nor has no being but amongst sinfull men so even amongst men it is not without its defects and inconveniences We must not expect more then a mixture of good and evill in it and if we will refuse the burden of it we must withall deny the benefit of it Nulla lex satis commodo est saith Cato id modo quaeritur si majori parti in summa prodest Wherefore it is now sufficiently apparent that order does more naturally refer to God as its Author then Jurisdiction does and that it also conveyes nothing in speciall to Kings inasmuch as the benefit of it is generall and extends to families as well as States and to popular States as well as Monarchies As to government also we must in the next place observe three things therein very distinguishable The constitution of power in generall must be sever'd from the limitation of it to this or that form and the form also must be sever'd from the designation of it to this or that person The constitution or ordinance of Jurisdiction we doe acknowledge to contain {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} but this excludes not {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} it may be both respectively and neither simply and St. Peter seems to affirm as much of the humanitie as St. Paul does of the divinitie of the constitution In Matrimony there is something divine the Papist makes it sacramentall beyond royall inauguration but is this any ground to infer that there is no humane consent or concurrence in it does the divine institution of marriage take away freedome of choice before or conclude either party under an absolute degree of subjection after the solemnization is there not in conjugall Jurisdiction notwithstanding the divine establishment of it a strange kind of mixture and coordination and may not the Spouse plead that divine right as much for a sweet equality as the husband does for a rigorous inequalitie Inferior matrona suo sit blanda marito Non alitèr fuerit foemina virque pares There may be a parity even in the disparity of the matrimoniall bond and these two contraries are so farre from being made contrary by any plea of divine institution that nothing else could reconcile them And if men for whose sakes women were created shall not lay hold upon the divine right of wedlock to the disadvantage of women much lesse shall Princes who were created for the peoples sake chalenge any thing from the sanctity of their offices that may derogate from the people Besides even government it self in the very constitution of it is so farre from being injoyned as divine upon any persons not before ingaged by their own or their Ancestors consent or from being necessitated by any precept or president in Scripture that we rather see an instance of the contrary in the story of Lot and Abraham Certainly there was in nature some majority or precedence due either from Lot to Abraham or from Abraham to Lot for the rules of order are no wayes failing and yet we see this is no sufficient inforcement to subject either of these Patriarks to the others jurisdiction When discords arose amongst their servants they might have been qualified and repressed by a friendly association and either one or both joyntly or by course might have had the oyer and terminer thereof Yet so it was that they rather resolved upon a dissociation and this could not but have been a great sin against the divine right of Government if any such had been originally imprinted in Nature or delivered by command from God as of more value then common liberty T is true it proved afterwards fatall to Lot that he did disjoyne from Abraham and it had been farre more politick and advantagious for both of them perhaps if they had incorporated one with another but the question is not whether it was prejudiciall or no to esteeme the priviledge of an Independent liberty before the many other fruits and advantages of a well framed principalitie but whether it was sin against God or no and a transgression against the constitution of power to pursue that which was most pleasing before that which was likely to prove more commodious I conceive that freedome being in it self good and acceptable to Nature was preferred before Government which was also good and more especially commendable but God had left the choice indifferent and arbitrarie and therefore there was no scandall or trespasse in the choice I speak not this to unsettle any form of Government already founded and composed nor against the constitution it self or intention of framing associations t is sufficient for my purpose if it be proved that before such foundation or composition every man be left free and not abridged of his own consent or forced by any Law of God to depart from his freedome and I am sure this example of Abraham and Lot does evince thus much unlesse we think good to charge them both as enemies to the politick constitution of power and will needs introduce a perpetuall yoke of authority upon all men whatsoever whether pre-obliged by consent or not which seems to me very uncharitable But enough of this I passe now from the constitution it self to the determination of power to such a line or such a person electively or hereditarily and this also is an act wherein we do not deny Gods ordinary interposition we onely deny that the peoples freedome of choice or consent is at all drowned thereby Gods chusing of Saul particularly is no generall denyall of humane choice we may rather suppose that that coronation was an act of divine providence then of any speciall command For as God remitted the matter to the decision of Lots so it is undoubted that he guided the event of those lots as gently as he guides all other second causes without violenting the nature of them So the Scepter of Judah though it was prophetically intayled