of the King of Tombute did enterprize to attain Soveraignty above them which by violence he effected and left the same to his posterity And because I will not be tedious in running through particulars give you an instance of any one people which hath not divers times received both Prince and Government by absolute constraint Et Phillida solus habito and I will yield to all that you affirm But failing herein you shall be enforced to confess that in many yea in most if not in all Countries the people have received liberty either from the grant or permission of the victorious Prince and not the Prince authority from the vanquished people What helps now do you imagine that the people have assigned to their Prince The first you affirm to be the direction of Laws But it is evident that in the first heroical Ages 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 people were not governed by any positive Law but their Kings did both Judge and Command by their word by their will by their absolute power and as Pomponius saith Omnia manu a regibus gubernabantur Kings governed all things without either restraint or direction but onely of the Law of Nature The first Law was promulged by Moses but this was so long before the Laws of other Nations that Iosephus writeth It was more ancient than their Gods Affirming also that the word Law is not found in Homer or in Orpheus or in any Writer of like antiquity· Of this Law of Nature Homer maketh mention in these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And they who keep the Laws which God hath prescribed And again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Vncivil and unjust is he and wanting private state Who holdeth not all civil War in horror and in hate And of the Justice of Kings he writeth in this manner 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on In which verses Chrysostom affirmeth by the judgment of Alexander that Homer hath delineated the perfect Image of a King but that he maketh mention of any positive Laws I do rather doubt than assuredly deny For Kings in ancient times did give judgment in person not out of any formality in Law but onely according to natural equity Virgil saith Hoc Priami gestamen erat cum jura vocatis Moredaret populis This was the Robe which Priamus did always use to wear When he the People to him call'd their causes for to hear Which he doth also affirm of Aeneas Dido and of Alcestes This like doth Herodotus report of Midas King of Phrygia who consecrated his Tribunal to Apollo and the like also doth Plutarch of divers Kings of Macedonia Philarchus affirmeth in Athenaeus that the Kings of Persia had Palm-trees and Vines of Gold under which they did sit to hear Causes But because it grew both troublesome and tedious for all the People to receive their Right from one man Laws were invented as Cicero saith and Officers also appointed to execute the same Another Original of Laws was thus occasioned When any People were subdued by Arms Laws were laid like Logs upon their necks to keep them in more sure subjection which both because it is not doubtful and to avoid prolixity I will manifest onely by our own example When the Romans had reduced the best part of this Island into the form of a Province as they permitted liberty of Law to no other Country under their obedience so here also they planted the practice of their Laws and for this purpose they sent over many Professors and among others Papinian the most famous both for Knowledge and Integrity of all the Authors of the Civil Law Again when the Saxons had forced this Realm and parted it into seven Kingdoms they erected so many sets of Law of which onely two were of continuance the Mercian Law and the West-Saxon Law After these the Danes became victorious and by these new Lords new Laws were also imposed which bare the name of dane-Dane-law Out of these three Laws partly moderated partly supplied King Edward the Confessor composed that body of Law which afterwards was called St. Edward's Laws Lastly the Normans brought the Land under their power by whom St. Edward's Laws were abrogated and not onely new Laws but new Language brought into use insomuch as all Pleas were formed in French and in the same Tongue Children were taught the principles of Grammar These causes we find of the beginning of Laws but that they were assigned by the people for assistance and direction to their Kings you bring neither Argument nor Authority for proof it is a part of the dross of your own device The second help which you affirm that Commonwealths have assigned to their Kings is by Parliaments and Privy-Councils But Parliaments in all places have been erected by Kings as the Parliament of Paris and of Mâ—ntpellier in France by Philip the Fair the Parliament in England by Henry the First who in the sixteenth year of his Reign called a Councel of all the States of his Realm at Salisbury which our Historiographers do take for the first Parliament in England affirming that the Kings before that time did never call the common People to Councel After this the Privy-Council at the instance of the Archbishop of Canterbury was also established and since that time the Counsellors of State have always been placed by election of the Prince And that it was so likewise in ancient times it appeareth by that which Homer writeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 First he established a Council of honorable old men And likewise by Virgil gaudet regno Trojanus Acestes Indicitque forum patribus dat jura vocatis Acestes of the Trojan Bloud in Kingdom doth delight He sets a Court and Councel calls and gives each man his Right I will pass over your coarse foggy drowsie Conceit that there are few or none simple Monarchies in the world for it would tire a Dog to toyl after your impertinent errours and will now rip up your Packet of Examples whereby you endeavour to shew that the Power of Kings hath been bridled by their Subjects But what do you infer hereby what can you inforce will you rake over all Histories for examples of Rebellion and then argue a facto ad jus that every thing is lawful which you find to have been done Iustinian saith Non exemplis sed legibus judicandum We must judge Facts by Law and not Law by Facts or by Examples which Alciate and Deeiane do term a Golden Law because there is no Action either so impious or absurd which may not be paralleled by Examples Will you prove it lawful to use carnal familiarity with the Sister with the Mother-in-law with the natural Mother You have the example of Cambyses for the first Caracalla for the second Dionysius and Nero for the third The Iews upon whom God had setled his
the same points in effect which before have been mentioned This we must take upon your forfeited Faith for you alleadge no form of Oath onely you write that the fourth National Council of Toledo with all humility convenient did require that the present King and all other that should follow would be meek and moderate towards their Subjects and govern them with Justice and not give sentence in Causes capital without assistance declaring further that if any of them should exercise cruel and proud Authority that they were condemned by Christ with the sentence of Excommunication and separated to everlasting Judgment But what pang hath possessed your dreaming brains to term this by a marginal Note Conditions of reigning in Spain being no other than a reverent and grave admonition of the duty of a King with a fearful declaration of the Judgment of God against wicked Princes And that which was afterward decreed in the sixth Council of Toledo That the King should swear not to suffer any man to break the Catholick Faith because it is a principal point of his duty his Estate was not thereby made conditional The rest of this passage you fill up with froath of the antiquated Law of Don Pelayo prescribing a form of inaugurating the Kings of Spain whereof there is not one point either now in use or pertaining to the purpose So miserable is your case that you can write nothing therein but that which is either impertinent or untrue For France your first Example is taken from the Coronation of Philip the First wherein you note that King Henry his Father requested the people to swear Obedience to his son inferring thereby that a Coronation requireth a new Consent which includeth a certain Election of the Subjects But this is so light that the least breath is sufficient to disperse it Philip was crowned King during the life of his Father which action as it was not ordinary so was it of such both difficulty and weight that it could not be effected without assembly and consent of the States The Oath which he made is in this form extant in the Library of Rheimes I do promise before God and his Saints that I will conserve to every one committed unto me Canonical Priviledge and due Law and Iustice and will defend them by the help of God so much as shall lie in my power as a King by right ought to do within his Realm to every Bishop and to the Church committed to him and further to the People committed to my charge I will grant by my authority the dispensation of Laws according to right Adde to this a more ancient form of the Oath of those Kings which it seemeth you have not seen I swear in the Name of God Almighty and promise to govern well and duly the Subjects committed to my charge and to do with all my Power Iudgement Iustice and Mercy Adde also the Oath which you alleadge of Philip the Second surnamed Augustus To maintain all Canonical Priviledges Law and Iustice due to every man to the uttermost of his power to defend his Subjects as a good King is bound to do to procure that they be kept in the union of the Church to defend them from all Excess Rapine Extortion and Iniquity to take order that Iustice be kept with equity and mercy and to endeavour to expel Hereticks What doth all this rise unto but a Princely promise to discharge honourably and truly those points of duty which the Laws of God did lay upon them What other Conditions or Restraints are imposed What other Contract is hereby made Where are the Protestations which in the end of the last Chapter you promised to shew that if the Prince do fail in his Promise the Subjects are free from their Allegiance What Clause do you find sounding to that sence But you little regard any thing that you say you easily remember to forget your word Well then we must put these your vain Speeches into the reckoning of Money accounted but not received and seeing you cannot shew us that the Kings of France and of Spain are tyed to any Condition whereto the Law of God doth not bind them I will not vary from the judgment of Ordradus in affirming them to be absolute Kings I have pressed this point the rather in this place because you write that most Neighbour-Nations have taken the form of anointing and crowning their Kings from the ancient custom of France although the substance be deduced from the first Kings of the Hebrews as appeareth by the anointing of King Saul whereof David you say made great account notwithstanding that Saul had been rejected by God and that himself had lawfully born Arms against him Out Atheist you would be dawbed with Dung and have the most vile filth of your Stews cast in your face Did David bear Arms against his anointed King did he ever lift up his eye-lids against him did he ever so much as defend himself otherwise than by flight It is certain that Shemei did not half so cruelly either curse or revile this holy man who did so much both by speech and action detest this fact that he would rather have endured ten thousand deaths than to have defiled his Soul with so damnable a thought What then shall we say unto you who to set up Sedition and Tumult abuse all divine and humane Writings in whatsoever you believe will advance your purpose who spend some speech of respect unto Kings for allurement onely to draw us more deep into your deceit Shall we give any further ear to your Doctrine both blasphemous and bloudy We will hear you to the end and I deceive my self but your own tale shall in any moderate judgment condemn the authority of your opinions for ever Let us come then to your last Example which is neither the last nor the least whereat you level and that is of England which of all other Kingdoms you say hath most particularly taken this Ceremony of Sacring and Anointing from France Well let the Ceremony be taken from whence you please if the Oath be no other than you do specifie To observe peace honour and Reverence unto Almighty God to his Church and to the Ministers of the same to administer Law and Iustice equalâ—y to all to abrogate evil Laws and Customs and maintain good which was the Oath of King Richard the First the like whereto was that of King Iohn altered onely in the first branch To love and defend the Catholick Church If the Oath be no other I say I do not see what other Answer you need to expect but that it is onely a free Royal Promise to discharge that duty which God doth impose And this is plainly declared by the Speech which you alleadge of Thomas Arundel Archbishop of Canterbury to King Henry the Fourth Remember saith he the Oath which voluntarily you made Voluntarily he said and not necessarily it was voluntaly in Oath but necessary in
