ortant
post in which fortune has placed you, holding the balance of a great, if
a well poised empire. This, Sire, is the advice of your great American
council, on the observance of which may, perhaps, depend your felicity
and future fame, and the preservation of that harmony which alone can
continue, both to Great Britain and America, the reciprocal advantages
of their connection. It is neither our wish nor our interest to separate
from her. We are willing, on our part, to sacrifice every thing which
reason can ask, to the restoration of that tranquillity for which all
must wish. On their part, let them be ready to establish union on a
generous plan. Let them name their terms, but let them be just. Accept
of every commercial preference it is in our power to give, for such
things as we can raise for their use, or they make for ours. But let
them not think to exclude us from going to other markets, to dispose of
those commodities which they cannot use, nor to supply those wants which
they cannot supply. Still less, let it be proposed, that our properties,
within our own territories, shall be taxed or regulated by any power
on earth, but our own. The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the
same time: the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them.
This, Sire, is our last, our determined resolution. And that you will
be pleased to interpose, with that efficacy which your earnest endeavors
may insure, to procure redress of these our great grievances, to quiet
the minds of your subjects in British America against any apprehensions
of future encroachment, to establish fraternal love and harmony through
the whole empire, and that that may continue to the latest ages of time,
is the fervent prayer of all British America,'

[NOTE D.]--August, 1774., Instructions for the Deputies

Instructions for the Deputies appointed to meet in General Congress on
the Part of this Colony.

The unhappy disputes between Great Britain and her American colonies,
which began about the third year of the reign of his present Majesty,
and since, continually increasing, have proceeded to lengths so
dangerous and alarming, as to excite just apprehensions in the minds of
his Majesty's faithful subjects of this colony, that they are in
danger of being deprived of their natural, ancient, constitutional, and
chartered rights, have compelled them to take the same into their most
serious consideration; and, being deprived of their usual