Vindiciae, Contra
Tyrannos was an infamous French Calvinist (or Huguenot) work of resistance
theory published in 1579 during the period of that nation’s Wars of
Religion. It was printed pseudonymously
(supposedly in Edinburgh, but truly in Basel) and the authorship is something
of a mystery, though it was likely the collaborative work of Hubert Languet
(1518-1581) and Philippe de Mornay (1549-1623), thus putting it in the same
league as the Catholic resistance text On
Voluntary Servitude (see my blog entry), as they each attempt to make a
defence of society.
Vindiciae, Contra
Tyrannos is significant for presenting an argument against the secularized
theory of politics espoused by Machiavelli (1469-1527), who likens the ideal
prince to “the fox and the lion,” and it speaks instead of the “firm bond of
human society” and of “an alliance or covenant between the King and the People”.[1] Essentially put, there exists a contract
between the king and his subjects (each of whom were beholden to God), with
mutual obligations, and if the king breaks his promises, the people are
released from their promises of obligation to the king.[2]
The work was translated by William Walker from the original
Latin and French in 1648 a year before King Charles I of England lost his head.
It reappeared again in 1689 on the occasion of the “Glorious Revolution”, when
the Catholic (and French-supported) Stuart Monarchies finally came to an end,
ushering in William of Orange from Protestant Holland who conquered England,
albeit peacefully (starting on Guy Fawkes Day) and who shared the Crown with
his wife Mary, or perhaps vice-versa.
The Revolution of 1688-89 has typically been seen as a
“conservative revolution” where quintessential English exceptionalism found its
day, satisfying everyone (except James II, who fled the country) thus
preserving “ancient liberties”. The
American academic Steve Pinkus has produced a very recent work arguing against
this 300-year consensus, suggesting
instead that it was the “first modern revolution.”[3]
The fact that Vindiciae, Contra Tyrannos
flourished - and was, on occasion, burned - in seventeen-century England
indicates that there were significant popular elements to the political events.
We need look no further than John
Locke’s Two Treatise of Government, which
makes a case for popular sovereignty - mixed with “property” rights - and was written
at least half a decade before the
Revolution, to help substantiate this claim, but that is another topic for
discussion.
The modern-day English translation of Vindiciae, Contra Tyrannos by George Garnett of Oxford University
is recommended reading for those interested in the history of political thought,
but to whet the appetite here is the text as it would have appeared in 1648,
and as it did appear - reprinted - in 1689, with only with some minor changes
in spelling and expression for the sake of today’s audience. The early-modern English is retained for its
flavour, and I invite the reader to sift through the writing, for there are various
commonalities with Canada today.
Assuredly, looking abroad, there are resonances with the Arab
Spring. And the current pressing
question is: whither Syria?
Parenthetically-speaking, there are some worthy historical
nuggets in the excerpts, too, for the devoted antiquarian. For example, it helps explain why the Death
Warrant of King Charles I stipulated a “severing of his head from his body”.[4] Clearly the executioners were not content
with any ordinary hanging: the selection below suggests that the head
represented the soul (which the King’s People followed via the law), so the soul must be severed from the body. And as Francis Bacon (1561-1626) points out (perhaps
a little presumptuously) in The Essays: “the most vital parts are not
the quickest of sense”.[5] In other words, the advances of science
revealed other important organs in the body, lending itself to a far less
hierarchical (and possibly more headless, yet oftentimes individualistic)
development in modern history.
And there are plums here for those interested in linking
Stephen Harper to notions of tyranny. The
London School of Economics political thinker Harold Laski, who late in his
career taught Pierre Trudeau, published a reprint of Vindiciae, Contra Tyrannos in 1924 – and both these once-towering intellects
would likely see much need for “reform” today.
The section below “Who may be called Tyrants?” is especially fruitful,
and reference to the Pharaohs is suggestive of a connection between tyranny and
national monument building on grandiose scales.
