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sound principles in matters of law and religion than Filmer and Heylin; since it is no less absurd to deduce a right from him that had none, than to expect pure and wholesome waters from a filthy, polluted, and poisonous fountain.

If it be pretended, that some other man since Noah had this universal right, it must either remain in one single person, as his right heir, or be divided. If in one, I desire to know who he is, and where we may find him, that the empire of the world may be delivered to him: but if he cannot be found, the business is at an end, for every man in the world may pretend himself to be the person; and the infinite controversies arising thereupon can never be decided, unless either the genealogies of every one from Noah was extant and proved, or we had a word from heaven, with a sufficient testimony of his mission who announceth it. When this is done, it will be time to consider what kind of obedience is due to this wonderfully happy and glorious person. But whilst the first appears to be absolutely impossible, and we have no promise or reason to expect the other, the proposition is to be esteemed one of our author's empty whimsies, which cannot be received by mankind, unless they come all to be possessed with an epidemical madness, which would cast them into that which Hobbes calls "bellum omnium contra omnes:" when every man's sword would be drawn against every man, and every man's against him, if God should so abandon the world to suffer them to fall into such misery.

If this pretended right be divided, it concerns us to know by whom, when, how, or to whom; for the division cannot be of any value, unless the right was originally in one; that he did exercise this right in making the division; that the parcels into which the world is divided are according to the alotment that was made; and that the persons claiming them by virtue of it are the true heirs of those to whom they were first granted. Many other difficulties may be alledged no less inextricable than these ; but this seeming sufficient for the present, I shall not trouble myself with more, promising that, when they shall be removed, I will propose others, or, confessing my errors, yield up the cause.

But if the dominion of the whole world cannot belong to any one man, and every one have an equal title to that which should give it; or if it did belong to one, none did ever exercise it in governing the whole, or dividing it; or, if he did divide it, no man knows how, when, and to whom; so that they who lay claim to any parcels can give no testimony of that division, nor shew any better title than other men derived from their first progenitor, to whom it is said to have been granted; and that we have neither a word, nor the promise of a word from God to decide the controversies arising thereupon; nor any prophet giving testimony of his mission that takes upon him to do it, the whole fabric of our author's patriarchal dominion falls to the ground; and they who propose these doctrines, which, if they were received, would be the root of

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perpetual and irreconcilable hatred in every man against every man, can be accounted no less than ministers of the devil, though they want the abilities he has sometimes infused into those who have been employed on the like occasions. And we may justly conclude, that God having never given the whole world to be governed by one man; nor prescribed any rule for the division of it; nor declared where the right of dividing or subdividing that which every man has, should terminate; we may safely affirm, that the whole of it is forever left to the will and discretion of man: we may enter into, form, and continue in greater or lesser societies, as best pleases ourselves: the right of paternity as to dominion is at an end; and no more remains, but the love, veneration and obedience, which proceeding from a due sense of the benefits of birth and education, have their root in gratitude, and are esteemed sacred and inviolable by all that are sober and virtuous. And as it is impossible to transfer these benefits by inheritance, so it is impossible to transfer the rights arising from them. No man can be my father but he that did beget me; and it is as absurd to say I owe that duty to one who is not my father, which I owe to my father, as to say, he did beget me, who did not beget me; for the obligation that arises from benefits can only be to him that conferred them. It is in vain to say the same is due to his heir; for that can take place only when he has but one, which in this case signifies nothing; for if I, being the only son of my father, inherit his right, and have the same power over my children as he

had over me; if I had one hundred brothers, they must all inherit the same; and the law of England, which acknowledges one only heir, is not general, but municipal; and is so far from being general, as the precept of God and nature, that I doubt whether it was ever known or used in any nation in the world beyond our island. The words of the apostle, "if we are children, we are therefore heirs and co-heirs with Christ," are the voice of God and nature; and as the universal law of God and nature is always the same, every one of us who have children have the same right over them as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had over theirs; and that right which was not devolved to any one of them, but inherited by them all (I mean the right of father as father, not the peculiar promises which were not according to the law of nature, but the election of grace) is also inherited by every one of us, and ours, that is, by all mankind. But if that which could be inherited was inherited by all, and it be impossible that a right of dominion over all can be due to every one, then all that is or can be inherited by every one is that exemption from the dominion of another, which we call liberty, and is the gift of God and nature.

SECTION XVII.

IF A RIGHT OF DOMINION WERE ESTEEMED
HEREDITARY ACCORDING то THE LAW OF

NATURE,

A MULTITUDE OF

DESTRUCTIVE

AND INEXTRICABLE CONTROVERSIES WOULD

THEREUPON ARISE.

THERE being no such thing therefore, according to the law of nature, as an hereditary right to the dominion of the world, or any part of it; nor one man that can derive to himself a title from the first fathers of mankind, by which he can rightly pretend to be preferred before others to that command, or a part of it; and none can be derived from Nimrod, or other usurpers, who had none in themselves; we may justly spare our pains of seeking farther into that matter. But as things of the highest importance can never be too fully explained; it may not be amiss to observe, that if mankind could be brought to believe, that such a right of dominion were by the law of God and nature hereditary, a great number of the most destructive and inextricable controversies must thereupon arise, which the wisdom and goodness of God can never enjoin, and nature, which is reason, can never intend; but at present I shall only mention two, from whence others must perpetually spring. First, if there be such a law, no human constitution can alter it: no length of time can be a defence against it: all governments that are not con

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