will you say is nature immutable It is in abstracto but it is not in subjecto Or thus In it self it is not changed in us by reason of our imperfections it is Or else more plainly it is not changed but it is transgressed But nature you say is alike to all Not so good sir because all are not apt alike to receive her even as the sun beams do not reflect alike upon a clean and clear glass and upon a glass that is either filthy or course And in many not only men but nations evil custom hath driven nature out of place and setteth up it self in stead of nature Your third conclusion that no particular form of Government is natural doth not find so easie acceptance Your only proof is that if it were otherwise there should be one form of Government in all Nations because God and nature is one to all But this reason I have encountred before and yet you take pains to puff it up with many wast words how the Romans changed Government how in Italy there is a Pope a King and many Dukes how Millaine Burgundie Loraine Bavier Gascoine and Britain the less were changed from Kingdoms to Dukedoms how Germany was once under one King and is now divided among Dukes Earles and other supreme Princes How Castile Aragone Portugall Barcelona and other countries in Spain were first Earldoms then Dukedoms then several Kingdoms and now are united into one how Boeme and Polonia were once Dukedoms and now are Kingdoms how France was first one Kingdom then divided into four and lastly reduced into one How England was first a Monarchy under the Britains then a Province under the Romans after that divided into seven Kingdoms and lastly reduced into one how the People of Israel were first under Patriarcks Abraham Isaac and Iacob then under Captains then under Judges then under high Priests then under Kings and then under Captains and high Priests again I will not follow you in every by way whereinto your errors do lead for who would have adventured to affirm that the Children of Israel were under Abraham and Isaac and that the Britains at the first were under one King whereas Caesar reporteth that he found four Kings in that Country which is now called Kent but I will only insist upon the principal point in regard whereof all this bundel of words is like a blown bladder full of wind but of no weight For first you do but trifle upon tearms in putting a difference between Kings Dukes and Earls which hold their state with Soveraign power We speak not of the names but of the Government of Princes Supreme Rulers may differ in name they may change name also either by long use or upon occasion and yet in Government neither differ nor change Secondly it is a more vain jeast to put a difference in this regard between a great territory and a small If a Kingdom be enlarged or streightned in limits the Government is not thereby changed if many Kingdoms be united into one if one be divided into many the nature of Government is no more altered then is the tenure of land either when partition is made or when many parts accrewe into one The knot of doubt is whether it be not natural that one state be it great or small should rather be commanded by one person howsoever intitled then by many And if we descend into true discourse we shall find that the very sinews of Government do consist in commanding and in obeying But obedience cannot be performed where the commandments are either repugnant or uncertain neither can these inconveniencies be any ways avoided but by union of the Authority which doth command This union is of two sorts first when one commandeth secondly when many do knit in one power and will The first union is natural the second is by means of amity which is the only band of this collective body and the more they are who joyn in Government the less natural is their union and the more subject to dissipation For as Taciâ—us saith equality and amity are scarce compatible Natural reason teacheth us that all multitude beginneth from one and the ancient Philosophers have held that from unity all things do proceed and are again resolved into the same Of which opinion Laertius reporteth that Museus of Athens was Author who lived long before Homer but afterwards it was renewed by Pythagoras as Plutarch Alexander and Laertius do write who added thereunto that Unity is the original of good and duality of evil And of this opinion Saint Hierome was alâ—o whose sentence is repeated in the canonical decrees but under the title name of Saint Ambrose Hereupon Homer doth oftentimes call good 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 applyeth the terme 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to affliction trouble Hereupon Galen also writeth that the best in every kind is one Plato produceth all things from one measureth all things by one and reduceth all things into one The whole world is nothing but a great state a state is no other then a great family and a family no other then a great body As one GOD ruleth the World one master the family as all the members of one body receive both sence and motion from one head which is the seat and tower both of the understanding and of the will so it seemeth no less natural that one state should be governed by one commander The first of these arguments was used by Soliman Lord of the Turks Who having strangled Sultane Mustapha his son because at his return out of Persia he was received by the soldiers with great demonstrations of joy he caused the dead body to be cast forth before the armie and appointed one to cry There is but one God in Heaven and one Sultane upon Earth The second was used by Agesilaus to one that moved the Spartans for a popular government go first said he and stablish a popular Government within your own doors To the third Tacitus did allude when he said The body of one Empire seemeth best to be governed by the soul of one man In the Heavens there is but one Sun which Serinus also applyeth unto Government in affirming that if we set up two Suns we are like to set all in combustion Many sociable creatures have for one company one principal either Governour or guide which all Authors take for a natural Demonstration of the Government of one And if you require herein the testimony of men you shall not find almost any that writeth upon this subject but he doth if not allege yet allow that of Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one Lord one King Plutarch declareth both his own Judgment concerning this point and also the consent of others in affirming that all men did acknowledge that the Government of a King is the most excellent benefit that God hath given unto Men. Callimachus saith that Kings proceed from God Homer
World You close your conclusion with this conceit that the word natural Prince or natural Successor is to be understood of one who is born within the same Realm and that it is ridiculous to take it as though any Prince had natural Interest to succeed But what construction will you then make of that which Herodian delivereth in the speech of Commodus the Son of Marcus Now hath fortune given me unto you for Prince in his stead not drawn into the state such as they were who were before me nor as one that glorieth in the purchase of the Empire for I only am born unto you and brought up in the Court never swathed in private Cloaths but so soon as I was born the imperial purpure did receive me and the Sun beheld me at once both a Man and a Prince Consider these things and honor your Prince by right who is not given but born vnto you Girard goeth further in writing of Charles the Simple that he was King before he was born Say therefore again that it is ridiculous to take the word natural Prince for one that hath right of succession inherent in him by birth and I will say that this mirth will better beseem a natural indeed then any man that is wise But let us now consider the further passage of your discourse both how you are able to fortifie this foundation and what building it is able to bare TO THE SECOND CHAPTER which is intituled Of the particular Form of Monarchies and Kingdoms and the different Laws whereby they are to be obtained holden and governed in divers Countries according as each Common-wealth hath chosen and established IN this chapter you spend much speech in praising a monarchie and preferring it before the Government of manie which you do to no other end but to insinuate your self either into credit or advantage to draw it down even as Ioab presented Amasa with a kind Kiss to win thereby opportunity to stab him For in the end you fetch about that because a Prince is subject as other men not only to errours in Judgment but also to passionate affections in his will it was necessary that as the common wealth hath given that great power unto him so it should assigne him helps for managing the same And that a Prince reciveth his authority from the people you prove a little before for that Saint Peter termeth Kings Humane creatures which you interpret to be a thing created by man because by mans free choise both this form of government is erected and the same also laid upon some particular person I know not in what sort to deal with you concerning this interpretation Shall I labour to impugne it by arguments Why there is no man that wanteth not either judgment or sincerity but upon both the natural and usual sense of the words he will presently acknowledg it to be false Shall I go about either to laugh or to rail you from your errour as Cicero in the like case perswaded to do But this would be agreeable neither to the stayedness of our years nor the gravity of our professions I am now advised what to do I will appeal as Machetes did before Philip of Macedon from your self asleep to your self awake from your self distempered by affection to your self returned to sobriety of sense Do you think then in true earnest that a human creature is a thing created by man or rather that every man is a humane creature Is a brutish creature to be raken for a thing created by a beast Spiritual Angelical or any other adjunct unto creature what reference hath it to the Author of Creation And if it were so then should all creatures be called divine because they were created by God to whom only it is proper to create and in this very point Saint Paul saith that all authority is the ordinance and institution of God Neither needeth it to trouble us that Saint Peter should so generally injoine us to be obedient to all men no more than it troubled the Apostles when Christ commanded them to preach to all creatures according to which commission St. Paul did testifie that the Gospel had been preached to every creature under Heaven but St. Peter doth specifie his general speech and restrain his meaning to Kings and Governors in which sence St. Ambrose citeth this place as it followeth Be subject to your Lords whether it be to the King as to the most excellent c. This interpretation not onely not relieving you but discovering very plainly either the weakness or corruption of your judgment it resteth upon your bare word that Kings have received their first Authority from the people which although I could deny with as great both countenance and facility as you affirm yet will I further charge upon you with strength of proof Presently after the inundation of the world we find no mention of politick Government but onely of oeconomical according as men were sorted in families for so Moses hath written that of the progeny of Iapheth the Isles of the Gentiles were divided after their families The first who established Government over many families was Nimrod the Son of Cush accounted by St. Chrysostome the first King which Authority he did not obtain by favour and election of any people but by plain purchase of his power Hereupon Moses calleth him a mighty Hunter which is a form of speech among the Hebrews whereby they signifie a spoiler or oppresser And this doth also appear by the etymology of his name for Nimrod signifieth a Rebel a Transgressour and as some interpret it a terrible Lord And names were not imposed in ancient times by chance or at adventure as Plato one of Natures chief Secretaries and among the Latin Writers Aul. Gellius do affirm Many hold opinion that this Nimrod was the same whom the Grecians call Ninus which seemeth to be confirmed by that which Moses saith that he did build the City of Ninive Of this Ninus Iustine writeth that he was the first who held that which he did subdue others satisfied with Victory aspired not to bear Rule Nimrod founded the Empire of the Assyrians which continued by Succession in his posterity until it was violently drawn from Sardanapalus to the Medes From them also Cyrus by subversion of Astyages did transport it to the Persians and from them again the Grecians did wrest it by Conquest After the death of Alexander his Captains without any consent of the people made partition of the Empire among them whose successors were afterwards subdued by the Armies and Arms of Rome And this Empire being the greatest that ever the Earth did bear was in the end also violently distracted by divers several either Conquests or Revolts Leo Afer writeth that it is not a hundred years since the people of Gaoga in Africk had neither King nor Lord until one observed the greatness and Majesty
