and if that condescent be an act of Grace doth not this condesent to a limitation come from the free determination of the Monarchs will if he either formally or virtually as the Author supposeth desert his absolute or Arbitrary power which he hath by conquest or other right Which last words of Mr. H. though I confess they are ill exprest yet I see no down right contradiction in the sence Mr. H. meant them if any man please to consult him he there says That a Monarch may either be limited by original constitution or an after condescent therefore these words the sole means of Soveraignty is the consent and fundamental contract is not meant of a limited Monarchy any more than of another but of any Soveraignty whatever So likewife though these words a secundary original constitution may seem to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and to destroy each other yet as the Author explains himself you will find they do not in sense for he only supposes that a Prince who hath an absolute Arbitrary power either by succession or election finding it not so safe and easie as he conceives it would be for him if he came to new terms with his people would desert some of that despotick power and govern by let rules or Laws which he obliges himself and his Successors by Oath or some other conditions never to make or alter without the consent of his Subjects I see not why this may not in one sense be called a second original constitution for he was at first an absolute King by which was the original constitution and his coming to new Terms with them may be termed in respect of this a secundary original constitution or agreement of the government though founded upon the former old right which the Monarch had to govern as for a King by Conquest it cannot indeed in respect of him be properly called a secundary constitution since the Conquerour had no right to clame an absolute subjection from the Subjects until they submitted to him so as that they might not drive him out again if they were able until he came to some Terms with them Thus I think no sober man but will maintain that the people of England might lawfully have driven out William I. called the Conquerour supposing he had claimed by no other title but Conquest alone which when he had sworn to observe and maintain all the Laws and liberties of the people of England and had been thereupon Crown'd and received as King and had quitted his pretensions by Conquest or force and had taken the Oaths and homage of the Clergy Nobility and People they could not then without Rebellion endeavour to do And certainly had he not thought his title by Conquest not so good as the other of King Edward's Testament he would never have quitted the former and sworn to observe the Laws of his Predecessor so likewise Henry I. Mat. Paris from whom all the Kings and Queens of England have since claim'd upon his Election and Coronation for other title he had none granted a Charter whereby he renounced divers illegal practices which Flatterers may call Prerogatives which his Father and brother had exercised contrary to King Edward's Laws and their own Coronation Oaths so that here is an Example of one of the Authors absolute Monarchs who by a right of Conquest might pretend to the exercise of an arbitrary power yet renounced it and only retained so much as might serve for the well governing of his Subjects and his own security It is not therefore true which this Author affirms that this accepted of so much power as the people pleased to give him since they neither desired nor did he grant them any more but those just rights they had long before enjoyed under their former Kings before his Father's coming into England However I conceive this wise Prince was of the opinion of Theopompus King of Lacedemon Plut. in Lycurgo who when his wife upbraided him that he would leave the royal dignity to his Sons less than he found it no rather replyed he greater as more durable and therefore Plutarch in the same place ascribes the long continuance of the Lacedemonian Kingdom to the limited power of their Kings in these words ' and indeed when Envy is removed from Kings together with excess of power it followed that they had no cause to fear that which happened to the Kings of the Massenians and Argives from their Subjects But because this Author tells Mr. H. that if we should ask what proofs or examples he hath to justify his Doctrine of a limited Monarchy in the Constitution he would be as mute as a fish we will shew two or three examples of the antiquity of such limited Monarchies though they were not of the same model with those that are at this day found among the Germanes and other northern Nations descended from thence In Macedon the Kings descended of Caranus as Callisthenes says in Arrian did obtain an Empire over the Macedonians not by force but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Law So Curtius Lib. IV. The Macedonians were used to Kingly Government but in a greater appearance of liberty than other Nations For it is certain the lives of their Subjects were not at their disposal as appears from the same Author Lib. VI. The Army by an antient custom of the Macedonians did judg of Capital causes i. e. in time of War but in peace it belonged to the People the power of their Kings signified litle unless his Authority was before of some force And this was by original constitution for we do not find that ever the Kings of Macedon altered any thing in their original constitution yet they had the Soveraignty in most things and their persons were sacred So likewise among the antient Romans where Romulus from a Captain of Volunteers became a King Dyonisius Halicar Lib. II. Tells us that after Romulus had made a speech to his Souldiers and followers to this effect that he left it to them to consider what Government they would chuse for whatsoever they pitcht upon he should submit to it and though he did think himself unworthy the Principality yet he should not refuse to obey their Commands concluding that he thought it an Honour for him to have been declared the Leader of so great a Colony and to have a City called by his name Whereupon the people after some deliberation among themselves chose him their King or limited Monarch since both the Senate and people had from the very beginning their particular shares in the Government the Senates making this great Counsel which yet were for the greater part of them chosen out of the Patricians by the Tribes Dyon Hal. Lib. 11. and Curiae with these he consulted and referred all business of lesser moment which he did not care to dispatch himself for be reserved to himself the last Appeal in causes and to be Pontifex Maximus or Cheif Priest and Preserver
reason why these distinctions of Grotius may not be well enough defended against all the Reasons which the Authour gives us to the contrary For he only tells us He cannot conceive how in any case Children can ever naturally have any power or moral faculty of doing what they please without their Fathers leave and that naturally the Power of Parents never ceaseth by any separation c. but gives us no other reason than that they are always bound to study to please them As if this obligation of Gratitude and Complacency did likewise comprehend a full and perfect propriety of all Fathers in the persons of their Children and an absolute power over them in all cases whatsoever so that Children shall have no Right left to consult their own good or preservation in any case whatsoever Vid. Bodin de Rep. l. 1. c. 4. farther than the Father pleases As for Bodin and divers others that have writ on this subject they do no more than follow others who have asserted this Absolute Power upon no other grounds than the Jewish or Roman Municipal Laws but have never troubled themselves to look into the true Original of Paternal Authority or Filial Subjection according to the Laws of Nature or Reason And most Treatises of this subject being commonly written by Fathers they have been very full in setting forth their own Power and Authority over their Children but have said little or nothing of the Rights of Children in the state of Nature towards their Parents Loc. sup laudat Therefore Bodin thinks he hath done enough in supposing that if a Father is wise and not mad he will never kill his Son without cause since he will never correct him without he deserve it and that therefore the Civil Law supposes that the Will of the Parents in managing the concerns of their Children is void of all Fraud and that they will rather violate all Divine and Humane Laws than not endeavour to make their Children both rich and honourable And from those instances out of the Roman Law supposes that Parents cannot so much as will any thing to their Childrens prejudice or so much as abuse this Fatherly Power of Life and Death And therefore thinks he hath sufficiently answered the Objection he makes that there have been some Parents who have abused this power so far as to put their Children to Death without cause He says They give us no Examples to the contrary And supposing this to have sometimes