thou hast the knack to wheadle or persuade him Would not this have been a mighty matter for God Almighty to have appeared to Cain about and an excellent Argument to comfort him and to appease his Wrath against his Brother So that it seems apparent by this Law given by God to Cain and Abel that this Regal and Paternal Authority was not to dye with him nor â—o be equally divided amongst all his Children at his Death or that from thenceforth no man should have a Right by Birth of commanding another for this command to Abel could not be supposed to take place in the Life of Adam for then Adam was Lord over all his Children and so none of them without his permission could rule over the rest and if it were otherwise by Adam's appointment then Adam was the Soveraign still and the Son or Grand-Son so exercising this Power was but his Deputy but after Adam's decease then it became a real Soveraignty in his Eldest Son as having none but God Superior to it F. I hope you will judge more charitably of me than to believe that the sense that I have put upon these words tho' different from yours is out of any love of Anarchy or confusion much less out of any design to pervert or wrest this place of Scripture and if I should be so severe as you are perhaps I might with more reason lay this charge at your Door for in the first place I am not satisfied with your Argument that these words could not be meant personally or concerning Abel only because the same words when spoken of Eve do likewise concern her Posterity and therefore when spoken concerning Abel they must likewise relate to all Younger Brothers in Hereditary Monarchies which consequence I may with very good reason deny for whatsoever subjection may be due by vertue of the like words from Eve and her Posterity to Adam and all other Husbands is to be supposed to have been enjoyned because all Women are descended from Eve and so were represented by her as their first Parent Thus St. Paul supposes all men to be in a state of Sin and Death as represented by Adam their Ancestor by whose disobedience all have sinned But no man will affirm that all the Elder Brothers or Monarchs in the World were represented by Cain and all younger Brothers by Abel no man at this day being as appears in Scripture descended from either of them and I cannot but take notice that the better to strengthen your Notion you again foist in out of the margin of our English Bible His desire shall be subject to thee whereas in the Hebrew it is no more than His or its desire shall be to thee And that the words Rule over are to be interpreted according to the subject and do not always mean a ruling by force or command appears by the same Hebrew words made use of in the first of Genesis concerning the two great Lights that God set in the Firmament to give Light upon the Earth to rule over the Day and over the Night which cannot signifie a ruling by force or command but only by a natural influence or preheminence of the Sun and Moon above the Stars or Planets And tho' you are pleased to ridicule this explanation of mine yet I think I may with as much reason treat yours with the like contempt for since your self grant that this Power of Cain over Abel was not to commence till after the Death of Adam and that this Murder of Abel was committed above a hundred years after Adams Creation appears by the time of the Birth of Seth who was born sometime after Abel's Death would not this thing have been a mighty comfort to Cain when he was in his dogged humor if God had bid him chear up for the time should come that if he behaved himself well about eight hundred years hence when his Father Adam should die he should then Lord it over his Brother and be revenged of him for the affront he had received in having his Sacrifice preferred before his own So that this interpretation of yours is so absurd that I do much rather agree with divers learned commentators as well Jews as Christians who make not only a quite different interpretation but also a different version of these words from the Hebrew Text and if you have the Learned Jesuit Menochius his Notes upon the Bible I pray let me see them Here pray observe what he says upon this place Seâ— sub te erit appetitus ejus in Hebraeo apud LXX est ad te conversio ejus sensus est Peccatum ejusque appetitus concupiscentia te sollicitabit ad consensum sed ita ut ad te converti a te conseusum petere impetrare debeat id noster interpres ad sensum clare vertit sub te erit appetitus ejus by all which he means no more than that sin should tempt or sollicit him to offend but that he should rule over it that is had a power so to do if he would use it as he ought So likewise Mr. Ainsworth upon this place as you may see in Pool's Criticks puts a liâ—e sense upon the following words referring the whole sentence to the sin in these words Peccatum ponitur pro poena Peccati juxta Hebraeos ita accipitur Gen. 19.15 Lev. 20. 9. 1 Rep. 7.9 sinsus est prope te punitio peccati ad te desiderum ejus i. e. cupit te poena peccati tui ut solet post peccatum admissum Sed tu si vis dominaberis illi i. e. potes declinare peccatum q. d. poena haec sicut canis est qui ad ostium cubat cupiens ingredi sed in potestate Domini est vel claudere ostium ne ingrediatur vel aperire ut intret Probatur hic sensus 1. Prius membrum de praemio lâ—quitur reportabis scil praemium ergo posterius loquitur de poena peccatum jam inerat ipsi punitio vero nondum sed ad fores erat So that according to these learned Comentators this place is to be thus turned out of Hebrew If thou dost not well sin lyeth at the door and to thee is its desire but thou mayst or shalt rule over it which seems to me to be a much more Genuin and Rational Interpretation than that of our English or Latin Bibles so that I think I may justly except against the Authority of so doubtful and obscure a place as sufficient to found your Monarchical Power of Elder Brothers in the State of Nature M. Well Sir since you are no better satisfied with this Testimony oâ—â— of Genesis for the Divine Right of Primogeniture I will no longer insist upon it tho' I am not yet convinced but that my Interpretation of this place is truer than yours since I have likewise great Authorities on my side both Antient and Modern besides our common versions to authorize it and
Subjection to Adam since they could never have quitted his Family without his consent and when they did quit it unless he pleased to manumit them they their Wives and Children were still as much Subject as they were before Since I do not see if they were once Subjects to him how any thing but his express will and consent could ever discharge them from it Nor was that Authority which every one of these Sons of Adam might Exercise over their Wives and Children though they were not freed from the power of their Father any more inconsistent with that Subjection and Obedience they owed him as their Prince than in an absolute Monarchy the power of Fathers and Husbands over their Wives and Children as to the things relating to the well-ordering and governing their Families is inconsistent with that supreme predominant power which the Monarch hath over the Father himself and all his Family or than the power of a Master of a Family in the Isle of Barbadoes over his Slaves that are Married and have Children is inconsistent with that Marital and Paternal power which such a Slave may exercise over his Wife and Children within his own Family though still subordinate to the will of the Master who may forbid any such Slaves or their Children to Marry but where he hath a mind they should and may likewise hinder them from correcting or putting to Death their Wives and Children without his consent Though such Subjects in an absolute Monarchy or Slaves in a Plantation cannot have or enjoy any Property in Lande or Goods but at the Monarchs or Masters will And so likewise at first none of these Sons of Adam though they set up distinct Families from their Fathers could enjoy or inclose any part of the Earth without his Grant or Assignment to whom the whole was given by God before It seems likewise to be a great mistake when you at first affirmed that all Civil Government was Ordained by God for the benefit and advantage of the Subjects rather than the Governours Whereas from the first and most Natural Government it appears that Children who were the Subjects were Ordained as much for the benefit and help of their Parents who were the first Monarchs as their Parents for them From all which we may draw these Conclusions First that from Gen. 3. v. 6. already Cited we have the Original Charter of Government and the Fountain of all Civil Power derived from Adam as the Father of all Mankind So that not only the Constitution of power in general but the special limitation of it to one kind viz. Monarchy and the determination of it to the individual person of Adam are all Ordinances of God Neither had Eve or her Children any Right to limit Adam'â— Power or joyn themselves with him in the Government Now if this Supreme Power was setled and sounded by God himself in Fatherhood how is it possible for the people to have any Right to alter or dispose of it otherwise it being God's Ordinance that this Supremacy should be unlimited in Adam and as large as any Acts of his Will So that he was not only a Father but a King and absolute Lord over his Family a Son a Subject and a Servant or Slave being one and the same thing at first the Father having power to dispose of or sell his Children or Servants at his pleasure and though perhaps he might deal too severely or cruelly in so doing yet there was none above him except God in the state of Nature who could call him to an account much less resist or punish him for so doing F. You have Sir made a very long Speech upon the Monarchical power of Adam which you have made of so large an Extent that this imaginary Kingship will swallow up all the other more dear and tender Relations both of a Husband and of a Father So that were I not satisfied you were a very good natured Man and spoke more the sense of others than from your own Natural Inclinations I should be apt to believe that if you had sufficient Power you would prove as great a Tyrant over your Wife Children and all that should be under your Command as such Arbitrary Tenets would give you leave but since I hope your Errour lyes rather in your Understanding than in your Natureâ— I shall make bold to shew you the mistakes you have committed in those Principles you here lay down I might first begin with the place of Scripture you farther insist upon for Eve's absolute