The Commonwealth of Oceana Part 5

The manner how the Comitia curiata, centuriata or tributa were called, during the time of the commonwealth, to the suffrage, was by lot: the curia, century, or tribe, whereon the first lot fell, being styled principium, or the prerogative; and the other curioe, centuries or tribes, whereon the second, third, and fourth lots, etc., fell, the jure vocatoe. From henceforth not the first cla.s.ses, as in the times of Servius, but the prerogative, whether curia, century, or tribe, came first to the suffrage, whose vote was called omen proerogativum, and seldom failed to be leading to the rest of the tribes. The jure vocatoe, in the order of their lots, came next: the manner of giving suffrage was, by casting wooden tablets, marked for the affirmative or the negative, into certain urns standing upon a scaffold, as they marched over it in files, which for the resemblance it bore was called the bridge. The candidate, or compet.i.tor, who had most suffrages in a curia, century, or tribe, was said to have that curia, century, or tribe; and he who had most of the curioe, centuries, or tribes, carried the magistracy.

These three places being premised, as such upon which there will be frequent reflection, I come to the narrative, divided into two parts, the first containing the inst.i.tution, the second the const.i.tution of the commonwealth, in each whereof I shall distinguish the orders, as those which contain the whole model, from the rest of the discourse, which tends only to the explanation or proof of them.

In the inst.i.tution or building of a commonwealth, the first work, as that of builders, can be no other than fitting and distributing the materials.

The materials of a commonwealth are the people, and the people of Oceana were distributed by casting them into certain divisions, regarding their quality, their age, their wealth, and the places of their residence or habitation, which was done by the ensuing orders.

The first order "distributes the people into freemen or citizens and servants, while such; for if they attain to liberty, that is, to live of themselves, they are freemen or citizens."

This order needs no proof, in regard of the nature of servitude, which is inconsistent with freedom, or partic.i.p.ation of government in a commonwealth.

The second order "distributes citizens into youth and elders (such as are from eighteen years of age to thirty, being accounted youth; and such as are of thirty and upward, elders), and establishes that the youth shall be the marching armies, and the elders the standing garrisons of this nation."

A commonwealth, whose arms are in the hands of her servants, had need be situated, as is elegantly said of Venice by Contarini, out of the reach of their clutches; witness the danger run by that of Carthage in the rebellion of Spendius and Matho. But though a city, if one swallow makes a summer, may thus chance to be safe, yet shall it never be great; for if Carthage or Venice acquired any fame in their arms, it is known to have happened through the mere virtue of their captains, and not of their orders; wherefore Israel, Lacedaemon, and Rome entailed their arms upon the prime of their citizens, divided, at least in Lacedaemon and Rome, into youth and elders: the youth for the field, and the elders for defence of the territory.

The third order "distributes the citizens into horse and foot, by the sense or valuation of their estates; they who have above 100 a year in lands, goods, or moneys, being obliged to be of the horse, and they who have under that sum to be of the foot. But if a man has prodigally wasted and spent his patrimony, he is neither capable of magistracy, office, or suffrage in the commonwealth."

Citizens are not only to defend the commonwealth, but according to their abilities, as the Romans under Servius Tullius (regard had to their estates), were some enrolled in the horse centuries, and others of the foot, with arms enjoined accordingly, nor could it be otherwise in the rest of the commonwealths, though out of historical remains, that are so much darker, it be not so clearly probable. And the necessary prerogative to be given by a commonwealth to estates, is in some measure in the nature of industry, and the use of it to the public. "The Roman people," says Julius Exuperantius, "were divided into cla.s.ses, and taxed according to the value of their estates. All that were worth the sums appointed were employed in the wars; for they most eagerly contend for the victory; who fight for liberty in defence of their country and possessions. But the poorer sort were polled only for their heads (which was all they had) and kept in garrison at home in time of war; for these might betray the armies for bread, by reason of their poverty, which is the reason that Marius, to whom the care of the government ought not to have been committed, was the first that led them into the field;" and his success was accordingly. There is a mean in things; as exorbitant riches overthrow the balance of a commonwealth, so extreme poverty cannot hold it, nor is by any means to be trusted with it. The clause in the order concerning the prodigal is Athenian, and a very laudable one; for he that could not live upon his patrimony, if he comes to touch the public money, makes a commonwealth bankrupt.

The fourth order "distributes the people according to the places of their habitation, into parishes, hundreds, and tribes."

