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A87638 An examination of the observations upon His Majesties answers. Wherein the absurdities of the observators positions, and inferences are discovered. Jones, John, 17th cent. 1643 (1643) Wing J968; Thomason E65_7; ESTC R23238 15,689 26

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is grantable and granted by the people upon what condition and limitation best pleaseth them they are so enabled by expresse or tacit causalitie of the first cause mediate and remoter God if tacitly it is an instinct contracted with them and then it falleth properly to be discussed in the Law of Nature which we shall consider in its due place if expresly either it is committed to writing and so in the sacred Book or else traditionally practis'd by all ages and confessed by all or most Nations neither of these is pressed or can be justly by you hence we have clearly evinced that the people by the divine Law cannot be the immediate efficient of this Supremacie whether you will consider them as meer instruments or free agents enabled by God the mediate Cause to settle and convey this Principalitie upon whom and in what manner they please Next we shall enquire whether the people is the mediate God the immediate Cause of this power if you so consider God and man it followeth that the people worketh through God as a meer instrument or free agent receiving his authoritie from man To averr either is hardly distinguished from blasphemie therefore we will pitch upon the last consideration of this Supremacie in the divine Law and see whether God concurreth as a partiall immediate cause with the people to produce and convey this power upon one or many I shall admit unto you as your last refuge this mutuall and immediate concurrence the people being but a partiall cause cannot in reason devest as they did not alone invest this power without the concurrence of God the sociall cause unlesse you will say the forfeiture and power of re-entrie to be onely reserved to the people or accruing to them by Survivership either of these portents of opinions madnesse it selfe will not own Again the Creatour and Creature cannot have the same numericall influence and if it could the effect still denominateth the worthier cause therefore unlesse the people be held the worthier cause they cannot properly or justly be called the authour or cause of this Supremacie Hence is undeniably inferred that the people are not nor cannot be stiled properly and justly the Cause mediate or immediate of Principalities God is the Donor of Aristocracie and Monarchie pag. 1. but few lines after of the same page you retract that opinion disseize him of the title of Donor holding God well repaid with the title of a Confirmer of Principalities Quo te mutantem Protea nodo First a Donor to give a being then rob him of that onely a Confirmer to give a well being at most the confirmation of a Charter presupposeth a Charter God is a free Agent suppose he suspendeth or not at all confirmeth the popular conveyance Is the conveyance void or voidable if void then either the people giveth no being at all or this being still floweth and not otherwise from them at that instant that God confirmeth it and if it must alwayes flow from them at the same instant that God confirmeth it and not before escapeth I believe any mans reason to finde out If voidable then they give a being before God confirmeth it and then popular election is supposable without divine concurrence and if it be the people prove efficients and fall to be considered under one of the branches of efficients discussed before and that they have not there the least shadow to this pretended Soveraigntie is already and clearly evinced Whether Nature entituleth them to this Royalnesse resteth next to be examined Ignoratis terminis ignoratur scientia we shall therefore explain what we mean by the Law of Nature what dominion ariseth by this Law of Nature and in whom this dominion is naturally resident by the Law of Nature we understand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 statutes but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 right and this is not in so large a sense as the Roman Lawyers use it for that which is common to man and beast is improperly applied to beasts according to that of Hesiod 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God gave mankinde a Law which is Deni'd to beast wing'd fowle and fish These when ere their nature need Do out upon another feed But we restrain this to mankinde and this restrained we consider that which is properly the Law of Nature which we conceived to be the dictate of right reason commanding or prohibiting an Act by the congruitie or incongruitie of the Act with rationall nature and consequently injoyned or forbidden by the Authour of Nature Order and Subornation is assigned by most Astronomers to celestiall Bodies the Inhabitants of Heaven I am assured by divine Authoritie the Angels Archangels Principalities and Dominions the Earth and the parts of it are created with subordinate Dependencie the meaner Creatures of the Earth as Bees discover in themselves and actions