Subjection to Adam from the like Expression used by God to Cain concerning his ruling over his Brother Abel as is us'd here to Eve and tho' you are pleased to think my exposition of this place so ridiculous yet I doubt not but I be able to prove when I come to speak of this pretended Divine Author of Elder Brothers over this younger that this place cannot be understood in any such sense according to the best Interpretation that both the reason of the Subject and the sense the best Commentators put upon it can allow but I shall defer this till we come to discourse concerning the successors of Adam in this Monarchical Power you suppose And therefore I shall only at present pursue that absolute Power which you suppose Adam to have had not only over Eve but all her descendants So that your Argument of Eve's and consequently all her Childrens absolute Subjection to Adam depends upon a very false supposition For if the Subjection of Eve to Adam and of all Wives to their Husbands is not servile or absolute neither can that of the Children be so since according to your own simile if the streams are of the same nature of the Fountain they can never rise higher than it and tho' I grant Adam might in some cases have put his Wife or Children to death for any enormous crime against the Law of Nature yet I allow him that power not as a Husband or Father but only as a Lord or Master of a separate Family who having no Superiour in the state of Nature I grant it is endued by God with this Prerogative for the good of his Family and preservation of Mankind lest such horrid crimes so much to its prejudice should pass unpunisht But that the Husband or Father doth not act thus in either of these two capacities I can easily prove First Because the Scripture tells us the Husband and Wife are one Flesh and that no man ever yet hated his own Flesh so that it is impossible for a Husband to put his Wife to death till by the greatness of her Crimes she becomes no longer worthy of that tender affection he ought to bear her Then as to the Father he as a Father ought not to desire to put his Son to death whose being he hath been the cause of and who is principally made out of his own substance and on whom he hath bestowed nourishment and education for
so many Years until he finds that instead of a Son he proves an Enemy to his Family or hath so laid wait against his Life that as long as he lives he cannot be safe or else commits some of those heinous crimes which by the Laws of God and Nature do justly deserve no less punishment than Death in short when he ceases any longer to deserve the name of a Son Yet this Authority holds no longer than whilst the Son remains part of his Fathers Family and so Subject to his Power and this I take to be the reason why we do not read that Adam took any notice of Cains's murdering his Brother because he was before freed from his Power by setting up another Family which certainly had been Adam's duty to have done had he been then under his jurisdiction Murder being as great a crime before the Flood as aâ—ter tho' the punishment of in by Death were not positively enjoin'd by God till then But I shall prove this point more particularly by and by as also that Adam's Children might enjoy or enclose some part of the Earth without any grant or assent from Adam to whom you suppose tho' without any proof as yet that the whole Earth was given by God To conclude I doubt you mistook me when you say I at first affirmed that all Civil Government was ordained by God for the benefit or advantage of the the Subjects rather than that of the Governours and therefore you undertake to shew me that in the first and most natural Government viz. that of a Family Children who are subjects in the state of Nature are ordained as much for the benefit and help of their Parents who are their Princes or Masters as their Parents for them in which assertion you fall in to more than on mistake for I do not assert that in Civil Government the benefit or advantage of the Subject is only to be considered For I shall easily grant that Princes may very well challenge a very great share in the honour and other advantages that may be reapt by their Government and yet for all that when the happiness and preservation of the Subjects is incompatible with that of the Prince the former is to be preferred and Bishop Sanderson is of this opinion when he tells us in his Lecture De Iuramento That the end of Civil Government and the obedience that is due to it is the safety and tranquillity of humane society and therefore the end is certainly to be preferred before the means when they cannot both consist together but this is no argument for the preferring the benefit or advantages of Parents before that of their Children since Paternal Government is not Civil Government nor are Fathers absolute Princes or Masters over their Children as you suppose and yet I think I may safely affirm that even in this Paternal Government tho' it be granted that Children are ordained for the benefit or help of their Parents yet when their happiness and preservation is inconsistent with that of their Children it may be a great doubt which is to be prefer'd since Gods chief intention in Parents was for the Preservation and Propagation of Mankind and therefore I cannot see how it could ever be any part of the Paternal Power for a Father to make his Child a Slave or to sell him to others at his pleasure as you suppose This being no part or end of the design or duty of a Father And whereas you lay to my charge my mistaking the true sense of those Civil Law Maxims you have quoted I think I can easily prove that the miâ—â—ake lyes on your side and that you have misapplied them to make them serve your purpose For as to your first Maxim Partus sequitur Ventrem from which you infer that the Child ought to be of the same condition with the Mother this rule in your Civil Law relates only to Bastards and not Legitimate Children who follow the condition of the Father according to your Digest Qui ex uxore mea nascitur filius mariti est habendus so likewise in your Code Cum legitimae nuptiae factae sunt patrem liberi sequuntur vulgo quaesitus matrem sequitur Nor is your second Maxim more true for tho' I grant according to your Roman Law the Father might have absolute power over his Wife and Children yet I cannot see how this word and nascitur can be extended beyond those that are born of a man and his Wife and therefore can never concern Grand-children much less any more remote Descendants and this very Law that a Son or Daughter might be killed by a Father seem'd so cruel and odious even to the Antient Romans themselves that neither the Law of the Twelve Tables nor the Iulian Law of Adulteries which were provided against Fathers Sons and Daughters ever extended it to the Grand-Father Grand-son or Grand-daughter by Interpretation or argument à casâ—â— consimili Nor do these words in Potestate mea est prove more than that all Children are born under the Power of their Parents tho' whether they shall always continue so as long as they live is not to be proved from this Maxim nor if it were doth that make it a Law of Nature For I must needs observe this of divers of you Civilians that what ever Maxim you find in your Civil Law Books that will make for your Notions you presently adopt them for Laws of Nature without ever enquiring by the strict Rules of Reason and the Good of Mankind by which alone any Law of Nature is to be tryed whether they are so or no. I shall not trouble my self to confute those false Conclusions you have brought from those weak Promises for if I have destroyed your Foundation I think your Superstructure cannot stand and therefore you must pardon me if I cannot find this Original Charter of Government and of all Civil Power to be derived from Adam by any Argument that yet you have brought either from Scripture or Reason only give me leave to observe thus much upon what you have said That if not only the Constitution of Civil Power in general but the special Limitation of it to one kind viz. Monarchy be the Ordinance of God I cannot see how any other Government but that can be lawfully set up or obeyed by Men since no Government can challenge this Priviledge against Divine Institution M. Since this Hypothesis doth not please you I shall be glad if you can shew me any better Original either of Adam's Paternal Power or of Civil Government than this that God gave Adam over Eve who indeed was as at the first Subject so the Representative of all that followed and it reaches not only to all her Daughters in relation to their Husbands but to all of them in relation to their Fathers and to her Sons too in relation to both their Father and their Eldest Brother after his Decease if no body
the Chineses and the Inhabitants of Formosa at this day all which either did or now do destroy their Children as soon as they are brought forth or else in the Womb afore they are born if they please so to do And as for some of these Nations you have instanced in and particularly the Muscovites who can â—ell their Children but four times it is apparent it is only a Municipal Law for if the Property of the Father over the Sons Persons were by them looked upon as perpetual he might not only sell him four times but forty if it were possible But on the other side I have against this Custom of your Nâ—tions the Examples of divers altogether as Wise and Civiliz'd who did not permit Fathers to exercise this absolute Power over their Children and therefore against your Example of the Jews I set that of the Egyptians who did not Permit Parents to put their Children to Death nor yet to sell them unless in case of great necessity and when they could not otherwise maintain them and then I grant it may be necessary So likewise against your Roman Law I set that of all the Greek Nations none of whom permitted Fathers to put their Children to Death except the Spartans and that was only in one case and that was only in one case and that with the judgment and consent of the eldest Men of the Family yet when their new born Infants were so weak or ill shaped as to be thougt not worth the rearing So likewise against your examples of the Antient Gauls I set that of the Germans a Nation altogether as wise and civilized as the other to whom I could likewise add the Antient Britains Spaniards and divers others and to the more Modern examples of the Eastern Nations where this custom is permitted of selling or killing their Children I shall oppose the Turks and Persians amongst whom it is forbidden as also amongst all the Nations of Europe