Treatise of Civil Policy, Treatise · Question 15
QUEST. XV. Whether or no the King be Ʋnivocally, or only Analogically, and by proportion a father?
IT is true, Ariſtotle Polit. l. 3. c. 11. ſaith, That the Kingly powerIoan. Roffenſ. de potest. pap…. l. 2. c. 5. Adam ſuppoſe he had lived till now ſhould not have bin King of the whole earth becauſe … father. is a fatherly power; and Iuſtin. Novell 12. c. 2. Pater quamvis legum contemptor, quamvis impius ſit, tamen pater eſt. But I doe not beleeve that, as Royaliſts ſay, that the Kingly power is eſſentially and univocally that ſame with a paternall or fatherly power; or that Adam as a father, was as a father and King, and that ſuppoſe Adam ſhould live in Noahs daies, that by divine inſtitution and without conſent of the Kingdomes and communities on earth, Adam hoc ipſo, and for no other reaſon but becauſe he was a father, ſhould alſo be the univerſall King, and Monarch of the whole world; or ſuppoſe Adam were living to this day; that all Kings that hath been ſince, and now are, held their Crownes of him, and had no more Kingly power then inferiour Iudges in Scotland have under our ſoveraigne King Charles, for ſo all that hath been, and now are lawfull Kings ſhould be unjuſt uſurpers; for if fatherly power be the firſt and native power of commanding, it is againſt nature that a Monarch who is not my father by generation, ſhould take that power from me, and be a King over both me and my children.
But I aſſert, that though the Word warrant us to eſteem Kings King a father Metaphorically only.fathers, Eſa. 49. 23. Jud. 5. 7. Gen. 20. v. 2. yet are not they eſſentially and formally fathers by generation, Num. c. 11. v. 12. Have I conceived all this people? have I begotten them? and yet are they but fathers metaphorically; 1. By office, becauſe they ſhould care for them as fathers doe for children, and ſo come under the name of fathers in the fifth Commandement; and therefore rigorous and cruell Rulers are Leopards and Lyons, and Wolves, Ezech. 22. 27. Zeph. 3. 3. If then tyrannous Judges be not eſſentially and formally Leopards and Lyons, but only metaphorically, neither can Kings be formally fathers. 2. Not only Kings, but all Iudges are fathers in defending their ſubjects from violence and the ſword, and fighting the Lords battells for them, and counſelling them. If therefore Royaliſts argue rightly, A King is eſſentially a father, and, fatherly power and royall power are of the ſame eſſence and nature; As therefore he who is once a father, is ever a father, and his children cannot take up armes againſt him to reſiſt him, for that is unnaturall, & repugnant to the 5. Commandement: So he who is once a King, is evermore a King, and it is repugnant to the fifth Commandement to reſiſt him with armes. It is anſwered, that the Argument preſuppoſeth that Royall power, and Fatherly power is one and the ſame in nature, whereas they differ in nature, and are only one by analogie and proportion: for ſo Paſtors of the Word are called fathers, 1 Cor. 4. 15. it will not follow, that once a Paſtor, evermore a Paſtor; and that if therefore Paſtors turne wolves, and by hereticall doctrine corrupt the flock, they cannot be caſt out of the Church. 3. A father, as a father, hathA fatherly power and a politike power are not one and the fame. not power of life and death over his ſonnes, becauſe, Rom. 13. by divine inſtitution the ſword is given by God to Kings and Iudges: and if Adam had had any ſuch power to kill his ſonne Cain, for the killing of his brother Abel, it had been given to him by God as a power politike, different from a fatherly power: for a fatherly power, as ſuch, is formally to conſerve the life of the childaen, and not to take away the life: yea, and Adam, though he had never ſinned, nor any of his poſteritie, Adam ſhould have been a perfect father, as he is now indued with all fatherly power that any father now hath; yea ſhould not God have given the ſword or power of puniſhing ill doers, ſince that power ſhould have been in vaine, if there had been no violence, nor bloodſhed, or ſinne on the earth: for the power of the ſword and of lawfull warre, is given to men now in the ſtate of ſinne. 4. Fatherly government and power is from the boſome and marrow of that fountaine law of nature; but Royall power is not from the law of nature, more then Ariſtocraticall or Democraticall power. D. Ferne ſaith, Monarchie is not jure divino, (I am notD. Ferne, par. 1. ſect. 3. pag. 8. of his mind) nor yet from the law of Nature, but, ductu naturae, by the guidance of nature. Sure it is from a ſupervenient commandement of God, added to the firſt law of nature, eſtabliſhing Fatherly power. 