general, or else of force against the prince's own person: Whereas I think, the case, which sticks most on the conscience at this time, is this latter Of opposing misleading and misemployed subjects, which he speaks very little to. Nay, he seems to me, after all his disclaiming of resistance, to come home to us, and, though sparingly, yet to assent to the lawfulness of resistance in this point. For Sect. ii. speaking of David's guard of armed men: He says, it was to secure his person against the cut-throats of Saul, if sent to take away his life: He means to secure it by force, for soldiers are for force: He means no negative securing by flight, for that may be done even against Saul himself: But he speaks of such a securing which might only be against cut-throats. So then he grants secur. ing by force against these: But they went on Saul's command, and mostly with his presence. Again, in the instance of Elisha, he seems to acknowledge the lawfulness of personal defence against the sudden and illegal assaults of messengers; he means by force, for he speaks of such which he will not allow in publick, which can be understood of none, but by force: But it appears the Doctor, in his whole discourse, hath avoided this point of resistance of misemployed subjects; which yet is the alone point which would have given satisfaction: For, before it appears, we agree in all the rest, and in this too for aught I know, he having not distinctly said any thing against it.

SECT. III.

Whether resistance of instruments of will be lawful.

Now, concerning this case of forcible resistance of inferior per. sons misemployed to serve the illegal, destructive commands of the prince, I will do two things. 1. I will maintain my assertion by convincing arguments. 2. I will shew the invalidity of what is said against it.

This, then, is my assertion. The two estates in parliament may lawfully, by force of arms, resist any persons, or number of persons, advising or assisting the king in the performance of a command illegal and destructive to themselves or the publick.

First, Because that force is lawful to be used for the publick conservation, which is no resistance of the ordinance of God, for that is the reason condemning the resistance of the powers. Now, this is no resistance of God's ordinance; for, by it, neither the person of the sovereign is resisted, nor his power; not his person, for we speak of agents employed, not of his own person, nor his power, for the measure of that, in our government, is acknowledged to be the law. And therefore he cannot confer authority beyond law; so that those agents, deriving no authority from him, are mere instruments of his will, unauthorised persons, in their assaults robbers, and, as Dr. Fern calls them, cut-throats. If the case be put, What if the sovereign himself, in person, be present with such assailants, joining his personal assistance in the execution of his commands? It is much to be lamented, that the will of the prince should be so impetuous in

much testimony: Thus it is apparent, that the denial of this power any subverting act, as to hazard his own person in the prosecution of it: Yet, supposing such a case, all counsels and courses must be taken, that no violence be offered to his person, and profession of none intended: But no reason the presence of his person should privilege ruining instruments from suppression, and give them an im punity to spoil and destroy subjects, better than themselves. His person being secured from wrong, his power cannot be violated in such an act, in which none of it can be conferred on the agents. And sure David, though he avoided laying hands, or using any violence against the person of Saul, and on no extremity would have done it; yet, for the cut-throats about him, if no other means would have secured him, he would have rescued himself by force from their outrage, though Saul was in their company, else what intended he by all that force of soldiers, and his enquiry of God at Keilah? By which it is plain he had an intent to have kept the place by force, if the people would have stuck to him: Neither is it to the purpose which the Dr. says, Sect. ii. That his example was extraordinary, because he was anointed, and designed to succeed Saul, for that, being but a designation, did not exempt him from the duty of subjection, for the present, or lessen it, as is plain by the great conscience he made of not touching Saul. But he knew it was one thing to violate Saul's person and power, and another to resist those instruments of tyranny, the cut-throats which were about him.

