Partner in the Soveraign Power because he molested the Eastern Christians by which act of his he declared thus much at least That one Magistrate might punish another for he for his Subjects take punished â—icinius who to all intents was as abso 〈◊〉 in the Empire as himself and did not leave the vengeance to God alone Licinius might have done the same to Constantine if there had been the like occasion So then if the matter be not wholly reserved to Gods own Tribunal but that men have something to do in the case why did not the Parliament of England stand in the same relation to King Charles that Constantine did to Licinius The Soldiers made Constantine what he was But our Laws have made our Parliaments equal nay superior to our Kings The Inhabitants of Constantinople resisted Constantius an Arrian Emperour by force of Arms as long as they were able they opposed Hermogenes whom he had sent with a Military power to depose Paul an Orthodox Bishop the house whither he had betaken himself for security they fired about his ears and at last killed him right out Constans threatned to make War upon his Brother Constantius unless he would restore Paul and Athanasius to their Bishopricks You see those holy Fathers when their Bishopricks were in danger were not ashamed to stir up their Prince's own Brother to make War upon him Not long after the Christian Soldiers who then made whom they would Emperors put to death Constans the Son of Constantinus because he behaved himself dissolutely and proudly in the Government and Translated the Empire to Magnentius Nay those very persons that saluted Julian by the name of Emperour against Constantius his will who was actually in possession of the Empire for Julian was not then an Apostate but a vertuous and valiant person are they not amongst the number of those Primitive Christians whose Example you propose to us for our imitation which action of theirs when Constantius by his Letters to the people very sharply and earnestly forbad which Letters were openly read to them they all cried out unanimously That themselves had but done what the Provincial Magistrates the Army and the Authority of the Commonwealth had decreed The same persons declared War against Constantius and contributed as much as in them lay to deprive him both of his Government and his Life How did the Inhabitants of Antioch behave themselves who were none of the worst sort of Christians I 'le warrant you they prayed for Julian after he became an Apostate whom they used to rail at in his own presence and scoffing at his long Beard bid him make Ropes of it Upon the news of whose death they gave publick Thanksgivings made Feasts and gave other publick Demonstrations of Joy do you think they used when he was alive to pray for the continuance of his life and health Nay is it not reported that a Christian Soldier in his own Army was the Author of his Death Sozomen a Writer of the Ecclesiastical History does not deny it but commends him that did it if the fact were so For it is no wonder says he that some of his own Soldiers might think within himself that not only the Greeks but all Mankind hitherto had agreed that it was a commendable action to kill a Tyrant and that they deserve all mens praise who are willing to die themselves to procure the liberty of all others so that that Soldier ought not rashly to be condemned who in the cause of God and of Religion was so zealous and valiant These are the words of Sozomen a good and Religious man of that age by which we may easily apprehend what the general opinion of pious men in those days was upon this point Ambrose himself being commanded by the Emperour Valentinian the Younger to depart from Milan refused to obey him but defended himself and the Palace by force of Arms against the Emperour's Officers and took upon him contrary to his own Doctrine to resist the higher powers There was a great sedition raised at Constantinople against the Emperour Areadius more than once by reason of Chrysostom's Exile Hitherto I have shewn how the Primitive Christians behaved themselves towards Tyrants how not only the Christian Soldiers and the people but the Fathers of the Church themselves have both made War upon them and opposed them with force and all this before St. Austin's time for you your self are pleased to go down no lower and therefore I make no mention of Valentinian the Son of Placidia who was slain by Maximus a Senator for committing Adultery with his Wife nor do I mention Avitus the Emperour whom because he disbanded the Soldiers and betook himself wholly to a luxurious life the Roman Senate immediately deposed because these things came to pass some years after St. Austin's death But all this I give you Suppose I had not mentioned the practice of the Primitive Christians suppose they never had stirred in opposition to Tyrants suppose they had accounted it unlawful so do I will make it appear that they were not such persons as that we ought to â—ely upon their Authority or can safely follow their Example Long before Constantine's time the generality of Christians had lost much of the Primitive Sanctity and integity both of their Doctrine and Manners Afterwards when he had vastly enriched the Church they began to fall in love with Honour and Civil Power and then the Christian Religion went to wrack First Luxury and Sloth and then a great drove of Herches and Immoralities broke loose among them and these begot Envy Hatred and Discord which abounded every where At last they that were linked together into one Brotherhood by that holy band of Religion were as much at variance and strife amongst themselves as the most bitter Enemies in the world could be No reverence for no consideration of their duty was left amongst them the Soldiers and Commanders of the Army as oft as they pleased themselves created new Emperors and sometimes killed good ones as well as bad I need not mention such as Verannio Alaximus Eugenius whom the Soldiers all on a sudden advanced and made them Emperors nor Gratian an excellent Prince nor Valentinian the younger who was none of the worst and yet were put to death by them It is true these things were acted by the Soldiers and Soldiers in the field but those Soldiers were Christians and lived in that Age which you call Evangelical and whose example you propose to us for our imitation Now you shall hear how the Clergy managed themselves Pastors and Bishops and sometimes those very Fathers whom we admire and extol to so high a degree every one of whom was a Leader of their several Flocks those very men I say fought for their Bishopricks as Tyrants did for their Soveraignty sometimes throughout the City sometimes in the very Churches sometimes at the Altar Clergy-men and Lay-men fought promiscuously they slew one another and great
