s look somewhat lightly over the offenses of
Britain, and, still hoping for the best, are apt to call out, "COME,
COME, WE SHALL BE FRIENDS AGAIN, FOR ALL THIS." But examine the
passions and feelings of mankind, Bring the doctrine of reconciliation
to the touchstone of nature, and then tell me, whether you can
hereafter love, honor, and faithfully serve the power that hath carried
fire and sword into your land? If you cannot do all these, then are
you only deceiving yourselves, and by your delay bringing ruin upon
posterity. Your future connection with Britain, whom you can neither
love nor honor will be forced and unnatural, and being formed only on
the plan of present convenience, will in a little time fall into a
relapse more wretched than the first. But if you say, you can still
pass the violations over, then I ask, Hath your house been burnt? Hath
your property been destroyed before your face! Are your wife and
children destitute of a bed to lie on, or bread to live on? Have you
lost a parent or a child by their hands, and yourself the ruined and
wretched survivor! If you have not, then are you not a judge of those
who have. But if you have, and still can shake hands with the
murderers, then are you unworthy of the name of husband, father,
friend, or lover, and whatever may be your rank or title in life, you
have the heart of a coward, and the spirit of a sycophant.

This is not inflaming or exaggerating matters, but trying them by those
feelings and affections which nature justifies, and without which, we
should be incapable of discharging the social duties of life, or
enjoying the felicities of it. I mean not to exhibit horror for the
purpose of provoking revenge, but to awaken us from fatal and unmanly
slumbers, that we may pursue determinately some fixed object. It is
not in the power of Britain or of Europe to conquer America, if she do
not conquer herself by DELAY and TIMIDITY. The present winter is worth
an age if rightly employed, but if lost or neglected, the whole
continent will partake of the misfortune; and there is no punishment
which that man will not deserve, be he who, or what, or where he will,
that may be the means of sacrificing a season so precious and useful.

It is repugnant to reason, to the universal order of things, to all
examples from former ages, to suppose, that this continent can longer
remain subject to any external power. The most sanguine in Britain
does not think so. The