this our Author attributes it to the wisdom of Princes But before this comes to be authentick we must at the least be sure that all Princes have this great and profound Wisdom which our Author acknowledges to be in them and which is certainly necessary for the doing of such great things if they were referred to them They seem to us to be born like other men and to be generally no wiser than other men We are not obliged to believe that Nebuchadnezzar was wise till God had given him the heart of a man or that his Grandson Belshazzar who being laid in the balance was found too light had any such profound Wisdom Ahasuerus shewed it not in appointing all the People of God to be slain upon a Lie told to him by a Rascal and the matter was not very much mended when being informed of the truth he gave them leave to kill as many of their Enemies as they pleased The hardness of Pharaoh's heart and the overthrow thereby brought upon himself and People dos not argue so profound a Judgment as our Author presumes every Prince must have And 't is not probable that Samuel would have told Saul He had done foolishly if Kings had always bin so exceeding wise Nay if Wisdom had bin annexed to the Character Solomon might have spared the pains of asking it from God and Rehoboam must have had it Not to multiply examples out of Scripture 't is believed that Xerxes had not inflicted Stripes upon the Sea for breaking his Navy in pieces if he had bin so very wise Caligula for the same reason might have saved the labour of making love to the Moon or have chosen a fitter Subject to advance to the Consulat than his Horse Incitatus Nero had not endeavoured to make a Woman of a Man nor married a Man as a Woman Many other Examples might be alledged to shew that Kings are not always wise and not only the Roman Satyrist who says Quicquid delirant Reges c. shews that he did not believe them to be generally wiser than other men but Solomon himself judges them to be as liable to infirmities when he prefers a wise Child before an old and foolish King If therefore the strength of our Author's Argument lies in the certainty of the Wisdom of Kings it can be of no value till he proves it to be more universal in them than History or Experience will permit us to believe Nay if there be Truth or Wisdom in the Scripture which frequently represents the wicked Man as a Fool we cannot think that all Kings are wise unless it be proved that none of them have bin wicked and when this is performed by Filmer's Disciples I shall confess my error Men give testimony of their Wisdom when they undertake that which they ought to do and rightly perform that which they undertake both which points do utterly fail in the subject of our Discourse We have often heard of such as have adopted those to be their Sons who were not so and some Civil Laws approve it This signifies no more than that such a man either through affection to one who is not his Son or to his Parents or for some other reason takes him into his Family and shews kindness to him as to his Son but the adoption of Fathers is a whimsical piece of nonsense If this be capable of an aggravation I think none can be greater than not to leave it to my own discretion who having no Father may resolve to pay the Duty I owed to my Father to one who may have shewed Kindness to me but for another to impose a Father upon a Man or a People composed of Fathers or such as have Fathers whereby they should be deprived of that natural Honour and Right which he makes the foundation of his Discourse is the utmost of all absurdities If any Prince therefore have ever undertaken to appoint Fathers of his People he cannot be accounted a man of profound Wisdom but a Fool or a Madman and his acts can be of no value But if the thing were consonant to Nature and referred to the will of Princes which I absolutely deny the frequent Extravagancies committed by them in the elevation of their Favourites shews that they intend not to make them Fathers of the People or know not what they do when they do it To chuse or institute a Father is nonsense in the very term but if any were to be chosen to perform the Office of Fathers to such as have none and are not of age to provide for themselves as men do Tutors or Guardians for Orphans none could be capable of being elected but such as in kindness to the person they were to take under their care did most resemble his true Father and had the vertues and abilities required rightly to provide for his good If this fails all Right ceases and such a corruption is introduced as we saw in our Court of Wards which the Nation could not bear when the Institution was perverted and the King who ought to have taken a tender care of the Wards and their Estates delivered them as a prey to those whom he favoured Our Author ridiculously attributes the Title and Authority of Father to the word Prince for it hath none in it and signifies no more than a Man who in some kind is more eminent than the Vulgar In this sense Mutius Scaevola told Porsenna that Three hundred Princes of the Roman Youth had conspired against him by which he could not mean that three hundred Fathers of the Roman Youth but three hundred Roman young men had conspired and they could not be Fathers of the City unless they had bin Fathers of their own Fathers Princeps Senatus was understood in the same sense and T. Sempronius the Censor chusing Q. Fabius Maximus to that Honour gave for a reason Se lectarum Q. Fabium Maximum quem tum Principem Romanae Civitatis esse vel Annibale judice dicturus esset which could not be understood that Hannibal thought him to be the Father or Lord of the City for he knew he was not but the Man who for Wisdom and Valour was the most eminent in it The like are and ought to be the Princes of every Nation and tho something of Honour may justly be attributed to the Descendents of such as have done great Services to their Country yet they who degenerate from them cannot be esteemed Princes much less can such Honours or Rights be conferred upon Court-creatures or Favourites Tiberius Caligula Claudius Nero Galba and others could advance Macro Pallas Narcissus Tigellinus Vinnius Laco and the like to the highest degrees of Riches and Power but they still continued to be Villains and so they died No wise or good Man ever thought otherwise of those who through the folly of Princes have bin advanced to the highest places in several Countries The madness of attributing to them a paternal power seems to
Body Mind Mony and Forces but as an ill Hare is said to make a good Dog he conquer'd the best part of Italy without breaking a Lance. Ferdinand and Alphonso of Arragon Kings of Naples had governed by Trepanners false Witnesses corrupt Judges mercenary Soldiers and other Ministers of Iniquity but these could afford no help against an Invader and neither the oppressed Nobility nor People concerning themselves in the quarrel they who had bin proud fierce and cruel against their poor Subjects never durst look an Enemy in the face and the Father dying with anguish and fear the Son shamefully fled from his ill governed Kingdom The same things are no less evident in Spain No People ever defended themselves with more Obstinacy and Valour than the Spaniards did against the Carthaginians and Romans who surpassed them in Wealth and Skill Livy calls them Gentem ad bella gerenda reparanda natam and who generally kill'd themselves when they were master'd and disarm'd Nullam sine armis vitam esse rati But tho the mixture of Roman Blood could not impair their Race and the conjunction of the Goths had improved their Force yet no more was requir'd for the overthrow of them all than the weakness and baseness of the two lewd Tyrants Witza and Rodrigo who disdained all Laws and resolved to govern according to their Lust. They who for more than two hundred years had resisted the Romans were intirely subdued by the vile half naked Moors in one slight Skirmish and do not to this day know what became of the King who brought the Destruction upon them That Kingdom after many revolutions is with many others come to the House of Austria and enjoys all the Wealth of the Indies whereupon they are thought to have affected an universal Monarchy Sed ut sunt levia Aulicorum ingenia this was grounded upon nothing except their own Vanity They had Mony and Craft but wanting that solid Virtue and Strength which makes and preserves Conquests their Kings have nothing but Milan that did not come to them by Marriage And tho they have not received any extraordinary disasters in War yet they languish and consume through the defects of their own Government and are forced to beg assistance from thier mortal and formerly despis'd Enemies These are the best hopes of defence that they have from abroad and the only Enemy an Invader ought to fear in their desolate Territories is that want and famin which testifies the good Order Strength and Stability of our Author 's divine Monarchy the profound Wisdom of their Kings in subtilly finding out so sure a way of defending the Country their paternal care in providing for the good of their