make it evident that you take a liberty to publish palpable down-right lies You begin with the Egyptians and indeed who does not see that you play the Gipsy your self throughout Amongst them say you there is no mention extant of any King that was ever slain by the People in a Popular Insurrection no War made upon any of their Kings by their Subjects no attempt made to depose any of them What think you then of Osiris who perhaps was the first King that the Egyptians ever had Was not he slain by his Brother Typhon and five and twenty other Conspirators And did not a great part of the Body of the People side with them and fight a Battel with Isis and Orus the late King's Wife and Son I pass by Sesostris whom his Brother had well-nigh put to Death and Chemmis and Cephrenes against whom the People were deservedly enraged and because they could not do it while they were alive they threatned to tear them in pieces after they were dead Do you think that a People that durst lay violent hands upon good Kings had any restraint upon them either by the Light of Nature or Religion from putting bad ones to Death Could they that threatened to pull the dead Bodies of their Princes out of their Graves when they ceased to do mischief tho by the Custom of their own Country the Corps of the meanest Person was sacred and inviolable abstain from inflicting Punishment upon them in their Life-time when they were acting all their Villanies if they had been able and that upon some Maxim of the Law of Nature I know you would not stick to answer me in the Affirmative how absurd soever it be but that you may not offer at it I 'll pull out your Tongue Know then that some Ages before Cephrene s time one Ammosis was King of Egypt and was as great a Tyrant as who has been the greatest him the People bore with This you are glad to hear this is what you would be at But hear what follows my honest tell-truth I shall speak out of Diodorus They bore with him for some while because he was too string for them But when Actisanes King of Ethiopia made War upon him they took that oppotunity to revolt so that being deforced he was easily subdued and Egypt became an Accession to the Kingdom of Ethiopia You see the â—…tians as soon as they could took up Arms against a Tyrant they joyned Forces with a Foreign saince to depose their own King and disinherit his Posterity they chosâ— to live under a moderate and good Prince as Actisanes was tho a Foreigner rather than under a Tyrant of their own The same People with a very unanimous Consent took up Arms against Apries another Tyrant who relied upon Foreign Aids that he had hired to assist him Under the Conduct of Amasis their General they Conquered and afterward Strangled him and placed Amasis in the Throne And observe this Circumstance in the History Amasis kept the 〈◊〉 aptive King a good while in the Palace and treated him well At last when the People comâ—â—…d that he nourished his own and their Enemy he put him into their hands who put him to Death in the manner I have mentioned There things are related by Heroditus and Diodorus Where are you now Do you think that any Tyrant would not chuse a Hatchet rather than an Halter Asâ—… say you when the Egyptians were brought 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the Persians they continued faithful to 〈◊〉 which is most false they never were faithful to 〈◊〉 For in the fourth year after Cambyses had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thâ—m they rebelled Afterward when 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tamed them within a short time after 〈◊〉 râ—volted from his Son Artaxerxes and set up one 〈◊〉 to be their King After whose Death they rebell'd again and made one Tachus King and made War upon Artaxerxes Mnemon Neither were they better Subjects to their own Princes for they deposed Tachus and confer'd the Government upon his Son Nectanebus till at last Artaxerxes Ochus brought them the second time into Subjection to the Persian Empire When they were under the Macedonian Empire they declared by their Actions that Tyrants ought to be under some restraint They threw down the Statutes and Images of Ptolomaeus Physco and would have killed himself but that the Mercenary Army that he Commanded was too strong for them His Son Alexander was forced to leave his Country by the meer Violence of the People who were incensed against him for killing his Mother And the People of Alexandria dragged his Son Alexander out of the Palace whose Insolent Behaviour gave just Offence and killed him in the Theatre And the same People deposed Ptolomaeus Auletes for his many Crimes Now since it is impossible that any Learned Man should be ignorant of these things that are so generally known and since it is an inexcusable fault in Salmasius to be ignorant of them whose profession it is to teach them others and whose very asserting things of this Nature ought to carry in its self an Argument of Credibility it is certainly a very scandalous thing either that so Ignorant Unlearned a Blockhead should to the Scandal of all Learning profess himself and be accounted a Learned Man and obtain Salaries from Princes and States or that so impudent and notorious a Lyar should not be branded with some particular Mark of Infamy and for ever banished from the Society of learned and honest Men. Having searched among the Egyptians for Examples let us now consider the Ethiopians their Neighbours They adore their Kings whom they suppose God to have appointed over them almost as if they were a sort of gods themselves And yet whenever the Priests condemn any of them they kill themselves And on that manner says Diodorus they punish all their Criminals they put them not to death but send a Minister of Justice to command them to kill themselves In the next place you mention the Assyrians the Medes and the Persians who of all others were most observant of their Princes And you affirm contrary to all Historians that have wrote any thing concerning those Nations That the Regal Power there had an unbounded Liberty annexed to it of doing what the King listed In the first place the Prophet Daniel tells us how the Babylonians expelled Nebuchadnezzar out of human Society and made him graze with the Beasts when his pride grew to be insufferable The Laws of those Countries were not entituled the Laws of their Kings but the Laws of the Medes and Persians which Laws were irrevocable and the Kings themselves were bound by them Insomuch that Darius the Mede tho he earnestly desired to have delivered Daniel from the hands of the Princes yet could not effect it Those Nations say you thought it no sufficient pretence to reject a Prince because he abused the Right which was inherent in him as he was Sovereign But in the very writing of these words you are so stupid
a King But we do not bear with a Father if he be a Tyrant If a Father murder his Son himself must die for 't and why should not a King be subject to the same Law which certainly is a most just one Especially considering that a Father cannot by any possibility divest himself of that relation but a King easily may make himself neither King nor Father of his people If this action of ours be considered according to its quality as you call it I who am both an English man born and was an eye-witness of the Transactions of these times tell you who are both a Foreigner and an utter stranger to our Affairs That we have not put to death a good nor a just nor a merciful nor a devout nor a godly nor a peaceable King as you stile him but an Enemy that has been so to us almost ten years to an end nor one that was a Father but a Destroyer of his Country You confess that such things have been 〈◊〉 for your self have not the impudence to deny it but nâ—t by Protestants upon a Protestant King As if he deserv'd the name of a Protestant that in a Letter to the Pope could give him the title of Most Holy Father that was always more favourable to the Papists than to those of his own Profession And being such he is not the first of his own Family that has been put to death by Protestants Was not his Grand-mother deposed and banisht