fallen out must therefore Legislators alter a wholsome Law because some persons may abuse it But if we consider what Bodin hath here said we shall finde every one of his Suppositions false For 1. he supposes it to be the Right of all Fathers by the Law of Nature to have an absolute power over the lives and persons of their Children 2. That the Jewish and Roman Law are most agreeable to the Laws of Nature in this point 3. That Fathers do seldom or never abuse this power 4. That if they do abuse it yet it is better to leave it in their hands than to abrogate it or retrench it The falseness of all which Assertions I either have already or else shall hereafter make manifest Only I shall remark thus much at present That upon Bodin's principle women that murder their Bastards would have a good time on 't because having no Husbands they have full power over the Life of their Children and there is no reason that it should be retrencht by any positive Laws because some offend against it But however this Argument of Bodin's would do our Author's cause no good for if Parents are to be trusted with this absolute power over their Children because of the natural affection they are always supposed to bear them then Princes ought not to be trusted with it since none but Parents themselves can have this natural affection towards their Children Princes as the Author grants having this power onely as representing these Parents Whereas Parentage is a natural Relation and neither can be created nor assigned farther than the Civil Laws of the Country have appointed and therefore there can be no adopted Son by the Law of Nature since Adoption arises chiefly from the promise and consent of the person adopted and partly from the Authority of the Civil Law or Municipal Law of the Commonwealth So that in relation to Princes upon this Reason of Bodin's cessante causa cessat effectus But indeed Bodin never dreamt of this fine Notion of our Author's that all Monarchs were not onely Heads but Fathers of their people or else certainly we should have had this as the chief Argument to prove his French Monarchy to be Jure Divino But I shall trouble my self no farther with him at present but shall proceed to consider this point of absolute Obedience a little farther I suppose the Author as any sober man else would grant that Children are not obliged so much as to attempt to perform the commands of their Parents in case they evidently appear impossible or extravagant such as a Father may give when he is in a fit of drunkenness madness or sudden rage which is all one with madness and of this who can judge but the Children who are to perform these Commands And in this case no man will deny but it is lawful for the Children to hold nay binde their mad or drunken Parents in case they cannot otherwise hinder them from doing mischief or killing either themselves their Mothers or Brethren So that though they may do this from that natural love charity which all men in the state of nature ought to shew toward each other yet they may likewise justifie the doing of it as Children who ought to have a greater concern for the good and preservation of their Parents than meer strangers and have therefore an higher obligation to prevent their doing any mischief either to themselves or neer Relations this being for the Fathers good and preservation and that for which he hath cause to thank them when he comes to himself And if it be said that the Son may then refuse his Fathers Commands or resist them pretending he is mad drunk or in a rage when he really is not and thereby take occasion to obey his Father no farther than he pleases to this I answer That the Son is either really perswaded that his Father is in some of those evil circumstances before mentioned or else onely pretends that he thinks so when really he does not If in the first case he erre in his judgment and the ignorance did not proceed from his own fault either of passion prejudice or too slight an esteem of his Fathers understanding he is not culpable though he make such a false judgment of his Fathers actions for God considering onely the sincerity of the heart does not require of any man more than he is able to perform But if on the other side the Son play the Hypocrite and refuse
Sons of Esau and Ishmael are reckon'd as so many independant Princes or Dukes and Lords of distinct Territories without any Superiority in the eldest Son who ought by the Authours Principle to have been absolute Lord over the rest And if these could divide themselves into as many distinct Governments as there were Sons Why might not they do so in infinitum And then there could never be any common Prince or Monarch set over them all but by Force or Conquest or else by Election either of which destroys the notion of the Natural Right of Eldership And as for the places he brings to prove it 1. Gods words to Gain concerning Abel will not do it His desires shall be subject unto thee and thou shalt rule over him For first this might be spoken only personally to Cain and not to give a Right to all Eldest Sons Secondly the words do not signifie an absolute Despotick Power but a ruling or governing by perswasion or fair means as when a man is ruled that is advised by another in his concerns Then as for the blessing upon Jacob by his Father Isaac Be Lord over thy Brethren and let the Sons of thy Mother bow before thee 't was never litterally fulfilled For Jacob was never Lord over Esau who was a Prince of Mount Seir in Jacob's life-time whilst Jacob was at best but Lord of his own family And as for bowing and other Rights of Superiority we read Gen. 33.3 that Jacob at his Interview with his Brother Esau called him Lord and bowed seven times to the ground before he came to him So that this Text is no more than a Prophecy to shew why the Jews or descendents of Jacob should have Right in After-times to rule over the Edomites or Posterity of Esau Lastly this Example makes against the Authour for it seems it is not the Eldest Son but whom the Father pleases to appoint is Heir after his death Since here Esau looses his Birth right by his own act but chiefly by his Fathers Will. Yet if after all some will urge from the Principles I have laid down that it seems more to conduce to the happiness and peace of Families and in that to the great end I have before laid down the common good of Mankinde rather to allow this absolute Power of Life and Death to Parents over their Children and an absolute Subjection to them as long as they live since Parents do usually take that care to breed up their Children and to have that tender Affection towards them that they will seldom take away their Lives or sell them for Slaves or keep them so themselves unless there be very great cause of which the Father only ought to be Judge since it being the nature of most Children to be apt to contradict and disobey their Fathers commands or perhaps resist them pretending they would kill them when they only go about to give them due correction And since most young people hate restraint and love to be gadding abroad they having a Right by these Principles to judge when they are able to shift for themselves would take any slight pretence to run away from their Father assoon as they were grown pretty big and so perhaps leave their Parents in their old Age when they had no body to take care of them whereby nothing but confusion and quarrels would happen in Families great mischief to the Parents and often ruine to the Children who being often opiniatred and self-will'd would think better of their own abilities than they really deserved And therefore divers Nations seeing these great Inconveniencies did by their Laws leave Parents the Power of Life and Death over their Children Such were those the Author instances in the Persians See Patriarcha p. 38. chap. 2. Gauls and many Nations in the West-Indies And the Romans even in their Popular State had this Law in force Which Power of Parents was ratified and amplified by the Laws of the XII Tables enabling of Parents to sell their Children three times And the Law of Moses gives full power to the Father to stone his disobedient Son so it be done in presence of a Magistrate And yet it did not belong to the Magistrate to inquire and examine the justness of the cause but it was so ordained lest the Father should in his Anger suddenly or secretly kill his Son To all which I answer that since this Argument quits the natural Power of a Father by Generation and only sticks to the acquired one of education and appeals to the common good of Mankinde I do acknowledge it is a better than any of the rest Yet I think it is not true that Parents in the state of Nature would more seldome abuse their power than Children would this Natural Liberty I here allow them of defending and providing for themselves in cases of extreme Danger and Necessity For this Temptation to do ill is greater on the Fathers side than that of the Children For they looking on themselves as having an absolute and unquestionable power over them and that they may deal with them as they please are apt to think themselves