A NEEDFUL CORRECTIVE OR balance IN Popular Government, Expressed in a Letter to James HARRINGTON, Esquire, Upon occasion of a late Treatise of his; And published as seasonable in the present Juncture of affairs.  
SIR,  
THE high esteem and reverence you bear (and that deservedly) unto human Prudence, (which the more ancient the date is that you set to it, is doubtless the better, as most partaking of its primitive purity) does nevertheless, I fear, outweigh with you, beyond what it ought, to the derogation and prejudice of that pattern for Magistracy itself, which was shown unto Moses in the Mount, during the forty days in which the body of that godly Man was nourished, without the help of secondary means, and yet lived not upon the air, but upon every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God: In the wisdom of which Word he was then taught to see the most excellent platform of Civil Government; as having its root and inward principles, as well as its outward administration flowing from Divine Institution & revelation: of which we may well suppose, that the abilities in Jethro a Heathen (that appeared in the advice he gave touching the outward order to be observed for the administration of Justice in the commonwealth of Israel) did fall very short, although there be nothing contained in the one, which may not have witness and justification given unto it by the other, as was the case between Jethro and Moses; yet Moses was he, that by conversing face to face with God, and receiving the lively Oracles, was much better qualified to lay down the rules of a perfect commonwealth Government than Jethro was, that by the help only of tradition, acquired gifts and experience, might arrive to that skill in the rules of ancient Prudence, as to make him a very knowing and able Politician, and yet not to stand in competition with Moses.  
And since you have thought fit, in your Treatise showing the Prerogative of popular Government, and very worthily asserting that cause, with great advantage on your part, against all adversaries that are entered into the list with you, to annex to it certain Queries with this inscription, To the godly man: Be pleased to take in good part this general return that is made thereunto, not with any intent to oppose, but rather countenance the essentials of that Government you plead for, and perfect the principles of true freedom, which are taught by ancient Prudence, to the rendering us a holy as well as a free people: In which Spirit of holiness you may become invinsible against the very Clergy themselves, that have begun to undertake you; as you also, in requital, have not a little unmasked them in their pretended ordination, which they, as the Presbytery, would fain engross and usurp to themselves, without the free consent of the Congregation.  
Nor will it be much material in this, to know from whom this comes to you, under any other notion, than the Advocate for the godly Man, to whom your Queries are directed; it being indeed from one that cannot be wrought off from a sincere and hearty friendship and value of true godliness; how shameful soever the miscarriage hath been in these our days, of those that having had only the form of it, have served themselves thereof to advance their worldly interests, to the making that very name to stink amongst the Heathens and great Leviathans of the world; and therefore is desirous to receive a clear information and resolution from yourself, unto some Queries that you will find in the close of this paper, directed to you, on the behalf of the godly Man; after some little discanting upon the nature of Government, in the general, and joining in witness with you unto those principles of common right and freedom, that must be provided for, in whatsoever frame of Government it be, which does pretend to a perfection in its kind.  
By Government or Rule in general is to be understood that power which, de facto, comes to be set up as supreme, and is exercised over Nations or People by way of oversight and command for the good of the whole Body, in either of the three conditions of men you mention, whether of Servants, Subjects, or Citizens.  
The rise and being which is given to ruling Power amongst Nations and kingdoms, is not by chance, nor merely through the will of Man, but hath its place found in God's Ordinance and Institution; for there is no Power but is of God, and the Powers that are sprung either from his Authority and Commission, or from his toleration and Permission. So as upon one account or the other, we may truly say, they are so limited and ordered by him, whether it respect the form of their constitution, the force of their operation, or the time of their continuance, as well as the use and end which they serve unto, that when all is done, Power only belongs to God, who kills and makes alive, and pulls down one and sets up another, that it may be kuown, that the pillars of the Earth are his, and he hath set the World upon them, upholding all things by the Word of his Power; so as neither promotion nor abasement does come from the East or from the West, but from him alone, in order to bring to pass the work which he hath to do in the World, for the good of his Church and People.  
However Government, considered as well in reference to the right as to the actual exercise of it, is seated also in the will of man, where it hath, next under God, its rise and being. And the access unto it is usually had upon pretence of one of these three rights.  
First the right of consent and free gift by the common vote of the whole Body, which is the right door to enter into the exercise of supreme Power, and is genuine, natural, righteous, consonant to those pure Principles of man's nature, wherein he was at first created, and does declare the governed to be in the state of free Citizens, who as Brethren partaking of the Spirit of right reason, common to them as men made in the Image of God, are equally entitled to their own oversight and Government, and do therefore see cause voluntarily to associate themselves together, and on the grounds of common right and freedom, to agree to be subject and yield obedience to the Laws, that are from time to time made amongst them by their own free and common consent. So as this sort of Empire or Government is that of Laws, and not of Men, and is of a nature better agreeing with the many than the few, and least of all with the single person.  
