"The measures of Power, and by consequence of Obedience, must be taken from the express Laws of any State or Body of Men, from the Oaths that they swear, or from immemorial Prescription, and a long Possession, which both give a Title, and in a long Tract of Time make a bad one be came good, face Prescription, when it passes the Memory of Man, and is not disputed by any other Pretender, gives by the common Sense of all Men a just and good Title: so upon the whole matter, the degrees of all Civil Authority are to be taken either from express Laws, immemorial Customs, or from particular Oaths, which the Subjects swear to their Princes: this being still to be laid down for a Principle, that in all the Disputes between Power and Liberty, Power must always be proved, but Liberty proves it self; the one being founded only upon a Positive Law, and the other upon the Law of Nature."

“he queen spoke to myself ... I asked leave to speak my mind plainly; which she granted: I said, any treaty by which Spain and the West Indies were left to king Philip, must in a little while deliver up all Europe into the hands of France; and, if any such peace should be made, she was betrayed, and we were all ruined; in less than three years' time she would be murdered, and the fires would be again raised in Smithfield: I pursued this long, till I saw she grew uneasy; so I withdrew.”

“he chief Design of our whole Law, and of all the several Rules of our Constitution, is to secure and maintain our Liberty.”

“n the management of this Civil Society, great distinction is to be made, between the Power of making Laws for the regulating the Conduct of it, and the Power of executing those Laws: The Supream Authority must still be supposed to be lodged with those who have the Legislative Power reserved to them, but not with those who have only the Executive; which is plainly a Trust, when it is separated from the Legislative Power.”

“The chief glory of Princes, and the chief of their Titles...is, That they are God's Deputies and Vicegerents here on earth; that they re­present him, and by consequence, that they ought to resemble him. The outward respect paid them, carries a proportion to that Character of Divinity which is on them, and that supposes an imitation of the Divine Perfections in them.”

“It is certain, That the Law of Nature has put no difference nor subordination among Men, except it be that of Children to Parents, or of Wives to their Husbands; so that with Relation to the Law of Nature, all Men are born free; and this Liberty must still be supposed entire, unless so far as it is limited by Contracts, Provisions, or Laws. For a Man can either bind himself to be a Servant, or sell himself to be a Slave, by which he becomes in the power of another, only so far as it was provided by the Contract: since all that Liberty which was not expresly given away, remains still entire: so that the Plea for Liberty always proves it self, unless it appears that: it is given up or limited by any special Agreement.”