§. 112. Thus we may see how probable it is that people that were naturally
free, and, by their own consent, either submitted to the government of their
father, or united together, out of different families, to make a government,
should generally put the rule into one man's hands, and choose to be under the
conduct of a single person, without so much, as by express conditions, limiting
or regulating his power, which they thought safe enough in his honesty and
prudence; though they never dreamed of monarchy being jure Divino, which we
never heard of among mankind till it was revealed to us by the divinity of this
last age, nor ever allowed paternal power to have a right to dominion or to be
the foundation of all government. And thus much may suffice to show that, as
far as we have any light from history, we have reason to conclude that all
peaceful beginnings of government have been laid in the consent of the people.
I say "peaceful," because I shall have occasion, in another place, to
speak of conquest, which some esteem a way of beginning of governments.
The other objection, I find, urged against the beginning of polities, in
the way I have mentioned, is this, viz.:
