unlawfull but in submitting their Tutela is inculpata For it is easie to understand how we may have a right to receive what another may not have a right to give as a Necessary alms begd and received from one who got his riches by wrong and oppression as also in borrowing mony upon biting Usury when a man cannot by Morall diligence get it other waies As for the dues here mentioned I shall speak to them in the next Proviso Here I must observe that the Author of the Exercitation hath an expresse Chapter against no other Author which I know of but the Doctor in this his forth Proviso highly blaming him for giving way to the temporizing reservations of Allegiance during the intervall and prevalency of another Power at which Power some profess themselves so much scandalized that they cannot see how they may with a good Conscience ever go to Law in the present Courts of Justice for their debts and rights But for their ease this Exercitation hath found out an excellent expedient for them tho not moulded from that equity whereby Saint Paul appealed to Caesar which is That they may now recover their dues in those Courts provided they give not such titles to the Iudges and Officers as they should give to the Lawfull Magistrates I wonder whether this Gentleman thinks the like exception and scruple might not have been made against their Courts during the Parliaments first War with the King when Judges and every thing else was regulated here only by his name and absolutely against his Will Such another expedient for the Kingdom of Scotland would set all right in their justice too For I beleeve the King of Scotland hitherto hath made no more Judges in Scotland then the Prince of Wales hath done in England But the grand Case of Conscience p. 10. will tell this Gentleman how truly let him look to it that his expedient salves not half the difficulty and that after he hath received that which he judges in himself is jâ—stly his own by the might and power only of an unjust Court yet he hath not his own because a thing in itself just is not recovered by their help justly For Justice and Judgment is then only just when it derives from the Just Legall Magistrate and Justice as he saith p. 26. looks upward as well as downward The like Note doth he recommend to the Clergy p. 24. advising them not to preach on such unseasonable days as a wrong Magistrate shall appoint for some Religious duty yea though the Parishioners were willing to heare the word of God Surely he cannot think but they will follow Saint Pauls authority rather then his who enjones them to be instant both in season and out of season The fifth Proviso is That this submission be only to the {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} not with an acknowledgment of the {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} of the prevailing Power I know not to what purpose this Criticisme is inserted to weigh against the consequence of such important Cases and Arguments unless it be to indispose people by perplexing them Though the difference betwixt those two Greek words be no more then is betwixt Potentia and Potestas or as is more Critically betwixt power and Authority yet our Author p. 2. ch. 11. 9. proves that the inequality of force or Potency is the originall ground of ruling as well as Impotency is of subjection For which reason Master Hobbes his supposition That if there were two Omnipotents neither could obey one the other is very conclusive But if I shew that {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Rom. 13. 1. signifies no more then the establishment of a supreme {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} when it comes at last to be as Saint Paul saith {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and without further contests actually possesses all other Powers and that every Country hath not a Prophet to give assurance of Gods extraordinary reveal'd will then I suppose this Proviso will signifie noting That such is the meaning of {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Rom. 13. is evident Because v. 1. the Apostle speaks onely of the Powers which de facto are and that by this very word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Moreover hee interprets it clearlier v. 3. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} They who actually rule are a terrour to evill workes but how the answer is in the same verse Because they carry or hold not the sword in vaine which can in no sense be understand of those who have actually lost the sword by which dispossession they are disinabled to fright any body being in the sense of the Law Civilly dead themselves Seing then the change of Gods Vice Roys or of the hands which carry swords is of his secret disposing not by meere chance or humane contrivance it will concerne us to submit to them after an establishment as to an Authority or {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and that for Conscience sake lest by continuall disturbance and without assurance for the successe of more then our Morall endeavours have attain'd to wee unnecessarily breed a publique disturbance to our owne and others destructions But if by {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} he meane a cleare right without interruption deriv'd ab origine from some Capitall family or Compact hee might put all the World into an endlesse suffle before he