ABSTRACT
The Christian politics of Sir John Fortescue is totally bereft of pagan illusions concerning any putative power in power to deliver to man the goods of eternal life and the happiness that is written as a hope in his nature. If Sir John s king exercised a moderate and limited power he was thereby cheated in nothing. This kind of power is the best that any man called to a throne could have and it is the most that he ought to desire. Even should such a king violate the laws of the land through surrendering to the perpetual temptation to have more of everything and thus more of the power that is already his own, his deed will work him no good. His power will eventually wither and his sceptre will become a reed because the presumptuous of this world are always humbled, and if not humbled in life then humbled in the grave. Chris tian politics are the work of men who live in two cities and one of these cities, the one of this world, is tolerable only if the itch to play God is relieved by the salve of laws annealed in mans very own nature.