The Egyptian Pyramids, the German Autobahn,
and the Great Wall of China can all be compared to another huge construction
(or, rather, destruction) project: the Alberta Tar Sands, which are comparable
in size to the state of Florida, if you can ignore the massive pipeline plans, as
well, spreading south and west, and possibly east.
For further credence to the idea that Canada is promoting
construction on the scale of the pyramids, let us consider the Song of the
Harper (or “Harper’s Song” as it is also known): actual poetry found in Ancient Egyptian tombs by that name, usually
depicted by a blind man playing a harp for the dead. In other words, there may be something of an
ancient Egyptian in Harper’s blood, which explains why he tended to side against
the people of Cairo and with autocracy at the time of its Tahrir moment.
Vindiciae, Contra
Tyrannos was divided into four chapter questions listed below, the most
interesting of which was Question 3, discussed here.
Questions discussed in this Treatise
Whether Subjects are
bound and ought to obey Princes, if they command that which is against the Law
of God.
Whether it be lawful
to resist a Prince which doth infringe the Law of God, or ruin the Church, by
whom, how, and how far it is lawful.
Whether it be lawful
to resist a Prince which doth oppress or ruin a public state, and how far such
resistance may be extended, by whom, how, and by what Right, or Law it is
permitted.
Whether neighbour
Princes or States may be, or bound by Law, to give succours to the Subjects of
other Princes, afflicted for the Cause of true Religion, or oppressed by
manifest Tyranny.
THE THIRD QUESTION
Whether it is lawful to resist a Prince which
doth oppress or ruin a public state, and how far such resistance may be
extended, by whom, how, and by what Right, or Law it is permitted.
The whole Body of the People is above the King.
No truly, but it is said in regard of all the People, whom the business
principally concerns, who lend to the King for the good of the Common-wealth,
their Eyes, their Ears, their Means, their Faculties. Let the People forsake the King, he presently
falls to the Ground, although before his Hearing and Sight seemed most
excellent, and that he was strong and in the best Disposition that might be;
yea, that he seemed to triumph in all significance, yet in an instant he will
become most vile and contemptible, to be brief, instead of the Divine Honours
wherewith all men adore him, he shall be compelled to be a Pedant and whip
children in the school at Corinth. Take away but the Basis to this Giant, and
like the Rhodian Colossus, he presently tumbles on the ground and falls into
pieces. Seeing then that the King is
established in this degree by the People, and for their Sake, and that he
cannot subsist without them, who can think it strange then for us to conclude,
that the People are above the King?[6]
Wherefore Kings were created.
Therefore then to
govern is nothing else but to provide for; These proper ends of commanding,
being for the peoples Commodity; the only Duty of Kings and Emperors is to
provide for the peoples’ Good. The
Kingly Dignity to speak properly is not a Title of Honour but a weighty and
burdensome Office; It is not a discharge or vacation from affairs, to run a
licentious course of liberty, but a charge and vocation to all industrious
Employments, for the service of the Common-wealth; the which has some glimpse
of honour in it, because in those first and Golden Ages, no man would have
tasted of such continual troubles, if they had not been sweetened with some
relish of honour; insomuch, as there was nothing more true, then that which was
commonly said in those times. If every
man knew with what turmoil and troubles the Royal Wreath was wrapped withal, no
man would vouchsafe to take it up, although it lay at his feet.
