 12 ; 1 Chron. xxviii. 7 
— r9. This argupiept is not brought to prove 
that Jeroboam or Saul leave off to be kings 
when they fail in pome part of the concG- 
tiop ; or as if they were not God's vicege- 
rents, tp be obeyed in things lawful, after 
they have gope on in wicked courses ; for 
the people consenting to make Saul king, 
they give him the crown, prQ hoc viccy at 
his eptry absolutely. There is no condition 
required in hiip before they make him king, 
but only th^t he coyenant with them to rule 
according to God's law. The conditions to 
be performed are consequent, and posterior 
to his actual coronation and his sitting on 
the throne. But the argument presuppos- 
eth that which the Lord's word teacheth, to 
wit, that the Lord and t)^e people givetli a 
crown by one and the same action ; tor God 
formally maketh David a king ])j the princes 
and elaers of Israel choosing of hipi to be 
their kii^g at Jlebron ; and, therefore, see- 
ing the people maketh hini a kipg poyepapt- 
wise apd conditionally, so he rule according 
to Qod's law, and the people resigping their 
power to lam for their safety, and for a 
peaceable and godly life under hin^, and not 
to destroy them, and tyrannise oyer them. 
It is certiaip GrO(l giyetb a king th^t same 
way by that very sapie act pf the people ; 
and if the king tyranpise, I canpot say it is 
beside the intention of God makipg a kipg, 
nor yet beside his iptention as a just pun- 
isher of their transgressiops ; for to me, as I 
conceive, nothipg ^itjxer good or evil fallpth 
out beside th^ intention of ijipi who " do^th 
all things accor4ing to the pleasure of his 
will," If, then, t^e people make a king, as 
a king, coniiitionally, for their safety, and not 
for tpeir destrpption, (for as a king he sayeth, 
as a man }ie destroyeth, and not as a king 
apd father,) apd if God, by the peopje's free 
election, make a king, God p^aketp hini a 
king copditionaliy, and so by povppant ; and, 
therefore, when God propiis^tb (2 Sam. vii. 

K 



68 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



12 ; 1 Chron. xxviii. 7 — 9) to David's seed, 
and to Solomon, a throne, he promiseth not 
a throne to tJiem immediately, as he raised 
up prophets and apostles without any me^ 
diate action and consent of the people, but 
he promiseth a throne to them by the me- 
diate consent, election, and covenant of the 
people; which condition and covenant he 
expresseth in the very words of the people's 
covenant with the king, " So they wait as 
kings in the law of the Lord, and take heed 
to God's commandment and statutes to do 
them." 

Obj. 1. — But then Solomon, falling in 
love with many outlandish women, and so 
hot walking according to God's law, loseth 
all royal dignity and Tdngly power, and the 
people is not to acknowledge him as king, 
since the kingly power was conferred upon 
him rather than Adonijah, upon such a con- 
dition, which condition not being performed 
by him, it is presumed that neither God, 
nor the people under God, as God's instru- 
ments in making king, conferred any royal 
power on him. 

Ans. — It doth not follow that Solomon, 
falling in love with strange women, doth lose 
royal dignity, either in the court of heaven 
or before men; because the conditions of 
the covenant upon which God, by the peo- 
ple, made him kins must be exponed 
by the law, Deut. xvii« Now that cannot 
bear that any one act, contrary to the royal 
office; yea, that any one or two acts of 
tyranny doth denude a man of the royal 
dignity that God and the people gave him ; 
for so David, committing two acts of tyran- 
ny : one of taking his own faithfiil sul^ect's 
wife from, and another in killing himself, 
should denude himself of aU uie kingly 
power that he had ; and that, therefore, me 
people, after his adultery and murder, were 
not to acknowledge David as their king, — 
which is most absurd ; for as one single act 
of unchastity is indeed against the matrimo- 
nial covenant, and yet doth not make the 
woman no wife at all, so it must be such a 
breach of the royal covenant as maketh the 
king no king, that annuUeth the royal cove- 
nantj and denudeth the prince of nis royal 
authority and power, that must be inter^ 
preted a breach of the oath of God, because 
it must be such a breach upon supposition 
whereof the people would not have given 
the crown, but upon supposition of his de- 
structiveness to the commonwealth, they 
would never have given to him the crown. 



Ob). 2.— Yet at least it will folloi*; that 
Saul, after he is rejected of God for disobe-* 
dience in not destroying the Amalekites, as 
Samuel speaketh to him, (1 Sam. xv.) is ho 
longer to oe acknowledged king by the peo- 
ple, at least after he committetn such acts of 
tyranny, as are 1 Sam. xyiii. 12 — 15, &c. ; 
and after he had killed the priests of the 
Lord and persecuted innocent David, with- 
out cause, he was no longer, either in the 
court of heaven or the court of men, to be 
acknowledged as king, seeing he had ma- 
nifestly violated the royal covenant made 
with the people; (1 Sam. xi. 14, 15,) and 
yet, after those breaches, David acknowledg- 
eth him to be his prince and the Lorcrs 
anointed 

Ans. 1. — The prophet Samuel's threat- 



ening, (1 Sam. xvii.) IS not exponed of ac- 

mngi 
present ; £r after that, Samuel both hon- 



tual unxinging and rejecting of Saul at the 



oured him as king before the people and 
prayed for him, and mourned to God on his 
behalf as king, (1 Sam. xvi. 1, 2,) but the 
threatening was to have effect in God's time, 
when he should bring David to the throne, 
as was prophesied, upon occasion of less sin, 
even his sacrificing and not waiting the time 
appointed, as Grod had commanded, 1 Sam. 
xiii. 13, 14. 2. The people and David's 
acknowledgment of Saul to be the Lord's 
anointed and a king, after he had committed 
such acts of tyranny as seem destructive of 
the royal covenant, and inconsistent there- 
with, cannot prove that Saul was not made 
king by the Lord and the people condition- 
ally, and that for the people's good and 
saiety, and not for their destruction; and 
it doth well prove, — (1.) That those acts of 
blood and tyrantiy committed by Saul, were 
not done by him as king, or from the prin- 
ciple of royal power given to him by God 
and the people. (2!) That in these acts 
they were not to acxnowledge him as king. 
(3.) That these acts of blo(3 were contrary 
to the covenant that Saul did swear at his 
inaugeration, and contrary to the conditions 
that Saul, in the covenant, took on him to 
perform at the making of the royal cove- 
nant. (4.) They prove not but the states 
who made Saul king might lawfully de- 
throne him, and anomt David their king. 
But David had reason to hold him for his 
prince and the Lord's anointed, so long as 
the people recalled not their grant of royal 
dignity, as David, or any man, is obliged to 
honour him as king whom the people mak- 



I 



THE LAW AND THE PBINGE. 



09 



eth king, though he were a bloodier and 
more tyrannous man than Saul. Any ty- 
rant stanaeth in tituloy so long as the peo- 
ple and estates who made him king nave 
not recalled their grant ; so as neither Da- 
vid, nor any single man, though six Hundred 
widi him, may unking him or detrapt obe- 
dience from him as king ; so many acts of 
disloyalty and breaches of laws in the sub- 
jects, though they be contrary to this cove- 
nant that me states make with their prince, 
doth not make them to be no subjects — and 
the covenant mutual standeth thus, 

Arg. 3. — 1. If the people, as God's instru- 
ments, bestow the benefit of a crown on 
their king, upon condition that he will rule 
them accordmg to Grod's word, then is the 
king made king by the people conditionally; 
but the former is true, therefore so is the 
latter. The assumption is proved thus : — 
Because to be a king, is to be an adopted 
father, tutor, a pohtic servant and royal 
watchman of the state ; and the royal hon- 
our and royal maintenance given to him, is 
a reward of his labours and a kingly hire. 
And this is the apostle's argument, Rom. 
xiii. 6, " For this cause pay you tribute also, 
[there is the wages] for they are Grod's mi- 
nisters, attending continually upon this very 
thing." There is the work. Qui non implet 
conaitianem asepromMsam^caditheneJlcio. 
It is confirmed thus.: — The people either 
maketh the man their prince conoitionally; 
— (1.) that he rule according to law or abso- 
lutely; — (2.) so that he rule according to will 
or lust ; — or, (3.) without any vocal trans- 
actions at all, but only hrevi manu, say, 
" Beign thou over us, and, God save the 
king ;'' and so there be no conditions spoken 
on either side ;— or, (4.) the king is obliged 
to God for the condition which he promis- 
eth by oath to perform toward the people ; 
but he is to make no reckoning to the peo- 
ple, whether he perform his promise or no ; 
lor the people bemg inferior to him, and he, 
solo Deo minoTj only next and immediate 
to God, the people can have no jus, no law 
over hun by virtue of any covenant. But 
the first standing, we have what we seek ; 
the second is contrary to Scripture. He is 
not (Deut. xvii. 16, 16) made absolutely a 
a king to rule according to his will and lust ; 
for " reign thou over us," should have this 
meaning — ^** Come thou and play the tyrant 
over us, and let thy lust and will be a law 
to us," — which is against natural sense ; nor 
can the sense and meaning be according to 



the third. That ihe people, without any ex- 
press,, vocal, and positive covenant, give a 
throne to their king to rule as he pleaseth ; 
because it is a vam thing for the Prelate 
and other Mandpia Aulce, court-bellies, to 
jsay Scotland and England must produce a 
written authentic covenant betwixt the first 
king and their people, because, say they, it is 
the law's word. Do non apparentibiLS et non 
eodstentibus ectdem lex, that covenant which 
appeareth not, it is not ; for in positive cove- 
nants that is true, and in such contracts as 
are made according to the civil or municipal 
laws, or the secondary law of nature. But 
the general covenant of nature is presup- 
posed in making a king, where there is no 
vocal or written covenant. If there be no 
conditions betwixt a Christian king and his 
people, then those things which are just and 
right according to the law of God, and the 
nue of God in moulding the first king, are 
understood to rule both king and people, as 
if they had been written ; and here we pro- 
duce our written covenant, Deut. xvii. 15 ; 
Josh. i. 8, 9 ; 2 Chron. xxxi. 32. Because 
this is as much against the king as the peo- 
ple, and more ; wr if the first king cannot 
bring forth his written and authentic tables 
to prove that the crown was given to him 
ana his heirs, and his. successors, absolutely 
and without any conditions, so as his will 
shall be a law, cadit causa, he loseth his 
cause (say they). The king is in possession 
of the royal power absolutely, without any 
condition, and you must put him from his 
possession by a law. I answer, This is most 
false. (1.) Though he were in inala fde, 
and in unjust possession, the law of nature 
will warrant the people to repeal their right 
and plead for it, in a matter which concem- 
eth their heads, hves, and souls. (2.) The 
parliaments of both kingdoms standing in 

Possession of a nomothetic power to make 
iws, proveth clearly that the king is in no 
possession of any royal dignity conferred ab- 
solutely, and without any condition, upon 
him ; and, therefore, it is the king's part by 
law to put the estates out of possession; and 
though there were no written covenant, the 
standing law and practice of inany hundred 
acts of parliament, is eijuivaleiit to a written 
covenant. 

2. When the people appointed any to be 
their king, the voice of nature exponeth their 
deed, though there be no vocal or written 
covenant ; foj that fact — of making a king 
— is a moral lawful act warranted by the 



60 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



word of God (Deut. xvii. 16, 16; Rom. 
xiii. 1, 2) and tn6 law of nature; and, there- 
fore, they having made such a man their 
kin^r, they have given him pOwdr to be their 
father, feeder, healer, and protector ^ and 
so must only have made him king dbndi- 
tionally. so he be a father, a feeder, and tu- 
tor. Inow, if this deed of nlaking a king 
must be exponed to be an investing with an 
absolute, and ndt a (Conditional power, this 
fact shall be contrary to Scripture and to 
the law of nature J for if they have given 
him ro^al powet* absolutely, and Without any 
condition, they must have given to him power 
to be a father, protector, tutor, and to be a 
tyrant, a murderer, a bloody lion, to waste 
and destrov the people of God. 

3. The law permitteth the bestoWei^ of A 
benefit to interpret his own mind in the be- 
stowing of a benefit, even as a king and state 
must expone their own commission given to 
their ambassador, so must the estates expone 
whether they bestowed the crown upon the 
first king conditionally or absolutely. 

4. If it stand, then mu^t the people give 
to their first elected king a power to waste 
and destroy themsdves, sO as they m^ never 
control it, but only leave it to Grod and the 
king to reckon togethei^, but so the condi^- 
tion is a chimera. " W© give you a throne, 
upon condition you swear by Him who made 
heaven and earth, that you wiU goverh us 
according to God's law ; and you shall be 
answerable to God only, hot to tis, whether 
yOu keep iiie co^enaht you make with us, or 
violatie it." But how a covenant can be 
made ^vith the people^ aiid the king obliged 
to God^ n'6t to tb^ people, I conceive not. 
This p^supposeth that the king, as king, 
cannot d6 any sin, or <!iommit ahy act of ty^- 
ranny against the people, but against G^ 
only ; because if he be obliged to God only 
as a king, by virtue of his Covenant, how can 
he fail against an obligation where there is 
no obligation ? But, as a king, he oWeth no 
obligation of duty to the people ; and in- 
deed so do our good men expound Psal. li., 
" Against thee, thee only have I sinned," 
not against Uriah ; for if he sinned not 
as king aga&hst Uriah, whose life he was 
obliged to preserve as a king, he wafe not 
obliged as a king by any royal duty to pre- 
serve his lifew Where there is no sin, there 
is no obHgation not to sin ; and where there 
is no obligation tiot to sin, tliere is no sin. 
By this the king, as king, is loosed from all 
duties of the se<^ond table, being once made 



a king, he is above all obligation to love his 
neighbour as himself ; for ne is above all his 
neighbours, and above ail mankind, and only 
less than God. 

Arg, 4. — If the people be so given to the 
king, that they are cotnmitted to him as a ' 
pledge, oppignerated in his hand as a pupil 
to a tutor, as ^ distressed man to a patron, 
aa a flock to a shepheH ; and so they remain 
the Lord^s church, hi^ people, his flock, his 

Sortion, his inheritance, his viney^, his re- 
eemed onesj then they cannot be giVen to the 
king as oxen and sheep, that are &eely gifted 
to a man ; or as a gift or sum of gold or silver 
that the Inan to vdiom they are given may 
use, so that he liiannot commit a &ult against 
the oxeuj sheep, gold, or tnoney that is given 
to him, however he shall dispose of them. 
But the people are given to the king to be 
tutoi^ and protebted of him, so as they re- 
main the people of Grod, and in covenant with 
him ; and if the people Were the goods of for- 
tune (as heathens 6ay), he could no more sin 
against the pleople than a man can sin against 
his gold ; now, though a ihan by adoring 
gold, or by lavish profusion Und wasting of 
gold, may sin against God, yet not against 
gold; nor can he be in any covenant with 
gold, or under any obligation of either duty 
or sin to gold, or to hfeless and reasonless 
ci'eatures properly, therefore he may sin in 
the UBe of them, and yet not sin against them, 
but against God. Hence, of necessity, the 
king must be under obligation to the Lord's 
people in another manner than that he 
should only answer to God for the loss of men, 
as if men were worldly goods under his hand, 
and as if being a king ne were now by this 
royal authority privileged fix)m the best half 
of the law of nature, to wit, from acts of mercy 
and truth, and covenant-keeping vrith his 
brethren. 

Arg. 5. — If a king, because a king, were 
privileged from all Covenant obligation to his 
Bulyecte, then could no law of hieii lawfully 
reach him for any contract violated by him ; 
then he could not be a debtor to his slUbjects 
if he bolTowed money from them ; ai5i it 
were utterly, unlawful either to crave Mm 
monev, or to sue him at law fot debts ; yet 
our civil laWs of Scotland tyeth the king to 
pay his debts, as any other hian : yea, and 
king Solomon traificing, and buying, and 
tellmg betwixt him and his own subjects, 
Would seem unlawfiil ; for how can a king 
buy and sell with his subjects, if he be under 
no covenant obligation to men, but to God 



IniVirir iif *" 



THE LAW AND THE PBIKCE. 



61 



only. Tea^ then, a king could not marry a 
wife, foi* he coUld not come under a cove** 
nant to keep his body to her only, nor if he 
committed adultery, could he sin a^nst his 
wife, because being immediate unto God, and 
above all Obligation to men, he could sin a- 
gainst no covenant made with men, but only 
against God. 

Atg. 6. — If that Was a lawful covenant 
made by Asa, and the states of Judah, 2 
Chron. 15, 18, " That whosoever would not 
seek the Lord €rod of their fathers, should 
be put to death) whether i^mall or great, 
whether man or woman," thi& obligetn the 
king, for ought I see, and thb princes, and 
the people, but it wb6 a lawml covenant; 
therefore the king is under a covenant to the 
princes a)ld judges, as they are to him ; it 
IS replied by Barclaius : " If a master of a 
school should tnake a law, Whosoever shall 
go out at the school doors without liberty 
obtained of thia master, shall be whipped, it 
will not oblige the schoolmaster that he shall 
be whipped if he go out at the school doors 
without liberty ; so neither doth this law 
oblige the king, the supreme lawgiver." 

Am, 1. -^Suppose that the scholars have 
no less hand luld authority magisterial in 
making thd laW than the schoomiaster, as 
the prmces of Judah had a collateral power 
with king A^ about that law, it would fol- 
low, that the schoolmaster is under the same 
law. 2. Suppose going out at school doors, 
were that way d. nl6r^ neglect of studying 
in the master, as it is in the scholars, as 
the not seeking of €rOd is as heinotls a sin m 
king Asa, ana no less deserving death, than 
it is in the pe6pl6, then should the law ob- 
lige schoolmaster and scholar both without 
exception. 3. The schoolmajster is clearly 
above ail laws of discipline which he impos- 
eth on his scholars ; but none can SaV that 
king Asa was clearly above that law of seek- 
ing of the Lord God of his fathers. Diodo- 
rus Siculujs (1. 17), saith, the kings of Persia 
were under an oath, and that they might not 
change the laws ; and so wete the kings of 
Egypt ajid Ethiopia. The kings of Sparta, 
w&en Aristotle calleth just khigs, renew their 
oath every month. RomulUs so covenanted 
with the senate and people. GarolUs V. Aus- 
triacus sweaf eth he shall not change the laws 
without the consent of the electors, nor make 
new laws, vLdt dispose or pledge any thing 
that belongeth to the empire. So read we 
Spec. Saxon, lib. 3, act. 54, and Xenophon 
(Cyroped. lib. d^) saith there was a coi^enant 



between Cyrus and the Persians. The no- 
bles are crowned when they crown their king, 
and exact a special oath of the king; So 
doth England, Poland, Spain, Arragonia, &c. 
Alberi Gentllis,^ and Grotius,* prove that 
kings are really bound to perform oaths and 
contracts to their people; but " notwith- 
standing thet'e be such a covenant, it follow- 
eth not from this, ^saith Amisseus)' that if 
the prince brekk his covenant and rule ty- 
ranmcally, the people shall be free, and tne 
contract tyt covenant nothing; "^-Jlw*. The 
covenant may be materially broken, while 
the king remaineth king, and the subjects 
remain subjects ; but when it is both mate- 
rially and iormally declared by the states to 
be broken, the people must be free from their 
allegiance ; but ot this more hei'eaftef . 

Arg\ 7. — If a master bind himself by an 
oath to his servant, he shall not receive such 
a benefit of such a point of service ; if he vio- 
late the oath, his oath must give his servant 
law and right both to challenge his master, 
and to be free from that point of service ; an 
army appointeth such a one their leadet and 
captain, but they revise to do it except he 
swear he shall not betray them to the ene- 
my. If he doth betray them, then must the 
soldiers be loosed from that contract. If one 
be appointed pilate of a ship, and not but by 
an oatn, if he sell the passengers to the Turks, 
they may challenge the puate of his oath ; 
and it is clear that (1.) the estates should re- 
fuse the Crown to him who would refuse to 
govern them according to God's law, but 
uiould profess that he would make his own 
will a laW) therefore the intention of the oath 
is clearly conditional. (2.) When the king 
sweareth the oath, he is but king injieriy ana 
so not as king above the states of kingdoms. 
Now his being king doth not put him in a 
case above all civil obligation -of a king to his 
subjects, because the matter of the oath is, 
that he shall be under them so far in regard 
of the oath of Grod; 

Arg. 8. — If the oath of God made to the 
people do not bind him to the people to go- 
^m according to law, and not ac^rding to 
his will and lust, it should be unlawful for any 
to swear such an oath, for if a power above 
law agree essentiaUv to a king as a king, as 
royalists hold, he who sweareth such an oath 

1 Alber. Gentilis in diapUt. Regal, lib. 2, c. 12, 
lib. 3, c. 14-16. 

s Hugo Grotias de jure belli et poc. lib. 2, 
c. 11—13. 

^ Amisteus de authoHtate ^rincip. c. 1, n. 7, 8, 10. 



^ 



SEz: 



■* y j ^ir^* 



62 



J.EX, RBx ; oa, 



should both swear to be a king to such a peo- 
ple, and should swear to be no king, in re- 
pect by his oath he should renounce that 
which is essential to a king, 

AmissBUS objecteth: £39 particularibtis 
non potest colligi eoncliL8ix> universalis , some 
few of the kings, as David and Joash, made 
a covenant with the people ; it followeth not 
that this was an universal law* — Ans, Yea, 
the covenant is fDeut. 17.) and must be a 
rule to all ; if so just a man as David was li- 
mited hj a covenant, then all the rest also. 






QUESTION XV. 

WHETHER OR NO THE KING 9B UNIVOCALLT, 
OR ONLY AXALOGIGALLT, AND BX PROPOR- 
TION, A FATHER. 

It is true Aristotle (Polit. L 3, c.ll) saith, 
that the kinglv power is a fatherly power ; 
and Justin, (XH0velll2, c. 2^)Paterquamvis 
legum contemptovy quamvis impius sit^ ta- 
men pater est. But I do not believe that, 
as rojalista saj, the kinglj power is essen- 
tially and univocally that same with a pa- 
ternal or fatherly power ; or that Adam, as 
a father, was as a father and king ; and that 
suppose Adam should live in I^loah's days, 
that by divine institution and without consent 
of the kingdoms and communities on earth, 
Adam hoc ipso^ and for no other reason but 
because he was a father, should also be the 
universal king, and monarch of the whole 
world ;*or suppose Adam was living to this 
day, that all kings that hath been smce, and 
now are, held their crowns of him, and had 
no more kingly power than inferior judges 
in Scotland have, under our sovereign kmg 
Charles, for so all that hath been, and now 
are, lawtiil kings, should be unjust usurpers ; 
for if fatherly power be the first and native 
power of commanding, it is against nature 
that a monarch who is not my father by ge- 
neration, should take that power from me, 
and be a king over me and my children. 

1. But I assert, first, that though the Word 
warrant us to esteem kings fathers, Isa xlix. 
23 ; Jud. V. 7 ; Gen. xx. 2, yet are not they 
essentially and formally fathers by genera- 
tion; Num. xi. 12, " Slave I conceived all 
this people ? have I begotten them ?" and 
yet are they but fathers metaphorically — by 
office, because they should care for them 
as fathers do for children, and so come under 



the name of &thersin the fifth commandment, 
and therefore rigorous and cruel rulers ai*e 
leopards, and lions, and wolves, £zek. xxii. 
27 ; Zeph. iii. 3. If, then, tyrannous judges 
be not essentially and formally leopards and 
lions, but only metaphorically, neither can 
kings be formally fathers. 2. Not only kings 
but all judges are fathers, in defending their 
subjects from violence and the swora, and 
fighting the Lord's battles for them, and 
counsemng them. If, therefore, royaHsts ar- 
gue right^, a king is essentially a father, and, 
rather^ power and royal power are of the 
same essence and nature. As, therefore, he 
who is once a father is ever a father, and his 
children cannot take up arms against him to 
resist him, for that is unnatural and repug- 
nant to the fifth commandment ; so he who 
is once a king is evennore a king, and it is re- 
pugnant to me fifth commandment to resist 
nim ¥rith arms. It is answered, — ^that the 
argument presupposeth that royal power and 
fauierly power is one and the same in nature, 
whereas they differ in nature, and are only 
one by analogy and proportion ; for j90 pas- 
tors of the Word are called fadiers, 1 Cor. 
iv. 15, it will not follow, that once a pastor, 
evermore a pastor ; and that if therefore pas- 
tors turn wolves, and by heretical doctrine 
corrupt the flock, they cannot be cast out of 
the church. 3. A father, as a father, hath 
not power of life and death over his sons, be- 
cause, Eom, xiii., by divine institution the 
sword is given by Grod to kings and judges ; 
and if Adam had had any such power to kill 
his son Cain for the killing of his brother 
Abel, it had been given to him by God as a 
power politic, different from a &therly pow- 
er ; for a fatherly power is such as formally 
to preserve the life of the children, and not 
to take away the life ; yea, and Adajn, though 
he had never sinned, nor any of his posterity, 
Adam should have been a perfect father, as 
he is now indued with all fatherly power that 
any father now hath ; yea God should not 
have given the sword or power of punishing 
ill-doers, since that power should have been 
in vain, if there had been no violence, nor 
bloodshed, or sin on the earth ; for the pow- 
er of the sword and of lawful war, is given to 
men now in the state of sin. 4. Fatherly go- 
vernment and power is from the bosom and 
marrow of that fountain law of nature ; but 
royal power is not from the law of nature, 
more than is aristocratical or democratical 

Sower. Dr. Feme saith, (part 1, sec. 3, p. 8,) 
lonarchy is not jure divino, (I am not of 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



63 



his mind,) nor yet from the law of nature, but 
duetu naturaSy bj the guidance of nature. 
Sure it is from a supervenient command- 
ment of Crod, added to the first law of na- 
tufe, establishing fatherly power. 5. Chil- 
dren having theur life ana first breathings 
of nature from their parents, must be in a 
more entire relation from their father than 
from their prince. Subjects have not their 
being natural, but their dvil, politic and 
peaceable well-being from their prince. 6. 
A father is a fatner by generation, and 
giving the being of nature to children, and 
IS a natural head and root, without the fred 
consent and suffrages of his children, and is 
essentially a father to one child, as Adam 
was to one Cain ; but a prince is a prince by 
the free sufiPrages of a community, and can- 
not be a king to one only, and he is the po- 
litic head of a civil corporation. 7. A fa- 
ther, so long as his children liveth, can never 
leave off to be a father, though he were mad 
and fiurious — ^though he be me most wicked 
man on earth. Qui genuit filium non po^ 
test non genuisse Jtlium, what is once past 
cannot, by any power, be not past; a fa* 
ther is a father for ever. But by confession 
of royalists, as Barclaius, Hugo Grotius, and 
Amisseus, and others, grant, If a king sell 
his subjects' by sea or land to other nations, 
— ^if he turn a furious Nero, he may be de- 
throned; and the power that created the 
king under such express conditions, as if the 
king violate them by his own consent he shall 
be put frora the throne — ^may cease to hold 
him king; and if a stronger king conquer 
a king and his subjects, royalists say the 
oonqueror is a lawful king ; and so the con- 
quered king must also lawfully come down 
mm his throne, and turn a lawful captive 
sitting in the dust. 8. Learned politicians, 
as Bartholomeus Romulus, {Defens. part 1, 
n. 153,) and Joannes de Anama (in c. fin, 
de his qui fit. ocdd.) teach that " the fatner 
IS not oWiged to reveal the conspiracy of his 
son against his prince; nor is he more to ac- 
cuse his son, than to accuse himself, because 
the father loveth the son better than him- 
self," (D. Listi quidem. Sect, Fin, qUod, 
met, caus, et D, L,.fin, c, de ciMra furiosi,) 
and certainly a father had rather die in his 
own person; as choose to die in his son's, in 
whom he affecteth a sort of immortality, in 
spede, quando non potest in individuo ; 
but a king doth not loVe his subjects with a 
natural or fatherly love thus ; and if the af- 
fections differ, the power which secondeth 



the affection, for the conservation either of 
being, or well-being, must also differ pro- 
portionally. 

The P. Prelate (c. 7, p. 87,) objecteth 
against us thus, stealmg word by word from 
AmissBus.^ 1. When a king is elected so- 
verei^ to a multitude, he is surrogated in 
the place of a common father, Exod. xx. 
12, " Honour thy father." Then, as a na- 
tural father receiveth not paternal right, 
power, or authority, from his sons, but hath 
this from Grod ana the ordinance of nature, 
nor can the king have his right firom the 
community. 2. The maxim of the law is, 
Surrogatus gaudet privilegus ejus cui sur- 
rogatur, et qui succedit in locumy succedit 
in jus. The person surrogated hath all the 
privileges that he hath in whose place he 
succeedeth ; he who succeedeth to tne place 
succeedeth to the rights ; the adopted son, 
Or the bastard who is legitimated and com- 
eth in the place of the lawful bom son, com- 
eth also in the privileges of the lawM bom 
son. A prince elected cometh to the fuU 
possession of the majesty of a natural prince 
and father, for Modus acquirendi non toU 
lit naturale jus possidendi (saith AmissBus, 
more fully than the poor PlagiariusJ, the 
manner of acquiring any thing, taketn not 
away the natural possession, for however 
flings be acquired, if the title be just, pos- 
session is the law of nations. Then wnen 
the king is chosen in place of the father, as 
the fkther hath a divine right by nature, (so 
must the king have that same ;) and seeing 
the right proprietor (saith the pamphleting 
Prelate) had his right by God!, by nature, 
how can it be but nowsoever the designa- 
tion of the person is from the disordered 
community, yet the collatioii of the power is 
from Gk)d immediately, and from his sacred 
and inviolable ordinance? And what can 
be said against the way by which any one 
elected obtained his right, for seeing Grod 
doth not now send Samuels or Eli^ias to 
anoint or defclare kings, we are, in his ordi- 
nary providence, to conceive the designation 
of the person is the manifestation of Grod's 
will, called voluntas signi, as the schools 
speak, just so aJa when tne church designeth 
one to sacred orders. 

Ans, 1. — He that is surrogated in the 
place of another, due to him by a positive 
law of mart, he hath law to all the privileges 
that he hath in whose place he is surrro- 

1 ArnissBus de potest princip. c. 3, n. 1, 2. 



gated, that k true, He who is made assig- 
nee to an ohligation for a sum of money, 
hath all the rignts that the principal partj 
to whom the bond or Qb^igation was made. 
He who cometh in the place of a ma^or of a 
city, of a captain in an anpj, of a pilot in a 
ship, or of a pope, hath all the privileges 
ana rights that his predecessors had by law. 
Jus succedit juri, persona jure predita per^ 
soncB jure preditcBf So the law, so far as 
my reading can reach,^-who profess myself 
a divine; — ^but that h© whp succeedeth to 
the place of a father by nature, should en- 
joy all the natural rights and privileges of 
the person to whom be succeedeth, I believe 
the law never dreamed it ; for then the 
adopted son, coming in place of the natural 
son, hath right to the natpral affection of 
the father. If any should gdopt Maxwell 
the prelate, should he love him as the pur- 
suivant of Crail (Maxwell's father) loved him, 
I conceive not. Hath the adopted son his 
life, his being, the figure bodily, the man- 
ners <of the son in whose place he is adop-. 
ted ; or doth he naturally resemble the la- 
ther as th^B natural son doth ? The Prelate 
did not read this law in any approved jurist, 
though he did steal the argument from Ar- 
nisseiis, and stole the citations of Homer 
and Arjustotle out of him, with a little meta- 
thesis, A natural spn is not mad^ a son by 
the coiisent of pareijits, but he is a son by gen- 
eration : so musjb the adopted son he adopted 
without the free consent and grace otthe 
father adoptmg: so here the king cometh 
in the place of a natural father. But I con- 
ceive the law saith not that the elected king 
is a king without consent of the objects, as 
a natur^ father is a father withoiat the con- 
sent of his sons. Nor is it a law true, as 
" once a father always a father," sp once an 
electe4 ]^ng always a king, though he sell 
his subjects, hejng induced theireunto by 
wicked counsellors. If the king h^ve no 
privileges but what the natural father hath, 
m whose place he cometh^ then, as jthp na- 
tural father, in a free lapgcjom, hath not 
power of life and death oyer nis sons, neither 
nath the king power of life and death over 
his subjects. This is no law. This maxim 
should prove good if the king were essjenti- 
ally a father by generation and natural pro- 
pagation ; but he is only a Mher metapho- 
rically, and hy ft borrowed speech. A father 
non geneTCLTpdOf sed pplitice alendo^ tuendo^ 
regendOy therefore an elected prince cometh 
not in the full possession of all the natural 



power mid rights of ^ natural father, % 
The F, Prelate speaketh disgracefully pf 
the church of God!, callin&r it a disorderly 
commumtj, as if he himJlf were bom oY 
kings, whereas God calleth the king their 
shepherd, and the people, " God's flock, uit 
henta^ce and people ; and they are not a 
disorderly bpdy by natu^re, but by sin; in 
which sense the Prelate may call king, 
priest ^d people, a co^ipany of heirs of 
God's YH^th, except he be an Armini^ 
still, as once he w^. If we ^re in ordinary 
providence nowi because lye have npt l^a? 
muels ^d prophets to anqint kings, to hpld 
the designation of a person to he &ing to he 
the mapifestation ot God's will, eddied voU 
untas sigviiy is t^ason, for if Scotland and 
England should design Maxwell in the plftce 
of xing Charles o\ir native sovereigp^ (an 
odious oomparison,) Mpxwell should be law- 
ful king; tor what is done by Grod's will, 
called by our divines (they have it not from 
schoolmen, as the Prelate ignorantly saith) 
his signijled will^ which is our rule, is done 
lawfuUy. There c^ be w greater trea^n 
put in print than this, 



"TT" 



QUESTION XVL 

WHETHER QR NO A DESPQTICAL AND liA^-r 
TERLY DOMINIO^r OF MEN AND THINGS 
AGREE TQ TOE J^ING BECAUSE HE IS KING, 

I may here dispute whethpr the ki|ig be 
lord, having a masterly dominion both ove^ 
men and things. But I first discuss shortly 
his dominipn oyer his subjects. 

It is agreed pn by divines, that servitudp 
is a penal fruit of sin, and against nature. Zn- 
stitutt. de jure personarumy Sect. 1, and F^ 
de statu hominum. I, libertas ; because all 
men are bom by nature of equal condition, 

Assert. 1 , — The king hath no proper, ihasr 
terly, or lordly dopiinion over his subjects ; 
his dominion is rather fiduciary and minis- 
terial, than piasterly, 

1. Because royal empire is essentially to 
feed, rule, defend, and to goveyn in peace 
and godliness, (1 Tim, ii. 2^ as the father 
doth his children; Psal. Ixxviii. 71, " He 
brought him to feed Japob his pepple, and 
Israel his inheritance ;" Is?,. Iv, 4, " I gave 
him for a leader and cpmmauder to the peo- 
ple ;" 2 Sam. v, % *< Thou sh^t feed my 
people Israel ;" 2 Sam. y, 2 ; I Chron. xi. 



^ 



J 




2 ; 1 Ghron. xvii. 6.) And so it is for the 
good of the people, and to bring those over 
whom he is a feeder and ruler, to such a hap- 
py end ; and, as saith Althusius, (polit, c. 1, 
n, 13,) and Marius Salomonius, (de princ, c. 
2,) it is to take care of the good of those over 
whom the ruler is set, and, conservare est, 
rem illcesam servare^ to keep a thing safe. 
But to be a n!iaster, and to have a masterly 
and lordly power over slaves and servants, is 
to make use of servants for the owner's bene* 
fit, not for the good of the slave, {I, 2, de 
leg, I, ServtLs de servit. expert. Dance po^ 
lit, L 1, Tolosaan. de Hep, I. 1, c. 1, n. 15, 
16,) therefore are servants bought and sold 
as goods, (jure belli. F, de statu hominum 
L et servorum,) 

2. Not to be under governors and magis- 
trates is a judgment of God, (Isa. iii. 6, 7 ; 
iii, 1 ; Hos. iii. 4; Judg, xix. 1, 2,) but not 
to be under a ma£^r as slaves are, is a bless- 
ing, seeing freedom is a blessing of Grod, 
(John viii. 33 ; Exod. xxi. 2, 26, 27 ; Deut. 
XV, 12 ;) so he that killeth Goliath, (1 Sam, 
xvii. 25,) his father's house shall be free in 
Israel. ( Jer. xxxiv, 9 ; Acts xxii. 28 ; 1 
Cor. ix. 19; Gal. iv. 26, 31.^ Therefore the 
power of a king cannot be a lordly and mas- 
terly power; ror then to be under a kingly 
power should both be a blessing and a curse, 
and just punishment of sin. 

3. Subjects are called the servants of the 
king, (1 Sam. xv. 2 ; 2 Ghron, xiii. 7 ; 1 
Kings xii. 7 ; Exod. x. 1, 2 ; Exod. ix, 20,) 
but they are not slaves, because (Deut, xvii, 
20) they are his brethren : " That the king's 
heart be not lifted up against his brethren ;" 
and his sons; (Isa. 3uix, 23 ;) and the Lord 
gave his people a king as a blessing, (1 Kings 
X. 9 ; Hos, 1. 11 ; Isa, i. 26 ; Jer. xvii. 25,) 
" and brought them out of the house of bon- 
dage," (Exod, XX. 2,) as out of a place of 
misery. And therefore to be the king's ser- 
vants in the place cited, is some other thing 
than to be the king's slaves, 

4. The master might in some oases sell the 
servant for money, yea for his own gain he 
might do it, (Nehem. v. 8 ; Eccles, u, 7 ; 1 
Kings ii. 32 ; Gen. ix. 25 ; G^n. xxvi, 14 ; 
2 Kmgs iv. 1 ; G«n. xx. 14, and might give 
away his servants ; and tlie servants were the 
proper goods and riches of the master ; (Ec- 
cles. ii. 7 ; Gen. xxx, 43 ; Gen, xx, 14 ; Job 
i. 3, 15) ; but the king may not sell his king- 
dom or subjects, or give them away for mo- 
ney, or any other way ; for royalists grant 
that king to be a tyrant, and worthy to be 



dethroned, who shall sell his people ; for the 
king may not dilapidate the rents of the crown 
and give them away to the hurt and preju- 
dice of his successors, (Z. uU, Sect, sed nostr, 
c. Comment, de lege, I, peto, 69, Sect, fra- 
trem de lege, 2, I, 32, ultimo, D. T.\ and far 
less can he lawMly sell men, and give away 
a whole kingdom to the hurt of his succes- 
sors, for that were to make merchandise of 
the living temples of the Holy Ghost ; and 
Amiseeus, (de authorit. prindp, c, 3, n. 7,) 
saith, servitude is prmter naturam, beside 
nature ; he might have said, contrary to na- 
ture (l, 5, de Stat, homin. Sect, 2, Inst, de 
jur. perso, c, 3, et Novel, 89) ; but the sub- 
jection of subjects is so consonant to nature, 
that it is seen m bees and cranes. Therefore 
a dominion is defined, a faculty of using of 
things to what uses you will. Now a man 
hath not this way an absolute dominion over 
his beasts, to dispose of them at his will ; for 
a good man hath mercy on the life of his 
beast, JProv, xii. 10,) nor hath he dominion 
over bis goods to use them as he will, because 
he may not use them to the damage of the 
commonwealth, he may not use them to the 
dishonour of God ; and so God and the ma- 
gistrate hath laid some bound on his domi- 
nion. And because the king being made a 
king leaveth not off to be a reasonable crea- 
ture, he must be under a law, and so his will 
and lust cannot be the rule of his pow^r and 
dominion, but law and reason must regulate 
him, Now.if God had given to the king a 
dominion over men as . reasonable creatures, 
his power and dominion which by royalists is 
conceived to be above law, should be a rule 
to men as reasonable men, which would make 
men under kings no better than brute beasts, 
for then should subjects exercise acts of rea- 
son, not because good and honest, but because 
their prince commandeth them so to do ; and 
if this cannot be said, none can be at the dis- 
posing of kings in politic acts liable to royal 
government, tnat way that the slave is in his 
actions under the dominion of his master, 

Obj, 1. — The Prelate objecteth out of 
Spalato, Amiseeus, and Hugo Grotius, (for in 
his book there is not one line which is his 
own, except his railings ;) " All government 
and supenority in rufers is not primely and 
only for the subjects* good ; for some are by 
Grod and nature appointed for the mutual 
and inseparable good of the superior and in- 
ferior, as in the government of husband and 
wife, or father and son ; and in herili domi" 
nio, in the government of a lord and his ser« 



66 



LEX, REX ; OB, 



vant, the good and benefit of the servant is 
but secon<mry and oonsecutiyely intended, it 
is not the principal end, but the external and 
adventitious, as the gain that cometh to a 
physician is not the proper and internal end 
of his art, but followeth only from his practice 
of medicine. 

Ans, 1. — The Prelate's logic tendeth to 
this ; some government tendeth to the mu- 
tual good (n the superior and inferior, but 
royal government is some government, there- 
fore, nothing followeth from a major propo- 
sition, Ex particulari afftrmomte^ in 'prima 
figura ; or of two particular propositions. 2. 
If it be thus formed, every mantal govern- 
ment, and every government of the lord and 
servant is for the mutual good of the supe- 
rior and inferior ; but royal government is 
such, therefore the assumption is false, and 
cannot be proved, as I shall anon clear. 

Oy. 2. — Solomon disposed of Cabul and 

fave it to Hiram, therefore a conquered king- 
om is for the good of the conqueror espe- 
cially. 

Ans, — Solomon's special giving away some 
titles to the king of Tyre, being a special act 
of a prophet as well as a king, cannot war- 
rant the king of England to sell England to 
a foreign prince,^ because William made Eng- 
land his own by conquest, which also is a most 
false supposition ; and this he stole from Hu- 
go Grotius, who condemneth selling of king- 
doms, 

Ohj. 3. — A man may render himself to- 
tally under the power of a master without 
any conditions ; and why may not the body 
of a people do the like ? even to have peace 
and safety, surrender themselves fully to the 
power of a king ? A lord of great manors 
may admit no man to live in his lands but 
upon a condition of a ^11 surrender of him 
and his posterity to that lord. Tacitus shew- 
eth us it was so anciently amongst the Ger- 
mans : those engaged in the campaigns sur- 
rendered themselves fully to the Komans. 

Ans, — What compelled people may do to 
redeem their lives, with loss of liberty, is 
nothing to the point ; such a violent conque- 
ror who will be a father and a husband to a 
people, against their will, is not their lawful 
king ; and that they may sell the liberty of 
their posterity, not yet bom, is utterly de- 
nied as unlawful ; yea, a violentated father to 
me is a father, and not a father, and the pos- 
terity may vindicate their own liberty given 
away unjustly, before they were bom, Qua 
omne regnum vi partum potest vi dissolvi. 



Ohj, 4. — But (saith Dr Feme) these 
which are ours, and given away to another, 
in which there redoundeth to (rod by dona- 
tion a special interest, as in things devoted 
to holy uses, though after they he abused, 
yet we cannot rec^ them ; therefore, if the 
people be once forced to give away their li- 
berty, they cannot recal it, far less if they 
willingly resign it to their prince. 

Ans, — 1 . This is not true, when the power 
is given for the conservation of the kingdom, • 
and is abused for the destruction thereof; for 
a power to destructi(m was never given, nor 
can it, by rational nature, be given. Morti- 
fications given to religious uses by a positive 
law, may be recalled by a more divine and 
stronger law of nature, such as this, — " I 
will have mercy and not sacrifice." Sup- 
pose David, of his own proper heritage, had 
given the shew-bread to the priests; yet, 
when David and his men are mmishing, he 
may take it back from them against their 
will. Suppose Christ had bought the ears 
of com, and dedicated them to trie altar, yet 
might he and his disciples eat them in their 
hunger. The vessels of silver, dedicated to 
the church, may be taken and bestowed on 
wounded soldiers. 2. A people free may 
not, and ought not, totally surrender their 
liberty to a prince, confiding on his good- 
ness. (1.) Because liberty is a condition of 
nature that all men are bom with, and they 
are not to give it away — no, not to a king, 
except in part and for the better, that they 
may nave peace and justice for it, which is 
better for them, hie et nunc. (2.) If a peo- 
ple, trusting in the goodness of their prince, 
enslave themselves to him, and he shall 
after turn tyrant, a rash and temerarious 
surrender obligeth not, Et ignorantia facit 
factum quasi involuntarium. Ignorance 
maketh tlie fact some way involuntanr ; for 
if the people had believed that a meek king 
would nave turned a roaring lion, they should 
not have resigned their liberty into his hand ; 
and, therefore, the surrender was tacitly ooq- 
ditional to the king as meek, or whom they 
believed to be meek, and not to a tyrannous 
lord; and, therefore, when the contract is 
made for the utility of the one party, the 
law saith, their place is for after wits, that 
men may change their mind and resume 
their liberty, though, if they had given away 
their liberty for money, they cannot recal 
it; and if violence made the surrender of 
liberty, here is slavery ; and slaves taken in 
war, so soon as they can escape and return 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



67 



to their own, they are free. (D. Sect, item. 
ea justit. de rerum divin. L nihil. F, de 
capt Z. 3.) So the learned Ferdin. Vasquez 
(iliust. 1. 2. c. 82. n. 16.) saith, ** The bird that 
was taken, and hath escaped, is free." Na- 
ture in a forced people, so soon as they can 
escape from a Solent conqueror, maketh 
them a firee people; and si solo tempore 
(saith Ferd. Vasquez, 1. 2. c. 82, n. 6,) j'tw- 
tijicatur subjectio, solo tempore facdius 
justificahitur libercttio. 

Assert. 2.^^ All the goods of the sabjects 
belongeth not to the ling. I presuppose 
that the division of goods doth not necessa* 
rily flow from the htw of nature, for Grod 
made man, before the fall, lord of the crea- 
tures indefinitely ; but what goods be Pe- 
ter's, and not Paul's, we know not. But sup- 
posing man's sin, though the light of the sun 
and air be common to all, and religious 
places be proper to none, yet it is morally 
impossible that there should not be a dis- 
tinction of msum et tuum^ mine and thine ; 
and the decalogue forbidding theft, and co- 
veting the wife of another man, (yet is she 
the wife of Peter, not of Thomas, by free 
election, not by an act of nature's law,) doth 
evidence to us> that the division of things is 
so far f<Mrth (men now being in the state of 
sin) of the law of nature, that it hath evi- 
dent ground in the law of nations; and thus 
far natural, that the heat that I have from 
my own coat and doak, and the nourishment 
from my own meat, are physically inconunu- 
nicable to any.^ But I hasten to prove the 
proposition : — If, 1. I have leave to permit 
that, in' time of necessity, all things are com- 
mon by Grod's law — -ja man traveUing might 
eat grapes in his neighbour's vineyard, though 
he was not licensed to carry any way. I 
doubt if David, wanting money, was neces- 
sitated to jpay money for the shew-bread, or 
for Groliath's sword, supposing these to be the 
very goods of private men, and ordinarily to 
be bought and sold. Nature's law in ex- 
tremity, for self-preservation, hath rather a 
prerogative royal above all laws of nations 
and all civil laws, than any mortal king ; 
and, therefore, by the civil law, all are the 
king's, in case of extreme necessity. In this 
meaning, any one man is obliged to give all 
he hath for the good of the commonwealth, 
and so far the good of the king, in as far as 



1 Quod jare gentium dicitur. F. de jnstitia et jure, 
I ex hoc. — Quwl partim jure ciyili. Insti. de rerum 
diTisio. sect, singnlorum. 



he is head and father of the commonwealth.^ 
2. All things are the king's, in regard of his 
public power to defend all men and their 
goods from unjust violence. 3. All are the 
king's, in regard of his act of conservation of 
gocMs, for the use of the lust owner. 4. All 
PTthe king's in regard k a legal limitotion, 
in case of a damage offered to the common- 
wealth. Justice requireth confiscation of 
goods for a fault ; but confiscated goods are 
to help the interested commonwealth, and 
the king, not as a man (to bestow them on 
his children) but as a king. To this we 
may refer these called bona caduca et m- 
venta, things lost by shipwreck or any other 
providence, Ulpian, tit. 19, t. c. de bonis 
vacantibus. C. de Thesauro. 

Arq. 1. — And the reasons why private 
men <^ iu8t lords and proprietors o^ their 
own gooos, are, — 1. Because, by order of 
nature, division of goods cometh nearer to 
nature's law and necessity than any king or 
magistrate in the world; and because it is 
acrreeable to nature that every man be 
wmed by his own fleece-noshed by 
his own meat, therefore, to conserve every 
man's goods to the just owner, and to pre- 
serve a community from the violence of ra- 
pine and theft, a magistrate and king was 
devised. So it is clear, men are just owners 
of their own goods, by all good order, both 
of nature and time, before there be any such 
thing as a king or magistrate. Now, if it 
be good that every man enjcnr his own goods, 
as lUst proprietor thereof, mr his own use, 
berore there be a king, who can be proprie- 
tor of his goods ? And a king being given of 
God for a blessing, not for any man's hurt 
and loss, the king cometh in to preserve a 
man's goods, but not to be lord and owner 
thereof himself, nor to take from any man 
Grod's right to his own goods. 

Arg. 2. — ^When Grod created man at the 
beginning, he made all the creatures for 
man, and made them by the law of nature 
the proper possession of man, but then there 
was not any king formally as king ; for cer- 
tainly Adam was a father before he was a 
king, and no man being either bom or crea- 
ted a king over another man, no more than 
the first lion and the first eagle that God 
created, were, by the birthrignt and first 
start of creation, by nature the king of all 
lions and all eagles to be after created, — no 



1 L. item si verberatum. F. de rei yindicat. Jas. 
plene. m. lib. Barbarius. F. de offici. prietor. 



-f- 



68 



LSX, REX ; OR, 



t 

man can, b? nature's law, be the owner of 
all goods of particular men. And because 
the law of nations^ founded upon the law of 
nature, hath brought in meum et twam^ mine 
and thine, as proper to every particular man, 
and the introduction of kings cannot over- 
turn nature's foundation; neither civility nor 
grace destroy eth but peifecteth nature; and 
if a man be not bom a king, because he is a 
man, he cannot be bom the possessor of my 
goods. 

Arg. 8* — What is a character and note of 
a tyrant, and an oppressing king as a tyrant, 
is not the just due of a' king as a king ; but 
to take the proper goods of subjects, and use 
them as his own, is a proper character and 
note of a tyrant and oppressor; therefore the 
proposition is evident : A king and a tyrant 
are, by way of contradiction, contrary one to 
another. The assumption is proved thus :- — 
Ezek. xlv. 9, 10, " Thus saith the Lord, 
Let it suffice you, princes of Israel: re- 
move violence and spoil, and execute judg^ 
ment and justice ; take away your exactions 
from my people, saith the Lord. Ye shall 
have just balances, and a just ephah, and a 
just bath." If all be the king's, he is not 
capable of extortion and rapine. God com- 
plaineth of the J^iolence of kings, Micah iii. 
1,3," Is it not for you to know judgment ? 
who also eat the flesh of my people, and fiav 
their skins from off them ; and they break 
their bones and chop them in pieces, as for 
the pot, and as fiesn within the chaldron." 
(Isa. iii. 14 ; Zeph. iii. 3.) Was it not an 
act of tyranny in king Adiab to take the 
vineyard of Naboth ? and in king Saul (1 
Sam. viii. 14) to take the people of Grod's 
" fields and vineyards, and oliveyards, and 
give them to his servants ?" Was it a just 
fault that Hybreas objected to Antonius, ex- 
acting two tributes in one year, that he said, 
" If thou must have two tributes in one 
year, then make for us two summers and 
two harvests in one year ?" This cannot be 
just. If all be the king's, the king taketh 
but his own. 

Arg^ 4. — Subjects under a monarch could 
not give alms, nor exercise works of charity ;^ 
for charity must be my own, Isa. Iviii. 7, 
" Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry," 
&c.; Eccles«xi. 1, " Cast thy bread upon the 
waters ;" and the law saith, " It is theft to 



1 Species enim fnrti est de alieno largiri, et bene- 
ficii debitorcm sibi acqnirore, L. si pignoro, sect. 
de fart. 



I 



rive of another man's to the poor ;" yea, 
uie distinction of poor and rich should nave 
no place under a monarchy, he only should 
be rich. 

Arg, 5. — ^When Paul commandeth us to 
pay tnbute to princes (Bom. xiii. 6) because 
they are the ministers of Grod, he layeth 
this ground, that the king hath not all, but 
that the subjects are to give to him of their 
goods. 

Arg, 6. — It is the king's place, by jus- 
tice, to preserve every man in nis own right, 
and under his own fig-tree ; therefore, it is 
not the king's house. 

Arg. 7.-^-Even Pharaoh could not make 
all the victual of the land his own, while he 
had bought it with money ; and every thing 
is presumed to be firee (aUodialis^ free land,) 
except the king prove that it is bought or 
purchased. X. octtW, C de servit, et aqua, 
et Joan, And, m, C. F. de ind, et hosti, in 
C* minuts de jur* 

Arg, 8. — If the subjects had no propriety 
in their own goods, but all were the prince's 
due, then ihe subject should not be able to 
make any contract of buying and selling 
without tne king, and every subject were in 
the case of a slave. Now the law saith, (L, 
2. F, de Noxali, act, I, 2. F. ad legem 
aquil.) When he roaketh any covenant, 
he is not obliged civilly to keep it, because 
the c(»idition of a servant, he not being sui 
juris, is compared to the state of a beast, 
though he be obliged by a natural obliga- 
tion, being a ratiomd creature, in regard of 
the law of nature, L, naturaliter^ L, si id 
quod, L, interdum, F. de cond, indebit, 
cum aliis. The subject could not, by Solo- 
mon, be forbidden to be surety for his friend, 
as kmg Solomon doth counsel, (Prov. vi. 1 
' — ^3 ;) ne could not be condenmed to bring 
on himself poverty by sluggishness, (as Prov. 
vi. 6 — 10 ;) nor were he U> honour the Lord 
with his riches, (as Prov. iii» 9 ;) nor to keep 
his covenant) liiough to his loss, (Psal. xv. 
14 ;) nor could he be merciful and lend, 
(Psal. xxxvii. 26 ;) nor had he pdwer to 
borrow ; nor could ne be guilty in not pay- 
ing all again. (Psal. xxxvu. 21.) For sub- 
jects, under a monarchy, can neither per- 
form a duty, nor fail in a duty, in the mat- 
ter of goods. If all be the king's, what 
power or dominion hath the subject in dis- 
posing of his prince's goods ? See more in 
jPetr, Rehufus, tract, congruoe portionis, 
n. 226, p, 109, 110. Sed quoad domini- 
um rerum, 8fc, 



THE LAW AND THE PRiyCE. 



69 



QUESTION XVII. 

WHETHER OR NOT THE PRINCE HAVE PROPER- 
LY A FIDUCUkRY AND MINISTERL/kL POWER 
OF A TUTOR, HUSBAND, PATRON, MINISTER, 
HEAD, FATHER OF A FAMILY, NOT OF A 
LORD OR DOMINATOR. 

That the power of the king is fiduciary, 
that is, given to him iinme£ately by God 
in trust, j^yalists deny not ; but we hold 
that the Ixiist is put upon the king by the 
people. We deny that the people rive 
themselves to the kins as a gin, for liniat 
is freely given cannot oe taken again ; but 
they gave themselves to the king as a pawn, 
and if the pawn be abused, or not used in 
that manner as it was conditioned to be 
used, the party in whose hand the pawn is 
intrusted, faileth in his trust. 

Assert. 1. — The king is more properly a 
tutor than a &ther. 1. Indigency is the 
original of tutors— the parents die; what 
then shall become of the orphan and his in- 
heritance? He cannot guide it himself, 
therefore nature devised a tutor to supply 
the place of a father, and to govern the tu- 
tor ; but, with this consideration, the father 
^is lord of the inheritance, and if he be dis- 
tressed, may sell it, that it shall never come 
to the son, and the father, for the - bad de- 
serving of his son, may disinherit him ; but 
the tutor, being but a borrowed father, can- 
not sell the inheritance of the pupil, nor can 
he, for the pupil's bad deserving, by any do- 
minion of justice over the pupil, take away 
the inheritance &om him, and give it to his 
own son. So a community of itself, because 
of sin, is a naked society that can but de- 
stroy itself, and every one eat the flesh of 
his brother ; therefore God hath appointed a 
king or governor, who shall take care of that 
commumty, rule them in peace, and save all 
from reciprocation of mutual acts of violence, 
yet so as, because a trust is put on the ruler 
of a community which is not his heritage, he 
cannot dispose of it as he pleaseth, because 
he is not the proper owner of the inheri- 
tance. 2. The pupil, when he cometh to 
age, may call his tutor to an account for his 
administration. I do not acknowledge that 
as a truth, which Amis8Bus salth, (de au- 
thoritate prin. c. 3, n. 6,J " The common- 
wealth is always minor ana under tutory, be- 
cause it alway hath need of a curator and 
governor, and can never put away its gover- 



nor; but the pupil may grow to age and 
wisdom, so as he may be without all tutors 
and can guide himself, and so may call in 
question on his tutor ; and the pupil cannot 
be his judge, but must stand to the sentence 
of a superior judge, and so the people can- 
not judge or punish their prince — God must 
be judge betwixt them both." 

JDut this is besging^the question; every 
comparison haltetST There is no community 
but IS major in this, that it can appoint its 
own tutors ; and tiiough it cannot be without 
all rulers, yet it may well be without this or 
that prince and ruler, and, therefore, may 
resume its power, which it gave conditionally 
to the ruler for its own safety and good ; and 
in so far as this condition is vio&ted, and 
power turned to the destruction of the com- 
monwealth, it is to be esteemed as not given ; 
and though the people be not a politic judge 
in their own cause, yet in case of msoiifest 
oppression, nature can teach them to oppose 
defensive violence against oifensive. A com- 
munity in its politic body is also above any 
ruler, and may judge what is manifestly de- 
structive to itself'. 

Obj, — The pupil hath not power to ap- 
point his own tutor, nor doth he give power 
to him ; so neither doth the people give it 
to the king. 

-4«w.-*The pupil hath not indeed a for- 
mal power to make a tutor, but he hath 
virtually a legal power in his father, who 
appointeth a tutor for his son ; and the peo- 
ple hath virtually all royal power in them, 
as in a sort of immortal and eternal foun- 
tain, and may create to themselves many 
kings. 

Assert. 2. — The king's power is not pro- 
perly and univocally a marital and husbandlt 
power, but only analogically. 1. The wife 
by nature is the weaker vessel, and inferior 
to the man, but l^e kingdom, as shall be 
demonstrated, is superior to tbe king. 2. 
The vrife is given as an help to the man, but 
by the contrair, the father here is given as 
an help and rather to the commonwealth, 
which IS presumed to be the wife. 3. Ma- 
rital and husbandly power is natural, though 
it be not natural but from free election that 
Peter is Ana's husband, and should have 
been, though man had never sinned; but 
royal power is a politic constitution, and the 
world might have subsisted though aristo- 
cracy or democracy had been the only and 
perpetual governments. So let the Prelate 
glory in his borrowed logic ; he had it from 



70 



LEX, BEX ; OR, 



^^^^k^Ml^ 



Barclajt " It is not in the power of the 
wife to repudiate her husband, though never 
so wiokedi She is tyed to him for ever, and 
may not give to him a bill of divorcement, 
as by law the husband might give to her« 
If therefore the people swear loyalty to him, 
they keep it, thougn to their hurt." Psal* 
XV. — Ans. There is nothing here said, ex- 
cept Barclay and the Plagiary prove that 
the king's power is properly a husband's 
power, which they cannot prove but from a 
simile that crooketh. But a king, elected 
upon conditions, that if he sell his people he 
snail lose his crown, is as essentially a long as 
Adam was Eve's husband, and yet, by grant 
of parties, the people may never divorce 
from such a king, and dethrone him, if he 
sell his people ; but a wife may divorce from 
her husband, as the argument saith. And 
this poor argument the Prelate stole from 
Dr Feme (part 2, sect. 3, n. 10, 11). The 
keeping of covenant, though to our hurt, is 
a penal hurt, and loss oi goods, not a moral 
hurt, and loss of religiao. 

Assert. 3.---The Bng is more properly a 
sort of patron, to defend the people, (and 
therefore hath no power given either by God 
or man to hurt the people,) and a minister, 
or public and honourable servant, (Rom. 
xiii. 4,) for he is the minister of Uod to 
thee for good. 1. He is the commonwealth's 
servant objectively, because all the king's 
service, as he is king, is for the good, safety, 
peace and salvation of the people, and in 
this he is a servant. 2. He is the servant 
of the people representatively ^ in that the 
people hath impawned in his hand all their 
power to do royal service. 

Obj. 1. — ^He is the servant of God, lliere- 
ibre he is not the people's servant, but their 
sovereign lord. 

Ans^-^lt followeth not ; because all the 
services the kin^, as king, performelli to 
God, are acts oi royalty, and acts of royal 
service, as terminated on the people, or acts 
of their sovereign lord; and this proveth, 
that to be their sovereign is to be their ser- 
vant and watchman. 

Obj» 2.^-^God maketh a king only, and 
the xingly power is in him only, not in the 
people. 

Ans, 1» — The royal power is only from 
God immediately, — immediatione simplicie 
constitutionis, et solum a Deo solitudme 
primcB causce, — by the immediation of sim- 
ple constitution, none but God appointed 
there should be kmgs. But, 2. Royal power 



is not in God, nor only from God, imme- 
diatione afplicationis regide digmtatis 
ad personam^ nee a Deo solum^ solitudine 
causcB appUcantis dignitatemy huicy non 
illif in respect of the applying of royal dig- 
nity to this person, not to that. 

Obj. 3. — ^Though royal power were given 
to the people, it is not given to the people 
as if it were the royal power of the people, 
and not the royal power of Grod, neither is 
it any otherwise bestowed on the people but 
as on a beam, a channel, an instrument by 
which it is derived to others, imd so the king 
is not the minister or servant of the people. 

Ans, — It is not in the people as in the 
principal cause ; sure all royal power that way 
IS only in God ; but it is in the people as in 
the instrument) and when the people maketh 
David their khig at Hebron, in that same 
very act, Grod, by the people using their free 
suffrages and consent, maketh David king at 
Hebron ; so God only giveth rain, and none 
of the vanities and supposed gods of the Gen- 
tiles can give rain, (Jen xiv. 22,) and yet 
the clouds also give rain, as nature, as an or- 
gan and vessel out of which God poureth 
down rain upon the dry earth ; (Amos ix. 
6 ;) and every instrument under God that is 
properly an instrument, is a sort of vicarious 
cause in God's room, and so the people as in 
God's room applieth royal power to David, 
not to any of Saul's sons, and appointeth I>a- 
vid to be their royal servant to govern, and 
in that to serve Grod, and to do that which a 
community now in the state of sin cannot for- 
mally do themselves ; and so I see not how 
it is a service to the people, not only objec- 
tively, because the king's royal service tend- 
eth to the good, and peace, and safety of the 

ale, but also subjectively, in regard he 
his power and royal authority which he 
exerciseth as king from the people under 
God, as Grod's instruments ; and, therefore, 
the king and parliament give out laws and 
statutes in the name of the whole people of 
the land ; and they are but flatterers, and 
belie the Holy Ghost, who teach that the 
people do not make the king; for Israel made 
Saul king^ at Mizpeh, and £rael made David 
king at Hebron. 

Obj. 4. — Israel made David king, that 
is, Israel designed David's person to be king, 
and Israel consented to Grcd's act of making 
David king, but they did not make David 
king. 

Ans, — I say not that Israel made the roy- 
al dignity of kings : God (Deut. xvii.) insti- 



THS LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



71 



tnted that himself; but the rojaligt must give 
us an act of Grod going before an aet of the 
people's making j^vid king at Hebron, by 
which David of no king is made formally a 
king ; and then another act of the people, 
approving only and consenting to that act of 
God, whereby David is made formally of no 
king to be a Wg. This royalists shall never 
instruct, for there be only two acts of Grod 
here ; 1. God's act of anointing David by the 
hand of Samuel ; and 2. Grod's act of making 
David king at Hebron ; and a third they 
shall never give. But the former is not that 
by which David was essentially and formally 
changed from the state of a private subject 
and no king, into the state of a public judge 
and supreme lord and king ; for (as I have 
proved) after this act of anointing of David 
king, he was designed only and set apart to 
be king in the Lord's fit time ; and after this 
anointing, he was no more formally a king 
than Doeg or Nabal were kings, but a sub- 
ject who called Saul the Lord's anointed and 
king, and obeyed him as another subject doth 
hislmg ; but it is certain God by no other act 
made David king at Hebron, than by Israel's 
act of free electing him to be king and leader 
of the Lord's people, as God by no other act 
sendeth down rain on the eardi, but by his 
melting the clouds, and causing rain to fall on 
the earth ; and therefore to say Israel made 
David king at Hebron, that is, Israel approv'- 
ed only and consented to a prior act of^ God's 
making David king, is just to say Saul pro- 
pheciea, that is, Saul consented to a prior act 
of the Spirit of God who prophecied ; and 
Peter preached, (Acts ii.) that is, Peter ap- 
proved and consented to the Holy Ghost's 
act of preaching, which to say, is childish. 

Assert, 4.— -The kmg is an head of the 
commonwealth only metaphorically, by a bor- 
rowed speech in a politic sense, because he 
mleth, commandeth, directeth the whole po- 
litic body in all their operations and func- 
tions. But he is not univocally and essen- 
tiaUy the head of the commonwealth. 1. 
The very same life in number that is in the 
head, is in the members ; there be divers dis- 
tinct souls and lives in the king and in his 
subjects. 2. The head natural is not made 
an head by the free election and consent of 
arms, shoulders, legs, toes, fingers, &c. The 
king is made king only by the free election 
of his people. 3. The natural head, so long 
as the person liveth, is ever the head, and 
cannot cease to be a head while it is seated 
on the shoulders ; the king, if he sell his 



people's persons and souls, may leave off to 
be a king and head. 4. The head and mem- 
bers live together and die together, the king 
and the people are not so ; me king may die 
and tiie people live. 6. The natural head 
cannot destroy the members and preserve it-^ 
self; but king Nero may waste and destroy 
his people. Dr Feme, M. Symmons, ^e P. 
Prelate, when they draw arguments from the 
head, do but dream, as the members should 
not resist the head. Natural members should 
not or cannot resist the head, though the 
hand may pull a tooth out of the head, which 
is no smaQ violence to the head; but the 
members of ajpolitic body may resist the po«- 
litic head. Tnis or that king is not the 
adequate and total politic head of the oom«- 
monwealth ; and therefore though you cut off 
a politic head, there is nothing done against 
nature. If you cut off all kings of the royal 
line, and all governors aristocratical, both 
king and parliament, this were against na^ 
ture ; and a commonwealth which would cut 
off all governors and all heads, should go 
against nature and run to ruin quickly. J 
conceive a society of reasonable men cannot 
want governors. 6. The natural head com- 
municateth life, sense, and motion to the 
members, and is the seat of external and in- 
ternal senses ; the king is not so. 

Assert, 5. — Hence the king is not properly 
the head of a family, for, as Tholossa saith 
well, (de Rep. 1. 5, c, 6,) Nature hath one in- 
tention in making the thumb, another in- 
tention in making the whole hand, another 
in forming the Ixxly ; so there is one inten- 
tion of the God of nature in governing of one 
man, another in governing a family, another 
in governing a city ; nor is the thumb king 
of ail the members ; so domestic government 
is not monarchical properly. 1. The mother 
hath a jparental power as the father hath, 
(Prov. IV. 5 ; X. 3 ; xxxi. 17,) so the fifth 
commandment saith, ^' Honour thy father and 
thy mother." 2. Domestic government is 
natural, monarchical politic. 3. Domestic is 
necessary, monarchical is not necessary ; other 
government may be as well as it. 4. IX)- 
mestic is imiversal, monarchical not so. 5. 
Domestic hath its rise from natural instinct 
without any farther instruction ; a monarchi- 
cal government is not but from election, 
choosmg one government, not another. Hence 
that is a fiduciary power, or a power of trust, 
wherein the thing put in trust is not either 
his own proper heritage or gif^, so as he may 
dispose of it as he pleaseth, as men dispose of 



72 



LKLj HEX ; OR, 



their goods or heritage. But the king may 
not dispose of men as men, as he pleaseth ; 
nor of laws as he pleaseth ; nor of governing 
men, killing or keeping alive, punishing and 
rewarding, as he pleaseth. My life and re- 
ligion, and so my soul, in some cases, are com- 
mitted to the king as to a public watchman, 
even as the flock to the feeder, the city to 
the watchmen ; and he may betray it to the 
enemy. Therefore, he hatii the trust of life 
and religion, and hath both tables of the law 
in his custody, ex oficio, to see that other 
men than himself keep the law. But the law 
is not the king's own, but dven to him in 
trust. He who receiveth a Kingdom condi- 
tionally, and may be dethroned if he sell it 
or put it away to any other, is a fiduciary pa- 
tron, and hath it only in trust. So Hotto- 
man, (quest, ill, 1.) Ferdinand. Vasquez, 
{illiist. quest. I. 1, c. 4.) Althusius, {polit. 
c. 24, n. 36,) so saith the law of every &ctor 
or deputy, (Z. 40, 1. 63, procwr. 1. 16, C. diet. 
1.) Antigonus dixit regnum esse fiohUem 
servitutem. Tyberius CeBsar called the se- 
nate, dominum suum^ his lord. (JSuetOfdus 
in vita Tiberii, c. 29.) 



QUESTION XVIII. 

WHAT IS THE LAW OF THE KING, AND HIS 

POWER? 

* 

1 Sam, viii. 11. ** This wiU he the manner of the king 
who shall reign over you" &c. 

This^lace, (1 Sam. viii. 11,) the law or 
manner of the king is alleged to prove both 
the absolute power of kings, and the unlaw- 
fulness of resistance ; therefore I crave leave 
here to vindicate the place, and to make it 
evident to all that the place speaketh for no 
such matter. Grotius argueth thus :^ " that 
by this place, the people oppressed with in- 
juries of a tyrannous king liave nothing left 
them but prayers and cries to God ; and 
therefore there is no ground for violent re- 
insdng." Barclay^ willhave us to distinguish 
inter oficium regis, et potestatem, between 
the king's office and the king's power ; and 
he will nave the Lord here speaking, not of 



I Grofias de jure belli et pacis, lib. 1, c. 4, n. 3. 

s Barclains oontra Monarcbom. lib. 2, p. 64. Po- 
testatem intelligit non earn quas competit ex pne- 
cepto, neqne etiam quae ex permissn eat, quatenus 
liberat a peccato, sed qnatenns psenis legallbus exi- 
mit operantem. 






the king's office, what he ought to do before 
Grod, but what power a king nath beside and 
above the power of judges, to tyrannise over 
the people, so as the people hath no power to 
resist it. He will have the office of the king 
spoken of Deut, xvii., and the power of the 
Ung, 1 Sam. viii., and that power which the 
people was to obey and submit unto without 
resisting. But I answer, 1. It is a vain 
thing to distinguish betwixt the office and the 
power ; for the power is either a power to 
rule according to God's law, as he is com- 
manded, (Deut. xvii.) and this is the very of- 
fice or official power which the Bang of kings 
hath given to all kings under him, and this 
is a power of the royal office of a king, to 
govern for the Lord his Maker ; or this is 
a power to do ill and tyrannise over God's 
people ; but this is accidental to a king and 
the character of a tyrant, and is not from 
God, and so the law of the king in this place 
must be the tyranny of the king, which is our 
very mind. 2. '^ lieges sine dominatione ne 
concipi quidem posstmt; — judices domi- 
nationem in populum nUnime habebant"^ 
Hence it is clear that Barclay saith, that 
the judges of Israel and the kings are 
different in essence and nature ; so that do- 
mination is so essential to a king, that you 
cannot conceive a king but he must have 
domination, whereas uie judges of Israel 
had no domination over the people. Hence 
I argue, that whereby a king is essentially 
distinguished from a judge that must be 
from God ; but by domination, which is a 
power to oppress uie subject, a king is es- 
sentially distinguished from a judge of Is- 
rael ; therefore, domination and a power to 
do acts of tyranny, as they are expressed, 

iyer. 11 — 13,) and to oppress a subject, is 
rom God, and so must be a lawM power. 
But the conclusion is absurd ; the assump- 
tion is the doctrine of Barclay. The major 
proposition I prove. 1. Because both the 
judge and the king was from God ; for God. 
gave Moses a lawM calling to be a judge, 
so did he to Eli and to Samuel, and hence 
(Deut. xvii. 15) ihe king is a lawM ordi- 
nance of God. If then the judge and the 
king be both lawfiil ordinances, and if they 
difiSr essentially, as Barclay saith, then 
that specific form which distinguisheth the 
one from the other, to wit, domination and 
a power to destroy the subject, must be 
from God ; which is blasphemous : for God 

s Barclains contra Monarcbo. lib. 2. p. 56, 57. 




can give no moral power to do wickedly ; for 
that is licence, and a power to sin against 
a law of God, which is absolutely inconsis- 
tent with the holiness of God ; for so the 
Lord might deny himself, and dispense with 
sin. God avert such blasphemies ! 2. Now 
if the kingly power be from God, that which 
essentially and specifically constituteth a 
king mnst^be from Grod, as the office itself 
is from God. Barclay saith^ expressly that 
the kingly power is from God, and that 
same, which is the Specific form that con- 
stituteth a king, must be that which essen- 
tially separatetn the king from the judge, 
if they be essentially different, as Barclay 
dreameth. Hence have we this jus regis, 
this manner or law of the king to tyrannise 
and oppress, to- be a power from God, and 
so a lawful power, by which you shall have 
this result of Barday's interpretation,-^that 
Grod made a tyrant as well as a king. 3. 
By this difference that Barclay putteth be- 
twixt the king and the judge, the judge 
might be resisted ; for he had not this power 
of domination that Saul hath, contrary to 
Bom. xiii. 2 ; Exod. xxii, 28 ; xx, 12. , 

But let us try the text first, •l7Dn 
JOBBED the word cannot enforce us to ex- 
pone DSK^D ft ^^9 <>u^ English rendereth, 
Show them the manner of tne king. Arri. 
Montanus tumeth it ratio regis.^ I grant 
the LXX* render it, r« ^nmttfMt rw /3«^/Xf«#.' 
The Chaldee Paraphrase saith,^ Stututum 
regis. Hieronimus translateth it jus regis^ 
and also Calvin; but I am sure the He- 
brew, both in words and sense, beareth a 
consuetude ; yea, and the word QDB^O sig- 
nifieth not always a law, as, (Josh. vi. 14,) 
" They compassed the city tOSE^DD seven 

times ;" the LXX. jutrk W99 x^lfim, * r»vri ; 2 

Kings xvii, 26, They " know not the man- 
ner of the God of the land ; (ver. 83) they 
served their own gods, after the manner of 
the heathen," DVtn DDC^DD can- 
not be according to the law or right of the 
heathen, except JDBtJ^D, be taken in an 
evil part : the LXX. »wrm rh »ffut rSv l/y«r, 
ver. 34, " Until this dav they do after these 
manners ;" 1 Kings xviii. 28, Baal's priests 
"cut themselves with knives DtDBB^OD 
after their manner:" the LXX. nar^ rn 
ift^puf; Gen. xl. 13, Thou shalt give the 
cup to Pharaoh, according as thou wast 

1 Barclaius, lib. 3, c. 2. 

* Arr. Mon. Hsbc erit ratio Regis. , 

3 Chald. Para, {{n^ KDD3 ND^DT 



wont to do ; t3DB^3> Exod. xxi. 9, " He 
shall deal with her after the manner of 
daughters;" 1 Sam. xxvii. 11, *<And Da- 
vid saved neither man nor woman alive, to 
bring tidings to Gath, saying. So did David, 
and so will his manner be," ItOflB^D- It 
cannot be they meant that it was David's 
law, right, or privilege, to spare none a- 
live; 1 Sam, ii. 13, "And the priests' cus- 
tom with the people was," &c. CD^jnDn 
OQK^DV This was a wicked custom, not a 
law ; and the LXX, tumeth it, xm! rn ^ixeu. 
rnfim r«S It^iui ; and therefore ttxuuifi* is not al- 
ways taken in a good meaning : so P. Mar- 
tjnr,^ " He meaneth here of an usurped law;" 
Calvin,^ Non jus a deo prescriptum, sed 
tyranidem, — " He speaketh not of God's 
law here, but of tyranny ;" and Rivetus,^ 
OStt^D signifieth not ever jus, law. Sed 
aliquando morerri sive modum et rationem 
agendiy — " The custom and manner of do- 
ing:" so Junius* and Tremellius. Dioda- 
tus* exponeth jus, — This law, *< namely, 
(saith he,) that which is now grown to a 
common custom, by the consent of nations 
and God's toleration." Glossa,* (to speak 
of psmists,) Exactionem et dominationem, 
— " The extortion and domination of king 
Saul is here meant ;" Lyra^ exponeth it 
tyranny ; Tostatus Abulens.,® " He mean- 
eth here of kings indefinitely who oppressed 
the people with taxes and tributes, as So- 
lomon and others;" Cornelius a Lapide,® 
" This was an unjust law;" Gajetanus*^ call- 
eth it tyranny; Hugo Carainal. nameth 
them, eocactiones et servitutes, — ** exactions 
and slaveries ;" and Serrarius speaketh not 
here, Quid Reges jure possint, — " What 
they may do by right and law ;" Sed quid 
audeant, — " What they will be bold to do, 
and what they tyranically decern against 
all laws of nature and -humanity ;" and so 
speaketh Thom. Aquinas ;^l so also Men- 

l P. Martyr, comment. 1 Sam. yiii., Temm jus re- 
ginm describit in Dent, apnd Samuelnm antem nsur- 
patom. 

> Calvin, cone. 1 Sam. viii, 

' Andr. Rivetua in decal., Exod. xx. in 5, mnn- 
dat., p. 165. 

^ Jnnius annot., in 1 Sam. ii. 13. 

B Diodatus annot., 1 Sam. yiii. 3, 

' GloBsa interlinearis. 

7 Lyra in locum. Uc accipitnr jns large snmptum 
quod repntatnr jus propter malum abusum. Nam 
ilia quas dicuntur liic de jure Regis, magis contin- 
gunt per tyranidem. 

s Tostatus Abulens. in 1 Reg. 8, q. 17, de q. 21, 

9 Cornelius a Lapide, in locum. 

10 CajetanuR, in locum. 

n Thom. Aquinas, 1. 3, de Regni Princlp. c. 11, 

M 



— :/ 



74 



LEX, BEX ; OR, 



doza^ speaketh of the ^*law of tyrantB;" 
and, amonrnt the fathers, Clemens Alexaa- 
drinus 8ai& on this place, Non humanum 
poUieetur donUnum^ sed insolewtem datt^ 
rum minatur tyrannum^ — '^ He promiseth 
not a humane prince, but threateneth to give 
them an insolent tyrant ;'* and the like also 
saith Bede ;' and an excellent lawyer. Pet* 
BebufiFus saith,^ Etiam loquitur de tyrafi- 
no qui non erat a Deo eUetus^ and tioat he 
speaketh of Saul's tyrannical usurpation, and 
not of the law prescribed by God, Deut. 
xvii., I prove,-^!. He apeaketh of such a 
power as is answerable to the acts here 
spoken of; but the acts here spoken of are 
acts of mere tyranny ; ver. lit ^' ^'^ ^^ 
will be the manner of your king that shall 
reign over you : he will take your sons, and 
appoint them for himself, for his chariots, 
and to be his horsemen; and some shall 
run before his chariots." Now, to make 
slaves of their sons was an act of tyranny. 
2. To take their fields, and vineyards, and 
oliveyards from them, and give them to his 
servants, was no better than Ahab's taking 
Naboth's vineyard from him, which by Grod's 
law he might not lawAiUy sell, except in the 
case of extreme poverty, and then, in the 
year of jubilee, ne might redeem his own 
uUieritance. 3. (Ver. 16f 16,^ To put the 
people of Grod to bonda^, ana make them 
servants, was to deal with them as the ty- 
rant Pharaoh did. 4. He speaketh of such 
a law, the execution whereof should ^' make 
them cry out to the Lord because of their 
kinff ;" but the execution of the just law of 
the King (Deut, xvii.) is a blessing, and not 
a bondage which should make the people cry 
out of the bitterness of their spirit. 6. It is 
clear here that God is, by his prophet, not 
instructing the king in bis duty, but, as 
Rabbi Leyi Ben. G^rsom. saith,^ ^' Terniy* 
ing them from their purpose of seeking a 
king, and foretelling the evil of punishment 
that they should differ under a tyrannous 
king;" but he speaketh not one word of 
these necessary and comfortable acts of fa- 
vour that a good king, by his good govem- 



1 Mendoza, jus T jrannonim. 

s Clemens Alezand. p. 26. 

s 3ed«, 1. %, expo, in Samuel. 

4 Pet. Rebnfus tract de incongma. prert. p.. 1X0. 

Ben. Gerapm^ ia 1 Sam. yiii., Pezelius '}jx ezp. 
leg. Mosai. 1. 4, c. 8. Tossan. in not. Bibl. BoBsens 
de Rep. Christ, potest;, snpra r^em, c.. % p» 103. 
Bodin. de Rep. 1. 1, c. 19. Brentins, homi). 27, in 
1 Sam. Tiii., Mos regis non de jure, sed de Vnlgatam 
eoBsnetsdiae. 



ment, was to do for his people. Deut. xvii. 
15, 16. But he speaketh of contrary fiEusts 
here ; and that he is dissuading them firom 
suiting a king is clear from the text. (1.) 
Because he saiih. Give them their will ; but 
yet protest against their onlawM course. 
(2.) He bid&th the prophet lay before 
them the tyranny and oppression of their 
king; which tyranny Saiu exercised in his 
time, as the story showeth. (3.) Because 
how ineffectual Samuel's exhortation was 
is set down, ver. 19, *^ Nevertheless they 
would not obey the voice of Samuel, but 
said. Nay, but we will have a king over us." 
If Samuel bad not been dejiorting them 
from a king, how could they be said in iJiis 
to refuse to hear the voice of Samuel ? 6, 
The ground of Bardav and royalists here is 
weak ; for they say. That the people sought 
a king like the nations, and the kmgs of the 
nations were all absolute, and so tyrants; 
and God granted their unlawM desire, and 
gave them a tyrant to reign over them such 
as the nations had.^ The plain contrary is 
true. They sought not a tyrant ; but one 
of the spe^ reasons why they sought a 
king was to be freed of tyranny ; for 1 Sam. 
viii. 3, ** Because Samuel's sons turned aside 
after lucre, and took bribes, and perverted 
judgment ; therefore all the elders of Israel 
gathered tJiemselves together, and came to 
Samuel, to Bamah, apd there they sought 
a king." 7. One could not more clearly 

r\ with the mouth of a felse prophet 
the author of " Active and J^assive 
Obedience^* doth, while he will have Samuel 
here to describe a king, and to say, ^' Ye 
have formerly committed one error in shak- 
ing off the yoke of Grod, and seeking a king; 
so now beware you fall not in the next error, 
in casting off the yoke of a king, which God, 
at your own desire, hath laid on you; for 
Grpd onlv hath power to make and unmake 
kings ; therefore prepare yourselves patient- 
ly to suffer and bear. 

An8. 1. — For if he were exhorting to 
^iti^nt suffering of the yoke of a king, he 
should presume it were God's revealed and 
regulating will that th^y should have a king. 
But the scope of Sapuiel's sermon is to dis- 
Efuad^e them fropi a king, and they by the 
contrary, (ver, 19,) sav, ^* Nay, but we will 
have a king;" and there is not one word 
in the text that may intimatepatience un- 
dei^jbhe yoke of a king. 2, There is here 



1 Dr Ferae, seet. % p. 56. 



THS LAW AND THS PRINCE. 



75 



the description of a tyrant, not of a king. 
3. Here is a threateninff and a prediction, 
not anything that smellew of an exhortation, 

Otj. — ^But it is evident that God, teach- 
ing the people how to hehave themselyes 
under the unjust oppressions of their king, 
set down no reme<fy but tears, crying to 
Gfod, and patience ; therefore resistance is 
not kwfuL^ 

^Mt-^Though this be not the place due 
to the doctrine of redstance, yet, to vindi* 
cate the place, — 1. I say, there is not one 
word of any lawful remedy in the toxt; 
only it is said, K^HH DVl Dnpyt^ 

DD3yD ^JBSDj -E"* damoitis in ilia die 
afiidebus regis vestri. It is not necessari- 
ly to be exponed of praying to Grod ; Job 
XXXV, 9, " By reason of the multitude of 
oppressions, they make the oppressed to 
cry," Ip^yn clamare faciunt\ Isa. xv. 
4, " And Heshbon shall cry : py tni 
the armed soldiers of Moab shall cry out." 
There is no other word here than doth ex- 
press the idolatrous prayers of Moab ; Isa. 
xviL 12 ; Hab. ii. 11, " The stone shall cir 
out of the wall pyTfl f I>eut. xxii; 24, 
"You shall stone the nuud ^N7 IBfJ* 
in^^y, because she cried not HpySf ;" 
but she is not to be stoned because she 
prayed not to God ; Psal. xviii. 4, " Da- 
vid's enemies cried, and there vras none to 
save, even to the Lord, and he heard not." 
2. Though it were the prophet's meaning, 
" they cried to the Lord," yet it is not the 
crying of a people humbledi and, in faith, 
speaking to God in their troubles ; Zech. yii. 
13, " Thej cried, and I would not hear ;" 
therefore royalists must make ciying to God 
out of the bitterness of affliction, without 
humiliation and faith, and such prayers of 
sinners as God heareth not, (Psal. xviii. 41 ; 
John *ix, 31 ; Isa. xvii^ 12,) to be the only 
remedy of a people oppressed by a tyran- 
nous King. Kow, it IS certain God pre- 
scribeth no unlawful means to an oppressed 
people under their affliction ; therefore it is 
clear here that God speaketh only of evils 
of punishment, such as is to cry m trouble 



1 Dr Ferae, part 8^ sect. 2, p. 10. 

^ Learned antbors teach that Gkxi's law, (Dent. 
xr]i.) and the {3Qt{^Q a manner of the king, (1 
Sam. yiii. 9,) are opposite one to another, so Ger- 
som. in trinprino. sac. adn. lat. par. 4, Alp. 06, lit. 
I. cons. 8, Bnehan. de jnre r^gni apud Soot. Chaa- 
son. cat. glo. mnndi cons, 24, n. 16^, cons. 35. Tho- 
lo88. 1. 9, e. 1. Rossen. de polus. Rep. c. 2, n. 10. 
Magdebnrg. in trac. de off. ma. 



and not be heard of God, and that he pre- 
scribeth here no duty at all, nor any re- 
medjTb 3. All protestant divines say, Ex 
partictdari non valet ctrawnentum nega^ 
«itie, — ^** From one particular place, a nega- 
tive argument is not good." This remedy 
is not written in this j»rticular place, there- 
fore it is not written at all in other places 
of Scripture; so 1 Tim. i. 19, the end of 
excommunication is, that the party excom- 
municated may learn not to blaspheme; 
therefore the end is not also that the church 
be not infected. It followeth not. The 
contrary is clear (1 Cor. v. 6). Dr Feme, 
and other royalists, teach us that we may 
supplicate and make prayers to a tyrannous 
king. We may fly from a tyrannous king ; 
but neither BUpplicating the king, nor flying 
from his fiiry, snail be law^l means left by 
this argument ; because these means are no 
more in this text (where royalists say the 
Spirit of Grod speaiketh of purpose of the 
means to be used against tyranny) than vio- 
lent resistance is in this text. 

Barclay, Feme, Grotius, Amisseus, the P. 
Prelate following them, saith, ** An ill king 
is a punishment of Grod for the sins of the 
pe^Ie, and there b no remedy but patient 
sufroring." 

Am. — Truljr it is a silly argument. The 
Assyrians commg against the people of Grod 
for their sins, is a punishment of Grod. (In. 
X. 5 ; xii. 13.) But doth it foUow that it is 
unlawM for Israel to fight and resist ttie 
Assyrians, and that they had warrant to do 
no other thing but lay down arms and pray 
to Grod, and fight none at all ? Is mere 
no lawful resisting of ills of punishment, but 
mere prayers and patience ? The Amale- 
kites came out against Israel for ^eir sins, 
Sennacherib against Hezekiah for the sins of 
the people ; Asa's enemies foadbt againsthim 
for his sins, and the people's sms. Shall Mo- 
ses and the people, Hezekiah and Asa, do 
then nothing but pray and suffer? Is it unlaw- 
fiil with the swora to resist them ? I believe 
not. Famine is oftm a punishment of Grod in 
a hmd, (Amos iv. 7, 8,) is it therefore in &- 
mine unlawful to tall the earth, and seek 
bread by our industry, and are we to do no- 
thing but to pray for daily bread ? It is a 
vain argument. 

Observe, therefore, the wickedness of Bar- 
clay, (contra monarch. 1. 2, p. 56,) for he 
would prove, that ** a power of doing ill, and 
that without any punishment to be inflicted 
by man, is from God ; because our laws pu- 



76 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



nish not perjury, but leateth it to be punish- 
ed of God (Z. 2, 1, de Ileb, cred^ CujaciiLSj L 
2, obs, c,19); and the husband in the law of 
Moses had power to give a bill of divorce to 
his wife and send her away, and the husband 
was not to be punished. And also stews and 
work-'houses for harlots, and to take usury, 
are tolerated in many Christian common* 
wealths, and yet these are all sorts of mur- 
ders by the confession of heathen ; therefore, 
(saith Barclay,) God may give a powej* of 
tyrannous acts to kings, so as they shall be 
under no punishment to be inflicted by men. 
Ans^ — All this is an argument from fact. 
1. A wicked magistracy may permit perjury 
and lymg m the commonwealth, and that 
without punishment; and some Christian 
commonwealths, he meaneth his own syna- 
gogue of Rome, spiritual Sodom, a cage of 
unclean birds, suffereth harlots by law, and 
the whores pay so many thousands yearly to 
the Pope, and are free of all punishment by 
law, to eschew homicides, adulteries of Ko- 
mish priests, an^ other greater sins ; there- 
fore God hath given power to a king to play 
the tyrant without any fear of punishment to" 
be inflicted by man. But if this be a good 
argument, the magistrate to whom God hath 
committed the sword to take vengeance on 
evil doers, (E-om. xiii. 3—6,) such as are per- 
jured persons, professed whores and harlots, 
nath a lawful power from God to connive at 
sins and gross scandals in the commonwealth, 
as they dream that the king hath power giv- 
en from God to exercise afi acts of tyranny 
without any resistance* But, 1. This was a 
grievous sin in Eli, that he being a father and 
a judge, punished not his sons for their un- 
cleanness, and his house, in God's heavy dis- 
pleasure, was cut of£ from the priesthood 
therefor. Then God hath given no such 
power to the judge. 2. The contrary duty 
is lying on the judge, to execute judgment 
for the oppressed, (Job xxix. 12-^17 ; Jer. 
xxii* 15, 16,) and perverting of judgment, 
and conniving at the heinous sins of the wick- 
ed, is condemned, (Num. v. 31, 32 ; 1 Sam. 
XV. 23 ; 1 Kings xx. 42, 43 ; Isa. i- 17 ; x. 
1 ; V. 23,) and therefore Grod hath given no 
power to a judge to permit wicked men to 
commit grievous crimes, without any punish- 
ment. As for the law of divorce, it was in- 
deed a permissive law, whereby thei husband 
might give the wife a bill of divorce, and be 
free of punishment before men, but not free 
of sin and guiltiness before God, for it was 
contrary to God's institution of marriage at 



the beginning, as Christ saith ; and the pro- 
phet saith, (Mai* 2,) that the Lord hateth 
putting away ; but that Grod hath given any 
such permissive power to the king, that he 
may do what he pleasetl), and cannot be re- 
sisted, this is in question. 3. The law spoken 
of in the text is by royalists called, not a con- 
suetude of tyranny, but the divine law of Grod, 
whereby the king is formally and ess^itially 
distinguished from the judge in Israel ; now 
if so, a power to sin and a power to commit 
acts of tyranny, yea, and a power in the 
king's sergeants and bloody emisBaries to 
waste and destroy the people of Grod, must 
be a lawflil power given oi God ; for It law- 
ful power it must be if it cometh from Grod, 
whether it be from the king in his own per- 
son, or from his servants at his command- 
ment, and by either put forth in acts, as the 
power of a bill of divorce was a power from 
God, exempting either the husband from 
punishment before men, or freeing the ser- 
vant, who at the husband's command should 
write it and put it in the hands of the wo- 
man. I cannot believe that God hath given 
a power, and that by law, to one man to com- 
mand twenty thousand cut-throats to kill and 
destroy all the children of God, and that he 
h^th commanded his children to give their 
necks and heads to Babel's sons without re- 
sistance. This I am sure is another matter 
than a law for a bill of divorce to one woman 
married by free election of a changeable and 
unconstant man. But sure I am, God gave 
no permissive law from heaven like the law 
of divorce, for the hardness of the heart, not 
of the Jews only, but also of the whole Chris- 
tian and heathen kingdoms under a monarch, 
that one eniperor may, by such a law of God 
as the law of divorce. Kill) by bloody cut- 
throats, such as the Irish rebels are, aU the 
nations that call on Grod's name, men, wo- 
men, and sucking infants. And if rrovi- 
dence impede the catholic issue, and dry up 
the seas of blood, it is good ; but Grod hath 
given a law, such as the kw of divorce, to 
the king, whereby he, and all his, may, with- 
out resistance, by a legal power given of 
God, who giveth kings to be fathers, nurses, 
protectors, guides, yea the breath of nostrils 
of his church, as special mercies and blessings 
to his people, he may, I say, by a law of 
Grod, as it IS 1 Sam. viii. 9, 11, cut off na- 
tions, as that lion of the world, Nebuchad- 
nezzar, did. So royalists teach us. 

Barclay saith (1. 2. contra Monarch, p. 
69) — The Lord spake to Samuel the law of 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



77 



the king, and wrote it in a book, and laid it 
up before the Lord* But what law ? That 
same law which he proposed to the people 
when they first sought a king. But that was 
the law contemning precepts, rather for the 
people's obeying uian for the king's com- 
manding ; for the people was to be instruc- 
ted with those precepts, not the king. Those 
things that concerned the king's duty (Deut. 
xvii.) Moses commanded to he put into the 
ark ; but so if Samuel had commanded the 
king that wbici Moses (Deut. xvii.) com- 
manded, he had done no new thing, but had 
done again what was onoe done actum egis* 
set; but there was nothing before command* 
ed the people concerning their obedience and 

! patience under evil princes. Joseph. Antiq. 
L 6, c. 5,) wrote, t^ fuxxiwrM »«r« the evils 
that were to befall them. 

Ans, 1. — It was not that same law, for 
though this law was written to the people, 
yet it was the law of the king ; and, I pray 
you, did Samuel write in a book all the rules 
of tyranny, and teach Saul, and all the kings 
after him, (for this book was put in the a^ 
of the covenant, where also was the book 
of the law) how to play the tyrant ? And 
what instruction was it to king or people to 
write to them a book of the i^i^ed ways of a 
king, which nature teacheth without a doctor? 
Sanctius saith on the place, These things 
which, by men's fraud and to the hurt of 
the public, may be corrupted, were kept in 
the tabernacle, and the book of the law was 
kept in the ark. Cornelius a Lapide saith, 
It was the law common to king and people, 
which was commonly kept witli the book of 
the law in the ark of the covenant. Lyra 
contradicteth Barclay. He exponeth Le- 
gem^ legem regni non secundum, usurpa- 
tionem siipra positamy sed secundum ordi- 
nationem Dei positam, (Deut. xvii.) Theo- 
datius excellently exponeth it, The fimda- 
meivtal laws of the kingdom, inspired by God 
to temper monarchy with a liberty befitting 
God's people, and with equity toward a na- 
tion — to withJstand the abuse of an absolute 
power. 2. Can any believe Samuel would 
have written a law of tyranny, and put that 
book in the ark of the covenant before the 
Lord, to be kept to the posterity, seeing he 
was to teach both king and people the good 
and the right way, 1 Sam. xii. 23 — 25. 3. 
Where is the law of the kingdom called a 
law of punishing innocent people ? 4. To 
write the duty of the king in a book, and 
apply it to the king, is no more superfluous 



than to teach the people the good and the 
right way out of the law, and apply general 
laws to particular persons. 6. There is no- 
thing in the law (1 Sam. viii. 9 — 12) of the 
people's patience, but rather of their impa- 
tient crying out, God not hearing nor help- 
ing ; and nothing of that in this book, for any 
thmg that we know, and Josephus Bpeaketh 
of the law in 1 Sam. viii., not of this law, 1 
Sam. xii. 



QUESTION XIX. 

WHETHER OR NO THE KING BE IN DIGNITY 
AND POWER ABOVE THE PEOPLE. 

In this grave question, divers considera* 
tions are to be pondered. 1. There is ^ 
dignity material m the people scattered — 
they being many representations of God and 
his image, which is in the king also, and for- 
mally more as king, he being endued with 
formal magistratical and pubhc royal autho- 
rity* In the former regard, this or that 
man is inferior to the xing, because the 
king hath that same remainder of the image 
of God that any private man hath, and 
something more — ^he hath a politic resem- 
blance ofthe King c£ heavens, being a little 
god, and so is above any one man. 

2.' All these of the people taken collec- 
tively having more of God, as being repre- 
sentations, are, according to this material 
dignity, more excellent than the king, be- 
cause many are more excellent than one ; 
and the king, according to the magistratical 
and royal authority he hath, is more excel- 
lent than they are, because he partaketh 
formally of royalty, which they have not for- 
mally. 

3. A mean or medium, as it is such, is 
less than the end, though the thing materi- 
ally that is a mean may be more excellent. 
Every mean, as a mean, under that redup- 
lication, hath all its goodness and excellency 
in relation to the end ; yet an angel that is 
a mean (or medium) and a ministering spi- 
rit, ordained of God for an heir of life eter- 
nal, (Heb. i. 13, J considered materially, is 
more excellent tnan a man. (Psal. viii. 6; 
Heb. ii. 6—8.) 

4. A king and leader, in a military consi- 
deration, and as a governor and conserver of 
the whole army, is more worth than ten 
thousand of the people, 2 Sam. xviii. 13. 



■mW 



78 



LEX, REX ; 0R» 



--»- ...^ 



6. But sithply and absolutely the people 
is above, and moi*e excellent, than the king, 
and the king m dignity inferior to the peo- 
ple; and thAt updn these redsons :-^ 

Arg. l.-^Bedal3se he is the mean ordain- 
ed ht the peoj^le, as iot the end) that he 
may save theth, (2 Sam. xix. 9 ;) a public 
shepherd to feed them, (Psal. bcxViii. 70 — 
73 \) the captain and leader of the Lord's 
inheritance to defend them, (1 Sam. x. 1 ;) 
the minister of God for their good. (B<mi. 
xiii. 4.) 

Arq. 2. — The pilot is less than the whole 
p««e4e«; thb general 1«» ttum the whole 
army ; the tutor less than all the children ; 
the phVsiclan less than all the living men 
whose health he careth for ; the master or 
teacher less than all the scholars, because 
the pa)^ is less than the whole ; the king is 
but a part and member (though I grant a 
very eminent and noble member) of the 
kingdom. 

Arg, 3. — A Christian people, especially, 
is the portion of the Lord's inheritance, 
(Deut. xxxii. 9) the sheep of his pasture — 
his redeemed one^or wW od gave his 
blood, Acts xXi. 284 And the kilhng of a 
man is te violate the image of God, (Gren. 
ix. 6,) and therefore the cbath and destruc- 
tion of a churchy and of thousand thousands 
of men, is ia sadder and a more heavy mat- 
ter than the death of a king^ who is but one 



maxiv 



Atg, 4i,>-^A king as a ^^> 01* because a 
king, is not the inheritance of God, nor the 
chosen and called of Grod^ nor the dbeep or 
flock of the Lord's pasture, no)^ the redeem- 
ed of Christ) for those excellencies agree not 
te kings becatise they we kings; for then all 
kings uiotdd be ^dued with those excellen- 
cies, and God should be an acceptor of per- 
sons, if he put those excellencies of grace 
upon men for extetmal respects of highness 
and kingly power^ and worldly glory and 
splendour ; for many living images and re- 
presentations of Grod, as he is hdy, or more 
excellent than a politic representation of 
Grod's greatness and majesty, such ad the 
king is \ because that which is the fruit of a 
love of God, which cometh nearer te Gh)d's 
most special love, is more excellent than that 
which Is farther remote from his special love* 
Now, though royalty be a beam of the ma^ 
jesty of tiie greatness of the King of kings 
and Lord of lords, yet is it such a fruit and 
beam of Grod^s greatness^ as may consist with 
the eternal reprobation of the party loved ; 



so now GM's love, from whence he com- 
municateth his image representing his own 
holinesSj Cometh nearer te his most special 
love of election of men te glory. 

Arg. 6.-«-If GrOd give kincs to be a ran- 
som for his churchy and if he uay great kings 
for their sake, as Pharaoh^ king of Egypt, 
(Isa. xliii. 9,) and Sihon king ^ the KtAo* 
rites, and Og king ofBashan \ (Psal. cxxxvi. 
18 — ^20 ;) ifne plead with princes and kings 
for destroying his people ; (Isa* iii. I2'^l4;) 
if he make Babylon and her king a thresh- 
ing-floor j for the ** violence done to the in- 
habitants of Zion," (Jer. li. 33-^5,) then 
his people, as his people, must be so much 
dearer and more precious in the Lord's eyes 
than kings, because they are kings ; by how 
nmch more his justice is active to destroy 
the one, and his mercy to save tiie other. 
Neither is the argument taken off by say- 
ing the king must, in this question, be com- 
pared with his owli people ^ not a foreign 
king, with other foreign people, over whom 
he doth not reign, for the argument proveth 
that the people of GNmI are of mere worth 
than kings as kings ; and Nebuchadnezzar 
and Pharaoh) for the time, were kings to 
the people of God, and foreign kings are no 
less essentially kings, than kmgs native are. 

Ara, 6.— Those who are given of Grod as 
giAs ror the preservation of tne people, to be 
nurse-fathers to them, those must be of less 
worth before Gk>d) than those to whom they 
are given^ mnoe the gift, as the gift^ is less 
than the party on whom the gift is be- 
stowed* But the king is a gift for the good 
and preservation of we people, as is clear, 
L». 1. 26 ; and from this, that Grod gave his 
people a king In his wrath^ we may con- 
duae, that a king of himself, except Grod be 
angry with his people, must be a gift. 

Arg, 7. — That which is eternal, and can* 
not politically die, yea, which must continue 
as tne days of heaven, because of Gkni's 
promise, is more excellent than that which 
IS both accidental^ temporary^ and mortal. 
But the people are both eternal as people, 
because (Eccles. i. 4) '' one generation pass- 
eth awayj and another generation cometh," 
and as a people in covenant with God, (Jer. 
xxxiii 40, 41,) in respect that a people and 
church) though mortal in the individuals, 
yet the churdi) remaining the church, can- 
not die; but the king, as king, may and 
doth die. It is truO) where a ungdom go- 
eth by slicbession) the politicians say, tne 
man who is king dieth^ but the king never 






THE LAW AND THE PRINCE, 



79 



diethy because some other, either by birth or 
free election, succeedeth in his room. But 
I answer,-^!. People, bj a sort of necessity 
of nature, succeedeth to people, generation 
to generation^ except Grod's judgment, con- 
trary to nature, intervene to ma£e Babylon 
no people, and a land that shall never be in- 
habited (whi(^ I both believe and hope for, 
according jto God's word of prophesy). But 
a king, by a sort of contingency, succeedeth 
to kings; for nature doth not ascertain us 
there must be kings to the world's end, be- 
cause the essence of governors is kept safe 
in aristocracy and democracy, though there 
were no kings ; and that kings shomd neces- 
sarily have be^n in the worii, if man had 
never &llen in sin, I am not, by any cogent 
argument, induced to believe, I conceive 
there should have be^n no government but 
those of &thers isnd children, husband and 
wife, and (which is improperly government) 
some more gifted with supervenient addi- 
tions to nature, as gifls ana ez^Uencies of 
engines. Now on this point Althusius 
(pdit. c. 38. n. 114) saithy the king, in re- 
spect of office, is worthier than the people, 
(but this is but an accidental respect,) but 
as the king is a man^ he is inferior to the 
peo^e. 

Arg. 8,' — ^He who^ by ofiSce, is obliged to 
expend hixoself^ and to give lus life lor the 
sa&tf x>{ the peopki, must be inferior to the 
people^ So tSaist saith, ihe life is more 
than raiment or food, because both these 
give themselves to corruption for man's life ; 
80 the beasts, are infenor to man, because 
they die for our life, that ibffj may sustain 
our life. And Caiaphas prophesied right, 
that it was bettor that one man die than the 
whole nation perifiih (John :^, 50) ; and in 
nature, elements, against their p^cular in- 
dination, defraud ^pmselves of their private 
and particular endi^ that the commonwealth 
of nature may stand; as heavy elements 
ascend, light aespend, lest nature should pe- 
rish by a yacuity. And th9 good Shepherd 
(John z;.) giveth his life for his sheep ; so 
both Saul and David were made kings to 
fight the lord's battles, and to expose their 
lives to hazaid for the safi^ty of tne church 
and people of God. jBut the king, by office, 
is obliged to expand his life for the safety of 
the people of Uod ; h^ is obliged to fight the 
Lord's battles for them; to go betwixt the 
flock and death, as Paul was willing to be 
^nt for the church. It may be objected, 
Jesus Christ gave himself a ransom for his 



church, and his life for the life of the world, 
and was a gift ^ven to the world, (John iii. 
16 ; iv, 10|) and he was a mean to save us ; 
and BO, what arguments we have before pror 
duced to prove that the king must be mfe« 
rior to the people, because he is a ransom, 
a mean, a ^ift, are not conclusive, I answer, 
— 1. Consider a moan reduplicatively, and 
formaliter^ as a mean ; and secondly, as a 
mean materially, that is, the thing which is 
a mean, 2. Gonsidar that which is only a 
mean, and ransom, and gift, and no more ; 
and that which, beside that it is a mean, is 
of a higher nature also. So Christ formally 
as a mean, ^ving his temporal life for a 
time, accordmg to the flesh, for the eter» 
nal life of all the catholic church, to be 

glorified eterhally — (not his blessed god- 
ead and glory, which, as God, he had with 
the Father team eternity) — ^in that respect 
Christ hath the relation of a servant, ran^ 
som, gift, and some inferiority in compari^ 
son otthe churdi of Grod ; and his Father's 
glory, as a mean, is inferior to the end, but 
Christ materially, in conoreto, idhrist is 
is not only a mean to save his church, but, 
as God (in which consideration he waa the 
immortal Lord of life) he was more than 
a mean, — even the Author, Efficient and 
Creator of heaven and earth ; and so there 
is no ground to say that he is inferior to 
the church, but the absolute head, king,^*^ 
the chief of ten thousand; — more in ex-> 
cellency and worth than ten thousand mil-^ 
lions of possible worlds of men and angels. 
But such a consideration cannot befikU any 
mortal king; because, consider the king man 
terially as a mortal man, he must be infe« 
rior to the whole church, for he is but one, 
and so of l^ss worth than the whole church ; 
as the tJmmb, though the strongest of the 
fingers, yet it is inferior to the hand, and 
fiir moro to the whole body, as any psurt is 
inferior to the whole. Consider the king 
reduplicative and formally as king, and by 
the official relation he hath^ he is no more 
then but a royal servant, an official mean 
tending* ex qfim^ to this end, to preserve 
the people, to rule and govern them $ and a 
gift of God, siven by vurtue of his office, to 
rule liio peopi? of God, and ao any way in- 
ferior to the peppl^* 

Ar^f 9.-«-Those who az)e before the peo- 
ple, and may be a people without a king, must 
be of more worth than that which is poster 
rior and icannot be a king without them. 
For thus, God's self-sufficiency is proved, in 



80 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



that he mi^ht be, and eternally iiras, bleeBed 
for ever, without his creature ; but his crea- 
ture cannot subsist in being without him. 
Now, the people were a people many years 
before there was a government, (save do- 
mestic,) and are a people where there is no 
king, but only an aristocracy or a democra* 
cy ; but the king can be no king without a 
people. It is vam that some say, the king 
and kingdoms are relatives, and not one is 
before another, for it is true in the naked 
relation ; so are father and son, master and 
servant, Relata simul natura ; but sure 
there is a priority of worth and indepen- 
dency, for ail that, in the father above the 
son, and in the master above the servant, 
and so in the people above the king ; take 
away the people, and Dionysius is but a poor 
schoolmaster. 

Arg. lO.-^—The people in power Are su- 
perior to the king, because every efficient and 
constituent cause is more excellent than the 
effect. Every mean is inferior in power to 
the end ; (Sa Jun. Brutus^ g? 31. Bucher 
^. 1. c 16. Author Lib. de ofie, Magistr, 
q» 6. Hencenius disp, 2, n. 6. Joan Rof- 
^ensis Epist, de potest, pap, 1, 2, c. 6. jSpa- 
lato deJRepu^ JEoclesiast. h 6, c. 2, n. 3;J 
but the people is the efficient and constitu- 
ent cause, the king is the effbot ; the people 
is the end ; both intended 6f Grod to save 
the people, to be a healer and a j^ysician to 
them (Isau iii. 7) ;• and the people appoint 
and create the king out of their indigence, 
to preserve themselves from mutual vio- 
lence. Many things are objected against 
this. That the efficient and constituent 
cause is Grod, and the people are only the 
instrumental cause; and Spalato saith, that 
the people doth indirectly only give kingly 
power, because God, at their act of election, 
ordinarily giveth it. 

Ans. — 1. The Scripture saith plainly, aa 
we heard before, the people made kings ; 
and if they do, as other second causes pro- 
duce their effects, it is all one that God, as 
the principal cause, maketibi kings, else we 
should npt argue from the cause to the ef- 
fect amongst the creatures. 2. God, by 
that same action that the people createth a 
king, doth also, by them, as by his instru- 
ments, create a king; and that God doth 
not immediately, at the naked presence of 
the act of popular election, confer royal dig- 
nity on the man, without any action of the 
people, as they say, by the church's act of 
conterriiig orders, God doth immediately. 



without any act of the church, in^se from 
heaven supernatural liabilities on the man, 
without any active influence of the church, 
is evident by this. 1. The royal power to 
make laws with the king, unid so a power 
eminent in their states representative to go- 
vern themselves, is in the people ; for if tne 
most high acts of royality be in them, why 
not the power also? And so, what need 
to fetch a royal power from heaven to be 
immediately infused in him, seeing the peo- 
ple hath such a power in themselves at 
hand ? 2. The people can, and doth, limit 
and bind royal power in elected kings, 
therefore they have in them royal power 
to give to the king. Those who limit power, 
can take away so many degrees of royal 
power; and those who can take away p6wer, 
can give power ; and it is inconceiveable to 
say that people can put restraint upon a 
power immec^tely coming from Gfoa.; If 
Christ immediately infused an apostoHc spi- 
rit into Paul, mortal men cannot tAke from 
him any degrees of that infrised spirit; if 
Christ infuse a spirit of nine- degrees, the 
church cannot limit it to six' degrees only. 
But royalists consent that the people may 
choose a king upon such conditions to reign, 
as he hath royal power of ten degrees, 
whereas his ancestor had by birth a power 
of fourteen degrees. 8, It is not intelligi- 
ble that the Holy Ghost should give com- 
mandment unto the people to make this 
man king, (Deut. xvii. 16, 16,) and forbid 
them to make that man king, if the peo- 
ple had no active influence in making a 
king at all; but G^, solely and immedi- 
atefy from heaven, did infuse royalty in the 
king without any action of the people, save 
a naked consent only ; and that after God 
had made the king, they should approve 
only with an after-act of. naked approbation, 
4. If the people by other governors, as by 
heads of families and other choice men, go- 
vern themselves and produce these same for- 
mal effects of peace, justice, religion, on 
themselves, which the king doth produce, 
then is there a power of the same kin^, and 
as excellent as the royal power, in the peo- 
ple ; and there is no reason but this power 
should be held to come immediately from 
Grod, as the royal power; for it is every way 
of the same nature and kind, as I shall 
prove. Kings and judges differ not in na- 
ture and specie, but it is experienced that 
people do, by aristocratical guides, govern 
themselves, &c. ; so then, it God imme- 



: ^ »i ii , , — :*- 



THS LAW AND THB BBDTCB, 



61 



» ■ — n 1 ^1. " .i^ i - ' juw. - ■ . i 



p * 



.".'J /»■."' »» 



'. _T".f .■: 



diat0l7 infuse rojalt j when the people ohoock 
eth a )dng, without an^ m^on of the people, 
than mu^ God iinmediately infuse a b^un 
of goyeminff on a provo^ apd bailie, when 
tbe people dioose miob, apd that without any 
action 0? the pepple, because all powers are, 
in abs^raeU>i trom God, CRom. ziii. 2.) And 
God as immedij»tely maketh inferior judges 
as superior, (ProT^ yiii, 16 ;) and all promo^ 
tion (ey0n to be a proyost or nmyor) oom? 
eth fron^ Qod only, a^ to be a Jung ; exoept 
FQyaJIsts 81^, all proinoticm oon^^th from the 
east and fr^ the west, and not ^m Grod, 
6;(opp4i promotion io the roysd throne ; the 
contrary whereof is sai4, Psal, Izxy. 6, 7 ; 
1 Sf|ip» iif 7* 3- ^ot only kings, but all 
judges are godsi (Psal. Ixyyii. 1, 2,) and 
th^refore all must be tb^ same wny created 
^4 moulded of God, except by Scripture 
royalist can show us a aifference. An 
English prelate^ ffiy^th reasons why peor 
ple, who are said to make kings as effi* 
cients 4ad authors, cannot unmake them : 
the on9 is, becaiise Qod, as phief and sole 
8^preme moderator, maketh kings ; ^but I 
m, Christ, as the ^ef moderator and head 
of th^ church, dotb imm^&lely confer abi- 
lities qpon a man to be a preacher; and 
though, by indus^, tha man acquire abi« 
lities, yet in regfffd the diurch doth not so 
much as {n^trumentally confer those abir 
Uties^ they may be said to come from God 
imiqediately, in relation to the church who 
Q>l}etli the man to the ministry, Yea, 
royalists, as our exconmuinic^ted Prelate 
learned from Spalato, s^, that God, at the 
naked presence o£ the church's call, doth 
immediately infuse that from heayen by 
which the man is now in holy orders and a 
pastor, whereas he was not so before ; and 
yet prelates cannot deny but they can un^ 
make ministers, and haye practised this in 
their ^nhallpwed oo)irta; and, therefore, 
though Qod inunediately, without any aoy 
tioQ of the people, make kings, this is a 
weak re^^u to p}X>?e they cannot unmake 
th^m? As for their indeUible character, 
that prelates cai^iot take from a minister ; 
it is nothing, if the church may unmake a 
minister, though bis character go tp prison 
with \am^ We seek nq more hat to annul 
thQ reason, G[qd imm0diately maketji kinss 
and pasters, therefore no power on eartn 
can unmake them. This consequence is as 
weak as ^yater^ 2, The o1;her cause i^, 

1 Joan. BoffSeiii. de potest, pap. 1. 8, c. 6. 



M^" 



because God hath erected no tribunal 
on earth higher than the king's tribunal, 
therefore no power on earth can unmake 
a king. The antecedent and oonsequence 
is bom denied, and is a begging of the 
question; for the tribunal that made the 
king is aboye the king. Thoush there be 
no tribunal formally regal and kmgly aboye 
the king, yet is there a tribuiml yirtual 
eminentfy aboye him in the case of tyran- 
ny ; for the states and princes haye a tribu* 
pal aboye him. 

Aasert.-r-To this the constituent cause is 
of more power and dignity than the effect, 
and so the people are aboye the king. The P. 
Prelate borrowed an answer from Amisffius, 
and Barclay, and other royalists, and saith, 
Jf we knew anything in law, or were ruled 
hj reason, ** eyery constituent, (saith Ar- 
msseus^ and Barclay, more accurately than 
the P. Prelate had a head to transcribe their 
words,) where the constituent hath resigned' 
all his power in the hand of the prince wnom 
be constitutes, is of more worth and power 
than he in whose hand he resigns the power : 
so the proposition is fiilse. The seryant 
who hath constituted his master lord of his 
Uberty, is not more worthy than his master 
whom he hath made his lord, and to whom 
he hath given himself as a slaye, (for afler he 
hath resigned his liberty he cannot repent, 
he must keep coyenant though to his hurt,) 
y^ such a senrant is not omy not aboye his 
master, but he cannot moye his foot with- 
out his master." *' This goyemor of Britain 
(saith AmissBus) being despised by king 
Philip, resigned himseff as yassaj to king 
Edward of lElngland ; but did not for that 
make himself superior to king Edward. In- 
deed, he who constituteth another under him 
as a legate is superior; but the people do con- 
stitute a king aboye themselyes, hot a kiqg 
under themselyes; and, therefore, the people 
are not by this made the king's superior, but 
his inferior." 

Ans. l.-^It is &lse that the people doth, 
or can by the law of nature, resign their 
wft>le liberty in the hand d a kmg. 1. 
They cannot reagn to others that which 
they haye not in themselyes. Nemo potest 
dare quod nofi hahet; but the people hath 
not an absolute power in themselyes to de- 
stroy themselyes, or to exercise thos^ tyraur 
nous acts ppoken of, 1 Sam. yiii^ 11—15, 
&c. ; for neither God nor nature's law hath 

1 AmiflfBas de aathorit. princip. c. \. n. X, 

N 



■••■w 



WW"*" 



82 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



given any such pow^r. 2, He who consti- 
tuteth himself a slave is supposed to be com- 
pelled to that unnatural act of alienation of 
that liberty which he hath from his Maker 
from the womb, by violence, constraint, or 
extreme necessity, and so is inferior to all 
free men ; but the people doth not make 
themselves slaves when they constitute a 
king over themselves ; because Grod, giving 
to a people a king, the best and most excel- 
lent governor on earth, giveth a blessing 
and special favour, (Isa. i. 26 ; Hos. i. 11 ; 
Isa. iii. 6, 7 ; ■ Psal. Ixxix. 70—72 ;) but to 
lay upon his people the state of slavery, in 
which they renounce their whole liberty, 
is a curse of God. (Gen. ix, 25 ; xxvii. 
29; Deut. xxviii. 32, 36.) But the peo- 
ple, having their liberty to make any often, 
or twenty, their king, and to advance one 
from a private state to an honourable throne, 
whereas it was in their liberty to advance 
another, and to give him royal power of ten 
degrees, whereas they might give him power 
of twelve degrees, ot eight, or six, must be 
in excellency and worth above the man 
whom they consitute king, and invest with 
such honour ; as honour in the fountain, and 
honos participans et originanSj must be 
more excellent and pure than the derived 
honour in the king, which is honos partici- 
patus et originatus. If the servant give 
his Hberty to his master, therefore he nad 
that liberty in him, and in that act, liberty 
must be in a more excellent way in the ser- 
vant, as in the fountain, than it is in the 
master ; and so this hberty must be purer 
in the people than in the King ; and there- 
fore, in that both the servant is above the 
master, and the people worthier than the 
king. And when the people give themselves 
conditionally and covenant-wise to the king, 
as to a public servant, and patron, and tu- 
tor, — as the governor of BritaiD, out of his 
humour, gave nimself to king Edward — ^there 
\& even here a note of superiority, Every 
giver of a benefit, as a giver, is superior to 
him to whom the gift is given; though after 
tjie servant hath given away his S. of fi- 
berty, by which he was superior, he cannot 
be a superior, because by his gift he hath 
made himself inferior. The people consti- 
tuteth a king above themselves, I distin- 
guish supra se, above themselves ; according 
to the fountam-power of royalty, — ^that is 
false; for the fountain-power remaineth 
most eminently in the people, 1. Because 
they give it to the king, ad modum redpi^ 



entU^ and with limitations; therefore it is 
unlimited in the people, and bounded and 
limited in the king, and so less in the king 
than in the people. 2. If the king turn 
distracted, and an ill spirit from the Lord 
come upon Saul, so as reason be taken &om 
a Nebuchadnezzar, it is certain the people 
may put curators and tutors over him who 
hath the royal power. 3. If the king be 
absent and taken captive, the people may 
give the royal power to me, or to some few, 
to exercise it as custodes regni. And, 4. 
If he die, and the crown go by election, 
they may create another, with more or less 
power. All which e?inceth, that they never 
constituted over themselves a king, in re- 
gard of fountain-power; for if they give 
away the fountain, as a slave selleth his li- 
berty, they could not make use of it. In- 
deed they set a king above them, quoad 
poteHatem legum execuiivam, in re^urd of 
a power of executing laws and actual go- 
vernment for their good and safety ; but this 
proveth only that the king is above the peo- 
ple, umrk r), in somo rospoct. But the mos^ 
eminent and fountain-power of royalty re- 
maineth in the people as in an immortal 
spring, which they communicate by succes- 
sion to this or that mortal man, in the man- 
ner and measure that they think good. Ul- 
pian^ and Bartolus,* cited by our Prelate out 
of Barclaius, are only to be understood of 
the derived, secondary, and borrowed power 
of executing laws, and not of the fountain- 
power, whicn the people cannot give away, 
no more than they can give away their ra- 
tional nature ; for it is a power natural to 
conserve themselves, essentially adhering to 
every created being. For if the people give 
all their power away, what shall they re- 
serve to make a new king, if this man die? 
What if the royal line should cease ? there 
be no prophets immediately sent of €rod 
to make kmgs. What if he turn tyrant, 
and destroy nis subjects with the sword? 
The royalists sav, they may fly ; but, when 
they made him xing, they resigned all their 
power to him, even their power of flying ; 
for they bound themselves by an oath (say 
royalists) to all passive and lawful active 
obedience ; and, I suppose, to stand at his 
tribunal, if he summoned the three estates, 
upon treason, to come before him, is con- 



1 Ulpian 1. 1, ad Sc. Tnbil. Populus omne snain 
ixnperium et potestatem confert in Regem. 
9 Bartolai ad L hostos 2^, f. de capt. et host. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



83 



tamed in the oath, that royalists say, bind- 
eth all, and is contradictory to flying. 

Amisseus, a more learned jurist and di- 
vine than the P. Prelate, answereth the 
other maxim, '* The end is worthier than 
the mean leading to the end, because it is 
ordained for the end. These means, (saith 
he,j which refer their whole nature to the 
end, and have all their excellency from the 
end, and have excellency from no other 
thing but from the end, are less excellent 
than the end. That is true, such an end as 
medicine is for health." And Hugo Gro- 
tius, (1. 1, c. 3, n. 8,) " Those means which 
are only for the end, and for the good of the 
end, and are not for their own good, also 
are of less excellency, and infenor to the 
end; but so the assumption is false. But 
these means which, beside their relation to 
the end, have an excellency of nature in 
themselves, are not always inferior to the 
end. The disciple, as he is instituted, is 
inferior to the master ; but as he is the son 
of a prince, he is above the master. But 
hy this reason the shepherd should be infe- 
rior to brute beasts, to sheep ; and the mas- 
ter of the family is for the family, and re- 
ferreth ail that he hath for the entertaining 
of the family ; but it followeth not therefore 
the family is above him. The form is for 
the action, is therefore the action more ex- 
cellent than the form, and an accident than 
the subject or substance 1" And Grotius 
saith, " Every government is not for the 
good of another, but some for its own good, 
as the government of a master over the ser- 
vant, and the husband over the wife. 

Ans, — I take the answer thus: Those 
who are mere means, and only means re- 
ferred to the end, they are inferior to the 
end ; but the king, as king, hath all his of- 
ficial and relative goodness in the world, as 
relative to the end. All that you can ima- 
gine to be in a king, as a king, is all relative 
to the safety and ^^od of the people, (Epm. 
xiii. 4,) " He is a minister for thy good." 
He should not, as king, make himself, or 
his own gain and honour, his end. I grant, 
the king, as a man, shall die as another 
man, sum so he may secondarily intend his 
own good ; and what excellency he hath as 
a man, is the excellency of one mortal man, 
and cannot make him amount in dignity, 
and in the absolute consideration of the ex- 
cellency of a man, to be above many men 
and a whole kingdom ; for the more good 
things there be, the better they are, so the 



good things be multiplicable, as a hundred 
men are better than one ; otherwise, if the 
good be such as cannot be multiplied, as one 
God, the multiplication maketh them worse, 
as many gods are inferior to one God. Now 
if royaHste can show us any more in the king 
than these two, we shall be obliged to them; 
and in both he is inferior to the whole. 

