§. 66. But though there be a time when a child comes to be as free from
subjection to the will and command of his father as he himself is free from
subjection to the will of anybody else, and they are both under no other
restraint but that which is common to them both, whether it be the law of
Nature or municipal law of their country, yet this freedom exempts not a son
from that honour which he ought, by the law of God and Nature, to pay his
parents, God having made the parents instruments in His great design of
continuing the race of mankind and the occasions of life to their children. As
He hath laid on them an obligation to nourish, preserve, and bring up their
offspring, so He has laid on the children a perpetual obligation of honouring
their parents, which, containing in it an inward esteem and reverence to be
shown by all outward expressions, ties up the child from anything that may ever
injure or affront, disturb or endanger the happiness or life of those from whom
he received his, and engages him in all actions of defence, relief, assistance,
and comfort of those by whose means he entered into being and has been made
capable of any enjoyments of life. From this obligation no state, no freedom,
can absolve children. But this is very far from giving parents a power of
command over their children, or an authority to make laws and dispose as they
please of their lives or liberties. It is one thing to owe honour, respect,
gratitude, and assistance; another to require an absolute obedience and
submission. The honour due to parents a monarch on his throne owes his mother,
and yet this lessens not his authority nor subjects him to her government.