Secondly, Because, without such power of resistance in the hands of subjects, all distinction and limitation of government is vain, and all forms resolve into absolute and arbitrary; for that is so which is unlimited; and that is unlimited not only which hath no limits set, but also which hath no sufficient limits; for to be restrained from doing what I will, by a power which can restrain me no longer, nor otherwise than I will, is all one, as if I were left at my own will. I take this to be clear: Now, it is as clear, that, unless this forcible resistance of instruments of usurped power be lawful, no sufficient limits can be to the Prince's will, and all laws bounding him are to no purpose. This appears by enumerating the other means, prayer to God, petition to the prince, denial of obedience, denial of sub sidy, a moderate use of the power of denying, as Dr. Fern calls it. These are all; but what are these to hinder, if a prince be minded to overthrow all, and bring the whole government to his own will? For prayer and petition, these are put in to fill up the number: They are no limitations; they may be used in the most absolute monarchy. For denial of obedience, that may keep me from being an instrument of publick servitude; but princes wills never want them which will yield obedience, if I deny it; yea, enough to destroy all the rest, if nothing be left them but to suffer. Then for denial of subsidy, if he may, by thousands of instruments, take all, or what he or they please, and I must not resist: What need he care whether the people deny or grant, if a prince be taught that he may do it? Cases and reasons will soon be brought to persuade him, that in them he may lawfully do it, as late experiences have given us too

of resistance of instruments overthrows and makes invalid all govern. ment, but that which is absolute, and reduces the whole world de jure to an absolute subjection, that is, servitude; for the end of all constitution of moderated forms is not, that the supreme power might not lawfully exorbitate, but that it might have no power to exorbitate.

The doctor is conscious hereof, and therefore tells us, in his Sect. v. This is the very reason which is made for the Pope's power of curb. ing and deposing kings in case of heresy, because else the church, says the Papist, hath no means for the maintenance of the catholick faith, and its own safety. But who sees not the vast difference be twixt these two? And that the same reason may be concluding here, which is apparently non-concluding there. For, 1. they thereby would draw to the Pope an authoritative power, we no such su perior power, but only a power of resistance for self-conservation, which nature and the law of reason gives to every one, and may stand with the condition of subjection and inferiority. 2. They, on this reason, give the Pope a power over the very person of the king, we only of resisting of unauthorised, invading destroyers, coming under the colour of an authority which is not in the sovereign to be derived. 3. They prove a civil right for spiritual reasons, we only for civil reasons. 4. The church and the faith are constituted in their very formal being from Christ himself, who is the head and great shepherd immediately in his own person; and, as it is his own family, so he keeps the power of preserving it in his own hands, having made direct and particular promises to assure us of their upholding against all subversion by his own power; so that here is assurance enough without visible means of force for a spiritual body, which lives by faith. But in a civil state there is no such assurance, nor supporting promises, power only, in the undefined being of it, being God's immediate ordinance, and not in this spe cificated or determinate being; wherefore it hath no such immediate provision made for its preservation, no promise of a divine power for its standing: But as it is left by God to men's wisdom to contrive the frame, so to their providence to establish means of preservation. As the body is outward and civil, so the upholding means must be such, spiritually and infallibly assuring a formed state hath not, as 'the church and faith have; if there be none of outward force and power neither, then none at all it hath, and is in ill case indeed. But there is an art full of venom, when a truth cannot be beaten down by just reasoning, then to make it odious by hateful com. parisons; so in this case aspersions are cast, as if the patrons of resistance did borrow the Popish and jesuitical grounds, and their po. sitions as dangerous to kings, as the Jesuits hell-bred and bloody principles: Whereas it appears, by all this discourse, and I am per. suaded is written in capital letters in the very consciences of them which despightfully object it, that there is no congruity at all betwixt their doctrines, no more than betwixt light and darkness.

Thirdly, Because such power is due to a publick_state for its preservation, as is due to a particular person.

But every

particular person may lawfully, by force, resist illegal destructive ministers, though sent by the command of a legal sovereign, provided no other means of self-preservation be enough. This assumption the doctor seems to grant; he denies it to be lawful against the person of the prince, but, in effect, yields it against subordinate persons. But the main is against the proposition; and the doctor is so heavy a friend to the state, that he thinks it not fit to allow it that liberty he gives every private man. But, whose judgment will concur with his herein, I cannot imagine; for sure the reason is greater, the publick safety being far more precious and able to satisfy the damages of a publick resistance, than one particular man's is of a private. But of this more in answer to his reasons.

