DISCOURSES CONCERNING GOVERNMENT BY Algernon Sidney Son to Robert Earl of Leicester and Ambassador from the Commonwealth of England to Charles Gustavus King of Sweden Published from an Original Manuscript of the Author LONDON Printed and are to be sold by the Booksellers of London and Westminster MDCXCVIII THE PREFACE HOW highly the Writings of wise and good Men concerning Government have bin esteemed in all Ages the testimony of History and the preservation of so many Books composed by the Antients on that Subject do sufficiently manifest And it may be truly said that unless men have utterly abandon'd themselves to all that is detestable they have seldom attempted to detract from the worth of the Assertors of Liberty tho Ambition and other passions have influenced them to act in opposition to it When Augustus had surprised a young Roman who was related to him reading a political Discourse of Cicero he commended his judgment in that choice The History of France written by the President de Thou with a spirit of Freedom that might have bin worthy of those who had liv'd before the violation of their Liberty has bin so generally valued by men of all ranks in that Nation that'tis hard to find a Book on any important Subject which has had so many Editions And the just esteem that the Emperor Charles the fifth made of the Memoirs of Philip de Commines tho that Author has given so many instances of his detestation of Tyranny may be enough to put this matter out of dispute But if all other proof were wanting the implacable hatred and unwearied industry of the worst of men to suppress such Writings would abundantly testify their excellency That Nations should be well informed of their Rights is of the most absolute necessity because the happiness or infelicity of any People intirely depends upon the enjoyment or deprivation of Liberty which is so invincibly proved in the following Discourses that to endeavour to make it more clear would be an unpardonable presumption If any man think the publication of this Work to be unseasonable at this time he is desired to consider that as men expect good Laws only from a good Government so the Reign of a Prince whose Title is founded upon the principle of Liberty which is here defended cannot but be the most proper if not the only time to inform the People of their just Rights that from a due sense of their inestimable value they may be encouraged to assert them against the attempts of ill men in time to come 'T is not necessary to say any thing concerning the Person of the Author He was so well known in the world so universally esteemed by those who knew how to set a just value upon true Merit and will appear so admirable in the following Discourses as not to stand in need of a flattering Panegyrick But it may not be amiss to say something of the Discourses now published The Paper delivered to the Sheriffs immediately before his death informs us that he had left a Large and a Lesser Treatise written against the Principles contained in Filmer's Book and that a small part of the lesser Treatise had bin produced for evidence against him at his Trial. 'T is there also said that the lesser Treatise neither was nor probably ever should have bin finished This therefore is the Large Work mentioned in that Paper and not the Lesser upon part of which the wicked Sentence pronounc'd and executed against him was grounded It remains only to add a few words for satisfaction of the Publick that these Discourses are genuine And here I shall not need to say that they were put into the hands of a Person of eminent Quality and Integrity by the Author himself and that the Original is in the judgment of those who knew him best all written by his own hand His inimitable manner of treating this noble Subject is instead of a thousand demonstrations that the Work can belong to no other than the Great Man whose name it bears DISCOURSES CONCERNING GOVERNMENT CHAP. I. SECTION I. INTRODUCTION HAVING lately seen a Book intituled Patriarcha written by Sir Robert Filmer concerning the Universal and undistinguished Right of all Kings I thought a time of leisure might be well employed in examining his Doctrine and the Questions arising from it which seem so far to concern all Mankind that besides the influence upon our future Life they may be said to comprehend all that in this World deserves to be cared for If he say true there is but one Government in the World that can have any thing of Justice in it and those who have hitherto bin esteemed the best and wisest of Men for having constituted Commonwealths or Kingdoms and taken much pains so to proportion the Powers of several Magistracies that they might all concur in procuring the Publick Good or so to divide the Powers between the Magistrates and People that a well-regulated Harmony might be preserved in the whole were the most unjust and foolish of all Men. They were not builders but overthrowers of Governments Their business was to set up Aristocratical Democratical or mixed Governments in opposition to that Monarchy which by the immutable Laws of God and Nature is imposed upon Mankind or presumptuously to put Shackles upon the Monarch who by the same Laws is to be absolute and uncontrolled They were rebellious and disobedient Sons who rose up against their Father and not only refused to hearken to his Voice but made him bend to their Will In their opinion such only deserved to be called Good Men who endeavoured to be good to Mankind or to that Country to which they were more particularly related and in as much as that Good consists in a felicity of Estate and perfection of Person they highly valued such as had endeavoured to make Men better wiser and happier This they understood to be the end for which Men enter'd into Societies And tho Cicero says that Commonwealths were instituted for the obtaining of Justice he contradicts them not but comprehends all in that word because 't is just that whosoever receives a Power should employ it wholly for the accomplishment of the Ends for which it was given This Work could be performed only by such as excelled in Virtue but lest they should deflect from it no Government was thought to be well constituted unless the Laws prevailed above the Commands of Men and they were accounted as the worst of Beasts who did not prefer such a Condition before a subjection to the fluctuating and irregular Will of a Man If we believe Sir Robert all this is mistaken Nothing of this kind was ever left to the choice of Men. They are not to enquire what conduces to their own good God and Nature have put us into a way from which we are not to swerve We are not to live to him nor to our selves but to the Master that he hath set over us One Government
in the hands of the worst which produced the effects beforementioned This seems to have bin so well known that no man pretended to be great at Court but those who had cast off all thoughts of honour and common honesty Revertar cum Leno Meretrix Scurra Cinaedus ero said one who saw what manners prevailed there and wheresoever they do prevail such as will rise must render themselves conformable in all corruption and venality And it may be observed that a noble Person now living amongst us who is a great enemy to Bribery was turned out from a considerable Office as a scandal to the Court for said the principal Minister he will make no profit of his place and by that means casts a scandal upon those that do If any man say this is not generally the fate of all Courts I confess it and that if the Prince be just virtuous wise of great Spirit and not pretending to be absolute he may chuse such men as are not mercenary or take such a course as may render it hard for them to deserve Bribes or to preserve themselves from punishment if they should deflect from his intention And a Prince of this Age speaking familiarly with some great Men about him said he had heard much of vast Gains made by those who were near to Princes and asked if they made the like one of them answer'd that they were as willing as others to get something but that no man would give them a farthing for every one finding a free admittance to his Majesty no man needed a Sollicitor And it was no less known that he did of