Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	child_n	correct_v	parent_n	998	5	9.2727	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A62670	An essay concerning obedience to the supreme powers, and the duty of subjects in all revolutions with some considerations touching the present juncture of affairs.	Tindal, Matthew, 1653?-1733.	1694 (1694)	Wing T1299; ESTC R5554	50,889	92

from any Nation that when he was pleased to take upon himself the Office of King over his own People the Jews he first required their Consent and a Contract between God and the People as is plain by the 19th of Exodus was the Foundation of the Theocracy And since it is not by God's Positive Law That one Form of Government rather than another is any where established there can remain no other way by which any Government can be erected or that one man can have a Right to command over others but by the Law of Nature or by the Consent of the Parties concerned But there is no Law of Nature for any one Form of Government so as to make the rest unlawful or that one person rather than another should have the Sovereign Administration of Affairs Nor can there be any one Law of Nature urged why any particular person should have a Power over so many Millions of different Families with no manner of relation and dependance one upon another and who are by Nature equal being of the same rank promiscuously born to the same Advantages of Nature and to the use of the same common Faculties And therefore it remains That Government must be derived from Consent Object Men are not by Nature free because they are born subject to their Parents who by the Law of Nature have an Absolute Power over them Therefore they could not chuse Governors for themselves Answ. The Power that Parents have over their Children does not extend to their Lives or Properties or hinder them from being free tho they are born in a condition which makes them for some time incapable to exercise their freedom It is the duty of those by whose means they come into the world to take care and provide for them until they are able to provide for themselves which Duty Parents cannot effectually discharge except they have a Power to correct and manage them as they think fit Children are obliged to take the same care for their Parents if they chance by losing their Reason to fall into the same helpless Condition which they cannot perform except they have also in their turn a Power to govern them too and even to use Forcible means when they think it necessary Whoever has the Charge of educating a Child whether he be his Father or a Stranger must have the same Power over him and this a Child tho an Absolute King must be forced to submit to The information of his mind the health of his body and even the necessities of life make it absolutely necessary And if this be not inconsistent with Sovereign Power much less is it with Freedom A man may be said to be by Nature Free as well as Rational tho he be not capable of exercising both until such an Age and the same Age that sets him free from the Power of a Tutor sets him free from the Power of his Parents tho nothing can set him free from that Reverence which is not inconsistent with the state of Freedom which he must for ever owe them But that Filial Reverence does not give his Father or Mother to whom by the Law of God and Nature he is obliged to pay equal Honour and Reverence a Power over his Life and Properties or any Jurisdiction over him Whilst he is part of the Family it is true he must be subject in matters that concern the Family because there can be but one Master in a Family If Parents had an Absolute Regal Power all Civil Government would be unlawful because it would deprive all Fathers of that Paternal Regal Power which by the Law of Nature which is superior to all Human Laws does upon their having Children become their Right and which the Government could no more justly deprive them of than of that Duty and Honour which Children by the same Law of Nature are obliged to pay them and which too if Government were nothing but Paternal Power must belong to it But if this Notion were true this would not give Governors a Power over Parents themselves or over those who have no Parents in being because Paternal Power can affect none but Children And the Supreme Magistrate who does not beget his Subjects can have no Natural nor any other Right to it but as it is conveyed to him by Consent except the First-born from Adam which the Asserters of Paternal Power do affirm hath an Universal Hereditary Right the Absurdity of which Opinion has sufficiently been exposed by a late most Ingenious Author supposing which to be true it is plain that no other can have the same Right so that until that mighty Monarch prove his Claim all the Civil Power that is now in the world must come by Consent and there is nothing but that can give another a greater Power than Parents pretend to over their Children and which Children are obliged to obey even contrary to their Parents Commands and which gives them a Power of Life and Death over their Parents as it frequently happens in Elective Governments which Governments it is visible have their Power from the People and this way too at first must come the Power in all Hereditary Governments for the first of a Family could not have an Hereditary Right Object The Power of Government could not come from the People because they have no Power over their own Lives and therefore could not give that to another which they had not themselves Answ. It is true men having no power over their own Lives could not part with a Power they had not yet Governors will have all the Power which is necessary for the Ends of Government by the Peoples giving them that Power which by the Law of Nature they had over the lives of one another for by that Law every one had a Right to take away the life of another if he could not otherwise secure his own or what was in order to the supporting it and might do the same in defence of any innocent person and could punish any one for injuring him or his neighbours because by it he acted for his own and their security And if Punishment ought then to be inflicted some one must have a Right to inflict it and if any one had a Right all being by Nature equal every one must have the same Right the exercise of which Right men have parted with to their Governors so that they alone have now the only Right to punish with loss of life or any less Punishment in all cases except in those where upon the suddenness of the danger Protection cannot be had from them or where they wholly neglect or are incapable to protect them There mens Natural Liberties still remain and they may in Defence of their own Lives or what is necessary to support them justly take away the lives of the Aggressors And any Law which should take this Power from the people would be null and void because the people never did or could give the