for from him every one, who would be as faſhionable as French was at court, has learned, and runs away with this ſhort ſyſtem of politics, viz. Men are not born free, and therefore could never have the liberty to chooſe either governors, or forms of government. Princes have their power abſolute, and by divine right; for ſlaves could never have a right to compact or conſent. Adam was an abſolute monarch, and ſo are all princes ever ſince.
CHAP. II.
Of Paternal and Regal Power.
§. 6. SIR Robert Filmer's great poſition is, that men are not naturally free. This is the foundation on which his abſolute monarchy ſtands, and from which it erects itſelf to an height, that its power is above every power, caput inter nubila, ſo high above all earthly and human things, that thought can ſcarce reach it; that promiſes and oaths, which tye the infinite Deity, cannot confine it. But if this foundation fails, all his fabric falls with it, and governments muſt be left again to the old way of being made by contrivance, and the conſent of men (Άνϧϛωπίνη ϰτίσιϛ) making uſe of their reaſon to unite together into ſociety. To prove this grand poſition of his, he tells us, p. 12. Men