slighted and disobeyed by their Children perhaps on very light occasions and their Passion often rises to that height as not considering the Follies and Inconsiderateness of Youth that they may if Cholerick or Ill-natur'd strike them with that which may either kill them or else cripple or maim them and perhaps out of an immoderate Anger or being weary of them murder them on purpose And Fathers being more apt as having oftner occasion to be angry with their Children than their Children with them it is evident to me that in the state of Nature where there is no Magistrate to keep the Father in awe Fathers will be as apt to kill or maim their Children as Children their Parents And if the Fathers as I said before are intended for the good and preservation of their Child and that where their Right ceases the Childrens Right to preserve themselves takes place It seems to conduce more to the general good of Mankinde that the Children should make use of this last refuge of defending themselves when they cannot otherwise preserve their Lives and Members than that Fathers should have such an absolute Right to deal with them as they pleased without any power in the Children to resist or defend themselves So likewise Fathers being so much older understand their own advantage better than their Children and being somtimes more ill-natur'd and often by reason of their Age more covetous than they may be tempted to sell their Children for Slaves whereby they may fall into a condition worse than Death itself and may not the Son then endeavour to run away or use all lawful means possible to escape so great a misery Or if the Father will keep his Son as a Slave all the days of his life without any hopes of ever being free For when the Father dies the Son according to this
for who hath greater need of Prudence then he who deliberates of such great Affairs Who of more exact Justice then he who is above the Laws Who of a more severe modesty than he to whom all things are Lawful Who of greater Fortitude than he who keeps all things in safety Yet because the Judgment of any one man in discerning that which truly conduces to the publick safety may be easily deceived neither is there in all Men that strength of mind that they may know how in so great a Liberty to govern their Passions and Lusts as Herodian Li. 1. Cap. 4. well observes that it is difficult in the highest Liberty for a Man to restrain himself as it were to bridle his own desires Therefore it seemed most convenient to divers people not to commit so great a power to one mans sole discretion and he no more free from Errors than others but rather more subject to Vices and therefore would rather prescribe the Prince a certain Form or Method of dispatching of publick Affairs after it was at first found out what sort of constitutions or forms of dispatching publick Affairs did best suit with the Genius of the people and the Nature of the Common-wealth to be constituted Neither is there any injury done to the Prince who was at first raised to that Dignity by the free consent of the people upon those conditions For if it seemed grievous to take the supreme Authority because he could not manage it as he pleased he might have refused it if he would so the Conscience of the Oath by which they are obliged upon their taking this Authority ought to restrain them and their Successors from going about to make themselves absolute by secret Machinations and Designs Much less to subvert the Laws of the Kingdom by force Plin. Paneg. Since an Oath is not more Religiously to be observed by any than he whom it most chiefly concerns not to be perjured For that is too weak which some maintain that since Kings are ordained by God who injoyns them a true discharge of their Duty which cannot be performed without the exercise of the most absolute power and therefore God is to be supposed to have conferred such a proportion of power on all Kings as that they ought not to suffer the least part thereof to be diminished or circumscribed and that the People can neither rightly require or oblige their King to it no more than there can honestly be made such a bargain between a Husband and a Wife that he should connive at her stolen pleasures But as we have already sufficiently proved that as all Civil Government is from God yet is so left in Mans disposal at least to those that God did not give any particular Laws to what sort of Government they would set up as Phil. Melancthon in his Epitomy of Moral Philosophy honestly teaches That the forms of Kingdoms are different and in some places there are some degrees of Liberty more than in others For God approves all Forms of Government that are agreeable to Right Nature and Reason and as I think there is no where any Divine precept extant that a free People being about to chuse it self a King should chuse Cajus rather than Titius no more is there any certain form Divinely establish'd under which and no other Authority is to be conferred on Princes Neither are these Men any way helped by that place of 1 Sam. 8. where some will have only the bare unjust practice of Kings that the true right of all Kings is to be there described But Grotius Lib 1. c. 4. § 3. Taking a middle way lays down that there the bare actions of a King is described yet what hath the effect of a right to wit an Obligation of non resistance So that however a King may act against his Duty when he commits such things yet that his Subject sought no more to resist than if he had acted thus by the highest Right and therefore it is added that the People pressed by those vexations should cry to God because there remained no humane remedies So that this was called the Right of the King in that sence as the Roman Praetor was sayed jus reddere to judg right even then when he decreed unjustly however I conceive the true sence of this place may be thus understood there had been hitherto a Democracy among the Hebrews but that which often resembled that sort of Kingdome which Aristotle calls Heroical The Judges incited by a divine instinct did for the most part rescue the oppressed People from their Enemies or else in Peace Judged Causes but in other matters were rather endued with a power of perswading than commanding but yet their Equipage and State being small was not born or encreased by any Publick Taxes yet the People weary of this Government would have a King after the manner of other Nations That is who should appear in great State and Splendour and should maintain a constant Guard or at least should still exercise his Subjects in Arms that they might still be able to meet their Enemies in the Field see Sam. XIII 2. XIV 48 52. Now Samuel that the People might consider of it soberly before hand lays open to them the Prerogatives of such a King and the inconveniencies of that Government You would have a King remarkable by a great deal of Splendour but such a one must be attended with a numerous Train and so will take your Sons and appoint them for himself and to be his Horsemen and to run before his Chariots You would have a King who should maintain an Army but it will be necessary that he appoint him Captains over Hundreds and Captains over Fifties and this must be of your Sons who were used before to look after your own business only the greatness of his affairs and the state of his Office will not permit this King to till his own Land Therefore of your Sons will he set some to Ear his Ground and Reap his Harvest and to make his Instruments of War and since besides he must need a great deal of Attendance and that it will not become the Dignity of his Wives or Daughters to look after the Houshold-affairs Therefore he will take your Daughters to be Confectioners to be Cooks and to be Bakers he will likewise stand in need of many Servants to dispatch the businesses of War and Peace and who all must have Salaries and therefore he will take your Fields and your Vineyards and your Olive-Yards and give them to your Servants and to this purpose he will take the Tenth of your Seed and of your Vineyards and give to his Officers and to his Servants and he will likewise when he hath need take your Men-servants and your Maid-servants and your young Men and your Asses and put them to his work In short he says no more than this If you will have a King he must be maintained like a King and a
