but I subjoin a few, that the reader may form his own
opinion. Speaking of the sovereign of Great Britain, they say he has
protected "armed troops among us, by a mock trial, from punishment for
any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these States.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and
destroyed the lives of our people. He is, at this time, transporting
large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death,
desolation, and tyranny, already begun, with circumstances of cruelty
and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally
unworthy the head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our
fellow-citizens taken captive on the high seas, to bear arms against
their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren,
or to fall themselves by their hands. He has excited domestic
insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the
inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known
rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes,
and conditions. In every stage of these oppressions, we have petitioned
for redress in the most humble terms; our repeated petitions have been
answered only by repeated injury. A prince whose character is thus
marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler
of a free people."

I pause not to ask if any of these charges are correct or not: grant
them accuracy in every statement, nay more, admit that they were
eminently calculated to stir up the feelings of the colonists, and to
inflame that spirit which was requisite to make their struggle for
independence justifiable and successful, and that they were therefore
called for by the emergencies of the day;--but nearly eighty years have
rolled over since that Declaration was penned; there is no success
sought for now which renders such appeals necessary, and surely it is
not for the purpose of justifying their rebellion that they are made.
Where then is the good to be derived from such declarations? Is there
any misgiving in the Republic as to sentiments of patriotism or pluck?
Surely none. But who can help seeing the evil to which they lead? These
annual recapitulations of old grievances, buried beneath nearly a
century, must tend to excite hostile feelings towards England. Conceive
for one moment France reading annually a declaration of independence
from British arms on the anniversar