Words necessary means selected with caution."The necessary means (which is the phrase used by the Commons in their first article) words made choice of by them with the greatest caution. Those means are described (in the preamble to their charge) to be, that glorious enterprise which his late Majesty undertook, with an armed force, to deliver this kingdom from Popery and arbitrary power; the concurrence of many subjects of the realm, who came over with him in that enterprise, and of many others, of all ranks and orders, who appeared in arms in many parts of the kingdom in aid of that enterprise.

"These were the means that brought about the Revolution; and which the act that passed soon after, declaring the rights and liberties of the subject, and settling the succession of the crown, intends, when his late Majesty is therein called the glorious instrument of delivering the kingdom; and which the Commons, in the last part of their first article, express by the word resistance.

Regard of the Commons to their allegiance to the crown, and to the ancient Constitution."But the Commons, who will never be unmindful of the allegiance of the subjects to the crown of this realm, judged it highly incumbent upon them, out of regard to the safety of her Majesty's person and government, and the ancient and legal Constitution of this kingdom, to call that resistance the necessary means; thereby plainly founding that power, of right and resistance, which was exercised by the people at the time of the happy Revolution, and which the duties of self-preservation and religion called them to, upon the NECESSITY of the case, and at the same time effectually securing her Majesty's government, and the due allegiance of all her subjects."

All ages have the same interest in preservation of the contract, and the same Constitution."The nature of such an original contract of government proves that there is not only a power in the people, who have inherited its freedom, to assert their own title to it, but they are bound in duty to transmit the same Constitution to their posterity also."

Mr. Lechmere made a second speech. Notwithstanding the clear and satisfactory manner in which he delivered himself in his first, upon this arduous question, he thinks himself bound again distinctly to assert the same foundation, and to justify the Revolution on the case of necessity only, upon principles perfectly coinciding with those laid down in Mr. Burke's letter on the French affairs.

Mr. Lechmere.

The Commons strictly confine their ideas of a revolution to necessity alone and self-defence."Your Lordships were acquainted, in opening the charge, with how great caution, and with what unfeigned regard to her Majesty and her government, and to the duty and allegiance of her subjects, the Commons made choice of the words necessary means to express the resistance that was made use of to bring about the Revolution, and with the condemning of which the Doctor is charged by this article: not doubting but that the honor and justice of that resistance, from the necessity of that case, and to which alone we have strictly confined ourselves, when duly considered, would confirm and strengthen[A][A] N.B. The remark implies, that allegiance would be insecure without this restriction. and be understood to be an effectual security of the allegiance of the subject to the crown of this realm, in every other case where there is not the same necessity; and that the right of the people to self-defence, and preservation of their liberties, by resistance as their last remedy, is the result of a case of such NECESSITY ONLY, and by which the ORIGINAL CONTRACT between king and people is broke. This was the principle laid down and carried through all that was said with respect to ALLEGIANCE; and on WHICH FOUNDATION, in the name and on the behalf of all the commons of Great Britain, we assert and justify that resistance by which the late happy Revolution was brought about."

"It appears to your Lordships and the world, that breaking the original contract between king and people were the words made choice of by that House of Commons," (the House of Commons which originated the Declaration of Right,) "with the greatest deliberation and judgment, and approved of by your Lordships, in that first and fundamental step made towards the re-establishment of the government, which had received so great a shock from the evil counsels which had been given to that unfortunate prince."

Sir John Hawles, another of the managers, follows the steps of his brethren, positively affirming the doctrine of non-resistance to government to be the general moral, religious, and political rule for the subject, and justifying the Revolution on the same principle with Mr. Burke,—that is, as an exception from necessity. Indeed, he carries the doctrine on the general idea of non-resistance much further than Mr. Burke has done, and full as far as it can perhaps be supported by any duty of perfect obligation, however noble and heroic it may be in many cases to suffer death rather than disturb the tranquillity of our country.

