Government That which makes the Community and brings Men out of the loose State of Nature into one Politick Society is the Agreement which every one has with the rest to incorporate and act as one Body and so be one distinct Commonwealth The usual and almost only way whereby this Union is dissolved is the Inroad of foreign Force making a Conquest upon them For in that Case not being able to maintain and support themselves as one intire and independent Body the Union belonging to that Body which consisted therein must necessarily cease and so every one return to the state he was in before with a liberty to shift for himself and provide for his own Safety as he thinks fit in some other Society Whenever the Society is dissolved 't is certain the Government of that Society cannot remain Thus Conquerors Swords often cut up Governments by the Roots and mangle Societies to pieces separating the subdued or scattered multitude from the Protection of and Dependence on that Society which ought to have preserved them from violence The World is too well instructed in and too forward to allow of this way of dissolving of Governments to need any more to be said of it and there wants not much Argument to prove that where the Society is dissolved the Government cannot remain that being as impossible as for the Frame of an house to subsist when the Materials of it are scattered and displaced by a Whirl-wind or jumbled into a confused heap by an Earthquake 212. Besides this over-turning from without Governments are dissolved from within First When the Legislative is altered Civil Society being a state of Peace amongst those who are of it from whom the state of War is excluded by the Umpirage which they have provided in their Legislative for the ending all differences that may arise amongst any of them 'T is in their Legislative that the Members of a Commonwealth are united and combined together into one coherent living Body This is the Soul that gives Form Life and Unity to the Commonwealth from hence the several Members have their mutual Influence Sympathy and Connexion and therefore when the Legislative is broken or dissolved Dissolution and Death follows For the Essence and Union of the Society consisting in having one Will the Legislative when once established by the Majority has the declaring and as it were keeping of that Will The Constitution of the Legislative is the first and fundamental Act of Society whereby provision is made for the Continuation of their Union under the Direction of Persons and Bonds of Laws made by Persons authorized thereunto by the Consent and Appointment of the People without which no one Man or number of Men amongst them can have Authority of making Laws that shall be binding to the rest When any one or more shall take upon them to make Laws whom the People have not appointed so to do they make Laws without Authority which the People are not therefore bound to obey by which means they come again to be out of subjection and may constitute to themselves a new Legislative as they think best being in full liberty to resist the force of those who without Authority would impose any thing upon them Every one is at the disposure of his own Will when those who had by the delegation of the Society the declaring of the publick Will are excluded from it and others usurp the place who have no such Authority or Delegation 213. This being usually brought about by such in the Commonwealth who mis-use the Power they have It is hard to consider it aright and know at whose door to lay it without knowing the Form of Government in which it happens Let us suppose then the Legislative placed in the Concurrence of three distinct Persons First A single hereditary Person having the constant supream executive Power and with it the Power of convoking and dissolving the other two within certain Periods of Time Secondly An Assemby of hereditary Nobility Thirdly An Assembly of Representatives chosen pro tempore by the People Such a Form of Government supposed it is evident 214. First That when such a single Person or Prince sets up his own Arbitrary Will in place of the Laws which are the Will of the Society declared by the Legislative then the Legislative is changed For that being in effect the Legislative whose Rules and Laws are put in execution and required to be obeyed when other Laws are set up and other Rules pretended and inforced than what the Legislative constituted by the Society have enacted 't is plain that the Legislative is changed Who-ever introduces new Laws not being thereunto authorized by the fundamental Appointment of the Society or subverts the old disowns and overturns the Power by which they were made and so sets up a new Legislative 215. Secondly When the Prince hinders the Legislative from assembling in its due time or from acting freely pursuant to those ends for which it was constituted the Legislative is altered For 't is not a certain number of Men no nor their meeting unless they have also Freedom of debating and Leisure of perfecting what is for the good of the Society wherein the Legislative consists when these are taken away or altered so as to deprive the Society of the due exercise of their Power the Legislative is truly altered For it is not Names that constitute Governments but the use and exercise of those Powers that were intended to accompany them so that he who takes away the Freedom or hinders the acting of the Legislative in its due seasons in effect takes away the Legislative and puts an end to the Government 216. Thirdly When by the Arbitrary Power of the Prince the Electours or ways of Election are altered without the Consent and contrary to the common Interest of the People there also the Legislative is altered For if others then those whom the Society hath authorized thereunto do chuse or in another way than what the Society hath prescribed those chosen are not the Legislative appointed by the People 217. Fourthly The delivery also of the People into the subjection of a foreign Power either by the Prince or by the Legislative is certainly a change of the Legislative and so a Dissolution of the Government For the end why People entered into Society being to be preserved one intire free independent Society to be governed by its own Laws this is lost when-ever they are given up into the Power of another 218. Why in such a Constitution as this the Dissolution of the Government in these Cases is to be imputed to the Prince is evident because he having the Force Treasure and Offices of the State to imploy and often perswading himself or being flattered by others that as supreme Magistrate he is uncapable of controul he alone is in a Condition to make great Advances toward such Changes under pretence of lawful Authority and has it in his hands to terrifie or
below him and so he had accidentally a Superiority over her for her greater Punishment yet he too had his share in the fall as well as the sin and was laid lower as may be seen in the following Verses and 't would be hard to imagin that God in the same Breath should make him Universal Monarch over all Mankind and a day labourer for his Life Turn him out of Paradice to till the Ground ver 23. and at the same time advance him to a Throne and all the Priviledges and Ease of Absolute Power 45. This was not a time when Adam could expect any Favours any Grant of Priviledges from his offended Maker If this be the Original Grant of Government as our A tells us and Adam was now made Monarch whatever Sr. Rob. would have him 't is plain God made him but a very poor Monarch such an one as our A himself would have counted it no great Priviledge to be God sets him to work for his living and seems rather to give him a Spade into his hand to Subdue the Earth then a Scepter to Rule over its Inhabitants In the Sweat of thy Face thou shalt eat thy Bread says God to him ver 19. This was unavoidable may it perhaps be answered because he was yet without Subjects and had no Body to work for him but afterwards living as he did above 900 Years he might have People enough whom he might command to work for him no says God not only whilst thou art without other help save thy Wife but as long as thou livest shalt thou live by thy Labour In the Sweat of thy Face shalt thou eat thy Bread till thou return unto the Ground for out of it wast thou taken for dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return v. 19. It will perhaps be answered again in Favour of our A that these Words are not spoken Personally to Adam but in him as their Representative to all Mankind this being a Curse upon Mankind because of the fall 46. God I believe speaks differently from Men because he speaks with more Truth more Certainty but when he vouchsafes to speak to Men I do not think he speaks differently from them in crossing the Rules of Language in use amongst them this would not be to condescend to their Capacities when he humbles himself to speak to them but to loose his design in speaking what thus spoken they could not understand And yet thus must we think of God if the Interpretations of Scripture necessary to maintain our A s Doctrin must be received for good For by the ordinary Rules of Language it will be very hard to understand what God says if what he speaks here in the Singular Number to Adam must be understood to be spoken to all Mankind and what he says in the Plural Number 1 Gen. 26. and 28. must be understood of Adam alone exclusive of all others and what he says to Noah and hiâ— Sons Joyntly must be understood to be meant to Noah alone Gen 9. 47. Farther it is to be noted that these words here of 3 Gen. 16. which our A calls the Original Grant of Government were not spoken to Adam neither indeed was there any Grant in them made to Adam but a punishment laid upon Eve and if we will take them as they were directed in particular to her or in her as a representative to all other Women they will at most concern the Female Sex only and import no more but that subjection they should ordinarily be in to their Husbands but there is here no more Law to oblige a Woman to such a Subjection if the Circumstances either of her Condition or Contract with her Husband should exempt her from it then there is that she should bring forth her Children in Sorrow and Pain if there could be found a Remedy for it which is also a part of the same Curse upon her for the whole Verse runs thus unto the Woman he said I will greatly Multiply thy sorrow and thy conception In sorrow thou shall bring forth Children and thy desire shall be to thy Husband and he shall rule over thee 'T would I think have been a hard matter for any Body but our A to have found out a Grant of Monarchical Government to Adam in these Words which were neither spoke to nor of him neither will any one I suppose by these Words think the weaker Sex as by a Law so Subjected to the Curse contained in them that 't is their duty not to endeavour to avoid it And will any one say that Eve or any other Woman sin'd if she were brought to Bed without those Multiplyed Pains God threatens her here with or that either of our Queens Mary or Elizabeth had they Married any of their Subjects had been by this Text put into a Political Subjection to him or that he thereby should have had Monarchical Rule over her God in this Text gives not that I see any Authority to Adam over Eve or Men over their Wives but only foretels what should be the Womans Lot how by his Providence he would order it so that she should be Subject to her Husband as we see that generally the Laws of Mankind and Customs of Nations have ordered it so and there is I grant a Foundation in Nature for it 48. Thus when God says of Iacob and Esau that the Elder should serve the Younger 25 Gen. 23. no body supposes that God hereby made Iacob Essaus Sovereign but foretold what should de facto come to pass But if these words here spoke to Eve must needs be understood as a Law to bind her and all other Women to Subjection it can be no other Subjection then what every Wife owes her Husband and then if this be the Original Grant of Government and the Foundation of Monarchial Power there will be as many Monarchs as there are Husbands If therefore these words give any Power to Adam it can be only a Conjugal Power not Political the Power that every Husband hath to order the things of private Concernment in his Family as Proprietor of the Goods and Land there and to have his Will take place in all things of their Common Concernment before that of his Wife But not a Political Power of Life and Death over her much less over any body else 49. This I am sure If our A will have this Text to be a Grant the Original Grant of Government political Government he ought to have proved it by some better Arguments then by barely Saying that thy desire shall be unto thy Husband was a Law whereby Eve and all that should come of her were subjected to the Absolute Monarchical Power of Adam and his Heirs Thy desire shall be to thy Husband is too doubtful an Expression of whose signification Interpreters are not agreed to build so confidently on and in a Matter of such moment and so great and general Concernment But our A according to his way of
Goverments with their Governors start up who could not all have Fatherly Authority and is it not as much reason to say that God is careful to destroy Fatherly Authority when he suffers one who is in Possession of it to have his Government torn in pieces and shared by several of his Subjects And would it not be an Argument just like this for Monarchical Government to say when any Monarchy was shatter'd to pieces and divided amongst revolted Subjects that God was careful to preserve Monarchical Power by rending a settled Empire into a multitude of little Governments If any one will say that what happens in providence to be preserved God is careful to preserve as a thing therefore to be esteemed by Men as necessary or ufeful 't is a peculiar Propriety of Speech which every one will not think fit to imitate but this I am sure is impossible to be either proper or true speaking that Shem for example for he was then alive should have Fatherly Authority or Sovereignty by right of Fatherhood over that one People at Babel and that the next moment Shem yet living 72 others should have Fatherly Authority or Sovereignty by right of Fatherhood over the same People divided into so many distinct Governments either these 72 Fathers actually were Rulers just before the confusion and then they were not one People but that God himself says they were a Commonwealth and then where was Monarchy or else these 72 Fathers had Fatherly Authority but knew it not Strange that Fatherly Authority should be the only Original of Government amongst Men and yet all Mankind not know it and Stranger yet that the confusion of Tongues should reveal it to them all of a suddain that in an instant these 72 should know that they had Fatherly Power and all others know that they were to obey it in them and every one know that particular Fatherly Authority to which he was a Subject he that can think this Arguing from Scripture may from thence make out what Model of an Eutopia will best suit with his Phansy or Interest and this Fatherhood thus disposed of will justifie both a Prince who claims an Universal Monarchy and his Subjects who being Fathers of Families shall quit all Subjection to him and Canton his Empire into less Governments for themselves for it will always remain a doubt in which of these the Fatherly Authority resided till our A râ—solvâ—s us whether Shem who was then alive or these 72 new Princes beginning so many new Empires in his Dominions and over his Subject had right to govern since our A tells us that both one an tother had Fatherly which is Supream Authority and are brought in by him as