upon Davids posterity yet the individuall person or line of that race was not alwayes specified by God The order of primogeniture was broken in Solomon and there was no certain rule left as often as that order was to be altred or inverted to whose choice or discretion it should be left After the Captivity there was also interruption in the lineall course of dissent and by whom the successive right was then convayed is uncertain but in probabilitie either the people or some other humane hand was the pipe of that conveyance We shall not need to prosecute this further our Adversaries do grant us that the election of Princes is not now so extraordinarie and divine as it was amongst the Jews and the Scripture it self is clear that even those Jewish Princes which God pointed out by Lots or anointed by his Prophets were yet establisht and invested by the people And therefore in the first delivery of the Law by Moses before any king was resolved upon by the people God prescribed to them in this
manner Quando statues Regem super te c. when you shall think fit to set or erect a King over you you shall chuse that man whom I shall designe And the same word statuere is divers times elsewhere used in Scripture so that though God did never interpose in any other Nation so eminently about the making of Kings as in Judea yet even there he did commend the person the people did chuse or if he did chuse the people did statuere viz. give force and sanction to the same It remains now that we try what there is of God and what of man in the limitations or mixtures of authority T is a true and old maxime in Law Qui jus suum alienat potest id jus pactis imminuere And hereupon Grotius takes a good difference betwixt imperium and imperii habendi modum and as for the manner or qualification of rule that he accounts so meerly humane that if the King seek to alter it he may be as he acknowledges opposed by the people nay he proceeds further and cites Barclayes authority who was the violentest assertor of absolute Monarchy that ever wrote to prove that Kings may have but a part in the supremacy of power and where they have but such a partiall mixt interest they may not onely be resisted but also deposed for forfeiture in case they invade the other interest The same Author also affirms That States may condition with Kings to have a power of resisting and that the same is a good condition though the Royalty be limited by no other If this be so surely the founding or new erecting of authorities at first and the circumscribing the same after by consent is so farre from being Gods sole immediate act that it is as far as any act can be mans proper and intire act for except we allow that God has left it indifferent to man to form government as he thinks most for his behoof we must needs condemne all forms except one as unlawfull and if we grant indifference t is all one as if we left it to second causes But soft to call Kings saies one loud Royalist derivatives of the people it is to disgrace them and to make them the basest extracts of the basest of rationall creatures the Community If we fix an underived Majestie in the community as in it first seat and receptacle where there is not one of a thousand an intelligent knowing man this is if not blasphemy certainly high treason against God and the King This is Oxford Divinitie God reproves Kings for his anointed peoples sake these reproach the people for Kings sakes These are the miserable Heralds of this unnaturall warre having mouthes as black as their hands are crimson but let the man fall to his Arguments A world of reasons saies he may be brought from Scripture to prove that Kings are independent from all and solely dependent from God But for brevities sake take these 1 To whom can it be more proper to give the rule over men then to him who is the onely King truly and properly of the whole world Answer To none more proper there shall be no quarrell in this provided you will no more except Kings then Subjects from this generall subjection 2 God is the immediate Author of all rule and power amongst all his creatures above or below why then should we seclude him from being the immediate Author of government and empire amongst men Answer We seclude him not We onely question whether he be so the immediate Author of our constitutions as he is of primitive order or whether or no he so extraordinarily intervene in the erecting of Governors or limiting of governments as to strangle second causes and invalidate humane acts 3 Man in his innocence received dominion over the creatures immediately from God and shall we deny that the most noble and excellent government over men it from God or say it is by humane constitution Answer God did not create so vast a distance betwixt man and man as betwixt man and other irrationall creatures and therefore there was not at first the same reason of subjection amongst the one as the other Yet we except nothing against order or a milde subjection amongst men we onely say that such servility as our Adversaries would novv fain patronize in Gods name vvas never introduced by God Nature or any good men 4 They who exercise the judgement of God must needs have their power to judge from God but Kings by themselves and their Deputies exercise their judgement from God Ergo Answer The Prince of Orange or the Duke of Venice may as well plead thus as the King of Spaine or the Emperour of Germany Besides according to this rule Quod quis per alium facit facit per se the State may as truly say it exercises judgement by the King as the King may that he exercises judgement by his inferior Courts Lastly if this be pressed upon supposition that the King is Judge next under God without any dependence from the State it begs the question if it be pressed only to