Jacques
Bossuet, Politics Drawn from the Very Words of Holy Scripture (1707)
from J.H. Robinson, ed.
Readings in European History (
Bossuet was the court preacher to Louis XIV and
became famous for his extreme views on the nature of royal power. His sermons drew on the Old Testament Kings
and depicted the monarch as the literal, immediate instrument of God on Earth. He
served as tutor to Louis XV.
We have already seen that all power is of God. The ruler,
adds
Moreover, that
no one may assume that the Israelites were peculiar in having Kings over them
who were established by God, note what is said in Ecclesiasticus: "God has
given to every people its ruler." He therefore governs all peoples and
gives them their Kings, although he governed
It
appears from all this that the person of the King is sacred, and that to attack
him in any way is sacrilege. … They are by their very office the
representatives of the divine majesty deputed by
There is
something religious in the respect accorded to a prince. The service of God and
the respect for Kings are bound together. St. Peter unites these two duties
when he says, "Fear God. Honor the King.". . .
But Kings,
although their power comes from on high, as has been said, should not regard
themselves as masters of that power to use it at their pleasure; . . . they
must employ it with fear and self-restraint, as a thing coming from God and of
which God will demand an account. "Hear, O Kings, and take heed,
understand, judges of the earth, lend your ears, you who hold people under your
sway, and delight to see the multitude that surround you. It is God who gives
you the power. Your strength comes from the Most High,
who will question your works and penetrate the depths of your thoughts, for,
being ministers of his Kingdom, you have not given righteous judgments nor have
you walked according to his will. He will straightway appear to you in a
terrible manner, for to those who command is the heaviest punishment reserved.
The humble and the weak shall receive mercy, but the mighty shall be mightily
tormented. For God fears not the power of any one, because he
made both great and small and he has care for both.". . .
Kings should
tremble then as they use the power God has granted them; and let them think how
horrible is the sacrilege if they use for evil a power which comes from God. We behold Kings seated upon the throne of
the Lord, bearing in their hand the sword which God
himself has given them. What profanation, what arrogance, for the unjust King
to sit on God's throne to render decrees contrary to his laws and to use the
sword which God has put in his hand for deeds of violence and to slay his
children! . . .
The
royal power is absolute. With the aim of making this truth hateful and
insufferable, many writers have tried to confound absolute government with
arbitrary government. But no two things could be more unlike, as we shall show
when we come to speak of justice.
The
prince need render account of his acts to no one. "I counsel thee
to keep the King's commandment, and that in regard of the oath of God. Be not
hasty to go out of his sight: stand not on an evil thing, for he does
whatsoever pleases him. Where the word of a King is, there is power: and who
may say unto him, “What are you doing?” Whoever keeps the
commandment shall feel no evil thing. Without this absolute authority the King
could neither do good nor repress evil. It is
necessary that his power be such that no one can hope to escape him, and,
finally, the only protection of individuals against the public authority should
be their innocence. This conforms with the teaching of
I do not call
majesty that pomp which surrounds Kings or that exterior magnificence which
dazzles the vulgar. That is but the reflection of majesty and not majesty
itself. Majesty is the
image of the grandeur of God in the prince.
God is infinite, God is all. The prince, as
prince, is not regarded as a private person: he is a public personage, all the
state is in him; the will of all the people is included in his. As all perfection and all strength are united in God, so all the
power of individuals is united in the person of the prince. What
grandeur that a single man should embody so much!
The power of
God makes itself felt in a moment from one extremity of the earth to another.
Royal power works at the same time throughout all the
realm. It holds all the realm in position, as God
holds the earth. Should God withdraw his hand, the earth would fall to pieces;
should the King's authority cease in the realm, all would be in confusion.
Look at the
prince in his cabinet. Thence go out the orders which cause the magistrates and
the captains, the citizens and the soldiers, the provinces and the armies on
land and on sea, to work in concert. He
is the image of God, who, seated on his throne high in the heavens, makes all
nature move.
Finally, let
us put together the things so great and so august which we have said about
royal authority. Behold an
immense people united in a single person; behold this holy power, paternal and
absolute; behold the secret cause which governs the
whole body of the state, contained in a single head. Kou see the image of God in the King, and you
have the idea of royal majesty. God is holiness itself, goodness itself, and
power itself. In these things lies the majesty of God. In the image of these
things lies the majesty of the King.
So great is
this majesty that it cannot reside in the King as in its source; it is borrowed
from God, who gives it to him for the good of the people, for whom it is good
to be checked by a superior force. Something of divinity itself is attached to
princes and inspires fear in the people. .
O Kings,
exercise your power then boldly, for it is divine and salutary for human kind,
but exercise it with humility. You are endowed with it from without. At bottom
it leaves you feeble, it leaves you mortal, it leaves you sinners, and charges
you before God with a very heavy account.
http://history.hanover.edu/texts/bossuet.html