For except the people be methodically distributed, they cannot be methodically collected; but the being of a commonwealth consists in the methodical collection of the people: wherefore you have the Israelitish divisions into rulers of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens; and of the whole commonwealth into tribes: the Laconic into oboe, moras, and tribes; the Roman into tribes, centuries, and cla.s.ses; and something there must of necessity be in every government of the like nature, as that in the late monarchy--by counties. But this being the only inst.i.tution in Oceana, except that of the agrarian, which required any charge or included any difficulty, engages me to a more particular description of the manner how it was performed, as follows:

A thousand surveyors, commissioned and instructed by the Lord Archon and the Council, being divided into two equal numbers, each under the inspection of two surveyors-general, were distributed into the northern and southern parts of the territory, divided by the river Hemisua, the whole whereof contains about 10,000 parishes, some ten of those being a.s.signed to each surveyor; for as to this matter there needed no great exactness, it tending only by showing whither everyone was to, begin, to the more orderly carrying repair and whereabout to on of the work; the nature of their instructions otherwise regarding rather the number of the inhabitants than of the parishes. The surveyors, therefore, being every one furnished with a convenient proportion of urns, b.a.l.l.s, and balloting-boxes--in the use whereof they had been formerly exercised--and now arriving each at his respective parish, being with the people by teaching them their first lesson, which was the ballot; and though they found them in the beginning somewhat froward, as at toys, with which, while they were in expectation of greater matters from a Council of legislators, they conceived themselves to be abused, they came within a little while to think them pretty sport, and at length such as might very soberly be used in good earnest; whereupon the surveyors began the inst.i.tution included in--

The first order, requiring "That upon the first Monday next ensuing the last of December the bigger bell in every parish throughout the nation be rung at eight of the clock in the morning, and continue ringing for the s.p.a.ce of one hour; and that all the elders of the parish respectively repair to the church before the bell has done ringing, where, dividing themselves into two equal numbers, or as near equal as may be, they shall take their places according to their dignities, if they be of divers qualities, and according to their seniority, if they be of the same, the one half on the one side, and the other half on the other, in the body of the church, which done, they shall make oath to the overseers of the parish for the time being (instead of these the surveyors were to officiate at the inst.i.tution, or first a.s.sembly) by holding up their hands, to make a fair election according to the laws of the ballot, as they are hereafter explained, of such persons, amounting to a fifth part of their whole number, to be their deputies, and to exercise their power in manner hereafter explained, as they shall think in their consciences to be fittest for that trust, and will acquit themselves of it to the best advantage of the commonwealth. And oath being thus made, they shall proceed to election, if the elders of the parish amount to 1,000 by the ballot of the tribe, as it is in due place explained, and if the elders of the parish amount to fifty or upward, but within the number of 1,000, by the ballot of the hundred, as it is in due place explained. But, if the elders amount not to fifty, then they shall proceed to the ballot of the parish, as it is in this place and after this manner explained.

"The two overseers for the time being shall seat themselves at the upper end of the middle alley, with a table before them, their faces being toward the congregation, and the constable for the time being shall set an urn before the table, into which he shall put so many b.a.l.l.s as there be elders present, whereof there shall be one that is gilded, the rest being white; and when the constable has shaken the urn, sufficiently to mix the b.a.l.l.s, the overseers shall call the elders to the urn, who from each side of the church shall come up the middle alley in two files, every man pa.s.sing by the urn, and drawing out one ball; which, if it be silver, he shall cast into a bowl standing at the foot of the urn, and return by the outward alley on his side to his place. But he who draws the golden ball is the proposer, and shall be seated between the overseers, where he shall begin in what order he pleases, and name such as, upon his oath already taken, he conceives fittest to be chosen, one by one, to the elders; and the party named shall withdraw while the congregation is balloting his name by the double box or boxes appointed and marked on the outward part, to show which side is affirmative and which negative, being carried by a boy or boys appointed by the overseers, to every one of the elders, who shall hold up a pellet made of linen rags between his finger and his thumb, and put it after such a manner into the box, as though no man can see into which side he puts it, yet any man may see that he puts in but one pellet or suffrage. And the suffrage of the congregation being thus, given, shall be returned with the box or boxes to the overseers, who opening the same, shall pour the affirmative b.a.l.l.s into a white bowl standing upon the table on the right hand, to be numbered by the first overseer; and the negative into a green bowl standing on the left hand, to be numbered by the second overseer; and the suffrages being numbered, he who has the major part in the affirmative is one of the deputies of the parish, and when so many deputies are chosen as amount to a full fifth part of the whole number of the elders, the ballot for that time shall cease. The deputies being chosen are to be listed by the overseers in order as they were chosen, except only that such as are horse must be listed in the first place with the rest, proportionable to the number of the congregation, after this manner."