The Prelate and his followers would have 
the maxim to lose credit; for then (say 
they) the shepherd should be inferior to the 
sheep; but m this the maxim ^eth in- 
deed, because the shepherd is a reasonable 
man, and the sheep brute beasts, and so 
must be more excellent than all the flocks 
of the world. Now, as he is a reasonable 
man, he is not a shepherd, nor in that rela- 
tion referred to the sheep and their preser- 
vation as a mean to the end ; but he is a 
shepherd by accident, for the unruliness of 
the creatures, for man's sin, withdrawing 
themselves from that natural dominion that 
man had over the creatures before the &11 ; 
in that relation of a mean to the end, and 
so by accident, is this official relation put on 
him ; and according to that official relation, 
and by accident, man is put to be a servant 
to the brutish creature, and a mean to so 
base an end. But aU this proveth him, 
through man's sin and by accident, to be 
under the official relation of a mean to baser 
creatures than himself, as to the end, but 
not a reasonable man. But the king, as 
kin?, is an official and roval mean to this 
end, that the people may lead a godly and 
peaceable life under him; and this official 
relation being an accident, is of less worth 
than the whole people, as they are to be 
governed. And I grant the king's son, in 
relation to blood and birth, is more excel- 
lent than his teachers ; but as he is taught, 
he is inferior to his teacher. But in ]^th 
considerations the king is inferior to the 
people ; or though he command the people, 
a^d so have an executive power of law above 
them, yet have they a fountain-power above 
him, because they made him king, and in 
God's intention he is given as king for their 
good, according to this, " Thou shalt feed 
my people Israel," and that, " I gave him 
for a leader of my people." 

The P. Prelate saitn : " The constituent 
cause is more excellent than the effect con- 
stituted, where the constitution is voluntary, 
and dependeth upon the free act of the will, 
as when the king maketh a viceroy or a 
judge, durante henepladto, during his free 



1 



will, but not when a man maketh oyer his 
right to Another ; for then there should be 
neither fidth nor truth in covenants^ if pe<>> 
pie might make oyer theur power to tneir 
king, and retract and take back what they 
have once giveni 

^tt«.-^Tiiis is a begging of the question ; 
for it is denied that the people can abso^ 
lutely make away their whole power to the 
king. It dependeth on the people that the j 
b^not destroyed^ They give to the king a 
politic power for their own safety^ and they 
keep a natural power to themskyee which 
they must oonserye, but cannot giye away ; 
and Uiey do not break l^eir ooyenant when 
they put in action that natural vcfwet to 
conserve themselves ; for though the pei^le 
should fflve away that power, and swear 
thou^ the king should kill them all, they 
shouH not resist^ nor defend their own lives, 
yet that being against the sixth command- 
ment, which ei^ineth natural sel^preserva- 
tion, it should not oblige the oonsGience, for 
it should be intrinaca% sinM; for it is all 
one to swear to non^self-preaervation as to 
swear to self-murder. 

'' If the. people^ (saith the Prelate^ beg* 
ging the answer irom Barclay,^) the oonsti» 
tuent, be more excellent than the effect, and 
so the people above the kii^^ because they 
constitute him king^ then the counties and 
corporati(»3S may make void all the commis>« 
sionssiven to the knights and burgesses of 
the House of Commons^ and send others in 
their place, and repeal their orders; there<> 
fore Buchanan saith, that orders and laws 
in parliament were but #^«C^xl^rii prepa>> 
ratory consultations, and had not the force 
ofalaw^ till the people give their consent 
and have their influence authoritative^ upwi 
the statutes and acts of parliament ; but the 
observator holdeth that the ledslative power 
is whole and entire in the paimment. But 
when the Scote were preferring petitions 
and declaraticms they put all power in the 
collective bodyi and kept theur distinct ta- 
bles. 

Ans. — 1. There is no consequence here! 
the counties and incorporations that send 
commissioners to parliament, may make 
void their commissions and annul their acts^ 
because they constitute them commissioners. 
If they be unjust acts, they may disobey 
them, and so disannul tiiem; but, it is pre- 

1 Sac Sane. Maji t\ ^, p> 1S9> stot'ea from Barcla.> 
Ub. 6, c. 12. 



sumed, Grod hath given no moral power to 
do ill, nor can the counties and corporations 
give any such power to evil, for they have 
not any such from Grod» If they be just acts, 
they are to obey them) and cannot retract 
commissions to make just orders. Illwi 
tantwn possUTttus quod jure poiswnuSf and 
therefore, as power to ffotem justiy is irre* 
vocably committed by the three estates who 
made the king to the king, so is that same 
power committed by the shires and corpo- 
rations to their oommissioDers, to decree* in 
parliament what is just and good irrevo- 
cably ; and to take atiy just power from the 
king which is his due^ is a great sin» But 
when he abuseth his power to the destruc- 
tion ci his subjects) it is lawful to throw a 
sword out of a madman's hand, though it be 
his own proper sword^ and though he have 
due right td it^ and a just power to use it 
for good; for all fiduciary power abused may 
be repealed. And if the knights and bur- 
cresses of the House of Commons abuse their 
fiduciary power to the destrtietion of these 
shires and corporations who piit the trust on 
them, the observator did nev6r say that 
parliamentary power was so entire and ir- 
revocably in them, as that the people may 
not resut them, annul their commissions 
and rescind their fu;ts, and denude them of 
fidudaiT power> even as the king may be 
denuded of that same power by the three 
estates $ for particular corporations are no 
more to be denuded of that fountain-pow^ 
of making commisffloners^ and of the sdtf- 
preservation^ than the thtee estates are. 2. 
The P. Prelate cometh not home to the 
mind of Buch^man^ who kheW the fimda^ 
mental laws of Sootiand, and the power of 

Parliaments; for his meaning was not to 
eny a ledslative power in the parUatoent ; 
but when ne calletn their paJfliamentary de- 
clarations A'^dCftfXfb/Mrtf, his meanin? is Ohljr 
that which lawyers and schoolmen both sayi 
Leges non promulgatds non Jiabent vim l&- 
gis actu completo obUaatoricBy'^^^^ Laws not 
promulgated do not oblige the subject while 
they be promulgated |" but he fulfils Bucha- 
nan^ when he saith, *' Parliamentary laws 
must have the authoritative influence o£ the 
people) before they can be formal laws, or 
any more than ^^«C««xi0^(ttr* or preparatory 
notions^ And it was no wonder wiien the 
king denied a parliament, and the supreme 
senate of the secret council was corrupted, 
that the people did then set up t&bleS) and 
extraordinary judicatunes of we three es^ 



)^ 



— ■ ' -ijr yT ' #V.v- ."«^P1 



i- .. - j { » - -. 



Hm.UWMN^«^M«H_^H 



THl LAW AND THB PRINCB. 



86 



iMMiMi^MtaCM^IM 



tates, seeiDg there eould not b^ any other 
goTemment for the time. 

Barclay^ answereth to this ! " The mean 
is inferknr to the end, it holdeth not ; the 
tutor and corator is for the minor^ as for 
the end, and given for his ffood ; but it fol- 
loweth not that, therefore, uie tator^ in the 
administration of the minor or pupil's inhe« 
ritance, is not superior to the min<»*," 

An», — It foUoweth well that the minor 
virtually, and in the intention of the law^ is 
more excellent than the tutor^ though the 
tutor can exercise more excellent acts than 
the pupil, by accident, for defect of age in 
the minor, yet he doth exercise those acts 
with sabordinatioQ to the minor^ and with 
correction, beeause he is to render an ac» 
count of his d(xng8 to the pupil oomine to 
age; so the tutor is only more exoeuent 
and superior in some respect, %m»k «^ but not 
amply, and so is the kmg in some respect 
above the people. 

The P. Prelate beggeth from the roya^ 
lists another 6f our arguments, Qaod ejltit 
tale, est magia toje,' — ** That which maxeth 
another such, is&r more such itself." If the 
people give royal power to the king, then 
mr more is ihe royal power in the people. 
By this (saith the Prelate) it shall follow, if 
the observatcMT give all his goods to me, to 
make me rich, the observator is more rich : 
if the people give most part of their goods to 
foment the rebellion, then the people are 
more rich, having given all they nave upon 
the public £uthv 

Ans. — 1. This greedy Prelate was made 
richer than ten poor pursuiVantSj by a bi- 
shopric; it will i^ow well,*— therefore, the 
bishopric is richer than the bishop, whose 
goods the curse of God blasteth. 8. It hold- 
eth in efficient cauBes*, so working in other 
things as the virtue of the effect remaineth 
in uke cause, even after the production of 
the effect. As the sun maketh all thinss 
light, the fire all things hot, therefore the 
sun is more light, the fire more hot; but 
where the canse doth alienate and tnake 
over, in a corporal manner^ that which it 
hath to another, as the hungry Prelate would 
have the observator^s goods, it holdeth not ; 
for the effect may exhaUst the virtue of ihe 
cause, but the people doUi, as the feuntiain) 
derive a stream of royalty to Saul^ and 

^ Bftrcla., lib. 4, cone. Monarcho., Ck ll> p. 27. 
I Sttcr. Sane. Mai., c. 13, p. 190, stolen oat of Ar- 
nisaens de jnre Majest. c. 3, n. 1, p. 34. 



make him king, and yet so as they keep 
fountain-power of makinsr kings in them- 
selves; yea, when Saul is dead to mtike Da- 
vid king at Hebron, and when he is dead to 
make Solomon king, and after him to make 
Behoboam king ; and, therefore, in the peo- 
ple there is more fountain-power of making 
Kings than in Darid, in Saul, in any long of 
the world. As for the Prelate's scoff about 
the people's giving of their goods to the good 
cause, I hope it shall) by the blessmg of God, 
enrich them more ; whereas prelates, by the 
rebellion in Ireland^ (to whioi they assent, 
when they council his Majesty to sell the 
blood of some hundred thousands of inno- 
cents killed in Ireland^) are broughti from 
thousands a year, to beg a morsel of bread. 

The P. Prelate (p. 131]) answereth that 
maxim^ Quodeftdt tdU^ id ipsum ttt nuh 
</w taUi — " l!hat which miULeth another 
such, it is itself more 8udi»" It is true, de 
prindpio farmaU efectivo, (as I leanied in 
the university)) of such an agent as is for- 
mally such in itself as is the effect produced. 
Next^ it is such as is effective ana produc- 
tive of itself j as when fire heateth oold water, 
so the quality must be f<»rmally inherent in 
the agent ; as wine maketh drunk, it Mow- 
eth not^ wine is more drunk^ because drunk- 
enness is not inherent in the wine, nor is it 
capable of drunkenness; and, therefore, Aris- 
totle qualifieth the maxim with this, Quod 
e^t tale est tnaaia tale, modo utrique tn- 
sit,"^*^ and it holdeth not in agents, who ope- 
rate by donation, if the ri^t of the king be 
transferred from the people to the king." 
The donation divesteth the people totally of 
it, except the king have it by way of loan^ 
which, to my thinung, never yet any spoke< 
Sovereignty never was, never can be^ in 
the oommunityh Sovereignty hath power of 
life and death, which none hath over him- 
self, and the community conceived without 
government, all as equal, endowed with 
nature's and native liberty, of that commu- 
nity no one can have power over the life of 
another. And so the aimiment may be 
turned home, if the people be not tales, 
such bv nature, (as nam formally royal 
power, ne should say,) they cannot give the 
king royal power ; abo, none hath power of 
life and death, either more eminently <v 
formally, the people, either smgly or collec- 
tively, have not power over their own life, 
much less over their neighbours'* 

Ans, — 1. The Prelate would make the 
maxim true of a formal cause, and this he 



learned in the Umvendty of St. Andrews. 
He wrongeth the umversitT, he rather learn- 
ed it while he kept the calves of Grail. The 
wall is white from whiteness; therefore, 
whiteness is more white by the Prelate's 
learning. Never such thing was taught in 
that learned university. 2. Prinoipium for- 
male efecHvum is as good logic as pnnot- 
pium effedivum mcUertalej formale, Jlnale. 
The Prelate is in his accuracy of logic now. 
He yet maketh the causality of the formal 
cause all one with the causaiity of the effi- 
cient ; but he is weak in his logic. 3. He 
confoundeth a cause equivocal and a cause 
univocal, and in that case the maxim hold- 
eth not. Nor is it necessary to make true 
the maxim, that the quali^ be inherent in 
the cause the same way ; for a city maketh 
a mayor, but to be a mayor is one way in the 
city, and another way in him who is created 
mayor. The Prelate's maxim would help 
him, if we reasoned thus : The people mak- 
eth the kinir, therefore the people is more a 
king, and more fomally a »>yereign than 
the king. But that is no more our argu- 
ment than the simile that Maxwell used, as 
near heart and mouth both. Wine makelii 
drunk the Prelate, therefore wine is more 
drunk. But we reason thus : The fountain- 
power of making six kings is in the people, 
therefore there is more fountain-power of 
.royalty in the people than in any one king. 
For we read that Israel made Saul king, 
and made David king, and made Abimelem 
king; but never that king Saul made an- 
other king, or that an earthly king made 
another absolute king. 4. The Prelate will 
have the maxim i^se, where the agent work- 
eth by donation, which yet holdeth true by 
his own grant (c. 9, p. 98). The king giv- 
eth power to a deputy, therefore there is 
more power in the king. 5. He supposeth 
that which is the basis and foundatictti of all 
the question, that people divesteth them- 
selves totally of their foimtain-power, which 
is most false. 6. Either they must divest 
themselves totallv (saith he) of their power, 
or the king ham power from the people, 
by way of loan, which, to my thinking, never 
any yet spake. But the P. Prelate's think- 
ing is short, and no rule to divines and 
lawyers ; for, to the thinking of the learned 
jurists, this power of the king is but fiduci- 
ary, and that is (whether the Prelate think 
it or think it not) a sort of power by trust, 
pawn or loan. Hex director Regni, hon 
proprietarius, (MolincB. in consuet. Parisi, 



Tie. 1, 9 ; 1 Gloss. 7, n. 9,)—" The king is 
a life-renter, not a lord, or proprietor of nis 
kingdom." So Novel. 85, tn prineip^ et c. 
18, Quod magistratus sit nudus dispen- 
sator et defensor jurium regnif non pro^ 
prietarius, const(xt^ ex eo guod non posset 
alienare tmpertum, oppida^ urhes^ recfiones 
vey vet res suhditorwm^ bonave regm. So 
Gregory, I. 3, c. 8, de Repuh. per c. 1, 
Sect* prcBtereay de propo. fevd., Hotto- 
man, quest, illust. 1 ; Ferdinan. Vasquez, 
I. 1, c. 4; Bossius, deprincip. et privileg. 
illiuSy n. 290, — ** The king is only a steward, 
and a defender of the laws of the kingdom, 
not a proprietor, because he hath not power 
to make away the empire, cities, towns, 
countries, and goods of the subjects ;" and, 
bona commissa magistratuif stmt suhjeda 
restitutioniy et in prejudicium suecessorum 
aliendri non possunt, {per I. idt. Sect, sed 
nost. C. Comment, de leg. I. peto 69, fra- 
trem de leg. 2, I. 32, ult. d, t.) — " All the 
soods committed to any magistrate are un- 
der restitution ; for he hath not power to 
make them away, to the prejudice of his 
succest^or^." The Prelate's thoughts reach 
not the secrets of jurists, and therefore 
he speaketh with a warrant; he will say 
no more than his short-travelled thoughts 
can reach, and that is but at the door. 
7. Sovereignty is not in the oonununity, 
(saith the P. Prelate). Truly it neither 
is, nor can be, more tlian ten, or a thou- 
sand, or a thousand thousands, or a whole 
kingdom, can be one man ; for sovereignty 
is the a1:^tract,the sovereign is the concrete. 
Many cannot be one king or one soverign : 
a sovereign must be essentially one ; and a 
multitude cannot be one. But what then ? 
May not the sovereign power be eminently, 
fontaliter^ originally and radically in the 
people ? I thmk it may, and must be. A 
king is not an under judge: he is not a 
lord of council and session formally, be- 
cause he is more. The people are not 
king formally, because the people are emi- 
nently more than the king ; for they make 
David king, and Saul king ; and the power 
to make a lord of council and session, is in 
the king (say royalists). 8. A commu- 
nity hath not power of life and death ; a 
king hath power of life and death (saith 
the Prelate). What then? Therefore a 
community is not king. I grant all. The 
power of making a king, who hath power of 
life and death, is not in the people. Poor 
man ! It is like prelates' logic. Samuel 



THE LAW AXO THE PRINCE. 



87 



is not a king, therefore he cannot make 
David a king. It followeth not bj the Pre- 
late's ground. So the king is not an infe- 
rior judge. What! Therefore he cannot 
make an inferior judge? 9. The power of 
life and death is eminently and viitually in 
the people, ooUectiyely taken, though not 
formally. And though no man can take 
away hjs own life, or hath power over his 
own life fonnally, yet a man, and a body of 
men, hath power over their own lives, radi- 
cally and vu-tually, in respect they may ren- 
der themselves to a magistrate, and to laws 
which, if they violate, mey must be in ha- 
zard of their lives ; and so they virtually 
have power of their own lives, by putting 
them under the power of good laws, for the 
peace and safety of the whole. 10. This is 
a weak conseouence. None hath power of 
his own life, therefore, far less of his neigh- 
bour's (saith the Prelate). I shall deny the 
consequence. The king hath not power of 
his own Ufe, that is, according to the Pre- 
late's mind, he can neither, by the law of 
nature, nor by any civil law, kill himself; 
therefore, the king hath far less power to 
kill another; it followeth not: for the 
judge hath more power over his neigh- 
bour's life than over his own. 11. But, 
saith the P. Prelate, the community con- 
ceived without government, all as equal, 
endowed with nature's and native liberty, 
hath no power of life and death, because all 
are bom free; and so none is bom with 
dominion and power over his neighbour's 
life. Yea, but so, Mr P. Prelate, a king 
considered without government, and as bom 
a free man, hath not power of any man's 
life more than a community hath ; for king 
and beggar are bom both alike free. But a 
Gommumty, in this consideration, as they 
come from the womb, have no politic consi- 
deration at all. If you consider them as 
without all policy, you cannthe oonsul the same way, that is, 
with the same degree of reverence and sub- 
mission ; for we owe more submission of spi- 
rit to tbe king than to the consul ; but fno- 
ais «l mifM8 non voficmi speciem^ more or 
less vwrieth not the nature of things. But if 
the meaning be that we are not to obey the 
inferior judge, commanding things lawful, 
if the kmg oom^iand the contrary, this is 
utterly denied. But saith Grotius, <^The 
inferior judge is but the deputy of the kiiig, 
and hath all his power from him ; therefore 
we are to obey nim for the king." — Ans. 
The inferior judge may be called 3ie deputy 
of the king, (where it is the king's place to 
make judges^ because he hath his external 
call from uie fciiig, and is judge infoTO soli, 
in the name and authority of the king ; but 
being once made a judge, m foro poli^ be- 
fore God, he is as ess0ntially a judge, and in 
bis officii^ acts, no less immediately sub- 
jected to God than tlie king himself. 

Ara. 2.-^These powers to whom we are 
to yield obedience, because they are ordain- 
ed of God, these are as essentially judges as 



o 



■n 



90 



LBX, REX ; OR, 



the supreme magistrate the king; but in- 
ferior judges are such, therefore inferior 
judges are as essentially judges as the su- 
preme magistrate. The proposition is, Bom. 
xiiL 1, for that is the apostle's arguments ; 
whence we proTO kings are to be obeyed, be- 
cause they are powers from Grod. I prove the 
assumption : inferior magistrates are powers 
from God, Deut. i. 17; xix. 6, 7; Exod. 
xxiL 7 ; Jer. t. i. ; and the apostle saith, 
" The powers that be are ordamed of God." 

Arg, 3. — Christ testified that Pilate had 
power from Grod as a judge (say royalists) 
no less than Caesar the emperor. (John xix. 
11 ; 1 Pet. ii. 12.) We are commanded to 
obey the king and those that are sent by 
him, and that for the Lord's sake, and for 
conscience to God ; and (Bom. xiii 5) we 
must be subject to all powers that are of 
God, not only for wrath, but for conscience. 

Arg. 4. Those who are rebuked because 
they execute not just judgment, as well as 
the king, are supposed to be essentially 
judges, as well as the king; but inferior 
judges are rebuked because of this, Jer. 
xxu. 16—17; EzeL xlv. 9—12; Zeph. 
iii. 3 ; Amos t. 6, 7 ; Eccles. iii. 16 ; Mic. 
iii. 2—4 ; Jer. v. 1, 31. 

Arg. 6. — ^He is the minister of Grod for 
good, and hath the sword not in vain, but to 
execute vengeance on the evil-doers, no less 
than the kmg. (Bom. xiii. 2 — 4.) He to 
whom agreeth, by an ordinance of God, the 
specific acts of a magistrate, is essentially a 
magistrate. 

Arg 6. — The resistmer of the inferior ma- 
gktrate in his lawM commandments is the 
resisting of Grod's ordinance, and a breach of 
the fifm commandment, as is disobedience 
to parents ; and not to give him tribute, and 
fear, aqd honour, is the same transgression, 
Bom. xiii, 1 — 1, 

Arg, 7.-^These styles, of gods, of heads 
of the people, of fathers, of physiciaiis and 
healers of the sons of the Most High, of 
such as reign and decree by the wisdom of 
God, &c», that are given to kings, for the 
which royalists make kings only judges, and 
all inferior judges but deputed, and judges 
by participation, and at the second hand, or 

flven to mferior judgeSr (Exod, xxii. 8, .9 ; 
ohn X. 35.) Those who are appointed 
judges under Moses (D^t. i. 16) are called, 
in Hebrew or Chaldee, (1 Kings viii. 1, 2 ; 
V. 2 ; Mic. iii. 1 ; Josh, xxiii. 2 ; Num. i. 
16,) ^tt^NT rasce, ^BftT fathers, (Acts vii, 
2 ; Josh, xiv, 1 ; xix. 16; 1 Cbron, viii. 28,) 



healers, (Isa. iii. 7,) gods, and sons of the 
Most High. (Psal. Imii. 1, 2, 6, 7 ; Prov. 
viii. 16, 17.) I much doubt if kings can in- 
fiise godheads in their subjects. I conceive 
they nave, from the God of gods, these gifts 
whereby diey are enabled to be judges; and 
that kmgs may appoint them judges, but 
can do no more : tney are no less essentially 
judges than themselves. 

Arg. 8, — If inferior judges be deputies of 
the king, not of Grod, and have all their au^^ 
thority from the king, then may the king 
limit the practice of these inferior judges. 
Say that an inferior judge hath condemned 
to death a paridde, ana he be conveying 
him to the place of execution, the king com- 
eth with a force to rescue him out of his 
hand ; if this inferior magistrate bear God's 
sword for the terror of ill-doers, and to exe- 
cute God's vengeance on murderers, he can- 
not but resist the king in this, which I judge 
to be his office ; for tne inferior judge is to 
take vengeance on ill-doers, and to use the 
co-active force of the sword, by virtue of his 
office, to take away this paricide. Now, if 
he be the deputy of the xing, he is not to 
break the jaws of the wicked (Job xxix« 
17); not to take vengeance on evil-doers 
(Bom.- xiii. 4) ; nor to execute judgment on 
the wicked, Psal. cxHx. 9) ; nor to execute 
judgment for the fatherless (Deut. x. 18) ; 
except a mortal man's creator, the king, say 
Amen. Now, truly then, Grod, in all £rael, 
was to rebuke no inferior judge for pervert- 
ing judgment, — as he doth, Exod. xxiii. 
26; Mic. iii. 2 — 4; Zech. iii, 3; Num. 
XXV. 5 ; Deut. i. 16 ; for the king only is 
lord of the conscience of the infenor judge 
who is to give sentence, and execute sen- 
tence righteously, upon condition that the 
king, the only univocal and proper judge, 
first decree the same, as royalists teach. 

Hear our Prelate (c. 4, p. 46). — ^How is 
it imaginable that kings can be said to judge 
in Grod's place, and not receive the power 
from God ? But kings judge in Grod's place. 
(Deut. i. i.7; 2 Chron. xix. 6.) Let no 
man stunible (this is his prolepsis) at this, 
that Moses in the one place, and Jeho- 
shaphat in the other, apake to subordinate 
judges under them. This weakeneth no- 
wise our argument; for it is a ruled case 
in law, Qtiod quia facit per alium, fadt 
per se^ all judgments of interior judgeis are 
in the name, authority, and by the power of 
the supreme, and ^r^ but commumcatively 
and derivatively from the sovereign power.' 



Ans, — How is it possible that inferior 
judges (Deut. i. 17 ; 2 Chron. xix. 6) can 
be said to judge in God's place, and not 
receive the power from God immediately, 
without anj consent or covenant of men? 
So saith the P. Prelate. But inferior judges 
judge in the place of Grod, as both the P. 
Prelate and Scripture teach. (Deut. i. 17 ; 
2 Chron. xix. 6.) Let the Prelate see to 
the stumbling conclusion, for so he feareth 
it proves toms bad cause. He saith the 
places, Deut. i. 17 ; 2 Chron. xix. 6, prove 
that the king judseth in the room of God, 
because his deputies judge in the place of 
Grod. The Prelate may know we would deny 
this stumbling and lame consequence; for 
1. Moses and Jehoshaphat are not speaking 
to themselves, but to other inferior judges, 
and doth publicly exhort them. Moses and 
Jehoshaphat are persuading the regulation 
of the personal actions of other men who 
might pervert judgment. 2. The Prelate 
is much upon his law, after he had foresworn 
the gospel and religion of the church where 
he was baptized. " What the kins doth by 
another, that he doth by himseff." But 
wero Moses and Jehoshaphat afraid that 
they should pervert judgment in the un- 
just sentence pronounced by under judges, 
of which sentence they could not know any 
thing ? And do inferior judges so judge in 
the name, auliiority, and power of the king, 
as not in the name, authority, and power of 
the Lord of lords and Kins of kings ? or is 
the judgment the king's? l^o; the Spirit of 
God saith no such matter. The judgment 
executed by those inferior judges is the 
Lord's, not a mortal king's; therefore, a 
mortal king may not hinder them to exe- 
cute judgment. 

Ohj, — ^He cannot suggest an unjust sen- 
tence, and command an inferior judge to give 
out a sentence absolvatory on cut-throats, but 
he may hinder the execution of any sentence 
against Irish cut-throats. 

Ans. — It is all one to hinder, the execu- 
tion of a just sentence, and to suggest or 
command the inferior judge to pronounce 
an unjust one ; for inferior judges, by con- 
science of their office, are botn to judge 
righteously, and by force and power of the 
sword given to them of God (Rom. xiii. 
1—4) to execute the sentence ; and so God 
hath commanded inferior judges to execute 
judgment, and hath forbidden them to wrest 
judgment, to take gifts, except the king com- 
mand them so to do. 



The king is by the grace of Grod, the in- 
ferior judge is judge by the grace of the 
kins ; even as the man is the image of God, 
and the woman the man's image.^ 

Ans. 1. — This distinction is neither true 
in law nor conscience. Not in law, for it dis- 
tinguisheth not betwixt ministros regis, et 
ministros regni. The servants of the kilig 
are his domestics, the judges are ministri 
regni, non regis ; the ministers and judges 
of the kingdom, not of the king. The king 
doth not snow grace, as he is a man, in 
making such a man a judge ; but justice 
as a kmg, by a royal power received from 
the people, and by an act of justice, he 
makes judges of deserving men ; he should 
neither for fisivour nor bribes mskke any one 
judge in the land. 2. It is by the grace of 
Gfod that men are to be advanced from a 
private condition to be inferior judges, as 
royal dignity is a free gift of God ; 1 Sam. 
ii. 7, " The Lord bringeth low and lifteth 
up ;" Psal. Ixxv. 7, " God putteth dovm one 
and setteth up another." Court flatterers 
take from G<xi and give to Jdngs ; but to 
be a judge inferior is no less an immediate 
favour of God than to be king, though the 
one be a greater favour than the other. 
Mcbgis honos and Majoc konos are to be 
considered. 

Arg 9. — Those powers which differ gra- 
dually, and per magis et minus, by more 
and less only, differ not in nature and spe- 
cies, and constitute not kings and inferior 
judges different univocally. But the power 
of kmgs and inferior judges are such; there- 
fore kmgs and inferior judges differ not uni- 
vocally. That the powers are the same in 
nature, I prove, 1. by the specific acts and 
formal object of the'power of both ; for both 
are powers ordamed of God. (Eom. xiii. 1.) 
To resist. either, is to resist the ordinance of 
God. 2. Both are by office a terror to evil 
workers, ver. 3. 3. Both are the ministers of 
God for good. Though the king send and 
give a caU to the inferior judge, that doth 
no more make the inferior judge's powers in 
nature and specie different than ministers 
of the Word, called by ministers of the 
Word, have offices different in nature. Ti- 
mothy's office to be preacher of the Word 
differeth not in specie from the office of the 
presbytery which laid hands on him, though 
their office by extension be more than Ti- 
mothy's office. The people's power is put 

1 Symmon's Loyal Sobjccts* Belief, sect 1, p. 8. 




forth in those same acts, when thej choose . 
one to be their king and sapreme governor, 
and when thej set up an aristocratical go- 
vernment, and choose many, or more than 
one, to be their governors ; for the formal 
object of one or many governors is justice 
and religion, as thej are to be advanced. 
The form and manner of their operation is, 
hraehio secularly by a co*active power, and 
by the sword. The formal acts of king and 
many judges in aristocracy are these same, 
the defending of the poor and needy from 
violence, the conservation of a community in 
a peaceable and a godly h'fe. (1 Tim. ii. 2 ; 
Job xxixk 12, 13 ; l8a% i. 170 ^h^se same 
laws of God that regulateth me king in all 
his acts of royal government, and tyeth and 
obligeth his conscience, as the Lord's de- 
puty, to execute judgment for Grod, and not 
m the stead of men, in God's court of hea- 
ven, doth in like manner tie> and oblige 
the conscience of aristocratical judges, and 
all inferior judges, as is clear and evident 
by these places, 1 Tim. ii. 2, not only kings, 
but all in authority udfnt Si U vn^x« ^*^*9 ^^^ 
obliged to procure that their subjects lead a 
quiet and peaceable life, in all godliness and 
h(mesty» AU in conscience are obliged 
(Deut* i. 16) to judge righteoivly between 
every man and his brother, and the stran^ 
ger that is with them% Neither are they 
k> respect persons in judgment, but are to 
heai: the small as well as the great, nor to 
be afraid of the face of men ,^»the judgment 
administered by all, is God's. (2 Chron. 
3dx» 6.) All are obliged to fear God, (Deut. 
xvii. 19, 20,) to keep the words of the law ; 
not to be lifted up in heart above their 
brethren. (Isa. i. 17 ; Jer. xxii. 2, 3.) Let 
any man uiow me a difference, according to 
God's word, but in the extension, that wnat 
die king is to do as a king, in all the king«- 
dom and whole dominions, (if God give to 
him many, as he save to David, ana Solo<^ 
mon, and Joshua^ that the inferior judges 
are to do in such and such circuits, and li- 
mited places, and Z quit the cause; so as 
the inferior judges ajre Ktde kings, and the 
king a great and delated judge, — ^as a com- 
pressed hand or fist, and the nand stretched 
out in fingers and thumb, are one hand; so 
herov 4. Gk>d owneth inferior judges as a 
congregation of gods; (Fsal. Ixxxii. 1, 2;) 
for that Grod sitteth in a congregation or 
senate of kings or m(»uu'chs, J. meS. not be- 
lieve till I see royalists show to me a com- 
monwealth of monarchs convening in one 



judicature. All aire equally called gods, 
(John X. 35; Exod. xxii. 8,) if for any 
cause, but because all judges, even inferior, 
are the immediate deputies of the King of 
kings, and their senteilee in judgment as 
the sentence of the Judge of «ul £e earth, 
I shall be informed by the P. Prelate, 
when he shall answer my reasons, if his in- 
terdicted lordship may cast an eye to a poor 
presbyter below ; and as wisdom is that 
by which kings reign, (Prov. viii. 15, so also 
ten 16,) by which princes rule, and nobles, 
even all the judges of the earth ; all that is 
said against this is, that the king hath a 
prerogative royal, by which he is differ- 
enced from all judges in Israel, called jus 
regis fltOtS^Dj for, (saith Barclay,^) the 
king, as ^g, essentially hath a domination 
anapower above all, so as none can censure 
him, or punish him, but Grod, because there 
be no tnrones above his but the throne of 
Grod. The judges of Israel, as Samuel, 
Gideon, &c. had no domination,^— the do- 
minion was in G^'s hand. *' We may re- 
sist an inferior judge, (saith Amissus,') 
otherwise there were no appeal from him, 
and the wrong we suffer were irreparable" 
as saith Marantius.' " And all the judges 
of the earth (saith Edward Symmons^) 
are from God more remotely ; namely, me- 
diante rege^ by the mediation of the Su- 
preme, even as the lesser stars have their 
light from God by the mediation of the 
siin. To the first I answer :— There was a 
difference betwixt the kings of Israel and 
their judges, no question; but if it be an es- 
sential difference, it is a question. • For, 1. 
The judges were raised up in an extraordi- 
nary manner, out of any tribe, to defend 
the people, and vindicate their liberty, God 
remaining their king; the king, by the 
Lord's appointment, was tyed, e&er Saul, 
to the royal tribe of Judah, till the Mes- 
siah's coming. God took his own blessed 
liberty to set up a succession in the ten 
tribes% 2. . The judges were not by succes- 
sion from father to son : the kings were, as 
I conceive, for the typical eternity of the 
Messiah's throne, presignified to stand from 



1 Inferfotes Jndices sunt im{>roprie Yicarii Regis, 
quod missionem exteimam ad offlcittm, sed imme- 
diati Dei vicarii, quoad offidum in qnod missi sunt. 
Barclaius contr. Monaireh. 1. 2, p. 6^ §7. 

s ArnisaBus de authoritate princip. c. 3, n. 9. 

> Marant. diip. 1, Zoatt. tract. 3> de defens. Myn- 
sing, obs, 18, cent. 5, 

* iSymmous, sect. 1, p. 3. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



93 



generation to generation. 3. Whether the 
judges were appointed by the election of the 
people, or no, some doubt; because Jeph- 
thah was so niade . judffe : but I think it 
was not a law in Israel uiat it should be so. 
But the first mould of a king (Deut. xvii.) 
is bj election* But that Grod gave power 
of domineering, that is, of tyrannising, to a 
king, so as he cannot be resisted, which he 
gave not to a judge, I think no scripture 
can make good. For by what scripture 
can royalists warrant to us that the people 
might rise in arms to defend themselves 
against Moses, Gideon, Eli, Samuel, and 
oSier judges, if they should have tyrannised 
over the people ; and that it is unlawful to 
resist the mo«t tyrannous king in Israel and 
Judah ? Yet Barclay and others must say 
this, if they be true to that principle of ty- 
ranny, that the jus regis^ the law or man- 
ner of the king (1 Sam. viii. 9, 11 ; and 1 
Sam. X. 25) doth essentially differ betwixt 
the kings of Israel and the judges of Is- 
rael. But we think Grod ffave never any 
power of tyranny to either judge or king of 
Israel ; and domination in that sense was 
by Grod dven to none of them. Amisseus 
hath as uttle for him, to say the inferior 
magistrate may be resisted, because we may 
appeal &om him ; but the king cannot be 
reosted, quia sanctUas majestatis id non 
permittitj the sanctity of royal majesty will 
not permit us to resist the king. 

Ang, — That is not Paul's argument to 
prove it unlawful to resist kings, as kings, 
and doing their office, because of the sanc- 
tity of their majesty ; that is, as the man in- 
tendeth, because of the supreme, absolute, 
and unlimited power that God hath given 
him. But this is a begging of the question, 
and all one as, to say, the king may not be 
resisted, because he may not be resisted ; 
for sanctity of majesty, if we believe roya- 
lists, indudeth essentially an absolute supre- 
macy of power, whereby they are above the 
reach of all thrones, laws, powers, or resis- 
tance on earth. But the argument is, re- 
sist not, because the power is of Grod. But 
the inferior magistrate's power is of God. 
Ilesist not, because you resist God's ordi- 
nance in resisting the judge ; but the infe- 
rior judge is Grod's ordinance. (Bom. xiii. 1 ; 
Deut. i. 17 ; 2 Chron. xix. 6.) Mr Spn- 
mons saith, ^' All judges on earth are mm 
the king, as stars have their Ught from the 
sun." I answer, 1. Then aristocracy were 
unlawful, for it hath not its power ^m mo- 



narchy. Had the lords of the Philistines, 
have the states of Holland, no power but 
from a monarchy? Name the monarch. 
Have the Venetians any power from a king? 
Indeed, our Prelate saith from Augustine, 
(Confess, lib. 3, cap. 8,) Generate pactum 
estsocietatis humanas, ohedire Regibus suisy 
it is an universal covenant of human so- 
ciety, and a dic^te of nature, that men 
obey their kings. " I beg the &vour of 
sectaries (saith he) to show as much for 
aristocracy and democracy." Now all other 
governments, to those bom at court, are the 
mventions of men. But I can show that 
same warrant for the one as for the other ; 
because it is as well the dictate of nature 
that people obey their judges and rulers as 
it is that they obey their kings. And Au- 
gustine speaketh of all judges in that place, 
tnough he Aame kings ; for kingly govern- 
ment is no more of the law of nature 
than aristocracy or democracy ; nor are 
any bom iudges or subjects at all. There 
is a natural aptitude in all to- either of these, 
for the conservation of nature, and that is 
all. Let us see that men, naturally inclining 
to government, incline rather to royal go- 
vernment than to any other. That the r. 
Prelate shall not be able to show; for father- 
ly government, being in two, is not kingly, 
but nearer to aristocracy; and when many 
families were on earth, every one indepen- 
dent within themselves, if a common ene- 
my should invade a tract of land governed 
by families, I conceive, by nature's Hght, 
they should incline to defend themselves, 
and to join in one politic body for their own 
safety, as is most natural. But, in that case 
they, having no king, and there were no rea- 
son of many fathers all alike loving their 
own families and self-preservation, wny one 
should be king over all, rather than an- 
other, except by voluntary compact. So it is 
clear that nature is nearer to aristocracy be- 
fore this contract than a monarchy. And let 
him show us in multitudes of ^unilies dwell- 
ing together, before there was a king, as 
clear a warrant for monarchy as here is for 
aristocracy ; though to me both be laudable 
and lawful ordinances of Gh)d, and the dif- 
ference merely accidental, being one and the 
same power from the Lord, (Kom. xiii. 1,) 
which is in divers subjects ; in one as a mo- 
narchy, in many as in aristocracy ; and the 
one is as natural as the other, and the sub- 
jects are accidental to the nature of the 
power. 2. The stars have no light at all 



1 



94 



LEl, REX ; Oft) 



but in actual aspect toward the sun ; and 
they are not lightsome bodies by the free 
will of the sun, and have no immediate light 
from Crod formally) but from the siln ; so as 
if there were no sun, there idiould be no 
stars. 3. Foi* actual shining and sending 
out of beams of light actu secundo, they de- 
pend upon the presence of the sun ; but for 
mferior judges, though they have their call 
from the king, yet have they gifts to govern 
from no king on earth, but only from the 
King of kings. 4. When the king is dead, 
the judges are judges, and they depend not 
on the king for their second acts of judging ; 
and for the actual emission and puttmg forth 
their beams and rays of justice upon the 
poor and needy, they depend on no volun- 
tary aspect, information or commandment 
of the Eing, but on that immediate subjec- 
tion of their conscience to the King of kings. 
And their judgment which they execute is 
the Lord's immediately, and not the king's ; 
and so the comparison halteth* 

Arg^ 10. — If the king dying, the judges 
inferior remain powers from God, the de- 
puties of the Lord of Hosts, having their 
powei^ from GM, then are they essentially 
judges; yea, and if the estates, in their prime 
representators and leaders, have power in the 
death of the king to choose and make an- 
other king, then are they not judges and 
rulers by derivation and participation, or im- 
properly; but the king is rather the ruler 
by deritation and participation than those 
who are called inferior judges. Now, if these 
judges depend in their sentences upon the 
immediate will of him who is supposed to be . 
the only judge, when this only judge dieth, 
they should cease to be judges : for Etopir- 
ante mandatore exmrat mandatum; be* 
cause the fountain-judge drying up, the 
streams must dry up. Now, when Saul 
died, the princes of the tribes remain by 
God's institution princes, and they by God's 
law and warrant (Deut. xvii.) choose David 
their king. 

Arg, 11 .--^K the king, through absolute 
power, do not send inferior judges, and con- 
stitute them, but only by a power from the 
people ; and if the Lord have no less imme- 
diate influence in making inferior judges 
than in making kings, men there is no 
ground that the king should be sole judge, 
and the inferior judge only judge by deri- 
vation from him, and essentially nis deputy, 
and not the immediate deputy of God. If 
the former is true, therefore, so is the lat- 



ter» And, 1. That the king's absolute will 
maketh not inferior judges, is clear, from 
Deut. i. 15. Moses might not follow his 
own will in making inferior judges whom 
he pleased: God tyed him to a law, (ver. 
13,) that he should take wise, men, known 
amongst the people, and fearing Gk)d, and 
hating covetousness. And these qualifica-' 
tions were not from Moses, but from Grod ; 
and no less immediately from God than the 
inward qualification of a king (Deut. xvii.) ; 
and therefore, it is not G^d s law that the 
king may make inferior judges only, Du- 
rante beneplacito^ during his absolute will ; 
for if these divine qualifications remain in 
the seventy elders, Moses, at his will, could 
not remove them from their places. 2. 
That the king can make heritable judges 
more than he can communicate faculties 
and parts of' judging, I doubt. Riches are 
of fathers, but not promotion, which is from 
God, and neither from the east nor the 
west: that our nobles are bom lords of 
parliament, and judges by blood, is a posi- 
tive law. 3. It seemeth to me, from Isa. 
iii. 1—4, that the inferior judge is made by 
consent of the people ; nor can it be called 
a wronging of the king, that all cities and 
burghs of Scotland and England have power 
to %oose their own provosts, rulers, and 
mayors. 4. If it be warranted by God, 
that the lawful call of God to the throne 
be the election of the people, the call of in- 
ferior judges must also be from the people, 
mediately or immediately. So I see no 
ground to say, that the inferior judge is 
the king's vicegerent, or that he is in re- 
spect of the king, or in relation to supreme 
authority, only a private man. 

Arg, 12. These judges cannot but be 
univoodly and essentiaUy judges no less 
than the king, without which in a king- 
dom justice IS physically impossible; and 
anarchy, and violence, and confusion, must 
follow, if they be wanting in the kingdom. 
But without inferior judges, though there 
be a king, justice is physically impossible ; 
and anarchy and confiision, &c. must follow. 

Now this argument is more considerable, 
that without inferior judges, though there 
be a king in a kingdom, justice and safety 
are impossible ; and if there be inferior 
judges, though there be no king, as in aris- 
tocracy, and when the king is dead, and 
another not crowned, or the king is minor, 
or absent, or a captive in the enemy's land, 
yet justice is possible, and the kingdom 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



95 



preserved ; the medium of the argument 
is grounded upon God's word, Num. xi. 
14, 15, when Moses is unable alone to judge 
the people, seventy elders are joined with 
him (ver. 16, 17) ; so were the elders ad- 
joined to help him (£xod. xxiv. 1 ; Deut. 
V. 23 ; xxii. 16 ; Josh, xxiii. 2 ; Judg. viii. 
14 ; xi. 5, 11 ; 1 Sam. xi. 3 ; 1 Kings xx. 
7; 2 Kings vi. 32; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 29; 
Ruth iv. 4; Deut. xix. 12; Ezek. viii. 1 ; 
Lam. i. 19); then were the elders of Moab 
thought to nave a king. . The natural ^nd 
of judges hath been mdigence and weak- 
ness, because men could not in a society 
defend themselves irom violence ; therefore, 
by the light of nature they gave their power 
to one or more, and made a judge or judges 
to obtain the end of self-preservation. But 
nature useth the most efficacious means to 
obtain its end; but in a great society and 
kingdom, the end is more easily attained by 
many governors than by one only; for where 
there is but one, he cannot minister justice 
to all; and the farther that the children are 
removed from their father and tutor, they 
are the nearer to violence and injustice. 
Justice should be at as easy a rate to the 
poor as a draught of water. Samuel went 
yearly through the land to Bethel, Gilgal, 
Mizpeh, (1 Sam. vii. 16,) and brought jus- 
tice to the doors of the poor. So were our 
kings of Scotland obliged to do of old ; but 
now justice is as dear as gold. It is not a 
good argument to prove mferior judges to 
be only vicars and deputies of the xing, be- 
cause the king may censure and punish them 
when they pervert judgment. 1. Because 
the king, in that punisheth them not as 
judges, out as men. 2. That might prove 
all the subjects to be vicars and deputies of 
the king, because he can punish them all, iu 
the case of their breach of laws. 



QUESTION XXI, 

WHAT POWER TEDE PEOPLE AND STATES OP 
PARLIAMENT HAVE OVER THE KING, AJ^D 
IN THE STATE. 

It is true the king is the head of the 
kingdom; but the states of the kingdom 
are as the temples of the head, and so, as 
'essentially parts of the head as the king is 
the crown of the head.^ 

^ Principes sunt capitis tempon^ rex vertex. 



Assert. 1. — These ordines regni, the 
states, have been in famous nations : so 
there were fathers of &milies, and princes 
of tribes amongst the Jews: the Ephori 
amongst the Lacedemonians, (Folyb. hist. 
1. 6 ;) the senate amongst the Bomans ; the 
forum superhiense amongst the Arrago- 
nians; the parliaments in Scotland, Eng- 
land, France, Spain. Abner commun^ 
with the elders of Israel to bring the king 
home; (2 Sam. iii. 17 ;) and mere were 
elders in Israel, both in the time of the 
judges, and in tiie time of the kings, who 
did not only give advice and counsd to the 

i'udges and kmgs, but also were judges no 
ess than the kings and judges, which I shall 
make good by these places : Deut. xxi. 19, 
the rebellious son is brought to the elders of 
the city, who had power of life and death, 
and caused to stone him; Deut. xxii. 18, 
" The elders of the city shall take that man 
and chastise him ;" Josh. xx. 4, but beside 
the elders of every city, there were the el- 
ders of Israel and the princes, who had also 
judicial power of life and death, as the judges 
and king had; Josh. xxii. 30, even when 
J'oshua was judge in Israel, the princes of 
the congregation and heads of the thousands 
of Israel did judicially cognosce whether the 
children of Eeuben, of (SaA, and of half the 
tribe of Manasseh, were apostates irom Grod, 
and the religion of Israel ; 2 Sam. v. 3, all 
the elders of Israel made David king at 
Hebron ; and Num. xii., they are appointed 
by God not to be the advisers only and help- 
ers of Moses ; but (ver. 14-^-17) to bear a 
part of the burden of ruling and governing 
the people, that Moses might be eased. Jet- 
remiah is accused, (xxvi. lO,) upon his life, 
before the princes ; Josh. vii. 4, the princes 
sit in judgment with Joshua ; Josh. ix. 15, 
Joshua and the princes of the congregation 
sware to the Gibeonites that they would not 
kill them. The princes of the house of 
Israel could not be rebuked for oppression 
in judgment (Mic. iii. 1-^3) if they had 
not had power of judgment. So (Zeph. iii. 
3 ; Deut. i. 17 ; 2 CSron. xix. 6, 7) they 
are expressly made judges in the place of 
God; and (1 Sam. viii. 2) without advice 
or knowledge of Samuel, the supreme judge, 
they convene and ask a king ; and without 
any head or superior, when there is no king, 
they convene a parliament, and made David 
king at Hebron; and when David is banished, 
they convene to bring him home again; 
when tyrannous Athalia reigneth, they con- 



-pr*- 



96 



LBX, rex; or, 



yene and make Joash king, and that with- 
out any king; and (Josh, xxii.) there is a 
parliament convened, and, for any thing we 
con x^sA, without Joshua, to take cognisance 
of a new altar. It had been good that the 
parliaments both of Scotland and of £ng- 
umd had convened, though the king had 
not indicted and summoned a parliament, 
without the king, to take order with the 
wicked clergy, who had made many idola- 
trous^altars; and the P. Prelate should have 
brought an argument to prove it unlawful, 
in foro Dei, to set up the tables and con- 
ventions in our kingdom, when the prelates 
Were bringing in the grossest idolatory into 
the church — a service for adoring of altars, 
of bread, the work of the hand of the baker 
— a god more corruptible than any god of 
silver and gold. 

And against Achab's will and mind, (1 
Kings xviii. 19,) Elias causeth to kill the 

Jmests of Baal, according to God's express 
aw. It is true it was extraordinary ; but 
no otherwise extraordinary than it is at this 
day. When the supreme madstrate will 
not execute the judgment of the Xord, thosQ 
who .made hiin supreme magistrate, under 
God, who have, under Grod, sovereign li- 
berty to dispose of crowns and kin^oms, 
are to execute the judgment of the Lord, 
when wicked men make thb law of God of 
none effect. 1 Sam. xv. 32, so Samuel 
killed Agag, whom the Lord expressly com- 
manded to be killed) because Saul disobeyed 
the voice of the Lo^l. I deny not but there 
is necessity of a clear warrant that the ma- 
gistrate neglect his duty, either in not c<m- 
v'ening the states, or not executing the judg- 
ment of the Lord. I s^e not how the con- 
vening of a parliament is extraordinary to 
the states ; tor none hath power ordinary 
when the king is dead, or when he is dis- 
tracted, or captive in another land, to con- 
vene the estates and parliament, but they 
only; and in their defect, by the law of na- 
ture, the people may convene. But, if they 
be essentially judges no less than the king, 
as. I have demonstrated to the impartial 
reader, in the former chapter, I conceive, 
though the state make a positive law, for or- 
der's cause, that the king ordinarily convene 
parliaments ; yet, if we dispute the matter 
m the court of conscience, the estates have 
intrinsically (becatise they |u?e the estates, 
and essentially judges of the land) ordinary 
power to convene themselves. Because, 
when Moses, by Grod's rule, hath appointed 



seventy men to be catholio judges in the 
land, Moses, upon his sole pleasure and will, 
hath not power to restrain them in the ex- 
ercise of ji}dgment given them of God ; for, 
as God hath given to any one judge power to 
judge righteous judgment, though the king 
command the contrary, so hath he given to 
him power to sit down in the gat^ or the 
bench, when and where the necessity of the 
oppressed people calleth for it. For the ex- 
press commandment of God, which saith to 
all judges, execute judgment in the morn- 
ing, involveth essenlaaUv a precept to all 
the physical actions, without which H is im- 
possible to execute judgment ; — as, namely, 
if, by a divine precept, the judge must exe- 
cute judgment ; therdfore he must come to 
some public place, and he must cause party 
and witnesses come before him, and he must 
consider, cognosce, examine, in the place of 
judgment, things, peraons, circumstances: 
and so God, who commandeth positive acts 
of judging, commandeth the judge's loco* 
motive power, and his natural actions of 
compelling, by the sword, the parties to 
come before him, even as Christ, who com- 
mandeth his servants to preach, command- 
eth that the preacher and the people go to 
church, and that he stand mr sit in a place 
where all may hear, and that he give liim- 
self to reading and meditating before he 
come to preach. And if God command one 
judge to come to the place of judgment, so 
doth he command seventy, and so all 
estates to convene in the place of judgment. 
It is objected, '' That the estates are not 
judges, ordinary and habitually, but only 
judges at some certain occasions, when the 
king, for cogent and weighty causes, calleth 
them, and c^eth them not to judge, but to 
give him advice and counsel how to judge." 

Ara, 1. — -They are no less judges hs^itu- 
ally tnan the king, when the common affairs 
of the whole kmgdom necessitateth these 
public watchmen to come together ; for even 
the king judgeth not actuaSy, but upon oc- 
casion. This is to beg the question, to say 
that the estates are not judges but when 
the king calleth them at such and such oc- 
casions ; for the elders, princes, and heads of 
fiunilies and tribes,' were judges ordinary, 
because they made the king. 

Ara.2. — The kingdom, by Gk)d, yea, and 
church, justice and religion, so far as they' 
concern the whole kingdom, are committed 
not to the keeping of the Ising cmly, but to 
all the judges, emers, apd princes of the 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE, 



97 



land: and they are rebuked as evening 
wolves, lioHB, oppressors, (£zek. xxii. 27 ; 
Zee. ill. 3 ; Isa. liL 14, 15 ; Mic. iii, 1—3,) 
when they oppress the people in judgment, 
so are they (Deut. i. 16-— 17 ; 9 Chron. xix, 
6, 7) niade judges, and therefore they are 
no more to be restrained not to convene by 
the king's power, (which is in this accumu- 
lative and auxiliary, not privative,) than 
they can be restrained in judgment, and in 
pronouncing such a sentence, as the king 
pleased, and not such a sentence ; because, 
as they are to answer to Grod.ibp unjust 
sentences, so also for no just sentences, and 
for not convening to judge, when rehgion 
and justice, whicn are falkn in the struts, 
calleui for them. 

Arg, 3. — As Grodin a law of nature hath 
given to every man the keeping and self- 
preservation of himself and of Qs brother, 
Cain ought in his place to be the keeper of 
Abel his brother; so hath God conmiitted 
the keeping of the commonwealth, by a posi-> 
tive law, not to the king alone, because that 
is imposaable.* (Num« xi, 14, 17 ; 2 Chron. 
xix. 1 — 6 ; 1 Qiron. xxvii,) 

Arg, 4. — If the king had such a power 
as king, and so from wd, he should have 
power to break up the meeting of all courts 
of parliament, secret councils, and all in- 
ferior judicatures ; and when the congrega- 
tion of gods, as Psd, Ixxxii., in the midst of 
which the Lord standeth, were about to 
pronounce just judgment for the oppressed 
and poor, they might be hindered by the 
kins ^ and so they should be as lust as the 
king maketh them, and might pel^ert judg- 
ment, and take awar the rigWusn^s of 
the righteous from him, (Isa, v, 23,) be- 
cause tne king commandeth ; and the cause 
of the poor should not come before the 
judge, when the king so commandeth. And 
ahaU it excuse the estates, to say, we could 
not judge the cause of the poor, nor crush 
the priests of Baal, and the idolatrous 
mass-prelates, because the king forbade us ? 
So might the king break up the meeting of 
the lords of session, when they were to de- 
cern that Naboth's vineyard should be re- 
stored to him, and hinder the states to re- 
press tyranny ; and this were as much as if 
the states should say, We made this mqn 
our king, and with our good-wiU we a^e 
he shall be a tyrant. For if God gave S to 



^ Jnnias Brat* q. 2, p. 51, tlnd. contr. Tyran. 



him as a king, we are to consent that- he 
enjov it, 

Arg, 5. — If Barclay and other flatterers 
have leave to make the parliament but 
counsellors and advisers of the king, and the 
king to be the only and sole judge, the 
king is, by that same reason, the sole judge, 
in relation to all judges; the contrary 
whereof is dear. (Num, xi. 16 ; Deut, i. 
16 — 17; Chron, xix. 8; Rom, xiii, 1, 2; 
1 Pet, ii. 13, 14.) Yea, but (say they) the 
king, when he sendeth an ambassador, he 
may tie him to a written commission ; and 
in so far as he exceedeth that ^ he is not an 
ambassador; and dear it is, that all in- 
ferior judges ^1 Pet. ii, 13, 14) are but 
sent by the kmg; therefore, they are so 
judges as they are but messengers, and are 
to adhere to uie royal pleasure of the prince 
that sent them, A'os, (l.)-*-The amoassa* 
dor is not to accept an unjust ambassage, 
that flghteth with the law of nature, (2.) 
The ambassador and the judge differ, the 
ambassador is the king and states' deputy, 
both in his call to the ambassy, and also 
in the matter of the ambassy ; for which 
cause he is not to transgress what is given 
to him in writ as a rule; but the inferior 
judges, and the high court of pariiainent, 
though they were the king's deputies, (as 
the parliament is in no sort his deputy, but 
he tneir deputy royal) yet it is only in re- 
spect of their call, not in respect of the 
matter of their commission, for the king 
may send the judge to judge in gener^ 
according to the law, justice, and religion, 
but he cannot depute the sentence, and com- 
mand the consdence of the judge to pro- 
nounce such a sentence, not such. The in- 
ferior judge in the act of judging is as 
independent, and his consdence as imme- 
diately subject to God as the king ; therefore, 
the king owes to every sentence his appro- 
bative suffrage as king, but not either his 
directive suffrage, or lus imper^^tive suffrage 
of absolute pleasure, 

Arg, 6. — If the king should sell his 
country, and bring in a foreign army, the 
estates are to convene, to take course ifor the 
safety of the kingdom. 

Arg. 7. — If Savid exhort the princes of 
Israel to help king Solomon in governing 
the kingdom, and in building the temple 
(2 Chron. x3^xii,3);-^ifHezekiah took counsel 
with his princes, and his mighty men in the 
matter of holding off the Assyrians, who 
were to invade the land: if David (1 Chron. 



98 



LEX) REX ; OB, 



xiii. 1 — 4) oonsult with the captains of 
thousands and hundreds, to bring tne ark of 
God to Kirjath-jearim: if Solomon (1 EJngs 
viii. 1) " assemble the elders of Israel, and 
all the heads of the tribes, and the chief of 
the fathers, to bring the ark of the taber- 
nacle to the congregation of the Lord :" 
if Achab gathered together the states of 
Israel, in a matter that nearly concerned 
religion : if the elders and people (1 Kings 
XX. 8) counsel and decree tnat king Achab 
should hearken to Ben-hadad king of Syria, 
and if Ahasuerus make no decrees, but with 
consent of his princes, (Esth, i. 21,) nor 
Darius any act without his nobles and 
princes : if Hamor and Shechem (Gen. 
xxxiv. 20) would not make a covenant with 
Jacob's sons, without the consent of the men 
of the city, and Ephron the Hittite would 
not sell Abraham a burial place in his land 
without the cdnsent of the children of Heth 
(Gren. xxiii. 10) : — then must the estates 
have a power oi judging with the king or 
prince m matters or religion, justice, and 

fovemment, which concern the whole king- 
om. But the former is true by the records 
of Scripture ; therefore, so is the latter. 

Arg. 8. — The men of Ephraim complain 
that Jephthah had gone to war against the 
children of Ammon without them, and 
hence rose war betwixt the men of Ephraim 
and the men of Gilead, (Judges xii. 1 — 3,) 
and the men of Israel fiercely contended 
with the men of Judah, because they brought 
king David home again without them, plead- 
ing that they were uierein despised, (2. Sam^ 
xix. 41 — 43,) which evinceth that the 
whole states have hand in matters of public 
government, that concern all the kingdom ; 
and when there is no king, (Judg. xx.) the 
chief of the people, and ot all the tribes, go 
out in battle agaiast the children of Ben- 
jamin. 

Arg. 9. — Those who make the king, and 
so have power to unmake him in the case of 
tyranny, must be above the king in power 
of government ; but the elders and princes 
made both David and Saul kings. 

Arg» 10. — There is not any who say that 
the princes and people, (1 Sam. xiv.) did 
not right in rescuing innocent Jonathan 
from death, against the king's will and his 
law. 

Arg. 11. — The special ground of royalists 
is, to make the king the absolute supreme, 
giving all life and power to the parliament 
and states, and of mere grace convening 



p 

le 



them. So saith Feme, the author of 
Ossorianum, (p. 69,) but this ground is 
Mse, because me king's power is fiduciary, 
and put in his hand upon trust, and must be 
ministerial, and borrowed fix)m those who 
ut him in trust, and so his power must be 
ess, and derived firom the parliament. But 
the parliament hath no power in trust from 
the King, because the time was when the 
man who is the king had no power, and the 
parliament had the same power that they 
now have ; and now, when the king hath re- 
ceived power firom them, they nave the 
whole power that they had before — that is, 
to make laws ; and resigned no power to the 
king, but to execute laws; and ms convening 
of uiem is an act of royal duty, which he 
oweth to the parliament by virtue of his 
office, and is not an act of grace ; for an act 
of grace is an sact of free wiS; and what the 
king doth of &ee will, he may not do, and so 
he may never convene a parliament. But, 
when David, Solomon, Asa, Hezekiah, Je- 
hoshaphat, Ahaz, convened parliaments, 
they convened parliaments as kmss, and so 
ex debito et virtute ofidi^ out oi debt and 
royal obligation, and If the king as the king, 
be lex ammata, a breathing and living law, 
the king, as king, must do by obligation of 
law what he doth as king, and not from 
i^ontaneous and arbitrary grace. If the 
Scripture holds forth to us a king in Israel, 
and two princes and -elders who made the 
king, and had power of life and death, as 
we have seen; then is there in Israel 
monarchy tempered with aristocracy; and 
if there were elders and rulers in every city, 
as the Scripture saith, here was also aristo- 
cracy and oemocracy ; and for the warrant 
of the power of the estates, I appeal to 
jurists, and to approved authors: Arg» L 
aliud, 160, sect. 1 ; De Jur, Beg^ I, 22 ; 
Mortuo de fidd. L 11, 14, ad Mum, L 3, 
1, 4 ; Sigemus De Bep. Judceor. l. 6, c. 7; 
Comelitis Bertramo, c. 12/ Junius Brutus, 
Vindk. contra, Tyran. sect, 2; Author 
Libelli de jur Magistral, in suhd. q, 6; 
Althus, Politic, c, 18; Calvin Institut, I, 
4, c, 20 ; Pareus Coment. in Bom. xiii. ; 
Pet, Martyr in Lib, Judic. c, 3; Joan 
Marianus de rege lib. 1, c. 7 ; Hottoman 
de jure Antiq, Megni Gallici I, 1, c. 12; 
Buchanan de jure Begni a/pud Scotos. 

Obj. — The king after a more noble way 
representeth the people than the estates 
doth ; for the princes and commissioners of 
parliament have all their power from the 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



99 



people, and the people's power is concen- 
trated in the king. 

An8. — The estates taken collectively do 
represent the people both in respect of office, 
and of persons, because they stand judges 
for them ; for many represent many, ratione 
numeri et oficiiy better than one doth. 
The king doth improperly represent the 
people, though the power tor actual execu- 
tion of laws he more in the king, yet a legis- 
lative power is more in the estates. Neither 
will it follow, that if the estates of a king- 
dom do any thing but counsel a king, they 
must then command him, for a legal and 
judicial advice hath influence in the effect 
to make it a law, not on the king's will, to 
cause him give the being of a law to that, 
which without his will is no law, for this 
supposeth that he is only judge. 

Obj, — ^What power the people reserveth, 
they reserve it to themselves in unitate, 
as united in a parliament; and therefore 
what they do out of a parliament is tumul- 
tuous. 

Ans. — I deny the consequence ; they re- 
serve the power of self-preservation out of a 
parliament, and a power of convening in 
parliament for that effect, that they may by 
common counsel defend themselves. 



QUESTION XXII. 

WHSTHER THE POWER OF THE KING AS KINO 
BE ABSOLUTE, OR IXEPENDSNT AND LIMITED 
BY god's first mould AND PATTERN OF 
A KING. 

Dr Feme (sect. 3, p. 12) showeth us it was 
never his purpose to plead for absoluteness 
of an arbitrary commandment, free from all 
moral restraint laid on the power by God's 
law ; but only he striveth for a power in the 
king that cannot be resisted by the subject. 
But truly we never disputed with royalists 
of any absolute power in the king, free from 
moral subjection to Grod's law. 1, Because 
any bond that God's law imposeth on the 
king, cometh wholly from God, and the 
nature of a divine law, and not from any 
voluntary contract or covenant, either ex- 
press or tacitOf betwixt the king and the 
people who made him king ; tor, if he fail 
against such a covenant, though he should 
exceed the cruelty of a king or a man, and 
become a lion, a iTero, and a mother-killer, 



he should in all his inhumanity and breach 
of covenant be accountable to God, not to 
any man on earth. 2. To dispute with 
royalists if Grod's law lay any moral restraint 
upon the king, were to dispute whi?ther the 
kmg be a rational man or no, and whether 
he can sin agamst Grod, and shall cry in the 
day of God's wrath, (if he be a wicked 
prince) Hills fall on us and cover us, as it is 
Rev. vi. 15, 16 ; and whether Tophet be 
prepared for all workers of iniquity; and 
certainly I justify the schoolmen in that 
question : Whether or no God could have 
created a rational creature, such a one as 
by nature is impeccable, and not naturally 
capable of sin before Grod ? If royalists dis- 
pute this question of their absolute monarch, 
they are wicked divines. 

We plead not at this time, (saith the 
Prelate, c. 14, p. 163, stealing from Gro- 
tius, Barclay, Arnisfieus, who spake it with 
more sinews of reason ;) for a masterly or 
despotical, or rather for a slavish sovereign- 
ty, which is dominium Iierile, an absolute 
power, such as the great Turk this day ex- 
erciseth over his subiects, and the king of 
Spain hath over and m his territories with- 
out Europe : we maintain only regiam po- 
testatem, quce fundatur in paternal such 
royal, fatherly sovereignty, as we live un- 
der, blessed be Grod, and our predecessors. 
This, (saith he,) as it hath its royal prero- 
gative inherent to the crown naturally, and 
inseparable irom it, so it trencheth not upon 
the liberty of the person, or the property of 
the goods of the subject, but in and by the 
lawml and just acts of jurisdiction. 

Ans. — 1. Here is another absolute power 
disclaimed to be in the king ; he hatn not 
such a masterly and absolute liberty as the 
Turk hath. Why ? John P. P., in such a 
tender and high point as concemeth soul 
and body of subjects in three Christian king- 
doms, you should have taught us. What 
bonds and fetters any covenant or paction 
betwixt the king and people layeth upon 
the king, — ^whyhe hath not, as king, the 
power of the great Turk, I will tell you. 
The great Turk may command any of his 
subjects to leap into a mountain of iire, and 
bum himself quick, in conscience of obe- 
dience to his law. And what if the sulnect 
disobey the great Turk ? if the great Turk 
be a lawful prince, as you will not deny ; — 
and if the King of Spain should command 
foreign conquered slaves to do the like. By 
your doctrine, neither the one nor the other 



., 



100 



L£X, REX ; OR, 



were obliged to resist by violence, but to 
pray, or ny ; which both were to speak to 
stones/ and were like the man who, in case 
of shipvn:eck, made his devotion of praying 
to the waves of the sea, not to enter the 
place of his bed and drown him. But a 
Christian king hath not this power ; why ? 
and a Christian king (by royaust's doctrine) 
hath a greater power tluui the Turk (if 
greater can be) : he hath power to com- 
mand his subjects to cast themselves into 
hell-fire ; that ^is, to press on them a ser- 
vice wherein it is written,— Adore the work 
of men's hands in the place of the living 
Grod; and this is worse than the Turk's 
commandment of bodily burning quicks 
And what is left to the Christian subjects 
in this case is the very same, and no other 
than is left to the Turkish and foreign Spa- 
nish subjects Either fly, or make prayers. 
There is no more left to us. 

2k Many royalists maintain that England 
is a conquered nation^ Why, theU) see 
what power^ by law of conquest^ the king of 
Spain hath over his slaves ; the same must 
the king of England have over his subjects. 
For, to royalists, a title by conquest to a 
crown is as lawful as a title by birth or 
election \ for lawftdness, in relation to Gk^d's 
law> is placed in an indiviable point, if we 
regard the essence of lawftdness ; and 
therefore there is nothing left to England, 
but that all protestants who take the oath of 
a protestant king^ to defend the true pro- 
testant religion, should, after prayers con- 
veyed to the king through the fingers of 
prelates and papists, leave the kmgdom 
«mpty to papists, prelates, and atheists^ 

3. AU power restrained that it cannot 
arise firom ten degrees to fourteen, — fix)m 
the kingly power of Saul {1 Sam. viil. 9, 
11) to the kuigly power of tnd great Turk, 
to fourteen,-*-must either be restrained by 
God's law, or by man's law, or by the in- 
nate goodness and grace of the prince, or 
by the providence of God. A restraint from 
God's law is vain ; for it is no question be- 
tween us and royalists but God hath laid a 
moral restraint on kings, and all men, that 
they have not moral power to sin against 
God» Is the restraint laid on by man's 
law ? What law of man ? The royalist saith, 
the king, as king, is above all law of man. 
Then (say I) no law of man can hinder 
the king's power of ten, to arise to the Tur- 
kish power of fourteen. All law of man, as 
it is man's law, is seconded either with ec- 



clesiastic^ and spiritual co-action, such as 
excommunication, or with civil and tempo- 
ral Co-4otion, such as is the sword, if it be 
violated. But royalists deny that either 
the sword of the church in excommunica- 
tion, or the civil sword, should be drawn 
against the king. This law of man should 
be produced by this profound jurist, the P. 
Prelate, who mocketh at all the statists and 
lawyers of Scotland. It is not a covenant 
betwixt the king and people at his corona- 
tion ; for though there were any such cove- 
nant, yet the breach of it doth bind before 
Grod, but not before man* Nor can I see, 
or any man else, how a law of man can lay 
a restraint on the king's power of two de- 
greeS) to cancel it withm a law, more than 
on a power of ten or fourteen degrees. If 
the king of Spain, the lawful sovereign of 
those over-European people, (as royalists 
say,) have a power of ibuiiieen degrees over 
those conquered subjects, as a kmg, I see 
not how he hath not the Hke power over his 
own subjects of Spain, to wit, even of four- 
teen ; for what agreeth to a king, as a king, 
(and kingly power firom Grod ne hath as 
king,) he hath it in relation to all subjects, 
except it be taken ft'om him in relation to 
some subjects, and given by some law of 
God^ or m relation to some other subjects. 
Now no man can produce any such law. 
The nature of the goodness and grace of 
the prince cannot lay bonds on the king to 
cancel his power, that be should not usurp 
the power of the king of Spain toward his 
over^EuropeanSk 1. RoyaHsts plead for a 
power due to the king, as king, and that 
from Grod, such as Sam had ; (1 Sam. viii. 
9, 11 1 X. 25 ;) but this power should be a 
power of grace and goodness in the king 
as a good man ; not in the king as a king, 
and due to him by law : and so the king 
should have his legal power from Grod to 
be a tyrant. But ii he were not a tyrant, 
but should lay limits on his own power, 
through the goodness of his own nature, 
no thanks to royalists that he is not a ty- 
rant ; for, actu primo^ and as he is a king, 
(as they say) he is a tyrant, having from 
Grod a tyrannous power of ten degrees, as 
Saul had ; (1 Sam. viii. ;) and why not of 
fourteen degrees as well as the great Turk, 
or the king of Spain ? If he use it not, it 
is his own personal goodness, not his official 
and royal power. The restraint of provi- 
dence laid by God upon any power to do 
ill, hindereth only the exercise of the power 



I 



not to break forth in aa tyrannous acts as 
ever the king of Spain or the great Turk 
can exercise toward any. Yea, providence 
lajeth physical restraint, and possibly mo- 
ral, sometimes, upon the exercise of that 
power that devils and the most wicked men 
of the world hath. But royalists must show 
us that providence hath laid bounds on the 
king's power, and made it &therly and not 
masterfy ; so that if it, the power, exceed 
bounds of fatherly power, and pass over to 
the despotical and masterly power, it may 
be resisted by the subjects ; but that they 
will not say. 

4. This paternal and fatherly power that 
God hath given to kings, as royalists teach, 
trencheth not upon the liberty of the sub- 
jects and the property of their eoods, but in 
and by lawM and just acts of jurisdiction 
(saith the P. Prelate). W^U ; then it may 
trench upon the hberty of soul and body of 
the subjects but in and by lawful and just 
acts of jurisdiction. But none are to judge 
of these acts of jurisdiction, whether they 
be just or not just, but the king, the only 
judge of supreme and absolute authority 
and power. And if the king command the 
idolatrous service in the obtruded service- 
book, it is a lawM and a iust act of jurisdic- 
tion. For to royalists, who make the kind's 
power absolute, all acts are so just to the 
subject, though he command idolatry and 
Mahommedanism, that we are to suffer only, 
and not to resist. 

5. The Prelate presumeth that&therly 
power is absolute ; but so, if a father murder 
his child, he is not accountable to the ma- 
gistrate therefor, but, being absolute over 
his children, only the Judge of the world, 
not any power on earth, can punish him. 

6. We have proved that the king's power 
is paternal or fatherly only by analogy, and 
improperly. 

7. What is this prerogative royal, we 
shall hear by and by. 

8. There is no restraint on earth laid 
upon this fatherly power of the king but 
God's law, which is a moral restraint. If 
then, the king challenge as great a power as 
the Turk hath, he only sinneth against Grod, 
but no mortal man on earth may control 
him, as royalists teach. And who can know 
wbttt power it is that royalists plead for, 
whether a despotical power of loraly power, 
or a fatherly power ? If it be a power above 
law, such as none on earth may resist it, it is 
no matter whether it be above law of two 



degrees, or of twenty, even to the great 
Turk's power. 

These go for oracles at court : Tacitus, — 
Principi gummun rerum arbitrium Dii de- 
derunty subditis obsequii gloria relicta est ; 
Seneca, — Indigna digna habenda sunt^ Rex 
quafadt; Salust, — Impune quidvis facerey 
Id esty Hegem esse. As if to be a king and 
to be a god who cannot err were all one. 
But certainly these authors are taxing the 
Hcense of kings, and not commanding their 
power. 

But that God hath given no absolute and 
unlimited power to a king above the law, is 
evident by this : — 

Arg. 1. — He who, in his first institution, 
is appointed of Grod by office, even when he 
sitteth on the throne, to take heed to read 
on a written copy of God's law, that he may 
" learn to fear the Lord his Gk)d, and keep 
all the words of this law," &c., he is not of 
absolute power above law. But (Deut. xvii. 
18, 19) the kii^ as kins, while he sitteth 
on the throne, is to do uiis ; therefore the 
assumption is clear, for this is the law of the 
king as king, and not of a man as a man. 
But as he sitteth on the throne, he is to 
read on the book of the law ; and (ver. 20) 
because he is king) " his heui^ is not to be 
lifted up above his brethren ;" and as king, 
(ver. 16,) ^*he is not to multiply horses," 
&c. So politicians make this argument 
good: — they say, Bex est lex vtva, ani- 
mata^ et loquens lex^ the king as king, is a 
livingi breathing, and speaking law. And 
there be three reasons of this, — 1. If all 
were innocent persons, and could do no vio- 
lence one to another, the law would rule 
all, and all men would put the law in exe- 
cution^ Cigendo sponte^ by doing right of 
their own accord; and there should be no 
need of a king to compel men to do right. 
But now, because men are by nature averse 
to good laws, therefore there was need of a 
ruler, who, by office, should reduce the law 
into practice ; and so is the king the law re- 
duced in practice. 2. The law is ratio sive 
menSy the reason or mind, free from all per- 
turbations of anger, lust, hatred, and can- 
not be tempted to iU ; and the king, as a 
man, may be tempted by his own passions, 
and therefore, as lung, he cometh by office 
out of himself to reason and law ; and so 
much as he hath of law, so much of a king ; 
and in his remotest distance from law and 
reason he is a tyrant. 3. Abstra,cta eon." 
cretis sunt puriora et perfectiora. Justice 



L 




is more perfect than a just man, whiteness 
more perfect than the white wall ; so the 
nearer the king comes to a law, for the 
which he is a king, the nearer to a king, 
Propter quod unumqit6dq%te tale, id ipsum 
magis tale. Therefore, kings throwing laws 
to themselves as men, whereas they should 
have conformed themselves to the law^ have 
erred. Cambyses, the son of Cyrus, because 
he loved his own sister, would have " the mar- 
riage of the brother with the sister lawful." 
Anaxarchus said to Alexander, (grieved in 
mind that he had killed Glytus,) Megi ac 
Joti themin atqvie institiam cissidere : — 
Judgment and righteousness did alway ac- 
company Grod and the king in all they do ; 
but some, to this purpose, say better : — The 
law, rather than the king, hath power of 
life and death. 

Arg. 2. — The power that the king hath 
(I speak not of his gifts) he hath it from the 
people who maketh him king, as I proved 
before ; but the people have neither for- 
mally nor virtually any power absolute to 
give the king. All the power they have 
is a legal and natural power to guide them- 
selves in peace and godliness, and save them- 
selves from unjust violence by the benefit of 
rulers. Now, an absolute power above a 
law is a power to do ill and to destroy the 
people, and this the people have not them- 
selves, it being repugnant to nature that any 
should have a natund power in themselves 
to destroy themselves, or to inflict upon 
themselves an evil of punishment to destruc- 
tion. Though therefore it were given, which 
yet is not granted, that the people had re- 
signed all power that they have into their 
king, yet if ne use a tyrannical power against 
the people for their hurt and destruction, he 
useth a power that the peojple never gave 
him, and against the intention of nature ; 
for they invested a man with power to be 
their father and defender for their good; 
and he faileth against the people's inten- 
tion in usurping an over-power to himself, 
which they never gave, never had, never 
could give ; for they cannot give what they 
never nad, and power to destroy themselves 
they never had. 

Arg. 3. — All royal power, whereby a 
king IS a king and differenced from a pri- 
vate man, armed with no power of the 
sword, is from Grod. But absolute power 
to tyrannise over the people and to destroy 
them is not a power from Grod ; therefore 
there is not any such royal power absolute. 



The proposition is evident, because that 
God who maketh kings and disposeth of 
crowns, (Prov. viii. 15, 16 ; 2 Sam. xii. 7 ; 
Dan. iv. 32,) must also create and give that 
royal and official power by which a king is 
a king. 1. Because Grod created man, he 
must be the author of his reasonable soul. 
If Grod be the aulJior of things, he must be 
the author of their forms by which they are 
that which they are. 2. All power is God's, 
(1 Chron. xxix. 11 ; Matt. vi» 13 ; Psal. 
Ixii. 11 ; Ixviii. 35 ; Dan. ii. 37)) and that ab- 
solute power to tyrannise, is not from God. 
1. Because, if this moral power to sin be 
from Grod, it being formally wickedness, 
Grod must be the author of sin* 2. What- 
ever moral power is from Grod, the exercises 
of that power, and the acts thereof, must be 
from God, and so these acts must be morally 
good and just ; for if the moral power be of 
God, as the author, so must the acts be. 
Now, the acts of a tyrannical power are acts 
of sinful injustice and oppression, and can- 
not be from Grod. 3. Politicians say, there 
is no power in rulers to do ill, but to help 
and defend the people, — as the power of a 
physician to destroy, of a pilot to cast away 
the ship on the rock, the power of a tutor 
to waste the inheritance of the orphan, and 
the power of father and mother to kill their 
children, and of the mighty to defraud and 
oppress, are not powers from Grod. S6 
Ferdinand, Vasquez illustr. quest, l.l, c. 
26, c. 45; Prickman d, c. 3, sect, Soluta 
potestas ; Althus, pol. cap. 9, n. 25. 

BarclaiuB,! Grotius, Dr Feme, (The P. 
Prelate's wit could come up to it,) say, 
" That absolute power to do ill, so as no 
mortal man can lawfiilly resist it, is &om 
Grod; and the king hath this way power 
from God as no subject can resist it, but he 
must resist the ordjnance of God, and yet 
the power of tyranny is not simply from 
God." 

Ana. — The law saith, Ulud possumus 
quod jure possumus, Pa/pinus F, Jllius, D, 
de cond. Just, It is no power which is not 
lawful power. The royalists say, power of 
tyranny, in so far as it may be resisted, and 
is punishable by men, is not from Grod. But 
what is the other part of the distinction ? It 
must be, that tyrannical power is simpliciter 
from God, or in itself it is from God; bift afi 
it is punishable or restrainable by subjects, 
it is not from Grod. Now, to be puniimable 



1 Barclaius, contra MonarchOi lib. 2. p. 62. 



=J 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



103 



by subjects is but an sccident, and tyrannical 
power is tbe subject ; yea, and it is a separ* 
able accident; for many tyrants are never 
punished, and their power is never re- 
strained : such a tyrant was Saul, and many 
persecuting emperors. Now, if the tyran- 
nical power itself was from God, the ar- 
gument is yet valid, and remaineth unan- 
swered. And shall not this fall to the ground 
as &lse, which Amisseus saith, (de autho, 
princ, c. 2, n, 10,) Dum contra qfidum 
facit, magistratus non est magiiftratuSy 
quippe a quo non injuria^ sed jus noLSci 
debeaty L meminerinU 6. (7. unde vi. dtn, 
in C, quod quis, 24, n. 4, 6. — Et de hoc 
neminem dubitare aut dissentire scribity 
Marant. disp. 1, num, 14. When the 
magistrate doth anything by violence, and 
without law, in so far doing against his 
office, he is not a magistrate. Then, say I, 
that power bv which he doth, is not of God. 
None doth, then, resist the ordinance of God 
who resist the king in tyrannous acts. If 
the power, as it cannot be punished by the 
subject nor restrained, be from God, there- 
fore the tyrannical power itself, and without 
this accident — ^that it can be punished by 
men — it must be from God also. But the 
conclusion is absurd, and denied by royalists. 
I prove the connection : If the king have 
sucn a power above all restraint, the power 
itself, to wit, king David's power to kill 
innocent Uriah, and deflower Bathsheba, 
without the accident of being restrained or 
punished by men, it is either from God or 
not from God. If it be from God, it must 
be a power against the sixth and seventh 
commandments, which God gave to David, 
and not to any subject ; and so David lied 
when he confessed this sin, and this sin can- 
not be pardoned because it was no sin : and 
kinas, necause kings, are under no tie of 
duties of mercy, and truth, and justice to 
their subjects, contrary to that which God's 
law requireth of alljudges (Deut. i. 16—17; 
xvii. 16—20 ; 2 Chron. xix. 6, 7 ; Bom. 
xiii. 3, 4) : if this power be from God, as it 
is unrestrmable and unpunishable by the 
subject^ it is not from God at all; for how 
can God give a power to do ill, that is un- 
punishable by men, and not give that power 
to do ill ? It is inconceivable ; for in this 
very thing that God giveth to David — ^a 
power to murder the innocent — with this re- 
spect, that it shall be punishable by God 
only, and not by men, God must give it as 
a sinfiil power to do ill, which must be a 



power of dispensation to sin, and so not to 
be punished by either God or man, which is 
contrary to ms revealed will in his word. 
If such a power as not restrainable by man 
be from God by way of permission, as a 
power to sin in devils and men is, then it 
is no royal power, nor any ordinance of God ; 
and to resist this power, is not to resist the 
ordinance of God. 

Arg. 4. — That power which maketh the 
benefit of a king to be no benefit, but a 
judgment of God, as a making all the peo- 
ple slaves, such as were slaves amongst the 
Romans and Jews, is not to be asserted by 
any Christian ; but an absolute power to do 
ill, and to tyrannise, which is supposed to be 
an essential and constitutive of kings, to 
difference them from all judges, makem the 
benefit of a king no benefit, but a judgment 
of God, as m^ng all the people slaves. 
That the major may be clear, it is evident, 
1. To have a king is a blessing of God, be- 
cause to have no king is a judgment ; Judg. 
xvii. 6, " Every man doth what seemeth 
good in his own eyes." (Judg, xviii. 1 ; 
xix. 1 ; xxi. 26,) 2. So it is a part of 
God's good providence to provide a xing for 
his people, (1 Sam, xvi, 1 ; so 2 Sam. v. 
12.) And David perceived that the Lord 
had established him king over Israel, and 
that he had exalted his kingdom for his 
people Israel's sake, 2 Sam, xv. 2, 3, 6 ; 
xviii. 3 ; Bom. xiii. 2r — 4. If the king be 
a thing good in itself, then can he not, actu 
primoy be a curse and a judgment, and es- 
sentially a bondage and slavery to the peo- 
ple ; also the genuine and intrinsical end of 
a kkig is the good, (Bom. xiii. 4,) and the 
good of a quiet and peaceable life in all god- 
liness and honesty (1. Tim. ii. 2); and he is 
by office, custos utriusque tdbulce^ whose 
genuine end is to preserve the law from 
violence, and to defend the subject ;-^he is 
the people's debtor for all happiness possi- 
ble to be procured by God's sword, either in 
peace or war, at home or abroad. For the 
assumption is evident. An absolute and 
arbitrary power is a king«-law, such as roy- 
alists say Grod gave to Saul (1 Sam. viii. 
9, 11 ; X. 26) to play the tyrant ; and this 

Eower, arbitrary and unlimited, above all 
iws, is^that which, (1.) Is given to God; 
(2.) Distinguisheth essentially the kings of 
Israel from the judge, saith Barclary, Gro- 
tius, AmissBus; (3.) A constitutive form of 
a king, therefore it must be actu primo^ a 
benefit, and a blessing of Grod ; but if (}od 



u 



104 



LEX, tlBX ; OR, 



hath gben my such power absolute to a 
king : as, 1. His will must be a law, either 
to do or suffer all the tyranny and cruelty 
of a tiger, a leopard, a Nero, or a Julian ; 
then hath Grod given, <ietu prima, a power 
to a king, as smg, to enslaTe the people 
and flock of God, redeemed by the blood of 
God, as the slaves among the Romans and 
Jews, who were so under their masters, as 
their bondage was a plague of Grod, and the 
lives of the people oi Gsd under Pharaoh, 
who compelled them to work in brick and 
day. 2. Though he cut the throats of the 
people of Grod, as the lioness Queen Mary 
did, and command an army of soldiers to 
come and bum the cities of the land, and 
kill man, wife, and children ; yet in so do- 
ing, he doth the part of a king, so as you 
cannot resist him as a man, and obey him 
as a king, but must give your necks to him, 
upon this ground, because this absolute 
power of his is ordained of Grod ; and there 
IS no power even to kill and destroy the in- 
nocent , but it is of Grod. So saith Paul, 
Bom. xiii,, if we believe court-prophets, or 
rather lying-spirits, who persuade the king 
of Britain to make war against his three 
dominions. Now, it is clear that the dis- 
tinction of bound and free continued in Is- 
rael even under the most tyrannous kings; 
(2 Kings iv. 1 ;) yea, even when the Jews 
were captives under Ahasuerus. (Esth. vii. 
4.) And what diiference should there be 
between the people of Grod under their 
own kings, and when they were captives 
under tyrants, serving wood and stone, and 
false gods, as was threatened as a curse in 
the law? (Deut. xxviii. 25, 36, 64, 68.) 
If their own kings, by God's appointment, 
have the same absolute power over them, 
and if he be a tyrant, aatu primo, that is, 
if he be indued with absolute power, and so 
have power to play the tyrant, then must 
the people of God be actu primo^ slaves, 
and under absolute subjection ; for they are 
relatives, as lord and servant, conqueror and 
captive. It is true, they say, kings by office 
are fathers, they cannot put forth in action 
their power to destroy. I answer, it is their 
goodness of nature that they put not forth 
m action all their absolute power to destroy, 
which God hath given them as kings, and 
therefore, thanks are due to their goodness, 
for that they do not, actu secundo^ play the 
tyrant ; for royalists teach, that by virtue of 
their office Grod hath given to them a royal 
power to destroy; therefore, the Lord's 



nle are slaves under them, though they 
not with them as slaves, but that hin- 
dereth not but the people by condition are 
slaves. So many conquerors of old did deal 
kindly with their slaves whom they took in 
war, and dealt with them as sons; but as 
conquerors they had power to sell them, to 
kill them, to put them to work in brick and 
clay. So say I here, royal power and a 
king cannot be a blessing, and cujtu prima 
a favour of Grod to the people, for the which 
they are to pray when tney want a kin? 
that they may have one, or to praise God 
when they have one. But a king must be 
a curse and a judgment, if he be such a 
creature as essentiaUy, and in the intention 
and nature of the thing itself, hath by office 
a royal power to destroy, and that from 
God ; for then the people praying — " Lord 
give us a king," snould pray, " Make us 
uaves. Lord ; take our liberty and power from 
us, and give a power unlimited and absokte 
to one man, by which he may, if he please, 
waste and destroy us, as all the bloody em- 
perors did the people of God." Surely, I 
see not but they should pray for a tempta- 
tion, and to be led into temptation when 
they pray God to give them a king; and, 
therefore, such a power is a vain thing. 

Arg, 6, — A power contrary to justice, 
to peace and the good of the people, that 
looketh to no law as a rule, and so is un- 
reasonable, and forbidden by the law of Grod 
and the civil law, (L. 15. Jllius de condit. 
Instit,) cannot be lawffil power, and cannot 
constitute a lawful judge ; but an absolute 
and unlimited power is such. How can the 
judge be the minister of Grod for good to 
the people (Bom. xiii. 4) if he have such 
a power as a king, given him of Grod, to 
destroy and waste the people ? 

Arg, 6, An absolute power is contrary to 
nature, and so unlawful ; for it maketh the 
people give away the natural power of de- 
fending their life against illegal and cruel 
violence, and maketh a man mio hath need 
to be ruled and lawed bv nature above all 
rule and law, and one who, by nature, can 
sin against his brethren such a one as can- 
not sm against any but God only, and mak- 
eth him a lion and an unsocial man. What 
a man is Nero, whose life is poetry and 
painting I Domitian, only an archer; Va- 
lentinian, only a painter; Charles IX. of 
France, only a hunter; Alphonsus Dux 
Ferrariensis, only an astronomer; Philip 
of Macedonia, a musican ; £md all because 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



106 



they are kings. This our king deinieth, 
irhen he saith, (art. 13,) *^ There is power 
legally placed in the parliament more than 
sufficteat to prevent and restrain the power 
of tyranny.'* Sut if they had not power to 
play the lions, it is not much that kings are 
musicians, hxmterBy &c, 

Ara, .7. — God, in making a king to pre- 
serre his people, should give liberty without 
all poUtic restrain,. lor one man i/> destroy 
many, whidi is contrary to God's end in the 
fifth commandment, if one have absolute 
power to destroy souls and bodies of many 
thousands. 

Arg, 8. — If the kings of Israel and Ju- 
dah were under censures and rebukes of the 
prophets, and eintied against God and the 
people in rejecting these rebukes, and in 
persecuting we prophets, and were under 
this law not to take their neighbour's wife, 
or his vineyard from him against his will; 
and the inferior judges were to accept the 
persons of none in judgment, small or great; 
and if the king yet remain a brother, not- 
withstanding he be a king, then is his power 
not above any law, nor absolute. For what 
reason ? — 1. He should be under one law of 
Grod to be executed by men, and not under 
another law ? Boyalists are to show a diifer- 
rence from Grod's word. 2. His neighbours, 
brother, or subjects, may by violence keep 
back ^eir vineyards, and chastity from the 
king. Naboth may by force keep his own 
vineyard from Achab. By the laws of Scot- 
land, if a subject obtain a decree of the 
king, of violent possession of the heritages 
of a subject, he nath by law power to cast 
out, force, apprehend, and deliver to prison 
those who are tenants, brooking these lands 
by the king's personal commandment. If 
a king shoiud force a damsel, she may vio- 
lently resist, and by violence, and bodily op- 
posing of violence to violence, defend her 
own dbastity. Now, that the prophets have 
rebuked kings is evident : Samuel rebuked 
Saul, Natlm David, Elias king Achab; 
Jer^uiah is commanded to prophecy against 
the kings of Judah, (Jer. L 18,) and the pro- 
phets practised it. (Jer. zix. 3; xxi. 2; xxii. 
13—16; Hos. V. 1.) Kings are guilty be- 
fore God because they submitted not their 
royal power and greatness to the rebukes of 
the prophets, but persecuted them. 

Deut. xvii. 20, The kin^ on the throne 
remaiheth a brother;^ Fsal. xxii. 22, and 
so the judges or three estates are not to ac- 
cept of the person of the king for his great- 



ness in judgment ; Deut. i. 16, 17, and the 
judge is to give out such a sentence in judg- 
ment as the Lord, with whom there is no 
iniquity, would give out if the Lord himself 
were sitting in judgment; because the judge 
is in the very stead of God, as his lieutenant; 
(2 Chron. xix. 6, 7; PsaL Ixxxii. 1, 2; 
j[>eut. i. 17 ;) and with God there is no re- 
ssj^ect of persons. (2 Chron. xix. 7 ; 1 Pet. 
i. 17 ; Acts X. 34.) I do not intend that 
any inferior judge sent by the king is to 
judge the king; but those who gave him 
the throne, and made him kin?, are truly 
above him, and to judge him witnout respect 
of persons, as God himself would judge if 
he were sitting on the bench. 

Grod is the author ^of civil laws and go- 
vernment, and his intention is therein me 
external peace, and quiet life, and godliness 
of his church and people, and that aU judges, 
according to their places, be nurse-&thers 
to the (Siurch. (Isa. xlix. 23.) Now God 
must have appointed sufficient means for 
this end ; but there is no sufficient means 
at all, but a mere anarchy and confusion, 
if to one man an absolute and unlimited 
power be given of God, whereby, at his 
pleasure, he may obstruct the fountains of 
justice, and command lawyers and laws to 
speak not Grod's mind, that is justice, right- 
eousness, safety, true religion, but the sole 
lust and pleasure of ene man. And this 
one having absduto and irresistible influ- 
ence on aU the infericnr instruments of jus- 
tice, may, by this power, turn aU into an- 
archy, and put the people in a worse condi- 
tion than it there were no judge at aU in 
the land. For that of politicians, that ty- 
ranny is better than anarchy, is to be taken 
cum grano acdis ; but I shall never believe 
that absolute power of one man, which is 
actu prima tyranny, is God's sufficient way 
of peaceable govemm^it. Therefore, Bar- 
claius^ saith nothing for the contrary, when 
he saith, *' The Athenians made Draco and 
Solon absolute law-givers, for, a facto ad 
jus non valet consequential** What if a 
roving people, trusting Draco and Solon to 
be kings above mortal men, and to be gods, 
gave them power to make laws, written not 
with ink, but with blood, shall other kings 
have from God the like tyrannical and bloo^ 
power from that to make bloody laws ? 
Chytreus (Ub. 2) and Sleidan citeth it, (1. 



s Barclaius contra Monarch, lib. 2, p. 76, 77* 

Q 



106 



LEX, BEX ; OR, 



1 ;) Sueron^ Sub pc^na periurii ncn tenen' 
tur fdem sevare regi degeneri. 

Arg, 9.-=-He who is regulated by law, 
and sweareth to the three estates to be re- 
gulated by law, and accepteth the crown 
corenant-wise, and so as the estates would 
refuse to make him their king^ if either he 
should refuse to swear, or if they did be- 
lieve certainly that he would break his oath, 
hath no unlimited and absolute power from 
GrOd or the people ; for, fcedus conditioner 
turn, aut promissio conditionalis mutua, 
faeit jus alteri in alterum, a mutual condi- 
tional covenant giyeth law and power over 
one to another^ But, from that which hath 
been said, the king sweareth to the three 
estates to be regulated by law — ^he accepteth 
the crown upon the tenor of a mutual cove- 
nant, &c. ; for if he should ^ as king, swear 
to be king, that is, one who hath absolute 
power above a law, and also to be regulated 
by a law, he should swear things contra- 
dictory, that is, that he should be their 
king, having absolute power over them, and 
according to that power to rule them ; and 
he shouM swear not to be their king, atid 
to rule them, not according to absolute 
power, but according to laww If) therefore, 
this absolute power be essential to a king, 
as a king, no king can lawfully take the 
oath to govern according to law, for then he 
should swear not to reign as king, and not 
be their king; for how could he biB their 
king, wanting that which God hath made 
essential to a king as a king ? 



QUESTION XXIII. 

WHETHER THE KING HATH ANY ROYAL PRERO-^ 
GATIVE, OR A POWER TO DISPENSE WITH 
LAWS ; AND SOME OTHER GROUNDS AGAINST 
ABSOLUTE MONARCHY. 

A prerogative royal I take two ways: 
either to be an act of mere will and plea^ 
sure above or beside reason or law, or an 
act of dispensiation beside or against the 
letter of the law-. 

Assert. 1. — That which royalists call the 
prerogative royal of princes is the salt of 
absolute power; and it is a supreme and 
highest power of a king, as a king, to do 
above, without or contrary to a law or rea- 



son^ which is unreasonable. 1. When God's 
word speaketh of the power of kings and 
judges, l)eut. xvii. 15 — 17 ; i. 15 — 17, and 
elsewhere there is not any footstep or any 
ground for such a power; and, therefore, 
(if we speak according to conscience,) there 
is no such thing in the world ; and because 
royalists cannot give us any warrant, it is 
to be rejected. 2. A prerogative royal 
must be a power of doing good to the peo- 
ple, and grounded upon some reason or law ; 
but this is but a branch of an ordinary li- 
mited power, and no prerogative above or 
beside law ; yea, any power not mounded 
on a reason different from mere mJl or ab- 
solute pleasure is an irrational and brutish 
power I and, therefore, it may well be jus 
persowBy the power of the man who is king; 
it cannot be jus coronoB, any power annexed 
to the crown ; for this holdetn true of all the 
actions of the king^ as a king, illud potest 
reXy et illud tantum quod jure potest. The 
king, as king, can do no more than that 
which upon right and law he may do. 3. 
To dispute this question, whether such a 
prerogative s^ee to any king, as king, is to 
dispute whether God hath made all under 
a monarch slaves by their own consent; 
which is a vain question. Those who hold 
such a prerogative, must say the king is so 
absolute and unlimited a god on earth, that 
either by law, or his sole pleasure beside 
law, he may regularly and rationally move 
all wheels in p^cy \ and his uncontrolled 
will shall be tne coletree on which all the 
wheels are turned^ 4. That which is the 
garland and proper flower of the King of 
kings, as he is absolute above his creatures, 
and not tied to any law, without himself, 
that regulateth his will, that mu&t be given 
to no mortal man or king, except we would 
communicate that which is God's proper 
due to a sinful man, which must be sdola- 
tory^ But to do royal acts out of an abso- 
lute power above law and reason-, is such a 
power as agreeth to God, as is evident in 
positive laws and in acts of Grod's mere 
pleasure, where we see no reason without 
the Almighty for the one side rather than 
for the ouier-, as Grod's forbidding the eat- 
ing of the tree of knowledge maketh the 
eating sin and contrary to reason; but 
there is no reason in the object : for if God 
should boknmand eating of that tree, not to 
eat should also be sin. So God's choosing 
Peter to glory and his refusing Judas, is a 
good and a wise act, but not good or wise 



,^-^- 




froip the object of the act, but from the lole 
wise pleasure of God ; because, if God had 
chosen Judas to glory and rejected Peter, 
that ^ct had been no less a good and a wise 
act than the former. For when there is 
m law in the object but only God's will, 
the act is good and wise, seeing infinite 
wisdom cannot be separated from the per- 
fect will of God ; but no act of a morts^ king, 
having sole and only will, and neither law 
nor reason in it, can be a lawful, a wise, or 
a good act. 

Assert, 2, — There is somethii^g which 
may be called a prerogative bv way of dis- 
pensation, There is a threerold dispensa- 
tion, — one of power, another of justice, and 
a third of grace, 1. A dispensation of power 
is wheii ^e will of the law-giver maketh 
that act to be no sin, which without that 
will would have been sin, — ^aa if God's com- 
manding will had not intervened, the Israel- 
ites borrowing the ear-rings ai,d jewels of 
the Egyptians, and not restoring them, had 
been a breach of the eighth commyidment ; 
and ip this sense no king hath a prerogative 
to dispense with a law, 2. There is a dis- 
pensation of law and justice not Rowing from 
aiiy pre^rogative, but from the true intent of 
the law ; and thus the king, yea, the inferior 
judge, is not to take the life of a man whom 
the letter of the h^w would condemn, be- 
cause the justice of the law is the intent and 
life of the law ; and where nothing is done 
against the intent of the law, there is no 
breach of any law, 3. The third is not un- 
like unto the second, when the king expon- 
@th the law by grace, a;id this is twon)ld : 
(1,) Either wnen he exponeth it of his wis- 
dom aiid merci^ pature, inclined to mercy 
and justice, yet, according to the just in- 
tent, n^^tive sense, and scope of the law, 
considering the occasion, circumstances of 
the fact, apd comparing both with the law,^-^ 
and this dispensation of grace I grant to 
the king, as when the tribute is great and 
the man poor, the king may dispense with 
the custom.^ (2,) Tne law saith, in a 
doubtful case the prince may dispense, be- 
cause it is presumed the law can have no 
sense against the principal sense and intent 
of the mw. 

But there is another dispensation that 
royalists do plead for, and tu^t is, a power 

1 {n re dabifh possant dlspensave pripcipes, quia 
imlliiB sensns psesamitnr, qui Tinoat principalem, 
lib. 1, leet. initiuiii ib. 



in the king, ex mera grcttia absolutoB po^ 
testatis regalis, out of mere grace of abso- 
lute royal power to pardon crimes which 
God's law saith should be punished bydeaUi. 
Now, this they call a power of grace ; — ^but 
it is not a power of mere grace, 

1. Though princes may dp some things 
of grace, yet not qf mere grace; because 
what kin^ do as kings, and by virtue of 
their roy^l office, that they do «c dehito 
oMciiy by debt 8wi4 right of their office; and 
that they cannot but do, it not being artfi- 
trary to them to do the debtfiil acts of their 
office : hut what they do of mere grace, that 
they do as good men, and pot aaldngs, and 
that they may pot do. As, for example, 

. some kings, out of their pretended prero^- 
tive, have given four pardons to one man for 
four murders. Now this the king might 
have left undone without sin, but of mere 
^race he pardoned the murderer who killed 
tour men. But the truth is, the king killed 
the three last, because he hath no power in 
point of conscience to dispense with blood, 
Num. XXXV, 31 ; Gen, ix. 6. These par- 
dons are acts of mere grace to one man, but 
acts of blood, to the oommumty, 

2, Because the prinee is ^e minister of 
God for the good oi the subject; and there- 
fore the law saith, '< He cannot pardon and 
free the guilty of the punishment due to 
him ; (Contra I, quodfavore, F, de leg, I. 
non ideo minus^ F. deproc, I, legata ifiwti- 
liter^ F. de lega, 1 ;) and the reason is clear : 
He is but the minister of God, a revenger 
to execute wrath upon hun that doth evil. 
And if the judgment be the Lord's, not 
man's, not the kmg's, as it is indeed, (Deut, 
i, 17 ; 2 Chron, xix. 6,) he cannot draw the 
sword against the innocent, nor absolve the 
guilty, except he would take on himself to 
qarve and dispose of that which is proper to 
his master. Now certain it is, God only, 
univocally and easentiaUy as Grod» is tlie 
judge, (Psal. Ixxv. 7,) and God only and 
essentially king, (Psal, xcvii, 1 ; xdx. 1,) 
and aU men m relation to him are mere 
ministers, servants, legates, deputies; and 
in relation tq Imn, equivocally and impro- 
perly, judges or kings, and mere created 
and breathnig shadows of the power of the 
King of kings. And look, as the scribe 
following his own device, and writing what 
sentence he plee^th, is not an officer of the 
court in that point, nor the pen and servant 
of the judge, so are kings and all judges 
hut forged intruders and bastard kings and 






=.1 



J 



108 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



judges, in 80 far as they give out the sen- 
tenoBB of men, and are not the very months 
rf the King of kin^ to pronounoe such a 
sentence as the Abm^htj himself wouM do, 
if he were sitting on ttie throne or hench. 

3. If the king, from any supposed prero- 
gative royal, may do acts of mere ffcace 
without any warrant of law, because ne is 
above law by office, then also may he do 
acts of mere rigorous justice, and kill and de- 
strc^ the innocent, out of the same supposed 
prerogative ; for God's word equally tyeth 
him to the place of a mere minister in doin&r 
good, u in executing wrath on evil-doers, 
ilom. x&i. 8, 4. Aim reason would say, he 
must be as absolute in the one as in the 
other, seeing God tyeth him to the one as 
to the other, by his office and place ; yea, 
by this, acts of justice to ill-doers, and acts 
of reward to well-doers, shall be arbitrary 
morally, and by virtue of office to the king, 
and the word prerogative royal fiaith this ; 
for the word prerogative is a supreme power 
absolute that is loosed from all law, and so 
from all reason of law, and depending m 
the king's mere and naked pleasure and 
will ; and the word royal or Kingly is an 
epithet of office and of a judge, — a created 
and limited judge, and so it must tie this 
supposed prerogative to law, reason, and to 
that which is dehitum hgcde c^cii and a 
legal duty of an office; and by this our mas- 
ters, the royalists, make Grod to frame a 
rational creature, which ihej call a king, to 
frame acts of royalty, good and lawful, upon 
his own mere pleasure and the super-domi- 
nion of his will above a law and reason. 
And from this it is that deluded oounsellcms 
made king James (a man not of edis^ow un- 
derstanding) and king Charles to give par^ 
dons to sucn bloody murderers as James a 
Grant ; and to go so &r on, by this 8ni^K)6ed 
prerogative royal, that king Charles m par- 
liament at E<&iburgh, 1633, did command 
an high point of religion: — ^that ministers 
skoula use, in officiatmg ki God's service, 
such habits and garm^its as he pleaseth, 
that is, all the atture and habits of the ido- 
latrous mass-priests that the Bomish priests 
of Baal useth in the oddest point of idola- 
ixj (the adoring <^ bread) tktit the eardi 
has ; and by this prerogative the king com- 
manded the Servioe Bock in Scotland, anno 
1637, without or above law and reason. 
And I desire any man to satisfy me in lliis, 
if the king's prerogative royal may over- 
les^ law and reascm in two degrees, and if 



he may as king, by a prerogative royal, 
command the wdj of popery in a popish 
book ; — ^if he may not, 1^ the same reason, 
over-leap law and reason by the elevation of 
twenty aegrees ; — ^and if you make the kins 
a Julian, (God avert, and give the spirit m 
revelation to our king,) may he not com- 
mand all the Alkoran and the religion of 
the heathen and Indians? Boyalists say 
the prerogative of royalty excludeth not 
reason, and maketh not the Ismg to do as a 
brute beast, without all reason, but it giv- 
eth a power to a king to do by his royal 

Eleasure, not fettered to the dictates of a 
Lw; for in things which the king doth by 
his prerogative royal he is to follow the ad- 
vice and counsel of his wise council, though 
their counsel and advice doth not bind the 
royal will of the king. 

Ans, 1. — I answer, it is to me, and I am 
sure to many more learned, a great -ques- 
tion, — ^if the will of any reasonable creature, 
even of the damned angels, can will or 
choose anything which "uieir reason, cor- 
rupted as it is, doth not dictate kic et nunc 
to be good ? For the object of the will of 
all men is good, either truly, or apparently 
good to the doer; for the devil could not 
suit in marriage souls except he war in the 
clothes of an angel of light ; sin, as sin, can- 
not seU, or obtnide itself upon any, but 
under the notion of good. I tnink it seem- 
eth good to the great Turk to command 
innocent men to cast themselves over a 
precipice two hundred fathoms high into 
the sea, and drown themselves to pleasure 
him; so the Turk's reason (for he is ra- 
tionsJ, if he be a man) dictateth, to his vast 
pleasure, that that is good which he com- 
mandeth. 

2. Counsellors to the king, who wfll 
(^eak what will please the queen, are but 
naked empty titles, for they speak que 
plcbcentf non que prosunt, what may please 
the king whom they make glad with their 
lies, not what law and reason dictateth. 

3. Absoluteness <^ an unreasonable pre- 
rogative doth not deny counsel and law 
also, for none more absolute, de facto, I 
cannot say dejure, than the kings of Baby- 
lon and Persia ; for Daniel saith of one of 
them, (Dan. v. 19,) " Whom he would he 
slew, and whom he would he kept alive, and 
whom lie would he set up, and whom he 
would he put down ;" and yet these same 
kings did nothing but by advice of thMr 
princes and counsellors; yea, so as they oould 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



109 



not alter a decree and law, aa is clear; 
(Esth. i. 14 — 17, 21) yea, Darius, defacto^ 
an absolute prince, was not able to deliyer 
Daniel, because the kw was passed; that he 
should be cast into the lions' den. (Dan. 
vi. 14—16.) 

4. That which the Spirit of God condem- 
neth as a point of tyranny in Nebuchad- 
nezzar, is no lawful jprerogatiTe royal ; but 
the Spirit of Grod oondemneth this as tyranny 
in Nebuchadnezzar, — that he slew whom he 
would, he kept alire whom he would, he set 
up whom he would, he put down whom he 
would. This is too God-like. (Deut. xxxii. 
39.) So Pohmus^ and RoUocus' on the place 
say, he did these thin^, (ver 19,) Ex 
abusn legitimm potestatisf tor Nebuchad- 
nezzar's wiU, in matters of death and life, 
was his law, and he did what pleased him- 
self, aboye aU law, beside ana contrary to 
it. And our flatterers of kings draw the 
king's prerogatiye out of Ulpian^ words, who 
saitn, *' That is a law which seemeth good 
to the prince;" but Ulpian was far from 
making the prince's will a rule of good and 
ill; for he saith the contrary, " That the 
law ruleth the just, prince." 

5. It is considerable here, that Sanches^ 
defineth the absolute power of kings to be 
a plenitude and fiilness of power, subject to 
no necessity, and bounded with rules of no 
public law; and so did Baldus^ before him. 
But all politicians condemn that of Caligula, 
(as Suetonius saith,'^) which he spake to 
Alexander the Great, ** Remember that 
thou must do all things, and that thou hast 
a power to do to all men what thou pleasest." 
Aud lawyers say, that this is tyranny. 
Chilon, one of the seven wise of Greece, (as 
Rodigi,*) saith better, " Princes are like gods, 
because they only can do that which is just ; 
and this power,^ being merely tyrannical, can 
be no ground of a royal prerogative. Tliere 
is another power (saith Sanches) absolute, 
by which a prince dispenseth without a cause 
in a human law ; and this power, saith he, 
may be defended. But he saith, what the 
king doth by this absolute power he doth it 



1 PoUniu in Daniel, c 5, 19. 

s RoUocnSy com. 16, lb. 

s Th. Sanches de matr. torn. 1 , lib. 2, dig. 16, n. 
3, est arbitrii plenitndo, nnlli necesa&tati Bubjecta, 
nnllintq. ; pnblici juris regnUs limitata. 

^ Baldus, lib. 2, n. 40, C. de senrit. et aqna. 

' SuetonL in Calign. cap. 29, memento Ubi omnia, 
et in omnes licere. 

> Gaelias Rodigi, lib. 8, Lect. Antiq. e. 1. 



valide^ validly, but not jure, by law ; but by 
valid acts the Jesuit must mean royal acts. 
But no acts void of law and reason (say we) 
can be royal acts; for royal acts are acts 
performed by a king, as a king, and by a law, 
and so cannot be acts above or beside a law. 
It is true a king may dispense with the 
breach of a human law, as a human law, 
that is, if the law be death to any who 
goeth upon the walls of the city, the king 
may pardon any, who, going up, diseoveretn 
the enemies approach, and saveth the city. 
But, 1. The mferior judge according to 
the hnmtsm that benign interpretation that 
the soul and intent of the law requireth, 
may do this as well as the king. 2. All 
acts of independent prerogative are above 
a law, and acts of free will having no causfe 
or ground in the. law, otherwise it is not 
founded upon absolute power, but on power 
ruled by law and reason. But to pardon a 
breach of the letter of the law of man by 
exponing it according to the true intent of 
the law, and benignly, is an act of legal ob- 
ligation, and so of the ordinary power of ail 
judges ; and if either king or judge kill a 
man for the violation of the letter of the 
law, when the intent of the law contradict- 
eth the rigid sentence, he is guilty of in- 
nocent blo^. If that learned Ferdinandus 
Vasquez be consulted, he is against this 
distinction of a power ordinary and extra- 
ordinary in men ; and certainly, if you give 
to a king a prerogative above a law, it is a 
power to do evil as well as good ; but there 
IS no lawAil power to do evil; and Dr Feme 
is plunged in a contradiction by this, for he 
saith, (sect. 9, p. 68,) " I ask when these 
emperors took away lives and goods at plea- 
sure ? Was that power ordained by God ? 
No ; but an illegal will and tyranny ; but 
(p. 61) the power, though abused to execute 
such a wicked commandment, is an ordi- 
nance of Grod." 

Obj. 1. — For the lawfulness of an absolute 
monarchy, — ^the Eastern, Persian, and Turk- 
ish monarchy maketh absolute monarchy law- 
ful, for it is an oath to a lawful obligatoiy 
thing ; and judgment fEzek. xvii. 16, 18) is 
denounced against Juaah for breaking the 
oath of the kmg of Babylon, and it is called 
the oath of God, and doubtless was an oath 
t>f absolute subjection ; and the power (Rom. 
xiii.) was absolute, and yet the apostle 
calleth it an ordinance of <xod. The so- 

1 Vasqnez, illnst. qnest. lib. 1, c. 26, n. 2. 



110 



LSX, REX ; OS, 



yereignty of masters over servante yras ab- 
solute, and the apostle exhorteth not to re- 
nounce thaib title as too rigid, but exhorteth 
to moderation in the use of it. 

Ans, 1, — That the Persian monarchy 
was absolute is but a facto ad jus^ and no 
rule of a lawful monarchy ; but ths^t it was 
absolute, I believe not. Darius, who was an 
absolute prince, as many think, but I think 
not, would gladly ho-ve delivered Daniel 
from the power of a law, (Dan. vi. 14,) "And 
he set his heart on Daniel to deliver him, 
and he laboured till the going down of the 
sun to deliver him," and was so sorrowful 
that he could not break through a law, that 
he interdicted himself of all pleasures of 
musicians ; and if ever he had used the ab- 
soluteness of a prerogative royal, I con- 
ceive he would have done it in this, yet he 
could not prevail. But in things not estab- 
lished by law I conceive Darius was abso- 
lute, as to me is clear, (Dan vi, 24,) but ab- 
solute not by a divine law, but de facto, 
quod transierat ir^ jus humanum, by fact, 
which was now become a law. 

2, It was Grod's oath, and God tied 
Judah to absolute subjection, therefore, 
people may tie themselves. It foUoweth not, 
except you could make good this inference : 
1, God is absolute, therefore the king of 
Babylon may lawfully be absolute. This is a 
blasphemous consequence, 2- That Judah 
was to swear the oath of absolute subjection 
in the latitude of the absoluteness of the 
kings of Chgldea, I would see proved. Their 
absoluteness by the Chaldean laws was to 
command murder, idolatry, (pan. iii. 4, 5,) 
and to make wicked la^s. (Dap. vi. 7, 8.) 
I believe Jeremiah pommanded not absolute 
subjection in this sense, but the contrary. 
^Jer. X. 11.) They were to swear the oath 
m the point of suffering ; but what if the 
kiQg of Chaldea had commanded them all, 
the whole holy seed, men, women and chil- 
dren, out of his royaj power, to give their 
necks all in one day to his sword, were 
they obliged by this oath to prayers and 
tears, and only to suffer? pnd was it 
against the oath of God to defend them- 
selves by arms? I believe the oath did 
not oblige to such absolute subjection, and 
though they had taken arms in their own 
lawful defence, according to the law of na- 
ture, they had not broken the oath of God. 
The oath was not a tie to an absolute subjec- 
tion of all and every one, either to worship 
idols, or then to fly or suffer death. Now, 



the Service Boq& oommanded, in the king's 
absolute authority, . all Scotland to commit 
grosser idolatry, in the intention of the 
work, if not in the intention of the com- 
mander, than was in Babylon, We read not 
that the king of Babylon pressed the con- 
sciences of Grod's people to idolatry, or that 
all should either fly the kingdom, and leave 
their inheritances to papists and prelates, or 
then come under the mercy of the sword of 
papists and atheists by sea or land. 3. God 
may command against the law of nature, 
and God's commandment maketh subjection 
lawful, so as men may not now, being under 
that law of Grod, defend themselves. What 
then ? Therefore we owe subjection to ab- 
solute princes, and their power must be a 
lawful power, it nowise is consequent. God's 
commandment by Jeremia*h. made the sub- 
jection of Judah lawful, and without that 
commandment they might have taken arms 
against the king of Babylon, as they did 
against the Philistines; and God's com- 
mandment maketh the oath liawfliL As 
suppose Ireland would all rise in arms, 
and conae and destroy Scotland, the king of 
Spain leading, then we were by this argu- 
ment not to resist. 4. It is denied, that 
the power, (Eom. xiii.,) as absolute, is God's 
ordinance. And J deny utterly that Christ 
and his apostles did swear nonrresistance 
absolute to the Eoman emperor. 

Obj. 2,--It seemeth, (1 Pet. ii, 18, 19,) 
if weU-doing be mistaken by the reason and 
judgment of an absolute monarch for ill- 
doing, and we punished, yet the magistrate's 
will is the command of a reasonable will, 
and so to be &;ubmitted unto ; because such a 
one suffereth by law, where the monarch's 
will is a law, and in this case some power 
must judge. Now in an absolute monarchy 
all judgment resolveth in the will of the 
monarch, as the supreme law ; and if an- 
cestors have submitted themselves by oath, 
there is no repeal or redressment. 

-4»w.-:— Whoever was the author of this 
treatise he is a bad defender of the defen- 
sive wars in England, for all the lawflilness 
of wars then must depend on this : 1. 
Whether England be a conquered nation at 
the beginning? 2. If the law-will of an 
absolute monarch, or a Nero, be a reason- 
able will, to ifhich we must submit in suf- 
fering ill, I see not but we must submit to 
a reasonable will, if it be reasonable will in 
doing ill, no less than in suffering iU. 3. 
Absolute will -in absolute monarchies is no 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



Ill 



judge dejure, but an unlawful and a usurp- 
ing judge. (1 Pet. ii. 18, 19i) Servants are 
not commanded simply to sufifen (I can 
prove suffering formally not to fall under 
any law of Grod> but ordy patient suffering. 
I except Christ, who was under a peculiar 
commandment to suffer^) But servants, 
upon supposition that they are servants, and 
buffeted unjustly by their masters, are, by 
the apostle Peter, commanded (ven 20) to 
suffer patiently. But it doth not bind up a 
servant's hand to defend his own life with 
weapons if his master invade hiin, without 
cause, to kill him ; otherwise, if God call him 
to suffer, he is to suffer in the manner and 
way as Christ did, not reviling, not threa*- 
tening. 4. To be a king and an absolute 
master to me are contradictory, A king es- 
sentially is a living law ; an absolute man is 
a creature that they call a tyrant, and no 
lawful king* Yet do I not mean that any 
that is a ^ing^ and usurpeth absoluteness, 
leaveth off to be a king ; but in so far as he 
is absolute he is no more a king than in so 
far as he is a tyrant. But further, the king 
of England saith in a declaration, 1. The 
law is the measure of the king's powers 2. 
Parliaments are essentiallv lord-judges, to 
make laws essentially, as the king is, there- 
fore, the king is not above the law. 3. 
Magna ChaHa, saith the king, can do no- 
thmg but by laws, and no obedience is due 
to him but by law. 4. Prescriptions taketh 
away the title of conquests. 

Ohj. 3k — The king, not the parliament^ 
is the anointed of God. 

^n^.^-The pajrliament is as good, even a 
congregation of gods. (Ps. Ixxxii. 6.) 

Obj, 4. — The parliament in the court, in 
their acta, they say, with consent of our so- 
vereign lord. 

Ans%~£hej say not at the command- 
ment and absolute pleasure of our sovereign 
lord. He is their lord materially, not as 
they are formally a parliament, for the king 
made them not a parliament; but sure I am 
the parliament had power before he was 
king, and made him king. (1 Sam. x. 17, 
18.J 

06;. 5. — 111 an absolute monarchy there 
is not a resignation of men to any will as 
will, but to the reasonable will of the mo- 
narch, which, having the law of reason to 
direct it, is kept from injurious acts. 

Am. — If reason be a sufficient restraint, 
and if God hath laid no other restraint upon 
some lawful king, then is magistracy a lame, 



a needless ordinance of God ; for all man- 
kind hath reason to keep themselves from 
injuries, and so there is no need of judges 
or kin^ to defend them from either domg 
or suffering injuries. But certainly this 
must be admirable, — ^if God, as autnor of 
nature, should make the lion king of all 
beasts, the lion remaining a devouring beast, 
and should ordain by nature all the sheep 
and lambs to come and submit their bodies 
to him, by instinct of nature, and to be 
eaten at his will, and then say, the nature 
of a beast in a lion is a sufficient restraint 
to keep the lion horn devouring lambs. 
Certainly, a king being a sinM man, and 
having no restraint on his power but rea- 
son, he may think it reason to allow rebels 
to kill, drown, hang, torture to death, an 
hundred thousand protestants, men, wo- 
men, infants in the womb, and sucking 
babes^ as is clear in Pharaoh, Manasseh, 
and other princes. 

Obj, 6* — There is no court or judge above 
the long, therefore he is absolutely supreme. 

Ans, — The antecedent is false. 1. The 
court that made the king of a private man 
is above him ; and here are Hmitations laid 
on him at his coronation. 2. The states of 
parliament are above him, to censure him. 
3. In case of open tyranny, though the 
states had not time to convene in pariiia- 
ment, if he bring on his people an host of 
Spaniards or foreign rebels, nis own con- 
science is above him, and the conscience of 
the people far more, called conscientia ter- 
ra, may judge him in so &r as they may 
rise up and defend themselves. 

Obj, 7. — Here the Prelate, (c. 14, p. 
144,^ borrowing from Grotius, Barclay, 
Amis8Bus> (or it is possible he be not so mr 
traveUed, for Dr Feme hath the same,) 
" Sovereignty weakened in aristocracy can- 
not do its work, and is in the next place to 
anarchy and confusion. When Zedekiah 
was overlorded by his nobles, he could nei- 
ther save himself nor the people, nor the 
prophet, the servant of Godj Jeremiah ; 
nor could David punish Joab when he was 
overawed by that power he himself had put 
in his head. To weaken the hand is to 
distemper the Whole body ; if any good 
prince, or his royal ancestors, be cheated of 
their sacred right by fraud or force, he may, 
at his fittest opportunity, resume it. What 
a sin it is to rob God or the king of their 
due !" 

-4»w.— Aristocracy is no less an ordinance 



112 



LEX, B£X; OR, 



of God than royalty, for (Bom. xiiL 1, and 
1 Tim. ii.) — 1. All in authority are to be 
admowledged as Grod's vice«>reffent8^ the se- 
nate, the consuls, as well as me emperor; 
and so one ordinance of God cannot weaken 
another, nor can any but a lawless animal 
say, aristocracy boidereth with confusion; 
but he must say, order and light are sis- 
ter-germans to concision and dwrkness. 2. 
Th(mgh Zedekiah, a man void of God, was 
0¥er-awed by his nobles, and so could not 
help Jeremiah, it followeth not that because 
kings may not do this and this cood, there- 
fore they are to be invested wim power to 
do all ill : if they do all the good that diey 
have power to do, they will find way to help 
the oppressed Jeremiahs, And, because 
power to do both good and evil is given by 
the devil to our Scottish witches, it is a poor 
consequent that the states should give to the 
king power absolute to be a tyrant. 3. A 
state must give a king more power than or- 
dinary, especially to execute laws, which re- 
quireth singular wisdom, when a prince 
cannot always have his great eoun^ about 
with him to advise him. 1. That is power 
borrowed, and bv loan, and not properly his 
own ; ami there&re it is no sacnlese in the 
states to. resume what the king hath by a 
fiduciary title, and borroiwed from them. 2. 
This power waa given to do good, not evil. 
David had power over Joab to punish him 
for his murder, but he executed it not upon 
carnal fears, and abused his power to xill 
innocent Uriah, which power neither Grod 
nor the states gave him. But how proveth 
he the states took power from David, or 
that Joab took power firom David to put to 
death a murderer ? That I see not. 3, If 
princes' power to do good be taken firom 
them, they may resume it when God giveth 
opportunity ; but this is to the Prelate per* 
jury, that the people l^ oath give away 
their power to their kmg and resume it 
when he abuseth it to tyranny. But it is no 
perjury in the king to resume a taken-away 
power, which, if it be his own, is yet lis sub 
judice, a great controversy. Quod in Oajo 
Ucety in Nemo non licet. So he teacheth 
the king that perjury and sacrilege is lawful 
to him. If princes' power to do ill and cut 
the whole land off as one neck, (which was 
the wicked desire of Caligula,) be taken fi:om 
them by the states, I am sure this power 
was never theirs, and never the people's ; 
and you cannot take the prince's power 
from him which was never his power, I 



am also sure the prince should never re- 
sume an unjust power, though he were 
dieated of it. 

