IO

and a promissory oath. An assertory oath is made to man before God, and I must swear so, as man may know what I mean. But a promissory oath is made to God only, and I am sure he knows my meaning. So in the new oath it runs [Whereas I believe in my conscience, &c. I will assist thus and thus]; that whereas gives me an outloose, for if I do not believe so, for aught I know, I swear not at all.

5. In a promissory oath, the mind I am in is a good interpretation; for if there be enough happened to change my Io mind, I do not know why I should not. If I promise to go to Oxford tomorrow, and mean it when I say it, and afterwards it appears to me that 'twill be my undoing, will you say I have broken my promise if I stay at home? Certainly I must not go.

6. The Jews had this way with them concerning a promissory oath or vow; if one of them had vowed a vow, which afterwards appeared to him to be very prejudicial, by reason of something he either did not foresee, or did not think of, when he made his vow; if he made it known 20 to three of his countrymen, they had power to absolve him, though he could not absolve himself; and that they picked out of some words of the text. Perjury has only to do

1. 3. a promissory oath is made to God only] There seems no reason for this limitation, nor does it agree with what Selden says elsewhere. See 'All oaths are either promissory or assentatory (assertatory?); the first being that which binds to a future performance of trust; the second that which is taken for the discovery of a past or present truth. The first kind they . . . . used in taking the oath of all the Barons for the maintenance of the great charter,' &c. &c. Works, iii. p. 1533.

The statement in the text must be understood, therefore, as part and parcel of the argument in sec. 3, which, so helped out, seems to run thus—that since the oaths imposed by Parliament are promissory oaths, and since only a superior can rightfully impose such oaths or can give his own sense to them, it follows that any member of Parliament taking a Parliamentary promissory oath, takes it to God only, and in any non-natural sense which he himself chooses mentally to put upon it.

with an assertory oath, and no man was punished for perjury by man's law till Queen Elizabeth's time; 'twas left to God as a sin against him. The reason was, because 'twas so hard a thing to prove a man perjured; I might misunderstand him, and he swears as he thought1.

7. When men ask me whether they may take it in their own sense, 'tis to me, as if they should ask whether they may go to such a place with their own legs. I would fain know how they can go otherwise.

8. If the ministers that are in sequestered livings will 10 not take the engagement, threaten to turn them out and put in the old ones, and then I'll warrant you they will quickly take it. A gentleman having been rambling two or three days, at length came home, and being abed with his wife, would fain have been at something that she was unwilling to, and instead of complying, fell to chiding him for his being abroad so long: Well, says he, if you will not, call up Sue (his wife's chambermaid); upon that she yielded presently.

9. Now oaths are so frequent, they should be taken like 20 pills, swallowed whole: if you chew them you will find them bitter: if you think what you swear, 'twill hardly go down.

XCIV.

ORACLES.

ORACLES ceased presently after Christ, as soon as nobody believed them. Just as we have no fortune-tellers, nor

1 As he thought, H. 2] as the thought, H.

1. 1. no man was punished for perjury till Queen Elizabeth's time] This was by 5 Eliz. ch. 9, sec. 2. Earlier statutes had dealt only with the suborning of false witnesses, and had left the false witnesses themselves untouched.

wise men, when nobody cares for them. Sometime you have a season of them, when people believe them; and neither of these, I conceive, wrought by the devil.

XCV.

OPINION.

I. OPINION and affection extremely differ. I may affect a woman best, but it does not follow I must think her the handsomest woman in the world. I love apples best of any fruit; it does not follow that I must think apples to be the best of fruit. Opinion is something wherein I go about 10 to give reason why all the world should think as I think, Affection is a thing wherein I only look after the pleasing of myself.

