The Act of Charles apparently modified Cromwell’s law, by making the prohibition of “the importation of foreign commodities, except in British ships, or in ships belonging to the country or place where the goods were produced,” to apply only to the goods of Russia and Turkey and to certain other specified articles, which could not be imported into the United Kingdom except in British ships. But as the enumerated articles comprehended almost all the chief articles of freight, it can scarcely be said that any relaxation of the principles of Cromwell’s law was thus sanctioned. At all events, the supplemental statute of the 14th Charles II. fully carried into effect the declared intentions of the Legislature. By this Act all importation of a long list of enumerated goods, whether from Holland, the Netherlands, or Germany, was prohibited under any circumstances and in any vessels, British or foreign, under the penalty of the seizure and confiscation of the ships and goods. [Sidenote: The Dutch navigation seriously injured.] It would be vain to deny that, whatever prospective results in after times were produced by these laws, the Dutch trade and navigation suffered most seriously from them. The triumphant career of Blake against the Spanish navy in the Mediterranean had previously crippled the maritime power of Spain. The English had acquired a vast territory in North America, and rich islands in the West Indies with a virgin soil. In the East they had surmounted their first difficulties in making settlements, and only required such protection as their own government could supply to become the general carriers of Indian produce to the chief consuming nations of Europe. As it was idle to expect relaxations of their prohibitive systems from France, Spain, or Portugal, the Parliament and the people saw clearly the necessity of maintaining at all hazards the maritime superiority of England, and by such means too as were then within their reach. [Sidenote: Fresh war with the Dutch, 1664.] [Sidenote: Its naval incidents.] [Sidenote: Action off Harwich, 1665.]