Wild digital books

"
* * * * *
I now proceed to show that the Whig managers for the Commons meant to
preserve the government on a firm foundation, by asserting the perpetual
validity of the settlement then made, and its coercive power upon
posterity. I mean to show that they gave no sort of countenance to any
doctrine tending to impress the _people_ (taken separately from the
legislature, which includes the crown) with an idea that _they_ had
acquired a moral or civil competence to alter, without breach of the
original compact on the part of the king, the succession to the crown,
at their pleasure,--much less that they had acquired any right, in the
case of such an event as caused the Revolution, to set up any new form
of government. The author of the Reflections, I believe, thought that no
man of common understanding could oppose to this doctrine the ordinary
sovereign power as declared in the act of Queen Anne: that is, that the
kings or queens of the realm, with the consent of Parliament, are
competent to regulate and to settle the succession of the crown.


Pages:
168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192