of the King the Fountain in opposition to the King it is but an opacous Body the light withdrawn from it Grotius states the case Grotius de jure Villi 54. inventi sunt nostro seculo whether Subordinates may act against the Supream Power that is whether any sort of Magistracy under a King have any quality or consideration in them as dividing from the King and he resolves it in the Negative He reasons it thus that these publick Persons are but private in respect of the chief and all the faculty of governing in them is so subjected to the chief Power as whatsoever they act against the Will of that is defective of the faculty and is but of the Nature of a private Act. I shall give it off here because hereafter I shall demonstrate the impossibility of two Soveraignties or Supremacies in one Government and reduce Parliamentary Rights to their due Qualification Now then take away this the other falls this the Theatre Mr. Baxter erects for judging the King and Scaffold for beheading him The truth is the Laws are all silent about this Question Whether a Parliament may commit Tteason so as if we shall not take them in their general understanding we have no law in this Case It is a thing not to be doubted that the Law never had it in imagination that there was any exception to the committing of Treason so as no such thing mentioned in Laws nor ever entred into the mind of any Commentator who write at large and many times their own conceipts yet it never came into the conceipt of any Person to except a Parliament for committing Treason It is many times in Nature the strongest Law that which is not mentioned because the case never imagined to be and therefore not provided for So as if Mr. Baxter will not take all the Laws that are generall without exception to include all Persons then is the King without Law as against a Parliament All the sense of the Laws respect the King without any consideration of Persons no sense or intendment of that but only the end to which it is directed and therefore it is called Crimen laesae Majestatis which shews where the end is in the King's Preservation but the means never differenced in respect of any It were in vain to enumerate the Laws and to aggravate them all dread and all saving being to the life of the Government the King This differencing is out of all Laws never thought of it had its Law and Execution at once as Treasons are never owned till they are acted But let the Reader consider upon the Statute 25 Edw. 3. which is the Declarative of Treasons whether there is discernable any differencing in it or exceptions of Persons or Callings or of qualities or any imagination of this Proposition till now that wickedness strives to defend it self I shall take occasion here to speak to former actings of Parliaments upon Kings deposing them and consequently killing them because the Nature of man is to think any thing that hath bin done may be done and so never finds end of wickedness but to make it infinite Any extraordinary or transcendent acting upon Government though never so unlawful and violent yet if it become powerful it commonly creates something to others to derive from it as those Persons whom Mr. Baxter would vindicate long before they divided declared That in case they should act to the highest Presidents they should not fail in duty or trust having their eye and aim upon the deposing of Kings Ed. 2. Rich. 2. And the last Actors that compleated the Tragedy conclude power of Parliaments from former destroying Kings and setting up others I shall produce it only into some considerations by Epitome only leaving the large Subject of it to the Histories how those Princes came to be declined and lose their Power The first Edw. 2. his condition was to be Prisoner to his own Queen and his Son a Prince of fourteen years of Age and the implacable hatred of the Queen and her party was such as the King must be destroyed no competition being to them both The whole Power was with them they call a Parliament which acted meerly as they prescribed The King deposed by Act of Parliament submitted and resigned in hope of life which he could not have The other as unhappy Richard II. Prisoner to the Usurper Henry of Lancaster his Cousin-Germane The Fate of subdued Kings by Traytors is ever to run into the same Center Traytors leave nothing undone of the last Act of destroying Now the actings being thus what are the considerations upon it First these Persons and the Parliament were the first that ever acted so in England and so must derive the Justice and Authority of it out of themselvs and nothing from whatsoever had been done before Next there was no such thing as King or Parliament in the Nature of it As well Jack Cade or Wat Tyler if they had compleated their Rebellion might have convened any party out of the People calling it a Parliament set himself up King for one Subject hath as much Right to be King as any other Next such a Parliament as it was it was the Subject of an Army the Army of the Usurper by which he had got Possession and destroyed the King's Power so as in effect condemning deposing was the Act of the Army absolutely for so it must be done by such a party called a Parliament and for the purpose and so are all our Mock-shews to set up any wickedness own Authority but act servilly and are meer imposture Next the Act horrid Treason as was imaginable or possible to be in Nature Now the Question comes to be Whether doing wickedly can create a lawfulness If so all sins and villanies by the perpetrating them lose their Natures to be evils and become lawful A conceipt nothing that comes into imagination can be more monstrous There must be a first lawfulness in every Act else the doing it is a Wickedness and still that wickedness perpetuated and multiplied in the after-acting it Next this condemned by the first Parliament that was upon the change of the Power for so long as the Power continued it stood for good as all Wickedness does But the Parliament under the rightful King damns it as traiterous detestable to be driven out of the World never to rise up again pulling down God's Judgments upon the Land Civil War and all the Plagues of it I shall conclude this that Wickedness can be no President Now having gone along with him upon his particulars which he only asserts not proves my next is to take notice and mind him that he is very near losing his cause which I fear he will do anon for he is arguing to a lawfulness in their putting the King to death and it is his business to keep himself out of it and likewise the Parliament's Cause and War and the Religion Protestant and Presbyterian
Now being himself a chief Professor and Actor in those-Interests if he finds Argument for it so far it is his Reason if his Reason why not his Opinion I know not the difference if his Opinion why not of the party Thus he winds and scrues himself into that Interest he would disclaim and says more for it than the Actors themselvs and he concludes with these words And they say so as he sayes it and yet makes it their saying Either Mr. Baxter holds it lawfully done or unlawfully if lawfully then he loses his cause which is a disclamer of it as unlawful if unlawfully then his Judgment is that Form of Law used to unlawful Actions makes them less evil In Answer to it This is an Opinion so strange that forms of Justice put to wickedness to act it by should be the good of it or make it a less evil that I never heard it reasoned but condemned in Nature very Nature it self hath an abhorrency to it when we see Laws and Justice and Tribunals and any thing that is good in its self to be made the means to wickedness Now I shall enquire into the causes First it is because the Law is the Rule and measure of all Justice and Righteousness and therefore the perverting of that begets a common Injustice and this far exceeds the Nature of any particular evil because it refers and relates to the common condition of men All murdering by Law is most wicked and noxious because the Law it self in its truth and righteousness is murdered in it and therefore great actions of publick Injustice the Laws drawn down to serve to them are looked upon as Prodigies and this Argument is such as needs no amplification or addition to it it contains all in it self Then the villany and apostacy of it when it is done purposely of design and by Hypocrisy this comprehends in it the complicate nature of Wickedness when Hypocrisy is added to it and when that he calls Legal Judicial is made instrumental of it the Law debauched and bawded to serve to the interest of a wicked action this is the very height of wickedness it cannot in nature go higher And hence it is Hypocrisy and false pretentions and disguising our corruptions with shews and false owning of good is so hatefull and abominable and detested an agravation of all evil and wickedness It was an instance given in Parliament by the Lord Digby upon the tryal of the Earl of Strafford to illustrate the nature of acting wickedness by Law which they were going upon that one having gotten with Child his Brothers Daughter to mend the matter and to his further end of enjoying her marryes her and this is condemned by the Casuists as adding to the simple sin of Incest by