Choise did at times beside many other Enormities erect Malestews Of the two Nations whose Examples you use the Romans and the Lacedemonians the first did the like under divers Empâ—rours as Lampridius writeth and in more ancient times allowed also Parricide of Children the other would sort themselves by fifteen and twenty Families together and hold both Wives and Goods in common I omit the unnatural customs of divers other Nations and will now declare how in straining a few Examples to countenance your Conceit you are constrained to bear your self no less cunning in concealing truths than bold in avouching things which are not onely uncertain but plainly false It is true which you write that the Kings of Sparta by the institution of Lyâ—urgus were obâ—dient to the Officers called Ephori but these were Titular Kings having no other power but a single voice among the Senators and because all Affairs were carried by consent of the People the Estate was then esteemed popular Afterwards Theopompus by pretence of an Oracle drew this Authority from the People to a Senate of thirty whereby the Government did change into an Aristocracy and yet the naked name of Kings was retained By this shuffling-off Rule the Lacedemonians were continually tossed with Tempests of Sedition ceasing not to wade in their own Bloud as before you have acknowledged until in the end they were brought into subjection first by the Macedonians afterward by the Achaeans and lastly by the Romanâ— I will not say now what reason have we but what a shame is it for us to open our ears to these Utopical State-writers who being mellowed in Idleness and having neither Knowledge nor Interest in matters of Government make new Models upon disproportioned joynts borrowed from Nations most different in Rule You affirm by the testimony of Livy that for offence taken against Romulus because he raigned at Pleasure and not by Law the Senators did cut him in pieces in which short Assertion many base untruths are included beneath the degree of any vile word Livy writeth that he sorted the People into order and governed them by Laws and that he was also both advised and valiant in the Field even such a one as Homer describeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Both a good King and courageous Commander Concerning his end Livy writeth that in taking muster of his Army a thick Tempest did arise after which he was never seen wherein he is seconded by Solinus Eutropius and the rest onely Livy addeth that there was a rumor but very obscure without any certain either Author or ground I will adde also without probability that he was torn in pieces for how probable is it that such a Fact in the open view of his Army could be very obscure How probable is it also that the People would first tear him in pieces for his Injustice and then worship him for a God Further with what either confidence or conceit do you alledge this Report of Livy for his opinion I find your fetch you apprehend every thing which may if not confirm yet countenance that Doctrine which lately you have drawn out of Cerberus Den That it is lawful to contrive the death of Kings That the People were grieved against Servius Tullius for reigning without Election it is a meer Fantasie a Dream a Device Livy saith that he was declared King with such a Consent as no man had been before him That Tarquinius neglected the Laws of Government prescribed to him by the Common-wealth it is an ugly untruth Livy saith that he brake the ancient manner of Kings before him But for Laws Pomponius affirmeth that at that time the Romans had no Laws but from their Kings and that Sextus Papirius reduced them into one Volume which was called the Civil Law of Papirius and that when the People expelled their Kings they abrogated their Laws also and remained twenty years without any Law Lastly you adde that the Romans did expel their Kings and erect Consuls in their stead but you suppress that which followed which I hold for a common consequence of the like disorder First that for this cause they were presently almost overwhelmed with Wars Secondly that in this state they never enjoyed long time free from Sedition Lastly that as Tacitus saith there was no means to appease these Tumults but by returning to a Monarchy again All this I write rather to manifest the manner of your dealing than that I hold it much regardable what Romans did Your Examples of our present Age I will wrap up in these few words All Nations very few excepted do consent in this form of Government first to be under one Prince secondly to accept him by succession according to propinquity of Bloud In other circumstances either for inaugurating their Prince or for the manner of managing and executing his Government not two Nations in the world in all points do agree And yet is not this diversity raised by any Laws which the People do prescribe unto their Prince as you do most grosly yea peevishly yea maliciously affirm but by the particular Laws and Customs of every Nation in which the consent of the Prince either secret or express sometimes onely is sufficient always principally doth concur Upon this diversity of Customs you conclude that it sufficeth not to alleadge bare propinquity of Bloud What not where that Custom is established as I have declared it to be in most Nations of the World Doth difference of Customs make all Custom void Doth diversity of Custom in some circumstances take away the principal Custom of Succession by Bloud This cleaveth together no surer than Sand you lose both labour and credit in obtruding unto us these weak and loose Arguments without either force of Reason or form of Art Your instance of the Law Salick in France doth offer occasion to enter into a large Field wherein I could plainly prove that there was never any such Law made to bind the descent of the Crown of France and that it hath been the custom in most parts of the world not to exclude Women from succession in State insomuch as Beda and before him Eusebius and Pliny do write that certain People were governed onely by Princes of that Sex But because this is a matter both of long discourse and not proper to our purpose I will contain my self within this Observation That the Exclusion of King Edward the Third from the Crown of France upon this pretence was the cause of the effusion of their bravest Bloud and of the spoil waste and conquest of all that Realm I acknowledge that the English have lost the possession of that Conquest and that was by means of domestical Wars for excluding the nearest in Bloud from the Crown into which unquiet Quarrel you do now endeavour again to embark us Yet no man can assure that the miseries of France for this cause are at an end Rams recoil to strike harder
we are gone rather back than away I will not presage but any man may conjecture that our minds and our means will not always want the favour of time After all this you proceed a degree further that it is lawful upon just considerations not onely to put back the next Inheritor of the Crown but also to remove him who is in full possession thereof And that is plain you say not onely by the grounds before by you alleadged but also by example of the Romans and Grecians and because God hath commonly concurred in such judicial actions of the State not onely in prospering them but in giving them also some notable Successour And yet you protest you are far from their opinion who upon every mislike are ready to band against their Prince and that you esteem the tenure of a Crown if once it be setled the most irregular whereto every man is bound to settle his Conscience without examination of Title or Interest but onely by the supreme Law of Gods disposition who can dispence in what he listeth and that notwithstanding you are as far from the abject flattery of Billaie and others who affirm that Princes are subject to no Law or limitation at all and that they succeeded by nature and birth onely and not by admission of the people and that there is no authority under God to chasten them These you call absurd Paradoxes and herewith you settle your self to shew in the next Chapter what good success hath ensued the disposition of Princes Concerning your protestation we may say unto you as Isaac said to his son Iacob The voice is Jacobs voice but the hands are the hands of Esau You speak fair and therewith also well but the main drift of your discourse is nothing else but a tempestuous Doctrine of Rebellion â—nd Disorder you being therein like the Boatman who looketh one way and pulleth another or rather like the Image of Ianus which looked two contrary ways at once It is a Rule in Law That a Protestation contrary to a mans Act will not serve to relieve him only this shall serve to convince you either of false or of forgetful dealing when we come to that place where in flat words you maintain the contrary Concerning the quarrel which you lay against Billaie as I have not seen what he hath written so will I not interpose between him and you I never heard of Christian Prince who challenged Infinite Authority without limitation of any Law either Natural or Divine But where you term it an absurd paradox that the people should not have power to chasten their Prince and upon just considerations to remove him I am content to joyn with you upon the issue And first I note the manner of your dealing in that you have omitted to express what these just considerations may be For seeing there hath been no King who is not noted of some defects and again no Tyrant who hath not many commendable parts as Plutarch writeth that Dionysius excelled most Princes in divers points of Justice and Vertue it is a matter of dangerous consequence to leave these considerations undetermined and at large But who seeth not that you do it out of policy that you may upon every particular occasion declare such causes to be sufficient as you please How then do you prove that upon any cause the people have power to dispossess their Prince This is plain you say not onely by the grounds before by you alleadged but also by example of the Romans and Graecians The grounds by you alleadged are two One in your first Chapter that because no one form of Government is natural the people have power both to choose and to change and to limit it as they please The other ground is in this Chapter that because there are divers Laws and Customs in matters of principality it sufficeth not to alleage bare proinquity of bloud Why but had you no Text of Scripture no Father of the Church to alledge no Law no Reason no better Example no surer Ground It is more than this which you bring against your self in citing out of St. Peter The Lord knoweth to reserve the unjust unto the day of Iudgment and especially them that despise Government and speak evil of those that are in Dignity And out of St. Iude Likewise these dreamers despise Government and speak evil of them that are in Authority Besides also you have alledged out of St. Paul Let every soul be subject unto the higher power for there is no power but of God Whosoever therefore resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of God and they that resist shall receive to themselves judgment And likewise out of St. Peter Submit your selves to every humane creature whether it be to the King or unto Goververnours for so is the will of God To which places we may likewise add that which St. Paul did write unto Titus Put them in remembrance that they be obedient to the principalities and powers And writing to Timothy he exhorteth us also to pray for them that we may lead under them a peaceable life But perhaps you will say that the Apostles did not mean this of wicked Princes Trifler the Apostles spake generally of all St Peter maketh express mention of evil Lords And what Princes have ever been more either irreligious or tyrannical than Caligula Tiberius Nero the infamy of their Ages under whose Empire the Apostles did both live and write Bellarmine the great master of Controversies perceiving this to be unanswerably true did in another sort rather cut than unty the knot affirming that at that time it was necessary to admonish the Christians to perform obedience to their Kings lest the preaching of the Gospel might otherwise be hindred which is as if in direct terms he should have said Sir Kings whilst our heads were under your girdle we were content to curry favour by preaching obedience unto the people But now we have got the wind of you we must plainly tell you that you hold your Crowns at their courtesie and favour and have no power in effect but as Lieutenant-Generals I know you will make a sour face at this it will go very much against your stomachs but there is no remedy you must take it down they are your good Lords they may dispossess you Prophane Bellarmine is Christian Religion a mere policy doth it apply it self onely to the present doth it turn always with the time May the principal professors thereof say as an infidel Moor did when he violated the Faith which he had given unto Christians We have no bone in our tongues that we cannot turn them which way we please We see plainly that you say so and it as is plain that it was far from the true meaning of the Apostles St. Iude writeth sharply against those who had mens persons in admiration because of advantage St. Paul also saith Go I