pleases because I have obliged my self to it by compact and I am obliged to follow this Mans will because he can enjoyn me thus by his supreme Authority But supreme and absolute are not one and the same thing for that denotes the absense of a Superiour or an Equal in the same order or degree but this a faculty of exerciseing any right by a Man 's own Judgment and Will but what if there be added a Commissary clause that if he shall do otherwise he shall forfeit his Kingdom as the Arogonians of Old after the King had sworn to their Priviledges did promise him Obedience in this manner Vid Hotomani Frarcogallia C. 12. We who are of as great Power as thou do Create thee our King and Lord on this condition that thou observe our Laws and Priviledges if otherwise not Here it is certain that an absolute King cannot be He to whom the Kingdom is thus committed under a Commissary Clause or Condition but that this King may have for all this a regal Power though limited I see no reason to the contrary for although we grant a Temporary Authority cannot be acknowledged for Supreme because it depends upon a potestative condition and which can never be in the Princes power Yet a King of this sort above-mention'd is not therefore subject to the power of the People with whom the cognizance is whether he keep his Oath or not for besides that such a Commissary Clause is wont to comprehend only such plain things which are evident to any Mans sences and so are not liable to dispute So that this power of taking cognizance does not at all suppose any Jurisdiction by which the Actions of the King as a Subject may be judged but is nothing else than a bare Declaration whereby any Man takes notice that his manifest right is violated by another See Grotius Lib. 1. Cap. 3. § 16. And Baecler upon him who are both of the same Opinion Grotius indeed in the same place speaks more obscurely when he says That the Obligation arising from the promises of Kings does either fall upon the exercise of the act or also directly upon the very power of it if he act contrary to promises of the former sort the act may be called unjust and yet be valid if against those of the latter it is also void as if he should have said Sometimes a King promises not to use part of his Supreme Authority but after acertain manner and sometimes he plainly renounces some part thereof concerning which there are two things to be observed first that also some acts may be void which are performed contrary to an Obligation of the former sorts as for example if a King swear not to impose any Taxes without the consent of the Estates I suppose that such Taxes which the King shall Levy by his own will alone to bevoid Secondly That in the latter form the parts of the supreme power are divided But that the Nature of limited Kingdoms may more thoroughly be understood it is to be observed that the affairs which occur in Governning a Common-wealth are of two kinds for of some of them it may be agreed beforehand because whenever they happen they are still but of the same Nature but of others a certain Judgment cannot be made but at the time present whether they are beneficial to the Publick or not for that those circumstances which accompany them cannot be forseen Yet concerning both that People may provide that he to whom they have commited this limited Kingdom should not depart from the Common good in the former whilst it prescribes perpetual Laws or Conditions which the King should be obliged to observe in the latter whilst he is obliged to consult the assembly of his People or Nobility Thus the People being satisfied of the truth of their Religion and what sort of Ecclesiastical Government or Ceremonies do best suit their Genius so it is in Sweden may condition with the King upon his Inauguration that he shall not change any thing in Religious matters by his sole Authority So every Body being sensible how often Justice would be injured if Sentence should always be given by the sole Judgment of the Prince ex aequo hono without any written or known Laws and that Passion VI. Tacit An. L. 13. 4. 2. Interest or unskilfulness would have too great a sway for avoiding this inconvenience the people may oblige their King that either he shall compose a Body of just Laws or observe those that are already extant and also that Judgment be given according to those Laws in certain Courts or Colledges of Justice and that none but the most weighty Causes should come before the King by way of Appeal This is likewise the Law of Sweden So likewise since it is well known how easily Riches obtained by the Labour of others may be squandered away by Luxury or Ambition therefore the Subjects Goods should not lie at their Princes mercy to sustain their Lusts Some Nations have wisely assigned a certain Revenue to their Prince such as they supposed necessary for the constant Charges of the Common-wealth but if greater expences were necessary they would have those referred to the Assembly of Estates And since also some Kings are more desirous than they ought to be of Military Glory and running themselves into unnecessary Wars may put themselves and their Kingdoms in hazard therefore some of them have been so cautious that in the conferring the regal Dignity they have imposed this necessity upon their Kings that if they would make offensive Wars upon their Neighbours they should first advise with their great Council and so likewise it might be ordained concerning other matters which the People judged necessary for the Common-wealth lest that if an absolute power of ordering those things were left to the Prince the common good of the People would perhaps be less considered And since the people would not leave to this limited King an absolute power in those Acts which are thus excepted but that an Assembly either of the whole people or of those that represent them divided into their several Orders it is further to be observed that the power of this Council or Assembly is not alike every where For in some places the King himself though every where absolute may have appointed a Council or Senate without whose approbation he will not have his decrees to be valid Which Senate without doubt will only have the Authority of Councellors and though they may question the Kings Grants or Decrees and reject those which they judg inconvenient for the Common-wealth yet they do not this by any inherent Right but by a power granted them from the King himself Who would this way prevent his decreeing any thing through hast imprudence or the perswasion of Flatterers that might prove hurtful to his State to which may be referred what Plutarch mentions in his Apothegms ' That the Aegyptian Kings
his Parents Commands pretending they are mad or drunk when really they are not he is without doubt doubly guilty both of Hypocrisie and Disobedience But this does not hinder Children in the state of Nature from judging of the reasonableness or lawfulness of their Parents Commands and of the condition they are in when they gave them for otherwise a Child ought to be of his Fathers Religion though it were Idolatry if he commanded it or were obliged to break any of the Laws of Nature if this Obedience were absolute And it is a lesser evil that the Commands of Parents should be disobeyed nay sometimes their persons resisted than that they should make a Right to command or do unreasonable and unlawful things in a fit of madness drunkenness or passion destroy either themselves or others But it may be replied that though Fathers in the state of Nature have no Right to act unjustly or cruelly toward their Children or to command such unlawful or unreasonable things yet however they are onely answerable to God for so doing and there is out of a Commonwealth no superiour power that can question the Fathers actions for since his Children are committed by God to his care he onely is answerable for them and for his actions towards them since no other man hath any interest or concern in them but himself So that if he kill maim abuse or sell his Son there is no man that hath Right to revenge punish or call him to an account for so doing and if no others that are his equals much less his Wife and Children who are so much his Inferiours and who ought in all things to be obedient to his Will Therefore this Power though it be not absolute in respect of God yet is so in respect of his Wife and Children and so in all cases where the Children cannot yield an active Obedience to their Fathers commands they are notwithstanding obliged by the Law of God See Ephes 6.1 Colos 3.20 to a passive one and patiently to submit to whatever evils or punishments he pleases to inflict though it were to the loss of Life itself To which I answer That though it is true a Father in the state of Nature and considered as the head of a separate Family hath no Superiour but God and consequently no other person whatsoever hath any Authority or Right to call him to an account and punish him for this abuse of his paternal Power yet it doth not follow that such absolute submission is therefore due from the Children as does oblige them either to an active or a passive Obedience in all cases to the Fathers Will so that they neither may nor ought to defend themselves in any circumstance whatsoever There is a great deal of difference in the state of Nature between calling a man to an account as a Superiour and defending a mans self as an equal For a man in this state hath a right to this latter against all men that assault him by the principle of Self-preservation But no man hath a right to the former but onely in respect of those over whom he hath an Authority either granted him by God or conferr'd upon him by the consent of other men So that the evils which an Aggressor or Wrong-doer suffers from him he injured though in respect of God the Supreme Lawgiver they may be natural Punishments ordained by him to deter men from