who believe Christianity and if we go over to America we shall find that they are there so indulgent to their Children that no fault whatsoever tho' never so great shall make them put them to Death And to let you see that this is most suitable to Reason the two greatest Philosophers amongst the Greeks Plato and Aristotle have condemned it The former in his Laws where he expresly forbids it supposing that in no case whatever a Father ought to put off all Piety and Humanity towards his Son and that a Son should be rather led by Nature than driven by force to obey his Father especially since his Power is sufficiently established by the Law and the appointing of publick Judges and Aristotle in his Morals to Nicomachus Lib. 8. cap. 12. accuses the Jus Patrium in use among the Persians as Tyrannical and Grotius tells you he makes use of these examples of the Romans and Persians only that we might distinguish Civil Rights from natural From whence it appears that the putting of Children to death by Parents was lookt upon as an odius thing amongst the wisest of the Antients and therefore neither the Lex Regia nor the Law of the XII Tables nor the Julian Law de Adulteriis all which left Fathers a Power over the Lives of their Sons and Daughters yet would extend this Power by Interpretation to the Grand Father towards his Grand-Son or Grand-Daughter M. Yet for all this I think all the wisest and most Civilized Nations were of my opinion and it is from them that we ought to take this Law of Nations rather than the others and therefore I think the Romans were a great deal wiser and better People than the Greeks and the Antient Gauls than the Germans Nor does your argument against this power of Life and Death in Fathers by the Law of Nature seem cogent that if it were so it could never be taken away or restrained by any Civil Law since this argument will make vâ— much against that power of Life and Death with which you invest your Fathers of Families in the state of Nature since if they have it by the Law of Nature it could no more he restrained or taken away by Civil Laws than any Paternal Power in the like case F. I pray Sir hold if this controversie is to be decided by the Wisdom and the Civility of Nations we shall never have done For in the first place who shall judge of this consent of the most Civilized People and that no account is to be made of those whom you call Barbarous for what Nation will acknowledge it self to be so or can arrogate so much to it self as that it may require all others to conform themselves to their Laws and Customs and that all Nations must be barbarous that act otherwise Antiently the arrogance of the Greeks made them look upon all other Nations as Barbarous and then the Romans succeeded in this foolish conceit of themselves and at this day we People of Europe who are but a few in comparison of the rest of the World do suppose our selves to exceed all others in Knowledge And yet on the other side there are diverse Nations who prefer themselves far before us and I have read that the Chineses have a saying that the Europeans see with one Eye themselves with two but that all the rest of the World are stark blind and yet this Nation maintains a Power of selling and exposing their Children which we Europeans abhor Now pray tell me if there is not some common rule to be drawn from reason or the common good of Mankind how shall we judge which is in the right So that notwithstanding all that hath been said on this subject I think I may safely conclude with the Judgment of the Learned Pufendorf in Lib. 6. Cap. 2. where speaking of the Paternal Power he says thus But neither thâ— same Power as such seems to extend it self to that of Life and Death by reason of any fault but only to a moderate chastisement For since this authority is employed about an Age that iâ— weak and tender and in which such incorrigible crimes can hardly be committed which nothing but Life can expiate it is much better that a Father should turn out of Doors a Son who doth willfully refuse through obstinacy and wickedness all due correction So that Abdication and Disinheriting seems to be the utmost punishment which can be inflicted by a Father on a Son considered as such M. I see it is to no purpose to spend longer time about this question but since your self have all along allowed that the Father of a separate Family in the state of Nature hath a Power to put his Wife or Children to Death in case they have committed any heinous sins or offences against the Laws of God or Nature but you have not yet told me and I doubt cannot how Adam or any other Master of a Family could be endued with this Power of Life and Death unless
by several places in Genesis by which it plainly appears that Adam and after him Noah were supernaturally endued with this Divine Power F. Tho â— am satisfied that this Hypothesis is extreamly absurd since if it were so only Christian or Jewish Soveraigns or Magistrates who acknowledg the Scriptures could lay any claim to or exercise this Divine Power whereas we find it practised by all those Nations with whom the memory of Adam and Noah is quite lost and therefore must claim this Prerogative not from any Revealed but Natural Law of God yet however since you think you have such clear Texts of Scripture on your side I desire you to produce them tho if they should make out what you say they would only serve to confirm by Divine Revelation that Prerogative of Life and Death which all Masters of Families as well as Civil Soveraigns enjoyed by the Law of Nature before ever the Bible was written M. As for my own part I am so well satisfied of this Supream Power of life and death granted at first by God to Adam and after to Noah that I cannot see that without the supposal of this any Supream power could lawfully be exercised by civil Soveraigns at this day And therefore I am of Mr. Selden 's opinion who in his most learned Treatise De Iure gentium apud Hebraeos maintains with the Iewish Rabbins That the Law of Nature can never be planly proved and made out by Reason without a Tradition of its Preceps as given by God to Adam and thence conveyed to Noah and his posterity Which Divine Laws or Commands are called by the Iews the Seven precepts of Noah which whatsoever Nation or People would observe they permitted them to live as Inhabitans among them though they did not embrace Circumcision or those other Rights and Ceremonies commanded by the Law of Moses Now amongst these Precepts that of instituting publick Judgments for capital Crimes is one of the first in pursuance of that Command which God gave Noah immediately after the Flood Gen. 9. v. 6. Whosoever sheddeth man's blood by man shall his blood be shed for in the image of God made he man By which Text almost all Commentators understand that it is not any common man but the person of the civil Magistrate or Soveraign that is to be meant Since it would be both impracticable and also breed great confusion in civil Societies if by this word man every common person not endued by God with this Supream Power of Life and Death should be understood and therefore I do suppose with the most Learned Iews that this Power was first exercised by vertue of that Divine Charter that was given of it by God to Adam and then renewed again to Noah by the Text abovementioned Now that Adam had by Divine grant an absolute Dominion over the whole World and all Creatures therein contained will appear from Gen. 1. v. 27 28. here is the Bible I desire you would read it with me So God created man in his own image in the image of God created he him male and female created he them And God blessed them and God said unto them Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the Earth and subdue it and have dominion over the Fish of the Sea and over the Fowl of the Air and over every living thing that moveth upon the Earth By which Grant or Donation from God of subduing the Earth and having dominion over the Creatures Adam was made the general Lord of all things with such a particular propriety to himself as did exclude his Children from having any share in it So that if Cain had his Fields for Corn or Abel his Flocks and Pasture for them it was only by Adam's Grant or Assignation none of his Children or Descendents having any property in Lands or Goods without his particular Grant or Permission F. You must pardon me Sir if I cannot be of your Opinion that all the Preceps of the Law of Nature must depend upon no firmer foundation than a Tradition of the Seven Preceps supposed by the Jewish Rabbins to be given to Adam and Noah and from them conveyed to all their Posterity since we find not the least mention of any such Precepts in the Scripture or in Josephus Philo Judaeus or any other ancient Writer but only in the Tâ—lmud Which though it pretends to a great Antiquity in its Traditions yet any judicious man that will but peruse it may easily see the falshood as well as absurdity of the pretended Tradition of these Precepts one of which is against eaâ—ing the Members of any living Creature which savours so strongly of a Jewish Superstition that if that were a true Precept or Law of Nature no man could eat a Dish of Lambstones or a Black pudding without sinning against the Law of Nature And it is very improâ—â—â— to suppose that all mankind except Jews Christians and Mahometans should be obliged to live or act by those Laws or Preceps they never heard of For it as you your self must grant the memory or tradition of these Precepts be quite lost amongst all Nations except the Jews it is all one as if they had acted without any Law at all and consequently if they have not some better grounds for their observation of the Law of Nature than these Preceps of Noah I doubt whether according to your Hypothesis all Civil Soveraigns that do not own the original of their Power of life and death to this Divine Charter granted to Adam and Noah must be no better than Murtherers since they take upon them to exercise this great Prerogative without any Divine Authority for so doing But I hope to shew you before we have concluded this conversation that not only the Power of Life and Death but also other Laws of Nature may easily be deduced by Reason to have been given by God to Mankind by the ordinary Course of his Providence without recurring to Divine Revelation which can only oblige those that have heard of it But since you lay so much stress upon those Texts of Scripture you have now cited I pray give me leave to examine whether they will bear that sense you put upon them As for the first of those Texts you quote Whosoever sheddeth man's blood by man shall his blood be shed c. Suppose I should take it in that sense you put upon it only to extend to Civil Soveraigns or Magistrates it will be so far from proving a Power of Life and Death to have been granted by God to Adam and from him conveyed to Noah that this place seems to imply the contrary for if it was a known Law before that Murther was to be punished with death by a Father or other Magistrate to what purpose was this Command now given to Noah Since if it were a Divine Law before the Flood wherefore is it here repeated And therefore all Expositors agree that this is the first Precept enjoyning Murther to
