The laws of England with respect to prerogative, and in other instances, have accommodated themselves, without alteration by statutes, to a change of circumstances, the welfare of the people so requiring. A regard for that grand object perpetually animates the Constitution and regulates all its movements—unless unnatural obstructions interfere—

"Speritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus
Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet."

Another argument for the extravagant power of internal legislation over us remains. It has been urged with great warmth against us, that "precedents" show this power is rightfully vested in Parliament.

Submission to unjust sentences proves not a right to pass them. Carelessness or regard for the peace and welfare of the community may cause the submission. Submission may sometimes be a less evil than opposition, and, therefore, a duty. In such cases it is a submission to the Divine authority, which forbids us to injure our country; not to the assumed authority on which the unjust sentences were founded. But when submission becomes inconsistent with and destructive of the publick good, the same veneration for, and duty to the Divine authority, commands us to oppose. The all-wise Creator of man impressed certain laws on his nature. A desire of happiness and of society are two of those laws. They were not intended to destroy, but to support each other. Man has therefore a right to promote the best union of both, in order to enjoy both in the highest degree. Thus, while this right is properly exercised, desires that seem selfish, by a happy combination, produce the welfare of others. "This is removing submission from a foundation unable to support it, and injurious to the honour of God, and fixing it upon much firmer ground."*

No sensible or good man ever suspected Mr. Hooker of being a weak or factious person, "yet he plainly enough teacheth, that a society, upon experience of universal evil, have a right to try by another form to answer more effectually the ends of Government." And Mr. Hoadly asks—"Would the ends of Government be destroyed should the miserable condition of the people of France, which has proceeded from the King's being absolute, awaken the thoughts of the wisest heads amongst them, and move them all to exert themselves, so as that those ends should be better answered for the time to come ?"

What mind can relish the hardy proposition, that because precedents have been introduced by the inattention or timidity of some, and the cunning or violence of others, therefore the latter have a right to make the former miserable—that is, that precedents that ought never to have been set, yet being set, repeal the eternal laws of natural justice, humanity, and equity.†

The argument from precedents begins unluckily for its advocates. The first produced against us by the gentleman before mentioned, was an Act past by the Commonwealth Parliament in 1650 to "punish" Virginia,‡ Barbadoes, Antigua, and Bermudas, for their fidelity to Charles the Second. So ancient is the right of Parliament to "punish" Colonists for doing their duty. But the Parliament had before overturned Church and Throne, so that there in an older "precedent" set against these.

That Parliament sat amidst the ruins that surrounded it, fiercer than Marius among those of Carthage. Brutal power became an irresistible argument of boundless right. What the style of an Aristotle could not prove, the point of a Cromwell's sword sufficiently demonstrated. Innocence and justice sighed and submitted. What more could

clusion. How, or why? to support this most curious distinction—that Mr. Locke in that celebrated part of his argument, where speaking of "Government taking the property of subjects," he says, "What property have I in that, which another may by right take from me when he pleases," * "means no more" than that the supreme legislative power has no right to take the property of others without their consent "for the private use or purpose of the legislative." So that according to this construction the Constitution of a well established Government, or the freedom of a people, depends not on the great right which God has given them "of having a share in the government of themselves," whereby their property is secured, but merely on the "purpose" to which the property taken from them, without their consent, is applied by those who thus take it. And yet this gentleman has severely attacked the writer of the Letters for using the word "purpose" in a much more confined sense, in saying a "tax is an imposition on the subject for the sole purpose of levying money."