Order and Subalternation in place and Authoritie to deny this to Man to whom all earthly Creatures were given that Anarchie should onely run in Mankinde cannot be imagined to be intended by Nature or the Authour of it The Word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so called for Order and Decencie and shall this be denied to Microcosmos the little world Man whose parts are guided by the Head from thence proceed commands to all the Members The contemplation of these Subordinations and Offices invite us to consider the World and the things therein with respect to the Head and Monarch of it Man and in Man the worthier to whom Nature gave a respect and prioritie the Son as Son owing his being to his Father owed him also Honour hence Honour thy father c. is re-written in the heart the characters that Nature first imprest being by the corruption of it blotted and defaced Hereupon Basil wittily stileth a Parent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a visible Deitie the Patriarchs of the first age as we have already urged derived from their Father Adam Supremacie and left to the first-borne successively in their Generations The contemplation thereof induceth me to believe that had Adam stood in the state of innocencie one had been subject and subordinate to one another but without tyrannie or oppression on the Commanders part or reluctancie on the Subject When rapine and violence the issue of corrupted Nature broke forth necessitie of safeguard forced men to draw into societies the easier to protect themselves and from thence you say sprung all Principalities but whether the People chose over themselves Governours or Kings or those Governours and Kings made themselves so at first over the People seemeth to me not so evident as the confidence of your Observations would have me believe to lay aside Authorities that speak of either we will enquire after the Truth of this especially the Principalitie of the first Age by all the meanes reason can discover to us When oppression appeared probably it began in one then more and so in multitudes and proportionably the number of
this power is originally inherent in the people de jure it is then so inherent in them jure Divino by Divine right naturally by the law of Nature or jure Gentium by the law of Nations to averre the people intituled to this power by any Civill law that is by the law of any particular Nation commeth not to the purpose for your tenent is indefinite not limited to any particular government and endeavoured to be maintained by indefinite arguments therefore if the people hath any right to this power we must finde it out in one of the three rights proposed by us and we will here first enquire after this power in the Divine law God is donour of all Dominions witnesseth your selfe page 1. therefore not the people but you will say God and the people to prove this I finde not one argument drawne from Scripture in all your Observations and if any text had the least colour of advantage for you without doubt it had beene urged and sacred History is most energeticall and too frequent in the mouth of conscious Heterodoxy we shall to keepe closer to you decline to examine your Observations according to the rule of Scripture and keep our discourse to runne within the Channels of naturall Reason touching only Divinity as we passe along so far as it descendeth to communicate it selfe with reason if you must needs therefore justle in man to share with God in the constitution of Royalnesse reason reason and nature being the Idols of your discourse forceth you to confesse that God is either the mediate people immediate or the people mediate God the immediate or both immediately concurre as immediate efficients of principalities no other sort of operation or influx can be assigned to efficient Causes and reducible to the Observations advantage if God is made to be mediate people immediate efficients it followeth of necessity that the people must either be a meer instrument or a free Agent enabled by the first cause to settle this power in whom they please and that in an absolute or conditionall estate a meere instrumentall Cause I am assured you will deny the people to bee for Instrumentum non movet nisi motum and the effects of it are properly and usually called the effect of the mover I meane by mover not the finall cause but efficient or Agent which indeed hath the most influence upon the effect and whose quality still specificates and denominates accordingly this efficient and not the instrument he that killeth a man with a Sword is called the man-slayer not the Sword a virtuous or vicious exploit is attributed to the man not the sword wherewith he did it to take God and people in this state is to allow God to be the Well from whence doth flow principality and the people the Conduit-pipe and he that hath the least drop of Reason will not averre the water to have its being from the Conduit-pipe that conveyeth it people in this notion have not the powers dreamed of by the Observations either originall or inherent in them nor can your quod fecit tale est magis tale be applyed to them that have not sufficiency fit to