himself grant those things that were just than that none of them had so much credit as to promote such as were not so I will not say such a King is a Phenix perhaps more than one may be found in an Age but they are certainly rare and all that is good in their Government proceeding from the excellency of their personal Virtues it must fail when that Virtue fails which was the root of it Experience shews how little we can rely upon such a help for where Crowns are hereditary Children seldom prove like to their Fathers and such as are elective have also their defects Many seem to be modest and innocent in private Fortunes who prove corrupt and vicious when they are raised to Power The violence pride and malice of Saul was never discover'd till the people had placed him in the Throne But where the Government is Absolute or the Prince endeavours to make it so this integrity can never be found He will always seek such as are content to depend upon his Will which being always unruly good men will never comply ill men will be paid for it and that opens a gap to all manner of corruption Something like to this may befal regular Monarchies or popular Governments They who are placed in the principal Offices of trust may be treacherous and when they are so they will always by these means seek to gain Partizans and dependents upon themselves Their designs being corrupt they must be carried on by corruption But such as would support Monarchy in its regularity or popular Governments must oppose it or be destroy'd by it And nothing can better manifest how far Absolute Monarchies are more subject to this venality and corruption than the regular and popular Governments than that they are rooted in the principle of the one which cannot subsist without them and are so contrary to the others that they must certainly perish unless they defend themselves from them If any man be so far of another opinion as to believe that Brutus Camillus Scipio Fabius Hannibal Pericles Aristides Agesilaus Epaminondas or Pelopidas were as easily corrupted as Sejanus Tigellinus Vinnius or Laco That the Senate and People of Rome Carthage Athens Sparta or Thebes were to be bought at as easy rates as one profligate Villain a Slave an Eunuch or a Whore or tho it was not in former Ages yet it is so now he may be pleased to consider by what means men now rise to places of Judicature Church-preferment or any Offices of trust honour or profit under those Monarchies which we know that either are or would be absolute Let him examine how all the Offices of Justice are now disposed in France how Mazarin came to be advanced what traffick he made of Abbies and Bishopricks and what treasures he gained by that means Whether the like has not continued since his death and as a laudable Example been transmitted to us since his Majesty's happy restauration Whether Bawds Whores Thieves Buffoons Parasites and such vile wretches as are naturally mercenary have not more Power at Whitehal Versailles the Vatican and the Escurial than in Venice Amsterdam and Switzerland Whether H-de Arl-ng-t-n D-nby their Graces of Cleveland and Portsmouth S-nd-rl-nd Jenkins or Chiffinch could probably have attained such Power as they have had amongst us if it had bin disposed by the Suffrages of the Parliament and People Or lastly Whether such as know only how to work upon the personal Vices of a man have more influence upon one who happens to be born in a reigning Family or upon a Senate consisting of men chosen for their Virtues and Quality or the whole Body of a Nation But if he who possesses or affects an absolute Power be by his interest led to introduce that corruption which the People Senate and Magistrates who uphold Popular Governments abhor as that which threatenâ— them with destruction if the example arts and means used by him and his dependents be of wonderful efficacy towards the introduction of it if nothing but an admirable Virtue which can hardly be in one that enjoys or desires such a Power can divert him from that design and if such Virtue never did nor probably ever will continue long in any one Family we cannot rationally believe there ever was a race of men invested with or possessing such a Power or that there will ever be any who have not and will not endeavour to introduce that corruption which is so necessary for the defence of their Persons and most important Concernments and certainly accomplish their great Design unless they are opposed or removed SECT XXVI Civil Tumults and Wars are not the greatest Evils that befal Nations BUT skin for skin says our Author and all that a man hath will he give for his life And since it was necessary to grace his Book with some Scripture phrases none could be fitter for that purpose than those that were spoken by the Devil but they will be of little use to him For tho I should so far recede from truth as to avow those words to be true I might safely deny the conclusions he draws from them That those are the worst Governments under which most men are slain or that more are slain in Popular Governments than in Absolute Monarchies For having proved that all the Wars and Tumults that have happen'd
manifest this by the words Be it enacted by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons in Parliament assembled and by Authority of the same But King James says Filmer in his Law of free Monarchy affirms the contrary and it may be so yet that is nothing to us No man doubts that he desired it might be so in England but it dos not from thence appear that it is so The Law of a free Monarchy is nothing to us for that Monarchy is not free which is regulated by a Law not to be broken without the guilt of Perjury as he himself confessed in relation to ours As to the words cited from Hooker I can find no hurt in them To draw up the form of a good Law is a matter of invention and judgment but it receives the force of a Law from the power that enacts it We have no other reason for the paiment of Excise or Customs than that the Parliament has granted those Revenues to the King to defray the publick Charges Whatever therefore King James was pleased to say in his Books or in those written for him we do not so much as know that the killing of a King is Treason or to be punished with death otherwise than as it is enacted by Parliament and it was not always so for in the time of Ethelstan the Estimates of Lives were agreed in Parliament and that of a King valued at thirty thousand Thrymsae And if that Law had not bin alter'd by the Parliament it must have bin in force at this day It had bin in vain for a King to say he would have it otherwise for he is not created to make Laws but to govern according to such as are made and sworn to assent to such as shall be proposed He who thinks the Crown not worth accepting on these conditions may refuse it The words Le Roy le veult are only a pattern of the French fashions upon which some Kings have laid great stress and would no doubt have bin glad to introduce Car tel est nostre plaisir but that may prove a difficult matter Nay in France it self where that Stile and all the ranting expressions that please the vainest of men are in mode no Edict has the power of a Law till it be registred in Parliament This is not a mere ceremony as some pretend but all that is essential to a Law Nothing has bin more common than for those Parliaments to refuse Edicts sent to them by the King When John Chastel had at the instigation of the Jesuits stabb'd Henry the fourth in the Mouth and that Order had designed or executed many other execrable crimes they were banished out of the Kingdom by an Arrest of the Parliament of Paris Some other Parliaments registred the same but those of Tholouse and Bordeaux absolutely refused and notwithstanding all that the King could do the Jesuits continued at Tournon and many other places within their Precincts till the Arrest was revoked These proceedings are so displeasing to the Court that the most violent ways have bin often used to abolish them About the year 1650 Seguier then Chancellor of France was sent with a great number of Soldiers to oblige the Parliament of Paris to pass some Edicts upon which they had hesitated but he was so far from accomplishing his design that