Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	act_n	king_n	power_n	3,247	5	5.0875	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A86918	A vindication of the Treatise of monarchy, containing an answer to Dr Fernes reply; also, a more full discovery of three maine points; 1. The ordinance of God in supremacie. 2. The nature and kinds of limitation. 3. The causes and meanes of limitation in governments. Done by the authour of the former treatise.	Hunton, Philip, 1604?-1682.	1644 (1644)	Wing H3784; Thomason E39_12; ESTC R21631	66,271	81

Governement for he is resolved not to be reasoned into them He can denie all as failing either in the Antecedent or Consequent p. 32. The Power of this Kingdome he must have unlimited He will give no Reason for it nor heare no Reason against it Yet sith he professeth himselfe a Resolver of Conscience Let me therfore be so bold as to propose certaine Cases to him 1. Why in the late Oath proposed to be taken by all his Majesties Subjects the Power of enacting Statutes is sworne to be joyntly in the Kings Maiestie Lords and Commons in Parliament Certes the Doctor writ this Reply before that Oath was printed in Oxford or else he did not consider of it He cannot say I hope there were but few of his counsell about him when that was framed if the Doctor hath taken it He hath forsworne this passage of his Reply and sworne them a joynt enacting power 2. Why we are enjoyned to sweare that we doe beleeve that the Subiects of England are not obliged by any Act made either by the Kings Maiestie solely or the Houses solely c. Sure the Doctor hath abjured his other Assertion of the unlimited Power of the King if he hath taken this Oath for if Power be solely his then an Act made by him solely is obliging If they be not obligatorie they are not Authoritative and so the mixture and limitation is in the Authority it self Here is no place left for his distinction of Active and Passion subiection For 1. Will any thinke that the intent is to sweare men to be bound not to doe but to suffer 2. The Beliefe of a non-Obligation proceeds indifferently and as fully concerning the sole Acts of the King us the Houses but I beleeve the Doctour will not say we are obliged to passive subiection to the sole Acts of the Houses 3. I would know if the States doe limit onely morally what they doe which is not done without them A Promise and Oath do limit morally without them He will say they may admonish him and denie their consent and so iudge his Acts invalid He meanes still morally invalid and so would they be without them 4. Suppose the Monarch minded to establish a Law which he judges needfull and the States being averse he enacts it without them Is it not a Law It hath all the Legislative authoritie in it He will say it is not duly made 1. I grant it but yet it is a Law for it hath all the Power of a Law 2. But is it not duly made Why the power of last decision is in the King alone Suppose he define that the Intent of his Predecessours in granting this consenting power to the Houses had no intent to hinder but further themselves in establishing good lawes and therefore now they not concurring by assent to this needfull Act He ought not to be hindred but may lawfully doe it without them He is the last Judge in this case and it must be held ever lawfully enacted So that in the result here is left to these States by the Doctors grounds neither Civill nor Morall Limitation but at pleasure 5. If Limitation in our Government exempt Subjects from a necessity of active Subjection but not from passive How is it that our Lawes doe not only determine what the Monarch shall command but also what he shall inflict what shall be accounted Rebellion what Felonie c. and what not also what he shall inflict for this crime and that crime and what not Sith the Lawes limiting what he shall command doe limit our necessity of active Subiection it will follow that the Lawes limiting what he shall inflict doe limit our necessity of passive Subiection Here 's no evasion by saying the Laws do limit him morally what he shall inflict and if he inflict beyond Law he sinnes in it but we must suffer for the Doctor acknowledges that the Lawes defining what he shall command doe so limit our active subjection that we have a simple exemption from any necessity of Doing and therefore also the Laws defining what he shall inflict doe so limit our passive subjection that we have a simple exemption from any necessity of suffering beyond those Limitations for also if they did not free us from passive subjection it were unlawfull not only to resist but also to avoid suffering even by flight 6. When the liberties of magna Charta and other grants have been gotten and preserved and recovered at the rate of so much trouble sute expence and bloud whither by all that adoe was intended only a morall liberty definement in the Monarch and not also of the power it selfe only that he might not lawfully exorbitate from established Lawes and not also that he might have no Authority or Power to exorbitate at all Sure this was their aime for the former he could not doe before 7. The Law granting a writ of Rebellion against him who refuseth to obey the sentence of the Judge though he have an expresse Act of the Kings will to warrant him doth it not suppose those exceeding and extrajudiciall Acts of the Kings will to be unauthoritative and unable to priviledge a man from Resistance If the Doctor by his faculty can resolve these Cases He will doe much in way of satisfaction of my conscience but if he cannot they will prove so many convincing arguments that the Power of the Monarch in this Frame is not unlimited Now having made good my Assertions I expected another worke sc an Examination of his Reasons for unlimitednesse and simplicity of Monarchicall Power but he is not guilty of my fault he doth not goe so much as to reason us into a beliefe of it He doth in vaine expresse a desire hee hath that some skilfull Lawyers or Divines would helpe him at this dead lift yet he is like to goe alone in this wild untroden path of defending an unresistiblenesse on such supposals shall we think any Divine will second him in justifying his unwritten fancie about Gods Ordinance necessarily investing all the acts of his will who is supreme Or any sound Lawyer will overthrow the grounds of his Profession that the Royall Right Authority and Government of this Realme is both founded on and measured by the Laws thereof Yea it is very remarkeable that his Majestie in all the Declarations and Expresses which I have seen doth not once touch upon this way sc a challenge of such a latitude of Authority as can preserve destructive instruments from force but condemnes the now Resistance by solemne protestations of innocency and intention of governing by the known Laws CHAP. VI. An Answer to his 5. Sect. of Resistance in Relation to severall kinds of Monarchy THE residue of his Book is spent about the Question of Resistance Sect. 1 I might well spare the labour of any farther Answer for now having so apparently made good these two Assertions 1. That soveraignty may be limited in the very power 2. That de