Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	moral_a	nature_n	positive_a	4,914	5	10.3383	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29375	The truth of the times vindicated whereby the lawfulnesse of Parliamentary procedings in taking up of arms, is justified, Doctor Fernes reply answered, and the case in question more fully resolved / by William Bridge ...	Bridge, William, 1600?-1670.	1643 (1643)	Wing B4467; ESTC R19219	59,030	63

which in prudence might best correspond with their condition still making people the first subject and receptacle of civill power In proofe whereof I have stayed the longer it being the foundation of all this controversie And now passe on to the fourth Proposition which is 4th Proposition SEeing that the people are under God the first subject of civill power therefore the Prince o● supreme Magistrate hath no more power then what is communicated to him from the communitie because the affect doth not exceed the vertue of its cause 5th Proposition ANd as the Prince hath no more power then what is communicated from the communitie so the people or communitie cannot give away from themselves the power of selfe-preservation Because the same Commandement that faith Thou shalt not kill doth also say Thou shalt preserve Precepts that forbid evill do command the contrary good Now the morall naturall Law of God forbids a man to kill himselfe and therefore commands him to preserve himselfe and as by a positive act men cannot make a Law to kill themselves no more can they not to preserve themselves the one being as strongly commanded by the morall Law and as deeply seated in Nature as the other Secondly because if the communitie should give away the power of self-preservation the state should not be in a better but in a worser condition then before The King and Prince is taken into Office for the good of the people therefore called Pater patriae Pastor gregis not because he may arbitrarily rule in the Common wealth as a Father doth in his familie but because of his tender care that he is to have over his people and that the people might live more secure and peaceably in all godlinesse and honestie But if the communitie should give such a trust to any one that they might not at all defend themselves beyond his actuall appointment they should be infinitely in a worser condition then before because before such trust they should be freemen but after the trust they should be slaves unlesse it pleases the King through his own gratious condiscention to let them be free still for what is a slave but such a one who is so absolutely at the power of anothers command that he may be spoiled or sold or put under the Gallies and there beaten daily having no power to make any resistance or selfe-defence Thirdly it is agreeable to the Law of Nations and Reason that no inferiour Court can undo what a superiour Court hath done As where an estate is setled upon children by Act of Parliament no inferiour Court of Justice can cut off the intayle Now selfe-preservation is enacted in the Court of Nature as he that hath read but Magirus unbound I meane common naturall principles will grant and therefore no act of a communitie can cut off this intayle from their posteritie or make such a deed of Conveyance whereby themselves and their children should be spoyled of self-preservation Ob. But though by nature a man is bound to preserve himself yet he may destroy or put himself upon that which will be his destruction for the publick good doth not natura particularis go crosse to its own disposition ne detur vacuum Respons True I have read indeed that Natura particularis gives way to natura universalis but never heard before that natura universalis gives way to natura particularis or that natura universalis doth seek its own destruction or loose the power of self-preservation for the good or betternesse of some particular nature Wherefore if the seat of power be in the community and therefore no more power in the supreme then was and is derived from the communitie and the people cannot give away the power of self preservation Then in case the Prince doth neglect his trust so as not to preserve them but to oppose them to violence it is no usurpation for them to look to themselves which yet may be no act of jurisdiction over their Prince or taking away of any power from him which they gave him but is in truth a stirring up acting and exercising of that power which alwayes was left in themselves CHAP. II. HAving now spoken of power in generall I shall say somewhat of the governing and ruling power of England yet because that concerns the Parliament to declare which they have done and Lawyers for to clear which they do I shall but touch upon it and no more then comes within the compasse and verge I do not say of a divine but subject I find therefore in learned Fortescue Lord Chief-Justice and after Lord Chancellor in King Henry the sixth time that he doth distinguish of governed or ruling power into two sorts the one meerly royall and the other politick When Kingdoms are ruled by royall government saith he then men in a times past excelling in power and greedie of dignity and glory did many times by plain force subdue unto themselves their neighbours the Nations adjoyning and compelled them to do them service and to obey their commands which commands they decreed afterwards to be unto the people very Laws Cap. 12. The forme of institution of a politick Kingdom is that where a King is mad and ordained for the defence of the Law of his Subjects and of their bodies and goods whereunto he receiveth power of his people for that he cannot govern his people by any other power Cap. 13. Now saith he the King of England cannot alter or change the Laws of his Realm at his pleasure for he governeth his people by power not onely Royall but also politick And accordingly Wil. the Conquerour to go no higher in whose entrance to the Crown Dr. F. makes the first contrivement of his English government for conscience to rest upon seemes to me to have possest himself of this Kingdom who though he did conquer the same yet the first claime or title that he laid to this Crown was gift which Edward the Consessor had made to him Herauld the former King having promised the Crown also to him In this right he first set foot on the English shore not in the right of a conquest but in the right of a gift and promise as Speed Cambden and others affirm And afterwards when he had obtained the Crown he swore to use and practise the same good laws of Edward for the common laws of this realme notwithstanding saith Mr Fox Amongst the said lawes I find in ancient Records this was part that the King because he is Vicar of the highest King is appointed to rule the kingdome and the Lords people to defend the holy Church which unlesse he do the name of a King agrees not to him but he loseth the name of a King c. 2ly As the King and Conqueror came into the Kingdome by this claim so we finde that in those times the consent and choice of the people was in use for the establishing of Kings amongst them For