Instances of those who did enjoy the Lordships of Adam by right descending to them which was as large and ample as the Absolutest Dominion of any Monarch This at least is unavoidable that if God was careful to preserve the Fatherly Authority in the 72 new erected Nations it necessarily follows that he was as careful to destroy all pretences of Adams Heir since he took care and therefore did preserve the Fatherly Authority in so many at least 71 that could not possibly be Adams Heirs when the right Heir if God had ever ordained any such Inheritance could not but be known Shem then living and they being all one People 148. Nimrod is his next instance of enjoying this Patriarchal Power p. 16. but I know not for what Reason our A seems a little unkind to him and says that he against Right enlarged his Empire by seizing violently on the Rights of other Lords of Families These Lords of Families here were called Fathers of Families in his account of the dispersion at Babel but it matters not how they are call'd so we know who they are for this Fatherly Authority must be in them either as Heirs to Adam and so there could not be 72 nor above one at once or else as natural Parents over their Children and so every Father will have Paternal Authority over his Children by the same Right and in as large extent as those 72 had and so be Independent Princes over their own Off-spring and his Lords of Families thus understood he gives us a very pretty account of the Original of Monarchy in the following words And in this Sense he may be said to be the Author and Founder of Monarchy viz. As against Right seizing violently on the Rights of Fathers over their Children which Paternal Authority if it be in them by Right of Nature for else how could those 72 come by it no body can take from them without their own consents and then I desire our A and his Friends to consider how far this will concern other Princes and whether it will not according to his conclusion of that Paragraph resolve all Regal Power of those whose Dominions extend beyond their Families either into Tyranny and Usurpation or Election and Consent of Fathers of Families which will differ very little from Consent of the People 149. All his Instances in the next Section p. 17. Of the 12 Dukes of Edom the 9 Kings in a little corner of Asia in Abrahams days the 31 Kings in Canaan destroyed by Ioshua and the care he takes to prove that these were all Sovereign Princes and that every Town in those days had a King are so many direct Proofs against him that it was not the Lordship of Adam by Right descending to them that made Kings for if they had held their Royalties by that Title either there must have been but one Sovereign over them all or else every Father of a Family had been as good a Prince and had as good a claim to Royalty as these for if all the Sons of Esau had each of them the Younger as well as the Eldest the right of Fatherhood and so were Sovereign Princes after their Fathers Death the same Right had their Sons after them and so on to all Posterity which will limit all the natural Power of Fatherhood only to be over the Issue of their own bodies and their descendants which Power of Fatherhood dies with the head of each Family and makes way for the like Power of Fatherhood to take place in each of his Sons over their respective Posterities whereby the Power of Fatherhood will be preserv'd indeed and is intelligible but will not be at all to our A s purpose nor are any of the instances he brings Proofs of any Power they had by Title of Fatherhood as Heirs of Adam's Paternal Authority nor by Vertue of their own For Adams Fatherhood being over all Mankind it could descend but to one at once and from him to his right Heir only and so there could by that Title be but one King in the World at a time And by Right of Fatherhood not descending from Adam it must be only as they themselves were Fathers and so could be over none but their own Posterity so that if those 12
say to know it as well as several others who live as Free-men under that Law The Affection and Tenderness God hath planted in the breasts of Parents towards their Children makes it evident that this is not intended to be a severe Arbitrary Government but only for the Help Instruction and Preservation of their Off-spring But happen it as it will there is as I have proved no reason why it should be thought to extend to Life and Death at any time over their Children more than over any body else or keep the Child in subjection to the Will of his Parents when grown to a Man and the perfect use of Reason any farther than as having received Life and Education from his Parents obliges him to Respect Honour Gratitude Assistance and Support all his Life to both Father and Mother And thus 't is true the Paternal is a natural Government but not at all extending it self to the Ends and Jurisdictions of that which is Political The Power of the Father doth not reach at all to the Property of the Child which is only in his own disposing 171. Secondly Political Power is that Power which every Man having in the state of Nature has given up into the hands of the Society and therein to the Governours whom the Society hath set over it self with this express or tacit Trust That it shall be