-
All Objections Against the Government of the People ,Answered
- Liberty Fund
- Chapter
- Additional Information
47 All Objections Against the Government of the People, Answered. [81] [MP 92, 4–11 Mar. 1652] Considering,That in times past,the People of this Nation were bred up and instructed in the brutish Principles of Monarchy, by which means they have been the more averse from entertaining Notions of a more noble Form: and remembring, that not long since we were put into a better course, upon the declared Interest of a Free-State, or Commonwealth ; I conceived nothing could more highly tend to the propagation of that good Interest, and the Ho-[82]nour of its Founders, than to manifest the Inconveniences and ill Consequences of the other Forms; and so to root up their Principles, that the good People227 , who but the other day were invested228 in the possession of a more excellent way,may (in order to their re-establishment) understand what CommonwealthPrinciples are and229 thereby become the more resolute to defend them against the common Enemy; learn to be true Commonwealths men, and zealous against Monarchick-Interest, in all its appearances and incroachments whatsoever. To this end we have set down our Position, That a Free-State, or Government by the People, setled in a due and 48 The Excellencie of a Free-State orderly succession of their supreme Assemblies, is the most excellent Form of Government; which (I humbly conceive) hath been sufficiently proved, both by Reason and Example: but because many pretences of Objection are in being, and such as by many are taken for granted; therefore it falls in of course, that we may refute them: which being done with the same evidence of Reason and [83] Example, I doubt not but it will stop all the Mouths, not onely of Ignorance, but even of Malice and Flattery, which have presumed to prophane that pure way of a Free-State, or Government by the People. That Objection of Royalists, and others, which we shall first take notice of, is this, That the erecting of such a Government would be to set on Levelling and Confusion. For answer,If we take Levelling in the common usage and application of the term in these days, it is of an odious signification, as if it levell’d all men in point of Estates, made all things common to all, destroyed propriety, introduced a community of enjoyments among men; which is a Scandal fastned by the cunning of the common Enemy upon this kinde of Government, which they hate above all others; because, were the People once put in possession of their Liberty, and made sensible of the great Benefits they may reap by its injoyment, the hopes of all the Royal Sticklers would be utterly extinct, in regard it would be the likeliest means [84] to prevent a return of the Interest of Monarchy: for no Person or Parties seeking or setting up a private Interest of their own, distinct from the Publick, it will stop the Mouths of all Gainsayers . But230 the Truth is, This way of Free-State, or Government by the People in their successive Assemblies, is so far from introducing a community, that it is the onely preservative of Propriety in every particular : the Reasons whereof are plain: for, as on the one side, it is not in Reason to be imagined, that so choice a Body, as the Representative of a Nation, should agree to destroy one another in their several Rights and Interests: on the231 other side, all Determinations being carried in this Form by common Consent, every Man’s particular Interest must needs be fairly provided for, against the Arbitrary disposition of others ; therefore, whatever is contrary to this, is levelling indeed; because it placeth every Man’s Right under the Will of another, and is no less A Free state the only preservative against Levelling and confusion of propriety. [3.230.1.23] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 15:44 GMT) Objections Answered 49 than Tyranny; which seating it self in an unlimited uncontrollable Prerogative over others without their [85] Consent, becomes the very bane of propriety; and however disquieted, or in what Form soever it appears , is indeed the very Interest of Monarchy. Now that a Free-State, or successive Government of the People, &c. is the onely preservative of Propriety, appears by Instances all the World over; yet we shall cite but a few. Under Monarchs, we shall finde ever, That the Subjects had nothing that they could call their own; neither Lives...