CHAP. XIX.

Of the Dissolution of Government.

Sec. 211. HE that will with any clearness speak of the
dissolution of government, ought in the first place to
distinguish between the dissolution of the society and the
dissolution of the government. That which makes the community,
and brings men out of the loose state of nature, into one politic
society, is the agreement which every one has with the rest to
incorporate, and act as one body, and so be one distinct common-
wealth. The usual, and almost only way whereby this union is
dissolved, is the inroad of foreign force mak-
ing a conquest upon them: for in that case, (not being able to
maintain and support themselves, as one entire and independent
body) the union belonging to that body which consisted therein,
must necessarily cease, and so every one return to the state he
was in before, with a liberty to shift for himself, and provide
for his own safety, as he thinks fit, in some other society.
Whenever the society is dissolved, it is certain the government
of that society cannot remain. Thus conquerors swords often cut
up governments by the roots, and mangle societies to pieces,
separating the subdued or scattered multitude from the protection
of, and dependence on, that society which ought to have preserved
them from violence. The world is too well instructed in, and too
forward to allow of, this way of dissolving of governments, to
need any more to be said of it; and there wants not much argument
to prove, that where the society is dissolved, the government
cannot remain; that being as impossible, as for the frame of an
house to subsist when the materials of it are scattered and
dissipated by a whirl-wind, or jumbled into a confused heap by an
earthquake.
Sec. 212. Besides this over-turning from without,
governments are dissolved from within,
First, When the legislative is altered. Civil society being
a state of peace, amongst those who are of it, from whom the
state of war is excluded by the umpirage, which they have
provided in their legislative, for the ending all differences
that may arise amongst any of them, it is in their legislative,
that the members of a commonwealth are united, and combined
together into one coherent living body. This is the soul that
gives form, life, and unity, to the common-wealth: from hence the
several members have their mutual influence, sympathy, and
connexion: and therefore, when the legislative is broken, or
dissolved, dissolution and death follows: for the essence and
union of the society consisting in having one will, the
legislative, when once established by the majority, has the
declaring, and as it were keeping of that will. The constitution
of the legislative is the first and fundamental act of society,
whereby provision is made for the continuation of their union,
under the direction of persons, and bonds of laws, made by
persons authorized thereunto, by the consent and appointment of
the people, without which no one man, or number of men, amongst
them, can have authority of making laws that shall be binding to
the rest. When any one, or more, shall take upon them to make
laws, whom the people have not appointed so to do, they make laws
without authority, which the people are not therefore bound to
obey; by which means they come again to be out of subjection, and
may constitute to themselves a new legislative, as they think
best, being in full liberty to resist the force of those, who
without authority would impose any thing upon them. Every one is
at the disposure of his own will, when those who had, by the
delegation of the society, the declaring of the public will, are
excluded from it, and others usurp the place, who have no such
authority or delegation.
Sec. 213. This being usually brought about by such in the
commonwealth who misuse the power they have; it is hard to
consider it aright, and know at whose door to lay it, without
knowing the form of government in which it happens. Let us
suppose then the legislative placed in the concurrence of three
distinct persons.
1. A single hereditary person, having the constant,
supreme, executive power, and with it the power of convoking and
dissolving the other two within certain periods of time.
2. An assembly of hereditary nobility.
3. An assembly of representatives chosen, pro tempore, by
the people. Such a form of government supposed, it is evident,
Sec. 214. First, That when such a single person, or prince,
sets up his own arbitrary will in place of the laws, which are
the will of the society, declared by the legislative, then the
legislative is changed: for that being in effect the legislative,
whose rules and laws are put in execution, and required to be
obeyed; when other laws are set up, and other rules pretended,
and inforced, than what the legislative, constituted by the
society, have enacted, it is plain that the legislative is
changed. Whoever introduces new laws, not being thereunto
authorized by the fundamental appointment of the society, or
subverts the old, disowns and overturns the power by which they
were made, and so sets up a new legislative.
Sec. 215. Secondly, When the prince hinders the legislative
from assembling in its due time, or from acting freely, pursuant
to those ends for which it was constituted, the legislative is
altered: for it is not a certain number of men, no, nor their
meeting, unless they have also freedom of debating, and leisure
of perfecting, what is for the good of the society, wherein the
legislative consists: when these are taken away or altered, so as
to deprive the society of the due exercise of their power, the
legislative is truly altered; for it is not names that constitute
governments, but the use and exercise of those powers that were
intended to accompany them; so that he, who takes away the
freedom, or hinders the acting of the legislative in its due
seasons, in effect takes away the legislative, and puts an end to
the government,
Sec. 216. Thirdly, When, by the arbitrary power of the
prince, the electors, or ways of election, are altered, without
the consent, and contrary to the common interest of the people,
there also the legislative is altered: for, if others than those
whom the society hath authorized thereunto, do chuse, or in
another way than what the society hath prescribed, those chosen
are not the legislative appointed by the people.
