Johannes Althusius: Politica - Hubertlerch.com - HubertLerch.com

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM others bring against him, as the Golden Bull of Charles IV teaches. The king of France is under the judgment of the Parliament of Paris, and the princes of the German imperium are under the judgments of other princes, of counts, or even of their counselors. 62 Bartolus asserts that a king also can be subjected to someone less than himself or to his equal. 63 Therefore, these persons— Caesar, king, and prince—are over ( praeesse) in one relationship and are under ( subesse) in another, but not over and under in the same relationship; they are, nevertheless, over and under at the same time and with reference to the same interpretation. [§ 99] The king is over and rules in those things for which he receives the power of ruling and governing, not in those things that have been reserved to the power and judgment of the ephors. He is over when he governs and administers lawfully, justly, and piously; that is, he ceases to be the administrator when he does not care what happens, but loses, squanders, and destroys, and ceases to be a living law, just as a pastor ceases to be a pastor who flays, divides, and loses his sheep. Barclay continues by developing his argument from examples. Thus he says cardinals constitute a pope above them, priests a bishop above them, and monks an abbot above them. Whence the former are inferior in power and authority, and the latter are superior. The former are devoid of the imperium and power that the latter have. [§ 100] But I say that such persons—the pope, bishop, abbot, or anyone else—can be removed for just reasons by those who constituted them, and can be deprived of their power. For what if such a pope, bishop, or abbot should become a heretic, or in any manner become unfit or untrustworthy in office? Canonical laws ( jura canonica) pronounce such persons to be restrained from the authority and administration of the office entrusted to them. 64 And often such persons have been deprived of their office, as history bears witness and practical experience teaches. [§ 101] For who, to the detriment of the church and to the damage and loss of man’s salvation, would long endure such unfit men, heretics, schismatics, sorcerers, incapacitated persons, those who live a shameful life and provide not at all for the functions of their office, or those who do not tend their sheep but flay them? If they lose their mind or develop another disorder of soul or body, so that henceforth they become altogether unfit or incapacitated, will not the church be committed to the government of other ministers? Or does the church so fall into their power, care, and protection that while they are living its government never can be committed to another? Or in emergencies is the order, authority, and power of one man—of a pope, bishop, or abbot—greater and stronger than that of the church, the cardinals, or the monks? Or is the power of one greater than the power of many? No one will maintain this. Or in these emergencies is the right of one pope, bishop, or abbot greater, stronger, and in better condition than that of all the cardinals and monks of the entire church? Nor will anyone affirm this. For whatever the right, power, and authority such ecclesiastical overseers have, it is not their property, nor do they derive it from themselves. Rather they have received it from the church, the collegium of cardinals, and the chapter of monks. Those who die or lay aside their office resign this right, power, and authority into the hands of the church, collegium, or chapter by which they were constituted. They restore this right to its owners, so that these overseers are considered to be nothing more than usufructuaries of it, and the collegia indeed to be its proprietors. [§ 102] Whence it is that the right of these overseers is temporal. On the other hand, the right of the collegia is permanent and immortal to the extent that these collegia, because of their constant succession of persons in place of those who depart, are considered to be immortal. When we consider the office and administration of kings, we find that their nature and constitution are not unlike those of ecclesiastical overseers. [§ 103] The right of a king consists in the faithful and diligent care and administration of the commonwealth entrusted to him by the people. For this reason the people transfers to him as much authority and power as it judges necessary. By the communication, sharing, and contribution of individual persons from the people, the king becomes rich and powerful. By their counsel he becomes wise. By the aid of his subjects he excels in strength, vigor, and might. If the people denies these to the king, he again becomes weak, poor, needy, and a private person. The king holds, uses, and enjoys these riches—and this might, wisdom, and authority—as a usufructuary. When the king dies, or is denied the regal throne by any legitimate means, these rights of the king, as we have said, return to the people as to their proprietor. The people then reassigns them as it thinks wise for the good of the commonwealth. [§ 104] Therefore, the right of the king is one thing, and the right of the people is another. The former is temporal and personal; the latter is permanent. The former is the lesser; the latter is the greater. The former is a precarium given by contract to the commissioned king, and undertaken by him; the latter is an incommunicable property. [§ 105] Moreover, Barclay says that as the husband who is constituted over his wife is her superior, so the king is superior to the commonwealth and realm. But I say that the superiority and power the husband has over his wife he derives from the marriage. And this is only for a time and with a condition, namely, that it lasts as long as the marriage endures, that is, as long as the marriage is not dissolved by adultery, desertion, or death. When the marriage is dissolved, every marital power he exercises over his wife is ended. Of equal seriousness with desertion is the intolerable cruelty of a husband that makes it impossible to live with him. Because of incurable cruelty, and its hazard to life and health, theologians concede a dissolution of http://oll.libertyfund.org/Home3/EBook.php?recordID=0002 Page 74 of 132
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM marriage, and defend divorce by the authority of sacred scripture. 65 Is there not equal reason for conceding divorce between a king and a commonwealth because of the intolerable and incurable tyranny of a king by which all honest cohabitation and association with him are destroyed? No bond is considered to be stricter than that of matrimony, which is ordained by divine authority to be indissoluble. However, for the previously mentioned causes it is dissolved. Cannot the bond between magistrate and subjects likewise be dissolved for equally serious reasons? [§ 106] All power is limited by definite boundaries and laws. No power is absolute, infinite, unbridled, arbitrary, and lawless. Every power is bound to laws, right, and equity. Likewise, every civil power that is constituted by legitimate means can be terminated and abolished. Barclay is likewise wrong when he says that all functions of the commonwealth are entrusted to the king. 66 For the function of electing, constituting, and defending a king, the function of resisting tyranny, and many other functions that I have listed in this chapter as entrusted to the ephors cannot be committed to the king. THUS FAR WE HAVE SPOKEN of the office of the ephors, and we have refuted the things that have been alleged against their power by Barclay. We will now