The second is the right of conquest, which is also through the will of man usurping and imposing upon his Brethren, by force of arms, that which could not be obtained (as it ought) by free consent, and is therefore held upon the same terms of force and violence, to the proclaiming the governed to be fallen into a state of servants, if not of slaves, who hold all they have at the will of the Lord, and are in a condition most agreeing with the principles of absolute Monarchy, as in practice began with Nimrod, and is yet to be seen in the Government of Turkey, and other Nations of the World.  
Thirdly, There is a mixed right that is made up of both the former, to the rendering that tolerable, and, in some sort, satisfying, in process of time, which was at first most wickedly & unduly acquired: And is their case, who not being able to be free men, are resolved to do their utmost not to be slaves; and so are brought to consent to walk in the middle way, between both; agreeing to be subjects, or yield subjection to their Ruler, upon condition of enjoying certain known rights and privileges belonging to them as men, and which may distinguish them from mere slaves, and be laid as fundamental Laws of that constitution of Government. This way of obtaining the exercise of supreme Power, carrying in it the temper and mixture of the other two, is neither very good, nor stark nought; but is the worse for this, that such as are under it do seldom care to be better, they are so afraid, that by attempting to mend themselves, they shall make themselves irrecoverably worse. This kind of Government agrees not with the principles of absolute Monarchy, nor perfect popular freedom, but sorts with Aristocracy, that is, the mixture of them both, and with regulated Monarchy, as that of Kings, Lords and Commons.  
The difficulty at first view appears not to be great in introducing and settling a Government, where the people are conquered by force of arms, no more than (under the fright and apprehension of the fate of those that come to be reduced by the sword) to compound up the business in the middle way before mentioned, as this Nation hath often and dearly experienced in the changes of Governors, if not Governments, which they have been subject unto; So as the great clamour and objection lies only against the first; that is, as to the practicableness of introducing and settling the exercise of the supreme Power, by the free and common consent of the Citizens, whose equality in power is apt to make their tempers luxuriant and immoderate, and keeps them from coming rightly to agree in a matter of such consequence.  
Wherein first consideration is to be had by them, whether this high trust of the chief Magistracy shall be placed in one single person, or in a collective Body of Elders, or a Senate, consisting of more or fewer persons? And then,  
Secondly, Whether this Power shall be transferred absolutely to the person or persons so chosen, or with limitation and condition?  
To transfer it absolutely yields up with it the Legislative Power, and sixes it as well as the executive, in one and the same hand) admit it be to a single Person, or a Senate) and leaves nothing afterward unto the People but slavery and bondage, by putting forth all the Acts of Rule and Power without their consent.  
But to confer this Power rationally, and agreeably to the principles of ancient Prudence, is to reserve, by way of limitation, that which may so qualify and regulate the supreme executive Power, in and by whatsoever hand it be exercised, as is able to preserve it within its due bounds as it is executive, and keeps the result of that wherein it is Legislative within the power and consent of the People.  
This is easily done, by the help of a second order of men, ordained and constituted by the people's suffrage; who, in the capacity of their Deputies and Representative Body, are from time to time to make up one general Assembly with the Senate, by yertue of their Summons and call, and there to give the consent of the People to all Acts and Decrees that are Legislative and binding to the commonwealth.  
The third thing to be done, in order to the right introducing and settling of Magistracy in a free State of Citizens, is to dispose themselves, or suffer themselves to be disposed into that order, which is requisite, and may best conduce to the choice of meet and fit persons into either of the two Assemblies, whether that of the Senate, or of the people's Representative.  
But the great difficulty remains yet to receive its solution, which is to show how the depraved, corrupted, and self-interested will of man, in the great Body, which we call the People, being once left to its own free motion, shall be prevailed with to espouse their true publiick interest, and closely adhere to it, under the many trials and discouragements they must be sure to meet with, before they obtain what they pursue.  
Which Objection being so experimental as it is, carries with it the greater force, and is obvious to most men; by reason whereof they rather choose the bondage whereinto they fall under the power of the sword moderately used, then to commit themselves to the boundless power of the people's will unbridled, and unsubjected unto any rules from inward principles, or outward order and command.  
However, in way of answer, there is that to be said, which whether it will weigh in the judgements of others I know not, but it is considerable with me.  