5. Children having their life and firſt breathings of nature from their parents, muſt be in a more intire relation from their father, then from their Prince: Subjects have not their Being naturall, but their civill, politique and peaceable well-being from their Prince. 6. A father is a father by generation, and giving the being of nature to children, and is a naturall head and root, without the free conſent and ſuffrages of his children, and is eſſentially a father to one childe, as Adam was to one Cain: but a Prince is a Prince by the free ſuffrages of a community, and cannot be a King to one only, and he is the politique head of a civill Corporation. 7. A father, ſo long as his children liveth can never leave off to be a father, though he were mad, and ſurious, though he be the moſt wicked man on earth. Qui genuit filium non poteſt non genuiſſe filium, what is once paſt cannot by any power be not paſſed, a father is a father for ever. But by confeſſion of Royaliſts, as Barclay, Hug. Grotius, and Arniſaeus and others grant, if a King ſell his ſubjects by ſea or land to other nations, if he turne a furious Nero, he may be dethroned, and the power that created the King under ſuch expreſſe conditions, as if the King violate them by his owne conſent, he ſhall be put from the Throne, may ceaſe to be a King, and if a ſtronger King conquer a King and his ſubjects, Royaliſts …ay the conquerour is a lawfull King; and ſo the conquered King muſt alſo lawfully come downe from his Throne, and turne a lawfull captive ſitting in the duſt. 8. Learned Polititians, as Bartholomeus Romulus, Defenſ. part. 1. num. 153. Ioannes de Anania in c. fin. de his qui fil. occid. teach that the father is not obliged to reveale the conſpiracy of his ſon againſt his Prince, nor is he more to accuſe his ſon, then to accuſe himſelfe; becauſe the father loveth the ſonne better then himſelfe. D. Liſti quidem. Sect. Fin. quod. met. cauſ. & D. L. fin. c. de cura furioſi, and certainly a father had rather dye in his own perſon as chooſe to dye in his ſonnes, in whom he affecteth a ſort of immortality, In ſpecie, quando non poteſt in individuo: but a King doth not love his ſubjects with a naturall or fatherly love thus; and if the affections differ, the power which ſecondeth the affection, for the conſervation either of being, or well being, muſt alſo differ proportionally.
The P. Prelate objecteth againſt us thus, ſtealing word by word Sacr. ſanct. Reg. Maieſt. c. 7. pag. 87. Arniſaeus de poteſt. princip. c. 3. u. 1. 2.from Arniſaeus: When a King is elected Soveraigne to a multitude, he is ſurrogated in the place of a common father, Exod. 20. 5. Honour thy father; then as a naturall father receiveth not Paternall right, power, or authority from his ſonnes, but hath this from God, and the ordinance of nature, nor can the King have his right from the community. 2. The maxime of the Law is, Surrogatus gaudet privilegiis ejus cui ſurrogatur, & qui ſuccedit …n locum, ſuccedit in jus. The perſon ſurrogated, hath all the Priviledges that he hath, in whoſe place he ſucceedeth, he who ſucceedeth to the place, ſucceedeth to the right; the adopted ſonne, or the baſtard who is legittimated, and commeth in the place of the lawfull borne ſonne, commeth alſo in the priviledges of the lawfull borne ſonne; a Prince elected commeth to the full poſſesſion of the Majeſty of a naturall Prince and Father, for Modu… acquirendi non tollit naturale jus poſſidendi (ſaith Arniſaeus, more fully then the poore Plagiarius) the manner of acquiring any thing taketh not away the naturall poſſesſion, for how ever things be acquired, if the title be juſt, poſſesſion is the Law of Nations; then when the King is choſen in place of the father, as the father hath a divine right by nature, ſo muſt the King have that ſame: and ſeeing the right proprietor (ſaith the Pamphleting Prelate) had his right by God, by nature, how can it be, but howſoever the deſignation of the perſon is from the diſordered community, yet the collation of the power is from God immediatly, and from his ſacred and inviolable ordinance. And what can be ſaid againſt the way by which any one elected obtained his right, for ſeeing God doth not now ſend Samuells or Eliſha's to anoynt or declare Kings, we are in his ordinary providence to conceive the deſignation of the perſon is the manifeſtation of Gods Will, called Voluntas ſigni, as the Schooles ſpeake, juſt ſo as when the Church deſigneth one to ſacred orders.