P. Prelate, — It is a poor shift to acknow- 
ledge no more for the royal prerogative 
than the municipal law hath determined, as 
some smatterers in the law say. They can- 
not distinguish betwixt a statute declara- 
tive and a statute constitutive ; but the sta- 
tutes of a kingdom do declare only what is 
the prerogative royal, but do not constitute 
or make it. God Almighty hath by himself 
constituted it. It is laughter to say the de- 
calogue was not a law tiU God wrote it. 

Ans, — Here a profound lawyer calleth 
all smatterers in the law, who cannot say 
that non ens, a prerogative royal, that is, a 
power contrary to God and man's law to 
kill and destroy the innocent, came not im- 
mediately down from heaven. But I pro- 
fess myself no lawyer; but do maintain 
against the Prelate that no municipal law 
can constitute a power to do ill, nor can 
any law either justly constitute or declare 
such a fancy as a prerogative royal. . So far 
is it from being like the decalogue, that is, 
a law before it be written, that liiis prero- 
gative is neither law heiore it be written, 
nor after court-hunters, have written for it ; 
for it must be eternal as the decalc^ue if it 
have any blood from so noble a house. In 
what scripture hath God Almighty spoken 
of a fancied prerogative royal ? 

P. Prelate (p. 145). — Prerogative rest- 
eih not in its natural seat, but m the king. 
Grod saith, Beddite, not DcUe, render to 
kings that which is kings, not give to kings ; 
it mail never be well with us if his anointed 
and his church be wronged. » 

Ans. — The Prelate may remember a 
country proverb : he and his prelates (called 
the church, — the scum of men, not the 
church,) are like the tinker's dogs, — ^they 
Hke good company — ^they must be ranked 
with the king. And hear a false prophet : 
It shall never be well with the land while 
arlntrary power and popery be erected, saith 
he, in ^od sense. 

P. Prelate (c. 16, p. 170, 171).— The 
king hath his right from God, ana cannot 
make it away to tne people. Bender to Cae- 
sar the things that are Caesar's. Kings' 
persons, their charge, their right, their au- 
thority, their prerogative, are by Scrip- 
tures, fathers, juriste, sacred, inseparable 
(»-dinances inherent in their crowns, — ^they 
cannot be made away ; and when they are 



given to inferior judges, it is not ad minu* 
mdam majestatem, ded aolidtudinem, to 
lessen sovereign niajesty, but to ease them. 

Ans, — 'The king hath his right from Grod. 
What, then not m>m the people ? I read 
in Scripture, the people made the king, 
never that the king made the people. All 
these are inseparably in the crown, but he 
stealeth in prerogative royal, in the clause 
which is now in question, ** Render to Cee- 
sar all Osesar's;" and therefore, saith he, 
render to him a prerogative, that is, an ab- 
solute power to pardon and sell the blood of 
thousands. Is power of blood either the 
the king's, or mherent inseparably in his 
crown? Alas I I fear prelates have made 
blood an inseparable accident of his throne. 
When kings, by that public power given to 
them at weir ooronation, maketh inferior 
judges, they give them power to judge for 
theXord, not for men. (Deut. H7; 2 Chron, 
xix. 6,) Now, they cannot both make away 
a power and keep it also ; for the inferior 
judge's conscience hangeth not at the king's 
irdle. He hath no less power to judge in 
is sphere than the king hath in his sphere, 
though the orb and circle of motion be larger 
in compass in the one than in the other; and 
if the king cannot give himself royal power, 
but God and the people must do it, how can 
be communicate any part of that power to 
inferior judges except by trust? Yea, he 
hath not that power that other men have 
in many respects : — 

I. He may not marry whom he pleaseth ; 
for he might give his body to a leper woman, 
and so hurt the kingdom.-^2. He may not 
do as Solomon and Ahab, marry the daugh- 
ter of a strange ^od, to make her the mother 
of the heir of 9ie crown. He must in this 
follow his great senate. He may not expose 
his person to hazard of wars. — ^3, He may 
not go over sea and leave bis watch-tower, 
without consent. — 4. Many acts of parlia- 
ment of both kingdoms discharge papists to 
con^e within ten miles of the king, — 5. Some 
pemidoos counsellors have been discharged 
his company by laws. — 6. He may not eat 
what meats he pleaseth. — 7. He may not 
make wasters his treasurers. — 8. Nor dila- 
pidate the rents of the crown. — 9. He may 
not disinherit his eldest son of the crown at 
his own pleasure.-*- 10. He is sworn to follow 
no Mae gods and false religions, nor is it in 
his power to go to mass. — 11, If a priest 
say mass to the kuig, by the law he is hang- 
ed, drawn and quartered. — 12. He may not 



write letters to the Pope, by law. — 13. He 
may not, by law, pardon seducing priests and 
Jesuits.— 14, He may not take pnysic for his 
health but from physicians, sworn to be true 
to him. — 15. He may not educate his heir 
as he pleaseth. — '16. He hath not power of 
his children, nor hath he that power that 
other fathers have, to marry his eldest son 
as he pleaseth.— 17. He may not befriend 
a traitor. — -18. It is high treason for any 
woman to give her body to the king, except 
she be his married wife. — 19. He ought not 
to build sumptuous houses without advice of 
bis council.-— 20, He may not dwell con- 
stantly where he pleaseth, — =21. Nor may 
he go to the country to hunt, far less to 
kill nis subjects and desert the parliament. 
* —22. He may not confer honours and high 
places without his council,--^23. He may not 
deprive judges at his will. — 24. Nor is it 
in nis power to be buried where he pleaseth, 
but amongst the kings. Now, in most of 
these twenty-four points, private persons 
have their own liberty fer less restricted 
than the king. 



QUESTION XXIV, 

WHAT POWER THE KING HATH IN RELATION 
TO THE UlW and THE PEOPLE, AND HOW 
A KING AND A TTRANT DIFFER. 

Mr Symmons saith, (sect. 6, p. 19,) that 
authority is rooted rather in the prince than 
in the law ; for as the king giveth being to 
the inferior judge, so he doth to the law it- 
self, making it authorisable; for propter quod 
utium^quodque tale, id ipsum magis tale, 
and therefore the king is greater than the 
law? others say, that the Bng is the foun- 
tain of the law, and the sole and only law- 
giver. 

Assertion First. — 1. The law hath a two- 
fold consideration, — (1.) Secundum esse pee* 
nale, in relation to the punishment to be in- 
flicted by man.l (2.) Secundum esse legis, 
as it is a thing legally good in itself. In the 
former notion it is this way true, — ^human 
laws take life and being, so as to be pun<r 
ished or rewarded by men, from the will of 
princes and law-givers V *nd so Symmons 
saith true, because men cannot punish or re- 
ward laws but where they are made; and 



1 Barclaias, lib. 4, c. 23, p. 325. 
R 



\ 



114 



LEX, rex; OB, 



the will of rulers putteth a sort of stamp on 
a law, that it bnngeth the oommonw^dth 
under goiltinesB it thej break this law. 
But this maketh not the king greater than 
the law, for therefore do rulers put the 
stamp of relation to punishment on the law, 
because there is intnnsical worth in the law 
prior to the act of the ¥dll of lawgivers for 
which it meriteth to be enacted; and, there- 
fore, because it is authorisable as good and 
just, the king putteth on it this stamp of a 
politic law. God formeth being and moral 
aptitude to the end in all laws, to wit, the 
safety of the people, and the lang's will is 
neither the measure nor the cause of the 
goodness of kings. 

2. If the kmg be he who makelli the 
law good and just, because he is more such 
himself, then as liie law cannot crook, and 
err, nor sin, neither can the king sin, nor 
break a law. This is blasphemy; every man 
is a liar : a law which deserveth the name 
of a law cannot lie. 

3. His ground is, that there is such ma- 
jesty in kings, that their will must be done 
either in us or on us. A great untruth. 
Ahab's will must neither be done of Elias, 
for he oommandeth things unjust, nor yet 
on Elias, for Elias fled, and lawfully we may 
fly tyrants ; and so Ahab's will in killing 
Elias was not done on him. 

Assertion Second, — 1. Nor can it be 
made good, that the king only hath power 
of makmg laws, because his power were then 
absolute to inflict penalties on subjects, with- 
out any consent of theirs ; and that were 
a dominion of masters, who command what 
they please, and under what pain they please. 
And the people consenting to be niled by 
such a man, they tacitly consent to penalty 
of laws, beouise natural reason saith, an ill- 
doer should be punished / (Fhrianus in I, 
inde. Vasquez, I, 2, c. 55, n. 3, ) therefore 
they must have some power in making these 
laws. 

2. Jer. xxvi., It is clear the princes judge 
with the people. A nomothetic power dif- 
fereth gnuiually only from a judicial power, 
both being collateral means to the end of 
government, the people's safety. But par- 
liaments judge, therefore they have a no- 
mothetic power with, the king. 

3. The parliament giveth all supremacy 
to the king, therefore to prevent tyranny, 
it must keep a co-ordinate power with the 
king in the highest acts. 

4. K the kingly line be interrupted, if 



the king be a child or a captive, they make 
laws who make kings; therefore, this nomo- 
thetic power recuireth into the states, as to 
the first subject. 

06;. — The king is the fountain of the law, 
and subjects cannot make laws to themselves 
more than they can punish themselves. He 
is only the supreme.^ 

Ans. — The people being the fountain of 
the king must rather be the fountain of 
laws, fii is &]se that no man maketh laws 
to himself. Those who teach others teach 
themselves also, (1 Tim. ii. 12 ; 1 Cor. xiv. 
34,) though teaching be an act of authority. 
But they agree to the penalty of the law 
seoondanly only ; and so doth tiie kins who, 
as a fiither, dotn not will evil of puni^ment 
to his children, but by a consequent will. 
The king is the only supreme in the power 
ministerial of executing laws ; but this is a 
derived power, so as no one man is above 
him ; but in liie fountain-power of royalty 
the states are above him. 

5. The civil law is dear, that the laws of 
the emperor have force only finom this foun- 
tain, because the people have transferred 
their power to the king. Lib. 1, digest, tit. 
4, de constit. Princip. leg. 1, sic Ulpian. 
Quod fyrindpi placuitf (loquitur de prin- 
dpe formaliter, qua princeps est, non qua 
est homo,) legis habet vigorem, utpote cum 
legi regia, quce de imperio ejus lata est. 
populus ei, et in cum, omne suum imperium 
et potestatem conferat. Yea, the emperof 
himself may be convened before the prince 
elector. (Aurea BuUa Carol. 4, Imper. 
c. d.) The king of France may be con- 
vened before the senate of Paris. The 
states may resist a tyrant, as Bossius saith, 
(de principe, et privUeg. ejus, n. 65. Pa^ 
ris de puteo, in tract, syno. tit. de excess, 
reg. c. 3.) Divines acknowledge that Elias 
rebuked ^e halting of Israel betwixt God 
and Baal, that their princes permitted Baal's 
priests to converse with the king. And is 
not this the sin of the land, that they suffer 
their king to worship idols? And, there- 
fore, the land is pimished for the sins of 
Manasseh, as Knox observeth in his dispute 
with Lethington, where he proveth that the 
states of Scotland should not permit the 
queen of Scotland to have her abominable 
mass. (Hist, of Scotland.) Surely the power, 
or sea prerogative, of a deepy or mad pilot, 
to split the ship on a rock, as I conceive, is 

1 Symmons' Loyal Subject, sect. 5, p. 8. 




limited by the passenfirera. Suppose a father 
inadistlper^/set his pWhoiue on 
fire, and bom himself and his ten sons, I 
conceiye his fiitherlj prerogative, which nei- 
ther God nor nature gave, should not be 
looked to in this, but mej may bind him. 
Yea, Althusius (polit. c. 39), answering this, 
" That in democracy the people cannot both 
command and obey," saith, It is true, aecua^ 
dum idem^ ad idemy et eodem tempore. But 
the people may (saith he) choose magistrates 
by succession. Yea, I say, 1. They may 
change rulers yearly to remove envy: a 
yearly king were more dangerous, the king 
being almost above envy. Men incline more 
to flatter than to envy kings. 2. Aristotle 
saith, (polit. 1. 4, c 4, 1. 6, c. 2,| The peo- 
ple may give their judgment of tne wisest. 

Obj. 1. — ^WiUiams, bishop of Ossory, in 
Vinddc Beg. (a looking-glass for rebels,) 
saith, " To say the king is better than any 
one, doth not prove him to be better than 
two ; and if his supremacy be no more, then 
any other may challenge as much, for the 
prince is singulis major, A lord is above 
ail knights; a knight above all esquires ; and 
so the people have placed a king under tliem, 
not above them. 

Ans^ — The reason is not alike : 1. For 
all the knights united cannot make one 
lord; and all the esquires united cannot 
make one knight ; but all the people united 
made David king at Hebron. 2. The king 
is above the peope, by eminence of derived 
authority as a watchman, and in actual su- 
premacy; and he is inferior to them in 
fountain-power, as the effect to the cause. 

06;. 2. — The parliament (saith Williams) 
" may not command the king ; why, then, 
make they supplication to him, if their vote 
be a law? 

Ans. — They supplicate, ex decentia, of 
decency and oonveniency for his place, as 
a city supplicate a lord naayor; but they 
supplicate not ex debitOy of obligation, as 
bemrs seek alms, then should they be 
cyders. When a subject oppressed snp- 
phcateth his sovereign tor justice, the king 
is obliged, by office, to give justice; and 
to hear the oppressed is not an act of grace 
and mercy, as to give alms, though it should 
proceed from mercy in the prmce, (Fsal. 
Ixxii. 13,) but an act of royal debt. 

Ohj. 3.— The P. Prekte (c. 9, pp. 103, 
104) objecteth: The most you clium to 
parliament is a co-ordinate power, which, 
in law and reason, run in equal terms. In 



law, par in parem wm habet imperium ; 
an equal cannot judge an equal, much less 
may an inferior usurp to ;ud^e a supe- 
rior. Our Lord knew, gratia visiomSy the 
woman taken in adultery to be guilty, but 
he would not sentence her ; to teach us, not 
improbably, not to be both judge and wit- 
ness. The parliament are judges, accusers, 
and witnesses against the kmg in their own 
cause, against the imperial laws. 

Ans, 1. — The parliament is co-ordinate 
ordinarilv with the king in the power of 
making laws ; but the co-ordination on the 
king's part is by derivation, on the parHa^ 
ment's part, oriatnaltter et/ontaliter, as in 
the fountain. 2. In ordinary there is co- 
ordination ; but if the king turn tyrant, 
the estates are to use their fountain-power. 
And that of the law, par in parem, &c. is 
no better from his pen, that stealeth all he 
hath, than from Barclaius, Grotius, Ami- 
seeus, Blackwood, &c.: it is cold and sour. 
We hold the parliament that made the king 
at Hebron to be above their own creature, 
the king. Barclaius saith more accurately, 
(1. 6, cent. Monarch, p. 129,) " It is absurd 
that the people should both be subject to 
the king, and command the king also. — Ans. 
1. It is not absurd that a father natural, as 
a private man, should be subject to his son ; 
even that Jesse, and his elder brother, the 
lord of all the rest, be subject to David their 
king. Boyalists say, Our late queen, being 
supreme magistrate, might by law have put 
to death her own husband, tor adultery or 
murder. 2. The parliament should not be 
both accuser, judge, and witness in their 
own cause. 1. It is the cause of religion, 
of God, of protestants, and of the mole 
people. 2. The oppressed accuse ; there is 
no need of witnesses in raismg arms against 
the subjects. 3. The P. Prelate could not 
object this, if against the imperial laws the 
king were both party and judge in his own 
cause ; and in these acts of arbitrary power, 
which he hath done through bad counsel, in 
wronging fondmental laws, raising arms 
against his subjects, bringing in foreign 
enemies into botn his kingdoms, &c. Now 
this is properly the cause of the king, as he 
is a man, and his own cause, not the cause 
of Gt)d ; and by no law of nature, reason, 
or imperial statutes, can he be both judge 

judge without any fellow sharers m power, 
(1.) He is not obliged by law to follow coun- 
sel or hold parliaments ; for counsel is not 



command. (2.) It is impossible to limit him 
even in the exercises of his power, which 
yet Dr Feme saith cannot be said ; for if 
any of his power be retrenched, God is rob- 
bedi saith Maxwell. (3») He may by law 
play the tyrant gratis. 

Feme objecteth, (sect* 7, p. 26,) — The 
king IS a fundamental ydth. the estates ; now 
foundations are not to be stirred or re- 
moved* 

Avis, — The king, as king, inspired with 
law, is a fundamental, and his power is not 
to be stirred; but as a man wasting his 
people, he is a destruction to the house and 
community, and not a fundamental in that 
notion. 

Some object: The three estates, as men, 
and looking to their own ends, not to law 
and the public good, are not jBandamentals, 
and are to be judged by the king* 

Ans.^Bj the people, and the conscience 
of the people, they are to be judged^ 

Obj^-^oxxi the people also do judge as 
cormpt men, and not as the people, and a 
politic body providing for their own safety* 

Ans, — -I grant all; when Grod will bring 
a vengeance on Jerusalem, prince and peo> 
pie both are hardened to their ovra de- 
struction* Now, God hath made all the 
three. In every government where there 
is democracy, there is some chosen ones re- 
sembling an aristocracy, and some one for 
order, presiding in democratical courts, re* 
sembling a king* In aristocracy, as in Hol*- 
land, there is somewhat of democracy,— the 
people have th^ir commtssi(^ers, and one 
duke or general, as the prince of Orange is 
some umbrage of royalty ; and in monarchy 
there are the three estates of parliament, 
and these contain the three estates, and so 
somewhat of the three forms of government; 
and there is no one government just that 
hath not some of all three* Power and ab* 
solute monarchy is tyranny; unmixed de- 
mocracy is comusion ; untehipered aristo- 
cracy is factious dominion ; and a limited 
monarchy hath from democracy respect to 
public good, without confusion. From aristo- 
cracy safety in multitude of counsels with- 
out factious emulation, and so a bar laid on 
tyranny by the joint powers of many; and 
from sovereignty union of many children in 
one &ther ; and all the three thus contem- 
pered have their own sweet fmits through 
God's blessing, and their own diseases by 
accid^it, and through men's cormption ; 
and neither reason nor Scripture shall war- 



rant any one in its rigid purity without 
mixture. And God havmg chosen the best 
government to bring men fallen in sin to 
happiness, must warrant in any one a mix- 
ture of all three, as in mixed bodies the 
four elements are reduced to a fit temper 
resulting of all the four, where the acrimony 
of all the four first qualities is broken, and 
the good of all combined in one. 

1. The king, as the king, is an unerrin? 
and living law, and by grant of Barclay,^ 
of old, was one of excellent parts, and noble 
through virtue and goodness ; and the good- 
ness of a &ther as a &ther, of a tutor as a 
tutor, of a head as a head, of a husband as 
a husband, do agree to the king as a king ; 
so, as king, he is the law itself, commanding, 
governing, saving* 2* His will as king, or 
his royal will, is reason, conscience, law* 3. 
This will is politicly present (when his person 
is absent) in all parliaments, courts, and in- 
ferior judicatures. 4. The kmg, as king, can- 
not do wrong or violence to any* 5* Amongst 
the Bomans the name king and tyrant were 
common to one thing* (1.) Because, de 
facto^ some of their kings were tyrants, in 
respect of their dominion, rather than kings. 
(2.) Because he who was a tyrant, de facto ^ 
should have been, and was a king too, de 
jure, 6. It is not lawful either to disobey 
or resist a king as a king, no more than it 
is lawful to disobey a good law. '"» What 
violence, what injustice and excess of pas- 
sion the king mixeth in with his a/cts of 
government, are merely accidental to a king 
as king ; for, because men by their own in- 
nate goodness will not, yea, morally cannot 
do tibat which is lawful and just one to an- 
other, and do naturally, since the fall of 
man, violence one to another ; therefore, if 
there had not been sin, there should not 
have been need of a king, more than there 
should have been need of a tutor to defend 
the child whose father is not dead, or of a 
physician to cure sic^ess where there is 
healtli ; f<»*, remove sin, and there is neither 
death nor sickness; but because sin is en- 
tered into the world, God devised, as a re- 
medy of violence and injustice, a living, 
rational, breathing law, called a king> a judge, 
a father. Now the aberrations, violence, 
and oppression of this thing which is the 
Hving, rational, breathing law, is no medium, 
no mean intended by God and nature to 
remove violence. How shall violence re- 

-'■-■ 
1, Bftrcl. ad yetsaB Monarcbo* lib. 1, p. 24 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



117 



move yiolence ? Therefort ka unjust king, 
as unjust, is not that genuine ordinance of 
God, appointed to remove injustice, but ac- 
cidental to a king. So we may resist the 
injustice of the king, and not resist the king. 
8. If, then, any cast off the nature of a 
king, and become habitually a tyrant, in so 
iar^e is not from Grod, nor any ordinance 
which Grod doth own. If the office of a 
tyrant f to speak so) be contrary to a king's 
offices, it is not from God, and so neither is 
the power from Grod. 9. Yea, lawd, (which 
are no less from God than the king's are,) 
when they begin to be hurtful, cessant mar 
teriaUter^ they leave off to be laws \ because 
they oblige non secundwn vim verborum^ 
sed in vtm sensua^ not according to the 
force of words, but according to sense, — I. 
non figura literarum F, de actione et o&- 
ligatione, L ita stipulattts. But who (saith 
the royalists) shall be judge betwixt the 
king and the people, when the people allege 
that the king is a tyrant. 

Ans. — There is a court of necessity no 
less than a court of justice ; and the funda- 
mental laws must then speak, and it is with 
the people, in this extremity, as if they had 
no ruler. 

Obj, 1. — But if the law be doubtful, as 
all human, all civil, all municipal laws may 
endure great dispute, — ^the peremptory per- 
son exponing the law must be the supreme 
judge. This cannot be the people, there- 
tore it must be the king. 

Ans. 1. — As the Scriptures in all funda- 
mentals are clear, .and expone themselves, 
and (zctu primo condemn heresies, so all 
laws of men in their fundamentals, which 
are the law of nature and of nations, are 
clear ; and, 2. Tyranny is more visible and 
intelligible than heresy, and is soon decerned. 
If a king bring in upon his native subjects 
twenty thousand Turks armed, and the xing 
lead them, it is evident they come not to 
make a friendly visit to salute the kingdom, 
aad depart in peace. The people mve a 
natural throne of policy in tlieir conscience 
to give warning, and materially sentence 
against the king as a tyrant, and so by 
nature are to defend themselves. Where 
tyranny is more obscure^ and the thread 
small, that it escape the eye of men, the 
king keepeth possession ; but I deny that 
tyranny can be obscure long. 

Obj. 2.-— Dr Feme (p. 3, sect. 6, p. 39).— 
A king may not, or cannot easily alter the 
irame of fundamental laws, he may make 



some actual invasion in some transient and 
unfixed acts ; and it is safer to bear these, 
than to raise a civil war of the body against 
the head. 

Ans, 1. — If the king, as king, may alter 
any one wholesome law, by that same reason 
he may alter all. 2. You give short wings 
to an arbitrary prince, if he cannot overfly 
all laws to the subversion of the frmdamen- 
tals of a state, if you make him, as you dp, 
(1.) One who hath the sole legislative power, 

la^eth 1 



who allenarly by himself maketh laws, and 
his parliament and council are only to give 
him advice, which by law he may as easily re- 
ject as they can speak words to him, he may 
in one transient act (and it is but one) cancel 
all laws made agaiiist idolatry and popery, 
and command, through bad counsel, in all his 
dominions, the Pope to be acknowledged as 
Christ's vicar, and idl his doctrine to be 
established as the catholic true religion. It 
is but one transient act to seal a {^xdon to 
the shedding of the blood of two hundred 
thousand killed by papists. (2.) If you make 
him a king, who may not be resisted in 
any case, and though he subvert all funda- 
mental laws, he is accountable to God only : 
his people have no remedy, but prayers or 
flight. 

Obj. 3.— Feme (p. 3. sect. 6, p. 39). — 
Limitations and mixtures in monarchies do 
not imply a forcible restraining power in 
subjects, for the preventing of the dOssolution 
of the state, but only a legal restraining 
power ; and if such a restraming power be 
m the subjects by reservation, then it must 
be expressed in the constitution of the 
government, and in the covenant betwixt 
ttxe monarch and his people. But such a 
condition is unlawful, which will not have 
the sovereign power secured, — is unprofitable 
for king and people, — ^a seminary for sedi- 
tions and jealousies. 

Avis, L — I understand not a difference 
betwixt forcible restraining and le^ re- 
straining: for he must mean by "legal," 
man's law, because he saith it is a law in the 
covenant betwixt the monarch and his people. 
Now, if this be not forcible and physical, it is 
only moral in the conscience of the king, and 
a cypher and a mere vanity; for God, not the 
people, putteth a restraint of conscience on 
the King, that he may not oppress his poor 
subjects; but he shall sin against Grod — ^that 
is a poor restraint : the goodness of the 
king, a sinful man, inclined from the womb 
to all sin, and so to tyranny, is no restraint. 



118 



LEX, BBX ; OR, 



2. There is no necessity that the reserve 
be expressed in the covenant between king 
and people^ more than in contract of mar- 
riage between a husband and a wife; beside 
her jointure, you should set down this 
clause in the contract, that if the husband 
attempt to kill the wife, or the wife the 
husband, in that case it shall be lawful to 
either of them to part oompanv. For Dr 
Feme saith, " That personal defence is law- 
ful in the people, if the king's assault be 
sudden, without colour of law, or inevitable." 
Yet the reserve of this power of defence is 
not necessarily to be expressed in the con- 
tract betwixt king and people. Exigencies 
of the law of nature cannot be set down in 
positive covenants, they are presupposed. 3. 
He saith, " A reservation of power whereby 
sovereignty is not secured, is unlawful." 
Lend me this argument : the riving awajr of 
a power of defence, and a making the king 
absolute, isunlawM, because by it the people 
is not secured ; but one man hath thereby 
the sword of God put in his hand, whereby 
ex oMcio he may, as king, cut the throats 
of thousastds, and be accoiintable to none 
therefor, but to God only. Now, if the 
non-securing of the king make a condition 
unlawful, the non-securing of a kingdom and 
church, yea, of the true region, (which are 
infinitely in worth above one single man,) 
may £sur more make the condition unlaw- 
ful. 4. A legal restraint on a king is no 
more unprofitable, and a seminary of jea- 
lousies between king and people, than a 
legal restraint upon people; for the king, 
out of a non-restraint, as out of seed, may 
more easily educe tyranny and subversion 
of religion. If outlandish women tempt 
even a Solomon to idolatry, as people may 
educe sedition out of a legal restraint laid 
upon a king, to say nothing that tyranny is 
a more (mngerous sin than sedition, by 
how much more the lives of many, and true 
religion, are to be preferred to the safety of 
one, and a false peace. 

Obj. 4. — An absolute monarch is firee from 
all forcible restraint, and so far as he is ab- 
solute from all legal restraints of positive laws. 
Now, in a limited monarch, there is only 
sought a legal restraint ; and limitation can- 
not infer a forcible restraint, for an absolute 
monarch is limited also, not by dvil compact, 
but by the law of nature and nations, which he 
cannot justly transgress. If therefore an abso- 

1 Dr Feme, p. 3, sect. 6, p. 40. 



late monarch, being exorbitant, may not be 
resisted because he transgresseth the law of 
nature, how shall we thmk a limited mo- 
narch may be resisted for transgressing the 
bounds set by dvU agreement. 

Ana. 1. — ^A legal restraint on the people 
is a forcible restraint; for if law be not 
backed with force, it is only a law of reward- 
ing well-doing, which is no restraint, but an 
encouragement to do evil. K, then, there 
be a le^ restraint upon the king, without 
any force, it is no restraint, but only such a 
reouest as this: be a just prince, and we 
will give your maiesty two subsidies in one 
year. 2. I utterly denv that God ever or- 
dained such an irrational creature as an ab- 
solute monarch. If a people unjustly, and 
against nature's dictates, make away irre- 
vocably their own liberty, and the liberty of 
their posterity, which is not their's to dis- 
pose off, and set over themselves as base 
slaves, a sinning creature, with absolute 
power, he is their king, but not as he is ab- 
solute, and that he may not be forcibly 
resisted, notwithstanding the subjects did 
swear to his absolute power, (which oath in 
the point of absoluteness is unlawful, and so 
not obligatory,) I utterly deny. 3. An ab- 
solute monarch (saith he) is limited, but by 
law of nature. That is, Master Doctor, he is 
not limited as a monarch, not as an absolute 
monarch, but as a son of Adam ; he is under 
the limits of the law of nature, which he 
should have been under though he had never 
been a king all his days, but a slave. But 
what then? Therefore, he cannot be re- 
sisted. Yes, Doctor, by your own grant he 
can be resisted: if he invade an innocent 
subject (say you) suddenly, without colour 
of law, or inevitably ; and that because he 
transgresseth the law of nature. You say a 
Umited monarch can less be resisted for 
transgressing the bounds set by civil agree- 
ment. But what if the thus limited mo- 
narch transgress the law of nature, and sub- 
vert fundamental laws? He is then, you 
seem to say, to be resisted. It is not for 
simple transgression of a civil agreement 
that he is to be resisted. The linuted mo- 
narch is as essentially the Lord's anointed, 
and the power ordained of God, as the ab- 
solute monarch. Now resistance by all 
your grounds is unlawful, because of God's 
power and place conferred upon him, not 
because of men's positive covenant made 
with him. 

To find out the essential difference be- 




twixt a king and a tyrant, we are to observe, 
that it is one thing to sin against a man, an- 
other thing against a state. David, kUIing 
Uriah, committed an act of murder. Bat 
upon this supposition, that David is not 
punished for tnat murder, he did not so sin 
against the state, and catholic good of the 
state, that he tumeth tyrant and ceaseth to 
be a lawful king. A tyrant is he who 
habitually sinneth against the catholic good 
of the subjects and state, and subverteth law. 
Such a one should not be, as Jason, of whom 
it is said by ^neas Silvius, Graviterferehaty 
si non regnaret, qucui nesciret ease pri" 
vatus. mien such as are monstrous tyrants 
are not taken away by the estates, God pur* 
sueth them in wrath. Domitian was killed 
by his own family, his wife knowing of it ; 
Aurelionus was killed with a thunderbolt; 
Darius was drowned in a river ; Dioclesian, 
fearing death, poisoned himself; Salerius 
died eaten with worms, — ^the end also of 
Herod and Antiochus ; Maxentius was swal- 
lowed up in a standing river ; Julian died, 
being stricken through with a dart thrown 
at mm by a man or an angel, it is not 
known ; Valens, the Arian, was burnt with 
fire in a litttle village by the Grothes; Anas- 
tasius, the Eutychian emperor, was stricken 
by Grod with thunder ; Gundericus Vandalus, 
when he rose against the church of God, 
being apprehended by the devil, died. Some- 
time the state have taken order with tyrants : 
the empire was taken from Vitellius, Helio- 
gabalus, Maximinus, Didius, Julianus; so 
was the two Childerici of France served ; 
80 were also Sigebertus, Dasabertus, and 
Luodovic II. or France : Cnristiemus of 
Denmark, Mary of Scotland, who killed her 
husband and raised forces against the king- 
dom ; so was Henricus Valesius of Poland, 
for flying the kingdom; Sigismundus of 
Poland, ror violating his faith to the states. 



. QUESTION XXV. 

WHAT FORCE THE SI7FREHE LAW HATH OYER 
THE KINO, EVEN THAT LAW OF THE PEO- 
PLE'S SAFETY, CALLED " SALUS POPULI," 

The law of the twelve tables is, salus 
populi, suprema lex. The safety of the 
people is the supreme and cardinal law to 
which all laws are to stoop. And that from 
reasons : — 



1. Originally: Because if the people be 
the first author, fountain and efiicient under 
Grod, of law and king, then their own safety 
must be principally sought, and their safety 
must be far above the Bug, as the safety of a 
cause, especially of an umversal cause, such 
as is the people, must be more than the safety 
of one, as Aristotle saith, (1. 3. polit., alias 

I. 5,) 0u ft4n rt^awi ri /H^«r itnfix,*'* ^*^ wr^r 

— ^^ The part cannot be more excellent 
than the whole ;" nor the effect above the 
cause. 

2. Fincditer. This supreme law must 
stand ; for if all law, policy, maffbtrates and 
power be referred to the peoj^e's good as 
the end, (Rom. xiii. 4,) and to their quiet 
and peaceable life in godliness and honesty, 
then must this law stand, as of more worth 
than the king, as the end is of more worth 
than the means leading to the end, for the 
end is the measure and rule of the goodness 
of the mean ; and, finis ulHmus in infiuxu 
est potentissimusy the kins is good, because 
he conduceth much for ike safety of the 
people ; therefore, the safety of the people 
must be better. 

3. By way of limitation : because no law 
in its letter hath force where the safety of 
the subject is in hazard ; and if law or idng 
be destructive to the people they are to be 
abolished. This is dear in a tyrant or a 
wicked man. 

4. In the desires of the most holy : Moses, 
a prince, desired for the safety of God's 
people, and rather than Grod should destroy 
Ids people, that his name should be rased 
out of the book of life ; and David saith, 
(1 Chron. xxi. 17,) " Let thine hand, I pray 
thee, Lord my God, be on me, and on my 
father's house ; but not on thy people, that 
they should be plagued." This being a 
holy desire of these two public spirits, the 
object must be in itself true, and the sifety 
of GrOd's people and their happiness must be 
of more worth than the salvation of Moses 
and the life of David and his Other's house. 

The Prelate (c. 16, p. 169) borroweth an 
answer to thi&--for he hatn none of his 
own — ^from Dr Feme (sect. 7, p. 28) : The 
safety of the subjects is the prime end of 
the constitution of government; but it is 
not the sole and adequate end of govern- 
ment in monarchy ; for that is the safety 
of both king and people. And it beseem- 
eth the king to proportion his laws for tlieir 
good ; and it becometh the people to pro- 
portion all their obedience, actions, and en- 



\}= 



-* 



120 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



deayours for the safety, honour, and happi- 
ness of the king. It is impossible the peo- 
ple can have safety when sovereignty is 
weakened. 

Ans, — ^The Prelate would have the other 
half of the end, why a king is set over a peo- 
ple, to be the safety and happiness of the 
kiag, as well as the safety ot the people. 
This is new logic indeed, that one and the 
same thing should be ihe mean and the 
end. The question is, For what end is a 
king made so happy as to be exalted king ? 
The Prelate answereth, He is made happy 
that he may be happy, and made a king 
that he may be made a king. Now, is the 
king, as king, to intend this half end ? that 
is, whether or no accepteth he the burden 
of setting his head and shoulders under the 
crown, for this end, that he may not only 
make the people happy, but also that he may 
make himself rich and honourable above his 
brethren, and enrich himself ? I believe not ; 
but that he feed the people of God ; for if 
he intend himself, and his own honour, it is 
the intention of the man who is king, and 
intentio operands^ but it is not the intention 
of the king, as the king, or intentio operis. 
The king, as a king, is formally and essen- 
tially the " minister of God for our good," 
(Bom. xiii. 4 ; 1 Tim. ii. 2,) and cannot 
come under any notion as a long, but as a 
mean, not as an end, nor as that which he is, 
to seek himself. I conceive Grod did forbid 
this in the moulding of the first king. (Deut. 
xvii. 18, 19, 26.) He is a minister by office, 
and one who receiveth honour and wages 
for this work, that, ex qficioy he may feed nis 
people. But the Prelate saith, the people 
are to intend his riches and honour. 1 can- 
not say but the people may intend to honour 
the king ; but the question is not, whether 
the people be to refer the king and his 

fvemment as a mean to honour the king ? 
conceive not. But that end which me 
people, in obeying the king, in being ruled 
by nim, may intend, is, (1 Tim. ii. 2,) 
'' That under him they may lead a quiet 
and peaceable life, in all godliness and 
honesty." And Grod's end in giving a king 
is the good and safety of his people. 

P. I^relate (c. 16, p. 160). — To reason 
from the one part and end of monarchical 
government — the safety of the subjects, to 
the destruction and weiakemng of the other 
part of the end— the power of sovereignty 
and the royal prerogative, is a caption a 
divisis. If the king be not happy, and in- 



vested with the full power of a head, the 
body cannot be well. By anti-monarchists, 
the people at the beginning were necessi- 
tated to commit themselves, lives and for- 
tunes, to the government of a king, because 
of themselves they had not wiSom and 
power enough to do it ; and therefore, they 
enabled him with honour and power, with- 
out which he could not do this, being as- 
sured that he oould not choose, but most 
eamestlv and carefully endeavour this end, 
to wit, his own and the people's happiness ; 
therefore, the safety of the people issueth 
from the safety of the king, as the life of 
the natural boay from the souL Weak go- 
vernment is near to anarchy. Puritans will 
not say, Q^otn8 modo essCf etiam pcenakj 
is better than non esse : the Scripture saith 
the contrary ; it were better for some never 
to have been bom than to be. Tyranny is 
better than no government. 

Ans, 1. — He knows not sophisms of logic 
who calleth this argument a divisis ; for we 
king's honour is not the end of the king's 
government. He should seek the safety of 
state and church, not himself; himself is a 
private end, and a step to tyranny. 

2. The Prelate lieth when he maketh us 
to reason from the safety of the subject to 
the destruction of the king. Feme, Bar- 
day, Grotius, taught the hungry scholar 
to reason so. Where read he uds ? The 
people must be saved, that is the supreme 
law, therefore, destroy the king. The 
devil and the Prelate both shall not fasten 
this on us. But thus we reason : when the 
man who is the king endeavoureth not the 
end of his royal place, but, through bad 
counsel, the subversion of laws, religion, and 
bondage of the kingdom, the free elites 
are to join with him for that end of safety, 
accordmg as God hath made them heads of 
tribes and princes of the people ; and if 
the king rehise to join with them, and will 
not do nis duty, I see not how they are in 
conscience liberated before God from doing 
their part, 

3. If the P. Prelate call resisting the 
king by lawM defensive wars, the destruc- 
tion of the head, he speaketh with the mouth 
of one excommunicated and delivered up to 
Satan. 

4. We endeavour nothing more than the 
safety and happiness of the king, as king ; 
but his happmess is not to suSer him to 
destroy his subjects, subvert religion, arm 
papists who have slaughtered above two 



THE LAW AND TUB PRISCE. 



121 



hundred thousand innocent protestants, only 
for the profession of that true religion which 
the king hath sworn to maintain. Not to 
rise in arms to help the Idns a&fainst these 
were to gratify him as a manf but to be 
accessory to his soul's destruction as a king. 

5. That the royal prerogative is the end 
of a monarchy ordamed by Grod, neither 
Scripture, law, nor reason can admit. 

6. The people are to intend the safety of 
other judges as well as the king's. If par- 
liaments be destroyed, whose it is to make 
laws and kings, the people can neither be 
safe, free to serve Chnst, nor happy. 

7. It is a lie that people were necessitated 
at the beginning to commit themselves to a 
king ; for we read of no king while Nimrod 
arose: fathers of families (who were not 
kii^), and others, did govern till then. 

8. It was not want of wisdom, (for in 
many, and in the people, there must be 
more wisdom than in one man,) but rather 
corruption of nature and reciprocation of 
injunes that created kings and other judges. 

9. The king shall oetter compass his 
end, to wit, the safety of the people, with 
Umited power, (vlacent mediocna,) and wth 
other judges added to help him, (Num. xi. 
14, lo; I)eut. i. 12 — 15,) than to put in 
one man's hand absolute power ; for a sinful 
man's head cannot bear so much new wine, 
such as exorbitant power is. 

10. He is a base flatterer who saith. 
The king cannot choose, but earnestly and 
carefiilly endeavour his own and the people's 
happiness ; that is, the king is an angel, and 
cannot sin and decline from the duties of a 
king. Of the many kings of Judah and 
Israel, how many chose this ? All the 
good kings that liave been may be written 
in a gold ring. 

11. The people's safety dependeth indeed 
on the king, as a king and a happy gover* 
nor ; but me people smJl never be fattened 
to eat the wind of an imaginary prerogative 
royal. 

12. Weak government, that is, a king 
with a limited power, who hath more power 
about his head than within his head, is a 
strong king, and far &om anarchy. 

13. I blow not what he meaneth, but 
his master Arminius's way and words are 
here, for Arminians say,^ " That being in 
the damned, eternally tormented, is no bene- 



1 Jac. ArminL Declar. Remonstrant, in snod. 
dordrac. 



fit; it were better they never had being 
than to be eternally tormented ;" and this 
they say to the defiance of the doctrine of 
eternal reprobation, in which we teach, that 
though by accident, and because of the 
damned's abuse of being and life, it were to 
them better not to be, as is said of Judas, 
yet simpliciter comparing being with non- 
being, and considering the eternity of mise- 
rable being in relation to the absolute liber- 
ty of the Former of all things, who maketh 
use of the sinful being of clay-vessels for the 
illustration of the glory of his justice and 

Sower, (Kom. ix. 17, 22 ; 1 ret. ii. 8 ; 
ude V. 4,) it is a censuring of God and 
his unsearcnable wisdom, and a condemning 
of the Almighty of cruelty, (Grod avert blas- 
phemy of the unspotted and holy Majesty,) 
who, by Armiman grounds, keepeth ^e 
damned in life and being, to be fuel eter- 
nally for Tophet, to declare the glory of his 
justice. But the Prelate behoved to go out 
of his way to salute and gratify a proclaimed 
enemy of free grace, Arminius, and hence 
he would infer that the king, wanting his 
prerogative royal and fulness of absolute 
power to do wickedly, is in a penal and mi- 
serable condition, and tliat it were better 
for the king to be a tyrant, with absolute 
liberty to destroy and save alive at his plea- 
sure, as is said of a tyrant, (Dan. v. 19,) 
than to be no king at all. And here con- 
sider a principle of royalists' court faith : — 
1. The xing i& no kuig, but a lame and mi- 
serable judge, if he have not irresistible 
power to waste and destroy. 2. The king 
cannot be happy, nor the people safe, nor 
can the king do good in saving the needy, 
except he have the uncontrollable and unU- 
mited power of a tyrant to crush the poor 
and needy, and lay waste the mountain of 
the Lord's inheritance. Such court-ravens 
who feed upon the souls of living kings, are 
more cruel than ravens and vultures, who 
are but dead carcases. 

Williams, bishop of Ossory, answereth to 
the maxim, Salits populi^ &c. " No wise 
king but will carefully provide for the peo- 
ple's safety, because his safety and honour is 
included in theirs, his destruction in theirs." 
And it is, saith Lipsius, egri animi propria 
um nihil diu pati, Absalom was persuaded 
there was no justice in the land when he 
intendeth rebellion ; and the poor Prelate, 
following him, spendeth pages to prove that 
goods, hfe, chastity, and fame, dependeth 
on the safety of the king, as the breath of 



122 



LEX, BEX ; OB, 



our nostrils, our nur8e-&ther, our head, cor- 
ner-stone, and judge (c. IT, 6, 18, 1). The 
reason why all disorder was in ohuxxdi and 
state was not hecause there was no judge, 
no government ; none can be so stupid as to 
imagine that. But because, 1. They wanted 
the most exoellent of goyernments. 2. Be- 
cause aristocracy was weakened so as there 
was no right. No doubt priests there were, 
but (Hos. iv.) either they would not serve, 
or were over-awed. No doubt in those days 
they had judges, but priests and judges 
were stoned by a rasctuly multitude, and 
they were not able to rule ; therefore it is 
most consonant to Scripture to say. Solus 
tegis suprema poptdi «aZtM, the safety of 
the king and ms prerogative royal is the 
safest sanctuary for the people. So Hos. 
iii. 4 ; Lament. iL 9. 

Ans. 1. — ^The question is not of the wis- 
dom, but of the power of the king, if it 
should be bounded by no law. 

2. The flatterer may know, there be 
more foolish kings in the world than wise, 
and that kings misled with idolatrous queens, 
and by name Ahab ruined himself, and his 
posteritv and kin^om. 

3. The salvation and happiness of men 
standing in the exalting of Christ's throne 
and the gospel, therefore every king and 
every man will exalt the throne ; and so let 
them have an uncontrollable power, without 
constraint of law, to do what they list, and 
let no bounds be set to kings over subjects. 
By this argument their own wisdom is a 
law to lead uiem to heaven. 

4. It is not Absalom's mad malcontents 
in Britain, but there were really no justice 
to protestants, — ^all indulgence to papists, 
popery, Arminianism, — idolatry printed, 
preached, professed, rewarded by authority, 
parliaments and church assemblies; the 
bulwarks of justice and religion were de-^ 
nied, dissolved, crushed, &c. 

5. That by a kin^ he understandeth a 
monarch, ( Judg. xvii!) and that such a one 
as Saul, of abs^ute power, and not a judge, 
cannot be proved, for there were no kings 
in Israel in the judges' days, — ^the govern- 
ment not being dianged till near the end of 
Samuel's government. 

6. And that they had no judges, he 
saith, it is not imaginable. But I rather be- 
lieve God than the Prelate. Every one did 
what was right in his own eyes, because 
there was none to put ill-doers to shame. 
Possibly the estates of Israel governed some 



way for mere necessity, but wantmg a su- 
preme judge, which they should have, they 
were loose ; but this was not because where 
there is no king, as P. P. would insinuate, 
there was no government, as is dear. 

7. Of tempered and limited monarchy I 
think as honourably as the Prelate, but uiat 
absolute and unlimited monarchy is more ex- 
cellent than aristocracy, I shall then believe 
when royalists shall prove such a govern- 
ment, in so £»: as it is absolute, to be of God. 

8. That aristocracy was now weakened I 
believe not, seeing Grod so highly commend- 
eth it, and calleth it his own reigning over 
his people. (1 Sam. viii. ?•) The weaken- 
ing of it through abuse is not to a purpose, 
more than the abuse of monarchy. 

0. No doubt, saith he, (Hos. iv.) they 
were priests and judges, but they were 
over-awed, as they are now. I think he 
would say, (Hos. iii. 4,) otherwise he cit- 
eth Scripture sleeping, that the priests of 
Antichrist be not only over-awed, but out of 
the earth. I yield tnat the king be limited, 
not over-Awed, I think God's law and man's 
law alloweth. 

10. The safety of the king, as king, is not 
only safety, but a blessing to church and 
state, and therefore this P. Prelate and bis 
fellows deserve to be hanged before the 
sun, who have led him on a war to destroy 
him and his protestant subjects. But the 
safety and flourishing of a king, in the ex- 
ercises of an arbitrary unlimited power 
against law and religion, and to the de- 
struction of his subjects, is not the safety of 
the people, nor the safety of the king's soul, 
which tnese men, if they be the priests of 
the Lord, should care for. 

The Prelate cometh to refute the learned 
and worthy Observator. The safetv of the 
people is the supreme law, therefore the 
king is bound in duty to promote aU and 
every one of his subjects to all happiness. 
The Observator hath no such inference, the 
king is bound to promote some of his sub- 
jects, even as king, to a gallows, especially 
Irish rebels, and many bloody mahgnants. 
But the Prdate will needs have Qoa rigo- 
rous (hallowed be his name) if it be so; for it 
is impossible to the tenderest-hearted &ther 
to do so. Actual promotion of all is impossi- 
ble. That the king intend it of aU his sub- 
jects, as good subjects, by a throne estab- 
lished on righteousness and judgment is that 
which the worthy Observator meaneth. Other 
things here are answered. 



THE LAW AND THB PRINCE. 



123 



The sum of his second answer is a repe- 
tition of what he hath said. I gire my word, 
in a pamphlet of one hundred and ninety- 
four pa^, I never saw more idle repeti- 
tions 01 one thing twenty times before said ; 
bat (p. 168) he saith, " The safelr of the 
king and his subjects, in the moral notion, 
may be esteemed mondly the same, no less 
tluui the soul and the body make one per- 
sonal subsistence." 

^t».^-Thi8 is strange logic. The king 
and his sabjects are ens per aggregationem, 
and the king, as king, hath one moral subsis- 
tence, and the people anotho*. Hath the 
father and the son, the master and the ser- 
vant, one moral subsistence ? But the man 
speaketh of their well-being, and then he 
must mean that our king's government — that 
was not long ago, and is yet, to wit, tlie 
popery, Arminianism, idolatry, cutting off 
men's ears and noses, banishing, impnson- 
ment for speaking against popery, arming 
of papists to slay protestants, pardoning the 
blcxNl of Ireland, that I fear, shall not be 
soon taken away, &c., — is identically the 
same with the life, safety, and happiness of 
protestants. Then life and deatn, justice 
and injustice, idolatry and sincere worship, 
are identically one, as the soul oi the Pre 
late'and his body are one. 

The third is but a repetition. The acts 
of royalty (saith the Observator) are acts of 
duty ana obligation, therefore, not acts of 
grace properly so called ; therefore we may 
not tiumk the king for a courtesy. This is 
no consequence. What fothers do to chil- 
dren are acts of natural duty and of na- 
tural grace, and yet children owe gratitude 
to parents, and subjects to good kings, in a 
le^ sense. No, but in way of courtesy 
oi3y. The observator said, the king is not 
a father to the whole collective body, and it 
is well said he is son to tliem, and they his 
maker. Who made the king? Policy an- 
swereth, The state made him, and divinity, 
Grod made him. 

The Observator said well, the peoj^'s 
weakness is not the king's slarength. The 
Prelate saith. Amen. He said. That that 
perii^eth not to the king, which is granted 
to the people. The Prelate (p. 170) de- 
nieth, because, what the king hath in trust 
from God, the king cannot mSke away to an- 
other, nor can any take it finom him with- 
out sacrilege, 

Ans» — True indeed, if the king had roy- 
alty by immediate trust and infusion by God, 



as EHas had the spirit of prophecy, that he 
cannot make away. Royalists dream that 
God, immediately from heaven, now in- 
fusetili foculty . and right to crowns with- 
out any word of God. It is enough to mske 
an enUmsiast leap up to the throne and kill 
kin^. Judge if these fknalios be favourers 
of kmgs. But if the king have royalty me- 
diately, by the people's Tree consent, from 
Grod, there is no reason but people give as 
much power, even by ounce weights, (for 
power IS strong wine and a great mocker,) 
as they know a weak man's head will bear, 
and no more. Power is not an immediate 
inheritance from heaven, but a birthright 
of the |>eople b<»Towed from them; they 
may let it out for their good, and resume it 
when a man is drunk with it. The man 
will have it conscience on the king to fight 
and destroy his three kingdoms for a dream, 
his prerogative above law. But the truth is, 
prelates do engage the king, his house, hon- 
our, subjects, church, for their cursed mil^es. 

The Prelate (p. 172) vexeth the reader 
with repetitions, and saith, The kmgmust 
proportion his government to the siSety of 
the people on the one hand, and to his own 
safety and power on the other hand. 

Ans. — What the king doth as king, he 
doeth it for the happiness of his people. 
The king is a relative ; yea, even his own 
happiness that he seeketh, he is to refer to 
the good of Grod's people. He saith far- 
ther. The safety of the people indudeth the 
safety of the king:, because the word popu- 
lus is so taken ; which he proveth by a raw, 
sickly rabble of words, stolen out of Pas- 
serat's dictionary. His &,ther, the school- 
master, may whip him for frivolous etymo- 
logies. 

This supreme law, saith the Prelate, (p. 
175,^ is not above the law of prerogative 
royw, the highest law, nor is rex above lex. 
The democracy of Rome had a supremacy 
above laws, to make and unmake laws ; and 
will they force this power on a monarch, to 
the destruction of sovereignty ? 

Ans, — This, which is stolen from Spalato, 
Barclay, Grotius, and others, is easuy an- 
swered. The supremacy of people is a law 
of nature's self-preservation, above all posi- 
tive laws, and above the king, and is to re- 
gulate sovereignty, not to destroy it. If 
this supremacy of majesty was in people be- 
fore they have a king, then, 1. They lose 
it not by a voluntary choice of a king ; for 
a king is chosen for good, and not for the 



124 



L£X, REX ; OR, 



people's loss, therefore, they must retain 
this power, in habit and potency, even when 
they have a king. 2. Then supremacy of 
majesty is not a beam of divinity proper to 
a king only. 3. Then the people, having 
royal sovereignty virtually in them, make, 
and so unmade a king, — all which the Pre- 
late denieth. 

This supreme law (saith the Prelate, p. 
176, begging it from Spalato, Amisseus, 
Grotius) advances the king, not the people ; 
and the sense is, the kingoom is really some 
time in such a case that the sovereign must 
exercise an arbitrary power, and not stand 
upon private men's interests, or transgres- 
sing ot laws made for the private good of 
individuals, but for the preservation of itself, 
and the public, may break through all laws. 
This he may, in the case when sudden 
foreign invasion threateneth ruin inevitably 
to king and kingdom: a physician may 
rather cut a gangrened member than suffer 
the whole body to perish. The dictator, in 
case of extreme dangers, (as Livy and Dion. 
Halicamast show us,) had power according 
to his own arbitrament, had a sovereign 
commission in peace and war, of life, deam, 
persons, &c., not co-ordinate, not subordi- 
nate to any. 

Ans, 1. — It is not an arbitrary power, 
but naturally tied and fettered to this same 
supreme law, salus populiy the safety of 
the people, that a king break: through not 
the law, but the letter of the law, tor the 
safety of the people ; as the chirurgeon, not 
by any prerogative that he hath above the 
art of chirurgery, but by necessity, cut- 
teth off a gangrened member. Thus it is 
not arbitrary to the king to save his people 
from ruin, but by the strong and imperious 
law of the people's safety he doth it ; for if 
he did it not, he were a murderer of his peo- 
ple. 2. He is to stand upon transgression 
of laws according to their genuine sense of 
the people's safety; for good laws are not 
contrary one to another, though, when he 
breaketh through the letter of the law, yet 
he breaketh not the law; for if twenty 
thousand rebels invade Scotland, he is to 
command all to rise, though the formality 
of a parliament eannot be had to indict the 
war, as our law provideth ; but the king 
doth not command all to rise and defend 
themselves by prerogative royal, proper to 
him as king, and incommunicable to any 
but to himself. 

1. There is no such din and noise to be 



made for a king and his incommunicable 
prerogative ; for though the king were not 
at all, yea, though he command the con- 
trary, (as he did when he came against 
Scotland with an English army,) the law 
of nature teacheth all to rise, without the 
king. 

2. That the king command this, as king, 
is not a particular positive law ; but he doth 
it as a man and a member of the kingdom. 
The law of nature (which knoweth no oream 
of such a prerogative) forceth him to it, as 
every member is, by nature's indictment, to 
care for the whole. 

3. It is poor hungry skill in this new 
statist, (for so he nameth all Scotland,) to say 
that any laws are made for private interests, 
and the good of some individuals. Laws 
are not £kws if they be not made for the 
safety of the people. 

4. It is iaLse that the king, in a public 
danger, is to care for himself as a man, with 
the ruin and loss of any ; yea, in a public 
calamity, a good king, as Diivid, is to desire 
he may die that the public may be saved, 
2 Sam. xxiv. 17 ; Exod. xxxii. 32. It is 
commended of all, that the emperor Otho, 
yea, and Richard II. of England, as M. 
Speed saith, (Hist, of Engird, p. 757,) 
resigned their sdi^oms to eschew the e&- 
sion of blood. The Prelate adviseth the 
king to pass over all laws of nature, and 
slay thousands of innocents, and destroy 
church and state of three kingdoms, for a 
straw, and supposed prerogative royal. 

1. Now, certainly, prerogative and abso- 
luteness to do good and ill, must be inferior 
to a law, the end whereof is the safety of the 
people. For David willeth the pestilence 
may take him away, and so his preroga- 
tive, that the people may be saved (2. Sam. 
xxiv. 17) ; for prerogative is cumulatiye to 
do good, not privative to do ill ; and so is 
but a mean to defend both the law and the 
people. 

2. Prerogative is either a power to do 
good or ill, or both. If the first be said, it 
must be limited by the end and law for 
which it is ordained. A mean is no farther 
a mean, but in so far as it conduceth to the 
end, the safety of all. If the second be ad- 
mitted, it is licence and tyranny, not power 
from God. If the third be said, both rea- 
sons plead against this, that prerogative 
should be the king's end in the present 
wars. 

3. Prerogative being a power given by 



the mediation of the people; yea, suppose 
(which is false) that it were given imme- 
diately of God, yet it is not a thmg for which 
the king should raise war against his sub- 
jects ; tor Grod will ask no more of the king 
than he giveth to him. The Lord reapeth 
not where he soweth not. J£ the militia, 
and other things, be ordered hitherto for the 
holding off Iriah and Spanish invasion by 
sea, and so for the good of the land, seeing 
the king in his own person cannot make use 
of the militia, he is to rejoice that his sub- 
jects are defended. The king cannot an- 
swer to Grod for the justice of war on his 
part. It is not a case of conscience that the 
king should shed blood for, to wit, because 
the under-officers are such men, and not 
others of his choosing, seeing the kingdom 
is defended sufficiency except where cava- 
liers destroy it. And to me this is an un- 
answerable argument, that the cavaliers de- 
stroy not the kingdoms for this prerogative 
royaJ, as the prmcipal ground, but for a 
deeper design, even for that which was 
working by prelates and malignants before 
the late troubles in both kin&fdoms. 

4. The king is to intend the safety of his 
people, and the safetv of the king as a go- 
vernor ; but not as uiis king, and this man 
Charles, — ^that is a selfish end. A king Da- 
vid is not to look to that ; for when the peo- 
file was seeking his life and crown, he saith, 
Psal. iii. 8,) " Thy blessing upon thy peo- 
ple." He may care for, and intend that 
the king and government be safe ; for if the 
kingdom be destroyed, there cannot be a 
new kingdom and church on earth again to 
serve Grod in that generation, (Fsal. Ixxxix. 
47,) but they may easily have a new king 
again ; and so the safety of the one cannot 
in reason be intended as a collateral end 
with the safety of the other ; for there is no 
imaginable comparison betwixt one man, 
with all his accidents of prerogative and ab- 
soluteness, and three national churches and 
kindgoms. Better the king weep for a 
childish trifle of a prerogative than that 
popery be erected, and three kingdoms be 
destroyed by cavaliers for their own ends. 

6. The dictator's power is, 1. A &ct, 
and proveth not a point of conscience. 2. 
His power was in an exigence of extreme 
, danger of the commonwealth. The P. Fre- 
I late pleadeth for a constant absoluteness 
above laws to the king at all times, and 
that jure divino. 3. The dictator was the 
people's creature ; therefore the creator. 



the people, had that sovereignty over him. 
4. The dictator was not above a king ; but 
the Komans ejected kings. 5. The dicta- 
tor's power was not to destroy a state : he 
i^ight be, and was resisted; he might be 
deposed. 

P. Prelate (p. 177).— The safety of the 
people is pretended as a law, that the Jews 
must put Christ to death, and that Saul 
spared Agag. 

Ans, 1. — No shadow for either in the 
word of Grod. Caiaphas prophecied, and 
knew not what he said ; but that the Jews 
intended the salvation of the elect, in killing 
Christ, or that Saul intended a public good 
in sparing Agag, shall be the Prelate's di- 
vinity, not mme. 2. What, howbeit many 
should abuse this law of the people's safety, 
to wrong good kings, it ceaseth not there- 
fore to be a law, and licenceth not ill kings 
to place a tyrannical prerogative above a 
just dictate of nature. 

In the last chapter (c. 16] the Prelate 
hath no reasons, only he would have kings 
holy, and this he proveth from Apocrypha 
books, because he is ebb in Holy Scripture ; 
but it is Romish holiness, as is clear, — 1. He 
must preach something to himself, that the 
king adore a tree-altar. Thus kings must 
be most reverend in their gestures (p. 182). 
2. The king must hazard his sacred life and 
three kingaoms, his crown, royal posterity, 
to preserve sacred things, that is, anti- 
christian Romish idols, images, altars, cere- 
monies, idolatry, popery. 4. He must, 
upon the same pam, maintain sacred per- 
sons, that is, greasy apostate prelates. The 
rest, I am weary to trouble the reader with- 
all, but know ex ungue leonem. 



QUESTION XXVI. 

WHETHER THE KING BE ABOVE THE LAW 

OR NO. 

We may consider the question of the 
law's supremacy over the king, either in the 
supremacy of constitution of the king, or of 
direction, or of limitation, or of co-action 
and punishing. Those who maintain this, 
" The king is not subject to the law," if their 
meaning be, " The kmg as king is not subject 
to the law's direction," they say nothing ; for 
the king, as the king, is a living law ; then 
they say, " The law is not subject to the 



law's direction :" a very improper speedi ; or, 
the king, as king, is not subject to the oo* 
action m the law : that is true; for he who 
is a living law, as such, cannot punish him- 
self, as the law saith. 

Assert, 1. — The law hath a supremacy 
of constitution above the king : — 

1. Because the king by nature is not king, 
as is proved ; therefore, he must be king by 
a pontic constitution and law; and so the 
law, in that consideration, is above the king, 
because it is from a civil law that there is a 
king rather than any other kind of gover- 
nor. 2. It is by law, that amongst many 
hundred men, tnis man is king, not that 
man ; and because, by the which a thing is 
constituted, by the same thing it is, or may 
be dissolved; therefore, 3. As a commu- 
nity, finding such and such qualifications as 
the law requireth to be in a king, in this 
man, not in that man,-^therefore upon law- 

g*ound they make him a king, and, upon 
w-grounds and just demerit, they may 
unnmke him again ; for what men volun- 
tary do upon condition, the condition being 
removed, they may undo again* 

Assert. 2. — It is denied by none but the 
king is under the directive power of the law, 
though many liberate the kmg from the co- 
active power of a civil law. But I see not 
what direction a civil law can give to the 
king if he be above all obedience, or disobe- 
dience, to a law, seeing all law-direction is in 
ordine ad ohedi&ntiam^ in order to obey, ex- 
cept thus far, that the light that is in the 
civil law is a moral or natural guide to con- 
duct a king in his walking ; but this is the 
morality of the law which enlighteneth and 
informeth, not any obligation that aweth the 
king ; and so the king is under God's and 
nature's law. This is nothing to the purpose. 
Assert, 3. — The b'ng is under the law, in 
re^d of some coercive limitation ; because, 
1. There is no absolute power given to him 
to do what he listeth, as a man. And be- 
cause, 2. God, in making Saul a king, doth 
not by any royal stamp give him a power to 
sin, or to play the tyrant ; io€ which cause I 
expone these of the law, omma sunt possi' 
bilta regif imperator omnia potest, Baldus 
in seat, F, de no, for, fidel, in F, et in 
prima constitut, C* col. 2. Chassanceus in 
catalog, glories mundi. par. 5. considerat. 
24. et tanta est ejus celsitudo, ut non posset 
ei imponi lex in regno suo. Curt, in consol. 
66. col. 6. ad. F. Petrus Rebuff. Notab. 3. 
repet, I. unicce. C. de sentent. quas pro eo 



quod n. ITjj'. 363. All these go no otha*wise 
but thus, The king can do s£ things which 
by a law he can do, and that holdeth him, id 
possumus quod jure possumus ; and, there- 
fore, the kmg cannot be above the covenant 
and kw made betwixt him and his people 
at his coronation-oath ; for then the covenant 
and oath should bind him only by a natural 
obligation, as he is a man, not by a civil or 

?olitic obligation, as he is a king. So then, 
. It were sufficient that the king should 
swear that oath in his cabinet-chamber, and 
it is but a mocking of an oath that he swear 
it to the people. 2. That oath given by the 
representative-kingdom should also oblige the 
subjects naturally, tnforo Dei, not politically, 
inforo humanOj upon the same reason. 3. 
He may be resisted as a man* 

Assert. 4. — The fourth case is, if the king 
be under the obliging politic co-action of dvu 
laws, for that he, inforo Dei, be under the 
morality of civil laws, so as he cannot contra- 
vene any law in that notion but he must sin 
against God, is granted on all hands. (Deut. 
xvii. 20 ; Josh. i. 8 ; 1 Sam. xii. 15.) That 
the king bind himself to the same law that 
he doth bind others, is decent, and obligeth 
the king as he is a man ; because, 1. (Matt, 
vii. 12,) It is said to be the law and the 
prophets, " All things whatsoever ye would 
men should do unto you, do ye even so to 
them." 2. It is the law, imperator I. 4. 
digna vox. C. de lege et tit. Quod quisque 
juris in alium statuit, eodem et ipse utatur. 
Julius Csesar commanded the youth who had 
deflowered the emperor's daughter to be 
scourged above that which the Lsiw allowed. 
The youth said to the emperor, Dixisti legem 
CcBsar, — " You appointed the law, Csesar." 
The emperor was so oiFended with himself 
that he had failed against the law, that for 
the whole day he refused to taste meat.^ 

Assert. 5.— The king cannot but be sub- 
ject to the co-active power of fundamental 
laws. Because, 1. This is a fundamental law 
that the free estates lay upon the king, that all 
the power that they give to the king, as king, 
is for the good and safety of the people; 
and so what he doth to the hurt of his sub- 
jects, he doth it not as king. 2. The law 
saith. Qui habet potestatem coTistituendi 
etiam et jus ctdimendi, L nemo. 37. I. 21. 
de reg. jure. Those who have power to 
make have power to unmake kin^. 3. 
Whatever the king doth as king, tnat he 

1 Plntarcb in Apotbf g. lib. 4. 



THB LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



127 



doth by a power borrowed from (or bj a 
fiduciary power which is his by trust) the 
estates, who made him king. He must then 
be nothing but an eminent servant of the 
state, in the punishing of others. If, therefore, 
he be unpunishable, it is not so much because 
his royal power is above all law oo-action, 
as because one and the same man cannot be 
both the punisher and the punished; and 
this is a physical incongruity rather than a 
moral absurdity. So the law of Grod layeth 
a duty on the inferior magistrate to use the 
sword against the murderer, and that by 
virtue of liis office ; but I much doubt, if for 
that he is to use the sword against himself 
in the case of murder, for this is a truth I 
purpose to make good. That suffering, as 
sufPering, according to the substance and 
essence of passion, is not commanded by any 
law of Grod or nature to the sufferer, but 
only the manner of suffering. I doubt if it 
be not, by the law of nature, lawfiil even to 
the ill-doer, who hath deserved death by 
God's law, to fly from the sword of the law- 
ful magistrate ; only the manner of suffering 
with patience is commanded of Grod. 1 
know the law saith here, That the magistrate 
is both judge and the executor of the sentence 
against himself, in his own cause, for the ex- 
cellency of his office.^ Therefore these are 
to be distinguished, whether the kin?, rati- 
one dementi et jure^ by law be puni^ble, 
or if the king can actually be punished cor- 
porally by a law of man, he remaining king ; 
and since he must be a punisher himself, and 
that by virtue of his office. In matters of 
goods, the king may be both judge and 
punisher of himself, as our law provideth 
that any subject may plead his own heritage 
from the king before tne inferior judges, and 
if the king be a violent possessor, and in 
mala fide for many years, by law he is 
obliged, upon a decree of the lords, to exe- 
cute the sentence against himself, ex ofido, 
and to restore the lands, and repay the 
damage to the just owner ; and this the king 
is to do against himself, ex ojlcio. I grant 
here the king, as king, punisheth himself as 
an unjust man, but because bodily suffering 
is mere violence to nature, I doubt if the 
king, ex oficio^ is to do or inflict any bodily 
punishment on himself. Nemo potest a 
scipso cogi. L ille a quOy sect, 13. 

^ Ma|[i9tratii8 ipse est judex et execntor contra 
Bcipsam* in propria causa, propter excellentiam sni 
officii, 1. si pater familias, et 1. et hoc. Tiberius 
GaBsar, F. de Hered. hoc. just. 



Assert, 6. — There be some laws made in 
favour of the king, as king, as to pay tribute. 
The king must be above this law as king. 
True, but if a nobleman of a great rent be 
elected king, I know not if he can be free 
from paying to himself, as king, tribute, see- 
ing this is not allowed to the kmg by a divine 
law, (Rom. xiiL 6,) as a reward of his work; 
and Christ expressly maketh tribute a thing 
due to Caesar as a king. (Matt. xxii. 21.) 
There be some solenmities of the law from 
which the king may be free; Frickman 
(D. c. 3, n. 78) relateth what they are; 
they are not laws, but some circumstances 
belonging to laws, and he answereth to many 
places aUeged out of the lawyers, to prove 
the king to be above the law. Malderus (in 
12. Art. 4, 6, 9, 96,) will have the prince 
under that law, which concemeth ail the 
commonwealth equallv in regard of the mat- 
ter, and that by the law of nature ; but he 
will not have him subject to these laws which 
concemeth the subjects as subjects, as to pay 
tribute. He citeth Francisc. a Vict. Covar- 
ruvias, and Turrecremata. He also will have 
the prince under positive laws, such as not to 
transport victuals ; not because the law bind- 
eth mm as a law, but because the making of 
the law bindeth him, tanquam conditio sine 
qua non, even " as he who teacheth another 
that he should not steal, he should not steal 
himself." (Kom. ii.) But the truth is, this 
is but a branch of tne law of nature, that I 
should not commit adultery, and theft, and 
sacrile^, and such sins as nature condem- 
neth, ii I shall condemn them in others, and 
doth not prove that the king is under the 
co-active power of civil laws. Ulpianus (h 
31. F. de regibus) saith, " The prince is 
loosed £rom laws." Bodine (de Bepub. 1. 7^ 
c. 8). — " Nemo tmperat sibiy^ no man com- 
mandeth himself. Tholosanus saith, (de 
Bep. 1. 7, c. 20,) " Ipsius est dare, non ac- 
cipere leges,^^ the prince giveth laivs, but re- 
ceiveth none. Donellus (Lib. 1, Comment, 
a 17) distinguisheth betwixt a law and a 
roycd law proper to the king. Trentlerus 
^vol. i. 79, 80) saith, •* The prince is freed 
irom laws;" and that he obeyeth laws, de 
honestate, non de necessitate, upon honesty, 
not of necessity. Thomas P. f 1. q. 96, art. 
6,) and with hSm Soto Chregonus de Valen" 
tia, and other schoolmen, subject the king to 
the directive power of the law, and liberate 
him of the co-active power of tJie law. 

Assert, 7. — If a ting turn a parricide, 
a lion, and a waster and destroyer of the 



128 



L^X, REX ; OR, 



people^ as a man he is subject to the <?o-actiye 
power of the laws of the hiad., Tf any law 
should hinder that a tyrant should not be 
punidied by law, it must be ]£)ecause he hath 
not a superior but God, for royalists build all 
upon this ; but this ground is false : — 

Arg, 1. — Because the estates of the king- 
dom, who gave him the crown, are above 
him, and they may take away what they 
gave him ; as the law of nature and God 
saith. If they had known he would turn 
tyrant, they would never have given him the 
sword; and so, how much ignorance is in 
the contract they made with the king, as 
little of will is in it ; and so it is not every 
way willing, but, being conditional, is sup- 
posed to h% against their will. They gave 
the power to nim onlv for their good, and 
that they may make the king, is dear. (2 
Chron. xxiiL 11 } 1 Sam. x. 17, 24 ; Deut. 
xvU. 14 — 17 ; 2 Kings xi. 12 ; 1 Kings xvi. 
21; .2 Kings x, 5; Judg. ix. 6.) Tour- 
score valiant men of the priests withstood 
Uzziah with corporal violence, and thrust 
him out, and cut him off from the house of 
the Lord, (2 Chron. xxvi. 18.) 

Arg, 2. — If the prince's place do not put 
him above the laws of church disciplme, 
(Matt, xviii., for CSirist excepteth none, 
and how can men except?) and if the rod of 
Christ's " lips smite the earth, and slay the 
wicked,*' (Isa. xL 4,) and the prophets Elias, 
Nathan, Jeremiah, Isaiah, &c., and John 
Baptist, Jesus Christ, and his Apostles, have 
used this rod of censure and rebuke, as ser- 
vants under God, against kings, this is a sort 
of gpiritual co-action of laws put in execution 
by men; and by due proportion corporal co- 
action being tne same ordinance of God, 
though of another nature, must have the 
like power over all, whom the law of God 
hath not excepted ; but God's law excepteth 
none ^ all. 

Arg^ 3. — It is presumed that God hath 
not provided better for the safety of the part 
than of the whole, especially when he maketh 
the part a mean for the safety of the whole. 
But if God have provided that the king, who 
is a part of the commonwealth, shall be free 
of all punishment, though he be a habitual 
destroyer of the whole kingdom, seeing God 
hath given him to be a father, tutor, saviour, 
defender thereof, and destined him as a mean 
for their safety, then must God have worse, 
not better, provided for the safety of the 
whole than of the part. The proposition is 
clear, in that God (Rom. xiii. 4 ; 1 Tim. ii. 



2) hath ordained the ruler, and given tc( him 
the sword to defend the whole kxngdom"'and 
city; but we read nowhere that the' liord 
hath given the sword to the whole kingdoip, 
to defend one man, a king, though a ri^lejQ, 
going on in a tyrannical way of destroying 
all his subjects. The assumption is evi4en.t: 
for then tne king, turning tyrant, might set 
an army of Turks, Jews, or cruel !papi^.t,o 
destroy the church of God, without al^ifear 
of law or punishment. Yea, this '^ 6o|^- 
trary to the doctrine of royalists : yox, ytm- 
zetus {adversus Buckananum, p. 275| saith 
of Nero, tlmt he, seeking to destroy the 
senate and people of Home, and seeking to 
make new laws for himself, eoadd^ jur^ 
regnif lost right to the kingdom. And Bar- 
claius (Monarch. 1. 3, c. uTt. p. 213,j saith, 
a tyrant, such as Caliaula, spdUare se jure 
regniy spoileth himself of the right to the 
crown. And in that same place, regerii,' si 
regnum suum alienee ditioni manciparit, 
regno cadere^ if the king sell his kingdom, 
he loseth the title to the crown. Grotius, 
(de jure belli et pacts, I, i. c. 4, n. 7^) "Si 
rex kostili animo in totius populi ea^tium 
f&ratur, amittit regnum, if he turn enemy 
to the kingdom, for their destructibn, he 
loseth his kingdom, because (saith he) volun- 
tas imperandi, et voluntas perdendi, simul 
consistere non possunt, a will or mind to go- 
vern and to destroy cannot consist together 
in one. Now, if this be true, that a iing, 
turning tyrant, loseth title to the crotm, 
this is either a falling from his royal title 
only in G^kI's court, or it is a losmg of it 
before men, and in the court of his stuDJects. 
If the former be said, 1. He is no Mng, 
having before God lost his royal title ; and 
yet the people is to obey him as " the minis- 
ter of Ged," and a power from God, when 
as he is no such thing. 2. In vain do these 
authors provide remedies to save the people 
from a tyrannous waster of the peopW, if 
they speak of a tyrant who is no kmg ifi 
God's court only, and yet remaineth a king 
to the people in regard of the law : for "the 
places speak of remedies that God hath' jpro- 
vided against tyrants cum titulo, such as are 
lawful lings, but turn tyrants. Now by 
this they provide no remedy at all, if only 
in God's court, and not in man's court also, 
a tyrant lose his title. As for tyrants sine 
titulo, such as usurp the throne, and have 
no just claim to it, Barclaius (adver. 
Monarch, L iv. e, 10. j). 268) saith, " Any 
private man may kill him as a pubHc enemy 



If 



THB LAW AND TIDE PRINCE. 



129 



of the state :'' bat if he lose his title to the 
crown in the court of men, then is there a 
court on mtOi to judge the king, and so he 
is under the eo-actiTe power of a law; — 
then a king may be resisted, and jret those 
who resist liim do not incur damnation ; the 
contrary whereof royalists endeavour to proy e 
from Bom. ziii. ;~^then the people may un- 
king one who was a king. But I would 
know who taketh that !kt»9 wi fiK>m him, 
whereby he is a king, that beam of divine 
majesty ? Kot the people ; because royalists 
say, they neither can gire nor take away royal 
dignity, and so they cannot unking him. 

Arg, 4. — The more will be in the con- 
sent, (saith Ferd. Vasquez, 1. i. o. 41,) the 
obli^tion is the stricter. So doubled words 
(saiui the law, 1. 1, sect. 13, n. 13) oblige more 
strictly. And all laws of kings, who are 
rational fathers, and so lead us by laws, as 
b^ rational means to peace and external hap- 
piness, are contracts of king and people. 
Omms lex tponsio et contractus Beip, sect. 
1, Intt, de ver, reUg. Now the king, at his 
coronation-corenant with the people, giveth 
a most intense consent, an oath, to be a 
keeper and preserver of all good laws : and 
so hardly he can be freed from the strictest 
obligation that law can impose. And if he 
keep laws by office, he is a mean to preserve 
laws; and no mean can be superior and 
above the end, but inferior thereunto. 

Arg. 5. — Bodine proveth, (de Rep, I, 2, 
e. 5, p. 221, j that emperors at first were 
bat princes of the commonwealth, and that 
sovereignty remained still in the senate and 
peof^e. Marius SaLomonius, a learned B.0- 
man divilian, wrote six books de prindpatUy 
to refute the supremacy of emperors above 
the state. Ferd. Vasq. (illust. qtiest. part, 
1. 1. 1, n. 21) proveth, tnat the prince, by 
royal dignity, leaveth not off to be a citizen, 
a mem&r of the politic body, and not a 
king, but a keeper of laws. 

Arg, 6. — Hence, the prince reroaineth, 
even being a prince, a social creature, a man 
as well as a kmg ; one who must buy, seU, 
promise, contract, dispose : therefore, he is 
not reaula regulani, but under rule of law ; 
for it IS impossible, if the king can, in a poli- 
tical way, live as a member of a society, and 
do and perform acts of policy, and so per- 
form them, as he may, by his office, buy and 
not pay; promise, and vow, and swear to 
men, and not perform, nor be obliged to 
men to render a reckoning of his oatn, and 
kill and destroy,— *and yet in curia political 



societatiSj in the court of human policy, be 
free : and that he may give inheritances, as 
just rewards of virtue and well-doing, and 
take them away again. Yea, seeing these 
sins, that are not punishable before men, are 
not sins before men, if all the shis and op- 
pressions of a prince be so above the punish- 
ment that men can inflict, they are not sins 
before men; by which means the king is 
loosed from all ffuiltiness of the sins agauist 
the second tabk: for the ratio formalism 
the formal reason, why the judge, by war- 
rant from Grod, oondeameth, in the court of 
men, the guilty man, is, that he hath sinned 
against human society through the scan- 
dal of blasphemy, or that through some other 
heinous sin he hath defiled the land. Now 
this is incident to the \mst as well as to 
some other sbfiil man. 

To these, and the Uke, hear what the ex- 
communicated Prelate hath to say, (c. 15, jp. 
146, 147,) ** They sajr (he meaneth the 
Jesuits) every society of men is a perfect re- 
public, and so must have withm itself a 
power to preserve itself from rum, and by 
that to punish a tjrrant.'' He answereth, 
'' A society without a head, is a disorderiy 
rout, not a politic body ; and so cannot have 
this power. 

Ang, 1, — The Pope giveth to every so- 
ciety politic power to make away a tyrant, 
or heretical xing, and to unking him, by his 
brethren, the Jesuits', way. And observe 
how papists (of which number I could easily 
prove tne P. Prelate to be, by the popiw 
doctrine that he delivered, while the iniquity 
of time, and dominion of prelates in Scot- 
land, advanced him, against all worth of 
true learning and holiness, to be a preacher 
in Edinbur^) and Jesuits agree, as the 
builders of Babylon. It is the purpose of 
€rod to destroy Babylon. 

2. This answer shall infer,, that the aris- 
tocratical governors of any free state, and 
that the Duke of Venice, and the senate 
there, is above all law, and cannot be resisted, 
because without their heads they are a dis- 
orderly rout. 

3. A political society, as by nature's in- 
stinct they may appoint a head, or heads, to 
themselves, so also if their head, or heads, 
become ravenous wolves, the God of nature 
hath not left a perfect society remediless ; 
but they may both resist, and punish the 
head, or heads, to whom tiiey gave all the 
power that they have, for their good, not for 
their destruction. 




t 



4. Thqr are as orderly a bodj politic, to 
munalLe a tyrannous oomnumder, as they 
were to make a iust governor. The Prelate 
saithy *' It is alile to conceive a politic body 
without a governor, as to conceive the natu- 
ral body without a head." He meaneth, 
none of them can be conceivable. I am not 
of his mind. When Saul was dead, Israel 
was a perfect politic bod^ ; and the Prelate, 
if he be not very obtuse m his head, (as this 
hungry piece, stolen from others, showeth him 
to be,) may conceive a visible political so- 
ciety performing a political action, (2 Sam. 
V. 1 — 3,) malung Pavid king at a visible 
and conceivable p&ce, at Hebron, and mak- 
ing a covenant with him. And that they 
wanted not all governors, is nothing to make 
them chimeras mconceivable. For when so 
many families, before Nimrod, were go- 
verned only bv fathers of families, and they 
agreed to maKo either a king, or other go- 
vernors, a head, or heads, over themselves, 
though the several families had government, 
yet wese associated &milies had no govern- 
ment ; and vet so conceivable a politic body, 
as if Maxwell would have appeared amongst 
them, and called them a disorderly rout, or 
an unconceivable chimera, they should have 
made the Prelate know that chimeras can 
knock down prelates. Neither is a king the 
life of a politic body, as the soul is of the 
natural body. The body createth not the 
soul; but Israel created Saul king, and 
when he was dead, they made David king, 
and so, under God, many kings, as they 
succeeded, till the Messian came. No na- 
tural body can make souls to itself by suc- 
cession; nor can sees create new prelates 
always. 

P, Prelate. — Jesuits and nuritans differ 
infinitely: we are hopeful God shall cast 
down tms Babel. The Jesuits, for ought I 
know, seat the superintendent power m the 
community. Some sectaries follow them, 
and warrant any individual person to make 
away a king in case of defects, and the work 
is to be rewarded as when one killeth a 
ravenous wolf. Some will have it in a col- 
lective body; but how? Not met together 
by warrant, or writ of sovereign authority, 
but when fancy of reforming church and 
state calleth them. Some will have the 
power in the noUes and peers ; some in the 
three estates assembled by the king's writ ; 
some in the inferior judges. I luiow not 
where this power to curb sovereignty is, but 
in Almighty God. 



Afu. 1. Jesuits and puritans differ in- 
finitely; true. Jesuits deny the Pope to 
be antichrist, hold all Arminian doctrine, 
Christ's local descension to hell, — ail which 
the Prelate did preach. We deny all this. 

2. We hope also the Lord shall destroy 
the Jesuits' Babel; the suburbs whereof, and 
more, are the popish prelates in Scotland 
and !^^land. 

3. The Jesuits, for ought he knoweth, 
place all superintendent power in the com- 
munity. The Prelate knoweth not^ all his 
brethren, the Jesuits', ways ; but it is igno- 
rance, not want of good-wiU. Tot Bellarmine, 
Beucanus, Suarez, Gregor. de Yalentia, and 
others, his dear fellows, say, that aU super- 
intendent power of policy, in ordine ad 
spiritualia is in the man, whose foot Max- 
well would kiss for a cardinal's hat. 

4. li these be all the differences, it is 
not much. The community is the remote 
and last subject, the representative body the 
nearest subject, the nobles a partial subject ; 
the judges, as judges sent by the king, are 
so in &e game, that when an arbitrary 
prince at his pleasure setteth th^m up, and 
at command that they judge for men, and 
not for the Lord, and accorcungly obey, they 
are by this power to be punished, and others 
put in their place. 

6. A true cause of convening parliaments 
the Prelate maketh a fancy at this time : it 
is as if the thieves and robbers should say a 
justice-court were a fancy ; but if the Prelate 
might compear before the parliament of 
Scotland, (to which he is an outlaw like his 
father, 2 Thess. ii. 4,) sUch a fancy, I con- 
ceive, should hang him, and that deservedly. 

P. Prelate (p. 147, 148).— The subject 
of this superintending power must be se- 
cured from error in judgment and practice, 
and the community and states then should 
be infallible. 

Ana, — The consequence is nought. • No 
more than the king, the absolute indepen- 
dent, is infallible. It is sure the people are 
in less hazard of tyranny and self-destruc- 
tion than the king is to subvert laws and 
make himself abeSute ; and for that cause 
there must be a superintendent power above 
the king, and God Almighty also must be 
above all. 

P. Prelate. — The parliament may err, 
then God hath left the state remediless, 
except the king remedy it. 

An8» — There is no consequence here, ex- 
cept the king be impeccable. Posterior 




parliaments may correct the former. A 
state IS not remediless, because God's reme- 
dies, in sinful men's hands, may miscarry. 
But the question is now, Whether God hath 
siren power to one man to destroy men, sub- 
yert d and raligion, without any power 
above him to coerce, restrain, or punish ? 

P. Prdate (c. 16, p. 148).— If, when 
the parliament erreth, the remedy is lefb to 
the wisdom of God, why not when the king 
erreth? 

Ans. — Neither is antecedent true, nor 
the ccmsequence valid, for the sounder part 
may resist ; and it is easier to one to destroy 
many, having a power absolute, which God 
never gave him, than for many to destroy 
themsmves. Then, if the kins Uzziah in- 
trude himself and sacrifice, the priests do 
sin in remedying thereof. 

P. Prelate. — Why might not the peo- 
ple of Israel, peers or sanhedrim, have con- 
vened before them, judged and punished 
David for his adultery and murder ? Ro- 
manists and new statists acknowledge no 
case lawful, but heresy, apostacy, or ty- 
ranny; and tyranny, ihej say, must be 
universaly manifest as the sun, and with 
obstinacv, and invincible by prayers, as is 
recorded of Nero, whose wisn was rather 
a transported passion, than a fixed reso- 
lution. This cannot fidl in the attempts 
of any but a madman. Now this cannot be 
proved our king; but though we ^rant in 
the foresaid case, that the commumtv mav 
resume their power, and rectify what is 
amiss, which we cannot grant ; but this will 
follow by their doctrine, in every case of 
male administration.^ 

Afu. — The Prelate draweth me to speak 
of the case of the king's unjust murder, 
confessed (Fsal. li.); to which I answer: 
He taketh it for confessed, that it had been 
treason in the sanhedrim or states of Israel 
to have taken on them to judge and punish 
Darid for his adultery and his murder ; but 
he giveth no reason for this, nor any word 
of God ; and truly, though I will not pre- 
sume to go before others m this, God's law 
(Gren. ix. 6, compared with Num. xxxv. 30, 
31) seemeth to say «;ainst them. 

6. Nor can I think that Grod's law, or his 
deputy the judges, are to accept the persons 
of the great, because they are great ; (Deut. 
i. 17 ; 2 Ghron. xix. 6, 7 ;) and we say, we 



^ Stolen from AmisaBus, de anthorit. prin. c. 4^ 
n.5,p.7a 



cannot distinguish where the law distinguish- 
eth not. TheXord speaketh to under judges, 
(Lev. xix. 16,) *' Thou shalt not respect 
the person of the poor, nor honour the person 
of the mighty," or of the prince, for we know 

what these names Sl*IJ ^^^ {t!3*l ™®<^~ 
eth. I grant it is not God's meaning that 
the king should draw the sword against him- 
self, but yet it followeth not, tJiat if we speak 
of the demerit of blood, that the law of Crod 
accepteth any judge, great or small ; and if 
the estates be above me king, as I conceive 
they are, though it be a human politic con- 
stitution, that uie king be firee of all co-action 
of law, because it conduceth for the peace of 
the commonwealth; yet if we make a matter 
of conscience, for my part I see no exception 
that Grod maketh it ; if men make, I crave 
leave to say, a facto (xd jus non sequitur ; 
and I eaoly yield that in e?ery case the 
estates may coerce the kinff, if we make it 
a case of conscience. And for the place, 

SPs. li. 4,) '* Against thee, thee only, have 
: sinned," ♦nNOfTn^S ^S flatterers 
allege it to be a place proving'that the king 
is above all earthly tribunals, and all laws, 
and that there was not on earth any who 
might punish king David ; and so they cite 
Clemens Alexandnn. (Stnrni. 1. 4,) Amobi., 
PsaL 1., Dydimus, Hieronim. ; but Calvin on 
the place, giveth the meaning that most of 
the fathers give, — Domine, etMm si me totus 
mundus msoivat^ mihi tamen plusquam 
satis estf quod te solum judicem sentio. It 
is true, Beda, Euthymius, Ambrosius, (Apol. 
David, c. 4 and c. 10,) do all acknowledge 
from the place, de faeto^ there was none 
above Darid to judge him, and so doth Au- 
ffustine, Basilius Theodoret, say, and Chry- 
LtomiL, and GyriUus, a^d Hieronim^ 
(Epist. 22.) Ambrose (Sermon 16, in Fsal. 
cxviii.) Gregorius, and Augustine (Joan 8,) 
saith, he meaneth no man durst judge or 
punii^ him, but Grod only. Lorinus, the Je- 
suit, observeth eleven iaterpretations of the 
fathers all to this sense : " Since (Lyra saith) 
he sinned only against Grod, because Grod only 
could pardon him ;" Hugo Cardinalis, '' Be- 
cause Grod only could wash him," which he 
asketh in the text. And Lorinus, " Solo Deo 
consdo peccaviJ^ But the simple meaning 
is, 1. Against thee only have I sinned, as my 
eye-witness and immediate beholder; and, 
therefore, he addeth — and have done this evil 
in thy sight. 2. Against thee only, as my 
judge, that thou mayest be justified when thou 
judgest, as clear from ail unrighteousness^ 



18B 



LEKy BX& ; OR, 



wiidn< tfiDii dbalt send-tbe sMrordoiD mff hoqaa. 
3; Agaitirt tiwe, O Loitdocdy^ who caiutt 
iMuiitiie,<iadpardottme(v^Jl,2)^ And if 
this ^^ tlMO OBtij'' exebde aikogetber IJriab) 
BMih8lieb% and tk« kv of tbe judges, as if 
he had smoied against*Bone of tnese in their 
kind, then m the kin^, becaiiae a king, free, 
not only from a pnnisiiing hwr of man, but 
from &e dati« of the seoond table shnply, 
and do a king cannot be under the best and 
largest half of the kw^ Thou abalt love thy 
nei^bour aa thyaelf» He shaM nfA need 
to say, For^ve us our sbs, ami we fi^igiTe 
them that sm against us ; for there is no 
reason, from the nature «f sin, and the nature 
of the kw of God, why iveaaa aay mere the 
sttbjeots and sons* sin against' the king and 
father, than to say the father and kii^ sin 
against the eons and snl^ects. By thosj 
the' ki^ kilting hia &iher Jesse, should ma 
a^nst God, t^ not break the fifth cqir-« 
inand, it<^r sin afiaiast his father. God 
should in vabi^rbidi&thersto prenroka their 
cfaiidren to wrat}i« 

1. And kiiigs^ to do injustice to their sub^ 
jeete, becajuae by this tne supeiior caimot 
sb against the inferior, fbrasmnch as kii^ 
can sin asainst none but those who have 
power to judge and punish them ; but God 
only, and no inferiors, and no subjects, hftve 
power to punish the kings; thereifore kkgs 
can sin against none of th^r subjects; and 
where there is no sin, how can there be a 
law ? Neither maior or minor can be deided 
byroyalkts. ^ 

2* We acknowledge tyranny mui^ only 
unking a prince. l%e Prelate denieth it, 
but he is a green statist. Barcky, Grotius^ 
Winzetus, as I hare proved, granteth it. 

S. He will excuse Neio^ as oi infirmity, 
wishing all Borne to have one nedc, that he 
may cut it oif. And is that charitable of 
kings, that they will not be so mad as to 
destroy their own kingdom? But when his- 
tories teach us there have been more tyrants 
than kings, the kings are more obliged to 
him for flattery than for state-wit, except 
we say that all kii^ who eat the peopk of 
God, as they do bread, owe him little £ar 
making them all mad and fiwntic. 

4., But let them be Neroes, and mad, and 
worse, there is no coefoing of them, but all 
must give dkeir nedks to the sword, if the 

Cr Prekte be heard; and yet kings cannot 
30 mad as ta destroy their subjects. Mary 
of England was that mad. The Bomidbi 
princes who have given (Bev. xvii. 13} 



their power and strength to the beast, and 
do nuAe war with the Lamb; and idnflsin- 
SfMred with the mrit of the beaAt^^aod maak 
with the wine or the cup of Babei\i Ibmicft^ 
tioBs, are so mad ; and the temempeKoiaarp 
so mad, who wasted theb faifth&dettwibjdcts. 

P. Prelate, — If there be swh a power, in 
the peers, resumahle in the exigsntiofnteBB^ 
sity, as the last necessary remodyiforjea&iy 
oi diarch and state, Grod and juitoiersot 
being deficient in things nweaaArj^it'^asa^ 
be proved out of the Senptoorevaiid net^ Udka 
oa trust, for a^Mrmawti tncumbit'probaiUK' • 

^n^.— *Mr Bishop, whad; better lis i^wt 
c^mnanti ineumbit^ &e., Ihan ^fliiiieS «&r 
you are the afi&rmer. L I caa jpvove a 
power in the king, limited oidy to mdy go- 
vern, and save the people; aad yoo- afimai 
that God hath given to the king^ not'ooly a 
power official and royal to savie^ but* ako te 
destroy and cut off, so as no man (may sa^^ 
Why doest ^on this? Shall we t(|ke tins 
upon the word of an excMnmuniciriaid ^.yre» 
kte? Frofer ta6u2a#, John P. P^, I Maave 
you not, rojral power is, Deut« mviL 18; Bkuu. 
iii. 14. I am sure there is thero< a power 
given to the king to do good, and that-firom 
God. Let John P. P. prove a power to do 
iU, given of God to the king. 2» We shall 
aui^y prove that the states may mprefli 
tnis power, and punish the tyrantr-^not die 
king, 'when he shall prov« tlnli a tyraanous 
power is an ordinance ot' God, and so >niey 
not be resisted ; &r the kw of natmre teash-^ 
ethy-^tf I give my sword to my feiiowitode^ 
fend me from me murderer, if : he shall 
fall to and murder me with mv own Mnrd^ 

I may (if I hare gtreiigth>«a&. nqr wwd 
irom nun. 

P. I^date. — 1. It id infiddit^ to-^think 
that God cannot help us, and* imJ>alsenoe 
that we wiU not wait on GML When siking 
op|ffesseth us, it is aieaibiat God's wisdom 
that he hath not provided azK^lusr mean for 
our safety than intrasicm on God^ vight. iL 
It is agunst God's power,*^. fiis faolineas 
«— 4* GhiistiaB religion, that we iieoessitate 
God to so weak a mean as to make use of 
sin, and we oast the aspersum of treason on 
religion, and deter kin^ to profess ref<»med 
caiholio reMgion ;«<^. We are not' to jostle 
God out of his ri^t. 

Ans» l.-^I see nothing but what Dr 
F^me, Gfotius, Barcky, fikekwood, have 
said before, with some colour of proving the 
conse<p]ence. The P. Prekte giveth us Qther 
men's arguments, but without bones. All 



:^= 



=5 



THE LAW ANB THE HRINCB. 



188 



were flood, if the state's ooercmff and carbinff 
a po4r which Ood ae^er ga4 to the king 
weie A sin and an act of impati^ioe and uih 
bdief; and if it were proper to God only, 
by in. i»in«U»te h«ul, to ooeroe tyranny. 
% He eaiieth it not protestant relisiGD, 
either iiere or elsewherey but cunnmglj 
givB^rs naone that will agree to the Roman 
cathdic religionk For ^e Dominjcans, 
Fnmdwans^ and the Faiisian doctors and 
sidioohnent'&Uflwing^ Oocham, Gerson, Al** 
main, and o4hw papists, call themselves re* 
formed cathnlioB. He layeUi this for a 
gcoond, in liiree or four pages, — ^where these 
flane aigiunents are again and again repeated 
w tenmniw, as his second reason, fp. 149,^ 
was handled ad nctuseam (p. 148) ; his thira 
reason is repeated in his sixtn reason. (p.l51.) 
He kyeth down, I say, this groimd, which 
is the>^b^(ffed oondusion, and maketh the 
coflBlii8L(Hi inie assamption, in eight raw and 
aften^iepeated arguments, — ^to wit, That the 
pariiaaM&t's coercing and restraining of ap* 
bitBary j^wer is rebdlion, and resistmg the 
ordiaanee of €k)d. But he dare not lo& the 

te^.Bom.xi]i.,onthefaoe. Other royalists 
done h with bad success. This I desire 
to be weighed, and I retort die Prelate's 
aigtmielit. But it is indeed the triyial ar- 
j^inrant of all royaysts, especially of Barclay, 
--^obvious tx his thurd book. If arbikary and 
tyrannical power, above any law that the 
lawfiil ntagistarate oommandeth under the 
pain of dsothj^^Thoa idialt not murder one 
man, Thou shalt not take away the vineyard 
ofone JSfaboth viokntly-^be lawful and war- 
rantable by God's word, then an arbitrary 
power, above all divine laws, is given to the 
Keeping of the civil magistrate. And it is 
Ao laBs>law£ul 'arbitfary, or rather tyrannical 
pewerv-for David to kill all his sulnecte, and 
to> plunder all Jopusalem, (as I believe pre- 
lateft«nd malignantsand papists would serve 
the three kiBi^nis, if the king should com- 
mand them,) than to kill one Uriah, or for 
Ahabto spoil one Naboth. The essence of 
sin most agree alike to aU, thw^h the degrees 

^ God's remedy a^st arbitrary poweo* 
hereafter, in the ^piestion of reaistanoe ; but 
the confused engine of the Prelate bringeth 
it in here, where there is no> place for it. 
^7. m. m,m^ i^tgBinent k :-Befare 
^^ would authorise' rebellion, aiid give a 
bad precedent thereof Ibr 0f«r, he would 
r^er w<»k extraordinary and wonder&l 
iniracles ; and therefore would not authorise 



the people te deltvor tbemadtes from under^ 
Phsfaoh,' but made Mdsea^ a pnboe^ to bring' 
them out of Egypt with' a stnstebediinifc 
arm* Ifcr did ^e Lord^elitaD his' people 
by the wisdom i£ Moeo^ or strength ^ uA 
people, or any act that way of weirs,, but 
by his own immediate band and power* 

Amj^^\ reduce the Prelate's oooiL&sed 
words to a few; for I speak not of his ponah 
term of St* Steven, and- r others: the. nke; 
because aH that hd ha^ sAid* in a book of 
14& Y«W !maght liavebeen said in three 
sheets of paper. But, I pray yon, what- is^ 
this argument to the qnestion in haiad^ 
which is, whedi^r the king be so above ^aU' 
lawii, as people > and peers, in thO'Casoiof 
arbitrary power, may resume their power 
and punish a tyrant? The P. Prelaite draw*- 
eth m the question of resistance by th^ 
hair. Israel's not rising in attns agaiinsi 
kmg Pharaoh proveth nethtag against the 
power of a &ee xingdom against a tyrants 

1* Mosesy who wr(Nj^ht miracles destruc* 
tive to Pharaoh, might pray for vengeance 
against Pharaoh,. God having revealed to 
Moses that Pharaoh was a reprobate ; but 
may ministers and nobles pray so against 
king CSiarles? God forbid. 

2. Pharai^ had not his crown from 
Israel. 

3. Pharaoh had not sworn to defend 
Israel^ nor became he their king upon con- 
dition he should maintain and profess the 
religion of the God of Israel; therefore 
Israel could not, as free estates, challenge 
him in their supreme court of pariiament 
of breach of oath ; and upon no terms conld 
they unking Pharaoh : he held not his 
crown of them. . 

4. Pharaoh was never circumcised, nor 
within the oovenant of the God of Israel 
in profession. 

5* Israel had their lands by the mere 
gift of the king. I hope the lung of Bxj- 
tain standeth to Scotland and En^and in a 
fourfold contrary relation. 

All divines know that Pharaoh, his prinos^ 
and the Egyptians, were his peers and peo- 
ple, and uiat Israel were not his native 
subjects, but a number of strangers, who, 
by the laws of the king and princes^ by the 
means of Joseph, had gotten the land of 
Goshen for their dwelhng, and liberty to 
serve the God of Abraham, to whom they 
prayed in their bondage, (Ex)Dd. ii^ 23, 24^ 
and they were not to serve the gods of 
•Egypt, nor were they of the king's reli- 






-akoa^KM^ik— ^M^»B-k*aMw^a«M>h> 



134 



LEX, BBX ; 0]t» 



gion. And therefinre, his argument is thus: 
A number of poor exiled strax^rs under 
king Pharaoh, who were not Pharaoh's 
princes and peers, could not restram . the 
tyranny of lung Pharaoh; therefore^ the 
three estates in a free kingdom may not re- 
strain the arbitrary power of a kinff • 

1. The Prelate must prove that God 
save a royal and kinely power to kinir 
Iharaoh, due to him by 4tue of his kingly 
calling, (according as royalists explain 1 
Sam. yiii. 9, 11,) to kill all the male chil- 
dren of Israel, to make slaves of themselves, 
and compel them to work in brick and clay, 
while their lives were a burden to them ; 
and that if a Roman catholic, Mary of Eng- 
land, should kill all the male children of 
protestants, by the hands of papists, at the 
queen's commandment, and make bond- 
slaves of all the peers, judges, and three 
estates, who made her a iree princess ; yet, 
notwithstanding that Mary had sworn to 
maintain the protestant reugion, they were 
to suffer and not to defend memselves. But 
if Grod give Pharaoh a power to kill all 
Israel, so as they could not control it, then 
Grod giveth to a king a royal power by office 
to sin, only the royalist saveth God from being 
the author of sin in this, that God gave the 
power to sin ; but yet with this limitation, 
that the subjects should not resist this power. 
2. He must prove that Israel was to give 
their male children to Pharaoh's butchers, — 
for to hide them was to resist a royal power ; 
and to disobey a royal Ppwer ^ven of Grod, 
is to disobey God. 3. The subjects may not 
resist the king's butchers coming to kill 
them and their male children ; for to resist 
the servant of the king in that wherein he is 
a servant, is to resist we kin^. (1 Sam. viii. 
7; 1 Pet. ii. 14; Rom. xiii. 1.) 4. He 
must prove, that upon the sumK)6ition that 
Israel had been as strong as r haraoh and 
his people ; that without God's special com- 
mandment, (they then wanting the written 
word,) they should have fought with Pha- 
raoh ; and that we now, for all wars, must 
have a word from heaven, as if we had not 
God's perfect will in his word, as at that 
time Israel behoved to have in all wars, 
Judg. xviii. 5 ; 1 Sam. xiv. 37 ; Isa. xxx. 
2; Jer. xxxviii. 37; 1 Bangs xxii. 6; 1 
Sam. xxx. 5 ; Judg. xx. 27 ; 1 Sam. xxiii. 
2 ; 2 Sam. xvi. 23 ; 1 Chron. x. 14. But 
because Grod gave not t^em an answer to 
fi^t against Pharaoh, therefore we have no 
warrant now to fight against a foreign nation 



invading us; the consequence is null, and 
therefore this is a vain argument. The pro- 
phets never reprove the people for not per- 
forming the duty of defensive wan against 
tyrannous kings ; therefore, there is no such 
duty enjoined by any law of Grod to us. 
For the prophetiB never rebuke the people 
for non-performing the duty of ofirensive 
wars. against their enemies, but where God 
gave a special command and response from 
his own oracle, that they should nght. And 
if Grod was pleased never to command the 
people to rise against a tyrannous king, they 
did not sin where they had no command- 
ment of Grod ; but I hope we have now a 
more sure word of prophecy to inform us. 
5. The Prelate conjectureth Moses' mira- 
cles, and the deHveranoe of the people by 
dividing the Bed Sea, was to forbid and 
condemn defensive wars of people against 
their king; but he hath neither Scnpture 
nor reasons to do it« The end of these 
miracles was to seal to Pharaoh the truth 
of Grod's calling of Moses and Aaron to 
deliver the people, as is. clear, £xod. iv. 
1 — 4, compared with vii. 8 — 10. And that 
the Lord might get to himself a name on 
all the earth, Bom. ix. 17 ; Exod. ix. 16 ; 
xiii. 13, 14. But of the Prelate's conjec- 
tural end, the Scripture is silent, and we 
cannot take an excommunicated man's word. 
What I said of Pharaoh, who had not his 
crown from Israel, that I say of Nebuchad- 
nezzar and the kin^ of Persia^ keeping the 
people of Grod captive. 

P. Prelate (p. 153).— So m the book 
of Judges, when the people were delivered 
over to the hand of their enemies, because 
of their sins, he never warranted the ordi- 
nary judges or community to be their own 
deliverers; but when they repented, Grod 
raised up a judge. The people nad no hand 
in their own deliverance out of Babylim ; 
Grod effected it by Cyrus, immediately and 
totally. Is not this a real proof Grod will 
not have inferior judges to rectify what is 
amiss; but we must wait in patience till 
Grod provide lawM me9ns, some sovereign 
power immediately sent by himself, in which 
course of his lOrdinary providei)cey he will 
not be defrdent. 

Ans. 1. — All this is beside the question, 
and proveth nothing less than that peers 
and community may not resume their power 
to curb an arbitrary power. For, in the 
first case, their is neither arbitrary nor law- 
ful supreme judge. 2. If the first prove any 



THB LAW Aia> THE PRINCE. 



135 



thing, it proYeth that it was rebellion in the 
infenor judges and community of Israel to 
fight aeainst foreign icings, not set over them 
by Grcd; and tmtt onensive wars against 
any kings whatsoever, because they are 
kin^ though strangers, are unlawM. Let 
Socimans and anabaptists consider if the P. 
Prelate help not them in tiiis, and may 
proTO all wars to be unlawful. 3. He is so 
malignant to all inferior judges, as if they 
were not powers sant of Grod, and to all 

fovemors that are not kings, and so up-> 
olders of prelates, and of lumself as ne 
conceiveth, that by his arguing he will have 
all delirerance of kings only, tne only lawful 
means in ordinary providence ; and so aris- 
tocracy and democracy, except in Grod's ex- 
traordinary providence, and by some divine 
dispensation, must be extraordinarv and or- 
dinarily unlawful. 1. The acts of a state, 
when a king is dead and they choose an- 
other, shall be an anticipating of Grod's pro- 
vidence. 2. K the king be a child, a cap- 
tive, or distracted, and the kingdom op- 
pressed with maliffnants, they are to wait, 
^Me God munedi^ from Saven create a 
king to them, as he did Saul long ago. But 
have we now kings immediately sent as Saul 
was? How is we spirit of prophecy and 
government infused m them, as in king 
Saul? or are they by prophetical inspira- 
tion, anointed as David was? I conceive 
their calling to the throne on God's part 
differs as much from the calling of Saul and 
Dayid, in some respect, <» tEe calling of 
ordinary pastors, who must be gifted by in- 
dustry ana learning and called by the church, 
and tne calling of apostles. 3. God would 
deliver his people from Babylon by moving 
the heart of Cyrus immediately, the people 
having no hand in it, not so much as sup- 
pUcatmg Cyrus ; therefore, the people and 
peers nmo made the king cannot curb his 
tvrannical power, if he make captives and 
slaves of them, as the kings of Chaldea made 
slaves of the people of Imel. What ! Be- 
cause Grod useth another mean, therefore, 
this mean is not lawAil. It foUoweth in no 
sort. If we must use no means but what 
the captive people did under Cyrus, we may 
not lawftiUy fly, nor supplicate, for the peo- 
ple did neither. 

P. Prelate, — You read of no covenant in 
Scripture made without the king. (£xod. 
xxxiv.) Moses king of Jeshurun : neither 
tables nor parliament framed it. Joshua 
another, (Josh, xxiv.) and Asa, (2 Chron. 



XV. ; 2 Chron. xxxiv. ; Ezra x.) The 
covenant of Jehoiada in the nonage of 
Joash, was the h^h priest's act, as the 
king's governor. There is a covenant with 
hell, n^e without the king, and a false 
covenant. (Hos. x. 3, 4.) 

Ans, — ^We argue this negatively. 1. This 
is neither commanded, nor practised, nor 
warranted by promise ; therefore, it is not 
lawful. But tnis is not practised in Scrip- 
ture ; therefore, it is not lawful. It foUow- 
eth it. Show me in Scripture the killing of 
a coring ox who killed a man; the not 
ins3dng oatUements on a house ; the putting 
to death of a man lying with a beast ; the 
killing of seducing projpiets, who tempted 
the pe^le to go a whoring, and serve an- 
other God than Jehovah : I mean, a god 
made by the hand of the baker, such a one 
as the excommunicated Prelate is known to 
be, who hath preached this idolatry in three 
kingdoms. (Deut. xiii.) This is written, and 
all the former laws are divine precepts. 
Shall the precept make them all unlawnd, 
because they are not practised by some in 
Scripture ? By this ? I ask. Where read ye 
that the people entered in a covenant with 
Grod, not to worship the golden image, and 
the king ; and those who pretended tney are 
the priests of Jehovah, the churchmen and 
relates, re&sed to enter in covenant with 
Grod? By this argument, the king and 
prelates, in non-practising with us, want- 
mg the precedent of a Ske practised in 
Scripture, are in the &rult. 2. This is no- 
thing to prove the conclusion in question. 
3. iQl these places prove it is the king's 
duty, when the people under him, and their 
fathers, have corrupted the worship of God, 
to renew a covenant with Grod, and to cause 
the people to do the like, as Moses, Asa, 
and Jehoshaphat did. 4. H the king refuse 
to do his duty, where is it written that the 
people ought also to omit their duty, and to 
love to have it so, because the rulers cor- 
rupt their ways? (Jer. v. 31.) To renew a 
covenant with Grod is a point of service due 
to God that the people are obliged unto, 
whether the king command it or no. What 
if Xh» king command not his people to serve 
God ; or, what if he forbid i^iel to pray 
to Grod ? Shall the people in that case serve 
the King of kings, only at the nod and royal 
command of an earthly king? Clear this 
from Scripture. 5. Ezra (di. v.) had no 
commandment in pirticular from Artax- 
erxes, king of Persia, or from Darius, but a 



general. (£zraTii.2d.) " Whatsoever is com- 
manded bj the God of heaven, let it be dili- 
ffentlj done for the hooae of the God of 
heayen.*' Bat the tables in Scotland, and 
the two parliaments of England and Scot- 
land, who renewed the oorenant, and entered 
in covenant not against the king, (as the P. 
P. saith,) bat to TMtore religion to its ancient 
puritj, lubve this express law both from kin? 
James and king Giuurles, in manj acts S 
parliament, that religion be kept pore. Now, 
as Artaxerxes knew nothing ot the covenant, 
and was unwilling to subembe it, and yet 
gave to Ezra ana the princes a warrant, in 
general, to do all that the God of heaven 
required to be done, for the religion and 
house of the Grod of heaven, and so a gene- 
ral warrant &r a covenant, without the 
king; and yet Ezra and the people, in 
swearing that covenant, failed in no dntv 
against their king, to whom, by the fifth 
comnuuidment, they were no less subject 
than we are to our lung : just so we are, and 
so have not failed. But they say, the king * 
h&th committed to no lieutexuoit and deputy 
under him, to do what they please in reli- 
gion, without his roval consent in particular, 
and the direction of his clergy, seeing he is 
of that same religion with his people; where- 
as Artaxerxes was of another religion than 
were the Jews and their ^vemor. — Ans. 
Kor can our king take on himself to do what 
he pleaseth, and what the prelates (amongst 
whom those who ruled all are known, before 
the world and the sun, to be of another reli- 

f'on than we are^ pleaseth, in particular, 
ut see what religion and worship the Lord 
our God, and tiiie law of the lana (which is 
the king's revealed will) alloweth to us, that 
we may swear, though the king diould not 
swear it ; otherwise, we are to be of no re- 
ligion but of the king's, and to swear no 
covenant but the king's, which is to Wn 
with papists against protestants. 6. The 
strangers of Ephraim and Manasseh, and out 
of Simeon fell out of Israel in abundance to 
Asa, when they saw that the Lord his God 
was with him, (2 Chron. xv. 9, 10,) and 
sware that covenant without their own king's 
consent, their own king being against it. xf 
a people swear a religious covenant, without 
tiieir King, who is averse thereunto, fer more 
may the nobles, peers, and estates of parlia- 
ment do it without their king ; and here is 
an example of a practice, which the P. Pre- 
late requuretib. 7. That Jehoiada wba go- 
vernor and viceroy during the ncmage of 



Joash, and that by this royal authority the 
covenant was sworn, is a draam, to the end 
he may make the Pope, and the ardtprelate, 
now vioercniv and kmgs, when the throne 
varieth. The nobles were authors of iha 
making c^ that covenant, no less tiian Jeho- 
iada was ; yea, and the people of the land, 
ndien the kin^ was bat a child, went unto 
the house oi Baal, and brake down hii 
images, &c. Here is a ref<Nnnation, made 
without the kine, by the people. 8. Grave 
expositors say, Uiat the covenant with death 
ana hell (Ink xxviii.) was the king's cove- 
nant with Egypt. 9. And the covenant 
(Hos. X.) is by none exponed of a covenant 
made without the king. I have heard said, 
this Prelate, preaching on this text belbre 
the king, exponed it so ; but he ifpake words 
(as the text is) fiJsely. The P. rrelate, to 
the end of the chapter, giveth instance of the 
ill success of popular reformation, because the 
people caused Aanm to make a golden calf, 
and they revolted firam Behoboun to Jero- 
boam, and made two ffolden calves, and they 
conspired with Absuom against David.--* 
Ang, If the first example make good any 
thing, neither the high priest, as was Aarxm, 
nor the P. Prelate, who daimeth to be de- 
scended of Aaron's house, should have any 
hand in reformation at all; for Aaron erred 
in that And to argue firom the people's 
sins to deny their power, is no better than 
to prove Ahab, Jeroboam, and many kines 
in^^ and Jodah, oo^niitted iL»i^, 
therefore they had no royal power at au. 
In the rest of the chapter, for a whole page, 
he singeth over again his matins in a cundie, 
and giveth us the same arguments we heard 
before; of which you have these three 
notes: — 1. They are stolen, and not his 
own. 2. ilepeated again and again to fill 
the field. 3. All hang on a fa&e supposi- 
tian, and a begging of the question. That 
the people, without the king, have no power 
at all. 



QUESTION XXVII. 

WHETHER OB NO THE KIXG BE THE SOLE, 
SUPREME AND FINAL INTERPBETEB OE THE 
LAW. 

This question oonduceth not a little to the 
clearing of the doubts concerning the king's 
absobite power, and the suppoi^ sole no- 



THE LAW AVA'TJBIB PRINCE. 



137 



1 1 



iJIbthetM^ yowep in the king. And I thiiik 
it^not.tumk^ to the question, Whether the 
Bepe'imd'Soiniidi divrsh haye a aole and 
pecemploiy p6wer of exp(«ing kws, «nd 
the wosd «f Qod? We are to connder that 
thiere is- a'tiro£oid enweiiion of laws; 1. 
. Ooe qMctdatiire tn a scnool way, so exquisite 
JQiistfer'faaye'a pover to expone laws. 2. 
Phbdiatth, in so far as the sense of the law 
&tteth oader oar piaotice ; a&d this is two- 
iUdf^-^her piivate and oommon to all, or 
jadidal and proper to judges ; and of this 
kit'is the* queiriion. 

Fop t^) public, the law hath one funda- 
menial rule^ sulmg poouU, like the king of 
pfanetsy'the son, whicn lendeth star-light to 
all kvwtf, and bj which they are exponed : 
whatevei? interpretetion swerreth either from 
feodaibenital laws of policy, or from the law 
of nature, and tho law of nations, and espe* 
cnlfyi&oiri tiie nfety of the pubhc, is to be 
rcgected as a perrerting of the law; and 
tlraisfofey wtadentia humam generis, the 
natiuSakicoBieienoe of all men, to which the 
opprasriod people may appeal unto when the 
kasgicoBponcith a law unjustly, at his own 
imiare,>:i8 the last rule on earth for e^pon- 
mg el lawsi Nar ought laws to be made so 
ohecam, aa 9n ordinary wit cannot see their 
oonnaexiDn with fundamental truths of poUcy, 
and the safety of the people ; and therefore 
I see no tnconyeiiienoe, to say, that the law 
itself is MortMi et regtda jtuiuioandiy the 
rak^aitd directoiy to square the jud^e, and 
tiiat )the jvdge is the pubUc practical inter* 
pietfDofthelaiw. 

Assert! l.r-«Th6 king is not the sole and 
final Satoi^nreter of the law. 
• >1«. Besuse then inferior judges should 
not beridtearprefteroof the kw ; but inferior 
judges iar9 no less essentially judges than 
the km^, <Beat. i. 17; 2 Chron. xix. 6; 
1 P^t. iLil4; Bom. xiii. 1, 2,) and so by 
«fficB| must interpret the law, else they can- 
not give sentence according to their con- 
science and equity. Now, exponing of the 
law judicially is an act of judgmg, and so a 
personal and incommunicable act ; so as I 
can no more judge and expone the law ac- 
cording to another man's conscience, than I 
can beneve with another man's soul, under- 
stand with another man'a understanding, or 
see with another man's eye. The king's 
pleasure, therefore, cannot be the rule of 
the inferior judge's oonscioioe, for he giveth 
aninmiediate account to Grod, the Juage of 
all, of a just or an unjust sent^ooe. Suppose 



Ceesar fshaU- azptftie th^ law to FUate, that 
Christ deaetvcuv to die the dsath. yet Pilate 
is tftot^in ooii6ciHioeit» expone the law sq. 
If therefore inferior judges jtKige for the 
king, Ahey * judge t only- by power borrowed 
from the king, not by the pleasure, will^ or 
command of the > king thus and thus expon- 
ii^ the law, therefore thekiagtoannot be the 
sok interpreter «f the kiw« 

2. If tne Lord say not to the king only, 
but alsoto other inferior judges, ^' Be wise, 
understand, and the cause that you know 
not, search out," then tlie king is not the 
only interpreter of the law. Eut the Lord 
saith not to the king only, but to other judges 
also, Be wise, understand, and the cause that 
you know not,' search out ; thecrefore the king 
is 'not the- sole law-giver. The major is 
clear fi*om Psal. ii. 10, " Be wise now there- 
fore, O ye kings, be instructed, ye judges of 
the earth." So am oommands and rebukes 
for unjust judgment given to others than to 
kings. (Fs. luxii. 1--^; lviii« 1, 2; Isa. i. 
17, 23, 25, 26; iii. 14; Job xxix; 12--15; 
xxxi. 21, 22.) 

3. The kin^ is either ^e sole interpreter 
of law, in respect he is to f(^ow the law as 
his rule, and so he is a ministerial interpre- 
ter of the law, or he is an interpreter of the 
law aooording to that super-dominion of ab- 
sdute power that he hath above the law. If 
the former be h(^en, then it is clear that 
the king is not the only interpreter, for all 
judges, as they are judges, have a ministerial 
power to expone the law by the law : but the 
second is the sense of royalists. 

Assert. 2. — ^Hence our sec<»id assertion is, 
That the king's power of exp(»iing the law 
is a mere mimsterial power, and he hath no 
dominion of any absolute royal power to ex- 
pone the law as he will, and to put such a 
sense and meaning of the law as he pleaseth. 

1. Because Saul maketh a law, (1 Sam. 
xiv. 24,) ** Cursed be the man that tasteth 
any food tiU night, that the king may be 
avenged on his enemies," the law, according 
to the letter, was bloody ; but, according to 
the intent of the lawgiver and substance of 
the law, profitable, for tl» end was that the 
enemies should be pursued with all ^eed. 
But king Saul's exponing the law a^r a 
tyranni(»il way, against the intent of the law, 
which is the diamond and pearl of all laws — 
the safety of the innocent people, was justly 
resisted by the innocent people, who violentlv 
hindered innocent Jonathan to be killed. 
Whence it ia dear, that the people and 



u 



138 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



piinces put on the law its tnie sense and 
meaning ; for Jonathan's tasting of a little 
hcmej, though as it was against that sinful 
and predpitote circumstance, a rash oath, 
yet it was not against the suhstance and true 
mtent of the &w, which was the people's 
speedy pursuit of the enemy. Whence it is 
Clear, that the people, including the princes, 
hath a ministerial power to expone the law 
aright, and according to its genuine intent, 
and that the king, as king, hath no ahsolute 
power to expone iixe law as he pleaseth. 

2. The king's ahsolute pleasure can no 
more he the genuine sense of a just law than 
his ahsolute pleasure can he a law ; hecause 
the genuine sense of the law is the law itself, 
as l£e formal essence of a thing differeth 
not really, hut in respect of reason, from 
the thing itself. The Pope and Bomish 
church cannot put on the Scripture, ex 
plenitudine potestatis, whatever meaning 
they will, no more than they can, out of 
absolute power, make canonic a^pture. 
Now so it is, that the king, hy his ahsolute 
power, cannot make law no law. 1. Because 
ne is king hy, or according to, law, hut he is 
not king of law. Hex est rex seoimdum 
legem^ sed non est dominus et rex legis, 2. 

. Because, although it have a good meaning, 
which XJlpian saith, *' Qibod pnncipi placet 
legis vigorem hahet,^^ — ^the wul of the prince 
is the law ; yet the meaning is not that any- 
thing is a just law, hecause it is the prince's 
will, for its rule formally; for it must be 
good and just before the prince can will it, — 
and then, he finding it so, he putteth the 
stamp of a human law on it. 

3. This is the difference between Grod's 
will and the will of the king, or any mortal 
creature. Things are just and good, because 
God willeth them,— -especially things posi- 
tively good, (though I conceive it hoKi in all 
things^ and Grod doth not will things, be- 
cause tney are good and just ; but the crea- 
ture, be he king or any never so eminent, 
do ¥011 things, because they are good and 
just, and the king's willing of a thing maketh 
it not good and just ; for only Grod's will — 
not the creature's— can be the cause why 
things are good and just. If, therefore, it 
be so, it must undeniably hence follow, that 
the king's will maketh not a just law to 
have an unjust and bloody sense; and he 
cannot, as kmg, by any absolute super-domi- 
nion over the law, put a just sense on a 
bloody and unjust law» 

4. The advancing of any man to the 



throne and royal dignity putteth not the 
man above the number ot rational men. 
No rational man can create, by any act of 
power never so transcendent or boundless, a 
sense to a law contrary to the law. Nay, 
give me leave to doubt if Omnipotence can 
make a just law to have an unjust and 
bloody sense, aut contra^ because it involveth 
a contradiction ; — ^the true meaning of a law 
being the essential form of the law. Hence 
judge what brutish, swinish flatterers they 
are who say, " That it is the true meaning 
of the law which the king, the only supreme 
and independent expositor of the law, saith 
is the true sense of the law." There was 
once an animal — ^a fool of the first magnitude 
— ^who said he could demonstrate, by invin- 
cible reasons, that the king's dung was more 
nourishing food than bread of me flour of 
the finest wheat. For my part I could wish 
it were the demonstrators only food fi>r 
seven days, and that should be the best 
demonstration he could make for his proof. 

5. It must follow that there can be no 
necessity of written laws to the subjects, 
against Scripture and natural reason, and 
the law of nations, in which all accord : that 
laws not promul^ted and published cannot 
oblige as law ; yea, Adam, m his innocency, 
was not obliged to obey a law not written in 
his heart by nature, except Crod had made 
known the law; as is clear, Gren. iii. 11, 
'' Hast thou eaten of the tree whereof I 
commanded thee that thou shouldest not 
eat?" But if the king's absolute will may 
put on the law what sense he pleaseth, out 
of his independent and irresistible supremacy, 
the laws promulgated and written to the 
subjects can declfu:^ nothing what is to be 
done by the subjects as just, and what is to 
be avoided as unjust ; because the laws must 
signify to the subjects what is just and what 
is unjust, according to their genuine sense. 
Now, their genuine sense, according to roy- 
alists, is not only uncertain and impossible 
to be known, but also contradictory ; for the 
king obhgeth us, without gainsaying, to be- 
hove that the just law hath this unjust sense. 
Hence this of flattering royalists is more 
cruel to kings than ravens, (for these eat but 
dead men, while they devour living men,) 
When there is a controversy between the 
king and the estates of parliament, who shall 
expone the law and render its native mean- 
ing ? Boyalists say, Not the estates of parlia- 
ment, for they are subjects, not judges, to 
the king, and only counsellors and advisers 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



139 



of the king. The king, therefore, must 
be the only judicial and final expositor. "As 
for lawyers, (said Strafford,) the law is not 
endos^ in a lawyer's cap." But I remem- 
ber this was one of the articles laid to the 
charge of Bichard II., that he said, " The 
law was in his head and breast."^ And, 
indeed, it must follow, if the king, by the 
plenitude of absolute power, be the only 
supreme uncontrollable expositor of the law, 
that is not law which is written in the acts 
of parliament, but that is the law which is in 
the king's breast and head, which Josephus 
(lib. 19, Antiq. c. 2.) objected to Caius. 
And all justice and injustice should be finally 
and peremptorily resolved on the king's will 
and absolute pleasure. 

