A57975:779
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.
Assert. 1. The King is not the sole and final interpreter of the Law.
Assert. 1. The King is not the sole and finall interpreter of the Law.
11. Because then inferior Judges should not be interpreters of the Law, but inferior Judges are no less essentially Judges, then the King• Deut. 1.17. 2 Chron. 19.6. 1 Pet. 2.14. Rom. 13.1, 2. and so by Office must interpret the Law, else they cannot give sentence according to their conscience and equity, now exponing of ⟨p. 253⟩the Law judicially is an act of judging, and so a personal and incommunicable act, so as I can no more judge and expone the Law according to another mans conscience, then I can believe with another mans soul,2 or understand with another mans understanding, see with another mans eye: The Kings pleasure therefore cannot be the rule of the inferior Judges conscience, for he giveth an immediate account to God the Judge of all, of a just or an unjust sentence. Suppose Caesar shall expone the Law to Pilate, that Christ deserveth to dye the death, yet Pilate is not in conscience to expone the Law so. If therefore inferior Judges judge for the King, they judge only by power borrowed from the King, not by the pleasure, will, or command of the King thus and thus exponing the Law, ergo the King cannot be the sole interpreter of the Law.