Anſ. 1. He that is ſurrogated in the place of another, due to him, by a poſitive Law of man, he hath Law to all the priviledges that he hath in whoſe place he is ſurrogated, that is true. He who is made Aſſignee to an Obligation for a ſumme of money, hath all the rights that the principall party to whom the Bond or Obligation was mad…, he who commeth in the place of a Major of a City, of a Captaine in an Army, of a Pilot in a ſhip, of a Pope, hath all the priviledges and Rights that his predeceſſors had by Law. Jus ſuccedit juri, perſona jure predita perſonae jure preditae. So the Law, ſo far as my reading can reach, who profeſſe my ſelfe a Divine; but that he who ſucceedeth to the place of a father, by nature, ſhould injoy all the naturall Rights and Priviledges of the perſon to whom he ſucceedeth; I beleeve the Law never dreamed it, for then the adopted ſonne comming in place of the naturall ſonne, hath right to the naturall affection of the father; if any ſhould adopt Maxwell the Prelate, ſhould he love him as the Purſevant of Craile, Maxwell his father loved him? I conceive not; hath the adopted ſonne his life, his being, the figure bodily, the manners of the ſonne in whoſe place he is adopted? or doth he naturally reſemble the father as the naturall ſonne doth? The Prelate did not read this Law in any approved Iuriſt, though he did ſteale the argument from Arniſaeus, and ſtole the citations of Homer and Ariſtotle out of him, with a little Metatheſis: A naturall ſonne is not made a ſonne by the conſent of Parents, but he is a ſonne by generation, ſo muſt the adopted ſonne be adoptedSee Ariſtotle ſaith the Prelate, Eth. 8. 10. pol. 1. c. Homer. Odyſ. 1. he might have ſaid, ſee Arniſaeus loe. tit. without the free conſent and grace of the father adopting: ſo here the King commeth in the place of a naturall father, but I conceive the Law ſaith not that the elected King is a King without conſent of the ſubjects, as the naturall father is a father without conſent of his ſonnes. 2. Nor is it a Law true, as once a father alwaies a father, ſo once an elected King, alwaies a King, though he ſell his ſubjects, being induced thereunto by wicked Counſellors. 3. If the King have no priviledges, but what the naturall father hath in whoſe place he commeth, then as the naturall father in a free Kingdome hath not power of life and death over his ſonnes, neither hath the King power of life and death over his ſubjects, this is no Law. 4. This maxime ſhould prove good, if the King were eſſentially a father, by generation and naturall propagation, but he is onelyonly a father Metaphorically, and by a borrowed ſpeech. A father non generando, ſed politicè alendo, tuendo, regendo, therefore an elected Prince commeth not in the full poſſeſſion of all the naturall power and rights of a naturall father. 2. The P. Prelate ſpeaketh diſgracefully of the Church of God, calling it a diſorderly community, as if he himſelfe were borne of Kings, where as God calleth the King their Shepheard, and the people, Gods flocke, inheritance and people; and they are not a diſorderly body by nature, but by ſin; in which ſenſe the Prelate may call King, Prieſt and people, a company of Heires of Gods wrath, except he be an Arminian ſtill, as once he was. 3. If we are in ordinary providence now, becauſe we have not Samuels, and Prophets to anoynt Kings, to hold the deſignation of a perſon to be King, to be the manifeſtation of Gods Will, called voluntas …igni, is Treaſon, for if Scotland and England ſhould deſigne Maxwell in the place of King Charles our native Soveraigne (an odious compariſon) Maxwell ſhould be lawfull King for what is done by Gods Will, called by our Divines (they have it not from Schoolemen, as the Prelate ignorantly ſaith) his ſignified will which is our rule, is done lawfully, there can be no greater treaſon put in print then this.