about to please men If I should please men I were not then the servant of Christ. I will give you an example of another time Nebuchadnezzer King of Assyria wasted all Palestina took Hierusalem slew the King burnt the Temple took away the holy Vessels and Treasure the residue he permitted to the cruelty and syoyl of his unmerciful Souldiers who defiled all places with rape ruine and blood After the glut of this butchery the people which remained he led captive into Chaldaea and there commanded that whosoever refused to worship his golden Image should be cast into a fiery furnace What cruelty what impiety is comparable to this and yet the Prophets Ieremiah and Baruch did write to those captive Jews to pray for the prosperity and life of him and of Baltazar his Son that their days might be upon Earth as the days of Heaven and Ezekiel both blameth and threatneth Zedechia for his disloyalty in revolting from Nebuchadnezzar whose homager and tributary he was What answer will you make to this example I am wisely busied to cast forth this question what answer can you make which your own knowledge will not convince Many other places there are in holy Scripture whereby not onely our actions are tied to obedience He that doth presumptuously against the Ruler of the people shall die but also our words Thou shalt not speak evil against the Ruler of the people yea our secret thoughts Detract not from the King no not in thy thought for the fowls of the air shall carry thy voice The reason hereof is not obscure Because Princes are the immediate Ministers of God and therefore he called Nebuchadnezzar his servant and promised him also hire and wages for the service which he did And the Prophet Esay calleth Cyrus a prophane and heathen King the Lords Anointed For as Solomon saith The Hearts of Kings are in the hands of the Lord and he stirreth up the spirit even of wicked Princes to do his will and as Iehoshaphat said to his Rulers they execute not the will of man but of the Lord. In regard hereof David calleth them Gods whereof Plato also had some sense when he said A King is instead of God And if they do abuse their Power they are not to be judged by their Subjects as being both inferiour and naked of Authority because all Jurisdiction within their Realm is derived from them which their presence onely doth silence and suspend but God reserveth them to the sorest tryal Horribly and suddainly saith the wise man will the Lord appear unto them and a hard judgment shall they have You Jesuits do yield a blindfold obedience to your Superiours not once examining either what he is or what he doth Command and although the Pope should swerve from Justice yet by the Canons men are bound to perform obedience unto him and God only may â—udge his doings and may a King the Lords Lieutenant the Lords Anointed in the view of his Subjects nay by the hands of his Subjects be cast out of State May he as was Actaeon be chased and worried by his own hounds Will you make him of worse condition than the Lord of a Mannor than a Parish-Priest than a poor Schoolmaster who cannot be removed by those that are under their authority and charge The Law of God commandeth that the child should die for any contumely done unto the Parents But what if the Father be a Robber if a Murtherer if for all excess of villanies odious and execrable both to God and Man Surely he deserveth the highest degree of punishment and yet must not the Son lift up his hand against him For as Quintilian saith No offence is so great as to be punished by parricide But our Country is dearer to us than our selves and the Prince is the Father of our Country whose Authority as Baldus noteth 〈◊〉 greater than of Parents and therefore he must not be violated how impious how imperious soever he be If he commandeth those things that are lawful we must manifest our obedience by ready performing If he enjoyn us those actions that are evil we must shew our subjection by patient enduring It is God onely who seateth Kings in their State it is he only who may remove them The Lord will set a wise King over the people which he loveth as himself doth testifie And again For the sins of the land the Kings are changed Aâ— therefore we endure with patience unseasonable weather unfruitful years and other like punishments of God so must we tolerate the imperfections of Princes and quietly expect either reformation or else a change This was the Doctrine of the ancient Christians even against their most mortal persecutors Tertullian saith For what war are we not both serviceable and ready although unequal in number who do so willingly endure to be slain neither want we strength of number but God forbid that Religion should be maintained with humane fire From him also St. Cyprian a most studious reader of Tertullian as St. Hierom noteth in like manner writeth Although our people be exceeding copious yet it doth not revenge it self against violence it suffereth St. Augustin saith It is a general paction of humane society to obey Kings Which sentence is assumed into the body of the Canon-Law In a word the current of the ancient Fathers is in this point concurrent insomuch as among them all there is not one found not any one one is a small number and yet I say confidently again there is not any one who hath let fall so loose a speech as may be strained to a contrary sense How then are you of late become both so active and resolute to cut in sunder the reins of Obedience the very sinews of Government and Order Whence had Benedâ—tto Palmio a Jesuit his Warrant to incite William Parry to undertake the parricide of our Queen whence did Annibal Codretto another Jesuit assure him that the true Church made no question but that the fact was lawful Whence did Guignard a Jesuit term the Butchery of Henry late King of France an heroical act and a gift of the Holy Ghost Whence did he write of the King who now there reigneth If without Arms he cannot be deposed let men take Arms against him if by War it cannot be accomplished let him be murthered Whence did Ambrose Verade Rector of the Colledge of the Jesuits in Paris animate Barriers as he confessed to sheath his Knife in the Kings breast assuring him by the living God that he could not execute any act more meritorious Whence did the Commenter upon the Epitome of Confessions otherwise the seventh book of Decretals commend all the Jesuits in these terms They set upon Tyrants they pull the Cockle out of the Lords field It is a Rule in Nature that one contrary is manifested by
the other Let us compare then your boisterous Doctrine with that of the Apostles and ancient Fathers of the Church and we shall find that the one is like the rough Spirit which hurled the herd of Swine headlong into the Sea the other like the still and soft Spirit which talked with Elias Neither was the Devil ever able until in late declining times to possess the hearts of Christians with these cursed Opinions which do evermore beget a world of Murders Rapes Ruines and Desolations For tell me what if the Prince whom you perswade the People they have power to depose be able to make and maintain his Party as King Iohn and King Henry the Third did against their Barons What if other Princes whom it doth concern as well in honour to see the Law of Nations observed as also in policy to break those proceedings which may form Presidents against themselves do adjoyn to the side What if whilst the Prince and the People are as was the Frog and the Mouse in the heat of their Encounter some other Potentate play the Kite with them both as the Turk did with the Hungarians Is it not then a fine piece of policy which you do plot or is it not a gross errour to raise these dangers and to leave the defence to possibilities doubtful Go to Sirs go to there is no Christian Country which hath not by your devices been wrapped in Wars You have set the Empire on float with Bloud your Fires in France are not yet extinguished in Polonia and all those large Countries extending from the North to the East you have caused of late more Battels to be fought than had been in five hundred years before Your practices have heretofore prevailed against us of late years you have busied your selves in no one thing more than how to set other Christian Princes on our necks stirring up such store of Enemies against us as like the Grashoppers of Egypt might fill our houses and cover our whole land and make more doubt of room than of resistance Our own people also you have provoked to unnatural attempts you have exposed our Country as a Prey to them that will either invade or betray it supposing belike that you play Christ's part well when you may say as Christ did Think not that I came to send peace I came not to send peace but a sword But when by the power and providence of God all these attempts have rather shewn what good hearts you bear towards us than done us any great harm when in all these practices you have missed the mark now you do take another aim Now having no hope by extremity of Arms you endeavour to execute your malice by giving dangerous advice Now you go about to entangle us with Titles which is the greatest misery that can fall upon a State You pretend fair shews of Liberty and of Power Sed timeo Danaos dona ferentes We cannot but suspect the Courtesies of our Enemies The Power which you give us will pull us down the Liberty whereof you speak will fetter us in Bondage When Themistocles came to the Persian Court Artabanus Captain of the Guard knowing that he would use no Ceremony to their King kept him out of presence and said unto him You Grecians esteem us barbarous for honouring our Kings but we Persians esteem it the greatest honour to us that can be The like Answer will we frame unto you You Iesuits account it a bondage to be obedient unto Kings but we Christians account it the greatest means for our continuance both free and safe An Answer to the third Chapter which is intituled Of the great Reverence and respect due to Kings and yet how divers of them have been lawfully chastised by their Common-wealths for their misgovernment and of the good and prosperous success that God commonly hath given to the same and much more to the putting back of an unworthy Pretender THat Princes may be chastised by their Subjects your proofs are two One is drawn from certain Examples the other from the good success and Successors which usually have followed Surely it cannot be but that you stand in a strong conceit either of the authority of your Word or simplicity of our Judgment otherwise you could not be perswaded by these slender Threads to draw any man to your Opinion Of the force of Examples I have spoken before there is no Villany so vile which wanteth example and yet most of the Examples which you do bring are either false or else impertinent For there have been divers States wherein one hath born the name and title of King without power of Majesty As the Romans in the time of their Consular Estate had always a Priest whom they entitled King whose office consisted in certain Ceremonies and Sacrifices which in former times could not be performed but by their Kings Likewise the Lacedemonians after Lycurgus had formed their Government retained two Kings who had no greater stroke in matters of State than a single Voice as other Senators Such were in Caesars time many petty Kings of Gaul who as Ambiorix King of Leige confessed were subject to their Nobility and questionable by them Such are now the Emperours of Almain because the Puissance and Majesty of the Empire pertaineth to the States who are sworn to the Empire it self and not to the person of the Emperour Such are also the Dukes of Venice the Soveraignty of which State is setled in the Gentlemen In these and such-like Governments the Prince is not Soverain but subject to that part of the Commonwealth which retaineth the Royalty and Majesty of State whether it be the Nobility or Common People and therefore your Examples drawn from them is nothing to our purpose Concerning success it cannot be strange unto you that by the secret yet just Judgement of God divers evil actions are carried with appearance of good success The Prophet David said that his treadings had almost slip't by seeing the wicked to flourish in prosperity The Prophet Ieremiah seemed also to stagger upon this point and it hath always been a dangerous stone in the way of the Godly whereat many have stumbled and some fallen Besides it ordinarily happeneth that good Princes succeed Tyrants partly because they are so indeed as being instructed to a better manage of Government both by the miserable life of their Predecessors and by the ugly infamy which remaineth after their death partly because by means of the Comparison they both seem and are reported to be far better than they are Hereupon Lampridius saith of Alexander Severus I may also say that Alexander was a good Prince by fear for that Heliogabalus his Predecessor was both an evil Prince and also massacred and slain Seeing therefore the reason is so manifest wherefore good Princes should succeed Tyrants is it not rashness is it not impudence is it not impiety for us to wade with unclean feet into God's