the Ordinance of Marriage abused to it This shews the nature of it but we shall find it higher presidented in that of Naboth The design being the having his Vineyard the means must be such as would serve to the end a less means then to take away his life would not do it private murther will not serve it must be such a way as he must be condemned and lose his Inheritance with his life The Elders of the City are plotted with in it the solemnity of a Fast used it must be done formally Judicially they gave Judgment as appears because they received testimony heard Witnesses then kill and possess Nor this neither though extreamly wicked rises up to the heigth of the Kings Case no paralel in the world for it If it be objected That they did not act deceitfully but believingly though wickedly this is manifest against it that they resolved the death of the King before they tryed him Mr. Baxter cannot be so blinded with partiality as to believe the King in any case should have come off or been acquitted but precondemned and thus to make him more the subject of their cruelties and scorn and by a kind of Judgment to be the fatal period of Kingship to the Nations so as it was nothing but a direful design dark as Hell a meer conspiracy And Pagentry in the acting of it and the Law abused to it false in every part of it to do it in the name of the People and Parliament so as in this Mr. Baxters reason utterly deserts him or else he contracts all the guilt and odium of it upon himself to extenuate the evil of the Act by that which was the exquisite wickedness of it the formality and owning Authority in doing it Then to descend from the evil in the nature of it to a politick consideration of it this goes to the Calling the other but to the Person this brings all Kings under their people The difference betwixt this and that of the Pope is Things may be as evil as is possible yet not so extensively evil this is as universal as man is for where men are must be Government This judicial way which he places as the good of it is such a Monster in the president and practice of it as all the World is concerned in it It strikes a greater blow then the killing of many Kings the Calling killed in it the priviledg and exemption of Supream Governours killed in it the very essence of Government killed in it the subordination to God and to be judged by none but God killed in it all is beaten down and trampled upon by this act the whole frame of nature over-turned No such thing as Government can be if the governed may judg and execute their Governour Then the manner of it by this formality makes it viler upon the precious person of a Soveraign King than assassination murdering or sudden dispatching The King to be subjected to so miserable a condition as to be made appear a criminal at the Tribunal of his Subjects And if he had answered out of any poor imbasing hope he had stained that sacred Prerogative of Kings Not to be judged And all the tedious and odious formalities that did attend this which horror makes me not express but take it inwardly as that we owe the victims of our sorrow to To conclude it I confess before this horrid production I thought nothing could be worse then that of the Pope but now is the world of wickedness enlarged and such a Monster as seems to add to Nature the odium of it taints the English Nation and will do as long as memory is of any thing for he cannot deny it English though so many out of it so few in it Now after all this I do admire how Mr. Baxter can dispence with the Scriptures against using force to Kings or destroying them His distinction of Parliamentary right will not serve since it is absolutely forbidden Thou shalt not revile the Gods nor Curse the Ruler of thy People Exod. 22. ver 28. That they may have to offer sweet Odours to the God of Heaven and pray for the Kings life and his Sons Ezr. 6.10 This
as madness it self yet I think that God would take it ill that we should mock him to set up a King to Govern and then to reserve a Power to destroy him against his Word and meaning for the very power of Governing invests him with all these rights of protection vertually all these Attributes fall to him by his actual governing It is a principle in nature that Supremacy attracts all right to it and all perfection to be King and not perfect is impossible And this I will say at last of the King himself which I think his very enemies and destroyers cannot deny that never any Prince fell by his people that had fewer faults and more vertues Now at last my exception to Mr. Baxter is that he personates the Protestants so as to destroy them and their Religion There is no other way of keeping the guilt and imputation of that horrid accursed act from the Religion but by a total condemnation of it We say and justly that it was an act that transcends all that ever was worse and more infernal and execrable then any thing else the Pope or man can do Now Mr. Baxter out of his particular makes it the Protestant interest that it be not so evil as the wickedness under the Religion of Papists and so puts it upon the Protestants account of whatsoever nature it be and makes it their interest to extenuate the evil of it which is a meer involving them and their cause into it and the most unjust in the World for Is a Religion to answer for what wickedness men do in it I mean being of it or professing it But thus he loves to hale all Interests after him to follow his sense Let him himself be in love with it extenuate it find Jesuitical abstracted quintessential notions to dissolve all Allegiance upon Terms let him take it to himself and not make it more general then his own party Having done with this sad subject we will see him in his next whither he will lead us Object It is a grievous Case that the Senate or Body of a Nation should think themselvs necessitated to defend themselvs and the Church and State against their Prince or any that act by his Commands it will strongly tempt them to think that the end is to be preferred before the means and it ceaseth to be a means which is against or destructive to the end Answ The poor unfortunate King that could never by any possible compliance and means begg off his own and his Kingdoms ruine of them was wont to tell them when they used the great Argument of necessity for all violent actions that they were necessities of their own making Because their ends were exorbitant and such as the Laws would not bear they must proportion the means which drew on the necessities Now to his preferring the end before the means a principle he is fallen upon and the most dangerous one of the World for by this he may decline all Truth and Justice to go the next way over to his ends and yet a very strong one that the end is that for which the means is there is no use or consideration of the means but to the end By this ground he hath laid flat all Honesty Truth Goodness whatsoever for it may be it doth not suit to the end And hence it was that their ends being Reformation as they call our Deformation and Destruction it could not be done by a lesse means I do but mind him of this his party having made so much use of it The truth is if men would ty themselvs to the Justice of the means they could never attain to unjust ends Object It is essentiall to governing Power to be for common good Answ No doubt but it is as appears by their destroying the Government and we never had any good since But without taking this advantage I will give him a further Answer from the nature of Government and every other thing we call good that is good in the generality not exact good in every action of it Object It is no Authority which is used against common good Answ Then there is no Authority in the World for there is no Authority or Magistracy but at some time or other is used against it He multiplies forward still Object It would tempt them also to think that God never gave Power to any against himself or above his Laws or against the end of Government Answ He should prove here that God gave them a Right of destroying both the King and the Government for that is the Case For he confesseth the War raised by themselvs against delinquent Subjects But to answer to this as he intends it God doth some times give evil Governours and doth he not likewise give them Power God himself fore-spake in Saul and then concluded the People in these words then that is when they were oppressed by their King 1 Sam. 8.18 Grotius de jure Belli 81. shall they cry out that is to say seek help of God Quia scilicet humana remedia nulla extarent Grotius exposition of it call to God for help that is there was no means of resistance to be used on their part His next Object A Senate or the Body of a Nation will be apt to think themselvs fit to discern when the Publick safety is dangerously assaulted and will hardly be brought to trust any one to be the finall Judge of their necessity as thinking such a publick necessity proves it self and needs no Judge but sense and reason to discern it Answ Suppose there had been no Parliament this Argument would have served for the Body of the People to rise up and take away the King's Power as not fit to judge of the necessity or to be trusted with the Publick safety It was the King's Act to call a Parliament and 't was his and our ruine that he put himself upon it Having hitherto kept equal pace with him in these his severall distinct heads give me leave in general to censure of them that is that in them he hath sown the seeds of all the Rebellions in the World Let them be taken as truths abstractedly without their alloy or composition as so the very Elements would destroy us no Government can stand Do we not as often as we err in any thing employ the means against the end and shall we as often fall out with our selvs These abstracted Considerations cannot consist with the being of Man which is not certain in any thing but subject to error and as often as ever a King errs so often by his Argument the means is against the end and loseth the essence of a governing Power So as by Mr. Baxter's Learning there can never want matter for Rebellion In the next he raiseth his Parliament as an out-work to affront and batter Monarchy in these words Object And if they also think that the fundamentall Constitution of the Government doth make the Senate