2. 'Twas a good fancy of an old Platonic: the gods which are above men, had something whereof man did partake, [an intellect, knowledge] and the gods kept on their course quietly. The beasts, which are below men, had something whereof man did partake [sense, and growth] and the beasts lived quietly in their way; but man had something in him, whereof neither gods nor beasts did partake, which

1. 13. 'Twas a good fancy &c.] This bears some resemblance to a passage in the Phaedrus (p. 247-249), in which the Gods are described as borne aloft by winged horses of pure and noble breed, and as thus keeping steadily in their course and in the possession of true knowledge. Other souls, whose horses are unequally yoked, one noble and the other ignoble, cannot easily follow the upward movement of the Gods, but are troubled and confused by the wild tricks of the ignoble horse; and if they are thrown out of their course, and fall to earth, they suffer many disadvantages and are fed with opinion (rpop doέaσtî Xpôvτai) in the place of true knowledge. If Selden's reference is to some later Platonist, this must have been the original which he had in mind. It is one out of many variations on the regular Platonic theme of the distinction between real and phenomenal existence and between the faculties by which they are severally known.

gave him all the trouble, and made all the confusion we see in the world; and that is opinion.

3. 'Tis a foolish thing for me to be brought off from an opinion in a thing neither of us know, but are led only by some cobweb-stuff; as in such a case as this, Utrum angeli invicem colloquantur? If I forsake my side in such a case, I shew myself wonderfully light, or infinitely complying, flattering the other party. But if I be in a business of nature, and hold an opinion one way, and some man's experience has found out the contrary, I may with a safe 10 reputation give up my side.

4. 'Tis a vain thing to talk of an heretic, for a man for his heart can think no otherwise than he does think. In the primitive times there were several opinions; nothing scarce but some or other held: one of these opinions being embraced by some prince, and received into his kingdom, the rest were condemned as heresies1; and his religion, which was but one of the several opinions first, is said to be orthodox and to have continued ever since the Apostles.

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XCVI.
PARITY.

THIS is the juggling trick of parity; they would have nobody above them, but they do not tell you they would have nobody under them.

1 Heresies, H. 2] heretics, H.

1. 5. Utrum angeli invicem colloquantur?] This is a point which Aquinas discusses at length, and on which he concludes in the affirmative. Summa Theolog. pt. i. quaest. 107, art. 1 and 2.

1. 21. parity] A term, in general use, for a form of Church government by a body of Presbyters or elders and lay assessors all equal in power, as opposed to Church government by bishops. It is so ex

XCVII.

PARLIAMENT.

I. ALL are involved in a parliament. There was a time when all men had their voice in choosing knights. About Henry the Sixth they found the inconvenience; so one parliament made a law, that only he that had forty shillings per annum should give his voice, they under should be excluded. They made the law who had the voices of all, as well under forty shillings as above; and thus it continues at this day. All consent civilly in a parliament; women Io are involved in the men, children in those of perfect age,

those that are under forty shillings a year in those that have forty shillings a year, those of forty shillings in the knights.

2. All things are brought to the parliament, little to the courts of justice; just as in a room where there is a banquet presented, if there be persons of quality there, the people must expect, and stay till the great ones have done. plained, e. g. by Laud, in his sermon before Charles' second Parliament: 'I know there are some that think the Church is not yet far enough beside the cushion; that their seats are too easy yet and too high too. A parity they would have; no bishop, no governor, but a parochial consistory, and that should be lay enough too. Well, first, this parity was never left to the Church by Christ. He left Apostles, and disciples under them. No parity. It was never in use with the Church since Christ; no Church ever, anywhere, till this last age, without a bishop. ... And there is not a man that is for parity-all fellows in the Church -but he is not for monarchy in the State.' Laud's Works, vol. i. pp. 82, 83.

1. 4. so one parliament made a law &c.] The Act 8 Henry VI, ch. 7, recites that elections of knights of shires have been made by large and excessive numbers of persons of small substance, and that riots and disturbances are likely thence to arise. It enacts, accordingly, that knights of shires to come to Parliament be chosen by residents in the shire having free land or tenement worth at least a clear forty shillings by the year.

By 10 Henry VI, ch. 2, it is further expressly said that the qualifying estate must be a freehold.