Anno Domini

THE LIST OF THE FIRST MOVER

A.A. Equestrian Order, First Deputy B.B. Second Deputy, C.C. Third Deputy, D.D. Fourth Deputy, E.E. Fifty Deputy,

Of the parish of in the hundred of and the tribe of, which parish at the present election contains twenty elders, whereof one is of the horse or equestrian order.

"The first and second in the list are overseers by consequence; the third is the constable, and the fourth and fifth are churchwardens; the persons so chosen are deputies of the parish for the s.p.a.ce of one year from their election, and no longer, nor may they be elected two years together. This list, being the primum mobile, or first mover of the commonwealth, is to be registered in a book diligently kept and preserved by the overseers, who are responsible in their places, for these and other duties to be hereafter mentioned, to the censors of the tribe; and the congregation is to observe the present order, as they will answer the contrary to the phylarch, or prerogative troop of the tribe, which, in case of failure in the whole or any part of it, have power to fine them or any of them at discretion, but under an appeal to the Parliament."

For proof of this order, first, in reason, it is with all politicians past dispute that paternal power is in the right of nature; and this is no other than the derivation of power from fathers of families as the natural root of a commonwealth. And for experience, if it be otherwise in that of Holland, I know no other example of the like kind. In Israel, the sovereign power came clearly from the natural root, the elders of the whole people; and Rome was born, Comitiis curiatis, in her parochial congregations, out of which Romulus first raised her Senate, then all the rest of the orders of that commonwealth, which rose so high: for the depth of a commonwealth is the just height of it--

"She raises up her head unto the skies, Near as her root unto the centre lies."

And if the Commonwealth of Rome was born of thirty parishes, this of Oceana was born of 10,000. But whereas mention in the birth of this is made of an equestrian order, it may startle such as know that the division of the people of Rome, at the inst.i.tution of that commonwealth into orders, was the occasion of its ruin. The distinction of the patrician as a hereditary order from the very inst.i.tution, engrossing all the magistracies, was indeed the destruction of Rome; but to a knight or one of the equestrian order, says Horace,

"Si quadringentis s.e.x septem millia desunt, Plebs eris."

By which it should seem that this order was not otherwise hereditary than a man's estate, nor did it give any claim to magistracy; wherefore you shall never find that it disquieted the commonwealth, nor does the name denote any more in Oceana than the duty of such a man's estate to the public.

But the surveyors, both in this place and in others, forasmuch as they could not observe all the circ.u.mstances of this order, especially that of the time of election, did for the first as well as they could; and, the elections being made and registered, took each of them copies of those lists which were within their allotments, which done they produced--

The sixth order, directing "in case a parson or vicar of a parish comes to be removed by death or by the censors, that the congregation of the parish a.s.semble and depute one or two elders by the ballot, who upon the charge of the parish shall repair to one of the universities of this nation with a certificate signed by the overseers, and addressed to the vice-chancellor, which certificate, giving notice of the death or removal of the parson or vicar, of the value of the parsonage or vicarage, and of the desire of the congregation to receive a probationer from that university, the vice-chancellor, upon the receipt thereof, shall call a convocation, and having made choice of a fit person, shall return him in due time to the parish, where the person so returned shall return the full fruits of the benefice or vicarage, and do the duty of the parson or vicar, for the s.p.a.ce of one year, as probationer; and that being expired, the congregation of the elders shall put their probationer to the ballot, and if he attains not to two parts in three of the suffrage affirmative, he shall take his leave of the parish, and they shall send in like manner as before for another probationer; but if their probationer obtains two parts in three of the suffrage affirmative, he is then pastor of that parish. And the pastor of the parish shall pray with the congregation, preach the Word, and administer the sacraments to the same, according to the directory to be hereafter appointed by the Parliament. Nevertheless such as are of gathered congregations, or from time to time shall join with any of them, are in no wise obliged to this way of electing their teachers, or to give their votes in this case, but wholly left to the liberty of their own consciences, and to that way of wors.h.i.+p which they shall choose, being not popish, Jewish, or idolatrous. And to the end they may be the better protected by the State in the exercise of the same, they are desired to make choice, and such manner as they best like, of certain magistrates in every one of their congregations, which we could wish might be four in each of them, to be auditors in cases of differences or distaste, if any through variety of opinions, that may be grievous or injurious to them, shall fall out. And such auditors or magistrates shall have power to examine the matter, and inform themselves, to the end that if they think it of sufficient weight, they may acquaint the phylarch with it, or introduce it into the Council of Religion; where all such causes as those magistrates introduce shall from time to time be heard and determined according to such laws as are or shall hereafter be provided by the Parliament for the just defence of the liberty of conscience."