secret Counsels unknown to the Angels and to justifie upon this event the Parricide of any Prince For my part I know not whether you shew your self more presumptuous in entering into this observation or in pursuing it more idle and impure I will pass over your protestation of Respect and Obedience due unto Princes Protest what you please we will take you for no other than a vile kind of vermine which if it be permitted to creep into the bowels of any State will gnaw the Heart-strings thereof in sunder This you manifest by the coarse comparison which presently you annex that as a natural Body hath authority to cure the Head if it be out of tune and reason to cut it off oftentimes if it were able to take another so a body Politick hath power to cure or cut off the Head if it be unsound But what either Will or Power hath any part of the Body in it self What either Sense for the one or Motion for the other which proceedeth not altogether from the Head Where is the Reason seated which you attribute to the Body both in judging and curing the infirmities of the Head Certain it is that in your cutting-cure you deal like a foolish Physician who finding a Body half taken and benumb'd with a Palsie cutteth off that part to cure the other and so make sure to destroy both You suppose belike that to enter into greater perils is the onely remedy of present Dangers I omit to press many points of this Comparison against you because Comparisons do serve rather to illustrate than enforce and I know not what assertion you might not easily make good if such senceless prating might go for proof I come now to your particular Examples whereof the first is of King Saul whom you affirm to be deprived and put to death for his disobedience Saul deprived and put to death I never heard that any of his Subjects did ever lift up one thought against him Dreamer you will say he was slain by the Philistines Good but who deprived him It was God you say who did deprive him You must pardon us if upon the suddain we do not conceive the mystery of your meaning Your words of deprivation and putting to death do rather import a judicial proceeding against him than that God delivered him to be vanquished by his Enemies in the Field But what is this to dispossessing by Subjects Yes you say because whatsoever God hath put in ure in his Commonwealth may be practised by others Why but then also good Princes may be deposed by their Subjects because God delivered Iosiah to be slain by the Egyptians You Firebrands of Strife you Trumpets of Sedition you Red Horses whose sitters have taken peace from the Earth how impudently do you abuse the Scriptures how do you defile them with your filthy Fingers It is most certain that David knew both because Samuel told him and because he had the Spirit of Prophesie that God had rejected Saul and designed him to be King in his place yet his Doctrine was always not to touch the Lords Anointed whereto his Actions were also answerable For when Saul did most violently persecute him he defended himself no otherwise than by Flight During this pursuit Saul fell twice into his power once he did not onely spare but protect him and rebuke the Pretorian Soldiers for their negligent watch The other time his Heart did smite him for that he had cut away the lap of his garment Lastly he caused the Messenger to be slain who upon request and for pity had furthered as he said the death of that sacred King We have a Precept of Obedience which is the mould wherein we ought to fashion our actions God onely is superiour to Princes who useth many instruments in the execution of his justice but his authority he hath committed unto none Your second Example is of King Amon who was slain as you write by his own people because he walked not in the ways of the Lord. This is somewhat indeed if it be true let us turn to the Text Amon was twenty two years old when be began to reign c. and he did evil in the sight of the Lord c. and his servants conspired against him and slew him in his house and the people smote all those who conspired against King Amon and made Josiah his son King in his stead But this is very different from that which you report Amon was slain by his Servants and not by the people who were so far from working that they severely revenged his death And although Amon was evil yet the Scripture layeth not his evil for the motive whereupon his Servants slew him The Devil himself in alleadging the Scripture used more honesty and sincerity if I may so term it than you For he cited the very words wresting them onely to a crooked sence but you change the words of the Scripture you counterfeit God's coyn you corrupt the Records which he hath left us I will now shake off all respect of civility towards you and tell you in flat and open terms that as one part of your Assertion is true that good Kings succeeded Saul and Amon so the other part that either they were or in right could have been deprived and put to death by their Subjects it is a sacrilegious a loggerheaded lye Of your Example of Romulus I have spoken before I have declared also how the Romans presently after the expelling of their Kings and for that cause were almost overwhelmed with the weight of War being beaten home to the very Gates of their City And had not Chocles by a miracle of Manhood sustained the shock of the Enemies whilst a Bridg was broken behind him the Town had been entred and their State ruined And whereas you attribute the inlargement of the Empire which hapned many Ages after to this expelling of their Kings you might as well have said that the rebellion against King Iohn was the cause of the Victories which we have since had in France I have before declared that the state of the Romans under their Consuls was popular rather in shew than in deed This shew began also to end when by the Law Valeria L. Sylla was established Dictator for four and twenty years After this the Empire did mightily increase until the reign of Trajane at which time all Authors agree that it was most large and yet far short of your wandring Survey not half Fifteen thousand miles in compass In your Example of Caesar I never saw more untruths crowded together in fewer words you say he broke all Laws both Humane and Divine that is one his greatest Enemies did give of him a most honourable testimony You say he took all Government into his hands alone that is two the people by the Law Servia elected him perpetual Dictator You make his death to be an act of the State that is three for they who slew him
Haro Lord of Biscay to procure him to be advanced to the succession of the Kingdom before his Nephews D. Lope undertook the devise and drawing some other of the Nobility to the party they so wrought with the King that in an Assembly of the States at Segovia Sancho was declared Successor and the Children of Ferdinand appointed to be kept in Prison But Sancho either impatient to linger in expectation or suspitious that his Father grew inclinable towards his Nephews made a League with Mahomed Mir King of Granado a Moor by whose aid and by the Nobility of his Faction he caused himself to be declared King Hereupon Alphonso was enforced to crave assistance of Iacob Aben Ioseph King of Morocco who before had been an Enemy to Alphonso but upon detestation of his unnatural Rebellion he sent Forces to him protesting notwithstanding that so soon as the War should be ended he would become his Enemy again So Alphonso by help partly of the Morocco Moors and partly of his Subjects which remained loyal maintained against his son both his Title and State during his life but not without extremity of bloodshed and opportunity for the Moors being assistant to both parties to make themselves more strong within the Countries of Spain For this cause Alphonso disinherited his son by his Testament and cast a cruel curse upon him and his Posterity and afterward it was ordained in an Assembly of the States holden at Tero that the Children of the elder Brother deceased should be preferred before their Uncle How then will you verifie your two points by this History First that Alphonso was deprived by a publick Act of Parliament Secondly that it turned to the great Commodity of the State It is not a million of Masses that are sufficient to satisfie for all your deceitful and malicious untruths I marvel how the Rebellion of Absolon against King David his Father escaped you Oh it wanted success and you could not easily disguise the Report You write that the Commonwealth of Spain resolving to depose Don Pedro the cruel sent for his Brother Henry out of France and required him to bring a strength of Frenchmen with him But hereby you make it plain that the Commonwealth was not fully agreed The truth is that this was a dangerous division of the State between two Concurrents some holding for Henry and some for Pedro Henry obtained forraign Assistance by the French Pedro by the English In the mean time whilst Peter was thrown out of State by the Forces of France and after that Henry by the Arms of England and again Peter dejected both from dignity and life the poor Country became a Spectacle for one of your Enterludes Your Example of Don Sancho Capello King of Portugal containeth many intollerable untruths for neither was he deprived of his dignity neither did the Pope and Council of Lions give either authority or consent that he should be deprived neither was he driven out of his Realm into Castilla neither died he in banishment neither was Alphonso his Brother King during his liâ—e These five untruths you huddle into one heap The Council of Lions wholly opposed against the deposing of Don Sancho notwithstanding many disabilities were objected against him in regard whereof they gave direction that Alphonso his Brother should be Regent of the Realm as in that case it is both usual and fit But Sancho taking this to dislike did seek Aid of the King of Castile and in that pursuit ended his life without Issue whereby the right of Succession devolved to Alphonso To your Examples of Greek Emperours I will answer by your words which are That for the most part they came not orderly to the Crown but many times the means thereof were tribulent and seditious The deposing of Henry King of Polonia I acknowledge to be both true and just I have nothing to except against it When the Crown of France did descend unto him he forsook Polonia and refused to return again to that swaggering Government whereupon they did depose him Give us the like case and you shall be allowed the like proceeding but you esteem your Examples by tale and not by touch being not much unlike a certain mad Fellow in Athens who imagined every Ship which was brought into the Haven to be his For whatsoever you find of a King deposed you lay claim unto it as both lawfully done and pertaining to your purpose whereas one of these doth always fail Concerning your two Examples one of Sweden and the other of Denmark I shall have occasion to speak hereafter The Nobility of those Countries pretend that their Kings are not Soveraign but that the power in highest matters of State pertaineth unto them If it be thus the Examples are not appliable to the Question if it be otherwise then the Princes had wrong We are now come to our domestical Examples the first whereof is that of King Iohn who was deposed by the Pope you say at the suit of his own people All this people was the Archbishop of Canterbury the Bishop of London and the Bishop of Ely at whose complaint the Pope did write to Philip King of France that he should expel King Iohn out of his Realm If not Conscience if not ordinary Honesty pure Shame should have drawn you to another form of writing He was also deprived you say afterwards by his Barons Hâ—avy Beast call you this a Deprivation The Commons were never called to consent the Clergy were so opposite to those that stood in Arms against King Iohn that they procured Excommunication against them first â—â—â—â—câ—ally then by name lastly Lewes the French Kings son was also included Of the Nâ—bâ—lity which is onely the third State of the Realm I make no doubt but some reserved themselves to be guided by success others and namely the Earls of Warren Arundel Chester Pembrooke Ferrers Salisbury and divers Barons did openly adhere unto King Iohn You may as well call any other Rebellion a Deprivation as affirm that the rest either did or might deprive him And whereas you bring in King Henry the Third as a most worthy Successor after this Deprivation I will derogate nothing from his worthiness but there was never King in England who without concurrent in the Title of the Crown did draw more bloud out of the sides of his Subjects Your second Example is of King Edward the Second whom many of our Histories report to be of a good and courteous nature and not unlearned imputing his defects rather to Fortune than either to counsel or carriage of his Affairs His Deposition was a violent fury led by a Wife both cruel and unchast and can with no better countenance of right be justified than may his lamentable both indignities and death which thereupon did ensue And although the Nobility by submitting themselves to the government of his Son did break those occasions of Wars which do usually rise upon such Disorders yet did not the hand
