"Further, I desire it may be considered, these legislators" (the legislators who framed the non-resistance oath of Charles the Second) "were guarding against the consequences of those _pernicious and antimonarchical principles which had been broached a little before in this nation_, and those large declarations in favor of _non-resistance_ were made to encounter or obviate the _mischief_ of those principles,--as appears by the preamble to the fullest of those acts, which is the _Militia Act_, in the 13th and 14th of King Charles the Second. The words of that act are these: _And during the late usurped governments, many evil and rebellious principles have been instilled into the minds of the people of this kingdom, which may break forth, unless prevented, to the disturbance of the peace and quiet thereof: Be it therefore enacted_, &c. Here your Lordships may see the reason that inclined those legislators to express themselves in such a manner against resistance. _They had seen the regal rights swallowed up under the pretence of popular ones_: and it is no imputation on them, that they did not then foresee a _quite different case_, as was that of the Revolution, where, under the pretence of regal authority, a total subversion of the rights of the subject was advanced, and in a manner effected. And this may serve to show that it was not the design of those legislators to condemn resistance, in a case _of absolute necessity, for preserving the Constitution_, when they were guarding against principles which had so lately destroyed it." [Sidenote: Non-resistance oath not repealed because (with the restriction of necessity) it was false, but to prevent false interpretations.] "As to the truth of the doctrine in this declaration which was repealed, _I'll admit it to be as true as the Doctor's counsel assert it,--that is, with an exception of cases of necessity_: and it was not repealed because it was false, _understanding it with that restriction_; but it was repealed because it might be interpreted in _an unconfined sense, and exclusive of that restriction_, and, being so understood, would reflect on the justice of the Revolution: and this the legislature had at heart, and were very jealous of, and by this repeal of that declaration gave a Parliamentary or legislative admonition against asserting this doctrine of non-resistance _in an unlimited sense_." [Sidenote: General doctrine of non-resistance godly and wholesome; not bound to state _explicitly_ the exceptions.]