"Nature Hath Framed Strange Fellows" William Shakespeare and Natural Law

A. Introduction

             

             Natural law theorists might turn to The History of Troilus and Cressida to start building their case.  They might begin with Ulysses’ lofty outline of the “natural” order:

The heavens themselves, the planets, and this center          

Observe degree, priority, and place,                            

Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,                    

Office, and custom, in all line of order,                       

And therefore is the glorious planet Sol                        

In noble eminence enthroned and sphered                         

Amidst the other; whose med'cinable eye                         

Corrects the influences of evil planets

And posts, like the commandment of a king . . . .[1]                      

Such theorists might then use Ulysses’ further stirring words to blend such “natural physical order” with a “natural order” in law and morality as well:

Take but degree away, untune that string,                      

And hark what discord follows. Each thing meets                

In mere oppugnancy.  The bounded waters                          

Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores              

And make a sop of all this solid globe;                         

Strength should be lord of imbecility,                          

And the rude son should strike his father dead;                 

Force should be right; or rather right and wrong,             

Between whose endless jar justice resides,                    

Should lose their names, and so should justice too.^[2]                             

As far as it goes, it is hard to imagine a more eloquent case for natural law than this.

Parsing Babble in North Carolina's HB-2 and Calling Out the Need for Immediate Repeal

Read here my parsing of ambiguous bathroom provisions in North Carolina's HB-2 and the immediate need to repeal the flawed statute in light of further imminent threatened boycotts of the state.

Pope Urban II's Double Sonnet: Red Fields and Lucious Palaces (Addition to "The Apology Box")

        Pope Urban II’s Double Sonnet

                               I.

Although we were God's advocate below,

We were a child of Adam, too, brought low

By sin.  We therefore beg forgiveness though

We did our duty.  Bravely, we brought low

The infidels.  Our rhetoric called men to

Jerusalem with swords in hand as Christ

Himself commanded.  Fields ran red with sliced-

Up children, men, expectant mothers, too--

The serpent crushed within the egg can't grow

To blaspheme God or strike at others.  Though

Much bloody work, we had no choice.  Our trust

As shepherds left no option--shepherds must

Protect their lambs.  The Eastern fields ran red

With menaces that shepherds rightly bled.

                                    II.

We tended, too, our wandering sheep inside
The one true church. Thus, to our eastern side
We led the roaming churches back to Rome
While bringing, too, more unity at home

Among the many Occidentals who

Now shared a common venture.  Joined anew,
They focused on a foreign infidel

And Grace that comes from others sent to Hell--

Though we regret our actual person could

Not quit Rome's luscious palaces.  We would

Have joined the foreign danger, blood, and grind

Had our position not kept us behind.

A headless body could not wage a war.

We were the head and lodged in Rome therefore.

© Harold Anthony Lloyd 2016
  
The current contents of "The Apology Box" can be found here.