A92147:620
A treatise of civil policy
A treatise of civil policy: being a resolution of forty three questions concerning prerogative, right and privilege, in reference to the supreme prince and the people. / By Samuel Rutherford professor of divinity of St Andrews in Scotland.A treatise of civil policy: being a resolution of forty three questions concerning prerogative, right and priviledge, in reference to the supream prince and the people. / By Samuel Rutherford professor of divintiy of St Andrews in Scotland.
London, : Printed and are to be sold by Simon Miller at the Star in St Pauls Church-yard near the West end., 1657 i.e. 1656
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 Law hath a twofold consideration, 1. Secundum 1esse paenale, in relation to the punishment to be inflicted by man▪ 2. Secundum esse legis, as it is a thing legally good in it self: In the former notion, it is this way true, Humane Laws take life and being,2 in way to be punished, or rewarded by men, from the will of Princes and Law-givers, and so Symmons saith true, Because men cannot punish or reward Laws, but where they are made; and the will of Rulers putteth a sort of stamp on a Law, that it bringeth the Commonwealth under guiltiness, if they break this Law. But this maketh not the King greater then the Law; for therefore do Rulers put the stamp of relation to punishment on the Law, because there is intrinsical worth in the Law, Prior to the Act of the will of Lawgivers, for which it meriteth to be enacted; and therefore, because3 it is authorizable as good and just, the King puteth on it this stamp of a Politic Law. God formeth Being, and moral Aptitude to the end in all Laws, to wit, the safety of the people; and the Kings will is neither the measure, nor the cause of the goodness of things.
Assert. 1. The Law hath a twofold consideration, 1. Secundum 1esse paenale, in relation to the punishment to be inflicted by man▪ 2. Secundum esse legis, as it is a thing legally good in it self: In the former notion, it is this way true, Humane Laws take life and being,2 inway to be punished, or rewarded by men, from the will of Princes and Law-givers, and so Symmons saith true, Because men cannot punish or reward Laws, but where they are made; and the will of Rulers putteth a sort of stamp on a Law, that it bringeth the Commonwealth under guiltinesse, if they break this Law. But this maketh not the King greater then the Law; for therefore do Rulers put the stamp of relation to punishment on the Law, because there is intrinsecall worth in the Law, Prior to the Act of the will of Lawgivers, for which it meriteth to be inacted; and therefore, because