Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
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A45622
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The stumbling-block of disobedience & rebellion cunningly imputed by P.H. unto Calvin, removed in a letter to the said P.H. from I.H.
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Harrington, James, 1611-1677.
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1658
(1658)
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Wing H822; ESTC R35985
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10,790
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18
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THE STUMBLING-BLOCK OF DISOBEDIENCE REBELLION Cunningly imputed by P. H. unto CALVIN removed in a Letter to the said P. H. from I. H. Let no man put a Stumbling-block in his brothers way Rom. 14. 13. Sir I Gave my judgment upon your late book that I mean against Calvin in such manner among some Gentlemen that they desired me to write something in Answer to it which if there happen to be need I may In the mean time it will perhaps be enough if I acquaint you with as much as I have acquainted them In this book of yours you speak some things as a Polititian only others as a Polititian and a Divine too Now to repeat a few and yet as many I think as are needful of each kind I shall begin with the former The Rise Progress and Period of the Common-wealth of Lacedemon is observable in Authors by these steps 1. The Insufficiency of the Monarchy 2. The Form of the Commonwealth 3. An Infirmity in the Form and a cure of it 4. The Corruption and Dissolution of the whole All which happened within the compasse of eight hundred years To the first you say That the Spartan Kings were as absolute Monarchs as any in those times till Eurytion or Eurypon to procure the favour and good will of the Rascall-rabble so you commonly call the people purchased nothing but the losse of Royalty beside an empty name unto his Family thence called the Eurypontidae It is true that Plutarch in the Life of Lycurgus sayes That Eurypon was the first who to obtain favour with the people let loose the reins of Government and this he saith there without shewing any necessity that lay upon the King so to do nevertheless that such necessity there was is apparent in Agis where he affirmeth That a King of Lacedemon could never come to be equal unto any other King but only by introducing Equality among the people forasmuch as a servant or Lieutenant of Seleucus or Ptolomy was worth more then ever were all the Kings of Sparta put together Which latter speech if a man consider the narrowness of the Laconick Territory being but a part of Peloponnesus must needs evince the former action to have been not so voluntary in Eurypon as in prudence unavoidable But Eurypon having by this means rather confessed the infirmity of the Monarchy then introduced any cure of the Government it remained that the people not yet brought under fit Orders must needs remain in disorderrs as they did till the institution of the Commonwealth The Monarchy that is or can be absolute must be founded upon an Army planted by Military Colonys upon the overballance of Land being in dominion of the Prince and in this case there can neither be a Nobility nor a People to gratifie at least without shaking the foundation or disobliging the Army Wherefore the Spartan Kings having a Nobility or People to gratifie were not absolute It is true you call the Kings of France absolute so do others but it is known that in the whole world there is not a Nobility nor a People so frequently flying out or taking Armes against their Princes as the Nobility and People of France The Monarch that is founded upon a Nobility or a Nobility and the people as by the rise and progresse of the Norman line in our story is apparently necessary must gratifie the Nobility or the Nobility and the people with such Laws and liberties as are fit for them or the government as we have known by Experience is found in France and no doubt was seen by Eurypon becometh Tyrannical be the Prince otherwise never so good a Man Thus Carilaus in whose Reigne the Commonwealth was instituted by Lycurgus is generally affirmed to have been a good man and yet said by Aristotle to have been a Tyrant it remaineth therefore with you to shew how a good man can otherwise be a Tyrant then by holding Monarchical government without a sufficient balance or if you please how he that shall undertake the like be he never so good or well deserving a man can be any other Or confesse that not the favour of Princes by which if they be well balanced they lose nothing nor the usurpation of the people by which without a popular balance they get nothing but the infirmity of the Monarchy caused the Common wealth of Lacedemon And what less is said by Plutarch or thus rendred by your self Not the people only sent messages to Lycurgus for his counsel but the Kings were as desirous he should return from his travels in hope that his presence would bridle and restrain the people but Lycurgus applyed not himself unto either being resolv'd to frame both into one Common-Wealth To the form of this Common Wealth you say That whatever the Kings lost the people got little by this alteration being left out of all imployment in affairs of state and forced to yeild obedience unto Thirty Masters whereas before they had but two A strange affirmation seeing the Oracle conteyning the model of Lacedemon is thus recorded by your Author When thou hast divided the people into Tribes and linages thou shalt establish the Senate consisting with the two Kings of thirty Senators and assemble the people as there shall be occasion where the Senate shall propose and dismiss the people without suffering them to debate Now who seeth not that the people having no right to debate must therefore have had the right to resolve or else were to be assembled for nothing but the Ultimate result is the soveraign power in every government It is true the Greek of the Oracle is obsolete and abstruse but then it is not only interpreted by Plutarch in the sense I have given but by the Verses of the Poet Tyrteus which the Kings themselves though they would have made other use of acknowledged unto the people to be Authentick They having of Apollo sought This Oracle from Delphos brought Vnto the Spartan Kings among The Senators it doth belong To moderate in Royal Chairs And give their Votes in all Affairs And when they have proposed these The People chose what ere they please Of many other Testimonies I shall add no more then one out of the Isocrates I am not ignorant saith he to the Areopagites that the Lacedemonians flourish for this cause especially that their government is popular To the infirmity of this form and the cure of it you say That the Royalty and power of the Kings being thus impaired the people absolutely discharged from having any hand at all in publick government and the Authority of the Senate growing every day more insolent and predominant by reason that albeit the Senators were elected by the people they had their places for term of life the Kings resolved upon a course of putting the people into such a condition as might inable them to curb and controle the Senators to which end they ordained the Ephori Magistrates to be annually