A57975:498
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.
QUEST. XXII. Whether the power of the King as King be absolute, or dependent and limited by Gods first mould and pattern of a King?
QUEST. XXII. Whether the power of the King as King be absolute, or dependent and limited by Gods first mould and paterne of a King?
Doctor Ferne showeth us it was never his purpose to plead for absoluteness of an Arbitrary commandment,1 free from all Moral restraint laid on the power by Gods Law; but only he striveth for a power in the King that cannot be resisted by the subject. But truly we never disputed with Royalists of any absolute power in the King, free from Moral subjection to Gods Law 1. Because any bond that Gods Law imposeth on the King, it cometh wholly from God, and the nature of a Divine Law,2 and not from any voluntary contract, or covenant, either express, or tacito, betwixt the King and the people who made him King, for if he fail against such a covenant, though he should exceed the cruelty of a King, or a man, and become a Lion and a Nero, a Mother-killer, he should in all his inhumanity and breach of covenant be countable to God, not to any man on earth. 2. To dispute with Royalists, if Gods Law lay any Moral restraint upon the King, nor to dispute whether the King be a rational man, or no; and whether he can sin against God, and shall cry in the day of Gods wrath (if he be a wicked Prince) Hills fall on us, and cover us, as it is Revel. 6.15, 16. and whether Tophet be prepared for all workers of iniquity; and certainly I justify the School-men in that question: Whether or no God could have created a rational creature, such a one as by nature ⟨p. 180⟩is impeccable, and not naturally capable of sin before God? if Royalists dispute this question of their absolute Monarch, they are wicked Divines.