ever, who
migrated hither, were laborers, not lawyers. The fictitious principle,
that all lands belong originally to the King, they were early persuaded
to believe real, and accordingly took grants of their own lands from
the Crown. And while the Crown continued to grant for small sums and on
reasonable rents, there was no inducement to arrest the error, and
lay it open to public view. But his Majesty has lately taken on him to
advance the terms of purchase and of holding to the double of what they
were; by which means the acquisition of lands being rendered difficult,
the population of our country is likely to be checked. It is time,
therefore, for us to lay this matter before his Majesty, and to declare
that he has no right to grant lands of himself. From the nature and
purpose of civil institutions, all the lands within the limits which any
particular society has circumscribed around itself, are assumed by that
society, and subject to their allotment; this may be done by themselves
assembled collectively, or by their legislature, to whom they may have
delegated sovereign authority: and, if they are allotted in neither of
these ways, each individual of the society may appropriate to himself
such lands as he finds vacant, and occupancy will give him title.

'That, in order to enforce the arbitrary measures before complained of,
his Majesty has, from time to time, sent among us large bodies of armed
forces, not made up of the people here, nor raised by the authority of
our laws. Did his Majesty possess such a right as this, it might swallow
up all our other rights whenever he should think proper. But his Majesty
has no right to land a single armed man on our shores; and those whom he
sends here are liable to our laws for the suppression and punishment of
riots, routs, and unlawful assemblies, or are hostile bodies invading
us in defiance of law. When, in the course of the late war, it became
expedient that a body of Hanoverian troops should be brought over
for the defence of Great Britain, his Majesty's grandfather, our late
sovereign, did not pretend to introduce them under any authority he
possessed. Such a measure would have given just alarm to his subjects of
Great Britain, whose liberties would not be safe if armed men of another
country, and of another spirit, might be brought into the realm at any
time, without the consent, of their legislature. He, therefore, applied
to Parliament, who passed an act for that purp