the People rose against him and he thought himself happy that he escaped with his Life If the Parliaments do not in all parts of the Kingdom continue in the Liberty of approving or rejecting all Edicts the Law is not altered but oppressed by the violence of the Sword And the Prince of Condé who was principally employ'd to do that work may as I suppose have had leisure to reflect upon those Actions and cannot but find reason to conclude that his excellent valour and conduct was used in a most noble exploit equally beneficial to his Country and himself However those who are skilled in the Laws of that Nation do still affirm that all publick Acts which are not duly examined and registred are void in themselves and can be of no force longer than the miserable People lies under the violence of Oppression which is all that could reasonably be said if a Pirat had the same power over them But whether the French have willingly offer'd their ears to be bor'd or have bin subdued by force it concerns us not Our Liberties depend not upon their will virtue or fortune how wretched and shameful soever their Slavery may be the evil is only to themselves We are to consider no human Laws but our own and if we have the spirit of our Ancestors we shall maintain them and die as free as they left us Le Roy le veut tho written in great Letters or pronounced in the most tragical manner can signify no more than that the King in performance of his Oath dos assent to such Laws as the Lords and Commons have agreed Without prejudice to themselves and their Liberties a People may suffer the King to advise with his Council upon what they propose Two eyes see more than one and human judgment is subject to errors Tho the Parliament consist of the most eminent men of the Nation yet when they intend good they may be mistaken They may sefely put a check upon themselves that they may farther consider the most important matters and correct the errors that may have bin committed if the King's Council do discover them but he can speak only by the advice of his Council and every man of them is with his head to answer for the advices he gives If the Parliament has not bin satisfied with the reasons given against any Law that they offer'd it has frequently pass'd and if they have bin satisfied 't was not the King but they that laid it aside He that is of another opinion may try whether Le Roy le veut can give the force of a Law to any thing conceived by the King his Council or any other than the Parliament But if no wise man will affirm that he can do it or deny that by his Oath he is obliged to assent to those that come from them he can neither have the Legislative power in himself nor any other part in it than what is necessarily to be performed by him as the Law prescribes I know not what our Author means by saying Le Roy le veut is the interpretative phrase pronounced at the passing of every Act of Parliament For if there be difficulty in any of them those words do no way remove it But the following part of the paragraph better deserves to be observed It was says he the antient custom for á long time until the days of Henry the fifth for the Kings when any Bill was brought to them that had passed both Houses to take and pick out what they liked not and so much as they chose was enacted as a Law But the custom of the
is established over all and no Limits can be set to the Power of the Person that manages it This is the Prerogative or as another Author of the same stamp calls it The Royal Charter granted to Kings by God They all have an equal right to it Women and Children are Patriarchs and the next in Blood without any regard to Age Sex or other Qualities of the Mind or Body are Fathers of as many Nations as fall under their power We are not to examine whether he or she be young or old virtuous or vicious sober minded or stark mad the Right and Power is the same in all Whether Virtue be exalted or suppressed whether he that bears the Sword be a Praise to those that do well and a Terror to those that do evil or a Praise to those that do evil and a Terror to such as do well it concerns us not for the King must not lose his Right nor have his Power diminished on any account I have bin sometimes apt to wonder how things of this nature could enter into the head of any Man Or if no wickedness or folly be so great but some may fall into it I could not well conceive why they should publish it to the World But these thoughts ceased when I considered that a People from all Ages in love with Liberty and desirous to maintain their own Privileges could never be brought to resign them unless they were made to believe that in Conscience they ought to do it which could not be unless they were also perswaded to believe that there was a Law set to all Mankind which none might transgress and which put the examination of all those Matters out of their power This is our Author's Work By this it will appear whose Throne he seeks to advance and whose Servant he is whilst he pretends to serve the King And that it may be evident he hath made use of Means sutable to the Ends proposed for the Service of his great Master I hope to shew that he hath not used one Argument that is not false nor cited one Author whom he hath not perverted and abused Whilst my work is so to lay open these Snares that the most simple may not be taken in them I shall not examin how Sir Robert came to think himself a Man fit to undertake so great a work as to destroy the principles which from the beginning seem to have bin common to all Mankind but only weighing the Positions and Arguments that he alledgeth will if there be either truth or strength in them confess the discovery comes from him that gave us least reason to expect it and that in spight of the Antients there is not in the world a piece of Wood out of which a Mercury may not be made SECT II. The common Notions of Liberty are not from School Divines but from Nature IN the first lines of his Book he seems to denounce War against Mankind endeavouring to overthrow the principle of Liberty in which God created us and which includes the chief advantages of the life we enjoy as well as the greatest helps towards the felicity that is the end of our hopes in the other To this end he absurdly imputes to the School Divines that which was taken up by them as a common notion written in the heart of every Man denied by none but such as were degenerated into Beasts from whence they might prove such Points as of themselves were less evident Thus did Euclid lay down certain Axioms which none could deny that did not renounce common Sense from whence he drew the proofs of such Propositions as were less obvious to the Understanding and they may with as much reason be accused of Paganism who say that the whole is greater than a part that two halfs make the whole or that a streight Line is the shortest way from Point to Point as to say that they who in Politicks lay such Foundations as have been taken up by Schoolmen and others as undeniable Truths do therefore follow them or have any regard to their Authority Tho the Schoolmen were corrupt they were neither stupid nor unlearned They could not but see that which all men saw nor lay more approved Foundations than That Man is naturally free That he cannot justly be deprived of that Liberty without cause and that he doth not resign it or any part of it unless it be in consideration of a greater good which he proposes to himself But if he doth unjustly impute the invention of this to School Divines he in some measure repairs his Fault in saying This hath been fostered by all succeeding Papists for good Divinity The Divines of the Reformed Churches have entertained it and the Common People every where tenderly embrace it That is to say all Christian Divines whether Reformed or Unreformed do approve it and the People every where magnify it as the height of human felicity But Filmer and such as are like to him being neither Reformed nor Unreformed Christians nor of the People can have no title to Christianity and in as much as they set themselves against that which is the height of human Felicity they declare themselves Enemies to all that are concern'd in it that is to all Mankind But says he They do