prove that the King ought to be so independent 't is vain and frivolous 5. Kings are the Ministers of God not only as to their Judiciary but as to their Executory power ergo their charge is immediately from God They are called Gods Angells c. So in the Church Preachers are the Embassadors of God and this makes their function immediately divine Answ. The judiciary and executory power flowes from the same source this shall breed no dispute and as for all the glorious attributes of Majesty and irradiations of sanctity and divinity which the scripture frequently applies to Kings First We must know they are not only appropriated to Kings as they are absolute and solely supreame but to all chiefe governours also though bounded by lawes and restrained by coordinate partners Secondly They are many times affixt to Kings not quatenus Kings but quatenus religious and just Kings these sacred expressions applyed to Ahas or Jeroboam doe not sound so tunably as when they point at David or Josiah Thirdly The people and flock of God sometimes communicate in termes of the like nature not only Priests and Prophets were annointed as well as Kings but the whole nation of the Jewes was called holy and dignified with that which the ceremony of unction shadowed only Priests were not Kings nor Kings Priests but the children of God are both Kings and Priests the scripture expresly calls them a royall Priesthood Fourthly That sanctity that divine grandour which is thus shed from above upon Princes for the peoples sake in the judgement of wisemen does not so properly terminate it self in the means as in the end 6. If the grace inabling Kings for their imployment be only from God then consequently the imployment it selfe ergo Answer if God by inspiration did inable all Kings extraordinarily and none other but Kings this were of some force and yet
are more civill more religious more happy then those which are not These things are beyond all doubt and debate The question then is only whether absolute Princes that is such as have no persons to share in power with them nor no lawes to circumscribe their power for them be not as meer servants to the State and as much obliged in point of duty to pursue its publick interest as they are Lords over private persons and predominant over particular interests Many of the authorities before cited make good the affirmative and many more may be alleaged to the same purpose and the rule of finall causes makes it beyond all contradiction that there is a certain service annexed to the office of the most independent Potentate Nefas est sayes Alexander Severus à publico dispensatore prodigi quae Provinciales dederant He contents himselfe with the name of a publick Steward or Treasurer and confesses that hee cannot mispend the common stock intrusted with him without great sinne and injustice Maximus also as was before recited challenged no more in the Empire then a kind of Commission to dispense and administer they are his owne very words the affaires of the Empire with the State And therefore Seneca gives this admonition that the Emperour should make his account non suam esse Rempub. sed se Reipub. And this was that service the very word it selfe is servitus which Tiberius complained to be layed on his shoulders so miserable and burthenous as Sueton. writes in the life of Tiberius It was recorded in commendation also of Nasica that hee preferred his countrey before his owne family and did account no private thing his owne or worthy of his thoughts in comparison of those things which were publickly advantageous ut enim tutela sic procuratio Reipub. ad utilitatem eorum quibus commissi sunt non ad eorum quibus commissa est gerenda est here the office of a Magistrate is a procuration he is taken as a Guardian in Socage and the end of his office is the utility of those which are committed to his trust not his owne To conclude the lawes of the Empire were very full and cleer in this and many more histories might bee brought forth to give more light and strength in the case but there is no need of any If any honest Patriot neverthelesse think fitter to use the name of father then servant I shall not wholly gainsay therein My wish is that subjects may alwayes understand their right but not too rigorously insist upon it neither would I have them in private matters look too much upon their publick capacity Princes also may without indignity to themselves at some times condescend to such acknowledgements of the peoples due as is not so fit to be heard from any mouth but their owne Happy is that King which anticipates his subjects in submitting his own titles and happy are those subjects which anticipate their King in submitting their owne rights and happy are both when both thus comply at the same time Neverthelesse if it may be ever seasonable to urge a verity with strictnesse Princes are not to be called Fathers of their Subjects except taken divisim but are meer servants to the people taken collectim How erronious then are they and how opposite to the end of government which are so far from making Kings servants to the people that they make the people servants to Kings whereas the Lord doth not rule for the profit of his servant but by the profit of his servant compasses his own Servile power is tolerated because it tends to the safety and good of him that is subject to it but as Aristotle holds 3. Pol. c. 4. the master in protecting his servant does not look upon his servants ends herein but his own because the losse of his servant would be a losse to his family Therefore this kind of Authority is not to be indured in a State because it is incompetent with liberty provided onely for slaves and such as have no true direct interest in the State whereas finis justi imperii as Ammianus writes