Fourthly, Because it is a power put into the two estates by the very reason of their institution; and therefore they not only may, but also ought to use it for publick safety; yea, they should betray the very trust reposed in them, by the fundamentals of the kingdom, if they should not. An authority legislative they have: Now to make laws, and to preserve laws, are acts of the same power; yea,' if three powers jointly have interest in making of laws, surely either of these severally have, and ought to use that power in preserving them: Also, that the authority which the houses have is as well given them for preserving the government by established laws, as for establishment of laws to govern by, is a truth proved by the constant use of their power to that end, in correcting the exorbitance of inferior courts, and questioning delinquent judges and officers of state for violations; and much is done in this kind by the sole authority of the houses, without the concurrence or expectance of royal power: So then, supposing they have such an authority for safety of publick government, to question or censure inferior officers for transgressions, though pretending the king's authority, can it be denied but that their authority will bear them out to use forcible resistance against such, be they more or fewer?

This

Fifthly, The king's warrant, under his hand, exempts not a male. factor from the censure of a court of justice, nor punishment im. posed by law, but the judge must proceed against him according to law; for the law is the king's publick and authoritative will; but a private warrant to do an unlawful act, is his private and unauthoritative will; wherefore the judge ought to take no notice of such warrant, but to deal with the offender as no other than a private man. proves that such instruments, thus illegally warranted, are not authorised, and therefore their violence may be, by force, resisted, as the assaults of private men, by any; and then much rather by the houses of parliament; which, supposing them divided from the king to have no complete authority, yet, sure they have two parts of the greatest legislative authority. But I fear I shall seem superfluous, in producing arguments to prove so clear a truth. Is it credible that any one will maintain so abject an esteem of their authority, that it will not extend to resistance of private men, who should endeavour the subversion of the whole frame of government, on no other war. rant than the king's will and pleasure? Must they be merely pas

sive? Is patience, and the denial of their votes to a subversion, all the opposition they must use, if a king (which God forbid) should, on his royal pleasure, send cut-throats to destroy them as they sit in their houses? Is all their authority (if the king desert them or worse) no more than to petition, and suffer; and, by a moderate use of their power of denying, dissent from being willing to be destroyed? If the power of resisting by force subverters armed by the king's will (for by his authority they cannot) be unlawful for them, all these absurdities must follow: Yea, the vilest instrument of oppression, shewing but a warrant from the king to bear him out, may range and rage all his days through a kingdom, to waste and spoil, tax and distrain, and at the utmost of his insolence, must have no more done to him by the parliament itself, than to stay his hand, as the basest servant may his master's, or the meanest subject the king's own hand, by the doctor's own confession. Consider then, and admire, if any man of learning will deny this power of forcible resistance of mi nisters, of subverting commands to be lawful. I have, thus far, con firmed my assertion, not that I find any openly opposing it, but because the doctor and some others seem to have a mind that way, and do strike at it, though not professedly and in open dispute.

For the several proofs brought in behalf of resistance, some of them prove as much as is here asserted; others are not to the pur. pose: Particularly, that of the people's rescuing Jonathan from his father's bloody resolution, proves the lawfulness of hindering un. reasonable self-destructive purposes, even in absolute monarchies, if it prove any thing. That of Uzzah's thrusting out by the priests, is not to the purpose; but David's raising and keeping forces about him, and his purpose at Keilah, proves the point directly, viz. lawful. ness of forcible resistance of cut-throats, even though Saul himself were in presence: This the doctor sees plainly,and therefore shuffles it off, by saying, his example is extraordinary; as if he were not a present subject, because he was designed by God's revealed counsel to be a future king. And he confesses Elisha's example, of shutting the door against the king's messenger, proves personal defence against sudden illegal assaults of messengers, which is the thing in question, SECT. IV.

Arguments on the contrary dissolved.

LIT us now view the strength of what is said against resistance, whether any thing comes home against this assertion. The doctor's proofs from the Old Testament come not to the matter: Moses, and afterwards the kings, were of God's particular designation, setting them absolutely over the people, on no condition or limitation; so that, did they prove any thing, yet they concern not us, respecting a government of another nature: But particularly, that of Corah, and the princes, rebelling against Moses, is not to the matter; it was a resistance of Moses's own person and office; and, doubtless, penury of other proofs caused this, and the rest here, to be alledged: For that, 1 Sam, viii, 18, how inconsequent is it to say, the people