8.]

I.

law respecteth both "the evil act past" and "the good to come." DISCOURSE The ground of it is "the evil act past;" the scope or end of it is "the good to come." The end without the ground cannot justify the act. A bad intention may make a good action bad; but a good intention cannot make a bad action good. It is not lawful to "do evil, that good may come" of it; nor [Rom. iii. to punish an innocent person for the admonition of others: that is, to 'fall into a certain crime, for fear of an uncertain.' Again, though there were no other end of penalties inflicted, neither probatory, nor castigatory, nor exemplary, but only vindicatory, to satisfy the law, out of a zeal of justice, by giving to every one his own, yet the action is just and warrantable. Killing, as it is considered in itself without all undue circumstances, was never prohibited to the lawful magistrate, who is the vicegerent or lieutenant of God, from Whom he derives his power of life and death.

consisten

T. H. hath one plea more. As a drowning man catcheth [T. H.'s inat every bulrush, so he lays hold on every pretence to save a cies.] desperate cause. But, first, it is worth our observation to see how oft he changeth shapes in this one particular. First, he told us, that it was the "irresistible power" of God that "justi682 fies all His actions," though He command one thing openly and plot another thing secretly, though He be the cause, not only of the action, but also of the irregularity, though He both give man power to act and determine this power to evil as well as good, though He punish the creatures for doing that, which He Himself did necessitate them to do. But, being pressed with reason,--that this is tyrannical, first to necessitate a man to do His will, and then to punish him for doing of it, he leaves this pretence in the plain field, and flies to a second;-that therefore a man is justly punished for that which he was necessitated to do, because the act was voluntary on his parts. This hath more show of reason than the former, if he did make the will of man to be in his own disposition; but, maintaining, that the will is irresistibly determined to will whatsoever it doth will, the injustice and absurdity is the same :-first, to necessitate a man to will, and then to punish him for willing. The dog only bites the stone which is thrown at him with a strange hand; but they [See T. H. Numb. xii., above p. 66.] [See above, p. 85.]

PART make the First Cause to punish the instrument for that which is His own proper act. Wherefore, not being satisfied with this, he casts it off, and flies to his third shift. "Men are not punished" (saith he) "therefore, because their theft proceeded from election" (that is, because it was willingly done, for "to elect and will," saith he, "are both onet,"-is not this to blow hot and cold with the same breath?), "but because it was noxious, and contrary to men's preservation." Thus far he saith true, that every creature, by the instinct of nature, seeks to preserve itself. Cast water into a dusty place, and it contracts itself into little globes; that is, to preserve itself. And those who are "noxious" in the eye of the law, are justly punished by them to whom the execution of the law is committed; but the law accounts no persons "noxious" but those who are noxious by their own fault. It punisheth not a thorn for pricking, because it is the nature of the thorn, and it can do no otherwise; nor a child before it have the use of If one should take mine hand perforce and give another a box on the ear with it, my hand is "noxious," but the law punisheth the other who is faulty. And therefore he hath reason to propose the question, "how it is just to kill one man to amend another," if he who killed did nothing but what he was "necessitated" to do. He might as well demand, how it is lawful to murder a company of innocent infants, to make a bath of their lukewarm blood for curing the leprosy. It had been a more rational way, first, to have demonstrated that it is so, and then to have questioned why it is so. His assertion itself is but a dream; and the reason which he gives of it why it is so, is a dream of a dream.

[Right and wrong antecedent to

human pacts.]

reason.

The sum of it is this,-that "where there is no law, there no killing or anything else can be unjust;" that before the constitution of commonwealths every man had power to kill another, if he conceived him to be hurtful to him; that at the constitution of commonwealths particular men "lay down" this right in part, and in part reserve it to themselves, "as in case of theft, or murder;" that "the right which the commonwealth hath to put" a malefactor "to death, is not created by the law, but remaineth from the first right of nature, which every man hath, to preserve himself;"

[See below, T. H. Numb. xx. p. 700 (fol. edit.).]

I.

that the killing of men in this case is as the killing of beasts DISCOURSE "in order to our own preservation." This may well be called stringing of paradoxes.

1. But, first, there never was any such time when mankind was without governors and laws and "societies." Paternal government was in the world from the beginning, and the law of nature. There might be sometimes a root of such barbarous thievish brigands, in some rocks, or deserts, or odd corners of the world; but it was an abuse, and a degeneration from the nature of man, who is a political creature. This savage opinion reflects too much upon the honour of mankind.

2. Secondly, there never was a time when it was lawful ordinarily for private men to kill one another for their own preservation. If God would have had men live like wild beasts, as lions, bears, or tigers, He would have armed them with horns, or tusks, or talons, or pricks; but of all creatures man is born most naked, without any weapon to defend himself, because God had provided a better means of security for him, that is, the magistrate.