should finde such Persons for all Kingdomes And Princes quietly possest or as Henry the Seventh would have it establisht are but little beholden to him for this doctrine of Allegiance as little as the People are to him for his Divinity who for want of that which they cannot get are by him necessitated ever to do all just things doubtingly and without faith If hee speak as a Casuit he cannot argue Prescription for the cleare right of one against the present Possession of another For Prescription of it selfe proves only a Comparative right as one may bee some what better then the other onely because ancienter Prescription is but a kind of Penalty in a State and therefore is allow'd the Opinion and effects of Right and in a tryall makes an Excellent exception against the claime of another as when Ieptâ—a objected 300. yeares Possession to the Ammonites The C. Law presumes that what cannot appeare to be anothers is therefore the Possessours because men have so much interest in the continuall preservation of those necessary rights which truly belong to them therefore in the sence of that Law that thing cannot appeare to be anothers which hath been for so many years neglected by him for such negligence the Law judges him worthy to be punisht with the losse of what he pretends to This perhaps is an inconvenience to particular men yet States allow it as an Equity to avoyd a greater inconveniency viz. Publique disquiets perpetuall controversies and uncertainty of
p. 60. saith The Oath of Allegiance prevents such a Presumption and obliges during life to doe all that possibly may be done for such an absent Prince Our Author chap. 9. Proves that wee are bound to doe the utmost of all our Morall not of all our Naturall endeavour and that not during life but during Possession which is the scope of that Promissory Oath Otherwise what will he say to our late Kings Oath with the now King of Portugall contrary to that which he took with the King of Spaine as King of Portugall and what will he say to those Cases which our Author puts to him chap. 9. concerning those who in frontire places fall somtimes into the possession of one Prince and Allegiance and somtimes into another quite contrary In opposition to our Author the Exercitation delivers a strange Doctrine affirming That when such Enemies prevaile they can pass no Obligation upon men so reduced as thereby to make them indebted to them for their lives because they were unjust enemies According to this there will be no faith kept betwixt Enemies who oft presume one as much as another of the justice of their Causes neither were Prisoners releast upon their Paroles bound to keep them and that brave Roman releast at Carthage upon his faith to return again from Rome did not only a sottish but an unjust act in keeping it But saith he in opposition to our Author p. 60. a new life cannot be given and so consequently no new Obligation and our Author cannot really prove his life another then it was R. When a mans life is given it is civily though not naturally taken to be another and if it be a contradiction to say a man can in no consideration be said to have a new life because it is naturally still the same then I am sure he contradicts the whole current of the Gospell which tells us how we may become New Creatures and Saint Paul Rom. 7. did but prevaricate when he said It was no longer he that did such things because the old man was dead in him which is not to be understood as if the former individuall soule of Saint Paul were changed for another But that Author to maintaine himselfe in these streights asserts this as his Principle for all p. 56. That peoples oaths are all absolute and irrespective and have no implications of if's or and 's c. From whence notwithstanding his great sufferings for the Parliament he must directly condemne their first ingagement against the King and so he doth plainly saying p. 13. That it is unlawfull to resist or fight against any just Magistrate as he understands just in Title and yet p. 56. he calls KING CHARLES The late invasive Prince Secondly he therby upbraids the Covenant which provided for the preservation of the King but conditionally in the preservation of Religion and Law But indeed if wee trace him we shall finde that he knowes not what to make of the Covenant himselfe For p. 4. where he speakes of the degrees of Vsurpation he saith distinctively that it may be either against the Oath of Allegiance or against Covenant which bounds it He might trulier have said which derogates from it because that which the King was sworne to keep we in it contrary to his oath and consent swore to take away viz. Episcopacy Moreover p. 59. he saith the party sworne to in the Covenant is not the King but the people of all ranks in the three Kingdomes who therefore as he inferres carry the power of Obligation to and releasment from it in themselves which is a wilde extravagancy and Leads to attempt any madnesse and to dissolve all Government and Allegiance the People of private callings being sworne in relation and subordination to their respective Judicatories as himselfe after all confesses with some contradiction in his America case p. 5. That the houses presorih'd the Covenant to the People and if you would know quo juâ—â— he saith as impertinently in the same page by Vertue of a Coordinate â—anck with the King For Coordinata fâ—se â—nvicem supplent and have mutually a power to act fully one for the other As if the King legally could in the making of Lawes and laying taxes at sometime act not onely his owne share but that of both houses also and so consequently might both houses comprehend themselves and the King and consequently give an Oath of Allegiance in Covenant which is an unsound argument because it satisfies not both waies alike and hath contradictions of Government involved in it Our Author chap. 9. p. 2. hath shewn how impossible it is that any Promissory Oath can be absolute and irrespective and so hath this Doctor the Censurer also praelecti p. 7. 