and as has been confirm'd by many other proofs Vtilitas obedientium aestimatur salus But you will say It is more reasonable that Subjects should remain under the condition of servants then he which has authority over those Subjects and is in place far above them I answer That end to which Princes are destin'd viz. the Common good or {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} as one cals or {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} as another cals it or cura salutis aliena as another cals it is so excellent and noble that without the inconvenience of servility they may be servile to it The truth is all things that are in the nature of means and instruments are then most perfect and intire when they are most fit and conducible to accomplish the end for which they are prepared So Aristot. delivers in the 5. Metaphys. and so Averroes and Thomas thereupon T is to quarrell against God and Nature to except against that true and proper end which God and Nature hath design'd to any person or thing The Greeks called excellence {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} from {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and the Romanes called it perfectio because that is perfect or consummate which approaches nearest to its end T is not onely therefore to be said that that is a perfect or intire State wherein the Governor executes all things in order to the Common good but he also is a perfect and intire Governor which bends all his actions to that purpose For if we look up to Almighty God we must needs acknowledge that he is most truly represented and personated by such a Deputy as refers all things to publick Good For God is goodnesse it self and there is nothing more essential to goodnesse then to be diffusive and God has no end of addition or profit to himself in making Heaven or Earth Angels or men Next if we look upon Nations they ever retribute most honour and repay most dutie love and gratitude to such Princes as are most free from particular aymes That Reigne which supports it self by terror is accompanied with hatred and danger but that which found it self upon love is truly majesticall safe and durable For in part the Princes happinesse is involved in his Subjects and he does more partake in their flourishing condition then they in his private advantages If Cicero can say Nistrum dicamus esse quicquid bono principi nascatur the Prince may say as truly Principis est quicquid est omnium Therefore does Aristot. 8. Ethic. c. 10. maintain that Kings do not regard their own particulars but the community of their Subjects because there is a self-sufficiencie and perfection in good Kings whilest they cannot be said to want that which their Subjects have Queen Elizab. by her publick actions doubted not to win
Jus Populi OR A DISCOURSE Wherein clear satisfaction is given as well concerning the Right of SUBIECTS as the Right of PRINCES Shewing how both are consistent and where they border one upon the other AS ALSO What there is Divine and what there is Humane in both and whether is of more value and extent Claudianus ad Honorium Tu Civem Patremque geras tu consule cunctis Non tibi nec tua te moveant sed publica damnae In private matters do a Brothers part In publick be a Father let thy heart Be vast as is thy fortune and extend Beyond thy self unto the Common end Published by Authority LONDON Printed for Robert Bostock dwelling in Pauls Church-yard at the Signe of the King Head 1644. Jus Populi OR A DISCOURSE Wherein clear satisfaction is given as well concerning the right of Subjects as the right of Princes c. THe Observator so he is stiled at Oxford writing against our parasiticall Court-Doctors who think they cannot be meritorious Patrons of Royalty without shewing themselves Anti-patriots or destroyers of publick liberty grounds himself upon these three main Assertions 1 Princes derive their power and prerogatives from the people Secondly Princes have their investitures meerly for the people benefit Thirdly In all well-formed States the Laws by which Princes claim do declare themselves more in favour of liberty then Prerogative Much art force and industry has been used to destroy these fundamentals wherein though the Royalists have not been prevalent in the judgement of wise men yet something must further be replyed for the weaker sort of peoples sake lest multitudes of opponents should sway them and effect that by number which cannot be done by weight Man saies the Apostle was not made of the woman but the woman of man and this is made an argument why the woman should pay a due subjection to man And again Man saies the same Apostle was not created for the woman but the woman for the man this is made an other argument to inforce the same thing There cannot be therefore any to pick rules more properly pressed then these nay without offering some contradiction to the Spirit of God we cannot reject the same form of arguing in the case of a people and their Prince especially when we do not insist onely upon the vertue of the efficient or finall cause but also upon the effect it self and that form of Law which was as it were the product of both Let us now then re-examine these three grounds and seek to give further satisfaction to others by inlarging our Discourse where our adversaries have given a just occasion If we can make it good that Princes were created by the people for the peoples sake and so limited by expresse Laws as that they might not violate the peoples liberty it will naturally follow that though they be singulis majores yet they are universis minores and this being once made good it will remaine undeniable that salus Populi is suprema Lex and that bonum Publicum is that which must give Law and check to all pretences or disputes