Sec. 217. Fourthly, The delivery also of the people into
the subjection of a foreign power, either by the prince, or by
the legislative, is certainly a change of the legislative, and so
a dissolution of the government: for the end why people entered
into society being to be preserved one intire, free, independent
society, to be governed by its own laws; this is lost, whenever
they are given up into the power of another.
Sec. 218. Why, in such a constitution as this, the
dissolution of the government in these cases is to be imputed to
the prince, is evident; because he, having the force, treasure
and offices of the state to employ, and often persuading himself,
or being flattered by others, that as supreme magistrate he is
uncapable of controul; he alone is in a condition to make great
advances toward such changes, under pretence of lawful authority,
and has it in his hands to terrify or suppress opposers, as
factious, seditious, and enemies to the government: whereas no
other part of the legislative, or people, is capable by
themselves to attempt any alteration of the legislative, without
open and visible rebellion, apt enough to be taken notice of,
which, when it prevails, produces effects very little different
from foreign conquest. Besides, the prince in such a form of
government, having the power of dissolving the other parts of the
legislative, and thereby rendering them private persons, they can
never in opposition to him, or without his concurrence, alter the
legislative by a law, his conse power, neglects and abandons that charge, so that the
laws already made can no longer be put in execution. This is
demonstratively to reduce all to anarchy, and so effectually to
dissolve the government: for laws not being made for themselves,
but to be, by their execution, the bonds of the society, to keep
every part of the body politic in its due place and function;
when that totally ceases, the government visibly ceases, and the
people become a confused multitude, without order or connexion.
Where there is no longer the administration of justice, for the
securing of men's rights, nor any remaining power within the
community to direct the force, or provide for the necessities of
the public, there certainly is no government left. Where the
laws cannot be executed, it is all one as if there were no laws;
and a government without laws is, I suppose, a mystery in
politics, unconceivable to human capacity, and inconsistent with
human society.
Sec. 220. In these and the like cases, when the government
is dissolved, the people are at liberty to provide for
themselves, by erecting a new legislative, differing from the
other, by the change of persons, or form, or both, as they shall
find it most for their safety and good: for the society can
never, by the fault of another, lose the native and original
right it has to preserve itself, which can only be done by a
settled legislative, and a fair and impartial execution of the
laws made by it. But the state of mankind is not so miserable
that they are not capable of using this remedy, till it be too
late to look for any. To tell people they may provide for
themselves, by erecting a new legislative, when by oppression,
artifice, or being delivered over to a foreign power, their old
one is gone, is only to tell them, they may expect relief when it
is too late, and the evil is past cure. This is in effect no
more than to bid them first be slaves, and then to take care of
their liberty; and when their chains are on, tell them, they may
act like freemen. This, if barely so, is rather mockery than
relief; and men can never be secure from tyranny, if there be no
means to escape it till they are perfectly under it: and
therefore it is, that they have not only a right to get out of
it, but to prevent it.
Sec. 221. There is therefore, secondly, another way whereby
governments are dissolved, and that is, when the legislative, or
the prince, either of them, act contrary to their trust.
First, The legislative acts against the trust reposed in them,
when they endeavour to invade the property of the subject, and to
make themselves, or any part of the community, masters, or
arbitrary disposers of the lives, liberties, or fortunes of the
people.