speak of the types of ephors. [§ 107] Ephors are permanent (rendered hereditary by the consent of the universal association), or temporal. Permanent ephors have their responsibility so assigned to them that they may even transfer it to their heirs. Temporary ephors, on the other hand, perform this office for a prescribed time only, after which they lay it aside. … [§ 108] Such ephors and estates, or orders of the realm, are also of two kinds. Some are ecclesiastical, and others are secular. Ecclesiastical ephors are those who have been constituted from among ecclesiastical persons, and bear the responsibility for ecclesiastical things. [§ 109] Secular ephors are those who have the knowledge and care of public things. These latter are, in turn, either nobles or commoners. Nobles are chosen from the order of the nobility; commoners are selected from the remaining persons of the villages, towns, and cities of the realm. All these ephors and orders of the realm are distributed among two species. Some are general, and others special. [§ 110] General ephors are those to whom is entrusted the guardianship, care, and inspection of the whole realm and of all its provinces. Such are imperial senators, counselors, syndics, chancellors of the realm, and so forth. Such general optimates and ephors in the Israeli realm were the seventy elders. “And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Gather for me seventy men of the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people and officers over them; and bring them to the tent of meeting, and let them take their stand there with you. And I will come down and talk with you there; and I will take some of the spirit that is upon you and put it upon them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with you, that you may not bear it yourself alone.’ ” 67 In the Roman imperium there first were in the democracy the tribunes of the people who checked the consular power so that the consuls might not abuse the imperium, nor become accustomed to excessive boldness or savagery. Later in the Roman monarchy the general ephors were the senators of Rome, as Xenophon, Aristotle, Plutarch, and others have testified. 68 In the German polity such general ephors are the electors, or the seven men of the imperium, of which three are ecclesiastical and four secular. The ecclesiastical are the archbishop of Mainz, who is also the arch-chancellor of the imperium, the archbishop of Cologne, and the archbishop of Treves. The secular ephors are the king of Bohemia, the prince of the Rhenish Palatinate, the duke of Saxony, and the duke of Brandenburg. The Palatinate elector, in accord with the Golden Bull of Emperor Charles IV, is the judge from among them in cases instituted against the emperor. Likewise, he and the Saxon prince are trustees and vicars of the imperium in time of interregnum. The archbishop and elector of Mainz, as the arch-chancellor of the German imperium, has the right of calling together the electoral colleagues in this collegium of electors, of proposing matters to them, and of soliciting their judgments. Philip Honorius and other historians agree that in the French realm there are three orders; the ecclesiastical order, the nobility, and the commons. … 69 The general optimates of France are the chancellor of France, the French princes born with royal blood from their fathers, the major courtiers, who today are called equestrian counts, marshals, admirals, the keeper of the seal, quaestors, and others accepted by the Parisian senate. … 70 [§ 111] Special ephors are those that undertake the guardianship and care of a province, region, or certain part of the realm. http://oll.libertyfund.org/Home3/EBook.php?recordID=0002 Page 75 of 132
Page 1 and 2:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM THE
Page 3 and 4:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM ____
Page 5 and 6:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM clar
Page 7 and 8:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM coll
Page 9 and 10:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM that
Page 11 and 12:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM Zwin
Page 13 and 14:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM Alth
Page 15 and 16:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM of t
Page 17 and 18:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM conn
Page 19 and 20:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM [12]
Page 21 and 22:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM Ren
Page 23 and 24: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM A. M
Page 25: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM mora
Page 28 and 29: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM To d
Page 30 and 31: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM all
Page 32 and 33: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM grea
Page 34 and 35: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM II [
Page 36 and 37: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM end
Page 38 and 39: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM is o
Page 40 and 41: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM the
Page 44 and 45: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM [§
Page 46 and 47: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM and
Page 48 and 49: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM rece
Page 52 and 53: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM cons
Page 54 and 55: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM that
Page 56 and 57: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM noth
Page 58 and 59: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM unde
Page 60 and 61: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM noth
Page 62 and 63: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM can
Page 64 and 65: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM real
Page 67 and 68: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM body
Page 73: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM Thus
Page 77 and 78: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM [6]
Page 79 and 80: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM poin
Page 83 and 84: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM comm
Page 85 and 86: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM was
Page 89 and 90: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM live
Page 91 and 92: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM The
Page 95 and 96: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM modi
Page 97 and 98: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM easi
Page 101 and 102: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM supr
Page 103 and 104: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM mini
Page 105 and 106: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM dwel
Page 107 and 108: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM 21).
Page 111 and 112: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM It i
Page 117 and 118: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM and
Page 119 and 120: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM itse
Page 123 and 124: Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM peop
Page 125 and 126:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM [8]
Page 127 and 128:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM §15
Page 129 and 130:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM Poli
Page 131 and 132:
Althusius_0002 9/10/05 4:09 PM [ St
show all

Johannes Althusius: Politica - Hubertlerch.com - HubertLerch.com

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?