and at last beheaded by Protestants And were not her own Countrymen that were Protestants too well enough pleas'd with it Nay if I should say they were parties to it I should not lie But there being so few Protestant Kings it is no great wonder if it never happened that one of them has been put to death But that it is lawful to depose a Tyrant and to punish him according to his deserts Nay that this is the opinion of very eminent Divines and of such as have been most Instrumental in the late Reformation do you deny if you dare You confess that many Kings have come to an unnatural death Some by the Sword some poyson'd some strangled and some in a dungeon but for a King to be arraign'd in a Court of Judicature to be put to plead for his life to have Sentence of death pronounc'd against him and that Sentence exâ—cuted this you think a more lamentable Instance than all the rest and make it a prodigious piece of impiety Tell me thou superlative Fool Whether it be not more just more agreeable to the Rules of Humanity and the Laws of all Humane Societies to bring a Criminal be his Offence what it will before a Count of Justice to give him leave to speak for himself and if the Law condemn him then to put him to death as he has dâ—â—erv'd so as he may have time to repent or to recollect himself than presently as soon as ever he is taken to butâ—hâ—r him without more ado 〈◊〉 think there 's a Malâ—…r in the World that if he might have his choice would not chuse to be thus dealt withal and if this sort of proceeding against a private Person be accounted the fairer of the two why should it not be counted so against a Prince nay why should we not think that himself liked it better You would have had him kill'd privately and none to have seen it either that future Ages might have lost the advantage of so good an Example or that they that did this glorious Action might seem to have avoided the Light and to have acted contrary to Law and Justice You aggravate the matter by telling us that it was not done in an uproar or brought about by any Faction amongst Great Men or in the heat of a Rebellion either of the People or the Soldiers that there was no hatred no fear no ambition no blind precipitate rashness in the Case but that it was long consulted on and done with deliberation You did well in leaving off being an Advocate and turn Grammarian That from the Accidents and Circumstances of a thing which in themselves considered sway neither one way nor other argue in dispraise of it before you have proved the thing it self to be either good or bad See how open you lie If the Action you are discoursing of be commendable and praise-worthy they that did it deserve the greater Honour in that they were prepossessed with no Passions but did what they did for Virtue 's sake If there were great difficulty in the enterprise they did well in not going about it rashly but upon Advice and Consideration Thâ— for my own part when I call to mind with how unexpected an importunity and servency of Mind and with how unanimous a Consent the whole Army and a great part of the People from almost every County in the Kingdom cried out with one Voice for Justice against the King as being the sole Author of all their Calamities I cannot but think that these things were brought about by a Divine impulse Whatever the matter was whether we consider the Magistrates or the Body of the People no Men ever underâ—ook with more Courage and which our Adversaries themselves confess in a more 〈◊〉 temper of Mind so brave an Action an Action that might have become those famous Heroes of whom we read in former Ages an Action by which they â—â—nobled not only Laws and their Execution which seem for the future equally restor'd to high and low against one another but even Justice it self and to have rendred it after so signal a Judgment more illustrious and greater than in its own self We are now come to an end of the third page of the First Book and have not the bare Narrative he promis'd us yet He complains that our Principles arâ— â—hat a King whose Government is Burdensom and Odiâ—s may lawfully be deposed And by this Doâ—… says he if they had had a King a thousand times 〈◊〉 thann they had they would not have spared his Life Observe the Man's subtle way of arguing For I would willingly be inform'd what Consequence there 〈◊〉 in this unless he allows that a King's Government may be Burdersâ—m and Odieus who is a thousand 〈◊〉 better than our King was So that now he has brought things to this pass to make the King that he defends a thousand times worse than some whose Government notwithstanding is Burdensom and Oâ—… 〈◊〉 is it may be the most monstrous Tyrant that 〈◊〉 â—…d I wish ye Joy O ye Kings of 〈…〉 able a Defender Now the Narrative begins They put him to sâ—…ral sorts of Torments Give an inâ—… They remov'd him from Prison to Prison and so they might lawfully do for having been a Tyrant he became an open Enemy and was taken in War Often changing his Keepers Lest they themselves should change Sometimes they gave him hopes of Liberty nay and sometimes even of restoring him to his Crown upon Articles of Agreement It
the Law of Nature to oppress their Subjects and go unpunished because as circumstances may fall out it may sometimes be a less mischief to bear with them than to remove them Remember what your self once wrote concerning Bishops against a Jesuit you were then of another opinion than you are now I have quoted your words formerly you there affirm that seditious Civil dissentions and discords of the Nobles and Common people against and amongst one another are much more tolerable and less mischievous than certain misery and destruction under the Government of a single person that plays the Tyrant And you said very true For you had not then run mad you had not then been bribed with Charles his Jacobusses You had not got the King's-Evil I should tell you perhaps if I did not know you that you might be ashamed thus to prevaricate But you can sooner burst than blush who have cast off all shame for a little profit Did you not remember that the Commonwealth of the people of Rome flourished and became glorious when they had banished their Kings Could you possibly forget that of the Low-Countries which after it had shook off the yoke of the King of Spain after long and tedious Wars but Crown'd with success obtained its Liberty and feeds such a pitiful Grammarian as your self with a Pension not that their youth might be so infatuated by your Sophistry as to chuse rather to return to their former Slavery than inherit the Glorious Liberty which their Ancestors purchased for them May those pernicious principles of yours be banished with your self into the most remote and barbarous corners of the World And last of all the Commonwealth of England might have afforded you an example in which Charles who had been their King after he had been taken captive in War and was found incurable was put to death But they have defaced and impoverished the Island with Civil broils and discords which under its Kings was happy and swam in Luxury Yea when it was almost buried in Luxury and Voluptuousness and the more inured thereto that it might be enthralled the more easily when its Laws were abolished and its Religion agreed to be sold they delivered it from Slavery You are like him that published Simplicius in the same Volume with Epictetus a very grave Stoick Who call an Island happy because it swims in Luxury