Sir John Hawles.[15]

"Certainly it must be granted, that the doctrine that commands obedience to the supreme power, though in things contrary to Nature, even to suffer death, which is the highest injustice that can be done a man, rather than make an opposition to the supreme power [is reasonable[16]], because the death of one or some few private persons is a less evil than disturbing the whole government; that law must needs be understood to forbid the doing or saying anything to disturb the government, the rather because the obeying that law cannot be pretended to be against Nature: and the Doctor's refusing to obey that implicit law is the reason for which he is now prosecuted; though he would have it believed that the reason he is now prosecuted was for the doctrine he asserted of obedience to the supreme power; which he might have preached as long as he had pleased, and the Commons would have taken no offence at it, if he had stopped there, and not have taken upon him, on that pretence or occasion, to have cast odious colors upon the Revolution."

General Stanhope was among the managers. He begins his speech by a reference to the opinion of his fellow-managers, which he hoped had put beyond all doubt the limits and qualifications that the Commons had placed to their doctrines concerning the Revolution; yet, not satisfied with this general reference, after condemning the principle of non-resistance, which is asserted in the sermon without any exception, and stating, that, under the specious pretence of preaching a peaceable doctrine, Sacheverell and the Jacobites meant, in reality, to excite a rebellion in favor of the Pretender, he explicitly limits his ideas of resistance with the boundaries laid down by his colleagues, and by Mr. Burke.

General Stanhope.

Rights of the subject and the crown equally legal."The Constitution of England is founded upon compact; and the subjects of this kingdom have, in their several public and private capacities, as legal a title to what are their rights by law as a prince to the possession of his crown.

Justice of resistance founded on necessity."Your Lordships, and most that hear me, are witnesses, and must remember the necessities of those times which brought about the Revolution: that no other remedy was left to preserve our religion and liberties; that resistance was necessary, and consequently just."

"Had the Doctor, in the remaining part of his sermon, preached up peace, quietness, and the like, and shown how happy we are under her Majesty's administration, and exhorted obedience to it, he had never been called to answer a charge at your Lordships' bar. But the tenor of all his subsequent discourse is one continued invective against the government."

Mr. Walpole (afterwards Sir Robert) was one of the managers on this occasion. He was an honorable man and a sound Whig. He was not, as the Jacobites and discontented Whigs of his time have represented him, and as ill-informed people still represent him, a prodigal and corrupt minister. They charged him, in their libels and seditious conversations, as having first reduced corruption to a system. Such was their cant. But he was far from governing by corruption. He governed by party attachments. The charge of systematic corruption is less applicable to him, perhaps, than to any minister who ever served the crown for so great a length of time. He gained over very few from the opposition. Without being a genius of the first class, he was an intelligent, prudent, and safe minister. He loved peace, and he helped to communicate the same disposition to nations at least as warlike and restless as that in which he had the chief direction of affairs. Though he served a master who was fond of martial fame, he kept all the establishments very low. The land tax continued at two shillings in the pound for the greater part of his administration. The other impositions were moderate. The profound repose, the equal liberty, the firm protection of just laws, during the long period of his power, were the principal causes of that prosperity which afterwards took such rapid strides towards perfection, and which furnished to this nation ability to acquire the military glory which it has since obtained, as well as to bear the burdens, the cause and consequence of that warlike reputation. With many virtues, public and private, he had his faults; but his faults were superficial. A careless, coarse, and over-familiar style of discourse, without sufficient regard to persons or occasions, and an almost total want of political decorum, were the errors by which he was most hurt in the public opinion, and those through which his enemies obtained the greatest advantage over him. But justice must be done. The prudence, steadiness, and vigilance of that man, joined to the greatest possible lenity in his character and his politics, preserved the crown to this royal family, and, with it, their laws and liberties to this country. Walpole had no other plan of defence for the Revolution than that of the other managers, and of Mr. Burke; and he gives full as little countenance to any arbitrary attempts, on the part of restless and factious men, for framing new governments according to their fancies.

Mr. Walpole.

Case of resistance out of the law, and the highest offence.
Utmost necessity justifies it."Resistance is nowhere enacted to be legal, but subjected, by all the laws now in being, to the greatest penalties. 'Tis what is not, cannot, nor ought ever to be described, or affirmed in any positive law, to be excusable; when, and upon what never-to-be-expected occasions, it may be exercised, no man can foresee; and ought never to be thought of, but when an utter subversion of the laws of the realm threatens the whole frame of a Constitution, and no redress can otherwise be hoped for. It therefore does and ought forever to stand, in the eye and letter of the law, as the highest offence. But because any man, or party of men, may not, out of folly or wantonness, commit treason, or make their own discontents, ill principles, or disguised affections to another interest, a pretence to resist the supreme power, will it follow from thence that the utmost necessity ought not to engage a nation in its own defence for the preservation of the whole?"

