Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
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A44455
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Animadversions on Mr Johnson's answer to Jovian in three letters to a country-friend.
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Hopkins, William, 1647-1700.
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1691
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Wing H2753; ESTC R20836
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74,029
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140
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younger before the elder Son's Posterity much less to adopt Strangers nor yet to divide their three Kingdoms among three Sons or to set them up all together joint Soveraigns and Kings of the whole British Empire Now to all this what saith Mr. I. Truly nothing in effect but thinks to sham it all with a piece of Republican Cant he calls it the History of the broken Succession in the Empire which is as good as he and his Friends will allow the English Succession to have been and then he tells us that it is of so small concernment in the Controversy that he hath never examined it Whether he hath examined it or no I cannot tell I am sure 't is much his interest that no body else should examine it There is a Cloud of Witnesses against him and they all speak home to the point and I think if any Man will have Patience to examine them he must have Mr. I's own Forehead if he dare say their Testimony is of small concernment in the Controversy He once believed it a matter of such moment to prove the Empire Hereditary that he thought he could not proceed faithfully without doing it and therefore unless some great Revolution hath since happened in his Mind he cannot esteem so full and clear a proof of the contrary of little or no concernment in the dispute Perhaps it was prudently done to slight and overlook what he could not Answer but Mr. I. hath in all appearance undertaken to answer some other passages in Iovian without examining them Again it was by no means fairly done to represent the account of the Roman Succession as a meer History and slight it when he had done as containing nothing that he was obliged to take notice of There are many and till he shew the contrary I shall think concluding proofs drawn from the History that nothing is more plain than that the Roman Empire was not Hereditary which if he meant in earnest to defend his first Book it concern'd him to Answer I am sure they were such as have in my presence made some of the most considerable of his Friends acknowledge that he was mistaken in asserting the Empire to have been Hereditary And if he were mistaken in that all his Discourse from Iulian's Case which is founded on that supposition falls to the ground with it For an Argument from one case to another concludeth not if the two Cases prove to be very different Now all that he saith for exclusion in his first Book abating some things in his Preface which are considered in the Preface to Iovian is wholly deduced from Iulian's Case and the sence of the Ancient Fathers and Christians thereupon And therefore if he have a stock of new Arguments to produce for Exclusion in this Book 't is nothing to the state of the Controversy as it stood between him and his Adversary who undertook only to answer what he had written and not to divine what he might say hereafter But if the Authour of Iovian had not given us an History of the Roman Succession and by an Induction which is one of the strongest sorts of proof as an Example or Case is the weakest made it out to be Elective and not Hereditary He hath without that sufficiently evinced the disparity of the Cases of Iulian and the D. of Y. by shewing that there were no entailed Estates nor any such thing as Heir in Tail or Hereditary Succession to Entailed Estates in the Empire but that every Man might dispose of his Patrimony by his last Will and Testament or sell or give it away as he pleased or in case he died Intestate it fell to his next Kindred as Heir or Heirs at Law To this Mr. I. makes no Reply Nor indeed could he make any defence for his Foreign Notion of an Heir and Inheritance which is in truth as great a fallacy as a scale of Dutch Miles in a Map of Middlesex For a Roman Heir and English Heir like Dutch and English Miles agree in nothing but an ambiguous Name they are distinct Species of Title and have not the same formal Conception as Dutch and English Miles are distinct species of Measure Whether there be not more Wit than Truth in his representing Mr. Dean's Notion of a Soveraign to be such a deceit I shall have another occasion to consider The other main Notion in his Book and that which for ought I know he may have the honour of first discovering is that a Prince persecuting against Law may lawfully be resisted by force of Arms and that the reason why the Primitive Christians treated Iulian worse than former persecuting Emperours was because they persecuted by virtue of Law against Christianity whereas he persecuted against Laws which established the Christian Religion Now to this new Hypothesis of Mr. Iohnson the Dean objects two things 1. That it is next to impossible for a Roman Emperour to persecute against Law considering his absolute power over the Laws and that his Edicts Rescripts and indeed his Pleasure any way expressed had the force of a Law And as for what was done against Christianity by his Officers presuming on his connivence and secret approbation was no more than what had been usual in former Reigns and therefore could no more justify resistance under Iulian than it would have done it under former Emperours And at this answer he just nibbles p. 158. 2. He saith that if oppressing the Christians contrary to former Laws their civil Liberties as Romans were persecuting against Law the former Christians as many as were Roman Citizens were also persecuted against Law put to Death upon shams and pretended Crimes of Treason tortured to deny their Religion which was their pretended Crime and not as other Malefactors to bring them to confess it denied the Liberty of making their defence which the Laws of the Empire allowed all Men and this he makes good by the Testimony of Tertullian and he shews at large how Galerius invaded the civil rights of all Men as well as the Christians subverted the fundamental Laws of the Empire and endeavoured to introduce the Persian Tyrannical Form of Government and to enslave the freeborn Roman People His illegal and barbarous treatment of his Subjects in general is described from Lactantius and Eusebius and yet never in any Persecution did the Christians suffer more patiently than in this Galerian Persecution when if Persecution against Law would warrant Resistance they had sufficient provocation to take Arms if in other Persecutions they were discouraged by want of sufficient Force and Numbers yet in this they could not want either but might have expected that their Pagan Neighbours would have joined with them for their common defence against such a Monster and Tyrant And what saith the unanswerable Man to all this Why truly not one word no not so much as that this Chapter is of small concernment in the Controversy I have noted these material parts of Iovian
