Of TYRANNY.

199. AS Usurpation is the exercise of Power, which another hath a Right to; so Tyranny is the exercise of Power beyond Right, which no Body can have a Right to. And this is making use of the Power any one has in his hands; not for the good of those who are under it, but for his own private, separate Advantage. When the Governour, however entituled, makes not the Law, but his Will, the Rule, and his Commands, and Actions are not directed to the preservation of the Properties of his People, but the satisfaction of his own Ambition, Revenge, Covetousness, or any other irregular Passion.

200. If one can doubt this to be Truth, or Reason, because it comes from the obscure hand of a Subject; I hope the Authority of a King will make it pass with him. King Iames, in his Speech to the Parliament, 1603. tells them thus; I will ever prefer the Weale of the publick, and of the whole Commonwealth, in making of good Laws, and Constitutions, to any particular, and private Ends of mine. Thinking ever the Wealth and Weale of the Commonwealth, to be my greatest Weale, and worldly Felicity; a Point, wherein a lawful King doth directly differ from a Tyrant. For I do acknowledge that the special and greatest point of Difference, that is between a rightful King, and an usurping Tyrant, is this, That whereas the proud and ambitious Tyrant doth think, his Kingdom and People are only ordained for satisfaction of his Desires, and unreasonable Appetites; the righteous and just King doth, by the contrary, acknowledge himself to be ordained for the procuring of the wealth and Property of his People. And again, in his Speech to the Parliament, 1609 he hath these Words; The KING binds himself, by a double Oath, to the observation of the fundamental Laws of his Kingdom. Tacitly, as by being a King, and so bound to protect, as well the People, as the Laws of his Kingdom; and expresly by his Oath at his Coronation: so as every just King, in a setled Kingdom, is bound to observe that Paction made to his People, by his Laws, in framing his Government agreeable thereunto, according to that Paction which God made with Noah, after the Deluge. Hereafter, Seed-time, and Harvest, and Cold, and Heat, and Summer, and Winter, and Day, and Night, shall not cease, while the Earth remaineth. And therefore a King, governing in a setled Kingdom, leaves to be a King, and degenerates into a Tyrant, as soon as he leaves off to rule according to his Laws. And a little after: Therefore all Kings, that are not Tyrants, or perjured, will be glad to bound themselves within the Limits of their Laws. And they that perswade them the contrary, are Vipers, Pests both against them and the Commonwealth. Thus that learned King, who well understood the Notions of things, makes the difference, betwixt a King and a Tyrant, to consist only in this, That one makes the Laws the Bounds of his Power, and the Good of the publick the End of his Government; The other makes all give way to his own Will and Appetite.

201. 'Tis a Mistake, to think this Fault is proper only to Monarchies, other Forms of Government are liable to it, as well as that: for where-ever the Power, that is put in any hands, for the Government of the People, and the Preservation of their Properties, is applied to other ends, and made use of to impoverish, harass, or subdue them to the Arbitrary, and Irregular Commands of those that have it: There it presently becomes Tyranny, whether those, that thus use it, are one, or many. Thus we read of the Thirty Tyrants at Athens, as well as one at Syracuse; and the intolerable Dominion of the Decemviri, at Rome, was nothing better.