be punished by the Civil Magistrate which before any of the Kin of the Person slain might have executed as appears by Genesis 4. v. 14. when Cain said unto the Lord I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond on the Earth and it shall come to pass that every one that findeth me shall slay me which had been a needless fear if none but Adam had a power to take away his life for the murther of his Brother as you suppose much less that God should have needed to have set a mark upon him to keep him from being murthered by his Brethren or other Relations Nor will that other place you cite out of Genesis prove Adam's sole dominion over the Earth and all the things and persons therein contained For if you please to consider it you will find That it is so far from proving your Opinion that it speaks the direct contrary pray therefore observe of whom Moses speaks in that place surely not of Adam alone when he says Male and Female created he them and God blessed them and said unto them Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the Earth and subdue it and have dominion over the Fish of the Sea and over the Fowl of the Air and over every living thing that moveth upon the Earth From whence we may observe First That these words being directed in the plural number both to the Male and Female were not intended to Adam alone but by way of anticipation not only to himself and Eve who was not then made but likewise to their Posterity that is all mankind Then that they should be fruitful and multiply and replenish the Earth and subdue it that is possess and enjoy it and have dominion c. over every living thing that moveth in the Hebrew creepeth upon the face of the Earth By which words it appears That not any dominion over Mankind but only over Bruit-beasts that move or creep upon the Earth is hereby conferred And that this must be the true meaning of this place is plain if you will but read the two next Verses that follow And God said Behold I have given you every Herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the Earth and every Tree in which is the fruit of a Tree yielding seed to you it shall be for meat And to every beast of the Earth and to every Fowl of the Air and to every thing that creepeth upon the Earth wherein there is life I have given every green Herb for meat and it was so Which words are certainly directed to the same persons as the former that is to all Mankind by the same Argument as that every green Herb is here granted for meat to every Beast of the Earth and every Fowl of the Air c. that then was or ever shall exist in Nature So that this Text which you have cited to prove this absolute and sole dominion of Adam over the Earth and all thee Creatures therein contained is so far from proving any such thing that it seems to me to make out the direct contrary Doctrine viz. That the Earth and all the Creatures thâ—rein were not granted to Adam alone as the sole Lord and Master of them but in common to himself his Wife and all his Posterity who had as good a right to them `as he had himself So that I must tell you if you intend to bring me over to your Opinion you must produce some better proofs out of Scripture or Reason than those made use of by 〈◊〉 R. F. and therefore I desire that you would give me some plaineâ— proofâ— for Adam's absolute Power over his Wife and all his posterity than hitherto you have done since I cannot see any Divine Charter granted by God in Scripture of any absolute power or dominion over their Lives or Persons M. I shall Sir do my best endeavour to give you all the satisfaction I can possibly therein therefore I desire you farther to take notice That Mr. Selden in his Mare Clasum and all the Jewish Rabbins have understood this Text in Genesis to give Adam an absolute power over the Earth and all things therein contained exclusive to his Posterity as long as he lived And the said Author from the ancient Tradition of the Jews is of the same Opinion in his Mare Clausum So that if Sir R. F. and divers others have erred in the sense of this place I believe it is more than you or I can prove since sure they would not have put this sense upon it without they had some good reason for it But this much I suppose you will admit that Adam was created by God and is in Scripture called the Son of God as indeed he was and if so let your self or any other rational man considerâ— Whether it be at all likely that God should not endow this Son of his the Father of mankind with somuch Authority and Power as should enable him to govern his own Family and Children as long as he lived without depending upon them for their consent and chopping Logick with them whetheâ— his Commands were reasonable or lawful or not And if a power of life and death was necessary as the murther of Abel by Cain shews it was whether Adam had no more share in that Power than any of his Children or Grand-children which is sufficient to shew you the absurdity of your Tenets That the Authority of Adam over his posterity was not absolute in its exercise as well as perpetual in its duration and this I think you cannot but admit because you have already acknowledged this Power of life and death to proceed from or to be granted by God to Adam and so consequently must have continued with him as long as he lived F. Well I perceive you find your Monarchy or absolute Dominion of Adam over Eve and all her Posterity as also over all the Creatures of the Earth not to be proved from any of these Places of Scripture you have brought for this extravagant Opinion and therefore you now urge upon me my own concession of this Supream and Absolute Authority of Life and Death which I do not deny but Adam might have exercised in some cases over his Wife and Children as long as they continued part of his Family But that he was not endued with this Prerogative as a Father but as a Head or Master of his own Family I think I have sufficiently proved and therefore need not repeat it And indeed your own instance of the murther of Abel by Cain which for all we can find past unpunish'd by Adam sufficienly proves That this Power of Life and Death over his Children or Grand children when once they were separated from his Family was not a necessary Prerogative of his Government or else that his Children and Grand-children when they have erected 〈◊〉 milies of their own had it as much from God as he and that from the same reason which you
give why God endowed Adam with it viz. because without such a Power they could not have been enabled to Govern their Children and Families as long as they lived So that Adam's being created by God or called his Son gave him not a joâ— more power over his Children and his Descendents than what as a Master or Head of a Family he would have had by the Law of Nature however and it is all one in this Case whether you suppose Mankind to have been created by God or to have existed from all Eternity provided you hold the being of a God according to the Hypothesis of the more modern Platonists who tho they held the Eternity of the World yet likewise owned all things to be governed by God's Providence And therefore if on this Supposition Mankind could not be well governed nor preserved without inflicting of Capital Punishments for great Crimes and that they are necessary for its peace and preservation it is likewise as necessary that there should be some Judge appointed by God to inflict them which in the State of Nature can be only the Head or Master of a Family as after Civil Government is once instituted it belongs to the Civil Sovereign or Commonwealth And this I hope will serve to answer your Scruple how Adam or any other Master of a separate Family may very well be endued with this great Power of Life and Death by the Law of Nature without supposing any Charter granted him for it by Divine Revelation or else depending upon his Childrens consent for his exercise of it But before I farther consider whether this Power of Adam or of any other Father or Master be perpetual or not and extends any farther than his own Family give me leave to examine Whether or no Children when grown to years of Discretion and even whilst they continue Members of their Father's Family may not in some Cases chop Logick with him as you call it and not only question but judge whether their Commands be reasonable or lawful or not or else Abraham for example mut have sacrificed to Idols because his Father bid him Whereas Josephus tells us He rather chose to quit his Country and his Father's house than to sin against God And therefore I think you cannot deny but if Husbands or Fathers command their Wives or Children to do any thing that is morally unlawful or contrary to the Laws of God or Nature they may lawfully nay are obliged not to obey such unlawful Commands M. I shall so far agree with you That if the thing commanded be apparently contrary to the Laws of God and Nature that they are not obliged to obey their Commands but they must be evidently and apparently so before they thus take upon them to refuse obedience to them otherwise I deny that their Conscience however misguided ought to be any excuse or just ground of their disobedience For if their Conscience be truly grounded upon the Laws of God or Nature that will excuse them but if it be not Conscience without such a Law can never do it And yet this non-performance of the unlawful Commands of the Husband or Father may very well consist without any Anarchy or disorder in the Family since the Wife and Children must always yield him an active-obedience in performing all his Commands or else a passive one in submitting to whatever harsh usage or punishment such a Husband or Father shall please to exercise or inflict upon them for their non performance of them tho never so unlawful But yet certainly in all possible and indifferent things Children are bounâ— yeild not only a passive but an active obedience to their Father's commands For if his Children should have