Page:Poetical Works of John Oldham.djvu/104

Kill like a plague or inquisition; spare
No age, degree, or sex; only to wear
A soul, only to own a life, be here
Thought crime enough to lose 't; no time nor place
Be sanctuary from your outrages;
Spare not in churches kneeling priests at prayer,
Though interceding for you, slay even there;
Spare not young infants smiling at the breast,
Who from relenting fools their mercy wrest;
Rip teeming wombs, tear out the hated brood
From thence, and drown them in their mother's blood;
Pity not virgins, nor their tender cries,
Though prostrate at your feet with melting eyes
All drowned in tears; strike home, as 'twere in lust,
And force their begging hands to guide the thrust;
Ravish at the altar, kill when you have done,
Make them your rapes, and victims too in one;
Nor let grey hoary hairs protection give
To age, just crawling on the verge of life;
Snatch from its leaning hands the weak support,
And with it knock 't into the grave with sport;
Brain the poor cripple with his crutch, then cry,
You've kindly rid him of his misery.
Seal up your ears to mercy, lest their words
Should tempt a pity, ram them with your swords
(Their tongues too) down their throats; let them not dare
To mutter for their souls a gasping prayer,
But in the utterance choked, and stab it there.
'Twere witty handsome malice (could you do 't)
To make 'em die, and make 'em damned to boot.
Make children by one fate with parent die,
Kill even revenge in next posterity;
So you'll be pestered with no orphans' cries,
No childless mothers curse your memories.
Make death and desolation swim in blood
Throughout the land, with nought to stop the flood
But slaughtered carcasses; till the whole isle
Become one tomb, become one funeral pile;