A57975:504
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.
3. All power restrained,1 that it cannot arise from ten degrees to fourteen, from the Kingly power of Saul, 1 Sam. 8.9, 11. to the Kingly power of the Great Turk, to fourteen; 1. must either be restrained by Gods law; 2. or by Mans law; or 3. by the innate goodness and grace of the Prince; or 4. by the providence of God. A restraint from Gods law is vain: for it is no question between us and Royalists, but God hath laid a moral restraint on Kings, and all men, that they have not moral power to sin against God. 2. Is the restraint laid on by mans law? What law of man? 1. The Royalist saith, 1. The King, as King, is above all law of man. Then (say I) no law of man can hinder the Kings power of ten, to arise to the Turkish power of fourteen. 2. All law of man, as it is mans law, is seconded either with Ecclesiastical and spiritual coaction, such as Excommunication;, or with Civill and temporal coaction, such as is the Sword, if it be violated. But Royalists deny, that either the sword of the Church in Excommunication, or the Civill sword, should be drawn against the King. 3. This law of man should be produced by this profound Jurist, the P. Prelate, who mocketh at all the Statists and Lawyers of Scotland. It is not a covenant betwixt the King and People, at his Coronation: for though there were any such covenant, yet the breach of it doth bind before God, but not before man: nor can I see, or any man else, how a law of man can lay a restraint on the Kings power of two degrees, to cancel it within a Law, more then on a power of ten, or fourteen degrees. If the King of Spain, the lawful Sovereign of those over-European ⟨p. 182⟩people, (as Royalists say) have a power of fourteen degrees over those conquered Subjects, as a King; I see not how he hath not the like power over his own Subjects of Spain, to wit, even of Fourteen: for what agreeth to a King, as a King, (and Kingly power from God he hath as King) he hath it in relation to all Subjects, except it be taken from him in relation to some Subjects, and given by some law of God; or in relation to some other Subjects. Now, no man can produce any such law. 4. The nature of the goodness and grace of the Prince, cannot lay bonds on the King, to cancel his power, that he should not usurp the power of the King of Spain toward his over-Europeans. 1.