not remember that the desire of Liberty was the first cause of the fall of Man and I desire it may not be forgotten that the Liberty asserted is not a Licentiousness of doing what is pleasing to every one against the command of God but an exemption from all human Laws to which they have not given their assent If he would make us believe there was any thing of this in Adam's Sin he ought to have proved that the Law which he transgressed was imposed upon him by Man and consequently that there was a Man to impose it for it will easily appear that neither the Reformed or Unreformed Divines nor the People following them do place the felicity of Man in an exemption from the Laws of God but in a most perfect conformity to them Our Saviour taught us not to fear such as could kill the Body but him that could kill and cast into Hell And the Apostle tells us that we should obey God rather than Man It hath bin ever hereupon observed that they who most precisely adhere to the Laws of God are least sollicitous concerning the commands of men unless they are well grounded and those who most delight in the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God do not only subject themselves to him but are most regular observers of the just Ordinances of Man made by the consent of such as are concerned according to the Will of God The error of not observing this may perhaps deserve to be pardoned in a Man that had read no Books as proceeding from ignorance if such as are grosly ignorant can be excused when they take upon them to write of such matters as require the highest knowledg But
Secrets relating to his person and commands which he forbids I cannot know how to obey unless I know in what and to whom Nor in what unless I know what ought to be commanded Nor what ought to be commanded unless I understand the Original Right of the Commander which is the great Arcanum Our Author finding himself involved in many difficulties proposes an Expedient as ridiculous as any thing that had gone before being nothing more than an absurd begging the main question and determining it without any shadow of proof He enjoins an active or passive obedience before he shews what should oblige or perswade us to it This indeed were a compendious way of obviating that which he calls popular Sedition and of exposing all Nations that fall under the power of Tyrants to be destroyed utterly by them Nero or Domitian would have desired no more than that those who would not execute their wicked Commands should patiently have suffered their throats to be cut by such as were less scrupulous and the World that had suffered those Monsters for some years must have continued under their Fury till all that was good and virtuous had been abolished But in those Ages and Parts of the World where there hath bin any thing of Vertue and Goodness we may observe a third fort of Men who would neither do Villanies nor suffer more than the Laws did permit or the consideration of the publick Peace did require Whilst Tyrants with their Slaves and the Instruments of their Cruelties were accounted the Dregs of Mankind and made the objects of detestation and scorn these Men who delivered their Countries from such Plagues were thought to have something of Divine in them and have bin famous above all the rest of Mankind to this day Of this sort were Pelopidas Epaminondas Thrasibulus Harmodius Aristogiton Philopemen Lucius Brutus Publius Valerius Marcus Brutus C. Cassius M. Cato with a multitude of others amongst the antient Heathens Such as were Instruments of the like Deliverances amongst the Hebrews as Moses Othniel Ehud Barac Gideon Sampson Jephtha Samuel David Jehu the Maccabees and others have from the Scriptures a certain testimony of the righteousness of their Proceedings when they neither would act what was evil nor suffer more than was reasonable But lest we should learn by their Examples and the Praises given to them our Author confines the Subject's choice to acting or suffering that is doing what is commanded or lying down to have his throat cut or to see his Family and Country made desolate This he calls giving to Cesar that which is Cesar's whereas he ought to have considered that the Question is not whether that which is Cesar's should be rendred to him for that is to be done to all Men but who is Cesar and what doth of right belong to him which he no way indicates to us so that the Question remains entire as if he had never mentioned it unless we do in a compendious way take his word for the whole SECT IV. The Rights of particular Nations cannot subsist if General Principles contrary to them are received as true NOtwithstanding this our Author if we will believe him doth not question or quarrel at the Rights or Liberties of this or any other Nation He only denies they can have any such in subjecting them necessarily and universally to the will of one Man and says not a word that is not applicable to every Nation in the World as well as to our own But as the bitterness of his malice seems to be most especially directed against England I am inclined to believe he hurts other Countries only by accident as the famous French Lady intended only to poison her Father Husband Brother and some more of her nearest Relations but rather than they should escape destroyed many other persons of Quality who at several times dined with them and if that ought to excuse her I am content he also should pass uncensured tho his Crimes are incomparably greater than those for which she was condemned or than any can be which are not of a publick extent SECT V. To depend upon the Will of a Man is Slavery THis as he thinks is farther sweetned by asserting that he doth not inquire what the rights of a People are but from whence not considering that whilst he denies they can proceed from the Laws of natural Liberty or any other root than the Grace and Bounty of the Prince he declares they can have none at all For as Liberty solely consists in an independency upon the Will of another and by the name of Slave we understand a man who can neither dispose of his Person nor Goods but enjoys all at the will of his Master there is no such thing in nature as a Slave if those men or Nations are not Slaves who have no other title to what they enjoy than the grace of the Prince which he may revoke whensoever he pleaseth But there is more than ordinary extravagance in his assertion That the greatest Liberty in the World is for a People to live under a Monarch when his whole Book is to prove That this Monarch hath his right from God and Nature is endowed with an unlimited Power of doing what he pleaseth and can be restrained by no Law If it be Liberty to live under such a Government I desire to know what is Slavery It has bin hitherto believed in the World that the Assyrians Medes Arabs Egyptians Turks and others like them lived in Slavery because their Princes were Masters of their Lives and Goods Whereas the Grecians Italians Gauls Germans Spaniards and Catthaginians as long as they had any Strength Vertue or Courage amongst them were esteemed free Nations because they abhorred such a Subjection They were and would be governed only by Laws of their own making Potentior a erant Legum quam hominum Imperia Even their Princes had the authority or credit of perswading rather than the power of commanding But all this was mistaken These men were Slaves and the Asiaticks were Freemen By the same rule the Venetians Switsers Grisons and Hollanders are not free Nations but Liberty in its perfection is enjoyed in France and Turky The intention of our Ancestors was without doubt to establish this amongst us by Magna Charta and other preceding or subsequent Laws but they ought to have added one clause That the contents of them should be in force only so long as it should please the King King Alfred upon whose Laws Magna Charta was grounded when he said the English Nation was as free as the internal thoughts of a Man did only mean that it should be so as long as it pleased their Master This it seems was the end of our Law and we who are born under it and are descended from such as have so valiantly defended their rights against the encroachments of Kings have followed after vain shadows and without the expence of Sweat Treasure or Blood might have