as to the coercive part is subject to no man under God The King of Poland hath a Crown but what is it At his Coronation it is conditioned with the People That if he shall not govern them according to such Rules they shall be freed from their Homage and Allegiance But the Crown of England is and always was an Imperial Crown and so sworn not subject to any Humane Tribunal or Judicature whatsoever God forbid I should intend any Absolute Government by this c. In like manner Mr. Deaâ— making all such Princes as the King of Poland not to be Proper Compleat and Imperial Soveraigns tells you what he means by an Imperial Soveraign viz One who is supream in his Dominions next under God who hath full perfect and entire Jurisdiction from God alone and all others in his Dominions by Emanation from him But though he asserts the Kings of this Realm to be true proper and Imperial Soveraigns yet he is as far as Mrâ— I. from asserting an Arbitrary and boundless Power in them For he at the same time declareth that to be Arbitrary is no way of the Essence of an Imperial Soveraign and though after Sir Edw. Cook he cites the Titles of Edgar and Edward it is not to prove that the Saxon Kings were Arbitrary and Absolute but to shew that they were Compleat Unconditional and Independent Soveraigns the Natural Consequence of which is that they are unaccountable free from Coercion of force and not to be resisted Therefore Mr. I. needed not to have taken all that pains he hath done p. 183. to prove it Nonsence to say that Boundless Power may be limited in the Exercise His Adversary saith nothing like it But only asserts that a King under the Direction of Laws may nevertheless be a properâ— Compleat and Imperial Soveraign And his Illustration of the matter by the similitude of a Fountain is clear and apposite and what nobody but Mr. I. will deride The Essence of Soveraign Power is not destroyed or changed by this limitation it receives from Concessions and Civil Contracts though the extent of it may be somewhat lessened It is still Supream Unconditional and Independent and the Prince who enjoys it though he be bound in Conscience to govern according to such Laws and Compacts yet may not be call'd to an account or punish'd by any save God his only Superiour for violating those Laws and transgressing the Legal Bounds of his Power His Answer to Mr. Dean's other Illustration of the Point viz. That being confin'd in the Exercise doth not destroy the Perfection of Soveraign Power because then the Power of God himself could not be Soveraign c. is not at all satisfactory I confess what he saith would be pertinent and considerable if God were confin'd only from such things as are evil in themselves and therefore inconsistent with the Perfection of the Divine Nature But we all know that the free Counsels of his own Will have set such bounds to the Exercise of his Almighty Power as render many things neither impossible in themselves nor yet repugnant either to the Wisdom Holiness or Goodness of God impossible for him to do For Example No Man will presume to deny That God if he had so pleas'd might have left faln Man to have perished without a Saviour and that without the least impeachment of his Wisdom Justice or Goodness And yet God having determined and declared that he will save all that believe in Jesus Christ it is impossible for him to suffer all Mankind to perish If Mr. I. please to consult the old Schoolman whom Fortescue cites as the Authour de Regimine Principum He will find a Distinction of God's Power into Absolute Power by which God can do every thing which implies no contradiction in it self or imperfection in him and Ordinate Power by which he can do nothing but what is agreeable to the Counsels of his own wâ—â—l This distinction plainly shews that being limited in things implying neither Contradiction in themselves nor defect in God is no impeachment of the Truth or perfection of God's Soveraignty and therefore being limited by Rules of Government doth not destroy the Essence of Humane Soveraign Authority Princes cease not to be Supream in their Dominions by reason of their Concessions and submitting their Government to the Regulation of Political Lawsâ— even as God ceaseth not to be the Supream Governour of the Worldâ— by reason of his Gracious Purposes and Promises reveal'd in Holy Scripture though â—t be impossible for him to act any way contrary to those Declarations The twelfth Chapter of Iovian wherein the Authour shews what security Subjects have of their Lives Properties and Religion under a Popish Prince notwithstanding the Doctrine of Non-Resistance is a rational grave and pious Discourse and deserves to be consider'd after another fashion than Mr. I. hath done He was pleas'd to droll it off but whosoever shall with sobriety and a mind void of prejudice weigh what hath been said on both sides will find a better sort of reasoning a better Spirit and a deeper sense of Religion in Iovian's Discourse than appears in this Answer It is certain that an Absolute Security against Rebellion on the one hand or against Arbitrary Government and Oppression on the other neither Prince nor People must expect For this cannot be had till either the People be so effectually inslav'd as to render them as little able to serve and assist their Prince as they are to disturb and dethrone him or till the Prince hath so little Power left him that he will be equally unable either to protect or oppress his Subjects And in such a state both King and People will be in a most desperate condition So that whether the one or other compass their ends for the present and obtain that absolute security which they affected they will enjoy it but a little while for both will inevitably hereby become the Subjects of Foreign Tyranny and Oppression A Moral security therefore must â—erve the turn and both Prince and People must acquiesce therein and trust each other with such a measure of Power as if abused may be of very ill consequence But vain and unreasonable Fears on either part must not be regarded or provided against If what he saith be not satisfactory to some of Mr. I's Friends we are the less to wonder seeing some of them profess to think that God hath not given so satisfactory an assurance of his own Being and Providence and of the Truth and Authority of the Holy Scriptures of the last Judgment and a future State of Rewards and Punishments as they expect All Men confess that the measures of the Jesuits who during the last Reign had too great an Influence on Publick Affairs are utterly unaccountable And the Credit that Order had with King Iames carried him to Undertakings as contrary to his own Interest as to those of the Nation and by consequence a