a liberty to judge of his commands whether they are reasonable or not what can ensue but Anarchy and Confusion in all Families F. Well I am glad we are so far agreed that a Wife and Children in the state of Nature have liberty to Judge of their Husband's and Father's Commands whether they are lawful or not and also to disobey them when they are not so And I think I may carry this a little farther and affirm That such Wife and Children ought not to obey the Commands of such a Husband or Father though they are not really contrary to such Divine or Moral Laws but only erroneously supposed so by them and therefore most Casuists agree That even an erroneous Conscience does oblige as long as a man lies under that mistake For St. Paul tells us Whatsoever is not of faith is sin Rom. 14. Nay farther Such an erroneous Conscience may excuse a man before God if his ignorance was not wilful but invincible and not proceeding from his own fault but of this no man can Judge but God alone and the Party whose Conscience it is and therefore such a Husband or Father can have no Right or Authority to compel their Wives and Children to perform such Commands because the Will ought always to follow the Dictates of the Understanding and therefore they should not be forced to do that which they Judge contrary to God's Moral or Divine Law since Conscience may be instructed but can never be forced Neither will your distinction of an Active and Passive Obedience help you in this matter For Active Obedience I understand well enough but as for Passive Obedience I think it is next door to that we call a Bull or Nonsense And to prove this I shall give you this plain instance Suppose you had a Iew to your Servant and should command him to do you some work or other on a Saturday which he judged a Breach of the Fourth Commandment that forbids him to work on the Seventh Day or Sabbath and you being very angry should cudgel him soundly for this refusal whereupon he tells you That you may beat him as long as you please he would not resist but yield a passive Obedience but yet could not perform your Commands I ask you now Whether you would rest satisfied that this Iewish Servant had sufficiently performed what you bad him by submitting to your cudgelling And whether your Dinner or Horse would not be as much undress'd after this sort of passive Obedience as it was before M. Perhaps indeed this Phrase of Passive Obedience may be somewhat improper and may be more properly termed an absolute Subjection or Submission but it is all one what we call it as long as you understand what we mean since such Submission doth sufficiently avoid that Anarchy and confusion which would necessarily follow in case it were lawful for Wives or Children in any case whatsoever to resist their Husbands or Fathers though for the defence of life it self since no Government can be maintained where the Parties governed have a right to resist their Superiors or Governors in any case F. I grant indeed that no Government can be maintained where the Parties governed resist their Superiours or Governors in the due exercise of their
this point without better consideration but methinks you have not yet fully answered one of my main Arguments to prove the Power of Life and Death to proceed from God alone and therefore must have been conferred as first on Adam since no Man hath a Power over his own life as I said before and therefore cannot have it over that of others F. I thought I had already as good as answered this doughty objection when I had yielded to you that neither private Men nor Masters of Families have any Right to defend their own lives much less to take away those of others but as it is granted them by God in the Law of Nature in order to the procuring the great end of it viz. the happiness and propagation of Mankind which I own could not in this lapsed and depraved State of Nature we now are in long subsist without such a Power Yet I think I have already sufficiently proved that we have no need to recur to I know not what divine Charter granted by God to Adam or Noah and from them derived to all Civil Magistrates that ever have been or shall be in the World the consequence of which would be that no Sentence of Death could be justly given against any Man but in such Kingdoms or Common-wealths who own this Authority as conferred on them by God in Adam or Noah from which they must deride their Title to it Now I desire you would shew me how many Kingdoms or Common-wealths there are in the World who ever heard of much less owned this Divine Charter this fine notion yea scarce reaching farther than some few Divines and high Royalists of our own Island But be it as it will the Antecedent or first Proposition is not true that no Man in any case whatsoever hath power over his own life and therefore neither is your consequence for I suppose that for the same End for which the Civil Powers may take away another Man's life viz. in order to the greater good of Mankind of which my Religion or Countrey is a part I am likewise Master of my own and may lay it down or expose it when I think it can conduce to a greater good than my single life can amount to And therefore the Example of Codrus the Athenian King is highly celebrated by all ancient Authors and is not condemned by any Christian Writer that I know of for Exposing himself to certain death to gain his Citizens the Victory the loss of which would have been the ruin of the State And in the first Book of Maccabees Chap. 6.43 which thâ— it be not Canonical Scripture yet is allowed to be Read in our Churches as containing Examples of good manners you may Read that Eleazar the younger Brother of Iudas Maccabeus is there highly commended for his valour in killing the Elephant on which the supposed King Antiochus was mounted that he might thereby destroy him likewise tho he might be assured of his own death by the Elephants falling upon him And the zeal for the Christian Religion amongst the Primitive Christians was so great that we may read in Tertullian and divers Ecclesiastical Historians of whole Troops of Martyrs who tho unaccused yet offered up their lives at the Heathen Tribunals to a voluntary Martyrdom and farther Eusebius himself doth not condemn but rather commends some Primitive Christians that being like to be taken by their Heathen Persecutors cast themselves down head long from the top of their Houses esteeming as he their tells us a certain Death as an advantage because they thereby avoided the cruelty and malice of their Persecutors I could likewise give you if it were not two tedious several other Examples of Ancient Martyrs who have given up themselves to certain Death to save the Lives of some of their friends or else of Christian Bishops whom they lookt upon as more useful to the Church than themselves and which St. Paul himself does likewise suppose to be Lawful when he tells the Romans That the scarcely for a Righteous Man would one dye yet per adventure for a good Man somâ— would even dare to dye that is a Man highly beneficial to others And the same Apostle in the last Chapter of this Epistle returns thanks to Priscilla and Aquila not only on his own behalf but also for all the Churches of the Gentiles because they had for his Life laid down their own Necks that is hazarded their lives to save his and where ever they might have thus exposed them surely they might have lost them too And therefore I think I may with reason affirm that in most Cases where a Prince or Commonwealth may command a Man to expose his Life to certain destruction for the publick good of his Religion or Countrey he hath power likewise to do it of his own accord without any such command the Obligation proceeding not only from the orders of his Superiour but from that zeal and affection which by the Laws of God and Nature he ought to have for his Religion and Country even beyond the preservation of his own Life M. Well I confess that this that you have now said carries some colour of reason with it and is more than I had considered before But pray resolve me one difficulty more which still lies upon my mind By what Authority less than a Divine Commission from God himself revealed in Scripture do Supream Powers take upon them to make Lawâ— And that under no less penalty than Death it self against such offences as by the Laws of Nature do no ways deserve Death such as Theft Counterfiting the publick Coyn with divers other offences needless here to be reckoned up And if a Father as you will not allow him hath no Right over the Lives or Persons of his Wife and Children I cannot see how a Master of a separate Family can have any such Power more than his Wife or any other of the Family and the Scripture seems to countenance this Power of punishing for Murder to be in any that will take it upon them and therefore you see Cain said whoever meets me will slay me And God tells Noah whoever sheddeth Mans Blood by Man shall his Blood be shed without restraining it to any Man particularly who is to do it F. This Objection is easily answered if you please to consider what you your self did a good whâ—â—â— since urge to me that God endowed Adam with so much Authority as should enable him to govern his own Family and Children as long as he lived which I readily granted you and I only differed in the manner of its derivation you affirming it to proceed from a Divine Charter or Grant by Revelation conferred upon him by God and I maintaining that both he and every other Master of a separate Family derive it only from Gods Natural and not Revealed Law which if it be well proved such Masters of Families as also all Civil Powers whom I suppose to be endued