have bin peculiarly reserved to compleat the infamy of our Author for he only could acknowledg a cooptitious Father or give to another man the power of chusing him I confess that a man in his infancy may have bin exposed like Moses Cyrus Oedipus Romulus He may have bin taken in War or by the charity of some good person saved from the teeth of wild Beasts or from the Sword by which his Parents fell and may have bin educated with that care which Fathers usually have of their Children 't is reasonable that such a one in the whole course of his life should pay that veneration and obedience to him who gave him as it were a second birth which was due to his natural Father and this tho improperly may be called an Adoption But to think that any man can assume it to himself or confer it upon another and thereby arrogate to himself the Service and Obedience which by the most tender and sacred Laws of Nature we owe to those from whom we receive Birth and Education is the most preposterous folly that hitherto has ever entered into the heart of man Our Author nevertheless is not ashamed of it and gives Reasons no way unsutable to the Proposition Men are says he adopted Fathers of Provinces for their Abilities Merits or Fortunes But these Abilities can simply deserve nothing for if they are ill employed they are the worst of Vices and the most powerful Instruments of Mischief Merits in regard of another are nothing unless they be to him and he alone can merit from me the respect due to a Father who hath conferred Benefits upon me in some measure proportionable to those which we usually receive from our Fathers and the world may judg whether all the Court-Ministers and Favorites that we have known do upon this account deserve to be esteemed Fathers of Nations But to allow this on account of their Fortunes is if possible more extravagant than any thing that hath bin yet utter'd By this account Mazarin must have bin Father of the French Nation The same Right was inherited by his chast Niece and remained in her till she and her silly Husband dissipated the Treasures which her Uncle had torn from the Bowels of that People The Partizans may generally claim the same Right over the Provinces they have pillaged Old Audley Dog Smith Bp Duppa Brownloe Child Dashwood Fox c. are to be esteemed Fathers of the People of England This Doctrine is perfectly Canonical if Filmer and Heylin were good Divines and Legal if they judged more rightly touching matters of Law But if it be absurd and detestable they are to be reputed Men who by attributing the highest Honours to the vilest Wretches of the world for what they had gain'd by the most abominable means endeavour to encrease those Vices which are already come to such a height that they can by no other way be brought to a greater Daily experience too plainly shews with what rage Avarice usually fills the hearts of men There are not many destructive Villanies committed in the World that do not proceed from it In this respect 't is called Idolatry and the Root of all evil Solomon warns us to beware of such as make haste to grow rich and says they shall not be innocent But 't is no matter what the Prophets the Apostles or the wisest of men say of Riches and the ways of gaining them for our Author tells us that men of the greatest Fortunes without examining how they came to them or what use they make of them deserve to be made Fathers of Provinces But this is not his only quarrel with all that is just and good His whole Book goes directly against the Letter and Spirit of the Scripture The work of all those whom God in several Ages has raised up to announce his Word was to abate the Lusts and Passions that arise in the hearts of men to shew the vanity of worldly Enjoyments with the dangers that accompany Riches and Honours and to raise our hearts to the love of those Treasures that perish not Honest and wise men following the Light of Nature have in some measure imitated this Such as lived private lives as Plato Socrates Epictetus and others made it their business to abate mens Lusts by shewing the folly of seeking vain Honours useless Riches or unsatisfying Pleasures and those who were like to them if they were raised to supreme Magistracies have endeavoured by the severest Punishments to restrain men from committing the Crimes by which Riches are most commonly gained but Filmer and Heylin lead us into a new way If they deserve credit whosoever would become supreme Lord and Father of his Country absolute sacred and inviolable is only to kill him that is in the head of the Government Usurpation confers an equal Right with Election or Inheritance We are to look upon the Power not the Ways by which it is obtained Possession only is to be regarded and men must venerate the present Power as set up by God tho gained by Violence Treachery or Poison Children must not impose Laws upon nor examine the Actions of their Father Those who are a little more modest and would content themselves with the honour of being Fathers and Lords only of Provinces if they get Riches by the favour of the King or the favour of the King by Riches may receive that honour from him The Lord Paramount may make them peculiar Lords of each Province as sacred as himself and by that means every man shall have an immediate and a subaltern Father This would be a Spur to excite even the most sleeping Lusts and a Poison that would fill the gentlest Spirits with the most violent Furies If men should believe this there would hardly be found one of whom it might not be said Hac spe minanti fulmen occurret Jovi No more is required to fill the World with Fire and Blood than the reception of these Precepts No man can look upon that as a Wickedness which shall render him Sacred nor fear to attempt that which shall make him God's Vicegerent And I doubt whether the wickedness of filling mens heads with such Notions was ever equalled unless by him who said Ye shall not die but be as Gods But since our Author is pleased to teach us these strange things I wish he would also have told us how many men in every Nation ought to be look'd upon as adopted Fathers What proportion of Riches Ability or Merit is naturally or divinely required to make them capable of this sublime Character Whether the Right of this Chimerical Father dos not destroy that of the Natural or whether both continue in force and men thereby stand obliged in despite of what Christ said to serve two Masters For if the Right of my Artificial Father arise from any Act of the King in favour of his Riches Abilities or Merit I ought to know whether he is to excel in
lineal Subjection And in the next affirms That the Ignorance of the Creation occasioned several amongst the Heathen Philosophers to think that men met together as herds of Cattel Whereas they could not have bin ignorant of the Creation if they had read the Books that Moses writ and having that knowledg they could not think that men met together as herds of Cattel However I deny that any of them did ever dream of that lineal Subjection derived from the first Parents of mankind or that any such thing was to be learnt from Moses Tho they did not perhaps justly know the beginning of Mankind they did know the beginnings and progress of the Governments under which they lived and being assured that the first Kingdoms had bin those which they called Heroum Regna that is of those who had bin most beneficial to Mankind that their Descendents in many places degenerating from their Vertues had given Nations occasion to set up Aristocracies and they also falling into corruption to institute Democracies or mixed Governments did rightly conclude That every Nation might justly order their own Affairs according to their own pleasure and could have neither obligation nor reason to set up one man or a few above others unless it did appear to them that they had more of those Virtues which conduce to the good of Civil Societies than the rest of their Brethren Our Author's cavil upon Aristotle's Opinion That those who are wise in mind are by Nature sitted to be Lords and those who are strong of body ordained to obey deserves no answer for he plainly falsifies the Text Aristotle speaks only