ngland, that the same tyranny which drove the first
emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still.

In this extensive quarter of the globe, we forget the narrow limits of
three hundred and sixty miles (the extent of England) and carry our
friendship on a larger scale; we claim brotherhood with every European
Christian, and triumph in the generosity of the sentiment.

It is pleasant to observe by what regular gradations we surmount the
force of local prejudice, as we enlarge our acquaintance with the
world. A man born in any town in England divided into parishes, will
naturally associate most with his fellow-parishioners (because their
interests in many cases will be common) and distinguish him by the name
of NEIGHBOUR; if he meet him but a few miles from home, he drops the
narrow idea of a street, and salutes him by the name of TOWNSMAN; if he
travel out of the county, and meet him in any other, he forgets the
minor divisions of street and town, and calls him COUNTRYMAN, i. e.
COUNTRYMAN; but if in their foreign excursions they should associate in
France or any other part of EUROPE, their local remembrance would be
enlarged into that of ENGLISHMEN. And by a just parity of reasoning,
all Europeans meeting in America, or any other quarter of the globe,
are COUNTRYMEN; for England, Holland, Germany, or Sweden, when compared
with the whole, stand in the same places on the larger scale, which the
divisions of street, town, and county do on the smaller ones;
distinctions too limited for continental minds. Not one third of the
inhabitants, even of this province, are of English descent. Wherefore
I reprobate the phrase of parent or mother country applied to England
only, as being false, selfish, narrow and ungenerous.

But admitting, that we were all of English descent, what does it amount
to? Nothing. Britain, being now an open enemy, extinguishes every
other name and title: And to say that reconciliation is our duty, is
truly farcical. The first king of England, of the present line
(William the Conqueror) was a Frenchman, and half the Peers of England
are descendants from the same country; therefore, by the same method of
reasoning, England ought to be governed by France.

Much hath been said of the united strength of Britain and the colonies,
that in conjunction they might bid defiance to the world. But this is
mere presumption; the fate of war is uncertain, neither do the
expressions mean any thing; for t