Sec. 222. The reason why men enter into society, is the
preservation of their property; and the end why they chuse and
authorize a legislative, is, that there may be laws made, and
rules set, as guards and fences to the properties of all the
members of the society, to limit the power, and moderate the
dominion, of every part and member of the society: for since it
can never be supposed to be the will of the society, that the
legislative should have a power to destroy that which every one
designs to secure, by entering into society, and for which the
people submitted themselves to legislators of their own making;
whenever the legislators endeavour to take away, and destroy the
property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under
arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the
people, who are thereupon absolved from any farther obedience,
and are left to the common refuge, which God hath provided for
all men, against force and violence. Whensoever therefore the
legislative shall transgress this fundamental rule of society;
and either by ambition, fear, folly or corruption, endeavour to
grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other, an absolute
power over the lives, liberties, and estates of the people; by
this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put
into their hands for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the
people, who. have a right to resume their original liberty, and,
by the establishment of a new legislative, (such as they shall
think fit) provide for their own safety and security, which is
the end for which they are in society. What I have said here,
concerning the legislative in general, holds true also concerning
the supreme executor, who having a double trust put in him, both
to have a part in the legislative, and the supreme execution of
the law, acts against both, when he goes about to set up his own
arbitrary will as the law of the society. He acts also contrary
to his trust, when he either employs the force, treasure, and
offices of the society, to corrupt the representatives, and gain
them to his purposes; or openly preengages the electors, and
prescribes to their choice, such, whom he has, by sollicitations,
threats, promises, or otherwise, won to his designs; and employs
them to bring in such, who have promised before-hand what to
vote, and what to enact. Thus to regulate candidates and
electors, and new-model the ways of election, what is it but to
cut up the government by the roots, and poison the very fountain
of public security? for the people having reserved to themselves
the choice of their representatives, as the fence to their
properties, could do it for no other end, but that they might
always be freely chosen, and so chosen, freely act, and advise,
as the necessity of the common-wealth, and the public good
should, upon examination, and mature debate, be judged to
require. This, those who give their votes before they hear the
debate, and have weighed the reasons on all sides, are not
capable of doing. To prepare such an assembly as this, and
endeavour to set up the declared abettors of his own will, for
the true representatives of the people, and the law-makers of the
society, is certainly as great a breach of trust, and as perfect
a declaration of a design to subvert the government, as is
possible to be met with. To which, if one shall add rewards and
punishments visibly employed to the same end, and all the arts of
perverted law made use of, to take off and destroy all that stand
in the way of such a design, and will not comply and consent to
betray the liberties of their country, it will be past doubt what
is doing. What power they ought to have in the society, who thus
employ it contrary to the trust went along with it in its first
institution, is easy to determine; and one cannot but see, that
he, who has once attempted any such thing as this, cannot any
longer be trusted.
Sec. 223. To this perhaps it will be said, that the people
being ignorant, and always discontented, to lay the foundation of
government in the unsteady opinion and uncertain humour of the
people, is to expose it to certain ruin; and no government will
be able long to subsist, if the people may set up a new
legislative, whenever they take offence at the old one. To this
I answer, Quite the contrary. People are not so easily got out
of their old forms, as some are apt to suggest. They are hardly
to be prevailed with to amend the acknowledged faults in the
frame they have been accustomed to. And if there be any
original defects, or adventitious ones introduced by time, or
corruption; it is not an easy thing to get them changed, even
when all the world sees there is an opportunity for it. This
slowness and aversion in the people to quit their old
constitutions, has, in the many revolutions which have been seen
in this kingdom, in this and former ages, still kept us to, or,
after some interval of fruitless attempts, still brought us back
again to our old legislative of king, lords and commons: and
whatever provocations have made the crown be taken from some of
our princes heads, they never carried the people so far as to
place it in another line.
Sec. 224. But it will be said, this hypothesis lays a
ferment for frequent rebellion. To which I answer,
First, No more than any other hypothesis: for when the
people are made miserable, and find themselves exposed to the ill
usage of arbitrary power, cry up their governors, as much as you
will, for sons of Jupiter; let them be sacred and divine,
descended, or authorized from heaven; give them out for whom or
what you please, the same will happen. The people generally ill
treated, and contrary to right, will be ready upon any occasion
to ease themselves of a burden that sits heavy upon them. They
will wish, and seek for the opportunity, which in the change,
weakness and accidents of human affairs, seldom delays long to
offer itself. He must have lived but a little while in the
world, who has not seen examples of this in his time; and he must
have read very little, who cannot produce examples of it in all
sorts of governments in the world.
Sec. 225. Secondly, I answer, such revolutions happen not
upon every little mismanagement in public affairs. Great
mistakes in the ruling part, many wrong and inconvenient laws,
and all the slips of human frailty, will be born by the people
without mutiny or murmur. But if a long train of abuses,
prevarications and artifices, all tending the same way, make the
design visible to the people, and they cannot but feel what they
lie under, and see whither they are going; it is not to be
wondered, that they should then rouze themselves, and endeavour
to put the rule into such hands which may secure to them the ends
for which government was at first erected; and without which,
ancient names, and specious forms, are so far from being better,
that they are much worse, than the state of nature, or pure
anarchy; the inconveniencies being all as great and as near, but
the remedy farther off and more difficult.