the highest Judge of the safety or danger of the Re-publick and that it is Treason against the Common-wealth and as Politicians say against the Majestas realis to rise against them Answ Mr. Baxter hath of this in several places the Parliament's Supremacy it is his Goliath I shall answer generally to it at once Now the Arguments may be many I will make it but a Passage not a serious Debate and give but hints of truths that may be enlarged The first is that I am sure though I was not of that time that Kings were when Parliaments were not and then must be granted absolute the other not in being We cannot suppose here in England any time of Government without Kings and the Kings themselvs thought it best to convene the People to draw thereby aids of the Publick by publick consent and likewise to have all Counsels and all Grievances in common to be common in helps and means which is strongest and peradventure to ballance the Loâ—ds by this popular Power Whatsoever the ends were in it or the use to be made of it or accidents that grew out of it it shews it was a Creature mearly of the King's Will and creating and therefore cannot be intended but to act under him and to his help as the end of its Being So being called by the King in this sense they bear in them the Peoples Rights whatsoever was left in the People to be disposed of by their own consent Their Power therefore must hold proportion with that that is only in the quality of the People as to complain of Grievances and petition Redresses to give their private to the Publick and to consent to alter Fundamentals as there shall be cause all which are the natural Rights of the People and common consent is required to them Now this does not reach at all to Mr. Baxter's sense of sharing with the King in Supremacy and Power and right of governing nothing at all of it All Parliament rights have their station below governing it is by accident when they meddle with the Government as about the causes that require their help And all great and outward relations and inward may be Objects of this great Body of the People as their help is required but this with that caution as the King puts them on and takes them off So jealous a thing is Soveraignty it self And it is a nice distinction to make them Judges of the necessity and not to judge of the cause of the necessity and therefore involve themselvs sometimes in it too far and the retreats have been difficult No doubt this must needs be a strange great considerable Power in the consequence of it that which all the rest moves by and is the matter or means of the Government But this does not alter the Nature of it It is a most noble Constitution because it begets treatment betwixt Prince and People and there is a correspondency betwixt the giving of the one and the retribution of the other but when either make too much use of their Power it destroys the order and the inconvenience is so intolerable to the Nation as they are brought again to it and must correspond Now nothing preservs so much as when things keep to their Natures The good of Parliaments does consist within their own rights and not to enter into the King's for then it breaks the Parliament or the Parliament breaks the Government To return to the nature of the Objection of co-ordinate Power of Parliaments The Parliament is a Creation that comes out of the King's Will and Power nothing of Power to beget it self and therefore cannot be understood to serve to another end against that which was its cause and which it self had absolute Being without it Never to this day they have Power to their own Being but at the King's Will a meer Entity first in the King's Will before it can have any in them so as they are meerly Creatures having their Creation from another's Will and so to determine them after they are in being which shews the most absolute depending on another Power that possibly can be Hence rationally and consequently of this it must be that the end is of the Agent and Author and not to be their own end that did not nor could not move to their own Being so as meerly it follows A Parliament is the King's business because it flows out of his Will And some Acts have been made by consent of Kings for certainty of Parliaments but have not bound Kings for we see they have been discontinued many years together So certain it is that Regal Right cannot be restrained Now the King 's good and the People's are so necessarily conjoyned as it cannot be supposed they can serve the King but it must conserve the Kingdom and all the People And hence flows all publick considerations and conclusions the whole Interest of the Nation resolves it self into it and all the Powers submit to it because all parties are in it by convention or representation and the King can make lawful whatsoever they can consent to But without the King they are a meer inanimate Body and can act nothing they are as the Womb or Matrix the King is the generative Masculine part that gives life and production and actuates and forms their conceptions And the difference not rightly conceived begets the mistake confounding their Power with that of ordinary standing Courts which act by the King's Power invested in them which he cannot with-draw or deny to and this of Parliaments which is extraordinary and by the King's consent And then too their work is about the generality not to do with the ordinary proceedings of Law proper to other Courts but only the abuse of them The Author of the History of Independency affirms pag. 35. History of Independency 35. that the judicial Power of the House of Lords is by the King 's special Authority his Argument upon it is The King makes them Admiministrators and interpreters of his Laws but he never trusts any but himself with the Power of pardoning and dispensing with the rigour of the Law in Criminal cases And though the Lord Keeper is Speaker of the Lord's House of course yet he is no Member of the Lord's House virtute Officii The Judges are not Members but Assistants only so that no man in the House of Peers as he is simply a Peer is trusted by the King either by dispensation of Law or Equity When a Peer of Parliament or any man else is tryed before the Lords in Parliament criminally he cannot be tried by his Peers only because in acts of Judicature there must be a Judge Superior who must have his Inferiors ministerial to him Therefore in the Trial of the Earl of Strafford as in all other Trials upon Life and Death in the Lord's House the King grants his Commission to a Lord High Steward to sit as Judge and the rest of the Lords are but in
deceived and abused to serve to others ends Object That they openly professed to manage their War for King and Parliament not against his Person and Authority but against Delinquents that were fled from Justice and against evil Councellers Answ Mr. Baxter would make their War just That it was professed and engaged to be managed for King and Parliament Certainly they did no more in this then all Subjects ever did that made War against their King that is to disstinguish the King's interest from the cause of the War A less pretension cannot be for a Rebellion Rebellion in the nature of it is so much a Monster as it seeks the best cover and never has the face to pretend against the King The fallaciousnesse of this he himself evinced in his following by saying or at least concluding That a subdued King is never fit again to rule over the People that subdued him We need no other evidence now then the things themselves so as we are to argue à posteriori from the ends and issues back to their causes that is that all War taken up by Subjects upon any pretence whatsoever or by whatsoever caution or limitation evermore in the nature of it intends the destroying of King and Kingdom Object That the two Nations of England and Scotland did in the midst of the Wars swear in the Solemn League and Covenant to be true to the King Answ Still this was but the same thing to strengthen the confederacy when at any time there should be a fainting or scrupling by the People a new engagement or profession to publick ends and to common preservation whereof the