denominate them tale we shall looke then upon the people as free Agents enabled by God the mediate or remoter Cause with power by them grantable and transferrable upon whomsoever their publike voyce and consent electeth this power is by them grantable absolutely or conditionally or both if they may doe it both wayes wee will for methods sake looke upon them in their first capacity if they make an absolute grant they are irrevocably concluded neither is it of any purpose to urge that the nature of the thing granted is incompatible with an absolute conveyance of it this is to deny our supposition neither doth the nature of the thing granted gainsay an absolutenesse of grant for power ever lives and estates is at most the thing conveyed which was and may be absolutely and irrevocably given a free man by the law of this Land may by confessing himselfe a villaine in a Court of Record bind himselfe and his heires to servitude and estate to the disposall of their Lord a man sui juris in the Romane Law usually called the Civill law may subject himselfe and posterity to another man over whom and fortunes he hath an absolute Dominion Gell. l. 11. c. 8. and Instinian Institut de servis the Jewish Law hath an expresse testimony for this addition in 21. Chapter of Exodus verse 6. his Master speaking of Servant he shall boare his eare through with an Awle and he shall serve him for ever the Logicke of these examples is evident by the same reason that one so many that are sui iuris may convey to one or more absolute dominion over themselves and posterity And though I would admit unto you that it is pag. 20. Vnnaturall for any Nation to give away its owne propriety in it selfe and yet this gift is both naturall and necessary to the being of all Societies and States for if every man reserveth to himselfe the power given him by nature to resist violence and injury though offered by a Magistrate then every man would be a law to himselfe to the extirpation of all Societies and civill Justice The inconveniency arising from the supposition of such absolute grant objected by the observator faleth to the ground for conditionall as well as absolute tralation of power is obnoxious to inconveniences neither is it insisted so much by us whether this power is ever or more usually granted but whether rightfully grantable irrevocably which no reasonable judgement will deny by the examples urged by us drawn from the Constitutions of those three most considerable Common-wealths neither is this absolute subjection as the Observator falsly urgeth contrary or dissonant to the Law of Nature by the Law of Nature hee understandeth that which right reason assenteth unto pag. 44. Naturall reason many times approveth and consenteth to this irrevocable conveyance poverty sometimes or inability to defend themselves by the strength of their owne Lawes compelleth the people irrevocably to subject themselves to another power and right reason assenteth to this grant induced thereunto by these or the like exigences of State Campani said incomparable Grotius olim necessitate subacti populo Romano se subiecerunt in hunc modum populum Campanum vrbemque Capuam agros delubra Deum Divina Humanaque in vestram ditionem P. C. dedimus here is an absolute conveyance over lives and fortunes by the people without reservations or conditions neither standeth this example single in History Learned Grotius in his exquisite book De Jure Belli pacis fol. 49. reckoneth many Conveyances of the same nature which for brevitie we passe over referring the scrupulous if any can be in a matter so evident to the foresaid cited Author to be fully satisfied and shall further view the superstructure of your discourse upon the foundation your selfe have
laid Admit Supremacie derived from the people hence Quod facit tale est magis tale The people more noble than the King because he is for them not they for him instituted Salus populi Suprema Lex and the Law of prerogative is subservient to this the King singulis major universis minor the right of conquest cannot bee pleaded to acquit Princes of that which is due to the people as the authors and ends of all power for meere force cannot alter the course of Nature or frustrate the tenour of Law and if it could there were more reason why the people might instisie force to regaine due Liberty then the King might subvert the same And this is all I finde in your Observations reducible to maintaine the principall subject of your observation the residue being either matter of fact admonitions or reprehensions I shall not meddle with being Heterogencous to our present purpose Quod facit tale c. Wine maketh a man drunk therefore Wine it selfe is more drunke than man the inference holdeth not you see in causes by accident Sol homo generant hominem therefore the Sunne is more man then the man generated this I am assured you will confesse to bee a very bad consequence so then the Maxime is not current in partiall efficients and the people are at most but partiall causes for you allow God also a sharer of this Supremacie but I will admit further unto you Supremacie wholly derived from the people the maxime is not true in all