as well by the part he
had acted in relation to public affairs, as by the exercise of his
professional ability. He was among those who took the deepest interest
in the controversy with England, and, whether in or out of the
legislature, his time and talents were alike devoted to the cause. In
the years 1773 and 1774 he was chosen a Councillor by the members of the
General Court, but rejected by Governor Hutchinson in the former of
those years, and by Governor Gage in the latter.

The time was now at hand, however, when the affairs of the Colonies
urgently demanded united counsels throughout the country. An open
rupture with the parent state appeared inevitable, and it was but the
dictate of prudence that those who were united by a common interest and
a common danger should protect that interest and guard against that
danger by united efforts. A general Congress of Delegates from all the
Colonies having been proposed and agreed to, the House of
Representatives, on the 17th of June, 1774, elected James Bowdoin,
Thomas Cushing, Samuel Adams, John Adams, and Robert Treat Paine,
delegates from Massachusetts. This appointment was made at Salem, where
the General Court had been convened by Governor Gage, in the last hour
of the existence of a House of Representatives under the Provincial
Charter. While engaged in this important business, the Governor, having
been informed of what was passing, sent his secretary with a message
dissolving the General Court. The secretary, finding the door locked,
directed the messenger to go in and inform the Speaker that the
secretary was at the door with a message from the Governor. The
messenger returned, and informed the secretary that the orders of the
House were that the doors should be kept fast; whereupon the secretary
soon after read upon the stairs a proclamation dissolving the General
Court. Thus terminated, for ever, the actual exercise of the political
power of England in or over Massachusetts. The four last-named delegates
accepted their appointments, and took their seats in Congress the first
day of its meeting, the 5th of September, 1774, in Philadelphia.

The proceedings of the first Congress are well known, and have been
universally admired. It is in vain that we would look for superior
proofs of wisdom, talent, and patriotism. Lord Chatham said, that, for
himself, he must declare that he had studied and admired the free states
of antiquity, the master states of the world, bu