from whence Joctan having many sons, some of them might pass into India, hearing of the beauty and riches thereof. But this was in process of time. The other fashion of planting I understand not, being grounded but upon men's imaginations, contrary to reason and possibility. And that this mountain in the east was no further off than in those regions before remembered, it appeareth by many places of the scripture where the same phrase is used; as in Numbers xxiii. 7. Balak the king of Moab hath brought me from Aram, out of the mountain of the east; which was from the east part of Mesopotamia. For Balak brought Balaam out of Mesopotamia, (witness this place of Deuteronomy xxiii. 4.) Because they hired Balaam the son of Beor, of Pethor in Aram Naharaiim, to curse thee; for Aram Naharaiim was Syria Fluviorum, which is Mesopotamia, as aforesaid. This plantation of the world after the flood doth best agree, as to me it seems, with all the places of scripture compared together. And these be the reports of reason and probable conjecture; the guides which I have followed herein, and which I have chosen to go after, making no valuation of the opinions of men, conducted by their own fancies, be they ancient or modern. Neither have I any end herein, private or public, other than the discovery of truth. For as the partiality of man to himself hath disguised all things, so the factious and hireling historians of all ages, (especially of these latter times,) have, by their many volumes of untrue reports, left honour without a monument, and virtue without memory; and instead thereof, have erected statues and trophies to those, whom the darkest forgetfulness ought to have buried and covered over for evermore. And although the length and dissolving nature of time hath worn out or changed the names and memory of the world's first planters after the flood, (I mean the greatest number and most part of them,) yet all the footsteps of antiquity, as appears by that which hath been spoken, are not quite worn out nor overgrown; for Babylon hath to this day the sound of Babel, Phoenicia hath Zidon, to which city the eldest son of Canaan gave name; so hath Cilicia Tharsis, and the Armenians, Medes, Hiberians, Cappadocians, Phrygians, the Syrians, Idumeans, Libyans, Moors, and other nations, have preserved from the death of forgetfulness some signs of their first founders and true parents. CHAP. IX. Of the beginning and establishing of government. SECT. I. Of the proceeding from the first government under the eldest of families to regal, and from regal absolute to regal tempered with laws. IT followeth now to entreat how the world began to receive rule and government, which, while it had scarcity of people, underwent no other dominion than paternity and eldership. For the fathers of nations were then as kings, 、 and the eldest of families as princes. Hereof it came, that the word elder was always used both for the magistrate, and for those of age and gravity; the same bearing one signification almost in all languages. For in Numbers xi. God commanded Moses to gather together seventy of the elders of the people, and governors over them; the Hebrew bearing the same sense which the Latin word senes or seniores doth. So it is written in Susanna; Then the assembly believed them, as those that were the elders and judges of the people. And so in the words of those false judges and witnesses to Daniel; Shew it unto us, seeing God hath given thee the office of an elder. Demosthenes useth the same word for the magistrate among the Grecians. Cicero in Cato giveth two other reasons for this appellation: Apud Lacedæmonios qui amplissimum magistratum gerunt, ut sunt, sic etiam appellantur senes; "Among the Lacedæmo"nians the chief magistrates, as they are, so are they called "eldermen :" and again, Ratio et prudentia nisi essent in senibus, non summum concilium majores nostri appellassent senatum ; "If reason and advisement were not in old men, our ancestors had never called the highest council by the "name of a senate." 66 But though these reasons may well be given, yet we doubt not but in this name of elders, for governors or counsellors of state, there is a sign that the first governors were the fathers of families, and under them the eldest sons. And from thence did the French, Italian, and Spaniard take the word signor, and out of it signiory, for lordship and dominion; signifying, according to Loyseau, puissance in propriety, or proper power. The kinds of this signiory Seneca makes two; the one, potestas aut imperium; power or command;" the other, proprietas aut dominium, 66 propriety or mastership:" the correlative of the one is the subject, of the other the slave. Ad Cæsarem, saith he, potestas omnium pertinet, ad singulos proprietas; “Cæsar "hath power over all, and every man propriety in his "own." And again; Cæsar omnia imperio possidet, singuli dominio; "Cæsar holdeth all in his power, and every man possesseth his own." But as men and vice began abundantly to increase, so