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