Sir Joseph Jekyl was, as I have always heard and believed, as nearly as any individual could be, the very standard of Whig principles in his age. He was a learned and an able man; full of honor, integrity, and public spirit; no lover of innovation; nor disposed to change his solid principles for the giddy fashion of the hour. Let us hear this Whig.

Sir Joseph Jekyl.

Commons do not state the limits of submission.
To secure the laws, the only aim of the Revolution. "In clearing up and vindicating the justice of the Revolution, which was the second thing proposed, it is far from the intent of the Commons to state the limits and bounds of the subject's submission to the sovereign. That which the law hath been wisely silent in, the Commons desire to be silent in too; nor will they put any case of a justifiable resistance, but that of the Revolution only: and they persuade themselves that the doing right to that resistance will be so far from promoting popular license or confusion, that it will have a contrary effect, and be a means of settling men's minds in the love of and veneration for the laws; to rescue and secure which was the ONLY aim and intention of those concerned in that resistance."

Dr. Sacheverell's counsel defended him on this principle, namely,—that, whilst he enforced from the pulpit the general doctrine of non-resistance, he was not obliged to take notice of the theoretic limits which ought to modify that doctrine. Sir Joseph Jekyl, in his reply, whilst he controverts its application to the Doctor's defence, fully admits and even enforces the principle itself, and supports the Revolution of 1688, as he and all the managers had done before, exactly upon the same grounds on which Mr. Burke has built, in his Reflections on the French Revolution.

Sir Joseph Jekyl.

Blamable to state the bounds of non-resistance.
Resistance lawful only in case of extreme and obvious necessity."If the Doctor had pretended to have stated the particular bounds and limits of non-resistance, and told the people in what cases they might or might not resist, he would have been much to blame; nor was one word said in the articles, or by the managers, as if that was expected from him; but, on the contrary, we have insisted that in NO case can resistance be lawful, but in case of EXTREME NECESSITY, and where the Constitution can't otherwise be preserved; and such necessity ought to be plain and obvious to the sense and judgment of the whole nation: and this was the case at the Revolution."

The counsel for Doctor Sacheverell, in defending their client, were driven in reality to abandon the fundamental principles of his doctrine, and to confess that an exception to the general doctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance did exist in the case of the Revolution. This the managers for the Commons considered as having gained their cause, as their having obtained the whole of what they contended for. They congratulated themselves and the nation on a civil victory as glorious and as honorable as any that had obtained in arms during that reign of triumphs.

Sir Joseph Jekyl, in his reply to Harcourt, and the other great men who conducted the cause for the Tory side, spoke in the following memorable terms, distinctly stating the whole of what the Whig House of Commons contended for, in the name of all their constituents.

Sir Joseph Jekyl.

Necessity creates an exception, and the Revolution a case of necessity, the utmost extent of the demand of the Commons."My Lords, the concessions" (the concessions of Sacheverell's counsel) "are these: That necessity creates an exception to the general rule of submission to the prince; that such exception is understood or implied in the laws that require such submission; and that the case of the Revolution was a case of necessity.

"These are concessions so ample, and do so fully answer the drift of the Commons in this article, and are to the utmost extent of their meaning in it, that I can't forbear congratulating them upon this success of their impeachment,—that in full Parliament, this erroneous doctrine of unlimited non-resistance is given up and disclaimed. And may it not, in after ages, be an addition to the glories of this bright reign, that so many of those who are honored with being in her Majesty's service have been at your Lordships' bar thus successfully contending for the national rights of her people, and proving they are not precarious or remediless?

"But to return to these concessions: I must appeal to your Lordships, whether they are not a total departure from the Doctor's answer."

