Part 20 (2/2)
GERRARD WINSTANLEY'S UTOPIA
THE LAW OF FREEDOM (_continued_)
”Look on yonder earth: The golden harvests spring; the unfailing sun Sheds light and life; the fruits, the flowers, the trees, Arise in due succession; all things speak Peace, harmony and love.... Is Mother Earth A step-dame to her numerous sons, who earn Her unshared gifts with unremitting toil; A mother only to those puling babes Who, nursed in ease and luxury, make men The playthings of their babyhood, and mar, In self-important childishness, that peace Which men alone appreciate?”--Sh.e.l.lEY.
”The end of law,” says Locke, ”is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom.” Winstanley evidently held the same view; for he commences this, his last and greatest book, as follows:
”WHERE TRUE FREEDOM LIES.
”The great searching of heart in these days is to find out where true Freedom lies, that the Commonwealth of England might be established in peace. Some say, It lies in the free use of Trading, and to have all Patents, Licenses and Restraints removed: But this is a Freedom under the Will of a Conqueror. Others say, It is true Freedom to have Ministers to preach, and for people to hear whom they will, without being restrained or compelled from or to any form of wors.h.i.+p: But this is an unsettled Freedom.... Others say, It is true Freedom that the Elder Brother shall be Land Lord of the Earth, and the Younger Brother a Servant: And this is but a half Freedom, and begets murmurings, wars and quarrels.
”All these, and such like, are Freedoms; but they lead to Bondage, and are not the true Foundation-Freedom which settles a Commonwealth in Peace.
”TRUE COMMONWEALTH'S FREEDOM LIES IN THE FREE ENJOYMENT OF THE EARTH.
”True Freedom lies where a man receives his nourishment and preservation, and that is in the use of the Earth.... All that a man labors for, saith Solomon, is this, That he may enjoy the free use of the Earth with the fruits thereof (Eccles. 2. 24). Do not the Ministers preach for maintenance in the Earth? The Lawyers plead causes to get the possessions of the Earth? Doth not the Soldier fight for the Earth? And doth not the Land Lord require Rent that he may live in the fullness of the Earth by the labor of his Tenants? And so from the Thief upon the Highway to the King who sits upon the Throne, does not everyone strive, either by force of Arms or secret Cheats, to get the possessions of the Earth one from another, because they see their Freedom lies in plenty, and their Bondage lies in Poverty?”
Then occurs this eternally true pa.s.sage:
”Surely, then, oppressing Lords of Manors, exacting Land-lords and Tythe-takers, may as well say their Bretheren shall not breathe in the air, nor enjoy warmth in their bodies, nor have the moist waters to fall upon them in showers, unless they will pay them rent for it, as to say their Bretheren shall not work upon Earth, nor eat the fruits thereof, unless they will hire that liberty of them.
For he that takes upon him to restrain his Brother from the liberty of the one, may upon the same ground restrain him from the liberty of all four, viz., Fire, Water, Earth and Air.
”A man had better to have had no body than to have no food for it.
Therefore this restraining of the Earth from Bretheren by Bretheren is oppression and bondage; but the free enjoyment thereof is true Freedom.”
INWARD AND OUTWARD BONDAGE.
”I speak now in relation between the Oppressor and the Oppressed, the Inward Bondages I meddle not with in this place, though I am a.s.sured that if it be rightly searched into, the inward bondages of the mind, as covetousness, pride, hypocrisy, envy, sorrow, fears, desperation and madness, are all occasioned by the outward bondage that one sort of people lay upon another. And thus far natural experience makes it good, THAT TRUE FREEDOM LIES IN THE FREE ENJOYMENT OF THE EARTH.”
”WHAT IS GOVERNMENT IN GENERAL?
”Government is a wise and free ordering of the Earth and of the Manners of Mankind by observation of particular Laws or Rules, so that all the inhabitants may live peaceably in plenty and freedom in the Land where they are born and bred.”
With this most suggestive, philosophic and beautiful definition of Government, Winstanley opens his second chapter, and immediately elucidates his views on this all-important subject by drawing what we regard as a true and just comparison between what he well terms Kingly Government and Commonwealth's Government, or, what would now be termed, Aristocracy and Democracy, as follows:
”WHAT IS KINGLY GOVERNMENT?
”There is a twofold Government: a Kingly Government and a Commonwealth's Government.
”Kingly Government governs the Earth by that cheating art of buying and selling, and thereby becomes a man of contention, his hand is against every man, and every man's hand against him ... and if it had not a Club Law to support it, there would be no order in it, because it is but the covetous and proud will of a Conqueror enslaving a conquered people.... Indeed, this Government may well be called the Government of Highwaymen, who hath stolen the Earth from the Younger Bretheren by force and holds it from them by force.... The great Lawgiver of this Kingly Government is Covetousness, ruling in the hearts of mankind, making one Brother to covet a full possession of the Earth, and a Lordly Rule over another Brother.... The Rise of Kingly Government is attributable to a politic wit in drawing the people out of Common Freedom into a way of Common Bondage: FOR SO LONG AS THE EARTH IS A COMMON TREASURY TO ALL MEN, KINGLY COVETOUSNESS CAN NEVER REIGN AS KING.
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