(Page 9 of 12) - Marchamont Nedham & the Origins of Liberal Republicanism authored by Rahe, Paul.

alike need their own arms.

To this end, in his Art of War, he championed the creation of a

popular militia—but this was to be drawn not only or even primarily from the citizens of
Florence but also from the subject population inhabiting the contado lying outside that city’s
walls.

His concern throughout was simply that one’s military manpower be plentiful and that

one’s arms be really and truly one’s own: with regard to the bearing of arms, everything that he
recommended, whether to a prince or a republic, was instrumental to insuring the fidelity of a
sufficiently large armed force. The first modern political theorist to insist, as the ancients had
done, that in a republic the citizens must be soldiers and all the soldiers citizens so that
citizenship and the bearing of arms should be inextricably linked was Marchamont Nedham, and
it is telling that he cites not Machiavelli but Aristotle to bolster his case.

Political participation as such was not Nedham’s primary concern. Like Machiavelli, he was

simply persuaded that, to be viable, a polity must rely on its own arms. To this observation,
however, he added a corollary never explicitly mentioned by the Florentine sage: that “the
sword, and sovereignty, ever walk hand in hand.” If “the people be continually trained up in the
exercise of arms,” he contended, and if “the militia [be] lodged only in the people’s hands,” then
“nothing” can “at any time be imposed upon the people, but by their consent; that is, by the
consent of themselves; or of such as were by them instrusted.” Among the ancient Romans, he
explained, “a general exercise of the best part of the people in the use of arms” was generally
regarded as “the only bulwark of their liberty: this was reckoned the surest way to preserve it
both at home, and abroad; the majesty of the people being secured thereby, as well against
domestic affronts from any of their own citizens, as against the foreign invasions of bad
neighbours.” It was only when “necessity constrained” the Romans “to erect a continued
stipendiary soldiery (abroad in foreign parts) either for the holding, or winning of provinces,”
that, “luxury increasing with dominion, the strict rule and discipline of freedom was ... quitted,”
and stipendiary “forces were kept up at home” as well. It was then that liberty was lost.

Of course, when Nedham speaks of “the people,” he does not have everyone in mind. In his

discussion of the militia, when he suggests that the militia be lodged in the people’s hands, he
indicates that it suffices that it be lodged in the hands of “that part of them, which are most firm
to the interest of liberty.” Later, when he describes the practice of the ancient Romans in this
regard, he with impressive accuracy observes that early on “their arms were never lodged in the
hands of any, but such as had an interest in the public; such as were acted by that interest, not
drawn only by pay; such as thought themselves well paid, in repelling invaders, that they might
with freedom return to their affairs: for, the truth is, so long as Rome acted by the pure principles
of a free-state, it used no arms to defend itself, but, such as we call, sufficient men; such, as for
the most part were men of estate, masters of families, that took arms (only upon occasion) pro
aris et focis, for their wives, their children, and their country.” In the time immediately following
the expulsion of the Tarquins, Nedham pointedly adds, “the milita was lodged and exercised,” as
it was in his own day, “in the hands of that party, which was firm to the ‘interest of freedom.’”

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33.

See Machiavelli, Il principe 12-13, 20 and Discorsi 1.21, 2.10, 12.4, 13.2, 20, 24, 30, in Tutte le opere 105-6,
159-60, 162-64, 176, 181-84, 190-91, 275-78, 289-91, which should be read in light of Machiavelli, Discorsi
3.24, in Tutte le opere 231.

34.

See Machiavelli, Dell’Arte della guerra 1, in Tutte le opere 310-13.

35.

Consider Nedham, The Excellencie of a Free State 114-19, in light of Arist. Pol. 1297b1-27, and see Paul A.
Rahe, Republics Ancient and Modern: Classical Republicanism and the American Revolution (Chapel Hill:
University of North Carolina Press, 1992) 28-135.

36.

See Nedham, The Excellencie of a Free State 114-19.

37.

See Nedham, The Excellencie of a Free State 114-16. In Mercurius Politicus, Nedham frequently referred to
Charles II as “young Tarquin”: see Frank, Cromwell’s Press Agent 90. Nedham’s understanding of the logic
underlying the fall of the Roman republic was acute: see Claude Nicolet, The World of the Citizen in Republi-
can Rome, trans. P. S. Falla (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980).