of Princes whatsoever To make appear thus much let us begin with the origo or first production of Civill Authority 1 The Royalists take a great deal of superfluous pains and quote many texts of Scripture to prove that all powers are from God that Kings are anointed by God and that they are to be obeyed as the vicegerents of God If we did oppose or denie these clear Truths no fraud were to be suspected in those that alledge them but when we do expresse no kind of dissent from them herein and when they have too generall a sense as our dispute now runs we must conclude that there is some secret fraud wrapped up and clouded under the very generality of these asseverations For t is not by us questioned whether powers are from God or no but whether they are so extraordinarily from God as that they have no dependence upon humane consent Neither do we raise any doubt whether or no Kings are anointed by God but whether that unction makes them boundlesse and their Subjects remedilesse or no in all cases whatsoever Neither do we dispute whether Monarchs are Gods deputies or no and so to be observed but whether limited Monarchs and other conditionate mixed Potentates may not chalenge the same priviledge To shew then more ingenuity towards our Antagonists we will be more clear in dividing and distinguishing and we will decline generall expressions as often as just occasion shall require In the first place therefore we desire to take notice that {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} or Potestas is sometimes taken for order sometimes for jurisdiction and these termes alwayes are not to be confusedly used If Adam had not sinned in Paradise order had been sufficient alone without any proper jurisdiction it may well be supposed that government truly so called had been no more necessary amongst men on earth then it is now in Heaven amongst Angels Government is in truth that discipline or method which we exercise in promoting inabling rewarding persons of good desert in the State and whereby we prevent suppresse punish such as are contrarily affected And as government has Laws to guide its proceedings so it is armed with power and commission for putting those Laws in execution It s plain therefore where there is no supposition of sin order will be prevalent enough without formall jurisdiction for as there needs no additionall rules besides those which creation imprinted so there needs no additionall power to attend those Rules If we look up to Heaven we see that preheminence which one Angel has above another is farre different from that command which Princes obtain here on earth over their vassals we apprehend it as an excellence that pertakes of more honour then power and that power which it has appertaining is rather physicall then politicall If we descend also to survey hell we shall find some order observed there too but no proper government used for as Law is uselesse where there is no sin so it is also improper or impossible where there is nothing but sin Wherefore something of primitive order is retained below amongst the damned legions for the conservation of their infernall kingdome but there is little resemblance of our policy in that cursed combination We may then acknowledge that order is of a sublime and celestiall extraction such as nature in its greatest purity did own but subjection or rather servile subjection such as attends humane policy amongst us derives not it self from Nature unlesse we mean corrupted nature Besides in order there is nothing defective nothing excessive it is so universally necessary and purely good that it has a being amongst irrationall creatures and not onely States but even Towns Villages houses depend upon it and as it was existent before sin so it must continue after sin but government as it had no being without sin
is apparent that in the family the power of the Mother does participate with the power of the Father and by its mixture and co-ordination cannot but be some qualification to its rigour Secondly take children before they are of maturity and there needs no other Scepter but a twig to awe them and take them to be of full age and then they spread into families themselves and rise to the same command in their own houses as they were subject to in their fathers It were unjust also that Parents should claime any Jurisdiction to hold their children from marriage or to usurp so over them after marriage as they may not command in the same manner as they are or were themselves commanded Thirdly Nature with a very strong instinct breaks the force of Paternall empire by turning the current of affection rather from the father to the son than from the son to the father it rather makes the father which is the root convey sap to the son which is the branch than on the contrary and therefore the naturall end of the father is not his own good only but his whole families according to Aristotle whereas take him in the notion of a Master and so he regards his own good in the first place and his servants in the second only as it conduces to his Fourthly If Parents had an absolute jurisdiction over their Children even to life and death then Children which in the eye of Policie are sometimes many in number and of more publike value then their Parents might be opprest without all meanes of remedie and this may prove mischievous and unequall and not fit to be referred to Natures intention Fifthly In all Civill Countries where Government is established there are Lawes to over-rule Parents as well as Children and to provide for the safetie of Children as well as Parents And where no Government is yet established there is no president of such jurisdiction Upon the murther of Abel if the right of a Father had intitled Adam to the same power as the right of