7. And the Exercitator at last with more contradiction confesses p. 61. That such an Oath may be indeed suspended but not dissolved Whereas it is a known Maxim Obligationes non sunt inpendenti the Obligations of Promises cannot be suspended quia annus dies debentur we owe time which may suspend the adimpletion of a Promise but not its obligation Otherwise we must allow though he would not reservations for severall allegiances for the same people for the same actions and the same time which is as contradictory as if we would have severall Centers for the same equidistant Lines in a Circle and that in Holland they owe allegiance both to the States and to the King of Spaine and in Portugall to the King of Spaine and to the new King The fourth Proviso of the Doctors is when this may be without prejudicing the oppressed party in his dues and without disabling our selves to help him in his recovery afterwards This Notion is fitted only to distract people by putting them in a way how they should do nothing in present with faith only that they might thereby act any thing afterwards with madness Yea though every thing both in Religion and Nature be more favourable for Peace then for War This is indeed a refind Chimaera as if People could in a State live half by themselves by their own Laws and their own Militia and so be taken into no plenary protection or possession by which they may be exposed in a Moment to certain ruine For non-obedience can expect nothing but non-protection as King Iames in his Apology objected to Pius Quinius when he absolved his Catholique Subjects from their Allegiance upon a pretence that he was an Hereticall and therefore an unlawfull King To which the King replied That what truth soever there might be in this his unlawfulness yet it was never asserted in the Church before That Temporall Obedience to any temporall power was against faith and salvation of souls a Doctrine which this Censurer doth ill now to second a Pope in against a Protestant King Nay though it were true That one Prince or Power commands to the prejudice of an other ejected yet the peoples obedience when necessary is not
the Parent ought by the Law of Nature to Redeeme also in the Guardienship of the Minor which is alwayes the state of a Common-wealth according to an old and true Axiome Respuh semper est in curâ tutelâ But the Law allowes the Guardien to look after the Minors Rights at his Charges tho he know not of it or knowing would not through peevishnesse have them so Lookt after From whence I coherently inferre That the protection of this supreme State guardien like a Meritum inferres Allegiance as a Debitum according to Solomon Prov. 27. 18. Hee who keeps the figtree shall eate the fruite thereof Nay i◠he administer the same Politicall Justice and give the same Protection or Security we are bound to doe more then obey him viz. praise God for him All of us say that it is sufficient in the Change of the sabbath if that which was Morall in it remaine still and in the Point of Mission of Ministers we say the Doctrinall Succession is sufficient tho there were Change or Interruption of the Personall since Christs time and what can hinder us from saying the same concerning things Civilly Lawfull when there are civill Changes of Persons or Goverments but immediate Interest Ambition or Revenge For this Reason Christ and his Apostles bad us not so much beware of Illegall and false Princes as of false Prophets because at the day of Judgement wee shall all be examined concerning the things themselves done here in the flesh not under what Politicall Titles and formes 3. The Censurer stands ballancing betwixt these two waies of Obedience and for want of that Christian fortitude which he speakes of outwardly onely pretends to a station of Neutrality although really hee is most consonant with our Author nor any way opposite to his publike Assertions or to present Obedience The Cases wherein the Censurer allows Obedience to a supposed unjust Authority First He directly saith he can pay taxes and conform to other things imposed by those who unlawfully and plenarily possess a Kingdom Here he leaves us in the dark by not naming those other things which may be for ought we know all those other things asserted by our Author Howsoever he sufficiently acknowledgeth the present Authority and so fals off from those of the first opinion But how he conceives he hath liberty to pay taxes and other duties without being commanded l understand not Secondly he saith he can obey in things not unlawfull in themselves Which is the utmost of what our Author asserts especially in the Chapter of Politicall Iustice Thirdly he can conform to what in the Conjuncture of present Circumstances may seem prudentially necessary for his own and