6. The king either is to expone the law by 
the law itself ; or by his absolute power, loosed 
from all law, he exponeth it ; or according to 
the advise of his great senate. If the first be 
said, he is nothing more than other judges. 
If the second be said, he must be ommpo- 
tent, and more. If the third be said, he is 
not absolute, if the senate be only advisers, 
and he yet the only judicial expositor. 
The king often professeth his ignorance of 
the laws ; and he must then bom be abso- 
lute above the law, and ignorant of the law, 
and the sole and final judicial exponer of 
the law. And by this, all parliaments, and 
their power of making laws, and of judging, 
are cned down. 

06;. 1. — Prov. xvi. 10, " A divine sen- 
tence is in the lips of the king ; his mouth 
trangresseth not in judgment ;" therefore 
he only can expone the law. 

Ans. — ^Lavater saith, (and I see no rea- 
son on the ccmtrary,) " By a king he mean- 
eth all magistrates." Aben Ezra and Isi- 
dorus read the words imperatively. The 
Tiguiine version, — " They are oracles which 
proceed from his Hps ; let not therefore his 
mouth transgress in judgment." Vatabu- 
lus, — ^** When he is in his prophecies, he 
Heth not." Jansenius, — ^^ Non facile er- 
rabit in judicando.^^ Mich. Jermine, — 
" If he pray." Calvin, — " If he read in the 
book of the law, as Grod commandeth him," 
Dent. xvii. But why stand we on the place? 
'' He speaketh of good kings, (saith Cor- 
nel, k Lapide,) otherwise Jeroboam, Ahab, 
and Manaaseh, erred in judgment." *' And 
except (as Mercerus exponeth it) we under- 



1 Imperator se leges in scrinio condere dicit. I. 
omniiim, C. de testazn. 



stand him to speak of kings according to 
their office, not their fiu^ and practice, we 
make them popes, and men who cannot give 
out erievous and uniust sentences on the 
thron^"-against boi the Word and ex- 
penence. 

Ohj, 2. — Sometimes aU is cast upon one 
man's voice ; why may not the king be this 
one man ? 

Ans, — The antecedent is false ; the last 
voter in a senate is not the sole judge, else 
why should others give suffrages with him ? 
This were to take away inferior judges, con- 
trary to Grod's word, Deut. i. l7 ; 2 Qiron. 
xix. 6, 7 ; Rom. xiii. 1 — 3. 



QUESTION XXVIII. 

WHETHER OR NO WARS RAISED BY THE SUB- 
JECTS AND ESTATES, FOR THEIR OWN JUST 



DEFENCE AGAINST THE 
EMISSARIES, BE LAWFUL. 



KING S BLOODY 



Amisseus perverteth the question; he 
saith, " The question is. Whether or no 
the subjects may, according to their power, 
judge the king and dethrone him ; that is. 
Whether or no it is lawful for the subjects 
in any case to take arms against their lawful 
prince, if he degenerate, and shall wickedly 
use his lawful power." 

1. The state of the question is much per- 
verted, for these be different questions. 
Whether the kingdom may dethrone a 
wicked and tyrannous prince, and whether 
the kingdom may take up arms against the 
man who is the king, in their own innocent 
defence. For the former is an act offensive, 
and of punishing ; the latter is an act of de- 
fence. 

2. The present question is not of subjects 
only, but of the estates, and parliamentary 
lords of a kingdom. I utterly deny these, 
as they are judges, to be subjects to the 
king ; for the question is, Whether is the 
king or the representative kingdom greatest, 
and which of^them be subject one to an- 
other ? I affirm, amongst judges, as judges, 
not one is the commander or superior, and 
the other the commanded or subject. In- 
deed, one higher judge may correct and 
punish a judge, not as a judge, but as an 
erring man. 

3. The question is not so much concern- 
ing the autnoritative act of war, as concern- 



140 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



ing the power of natural defence, upon sup- 
position, that the kins be not now turned 
an habitual tyrant; but that upon some 
acts of misinformation, he come in arms 
agunst his subjects. 

AmisGBus maketh two sort of kings, — 
** Some kings integrcc majestatts^ of entire 
power and sovereignty ; some kings by pac- 
tions, or voluntary agreement between king 
and people." But I judge this a vain dis- 
tinction; for the limited prince, so he be 
limited to a power only oi doing just and 
right, by this is not a prince integrcs ma^ 
jestatis, of entire royal majesty, whereby he 
may both do good and also play tlie tyrant ; 
but a power to do ill being no ways essen- 
tial, yea, repugnant to the absolute majesty 
of the King of kings, cannot be an essential 
part of the majesty of a lawful king ; and 
therefore the prince, Hmited by vomntary 
and positive paction only to rule according 
to law and equity, is the good, lawful, and 
entire prince, only if he have not power to 
do every thing just and good in that regard, 
he is not an entire and complete prince. So 
the man vdll have it lawful to resist the 
limited prince, not the absolute prince ; by 
the contrary, it is more lawM to me to re- 
sist the absolute prince than the limited, 
inasmuch as we may with safer consciences 
resist the tyrant and the lion, than the just 
prince and lamb. Nor can I assent to Cun- 
nerius (de oficio princip, Christia. c. 5 and 
17,) wno holdetn, " that these voluntary 
pactions betwixt king and people, in which 
the power of the prince is diminished, can- 
not stand, because their power is given to 
them by God's word, whicn cannot be taken 
from them by any voluntary paction, law- 
fully;" and mm the same ground, Winzetus 
(in velit. eontr. Buchan. p. 3) " will have 
it unlawful to resist kings, because God hath 
made them irresistible." I answer, — If 
God, by a divine institution, make kings ab- 
solute, and above all laws, (which is a blas- 
phemous supposition — ^the holy Lord can give 
to no man a power to sin, for God hath not 
himself any such power,) then tlie covenant 
betwixt the king and people cannot lawfully 
remove and take away what Grod by insti- 
tution has siven ; but because God (Deut. 
xvii.) hath mnited the first lavrful king, the 
mould of all the rest, the people ought also 
to limit him by a voluntaiy covenant; and 
because the laMrful power of a king .to do 
good is not by divine institution placed in an 
indivisible point. It is not a sin for the people 



to take some power, even of doing good, from 
the king, that he solely, and by himself, shall 
not have power to paidon an involuntary ho- 
micide, without advice and the judicial suf- 
frages of the council of the kingdom, least 
he, instead of this, give pardons to robbers, 
to abominable murderers ; and in so doing, 
the people robbeth not the king of the power 
that God gave him as king, nor ought the 
king to contend for a sole power in nimself 
of ministering justice to all ; for God layeth 
not upon kings burdens impossible ; and God 
by institution hath denied to the king all 
power of doing all good ; because it is his 
¥dll that other judges be sharers with the 
king in that power, (Num. xiv. 16 ; Duet 
i. 14—17 ; 1 Pet. ii. 14 ; Rom. xiii. 1—4;) 
and therefore the duke of Venice, to me, 
cometh nearest to the king moulded by Crod, 
(Deut. xvii.) in respect of power, de jwre^ 
of any king I know in Europe. And in 
point of conscience, the inferior judge dis- 
cerning a murderer and bloody man to die, 
may in foro conscienUcB despise the king's 
unjust pardon, and resist the King's force by 
his co-active power that Grod hath given 
him, and put to death the bloody murderer ; 
and he sinneth if he do not this ; for to me 
it is clear, that the king cannot judge so 
justly and understandingly of a murderer in 
Scotland, as a judge to whom God hath 
committed the sword in Scotland. Nor 
hath the Lord laid that impossible burden 
on a king to judge so of a murder four hun- 
dred mues removed from the king, as the 
judge nearer to him, as is clear hj Num. 
xiv. 16; 1 Sam. vii. 15 — 17. The king 
should go from place to place and judge ; 
and whereas it is impossible to him to go 
through three kingdoms, he should appoint 
faithful judges, who may not be reasted, — 
no, not by the king. 

1. The question is. If the king command 
A. B. to kill his father or his jmstor, — ^the 
man neither being cited nor convicted of 
any fault, he may mwfully be resisted. 

2. Queritur, — If, in that case in which 
the king is captived, imprisoned, and not 
8ui juris f and awed or overawed by bloody 
papists, and so is forced to command a 
barbarous and unjust war; and if, being 
distracted phvsicaily or morally through 
wicked counsel, he command that which no 
father in his sober wits would command, 
even against law and conscience, — that the 
sons should yield obedience and subjection 
to him in maintaining, with lives and goods. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



141 



a bloody religion and bloody papists : if in 
that case the king may not be resisted in 
his person, because the power lawful and 
the sinM person cannot be separated. We 
hold, that the king using, contrary to the 
oath of God and his royal office, violence 
in killing, against law and conscience, his 
subjects, by oloody emissaries, may be re^ 
sisted by defensive wars, at the command- 
ment of the estates of the kingdom. 

But before I produce arguments to prove 
the lawfulness of resistance, a little of the 
case of resistance. 1. Dr Feme (part 3, 
sect. 6, p. 39) granteth resistance by force 
to the kmg to be lawful, when the assault is 
sudden, without colour of a law or reason, 
and inevitable. But if Nero bum Eome, he 
hath a colour of law and reason; yea, though 
all Borne, and his mother, in whose womb 
he lay, were one neck. A man who will 
mih reason go mad, hath colour of reason, 
and so of law, to invade and kill the inno- 
cent. 2. AmissBus saith, (c. 2, n. 10,) " If 
the magistrate proceed extra-judidaliter^ 
without order of law by violence, the laws 
giveth every private man power to resist, if 
the danger be irrecoverable ; yea, though it 
be recoverable." fX. prohibitum^ C. de 
jur, Jhsc. I. que madmodum^ sect. 39, tncb- 
gistratus ad I, aquil, L nee, mctgistratihus^ 
(52, de injur.) Because, while the magis- 
trate doth against his office, he is not a 
magistrate ; for law and right, not injury, 
should come from the magistrate. (L. me- 
minerint. 6, C. unde vi.) Yea, if the ma- 
gistrate proceed judicially, and the loss be 
irrecoverable, jurists say that a private 
man hath the same law to resist. (Maran' 
iius, dis, 1, n, 35 j. And in a recoverable 
loss they say, every man is holden to resist, 
si evidenter constet de iniquitate^ if the ini- 
quity be known to all. (J). D. Jason, n. 
19, des. n. 26, ad I. ut vim dejust. etjur.) 
3. I would think it not fit easily to resist 
the king's unjust exactors of custom or tri- 
bute. (1.) Because Christ paid tribute to 
Tiberius Caesar, an unjust usurper, though 
he was free from that, by Gfod's law, lest 
he should offend. (2.) Because we have a 

greater dominion over goods than over our 
ves and bodies ; and it is better to yield in 
a matter of goods than to come to arms, for 
of sinless evik we may choose the least. 4. 
A tyrant, without a title, may be resisted 
by any private man. Quia licet vim vi re- 
pellere, because we may repel violence by 
violence; yea, he may be filled, Ut I. et 



I 



vim. F. de in8tit» etjure^ ubi plene per om^ 
nes. Vasquez, 1. 1, c. 3, n. 33 ; Barclaius, 
contra Monarch. 1. 4, c. 10, p. 268. 

For the lawfulness of resistance in the 
matter of the king's unjust invasion of life 
and religion, we oner these arguments. 

Arg. 1. — That power which is obliged to 
command and rule justly and religiously for 
the good of the subjects, and is only set over 
the people on these conditions, and not abso- 
lutely, cannot tie the people to subjection 
without resistance, when the power is abused 
to the destmction of laws, religion, and the 
subjects. But all power of the law is thus 
obliged, (Rom. xiii. 4 ; Deut. xvii. 18 — 20 ; 
2 Chron. xix. 6 ; Ps. cxxxii. 11, 12 ; Ixxxix. 
30, 31; 2 Sam. vii, 12; Jer. xvii. 24, 25,) 
and hath, and may be, abused by kings, to 
the destruction of laws, religion, and sub- 
jects. The proposition is clear. 1. For the 
powers that tie us to subjection only are of 
Grod. 2. Because to resist them, is to re- 
sist the ordinance of God. 3. Because they 
are not a terror to good works, but to evil. 
4. Because they are God's ministers for our 
good, but abused powers are not of God, but 
of men, or not ordinances of Grod ; they are 
a terror to good works, not to evil ; they are 
not Grod's ministers for our good. 

Arg. 2. — That power which is contrary 
to law, and is evil and tyrannical, can tie 
none to subjection, but is a mere tyrannical 
power and unlawful ; and if it tie not to sub- 
jection, it may lawfully be resisted. But the 
power of the king, abused to the destruction 
of laws, religion, and subjects, is a power con- 
trary to law, evil, and tyrannical, and tyeth 
no man to subjection : wickedness by no ima- 
ginable reason can oblige any man. Obliga- 
tion to suffer of wicked men falleth under 
no commandment of God, except in our Sa- 
viour. A passion, as such, is not formally 
commanded, I mean a physical passion, such 
as to be killed. Grod hath not said to me in 
any moral law, Be thou killed, tortured, be- 
headed ; but only. Be thou patient, if Grod 
deliver thee to wicked men's nands, to suffer 
these things. 

Arg, 3. — There is not a stricter obligation 
moral betwixt king and people than betwixt 
parents and chil£:en, master and servant, 
patron and clients, husband and wife, the 
lord and the vassal, between the pilot of a 
ship and the passengers, the physician and 
the sick, the doctor and the scholars, but 
the law granteth, (I. Minime 36, de Melig. 
et sumpt. funer^) if these betray their tmst 



~_t- 



142 



LBXyBXX; OB, 



1 



committed to them, thej may be resisted: if 
the father turn distracted,' and arise to kill 
his sons, his sons may violently apprehend 
him, and bind his hands, and spoil him of 
his weapons ; for in that he is not a father. 
Vasquez, (Lib, 1, lUtAStr, quest, c. 8, n. 
18 J — Si dominiM subditum enarmiter et 
atrociter onerarety princeps superior vcw- 
sallum posset ex toto eximere a sua juris-- 
dictione^ et etiam tacente subdit-o et nihil 
petente. Quid papa in suis decis. parliam, 
grot, dects. 62. Si quis Baro. abutentes 
dominio privari possunt. The servant may 
resist the master if he attempts unjustly to 
kill him, so may the wife do to the husband; 
if the pilot should wil&lly run the ship on a 
rock to destroy himself and his passengers, 
they midbit violently thrust him from the 
helm. Every tyrant is a furious man, and 
is morally distracted, as Althusius saith, 
Folit. c. 28, n. 30, and seq. 

Arg. 4. — That which is given as a bless- 
ing, and a favour, and a screen, between 
the people's liberty and their bondage, can- 
not be given of God as a bondage and sla- 
very to the people. But the power of a 
king is given as a blessing and favour of 
God to defend the poor and needy, to pre- 
serve both tables of the law, and to keep 
the people in their liberties from oppress- 
ing and treading one upon another. But 
so it is, that if such a power be given of 
God to a king, by which, actu pritnOy he is 
invested of God to do acts of tyranny, and 
so to do them, that to resist him in the 
most innocent way, which is self-defence, 
must be a resisting of God, and rebeUion 
against the king, his deputy; then hath 
&>d given a royal power as uncontrollable 
by mortal men, by any violence, as if God 
himself were immediately and personally 
resisted, when the king is resisted, and so 
this power shall be a power to waste and 
destroy irresistibly, and so in itself a plague 
and a curse ; for it cannot be ordained both 
according to the intention and genuine for- 
mal effect and intrinsical operation of the 
power, to preserve the tables of the law, re- 
ligion and Hberty, subjects and laws, and 
abo to destroy the same. But it is taught 
by royalists that this power is for tyranny, 
as weU as for peaceable government; because 
to resist this royal power put forth in acts 
either ways, either in acts of tyranny or 
just government, is to resist the ordinance 
of G^, as royalists say, from Biom. xiii. 1 
— 3. And we know, to resist God's or- 



dinances' and Gknl's d&patjj formaUter, as 
his deputy, is to resist God himself, (1 Sam. 
viii. 7 ; Matt x. 40,) as if Grod were doing 
personally these acts that the king is doing; 
and it importeth as much as the King of 
kings doth these acts in and through the 
tyrant. Now, it is blasphemy to tmnk or 
say, that when a king is drinlong the blood 
of innocents, and wasting the church of God, 
that Grod, if he were personally present, 
would commit these same acts of tyranny, 
(GUkL avert such blasphemy !) and that God 
in and through the ling, as his lawful de- 
puty and vicegerent in mese acts of tyran- 
ny, is wasting the poor church of God. If 
it be said, in these sinful acts of tyranny, he 
is not God's formal vicegerent, but only in 
good and lawful acts of government, yet he 
IS not to be resisted in these acts, not be- 
cause the acts are just and good, but be- 
cause of the dignity of his royal person. 
Yet this must prove that those who resist 
the king in these acts of tyranny, must re- 
sist no ordinance of God, but only resist 
him who is the Lord's deputy, though not 
as the Lord's deputy. What absurdity is 
there in that more than to disobey him, re- 
using active obedience to him who is the 
Lord's deputy, not as the Lord's deputy, 
but as a man commanding besides his mas- 
ter's warrant ? 

Arg. 6. — That which is inconsistent with 
the care and providence of Grod in giving a 
king to his church is not to be tau^t. 
Now God's end in giving a king to his 
church, is the feeding, safety, preservation, 
and the peaceable and quiet life of his 
church. (1 Tim. ii. 2 ; Isa. xlix. 23 ; Psal. 
Ixxix. 71 )• But Grod should cross his own 
end in the same act of giving a king, if he 
should provide a king, wbo, oy office, were 
to suppress robbers, murderers, and all op- 
pressors and wasters in his holy mount, 
and yet should give an irresistible power to 
one crowned lion, a king, who may kill ten 
hundred thousand protestants for their re- 
ligion, in an ordinary providence ; and they 
are by an ordinary law of God to give their 
throats to his emissaries and bloody execu- 
tioners. If any say the king will not be so 
cruel, — I believe it ; because, actu secundoy 
it is not possibly in his power to be so cruel. 
We owe thanks to his good ¥dll that he 
killeth not so many, but no thanks to the 
nature and genuine intrinsical end of a king, 
who hath power from God to kill all these, 
and that without resistance made b^ any 



THE LAW AND THB PRINCB. 



143 



mortal man. Tea, no thanks (Grod avert 
blasphemy I) to God's ordinary proyidence, 
which (if royalists may he helieved) putteth 
no har upon the unlimited power oi a man 
inclined to sin, and ahuse his power to so 
much cruelty. Some may say, the same 
absurdity doth follow if the king should 
turn papist, and the parliament all were 
papists. In that case there might he so 
many martyrs for the truth put to death, 
and God should put no bar of providence 
upon this power, then more tnan now; 
and yet, in that case, the king and parlia- 
ment should he iudges given of God, actu 
primOf and hy virtue of their office obliged 
to preserve the people in peace and godli- 
ness. But I answer. If God gave a mwful 
official power to king and parliament to 
work the same crueSy upon millions of 
martyrs, and it should he unlawM for them 
by arms to defend themselves, I should 
then think that king and parliaonent were 
both ex qfido^ hy virtue of their office, and 
actu prtmo, judges and fathers, and also by 
that same office, murderers and butchers, — 
which were a grievous aspersion to the un- 
spotted providence of God. 

Arg. 6. — If the estates of a kingdom give 
Ihe power to a king, it is their own power 
in the fountain; and if they give it for their 
own good, they have power to judge when 
it is used against themselves, and tor their 
evil, and so power to limit and resist the 
power that they gave. Now, that they may 
take away this power, is clear in Athaliah's 
case. It is true she was a tyrant without a 
title, and had not the right of heaven to the 
crown, yet she had, in men's court, a title. 
For supposing all the royal seed to be 
killed, and the people consent, we cannot 
say that, for these six years or thereabout, 
she was no magistrate : that there were none 
on the throne of David at this time : that she 
was not to he oheyed as Crod's deputy. But 
mnt that she was no magistrate ; yet when 
Jehoash is brought forth to be crowned, it 
was a controversy to the states to whom the 
crown should belong. 1. Athaliah was in 
possession. 2. Jehoash himself being but 
seven years old, could not be judge. 3. It 
might be doubted if Joash was the true son 
of Ahaziah, and if he was not killed with 
the rest of llie blood royal. 

Two great adversaries say with us ; Hugo 
Grotius (dejur. belli et pdcis^ I. 1, c. 4, n, 
7,) saith he dare not condemn this, if the 
lesser part of the people, and every one of 



them indifferently, should defend them- 
selves against a tyrant, ultimo necessitatis 
prcBsidio, The case of Scotland, when we 
were blocked up hy sea and land with 
armies : the case of England, when the king, 
induced by prelates, first attempted to bring 
an army to cut off the parliament, ana 
then gathered an army, and fortified York, 
and invaded Hull, to make the militia his 
own, sure is considerable. Barclay saith, 
the people hath jus se tuendi adversus tW 
manem scevitiem^ {advers. Monarch, I, 3, 
c. 8,) a power to defend themselves against 
prodigious cruelty. The case of England 
and Ireland, now invaded by the bloody 
rebels of Ireland, is also worthy of consi- 
deration. I could cite hosts more. 



QUESTION XXIX. 

WHETHBR, IN THE CASE OF DEFENSIYB WAR, 
THB DISTmCTION OF THE PERSON OF THE 
KING, AS A MAN, WHO CAN COMMIT ACTS 
OF HOSTILE TTRANNT AGAINST HIS SUB- 
JECTS, AND OF THE OFFICE AND ROTAL 
POWER THAT HB HATH FROM GOD AND 
THE PEOPLE, AS A KING, CAN HAVE 
PLACE. 

Before I can proceed to other Scripture 
proofs for the lawfulness of resistance, this 
distinction, rejected by royalists, must be 
cleared. This is an evident and sensible 
distinction : — The king in conoreto, the man 
who is king, and the kingjtn abstracto, the 
royal office of the king. The ground of this 
distinction we desire to be considered &om 
Rom. xiii. We affirm with Buchanan, that 
Paul here speaketh of the office and duty of 
good magistrates, and that the text speak- 
eth nothmg of an absolute king, nothing 
of a tyrant ; and the rovalists distinguisn 
where the law distinguisheth not, against 
the law, (1. pret. 10, gl. Bart, de pub. in 
Bern.) ; and therefore we move the question 
here, Whether or no to resist the illegal and 
tyrannical will of the man who is kmg, be 
to resist the king and the ordinance of 
God; we say no. Nor do we deny the 
king, abusing his power in uniust acts, to 
remain king, and the minister of God, whose 
person for his royal office, and his royal 
office, are both to be honoured, reverenced, 
and obeyed. God forbid that we should do 
so as the sons of Belial, imputing to us the 



i 



doctrine of anabaptists, and the doctrine 
falsely imputed to Wicliffe, — ^that dominion 
is founded upon supernatural grace, and 
that a magistrate being in the state of mor- 
tal sin, cannot be a lawful magistrate, — ^we 
teach no such thing. The P. Prelate show- 
eth us his sympathy with papists, and that 
he buildeth the monuments and sepulchres 
of the slain and murdered prophets, when 
he, revising to open his mouth m the gates 
for the righteous, professeth he will not 
purge the witnesses of Christ, the Wal- 
denses, and Widiffe, and Huss, of these 
notes of disloyalty, but that these acts pro- 
ceeding from this root of bitterness, the 
abused power of a king, should be acknow- 
ledged with obedience active or passive, in 
these unjust acts, we deny. 

Assert, 1. — It is evident from Rom. xiii. 
that all subjection and obedience to higher 
powers commanded there, is subjection to 
the power and office of the magistrate in 
abstractor or, which is all one, to me person 
using the power lawMly, and that no sub- 
jection is due by that text, or any word of 
God, to the abused and tyrannical power of 
the king, which I evince from the text, and 
from o£er Scriotures. 

1. Because tiie text saith, " Let every 
soul be subiect to the higher powers." But 
no powers commanding ^ngg unlawful, uid 
kilbng the innocent people of God, can be 
ixv^imi v^t^x^ea higher powers, but in that 
lower powers. He that commandeth not 
what Uod commandeth, and punisheth and 
killeth where God, if personally and imme- 
diately present, would neither command nor 
punish, is not in these acts to be subjected 
unto, and obeyed a« a superior power, 
though in habit he may remain a superior 
power ; for all habitual, all actual superiority 
IS a formal participation of the power of the 
Most High. Arnis8Bus well saith, (c. 4, p. 
96,) " That of Aristotle must be true. It is 
against nature, better and worthier men 
should be in subjection to unworthier and 
more wicked men ;" but when magistrates 
command wickedness, and kill the innocent, 
the non-obeyers, in so far, are worthier 
than the commanders (whatever they be in 
habit and in office) actually, or in these 
wicked acts are unworthier and inferior, and 
the non-obeyers are in that worthier, as being 
zealous adherents to God's command and 
not to man's will. I desire not to be mis- 
taken ; if we speak of habitual excellency, 
godly and holj men, as the witnesses of 



Christ in things lawfiil, are to obey wicked 
and infidel kings and emperors, but in that 
these wicked Bugs have an excellency in 
respect of office above them ; but when they 
command things unlawfiil, and kill the in- 
nocent, they do it not by virtue of any 
office, and so in that they are not higher 
powers, but lower and weak ones. Laertius 
doth explain Aristotle well, who d^neth a 
tyrant by this, " That he commandeth his 
subjects by violence;" and Arnisseus con- 
demneth Laertius for this, '' Because one 
tyrannical action doth no more constitute a 
tyrant, than one unjust action doth consti- 
tute an unjust man." But he may con- 
demn, as he doth indeed, (Covarruvias pract. 
quest, c. 1, and Vaequez jQlustr. quest. 1. 1, 
c. 47, n. 1, 12,) for this is essential to a 
tyrant, to command and rule by violence. 
If a lawful prince do one or more acts of a 
tyrant, he is not a tyrant for that, yet his 
action in that is tyrannical, and he doth not 
that as a king, but in that act as a sinful 
man, having something of tyranny in him. 

2. The powers (Bom. xiii. 1) that be, are 
ordained of God, as their author and effi- 
cient ; but kings commanding unjust things, 
and killing the innocent, in these acts, are 
but men, and sinful men; and the power 
by which they do these acts, a sinful and an 
usurped power, and so £ur they are not 
powers ordained of God, according to his 
revealed will, which must rule us. Now 
the authority and official power, in ab- 
stractor is ordained of God, as the text 
saith, and other Scriptures do evidence. 
And this pofiticians do clear, while they dis- 
tinguish betwixt jus personoBy Hud jus co- 
ronary the power of the person, and the power 
of the crown and royal office. They must 
then be two different things. 

3. He that resisteth the power, that is, 
the official power, and the lung, as king, 
and commanding in the Lord, resisteth the 
ordinance of God, and God's lawful consti- 
tution. But he who resisteth the man, who 
is the king, commanding that which is 
against God, and killing the innocent, re- 
sisteth no ordinance of God, but an ordi- 
nance of sin and Satan ; for a man command- 
ing unjustly, and ruling tyrannically, hath, 
in that, no power from God. 

4. They that resist the power and royal 
office of the king in things just and right, 
shall receive to themselves damnation, but 
they that resist, that is, refiise, for con- 
science, to obey the man who is the king. 




V- 



and choose to obey God rather than man, 
as all the martyrs did, shall receive to them- 
selves salvation. And the eighty valiant 
men, the priests, who used bodily violence 
a^nst king Uzziah*s person, '* and thrust 
him out or the house of the Lord," from 
offering incense to the Lord, which be- 
longed to the priest only, received not 
damnation to themselves, but salvation in 
doing Grod's will, and in resisting the king's 
wicked will. 

6. The lawful ruler, as a ruler, and in 
respect of his office, is not to be resisted, 
be<»use he is not a terror to good works, 
but to evil ; and no man who doih. good is 
to be afraid of the office or the power, but 
to expect praise and a reward of^the same. 
But the man who is a kins may command 
an idolatrous and superstitious worship- 
send an army of cut-throats a^nst them, 
because they refuse that worship, and may 
reward papists, prelates, and other corrupt 
men, and may advance them to places of 
state and honour because they kneel to a 
tree altar, — pray to the east, — adore the 
letters and souna of the word Jesus — ^teach 
and write Arminianism, and may imprison, 
deprive, confine, cut the ears, and slit the 
noses, and bum the faces of those who speak 
and preach and write the truth of God ; and 
may send armies of cut-throats, Irish rebels, 
and other papists and mali^ant atheists, to 
destroy and murder the judges of the land, 
and innocent defenders of the reformed re- 
Ugion, &c., — ^the man, I say, in these acts 
is a terror to good works, — ^an encourage- 
ment to evil ; and those that do good are to 
be afraid of the king, and to expect no 
praise, but punishment and vexation from 
oim; therefore, this reason in the text 
will prove that the man who is the king, 
in so far as he doth those things that are 
against his office, may be resisted ; and that 
in these we are not to be subject, but only 
we are to be subject to his power and royal 
authority, in abstraetOf in so far as, accord- 
ing to his office, he is not a terror to good 
works, but to evil. 

6. The lawful ruler is the minister of 
God, or tiiie servant of God, for good to the 
commonwealth ; and to resist the servant in 
that wherein he is a servant, and unng the 
power that he hath from his master, is to 
resist the Lord his master. But the man 
who is the king, commanding unjust things, 
and killing the innocent, in mese acts is not 
the minister of Grod for the good of the I 



commonwealth; — he serveth himself, and 
papists, and prelates, for the destruction of 
religion, laws, and commonwealth; there- 
fore the man may be resisted, by this text, 
when the 4>ffice and power cannot be 
resisted. 

7. The ruler, as the ruler, and the nature 
and intrinsical end of the office is, that he 
bear Grod's sword as an avenger to execute 
wrath on him that doth evil, — and so cannot 
be resisted without sin. But the man who 
is the ruler, and commandeth things unlaw- 
ful, and killeth the innocent, carrieth the 
papist's and prelate's sword to execute, not 
the righteous judgment of the Lord upon 
the ill-doer, but nis own private revenge 
upon him that doth well; therefore, the 
man may be resisted, the office may not 
be resisted ; and they must be two different 
things. 

8. We must needs be subject to the royal 
office for conscience, by reason of the fifth 
commandment ; but we must not needs be 
subject to the man who is king, if he com- 
mand things unlawful ; for Dr Feme war- 
ranteth us to resist, if the ruler invade us 
suddenly, without colour of law or reason, 
and unavoidably; and Winzetus, Barclay, 
and Grotius, as before I cited, give us leave 
to resist a king turning a cruel tyrant ; but 
Paul (Bom. xui.) forbiddeth us to resist the 
power, in abstracto ; therefore, it must be 
the man, in concrete, that we must resist. 

9. Those we may not resist to whom we 
owe tribute, as a reward of the onerous 
work on which they, as ministers of God, 
do attend continually. But we owe not 
tribute to the king as a man, — for then 
should we be indebted tribute to aU men, — 
but as a king, to whom the wages of tribute 
is due, as to a princely workman, — a king as 
a king; — ^therefore, the man and the king 
are different. 

10. We owe fear and honour as due to 
be rendered to the man who is king, because 
he is a king, not because he is a man ; for 
it is the highest fear and honour due to any 
mortal man, which is due to the king, as 
king. 

11. The man and the inferior judge are 
different; and we cannot, by this text, 
resist the inferior judge, as a judge, but we 
resist the ordinance of God, as llie text 
proveth. But cavaliers resist the inferior 
judges as men, and have kiUed divers 
members of both houses of parliament ; but 
they will not say that they killed then) as 



judges, but as rebels. If, therefore, to be a 
rebel, as a wicked man, and to be a judge, 
are differenoed thus, then^ to be a man, 
and commit some acts of tTranny, and to be 
the supreme judge and king, are two diffe- 
rent things. 

12. The' congregation, in a letter to the 
nobility, ^Knox, Hist, of Scotland, 1. 2.) say, 
'* There is great difference betwixt the au- 
thority, which is God's ordinance, and the 
persons of those who are placed in authority. 
The authority and God's ordinance can never 
do wrong, for it commandeth that vice and 
vdcked men be punished, and virtue, with 
virtuous men and just, be maintained ; but 
the corrupt person placed in this authority 
may offend, and most commonly do contrary 
to this authority. And is then the corrup- 
tion of man to be followed, by reason that 
it is clothed with the name of authority ?" 
And they give instance in Pharaoh and 
Saul, who were lawful kings and yet corrupt 
men. And certainly the La and the divine 
authority differ, as the subject and the acci- 
dent, — ^as that which is under a law and can 
offend God, and that which is neither capa- 
ble of law nor sin. 

13. The king, as king, is a just creature, 
and by office a Uving and breathing law. His 
will, as he is king, is nothing but a just law; 
but the king, as a sinftd man, is not a just 
creature, but one who can sin and play the 
tyrant ; and his will, as a private sinful man, 
is a private will, and may be resisted. So the 
law saith, '* The king, as king, can do no 
wrong," but the king, as a man, may do a 
wrong. While as, then, the parliaments of 
both kingdoms resist the king's private will, 
as a man, and fight against nis illegal cut- 
throats, sent out by him to destroy his native 
subjects, they fight for him as a king, and 
obey his public legal will, which is his royal 
will, de jure ; and while he is absent from 
his parliaments as a man, he is legally and 
in his law-power present, and so the parlia- 
ments are as legsil as if he were personally 
present with them. 

Let me answer royalists. — The P, Prelate 
saith it is Solomon's word, '' By me kings 
reign ;" — ^kings, in concreto, with their sove- 
reignty. He saith not, by me royalty or 
sovereignty reigneth. And elsewhere he 
saith that Barclay saith, *^ Paul, writing to 
the Bomans, keepeth the usual Boman dic- 
tion in this, — who express by powers, in ah- 
ptractOy the persons authorised by power, — 
and it is the Scripture's dialect: by him 



were created " thrones, dominions, princi- 
palities," that is, angels; to say angels, in 
abatractOy were created, (2 Pet. ii. 10,) 
They " speak evil of dignities," Jude viii., 
'' despise dominion," that is, they speak ill 
of Gajus, Caligula, Nero. Our Levites rail 
against the Lord's anointed, — ^the best of 
kmgs in the world. Nero, (Bom. xii. 4,) 
in concretOy beareth not the sword in vain. 
AmissBUS saith it better than the Prelate,^ 
(he is a witless thief,) Bom. xiii. 4, '' The 
royal power, in abstra>cto^ doth not bear the 
sword, but the person; not the power, but 
the prince himself beareth the sword." And 
the Prelate, poor man, following Dr Feme, 
saith, " It is absurd to pursue the king's 
person with a cannon bullet at Edgehill, and 
preserve his authority at London, or else- 
where." So saith Feme, (sect. 10, p. 64,) 
'' The concrete powers here are purposed as 
objects of our obedience, which cannot be 
directed but upon power in some person; for 
it is said, mi •htm iS^w0im The powers that be 
are of God." Now power cannot be •;r« 
existent but in some person; and, saith 
Feme, *' Can power in the abstract have 
praise ? Or is tribute paid to the power in 
the abstract ? Yea, the power is the reason 
why we yield obedience to the person," &o. 
The Prelate hath as much learning as to 
copy out of Feme, Barclay, Arnisseus, and 
others, these words and the like, but hath 
not wit to add the sinews of these authors' 
reason ; and with all this he can in his pre- 
face call it his own, and " provoke any to 
answer him if they dare ;" wnereas, while I 
answer this excommunicated pamphleteer, I 
answer these learned authors, from which 
he stealeth' all he hath ; and yet he must 
persuade the king he is the only man who 
can defend his Majesty's cause, and " the 
importunity (forsooth) of friends extorted 
this piece," as if it were a fault that this 
delpmc oracle (giving out railings and lies 
for responses) should be silent. 1. Not we 
only, but the Holy Ghost, in terminis^ hath 
this distinction. Acts iv. 19 ; v. 29, ^' We 
ought to obey God rather than men." Then 
rulers (for oi rulers sitting in judgment is 
that speech uttered) commanding and ty- 
rannising over the apostles, are men con- 
tradistinguished from God; and as they 
command and punish unjustly, thev are but 
men, otherwise commanding for God, diey 
are gods, and more than men* 2. From 

1 1 ■■ 1 1 ■ I I 1 1 1 1 Ill — — ^^.^^f 

1 Aniiami8.de potest, priacip* c. 2, 11, 17. > 



'■ .'.^. 



y 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



147 



TheopLylaot also, or from Ghnrsodtom on 
Rom. xiii. we have this, — Iiie apostle 
speaketh not (say they) m^ ^m tu^ Wm^w 

bovereiguty or royalty doth not properly 
reien or bear the gword, or receiye praise, 
and this accident doth not bear a sword ; 
nor do we think (or Paul speak, Bom. xiii.) 
of the abstracted due of power and royalty, 
subsisting out of its subject ; nor dream we 
that the naked accident of royal authority 
is to be feared and honoured as the Lord's 
anointed; the person or man who is the 
king, and beareth the crown on his head, 
and holdeth the sceptre in his hand, is to 
be obeyed. Accidents are not persons ; but 
they speak nonsense, and are like brute 
beasts who deny that all the kingly honour 
due to the king must be due to him as a 
kinff, and because of the royal dignity that 
God hath given to him, and not because he 
18 a man ; for a pursuivant's son is a man ; 
and if a pursuivant's son would usurp the 
throne, and take the crown on his head, 
and the sceptre in his hand, and command 
that all souls be subject to such a superior 
power, because he is a man, the laws of 
Scotland would hang a man for a less fault, 
we know ; and the r. Prelate was wont to 
edify women, and converted souls to Christ, 
with such a distinction as objectum quod 
and objectum quo, in the pulpits of Edin- 
burgh, and it hath good use here ; we never 
took abstract royalty to .be the king. The 
kin^ of Scotland of old were not second 
notions, and we exclude not the person of 
the king ; yet we distinguish, with leave of 
the P. Prelate, betwixt the person in linea 
fhysica (we must take physioa lai^ly here) 
and in linea morali, obedience, tetac, tri- 
bute, honour is due to the person of the 
king, and to the man who is King, not be- 
cause of his person, or because he is a man, 
(the P. Prelate may know in what notion 
we take the name person,) but because 
Grod, by the people's election, hath exalted 
him to royal dignity; and for this cause 
ill-doers are to -subject their throats and 
necks to the sword of the Lord's anointed's 
executioner or hangman, with patience, 
and willingly ; because, in takin? away the 
head of ilTdoers, for ill-doing, he is acting 
the office of the Lord, by whom he reign- 
eth ; but if he take away their heads, and 
send out the long-tusked vultures and boars 
of Babylon, the Irish rebels, to execute his 
wrath, as he is in that act a misinformed 



man, and wanteth the authority of Grod's 
law and man's law, he may be resisted with 
arms. For, 1. If royalists say against this, 
ihea, if a king turn an habitual tyrant, and 
induce an hundred thousand Turks to 
destroy his subjects upon mere desire of 
revenge, they are not to resist, but to be 
subject, and suffer for cooscienoe. I am 
sure Grotius saith,^ " If a king sell his sub- 
jects, he loseth all title to the crown, and 
80 may be resisted ;" and Winzetus saith,^ 
" A tyrant may be resisted ;" and Barday,' 
" It is lawful for the pe<^le, in case of ty- 
ranny, to defend themselves, adversus tm- 
manem scstfetiam, against extreme cruelty." 
And I desire the Prelate to answer how 
people are subject in suffering such cruelty 
of the higher power, because he is God's 
ordinance, and a power from God, except 
he say, as he selleth his people, and barba* 
rously destroyeth by the cut-ihroat Irish- 
men, his whole subjects refusing to worship 
idols, he is a man and a sinM man, eatenus, 
and an inferior power inspired by wicked 
counsel, not a king, eatenus, not a higher 
power ; and that in resisting him thus, the 
subjects resist not the ordinance of Grod. 
Also suppose king David defend his king- 
dom and people against Jesse, his natural 
father, who we suppose cometh in against 
his son and prince, king David, with a huge 
army of the Philistines to destroy him and 
his kingdom, if he shall kill his own native 
father m that war, at some £dgehiU, how 
shall he preserve at Jerusalem mat honour 
and love that he oweth to his father, by 
virtue of the fifth commandment, *' Honour 
thy father and thy mother, &c.," let them an- 
Bwer this ; except king David consider Jesse 
in one relation, in abstracto, as his &ther, 
whom he is to obey, and as he is a wicked 
man, and a perfidious subject, in another 
relation ; and except king David say, he is 
to subject himself to his father, as a father, 
accwding to the fif^ commandment, and 
that in the act' of his father's violent inva- 
sion, he is not to subject himself to him, as 
he is a violent invader, and as a man. Let 
the royalist see how he can answer the ar- 
gument, and how Levi is not to know his 
ikiher and mother, as they are sin&l men, 
(Deut. xxxiii. 9,) and yet to know and 
nonour them as parents; and how -an Is- 



1 Grot, de jur. et pacis, 1. 1, c. 4, n. 7. 
' Winzetus Velitat. adver. Buchanan, 
s Bard. adv. Monarchom. lib. 3/c. 8. 



148 



LEX, RBX ; OR, 



raelite is not to pity the wife that lieth in 
his bosom, when she enticeth him " to go 
a whoring after strange gods," but is to kiU 
her, (Deut. xiii. 6 — 8,) and yet the husband 
is to '^ love the wife, as Christ loved his 
church," Eph. v. 25. If the husband take 
away lus wife's life in some mountain in the 
Holy Land, as Gfod's law commandeth, let 
the royalists answer us, where is then the 
marital love he owes to her, and that re- 
spect due to her as she is a wife and a 
helper ? 2. But let not the royalist infer that 
I am from these examples pleading for the 
kiUing of kings ; for lawful resistance is one 
thing, and kming of kings is another, — ^the 
one defensiye and lawAiI, the other offen- 
sive and unlawful, so long as he remaineth a 
king, and the Lord's anointed ; but if he 
be a murderer of his father, who doth coun- 
sel his father to come to a place of danger 
where he may be killed, and where the kmg 
ought not to be; as Abner was worthy of 
death, who watched not carefully king Saul, 
but slept when David came to his bedside, 
and had opportunity to kill the king ; they 
are traitors and murderers of the king, who 
either counselled his Majesty to come to 
Edgehill, where the danger was so great, 
or did not violently restrain him from com- 
ing thither, seeing kings' safety and lives 
are as much, yea, more, in the disposing of 
the people than in their own private will 
(2 Sam. xviii. 2, 3) ; for certainly the peo- 
ple might have violently restrained king 
Saul from killing himself; and the kin^ £ 
guilty of his own death, and sinneth against 
his office and subjects, who cometh out in 
person to any such battles where he may be 
Killed, and the contrary party free of his 
blood. And here our Prelate is blind, if 
he see not the clear difference between the 
king's person and his office as king, and 
between his private will and his public and 
royal will. 3. The angels may be named 
thrones and dominions in abstractOy and yet 
created in conereto, and we may say the 
angel and his power are both created at 
once ; but Davia was not both bom the son 
of Jesse and a king at once ; and the P. 
Pr^te by this may prove it is not lawAil 
to resist the devil, (for he is of the number 
of these created angels, Gol. i.,) as he is a 
deyfl; because in resisting the devil as a 
devil, we must resist an angel of God and a 
principality. 4. To speak evil of dignities, 
(2 Pet. ii. ; Jude viii.,) Piscator insinuateth, 
is, to speak evil of the very office of rulers, 



as well as of their manners ; and Theodat. 
saith, on 2 Pet. ii., that '' these railers 
speak evil of the place of governors and 
masters^ as unbeseeming beuevers." All 
our interpreters, as Beza, Calvin, Luther, 
Bucer, Marloratus, from the place, saith it 
is a special reproof of anabaptists and liber* 
tines, who in that time maintained that we 
are all free men in Christ, and that there 
should not be kings, masters, nor any ma- 
mtrates. However the abstract is put for 
me concrete, it is true, and it saith we are 
not to rail upon Nero ; but to say Nero was 
a persecutor of Christians, and yet obey him 
commanding what is just, are very consis- 
tent. 5. '* The persons are proposed (Bom. 
xiii.) to be the object of our obedience," 
saith Dr Feme. Tnis is very true : but he 
is ignorant of our mind in exponing the 
wora perion. We never meant that fe«r, 
honour, royalty, tribute, must be due to the 
abstracted accident of kingly authority, and 
not to the man who is kmg; nor is it our 
meaning that royalty, in abstractor is 
crowned king, and is anointed, but that 
the person is crowned and anointed. But, 
i^ain, by a person, we mean nothing less 
than the man Nero wasting Kome, burn- 
ing, crucifying Paul, and torturing Chris- 
tians ; and that we owe subjection to Nero^ 
and to his person in conereto, as to Grod's 
ordinance, uod's minister, Grod's sword- 
bearer, in that notion of a person, is that 
only that we deny. Nay, in that Nero, in 
conereto, to us is no power ordained of God, 
no minister of God^ but a minister of the 
devil, and Satan's armour-bearer, and there- 
fore we owe not fear, honour, subjection, or 
tribute to the person of Nero. But the 
person thus far is the object of our obedi- 
ence, that fear, honour, subjection and tri- 
bute must be due to the man in conereto, 
to his person who is prince, but not because 
he is a man, or a person simply, or a sword- 
bearer of papists, but for nis office, — ^for 
that eminent place of royal dignity that 
God hath conferred on his person. We 
know the light of the sun, the heat of fire, 
in dbstracto, do not properly give light and 
heat, but the sun and fire in conereto / yet 
the princwium qito, ratio qua^ the prin- 
ciples of these operations in sun and fire be 
light and heat ; and we ascribe illuminating 
of dark bodies, heating of cold bodies, to sun 
and fire in conereto, yet not to the subjects 
simply, but to them as affected with such 
accidents ; so here we honour and submit to 



THE LAW AND THB PRINCE. 



140 



the man who is king, not because he is a 
man, that were treason; not because he 
useth his sword against the church, that 
were impiety ; but because of his royal dig- 
nity, and because he useth it for the Lorn. 
It is true, AmissBus, Barclay, and Feme, 
say, '* That kings leave not off to be kings 
when they use their power and swoid against 
the church and religion. And also it is 
considerable, that when the worst of em- 
perors, bloody Nero, did reign, the apostle 
presseth the duty of subjection to him, as 
to a power appointed of God, and condemn- 
eth tne resisting of NerO, as the resisting of 
an ordinance of Grod. And certainly, if 
the cause and reason, in point of duty mo- 
ral, and of conscience before Grod remain in 
kings, to wit, that while they are enemies 
and persecutors, as Nero was, their royal 
dignity, given them of God remaineth, then 
subjection upon that ground is lawful, and 
resistance umawfid." — Ana, It is true, so 
long as kings remain kings, subjection is due 
to them because kings ; but tluit is not the 
question. The question is, if subjection be 
due to them, wnen they use their power 
unlawfiiUy and tyrannicafly. Whatever Da- 
vid did, though he was a king, he did it 
not as king ; he deflowered not Bathsheba 
as king, and Bathsheba might with bodily 
resistance and violence lawfully have re- 
sisted king David, though kingly power re- 
mained in nim, while he should thus attempt 
to commit adultery ; else David might have 
said to Bathsheba, " Because I am the 
Lord's anointed, it is rebellion in thee, a 
subject, to oppose any bodily violence to my 
act of forcing of thee ; it is unlawful to thee 
to cry for help, for if any shall offer vio- 
lently to rescue thee from me, he resisteth 
the ordinance of God." Subjection is due to 
Nero as an emperor^ but not any subjection 
is due to him m the burning of Kome, and 
torturing of Christians, except you say that 
Nero's power abused in these acts of cruelty 
was, 1. A power from God. 2. An ordi- 
dance of God. 3. That in these he was the 
minister of God for the good of the com- 
monwealth. Because some believed Chris- 
tians were free from the yoke of magistracv, 
and that the dignity itself was unlawful; 
and because (c 12) he had set down the 
lawful church rulers, and in this and the fol- 
lowing chapter, the duties of brotherly love 
of one toward another ; so here (c. 13) he 
teacheth that all magistrates, suppose hea- 
then, are to be obeyed and submitted unto 



in all things, so fiur as they are ministers 
of Grod. AmissBus objecteth to Buchanan, 
" If we are by this place to subject ourselves 
to every power, in abstractor then also to a 
power contrary to the truth, and to a power 
of a king exceeding the limits of a lung ; 
for such a power is a power, and we are not 
to distinguish where the law distinguisheth 
not." 

Am^ 1. — The law clearly distinguisheth 
we are to obey parents in the Lord, and if 
Nero command idolatry, this is an excessive 
power. Are we obliged to obey, because the 
law distinguisheth not ? 2. The text saith 
we are to obey every power from Grod that 
is Grod's ordinance, by which the man is a 
minister of Grod for good; but an unjust 
and excessive power is none of these three. 
3. The text in words distinguisheth not 
obedience active in things wicked and law- 
ful, yet we are to distinguish. 

Svmmons. — Is authority subjected solely 
in the king's law, and no whit in his person, 
though put upon him both by God and 
man? Or, is authority only the subject, 
and the person exercising the authority, a 
bare accident to that, beins in it only more 
separably, as pride and fofly are in a man. 
Then, it one m authority command out of 
his own will, and not by law, — ^if I neither 
actively nor passively obey, I do not so much 
as resist abused authority ; and then must 
the prince, by his disorderly will, have quite 
lost nis authority and become like another 
man ; and yet his authority has not fled from 
him. 

Ans. 1. — If we speak accurately, neither 
the man solely, nor his power only, is re- 
sisted ; but the man clothed with lawful ha- 
bitual power, is resisted in such and such 
acts flowing from an abused power. 2. It 
is an ignorant speech to ask. Is authority 
subjected solely m the king's law, and no 
whit in his person, for the authority hath 
all its power by law, not from the man's 
person ? The authority hath nothing from 
the person but a naked inheritance in the 
person, as in the subject ; and the person is 
to be honoured for the authority, not the 
authority for the person. 3. Authority is 
not so separable from the person, as that for 
every act of lawless will the king loseth 
his royal authority and ceaseth to be king. 
No, but every act of a king, in so far, can 
claim subjection of the interior, as the act 
of commanding and ruling hath law for it ; 
and in so far as it is lawless, the person in 



\ 



160 



LEX, ssx ; OR, 



Jl 



thftt act repugnant to law loseth all due 
daim of actiml subjection in that act, and in 
that act power actual is lost, as is clear, 
Acts iv. 19 ; v. 29. The apostles say to 
rulers. It is safer to obej God than man. 
What I Were not these rulers lawful ma- 
gistrates armed with power from God ? I 
answer, habituallj thej were rulers and more 
than men, and to obey them in things law- 
M is to obey God. But, actually, in these 
unlawM commandments, especially being 
commanded to speak no more in the name 
of Jesus, the apostles do acknowledge them 
to be no more but men ; and so their actual 
authority is as separable from the person, as 
pride and foUy from men. 

Symmfums, — The distinction holdeth good 
of inferior magistrates, that they may be 
considered as magistrates and as men, be- 
-cause their authority is only sacred, and 
addeth veneration to their persons, and is 
separable from the person. The man may 
live when his authority is extinguished, but 
it holdeth not in kings. King Saul's per^ 
«on is venerable as ms authority, and his 
authority cometh by inheritance, and dieth, 
and hveth, inseparably with his person ; and 
4mthority and person add honour, each one 
to another. 

Ans. 1. — If this be true, Manasseh, a 
king, did not shed innocent blood and use 
sorcery. He did not these great wicked- 
nesses as a man, but as a king. Solomon 
played the apostate as a king, not as a man, 
u BO, the man must make the king more in- 
fallible than the Pope ; for the Pope, as a 
man, can err ; — ^as a pope he cannot err, say 
^pists. But prophets, in their persons, 
were anointed of G<xl as Satd and David 
were, then must we say, Nathan and Sa- 
muel erred not as men, because their per- 
sons were sacred and anointed, and sure 
they erred not as prophets, therefore they 
erred not aU. A king, as a king, is an holy 
ordinance of God, and so cannot do injus- 
tice, therefore they must do acts of justice 
as men. 1. The inferior judge is a power 
from God. 2. To resist him is to resist 
an ordinance of God. 3. He is not a ter- 
ror to good works, but to evil. 4. He is a 
minister of Grod for good. 5. He is God's 
^wrord-bearer. His ofiicial power to rule 
•may by as good right come by birth as the 
crown ; and the king's person is sacred only 
for his office, and is anointed only for his 
office. For then the Chaldeans dishonoured 
not inferior judges (Lam. v. 12,) when they 



^' hanged the prince, and honoured not the 
&ce8 of dders." It is in question, if the 
king's actual authority be not as separable 
from him, as the actual authority of the 
judffe. 

Symmons (p. 24). — The king himself may 
use this distinction. As a Ghnstian he may 
forgive any that of&ndeth against his per- 
son, but as a judge, he must punish, in re- 
gard of his omce. 

Ans. — ^Well, then, flatterers will grant 
the distinction, when the king doth good 
and pardoneth the blood of protestants, died 
by bloody rebels ; but when the king doth 
acta of injustice, he is neither man nor king, 
hut some independent absolute god. 

Symmona (p. 27). — God's word tyeth me 
to every one of his personal commandments, 
as well as his legal commandments. Nor do 
I obey the king's law, because it is esta- 
Uished, or because of its known penalty, 
nor yet the king himself, because he ruleth 
according to law, but I obey the king's law, 
because I obey the kins ; and I obey the 
king, because I obey God ; I obey. the king 
and his law, because I obey God and his 
law. Better obey the command for a re- 
verent regard to the prince than for a pen- 
alty. 

Atis. — It is hard to answer a sick man. 
It is blasphemy to seek this distinction of 
person and office in the King of kings, be- 
cause by person in a mortal king, we under- 
stand a man that can sin. 1. I am not 
obliged to obey his personal commandment^ 
except I were his domestic ; nor his unlaw- 
M personal commandments, because they 
are sinM. 2. It is false that you obey the 
king's law, because you obey the king; for 
then you say but this, I obey the king be- 
cause I obey the king. The truth is, obe- 
dience is not fonxHilly terminated on the 
person of the king. Obedience is relative 
to a precept, and it is men-service to obey a 
law, not because it is good and just, but upon 
this formal motive, because it is the will of 
a mortal man to command it. And reve- 
rence, love, fear, being acts of the affection, 
are not terminated on a law, but .properly on 
the person of the judge ; and they are modi- 
fications, <»: laudable qualifieations of acts of 
obedience, not motives, not the formal reason 
why I obey, but the manner how I obey. 
And the apostle maketh expressly (Bom. 
xiii. 4). fear of punishment a motive of obe- 
dience, while he saith, " He beareth not 
the sword in vain," llierefore be subject to 



THB LAW AND THB PRINCE. 



161 



the king ; and this hindereth not personal 
resistance to unjust commandments. 

Symmcms (p. 27—29).—" You say, * To 
obey the prince's, personal commandment 
against his legal will, is to obey himself 
against himself.' So say I, ' To obey his 
lesal will against his personal will, is to 
o^hin«eir.gainsth4elf.forIt;j.ehi. 
person to be himself.' " 

Ans, — 1. To obey the king's personal will, 
when it is sinful, (as we now suppose,) against 
his legal will, is a sin, and a disobedience to 
God and the king also, seeing the law is the 
king's will as king; but to obey his legal 
will, against his sinful personal will, (as it 
must be sinful if contrary to a just law,) is 
obedience to the king as king, and so obe- 
dience to God. 2. You ti^e the king's 
person to be himself, but you take quid pro 
quo ; for his person here you must not take 
physically, for his suppost of soul and body, 
but morally : it is the king, as a sinful man 
doing his worst will against the law, which 
is his just and best will, and the rule of the 
subjects. And the king's personal will is so 
far just, and to regulate the subjects, in so 
far as it agreeth with his legal will or his 
law, and this will can sin, and therefore may 
be crossed vrithout breach of the fifth com- 
mandment ; but his legal will cannot be 
crossed without disobedience both to Grod 
and the king. 

jSymmon« (p. 28). — The king's personal 
will doth not always presuppose passion; 
and if it be attended with passion, yet we 
must bear it for conscience sake. — Ans, We 
are to obey the king's personal will, when 
the thing commanded is not sin; but his 
subjects, as subjects, have httle to do with 
his personal wul in that notion. It con- 
oemeth his domestic servant, and is the 
king's will as he is the master of servants, 
not as he is king in relation to subjects; 
but we speak of the king's personal will as 
repugnant to law, and contrary to the king's 
will as king, and so contrary to the filth 
commandment; and this is attended often 
not only with passion, but also with pre- 
judice; and we owe no subjection to pre- 
judice and passions, or to acti<xis commanded 
by these disordered powers, because they 
are not from God, nor his ordinances, but 
from m^i and the flesh, and we owe no 
subjection to the flesh. 

hr Feme (sect. 9, p. 58). — The distinc- 
tion of personal and Ic^al will hath place in 
evil actions, biit not in resistance, where we 



cannot sever the person and the dignity, 
or authority, because we cannot resist the 
power but we must resist the person who 
hath the power. Saul had lawfully the 
command of arms, but that power he useth 
unjustly, against innocent I)avid. I ask, 
When these emperors took away lives and 
goods at their pleasure, was that a power, 
ordained of God ? No, but an illegal will, 
a tyranny — ^but they might not reast ; nay, 
but they cannot resist ; for that power and 
sovereignty employed to compass these il- 
legal commandments was ordained and 
settled in them.. When Pilate condemned 
our Saviour, it was an illegal will, yet our 
Saviour acknowledgeth in it, that Pilate's 
power was given hmi from above. 

Ans. — 1. Here we have the distinction 
denied by royalists, granted by Dr Feme. 
But if, when the king conunands us to do 
wickedness, we may resist that personal will, 
and when he commandeth us to suffer un- 
justly we cannot resist his will but we must 
resist also his royal person ; what ! is it 
not still the king, and his person sacred, as 
his power is sacred, when ne commandeth 
the subjects to do unjustly, as when he com- 
mandeth them to suner unjustly ? It were 
fearfiil to say, when kings command any 
one act of idolatry, they are no longer kings. 
If, for conscience, I am to suffer unjusuy, 
when Nero commandeth unjust puniahment, 
because Nero commanding so, remaineth 
God's minister, why, but when Nero com- 
mandeth me to worship an heathen god, 
I am upon the same ground to obey that 
unjust will in doing ill ; for Nero, in com- 
manding idolatry, remaineth the Lord's 
minister, his person is sacred in the one com- 
mandment of doing ill, as in inflicting ill of 
punishment. And do I not resist his per- 
son in the one as in the other ? His power 
and his person are as inseparably conj<Mned 
by God in the one as in the other. 2. In 
bodily thrusting out of Uzziah from the 
temple, these fourscore valiant men did re- 
sist the king's person by bodily violence, as 
well as his power. 3. If the power of killing 
the martyrs in Nero was no power ordained 
of God, then the resisting of Nero, in his 
taking away the lives of the martyrs, was 
but the resisting of tyranny ; and certain- 
ly, if that power in Nero was rtrmyftivn a 
power ordained of God, and not to be re- 
sisted, as the place (B^n. xiii.) is alleged 
by royalists, then it must be a lawful power, 
and no tyranny ; and if it cannot be ret- 






152 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



sisted, because it was a power ordained and 
settled in him, it is either settled by Grod, 
and so not tyranny, (except God be the 
author of tyranny,) or then settled by the 
devil, and so may well be resisted. But the 
text speaketh of no power but of that which 
is of God. 4. We are not to be subject to 
all powers in cancreto, by the text ; for we 
are not to be subject to powers law&l, yet 
commanding active obedience to things un- 
lawful, ^w subjection includeth active 
obedience of honour, love, fear, paying tri* 
bute, and therefore of need force, some 
powers must be excepted. 6. Pilate's 
power is merely a power by divine permis- 
sion, not a power ordained of God, as are 
the powers spoken of, Rom. xiii. Gregorius 
(mor. 1. 3, c. 11) expressly saith, — " This 
was Satan's power given to Pilate against 
Christ. Mambtts ScUanm pro nostra re- 
demptione se tradidit^* Lyi^y '* ^ prin" 
dpibiuf Romanorum et ulteriiM permtssum 
a deo, qm eat potestas, superior,^' Calvin, 
Beza and Diodatus, saitn the same; and 
that he cannot mean of legal power from 
God's regulating will is evident, 1. Because 
Christ is answering Pilate, (John xix. 10,) 
" Knowest though not that I have power 
to crucify thee?" This was an untruth. 
Pilate had a command to worship him, and 
beUeve in him; and whereas Feme saith, 
(sect. 9, p. 59,) *' Pilate had power to 
judge any accused before him ;" it is true ; 
but he being obHged to believe in Christ, 
he was obliged to beheve in Christ's inno- 
cency, and so neither to judge nor receive 
accusation against him; and the power he 
saith he had to crucify, was a law-power in 
Pilate's meaning, but not in very deed any 
law power ; because a law-power is from 
God's regulating will in the nf^h command- 
ment, but no creature hath a lawful or a 
law-power to crucify Christ. 2. A law- 
power is for good, (Bom. xiii. 4,) a power 
to crucify Chnst is for ill. 3. A law-power 
is a terror to ill works, and a praise to good : 
Pilate's power to crucify Chnst was the con- 
trary. 4. A law-power is to execute wrath 
on ill-doing, a power to crucify Christ is no 
such. 6. A law-power conciliateth honour, 
fear, and veneration, to the person of the 
judge, a power to crucify Christ conciliateth 
no such thing, but a disgrace to Pilate. 6. 
The genuine acts of a lawM power are law- 
ful a^ ; for such ad is the ^untain-power, 
such are the acts flowing therefrom. Grood 
acts flow not from bad powers, neither hath 



Grod ^ven a power to sin, except by way of 
permission. 



QUESTION XXX. 

WHETHER OR KO PASSIVE OBEDIENCE BE A 
MEAK TO WHICH WE ARE SUBJECTED IN 
CONSCIENCE, BY VIRTUE OF A DIVINE COM- 
MANDMENT ; AND WHAT A MEAN RESIST- 
ANCE IS. THAT FLYING IS RESISTANCE. 

Much is built, to commend patient suf- 
fering of ill, and to condemn all resistance of 
superiors, by royalists, on the place, 1 Pet. 
ii. 18, where we are commanded, being ser- 
vants, to suffer buffets not only for ill-3oing 
of good masters, but also undeservedly ; and 
when we do well, we are to suffer of those 
masters that are evil; and so much more 
are we patiently without resistance to suffer 
of kings. But it is clear, the place is no- 
thing against resistance, as in these assertions 
I clear : — 

Assert. 1. — Patient suffering of wicked 
men, and violent resisting are not incom- 
patible, but they may weS stand together; 
so this consequence is the basis of the argu- 
ment, and it is just nothing : to wit, ser- 
vants are to suffer unjustfy wounds and 
buffeting of their wicked masters, and they 
are to bear it patiently ; therefore, servants 
are in conscience obliged to non-resistance. 
Now, Scripture makeui this clear, — 1. The 
church of God is to bear with all patience 
the indignation of the Lord, because she 
hath sinned, and to suffer of wicked enemies 
which were to be trodden as mire in the 
streets (Micah vii. 9 — 12); but withal, 
they were not obliged to non-resistance and 
not to fight against these enemies, yea, they 
were obliged to fight against them alsa If 
these were Babylon, Judah might have re- 
sisted and fought if God had not given a 
special commandment of a positive law, that 
they should not fight; it these were the 
Assyrians and other enemies, or rather 
both, the people were to resist by fighting, 
and yet to endure patiently the indignation 
of the Lord. David did bear most* patiently 
the wrong that his own son Absalom, and 
Ahitophel, and the people inflicted on him, 
in pursuing him to take his life and the 
kingdom from him, as is clear by his gra- 
cious expressions (2 Sam. xv. 25, 26 ; xvi. 
10 — 12; Psal. iiL 1 — 3); yea, he prayeth 



Ls 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



163 



fur a blessing on the people that conspired 
against him (Psal. iii. 8) ; yet did he law- 
fully resist Absalom and the conspirators, 
and sent out Joab and a huge army in open 
battle against them, (2 Sam< xviii. 1— -4, 
&c.,) and fought against them* And were 
not the people of God patient to endure the 
riolence done to them in the wilderness 
by Og, king of Bashan ; Sihon, king of 
Heshbon; by the Amorites, Moabites, &c.? 
I think God's law tyeth all men, especiaUy 
his people, to as patient a suffering in wars. 
(Deut. viii. 16.) God then trying and hum- 
bling his people, as the servant is to endure 
patiently, unjurtly inflicted buffets (1 Pet. 
li. 18); and yet God's people at God's com- 
mand did resist these longs and people, and 
did fight and kill them, and possess their 
land, as the history is dear. See the like 
Josh. xi. 18, 19. 2.r One act of grace and 
▼irtue is not contrary to another ; resistance 
is in the children of Grod an innocent act of 
self-pres^vartion, as is patient suffering, and 
therefore they may well subsist in one. 
And so saith Amasa by the Spirit of the 
Lord, 1 Chron. zii. 18, ** Peace, peace be 
unto thee, and peace to thy helpers, for 
Grodhelpeth thee." Now, in that, David 
and all nis helpers were resisters of king 
Saul. 3. The scope of the j^ace (1 Pet. ii.) 
is not to forbid all violent resisting, as is 
dear he speaketh nothing of violent resisting 
eith^ one way or other, but only he for- 
biddeth revengefiil roasting of repaying one 
wrong with another, &om the example of 
Christ, who, '^ when he was reviled, reviled 
Bot a^ain ; when he suffered, he threatened 
not ;''^ therefore, the argument is a felacy, 
ah «o quod dodtur mmrk r), ad illtui qttod 
dkitar mirxSf Though therefore the mas- 
ter should attempt to kill an innocent ser- 
vant, and invade him with a weapon of 
death suddenly, without all reason or cause, 
or unavoidaJbly, Dr Feme, (p. S, sect. 2, p. 
10,) in that case, doi^ free a subject from 

iltiness if ho violently resist his prince ; 

Brefore, the servant who should violently 
resist his master in the aforesaid case should, 
and mi^t patiently suffer and violently re- 
sist, notwithstanding anything that royalists 
can oondude on the contrary. 4. No prince 
hath a masterly or lordly dominion over his 
subjects, but only a free, ingenuous, paternal* 
and tutoriy oversight for the good of the 
people. (Rom. xiii. 4.) The master, espe- 
cially in the^apostle Peter's tin^e, had a domi- 
moitof«r servants as over their proper goods. 



Assert, 2. — Neither suffering formally as 
suffering, and so neither can non-resisting 
passive fall under any moral law of Gkxi, 
except in two conditions : 1. In the point 
of Christ's passive obedience, he being the 
eternal God as well as man, and so lord of 
his own blood and life, by virtue of a special 
commandment imposed on him by his Fa- 
ther, was commanded to lay down his life, 
vea, and to be an agent as well as a patient 
m dying (Job. x. 18) ; yea, and actively he 
was to contribute something for his own 
death, and offer himself wimngty to death 
(Matt, xxviii. 20) ; and, knowing the hour 
that he was to depart out of this world unto 
the Father, (John xiii. 1,) would not only 
not fly — ^which is to ro3ralists lawiul, to us a 
special point of resistance (John xiv. 81 ; 
xviii. 4--7) — ^but upbraided Peter as the 
a^nt of SaUm, who would dissuade him to 
die, (Matt. xvi. 22, 23,) and would fight for 
him. And he doth not fetch any argument 
against Peter's dravdng of his swora firom 
the unlawfulness of self-defence and innocent 
resistance, (which he should have done if 
royalists plead with any colour of reason 
from his example, asainst the lawfulness of 
resistance and self-defence,) but from the 
absolute power of God. 2. From Grod's 
positive wiU, who commanded him to die.- 
(Matt. xxvi. 63, 64.) If therefore royalists 
prove anything against the lawMness of re- 
sisting kings, when they offer (most unjust- 
ly) violence to the life of God's servants, 
crom this one merely extraordinary and 
rare example of Christ, the like whereof was 
never in the world, they may, firom the 
same example, prove it unlawful to fly, for 
Christ would not fly. ^sal. xh 6, 7 ; Heb. 
X. 6 — 9; John xiv. 31; xviii. 4 — ^7.) 1. 
They may prove that people sought by a ty- 
rant to be crucified for the cause of God, are 
to reveal and discover themselves to an army 
of men who come to seek them. (John xiii. 
1,2; xviii. 4 — -7). 2. That martyrs are of 
purpose to go to the place where they know 
they shall he apprehended and put to death, 
for this Christ md, and are wiUmgly to offer 
themselves to the enemy's army, for so did 
Christ (John xiv. 3; Mark xiv. 41, 42; 
^att. xxvi. 46, 47) ; and so by his example, 
all the parliament, all the innocents of the 
city of London, and assembly of divines, are 
obliged to lay down arms and to go to their 
own death to prince Rupert, and the bloody 
Irish rebels. 3. By this example it is un- 
lawfiil to resist the cut-throats of a king, for 




Csesar in his own royal person — ^the high 
priest in person, came not out against Christ; 
yea, it is not lawful for the parliament to 
resist a Judas, who hath fled as a traitorous 
apostate from the truth and the temple of 
Qirist. 4. It is not lawful for innocents to 
defend themselves by any violence against 
the invasion of superiors, in Dr Feme's 
three cases in which he alloweth resistance : 
(1.) When the invasion is sudden. (2.) Un- 
avoidable. (3^ Without all colour of law 
and reason. In the two last cases, royalists 
defend the lawfulness of self-defence. 5. 
If the example be pressed, — Christ did not 
this and that, he resisted not with violence, 
to save his own life, therefore, we are to 
abstain from resistance and such and such 
means of self-preservation; then, because 
Christ appealed not from inferior judges to 
the emperor Ceesar ; who, no doubt, would 
have shown him more favour than the scribes 
and Pharisees did, and because Christ con- 
veyed not a humble supplication to his sove- 
reign and father Caesar, — ^then because he 
proffered not a humble petition to prince 
f ilate for his life, he being an innocent man, 
and his cause just, — ^because he neither pro- 
cured an orator to plead his own just cause, 
nor did he so plead for himself, and give 
in word and wnt, all lawful and possible de- 
fences for his own safety, but answered 
many things with silence, to the admiration 
of tne judge, (Mark xv. 3 — 5,) and was 
thrice pronounced by the judge to be inno- 
cent (Luke xxii. 23) ; because, I say, Christ 
did not all these for his own life, therefore 
it is unlawful for Scotland and England to 
appeal to the king, to suppHcate, to give in 
apolo^es, &;c. I think royalists dare not say 
so. But if they say he would not resist, 
and yet might histve done all these lawfully, 
because these be lawful means, and resis- 
tance with the sword unlawful, — ^because 
'^ He that taketh the sword, shall perish by 
the sword," — let me answer then, 1. They 
leave the argument from Christ's example, 
who was thus far subject to higher powers, 
that he would not resist, and plead worn the 
unlawfulness of resistance; this is petitio 
prindpiL 2. He that tskketh the sword 
without Grod's warrant, which Peter had not, 
but the contrary, he was himself a Satan to 
Christ, who would but counsel him not to 
die ; but there is no shadow of a word to 
prove that violent resisting is unlawful, when 
the king and his Irish cut-throats pursue us 
unjustly ; only Christ saith, when God may 



deliver extraordinarily by his angels, except 
it be his absolute will that his Don should 
drink the cup of death, then to take the 
sword, when God hath declared his will on 
the contrary, is unlawful; and that is all; 
though I do not question but Christ's ask- 
ing for swords, and his arresting all his 
enemies to the ground (John xviii. 6) back- 
ward, is a justifying of self-defence. But 
hitherto it is dear, by Christ's example, that 
he only was commanded to suffer. Now the 
second case in which suffering £sJleth under 
a commandment, is indirect^ and compa- 
ratively, when it cometh to uie election of 
the witness of Jesus, that it is referred to 
them, either to deny the truth of Christ 
and his name, or then to suffer death. The 
choice is apparently evident; and this choice 
that persecutors refer us unto, is to us a 
commandmtot of God, that we must choose 
suffering for Christ, and refuse sinning 
against Christ. But the supposition must 
stand, that this alternative is unavoidable, 
that is not in our power to decline either suf- 
fering for Christ, or denying of Christ before 
men; otherwise no man is to expect the 
reward of a witness of Jesus, who having 
a lawM possible means of eschewing suffer- 
ing, doth yet cast himself into suffering 
needlessly. But I prove that suffering by 
men of ^is world ialleth not formally and 
directly under any divine positive law ; for 
the law of nature, — whatever Arminians in 
their declaration, or this Arminian excom- 
municate think vrith them, (for they teach 
that Grod gave a commandment to Adam, 
to abstain from such and such fruit, with 
pain and trouble to sinless nature,}-— doth 
not command Buffering, or anything con- 
trary to nature, as nature is smless; 1 prove 
it thus : — 

1. Whatever falleth under a positive oom«- 
mandment of God, I may say here, under 
any commandment of God, is not a thing 
under the free will and power of others, 
from whom we are not descended necessarily 
by natural generation, but that men of the 
world kill me, even ikese from whom I am 
not descended by natural generation (which 
I speak to exclude Adam, who killed all his 
posterity) is not in my free will, either as if 
they had my common nature in that act, or 
as if I were accessory by counsel, consent, or 
approbation to that act, for this is under the 
free will and power of others, not under my 
own free will; therefore, that I suffer by 
others is not under my &ee vdll, and -oaonot 




fall under a oommandment of God ; and cer- 
tainly it is an irrational law (glorified be his 
name) that God should command Antipas 
either formally to suffer, or formally not to 
suffer death by these of the synagogue of 
Satan, (Bev. ii. 13,) because if they be 
pleased not to kill him, it is not in his free 
will to be killed by them ; and if they shall 
have him in their power (except God extra- 
ordinarily deliver) it is not in nis power, in 
an ordinary providence, not to be killed. 

2. All these places of God's word, that 
recommendeth suffering to the followers of 
Christ, do not command formally that we 
suffer; therefore, suffering falleth not for- 
mally under any comman£nent of God. I 
prove the antecedent, because if they be con- 
sidered, they prove only that comparatively 
we are to choose rather to suffer than to 
deny Christ before men, (Mat. x. 28, 32 ; 
Rev. ii. 13 ; Mat. x. 37 ; xvi. 24 ; xix. 29,) 
or then they command not suffering accord- 
ing to the substance of the passion, but ac- 
cording to the manner that we suffer, will- 
ingly, cheerfully, and patiently. Hence 
Christ's word to take up nis cross, which is 
not a mere passion, but commendeth an act 
of the virtue of patience. Now no Christian 
virtue oonsisteth in a mere passion, but in 
laudable habits, and good and gracious acts, 
and the text we are now on (1 Pet. ii. 18, 
19) doth not recommend suffering from the 
example of Christ, but patient sniroring; and 
so the word Sg'&rmMfUftp, not simply emoined, 
but Iv wmrri rS ^«Cm in all fear, (ver. 18,) and 
the words Ar«f i^uv and ^«^in7», to suffer with 
patience, as 2 Tim. iii. 11 ; 1 Cor. x. 13, 
and ^tftHifi is to suffer patiently, 1 Cor. 
xiii. 7y love ritmi ^t/aiw suffereth all 
things; Heb. xii. 17, if you suffer correc- 
tion ; 1 Tim. v. 5, she continueth pa- 
tientlv in prayers ; Heb. xii. 2, Christ en- 
durew the cross patiently/ (Bom. xv. 5 ; 
viii. 25 ; Luke viii. 16 ; xxi. 29). The deriva- 
tions hence agnify patience; so do all our in- 
terpreters, Beza, Calvin, Marloratus, and 
popish expositors, as Lorinus, Estius, Carthu- 
sian, Lyra, Hugo Cardinalis, expound it of 
patient suffering; and the text is clear, it is 
suffering like Ouist, without rendering evil 
for evil, and reviling for reviling. 

3. Suffering simply, according to substance 
of the passion, (I cannot say action,) is com- 
mon to good and ill, and to the wicked, yea 
to the damned in hell, who suffer against 
their will, and that cannot be Joined accord- 
ing to its substance as an act of formal obedi- 



ence and subjection to higher powers, kings, 
fathers, masters, by force of tke fifth com- 
mandment, and of the place. Bom. xiii. 1, 2. 
Which, according to its substance, wicked 
men suffer, and the damned in hell also 
against their will. 

4. Passive obedience to wicked emperors 
can but be enjoined (Bom. xiii.) but only in 
the manner, and upon supposition, that we 
must be subject to them, and must suffer, 
against our wills aU the ill of punishment 
that they can inflict; we must suffer pa- 
tiently, and because it is God's permissive 
will that they punish us unjustly ; for it is 
not God's ruling and approving will (called 
voluntas signi) that they should, against the 
law of Grod and man, kill us, and persecute 
us ; and therefore neither Bom. xiii., nor 1 
Pet. ii., nor any other place in God's word, 
any common divine, natural, national or 
any municipal law, commandeth formally 
obedience passive, or subjection passive, or 
non-resistance under the notion of passive 
obedience ; yea, to me, obedience passive (if 
we speak of obedience, properly called, as re- 
lative essentially to a law) is a chimera, a 
dream, and repugnantia in adjecto; and 
therefore I utterly deny that resistance pas- 
sive, or subjection passive, doth formally fall 
under either commandment of God affirma- 
tive or negative ; only the unlawM manner 
of resistance by way of revenge, or for de- 
fence of popery and false religion, and out of 
impatient toleration of monarchy or any ty- 
ranny, is forbidden in God's word ; and cer- 
tainly all the words used Bom. xiii., as they 
fidl under a formal commandment of God, are 
words of action, not of any chimerical pas- 
sive obedience, as we are not to resist active- 
ly God's ordinance, as his ordinance, (ver, 
1, 2,) that is, to resist God actively. We 
are to do good works, not evil, if we would 
have the ruler no terror to us (ver. 3). We 
must not do ill if we would be free of venge- 
ance's sword (ver. 7) ; we are to pay tribute 
and to give fear and honour to the ruler, all 
which are evidently actions, not passive sub- 
jection ; and if any passive subjection be com- 
manded, it is not here, nor in the first com- 
mandment, commanded, but in the first 
commandment under the hand of patience 
and submission under Grod's hand in suffer- 
ings, or in the third^ commandment under 
the hand of rather djring for Christ than de- 
nying his truth before men. Hence I argue 
here (Bom. xiii. ; 1 Pet. ii. ; Tit. mj is 
nothing else but an exposition of the fifth 




commaiidment ; but in the fifth coimnand- 
ment only active obedienoe is formallj c6m- 
manded, and the subordination of inferiors 
to superiors is ordained, and passiye obe- 
dience is nowhere commanded, but only 
modus reif the manner of suffering, and the 
occasion of* the commandment, here it is 
thought that the Jews converted under this 
pretext, that they were (Jod's people, be- 
lieved that they should not be subject to the 
Romans. A certain Galilean made the 
Galileans believe that they should not pay 
tribute to strangers, ^nd that they should 
call none lord, but the God of heaven ; as 
Josephus saith, (Antiq, Judaic. 1. 20, c. 2, 
and de bell. Judaic. 1 7> c 29,) yea and 
Hieron. (Com. in Tit.,) saith, At this time 
the sect of the Galileans were on foot. It is 
like the Jews were thought to be Galileans, 
and that their liberty, purchased in Cljirist, 
could not consist with the order of master 
and servant, king and subject. And to re- 
move this, Paul estabhshed magistracy, and 
commandeth obedience in the Lord ; and he 
is more to prove the office of the magistrate 
to be of Grod than any other thing, and to 
show what is his due, than to establish abso* 
luteness in Nero to be of God ; yea, to me, 
every word in the text speaketh limitedness 
of princes, and crieth down absoluteness : — 
(1.) No power of God, (2.) no ordinance of 
God, who is a terror to evil, but a praise 
to good works, (3.) no minister of Grod for 
good, &c. can be a power to which we sub« 
mit ourselves on eairth, as next unto Grod, 
without controlment. That passive obedi- 
ence &lleth formally under no command- 
ment of Grod, I prove thus : All obedience^ 
liable to a divine commandment, doth com- 
mend morally the performer of obedience, 
as having a will conformed to Qod's moral 
law, ana deformity betwixt the will of him 
who performeth not obedience, involveth the 
non-obedient in wrath and guiltiness. But 
non-passive subjection to the sword of the 
judge doth not morally commend him that 
sufiSreth not punishment; for no man is for- 
mally a sinner against a moral law because 
he suffereth not the ill of punishment, nor 
is he morally good, or to be commended, 
because he suffereth ill of punishment, but 
because he doth the ill of sin. And all evil 
of punishment unjustly inflicted hath Grod's 
voluntas beneplaciti, the instrumental and 
hidden decree of Grod, which ordereth both 
good and iU, (Ephes. i. 11,) for its rule and 
cause, and hath not God's will or approba- 



tion called, voluntfu signi^ for its rule, both 
is contrary to that wiU. I am sore Epipha- 
nius, (1. 1, torn, 3, heres. 40,) BasiliuB (in 
Fsal. xxxiiA Naaiapzen Orat. {ad suhd. et 
imperat^)y Hilar. (U. ad Constant.)^ and Au- 
gustine, all citeth these words, and saith the 
same. K, then, passive subjection be not 
commanded, non-subjection passive oannot 
be forbidden, and this text, Kom. xiii., and 
1 Pet. ii. cannot a whit help the bad cause 
of royalists. All then must be reduced to 
some action of resisting ; arguments for pas- 
sive subjection, though there were idiipmlisof 
them, they cannot help us. 

Assert. 3. — By the place, 1 Pet, ii., the 
servant unjustly buffeted is not to buffet 
his master agam, but to bear patiently as 
Christ did, mo, when he was reviled, did 
not revile ugarn. Not because the place 
condemneth resistance for self-defence, bat 
because buffeting again is formally re-of- 
fending — ^not deien<unff: defendii^ is -pro- 
perly a warding off a blow or stroke. If my 
ne^hbour come to kill me, and I can by no 
means save my life by flight, I may defend 
myself; and all divines say I may rather 
kill ere I be killed, because I am nearer, by 
the law of nature, and dearer to myself and 
my own life than to my brother ; — but if I 
kill him, out of malice or hatred, the act of 
defending, by the unlawful manner of doing, 
becometh an act of offraiding and murder ; 
whence the mind of the blood-shedder will 
vary the nature of the aetioa from whence 
this coroll/ucy dpth naturally issue^ that, the 
physical action of taking aM»y the life mak- 
eth not murder nor homicide, and so the 
physical action of offending my neiffhbeur is 
not murder. 1.. Abi^dbaia may kill his son, 
_he for whom the cities of re&ge were or- 
dained, and did kill lus brother, yet,, not 
hating him, be was not, by God's law, 
judgS 1^ murderer; and, 2. It necessarily 
hence Mloweth, that an act which ia physi- 
cally an act of offending my Inrother, yea 
even to the taking away of his life, is (^en 
morally and leguly an act of lawM seU- 
defence : an offending of another, necessi- 
tated &om the sole invention of self-defence, 
is no more but an act of innocent sdf-defence. 
If David, with his men, had killed any of 
Saul's men in a set battile, David and his 
men only int^iding self-defence, the war on 
David's part was mere defensive ; for physi- 
cal actions of killing, indifferent of them- 
selves, yet imperatea by a principle of natu- 
ral self-defence, and clothed with this formal 



THE LAW AND TH£ PRINCE. 



167 



end of self-defence, or aooordixiff to the sub- 
stance of the action^ the act is of self-defence. 
If, therefore, one shall wound me deadly, 
and I know it is my death, after that, to 
kill the killer of myself, I beins only a 
private man, mu^ be no act of sel^efence, 
but of homicide; because it cannot be impe- 
rated by a sinless dictate of a natural con- 
science, for this end of self-defence, after I 
know I am killed. Any mean not used for 
preTentinff death must be an act of revenge, 
not of seu-defence, for it is physicallv un- 
aiitable for the intended end d self-defence. 
And so, for a servant buffeted to buffet 
again, is oi the same nature, — ^ihe second 
Iraffet not being a condueibla mean to ward 
the first buffet, but a mean to procure he^ 
vier strdies, and, possibly, killing, it cannot 
be an act of self-defence ; f<Nr an act of s^- 
defence must be an act dsstinated ex natura 
ret, only for deHmce ; and if it be known to 
be an act of &Ae offending, without anr 
known necessary relation of a mean to s^- 
defenoe as the end, it cannot be {n^perly an 
act oi self-drfence. 

AtserL 4. — When the matter is lis^ter, 
as in paying tribute, or suffering a buffet of 
a rough master, thouflh unjustly, we are not 
to use any act criT r»-offending. For, though 
I be not absolute lord of my own goods, and 
so may not at my sole pleasure give tribute 
and expend monies to the hurting of my 
children, where I am not, by Grod^ law or 
man's law, obliged to pay tribute^ and 
though I be not aa absolute lord of my 
members, to expose &oe, and cheeks, and 
back, to stripes and whips at my own mere 
will, yet have we & comparative dominion 
myexL to us of God in matters of goods, and 
disposing of our members, ^I think I may 
except me case of mutilation, which is a 
little death,) for buffets, because Christ, no 
doubt to teach us the like, would rather give 
of his goods, and pay tribute where it was not 
due, than that this scandal be in the way of 
Christ, that Christ was no loyal su^ect to 
law&l emperors and kings. And (1 (jor. ix.) 
Paul would rather not ^e stipend, though 
it was due to him, than hinder the course of 
the gospel. And the like is 1 Cor. vL, where 
the C(»3nthians were rather to suffer loss in 
their goods Ihazi to go to law bei^re infidel 
judges, and by the hke to prevent greater 
mconveniences, and mutilation, and death. 
The Christian servant hath that dominion 
over hiB members, rather to suffer buffets 
than to ward off buffets with violent resis- 



tance. But it is no consequence, that inno- 
cent subjects should suffer death of tyrants, 
and servants be killed by masters, and yet 
that they shall not be allowed, by the law of 
nature, to defend themselves, by re-offending, 
when only self-defence is intended, because 
we have not that dominion over life and 
death. And therefore, as a man is his bro- 
ther's murderer, who, with froward Cain, 
wiU not be his brother's keeper, and may 
preserve his brother's life, without loss of 
his own life, when his brother is unjustly 
preserved; so, when he may preserve his 
own hfe, and doth not that wmdi nature's 
law alloweth him to do, (rather to kill ere 
he be killed,) he is guilty of self-murder, 
because he is deficient in the du^ of lawful 
self-defence. But I grant, to offend or kill 
is not of the nature of defensive war, but 
accidental thereunto; and yet killing of cut- 
throats, sent forth by the illegal command- 
ment of the kinff, may be intended as a 
mean, and a lai/mil mean, of self-defence. 
Of two ills of punishment, we have a com- 
parative dominion over ourselves, — a man 
may cast his goods into the sea to redeem 
his life ; so, for to redeem peace, we may 
suffer buffets, but because death is the great- 
est ill of punishment, God hath not made 
it eligiblie to us when lawftil self-defence is 
at hand. But, in defending our own life 
against tyrannical power, though we do it 
hj offencUng and killing, we resist no ordi- 
nance of God, only I judge killing of the 
king in selP-defenee not lawful, because self- 
defence must be national on just causes. 

Let here the reader judge Barclay, H. 3, 
c 8, p. 159, con. Monar!) " If the King 
(saith Jbe) shall vex the commonwealth, or 
one port thereof, with great and intolerable 
cruelty, what shall the people do? They 
have (saith he) in that case a power to resist 
and defend themselves from injury; but only 
to defend themselves, nor to invade the 
prince, nor to resist the injury, or to recede 
from reverence due to the prince."^ 

I answer, 1. Let Barclay or the Prelate, 
(if he may carry Barclay's books) or any, 
aifference these two, — ^the people may resist 
& tyrant, but they may not resist the inju- 
ries inflicted by a tyrant's officers and cut- 
throats. I cannot inu^ne how to conciliate 

^ Fopnlo qnidem hoc casn resitendi ac tnendi se ab 
injuria potestas competit. sod tuendi se tanttim, non 
autem principem inyadendi, et resistendi injuriSB il- 
lat8B, non recedendi a, debita reverentia — non vim 
prseteritam nldscendi jns habet. 



>«»«*»*■««■ 



158 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



these two ; for to resist the cruelty of a king 
is but to hold off the injury by resistance. 
2. If this Nero waste tke commonwealth 
insufferably with his cruelty, and remain a 
lawful king, to be honoured as a king, who 
may resist him, according to the royalists' 
way ? But, from Bom. xiii., they resist the 
ordinance of Grod. Besisting is not a mere 
suffering, nor is it a moral resisting by al- 
leging £ws to be broken by him. We had 
never a question with royalists about such 
resisting. Nor is this resisting non-obe- 
dience to unjust commandments; that re- 
sisting was never yet in question by any 
except the papists, who in good earnest, by 
consequent, say, It is better to obey men 
than God. 3« It is then resisting by bodily 
violence. But if the king have such an ab^ 
solute power given him by God, as royalists 
fancy, irom Bom. xiii. 1, 2; 1 Sam. viii. 9 — 
11, 1 know not how subjects have any power 
given them of Grod to resist the power from 
God, and God's ordinance. And if this re- 
sii^g extend not itself to defensive wars, 
how Siall the people defend themselves from 
injuries, and the greatest injuries imagina* 
ble, — from an army of cut-throats and idola- 
tors, in war coming to destroy reHgion, set 
up idolatry, and root out the name of Grod's 
people, and lav waste the mountain of the 
Lora's house? And if they may defend 
themselves by defensive wars, how can wars 
be without offending ? 4. The law of nature 
teacheth to repel violence with violence, 
when one man is oppressed, no less than 
when the commonwealth is oppressed. Bar- 
clay should have given either Scripture or 
the law of nature for his warrant here. 5. 
Let us suppose a king can be perjured, how 
are the estates of the kingdom, who are his 
subjects, by Barclay's way, not to challenge 
sucn a tyrant of his perjury ? He did swear 
he should be meek and clement, and he is 
now become a furious lion. Shall the flock 
of Grod be committed to the keeping of a 
furious lion ? 

Dr Feme (p. 3, sect. 2, p. 9,) addeth, 
*^ Personal defence is lawful against sudden 
and illegal invasion, such as Elisha practised, 
even if it were against the prince, to ward 
blows, and to hold the prince's hand, but 
not to return blows ; but general resistance 
by arms cannot be without many unjust 
violences, and doth immediately strike at 
the order, which is the life of the common- 
wealth. 

Ans. — 1. If it be natural to one man to 



defend himself against the personal invasion 
of a prince, then is it natural and warrant- 
able to ten thousand, and to a whold king- 
dom; and what reason to defraud a kingdom 
of the benefit of self-defence more than one 
man ? 2. Neither grace nor policy destroy- 
eth nature ; and how shall ten or twenty 
thousand be defended a^gainst cannons and 
muskets, tliat killeth af^ off, except they 
keep towns against the king, (which Jh 
Feme and others say had b^n treason in 
David, if he had kept Keilah against king 
Saul,) except they be armed to offend, with 
weapons of^the Uke nature to kill rather 
than be killed, as the law of nature teacheth. 
3. To hold the hands of the prince is no leas 
resisting violence than to cut the skirt of his 
garment, which royalists think unlawful, and 
18 an opposing of external force to the king's 
person. 4. It is true, wars merely defensive 
cannot be but they must be offensive ; but 
they are offensive by accident, and intended 
for mere defence, and they cannot be with' 
out wars sinfrdly offensive, nor can any wan 
be in rerum natura now, (I except the wars 
commanded by God, who only must have 
been sinful in the manner of doing,) but 
some innocent must be killed ; but wars 
cannot for that be condemned. 5. Neither 
are offensive wars against those who are no 
powers and no ordinances of Grod, such as 
are cut-throat Irish, condemned prelates and 
papists now in arms, more destructive to the 
order established by God than acts of lawful 
war are, or the punishing of robbers. And 
by all this, proteistants in Scotland and Ens* 
Itmd should remain in their houses unarmed, 
while the papists and Irish come on them 
armed, ana cut their throats, and spoil, and 
plunder at will. 

Nor can we think that resistance to a 
king, in holding his hands, can be natural ; 
if he be stronger, it is not a natural mean of 
self-preservation. Nature hath appointed 
innocent and offending violence, agiunst un- 
just violence, as a means of self-preservation. 
GoHath's sword is no natural means to hold 
Saul's hands, for a sword hath no fingers; 
and if king Saul suddenly, without colour of 
law or reason, or inevitably, should make 
personal invasion on David to kill him, Dr 
Feme saith he m&j resist ; but resisting is 
essentially a re-action of violence. Show us 
Scripture or reason for violent holding a 
king's hands in an unjust personal invasion, 
without any other re-aetion of offence. Wal- 
ter Torrils killed king W. Bufus as he ivas 



«■> 



sbootinff at a deer ; the Earl of Suffolk killed 
Henry VIII. at tilting : there is no trea- 
sonable intention here, and so no homicide. 
Defensive wars are offensive, ex eventu et 
efectu^ not ex cauaa^ or ex intentione. 

But it may be a^Lod, if no paflSLYe sub- 
jection at aU be commanded as due to su«- 
periors. — Ana. None properly so called, 
that is, purely passiye, only we are, for fear 
of the sword, to do our duty. We are to 
suffer ill of punishment of tyrants, ex hypo^ 
ihesi^ that tney inflict that ill on us some 
other way, and in some other notion than 
we are to suffer ill of equals ; for we are to 
suffer of equals not for any paternal authority 
that they have over us, as certainhr we are 
to suffer ill inflicted by superiors. 1 demand 
of royalists, If tyrants inflicting evil of punish- 
ment upon subjects unjustly be powers or- 
dained of God : if to resist a power in ty- 
rannical acts be to resist Grod. Since we are 
not to yield active obedience to all the com- 
mandments of superiors, whether they be 
good or ill, by virtue of this place. Bom. xiii. 
how is it that we may not deny passive sub- 
jection to all the acts of violence exercised, 
whedier of injustice, whether in these acts of 
violence wherein the prince in actu exercito 
and formally, punisheth not in God's stead, 
or m these wherein he punisheth tyrannically, 
in no formal or actual subordination to G<xl, 
we owe passive subjection ? I desire an an- 
swer to these. 

Assert. 5. — Flying from the tyranny of 
abused authority, is a plain resisting of rulers 
in their unlawful oppression and perverting 
of judgment. 

All royalists grant it lawful, and ground 
it upon the law of nature, that those that 
are persecuted b^ tyrannous princes may 
flee, and it is evident from Christ's com- 
mandment, **' If they persecute you in one 
city, flee to another," Matt. x. 23, and by 
Matt, xxiii. 34. Christ fled from the fliry 
of ihQ Jews till his hour was come ; Elias, 
Uriah, (Jer. xxvL 20,) and Joseph and 
Mary fled; the martyrs did hide them- 
selves in caves and dens of the earth (Heb. 
zi. 37> 38) ; Paul was let down through a 
window in a basket at Damascus. This cer- 
tainly is resistance; for look, what legal 
power God hath given to a tyrannous ruler, 
remaining a power ordained of Grod, to sum- 
mon legaiiy, and set before his tribunal the 
servants of God, that he may kill them, and 
murder them unjustly, that same le^ power 
he hath to murder them ; for if it be a 



legal power to kill the innocent, and such a 
power as they are obliged in conscience to 
submit unto, they are obliged in conscience 
to submit to the legal power of citing ; for 
it is one and the same power. 1. Now, if 
resistance to the one power be unlawful, re- 
sistance to the other must be unlawM also ; 
and if the law of self-defence, or command of 
Christ, warrant me to disobey a tyrannous 
power commanding me to compear to receive 
the sentence of death, that same law far more 
shall warrant me to resist and deny passive 
subjection in submitting to the unjust sen- 
tence of death. 2. When a murderer, self- 
convicted, fleeth from the just power of a 
judge lawfully citing him, he resisteth the 
just power ordain^ of Grod (Bom. iii.); 
therefore, by the same reason, if we flee 
from a tyrannous power, we resist that ty- 
rannous power, ana so, by royalists' ground, 
we resist the ordinance of God by flying. 
Now, to be disobedient to a just power sum- 
moning a malefactor, is to hinder that lawful 
power to be put forth in lawful acts; for the 
judge cannot purj^ the land of blood if the 
murderer flee. 3. When the king of Israel 
sendeth a captain and fifly lictors to fetch 
Elisha, these come instructed with legal 
power from the king ; if I may lay fetters 
on their power by night, upon the ground 
of self-preservation, the same warrant shall 
allow me to oppose harmless violence for my 
own safety, i, Boyalists hold it unlawM 
to keep a stronghold against the king, 
though the fort be not the king's house, and 
though that David should not nave offended 
if he nad kept Keilah against Saul: Dr Feme 
and royalists say it had been unlawflil resis- 
tance. What more resistance is made to 
royal power by walls interposed than by 
seas and miles of earth interposed? Both are 
physical resistance, and violent in their kind. 



QUESTION XXXI. 

WHSTHSR OR NO SELV-DEFENCB AGAINST 
ANY UNJUST VIOLENCE OFFEBED TO THE 
LIFE, BE WARRANTED BT GOD's LAW, AND 
THE LAW OF NATURE AND NATIONS. 

Self-preservation in all creatures in which 
is nature, is in the creatures suitable to their 
nature. The bull defendeth itself by its 
horns, the eagle by her claws and bill, it 
will not follow that a lamb will defend itself 



160 



LEX, REX ; ORy 



against a wolf any other way than bj flying. 
& men, and Christian men, do naturalhr 
defend themselves; but the manner of self*- 
defence in a rational creature is rational, and 
not always merely natural ; therefore, a po- 

naturesy as neither grace, &r less can policy, 
destroy nature, then must these many natures 
be allowed of Crod to use a natural self-de* 
fence. If the king bring in an army of 
foreigners, then a politic o(»nmumty must 
defend itself in a rational way. Why? 
Self-defenoe is natural to man, and natural 
to a lamb, but not the same way. A lamb 
or a dove naturally defend themselves against 
beasts of another kind only by flight, not by 
re-action and re-offending ; but it foUoweth 
not that a man defendeui himself from his 
enemy only by flight. If a robber invade 
me, to take aWaj my life and my parse, I 
may defend myself by re'<iction ; for reason 
ana grace both may determine the way of 
self-preservation. Hence royalists say, a 
private man against his prince hath no way 
to defend himself but by flight ; therefore^ 
a community hath no other way to defend 
themselves but by flight. 

1. The antecedent is false. Dr Feme 
aUoweth to a private man supplications, and 
denying of subsidies and tribute to the 
prmce, when he employeth tribute to the 
destruction of the commonwealth ; which, by 
the way, n a dear resistance, and an active 
resislaiiee made against the long (Rom. xiii, 
6, 7) and against a commandment of €rod, 
esc^ royuistsmnt tyrannous powers may 
be resisted. 2. TThe consequence ia naught, 
for a private man may defend himself 
against unjust violence, but not any way he 
pbaseth; the first way is by supplications 
and apolo^es, — ^he may not presently use vio» 
lence to the kuiff's. servants before he suppli'- 
cate, nor may he use re-offending, if flight 
may save. David used a^- the three in order. 
He made his defence by words, by the me- 
diation of Jonathan; when that prevailed 
not, he took himself to flight, as the next ; 
but because he knew flisht was net safe every 
way, and nature taught him self-preserva- 
tion, and reason and light of moe taught 
him the means, and the religious order of 
these means for self-preservation, there- 
fore he addeth a third, " He took Goliath's 
swQsd, and gathered six hundi^ed armed 
men,'^ and BXter that made use of an host. 
Now a sword and armour' are not horsing 
and shipping for flight, but contraey to 



flight ; so re-offending is policy's lai$ refuge. 
A godly mafflstrate taketh not away the hie 
of a subject if other means can compass the 
end of tne law, and so he is oompelled and 
necessitated to take away the lifo; so the 
private man, in his natiural self-defence, is 
not to use re-actum, or violent re-offending, 
in his self-defaice against any man, far less 
against the servants of a king, but in the 
exigence ci the last and most mexorable ne- 
cessity. And it IS true that M. Symmons 
nith, (sect. 11, p. 35,) '* Self-defence is not 
to be used where it cannot be without sin." 
It is certam, necessity is but a hungry plea 
for sin, (Luke xiv. 18,) but it is abo true, 
re-offenoinff comparaUvely, that I kill rather 
than I be killed, in the sinless court of na^ 
tnre's spotless and harmless necessity, is law- 
ful and necessary, except I be guil^ of self- 
murder, in the culpable omission of self-de- 
fence. Now a private man may fly, and 
and that is his second necessity, and violent 
re-offending is the third mean of self-preser- 
vation ; but, with leave, violent re-o£fend- 
ing is necessary to a private man, when his 
second mean, to wit, flight, is not possible, 
and cannot attain the end, as in the case of 
David : if flight do not prevail, Groliath's 
sword and an host of armea men are lawful. 
So, to a church and a community of protes* 
tants, men, wcmen, aged, sucking childien, 
sick, and diseased, who ave presMd either 
to be killed or forsake reHgion and JesDS 
Christ, flight is not the second mean, nor a 
mean at aH, because not possible, and there- 
fore not a natwal mean of preservatioii ; 
for the aged, the sick, the suosing infents, 
and sounl religion in the posterity cannot 
flee; flight here is nhysicaUy, and by nature's 
necessity, impossible, and therefore no hntM 
mean. What is to natuie physically impos- 
sible is no lawfbl mean. If Christ have a 
promise that the ends of ^b» earth (Pbal. ii. 
o] and the isles shaH. be his possession^ (Isa. 
xhx. 1,) I see not how natural defence can 
put us to flee, evem all> pvotestants and thdr 
seed, and the weak and sick, whom we are 
obliged to defend as ourselves, both by the 
law of nature and grace. I rcKEui that sev^ 
wicked nations and idolatrous were cast out 
of their land to> give place to tiie churdi d 
6od to dwell there, but show me a warrant 
in nature's law and in Grod's word that three 
kingdoms of protestants, their seed, aged, 
sick, sucking children, should flee out of 
England, Scotiand, Ireland, and leave reli- 
gion and the land< to a king and ta papists, 



THB LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



161 



prelates, and bloody Irish, and atheists f Mid 
therefore to a church and community having 
Qod's r^ht and man's law to the land, vio-* 
lent re-offending is their second mean (next 
to supplications and declarations, &c.) and 
filght IS not required of them as of a private 
man ; jea flight is not necessarily required 
of a private man, but where it is a possible 
mean of self-preservation; violent and unjust 
invaaon of a private man, which is unavoid- 
able, mAj be obviated with violent re-K>ffend- 
ing. ^ow the unjust invasion made on 
S^tlaad in 1640, for refusing the service- 
book, or raider the idolatry of the mass, 
therein intended, was unavoidable ; it was 
inmossiHe for the protestants, their old and 
»ck, their women and sucking children to 
flee over sea, or to have shipping betwixt 
the king's brin^g an army on them at 
Bunse Law, and tne prelates' charging of 
the ministers to receive the mess book. 
Althufflus saith well, (Polit. c. 38, n. 78,) 
Though private men may flee, yet the es- 
tates, if they flee, they do not do their duty, 
to commit a country, religion and aU, to a 
lion. Let not any obiect, We may not de- 
vise a way to fulfil the prophecy, Psal. ii. 
8, 9 ; Isa. xlix. 1 ; it is true, if the way be 
our own sinful way ; nor let any object, a 
colony went to New £ngland and fled the 
persecution. Answer, True, but if fleeing be 
the only mean after supplication, there was 
no more reascm that one colony should go to 
New England than it is necessary, and by a 
divine law obli^tory, that the whole protes- 
tants in tibe* three lungdoms, according to 
royalists' doctrine, are to leave their native 
country and religion to one man, and to po- 
pish idolatOFS and atheists, willing to worship 
idols with them, and whither then shall the 
gospel be, which we are obliged to defend 
with our hves ? 

There is tutela tfitce proooima, et remota, 
a mere and immediate defence of our life, 
and a remote or mediate defence; when 
there is no actual invasion made by a man 
seeking our life, we are not to use violent 
re-oflending. David might have killed Saul 
when he was sleeping, and when he cut off 
the lap of his garment, but it was unlawful 
for him to kill the Lord's anointed, because 
he is the iKMrd's anointed, as it is unlawful 
to kin a man, because he is the image of 
Grod, (Gen. ix. 6,) except in case of neces- 
sity. The ma^strate m case of necessity 
may kiU the malefactor, though his malefic 
cTis do not put him in that case, that he hath 



not now the image of €rOd ; how prudence 
and Kght of grace determineth, when n^e are 
to use violent re-offending for self-preserva- 
tion, it is not left to our pleasure. Li a re- 
mote posture of self-defence, we are not to 
use violent re-offending : David having Saul 
in his hand was in a remote posture of de- 
fence, the unjust invanon then was not ac- 
tual, not unavoidable, not a necessary mean 
in human prudence for self-preservation, for 
king Saul was then in a habitual, not in an 
actual pursuit of the whole princes, elders, 
and judges of Israel, or of a whole commu- 
nity and church ; Saul did but seek the life 
6f one man, David, and that not for religion, 
or a national pretended offence, and tbere- 
fbre he could not in conscience put hands on 
the Lord's anointed ; but if Saul had actual- 
ly ihvaded David for his Ufe, David might, 
in that case, make use of Goliath's sword, 
(for he took not that weapon with him as a 
cypher to boast Saul — it is no less unlawful 
to threaten a king than to put hands on 
him,) and rather kiU or be killed by Saul's 
emissaries ; because then he should have 
been in an immediate and nearest posture 
of actual self-defence. Now the case is 
far otherwise between the king and the two 
parliaments of England and Scotland, for 
the king is not sleeping in his emissaries, 
for he hath armies in two kingdoms, and 
now in three kingdoms,, by sea and land, 
night and day, in aictual pursuit, not of one 
David, but of the estates, and a Christian 
community in England and Scotland, and 
that for religions, £ws, and liberties; for the 
question is now between papist and protec- 
tant, between arbitrary ot tyrannicai go- 
vernment,- and law government, and there- 
fore by both the laws of the politic sofcieties 
of both kihdoms, and by the law of €rod and 
nature, we are to ude violent re-offending 
for self-preservation, and put to this neces- 
sity, when armiee are in actual pursuit of 
all the protestant churches of ^e three 
kingdoms, to actual killing, rather than we 
be killed, and suffer laws and religion to be 
undone. 

But, saith the royalist, David's argument, 
'^ God forbid that I stretch out my hand 
against the Lord's anointed, my master the 
kmg," concludeth universally, that the king 
in his most tyrannous acts, still remaining 
the Lord's anointed, cannot be resisted. 

Ans. — 1. David speaketh of stretching out 
his hand against the person of king Saul : no 
man in the three kingdoms did so much as 




attempt to do violence to the king's person. 
But this argument is inconsequent, for a 
king invading, in his own royal person, the* 
innocent suc^ect, suddenly, without colour 
of law or reason, and unavoidably, may be 
personally resisted, and that ¥dth opposing 
a violence bodily, yet in that invasion lie re- 
maineth the Lord's anointed. 2. By this 
argument the life of a murderer cannot be 
ta£en away by a judge, for he remaineth one 
indued ¥dth God's image, and keepeth still 
the nature of a man under all the murders 
that he doth, but it foUoweth nowise, that 
because Grod hath endowed his person with 
a sort of royalty, of a divine image, that his 
life cannot be taken ; and certainly, if to be 
a man endued with God's image, (Gen. vi. 
9, 10,) and to be an ill-doer worthy of evil 
punishment, are different, to be a king and 
,an ill -doer may be distinguished. 

1. The grounds of sell-defence are these: 
— A woman or a young man may violently 
oppose a king, if he force the one to adul- 
tery and incest, and the other to sodomy, 
though couct flatterers should say, the king, 
in regard of his absoluteness, is lord of li^ 
and death ; yet no man ever said that the 
king is lord of chastity, i^th, and oath that 
the wife hath made to her husband. 

2. Particular nature yields to the good of 
universal nature, for which cause heavy 
bodies ascend, airy and light bodies de- 
scend. If, then, a wild bull or a goring ox, 
may not be let loose in a great market-con- 
fluence of people, and if any man turn so 
distracted as he smite himself with stones 
and kiQ all that pass by him, or come at 
him, in that case the man is to be bound, 
and his hands fettered, and all whom he in- 
vadeth may resist him, were they his own 
sons, and may save their own lives with 
weapons, much more a king turning a Nero. 
King Saul, vexed with an evil spuit from 
the Lord, may be resisted ; and far more if 
a king endued with use of reason, shall put 
violent hands on all his subjects, kUl his 
son and heir; yea, and violently invaded, 
by nature's law, may defend themselves, 
and the violent restraining of such a one is 
but the hurting of one man, who cannot be 
virtually the commonwealth, but his de- 
stroying of the community of men sent out 
in wars, as his bloody emissaries, to the dis- 
solution of the commonwealth. 

8. The cutting off of a contagious mem- 
ber, that by a gangrene, would corrupt the 
whole body, is well warranted by nature, be- 



cause the safety of the whole is to be pre- 
ferred to the safety of a part Nor is it much 
that royalists say, The king being the head, 
destroy him, and the whole body of the 
commonwealth is dissolved ; as cut off a 
man's head, and the life of the whole man 
is taken awav. Because, 1. God cutteth off 
the spirits of tyrannous kings, and yet the 
commonwealth is not dissolved, no more 
than when a leopard or a wild boar, running 
through children, is killed, can be the de- 
struction of all the children in the land. 
2. A king indeflmtely is referred to the 
commonwealth as an adequate head to a 
monarchical kingdom; and remove all kings 
and the politic body, as monarchical, in its 
frame, is not monarchical, but it leaveth not 
off to be a politic body, seeing it hath other 
judges ; but the natural body without the 
nea^ cannot live. 3. This or that tyran- 
nous king, being a transient mortal thing, 
cannot be referred to the immortal com- 
monwealth, as it is adequate correlate. 
They say, " the king never dieth," yet this 
king can die ; an immortal poHtic body, 
such as the commonwealth, must have an 
immortal head, and that is a king as a king, 
not this or that man, possibly a tyrant, who 
is for the time (and eternal things abstract 
from time) only a king. 

4. The reason of Fortunius Gardas, a 
skilflil lawyer in Spain, is considerable, 
(Comment, in I. ut vim vi ff* de jttsttL et 
jure,) Grod hath implanted in every crea- 
ture natural inclinations and motions to pre- 
serve itself, and we are to love ourselves for 
God, and have a love to preserve ourselves 
rather than our neighbour; and nature's 
law teacheth every man to love God best of 
all, and next ourselves more than our neigh- 
bour ; for the law saith, " Thou shalt love 
thy neighbour as thyself." Then saith Mal- 
derius, (com. in 12, q. 26, torn. 2, c. 10, 
concl. 2,) " The love of ourselves is the 
measure of the love of our neighbour." But 
the rule and the measure is more perfect, 
simple, and more principal than the thing 
that is measured. It is true I am to love 
the salvation of the church, it cometh nearer 
to God's glory, more than my own salva- 
tion, as the wishes of Moses and Paul do 
prove; and I am to love the ssdvation of 
my brother more than my own temporal 
life; but I am to love my own temporal 
life more than the life of any other, and 
therefore, I am rather to kill than to be killed, 
the exigence of necessity so requiring. Na- 



ture without sin owneth this as a truth, in 
the case of loss of life, Proximus sum eao^ 
met mtAt, (Ephes. ▼. 28, 29,) "He that 
loveth his wife, loveth himself; for no man 
ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourisheth 
it, and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the 
church." As then nature tyeth the dam to 
defend the young birds, and the lion her 
whelps, and the husband the wife, and that 
by a comparative re-offending, rather than 
the wife or children should m killed ; yea, 
he that his wanting to his brother, (if a 
robber unjustly invade his brother,^ and 
helpeth him not, is a murderer of his bro- 
ther, so &r Grod's spiritual law requiring 
both conservation of it in our person, and 
preservation in others. The forced damsel 
was commanded to cry for help, and not the 
magistrate only, but the nearest private 
man or woman was to come, by an obliga- 
tion of a divine law of the seventh com- 
mandment, to rescue the damsel with vio- 
lence, even as a man is to save his enemy's 
ox or his ass out of a pit. And if a private 
man may inflict bodily punishment of two 
degrees, to preserve the life and chastity of 
his neighbour, far rather than suffer his 
life and chastity to be taken away, then he 
may inflict violence of four degrees, even to 
killing, for his life, and much more for his 
0¥m me. So when a robber, with deadly 
weapons, invadeth an innocent traveller to 
kill Mm for his goods, upon the supposition 
that if the robMr be not killed, tne inno- 
cent shall be killed. Now the question is, 
which of the two, by Grod's moral law and 
revealed will, in point of conscience, ought to 
be killed by his fellow ? For we spes^ not now 
of God's eternal decree of permitting evil, 
according to the which murderers may cru- 
cify the innocent Lord of glory. By no 
moral law of Grod should the unjust robber 
kill the innocent traveUer; therefore, in 
this exigence of providence, the traveller 
should rather kill the robber. If any say, 
by God's moral law not one should kul his 
fellow, and it is a sin against the moral law 
in either to kill the other, I answer, — If 
a third shall come in when the robber and 
the innocent are invading each other for his 
life, all acknowledge by Sie sixth command- 
ment the third may cut off the robber's 
arm to save the innocent ; but by what law 
of God he may cut off his arm, he may take 
his life also to save the other ; for it is mur^ 
der to wound unjustly, and to dismember a 
man by private authority, as it is to take 



I away his life ; if, therefore, the third may 
take away the robber's member, then also 
his life, so he do it without malice or ap- 
petite of revenge, and if he may do it out 
of this principle, " Thou shalt love thy 
neighbour as thyself;" because a man is 
obliged more to love his own flesh than his 
neighbour's, ^Ephes. v. 28,) and so more to 
de€nd himself than to defend his neigh- 
bour, — ^then may he oppose violence to the 
robber. As two men drowning in a water, 
the one is not obliged by God s law to ex- 
pose himself to drowning to save his neigh- 
bour; but by the contrary, he is obliged 
rather to save himself, though it were with 
the loss of his neighbour's life. As in war, 
if soldiers in a strait passage be pursued on 
their life, nature teacneth them to flee ; if 
one fall, his fellow in that exigence is not 
only not obHged to lift him up, but he and 
the rest flying, though they trample on him 
and kill him, they are not guilty of murder, 
seeing they hated him not before, (Deut. 
xix. 4, 6 ;) so Chemnit. {loc. com. de vindic, 
q. 3) alloweth private aefence. 1. When 
die violence is sudden. 2. And the vio- 
lence manifestly inevitable. 3. When the 
magistrate is absent and cannot help. 4. 
When moderation is kept as lawyers re- 
quire. 1. That it be done incontinent ; if 
it be done after the injury, it is revenge, 
not defence. 2. Not of desire of revenge. 
3. With proportion of armour. If the vio- 
lent invader mvade not with deadly weapons, 
you must not invade him with deadly wea- 
pons ; and certainly the law (Exod. xxii.) 
of a man's defending his house is clear. 1. 
If he come in the night, it is presumed he 
is a robber. 2. If he be taken with a wea- 
pon breaking the house, he cometh to kill, 
a man may defend himself, wife, aiid chil- 
dren, 3. But he is but to wound him, and 
if he die of the wound, the defender is free ; 
so the defender is not to intend his death, 
but to save himself. 

6. It were a mighty defect in providence 
to man, if dogs by nature may Mend them- 
selves against wolves, buUs against lions, 
doves against hawks, if man, in the absence 
of the &wM magistrate, should not defend 
himself against unjust violence ; but one 
man might raise armies of papists, sick for 
blood, to destroy innocent men. They ob- 
ject, " When the king is present in his per- 
son, and his invaders, he is not absent, and 
so though you may rather kill a private 
man than suffer yourself to be killed, yet, 



164 



USX, BSX ; OR, 



because prudence determinetb the meaDS of 
self-defence, you are to expose jour life to 
hazard for justice of your Eng, and there- 
fore not to do Tiolence to the life of your 
king; nor can the body, in any self-defence^ 
fight against the head, that must be the 
destructiop of the whde." — Ans, 1. Though 
the king be present as an unjust invader m 
wars against nis innocent subjects, he is ab- 
sent «s a king, and a father and defender, 
and present as an unjust conqueror, and 
therefore the innocent may defend themr 
selves whep the king neither can, nor will 
defend them. *^ Nature maketh a man, 
(saith th^ law, Gener, c, de decwr, h 10, I. 
9% alius, sect, Bellissime ubique Gloss, in 
vers, ex magn, not, 'per, ilium, text, ff, 
quod vi aut clam, I, ait prcetor, sect, si 
debitorem meum, ff, de kxsqua in fraud, 
credito.f) even a private man, his oivn judge, 
magistrate, and defender, qvtando copiam 



-y-' 



fuaxcts^ qui sibi jus reddat, non habet^ 
when he hath no judge to give him justice 
and law." The subjects are to give their 
lives for the king, as the king, because the 
safety of the king, as king, is the safety of the 
commonwealth. But the king, as offering 
unjust violence to his innocent subjects, is 
not king. Zoannet. (part 3, defens. i^. 44,) 
— Transgrediens notorie oMoium suum 
judeXy agit velut privatus cdiquis^ non ut 
ma^istratus (ff, de injur, est bonus in si- 
mili in, I. qut fundum, sect, si, tutor, ff, 
jyro emptore), 3. If the politic body fight 
against this head in particular, not as head, 
}mi as an oppressor of the people, there 
is no fear of^ dissolution ; if the body rise 
against all magistracy, as magistracy and 
laws, dissolution of all must follow. Parlia- 
ments and inferior judges are heads (Num. 
i. 16 ; X. 4 ; Deut i. 15 ; Josh, xxii, 21 ; 
Mic. iii. 1, 9, 11; 1 Kings viii. 1 ; 1 Chron^ 
y. 25; 2 Chron. v. 2,) no less than the 
king ; and it is unlawful to offer violence to 
them, though I shall rather think a private 
man is to suffer the king to kill him rather 
than he kill the king, because he i^ to pre- 
fer the life of a private man to the Ijfe of a 
public man. 

6. By the law of nature a ruler is ap- 
pointed to defend the innocent. Now, bv 
nature, an infant in the womb defendeth 
itself first, before the parents can defend 
it, then when parents and magistrates are 
not, (and violent invading magistrates are 
not in that magistrates,] nature hath com- 
mended every man to self-defence. 



7. The law of nature excepteth no vio- 
lence, whether inflicted by a magistrate or 
any other. Unjust violence from a ruler is 
double injustice. 1, He doth unjustly as a 
man. 2. As a member of the common- 
wealth. 3. He committeth a special kind 
of sin of injustice against his office, but it is 
absurd to say we may lawfully defend our- 
selves from smaller injuries, by the law of 
nature, and not from the greater. " If the 
Pope, saith Fer. Vasquez (illust.[ quest. L 
1, c. 24, n. 24, 25) command to take away 
benefices from the just owner, those who are 
to. execute his commandment are not to 
obey, but to write back that that mandate 
came not firom his holiness, but from the 
avarice of his officers ; but if the Pope still 
continue and press the same unjust mandate, 
the smeahoW be written aiun to him: 
and though there be none above the Pope, 
yet there is natural self-defence pate^t for 
all." '^ Defensio vitce necessaria est^ et a 
jure naturali projluit" (L, ut vim, ff. de 
just, et jure 16,J *' Nam quod quisque ob 
tutelam corporis sui fecerit^ jwre fecisse vi-* 
deaXAur^^ (C.jus naturale^ 1 distinc, 1, 1, ff, 
devietvi armata^ I, injuria/ru/m^ ff. de in- 
juria : C. significasti. 2, de horn, I, scien- 
tiam^ sect, qui non alitor ff. ad leg, Aquil; 
C, si veto 1, de sent, excom, e^ X sed etsi 
ff. ad leg. Aquil,) " Etiam» sequatur ho* 
middium.^* Vasquez. (I. 1, c. 17, n. 5.)^^ 
'^ Etiam ocddere licet ob de/ensionem re- 
rum. Vim vi repelhre on^nia jura per^ 
mittunt in C, significasti,** (xarcias Fortu- 
nius (Comment, in I, ut vim.ff, de insHt. et 
jur, n. 3,) — ** De/endere se est juris nor 
turos et gentium. A jure dvilijmt addi' 
turn m>oderamen inculpatee tutelcej- No- 
vel (defens. n. 101,^ — " Ocddens primi" 
pern vel alium tyranniidem exercentem^ a 
poena homicidii excusatur." Qrotius (de 
jure belli et pacis^ I. 2, c, 1^ n. 3. j-^" jSt 
corpus impetatur vi presente^ cum pencuh 
vitce non aliter vitabtli^ tunc bellum est lid- 
tu/m etiam cum interfectione periculum in- 
ferentisy ratio, natttra quemque sibi com^ 
mendat," BprdsluB (advers. Monar, L 3} 
0. 8.p — " E^tjus cuilibet se t^nmdi ^chfer- 
sus tmmanem sevitiamJ** 

But what ground (saith the royalist) is 
there to take arms against the king? Jea- 
lousies and suspicions are not enou^. 

Ans, — 1. llie king s^nt first a^i army to 
Scotland, and blocked us u^f by sea, before we 
took arms. 2. Papists were armed in ^ns" 
land. They have professed themselves in 



their religion of Trent to be so much the 
holier, that they root out protestants. 3. 
The king declared we had broken loyalty to 
him since the last parliament. 4. He de- 
clared both kingdoms rebels. 5. Attempted 
in his emissaries to destroy the parliament ; 
6. And to bring in a foreign enemy. And 
the law saith, ** An imminent danger, which 
is a sufEcient warrant to take up a^ is not 
strokes, but either the terr(»r of arming or 
threatening." Glossator. {ind» I, 1, C!)— 
*' Unde vi. ait non esse verbera expectant 
da, sed vel terrorem armorum suficere, vel 
minasy et hoc esse imminens perioulum,^* 
X. sed et si quemcunqtie in prine, ff* ad leg, 
Aquil I, 3, quod qui armati jf. devi et vi 
armata is qui aggressorem C ad legem 
ComeU, 

In most heinous sins, conatuSf the wdea- 
voor and aim, etiamsi effectus non sequa* 
tur, puniri debetf is punishable. BartoL 
in L " Si quis non dicam rapere,*^ 

The king hath aimed at the destruction 
of his subjects, through the power of wicked 
counsellors, and we are to consider not tba 
intention of the workers, but the nature and 
intention of the work. Papists are in arms, 
—their religion, the oonspiracy of Trent, 
thehr conscience, (if they nave any,) their 
malice against the covenant of Scotland, 
which abjureth their religion to the AiU, 
their ceremonies, their prelates, — ^lead and 
necessitate them to root out the name of 
protestant religion, yea, and to stab a king 
who is a protestant. Nor is our king, re- 
maining a protestant, and adhering to his 
oath made at the coronation in bom king- 
doms, lord of his own person, master of him- 
self, nor able, as king, to be a king over pro- 
testant subjects, if the papists, now in arms 
under his standard, shall proTail. 