they nor any friend of theirs will take it amiss if out of a just value of their Learned Writings he hath put that part of the Controversy in their Works as the best be could meet with and which he dares not pretend to alter and as for the Answers he hath put them either in his own or else in the expressions of one or two late Writers who have undertaken to answer what they formerly had Written on this Question To conclude since the Author does not take all that those have layed down on either side for clear and unquestionable demonstrations for then there would be no need of publishing any more than the Arguments of one side he hopes neither party will take it ill if he hath here fairly represented the strongest and most plausible Arguments that are brought on both sides for what Doctrine soever is true such Truth will not look the worse or lose ground if it appears in its true natural dress tho' set against its opposite Errour But if a great deal of what hath been layed down by Persons too Violent on either side appear upon a strict examination to be meer Precarious Opinions whose best Authority is the great Names of some that have broacht them He hopes no indifferent Person can take it ill if he endeavours to discover these mistakes since all men are liable to Errours and as none can be more sensible of this than himself so whenever either of those Learned and Reverend Persons or any other shall convince him of any weak or false reasonings in this discourse he promises to retract them with he first Opportunity THE Third Dialogue BETWEEN Mr. MEANWELL a Civilian AND Mr. FREEMAN a Gentleman F. You are welcome Sir I see you are a punctual Man to your Word Will you be pleased to sit down by the fire and drink a dish of Tea M. I thank you Sir I assure you I love to be punctual in small things as well as in great ones when I am not hindred or prevented by business F. Before we come to the Question we the last time resolved to make the Subject of our present Entertainment it will I think be convenient for me to look back and see what I have already proved at our two former Conferences viz. 1. That Adam had not either by Natural Right of Fatherhood or by Positive Donation from God any such Authority over his Children or Dominion over the World as you pretended 2. That if he had yet his Sons or Heirs had no Right to it 3. That if his Heirs had there being no Law of Nature nor Positive Law of God that determines who is the Right Heir in all Cases that may arise the Right of Succession and consequently of bearing Rule could not have been certainly determined without the Judgment of the rest of the Children or Descendants of Adam 4. That the knowledge of the Right Heir of Adam supposing still there was one being now long since lost no Prince or Monarch in the World can graft any Title upon this Paternal Dominion of Adam or Noah 5. That all Authority of inflicting Punishments of Life and Death or other less Penalties for the Breach of the Laws of Nature or the Transgression of the Civil Laws of the Common-wealth is originally derived from God as being that Power with which God in the State of Nature hath intrusted all Masters or Heads of separate Families and this not as Fathers but as Masters 6. That since all Kingdoms and Commonwealths at this day do owe their Original either to the Election of the People or to Usurpation or Conquest God doth not now by the ordinary Course of his Providence confer this Divine Authority on any Persons whatsoever so as to give them a Right to the People's Allegiance without the People's Consent first had or else an Owning of their Titles by a Subsequent voluntary Submission to them M. I grant indeed that you have with great labour and some appearance of reason too endeavoured to prove those Principles you have here laid down yet however tho' the five first of them should be true I have a great deal still to except against the last if you please to hear me For I think I can shew you a great many evil Consequences that will follow from this Principle of making the Consent or Submission of the People at all necessary to the Conveying of a Supream Power or of that Divine Authority which you grant to be derived from God himself on all Monarchs and Supream Magistrates in Commonwealths F. I pray give me leave a little to interrupt you I know very well what this evil Consequence is of supposing the Consent of the People as a means at all necessary for the Conveying of this Divine Authority that is in plain English because it will destroy your darling Doctrine of PASSIVE OBEDIENCE and NON-RESISTANCE therefore if it be so pray let us rather fall presently to the Question it self than argue by Consequences which if we should go that way to work I have my Consequences likewise to urge some of which I have given you already Therefore if you please let us begin a fairer way and hear me propose those Heads in which I doubt not but we do both agree and then I will bring it to the main Case or Question in which perhaps we differ M. I confess I had somewhat more to say which would have tended to prove this Doctrine of Non-resistance but since you are pleased to propose another Method which you better approve of I am ready to comply with you Therefore Sir go on in what way you think fit F. I shall then in the first place lay it down for a Principle which I suppose you will not deny that all Civil Power being from God it was principally instituted by him for the Peace Happiness and Safety of Mankind that is of all the Subjects who are to live together in a Commonwealth or Civil Society 2 That all Kings or Supream Magistrates are likewise secured by Gods Authority in those due Rights and Prerogatives which are necessary for their well discharging this great Trust or Duty which God requires of them and in Consideration of which the People at first Elected or Submitted themselves to them If therefore you grant as I suppose you will these two reasonable Propositions the Question will amount to no more than this whether if the Supream Power in any Kingdom or Commonwealth so far abuses this Trust which God by the People hath committed to them and instead of preserving and defending the Lives Liberties and Estates of their Subjects they manifestly go about to destroy or grievously to oppress them by making them instead of Subjects meer Slaves and Vassals the Question I say then is whether if such violence or oppressions be committed upon the whole People or so considerable a part of it as that the safety and well-being of the whole Commonwealth cannot in any likelihood
about to make himself King of the Iews in Opposition to Caesar and therefore whilst they lay under this Mistake they were under as high an Obligation as an Erroneous Conscience could lay upon them of Seizing him and bringing him before the High-Priest and the Governour For if they had believed him to be the true Messiah and consequently the King of their Nation it had been impossible that they should ever have gone about to put him to Death Which likewise our Saviour himself acknowledges when Praying for them that Crucified him he said Father forgive them for they know not what they do I speak not this to excuse the Priests or Sanâ—edrim for condemning our Saviour to Death or for using all the Power they had with Pilate to have him executed Since I grant their Ignorance being in great part Wilful at least not Invincible they had no just excuse not to believe on him after so many Miracles he had wrought in the sight of all the World But only to prove that which I suppose you will not deny i. e. that Magistrates even whilst they Act unjustly are not to be resisted in the Execution of Publick Iustice no not to rescue an Innocent Man by force from the Hand of Iustice after he is Condemned Since the false or unjust Sentences of Iudges against particular Persons are to be taken for just in common Acceptation till they be Repealed according to that Maxime in your Civil Law Proetor dum iniquum decernit Ius dicit and therefore our Saviour coming to fulfil all Righteousness and to be the exact Patern of Divine and Moral Actions could not do less than rebuke St. Peter for making use of the Sword against a Lawful Authority but what is this to the Cases that I have put of the Resistance of whole Nations or Bodies of Men against an unjust force and destructive Violence upon their Persons and Estates by those who pretend to Act as the Supream Powers tho contrary to all Laws Natural and Divine and who have no Pretence to Act as they do but only their unjust and Arbitrary Wills back't by Power Aâ—d that there is a great difference in these two I will clearly shew you from your own Concession that no man wanteth Authority to defend his Life against him that hath no Authority to take it away and therefore I suppose St. Paul might only with the Help of those that were with Him not only have defended his Life against those whom we find in the 25 th of the Acts who were by Order of the High-Priest and Chief of the Iews to have lain â—n wait to kill Paul by the way but also against any that Festus the Governour himself should have sent for the same End Since He there decâ—ares That it is not the manner i. e. Law of the Romans to deliver any Man to dye before that he that is accused have the Accuâ—â—rs face to face and have License to Answer for himself concerning the Crime laid against him And therefore as Caesar could give Festus no Commission to Murder Men so neither did God bestow on the Emperour any Authority to commit murder or to Authorise others to do it and if a single Person might do this certainly much more a whole Nation Country or City may justifie such a Resistance where their Lives Liberties and Estates lye at Stake from the Violence or Tyranny of the Supream Powers and therefore I do not see but that I may very well grant the Instance you have put to be conclusive against this Resistance made by St. Peter on our Saviours behalf so that your Instance doth not reach the Case in hand that all Resistance of Supream Powers is unlawful And you your self have already granted as much as I can in Reason desire that no Man wants Authority to defend his Life against Him who hath no Authority to take it away So that unless Princes and their Inferiour Officers receive Authority from God to commit Murders every Man may defend himself against them when they go about to take away their Lives by Violence contrary to Law And therefore I see no Reason from any thing that you have hitherto said to believe that Christ did not allow this Distinction between the Person and Authority of the Prince to be good in some Cases or that tho' his Person should be sacred yet that his Ministers who Act not by his Regal Authority but his Personal and Tyrannical Will may be opposed nor can I find any Consequence from what you say that he is a Mock Prince whose Authority is confined to his own Person who can do nothing more than what he can do with his own Hands Since no Man in his Wits asserts any such thing for I grant that an Absolute Prince hath Power to make Laws and to Command them to be put in Execution which do not contradict the Laws of God and Nature and a Limited Prince hath likewise a Right to Command in all things that do not expresly contradict Gods Natural and reveal'd Laws and also those Positive Laws of his Country which he is not the sole maker of that do not contradict the former and if he can do this I think he is endued with an Authority sufficient to Answer all the Ends of Government without supposing that he must needs have an irresistible Power and without which he cannot Answer those Ends to Murder and Enslave whomsoever he will I grant indeed a Prince is not meerly a Natural but a Political Person but certainly his Personal Authority as King doth not reach as far as his Commission or that he who resists those who Act by his Commission may be said in all Cases to resist his Regal Authority Since at this rate the poor Protestants in Ireland at the beginning of the last Irish Rebellion had been in a very woful Condition if it had happened which was not impossible that King Charles the first should really have granted a Commission to Sir Phelim Onâ—al to destroy them which no man could then certainly tell but that he had since Sir Phelim publickly shewed such a Commission and still asserted the Truth of it till he came upon the Gallows but this is only by the by and in answer to what you have now said to this Matter So that there is no need of supposing what our Saviour thought one way or other in this matter Since he did not rebuke St. Peter for resisting the Inferiour Officers because they offered an unjust and illegal Violence but because he resisted those who acted by a true and Legal Commission from the High-Priest and Sanhedrim who supposed our Saviour to be a false Prophet M. If this Distinction of yours were true it would render the Example of Christ's suffering in obedience to the Supream Powers tho' unjustly yet without Resistance of no effect to us whereas I am firmly perswaded that Christ took such a mean and suffering a Person upon him