of those qualities which are required for every purpose and means no more than that such as are eminent in the virtues of the mind deserve to govern tho they do not excel in bodily strength and that they who are strong of body tho of little understanding and uncapable of commanding may be useful in executing the commands of others But is so far from denying that one man may excel in all the perfections of mind and body that he acknowledges him only to be a King by nature who dos so both being required for the full performance of his Duty And if this be not true I suppose that one who is like Agrippa Posthumus Corporis viribus stolidé ferox may be fit to govern many Nations and Moses or Samuel if they naturally wanted bodily strength or that it decayed by age might justly be made Slaves which is discovery worthy our Author's invention SECT II. Every Man that hath Children hath the right of a Father and is capable of preferment in a Society composed of many I Am not concerned in making good what Suarez says A Jesuit may speak that which is true but it ought to be received as from the Devil cautiously lest mischief be hid under it and Sir Robert's frequent prevarications upon the Scripture and many good Authors give reason to suspect he may have falsified one that few Protestants read if it served to his purpose and not mentioning the place his fraud cannot easily be discovered unless it be by one who has leisure to examin all his vastly voluminous Writings But as to the point in question that pains may be saved there is nothing that can be imputed to the invention of Suarez for that Adam had only an Oeconomical not a political Power is not the voice of a Jesuit but of Nature and common Sense for Politick signifying no more in Greek than Civil in Latin 't is evident there could be no Civil Power where there was no Civil Society and there could be none between him and his Children because a Civil Society is composed of Equals and fortified by mutual compacts which could not be between him and his Children at least if there be any thing of truth in our Author's Doctrine That all Children do perpetually and absolutely depend upon the Will of their Father Suarez seems to have bin of another opinion and observing the benefits we receive from Parents and the Veneration we owe to them to be reciprocal he could not think any Duty could extend farther than the knowledg of the Relation upon which it was grounded and makes a difference between the Power of a Father before and after his Children are made free that is in truth before and after they are able to provide for themselves and to deliver their Parents from the burden of taking care of them which will appear rational to any who are able to distinguish between what a Man of fifty years old subsisting by himself and having a Family of his own or a Child of eight doth owe to his Father The same reason that obliges a Child to submit entirely to the Will of his Parents when he is utterly ignorant of all things dos permit and often enjoyn men of ripe age to examin the commands they receive before they obey them and 't is not more plain that I owe all manner of duty affection and respect to him that did beget and educate me than that I can owe nothing on any such account to one that did neither This may have bin the opinion of Suarez but I can hardly believe such a notion as that Adam in process of time might have Servants could proceed from any other brain than our Authors for if he had lived to this day he could have had none under him but his own Children and if a Family be not compleat without Servants his must always have bin defective and his Kingdom must have bin so too if that has such a resemblance to a Family as our Author fancies This is evident that a hard Father may use his Children as Servants or a rebellious stubborn Son may deserve to be so used and a gentle and good Master may shew that kindness to faithful and well-deserving Servants which resembles the sweetness of a fatherly rule but neither of them can change their nature a Son can never grow to be a Servant nor a Servant to be a Son If a Family therefore be not compleat unless it consist of Children and Servants it cannot be like to a Kingdom or City which is composed of Freemen and Equals Servants may be in it but are not Members of it As Truth can never be repugnant to Justice 't is impossible this should be a prejudice to the paternal rule which is most just especially when a grateful remembrance of the benefits received doth still remain with a necessary and perpetual obligation of repaying them in all affection and duty whereas the care of ever providing for their Families as they did probably increase in the time of our first long living Fathers would have bin an insupportable burden to Parents if it had bin incumbent on them We do not find that Adam exercised any such power over Cain when he had slain Abel as our Author fancies to be Regal The Murderer went out and built a City for himself and called it by the
governed by him than to enjoy their Liberty or rather they do enjoy their Liberty which is never more safe than when it is defended by one who is a living Law to himself and others Wheresoever such a man appears he ought to reign He bears in his Person the divine Character of a Sovereign God has raised him above all and such as will not submit to him ought to be accounted Sons of Belial brought forth and slain But he dos withal confess that if no such man be sound there is no natural King All the Prerogatives belonging to him vanish for want of one who is capable of enjoying them He lays severe Censures upon those who not being thus qualified take upon them to govern men equal to or better than themselves and judges the assumption of such Powers by persons who are not naturally adapted to the administration of them as barbarous Usurpations which no Law or Reason can justify and is not so much transported with the excellency of this true King as not to confess he ought to be limit d by Law Qui legem praeesse jubet videtur jubere praeesse Deum Leges qui autem hominem praeesse jubet adjungit bestiam libido quippe talis est atque obliquos agit etiam viros optimos qui sunt in potestate ex quo mens atque appetitus Lex est This agrees with the words of the best King that is known to have bin in the world proceeding as is most probable from a sense of the Passions that reigned in his own breast Man being in honour hath no understanding but is like to the beast that perisheth This shews that such as deny that Kings do reign by Law or that Laws may be put upon Kings do equally set themselves against the opinions of wise Men and the Word of God and our Author having found that Learning made the Grecians seditious may reasonably doubt that Religion may make others worse so as none will be fit Subjects of his applauded Government but those who have neither Religion nor Learning and that it cannot be introduced till both be extinguished Aristotle having declared his mind concerning Government in the Books expresly written on that Subject whatsoever is said by the by in his Moral Discourses must be referred to and interpreted by the other And if he said which I do not find that Monarchy is the best Form of Government and a Popular State the worst he cannot be thought to have meant otherwise than that those Nations were the most happy who had such a Man as he thinks fit to be made a Monarch and those the most unhappy who neither had such a one nor a few that any way excelled the rest but all being equally brutish must take upon them the Government they were unable to manage for he dos no where admit any other end of Just and Civil Government than the good of the governed nor any advantage due to one or a few persons unless for such Vertues as conduce to the common good of the Society And as our Author thinks Learning makes men seditious Aristotle also acknowledges that those who have Understanding and Courage which may be taken for Learning or the effect of it will never endure the Government of one or a few that do not excel them in Vertue but no where dispraises a Popular Government unless the multitude be composed of such as are barbarous stupid lewd vicious and uncapable of the Happiness