In the fupreme

power of the

vation of the community.

thority to chuse and change her government, fo hath fhe alfo to limit the fame with what laws and conditions fhe pleaseth; whereof enfueth the great diversity of authority and power, which each one of the former governments hath."

It is to this fovereignty or fupreme power legislature con- of legislating, that is, of making and establishfits the prefer- ing, and of altering, changing, and newmodelling the government, which conftantly and unalienably refides in the people, or in the community, that Mr. Locke attributes the fecurity and actual prefervation of all our civil and political rights and liberties. * «Though the legislative, whether placed in one or more, whether it be always in being, or only by intervals, though it be the fupreme power in every commonwealth, yet it is not, nor can poffibly be, abfolutely arbitrary over the lives and fortunes of the people. For it being but the joint power of every member of the fociety given up to that perfon or affembly, which is legiflator, it can be no more, than thofe perfons had in a ftate of nature, before they entered into fociety, and gave up to the community. For nobody can transfer to another more power,

• Locke of Civil Government, p. 205. *

than

than he has in himfelf; and nobody has an abfolute arbitrary power over himself, or over any other, to deftroy his own life, or take away the life or property of another. A man, as has been proved, cannot fubject himself to the arbitrary power of another; and having, in the ftate of nature, no arbitrary power over the life, liberty, or poffeffion of another, but only fo much as the law of nature gave him, for the prefervation of himself and the rest of mankind, this is all he doth or can give up to the commonwealth, and by it to the legislative power; fo that the legiflative can have no more than this. Their power, in the utmost bounds of it, is limited to the public good of the fociety; it is a power that hath no other end but prefervation, and therefore can never have a right to destroy, enflave, or defignedly to impoverish the fubjects. The obligations of the law of nature cease not in fociety, but only in many cafes are drawn clofer, and have, by human laws, known penalties annexed to them, to enforce their obfervation. Thus the law of nature stands as an eternal rule to all men, legiflators as well as others. The rules, that they make for other men's actions must, as well as their own and other men's actions, be conformable to the law of nature, i. e. to the

The first principles of go

vernment uncontrovertible.

will of God, of which that is a declaration; and the fundamental law of nature being the preservation of mankind, no human fanction can be good or valid against it."

I am fearful of fatiguing my readers with quotations: I have before given a reason for citing them, and I feel an encreafing anxiety to avoid the imputation of withholding the light from the fubject under confideration. I neither forget nor flight the exhortation of Dr. Price: Enlighten them and you will elevate them.

<<Though the fchoolmen were corrupt, they were neither ftupid nor unlearned; they could not but fee that, which all men faw, nor lay more approved foundations, than that man is naturally free; that he cannot justly be deprived of that liberty without cause; and that he doth not refign it, or any part of it, unless it be in confideration of a greater good, which he proposes to himself." Sa uncontrovertible and true did the principles, which I have laid down upon this fubject, appear to the fame author, that, fpeaking in the very next page, of Sir Robert Filmer, his great tory antagonist, he fays, "This,

• Algernoon Sydney's Difcourfes concerning Government, fec. ii. p. 5.

which hath its root in common fenfe, not being to be overthrown by reafon, he fpares his pains of feeking any; but thinks it enough to render his doctrine plaufible to his own party, by joining the jefuits to Geneva, and coupling Buchannan to Doleman, as both maintaining the fame doctrine; though he might as well have joined the puritans with the Turks, because they all think that one and one makes two."-I have now endeavoured to fhew clearly, that fociety and government were conftituted by God: but that the particular form of each government was left by him to the free option of the community, which was to be ruled by it." Upon the fame grounds we may conclude, that no privilege is peculiarly annexed to any form of government; but that all magiftrates are equally the minifters of God, who perform the work for which they were inftituted." And, "This fhews the work of all magiftrates to be always and every where the fame, even the doing of justice, and procuring the welfare of those, that created them. This we learn from common fenfe: Plato, Ariftotle, Cicero, and the best human authors, lay it as an immoveable foundation, upon which they

• Algernoon Sydney's Difcourfes concerning Government, P. 55.

build their arguments relating to matters of that nature; and the apoftle, from better authority, declares, That rulers are not a terror

to good works, but to evil: wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shall have praife of the fame; for he is the minister of God unto thee for good; but if thou do that, which is evil be afraid, for be beareth not the fword in vain; for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. And the reason he gives for praying for kings, and all that are in authority, is, that we may live a quiet and peaceable life, in all godliness and honesty."

I have hitherto confidered only the right, which each community effentially retains of forming and modelling the government, to which it chuses to fubject itself. I will now proceed to examine more minutely, upon what this right is founded.

* «Because no one of them is obliged to enter into the fociety, that the reft may constitute, he cannot enjoy the benefit of that fociety, unless he enter into it. He may be gone, and fet up for himself, or fet up another with fuch, as will agree with him; but if he enter into the fociety, he is obliged by

* Algernoon Sydney's Difcourfe concerning Government, p. 80, 81.

the