King was the Head would give new life to it And this was all the use that ever was made of that Covenant It never served the King at all but to beat him down and destroy him And all bringing the people into a body by Covenant is unlawful because Government meerly consists in having no contracts of the people acting of themselves And likewise the Covenant was not absolute as a Kings preservation should be but had a loose in it that made it nothing It was with a so far as consists with Religion Laws and Liberties The King's life and his Rights were not absolutely covenanted O God forbid there should not be an exception as to Religion Laws and Liberties and this a destroying power would be interpreter of So as this Covenant was like Nebuchadnezzar's Image the upper parts of Gold and Silver the lower parts of Iron and baser stuff but the truth is when men Covenant things contradictory as to fight against the King and to be true to him they cannot be expected to perform better for truth is of that Nature that though men abuse it ever so much yet it is unalterable Effects are certain to their causes and own their true Parents Object The Committees Commanders Ministers and People thorowout the Land professed openly to go only upon such tearms as managing but a defensive War against the King's miscariages but an offensive against delinquent Subjects Answ There is no such thing in Nature as a defensive War against a King by Subjects as I shall more clearly demonstrate in due place But in this Mr. Baxter grants as far as is possible to make it defensive necessary and of meer necessity on the King's part It was offensive against delinquent Subjects as much as to say it was a War on the Parliaments part to the destruction of the King's Subjects and the King must be unconcern'd in it sit by and be idle with-draw all protection and become immediately out of possession For such is the Nature and being of a King when an armed power is acting and the King sedentary and not resisting In a Kingdom a War cannot be against any party and not against the King for it deprives the King of his governing power Consider but what the Nature of a War taken up by the People is for his Senate signifies nothing he shall find the whole is but King and People First when it once becomes powerful it gains from its very unlawfulnesse a liberty to be governed by none for in unlawful actions they are all equals No obligation can arise but where there is a primary justice to fix it to and we see in this every thing that prevails never disputes right and the reason is because the whole is unlawful And I present this to Mr. Baxter's reason as it is visible to his observation to shew him that such a kind of War can be wicked but cannot find a Justice to govern it and his first of rebelling with caution and condition was a meer fiction His next is a Narrative only Object In that it was known that the Army was quite altered not only by a new modelling but by an intestine Jesuitical corrupting of multitudes of Souldiers before this odious Fact could be done And it was known that the corrupted part of the Army though the fewer did so excel the rest in Industry and Activity that thereby they hindred their Opposition And it is known that the Jesuited party that afterwards so many of them turned Levellers did draw unto them the Anabaptists Libertines and other Sects upon a Conjunction of Interests and by many sly pretences especially tying all together by the predicated Liberty for all Religions And yet after this the World knows they were fain before they could accomplish it to master the City of London to master the Parliament to imprison and cast out the Members and to retain but a few that were partly of their mind and partly seduced or over-awed by them to joyn with them in the work Answ It is incident alwayes that when a King's Power is dissolved all Wickedness and all manner of Factions and Divisions do grow up in the place of it for want of that Power to retain them and their own guilt still driving them on and being all equals in wickedness these are so natural Causes as I wonder any one can dispute them They ly all in the first Cause of taking away the King's Power all the rest results out of it And they themselvs had proceeded so far as to all Deprivations of the King and all manner of Imputations and Proscriptions as guilty of all the evill of the War setling him in the condition of a Traytor being King kept him in custody after they had bought him of the Scots and not enduring him to terms till the last when it was too late I grant his party would not have had the King bin killed A poor reserve when he is made incapable of any other condition If the People did but know what it were to subdue their King and deprive him of his Power they would never dispute terms of disposing him It is the same thing as killing it stays but the acting And this servs to all he says of this kind And let me insert this though I consent wholly to his Narrative that it is very ordinary and
natural when a party acts in a joynt wickedness and cruelty and after grow into difference the less able party will ever dislike what the other go thorow with to act and pretend to a greater Justice and Moderation when it is acted by others and out of their Power but more of this in the following Object It is known that before they were put out and imprisoned by the Army the Commons voted the King's Concessions in the Treaty to be so far satisfactory as that they would have proceeded on them towards a full agreement See Mr. Prin's large Speech in the house to that end And if they had not suddenly been secluded and imprisoned they had agreed with the King Answ This was when they had no other Interest left them but that of the King 's which they had laid by and trampled upon perpetually till now they must lose all unless they held by that How endless and insatiate were they in exercising their own greatness upon the King's weakness the People perpetually defrauded of the Accommodation by them thirsted after Never any thing satisfactory though they had all and playing with this their own fortune and most delectable greatness too long at length as all new excessive things are incident to change the accidents by him mentioned fell in amongst themselves and they were voting conclusions with the King just the instant before they brake Some secluded some made Prisoners some to avoid worse fled out of the Land It is the mis-fortune and condition of Tyrants to be subject to their own Power and Slaves to it An Army especially that servs but to Subjects against their Soveraign will though humble and obedient at first as all such things are grow insolent as to equals treat conditions and have other Interests It is like a hand-Wolf that though he will be played with for a time yet his Keepers and Masters are Subject to be torn in pieces by him upon the change of his humour Such was this their Army a hand-Wolf too long played with till it grew to know its own strength and to consider that all Rights were alike against the King and amongst the People And then for the Nature of the Agreement with the King It was that for some time he should have been without his Power and all agreements with a King that vest him not in his Power are nothing at all in consideration to a King for a future restoring or for security against the present Power they are things that cannot be and any intervening time would have raised new accidents from so great an impending cause the greatest in the World beyond and above all conditions and not being can have no assurance of future being I call to mind a Passage in a Book called A Plea for Parliaments supposed to be written by Sir Walter Rawley that it was moved in Parliament in Queen Maryes time that if she should dy leaving Issue King Philip the Father and now Matrimonial King should hold the Kingdom till the Issue came of Age to govern and strong bonds should be given for the Surrender And a certain Lord none of the wisest saith the story who had sate silent during the whole Debate at last boulted out this Question Who should sue those bonds against the King They were all presently surprized and so it fell not a word more of it As much as to say An absolute Power in possession is above all Condition Object One thing I shall call him back to that is saying That Multitudes who are now firm and loyall to the present Power supposing it to be set over us by God and therefore would abhor the like practices against them do yet detest that Fact that intervened and made way to it Answ I would desire to be satisfied how Mr. Baxter can reconcile his Divinity This Power set over us by God therefore not to act against it The King's Power either not in his sense set over us by God or else why did he act against it If he say to reform it then why not this Are all things so satisfactory to him in this as needs no Reformation The other Power of the King 's peradventure in his sense was not set over us by God But how this is I would desire him to distinguish and when and where he would make a stop to man's acting I should be very glad that the World were satisfied with it that Supream Power should be unquestionable I would trust God and Man and humane