A57975:456
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.
Hence I argue, If the Holy Ghost in this good King, forbid inferior Judges wresting of judgement, respecting of persons, and taking of gifts, because the judgement is the Lords; and if the Lord himself were on the Bench, he would not respect persons, nor take gifts; then he presumeth, that inferior Judges are in the stead and place of Jehovah: and that when these inferior Judges should take gifts, they make (as it were) the Lord, whose place they represent, to take gifts, and to do iniquity, and to respect persons: but that the holy Lord cannot do. 2. If the inferior Judges in the act of judging, were the Vicars, and Deputies of King Jehoshaphat, he would have said, Judge righteous judgement; Why? For the judgement ⟨p. 160⟩is mine, and if I the King were on the Bench, I would not respect persons, nor take gifts; and you judge for me the supreme Judge, as my Deputies: but the King saith, They judge not for man, but for the Lord. 3. If by this they were not Gods immediate Vicars, but the Vicars and Deputies of the King, then being mere servants, the King might command them to pronounce such a sentence, and not such a sentence as I may command my servant and deputy, in so far, as he is a servant and deputy, to say this, and say not this: but the King cannot limit the conscience of the inferior Judge, because the judgement is not the Kings, but the Lords. 4. The King cannot command any other to do that, as King; for the doing whereof, he hath no power from God himself, but the King hath no power from God to pronounce what sentence he pleaseth, because the judgement is not his own,1 but Gods: And though inferior Judges be sent of the King, and appointed by him to be Judges, and so have their external call from Gods deputy, the King; yet because judging is an act of conscience, as one mans conscience cannot properly be a deputy for another mans conscience, so neither can an inferior Judge, as a Judge, be a deputy for a King: therefore the inferior Judges have designation to their office from the King; but if they have from the King, that they are Judges, and be not Gods deputies, but the Kings, they could not be commanded to execute judgement for God, but for the King: and Deut. 1.17. Moses appointed Judges, but not as his deputies to judge and give sentence, as subordinate to Moses: For the judgement (saith he) is the Lords, not mine. 6.