Sec. 226. Thirdly, I answer, that this doctrine of a power
in the people of providing for their safety a-new, by a new
legislative, when their legislators have acted contrary to their
trust, by invading their property, is the best fence against
rebellion, and the probablest means to hinder it: for rebellion
being an opposition, not to persons, but authority, which is
founded only in the constitutions and laws of the government;
those, whoever they be, who by force break through, and by force
justify their violation of them, are truly and properly rebels:
for when men, by entering into society and civil-government, have
excluded force, and introduced laws for the preservation of
property, peace, and unity amongst themselves, those who set up
force again in opposition to the laws, do rebellare, that is,
bring back again the state of war, and are properly rebels: which
they who are in power, (by the pretence they have to authority,
the temptation of force they have in their hands, and the
flattery of those about them) being likeliest to do; the
properest way to prevent the evil, is to shew them the danger and
injustice of it, who are under the greatest temptation to run
into it.
Sec. 227. In both the fore-mentioned cases, when either the
legislative is changed, or the legislators act contrary to the
end for which they were constituted; those who are guilty are
guilty of rebellion: for if any one by force takes away the
established legislative of any society, and the laws by them
made, pursuant to their trust, he thereby takes away the
umpirage, which every one had consented to, for a peaceable
decision of all their controversies, and a bar to the state of
war amongst them. They, who remove, or change the legislative,
take away this decisive power, which no body can have, but by the
appointment and consent of the people; and so destroying the
authority which the people did, and no body else can set up, and
introducing a power which the people hath not authorized, they
actually introduce a state of war, which is that of force without
authority: and thus, by removing the legislative established by
the society, (in whose decisions the people acquiesced and
united, as to that of their own will) they untie the knot, and
expose the people a-new to the state of war, And if those, who by
force take away the legislative, are rebels, the legislators
themselves, as has been shewn, can be no less esteemed so; when
they, who were set up for the protection, and preservation of the
people, their liberties and properties, shall by force invade and
endeavour to take them away; and so they putting themselves into
a state of war with those who made them the protectors and
guardians of their peace, are properly, and with the greatest
aggravation, rebellantes, rebels.
Sec. 228. But if they, who say it lays a foundation for
rebellion, mean that it may occasion civil wars, or intestine
broils, to tell the people they are absolved from obedience when
illegal attempts are made upon their liberties or properties, and
may oppose the unlawful violence of those who were their
magistrates, when they invade their properties contrary to the
trust put in them; and that therefore this doctrine is not to be
allowed, being so destructive to the peace of the world: they may
as well say, upon the same ground, that honest men may not oppose
robbers or pirates, because this may occasion disorder or
bloodshed. If any mischief come in such cases, it is not to be
charged upon him who defends his own right, but on him that
invades his neighbours. If the innocent honest man must quietly
quit all he has, for peace sake, to him who will lay violent
hands upon it, I desire it may be considered, what a kind of
peace there will be in the world, which consists only in violence
and rapine; and which is to be maintained only for the benefit of
robbers and oppressors. VVho would not think it an admirable
peace betwix the mighty and the mean, when the lamb, without
resistance, yielded his throat to be torn by the imperious wolf?
Polyphemus's den gives us a perfect pattern of such a peace, and
such a government, wherein Ulysses and his companions had nothing
to do, but quietly to suffer themselves to be devoured. And no
doubt Ulysses, who was a prudent man, preached up passive
obedience, and exhorted them to a quiet submission, by
representing to them of what concernment peace was to mankind;
and by shewing the inconveniences might happen, if they should
offer to resist Polyphemus, who had now the power over them.
Sec. 229. The end of government is the good of mankind; and
which is best for mankind, that the people should be always
exposed to the boundless will of tyranny, or that the rulers
should be sometimes liable to be opposed, when they grow
exorbitant in the use of their power, and employ it for the
destruction, and not the preservation of the properties of their
people?
Sec. 230. Nor let any one say, that mischief can arise from
hence, as often as it shall please a busy head, or turbulent
spirit, to desire the alteration of the government. It is true,
such men may stir, whenever they please; but it will be only to
their own just ruin and perdition: for till the mischief be grown
general, and the ill designs of the rulers become visible, or
their attempts sensible to the greater part, the people, who are
more disposed to suffer than right themselves by resistance, are
not apt to stir. The examples of particular injustice, or
oppression of here and there an unfortunate man, moves them not.
But if they universally have a persuation, grounded upon manifest
evidence, that designs are carrying on against their liberties,
and the general course and tendency of things cannot but give
them strong suspicions of the evil intention of their governors,
who is to be blamed for it? Who can help it, if they, who might
avoid it, bring themselves into this suspicion? Are the people
to be blamed, if they have the sense of rational creatures, and
can think of things no otherwise than as they find and feel them?
