ies would have achieved their own noblest freedom
unstained by future bloodshed, and untainted by so unnatural an
alliance; the Anglo-Saxon race and language would have been one, and
greatly more advanced than it now is in the cause of the world's freedom
and civilization.

History has justly censured, in the severest language, the conduct of
Lord North's Administration for employing German mercenaries to aid in
maintaining the assumed prerogative of King and Parliament in the
colonies; but was it less censurable and more patriotic for the
administrative leaders in Congress to engage French and Spanish forces,
both at sea and land, to invade Great Britain and her possessions, and
to unite with Republicans for the dismemberment of the British empire?

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 393: Judge Marshall's History of the American Colonies, Chap.
XIV., pp. 449-451.]

[Footnote 394: _Ib._, p. 457.]

[Footnote 395: "The commencement of hostilities on the 19th of April,
1775, exhibited the parent State in an odious point of view. But,
nevertheless, at that time, and for a twelvemonth after, a majority of
the colonists wished for no more than to be re-established as subjects
in their ancient rights. Had independence been their object, even at the
commencement of hostilities, they would have rescinded the associations
which have been already mentioned, and imported more largely than ever.
Common sense revolts at the idea that colonists, unfurnished with
military stores and wanting manufactures of every kind, should, at the
time of their intending a serious struggle for independence, by a
voluntary agreement, deprive themselves of the obvious means of
procuring such foreign supplies as their circumstances might make
necessary. Instead of pursuing a line of conduct which might have been
dictated by a wish for independence, they continued their exports for
nearly a year after they ceased to import. This not only lessened the
debts they owed to Great Britain, but furnished additional means for
carrying on war against themselves. To aim at independence, and at the
same time to transfer their resources to their enemies, could not have
been the policy of an enlightened people. It was not till some time in
1776 that the colonists began to take other ground, and contend that it
was for their interest to be for ever separated from Great Britain."
(Dr. Ramsay's History of the United States, Vol. II., Chap, xii., pp.
158, 159.)]

[Footnote