When therefore that
these Words of mine and thine entered in the World, and that differences fell
among fellow Citizens, touching the propriety of Goods, and Wars amongst
Neighbouring People about the right of their Confines, the People bethought
themselves to have recourse to someone, who both could and should take order
that the Poor were not oppressed by the Rich, nor the Patriots wronged by
Strangers.[7]
Whether Kings be above the Law
… wherefore there is nothing which exempts the
King from obedience which he owes to the Law, which he ought to acknowledge as
his Lady and Mistress.[8]
…the law is the soul
of a good king, it gives him motion, sense and life. The King is the Organ and as it were the body
by which the law displays her forces, exercises her function, and expresses her
conceptions; now it is a thing much more reasonable to obey the soul, than the body; the law is
the wisdom of diverse sages, recollected in a few words, but many see more
clear and further than one alone: it is much better to follow the Law than
any one man’s opinion be he never so acute, the law is reason and wisdom
itself, free from all perturbation, not subject to be moved with Choler,
Ambition, Hate, or acceptances of Persons; Entreaties nor threats cannot make
to bow or bend; on the contrary, a man though endowed with reason suffers
himself to be lead and transported with anger, desire of revenge, and other
Passions which perplex him in such sort, that he looses his understanding, because
being composed of reason and disordered affections, he cannot so contain
himself, but sometimes his passions become his Master[9]
If the Prince may make new Laws?
What then? Shall it
not be lawful for a Prince to make new Laws and abrogate the old? Seeing it belongs to the King, not only to
advise that nothing be done against, nor to defraud the Laws but also that
nothing be wanting in them, nor anything too much in them; briefly that neither
Age nor Lapse of time do abolish or entomb them; if there be anything to
abridge, to be added or taken away from them, it is his Duty to assemble the
Estates, and to demand their Advice and Resolution, without presuming to
publish anything before the whole have been, first, duly examined and approved
by them, after the Law is once enacted and published, there is no more dispute
to be made about it, all men owe obedience to it, and the Prince in the first
place, to teach other men their Duty, and for that all men are easier led by
Example than by Precepts, the Prince must necessarily express his Willingness
to observe the Laws, or else by what equity can he require Obedience in his
Subjects, to that which he himself contemns. …
For, if the Welfare of
the Kingdom depends on the observation of the Laws, and the Laws are enthralled
to the pleasure of one man; is it not most certain that there can be no
permanent stability in that Government?
Must it not then necessarily come to pass, that the King (as some have
been) be infected with Lunacy, either continually or by intervals, that the
whole State fall inevitably to ruin? But
if the Laws be superior to the King, as we have already proved, and that the
King be tied to the same respect of obedience to the Laws, as a Servant is to
his Master, who will be so senseless, that will not rather obey the Law than
the King? Or will not readily yield his best assistance against those that seek
to violate or infringe them? Now seeing
that the King is not Lord over the Laws, let us examine how his Power may be justly
extended in other things.[10]
Whether the King be the proper owner of the Kingdom?
For what if a Man
for the Flocks sake have made thee Shepherd, does it follow that thou has
liberty to slay, pill, sell, and transport the Sheep at thy pleasure? Although the People have established thee
Judge, or Governor of a City, or of some Province, have thou therefore power to
alienate, sell, or play away that City or Province? And seeing that in alienating or passing away
a Province, the People also are told, have they raised thee to that Authority
to the end thou should separate them from the rest, or that thou should
prostitute and make them slaves to whom thou pleased. Furthermore I demand if the Royal dignity be
a Patrimony, or an Officer? If it be an
Office, what Community has it with any propriety? If it be a Patrimony, is it not such a one
that the Paramount property remains still in the People who were the
Donors? Briefly if the revenue of the
Exchequer, or the Demeans of the Kingdom, be called the Dowry of the Common-wealth,
and by good right, and such a Dowry whose dismembering or wasting brings with
it the ruin of the public State, the Kingdom and the King, by what Law shall it
be lawful to alienate this Dowry? …[11]
… a true King as he is
a careful manager of the public Affairs, so he is a ready Protector of the
Common welfare, and not a Lord in Propriety of the Commonwealth, having as
little Authority to alienate or dissipate the demeans or public Revenue, as the
Kingdom itself. And if he misgoverns
the State, seeing it imports the Commonwealth that everyone make use of his own
Talent, it is much more requisite for the public Good, that he which has the
managing of it, carry himself as he ought.
