And why
this should not hold in the highest, as well as in the most inferior
magistrate, I would gladly be informed. Is it reasonable that the
eldest brother, because he has the greatest part of his father's
estate, should thereby have a right to take away any of his younger
brothers' portions? Or that a rich man, who possessed a whole country,
should from thence have a right to seize, when he pleased, the cottage
and garden of his poor neighbour? The being rightfully possessed of
great power and riches, exceedingly beyond the greatest part of the
sons of Adam, is so far from being an excuse, much less a reason for
rapine and oppression, which the endamaging another without
authority is, that it is a great aggravation of it. For exceeding
the bounds of authority is no more a right in a great than a petty
officer, no more justifiable in a king than a constable. But so much
the worse in him as that he has more trust put in him, is supposed,
from the advantage of education and counsellors, to have better
knowledge and less reason to do it, having already a greater share
than the rest of his brethren.
203. May the commands, then, of a prince be opposed? May he be
resisted, as often as any one shall find himself aggrieved, and but
imagine he has not right done him? This will unhinge and overturn
all polities, and instead of government and order, leave nothing but
anarchy and confusion.
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