they were kept under before the more insolently will they then insult I observe that Saint Paul alleadgeth two reasons wherefore we should be obedient even to wicked and cruel Princes one is for conscience sake Because they are the ministers of God and in their Royalty do bear his Image Another for the safety and tranquillity of our selves that we may lead under them a quiet and peaceable life Whereupon the Prophet Ieremiah also exhorted the Jews to seek the peace of the City whither they should be transported because in the pâ—ace thereof their quiet should consist For by obedience a few particulars remain in danger by Rebellion all by Obedience we can be under the Tyranny but of one by Rebellion we are exposed to the Rapine and Cruelty of many by the one nothing by the other all things are permitted Upon this ground Saint Augustine said It is a general covenant of humane Society to obey Kings And likewise St. Ambrose It is a great and special point of doctrine whereby Christians are taught to be subject unto higher powers Three ways a cruel Prince may work violence against his Subjects upon their Goods upon their Persons and upon their Consciences by commanding them to commit that which is evil Of the first St. Ambrose saith If the Emperour demandeth tribute we do not deny him If he desireth Fields let him take them if he please I do not give them to the Emperour but therewith also I do not deny them Of the second Tertullian writeth as I have alleadged him before For what War are we unserviceable or unfit although unequal in number who do so willingly suffer death Yea he was so far from judging it lawful to resist that he thought it scarce allowable to fly In the third case not your rule of Law but the rule of the Apostles taketh place It is better to obey GOD than man whereby the Subject is not bound to yield obedience But how he is not bound to obey by doing but by suffering he is He is not bound to obey in doing that onely which is evil but he is not thereby freed from doing any other thing which is lawfully commanded St. Augustine saith Iulian was an Infidel Emperour an Apostata an Idolater Christian Souldiers did serve this Infidel Emperour when he would have them worship Idols and offer Frankincense unto them they preferred God before him but when he said Bring forth the Army march against such a Nation they did presently obey All this seemeth to be confirmed by God himself who after he had forewarned the people of Israel by the mouth of Samuel what heavie what open injustice they should endure under some of their Kings he concludeth in these words And ye shall cry out in that day because of your King and the Lord will not hear you As if he had said you shall grudge at this burthen you shall groan under it but you shall not have power either to shrink from it or to shake it off Surely if you had been advisied you would privily have blown your Blasphemies into the ears of those Ideots who adore you for the great Penitentiaries of the See of Rome and esteem your idle imaginations as the Articles of their Faith and not so publickly have poured forth your self into these Paradoxes both impious and absurd not so boisterously have stepped like Hercules Furens upon the open stage of the world to denounce deprivation against all Princes You would not thus confidently have opposed your hot-headed assertion against all the ancient Fathers of the Church You would not thus ignorantly have troubled the Waters of true humane Wisdom by corrupting the sence of the Civil Laws you would not thus profanely have abused the Scriptures in maintaining Rebellion as Conjurers do in invocating the Devil For first you are thereby discovered to be neither religious modest nor wise Secondly you have run your self into the compass of a Canon in the Council of Chalcedon Wherein it is thus decreed against you If Clerks shall be found to be contrivers of Conspiracies or raisers of Factions let them be degraded After this you declare who is a Tyrant and that is a King you say if once he doth decline from his duty which is a large description and fit to set all Christian Countries on float with Bloud Comines saith that he is to be esteemed a good King whose vertues are not overballanced by vice I omit your thick errour in putting no difference between a Magistrate and a King with many other of like quality and do come now to a principal point of your strength That Christian Princes at this day are admitted upon conditions and likewise with protestations that if they do not perform the same their Subjects are free from all alleageance This you will prove by the particular Oaths of all Princes if the over-running of your tongue may have the full course without encounter An Answer to the fifth Chapter which is intituled Of the Coronation of Princes and manner of admitting to their Authority and the Oaths which they do make in the same unto the Commonwealth for their good Government FIrst I will preface that no Prince is soveraign who acknowledgeth himself either subject or accountable to any but to God even as Marcus Aurelius said That Magistrates were Judges of private men and the Prince of Magistrates and God of the Prince In regard of this immediate subjection Princes are most especially obliged to the Laws of God and of Nature for Baldus Alexander Speculator all Interpreters the Law it self do affirm that Princes are more strictly bound to these Laws than any of their Subjects Whereof Dionysius the Tyrant had some sence when he said unto his Mother That he was able to dispence with the Laws of Syracusa but against the Laws of Nature he had no power If therefore a Prince doth profess that he will bear himself râ—gardful of the accomplishment of these Laws he doth not condition or restrain himself but 〈…〉 honourable promise of endeavour 〈◊〉 discharge his Duty being tyed thereby to no scanter scope than he was before The reason hereof is Quia expressio ejus quod tacitè inest nihil operatur The expressing of that which is secretly understood worketh nothing Again when the Promise is not annexed to the Authority but voluntarily and freely made by the Prince his Estate is not thereby made conditional For the Interpreters of the Civil Law do consent in this Rule Pacta conventa quae contractibus non insunt non formant actionem Covenants which are not inherent in Contracts do not form an Action And therefore although by all Laws both of Conscience and State a Prince is bound to perform his Promise because as the Master of Sentences saith God himself will stand obliged to his word yet is not the authority but the person of
right of Succession So have Pyrates against Merchants so have Murtherers and Thieves against true meaning Travellers And this disloyalty of the people hath moved divers Kings to cause their Sons to be crowned during their own lives because the unsetled state of succeeding Kings doth give opportunity to boldest attempts and not as you dream because admission is of more importance than succession I will examine your Examples in the Chapters following In the mean time where you write that King Henry and King Edward both called the Fourth had no better way to appease their minds at the time of their death but by founding their Title upon consent of the people the Authors which you cite do plainly charge you with unexcusable untruth King Edward never made question of his right King Henry did as some other Authors report but applied no such deceitful comfort this false skin would not then serve to cover his wound An Answer to the Seventh Chapter which beareth title How the next in Succession by propinquity of Blood have oftentimes been put back by the Commonwealth and others further off admitted in their places even in those Kingdoms where Succession prevaileth with many Examples of the Kingdom of Israel and Spain HEre you present your self very pensive to your audience as though you had so over-strained your wits with store of Examples of the next in Succession not admitted to the State that you had cracked the credit of them for ever But you are worthy of blame either for endangering or troubling your self in matters of so small advantage I have shewed before that Examples suffice not to make any proof and yet herein doth consist the greatest shew of your strength It is dangerous for men to be governed by Examples though good except they can assure themselves of the same concurrence of reasons not onely in general but in particularities of the same direction also and carriage in Counsel and lastly of the same favourable fortune but in actions which are evil the imitation is commonly worse than the example Your puffie discourse then is a heap of words without any weight you make mountains not for Mole-hills but of Moats long harvest of a small deal not of Corn but of Cockle and as one said at the shearing of Hogs great cry for a little and that not very fine Wool Yea but of necessity something you must say yea but this something is no more than nothing You suppose that either your opinion will be accepted more for authority of your Person than weight of your Proofs or else that any words will slide easily into the minds of those who are lulled in the humour of the same inclination because partiality will not suffer men to discern truth being easily beguiled in things they desire Besides whatsoever countenance you carry that all your Examples are free from exception yet if you had cast out those which are impertinent or unjust or else untrue you could not have been overcharged with the rest Your first example that none of the Children of Saul did succeed him in the Crown is altogether impertinent because by particular and express appointment of God the Kingdom was broken from his posterity We acknowledge that God is the onely superiour Judge of Supream Kings having absolute both Right and Power to dispose and transpose their Estates as he please Neither must we examine his actions by any course of Law because his Will is above all Law He hath enjoyned the people to be obedient to their Kings he hath not made them equal in authority to himself And whereas out of this example you deduce that the fault of the father may prejudicate the sons right although he had no part in the fault to speak moderately of you your judgement is either deceitful or weak God in his high Justice doth punish indeed the sins of Parents upon their Posterity but for the ordinary course of Humane Justice he hath given a Law that the Son shall not bear the iniquity of the Father The equity whereof is regularly followed both by the Civil and Canon Law and by the Interpreters of them both Your second example is of King Solomon who succeeded in the State of David his Father notwithstanding he was his youngest Son But this example in many respects falleth not within the compass of your case First because he was not appointed Successour by the people and we speak what the people may do to direct Succession Secondly for that the Kingdom was not then stablished in Succession Lastly for that the action was led by two Prophets David and Nathan according to the express choise and direction of God whereby it is no rule for ordinary right Here many points do challenge you of indiscretion â—â— the least You write that David made a promise to Bathsheba in his youth That Solomon should succeed in his estate but if you had considered at what years Solomon began to Reign you should have found that David could not make any such promise but he must be a youth about threescore years of age You write also that David adored his Son Solomon from his bed but the words wherewith David worshipped were these Blessed be the Lord God of Israel who hath made one to sit on my Throne this day even in my sight whereby it is evident that David adored God and not his Son This I note rather for observation of the loosness of your Judgment than for any thing it maketh to the purpose You are so accustomed to untruths that you fall into them without either advantage or end The like answer may be given to your example of Rehoboam because God declared his sentence therein by two Prophets Ahijah Shemaiah But for that the ten Tribes revolted from Rehoboam upon discontentment at his rough answer and with dispite against David and his House and not in obedience to Gods Decree we cannot excuse them from offence for which it turned to their destruction For hereupon first they were separated both from the place and manner of the true Worship of God then there arose unappeasable War between them and the Tribe of Iudah then insolencies following disorders they were never long time free from Conspiracies Divisions and Tumults by which means being drained both of Wealth and Inhabitants and reduced to a naked weakness they were lastly carried captive into divers far Countries and strangers were sent to inhabit their Cities I must here also observe a few of your interpretations wherein your boldness is not limited with any bounds It is to be noted you say that before Rehoboam went to Shechem to be admitted by the people he was not accounted true King I desire therefore that you would satisfie us in these places following Before Rehoboam went to Shechem the Scripture saith that Solomon died was buried and Rehoboam his Son reigned in his stead Again after the defection of
