We are strangely inattentive to the events of past ages. We read of the rise of Kingdoms and the ruin of Empires, together with the causes that produced them, as we peruse the fables of antiquity. Never giving ourselves the trouble of comparing and applying former occurrences, which are the beacons to warn posterity, with our own times, we turn over a few pages, are pleased with the tale, close the book, and the impressions die away. The consequences flowing from certain actions are much the same in all ages. We may derive knowledge, through the channels of history, from the fountains of remote time. By observing the behaviour of others, we gain experience for our own conduct, and are taught what things to pursue after, and what to avoid. It is likewise not uncommon, when the thunder begins to rumble at a near distance, when the political atmosphere is black and gloomy, when, amidst the scenes of war, misery, and distress, serious prospects open to view, to be lost in the contemplation of present difficulties, and to forget the origin, progress, and those links in the chain which have led to such threatening calamities. This knowledge is, however, necessary, as it furnishes materials of immediate utility. I must, therefore, my dear countrymen, beg your full recollection of the historical sketch in my last, and your equal attention to the contents of the present; that by comparing the intrigues, oppressions, practices, and the secret progress of slavery in our own State, which had brought it to totter on the verge of destruction, with those which have proved fatal to the freedom of others, you may be led to adore the goodness of that guardian angel who, as we were insensibly gliding into the most abject state, of humiliation, has, we trust, kindly snatched us from, the jaws of ruin, Being no courtier, I shall produce you the materials for the comparison with freedom, uninfluenced, by private pique or party spirit; as a descendant of one who, in search of liberty, found it in a desert, as a member of a community struggling for its rights, I shall do it with seriousness and becoming sensibility.

I shall take the Massachusetts Province, only, as an instance; not only because the stabs she received were the stabs of America, but because similar oppressions, management, and arts of subjugation, were pursued in all the other Colonies.

Taking, then, a part for the whole, I assert, and will prove it, that America has been trembling under the rod of tyranny for several years; that her neck has been galled by the yoke, and her spirits, for a time, almost subdued; that the shackles have been forged and put upon her hands; and, judging of what was to come from what we felt, had they been riveted, we should have been the servants of servants, the most despicable of God’s creation. I assert, that we have enjoyed little more than the formalities, without the real advantages of liberty; that, under the habits of regularity, real anarchy, confusion, and concealed tyranny, had made an amazing progress. This is the illshaped monster into which our Government has gradually been forming. The cockatrice, though hatched in an earlier period, could not stretch itself until nurtured by the fostering hand of its recent nurses. They brooded over it, gave it genial warmth, and made it a brat in their own likeness. I assert, further, as matter of opinion, that the destruction of the tea, and the assumption of government into the hands of the people, was the happy dawn of a bright and glorious day; that at this instant, notwithstanding fire and fagot are spreading desolation far and wide, the western world is now in blossom; that the flames that have consumed the dwellings of our countrymen will serve only to whet up the edge of our courage, to add a brilliancy to our sufferings, light up the lamps of fame; and that the trump of renown, in the mouths of revering posterity, will hail us the bulwarks of general liberty and the friends of mankind. Be this as it may, one thing is certain that a state of war, that the consequences of independency, that no state can be more depressing to the spirits of Englishmen, than the state we have been in for years that are past.

Two instances may show how a dread of power had blunted the ardour of an Englishman’s resolution. When the tool of a Ministerial despot, from the wantonness of revenge, had drove the Assembly from their State-House in Boston, how did they resent the gross affront? They came to what they called a constitutional stand maintained their ground for a while, and then (I had almost said shamefully) gave it up. Britons, upon discovering an arbitrary, vindictive display of prerogatives, would have returned to their legal and usual seat of residence, and proceeded to business.

The conduct of the people upon the surrender of the Castle, that important fortress erected by the Province, its defence and security, must be imputed either to an affectionate scrupulosity of displeasing the Parent State, or to such sentiments of the heart as I blush to name. In honour to my countrymen, I hope it was the former. But no one effectual step was taken to recover it from the hands of Ministerial butchers. It is true, the Assembly addressed the Justice of the King, by a dry remonstrance. It might have been but the spirit of Englishmen, had we addressed the hearts of our enemies by more forcible weapons, and bound the traitorous betrayer of his Country’s rights in fetters of iron, and packed him off to his royal master. This perfidious wretch has since dared to exult in the success of his treachery. It is too much for mortals to recollects Horum meminisse non possum sine indignatione quadarn. But not to dwell upon particulars:

Let any one recollect the uninterrupted series of oppressions, cruelty, and barbarity, under which we have laboured, from the Grenvillian to the late pitiful exertions of the present Minister, and he must confess that no sorrows for their origin, nature, and circumstances, have been like our sorrows. He must confess what I have advanced, that we have suffered all the horrours of slavery, under the formalities of a free Government. I say, let him recollect, for its description would baffle the force of genius, and exceed the boldest, flights of fancy. On this subject language is barren, and imagination wing-broken.

While the wounds we had received from the Stamp Act were still bleeding, the Revenue Laws fretted the sore, and caused it to gape anew. These acts were the designed criterions of British authority. Had we been deceived,

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