3. Thirdly, that right which private men have, to preserve themselves, though it be with the killing of another, when they are set upon to be murdered or robbed, is not a remainder or a reserve of some greater power which they have 683 resigned, but a privilege which God hath given them, in case of extreme danger and invincible necessity, that when they cannot possibly have recourse to the ordinary remedy, that is, the magistrate, every man becomes a magistrate to himself. 4. Fourthly, nothing can give that which it never had. The people, whilst they were a dispersed rabble (which in some odd cases might happen to be), never had justly the power of life and death, and therefore they could not give it by their election. All that they do is to prepare the matter; but it is God Almighty, that infuseth the soul of power.

5. Fifthly, and lastly, I am sorry to hear a man of reason and parts to compare the murdering of men with the slaughtering of brute beasts. The elements are for the plants, the plants for the brute beasts, the brute beasts for man. When God enlarged His former grant to man, and gave him liberty to eat the flesh of the creatures for his sus- Gen. ix. 3.

Gen. ix. 6.

[Rom. v.

12.]

PART tenance, yet man is expressly excepted,-" Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed;"—and the reason is assigned,-"For in the image of God made He man." Before "sin entered into the world," or before any creatures were hurtful or "noxious" to man, he had dominion over them, as their lord and master. And though the possession of this sovereignty be lost in part for the sin of man, which made not only the creatures to rebel, but also the inferior faculties to rebel against the superior (from whence it comes, that one man is hurtful to another), yet the dominion still remains: wherein we may observe, how sweetly the providence of God doth temper this cross; that though the strongest creatures have withdrawn their obedience, as lions and bears, to shew that man hath lost the excellency of his dominion, and the weakest creatures, as flies and gnats, to shew into what a degree of contempt he is fallen, yet still the most profitable and useful creatures, as sheep and oxen, do in some degree retain their obedience.

[Consultation does imply liberty, and does not

The next branch of his answer concerns "consultations;" which (saith he) are not superfluous, though all things come to pass necessarily, because they are "the cause which doth necessitate necessitate the effect," and the "means to bring it to pass." nation. ] We were told Numb. xi.", that the last dictate of right

determi

reason was but as the last feather which breaks the horse's back. It is well; yet that reason hath gained some command again, and is become at least a quarter-master. Certainly, if anything under God have power to determine the will, it is right reason. But I have shewed sufficiently, that reason doth not determine the will physically nor absolutely, much less extrinsecally and antecedently; and therefore it makes nothing for that necessity which T. H. hath undertaken to prove. He adds further, that as the end is necessary, so are the means; and "when it is determined that one thing shall be chosen before another, it is determined also for what cause it shall be so chosen." All which is truth, but not the whole truth. For, as God ordains means for all ends, so He adapts and fits the means to their respective ends; free means to free ends, contingent means to contingent ends, necessary means to necessary ends: whereas T. H. would have all " [Above p. 59.]

I.

means, all ends, to be necessary. If God hath so ordered DISCOURSE the world, that a man ought to use and may freely use those means of good, which he doth neglect, not by virtue of God's decree but by his own fault; if a man use those means of evil, which he ought not to use, and which by God's decree he had power to forbear; if God have left to man in part the free managery of human affairs, and to that purpose hath endowed him with understanding; then consultations are of use, then provident care is needful, then it concerns him to use the means. But if God have so ordered this world, that a man cannot if he would neglect any means of good, which by virtue of God's decree it is possible for him to use, and that he cannot possibly use any means of evil but those which are irresistibly and inevitably imposed upon him by an antecedent decree; then not only consultations are vain, but that noble faculty of reason itself is vain. Do we think, that we can help God Almighty to do His proper work? In vain we trouble ourselves; in vain we take care to use those means, which are not in our power to use or not to use. And this is that which was contained in my prolepsis or prevention of his answer, though he be pleased both to disorder it and to silence it. We cannot hope by our labours to alter the course of things set down by God. Let Him perform His 684 decree. Let the necessary causes do their work. If we be those causes, yet we are not in our own disposition; we must do what we are ordained to do, and more we cannot do. Man hath no remedy but patience, and shrug up the shoulders. This is the doctrine [which] flows from this opinion of absolute necessity. Let us suppose the great wheel of the clock, which sets all the little wheels a going, to be as the decree of God; and that the motion of it were perpetual, infallible, from an intrinsecal principle, even as God's decree is infallible, eternal, all-sufficient. Let us suppose the lesser wheels to be the second causes; and that they do as certainly follow the motion of the great wheel, without missing or swerving in the least degree, as the second causes do pursue the determination of the first cause. I desire to know in this case, what cause there is to call a council of smiths, to consult and order the motion of that which was ordered and determined before their hands? Are men wiser than God?