'Our
ancestors having most indisputably a competent jurisdiction to decide
this great and important question, and having, in fact, decided it, it
is now become our duty, at this distance of time, to acquiesce in their
determination.[565]'
Mr. Paley, the present Archdeacon of Carlisle, in his _Principles of
Moral and Political Philosophy_, having, with much clearness of
argument, shewn the duty of submission to civil government to be founded
neither on an indefeasible _jus divinum_, nor on _compact_, but on
_expediency_, lays down this rational position:--
'Irregularity in the first foundation of a state, or subsequent
violence, fraud, or injustice, in getting possession of the supreme
power, are not sufficient reasons for resistance, after the government
is once peaceably settled. No subject of the _British_ empire conceives
himself engaged to vindicate the justice of the _Norman_ claim or
conquest, or apprehends that his duty in any manner depends upon that
controversy. So likewise, if the house of _Lancaster_, or even the
posterity of _Cromwell_, had been at this day seated upon the throne of
_England_, we should have been as little concerned to enquire how the
founder of the family came there[566].' In conformity with this
doctrine, I myself, though fully persuaded that the House of _Stuart_
had originally no right to the crown of _Scotland_; for that _Baliol_,
and not _Bruce_, was the lawful heir; should yet have thought it very
culpable to have rebelled, on that account, against Charles the First,
or even a prince of that house much nearer the time, in order to assert
the claim of the posterity of Baliol.
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