And first, it may be but needful to inquire whence this is, and also what is that which is wanting to balance and complete the motion of man's will, in the exercise of its own freedom, that it is so little to be trusted and relied on, in the pursuit of that which is the common Interest of mankind, and the public good of human Societies. And if in this we search to the bottom, we have it declared in that Scripture, which says, It is not in man to order his own steps. Man, at his best, stands in need of the balancing and ruling motion of God's Spirit to keep him steadfast; let his nature be made, as it was at first, holy and righteous, when his will was morally bounded within the excellent limits that were set unto it by the Law of God, unto which he did bear a natural and willing conformity in the spirit of his mind, and was under the dictates of a pure enlightened reason.  
And how much therefore more does his nature and will want this ruling and moving influence now, from the Spirit of God, when it is at its worst, not only to heal and restore what is lost, but to add, by way of supply, that more grace that may preserve from the danger of future relapse. And this remedy is not always at hand, nor in man's power to take up at his pleasure. For as the wind bloweth where it listeth, and none know whence it comes, and whither it goes; so is every one that is born of the Spirit of God. And though it be easy with God to cause such a Nation to be born at once, and to make the Earth bring forth in a day, by the extraordinary effusion of his Spirit upon all flesh, yet this is extraordinary, and very remote, as to the redress of the evil now in question. Nevertheless, the consideration of this takes so far impression with me, as to conclude no Nation truly free that is in bondage to corruption, and alienated from the life of God by wicked works, how much soever it be set at liberty in other respects, to use the power of its own will in providing for its own Government: But the People of it ought to be as sensible of their great want and misery, in this respect, as they are forward to complain, and with great justice also, of the force of the sword, which God permits very frequently to be kept up over them, till holy and righteous Principles be of more power and better reception with them.  
But secondly, Until such times of refreshing and healing shall come, from the presence of the Lord, upon the Nations of the World, as is promised in the last of days; we are to take care in the use of the ordinary means, daily afforded by God's Providence, that are most conducing to guide and regulate the will of the People, unto their making a good choice of the Senate and their own Deputies, in order to meet together in one general Assembly, by them acknowledged the free and complete Representation of the whole Nation. And then, this being once done, and thereby the first great wheel of the commonwealth set upon its right hinges, all the other inferior wheels would quickly be set to keep motion and harmony with that, to the bringing in, with great facility, a well composed order of Government throughout the whole State.  
And this without difficulty may be done, if this one Rule be held unto and observed; which is, that in the time of the commonwealths constituting, and in a Nation much di●ided in affection and interest about their own Government, none be admitted to the exercise of the right and privilege of a free Citizen, for a season, but either such as are free born, in respect of their holy and righteous principles, flowing from the birth of the Spirit of God in them, (restoring man in measure and degree, as at the first by Creation) unto the right of Rule and Dominion) or else who, by their tried good affection and faithfulness to common right and public freedom, have deserved to be trusted with the keeping or bearing their own arms in the public defence.  
And if unto this selected number of Citizens, the liberty of exercising the choice of the Magistrates for the whole Body, should be for a season restrained; and they cast into a military order and discipline (as the Israelites of old, when they once had turned their backs upon Egypt, the House of Bondage) and shall become distributed in distinct Tribes and Divisions, within the borders of their several Habitations or Precincts where they dwell; it could be no sooner said unto them, as Moses did to the Children of Israel, Take and choose you able and wise men, such as fear God, men of truth and hating covetousness, that they may be made Heads over the People, of Thousands, of Hundreds, of Fifties, and of Tens; but the thing would carry that self-evidence in it to the minds of the People, how good and possible it is for them so to do, that they would most cheerfully set about, and accordingly effect it.  
As to what then hath been said in this matter, pointing out some dissatisfaction that rests with me, in reference to the definition you make of an equal commonwealth, and the way you find requisite to place the balance in it, by an Agrarian and Law for equal interesting the People in the soil, and an universal liberty unto election of the Magistrates, through the help of the rotation and use of the B●llot, the result of all amounts to this; That whilst holiness in principles, by way of spiritual birth, is wanting amongst the People, as one chief Ingredient to qualify them to the exercise of the right of free Citizens, and a tried good affection and faithfulness to common Right and public freedom remains undiscovered, the way by you proposed, for the well constituting a commonwealth, may bring it to a state and degree of freedom very desirable, and which being attained we may be in the fairer and nearer way to the other.  
But where (as you all along most deservedly have regard unto) the foundations of Government shall be laid so firm and deep as in the Word of God, bottomed upon that cornerstone the Lord Jesus, there is a Heavenly balance to be met with, which keeps all even. For upon this Stone there are seven eyes; God himself is he that engraves the graving thereof, and gives forth, according to that pattern, the order and constitution of Magistracy, in its primitive purity and perfection; where the Authority and proposing Power, by which to move and keep the will of the People in its right course of obedience, is first originally in God and Christ himself, as their Political King and Civil Legislator; and next under Christ, the Ruling Senate, whose Office it is; and as you yourself well say, from the excellency of their debate and deliberation, providently and faithfully unfolded to the People, they do frequently cause and necessitate the will and the deed in them. So much may one man, for the excellency of his aid, be as in the place and power of God unto another.  