I now proceed to show that the Whig managers for the Commons meant to preserve the government on a firm foundation, by asserting the perpetual validity of the settlement then made, and its coercive power upon posterity. I mean to show that they gave no sort of countenance to any doctrine tending to impress the people (taken separately from the legislature, which includes the crown) with an idea that they had acquired a moral or civil competence to alter, without breach of the original compact on the part of the king, the succession to the crown, at their pleasure,—much less that they had acquired any right, in the case of such an event as caused the Revolution, to set up any new form of government. The author of the Reflections, I believe, thought that no man of common understanding could oppose to this doctrine the ordinary sovereign power as declared in the act of Queen Anne: that is, that the kings or queens of the realm, with the consent of Parliament, are competent to regulate and to settle the succession of the crown. This power is and ever was inherent in the supreme sovereignty, and was not, as the political divines vainly talk, acquired by the Revolution. It is declared in the old statute of Queen Elizabeth. Such a power must reside in the complete sovereignty of every kingdom; and it is in fact exercised in all of them. But this right of competence in the legislature, not in the people, is by the legislature itself to be exercised with sound discretion: that is to say, it is to be exercised or not, in conformity to the fundamental principles of this government, to the rules of moral obligation, and to the faith of pacts, either contained in the nature of the transaction or entered into by the body corporate of the kingdom,—which body in juridical construction never dies, and in fact never loses its members at once by death.

Whether this doctrine is reconcilable to the modern philosophy of government I believe the author neither knows nor cares, as he has little respect for any of that sort of philosophy. This may be because his capacity and knowledge do not reach to it. If such be the case, he cannot be blamed, if he acts on the sense of that incapacity; he cannot be blamed, if, in the most arduous and critical questions which can possibly arise, and which affect to the quick the vital parts of our Constitution, he takes the side which leans most to safety and settlement; that he is resolved not "to be wise beyond what is written" in the legislative record and practice; that, when doubts arise on them, he endeavors to interpret one statute by another, and to reconcile them all to established, recognized morals, and to the general, ancient, known policy of the laws of England. Two things are equally evident: the first is, that the legislature possesses the power of regulating the succession of the crown; the second, that in the exercise of that right it has uniformly acted as if under the restraints which the author has stated. That author makes what the ancients call mos majorum not indeed his sole, but certainly his principal rule of policy, to guide his judgment in whatever regards our laws. Uniformity and analogy can be preserved in them by this process only. That point being fixed, and laying fast hold of a strong bottom, our speculations may swing in all directions without public detriment, because they will ride with sure anchorage.

In this manner these things have been always considered by our ancestors. There are some, indeed, who have the art of turning the very acts of Parliament which were made for securing the hereditary succession in the present royal family, by rendering it penal to doubt of the validity of those acts of Parliament, into an instrument for defeating all their ends and purposes,—but upon grounds so very foolish that it is not worth while to take further notice of such sophistry.

To prevent any unnecessary subdivision, I shall here put together what may be necessary to show the perfect agreement of the Whigs with Mr. Burke in his assertions, that the Revolution made no "essential change in the constitution of the monarchy, or in any of its ancient, sound, and legal principles; that the succession was settled in the Hanover family, upon the idea and in the mode of an hereditary succession qualified with Protestantism; that it was not settled upon elective principles, in any sense of the word elective, or under any modification or description of election whatsoever; but, on the contrary, that the nation, after the Revolution, renewed by a fresh compact the spirit of the original compact of the state, binding itself, both in its existing members and all its posterity, to adhere to the settlement of an hereditary succession in the Protestant line, drawn from James the First, as the stock of inheritance."

Sir John Hawles.

Necessity of settling the right of the crown, and submission to the settlement."If he [Dr. Sacheverell] is of the opinion he pretends, I can't imagine how it comes to pass that he that pays that deference to the supreme power has preached so directly contrary to the determinations of the supreme power in this government, he very well knowing that the lawfulness of the Revolution, and of the means whereby it was brought about, has already been determined by the aforesaid acts of Parliament,—and do it in the worst manner that he could invent. For questioning the right to the crown here in England has procured the shedding of more blood and caused more slaughter than all the other matters tending to disturbances in the government put together. If, therefore, the doctrine which the Apostles had laid down was only to continue the peace of the world, as thinking the death of some few particular persons better to be borne with than a civil war, sure it is the highest breach of that law to question the first principles of this government."