The king hath been compelled to go 
against his own oath, and the laws which 
he did swear to maintain ; the Po^ sendeth 
to his popish armies both dispensations, bulls, 
mandates, and encouragements; the king 
hath made a cessation with the bloody Irish, 
and hath put arms in the hands of papists. 
Now, he being under the oath of God, tyed 
to maintain the protestant religion, he luith 
a metaphysically subtle, piercing fidth of 
muracles, who believeth armed papists and 
prelates shall defend the reli^on of protes- 
tants ; and those who have aj^ured prelates 
as the lawful sons of the Pope, that § mfrix^t^r^i 
and as the law saith, QuiUbet in dubio prce-^ 
sumitur bonus, Z. merito prossumi, L, 



non omneSy sect, a Barbaris de re milit. 
Charity belieyeth not ill ; so charity is not 
a fool to believe all things. So saith the 
law, Semel malus, semper proBsumkur mo- 
lus, in eodem genere, C sem^l malus de 
jure gentium in 6. Once wicked, is always 
wicked in that kind. Marius Salamonius, 
l. C, in L, ut vimatque injuriamff. dejust 
etjure. We are not to wait on strokes, the 
terror of armour, onmium consensu, by con- 
sent of all is sufiicient (n. 3). ^* If I see 
(saith he) the enemy take an arrow out of 
the quiver, before he bend the bow, it is 
lawful to prevent him with a blow — cunctor 
tio est periculosaJ* The king's coming with 
aimed men into the House of Commons to 
demand the five members, is very symboh- 
eal, and war was printed on that &ct, ** he 
that runneth may read." His coming to Hull 
with an army, saith not he had no errand 
there, but to ask what it was in the dock. 
Novellus, that learned Venetian lawyer, in 
a treatise for defence, maketh continuatam 
rixam, a continued upbraiding, a sufficient 
ground of violent defence. He citeth Dr 
Uomniter. in X. ut vim, ff, de just et jure. 
Yea, he saith, drunkenness, (defens. n. 44,) 
error, (n. 46,) madness, (n. 40, 50,) igno- 
rance, (n. 51, 52y) impudence, (n. 54,) ne- 
cessity, (n. 56,) lactviousnesB, (n« 58,) con- 
tinual reproaches, (n. 59,) die fervour of 
anger, (n. 64,) threatening, (n. 66,) fear 
of imminent danger, (n, 67,) and just 
ffrief, do excuse a man m>m homicide, and 
mat in these he ought to be more mildly 
punished, quia obniMatum et m^ncum 
est consilium, reason in these being lame 
and clogged. (Ambros. 1. 1. offic.) Qui 
non repetlit injuriam a sodo, cum potest, 
tarn est in vitio, quam ille quifaeit. And 
as nature, so ^e law saith, " When the 
losses are such as can never be repaired, as 
death, mutilation, loss of chastity, quoniam 
facta infecta fieri nequeunt, things of that 
kind once done, can never be undone, we 
are to prevent the enemy" {L 21kmat, tract, 
defens. par, 3, Z. in belh sect, faetas de car 
pit, notat. Gloss, in I, si quis provocatione). 
If the kinff send an Irish rebel to east me 
over a bridge, and drown me in a water, I 
am to do nothing, while the king's emissary 
first cast me over, and then m the next 
room I am to defend myself; but nature 
and the law of self-defence warranteth me 
(if I know certainly his aim,) to horse him 
first over the bridge, and then consult how 
to defend myself at my own leisure. 






166 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



Boyalists object that Dayid, in his defence, 
never invaded and persecuted Saul ; jea, 
when he came upon Saul and his men sleep* 
ing, he would not kill any ; but the Scottish 
and parliament's forces not only defend, but 
inyade, offend, kill, and plunder ; and this 
is clearly an offensiye, not a defensive war. 

Ans, 1. — There is no defensiye war dif- 
ferent in specie and nature from an offen- 
sive war ; if we speak physically, they differ 
only in the event and intention of the heart ; 
and it is most dear that the affection and 
intention doth make one and the same ac- 
tion of taking away the life, either homicide, 
or no homicide. 1. If a man, out of hatred, 
deliberately take away his brother's life, he 
is a murderer eatenus, but if that same man 
had taken away that same brother's life, by 
the flying off of an axe-head off the staff, 
while he was hewing timber, he neither 
hating him before, nor intending to hurt 
his brother, he is no murderer, by Grod's 
express law, f Deut. iv. 42 ; xix. 4 ; Joshua 
XX. 5.) 2. Tne cause between the kin? and 
the two parliaments, and between Saul and 
David, are so different in this, as it is much 
for us. Boyalists say, David might, if he 
had seen offending to conduce for self-pre- 
servation, have invaded Saul's men, and, say 
they, the case was extraordinary, and bind- 
eth not us to self-defence; and thus they 
must say — ^for offensive weapons, such as 
GroUath's sword, and an host of armed men, 
cannot by any rational man be assumed (and 
David had the wisdom of God) but to of- 
fend, if providence should so dispose ; and 
so what was lawful to David, is law^l to us 
in self-defence ; he might offend lawfully, 
and so may we. 

2. If Saul and the Philistines, aiming (as 
under an oath) to set up dagon in the land 
of Israel, should invade David, and the 
princes and elders of Israel who made him 
king ; and if David, with an host of armed 
men, he and the princes of Israel, should 
come in that case upon Saul and the Philis- 
tines sleening, if in that case David might 
not lawfully have cut off the Philistines, and 
as he defended in that case Grod's church 
and true religion, if he might not then have 
lawfully killed, I say, the Philistines, I re* 
mit to the conscience of the reader. Now 
to us, papists and prelates under the king's 
banner, are Philistines, introducing the ido-^ 
latry of bread-worship and popery, as hate- 
ful to Grod as dagon-worship. 

3. Saul intended no arbitrary govern- 



ment, nor to make Israel a conquered peo- 
ple, nor yet to cut off all that professed the 
true worship of Grod ; nor came Saul against 
these princes, elders and people, who made 
him King, only David's head would have 
made Saul lay down arms ; but prelates, and 
papists, and malignants, under the king, in- 
tend to make the king's sole will a law, to 
destroy the court of parliament, which put- 
teth laws in execution against their idola- 
try ; and their aim is, that protestants be a 
conquered people; and their attempt hath 
been hitherto to blow up king and parlia- 
ment, to cut off all protestants; and they 
are in arms, in divers parts of the kingdom, 
against the princes of the land, who are no 
less judges and deputies of the Lord than 
the king himself; and would kill, and do 
kill, plunder, and spoil us, if we kill not 
them. And the case is every way now be- 
tween armies and armies, as between a sin- 
gle man unjustly invaded for his life, and an 
unjust invader. Neither in a natursd action, 
such as is self-defence, is that of policy to be 
urged, — ^none can be judge in his own cause, 
when oppression is manifest : one may be 
both agent and patient, as the fire and 
water conflicting; there is no need of a 
judge, a community casts not off nature; 
when the judge is wanting, nature is judge, 
actor, accused, 'and all. 

Lastly, no man is lord of the members 
of his own body, (w. I, liher homo ff, ad leg, 
Aqui.) nor lord of his own life, but is to be 
accountable to God for it. 



QUESTION XXXII. 

WHETHER OR NOT THE LAWFULNESS OP DE- 
PENSITE WARS HATH ITS WARRANT IN GOD's 
WORD, FROM THE EXAMPLE OF DAVID, ELI- 
SHA, THE EIGHTY PRIESTS WHO RESISTED 
UZZIAH, &C. 

David defended himself against king Saul, 
1. By taking Goliath's sword with him. 2. 
By being captain to six hundred men ; yea, 
it is more than clear, (1 Chron. xii. 22---34,) 
that there came to David a host like the host 
of God, to help against Saul, exceeding four 
thousand. Now, that this host came war- 
rantably to help him against Saul, I prove, 
1. Because it is said, " Now these are they 
that came to David to Ziklag, while he 
kept himself close, because of Saul the son 



^ ^dW.^^fc I 



- - -- ~- 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



167 



of Kiah ; and they were among^ the mighty 
men, helpers of the war ;" and then so many 
mighty captains are reckoned out. *' There 
came of the children of Benjamin and Ju- 
dah to the hold of David." And there fell 
some of Manasseh to David, — " As he went 
to Ziklag there fell to him of Manasseh, Ke- 
nah and Jozahad, Jediel and Michael, and 
Jozahad and Elihu, and Zilthai, captains of 
the thousands that were of Manasseh. ' ''And 
they helped David against the hand of the 
rovers." " At that time, day by day, there 
came to David, until it was a great hoKst, like 
the host of Grod." Now the same expres- 
sion that is in the first verse, where it is 
said they came to help David against Saul, 
is repeated in ver. 16, 19^23. 2. That 
they warrantably came, is evident ; because, 

SI.) The Spirit of God oommendeth them 
or their valour and skill in war, (ver. 2 
&c.), which the Spirit of Grod doth not in 
unlawful wars. (2A Because Amassai, (ver. 
18), the Spirit ot tne Lord coming on him, 
saith, '' Tnine are we, David, and on thy 
side, thou son of Jesse ; peace, peace unto 
thee, and peace to thy helpers, for thy God 
helpeth thee." The Spirit of God inspireth 
no man to pray peace to those who are in an 
unla?irful war. 3. That they came to David's 
side only to be sufferers, and to flee with 
David, and not to pursue and offend, is ridi- 
culous. 1. It is said, (ver. 1,) " They came 
to David to Ziklag, while he kept himself 
close, because of Saul the son of Ejsh. And 
they were amongst the mighty men, helpers 
of the war." It is a scorn to say, that 
their might, and their helping in war, con- 
sisted in being mere patients with David, 
and such as ned from Saul, for they had 
been on Saul's side before ; and to come 
with armour to flee, is a mocking of the 
word of God. 2. It is clear, the scope of 
the Spirit of God is to show how God help- 
ed his innocent servant David against his 
persecuting prince and master, king Saul, in 
moving so many mighty men of war to come 
in such multitudes, all in arms, to help him 
in war. Now to what end would the Lord 
commend them as fit for war, '' men of might, 
fit to handle shield and buckler, whose mces 
are as the faces of lions, as swift as the roes 
on the mountains," (ver. 8,^ and commend 
them as helpers of David, if it were unlaw- 
ful for David, and all those mighty men, to 
carry arms to pursue Saul and his followers, 
and to do nothing with their armour but 
flee ? Judge if the Spirit of Grod, in reason, 



could say, ** All these men came armed with 
bows," (ver. 2,) and could " handle both 
the right hand and the lefl in flinging stones, 
and shooting of arrows," and that ^er. 22) 
all these '' came to David, being mighty 
men of valour, and they came as captains 
over hundreds, and thousands, and they put 
to flight all them of the valleysj botn to- 
ward the east and toward the west," (ver. 
13, 15,) and that ** David received them, 
and made them captains of the band," if 
they did not come in a posture of war, and 
for hostile invasion, if need were? For if 
they came only to suffer and to flee, not to 

CBue, bowmen, captains, and captains of 
ds made by David, and David's helpers 
in the war, came not to help David by fly- 
ing, that was a hurt to David, not a help. 
It is true, Mr Symmons saith, (l Sam. xxii. 
2,) " Those that came out to David streng- 
thened him, but he strengthened not them ; 
and David might easily have revenged him- 
self on the Ziphites, who did good will to 
betray him to the hands of Saul, if his con- 
science had served him. 

Ana, 1. — This would infer thai these 
armed men came to help David against his 
conscience, and that David was a patient 
in the business. The contrary is in the text, 
(1 Sam. xxvi. 2,) *^ David became a captain 
over them;" and (1 Chron. xii. 17, 18,) 
" If ye come peaceably to helpme, my heart 
shall be knit to you. Then David received 
them, and made them captains of the band." 
2. David might have revenged himself upon 
the Ziphites, true ; but that conscience hin- 
dered him cannot be proved. To pursue an 
enemy is an act of a council of war ; and he 
saw it would create more enemies, not help 
his cause. 3. To David to kill Saul sleep- 
ing, and the people who, out of a mis-in- 
formed conscience came out, many of them 
to help their lawfiil prince against a traitor 
(as was supposed) seeJdng to sill their king, 
and to usurp the throne, had not been wis- 
dom nor justice ; because to kill the enemy 
in a just self-defence, must be, when the 
enemy actually doth invade, and the life of 
the defendant cannot be otherwise saved. 
A sleeping enemy is not in the act of unjust 
pursuit of the innocent ; but if an army 
of papists, Philistines, were in the fields 
sleeping, pursuing not one single David only 
for a supposed personal wrong to the king, 
but lying in the fields and camp against the 
whole kingdom and religion, and labouring 
to introduce arbitrary government, poper}% 



168 



LBX, RXX ; OR, 



idolatry, and to destroy laws, and Kberties, 
and parliaments, then David were obliged 
to kill these murderers in their sleep. 

If any say, The case is all one in a nata- 
ral self-defence, whatever be the cause, and 
whoever be the enemy, beeaose the selMe- 
fender is not to offend, except the unjust in- 
vader be in actual pursuit, — ^now armies in 
their sleep are not in actual pursuit. 

Ans, 1. — When one man with a multi- 
tude invadeth one man, that one man may 
pursue, as he seeth most condudble for self- 
defence. Now the law saith, ^* Threaten- 
ings and terror of armour maketh imminent 
dimger," and the case of pursuit in self-de- 
fence lawiul ; if therefore an army of Iruh 
rebels and Spaniards were sleeping in their' 
camp, and our king in a de^ sleep in the 
midst of them, ana these rebels actually in 
the camp besieging the parliament, and the 
city of London, most unjustly to iake away 
parliament, laws,> and hberties of religion, 
it should follow that General Essex ought 
not to kill the king's majesty in his sleep, 
for he is the Lord's anointed ; but will it 
follow that General Essex may not kill the 
Irish rebels sleeping about the king ; and 
that he may not rescue the king's person out 
of the hands of the papists and rebels, en- 
snaring the king, and leading him on to po- 
pery, and to employ his authority to defend 
popery, and trample mnm protestant parlia- 
m^te and h^f cJSj fiom i^ex- 
ample this cannot be concluded. For armies 
in actual pursuit of a whole parliament, 
kingdom, kws, and religion, (though sleep- 
ing in the camp,) because in actual pursuit, 
may be invaded, and killed, though steeping. 
And David useth no argument, from con- 
science, why he might not kill Saul's army, 
(I conceive he had not arms to do that,) and 
i^ould have created more enemies to himself, 
and hazard his own hfe, and the life of all his 
men, if he had of purpose killed so many 
sleeping men ; yea-, the mexpedience of that, 
for a private wrong to kill God's misled peo- 
^e, i^ould have imde all Israel enemies to 
David. But David useth an argument, from 
conscience only, to prove it was not lawM 
for him to stretch forth his hand against 
the king ; and for my part, so long as ne re- 
maineth king, and is not dethroned by those 
who made him king at Hebron, to put hands 
on his person, I ju<^e utterly unlawM. One 
man sleeping cannot be in actual pursuit of 
another man ; so that the self-defender may 
lawfully kill him in his sleep ; but the case 



is far otherwise in lawful wars ; the Isra^- 
ites might lawMly kill the Philistines en- 
camping about Jerusalem to destroy it, and 
religion, and the church of God, though 
they were aU sleeping; even though we 
suppose king Saul had brought them in by 
his authority, and though he were sleeping 
in the midst of the undrcumcised armies; 
and it is evident, that an host of armed ene- 
mies, though sleeping, by the law of self- 
defence, may be killed, lest they awake and 
kill us ; whereas one smgle man, and that a 
king, cannot be killed. 2. 1 think, eertainlj, 
David had done unwisely, and hazarded his 
own life and all his men's, if he, and Abime- 
lech, and Abishai, should have killed an host 
of their enemies sleeping : that had been a 
work as impossible to three, as hazardous to 
all his men. 

Dr Feme, as Amisseus did before him, 
saith, '^ The example of David was extraor- 
dinary, because he was anointed and designed 
by God as successor to Saul, and so he must 
use an extraordinary way of guarding him- 
self." Amisseus (c. 2, n. 15) citeth ^beric. 
G^ntilffi, that David was now exempted from 
amongst the number of subjects. 

Ans. — 1. There were not two kings in 
Israel now, both David and Saul. 1. David 
acknowledgeth his subjection in naming 
Saul the Lord's anointed, and his master, 
lord and king; and, therefore, David was 
yet a subject. 2. If David would have 
proved his title to the crown by extraordi- 
nary ways, he who killed Goliath extraordi- 
narily might have killed Saul by a miracle ; 
but David goeth a most ordinary way to 
work for sell-defence, and his coming to the 
kingdom was through persecution, want, 
eatmg shew-bread in case of necessity, de- 
fending himself with Groliath's sword. 3. 
How was anything extraordinary and above 
a law, seeing David might have killed his 
enemy Saul, and, according to God's law, 
he spared him ? and he argueth firom a mo- 
ral duty, He is the Lord's anointed, there- 
fore I will not kill him. Was this extraor- 
dinary above a law? then, according to 
God's law, he might have killed him. Koy- 
alists cannot say so. What ground to say 
one of David's acts in his deportment to- 
wards Saul was extraordinary, and not all ? 
Was it extraordinary that David fled ? No ; 
or that David consulted the oracle of God 
what to do when Saul was coining against 
him? 4. In an ordinary fact something 
may be extraordinary, — as the dead deep 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



169 



from the Lord upon Saul and his men, (1 
Sam. xxvi.) and jet the &ct, according to 
its substance, ordinary. 6. Nor is this ex- 
traordinary, — ^that a distressed man, being 
an excellent warrior, as David was, may use 
the help of six hundred men, who, by the 
law of charity, are to help to deliver the 
mnocent from death; yea, all Israel were 
obliged to defend him wno killed Groliath. 6. 
Royalists make David's act of not putting 
hands on the Lord's anointed an ordinary 
moral reason against resistance, but his put- 
ting on of armour they will have extraordi- 
nary ; and this is, I confess, a short way to 
an adversary to cull out something that is 
for his cause and make it ordinary, and 
something that is a^nst his cause must be 
extraordinary. 7. These men, by the law 
of nature, were obliged to join in arms with 
David ; therefore, the non-helping of an op- 
pressed man must be Grod's ordinary law, — 
a blasphemous tenet. 8. If David, by an 
extraordinary spirit, killed not king Saul, 
then the Jesuits' way of killing must be 
God's ordinary law. 

2. David certainly intended to keep Kei- 
lah against king Saul, for the Lord would not 
have answered David in an unlawM fact ; 
for that were all one as if (jfod should teach 
David how to play the traitor to his king ; 
for if G-od had answered, They will not de- 
liver thee up, but they shall save thee from 
the hand of Saul, — as David believed he 
might say this, as well as its oontradicent, 
then David behoved to keep the city ; for 
certainly David's question pre-supposeth he 
was to keep the city. 

The example of Elisha the prophet is con- 
siderable, (2 Kings vL 32,) " But Elisha 
sat in his nouse, and the elders with him ; 
and the king sent a man before him ; but, 
ere the messengers came to him, he said to 
the elders, See now, the son of a murderer 
hath sent to take away mine head." 1. Here 
is unjust violence offered by king Joram to an 
innocent man. Elisha keepem the house 
violently against the king's messenger, as we 
I did keep castles against king Charles' un- 
I kwfiil messengers. '* Look (saith he) when 
I the messenger cometh, — shut the door." 2. 
' There is violence also commanded, and re- 
^stance to be made, " Hold him &st at 
the door." In the Hebrew it is, nSlD 

\n^ DnsnSvnSin njD ^rias 

Montan. : Claudite ostium^ et oppremetis 
eumin ogtio, " Violently press him at the 
door." And so the Chaldee paraphrase, Ne 



nnatis eum introire, Jerome. The JiXX. 
Interpreters, U^ii4^«n aMt U r? ^^a illi" 
dvte eum in ostio, '' Press him betwixt the 
door and the wall." It is a word of bodily 
violence, according to Vatablus ; yea, Theo- 
doret will have king Joram himself holden 
at the door. And, 3. It is no answer that 
Dr Feme and other royalists give, that 
Elisha made no personal resistance to the 
king himself, but only to the king's cut- 
throat, sent to take away his head; yea, 
they say, it is lawM to resist the king's cut- 
throats. But the text is clear, that the vio- 
lent resistance is made to the king himself 
also, for he addeth, '* Is not the sound of his 
master's feet behind him?" And by this 
answer, it is lawful to keep towns with iron 
gates and bars, and violently to oppose the 
king's cut-throats coming to take away the 
heads of the parliaments of both kingdoms, 
and of protestants in the three kingdoms. 

Some royalists are so impudent as to say 
that there was no violence here, and that 
Elisha was an extraordinary man, and that 
it is not lawM for us to call a king the son 
of a murderer, as the prophet Ehsha did ; 
but Feme, (sect. 2, p. 9,) forgetting him- 
self, saith from hence, " It is lawRil to 
resist the prince himself, thus far, as to 
ward his blows, and hold his hands." But 
let Feme answer, if the violent binding of 
the prince's hand, that he shall not be able 
to HIl, be a greater violence done to his 
royal person tnan David's cutting off the 
skirt of Saul's garment; for certainly the 
royal body of a prince is of more worth than 
his clothes. Now it was a sin, I judge, that 
smote David's conscience, that he being a 
suliect, and not in the act of natural self- 
dei^nce, did cut the garment of the Lord's 
anointed. Let Feme see, then, how he will 
save his own principles; for certainly he 
yieldeth the cause for me. I judge that 
the person of the king, or any judge who is 
the Lord's deputy, as is the king, is sacred ; 
and that remaining in that honourable case, 
no subject can, without guiltiness before 
Grod, put hands on his person, the case of 
natural self-defence being excepted; for, 
because the royal dignity doth not advance 
a king above the common condition of men, 
and me throne maketh him not leave off to 
be a man, and a man that can do wrong; 
and therefore as one that doth manifest vio- 
lence to the life of a man, though his sub- 
ject, he may be resisted with bodily resist- 
ance, in the case of unjust and violent in- 

2a 



vadiHi. It is a vain thing to m;, " Who 
shall be judge betwieen the£iiieand his sab- 
jects? The sobiect cannot jiu^ the king, 
becanse aone can be judge in his own catue, 
and an inferior or eqoal cannot judm a 
■nperior or equal." But I ans»rer, 1. This 
is the king's own cause alw, and he doth 
unjust violence as a man, and not as a Ung, 
and BO he cannot be judge more than toe 
subject. 2. Every one that doth unjust vio- 
lence, as he is such, is inferior to the inno- 
cent, and BO ought to be judged W eome. 
3. There is no need of the iormahty of a 
judge in things evident to nature's eye, such 
as are manifestly unjust violences. Nature, 
in acta natural of self-defence, is judge, 
party, accuser, witnesB, and all; for it is 
supposed the judge is absent when tlie 
judge doth wrong. And for the plea of 
"^i^'s extraordinary q>irit, it is nothing 
extraordinary to the prophet to call the 
long the son of a murderer, when he oom- 
plameth to the elders for justice of his op- 
preKon, no more than it is for a plaintiff to 
hbel a true crime against a wicked person, 
and if Elisfaa's resistance came from an ex- 
traordinary spirit, then it is not natural for 
an oppressed man to close the door upon a 
murderer, Uten the taking away of the in- 
nocent prophet's head must l>e extraordinary, 
for this was but an ordinary and most na- 
tural remedy against this oppression; and 
though to name the king the son of a mur- 
derer be extraordinary, (and I should grant 
it without any hurt to ting cause,) it foilow- 
eth nowise that the self-defence was extra- 
ordinary. 4. (2 Chron. xxvi. 17.) four 
score en prieste, with Azariah, are com- 
mended as valiant men. LXX. iui tn^uM 
Heb. ^»n-*Ji Ariufl Montan. FUU virtu- 
ti», Men of courage and valour, for that 
they resisted Vztm the king, who would 
take on him to bum incense b> the Lord, 
against the law. Mr Bymmons, (p. 34, 
sect. 10,) They vritbstood him not vrith 
swords and weapons, but only by nieaking, 
and otto but spake. I answer, 1. It was a 
bodily reastance; for beode that, Jerane 
tum^ it, Virifortistimi, most violent men. 
And it is a speech in the Scnptures taken 
for men valorous for war ; as 1 Sam. xvi. 26 ; 
2 Sam. xviL 10 ; 1 Chron. v. 18 ; and so 
doth the phrase tj^n 'jn3J Potent in va- 
lour; andTthe phrase, 7in't!^')K ^ ^*'"- 
xxiv. 9 ; xi. 16 ; 1 Sam. xxxi. 12 ; and 
therefore all the e^ty, not only by words, 
but violently, expeUed the king out of the 



tempte. 2. imTV-'^y HDyn Ar. Mmt 
£t «te(«rHnt contra Huzn-tfoAu ; the LXX 
say. Mil fTfrnxM they resisted the king. So 
Inn. xi. 17, The armies of the south shall 
not stand, Dan. viii. 26, it is a word of 
violence. 3. The text saith, (ver. 20,) and 
they thrust him out. InlyTlD'l Arias 
Mont. Et/ecerwa etttn fegUnare; Hieron. 
FettincUo &ipule«-unt eum. The LXX. say, 
The priest urinwit aM. i»»» ; as Vata- 
blus,^ They cast him out. 4. It is said, (ver. 
21,) " He was cut oflf from the house of 
the Lord." Dr Feme saith, (sect. 4, p. 60,) 
" They are valiant men who dare withstand 
a king in an evil way, by a home reproof, 
and by withdrawing the holy things from 
him, especially sboe, by the law, the leper 
was to be put out of the congregation." 

An». \. — He contradicteth ^e text. It 
vras not a resistance 1^ words, for the text 
Biuth, " They withstood him, and they thrust 
him out videntlv." 2, He yieldeth the 
cause, for to withdraw the holy things of 
God by corporeal violence, and violenUy to 
pull the censer out of his hand, ^t be 
should not provoke God's wrath by offering 
incense to the Lord, is resistance; and the 
like violence may, by this example, be used 
when the king useth the sword and the 
militia to bring in an enemy to destroy tiie 
kingdom. It is no lees injustice against the 
second table, that the king useth the sword 
to destroy the innocent wan to usurp the 
censer agiunst the fimt table. But Dr 
Ferae yieldeth, that the censer may be 
pulled out of his hand, le«t he provoke God 
to wrath ; therefore, by the same very rea- 
son, aforlioTe, the sword, the castles, the 
sea-ports, the mihtia, may be violently 
pulled out of his hand ; for if there was an 
express law that the leper should be pnt out 
of the congregation, and therefore the king 
also ehoula be subject to his church-censor, 
then he subjecteth the king to a punishment 
to be inflicted by the subjects upon the 
king. 1. Therefore the king is omosiooa 
to ue co-active power of the hw. 2. Tliere- 
fore subjects may judge him and punish 
him. 3. Therefore he is to be subject to 
all church-censors no less than the people. 
4. There is an express law that Uie leper 
should be put out of the congregation. 
What then ? Flattering court divines ny, 



> V&tiib.— Dstnrbarant eun si Ulo louo, compnl- 
sque Dt Bgr«deretar, in not. FeatiaaoteT dfredi 
m ooeganint, hoc mt, extraMmnt eom. 



THS LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



171 



'< The king is above all these laws ;" for 
there is an ezprefis law of God as express as 
that ceremonial law on touching lepers, and 
a more landing law, that t£e murderer 
should die the death. Will royalists put no 
exception upon a ceremonial bw of expel- 
ling the lej^, and vet put an exception 
upon a divme moral law, concerning the 
punishing of murderers given before the 
law <m Mount SinaL (Gen, vi. 9.) Thej 
80 declare that thej accept the persons of 
men. 5. If a leper king could not actuallv 
fflt upon the throne, but must be cut off 
from the house of the Lord, because of an 
express law of God, these being inconsistent, 
that a kinff remaining amongst God's people, 
ruling and reigning, should keep company 
with the church of God, and jet be a leper, 
who was to be cut off, by a divine law, from 
the church. Now, I persuade myself, that 
far less can he actually reign in the fidl use 
of the power of the swora, if he use the 
sword to cut off thousands of innocent 
people; because, murdering the innocent 
^ th^ &therle^ and roy^ goyeming in 
righteousness and sodliness, are more incon- 
si^nt by Grod's taw, being morally oppo- 
site, than remaining a governor of tne peo- 
ple, and the disease- of leprosy, are incom- 
patible. 6. 1 think not much ^at Barclay 
saith, (cent. Monar. 1. 5, c. 11,) *^ Uzziah 
remained king, after he was removed from 
the congregation for leprocfy." 1. Because 
that toucheth the question of dethroning 
kbgg, this is an hmnmt brought d 
yk&nt resisting of ungs, and that the 
people did resume all power fr>om Uzziah, 
and put it in the '* hand of Jotham his son, 
who was over the king's house, judging the 
people of the land " fver 21). And by this 
same reason the parliaments of both king- 
doms may resume the power once given to 
the king, when he hath proved more unfit 
to govern morally than Uzziah was cere- 
monially, that he ought not to judge the 
people of the land in this case. 2. If the 
priests did execute a ceremonial law upon 
king Uzziah, far more may the three estates 
of Scotland, and the two houses of parlia- 
ment of ^England, execute the moral law of 
God on their king. 

If the people may covenant by oath to 
rescue the innocent and unjustly-condemned 
from the sentence of death, notoriously 
known to be tyrannous and cruel, then may 
the people resist the king in his unlawful 
practices; but this the people did in the 



matter of Jonathan. Mr Symmons (p. 32) 
and Dr Feme (sect 9^ 49) say, *' That 
with no violence, but by prayers and tears, 
the peoj^e saved Jonathan; as Peter was 
rescued out of prison by the prayers of the 
church, king Saul might easily be entreated 
to break a rash vow to save the life of his 
eldest son." — Ans» 1. I say not the com- 
mon people did it, but the people, including 
proceres ryniy the princes of the land, and 
captains of thousands. 2. The text hath 
not one word or syllable of either prayers, 
supplications or tears ; but by the contrary, 
they bound themselves by an oath, contrary 
to the oath of Saul, (1 Sam. xiv. 44, 46,) 
and swore, ** Grod forbid: as the Lordliveth, 
there shall not one hair ofhis head fall to the 
ground. So the people rescued Jonathan."^ 
The church prayed not to God for Peter's 
deliverance witn an oath, that Hiey must 
have Peter saved, whether Grod will or no. 
Though we read of no vidience used by the 
people, yet an oath upon so reasonable a 
ground, — 1. Without the king's consent. 
2. Contrary to astanding law that they had 
agreed unto. (ver. 24.) 3. Contradictory to 
the king's sentence and umust oath. 4. 
Spoken to the king in his race, — all these 
prove that the people meant, and that the 
oath ex eonditione operisy tended to a vio- 
let resisting of the king in a manifestly 
unjust sentence. Chrysostom, hom. 14, ad 
Pop., Antiodi accuseth Saul as a murderer 
in this sentence, and praiseth the people : 
so Junius, Peter Martyr* (whom royalists 
impudently cite); so Cornelius k Lapide, 
Zanchius, Lyra, and Hugo Cardinalis say, 
*' It was tyranny in Saul, and laudable that 
the people resisted Saul;" and the same 
is asserted by Josephus (1. 6, antiquit. c. 7 ; 
so Althusius, Polit. c. 38, n. 109). 

We see also, (2 Chron. xxi. 10,) that 
Libnah revolted from under Jehoram, be- 
cause he had forsaken the Lord God of his 
fathers. It hath no ground in the text that 
royalists say, that the defection of Libnah 
is not justified in the text, but the cause is 
from me demerit of wicked Jeboram, be- 
cause he made defection from God. Libnah 
made defection from him, as the ten tribes 
revolted from Behoboam for Solomon's 



1 Ohald. Par. — Manifestnm est quod Jonathan 
peccaTit per ignorantiam. 

> P. Mart, saith with a doubt. Si ista seditiose 
feceront — ^nnllo modo ezcnsari possant. Yea, he 
saith they might snffragiis, with their suffrages free 
him. 



172 



LEX, USX ; OB, 



idolatry, which, before the Lord, procured 
this defection, yet the ten tribes make de- 
fection for oppression. I answer. Where the 
literal meaning is simple and obvious, we 
are not to go from it. The text showeth 
what cause moved Libnah to revolt :^ it was 
a town of the Levites, and we biow they 
were longer found in the truth than the 
ten tribes (2 Chron. xiii. 8 — 10; Hosea 
xi. 12). Lavater saith, Jehoram hath pressed 
them to idolatry, and therefore they re- 
volted. Zanchius and Cornelius aLapide say. 
This was the cause that moved them to re- 
volt, and it is clear, (ver. 13,) he caused Ju- 
dah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to go 
a whoring from God, and no doubt tempted 
Libnah to the like."^ 

Yea, the city of Abel (2 Sam. xx.) did 
well to resist Joab, David's general, for he 
came to destroy a whole city for a traitor's 
sake, for Sheba ; they resisted and defended 
themselves. The wise woman calleth the city 
a mother in Israel, and the inheritance of 
the Lord ; (ver. 19 ;) and Joab professeth, 
(ver. 20,) far be it from him to swallow up 
and destroy Abel. The woman saith, (ver. 
18,) " They Said of old, thev shall surely 
ask counsel at Abel ; and so they ended the 
matter ;" that is, the city of Abel was a 
place of prophets and oracles of old, where 
they asked responses of their doubts, and 
therefore peace should be first offered to 
the city before Joab should destroy it, as the 
law saith, Deut. xx. 10. From all which 
it is evident, that the city, in defending 
itself, did nothing against peace, so they 
should deliver Sheba, the traitor, to Joab's 
hand, which they accordingly did; and 
Joab pursued them not as traitors for keep- 
ing the city against the king, but professeth 
in that they did no wrong. 






QUESTION XXXIII. 

WHETHER OR NO THB PLACE, ROM. XIII. 1, 
PROVE THAT IN NO CASE IT IS LAWFUL TO 
RESIST THE KING. 

The special ground of royalists from Bom. 
xiii., against the lawfulness of defensive wars, 

1 P. Mar. Com. in 2 Reg. c. 8, saith Libnah re- 
volted. Quia Bubditos nitebatur cogere ad idololatri- 
am, quod ipsi libneiises pati noluemnt et merito : 
prineipibns enim parendum est, yerum usque ad aras. 

> Yatab. in not. — Impulit Judseos ad idololatri- 
am, alioqui jam pronos ad cultum idololorum. . 



is to make Paul (Bom. xiii.) speak only of 
kings. Hugo GroHxiB {de jtMre belli et pac. 
L 1, c. 4, n. 6), and Barclay {cont Monar, 
L 3, c. 9) say, " Though Ambrose expound 
the place. Bom. xiii., de solis regihus^ of 
kings only, (this is false of kings <mLyy he 
dotE not, but of kings prindpaUi/y) yet it 
fblloweth not that afl magistrates, by this 
place, are freed from all laws, because (saith 
he) there is no judge above a king on earth, 
and therefore he cannot be punished; but 
there is a judge above all inferior judges, 
and therefore uiey must be subject to laws." 
So Dr Feme followeth him, (sect. 2, p. 10,) 
and our poor Prelate must be an accident to 
them, (Saer. San. Maj. c. 2, p. 29,) for his 
learning cannot subsist per se. 

Assert, 1. In a free monarchy (such as 
Scotland is known to be) by ^e higher 
power (Bom. xiii.) is the kmg principal^ in 
respect of digni^ understood, but not solely 
and only, as ii inferior judges were not 
higher powers. 1. I say in a free mo- 
narchy ; for no man can say, that where 
there is not a king,, but only aristocracy, 
and government by states, as in Holland, 
that there the people are obliged to obey 
the king; and yet this text, I hope, can reach 
the consciences of all * Holland, that there 
every soul must be subject to the higher 
powers, and yet not a subject in Holland is 
to be subject to any king: for non eniis 
nulla sunt accidentia, 2. I said the king, 
in a free monarchy, is here principally un- 
derstood in regard of dignity, but not in re- 
gard of the essence of a magistrate, because 
the essence of a magistrate doth equally 
belong to all inferior magistrates, as to the 
king, as is already proved ; (let the Prelate 
answer if he can ;) for though some judges 
be sent by the kmg, and have from him 
authority to judge, yet this doth no more 
prove that inferior judges are improperly 
judges, and only such by analogy, and not 
essentially, than it will prove a citizen is 
not essentially a citizen, nor a church-officer 
essentially a church-officer, nor a son not 
essentially a living creature, because the for- 
mer have authority from the incorporation 
of citizens, and of church-officers, and the 
latter hath his life by generation from his 
father, as Grod's instrument. For though 
the citizen and the church-officers may be 
judged by their several incorporations that 
made them, yet are they also essentially citi- 
zens and church-officers, as those who made 
them such. 



J 



THS LAW JlST) TH£ FRINGE. 



173 



Assert, 2. — There is no reason to restrain 
the higher powers to monarchs only, or jet 
prindpallj, as if they only were essentially 
powers ordained of God, 1. Because he call- 
eth them V^y^im iw^t^wnu higher powers. 
Now this will include ail hiffher powers, as 
Piscator obser^eth on the place; and cer- 
tainly Borne had never two or three kings 
to which every soul should be subject. If 
Paul had intended that they should have 
given obedience to one Nero, as the only 
essential judge, he would have designed him 
by the noun m the singular number. 2. All 
the reasons that the apostle bringeth to 
prove that subjection is due, agreeth to infe- 
rior judges as well as to emperors, for they 
are powers ordained of Grod, and they bear 
the sword, and we must obey them for con- 
science sake, and they are Grod's deputies, 
and their judgment is not the judgment of 
men, but of uie Lord (2 Ghron. xix. 6, 7 ; 
Deut. i. 16 ; Numb. xi. 16, 17). Tribute 
and wages be no less due to them, as minis- 
ters and servants, for their work, than to 
the king, &c. 3. The apostle could not omit 
obedience to the good civil laws enacted by 
the senate, nor could he omit to command 
subjection to rulers, if the Bomans should 
chuige the government, and abolish mo- 
narchy, and erect their ancient ibrm of go- 
vernment before they had kings. 4. Tnis 
is canonical Scripture, and a dear exposi- 
tion of the fifth commandment, and so must 
reach the consciences of all Christian repub- 
lics, where there is no monarchy. 5. Pa- 
rallel places of Scripture prove this. Paul 
(1 Tim. ii. 1, 2) will have prayers made to 
God for kings, and for all that are in autho- 
rity, and the intrinsical end of all is a godl^, 
honest, and peaceable life. And (1 Fet. li. 
13) '* Submit to every ordinance of man for 
the Lord's sake;" aJso, (Tit. iii. 1,) it is 
true, subjection to Nero, or whom Tertullian 
said, (Apol. 5,) Nihil nisi grande honwn a 
N^one damnaturny is commanded here, but 
to Nero as such a one as he is obliged, de 
jure, to be, (whether you speak of the office 
in ahstractOy or of the emperor in concretOy 
in this notion, to me it is all one,) but that 
Paul commandeth subjection to Nero, and 
that principally and solely, as he was such 
a man, de facto, I shall then believe, when 
antichristian prelates turn Paul's bishops, 
(1 Tim. ii.,) which is a miracle.- 6. Inferior 
judges are not necessarily sent by the king, 
by any divine law, but chosen by the people, 
as the king is ; and, de facto, is the practice 



of creating all magistrates of cities in both 
kingdoms. 7. Augustine, (expos, prop. 72 
on epist. Bom.,) IrensBus, (1. 6, c. 24;) 
Chrysostom, (in Psal. cxlviii., and on the 
place,) and Hieron. (epist. 63, advers, i;t- 
gilant.) expomid it of masters, magistrates; 
so do Calvin, Beza, Parous, Piscator, Bol- 
locus, Marloratus ; so do popish writers, 
Aquinas, Lyra, Hugo Cardinalis, Carihusius, 
Pirerius, Toletus, UomeHus k Lapide, Sal- 
meron, Estius, expound the place; and 
therefore there is no argument that royalists 
hence draw against resisting of the king by 
the parliaments, but they do strongly con- 
clude against the cavaliers' unlawful wars 
against the parliaments and estates of two 
kmgdoms. Here what the P. Prelate saith 
to tne contrary. 1. They are called emi- 
nent powers; therefore, kings only. — Ans, 
It followeth not, for these can be no other 
than itdpTis it h tntt^xS hr%$, (1 Tim. ii. 2). 
But these are not kings, but in the text con- 
tradivided from /SM-iXuf kings, and they can 
be no other than i^^** ^ ^•t^tea principalities 
and powers. 2. The reason of the apostle 
proveth clearly that V^v^Uu cannot mean 
king's only, for Paul addeth of that same 
Vi^wim " For there is no power but of God." 
It must be there is no supereminent royal 
power, but it is of God, and the powers only 
(so he must mean) that be, are ordained of 
God. Now the latter is manifestly false, for 
inferior powers are of God. The powers of 
the Boman senate, of a master, of a &>ther, 
are of God. 

P. Prelate. — " Peter must expound Paul, 
and Paul's higher powers must be (1 Pet. ii.) 
fia^iXus tnei^x**^i More reason that Paul 
expound Paul. Now (1 Tim. ii. 2) itims 
h v*t^»x^ tyrir. All in authority are not 
kings. P. Prelate.—" Are of God," or 
" ordained of God," cannot so properly be 
understood of subordinate powers, for that 
is not by immediate derivation from God, 
but immediately from the higher power the 
king, and mediately from G<^. 

Ans. 1. — It is most fidse that king David 
is so immediately a king from Grod, as that 
he is not also by the m^iation of the people, 
who made him king at Hebron. 2. The 
inferior magistrates are also immediate vi- 



1 Yatab.— Homiues intelligit pnblica authoritate 
pneditna. 

> P. Martyr. — ^Varia sunt potestatnm genera — 
regna, aristocratica, politica, tyrannica, oligarcliica 
— Dens etiam illomm author. Willet saith the 
same, and so Beza, Tolet., Hammond, &c. 




ears and mioisteni of God as the king, for 
their throne and judgment is not the king's, 
but the Lord's (IWt. i. 16 ; 2 Ghron. xxi. 
6). 3. Though thej were mediatelj from 
man, it foUoweth not that thej are not so 
properly from God, for wisdom (Prov. viii.) 
saith as properly, (ver. 16,) ** By me princes 
rule, and nobles, even all the judges of the 
earth ;" as, (ver. 16,) " By me kings reign ;" 
and promotion is as properly firom Grod, and 
not from the east and tne west, (PsJ. Ixxv, 
6, 7)) though God promote Joseph by the 
thankful mimificence of Pharaoh, and Mor- 
decai by Ahasuerus, Daniel by Darius, as if 
he gaye them power and honour immediate- 
ly from heaven. 

P. Prelate. — Learned interpreters ex- 
pound it so. — Am, It is an untruth, for 
none ej^und it only and principally of 
kings, rroduce one Literpreter for that 
conceit. P. Prelate, — Paul wrote this when 
Nero was monardi. — Ans. 1. Then must 
the text be expounded of Nero only. 2. 
He wrote this when Nero played the tyrant 
and persecuted Christians, therefore we are 
not to obey Neroes now, 3. He wrote it 
when the senate of Bome had power to de-^ 
clare Nero an enemy, not a father, as they 
did. P. PreUxte, — mi must be referred to 
the antecedent VS/u^U ^m^nffm and this, 
" There is no power •; ^ but of God," must 
undeniably inror there is no supreme power 
but of Grod ; and so, sovereignty relates to 
God as his immediate author, so sectaries 
reason, Gral. ii. 16, " Not justL&ed by works, 
(Uy fik) but by faith only." Thm <; ^ miri 
T»vt ^uS must be a perfect exclusive, else 
their stronghold for justification is over- 
thrown. — Ans. aS hatn a nearer antece- 
dent, which is i^'u^ it is alone without 

utri^x*^^' '^^ this mmmar is not so 
good as Beza's, which lie rejected. 2. hn 
^ will refer to God alone as &e only 
cause, t» genere causa primoB. God alone 

fiveth rain, but not for that inmiediately, 
ut by the mediation of vapours and clou<U. 
** Grod alone kilieth and maketh alive," Deut. 
xxxii. 39, that is, excluding all strange gods, 
but not immediately; for, bv his people's 
fighting, he slew Og, king of Baahan, and 
cast out seven nations, yet they used bow 
and sword, as it is used in the book of 
Joshua ; and, therefore, God killed not Og 
inunediately. Grod hath an infinite, emi- 
nent, transcendent way of wc»rking, so that 
in his kind he only worketh his alone ; Deus 
solus oper<x6ur solitudine primce eausaSf 



non solus solUudine onmiscausas^ God only 

fiveth learning and wisdom, yet not imioe- 
iately always—often he do^ it by teaching 
and industry, God only maketh ridb, yet 
the prelates make themselves rich idso witii 
the fat of the flock ; and God only maketh 
poor, yet the P. Prelate's courts, mediately 
also under God, made many men poor. 3. 
btf fik IB not such an exclusive particle 
when we ascribe it to God, as when we as- 
cribe it to two created causes, works and faith; 
and the protestants' form of arguing (Gal. 
n,\ to prove " we are justified by faith," he 
calleth our stronghol j^ therefore it is not 
his stronghold. In this point, then, he 
must be a papist, and so he refiiises to own 

Erotestant strongholds for justification by 
kith alone. 

Dr Feme (sect. 2, p. 10). — ^As many as 
have souls must be subject to the hi^er 
powers spoken of here; but all inferior 
judges have souls. 

Ans, — 1. If the word souls be thus 
pressed, none shall be understood by hi^er 

Eowers, but the king only. 2. Gertunly 
e that commandeth as he eommandeth 
must be excepted, except, because the kiag 
hath a soul, you must isubject the king to 
himself and to his own commandments royal, 
and so to penal laws. 3. Inferior judges, 
as judges, by this text, must either be sub- 
ject to themselves as judges, (and, by the 
same reason, the king must be subject to 
himself, as he is a jud^,) or judges, as men, 
or as erring men are to be subject ; which I 
would grant, but they are not subject as 
judges, no more than one, as he command- 
eth, can also obey as he oommandetb. 
These are c(mtradietory. I am not put off 
that opinion since I was at school, species 
suljusibUis qua subjicibiUs non est proBdir 
cahilis, 4. If Nero make fathers rulers 
over their mothers and children, and com- 
mand them, by this public sw(»d of justice, 
to kill their own children and mothers, — ^if a 
senate of such &thers disobey, and if, with 
the sword, they defend their own children 
and mothers, which some other Doegs, as 
judges, are to kill, in the name and com- 
mandment of Nero, then they, resisting 
Nero's bastard commandment by this doc- 
trine, resist the ordinance of God, and resist 
the minister of God. I have not a £uth 
stretched out so &r to the Prelate's court- 
divinity. Yet Feme saith, "There was 
never more cause to resist higher powers, 
for their widced Nero was emperor, whw 



THE LAW AND THS PRINCE. 



176 



he now forbiddeth resistance, (Bom. xiii.) 
under the pain of damnation." I desire to 
be informed, whether to resist the king's 
servants, be to resist the king ? Dr Feme 
(p. 3, sect. 2, p. 10, and part 3, sect. 9, p. 
59) allows us, m unayoidable assaults where 
death is imminent, personal defence without 
offending, as law^, whether the king or his 
emissaries invade, without law or reason. 
Well, then, the resisting of the king's cut- 
throats, thoueh thej have a persontu. com- 
mand of the King to kill the innocent, yet 
if thej want a legal, is no resisting of the 
king, as king, for the servant hath no more 
than the master giveth; but the king, in 
lawless commandments, gave nothing royal to 
his cat-throats, and so nothing legaL 



QUESTION XXXIV. 

WHETHER ROYALISTS BT COGENT REASONS 
BO PROVE THE X7NLAWEULNESS OF DEFEN- 
SIVE WARS. 

What reasons have already been dis- 
cussed, I touch not. 

Obj. 1. — AmissBUs {de authority prindp, 
c. 2, n. 2). " K we are to obey our parents, 
not if they be good, but simply whether 
they be good or ill, (so Justin, saith of the 
kin^j Quamvis legwn contemptOTy qwxnv- 
vis.tmpius, tamenpatery sect, si vera %nff, 
VM. 12,) then must we submit to wicked 
kings/' 

Am, — Valeat totum^ we are to submit 
to wicked kings and wicked parents, because 
kings and parents ; but when it cometh to 
actual submission, we are to submit to nei- 
ther but in the Lord. The question is not 
touching subjection to a prince, let him be 
Nero, but if in acts of tyranny we may not 
deny subjection. There be great odds be- 
twixt wicked rulers and rulers commanding 
or punishing unjustly* 

06;. 2— Amiseeus (c. 3, n. 9). « We 
may resist an inferior magistrate, therefore 
we may resist the supreme. It followeth not; 
for an inferior judge hath a majesty in fic- 
tion only, not properly : treason is, or can 
only be committed against the king; the 
obligation to inferior judges is only tor the 
prince, the person of none is sacred and in- 
violable but the king's. 

Ans, — ^We obey parents, masters, kings, 
upon this formal ground, because they are 



God's deputies, and set over us not by man, 
but by Uod; so that not only are we to 
obey them because what they command is 
good and just, (such a sort of obedience an 
equal owes to the counsel of either equal or 
inferior,) but also by virtue of the fifth com- 
mandment, because of their place of dignity. 
Now this majesty, which is the formal rea- 
son of subjection, is one and the same in 
specie and nature in king and constable, and 
only different gradually in the king and in 
other judges ; and it is denied that there is 
any incommunicable sanctity in the king's 
person which is not in some degree in me 
inferior judge. All proceedeth from this 
false ground, that the king and inferior 
judges differ in nature, which is denied; 
and treason inferior may be committed 
against an inferior judge, and it is a fiction 
that the inferior judge doth not resemble 
God as the king doth ; yea, there is a sacred 
majesty in all inferior judges, in the aged, 
in every superior, wherefore they deserve 
honour, fear, and reverence. Suppose there 
were no king on earth, as is clear in Scrip- 
ture, (£xod. XX. 12 ; Levit. xix. 32 ; Esther, 
i. 20; Psal. cxlix.:9; Prov. iii. 16; Matt, 
xiii. 57; Heb. v. 4; Isa. iii. 3; Lam. v. 
12 ; Mai. i. 6 ; Fsal. viii. 5,) and this hon- 
our is but united in a special manner in the 
king, because of his hign place. 

Obj. 3. — A king elected upon conditions 
may be resisted. 

Aris. — ^He is as essentially a king as a he- 
reditary, yea, as an absolute prince, and no 
less the Lord's anointed than another prince; 
if then one, also another may be resisted. 

Obj. 4.— The oath of God bindeth the 
subjects; therefore, they must obey, not 
resist. 

Ans, — Obedience and resistance are very 
consistent. No doubt the people gave their 
oath to Athaliah, but to ner as the only 
heir of the crown, they not knowing that 
Joash, the lawfiil heir, was living ; so may 
conditional oaths (all of this kind are condi- 
tional) in which tnere is interpretative and 
virtual ignorance, be broken; as the people 
swear loyalty to such a man conceivea to be 
a father, he, after that, tumeth tyrant, may 
they not resist his tyranny? They may. 
Also, no doubt, Israel gave their oath of 
loyalty to Jabin, (for when Nebuchadnezzar 
subdued Judah, he took an oath of loyalty 
of their king,) yet many of Zebulun, Naph- 
tali, and Issachar, Barak leading them, 
conspired against Jabin. 



176 



LEX, rex; or, 



i^ 



06?*. 6. — ^There is no law to take a king's | 
life if he turn a Nero, — we never read t£it 
subjects did it. 

Ans, — The treatise of unlimited preroga- 
tive saith, (p. 7,) " We read not that a 
father, killing his children, was killed by 
them, the fact being abominable." The 
law (Gen. vi. 9 ; Levit. xxiv. 16) excepteth 
none. See Deut. xiii. 6, the dearest that 
nature knoweth are not excepted. 

Obj. 6. — Vengeance pursued Korah, Da- 
than, and Abiram, who resisted Moses. 

Ans. — From resisting of a lawM magis- 
trate in a thing lawful, it followeth not it 
must be unlawftil to resist kings in tyran- 
nous acts. 

Obj. 7. — Exod. xxii. 28, " Thou shalt 
not revile the gods, nor curse the Ruler of 
the people." Exod. x. 20, " Curse not 
the king, no not in thy thought, nor the 
rich in thy bed-chamber." 

An$, — The word elohim signifieth all 
judges, and K*tJ^3> wcwt signifieth one. 
lifted up above the people, saith Rivetus, {in 
loc) whether a monarch, or many rulers. 
All cursing of any is unlawful, even of a 
private man, (Rom. xii. 14,) therefore we 
may not resist a private man by this ; the 
other text readeth, contemn not the king, 
^j;*lQ3 in scientia tua. Aria Mon., or 
in thy conscience or thought ; and it may 
prove resisting any rich man to be unlaw^I. 
Nothing in word or deed tending to the dis- 
honour of the king may be done ; now to 
resist him in self-defence, being a com- 
mandment of God in the law of nature, can- 
not fight with another commandment to 
honour the king, no more than the fifth 
commandment can fight with the sixth ; for 
all resistance is against the judge, as a man 
exceeding the limits of his omce, in that 
wherein he is resisted, not as a judge. 

Obj. 8.-.Eccles. viii. 3, 4, " Where the 
word of a king is, there is power ; and 
who may say to him, What dost thou?" 
therefore, the king cannot be resisted. 

Ans. — Tremelius saith well, That " the 
scope is that a man go not from the king's 
lawiul command in passion and rebeUion ;" 
Vatab.— " If thou go from the king in dis- 
grace, strive to be reconciled to him quickly;" 
Cajetanus — " Use not kings too familiarly, 
by coming too quickly to them, or going 
too hastily from them ;" Plutarch, — " Cum 
rege agendum ut cum rogOy neither too 
near tms fire nor too far oft." Those have 
smarted who have been too great in their 



favour, — Ahasuerus slew Haman, Alexan- 
der so served Glitus and Tiberius Sejaunus, 
and Nero Seneca. But the sense is clear, 
rebellion is forbidden, not resistance, so the 
Hebrew y^ ^DID IDyfl-^^f stand 
not in an evil matter, or in a rebellion, 
and he dehorteth from rebellion against 
the king by an argument taken from his 

Eower, for he dom whatsoever pleaseth 
im. Where the word of a king is, there 
is power, and who may say unto nim, what 
doest thou ? The meaning is, in way of 
justice, he is armed with power that cannot 
be resisted ; otherwise Samuel said to king 
Saul, (1 Sam. xiii. 13,) '^ Thou hast done 
foolishly." Elijah said more to Ahab then 
What hast thou done.? And the prophets 
were to rebuke sin in kings (2 Kings iii. 14 ; 
Jer. i. 28 ; xxii. 3 ; Hosea v. 1, 2) ; and 
though Solomon here give them a power, he 
speaketh of kings as they are de facto ; but, 
de jure^ they are under a law (Deut. xvii. 
18). If the meaning be, as royjuists dream, 
he doth whatsoever he will or desireth, as a 
prince, by his royal, that is, his legal ¥dll, by 
which he is lex animata, a breathing law, 
we shall own that as truth, and it is nothing 
against us ; but if the meaning be, that 
de jure, as king, he doth whatsoever he 
will, by the absolute supremacy of royal 
will, above all law and reason, then Joram 
should, by law, as king, take Elisha's head 
away; and Elisha resisted Grod in saying. 
What doth the king? and he sinned in 
commanding to deal roughly with the king's 
messenger, and hold him at the door ; then 
the fourscore valiant priests, who said to 
king Uzziah, What dost thou ? and resisted 
him, in burning incense, which he desired 
to do; sinned, then Pharaoh, who said, 

iEzek. xxix. 3,) " The river Nilus is mine, 
'. have made it for myself; and the king of 
Tyrus, (Ezek. xxvii. 2,) " I am God, I sit 
in the seat of Grod," should not be control- 
led by the prophets; and no man should 
say to them. What sayest thou ? Did Cy- 
rus, as a king, with a royal power from God, 
and jure regio, be angry at the river Ganges, 
because it drowned one of his horses, and 
punish it by dividing it in one hundred and 
thirty diannels? (Sen. Z. 3, de ira, c, 21.) 
And did Xerxes, jure regio, by a royal 

Eower given of God, when Hellespontus 
ad cast down his bridges, command that 
three hundred whips should be inflicted on 
that little sea, and that it should be cast in 
fetters? And our royalists will have these 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



177 



mad fools, doing these acts of blasphemous 
insolence against heaven, to be honoured as 
kings, and to act those acts by a regal 
power. But hear flatterers, — a royal power 
is the good gift of Grod, a lawful and just 
power. A Eing acting and speaking as a 
ting, speaketh and acteth law and justice. 
A power to blaspheme is not a lawful power; 
they did and spake these things with a hu- 
man and a sinml will ; if, therefore, this be 
the royalists' meaning, — ^as kings, 1. They are 
absolute, and so the limited and elected 
king is no king. 2. The king, as king, is 
above (Jod's law put on him by Grod, Venit. 
xvii. 3. His will is the measure of good and 
ill. 4. It were unlawful to say to the king 
of Gyrus, What sayest thou ? thou art not 
God, according to tnis vain sense of royalists. 

Oij. 9.— EUhu saith, (Job. xxxiv. 18,) 
" Is it fit to say to a king, Jhou art wicked, 
and to. princes, Ye are ungodly?" There- 
fore, you maynot resist kings. 

Ans. 1. — ^This text no more proveth that 
kings should not be resisted thim it proveth 
that rich men, or liberal men, or other 
judges inferior, should not be resisted, for 
DOn3 sigxiifleth all that, and it signiiieth 
liberal, Isa. xxxii. 6 ; and the same word is 
in ver. 8. 2. Deodatus and Calvin say, the 
meaning is, " Learn from the respect that 
is due to earthly princes the reverence due 
to the sovereign Lord," Mai. i. 8 ; for it is 
not convenient to reproach earthly kings, 
and to say to a prince, Sy*Si *eliel, a 
word of reproach, signifying extreme wicked- 
ness. And you may not say to a man of 
place, ytSfT an extremely wicked man; so 
are the words taken, as signifying most vile 
and wicked men, 1 Sam. ii. 12; x. 27; 2 
Sam. XXV. 6 ; Psal. i. 1, 6 ; xi. 5 ; xii. 8 ; 
Prov. xiv. 4 ; Psal. cxlvi. 9, and in infinite 

places. For ^y*Si ^fl ^^^ ^^ extreme 
reproach, coming from ry^ smCy vum^ and 
Syt profuit, ( Jud. xix. 22,).a most naughty 
and a lewd man, or from ^ty 7'w<^wi, a 
lawless man, who hath cast off all yokes of 
Ood's or man's laws. So then the meaning 
is. It is unlawful to reproach earthlv princes 
and men of place, far more is it unlawful to 
reproach the Judge of the whole earth with 
injustice. And what then? We maynot 
reproach the king, as Shimei cursed king 
IJavid ; therefore it is unlawful to resist the 
Kng in any tyrannous acts. I shall deny 
the cotisequence ; nay, as Pineda observeth, 
if the royalist press the words literally, it 
shall not be lawful for prophets to reprove 



kings of their sins. Christ called Herod a 
fox, Elias Ahab, one that troubled Israel. ' 

Obj. 10. — Acts xxiii. Paul excuseth him- 
self that he called Ananias, the high-priest, 
a whited wall. 

Ans. — Rivetus (Exod. xxii.) learnedly 
discussing the place, thinketh Paul, profess- 
ing he knew him not to be the high-priest, 
speaketh ironically, that he could not ac- 
luiowledge such a man for a judge. Pisca- 
tor answereth. He could not then cite Scrip- 
ture, " It is written," &c. — Ans, But they 
may well insist, in diat act of smiting Paid 
unjustly, he might be reproached, otherwise 
it IS not lawful to reproach him ; and surely 
it is not like that Paul was ignorant that he 
was a judge ; yea, it is certam ho knew him 
to be a judge. 1. He appeared before him 
as a juc[ge, to answer for himself. 2. Paul 
saith expressly he was a judge, fver. 3,) 
" Sittest thou to judge me after tne law," 
&c. And therefore the place is for us, for 
even according to the mind of all, the fault 
was (if there were any) in calling him a 
whited wall ; and he resisted him m judg- 
ment, when he said, '' Gommandestthou me 
to be smitten against the law ?" 3. Though 
royalists rather put a fault <m the aposUe 
Paul, (now in the act of prophesying judg- 
ment against Ananias, which after fell out,) 
than upon their god, the king, yet the conse- 
quence amounteth but to this. We may not 
revile the high-priest, therefore we may 
not resist the xing in his illegal command- 
ments. It followeth not; yea, it should 
prove, if a prelate come in open war to kill 
the innocent apostle Paul, the apostle might 
fly or hold his hands, but might not re- 
offend. Now the prelate iff the nigh-priest's 
successor, and so his base person is as sacred 
9S the person of the Lord's anointed, the 
king. Hence the cavaliers had ih one of 
their colours, which was taken by the Scots 
at the battle of Marston, July 2, 1644, 
the crown and the Prelate's mitre, painted 
vrith these words, " Nolite tangere Christos 
meos," as if the antichristian mitre were as 
sacred as the lawful crown of the kins of 
Britain. ^ 

Obj. 11.— Feme, (sect. 9, 56,) " If the 
senate and people of Bome, who a little be- 
fore had the supreme government over the 
then emperors, that of subjects had made 
them lords, might not resist their emperors, 
much less can the people of England have 
power of resistance a^dnst the succession 
of this crown, descending from the con- 

2b 



t= 



178 



LSX, ssx ; OR, 



queror, who by force of anos, but in justice, 
conquered the kingdom. 

Ans. 1. — Though the Boman emperors 
were absolute, (of which I much doubt,) and 
though the senate had made them absolute, 
I denj that, therefore, they cannot be re- 
sisted. The unlawM resistance condemned 
by Paul (Rom. xiii.) is not upon the ground 
of absoluteness, which is in the court of 
God nothing, being never ordained of God, 
but upon reasons of conscience, because the 

S)wers are of Grod, and ordained of Grod. 
ut some may say, Volenti nonfit injwriay 
If a people totally resign their power, and 
swear non-resistance to a conqueror, by com- 

Sact, they cannot resist. I answer, neither 
oth this follow, because it is an unlaw^ 
compact, and none is obliged to what is un- 
lawnd. For, (1.) It is no more lawful for 
me to resign to another my power of na- 
tural self-defence than I can resign my 
Sower to defend the innocent drawn to 
eath, and the wives, children, and pos- 
terity that God had tyed me unto. (2.^ The 
people can no more resign power oi self- 
defence, which nature hath given them, 
than they can be guilty of self-murder, and 
be wanting in the lawful defence of king- 
dom and religion. (3.) Though you make 
one their king with absoluteness of power, 
yet when he use that transcendent power, 
not for the safety but for the destruction of 
the state, it is l^own they could not resign 
to another that power which neither God nor 
nature gave them, to wit, a power to destroy 
themselves. 2. I much doubt if the Soman 
emperor was absolute when Paul wrote this. 
Justinian saith so, (Digest. I, 2, tit, 2,) but 
he is partial in tiiis cause. Bodine {de 
repuh. L 2, c» 5, p. 221,) proveth that the 
Boman 'emperors were but princes of the 
commonwealth, and that the sovereignty re- 
mained still in the senate and people. Ma- 
rius Salamon. writeth six books (De Prind- 
patM) on the contrary. How coula they make 
their emperors absolute ? Livy saith, ^' The 
name of a king w<u9 contrai^ to a senate 
liberty." Florus^ Nomen Regis invidioswny 
They instituted a yearly feast, Feb. 23, called 
Regifu^iwrn. CMsero, as Augustine observ- 
eth, Begem Bomce posthcec nee Diiy nee 
homines esse patiantibr. The emperors 
might do something defacto, but Lex Megia 
was not before Vespasian's tune. Augustus 
took on him to be tribune of the people from 
ten years to ten. Suetonius and Tacitus 
say, " The succeeding kings encroached by 



degrees upon the people's liberty." For 
speedier execution of law, the kings in time 
of war were forced to do many thmgs with- 
out the senate, and after the reign m empe- 
rors, though there were no Plebisdta, yet 
there were Senatus-consultOy and one great 
one is, that the senate declared Nero to be 
an enemy to the state. It is thought Julius 
Gcesar, in the war against Fompey, subdued 
the Bomans and the senate, and they were 
subdued again in the battle of Octavius 
against Gassius and Brutus. But Tacitus 
saith that was defactOy not de jwre, {Anal, 
L 1, ^. 2,) Ilom>CB ruere in servitium, Cortr 
sulesy PatreSy Eques, Caligula intended to 
assume diadema^ the ensign of a king, but 
his friends dissuaded him. 3. England is 
obliged to Dr Feme, who maketh them a 
subdued nation ; the contrary of which is 
known to the world. 

Si/mmons (sect. 6, p. 19). — God is not 
honoured by being resisted, no more is the 
king. 

Ans. — 1. I deny the consequence. Those 
who resist the king's personal ¥dll, and will 
not suffer him to ruin his crown and poste- 
rity in following papists, against his oath at 
the coronation, do honour him, and his 
throne and race, as a king, though for the 
time they displease him. 2. Uzziah was 
not dishonoured in that he was resisted. 3. 
Nor do we honour the king when we flee 
from him and his law ; yet that resistance 
is lawM, according to the way of royalists, 
and in truth also. 

Obj. 12. — Supreme power is not to be 
resisted by subordinate powers, because they 
are inferior to the supreme. 

Ans, — 1. The bloody Irish rebels, then, 
being inferior to the parliament, cannot re- 
sist me parliament. 2. Inferior judges, as 
judges, are immediately subot'dinate to God 
as me king, and must be guilty of blood 
before God if they use not the sword against 
bloody cavaUers and Irish cut-throats, ex- 
cept you say inferior judges are not obliged 
to execute judgment but at the king's com- 
mandment. 

Obj, — As the Irish rebels are armed with 
the king's power, they are superior to the 
parliament. 

Ans, — So an army of Turks and Spa- 
niards, armed with the king's power, and 
coming against the two kingdoms at the 
king's commandment, though thej be but 
lictors in a lawless cause, are superior to the 
highest courts of parliament in the two 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



179 



kingdoms. But the king and the law gave 
power to tibe parliament first to resist rebels, 
now he givetn power to rebels to resist the 
parliament. Here must be contradictory 
wills and contradictory powers in the king. 
Which of them is the king's will and his 
power ? the former is legal and parliamen- 
tary ; then, because law is not contrary to 
law, the latter cannot be legal also, nor can 
it be from God, and to resist it, then, is not 
to resist God. 

Obj. 13. — If resistance be restrained to 
legal commandments, what shall we say to 
these arguments, — that Paul forbiddeth re- 
sistance under these tyrannous govemors, 
and that from the end of their goyemment, 
which is for good, and which their subjects 
did in some sort enjoy under them ? 

Ans, — This proveth nothing, but that 
we are to co-operate with these governors, 
though tyrannous, by subjecting to their 
laws, so mr as they come up to this end, the 
moral good and peace of their government ; 
but Paul nowhere commandeth absolute sub- 
jection to tyrannous governors in tyrannous 
acts, which is still the question. 

Obj, 14. — ^He that hath the supreme trust 
next to God, should have the greatest secu- 
rity to his person and power ; but if resist- 
ance be lawfol, he hath a poor security. 

Ana. — 1. He that hath the greatest trust 
should have the greatest security to his per- 
son and power in the keeping his power, and 
usins it according to his trust wr its own 
natifeend-forj^ee, peace, and godliness. 
God alloweth security to no man, nor that 
hils angels c^all guard them, but only when 
they are in their ways and the service of 
Grod ; else, " there is no peace to the wicked." 
2. It is denied that one man, having the 
greatest trust, should have the greatesit se- 
curity ; the church and people of God, for 
whose safety he hath the trust, as a means 
for the end, should have a greater security ; 
the city ought to have greater security than 
the watchers, the army than the leaders, — 
*' The good shepherd giveth his life for his 
sheep." 3. A power to do ill, without re- 
sistance, is not security. 

Obj. 15. — If Grod appoint ministers to 
preadi, then the sheep cannot seek safety 
elsewhere. 

Ans. — The wife is obliged to bed and 
board with her husband, but not if she fear 
he will kill her in the bed. The obedience 
of positive duties that subjects owe to princes 
cannot loose them from nature's law of self- 



preservation,nor from God's law of defending 
religion ajgainst papists in arms, nor are the 
sheep obhged to entrust themselves but to li 
saving shepherd. 

Olj. 16. — K self-defence, and that by 
taking up arms against the king, be an un- 
lawfiu duty, how is it that you have no prac- 
tice, no precept, no TOromiii& for it, in all the 
word of Grod ? 1. You have no practice : 
Ahab sold himself to do evil, — he was an 
idolater, — and killed the prophets ; and his 
queen, a bloody idolatress, stirred him up to 
great wickedness. Elias had as great power 
with the people as you have, yet he never 
stirred up the people to take arms against 
the king. Why did God at this time rather 
use extraordinary means of saving his church? 
Amisaeus, {de auiho. princ. c. 8,) — " Elias 
only fled. Nebuchadnezzar, Ahab, Manas- 
seh, and Julian, were tyrants and idolaters, 
yet the people never raised an army aj^inst 
them." Bishop Williams of Ossory, (JDeut. 
xiv.,) " K brother, son, daughter, wife, or 
friend, entice thee to follow strange gods, kill 
them ; not a word of the father. Children 
are to love their fathers, not to kill them." 
" Christ (saith John P. P.), in the cradle, 
taudit by practice to flee from Herod ; and 
all Christ's acts and sufferings are full of my- 
steries and our instructions. He might have 
had legions of angels to defend him, but would 
rather work a miracle, in curing Malchus' 
ear, as use the sword against Ceesar. If 
sectaries give us a new creed, it will concern 
them never with expunging Christ's descent 
into hell, and the communion of saints, to 
raze out this. He suffered under Pontius 
Pilate. My resolution is (for this sin of 
yours) to dissolve in tears and prayers, and, 
with my master, say, daily and hourly. Fa- 
ther, forrive them, &c. Christ thought it 
an uncoum spirit to call for fire from hea- 
ven to bum the Samaritans, because they re- 
fused him lodging. The prophets cried out 
against idolatry, blasphemy, murder, adul- 
tery, &c., and all sins ; never against the sin 
of neglect, and murderous omission to de- 
fend church and religion against a tyran- 
nous king. No. promise is made to such a 
rebellious insurrection in God's word." 

Ans. It is a great non-consequence : this 
duty is not practised by any examples in 
God's word, therefore it is no duty. Prac- 
tice in Scripture is a narrow rule of faith. 
Show a practice when a husband stoned his 
wife, because she enticed him to follow strange 
gods ; yet it is commanded, (Deut. xiii. 0,) 






180 



LEX, R£X ; OR, 



whdn a mm lyinff with a beast is put to 
^eath ; yet it is a law (£xod. xxii. 19). In- 
gnite more laws are, the practice of which 
we find not in Scripture. 2. Jehu and the 
elders of Israel rooted out Ahab's posterity 
for their idolatry ; and if Jehu, out of sin*^ 
oerity, and for the zeal of Grod, had done 
what God commanded, he should have been 
rewarded ; for, say that it was extraordinary 
to Jehu that he should kill Ahab, yet there 
was an express law for it, that he that stir- 
reth up others to idolatry should die the 
death (Deut. xiiL 6) ; and there is no ex- 
ception of king or iailier in the law ; and to 
except father or mother in Grod's matter, is 
expressly against the zeal of God (Deut. 
xxxii. 9). And many grave divines think 
the people to be commended in making Jehu 
king, and in killing kingNabab, and smit- 
ing all the house of Jeroboam for his idola- 
try ; they did that which was a part of their 
ordinary duty, according to God's express 
law (Deut. xiii. 6 — 9), though the facts of 
these men be extraorainary. 3. Ahab and 
Jezebel raised not an army of idolaters and 
malignantB, such as are papists, prelates, and 
cavaliers, against the three estates, to destroy 
parliaments, laws, and religion — ^and the peo- 
ple conspired with Ahab m the persecution 
and idolatry, to forsake the covenant, throw 
down the altars of God, and s]a,y his pro- 
phets — so as in the estimation of Elias, (1 
King xix. 9 — 11,^ there was not one man, 
but they were malignant cavaliers ; and hath 
any Elias now power with the cavaliers, to 
exhort them to rise in arms a^mst them- 
selves, and to show them it is weir duty to 
make war against the king and themselves, 
in the defence of religion ? When the pro- 
phets had much ado to convince the people 
that they sinned in joining with the king, 
what place was there to mow them theur 
sin, in not using their own lawM defence ? 
And in reason, any may judge it unreason- 
able for Elias to exhort, of thousands of 
thousands in Israel, poor seven thousand 
(of which many no doubt were women, aged, 
weak, and young,) to rise in arms against 
Ahab and all Israel, except God had given 
a positive and extraordinary commandment, 
and with all miraculous courage and strexigth 
in war against the whole land. Axfd God 
worketh not always by miracles to save his 
church, and therefore the natural mandate 
of self-preservation in that case doth no 
more oblige a few weak ones to lawful resis- 
tance than it obliged one martyr to rise 



i^ainst a persecuting Nero and all his fi>roe8. 
Amiseeus should remember we are not to 
tie our Lord to miracles. 

1. Elias did not only flee, but denounced 
wrath against the king and cavaliers who 
joined with them in idolatry; and when 
Grod gave opportunity, he showed himself, 
and stirred the people up to kill Baal's Jesu- 
its and seducing idolaters, when the idola- 
trous king refiised to do it; and Elias with 
his own hand took them not, but all Israel 
being pothered together, (1 Kings xviii. 19,) 
the prmces and judges did apprehend them, 
(ver. 40,) which is a warrant, when the king 
refuseth to draw the ewotd of justice against 
armed papists, that other jw^es are to do 
it. 2. For Jeremiah, from the Loo'd, ex- 
pressly forbade to fight against Nebuchad- 
nezzar, show us the like for not defend- 
ing ourselves against bloody papists and Irish 
cut-throats ; for that example may as well 
prove, (if it be a binding law to us,) that our 
xing should not raise his subjeots to fight 
ag)£»t a Spanish armada and a for^gn 
prince ; for before ever .Nebuchadnezzar 
subdued the kingdom of Judah, (Jer. xxvii. 
1,) in the beginning of the reign of Jehoi- 
albm, (Jer. xxxvi. and xxxvii.,) the king of 
Judah is from the Lord commanded not to 
draw a sword against the king of Babylon. 
I hope this wSl not tie us and our king 
not to fight a^unst foreign princes, or against 
the great Tunc, if they shall unjustly invade 
us and our king ; and this example is a|^dnst 
the king's resisting of a foreign prince un- 
justly invading him, as much as against us, 
for Nebuchadnezzar was a tyrannous invader, 
and the king of Judah the Lord's anomted. 
3. The people also conspired with Manasseh, 
as with Ahab. (Jer. xv. 4). 4. Of empe- 
rors persecuting Christians we shall hear 
anon. 6. Deut. xiii., None are ex<3epted, 
by a synecdoche, the dearest are expressed, 
'' son, daughter, brother, the friend that is 
as thine own soul ;" therefore fathers also; 
^'and husbands are to love their wives" 
(Ephes. V. 26); yet to execute judgment 
on them ¥dthout pity (Deut. xiii. o, 9); 
the father is to love the son, yet if the son 
prophecy falsely in the name of the Lord, to 
kill hinfi. (Zech. xiii. 3.) Hence love, fear, 
reverence toward the king, may be com- 
manded, and defensive wars also. 6. Christ 
fled from Herod, and all his acticms and 
sufferings are mysteries and instructions, 
saith the poor Prelate. Christ kissed the 
man that, to his knowledge, came to betray 



-i»«- 



THE LAW AND TUB PRINCE. 



181 



him ; Christ fled not» but knowing where 
sad when his enemy should apprehend him, 
came willingly to the place; therefore we 
should not nee. His actions are so myste- 
rious that John P. P., in imitation of Christ's 
forty days' fast, will &8t from flesh in Lent^ 
and the Prelate must walk on the sea and 
work miracles, if all Christ's actions be our 
instructions. 7. He might, with more than 
twelve legions of angels, defend himself, but 
he would not, not because resistance was un- 
lawful — ^no shadow for that in the text — 
but because it was Grod's will that he should 
drink the cup his Father ^ve him, and be- 
cause to take the sword without Grod's war- 
rant, subjecteth the usurper of Gk)d's place 
to perish with the sword. Peter had God's 
revealed will that Christ behoved to suffer, 
(Matt. xxvi. 62, 63; xvi. 21—23,) and 
God's positive command, that Christ should 
die for sinners, (John x. 24,) may well re- 
strain an act of lawful self-preservation, hie 
et nttnc, and such an act as Christ lawfully 
used at another time, (Luke iv. 29, 30 ; 
John xi. 7, 8.) We rive no new creed ; but 
this apostate hath forsaken his old creed, 
and the religion of the Church of Scotland, 
in which he was baptized. Nor do we ex- 
punge out of the creed Christ's descension 
into hell and the communion of saints, as the 
apostate saith ; but the popish local descen- 
sum of Christ, and the popish advancing of 
the church's power above the Scriptures, 
and the intercession and prayers to the 
saints, or of the saiats for us, we deny ; and 
this Prelate, though he did swear the doc- 
trine of the Church of Scotland, preached 
expressly all these, and many other points 
of popery, in the pulpits of Edinburgh. 10. 
We believe that Christ suffered xmS&t Pon- 
tius Pilate, but that Pilate had any legal 
power to condemn Christ — but only a power 
by a permissive decree, (Acts iv. 27, 28,) 
such as devils had by God's permission, 
(Luke xxii. 63,) — we utterly deny. 11. 
The Prelate saith it is his resolution, for our 
sin of natural self-defence, to dissolve in 
tears; because his bishopric, I conceive, by 
which he was wont to dissolve in cups, (being 
drunk on the Lord's day, after he, with other 
prelates, had been at the Loid's supper, 
while the chamber, wherein they were, was 
dissolved in vomiting,) was taken from him. 
12. The prophets cry against all sms, but 
never agamst the sin of non-resistance ; and 
yet they had very tyrannous and idolatrous 
kings. This is but a weak argument. 1. 



The prophets cry not .out against all sins — 
they cry not out against men-stealers, and 
killers of father and mother, in express 
terms, yet do they, by consequence, con- 
demn all these sins ; and so do they condemn 
non-resistance in wars, by consequence, when 
they cry out, (Jer. v. 31,) " The prophets 
prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule 
by their means, and my people love to have 
it so." And when they oomplam (Ezek. xxii. 
26-^28), '' That the prophets and priests 
violate the law, her prmces are like wolves 
ravening the prey, to shed blood, and the 
people use oppression, and exercise robbery, 
and vex the poor ;" and when tiiiey say, 
(Jer. xxii* 2,) not to the king 'Only, but 
also to his servants, and the people that en- 
ter in by the gates, *' Execute judgment and 
righteousness, and deliver the spoiled out 
of the hand of the oppressor," — 1 pray you, 
who are the oppressors ? I answer. The 
murderine judges. (Isa. i. 21.) '* As for 
my people, children are their oppressors, 
and women rule over them," (L». iii 12,) 
and, (ver. 14, 16,) " the ancients of the 
people grind the faces of the poor ;" and 
when they are not valiant for the truth 
upon the earth ; and (Prov. xxiv. 11) the 
Lord shall render to these men according 
to their works, which forbear to help men 
that are drawn to death, and those that be 
ready to be slain ; if they shift the business, 
and say. Behold, we know not, doth not 
he that pondereth the heart consider it? 
When, therefore, the Lord's prophets com- 
plain that the people execute not judgment, 
relieve not the oppressed, help not and 
rescue not those that are drawn to death 
unjustly by the king, or his murdering 
judges, they expressly cry out against the 
sin of non-resistance. 2. The prophets can- 
not expressly and formally cry out against 
the judges for non-resisting the king, when 
they join, as ravening wolves, with tne king 
in tiiese same acts of oppression, even as the 
judge cannot formally impannel twenty-four 
men, sent out to guard the travellers from 
an arch-robber, if these men join with the 
robber, and rob the travellers, and become 
cut-throats, as the arch-robber is, he cannot 
accuse them for their omission in not guard- 
ing the innocent travellers, but for a more 
heinous crime, that not only they omitted 
what was their duty, in that they did not 
rescue the oppressed out of the hands of the 
wicked, but because they did rob and mur- 
der ; and so the lesser sin is swallowed up 



182 



LEX, RSX : OR 



in the greater. The under-jtidges are watch- 
men, and a guard to the cnnrdi of God ; if 
the king turn a bosom robber, their part is, 
(Jer. xxiL 3,) " To deUver the spoiled out of 
the hand of the oppressor," to watch against 
domestic and foreign enemies, and to defend 
the flock from wolves ; "To let the oppress- 
ed go free, and to break every yoke, (Isa. 
Iviu. 6,) " To break the jaws of the wicted, 
and pluck the spoil out of his teeth." fJob. 
xxix. 17.) Now if these judges turn lions 
and ravening wolves, to prey upon the flock, 
and join wiuL the kmg, as always they did 
when the king was an oppressor, " his princes 
made him g&d with tneir Hes," and joined 
with him, and the people with both, (Jer. i. 
18 ; V. 1 ; ix. 1 ; Mic. vii. 1 ; £zek. xxii. 
24--31 ; Jer. xv. 1 — 3,) it is no wonder if 
the prophets condemn and cry out against 
the hugest and most bloody crime of positive 
oppression, formally and expressly, and in 
that their negative murders, m not relieving 
the oppressed, must also be cried out against. 
13. The whole land cannot formally be ac- 
cused for non-resistance when the whole 
land are oppressors, for then they should be 
accused for not resisting themselves. 14. 
The king ought to resist the inferior judges 
in their oppression of the people, by the 
confession of royalists, then this argument 
cometh with the like force of strength on 
themselves. Let them show us practice, pre- 
cept, or promise in the Word, where the 
king raised an army for defence of religion, 
agamst princes and people who were sub- 
verting reHgion, and we shall make use of 
that same place of Scripture to prove that 
the estates and people, who are above the 
king, (as I have proved,) and made the 
king, may, and ought to resist the king, 
with the like force of scriptural truth in 
the like case. 15. Koyalists desire the like 
precedent of practice and precept for defen- 
sive wars ; but, I answer, let them show us 
a practice where any king of Israel or Ju- 
dah raised an army of malignants, of Phil- 
istines, Sidonians, or Ammonites, against 
the princes of Israel and Judah, convened 
in an assembly to take course for bringing 
home the captived ark of Grod, and vindi- 
cating the laws of the land, and raised an 
army contrary to the knowledge of the 
elders, princes, and judges, to set u^ Dagon, 
or tolerate the worship of Ihe Sidomangods; 
and yet princes, elders, judges, and the whole 
eople, were obliged all to flee out of God's 
nd, or then onfy to weep and request. that 



the king would not destroy souls and bodies 
of them and their innocent posterities, be- 
cause they could not, in conscience, embrace 
the worship of Dagon and the Sidonian gods. 
When the royalists can parallel this with a 
precedent, we can answer. There was as small 
apparency of precedency in Scripture, (ex- 
cept you flee to the law of nature,) that 
eighty priests, the subjects of king TJzziah, 
should put in execution a penal law against 
the Lord's anointed, and that the inferiors 
and subjects should resist the superior, and 
that 'these priests, with the princes of the 
land, should remove the kin&r fr^m actual 
goreUent, aU his days, -adiown hk son. 
at least make the &ther, their prince and 
superior, (as royalist say,^ as good as a cy- 
pher ? Is not this a pumsnment inflicted by 
keriors upon a superior, according to the 
way of royalists ? Now it is clear, a worship- 
pins of bread and the mass commanded, 
ana against law obtruded upon Scotland, 
by influence of the counsel of Known papists, 
is to us, and in itself, as abominable as the 
worshipping of Dagon or the Sidonian gods ; 
and when me kingdom of Scotland did but 
convene, supplicate, and protest against that 
obtruded idolatry, they were first declared 
rebels by the king, and then an army raised 
against them by prelates and malignants, 
inspired with the spirit of antichrist, to de- 
stroy the airhole land, if they should not sub- 
mit, soul and conscience, to that wicked ser- 
vice. 



£ 



QUESTION XXXV. 

WHETHER OR NO THE SUFFERINGS OF THE 
MARTYRS IN THE PRIMITIYE CHTJRCH MI- 
LITATE AGAINST THE LAWFULNESS OF DE- 
FENSIVE WARS. 

' Ohj. 1. — ^Royalists think they burden our 
cause much with hatred, when they bring 
the fathers and ancient martyrs against us ; 
so the P. Prelate (p. 74 — 76,) extracted 
out of other authors testimonies for this, 
and from 1. Armagh, in a sermon on Bom. 
xiii. (p. 20, 21 ); so the doctors of Aber- 
deen. The Prelate proveth from Oem. 
Alexand. (1. 7, c. if) that the king is 
constituted by the Lord ; so Ignatius. 

Ans, 1. — Except he prove from these 
fathers that the king is from . God only and 
immediately, he proveth nothing. 



THE LAW AND THB PRINCB, 



183 



Obj. 2. — Iren. (l. 5, adv. hasr. c. 20). — 
proveth that Grod siveth kingdoms, and 
that the devil lied, Luke iv. ; and we make 
the people to make kings, and so to be the 
children of the deril. 

Ans, — If we denied Grod to dispose of 
kingdoms, this man might allege the church 
of God in England and Scotl^d to be the 
sons of Satan ; but Grod's word, in Deut. 
xvii. 18, and many other places, makes the 
people to make kings, and yet not devils. 
But to say that prelates should crown kings, 
and with their loul fingers anoint him, and 
that as the Pope's substitute, is to make him 
that is the son of perdition a donor of 
kingdoms; also to make a man, with his 
bloody sword, to ascend to a throne, is to 
deny Grod to be the disposer of kingdoms ; 
and prelates teach both these. 

Obj. 3.— TertuL (Apol e. SO).—Inde 
est imperator, unde et homOf antequam tm- 
perator, inde potestcu t72t, unde et spirittis, 
God is no less uie creator of sovereignty than 
of the soul of man. 

Ans. — Grod only maketh kings by his ab- 
solute sovereignty, as he only maketh high 
and low, and so only he maketh mayors, 
provosts, bailiffs, for tnere is no power but 
of him, (Bom xiii.,) therefore provosts and 
bailiffs are not from men. The reader shall 
not be troubled with the rest of the testimo- 
nies of this poor plagiary, for they prove 
what never man domed but prelates and 
royalists, to wit, that kings are not from 
God's approving and regulating will, which 
iJiey oppose, when they say, So& conquest is 
a just title to the crown. 

But they deserve rather an answer which 
Grotius, Barclay, Amisseus, and Spalato, 
allege, as, — 

06;. 1 — CJyprian (epist. 1). — Non est fas 
Christianis, armisj ac vi tueri se adversus 
impetum persecutorumy Christians cannot, 
by violence, defend themselves against per- 
secutors. 

Ans, — If these words be pressed literally. 
It were not law&l to defend ourselves against 
murderers ; but Cyprian is expressly con- 
demning in that place the seditious tumults 
ofpeop&agwustthekwMinagistaite. 

Obj, 2. — The ancients say he was justly 
punished who did rend and tear the edict 
of Dioclesian and Maximinus {Euseb, L 7^ 
Hist. Eccles. c. 5). 

Ans. — To rend an edict is no act of na- 
tural self-defence, but a breach of a positive 
commandment of the emperor's, and could 



not be lawfully done, especially by a private 
man; 

Obj. 3. — CJyprian (epist. 56) Incumbamus 
gemitibiu assiduis et deprecationibus ere" 
briSf hcBc enim sunt munimenta spiritualia 
et tela divina quce protegunt ; and Buffi- 
nus,'(l. 2, c. 6,\ Ambrosius adversus regince 
{JustincB Artnoe) fwrorevn non se manu 
defensabat aut teloy sed jejunUs contintM" 
tisque vigilUs sub altari positus. 

Ans. — It is true, Cyprian reputed prayers 
his armour, but not his only armour. Though 
Ambrose, de fa/sto^ used no other against 
Jusdna, the places say nothing against the 
lawfulness of self-defence. Ambrose speak- 
eth of that armour and these means of de- 
fence that are proper to pastors, and these 
are prayers and tears, not the sword ; be- 
cause pastors carry the ark, that is their 
charge, not the sword, that is the magis- 
trate's place. 

Obj. 4. — TertuUian (apolog. c. 37) saith 
expressly, that the Christians might, for 
strength and number, have defended them- 
selves against their persecutors, but thought 
it unlawful. Q,uando vel una nox pauculis 
facuUs largitatem ultionis pass et operariy 
si malum malo dispungi penes nos liceretj 
sed cibsit ut igni humano vindieetur divina 
secta^ aut doleat pati^ in quo probetur. Si 
enim hostes eostraneosy non tantum vindices 
occultos agere vellemus^ deesset nobis vis 
numerorum et eopiarum ? 

Atis. — I will not go about to say that 
Tertullian thought it lawM to raise arms 
against the emperor : I ingenuously confess 
Tertullian was in that error. But, 1. some- 
thing of the man ; 2. Of the Christians. 1. 
Of tne man — TertuUian after this turned a 
Montanist. 2. Famelius saith of him, in vit, 
Tertul. inter Apocrypha numercOur — ex~ 
eommunicatus. 3. It was Tertullian's error 
in a fact, not in a question, that he believed 
Christians were so numerous as that they 
might have fought with the emperors. 4. 
M. Pryn doth judiciously observe, (part 3, 
Sovereign Power of Pari. p. 139, 140,) he 
not only thought it unlawml to resist, but 
also to flee, and therefore wrote a book de 
fuga; and therefore as some men are ex- 
cessive in doing for Christ, so also in suffering 
for Christ. Hence I infer, that TertuUum 
is neither ours nor theirs in this point ; and 
we can cite Tertullian against them also. 
Jam sumus ergo pares ; yea, Fox, in his 
Monum., saith, " Christians ran to the 
stakes to be burnt, when they were nei- 



184 



LEX, EEX ; OR, 



ther condemned nor cited." 5. What if we 
cite Theodoret, (fol. 98. De provid.) " Who, 
about that time, saj that eril men reign 
k^XH^^*^ Af«»)^Mi, through the cowardliness 
oi the subjects;" as the Prelate saith of 
Tertullian, I turn it, If Theodoret were now 
living he would go for a rebel. 1. About 
that time Christians sought help from Con- 
stantino the Great against Ljcinius their 
emperor, and overthrew him in battle ; and 
the Christians, being oppressed by the king 
of Persia their own king, sent to TheodosiuB 
to help them against hun. 2. For the man, 
Terti^ian, in tne place cited, saith, '^ The 
Christians were strangers under the empe- 
ror," extemi sumus^ and therefore they 
had no laws of their own, but were under 
the civil laws of heathen till Constantino's 
time ; and they had sworn to Julian, as his 
soldiers, and therefore might have, and no 
doubt had, scruples of conscience to resist 
the emperor. 3. It is known Julian had 
huge numbers of heathen in his army, and 
to resist had been great danger. 4. Want- 
ing leaders and commitnders, (many prime 
men doubting of the lawfulness thereof,) 
though they had been equal in number, yet 
number is not all in war, skill in valorous 
commanders is required. 5. What if all 
Christians were not of TertuUian's mind. 6. 
If I would go to human testimonies, which 
I judge not satisi^ictory to the conscience, I 
might cite many : the practice of France, of 
Hdili^d, the divines in Luther's time, (Slei- 
dan. 8, c. 8, 22,) resolved resistance to be 
lawful; Calvin, JBeza, Parous, the German 
divines, Buchanan, and an host might be 
produced. 



QUESTION XXXVI. 

WHBTHER THE POWER OF WAB BE ONLY IN 

THE KING. 

It is not hard to determine this question. 
The sword in a constitute commonwealth is 

f^iven to the judge supreme or subordinate ; 
Rom. xiii. 4;) *^He beareth not the sword in 
vain" in the empire. The use of armour is 
restricted to the emperor by a positive law ; 
so the law saith^ ^rmorum oMda nisijussu 
frvMXfis iumt inierdictaj {Ub, de Cod. de 
Lege. 1.) Imperat Valentinian niiZZt, nobis 
ineonsuUis^ usus armorum tribwxtw, {ad 
1. Jul. Mai. I. 3.) War k a species and a 
particular, the sword is a general. 



Assert. — 1. The powei: of the sword, by 
God's law, is not proper and peculiar to the 
• king only, but given T[)y God to the inferior 
judges. 1. Because the inferior judge is essen- 
tially a judge no less than tne king, as is 
proved, therefore he must bear the sword, 
(Bom. xiii. 4.) 2. Not Moses only, but the 
congregation of Israel, had power of life and 
deaSi, and so of the sword ; Num. xxxv. 12, 
the man-slayer shall not die, " until he stand 
before the congregation in Judgment;" ver. 
24, " Then the congregation shall judge 
between the slayer and the avenger of 
blood;" Dent. xxu. 18, « The elders of the 
city shall take that man and chastise him ;" 
ver. 21, ** The men of the city shall stone her 
with stones ;" Deut. xvii. 5 ; xix. 12, 13, v. 
18—21 ; xxi. 19, " Then shall his father 
and his mother bring him to the elders of 
his city ;" ver. 21, " And the men of the city 
shall stone him with stones ;" 1 Kings xxi. 

11, The elders and nobles that were inha- 
bitants in his city stoned Naboth. 3. In- 
ferior judges are condemned as murderers, 
who have shed innocent blood, (Isa. i. 12 ; 
Psal. xciv. 5, 6 ; Jer. xxii. 3 ; £zek. xxii. 

12, 27; Hosea vi. 8; Zeph. iii. 1—3,) 
therefore, they must have the power of the 
sword, hence, upon the same grounds. 

Assert. 2. — ^That the king oidy hath the 
power of war, and raising armies must be 
but a positive civil law. J^or, 1. By divine 
right, if the inferior judges have the sword 
given to them of God, uien have th^ also 
powerof war, and raising armies. 2. All power 
of war that the king h^ is cumulative, not 
privative, and not destructive, but given for 
the safety of the kingdom ; as therefore the 
king cannot take from one particular man 
the power of the sword for natural self-pre- 
servation, because it is the birthright of life, 
neither can the king take from a com- 
mnmt^ and kingdom a power of rising in 
arms for their own defence. If an army of 
Turks shall suddenly invade the land, and 
the king's express consent cannot be had, 
(for it is essentially involved in the office of 
the king, as king, that all the power of the 
sword £at he hath be for their safety,) or if 
the king should, as a man, revise nis con^ 
sent, and interdict and dischai^e the land to 
rise in arms, yet they have his royal ccnd- 
sent, though they want his personal consent, 
in respect that his office obligeth him to 
command than to rise in arms. 3. Because 
no king, no civil power can take away 
nature's burthrigbt m s^-defence fr<mi any 



THE UkW AND THE PRINCE. 



185 



man, or a oommunitj of men. 4. Because 
if a king should sell his kingdom, and invite 
a bloody conqueror to come in with an army 
of men to destroy his people, impose upon 
their conscience an idolatrous religion, they 
may lawfully rise against that army without 
the king's consent ; for, though royalists say, 
they n^ not come in asmine patience, and 
oifer their throats to cut-throats, but may 
flee, yet several things hindereth a flight. 
1. They are obliged by virtue of the nfth 
commandment to remain, and, with their 
sword, defend the cities of the Lord and the 
king (2 Sam. x. 12 ; 1 Chron. xix. 13) ; 
for if to defend our country and diildren, 
and the church of God, from unjust invaders 
and cut-throats, by the sword, be an act of 
charity that God and the law of v nature 
requireth of a people, as is evident, rProv. 
XXIV. 11,) and if the fifth oommaaapaent 
obligee the land to defend their need parents 
and youpg children from those in^ek, and 
if the sixth commandment lay on us the 
Uke bond, all the land are to act works of 
mercy and charity, though the king unjustly 
command the contrary, except, royalists say, 
that we are not to perform tne duties of the 
second table commanded by Gixl, if an 
earthly king forbid us ; and if we exercise 
not acts 01 mercy towards our brethren, 
when their life is in hazard, to save them, 
we are murderers ; and so men may murder 
their neighbour if the king oxnmand them 
so to do ; this is like the otwrt-fiedth. 2. The 
king's power of wars is for the safety of his 
people; if he deny his consent to their 
raism^ of arms till they be destroyed, he 
playeui the tyrant, not the king,, and Uie 
law -of nature will necessitate them either to 
defend themselves, (seeing flight of all in 
that case is harder than deau,) else they 
must be guilty of self-murder. Now, the 
king's commandment of not rising in arms, 
at best, is positive and against the nature of 
his office, and it floweth then from him as 
from a men, and so must be far inferior to 
ihe natural commandment of God, which 
commandeth self-weservation, if we would 
not be guilty of self-murder, and of obeying 
men raw^ tlian God ; so Althusius (Polit. 
c, 25, n. 9), Ehlicamas. (L 4, Antiq. Bom.V, 
Aristot. (FoUt. 1. 3, c. 3). 3. David took 
Goliath'B sword and became a captain, a 
captain to ^n host of armed men in the 
battle, and Ibught the battles of the L<»d, 
(1 Sam. XXV. 28,) and this Abigail by the 
spirit of prophecy, as I take it, saith, (ver. 



29—31; 1 Sam. xxii. 2; 1 Chron. xii. 
1—3 ; xvii. 18, 21, 22,) not only without 
Saul's consent, but against king Saul, as he 
was a man, but not against him as he was 
king of Israel. 4. If there be no king, or 
the Idng be minor, or an usurper, as Athaliah , 
be on the throne, the kingdom may law- 
fully make war vdthout the king, as (Judg. 
XX.) the children of Israel, — rour hundr^ 
thousand footmen that drew sword, went out 
to war against the children of Benjamin. 
Judah hfi^ the power of the Bword when 
Josiah was but eight years old, in the be- 
ginning of his reign, (2 Kings xxii. 1, 2,^ 
and before Jehoash was crowned king, ana 
while he was minor, (2 Kings xi.,) there 
were captains of hundreds in arms raised 
by. Jehoiada, and the people of Judah, to 
defend the young king. It cannot be said 
that this is more extraordinary than that 
it is extraordinary for kings to die, and 
in the interregnum^ wars, in an ordinary 
providence, may fall out in these kingdoms, 
where kings go by election; and for kings 
to faU to be minors, cai>tives, tyrannous. 
And I Aall be of that opinion that Mr Sym- 
mons, who holdeth that royid birth is equi- 
valent to divine unction, must also hold, that 
election is , not equivalent to divine unction ; 
for both eloction and birth cannot be of the 
same validity, the one being natural, the 
other a matter of free dioice, which shall in- 
fer that kings by election are less properly, 
and analogically only, kings; and so Saul 
was not properly a kmg, for he was king by 
election; but I conceive t^at rather kings 
by birth must be less properly kings, because 
the first king by God's institution, being the 
mould of all the rest, was by election (Deut. 
xvii. 18—20). 

5. If the estates create the king, and 
make this man king, not that man, (as is 
clear from Deut. xviL 18, and 2 Chron. v. 
1 — 4,) they give to him the power of the 
sw<M*d, and the power of war, and the mili- 
tia ; and I shali judge it strange and reason- 
less, that the power given to the king, by the 
parliam^t or estat^ of a free kingdom, 
(such as Scotland is acknowledged by all to 
be,) should create, regulate, limit, abridge, 
yea, and annul that power that created itself. 
Hath God ordained a parliamentary power 
to create a royal power of the sword and 
war, to be placed in liie king, the parlia- 
ment's creature, for the safety of parliament 
and kingdom, which yet is destructive of it- 
self? Dr Feme saith that '* l^e king sum- 

2c 



186 



LEX, BXX ; OR, 



moneth a parliament, and giveth them power 
to be a parliament, and to advise and coun- 
sel him ;" and, in the meantime, Scripture 
saith (Deut. xvii. 18—20 ; 1 Sam. x. 20— 
25 ; 2 Sam. v. 1 — 4) that the parliament 
createth the king. Here is admirable reci- 
procation of creation in policy I Shall God 
make the mother to destroy the daughter ? 
The parliamentary power that giveth orovm, 
militia, sword, and all to the king, must give 
power to the king to use sword and war for 
the destruction of the kingdom, and to an- 
nul aU the power of parlmments, to make, 
unmake paruaments, and all parliamentary 
power. What more absurd ? 

Ohj, 1. — (Syijanons, p. 57). These 
phrases, (1 Sam. ix. 1,) *^ When kings go 
forth to war," and (Luke xiv. 31) " WJiat 
king going forth to war,*' speak to my con- 
science, that both offensive and defensive war 
are in the king's hand. 

Ana. — It is not much to other men what 
is spoken to any man's conscience by phrase 
and customs ; for by this no states, where there 
be no kings, but government by the best, or 
the peop&, as in Holland, or in other na- 
tions, can have power of war ; for what time 
of year shall kmgs go to war who are not 
kings ? and because Christ saith, *' A cer- 
tain householder delivered talents to his 
servants," will this infer to any conscience, 
that none but a householder may take usury? 
And when he saith, '' If the good man of 
the house knew at what hour the thief 
would come, he would watch ;" shall it fol- 
low the son or servant may not watch the 
house, but only the good man ? 

Obj. 2.— (Feme, p. 95.) The natural 
body cannot move but upon natural prin- 
ciples ; and so neither can the politic body 
move in war, but upon politic reasons from 
the prince, which must direct by law. 

Ans. 1. — This may well be retorted, the 
politic head cannot then move but upon 
poHtic reasons; and so the king cannot 
move to wars but by the law, and that is 
by consent of Parliament; and no law can 
principle the head to destroy the members. 
2. If an army of cut-throats rise to destroy 
the kingdom, because the king is behind in 
his place in doing his duty, how can the 
other judges, the states and parliament, be 
accessory to murder committed by them in 
not raising armies to suppress such robbers ? 
Shall the inferior judges be guilty of in- 
nocent blood because me king will not do 
his duty ? 3. The politic body ceaseth no 






more to renounce the principles of sinless 
nature in self-defence, because it is a politic 
body, and subject to a king, than it can 
leave off to sleep, eat, and dnnk; and there 
is more need of politic principles to the one 
than the other. 4. The parliaments and 
estates of both kingdoms move in these 
wars by the king's laws, and are a formal 
politic body in themselves. 

Olj, 2. — The ground of the present ware 
against the king, saith Dr Feme, (sect. 4, 
p. 13,) is false, to wit, that the parliament 
18 co-ordinate with the king; but so the king 
shall not be supreme, the parliament's con- 
sent is required to an act of supremacy, but 
not to a denial of that act. And there can 
no more (saith Amisseus, de jure majes* 
tatUy c. 3 / in quo eonsistat essen. majest, 
c. 3, n. 1 ; and a/a jur, majest, separ,^ 8^e» 
c, 2, n. 2) be two equal and co-ordinate 
supreme powers than there can be two su- 
preme Grods; and multitudo deorum est 
nulUtcu deorum^ many gods infer no gods. 
Ans, 1. — If we consider the fountain- 
power, the king is subordinate to the par- 
liament, and not co-ordinate ; for the con- 
stituent is above that which is constituted. 
If we regard the derived and executive 
power in parliamentary acts, they make 
but a total and complete sovereign power ; 
yet so as the sovereign power of the parlia- 
ment, being habitually and underived a 
Erime and fountain-power, (for I do not 
ere separate people and parliament,) is per- 
fect without the king, for all parliamentary 
acts, as is clear, in that the parliament make 
kings, make laws, and raise armies, when 
either the king is minor, captived, tyran- 
nous, or dead ; but royal power parliamen- 
tary without the parliament, is null, be- 
cause it is essentially but a part of the par- 
liament, and can work nothing separated 
from the parliament, no more uian a hand 
cut off m>m the body can write ; and so 
here we see two supremos co-ordinate. 
Amongst infinite things there cannot be 
two, because it involveth a contradiction, 
that an infinite thing can be created, for 
then it should it be finite; but a royal 
power is essentially a derived and created 
power and supreme, secundum quid^ only 
m relation to single men, but not in rela- 
tion to the community ; it is always a crea- 
ture of the community, with leave of the 
royalist. 2. It is fidse, that to an act of 
parliamentary supremacy the consent of the 
king is required, for it is repugnant that 



J 



there can be any parliain^tary judicial act 
without the parUamenty but there may be 
without the kmg. 8. More fidse it is, that 
the king hath a negative voice in parliament; 
then he shall be sole judge, and the par- 
liamenty the king's creator and constituent, 
shall be a cjnpher. 

Ohf, 3.--*(Amis8Bn8, de jur. maj. de po- 
teat, armorumy c. 5, n. 4.) The people are 
mad and fiirious, therefore supreme majes^ 
cannot be secured, and rebels suppressed, 
snd public peace kept, if the power of ar- 
mour be not in tlie long's hand only. 

Ana, 1. — To denude 3ie people of armour, 
because thej may abuse the prince, is to 
expose them to violence and oppression, un- 
justly; for one king may more easily abuse 
armour than aU the people ; one man may 
more easily fail than a community. 2. The 
safety of the people is far to b& preferred 
before the safety of one man, though he 
were two emperors, one in the east, an- 
other in the west, because the emperor is 
ordained of God for the good and wety of 
the people* (1 Tim. ii. 2.) 3. There can be 
no mferior judges to bear the sword, as 
Grod requir^, (Rom. ziii. 4 ; Dent. i. 15, 
16 ; Chron. six. 6, 7») and the king must 
be sole judge, if he only have the sword, 
and all armour mcmopoLised to himself, 

Olj. 4.— The causes of war, saith Mr 
Symmons, (sect. 4, p. 9,) should not be 
made known to the subjects, who are to 
look more to the lawM call to war from 
the prince than to the cause of the war. 

Ana, 1. — ^The parliament and aU the 
fudges and nobles are subjects to royalists, 
if wey should make war and shed blood 
upon blind obedience to the king, not in- 
quiring either in causes of law or &ct, they 
must resign their consciences to the king. 
2. The kmg cannot make unlawM war to 
be lawful by any authority royal, except he 
oould rase out the sixth commandment; 
therefore subjects must look more to the 
causes of war than to the authority of the 
king; and this were a fair way to make 

ruaments of both kingdoms set up popery 
the swoid, and root out the reformed 
relision upon the. king's authority, as the 
lawful call to war, not looking to the causes 
of war. 



QUESTION XXXVII. 

WHBTHBR OE KO IT BB LAWFUL THAT THB 
ESTATES OF SCOTLAND HBLP THBIR OP^ 
FBBS8ED BBSmBEN, THE PABLIAMENT AND 
PBOTBSTANTS IN ENGLAND, AGAINST PA- 
FISTS AND PBELATBS NOW IN ABM8 
AGAINST THEM, AND KILLING THEM, AND 
ENDEAyomUNG THB ESTABLISHMENT OF 
POPERY, THOUGH THE KING OF SCOTLAND 
SHOULD INHIBIT THEM. 

1. Marianus saith, one is obliged to help 
his brother, non vinculo ^icaci, not with 
any efficacious band ; because in these, 
(saith he,) non eat actio aut poena, one 
may not have action of law against his 
brother, who revised to help him; yet, 
(saith he) as man he is obliged to man, 
neam dvilia aodetatia^ by the bond of human 
society. 

2. Others say, one nation mav indirectly 
defend a neighbour nation agamst a com- 
mon enemy, because it is a selNlefence ; and 
it is presumed that a foreign enemy, having 
overcome the neighbour nation, shall in- 
vade that nation itself who denieth help 
and succour to the neighbour nation. This 
is a self-opinion, and to me it looketh not 
like the spuntual law of God. 

3. Some say it is lawful, but not always 
expedient, in which opinion there is this 
much truth, that if the neighbour nation 
have an evil cause, neque licet, neque ex^ 
pedk, it is neither lawAil nor expedient. 
But what is lawful in the case of necessity 
so extreme, as is the loss of a brother's life, 
or <^ a nation, must be expedient ; because 
necessity of non-sinning maketh any lawful 
thing expedient. As to help my brother 
in fire or water, requiring my present and 
speedy help, though to the loss of my goods, 
must be as expedient as a negative com- 
mandment, Thou shalt not murder. 

4. Others think it lawfiil in the c&^e 
that mv brother seek mv help only, other- 
wise I have no calling thereunto; to which 
opinion I cannot universally subscribe, it is 
held, both by reason and the soundest di- 
vines, that to rebuke my brother of sin is 
actua miaericordics et charitcuia, an act of 
mercy and charity to his soul ; yet I hold 
I am obliged to rebuke him by Grod's law 

iLevit. xix. 17,) otherwise I bate him. 
Thes. V. 14 ; Col. iv. 17 ; Math, xviii. 16.) i 



188 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



Nor can I think in reason, that my duty of 
love to my brother doth not oblige me but 
upon dependency on his ftee consent ; but 
as I am to help my neighbour's ox out of 
a ditoh^ though my neighbour know not, 
and so I have only his implioit and virtual 
0onsait, so is the case here. I go not £Eir- 
ther in this case of conscience, — if a neigh- 
bour nation be iealous of our help, and in 
an hostile way should oppose us in h^pina, 
(whieh, blessed be the Lord, the honourable 
houses of the parliament of £ngland hath not 
done, though malignant spirits tempted 
them to 8U(£ a course,) what, in that case, 
we should Owe to the afflicted memberd of 
Christ's body, is a case may be determined 
easily. 

5. The fiflh and last opini(»i is <^ those 
who think, if the king command papists and 
prelates to rise against the parhament and 
our brethr^i in En^and in wars, that we 
are oUiged in conscience, and by our oath 
and covenant, to help our native prince 
against them, — ^to whi^ opinion, with nands 
and feet I should accord, if our kind's cause 
were just and lawful ; but from this it fol- 
loweth, that we must thus far judge of the 
cause, as concemeth our consdences, in the 
matter of our necessary duty, leaving the 

C'*)ial cognizance to the honourable par* 
ent of £ng;land. But because I cannot 
return to all these opinions particularly, I 
see no reason but the civil law of a king- 
dom doth oblige any citizen to help an in- 
nocent man against a murdering robbw, 
and that he may be judicially accused as a 
murderer, who faileth in his duty^ and that 
Solon said well, Beatam remp. esse illcnn^ 
in qua quisque injurictfm alterius sucmh 
^Hmet^ It is a blessed society in whidi 
every man is to repute an- injury done 
against a brother, as an injury done against 
himself. As the Egyptians had a eood 
law, by which he was accused upon his head 
who helped not one that suffered wrong; 
and if he was not able to help, he was 
held to accuse the injurer, if not, his pu- 
nishment was whips or three days' hunger ; 
it may be upon this ground it was that 
Moses slew the Egyptian. Ambrose ocxn- 
mended him for so doing. 

Assert. — ^We «c6 obliged, by many bands, 
to expose our lives, goods, children, &c., in 
this cause of religion and of the unjust op'- 
pression of enemies, for the safety and de- 
fence of our dear brethren and true religion 
in England ; 1 Prov. xxiv. 11, 12, " If thou 



forbear to deliver them that are drawn to 
death, H^DS D^HpS (taken as captives to 
be killed,J and those tluit are ready to be 
slain. Ii thou sayest. Behold we knew it 
not, doih not he that pondereth the heart 
consider it ? and he that keepeth thy soul, 
doth he not know it ? and shall he not ren- 
der to every man according to his work ?" 
Mr Jermine is too nanow, who^ commenting 
on the place, resiricteth all to these two, 
that the priest diould deliver by interceding 
for the innocent, and the king by pardoning 
only. But to deliver is a work of violence, 
as (1 Sam. xxx. 18) David by the sword 
rescued his wives ; Hos. v. 14, " I will take 
away, and none Aa^ rescue ;" 1 Sanu xvii. 
35, '^ I rescued the lambs out of his mouth," 
out of the lion's mouth, which behoved to be 
done with great violence; 2 Kings xviii. 
34, « They have not delivered ^^^%i7} O 
Samaria out of my hand." So ComeL k 
Lapide, Chcmtas m»adety nt vi et armis 
eruamus injuste dudos ad martemk Am- 
brose {Ub, 1, ojki c 36) citeth this same 
text, and commendeth Moses wlio killed the 
Egyptian in defending a Hebrew man. To 
deliver is an act of charity, and so to be 
done, though the judge forbnid it, when the 
innocent is unjustly put to death. 

Olj. — But in so doing, private men may 
offer violence to the lawnil magistrate when 
he unjustly putteth an innocent man to 
death, and rescue him out of the hands of 
the magistrate ; and this were to bring in 
anarchy and confusion ; for if it be an act of 
charity to deliver the innocent out of the 
hands of the magistrate, it is homicide to a 
private man not to do it ; for our obedienoe 
to the law of nature tyeth os absolutely, 
though the magistrate forbid these ax^; for 
it is known that I must obey Crod rather 
than men. 

Ans. — 1, The law of nature tyeih us to 
obedience in acts of charity, yet not to per- 
form these acts after any way and manner 
in a m&ce natural way, impetu nostwrcR; but 
I am to perform acts of natural charity in a 
rational and prudent way, and in lookmg to 
God's law, else, if my brother or ftther were 
justly condemned to. did, I might violently 
deliver him out of the magistrate's hand, 
but, by the contrary, my hand should be first 
on him, without natural compassion. As, ii 
my brother or my wife have been a blasphe- 
mer of God, (Deut. xiii. 6—^,) therefore, 
I am to do acts natural, as a wise man ob- 
serving (as Solomon saith, Ecdes. viii. 5) 



J 



^ ■■ 



THE LAW AND THB PRINCE. 



189 



" both time and judgment." Now, it were 
no wisdom for one private man to hazard 
his own life hj attempting to rescue an inno- 
cent brother, because he hath not strength 
to do it, and the law of nature obligeth me 
not to acts of charity when I, in all reason, 
see them impossible ; but a multitude who 
had strength did well to rescue innocent 
Jonathan oat oi the hands of the king, that 
he should not be put to death ; yet one man 
was not tyed by the law of nature to rescue 
Jonathan if the king and prince had con- 
demned him, though unjustly. 

2. The host of men that helped David 
against kins Saul (1 Sam. xzii. 2) entered 
in a lawM war, and (1 Chron. xii. 18) 
Amasa, by the Spirit of the Lord, blesseth 
his helpers,^ — *' reaoe, peace be unto thee, 
and peace be to thy helpers, for thy God 
helpeth thee.^' Therefore, peace must be 
to the parliament of Endand, and to their 
helpers, thdr brethren of Scotland. 

S. Numb, xxjpi. 1 — 3, dec. ; Josh. i. 12 
— 14, the children of Gad, and of Keuben, 
and the Indf tribe of Manasseh, though their 
inheritance fell to be on this side of Jordan, 
yet they were to go over the rivw armed, to 
fight for their brethren, while they had f^o 
possession of the knd, at the commandment 
of Moses and Joshua. 

4. So Saul and Israel helped the men of 
Jabesh-Gilead c(»ijomed in blood with them, 
against Nahadli the Ammonite, and hn un- 
just conditions in plucking out their right 
eyes, 1 Sam. xi. 

5. Jephtha (Judg. xii. 2) justly rebuketh 
the men of Ephraim because they would 
•not help him and his peo^e against the 
Anomonites. 

6. If the communion of saints be any 
bond, — that England and we have ** one 
Ikord, one &ith, one baptism, one head and 
^viour, Jesus Christ," then are we obliged 
to help our bleeding sisterK^hurch against 
these same common enemies, papists and 
prelates ; but the former is undeniably tcae^ 
tor we send help to the Hochelle, if there 
had not been a secret betraying of our bre- 
thren, we send help to the recovery of the 
palatinate, and the aid of the confederate 
princes agauist BabePs strenj^h and power, 
and that lawiuUy, but we did it at great 
leisure and coldly. Queen Elizabeth helped 
Holland agamst the king of Spain ; and, ho- 
rdes the union in religion, we sail in one 
iship together, being in one island, under one 
■king; and now, by the mercy of God, have 



sworn one covenant, and so must stand or 
fall together. 

7. We are obliged, by the union betwixt 
the kingdoms, concluded to be by the Con- 
vention of the Estates of Scotland^ anno 
1585, at the desire of the General Assem- 
bly, 1583, to join forces together at home, 
and enter in league with protestant princes 
and estates abrcmd, to mamtain the protesh 
tant rdigion against the bloody confederacy 
of Trent ; and, accordingly, this league be- 
tween the two crowns was subscribed at 
Berwick, 1586, and the same renewed, 
1567^8, as also the Confession of Faith sub- 
scribed, when the Spanish armada was on 
our coasts. 

8. The law of God, commanding that we 
love our neighbour as ourselves, and there- 
fore to defend one another against unjust 
violence, {L ut vim, /; de ju9t. et jur.,) 
obligeth us to the same, except we think 
Gk>d can be pleased with lip-love in word 
only, which the Spirit of God condemneth 
(1 John ii. 9, 10 ; iii. 16). And the sum of 
law and prophets is, that as we would not 
men should reRise to help us when we are 
unjustly oppressed, so neither would we so 
serve our afflicted brethren, (I. in facto ff, 
de cand, et demonstr, sect, St uxor. Jtutk, 
de n«tp^.) 

9. £v«ry man is a keeper of his brother's 
life. There is a voluntary homidde when a 
man rofbseth food or physic necessary for his 
own life, and refuseth food to his dying bro- 
ther; and men are not bom for themsmves; 
and when the king defendeth not subjects 
against their enemies, all fellow-subiects, by 
t£e law of nature, of nations, the krU and 
<j»m,on law, have a natural privilege to de- 
fend one another, and are mutual magistrates 
to one another when there be no omer ma- 
gistrates. If an army of Turics or pagans 
would come upon Britain, if the kii^ were 
dead, as he is civilly dead in this juncture of 
time, when he reluseth to help his subjects, 
one part of Britain would help another ; as 
Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, did right in 
helping Ahab and Israel, so the Lord had 
approved of the war. If the left hand be 
wounded, and the left eye put out, nature 
teacheth that the whole burden of natural 
acts is devolved on the other hand and eye, 
and so are they obliged to help one another. 

10. As we are to bear one another's bur- 
dens, and to help our enemies to compas- 
sionate strangers, so far more those who 
make one body of Christ with us. 



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• !»• 




THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



191 



justice and equity of commanding ; hence 
from this last I shall set down the first 
thesis. 

Assert, 1. — An absolute and unlimited 
monarchj is not only not the best form of 
government, but it is the worst, and this is 
against our petty Prelate and all royalists. 
My reasons are tiiese : — 1. Because it is an 
unlawful ordinance, and God never ordained 
it; and I cannot ascribe the superlative 
degree to anything of which I aeny the 
positive. Absolute government in a sinful 
Ind peaceable man is a wicked goyemment, 
and not a power from God, for God never 
gave a power to sin. Plenitudo potestatis 
ad mcUum et injunam non eaotendkur, 
Sozenus Junior (cans, 66) in catAsa occur^ 
renti (Z. 2). Ferdinand. Loazes in stio 
sans, pro March, de Velez. (p, 54, n, 66) , 



s 



and so that learned senator, Ferd. Vasquez 
(p. 1, 1. 1, c. 5, n. 17). 2. It was better 
tor ^e state tfaAt Epiminondas could not 
sleep than that he oould sleep, when the 
people were dancing, because, said he, *^ I 
wake that you may have leave to sleep and 
be secure ;" for he was upon deep cogitations 
how to do good to the commonwealui when 
the people were upon their pleasures ; be- 
cause all kings, since the Tall of the father, 
king Adam, are inclined to sin and injustice, 
and so had need to be guided by a law, even 
because they are kings, so they remain men. 
Omnipotency in one that can sin is a 
cursed power. With reason all our divines 
say, the state of saving grace in the second 
Adam, where there is non passe dejficerey 
they caxmot fall away from God, is better 
than the state of the first Adam, where 
there was passe non deficere^ a power not to 
fall away ; and that our fr^e will is better 
in our countnr in heaven, where we cannot 
sin, than in the way to our country, on earth, 
where we have a power to sin ; and so Grod's 
peo^e is in a better case, (Hosea, ii. 6, 7») 
*' Where her power to overtake her lovers 
is closed up with an hedge of thorns that she 
cannot find her paths ;" then the condition 
of Ephraim, of whom God saith, (Hosea, iv. 
17>) ^^ Ephraim is joined to idols, let him 
alone." So cannot that be a good govern- 
ment when the supreme power is in a sinful 
man, as inclinable to injustice by nature as 
any man, and more inclinable to injustice 
by the condition of his place than any ; 
and yet by office he is one that can do no 
injustice against his subjects ; he is a king, 
and so may destroy Uriah, kill his subjects. 



but cannot sin; and this is, to flattering 
royalists, the best government in the world. 
As if an unchamed lion were the best go- 
vernor, because unchained, to all the beasts, 
sheep, and lambs, and all others, which 
with his teeth and paws he may reach, and 
that by virtue otan ordinance of God. 
3. What is one man under no restraint, but 
made a eod on earth, and so drunk with 
the grandeur of a sinning-god, here under 
the moon and clouds ? who may hear good 
counsel from men of his own choosing, yet 
is under no restraint of law to follow it, 
being the supreme power absolute, high, 
mighty, and an impeccable god on earth. 
Certainly this man may more easily err, 
and break out in violent acts of injustice, 
than a number of rulers, grave, wise, un- 
der a law. One being a sinful man, shall 
sooner sin and turn a Nero (when he may 

fo to hell, and lead thousands to hell witJb 
im gratis^ than a multitude of sinful men, 
who nave less power to do against law, and 
a tyrannous killing of innocents, and a sub- 
version of laws, hberties, and religion, by 
one who may, by office, and without resist- 
ance of mortal men, do all ill, is more dange- 
rous and hurtful than division and faction 
incident to aristocracy. 4. Geesar is great, 
but law and reason are greater ; by an abso- 
lute monarchy all things are ruled by wiU 
and pleasure above law ; then this govern- 
ment connot be so good as law and reason 
in a government by the best, or by many. 
5. Under absolute monarchy, a free people 
is, €Ktu 2>rima, and in themselves enslaved, 
because though the monarch, so absolute, 
should kill ^, he cannot be controlled; 
there is no more but flight, prayers, and 
tears remaining ; and wluit greater power 
hath a tyrant? None at aU, so may we 
say. An absolute monarch is, actu primoy 
a sleeping Hon, and a tyrant is a waking 
and a devouring Hon, and they differ in 
accidents only. 6. This is the papists' way. 
Bellarmine (de pontif,, I, 1, c. 1), and 
Sanderus (de vistbili Monorchia, I, 3, c, 3), 
Turrere (m sum de Ecdes. I. 2, c. 2l 
prove that the government of the church is 
by an absolute monarch and pope, because 
that is the best government imch yet is 
in question. So royalists prove common- 
wealths must be best governed by absolute 
monarchs, because that is the best govern- 
ment ; but the law saith, it is contrary to 
nature, even though people should paction 
to make a king absolute: Canventio praear- 



192 



LEX, rex; OB, 

- - • 



atoria ctd dilapidandum et disavpandwn 
Juri naturali contraria nulla esty L fiXiiu 
15, decond. Just. L Nepoa. procul 125, de 
verb, signif. L 188, u6t. de jwre Regni I. 
85, d» tit. 

Assert. 2. — ^Monarchy in its latitude-^ 
as heaven, and earth, and all the host there- 
in, are citizens — is the best government ab- 
solutely, because God's immediate govern- 
ment must be best ; but that other govern- 
ments are good or best so far as thej come 
near to this, must prove that there is a mo- 
narchy in angels ii there be a government 
and a monarchy amongst fishes, leasts, birds, 
&c. ; and that, if Adam had never sinned, 
there should be one monarchy amongst all 
mankind. I profess I have no eye to see 
what government could be in that state, but 
paternal, or marital; and, by this reason, 
there should be one catholic emperor over 
all the kings of the earth; a position held by 
some papists and interpreters of the cannon 
law, which maketh all the princes of the 
earth to be usurpers, except those who ao^ 
knowledge a catholic dominion of the whole 
earth in the emperor, to whom they submit 
themselves as vassals. If kings were gods 
and could not sin, and just, as Solomon in the 
the beginning of his. reign, and as David, I 
could say, monarchy so Umited must be bet- 
ter than anstocracgr or democracy, 1. Be- 
cause it is farthest irom injui^ice, nearest to 
peace and godliness. {M. I, 3, sect, aparet, 
ff. de advM.imtrat. tutor. I. 2, sect, novis- 
Ame^f. de orig. jw. Aristot. pel. I. ByC. 
10, Sodin. de Rep. I, 6, c. 4.) 2. Because 
God oidained this government in his people. 
3. By experience it is known to be less ob- 
noxious to chai^, except that some think 
the Venetian c(MnmonweaIth best ; but, with 
rever^Qce, I see small difference betweai a 
king and the Duke ef Venice. 

Assert. 3. — Every government hath some- 
thing wherein it k be«t ; monaidby is hon- 
ourable and glorious-like before men ; aris- 
tocracy, for counsel, is surest; democracy 
for liberty, and possibly for riches and gain, 
is best. Monarchy obtaineth its end with 
more conveniency, because the «hip is easier 
brought to land wh^i gob sitteth at the 
helm, than when tai move the helm. We 
more easily fear, love, obey, and serve one 
than many. He can more easily execute 
the laws. 

Assert. 4. — A limited and mixed monar- 
chy, such as is in Scotland and England, 
seems to me the best governmeoxt, when par^ 



liamentfi, with the king, have the good of all 
the three. This government hath glory, 
order, unity, from a monarch; from the 
government of the most and wisest, it hath 
safety of oounsel, stability, strength ; from 
the influence of the commons, it hath liber- 
ty, privileges, promptitude of obedience. 

Uhj. 1. — There is more power, terror, and 
love, in one than in many. 

Ans. — ^Not more power; terror oometh 
from sin, and so to nature fallen in sin, in 
circumstances a monarchy is best. 

Ohj. 2. — It is more convenient to nature 
that one should be lord than many. 

Ans. — To sinless nature, true, as in a fa- 
ther to many diildren. 

