“Your case no tame expedients will afford,
Resolve on death or conquest by the sword,
Which for no less a stake than life you draw,
And self-defence is Nature's eldest law.”

—  John Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel

Pt. I, lines 455–458.
Absalom and Achitophel (1681)

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John Dryden196
English poet and playwright of the XVIIth century 1631–1700

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