And therefore if a
prodigal Lord by the Authority of Justice, be committed to the Tuition of his
Kinsmen and Friends, and compelled to suffer his Revenues and Means to be
ordered, and disposed of by others; by much more reason than those which have
interest in the Affairs of State, and whose Duty obliges them to, take all
the Administration and Government of the State out of the hands of he who
either negligently executes his place, Ruins the Commonwealth, if after
admonition he endeavours not to perform his Duty. And for so much as it is easily to be proved,
the King cannot be held Lord in Propriety of the demean. [12]
An Alliance or Covenant between the King and People
It is certain then, that the People by way of stipulation, require a
performance of Covenant, the King promises it.
Now the condition of a Stipulator is in terms of Law more worthy than of
a Promiser. The People ask the King,
whether he will govern justly and according to the Laws? He promises he will. Then the People answer, and not before, that
while he governs uprightly, they will obey faithfully. The King therefore promises simply and
absolutely, the People upon condition: the which failing to be accomplished,
the People rest according to Equity and Reason, quit from their Promise.
In the first Covenant or Contract, there is only an obligation to piety;
in the second, to Justice. In that the
King promises to serve God religiously: in this, to rule the People
justly. By the one he is obliged with
the utmost of his Endeavours to Procure the Glory of God: by the other, the
profit of the People. In the first there
is a Condition expressed, If thou keep my Commandments: in the second, If thou
distribute Justice equally to every man.
God is the proper avenger of deficiency in the former, and the whole
People the lawful punisher of the delinquency of the latter, or the Estates,
the representative Body thereof, who have assumed to themselves the Protection
of the People. This has been always
practiced in all well-governed Estates.[13]
Who may truly be called Tyrants?
Hitherto we have treated of a King, it now rests somewhat more fully
describe a Tyrant. We have shown that he
is a King, which lawfully governs a Kingdom, either derived to him by succession,
or committed to him by Election. It
follows therefore that he is reputed a Tyrant, which is opposite to a King,
either gains a Kingdom by violence, or indirect means, or being invested
therewith by lawful election, or succession, governs it not according to law
and equity, or neglects those contracts and agreements, to the observation
where he was strictly obliged at his reception.
All which may very well occur in one and the same person. The first is commonly called a Tyrant without
Title; the second a Tyrant by Practice.
Now it may well come to pass, that he who possesses a Kingdom by force,
to govern justly, and he on whom it descends a lawful Title, rule unjustly. But
for so much as a Kingdom is rather a right than an inheritance, and an office
than a possession: he seems rather worthy the name of a Tyrant, which
unworthily acquits himself of his charge, than he who entered in his place by a
wrong door. .. [14]
A Tyrant lops off those Ears which grow higher than the rest of the
Corn, especially where Virtue makes them most conspicuously eminent, oppressed
by calumnies and fraudulent practices, the principal Officers of the State
gives out reports of intended conspiracies against himself, that he might have
some colourful pretext to cut them off, witness, Tiberius, Maximinus, and
others …. [15]
A Tyrant as much as in him lies, prohibits or avoids all public
Assemblies, fears Parliaments … and meetings of the general Estates, flies the
light, affecting (like the Bat) to converse only in darkness, yea, he is
jealous of the very gesture, countenance and discourse of his Subjects. …[16]
If a tyrant wants
civil broils to exercise his cruel disposition, he makes Wars abroad; erects
idle and needless Trophees and continually employ his tributaries, that they
might want leisure to think on other things; as Pharaoh did the Jews, and Polycrates
the Samians; therefore he always prepares for, or threatens War, or at least
seems so to do, and so still rather draws mischief on, than puts it further off. A King, never makes war, but compelled unto
it, and for the preservation of the public; he never desires to purchase
advantage by treason, he never enters into any war that exposes the
Commonwealth that it affords probable hope of commodity.
A Tyrant leaves no
design unattempted by which he may fleece his Subjects of their subsistence and
turn it to his proper benefit, that being continually troubled in gaining means
to live, they may have no leisure no hope how to regain their liberty: On the
contrary, the King knows that every good Subject’s purse will be ready to
supply the Commonwealth’s occasion, and therefore believes he possess no small
treasure, while through his good Government his Subjects flow in all abundance.
