A92147:883
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.
Any mean not used for preventing death, must be an act of revenge, not of self-defence, for it is physically unsuitable for the intended end of self-defence. And so for a servant buffeted, to buffet again, is of the same nature: the second buffet not being a conducible mean to ward the first buffet, but a mean to procure heavier strokes and possibly killing, it cannot be an act of self defence, for an act of self defence must be an act destinated ex naturarei, onely for defence, and if it be known to be an act of sole offending, without any known necessary relation of a mean to self-defence as the end, it cannot be properly an act of self-defence.
Any mean not used for preventing death, must be an act of revenge, not of self-defence, for it is physically unsutable for the intended end of self-defence. And so for a servant buffeted, to buffet againe, is of the same nature: the second buffet not being a conducible meane to ward the first buffet, but a meane to procure heavier stroakes and possibly killing, it cannot be an act of self defence, for an act of self defence must be an act destinated ex naturarei, onely for defence, and if it be known to be an act of sole offending, without any known necessary relation of a mean to selfdefence as the end, it cannot be properly an act of self-defence.
Assert. 4. When the matter is lighter, as in paying tribute, or suffering a buffet of a rough master, though unjustly, we are not to use1 any act of re-offending. For though▪ I be not absolute Lord of my own goods, and so may not at my sole pleasure give tribute and expend monies to the hurting of my children, where I am not by Gods Law or Mans Law obliged to pay tribute; and though I be not an absolute Lord of my members, to expose face, and cheeks, and back to stripes and whips at my own mere will, yet have ⟨p. 322⟩we a comparative dominion given to us of God in matters of goods, and disposing of our members, (I think I may except the case of mutilation, which is a little death) for buffets, because Christ no doubt to teach us the like, would rather give of his goods, and pay tribute, where it is not due, then that this scandal lay on the way of Christ, that Christ was no loyal subject to lawful Emperors and Kings. And