Chapter the sixth.
Of the King’s duties.
I Proceed next to the duties, incumbent on the king by our conſtitution; in conſideration of which duties his dignity and prerogative are eſtabliſhed by the laws of the land: it being a maxim in the law, that protection and ſubjection are reciprocal[1]. And theſe reciprocal duties are what, I apprehend, were meant by the convention in 1688, when they declared that king James had broken the original contract between king and people. But however, as the terms of that original contract were in ſome meaſure diſputed, being alleged to exiſt principally in theory, and to be only deducible by reaſon and the rules of natural law; in which deduction different underſtandings might very conſiderably differ; it was, after the revolution, judged proper to declare theſe duties expreſſly, and to reduce that contract to a plain certainty. So that, whatever doubts might be formerly raiſed by weak and ſcrupulous minds about the exiſtence of ſuch an original contract, they muſt now entirely ceaſe; eſpecially with regard to every prince, who hath reigned ſince the year 1688.
The principal duty of the king is, to govern his people according to law. Nec regibus infinita aut libera poteſtas, was the conſtitution of our German anceſtors on the continent[2]. And this is not only conſonant to the principles of nature, of liberty, of
