ooper
Benjamin Rush
Richard Stockton
Thomas McKean
Caesar Rodney

ADDITIONAL CHARACTERS

General Washington and his Army

Fifer }
Drummer } Leading the Army
Little Boy } in "The Spirit of '76"

THE CONTINENTAL CONGRESS

ACT I.

SCENE I.--_Congress assembled; John Hancock in the chair as president;
his keynote speech._

JOHN HANCOCK.[2] Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--I thank you for
the signal honor you have conferred on me in making me your presiding
officer. I am glad to see so many Colonies represented in this Congress.
Let us show the nations of the old world what the people of the new
world will do when left to themselves, to their own unbiased good sense,
and to their own true interests. On us depend the destinies of our
country--the fate of three millions of people, and of the countless
millions of our posterity. Matchless is our opportunity--matchless also
is our responsibility! May the God of nations guide us in our
deliberations and in our actions.

Everything that is right or natural pleads for separation. The blood of
the slain, the weeping voice of Nature cries, "'Tis time to part." Even
the distance at which the Almighty hath placed England and America, is a
strong and natural proof that the authority of the one over the other
was never the design of Heaven. The time, likewise, at which the
continent was discovered, adds weight to the argument, and the manner
in which it was peopled, increases the force of it. The Reformation was
preceded by the discovery of America, as if the Almighty graciously
meant to open a sanctuary to the persecuted in future years, when home
should afford neither friendship nor safety.

The authority of Great Britain over this continent is a form of
government which sooner or later must have an end: and a serious mind
can draw no true pleasure by looking forward, under the painful and
positive conviction that what he calls "the present constitution" is
merely temporary. As parents, we can have no joy, knowing that this
government is not sufficiently lasting to insure anything which we may
bequeath to posterity; and by a plain method of argument, as we are
running the next generation into debt, we ought to do the work of it,
otherwise we use them meanly and pitifully. In order to discover the
line of our duty rightly, we should take our children by the hand, and
fix our station a few years farther into life;