 Hi, I'm Peter Adamson, and you're listening to the History of Philosophy podcast, brought to you with the support of the philosophy department at King's College London and the LMU in Munich, online at historyofphilosophy.net. Today's episode, With Such Perfection Govern, English Political Thought. It's time that I corrected a misleading impression. In the episodes that have so far been devoted to political thought in 15th and 16th century Europe, I've devoted a lot of attention to fairly radical ideas, from the breathtaking cynicism of Machiavelli to the theme of tyrannicide in the Huguenots and Scottish reformers. This focus is certainly defensible, the most daring ideas tend to be the most interesting, and in this case they had plenty of long-term influence. Just for example, Sam Adams, who was an agitator of the American Revolution before he was a brand of beer, wrote his master's thesis on the question whether one may rightfully resist a supreme magistrate to preserve the Commonwealth. That's about as loud an echo of 16th century Protestant political theory as you could want. But I don't want you to get the idea that most theorists of this period wanted to overturn the social and political order, or destabilize the monarchy. Even so bold an author as Tyndale, famous for his provocative English translation of the Bible, can be found saying that the king's supremacy is such that he can be judged by no man, but only by God. So, for a more balanced understanding of political thought in the period, we also need to look at the more subtle and gradual shifts that occurred between the late medieval and early modern periods. The 15th century tends to get skipped when writing the history of political philosophy, but it was actually an important transitional period. Not least because it was at this time that Parliament started to be seen as a genuinely representative assembly, rather than just a high court of nobles. We even find the Parliament being compared to the ancient Roman Senate. This was still far away from the Parliament that would fight a civil war against the king in the 17th century. The 15th century idea was more that the Parliament would support and advise the king. Still, the Parliament had a legitimacy of its own, and could offer a check and counterweight to royal power. This legitimacy was grounded in a concept that in fact goes back to the medieval period. That society is made up of three estates, those who work, pray, and fight, meaning the warrior and ruling class or nobility, the clergy, and the so-called commons or commonality. A separate house for the commons, which could introduce bills for consideration by the nobles and kings, had already been established in the 14th century. This was of course still a very hierarchical system, dominated by the monarch and the nobility. The existing order was taken to be good, both because it was ordained by God, and because it was natural. That was a core message of numerous works written in the Tudor period on the topic of the Commonwealth or Commonweal, a term that refers both to the body politic and the benefit that comes from its good order. A fine illustration would be the Tree of Commonwealth, written by Edmund Dudley while he was in prison on the orders of Henry VIII. You might think that his circumstances would have led Dudley to question the wisdom of having a rigidly hierarchical society with a mighty king at the top, but far from it. His treatise explains the relationship between the three estates as a God-given system in which subordinates must patiently accept their lot. The nobles and king wield their inherited power with impunity, and hopefully with mercy and justice. The result is a well-structured Commonwealth comparable to a fair and mighty tree growing in a fair field or pasture under the cover or shade, whereof all beasts, both fat and lean, are protected and comforted. For an earlier example of the same sort of attitude, it's worth quoting a passage found not in a political treatise, but in a sermon given by Robert Stillington, Bishop of Bath in 1467. Get comfortable, as you might in a warm bath, because this goes on for a bit. Justice was ground well and root of all prosperity, peace and political rule of every realm, whereupon all the laws of the world have been ground and set, which rests there, that is to say, the law of God, law of nature, and positive law. And, by saying, of all philosophers, felicity or peace in every realm is ever more cause of justice, as it appears by probable persuasions of philosophers. Wherefore first be asked, what is justice? Justice is every person to do his office that he is put in according to his estate or degree. And, as for this land, it is understood that it stands by three estates, and above that, one principle, that is, to wit, Lord Spiritual, Lord's Temporal and Commons, and over that, State Royal above, as our Sovereign Lord, the King. Here, then, we have a distant echo of Plato's Republic. Justice in the State is for each person or group to carry out their proper task, and also an appeal to the medieval theory of nested laws, those given by God, those written into human nature, and those devised by humans. This is what Stillington means by positive law. It was taken for granted by nearly all authors in this period