202. Where-ever Law ends, Tyranny begins, if the Law be transgressed to another's harm. And whosoever, in Authority, exceeds the Power given him by the Law, and makes use of the Force, he has under his Command, to compass that upon the Subject which the Law allows not; ceases, in that, to be a Magistrate, and acting without Authority, may be opposed, as any other Man, who by force invades the Right of another. This is acknowledged in subordinate Magistrates. He that hath Authority to seize my Person in the street, may be opposed as a Thief, and a Robber, if he indeavours to break into my House to execute a Writ, notwithstanding that I know he has such a Warrant, and such a legal Authority as will impower him to arrest me abroad. And why this should not hold in the highest, as well as in the most inferiour Magistrate, I would gladly be informed. Is it reasonable that the eldest Brother, because he has the greatest part of his Father's Estate, should thereby have a Right to take away any of his younger Brothers Portions? Or that a rich Man, who possessed a whole Countrey, should from thence have a Right to seize, when he pleased, the Cottage and Garden of his poor Neighbour? The being rightfully possessed of great Power and Riches, exceedingly beyond the greatest part of the Son of Adam, is so far from being an excuse, much less a reason for Rapine and Oppression, which the endamaging another, without Authority, is; that it is a great Aggravation of it. For the exceeding the Bounds of Authority, is no more a Right, in a great, than a petty Officer: no more justifiable in a King, than a Constable. But so much the worse in him, as that he has more trust put in him, is supposed, from the advantage of Education, and Counsellours to have better Knowledge, and less reason to do it, having already a greater share than the rest of his Brethren.

203. May the Commands then of a Prince be opposed? May he be resisted, as often as any one shall find himself aggrieved, and but imagine he has not Right done him? This will unhinge and overturn all Politi•s, and, instead of Government and Order, leave nothing but Anarchy and Confusion.

204. To this I answer: That Force is to be opposed to nothing but to unjust and unlawful Force; who ever makes any opposition, in any other Case, draws on himself a just Condemation, both from God and Man; and so no such Danger or Confusion will follow, as is often suggested. For,

205. First, As, in some Countries, the Person of the Prince, by the Law, is Sacred, and so, what-ever he commands, or does, his Person is still free from all Question or Violence; not liable to Force, or any judicial Censure or Condemnation. But yet opposition may be made to the illegal Acts of any inferiour Officer, or other commissioned by him; unless he will, by actually putting himself into a State of War with his People, dissolve the Government, and leave them to that defence, which belongs to every one in the state of Nature. For of such things who can tell what the end will be? And a Neighbour Kingdom has shewed the World an odd Example. In all other Cases the Sacredness of the Person exempts him from all Inconveniencies, whereby he is secure, whilst the Government stands, from all violence and harm whatsoever. Than which, there cannot be a wiser Constitution. For the harm he can do, in his own Person, not being likely to happen often, nor to extend it self far; nor being able, by his single strength, to subvert the Laws, nor oppress the Body of the People, should any Prince have so much Weakness, and ill Nature as to be willing to do it. The Inconveniency of some particular mischiefs that may happen, sometimes, when a heady Prince comes to the Throne, are well recompenced by the peace of the Publick, and security of the Government, in the Person of the chief Magistrate, thus set out of the reach of danger. It being safer for the Body, that some few private Men should be sometimes in danger to suffer, than that the Head of the Republick should be easily, and upon slight occasions exposed.

206. Secondly, But this Priviledge belonging only to the King's Person, hinders not but they may be questioned, opposed, and resisted, who use unjust force, though they pretend a Commission from him, which the Law authorizes not. As is plain, in the Case of him that has the King's Writ to arrest a Man, which is a full Commission from the King; and yet he that has it cannot break open a Man's House to do it, nor execute this Command of the King upon certain days, nor in certain places, though this Commission have no such exception in it; but they are the Limitations of the Law, which, if any one transgress, the King's Commission excuses him not. For the King's Authority being given him only by the Law, he cannot impower any one to act against the Law, or justifie him, by his Commission, in so doing. The Commission, or Command of any Magistrate, where he has no Authority, being as void and insignificant as that of any private Man. The difference, between the one and the other, being, that the Magistrate has some Authority, so far, and to such ends, and the private Man has none at all. For 'tis not the Commission, but the Authority, that gives the Right of acting; and against the Laws there can be no Authority. But, notwithstanding such Resistance, the King's Person and Authority are still both secured, and so no danger to Governour or Government.