casual events with my share out of it because I see pretended Reformations never countervail the mischief of Rebellions But in the mean time I desire him to distinguish betwixt these two Interests why he is indulgent to this now and so much an Actor and Engineer imploying his Divinity Learning and Passion against the old Let me still hold him to this his own ground Set over us by God Whether he means of God's general Providence as the great Governour of the World and so assigning Governours subordinate or else that he means it in special to this out of his fancy or favour to it I would have him distinguish and I am prepared for him with a further inquiry But in the mean time because I know not my future opportunities I shall further trouble him I suppose he will not otherwise call or account it Set over us by God then as all other wicked things come to pass as this did through the blood and death of the King which intervening cause he denotes detestable Now what obligation extraordinary and which the former Government did not this throws upon man is my Inquiry Where shall man's Wisdom act or rest This done by man and why may not man undo his own Work Is there a Fate upon him in one Action more than in another if Reason doth nor state a difference Is his Divinity otherwise intelligible to him than by his Reason Does he act freely in some things and not in all Are some things of God and not all things If he will say the being of Kings and Supream Governours should oblige an unquestionable Obedience let him answer then for destroying the former Is a less Attribute due to a rightful King than to his Destroyer His intended Reformation by a War intended no less than destroying his Power to resist Besides it will be very hard for him even in his own sense to determine betwixt a true King driven or kept out and a King in Fact and by Usurpation and King-killing which should draw to it the Right and Obligation of Conscience and likewise hard for him to resolve when the new is so settled the other in being though out of possessing as to make Obedience entire Therefore surely it were best God were left out who in these our miserable times hath been made a Stale and a Colour for all the cruelties men have committed Certainly Divinity in understanding the Will of God admits of some distinction betwixt things done
was customary with the Jews to pray for the King which being practicall in Gods Worship was more then Precept Against thee thee only have I sinned Psal 51.4 That is None to judg the Kings sin but God He might be evil but the offence was only to God The offence respected the Judg of it which is God only Curse not the King no not in thy thought Eccl. 10. ver 20. This not thinking is a restraint of all evill since all evill is a first thinking evill so as this is an universal prohibition My Son fear thou the Lord and the King and meddle not with the seditious for their destruction shall rise suddenly Prov. 24. ver 21. This proves the natural dependency of it The fear of the King on the fear of God then it goes to the reason of it fear the King not to rebel against him I will conclude it with that of David cautionary to his own Soul Who can lay his hand on the Lords Annointed and be guiltless 1 Sam. 26. ver 9. A full definitive sentence in the Case that no violence can be offered to a Kings person And that this was general to all Kings see the consent of all Scriptures Let every Soul be subject to the Higher Powers for there is no Power but of God and the Powers that be are ordained of God and whosoever resisteth the Power resisteth the Ordinance of God and they that resist receive to themselves damnation Rom. 13. Now that all these Powers doth properly intend a King the words following are For Princes are not to be feared for good works but for evill And then after in the singular number He is the Minister of God and he beareth not the Sword for nought Now this Text as it makes subjection absolute so it takes away all parity of Powers it intends one Supream And Powers in the nature of it is but one Power for all subordinate Powers flow out of it and refer to it 1 Tim. 2. Exhort therefore that first of all Supplications Prayers intercessions and giving of thanks be made for all men for Kings and all that are in Authority that we may live a peaceable life in all Godlinesse and honesty for that is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour This present Emperour was a Tyrant Claudius Nero which stops all objection from the Kings mis-using his Authority it looks to the good of Government in general and to the evil in general of resisting to Government 1 Pet. 2.13 Submit your selves to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake whether unto Kings as Supream or unto Governors as unto them that are sent of him Here all Government is included in the King sent of him that is out of him and acts by him And submission to Government here is made essential to Godliness 1 Pet. 2.17 Fear God Honour the King Making them connaturals and that the fear of God cannot consist with dishonouring the King the word Honour includes all subjection in it Having taken forth these Scriptures thus clearly and considered all the united force of them for preservation of Kings and for all Allegiance and fidelity to them I reason thus as to Mr. Baxter and his Case that the very force of Scripture and Word of God will not permit any such thing to be as a lawfulness of killing or judging a King or that possibly Law or Authority amongst men should be repugnant to the voice of God being general and universal for obedience to Kings and not to offer violence to them To acknowledg as he needs must that the Scripture commands such things of Kings But we have a Parliament a thing made out of the people that may lawfully condemn and execute the King This is a meer contradiction to God himself no pretence of man can dissolve the universal Will of God declared without exception for a King he is and no distinction can frustrate the will and command of God for so it should be subject to a lye if it should come under man And then to consider that truths stated in Moral duties never lose their natures but are ever the same And now I am loath yet to part with these Scriptures till I have made a full claim to the sense of them howsoever Mr. Baxter deal with them afterwards Let every Soul be subject c. which is to the King which I have proved and the Text shews it Is it not exclusive of any power to be against the King Every Soul the word hath a strange emphasis in it every Soul that is bringing it to a singularity and nearest distinction of man by his Soul which is most himself and wherein he acts his subjection and so precisely and individually every containing all Then to fear the Lord and the King that is both as one the condition of the one implying the other Then forbidding to joyn with seditious or such as are given to Change which directly points out Rebellion And then the case of very Tyrants commanding supplications to God for them shewing directly the nature of Supream Governours to be born by the people whatsoever their condition be And then setting forth all Government of subordinates to be but the Kings Government virtually in him nothing of themselves perse And then Curse not the King admit not an evil thought of him pray for him still so many steps to his preservation keeping all harm or hurt far off him must needs intend the greatest of not destroying him Then to call them Gods an exemption from all humane Tribunalls above the condition of mankind subject to God onely as Supream Governours cannot in nature be other and then generally submission to them for the Lords sake that is to say Gods Service included in it Now if out of all this we cannot make a construction that Kings ought not to be destroyed by the People or by any sort or calling of them under any Form Guise or pretence whatsoever then nothing can be conclusive to man If after all this there be any thing for Mr. Baxter to pretend to and not utterly give up his cause he must make the King of England to be such a thing as not to be within the intendment of these Scriptures Not a King not a Supream Governour not so qualified or to be so obeyed or acknowledged a thing meerly nominal and conditional under some other Supremacy and subject to a forfeiture of himself That this was so at his beginning and admitting that time and succession hath given him no other right since that all this proves it self so to be That the Parliamentary was the onely Primary right and only natural and National and Kings their Servants and Trustees and accomptable And that the Government so began when no King was and his being still under a condition and the condition no less then to be subject to a lawful destroying Power If all this were which is as far from truth