violating the Laws of Nature yet they are not so in regard of the Person who inflicts them For God may sometimes appoint those for the Instruments of his Justice who otherwise do injury to the person punished as in the case of Absalom's Rebellion against his Father David So that in this case the evils the wrong-doer suffers are not properly Punishments but necessary Consequences of his Violence and Injustice and in respect of the Inflicter are but necessary means of his preservation So that if a Son have any Right to defend himself in what belongs to him from the unjust violence of his Father he doth not act as his Superiour but in this case as his Equal as he is indeed in all the Rights of Nature considered only as a Man Such as are a Right to live and to preserve himself and to use all lawful means for that end Therefore since as I have already shown that a Father hath no higher Right or Authority from God over the person of his Child but as it tends to his good and preservation or as it conduces to the great end of Nature the common Good and preservation of Mankinde So when the Father transgresses this Authority his Right ceases and when that ceases the Sons Right to preserve himself and in that to pursue that great end begins to take place Therefore out of a Civil state if a Father will endeavour evidently without any just cause to take away his Sons Life I think the Son may in this case if he cannot otherwise escape nor avoid it and that his Father will not be pacified neither with his submission nor entreaty defend himself against his Father not with a design to kill him but purely to preserve his own Life and if in this case the Father happen to be kill'd I think his Blood is upon his own head But if any object to me the Example of Isaac's submission to his Father when he intended to sacrisice him To this I answer that as this act of Abraham's is not to be taken as an Example for other Fathers so neither does the Example of Isaac oblige other Sons For as Abraham had no right to offer up his Son but by God's express Will so it is rational to suppose that Isaac being then as Chronologers make him about nineteen or twenty years of Age and able to carry wood enough upon his back to consume the Sacrifice and of years to ask where the Lamb was for the Offering was also instructed by his Father of the cause of his dealing so with him and then the submission was not paid to his Father's but to God's Will whom he was perswaded would have it so But if any man yet doubts whether resistance in such a case were lawful I leave it to his own Conscience whether if his Father and he were out of any civil estate whose assistance he might implore he would lie still and suffer his Father to cut his throat only because he had a minde to it or pretended revelation for it So likewise if a Father in this state should go about to violate his Sons Wife in his presence or to kill her or his Grandchildren I suppose he may as lawfully use the same means for their preservation if he cannot otherwise obtain it as he might for his own since they are delivered to his charge and that he only is answerable for them For since the Father doth not acquire any property in the Sons person either by begetting or educating him much less ought he to have it over those
in their Council in time oâ— Peace and shall not have any power more than that unless in time of War he then is the Mouth of the Senate in time of Peace and their General in War And of this kind was the Lacedemonian King And in modern times the ancient Dukes of Venice when they went out to War And so are those Caciques that the Indians in the Caribbeé Islands and Brasile chuse to be their Leaders in War but in Peace have little or no power So likewise these Masters of Families or Freemen agreeing with him that they would chuse for their Prince what Power he should exercise or they would confer upon him as suppose that he should not condemn any of them to death unless many of the same condition with himself find him guilty or that he should not make any Laws or levie Taxes for the publick Charges of the Commonwealth but what â—hey propose to him and that he swear for himself â—nd his Posterity to observe these Conditions There will then be produced a Limited Kingdom consisting â—f a Prince as the Head of all Civil Power and of an Aristocratical or Democratical Council according as that Assembly consists either of the whole or but of the People And that such a Government is no Soloecism in Politicks I shall prove farther when I come to make some Observations upon this Authors Treatise of the Anarchy of a mixt Monarchy Nor can any man imagine from the Priviledges of the Nobility and People that â—re found to have been almost the same in all these Northern Kingdoms of Europe as ancient as the Government could ever have owed their Original to any other Cause than the Original Constitution of the Government And if these Fathers of Families may â—imit the power they confer upon their new Prince upon this Escheat of the Soveraign Power and retain some of it to themselves they might do the same upon the first institution of the Government either as when so many Masters of Families who had before lived apart and without any dependance upon each other did agree in the state of Nature to erect a Civil Government among them or else when a Colony or Army of men was led out by some particular Captains or Leaders for the conquest of a foreign Country which when conquered and settled every free Souldier in the Army would certainly have as good a Vote in the crcating of their General to be their King as their Captain or Colonel since they all were at first but Volunteers and followed these Captains not from any Civil Authority they had over them but by their own consent But since the Author will by all means have it that these Fathers of Families must needs transfer their power upon one man absolutely who must be endued with all this power without any reservation I shall now give you his best Arguments for this absolute Monarchy and try whether they are unanswerable or not Patriarch p. 49. His first reason for it is built upon Bellarmine's Concession That God when he made all mankind of one man did seem openly to signifie that he rather approved the government of one man than of many This had been somewhat of an Argument if Adam's power had been purely Monarchical over Eve and all his Children and Descendants as it was not but if it had Gods bare Approbation lays no Obligation for all mankind to practise it now any more than it is a good Argument to say that it is now not onely lawful but necessary for men to marry their Sisters because God approved of that way of propagation of mankind at first Secondly God declared his Will when he endues not onely Men but all Creatures with a natural Propensity to Monarchy neither can it be doubted but a natural Propensity is to be referred to God who is the Author of Nature What he means by a Propensity in all Creatures to Monarchy I understand not neither know I any Monarchy among Brutes besides that of the stronger over the weaker and in that Authors sence the master-Buck in a Herd of Deer the master-Bull in that of Cows and the Bell-weather of the Flock are all of them so many Monarchs endued with Fatherly Authority over the Herd or else which is as good are Usurpers of that Authority and so the Herd are all bound in Conscience to submit to them As for the Monarchical Government of Bees whether under a King or Queen I doubt it would pose even those Vertuosi who have glass-Hives to prove their Government an absolute Monarchy both in War and Peace and that none of the Princes of the Bloud or other Bee-grandees have any share in it or that never a Bee in the Hive dare place any Honey in the Combs or eat a drop of what â—e hath gathered her self without the Queens orders â—ut if the Government of Bees be Monarchical and that â—ere a good Argument for Monarchy then that of â—mmets might be so for a Democracy since most Naâ—uralists not being able to distinguish any Kings or â—rinces in the Ant-hill do suppose them to be a Comâ—onwealth But Raillery apart I would be glad to â—e fully satisfied whether Mankind naturally incline to â—e governed by an absolute Monarchy It is true the â—reatest part of the Eastern Governments in the world â—e absolute Monarchs but the Author cannot bring his as an Argument of any Propensity according to his â—rinciples For if all of them were founded upon the â—ight of Fatherhood or else the Vsurpation of that Right his proves rather a natural Obligation to this kind of â—overnment than a Propensity for an Obligation â—nnot be drawn from a bare Propensity Since then 〈◊〉 man would have an Obligation to drink Wine beâ—use as soon as he tasts it he hath a Propensity to it â—nd perhaps may take so much of it until he be drunk â—nd then sick and so this Propensity may turn to a â—urfeit So some Nations as Rome for example â—aving taken a Cup too much of Monarchy this Surâ—it produced an absolute aversion hatred and a proâ—ensity to the contrary extream But as the Eastern â—ations have inclined to an Absolute so have the Weâ—ern either to Commonwealths or limited Kingdoms â—itness the Grecians of old and the modern Kingdoms â—f the Gothick Model as also those petty Governments â—f several Nations in America His third Reason is â—hat God confirmed Monarchy to be the best Government 〈◊〉 that Commonweal which he instituted among the Heâ—rews which was not Aristocratical as Calvin saith â—ut plainly Monarchical If the Author here means beâ—re they desired a King it is true that God himself was their King and govern'd them upon extraordinary occasions by men divinely assisted or inspired 〈◊〉 and such were the Judges whom God raised up to deliver them from the slavery and oppression of their Neighbours and being looked upon as having a great portion of the Spirit of God did likewise judge the People that is decide
difficult Cases by way of Appeal in time of peace But that the Government was purely Aristocratical this Author himself confesses even when he denies it He tells us p. 50. at the time when Scripture saith There was no King in Israel but that every man did that which was right in his own eyes even then the Israelites were under the Kingly Government of the Fathers of particular Families for i◠the consultation for providing Wives for the Benjamites we find the Elders of the Congregation bare the onely sway Judg. 21.16 Now what is an Aristocracy if this be not viz. an Assembly of the Elders or chief of the Fathers that is the best men meeting consulting and resolving of publick business What power these Fathers of Families had at home is not declared whether it was independant or else did submit to the government of its own Tribe But that it was Aristocratical is apparent if Josephus understood any thing o◠the History or Antiquities of his own Country which he undertook expresly to write of For Antiq. lib. 4. cap. he brings in Samuel speaking to this effect to the People desiring a King An Aristocracy is the best Government neither should you require any other sort of Government But as for the Kings which God gave them afterwards there is nothing to be drawn from thence for this Authors advantage for he himself tells us there is no use to be made of it Vid. His Observations upon Milton p. 20. For speaking against Milton's sence of the words in Deut. 17.14 he says Can the foretelling or the forewarning the Israelites of a wanton wicked desire of theirs i. e. of a King which God himself condemned be an Argument that God gave or granted them a Right to do such a wicked thing Or can the narration and reproving of a future Fact be a donation and approving of a present Right or the permission of a sin be made a commission for the doing of it So that it seems sometimes when it makes against the Author's sence God is so far from approving Kingly Government that it is a sin for the People so much as to desire it But it is likewise as great a Question whether after Kingly Government was established it was likewise absolute so that the King might put any body to death right or wrong For we find 1 Sam. 14.45 the People rescued Jonathan out of the hands of his Father Saul and would not permit him to be put to death for his breach of the rash Vow which Saul had made nor is it imputed to the People that is the Army for a sin Neither could Ahab take away Naboth's Vineyard and his Life together but by colour of Law and a legal Tryal Neither could King Zedekiah save Jeremy the Prophet from the power of the Princes who cast him into the Dungeon for Jer. 38. v. 5. Zedekiah said Behold he is in your hand for the King is not he that can do any thing against you His fourth reason is that God in Scripture mentions not nor takes notice of any other Government than Monarchical This is but a Negative Argument at best the Scriptures not being written to teach us Politicks but to declare God's Will and to shew us his merciful and gracious dealing with the Jews notwithstanding all their backslidings and rebellions against his Commandments His fifth reason is that Aristotle saith in his Ethicks chap. 11. That Monarchy is the best form of Government and a Popular Estate the worst The words are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which though true does not enforce any Obligation to the one more than the other for though a man be obliged to his own preservation yet he himself is the onely Judge of the means and if he erre and use the worst means for the best they are not in fault if they acted as well as they could and to the best of their knowledge for that end Neither does it follow that there are no more sorts of Government than these two to be chosen Nor is it any better Argument that the world for a long time knew no other sort of Government but onely Monarchy and that the Platforms of Commonwealths were hatched amongst a few Cities in Greece and that they were first governed by Kings until the wantonness ambition or faction of the People made them attempt news kinds of Regiment But let any one read the Greek Histories and he will find the cruelty and tyranny of Kings did more frequently give occasion to the People to run into Commonwealths than either the ambition or faction of the People And as for the antiquity of Monarchy the alteration of it rather makes against him since the whole Body of a People seldom alter a Government unless they find themselves hurt by it and that it proved inconvenient for them I shall not dispute which is the better Government Monarchy or Commonwealth since in my own judgment I incline to the former where the Monarch is good And though I will not affirm as the Author does Directions for Obedience p. 71. That even the Power which God himself exerciseth over mankinde is by the Right of Fatherhood as he is both King and Father of us all Since besides his absolute power and his being the sole cause of our production he is also endued with that infinite Wisdom and Goodness that he still orders all things for the good of his Subjects and so hath besides his Power the highest Right to govern as the best and most perfect being So likewise Monarchs as far as they imitate the divine Wisdom and Beneficence have the like Right to be called Gods Lieutenants Nor shall I trouble my self as the Author does p. 67. and so on to 73. to compare the Mischiess and Inconveniencies that have been found in absolute Monarchical and Popular Government there being various Examples both of Cruelty and Injustice in both and I think they are both the aptest of any sorts of Governments to run into Extreams and I know not whether there have not been found out a Regal Government mixt with somewhat of an Aristocracy or Democracy which if truely observed were freest from the inconveniencies of either But this Author is so full of the mischiefs of Commonwealths that he sometimes mistakes in History and makes those Disorders to arise from the faults and licentiousness of the People which proceeded indeed from the Usurpation of their Power Thus he makes it the height of the Roman Liberty that its Subjects might be killed by those that would and sets forth the Tyranny of Sylla as an effect of the Roman Freedom when indeed it was rather an effect of the absolute Monarchy usurped by Sylla during his Dictatorship So that Dionysius Halicarnasseus gives us his judgment of those actions of Sylla in these words Lib. V. circa finem I would onely shew that for these wickednesses the name of Dictator became hateful for all things seem good and profitable onely
own Consent as a Slave by Compact or without his fault as a Slave taken in a just War and that no Master of a Family hath such Right in the person of one of these but that he may do him injury if he take away his life or punish him without cause and that such even such a Slave may lawfully set himself free if the Master do not perform his part of the Bargain And having in the last place shewn what power a Husband hath over his Wife in the state of Nature and from whence it takes its Original it is now time to answer those Arguments and Objections made by this Author and others That the Prince or Governour so elected by the Fathers of Families or Frcemen at their own dispose which I hold to be equivalent to the whole People hath not onely his Nomination from them but that it is from God alone that he derives his Soveraign Power and Authority with which he is endued upon his first acceptance of the Supreme Power and if he should accept it with any limitation it were to restrain that Power which God hath conferred upon him by his being made the Supreme Magistrate and would hinder him from performing that great Duty as he ought In answer to which I have already proved that no such unlimited Power was conferred by God to any private man in the state of Nature as a Father Husband or Master and therefore could not be given to any Civil Soveraign who is supposed to have no more power than the Father of the Family had before A second Objection is That no particular man hath in the state of Nature any power over his own life and therefore cannot have any over the life of another man and if one man hath not this power neither