Subjects and that whatsoever is defective in the Prince is assuredly supplied by the Sedulity of a good Council We have already said enough to obviate the objections that may be drawn from the prosperity of the French Monarchy The beauty of it is false and painted There is a rich and haughty King who is bless'd with such Neighbours as are not likely to disturb him and has nothing to fear from his miserable Subjects but the whole body of that State is full of boils and wounds and putrid sores There is no real strength in it The People is so unwilling to serve him that he is said to have put to death above fourscore thousand of his own Soldiers within the space of fifteen years for flying from their Colours and if he were vigorously attack'd little help could be expected from a discontented Nobility or a starving and despairing People If to diminish the force of these arguments and examples it be said that in two or three thousand years all things are changed the antient Virtue of Mankind is extinguished and the love that every one had to his Country is turned into a care of his private Interests I answer that Time changes nothing and the Changes produced in this time proceed only from the change of Governments The Nations which have bin governed arbitrarily have always suffer'd the same Plagues and bin infected with the same Vices which is as natural as for Animals ever to generate according to their kinds and Fruits to be of the same nature with the Roots and Seeds from which they come The same Order that made men valiant and industrious in the service of their Country during the first ages would have the same effect if it were now in being Men would have the same love to the publick as the Spartans and Romans had if there was the same reason for it We need no other proof of this than what we have seen in our own Country where in a few years good Discipline and a just encouragement given to those who did well produced more examples of pure compleat incorruptible and invincible Virtue than Rome or Greece could ever boast or if more be wanting they may easily be found among the Switzers Hollanders and others but 't is not necessary to light a Candle to the Sun SECT XXIV Popular Governments are less subject to Civil Disorders than Monarchies manage them more ably and more easily recover out of them 'T Is in vain to seek a Government in all points free from a possibility of Civil Wars Tumults and Seditions that is a Blessing denied to this life and reserved to compleat the Felicity of the next But if these are to be accounted the greatest evils that can fall upon a People the rectitude or defects of Governments will best appear if we examin which Species is more or less exposed to or exempted from them This may be done two ways 1. By searching into the causes from whence they may or usually do arise 2. Which kind has actually bin most frequently and dangerously disturbed by them To the first Seditions Tumults and Wars do arise from mistake or from malice from just occasions or unjust from mistake when a People thinks an evil to be done or intended which is not done nor intended or takes that to be evil which is done tho in truth it be not so Well regulated Cities may fall into these errors The Romans being jealous of their newly recover'd Liberty thought that Valerius Publicola designed to make himself King when he built a House in a place that seemed too strong and eminent for a private man The Spartans were not less suspicious of Lycurgus and a lewd young Fellow in a Sedition put out one of his eyes but no People ever continued in a more constant affection to their best deserving Citizens than both the Romans and Spartans afterwards manifested to those virtuous and wrongfully suspected men Sometimes the fact is true but otherwise understood than was intended When the Tarquins were expelled from Rome the Patricians retained to themselves the principal Magistracies but never thought of bringing back Kings or of setting up a corrupt Oligarchy among themselves as the Plebeians imagin'd And this mistake being discover'd the fury they had conceived vanished and
in Commonwealths have never produced such slaughters as were brought upon the Empires of Maecedon and Rome or the Kingdoms of Israel Judah France Spain Scotland or England by contests between several Competitors for those Crowns if Tumult War and Slaughter be the point in question those are the worst of all Governments where they have bin most frequent and cruel But tho these are terrible Scourges I deny that Government to be simply the worst that has most of them 'T is ill that men should kill one another in Seditions Tumults and Wars but 't is worse to bring Nations to such misery weakness and baseness as to have neither strength nor courage to contend for any thing to have nothing left worth defending and to give the name of Peace to desolation I take Greece to have bin happy and glorious when it was full of populous Cities flourishing in all the Arts that deserve praise among men When they were courted and feared by the greatest Kings and never assaulted by any but to his own loss and confusion When Babylon and Susa trembled at the motion of their Arms and their valour exercised in these Wars and Tumults which our Author looks upon as the greatest Evils was raised to such a power that nothing upon Earth was found able to resist them and I think it now miserable when Peace reigns within their empty walls and the poor remains of those exhausted Nations sheltering themselves under the ruins of the desolated Cities have neither any thing that deserves to be disputed amongst them nor spirit or force to repel the Injuries they daily suffer from a proud and insupportable Master The like may be said of Italy Whilst it was inhabited by Nations governing themselves by their own Will they fell sometimes into domestick Seditions and had frequent Wars with their Neighbours When they were free they loved their Country and were always ready to fight in its defence Such as succeeded well increased in vigor and power and even those that were the most unfortunate in one Age found means to repair their greatest losses if their Government continued Whilst they had a propriety in their goods they would not suffer the Country to be invaded since they knew they could have none if it were lost This gave occasion to Wars and Tumults but it sharpned their Courage kept up a good Discipline and the Nations that were most exercised by them always increased in power and number so that no Country seems ever to have bin of greater strength than Italy was when Hannibal invaded it and after his defeat the rest of the World was not able to resist their Valour and Power They sometimes killed one another but their Enemies never got any thing but burying-places within their Territories All things are now brought into a very different method by the blessed Governments they are under The fatherly care of the King of Spain the Pope and other Princes has established Peace amongst them We have not in many Ages heard of any Sedition among the Latins Sabins Volsci Equi Samnits or others The thin half-starv'd Inhabitants of Walls supported by Ivy fear neither popular Tumults nor foreign Alarms and their sleep is only interrupted by Hunger the cries of their Children or the howling of Wolves Instead of many turbulent contentious Cities they have a few scatter'd silent Cottages and the fierceness of those Nations is so temper'd that every rafcally Collector of Taxes extorts without fear from every man that which should be the nourishment of his Family And if any of those Countries are free from that pernicious Vermin 't is through the extremity of their Poverty Even in Rome a man may be circumvented by the fraud of a Priest or poison'd by one who would have his Estate Wife Whore or Child but nothing is done that looks like Tumult or Violence The Governors do as little fear Gracchus as Hannibal and instead of wearying their Subjects in Wars they only seek by perverted Laws corrupt Judges false Witnesses and vexatious Suits to cheat them of their Mony and Inheritance This is the best part of their condition Where these Arts are used there are men and they have something to lose but for the most part the Lands lie waste and they who were formerly troubled with the disorders incident to populous Cities now enjoy the quiet and peaceable estate of a Wilderness Again there is a way of killing worse than that of the Sword for as Tertullian says upon a different occasion prohibere nasci est occidere those Governments are in the highest degree guilty of Blood which by taking from men the means of living bring some to perish through want drive others out of the Country and generally disswade men from marriage by taking from them all ways of subsisting their Families Notwithstanding all the Seditions of Florence and other Cities of Tuscany the horrid Factions of Guelphs and Ghibelins Neri and Bianchi Nobles and Commons they continued populous strong and exceeding rich but in the space of less than a hundred and fifty years the peaceable Reign of the Medices