Robert Filmer - Patriarcha and Other Works

Patriarcha and Other Works

Filmer was already a middle-aged man when the controversy between the king and the House of Commons roused him into literary activity. His writings afford examples of the doctrines held by the extreme section of the Divine Right party.

The most complete expression of Filmer's thought is given in Patriarcha, or the Natural Power of Kings, which was published posthumously in 1680, but was probably begun in the 1620s, and almost certainly was completed before the Civil War began in 1642. According to Christopher Hill, "The whole argument of ... Patriarcha, and of his works published earlier in the 1640s and 1650s, is based on Old Testament history from Genesis onwards".

His position was enunciated by the works which he published during his lifetime. Of the Blasphemie against the Holy Ghost from 1646 or 1647 was against Calvinists, starting from John Calvin's doctrine on blasphemy. The Freeholders Grand Inquest (1648) concerned English constitutional history; Filmer's early published works did not receive much attention, while Patriarcha circulated only in manuscript. Anarchy of a Limited and Mixed Monarchy (1648) was an attack on a treatise about monarchy by Philip Hunton. Hunton had maintained that the king's prerogative is not superior to the authority of the Houses of Parliament.

His Observations concerning the Original of Government upon Mr Hobbes's Leviathan, Mr Milton against Salmasius, and H. Grotius' De jure belli ac pacis appeared in 1652. As its title suggests, it attacks several political classics, the De jure belli ac pacis of Grotius, the Leviathan of Thomas Hobbes, and the Defensio pro Populo Anglicano of John Milton. The pamphlet entitled The Power of Kings, and in particular, of the King of England (written 1648) was first published in 1680.