hinking ever the wealth and
weal of the commonwealth to be my greatest weal and worldly
felicity; a point wherein a lawful king doth directly differ from a
tyrant: for I do acknowledge, that the special and greatest point
of difference that is between a rightful king and an usurping
tyrant, is this, that whereas the proud and ambitious tyrant doth
think his kingdom and people are only ordained for satisfaction of
his desires and unreasonable appetites, the righteous and just king
doth by the contrary acknowledge himself to be ordained for the
procuring of the wealth and property of his people.
#/

And again, in his speech to the parliament, 1609, he hath these words:

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The king binds himself by a double oath, to the observation of the
fundamental laws of his kingdom; tacitly, as by being a king, and
so bound to protect as well the people, as the laws of his kingdom;
and expressly, by his oath at his coronation, so as every just
king, in a settled kingdom, is bound to observe that paction made
to his people, by his laws, in framing his government agreeable
thereunto, according to that paction which God made with Noah after
the deluge. Hereafter, seed-time and harvest, and cold and heat,
and summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease while the
earth remaineth. And therefore a king governing in a settled
kingdom, leaves to be a king, and degenerates into a tyrant, as
soon as he leaves off to rule according to his laws.
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And a little after,

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Therefore all kings that are not tyrants, or perjured, will be glad
to bound themselves within the limits of their laws; and they that
persuade them the contrary, are vipers, and pests both against them
and the commonwealth.
#/

Thus that learned king, who well understood the notion of things, makes
the difference betwixt a king and a tyrant to consist only in this, that
one makes the laws the bounds of his power, and the good of the public,
the end of his government; the other makes all give way to his own will
and appetite.

Sect. 201. It is a mistake, to think this fault is proper only to
monarchies; other forms of government are liable to it, as well as that:
for wherever the power, that is put in any hands for the government of
the people, and the preservation of their properties, is applied to
other ends, and made use of to impo