was signed by Congress, justifying their
proceedings, but disdaining any idea of separation from England. They
say, "We are reduced to the alternative of choosing an unconstitutional
submission to the tyranny of irritated Ministers, or resistance by
force. The latter is our choice. We have counted the cost of this
contest, and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary slavery. Honour,
justice, and humanity forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which
we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity
have a right to receive from us....

"With hearts fortified with these animating reflections, we most
solemnly, before God and the world, _declare_ that, exerting the utmost
energy of those powers which our beneficent Creator hath graciously
bestowed upon us, the arms we have been compelled by our enemies to
assume, we will, in defiance of every hazard, with unabating firmness
and perseverance, employ for the preservation of our liberties; being
with one mind resolved to die freemen rather than to live slaves.

"Lest this declaration should disquiet the minds of our friends and
fellow-subjects in any part of the empire, _we assure them that we mean
not to dissolve that union which has so long and so happily subsisted
between us, and which we sincerely wish to see restored_. Necessity has
not yet driven us to that desperate measure, or induced us to excite any
other nation to war against them. _We have not raised armies with
ambitious designs of separating from Great Britain, and of establishing
independent States._ We fight not for glory or for conquest. We exhibit
to mankind the remarkable spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked
enemies, without any imputation or even suspicion of offence. They boast
of their privileges and civilization, and yet proffer no milder
conditions than servitude or death.

"In our native land, in defence of the freedom that is our birthright,
and which we ever enjoyed until the late violation of it, for the
protection of our property acquired solely by the honest industry of
our forefathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we
have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease
on the part of the aggressors, and all danger of their being renewed
shall be removed, and not before."[393]

"Amidst these hostile operations, the voice of peace was yet
heard--allegiance to the King was still acknowledged, and a lingering
hope remained th