away, by the act of the first electors, in
their choice not only of a king, but of a family of kings for ever,
hath no parallel in or out of scripture but the doctrine of original
sin, which supposes the free will of all men lost in Adam; and from
such comparison, and it will admit of no other, hereditary succession
can derive no glory. For as in Adam all sinned, and as in the first
electors all men obeyed; as in the one all mankind were subjected to
Satan, and in the other to Sovereignty; as our innocence was lost in
the first, and our authority in the last; and as both disable us from
reassuming some former state and privilege, it unanswerably follows
that original sin and hereditary succession are parallels.
Dishonourable rank! Inglorious connection! Yet the most subtle sophist
cannot produce a juster simile.

As to usurpation, no man will be so hardy as to defend it; and that
William the Conqueror was an usurper is a fact not to be contradicted.
The plain truth is, that the antiquity of English monarchy will not
bear looking into.

But it is not so much the absurdity as the evil of hereditary
succession which concerns mankind. Did it ensure a race of good and
wise men it would have the seal of divine authority, but as it opens a
door to the FOOLISH, the WICKED, and the IMPROPER, it hath in it the
nature of oppression. Men who look upon themselves born to reign, and
others to obey, soon grow insolent; selected from the rest of mankind
their minds are early poisoned by importance; and the world they act in
differs so materially from the world at large, that they have but
little opportunity of knowing its true interests, and when they succeed
to the government are frequently the most ignorant and unfit of any
throughout the dominions.

Another evil which attends hereditary succession is, that the throne is
subject to be possessed by a minor at any age; all which time the
regency, acting under the cover of a king, have every opportunity and
inducement to betray their trust. The same national misfortune
happens, when a king, worn out with age and infirmity, enters the last
stage of human weakness. In both these cases the public becomes a prey
to every miscreant, who can tamper successfully with the follies either
of age or infancy.

The most plausible plea, which hath ever been offered in favour of
hereditary succession, is, that it preserves a nation from civil wars;
and were this true, it would be weighty; w