I 'm sure no such Doctrine ever came out of Zeno's School But why should not you who would give Kings a power of doing what they list have liberty your self to broach what new Philosophy you please Now begin again to act your part There never was in any King's Reign so much blood spilt so many Families ruined All this is to be imputed to Charles not to us who first raised an Army of Irishmen against us who by his own Warrant Authorized the Irish Nation to conspire against the English who by their means slew Two hundred Thousand of his English Subjects in the Province of Uâ—… besides what Numbers were sâ—ain in other parts of that Kingdom who sollicited two Armies towards the destruction of the Parliament of England and the City of London and did many other actions of Hostility before the Parliament and people had Listed one Soldier for the preservation and defence of the Government What Principles what Law what Religion ever taught men rather to consult their ease to save their money their blood nay their lives themselves than to oppose an enemy with force for I make no difference betwixt a Foreign Enemy and another since both are equally dangerous and destructive to the good of the whole Nation The People of Israel saw very well that they could not possibly punish the Benjamites forSpanâ— Murthering the Levite's Wife without the loss of many Men's lives And did that induce them to sit still Was that accounted a sufficient Argument why they should abstain from War from a very Bloody Civil War Did they therefore suffer the Death of one poor Woman to be unrevenged Certainly if Nature teacheth us rather to endure the Government of a King though he be never so bad than to endanger the lives of a great many Men in the recovery of our Liberty it must teach us likewise not only to endure a Kingly Government which is the only one that you argue ought to be submitted to but an Aristocracy and a Democracy Nay and sometimes it will persuade us to submit to a Multitude of Highway-men and to Slaves that Mutiny Fulvius and Rupilius if your Principles had been received in their days must not have engaged in the Servile War as their Writers call it after the Praetorian Armies were Slain Crassus must not have Marched against Spartacus after the Rebels had destroyed one Roman Army and spoil'd their Tents Nor must â—â—mpâ—y have undertaken the Piratick War But the State of Rome must have pursued the dictates of Nature and must have submitted to their own Slaves or to the Pyrates rather than run the hazard of losing some Mens lives You do not prove at all that Nature has imprinted any such notion as this of yours on the minds of Men And yet you cannot forbear boding us ill luck and denouncing the Wrath of God against us which may Heaven divert and inflict it upon your self and all such Prognosticators as you who have punished as he deserved one that had the name of our King but was in Fact our implacable Enemy and we have made Atonement for the Death of so many of our Countreymen as our Civil Wars have occasion'd by shedding his Blood that was the Author and Cause of them Then you tell us that a Kingly Government appears to be more according to the Laws of Nature because more Nations both in our days and of old have submitted to that Form of Government than ever did to any other I answer If that be so it was neither the effect of any Dictate of the Law of Nature nor was it in Obedience to any Command from God God would not suffer his own People to be under a King he consented at last but unwillingly what Nature and right Reason dictates we are not to gather from the practice of most Nations but of the wisest and most prudent The Grecians the Romans the Italians and Carthagenians with many other have of their own accord out of choice preferr'd a Commonwealth to a Kingly Government and these Nations that I have named are better instances than all the rest Hence Sulpitius Severus says That the very Name of a King was always very odious among freeborn People But these things concern not our present purpose nor many other Impertinences that follow over and over again I 'll make haste to prove that by Examples which I have proved already by Reason viz. That it is very agreeable to the Law of Nature that Tyrants should be punished and that all Nations by the instinct of Nature have punished them which will expose your Impudence and
were turned into so many Tyrannies and the Subjects began to conspire the Death of their Governors neither were they the profligate sort sort that were the Authors of those Designs but the most Generous and Magnanimous I could quote many 〈◊〉 like passage but I shall instance in no more 〈…〉 Philosophers you appeal to the Poets and 〈…〉 willing to follow you thither Aeschylus 〈…〉 to inform us That the Power of the Kings of 〈…〉 as not to be liable to the censure of any 〈…〉 questioned before any Human Judicature â—…gedy that is called The Suppliants calls 〈…〉 Argives a Governor not obnoxious to th◠〈…〉 any Tribunal But you must know for 〈…〉 you say the more you discover your rashness and want of judgment you must know I say that one is not to regard what the Poet says but what person in the Play speaks and what that person says for different persons are introduced sometimes good sometimes bad sometimes wise men sometimes fools and such words are put into their mouths as it is most proper for them to speak not such as the Poet would speak if he were to speak in his own person The Fifty Daughters of Danaus being banished out of Egypt became Suppliants to the King of the Argives they begg'd of him that he would protect them from the Egyptians who pursued them with a Fleet of Ships The King told them he could not undertake their Protection till he had imparted the matter to the people For says he if I should make a promise to you I should not be able to perform it unless I consult with them first The Women being Strangers and Suppliants and fearing the uncertain suffrages of the people tell him That the Power of all the people resides in him alone that he judges all others but is not judged himself by any He answers I have told you already That I cannot do this thing that you desire of me without the peoples consent nay and tho I could I would not At last he refers the matter to the people I will assemble the people says he and persuade them to protect you The people met and resolved to engage in their quarrel insomuch that Danaus their Father bids his Daughters be of good cheer for the people of the Countrey in a Popular Convention had voted their Safeguard and Defence If I had not related the whole thing how rashly would this impertinent Ignoramus have determined concerning the Right of Kings among the Grecians out of the mouths of a few Women that were Strangers and Suppliants tho the King himself and the History be quite contrary The same thing appears by the story of Orestes in Euripides who after his Father's Death was himself King of the Argives and yet was called in question by the people for the death of his Mother and made to plead for his Life and by the major suffrage was condemned to dye The same Poet in his Play called The Suppliants declares That at Athens the Kingly Power was subject to the Laws where Theseus then King of that City is made to say these words This is a free City it is not governed by one man the people reigns here And his Son Demophoon who was King after him in another Tragedy of the same Poet called Hâ—raclidae