for which Governments are instituted who cannot live to themselves but like a herd of Beasts must be brought under the dominion of another or who having amongst themselves such an excellent Person as is above described will not submit to him but either kill banish or bring him to be equal with others whom God had made to excel all I do not trouble my self or the Reader with citing here or there a Line out of his Books but refer my self to those who have perused his Moral and Political Writings submitting to the severest Censures if this be not the true sense of them and that Vertue alone in his opinion ought to give the preheminence And as Aristotle following the wise Men of those times shews us how far Reason improved by Meditation can advance in the knowledg and love of that which is truly good so we may in Filmer guided by Heylin see an Example of corrupted Christians extinguishing the Light of Religion by their Vices and degenerating into Beasts whilst they endeavour to support the personal Interest of some men who being raised to Dignities by the consent of Nations or by unwarrantable ways and means would cast all the Power into the hands of such as happen to be born in their Families as if Governments had not bin instituted for the common good of Nations but only to increase their Pride and foment their Vices or that the care and direction of a great People were so easy a work that every Man Woman or Child how young weak foolish or wicked soever may be worthy of it and able to manage it SECT XI Liberty produceth Vertue Order and Stability Slavery is accompanied with Vice Weakness and Misery OUR Author's judgment as well as inclinations to Vertue are manifested in the preference he gives to the manners of the Assyrians and other Eastern Nations before the Grecians and Romans Whereas the first were never remarkable for any thing but Pride Lewdness Treachery Cruelty Cowardice Madness and hatred to all that is good whilst the others excelled in Wisdom Valour and all the Vertues that deserve imitation This was so well observed by St. Augustin that he brings no stronger Argument to prove that God leaves nothing that is good in man unrewarded than that he gave the dominion of the best part of the World to the Romans who in moral Vertues excelled all other Nations And I think no Example can be alledged of a Free People that has ever bin conquer'd by an Absolute Monarch unless he did incomparably surpass them in Riches and Strength whereas many great Kings have bin overthrown by small Republicks and the success being constantly the same it cannot be attributed to Fortune but must necessarily be the production of Vertue and good Order Machiavel discoursing of these matters finds Vertue to be so essentially necessary to the establishment and preservation of Liberty that he thinks it impossible for a corrupted People to set up a good Government or for a Tyranny to be introduced if they be vertuous and makes this Conclusion That where the matter that is the body of the People is not corrupted Tumults and Disorders do no hurt and where it is corrupted good Laws do no good Which being confirmed by Reason and Experience I think no wise man has ever contradicted him But I do not more wonder that Filmer should look upon Absolute Monarchy to be the Nurse of Vertue tho we see they did never subsist together than that he
publick if they be few and the matters not great others will not suffer their quiet to be disturbed by them if they are many and grievous the Tyranny thereby appears to be so cruel that the Nation cannot subsist unless it be corrected or suppress'd Corruption of Judgment proceeds from private Passions which in these cases never govern and tho a zeal for the publick good may possibly be misguided yet till it Le so it can never be capable of excess The last Tarquin and his lewd Son exercised their Fury and Lust in the murders of the best men in Rome and the rape of Lucretia Appius Claudius was filled with the like madness Caligula and Nero were so well established in the power of committing the worst of Villanies that we do not hear of any man that offer'd to defend himself or woman that presumed to refuse them If they had bin judges in these cases the utmost of all Villanies and Mischiefs had bin established by Law but as long as the judgment of these matters was in the People no private or corrupt Passion could take place Lucius Brutus Valerius Horatius and Virginius with the People that followed them did not by the expulsion of the Kings or the suppression of the Decemviri assume to themselves a power of committing Rapes and Murders nor any advantages beyond what their equals might think they deserved by their virtues and services to the Commonwealth nor had they more credit than others for any other reason than that they shewed themselves most forward in procuring the publick Good and by their Valour and Conduct best able to promote it Whatsoever happen'd after the overthrow of their Liberty belongs not to my Subject for there was nothing of popularity in the judgments that were made One Tyrant destroy'd another the same Passions and Vices for the most part reigned in both The last was often as bad as his Predecessor whom he had overthrown and one was sometimes approved by the People for no other reason than that it was thought impossible for him to be worse than he who was in possession of the Power But if one instance can be of force amongst an infinite number of various Accidents the words of Valerius Asiaticus who by wishing he had bin the man that had kill'd Caligula did in a moment pacify the fury of the Soldiers who were looking for those that had done it shew that as long as men retain any thing of that Reason which is truly their Nature they never fail of judging rightly of Virtue and Vice whereas violent and ill Princes have always done the contrary and even the best do often deflect from the rules of Justice as appears not only by the examples of Edward the first and third who were brought to confess it but even those of David and Solomon Moreover to shew that the decision of these Controversies cannot belong to any King but to the People we are only to consider that as Kings and all other Magistrates whether supreme or subordinate are constituted only for the good of the People the People only can be fit to judg whether the end be accomplished A Physician dos not exercise his Art for himself but for his Patients and when I am or think I shall be sick I send for him of whom I have the best opinion that he may help me to recover or preserve my health but I lay him aside it I find him to be negligent ignorant or unfaithful and it would be ridiculous for him to say I make my self judg in my own case for I only or such as I shall consult am fit to be the judg of it He may be treacherous and through corruption or malice endeavour to poison me or have other defects that render him unfit to be trusted but I cannot by any corrupt passion be led wilfully to do him injustice and if I mistake 't is only to my own hurt The like may be said of Lawyers Stewards Pilots and generally of all that do not act for themselves but for those who employ them And if a Company going to the Indies should find that their Pilot was mad drunk or treacherous they whose lives and goods are concerned can only be fit to judg whether he ought to be trusted or not since he cannot have a right to destroy those he was chosen to preserve and they cannot be thought to judg perversly because they have nothing to lead them but an opinion of truth and cannot err but to their own prejudice In the like manner not only Solon and Draco but Romulus Numa Hostilius the Consuls Dictators and Decemviri were not distinguished from others that it might be well with them Sed ut bonum faelix faustumque sit Populo Romano but that the prosperity and happiness of the People might be procured which being the thing always intended it were absurd to refer the judgment of the performance to him who is suspected of a design to overthrow it and whose passions interests and vices if he has any lead him that way If King James said any thing contrary to this he might be answered with some of his own words I was says he sworn to maintain the