is thought to have destroyed nine parts in ten of the people of that Province Amongst other things 't is remarkable that when Philip the second of Spain gave Sienna to the Duke of Florence his Ambassador then at Rome sent him word that he had given away more than six hundred and fifty thousand Subjects and 't is not believ'd there are now twenty thousand Souls inhabiting that City and Territory Pisa Pistoia Arezzo Cortona and other Towns that were then good and populous are in the like proportion diminished and Florence more than any When that City had bin long troubled with Seditions Tumults and Wars for the most part unprosperous they still retain'd such strength that when Charles the eighth of France being admitted as a Friend with his whole Army which soon after conquer'd the Kingdom of Naples thought to master them the people taking Arms struck such a terror into him that he was glad to depart upon such conditions as they thought fit to impose Machiavel reports that in that time Florence alone with the Val d'Arno a small Territory belonging to that City could in a few hours by the sound of a Bell bring together a hundred and thirty five thousand well arm'd men whereas now that City with all the others in that Province are brought to such despicable weakness emptiness poverty and baseness that they can neither resist the oppressions of their own Prince nor defend him or themselves if they were assaulted by a foreign Enemy The People are dispers'd or destroy'd and the best Families sent to seek Habitations in Venice Genoa Rome Naples and Lucca This is not the effect of War or Pestilence they enjoy a perfect peace and suffer no other plague than the Government they are under But he who has thus cured them of Disorders and Tumults dos in my opinion deserve no greater praise than a
Riches Virtue and Power If on the other side by doing evil he has drawn upon himself the publick hatred he will always endeavour to take from them the power of doing him any hurt by bringing them into the utmost weakness poverty and baseness And whoever would know whether any particular Prince desires to increase or destroy the Bodies and Goods of his Subjects must examine whether his Government be such as renders him grateful or odious to them and whether he do pursue the publick Interest or for the advancement of his own Authority set up one in himself contrary to that of his People which can never befal a Popular Government and consequently no mischief equal to it can be produced by any such unless something can be imagined worse than corruption and destruction SECT XXVIII Men living under Popular or Mix'd Governments are more careful of the publick Good than in Absolute Monarchies OUR Author delighting in strange things dos in the next place with an admirable sagacity discover two faults in Popular Governments that were never found by any man before him and these are no less than Ignorance and Negligence Speaking of the Care of Princes to preserve their Subjects he adds On the contrary in a Popular State every man knows the publick Good doth not wholly depend upon his Care but the Commonwealth may be well enough governed by others tho he only tend his private business And a little below Nor are they much to be blamed for their Negligence since it is an even wager their Ignorance may be as great The Magistrates amongst the people being for the most part annual do always lay down their Office before they understand it so as a Prince of a duller understanding must needs excel them This is bravely determin'd and the world is beholden to Filmer for the discovery of the Errors that have hitherto bin Epidemical Most men had believed that such as live in Free States are usually pleas'd with their condition desire to maintain it and every man finding his own good comprehended in the Publick as those that sail in the same Ship employs the Talent he has in endeavouring to preserve it knowing that he must perish if that miscarry This was an incouragement to Industry and the continual Labours and Dangers to which the Romans and other free Nations exposed themselves have bin taken for Testimonies that they thought themselves concerned in the businesses that passed among them and that every one did not neglect them through an opinion that they would be done well enough by others It was also thought that free Cities by frequent Elections of Magistrates became Nurseries of great and able Men every man endeavouring to excel others that he might be advanced to the Honor he had no other title to than what might arise from his Merit or Reputation in which they succeeded so well that one of them may be justly said to have produced more eminent Men than all the Absolute Monarchies that have bin in the World But these were mistakes Perhaps Brutus Valerius and other Roman Senators or Magistrates for the space of three hundred years might have taken some care of the Common-wealth if they had thought it wholly depended upon one of them But believing it would be well enough governed by others they neglected it Camillus Cincinnatus Papirius Fabius Rullus and Maximus Scipio Africanus Amilcar Hannibal Pericles Themistocles Alcibiades Epaminondas Philopemen and others might have proved able Men in affairs of War or Government but they were removed from their Offices before they understood them and must needs be excelled in both by Princes tho of duller understanding This may be enough to excuse them for performing their Duty so slackly and meanly But 't is strange that Tacitus and others should so sar overlook the Reason and so grosly mistake the matter of Fact as not only to say that great and excellent Spirits failed when Liberty was lost and all Preferments given to those who were most propense to Slavery but that there wanted men even to write the History Inscitia Reipublicae ut alienae They never applied themselves to understand Affairs depending upon the will of one man in whom they were no otherwise concern'd than to avoid the effects of his Rage and that was chiefly to be done by not falling under the suspicion of being virtuous This was the study then in request and the most cunning in this Art were called Scientes temporum No other wisdom was esteemed in that and the ensuing Ages and no more was requir'd since the paternal Care deep Wisdom and profound Judgment of the Princes provided for all and tho they were of duller understandings they must needs excel other Magistrates who having bin created only for a year left their Offices before they could understand the Duties of them This was evidenced by that tenderness and sincerity of heart as well as the great purity of manners observed in Tiberius the Clemency Justice solid Judgment and Frugality of Caligula the Industry Courage and Sobriety of Claudius the good Nature and prudent Government of Nero the Temperance Vivacity and Diligence of Vitellius the Liberality of Galba and Vespasian together with the Encouragement given by Domitian Commodus Heliogabalus and many others to all manner of Virtues and Favours conferred upon those that excelled in them Our Author giving such infallible proof of his Integrity and Understanding by teaching us these things that would never have come into our heads ought to be credited tho that which he proposes seem to be most absurd But if we believe such as lived in those times or those who in later ages have perused their Writings we cannot but think the Princes beforementioned and the greatest part of those who possessed the same place not only to have bin void of all Virtue and to have suffer'd none to grow up under them but in baseness sottishness and malice to have bin equal to the worst of all Beasts Whilst one Prince polluted with Lust and Blood sat in his Grotto at Capreae surrounded with an infamous troop of Astrologers and others were govern'd by Whores Bardache's manumised Slaves and other Villains the Empire was ruin'd through their negligence incapacity and wickedness and the City that had flourish'd in all manner of Virtue as much or more than any that has bin yet known in the world produced no more the Discipline was dissolved that nourish'd it no man could hope to advance a publick Good or obviate an Evil by his diligence and valour and he who acquired reputation by either could expect no other reward than a cruel death If Germanicus and Corbulo who were born when Liberty was expiring be brought for Examples against the first part of my Assertion their ends will justify the latter and no eminent Roman Family is known to have brought forth a man that deserved to be named in History since their time This is as probable in reason as true in fact Men are
