reverence, respect, and superiority: and then the odds that 
remains, is, that he, who opposes the unjust agressor, has this 
superiority over him, that he has a right, when he prevails, to 
punish the offender, both for the breach of the peace, and all 
the evils that followed upon it.  Barclay therefore, in another 
place, more coherently to himself, denies it to be lawful to 
resist a king in any case.  But he there assigns two cases, 
whereby a king may un-king himself.  His words are,

     Quid ergo, nulline casus incidere possunt quibus populo sese 
erigere atque in regem impotentius dominantem arma capere & 
invadere jure suo suaque authoritate liceat?  Nulli certe quamdiu 
rex manet.  Semper enim ex divinis id obstat, Regem honorificato; 
& qui potestati resistit, Dei ordinationi resisit: non alias 
igitur in eum populo potestas est quam si id committat propter 
quod ipso jure rex esse desinat.  Tunc enim se ipse principatu 
exuit atque in privatis constituit liber: hoc modo populus & 
superior efficitur, reverso ad eum sc.  jure illo quod ante regem 
inauguratum in interregno habuit.   At sunt paucorum generum 
commissa ejusmodi quae hunc effectum pariunt.  At ego cum plurima 
animo perlustrem, duo tantum invenio, duos, inquam, casus quibus 
rex ipso facto ex rege non regem se facit & omni honore & 
dignitate regali atque in subditos potestate destituit; quorum 
etiam meminit Winzerus.  Horum unus est, Si regnum disperdat, 
quemadmodum de Nerone fertur, quod is nempe senatum populumque 
Romanum, atque adeo urbem ipsam ferro flammaque vastare, ac novas 
sibi sedes quaerere decrevisset.  Et de Caligula, quod palam 
denunciarit se neque civem neque principem senatui amplius fore, 
inque animo habuerit interempto utriusque ordinis electissimo 
quoque Alexandriam commigrare, ac ut populum uno ictu 
interimeret, unam ei cervicem optavit.  Talia cum rex aliquis 
meditator & molitur serio, omnem regnandi curam & animum ilico 
abjicit, ac proinde imperium in subditos amittit, ut dominus 
servi pro derelicto habiti dominium.

     Sec. 236.  Alter casus est, Si rex in alicujus clientelam se 
contulit, ac regnum quod liberum a majoribus & populo traditum 
accepit, alienae ditioni mancipavit.  Nam tunc quamvis forte non 
ea mente id agit populo plane ut incommodet: tamen quia quod 
praecipuum est regiae dignitatis amifit, ut summus scilicet in 
regno secundum Deum sit, & solo Deo inferior, atque populum etiam 
totum ignorantem vel invitum, cujus libertatem sartam & tectam 
conservare debuit, in alterius gentis ditionem & potestatem 
dedidit; hac velut quadam regni ab alienatione effecit, ut nec 
quod ipse in regno imperium habuit retineat, nec in eum cui 
collatum voluit, juris quicquam transferat; atque ita eo facto 
liberum jam & suae potestatis populum relinquit, cujus rei 
exemplum unum annales Scotici suppeditant.   Barclay contra 
Monarchom. 1. iii. c. 16.

    Which in English runs thus:

     Sec. 237.  What then, can there no case happen wherein the 
people may of right, and by their own authority, help themselves, 
take arms, and set upon their king, imperiously domineering over 
them?  None at all, whilst he remains a king.  Honour the king, 
and he that resists the power, resists the ordinance of God; are 
divine oracles that will never permit it, The people therefore 
can never come by a power over him, unless he does something that 

makes him cease to be a king: for then he divests himself of his 
crown and dignity, and returns to the state of a private man, and 
the people become free and superior, the power which they had in 
the interregnum, before they crowned him king, devolving to them 
again.  But there are but few miscarriages which bring the matter 
to this state.  After considering it well on all sides, I can 
find but two.  Two cases there are, I say, whereby a king, ipso 
facto, becomes no king, and loses all power and regal authority 
over his people; which are also taken notice of by Winzerus.

     The first is, If he endeavour to overturn the government, 
that is, if he have a purpose and design to ruin the kingdom and 
commonwealth, as it is recorded of Nero, that he resolved to cut 
off the senate and people of Rome, lay the city waste with fire 
and sword, and then remove to some other place.  And of Caligula, 
that he openly declared, that he would be no longer a head to the 
people or senate, and that he had it in his thoughts to cut off 
the worthiest men of both ranks, and then retire to Alexandria: 
and he wisht that the people had but one neck, that he might 
dispatch them all at a blow, Such designs as these, when any king 
harbours in his thoughts, and seriously promotes, he immediately 
gives up all care and thought of the common-wealth; and 
consequently forfeits the power of governing his subjects, as a 
master does the dominion over his slaves whom he hath abandoned.

     Sec. 238.  The other case is, When a king makes himself the 
dependent of another, and subjects his kingdom which his 
ancestors left him, and the people put free into his hands, to 
the dominion of another: for however perhaps it may not be his 
intention to prejudice the people; yet because he has hereby lost 
the principal part of regal dignity, viz.  to be next and 
immediately under God, supreme in his kingdom; and also because 
he betrayed or forced his people, whose liberty he ought to have 
carefully preserved, into the power and dominion of a foreign 
nation.  By this, as.  it were, alienation of his kingdom, he 
himself loses the power he had in it before, without transferring 
any the least right to those on whom he would have bestowed it; 
and so by this act sets the people free, and leaves them at their 
own disposal.  One example of this is to be found in the Scotch 
Annals.