Page:A Declaration of the People's Natural Right to a Share in the Legislature (1775) (IA declarationofpeo00shar).djvu/28

[ xviii ] which the greater number give consent” (as he himself remarks in the preceding paragraph) “is taken for the Will and Decree of all;” so that, by this means, a whole Nation is as capable of making a Covenant or Compact as an Individual; and I will only add, to what the Baron has allowed about the binding of those who dissent, that they are bound only so far as the imposed Obligation is consistent with their superior Covenant and duty to God, which is always to be implied: for even the of the World,, who alone can be said to have an absolute Right to govern his creature man without a free Covenant, (if he had been pleased so to do,) has nevertheless condescended to include all his positive Laws in two express legal Covenants, the old and the new, both of which have been from time to time confirmed and fulfilled, and still respectively subsist to this day in all points, wherein the former is not superseded, and fulfilled by the latter. It therefore ill becomes this learned Civilian to separate the idea of a Compact or Covenant from Law; and more especially when he endeavours thereby to establish “the power of the