I do not exercise a Tyrannical power over them as if they were Barbarians I am upon other terms with them but if I do them Justice they will do me the like Sophocles in his Oedipus shows That anciently in Thebes the Kings were not absolute neither Hence says Tiresias to Oedipus I am not your Slave And Creon to the same King I have some Right in this City says he as well as you And in another Tragedy of the same Poet called Antigone Aemon tells the King That the City of Thebes is not govern'd by a single person All men know that the Kings of Lacedemon have been arraigned and sometimes put to death judicially These instances are sufficient to evince what Power the Kings in Greece had Let us consider now the Romans You betake your self to that passage of C. Memmius in Salust of Kings having a liberty to do what they list and go unpunished to which I have given an answer already Salust himself says in express words That the Ancient Government of Rome was by their Laws tho the Name and Form of it was Regal which form of Government when it grew into a Tyranny you know they put down and changed Cicero in his Oration against Piso Shall I says he account him a Consul who would not allow the Senate to have any Authority in the Common-wealth Shall I take notice of any man as Consul if at the same there be no such thing as a Senate when of old the City of Rome acknowledged not their Kings if they acted without or in opposition to the Senate Do you hear the very Kings themselves at Rome signified nothing without the Senate But say you Romulus governed as he listed and for that you quote Tacitus No wonder The Government was not then established by Law they were a confus'd multitude of strangers more like than a State and all mankind lived without Laws before Governments were setled But when Romulus was dead tho all the people were desirous of a King not having yet experienced the sweetness of Liberty yet as Livy informs us The Soveraign Power resided in the People so that they parted not with more Right than they retained The same Author tells us That that same Power was afterwards extorted from them by their Emperours Servius Tullius at first reigned by fraud and as it were a Deputy to Tarquinius Priscus but afterward he referred it to the people Whether they would have him reign or no At last says Tacitus he became the Author of such Laws as the Kings were obliged to obey Do you think he would have done such an injury to himself and his Posterity if he had been of opinion that the Right of Kings had been above all Laws Their last King Tarquinius Superbus was the first that put an end to that custom of consulting the Senate concerning all Publick Affairs for which very thing and other enormities of his the people deposed him and banished him and his Family These things I have out of Livy and Cicero than whom you will hardly produce any better Expositors of the Right of Kings among the Romans As for the Dictatorship that was but Temporary and was never made use of but in great extremities and was not to continue longer than six months But that thing which you call the Right of the Roman Emperors was no Right but a plain downright Force and was gained by War only But Tacitus say you that lived under the Government of a single person writes thus The Gods have committed the Sovereign Power in human Affairs to Princes only and have left to Subjects the honour of being obedient But you tell us not where Tacitus has these
what Seneca himself and all good Men even in Nero's time thought was fit to be done to a Tyrant and how vertuous an Action how acceptable to God they thought it to kill one So every good Man of Rome as far as in him lay kill'd Domitian Pliny the Second owns it openly in his Panegyrick to Trajan the Emperor We took pleasure in dashing those proud Looks against the Ground in piercing him with our Swords in mangling him with Axes as if he had bled and felt pain at every stroke No man could so command his passion of Joy but that he counted it a piece of Revenge to behold his mangled Limbs his Members torn asunder and after all his stern and horâ—â—â— Statues thrown down and burnt And afterwards They cannot love good Princes enough that cannot hate bad ones as they deserve Then amongst other Enormities of Domitian he reckons this for one that he put to Death Epâ—phroditus that had kill'd Nero Had we forgotten the avenging Nero's Death Was it likely that he would suffer his Life and Actions to be ill spoken of whose Death he revenged He seems to have thought it almost a Crime not to kill Nero that counts it so great a one to punish him that did it By what has been said it is evident that the best of the Romans did not only kill Tyrants as oft as they could and howsoever they could but that they thought it a commendable and a praise-worthy Action so to do as the Grecians had done before them For when they could not proceed judicially against a Tyrant in his life-time being interior to him in Strength and Power yet after his Death they did it and condemn'd him by the Valerian Law For Valerius Publicola Junius Brutus his Colleague when he saw that Tyrants being guarded with Soldiers could not be brought to a legal Tryal he devised a Law to make it lawful to kill them any way tho uncondemn'd and that they that did it should afterwards give an account of their so doing Hence when Cassius had actually run Caligula through with a Sword tho every Body else had done it in their hearts Valerius Asiaticus one that had been Consul being present at the time cried out to the Soldiers that began to Mutiny because of his Death I wish I my self had kill'd him And the Senate at the same time was so far from being displeased with Cassius for what he had done that they resolved to extirpate the Memory of the Emperors and to raze the Temples that had been erected in Honour of them When Claudius was presently saluted Emperor by the Soldiers they forbad him by the Tribune of the People to take the Government upon him but the Power of the Soldiers prevailed The Senate declared Nero an Enemy and made enquiry after him to have punished him according to the Law of their Ancestors which required that he should be stript naked and hung by the Neck upon a forked Stake and whipt to Death Consider now how much more mildly and moderately the English dealt with their Tyrant tho many are of Opinion that he caused the spilling of more Blood than ever Nero himself did So the Senate condemn'd Domitian after his Death they commanded his Statues to be pull'd down and dash'd in pieces which was all they could do When Commodus was slain by his own Officers neither the Senate nor the People punisht the Fact but declared him an Enemy and enquired for his dead Corps to have made it an Example An Act of the Senate made upon that occasion is extant in Lampridius Let the Enemy of his Country be depriv'd of all his Titles let the Parricide be drawn let him be torn in pieces in the Spoliary let the Enemy of the gods the Executioner of the Senate be drag'd with a Hake c. The same Persons in a very full Senate condemn'd Didius Julianus to Death and sent a Tribune to slay him in the Palace The same Senate deposed Maximinus and declared him an Enemy Let us hear the words of the Decree of the Senate concerning him as Capitolinus relates it The Consul put the question Conscript Fathers what is your pleasure concerning the Maximines They answered They are Enemies they are Enemies who ever kills