"If the Doctor had been contented with the liberty he took of preaching up the duty of passive obedience in the most extensive manner he had thought fit, and would have stopped there, your Lordships would not have had the trouble in relation to him that you now have; but it is plain that he preached up his absolute and unconditional obedience, not to continue the peace and tranquillity of this nation, but to set the subjects at strife, and to raise a war in the bowels of this nation: and it is for this that he is now prosecuted; though he would fain have it believed that the prosecution was for preaching the peaceable doctrine of absolute obedience."

Sir Joseph Jekyl.

Whole frame of government restored unhurt, on the Revolution."The whole tenor of the administration then in being was agreed to by all to be a total departure from the Constitution. The nation was at that time united in that opinion, all but the criminal part of it. And as the nation joined in the judgment of their disease, so they did in the remedy. They saw there was no remedy left but the last; and when that remedy took place, the whole frame of the government was restored entire and unhurt.[17] This showed the excellent temper the nation was in at that time, that, after such provocations from an abuse of the regal power, and such a convulsion, no one part of the Constitution was altered, or suffered the least damage; but, on the contrary, the whole received new life and vigor."

The Tory counsel for Dr. Sacheverell having insinuated that a great and essential alteration in the Constitution had been wrought by the Revolution, Sir Joseph Jekyl is so strong on this point, that he takes fire even at the insinuation of his being of such an opinion.

Sir Joseph Jekyl.

No innovation at the Revolution."If the Doctor instructed his counsel to insinuate that there was any innovation in the Constitution wrought by the Revolution, it is an addition to his crime. The Revolution did not introduce any innovation; it was a restoration of the ancient fundamental Constitution of the kingdom, and giving it its proper force and energy."

The Solicitor-General, Sir Robert Eyre, distinguishes expressly the case of the Revolution, and its principles, from a proceeding at pleasure, on the part of the people, to change their ancient Constitution, and to frame a new government for themselves. He distinguishes it with the same care from the principles of regicide and republicanism, and the sorts of resistance condemned by the doctrines of the Church of England, and which ought to be condemned by the doctrines of all churches professing Christianity.

Mr. Solicitor-General, Sir Robert Eyre.

Revolution no precedent for voluntary cancelling allegiance.
Revolution not like the case of Charles the First."The resistance at the Revolution, which was founded in unavoidable necessity, could be no defence to a man that was attacked for asserting that the people might cancel their allegiance at pleasure, or dethrone and murder their sovereign by a judiciary sentence. For it can never be inferred, from the lawfulness of resistance at a time when a total subversion of the government both in Church and State was intended, that a people may take up arms and call their sovereign to account at pleasure; and therefore, since the Revolution could be of no service in giving the least color for asserting any such wicked principle, the Doctor could never intend to put it into the mouths of those new preachers and new politicians for a defence,—unless it be his opinion that the resistance at the Revolution can bear any parallel with the execrable murder of the royal martyr, so justly detested by the whole nation."

Sacheverell's doctrine intended to bring an odium on the Revolution.
True defence of the Revolution an absolute necessity."'Tis plain that the Doctor is not impeached for preaching a general doctrine, and enforcing the general duty of obedience, but for preaching against an excepted case after he has stated the exception. He is not impeached for preaching the general doctrine of obedience, and the utter illegality of resistance upon any pretence whatsoever, but because, having first laid down the general doctrine as true, without any exception, he states the excepted case, the Revolution, in express terms, as an objection, and then assumes the consideration of that excepted case, denies there was any resistance in the Revolution, and asserts that to impute resistance to the Revolution would cast black and odious colors upon it. This, my Lords, is not preaching the doctrine of non-resistance in the general terms used by the Homilies and the fathers of the Church, where cases of necessity may be understood to be excepted by a tacit implication, as the counsel have allowed,—but is preaching directly against the resistance at the Revolution, which, in the course of this debate, has been all along admitted to be necessary and just, and can have no other meaning than to bring a dishonor upon the Revolution, and an odium upon those great and illustrious persons, those friends to the monarchy and the Church, that assisted in bringing it about. For had the Doctor intended anything else, he would have treated the case of the Revolution in a different manner, and have given it the true and fair answer: he would have said that the resistance at the Revolution was of absolute necessity, and the only means left to revive the Constitution, and must be therefore taken as an excepted case, and could never come within the reach or intention of the general doctrine of the Church."

