Sec. 239.  In these cases Barclay, the great champion of 
absolute monarchy, is forced to allow, that a king may be 
resisted, and ceases to be a king.  That is, in short, not to 
multiply cases, in whatsoever he has no authority, there he is no 
king, and may be resisted: for wheresoever the authority ceases, 
the king ceases too, and becomes like other men who have no 
authority.  And these two cases he instances in, differ little 
from those above mentioned, to be destructive to governments, 
only that he has omitted the principle from which his doctrine 
flows: and that is, the breach of trust, in not preserving the 
form of government agreed on, and in not intending the end of 
government itself, which is the public good and preservation of 
property.  When a king has dethroned himself, and put himself in 
a state of war with his people, what shall hinder them from 
prosecuting him who is no king, as they would any other man, who 
has put himself into a state of war with them, Barclay, and those 
of his opinion, would do well to tell us.  This farther I desire 
may be taken notice of out of Barclay, that he says, The mischief 
that is designed them, the people may prevent before it be clone: 
whereby he allows resistance when tyranny is but in design.  Such 
designs as these (says he) when any king harbours in his thoughts 
and seriously promotes, he immediately gives up all care and 
thought of the common-wealth; so that, according to him, the 
neglect of the public good is to be taken as an evidence of such 
design, or at least for a sufficient cause of resistance.  And 
the reason of all, he gives in these words, Because he betrayed 
or forced his people, whose liberty he ought carefully to have 
preserved.  What he adds, into the power and dominion of a 

foreign nation, signifies nothing, the fault and forfeiture lying 
in the loss of their liberty, which he ought to have preserved, 
and not in any distinction of the persons to whose dominion they 
were subjected.  The peoples right is equally invaded, and their 
liberty lost, whether they are made slaves to any of their own, 
or a foreign nation; and in this lies the injury, and against 
this only have they the right of defence.  And there are 
instances to be found in all countries, which shew, that it is 
not the change of nations in the persons of their governors, but 
the change of government, that gives the offence.  Bilson, a 
bishop of our church, and a great stickler for the power and 
prerogative of princes, does, if I mistake not, in his treatise 
of Christian subjection, acknowledge, that princes may forfeit 
their power, and their title to the obedience of their subjects; 
and if there needed authority in a case where reason is so plain, 
I could send my reader to Bracton, Fortescue, and the author of 
the Mirrour, and others, writers that cannot be suspected to be 
ignorant of our government, or enemies to it.  But I thought 
Hooker alone might be enough to satisfy those men, who relying on 
him for their ecclesiastical polity, are by a strange fate 
carried to deny those principles upon which he builds it.   
Whether they are herein made the tools of cunninger workmen, to 
pull down their own fabric, they were best look.  This I am sure, 
their civil policy is so new, so dangerous, and so destructive to 
both rulers and people, that as former ages never could bear the 
broaching of it; so it may be hoped, those to come, redeemed from 
the impositions of these Egyptian under-task-masters, will abhor 
the memory of such servile flatterers, who, whilst it seemed to 
serve their turn, resolved all government into absolute tyranny, 
and would have all men born to, what their mean souls fitted them 
for, slavery.

     Sec. 240.  Here, it is like, the common question will be 
made, Who shall be judge, whether the prince or legislative act 
contrary to their trust?  This, perhaps, ill-affected and 
factious men may spread amongst the people, when the prince only 
makes use of his due prerogative.  To this I reply, The people 
shall be judge; for who shall be judge whether his trustee or 
deputy acts well, and according to the trust reposed in him, but 
he who deputes him, and must, by having deputed him, have still a 
power to discard him, when he fails in his trust?  If this be 
reasonable in particular cases of private men, why should it be 
otherwise in that of the greatest moment, where the welfare of 
millions is concerned, and also where the evil, if not prevented, 
is greater, and the redress very difficult, dear, and dangerous?

     Sec. 241.  But farther, this question, (Who shall be judge?) 
cannot mean, that there is no judge at all: for where there is no 
judicature on earth, to decide controversies amongst men, God in 
heaven is judge.  He alone, it is true, is judge of the right.  
But every man is judge for himself, as in all other cases, so in 
this, whether another hath put himself into a state of war with 
him, and whether he should appeal to the Supreme Judge, as leptha 
did.

     Sec. 242.  If a controversy arise betwixt a prince and some 
of the people, in a matter where the law is silent, or doubtful, 
and the thing be of great consequence, I should think the proper 
umpire, in such a case, should be the body of the people: for in 
cases where the prince hath a trust reposed in him, and is 
dispensed from the common ordinary rules of the law; there, if 
any men find themselves aggrieved, and think the prince acts 
contrary to, or beyond that trust, who so proper to judge as the 
body of the people, (who, at first, lodged that trust in him) how 
far they meant it should extend?  But if the prince, or whoever 
they be in the administration, decline that way of determination, 
the appeal then lies no where but to heaven; force between either 
persons, who have no known superior on earth, or which permits no 
appeal to a judge on earth, being properly a state of war,