The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, Volume 06 (of 11)
Thomas Hobbes · en
_A._ In August following, the King supposing he had now sufficiently
obliged the Parliament to proceed no further against him, took a journey
into Scotland, to satisfy his subjects there, as he had done here;
intending, perhaps, so to gain their good wills, that in case the
Parliament here should levy arms against him, they should not be aided
by the Scots: wherein he also was deceived. For though they seemed
satisfied with what he did, whereof one thing was his giving way to the
abolition of episcopacy; yet afterwards they made a league with the
Parliament, and for money, when the King began to have the better of the
Parliament, invaded England in the Parliament’s quarrel. But this was a
year or two after.
_B._ Before you go any further, I desire to know the ground and original
of that right, which either the House of Lords, or House of Commons, or
both together, now pretend to.
_A._ It is a question of things so long past, that they are now
forgotten. Nor have we any thing to conjecture by, but the records of
our own nation, and some small and obscure fragments of Roman histories:
and for the records, seeing they are of things done only, sometimes
justly, sometimes unjustly, you can never by them know what right they
had, but only what right they pretended.
_B._ Howsoever, let me know what light we have in this matter from the
Roman histories.
_A._ It would be too long, and an useless digression, to cite all the
ancient authors that speak of the forms of those commonwealths, which
were amongst our first ancestors the Saxons and other Germans, and of
other nations, from whom we derive the titles of honour now in use in
England; nor will it be possible to derive from them any argument of
right, but only examples of fact, which, by the ambition of potent
subjects, have been oftener unjust than otherwise. And for those Saxons
or Angles, that in ancient times by several invasions made themselves
masters of this nation, they were not in themselves one body of a
commonwealth, but only a league of divers petty German lords and states,
such as was the Grecian army in the Trojan war, without other obligation
than that which proceeded from their own fear and weakness. Nor were
those lords, for the most part, the sovereigns at home in their own
country, but chosen by the people for the captains of the forces they
brought with them. And therefore it was not without equity, when they
had conquered any part of the land, and made some one of them king
thereof, that the rest should have greater privileges than the common
people and soldiers: amongst which privileges, a man may easily
conjecture this to be one; that they should be made acquainted, and be
of council, with him that hath the sovereignty in matter of government,
and have the greatest and most honourable offices both in peace and war.
But because there can be no government where there is more than one
sovereign, it cannot be inferred that they had a right to oppose the