that the King would be subject to these laws, including those made by humans, but just as standard was the assumption that the laws of God and man put the monarch above all others with unchappened supremacy. That political philosophers of the time were broadly happy with this arrangement is shown by the fact that the most famous of them, John Fortescue, wrote a work entitled In Praise of the Laws of England. Fortescue was himself a member of Parliament, was knighted, and served as Justice of the Peace. He was also a supporter of Henry VI in the Wars of the Roses, so very much an establishment figure. But take another look at that title. He wants to praise the laws of England, and a key reason for his enthusiasm is that the King does indeed rule within those laws. This is not something that can be taken for granted. There are two ways that a monarch might rule over a kingdom, which Fortescue calls royal and both royal and political. Both are compatible with a natural law, but Fortescue leaves no doubt that the second form of government is preferable. The difference has precisely to do with the laws. A merely royal ruler governs without constraint or restriction. Ultimately, the only law is his will. By contrast, a royal and political ruler, like the English king, cannot arbitrarily change the laws. He needs the consent of the people to do so. So in such a regime, the people are, as Fortescue says, ruled by laws that they themselves desire. They freely enjoy their goods and are despoiled neither by their own king nor any other. He adds that the king, no less than the people, should be glad to work within this sort of system, since it binds the lower estates to him and provides for harmony. Being an Englishman, he takes the opportunity to pour scorn upon the French for putting up with a more tyrannical state. The only reason they don't rise up in rebellion is that they are too cowardly. By contrast, the English constitutional arrangement, which supposedly has consent at its core, is a recipe for long-lasting stability as shown by England's past history. England's situation in Fortescue's day might seem a mighty strong counterexample, but he doesn't see fit to mention that. Speaking of history, the two kinds of rule also have different origins, according to Fortescue. Merely royal rule has always been established through brute force, whereas political rule arises through a kind of social contract. While this seems to anticipate the later ideas of the Huguenots, and even Hobbes, Fortescue was actually drawing on medieval theories here. Thomas Aquinas was a main source of inspiration and gave Fortescue the contrast between different types of law. The scholastic background becomes especially clear when Fortescue alludes to Averroes's explanation of how principles are established in Aristotelian science. His writings then were not revolutionary in political or intellectual terms. Still, Fortescue offered a polite but firm push in the direction of a certain form of governance. Alongside his emphasis on the lawfulness of political rule and awfulness of merely royal rule, he stressed the need for a council to advise and, though he doesn't come out and put it this way, constrain the king. These should be drawn from the spiritual and secular lords, that is, high-ranking churchmen and nobles. So, even if he insisted upon the people's consent to their rulers, Fortescue was far more an oligarchic thinker than a democrat. In this respect, he set the stage for what would come in political writings of the 16th century. Indeed, we've already seen an example with Thomas Eilat's Book of the Governor, which proposed that a humanist education was just the thing to prepare aristocrats for giving good advice to their ruler. Eilat even cited an ancient maxim that it is better to have a wicked king than wicked advisers. The same sort of oligarchic ideas animate a work written at just the same time, Thomas Starkey's Dialogue Between Pole and Lupset. The pole of the title is Reginald Pole, a powerful cousin of Henry VIII, who broke with the king and sided with the pope. He then became a Catholic bishop. In Starkey's dialogue, he is shown in conversation with Thomas Lupset, a member of Pole's household who had philosophical interests. For instance, Lupset wrote a work inspired by Stoicism on how to approach death. Thanks to his connections with Pole, Starkey traveled widely in Europe and was influenced by the ideas of the Italian Renaissance. Indeed, the modern editor of his dialogue says that Starkey was the most Italianate Englishman of his generation and among the most eager importers of Italian concepts in the 16th century. Starkey's use of the dialogue form may itself be a sign of this influence. The circle orbiting around Pole, if you'll pardon the expression, was more generally involved in the take-up of humanist ideas in England. Through this group, Starkey would have known the ideas of Erasmus, Colette, and More, but unlike More's Utopia, Starkey's dialogue engages with the politics of his own day rather than imagining an ideal state. Indeed, at one point, Starkey disavows the approach of Plato, describing an unattainably perfect state. In this respect, Starkey is more like Fortescue, who discussed the real political regime of England. Fortescue may in