13. 14.). As if the whole kingly authority
were nothing else but to be their general; and therefore the tribes
who had stuck to Saul's family, and opposed David's reign, when they
came to Hebron with terms of submission to him, they tell him, amongst
other arguments, they had to submit to him as to their king, that he
was, in effect, their king in Saul's time, and therefore they had no
reason but to receive him as their king now. "Also," say they, "in
time past, when Saul was king over us, thou wast he that leddest out
and broughtest in Israel, and the Lord said unto thee, Thou shalt feed
my people Israel, and thou shalt be a captain over Israel."
110. Thus, whether a family, by degrees, grew up into a
commonwealth, and the fatherly authority being continued on to the
elder son, every one in his turn growing up under it tacitly submitted
to it, and the easiness and equality of it not offending any one,
every one acquiesced till time seemed to have confirmed it and settled
a right of succession by prescription; or whether several families, or
the descendants of several families, whom chance, neighbourhood, or
business brought together, united into society; the need of a
general whose conduct might defend them against their enemies in
war, and the great confidence the innocence and sincerity of that poor
but virtuous age, such as are almost all those which begin governments
that ever come to last in the world, gave men one of another, made the
first beginners of commonwealths generally put the rule into one man's
hand, without any other express limitation or restraint but what the
nature of the thing and the end of government required.
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