第32章 Letter IX(2)

Let us prove what we advance;and that we may do so ad homines,let us borrow our argument from the great champion of hereditary right.Having mentioned in his introduction what he endeavours pompously,but vainly,to establish in his book in favour of hereditary right,'a preion of nine centuries,a continual claim of five hundred and fifty years',he attempts to convince us by a 'novel law,and a modern constitution'.This modern constitution is the Act of Recognition,in the first of King James the First.The declarations there made in favour of hereditary right,are no doubt as strong as words can frame,and the words are such as would tempt one to think,by the fustian they compose,that his majesty himself had penned them.From hence it is concluded,that since 'the vows and acts of fathers bind their posterity,this act,till the society hath revoked it lawfully,lays the same obligation on every member of the society,as if he had personally consented to it'.

--If this Act then was lawfully revoked,or repealed,another novel law,contrary to it,might be made equally binding;but neither this Act,nor the Act of the twelfth of Charles the Second,affirming the crown to appertain by just and undoubted right to the King,his heirs and lawful successors,having been expressly repealed,we still lie under the same obligations,and every settlement,contrary to them,and by consequence the settlement made at the Revolution,is unlawful.Now I ask,was not the will of Henry the Eighth,which excluded the whole Scottish line,made in pursuance,and by the authority of an Act passed in the twenty-fifth year of his reign?