"Your Lordships take notice on what grounds the Doctor continues to assert the same position in his answer. But is it not most evident that the general exhortations to be met with in the Homilies of the Church of England, and such like declarations in the statutes of the kingdom, are meant only as rules for the civil obedience of the subject to the legal administration of the supreme power in ordinary cases? And it is equally absurd to construe any words in a positive law to authorize the destruction of the whole, as to expect that King, Lords, and Commons should, in express terms of law, declare such an ultimate resort as the right of resistance, at a time when the case supposes that the force of all law is ceased."[18]

Commons abhor whatever shakes the submission of posterity to the settlement of the crown."The Commons must always resent, with the utmost detestation and abhorrence, every position that may shake the authority of that act of Parliament whereby the crown is settled upon her Majesty, and whereby the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons do, in the name of all the people of England, most humbly and faithfully submit themselves, their heirs and posterities, to her Majesty, which this general principle of absolute non-resistance must certainly shake.

"For, if the resistance at the Revolution was illegal, the Revolution settled in usurpation, and this act can have no greater force and authority than an act passed under a usurper.

"And the Commons take leave to observe, that the authority of this Parliamentary settlement is a matter of the greatest consequence to maintain, in a case where the hereditary right to the crown is contested."

"It appears by the several instances mentioned in the act declaring the rights and liberties of the subject and settling the succession of the crown, that at the time of the Revolution there was a total subversion of the constitution of government both in Church and State, which is a case that the laws of England could never suppose, provide for, or have in view."

Sir Joseph Jekyl, so often quoted, considered the preservation of the monarchy, and of the rights and prerogatives of the crown, as essential objects with all sound Whigs, and that they were bound not only to maintain them, when injured or invaded, but to exert themselves as much for their reëstablishment, if they should happen to be overthrown by popular fury, as any of their own more immediate and popular rights and privileges, if the latter should be at any time subverted by the crown. For this reason he puts the cases of the Revolution, and the Restoration exactly upon the same footing. He plainly marks, that it was the object of all honest men not to sacrifice one part of the Constitution to another, and much more, not to sacrifice any of them to visionary theories of the rights of man, but to preserve our whole inheritance in the Constitution, in all its members and all its relations, entire and unimpaired, from generation to generation. In this Mr. Burke exactly agrees with him.

Sir Joseph Jekyl.

What are the rights of the people.
Restoration and Revolution.
People have an equal interest in the legal rights of the crown and of their own."Nothing is plainer than that the people have a right to the laws and the Constitution. This right the nation hath asserted, and recovered out of the hands of those who had dispossessed them of it at several times. There are of this two famous instances in the knowledge of the present age: I mean that of the Restoration, and that of the Revolution: in both these great events were the regal power and the rights of the people recovered. And it is hard to say in which the people have the greatest interest; for the Commons are sensible that there it not one legal power belonging to the crown, but they have an interest in it; and I doubt not but they will always be as careful to support the rights of the crown as their own privileges."

The other Whig managers regarded (as he did) the overturning of the monarchy by a republican faction with the very same horror and detestation with which they regarded the destruction of the privileges of the people by an arbitrary monarch.

Mr. Lechmere,

Constitution recovered at the Restoration and Revolution.Speaking of our Constitution, states it as "a Constitution which happily recovered itself, at the Restoration, from the confusions and disorders which the horrid and detestable proceedings of faction and usurpation had thrown it into, and which after many convulsions and struggles was providentially saved at the late happy Revolution, and by the many good laws passed since that time stands now upon a firmer foundation, together with the most comfortable prospect of security to all posterity by the settlement of the crown in the Protestant line."

I mean now to show that the Whigs (if Sir Joseph Jekyl was one, and if he spoke in conformity to the sense of the Whig House of Commons, and the Whig ministry who employed him) did carefully guard against any presumption that might arise from the repeal of the non-resistance oath of Charles the Second, as if at the Revolution the ancient principles of our government were at all changed, or that republican doctrines were countenanced, or any sanction given to seditious proceedings upon general undefined ideas of misconduct, or for changing the form of government, or for resistance upon any other ground than the necessity so often mentioned for the purpose of self-preservation. It will show still more clearly the equal care of the then Whigs to prevent either the regal power from being swallowed up on pretence of popular rights, or the popular rights from being destroyed on pretence of regal prerogatives.

Sir Joseph Jekyl.