fact have influenced Starkey, who like him, says royal authorities founded upon the consent of the people, including the commons. The king absolutely must abide by the laws. For him to do otherwise is an open gate to tyranny. But there are differences, too. For one thing, Starkey's study of ancient authors like Aristotle and Cicero leads him to frame politics in more explicitly ethical terms. Admittedly, Fortescue had already stated that happiness lies in virtue and that virtue is encouraged by good laws so that whoever enjoys justice is made happy by the law. But the theme of individual flourishing is far more pronounced than Starkey. Like the Italian humanists, he develops the concept of civic virtue, saying that there is little point in virtue that is not published abroad to the profit of others, and that every man ought to apply himself to the setting forward of the common wheel. His very definition of civil life also builds in an ethical perspective. It is a political order of a multitude conspiring together in virtue and honesty. On these grounds, Starkey answers the question posed in the first book of Moore's Utopia as to whether it is advisable to engage in political life with a resounding yes. However, whereas even the Wars of the Roses didn't stop Fortescue from painting a rosy picture of English political life, Starkey laments the parlous state of England in his own day. There is a pestilence in the political body, as witnessed by abandoned towns and a shortage of labor. He's still an Englishman, though, so he makes sure to mention that things are even worse in France, and in Spain and Italy too. Part of the problem is a lack of virtue among the English nobility, who out of inordinate love for themselves failed to do their part to support the common good. But there's a deeper problem, namely the way that monarchs are appointed. While Starkey is cautious enough to say that the sitting king, Henry VIII, is eminently praiseworthy, he has his mouthpiece Reginald Pole argue that monarchs should be put in place through election by the common voice of Parliament, rather than by inheritance. When Lupset responds that a hereditary monarchy has the advantage of reducing the chances of civil war, Pole says that this is not generally true, though it may be a good point as concerns the situation in England. That might be another attempt to defuse the potentially explosive implications of his own argument. As in Fortescue, the need for the people to consent to being ruled is connected to a historical account of the origins of kingship. In a passage that will again make us think ahead to Hobbes, Starkey describes a primordial situation of wild disorder in the distant past, which was tamed only thanks to the advice of certain men of great wit and policy with perfect eloquence and high philosophy. Good thing there were some humanist philosophers hanging around in the state of nature. Their suggestion was to establish political constitutions, which might be monarchial, oligarchic, or democratic. Any of these would impose peace and encourage happiness among the people, so long as the rulers look to the common wheel. But obviously, Starkey is thinking mostly about monarchy as the outcome of this process, and he approves of this solution, remarking that a good king is the ground of all felicity in the civil life. Like Fortescue, though, Starkey also leaves a significant role for a council of advisors, who will represent Parliament and help the king to rule wisely. Actually, more than that. Starkey says that the king should do nothing pertaining to the state of his realm without the authority of his proper council. On the whole, then, these more mainstream political treatises from the Tudor period might remind us of ideas current in France around the same time. I don't mean the provocative treatises of the Huguenots, which came somewhat later, but an author like Claude de Seisel, who advocated monarchy as the best form of government as long as the monarch is bound by certain bridles. These would include the law, to which the king is subject, and a council that would steer the king's choices and even have veto power over him. Furthermore, the king's power would be given to him through election by the nobility. This proposal could have been known from Marsilius of Padua, or simply from Aristotle's Politics. Actually, the politics was getting quite a bit of attention in this period. Among ancient treatises on practical philosophy, the politics was less popular than Cicero's work on duties or Aristotle's own Nicomachean ethics, but like Sam Adams in a Boston pub, its contents were greedily imbibed by university students. If you have a very good memory, you might recall me quoting a report about the popularity of Jean Bodin's writing among students at Cambridge. Well, that same report says that the students could quote Aristotle's politics from memory. William Seisel, a powerful minister under Queen Elizabeth, even asked the scholastic thinker John Case to write a commentary on the politics, which he duly did. It was published in 1588. Case used the opportunity to defend the permissibility of having female monarchs, which was in every sense of the word a politic thing to argue for during the reign of Elizabeth, but he was critical of the concept of