promote I may go a step farther and truly say that as such vast Powers cannot be generally granted to all who happen to succeed in any Families without evident danger of utter Destruction when they come to be executed by children women sools vicious incapable or wicked persons they can be reasonably granted to none because no man knows what any one will prove till he be tried and the importance of the Affair requires such a trial as can be made of no man till he be dead He that resists one Temptation may fall under the power of another and nothing is more common in the world than to see those men fail grosly in the last actions of their lives who had passed their former days without reproach Wise and good men will with Moses say of themselves I cannot bear the burden and every man who is concern'd for the publick Good ought to let fools know they are not fit to undergo it and by Law to restrain the fury of such as will not be guided by reason This could not be denied tho Governments were constituted for the good of the Governor 'T is good for him that the Law appoints helps for his Infirmities and restrains his Vices but all Nations ought to do it tho it were not so in as much as Kingdoms are not established for the good of one man but of the People and that King who seeks his own good before that of the People departs from the end of his Institution This is so plain that all Nations who have acted freely have some way or other endeavoured to supply the defects or restrain the vices of their supreme Magistrates and those among them deserve most praise who by appointing means adequate to so great a work have taken care that it might be easily and safely accomplished Such Nations have always flourished in Virtue Power Glory and Happiness whilst those who wanted their Wisdom have suffer'd all manner of Calamities by the weakness and injustice of their Princes or have had their hands perpetually in Blood to preserve themselves from their fury We need no better example of the first than that of the Spartans who by appointing such Limits to the power of their Kings as could hardly be transgress'd continued many Ages in great union with them and were never troubled with civil Tumults The like may be said of the Romans from the expulsion of the Tarquins till they overthrew their own Orders by continuing Marius for five years in the Consulat whereas the Laws did not permit a man to hold the same Office two years together and when that rule was broken their own Magistrates grew too strong for them and subverted the Commonwealth When this was done and the power came to be in the hands of one man all manner of evils and calamities broke in like a flood 'T is hard to judg whether the mischiefs he did or those he suffer'd were the greater he who set up himself to be Lord of the World was like to a Beast crowned for the slaughter and his greatness was the forerunner of his ruin By this means some of those who seem not to have bin naturally prone to evil were by their fears put upon such courses to preserve themselves as being rightly estimated were worse than the death they apprehended and the so much celebrated Constantine the Great died no less polluted with the Blood of his nearest Relations and Friends than Nero himself But no place can show a more lively picture of this than the Kingdoms of Granada and others possessed by the Moors in Spain where there being neither Senate nor Assemblies of the Nobility and People to restrain the violence and fury of their Kings they had no other way than to kill them when their vices became insupportable which happening for the most part they were almost all murder'd and things were brought to such extremity that no man would accept a Crown except he who had neither Birth nor Virtue to deserve it If it be said that Kings have now found out more easy ways of doing what they please and securing themselves I answer that they have not proved so to them all and it is not yet time for such as tread in the same steps to boast of their success many have fallen when they thought their designs accomplished and no man as long as he lives can reasonably assure himself the like shall not befal him But if in this corrupted Age the treachery and perjury of Princes be more common than formerly and the number of those who are brought to delight in the rewards of injustice be so increased that their parties are stronger than formerly this rather shows that the balance of Power is broken or hard to be kept up than that there ought to be none and 't is difficult for any man without the Spirit of Prophesy to tell what this will produce Whilst the antient Constitutions of our Northern Kingdoms remain'd intire such as contested with their Princes sought only to reform the Governments and by redressing what was amiss to reduce them to their first Principles but they may not perhaps be so modest when they see the very nature of their Government chang'd and the foundations overthrown I am not sure that they who were well pleased with a moderate Monarchy will submit to one that is absolute and 't is not improbable that when men see there is no Medium between Tyranny and Popularity they who would have bin contented with the reformation of their Government may proceed farther and have recourse to Force when there is no help in the Law This will be a hard work in those places where Virtue is wholly abolished but the difficulty will lie on the other side if any sparks of that remain if Vice and Corruption prevail Liberty cannot subsist but if Virtue have the advantage arbitrary Power cannot be established Those who boast of their Loyalty and think they give testimonies of it when they addict themselves to the will of one Man tho contrary to the Law from whence that quality is derived may consider that by putting their Masters upon illegal courses they certainly make them the worst of men and bring them into danger of being also the most miserable Few or no good Princes have fallen into disasters unless through an extremity of corruption introduced by the most wicked and cannot properly be called unhappy if they perished in their Innocence since the bitterness of Death is asswaged by the tears of a loving People the assurance of a glorious memory and the quiet of a well satisfied mind But of those who have abandoned themselves to all manner of Vice followed the impulse of their own fury and set themselves to destroy the best men for opposing their pernicious designs very few have died in peace Their Lives have bin miserable Death infamous and Memory detestable They therefore who place Kings within the power of the Law and the Law to
not the least similitude of either And tho it were true that Fathers are held by no contracts which generally 't is not for when the Son is of age and dos something for the Father to which he is not obliged or gives him that which he is not bound to give suppose an Inheritance received from a Friend goods of his own acquisition or that he be emancipated all good Laws look upon those things as a valuable consideration and give the same force to contracts thereupon made as to those that pass between strangers it could have no relation to our question concerning Kings One principal reason that renders it very little necessary by the Laws of Nations to restrain the power of Parents over their Children is because 't is presumed they cannot abuse it they are thought to have a Law in their Bowels obliging them more strictly to seek their good than all those that can be laid upon them by another Power and yet if they depart from it so as inhumanly to abuse or kill their Children they are punished with as much rigour and accounted more unpardonable than other men Ignorance or wilful malice perswading our Author to pass over all this he boldly affirms That the Father of a family governs it by no other Law than his own Will and from thence infers that the condition of Kings is the same He would seem to soften the harshness of this Proposition by saying That a King is always tied by the same Law of Nature to keep this general ground that the safety of the Kingdom is his chief Law But he spoils it in the next page by asserting That it is not right for Kings to do injury but it is right that they go unpunished by the People if they do so that in this point it is all one whether Samuel describe a King or a Tyrant for patient obedience is due unto both no remedy in the Text against Tyrants but crying and praying unto God in that day In this our Author according to the custom of Theaters runs round in a Circle pretends to grant that which is true and then by a lie endeavours to destroy all again Kings by the Law of Nature are obliged to seek chiefly the good of the Kingdom but there is no remedy if they do it not which is no less than to put all upon the Conscience of those who manifestly have none But if God has appointed that all other transgressions of the Laws of Nature by which a private man receives damage should be punished in this world notwithstanding the right reserved to himself of a future punishment I desire to know why this alone by which whole Nations may be and often are destroy'd should escape the hands of Justice If he presume no Law to be necessary in this case because it cannot be thought that Kings will transgress as there was no Law in Sparta against Adultery because it was not thought possible for men educated under that discipline to be guilty of such a Crime and as divers Nations left a liberty to Fathers to dispose of their Children as they thought fit because it