his Neighbours preservation from Injuries He approves not of a Non-obedience which might be made use of to his own danger But for assuring his Obedience in these three Generall heads which comprehend the whole state of Subjection he must have these five PROVISO'S which I shall examine only to see how far they are opposite either to Reason or to the Book which he Censures Those three Cases of Obedience are allowable then only when they violate no Duty to God or Obligation of Oath or Law The same is asserted largely by our Author shewing how things in themselves just and necessary are not displeasing to God as also how Promissory Oaths alwaies have tacite conditions innate to them in regard of their uncertain futurition That the condition of Politicall Oaths is to obey whom God permits plenarily to possesse Kingdoms which is the sense in which Kings themselves understand them Though such Oaths may be violated by Princes who at the expence of the Peoples bloud dispute de jure ad regnum yet that ended the poor People in submitting to changed Titles violate no former Oaths For the matter of such Oaths and Laws as the Censurer himself hath taught it is consumed to them and as I may say dyes to them like fire rather by extinction than by corruption Otherwise all the World should be obliged to Morall impossibilities which the Censurers Book of Oaths will not allow For that were to be ever restless among our selves till we brought God to our bent as if we could force him to continue such Persons and Governours only as we approve of best our selves The second Proviso gives allowance only in Cases of extreme Necessity Which our Author likewise asserts to be that alone which Originally makes interprets and finally abrogates Laws and Goverments Ministeriall to them and so becomes the Caesar of Caesars The third is When he may reasonably presume that the Power to which his Obedience is justly due upon consideration of his present exigencies would if he knew them dispence with his present Obedience to a prevailing Power Our Author asserts thus much and more Chap. 10. p. 2. not here contradicted especially when the supposed Governour derives such an absolute clear right as is here pretended This Proviso for self-Preservation runs to the end of all the Circumstances of Subjection to a new Possessour and may be as he saith as reasonably presumed from all right powers actually ejected as it was reasonably practised by King Ferdinand antecedently to his ejection out of the Kingdom of Naples to prevent the desolation of his Subjects This indeed was a releasement by dispensation because he then was in possession But when Princes do as the Civill Law saith and as in the Government of the 24 years which our Author supposes when Edward the fourth lived in Flanders pati capitis diminutionem and are reduced to the station of private Persons living in other Orbes subject to other Magistracies then the Law looks at them as civily dead so that the releasment then is by extinction as the same Law saith {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Death dissolves all things alike The Author of the Exercitation p. 58. fals highly foule on the Dr. here and will not allow him this Proviso saying Such a presumptive releasment is groundless and highly impious and is but his own act that cannot be a discharge The Doctor our Author here speak not of the extremities of one particular man but of a whole Nation in which Case Posito sed non concesso that Princes had such an inalienable right of Property in People that Goverment were for the person governing primarily yet the presumption were good and would discharge a man in foro interiori though not in exteriori where for reasons of state summum jus is somtimes summa injuria I wonder What expresse Letter of the Law there was to Authorize our Saviours pulling Corne in another mans field or Davids eating the shew-bread or Sampsons killing of himselfe whom Iosephus excus'd because when hee saw he could live no longer but with a reproach to God he conceivd hee might then anticipate his death Vid. Grot. l. 2. c. 19. 5. de Iu bel Pacis The exercitation
Properties But how suddainly doth all this vanish when we argue de jure ad regna For triall of which there is no Tribunall coercion or Regula juris save that one and all of necessity Neither can a Casuisâ— plead time against truth nor by that Accident ever make wrong become right or turne quantity into quality The Author of the Exercitation takes much paines disperstly to prove an {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} on his new sence but so that if he had a King to day he would go neer to cachier him to morrow unlesse after Possession he would submit to the Peoples consent for giving him a new Title which Henry the seventh refus'd or for confirming an old Title Hee saith all lawfull power is founded upon the Wills of those over whom it is set p. 4. I wish hee had specified how he understands this For tho the Senate might give Caesar an Authority over the towne of Rome yet from that Position a man might question what right he or they could have to extend their Authority so far from Rome as this Country of ours is contrary to the wils of those millions which they governed Moreover St Paul wrot his 13 ch. to the Romanes with an exhortation to obey them there where they the Roman Magistrates never entred by the free Votes of the People They who according to Hosea 8. 