Close of a Civil War, are not to be allowed Sharers in the
Rights of the People, is evident for divers Reasons: Not
onely because such an allowance would be a means to give
them oportunity to sow the seeds of new broiles and divisions
and bring a new hazard upon the Liberties of the People,
which are Reasons derived from Convenience: but
there is a more special Argument to be drawn from the equity
of the Thing, according to the Law and Custome of Nations;
that such as have commenced war, to serve the lusts
of Tyrants against the People's interest, should not be reckoned
any longer a part of the People, may be handled as
Slaves when subdued, if their Subduers pleas so to use them,
because by their Treasons against the Majesty of the People,
(which they ought to have maintained) they have made for-feiture
of all their Rights and Priviledges, as Members of
the People; and therefore if it happens in this case at any
time that any Immunities, Proprieties, or Enjoyments, be
indulged unto them, they must not take them as their own
by Right, but as Boones bestowed upon them by the Peoples
courtesie.
The old Common-wealths of Greece were very severe in
this Particular: For, as they were wont to heap all the honors
they could invent, upon such as did or sufferd anything
for the maintenance of their Liberty, so on the other side
they punished the under miners of it, or those that any way
appeared against it with utmost extremity, perfecting them
with forfeitures both of life and fortune: and if they escaped
with life, they usually became Slaves: and many times
they persecuted them being dead, devouing them to the
deeps with Imprecations, and branding their memories with
an eternal mark of infamy.
In ole Rome, they dealt more mildly with the greatest part of
those that had sided with the Tarquins after their expulsion,
but yet they were not restord to al their former Privileges In
process of time, as oft as any conspir'd against the people's interest
in their successive assemblies, after they had once gotten
them, themselvs were banish't, & their estates confiscated, not