e. Wherefore, her own interest leads her to suppress the
growth of OURS in every case which doth not promote her advantage, or
in the least interferes with it. A pretty state we should soon be in
under such a secondhand government, considering what has happened! Men
do not change from enemies to friends by the alteration of a name: And
in order to shew that reconciliation now is a dangerous doctrine, I
affirm, THAT IT WOULD BE POLICY IN THE KING AT THIS TIME, TO REPEAL THE
ACTS FOR THE SAKE OF REINSTATING HIMSELF IN THE GOVERNMENT OF THE
PROVINCES; in order, that HE MAY ACCOMPLISH BY CRAFT AND SUBTLETY, IN
THE LONG RUN, WHAT HE CANNOT DO BY FORCE AND VIOLENCE IN THE SHORT ONE.
Reconciliation and ruin are nearly related.

SECONDLY. That as even the best terms, which we can expect to obtain,
can amount to no more than a temporary expedient, or a kind of
government by guardianship, which can last no longer than till the
colonies come of age, so the general face and state of things, in the
interim, will be unsettled and unpromising. Emigrants of property will
not choose to come to a country whose form of government hangs but by a
thread, and who is every day tottering on the brink of commotion and
disturbance; and numbers of the present inhabitants would lay hold of
the interval, to dispense of their effects, and quit the continent.

But the most powerful of all arguments, is, that nothing but
independence, i.e. a continental form of government, can keep the
peace of the continent and preserve it inviolate from civil wars. I
dread the event of a reconciliation with Britain now, as it is more
than probable, that it will be followed by a revolt somewhere or other,
the consequences of which may be far more fatal than all the malice of
Britain.

Thousands are already ruined by British barbarity; (thousands more will
probably suffer the same fate.) Those men have other feelings than us
who have nothing suffered. All they NOW possess is liberty, what they
before enjoyed is sacrificed to its service, and having nothing more to
lose, they disdain submission. Besides, the general temper of the
colonies, towards a British government, will be like that of a youth,
who is nearly out of his time; they will care very little about her.
And a government which cannot preserve the peace, is no government at
all, and in that case we pay our money for nothing; and pray what is it
that Britain can do, whose power will be wholly on pa