them shall be rewarded Would you know now whether the People of Rome and the Provinces of the Empire obeyed the Senate or Maximine the Emperor Hear what the same Author says The Senate wrote Letters into all the Provinces requiring them to take care of their Common Safety and Liberty the Letters were publickly read And the Friends the Deputies the Generals the Tribunes the Soldiers of Maximine were slain in all places very few Cities were found that kept their Faith with the publick Enemy Herodian relates the same thing But what need we give any more Instances out of the Roman Histories Let us now see what manner of thing the Right of Kings was in those days in the Nations that bordered upon the Empire Ambiorix a King of the Gauls confesseth The Nature of his Dominion to be such that the People have as great Power over him as he over them And consequently as well as he judged them he might be judged by them Vercingetorix another King in Gaul was accused of Treason by his own People These things Caesar relates in his History of the Gallick Wars Neither is the Regal Power among the Germans absolute and uncontroulable lesser matters are ordered and disposed by the Princes greater Affairs by all the People The King or Prince is more considerable by the Authority of his Persuasions than by any Power that he has of Commanding If his Opinion be not approv'd of they declare their dislike of it by a general murmuring Noise This is out of Tacitus Nay and you your self now confess that what but of late you exclaim'd against as an unheard of thing has been often done to wit That no less than fifty Scotish Kings have been either Banished or Imprisoned or put to Death nay and some of them publickly executed Which having come to pass in our very Island why do you as if it were your Office to conceal the violent Deaths of Tyrants by burying them in the dark exclaim against it as an abominable and unheard of thing You proceed to commend the Jews and Christians for their Religious Obearence even to Tyrants and to heap one lye upon another all which I have already conâ—uted you in Of late you made large Enccmiums of the Obedience of the Assyrians and Persians and now you reckon up their Rebellions and tho but of late you said they never had Rebell'd at all now you give us a great many reasons why they Rebell'd so often Then you resume the Narrative of the manner of our King's Death which you had broken off long since that if you had not taken care suâ—â—iâ—ntly to appear ridiculous and a Fool then you may do it now You said He was led through the Members of
his own Court What you mean by the Members of the Court I would gladly know You enumerate the Calamities that the Romans underwent by changing their Kingdom into a Commowealth In which I have already shown how grosly you give your self the lye What was it you said when you wrote against the Jesuit You demonstrated That in an Aristocracy or a popular State there câ—uld but he Seditiâ—â—s and Tumults whereas under a Tyrant nothing was to be lâ—ked for but certain Ruin and Destruction And dare you now say you vain corrupt Mortal That thâ—se Seditions were Punishments inflicted upon them fâ—r Banâ—shing their Kings to wit because King Charles gave you a hundred Jacobussâ—s afterward Therefore the Romans shall be punished for Banishing their Kings But they that kill'd Julius Caesar did not prosper afterwards I confess if I would have had any Tyrant spared it should have been him For altho he introduced a Monarchical Government into a 〈◊〉 State by force of Arms yet perhaps himself deserved a Kingdom best and yet I conceive that none of those that killed him can be said to have been punished for so doing any more than Caius Anthonius 〈…〉 's Colleague for destroying Cataline who when he was afterward condemn'd for other Crimes says Cicero in his Oration Pro Flacco Cataline's Sepulchâ—… was adâ—rn'd with Flowers For they that fa voured Cataline then rejoyced They gave out then that what Cataline did was just to encrease the Peoples hatred against those that had cut him off These are Artifices which wicked Men make use of to deter the best of Men from punishing Tyrants and slagitious Persons I might as easily say the quite contrary and instance in them that have killed Tyrants and prospered afterwards if any certain inference might be drawn in such â—…ases from the Events of things You object further That the English did not put their Hereditary King to Death in like manner as Tyrants use to be slain but as Robbers and Traytors are executed In the first place I do not nor can any wise Man understand what a Crowns being Hereditary should contribute to a King's Crimes being unpunishable What you ascribe to the Barbarous Cruelty of the English proceeded rather for their Clemency and Moderation and as such deserves Commendation who tho the beinâ— a Tyrant is a Crime that comprehends all sorts of Enormities such as Robberies Treasons and Rebellions against the whole Nation yet were contented to inflict no greater punishment upon him for being so than they used of course to do upon any Common Highway-man or ordinary Traytor You hope some such Men as Harmodius and Thrasibulus will rise up amongst us and make Expiation for the King's Death by shedding thâ—ir Blood that were the Authors of it But you will run â—…d with despair and be detested by all good Men and put an end to that wretched Life of yours by hâ—nging your self before you see Men like Hâ—…dius avenging the Blood of a Tyrant upon such 〈◊〉 hâ—ve done no other than what they did themselves That you will come to such an end is most proâ—â—ble nor can any other be expected of so great a Rogue but the other thing is an utter impossibility You mention thirty Tyrants that rebelled in Callienus's time And what if it fall out that one Tyrant happens to oppose another must therefore all they that resist Tyrants be accounted such themselves You cannot persuade Men into such a belief you Slave of a Knight nor your Author Trebellius Pollio the most inconsiderable of all Historians that have writ If any of the Emperors were declared Enemies by the Senate you say it was done by Faction but could not have been by Law You put us in mind what it was that made Emperours at first It was Faction and Violence and to speak plainer it was the Madness of Anthony that made Generals at first Rebel against the Senate and the People of Rome there was no Law no Right for their so doing Galba you say was punished for his Insurection against Nero. Tell us likewise how â—â—spasian was punished for taking up Arms against Vitellius There was as much difference you say betwixt Charles and Nero as betwixt those English â—…chers and the Roman Senators of thâ—â— Age. Desâ—icâ—ble Villain by whom it is Scandalous to be commended and a Praise to be Evil spoken of But a few Periods before discoursing of this very thing you said That the Roman Senate under the Emperors was in effect but an Assembly of Slaves in Robes And here you say That very Senate was an Assembly of Kings which if it be allowed then are Kings according to your own Opinion but Slaves with Robes on Kings are blessed that have such a Fellow as you to write in their praise than whom no Man is more a Rascal no Beast more void of Sense unless this one thing may be said to be peculiar to you that none ever brayed so learnedly You make the Parliament of England more like to Nero than to the Roman Senate This itch of yours of making