elective kingship, which may have inspired Starkey. The upshot was, as a study of this commentary has put it, to transform Aristotle from ancient Greek polis dweller to Tudor loyalist and proto-feminist. One of the numerous English scholars approaching Aristotle in a humanist spirit was the unexcitingly named Thomas Smith. He was a Protestant who taught the politics at Cambridge on the basis of the original Greek, and was also a member of parliament and an ambassador. So, despite his unmemorable name, he managed to be involved in pretty much all the movements we've been looking at over the last few from the Reformation to humanism and political affairs. One work of Smith's in particular deserves not to be forgotten, A Discourse of the Common Wheel of This Realm of England, which takes a secular and empirical approach to the topic of political economy. In this work, Smith echoes Jean Bodin's explanation of inflation, like him blaming it on debasement of coinage. He also echoes a point from Thomas More's Utopia, namely that individual interest, or to put it more bluntly, greed, is a powerful mechanism that can be used to drive economic activity. To economically beneficial activities, he writes, men may well be provoked, encouraged, and allured, as if they that be industrious and painful be rewarded well for their pains, and be suffered to take gains in wealth as reward for their labors. Relatedly, he compares the national economy to a clock in which each part makes the next part go. Or rather, his attention is not restricted to only the national economy. He realizes that the wider international context, what he calls the common market of the world, has a powerful effect on England. Yet another observation that has lost none of its relevance nowadays. Indeed, just about everything I've mentioned in this episode seems to point forward toward later developments. Of course, unlike the barrels of tea thrown into Boston Harbor at the instigation of Sam Adams, we shouldn't go overboard. I'm not saying that Thomas Smith already anticipated all the ideas of the similarly named Adam Smith, or that Thomas Hobbes was just repeating the views of Fortescue or Starkey. But these earlier thinkers of the Tudor age did anticipate much of what we'll be seeing when we get to the 17th and even 18th centuries. This is true at the level of fine detail, as with Smith's clock analogy, and also at the level of broad principle. Slowly but surely, political theory was moving away from the assumption that sovereignty is legitimated through divine fiat, or the natural law, and towards the notion that people might actually have to consent to be ruled. The monarchs of the time noticed this, and were unsurprisingly annoyed. In 1567, Queen Elizabeth gave a speech to Parliament in which she asserted the age-old comparison of the body politic to the human body. She was the head, and Parliament the feet, so it was pretty clear who should be in charge. God forbid, Elizabeth warned, that your liberty should make my bondage. It's often thought that Protestantism undermined such appeals to a naturalist, even organic conception of political life. For Protestants, especially radical ones like the Puritans, true authority was scriptural, rather than rational or natural. Religious acceptability was the test that rulers needed to pass, and fiery Protestant preachers claimed the right to give a failing grade. Now, the English authors we've just discussed did continue to refer to the concept of natural law, juxtaposing it to divine and human law, in good scholastic fashion. There was even a poem by John Bale called Comedy Concerning Three Laws, which deals with the laws of nature, the Old Testament, and the New Testament. Natural law gives a speech about herself, stating, God hath appointed me mankind to oversee, and in his heart to sit, to teach him for to know, in the creatures high and low, his glorious majesty. Nature could also be invoked in arguments over concrete political issues. We saw John Knox saying that the rule of women is unnatural, a point that was rebutted by John Aylmer. I reason against him thus, Whatsoever preserves commonwealths and destroys them not is not against nature, but the rule of women has preserved commonwealths, ergo, it is not against nature. Still, the increasing tendency to base political authority on something like a contract, a primordial agreement in which the people would have transferred authority to a sovereign, was gradually chipping away at the traditional foundations of monarchical rule. To realize that the king's power is artificial is to take the first step towards questioning that power. After all, what is man-made can be unmade by men. This issue will stay with us in the next episode, as we move on to a figure who resisted the consent-based political theories of his fellow Protestants. His name was Richard Hooker. He was a theologian who, like Thomas Cranmer before him, stood for a middle-ground version of Protestantism, avoiding the contrary threats of Puritanism and Popery. This makes Hooker a key figure in the history of the Anglican Church, but it is above all the connection between his theological and political ideas that I hope will catch your attention next time as you stay hooked to the history of philosophy without any gaps.