the ten Tribes it is said that in the Cities of Iudah Rehoboam did Reign still implying thereby that in the other Cities he reigned before Again they are said to have rebelled against the house of David And lastly Rehoboam raised all the strength of Iudah and Benjamin to bring the Kingdom again unto him Further you write that ten Tribes refused to admit Rehoboam but the Scripture saith that they rebelled What did God only allow hereof after it was done did he only permit the people to do it The Scripture testifieth that it was his Decree that it was his Deed and that he declared his Will by Ahijah the Prophet during the life of Solomon and for his sins But these special Warrants do not constitute a Law they serve onely to make good the particular actions for which they are directed and not to justifie another the like Lastly St. Paul saith that all things hapned to the Jews in figure upon which place divers Expositors have noted that the State of the Jews was a figure of the Church of Christ but that it was an example and patern of all other States that should ensue it shall be ranged among your cast conceits I refer me now to the judgment of any man who taketh not pleasure to beguile himself whether you do not by art and trumpery manifestly abuse us partly by incapacity and partly by deceit either corrupting or confounding whatsoever you take in hand Your humour both discontented and unquiet hath armed your mind with bloudy desires which have edged you on to put fewel to those flames which you should endeavour to quench though it were with your bloud I will not stand upon the particular Examples of Spain as well for that the matter is both tedious and to little purpose as also for that we have small conformity with the Customs of that Nation Onely thus much in general We acknowledge that in ancient times the Kingdom of Spain was Elective and therefore your Examples drawn from thence are nothing pertinent The Examples of latter times are both few and unjust carried onely by Faction and by Force as Garabay testifieth of your Example of Aurelio and as by the Example of D. Sancho el Bravo I have declared before But you account Faction to be the Commonwealth and Violence Justice when it may make to the furtherance of your affairs The History of D. Berenguela I will briefly report rather for the respect which guided the Castilians than that I allow it for Right which they did Henry had two Sisters Donna Blanch the eldest married to Lewes the eighth King of France and Berenguela the youngest married to Alphonso King of Leon. Henry dying without Issue the Castilians feared if they should submit themselves unto Blanch that their State being less than the State of France would be made a Member thereof and governed as a Province and not as a Kingdom And therefore they did rather chuse to profess Allegiance to the Lady Berenguela by which means the Kingdom of Leon was afterwards annexed unto Castile to the great increase both of dignity and assurance to them both I have followed herein your own Authors not being ignorant that others of better name do write that Berenguela was the eldest Sister as I shall have occasion hereafter to declare but for the present let it be as you please and let us weigh our own wisdoms not onely in straining but in forging Titles to incur those mischiefs which the Castilians rejected a lawful Title to avoid And this was also one of the Motives of the Revolt of Portugal which is your last Example although it had also as Garabay writeth a concurrence of Right For Ferdinand King of Portugal by his Procurators the Bishop of Ebora and others did both contract and solemnize espousals with Elianor Daughter of Peter King of Aragon But being entred into War with Henry King of Castile and finding himself at some disadvantage he forsook the King of Aragons Daughter and contracted himself to Elianor Daughter to the King of Castile upon very beneficial Conditions for his State Afterward falling into fancy with one of his Subjects named Elianor Telles de Meneses Wife to a Nobleman called Lorenzo Vasques de Aounna he took her as his Wife and enforced her Husband to avoid the Realm and had by her one onely Daughter named Beatrix who was joyned in marriage to Iohn King of Castile After the death of the King of Portugal her Father the King of Castile in the right of his Wife laid claim to that Realm and was accordingly acknowledged by the chief of the Nobility and Prelates and in particular by D. Iohn Master of Avis her Fathers base Brother who was then the most forward man in her favour But afterwards falling into quarrel and having slain the Count de Oren he stirred the people against the Queen and compelled her to quit the City And after divers Outrages and Murthers committed upon the Bishop of Lisbon an Abbess and many others he was first made Governour of Portugal and then proceeding further in an Assembly of his Party gathered at Coimbra he was made King Garabay writeth that the chiefest objection against Beatrix was because her Mother was not King Ferdinand 's lawful Wife And I believe you also that they had a reflex not to lose the dignity of their Kingdom as now they have done and be made subject to the cruel both Avarice and Ambition of a more potent State An Answer to the eighth Chapter which is entituled Of divers other examples out of the States of France and England for proof that the next in Blood are sometimes put back from Succession and how God hath approved the same with good Success YOur Examples of France to which Nation we are more near both in situation and Laws I will run over with a swift course Of the Change which twice hath hapned in the whole Race of the Kings of France I have spoken before You seem also either to threaten or presage the third Change from the King who now reigneth and other Princes of the House of Bourbon It was your desire you applyed your endeavour with all the power and perswasions you could make You knit divers of the Nobility in a treacherous League against him you incensed the People you drew in Forreign Forces to their assistance by which means the Realm fell daily into change of distresse the men of Arms making all things lawful to their Lust. The Good did fear the Evil expect no place was free either from the rage or suspition of Tumult few to be trusted none assured all things in commixtion the Wisest too weak the Strongest too simple to avoid the Storm which brake upon them the People Joyning to their miserable Condition many Complaints That they had been abused by you in whose Directions they found nothing but Obstinacie and Rashness two dangerous Humours to lead a great
plainly to break beyond the bounds of all truth or grossely for I cannot now say artificially to disguise it with many false and deceiveable terms But to conclude for the state of France which is also to exclude whatsoever you have said under the Reign of Charles the fift for the better establishment of this right and for cutting off those calamities which accompany usurpation there was a Law made that after the death of any King the eldest Son should incontinently succeed We are now come to our English examples of which you might have omitted those of the Saxon Kings as well for that there could be no setled form of Government in those Tumultuous times as also for that our Histories of that Age are very imperfect not leading us in the Circumstances either of the manner or occasion of particular actions they declare in Gross what things were done without further opening either how or wherefore But both these do make for your advantage for who seeth not that your examples are chiefly bred in Tempestuous times and the obscuritie of Histories will serve for a shadow to darken your deceit Well let us take both the Times and Histories as they are How will you maintain that Egbert was not next Successor to Briticus by propinquitie of Blood Briticus left no Children and Egbert was descended of the Blood Royal as Polydore affirmeth William Malmesbury saith that he was â—he only Man alive of the Royal Blood beâ—ng descended of Inegild the Brother of King Ina. How then is it true which you say that Briticus was the last of the royal Descent and if it had been so indeed the right of Election should then have been in the State And thus you Stumble at every step you entangle your self without Truth or End You snatch at the words of Polydore where he saith He is created King by consent of all which do imply no other sense but that which a little after he saith That he was saluted King by all So we finde also that the like Improper speech was used at the Coronation of Philip the Second King of France whereby the Archbishop of Reimes did Challenge power in the right of his See to make Election of the King That Adelstane was illegitimate you follow Polydore a Man of no great either Industry or Judgement William Malmesbury accounted Egwina the Mother of Adelstane to be the first Wife of King Edward his Father he termeth her also a noble Woman contrary to that which Polydore fableth Henry Huntington Roger Hoveden and others write no otherwise of him but as of one that was lawfully Born And in that you english these words of Polydore Rex dicitur Rex a populo salutatur He was made King by the People In that you affirm also that for the opinion of his valour he was preferred before his Brethren which were lawfully born whom you acknowledge to be Men of most Excellent both Expectation and proof you do plainly shew that use hath made you too open in straining of truth Eldred did first take upon him but as Protector because of the minoritie of the sonnes of Edmund his elder brother and afterward entred into full possession of the Crown But that his Nephewes were put back by the Realm it is your own idle invention it was no more the act of the realme than was the usurpation of King Richard the third That Edwin was deposed from his estate it is inexcusably untrue Polydore writeth that the Northumbrians and Mercians not fully setled in subjection made a revolt Malmesburie saith that he was maimed of a great part of his kingdome by the stroke of which injurie he ended his life And whereas you write in commendation of Kind Edgar his next successor that he kept a Navie of 6600 shippes for defence of the Realme you discover your defective judgement in embracing such reports for true In that you say that many good men of the Realm were of opinion not to admit the succession of Etheldred after the death of his brother I dare confidently affirm that you do not only tell but make an untruth having no author either to excuse or countenance the same In that you write also that between the death of Edmund Ironside and the reigne of William Conquerour it did plainly appear what interest the Common-wealth hath to alter titles of succession it doth plainly appear that both you reason and your conscience is become slavish to your violent desire For what either libertie or power had the Common-wealth under the barbarous rage and oppression of the Danes when Canutus had spread the wings of his fortune over the whole Realm none having either heart or power to oppose against him what choice was then left unto the people what room for right what man not banished from sobrietie of sense would ever have said that he was admitted king by the whole Parliament and consent of the Realme It is true that after he had both violently and unjustly obtained full possession of the Realme slain the brother of Edmund Ironside and conveyed his Children into Sueden he assembled the Nobilitie and caused himself to be crowned king but neither the form nor name of a Parliament was then known in England and if coronation were sufficient to make a title no king should be accounted to usurp Of Harold the first the natural Son of Canutus our Histories doe verie differently reporâ— Saxo Grammaticus writeth that he was never king but that he died before his Father Henry of Huntington reporteth that he was appointed but as Regent for his brother Hardicanutus Others write that apprehending the opportunitie of his Brothers absence he invaded Northumberland and Mercia by force of the Danes who were in England whereupon the Realm was divided one partholding for Harold and another for Hardicanutus who was in Denmark But because he delayed to come into England they all fell rather not to deny then to acknowledge Harold for their king Take now which of these reports you please for all do serve to your purpose alike Hardicanutus after the death of Harold came out of Denmark into England and the people having their courages broken with bondage were easie to entertain the strongest pretender But after his death divers of the Nobility especially Godwin Earl of Kent rising into hope to shake off their shoulders the importable yoke of the Danes advanced Edward the Son of Etheldred to the Crown as being the next of the Race of the Saxon Kings though not in blood yet at hand for Edward the Outlaw his elder Brother was then in Hungary and fear being the only knot that had fastened the people to the Danish Kings that once united they all scattered from them like so many birds whose Cage had been broken Edward being dead Harold the Son of Godwine usurped the Kingdom for as Malmesbury saith By extorted faith from the nobility he fastned upon the Crown a forceable gripe