A tyrant extorts
unjustly from many to cast prodigally upon two or three Minions, and those
unworthy; he imposes on all: and exacts from all to furnish their superfluous
and riotous expenses: he builds his own, and followers fortunes on the ruins of
the public: he draws out the people’s blood, by the Veins of their means, and
gives it presently to carouse to his Court-leeches. But a King cuts off from his ordinary
expenses, to ease the people’s necessities, neglects his private state, and
furnishes with all magnificence the public occasions; briefly is prodigal of
his own blood, to defend and maintain the people committed to his care. …[17]
And therefore as
the holy Scripture compares one to a Shepherd, so does it also resemble the
other to a roaring Lion, to whom notwithstanding the Fox is often coupled. For a Tyrant as says Cicero, is culpable in
effect of the greatest injustice that may be imagined, that when he most
deceives, it is when he carries it so appearance to deal sincerely. And therefore he artificially counterfeits
Religion and devotion, wherein faith Aristotle, he expresses one of the most absolute
subtleties that tyrants can possibly practice: he composes his countenance to
piety, by that means to terrify the people from conspiring against him; who
they may well imagine to be especially favoured of God, expressing in all
appearance so reverently to serve him. He
fains also to be exceedingly affected to the public good; not so much for
the love of it, as for the fear of his own safety.[18]
What may lawfully be done against Tyrants by practice.
Finally, that we may come to some period of this third question: Princes are chosen by God, and established by the People; as all particulars considered one by one are inferior to the Prince; so the whole body of the People and Officers of State, which represent that Body, are the Prince's Superiors. In the receiving and inauguration of a Prince, there are Covenants and Contracts passed between him and the People, which are tacit and expressed;to wit, obey him faithfully while he commands justly, that he serving the Common-wealth, all men shall serve him, that while he governs according to Law, all shall be submitted to his Government, etc. The Officers of the Kingdom are the guardians and Protectors of these Covenants and Contracts. And therefore the Officers of the State may judge him according to the Laws: And if he support his Tyranny by strong hands, their duty binds them, when no other man can be effected, by Force of Arms to suppress him.[19]
[1]
Stephanus Junius Brutus, the Celt, Vindiciae,
Contra Tyrannos: or, concerning the legitimate power of a prince over the
people and of the people over a prince, ed and tr. George Garnett
(Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press, 2003), p. 11.
[2] Robert
M. Kindon, “Calvinism and Resistance Theory, 1550-1580” in The Cambridge History of Political Thought, 1450-1700, ed. J.H.
Burns with Mark Goldie (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), pp. 212, 213.
[3]
Steve Pincus, 1688: The First Modern
Revolution (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009).
[4] Roger
Lockyer, ed. The Trial of Charles I (London:
The Folio Society, 1959), p.158.
[5] Francis
Bacon, The Essays, ed. John Pitcher
(Markhan, Ontario: Penguin, 1985), p. 64.
[6] William
Walker, tr. Vindiciae, Contra Tyrannos, a
defence of liberty against tyrants, or, Of the lawful power of the prince over
the people, and of the people over the prince. Early English Books Online
(EEBO) Editions. (London: Printed for Richard Baldwin, 1689), p. 66.
[7] Ibid., pp. 82-83.
[8] Ibid., p. 86.
[9] Ibid., pp. 86,87.
[10]
Ibid., pp. 89-90.
[11] Ibid., pp. 99-100.
[12]
Ibid. pp. 103,104. For a modern-English translation, see my blog entry: “Reasons to protect the CBC – the case as put
in 1579.”
[13] Ibid., p. 113.
[14] Ibid., p. 119.
[15] Ibid., p. 122.
[16] Ibid., p. 123.
[17] Ibid., pp. 124,125.
[18] Ibid. p. 125.
[19] Ibid., p. 150.