Mischief of broaching antimonarchical principles.
Two cases of resistance: one to preserve the crown, the other the rights of the subject."Further, I desire it may be considered, these legislators" (the legislators who framed the non-resistance oath of Charles the Second) "were guarding against the consequences of those pernicious and antimonarchical principles which had been broached a little before in this nation, and those large declarations in favor of non-resistance were made to encounter or obviate the mischief of those principles,—as appears by the preamble to the fullest of those acts, which is the Militia Act, in the 13th and 14th of King Charles the Second. The words of that act are these: And during the late usurped governments, many evil and rebellious principles have been instilled into the minds of the people of this kingdom, which may break forth, unless prevented, to the disturbance of the peace and quiet thereof: Be it therefore enacted, &c. Here your Lordships may see the reason that inclined those legislators to express themselves in such a manner against resistance. They had seen the regal rights swallowed up under the pretence of popular ones: and it is no imputation on them, that they did not then foresee a quite different case, as was that of the Revolution, where, under the pretence of regal authority, a total subversion of the rights of the subject was advanced, and in a manner effected. And this may serve to show that it was not the design of those legislators to condemn resistance, in a case of absolute necessity, for preserving the Constitution, when they were guarding against principles which had so lately destroyed it."

Non-resistance oath not repealed because (with the restriction of necessity) it was false, but to prevent false interpretations."As to the truth of the doctrine in this declaration which was repealed, I'll admit it to be as true as the Doctor's counsel assert it,—that is, with an exception of cases of necessity: and it was not repealed because it was false, understanding it with that restriction; but it was repealed because it might be interpreted in an unconfined sense, and exclusive of that restriction, and, being so understood, would reflect on the justice of the Revolution: and this the legislature had at heart, and were very jealous of, and by this repeal of that declaration gave a Parliamentary or legislative admonition against asserting this doctrine of non-resistance in an unlimited sense."

General doctrine of non-resistance godly and wholesome; not bound to state explicitly the exceptions."Though the general doctrine of non-resistance, the doctrine of the Church of England, as stated in her Homilies, or elsewhere delivered, by which the general duty of subjects to the higher powers is taught, be owned to be, as unquestionably it is, a godly and wholesome doctrine,—though this general doctrine has been constantly inculcated by the reverend fathers of the Church, dead and living, and preached by them as a preservative against the Popish doctrine of deposing princes, and as the ordinary rule of obedience,—and though the same doctrine has been preached, maintained, and avowed by our most orthodox and able divines from the time of the Reformation,—and how innocent a man soever Dr. Sacheverell had been, if, with an honest and well-meant zeal, he had preached the same doctrine in the same general terms in which he found it delivered by the Apostles of Christ, as taught by the Homilies and the reverend fathers of our Church, and, in imitation of those great examples, had only pressed the general duty of obedience, and the illegality of resistance, without taking notice of any exception," &c.

Another of the managers for the House of Commons, Sir John Holland, was not less careful in guarding against a confusion of the principles of the Revolution with any loose, general doctrines of a right in the individual, or even in the people, to undertake for themselves, on any prevalent, temporary opinions of convenience or improvement, any fundamental change in the Constitution, or to fabricate a new government for themselves, and thereby to disturb the public peace, and to unsettle the ancient Constitution of this kingdom.

Sir John Holland.

Submission to the sovereign a conscientious duty, except in cases of necessity."The Commons would not be understood as if they were pleading for a licentious resistance, as if subjects were left to their good-will and pleasure when they are to obey and when to resist. No, my Lords, they know they are obliged by all the ties of social creatures and Christians, for wrath and conscience' sake, to submit to their sovereign. The Commons do not abet humorsome, factious arms: they aver them to be rebellions. But yet they maintain that that resistance at the Revolution, which was so necessary, was lawful and just from that necessity."

Right of resistance how to be understood."These general rules of obedience may, upon a real necessity, admit a lawful exception; and such a necessary exception we assert the Revolution to be.

"'Tis with this view of necessity, only absolute necessity of preserving our laws, liberties, and religion,—'tis with this limitation, that we desire to be understood, when any of us speak of resistance in general. The necessity of the resistance at the Revolution was at that time obvious to every man."

