Robert Filmer & Algernon Sidney

Monty Python  "The Annoying Peasant"   2 min 50 seconds


Romans 13:1-7 ( Submission to Governing Authorities )

13.1  Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established.  The authorities that exist have been established by God.  2.  Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.  3.  For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong.  Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority?  Then do what is right and you will be commended.

4.  For the one in authority is God’s servant for your good.  But if you do wrong, be afraid, for rulers do not bear the sword for no reason.  They are God’s servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.  5.  Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also as a matter of conscience.

6.  This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing.  7.  Give to everyone what you owe them: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.


Robert Filmer  (1588 - 1653)  English

Filmer was an English political theorist who defended the divine right of kings.  His best known work, Patriarcha (online text here), published posthumously in 1680, was the target of numerous Whig attempts at rebuttal, including Algernon Sidney's Discourses Concerning Government, James Tyrrell's Patriarcha Non Monarcha and John Locke's Two Treatises of Government.  Filmer also wrote critiques of Thomas Hobbes, John Milton, Hugo Grotius and Aristotle.

The Divine Right of Kings is a political system in which all powers of government are vested solely in the king and granted to him by God.  Under this system, the king acts as God's hand on earth.  His power extends beyond government into the private religious life of his subjects.  Under this system, citizens were often persecuted and imprisoned for their religious beliefs.


Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet  (1627 - 1704)  French

Bossuet was a French bishop and theologian, renowned for his sermons and other addresses.  He has been considered by many to be one of the most brilliant orators of all time and a masterly French stylist.

Court preacher to Louis XIV of France, Bossuet was a strong advocate of political absolutism and the divine right of kings.  He argued that government was divine and that kings received their power from God.  He was also an important courtier and politician.

The works best known to English speakers are three great orations delivered at the funerals of Queen Henrietta Maria, widow of Charles I of England (1669), her daughter, Henriette, Duchess of Orléans (1670), and the outstanding soldier le Grand Condé (1687).

His work Discours sur l'histoire universelle (or Discourse on Universal History) (1681) is regarded by many Catholics as an actualization or second edition of the City of God of St. Augustine of Hippo.


Richard Hooker  (1554 - 1600)  English

An influential theologian and a priest in the church of England, Hooker defended reason.  His natural law theory, adapted from Aquinas (and Aristotle), argued that man lives naturally in society.  This would influence John Locke who saw a gentler state of nature than did Thomas Hobbes.  


James Tyrrell  (1642 - 1718)  English

Tyrrell was an English author, Whig political philosopher, and historian.  His Patriarcha non monarcha (1681) was a reply to Robert Filmer's Patriarcha; it also included references to Thomas Hobbes, and was also influenced by Samuel Pufendorf.  A Brief Disquisition of the Law of Nature was an English abridgment of Richard Cumberland's De legibus naturae.  Bibliothetica politica was a huge compendium of Whig constitutional theory.


Algernon Sidney  (1623 - 1683)   English

Discourses Concerning Government (1680, published 1698)  online text):

Sidney was an English politician/Parliamentarian and political thinker.  A trial commissioner at Charles I's trial, Sidney opposed Charles' execution.  His most important book was Discourses Concerning Government.  Sidney was indicted in the Rye House plot to kill Charles II and his brother, the future king James II.  Sidney's unfinished Discourses was used as one of two needed witnesses against him.  Sidney was executed on December 7, 1683.  

For Sidney, absolute monarchy was a great political evil. His Discourses Concerning Government was written during the Exclusion Crisis, as a response to Robert Filmer's Patriarcha. It is this Divine Right of Kings government that Sidney strongly opposed.   

Sidney believed that the individuals have the right to choose their own form of government and that, if that government became corrupt, the people retained the power to abolish it and form another. In his own words, "God leaves to man the choice of forms in government ... He who institutes, may also abrogate."  

Sidney also argued that for a valid civil government to exist, it must be formed by general and voluntary consent.  Sidney states that  "General consent ... is the ground of all just governments."

Furthermore, Sidney believed that civil government should have limited jurisdiction.  He said the "only ends for which governments are constituted and obedience rendered to them, are the obtaining of justice and protection."  This suggests a limited civil government whose primary purpose is to  1) render legal justice through its court system and,  2) provide for the safety of its citizens.  If a government fails to accomplish these basic components, obedience to that government is no longer required.  

Sidney's Discourses Concerning Government along with John Locke's Two Treatises on Government are recognized as critical works in the founding of the United States of America.   The founders, Thomas Jefferson in particular, are known to have heavily studied and researched the works of Locke and Sidney.