Laws of the Land and therefore had bin perjured if I had broken them It may also be presumed he had not forgotten what his Master Buchanan had taught in the Books he wrote chiefly for his Instruction that the violation of the Laws of Scotland could not have bin so fatal to most of his Predecessors Kings of that Country nor as he himself had made them to his Mother if Kings as Kings were above them SECT XV. A general presumption that Kings will govern well is not a sufficient security to the People BUT says our Author yet will they rule their Subjects by the Law and a King governing in a settled Kingdom leaves to be a King and degenerates into a Tyrant so soon as he ceases to rule according unto his Laws Yet where he sees them rigorous or doubtful he may mitigate or interpret This is therefore an effect of their goodness they are above Laws but will rule by Law we have Filmers's word for it But I know not how Nations can be assured their Princes will always be so good Goodness is always accompanied with Wisdom and I do not find those admirable qualities to be generally inherent or entail'd upon supreme Magistrates They do not seem to be all alike and we have not hitherto found them all to live in the same Spirit and Principle I can see no resemblance between Moses and Caligula Joshua and Claudius Gideon and Nero Samson and Vitellius Samuel and Otho David and Domitian nor indeed between the best of these and their own Children If the Sons of Moses and Joshua had bin like to them in wisdom valour and integrity 't is probable they had bin chosen to succeed them if they were not the like is less to be presumed of others
In the other by the Parliament which being the representative body of the People and the collected wisdom of the Nation is least subject to error most exempted from passion and most free from corruption their own good both publick and private depending upon the rectitude of their Sanctions Thev cannot do any thing that is ill without damage to themselves and their posterity which being all that can be done by human understanding our Lives Liberties and Properties are by our Laws directed to depend upon them SECT XLIII Proclamations are not Laws Our Author according to his usual method and integrity lays great weight upon Proclamations as the significations of the King's pleasure which in his opinion is our only Law But neither Law nor Reason openly directing nor by consequences insinuating that such a Power should be put into an uncertain or suspected hand we may safely deny them to be Laws or in any sense to have the effect of Laws Nay they cannot be so much as significations of his will for as he is King he can have no will but as the Law directs If he depart from the Law he is no longer King and his will is nothing to us Proclamations at most are but temporary by the advice of Council in pursuance of the Law If they be not so the Subject is no way obliged to obey them and the Counsellors are to be punished for them These Laws are either immemorial Customs or Statutes The first have their beginning and continuance from the universal consent of the Nation The latter receive their Authority and Force of Laws from Parliaments as is frequently expressed in the Preambles These are under God the best defence of our Lives Liberties and Estates they proceed not from the blind corrupt and fluctuating humor of a man but from the mature deliberation of the choicest Persons of the Nation and such as have the greatest interest in it Our Ancestors have always relied upon these Laws and 't is to be hoped we shall not be so abandoned by God so deprived of courage and common sense to suffer our selves to be cheated of the Inheritance which they have so frequently so bravely and so constantly defended Tho experience has too well taught us that Parliaments may have their failings and that the Vices which are industriously spread amongst them may be too prevalent yet they are the best helps we have and we may much more reasonably depend upon them than upon those who propagate that corruption among them for which only they can deserve to be suspected We hope they will take care of our concernments since they are as other men so soon as a Session is ended and can do nothing to our prejudice that will not equally affect them and their posterity besides the guilt of betraying their Country which can never be washed off If some should prove false to their trust 't is probable that others would continue in their integrity Or if the base arts which are usually practised by those who endeavour to delude corrupt enslave and ruin Nations should happen to prevail upon the youngest and weakest it may be reasonably hoped that the wisest will see the snares and instruct their companions to avoid them But if all things were so put into the hands of one man that his Proclamations were to be esteemed Laws the Nation would be exposed to ruin as soon as it should chance to fall into an ill hand 'T is in vain to say we have a good King who will not make an ill use of his power for even the best are subject to be deceived by flatterers and Crown'd heads are almost ever encompassed by them The principal art of a Courtier is to observe his Master's passions and to attack him on that side where he seems to be most weak It would be a strange thing to find a man impregnable in every part and if he be not 't is impossible he should resist all the attempts that are made upon him If his Judgment come to be prepossess'd he and all that depend on him are lost Contradictions tho never so just are then unsafe and no man will venture upon them but he who dares sacrifice himself for the publick good The nature of man is frail and stands in need of assistance Virtuous actions that are profitable to a Commonwealth ought to be made as far as it is possible safe easy and advantageous and 't is the utmost imprudence to tempt men to be enemies to the publick by making the most pernicious actions to be the means of obtaining honour and favour whilst no man can serve his Country but with the ruin of himself and his family However in this case the question is not concerning a person the same Counsels are to be follow'd when Moses or Samuel is in the Throne as if Caligula had invaded it Laws ought to aim at perpetuity but the Virtues of a man die with him and very often before him Those who have deserved the highest praises for wisdom and integrity have frequently left the honors they enjoyed to foolish and vicious children If virtue may in any respect be said to outlive the person it can only be when good men frame such Laws and Constitutions as by favouring it preserve themselves This has never bin done otherwise than by balancing the Powers in such a manner that the corruption which one or a few men might fall into should not be suffer'd to spread the contagion to the ruin of the whole The long continuance of Lycurgus his Laws is to be attributed to this They restrained the lusts of Kings and reduced those to order who adventured to transgress them Whereas the whole fabrick must have fallen to the ground in a short time if the first that had a fancy to be absolute had bin able to effect his design This has bin the fate of all Governments that were made to depend upon the virtue of a man which never continues long in any family and when that fails all is lost The Nations therefore that are so happy to have good Kings ought to make a right use of them by establishing the good that may outlast their lives Those of them that are good will readily join in this work and take care that their Successors may be obliged in doing the like to be equally beneficial to their own families and the people they govern If the rulers of Nations be restrained not only the people is by that means secured from the mischiefs of their vices and follies but they themselves are preserved from the greatest temptations to ill and the terrible effects of the vengeance that frequently ensues upon it An unlimited Prince might be justly compared to a weak ship exposed to a violent storm with a vast Sail and no Rudder We have an eminent example of this in the book of Esther A wicked Villain having filled the ears of a foolish King with false stories of the Jews he issues out