This sort of Government is contained in these following Queries.  
Quer. 1. Whether in the restitution of all things, so assuredly promised, and so often foretold, since the World began, Acts 3. Man himself shall not be restored to the gift and exercise of Righteousness in his natural judgement and will, in the perfection, as to kind, wherein he was at first created; (as in the Type, in a good degree, did befall Nabuchadnezzar in the exercise of Government, Dan. 4. 34, 36.) to the enabling of whole Nations, in this day of God's Power, in such manner to obey God's voice and keep his Covenant, as shall render them unto God a kingdom and holy Nation, in the relation of his Subjects; and he shall be to them a King or supreme Legislator, accepted and voted by the people's free and common consent, as Exod. 19  
Quer. 2. Whether such a restored People and holy Nation, made after this manner God's peculiar treasure, and he their chief Magistrate, and directed by the Spirit of their Head, to put themselves in the best capacity they can (first to hear what God hath to propose to them, as the rule of their obedience to him: Secondly, to exercise that which they agree to bear the stamp and authority of the Wisdom of the Nation, in matters that appertain to the oversight of the whole Body, in the hands of a Senate or Council of Elders, for the executive part of the supreme Power: And thirdly, to give the public vote and suffrage of the whole People, in a way of assent or dissent, upon all matters proposed by the Senate, to pass into Laws amongst them, by their own chosen Deputies and Representative Body, for that purpose constituted by them from time to time, as need shall require, to join with the Senate) be not that righteous and faithful City spoken of, Isai. 1. 26. to whom her Judges are restored, as at the first, and her Counsellors as at the beginning, by whose Decrees that Law goes forth, wherein Christ himself shall appear judging amongst the Nations, and rebuking many People, until he settle Peace and Righteousness in the Earth?  
Quer. 3. Whether such a Ruling Senate, consisting of a competent number of fit and meet persons to be made Heads of the People, and by their free suffrage elected and designed to the office of executing the supreme Power, (as the work singly appertaining to this chief Council of Elders) and also to the exercise of the Legislative Power, in association with the Representative Body of the People, to be by them from time to time summoned and called together for that purpose, in which general and great Assembly to propose all such matters whatsoever as are to pass into Laws, and to receive the distinct and public vote of the people's consent to them, before they be of the force of Laws or binding, be not the most exact platform of the purest kind of popular Government, and that which hath its foundation and first pattern in the Word of God, in the practice of Israel's commonwealth, and so plainly of Divine Creation and Institution?  
Quer. 4. Lastly, Whether the beginnings of such a Government as this, as small as they may be at first, and accompanied with the mixture of human frailties and infirmities, may not however, through the mighty and universal pouring out of the Spirit upon all flesh, so grow and increase, as at last to come up unto a perfect day; in such sort as the public sentence and judgement of such a restored People and holy Nation, in their Assemblies of Judicature, may not so much be the judgement of Man, as of the Lord himself, their King and lawgiver, and be owned by him to be the same here on Earth, with his which is in Heaven, and therefore to be ratified and made stable, by the Word of his Heavenly Power, executed by his mighty Angels, as well as by their earthly forces and strength of men's bodies, against all opposers and rebellious gainsayers, to the setting up of Christ as King throughout the whole Earth, and causing the Nations and kingdoms of this World to become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ, in a visible manner here below, for the space of a thousand years; in which time the Moon shall be confounded, and the Sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, before his Ancients gloriously, showing himself King in Jeshurum, when the Heads of the People and Tribes of Israel are gathered together before the Lord in the day of their Assembly?   
By this time, I suppose, I have well nigh tired out your patience, having drawn out my Letter to a greater length than becomes this way of address. But since my aim in setting these things before your consideration is (as I said at first) not to put led on your Chariot wheels, to cause them to drive heavily, but rather to be an occasion to carry on the Work in a straight line unto its perfection; you will, I hope, the more willingly bear with me, and not be offended at this small glimpse, which, duly improved, may at length lead unto a fuller and clearer prospect into the new Heavens and new Earth, wherein dwells Righteousness, and may in some sort provide us against the time when the fashion of the old ones shall wear off, and pass away with great noise and fervent heat, which is the faith and assured expectation of him, who is  
Your true Honourer, and real Servant.  
FINIS.