could not be imagined that any one would abuse that power he ought to remember that the Spartans were mistaken and for want of that Law which they esteemed useless Adulteries became as common there as in any part of the world and the other error being almost every where discovered the Laws of all civilized Nations make it capital for a man to kill his Children and give redress to Children if they suffer any other extreme injuries from their Parents as well as other persons But tho this were not so it would be nothing to our question unless it could be supposed that whoever gets the power of a Nation into his hands must be immediately filled with the same tenderness of affection to the People under him as a Father naturally has towards the Children he hath begotten He that is of this opinion may examine the lives of Herod Tiberius Caligula and some later Princes of like inclinations and conclude it to be true if he find that the whole course of their actions in relation to the People under them do well sute with the tender and sacred name of Father and altogether false if he find the contrary But as every man that considers what has bin or sees what is every day done in the world must confess that Princes or those who govern them do most frequently so utterly reject all thoughts of tenderness and piety towards the Nations under them as rather to seek what can be drawn from them than what should be done for them and sometimes become their most bitter and publick enemies 't is ridiculous to make the safety of Nations to depend upon a supposition which by daily experience we find to be false and impious to prefer the lusts of a man who violates the most sacred Laws of Nature by destroying those he is obliged to preserve before the welfare of that People for whose good he is made to be what he is if there be any thing of justice in the power he exercises Our Author foolishly thinks to cover the enormity of this nonsense by turning Salutem Populi into Salutem Regni for tho Regnum may be taken for the power of commanding in which sense the preservation of it is the usual object of the care of Princes yet it dos more rightly signify the body of that Nation which is governed by a King And therefore if the Maxim be true as he acknowledges it to be then Salus Populi est lex Suprema and the first thing we are to inquire is whether the Government of this or that man do conduce to the accomplishment of that supreme Law or not for otherwise it ought to have bin said Salus Regis est lex suprema which certainly never entred into the head of a wiser or better man than Filmer His reasons are as good as his Doctrin No Law says he can be imposed on Kings because there were Kings before any Laws were made This would not follow tho the Proposition were true for they who imposed no Laws upon the Kings they at first made from an opinion of their Virtue as in those called by the antients Heroum regna might lay restrictions upon them when they were found not to answer the expectation conceived of them or that their Successors degenerated from their Virtue Other Nations also being instructed by the ill effects of an unlimited Power given to some Kings if there was any such might wisely avoid the Rock upon which their Neighbours had split and justly moderate that Power which had bin pernicious to others However a Proposition of so great importance ought to be proved but that being hard and perhaps impossible because the original of Nations is almost wholly unknown to us and their practice seems to have bin so various that what is true in one is not so in another he is
able than themselves to bear the weight of a Crown convinces me fully that they had so framed our Laws that even children women or ill men might either perform as much as was necessarily required of them or be brought to reason if they transgressed and arrogated to themselves more than was allow'd For 't is not to be imagined that a company of men should so far degenerate from their own Nature which is Reason to give up themselves and their Posterity with all their concernments in the world to depend upon the will of a child a woman an ill man or a fool If therefore Laws are necessary to popular States they are no less to Monarchies or rather that is not a State or Government which has them not and 't is no less impossible for any to subsist without them than for the body of a man to be and perform its functions without Nerves or Bones And if any People had ever bin so foolish to establish that which they called a Government without Laws to support and regulate it the impossibility of subsisting would evidence the madness of the Constitution and ought to deter all others from following their example 'T is no less incredible that those Nations which rejected Kings did put themselves into the Power of one man to prescribe to them such Laws as he pleased But the instances alledged by our Author are evidently false The Athenians were not without Laws when they had Kings AEgeus was subject to the Laws and did nothing of importance without the consent of the People and Theseus not being able to please them died a banished man Draco and Solon did not make but propose Laws and they were of no force till they were established by the Authority of the People The Spartans dealt in the same manner with Lycurgus he invented their Laws but the People made them and when the Assembly of all the Citizens had approved and sworn to observe them till his return from Crete he resolved rather to die in a voluntary banishment than by his return to absolve them from the Oath they had taken The Romans also had Laws during the Government of their Kings but not finding in them that Perfection they desired the Decemviri were chosen to frame others which yet were of no value till they were passed by the People in the Comitia Centuriata and being so approved they were established But this Sanction to which every man whether Magistrate or private Citizen was subject did no way bind the whole body os the People who still retained in themselves the Power os changing both the matter and the form of their Government as appears by their instituting and abrogating Kings Consuls Dictators Tribuns with consular Power and Decemviri when they thought good for the Commonwealth And if they had this Power I leave our Author to shew why the like is not in other Nations SECT XIV Laws are not made by Kings not because they are busied in greater matters than doing Justice but because Nations will be governed by Rule and not Arbitrarily OUR Author pursuing the mistakes to which he seems perpetually condemned says that when Kings were either busied in War or distracted with publick Cares so that every private man could not have access unto their Persons to learn their Wills and Pleasures then of necessity were Laws invented that so every particular Subject might find his Prince's Pleasure I have often heard that Governments were established for the obtaining of Justice and if that be true 't is hard to imagine what business a supreme Magistrate can have to divert him from accomplishing the principal end of his Institution And 't is as commonly said that this distribution of Justice to a People is a work surpassing the strength of any one man Jethro seems to have bin a wise man and 't is probable he thought Moses to be so also but he found the work of judging the People to be too heavy for him and therefore advised him to leave the judgment of Causes to others who should be chosen for that purpose which advice Moses accepted and God approved The governing power was as insupportable to him as the Judicial He desired rather to die than to bear so great a burden and God neither accusing him of sloth or impatience gave him seventy Assistants But if we may believe our Author the Powers Judicial and Legislative that of judging as well as that of governing is not too much for any man woman or child whatsoever and that he stands in no need either of God's Statutes to direct him or Man's Counsel to assist him unless it be when he is otherwise employ'd and his Will alone is sufficient for all But what if he be not busied in greater matters or distracted with publick cares is every Prince capable of this work Tho Moses had not found it too great for him or it should be granted that a man of excellent natural Endowments great Wisdom Learning Experience Industry and Integrity might perform it is it certain that all those who happen to be born in reigning Families are so If Moses had the Law of God before his eyes and could repair to God himself for the application or explanation of it have all Princes the same Assistance Do they all speak with God face to face or can they do what he did without the Assistance he had If all Kings of mature years are of that perfection are we assured that none shall die before his Heir arrive to the same Or shall he have the same ripeness of Judgment in his Infancy If a Child come to a Crown dos that immediately infuse the most admirable Endowments and Graces Have we any promise from Heaven that Women shall enjoy the same Prerogatives in those Countries where they are made capable of the Succession Or dos that Law which renders them capable defend them not only against the frailty of their own Nature but confer the most sublime virtues upon them But who knows not that no Families do more frequently produce weak or ill men than the greatest and that which is worse their greatness is a snare to them so that they who in a low condition might have passed unregarded being advanced to the highest have often appeared to be or became the worst of all Beasts and they who advance them are like to them For if the Power be in the Multitude as our Author is forced to confess otherwise the Athenians and Romans could not have given all as he says nor a part as I say to Draco Solon or the Decemviri they must be Beasts also who should have given away their Right and Liberty in hopes of receiving Justice from such as probably will neither understand nor regard it or protection from those who will not be able to help themselves and expect such Virtue Wisdom and Integrity should be and for ever remain in the Family they set up as was never known to
