sufficient liberty and sufficient self-control, but because the
mother country infringed the liberties and powers of self-control
which she herself had given. The mother country, so these States
declare, had acted the part of Sir Edmund Andross--had endeavored
to take away their charters. So they also put out the lights, and
took themselves to an oak-tree of their own--which is still
standing, though winds from the infernal regions are now battering
its branches. Long may it stand!

Whether the mother country did or did not infringe the charters she
had given, I will not here inquire. As to the nature of those
alleged infringements, are they not written down to the number of
twenty-seven in the Declaration of Independence? They mostly begin
with He. "He" has done this, and "He" has done that. The "He" is
poor George III., whose twenty-seven mortal sins against his
Transatlantic colonies are thus recapitulated. It would avail
nothing to argue now whether those deeds were sins or virtues, nor
would it have availed then. The child had grown up and was strong,
and chose to go alone into the world. The young bird was fledged,
and flew away. Poor George III. with his cackling was certainly
not efficacious in restraining such a flight. But it is gratifying
to see how this new people, when they had it in their power to
change all their laws, to throw themselves upon any Utopian theory
that the folly of a wild philanthropy could devise, to discard as
abominable every vestige of English rule and English power,--it is
gratifying to see that, when they could have done all this, they
did not do so, but preferred to cling to things English. Their old
colonial limits were still to be the borders of their States.
Their old charters were still to be regarded as the sources from
whence their State powers had come. The old laws were to remain in