Page:The Leveller movement; a study in the history and political theory of the English Great Civil War (IA levellermovement01peas).djvu/130



The law of the land was men’s authority for obedience to Parliament. If Parliament by its actions taught them to disregard that law, not only was its own authority at an end, but property and civilization itself were at the mercy of brute force. Nor could it be argued that all the people save members of Parliament were bound by the law. In such a case the people would have given the Parliament a power to harm and not to help them; and no law could give Parliament such a power. Since by the Parliament’s own maxim the letter of all laws must be governed by their equity, it was impossible that any law could be so interpreted as to free Parliament from the law.

Lilburne deduced important consequences from the proposition that Parliament was bound to walk according to the law. First, Parliament in its executive actions must accept the guidance of the equity as well as the letter of the Star-Chamber act, and the Petition of Right. The equity of these laws condemned the late actions of parlia-