the Moors than an old Astrologer or a Child Alphonso and Sancho being dead Alphonso El Desheredado laid claim to the Crown but it was given to Ferdinand the Fourth and Alphonso with his descendents the Dukes de Medina Celi remain excluded to this day Peter sirnamed the Cruel was twice driven out of the Kingdom and at last killed by Bertrand to Guesclin Constable of France or Henry Count of Trastamara his Bastard-Brother who was made King without any regard to the Daughters of Peter or to the House of La Cerda Henry the Fourth lest a Daughter called Joan whom he declared his Heir but the Estates gave the Kingdom to Isabel his Sister and crowned her with Ferdinand of Arragon her Husband Joan Daughter to this Ferdinand and Isabel salling mad the Estates committed the care of the Government to her Father Ferdinand and after his death to Charles her Son But the French have taught us that when a King dies his next Heir is really King before he take his Oath or be crowned From them we learn that Le mort saisit le vif And yet I know no History that proves more plainly than theirs that there neither is nor can be in any man a right to the Government of a People which dos not receive its being manner and measure from the Law of that Country which I hope to justify by four Reasons 1. When a King of Pharamond's Race died the Kingdom was divided into as many parcels as he had Sons which could not have bin if one certain Heir had bin assigned by nature for he ought to have had the whole and if the Kingdom might be divided they who inhabited the several parcels could not know to whom they owed obedience till the division was made unless he who was to be King of Paris Metz Soissons or Orleans had worn the Name of his Kingdom upon his forehead But in truth if there might be a division the Doctrine is false and there was no Lord of the whole This wound will not be healed by saying The Father appointed the division and that by the Law of nature every man may dispose of his own as he thinks fit for we shall soon prove that the Kingdom of France neither was nor is disposeable as a Patrimony or Chattel Besides if that Act of Kings had bin then grounded upon the Law of nature they might do the like at this day But the Law by which such Divisions were made having bin abrogated by the Assembly of Estates in the time of Hugh Capet and never practised since it follows that they were grounded upon a temporary Law and not upon the Law of Nature which is eternal If this were not so the pretended certainty could not be for no man could know to whom the last King had bequeathed the whole Kingdom or parcels of it till the Will were opened and that must be done before such Witnesses as may deserve credit in a matter of this importance and are able to judg whether the Bequest be rightly made for otherwise no man could know whether the Kingdom was to have one Lord or many nor who he or they were to be which intermission must necessarily subvert their Polity and this Doctrine But the truth is the most Monarchical men among them are so far from acknowledging any such right to be in the King of alienating bequeathing or dividing the Kingdom that they do not allow him the right of making a Will and that of the last King Lewis the 13th touching the Regency during the minority of his Son was of no effect 2. This matter was made more clear under the second race If a Lord had bin assigned to them by nature he must have bin of the Royal Family But Pepin had no other Title to the Crown except the merits of his Father and his own approved by the Nobility and People who made him King He had three sons the eldest was made King of Italy and dying before him lest a Son called Bernard Heir of that Kingdom The Estates of France divided what remained between Charles the Great and Carloman The last of these dying in few years left many Sons but the Nobility made Charles King of all France and he dispossessed Bernard of the Kingdom of Italy inherited from his Father so that he also was not King of the whole before the expulsion of Bernard the Son of his elder Brother nor of Aquitain which by inheritance should have belonged to the Children of his younger Brother any otherwise than by the will of the Estates Lewis the Debonair succeeded upon the same title was deposed and put into a Monastery by his three Sons Lothair Pepin and Lewis whom he had by his first Wife But tho these lest many Sons the Kingdom came to Charles the Bald. The Nobility and People disliking the eldest Son of Charles gave the Kingdom to Lewis le Begue who had a legitimate Son called Charles le Simple and two Bastards Lewis and Carloman who were made Kings Carloman had a Son called Lewis le faineant he was made King but afterwards deposed for his vicious Lise Charles le Gros succeeded him but for his ill Government was also deposed and Odo who was a stranger to the Royal Blood was made King The same Nobility that had made five Kings since Lewis le Begue now made Charles le Simple King who according to his name was entrapped at Peronne by Ralph Duke of Burgundy and forced to resign his Crown leaving only a Son called Lewis who fled into England Ralph being dead they took Lewis sirnamed Outremer and placed him in the Throne he had two Sons Lothair and Charles Lothair succeeded him and died without Issue Charles had as fair a title as could be by Birth and the Estates confessed it but their Ambassadors told him that he having by an unworthy Life render'd himself unworthy of the Crown they whose principal care was to have a good Prince at the head of them had chosen Hugh Capet and the Crown continues in his race to this day tho not altogether without interruption Robert Son to Hugh Capet succeeded him He left two Sons Robert and Henry but Henry the younger Son appearing to the Estates of the Kingdom to be more fit to reign than his elder Brother they made him King Robert and his descendents continuing Dukes of Burgundy only for about ten Generations at which time his Issue Male failing that Dutchy returned to the Crown during the Life of King John who gave it to his second Son Philip for an Apannage still depending upon the Crown The same Province of Burgundy was by the Treaty of Madrid granted to the Emperor Charles the fifth by Francis the first but the People resused to be alienated and the Estates of the Kingdom approved their refusal By the same Authority Charles the 6th was removed from the Government when he appeared to be mad and other examples of a like nature
a Proclamation for their utter extirpation and not long after being informed of the truth he gave them leave by another Proclamation to kill whom they pleased which they executed upon seventy thousand men The Books of Ezra Nehemiah and Daniel manifestly discover the like fluctuation in all the Counsels of Nabuchodonosor Cyrus Darius and Artaxerxes When good men had credit with them they favour'd the Israelites sent them back to their own Country restored the sacred Vessels that had bin taken away gave them all things necessary for the rebuilding of the City and advanced the chief of them to the highest employments But if they fell into ill hands three just men must be thrown into the burning Furnace sor refusing to worship an Idol Daniel must be cast to the Lions the holy City esteemed rebellious and those who endeavoured to rebuild it enemies to Kings Such was the state of things when their Proclamations passed for Laws and numbers of flattering slaves were ready to execute their commands without examining whether they were just or unjust good or bad The life and death of the best men together with the very being of Nations was exposed to chance and they were either preserved or destroyed according to the humor of that man who spoke last to the King or happened to have credit with him If a frantick fancy come into the head of a drunken whore Persepolis must be burnt and the hand of Alexander is ready to execute her will If a dancing wench please Herod the most venerable of all human heads must be