have the People which is but a universal consisting of singulars any such power and consequently cannot confer it on any other man therefore every Prince must have this Soveraign Power of life and death not from the People but from God In answer to which I shall first of all deny the consequence that because God hath not given a man a power over his own life therefore he can have none over the person of another For God gave man a Right to preserve but not to destroy himself and so cannot dispose of his own life whenever he is weary of it Therefore since the first Law of Nature is Self-preservation it is lawful for a man to use all means conducing to this end that do not prejudice another mans Right in his particular life or happiness so that if any man assault me in the state of Nature I may defend my self and consequently kill the Assailant if I cannot otherwise escape But perhaps it will be replyed that the intention here is not principally to kill the man if it may be otherwise avoided and that this Right is given men onely to preserve their lives from being taken away at another mans pleasure but that no private man hath power to revenge an injury done to another or ones self in the state of Nature with death but God or him to whom God hath committed this power according to St. Paul Rom. 12.19 Dearly beloved avenge not your selves c. I shall prove that this place does not destroy that which I maintain for I grant that all Revenge taken as the satisfaction some men take in the very doing evil or prejudice to another is unlawful even by the light of Nature Secondly Likewise where Magistracy is instituted who is to bear the Sword for the punishment of evil doers I grant all return of like for like to be unlawful since he is appointed as a publick Judge to right those that are injured and maintain the common Peace But no Text forbids men to punish injuries done either to themselves or those they have a concern for in the state of Nature for this is not Revenge but a natural Punishment to deter men from committing violent and unjust actions that disturb the peace of humane Society since the wrong doer declares himself thereby a publick Enemy to all Mankind And on this account Cain feared that not his Father onely hut every one that met him would slay him that is punish him for the death of their Brother or Kinsman And if this were unlawful then all War must be so in the state of Nature and Princes being always in that state in respect of each other could never make any War for the gaining of Rights usurped or to punish for Injuries received So that this power which a man in some cases hath over the life of another is onely given him by God for the common good and preservation of Mankind of which every particular person is a part and so this power conferred upon the supreme Magistrate is no more nor extends higher than that though there are more things requisite to the publick peace and safety of a Civil Government than are to humane Society in the state of Nature And from hence do supreme Powers derive their Right of making positive Laws and ordaining higher Punishments for Offences than the Laws of God or Nature do expresly appoint as for Thest Coining and the like Nor is the Antecedent true that no man in the state of Nature hath a power to dispose of his own life For though it may be true that no man hath a Right to make away himself whenever he dislikes his being here yet it does not therefore follow but that for a greater good to the publick any man nay a Prince himself may lay down his life for his Peoples good And therefore I doubt not but the Example of Codrus the Athenian King was not onely lawful but highly commendable in facrificing his life for the good and safety of his People supposing that all their Estates and Liberties depended upon that one Battel much more for a private man to lay down his life to save some publick person highly useful to humane Society And this much does the Apostle Paul himself seem to admit Rom. 5.7 when he says For scarcely for a righteous man will one die yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die Where by a righteous man Expositors understand one who had sufficiently done his duty in an ordinary private capacity yet contributed little to the publick good whereas by a good man is understood some person highly useful and beneficial to others and for such a one a man may not onely dare to die but actually lay down his life if occasion be A second Objection is That if the supreme Magistrates Authority be derived from the People then this Authority must be either inferiour or superiour to it If inferiour how can the People be commanded or governed by that which is inferiour to its self If superiour how can the Effect be more noble than the Gause since neither any particular Person nor the whole Multitude had Soveraign Authority and therefore
could not confer it upon others To this I answer That this Soveraignty being but the submission of the Wills of the Persons that institute it to the Will of him on whom they confer it that he should thereby make use of all their Powers for the common good of them all and being therefore not any physical but moral Quality may be produced in another by their Compact who had it not formally in themselves before As from the Voices of divers men singing together there may arise a Harmony which was not in their particular Voices alone though each of these Voices must be musical to produce it So every particular person having before in the state of Nature a Right to preserve himself and to govern his own actions when many men joyn together to confer this care upon one or more there arises a Political Power indeed more noble yet of the same kind with the other for if the singulars had it not before in some measure the universal could not have it all So that it is absurd to alleadge that Soveraignty is not derived from men because it cannot be found among a mans natural powers or faculties in the same manner as it is in the supreme Magistrate as if there were no other than Physical Qualities in nature yet even in Physicks admitting Epicurus Hypotheses of Atomes to be true there will arise from their conjunction that quality in bodies which we call divisibility and yet each particular Atome considered apart being indivisible had it not alone But to answer a distinction they use in this matter between the immediate efficient and the immediate constituent modus of Soveraignty they confess indeed That by this Election and Transferring of the Power of the Fathers of Families the Civil Soveraign is declared but that it is from God alone that he receives his Soveraign Authority If they mean by this transferring of Fatherly Power any absolute Power which God hath by any Law divine or natural conferred upon the Fathers over their Children and Families I have already proved that this Fatherly power is neither absolute nor assigneable to another If they mean any other Soveraignty distinct from this then they must needs conceive this as an abstracted Ens or Physical quality which is immediately produced by God and conferred upon the person of the Soveraign at his Election or Declaration but I see no reason of constituting here more Causes than needs as one efficient and the other secundary or why God should do that by an extraordinary unintelligible way of acting which he may perform by a plain and easie one since it is contrary to his other methods of acting in the course of Nature For frustra fit per plura quod potest fieri per pauciora and supposing as I have already proved and as divers who are sufficiently for Kingly Power do admit that the People or Heads of Families have a freedom of setting up what kind of Government they please either Monarchical or other and if there were none other but Aristocracies or Democracies in the world I would fain know what then would become of this notional Majesty or Soveraignty Now if any man should ask them where this abstracted Soveraignty exists before it finds a King to settle upon and whether it be a Substance or an Accident if the latter how it can subsist without its Subject or if the former when it was created whether it was at the beginning of the world or like the Souls of men creando infunditur infundendo creatur or whether there be one single Soul of Soveraignty diffused all over the world which being distributed does as it were animate so many Kings Also whether this Majesty dies with the Monarch or else survives him as the Soul does the Body and by a new Metempsychosis immediately transfuses it self into his Successour If the Gentlemen of this Author's Principles please but to consider these difficulties I 'll undertake they will finde them as hard to be resolved as any the Author hath proposed about all the Peoples agreeing or being the cause of this Soveraignty But I will not deny that God is properly the original and efficient Cause of Soveraignty as of all good things and particularly of that power whereby every individual Freeman in the state of Nature hath a power to dispose of his actions for his own preservation and the common good