being forbidden by the Laws of our Country I shall answer that when you urge those Laws to me M. I hope I shall be able to prove that by and by but in the mean time give me leave to observe that it seems very strange to me that you should own Christ hath obliged his Disciples to submit without any resistance in some Cases to the Supreme Powers when they persecute them and put them to death for Religion and that they might not take up Arms in their own defence and that of their Religion which is the greatest concern that men ought to have in this World and yet that they might do it for much less considerable Matters viz. their Lives Liberties or Estates which sure ought to be of much less importance than the Glory of God which is chiefly maintained by his true Worship but I see you have found a Salvo for this and will not allow Princes the irresistible Power of Persecution when the Religion is once setled by Law that is when the Christians were strong enough to resist which certainly would be no thanks at all for their Submission since Men who are weak and unable to resist must needs obey and suffer which were matter of force and not of Duty whereas we find by Tertullian and all the Ecclesiastical Historians that though the Christians were strong and numerous enough in the Roman Empire yet they chose rather to dye than to resist as I shall shew you more particularly anon when I come to those Quotations but I will if you please now proceed to the two last Texts I have to cite to you out of St. Paul and St. Peter F. That we may not confound things one with another I pray give me leave now to answer what you have objected against what I said last before you proceed to any fresh places of Scripture for though in the first place I doubt whether the Non-Resistance which Tertullian and other Primitive Fathers so strictly preached up was sounded upon any express Command of our Saviour or his Apostles yet granting at present that Christ and his Apostles enjoyn'd it both by their Example and Precept yet this does not reach the case now before us for there may be very good Reasons why our Saviour might enjoyn an absolute Submission to the 〈◊〉 Powers without any Resistance though they persecute us nay put us to 〈◊〉 for Matters of Religion and yet he may allow us greater Liberty for the defence of our Lives Liberties and Estates when assaulted by the unjust violence of the supreme Powers For First our Saviour ordaineth his Religion to be suitable to his Person viz. a meek humble Suffering Messiah to be an Example of a meek and suffering Religion Secondly Religion is a thing that no Power in the World can take from us Persecution indeed may encrease it and render it more fervent but can never diminish it if it be real And God hath expresly promis'd so great a Reward in another Life for our sufferings for it in this that it will infinitely outweigh all that ever we can suffer on that Account and Lastly our Saviour Christ was pleased to ordain his Doctrine to be propagated by Miracles and Sufferings to distinguish it from all the false Religions that had been in the World before his or that should be set up in opposition to it afterwards since neither the Pagan nor Mahometan Superstitions nor yet the Iewish Religion can shew the like to subsist nay encrease for above three hundred years under such great and cruel Persecutions nor yet is the Glory of God at all diminish'd but rather encreas'd under Persecution since none are then firm to it but such as are really perswaded of its Truth and that they ought to suffer the worst that can befall them rather than forsake it And certainly nothing can tend more to the Glory of God than to see it subsist and encrease under a cruel and bloody Persecution nor is it the same reason that we should suffer Persecution after Religion is become the setled Constitution of a Nation because then every man hath the same Right to it as he hath to his Property or Freedom And though a man may part with either the one or the other yet is he not obliged to give them up by force and whether he will or no so likewise neither that Right which he hath to enjoy his Religion according to the Laws of his Country And therefore I do not resolve the Obligation to Non-Resistance in matters of Religion into the being the major party in a Kingdom as you suppose for if the Government of England were Popish that is the Legislative part of it and the Major part of the Common People were Protestants perhaps in that Case they were under all the Obligations of enduring Persecution without resistance as they were under the Heathen Emperours but indeed the Primitive Christians were obliged to Non-resistance because they lived under a Government in which Christianity was forbid and Paganism established by Law And though it is true Constantine made several Laws enjoyning the free Exercise of the Christian Religion and forbidding the Heathen Sacrifices and that the Pagan Temples should be shut up yet was not the Christian Religion for all that the sole Religion of the State the Senators of Rome and the Major part of the Common People continuing Pagans still So that it seems the Christian Religion was all this while rather established together with Heathenism than that this was wholly forbid since all Civil Offices and Preferments were equally conferred upon Pagans as well as Christians if they deserved them and therefore it was no hard matter for Iulian the Apostate to revoke so many of those Edicts his Uncle had made in Favour of Christianity and to abrogate those which had been publish't against the publick Sacrifices to the Heathen Gods and shutting up their Temples so that no wonder if they were now again under the same Obligations to suffer as they were before Constantine's Time since the Christian Religion was never the only One establish't by Law so as to exclude the open Profession of any other till the Time of Theodosius after which as also before according as the Christian Religion encreas'd and as they got greater Priviledges from the Emperours so were they more stout and bold in standing up for and defending the just Rights of their Religion when ever they thought them invaded by the Arian or other Heretical Emperours as I shall shew you by several Instances out of Church-History when we come to it but you may now if you please proceed to the rest of those places of Scripture which you have to produce against this Doctrine of Resistance in those Cases I have put M. I have many things still to object against your last Discourse but since it grows late I shall now continue my self to the Doctrine of the Apostles concerning Non-resistance not as if the Authority and Example of
extremity or else that the King should be thus invested with an irresistible Power of doing whatever he pleased with us I durst leave to any indifferent person to judge M. I confess you have told me more concerning the History of this Oath than ever I knew before but let the legal sense of it be what it will and setting aside the Precepts in Scripture for absolute Submission without any resistance I think I am able to prove from your own grand Topick of the common good and preservation of Mankind that it is much better to submit to the worst and greatest Tyrant that ever was than to resist him if he be our lawful Prince for if you consider what is the Subject of all Humane Happiness and Contentment it is certainly life now what Tyrant ever in his whole Reign destroyed so many Mens lives by force or unjust Prosecutions as a Civil War if carried on with violence and animosity does in a years time so vast a distance there is between the Evils of Tyranny and Rebellion and so much is the Remedy worse than the Disease the Cruelty of a Tyrant says one is like a Clap of Thunder it strikes with great terrour but Civil War is like an Inundation it sweeps away all before it without noise Thus one Man brought to the Scaffold by the Arbitrary Command of a Tyrant makes more noise than ten Thousand killed in the Field in a Civil War but that does not make the Evil the less but the greater Evil while we are made willing to destroy our selves and do it more effectually in one day than the bloodiest Tyrant could find in his heart to do in his whole Reign All the men put to death by the Arbitrary Commands of Tyrants since the beginning of the World in all the Kingdoms of it will not amount to half the number of those who have perish'd in the Roman or English Civil Wars so much safer are we in God's hands than in our own and in theirs under whom God hath placed us and tho' he often makes them like the Sun and Sea tho' highly useful in themselves scourges for our Sins yet he has promised to keep their hearts in his hand and to turn them as seemeth best unto him we have more Promises of safety there than when we are delivered over to the Beasts of the People whose madness David compares to the raging of the Sea In short The strict Restraint of the People by Government is their truest Liberty and Freedom since if they were at Liberty