Ohj. 3. — ^Monarchy, for invention of coun- 
sels, execution, concealing of secrets, is above 
any other government. 

Ans.-^hsii is in some particulars, be- 
cause sin hath brought darlmess on us; so 
are we all dull of invention, slow in execu- 
tion, and by reason of the falseness of men, 
silence is needM ; bat this is the aeddentary 
state of nature, and otherwise there is safety 
in a multitude of counsellors; one command- 
ing all, without following counsel, trusteth in 
his own heart, and is a fool. 

Ohj. 4. — A monarch is above envy, be- 
cause he hath no equal. 

^ntf.-'-Granted ; in many things a mo- 
nardiy is more excellent, but that is no- 
thing to an abscdute monarchy, for which 
roya£sts contend. 

Ohj. 5. — In a multitude there be more 
fools than wise men, and a multitude (^ 
vices, and liUle virtue, is in many. 

Ans^^^-yL&ce multitude cannot govern in 
eitlier democracy of aristocracy, for then all 
diould be mlers, and none ruled, but many 
eyes see more than one, — by accident one 
may see more than hundreds, but accidents 
are not rules. 

06;, 6. — ^Monardiy is most perfect, be- 
cause most oj^osite to anarchy and most 
agreeable to nature, as is evident in plants, 
bu*ds, bees. 

. Ans. — Government of sinless nature vwd 
of reason, as in birds and bees, is weak to 
oondude politic civil government amongst 
men in ain, and especially absolute govern- 
ment. A king-bee is not absolute, nor & 
king-eagle, if either destroy its fellows, by 
nature all rise and destroy thdr king. A 
king-bee doth not act by counsel b<Mn*owed 
from felk)w4)ees, as a king must do, and 
joommunioation of counsels lesseneth abso- 




luteness of a man. I see not how a monar- 
chy is more opposite to anarchy and confu- 
sion than other governments. A monarch, 
as one, is more opposite to a multitude, as 
many, but there is no less order in aristo- 
cracy than in monarchy ; for a government 
essentially includeth order of commanding 
and subjection. Now, one is not, for abso- 
luteness, more contrary to anarchy than 
many ; for that one now who can easily slip 
from a king to a tyrant, cannot have a ne- 
gative voice in acts of justice, for then should 
he have a legal power to oppose justice, 
and so, for his absoluteness, he should be 
most contrary to order of justice ; and a mo- 
narch, because absolute, should be a door- 
neighbour to disorder and confusion. 

06;. — But the parliament hath no power 
to deny their voices to things just, or to 
cross the law of God, more than the king. 

Ans, — It is true neither of them hatn a 
negative voice against law and reason, but if 
the monarch, by his exorbitant power, may 
deny justice, he may, by that same legal 
power, do all injustice ; and so there is no 
absoluteness in either. 

Ohj, — ^Who should then punish and co- 
erce the parliament in the case of exorbi- 
tance? 

Ans, — Posterior parliaments. 

Ohj. — Posterior parliaments and people 
may both err. 

Am, — All is true; God must remedy that 
only. 



QUESTION XXXIX. 

WHETHER OR NO ANY PREROGATIVE AT ALL 
ABOVE THE LAW BE DUE TO THE KING, OR 
IF " JURA MAJESTATIS" BE ANY SUCH PRE- 
ROGATIVE ROYAL. 

I conceive kings are conceived to have a 
threefold supreme power. 1. Strictly abso- 
lute to do what they please, their will being 
simply a law. This is tyrannical. Some 
kings have it, de facto ^ ex consuetudine, but 
by a divine law none have it. I doubt if 
any have it by a human positive law, except 
the great Turk and the king of Spain, over 
his conquest without the borders of Europe, 
and some few other conquerors. 2. There 
is another power limited to God's law, the 
due proper right of kings. (Deut. xvii. 18 — 
20.) 3. There is, a poteitas intermedia^ a 



middle power, not so vast as that which is 
absolute and tyrannical, which yet is some 
way human. This I take what jurists call 
jus regium, lex regia, jura regalia regis ; 
Cicero, jura majestatis ; Livius, jura tm- 
periiy and these royal privileges are such 
common and high dignities as no one parti- 
cular magistrate can have, seeing they are 
common to all the kingdom, as that Ceesar 
only should coin money in his own name. 
Hence the penny given to Christ, because 
it had Caesar's image and superscription, 
(Matt. xxii. 20, 21,) infers by way of argu- 
mentation, i^^arl 9V9, &c., give therefore 
tribute to Caesar as his due ; so the maga- 
zine and armoury for the safety of the kinff- 
dora is in the king's hand. The king hath 
the like of these privileges, because he is the 
common, supreme, public officer and minis- 
ter of God for the good of all the kingdom ; 
and, amongst these royal pnTUeges, I reckon 
that power that is given to the king, when 
he is made king, to do many things without 
warrant of the letter of the law, without the 
express consent of his council, which he can- 
not always carry about with him, as the law 
saith. The kin^ shall not raise armies with- 
out consent oi the parliament; but if an 
army of Irish, or Danes, or Spaniards, 
should suddenly land in Scotland, he hath 
a power, without a formally-convened par- 
liament, to command them all to rise in 
arms against these invaders and defend 
themselves, — ^this power no inferior magis- 
trate hath as he is, but such a magistrate. 
And in many such exigencies, when the ne- 
cessity of justice or grace requireth an ex- 
temporal exposition of laws, pro re nata, 
for present necessary execution, some say 
only the emperor, — others, all kings have 
these pleasures. I am of the mind of Ar- 
nisaeus,^ that these privileges are not re- 
wards given to princes for their great pains; 
for the king is not obHged to govern the 
commonwealth because he receiveth these 
royal privileges as his reward, but because 
by office he is obliged to govern the com- 
monwealth; thereiore these privileges are 
given to him, and without them he could 
not so easily govern. But I am utterly 
against Amiseeus, who saith, "These are 
not essential to a king, because (saith he) he 
createth marquises, dukes, nobles, &c., and 
constituteth magistrates, not because of his 
royal dignity, but by reason of his aboslute 

1 Arnls8BU9 de jure, 6 maj. c. 1, n. 3, p. 157, 158. 

2t> 



194 



LEX, RKX ; OR, 



power; for many princes have supreme 
power and cannot make nobles, and there- 
fore to him they are jura majestatis^ non 
jura potestatis. 

Ans, 1. — The king, sappose a limited 
king, may and ought to make nobles, for he 
may confer honours as a reward of virtue ; 
none can say Pharaoh, by his absolute au- 
thority, and not as a kins, advanced Joseph 
to be a noble ruler. We cannot say that, 
for there was merit and worth in mm de- 
serving that honour; and Darius, not by 
absolute authoritv, but on the ground of 
well-deservinff, (the rule by which kings 
are obliged, m justice, to confer honours,) 
promoted Daniel to be the first president 
of all his kingdoms, because, (Daii. vi. 3,) 
" an excellent spirit was in him ;" and in 
justice the king could ennoble none rather 
than Daniel, except he should fail against 
the rule of conferring honours. It is ac- 
knowledged by all, that honos est prcemium 
virtuUSf honour is founded upon virtue ; 
and therefore Darius did not this out of 
his absolute majesty, but as king. 

2. All kings as kings, and by a divine 
law of God, and so by no absoluteness of 
majesty, are to make men of ¥risdom, fear- 
ing Grod, hating covetousness, judges under 
them, Deut, i. 13; 2 Chron. xix. 6, 7; 
Psal. ci. 6—8. 

3. J£ we suppose a king to be limited, as 
Grod's king is, (Deut. xvii. 18 — 20,) yet is 
it his part to confer honours upon the 
worthiest. Now, if he have no absolute- 
ness of majesty, he cannot confer honours 
out of a prmdple that is none at all, unum 
quodque sicut est, ita operatur ; and if the 
people confer honours, then must royalists 
mnt that there is an absolute majesty in 
the people, why then mav they not derive 
majesty to a king ? and why then do royal- 
ists taUk to us of Grod's immediate creating 
of kings, without any intervening action of 
the people ? 

4. By this absoluteness of majesty, kings 
may play the tyrant, as Samuel (1 Sam. 
viii. 9 — 14) foretelleth Saul would clo. But 
I cannot believe that kings have the same 
very official absolute power, from whence 
they do both acts of grace, goodness, and 
justice, such as are to expone laws extem- 

E orally in extraordinary cases, — ^to confer 
onours upon good and excellent men of 
grace, — to pardon offenders upon good 
grounds, and also do acts of extreme ty- 
ranny I for out of the same fountain doth 



not proceed both sweet water and bitter. 
Then by this absoluteness kings cannot do 
acts of goodness, justice, and grace, and so 
they must do good as kings, and they must 
do acts of tyranny as men, not &om ab- 
soluteness of majesty. 

5. Inferior magistrates, in whom Hiere 
is no absoluteness of majesty, according to 
royalists, may expound laws also extempo- 
rally, and do acts of justice, without forma- 
lities of civil or municipal laws, so they keep 
the genuine intent of the law, as they may 
pardon one that goeth up to the wall of a 
city, and discovereth the approach of the 
enemy, when the watchmen are sleeping, 
though the law be, that any ascending to 
the wall of the cily shall die. Also, the 
inferior judge may make judges and depu- 
ties under himself. 

6. This distinction is neither grounded 
upon reason or laws, nor on any word of 
(rod. Not the former, as is proved before, 
for there is no absolute power in a king to 
do above or against law; all the o&cial 

Sower that a king hath, is a royal power to 
good, for the safety and good othis sub- 
jects, and that according to law and reason, 
and there is no other power given to a king 
as a king; and for Scripture, Amisfeus al- 
legeth, 1 Sam. viii. tne manner or law 
of the king, ver. 9, 11, and he saith. It 
cannot be tlie custom and manner of the 
king, but must be the law of absolute ma- 
jesty, 1. Because it was the manner of in- 
ferior judges, as Tiberius said of his judges, 
to flay the people, when they were com- 
manded to snearthem only. 2. Samuel's 
sons, who wrested judgment and perverted 
the law, had this manner and custom to 
oppress the people, as did the sons of Eli ; 
and, therefore, without reason it is called 
the law of kings, jus reaumy if it was the 
law of the judges ; for it all this law be ty- 
rannical, and but an abuse of kingly power, 
the same law may agree to all other magis- 
trates, who, by the same unjust power, may 
abuse their power; but Samuel (as Bren- 
tius observeth, homi. 27, in 1 Sam. tnprtnc.) 
doth mean here a greater license than kings 
can challenge, if at any time they would 
make use of their plentitude of absolute 
power ; and therefore, nomine juris, by 
the word law here, he understandeth a 
power granted by law, jwe, or right to the 
King, but pernicious to the people, which 
Gregory calleth jus regium tyrannorum, 
the royal law of tyrants. — So Seneca, 1 de 



'♦-- 



:3: 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



195 



clem, c. 11, hoc interest inter regem et tV" 
rannumy species ipsa fortunce ac Hcentice 
par estj ntsi quod tyranni ex voluntate 
scBviunty reges non nisi ex causa et neceS' 
sitate f quid ergo ? non reges quoque occt- 
dere solent ? sed quoties fieri pvJblica utt- 
litas persuadet, tyrannis scevitia cordi est. 
A tyrant in this differeth from a king, Qui 
ne ea quidem vult^ qtux sibi licent^ that a 
king wul not do these things which are law- 
ful ; a tyrant doth quae libet, what he pleas- 
eth to do. 

Ans. 1. Amisseas betray eth his ignor- 
ance in the Scriptures, for me word tSBti^D 
signifieth a custom, and a wicked custom, 
as by many Scriptures I have proved al- 
ready : his reasons are poor. It is the man- 
ner of inferior judges, as we see in the sons 
df Eli and Samuel, to pervert judgment, as 
well as king Saul did ; but ti^e king may 
more oppress, and his tyranny hath more 
colour, and is more catholic than the op- 
pression of inferior judges. It is not Sa- 
muel's purpose thus to dutinguish the judges 
of Israel and the kings, in that the judges 
had no power granted them of Grod to op- 
press, because the people might judge theur 
judges and resist them; and there was 
power given of God to the king, so far to 
play the tyrant, that no man could resist 
him, or say. What dost thou ? The text will 
not bear any such difference ; for it was as 
unlawM to resist Moses, Joshua, Samuel, 
(as royalists prove from the judgment of 
Grod that came upon Korah, jDaman, and 
Abiram,) as to resist king Saul and king 
David : royalists doubt not to make Moses a 
king. It was also no less sin to resist Sa- 
muel's sons, or to do violence to their per- 
sons, as judging for the Lord, and sent by 
the supreme judge, their &ther Samuel, 
than it was sin to resist many inferior judges 
that were lions and even wolves under the 
kings of Israel and Judah, so they judged 
for the Lord, and as sent by the supreme 
magistrate. But the difference was in this, 
that judges were extraordinarily raised up 
of God out of any tribe he pleased, and 
were believers, (Heb. xi. 32,) saved by faith, 
and so used not their power to oppress the 
people, though inferior judges, as the sons 
of Eli and Samuel, perverted judgment; 
and therefore in the time of the judges, 
God, who gave them saviours and judges, was 
their king ; but kings were tyed to a certain 
tribe, especially the line of David, to the 
kingdom of Judah. 



2. They were hereditary, but judges are 
not so. 

3. They were made and chosen by the 
people, (Deut. xvii. 14, 16 ; 1 Sam. x. 17 — 
20 ; 2 Sam. v. 1 — 3,) as were the kings of 
the nations ; and the first king, (though a 
king be the lawful ordinance of God,) was 
sought from God in a sinful imitation of the 
nations, (1 Sam. viii. 19, 20,) and therefore 
were not of Grod's peculiar election, as the 
judges, and so they were wicked men, and 
many of them, yea, all for the most part, 
did evil in the sight of the Lord, and their 
law, tO&tS^D) their manner and custom, was 
to oppress the people, and so were their in- 
ferior judges little tyrants, and lesser lions, 
leoparos, evening wolves. (Ezek. xxii. 27 ; 
Mic. iii. 1 — 3 ; Isa. iii. 14, 16.) And the 
kings and inferior judges are only distin- 
guiuied, de facto f that the king was a more 
catholic oppressor, and the old lion, and so 
had more art and power to catch Uie prey 
than the inferior judges, who were but 
whelps, and had less power, but all were op- 
pressors, (some few excepted, and Samuel 
speaketh of that which Saul was to be, de 
facto, not de jure, and the most part of the 
Idngs after him,) and this tyranny is well 
called jtis regis, the manner of uie king, 
and not the maimer of the judges, because 
it had not been the practice, custom, and 
tOBB^O, of the believing judges^ before 
Saul's reign, and while God was nis people's 
king, (1 Sam, viii. 7,) to oppress. We grant 
that all other inferior judges, after the peo- 
ple cast off God's government, and, in imi- 
tation of the nations, would have a king, 
were also lesser tyrants, as the king was a 
greater tyrant, and that was a punishment 
of their rejecting God and Samuel to be 
their King and judge. How shall Amis- 
8BUS prove that this manner or tODU^D of the 
king was, potestas concessa, a power grant- 
ed, I hope, granted of God, and not an 
abuse of kingly power ; for then he and roy- 
alists must say, that all the acts of tyranny 
ascribed to king Saul, (1 Sam. viii. 11 — 14,^ 
by reason of which they did cry out, ana 
complain to Grod because of their oppres- 
sion, was no abuse of power given to Saul ; 
therefore it was an use, and a lawful use of 
power given of Grod to their king, for there 
IS no medium betwixt a lawftd power used 
in moral acts, and a lawftd power abused ; 
and, indeed, Amiseeus so distinguisheth a 
king and a tyrant, that he maketh them all 
one in nature and specie. He saith, a ty- 



il 



196 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



T 



rant doth, quod Ucet, that which hj law he 
may do, and a king doth not these things, 
quce Ucenty which bj law he maj do ; but, 
so to me it is clear, a tyrant, acting as a ty- 
rant, must act according to this DDt^D ^^ 
of the king, and that which is lawtiil, and a 
king, acting as a king, and not doing these 
things that are lawful, must sin against his 
office, and the power that God hath given 
to him, which were to commend and praise 
the tyrant, and to condemn and dispraise 
the kmg. If this law of the king be a per- 
missive law of Grod, which the King may, 
out of his absoluteness, put in execution to 
oppress the people, such as a law of a bill of 
divorcement, as Arnisseus, Barclay, and 
other royalists say, then must God have 
given a law to every king to play the tyrant, 
because of the hardness of the king's heart ; 
but we would gladly see some word of God 
for this. The law of a bill of divorcement 
is a mere positive law, permitted in a par- 
ticular exigent, when a nusband, out of le- 
vity of heart and affection, cannot love his 
wife ; therefore God by a law permitted 
him out of indulgence to put her away, that 
both might have a seed, (the want where- 
of, because of the blessed Seed to be bom 
of woman, was a reproach in Israel,) and 
though this was an affliction to some parti- 
cular women, yet the intent of the law, and 
the soul thereof, was a public benefit to the 
commonwealth of Israel, of which sort of 
laws I judge the hard usage permitted by 
God to his people — in the master toward 
the servant — and the people of Grod toward 
the stranger, of whom they might exact 
usury — though not toward their brethren. 
But that Grod should make a permissive law, 
that Jeroboam might press all Israel to sin 
and worship the golden calves ; and that a 
king by law may kill, as a bloody Nero, all 
the people of God, by a divine permissive 
law, hath no warrant in Grod's word. Judge^ 
reader, if royalists make God to confer a 
benefit on a land, when he giveth them a 
king, if by a law of Grod, such as the law for 
a bill of divorcement, the king may kill and 
devour, as a lawful absolute lion, six king- 
doms of nations that profess Christ and bi- 
lieve in his name. For if the king have a 
divine law to kill an innocent Jonathan, so 
as it be unlawful to resist him, he may, by 
that same law, turn bloodier than either 
Nero, Julian, or any that ever sucked the 
paps of a lioness, or of whom it may be said, 
Qoaoqae dedit nntrix ubera, tigris erat, 



and he shall be given as a plague of Grod, 
ew conditione doni^ to the people, and the 
people, inasmuch as they are gifted of God 
with a king, to feed them in a peaceable and 
godly life, must be made slaves; now, it 
wanteth reason, that God will have a permis- 
sive law of murdering the church of Christ, 
a law so contrary to the public good and in- 
trinsical intention of a kmg, and to the im- 
mutable and eternal law ot nature, that one 
man, because of his power, may, by God's 
permissive law, murder millions of innocents. 
Some may say, " It is against the duty of 
love, that by nature and God's law the hus- 
band owes to the wife, (£phes. v. 25,) that 
the husband should put away his wife ; for 
God hateth putting away, and yet God made 
a law, that a husband might give his wife 
a bill of divorce, and so put her away ; and 
by the same reason, Goa may make a law, 
though against nature, that a king should 
kill and murder, without all resistance." 

Ans. — 1. The question is not, if God 
may make permissive laws to oppress the in* 
nocent ; I grant he may do it, as he may 
command Abraham to kill his son Isaac ; and 
Abraham by law is obHged to kill him, ex- 
cept Grod retract his commandment, and whe- 
ther God retract it or not, he may intend to 
kill his son, which is an act of love and obe- 
dience to God ; but this were more than a 
permissive law. 2. We have a clear Scrip- 
ture for a permissive law of divorce, and it 
was not a law tending to the universal de- 
struction of a whole kingdom, or many king- 
doms, but only to the grievance of some par- 
ticular wives ; but the law of divorce gave 
not power to all husbands to put away meir 
wives, but only to the husband who could not 
command his affection to love his wife. But 
this law of the king is a catholic law to all 
kings, (for royalists will have all kings so 
absolute, as it is sin and disobedience to God 
to resist any,) that all kings have a divine 
law to kill aU their subjects ; surely, then, it 
were better for the diurch to want such 
nurse-fathers, as have absolute power to suck 
their blood ; and for such a perpetual per- 
missive law continuing to the end of the 
world, there is no word of God. Nor can 
we think that the hardness of one prince's 
heart can be a ground for God to make a 
law, so destructive to his church and all 
mankind; such a permissive law, being a 
positive law of God, must have a word of 
Christ for it, else we are not to receive it. 
Arnisffius, (cap, 4. distru, T^rcm. et pnnc. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



197 



n, 16 J thinketh a tyrant, in exercitOy be- 
coming a notorious tyrant, when there is no 
other remedy, may be removed from govern- 
ment, sine magno scelere, without great 
sin. But, I ask, how men can annul any di- 
vine law of God, though but a permissive law. 
For if God's permissive law warrant a ty- 
rant to kill two innocent men, it is tyranny 
more or less, and the law distinguisheth not. 
3. This permissive law is expressly contrary 
to God's law, limiting all kings. (Deut. xvii. 
16 — 18.) How then are we to believe that 
Grod would make an universal law contrary 
to the law that he established before Israel 
had a king ? 4. What Brentius saith is 
much for us, for he calleth this {OQtJ^D law 
a licence, and so to use it, must be licen- 
tiousness. 5. Amiseeus desireth that kings 
may use sparingly the plenitude of their 
pwer for public good ; there must be, saith 
he, necessity to make it lawful to use the 
plenitude of their power justly ; therefore 
Ahab sinned, in that he unjustly possessed 
Naboth's vineyard, though he sinned spe- 
cially in this, Uiat he came to the possession 
by murder, and it was peculiar to the Jews 
that they could not transfer their possessions 
from one tribe to another. But if it be so, 
then this power of absoluteness is not given 
by permissive law, by which God permitted 
putting away of wives, for the object of a 
permissive law is sin ; but this plenitude of 
power may be justly put forth in act, saith 
lie, if the public good may be regarded. I 
would know what public good can legitimate 
tyranny and killing of the innocent, — ^the 
intentions of men can make nothing intrin- 
sically evil to become good* 6. How can that 
be a permissive law of God, and not his ap- 
proving law, by which kings create inferior 
judges ? for this is done by God's approving 
will, 7* It is evident that Amisseus' mind 
is, that kings may take their subjects' vine- 
yards and their goods, so they err not in 
the manner and way of the act ; so be like, 
if there had not been a peculiar law that 
Naboth should not sell his vineyard, and if 
the king had had any public use for it, he 
might have taken Naboth's vineyard from 
him ; but he ^ecially sinned, saith he, in eo 
mcucime mtpafu/r^ ^c, that he took away 
the man's vineyard by murdering of him ; 
therefore, saith Amisaeus, (c, 1. de potest, 
maj, in bona privato* 2,) that by the king's 
law, (1 Sam. viii.,) " There is given to the 
king, a dominion over the people's sons, 
daughters, fields, vineyards, olive-yards, ser- 



vants, and flocks." So he citeth that, that 
Daniel puttoth all places, the rocks of the 
mountams, the birds of the heaven, (Dan. 
ii.,) under the king's power. So all is the 
king's in dominion, and the subjects in use 
only. 

But 1. This law of the king, then, can be 
no ground for the king's absoluteness above 
law, and there can be no permissive law of 
God here ; for that which asserteth the 
king's royal dominion over persons and 
things, that must be the law of God's ap- 
proving, not his permitting evil ; but this is 
such a law as Amisaeus saith. 

2. The text speaketh of no law or law- 
ftil power, or of any absoluteness of king 
Saul, but of his wicked custom, and his ra- 
pine and tyranny, ** He will take your sons, 
your daughters, your fields, and your vine- 
yards from you." Saul took not these 
through any power of dominion by law, but 
by mere tyranny. 

3. I have before cleared that the subjects 
have a propriety, and an use also, else how 
could we be obliged, by virtue of the fifth 
commandment, to pay tribute to the king, 
(Rom. xiii. 7,) for that which we pay was 
as much the king's before we paid as when 
we have paid it. 

4. Amisseus saith, all are the king's, in 
respect of tlie universal jurisdiction that the 
king hath in governing and ordering all to 
the universal end, the good of the common- 
wealth ; for as universal nature careth for the 
conservation of the specie and kind, so doth 
particular nature care for the conservation of 
individuals, so do men care for their private 
goods, and the king is to refer every man's 
private goods to the good of the public. But 
the tru^ is, this taketh not away propriety 
of goods from private men, retaining only the 
use to private men, and giving the dominion 
to the xing, because this power that the king 
hath of men's goods is not power of domi- 
nion, that the king hath over the goods of 
men, as if the king were dominus, lord and 
owner of the fields and momes of the private 
subject; but it is a power to regulate the 
goods for a public use, and supposeth the 
abuse of goods, when they are monopolised 
to and for private ends. The power that 
the king hath over my bread is not a power 
of dominion, so as he may eat my bread as 
if it were his own bread, and he be lord of 
my bread as I was sometime myself, before 
I abused it, but it is a dominion improperly 
and abusively so called, and is a mere fidu- 



i^tmmmmm^^^^ 



198 



LEX, RBX ; OB, 



dary and dispensatory power, because he is 
set over my bread not to eat it, nor over mj 
houses to dwell in them, but only with a mi* 
nisterial power, as a public though honoura- 
ble servant and watchman, appomted by the 
community as a mean for an end, to regulate 
my bread, houses, monies and fields, mr the 
good of the public. Dominion is defined " a 
»culty to use a thing as you please, except 
you be hindered by force or by law;" (Jus' 
tin. tit. c. de leaibus in l. digna voXy ^c. ;) 
so have I a dominion over my own gar- 
ments, house, money, to use them for uses 
not forbidden by the law of God and man, 
but I may not lay my oom-field waste, that 
it shall neither bear grass nor com, — ^the 
king may hinder that, because it is a hurt to 
the public ; but the king, as lord and sove- 
reign, hath no such dominion over Naboth's 
vineyard. How the king is lord of all goods, 
ratione jurisdictionisy et tuitionia se. Ann 
tan. de paudrill. in I. ; Altius. n. 6, c. de 
servit; Hottom. illust. quest, q. 1, adfin.^ 
cone. 2 ; Lod. Molin. de just, et jur. dis. 
25; Soto, de jtistitia et jur. L 4, q. 4, 
art, 1. 



QUESTION XL. 

WHXTHSB OR NO THB PEOPLE HAVE ANY 
POWER OYER THE KINO, EITHER BT HIS 
OATH, COVENANT, OR ANY OTHER WAY. 

Aristotle saith, (Ethic, 8, c. 12, j 'O fikf 

un$ tuu «•«#•# r«f itym$97$ vfri(i;^*rv, "A ty- 
rant seeketh his own, a king the good of 
the subjects ; for he is no kmg who is not 
content and excelleih in goo<Siess." The 
former part of these words distinguish essen- 
tially the king by his office from the tyrant. 
Now, every office requireth essentially a duty 
to be performed by him that is in office ; 
and, where there is a duty required, there 
is some obligation ; — if it be a pohtic duty, 
it is a poHtic obligation. 1. Now, amon^ 
pohtic duties betwixt equal and equal, supe- 
rior and inferior, that is not, de facto^ re- 
quired co-action for the performance thereof, 
but, de jure, there is ; for two neighbour 
kings and two neighbour nations, both being 
equal and independent the one toward the 
the other, the one owes a duty to the other; 



and if the Ammonites do a wrong to David 
and Israel, as they are equal, de facto, the 
one cannot punish the other, though the 
Ammonites do a disgrace to David's messen- 
gers, yet, de jure^ David and Israel may 
compel them to poHtic duties of pohtic con- 
sociation, (for betwixt independent kingdoms 
there must be some pohtic government, and 
some poHtic and dvu laws, for two or three 
making a society cannot dwell together with- 
out some pohcy,) and David and Israel, as by 
the law of nature they may repel violence 
with violence ; so, if the laws ot neighbour- 
hood and nations be broken, the one may 
{nmish the other, though there be no reU^ 
tion of superiority and inferiority betwixt 
them. 2. Wherever there is a covenant 
and oath betwixt equals, yea, or superiors 
and inferiors, the one hath some co-active 
power over the other ; if the father give his 
bond to pay to his son ten thousand pounds, 
as his patrimony to him, though before the 
giving of the bond the fatiier was not obliged 
but only by the law of nature to give a pa- 
trimony to his son; yet now, by a pohtic 
obUgation of promise, covenant, and writ, he 
is obliged so to his son to pay ten thousand 
pounds, that, by the law ot nations and the 
civil law, the son hath now a co-active power 
by law to comj^l his father, though his supe- 
rior, to pay hun no less than ten thousand 
pounds of patrimony. Though, therefore, 
the king should stand simply superior to his 
kingdom and estates, (whicn I shall never 
grant,^ yet if the king come under covenant 
with nis kingdom, as I have proved at 
length, (c. 13^ he must, by that same, come 
under some co-active power to fiilfil his cove- 
nant ; for omne pronUssum (saith the law) 
cadit in dehitum, what any doth promise 
falleth under debt. If the covenant be politic 
and civil, as is the covenant between king 
David and all Israel, (2 Sam. v. 1 — 3,) ana 
between king Jehoasn and the people, (2 
Kings xi. 17, 18,) then the king must come 
under a civil obligation to perform the cove- 
nant ; and, thou^ there be none superior 
to king and the people on earth, to compel 
them both to penorm what they have pro- 
mised, yet, de jure, by the law of nations, 
each may compel the other to mutual per- 
formance. This is evident, — 

1. By the law of nations, if one nation 
break covenant to another, though both be 
independent, yet hath the wronged nation a 
oo-acdve power, de jure, (by accident, be- 
cause they are weaker they want strength to 



THB ULW AND THB PBIKCB. 



199 



oompel, yet they have right to compel them,) 
to force the other to keep covenant, or then 
to punish them, because nature teacheth to 
repel violence by violence, so it be done 
without desire of revenge and malice. 

2. This is proved from the nature of a 
promise or covenant, for Solomon saith, 
?Prov. vi. 1, 2,) " My son, if thou be surety 
tor thy friend, if thou hast stricken thy hand 
with a stranger, thou art snared with the 
words of thy mouth, and art taken with the 
words of thy mouth." But whence is it that 
a man free is now snared as a beast in a gin 
or trap ? Certainly Solomon saith it is by a 
word and striking of hands, by a word oi 
promise and covenant. Now, the creditor 
nath co-active power, though he be an equal 
or an inferior to the man i^o is surety, even 
by law to force him to pay, and the judge is 
obliged to give his co-active power to the 
creditor, that he may force the surety to 
pay. Hence it is clear, that a covenant 
maketh a free man under the co-active 
power of law to an equal or a weaker, and 
the stronger is by the law of fraternity to 
help the weaker with his co-active power, 
to cause the superior i^ilfil his covenant. If, 
then, the king (giving, and not granting, he 
were superior to his whole kingdom) come 
under a covenant to them to seek their 
good, not his own, to defend true protestant 
religion, they have power to compel him to 
keep his covenant, and Scotland (if the king 
be stronger than England, and break his co- 
venant to them) is obliged, by Grod's law, 
(Prov. xxiv. XI,) to a& their forces and 
co-active power to help their brethren of 
England. 

3. The law shall warrant to loose the 
vassal from the lord when the lord hath 
broken his covenant. Hippolitus in Z., Si 
quis idduam coL 5, et diadt de quest, I, Si 
<m%8 major. 41 et 161. Bartoh n. 41. The 
Magdeburgens, in libel, de oMc, magistrate 
Imperatores et reges esse pnm^rios vassal" 
lo8 imperii^ et regni, et proinde sifeloniam 
contra imperium aut regnum committant, 
feudo privarif proinde ut alios vasallos. 

AmiscBus (q. 6. An princeps qui jurat 
sribditisy etc. n. 2 ) saith, *^ This occasioneth 
confusion and sedition." " The Egyptians 
cast off PtolemsBus because he affected too 
much the name of a king of the Bomans, 
his own friend," Dion. (1. 9.) « The States 
punished Archidanius because he married a 
wife of a low stature," Plutarch, {in Ages, 
inpris.) '' The ancient Burgundians thought 



it cause enough to expel their king, if mat- 
ters went not well in the state," Marcel. (1. 
27.) " The Groths in Spain gave no other 
cause of expelling their king, nisi quod sibi 
dispUceret, because he displeased them," 
Aimon. (1. 2, c. 20, 1. 4, c. 35.) 

Ans, — All these are not to be excused in 
people, but neither every abuse of power in 
a kmg dethroneth a king, nor every abuse 
in people can make null uieir power. 

Amisceus maketh three kinds of oaths: 
The first is, when the king sweareth to de- 
fend true religion and the Pope ; and he 
denieth that uiis is an oath of fidelity, or 
by paction or covenant made to the Pope or 
clergy, he saith it is only on oath of^pro- 
tection, nor doth the king receive the crown 
from the Pope or clergy. 

Ans. 1. — Amisseus divideth oaths that 
are to be conjoined. We do not read that 
kings swear to defend religion in one oath, 
and to administer judgment and justice 
in another ; for David made not two cove- 
nants, but only one, with all Israel. 2. The 
kinff was not king while he did swear this 
oath, and therefore is must be a pactional 
oath between him and the kingdom, and it 
is true the king receiveth not a crown from 
the church; yet David received a crown 
from the church, for this end, '^ to feed the 
Lord's people," and so conditionally. Papir. 
Masse (Z. 3, Ckron. Cral.) saith, the kmg 
was not a king before the oath, and that he 
swore to be a keeper not only of the first, 
but also of the second table of the law. 
Ego N. Dei gr<xtia, moxfuturus rex Fran- 
corum, in die ordinationis mece coram Deo, 
et Sanctis ejus polUceor, quod servdbo pri" 
vilegia canonica, justitiamque et jus unu- 
cuique Prcelato debitum, vosque defendam^ 
Deo juvo/ntCy quantum potero, quemcui- 
modum rex ex ofido in suo regno defeu" 
dere debet, unumquemque episcopum ac 
ecclesiam, et administrabo populo justitiam 
et leges, uti jus postulat. And so it is or- 
dained in the council of Toledo : Quisquis 
deinceps regni sortitus fuerit apicem, non 
ante conscendat regiam sedem, quam in- 
ter reliquas conditiones Sacramento poli- 
cittts fuerit, quod non sinet in regno suo 
degere eum qui non sit catholicus. All 
these by Scripture are oaths of covenant, 
Deut. xvii. 17, 18; 2 Sam. v. 1-— 4; 2 
Kings xi. 17, 18. 

AmissBus maketh a second oath of abso- 
lute kings, who swear they shall reign ac- 
cording to equity and justice ; and he saith. 



200 



LKX, RSX ; OR, 



*' There is no need of this oath, a promise 
is enough ; for an oath increaseth not the 
obligation, {L.Jin, de non num. pec.,) only 
it addeth the bound of religion ; for there 
is no use of an oath where there is no pac- 
tion of law against him that sweareth ; u he 
violate the oath, there followeth only the 
punishment of perjury. And the word of 
a prince is as good as his oath, only he con- 
descendeth to swear to please the people, 
out of indulgence, not out of necessity. And 
the king doth not therefore swear because 
he is made king, but because he is made 
king he sweareth. And he is not king be- 
cause he is crowned, but he is crowned be- 
cause he is king. Where the crown goeth 
by succession, the king never dieth ; and he 
is king by nature before he be crowned." 

Ans. 1.— This oath is the very first oath 
spoken of before, included in the covenant 
that the king maketh with the people ; (2 
Sam. V. 2— -4;) for absolute powers, by 
Amisseus' grant, doth swear to do the du- 
ties of a king, as Bodinus maketh the oath 
of France, (de Rep. l.\. c. 8,) Juro egOy 
per deum, ac promitto me juste regnatu- 
rum judiaiumj equitatevn^ ac misericoT" 
diam facturum ; and Fapir. Masse (1. 3, 
Chron.) hath the same expressly in the par- 
ticulars. And by this a &ing sweareth he 
shadl not be absolute ; and if ne swear this 
oath, he bindeth himself not to govern by 
the law of the king, whereby he may play 
the tyrant, as Saul did, (1 Sam. viii. 9 — 12, 
6^.,) as all royalists expound the place. 2. 
It is Imt a poor evasion to distinguish be- 
twixt the king's promise and his oath ; for 
the promise and covenant of any man, and 
so of the king, doth no less bring him under 
a dvil obligation and politic co-action to 
keep his promise than an oath ; for he that 
becometh surety for his friend doth by no 
civil law swear he shall be good for the son, 
or perform in lieu and place of the friend ; 
what he is to perform he doth only cove- 
nant and promise, and in law and politic 
obligation he is taken and snared by that 
promise, no less than if he had sworn. 
Keuben offered to be caution to bring Ben- 
jamin safe home to his old father, ^Gen. 
xlii. 37,) and Judah also, (Gen. xliu. 9,) 
but they do not swear any oath ; and it is 
true that an oath addeth nothing to a con- 
tract and promise, but only it lays on a re- 
ligious tie before God, yet so as consequent- 
ly, if the contractor violate both promise 
and oath, he cometh under the guUt of per- 



jury, which a law of men may punish. Now, 
that a covenant bringeth the king under a 
pohtic obhgation as well as an oath, is al- 
ready proved, and farther confirmed by Gal. 
iii. 15, *' Though it be a man's testament or 
covenant, no man disannuleth and addeth 
thereunto." No man, even by man's law, 
can annul a confirmed covenant ; and there- 
fore the man that made the covenant 
bringeth himself under law to fulfil his own 
covenant, and so must the king put himself 
under men's law, by a covenant at his coro- 
nation ; yea, and David is reputed by roy- 
alists an absolute prince, yet he cometh 
under a covenant before he be made a king. 
3. It is but a weak reason to say that an 
oath is needless, where no action of law can 
be against the king who sweareth, if it have 
any strength of reason. I retort it ; a legal 
and solemn promise then is needless a£o, 
for there is no action of law against a king 
(aa royalists teach) if he violate his promise. 
So then king David needlessly made a co- 
venant with the people at his coronation; 
for though David should turn as bloody an 
enemy to the church as Nero or Julian, 
the people have no law-action a^inst Da- 
vid ; and why then did Jeremiad seek an 
oath of the king of Judah, that he would 
not kill him nor dehver him into the hands 
of his enemies? and why did David seek 
an oath of Jonathan ? It is not like Jere- 
miah and David could have law-action 
r'nst a king and a king's son, if they 
lid violate the oath of God; and far- 
ther, it is a begging of the question to say 
that the states can nave no action against 
the king if he should violate his oath. 
Hugo Grotius putteth seven cases in which 
the people may have real action against the 
king to accuse and punish. (1.) They may 
punish the king to death, for matters capi- 
tal, if so it be agreed on betwixt the king 
and the people, bs m. Lacedaomonia. (2.) 
He may be punished as a private man. (3.) 
If the king make away a kingdom given to 
him by succession, his act is null, and he 
may be resisted, because the kingdom is a 
life-rent only to him; yea, saith Barclay, 
he loseth the crown. (4.) He loseth his 
kingdom, if, with a hostile mind, he seek 
the destruction of the kingdom. (5.) If 
such a clause be put in, that if he commit 
felony, or do such oppressions, the subjects 
shall be loosed from the bonds of subject 
tion ; then the king, failing thus, tumedi a 
private man. (6.) If the king have the 




one-half or part of the kingdom, and the 
people or senate the other luuf ; if the king 
prey upon that half which is not his own, 
he may violently be resisted, for in so far 
he hath not the empire. (7.) Ify when the 
crown was given, this be declared, that in 
some cases ne may be resisted, then some 
natural liberty is free from the king's power, 
and reserved in the people's hand. 4. It 
is then reason that the kmg swear an oath, 
1. That the king's oath is but a ceremony 
to please the people, and that because he is 
king, and king by birth, therefore he swear- 
eth, and is crowned, is in question, and de- 
nied. No man is bom a king, as no man 
is bom a subject; and because the people 
maketh him ^^ng, therefore he is to swear. 
The council of Toledo saith, non antea con- 
scendat regiam sedem quam juret, 2. An 
oath is a religious obligation, no arbitrary 
ceremony. 3, He may swear in his cabi- 
net-chamber, not covenanting with the peo- 
ple, as David and Jehoash md. 4. So he 
maketh promises that he may be king, not 
because he is king; it were ridiculous he 
should promise or swear to be a just king, 
because ne is a just king ; and by the same 
reason the estates swear the oath of loyalty 
to the new king, not that they may -be loyal 
in all time coming, but because they are 
loyal subjects already ; for if the one-half of 
the covenant on the king's part be a cere- 
mony of indulgence, not of necessity, by 
the same reason the other half of the cove- 
nant must be a ceremony of indulgence also 
to the people. 

06;'. — AmissQus saith, A contract cannot 
be dissolved in law, but by consent of two par- 
ties contracting, because both are obliged ; 
(2. ah emptione 58, in pr, de pact. I, 3, de 
rescind, vend, I. 80, de solu ;) therefore, if 
the subjects go from the covenant that they 
have made to be loyal to the king, they 
ought to be punished. 

Ans. — A contract, the conditions whereof 
are violated by neither side, cannot be dis- 
solved but by the joint consent of both ; 
and in buying and selling, and in all con- 
tracts unviolated, the sole will of neither 
side can violate the contract : of this speak- 
eth the law. But I ask the royalists, if 
the contract betwixt the spies sent to view 
Jericho, and Rahab the harlot, had not 
been null, and the spies free from any obli- 
gation, if Bahab had neglected to keep 
within doors when Jericho was taken, though 
B.ahab and the spies had never consented 



expressly to break the<x)venant? We hold 
that the law saith with us, that vassals loss 
their &nn if they pay not what is due.^ 
Now, what are kings but vassals to the 
state, who, if they turn tyrants, fall from 
their right ? 

Amiseeus saith in the council of Toledo, 
(4. c. 47,) the subjects ask from the king, 
that kings would be meek and just, not 
upon tlie ground of a voluntary contract 
and paction, but because God shall rejoice 
in king and people by so doing.' 

Ana. — These two do no more fight with 
one another than that two merchants should 
keep faith one to another, both because God 
hath said he shall dwell in Grod's mountain 
who sweareth and covenanteth, and stand- 
eth to his oath and covenant, though to his 
loss and hurt, (Psal. xv.) and also because 
they made their covenant and contract thus 
and thus. 

AmigoBUs. — Eveiy prince is subject to 
Grod, but not as a vassal ; for a master may 
commit felony, and lose the propriety of his 
farm. Can God do so ? The master can- 
not take the farm from the vassal without 
an express cause lewdly deduced ; but can- 
not Grod take what lie hath given but by a 
law process ? A vassal can entitle to hun- 
self a farm against the master's will, as some 
jurists say, but can a prince entitle a king- 
dom to himself against the God of heaveirs 
will? Though we grant the comparison, 
yet the subjects have no law over the kings, 
because the coercive power of the vassal is 
in the lord of the manor, the punishing of 
kings belongeth to God. 

Ans. 1. — We compare not the lord of a 
manor and the Lord of heaven together; 
all these dissimilitudes we grant, but as the 
king is God's vassal, so is he a noble and 
princely vassal to the estates of a kingdom 
because they make him. 2. They make 
him rather than another their noble ser- 
vant. 3. They make him for themselves 
and their own godly, quiet, and honest 
life. 4. They, in their nrst election, limit 
him to such a way, to govern by law, and 
give to him so much power for their good, 
no more ; in these four actst hey are above 
the prince, and so have a coercive power 
over nim. 

Amisceus. — It is to make the prince's 
fideUty doubtfril to put him to an oath. 



1 Bartol. in 1. 1, n. 4, de his qui not. infam. 

> Arni8.| c. 6, an princepa qui jurat subdiUa, &c. 

2e 



202 



LEX, KEX ; OR, 



Lawyers say there is no need of an oath, 
when a person is of approved fidelity. 

Ans, 1. — Then we are not to seek an 
oath of an inferior magistrate, of a com- 
mander in wars, of a pastor, it is presumed 
these are of approved fidelity, and it maketh 
their integrity obnoxious to slander to put 
them on an oath« 2. David was of more 
approved fidelity than any king now a-days, 
and to put him to a covenant seemed to 
call his fidelity in question; Jonathan 
sought an oath of David to deal kindly 
with his seed when he came to the throne ; 
Jeremiah sought an oath of the king of 
Judah. Did tney put any note of falsehood 
on them therefore ? 

Amisceus, — You cannot prove that ever 
any king gave an oath to his subjects in 
Scripture* 

Ans. 1. — What more unbeseeming kings 
is it to swear to do their duty, than to pro^ 
mise covenant-wise to do the same? And 
a covenant you cannot deny« 2. In a 
covenant for religious duties there was 
always an oath, (2 Chron. xv. 12 — 14,) 
hence the rite of cutting a calf, and swear- 
ing in a covenant (Jer. xxxiv. 18). 3. 
There is an oath that the people giveth to 
the king to obey him, (Ecdes. viii. 2,) and 
a covenant (2 Sam. v. 1- — 3) mutual be- 
tween the king and people ; I leave it to 
the judicious, if the people swear to the 
king obedience in a covenant mutual, and 
he swear not to them. 

Amisaeus showeth to us a third sort of oath 
that limited princes do swear. This oath 
in Denmark, Sweden, Poland, Hungary, is 
sworn by the kings, who may do nothing 
without consent of the senate, and according 
to order of law ; this is but the other two 
oaths specified, and a prince cannot con- 
travene his own contnu;t ; the law saith, in 
that the prince is but as a private man {in 
L digna vox C^ de IL Bom. cons, 426, n. 
17) ; and it is known that the emperor is 
constituted and created by the prince's elec- 
tors, subject to them, and by law may be 
dethroned by them. 

The Bishop of Bochester (de potest, p. 1. 2, 
c. 20) saith from Barclay, " i^one can de- 
nude a king of his power, but he that gave 
him the power, or hath an express com- 
mandment so to do, from him that gave the 
power. But God only, and the people, gave 
the king his power; therefore God, with 
the peo][ue, having an express commandment 
firom God, must denude the king of power. 



Ans. 1. — This shall prove that God only, 
by an immediate action, or some having an 
express commandment from him, can de- 
prive a preacher for scandals ; Christ only, 
or those who have an express commandment 
firom him, can excommunicate ; God only, 
or the magistrate with him, can take, away 
the life ot man (Nnmb. xi. 14— *16) ; and 
no inferior magistrates, who also have their 
power from God immediately, (Bom. xiii. 
1,) if we speak of the immediation of the 
office, can denude inferior judges of their 
power. Grod only, by the husbandman's 
pains, maketh a miitfid vineyard, therefore, 
the husbandman cannot make his vineyard 
grow over with nettles and briers. 2« The 
argument must run thus, else the assump- 
tion shall be ^Ise. Crod only by the action 
of the people as his instrument, and by no 
other a^ion, makes a lawfiil king ; God only 
by the action of the people, as his instru- 
ment, can make a king ; God only by the 
action of the people, as his instrument, can 
dethrone a king ; for as the people, making 
a king, are in that doing what God doth 
before them, and what God doth by them 
in that very act, so the people unmaking a 
king, doth that which God doth before we 
people ; both the one and the other accord- 
mg to God's rule obligeth. (Deut. xvii. 
14—20.) 

The Prelate, whose tribe seldom saith 
truth, addeth,— " As a fatherly power, by 
God and nature's law, over a family, was in 
the father of a familv before the children 
could either transfer mevr power, or consent 
to the translation of that power to him, so 
a kingly power (which succeedeth to a pa- 
ternal or fatherly power) to govern many 
families, yea, and a kingdom, was in that 
same father, in relation to many £sanilies, 
before these many families can transfer 
their power. The kingly power floweth 
immediately from God, and the people 
doth not transfer that power, but doth 
only consent to the person of the king, or 
doth only choose his person at some tune. 
And though this power were principally 
riven to the people, it is not so given to 
the people as u it were the people's power, 
and not God's, fpr it is God's power ; nei- 
ther is it any otherwise given to the people, 
but as to a stream, a beam, and an mstru- 
ment which may confer it to another." 
M. Antonius {de domini. Z. 6, c. 2, n. 22, 
23) doth more subtlely illustrate the mat- 
ter : ^* If the king should confer honour on 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



203 



a subject, by the hand of a servant who had 
not power or freedom to confer that honour, 
or not to confer it, but by necessity of the 
king's commandment must confer it, no- 
thing should hinder us to say, that such a 
subject had his honour immediately from 
the king: so the earth is immediately 
illuminated by the sun, although light be 
received on the earth, but by the interven- 
ing mediation of many inferior bodies and 
elements, because by no other thing but 
by the sun only, is ^e light as an emcient 
cause in a nearest capacity to give light ; so 
the royal power in whomsoever it be, is 
immediately from God only, though it be 
applied by men to this or that person, be- 
cause from God only, and from no other 
the kingly power is formally and effectively 
that whicn it is, and worketh that which it 
worketh ; and if you ask by what cause is 
the tree immediately turned into lire, none 
sound in reason would say, it is made fire, 
not by the fire, but by him that laid the 
tree on the fire." John P. P. would have 
stolen this argument also, if he had been 
capable thereof. 

Ans. 1. — A fatherly power is in a father, 
not before he hath a child, but indeed be- 
fore his children by an act of their fi:ee-will 
consent that he be their father ; yea, and 
whether the children consent or no, from a 
physical- act of generation, he must be the 
fatner; and let the father be the most 
wicked man, and let him be made by no 
moral requisite, yet is he made a father, 
nor can he ever leave off physically to be a 
father : he may leave off morally to do the 
duty of a father, and so be non pater oJUdo^ 
but he cannot but be pater naturce gener^ 
antis vi. So there never is, nor can be, 
any need that children's free consent inter- 
vene to make Kish the father of Saul, be- 
cause he is by nature a father. To make Saul 
a king and a moral father by analogy and 
improperly, — ^a father by ruling, governing, 
guiding, defending Israel by good laws, in 
peace and godliness, I hope there is some 
act of the people's free-will required even 
by Spalato's way ; the people must approve 
him to be king, yea, they must king him, or 
constitute him King, say we. No such act is 
required of natural sons to make a physical 
fauier, and so here is a great halt in the 
comparison, and it is most false that there 
is a Jdngly power to govern many families 
in the same father; before these jnany 
families can transfer their power to make 



him king. Put royalists to their logic, they 
have not found out a medium to mi^e good 
that there is a formal kingly power whereby 
Saul is king and father morally over all 
Israel before Israel chose him and made 
him, as Kish was Saul's father formally, and 
had a fatherly power to be his father, before 
Saul had the use of free-will to consent that 
he should be his father. Boyalists are here 
at a stand. The man may have royal gifts 
before the people make him king, but this 
is not regiapotestaSf a royal power, by which 
the man is formally king. Many have more 
royal gifts than the man that beareth the 
crown, yet are never kings, nor is there 
formally regia potestasj kingly power, in 
them. In this meaning Petrarch said, 
Plures sunt reges quam regna, 2. He 
saith, " The people doth not confer royal 
power, but only consent to the person of the 
man, or choice of his person." This is non- 
sense, for the people's choosing of David at 
Hebron to be king, and their refusing of 
Saul's seed to be fing, what was it but an 
act of Grod, by the free suffrages of the 
people, conferring royal power on David, 
and making him king ? Whereas in former 
times, David even anointed by Samuel at 
Bethlehem, (1 Sam. xvi,)was only a private 
man, the subject of king Saul, and never 
termed by the Spirit of^Grod a king ; nor 
was he king till God, by the people s con- 
sent made him king at Hebron; for Samuel 
neither honoured him as king, nor bowed to 
him as king, nor did the people say, God 
save king David ; but after this David ac- 
knowledffed Saul as his master and king. 
Let royalists show us any act of God making 
David king, save this act ofM;he people mak- 
ing him formally king at Hebron, and there- 
fore the people, as God's instrument, trans- 
ferred the power, and God by them in the 
same act transferred the power, and in the 
same they chose the person ; the royalists 
affirm these to be different actions, a^r- 
manti incumhit probation 3. This power is 
the people's radically, naturally, as the bees 
(as some think) have a power natural to 
choose a king-bee, so bath a community a 
power naturally to defend and protect 
themselves; and God hath revealed in 
Deut. xvii. 14, 15, the way of regulating 
the act of choosing governors and kings, 
which is a special mean of defending and 
protecting themselves ; and the people is as 
principal^ the subject and fountain of royal 
power, as a fountain is of water. I shall not 



204 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



contend, if you call a fountain God's instru- 
ment to give water, as all creatures are his 
instruments. 4. For Spalato's comparison, 
he is far out, for the people choosing one 
of ten to be their king, nave free wDl to 
choose any, and are under a law (Deut. 
xvii. 14, 15) in the manner of their choos- 
ing, and though they err and make a sinM 
choice, yet the man is king, and Grod's king, 
whom they make king; but, if the king 
command a servant to make A. B. a knight, 
if the servant make C. D. a knight, I shall 
not think C. D. is a valid knight at all ; and 
indeed the honour is immediately here from 
the king, because the king's servant by no 
innate power maketh the knight, but nations 
by a radical, natural, and mnate power, 
makeih this man a king, not that man; 
and I conceive the man chosen by the 
people oweth thanks and grateful service to 
the people, who rejected others, that they 
had power to choose, and made him king. 
5. The light immediately and formally is 
light i^om the sun, and so is the office of a 
kmg immediately instituted of Grod, Deut. 
xvii: 14. WhetLr the institution be luw 
tural or positive, it is no matter. 2. The 
man is not king, because of royal endow- 
ment^, though we should say these were 
immediately from Grod, to which instruction 
and education may also confer not a little ; 
but he is formaUy king, ratione I^oUms 
fia^txixfif in regard of the formal essence of 
a king, not immediately from Grod, as the 
light IS from the sun, but by the mediation 
of the free consent of the people; (2 Sam. v. 
1 — 3 ;) nor is the people in makbg a king, 
as the man who only casteth wood in the 
fire ; the wood is not made fireTormally, but 
by the fire, not by the approach of fire to 
wood, or of wood to fire ; for the people do 
not apply the royalty, which is immediately 
in and from God to the person. Explicate 
such an application ; for to me it is a fiction 
inconceivable, because the people hath the 
royalty radically in themselves, as in the 
fountam and cause, and conferreth it on the 
man who is made king ; yeii, the people, by 
making David king, confer the royal power 
on the king. This is so true, that royalists, 
forgetting themselves, inculcate frequently 
in assertmg their absolute monarch from 
Ulpian, but misunderstood that the people 
have resigned all their power, liberty, right 
of life, death, goods, chastity, a potency ofra- 
pine, homicides, unjust wars, &c., upon a crea- 
ture called an absolute prince; even, saith 



I 



Grotius, as a man may make himself a slave, 
by selling his liberty to a master. Now, 
if the people make away this power to the 
king, and this be nothing but the tran- 
scendent absoluteness of a king, certainly 
this power was in the people ; for how can 
they give to a king that which they have 
not tnemselves ? As a man cannot make 
away his liberty to a master, by becoming 
a slave to him, if his liberty were imme- 
diately in Grod, as royalists say, sovereignty 
is immediately in Grod, and people can ex- 
ercise no act about soyereignty, to make 
it over to one man rather than to another. 
People only have an after-approbation, that 
this man to whom God hath given it imme- 
diately, shall have it. Furthermore, they 
say, people in making a king may make 
such conditions, as in seven cases a king 
may be dethroned, at lea^ resisted, saith 
Hugo Grotius: therefore people may give 
more or less, half or whole, hmited or ab- 
solute royal power to the prince; but if this 
power were immediately m Grod and from 
ixod, how could the people haye the hus- 
banding of it, at their need to expend it 
out in oimce weights, or pound weights, as 
they please ? And that the people may be 
purveyors of it to sell or give it, is taught 
by Grotius {de jur, hel et pac. Z. 1, c. 4) ; 
Barclay {advers, monarch, I, 4, c, 6) ; Ar- 
nisaeus (c. 6, de majest, an princeps qui 
jurat subditisj 8fc. n. 10, n. se Aventium 
Anal I 3) ; Chytreus {I 23, I 28); Saxon 
Sleidan {lib. 1, infi); yet Amisseus is not 
ashamed to cite Anstot. {polit. c. 12, L 3), 
that he is not a true and absolute king who 
ruleth by laws. The point blank contrary 
of which Aristotle saith. 



QUESTION XLI. 

WHETHER DOTH THE P. PRELATE TTPOIT GOOD 
GROUNDS ASCRIBE TO US THE DOCTRINE OF 
JESUITS m THESE QUESTIONS OF LAWFUL 
DEFENSiyE WARS. 

Th0 P. Prelate, without all ground, will 
have us all Jesuits in this point, but if we 
make good that this truth was in Scriptare 
before a Jesuit was in the earth, he falleth 
from his cause. 

P. Prelate (c. 1, p. 1, 2).— The Begardi 
saith. There was no government, no law 
given to the just. It fearetb me this age 



THE LAW AND THS PHINCE. 



205 



fancieth to itself some such thing, and have 
learned of Korah, Dathan, &c. 

AfUf. — This (»lumniator, in the next 
words, belieth himself when he saith, We 
presuppose that those with whom we are to 
enter in lists, do willingly grant that govern- 
ment is not only lawml and just, but ne* 
cessary both for church and conmionwealth: 
then we fiuicy no such thing as he imput- 
eth to us. 

P. Prelate. — Some said that the right of 
dominion is founded on grace, whether the 
Waldenses and Huss held any such tenet, I 
cannot now insist to prove or disprove. Ger- 
son and others held that there must be a new 
title and right to what men possess. Too 
many too confidently hold these or the like. 

Ans. — 1. That dominion is founded upon 
grace as its essential pillar, so as wicked 
men be no magistrates, because they are in 
mortal sin, was falslv imputed to ancient 
protestants, the Wudenses, WichfF, and 
Huss, by papists ; and this day by Jesuits, 
Suarez, Bellarmine, Becanus. The P. Pre- 
late will leave them under this calumny, 
that he may offend papists and Jesuits as 
little as he can, but he would lay it on us ; 
but if the P. Prelate think that dominion 
is not founded on grace, dejure, that rulers 
should have that spirit that God put on the 
seventy elders for their calling, and that 
they ought not to be '' men feanng God and 
hatuig oovetousnesB," as Grerson and others 
did, he belieth the Scripture. 2. It is no 
error of Gerson that behevers have a sip- 
ritual right to their civU possessions, but by 
Scripture, 1 Cor. iv. 21 ; Bev. xxi. 7. 

jn Prelate, — The Jesuits are ashamed of 
the error of casuists, who hold that, directum 
imperium^ the direct and primary power, 
supreme, civil, and ecclesiastical, is in the 
Pope ; and, therefore, they give an indirect 
directive and coercive power to him over 
kings and states, in ardine ad spirituaUa, 
BO may he kii^ and unking princes at his 
pleasure. Our presbyterians, if they run 
not fully this way, are very near to it. 

Ans, — 1. The windy man would seem 
versed in schoolmen. He should have 
named some casuists, who hold any like 
thing. 2. The presbyterians must be popes, 
becsMise they subject kings to the gospel, 
and Christ's sceptre in church censures, and 
think Christian kings may be rebuked for 
Uasphemy, bloodshed, &c., whereas prelates, 
in ordine ad diaboUca^ murder souls of 
king9. 3. Prelates do king princes. A 



popish archprelate, when our king was 
crowned, put the crown on king Charles' 
head, the sword and sceptre in his hand, 
anointed him in his hands, crown, shoul- 
ders, arms, with sacred oil. Tlie king must 
kiss the archbishop and bishops. Is not this 
to king princes in ordine ad spirititalial 
And those that kingeth may unking, and 
judge what relation the popish archbishop 
Spotswood had, when he proffered to the 
king the oath that the popish kings swear- 
eth to maintain the protessed religion, (not 
one word of the true protestant reHgion,) and 
will carefully root out all heretics and ene- 
mies (that is protestants as they expone it) 
to the true worship of God, that shall be 
convicted by the church of God of the fore- 
said crimes. And when the prelates pro- 
fessed they held not their prelacies of the 
king, but of the Pope indeed : who are then 
nearest to the Pope's power, in ordine ad 
spirititalia? 4. How will this black-mouthed 
calumniator make presbyterians to dethrone 
kings? He hath written a pamphlet of 
the inconsistency of monarchy and presby- 
terian government, consisting of lies, in- 
vented calumnies of his church in which he 
was baptized. But the truth is, all his ar- 
guments prove the inconsistency of monarchs 
and parliaments, and transform any king in- 
to a most absolute tyrant; for which treason 
he deserveth to suffer as a traitor. 

P. Prelate {q. 1, c. IJ. The puritan 
saith that all power civil is radically and 
originally seated in the community ; he here 
joineth hands with the Jesuit. 

Ans, — In six pages he repeateth the same 
things, 1. Is this such an heresy, that a 
colony cast into America by the tyranny 
of popish prelates, have power to choose 
their own government ? All Israel was he- 
retical in this ; for David could not be their 
king, though designed and anointed by God, 
(1 Sam. xvi.,) till the people (2 Sam. v.) 
put forth in act this power, and made Da- 
vid king in Hebron. 2. Let the Prelate 
make a syllogism, it is but ex utraque af- 
Jirmante in seeunda ^gura^ logic like the 
bellies of the court, m which men of their 
own way is disgraced and cast out of grace 
and court; because in this controversy of 
the king with his two parliaments, they are 
like Erasmus in God's matters, who said, 
Lutherum nee accusOy nee defendo. He 
is discourted, whoever he be, who is in 
shape like a puritan, and not fire and sword 
against religion and his country, and oath 



and covenant with God ; and so it is this : 
The Jesuit teacheth that power of govern- 
ment is in the community originally. The 
puritan teacheth, that power of government 
is in the community oridnally; therefore, 
the puritan is a Jesuit. But so the puritan 
is a Jesuit, because he and the Jesuit teach- 
eth that there is one God and three per- 
sons. And if the Prelate like this reason- 
ing, we shall make himself and the pre- 
lates, and court-divines, Jesuits upon surer 
grounds. 

h Jesuits teach, (1.) The Pope is not the 
antichrist. (2.) Christ locally descended to 
hell to free some out of that prison. (3.) It 
was sin to separate from Babylonish Home. 
(4.) We are justified by works. (6.) The 
merit of fasting is not to be condemned. 
(6.) The mass is no idolatry. (7.) The 
Church is the judge of controversies. (8.) 
All the Arminian points are safer to be be- 
lieved, than the contrary ; yea, and all the 
substantials of popery are true, and cathoHc 
doctrine to be preached and {printed. 2. 
The prelates and court-divines, and this 
Prelate, conspireth in all these with the 
Jesuits, as is learnedly and invincibly proved 
in the treatise, called iiuro»m9ti»fUtf, the Can- 
terburian self-conviction ; to which no man 
of the prelatical and Romish faction durst 
ever make answer for their hearts ; and see 
then who are Jesuits. 3. This doctrine was 
taught by lawyers, protestants, yielded to by 
papists, before any Jesuit was whelped in 
rerum natura, Hever learned man wrote 
of policy, till of late, but he held power of 
government, by the light of nature, must 
be radically and originally in a community. 
The P. Prelate saiui, Jesuits are not the 
fathers of this opinion (c. 1, p. 12). How 
then can the liar say, that the puritan 
conspireth with the Jesuit ? Suarez, the 
Jesuit, (de primaL sum, ponti/i. L 3, c. 2, 
n. 10,) Non est novum, aut a Cardinali 
Bellarmino inventum. The Jesuit Tanne- 
rus, wiU not have their family the mother of 
this opinion, {torn 2, disp, 5, de leg, q. 5, 
in 12, q. 95, 96 ; Dubi. 1, n. 7). Sine du- 
bio communis omnium Theologorum et Ju- 
risperitorum sententia^ 8fc. The Jesuit To- 
let, (in Bom. xiii.,) taketh it for a ground, 
that the civil powers are from Grod, by the 
natural mediation of men, and civil socie- 
ties. 4. Jesuits teach that there is no 
lawM Christian society, truly politic, that 
hath a near and formal power to choose and 
ordain their own magistrates, but that which 



acknowledffeth subjeoti<Hi, and the due re- 
gulation of their creating of magistrates, to 
be due and proper to the Pope of Rome. 
We acknowledge nowise the bishop of Rome, 
for a lawful bishop and pastor at all. But 
this popish Prelate doth acknowledge him, 
for he hath these words, (c. 6, p. 58,) " It 
is high presumption in the Pope to chal- 
lenge to liimself the title or right of Christ's 
universal vicar on earth, by divine right. 
The Pope, the bishop of Rome, hath no 
more by divine right, (what he may have 
by positive ecclesiastical right is not perti- 
nent for us now to examine and discuss,) no 
higher privilege, (except it be in extent,) 
than the meanest bishop of the world in his 
diocese." And amongst all proofs, he pass- 
ing by Scriptures, which should prove, or 
improve a divine rijght, he will content him- 
self with one proof of Cyprian, {de unitat. 
Eocles,,) and endeth with these words, — 
" Would God, both sides in this, and other 
controversies, would submit to iJie judgment 
of the holy fathers." 

1. Hence the P. Prelate, in his fourth 
article, (the other two I shall touch anon,) 
maketh puritans grosser than Jesuits, in 
dethroning kings ; because if the king be de- 
ficient, the people may resume their power, 
and govern for him, and so dethrone the 
king. But Bellarmine (L 3, q. de laic,) 
holdeth the people cannot dethrone the 
king, but, in certis oasibus, in some cases, 
that is, (as Suarez saith,) si Bex sua pates* 
tate in manifestam, (Cttntatis cm Regni,) 
pemiciem abutatur. But I will demon- 
strate, that if papists hold that the Pope 
may dethrone kings, this Prelate is of their 
mind ; for, 1. The words I cited make good 
that he is for the Pope's supremacy ; ^ow 
it is a joint or part of his supremacy, to 
king and unking princes.) 2. They make 
good that he is a papist ; for, 1, It is pre- 
sumption m the Pope to challenge to him- 
self that he is Christ's universiu vicar on 
earth, by divine right. Why saith he not, 
by no right at all, but only he is not Christ's 
vicar by divine right ; for it is evident, that 
papists make him Christ's vicar only by ec- 
clesiastical right ; for they profess succes- 
sion of popes to this day cannot be proved 
but by tradition, not by Scripture. 

2. The Pope's supremacy, by papists, is 
expressly reckoned amongst unwritten tra- 
ditions, and so there is no necessity ^t the 
right of it be proved from Scripture. 

3. The Prelate expressly saith, " He will 



not discuss the wciesiastical right that the 
Pope hath to be Christ's vicar ;" and bj 
that he clearly insinuateth that he hath a 
right to be Christ's vicar, besides a scriptu*- 
nS and divine right; only, for offending 
papists, he will not discuss it. 

4. He hath no higher privilege, saith he, 
than other bishops, except in extent, by di- 
vine right. Now other bishops, as officers, 
in nature different from presbyters, f for of 
such the P. Prelate must speak in his own 
dialect,) have their office by divine ri^ht ; 
and this the Prelate's word must incmde, 
else he saith nonsense to the matter in hand. 
And, in extent, the Pope hath, by divine 
right, more than other bishops have. Now 
what is the Pope of Bome's extent ? All 
know it is the whole catholic visible church 
on earth. If then, all bishops be particular 
ambassadors in Christ's stead, (2 Cor. v. 20,) 
and so legates and deputies of Christ, he who 
by divine right is a bishop in extent over the 
whole world, is as like one that calleth him- 
self the universal vicar of Christ, as one egg 
is like another. The doctrine taught by t^ 
Prelate, so popish, and hints, yea, are more 
thjm evidences, of otoss popery in this book, 
and his other pam^et against presbyteries. 
And his desire that the controversy, concern- 
ing the Pope's supremacy and omers, were 
determined with submission to the judgment 
of the facers, do cry that he is but a rot- 
ten papist. For why will he submit all other 
controversies to the judgment of the fathers? 
Why not to the prophets and apostles ? Can 
fathers decide controversies better than the 
Word of Grod ? A reason cannot be dreamed 
of why the fathers should be judges, and not 
the Scriptures, except that the Scriptures are 
obscure. Their authority and light cannot 
determine and judge controversies, except 
in so far as they have authority from fathers 
and the church ; and we know this to be pro^ 
prium qua/rto modo, proper to Jesuits and 
papists, to cry, Fathers, fathers, in all contro- 
versies, though the fathers be more for us 
than for them, except two things : — 1. What 
fathers speak for us, are corrupted by them. 
2, WTiat were but errors in fathers, when 
children add contumacy to error, becomes 
the heresies of the sons. 

And it is most false that we join with Je- 
suits. 1. We teach no more against tyrants, 
in exerdtio, than Grotius, Barclay, and Win- 
zetus, in the matter of deposing kings ; and 
in tliis, royalists conspire with Jesuits. 2. 
We deny that the Pope may loose subjects 



from the oath of fidelity when a king tum- 
eth heretical. 8. That people, at the Pope's 
commandment, are to dethrone kings for he- 
resy ; so do tlie prelates, and their fellows, 
the papists, teach ; so Gregory VII, prac- 
tised ; so Aquinas taught, (22 q» 12. ar. 2.) 
Antonin, {sum, par, 3. t, 22, c. 3, sect. 7,) 
'* Thou hast put all things under the Pope's 
feet," oves, id est, Christianos ; hoves* Ju' 
dosos et hereticos ; pecora, Paganos ; so 
Navar. (L 1, c. 13, j Pagans have no juris- 
diction. Jaco. Symanca, {de Catho. fnstit. 
tit 46, n, 25,) '^ Catholica uxor heretico 
viro debitum reddere non tenetur,^^ Item, 
Constat, ficereticum privatum esse omni dO' 
miniOf naturalij dvili, politico, naturali 
quod habet in JLlios, nam propter hasresin 
patris eficiuntur Jilii sui juris, dvili, quod 
hahet in servos, ab eo erdm servi liberantur, 
politico, quod rerum domini hahent in sub- 
ditos, ita Bannes, (22. q, 12, art* 10.) Gre- 
gor. {de valent. 22. dis. 1, q, 12, p. 2, lod, 
MoL to, 1, dejust, etjur. tract, 2, dis, 29, 
V, 3.) Papists hold that generatio clerici 
est corruptio subditi, churchmen are not 
subjects under the king's law. It is a cano- 
nical privilege of the clergy, that they are 
not subject to the king's civil laws. Now 
this Prelate and his fdlows made the king 
swear, at his coronation, to maintain all ca- 
nonical privileges of the prelatical clergy, 
the very oath and words sworn by all me 
popish kings. 

P. Prelate. — Power is given by the mul- 
titude to the king immediately, and by Crod 
mediately, not so much by collation, as by 
approbation, how the Jesuit and puritan 
walk all along in equal pace. See Bellar- 
mine, I. 1, de liac, c. 6. Suarez cont, sect, 
Angl, I, 2. c. 3. 

Ans, — It is a calumny that we teach that 
the power of the king is from God mediate- 
ly, by mere approbation ; indeed, a fellow 
of his, a papist, writing against the king's 
supremacy, Anthony Capell saith, ^ Saul was 
made king, and others also, by Grod's per- 
mission, and Deo invito et irato, God being 
angry, that is not our doctrine; but with 
what real efficiency God hath made men 
and communities rational and social men 
with the same hath he made them by in- 
stinct of nature, by the mediation of reason, 
to create a king ; and Bellarmine and Sua- 
rez say not God maketh kings by approba- 
tion only. 

1 Tract, contra prixnatum Regis Anglise. 



208 



LEX, EBX ; OR, 



P. Prelate, — The people may change mo- 
narchy into aristocracy or democracy, or aris- 
tocracy into monarchy ; for aught I know, 
they differ not in this neither. 

Ans, 1. — The P. Prelate knoweth not aU 
things — the two Jesuits, Bellarmine and 
Suarez are produced only, as if they were 
all Jesuits; and Suarez saith, {De prim, 
po. L 3, n. 4,) *' Danationem dbsolutam 
semel vaUdefactam revoeari non posse, ne- 
que in tottun^ neque ex parce^ mcudme 
qtiando onerosa fuit," If tne people once 
give their power to the king, they cannot 
resume it without cause ; and laying down 
the grounds of Suarez and other Jesuits, 
that our religion is heresy, they do soundly 
collect this consequence, ^* That no king can 
be lord of the consciences of their subjects, 
to compel them to an heretical religion." 
We teach that the king of Spain hath no 
power over the consciences of protestant 
subjects to force them to idolatry, and that 
their souls are not his subjects, but only their 
persons, and in the Lord. 2. It is no great 
crime, that if a king degenerate in a tyran- 
ny, or if the royal mie rail, that we think the 
people have liberty to change monarchy into 
aristocracy, aut contra, Jesuits deny that 
the people can make this change without 
the rope's consent. We judge neither the 
great bishop, the Pope, nor the little popes, 
oud^t to hiMre hand in making kings. 

i*. Prelate, — They say the power is de- 
rived to the king from the people, eomula- 
tive or eommunicaidvey non privative^ by 
way of communication, not by way of priva- 
tion, so as the people denude not themselves 
of this sovereignty. As the king maketh a 
lieutenant in Ireland, not to denude him- 
self of his royal power, but to put him in 
trust for his service. If this be their mind, 
the king is in a poor case. The principal 
authoritv is in the delegate, and so the peo- 
ple is still judge, and the king their deputy. 

Ans, — The P. Prelate taketh on him to 
write, he knoweth not what, this is not our 
opinion. The king is king, and hath the 
people's power, not as their deputy. 

1. Because the people is not prindpal 
judge, and the king subordinate. The 
king, in the executive power of laws, is 
reaUy a sovereign above the people; a de- 
puty is not so. 

2. The people have irrevocably made over 
to the king their power of governing, de- 
fending, and protecting themselves, I ex- 
cept the power of sel^preservation, which 



people can no more make away, it being sin- 
less nature's birthright, than tiie liberty of 
eating, drinking, ueeping; and this the 
•peop^ cannot resume, except in case of the 
king's tyranny ; there is no power by the 
king so irrevocably resigned to his servant 
or deputy, but he may use it himself. 

3. A delegate is accountable for all he 
doth to those that put him in trust, whether 
he do ill or well. The king, in acts of jus- 
tice, is not accountable to any ; for if his 
acts be not liable to high suspicions of ty- 
ranny, no man may say to him, What dost 
thou ? only in acts of injustice ; and those 
80 tyrannous, that they be inomaistent with 
the habitual fiduciary repose and trust put 
on him, he is to rendbr accounts to the par- 
liament, which representeth the people. 

4. A delegate in esse^ infieri, both that 
he may be a delegate, and that he may con- 
tinue a delegate, whether he do iU or well, 
dependeth on his pleasure who del^ateth 
him ; but though a Idng depend in JUri, in 
regard of his cs3l to the crown, upon the suf- 
frages of his people, yet that he may be con- 
tinued king, ne dependeth not on the people 
simply, but only in case of tyrannical admi- 
nistration, and in this sense Suarez and Bel- 
larmine spake with no more honesty than 
we do, but with more than prelates do, for 
they profess any emissary of nell may stab a 
protestant king. We know the prelates pro- 
tess the contrary, but their judgment is the 
same with Jesuits in all points ; and since 
they wiU have the Pope Christ's vicar, by 
such a divine right as they themselves are 
bishops, and have the king under oath to 
maintain the clergy, bishops, and all their 
canonical privileges, (amongst which the bi- 
shops of ilome's indirect power in ordine 
ad spiritualia, and to detnrone kings who 
turn heretics, is one principal right,) I see 
not how prelates are not as deep in treason 
against kmgs as the Pope himself, and there- 
fore, P. Prelate, take toe beam out of your 
own eye. 

The P.. Prelate taketh unlearned pains to 
prove that Gerson, Occam, Jac. de Almaine, 
and the Parisian doctors, maintained these 
same grqunds anent the people's power over 
kings m the case of tyranny, and that before 
Lumer and Calvin were in the world; and 
this is to give himself the lie, that Luther, 
Calvin, and we, have not this doctrine from 
Jesuits; and what is Calvin's mind is evi- 
dent, (Instit. 1. 4, c. 4,) all that the estates 
may coerce, and reduce in order a tyrant, 



THE LAW AXD THE PRINCE. 



209 



else they are deficient in their trust that 
God hath given them over the common- 
wealth and church ; and this is the doc- 
trine for which royalists cry out against 
Knox of Messed memory, Buchanan, Junius 
Brutus, Bouchier, Bosssbus, and Althusius* 
Luther, in scripto ad pastorem^ (torn. 7f 
Grerman, fol. 386,) bringeth two examples 
for resistance ; the people resisted Saul, wnen 
he was willing to kUl Jonathan his son, and 
Ahikam and other princes rescued Jeremiah 
out of the hands of the king of Judah ; and 
Gerardus citeth many divmes who second 
Luther in this, as Bugenlia^us, Justus 
Jonas, Nicholas AmbsderSius, George Spa- 
ladnus, Justus Meoius, Chnstopher Hof- 
manus. It is known what is the mind of 
protestant divines, as Beza, Parous, Me- 
lanethoD, Bucanus, Polanus, Chamer, and all 
the divines of France, of Germany, and of 
Holland. No wonder than prelates were 
upon the plot of betraying the city of 
Hochelle, and of the protestant church there, 
when they then will have the protestants 
of France, for their defensive wars, to be 
rebels, and siders with Jesuits, when, in 
these wars, Jesuits sought their blood and 
ruin. 

The P. Prelate having shown his mind 
concerning the deposing of Childerick by the 
Pope, (of which I say nothing, but the Pope 
was an antichristian usurper, and the poor 
man never fit to bear a crown,) he goeth on 
to set down an opinion of some mute au- 
thors ; he might aeme a thousand opinicms 
that w&y» to make men believe he had been 
in a world of learned men's secrets, and that 
never man saw the bottom of the contro- 
refsjy while he, seeing the escapes of many 
neBSf (as supercilious ]Bubo praiseth,) was 
torced to mpear a stair new risen in the fir- 
mannent of pursuivants, and reveal all 
dreams, and teach all the n^w statists, the 
Gamaliels, Buchanan, Junius Brutus, and a 
world who were all sleeping, wb^e this 
Lucifer, the son of the ni^ht, did appear, 
this new way of laws, divimty, and casuists^ 
theolo^. 

p. Prelate. — They hold sovereign power 
is primarily and naturally in the multitude, 
from it derived to the king, immediately 
from God. The reason of which order is, 
because we cannot reap the fruits of govern- 
ment unless by compact we submit to some 
possible and accidental inconveniences. 

Ans, 1. — Who saith so the P. Prelate 
cannot name, — That sovereign power is pri- 



marily and naturally in the multitude. Vir- 
tually (it may be) sovereignty is in the mul- 
titude, but primarily and naturally, as heat 
is in the fire, light in the sun, I ikmk the 
P. Prelate dreamed it ; no man said it but 
himself; £ot what attribute is naturally in a 
subject, I conceive may directly and natu- 
rally be predicated therectf. Now the P. 
Prelate hath taught us this very natural pre- 
dication. ** Our dreadful and sovereign 
lord, the multitude, commandeth this and 
that." 

2. This is no more reason for a mo^ 
narchythan for a democracy, for we can 
reap the fruits of no government exc^t we 
sutoit to it. 

3. We must submit in monarchy (saiOi 
he) to some possible and accidental incon- 
veniences. Here be soft words, but is sub- 
version of religion, laws, and liberties of 
church and st^. Introducing of popery, 
Arminianism, of idolatry, altar-worship, the 
mass, (proved by a learned treatise, " the 
Canterburian seli-conviction," printed 1641, 
third ed., never answered, couched under 
the name of inconvenienoy,) the pardoning 
.of the innocent blood of hundreds of thou- 
sand protestants in Ireland, the killing of 
many thousand nobles, barons, commons, 
by the hands of papists in arms against the 
law of the land, the making of l^gland a 
field of blood, the obtruding of an idolatrous 
service-book, with armies of men, by sea 
and land, to block up the kingdcmi of Scot- 
land, are all these inconveniences only ? 

4. Are they only possible and accidental ? 
Bi^ make a monarch absolute, as the P. 
Prelate doth, and tyranny is as necessary 
and as much intended by a sinjful man, in- 
clined to make a g^ of himself, as it is natu- 
ral to men to sin, when they axe tempted, 
and to be drunken and giddy with honour 
and ^eatoess. Witness the kmgs of Israel 
and Judah, though de jure they were not 
absolute. Is it aocid^ital to Nero, Julian, 
to the ten horns that grew out of the wo- 
man's head, who sat upon the scarlet co- 
loured beast, to make war against the Lamb 
and his fdOiowers, especially the spirit of 
Satan bemg in them ? 

P. Prelate, — They infer, 1. They cannot, 
without violation of a divine ordinance and 
breach of faith, resume the authority they 
have placed in the king. 2. It were high 
sin to rob authority of its essentials. 3. 
This ordinance is not aXoytg but iv^0M« and 
hath urgent reasons. 

2f 



I 



'-■I- 



210 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



Ans, 1. — These nameless authors cannot 
infer that an oath is broken which is made 
conditionally; all authority given by the 
people to the king is condition^, that he use 
it for the safety of the people ; if it be used 
for their destruction, they break no faith to 
resume it, for they never made faith to give 
up their power to the king upon such terms, 
and so they cannot be said to resume what 
they never gave. 

2. So the P. Prelate maketh power to 
act all the former mischiefs, the essentials of 
a king. Balaam is not worthy his wages 
for prophesying thus, that the king's essen- 
tials is a power of blood, and destructive to 
people, law, religion, and liberties of church 
and state, for omerwise we teach not, that 
people may resimie from the king autho- 
rity and power to disarm papists, to root 
out the bloody Irish, and m justice serve 
them as they have served us. 

3. This ordinance of the people, giving 
lawful power to a king for the governmg of 
the people in peace and godliness, is G^'s 
gooa pleasure, and hath just reasons and 
causes. But that the people make over a 
power to one man, to act all the inconve- 
niences above named, I mean the bloody 
and destructive inconveniences, hath nothing 
of Grod or reason in it. 

P. Prelate. — The reasons of this opinion 
are : — 1. If power sovereign were not in one, 
he could not have strength enough to act all 
necessary parts and acts of government. 2. 
Nor to prevent divisions which attend mul- 
titudes, or many endowed with equal power ; 
and the authors say, they must part with 
their native right entirely for a greater 
good, and to prevent greater evils. 3. To 
resume any part of this power, of which the 
people have totally divested themselves, or 
to limit it, is to disable sovereignty from go- 
vernment, loose the sinews of sJl society, &c. 

Ans. 1. — I know none for this opinion, 
but the P. Prelate himself. The first rea- 
son may be made rhyme, but never reason : 
for though there be not absolute power to 
good and ill, there may be strength of 
umited power in abundance in the king, 
and sufficient for all acts of just government, 
and the adequate end of government, which 
is, saltis populi, the sarety of the people. 
But the royalist will have strength to be a 
tyrant, and act all the tyrannical and bloody 
inconveniences of which we spake, an essen- 
tial part of the power of a king ; as if weak- 
ness were essential to strength, and a king 



could not be powerful as a king, to do good, 
and save and protect, except he had power 
also afi a tyrant to do evil, and tp destroy 
and waste his people. This power is weak- 
ness, and no part of the image of the great- 
ness of the King of kings, woxym a king re- 
presenteth. 

2. The second reason condemneth de- 
mocracy and aristocracy as unlawM, and 
maketh monarchy the only physic to cure 
these ; as if there were no government an 
ordinance of Grod save only absolute mo- 
narchy, which indeed is no ordinance of God 
at all, but contrary to the, nature of a lawful 
king. (Deut. xvii. 3.) 

3. That people must part with their native 
right totally to make an absolute monarch, 
is as if the whole members of the body 
would part with their whole nutritive power, 
to cause the milt to swell, which would be 
the destruction of the body. 

4. The people cannot divest themselves 
of power of defensive wars more than they 
can part with nature, and put themselves in 
a condition inferior to a slave, who, if his 
master, who hath power to sell him, invade 
him unjustly, to take away his life, may op- 
pose violence to unjust violence. And the 
other consequences are null. 



QUESTION XLII. 

WHETHER ALL CHRISTIAN KINGS ARK DEPEN- 
DENT FROM CHRIST, AND MAY BE CALLED 
HIS VICEGERENTS. 

The P. Prelate taketh on him to prove 
the truth of this ; but the question is not 
pertinent, it belongeth to another head, to 
the king's power in church matters. I 
therefore ontj examine what he saith, and 
follow him. 

P. Prelate. — Sectaries have found a query 
of late, that kings are God's, not Christ's 
lieutenants on earth. Bomanists and puri- 
tans erect two sovereigns in every state, — 
the Jesuit in the Pope, the puritan in the 
presbytery. 

Ans. 1. — We give a reason why Grod hath 
a lieutenant, as God; because kings are 
gods, bearing the sword of vengeance against 
seditious and bloody prelates, and other ill 
doers. But Christ, God-man, the Mediator 
and head of the body — ^the church, hath 
neither pope nor king to be head under him. 



s=r 



THE LAW AND THB PIUNCS. 



211 



The sword is oommonicable to men ; bat the 
headship of Christ is communicable to no 
king, nor to any created shoulders. 2. 
The Jesuit maketh the Pope a king; and 
so this P. Prelate maketh nim, in extent, 
the bishop of bishops, and so king, as I 
have proved. But we place no sovereignty 
in presbyteries, but a mere ministerial power 
of servants, who do not take on them to 
make laws and religious .ceremonies, as pre- 
lates do, who indeed make themselves kmgs 
and lawgivers in God's house. 

P. Prelate. — We speak of Christ as head 
of the church. Some think that Christ was 
king by his resurrection, jure <icquisito, by 
a new title, ri^ht of merit. I thmk he was 
a king from his conception. 

Ans. — 1. You declare hereby, that the 
king is a ministerial head of the church, 
rnaer the head Christ. All our divines, 
disputing against the Pope's headship, say. 
No mortal man hath shoulders for so glo- 
rious a. head. You give the king such 
shoulders. But why are not the kings, 
even Nero, Julian, Nebuchadnezzar, and 
Belshazzar, vicegerents of Christ, as media- 
tor, as priest, as redeemer, as prophet, as 
advocate, presenting our prayers to God his 
father? What action, 1 pray you, have 
Christian kings, by office, under Christ, in 
dying and rising from the dead for us, in 
sendmg down me Holy Ghost, preparing 
noansions for us ? Now, it is as proper and 
incommunicably reciprocal with the media- 
tor to be the only head of the body, the 
church, (CoL i. 18,) as to be the only re- 
deemer and advocate of his church. 

2. That Christ was kii^ from his concep- 
tion, as man bom of the Virgin Mary, suit- 
eth well with papists, who wfll have Christ, 
as man, the visible head of the church; 
that so as Christ-man is now in heaven, he 
may have a visible pope to be head in all 
ecclesiastical matters. And that is the 
reason why this P. Prelate maketh him 
head of the church by an ecclesiastical 
right, as we heard; and so he foUoweth 
Becanus the Jesuit in this, and others of his 
fellows. 

P. PreUae. — 1. Proof. If kings reign by 
^]1 per, in and through Christ, as the wisdom 
of God and the mediator, then are kings 
the vicegerents of Christ as mediator ; but 
the former is said, Prov. viii. 16, 16 ; so Dr 
Andrews, of blessed memory. 

Ans, 1. — I deny the major. All believ- 
ers living the life ot God, engrafted in Christ 



as branches in the tree, (John xv. 1, 2,) 
should, by the same reason, be vicegerents 
of the Mediator; so should the angels to 
whom Christ is a head, (Col. ii. 10,) be his 
vicegerents ; and aU the judges and consta- 
bles on earth should be under-mediators, 
for they live and act in Christ ; yea, all the 
creatures, in the Mediator, are made new, 
(Rev. xxi. 6 ; Rom. viii. 20—22.) 2. Dr 
Andrew's name is a curse on the earth, his 
writings prove him to be a popish apostate. 

P. JVetoe. — 2. Christ is not only king 
of his church, but in order to his church, 
Bang over the kings and kingdoms of the 
earth. (Psal. ii. 5, 8.) 3. Matt. xxi. 18, 
^' To him is given all power in heaven and 
earth ;" theretore, all sovereignty over kings. 

Ana. 1. — If aU these be Christ's vice- 

Serents, over whom he hath obtained power, 
iien, because the Father hath given him 
power over all flesh, to give them life eter- 
nal, (John xvii. 1, 2,) then are all believers 
his vicegerents, yea, and all the damned 
men and devils, and death and hell, are his 
vicegerents; for Christ, as mediator, hath 
all power given to him as king of the church, 
and so power kingly over s3l his enemies, 
" to reign until he make them his foot- 
stool," (rsal.cx. 1, 2,) " to break themivilJi 
a rod ot iron." (Psal. ii. 9 ; 1 Cor. xv. 24 — 
27; Rev. i. 18, 20; v. 10—16.) And, by 
that same reason, the P. Prelate's fourth 
and fifth aiguments fall to the ground. He is 
heir of all things ; therefore, all things are 
his vicegerents. What more vain ? He is 
Prince of the kin^ of the earth, and King of 
Ogs, of kings, m his enemies; thererore, 
sea and land are his vicegerents. 

P. Prelate (p. 58). — Kings are nurse- 
fathers of the cnurch, therefore they hold 
their crowns of Christ. Divines say, that 
by men in sacred orders Christ doth rule 
ms church meddately in those things which 
primely concern salvation, and that by 
kings' sceptres and power he doth protect 
his church, and what concemeth external 

Eomp, order, and decency. Then, in this 
ttter sense, kin^ are no liss the immediate 
vicegerents of Christ than bishops, priests, 
and deacons, in the former. 

Ans. 1. — Because kings hold their crowns 
of Christ as mediator and redeemer, it fol- 
loweth, by as good consequence, kings are 
sub-mediators, and under-priests, and re- 
deemers, as vicegerents. Christ, as king, 
hath no visible royal vicegerents under him. 
2. Men in holy orders, sprinkled with one 




of the p3Sp]al^ fiver bkssed BSmMaakeniBf mth 
as flntioknstion prelates, unwashed priests 
to (yffer sac^rifioes, and popish deacons, are 
no more adaiitted hj Christ to enter into 
his sanctuary as goyemors, than the leper 
into the camp of old, and the Moabite and 
Ammonite were to enter into the con- 
gregation of the Lord (Deut. xxiii. 3); 
therefore, we have excommmnicated this P. 
Prelate and such Moabites out of the Lord's 
hotse. What be the things that do not 
primely concern salration, the P. Prelate 
knoweth, to wit, images in the church, altar- 
worship, antichristian ceremonies, whichnation to 
root out heretics, that is, (if prelates were 
not traitorous in administering the oath,) 
Arminians and papists, such as this P. Pre- 
late is known to be ; but I hold that the 
estates of Scotland have power to punish 
the king, if he labour to subvert religion and 
laws. 

4. If this argument, that religion is to be 
persuaded, not forced, which the P. Prelate 
useth, be good, it will make much against 
the king ; tor the king, then, can force no 
man to tlie external profession and use of 
the ordinances of God, and not only kings, 
but all the people should be willing. 

P. Prelate, — Though the king may not 

g reach, &c., yet the exercise of these tilings 
*eely within his kingdom, what concemem 
the decent and orderly doing of all, and the 
external man, in the external government 
of the church, in appointing things arbitrary 
and indifferent, and what else is of this strain, 
are so due to the prerogative of the crown, 
as that the priests, without highest rebellion, 
may not usurp upon him ; a king in the state 
and church is a mixed person, not simply 
civil, but sacred too. They are not only 
professors of truth, that they have in the 
capacity of Christians, but they are defen- 
ders of the faith as kings ; they are not sons 
only, but nurse-&thers ; they serve God, as 
Augustine saith, as men, and as kings also. 

Ans, 1. — If ye give the king power of the 
exercises of word and sacraments in his king- 
dom, this is deprivation of ministers in lus 
kingdom, (for he sure cannot hinder them in 
another kingdom,) you may make him to give 
a ministerial calling, if he may take it away. 
By what word of God can the king close the 
mouth of the man of God, whom Christ 
hath commanded to speak in his name ? 2. 
If the king may externally govern the 
church, why may he not excommunicate ; 
for this is one of the special acts of church 



government, especially seeing he is a mixed 
person, that is, half a churchman, and if he 
mav prescribe arbitrary-teaching ceremonies, 
and mstruct men in the duties of holiness 
required of pastors, I see not but he may 
teach the m)rd. 3. Dr Feme, and other 
royalists, deny arbitrary government to the 
king in the state, and with reason, because 
it is tyranny over the people ; but prelates 
are not ashamed of commanding a thing ar- 
bitrary and indifferent in God's worSiip; 
shall not arbitrary government in the church 
be tyranny over the conscience ? But, say 
they, " Churchmen teacheth the king what 
is decent and orderly in God's worship, and 
he commandeth it." 

Ana, — 1. Solomon by no teaching of church- 
men deposed Abiathar ; David by no teach- 
ing of churchmen appointed the form of the 
temple. 2. Hath God given a prerogative 
royal to kings, whereby they may govern 
the church, and as kings, they sh^ not 
know how to use it, but in so far as they are 
taught by churchmen? 3. Certainly, we 
shafi once be informed by God's word, what 
is this prerogative, if according to it, all the 
external worship of God may be ordered. 
Lawyers and royalists teach, that it is an 
absoluteness of power to do above or against 
a law, as they say from 1 Sam. viii., 9 — 11, 
and whereby the king may oppress, and^ 
no man Jmay say, "What dost thou ? Now, 
good P. Prelate, if, by a plenitude of ty- 
ranny, the king prescribe what he will in 
the external worship and government of 
God's house, who can rebuke the king 
though he command all the antichristian 
ceremonies of Home, and of Turkey, yea, 
and the sacrificing of children to Molech ? 
(for absoluteness royal will amount to shed- 
ding of innocent blood,) for, if any oppose 
the king, or say, Sir, wnat do you ? he op- 
poseth the prerogative royal, and that is 
highest rebellion, saith our P. Prelate. 4. 1 
see not how the king is a mixed person, be- 
cause he is defender of the fsiith, as the Pope 
named the king of England, Henry VIII. ; 
he defendeth it by his sword, as he is a nurse- 
father, not by the sword that cometh out of 
his mouth. 5. I would know how Julian, 
Nebuchadnezzar, Og, and Sihon, were mix- 
ed persons, and did all in the external go- 
vernment of the church, and that by their 
office, as they were kings. 6. All the in- 
stances that Augustine bringeth to prove 
that the king is a mixed person, proveth 
nothing but civil acts in kings ; as Hezekiah 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



215 



I 



cast down the high places, the king of Nin- 
eveh compelled to obey the prophet Jonah, 
Darius cast Daniel's enemies to the hons. 

P. Prelate, — If you make two sovereigns 
and two independents, there is no more peace 
in the state, than in Rebecca's womb, while 
Jacob and Esau strove for the prerogative. 

Ans, 1. — What need Israel strive, when 
Moses and Aaron are two independents ? If 
Aaron make a golden calf, may not Moses 
panish him f It Moses turn an Ahab, and 
sell himself to do wickedly, ought not eighty 
valiant priests and Aarons both rebuke, cen- 
sure, and resist ? 

2. The P. Prelate said, (p. 65,) " Let no 
man imagine we privilege the king from the 
direction and power of the church, so he be 
no intruding Uzziah." I ask, P. Prelate, 
what is this church power? Is it not su- 
preme in its kind of church power ? or is it 
subordinate to the king? It it be supreme, 
see how P. Prelate maketh two supremos, 
and two sovereigns. If it be subordmate to 
the king, as he is a mixed person, the king 
is privileged from this power, and he may 
intrude as Uzziah ; and by his prerogative, 
as a mixed person, he may say mass, and of- 
fer a sacrifice, if there be no power above 
his prerogative to curb him. If there be 
none, the P. Prelate's imagination is real ; 
the king is privileged frx)m bH church power. 
Let the P. Prelate see to it. I see no in- 
convenience for reciprocations of subjections 
in two supremos ; and that they may mutu- 
ally censure and judge one another. 

06;.-^Not in the same cause, that is im- 
possible. If the king say mass, shall the 
church judge and censure the king for intru- 
sion ? and because the king is also sovereign 
and supreme in his kind, he may judge and 
punish the chiux;h for tiieir act of judging 
and censuring the king ; it being an intru- 
sion on his prerogative, that any should 
judge the highest judge. 

Ans, — The one is not subject to the other, 
but in the case of mal-administration ; the 
innocent, as innocent, is subject to no higher 
punishing ; he may be subject to a higner, 
as accusing, citing, &c. STow, the royalist 
must give mstance in the same cause, where 
the church faileth against the king and his 
civil law ; and the kmg, in the same cause, 
Meth against the church canon ; and then 
it shall be easy to answer. 

P. PreUUe, — Religion is the bottom of 
all happiness, if you make the king only to 
execute what a presbytery commandeth, he 



is in a hard case, and you take from him the 
chiefest in government. Ecclesiastical power 
hath the soul in subjection ; the civil sove- 
reignty holdeth a dead dominion over the 
body. Then the Pope and presbytery shall 
be in a better condition than the long. Cic, 
in ver, omnes religione moventur: super- 
stition is furious, and maddeneth people, that 
they spaxe neither crown nor mitre. 

Ans. — Cold and dry is the P. Prelate 
when he spendeth four pages in declama- 
tion for the excellency of religon : the mad- 
ness of superstition is nothing to the pur- 
pose. 

1. The king hath a chief hand in church 
affairs, when he is a nurse-father, and bear- 
eth the royal sword to defend both the ta- 
bles of the law, though he do not spin and 
weave surplices, and other base mass-clothes 
to prelates, and su6h priests of Baal : they 
dishonour his majesty, who bring his prero- 
gative so low. 

2. The king doth not execute with blind 
obedience, wim us, what the Pope com- 
mandeth, and the prelates, but with h'ght of 
knowledge what synods discern ; and he is 
no more made the servant of the church by 
this, than the king of Judah and Nebuchad- 
nezzar are servants to Jeremiah and Daniel, 
because they are to obey the word of the 
Lord in their mouth. Let them show a rea- 
son of this, why they are servants in exe- 
cuting God's will in discipline, and in pun- 
ishing what the Holy Ghost, by his apostles 
and elders, decree, when any contemn the 
decree concerning the abstinence from blood, 
things strangled, &c., (Acts xv.,) rather than 
when they nunish murder, idolatry, blas- 
phemy, whiai are condemned in the Word, 
preached by pastors of Christ ; and farther, 
this objection would have some more colour, 
(in reality it hath not,) if kings were only to 
execute what the church ministerially, in 
Christ's name, commandeth to be done in 
synods; but ^ngs may, and do command 
synods to convene, and do their duty, and 
command many duties, never synodically 
decreed ; as they are to cast out of their 
court apostate prelates, sleeping many years 
in the devil's arms, and are to command 
trencher-divines, neglecting their flock, and 
lying at court attending the filing of a 
dead bishop, as ravens do an old dying 
horse, to go and attend the flock, and not 
the court, as this P. Prelate did. 

3. A king hath greater outward riory, 
and may do much more service to Qirist, 



216 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



in respect of extension, and is more excel-* 
lent than the pastor, who yet, in regard of 
intention, is busied about nobler things, to 
wit, the soul, the gospel, and eternity, than 
the king. 

4. Superstition maddeneth men; but it 
foUoweth not that true religion may not set 
them on work to defend soul and body 
against tyranny of the crown, and antichris- 
tian mitres. 

P. Prelate, — ^The kingdom had peace and 
plenty in the prelates' time. 

Ans, — 1. A beUy-argument. We had 
plenty, when we sacrificed to the queen of 
heaven. If the traveller contend to have 
his purse again, shall the robber say, Bob- 
bery was blessed with peace ? The rest, to 
the end, are lies, and answered already. 
Only his invectives against ruling elders, 
falsely called lay-elders, are not to purpose. 
Parliament-priests, and lay and court-pas- 
tors, are lay-prophets. 

2. That presbyteries meddle with civil 
business, is a slaiider. They meddle with 
public scandals that offendeth in Christ's 
kingdom. But the prelates, by oflioe, were 
more in two elements, in church and state, 
than any frogs, even in the king's leaven- 
tubs, ordinarily. 

3. SomelJiing he saith of popes usurping 
over kings, but only of one of his fathers, a 
great unclean spirit, G-regory the Great. 
But if he had refuted him by God's word, 
he should have thrown stones ^t his own 
tribe; for prelates, like him, do ex q^cio 
trample upon the neck of kings, 

4. His testimonies of one council and 
one &ther for all antiquity proveth nothing. 
Atbanasius said, *^ G^ hath given David's 
throne to kings." What, to be hei\d of the 
church ? No ; to be minister of Gpd, with-r 
out i§« to tutor the church. And, beepiuse 
" Kmgs reign by Christ," as the connpil of 
Armin saith; therefore, it may fdkw, a 
bailie is also head of the church. It is takea 
from Prov. viii., wjd answered* 

5. That presbyteries have usuri)ed ^ver 
kings more than popes, since Hifdebrand, 
is a lie. AU stories are full of the usurpa- 
tion of prelates, hie own tribe. The Pope 
is but a swelled fat prelate ; and what he 
saith of popes, he saith of his 9wn house. 

6. The ministers of Christ in Scotland 
had never a contest with king James but 
for his sins, and his conniving witli papists, 
and his introducing bishops, the usners of 
the Pope. 



QUESTION XLIII. 

WHETHER THE KING OF SCOTLAITD B^ AN 
ABSOLUTE PRnrCB, HAVING PRBROGATIYBS 
ABOVE PARLIAMENT AKD LAWS : THR UB- 
GATJTE IS ASSERTED BT THE LAWS OF 
SCOTLAND, THE KING's OATQ OF CORONA- 
TION, THE CONFESSION OF FAITH, ^. 

The negative part of this I hold in these 
assertions. 

Assert, 1. — The kings of Scotland have 
not any prerogative distmctfrom supremacy 
above the laws. If the people must b& 
governed by no laws but by me king's own 
biws, that is, the laws and sts^tutes of the 
realm, acted in parliament ander pain of 
disobedience, then must the king govern by 
no other laws, and so by no prerogative 
above law. But the former is an evident 
truth by our acts of parliament ; therefore, 
so is the latter. The proposition is con- 
firmed, 1. Because whatever law enjoineth 
passive obedience no way but hy laws, that 
must enjoin also the king actively to com- 
mand no other way but by law ; for to be 
governed by law essentially includeth to be 
governed by the supreme governor only 
by law. 2. An act of regal govemij^ is 
an act of law, and essentiafly an act of law; 
an act of absolute prerogative is no act of 
law, but an act above law, or qS pleasure 
loosed from law ; and so they are opposed 
as acts of law, and non-aets of law. If the 
subjects, by command of iiie king and par- 
liament, cannot be governed but by W, 
how can the king but be under his own 
and the parliament's law, to govern pn{y hj 
law ? I prove the assumption from Pari 3, 
of king James I, act 48, which ordains 
'^ That all and sundry the king's Keg^s be 
governed under the kmg's hms and /statutes 
of the realm allenarly, and under no poro 
ticidar laws or Bfemai privileges, nor by any 
laws of other countries or r^ms.'^ Privi- 
leges do exdude kws. Absolute pleasure 
of the king as a man« and the law of the 
king as kmg, are opposed by way of con- 
tradiction ; and so in Pari. 6, James IV, 
act 79, ratified Pari. 8, James VI. act 
131, 

2, The king, at his coronation, (Pari. 1, 
James VI. act 8,) sweareth " to maintain 
the true kirk of Ood, and religion now pre- 
sently professed, in purity, and to rule the 
people according to the lawn and constitu- 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



217 



tions receired in the retJm, causing justice 
and equity to be ministered without par^ 
tiality." This did king Charles swear at 
his coronation, and was ratified, ParL 7, 
James VI. act 99. Hence he who, by the 
oath of God, is Hmited to govern by law, 
can have no prerogative above the law. If, 
then, the king change the religion and con- 
fession of faith, authorised by many par- 
liaments, (especially by Pari. 1, Charles, 
1633,) he goeth against his oath. The 
king's royal prerogative, or rather wpre- 
macy, (enacted Pari. 8, James VI. act 
129 ; Pari. 18, act 1 ; Pari. 21, act 1, 
James ; and Pari. 1, Charles, act 3,) can- 
not be contrary to the oath that king 
Charles did swear at his coronation, which 
bringeth down the prerogative to governing 
according to the standing laws of the realm." 
It cannot be contrary to these former par- 
liaments and acts, declaring that '* the lieges 
are to be governed by the hiws of the realm, 
and by no particular laws and special privi- 
leges ;" (but absolute prerogative is a special 
privilege above, or without Taw ;) which acts 
stand unrepealed to this day ; and these acts 
of parliaments stand ratified by Pari. 1, 
Charles, 1633. 

3. ParL 8, James VI. in the first three 
acts thereof, the king's supremacy, and the 
power and authority of parliaments are 
equally ratified under the same pain : — 
" Their jurisdictions, power, and judgments 
in spiritual or tempond causes, not ratified 
by lus Majesty, and the three estates con- 
vened in parliament, are discharged." But 
the absolute prerogative of the king above 
law, equity, and justice, was never ratified 
m any parliament of Scotland to this day. 

4. By Pari. 12, James VI. act 114, all 
former acts in &vour of the true church and 
religion being ratified, their power of mak- 
ing constitutions concerning ri ir^iirny order 
and decency, the privileges that |Grod hath 
given to spiritual office-bearers^ as well of 
doctrine and dicipline, in matters of heresy^ 
excommunication, collation, deprivation, and 
such like, warranted by the word of God, 
and aibo to assemblies and presbyteries, are 
ratified. Now in that parliament, in acts so 
contiguous, we are not to think that the 
king and three estates would n^ake acts for 
establishing the church's power in all the 
former heads of government, in which roy- 
alists say, " the soul of the king's absolute 
prerogative doth consist ;" and therefore it 
must be the true intent of our paurliament 



to give the king a supremacy and a prero- 
gative royal, (which we also give,) but with- 
out any absoluteness of boundless and tran- 
scendent power above law, and not to ob- 
trude a service-book, and all the supersti- 
tious rites of the church of Rome, without 
Grod's word, upon us. 

6. The former act of parliament ratifieth 
the true rehgion, according to the word of 
God, then could it never have been the in- 
tent of our parliament to ratify an absolute 
supremacy, according to which a king might 
govern li people, J a tyrannous lion, cSn. 
trary to Deut. xvii. 18 — 20. And it is 
true, Pari. 18, James VI. acts 1 and 2, 
upon personal qualifications, giveth a royal 
prerogative to king James over all causes, 

Sersons, and estates within his Majesty's 
ominion, whom they humbly acknowledge 
to be " sovereign monarch, absolute prince, 
judge and governor over all estates, per- 
sons, and causes." 

These two acts, for my part I acknow- 
ledge, are spoken rather in court expres- 
sions than in law terms. 

1. Because personal virtues cannot ad- 
vance a limited prince (such as the kings of 
Scotland, post hominum memoriam, ever 
were) to be an absolute prince. "Personal 
graces make not David absolutely supreme 
judge over all persons and causes ; nor can 
king James, advanced to be king of Eng- 
land, be for that made more king of Scot- 
land, and more supreme judge, than he 
was while he was only king of Scotland. 
A wicked prince is as essentially supreme 
judge as a godly king. 

2. If this parliamentary figure of speech, 
which is to be imputed to the times, exalted 
king James to be absolute in Scotland, for 
his personal endowments, there was no 
ground to put the same on king Charles. 
Personal virtues are not always hereditary, 
though to me the present king be the best. 

3. There is not any absoluteness above 
law in act 1, — the parliament must be more 
absolute in themselves. King James VI. 
had been divers years, before this 18th par- 
liament, king of Scotland; then, if they gave 
him by law an absoluteness, which he had 
not before, then they were more absolute. 
Those who can add absoluteness must have 
it in themselves. Nemo dat quod non habet. 
If it be said king James had that before the 
act ; the parliament legally declared it to be 
his power, which, before the declaration, 
was his power, I answer, all he had before 

2g 



218 



L£X, REX ; OK, 



this declaration was, to govern the people 
according to law and conscience, and no 
more ; and if they declare no other prero- 
gative royal to be due to him, there is an 
end, — we grant all. But, then, this which 
they call prerogative royal, is no more than 
a power to govern according to law, and so 
you had nowing to add to nng James upon 
the groimd of his personal virtues, only you 
make an oration to his praise in the acts of 
parliament. 

4. If this absoluteness of prerogative be 
given to the Idng, the subjects, swearing 
obedience, swear uiat he hath power from 
themselves to destroy themselves: this is 
neither a lawM oath^ nor though they 
should swear it, doth it oblige them. 

5. A supreme judge is a supreme father 
of all his children and all their causes ; and 
to be a supreme father cannot be contrary 
to a supreme judge ; but contrary it must 
be, if this supremacy make over to the 
prince a power of devouring as a lion, and 
that by a regal privilege, and by office, 
whereas he should be a father to save ; or 
if a judge kill an evil-doer, though that be 
an act destructive to one man, yet is it an 
act of a father to the commonwealth. An 
act of sil|>rem6 and absolute royalty is often 
an act of destruction to one particular man, 
and to the whole commonw^th. For ex- 
ample, when the kin^, out of his absolute 
prerogative, pai'donew a murderer, and he 
killeth another innocent man, and out of 
the same ground the king pardoneth him 
again, and so till he kill twenty, (for by what 
reason the prerogative giveth one pardon, 
he may give twenty, there is a like reason 
above law for all,) this act of absolute 
royalty is such an act of murder, as if a 
shepherd would keep a wolf in the fold with 
the sheep, he were guilty of the loss of these 
sheep. JSTow an act of destroying cannot 
be an act of judging^ far less of a supreme 
judge, but of a supreme murderer. 

6. Whereas he is called *' absolute prince 
and supreme judge, in aU causes, ecdesias- 
tical and civil," it is to be considered, 1. 
That the estates profess not in these acts to 
give any new prerogative, but only to con- 
tinue the old power, and that only with that 
amplitude and freedom which the king and 
his predecessors did enjoy and exercise be- 
fore : the extent whereof is best known 
from the acts of parliament, histories of the 
time, and the oaths of the kings of Scot- 
land. 2. That he is called absolute prince, 



not in any relation of freedom from law, or 
prerogative above law, whereunto, as unto 
the norma regula ao mensura potestatis 
sucBf ac subjectionis meoSj he is tyed by the 
fundamental law and his own oath, but in 
opposition to all foreign jurisdiction or prin- 
cipality above him, as is evident by the oath 
of supremacy set down for acknowledging of 
his power in the first act of parliament 21, 
king James VI. 3. They are but the same 
expression, giving only the same power be- 
fore acbiowledged in the 129th act, ParL 
8, king James vLj and that only over per- 
sons or estates, considered s^paratim^ and 
over causes; but neither at all over the 
laws nor over the estates^ taken conjufictim, 
and as convened in parliament, as is clear, 
both by the two immediately subsequent 
acts of that parliament, 8, James V I., esta- 
blishing the authority of parliaments equally 
with the kings^ and discharging all jurisdic- 
tions (albeit granted by the Bng) without 
their warrant, as also by the narrative deposit 
tive wordS) and certification of the act itself; 
otherwise the estates convened in parliament 
might, by virtue of that act j be summoned be- 
fore and censured by the king's majesty or his 
council, a judicatory substitute, be subordi- 
nate to, and censured by themselves, which 
were contrary to sense and reason. 4. The 
very terms of supreme judge, and in all 
causes, according to the nature of correlates, 
presuppoBoth courts and judicial proceedings 
and laws, as the ground-work and rule of 
all, not a freedom from them. 5. Act 6, 
Pari. 20, James Vli clearly interpreteth 
what is meant by the king's jurisdiction in 
all spiritual and ecclesiastical causes ; to wit, 
to be only in the oonsistorial causes of ma- 
trimony, testaments, bastardy, adulteries, 
abusively called spiritual causes, because 
handled in commissary courts, wherein the 
king appoints the commissary, his deputies, 
and makes the lords of the session his great 
consistory in all ecclesiastical causes, with 
reservation of his supremacy and preroga- 
tive therein. 

7. Supreme judge in all causes, cannot be 
taken quoad actus elieitoSy as if the king 
were to judge between two seamen, or two 
husbandmen, or two tradesmen, in that 
which is ■pnyper to their art ; or between two 
painters. Certainly the king is not to judge 
which of the two draweth the feirest picture, 
but which of the two wasteth most gold on 
his picture, and so doth interest most of the 
commonwealth. So the king cannot judge 



I 



TH^ LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



219 



in all ecclesiastical causes, that is, he cannot, 
auoad actos elicitos, prescribe this worship, 
tor example, the mass, not the sacrament of 
the Lord^s supper. Therefore the king 
hath but ckctvLs irnperatoSf some royal poli- 
tical acts about the worship of Gk>d, to oom- 
mand God to be worshipped according to 
his word, to punish the superstitions or ne- 
glectors of divine worship ; therefore, can-; 
not the king be sole judge in matters that 
belong to the college of judges bj the laws 
of Scotland, the lord^C of session only may 
judge these matters, (rarl. 2, James I., act 
45; Pari. 8, James III., act 62 ; Pari. 4, 
James III., act 105; Pari. 6, James I., 
act 83 ; Pari. 6, James L, act 86 ; Pari. 7, 
James V., act 104,) and that only according 
to law, without any remedy of appellation to 
king or the parliament (Pari. 14, James II., 
act 62 and 63). And the king is by act of 
parliament inhibited to send any private 
letter to stay the acts of justice; or if any 
such letter be procured, the judges are not 
to acknowledge it a« the king^ will, for 
they are to proceed impartially according to 
justice, and are to mak<s the law, which is 
the kmg and parliament's public revealed 
will, their rule (Pari. 5, James V., act 68 ; 
Pari. 8, James VI., act 139 ; Pari. 6, James 
VL, act 92). Nor may the lords suspend 
the course of justice, or the sentence or exe- 
cution of decrees upon the king's private let- 
ter (Pari. ^, James YI., act 79, and Pari. 
11, James YI., act 47). And so, if the 
kinff's will or desire, as he js a man, be opr^ 
posite to his law and his wiU as king, it is 
not to be regarded. This is a strong argu-r 
ment, that me parliaments never nmde the 
king supreme judge, quocui cictus elicitos, 
in ail causes, nay not if the king have a 
cause of his own that concemeth lands of 
the crown, iax less can the king have a will 
of prerogative above the law by our laws of 
Scotland. And, therefore, when in Pari, 
8, James VI., the king's royal power is 
established in the ^rst act, the very next 
act immediately subjoined thereunto declar- 
eth the authority of the supren^e court of 
parliament continued past all memory of 
man unto this day* &nd constitute of the free 
voices of the three estates of this ancient 
kingdom, which, in the parliament 1606, is 
called, '^ the ancient and fundan^ental po* 
licy of this kingdom ;" and so fundamental, 
as if it should be innovated, such confusion 
would ensue, as it could no more be a free 
monarchy, as is expressed in the parliament's 



printed commi»ion, 1604, by whom the 
same, under God, hath been upholden, re- 
bellious and traitorous subjects punished, 
the good and faithful preserved and main- 
tained, and the laws and acts of parliament 
(by which all men are governed) made and 
established, and appointeth the honour, au- 
thority, and dignity of the estates of parlia- 
ment to stand in their own integrity, ac- 
cording to the ancient and laudable custom 
by-past, without alteration or diminution, 
ana therefore dischargeth any to presume or 
take in hand, " to impugn the aignity and 
the authority of the said estates, of to seek 
or procure the innovation or diminution of 
their power or authority, under the pain of 
treason:" and, therefore, in the next aot^ 
they discharge all jurisdictions, or judica- 
tories, (albeit appointed by the king's ma- 
jesty, as the high commission was,) without 
their warrant and approbation ; and that, 
as contrary to the fundamental laws above 
titled, (Pari. 3, James I., act 48 and Pari. 
6, James IV., act 79,) whereby the lieges 
should only be ruled by laws or acts passed 
in the parliament of this kingdom. Now, 
what waa the ancient dignity, authority, and 
power of the parliaments of Scotland, which 
IS to stand without diminution, that will be 
easily and best known from the subsequent 
passages, or historians, which can also be 
very easily verified by the old registers, 
whensoever they should be produced. In 
the meantime, remember that in parliament 
and by act of Pari. James YI., for observ- 
ing the due order of parliament, promiseth, 
never to do or command any thmg which 
may directly or indirectly prejudge the li- 
berty of free reasoning or votmg of parlia- 
ment (Pari. 11, James VL, act 40). And 
withal, to evidence the freedom of the par- 
liament of Scotland, from that absolute un- 
limited prerogative of the prince, and their 
liberty to resist his breaking of covenant 
with them, or treaties with foreign nations, 
ye shall consider — 1. That the kings of 
Scotland are obliged, before they be in- 
augurated, to swear and make their faithful 
covenant to the true kirk of Grod, th^t they 
shall maintain, defend, and set forward the 
true religion confessed and established within 
this reahn; even as they are obliged and 
restricted by the law of Grod, as well in 
Deuteronomy as in 2 Kings xi., and as they 
crave obedience of their subjects. So that 
the bond and contract shall be mutual and 
reciprocal, in all time coming, between the 



J 



220 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



prince and the people, aooording to liie word 
of Grod, as is fullj expressed in the register 
of Hie convention of estates, July Ib&f. 2. 
That important acts and sentences at home, 
(whereof one is printed, Pari. 14, James 
III., act 112,) and in treaties with foreign 
princes, the estates of parliament did append 
their several seals with the king's great seal, 
(which to Grotius, Bardaius, and Amisseus, 
is an mideniahle argument of a limited 
prince, as well as the style of our parlia- 
ment, that the estates, with the king, ordain, 
ratify, rescind, &c.) as also they were obliged, 
in case of the king's breaking these treaties, 
to resist him therein, even by arms, and 
that without any breach of their allegiance, 
or of his prerogative, as is yet extant m the 
records of our old treaties with England and 
France, &c. But to go on, and leave some 
high mysteries unto a rejoinder. 

And to the end I may make good, 1. That 
nothing is here taught in this treatise but 
the very doctrine of the Church of Scotland, 
I desire that the reader may take notice of 
the larger Confession of the Church of Scot- 
land, printed with the body of the confes- 
sions at Creneva, anno 1612, and authorised 
by James VI. and the three estates in par- 
liament, and printed in our acts of parlia- 
ment (Pari. 16, James VI., anno 1567). 
Amongst good works of the second table, 
saith our Confession, (art, 14,) are these : — 
Tb honour father, mother, princes, rulers, 
and superior powers. To love them, to sup- 
port them, yea, to obey their charge, fnot 
repugning to the commandment of God,) to 
save the lives of innocents, to repress ty- 
ranny, to defend the oppressed, to keep our 
bodies clean and holy, &c. The contrary 
whereof is, to disobey or resist any that 
Grod hath placed in authority, (while they 
pass not over the bounds of their office,) to 
murder, or to consent thereunto, to bear 
hatred, or to let innocent blood be shed, if 
we may withstand it, &c. Now the Confes- 
sion citeth in the margin, Eph. i. 1, 7 and 
Ezek. xxii. 1 — 4, &c., where it is evident, 
by the name of father and mother, all infe- 
rior judges as well as the king, and espe- 
dally the princes, rulers, and lords of par- 
liament are understood. 2. The bloody city 
is to be judged, because they relieved not 
the oppressed out of the hand of the bloody 
princes, (v. 6,) who every one of them did 
to their power shed innocent blood (Ezek. 
xxii. 6), 3. To resist superior powers, and 
so the estates of parliament, as the cavaliers 



of Scotland do, is resistance forbidden (Bom. 
xiii. 1). The place is also cited in the Con- 
fession, and the Confession exponeth the 
place (Bom. xiii.) according to the interpre- 
tation of all sound expositors, as is evident in 
these words, art. 24, ^' And therefore we 
confess and avouch, that such as resist the 
supreme power, doing that thing which ap- 
pertaineth to his charge, do resist God's or- 
dinance, and therefore cannot be guiltless. 
And farther, we affirm, that whosoever 
denieth unto them aid, their counsel and 
support, while as the princes and rulers vigi- 
lantly travel in execution of their office, tl^t 
the same men deny their help, support, and 
counsel to God, who, by the presence of his 
lieutenant, craves it of them." From which 
words we have clear : — 

1. That to resist the king or parliament, 
is to resist them while as they are doing 
the thing that appertaineth to tiieir charge, 
and white they virilantly travel in the exe- 
cution of their omce. But while king and 

Earliament do acts of fyranny against Grod's 
kw, and all good laws of men, they do not 
the things mat appertain to their charge 
and the execution of their office ; therefore, 
by our Confession, to resist them in tyran- 
nical acts is not to resist the ordinance of 
God. 

2. To resist princes and rulers, and so in- 
ferior judges, and to deny them counsel and 
comfort, is to deny help, counsel, and com- 
fort to God. Let then cavaliers, and such 
as re^e to help the princes of the land 
against papists, prelates and mahgnants, 
know, that they resist God's ordmance, 
which rebellion they unjustly impute to us. 

3. Whereas it is added in our Confession, 
that God, by the presence of his lieutenant, 
craveth support and counsel of the people, 
it is not so to be taken, as if then only we 
are to aid and help inferior judges and 
parliaments, when the king personally re- 
quireth it, and not otherways. 1. Because 
the king requireth help, when, by his office, 
he is obliged to require our help and coun- 
sel agamst papists and maHgnants, though as 
misled, he should command the contrary: 
so if the law require our hdbp, the king re- 
quireth it ex ojfficiQ, 2. lliis should ex- 
pressly contradict our Confession, if none 
were obliged to give help and counsel to the 
parliaments and estates, except the king 
in his own person should require it, because 
(art. 14) it is expressly said. That to save 
the lives of innocents, or repress tyranny, to 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



221 



defend the oppressed, — ^not to suffer inno- 
cent blood to be shed, are works pleasing to 
God, which he rewardeth. Now we are not 
to think in reason, if the king shall be in- 
duced bj wicked counsel to do tyrannical 
works, and to raise papists in arms against 
protestants, that God doth by him, as by his 
fieutenant, require our help, comfort, and 
counsel in assisting the kins in acts of ty- 
ranny, and in oppression, ana in shedding in- 
nocent blood ; yea, our Confession tyeth us 
to deny help and comfort to the king in these 
wicked acts, and therefore our help must be 
in the things that pertaineth to his royal 
office and duty only, otherwise we are to re- 
press all tyranny (art. 14). 

4. To save the lives of innocents, to re- 
press tyranny, to defend the oppressed, are, 
by our Confession, good works, well pleasing 
to God, and so is this a good work, not to 
suffer innocent blood to be shed, if we may 
withstand it. Hence it is clear as the sun, 
that our Confession, according to the word of 
God, to which king Charles £d swear at his 
coronation, doth oblige and tie us in the 
presence of God and his holy angels, to rise 
m arms to save the innocent, to repress 
tyranny, to defend the oppressed. When 
the king, by ill counsel, sent armies by sea 
and land to kill and destroy the whole king^ 
dom who should refuse such a service-bo^ 
as they could not in conscience receive, ex- 
cept they would disobey Grod, renounce the 
Confession of Faith, which the king and they 
had sworn unto, and prove perfidious apos- 
tates to Christ and his church, what could 
we do, and that the same Confession, consi- 
dering our bonds to our dear brethren in 
Engird, layeth bonds on us to this, as a 
good work also, not to suffer their innocent 
blood to be shed, but to defend them, when 
they, against all law of Grod, of men, of 
state, oi nations, are destroyed and killed. 
For mv part, I judge it had been a guilti- 
ness of blood upon Scotland, if we hiM, not 
helped them, and risen in arms to defend 
ourselves and our innocent brethren against 
bloody cavaliers. Add to this what is in the 
24th article of the same Confession: — 
** We confess, whosoever goeth about to take 
away, or to confound the whole state of civil 
polity, now long estabHshed, we affirm the 
same men not only to be enemies to man- 
kind, but also wickedly to fight against God's 
will." But those who have taken arms 
against the estates of Scotland, and the 
princes and rulers of the land, have la- 



boured to take away parliaments, and the 
fundamental laws of this kingdom, there- 
fore, the Confession addeth, (art. 16,) '' We 
farther confess and acknowledge, that such 
persons as are placed in authority are to be 
loved, honoureo, feared, and holden in most 
reverent estimation, because that they are 
lieutenants of Grod, in whose sessions Grod 
himself doth sit and judge ; yea, even the 
judges and princes themselves, to whom, by 
God, is given the sword, to the praise and 
defence of good men, and to revenge and 
punish all open malefactors." Therefore, 
the parliament, and princes, and rulers of 
the land, are Good's lieutenants on earUi no 
less than the king, by our Confession of 
Faith ; and those wno resist them, resist the 
ordinance of God. Boyalists say, they are 
but the deputies of the king, and when they 
do contrary to his royal will, they may be 
resisted, yea, and be killed, for in so far 
they are private men, though they are to be 
honoured as judges when they act according 
to the king's wul, whose deputies they are. 
But, I answer : — 

1. It is a wonder that inferior judges 
should be formally judges, in so far as they 
act conform to the wiU of a mortal king, 
and not in so far as they act conform to the 
will of the King of kings, seeing the judg- 
ment they execute is the King of kings', 
and not the judgment of a mortal king. (2 
Chron. xix. 6.) 

