n danger, or _their
grandeur and riches at least_, most of them turned against the
Parliament.

This, and in this place, is unworthy of Baxter. Even he, good man, could
not wholly escape the jaundice of party.

Ib. p. 34.

They said to this;--that as all the courts of justice do execute their
sentences in the King's name, and this by his own law, and therefore
by his authority, so much more might his Parliament do.

A very sound argument is here disguised in a false analogy, an
inapplicable precedent, and a sophistical form. Courts of justice
administer the total of the supreme power retrospectively, involved in
the name of the most dignified part. But here a part, as a part, acts as
the whole, where the whole is absolutely requisite,--that is, in passing
laws; and again as B. and C. usurp a power belonging to A. by the
determination of A. B. and C. The only valid argument is, that Charles
had by acts of his own ceased to be a lawful King.

Ib. p. 40.

And that the authority and person of the King were inviolable, out of
the reach of just accusation, judgment, or execution by law; as having
no superior, and so no judge.

But according to Grotius, a king waging war against the lawful
copartners of the 'summa potestas' ceases to be their king, and if
conquered forfeits to them his former share. And surely if Charles had
been victor, he would have taken the Parliament's share to himself. If
it had been the Parliament, and not a mere faction with the army, that
tried and beheaded Charles, I do not see how any one could doubt the
lawfulness of the act, except upon very technical grounds.

Ib. p. 41.

For if once legislation, the chief act of government, be denied to any
part of government at all, and affirmed to belong to the people as
such, who are no governors, all government will hereby be overthrown.

Here Baxter falls short of the subject, and does not see the full
consequents of his own prior, most judicious, positions. Legislation in
its high and most proper sense belongs to God only. A people declares
that such and such they hold to be laws, that is, God's will.

Ib. p. 47.

In Cornwall Sir Richard Grenvill, having taken many soldiers of the
Earl of Essex's army, sentenced about a dozen to be hanged. When they
had hanged two or three, the rope broke which should have hanged the
next. And they sent for new ropes so oft to hang him, and all of them
still broke, th