Powers of the Common-Wealth not above them for so presently they should perish having no power absolute to defend them so as we see directly it must be one or other either Subordination or Supremacy entire That must needs be a strange Government where the Soveraignty is divided and lying in divers Powers when they differ the people distracted in their obedience not knowing where to obey to but made to follow the lusts appetites and injustice of either party as it gains power and not certain to retain it Therefore there is a Law amongst our Statute Laws of England H. 7.11 y. C. 1. That the subject shall be secured to fight for the King in being This meerly from this reason of avoiding the mischief the Subject is put to by a divided commanding Power this Law though a gross one and against truth many times because Usurpers did possess the Throne yet for this reason preferred and not yet destroyed though the Sword was too hard for it as for all things else It is to be observed that there is no Government without a mixture which makes Rights in the People God himself doth not govern the World otherwise so but that he gives the People Laws both for their direction and conviction for it is in some sense that the Law makes the offence and besides otherwise all must flow from the King as Water continually renewed out of its Fountain and the People not know whom to obey nor subordinates how to act so as mixture in the Government makes no Argument it being of necessity to all Governments And as for taking up Arms and fighting for their Rights Right and right of defending holds not against Government absolutely His next Object If a Prince engage either hired Strangers or Fugitives or home-bred Delinquents or others to rise up against the Senate or People either it is lawful to defend themselvs by Arms or not if not especially if they have a share in the Soveraignty then is his Power absolute and unlimited and neither Laws or any thing below are any security against his Will to the common safety Answ The Ages that follow shall be very little beholden to Mr. Baxter to let them know the true state of a business of the highest and most horrid importance that ever befell England far excelling in accursedness the intestine War betwixt the two Houses of York and Lancaster because it hath destroyed our Form of Government and all Title to Govern which is an unhappiness upon a People above all evill whatsoever Usurpation being a continued source of evil I admire he can be so little serious in it This of his seems no more then that the King raiseth wicked Forces to destroy the Parliament and a Question meerly Whether or no they should defend themselvs There is a great Narrative and Historical part belongs to this to set it forth But it was not my end but only so far as to answer his and no farther In the first place the Parliament made alliance with the Scots disbanded the English Army to work their end upon the King The King was taken in a Toyl of his own making calling a Parliament the Scottish Army being in England and now both Interests clasped him that he had no means left him to get out of it but to break thorow it by force which he despaired of They draw up a Remonstrance to the three Nations to shame the King to the People and make him odious not the accidents of Government but are put upon the King's score as if any Government could be without faults and as if we should have been so much happier under them under whom we have found the little finger heavier than the Loyns of Kings and their whippings Scorpions to the other's Rods an Instance taken from Scripture and often applyed but never truer than in this of our condition and suffering under them The Parliament once in ruine was inevitable upon the King never after was any wisdom or means useful to him preservation is not always in our own Power we have but the offer of it which neglected or omitted commonly the means turns to another Interest and cannot be regained The King did now too late strive by all manner of concessions and compliance yet nothing would divert destructin that did fix upon him like the poysoned Shirt prepared by Dejanira for Hercules which once on though he did strive to tear it from him yet to no purpose the venom and poyson and fiery quality of it did penetrate into great Hercules and consume him The truth is the King was dispossessed before he durst appear in opposition all his Forces by Sea and Land City of London Hull and Port-Towns engaged against him his own Ordnance and Arms to fight against him He had nothing but the Interest of a King and the pity of those few that did compassionate him the People generally poysoned to raise up any party for him and fighting was but his meer necessity for as he said himself he was sure to be the loser because he had nothing but his own to oppose to in his own Kingdom and his own People his Enemies Yet further no Concessions would serve and Concessions were his fault and misfortune too it comes to be the case of the King not to be trusted and so the dispute grew upon the Militia a word introduced commonly treated as if an ordinary thing no less in it self than the being of a King who should have the Power I may very well give it off here because the case came to be Whether King or no King This being somewhat of the active part I shall speak now to the speculative part of his Objection That if a Prince engage either hired Strangers or Fugitives or home-bred Delinquents or others to rise up against the Senate or People either it is lawful to defend themselves by Arms or not if not especially if they have a share in the Soveraignty then saith he is the King's Power absolute and unlimited and neither Laws or any thing below are any security against his Will to the common safety Now in Answer to this first it supposeth a Case that never can be as a King to raise Forces to destroy his People or any party of them it can never be the case that is for a King to War upon his People in condition of Subjection therefore it is ever the People's War resisting the King in his governing Power It may be a case that the Parliament will not dissolve but defend themselvs by force and this is a making War upon the King Now this being directly the Nature of a War betwixt King and Subjects all the pretences to a defence are taken off and the Question comes simply to be Whether for other respects about the Government any party out of the King may raise War This must of necessity be resolved in the Negative because it is not possible to fancy governing power with a power in the
King and Parliament and all their Vows and Protestations but as so many charms only to destroy the King because by other means they could not delude the people and now he confesses it concludes and consents to the reason of it that an exasperated King is never to be trusted again with his power over those that subdued him by this he destroyes his Covenant his Cause and the whole onely that served then and this now To drive this further because Mr. Baxter declares himself so in it as he can have no retreat out of it First fight their King subdue him be Victorious upon him make him Captive then kill him according to the Kings own sense and saying when he was in that condition That there were but few steps betwixt the Prisons and the Graves of Princes Now Mr. Baxter makes it his very Argument for the death of the King and so involves his whole Cause and Party in it has destroyed all difference and distinction and makes the death of the King natural and consequential to the first of warring upon him We see here how naturally falshoods betray themselves out of their own Arguments I shall not pass by the insolency and impropriety of his saying Conquered the King If Mr. Baxter were skilled in the Laws of England which is out of his Element he would know that there can be no such thing as a Conquest of Subjects over their King it is desertion or Treason not Conquest If he consult but nature it will tell him that that which is the proper strength existency and being of any thing cannot be said to conquer it no more then any thing can be said to conquer it self the being ceases to be if the essentiall do but divide from it Cook 3. Inst p. 12. Nay the voice and reason of our Laws would never call them Enemies but Traytors Enemies implyes a kind of equalls He sayes Object It was the Judgment of the Parliament upon the division Answ Upon their division their dividing from the King their Judgment was nothing but as private persons or wicked enemies all Subordination depends so upon its first Cause as dividing from that the beeing ceases to be In the next you shall observe Mr. Baxter over-rule Scripture to his own sense as he hath dealt in Politicks Object And that those that did resist the Higher Powers set over them by God are guilty of the damnation of resisters Answ This of Higher Powers here in Mr. Baxters meaning is of those that raised the War against the King that they were the Higher Powers not to be resisted Now I have not met with a greater violation of Scripture then this to make it a meer contrary to its self and destructive to the end it serves to not only indirectly but oppositely This Scripture proceeds from the Spirit of God directly for preservation of Kings and Mr. Baxter applyes it to the Kings destroyers makeing them the meer object of it in the act of destroying the King I have driven it thus home to fix it upon observation what a strange degree of falsifying and abusing Scripture in it and the horridness of the example and consequence of falsifying grounds and rules by which truths should be measured