obedience, (the fruit of natural reverence, which but from excellent seed seldom ripeneth,) being exceedingly overshadowed with pride and ill examples, utterly withered and fell away; and the soft weapons of paternal persuasions (after mankind began to neglect and forget the original and first giver of life) became in all overweak, either to resist the first inclination of evil, or after, when it became habitual, to constrain it. So that now, when the hearts of men were only guided and steered by their own fancies, and tossed to and fro on the tempestuous seas of the world, while wisdom was severed from power, and strength from charity; 9 necessity (which bindeth every nature but the immortal) made both the wise and foolish understand at once, that the estate of reasonable men would become far more miserable than that of beasts, and that a general flood of confusion would a second time overflow them, did they not, by a general obedience to order and doNecessitas est firmum judicium, et immutabilis providentiæ potestas. minion, prevent it. For the mighty, who trusted in their own strengths, found others again (by interchange of times) more mighty than themselves; the feeble fell under the forcible, and the equal from equal received equal harms. Insomuch, that licentious disorder (which seemed to promise a liberty upon the first acquaintance) proved, upon a better trial, no less perilous than an unendurable bondage. These arguments, by necessity propounded, and by reason maintained and confirmed, persuaded all nations which the heavens cover, to subject themselves to a master, and to magistracy in some degree. Under which government, as the change (which brought with it less evil than the former mischiefs) was generally pleasing, so time (making all men wise that observe it) found some imperfection and corrosive in this cure. And therefore the same necessity which invented, and the same reason which approved sovereign power, bethought itself of certain equal rules, in which dominion (in the beginning boundless) might also discern her own limits. For before the invention of laws, private affections in supreme rulers made their own fancies both their treasurers and hangmen; measuring by this yard, and weighing in this balance both good and evil. For as wisdom in eldership preceded the rule of kings, so the will of kings forewent the inventions of laws: Populus nullis legibus tenebatur: arbitria principum pro legibus erant; "The people were not governed by any other laws "than the wills of princes." Hereof it followed, that when kings left to be good, neither did those men's virtues value them, which were not fancied by their kings, nor those men's vices deform them that were: Amor interdum nimis videt, interdum nihil videt; "Love sees one while too much, "another while stark nothing." Hence it came to pass, that after a few years (for direction and restraint of royal power) laws were established; and that government which had this mixture of equality, (holding in an even balance supreme power and common right,) acquired the title of regal; the other, which had it not, was known for tyrannical; the one God established in favour of his people, the other he permitted for their affliction. In the infancy of this regal authority, princes, as they were chosen for their virtues only, so did they measure their powers by a great deal of moderation. And therefore, saith Fabius Pictor, Principes, quia justi erant, et religionibus dediti, jure habiti dii et dicti ; " Princes, because "they were just and religious, were rightly accounted and "called gods." And though, speaking humanly, the beginning of empire may be ascribed to reason and necessity, yet it was God himself that first kindled this light in the minds of men, whereby they saw that they could not live and be preserved without a ruler and conductor; God himself, by his eternal providence, having ordained kings, and the law of nature leaders and rulers over others. For the very bees have their prince; the deer their leaders; and cranes, by order imposed, watch for their own safety. s The Most High beareth rule over the kingdoms of men, and appointeth over it whomsoever he pleaseth. By me, saith Wisdom, spoken by the Son of God, kings reign; by me princes rule and, It is God, saith u Daniel, that setteth up kings and taketh away kings: and that this power is given from God, Christ himself witnesseth, speaking to Pilate; Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above. t It was therefore by a threefold justice that the world hath been governed from the beginning: to wit, by a justice natural; by which the parents and elders of families governed their children, and nephews, and families, in which government the obedience was called natural piety: again, by a justice divine, drawn from the laws and ordinances of God, and the obedience hereunto was called conscience; and lastly, by a justice civil, begotten by both the former, and De Aureo Sæculo, par. 1. s Dan. v. 21. + Prov. viii. 15. u Dan. ii. 21. |