of mankind And the particular powers of many men being put together constitute that which we call a Politick or Civil Power And therefore his last Objection is easily answered That if the People be any Cause of Soveraignty or Civil Power they must have received this power from God by which they can confer it on any other But it can no way be proved that they received it from God for God having as I said imprinted upon mans Soul such a tender care of his own good and preservation and hath likewise enjoyned him to preserve Peace and Order amongst men in order to the common good and preservation of mankind and hath likewise given him reason to find out all means necessary for this end amongst which the constitution of Civil Government must be reckon'd as the principal who can doubt but the faculty of constituting of Civil Government likewise proceeds from God the Author of Truth and giver of all good things Thus the invention of Cloaths Fire and Houses proceed from God though they were found out by man as his Instrument for a help to his necessities and natural weakness See Garcilasso de Vega 's History of Peru. And as in some Countries there is little or no need of Cloaths or Houses where the weather is always warm and serene so likewise God hath not imposed upon any People an absolute Obligation of constituting any Civil Government at all if they can live without it or at least of its exercising farther than they have need of Thus among the West-Indians in several parts of America See Lerius Hist Brafile cap. 18. History of the Caribbe Islands lib. 11. c. 19. where they have no distinct propriety in Land more than in their little Gardens and Cabins which in Countries so slenderly inhabited as those where Land is worth nothing every man enjoys by a tacite consent a living upon Venison Fish or other Animals and Fruits which the Woods produce they need no Chattels nor Dishes but a few Earthen-pots or Cups of Calebasses besides their Bows and Arrows and Fishing-tackle which every man knows how to make for himself So likewise having no need of Clothes and living but from hand to mouth and taking care onely to provide meer necessaries of life as they never have any superfluities so they have no Disputes about them and most of their things being easie to be provided they are seldom known to steal them one from each other and if a man catch another stealing any thing from him he will be sure to beat the Thief soundly or
Vote to chuse Parliament-men but Freeholders or as in old times none but those who served in the Wars in person had Votes in the Withena Gemote or Great Council And yet this was no standing Army no more than those in Greece So likewise neither are these words fairly rendered in the same page 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that in a Popular State The Soveraign Power is in the Sword and those that are possessed of the Arms but are thus to be rendered In this kind of Government i. e. Popular those govern and have greatest Power who bear Arms and fight for the rest which is but reasonable I shall not trouble my self with the rest of those Contradictions and Faults he find◠with Aristotle since I look upon this Treatise of Politicks as the most confused he hath writ onely it seems this Author did but skim over Aristotle when he so confidently asserts That the natural Right of the People to found or elect their own kind of Government is not once disputed by him which whether he asserts or no let these words judge lib. 5. Pol. cap. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Which may be thus Englished But of Kingdoms by discent this may be supposed the cause of their dissolution besides those al◠ready mentioned viz. when it happens to many of them who not being endued with the power of a Tyrant but onely with a Kingly Authority become contemned whilst they will unjustly abuse their Subjects for then there is an easie dissolution of the Government for he is not a true King over those that like not his Government but a Tyrant P. 20 21. He finds fault with Aristotle for making the main distinction between right Forms of Government and those that are imperfect or corrupt to consist solely in this That where the profit of the governed is respected there is a right Government but where the profit of the Governours is onely regarded there is a corruption or transgression of Government By this it is supposed by Aristotle that there may be a Government which he calls a Tyranny onely for the benefit of the Governour That this Supposition is false may be proved from Aristotle himself to instance in the point of Tyranny And therefore the Author endeavours to make him contradict himself thus Tyranny saith Aristotle lib. 3. cap. 7. is a Despotical or Masterly Monarchy Now he confesseth l. 3. c. 6. That in truth the Masterly Government is profitable both to the Servant by nature and the Master by nature And he yields a solid reason for it viz. It is not possible if the Servant be destroyed the Mastership can be saved Whence it may be inferred That if the Masterly Government of Tyrants cannot be safe without the preservation of them whom they govern it will follow That a Tyrant cannot govern for his own profit onely And thus his main definition of Tyranny fails as being grounded on an impossible Supposition By his own confession no Example can be shewn of any such Government that ever was in the world as Aristotle describes Tyranny to be for under the worst of Kings though many particular men have unjustly suffered yet the Multitude or People in general have found benefit and profit by the Government If Aristotle were alive I doubt he would say this Author plaid the Sophister with him and did not onely misquote his words but pervert his meaning For first Aristotle does not say in that place he quotes or in any other that I know of That Tyranny is a Despotical or Masterly Monarchy And therefore all he builds upon this Concession is false It is true indeed Aristotle says That the Government of the Master is profitable both to the Servant by nature and the Master by nature that is upon his supposition that they are either so by nature But the Author omits what immediately follows because it would vindicate Aristotle's true meaning for his next words are Nevertheless it i. e. the Masterly power regards chiefly the profit of the Master and of the Servant but by accident but Oecumenical Government or that of a Master over the Wife Children and Servants is for their sakes whom he governs and for the common good of them all Hence it appears plainly that Aristotle when he says that a Tyranny is for the benefit of the Governour alone he does not mean that the Subjects can have no benefit at all by it since it is the Tyrants interest they should live and get Children or else he would quickly want Subjects Thus the Children of Israel under the Tyranny of Pharaoh had Meat Drink and Cloaths and were not so low kept but they got Children apace and yet we find God thought them opprest and heard their cry But Aristotle clears the point when he distinguishes an absolute Masterly power over a Slave from that of a Father of a Family the Master in the former considering onely his own profit and the preservation of the Slave but by accident and so an ill-natured brutish Master takes care of the life of his Slave that works in the Mines or Sugar-works in the Indies not out of any love to the person of the Slave but because he cannot subsist without him So a Grasier or Butcher takes care of his Cattel that they thrive and do well as they call it yet every body knows that they take this care onely for their Carcasses which yield them so much ready money at the Market So that indeed a Tyrant onely considers his own good in the welfare of his Subjects and looks upon them as no better than brute Beasts in which he hath an absolute property to shear or kill as he thinks it most conduces to his own profit without considering to what end he is set over them As the Grand Seignior makes use of the bodies of his poor Christian-slaves for Subjects I cannot call them to fill up Ditches and to blunt the edge of his Enemies Swords But that all Kings are bound to preserve the Lands Goods and Lives of their Subjects the Author himself confesses Patriarcha p. 94. Though not by any municipal Law so much as the natural Law of a Father which binds them to ratifie the Acts of their Forefathers and Predecessors in things necessary for the publick good of their Subjects So then I hope there is some difference between the Government of a Father over his Children and that of an absolute Lord over his Slaves notwithstanding our Author's Quotation out of Aristotle whereby he would make them all one viz. That a Kingdom will be a Fatherly Government Which is true if you take it in the best sence for that affection that Kings like Fathers should have for their Subjects And so it is plain Aristotle intended it by the words immediately foregoing thus For the Society of a Father with his Sons has an appearance of a Kingdom not that it is so indeed But to make an end with Aristotle I will give you one