and creating false conceptions which are seeds of all wicked actions Now to clear out this more fully and directly past exception there is not one word or syllable in Scripture Doctrinally of any Power or Authorities since God Governed by his Prophets but still generally the intendment is of Kings and no other Form of Government owned in Scripture or ever intended that being only natural all Power consisting in unity of Power and evermore the Powers are intended as part of the Kings Power for there is no fraction in Government supposing it a Government so as all Power is ever but the Power of the chief Power So many signalls upon Kings and Guards for their fence and safety because if the head fail all the parts and dependency of the people must needs dissolve And here I shall take up again his words no more to be trusted with Government A Speech of great scorn and contempt upon Kings to make them the people's Servants and at their dispose to turn off when they will and to destroy and deriving no higher then out of the Peoples trust their beeing still but a depending beeing nothing being higher in nature then its first Cause and upon this basis they plant their Engine for pulling down debasing Kings and casting them into their Graves It is good therefore to see the relation that Kings have For so much as we see immediate of God in it which is not ordinarily in the things of the World but limited to the chosen people and when he appeared by his Prophets then most manifestly the Kings or at least the first Kings which shews the nature of it and right of it in all was from God leaving out the people at all in it to have any share in it All this legible in Saul David Solomon and in the removes of Kings by Gods special denunciation and sending by his Prophets The people the Executioners in some cases and circumstances so as there is no footstep or mark from God of the Peoples title over Kings or their making them or giveing them their power This in God special and appearing proves in all shews the nature of it for that which we see was done and of God and freely done and at first when no accident had been so as it was a meer promulgation out of nature and proper to the nature of it must needs be held certain to it and most reasonable to conceive of it Corresponding to these are the Texts Rom. 13.1 There is no Power but of God the Powers that be are ordained of God this referring to Kings for the words are after For Princes are not to be feared for good works but for evill and he is the Minister of God Power as Power is properly of God who is the Power â— Chr. 1.9 11. Thou hast made me a King over a People That thou mayest Judg the People over whom I have made thee King â— Sam. 16. â—er 1. I have provided me a King still pointing out his End and his Author The Texts are many more and clear it beyond all doubt or objection of man that Kings as Kings are Gods Creatures and derive not lower then from God himself as immediate to him Now because this was of the Jews a peculiar people to God we will see what evidence the Scripture yields in case of Heathen Kings Nebuchadnezzar an Heathen and Idolater was owned by God as his Servant Jer. 25.9 Nebuchadnezzar my servant Isa 45.1 And thus said the Lord to Cyrus his annointed Which is the highest emblem of Soveraignty annointing attributed to Cyrus as King that is that he had it vertually as King Ezr. 1.2 And Cyrus King of Persia The Lord God of Heaven hath
given me the Kingdomes of the Earth And Daniel most full the Pattent of the King as extensive to all Creatures and Powers under him Dan. 1. ver 37 38. The God of Heaven hath given thee a Kingdom Power and Strength and Glory and in all places where the Children of men dwell the Beasts of the field and the Fowls of the Heaven has he given into thy hand and hath made thee Ruler over them all An Illustration of Gods dominion over all Creatures and acting by Kings his immediate Vice-gerents to the end of the 5th chapter of Daniel being nothing else then Gods clayming his Title over Kings as derivative from God and accountable to him Now all this is from the great end in nature that Kings being to rule the people which is Gods proper Office and Attribute all Power and all Dominion and all Providence being his they represent God and are his Image and Effigies in Ruling and Governing and this makes their dependance to be meerly of God and not accountable to any Power under God The nature of it is shewed in that of Saul as being the first King to the Jews and being the institutive of it comprehends the nature of it The person was meerly of Gods choice not left to the people nor any power left in them much less over the King In that day shall they cry unto the Lord sayes the Text That is 1 Sam. 8.18 no power to be against the Kings Power but an appeal only to an higher Power that is to God himself his Author and Founder they might complain of him that was set over them but had not any Authority of their own over him And this makes it in its nature to be the greatest trust in the World because there is no remedy against it contrary to Mr. Baxter's sense abusing the Term making Trust subject The reason of this absolute subjection of the People to Government lyes in the nature of it that no medium can be found betwixt power of Governing and liberty in the people as not Governed to be subject only to the good of Government is no Government at all or to be subject at all therefore of meer force from its nature it leaves nothing in the wills of the people so as no such mean or half being of it can be by any constitution provision or Policy whatsoever when it comes to Govern all those things though part of the Government yet come under the governing Power Now for the Originals of Ruling Powers ordinarily amongst men as to the persons ruling in such a Line and Succession we shall find it to be still from a first Power before it came to Governing Power the one introductive of the other for Power is its matter and nature for we see all Government is Power and the Power will govern Therefore equivocally the terms and names are used sometimes calling it the Government and sometimes the Power so as it is the same and signifies the same thing inseperables in nature Government and Power no remove can be in it for where the Power is there the Government will go along with it Hence it is that there is never any discontinuance in governing Power over the people In the most confused tumultuous War and distraction that ever was yet there is power still somewhere or other that contains the peoples liberty and subjects them so as there is not one moment or minute of time in the World where society and community of man is that there is any vacuum of Power to be over them and although powers devest one another yet the Series of governing Power is still continued and in all such removes of the Powers yet the Power never falls but is kept alwayes up and is in some still and is as inseperable from the People as the matter and the Form which never are asunder For that which we call Power out of the People it is not the people but a Power acting upon the People and in such a circumstance of it if it become too powerful for the Government then it becomes the Government it self Now having shewed thus the nature of it it destroyes all those imaginary Theaters that they would erect and build popular liberty upon and popular right over Kings They would fancy governing Power to be of the wills of the people and the people the Author so impossible an assertion as I only leave it upon what I have stated and how contradictory it is to nature in all consideration of it so as still the people is but the subject matter of Government never the Author of it nor does Government ever come below the people in the cause of it but must derive out of its own cause which is power to be above the people and so in all end and acting of it All this is still to explode that Monstrous conceit of the peoples instituting the Government or more Monstrous consequence of it the people as the first cause of it to dispose of it and destroy it It is observable in Government that Laws and Liberties come afterward to the people after power of the Government it self In the Norman Conquest all lay flatted some time under it till afterward as the Reporters of those times tell us that the party of the Conqueror or their Posterity did revive the English Liberties first the Conqueror's absolute will served them to expel and dispossess the Natives and after they were glad of establishments in Government to assure their own condition and what they had gained So as hereby we see Governments the farther they go on from their beginnings the more they take in of composition to their first single Nature so as still the Originals of Government are most absolute Hence it is manifest that Power is their Fountain and first cause as such is their Natures and the People's Freedom still is under Government and when Government is most confused then is their Freedom least so as still Power is over them and are alwayes subject to it let the Form of it be what it will To consider it in common Reason and Understanding the King took his Being from the People's Trust in Mr. Baxter's sense therfore the People are to dispose of him This were for the People not to be governed for then the Right were in the People and the King betrayed to govern under another Authority to make it accomptable Therefore this supposeth a Monster in nature and it would evermore make Government destructive to it self for then it doth not govern for where the end and ultimate of Power is there the Government is I shall insert something that is legal in this pertinent to the Case of the King of England how he comes to be King Sir Edward Coke that was a man popular enough in his third part of his Institutes pag. 7. saith That there is no such thing of the Kingly Being in England as an Inter-Regnum nor any Act confers to the making
