Lex Rex (1644)
[Law Is King, or The Law & The Prince]
Samuel Rutherford
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- Title Page, Dedication and Preface
- Quest. 1: Whether Government Be Warranted by a Divine Law
- Quest. 2: Whether or Not Government Be Warranted by the Law of Nature
- Quest. 3: Whether Royal Power and Definite Forms of Government Be from God
- Quest. 4: Whether the King Be Only and Immediately from God, and Not from the People
- Quest. 5: Whether or No the Popish Prelate, the Author of “Sac. San. Regum Majestas,” Called the Sacred and Royal Prerogative of Kings, proves That God Is the Immediate Author of Sovereignty, and That the King Is No Creature of the People’s Making
- Quest. 6: Whether the King Be So from God Only, Both in Regard of His Sovereignty and of the Designation of His Person to the Crown, as That He Is No Way from the People, but by Mere Approbation
- Quest. 7: Whether or No the Popish Prelate, the Aforesaid Author, does by Force of Reason Evince That Neither Constitution Nor Designation of the King Is from the People
- Quest. 8: Whether the Prelate proves by Force of Reason That the People Cannot Be Capable of Any Power of Government
- Quest. 9: Whether or No Sovereignty Is So from the People, That it remains in Them in Some Part, So as They May, in Case of Necessity, Reside It
- Quest. 10: Whether or Not Royal Birth Be Equivalent to Divine Unction
- Quest. 11: Whether or No He Be More Principally a King Who Is a King by Birth, or He Who Is a King by the Free Election and Suffrages of the People
- Quest. 12: Whether or Not a Kingdom May Lawfully Be Purchased by the Sole Title of Conquest
- Quest. 13: Whether or No Royal Dignity Have its Spring from Nature, and How That Is True, “Every Man Is Born Free,” and How Servitude Is Contrary to Nature
- Quest. 14: Whether or No the People Make a Person Their King Conditionally, or Absolutely; and Whether There Be Such a Thing as a Covenant Tying the King No less than His Subjects
- Quest. 15: Whether or No the King Be Univocally, or Only Analogically, and by Proportion, a Father
- Quest. 16: Whether or No a Despotical and Masterly Dominion of Men and Things Agree to the King Because He Is King
- Quest. 17: Whether or Not the Prince Have Properly a Fiduciary and Ministerial Power of a Tutor, Husband, Patron, Minister, Head, Father of a Family, Not of a Lord or Dominator
- Quest. 18: What Is the Law of the King, and His Power?
- Quest. 19: Whether or No the King Be in Dignity and Power above the People
- Quest. 20: Whether or No Inferior Judges Be Univocally and Essentially Judges, and the Immediate Vicars of God, No less than the King, or If They Be Only the Deputies and Vicars of the King
- Quest. 21: What Power the People and States of Parliament Have over the King, and in the State
- Quest. 22: Whether the Power of the King as King Be Absolute, or Dependent and Limited by God’s First Mold and Pattern of a King
- Quest. 23: Whether the King has Any Royal Prerogative, or a Power to Dispense with Laws; and Some Other Grounds Against Absolute Monarchy
- Quest. 24: What Power the King has in Relation to the Law and the People, and How a King and a Tyrant Differ
- Quest. 25: What Force the Supreme Law has over the King, Even That Law of the People’s Safety, Called “Salus Populi”
- Quest. 26: Whether the King Be above the Law or No
- Quest. 27: Whether or No the King Be the Sole, Supreme and Final Interpreter of the Law
- Quest. 28: Whether or No Wars Raised by the Subjects and Estates, for Their Own Just Defense Against the King’s Bloody Emissaries, Be Lawful
- Quest. 29: Whether, in the Case of Defensive War, the Distinction of the Person of the King, as a Man, Who Can Commit Acts of Hostile Tyranny Against His Subjects, and of the Office and Royal Power That He has from God and the People, as a King, Can Have Place
- Quest. 30: Whether or No Passive Obedience Be a Mean to Which We Are Subjected in Conscience, by Virtue of a Divine Commandment; and What a Mean Resistance Is. That Flying Is Resistance
- Quest. 31: Whether or No Self-defense Against Any Unjust Violence Offered to the Life, Be Warranted by God’s Law, and the Law of Nature and Nations
- Quest. 32: Whether or Not the Lawfulness of Defensive Wars has its Warrant in God’s Word, from the Example of David, Elisha, the Eighty Priests Who Resisted Uzziah, Etc.
- Quest. 33: Whether or No the Place, Rom. 13:1, Prove That in No Case it Is Lawful to Resist the King
- Quest. 34: Whether Royalists by Cogent Reasons Do Prove the Unlawfulness of Defensive Wars
- Quest. 35: Whether or No the Sufferings of the Martyrs in the Primitive Church Militate Against the Lawfulness of Defensive Wars
- Quest. 36: Whether the Power of War Be Only in the King
- Quest. 37: Whether or No it Be Lawful That the Estates of Scotland Help Their Oppressed Brethren, the Parliament and Protestants in England, Against Papists and Prelates Now in Arms Against Them, and Killing Them, and Endeavoring the Establishment of Popery, Though the King of Scotland Should Inhibit Them
- Quest. 38: Whether Monarchy Be the Best of Governments
- Quest. 39: Whether or No Any Prerogative at All above the Law Be Due to the King, or If “Jura Majestatis” Be Any Such Prerogative Royal
- Quest. 40: Whether or No the People Have Any Power over the King, Either by His Oath, Covenant, or Any Other Way
- Quest. 41: Whether does the P. Prelate upon Good Grounds Ascribe to Us the Doctrine of Jesuits in These Questions of Lawful Defensive Wars
- Quest. 42: Whether All Christian Kings Are Dependent from Christ, and May Be Called His Vicegerents
- Quest. 43: Whether the King of Scotland Be an Absolute Prince. Having Prerogatives above Parliament and Laws: the Negative Is Asserted by the Laws of Scotland, the King’s Oath of Coronation, the Confession of Faith, Etc.
- Quest. 44: General Results of the Former Doctrine, in Some Few Corollaries, or Straying Questions, Fallen off the Roadway, Answered Briefly
LEX REX (Law Is King, or The Law and the Prince) 1644, by Samuel Rutherford.
Based on the 1644 edition.
Footnotes have been converted to chapter end notes, and spelling has been modernized.