2. Boyalists cannot endure the former 
distinction as it is applied to the king, but 
they receive it with both hands as it is ap- 
pUed to inferior judges ; and yet, certain it 
is, that it is as ordinary for a king, being a 
sinful man, to act sometimes as tne Ueute- 
nant of God, and sometimes as an erring and 
misinformed man, no less than the inferior 
judge acteth sometimes according to the 
king's will and law, and sometimes accord- 
ing to his own private way ; and if we are 
to obey the inferior judge as the deputy of 
the king, what shall become of his person, 
when cavaliers may kill him at some £dge- 
hiU? fop so they mock this distinction, as 
applied to the king in regard of his person 
and of his royal office ; and for this point 
our Confession citeth in the margin Bom. 
xiii. 7; 1 Pet. ii. 17; Psal. ixxxii. 1, 
which places do clearly prove that inferior 
magistrates are, 1. God's ordinances; 2. 
Gods on earth, (Psal. Ixxxii. 6) ; 3. Such 
as bear the Lord's sword ; 4, " That they 
are not only (as the Confession saith) ap*- 



222 



LEX, REX ; OR, 



pointed for civil policy, but also for main* 
tenance of true reugion, and for suppressing 
of idolatry and superstition." Tnen, it is 
evident, to resist inferior magistrates is to 
resist God himself, and to la^ur to throw 
the sword out of G<)d's hand. 6. Our Con- 
fession useth the same Scriptures cited by 
Junius Brutus, to wit, £zek. xxii. 1 — ^7; 
Jer. xxii. 3, where we are, no less than the 
Jews, commanded to '' execute judgment 
and righteousness, and deliver the spoiled 
out of me hands of the oppressor ;" for both 
the law of God and the civil law saith, Qm 
nan impedit homicidiumy quum potest^ is 
hanUcidii reus est. I will cast in a word of 
other Confessions, lest we seem to be Jesuits 

alone. 

The Confession of Helvetia saith, (c. 30,) 
de Magistratu. Viduas, pu pillos, aJUctos 
asserat, every magistrate is to defend the 
widow, the orphan, and the oppressed. The 
French Confession saith, (art. 40,) Afirma- 
mus ergo pa/rendumesse legihiLS et statutist 
solvenda tributa^ subjectioms denique ju" 
gum voluntarie toUrandum^ etiamsi tn/{- 
deles fuerint magistratus, dummodo JDei 
summum imperium integrum et illibatum 
maTieat, So dear it is that all active obe- 
dience is due to all magistrates, and that 
that yoke of passive obemence is to be tole- 
rated but conditionally, with a dummodo^ 
go as the magistrate violate not the supreme 
commandment of the King of kings; and 
we know, accordingly, protestants of that 
church have taken defensive arms against 
their king. But our P. Prelate can say, the 
Confessions of Scotland, Helvetia, France, 
and all the reformed churches, are Jesuiti- 
cal, when as it was the doctrine of the 
Waldenses, the protestants, Luther, Calvin, 
and others, while as there was no Jesuit on 

earth. 

The thirty-seventh article of the Church 
of England's Confession^ is so far from erect- 
ing an absolute power in the king, that they 
expressly bring down the royal prerogative 
from the high seat and transcendent super- 
lative power above the law, and expone the 
prerogative to be nothing but mere law- 
power. " We only (say tney) ascribe that 



1 Angl. Conf. art. 37. Sed earn tantnin preroga- 
liTam aqnam in sacris Scripturis a Deo ipso omni- 
buB pits princibns semper fuisse tribntam, boo est, 
nt omnes status atqne ordines fidei, busb commissos, 
fixe ilU ecclesiastici sint, sive civiles, in officio con- 
tineant, et contumaees ac delinqnentes gladio civili 
ooeroeant. 



prerogative to the king which the Scripture 
doth ascribe to all godly princes; that is, 
that they cause all committed to their trust, 
whether ecclesiastical or civil persons, to do 
their duty, and punish with the civil sword all 
disobedient offenders." In syntag. Confess. 
'• And this they say in answer to some who 
believed the Church of England made the 
king the head of the church." The Pre- 
lates' Convocation must be Jesuits to this 
P. Prelate also. 

So the thirty-sixth article of the Belgic 
Confession saith of all magistrates, no less 
than of a king, (we know, for tyranny of 
soul and body, they justly revolted from 
their king,) Idcirco magistratus ipsos gla- 
dio armavity ut m^dos quidem pUAant 
pcsnisy prohos vera tueantur, Horum por- 
ro esty non modo de civili politia conser' 
vanda esse soUoitoSy verum etiam dare 
operam ut sacrum ministerium conservetur, 
omnis idololatria et adulterinus Dei cuUus 
e medio toUatwr^ regnum antickristi diru- 
atWy 8fc, Then, all magistrates, though in- 
ferior, must do their duty that the Taw of 
God hath laid on them, though the king 
forbid them ; but, by the Belmc Confession 
and the Scripture, it is their duty to reheve 
the oppressed, to use the sword against mur- 
dering papists and Irish rebels and destroy- 
ing cavaliers ; for, shall it be a good plea in 
the day of Obrist to say, " Lord Jesus, we 
would have used thy sword against bloody 
murderers if thy anointed, the king, had 
not commanded us to obey a morttu king 
rather than the King of ages, and to exe- 
cute no judgment for the oppressed, because 
he judged them faithful catholic subjects." 
Let all Oxford and cavalier doctors in the 
three kingdoms satisfy the consciences of 
men in this, that inferior judges are to obey 
a divine law, with a proviso that the king 
command them so to do, and otherwise they 
are to obey men rather than Grod. This is 
evidently holden forth in the Argentine 
Confession, exhibited by four cities to the 
emperor Charles V., 1530, in the very same 
cause of innocent defence that we are now in 
in the three kingdoms of Scotland, England, 
and Ireland. 

The Saxon Confession, exhibited to the 
Council of Trent, (1661, art. 23,) maketh 
the magistrate's office essentially to consist 
in keeping of the two tables of God's law ; 
and so, what can follow hence, but in so far 
as he defendeth murderers,— or, if he be a 
king, and shall with the sword or arms im- 



THE LAW AND THIS PRINCE. 



223 



pede inferior magistrates (for the Confession 
speaketh of all) to defend Grod's law and 
true religion against papists, murderers, and 
bloody 6avalier6> ana hinder them to exe- 
cute the judgment of the Lord against evil 
doers, — ^he is not, in that, a magistrate ; and 
the denying of obedience, active or passive, 
to him in tnat, is no resistance to the ordi- 
nance of God; but, bj the contrary, the 
king himself must resist the ordinance of 
God, 

The Confession of Bohemia is dear, (art. 
16,) Q^i publico muneremagistratuquefun- 
guntur, quemcunque, gradum teneant, se 
non suumysed Dei opus agere sciant. Hence^ 
all inferior or the supreme magistrate, what- 
ever be their place, they do not their own 
work, nor the work of the king, but the work 
of God, in the use of the sword ; therefore, 
they are to use the sword against bloody 
cavaliers^ as doing God's work — suppose the 
king is^uld forbid them to do God's work ; 
and it fiaith of all magistrates. Sunt autem 
magistratuutn peaces ac munus, omnibus 
ex aequo jus dicerej m eommunem omnium 
usum^ sine per sonarum acceptationey pacem 
ac tranquilitatem publicam tueri ac pro^ 
curare de mcdis ac facinorosis^ hanc inter 
turbantibus pcenas sumere, aliosque, omnes 
ab eorum vi et injuria vindicate. Now, 
this confession was the ^th of the barons 
and nobles of Bohemia who were magistrates, 
and exhibited to the emperor, anno 1635, 
in the cause not unlike unto ours now, and 
the emperor was their sovereign ; yet they 
profess they are obliged, in conscience, to 
defend all under them from all violence and 
injuries, that the emperor, or any other, 
could bring on them ; and that this is their 
ofiioe before Grod, which they are obliged to 
perform as a work of Grod, and the Chris- 
tian magistrate is not to do that work which 
is not h» own but Grod's^ upon condition that 
the king shall not inhibit him. What if the 
king shall inhibit parliaments, princes, and 
rulers, to relieve the oppressea, to defend 
the orphan, the widow, the stranger, from 
unjust violence ? Shall they obey man ra- 
ther than God? 

To say no more of this : prelates in Scot- 
land did what they could, 1. To hinder his 
Majesty to indict a parliament. 2^ When 
it was indicted, to have its freedom destroyed 
by prelimitations. 3. When it was sitting, 
their care was to divide, impede, and annul 
the course of justice. 4. AU in the P. Pre- 
late's book tendeth to abolish parliaments, 



and to enervate their power. 5. There were 
many ways used to break up parliaments in 
England ; and to command judges not to 
judge at all, but to interrupt the course of 
justice, is all one as to command unrighteous 
ludgment (Jer. xxii. 3). 6. Many ways 
have been used by cavaliers to cut off par- 
liaments, and the present parliament in 
England. 

The paper found in William Laud's study, 
touching fears and hopes of the parliament 
of Engbind, evidencetn that cavaliers hate 
the supreme seat of justice, and would it 
were not in the world ; which is the highest 
rebellion and resistance made against supe- 
rior powers. 

1. He feareth this parliament shall begin 
where the last lefl. 

AnSi — ^Whatever ungrateful courtier had 
hand in the death of king James deserved 
to come under trials 

2% He feareth they sacrifice some man. 

Ans, — 1. If parliaments have not power 
to cut off rebels^ and corrupt judges, the root 
of their being is undone. 2. If they be 
lawfiil courts, none need fear them, but the 
guilty. 

3. He feareth their consultations be long, 
and the supply must be present. 

AnS', — 1. Then cavauers intend parlia- 
ments for subsidies to the king, to foment 
and promote the war against Scotland, not 
for justice. 2. He that feareth long and 
serious consultations^ to rip up and lance the 
wounds of church and state, is afiraid that 
the wounds be cured. 

4. He feareth they deny subsidies, which 
are due by the law of God, nature, and na- 
tions, whereas parliaments have but their 
deliberation and consent for the manner of 
giving^ otherwise this is to sell subsidies, not 
to give them. 

Ans, — Tribute, and the standing revenues 
of the king, are due by the law oi God and 
nations; but subsidies are occasional rents 
given upon occasion of war, or some extra- 
ordinary necessity ; and they are not given 
to the king as tribute and standing revenues, 
which the king may bestow for ms house, 
family, and royal honour, but they are given 
by the kingdom, rather to the kingdom 
than to the king, for the present war, or 
some other necessity of the kingdom, and 
therefore are not due to the king as king, 
by any law of nature or nations, and so 
should not be given but by deliberation and 
judicial sentence of the states ; and they are 



3= 



not sold to the king, but given out by the 
kingdom by statute of parliament, to be be^ 
stowed on the kingdom, and the king should 
sell no aots of justice for subsidies. 

5. He dare not speak of the consequences, 
if the king grant bills of grace, and part with 
the fiowrets of the crown. 

Ans, — He dare not say, the people shall 
vindicate their liberty by selling subsidies to 
buy branches of the prerogative royal, and 
diminishing the king's fancied absoluteness ; 
so would prelates have the kin? absolute, 
that they may ride over the soms, purses, 
persons, estates, and religion of men, upon 
the horse of pretended absoluteness. 

6. He feareth the parliament fall upon 
church business; but, 1. The church is too 
weak already; if it had more power, the 
king might have more both of obedience and 
service. 2. The houses can be no competent 
judges in point of doctrine. 3. For the 
King, clergy,.and convocation are judges in 
all causes ecclesiastical. 

Ans^ 1. — This striketh at the root of all 
parliamentary power. 1. The P. Prelate 
giveth them but a poor deliberative power in 
subsidies ; and that is, to make the king's 
will a kw, in taking all the subjects' goods 
from them, to foment war against the sub- 
jects. 2, He taketh all jurisdiction from 
them over persons, though they were as 
black traitors as breathe. 3. And spoileth 
them of all power in church matters ; to 
make all judges, yea, and the king himself 
yield blind obedience to the Pope and Pre- 
late, and their illuminated clergy. Sure I 
am, P. Maxwell imputeth this^ but most 
unjustly, to presbyteries. What essential 
and fundamental privileges are left to par- 
liaments? David and the parliament of 
Israel are impertinent judges in the matter 
of bringing home the ark of God* And for 
the churcn's weakness, that is, the weak- 
ness of the damned prelates, shall this 
be the king's weakness? Yes; the P. 
Prelate must make it true, no bishop, no 
king. 

7. He feareth factious spirits will take 
heart to themselves, if the king yield to 
them without any submission of uieirs. 

Ans, — The princes and judges of the 
land are a company of factious men, and so 
no parliament, no court, but at best some 
good advisers of a king to break up the 
parliament, because they refuse subsidies, 
that he may, by a lawless way, extort sub- 
sidies. 



8. He desireth the parliament may sit a 
short time, that they may not well under- 
stand one another. 

An8. — He loveth short or no justice from 
the parliament; he feareth tney reform 
God's house, and execute justice on men 
like himself. But I return to the Scottish 
parliament. 

Assert. 2. — The parliament is to regu- 
late the power of the king. The heritable 
sheriffs complain that the king granteth 
coimmsions to others in cMee pUiing to 
their office ; whereupon the estates (Pari. 
6, James VI., act 82) dischargeth all such 
commissions, as also appointeth that all mur- 
derers be judged by tne justice general only. 
And in several acts the king is inhibited 
to grant pardons to malefactors, Pari. 11, 
James VI., act 75. 

It is to be considered that king James, 
in hb BasiUkon Doron, layeth down an 
unsound ground, that Fei*gus the first, fa- 
ther of one hundred and seven kings of 
Scotland, conquered this kingdom. The 
contrary whereof is asserted by Fordome, 
Major, Boethius, Buchanan, HoQanshed, 
who run all upon this principle, that the 
estates of the tdngdom did, 1. Choose a 
monarchy, and freely, and no other govern- 
ment. 2. That they fi-eely elected Fergus 
to be their king. 3. King Fergus fre- 
quently corivened the parliament cmled In- 
sulanorum duces, trthttum rectores, «ia- 
jorum consessus^ conventiis ofdinum, con- 
ventus statuum, communitatum regiii, phy^ 
larcM, primores, prindpes, patres ; and, 
as Hollanshed saith, they made Fergus 
king, therefore a parliament must be be- 
fore the king ; yea, and after the death of 
king Fergus, philarehi coeurrt condone ad- 
vocata, the estates convened without any 
king, and made that fundamental law regni 
elective, that when the king's children were 
minors, any of the Fergusian race might be 
chosen to reign, and this endured to the 
days of Kenneth ; and Redotha, the seventh 
king, resigned and maketh over the govern- 
ment into the hands of the parliament, and 
Philarehi Tribuum Gubematores ordained 
Thereus the eighth king. Buchanan, {I. 4, 
rer, Scot,) caUeth him Keutha, and said he 
did this, populo egre permittente, then the 
royal power recurred to the fountain. The- 
reus, the eighth king, a wicked man, filled 
the kingdom vnth robbers, and fearing the 
parliament should punish him, fied to the 
Britons, and thereupon the parliament 



THB LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



225 



choose G>nnanus ta be prorex and protector 
of the kingdom. 

Finnanus, the tenth king, decreed, — Ne 
quid regeSf quod majoris esset momently 
nisi de publici consilii authxmtate juherentf 
et ne domestico consilio remp, administror 
rentf regia puhlicaque negotia non sine 
patrum consultatione ductuque tracta/renr 
tWTy nee helium pacem aut fcedera reges 
per se patrum, trihuumve, rectorum in" 
jussu facerent, dem^rentue ; then it is 
clear that parliaments were consortes im- 
periiy and had the authority with and aboye 
the king. When a law is made that the 
kings should do nothing injussu rectorum 
tribuumf without commandment of the par- 
liament, a cabinet-council was not lawful to 
the kings of Scotland. So Durstus, the 
eleventh king, sweareth to the parliament, 
*' Se nihil nisi de primorum consilio actU' 
rumj^^ that he shall do nothing but by coun- 
sel of the rulers and heads of the kingdom. 

The parliament, rejecting the lanmil son 
of Gorbredus, the nineteenSi king, because 
he was young, created Dardanus, the ne- 
phew of MetellanuB, king, which is a great 
argument of the power of the Scottish par- 
liimient of old for elective rather than here- 
ditary kings. 

Gorbrecms II., called Graldus, the twenty- 
first king, at his coronation, renouncing all 
negative voices, did swear, Se majorum 
consUiis ctcquietummy that he should be 
ruled by the parliament ; and it is said, 
Leges qucLsdam tollere non potuity adver^ 
sante multititdinen 

Luctatus, the twenty-second king, is cen- 
sured by a parliament, " Quod spreto mor- 
jorum co9»t1to," he appointed baise men to 
pubUc offices. 

Mogaldus, the twenty-third king, '' Ad 
consUta seniorum omnia ex prisco more 
revocavit,*^ did all by the parliament, as the 
ancient custom was. 

Gonarus, the twenty-fourth king, was cast 
into prison by the parliament, " Quod non 
expectato decreto patrum, qttod summce 
erat potestatis, privatis consiliis adminis- 
trasset" because he did these weightiest 
business that concerned the kingdom, by 
private advice, without the judicial ordin- 
ance of parliament, that was of greatest au- 
thority. Where is the negative voice of the 
king here ? 

£thodius II. (son of Ethodius I.) the 
twenty-eighth king, (the parliament passing 
him by on account oi his age, and electing 



Satrael, his father's brother, kinir before 
him,) ^ a simple ignorant man? yet for 
reverence to the race of Fergus, kept the 
name of a king, but the estates appointed 
tutors to him. 

Nathalocus, the thirtieth king, corrupting 
the nobles with buds and fair promises, ol^ 
tained the crown. 

Bomachus, Fethelmachus, and Angu- 
sianus, or as Buchanan calleth him, ^ne- 
anus, contended for the crown, the parlia- 
ment convened to judge the matter was 
dissolved by tumult, and Bomachus chosen 
king, doing all, non (idhibitOy de more, 
consilio majorum, was censured by the par- 
liament. 

Fergus II. was created king by the 
states, de m^ore. 

Constantino, the forty-third king, a most 
wicked man, was punished by the states. 

Aidanus, the forty-ninth king, by the 
counsel of St Golumba, governed all in 
peace, by three parliaments every year. 

Ferchard I., the fifty-second king, and 
Ferchard II., the fifly-fourth king, were 
both censured by parliaments. 

Eugenius VII., the fifty-ninth king, was 
judicially accused, and absolved by the states, 
of killing his wife Spondana. 

Eugenius VIII., the sbcty-second king, 
a wicked prince, was put to death by the 
parliament, omnibus in ejus eositium, con^ 
sentientibtAS. 

Donaldus, the seventieth king, is cen- 
sured by a parliament, which convened, 
pro salute reipublicce, for the good of the 
land. So Ethus, the seventy-second king, 
Ne unius culpa, regnum periret, 

Gregory, tne seventy-third king, swear- 
eth to maintain kirk and state in their li- 
berties; the oath is ordained to be sworn 
by all kings at their coronation. 

The estates complain of Duff, the seventy- 
eighth king, because contemning the coun- 
sel of the nobles, Sacrificulorum consiliis 
abduceretur, and that either the nobility 
must depart the kingdom, or another king 
must be made. 

Culen, the seventy-ninth king, was sum- 
moned before the estates, so before him, 
Constantine III., the seventy-fifth king, 
did, by oath, resign the kingdom to the 
states, and entered in a monastery at St 
Andrews. 

Kenneth III., the eightieth king, pro- 
cured almost, per vim, saith Bucnanan, 
that the parliament should change the elec- 

2h 



226 



LEX, RSX ; OB, 



tiTe kings into hereditary; obeenre the power 
of parliaments. 

After this Grim, and then Macbeth, 
the eighty-fifth king, is rebuked for govern- 
ing by private comisel; in his time, the 
king IS ordained by the states to swear to 
mamtain the community of the kingdom. 

When Malcohn IV., the ninety-second 
king, would have admitted a treaty to the 
hurt of the kingdom, the nobles said, Non 
jus €8S6 reaij the king had no right to take 
anything from the kingdom. Nisi omrdhus 
ordinihus consendeni^bas. In the time of 
Alexander, the ninty-fourth king, is or- 
dained, Acta regis oparteri confirmari de- 
creto ordinum regm^ quia ordinibus regni 
non consuUis, aut odversanHbus^ nihil 
quod ad totius ream statum attmet^ regi 
agefre liceret; so all our historians observe ; 
by which it is clear, that the parliament, 
not the king, hath a negative voice. 

The states' answer to king Edward's le- 
gates, concerning Balzee's conditions in his 
contest with Bruce is, that these conditions 
were made a solo rege, by the king only, 
without the estates of the kingdom, and 
therefore they did not oblige the kingdom. 

In Bobert the Bruce's reign, the ninty- 
seyenth king, the 8ucce»on to the crown is 
appointed by act of parliament, and twice 
changed; and in the league with France, 
Quod quando de successuro rege amhige^ 
retur apud Scotos, ea controt>ersia ab or- 
dinum de creto decideretur, 

Bobert, the hundredth king, in a parlia- 
ment at Scoon, moved the states to appoint 
the earl of Garrick, his eldest son of the 
second marriage, to the crown, passing his 
children of the first marriage; and when 
he wofuld have made a treaty, he was told, 
that he could not inducias fitcere nisi ex 
sententia eonventus publioiy he could not 
make truces but witn the consent of the 
estates of parliament. 

James I. could not do anything in his 
oath in England. The parliament's appro- 
bation of the battle at Stirling against king 
James III. is set down in the pnnted acts, 
because he had not the consent of the states. 

To come to our first reformation, the 
queen regent, breaking her promise to the 
states, said, '* Faith <h promise should not 
be sought from princes;" the states an- 
swered, that they then were not obliged to 
obey, and suspended her government as in- 
consistent witn the duty of princes, by the 
articles of pacification at Leith, June 16, 



1560. No peace or war can be without 
the states. 

In the parliament thereafter, (1560,) the 
nobility say frequently to the queen. Begum 
Seotorum limitatum esse imperium^ nee 
unquam ad umus lihidinem, sed ad legum 
prcBSoriptum et nobilkatis consensum regi 
solitum. 

So it is declared, parliament at Stirling, 
1578, and pari. 1567, concerning queen 
Mary, I need not insist here. James VI. 
July 21, 1567) was crowned, the earl of 
Morton and Hume, jurarunt pro eo, et 
ejus nomine^ in leges^ eum doctrinam et 
ritus religionisy quce turn docebantur, pub" 
lice quoad posset^ serffaturum^ et con- 
trarios oppugnaturum, (Buch. Ber. Scot. 
Hist. 1. 18.) The three estates revoke all 
alienations made by the king without con- 
sent of the parliament. Pari. 2, James VI. 
c. 2, 4, 5, 6. 

lliree parliaments of James II. are held 
without any mention of the king, as 1437, 
1438, and 1440, and act 5 and 6 of Pari. 
1440, the estates ordain the king to do such 
and such things, to ride through the coun- 
try for doing of justice ; and Pari. 1, James 
I. act 23, uie estates ordained the king to 
mend his money ; but show any parliament 
where ever the xing doth prescribe laws to 
the states, or censure the states. 

In Pari. 1, James VI., the Confession of 
Faith being ratified, in acts made by the 
three estates, that the kings must swear at 
their coronation, '^ In the presence of the 
eternal Grod, that they shall maintain the 
true religion, right preaching, and admini- 
stration of the sacraments now received and 
preached within this reahn, and shall abo- 
lish and gain-stand all false religions con- 
trary to the same, and shall rule me people 
committed to their charge, accordmg to 
the will of Grod, laudable laws, and constitu- 
tions of the realm," &c. 

The Pari. 1, James VI., 1567, approveth 
the acts of parliament 1560, conceived only 
in name of the states, without the king and 
queen, who had deserted the same ; so saith 
the act 2, 4, 5, 20, 28. And so this par- 
liament, wanting the king and queen's au- 
thority, is confirmed. Pari. 1572, act 51, 
kins James VI. ; Pari. 1581, act 1 ; and 
Pad. 1581, act 115, in which it is declared, 
** That they have been common laws firom 
their first date," and are all ratified. Pari. 
1587, and 1592, act 1 ; and stand ratified 
to this day by king Charles' parliament, 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



227 



1633. The act of the Assembly, 1666, 
coimnendeth that parliament, 1560, as the 
'* most lawful and firee parliament that ever 
was in the kingdom." 

Yea, even Pari. 1641, king Charles him- 
self being present, an act was passed upon 
the occasion of the king's illegal imprisonmg 
of the laird of Lanffton : that the kinip hath 
no vawet to imprLm any member of the 
parliament without consent of the parlisr 
ment. Which act, to the great prejudice 
of the liberty of the subject, mould not have 
been left unprinted ; for, by what law the 
king may imprison one member of the par- 
liament, by that same reason he may im* 
prison two, twenty, and a hundred ; and so 
nruiy he clap up the whole free estates, and 
where shall then the highest court dP the 
kingdom be? 

All politicians say, the king is a limited 
prince, not absolute ; where the king gi^eth 
out laws, not in his own name, but m the 
name of himself and the estates judicially 
conyened. 

In p. 33 of the old acts of parliament, 
members are summoned to treat and con- 
clude. 

The duty of parliaments, and their power, 
according to the laws of Scotland, may be 
seen in uie history of Knox, now printed at 
London (an. 1643), in the nobles proceed- 
ing with the queai, who killed her nusband 
and married Bothwell, and was arraigned 
in parliament, and by a great part con- 
denmed to death; by many, to perpetual 
imprisonment. 

J^ing Charles received not crown, sword, 
and sceptre, until first he did swear the 
oath that king James his father did swear. 
He was not crowned, till one of every one 
of the three estates came and offered to him 
the crown, with an express condition of his 
duty, before he be crowned. 

After king Charles said, *' I will by God's 
assistance bestow my Hfe for your defence, 
wishing to live no longer than that I may 
see this kingdom flourish in happiness," 
thereafter, the king showing himself on a 
stage to the people, the popish archbishop 
said ; '^ Sirs, I do present unto you king 
Charles, the right descended inheritor, — ^the 
crown and dignity of this realm, appointed 
by the peers of the kingdom. And are you 
vailing to have him for your king, and be- 
come subject to him ?" The king turning 
himself on the stage, to be seen of the 
peope, they declared willingness, by cry- 



ing, Qod save king Charles t Let the king 
live I 



QUESTION XLIV. 

GENERAL BSSULTS OF THE FORMER DOCTltlNE, 
IN SOME FEW COROLLARIES, OR STRATINO 
QUESTIONS, FALLEN OFF THE ROADWAY, 
ANSWERED BRIEFLY. 

Quest. 1. — Whether all governments be 
but broken governments and deviations from 
monarchy. 

Ans, — 1. It is denied: there is no less 
somewhat of Grod's authority in government 
by many, or some of the choicest of ^e 
people, than in monarchy; nor can we 
judge any ordmance of man unlawj^, for 
we are to be subject to all for the Lord's 
sake. (1 Pet. ii. 13 ; Tit. iii. 1 ; 1 Tim. ii. 
1 — 3.) 2. Though monarchy diould seem 
the rule of all other governments, in regard 
of resemblance of Uie Supreme Monarch 
of all, yet it is not the moral rule from 
which, l£ other governments shall err, they 
are to be judged sinful deviations. 

Quest. 2. — Whether royalty is an im- 
mediate issue and spring of nature. 

Ans. — No; for a man, fallen in sin, 
knowing naturally he hath need of a law 
and a government, could have, by reason, 
devised governors, one or more; and the 
supervenient institution of God, coming 
upon this ordinance, doth more fully assure 
us, that Grod, for man's good, hath appointed 
governors ; but, if we consult with nature, 
many judges and governors, to Men nature, 
seem nearer of blood to nature than one 
only ; for two, because of man's weakness, 
are better than one. Now, nature seemeth 
to me not to teach that only one sinftd man 
should be the sole and only ruler of a whole 
kingdom; Grod, in his word, ever joined 
with the supreme ruler many rulers, who, 
as touching the essence of a judge, (which is, 
to rule for Grod,) were all equally judges: 
some reserved acts, or a longer cubit of 
power in regard of extent, being due to the 
king. 

Q^est. 3. — ^Whether magistrates, as ma- 
gistrates, be natural. 

^n«.-^~Nature is considered as whole and 
sinless, or as fallen and broken. In the for- 
mer consideration, that man should stand 
in need of some one to compel him with 



I 



228 



USX, rex; or, 



the sword to do his duty, and not oppress, 
was no more natural to man than to stand 
in need of lictors and hangmen, or physi- 
cians for the body, which in this state was 
not in a capacity of sickness or death ; and 
so government by parents and husbands was 
only natural in the latter consideration. 
Mi^strates, as magistrates, are two ways 
considered, — 1. According to the knowledge 
of such an ordinance ; 2. According to tne 
actual erection of the practice of the office 
of magistrates. In tne former notion, I 
humbly conceive, that by nature's li^t, man 
now fiJlen and broken, even under all the 
fractions of the powers and faculties of the 
soul, doth know, that promises of reward, 
fear of punishment, and the co-active power 
of the sword, as Plato said, are natural 
means to move us, and wings to promote 
obedience and to do our duty ; and that go- 
vernment by magistrates is natural. But, 
in the second reGltion, it is hard to deter- 
mine that kings, rather than other gover- 
nors, are more natural. 

Quest, 4. — Whether nature hath deter- 
mined that there should be one supreme 
ruler, a king, or many rulers, in a free com- 
munity. 

Ans. — It is denied. 

Quest. 6. — Whether every free common- 
wealth hath not in it a supremacy of ma- 
jesty, which it may formally place in one or 
many. 

Ans, — It is affirmed. 

Quest 6. — Whether absolute and un- 
limited power of royalty be a ray and beam 
of divine majesty immediately derived from 
God? 

Ans. — ^Not at all. Such a creature is not 
in the world of God's creation. Koyalists 
and flatterers of kings are parents to this 
prodigious birth. There is no shadow of 
power to do ill in Grod. An absolute power 
IS essentiaUy a power to do without or above 
law, and a power to do ill, to destroy ; and 
so it cannot come from Grod as a moral 
power by institution, though it come from 
God by a flux of permissive providence; 
but so things unlawful and sinflilcome from 
God. 

Quest. 7. — Whether the king may in his 
actions intend his own prerogative and ab- 
soluteness. 

Ans. — ^He can neither intend it as his 
nearest end, nor as his remote end. Not 
the former, for if he fight and destrov his 
people for a prerogative, he destroyeth his 



people that he may have a power to destroy 
them, which must be mere tyranny, nor can 
it be his remote end ; for, granting that his 
supposed absolute prerogative were lawful, 
he IS to refer all lawful power and alibis ac- 
tions to a more noble end, to wit, to the 
safety and good of the people. 

Quest. 8. — Do not they that resist the 
parliament's power, resist the parliament ; 
and they that resist the king's power, resist 
the king ; God hath joined king and power, 
who dare separate them ? 

Ans. — 1. If the parliament abuse their 
power, we may resist their abused power, 
and not their power parliamentary. Mr 
Bridges doth well distinguish (in his Anno- 
tations on the " Loyal Convert ") betwixt 
the king's power, and the king's will. 2. 
The resistors do not separate king and 
power, but the king himself doth separate 
his lawfld power from his will, if he woHl 
and act tyranny out of this principle, will, 
passion, lust ; not out of the royal principle 
of kingly power. So far we may resist &e 
one, and not the other. 

Quest. 9. — Why, if Grod might work a 
miracle in the three children's resistance 
active, why doth he evidence omnipotence 
in the passive obedience of these witnesses? 
The kingdom of Judah was Christ's birth- 
right, as man and David's son. Why did 
he not, by legions of men and angels, 
rather vindicate his own flesh and blood, 
than triumph by non-resistance, and the 
omnipotence of glory to shine in his mere 
suffering ? 

Ans. — Who art thou that disputest with 
God ? He that killeth with the jaw-bone 
of an ass, thousands, and he that destroyed 
the numberless Midianites by only three 
hundred, should no more put the three 
children to an unlawful act in the one, if 
they had by three men killed Nebuchad- 
nezzar and all his subjects, than in the 
other. But nothing is said against us in a 
sophism a non causa pro causa ; except it 
be proved, God would neithep deliver his 
three children, nor Christ from death, and 
the Jews from bondage, by miraculous re- 
sistance, because resistance is unlawM. And 
if patient suffering is lawfiil, therefore, is 
resistance unlawM? It is a poor conse- 
quent, and a begging of the question: both 
must be lawful to us ; and so we hold, of 
ten lawful means, fit to compass God's 
blessed end, he may choose one and let go 
nine. Shall any infer, therefore, these other 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



229 



nine memns are unlawful, because Grod chose 
a mean different from those nine, and re- 
fused them? So may I answer by retor- 
tion. The three hundred sinned in resisting 
Midian, and defeating them. Why ? Be- 
cause it should be more honour to Grod, 
if they had, by suffering patiently the 
sword of Midian, glorified GtikI in martyr- 
dom. So Christ and the apostles, who 
could have wrought miracles, might haye 
wrought reformation by the sword, and de- 
stroyed kings and emperors, the opposers of 
the Lamb ; and they did reform by suffer- 
ing ; therefore, the sword is unlawiiil in re- 
formation. It followeth not. The mean 
Christ used, is lawful; therefore, all other 
means that he used not, are unlaw&l. It 
is vain logic. 

Que^. 10. — ^Whether the coronation of 
a king is any other thing but a ceremony. 

Ans, — In the coronation there is, and 
may be, the ceremony of a shout and an 
acclamation, and the placing of a sceptre 
in his right hand who is made king, and the 
like; but the coronation, in concreto^ ac- 
cording to the substance of the act, is no 
ceremony, nor any accidental in^edient in 
the constitution of a king. 1. Because Is- 
rael should have performed a mere ceremo- 
nial action on Saul when they made him 
king, which we cannot say ; for as the peo- 
ple's act of coronation is distinctive, so is it 
constitutive : it distinguished Saul from all 
Israel, and did constitute him in a new 
relation, that he was changed from no king 
to be a king. 2. The people cannot, by a 
ceremony, make a king ; they must really 
put some honour on him, that was not put 
on him before. Now this ceremony, which 
royalists do fancy coronation to be, is only 
symbolical and declarative, not really dative. 
It placeth nothing in the king. 

Quest, 11, — ^Whether subjects may limit 
the power that they gave not to the king, 
it being the immediate result (without in- 
tervening of law or any act of man) issuing 
from GckI only. 

Ans. — 1. Though we should allow (which 
in reason we cannot grant) that royal power 
were a result of the immediate bounty of 
God, without any act of man, yet it may be 
limited by men, that it over-swell not its 
banks. Though God immediately make Pe- 
ter an apostle, without any act of men, yet 
Paul, by a sharp rebuke, (Gal. ii.) curbeth 
and limiteth his power, that he abuse it 
not to Judaising. Boyalists deny not, but 



they teach, that the eighty priests that re- 
strained Uzziah's power '* from burning in- 
cense to the Lord, fi;ave no royal power to 
Uzziah. Do not subjects, by flight, lay re- 
straint upon a king's power, that he kill not 
the subjects without cause ? yet they teach 
that subjects gave no power to the king. 
Certainly this is a proof of the immediate 
power of the King of kin^s, that none can fly 
trom his pursuing hand, (Psal. cxxxix. 1 — 3 ; 
Amos ix. 1 — 4 J whereas men may fly from 
earthly kings. Nebuchadnezzar, as royalists 
teach, might justly conquer some kingdoms, 
for conquest is a just title to the crown, say 
they. Now, the conqueror then justly not 
only limiteth the royal power of the con- 
quered .king, but wholly removeth his roy- 
sltj ana unkingeth him ; yet, we know, the 
conqueror gave no royal power to the con- 
quered king. Joshua and David took away 
royal power which they never gave, and 
therefore this is no good reason, — ^tne people 

gave not to the king royal power, therefore 
[ley could not lawfully limit it and t£^e it 
away. 2. We cannot admit that God giv- 
eth royal power immediately, without the 
intervention of any act of law ; for it is an 
act of law, that (Deut. xvii.) the people 
chooseth such a king, not such a king ; that 
the people, by a le^ covenant, ma^ Saul, 
David, and Joash, jkings, and that Grod ex- 
erciseth any political action of making a 
king over sucn subjects, upon such a con- 
dition, is absurd and inconceivable ; for how 
can God make Saul and David kings of Is- 
rael upon this political and legal condition, 
that they rule m justice and judgment, but 
there must intervene a political action ? and 
so they are not made Jdngs immediately. 
If God feed Moses by bread and manna, the 
Lord's act of feeding is mediate, by the me- 
diation of second causes ; if he feed Moses 
forty days without eating any thing, the act 
of feeding is immediate ; if Grod made Da- 
vid king, as he made him a prophet, I should 
think God immediately made him king; for 
God asked consent of no man, of no people, 
no, not of David himseli^ before he inmsed in 
him the spirit of prophecy; but he made him 
formally king, by the political and legal co- 
venant betwixt him and the people. I shall 
not think that a covenant and oath of God 
is a ceremony, especially a law-covenant, or 
a political paction between David and the 
people, the contents whereof behoved to be 
de materia gram et onerosa, concerning a 
great part of obedience to the fifth command- 



230 



LBX, RBX ; OR, 



ment of Grod's moral law, the duties moral 
concerning religion, and mercy, and justice, 
to be penorm^ reciprocally between king 
and people. Oaths, 1 hope, are more than 
ceremonies. 

Quest, 12. — ^Whether or no the common- 
wealth is not ever a pupil, never growing 
to age, as a minor under nonage dotn come 
not to need a tutor, but the commonwealth 
being still in need of a tutor, a governor, or 
king, must always be a tutor, and so the 
kingdom can never come to that condition 
as to accuse the king, it always being minor. 

Ans. — 1. Then can they never accuse infe- 
rior judges, for a kingdom is perpetually in 
such a nonage, as it cannot want them, when 
sometimes it wanteth a king. 2. Can the 
commonwealth, under democracy and aristo- 
cracy, being perpetually under nonage, ever 
then quarrel at these governments and never 
seek a king ? By this reason they cannot. 3. 
The king, in all respects, is not a tutor-^ 
every comparison in something beareth a 
leg; for the commonwealth, in their own 
persons, do choose a king, complain of a 
king, and resist an Uzzi^, and tie their 
elective prince to a law. A pupil cannot 
choose his tutor, either his dying father, or 
the living law doth that service for him ; he 
cannot resist his tutor, he cannot tie his 
tutor to a law, nor Hmit him, when first he 
chooseth him. Pttpillo non licet postulare 
tiUorem sttspecti, quamdiu sub tutela est, et 
manet impuhes, (I, Pietatis 6, in sin, C. de 
susp. Tutor. L impuherem, 7, cmd sect, inir' 
puberes. Just. eod). 

Quest. 13. — Whether or no subjects are 
more obnoxious to a king than clients to 
patrons, and servants to masters, because 
the patron cannot be the cHent's judge, but 
some superior magistrate must judge both, 
and the slave had no refuge a^nst his 
master, but only flight ; and the king doth 
confer infinite greater benefits on the sub- 
jects, than the master doth on the slave, be- 
cause he exposeth his life, pleasure, ease, 
credit, and all for the safety of lus subjects.^ 

Ans. — 1, It is denied, for to draw the 
case to fathers and lords, in respect of chil- 
dren and vassals, the reason why sons, clients, 
vassals, can neiliier formally judge, nor judi- 
cially punish,fathers, patrons, loras, and mas- 
ters, though never so tyrannous, is a moral 
impotency, or a political incongruity, because 
these relations of patron and client, fathers 

1 ArnissBas do aathorit. princip.^ c. 3, n. 6. 



and children, are supposed to be in a com- 
mnnity, in which are nders and judges above 
the ikther and son, the patron and the cUent ; 
but there is no physical incongruity that the 
politic inferior puiuah the superior, if we sup- 
pose there were no judges on the earth, and 
no relation but patron and client ; and, be- 
cause, for the fistther to destroy the children, 
is a troubling of the harmony of nature, and 
the highest degree of violence, therefore one 
violence of seli^fence, and that most just, 
though contrary to nature, must be a remedy 
against another violence ; but in a kingdom 
there is no political ruler above both king and 
people, and therefore, though nature have 
not formally appointed the political relation 
of akrng »4.r &m many govemoiB andsab- 
jects, yet hath nature appomted a court and 
tribimal of necessity, in which the people may, 
by innocent violence, repress the unjust vio- 
lence of an injuring prince, so as the people 
injured in the matter of self-defence may be 
their own judge. 2. 1 wonder that anv should 
teach, Tliat oppressed slaves had of old no 
refuge against the tyranny of masters, but 
only flight; for, (1.) The law expressly saith 
that they might not only fly but also change 
masters, which we all know was a great <m- 
mage to the master, to whom the servant 
was as good as money in the purse.^ (2.) 1 
have demonstrated before, by the law of na- 
ture, and out of divers learned jurists, that 
all inferiors may defend themselves by op- 
posing violence against unjust violence ; to 
say nothing that unanswerably I have proved 
that the kmgdom is superior to the king. 3. 
It is true. Qui plus dat, plus obligate as the 
Scripture saith, (Luke vii.,) He that giveth 
a greater benefit layeth a foundation of a 
greater obligation. But, 1. If benefit be 
compared with benefit, it is disputable if a 
king give a greater benefit than an earthly 
father, to whom, under Grod, the son is 
debtor for life and being, if we regard the 
compensation of eminency of honour and 
riches, that the people putteth upon the 
king; but I utterly deny that a power to 
act tyrannous acts, is any benefit or obliga- 
tion, that the people in reason can lay upon 
their prince, as a compensation or hire for 
his great pains he taketh in his royal watch- 
tower. I judge it no benefit, but a great 
hurt, damage, and an ill of nature, boui to 



1 Send indigne babiU confagiendi ad etatnas, et 
dominam mutandi copiam habent, 1. 2. De bis qui 
sunt sui. Item, C. de lat. Hered. toll. 




king and people, that the people should 
gi^e to their prince any power to destroy 
themselyes, and therefore that people do 
reverence and honour the prince most, who 
lay strongest chains and iron fetters on him, 
that he cannot tyrannise. 

Q^est. 14, — ^But are not subjects more 
subject to their prince, (seeing the subjection 
is natural, as we see bees and cranes,) to obey 
him, than servants to their Lord V (C. in 
Apib, 7, 9, 1, ex Hiero. 4, ad EiiHie, 
Monach, Plin, n. 17.) Eor jurists teach, 
that servitude is beside dr against nature, 
(Z. 5, de Stat, Aomt. sect, 2, just, et jvr. 
pers. c. 3, sect, et skut Nov. 89, quib. med. 
•mat. eff, sui.) 

Am. — There is no question, in active 
subjection to princes and fathers command* 
ing in the Lord, we shall grant as high a 
measure as you desire. But the question is, 
if either active subjection to ill and unjust 
mandates, or passive sulnection to penal in** 
flictions of tyranny and abused power, be 
natural or most natural ; or if subjects do 
renounce natural subjection to their prince, 
when they oppose violence to unjust viol.* 
ence. This is to beg the question. And for 
the commonwealth of bees and cranes, and 
crown and sceptre amongst them, give me 
leave to doubt of it. To be subject to 
kingSy is a divine moral law of God; but 
not pro^rly natural to be subject to co- 
action ot the sword. Government and sub- 
iection to parents, is natural ; but that a 
Mng \& juris naturcB strictim^ I must crave 
leave to doubt. I hold him to be a divine 
moral ordinance, to whi(^, in conscience, 
we are to submit in the Loni. 

Quest. 15, — Whether king Uzziah was 
dethroned by the people ? 

Ans. — Though we should say he was not 
formally unkin^^d and dethroned, yet if the 
royal power consist in an indivisible point, 
as some royalists say, and if Uzziah was re- 
moved to a private house, and could not 
reign, being a leper ; certainly much royal 
power was taken from. It is true, Ami- 
seeus saith,' he neither could be compelled to 
resign his power, nor was he compelled to 
resign his royal authority ; but he willingly 
resigned actual government, and remained 
king, as tutors and curators are put upon 
kings that are mad or stupid, and duldren, 



1 ArniBaonB de anthorit. princip. in popal. c. 3, n. 7. 
s Arnisffius de jure Pontif. Bom. in Begna et 
Princ. c 5, n, 30. 



who yet govern all by the authority of law- 
ful kmgs. But that Uzziah did not denude 
himself of the royal power voluntarily, is 
clear. The reason (2 Chron. xxvi, 21) 
why he dwelt in a house apart, and did not 
actually reign, is, because he was a leper ; 
for, '^ He was cut off (saith the text) from 
the house of the Lord ; and Jotham, his 
son, was over the king's house, judging the 
people of the land." Whereby it is clear, 
by the express law of Grod, he being a leper, 
and so not by law to enter into the congre- 
gation, he was cut off from the house otthe 
Lord; and he being passive, is said to be 
cut off from the Lord's house. Whether, 
then, Uzziah turned necessity to a virtue, I 
know not : it is evident, that Grod's law re- 
moved the actual exercise of his power. If 
we obtain this, which God's word doth give 
us, we have enough for our purpose, though 
Uzziah kept the naked title of a king, as in- 
deed he took but up room in the catalogue of 
kings. Now, if by law he was cut offfrom 
actual governing, whether he was willing or 
not wiUing to denude himself of reignmg, 
is all one. And to say, that fiuious men, 
idiots, stupid men, and children, who must 
do all royal acts by curators and tutors, are 
kings jure^ with correction, is petitio prin" 
cipii ; for then hath Grod infused immedi- 
ately from heaven (as royalists teach us) a 
royal power to govern a kingdom, on those 
who are as capable of royalty as blocks. I 
conceive that the Lord (Deut. xvii. 14 — 17) 
oonunandeth the people to make no blocks 
kings; and that the Lord hath not done 
that lumself in a binding law to us, which 
we have no commandment from him to do. 
I conceive that Gkxi made Josiah and Joash 
kings typical, and in destination, for his pro- 
mise sake to David, while they were chil- 
dren, as well as he made them kings ; but 
not actu completo raiUme ofidiy to be a 
rule to us now, to nuike a child of six years 
of age a kins bv office. I conceive children 
are to us omy kings in destination and ap- 
pointment ; and for idiots and fools, I shall 
not believe (let royalists break their &ith 
upon so rocky and stony a point, at their 
pleasure) that God hath made them gover- 
nors of others, by royal office, who can scarce 
number their own fingers; or that Grod 
tyeth a people to acknowledge stupid blocks 
for royal governors of a kingdom, who can- 
not govern themselves. But fiEur be it from 
me to argue with Bellarmine, (de pcenit. I. 
3, c. 2,) from Uzziah's bodily leprosy to 




infer ihat any prince who is spiritually lep- 
rous and turned heretical, is presently to be 
dethroned. Nothing can dethrone a king 
but such tyranny as is inconsistent with his 
royal office. Nor durst I infer that kings, 
now a*days, may be removed from actual 
government for one single transgression. It 
IS true, eighty priests, and the whole king- 
dom, so serving king Uzziah (their motives, 
I know, were divine) proveth well that the 
subjects may punish the transgression of 
€rod's express law in the king, in some 
cases even to remove him from tibe throne ; 
but as from Crod's commanding to stone the 
man that gathered sticks on the Sabbath- 
day, we cannot infer that Sabbath-breakers 
are now to be punished with death ; yet we 
may well argue, Sabbath-breakers may be 
punished, and Sabbath-breakers are not un- 
punishable, and above all law; so may we 
argue here, Uzziah, though a khig, was pun- 
ished; therefore kings are punishable by 
subjects. 

Quest, 16. — ^Whether or no, as the de- 
nial of active obedience in things unlawM 
is not dishonourable to the king, as king, he 
being obliged to command m the Lord 
only, so the denial of passive subjection to 
the king using unjust violence, be also no 
dishonouring of the king. 

Ana, — ^As the king is under God's law 
both in commanding and in exacting active 
obedience, so is he under the same regulat- 
ing law of God, in punishing or demanding 
of us passive sul^ection, and as he may not 
command what he will, but what the King 
of kings warranteth him to command, so may 
he not punish as he will, but by warrant 
also of the Supreme Judge of all the earth ; 
and therefore it is not dishonourable to the 
majesty of the ruler, that we deny passive 
subjection to him when he punisheth beside 
his warrant, more than it is against his ma- 
jesty and honour that we deny active obe- 
dience when he commandeth illegally ; else 
I see not how it is lawful to fly from a ty- 
rannous king, as £lias, Christ, and other of 
the witnesses of our Lord have done ; and, 
therefore, what royahsts say here is a great 
untruth, namely, that in things lawM we 
must be subject actively, — in mings unlaw- 
M, passively. For as we are in things lawM 
to be subject actively, so there is no duty in 
point of conscience, laying on us to be sub- 
ject passively, because I may lawfully fly, 
and so lawfully denv passive subjection to 
the king's will, punisning unjustly. 



Quest, 17. — Whether the prince may make 
away any part of his dominions, as an island, 
or a kingdom, for the safety of the whole 
kingdoms he hath; as if goods be like to 
sink an over-burthened ship, the seamen 
cast away a part of the goods in the sea, to 
save the lives of the wh3e passengers ; and 
if three thousand passengers being in one 
ship, and the ship in a storm like to be 
lost, it would seem that a thousand may 
be cast over board, to save the lives of the 
whole passengen?* 

Ans, — The kingdom being not the king's 
proper heritage, it would seem he cannot 
make away any part of his kingdom to save 
the whole, without the express consent of 
that part, though they be made away to 
save the whole. Li things of this kind, 
men are not as the commodities of mer- 
chants, nor is the case alike ; as when one 
thousand, of three thousand, are to be cast 
into the sea to save all the rest, and that 
either by common consent, or by lots, or some 
other way ; for it is one thing, when destruc- 
tion is evidently inevitable, as in the casting 
so many men into the sea to save the whole 
and many passengers, and when a king for 
peace, or for help from another king, mak- 
eth away part of his dominion. The Lord 
is here to be waited on in his good provi- 
dence, and events are to be committed to 
him ; but far less, can it be imaginably law- 
fril for a king to make away a part of his do- 
minions without their consent, that he may 
have help from a foreign prince to destroy 
the rest : this were to make merchandise of 
the lives of men.^ 

Quest, 18. — ^Whether or no the conven- 
ing of the subjects, without the king's will, 
be unlawfril. 

Ans, — The convention of men, of itself, 
is an indifferent thing, and taketh its speei- 
flcation from its causes, and manner of con- 
vening, though some convention of the sub- 
jects without the king, be forbidden; yet 
rath Ugis est anima legis, the reason and 
intent of the law, is the soul of the law. 
Convention of the subjects, in a tumultuary 
way, for a seditious end, to make war with- 
out warrant of law, is forbidden ; but not 
when religion, lavtrs, liberties, invasion of fo- 
reign enemies, necessitateth the subjects to 



1 Ferdinan. Vasquez illnst. quest. 1. 1, c. 8, n. 8, 
jnri alieno qnisqnam nee in minima piute obesse 
potest. 1. id quod nostra. F. de reg. jur. 1. jur. natu. 
cod. titol. 1. 



THE LAW AND THE PRINCE. 



233 



convene, though the king and ordinary judi- 
catures, going a corrupt way to pervert judg- 
ment, shall refuse to consent to their con- 
ventions. Upon which ground, no conven- 
tion of tahles at Edinburgh, or any other 
place, (an. 1637, 1638, 1639,) can be Judged 
there unlawful ; for if these be unlawml, be- 
cause they are conventions of the leagues, 
without express act of parliament, then the 
convention of the leagues to quench a house 
on fire, and the convention of a country to 
pursue a wolf entered in the land to destroy 
women and children, which are warranted 
by the law of nature, should be lawless, or 
against acts of parliament. 

Quest. 19. — Whether the subjects be ob- 
liged to pay the debts of the king. 

Ans. — These debts which the king con- 
tracteth as king, in throno regali, the peo- 
ple are to pay. For the law of nature and 
the divine law doth prove, that to every ser- 
vant and minister wages is due. (Rom. xiii. 
5, 6, compared with verse 4, and 1 Cor. ix. 
9—12 ; 1 Tim. v. 18.) K the prince be 
taken in a war, for the defence of the people, 
it is just that he be redeemed by them : so 
the law saith, {tit. F. et C. de negoiiis ges- 
tisy et F, et C. Manda,) But, Ferdinandus 
Yasquez (illust, quest. I. 1, c. 7) n* 6, 
Vicesimo tertio apparet, &c.) saith, if the 
prince was not doing the business of the 
public, and did make war without advice 
and consent of the people, then are they not 
to redeem him. Now certain it is, when 
the king raiseth war, and saith, ** God do 
so to me and mine, if I intend any thing but 
peace," yet maketli war not only against his 
oath, but also without consent of the parlia- 
ment, and a parliament at that time convo- 
cated by his own royal writ, and not raised, 
and dissolved at all, but still sitting formally a 
parliament ; if he borrow money from his own 
subjects, and from foreign princes, to raise war 
against his subjects and parliament, then the 
people are not obliged to pay his debts, 1. Be- 
cause they are obuged to the king only as a 
king, and not as an enemy ; but in so raising 
war he cannot he considered as a king. 2. 
Though if the people agree with him, and 
still acknowledge him king ; it is impossible, 
pki/sice, he can be their king, and they not 
pay his debts ; yet they sin not, but may, 
ex decentia, non ex debito legali^ pay his 
debts, yet are they not obliged by any law 
of God or man to pay his debts. But though 
it be true, by all law the king is obliged to 
pay his debt, (except we say, that aU the 



people's goods are the king's : a compendious 
way, I confess, to pay aU that any voluptu- 
ous Heliogabolus shall contract,) yet it may 
easily be proved, that what his subjects and fo- 
reign princes lent him to the raising of an un- 
just war are not properly debts, but expenses 
unjustly given out under the reduplication of 
formal enemies to the country, and so not 
payable by the subjects ; and tms is evident 
by law, because one may give most unjustly 
monies to his neighbour, under the notion of 
loan, which yet ^th nothing of the essence 
of loan and debt, but is mere delapidation, 
and cannot properly be debt by God's law ; for 
the law regiilateth a man in borrowing and 
lending, as in other politic actions. If I, out 
of desire of revenge^ should lend monies to 
a robber to buy powder and fuel to bum 
an innocent city, or to buy armour to kiU 
innocent men, I deny that that is legally 
debt. I dispute not whether A. B., bor- 
rowing money formally, that thereby he may 
waste it on debauchery, shall be obliged to 
repay it to C. D. imder the reduplication 
of debt; or if the borrower be obliged 
to pay what the lender hath unjustly lent. 
I c&re not pray to Grod that all our king's 
debts may be paid ; I have scarce faith so 
to do. 

Quest. 20. — ^Whether subsidies be due to 
the king as king. 

Ans. — There is a twofold subsidy; one 
dehitunif of debt; another, charitativum, 
by way of charity. A subsidy of debt is 
rather the kingdom's due for their neces- 
sity than the king's due, as a part of his 
rent. We read of customs due to the king 
as king, and for conscience sake, (Eom. xiii. 
6, 6,) never of a subsidy or taxation to the 
kings of Israel and Judah, at any conven- 
tion of the states. Augustus Csesar's taxing 
of aU the world (Luke ii.) for the mainten- 
ance of wars, cannot be the proper rent of 
Augustus, as emperor, but the rent of the 
Koman empire ; and it is but the act of a 
man. Charitative subsidies to the king, of 
indulgence, because, through bad husband- 
ing of the king's rents, he hath contracted 
debts, I judge no better than royal and 

?rincely begging. Yet lawful they are, as 
owe chanty to my brother, so to my father, 
so to my politic father the king. See Ferd. 
Vasq. {illust. quest. Z. 1, c. 8) who desireth 
that superiors, under the name of charity, 
hide not rapine, and citeth Cicero, gravely 
saying, {qfic. 1. 1,) ^^ Nulla generi humano et 
justitios major pestis est, qvtam eorum, qui 

2i 



234 



LEX, SSX. 



dwn mcunme/allunt, id agunif ut boni viri 
en$ videanttMr" 8fc. 

Quest, 21. — Whether the seas, floods, 
roadwBjg, cagtleB, ports, puUic magazine, 
militia, armour, forts, ana strongholds be 
the king's. 

Ana, — All these may be understood to 
be the king's in divers notions. 1. The^ 
are the king's, quoad cuftodtam, et pubh- 
cam possessionem^ as a pawn is the man's in 
whose hand the pawn is laid down. 2. They 
are the king's, quocui jwrisdictionem eumu- 
lativam^ non privativam. The king is to 
direct, and royally to oonmuind, that the 
castles, forts, ports, strongholds, armour, ma- 
rine, militia, be employed for the safety of 
we kingdom. All the ways, bridges, and 

Eublie roadways, are the king's, in so far as 
e, as a public and royal watSiman, is to se- 
cure the subject from robbers, and to cog- 
nosce of unknown murders, by himself and 
the inferior judges ; yet may not the king 
employ any of these against the kingdom. 
3. They are the kings, as he is king^ quoad 
qfidalem^ et rMoUm^ et publicam proprie" 
taUm f for he hath a royal «nd princely pro- 



priety to all these, as his own, in ao far as be 
useth them aooorcUng to law. 4. And thus 
they are tiie king's also, quoad usum, in 
regard of official use. But, 1. They are 
the kingdom's, quoad fructum, in regard 
of the effect and fruit. 2. They are the 
kingdom's, /SnoZtter, being destinated for the 
safety and security of the kin^om. 3. 
They are the kingdom's, quoad proprie- 
totem propriamf et legalem stricte sump' 
tamy according to the proper and legal 

Eropriety; and are not the king's proper 
entage as he is a man: 1. Because he 
may not sell these forts, strongholds, ports, 
magazine, bridges, &c. to a stranger, or a 
foreiffn prince. 2. When the king is dead, 
and his hdrs and royal line interrupted, 
these all remain proper to the kingdom ; yet 
so as the state cannot, as they are men, 
make them away, or sdl them, more than 
the king ; for no public persons, yea the mul- 
titade cannot make away the security, safety, 
and that which necessarily conduceth to the 
security of the posterity. *^ The Lord build 
his own Zion, and appoint salvation for 
walls and bulwarks !" 



THE END. 



■-MBk«HriikiM«MBMMl 



DE JURE REGNI APUD SCOTOS; 



A DIALOGUE 



CONCERNING 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



BY GEORGE BUCHANAN. 



TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH 

BY ROBERT MACFARLAN, A.M. 



I 



GEORGE BUCHANAN 



WISHES MUCH GOOD HEALTH TO 



JAMES THE SIXTH, KING OF THE SCOTS. 



Several years ago, when pnblic affairs were in 
the greatest confusion, I wrote on the prerogative 
of the Scottish crown a Dialogue, in which I en- 
deavoured to explain from their very cradle, if I 
may use the expression, the mutual rights of our 
kings and of their subjects^ Though that book 
seemed to have been serviceable at the time, by 
shutting the mouths of certain persons, who with 
importunate clamours rather inveighed against the 
existing state of things than weigh^Ml what was right 
in the scale of reason, yet influenced by the return 
of a little ti'anquillity, I also laid down my arms with 
pleasure on the altar of public concord. But having 
lately by accident lighted on this composition among 
my papers, and thought it interspersed with many 
remarks necessary to a person raised like you to an 
eminence so interesting to mankind, I have judged 
its publication expedient, that it might both testify 
my zeal for your service and also remind you of 
your duty to the community. Many circumstances 
also assure me that my endeavour on this occasion 
will not be fruitless; especially your age not yet 
corrupted by wrong opinions ; and a genius above 
your years spontaneously urging you to everything 
noble ; and an easy flexibility in obeying not only 
your preceptors, but also all wise monitors; and 
that judgment and sagacity in disquisition, which 
prevent you from allowing great weight to autho- 
rity, when it is not supported by solid arguments. 
I see also that, by a kind of natural instinct, you so 
abhor flattery, the vile nurse of tyranny and the 



very pest of legal sovereignty^ that you hate the 
solecisms and barbarisms of courtiers no less than 
they are relished and affected by those who in their 
own eyes appear connoisseurs in every species of 
elegance, and, as if they were delicate seasonings to 
conversation, interlard every sentence with majes- 
ties, lordships, excellencies, and, if it be possible, 
with other expressions of a still more offensive 
savour. Though you be at present secured from 
this error, both by the goodness of your natural 
disposition and by the instructions of your gover- 
nors, yet I cannot help being somewhat afraid that 
the blandishments of that pander of vice, evil com- 
munication, should give a wrong bias to a mind that 
is yet so pliant and tender ; especially as I am not 
ignorant with what facility our other senses yield to 
seduction. This treatise, therefore, I have sent you 
not only as a monitor, but also as an importunate 
and even impudent dun ; that in this critical turn of 
life it may guide you beyond the rocks of flattery, 
and not only give you advice, but also keep you in 
the road which you so happily entered, and, in case 
of any deviation, replace yon in the line of your duty. 
If you obey its directions, yon will insure to your- 
self and to your family in the present life temporal 
tranquillity, and in the future, eternal glory. Fare- 
well. 



At Stirling on the 10th of Jan- 
nary in the year of the Chris- 
tian Era 1679. 



) 



I '— - 



DE JURE REGNI APUD SCOTOS; 



A DIALOGUE 



CQMCBRXXKtt 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



Whsn, upon Thomas Maitland*8 return 
lately from the continent, I had questioned 
him minutely about the state ot affairs in 
France, I b^an, out of my attadbment to 
his person, to recommend tohim aperseyer- 
ance in that career to glory which ne had so 
happily begun, and to inspire him with the 
best hopes of ihe progress and result of his 
stadies. For, if I, with moderate talents, 
with hardly any fortune, and in an illiterate 
age, had still maintained such a c(mfliot 
with the iniquity of the times, as to be 
thought to nave achieved something, as- 
suredly tliose who were bora in ha|^ier 
days, and possess time, wealth and genius in 
abundance, ought not to be deterred from 
so honourable a purpose by its labour ; and, 
when aided by so many resources, cannot 
reasonably yield to despahr. They should 
therefore proceed to use every effort in 
communicating splendour to literature, and 
in recommen&ig themselves and thdr coun- 
trymen to the notice of posterity. If they 
continued for a little their joint exertions, 
the consequence would be, that they would 
eradicate irom the minds of men an opinion, 
that in the frigid regions of the globe the 
learning, politeness and ingenuity of the in- 
habitants <^infiiniidi in proportion to their 
distance from the sun; for, though nature 
may have &voured the Africans, Effyptians, 
and most other nations with qui^nr con- 
ceptions and greater keenness of intellect, 
vet she has been so unkind to no tribe as to 
have entirely precluded it from all access to 
virtue and glory. 



Here, when, according to his usual mo- 
desty, he had spoken of himself with diffi- 
dence, but of me with more affection than 
truth, the course of conversation at last led 
us so far, that, when he had questioned me 
concerning the convulsed state of our coun- 
try, and I had made him such an uiswer as 
I thought calculated for the time, I began, 
in my turn, to ask him what sentiments 
either the French, or any strangers that 
he met in France, entertained concerning 
Scottish affairs ; for I had no doubt that 
the novelty of the events would, as is usual, 
have Airnished occasion and matter for poli- 
tical discussions. 

" "Why," says he, ** do you address to me 
such a question ? For, since you know the 
whole train of events, and are not unac- 
quainted with what most people say, and al- 
most all think, you may easily conjecture, 
from the intenud conviction of your own 
mind, what is, or at least what ought to be, 
the opinion of all mankind." 

B^ — ^But the more distant foreign nations 
are, and the fewer causes they bive from 
that distance for anger, for hatred, for love, 
and for other passicms likely to make the 
mind swerve from truth, the more iMenu- 
ous and open they commonly are in judging, 
and the more freely they speak what they 
think ; and this very freedom of speech and 
mutual interchange of thought removes much 
obscnrily, disentangles many knotty points, 
oonverts doubts into certainties, and may shut 
the mouths of the dishonest and designing, 
and instruct the weak uid unenlightened. 



240 



DE JURE REONI AFUD SCOTOS ; OR, 



M. — ^Would you have me be ingenuous in 
my answer? 
B.— Why not ? 

M. — Though I was strongly actuated by 
a desire of revisiting, after a long absence, 
my country, my parents, my relations and 
friends, yet nothing inflamed this passion so 
much as the language of the untutored 
multitude. For, however firm I had thought 
the temper of my mind, rendered either by 
the effects of habit or by the precepts of 
philosophy, yet, when the event now uhder 
consideration occurred, I could not, by some 
fatality, conceal its softness and effeminacy. 
For, as the shocking enormity here lately 
exhibited was unanimously detested by all 
orders of men, and the perpetrator still un- 
certain, the vulgar, always swayed rather by 
momentary impulse than by sound discre- 
tion, imputed a fault of a few to the many ; 
and the common hatred to the misdeed of 
private individuals so overwhelmed the 
whole nation, that even those who stood 
most remote from suspicion laboured under 
the infamy of other men's crimes. There- 
fore, till diis storm of calumny should sub- 
side into a calm, I readily took shelter in 
this port, where, however, I fear that I 
have struck against a rock. 

B. — For what reason, I beseech you ? 
M. — Because the minds of all men, being 
already heated, seem to me likely to be so 
much inflamed by the atrocity of the late 
crime as to leave no room for defence. For 
how can I resist the attack not only of the 
uninformed multitude, but even of those 
who assume the character of politicians, 
while both will exclaim that our ferocious 
rage was not satiated by murdering, with 
unparalleled cruelty, an innocent youth, but 
exhibited a new example of barbarity in 
the persecution of women, a sex that is 
spared even by hostile armies at the capture 
of cities ? From what horror, indeed, will 
any dignity or any majesty deter men who 
are guSty of such outrage to their princes ? 
After these enormities, whom will justice, 
morality, law, respect for sovereignty or 
reverence for legal magistracy, restrain 
through shame or check through fear? 
When the exercise of the supreme execu- 
tive power is become the ridicule of the 
lowest rabble, when trampling upon every 
distinction between right and wrong, be- 
tween honour and dishonour, men degener- 
ate, almost by common consent, into savage 
barbarity. To these and still more atrocious 



charges I know that I shall be forced, upon 
my return to France, to listen, as the 
ears of all have in the meantime been so 
thoroughly shut as to be susceptible of no 
apology, nor even of a satisfactory defence. 

B. — But I will easily relieve you from 
this apprehension, and clear our nation from 
so false an imputation. For, if foreigners 
so heartily execrate the heinousness of the 
antecedent crime, where is the propriety of 
reprobating the severity of the subsequent 
pimishment ? Or, if they are vexed at the 
degradation of the queen, the former must 
necessarily meet with their approbation. 
Do you, therefore, choose to which of the 
two cases you wish to attach guilt; for 
neither they nor you, if you mean to be 
consistent, can either praise or dispraise 
both. 

M. — The murder of the king I certainly 
detest and abominate, and am glad that the 
odium of conscious guilt does not fall upon 
the public, but is attributable to the viUany 
of a few desperadoes ; but the latter act I 
cannot either wholly approve or disapprove. 
The detection by sagacity and industry of 
the most nefarious deed mentioned in any 
history, and the vengeance awaiting the 
wicked perpetrators from open hostHities, 
appear to me glorious and memorable 
achievements. But with the degradation of 
the chief magistrate, and with the contempt 
brought upon the royal name, which has 
been among all nations constantly held 
sacred and mviolable, I know not how all 
the nations of Europe will be effected, 
especially those that live under a regal 
government. As for myself, though not 
Ignorant of the adverse pretences and alle- 
gations, I feel violent emotions either fi^m 
tne magnitude or novelty of the event ; and 
the more so that some of its authors are 
connected with me by the closest intimacy. 
B. — ^Now, methinks, I can nearly discern 
what it is that affects you, but not perhajjs 
so much as it touches those iniquitous esti- 
mators of other men's merit, to whom you 
think satisfaction is due. Of those who will 
violently condemn the forcible seizure of the 
queen, I reckon three principal divisions. 
One is peculiarly- pernicious, as it compre- 
hends the panders to the lusts of tyrants, 
wretches who think no act unjust or dis- 
honourable by which they conceive that 
kings may be gratified, and who measure 
every thing not by its intrinsic value, but by 
the passions of their masters. These are 



J 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



241 



I 






such venal deyotees to the desires of an- 
other that they have retained freedom 
neither of speech nor of action. From this 
band proceeded the banditti, who, [without 
any cause of enmity, and merely with the 
hopes of preferment and power at court, 
sacrificed, m the most cruel manner, an in- 
nooent youth to another's lust. While these 
h3rpocrite8 pretend to lament the fate of the 
queen, and to sigh and groan over her mise- 
ries, they mean only to provide for their 
own security, and resuly gneve at seeing the 
enormous reward for their execrable yiUany, 
which they had devoured in imagination, 
snatched out of their jaws. This sort of 
people ought, therefore, in my opinion, to 
be chastised not so much by words as by 
the severity of the laws and by the force of 
arms. Others look totally to their own af- 
fairs. These, though in other respects by 
no means bad men, are not vexed, as they 
would wish us to think, at the injury done to 
the pubHc, but at their own domestic losses ; 
and therefore seem to me to need consola- 
tion rather than any remedy derivable from 
reason or from law. The remainder consist 
of the rude and undistinguishing multitude, 
who wonder and gape at every novelty, who 
censure almost every occurrence, and think 
hardly anything right but what is either 
their own act or what is done under their 
own eye. For every departure from the 
practice of their ancestors they think a pro- 
portionate deviation from justice and equity. 
These being swayed neither by malice nor 
by envy, nor by any regard to self-interest, 
are generally susceptible of instruction and 
of wing reclaimed from error, and com- 
monly yield to the force of reasoning and 
conviction ; a truth of which we now nave, 
and formerly often had, experience in the 
case of religion ; for 

Where's the sayage we to tame shonld fear, 
If he to culture lend a patient ear ? 

M. — That remark we have more than 
once found to be perfectly just. 

B. — What if, in order to silence this 
multitude, you should ask the most clamor- 
ous and importunate their opinion concern- 
ing the fate of Caligula, of Nero and of Do- 
mitian ; I presume that none of them would 
be so servilely attached to the regal name 
as not to acknowledge that they were justly 
punished ? 

M. — ^Possibly what you say may be true. 
But the same persons will immediately ex- 



claim that they do not complain of the 
punishment of tyrants, but feel indignant 
at the imdeserved calamities of legal sove- 
rei^s. 

B. — Do not you then see how easily the 
multitude may be pacified ? 

M. — Not yet. The matter seems to re- 
quire more elucidation. 

B. — I will, by a few words, make it intel- 
ligible. The vulgar, according to you, ap- 
prove the murder of grants, but compas- 
sionate the sufferings of kings. Do not you 
think, then, that if they should clearly un- 
derstand the difference between a tyrant 
and a king, it will be possible, in most par- 
ticulars, to alter their opinion ? 

M. — Were aU to acknowledge the justice 
of killing tyrants, it would open a wide inlet 
for the oifl^on of light upon the subject. 
But some men there are, and those of no 
contemptible authority, who, though they 
subject legal sovereigns to penal laws, con- 
tend for the sacre&ess of tyrants; and, 
though their decision is certainly in my opi- 
nion absurd, yet they are ready to fight 
for their government, however extravagant 
and intolerable, as for their own altai-s and 
hearths. 

B. — I also have more than once met with 
various individuals who obstinately main- 
tained the same doctrine ; but whether 
they were right or wrong we shall else- 
where more commodiously examine. In 
the meantime, if you will, let this point be 
taken for granted, upon condition that, if 
you do not afterwards find it sufficiently de- 
monstrated, you may at pleasure resume the 
subject for discussion. 

M. — Upon these terms I have no objec- 
tion. 

B. — We shall then establish it as an axiom 
that a king and a tyrant are contraries. 

M. — Be it so. 

B. — He then who has explained the ori- 

fin and the causes of creating kings, and the 
uties of kings to their subjects, and of sub- 
jects to their kings, must be allowed to have, 
by the contrast, nearly explained whatever 
relates to the nature of a tyrant. 
M. — I think so. 

B. — And when the picture of each is ex- 
hibited, do not you think that the people 
will also understand what is their duty to 
each? 
M. — Nothing is more likely. 
B. — But in things extremely dissimilar, 
and withal of the same general class, there 

2k 



242 



DB JURB RSGNI APUD SCOTOS ; OB, 



may be certain dissimilarities very apt to 
lead the inadvertent into error. 

M. — That may indisputably be the case, 
and particularly when an inferior character 
finds it easy to assume the appearance of a 
superior, and studies nothing so much as to 
impose upon ignorance. 

jB. — Have you in your mind any distinct 

Eicture of a king and a tyrant, for, if you 
ave, you will ea$e me of much labour ? 

M. — The figure of both, which I have in 
my mind, I could certainly deHneate with 
ease ; but it would appear to your eyes, I 
fear, rude and misshapen. Therefore, lest, 
by forcing you to rectify my errors, the con- 
versation snould exceed the due bounds, I 
choose rather to hear the sentiments adop- 
ted by you, who have the advantage of me 
both in age and experience, and not only 
know the opinions ot others, but have also 
visited in person many states, and noted 
tiieir manners and customs. 

B. — That I shall do, and with pleasure ; 
nor shall I expound so much my own as the 
opinion of the ancients, that more weight and 
authority may accompany my words, as not 
being framed for the present occasion, but 
extracted from the doctrines of those who 
were entirely unconnected with this contro- 
versy, and^dehvered their sentiments with no 
less eloquence than brevity, without hatred, 
without favour or envy, for which they could 
not have the most distant motive; and I 
shall adopt principally the opinions not of 
those who grew old in the shades of inacti- 
vity, but of men who were in well-regulated 
states distinguished at home and abroad for 
wisdom and virtue. But, before I produce 
their testimony, I wish; to ask you a few 
questions, that, when we-hi^ej^greed upon 
some points of no small importance, I may 
not be compelled to deviate from my in- 
tended course, and to dwell either upon 
the explanation or confirmation of matters 
that are evident, and almost acknowledged 
truths. 

M. — Your plan I approve ; and, there- 
fore, if you have any question to ask, pro- 
ceed? 

B. — Is it your opinion that there was a 
time when men Hved in huts and even in 
caves, and strolled at random, without laws, 
without setUed habitations, like mere va- 
grants, uniting in herds as they were led by 
fancy and caprice, or invited by some con- 
venience and common advantage ? 

M. — That is certainly my firm belief;. 



for it is not only consonant to the order of 
nature, but also sanctioned'by almost all the 
histories of all nations. Of that rude and 
uncultivated life we have, from Homer's pen, 
a picturesque description soon after the Tror 
jan war among the Sicilians : — 

** By them no statnte and no right vas knoirn, 
No conucil held, no monarch fills the throne ; 
Bnt high on hills or airy oUffs they dwell, 
Or deep in caverns or some rocky cell ; 
Each rules his race, his neighbour not his care. 
Heedless of others, to his own severe." 

At the same period, too, Italy is said to 
have been equally uncultivated; so that, 
from tiie state of tiie most fertile regions of 
the globe, it is easy to form a conjecture that 
the rest were nothing but wild and desolate 
wastes. 

B. — But which of the two do you think 
most conformable to nature; that vagrant 
and sohtary life, or the social and unanimqus 
assemblage of men ? 

M. — Undoubtedly the unanimous assem- 
blage of men, whom 

" Utility herself, from whom, on earth, 
Justice and equity derire their birth," 

first collected into masses and taught, 

** Fenc'd by one wall, and by one key and bar, 
From open'd gates to pour the tide of war." 

B. — What! do you imagine that utiKty 
was the first and principal cause of human 
union? 

M. — Why not? since the lesson incul- 
cated by the greatest sages is, that men 
were made by nature for men. 

B. — To certain individuals, indeed, uti- 
lity seems to have great influence, both in 
the formation and in the maintenance of 
society. But, if I am not mistaken, their 
assemblage claims a much higher origin, 
and the bond of their union is of a much 
earlier and more venerable date. For, if 
every individual were to pay attention only 
to his own interest, there is ground for sus- 
pecting, I fear, that this very utility would 
rather dissolve than unite society. 

M. — That observation may, perhaps, be 
true. But I should be glad to hear what is 
your other source of human association. 

B. — It is a certain innate propensity, not 
only in men, but also in other animals of 
the gentier tribes, to associate readily, even 
without the allurements of utility, with be- 
ings of their own species. But of the brute 
creation it is i^t our present business to 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



243 



treat. Men we certainlj find so deeply 
impressed, and so forcibly swayed by tnis 
natural principle, that, if any of them were 
to enjoy, in abundance, everything that is 
calcnkted either for the preservation and 
health of the body, or for the pleasure and 
amusement of the mind, he must, without 
human intercourse, experience life to be a 
burden. This is such a notorious truth that 
even the |>ersons who, from a love of science 
and a desire of investigating truth, have re- 
tired from the bustle of the world and lived 
recluse in sequestered retreats, have neither 
been able, for a length of time, to bear a per- 
petual exertion of mind, nor, upon discover- 
ing the necessity of relaxation, to remain 
immured in solitude, but readily produced 
the very result of their studies ; and, as if 
they had laboured for the common good, 
added the fruit of their laboiu*s to the com- 
mon stock. Hence it is my opinion, that if 
any person be so attached to solitude as to 
shun and fly the society of men, he is ac- 
tuated rather by a disease of the mind than a 
principle of nature. Such, according to 
report, was Timon of Athens, and Belle- 
rophon of Corinth, 

" A vretch, who, preying in corrosive pain 
On his own yitala, roam'd the Aleian plain 
With comfortless and solitary pace, 
Shunning the commerce of the haman race." 

M. — Here our sentiments are not far 
from coincidence. But the term nature^ 
adopted by you, is an expression, which, 
from habit, I often use rather than under- 
stand ; and it is applied by others so va- 
riously, and to sucn a multitude of objects, 
that I am generally at a loss about the idea 
which it conveys. 

B. — At present I certainly wish nothing 
else to be understood by it but the light in- 
fused into our minds by the divinity ; for, 
since God created this dignified animal 

** Erect, of deeper reach of thought possessed. 
And fit to be the lord of all the rest," 

he not only bestowed upon his body eyes, 
by whose guidance he might shun what is 
adverse, and pursue what is adapted to his 
condition, but also presented to nis mind a 
kind of light, by which he might distinguish 
vice and infamy from virtue and honour. 
This power some call nature, some the law 
of nature : I certainly hold it to be divine, 
and am thoroughly persuaded that 

" Nature and irisdom*s Toioes are the same/' 



Of this law, too, we have from God a kind 
of abridgement, comprehending the whole 
in a few words, when he commands us to 
love him with all our heart, and our neigh- 
bours as ourselves. The sacred volumes, in 
all the books which relate to the formation 
of mortals, contain hardly anything else but 
an explanation of this law. 

M. — Do you then conceive that human 
society derives its origin not from any ora- 
tor or lawyer that collected the dispersed 
tribes of men, but from God himself? 

B. — That is oositively my opmion ; and, 
in the words of Cicero, I think that no- 
thing done upon earth is more acceptable to 
the sovereign Diety, that rules this world, 
than assemblages of men called states, and 
united upon principles of justice, llie dif- 
ferent members of these states politicians 
wish to have connected by ties similar to 
the coherence subsisting between all the 
limbs of our body, to be cemented by mu- 
tual good offices, to labour for the general 
interest, to repel dangers and secure ad- 
vantages in common, and, by a reciprocation 
of. benefits, to conciliate the affections of 
the whole community. 

M. — You do not then assign utility as 
the cause of men's union in society, but the 
law implanted in our minds by God at our 
birth, which you hold to be a much higher 
and more divine origin ? 

B. — I admit of utility as one cause, but 
not as the absolute mother of justice and 
equity, as some would have her ; but rather 
^her handmaid, and one of the guardians 
of a well-regulated community. 

M. — Here also I have no difficulty in 
expressing my concurrence and assent. 

JB. — ISow as oiu* bodies, which consist of 
repugnant principles, are liable to diseases, 
that is, to passions and certain internal com- 
motions; so in like manner must those 
larger bodies called states, as they are com- 
posed of different, and in some measure, of 
incompatible ranks, conditions, and disposi- 
tions of men, and of men, too, 

" Who cannot, with a fixed and steady view, 
Kven for an hour a single plan pursue." 

Hence, the latter must certainly, like the 
former, come to a speedy dissolution, unless 
their tumults are calmed by a kind of phy- 
sician, who, adopting an equable and salu- 
tary temperament, braces tne weaker parts 
by fomentations, checks the redundant hu- 
mours, and provides for the several mem- 



bers, 80 that neither the feebler parts may 
waste through want, nor the stronger grow 
too luxuriant through excess. 

M. — These would be the consequences 
that must inevitably ensue. 

B. — By what name shall we Qualify him 
I who shall perform the part of piiysician to 
j the body politic ? 

M. — About the name I am not very 
anxious; but such a personage, whatever 
his name may be^ I hold to be of the first 
excellence, and to have the strongebt re- 
semblance to the divinity. In this respect 
much forecast seems discovered in the wis- 
dom of our ancestors, who distinguished an 
office so honourable in its own nature by a 
very splendid name. For you mean, I sup- 
pose, a king, a term, of which the import 
IS such, that it renders a thing of the most 
excellent and transcendent nature almost 
visible to our eyes. 

B. — You judge rightly, for by that ap- 
pellation we address the Deity; since we 
have not a more magnificent title to express 
the pre-eminence of his excellent nature, 
nor one better adapted for expressing his 
paternal care and anection. Why should I 
collect other words that are metaphorically 
used to signify the office of a king, such as 
father, shepherd of the people, guide, prince, 
and governor ? The latent intention of all 
these expressions is to show that kings were 
made not for themselves but for the people. 
And, now that we seem agreed about the 
name, let us, if you please, discuss the office, 
still treading the path which we have hither- 
to pursued. 

M. — ^What path I beseech you ? 
B. — You recollect what has been just 
said, that states have a great resemblance 
to the human body, civil commotions to di- 
seases, and kings to physicians. If there- 
fore we understand the business of a physi- 
cian, we shall not be far, I presume, from 
comprehending the duty of a king. 

M. — It may be so ; for, by the compara- 
tive view which you have exhibited, they 
appear to have not only a great resemblance, 
but even a strong affinity. 

B. — Do not expect that I should here 
discuss every minute particular; for it is 
what is neither allowed by the limits of our 
time, nor required by the nature of the sub- 
ject. But, if I show you that there is a strik- 
ing similarity in the most prominent features, 
your own imagination will readily suggest 
what is omitted, and complete the picture. 



M. — Proceed, as you have begun. 
B. — Each seems also to have the same 
object in view. 

M.— What object? 

B. — The preservation of the body com- 
mitted to his care. 

M. — I understand. For the one ought, 
as far as the nature of the case will admit, 
to maintain the human body, and the other 
the body politic, in a sound state; and, 
when they happen to be affected with a 
disease, to restore them to good health, 

B. — Your conception of the matter is 
just ; for the office of each is twofi^d, — the 
maintenance of a sound, and the recovery of 
a distempered constitution. 
M. — Such is my idea. 
B. — For in both cases the diseases are 
similar. 

M. — So they seem. 

B. — For both are injured by a certain 
redundance of what is noxious, and by a 
deficiency of what is salutary; and they 
are both cured nearly by a dmihr process, 
either by nursing, or gently cherishing the 
body when emaciated, or relieving it when 
full and overburdened by the discharge of 
superfluities, and by moderate exercise and 
labour. 

M. — Such is the fact. But there seems 
to be this difference, that in the one the 
humours, in the other the morak, must be 
duly tempered. 

B. — You are perfect master of the sub- 
ject ; for the body politic, like the natural, 
as its peculiar kind of temperament, which 
I think we may, with the ^eatest propriety, 
denominate justice ; since it is she that pro- 
vides for its distinct members, and makes 
them perform their duties with uniformity. 
Sometimes by the operation of bleeding, 
sometimes by the discharge of noxious mat- 
ter, she, by a kind of evacuation, expels re- 
dundancies; sometimes she rouses despon- 
dence and pusillanimity, and administers 
consolation to diffidence, and reduces the 
whole body to the temper mentioned above, 
and exercises it, when thus reduced, by 
suitable labours ; so that, by a regular and 
due intermixture of labour and rest, she 
preserves, as far as the thing is possible, the 
renovated constitution. 

M. — To all your positions I would readily 
assent, had you not made justice the tem- 
perament of the body pohtic; for, by its 
very name and profession, temperance seems 
rightfully entitled to that office. 



hi 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



245 



B. — I think it of no great moment on 
which of the two you confer this honour. 
For, as all the virtues, of which the energy 
is visible in action, consist in the observation 
of a due and uniform medium, they are so 
mutually interwoven and connected, that 
they seem all to have but one object, the 
moderation of the passions. Under what- 
ever general head it may be classed, it is of 
little importance which of the two names 
you adopt ; and yet that moderation, which 
is exerted in common affairs and in the or- 
dinary commerce of life, may, in my opinion, 
be with the greatest propriety denominated 
justice. 

M. — Here I have no difficulty in yielding 
my assent. 

B. — Now, I imagine that the intention 
of the ancients in creating a king was, ac- 
cording to what we are told of bees in their 
hives, spontaneously to bestow the sove- 
reignty on him who was most distinguished 
among his countrymen for singular merit, 
and wiio seemed to surpass all his fellows in 
wisdom and equity. 

M. — That is probably the fact. 

B. — But what must be done, if no such 
person can be found in the community ? 

M. — By the law of nature mentioned be- 
ibre, an equal has neither the power nor 
right of assuming authority over his equals ; 
for I think it but justice that among persons 
in other respects equal, the returns of com- 
mand and obedience should also be equal. 

B. — But, if the people, from a dislike to 
an ambitious canvass every year, should 
choose to elect as king an individual not 
possessed indeed of every regal virtue, but 
still eminent for nobility, for wealth or 
military glory, might not ne, with the great- 
est justice, be deemed a king ? 

M. — Undoubtedly; for the people have 
a right of investing whom they please with 
the sovereign power. 

B. — Suppose that we should employ, for 
the cure of diseases, a man of considerable 
acuteness, but still not possessed of extra- 
ordinary skill in the medical art, must we 
directly, upon his election by the generality, 
consider him as a physician ? 

M. — By no means. For learning and 
experience in many arts, and not votes, 
constitute a physician. 

B. — What do you think of the artists in 
the other professions ? 

M. — I think that the same reasoning is 
applicable to them all. 



B. — Do you believe that it requires any 
art to discharge the functions of a king ? 

M.— Why should I not ? 

B. — Can you give any reason for your 
belief? 

M. — I think I can; and it is that which 
is peculiar to all the arts. 

j5. — What reason do you mean ? 

M. — ^AU the arts certainly originated in 
experience. For, while most people pro- 
ceeded at random and without method in 
the performance of many actions, which 
others completed with superior skill and 
address, men of discernment, having re- 
marked the results on both sides, and 
weighed the causes of these results, ar- 
ranged several classes of precepts, and called 
each class an art. 

B. — By the means, therefore, of similar 
remarks, the art of sovereignty may be de- 
scribed as well as that of medicine ? 

M. — That I think possible. 

B. — On what precepts then must it be 
founded ? 

M. — I am not prepared to give you a 
satisfactory answer. 

B. — Perhaps its comparison with other 
arts may lead to its comprehension. 

M. — In what manner ? 

B. — Thus. There are certain precepts 
peculiar to grammar, to medicine, and to 
agriculture. 

M. — I comprehend. 

B. — May we not call these precepts of 
grammar and medicine also arts and laws, 
and so on in other cases ? 

M. — So I certainly think. 

B. — What do you think of the civil law ? 
Is it not a system of precepts calculated for 
sovereigns ? 

M. — So it seems. 

B. — Ought it not then to be understood 
by him who would be created a king ? 

M. — The inference appears to be una- 
voidable. 

B. — What shall we then say of him who 
does not understand it ? Do you conceive 
that, even after his nomination by the peo- 
ple, he shall not be called king ? 

M. — Here you reduce me to a dilemma ; 
for, to make my answer compatible with the 
preceding concessions, I must affirm that 
the suffrages of the people can no more 
make a king than any other artist. 

B. — What, then, do you think ought to 
be done in this case ? For, if the person 
elected by common suffrage is not a king. 



246 



DB JURE REGia APUD SCOTOS ; OR, 



I fear that we are not likely to have any 
le^ soToreign. 

M. — I also am not without the same fear. 

B. — Is it your pleasure, then, that the 
position just laid down in comparing the 
arts should be discussed with greater mi- 
nuteness ? 

M. — Be it so, if you think it necessary. 

B. — Did we not, in the seyeral arts, call 
the precepts of the several artists laws ? 

M.— We did. 

B. — But I fear that we did not then use 
sufficient circumspection. 

M.— Why so ? 

B. — Because it seems an absurdity to 
suppose that he who understands any art 
should not be an artist. 

M. — It is an absurdity. 

B. — Ought we not therefore to consider 
him, who can perform what belongs to art, 
an artist, whether it proceeds from the 
spontaneous impulse of nature, or irom an 
habitual facility acquired by a constant re- 
petition of similar acts ? 

M. — I think so. 

B. — Him, then, who possesses either the 
method or the skill to do anything rightly, 
we may term an artist, if he has by practice 
acquired the requisite power ? 

M. — With more propriety, undoubtedly, 
than the other who understands only the 
bare precepts, without practice and experi- 
ence. 

B. — The precepts, then, are not to be 
considered as the art ? 

M. — ^By no means ; but rather the sem- 
blance of art, or, more nearly still, its 
shadow. 

B. — What then is that directing power 
in states that we are to call either the art 
or science of politics. 

M. — I suppose that you mean the provi- 
dential wisdom, from which, as a fountain, 
all laws calculated for the benefit of human 
society must flow. 

B. — You have hit the mark. Therefore, 
if any man should possess this wisdom in the 
highest degree of perfection, we might call 
him a king by nature, not by suffrage, and 
invest him with uidimited power* But, if 
no such person can be found, we must be 
satisfied with the nearest approach to this 
excellency of nature, and, m its possessor 
grasping a certain resemblance of the desired 
reality, call him king. 

M. — Let us honour him with that title, 
if you please. 



B. — And, becanse there is reason to fear 
that he may not have sufficient firmness of 
mind to resist those affections which may, 
and often do, cause deviations from recti- 
tude, ire shall give him the additional assist- 
ance of law, as a colle^ue, or rather as a 
regulator of his passions. 

M. — It is not, then, your opinion, that a 
kin^ should in all matters be mvested with 
arbitranr power ? 

B. — Bj no means; for I recoUect that 
he is not only a king, but also a man erring 
much through ignorance, offending much 
throuch inclination, and much almost against 
his wm ; as he is an animal readily yimding 
to every breath of &vour or hatred. This 
imperfection of nature too is generally in- 
creased by the possession of office ; so that 
here, if anywhere, I recognise the force of 
the sentiment in the comedy, when it says, 
that " by unrestrained authority we all be- 
come worse." For this reason legislative 
sages suppHed their king with law, either to 
instruct nis ignorance or to rectify his mis- 
takes. From these remarks you may, I 
presume, conceive, as in a typical represen- 
tation, what my idea isof a genuine king's 
duty. 

M.^In whatever regards the creation of 
kings, their name and their office, you have 
given me entire satisfaction ; and yet, if you 
wish to make any additions, I am ready to 
listen. But, though my imagination hurries 
on with eagerness to the remainder of your 
discussion, one circumstance, which through 
your whole discourse gave me some offence, 
must not pass in nlence ; and it is this, that 
you seemed to be a little too hard upon 
kings ; an act of injustice of which I have 
before fi^quently suspected you, when I 
heard the ancient republics and the modem 
state of Venice become in your mouth the 
subjects of extravagant encomiums. 

B. — In this case you did not form a just 
idea of my sentiments ; for, among the Ilo- 
mans, the Massilians, the Venetians, and 
ethers who held the directions of the laws to 
be more sacred than the commands of theu: 
kinffs, it is not so much the diversity as the 
equity of their civil administration that I 
admire ; nor do I think it of much conse- 
quence whether the supreme magistrate be 
called king, duke, emperor, or consul, if it 
be observed as an invariable maxim, that it 
was for the express purpose of maintaining 
justice and equity that he was invested with 
the magistracy. For, if the plan of govern- 




ment be founded on law, there is no just 
reason for disputingr about its name. The 
person whom we cail the Doge of Venice is 
nothing else but a legal sovereign ; and the 
£b%t Boman consuls retained not only the 
ensigns but also the powers of the ancient 
kings. The only difference was that, as, to 
your knowledge, was the case with the per- 
petual kings 01 the Laoedsemonians, the pre- 
siding magistrates were two, and established 
not K)r a perpetuity, but for a single year. 
Hence, we must still adhere steadily to what 
was asserted at the commencement, that 
kings were at first constituted for the main- 
tenance of justice and equity. Had they 
been able to abide inviolably by this rule, 
they might have secured perpetual posses- 
sion of the sovereignty, such as they had 
received it, that is, free and unshackled by 
laws. But, as the state of human affairs 
has, according to the usual progress of every 
created existence, a constant tendency to 
deterioration, regal government, which was 
originally instituted lor the purposes of pub- 
lic utility, degenerated gradually into impo- 
tent tyranny. For, when kings observed no 
laws but their capricious passions, and find- 
ing their power uncircumscribed and immo- 
derate, set no bounds to their lusts, and were 
swayed much by favour, much by hatred, 
and much by private interest, their domi- 
neering insolence excited an universal desire 
for laws. On this account, statutes were 
enacted by the people, and kings were, in 
their judicial decisions, obliged to adopt, not 
what their own licentious fancies dictated, 
but what the laws, sanctioned by the people, 
ordained. For they had been taught, by 
many experiments, that it was mucn safer 
to trust their liberties to laws than to kings; 
since many causes might induce the latter 
to deviate from rectitude; and the former, 
being equally deaf to prayers and to threats, 
always maintained an even and invariable 
tenor. Kings being accordingly left, in 
other respects, free, found their power con- 
fined to prescribed limits only by the neces- 
sity of squaring their words and actions by 
the directions of law, and by inflicting pun- 
ishments and bestowing rewards, the two 
strongest ties of human society, according to 
its ordinances ; so that, in conformity to the 
expressions of a distinguished adept in poli- 
tical science, a king became a speaking law^ 
and law a dumb king. 

M. — At the first outset of your discourse, 
you were so lavish in praise of kings, that 



the veneration due to their august majesty 
seemed to render them almost sacred and 
inviolable. But now, as if actuated by 
repentance, you confine them to narrow 
bounds, and thrust them, as it were, into 
the cells of law, so as not to leave them 
even the common freedoms of speech. Me 
you have egregiously disappointed; for I 
was in great hopes that, in the progress of 
your dicourse, you would, either of your 
own accord or at my suggestion, restore 
what an illustrious historian calls the most 
glorious spectacle in the eyes of gods and 
men to its original splendour ; but, by spoil- 
ing of every ornament, and circumscribing 
within a close prison the magistracy first 
known in the world, you have so debased it, 
that to any person in his sober senses it 
must be an object of contempt rather than 
of desire. For can there be a man, whose 
brain is not deranged, that would not choose 
rather to rest satisfied with a moderate for^ 
tune in a private station, than, while he is 
intent upon other men's business and inat- 
tentive to his own, to be obliged, in the 
midst of perpetual vexations, to regulate the 
whole course of his life by the caprice of the 
multitude ? Hence, if it be proposed that 
this should everywhere be the condition of 
royalty, I fear that there will soon be a 
greater scarcity of kings than in the first 
infancy of our religion there was of bishops. 
Indeed, if this be the criterion by which we 
are to estimate kings, I am not surprised 
that the persons who formerly accepted of 
such an illustrious dignity, were found only 
among shepherds and ploughmen. 

B. — ^Mark, I beseech you, the egregious 
mistake which you commit, in supposing 
that nations created kings not for the main- 
tenance of justice, but for the enjoyment of 
pleasure. Consider how much, by tliis plan, 
you retrench and narrow their greatness. 
And, that you may the more easily compre- 
hend what I mean, compare any of the kmgs 
whom you have seen, and whose resemblance 
you wish to find in ihe king that I describe, 
when he appears at his levee dressed, for 
idle show, like a girl's doll, in all the colours 
of the rainbow, and surrounded with vast 
parade by an immense crowd; compare, I 
say, any of these with the renowned princes 
of antiquity, whose memory still lives and 
flourishes, and will be celebrated among the 
latest posterity, and you will perceive that 
they were the originals of the picture that I 
have just sketchecl. Have you never heard 



in conversation, that Philip of Maoedon, 
upon answering an old woman that begged 
ot him to inquire into a grievance of which 
she complained, '^ That he was not at lei- 
sure," and upon receiving this reply, " Cease, 
then, to be a king ;" — have you heard, I say, 
that this king, the conqueror of so many 
states, and the lord of so many nations, when 
reminded of his functions by a poor old 
woman, complied and recognised the official 
duty of a king ? Compare this Philip, then, 
not only with the greatest kings that now 
exist in Europe, but also with the most re- 
nowned in ancient story, and vou will find 
none his match in prudence, fortitude, and 
patience of labour, and few his equals in 
extent of dominion. Leonidas, Agesilaus, 
and other Spartan kings, all great men, I 
forbear to mention, lest I should be thought 
to produce obsolete examples. One saying, 
however, of Gorgo, a Spartan maid, and the 
daughter of king Cleomedes, I cannot pass 
unnoticed. Seemg his slave pulling off the 
slippers of an Asiatic guest, she exclaimed, 
in running up to her father, " Father, your 
guest has no hands." From these expres- 
sions, you may easily form an estimate of 
the whole discipline of Sparta, and of the 
domestic economy of its kings. Yet, to this 
rustic, but manly, discipline, we owe our 
present acquisitions, such as they are ; while 
the Asiatic school has only furnished slug- 
gards, by whom the fairest inheritance, the 
miit of ancestral virtue, has been lost 
through luxury and effeminacy. And, 
without mentioning the ancients, such not 
long ago among the Gallicians was Pelagius, 
who gave the first shock to the power of the 
Saracens in Spain. Though 

" Beneath one humble roof, their common shade, 
His sheep, his shepherds, and his gods were laid ;" 

yet the Spanish kings are so far from being 
ashamed of him, that they reckon it their 
greatest glory to find their branch of the 
genealogic tree terminate in his trunk. But, 
as this topic requires a more ample discus- 
sion, let us return to the point at which the 
digression began. For I wish, with all pos- 
sible speed, to evince what I first promised, 
that this representation of royalty is not a 
fiction of my brain, but its express image, as 
conceived by the most illustrious statesmen 
in all ages; and, therefore, I shall briefly 
enumerate the originals from which it has 
been copied. Marcus TuUius Cicero's vo- 
lume concerning moral duties is in universal 



esteem, and in the second book of it you will 
find these expressions : — " In my opinion, 
not only the Medes, as Herodotus says, but 
also our ancestors, selected men of good 
morals as kings, for the purpose of enjoying 
the benefit of justice. For, when the needy 
multitude happened to be oppressed by the 
wealthy, they had recourse to some person 
of eminent merit, who might secure the 
weak from injury, and, with a steady arm, 
hold the balance of law even between the 
high and low. And the same cause, which 
rendered kings necessarv, occasioned the in- 
stitution of laws. For the constant object of 
pursuit was uniform justice, since otherwise 
it would not be justice. When this advan- 
tage could be derived from one just and 
good man, they were satisfied; but, when 
that was not the case, they enacted laws 
that should at all times, and to all persons, 
speak the same language. Hence the de- 
duction is evident, that those were usually 
selected for supreme magistrates of whose 
justice the multitude entertained a high 
opinion ; and, if besides they had the addi- 
tional recommendation of wisdom, there was 
nothing which they thought themselves in- 
capable of acquiring under their auspices." 
From these words you understand, I pre- 
sume, what, in Cicero's opinion, induced 
nations to vish both for kings and for laws. 
Here I might recommend to your perusal 
the works of Xenophon, who was no less 
distinguished for military achievements than 
for attachment to philosophy, did I not 
know your familiarity with him to be such 
tliat you can repeat sdmost all his sentences. 
Of Plato, however, and Aristotle, though I 
know how much you prize their opinions, I 
say nothing at present; because I choose 
^ther to have men illustrious for real action, 
than for their name in the shades of acade- 
mies, for my auxiliaries. The stoical king, 
such as he is described by Seneca in his 
Thyestes, I am still less disposed to offer to 
your consideration, not so much because he 
is not a perfect image of a good king, as be- 
cause that pattern of a good prince is solely 
an ideal conception of tne mind, calculated 
for admiration rather than a well-grounded 
hope ever likely to be gratified. Besides, 
that there might be no room for malevolent 
insinuations against the examples which I 
have produced, I have not travelled into the 
desert of the Scythians for men who either 
curried their own horses, or performed any 
other servile woi^ incompatible with our 



THS RIGHTS OV THS GROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



249 



BoannerB, but into the heart of Greece, and 
for those men who, at the very time when 
l^e Greeks were most distinguished for the 
liberal and polite arts, presided over the 
greatest nations and the best-regolated com- 
mnnities, and presided over them in sodi a 
manner, that, when alive, thej acquired the 
highest veneration among their countrymen, 
and left, when dead, their memory glorious 
to posterity. 

M. — Here, if you should insist upon a de- 
claration of my sentiments, I must say that 
I dare hardly confess either my inconsi^ncy, 
or timidity, or other anonymous mental in-* 
firmity. For, whenever I read in the most 
excellent historians, the passes which you 
have either quoted or indicate<^ or hear their 
doctrines commended by sages whose autho- 
rity I have not the confidence to question, 
and praised by all good men, they appear 
to me not only true, just, and sound, but 
even noble and splendid. Again, when I 
direct my eye to the elegandes and niceties 
of our times, the sanctity and sobriety of the 
ancients seem rather uncouth and destitute 
of the requisite pdish. But this subject we 
may, pernaps, discuss some other time at 
our leisure. Now proceed, if you please, 
to finish the plan wmch you have begun. 

B. — Will you allow me, then, to make a 
brief abstract of what has been said ? Thus 
we shall best gain a simultaneous view of 
what has passed, and have it in our power to 
retract any inconsiderate at rash concession. 

M. — By all means. 

B. — ^First of all, then, we ascertained that 
the human species was, by nature, made for 
society, and for living in a community ? 

M.— We did so. 

£. — We also agreed that a king, for being 
a man of consummate virtue, was chosen as 
a guardian to the society. 

M. — That is true. 

B. — And, as the mutual quarrels of the 
|wople had introduced the necessity of creat- 
mg kings, so the injuries done by kings to 
their subjects occasioned the desire of mws. 

M. — I own it. 

B. — Laws, therefore, we judged a med- 
men of the regal art, as the precepts of me- 
dicine are of the medical art. 

M.— We did so. 

B.— As we could not allow to either a 
angular and exact knowledge of his art, we 
ju&ed it saf(^r that each should, in his me- 
thod of cur^, follow the prescribed rules of 
his art, than act at random. 



M. — It is safer undoubtedly, 

B. — ^But the precepts of the medical art 
seemed not of one single land. 

M.-^How ? 

B. — Some we found calculated for pre- 
serving, and others for restoring health. 

M. — The division is just. 

B. — How is it with the regal art ? 

M. — It contains, I think, as many spe- 
cies. 

B. — The next point to be considered is, 
what answer ou^t to be given to the fol- 
lowing question — ** Can you think that phy- 
sicians are so thoroughly acquainted with all 
diseases and their remedies that nothing far- 
ther can be desired for their cure ?" 

M. — ^By no means. For many new kinds 
of diseases start up almost every age ; and 
likewise new remedies for each are, almost 
every vear, either discovered by the indus- 
try of men or imported from distant re- 
gions. 

B. — What do you think of the civil laws 
of society ? 

M. — They seem, in their nature, to be 
similar, if not the same. 

B.— The written precepts of their arts 
then will not enable either physicians or 
kings to prevent or to cure all the diseases 
of individuals or of communities. 

M. — I deem the thing impossible. 

B. — Why, then, should we not investigate 
as well the articles which can, as those which 
cannot, come within the purview of laws ? 

M. — Our labour will not be fruitless, 

B. — The matters which it is impossible 
to comprehend within laws seem to roe 
numerous and important; and first of all 
comes whatever admits of deliberation con- 
cerning the future. 

M. — That is certainly one head of ex* 
ception. 

B. — The next is a multitude of past 
events ; such as those where truth is inves- 
tigated by conjectures, or confirmed by wit- 
nesses, or wrung from criminals by tortures* 

Mw — ^Nothing can be clearer. 

B. — In elucidating these questions, thaii, 
what will be the dutv of a king ? 

M. — Here I think tliat there is no great 
occasion for long discussion, since, in what 
r^ards provision for the future, kings are 
so far from arrogating sujpreme power, that 
they readily invite to their assistance counr 
sel learned in the law. 

B. — What do you think of matters which 
are collected from conjectures, or cleared 

2l 



250 



DB JUBS REONI APUD 8COT08 ; OR, 



up bj witnesses, sach as are the crimes of 
murder, of adultery, and impoisomnent ? 

M. — These points, after they have been 
discussed by the ingenuity, and cleared up 
by the address of lawyers, I see generally 
left to the determination of judges. 

B. — And, perhaps, with propriety ; for if 
the king should take it into liis nead to hear 
the causes dP individuals, when will he have 
leisure to think of war, of peace, and of those 
important affairs which mvolye the safety 
and existence of the community? When, in 
a word, will he have time to recruit nature 
by doinffnothing? 

M.— -The cognisance of every question I 
do not wish to see devolved upon the king 
alone ; because, if it were devolved, he, a 
single man, would never be equal to the task 
of canvassing aU the causes of ail his sub- 
jects. I therefore highly approve the advice 
no less wise than necessary given to Moses, 
by his father-in-law, " To divide among 
numbers the burden of judicature;" upon 
which I forbear to enlarge, because tiie story 
is universally known. 

B. — But even these judges, I suppose, are 
to administer justice according to the direc- 
tions of the laws? 

M. — They are, undoubtedly. But, from 
what you have said, I see that there are 
but few things for which the laws can, in 
comparison of those for which they cannot, 
provide. 

B. — There is another additional difficulty 
of no less magnitude, that all the cases, for 
which laws may be enacted, cannot be com- 
prised within any prescribed and determi- 
nate form of words. 

M. — How so ? 

B. — The lawyers, who greatly magnify 
their art, and would be thought the high- 
priests of justice, allege. That the multitude 
of cases is so great, that they may be deemed 
almost infinite, and that every day there 
arise in states new crimes, like new kinds of 
ulcers. What is to be done here by the le- 
gislator, who must adapt his laws to what is 
present and past ? 

M. — Not much, if he should not be some 
divinity dropped from heaven. 

B. — To these inconveniences add another, 
and that not 'a small difficulty, that, from 
the great mutability of human affairs, hard- 
ly any art can furnish precepts that ought to 
be universally j>ermanent and invariably ap- 
plicable. 

\ff .—Nothing can be truer. 



B. — The safest plan then seems to be, to 
entrust a skilful physician with the health 
of his patient, and a king with the preserva- 
tion of his people: for the physician, by 
venturing beyond the rules of his art, will 
often cure the diseased, either with their 
consent, or sometimes against their will ; and 
the king will impose a new but stiU a salu- 
tary law upon his subjects, by persuasion, or 
even by compulsion. 

M. — I can see no obstacle to prevent hiro. 

B. — When both are engaged in these 
acts, do they not seem each to exert a vigour 
beyond his own law ? 

M. — To me each appears to adhere to his 
art. For it was one oi our preliminary posi* 
tions, that it is not precepts that constitute 
art, but the mental powers employed by the 
artist in treating the subiect-matter of art 
At one thing, however, if you really speak 
from your heart, I am in raptures — ^that, 
compelled by a kind of injunction from 
truth, you restored kings to the dignified 
rank from which they had been violently de- 
graded. 

B. — Gome not so hastily to a conclusion, 
for you have not yet heard all. The empire 
of law is attended with another inconve- 
nience. For the law, like an obstinate and 
unskilful task-master, thinks nothing right 
but what itself commands; while a king 
may perhaps excuse weakness and temerity, 
and nnd reason to pardon even detected 
error. Law is deaf, unfeeling, and inexoiv 
able. A youth may allege the slippery 
ground which he treads, aa the cause of his 
tiall, and a woman the infirmity of her sex; 
one may plead poverty, a second drunken- 
ness, and a third friendship. To all these 
subterfuges what does the law say? Go, 
executioner, chain his hands, cover his head, 
and hang him, when scourged, upon the ac- 
cursed tree. Now, you cannot oe igncnrant 
how dangerous it is, in the midst of so much 
human nailty, to depend for safety on inno- 
cence alone. 

M. — What you mention is undoubtedly 
pregnant with danger. 

B. — I observe, uiat, on recollecting these 
circumstances, certain persons are somewhat 
alarmed. 

M. — Somewhat, do you say I 

B,. — ^Hence, when I caremlly revolve in 
my own mind the preceding positions, I fear 
that my compariscm of a physician and a 
king may, in this particular, appear to have 
been improperly introduced. 



="f 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



251 






M. — In what particular ? 
B. — In releasing both from all bondage to 
precepts, and in leaving them the power of 
curing at their will. 

M. — What do you find here most offen- 
sive? 

B. — ^When you have heard me, I shall 
leave yourself to judge. For the inexpedi- 
ence of exempting kings from the shackles 
of laws we assigned two causes, love and 
hatred, which, in judging, lead the minds of 
men astray. In the case of a physician, 
there is no reason to fear that he ^ould act 
amiss through love, as from restoring the 
health of his patient he may even expect a 
reward. And again, if a sick person should 
suspect that his physician is solicited by 
prayers, promises, and bribes, to aim at his 
life, he will be at liberty to call in another ; 
or, if another be not within his reach, he 
will naturally have recourse for a remedy to 
dumb books, rather than to a bribed mem- 
ber of the faculty. As to our complaint con- 
cerning the inflexible nature oi laws, we 
ought to consider whether it is not charge- 
able with inconsistency. 

M. — In what manner ? 

B. — A king of superior excellence, such 
as is visible rather to the mind than to the 
eye, we thought proper to subject to no law. 

M. — To none. 

B. — For what reason ? 

M. — Because, I suppose, he would, ac- 
cording to the words of Paul, be a law to 
himself and 'to others ; as his life would be a 
just expression of what the law ordains. 

B. — Your judgment is correct; and, 
what may perhaps surprise you, some ages 
before Paul, the same discovery had been 
made by Aristotle, through the mere light 
of nature. This remark I make solely for 
the purpose of showing the more clearly that 
the voice of God and of nature is the same. 
But, that we may complete the plan which 
has been sketched, will you tell me what 
object the original founders of laws had prin- 
cipally in view ? 

M. — ^Equity, I presume, as was before 
observed. 

B. — What I now inquire is not what 
end, but rather what patt-em, they kept be* 
ibr^their eyes. 

M. — Though, perhaps, I understand your 
meaning, yet I wish to hear it explained, 
that, if I am right, you may corroborate 
my opinion ; and, if not, that you may cor- 
rect my error* 



B. — You know, I apprehend, the nature 
of the mind's power over the body. 

M. — Some conception of it I can cer- 
tainly form. 

B. — You must also know, that of what- 
ever is not thoughtlessly done by men they 
have previously a certain picture in their 
mind, and that it is far more perfect than 
the works which even the greatest artists 
fashion and express by that model. 

M. — Of the truth of that observation I 
have myself, both in speaking a«d writing, 
frequently an experimental proof; for I am 
sensible that my words are no less inade- 
quate to my thoughts than my thoughts to 
tneir objects. For neither can our mind, 
when confined in this dark and turbid pri- 
son of the body, clearly discern the subtile 
essence of all things ; nor can we, by lan- 
guage, convey to others our ideas, however 
preconceived, so as not to be greatly in- 
ferior to those formed by our own intel- 
lects. 

B. — What then shall we say was the ob- 
ject of legislators in their institutions ? 

M. — Your meaning, I think myself not 
far from comprehending ; and, if I mistake 
not, it is that they caUed to their aid the 
picture of a perfect king; and by it ex- 
pressed the figure, not of his person but of 
his thoughts, and ordered that to be law 
which he should deem good and equitable. 

B. — Your conception of the matter is 
just ; for that is the very sentiment which I 
meant to communicate. Now, I wish that 
you would consider what were the qualities 
which we originally gave to our ideal king. 
Did we not suppose him unmoved by love, 
by hatred, by anger, by envy, and by the 
other passions ? 

M. — Such we certainly made his effigy, 
or even believed him to have actually been 
in the days of ancient virtue. 

B. — But do not the laws seem to have 
been, in some measure, framed according to 
his image. 

M.— -i^othing is more likely. 

B. — A good king then will be no less un- 
feeling and inexorable than a good law. 

M. — He will be equally relentless ; and 
yet, though I neither can effect, nor ought 
to desire, a change in either, I may still 
wish, if it be possible, to render both a little 
flexible. 

B. — But in judicial proceedings God does 
not desire us to pity even the poor, but com- 
mands us to looK solely to what is right and 



-••■ 



J. 



262 



PE JURB RSGKI AFUD SCOT08 ; OR, 



equitable, and according to that rule alone 
to pronounce sentence. 

M. — I acknowledge the Boundnes of the 
doctrine, and submit to the force of truth. 
Since then we must not exempt the king 
from a dependence on law, who is to be the 
legislator that we are to give him as an in- 
structor ? 

B. — ^Whom do you think most fit for the 
superintendence of this office ? 

M. — If Tou ask my opinion, I answer, the 
king himself. For in most other arts the 
artists themselves deliver the precepts, which 
serve as memorandums to aia their own re- 
collection, and to remind others of their 
du^. 

B.— I, on the contrary, can see no differ- 
ence between leaving a king free and at 
large, and granting him the power of enact- 
ing laws : as no man will spontaneously put 
on shackles. Indeed, I know not whether 
it is not better to leave him quite loose, 
than to vex him with unavailing chains 
which he may shake off at pleasure. 

B. — But, since you trust the helm of 
state to laws rather than to kings, take care, 
I beseech you, that you do not subject the 
person, whom you verbally term king, to a 
tyrant 

* With ohidns and jails his actions to control, 
And thvart each liberal purpose of his soul f 

and that you do not expose him, when 
loaded with fetters, to the indignity of toil- 
ing with slaves in the field, or with male- 
factors in the house of correction. 

B. — Forbear harsh words, I pray ; for I 
subject him to no master, but desire that 
the people, from whom he derived his power, 
should have the liberty of prescribing its 
bounds ; and I require that he should exer- 
cise over the people only those rights which 
he has received from their hands. Nor do 
I wish, as you conceive, to impose these laws 
upon him by force ; but declare it as my 
opinion, that, after an interchange of coun- 
sels with the king, the community should 
make that a general statute which is con- 
ducive to the seneral good. 

M. — Would you Uien assign this province 
to the people ? 

B. — To the people, undoubtedly, if you 
should not chance to alter my opinion. 

M. — Nothing, in my conception, can be 
more improper. 

B. — For what reason ? 

M.-^You know the proverb, " the people 



is a monster of many heads." You are 
sensible, undoubtedly, of their great rash- 
ness and great inconstancy. 

B. — It was never mv idea that this busi- 
ness should be left to uio sole decision of all 
the people ; but that, nearly in confonnity 
to our practice, representativeB selected 
from all orders tdioula assemble as council 
to the king, and that, when they had pre* 
viously discussed and passed a conditional 
act, it should be ultimately referred to the 
people for their sanction. 

M. — Your plan I per&ody undentand; 
but I think that you gain nothing by your 
circumspective caution. You do not choose 
to leave a king above the laws. And, lor 
what ? Because there are in human nature 
two savage monsters, cupidity and irasoi- 
bility, that wage perpetual war with reason. 
Laws, therefore, become an obiect of desire, 
that they might check their Ucentionsaess, 
and reclaim tbeir excessive extravagance to 
a due respect for legal authority. Whst 
purpose does it answer to asrign him these 
eounsellora selected from the people ? Are 
they not equally the victims of the same in- 
testine war ? Do they not suffer as much 
as kings from the same evils ? Therefore, 
the more assessors you attach to a king, 
the greater will be the number of fools; 
and what is to be expected firom them is 
obviousjj^ 

B.~^^at you imagine is totally differ- 
ent from the result which I expect; and, 
why I expect it, I will now unfold. First 
of all, it 18 not absolutely true, as you sap- 
pose, that there is no advantage in a multi- 
tude of counsellors, though none of them, 
perhaps, should be a man of eminent wis- 
dom. For numbers of men not only see 
farther, and with more discriminating eyes 
than any one of them separately, but also 
than any man that surpasses any single in- 
dividual among them in understanding and 
sagacity ; for mdividuals possess certain por- 
tions of the virtues, which, bdng accumu- 
lated into one mass, constitute one tranfr* 
cendent virtue* In medical preparations, 
and particularly in the antidote called mi- 
Uiridatic, this truth is evident ; for though 
most of its ingredients are separately nox- 
ious, they affora, when mixed, a sovenngn 
remedy against poisons. After a similar 
manner, downess and hesitation prove in- 
jurious in some ^en, as precipitate rashoess 
does in others ; but diffused among a multi* 
tude, they yield a certain temperament, er 



•»• 



THE BIGHTS OF THB CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



253 



that golden meaa, for which we look m 
everj species of Tirtue. 

M. — Well, since you press the matter, 
let the people have the right of proposing 
and of enacting laws, and let kings be in 
some measure onlr keepers of the records. 
Yet when these laws shall happen to be 
contradictory, or to contain clauses indis- 
tinQtlj or obecurely worded, is the king to 
act no part^ especially since, if you insist 
upon the strict interpretation of them ac- 
cording to the writtai letter, many absurdi- 
ties must inevitably ensue ? And here, if I 
produce as an example the hackneyed law 
of the schools, '' If a stranger mount the 
wall, let him forfeit his head/' what can be 
more absurd than that a country's saviour, 
the man who overturned the ttiemies on 
their scaling-ladders, should himself be 
dragged as a criminal to execution ? 

M«*^Yoa approve then <^ the old saying, 
*' The extremity of law is the extremity of 
injustice." 

B. — I certainly do. 

M. — If any question of this kind should 
come into a court of justice, a necessity 
arises for a merciful interpreter to mitigate 
the severity of the law, and to prevent what 
was intended for the general good from 
proving ruinous to worthy and innocent 



men. 



B. — Your sentiments are just; and, if 
you bad been sufficiently attentive, you 
would have perceived that in the whole of 
this disquisition I have aimed at nothing 
else but at preserving sacred and inviolate 
Cicero's maxim — *' Let the safety of the 
people be the supreme law." Therefore, if 
any case should occur in a court of justice of 
such a complexion, that there can be no 
question about what is good and equitable, 
it will be part of the king's prospective 
duty to see the law squared by the fore- 
mentioned rule. But you seem to me, in 
the name of kings, to demand more than 
what the most imperious of them ever ar- 
rogate. For you know that, when the law 
seems to dictate one thing, and its author to 
have meant another, such questions, as well 
as controversies grounded upon ambiguous 
or ccmtradictory laws, are generally referred 
to the judges. Hence arise the numerous 
cases solemnly ai^ed by grave counsellors 
at the bar, and the minute precepts appli- 
cable to them in the works of mgenuous 
rhetoricians. 

'M.-^l know what you assert to be fact 



But I think that, in this point, no less injury 
is done to the laws than to kings. For 1 
judge it better, by the immediate decision of 
one good man, to end a suit, than to allow 
ingenious, and sometimes knavish, casuists, 
the power of obscuring, rather than of ex- 
plaining the law. For, while the barristers 
contend not only for the cause of their clients, 
but also for the glory of ingenuity, discord 
is in the meantime cherished, religion and 
irreligion, right and wrong, are confounded ; 
and what we deny to a xing, we grant to 
persons of inferior rank, less stuaious, in 
general, of truth than of litigation. 

B. — You have forgotten, I suspect, a 
point which we just now ascertained. 

M.— What may that be ? 

B. — That to the perfect king, whom we 
at first delineated, such unlimited power 
ought to be granted, that he can have no 
occasion for any laws ; but that, Ivhen this 
honour is conferred on one of the multitude, 
not greatly superior, and perhaps even infe- 
rior to others, it is dangerous to leave him 
at large and unfettered by laws. 

M. — ^But what is all this to the interpre- 
tation of the laws ? 

B. — A great deal ; you would find, had 
you not overlooked a material circumstance, 
that now we restore in other words to the 
king, what we had before denied him, the 
undefined and immoderate power of acting 
at pleasure, and of unhinging and derang- 
ing every thing. 

M. — If I am guilty of any such thing, it 
is the guilt of insSvertence. 

B. — I shall, therefore, endeavour to ex- 
press my ideas more perspicuously, that 
there be no misconception. "N^Tien yon. grant 
to the king the interpretation of the law, 
you allow him the power of making the law 
speak, not what the legislator intends, or 
what is for the general good of the commu- 
nity, but what is for the advantage of the 
interpreter, and, for his own interest, of 
squanng all proceedings by it, as by an un- 
erring rule. Appius Claudius had, in his 
decemvirate, enacted a very equitable law, 
"That in a litigation concerning freedom, 
the claim of freedom should be favoured." 
What language could be clearer ? But the 
very author of this law, by his interpreta- 
tion, made it useless. You see, I presume, 
how much you contribute, in one line, to the 
licentiousness of your king, by enabling him 
to make the law utter what he wishes, and 
not utter what he does not wish. If this 




L 



doctrine be once admitted, it will avail no- 
thing to paw good laws to remind a good 
king of his duty, and to confine a bad one 
witbin due bounds. Nay, (for I will speak 
my sentiments openly and without disguise,) 
it would be better to have no laws at all, 
than, under the doak of law, to tolerate un-> 
lestramed and even honourable robbery. 

M. — ^Do you imagine that any king will 
be so impudent as to pay no regard to his 
reputation and character among the peojple, 
or so foi^etful of himself and of his family, 
as to degenerate into the depravity of those 
whom he overawes and coerces by igno- 
miny, by prison, by confiscation of gm>ds, 
and by the neaviest punishments ? 

B. — Let us not believe such events pos- 
rible, if they are not already historical facts, 
known by the unspeakable mischiefs which 
they have occasionecL to the whole world. 

M. — Where, I beseech you, are these 
facts to be traced ? 

B. — Where I do you ask ? As if all the 
European nations had not only seen, but 
also ielt, the incalculable misdbiefs done to 
humanity by, I will not say, the immode- 
rate power, but by the unbridled licentious- 
ness of the Boman pontiff. From what 
moderate, and apparently honourable, mo- 
tives it first arose, with what little ground 
for apprehension it furnished the improvi- 
dent, none can be ignorant. The laws ori- 
ginally proposed for our direction had not 
only been derived from the inmost recesses 
of nature, but also ordained by God, ex- 
plained by his inspired prophets, confirmed 
by the Son of God, himself also God, re- 
commended in the writings, and expressed 
in the lives, and sealed by the blood, of the 
most approved and sanctified personages. 
Nor was there, in the whole law, a chapter 
more carefully penned, more clearly ex- 
plained, or more strongly enforced, than 
that which describes the duty of bishops. 
Hence, as it is an impiety to add, to re- 
trench, to repeal, or alter, a single article 
in those laws, nothing remained for episco- 
pal ingenuity but the interpretation. The 
bishop of Bome having assumed this privi- 
lege, not only oppressed the other churches, 
but exerdsed the most enormous tyranny 
that ever was seen in the world ; for having 
the audacity to assume authority not only 
over men, but even over angels, he absolutely 
degraded Christ ; except it be not degrada- 
tion, that in heaven, on earth and in hell, 
the Pope's will should be law ; and that 



Christ's will should be law only if the Pope 
pleases. For, if the law should appear ra- 
ther adverse to his interest, he might, by 
his interpretation, mould it so as to compel 
Christ to speak, not only through his mouth, 
but also according to his mmd. Hence, 
when Christ spoke by the mouth of the 
Boman pontiff, Pepin seized the crown of 
Chilperic, and Ferdinand of Arragon de- 
throned Joan of Navarre; sons took up 
impious arms against their father, and sub- 
jects against their king ; and Christ being 
himself poisoned, was obliged afterwards to 
become a poisoner, that he might, by poison, 
destroy Henry of Luxemburg. 

M. — This is the first time that I e^er 
heard of these enormities. I wish, however, 
to see what you have advanced concerning 
the interpretation of laws a little more elu- 
cidated. 

