damental transaction, in point of
authority, upon grounds the least liable to cavil, we are bound both
in justice and gratitude to add, that it was conducted with a temper
and moderation which naturally arose from it's equity; that, however
it might in some respects go beyond the letter of our antient laws,
(the reason of which will more fully appear hereafter[z]) it was
agreeable to the spirit of our constitution, and the rights of human
nature; and that though in other points (owing to the peculiar
circumstances of things and persons) it was not altogether so perfect
as might have been wished, yet from thence a new aera commenced, in
which the bounds of prerogative and liberty have been better defined,
the principles of government more thoroughly examined and understood,
and the rights of the subject more explicitly guarded by legal
provisions, than in any other period of the English history. In
particular, it is worthy observation that the convention, in this
their judgment, avoided with great wisdom the wild extremes into which
the visionary theories of some zealous republicans would have led
them. They held that this misconduct of king James amounted to an
_endeavour_ to subvert the constitution, and not to an actual
subversion, or total dissolution of the government, according to the
principles of Mr Locke[a]: which would have reduced the society almost
to a state of nature; would have levelled all distinctions of honour,
rank, offices, and property; would have annihilated the sovereign
power, and in consequence have repealed all positive laws; and would
have left the people at liberty to have erected a new system of state
upon a new foundation of polity. They therefore very prudently voted
it to amount to no more than an abdication of the government, and a
consequent vacancy of the throne; whereby the government was allowed
to subsist, though the executive magistrate was gone, and the kingly
office to remain, though king James was no longer king. And thus the
constitution was kept intire; which upon every sound principle of
government must otherwise have fallen to pieces, had so principal and
constituent a part as the royal authority been abolished, or even
suspended.

[Footnote z: See chapter 7.]

[Footnote a: on Gov. p. 2. c. 19.]

THIS single postulatum, the vacancy of the throne, being once
established, the rest that was then done followed almost of course.
For, if the throne be at any time vacant (which