A57975:531
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.
2. A Prerogative Royal must be a power of doing good to the people, and grounded upon some reason or law: but this is but a branch of an ordinary limited power, and no prerogative above or beside law. Yea, any power not grounded on a reason different from mere will or absolute pleasure, is an irrational and brutish power; and therefore it may well be jus personae, the power of the man who is King; it cannot be jus coronae, 1any power annexed to the Crown: for this holdeth true of all the actions of a King, as a King. Illud potest Rex, & illud tantum quod jur• potest. The King, as King, can do no more, then that which upon right and law he may do.
2. A Prerogative Royall must be a power of doing good to the people, and grounded upon some reason or law: but this is but a branch of an ordinarie limited power, and no prerogative above or beside law. Yea, any power not grounded on a reason different from meere will or absolute pleasure, is an irrationall and brutish power; and therefore it may well be jus personae, the power of the man who is King; it cannot be jus coronae, 1any power annexed to the Crown: for this holdeth true of all the actions of a King, as a King. Illud potest Rex, & illud tantum quod jur• potest. The King, as King, can doe no more, then that which upon right and law he may doe.
- 1Jus personae, jus coronae.
3. To dispute this question,1 Whether such a Prerogative agree to any King, as King; is to dispute whether God hath made all under a Monarch, slaves, by their own consent: which is a vain question. 2. Those who hold such a Prerogative, must say, the King is so absolute and illimited a God on earth, that either by law, or his sole pleasure beside law, he may regularly and rationally move all wheels in Policy; and his uncontrolled will shall be the axletree on which all the wheels are turned.