And is it not rather their fault, who put things into such a
posture, that they would not have them thought to be as they are?
I grant, that the pride, ambition, and turbulency of private men
have sometimes caused great disorders in commonwealths, and
factions have been fatal to states and kingdoms. But whether the
mischief hath oftener begun in the peoples wantonness, and a
desire to cast off the lawful authority of their rulers, or in
the rulers insolence, and endeavours to get and exercise an
arbitrary power over their people; whether oppression, or
disobedience, gave the first rise to the disorder, I leave it to
impartial history to determine. This I am sure, whoever, either
ruler or subject, by force goes about to invade the rights of
either prince or people, and lays the foundation for overturning
the constitution and frame of any just government, is highly
guilty of the greatest crime, I think, a man is capable of, being
to answer for all those mischiefs of blood, rapine, and
desolation, which the breaking to pieces of governments bring on
a country. And he who does it, is justly to be esteemed the
common enemy and pest of mankind, and is to be treated
accordingly.
Sec. 231. That subjects or foreigners, attempting by
force on the properties of any people, may be resisted with
force, is agreed on all hands. But that magistrates, doing the
same thing, may be resisted, hath of late been denied: as if
those who had the greatest privileges and advantages by the law,
had thereby a power to break those laws, by which alone they were
set in a better place than their brethren: whereas their offence
is thereby the greater, both as being ungrateful for the greater
share they have by the law, and breaking also that trust, which
is put into their hands by their brethren.
Sec. 232. Whosoever uses force without right, as every
one does in society, who does it without law, puts himself into a
state of war with those against whom he so uses it; and in that
state all former ties are cancelled, all other rights cease, and
every one has a right to defend himself, and to resist the
aggressor. This is so evident, that Barclay himself, that great
assertor of the power and sacredness of kings, is forced to
confess, That it is lawful for the people, in some cases, to
resist their king; and that too in a chapter, wherein he pretends
to shew, that the divine law shuts up the people from all manner
of rebellion. Whereby it is evident, even by his own doctrine,
that, since they may in some cases resist, all resisting of
princes is not rebellion. His words are these. Quod siquis
dicat, Ergone populus tyrannicae crudelitati & furori jugulum
semper praebebit? Ergone multitude civitates suas fame, ferro, &
flamma vastari, seque, conjuges, & liberos fortunae ludibrio &
tyranni libidini exponi, inque omnia vitae pericula omnesque
miserias & molestias a rege deduci patientur? Num illis quod
omni animantium generi est a natura tributum, denegari debet, ut
sc. vim vi repellant, seseq; ab injuria, tueantur? Huic breviter
responsum sit, Populo universo negari defensionem, quae juris
naturalis est, neque ultionem quae praeter naturam est adversus
regem concedi debere. Quapropter si rex non in singulares
tantum personas aliquot privatum odium exerceat, sed corpus etiam
reipublicae, cujus ipse caput est, i.e. totum populum, vel
insignem aliquam ejus partem immani & intoleranda saevitia seu
tyrannide divexet; populo, quidem hoc casu resistendi ac tuendi
se ab injuria potestas competit, sed tuendi se tantum, non enim
in principem invadendi: & restituendae injuriae illatae, non
recedendi a debita reverentia propter acceptam injuriam.
Praesentem denique impetum propulsandi non vim praeteritam
ulciscenti jus habet. Horum enim alterum a natura est, ut vitam
scilicet corpusque tueamur. Alterum vero contra naturam, ut
inferior de superiori supplicium sumat. Quod itaque populus
malum, antequam factum sit, impedire potest, ne fiat, id postquam
factum est, in regem authorem sceleris vindicare non potest:
populus igitur hoc amplius quam privatus quispiam habet: quod
huic, vel ipsis adversariis judicibus, excepto Buchanano, nullum
nisi in patientia remedium superest. Cum ille si intolerabilis
tyrannus est (modicum enim ferre omnino debet) resistere cum
reverentia possit, Barclay contra Monarchom. 1. iii. c. 8.

In English thus:

Sec. 233. But if any one should ask, Must the people then
always lay themselves open to the cruelty and rage of tyranny?