offered in a dish for a sacrifice to the rage of her impure mother The nature of man is so frail that wheresoever the word of a single Person has had the force of a Law the innumerable extravagances and mischiefs it has produced have bin so notorious that all Nations who are not stupid slavish and brutish have always abominated it and made it their principal care to find out remedies against it by so dividing and balancing the powers of their Government that one or a few men might not be able to oppress and destroy those they ought to preserve and protect This has always bin as grateful to the best and wisest Princes as necessary to the weakest and worst as I have proved already by the examples of Theopompus Moses and many others These considerations have given beginning growth and continuance to all the mixed Governments that have bin in the world and I may justly say there never was a good one that was not mixed If other proofs of their rectitude were wanting our Author's hatred would be enough to justify them He is so bitter an enemy to mankind as to be displeased with nothing but that which tends to their good and so perverse in his judgment that we have reason to believe that to be good which he most abhors One would think he had taken the model of the Government he proposes from the monstrous Tyranny of Ceylon an Island in the East-Indies where the King knows no other Law than his own will He kills tears in pieces empales or throws to his Elephants whomsoever he pleases No man has any thing that he can call his own He seldom fails to destroy those who have bin employ'd in his domestick Service or publick Offices and few obtain the favour of being put to death and thrown to the dogs without torments His Subjects approach him no otherwise than on their knees licking the dust and dare assume to themselves no other name than that of dogs or limbs of dogs This is a true pattern of Filmer's Patriarchical Monarch His Majesty as I suppose is sufficiently exalted for he dos whatever he pleases The exercise of his power is as gentle as can reasonably be expected from one who has all by the unquestionable right of usurpation and knows the people will no longer suffer him and the Villains he hires to be the instruments of his cruelty than they can be kept in such ignorance weakness and baseness as neither to know how to provide for themselves or dare to resist him We ought to esteem our selves happy if the like could be established among us and are much obliged to our Author for so kindly proposing an expedient that might terminate all our disputes Let Proclamations obtain the power of Laws and the business is done They may be so ingeniously contrived that the antient Laws which we and our Fathers have highly valued shall be abolished or made a snare to all those that dare remember they are Englishmen and are guilty of the unpardonable crime of loving their Country or have the courage conduct and reputation requir'd to defend it This is the sum of Filmer's Philosophy and this is the Legacy he has left to testify his affection to the Nation which having for a long time lain unregarded has bin lately brought into the light again as an introduction of a Popish Successor who is to be established as we ought to believe for the security of the Protestant Religion and our English Liberties Both will undoubtedly flourish under a Prince who is made to believe the Kingdom is his Patrimony that his Will is a Law and that he has a Power which none may resist If any man doubt whether he will make a good use of it he may only examine the Histories of what others in the same circumstances have done in all places where they have had power The principles of that Religion are so full of meekness and charity the Popes have always shew'd themselves so gentle towards those who would not submit to their Authority the Jesuits who may be accounted the Soul that gives life to the whole body of that Faction are so well natur'd faithful and exact in their morals so full of innocence justice and truth that no violence is to be fear'd from such as are govern'd by them The fatherly care shew'd to the Protestants of France by the five last Kings of the House of Valois the mercy of Philip the second of Spain to his Pagan Subjects in the West-Indies and the more hated Protestants in the Netherlands the moderation of the Dukes of Savoy towards the Vaudois in the Marquisat of Saluzzo and the Vallies of Piedmont the gentleness and faith of the two Maries Queens of England and Scotland the kindness of the Papists to the Protestants of Ireland in the year 1641 with what we have reason to believe they did and do still intend if they can accomplish the ends of their Conspiracy In a word the sweetness and Apostolical meekness of the Inquisition may sufficiently convince us that nothing is to be feared where that principle reigns We may suffer the word of such a Prince to be a Law and the people to be made to believe it ought to be so when he is expected Tho we should wave the Bill of Exclusion and not only admit him to reign as other Kings have done but resign the whole power into
a matter of convenience but not of necessity Many Nations have had none and if the expression be so far stretched as to make it extend to the annual or temporary Magistrates set up by the Athenians Carthaginians Romans and other antient Commonwealths or to those at this day in Venice Holland Switserland and other places it must be consess'd that the people who made deposed abrogated or abolished both the Magistrates and Magistracies had the power of framing directing and removing their Heads which our Author will say is most absurd Yet they did it without any prejudice to themselves and very often much to their advantage In mentioning these vast and essential differences between the natural and political Head I no way intend to exclude others that may be of equal weight but as all figurative expressions have their strength only from similitude there can be little or none in this which differs in so many important points and can therefore be of no effect However Right proceeds from identity and not from similitude The right of a man over me is by being my Father and not by being like my Father If I had a Brother so perfectly resembling me as to deceive our Parents which has sometimes happened to Twins it could give him no right to any thing that is mine If the power therefore of correcting the parties peccant which our Author attributes to Kings be grounded upon the name of Head and a resemblance between the Heads of the body politick and body natural if this resemblance be found to be exceedingly imperfect uncertain or perhaps no way relating to the matter in question or tho it did and were absolutely perfect could confer no right the allegation of it is impertinent and absurd This being cleared 't is time to examine what the Office of the Head is in a natural Body that we may learn from thence why that name is sometimes given to those who are eminent in political Bodies and to whom it dos belong Some men account the Head to be so absolutely the seat of all the Senses as to derive even that of feeling which is exercised in every part from the brain but I think 't is not doubted that all the rest have both their seat and function in the Head and whatsoever is useful or hurtful to a man is by them represented to the understanding as Aristotle says Nihil est in intellectu quod non sit prius in sensu This is properly the part of every Magistrate He is the Sentinel of the Publick and is to represent what he discovers beneficial or hurtful to the Society which office belongs not only to the supreme but proportionably to the subordinate In this sense were the chief men among the Israelites called Heads of their Fathers house choice and mighty men of valour chief of the Princes And in the following Chapter mention is made of nine hundred and fifty Benjamites chief men in the house of their Fathers These men exercised a charitable care over such as were inferior to them in power and valour without any shadow of sovereignty or possiblity that there could be so many Sovereigns and such as were under their care are said to be their Brethren which is not a word of majesty and domination but of dearness and equality The name therefore of Head may be given to a Sovereign but it implies nothing of sovereignty and must be exercised with charity which always terminates in the good of others The Head cannot correct or chastise the proper work of that part is only to indicate and he who takes upon him to do more is not the Head A natural body is homogeneous and cannot subsist if it be not so We cannot take one part of a Horse another of a Bear and put upon them the head of a Lion for it would be a Monster that would have neither action nor life The Head must be of the same nature with the other members or it cannot subsist But the Lord or Master differs in specie from his Servants and Slaves he is not therefore properly their Head Besides the Head cannot have a subsistence without the Body nor any interest contrary to that of the Body and 't