This order consists of three parts, the first restoring the power of ordination to the people, which, that it originally belongs to them, is clear, though not in English yet in Scripture, where the apostles ordained elders by the holding up of hands in every congregation, that is, by the suffrage of the people, which was also given in some of those cities by the ballot. And though it may be shown that the apostles ordained some by the laying on of hands, it will not be shown that they did so in every congregation.

Excommunication, as not clearly provable out of the Scripture, being omitted, the second part of the order implies and establishes a national religion; for there be degrees of knowledge in divine things; true religion is not to be learned without searching the Scripture; the Scriptures cannot be searched by us unless we have them to search; and if we have nothing else, or (which is all one) understand nothing else but a translation, we may be (as in the place alleged we have been) beguiled or misled by the translation, while we should be searching the true sense of the Scripture, which cannot be attained in a natural way (and a commonwealth is not to presume upon that which is supernatural) but by the knowledge of the original and of antiquity, acquired by our own studies, or those of some others, for even faith comes by hearing.

Wherefore a commonwealth not making provision of men from time to time, knowing in the original languages wherein the Scriptures were written, and versed in those antiquities to which they so frequently relate, that the true sense of them depends in great part upon that knowledge, can never be secure that she shall not lose the Scripture, and by consequence her religion; which to preserve she must inst.i.tute some method of this knowledge, and some use of such as have acquired it, which amounts to a national religion.

The commonwealth having thus performed her duty toward G.o.d, as a rational creature, by the best application of her reason to Scripture, and for the preservation of religion in the purity of the same, yet pretends not to infallibility, but comes in the third part of the order, establis.h.i.+ng liberty of conscience according to the instructions given to her Council of Religion, to raise up her hands to heaven for further light; in which proceeding she follows that (as was shown in the preliminaries) of Israel, who, though her national religion was always a part of her civil law, gave to her prophets the upper hand of all her orders.

But the surveyors having now done with the parishes, took their leave; so a parish is the first division of land occasioned by the first collection of the people of Oceana, whose function proper to that place is comprised in the six preceding orders.

The next step in the progress of the surveyors was to a meeting of the nearest of them, as their work lay, by twenties; where conferring their lists, and computing the deputies contained therein, as the number of them in parishes, being nearest neighbors, amounted to 100, or as even as might conveniently be brought with that account, they cast them and those parishes into the precinct which (be the deputies ever since more or fewer) is still called the hundred; and to every one of these precincts they appointed a certain place, being the most convenient town within the same, for the annual rendezvous; which done, each surveyor, returning to his hundred, and summoning the deputies contained in his lists to the rendezvous, they appeared and received--

The seventh order, requiring, "That upon the first Monday next ensuing the last of January, the deputies of every parish annually a.s.semble in arms at the rendezvous of the hundred, and there elect out of their number one justice of the peace, one juryman, one captain, one ensign of their troop or century, each of these out of the horse; and one juryman, one coroner, one high constable, out of the foot. The election to be made by the ballot in this manner. The jurymen for the time being are to be overseers of the ballot (instead of these, the surveyors are to officiate at the first a.s.sembly), and to look to the performance of the same according to what was directed in the ballot of the parishes, saving that the high constable setting forth the urn shall have five several suits of gold b.a.l.l.s, and one dozen of every suit; whereof the first shall be marked with the letter A, the second with the letter B, the third with C, the fourth with D, and the fifth with E: and of each of these suits he shall cast one ball into his hat, or into a little urn, and shaking the b.a.l.l.s together, present them to the first overseer, who shall draw one, and the suit which is so drawn by the overseer shall be of use for that day, and no other; for example, if the overseer drew an A, the high constable shall put seven gold b.a.l.l.s marked with the letter A into the urn, with so many silver ones as shall bring them even with the number of the deputies, who being sworn, as before, at the ballot of the parish to make a fair election, shall be called to the urn; and every man coming in manner as was there shown, shall draw one ball, which, if it be silver, he shall cast it into a bowl standing at the foot of the urn, and return to his place: but the first that draws a gold ball (showing it to the overseers, who if it has not the letter of the present ballot, have power to apprehend and punish him) is the first elector, the second the second elector, and so to the seventh; which order they are to observe in their function. "The electors as they are drawn shall be placed upon the bench by the overseers, till the whole number be complete, and then be conducted, with the list of the officers to be chosen, into a place apart, where, being private, the first elector shall name a person to the first office in the list; and if the person so named, being balloted by the rest of the electors, attains not to the better half of the suffrages in the affirmative, the first elector shall continue nominating others, till one of them so nominated by him attains to the plurality of the suffrages in the affirmative, and be written first compet.i.tor to the first office. This done, the second elector shall observe in his turn the like order; and so the rest of the electors, naming compet.i.tors each to his respective office in the list, till one compet.i.tor be chosen to every office: and when one compet.i.tor is chosen to every office, the first elector shall begin again to name a second compet.i.tor to the first office, and the rest successively shall name to the rest of the offices till two compet.i.tors be chosen to every office; the like shall be repeated till three compet.i.tors be chosen to every office. And when three compet.i.tors are chosen to every office, the list shall be returned to the overseers, or such as the overseers, in case they or either of them happened to be electors, have subst.i.tuted in his or their place or places; and the overseers or subst.i.tutes having caused the list to be read to the congregation, shall put the compet.i.tors, in order as they are written, to the ballot of the congregation; and the rest of the proceedings being carried on in the manner directed in the fifth order, that compet.i.tor, of the three written to each office, who has most of the suffrages above half in the affirmative, is the officer. The list being after this manner completed, shall be entered into a register, to be kept at the rendezvous of the hundred, under inspection of the magistrates of the same, after the manner following:

Anno Domini

THE LIST OF THE NEBULOSA

A.A. Equestrian Order, Justice of the Peace, B.B. Equestrian Order, First Juryman, C.C. Equestrian Order, Captain of the Hundred, D.D. Equestrian Order, Ensign, E.E. Second Juryman, F.F. High Constable, G.G. Coroner,

Of the hundred of in the tribe of, which hundred consists at this election of 105 deputies.

"The list being entered, the high constable shall take three copies of the same, whereof he shall presently return one to the lord high sheriff of the tribe, a second to the lord custos rotulorum, and a third to the censors; or these, through the want of such magistrates at the first muster, may be returned to the orator, to be appointed for that tribe.

To the observation of all and every part of this order, the officers and deputies of the hundred are all and every of them obliged, as they will answer it to the phylarch, who has power, in case of failure in the whole or any part, to fine all or any of them so failing at discretion, or according to such laws as shall hereafter be provided in that case, but under an appeal to the Parliament." There is little in this order worthy of any further account, but that it answers to the rulers of hundreds in Israel, to the mora or military part of the tribe in Lacedaemon, and to the century in Rome. The jurymen, being two in a hundred, and so forty in a tribe, give the lat.i.tude allowed by the law for exceptions. And whereas the golden b.a.l.l.s at this ballot begin to be marked with letters, whereof one is to be drawn immediately before it begins, this is to the end that the letter being unknown, men may be frustrated of tricks or foul play, whereas otherwise a man may bring a golden ball with him, and make as if he had drawn it out of the urn. The surveyors, when they had taken copies of these lists, had accomplished their work in the hundreds.

So a hundred is the second division of land occasioned by the second collection of the people, whose civil and military functions proper to this place are comprised in the foregoing order.

Having stated the hundreds, they met once again by twenties, where there was nothing more easy than to cast every twenty hundreds, as they lay most conveniently together, into one tribe; so the whole territory of Oceana, consisting of about 10,000 parishes, came to be cast into 1,000 hundreds, and into fifty tribes. In every tribe at the place appointed for the annual rendezvous of the same, were then, or soon after begun those buildings which are now called pavilions; each of them standing with one open side upon fair columns, like the porch of some ancient temple, and looking into a field capable of the muster of some 4,000 men; before each pavilion stand three pillars sustaining urns for the ballot, that on the right hand equal in height to the brow of a horseman, being called the horse urn, that on the left hand, with bridges on either side to bring it equal in height with the brow of a footman, being called the foot urn, and the middle urn, with a bridge on the side toward the foot urn, the other side, as left for the horse, being without one; and here ended the whole work of the surveyors, who returned to the Lord Archon with this--

ACCOUNT OF THE CHARGE

Imprimis: Urns, b.a.l.l.s, and balloting-boxes for 10,000 parishes, the same being wooden-ware, 20,000 Item: Provision of the like kind for a thousand hundreds

3,000 Item: Urns and b.a.l.l.s of metal, with balloting-boxes for fifty tribes,

2,000 Item: For erecting of fifty pavilions,

60,000 Item: Wages for four surveyors-general at 1,000 a man

4,000 Item: Wages for the rest of the surveyors, being 1,000 at 250 a man

250,000

Sum Total 339,000