totall causes Adam was the author or cause of sinne God was the totall Author or cause of Adam therefore God was more Author or Cause of sinne your Religion will not allow this Logick the axiome therefore holdeth not in totall free agents and though I admit you the people to be whole cause of this power yet I know you will say they are free Agents in conferring of it and if you allow them that freedome your Axiome you see is ill applyed To come yet nearer unto you a Servant giveth the Master the title of Master Relatives as these are are Causa sibi invicem doth it follow therefore that the servant is more Master then he that is made master by him the passage betweene Valentinian and his Souldiers recorded by Sozom. in his Ecclesiasticall History cleareth the point Vt me ad imperandum vobis eligeretis in vestra situm erat potestate ô milites at postquam me elegistis quod petitis in meo est arbitrio non vestro vobis tanquam subditis competit parere mihi quae facienda sunt cogitare That I was chosen your Emperour lay in your power Souldiers but after I am so chosen by you what you demand of me lyeth now in mine not your power it befits you as subjects to obey and me to consider what I am to doe Your Quod facit iale in point of government holdeth true in him or them whose power continually dependeth upon the will of him or them that gave it not in them who have it transacted by one Act bee it absolute or with certaine limitation that this power is transactable is allowed by your selfe and that absolutely some thing is alreadie proved the conditionall relation of it we shall referre to be further examined in the second member of the division of immediate efficients and here we will sift the second propertie you annex to the subject of your discourse this supposed popular Supremacie The People more noble than the King because he for them not they for him is instituted that universally taken is apparently false some Government is onely for the Governour not the Governed erected as that between the Master and Servant whom the Master taketh for his own not his Servants profit and though the Servant gaineth by the service yet his gain was neither the cause nor end of this dominion not of that gained by conquest the end and efficient of some Government are both the Governour and Governed as that between the Husband and the Wife whose subjection still referreth to her and her Husbands goods So the Campani subjected themselves to Rome for their own safetie and the Roman Honour and greatnesse both you see proved the object of this Government the Conquerour is the efficient and end of his Government by his contract with the people to limit his power with certain caution over them maketh them thereby a partiall end of his Supremacie it is false then that all Kings are erected for the people and not the people for them but that you may perceive the weaknesse of your inference I shall admit unto you that all Kings are for the people and not the people for them doth it follow therefore they are more noble than the King tutorage is instituted for pupillage not pupillage for it is the pupill therefore more noble than the tutour that hath power over him the tutour upon misusage of his power over the pupill I confesse is removed but by a positive Law made by those above him where that positive Law is by whom made appeareth not in any considerable Monarch of the world some but sew and inconsiderable Antiquitie make mention of Mezentius in Virgil seemed to be of such conditionall powers Ergo omnis furiis surrexit Etruria justis Regem ad supp●●sium prasenti morte reposcunt This pretended Nobi●itie we have quitted the people of by what is already said Next your Salus populi suprema lex commeth to be discussed if you mean by People a Common-wealth with all the parts of it I allow you that Salus populi suprema lex but if you understand by people the Subject contrà distinguished fom the King if you take people for the Members without the Head of a Societie your Salus populi is not Suprema lex if you take Members apart the worthier Member challengeth the first respect and consequently the King who is the Head of the Common-wealth claimeth in reason the preheminence of the inferior Members Art imitateth Nature and if the Reason of Nature giveth it so Reason of policie being grounded upon that of Nature cannot deny this prerogative and so much concerning that adjunct Rex singulis maior universis minor you understand maior minor in respect of Supremacie and by universis singulis simul sumptis all the Subjects and the representation of them the Parliaments for they you say are essentially the same pag. 5. He can command all singly but all ioyntly can command him This of all your opinions carrieth most absurditie with it The people you say give a power over them to the King and yet reserve it to themselves In the Oath of Supremacie you confesse the King supreme next under God but by this you introduce an interposition of the people the representative Bodie of the Kingdom the Parliament which is the Kingdom it selfe so you terme it pag. 5. do joyntly and universally in most acts preface the King with May it please your