a Prince useth to doe Adam ought to have arraigned Cain at his Bar and to have required blood for blood But we do not find that Adam did claim any such power or sin in not claiming it We find rather that the whole stock of Mankinde then living were the Judges that Cain feared and there is reason why they should be more competent for such a tryall then the Father himselfe When there were no Kings no Judges in Israel the People by common consent did rise up to vindicate common trespasses and God so required it at their hands But if judgement should be left to Parents only much injustice might be expected from them which is not so much to be feared from the People not yet associated For the offence of the Son is either against the Father or some other If against the Father then is he Judge in his own case and that is dangerous the Father may be partiall to himselfe If against another then the Father is a stranger to the Plaintiffe not to the Defendant and that is more dangerous in regard that partialitie is more to be feared The Paternal right of Adam might better qualifie him for rule whilst he lived only amongst his own descendents than any other pretence could any other particular person amongst his descendents but it did only qualifie not actually constitute and since Adams death none but Noah could pretend to the same qualification The right of Fathers is now in all Fathers equall and if we doe not grant that it is now emerged or made subordinate in all great associated Bodies by that common authoritie which extends over all we must make it incompatible with Common Authoritie 'T is true Bodin is very zealous for Paternall empire and he conceives that the publique Courts of Justice would not be so full of suites if this Domesticall jurisdiction were not too far eclipsed thereby But 't is well answered That Bodin in this doth not aime at the totall cure of Contention in the State his only ambition is to ease the publique Courts and to fill private houses with more vexations and unnaturall contestations The Romane Law was very rigid against Children and Bodin supposes that Law was grounded upon the Law of Nature but we know it never was received in all Nations neither is it now in force almost in any Nation And whereas Bodin appeales to Gods law Deut. 21. we desire no better determination for the very words of the Law there give the definitive sentence to the Elders and the execution to the whole City the Parent hath no part but that of the Witnesse left to him neither indeed can any man be thought more unfit either to judge or to execute nay or to be a spectator of the rebellious executed Son than the Father himselfe Civilitie hath now so far prevailed even in the Imperiall Law it selfe that Parents may not causelesly abdicate or dis-inherit Children nor is that held a good Testament wherein the Sons name is totally omitted Nor if ingratitude or disobedience or any other cause be alleadged against the Son is the Father left solely to his own judgement in that cause We doe allow that Parents are gods to their Children and may challenge great pietie from them and that in nature their offices of kindnesse are of grace and not of duty whereas no office of the child is of grace but of meere duty Yet this destroyes not Law or the interposition of Publique Authoritie The Fathers right in the Son is not so great as is the Countries Cicero saith very well Patria una omnium charitates complectitur The Father therefore must not use his inferior right to the prejudice of a higher Nay the Father is not only restrained by Law from acts of injustice the same being in him more to be detested than in a stranger but he is of duty to perform all such pious offices also as the infirme condition of Children stand in continuall need of And this duty though the Child cannot challenge as proportionable to any merit in him yet the State shall injoyne as necessary and righteous and altogether indispensable Nay suppose our Crown escheated or suppose any body of men not yet associated yet still we maintain the Father not as animal sociatum but only as animal sociale owes a preservation of his Issue for the common good of Mankinde and cannot deny payment of the same without great injustice to humane nature We may conclude then that this Paternall rule being so far divided and limited in point of losse of life libertie or other properties wherein there is a rivaltie or concurrence of a common interest and so far clogged with pious duties and tender respects will be very unapt to lend any testimonie for rigorous boysterous prerogatives in Princes The next kind of Power visible in the World was Fraternall for the Father being dead the eldest Son is supposed by some
warre abroad or some other designe might lawfully be done any opposition of particular Laws or formalities notwithstanding But if the Dictator himself did walk excentrically or contrary to this end he was not exempted from resistance during his terme of command nor from giving an account after the expiration of the same The last thing inquirable into is the date or commencement of this Royall Law and this also is not agreed upon of all sides Arnissaeus will needs referre the time of this Law to Augustus his reigne but his reason is exceeding weak Aliàs enim saies he injusti possessores fuissent tam Augustus quam Tiberius caeteri regnatricis domus sucsessores nec leges ferre novas jure potuissent I shall not stand to answer this I shall rather herein follow Bodin for that he was not onely a grave Statesman but a learned Lawyer also Now in his judgement and if we may credit his reading this royall Law was first passed in Vespasians dayes and he gives some proofs and quotes Authorities for confirmation of the same Besides others he cites Suetonius censuring