Page:The Maid's Tragedy Altered - Waller (1690).djvu/98

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94
Mr. Waller's Speech

of the Right and Propriety of the Subject. A strange force (my Lords) in the sound of this word Necessity, that like a Charm it should silence the Laws, while we are dispoyl'd of all we have. For that but a part of our goods was taken, is owing to the Grace and Goodness of the King; for so much as concerns these Judges, we have no more left than they perhaps may deserve to have, when your Lordships shall have passed Judg­ment upon them: This for the neglect of their Oaths, and betraying that publick Trust, which for the conservation of our Laws was reposed in them.

Now for the cruelty and unmercifulness of this Judgment; you may please to remember that in the old Law they were forbid to seeth a Kid in his Mothers Milk; of which the received interpreta­tion is, that we should not use that to the destru­ction of any Creature, which was intended for its preservation: Now (my Lords) God and Nature has given us the Sea as our best Guard against our Enemies, and our Ships as our greatest Glory a­bove other Nations; and how barbarously would these Men have let in the Sea upon us, at once to wash away our Liberties, and to overwhelm, if not our Land, all the Propriety we have therein; making the Supply of our Navy, a pretence for the ruine of our Nation? For observe, I beseech you, the fruit and consequence of this Judgment,how