silly Similitudes enforces me to rectify you whether I will or no And I will let you see how like King Charles was to Nero. Nero you say commanded his own Mother to be run through with a Sword But Charles murdered both his Prince and his Father and that by Poyson For to omit other evidences he that would not suffer a Duke that was accused for it to come to his Tryal must needs have been guilty of it himself Nero slew many thousands of Christians but Charles slew many more There were those says Suetonius that praised Nero after he was dead that long'd to have had him again That hung Garlands of Flowers upon his Sepulchre and gave out that they would never prosper that had been his Enemies And some there are transported with the like Phrensy that wish for King Charles again and extol him to the highest degree imaginable of whom you a Knight of the Halter are a Ringleader The English Soldiers more Savage than their own Mastiffs erectâ—d a new and unheard-of Court of Justice Observe this ingenious Symbol or adage of Salmasius which he has now repeated six times over More Savage than their own Mastiffs Take notice Orators and School-Masters pluck if you are wise this Elegant Flower which Salmasius is so very fond of Commit this Flourish of a Man that is so much a Master of words to your Desks for safe Custody lest it be lost Has your rage made you forget words to that degree that like a Cuckcow you must needs say the same thing over and over again What strange thing has befallen you The Poet tells us That Spleen and Rage turn'd Hecuba into a Dog and it has turn'd you the Lord of St. Lupus into a Cuckow Now you come out with fresh Contradictions You had said before page 113. That Princes were not bound by any Laws neither Câ—ercive nor Directory that they were bound by no Law
might be occasioned by the King's Death and the change of Affairs than they would be profited by the punishment of one Man or two But when they begin to be universally injurious and insufferable it has always been the Opinion of all Nations that then being Tyrants it is lawful to put them to Death any how condemn'd or uncondemn'd Hence Cicero in his Second Phillippick says thus of those that kill'd Caesar They were the first that ran through with their Swords not a Man who affected to be King but who was actually setled in the Government which as it was a worthy and godlike Action so it 's set before us for our imitation How unlike are you to him Murder Adultery Injuries are not regal and publick but private and personal Crimes Well said Parasite you have obliged all Pimps and Prosâ—igates in Courts by this Expression How ingeniously do you act both the Parasite and the Pimp with the same breath A King that is an Adulterer or a Murderer may yet govern well and consequently ought not to be put to Death because together with his Life he must lose his Kingdom and it was never yet allowed by God's Laws or Man's that for one and the same Crime a Man was to be punished twice Infamous foul-mouth Wretch By the same reason the Magistrates in a popular State or in an Aristocracy ought never to be put to Death for fear of double Punishment no Judge no Senator must dye for they must lose their Magistracy too as well as their Lives As you have endeavoured to take all Power out of the Peoples hands and vest it in the King so you would all Majesty too A delegated translatitious Majesty we allow but that Majesty does chiefly and primarily reside in him you can no more prove than you can that Power and Authority does A King you say cannot commit Treason against his People but a People may against their King And yet a King is what he is for the People only not the People for him Hence I infer that the whole Body of the People or the greater part of them must needs have greater Power than the King This you deny and begin to cast up accounts He is of greater Power than any one than any two than any 〈◊〉 than any ten than any hundred than any thousand than any ten thousand be it so He is of more Power than half the People I will not deny that neither Add now half of the other half will be not have more Power than all thâ—se Not at all Go on why do you take away the Board Do you not understand Progression in Arithmetick He begins to reckon after another manner Has not the King and the Nobility together more Power No Mr Changeling I deny that too If by the Nobility whom you stile Optimates you mean the Peers only for it may happen that amongst the whole number of them there may not be one Man deserving that Appellation for it often falls out that there are better and wiser Men than they amongst the Commons whom in Conjunction with the greater or the better part of the People I should not scruple to call by the Name of and take them for all the People But if the King is not Superior in Power to all the People together he is then a King but of single Persons he is not the King of the whole Body of the People You say well no more he is unless they are content he should be so Now balance your accounts and you will find that by miscasting you have lost your Principal The English say that the Right of Majesty originally and principally resides in the People which Principle would introduce a Confusion of all States What of an Aristocracy and Democracy But let that pass What if it would overthrow a Gynaecocracy too i. e. a Government of one or more Women under which State or Form of Government they say you are in danger of being beaten at home would not the English do you a kindness in that you sheepish Fellow you But there 's no hope of that For 't is most justly so ordered since you would subject all Mankind to Tyranny abroad that you your self should live in a scandalous most unmanlike Slavery at home We must tell you you say what we mean by the word People There are a great many other things which you stand more in need of being told For of things that more immediately concern you you seem altogether ignorant and never to have learnt any thing but Words and Letters nor to be capable of any thing else But this you think you know that by the word People we mean the Common People only exclusive of the Nobility because we have put down the House of Lords And yet that very thing shows that under the word People we comprehend all our Natives of what Order and Degree soever in that we have setled one Supreme Senate only in which the Nobility also as a part of the People not in their own Right as they did before but Representing those Burroughs or Counties for which they may be chose may give their Votes Then you inveigh against the Common People as being Blind and Brutish Ignorant of the Art of Governing you say there 's nothing more Empty more Vain more Inconstant more Uncertain than they All which is very true of your self and it 's true likewise of the Rabble but not of the middle sort amongst whom the most prudent Men and most skilful in Affairs are generally found others are most commonly diverted either by Luxury and Plenty or by Want and Poverty from Virtue and the Study of Laws and Government There are many ways you say by which Kings come to the Crown so as not to he beholden to the People at all for it and especially those that inherit a Kingdom But those Nations most certainly be Slaves and born to Slavery that acknowledge any one to be their Lord and Master so absolutely as that they are his inheritance and come to him by descent without any Consent of their own they deserve not the Appellation of Subjects nor of Freemen nor can they be justly reputed such nor are they to be accounted as a Civil Society but must be looked on as the Possessions and Estate of their Lord and his Family For I see no difference as to the Right of Ownership betwixt them and Slaves and Beasts Secondly They that come to the Crown by Conquest cannot acknowledge themselves to have receiv'd from the People the Power they usurp We are not now discoursing of a Conqueror but of a Conquered King what a Conqueror may lawfully do we 'll discourse elsewhere do you keep to your Subject But whereas you ascribe to Kings that Ancient Right that Masters of Families have over their Housholds and take an example from thence of their absolute Power I have shown already over and over that there is no likeness at all betwixt them And