4. doe set up wrong Kings are onely answerable for it but I doubt that the rule which he gives us p. 62. Whereby we may know when a Prince is given by God is not in his owne intent sufficient For if wee want the reveiled will of God as Miracles and publique Prophecie now are ceas'd I believe the authority of Gamaliel who for ought we know had not the spirit of God signifies very little in this Argument viz. That if it be of God it will lâ—st For many things which are not of Gods expresse ordination last long and many things of Gods liking last but a little as Iebus power From whence hee inferres coherently p. 63. that for the present we must submissively beare those evills yet three lines after hee contradicts all againe saying we are allowed to remove them when they are befall 〈…〉 as if a man could at the same time both carry and throw downe the same burâ—hen In the midst of these rounds which he runs I wonder what fixt rules he would give for the reception of Embassadours when they must first prove their Masters Titles for the limits and duration of Empires c The Lawes of Nations must and do determine these and not the Municipall Lawes of any one Country But p. 53. he professeth he knowes not what the Lawes of Nations or of War meane if they derogate or vary from other humane Lawes as they indeed doe War beginning there where other Law ends and reciprocally and if he knowes not this it is neither Mr Seldens not Grotius c. faults but his owne For want of this he censures Grotius very impertinently for saying That if one Compeer unjustly invades the others rights he may by the Law of War lose the exercise of his own rights This Gentleman p. 54. thinking to mitigate the rigour of this heightens it For saith he it is not necessary that his right should be lost but that he make reparation and according to the justice of the Scripture he ought but to make a fourefold restitution of damage But I pray you what difference is there betwixt losing a right and not having that without which no satisfaction can be made nor any readmission may be obtained Princes are still little beholding to him for these Arguments For after a War and the desolation of Countries how can an invading Prince satisfie for the reall dammages which are so many Or for the Personall injuries or murthers of so many of which there can be no Compensation at all The assertion of our Authors ninth Chapter not being this That meere violent extrusion takes away a Soveraigns right I have nothing to do to follow the Arguments of the Exercitation Chap. 2. as if they were positive answers to our Author I shall only vindicate him in two places where the Exercitation would fasten Contradictions on him Our Author saith that we are bound to own Princes so long as it pleases God to give them the power to command us and when we see others possest of their powers we may then say that the King of Kings hath changed our Vice-Roy and yet speaking of Antichrists Dominion he saith it can by no Prescription become lawfull neither can a Christian submit himself to it without wounding his faith which saith the Exercitation is a Contradiction I answer with King Iames that we speak here only of Temporall Obedience in Temporall things and as the Pope is a Secular Prince he may have Allegiance due to him upon which account severall Protestant Princes have received his Nuncios although his spirituall Capacity may be denied him Thus they who in his Country may not go to his Churches may safely obey him in his other Laws and Courts in which assertion there is no Contradiction Secondly Our Author saith that the Obedience which the Israelites owed to Nebuchadnezzar ought not to be a generall rule for subjection which contradicts the former Position as the Exercitation conceives but erroniously First because they were given up as a prey to him Secondly Because they were warned by Prophets so to obey whereas we now of this Age neither have them nor Miracles to warrant us Hitherto I have shewed you what consonancy there is betwixt the Censurers Positions and Provisos with our Author But lest so much truth might unawares do some harme and that interests might not be changed with opinions he laies the Book aside and falls roughly on two Assertions which yet he saith our Author hath not spoke openly to The first concealed opinion of our Author or rather the Doctors own supposition is That no Oath binds the taker further then he intended to bind himself thereby and it is presumed that no man intended to bind himself to the prejudice of his own safety Who can sufficiently wonder at the Doctors great errour in this assertion Seeing the fourth Chapter in the second part of our Author is expresly in terminis writ to prove the quite contrary shewing that a Promissory Oath is to be taken in the Principalls or Propounders sence sine subticentiâ aut amphibologiâ Because a Promise is a Pact for transferring somthing to another as to a Principall whose sence we are bound to follow if our sence tells us that such or such is his sence and no further unless we will our selves As for our Ministers former Subscriptions to Episcopacy and their swearing since to extirpate it in Covenant our Author ch. 8. hopes Mr. Chittingworths Vindication to be sufficient The second tacit supposition is that self-preservation is the first and chiefest obligation in the World