Must they see their cities pillaged, and laid in ashes, their
wives and children exposed to the tyrant's lust and fury, and
themselves and families reduced by their king to ruin, and all
the miseries of want and oppression, and yet sit still? Must men
alone be debarred the common privilege of opposing force with
force, which nature allows so freely to all other creatures for
their preservation from injury? I answer: Self-defence is a part
of the law of nature; nor can it be denied the community, even
against the king himself: but to revenge themselves upon him,
must by no means be allowed them; it being not agreeable to that
law. Wherefore if the king shall shew an hatred, not only to
some particular persons, but sets himself against the body of the
common-wealth, whereof he is the head, and shall, with
intolerable ill usage, cruelly tyrannize over the u7hole, or a
considerable part of the people, in this case the people have a
right to resist and defend themselves from injury: but it must be
with this caution, that they only defend themselves, but do not
attack their prince: they may repair the damages received, but
must not for any provocation exceed the bounds of due reverence
and respect. They may repulse the present attempt, but must not
revenge past violences: for it is natural for us to defend life
and limb, but that an inferior should punish a superior, is
against nature. The mischief which is designed them, the people
may prevent before it be done; but when it is done, they must not
revenge it on the king, though author of the villany. This
therefore is the privilege of the people in general, above what
any private person hath; that particular men are allowed by our
adversaries themselves (Buchanan only excepted) to have no other
remedy but patience; but the body of the people may with respect
resist intolerable tyranny; for when it is but moderate, they
ought to endure it.
Sec. 234. Thus far that great advocate of monarchical power
allows of resistance.
Sec. 235. It is true, he has annexed two limitations to it,
to no purpose:
First, He says, it must be with reverence.
Secondly, It must be without retribution, or punishment; and
the reason he gives is, because an inferior cannot punish a
superior.
First, How to resist force without striking again, or how to
strike with reverence, will need some skill to make intelligible.
He that shall oppose an assault only with a shield to receive the
blows, or in any more respectful posture, without a sword in his
hand, to abate the confidence and force of the assailant, will
quickly be at an end of his resistance, and will find such a
defence serve only to draw on himself the worse usage. This is
as ridiculous a way of resisting, as juvenal thought it of
fighting; ubi tu pulsas, ego vapulo tantum. And the success of
the combat will be unavoidably the same he there describes it:

----- Libertas pauperis haec est:
Pulsatus rogat, & pugnis concisus, adorat,
Ut liceat paucis cum dentibus inde reverti.

This will always be the event of such an imaginary resistance,
where men may not strike again. He therefore who may resist,
must be allowed to strike. And then let our author, or any body

else, join a knock on the head, or a cut on the face, with as
much reverence and respect as he thinks fit. He that can
reconcile blows and reverence, may, for aught I know, desire for
his pains, a civil, respectful cudgeling where-ever he can meet
with it.
Secondly, As to his second, An inferior cannot punish a
superior; that is true, generally speaking, whilst he is his
superior. But to resist force with force, being the state of war
that levels the parties, cancels all former relation of
reverence, respect, and superiority: and then the odds that
remains, is, that he, who opposes the unjust agressor, has this
superiority over him, that he has a right, when he prevails, to
punish the offender, both for the breach of the peace, and all
the evils that followed upon it. Barclay therefore, in another
place, more coherently to himself, denies it to be lawful to
resist a king in any case. But he there assigns two cases,
whereby a king may un-king himself. His words are,
Quid ergo, nulline casus incidere possunt quibus populo sese
erigere atque in regem impotentius dominantem arma capere &
invadere jure suo suaque authoritate liceat? Nulli certe quamdiu
rex manet. Semper enim ex divinis id obstat, Regem honorificato;
& qui potestati resistit, Dei ordinationi resisit: non alias
igitur in eum populo potestas est quam si id committat propter
quod ipso jure rex esse desinat. Tunc enim se ipse principatu
exuit atque in privatis constituit liber: hoc modo populus &
superior efficitur, reverso ad eum sc. jure illo quod ante regem
inauguratum in interregno habuit. At sunt paucorum generum
commissa ejusmodi quae hunc effectum pariunt. At ego cum plurima
animo perlustrem, duo tantum invenio, duos, inquam, casus quibus
rex ipso facto ex rege non regem se facit & omni honore &
dignitate regali atque in subditos potestate destituit; quorum
etiam meminit Winzerus. Horum unus est, Si regnum disperdat,
quemadmodum de Nerone fertur, quod is nempe senatum populumque
Romanum, atque adeo urbem ipsam ferro flammaque vastare, ac novas
sibi sedes quaerere decrevisset. Et de Caligula, quod palam
denunciarit se neque civem neque principem senatui amplius fore,
inque animo habuerit interempto utriusque ordinis electissimo
quoque Alexandriam commigrare, ac ut populum uno ictu
interimeret, unam ei cervicem optavit. Talia cum rex aliquis
meditator & molitur serio, omnem regnandi curam & animum ilico
abjicit, ac proinde imperium in subditos amittit, ut dominus
servi pro derelicto habiti dominium.