Piety Sanctity and Constancy as he did and lest you should ascribe too much to that presence of mind which some common Malefactors have so great a measure of at their death many times despair and a hardned heart puts on as it were a Vizor of Courage and Stupidity of Quiet and Tranquility of mind Sometimes the worst of men desire to appear good undaunted innocent and now and then Religious not only in their life but at their death and in suffering death for their villanies use to act the last part of their hypocrisie and cheats with all the show imaginable and like bad Poets or Stage-players are very Ambitious of being clapp'd at the end of the Play Now you say you are come to enquire who they chiesly were that gave Sentence against the King Whereas it ought first to be enquired into how you a Foreigner and a French Vagabond came to have any thing to do to raise a question about our Affairs to which you are so much a stranger And what Reward induced you to it But we know enough of that and who satisfied your curiosity in these matters of ours even those Fugitives and Traytors to their Countrey that could easily hire such a vain Fellow as you to speak ill of us Then an account in writing of the state of our affairs was put into your hands by some hair-brain'd half-Protestant half-Papist Chaplain or other or by some sneaking Courtier and you were put to Translate it into Latin out of that you took these Narratives which if you please we 'll examine a little Not the hundred thousandth part of the people consented to this sentence of Condemnation What were the rest of the people then that suffered so great a thing to be transacted against their will Were they stocks and stones were they mere Trunks of men only or 〈◊〉 Images of Britans as Virgil describes to have been â—…ught in â—…ry Purpurea intexti tollunt aulea Britanni And Brittains interwove held up the Purple hangings For you describe no true Britains but Painted ones or rather Needle-wrought Men instead of them Since therefore it is a thing so incredible that a warlike Nation should be subdued by so few and those of the dregs of the People which is the first thing that occurs in your Narrative that appears in the very Nature of the thing it self to be most false The Bishops were turn'd out of the House of Lords by the Parliament it self The more deplorable is your Madness for are you not yet sensible that you Rave to complain of their being turn'd out of the Parliament whom you your self in a large Book endeavour to prove that they ought to be turn'd out of the Church One of the States of Parliament to wit the House of Lords consisting of Dukes Earls and Viscounts was removed And deservedly were they removed for they were not deputed to sit there by any Town or County but represented themselves only they had no Right over the People but as if they had been ordained for that very purpose used frequently to oppose their Rights and Liberties They were created by the King they were his Companions his Servants and as it were Shadows of him He being removed it was necessary they should be reduced to the same Level with the Body of the People from amongst whom they took their rise One part of the Parliament and that the worst of all ought not to have assum'd that Power of judging and condemning the King But I have told you already that the House of Commons was not only the chief part of our Parliament while we had Kings but was a perfect and entire Parliament of it self without the Temporal Lords much more without the Bishops But The whole House of Commons themselves were not admitted to have to do with the Tryal of the King To wit that part of them was not admitted that openly revolted to him in their Minds and Councels whom tho they stil'd him their King yet they had so often acted against as an Enemy The Parliament of England and the Deputies sent from the Parliament of Scotland on the 13th of January 1645. wrote to the King in Answer to a Letter of his by which he desired a deceitful Truce and that he might Treat with them at London that they could not admit him into that City till he had made Satisfaction to the State for the Civil War that he had raised in the three Kingdoms and for the Deaths of so many of his Subjects slain by his Order and till he had agreed to a true and firm Peace upon such Terms as the Parliaments of both Kingdoms had offered him so often already and should offer him again He on the other hand either refused to hear or by ambiguous Answers eluded their just and equal Proposals tho most humbly presented to him seven times over The Parliament at last after so many years patience lest the King should over-turn the State by his Wiles and Delays when in Prison which he could not subdue in the Field and lest the vanquish'd Enemy pleased with our Divisions should recover himself and triumph unexpectedly over his Conquerors vote that for the future they would have no regard to him that they would send him no more Proposals nor receive any from him After which vote there were found even some Members of Parliament who out of the hatred they bore that invincible Army whose Glory they envied and which they would have had disbanded and sent home with disgrace after they had deserved so well of their Nation and out of a servile Compliance with some Seditious Ministers finding their opportunity when many whom they knew to be otherwise minded than themselves having been sent by the House it self to suppress the Presbyterians who began already to be Turbulent were absent in the several Counties with a strange Levity not to say perfidiousness Vote that that inveterate Enemy of the State who had nothing of a King but the Name without giving any Satisfaction or Security should be brought back to London and restored to his Dignity and Government as if he had deserved well of the Nation by what he had done So that they preferr'd the King before their Religion their Liberty and that very celebrated Covenant of theirs What did they do in the mean time who were sound themselves and saw such pernicious Councils on foot Ought they therefore to have been wanting to the Nation and not provide for its safety because the Infection had spread it self even in their own House But who secluded those ill affected Members The English Army you say so that it was not an Army of Foreigners but of most Valiant and Faithful Honest Natives whose Officers for the most part were Members of Parliament and whom those good secluded Members would have secluded their Country and banished into Ireland while in the mean time the Scots whose Alliance begin to be doubtful had very considerable Forces in four of