A57975:641
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.
Ans. The Prelate would have the other half of the end, why a King is set over a People, to be the safety and happiness of the King, as well as the safety of the People.1 This is new Logic indeed, that one and the same thing should be the mean, and the end. The question is, For what end is a King made so happy, as to be exalted King? The Prelate answereth; He is made happy, that he may be happy; and made a King, that he may be made a King. Now is the King, as King, to intend this half end? that is, Whether or no accepteth he the burden of setting his head and shoulders under the Crown, for this end, that he may not only make the people happy, but also that he may make himself rich and honourable above his brethren, and enrich himself? I believe not: but that he feed the people of God. For if he intend himself, and his own honour, it is the intention of the man who is King, and intentio operantis; but it is not the intention of the King, as the King, or intentio operis. The King, as a King, is formally and essentially the Minister of God for our good, Rom. 13.4. 1 Tim. 2.2. and cannot come under any notion as a King, but as a mean, not as an end, nor as that which he is, to seek himself. I conceive, God did forbid this, in the moulding of the first King, Deut. 17.18, 19, 26. He is a minister by office, and one who receiveth honour and wages for this work, that ex officio, he may feed his people. But the Prelate saith, the people are to intend his riches and honour. I cannot say but the people may intend to honour the King: but that is not the question, whether the people be to refer the King and his government as a mean to honour the King? I conceive not. But that end which the people in obeying the King in being ruled by him, may intend, is, 1 Tim. 2.2. That under him they may lead a quiet and a peaceable life, in all Godliness and honesty. And Gods end in giving a King, is the good and safety of his people.
Ans. The Prelate would have the other halfe of the end, why a King is set over a People, to be the safetie and happinesse of the King, as well as the safetie of the People.