A57975:259
Lex, Rex
Lex, rex The law and the prince : a dispute for the just prerogative of king and people : containing the reasons and causes of the most necessary defensive wars of the kingdom of Scotland and of their expedition for the aid and help of their dear brethren of England : in which their innocency is asserted and a full answer is given to a seditious pamphlet entitled Sacro-sancta regum majestas, or, The sacred and royal prerogative of Christian kings, under the name of J. A. but penned by Jo. Maxwell the excommunicate P. Prelate. : with a scriptural confutation of the ruinous grounds of W. Barclay, H. Grotius, H. Arnisœus, Ant. de Domi P. Bishop of Spalata, and of other late anti-magistratical royalists, as the author of Ossorianum, D. Fern, E. Symmons, the doctors of Aberdeen, &c. : in XLIV questions.Lex, rex The law and the prince : a dispute for the just prerogative of king and people : containing the reasons and causes of the most necessary defensive wars of the kingdom of Scotland and of their expedition for the ayd and help of their dear brethren of England : in which their innocency is asserted and a full answer is given to a seditious pamphlet intituled Sacro-sancta regum majestas, or, The sacred and royall prerogative of Christian kings, under the name of J. A. but penned by Jo. Maxwell the excommunicate P. Prelat. : with a scripturall confutation of the ruinous grounds of W. Barclay, H. Grotius, H. Arnisœus, Ant. de Domi P. Bishop of Spalata, and of other late anti-magistratical royalists, as the author of Ossorianum, D. Fern, E. Symmons, the doctors of Aberdeen, &c. : in XLIV questions.
London: printed for John Field, 1644London: printed for Iohn Field, 1644
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
4. Things transferable and communicable by birth from father to son, are only, in Law, those which Heathen call bona fortunae, 12riches, as lands, houses, monies and heritages; and so saith the Law also. These things which essentially include gifts of the mind, and honour property so called, I mean honour founded on virtue, as Aristotle with good reason maketh honour praeminum virtutis, cannot be communicated by birth from the father to the son; for royal dignity includeth these three constituent parts essentially, of which none can be communicable by birth. 1. The royal faculty of governing, which is a special gift of God, above nature, is from God. Solomon asked it from God, and had it not by generation from his father David. 2. The royal honour▪ to be set above the people because of this royal virtue, is not from the womb, for then Gods spirit would not have said, Blessed are thou O Land, when thy King is the son of Nobles, Eccles. 10.17. this honour springing from virtue, is not borne with any man, nor is any man borne with either the gift, or honour to be a Judge; God maketh high and low, not birth. Nobles are borne to great estates, if judging be heritage to any, it is a municipal positive law. I now speak in point of conscience. 3. The external lawful title, before men come to a Crown must be Gods Will, revealed by such an external sign, as by Gods appointment and warrant is to regulate our will, but ⟨p. 72⟩according to Scripture nothing regulateth our will, and leadeth the people now that they cannot err, following Gods rule in making a King, but the free suffrages of the States choosing a man whom they conceive God hath endued with these royal gifts required in the King whom God holdeth forth to them in his Word, Deut. 17. now there be but these to regulate the people, or to be a rule to any man to ascend lawfully (in foro Dei) in Gods Court to the Throne; 1. Gods immediate designation of a man by Prophetical and Divinely inspired unction, 3