of the King but instantly by the descent of the Crown to the right Heir he is King This his and more there exprest And indeed no worldly Power can dispose alien or transfer the right of the Crown King Edward the sixth before his death would have setled the Crown upon his nearest Kinswoman the Lady Jane Gray Wife to the Lord Dudly his Sister Mary being of the Roman Church and the Council and Peers swore to this in his presence and he dyed Now what the effect Only to make them all Traytors and no other right in it Parliaments have declared for Titles but never can make any nor deprive Right It is true divers Usurpers have had Parliament Test for their Warrant for those have most need of it but still it was acted under power enforcing and so it was nothing but mearly so long as the Power lasted Usurpation doth not come into possession without power and it draggs Parliaments after it and deprives all reality but meer Hypocrisy in all that is acted or pretended to by Parliament or People I have no more now to consider of than of the Right of Kings having spoken of their Original Cause Power c. Now this first is generally from the great end of it that is Government which as Government is ever good good as Government though it may be an evil Government nor can any failings in the particularities so over-rule the common good of it but still it hath good of Government in it But this comes not to the Question of Right in the person which we are to inquire Certainly it cannot be Conquest which is only a great Riot and multiplying of Rapines and Man-slaughters it is all Wickedness which is only distinguished from common wickedness as it transcends all other actings of wickedness and such is the nature of Conquest by excess of wicedness to make it self above offending and punishment Then it cannot be in submission of the People to it being first conquered still before they consent and if they partly resist and gain conditions yet it is in respect of the power which is cause of all the following of what nature soever it be And it is not possible that any one can receive a Right from his doing wrong Some suppose upon the future settlement and equability of the Government established Title may result yet still all this is after the power and cannot imply in any kind a not Being of it being first supposed absolute at least not their condition to resist it Besides in the Case of a former Right the Peoples consent cannot evacuate a right in the former Prince outed or his posterity Now that it appears directly that none of these things make right or are of any force to it it is cleared by this that if the outed Prince can recover and regain Power these things vanish as unlawful and as wicked consentings and compliance and so long as the old Right can possibly retain its self in memory add but power to it and it is ever unquestionable One instance with us in England of sixty years discontinuance yet when it recovered power to act all the Usurpation went for nothing and the old came in as Right not as Conquest Where yet shall we find it Nothing but the Old extinguishing by long continuance of the latter and that becoming natural and consent goes with Nature so hard it is to the Titles of Princes and so precious to the People to retain them and so dangerous to lose them And all the Intervals filled and taken up with the uncertainty of Government and all the accidents that attend want of Title Therefore since only time and long time makes unquestionable Right to Princes it is of all Rights or Titles the hardest to be attained to and must be most absolute since nothing but User can give in its Authority therefore it is most unquestionable venerable unchangable independent of any other Cause and so under no other power and never falls but with the ruine of the People And this is a high perfection of Kingly Government since no other Form of Government can have this precious thing Title in it that is Right in the Person which is the Cement of Government and half the means of it and consent goes along with it whereby all the People act subordinately and this makes it easy and without force because of this tacite consent of the People to it for all operation of the Soul is but consent consent is the genius of the Government by which it acts and all the People and all common Interest doth center in the Right of it and find their rest And now I have done with the Argument I have only something of Observation from the natural effects of Rebellion and destroying rightful Government as we see it in ours Now the Work is done and all in the Power of the destroyers What comes of it Two very natural and great effects the one is Wickedness all manner of wickedness impieties false Religions Cruelty of manners and actings multiplicity of Tyrants having destroyed the great Tyrant-Government under a King as they called it all persons that get Power act as Tyrants Multitude of Tyrants out of the People themselves acting wickedly in all parts Cities and Towns where most Interest of the People lies strange Principles in profession and opinion and despising rancks and degrees of persons and of Kings and Supreams and bringing all into a contempt and baseness against order of nature and nature of Government which consists in difference and degrees and subordination To follow this subject of our present condition what a Monster England is become no such Copy of it in the World It must be all written and taken out of it self the strange infinite forms of Wickedness both in Faith and manners base horrible Conceptions monstrous Notions all hatched and have their production from the putrified matter of standing in condition of Rebellion and loosed from the rightful governing Power and running loose into parties and into their own sense having cast off the right Power which keeps to Order and Unity all Order and Unity being the effect of Government and the Monstrousness and Infiniteness that enters in the vacancy or deficiency of it for Errors in their nature are infinite whereas all true Beings have but their natural proportions and definitions The other is unsettledness which is the Curse of Usurpation and of destroying rightful Government that it cannot resolve it self into any thing of certainty or Being to the People under the power of it As we see these persons to perpetuate their Wickedness can make nothing of it The King 's Right and the wrong they do doth shine out of darkness it self out of that rubbish of confusion and destruction they would bury it under We see they can make nothing of all the Power having the whole it being the King's Power and the King 's Right they are confounded with it do but toss and tumble this Power over and over it can no where settle to make a Government but monstrous violence grows out of it and this is all they can create from it which doth admirably confirm the King 's right and that only in that doth consist the People's Interest and what a strange spirit and principle is in it that though troden down and debased reviled scandalized and kept out yet it riseth against all Power not in nature left or possible to make a settlement or Justice or Safety to the People without it the People undone by the usurping it so dangerous is a King 's Right when devested and displaced and so precious to preserve in its true place My last I will conclude withal which may reflect upon the whole is that I conceive the best way of calling Parliaments is frequently and never by necessity for when a King hath most need it proves most dangerous therefore it is never to be used as the last remedy Kings ought to have something in reserve to help them off that again if it grow averse and incline to danger And it was the total ruine of the King that he was so much a loser before he came to play this Game When all was distempered and disordered round about the out-Nations up in Arms and the home-People poysoned discontented then he calls a Parliament when no thing totally and mainly could have destroyed him but that for every grievance and every misery and every distress of the King 's served them for matter against the King and so turned the cause of putting himself upon them for help to be the means of their depressing him and destroying him It is like that our Saviour saith putting a new piece of Cloth into an old Garment it makes the rent worse so all the parts so fear and unsound as nothing to bear the searching severe remedy of a Parliament and apt to grow wicked with their Power FINIS