is impossible for any thing to be good for the Head that is hurtful to the Body A Prince therefore or Magistrate who sets up an interest in himself distinct from or repugnant to that of the people renounces the title or quality of their Head Indeed Moses was the Head of the Israelites for when God threatned to destroy that people and promised to make them a great Nation he waved the particular advantages offer'd to himself interceded for them and procured their pardon Yet he was not able to bear the weight of the Government alone but desired that some might be appointed to assist him Gideon was the Head of the same people but he would not reign himself nor suffer his Sons to reign over them Samuel was also their Head he took nothing from any man defrauded none took bribes from no man oppressed none God and the people were his witnesses He blamed them for their Rebellion against God in asking a King but was no way concerned for himself or his family David likewise had a right to that Title for he desired that God would spare the people and turn the effect of his anger against himself and the house of his Father But Rehoboam was not their Head for tho he acknowledged that his Father had laid a heavy yoke upon them yet he told them he would add to the weight and that if his Father had chastised them with Whips he would chastise them with Scorpions The Head is no burden to the Body and can lay none upon it the Head cannot chastise any member and he who dos so be it more or less cannot be the Head Jeroboam was not the Head of the revolting Tribes for the Head takes care of the Members and to provide for the safety of the whole But he through fear that the people going to Jerusalem to worship should return to the house of David by setting up Idols to secure his own interests drew guilt and destruction upon them Tho it should be granted that Augustus by a gentle use of his power had in a manner expiated the detestable Villanies committed in the acquisition and had truly deserved to be called the Head of the Romans yet that title could no way belong to Caligula Claudius Nero or Vitellius who neither had the qualities requir'd in the Head nor the understanding or will to perform the office Nay if I should carry the matter farther and acknowledg that Brutus Cincinnatus Fabius Camillus and others who in the time of their annual or shorter Magistracies had by their vigilance virtue and care to preserve the City in safety and to provide for the publick good performed the office of the Head and might deserve the name I might justly deny it to the greatest
Princes that have bin in the world who having their power for life and leaving it to descend to their children have wanted the Virtues requir'd for the performance of their duty And I should less fear to be guilty of an absurdity in saying that a Nation might every year change its Head than that he can be the Head who cares not for the Members nor understands the things that conduce to their good most especially if he set up an Interest in himself against them It cannot be said that these are imaginary cases and that no Prince dos these things for the proof is too easy and the examples too numerous Caligula could not have wished the Romans but one Head that he might cut it off at once if he had bin that Head and had advanced no Interest contrary to that of the Members Nero had not burn'd the City of Rome if his concernments had bin inseparably united to those of the people He who caused above three hundred thousand of his innocent unarmed Subjects to be murder'd and fill'd his whole Kingdom with fire and blood did set up a personal Interest repugnant to that of the Nation and no better testimony can be requir'd to shew that he did so than a Letter written by his Son to take off the penalty due to one of the chief Ministers of those cruelties for this reason that what he had done was by the command and for the service of his Royal Father King John did not pursue the advantage of his people when he endeavoured to subject them to the Pope or the Moors And whatever Prince seeks assistance from foreign Powers or makes Leagues with any stranger or enemy for his own advantage against his people however secret the Treaty may be declares himself not to be the Head but an enemy to them The Head cannot stand in need of an exterior help against the Body nor subsist when divided from it He therefore that courts such an assistance divides himself from the Body and if he do subsist it must be by a life he has in himself distinct from that of the Body which the Head cannot have But besides these enormities that testify the most wicked rage and fury in the highest degree there is another practice which no man that knows the world can deny to be common with Princes and incompatible with the nature of a Head The Head cannot desire to draw all the nourishment of the Body to it self nor more than a due proportion If the rest of the parts are sick weak or cold the Head suffers equally with them and if they perish must perish also Let this be compared with the actions of many Princes we know and we shall soon see which of them are Heads of their people If the Gold brought from the Indies has bin equally distributed by the Kings of Spain to the body of that Nation I consent they may be called the Heads If the Kings of France assume no more of the Riches of that great Kingdom than their due proportion let them also wear that honourable name But if the naked backs and empty bellies of their miserable Subjects evince the contrary it can by no means belong to them If those great Nations wast and languish if nothing be so common in the best Provinces belonging to them as misery famine and all the effects of the most outragious oppression whilst their Princes and Favorites possess such treasures as the most wanton prodigality cannot exhaust if that which is gained by the sweat of so many millions of men be torn out of the mouths of their starving Wives and Children to foment the vices of those luxurious Courts or reward the Ministers of their lusts the nourishment is not distributed equally to all the parts of the body the oeconomy of the whole is overthrown and they who do these things cannot be the Heads nor parts of the Body but something distinct from and repugnant to it 'T is not therefore he who is found in or advanced to the place of the Head who is truly the Head 'T is not he who ought but he who dos perform the office of the Head that deserves the name and privileges belonging to the Head If our Another theresore will perswade us that any King is Head of his People he must do it by Arguments peculiarly relating to him since those in general are found to be false If he say that the King as King may direct or correct the people and that the power of determining all controversies must be referred to him because they may be mistaken he must show that the King is infallible for unless he do so the wound is not cured This also must be by some other way than by saying he is their Head for such Powers belong not to the office of the Head and we see that all Kings do not deserve that name Many of them want both understanding and will to perform the functions of the Head and many act directly contrary in the whole course of their Government If any therefore among them have merited the glorious name of Heads of Nations it must have bin by their personal Virtues by a vigilant care of the good of their People by an inseparable conjunction of interests with them by an ardent love to every member of the Society by a moderation of spirit affecting no undue Superiority or assuming any singular advantage which they are not willing to communicate to every part of the political body He who finds this merit in himself will scorn all the advantages that can be drawn from misapplied names He that knows such honor to be peculiarly due to him for being the best of Kings will never glory in that which may be common to him with the worst Nay whoever pretends by such general discourses as these of our Author to advance the particular Interests of any one King dos either know he is of no merit and that nothing can be said for him which will not as well agree with the worst of men or cares not what he says so he may do mischief and is well enough contented that he who is set up by such Maxims as a publick plague may fall in the ruin he brings upon the people SECT XL. Good Laws prescribe easy and safe Remedies against the Evils proceeding from the vices or infirmities of the Magistrate and when they fail they must be supplied THOSE who desire to advance the power of the Magistrate above the Law would perswade us that the difficulties and dangers of inquiring into his actions or opposing his will when employ'd in violence and injustice are so great that the remedy is always worse than the disease and that 't is better to suffer all the evils that may proceed from his infirmities and vices than to hazard the consequences of displeasing him But on the contrary I think and hope to prove 1. That in well-constituted Governments the remedies against ill Magistrates are easy