Briefly thus then, Since I must speak for all,—your tyranny Drew us from our obedience. Happy those times When lords were styled fathers of families, And not imperious masters! when they number’d Their servants almost equal with their sons, Or one degree beneath them! when their labours Were cherish’d and rewarded, and a period Set to their sufferings; when they did not press Their duties or their wills, beyond the power And strength of their performance! all things order’d With such decorum, as wise lawmakers From each well-govern’d private house deriv’d The perfect model of a Commonwealth. Humanity then lodged in the hearts of men, And thankful masters carefully provided For creatures wanting reason. The noble horse That, in his fiery youth, from his wide nostrils Neigh’d courage to his rider, and brake through Groves of opposed pikes, bearing his lord Safe to triumphant victory, old or wounded, Was set at liberty and freed from service. The Athenian mules that from the quarry drew Marble, hew’d for the temples of the gods, The great work ended, were dismiss’d and fed At the public cost; nay, faithful dogs have found Their sepulchres; but man to man more cruel, Appoints no end to the sufferings of his slave; Since pride stepp’d in and riot, and o’erturned This goodly frame of concord, teaching masters To glory in the abuse of such as are Brought under their command; who grown unuseful, Are less esteem’d than beasts. This you have practis’d, Practis’d on us with rigour; this hath forced us To shake our heavy yokes off; and, if redress Of these just grievances be not granted us, We’ll right ourselves, and by strong hand defend What we are now possess’d of.(125) In a lower key of manly dignity is the speech of Charalois before the Judges in _The Fatal Dowry_. It begins thus: Thus low my duty Answers your lordships’ counsel. I will use, In the few words with which I am to trouble Your lordships’ ears the temper that you wish me; Not that I fear to speak my thoughts as loud, And with a liberty beyond Romont; But that I know, for me that am made up Of all that’s wretched, so to haste my end, Would seem to most rather a willingness To quit the burden of a hopeless life Than scorn of death or duty to the dead.(126) As an example of a high-spirited passage, a speech may be given from _The Bondman_. Cleora, the heroine, comes forward in a meeting of the Senate to urge patriotic effort on her fellow-countrymen. Timoleon, the general, is in the chair, and she addresses him first: