Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A47540
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The samaritan rebels perjured, by a covenant of association discovered in a sermon preach'd at the assizes holden at Northampton, March 30th, 1682 / by John Knight.
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Knight, John, 1651-1712.
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1682
(1682)
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Wing K688; ESTC R17067
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17,530
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39
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rest Yea Hence it 's manifest That he has not only a Right to our Homage but such an One as makes us from our Birth uncapable of making an Engagement to pass any on 't away WHEREFORE when the Supream is not only in Pacto prior but also in Jure Solus in reference to all matters falling under his Prerogatives the very Attempt of the People to defraud him by making those Regalities over to other men or reserving them to themselves is an Incroachment upon his Right and a Violation of their Oath BY the Oath we swear to defend his Rights by the Covenant we engage to spoyl them By the Laws of Nature the Jews without an Oath were bound to Assist Hoshea by the Association they vow to Imploy their Wealth and Weapons only for themselves THE Folly of which was as Desperate and Rash as it was Flagitious and unjust For if Rei illicitae nulla sit Obligatio If whatever is unlawful is held Impossible the Covenant made to the prejudice of their Oath was a Bond only binding to * Interdum scelus est Fides Seneca the guilt and punishment of Perjury and of no force to oblige them to the thing they promised For 3. 'T WAS Impossible the Covenant so made should obtain any obligatory force or be made valid by the consent of the King himself For upon supposition that Hoshea for any perswasion should have quitted his Right to the Defence of his Subjects and by an open Declaration have bidden them to be onely Faithfull to one another yet this had been no Absolution from their Allegiance nor had it given any vertue to their Federal Association it being not in the Power of the Prince to evacuate and null their Obligation by Oath to Allegiance The Reason of which seems to be Founded not only in the Formality of the Oath which makes God concerned in the Bond and therefore must he be in the Dispensation too but also in the unalterable Laws of Nature and on the positive Institutions of God Unalterable I say and no more repealable than the Jewish Corban could null the Fathers Right to the Childs Obedience no more than the Parent can give up his parental Jurisdiction and License his Son in an unnatural Rebellion no more than the Husband the Woman's Lord can absolve her after Marriage from her Conjugal Duty and bid her be disloyal For as these Relations so that between the Magistrate and the Subject is the Institution of God whereby the Soveraign is not only Invested in a Dignity but obliged to a Duty and bound to Govern till he has a call from God to relinquish his Dominion and indeed his Prerogatives are inseperable from his Person and not grantable to his Subjects because of their incapacity also to receive them THE Lords Anointed cannot Retreat or sink from his Office or his Honour so as to devolve them on one or more of his natural Subjects no more than his Oyl the Emblem of Supremacy can Subside or Incorporate with the Liquors under it For they were born to Obey and therefore he can no more make them Supream than Reverse their Birth or make that Oath that was declarative of their Homage when broken to be no Perjury WHEREFORE that Treachery or Violence which strips the Crown of its Prerogatives must be such as masters Religion and the Laws of God too since the King himself neither by his Grace nor for his Pleasure may warrantably put them off And this holds always true except the Authority be relinquisht to the next Heir who is therefore I think capable of receiving the Regalities because his Blood and Birth bespeaking him somewhat more than a Subject do naturally qualifie him for the successive Rule But in this I subscribe to the Oracles of the Laws THE Position being thus maintain'd I shall only stay to reflect upon the Sottishness and Iniquity of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Romish Dotard who by a kind of a religious Errantry assaults our Kingdom and undertakes to dissolve the Bonds both of Oaths and Equity of Justice and Religion and is not this literally to †2 Thes 2.4 exalt himself above all that is call'd God within whose Omnipotence it lyes not to consecrate the Witchcraft of a Rebel to make Perjury to be no Sin nor the Breach of Lawful possible Oaths to be no Perjury But to shew you the weakness and the wickedness of his pretence at once I will clearly evince THAT any Bull or Instrument of his which pretends to Absolve any English Subject from his Oath of Allegiance is 1. VAIN and Impertinent for if the Rights of the Crown are Feudatory to and justly invested in him our Oath of Allegiance to the King is actually void and can pass no Obligation and if no Obligation there 's no need of any solemn Absolution for the Oath it self would bind to nothing but Repentance But if in Justice what he claims be yet the Kings as it is most certainly for whom the admirable * E collatione duarum Potestatum egregiè conficitur Regiam aequè à Deo institutam fuisse ac spiritualem solidam humanarum rerum administrationem illi demandatam Petr. De Mar. Archiep. Paris lib. 2. de concor Imp. c. 2. §. 1. De Marca is an Advocate in this matter then his pretences to absolve from the Oath which promises to render them is 2. IMPIOUS and unnatural for no power can take anothers Right without Injustice nor can any man Absolve me of a Debt the Creditor to whom 't is due denying to quit his claim But of this enough for I have neither time for nor pleasure in exposing the Nakedness of such a Communion whose Zeal is Cruelty whose Worship 's a Prophanation and whose Proselytes are in truth the Trophies of the Churches Fraud or Violence and the wretched Monuments of Apostasie from Religion 'T is no Calumny but this Character †De Magistratibus Eccles Lib. Vanit Scient cap. 61. Corn. Agrippa a learned man and a Friend to some of their very absurdities has utterly superseded by one much Sharper COME we now 2. TO examine the pretences that Israel or any other People may take up to Countenance their Perjury i. e. their entring into a Covenant of Association for mutual defence against or without a regard to their Soveraign and here I confess I ought to rank them together and shew them in their united force that if possible they might like their Doctors and Fautors be valued for their Numbers they being very inconsiderable for their Intrinsick worth I am in earnest I have seen and examined mighty Labours in Vindication of Anarchy Levelling Sedition and Rebellion thô these perhaps are not ever their Christen-names and all together they make a Mist thick at some distance and seemingly impassable but when you are in 't it clears up and there 's no Impediment but to heave twice at a Mole-hill would give Suspicion it were