from Government they would be exposed to Combat one another which would be worse than the greatest slavery in the World the great mistake is in the foolish Notion we have of Liberty which generally is thought to consist in being free from the lash of Government as School-boys from their Master and proves in the consequence only a Liberty to destroy each other and yet it is for such a Liberty as this that men most commonly begin Civil Wars and fall a cutting of each others Throats Therefore tho' I grant it were much better for all Princes to let their Subjects live happily and enjoy a competent share of Ease and Plenty but on the other side if they will not permit them so to do but will tyrannically oppress them it were much better for them to sit down contented with poverty nay slavery it self rather than to destroy so great part of a Nation as may be lost in a Civil War whenever it begins Thus even the Poet Lucan tho' of Cato's party reckoning up the Miseries of the Civil Wars of Rome which were all for Liberty as if envying the happy Condition of those who lived under absolute Tyrants crys out Faelices Arabes Medioque Aeaque Tellus Quos sub perpetuis tenuerunt Fata Tyrannis I could give you instances of the truth of this in most Nations enough to make a History and if such a History were written of the Mischiefs of this false and pretended Liberty and good of the people I durst undertake the Comparison that more visible Mischiefs come upon the people more destruction of the publick good and greater loss of Liberty and Property by this one Method than by all the Tyranny and Violence of Mankind put together and consequently that there is no Comparison 'twixt the Evils of Tyranny and of a Civil War for publick good and that the Mischiefs of this pretence of publick good is infinitely less tolerable and a more Universal Ruine to the people than any Tyranny of lawful Governors that ever was in the World whereas this is by many degrees the greatest and most lawless Tyranny and always brings greater mischief along with it such as Confusion Rapin Violence Contempt of all Laws and legal Establishments with more intolerable Evils of all sorts than those it pretends to remedy But of all pretences for Rebellion Religion is the most ridiculous since a Man's Religion can never be taken from him or a false one imposed upon him whether he will or not and also because a Civil War introduces greater immorality and more loosens the Reins of Discipline and is more contrary to the Spirit of true Religion than any other Thing in the World true Religion is not propagated by the Sword it is a small still Voice that cannot be heard in War War confounds it and debauches it the most profligate and licentious Court bears no proportion in wickedness to the lewdness blasphemy and contempt of all that is Sacred which reigns and overflows in Camps It was an old and true Saying Nulla sides Pietasque viris qui Castra sequuntur F. I see when neither the Scripture nor the Law can justifie your absurd Doctrine of Passive Obedience then you fly back to your old Topick the Law of Nature and common good of Mankind I allow your Principles but not the deductions you draw from thence which are indeed but Paralogisms as I will shew you by and by but I see there is nothing so false and absurd which Prejudice and Education will not make men swallow I confess you have made a long and ingenious Harangue in a Commendation of the Benefits of Tyranny and Slavery which had you done only for an exercise of your Wit I should have ranked it with Cardan's Panegyrick of Nero and the praise of the Government but if you vent such Notions in good earnest I cannot forbear shewing you the absurdity of them First therefore admitting what you say for truth that a Civil War does destroy more men in one Battel than the greatest Tyrant hath ever done in his whole Reign Is this an Argument that no man may defend either his Life or Liberty against Arbitrary Power if this were true Reason it were the greatest folly in the World for the Poles or any other Nation that are at Wars with the Tartars ever to resist them for their Emissaries might thus make use of your Argument to make them submit to
the only Iudges of all Disputes about the Succession of the Crown D. 2. p. 891 to 892. D. 12. p. 893. D. 13. p. 917 to 919 921. Eve W. by being subject to Adam all her Posterity became so likewise D. 1. p. 14. to 25. F Fathers W. by right of generation or of education Lords over their Children in the state of Nature D. 1 p. 13 14. W. Any such power was given by Divine Grant to Adam and in him to all other Fathers Ib. p. 26 30 to 36. W. Fathers of Families have power of life and death over their Children by the Law of Nature Ib. 19. to 26. W. They may sell their Children Ib. 26. to 31. W. They may be resisted by their Children in case of any violent assaults upon their lives Ib. p. 41. W. Perpetual Masters over their Children as long as they live Ib p. 45. to 51. Fideles the signification of the word before the Conquest D. 6. p. 390 391. D. 7. p. 448. to 451. Sir R. Filmers Principles W. they do not rather encourage Tyranny than Fatherly affection in Princes towards their Subjects D. 2. p. 118. W. They do not also favour Vsurpers Ib. 125. to 128. G Common Good of Mankind the main design of all Government D. 1. p. 55. to 61. Civil Government the end of its Institution D. 1. p. 11. 19. 21. W. There had been any necessity of it if Man had never sinned Ib. p. 11. What it is and its Prerogative D. 3. p. 173. W. it can be setled without liberty and property in Estates Ib. 174. Government of Families and Kingdoms its Original and Necessity D. 1. p. 10. to 12. Supream Governours in what cases they cease to be Gods Ordinance D. 1. p. 41. Government among the ancient Germans and Saxons always by Common Councils D. 5. p. 365. to 369. Grands or Grants in Parliaments what those words signifie in ancient Statutes and Records W. The Lords alone or the Commons also D. 6. p. 369. vid. Append. Guards of the King when when first set up D. 9. p. 639. H K. Harold W. William of Normandy had a just cause of making War upon him D. 10 p. 718. What Title he had to the Crown Ib. p. 720. Haereditamentum its derivation Ib. p. 721. Hengist and all the rest of the Kings who founded the Saxon Heptarchy W. so by Election or Conquest D. 5. p. 357. to 362. King Henry the IVth W. his Title to the Crown were by right of blood or Election of the Estates in Parliament D. 12. p. 861. to 863. King Henry the VI. W. his Son were not unjustly disinherited by the Duke of York and himself unjustly deposed by Edward the IVth Ib. p. 863. to 867. King Henry the VIIth W. he had any Title to the Crown by right of Inheritance Ib. p. 868. to 870. King Henry the VIIIth W. the several alterations he made as to the the Succession were legal D. 12. p. 871 872. Homage W. it rendred the Prince or Lord irresistible D. 10. p. 727.728 Homines Liberi its signification in English Histories D. 6. p. 428. to 430. Homilies of our Church the the chief passages therein against all manner of Resistance of Governours considered D. 4. p. 287.288 W. It be Heresie or Schism to deny their Authority in any point there laid down Ib. 289.290 vid. Append. Mr. Hookers Opinion concerning the Original of Civil Government D. 12. p. 129.130 W. The two Houses of Parliament or the whole People of England have any coercive Power ove the King D. 9. p. 634. W. The Two Houses have on the behalf of the whole People renounced all right of self-defence in any case whatsoever Ib. p. 636. to 658. I King James the Firsts Speech in Parliament against Tyranny D. 3. p. 148. The Act of Recognition of K. James's Hereditary Right how far it obliges Posterity D. 12. p. 871 to 874. King James II. W. he violatid the fundamental constitution of the Government before his desertion D. 9. p. 673. to 685. Or W. he had amended all those violations before his departure p. 685. to 689. W. His setting up a standing Army and puting in Popish Officers and Souldiers were an actual making War upon the Nation Ib. p. 683.687 W. He abdicated the Government by his breach of the Original contract or else by his deserting it D. 11. p. 790. to 799. W. He might have been again safely restored to the Government upon reasonable terms Ib. p. 801. to 807. W. He really intended to redress all the violations he had made upon it p. 805. to 807. W. He resumed the Government upon his return to London from Feversham Ib. 802. to 806. Iesus Christ did not alter Civil Government neither by taking away the Prerogative of Princes nor yet by abridging the Civil Liberties of Subjects D. 4. p. 216. to 220. Jews often rebelled and sometimes killed their Kings D. 3. p. 203 to 205. Their resistance of Antiochus considered Ibid. p. 208. to the end Jewish Government before Saul W. Aristocratical or Monarchical D. p. 93. to 101. Judah and Thamar the History considered D. 1. p. 33. Iudges over Israel their Power W. Monarchical D. 2. p. 95 96. W. Some of them were not Iudges of some particular Tribes p. 96 97. Iudgements Divine W. they may be removed by humane means or force D. 4. p. 259 260. K Kings W. to be reputed Fathers of their People as the Heirs or Representatives of those who were once so D. 2. p. 65. W. They derive their Power from God or from the People and Laws D. 11. p. 773. to 780. D. 12. p. 936 to 938. Saxon Kings of England W. absolute or limited Princes D. 5. p. 349. W. They were endued with the sole Legislative Power Ib. p. 338 to 345. Kings of the English Saxons Elected and often deposed by the Great Council Ibid. p. 365. The same done also in other Kingdoms of the Gothic Model Ib. p. 365. Kings of England ever since King William I. W. they derive their Title to the Crown from Conquest or some other Title D. 10. p. 713. Their Concessions to Subjects do no ways derogate from Royal Prerogative D. 10. p. 715.716 Kings of the Roman Catholick Religion W. many of them have not observed Magna Charta and their Coronation Oath D. 12.882.888 King by Sir R. Filmer's Principles above all Laws and alone makes them D. 2. p. 123.124 In what sence he is head of the Politick Body of the Common-wealth D. 11. p. 803. to 805. W. He could have anciently by his Prerogative Taxed all the Tenants in Capite at his discretion D. 7. p. 495. to 499. W. He could call or omit to summon to Parliament what Earls Lords and Tenants he pleased Ibid. p. 505 to 511.523 W. He could also summon those Knights of Shires who served befere without any new Election Ib. 537. W. He could by his Prerogative discharge what Knights of Shires he pleased after they were chosen Ibid.