Mr. Locke in the preceding chapter, speaking of Monarchy, says, "that absolute power purifies not men's blood. For if it be asked what security or sense arises in such a state, against the violence and oppression of the absolute ruler? The very question cin scarce be borne. They are ready to tell you it deserves death, only to ask after safety. Betwixt subject and subject they will grant there must be measures, laws, and judges, for their mutual peace and security: but as for the ruler, he ought to be absolute, and is above all such circumstances; because he has power to do more hurt and wrong, 'tis right when he dose it. To ask how you can be guarded from harm or injury on that side where the strongest hand is to do it is presently the voice of "faction and rebellion." But here our opponent may come in with another distinction. "Mr. Locke speaks here of an absolute ruler, not of absolute rulers. Lilly proves there is the singular and plural number. A power that Mr. Locke would have held illegal in a Pisistratus or a Stuart, he would have held legal in the Four Hundred of Athens, or the Parliament of Great Britain." Let the distinction be allowed its due weight. Can it be believed that such a friend to mankind, as Mr. Locke was, could ever think absolute dominion † just or legal? Would not such a sentiment directly oppose those principles his benevolence induced him to take so much pains to vindicate and establish? Would the sound of the words—"dependence"—"subordination"—"within the Realm"—"part of the Dominions", &c., have convinced him that it was "the indispensable duty of Parliament to ease the gentry and people of Great Britain, by taxing the Colonists without their consent?"—and that it was the indispensable duty of the Colonists, on constitutional principles, to submit to such taxation?. The learned say that the too rigid attention of the mind to one idea sometimes is the cause of madness. So rigid has been the attention of many heads in Great Britain to the idea of dependence, that it seems to have occasioned a kind of insanity in them; and by ruminating, speechifying, and enacting about it and about it, they have lost all ideas of justice, humanity, law, and Constitution, and, in short, of every quality that used to distinguish men from the rest of this creation, and Englishmen from the rest of mankind. But Mr. Locke's understanding, even in the present whirl of the political world, would have preserved him just and tenacious of his principles. The case he puts, and on which the author of "The Controversy" argues, is that of a submission to the terms of Government in a Commonwealth. The question between Great Britain and the Colonies is, what are the terms of their connection under all the circumstances of it?

It is not recollected that Mr. Locke ever insinuates that the Parliament of Great Britain might bind the people of Ireland by statutes, "in all cases whatsoever." Yet there was in his time a famous dispute concerning the authority of Parliament over that Kingdom. So far was he from favouring the claim of Parliament, that it is hoped, it can clearly be proved he favoured the other side of the question.

His friend Mr. Molineux, in a Letter dated March 15, 1697-8, tells him of his intention to visit him, when he could get loose from business: "But this I cannot hope for till the Parliament in England rises. I should be glad to know from you when that is expected, for indeed they bear very hard upon us in Ireland. How justly they can bind us without our consent and Representatives, I leave the author of the two treatises on Government to consider"—meaning Mr. Locke's two treatises, one on Government, the other on Civil Government; though they are published also as one treatise, the first book of which is under the first title, and the second book under the second title.

Mr. Locke, in his Answer, dated April 6, 1698, says, "Amongst other things I would be glad to talk with you about, before I die, is that which you suggest at the bottom of the first page of your letter. I am mightily concerned for the place you meant in the question you say you will ask the author of the treatise you mention, and wish extremely well to it, and would be very glad to be informed by you what would be best for it, and debate with you the way to compose it: but this cannot be done by letters; the subject is of too great extent, the views too large, and the particulars too many to be so managed. Come therefore yourself, and come as well prepared as you can. But if you talk with others on that point there, mention not me to any body on that subject; only let you and I try what good we can do for those whom we wish well to; great things have sometimes been brought about from small beginnings well laid together."

Mr. Molineux quickly after came over from Ireland to England to see Mr. Locke.

* Hoadly's Discourse on Government.

† ————— "I could never think
A mortal's law of power or strength sufficient
To abrogate the unwritten law divine,
Immutable, eternal, not like these
Of yesterday, but made ere time began."

SOPHOCLES'S Antig. Frank. Transl.

It should be considered whether it ever was or ever can be the true interest of a Kingdom or state to violate the laws of natural justice, equity, and humanity. These laws may be called the laws of God. Can they be broken with impunity? The Scriptures are full of lessons on this subject, and history furnishes instances sufficient to alarm oppressors if they would attend to them. All the glories of Charles the Bold,—Charles the Fifth,—Philip the Second,—Charles the Twelfth,—Lewis the Fourteenth,—and a numerous list of distinguished Princes, were overcast, when unrelenting cruelty came to preside over their resolutions. From Athens to Genoa the observation holds true. Let not the opinion be condemned as presumptuous before it be fully inquired into. It is worth an inquiry.

"Discite justitiam ntoniti et non temnere divos."

England has been prosperous in many civil wars, but they were in defence of liberty. She never engaged in one against liberty. Would to Heaven she would set the world the much wanted example of lenity in Government. Mankind might gain by it. The other mode has been sufficiently tried, and proved to be impolitick and ruinous.

‡ This loyal, generous Colony preserved its principles with such spirit, notwithstanding the oppression above mentioned, that in January, 1659, they threw off all obedience to the Parliament, replaced the King's Govemour, and proclaimed Charles the Second several months before the Restoration in Europe.

* Page 33.

† "Absolute dominion, however placed, is so far from being one kind of civil society, that it is as inconsistent with it, as slavery is with property."—Locke on Civil GOV. p. 174.