thus of Caligula Paerum abfuit quin diadema sumeret aec speciem Prinoipatus in regnum converteret Also of Tiberius he censures thus Faedissima servitute Remp. oppressit He cals his reigne meer tyranny and oppression Bodin therefore having defined Princely government to be either a State of Optimacy or Populacy wherein some one has preeminence above all other particular persons and is called Princeps that is Primus He concludes that the Common-wealth of Rome from Augustus and his immediate successors Vsque ad Flavium Vespasianum Principatus dicebatur and he closes all with this that from the battell of Actium the State of Rome was neither popular nor Aristocraticall nor regall but mixt of all By all this we see that our great Irish Prelate when he sends us for St. Pauls meaning to the Romane Empire before Vespasians dayes there to find out what soveraigne power is irresistible He sends us not to regall power more then to Aristocraticall or Democraticall I will therefore put the case stronger against my self and make it my quaere what irresistibility is due to Domitian after his Fathers and Brothers death And here first I may except against the Royall Law it self passed in Vespasians time as not being the compleat voluntary lawfull act both of Patritians and Plebeians For besides that the Senate had been now long over-awed and corrupted many wayes by the acts of the Court we know the Tributa Comitia are also totally depraved and evirtuated by being called out of the field into the palace insomuch that all liberty of choice and suffrage is lost to that great convention and it is now turned into a ridiculous solemnity Wherefore when Nero was to be deposed and all his barbarous acts of inhumanity to be accounted for no plebiscitum could bee obtained an act of the Senate only was past to declare him an enemy of mankind But I shall not insist upon this I shall grant the royall law to be a good law and enacted in a full assembly of both the States yet still I shall maintaine that the law-makers did not passe any thing to Vespatian or his successors but only in order to the publick good and safety nor did they grant away their owne original right and power in themselves by granting a fiduciary use and administration of that right and power to the Emperors The whole body of the law will furnish testimonies to this purpose that the Emperour is not proprietary of his subjects or hath any interest at all in them to his own use meerely Give me leave to frame a case upon supposition Conceive that the major part of the Patritiaens and Plebeians all over the Roman Empire are converted to the faith of Christ conceive that Domitian whose claime is by the law past to his Father hates Christianity and being incited by his South-saying Priests his Concubines and parasiticall Libertines to eradicate true Religion and inrich himselfe by the great spoyle of the professors thereof sets up such an idol and makes such an edict for the generall adoration thereof as the Persian Monarch once did Conceive that the Christians both Senators and Plebeians petition for their lives but are rejected and seeing a number of Assasins armed ready to rush upon them betake themselves to their defence and rely upon forcible resistance Conceive further that they first acquaint Domitian with their resolutions and thus publish the justice thereof May it please your sacred imperiall Majesty the peaceable and gentle principles of our pure Religion teach us rather to suffer moderate wrongs from private hands then to offer the least injurious violence to Princes Neverthelesse since after all our vain supplications wee see our selves remorsely designed to a generall massacre for not obeying you against God and since you expect that we should tamely surrender not only out estates and such other rights as are in our arbitrary disposition but our lives also and the Gospell it selfe of neither whereof wee are masters at discretion for asmuch also as we being the major part of the State and virtually that whole Community from which you derive your Commission and for whose behoefe alone you are bound to pursue that Commission and not to decline from the maine intendment of it and whereas further wee have not so totally devested our selves by intrusting you with power but that we are to give some account to God and the law if wee oppose not generall subversion wher wee may especially we being now farther intituled to defence by the extraordinary law of generall necessity of the benefit of which iron law particular men are not wholly abridged we are compelled hereby to protest and remonstrate to all the world that we take now up these one just arms only for defence to secure our Lives Liberties and Religion against the bloody emissaries which indeed from your undue warrant can derive no authority and not to bridle any just authority of yours or to attempt any thing against that idolatrous devotion which hath been hitherto established by law And because we impute it to the wretched falsities and artifices of calumniators that your Majesty is incensed against us and our Religion and misinformed of our intentions wee crave leave farther to declare that we though we are free-men and not slaves and have some share in Empire it selfe and are not meer subjects will yet continue in the same obedience as our Ancestors payd you for peace sake if we may not be driven to extreamities And as for our Religion it is no other then a holy blessed law revealed from heaven prescribed for the good of all immortall rationall creatures more beneficiall to Princes then Paeganisme and such as without diminution of power you may submit to and cast down your Crowne before In the like manner also it will concern your imperiall office rather to protect us then those