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If God gave it them, let it be made appear when and where the first grant was made; let some evidence be produced to justify the claim, or at least, some credible testimony, or pregnant presumption to render it probable that there was some such thing done, though the records be lost. If none of all this can be done, it remaineth that if they had it they took it. And if they so did, it was saucily and sacrilegiously done at the first; and by our Saviour's presagek, like enough to prosper with them accordingly at the last.

XVI. Besides, the supposed contract itself is encumbered with so many doubts and difficulties, that it is not possible for the wit of man to devise salvos or expedients sufficient to rescue it from infinite entanglements and irreconcilable contradictions; I believe it would trouble the ablest of them all that hold this opinion, to give a direct satisfactory answer (amongst a world of queres more that might be tendered) to these following interrogatories: first, for the persons contracting; of what sort of persons did the people, who are supposed to have made the first contract in this kind, consist? Were all, without difference of age, sex, condition, or other respect, promiscuously admitted to drive the bargain or not? Had women, and children, and servants, and mad men, and fools, the freedom of suffrage, as well as men of age, and fortunes, and understanding? Or were any of them excluded? If any excluded, who excluded them? by whose order, and by what authority was it done? and who gave them that authority? If all were admitted, whether with equal right to every one, or with some inequality? Was the wife's interest towards making up the bargain equal with that of her husband? and the child's with that of his parents? and the servant's (if there were or could be then any

Matt. chap. 26. ver. 52.

such thing as master and servant) with that of his master? If every one had not an equal share and interest in the business, whence did the inequality arise? who made the difference between them? and what right had any man, and how came he to have that right, to give more or less power to one than another? If all were equal, who could summon the rest to convene together? or appoint the day and place of meeting? or when they were met take upon him the authority and office of regulating their proceedings, of presiding or moderating in the assembly, of determining such doubts and differences as might arise while matters were under debate, of calculating the voices, and drawing up the articles of the agreement, in case they should agree?

XVII. But let us imagine all these could be cleared, and the contract made as they would have it; yet would the force and obligation of it remain questionable still: for it may be demanded, whether the majority of votes shall conclude all that are present, dissenters as well as others? And whether by virtue of an act of those upon the place, an obligation shall lie upon such as are casually absent or willingly absent themselves, when it was free for them so to do, no man having power to require their appearance? And whether a contract made by such persons, as were at liberty before, can debar those that shall succeed them in the next generation from the use of that liberty their ancestors had and enjoyed? If so, by what law or right are the said respective persons so concluded? and whence should that obligation spring? None of these things look like the dictates of the law of nature, and other law besides that (according to our hypothesis) when as yet there was no government, there could be none. And the contract itself, as a bare contract, without the help of some law or other to give it force, cannot operate upon any but the contractors; it cannot have any cogency upon those that never gave consent thereunto.

XVIII. Besides these, and I know not how many more difficulties no less insoluble, one thing there is which puzzleth the men of this opinion very much, and wherewith a man that were so disposed might make himself some sport to wit, the circle, between property and government, which they have conjured themselves into, and wherein they run round even unto giddiness, (like men in a maze or labyrinth) not knowing which way to get out. That which some have said, because, when they are put to it, they must say something, viz.: "That dominion and property is in order of nature before government," be it true or be it false, as to their purpose signifieth nothing; unless it could be made out that they were before it in order of time also. This dispute is not much unlike that problem in Macrobius, "Ovumne prius fuerit, an gallina?" Whether were first the hen or the egg? We cannot imagine there could be a hen, but we must suppose there must have been an egg first, out of which that hen must have been hatched neither can we imagine there could be an egg, but we must suppose there must have been a hen first, to lay that egg. Semblably here, we cannot imagine property, but we must suppose some government first; because the right which any man hath to that wherein he claimeth a property must accrue to him by some law, and that supposeth government: nor can we imagine a government, one of the principal ends whereof is the preservation of men's properties who live together in one society, but we must suppose that there were first such properties to be so preserved. True it is, that a mere rationalist, (that is to say in plain English, an atheist of the late edition) who giveth more faith to such heathen philosophy, as affirmeth the world to have been ab æterno, than to divine revelation, which assureth us it had a beginning; (and some of the great champions of the opinion we now speak of, have given cause enough of

suspicion that they are little better:) such a one, I say, cannot possibly get out of the circle, or solve the difficulty in either of the aforesaid instances: but to us, who believe the Scriptures and acknowledge a creation, the solution of both is equally easy. If we will but follow the clue of the sacred history in the four first chapters of Genesis, it will fairly lead us out of these labyrinths in a plain way, and without any great trouble. It is certain that God in their first creation made all living creatures, each in their kind, in the full state and perfection of their nature; and thence we may conclude, that undoubtedly the hen was before the egg. And it is no less certain, that as soon as Adam was created, God gave to him as an universal monarch, not only dominion over all his fellow creatures that were upon the face of the earth, but the government also of all the inferior world, and of all the men that after should be born into the world so long as he lived; so as whatsoever property any other persons afterwards had or could have, in any thing in any part of the world, (as Cain and Abel, it is well known, had their properties in several, and distinct either from other) they held it all of him, and had it originally by his gift or assignment, either immediately or mediately. Whence we may also conclude, both in hypothesi, that Adam's government was before Cain's property; and in thesi, that undoubtedly government was before property. And we have great reason to believe that, after the flood, the sole government was at first in Noah, and whatsoever either property in any thing they possessed in several, or share in the government over any part of the world afterward any of his sons had, they had it by his sole allotment and authority, and transmitted the same to their posterity merely upon that account; without awaiting the election or consent of, or entering into any articles or capitulations with the people that were to be governed by them. Those words in Genesis,

chap. 10. ver. 32. seem to import as much: "These are the families of the sons of Noah after their generations in their nations: and by them were the nations divided in the earth after the flood." And so this supposed pact or contract, which maketh such a noise in the world, proveth to be but a squib, powder without shot, that giveth a crack, but vanisheth into air and doth no execution.

XIX. That last, from the ill-timing of the publication, is so poor an objection that it is scarce worth the answering. Subjection and obedience to superiors, besides that they are duties of perpetual obligation, equally with all those mentioned together with them in that fore-cited passage of the apostle', are also (as hath been said) of so great public concernment otherwise, and withal so little looked upon as duties by the most of men, that the pressing upon the people's consciences the performance thereof whether by word or writing, cannot with any pretence of reason be deemed unseasonable at any time. Nor hath the great mercy of God vouchsafed to these nations in the happy and little less than miraculous restoration of our gracious sovereign to his father's throne, or the general alacrity of our people in owning his sovereignty, rendered the truths in this treatise asserted any whit less necessary to be taught and known as the times now are, than in the times of our late sad troubles and distractions. As will be easily yielded by all such, as either have diligently observed the temper and carriage of the most active men of these times, or shall duly take into consideration, amongst many other things which might be added, these few ensuing particulars:

1. The desperate principles and resolutions of Quakers, Fifth-monarchy men, and other enthusiastic sectaries, of what denomination soever, who utterly refuse to take the

I Tit. chap. 3. ver. 1, 2.

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