B. — I will produce one single example, 
from which you may conceive the whole 
force and tendency of this general ami- 
ment. " There is a law, uiat a bishop 
should be the husband of one wife;" and 
what can be more plain or less perplexed? 
But " this one wife the Pope interprets to 
be one church," as if the law was ordained 
for not repressing the lust, but the avarice 
of bishops. This explanation, however, 
though nothing at all to the purpose, bear- 
ing on its face the specious appearance of 
piety and decorum, might pass muster, had 
he not vitiated the whole by a second in- 
terpretation. What then does this pontiff 
contrive ? " The interpretation," says he, 
" must vary with persons, causes, places, and 
times." Such is the distinguished nobility 
of some men, that no number of churches 
can be sufficient for their pride. Some 
churches, again, are so miserably poor, that 
they cannot afford even to a monk, lately a 
beggar, now a mitred prelate, an adequate 
liveBhood, if he would maintain the charac- 
ter and dignity of a bishop. By this knav- 
ish interpretation of the law there was de- 
vised a form, by which those who were called 
the bishops of single churches held others in 
commendam, and enjoyed the spoils of all. 
The day would fail me should I attempt to 
enumerate the fi-auds which are daily con- 
trived to evade this single ordinance. But, 
though these practices are disgraceful to the 
pontifical name and to the Christian charac- 
ter, the tyranny of the popes did not stop 
at this limit. For such is the nature of aU 
things, that, when tjiey once begin to slide 



- 



THS RiaHTS or THB CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



256 



down the precipice, thej never stop till they 
reach the bottom. Do you wish to have 
this point elucidated by a splendid example ? 
Do you recollect, among the emperors of 
Boman blood, any that was either more 
cruel or more abandoned than Gaius Cali- 
gula? 

M. — ^None that I can remember. 

B. — Among his enormities which do you 
think the most infamous action ? I do not 
mean those actions which clerical casuists 
class among reserved cases, but such as occur 
in the rest of his life. 

M. — I cannot recollect 

B. — What do you think of his conduct in 
inviting his horse, called Incitatus, to sup- 
per, orlayinff before him barley of gold, and 
in naming him consul elect ? 

M. — It was certainly the act of an aban- 
doned wretch. 

B. — What then is your opinion of his 
conduct, when he chose him as his colleague 
in the pontificate ? 

M. — Are you serious in these stories ? 

B. — Serious, undoubtedly ; and yet I do 
not wonder that these facts seem to you fic- 
titious. But our modern Boman Jupiter 
has acted in such a manner as to justify 
posterity in deeming these events no longer 
incredibilities but realities. Here I speak 
of the pontiff, Julius the third, who seems 
to me to have entered into a contest for 
superiority in infamy with that infamous 
monster, Caius Caligula. 

M. — What enormity of this kind did he 
commit ? 

B. — ^He chose for his colleague in the 
priesthood his ape's keeper, a fellow more 
detestable than that vile beast. 

M. — There was, perhaps, another reason 
for his choice. 

B. — Another is assigned ; but I have se- 
lected the least dishonourable. Therefore, 
since not only so great a contempt for the 

Eriesthood, but so total a forgeuulness of 
uman dignity, arose from the licentiousness 
of interpreting the law, I hope that you will 
no longer reckon that power inconsiderable. 
M. — ^But the ancients do not seem to me 
to have thought this office of interpretation 
so very important as you wish to make it ap- 
pear. The truth of this observation may be 
collected from a single circumstance,^at 
the Boman emperors granl^ the pjjmt^e 
to counsellors; a fact whim overturns the 
whole of your verbose dissertation, and re- 
futes not only what you asserted concerning 



the magnitude of that power, but, in oppo- 
sition to your earnest wish, clearly demons-* 
trates that the liberty of answering legal 
questions, which they granted to others, was 
not denied to themselves, if their inclination 
prompted, or their occupation permitted its 
exercise. 

B. — The Boman emperors, whom the 
soldiers placed at their nead, without any 
discrimination, or the least regard to the 
public good, do not stand in the predica- 
ment of the kings that we have been de- 
scribing ; as they were generally chosen by 
the most abandoned class of men for their 
abandoned character, or forced their way to 
the purple by open violence. Their con- 
duct in granting to counsellors the power of 
answering legal questions, I find not at all 
reprehensible ; for, though it is of very great 
importance, it is, with some degree of safety, 
entrusted to men to whom it cannot be an 
instrument of tyranny. Besides, as it was 
entrusted to numbers, they were kept to 
their duty by mutual reverence; since, if 
any of them deviated from rectitude, he was 
refiited by the answer of another. Nay, if a 
knot of counsellors entered into a knavish 
conspiracy, recourse might be had for re- 
lief to the judge, who was not under the ne- 
cessity of holding their, answers law. Be- 
course might also be had to the emperor, 
who had the power of inflicting punishment 
on every violator of the laws. Since these 
men were thus bound by so many chains, 
and more in dread of penalties for malver- 
sation than in expectation of rewards for 
fraud, you see, I apprehend, that the dan- 
ger from them oomd not be very formid- 
able. 

M. — Have you any further remarks to 
make about your king ? 

B. — First of all, if you please, let us col- 
lect in a few words what has been said ; for 
thus we shall most easily discover whether 
we have been guilty of any omission. 

M. — Your plan has my approbation. 

B. — We seemed to be pretty well agreed 
about the origin and cause of creating kings, 
and of establishing laws, but to differ a ht- 
tle about the author of tlie law. CompeUed, 
however, at last by the evidence of truth, 
you appeared, though with some reluctance, 
to yield your assent. 

M. — Though, as an advocate, I made the 
. most strenuous exertions, you certainly wrest- 
ed from the king not- only the power of or- 
.daining, but even of interpreting the laws ; 



256 



DS JURE BXaNI APUD 8COT08 ; OB, 



and here I fear that, if the matter should 
become public, I may be charged with pre- 
varication ; since I allowed a cause, which, 
at the outset, I thought so good, to be so 
easily wrested out of my hands, 

B. — Be not alarmed ; for, if any one 
should, in this case, charge you with preva- 
rication, I promise you my counsel gratis. 

M. — Of that promise, perhaps, we shall 
soon have a trial. 

B. — ^We discovered also many sorts of 
business, that seemed incapable of being in* 
eluded in any laws ; and of these we refer- 
red, with the king's consent, part to the or- 
dinary judges, ana part to his coundL 

M. — That we did so, I recollect. And, 
in the interim, what do you think came into 
my head? 

B. — How can I, unless you tell me ? 

M. — I thought you carved out kings in 
some degree similar to those figures of stone 
that seem generally to lean upon the heads 
of columns, as if they supported the whole 
structure, while, in reaUty, they bear no 
more of the weight than any other stone. 

B. — ^What an excellent advocate for kings ! 
You complain that I impose upon them too 
light a burden, while their sole business, 
night and day, is hardly any thing else but 
to discover associates, with whom they may 
either divide the burden of government, or 
upon whom they may lay its whole weight ! 
And yet you seem, at the same time, to be 
enraged tha4: I administer some relief to 
their distress. 

* M. — These auxiliaries I also embrace with 
cordiality ; but wish them^ as servants, not 
as masters ; as guides to point out the way, 
not to lead where they please, or rather to 
drag and impel a king as a machine, and 
leave him nothing else but the mere power 
of giving his assent. I have, therefore, been 
for some time in expectation of seeing you, 
after dosmg your aiscoursa upon royalty, 
make a di^ession to tyrani\y or to any oth^ 
subject. For so narrow are the limits to 
which you have confined your king, that, I 
fear, if we should dwell longer upon that to- 
pic, you will, in addition to the loss of his 
ni^ estate and sovereign power, banish him 
to some desert island, where, shorn of all 
his honours, he may dra^ a comfortless old 
age in penury and wretonedness. 

B.— You dread, as you allese, the charge 
of pnevarication. Now I, on ue other hand , 
fear that the kinff , whom you attempt to 
defend, will be injured by your chicanery. 



For, in the first place, why do you wish to 
see him idle, if you would not encourage 
idleness in architects; and in the next, to 
rob him of the good ministers and £dthful 
counsellors that I gave him, not as guar- 
dians to superintend his conduct, but as as- 
sociates to relieve him from part of his la- 
bour ? By their removal you leave him sur- 
rounded by a legion of knaves, who render 
him a terror to his subjects ; and you do not 
think his power sufficiently formidable, un- 
less we leave him at liberty to do much 
harm. I wish to see him beloved by his 
subjects ; and guarded, not by terror, but 
by affection ; the only armour that can ren- 
der kings perfectly secure. And, if you do 
not act ¥rith obstinacy, this is what, I trust, 
I shall soon effect. For I shall bring him 
out of what you call a narrow dungeon into 
broad daylight, and, by one law, invest him 
with such additional power and majesty, 
that, if he should wish for more, you will 
not hesitate yourself to charge him with ef- 




M. — That is a topic which I long to see 
ielucidated. 

B. — That I maVf therefore, satisfy your 
eagerness with all possible speed, I shall 
proceed directly to tne essential point. One 
of our late and uncontroverted deductions 
was, that no law can be so clearly and ex- 
plicitly worded as to leave no room for fraud 
by a knavish interpretation. This matter 
you will best understand by the production 
of an example. It was provided by law, 
that an illegitimate son should not succeed 
his father in an ecclesiastical benefice. Even 
in this affair, whidi one would imagine could 
admit of no fraud, an evasion was found 
practicable; for the father substituted an- 
other in his son's place, and that other re- 
Zed the benefice to the bastard. When, 
r this subterfuge, it was expressly pro- 
vided, by an additional clause, that the bene- 
fice which the father had at any time hdd 
should never be held by the son, oodiing 
was gained even by this provision ; for, to 
render it ineffectual, the priesta agreed mu^ 
tualiy to substitute one another's sons. When 
this practice also was forbidden, the law was 
eluded by a fresh kind of fraud. There starts 
up against the &ther a suppositious claimant, 
wno pretends a right to the benefice ; and, 
while the father is engaged in a sham fight 
with the suppositious sycophani, the son re- 
quests the bex]fifice, by petition, of the Roman 
pontiff, if the right of neither litigant should 



zz. 



THE BIGHTS OF THE GROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



267 



be found valid. Thus both parties are, by 
t^eir Yolantary and spontaneous cession, 
worsted, and the son possesses the benefice 
of the father by the nither's prevarication. 
In one law, then, jou see what various kinds 
of frauds are practised. 

M.— Ido. 

B. — ^Do not legislators, in this case, ap- 
pear to jou to act entirely like the mediod 
practitioners, who, in attempting by the ap- 
plication of plasters, to check tlie eruptions 
of the scurvy, or of any other distemper, 
force the repelled humours to burst out at 
once through various channels, and, for one 
head amputated to exhibit numbers sprout- 
ing up liKe the hydra's? 

M. — There cannot be a more apt com- 
parison. 

B. — As the physician of the body ought 
at first to have expelled entirely all noxious 
humours, ought not the physician of the 
state to imitate him, and to exterminate 
nniversi^ all corrupt morals ? 

M.— That, though I think it difficult, I 
h(dd to be the only genuine method of cure. 

B. — And, if this object can be attained, I 
think there will be occasion but for few laws. 

M. — ^That is certaioly matter of fact. 

B. — Does it not appear likely to you, that 
the person who can make a proper applica- 
tion of this medicine, wiU contribute more to 
the public good than all the assemblies of 
all the orders collected for the enactment of 
laws? 

M. — Infinitely more, without doubt. But 
let me ask, in the words of the comic poet, 
"Where is the person mighty enougn to 
confer so ffreat a favour ?" 

B. — ^miat do you think of entrusting the 
king with this cluurge ? 

M. -^ An admirable contrivance truly ! 
What was a pleasant and a smooth down-hill 
path yon have left the people in a mass to 
tread; but the laborious, rugged, and ar- 
duous departments you make the sole pro- 
vince of the king, as if it were not enough 
to confine him chained within a dose prison, 
unless you also imposed upon him so heavy 
a burden that he must sinx. 

B. — You mistake the case. I ask no- 
thing of him that is unreasonable or difficult. 
I do not insist, but request, that he would 
listen to oitreaty. 

M. — To what do you allude ? 

B. — To the natural behaviour of a good 
father to his children, judging that a King 
should, through his whole life, behave in the 



same manner to his subjects, whom he ought 
to consider as his children. 

M. — Wliat is that remark to the present 
purpose? 

B. — This is certamly the only, at least a 
very powerful, antidote against the poison 
of corrupt morals ; and, mat you may not 
think it a fiction of my brain, listen to 
Claudian's advice to a king : 

" Of oitizen and &ther yon should act the part, 
The general interest wearing next your heart. 
O'er one great body, you, as head, preside. 
And from its good can ne'er your own diride. 
To your own laws, if yon should think them fit, 
Others to bind, be foremost to submit. 
To laws the people willing homage pay. 
Whene'er their author can himself obey. 
The king's example as a model serres, 
As in a hire none from the soy*reign swerves. 
An ear to edicts when no man will lend. 
The prince's life the human mind can bend. 
The Tulgar herd, a changeful serrile race, 
Still ape their betters, eren in clothes and face." 

Do not imagine that a poet possessed of such 
distinguished genuis and learning was mis- 
taken m thinking that this circumstance had 
so mightv an influence; for the populace 
is so much inclined to follow, and so eager 
to imitate the manners of those who are 
eminently conspicuous for probity and worth, 
that they attempt in their conversation, 
dress, and gait, to copy even some of their 
imperfections. In their exertions, however, 
to resemble kings in habit, manner, and 
language, they are not actuated solely by 
the love of imitation, but also by the hopes 
of insinuating themselves into the favour of 
the great, and of acquiring, by wheedling 
arts, fortune, preferment, and power ; as 
they know that man is by nature formed 
not only for loving himself and his connex- 
ions, but also for embracing, with cordiality, 
in others, his own likeness, however imper- 
fect and vicious. This homage, though not 
demanded with pride and effrontery, but 
courted as a precarious favour, has a far 
greater effect than what the threats of the 
hiws, the engines of punishment, and files 
of musketeers can produce. This propen- 
sity recals the people without violence to 
moderation, procures to the king the affec- 
tion of his subjects, gives permanence to 
the tranquillity of the public, and solidity to 
the property of individuab. Let a kmg, 
therefore, constantly revolve in his own 
mind, that, as he stands in a publio theatre, 
exhibited as a spectacle to every beholder, 
all his words and actions must be noted and 
subject to comments ; and that 

2m 



^^ 



*=? 



258 



DE JURE REGNI APUD SCOTOS ; OR, 



" To rtgal vice no secrecy is known, 
Expoa'd aloft upon a splendid throne : 
Whaterer shape it takes, or new disgnise, 
All is ezplor'd by fame's qnick prying eyes.*' 

With what great caution, then, ought princes, 
in both cases, to act; since neither their 
▼irtues nor their vices can remain concealed, 
nor come to light, without effectme num- 
berless changes. If you should stifi doubt 
the great influence of the king's life upon 
the public discipline, take a retrospective 
view^ of infant Kome in its nascent state, 
and in its first cradle. "When this rude and 
uncivilised people, composed (for I will use no 
harsher terms) of shepherds and strangers, 
ferocious itself bv nature, with a most fero- 
cious king at its head, had formed a kind of 
camp, to disturb the peace, and to provoke 
the arms of the surroundiiig nations, how 
ffreat must have been the hatred, how vio- 
lent the alarm of its neighbours ! That very 
people, having chosen for its head a pious 
and upright kmg, was thought so suddenly 
changed, that any violence offered to it, in 
the service of the gods, and in the exercise 
of justice, was reckoned almost impiety by 
those very neighbours whose lands it had 
ravaged, whose cities it had burnt, and 
whose relations and children it had dragged 
into slavery. Now, if in the midst of such 
brutal manners and uncultivated times, 
Numa Pompilius, a king lately fetched from 
a hostile nation, could effect such a mighty 
alteration, what may we expect, or ratner, 
what may we not expect, from those princes 
who have been bom and bred to the hopes 
of royalty, and who receive an empire sup- 
ported by relations, by dependents, and by 
ancient connexions ? How much ought their 
minds to be inflamed with the love of vir- 
tue, by considering that they may not only 
hope for the praise of a single day, like 
actors who have performed their part well, 
but also presume that they secure the love 
and admiration of their own age, and per- 
petual renown, and honours nearly divine 
among posterity. The picture of this ho- 
nour, which I have conceived in my mind, 
I wish I could express to you in words. 
But that I may, in some measure, delineate 
to you a faint sketch, flgure to yourself the 
brazen serpent erected by Moses in the de- 
sert of Arabia, and curing solely by its pre- 
sence the wounds inflicted by other serpents; 
conceive some of the numerous host stung 
by the serpents, and crowding to the in&E- 
lible remedy ; others looking astonished at 



the novelty of the unprecedented miracle ; 
and all with every species of praise celebrat- 
ing the unbounded and incredible benefi- 
cence of God in removing the pains of a 
deadly wound, — ^not by medicines, with tor- 
ture to the patient, with labour to the phy- 
sician, and constant anxiety to friends, but 
restoring the part to a sound state, not by 
the slow operation of time, but in a single 
moment. Now compare to this serpent a 
king ; but so compare him, as to reckon a 
gooHi king among the greatest bleflsings of 
Orod, since he alone, witnout expense, with- 
out trouble to you, relieves all the distresses, 
and quiets all the commotions of the realm, 
and soon happily cures, by conciliatory ad- 
dress, even ancient animosities, and proves 
salutary, not only to those who behold him 
personaQy, but also to those who are so far 
distant as not to have the least hope of ever 
seeing him; and has, by his very effigy, 
when presented to the mind, such power as 
easily to effect what neither the learning of 
lawyers, nor the knowledge of philosophers, 
nor the experienee of so many ages em- 
ployed in tne formation of the arts, was 
ever able to attain. In fact, what honour, 
what dignity, what greatness or majesty can 
be expressed or conceived superior to that 
of the man, who, by his language, his con- 
versation, his look, his name, and even by 
the presence of his image in the mind, can 
bring back dissolute profligates to moderate 
expenses, violent oppressors to equitable 
practices, and furious madmen to their so- 
ber senses ? This, if I mistake not, is the 
true picture of a king, not indeed of a king 
hedged round with arms, always in fear, or 
causing fear, and, from his hatred of the 
people, measuring their hatred to himself. 
This portrait, which I have just exhibited, 
has been expressed in the most beautiful 
colours by Seneca, in his Thyestes ; and, as 
it is a very elegant piece of poetry, it must 
undoubtedly occur to your recollection. 
Now do you think that I still entertain 
mean and contemptible notions of a king, 
and that, as you lately said, I thrust him, 
with a load of fetters, into a legal dungeon? 
Have I not rather brought nim forward 
into day-light, into the communities of men, 
and into me public theatre of the human 
race, thronged, indeed, not by a haughty 
circle of spearmen and swordsmen, and silk- 
dad profligates, but guarded by his own in- 
nocence, and protected, not by the terror 
of arms, but by the love of the people ; and 



^0 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



259 



not onlj free and erect, but honoured, vene- 
rable, sacred, and august, hailed by everj 
species of good omens and felicitating ac- 
clamations, and attracting in his whole pro- 
gress the looks, the eyes, and souls of all 
spectators? 'What ovation, what triumph, 
can be compared to such a daily procession? 
Were a God in human shape to drop down 
upcMi earth, what greater honour could be 
shown him than what would be paid to a 
genuine king, that is, to the living image 
of God ? A greater honour than this neither 
love could bestow, nor fear extort, nor flat- 
tery invent. What think you of this picture 
of a king ? 

M. — -It is truly splendid, and so magni- 
ficent, that it seems impossible to conceive 
anything more noble, ^but during the cor- 
rupt morals of our times, it is difficult to 
conceive the existence of such magnanimity, 
unless a happy liberality of mind and natu- 
ral goodness of disposition be aided by the 
diligence of education. For the mind, if 
once formed by good instructions and arts, 
will, when confirmed by age and experi- 
ence, pursue true glory through the paths 
of virtue, be in vain tempted by the allure- 
ments of pleasure, and remain unshaken by 
the assaults of adverse fortune. For so 
much 

" To natire power does discipline impart, 
And proper culture eteel the human heart/* 

that in the very avocations of pleasure, it 
meets with opportunities for tne exercise 
of virtue, and considers the difficidties, 
which usually terrify weak minds, as casual 
materials for the acquisition of just renown. 
Hence, as a liberal education is in every 
point of view so momentous, what prospec- 
tive care and anxious precaution ought to 
be used, that the tender minds of kings may 
be properly seasoned from theirjvery cradle ! 
For, as the blessings conferred by good 
kings on their subjects are so numerous, and 
the calamities originating with bad princes 
are, on the other hand, equally numerous, 
nothing appears to me to have, in every re- 
spect, a greater weight than the moral cha- 
racters and political dispositions of kings 
themselves, and of those who enjoy wini 
them a share of the supreme power. For 
the good or bad conduct of individuals gene- 
rally escapes the notice of the multitude, or 
the obscurity of its author allows the exam- 
ple to reach but a few; but all the words 
and deeds of those who direct the helm of 



state being written, as Horace says, in a 
kind of votive tablet, cannot remain con- 
cealed, but lie open to general imitation. 
Nor is it merely by a fondness for pleasing, 
but by the inviting blandishments of inte- 
rest, that ministers attach the minds of 
courtiers, and make the public discipline 
veer with the veering incHnations ef kmgs. 
I fear, however, that we shall not be able 
to prevail upon our princes to discharge 
those fiinctions, of which you have just given 
a detail. For they are so corrupted by the 
allurements of pleasure, and so much de- 
ceived by a false idea of honour, that I think 
them likely to experience nearly the same 
misfortune which, as we are told by some 
poets, befel the Trojans in their voyage 
under Paris. Having left the real Helen 
in Egypt with Proteus, a man of uncom- 
mon sanctity, and indeed of a godlike cha- 
racter, they sought, during ten years, for 
her image with such obstinacy, that the 
same moment proved the end of the most 
destructive of wars, and of the most opulent 
kingdom then in existence. This false idol 
of royalty, when once possessed by right or 
by wrong, impotent tyrants embrace with 
fondness, and can neither retain without a 
crime, nor relinquish without ruin. If any 
man were to hint that the true Helen, for 
whom they beUeve themselves contending, 
is concealed in some remote and sequestered 
re^on, they would declare him insane. 

n, — It is with much pleasure I find, that 
if you have not really seen the daughter of 
Jove, you have, from my description, at least 
formed some idea of her beauty. For, if 
those who, to their own great detriment, 
are in love with the representation of the 
imaginary Helen, were to see a perfect like- 
ness of the real one, painted by stome Proto- 
genes or Apelles, I doubt not but they would 
^el for it the greatest admiration, and the 
most violent passion ; and that, if they did 
not immediately bid adieu to the other, they 
would justly incur the cruel punishment de- 
nounced against tyrants in tne imprecation 
of the satirist Persius — 

" Great Father of the gods, vhen, for our crimes, 
Thou eend'st some heavy judgment on the times, 
Some barbarous king, the terror of the age. 
The type and true vicegerent of thy rage, 
Thus punish him ; — set virtue in his sight, 
Graced with each charm that can the eye invite : 
But set her distant, that he thus may see 
His gains outweighed by lost felicity." 

And, since tyrants have been incidentally 



i^»^Mi^^ 



260 



DE JURE RSGNI APUD SCOTOS ; OB, 



mexitioned, what do jou think of proceeding 
directly to the consideration of them ? 

M. — I have no objection, if you think 
that no other subject claims a preference. 

B. — In my opmion we shaUnot be in the 
least danger of going astray, if, in the inves- 
tigation of a tyrant, we follow the steps 
which we trod in our search after a king. 

M. — That is likewise my opinion. For 
we shall most easily comprehend their dif- 
ference, if we survey them contrasted. 

B. — And first, if we begin with the name 
tyrant, we shall find it uncertain to what 
language it belmigs. Accordingly, to in- 
quire whether its etymology be Greek or 
Latin will be superfluous. But what the 
ancients called tyraxmy can, I think, be no 
mystery to any p^rsan ko fa a littleLnilu* 
with polite literature. For both the Greeks 
and Latins called those tyrants whose power 
was in every respect unlimited, re8tr«ined 
by no legal ties, and subject to the cog- 
nizance of no judicature. And therefore, 
in both languages, as you well know, not 
only heroes and the most excellent men, but 
also the greatest of the gods, and even Ju- 
piter himself, are styled tyrants, and that 
by those who both thought and spoke of 
the gods with the greatest reverence and 
honour. 

M. — Of that I am by no means ignorant ; 
and, therefore, I am the more surpnsed that 
the name should be, for so many ages, held 
odious and even highly reproachful. 

B. — This term has certainly met with the 
&te of most others ; for words, if duly con- 
sidered, will be found in their own nature 
totally innocent. Though they strike the 
ear, some with a smooth, some with a harsh 
sound, yet they have no intrinsic power of 
exciting in iAxe mind anger, hatred, or mirth, 
or in any way of creating pleasure or pain. 
If ever we experience any such thing, it 
generally proceeds, not from the word, but 
from human custom, and from the idea con- 
ceived in the mind. Hence, a word, that to 
some is a mark of respect, cannot be uttered 
before others without a prefatory apology. 

M. — I recollect that something of a simi- 
lar nature has happened in the case of Nero 
and Judas ; for the former of these names 
anions the Romans, and the latter among 
the Jews, was reckoned by the highest fa- 
milies eminently splendid and honourable. 
Afterwards, however, throuffh no defect in 
the names, but from the fault of two indivi- 
duals, it happened that the most abandoned 



would not give them to their children ; into 
so much obscurity had they fisdlen through 
infamy. 

B. — That tyrant stands in the same pre- 
dicament is evident. For, that the first 
magistrates who received that name were 
good men, is probable from this circumstance 
that the name was for some time so honour- 
able, that men applied it even to the sods. 
Their successors, by their crimes, rendered 
it so detestable, that all shunned it as con- 
tagious and pestilential, and deemed it a 
lifter reproach to be called hangman than 
tyrant. 

M. — ^Here the same thing happened as to 
the kings at Bome after the expulsion of the 
Tarquins, and to the name of dictator .after 
the consulship of Antony and Dolabella. 

B. — You perfectly comprehend the mat- 
ter. On the other hand, again, humble and 
plebeian names became, through the merit 
of the persons to whom they belonged, illus- 
trious, as among the Bomans, Camillus, Me- 
tellus, Scropha ; and, among the Germans, 
Henry, Geneserick, and Charles. This ob- 
servation you will the more easily under- 
stand, if you consider that, after the name 
of tyrant became extinct, the substance of 
the thing remained, and this species of ma- 
gistracy still retained its pristine dignity 
among a variety of illustrious nations, as the 
iEsymnetse among the Greeks and dictators 
among the Romans. For both were le^al 
tyrants ; tyrants indeed, because they were 
superior to the laws, — ^and legal, because 
elected by the consent of the people. 

M. — What do I hear! that there are 
even legal tyrants ? From you, at least, I 
expected to have heard a quite different 
doctrine. For now you seem to confound 
every distinction between kings and tyrants. 

B. — Among the ancients, xings and ty- 
rants seem undoubtedly to have conveyed 
the same idea, but, I conceive, at different 
periods of time. For the name of tyrants 
was, I presume, the more ancient; and, 
when nations became tired of them, kings 
succeeded in their place under a more sooth- 
ing tide, and with a milder sway. When 
these also degenerated, men had recourse to 
the moderatmg power of laws, that might 
limit the extent of their authority, and set 
bounds to their boundless desires. But, as 
the variations of times and manners required 
new remedies, and old governments became 
odious, new forms were invented. The sub- 
jects, however, which we have at present 



i;r-:- 



j 



THE BIGHTS OF THB CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



261 



undertaken to discuss, are the two species of 

government ; that in which the power of the 
ws is superior to the king's, and, what is 
the worst species of tyranny, that in which 
ererything is diametncaily opposite to roy- 
alty ; and to compare them one with toe 
other. 

M. — It is so ; and I long much to hear 
you upon that topic. 

B. — The first point, then, which we ascer- 
tained was, that Idngs were created for the 
maintenance of ctyil society ; and we estah- 
lished it as an axiom, that it was their duty 
to administer jostice to eyery man according 
to the du^ections of the law. 

M. — I recollect it. 

B. — First, then, by what name shall he, 
who does not receive that office by the 
people's voluntary consent, but seizes it by 
violence, or intercepts it by fraud, be qua* 
lified? 

M. — By that of tyrant, I conceive. 

B. — There are, besides, many other dis- 
tinctions, which, as they may be easily col- 
lected horn Aristotle, I shall lightly skim. 
Begal government is conformable, and ty- 
ranny contrary, to nature; a king rules 
over a willing, a tyrant over a reluctant 
people ; royalty is a freeman's authority over 
freemen — ^tyranny a master's over his daves; 
citizens act as sentinels to a king, for the 
security of his person ; foreigners to a tyrant 
for the oppression of the citizens. For the 
one exercises his power for the benefit of 
the peodie, and the other for his own. 

M.— What, then, shall we say of those 
who, by violence and without the people's 
consent, obtained supreme power, and so- 
yemod 'their respective statesV many y<S« 
in such a manner as to leave the public no 
reason to be dissatisfied with their adminis- 
tration ? For, except a legal election, how 
little was there wanted in Hiero of Syra- 
cuse, and in the Medicean Cosmo of Flo- 
rence, to constitute a just and accomplished 
king? 

B. — These we can by no means help in- 
serting in the catalogue of tyrants. For, as 
an exceUent historian h»> finely remarked. 
'* By force to rule your country or parents, 
though you should have the power, and 
shoukl rectify their errors, is stiU offensive 
and vexatious." In the next place, such 
men seem to me to act like robbers, who, 
by artfiilly dividing their ill-gotten booty, 
expect from iniquity the reputation of jus- 
tice, and from rapine the praise of libera- 



lity, and yet never attain the object of their 
desire. For, by the hatred arising from one 
misdeed, they lose all gratitude for their 
ostentatious beneficence, and gain the less 
credit for moderation among their fellow- 
citizens, that their view is not the public 
good, but their own private power, that they 
may the more securely enjoy their pleasures, 
and, by mollifying a little the general hatred, 
transmit their authority the more easily to 
their descendants. When this has been 
once effected, they resume their natural 
character; for what fruit is likely to be 
collected in harvest may be easily conceived 
from the seed that has been sown in spring. 
For to make eyerything bend to your o^ 
nod, and to centre in your own person the 
whole force of the laws, has the same effect 
as if you should abrogate all the laws. But 
this Kind of tyrants ought, perhaps, to be 
tolerated, if they cannot l>e removed without 
general ruin ; as we choose to submit to cer- 
tain bodily distempers rather than to expose 
our life to the hazardous experiment of a 
doubtful cure. But those who openly exer- 
cise their power, not for their country, but 
for themselves, and pay no regard to the 
public interest, but to their own ratifica- 
tion ; who reckon the weakness of uieir fel- 
low-citizens the establishment of their own 
authority, and who imagine royalty to be, 
not a charge entrusted to them by Grod, but 
a prey offered to their rapacity, are not con- 
nected with us by any civil or human tie, 
but ought to be put under an interdict, as 
open enemies to God and man. For all the 
actions of kings ought to keep in view, not 
their own private emolument, but the gene- 
ral safety of the state ; and the more they 
are exalted above the most eminent citizens, 
the more they ought to imitate those celes- 
tial bodies that, without any act of concilia- 
tion on our side, pour upon mankind the 
vital and beneficent streams of their light 
and heat. Even the very titles with which 
we decorated kings (and perhaps they are 
within your rec^lection,) might remind 
them of this munificence. 

M. — I think I recollect that, towards 
their subjects, they were to practise the in- 
dulgence of fathers to their children, to use 
the diligence of shepherds in promoting 
their interest, to behave as generals for the 
security of their persons, as chief-justices in 
displaying a pre-eminence of virtue, and as 
emperors in issuing salutary edicts. 

B. — Can he, then, be called a father, who 




treats his sabjects as slaves ? or he a shep* 
herd, who does not feed but slaj.his floc&? 
or he a pilot, whose constant studj it is to 
throw the goods overboard ; and who, accord- 
ing to the nautical adage, scuttles the vessel 
in which he sails ? 

M. — By no means. 

B. — ^^Vhat do you think of the king who 
governs, not for the benefit of the people, 
but for the gratification of his own appetites 
and passions, and is manifestly engaged in 
an insidious conspiracy against his su^ects ? 

M. — I shall oertamly deem him neither 
a general, an emperor, nco* a supreme judge. 

B. — Should you, then, observe a man 

ning the name of king who excels none 
e multitude in any species of virtue, 
and is even inferior to many, who discovers 
no paternal afiection for his subjects, but 
crusaes them under his proud sway; who 
considers them as a flock entrusted to him, 
not for their preservation but for his own 
emolument ; will you reckon him truly a 
king, though he should stalk along, crowded 
by a numerous train of guards, and make an 
ostentatious display of a magnificent dress, 
and dazzle the eye by exhibiting the sword 
of the law, and conciliate the favour and 
applause of the vulgar by prizes, games, 
processions, mad piles of buildings, and other 
popular signs of grandeur ? Wifl you, I say, 
deem him a king ? 

M. — Not at all, if I mean to be con- 
sistent; I must consider him as an outcast 
from human society. 

B. — By what bounds do you circumscribe 
this human society ? 

M. — By the very same to which you 
seemed to me, in your preceding disserta- 
tion, to wish it confined to the fences of 
law; for I see that robbers, thieves, and 
adulterers, who transgress them, are pun- 
ished by the public, and that their trans- 
gression of the limits prescribed by human 
society is thought a just cause for their pun- 
ishment. 

B. — What will you say of those who 
never would come within the pale of human 
society ? 

M. — I should c<Misider them as enemies 
to God and man, and entitle to the treat- 
ment, not of men, but of wolves and other 
noxious animals, which, if bred by any 
person, are bred to the destruction of him- 
self and of others, and, if killed, are killed 
to the advantage, not only of the individual, 
but of the pubhc. Nay, were I empowered 



to enact a law, I would adopt the Boman 
method of treating monsters, and order such 
a race of men to be exposed on some deso- 
late island, or to be sunk in the deep at a 
distance fitom the siffht of land, lest they 
should, even when dead, injure the living 
by their conta^on; and publish a decree, 
that whoever despatched them should be 
rewarded, not only by the whole people, 
but by private persons, as is generally done 
to those who have killed wolves or bears, or 
seized their cubs. For, if any such monster 
were to arise, ami to utter human accents, 
and to have ike appearance of a man^s face, 
and his likeness in every other part, I could 
never think myself connected with him by 
any social tie. Or, if any one, divesting 
himself of humanity, should degenerate into 
savage barbarity, and refiise to unite with 
other men, but for men's destruction, I do 
not think him entitled to the appellation of 
man any more than satyrs, apes, or bears, 
though in his look, gesture, and language, 
he should counterfeit man. 

B. — ^Now you comprehend, if I mistake 
not, what notion the wisest of the ancients 
entertained of a king's, as well as of a ty- 
rant's, character. Is it your pleasure then, 
that the rule adc^ted by us, in forming an 
idea of a king, should be followed in exhibit- 
ing the portrait of a tyrant ? 

M. — Certainly ; and, if it is not too trou- 
blesome, I am eager to hear you proceed. 

B, — You have not forgotten, I imagine, 
what is said by the poets of the furies, and 
by the populace of devils, that they are spi- 
rits hostile to the human race, and, in the 
midst of their own eternal torments, de- 
Ughting in the torture of men. This is 
certainly a true picture of tyranny. But, 
since this picture is discernible only to the 
mind, and without sensation, I shall offer 
you another, which will impress not only 
your mind, but your senses, and rush upon 
your eyes almost palpably visible. Imagine 
yourself viewing a ship at sea, tossed by 
storms, and all the shores around not only 
destitute of harbours, but full of inveterate 
enemies. Imagine also the master of that 
ship engaged in a mutual contest of hatred 
witn the passengers, and yet having no hopes 
of safety but in the fidehty of me sailors, 
and even those not certain, as he cannot be 
ignorant that his life is in the hands of a 
barbarous class of men, strangers to all 
humanity, retained in their duty solely by 
proffers of money, and easily tempted to.hu. 



THE RIGHTS 07 TiUS CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



263 



destruction by the prospect of greater hire. 
Such, positiYelj, is the Ufe embraced by 
tyrants as a state of beatitude. Abroad 
they dread open enemies, at home their 
subjects; and not only their subjects, but 
their domestics, their relations, their bro- 
thers, their wives, their children, and their 
parents. Accordingly, they always either 
wage or dread an external war with foreign- 
ers, a civil war with their subjects, or a do- 
mestic war with their relations, and never 
expect any assistance but from hirelings, and 
dare not hire the good nor trust the bad. 
What enjoyment Sien can life be to such 
men ? I$ionysius, dreading the application 
of a razor to his throat, would not permit 
his daughters, ladies of adult age, to supply 
the place of a barber. His brother was 
murdered by Timoleon, the Phersean Alex- 
ander by his wife, and Spurius Gassius by 
his father. What racks must the man, who 
has these examples constantly before his 
eyes, carry in his breast, when he considers 
himself erected as a mark at which all man- 
kind are to shoot their arrows ? when he is 
tormented by the stings of conscience, not 
only when awake, but is roused even in his 
sleep by the terrific images of the living and 
the dead, and pursued by the furies shaking 
their torches? For the time assigned by 
nature to all animals for repose, and to men 
as a relief from cares, becomes to him aU 
horror and despair ? 

M. — These topics you have unfolded with 
no inconsiderable art, and, perhaps, with 
equal truth ; but, if I am not mistaken, with 
little subserviency to our plan. For na- 
tions, who have the power of electing kings, 
have also the power of binding them, when 
elected, by laws. But you know that ours 
are not kmgs by election but by birth ; and 
I have always been of opinion that the 
crown was not more an hereditary right 
than the power of making their will the 
law. Nor have I Ughtly adopted this opi- 
nion, but deliberately, and under the sanc- 
tion of great statesmen, with whom, if I 
have erred, I need not be ashamed of my 
error. For, without mentioning others, the 
lawyers affirm that, by the imperial law en- 
acted concerning their authority, the whole 
power of the people was transferred to them, 
so that their pleasure should stand as law. 
Hence arose a certain emperor's threats, 
that he would, by one edict, wrest from all 
the lawyers, all the power in which they so 
much gloried. 



B. — ^While you were quoting the very 
worst authority in so important a case, 
you acted with prudence in suppressing all 
names, as it would be the name of &ius 
Caligula, who, for the gratification of his 
savage cruelty, wished that the Roman peo- 
ple had but one neck, and possessed nothing 
that belongs, I will not say to a king, but to 
a man, but the form. You cannot, there- 
fore, be ignorant what little credit is due 
to his words. As to the imperial law, 
lawyers themselves can neither explaui its 
nature, nor ascertain when, by whom, or in 
what words, it was passed. For the Boman 
kings never professed that power, as an ap- 
peal lay from them to the people. The act 
by which Lucius Flaccus, after the extinc- 
tion of Boman liberty, established, through 
the silence of the other laws, the tyranny of 
Lucius Sylla, no man ever recognised as a 
law ; for the purport of that act was, that 
whatever Lacms Sylla did, should be valid 
in law. Of such a power over itself, no 
fVee people was ever so mad as to make a 
voluntary grant ; or, if there was, it cer- 
tainly deserved to live in perpetual slavery 
to tyrants, and to suffer the punishment 
due to its folly. However, if any such law 
really existed, we ought to consider it as an 
example for caution, not for imitation. ^^ 

M. — Your admonition, though well ibund*- 
ed, is applicable only to those who have the 
power ot creating kings of specific qualities ; 
but not at all to us, who, by our suffrages, 
do not elect the best, but accept the gift of 
chance. This remark, made by our lawyers, 
peculiarly affects us, who bestowed upon the 
ancestors of our kings such a right to bind 
us and our posterity, that they and their de- 
scendants hold perpetual sovereignty over 
us. I wish, therefore, that this advice had 
been suggested to them, I mean to our an- 
cestors, as they were entirely at liberty to 
adopt what kings they pleased. Your coun- 
sel coming now too late, has certainly no 
other tendency, but to make us deplore the 
folly of our ancestors, and feel the misery of 
our condition. For, sold into bondage as 
we are, what remams for us but to suffer 
punishment for the folly of others, and to 
alleviate its weight by the meekness of our 
patience ; and not to exasperate, by unsea- 
sonable murmurs, the rage of those whose 
yoke we cannot shake off, whose power we 
cannot diminish, and whose violence and ty- 
ranny we cannot escape ? The imperial law, 
however, to which you are such a deter- 



264 



DB JURE BXGNI APUD 8COTOS ; OR, 



mined foe, was not, as yoa wish to insinuate, 
invented in favour of tyrants; for it was 
sanctioned by the justest of princes, by Jus- 
tinian, with whom such open flattery could 
never have prevailed ; for Horace's maxim 
is applicable even to a foolish prince : 

*' Whom does filie hononr please, or lying fame 

affright? 
None bat the wretches who in vice and lies delight." 

B. — ^However cruelly ungrateM to Beli- 
£Euriu8 some historians paint Justinian, he is 
certainly allowed to have been, in general, 
a great prince. Let him, therefore, be such 
as you wish him to appear ; you ought still 
to recollect, that most of his contemporaries 
have characterised Scribonian, the principal 
compiler of the laws in question, as a most 
abandoned man, who might have easily been 
induced to go any lengths for the gratifica- 
ion of the worst of sovereigns. For, 

" All wish the dire prerogative to kill ; 
Eren they would have the poVrwho want the will,** 

And, 

" Nothing 80 monstrous can be said or feigned. 
But with belief and joy is entertained. 
When to his face the worthless wretch is pridsed. 
Whom renal courtiers to a god hare raised." 

But let us return to our own princes, to 
whom you say that the crown belongs by in- 
heritance, not by suffrage. Now I here 
speak only of our own ; for, were I to make 
a digression to foreign princes, I fear that 
the discussion would embrace too wide a 
field. 

M. — That is, in my opinion, the best 
mode of proceecUng ; as foreign transactions 
are not very intimately connected with the 
present subject. 

B. — If then we trace the history of our 
nation from its first origin, it will be found 
a settled point, that uie princes invested 
with sovereign power owed their election to 
the opinion generally entertained of their 
merit. 

M. — Such is the account contained in our 
historical records. 

B. — ^Nor is it a less settled point, that 
many princes, who made a cruel or flagi- 
tious use of their office, were called to an ac- 
count by their subjects ; that some were, in 
certain cases, banished, and in others exe- 
cuted ; and that though either their sons or 
relations were chosen m their place, yet no 
inquiry was ever instituted against ^e au- 
'^'^rs of their punishment ; but that violence 



offered to good kings has, in no part of the 
world, been punished with more exemplary 
severity. And, since it would be tedious to 
enumerate individuals, a few only of a late 
date, and still fresh in the nation's memory, 
shall be here mentioned. The murder of 
James I., who left behind him a male heir, 
six years of i^e, was so inexorably revenged 
by the nobihty, that persons sprung from 
the most illustrious femilies, and of the first 
distinction for riches and connexions, were 
destroyed by a new and exquisite kind of 
punishment. But, on the other hand, who 
lamented, for I will not say revenged, the 
death of James III., a man noted for fiagi- 
tiousness and cruelty ? On the death, how- 
ever, of his son, James lY., even the sus- 
picion of murder could not escape the 
severest destiny. Nor did our ancestors 
discover a pious affection only to good 
kings, but also treated bad princes with 
lenity and mercy. For Cullen being, as he 
was coming to plead his cause, murdered on 
the road by an enemy, was revenged in an 
extraordinary manner by a decree of the 
states ; and £wen, who had been condemned 
to perpetual imprisonment, having been si- 
mimrly killed in confinement by an enemy, 
was similarly revenged; and the violent 
death of the man, whose nefarious life all 
detested, was punished as parricide. 

M. — The present subject of our inquiry 
is, not so much what has been sometimes 
done, as what are the legal rights of our 
sovereigns. 

B. — Aetuming then to that question, and 
considering the state of our kings down to 
Kenneth III., who first established his race 
permanently upon the throne, we shall find 
it a clear case, that as the people, till that 
period, exercised the right of creating and 
correcting their kings, ne must have pro- 
cured this right to his fitmily either by mrce 
or by persuasion. 

M. — ^The inference is undeniably just. 

B. — Besides, if he extorted obedience 
from the people by force, the people, upon 
the first prospect of superiority in the con- 
test, may shieike off so grievous a yoke; 
since the received laws and the imperative 
voice of nature proclaim, both to kings and 
to nations, that every system upheld by 
violence may, by the like violence, be over- 
turned. 

M. — But what will follow, if the people, 
either circumvented by fraud, or compelled 
by fear, should submit to slavery? What 



reason can be alleged why they should not 
for ever adhere to a convention once solemnly 
ratified ? 

B. — If you talk to me of a convention, 
what reason is there that I should not, in 
opposition, produce those causes which may 
eii^t the dissolution of compacts and con- 
ventions ? And first, with regard to agree- 
ments founded on violence and fear, their 
is in all communities an established law, de- 
rived from the pure fountains of nature. 
Even to such as have been overreached by 
fraud, the laws grant an entire restitution to 
their former state, and order this rule to be 
scrupulously observed in the case of minors, 
and other persons, whose interest they wish 
particularly to consult. Who then can have 
a juster claim to restitution than the whole 
body of the people, since an injury offered 
to it affects not only a single part of the 
community, but is widely diffused through 
all the members of the body politic. 

M. — I know that in the causes of private 
persons this law is adopted, and that it is in 
no case iniquitous. But upon this topic wo 
need not enter into any violent contest; 
since, as we are informed by our historians, 
it is extremely probable that the right in 
question was bestowed upon our kings by 
tne people's consent. 

B. — ^It is likewise probable, that so impor- 
tant a right was not granted without some 
important cause. 

M. — That position I readily admit. 

B. — What then, do you think, was the 
principal cause ? 

M. — What other causes can I assign but 
those recorded in history? The people's 
impatience, under the pressure of ambition, 
of anarchy, of murder, and of intestine war, 
frequently terminatinfir in the utter ruin of 
oiMof thi parties, an^ always with infinite 
mischief to both. For those who obtained 
the sovereign power, endeavoured to leave 
their children in undisturbed possession, by 
the total extinction of their brothers and 
nearest relations ; a species of policy, which, 
we hear, is adopted among the Turks, and 
which, we see, is practised by the chieftains 
in our own isles, as well as in Ireland. 

B. — ^To which of the two, then, do you 
think the contest proved more dsmgerous, 
to the people or to the princes ? 

M. — To the princes mdisputably ; for the 
people, though ultimately doomed to be- 
come the prey of the victors, may, during 
the contest, Uve in perfect security. 



B. — Princes then, it seems, have wished, 
rather on their own account than for the 
pubUc benefit, to make the crown perma- 
nent and hereditary in their family. 

M. — The suppositicm appears probable. 

B. — Now, in order to gain a point so 
essential to the lasting honour, to the wealth 
and security of their family, it is reasonable 
to suppose that, in return, they relinquished 
some part of their right, and that to retain 
the good-will and affection of the people, 
and to procure their consent, they granted, 
on their side, some equivalent boon. 

M. — I believe so. 

B. — You will certainly allow it to be an 
inci'edible supposition, that, in return for so 
important a concession to their kings, they 
should suffer their condition to be altered 
for the worse ? 

M. — Absolutely incredible. 

B. — Nor would kings, had they known 
this to be an injurious institution, disadvan- 
tageous both to their children and to the 
people, have solicited its adoption with such 
ambitious zeal. 

M. — By no means. 

B. — Suppose then any individual, in the 
mixed throng of a free people, freely to ask 
the king, " What is to be done, if any of 
our kings should have a son that is an idiot ; 
or, what is worse still, a son that is insane ? 
Will you grant the power of regulating our 
conduct, to a man who cannot regulate his 
own?" 

M. — There was no occasion, I think, for 
suggesting this exception, since, whenever 
this class of men occurs, there is sufficient 
provision made by the laws. 

B. — An honest, as well as sound opinion. 
Let us, therefore, inquire, whether, if kings 
had obtained from the people unlimited 
power over the laws, it womd not have been 
mjurious, especially to those who wished to 
provide for the welfare of their posterity ? 

M. — Why, I beseech you, should we think 
that it would prove injurious ? 

B. — Because nothing contributes so much 
to the perpetuity of sovereign authority as 
a due temperament, no less honourable to 
kings than equitable and salutary to the 

Eeople, For nature has implanted in the 
uman mind an elevated and generous prin- 
ciple, which makes it unwilling to obey unjust 
mandates; and there is nothing so effica- 
cious in consolidating societies of men, as a 
reciprocity of benefits. The answer, there- 
fore, of Theopompus to his wife, who up- 

2x 



266 



DB JURE RE6XI APUD SCOTOS ; OR, 



braided him with having, by the introduc- 
tion of the Ephori into power, impaired the 
energy of regal government, and with trans- 
mitting to his cnildren the crown less than 
he had received it, seems not to have been 
unwise, when he said, " I have left it so 
much the firmer round their head." 

M. — What you say concerning the per- 
petuity of the sovereign power, I see to be 
perfectly true. For the kingdoms of the 
Scots and Danes are, I thiriK, by far the 
most ancient in Europe; and this distinc- 
tion they seem to me to have secured by 
nothing so much as by the moderate use 
of the supreme power ; while, at the same 
time, the crowns of France, of England, 
and of Spain, have passed from family to 
family. Yet I know not whether our kings 
were as wise as Theopompus. 

B. — Though they should not have been 
so provident, do you think that the people 
were so foolish as to neglect an opportunity 
so seasonably offered, or so struck with 
fear, or so seduced by flattery, as to submit 
spontaneously to slavery ? 

M. — They were not, perehaps. But let 
them, as the thing is possible, have been so 
blind as not to see what was for their own 
benefit ; or let them^ have been, with their 
eyes open, so regardless of their own in- 
terest as to have despised it, will they pot 
be justly punished for their folly ? 

B. — It is not likely that any of these sup- 
positions was ever realised, since in our 
times their conduct has been constantly the 
reverse. For beside the constant punish- 
ment of bad kings, whenever they became 
tyrants to their subjects, there still remain, 
even in old families, some vestiges of the 
ancient practice. For the ancient Scots or 
Highlanders continue, down to our days, to 
elect their own chieftians, and to assign 
them a council of elders; and those who 
do not obey this council are deprived of the 
honourable office. Could then what is still 
partially observed with the greatest scrupu- 
lousness in certain districts be neglected in 
providing for the general good? or would 
those become voluntary slaves to the man, 
who w^ould deem the grant of royalty, under 
legal restraints, a favour ? Can it be sup- 
posed that the liberty, which they had se- 
cured by valour, defended by arms, and 
enjoyed uninterruptedly for ages, should, 
without violence, and without war, be re- 
signed to him as an unexpected prey ? That 
such power was never possessed by our kings 



is, without mentioning the punishments so 
often inflicted on them for mal-administni*- 
tion, sufficiently evident from the misfortune 
of John Baliol, who was, about 269 years 
ago, rejected by the nobility, because he 
had subjected himself and his kingdom to 
Edward I. of England ; and Ex>bert I. was 
substituted in his place. The same truth is 
evinced also by that uninterrupted practice, 
which has descended from the earliest times 
to ours. 

M. — ^What practice do you mean ? 

B. — Our kings, at their public inaugura- 
tion, solemnly promise to the whole people 
to observe the statutes, customs, and institu- 
tions of our ancestors, and to adhere strictly 
to that system of jurisprudence handed down 
by antiquity. This fact is proved by the 
whole tenor of the ceremonies at their 
coronation, and by theur first arrival in our 
cities. From all these circumstances it may 
be easily conceived what sort of power they 
received from our ancestors, and that it was 
clearly such as magistrates, elected by suf- 
frage, are bound by oath not to exceed. 
Upon such terms Grod offered the crown to 
David and to his posterity, promising that 
they should be kings as long as they obeyed 
the laws which he nad ordained. All this 
evidence makes it probable that the autho- 
rity conferred by our ancestors on their 
kings was not unbounded and immense, but 
circumscribed and confined- to fixed limits. 
In favour of this right in the people add, 
besides, immemorial prescription and long 
use, never contravened by any public de- 
cree. 

M. — But I fear that kings will not be 
easily persuaded, by the consideration of 
these probabilities, to submit to such lawi^ 
however much sanctioned by royal oaths, op 
justified by popular prescription. 

B. — In like manner, it is my belief that 
the people will not be easily prevailed upon 
to relinquish a right received from their an- 
cestors, approved by the concurring voiceof 
all, and practised for an uninterrupted series 
of ages ; nor do I think it necessaiy to form 
conjectures about what they will do, when I 
see what they have done. But, if from the 
obstinate perverseness of both parties, re- 
course should be had to arms, the conqueror 
will certainly impose what laws he pleases 
on the conquered : but he will impose them 
only till he, that has had the worst of the 
contest, can resume his arms with- recol- 
lected strength. These struggles- end al- 



' I 



THE RIGHTS OP THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



267 



wajs with mischief to the people, but gene- 
mUy with utter ruin to their kings ; and 
in these causes all the disasters of all king- 
don» origiiiate. ^ 

M. — ^Such must necessarilj be the result. 
B. — Here, perhaps, I have entered into 
a minuter investigation than the subject re- 
quired ; but my design was to elucidate, more 
completely, the limits of regal power among 
us in ancient times. For, if I had insisted 
upon the full extent of my legal claims, I 
might have taken a much shorter road to 
the object of my pursuit. 

M. — Though you have nearly satisfied 
me already, yet I shall be glad to hear you 
explain the nature of this compendious road. 
B, — First, then, I wish you to answer, 
whether you approve of the definition of a 
law given by lawyers, when they say that a 
law is a decree made by the people, at the 
instance of the legal magistrate. 

M. — Undoubtedly it has my approbation. 

B. — It was also ascertained that, when 

laws were found to be defective, they might, 

by the same legislators, be either amended 

•or repealed. 

M* — It was so. 

B. — You see besides, I suppose, that the 
persons, who become our kings by birth, be- 
come so both by the laws and by the suf- 
frages of the people, no less than those con- 
stituted such originally by election; and 
that the people, who made the laws, will 
not be in want of remedies, not only against 
violence and fraud, but also against neglect 
in acknowledging the acceptance of them, 
M. — I see it clearly. 
B. — There is only this difference, that 
the law relative to our kings was passed some 
ages ago ; and that, when a new reign com- 
mences, it is not usual to make a new law, 
but to approve the old. But among nations 
who hold assemblies for the election of their 
several kings successively, the same time 
usually serves for passing the law, for mak- 
ing oLl approving the king, ai^d for the 
commencement of the reign. 
M. — It is so. 

B. — ^Now, if you please, let us briefly 
collect the substance of what has been ascer- 
tained ; that, if we have anywhere been too 
rash in our conclusions, there may be room 
for recantation. 

M. — With all my heart. 
B. — First of all, it was our opinion that a 
king is created for the benefit of the people, 
and that, nothing derived from heaven can 



be a greater blessing than a good, or a 
greater curse than a bad king. 
M.— Right. 

B. — We also said that a bad king is called 
a tyrant. 

M. — We did so. 

B. — And because the crop of good men 
is not so abundant as to supply us constantly 
with a succession of worthy persons for our 
selection, or hereditary right so fortunate in 
its line of succession as to furnish us always, 
by accident, with a series of good princes, 
we accept, as kings, not such as we could 
wish, but such as either public consent has 
sanctioned, or chance offered. The hazard, 
however, incurred either in electing new 
dynasties, or in approving the casual claim- 
ants by hereditary right, occasioned a gene- 
ral wish for laws that should limit the ex- 
tent of regal power. Now, these laws ought 
to be nothing else but the express image, as 
far as it can be attained, of a good king. 

M. — That deduction also we acknowleged 
to be legitimate. 

B. — What now remains to be discussed is 
the punishment due to tyrants. 

M. — That seems the only topic not yet 
thoroughly examined. 

B. — If a king then should break through 
every restraint of law, and behave abso- 
lutely as a public enemy, what conduct 
ought, in your opinion, to be adopted ? ^ 
M. — Here I own myself at a nonplus. 
For, though the arguments advanced by 
you seem to evince that we cannot have any 
natural connexion with such a king, yet the 
power of long habit is so great, that with me 
it has the force of law ; and, indeed, it takes 
such deep and firm root in the minds of 
men, that, if it should ever be productive of 
error, it is better to bear it, than, by en- 
deavouring to cure the disease, to endanger 
the coftstitution of the whole body, i'or 
such is the nature of some remedies, that it 
is more eligible to bear the pain which they 
occasion, than to search for doubtful reme- 
dies, in the trial of which, though everything 
should ultimately succeed, the pains result- 
ing from their application are so acute, that 
the disease itself is less pernicious than its 
cure. In the next place, what has still more 
weight with me is, that I see what you call 
tyranny sanctioned by the oracle of God ; 
and what you execrate as the ruin of law, 
called, by the Deity, the law of the realm. 
My judgment is more decisively swayed by 
that single passage, than by all the ar^i- 



268 



D£ JURE REGNI APUD 8COTOS ; OR, 



ments of all the philosophers. If you do 
not extricate me from this dQemma, no 
human reasoning can, with all its subtiltj, 
prevent me from deserting at once to the 
enemy. 

B. — You are involved, I see, in a com- 
mon, but enormous doud of error, by en- 
deavouring to sanction tyranny by tyranny. 
For how great the tyranny of custom is, 
when it has once got thorough hold of the 
human mind, we have too often experienced 
in the present age, and learned sufficiently 
from ancient examples in the father of his- 
tory, Herodotus. But ancient examples I 
need not produce, since the authors are open 
for your inspection. Consider in your own 
mind what multitudes of things, and those 
not unimportant, there are, in which the 
suggestions of reason have made you deviate 
from customs that ages had rendered in- 
veterate ; and you wul be soon taught by 
domestic examples, that, of all others, the 
highway, which is here so much recom- 
mended, is the most dangerous to follow. 
Examine it, therefore, with cautious circum- 
spection ; and you will see it strewed with 
carnage, and chocked with ruins. But, if 
this truth be, according to the usual phrase, 
clearer than the light itself, I need not dwell 
longer either on the proof or on the illustra- 
tion of so evident a proposition. As to the 
passage, however, quoted by you from the 
book of Kings, and which you rather notice 
than explain, beware, I beseech you, of 
imagining that what God execrates in the 
lite of tyrants he should approve in the con- 
duct of kin^. That you may draw no such 
inference, I desire you to consider first, 
what the people requested of God; next, 
what their reasons were for a new request ; 
and, lastly, what was God's answer ? First, 
thev request a king. And of what sort? 
A king circumscribed by laws. Such they 
had; for Samuel had been appointed by 
God to preside over them ; and he had for 
many years administered justice in a legal 
manner, according to the directions of the 
divine law. But his sons, who sat as judges 
during his old age, were guilty of many 
flagitious acts, and in their decisions vio- 
lated the laws. Hitherto I cannot see that 
they had any just reason for desiring a 
change, but rather a reform of the govern- 
ment, which they might certainly have ex- 
pected from the beneficence of that God, 
who had not long before, and for a reason 
nearly similar, extirpated the whole family 



1 



of Heli. What then do they request ? A 
king, who might, as among the neighbour- 
ing nations, be their judge at home and 
their general abroad. Now, these were, in 
reality, tyrants. For, as the nations of Asia 
discover greater servility of mind than the 
Europeans, so they wiU submit with greater 
facility to the commands of tyrants ; and, 
hence there is not, as far as I know, men- 
tion any where made in historians of a king 
subject to laws in Asia. Besides, that a 
tyrant, and not a king, is here described, is 
readily deducible even from this circum- 
stance, that in Deuteronomy God had be- 
forehand prescribed to them a form of go- 
vemment, not only different, but perfectly 
the reverse. According to this form, 
Samuel, and the rest of tne judges, had, for 
a series of years, administered justice ; and, 
when they rejected it» Grod complained that 
they had rejected him. 

M. — Yet God everywhere styles him 
king, and not tyrant. 

B. — He does, indeed, style him king; 
for it is peculiar to God, in addressing a 
popular assembly, to adopt popular Ian- 
ffxlge. AccoFdiagly, in tpe^g to the 
commonalty, he uses a common word ; but 
that none might be deceived by its ambi- 
guity, he explains here distinctly, in what 
sense it was taken among the neighbouring 
nations. 

M. — Though we should admit the justness 
of your reasonings upon that ancient exam- 
ple, we are still more closely pressed by a 
more modem instance in Paul, who com- 
mands us to pray for the life of sovereigns, 
and is far from allowing us to renounce their 
authority, much less to dethrone, and, when 
dethroned, to murder them. And what 
princes does he thus recommend to our 
prayers ? Of all that ever existed the most 
cruel, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Ne- 
ro ; for these were co-eval with the epistles 
of Paul. 

B.— In comparing the writings of all Uie 
philosophers and lawyers with Paul's, you 
seem to me to act rightly, in allowing to his 
authority so much preponderance in the ba- 
lance. But you should consider whether you 
have sufficiently weighed his opinions ; for 
you ought to examine, not only his words, but 
also at what times, to what persons, and for 
what purposes, he wrote. First, then, let 
us see what Paul wrote. In the third 
chapter of his letter to Titus, he writes, 
'^ Put subjects in mind to be obedient to 



» 



:xz::z 






THE RIGHTS OF THS CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



269 



principalities and powers, and to be readj 
for every good work." Here you see, I 
presume, woat end he assigns to obedience. 
In the second chapter of nis epistle to Ti- 
mothy, the same apostle writes, '* That we 
should pray for all men, even for kings and 
and other magistrates, that we may lead a 
peaceable life, in all godHness and purity." 
Here, also, you see that he proposes, as the 
end of prayer, not the security of kings, but 
the tranquilHty of the churcn ; and, nence, 
it will be no difficult matter to comprehend 
his form of prayer. In his epistle to the 
Bomans, his definition of a king is accurate, 
even to logical subtilty ; for he says that ** a 
king is God's minister, wielding the sword 
of me law for the punishment of the bad, 
and for the support and aid of the good." 
" For these passages of Paul's," says Chry- 
sostom, " relate not to a tyrant, but to a 
real and legitimate sovereign, who person- 
ates a genuine god upon earth, and to whom 
resistance is certainly resistance to the ordi- 
nance of Grod." Yet, though we should 
pray for bad princes, we ought not, there- 
fore, to infer directly that their vices should 
not be punished like the crimes of robbers, 
for whom also we are ordered to pray ; nor, 
if we are bound to obey a good, does it follow 
that we should not resist a bad prince? 
Besides, if you attend to the cause which 
induced Paul to commit these ideas to writ- 
ing, you wiU find, I fear, that this passage 
is greatly against you ; since he wrote them 
to chastise the temerity of certain persons, 
who maintained that Christians ought not to 
be under the control of magistrates. For, 
since the magistrates were invested with au- 
thority on purpose to restrain wicked men, 
to enable us all to live under equal laws, and 
to exhibit a living example of divine justice, 
they contended that he was of no use among 
persons so uncontaminated by the contagion 
of vice as to be a law to themselves. Paul, 
therefore, does not here treat of the magis- 
trate, but of the magistracy — ^that is, of the 
fimction and duty of the person who presides 
over others, nor of this nor of that species 
of magistracy, but of every possible form of 
government. Nor does he contend against 
those who maintained that bad maoistrates 
ought not to be punished, but against per- 
sons who renounced every kind oiauthority ; 
who, by an absurd interpretation of Christian 
liberty, affirmed that it was an indignity to 
men emancipated by the Son of God, and di- 
rected by Grod's Spirit, to be controlled by any 



human power. To refute this erroneous opin- 
ion, Paul shows that magistracy is not only a 
good, but a sacred and divine ordinance, and 
instituted expressly for connecting assem- 
blages and communities of men, and to enable 
them, conjointly, to acknowledge God's bless- 
ings, and to abstain from mutual injuries. 
Persons raised to the rank of magistrates God 
has ordered to be the conservators of his 
laws ; and, therefore, if we acknowledge laws 
to be, as they certainly are, good things, we 
must also acknowledge that their conserva- 
tors are entitled to honour, and that their 
office is a good and useful institution. But 
the magistrate is terrible. To whom, I be- 
seech you ? To the good, or to the bad ? To 
the good he cannot be a terror, as he secures 
them from injury ; but, if he is a terror to 
the bad, it is nothing to you, who are directed 
by the Spirit of God. What occasion, then, 
is there, you will say, for subjecting me to 
the magistrate, since I am God's feeman? 
Much. To prove yourself Grod's freeman, 
obey his laws ; for the Spirit of God, of 
whose direction you boast, framed the laws, 
approves of magistracy and authorises obe- 
dience to the magistrate. On this head, 
therefore, we shall easily come to an agree- 
ment, that a magistrate is necessary in the 
best-constituted societies, and that he ought 
to be treated with every kind of respect. 
Hence, if any person entertains contrary 
sentiments, we deem him insane, intestable, 
and worthy of the severest punishment; 
since he openly resists God's wiU communi- 
cated to us in the Scriptures. For, suppos- 
ing that no punishment for the violation of 
all laws, human and divine, should be in- 
flicted on a Caligula, a Nero, a Domitian, 
and other tyrants of that sort, you have here 
no countenance from Paul, who is discours- 
ing of the power of magistrates and of bad 
men by whom it is badly exercised. Indeed, 
if you examine that kind of tyrants by Paul's 
rule, they will not at all be magistrates. 
Again, if you should contend that even bad 
pnnces are ordained by Grod, take care lest 
your language should be charged with cap- 
tiousness. For God, to counteract poison by 
poison, as an antidote, sometimes sets a bad 
man over bad men for their punishment; 
and yet, that Grod is the author of human 
wickedness, no man in his senses will dare 
to affirm, as none can be ignorant that the 
same God is the author of the punishments 
inflicted on the wicked. Even a good ma- 
gistrate generally chooses a bad man to be 



270 



D£ JURE REGNI APUD SCOTOS ; OR, 



the executioner in punisiring the gniltj. 
This executioner, though thus appointed by 
the magistrate to that office, is not, in con- 
sequence, indulged with impunity for every 
crime, nor raised so high as not to be ame- 
nable to the laws. On this comparison I 
shall dwell no longer, lest the sycophants of 
the court should cry out that I speak with 
too little reverence of the supreme magis- 
trate. But, let their outcries be ever so 
loud, certainly they will never be able to 
deny that the function of the executioner is 
a part of public, and perhaps also of kingly 
duty, even by the confession of kings them- 
selves ; since, when violence is offer^ to any 
public minister, they complain that their 
own person and majesty are violated. Now, 
if Miy thing can, certainly the punishment 
of the wicked must constitute a part of the 
king's executive duty. In what predica- 
ment stand the governors of cities, the com- 
mandants of camps, the mayors of corpora- 
tions, and other superior officers? Does 
Paul order us to be obedient also to them ? 
or does he hold them private persons ? But 
not only all inferior magistrates, but even 
those ^o are upon an equality with kings, 
it is customary to call to an account for mal- 
administration. I could wish, therefore, that 
those who dream of this mighty power con- 
ferred on kings by Paul's words would either 
show, from the same Paul, that kings alone 
are to be understood in the name powers, 
and, therefore, to be alone exempted from 
legal animadversion ; or, if the word powers 
mean also other magistrates appointed by 
the authority of the same God for the same 
purpose, that they would also show where 
all magistrates are pronounced to be inde- 
pendent of law, and released from the fear 
of punishment; or, where that immunity 
has been granted only to kings, and denied 
to others invested with public authority. 

M. — But to the higher powers he com- 
mands all to be obedient. 

B. — ^He does so ; but under the name of 
powers he must necessarily comprehend 
other magistrates also, unless you should, 
perhaps, imagine that he thought states 
not under a regal government to be with- 
out powers, and therefore mere anarchies. 

M. — That is not my belief, nor is the 
thing likely; and I am the more steadfastly 
of this opinion, that your interpretation of 
this passage is confirmed by the agreement 
of aU the more learned commentatore, who 
think Paul's dissertation here intended 



against those that contended for a total 
exemption fiom the control of all laws and 
magistrates. 

fi. — What then do you think of what I 
lately said ? Is it your belief that the most 
cmeL of aU tyrants are not included in 
Paul's form of words ? 

M. — Yes. For what do you allege to 
alter my belief? et^eoially as Jeremiah 
earnestly admonishes the Jews, and that 
by divine command, to obey the king of 
the Assyrians, and by no means to contra- 
vene his authority. And hence the infer- 
ence is, by a similar , mode of reasoning, 
drawn, that other tyrants also, however bar- 
barous, ought to be obeyed. 

B. — ^Meaning to answer first what you 
advanced last, 1 must desire you to remark 
that the prophet does not command the 
Jews to obey all tyrants, but only the king 
of the Assyrians. Therefore if, from a sin- 
gle and particular oommand, you should be 
inclined to collect the form of a general law, 
you cannot be ignorant, in the first place, as 
logic has taught you better, of what an ab- 
surdity you will be guilty ; and that you will, 
in the next place, be in danger of an attack, 
with similar arms, from the enemies of ty- 
ranny. For you must either show in what 
the singularity of this instance consists, that 
you offer it as a fit object of imitation to all 
men on all occasions ; or, if that should be 
impoEisible, you must acknowledge that, 
among all the special commands of Grod, 
whatever is ordered in the case of any sin- 
gle individual, extends to all mankind. If 
you once admit this inference, and admit it 
you must, it will be directly objected, that 
by God's order also Ahab was slain, and 
that a reward was both promised and paid 
by divine command to his murderer. There- 
fore, when you take refuge under the shelter 
of ^;^ obedience supposed to be due to all 
tyrants, because God, by his prophet, com- 
manded his own people to obey a single ty- 
rant, your ears will immediately ring with 
an opposite cant, that all tyrants ought to 
be slain by their own subjects, because Ahab 
was, by divine command, murdered by the 
general of his own forces. Therefore I ad- 
vise you either to provide from Scripture 
some stronger bulwark for your tyrants, or 
to set it aside for the present, and to return 
to the schools of philosophers. 

M. — That hint I sh^ certainly take into 
consideration. But, in the meantime, let 
us return to the point from whidi we di- 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



271 



grossed, and examine where the Scripture 
grants us a licence to murder princes, with 
unpunity. 

B. — My first argument is, that, as there 
is in Holy Writ, an express command for 
the extirpation of crimes and criminals, 
without any exception of degree or rank, 
there is nowhere any peculiar privilege 
granted, in that respect, to tyrants, more 
than to private persons; and my next is, 
that the definition of powers furnished by 
Paul does not, in the least, refer to tyrants ; 
as they accommodate the whole plan of their 
government, not to the utility of the people, 
but to the gratification of their own lusts. 
Besides, you must note, with particular at- 
tention, of what vast consequence Paul has 
made bishops, bestowing upon their office 
the highest encomiums, and making them> 
in the opposite scale of comparison, corre- 
spond, in some measure, to kings, at least as 
far as the nature of their respective func- 
tions will admit. For the former are phy- 
sicians for internal, and the latter for exter- 
nal maladies ; and yet he has not directed 
that the one class should be free and loose 
from the other's jurisdiction ; but that, as 
bishops are, in the exercise of the common 
duties of civil life, subject to kings, so kings 
also should obey the spiritual admonitions 
of bishops. Now these bishops, though ex- 
alted to such a height of majesty and gran- 
deur, are not exempted by any law, human 
or divine, from punishment for their crimes. 
And, without mentioning others, the Pope 
himself, who is in some measure deemed a 
bishop of bishops, and who rises so far above 
the eminence of all kings, that he would be 
reckoned a kind of god among mortals, is 
not even, by his own friends, Qie canonists, 
the class of men most devoted to his will, 
exempted from legal punishment. For judg- 
ing it absurd for a god, a name which 
they do not hesitate to give him, to be sub- 
ject to human animadversion, and thinking 
it unjust that the greatest crimes, and most 
flagitious enormities, should remain unpun- 
ished, they devised a method by which both 
the crimes migkt be punished, and the Pope 
be still held sacred and inviolable. For they 
declared the right of the Pope to be one 
thing, and the right of the person who 
should be Pope, another ; and, while they 
exempt the Pope, whom they invest with 
the attribute of infellibility, from the cog- 
nizance of the laws, they still acknowledge 
the person, who is Pope, to be liable to vices, 



and punishable for his vices ; and to this doc- 
trine, they have given their unequivocal sanc- 
tion, not more by the subtilty of their rea- 
sonings, than by the severity of their punish- 
ments. It would be tedious to enumerate 
the pontiffs, or, in their language, the men 
who bore the character of pontiffs, and were 
during their Uves not only forced to forswear 
the oiiice, but, even after their death, dug 
from their tombs and east into the Tiber. 
Without recurring to ancient examples, we 
need only refer to the late instance of Paul 
IV., whose fate is- stiU fresh in our memo- 
ries, and against whom his favourite Home 
expressed the common hatred by a new kind 
of decree. For the vengeance from which 
he had escaped was wreaked upon his rela- 
tions, upon his statues, and upon his por- 
traits. Nor ought you to imagine that ex- 
cessive subtilty IS couched under this inter- 
pretation, by which we separate the person 
trom the power; since it is acknowledged 
even by philosophy, and approved by the an- 
cient commentators, and it is not unknown 
to the untutored vulgar, however little ac- 
customed to the refinements of disputation. 
Mechanics do not consider it as a disgrace to 
their trade, that either a carpenter or baka* 
is punished for an act of robbery ; but re- 
joice rather that their company is purged 
from the stain of such infamous maleiactors. 
If any of them should entertain a contrary 
sentiment, there is, I think, reason to fear 
that he grieves more at the punishment of 
men with whom he is connected by a con- 
sciousness of guilt, than at the infamy of his 
company. Indeed, if kings did not form 
their councils of miscreants and flatterers, 
and measure their own importance by the 
gratitude due to their virtues rather than by 
me impunity of their crimes, they would, in 
my opinion, not be vexed at the punishment 
of tyrants, or think that their fate, however 
grievous, was any diminution of regal digni- 
ty ; but rather be pleased to see its honour 
cleared from a stain of so foul a nature, espe- 
cially since they use to be violently angry, 
and with great justice, with those who cloak 
their own misdeeds under the regal name. 

M. — And not without reason, assuredly. 
But I wi^ that you would quit this topic, 
and proceed to the other subjects, which 
you proposed to handle. 

B. — What subjects, pray, do you mean ? 
M. — The periods in which Paul com- 
posed his writings, and the persons to whom 
he addressed them ; for I am eager to know 



J j:::^ 



r f 



272 



DE JT7BE BBGNI APUD SCOTOS ; OR, 



of what advantage the knowledge of these 
circumstances can be to your argument. 

B. — ^Here, too, you shall be humoured. 
And first, in treatmg of the time, let me 
observe that Paul wrote these passages 
when the in^t church was still in her 
cradle ; a time that made it necessary for 
her not only to be free from guilt, but also 
not to afford even an unjust cause of ac- 
cusation to persons in active search of a 
handle for calumny ; and, in the next place, 
that he wrote to men collected from various 
nations, and indeed from the whole extent 
of the Koman empire, into one blended 
mass. Among these there were but few 
distinguished for opulence ; hardly any that 
were, or had been, magistrates ; not many 
that held the rank of citizens, and these 
mostly lodgers, or even mere freed-men ; 
and the rest almost all mechanics and slaves. 
Among these, however, there were not 
wanted men who extended Christian liberty 
farther than the simplicity of the gospel 
would admit. Accordingly, this multitude, 
composed of a promiscuous crowd of plebe- 
ians, that, with great labour, gained a scanty 
livelihood, had not so much reason to be 
anxious about the form of the government, 
the majesty of the empire, and the life and 
duty of kings, as about public tranquillity and 
domestic repose, and could hardly claim any 
other blessmg but the happiness of being 
any how sheltered under the shade of the 
empire. If such men attempted to grasp 
any part of the public administration, they 
deserved to be considered not only as foolish, 
but absolutely insane ; and they would de- 
serve it stUl more, if they issued from their 
cells, and proved troublesome to the minis- 
ters who managed the helm of government. 
There was a necessity, too, for checking 
premature luxury, that ill-omened interpre- 
ter of Christian liberty. What then did 
Paul write? No new precepts, certainly, 
but those common maxims, that subjects 
should be obedient to the magistrates, ser- 
vants to their masters, wives to their hus- 
bands, and not imagine that the yoke of the 
Lord, though light, releases us from the ties 
of morality ; but ought rather to make us 
more conscientious in the observance of them, 
so that, in all the gradations of duty, we 
might omit nothing that could help us to 
conciliate the good will of all men by honest 
practices. The ultimate consequence would 
thus be, that the name of God would, to all 
nations, sound more pleasing, and the glory 



of the gospel would be more widely dif- 
fiised. To effect these purposes, there was 
a necessity for public peace, of which princes 
and magistrates, though, perhaps, bad men, 
were the conservators. Do you wish to 
have this matter set before your eyes in a 
Hvely picture ? Figure to yourself any of 
our doctors to be writing to the Christians 
now living under the Turks ; to men, I say, 
of slender fortune, of humble mind, without 
arms, few in number, and exposed to every 
injur} from every nuln ; what other advice, 
I pray, could he give, but the advice of Paul 
to the church at Kome, and of Jeremiah to 
the exiles in Assyria ? Now, a most con- 
clusive argument, that Paul's attention was 
here directed solely to those persons to 
whom he was then writing, and not to the 
whole body of the citizens, is, that though 
he minutely explains the mutual duties of 
husbands to then- wives, of wives to their 
husbands, of parents to their children, of 
children to their parents, of masters to their 
slaves, and of slaves to their masters, he 
does not, in describing the duty of a magis- 
trate, address, as in the preceding parts, 
them expressly by name. Tor what reason 
then must we suppose that Paul gave no 
directions to kings and to other magistrates, 
especially as their passions required much 
more than those of private persons the coer- 
cive restraints of law ? What other reason 
can we imagine, but that, at the time in 
question, there were neither kings nor other 
magistrates to whom he could write. Con- 
ceive Paul to be living in our times, when 
not only the people, but the sovereigns adopt 
the name of Christians. At the same period, 
let there be a prince, who thinks that not 
only human, but also divine laws, ought to 
be subservient to his capricious lusts ; who 
would have not only his decrees, but even 
his nods, held as laws ; who, as Paul says in 
the gospel, " neither fears God nor reve- 
rences men;" who, not to say anything 
worse, squanders the revenues of the church 
upon parasites and buffoons; who derides 
the sincere observers of religion, and deems 
them fools and madmen; what, do you 
think, would Paul write concerning such a 
man ? If he should wish to be thought con- 
sistent, he will declare him unworthy of 
being reckoned a magistrate ; he will put all 
Christians under an interdict to abstain from 
all familiarity, all conversation, and all com- 
munion with him; his punishment by the 
dvil laws he will leave to the citizens, and 



will not think them steppins beyotid their 
dutrr, when th«7 announceWthe man, 
wita whom the divine law will allow them 
no commerce, can no longer be their king. 
But the servile herd of courtiers, finding 
every honourable resource flail, will have the 
impudence to say, that God, in his wrath, 
lets tyrants loose upon nations, as public 
executioners, to wreak their vengeance. 
Now, though I should acknowledge the 
truth of this assertion, yet it is equalfy true, 
that G^od generally excites some poor and 
almost unknown individuals of the lowest 
vulgar to check the extravagant pride and 
lawless career of tyrants. For God, as was 
said before, commands the wicked to be ex- 
terminated, and excepts neither rank, nor 
sex, nor condition, nor even person ; since 
to him kings are not more acceptable than 
beggars. It may, therefore, be trulv af- 
firmed, that God, who is equally the rather 
of all, from whose eye nothing can be hid, 
and whose power nothing can resist, will 
leave no crime unpunished. Besides, another 
parasite may perhaps start up, and ask me 
to produce, from Bfoly Writ, an example of 
a king punished by hLs subjects ; and yet, if 
no such instance should immediately occur, 
it will not directly follow that what we do 
not there read should be held wicked and 
nefarious. I can enumerate, from the codes 
of many nations, numerous and most whole- 
some laws, of which there is not the least 
trace in the sacred Scriptures. For, as it 
has been established by the unanimous con^ 
sent of all men, that what the law commands 
should be deemed just, and what it forbids, 
unjust, so we find no human records which 
forbid us ever to do what is not contained in 
the law. For such servility has never been 
recognked; nor will the nature of human 
affairs, so fruitful in new examples, allow it 
to be recognised to such a degree, that 
whatever is not ordained by some law, or 
evidenced by some illustrious record, should 
be instantly reckoned wicked and nefarious. 
Therefore, if any man should require of me 
to show him, in the books of the sacred 
volumes, an instance in which the punish- 
ment of kings is approved, I shall recipro- 
cally ask where it is disapproved. Indeed, 
if it should be a rule that nothing ought to 
be done without a precedent, only a small 
renmant of our civil constitutions, and even 
of our laws, will continue standing ; for the 
greatest part of them is founded, not upon 
and^t precedents, but established in op- 



position to new and unprecedented encroach- 
ments. But now we have given a fuller answer 
than the case required to the sticklers for pre- 
cedents. For, though the kings of the Jews 
should not have been punished by their sub- 
jects, it does not greatly affect our reason- 
ing ; as they were not originally created by 
the people, but assigned to them by God. 
With very good reason, therefore, he who 
conferred the honour also exacted the pun- 
ishment. But we contend that the people, 
from whom our kings derive whatever power 
they claim, is paramount to our kings ; and 
that the commonalty has the same Jurisdic- 
tion over them wluch they have over any 
individual of the commonalty. The usages 
of all nations, that live under legal kings, 
are in our favour ; and all states, that obey 
kings of their own election, in common 
adopt the opinion that whatever right the 
people may have granted to an individual, 
it may, for just reasons, also re-demand. 
For this is an inalienable privilege which all 
communities must have always retained. 
Accordingly, Lentulus, for having conspired 
with Cat^ine to overturn the republic, was 
forced to resign the praetorship ; and the 
decemvirs, the founders of the laws, though 
invested with supreme magistracy, were de- 
graded; and some Venetian doges, and 
Chilperic, king of the Franks, after being 
stripped of every imperial badge, grew old, 
as private persons, in monasteries ; and, not 
long ago. Christian, king of the Danes, 
ended his life in prison twenty years after 
he had been dethroned. Nay, even the 
dictatorship, which was a species of despo- 
tism, was still subordinate to the power of 
the people. And it has been everywhere 
an invariable usage, that public favours, im- 
properly bestowed, might be reclaimed ; and 
that even liberty, the tiavourite object of law, 
might be taken from ungrateful freed-men. 
These observations, which, I hope, will be 
sufficient, I have made, that we may not seem 
to be the only people who have adopted what 
is called a new practice towards our kings. 
Everything, that properly relates to us, might 
have been despatched in few words. 

M. — In what manner ? This is an argu- 
ment which I should be much pleased to 
hear discussed. 

B. — I could enumerate twelve or more of 
our kings, who, for their viUany of flagitious- 
ness, were either condemned to perpetual 
imprisonment, or escaped the punishment 
due to their crimes, by exile or by death. 

2o 



But, that none may allege that I produce 
antique and obsolete precedents, if I should 
mention the Calens, Ewens, and Ferchars, 
1 shall go back for a few examples no far- 
ther than the memory of our fathers. James 
III. was, in a public assembly of all the or- 
ders, declared to have been justly slain for 
his extreme cruelty to his relations, and for 
the enormous turpitude of his life ; and in the 
act there was inserted a clause, providing that 
those who had projected the conspiracy, or 
aided by their person or their purse, snould 
never, on that account, be injured or molested. 
What they declared, after the event, to 
have been a just and regular act, they un- 
doubtedly meant to propose as an example 
to posterity, and that certainly with no less 
propriety than Quinctius acted, when he de- 
livered, from the tribunal, a panegyric on 
Servilius Ahala, for having, in the forum, 
slain Spurius Mselius, who hesitated and 1*0- 
fused to plead his cause in a court of law ; 
and gave it as his opinion, that he was not 
polluted with the blood of a citizen, but en- 
nobled by the death of a tyrant, and found 
his opinion confirmed by the applauding 
voice of succeeding generations. When he 
thus approved the assassination of a man who 
only aimed at tyranny, what do you think 
he would do to a tyrant, who, upon the 
goods of his fellow-citizens, practises rob- 
bery, and upon their persons the trade of a 
butcher? What was the conduct of our 
countrymen ? In granting, by a public 
decree, impunity to a perpetrated deed, 
they certainly enacted a law including any 
similar event that might occur in future. 
For, in the result, it makes no difference 
whether you pass sentence upon what is 
past, or enact a statute for what is to come ; 
for in either way you give judgment con- 
cerning the nature of the fact, and concern- 
ing the punishment or reward of its author. 
M. — These arguments, perhaps, will, 
among our people, be deemed valid; but 
abroad, among other nations, I know not 
how they will be relished. You see that I 
must satisfy them, not as in a court of jus- 
tice, agitating a criminal question, but, be- 
fore the public eye, a question of reputation, 
affecting, indeed, not myself, as 1 am far 
beyond the reach of suspicion, but my 
countrymen. For I am afraid that the 
decrees, by which you think yourself suf- 
ficiently justified, will be blamed by foreign 
nations more than the deed itself, however 
pregnant with odium and atrocity. With 



1 



respect to the precedents which you have 
produced, you know, if I mistake not, what 
is usually said by every man according to 
his particular disposition and discernment. 
Therefore, since you seemed to me to have 
derived your explanation of other topics, not 
so much from tue decrees of men, aa from 
the fountains of nature, I wish that you 
would, in a few words, unfold what you nave 
to say for the equity of that law. 

B. — Though to plead in a foreign court, 
in defence ot a law adopted from the first 
origin of the Scottish monarchy, justified by 
the experience of so many ages, necessary to 
the people, neither severe nor dishonourable 
to their kings, and not till now accused of 
inconsistency with natural law, may seem 
unreasonable ; yet, on your account, I shall 
make the trial. And, as if I were arguing 
with the very persons who may be disposed 
to give you trouble, first I ask. What is it 
that you find here worthy of censure ? Is 
it the cause which gave rise to the law, or 
the law itself? The cause was a desire to 
restrain the unbridled passions of kings ; and 
he who condemns this purpose must condemn 
all the laws of all nations, as they were all 
enacted for the same reason. Is it the law 
itself that you censure, ^nd do you think it 
reasonable that kings ^hould be freed from 
every restraint of law ? Let ua also exa- 
mine whether such a plan is expedient. 
To prove that it cannot be expedient for 
the people, we need not waste many words. 
For if, in the preceding part of our conver- 
sation, we were right in comparing a king 
to a physician, it is evident that, as it was 
there proved not to be expedient for the 
people that a physician should be allowed to 
kill any man at pleasure, so it cannot be ad- 
vantageous to the public to grant to a king a 
license to commit promiscuous havoc among 
the whole community. With the people, 
therefore, who possess the sovereign power 
in making the law, we ought not to be 
angry, if, as they wish to be governed by a 
good king, they should also wish tiat a king, 
who is not the very best of men, should be 
governed by the law. Now, if this law be 
not advantageous to the king, let us see 
whether he ought to propose to the people 
to relinquish some part of their right, and 
let us appoint the meeting of parliament for 
the consideration of its repeal, not at the 
third market, but, according to our custom, 
on the fortieth day. In the meantime, in 
order to discuss here between ourselves the 



utk mm I M,M 



propriety of the measure, allow me to ask 
you, Whether you think that he, who re- 
leases a man in a state of insanity from a 
strait-waistcoat, consults the true interest of 
the insane person ? 

M. — By no means. 

B, — ^What do you say of him, who, at his 
constant request, gives to a man, labouring 
under such a paroxysm of fever as not to be 
far from insanity, cold water ? Do you con- 
ceive him to deserve well of his patient ? 

M. — But I speak of kings in their sound 
senses ; and deny that men in full health 
have any occasion for medicines, or kings, 
in their sound senses, for laws. But you 
would have all kings be thought bad, for 
upon all you impose laws. 

B. — Not all bad, by any means; but 
neither do I look upon the whole people as 
bad ; and yet the law addresses the whole 
with one voice. That voice the bad dread, 
and the good, being not concerned, hear at 
their ease. Thus neither good kings have 
any reason for feeling indignant at this law ; 
nor would bad kings, if they had wisdom, 
fail to return thanks to the legislator for or- 
daining that which he conceived likely to be 
in the event prejudicial, should in the act be 
illegal. If ever they recover a sound state 
of mind, they will certainly come to this re- 
solution, like persons relieved from distem- 
per, and expressing their gratitude to the 
physician whom they hated for not gratify- 
ing the calls of their sickly appetites. But, 
if they should continue in their state of in- 
sanity, he who humours them most should 
be deemed most their enemy. In this class 
we must rank flatterers, who, by cherishing 
their vices with blandishments, exasperate 
their disease, and generally fall headlong at 
last in one common ruin with their kings. 

M, — Certainly I cannot deny that such 
princes deserved, and still deserve, to be fet- 
tered by laws ; for no monster is more out- 
rageous, or more pernicious than man, when, 
as in the fables ol the poets, he has once de- 
generated into a brute. 

B. — On this assertion you would insist 
still more if you had remarked what a com- 
plicated animal man is, and of what ^various 
monsters he is composed. This truth llie 
ancient poets discerned with great acuteness, 
and expressed with no less elegance, when 
they record that, in the formation of man, 
Prometheus borrowed from the several ani- 
mals certain particles with which he consti- 
tuted his mingled frame. To recount the 



natures of all separately would be endless ; 
but, undoubtedly, there appear evidently in 
man two abominable monsters, anger and 
lust. And what else is the effect, or the ob- 
ject of laws, but to render these monsters 
obedient to reason, and to coerce them, 
while not obedient, by the power of their 
mandates. He, therefore, who releases either 
a king, or any other man, from the shackles 
of law, releases not only a single man, but 
sets loose against reason two of tlie most 
cruel monsters, and arms them for breaking 
through the barriers of order ; so that truth 
and rectitude seem to have guided the 
tongue of Aristotle, when he said that " He 
who obeys the laws, obeys Grod and the law ; 
and that he who obeys man, obeys man and 
a wild beast." 

M. — Though these doctrines seem to be 
expressed with much neatness and elegance, 
yet I think that we have fallen into a double 
error; first, because our last inferences do 
not seem to be perfectly correspondent to 
the premises; and next, because, though we 
should, in other respects, be found consistent, 
yet we have not, in my opinion, made any 
considerable progress towards the end of our 
investigation. In the preceding part, we 
agreed that the voice of the king and of the 
law should be the law ; but here we have 
made it dependent on the law. Now, 
though we should grant all this reasoning to 
be ever so just, what great advantage do we 
derive from the concession ? Who will call 
a king that has become a tyrant to an ac- 
count ? For I fear that justice, unsupported 
by physical strength, will not, of itself, be 
sufficiently powerful to coerce a king that 
has forgotten his duty, or to drag him by 
violence to plead his cause. 

B. — I suspect that you have not suffi- 
ciently considered the conclusions founded 
on our preceding debate about the regal 
power. For, ir ygu had sufficiently con- 
sidered them, you would have easily seen 
that the observations which you have just 
advanced are not in the least repugnant. 
That you may the more readily comprehend 
my meaning, first give me an answer to this 
question: — "When a magistrate or secre- 
tary, puts words into the mouth of the pub- 
Uc crier, is not the voice of both the same ; 
— ^the voice, I mean, of the crier and of the 
secretaiy ?" 

M.— The same entirely. 

B. — Which of the two appears to you to 
be the superior ? 



^ 



276 



DE JURE REGNI APUD SCOTOS ; OB, 



M. — ^He that dictates the words. 

B. — What do you think of the king, the 
author of the edict ? 

M. — That he is greater than either. 

B. — According to this representation, 
then, let us compare the kin?, the law, and 
the people. Hence we shall find the voice 
of the king and of the law to be the same. 
But whence is their authority derived ? The 
king's £rom the lawor the law's from the king ? 

M. — The king's from the law. 

B. — How do you come at that conclusion ? 

M. — By considering that a king is not in- 
tended for restraining the law, but the law for 
restraining the king ; and it is from the law 
that a king derives his quality of royalty ; 
since without it he would be a tyrant. 

B. — The law then is paramoimt to the 
king, and serves to direct and moderate his 
passions and actions. 

M. — That is a concession already made. 

B. — Is not then the voice of the people 
and of the law the same ? 

M. — The same. 

B. — Which is the more powerful, the 
people or the law ? 

M. — The whole people, I imagine. 

B. — Why do you entertain that idea ? 

M. — Because the people is the parent, or 
at least the author of the law, and has the 
power of its enactment or repeal at pleasure. 

B. — Since the people, then, is more 
powerful than the kmg, let us see whether 
it is not before the people that he must be 
called to account. And here let us inquire, 
whether what has been instituted &r the 
sake of another is not of less value than the 
object of its institution. 

M. — That proposition I wish to hear more 
distinctly explained. 

B. — Attend to the following line of argu- 
ment. — Is not the bridle made for the horse ? 

M. — For the horse undoubtedly. 

B. — What do you say of the saddle, the 
harness and spurs ? 

M. — That they were intended for the 
same purpose. 

B. — Therefore, if there was no horse, 
they would be of no use ? 

M. — Of none. 

B. — A horse then takes the lead of them 
aU? 

M. — Certainly. 

B. — What do you think of tiie horse? 
For what use is he so much in request ? 

M. — For many; and pajrticularly for 
gaining victory in war. 



B. — Victory then we value more than 
horses, arms, and other preparatory instru- 
ments of war. 

M. — ^Much more, indisputably. 

B. — In the creation of a king, what had 
men principally in view ? 

M. — The interest of the people, I beUeve. 

B. — Therefore, if there were no society 
of men, there would be no occasion for kings. 

M. — ^None at all. 

B. — The people, therefore, take the lead 
of the king. 

M« — The conclusion is unavoidable. 

B. — If the people take the lead, they are 
entitled to the superiority. Hence, when 
the king is called before tlie tribunal of the 
people, an inferior is summoned to appear 
before a superior. 

M. — But when can we hope for the feli- 
city of seeing the whole people unanimously 
agree to what is right ? 

B. — That is indeed a blessing, of which 
we can scarcely have any hope, and of which 
we need not certainly wait in expectation ; 
since, otherwise, no law could be passed, nor 
magistrate created. For there is hardly 
any law so equitable to ail, or any man so 
much in possession of popular favour, as not 
to be somewhere the object either of enmity, 
or of envy, or of detraction. The only ques- 
tion is, whether the law is advantageous to 
the majority, and whether the majority has 
a good opinion of the cajididate ? Therefore, 
if the people can ordain a law, and create a 
magistrate, what hinders it to pass sentenoQ 
u^on him, and to appoint judges for his 
trial ? Or, if. the tribunes of the people at 
Home, or the Ephori at Sparta, were ap- 
pointed to mitigate the rigour of kingly go- 
vernment, why should any man think it 
iniquitous, in a free people, to adiopt in a 
similar, or even a different manner, prospec- 
tive remedies for checking the enonnities of 
tyranny ? 

M. — ^Here, I think, I nearly see how far 
the power of the people extends ^ but what 
its will may be, what. laws it may pass, it is 
difHcuIt to judge. For the majority is com- 
monly attached to ancient usages, and abhors 
novelty ; a circumstance the more surprising, 
that its inconstancy in food, raiment, build- 
ing, and every species of furniture, is. no- 
torious. 

B. — 'Do not imagine that I have. madB 
these remarks^^ because I wish here to intro- 
duce any novelty. No ; my sole olg«ct was 
to.show that it was an aodent practuse to 



^ 



»•»— ^ 



wmmmmmmmimm 




make kings plead their cause before a court 
of justice : a thing which you c(Hioeiyed to 
be not only a norMjy but almost an incredi- 
bility. For, without mentioning the nume- 
rous instances of it among our forefathers, as 
we have before observed, and as you may 
yourself easily learn from history, have you 
never heard that candidates for the crown 
referred their dispute to arbitrators ! 

M. — That sucn a mode of decision was 
adopted once by the Persians, I have cer- 
tainly heard. 

B. — Our historians record, that our 
Grosme, and our Malcolm II., followed the 
same plan. But, that you may not allege 
that it is not by their own consent that the 
litigants submit to this kind of arbitrators, 
let us come to the ordinary judges. 

M. — ^Hear I fear that you will be reduced 
to the same dilemma with those who should 
spread a net in the ocean to catch whales. 

B. — ^How so ? 

M. — Because arrest, coercion, and anim- 
adversion, must always descend from the 
superior to the inferior. Now, before what 
judges will you order the king to appear ? 
Beibre those on whom he is mvested with 
supreme power to pass sentence, and whose 
proceedings he is empowered to quash by a 
mere prohibition ? 

B. — But what will you say, were ure 
able to discover a superior power that has 
the same elaim of jurisdiction over kings, 
that kings have over others ? 

M. — That topic I wish to hear argued. 

B. — This very jurisdiction, if you recol- 
lect, we found to be vested in the people. 

M. — In the whole people, I own, or in 
the greater part. Nay, I grant you still 
more, that it is vested in those to whom the 
people, or a majority, may have transferred 
that power. 

B. — You are obliging in relieving me 
from that labour. 

M. — But you are not ignorant that the 
greater part of the people is, either through 
fear or rewards, or trom the h(^ of bribes, 
or of impunity, so corrupt as to prefer their 
own interests or pleasures to the public uti- 
lity, and even to personal safety. Besides, 
those who are not influenced by these con- 
siderations are not very many ; for 

" The good are rare, and can in numbers scarce 
pretend. 
With Nile in mouths, or TbebiBs in portals, to 
contend.*' 

All the remaining dregs- of the sink, those 



that are fattened with blood and slaughter, 
envy other men's liberty, and sell their 
own. But, forbearing to mention persons 
to whom the very name even of bad kings 
is sacred, I omit also those, who, though not 
ignorant of the extent of law and equity, 
still prefer peaceable sloth to honourable 
danger, and, m suspense of mind, adapt all 
their schemes to uieir expectations of the 
event, or follow the fortune, not the cause 
of the parties. How numerous this class of 
people is Hkely to be cannot escape your 
notice. 

B. — Numerous, undoubtedly, they will 
be; but not tiie most numerous class. For 
the injuries of tyrants extend to multitudes, 
and their &vours but to few. For the de- 
sires of the vulgar are insatiable, and, like 
fires, require a constant supply of fresh ^el; 
for what is forcibly extorted tirom multitude, 
supports a few in a starving condition, in 
stead oi satisfying their hunger. Besides, 
the attachment oi such men is variable, — 

''And stiU vith fortune's smiles both stands and 
falls." 

But, if they were ever so consistent in their 
plan of politics, yet they do not deserve to 
be ranked among citizens; for they inr 
fringe, or rather betray, the rights of human 
society; a vice, which, if intolerable in a 
king, is much more so in a private indivi- 
dusS. Who then are to be reckoned citizens? 
Those who obey the laws and uphold the 
social compact, jrho choose rather to undergo 
all labours and all dangers for the common 
safety than, dishonour^ly, to grow old in 
ease and sloth, who always keep before their 
eyes, not the enjoyments of the present 
hour, but the meed of eternal fame among 
posterity. Hence, if any persons should 
be deterred from incurring danger through 
fear or regard to their property, yet still the 
splendour of a glorious action, and the beauty 
of virtue, will rouse desponding minds ; and 
those who wiU not have the courage to be 
the original authors or leading acUxca will 
not revise to be companions. Theref(»re, if 
citizens be estimated, not by their number, 
but by their w(»rth, not only the better, but 
also the greater part will take their stand 
in the ranks of liberty, of honour, and of 
national defence. For that reason, if the 
whole body of the populace should be of a 
different sentiment, it cannot in the least 
affect the present argument; because the 
question is not what is likely to happen, but 



278 



DE JUBS aSGNI APUD SGOTOS : OR, 



what maj be legallj done. But now let us 
come to the ordmary judges. 

M. — Of that discussion I have been long 
in expectation. 

B. — If a private person should urge that 
the king, in violation of all equity, keeps 
possession of the whole, or any part of his 
huided estate, how do you thinK this person 
is to act ? Shall he resign his land, because 
he cannot appoint a person to sit in judg- 
ment on the king 1 

M. — Bv no means. But he will call not 
upon the king, but upon his attorney to ap- 
pear in court. 

B. — Now mark the force and tendency 
of the subterfuge which you use. For it 
makes no difference to me, whether the king 
. shall appear, or his attorney ; since, either 
way, the litigation must proceed at the risk 
of the king, and the loss or gain from the 
issue of the suit will be his, and not his 
attorney's. In a word, he is himself the 
culprit, or the person whose interest is in 
dispute. Now, I wish that you would con- 
sider, not only how absurd, but also how 
iniquitous it is to permit a suit to be com- 
menced against a king for a paltry piece of 
land, for a skylight or for a gutter, and to 
refuse all justice in a case of parricide, em- 
poisonment, or murder ; in small matters to 
use the utmost severity of law, and on the 
commission of the most flagitious crimes to 
allow every license and impunity, so as to 
make the old saying appear an absolute 
truth, " that the laws arei, mere cobwebs, 
which entangle flies, and leave a free passage 
to large insects." Nor iu there any Justice 
in the complaint and indication of those 
who say that it is neither decent nor equit- 
able th^t a man of an inferior order should 
pass sentence upon a king, since it is a 
known and received practice in a question of 
money or land, and the most elevated per- 
sons aller the king generally plead their 
cause befcMre judges, that are neither in 
riches, nor in nobility, nor in merit, their 
equals, nor indeed much superior in emin- 
ence to the vulgar, and are much farther be- 
low the defen£uits in the scale of citizen- 
ship than men of the highest rank are below 
kincs. And 'yet kings and men of the first 
qusJity think this circumstance no degrada- 
tion from their dignity. Indeed, if we 
should once acknowledge it as a received 
maxim that the judge must always be, in 
every respect, supenor to the defendant, 
the poor must wait in patient expectation 



till the king has either inclination or leisure 
to enquire into any charge of injustice pre- 
ferred against a noble culprit. Besides, 
their complaint is not only unjust, but false ; 
for none that comes before a judge comes 
before an inferior ; especially as wd him* 
self honours the tribe of judges so far as to 
call them, not only kings, but even gods, and 
thus to communicate to them, as far as the 
thing is possible, his own dignity. Accord- 
ingly, the popes of Home, who graciously 
indulged kings with leave to kiss tneir toes, 
who, on their approach, sent their own 
mules to meet them, as a mark of honour, 
who trod upon the necks of emperors, were 
all obedience when summoned mto a court 
of justice ; and, when ordered by their 
judges, resigned the pontifical office. John 
the Twenty-Second having, after bis flight, 
been dragged back in chains, and released 
at last, with difficulty, for money, prostrated 
himself before another that was substituted 
in his place, and bv that prostration sanc- 
tioned the decree of*^ his judges. What was 
the conduct of the synod of B&le ? Did it 
not, by the common consent of all the elders, 
determine and ordain that the Pope is sub- 
ject to a council of priests ? By wmtt means 
those fathers were persuaded to come to this 
resolution you may learn from the acts of the 
councils. I know not, then, how kings, who 
allow the majesty of the popes to exceed 
theirs so much in eminence as to oversha- 
dow them all with the height of its exalta- 
tion, can think it any diminution of their 
dignity to stand in that place to which a 
pope, who sat upon a much higher throne, 
thought it no indignity to descend ; namely, 
to plead his cause before a council of cardi- 
nals. Why should I mention the falsehood 
chargeable upon the complaint of those who 
express indignation at seeing kings sum- 
moned before the tribunal of an inferior ? 
For he that condemns or acquits in judicial 
questions is not a Titius, or a Sempronius, 
or a Stichus, but the law itself ; to which 
. obedience in kings is declared to be honour- 
able by two illustrious emperors, Theodosius 
and Valentinian. Their very words, as they 
richly deserve to be remembered in every 
age, I shall here quote : — " It is an expres- 
sion," say they, " worthy of the sovereign's 
majesty, to confess that the prince is bound 
by the laws. And, in reality, the imperial 
dignity is exalted by subjecting the prince's 
power to the laws ; and that we announce, 
by the oracle of the present edict, which 



=•1 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWlf IN SCOTLAND. 



279 



Specifics what license we do not allow to an- 
other." These sentiments were sanctioned 
bj the best of princes, and cannot but be 
obvious to the worst. For Nero, when 
dressed Uke a musical performer, is said to 
have been observant, not only of their mo- 
tions and gesture, but also to have, at the 
trial of skill, stood suspended between hope 
and fear, in anxiety for victory; for, though 
he knew that he should be declared victori- 
ous, yet he thought the victory would be 
more honourable, if he obtained it, not from 
courtly adulation, but by a regular contest ; 
and he imagined that the observation of its 
rules tended not to the diminution of his 
authority, but to the splendour of his victory. 
M. — Your language, I see, is not so ex- 
travagant as I first had thought, when you 
wished to subject kings to the laws ; for it is 
founded, not so much upon the authority of 
philosophers, as of kings, and emperors, and 
ecclesiastical councils. But I do not tho- 
roughly comprehend what you mean by say- 
ing that, in this case, the judge is not the 
man, but the law. 

B. — Refresh your memory a little with a 
review of our former deductions. Did we 
not say that the voice of the king and of the 
law was the same ? 
M,— We did. 

B. — What is the voice of the secretary 
and of the crier when the law is proclaimed ? 
M. — The same. 

B. — What is that of the judge when he 
grounds his decisions on the law ? 
M. — The same. 

B. — But whence is their authority de- 
rived, — ^the judge's from the law, or the law's 
from thejudge ? 

M. — The judge's from the law. 
B. — The efficacy of the sentence then 
arises from the law, and the pronunciation 
of the words only from the judge ? 
M. — So it seems. 

B. — ^Nay, what can be more certain, since 
the sentence of a judge, if conformable to law, 
is valid ; and, if othei'wise, is null ? 
M. — Nothing can be more true. 
B. — You see, then, that the judge de- 
rives his authority from the law, and not 
the law from the judge. 
M.— I do. 

B. — Nor does the humble condition of 
the publisher impair the dignity of the law ; 
but its dignity, whether it be published by a 
king, or by a judge, or by a crier, is always 
the same ? 



l^-r 



M. — Completely so. 

B. — The law, therefore, when once or- 
dained, is first the voice of the king, and 
next of others. 

M. — It is so. 

B. — A king, therefore, when condemned 
by a judge, seems to be condemned by the 
law. 

M. — Clearly. 

B. — If he is condemned by the law, he is 
condemned by his own voice ; since the voice 
of the law and of the king is the same. 

M. — By his 0¥m voice it should seem, as 
much as ii he were convicted by letters writ- 
ten with his own hand. 

B. — Why then should we be so much 
puzzled by scruples about the judge, when 
we have the king's own confession, that is, 
the law, in our possession ? Nay, let us also 
examine an idea that has just come into my 
head, whether a king, when he sits as judge 
in a cause, ought not to divest himself of 
every chai*acter, — of a brother's, a father's, 
a relation's, a friend's, and an enemy's, and 
to consider only his function as a judge ? 

M. — He ought. 

B. — And to attend solely to that charac- 
ter which is peculiarly adapted to the cause ? 

M. — I wish that you would here speak 
with more perspicuity. 

B. — Attend then. — When any man clan- 
destinely seizes another's property, what 
name do we give to the deed ? 

M.— We call it theft. 

B. — And by what appellation do we qua- 
lify the actor ? 

M. — By the appellation of thief. 

B. — What do we say of him who uses 
another man's wife as his own ? 

M. — That he commits adultery. 

B. — What do we call him ? 

M. — An adulterer. 

B. — How do we denominate him who sits 
to judge ? 

M. — We style him judge. 

B. — In the same manner, also, names 
may be given to others from the actions in 
which they are employed^ 

M. — They may. 

B. — A king, therefore, in administering 
justice, ought to divest himself of every 
character but a judge's. 

M. He certainly ought, and particularly 
of every character that can, in nis judicial 
capacity, be prejudicial to either of the liti- 
gants. 

B. — What do you say of him who is the 



J 



280 



BB JURE KEOm APUD 8C0T0S ; OR, 



subject of the judicial inauirr ? What name 
shall we gire him from tne legal action ? 

M. — We may call him culprit. 

B. — And is it not reasonable that he 
should laj aside every character likely to 
impede the legal course of justice ? 

M. — If he should stand in any other ]pre- 
dicament but a culprit's, it is certamly 
nothing to the judge; since in a judiciad 
question, G^ orders no respect to be paid 
even to the poor. 

B. — Therefore, if any man, who is both a 
painter and a grammarian, should be en- 
gaged in a law-suit about painting with an- 
other who is a painter but no grammarian, 
ought he, in this case, to derive any advan- 
tage from his skill in grammar ? 

m*' — None. 

B.— Nor from his skill in painting, if 
he should be contending for superiority in 
grammar? 

M. — Just as little. 

B. — In a judidal trial, therefore, the 
judge will recognise only one name ; to wit, 
that of the crime, of which the plaintiff ac- 
cuses the defendant. 

M. — One only. 

B. — Therefore, if the king be accused of 
parricide, is the name of king of any conse- 
quence to the judge ? 

M. — Of none ; for the controversy hinges, 
not upon royalty, but upon parricide. 

B. — What do you say, if two parricides 
should be summoned before a court of justice, 
the one a king and the other a beggar? 
Ought not the judge to observe the same 
rule in taking cognizance of both ? 

M.-^The same, undoubtedly; and here 
Lucan seems to me to have spoken with no 
less truth than elegance, when he says, 

" CsBsar, my captain on the German plains, 

Is here my mate. — Guilt equals whom it stains." 

B. — With truth, certainly. Sentence, 
therefore, is here to be pronounced, not 
upon a king and a pauper, but upon parri- 
cides. For the sentence would then concern 
a king, if the qufntion were, which of two 
persons ought to be a king ? or if it were in- 
quired, whether Hiero be a king or a tyrant ? 
or if the controversy were about anything 
else belonging properly to the office of king, 
as a painter becomes the subject of judicial 
disquisition, when the question is, whether 
he knows the art of paining ? 

M. — What is to be the result, if the king 
should refuse, of his own accord, and can- 



not be drained by force, to appear in a 
court ofjustice ? 

B. — ^Here he stands in the same predica- 
ment with all malefactors ; for no robber or 
murderer will spontaneously submit to jus- 
tice* But you Know, I presume, title extent 
of the law, and that it allows a thief in the 
night to be killed any how, and a thief in 
the day to be killed if he uses a weapon in 
his defence. If nothing but force can drag 
him before a court of judicature, you recol- 
lect what then is the usual practice* For 
robbers, too powerful to be reduced to order 
by the regular course of law, we mast^ by 
war and arms. And there are hardly any 
other pretexts for any war between nations, 
between kings and their subjects, but inju- 
ries, which, being incapable of a legal deci« 
sion, are decided by the sword. 

M.— Against open enemies, indeed, these 
are usually the causes of waging war ; but 
we must observe a different process with 
kings, whom we are, by the pledge of a 
most solemn oath, bound to obey. 

B. — Bound, indeed, we are ; but, on the 
other hand, they were the first to promise 
that they would administer justice with 
equity and benevolence. 

M. — Such is the fact. 

B. — A mutual compact then subsists be- 
tween a king and his subjects ? 

M. — So it should appear. 

B. — Does not he then, who deviates from 
conventions, and acts in opposition to com- 
pacts, dissolve those compacts and conven- 
tions. 

M. — He does. 

B. — Upon the dissolution then of the tie 
which connected the king with his people, 
whatever right belonged by agreement to 
him who di^lves the compact, is, I pre- 
sume, forfeited? 

M. — It is. 

B. — ^He also, with whom the agreement 
was made, becomes as free as he was before 
the stipulation. 

M. — He clearly enjoys tlie same right 
and the same liberty. 

B. — If a king be guilty of acts tending 
to the dissolution of that society, for the 
preservation of which he was created, what 
do we call him ? 

M. — A tyrant, I suppose. 

B. — But a tyrant is so far from being en- 
titled to any just authority over a people, 
that he is the people's open enemy. 

M, — Their open enemy, undoubtedly. 




B. — Grievous and intolerable injuries ren- 
der a war with an open enemy just and 
necessary. 

M. — ^Undeniably just. 
B. — ^What do you call a war undertaken 
against the public enemy of all mankind, — 
a tyrant ? 

M. — The justest of all wars. 
B. — But when war is, for a just cause, 
once proclaimed against an open enemy, not 
only the whole people, but also each indivi- 
dual, has a right to kill that enemy, 
M . — I own it. 

B. — What say you of a tyrant, that pub- 
lic enemy, with whom all good men are per- 
Setually at war, — Have not all the indivi- 
uals of the whole mass of mankind, indis- 
criminately, a right to exercise upon him all 
the severities of war ? 

M. — I see that almost all nations enter- 
tained that opinion. For even her husband's 
death is generally applauded in Thebe, his 
brother's in Timoleon, and his son's in Cas- 
sius. Fulvius too is praised for killing his 
son, as he was on his way to Cataline ; and 
Brutus for condemning his sons and relations 
to the gallows, when ne learned their plan 
to restore the tyrants. Nay, many states 
of Greece voted public rewards and hon- 
ours to tyraimicides ; so much did they 
think, as was before observed, that with 
tvrants every tie of humanity is dissolved. 
But why do I collect the assent of single 
persons or states, when I can produce tne 
testimony of almost all the world? For 
who does not severely censure Domitius 
Gorbulo for having so far neglected the in- 
terest of the human race, as not have hurled, 
when the deed was easy, Nero from his 
throne ? Nor was he censured only by the 
Bomans, but even by Tiridates, king of the 
Persians, who feared nothing less than that 
the contagion of the example should even- 
tually reach his own person. The minds 
even of the worst men, who have become 
savage through acts of cruelty, are not so 
totaUy divested of this public hatred to ty- 
ranny, that it does not, on some occasions, 
burst forth involuntarily, and reduce them, 
by the contemplation of truth and honour, 
to a state of torpor and stupefaction. When, 
upon the assassmation of that cruel tyrant 
Gaius Galigula, his ministers, who were no 
less cruel, tumultuously insisted upon the 
punishment of the assassins, vociferating oc- 
casionally, " Who had killed the Emperor ?" 
Valerius Afiiaticus, a man of consular dis- 



tinction, exclaimed from a conspicuous place, 
whence he might be heard and seen, '* I wish 
that I had killed him." At this expression, 
these men, who were destitute of almost all 
humanity, forbore, as if thunderstruck, all 
riotous tumult. For so great is the power 
of virtue, that, when its picture, however 
imperfectly sketched, is presented to the 
mind, its most impetuous ebullitions sub- 
side ; the violence of its fury languishes ; 
and madness, in spite of all resistance, ac- 
knowledges the empire of reason. Nor do 
those who now move heaven and earth with 
their clamours, harbour other sentiments. 
The truth of this observation may be evinced 
even by this consideration, that, though they 
censure the late events, the same, or similar 
transactions, and even of a more atrocious na- 
ture, when quoted from ancient history, re- 
ceive their approbation and applause, and, 
by that circumstance, demonstrate that they 
are more swayed by private affections than 
by public injuries. But why should we look 
for surer witness of what tyrants deserve 
than their own conscience ? Hence springs 
their perpetual fear of all, and particularly 
of good men ; and, hence, they behold the 
sword, which they keep always drawn for 
others, constantly hanging over their own 
necks ; and, by their own hatred to others, 
measure the attachment of others to them- 
selves. But good men, on the other hand, 
reversinff this order, and fearing nothing, 
frequently incur danger by estimating the 
benevolent disposition of mankind, not by 
its vicious nature, but by their own merito- 
rious conduct. 

B. — You are, then, of opinion, that ty- 
rants ought to be ranked among the most 
ferocious beasts, and that tyrannic violence 
is more against nature than poverty, than 
disease, than death, and every other evil 
that the decrees of nature have entailed 
upon mankind ? 

M. — Truly, when I estimate within my- 
self the weights of different arguments, I 
cannot deny the truth of these positions; 
but, when I reflect on the dangers and in- 
conveniences which attend this opinion, my 
mind, as if checked at once with a bridle, 
£uls somehow in mettle, and, bending to- 
wards utiUty from the excessive rectitude of 
stoical severity, falls almost into a swoon. 
For, if any one be at liberty to kill a tyrant, 
mark what a wide field you open to the vil- 
lany of the wicked, to what .danger you ex- 
pose the good, what licence you ^ow to the 

2p 



282 



DE JURE RE6NI APUD 8C0T0S ; OR, 



bad, and what disorder you introduce into 
every department. For who, after killing a 
good, or at least not the worst king, may 
not palliate his crime under the specious ap- 
pearance of virtue ? Or, if even a good man 
should unsuccessfully attempt the assassina- 
tion of a detestable prince, or successfully 
execute the intended deed, what great con- 
fusion must necessarily ensue in every quar- 
ter! While the bad tumultuously express 
their indignation at the loss of a leader, the 
good will not all approve of the deed ; and 
even those who approve will not all defend 
the author against a wicked faction ; and the 
generality will cloak their own sloth under 
the honourable pretext of neace, and rather 
calumniate the valour of otners than confess 
their own cowardice. Assuredly, though 
this recollective attention to private interest, 
though this mean excuse for deserting the 
public cause, and this fear of incurring dan- 
ger, should not entirely break, they undoubt- 
edly weaken the spirits of most men, and 
cause a preference of tranquillity, though 
not very certain, to the expectation of un- 
certain liberty. 

B. — If you attend to the antecedent rea- 
sonings, your present apprehensions will be 
easily removed. For we remarked that some 
nations have, by their free suffrages, sanc- 
tioned tyrants, whom, for the lenity of their 
administration, we dignify with regal names. 
None will, by my advice, offer violence to 
any of these, or even of liiose who have by 
force or fraud become sovereigns, if their 
government be but tempered by a civic dis- 
position of mind. Such, among the Romans, 
were Vespasian, Titus, and Pertinax, Alex- 
ander among the Greeks, and Hiero at Sy- 
racuse ; for, though they obtained the impe- 
rial power by viSence and arms, yet tney 
deserved, by their justice and equity, to be 
numbered among legitimate kings. Besides, 
I here explain, under this head, now far our 
power and duty extend by law, but do not 
advise the enforcement of either. Of the 
former, a distinct knowledge and clear ex- 
planation are sufficient ; of the latter, the 
plan requires wisdom, the attempt prudence, 
and the execution valour. Tnough these 
preparatives may, in the case of a rash 
attempt, be aided or frustrated by times, 
persons, plaoes, and other instruments of 
action, I shall merit blame for any errors 
no more than the physician who properly 
describes the various remedies for diseases, 
ought to be censured for the folly of another. 



who administers them at an improper 
time. 

M. — One thing seems still wanted to com- 
plete this disquisition, and, if you make that 
addition, I must acknowledge that your fa- 
vours have reached their utmost possible 
limit. What I mean to ask is, whether 
tyrants ought to be liable to ecclesiastical 
censures ? 

B. — Whenever you please, you may see 
that kind of censure justified in the first 
epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, where the 
apostle forbids us to have any convivial or 
familiar converse with persons notoriously 
wicked or flagitious. Were this precept ob- 
served among Christians, the wicked must 
either repent or perish with hunger, cold, 
and nakedness. 

M. — That opinion has certainly great 
weight ; but yet I know not whether the 
people that uses everywhere to pay so much 
respect to magistrates, wUl believe that this 
rule comprehends kings. 

B. — The ancient ecclesiastical writei-s, to 
a man, certainly understood, in this manner, 
Paul's expressions. For, even the emperor 
Theodosius was excluded by Ambrose from 
the congregation of Christians, and Theodo- 
sius obeyed the bishop. Nor, as far as I 
know, is any bishop's conduct more highly 
extolled by antiquity, nor any emperor's 
modesty more loudly applauded. But, as to 
the main point, what great difference does 
it make, whether you be expelled from the 
communion of Christians or be forbid fire 
and water ? For, against those who refuse 
to obey their orders, all magistrates use, for 
their most formidable engine, the latter de- 
cree, and all ecclesiastics the former. Now, 
the punishment inflicted by both, for a con- 
tempt of their authority, is death ; but the 
one denounces the destruction of the body, 
and the other the destruction of the whole 
man. Will not the church, then, which con- 
siders much lighter crimes punishable with 
death, think death justly due to him whom 
alive it excommunicates from the congrega- 
tion of the godly, and whom dead it dooms 
to the company of devils ? — ^For the justice 
of my country's cause, I think that I have 
said enough; and if still some foreigners 
should not be satisfied, I beg that they 
would consider how iniquitously they trei^ 
us. For, as there are in Europe numbers 
of great and opulent nations, having each 
its own distinct laws, it is arrogance in them 
to prescribe to all their own peculiar form 



kAaflhaMMIMaM 



THE RIGHTS OF THE CROWN IN SCOTLAND. 



283 



of government. The Swiss live in a republic; 
the Germans, under the name of empire, 
enjoy a legitimate monarchy; some states in 
Germany, indeed, are, I hear, subject to a 
nobility ; the Venetians have a government 
that is a due mixture of all these forms; and 
Muscovy is attached to a despotism. We 
possess a kingdom that is, indeed, small, but 
that has now for above two thousand years 
remained free from a foreign yoke. Origi- 
nally, we created kings limited by laws, just 
to ourselves and to others. . These laws, 
length of time has proved to be advanta- 
geous ; as it is by the observance of them, 
more than by the force of arms, that the 
kingdom still remains unshaken. What in- 
justice, then, it is to desire that we should 
either repeal or disregard laws, of which we 
have, for so many ages, experienced the uti- 
lity I Or, rather, what impudence it is in 
men, who can scarcely mamtain their own 
government, to attempt an alteration in the 
policy of another country? Why should I 
mention that our institutions are beneficial, 
not only to ourselves, but also to our neigh- 
bours ? For what can contribute more to the 
maintenance of peace with neighbours than 
moderation in kings ? For, in general, it is 
through the effervescence of their unruly 
passions that unjust wars are rashly under- 
taken, wickedly waged, and dishonourably 
concluded. Besides, what can be more pre- 
judicial to any state than bad laws among its 
neighbours, as their contagion uses frequent- 
ly to spread wide ? Or why do they molest 
us alone, when different laws and institutions 
are used by so many surrounding nations, 
and the same, entirely, by none ? Or why do 
they now at last molest us, when we do not 
hazard any novelty, but adhere to our old 
system ; when we are not the only, nor the 
first people that adopted this practice, and 
do not now adopt it for the first time ? But 
some are not pleased with our laws; per- 
haps, also, not with their own. We do not 
inquire curiously into other men's institu- 
tions ; and, therefore, they should leave us 
ours, that have been for so many years ex- 
perimentally approved. Do we disturb their 
councils ? or do we, in any respect, molest 
them ? But, say they, you are seditious. To 



this charge I could freely answer, What is 
that to them ? If we are disorderly, it is at 
our own risk, and to our own loss. Yet I 
could enumerate not a few seditions, that 
both commonwealths and monarchies found 
not prejudicial. But that species of defence 
I shall not use. I deny that any nation 
was less seditious ; I deny that any was ever 
in its seditions more temperate. Many con- 
tests have occurred concerning the laws, con- 
cerning the right to the crown, concerning 
the administration of the government, but 
still without danger to the general weal; 
nor was the conflict, as among nations in 
general, continued to the ruin of the popu- 
lace, — nor from hatred to our princes, but 
from a patriotic zeal and a steady attach- 
ment to the laws. How oflen, in our me- 
mory, have large armies stood opposed in 
battle array, and parted, not only without a 
wound, but without a fray — ^without a re- 
proach? How oflen have private quarrels 
been quashed by pubHc utiUty ? How often 
has the report of a public enemy's approach 
extinguished domestic broils ? Nor have our 
seditions been quieted with more temperance 
than good fortime ; since the party that had 
justice on its side generally commanded suc- 
cess; and, as our civil disputes were con- 
ducted with moderation, they were amicably 
adjusted on the basis of utility. — These are 
the arguments which occur to me at present; 
and they seem calculated for checking the 
loquacity of the malevolent, for refiiting the 
dogmatism of the obstinate, and for satisfying 
the doubts of the equitable. The right to 
the crown among other nations I did not 
think of nmch consequence to us. Our own 
practice I have explained in a few words ; 
but yet in more than I intended, or than 
the subject required; because this was a 
labour which I undertook on your account 
only ; and, if I have your approbation, I am 
satisfied. 

M. — As far as I am concerned, the satis- 
faction which you have given is complete ; 
and, if I shall be able to give others the 
same satisfaction, I shall think myself not 
only much benefited by your discourse, but 
relieved fi^om a great deal of trouble. 



EDINBURGH: 

FKIKTSO BT A. XVBBAT, MILNE BQUABX. 



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