A92147:695
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.
Ans. This is strange Logic, the King and his subjects are Ens por aggregationem; and the King as King hath one Moral subsistence, and the people another. Hath the Father and the son, the Master and the servant one Moral subsistence? but the man speaketh of their well being: and then he must mean that our Kings Government that was not long ago, and is yet, to wit, the Popery, Arminianism, Idolatry, cutting of mens ears, and noses, banishing, imprisonment, for speaking against Popery, arming of Papists to slay Protestants, pardoning the blood of Ireland, that I fear, shall not be soon taken away, &c. are identically the same with the life, safety, and happiness of Protestants, then life and death, justice and unjustice, Idolatry and sincere worship are identically one, as the soul of the Prelate and his body are one.
Ans. This is strange Logick, the King and his subjects are Ens por aggregationem; and the King as King hath one Morall subsistence, and the people another. Hath the Father and the sonne, the Master and the servant one Morall subsistence? but the man speaketh of their well being: and then he must meane that our Kings Government that was not long agoe, and is yet, to wit, the Popery, Arminianisme, Idolatry, cutting of mens eares, and noses, banishing, imprisonment, for speaking against Popery, arming of Papists to slay Protestants, pardoning the bloud of Ireland, that I feare, shall not be soone taken away, &c. are identically the same with the life, safety, and happinesse of Protestants, then life and death, justice and unjustice, Idolatry and sincere worship are identically one, as the soule of the Prelate and his body are one.
The third is but a repetition. The Acts of Royalty (saith the Observator)1 are Acts of duty and obligation; Ergo, not acts of grace properly so called. Ergo, We may not thank the King for a courtesy. This is no consequence. What fathers do to children, are acts of natural duty, and of natural grace; and yet children owe gratitude to parents, and subjects to good Kings, in a legal sense. No, but in way of courtesy only. The Observator said, The King is not a father to the whole collective body, and its well said, he is son to them, and they his maker. Who made the King? Policy answereth, The State made him, and Divinity: God made him.