Henry Huntington also and out of him Polydore do write that upon confidence of his power he invaded the Crown which usurpation gave both encouragement and successe to the Enterprise of the Normans This short passage of History you do defile with so many untruths that it seemeth you have as natural a gift to falsifie as to eat drink or sleep But where you write that William the Conqueror formed any title by consent of the Realm you grow into the degree of ridiculous We find that he pretended the Institution of King Edward which had neither probability nor force and that he was nearer to him in blood than Harold the Usurper but that he ever pretended the Election of the People it is your own clouted conceit For when he had routed the English Army in the field when he had sacked their Towns harrassed their Villages slain much people and bent his Sword against the breasts of the rest what free Election could they then make Your self acknowledge also in another place that he came to the Crown by dint of Sword and at his death his own conscience constrained him to confesse that he took it without right And in that the Pope and the French King favoured his enterprise it is not material this is not the first injustice which they have assisted Neither was it the Popes hallowed Banner as you affirm but the Bow and the Arrow the only weapon of advantage long time after to this Nation whereby he did obtain the Victory One help he had also within the Realm for that King Edward had advanced divers Normans to high place both of Dignity and Charge who gave unto him much secret both incouragement and assistance in his Attempt And thus in all these turbulent times you are so far from finding five or six that you are short of any one who was made King by free Authority of the People King William Rufus made no other Title to the Crown but the Testament of his Father For often use hath confirmed it for Law that a Victor may freely dispose of the Succession of that State which he hath obtained by the purchase of his Sword The Conqueror disinherited his Eldest Son Robert for that joining with Philip King of France he invaded wasted and spoiled Normandy and joyned in open battel against his Father wherein the Father was unhorsed and wounded and brought to a desperate distress of his Life Hereupon he cast forth a cruel Curse against his Son which he could never be intreated to revoke in so much that upon his death-bed he said of him that it was a miserable Countrey which should be subject to his Dominion for that he was a proud and foolish Knave and to be long scourged with cruel Fortune And whereas you write that at the time of his Fathers death he was absent in the war of Ierusalem it is a very negligent untruth But it is an idle untruth that you write that Henry the first had no other Title to the Crown but the Election of the People He never was Elected by the People he never pretended any such Title Nubrigensis and after him Polydore do report that he laid his Title because he was born after his Father was King Malmesbury saith Henry the youngest Sons of William the Great being an Infant according to the desires and wishes of all men was excellently brought up because he alone of all the Sons of William was Princely born and the Kingdom seemed to appertain unto him He was born in England in the third year after his Father entred into it And this was the like Controversie to that which Herodotus reporteth to have happened between the Sons of Darius the Son of Hystaspis King of Persia when he prepared an expedition against the Grecians and Aegyptians because by the Laws of Persia the King might not enter into enterprise of Arms before he had declared his Successor Darius had three Children before he was King by his first Wife the Daughter of Gobris and after he attained the Kingdom he had other four by Anrosa the Daughter of Cyrus Artabazanes was eldest of the first sort Xerxes of the second Artabazanes alledged that he was eldest of all the Kings children and that it was the Custom amongst all men that the eldest should enjoy the Principality Xerxes alledged that he was begotten of Atossa the daughter of that King by whose puissance the Persians had gained not onely Liberty but also Power Before Darius had given sentence Demaratus the son of Aristo cast out of his Kingdom of Sparta came unto Xerxes and advised him to alledge further that he was the eldest son of Darius after he was king and that it was the Custom of Sparta that if any man had Children in private estate and afterward another son when he was King this last son should be his Successor upon which ground Darius pronounced in the bealf of Xerxes The same History is reported by Iustine and touched also by Plutarch although they differ both from Herodotus and one from the other in some points of circumstances Hereto also agreeth that which Iosephus writeth in reprehending King Herod for excluding Alexander and Aristobulus his Sons and appointing Antipater born to him in private estate to succeed in his Kingdom Many great Lawyers have subscribed their opinions to this kind of title and namely Pet. Cynus Baldus Albericus Raph. Fulgosius Rebuffus and Anto. Corsetta delivereth it for a common opinion But with this exception if the kingdom be acquired by any other title then by succession according to proximity in blood for in this case because the dignity is inherent in the stock the eldest Son shall succeed although he were born before his father was King And therefore Plutarch writeth that after the kingdom of Persia was setled in succession when Darius the King had four Sons Artaxerxes the Eldest Cyrus the next and two other Parysatis his wife having a desire that Cyrus should succeed in the kingdom pressed in his behalf the same reason wherewith Xerxes had prevailed before affirming that she had brought forth Artaxerxes to Darius when he was a private man but Cyrus when he was a king Yet Plutarch writeth that the reason which she used was nothing probable and that the eldest was designed to be King Howsoever the right stood between Robert Duke of Normandie and his younger brothers the fact did not stand either with the quiet or safetie of the Realm For during the reigne of William Rufus it was often infested upon this quarrel both with foreign arms and civil seditions which possessed all places with disorder and many also with fire rapine and bloud the principal effects of a licentious war These mischiefs not onely continued but encreased in the reigne of King Henry untill Robert the eldest brother was taken prisoner in the field which put a period to all his
your imaginary Audience to applaud your Opinion as worshipfully wise you proceed to declare what ought chiefly to be regarded in furthering or hindering any Prince towards the Crown Three Points you say are to be required in every Prince Religion Chivalry and Justice And putting aside the two last as both handled by others and of least importance you assume onely to treat of Religion wherein either Errour or Want doth bring inestimable Damage to any State You draw a long Discourse That the highest End of every Commonwealth is the Service and Worship of God and consequently That the Care of Religion is the principal Charge which pertaineth to a King And therefore you conclude That whatsoever Prince doth not assist his Subjects to attain this End omitteth the chief part of his Charge and committeth High Treason against his Lord and is not fit to hold that Dignity though he perform the other two Parts never so well And that no Cause can so justly clear the Conscience whether of the People or of particular Men in resisting the Entrance of any Prince as if they judge him faulty in Religion This is neither nothing nor all which you say In Elective States the People ought not to admit any Man for King who is either cold or corrupt in Religion but if they have invested such a one with Sovereign Authority they have no Power at pleasure to remove him In Successive Kingdoms wherein the People have no Right of Election it is not lawful for Private Men upon this cause to offer to impeach eithâ—r the Entrance or Continuance of that King which the Laws of the State do present unto them not onely because it is forbidden of God for that is the least part of your regard but because disorderly Disturbance of a setled Form in Government traineth after it more both Impieties and Dangers than hath ever ensued the Imperfections of a King I will come more close to the Point in controversie and dispel those foggy Reasons which stand between your Eye and the Truth There are two Principal Parts of the Law of God the one Moral or Natural which containeth three Points Sobriety in our selves Justice towards others and generally also Reverence and Piety towards God The other is Supernatural which containeth the true Faith of the Mysteries of our Salvation and the special kind of Worship that God doth require The first God hath delivered by the Ministry of Nature to all Men the second he doth partly reveal and partly inspire to whom he pleases and therefore although most Nations have in some sort observed the one yet have they not onely erred but failed in the other During the time of the Law this peculiar Worship of God was appropriate onely to the People of Israel in a corner Kingdom of the World The flourishing Empires of the Assyrians Medes Persians Aegyptians Graecians Syrians and Romans either knew it not or held it in contempt The Israelitâ—s were almost always in subjection under these both Heathen and Tyrannical Governments and yet God by his Prophets enjoyned them Obedience affirming That the Hearts of Kings were in his Hands and that they were the Officers of his Justice the Executioners of his Decrees In the time of Grace the true Mysteries both of Worship and Belief were imparted also to other Nations but the ordinary Means to propagate the same was neither by Policy nor by Power When St. Peter offered provident Counsel as he thought unto Christ advising him to have care of himself and not to go to Hierusalem where the Iews sought to put him to death Christ did sharply reprove him for it When he did draw his Sword and therewith also drew Blood in defence of Christ he heard this Sentence They that take the sword shall perish with the sword Christ armed his Apostles onely with Fiery Tongues by force whereof they maintained the Field against all the Stratagems and Strength in the World And when Princes did not onely reject but Persecute their Doctrine they taught their Subjects obedience unto them they did both encounter and overcome them not by resisting but by persisting and enduring This course seemeth strange to the discourse of Reason to plant Religion under the Obedience of Kings not only careless thereof but cruel against it but when we consider that the Jews did commonly forsake God in prosperity and seek him in distress that the Church of Christ was more pure more zealous more entire I might also say more populous when she travelled with the Storme in her Face then when the wind was either prosperous or calme that as S. Agustine saithâ—s Want or weakness of faith is usually Chastised with the Scourges of tribulations We may learn thereby no further to examin but to admire and embrace the unsearchable wisdom and will of God Seeing therefore that this is appointed the odinary means both to establish and encrease Religion may we adventure to exchange it with humane devices Is it the Servants duty either to contradict or dispute the Masters commandement is there any more ready way to prove an Heretick then in being a curious questionist with God is he bound to yield to any man a reason of his will It is more then presumption it is plain Rebellion to oppose our reason against his order against his decree It standeth also upon common Rules That which is contrary to the nature of a thing doth not help to strengthen but destroy it It is foolish to add external stay to that which is sufficient to support it self It is senceless to attempt that by force which no force is able to effect That which hath a proper Rule must not be directed by any other And this was both the Profession and practice of the antient Fathers of the Church as I have declared before whereto I will here add that which S. Ambrose saith Let every man bear it patiently if it be not extorted from the Emperor which he would be loath the Emperor should extort from him And lest they might be interpreted not to mean obedience as well to succession as to present Power they alledge that which the Captive Jews of Babylon did write to the tributary Jews which were at Ierusalem to pray for the life not only of Nebuchodonosor the King of Babylon but also of Baltasar his Son the next Successor to his Estate But in latter times Innocentius hath taught and is also seconded by Castrensis that love is a just cause to move armes for matters of Religion Under which pretence divers men have pursued their own private purposes and ends Guicciardine writeth that Firdinand who was called the catholick did cover all his covetous and ambitious desires with the honest and holy vail of religion the like doth Iovius report of Charles V. Emperour Paulus Emilius writeth thus of all every man professeth his war to be holy every man termeth his enemies impious sanctity and piety is