7. And from this manner of erecting an aristocracy, it is manifest, that the few, or _optimates_, have entered into no covenant with any of the particular members of the commonwealth, whereof they are sovereign; and consequently cannot do any thing to any private man, that can be called _injury_ to him, howsoever their act be wicked before Almighty God, according to that which hath been said before, section 3. Further, it is impossible, that the people, as one body politic, should covenant with the aristocracy or _optimates_, on whom they intend to transfer their sovereignty. For no sooner is the aristocracy erected, but the democracy is annihilated, and the covenants made unto them void. [Sidenote: The election of the _optimates_, &c.] 8. In all aristocracies, the admission of such, as are from time to time to have vote in the sovereign assembly, dependeth on the will and decree of the present _optimates_. For they being the sovereign, have the nomination, by the eleventh section of the former chapter, of all magistrates, ministers, and counsellors of state whatsoever, and may therefore choose either to make them elective, or hereditary, at their pleasure. [Sidenote: An elective king, &c.] 9. Out of the same democracy, the institution of a political monarch proceedeth in the same manner, as did the institution of the aristocracy, to wit, by a decree of the sovereign people, to pass the sovereignty to one man named and approved by plurality of suffrage. And if this sovereignty be truly and indeed transferred, the estate or commonwealth is an absolute monarchy, wherein the monarch is at liberty, to dispose as well of the succession, as of the possession, and not an elective kingdom. For suppose a decree be made first in this manner, that such a one shall have the sovereignty for his life, and that afterward they will choose a-new. In this case, the power of the people is dissolved, or not; if dissolved, then after the death of him that is chosen, there is no man bound to stand to the decrees of them that shall, as private men, run together to make a new election; and consequently, if there be any man, who by the advantage of the reign of him that is dead, hath strength enough to hold the multitude in peace and obedience, he may lawfully, or rather is by the law of nature obliged so to do: if this power of the people were not dissolved at the choosing of their king for life, then is the people sovereign still, and the king a minister thereof only, but so, as to put the whole sovereignty in execution; a great minister, but no otherwise for his time, than a dictator was in Rome. In this case, at the death of him that was chosen, they that meet for a new election, have no new, but their old authority for the same. For they were the sovereign all the time, as appeareth by the acts of those elective kings, that have procured from the people, that their children might succeed them. For it is to be understood, when a man receiveth any thing