Sec. 236. Alter casus est, Si rex in alicujus clientelam se
contulit, ac regnum quod liberum a majoribus & populo traditum
accepit, alienae ditioni mancipavit. Nam tunc quamvis forte non
ea mente id agit populo plane ut incommodet: tamen quia quod
praecipuum est regiae dignitatis amifit, ut summus scilicet in
regno secundum Deum sit, & solo Deo inferior, atque populum etiam
totum ignorantem vel invitum, cujus libertatem sartam & tectam
conservare debuit, in alterius gentis ditionem & potestatem
dedidit; hac velut quadam regni ab alienatione effecit, ut nec
quod ipse in regno imperium habuit retineat, nec in eum cui
collatum voluit, juris quicquam transferat; atque ita eo facto
liberum jam & suae potestatis populum relinquit, cujus rei
exemplum unum annales Scotici suppeditant. Barclay contra
Monarchom. 1. iii. c. 16.

Which in English runs thus:

Sec. 237. What then, can there no case happen wherein the
people may of right, and by their own authority, help themselves,
take arms, and set upon their king, imperiously domineering over
them? None at all, whilst he remains a king. Honour the king,
and he that resists the power, resists the ordinance of God; are
divine oracles that will never permit it, The people therefore
can never come by a power over him, unless he does something that
makes him cease to be a king: for then he divests himself of his
crown and dignity, and returns to the state of a private man, and
the people become free and superior, the power which they had in
the interregnum, before they crowned him king, devolving to them
again. But there are but few miscarriages which bring the matter
to this state. After considering it well on all sides, I can
find but two. Two cases there are, I say, whereby a king, ipso
facto, becomes no king, and loses all power and regal authority
over his people; which are also taken notice of by Winzerus.
The first is, If he endeavour to overturn the government,
that is, if he have a purpose and design to ruin the kingdom and
commonwealth, as it is recorded of Nero, that he resolved to cut
off the senate and people of Rome, lay the city waste with fire
and sword, and then remove to some other place. And of Caligula,
that he openly declared, that he would be no longer a head to the
people or senate, and that he had it in his thoughts to cut off
the worthiest men of both ranks, and then retire to Alexandria:
and he wisht that the people had but one neck, that he might
dispatch them all at a blow, Such designs as these, when any king
harbours in his thoughts, and seriously promotes, he immediately
gives up all care and thought of the common-wealth; and
consequently forfeits the power of governing his subjects, as a
master does the dominion over his slaves whom he hath abandoned.
Sec. 238. The other case is, When a king makes himself the
dependent of another, and subjects his kingdom which his
ancestors left him, and the people put free into his hands, to
the dominion of another: for however perhaps it may not be his
intention to prejudice the people; yet because he has hereby lost
the principal part of regal dignity, viz. to be next and
immediately under God, supreme in his kingdom; and also because
he betrayed or forced his people, whose liberty he ought to have
carefully preserved, into the power and dominion of a foreign
nation. By this, as. it were, alienation of his kingdom, he
himself loses the power he had in it before, without transferring
any the least right to those on whom he would have bestowed it;
and so by this act sets the people free, and leaves them at their
own disposal. One example of this is to be found in the Scotch
Annals.