imployed for their good and the preservation of their Property Now this Power which every Man has in the state of Nature and which he parts with to the Society in all such cases where the Society can secure him is to use such means for the preserving of his own Property as he thinks good and Nature allows him and to punish the Breach of the Law of Nature in others so as according to the best of his Reason may most conduce to the preservation of himself and the rest of Mankind so that the end and measure of this Power when in every Man's hands in the state of Nature being the preservation of all of his Society that is all Mankind in general It can have no other end or measure when in the hands of the Magistrate but to preserve the Members of that Society in their Lives Liberties and Possessions and so cannot be an Absolute Arbitrary Power over their Lives and Fortunes which are as much as possible to be preserved But a Power to make Laws and annex such Penalties to them as may tend to the preservation of the whole by cutting off those Parts and those only which are so corrupt that they threaten the sound and healthy without which no severity is lawful And this Power has its Original only from Compact and Agreement and the mutual Consent of those who make up the Community 172. Thirdly Despotical Power is an Absolute Arbitrary Power one Man has over another to take away his Life whenever he pleases and this is a Power which neither Nature gives for it has made no such distinction between one Man and another nor Compact can convey For Man not having such an Arbitrary Power over his own Life cannot give another Man such a Power over it but it is the effect only of Forfeiture which the Aggressor makes of his own Life when he puts himself into the state of War with another For having quitted Reason which God hath given to be the Rule betwixt Man and Man and the peaceable ways which that teaches and made use of Force to compass his unjust ends upon another where he has no right he renders himself liable to be destroyed by his Adversary when-ever he can as any other noxious and brutish Creature that is destructive to his Being And thus Captives taken in a just and lawful War and such only are subject to a Despotical Power which as it arises not from Compact so neither is it capable of any but is the state of War continued For what Compact can be made with a Man that is not Master of his own Life What Condition can he perform And if he be once allowed to be Master of his own Life the Despotical Arbitrary Power of his Master ceases He that is Master of himself and his own Life has a right too to the means of preserving it so that as soon as Compact enters Slavery ceases and he so far quits his Absolute Power and puts an end to the state of War who enters into Conditions with his Captive 173. Nature gives the first of these viz. Paternal Power to Parents for the Benefit of their Children during their Minority to supply their want of Ability and understanding how to manage their Property By Property I must be understood here as in other places to mean that Property which Men have in their Persons as well as Goods Voluntary Agreement gives the second viz. Political Power to Governours for the Benefit of their Subjects to secure them in the Possession and Use of their Properties And Forfeiture gives the third Despotical Power to Lords for their own Benefit over those who are stripp'd of all Property 174. He that shall consider the distinct rise and extent and the different ends of these several Powers will plainly see that Paternal Power comes as far short of that of the Magistrate as Despotical exceeds it and that Absolute Dominion however placed is so far from being one kind of civil Society that it is as inconsistent with it as Slavery is with Property Paternal Power is only where Minority makes the Child incapable to manage his Property Political where Men have Property in their own disposal and Despotical over such as have no Property at all CHAP. XVI Of CONQVEST 175. THough Governments can originally have no other Rise than that before mentioned nor Polities be founded on any thing but the Consent of the People yet such has been the Disorders Ambition has fill'd the World with that in the noise of War which makes so great a part of the History of Mankind this Consent is little taken notice of and therefore many have mistaken the force of Arms for the Consent of the People and reckon Conquest as one of the Originals of Government But Conquest is as far from setting up any Government as demolishing an House is from building a new one in the place Indeed it often makes way for a new Frame of a Commonwealth by destroying the former but without the Consent of the People can never erect a new one 176. That the Aggressor who puts himself into the state of War with another and unjustly invades another Man's right can by such an unjust War never come to have a right over the Conquered will be easily agreed by all Men who will not think that Robbers and Pyrates have a Right of Empire over whomsoever they have Force enough to master or that Men are bound by Promises which unlawful Force extorts from them Should a Robber break into my House and with a Dagger at my Throat make me seal Deeds to convey