207. Thirdly, Supposing a Government, wherein the Person of the chief Magistrate is not thus Sacred; yet this Doctrine, of the lawfulness of resisting all unlawful exercises of his Power, will not, upon every slight occasion, indanger him, or imbroil the Government. For, where the injured Party may be relieved, and his damages repaired, by Appeal to the Law, there can be no pretence for Force; which is only to be used, where a Man is intercepted from appealing to the Law. For nothing is to be accounted Hostile Force, but where it leaves not the remedy of such an Appeal. And 'tis such Force alone, that puts him that uses it, into a state of War, and makes it lawful to resist him. A Man, with a Sword in his hand, demands my Purse, in the High-way, when, perhaps, I have not 12d. in my Pocket; This Man I may lawfully kill. To another I deliver 100l. to hold, only whilst I alight, •hich he refuses to restore me when I am got up again, but draws his Sword to defend the possession of it, by force: I endeavour to retake it. The mischief, this Man does me, is a hundred, or possibly a thousand times more than the other perhaps intended me, (whom I kill'd, before he really did me any) and yet I might lawfully kill the one, and cannot so much as hurt the other lawfully. The Reason whereof is plain; because the one using force, which threatned my Life, I could not have time to appeal to the Law to secure it: And when it was gone, 'twas too late to appeal. The Law could not restore Life to my dead Carcass. The Loss was irreparable; which, to prevent, the Law of Nature gave me a Right to destroy him, who had put himself into a state of War with me, and threatned my destruction. But, in the other case, my Life not being in danger, I might have the benefit of appealing to the Law, and have Reparation, for my 100l. that way.

208. Fourthly, But if the unlawful acts, done by the Magistrate, be maintained, (by the Power he has got) and the remedy, which is due by Law, be, by the same Power, obstructed; ye• the Right of resisting, even in such manifest Acts of Tyranny, will not suddenly, or on slight occasions, disturb the Government. For if it reach no farther than some private Mens Cases, though they have a right to defend themselves, and to recover, by force, what, by unlawful force, is taken from them; yet the Right to do so, will not easily ingage them in a Contest, wherein they are sure to perish: It being as impossible, for one or a few oppressed Men, to disturb the Government, where the Body of the People do not think themselves concerned in it, as for a raving mad Man, or heady Male content to overturn a well setled State; the People being as little apt to follow the one, as the other.

209. But if either these illegal Acts, have extended to the Majority of the People; or if the Mischief and Oppression has light only on some few, but in such Cases as the Precedent and Consequences seem to threaten all; and they are perswaded in their Consciences that their Laws, and with them, their Estates, Liberties, and Lives are in danger, and perhaps their Religion too; how they will be hindred from resisting illegal Force, used against them, I cannot tell. This is an Inconvenience, I confess, that attends all Governments whatsoever, when the Governours have brought it to this pass, to be generally suspected of their People, the most dangerous state they can possibly put themselves in; wherein they are the less to be pityed, because it is so easie to be avoided. It being as impossible, for a Governour, if he really means the good of his People, and the preservation of them, and their Laws together, not to make them see and feel it; as it is for the Father of a Family not to let his Children see he loves, and takes care of them.

210. But if all the World shall observe Pretences of one kind, and Actions of another; Arts used to elude the Law, and the Trust of Prerogative (which is an Arbitrary Power in some things, left in the Prince's hand, to do good, not harm, to the People) employed contrary to the end, for which it was given, If the People shall find the Ministers, and subordinate Magistrates chosen, suitable to such ends, and favoured, or laid by proportionably as they promote, or oppose them: If they see several Experiments made of Arbitrary Power, and that Religion underhand favoured, though publickly proclaimed against, which is readiest to introduce it, and the Operators in it supported as much as may be; and when that cannot be done, yet approved still, and liked the better, and a long Train of Actings shew the Councils all tending that way: how can a Man any more hinder himself from being perswaded in his own Mind, which way things are going; or from casting about how to save himself, than he could from believing the Captain of the Ship he was in, was carrying him, and the rest of the Company, to Algiers, when he found him always stearing that Course, though cross Winds, Leaks in his Ship, and want of Men, and Provisions, did often force him to turn his Course another way, for some time, which he steadily returned to again, as soon as the Wind, Weather, and other Circumstances would let him?