Sec. 239. In these cases Barclay, the great champion of
absolute monarchy, is forced to allow, that a king may be
resisted, and ceases to be a king. That is, in short, not to
multiply cases, in whatsoever he has no authority, there he is no
king, and may be resisted: for wheresoever the authority ceases,
the king ceases too, and becomes like other men who have no
authority. And these two cases he instances in, differ little
from those above mentioned, to be destructive to governments,
only that he has omitted the principle from which his doctrine
flows: and that is, the breach of trust, in not preserving the
form of government agreed on, and in not intending the end of
government itself, which is the public good and preservation of
property. When a king has dethroned himself, and put himself in
a state of war with his people, what shall hinder them from
prosecuting him who is no king, as they would any other man, who
has put himself into a state of war with them, Barclay, and those
of his opinion, would do well to tell us. This farther I desire
may be taken notice of out of Barclay, that he says, The mischief
that is designed them, the people may prevent before it be clone:
whereby he allows resistance when tyranny is but in design. Such
designs as these (says he) when any king harbours in his thoughts
and seriously promotes, he immediately gives up all care and
thought of the common-wealth; so that, according to him, the
neglect of the public good is to be taken as an evidence of such
design, or at least for a sufficient cause of resistance. And
the reason of all, he gives in these words, Because he betrayed
or forced his people, whose liberty he ought carefully to have
preserved. What he adds, into the power and dominion of a
foreign nation, signifies nothing, the fault and forfeiture lying
in the loss of their liberty, which he ought to have preserved,
and not in any distinction of the persons to whose dominion they
were subjected. The peoples right is equally invaded, and their
liberty lost, whether they are made slaves to any of their own,
or a foreign nation; and in this lies the injury, and against
this only have they the right of defence. And there are
instances to be found in all countries, which shew, that it is
not the change of nations in the persons of their governors, but
the change of government, that gives the offence. Bilson, a
bishop of our church, and a great stickler for the power and
prerogative of princes, does, if I mistake not, in his treatise
of Christian subjection, acknowledge, that princes may forfeit
their power, and their title to the obedience of their subjects;
and if there needed authority in a case where reason is so plain,
I could send my reader to Bracton, Fortescue, and the author of
the Mirrour, and others, writers that cannot be suspected to be
ignorant of our government, or enemies to it. But I thought
Hooker alone might be enough to satisfy those men, who relying on
him for their ecclesiastical polity, are by a strange fate
carried to deny those principles upon which he builds it.
Whether they are herein made the tools of cunninger workmen, to
pull down their own fabric, they were best look. This I am sure,
their civil policy is so new, so dangerous, and so destructive to
both rulers and people, that as former ages never could bear the
broaching of it; so it may be hoped, those to come, redeemed from
the impositions of these Egyptian under-task-masters, will abhor
the memory of such servile flatterers, who, whilst it seemed to
serve their turn, resolved all government into absolute tyranny,
and would have all men born to, what their mean souls fitted them
for, slavery.
Sec. 240. Here, it is like, the common question will be
made, Who shall be judge, whether the prince or legislative act
contrary to their trust? This, perhaps, ill-affected and
factious men may spread amongst the people, when the prince only
makes use of his due prerogative. To this I reply, The people
shall be judge; for who shall be judge whether his trustee or
deputy acts well, and according to the trust reposed in him, but
he who deputes him, and must, by having deputed him, have still a
power to discard him, when he fails in his trust? If this be
reasonable in particular cases of private men, why should it be
otherwise in that of the greatest moment, where the welfare of
millions is concerned, and also where the evil, if not prevented,
is greater, and the redress very difficult, dear, and dangerous?
Sec. 241. But farther, this question, (Who shall be judge?)
cannot mean, that there is no judge at all: for where there is no
judicature on earth, to decide controversies amongst men, God in
heaven is judge. He alone, it is true, is judge of the right.
But every man is judge for himself, as in all other cases, so in
this, whether another hath put himself into a state of war with
him, and whether he should appeal to the Supreme Judge, as leptha
did.
Sec. 242. If a controversy arise betwixt a prince and some
of the people, in a matter where the law is silent, or doubtful,
and the thing be of great consequence, I should think the proper
umpire, in such a case, should be the body of the people: for in
cases where the prince hath a trust reposed in him, and is
dispensed from the common ordinary rules of the law; there, if
any men find themselves aggrieved, and think the prince acts
contrary to, or beyond that trust, who so proper to judge as the
body of the people, (who, at first, lodged that trust in him) how
far they meant it should extend? But if the prince, or whoever
they be in the administration, decline that way of determination,
the appeal then lies no where but to heaven; force between either
persons, who have no known superior on earth, or which permits no
appeal to a judge on earth, being properly a state of war,
wherein the appeal lies only to heaven; and in that state the
injured party must judge for himself, when he will think fit to
make use of that appeal, and put himself upon it.
Sec. 243. To conclude, The power that every individual gave
the society, when he entered into it, can never revert to the
individuals again, as long as the society lasts, but will always
remain in the community; because without this there can be no
community, no common-wealth, which is contrary to the original
agreement: so also when the society hath placed the legislative
in any assembly of men, to continue in them and their successors,
with direction and authority for providing such successors, the
legislative can never revert to the people whilst that government
lasts; because having provided a legislative with power to
continue for ever, they have given up their political power to
the legislative, and cannot resume it. But if they have set
limits to the duration of their legislative, and made this
supreme power in any person, or assembly, only temporary; or
else, when by the miscarriages of those in authority, it is
forfeited; upon the forfeiture, or at the determination of the
time set, it reverts to the society, and the people have a right
to act as supreme, and continue the legislative in themselves; or
erect a new form, or under the old form place it in new hands, as
they think good.

F I N I S.

.