I shall conclude these extracts with a reference to the Prince of Orange's Declaration, in which he gives the nation the fullest assurance that in his enterprise he was far from the intention of introducing any change whatever in the fundamental law and Constitution of the state. He considered the object of his enterprise not to be a precedent for further revolutions, but that it was the great end of his expedition to make such revolutions, so far as human power and wisdom could provide, unnecessary.

Extracts from the Prince of Orange's Declaration.

"All magistrates, who have been unjustly turned out, shall forthwith resume their former employments; as well as all the boroughs of England shall return again to their ancient prescriptions and charters, and, more particularly, that the ancient charter of the great and famous city of London shall again be in force; and that the writs for the members of Parliament shall be addressed to the proper officers, according to law and custom."

"And for the doing of all other things which the two Houses of Parliament shall find necessary for the peace, honor, and safety of the nation, so that there may be no more danger of the nation's falling, at any time hereafter, under arbitrary government."

Extract from the Prince of Oranges Additional Declaration.

Principal nobility and gentry well affected to the Church and crown, security against the design of innovation."We are confident that no persons can have such hard thoughts of us as to imagine that we have any other design in this undertaking than to procure a settlement of the religion and of the liberties and properties of the subjects upon so sure a foundation that there may be no danger of the nation's relapsing into the like miseries at any time hereafter. And as the forces that we have brought along with us are utterly disproportioned to that wicked design of conquering the nation, if we were capable of intending it, so the great numbers of the principal nobility and gentry, that are men of eminent quality and estates, and persons of known integrity and zeal, both for the religion and government of England, many of them, also being distinguished by their constant fidelity to the crown, who do both accompany us in this expedition and have earnestly solicited us to it, will cover us from all such malicious insinuations."

In the spirit, and, upon one occasion, in the words,[19] of this Declaration, the statutes passed in that reign made such provisions for preventing these dangers, that scarcely anything short of combination of King, Lords, and Commons, for the destruction of the liberties of the nation, can in any probability make us liable to similar perils. In that dreadful, and, I hope, not to be looked-for case, any opinion of a right to make revolutions, grounded on this precedent, would be but a poor resource. Dreadful, indeed, would be our situation!

These are the doctrines held by the Whigs of the Revolution, delivered with as much solemnity, and as authentically at least, as any political dogmas were ever promulgated from the beginning of the world. If there be any difference between their tenets and those of Mr. Burke, it is, that the old Whigs oppose themselves still more strongly than he does against the doctrines which are now propagated with so much industry by those who would be thought their successors.

It will be said, perhaps, that the old Whigs, in order to guard themselves against popular odium, pretended to assert tenets contrary to those which they secretly held. This, if true, would prove, what Mr. Burke has uniformly asserted, that the extravagant doctrines which he meant to expose were disagreeable to the body of the people,—who, though they perfectly abhor a despotic government, certainly approached more nearly to the love of mitigated monarchy than to anything which bears the appearance even of the best republic. But if these old Whigs deceived the people, their conduct was unaccountable indeed. They exposed their power, as every one conversant in history knows, to the greatest peril, for the propagation of opinions which, on this hypothesis, they did not hold. It is a new kind of martyrdom. This supposition does as little credit to their integrity as their wisdom: it makes them at once hypocrites and fools. I think of those great men very differently. I hold them to have been, what the world thought them, men of deep understanding, open sincerity, and clear honor. However, be that matter as it may, what these old Whigs pretended to be Mr. Burke is. This is enough for him.

I do, indeed, admit, that, though Mr. Burke has proved that his opinions were those of the old Whig party, solemnly declared by one House, in effect and substance by both Houses of Parliament, this testimony standing by itself will form no proper defence for his opinions, if he and the old Whigs were both of them in the wrong. But it is his present concern, not to vindicate these old Whigs, but to show his agreement with them. He appeals to them as judges: he does not vindicate them as culprits. It is current that these old politicians knew little of the rights of men,—that they lost their way by groping about in the dark, and fumbling among rotten parchments and musty records. Great lights, they say, are lately obtained in the world; and Mr. Burke, instead of shrouding himself in exploded ignorance, ought to have taken advantage of the blaze of illumination which has been spread about him. It may be so. The enthusiasts of this time, it seems, like their predecessors in another faction of fanaticism, deal in lights. Hudibras pleasantly says of them, they