It hath been reported of t!ie late Mr. Pelham, (who, though an able Minister, was not without his faults,) that on his being attacked in the House of Commons, on the score that his measures were only of a temporary kind, replied, "they will last my time." Should a thought so fatal and unmanly possess the Colonies in the present contest, the name of ancestors will be remembered by future generations with detestation. The sun never shined on a cause of greater worth. It is not the affair of a City, a County, a Province, or a Kingdom, but of a Continent—of at least one-eighth part of the habitable globe. It is not the Concern of a day, a year, or an age; posterity are virtually involved in the contest, and will be more or less affected, even to the end of time, by the proceedings now. Now is the seed time of Continental union, faith, and honour. The least fracture now, will be like a name engraved with the weak point of a pin on the tender rind of a young oak: the wound will enlarge with the tree, and posterity read it in full-grown characters.

By referring the matter from argument to arms, a new era for politicks is struck, a new method of thinking hath arisen. All plans, proposals, &.C., prior to the 19th of April, i. e. to the commencement of hostilities, are like the almanacks of the last year, which, though proper then, are superseded and useless now. Whatever was advanced by the advocates on either side of the question (hen, terminated in one and the same point, viz: an union with Great Britain. The only difference between the parlies was the method of effecting it; the one proposing force, the other friendship. But, it hath so far happened that the first hath failed, and the second hath withdrawn her influence.

As much hath been said of the advantages of reconciliation, which, like an agreeable dream, hath passed away and left us as we were, it is but right that we should examine the contrary side of the argument, and inquire into some of the many material injuries which these Colonies sustain, and always will sustain, by being connected with, and dependant on Great Britain; to examine that connection and dependance on the principles of nature and common sense, to see what we have lo trust to if separated, and what we are to expect if dependant.

I have heard it asserted by some, that, as America hath flourished under her former connection with Great Britain, that the same connection is necessary towards her future happiness, and will always have the same effect. Nothing can be more fallacious than this kind of argument; we may as well assert that because a child hath thrived upon milk, that it is never to have meat, or, that the first twenty years of our lives is to become a precedent for the next twenty. But even this is admitting more than is true, for I answer, roundly, that America would have flourished as much, and probably much more, had no European Power taken any notice of her. The commerce by which she hath enriched herself are the necessaries of life, and will always have a market while eatjng is the custom of Europe. But, she has protected us, says some. That she hath engrossed us is true, and defended the Continent at our expense as well as her own, is admitted; and she would have defended Turkey from he same motive, viz: the sake of trade and dominion.

Alas! we have been long led away by ancient prejudices, and made large sacrifices to superstition. We have boasted the protection of Great Britain, without considering that her motive was interest, not attachment; that she did not protect us from our enemies on our account, but from her enemies on her own account; from those who had no quarrel with us on any other account, and who will always be our enemies on the same account. Let Britain waive her pretensions to the Continent, or the Continent throw off the depgndance, and we should be at peace with France and Spain were they at war with Britain. The miseries of Hanover, last war, ought to warn us against connections.

It hath lately been asserted in Parliament, that the Colonies have no relation to each other but through the parent country; i. e. that Pennsylvania and the Jerseys, and so on for the rest, are sister Colonies by the way of England. This is certainly a very roundabout way of proving relationship, but it is the nearest and only true way of proving enemyship, if I may so call it. France and Spain never were, nor, perhaps, ever will be our enemies as Americans, but, as our being the subjects of Great Britain.

But Britain is the parent country, says some. Then the more shame upon her conduct. Even brutes do not devour their young, nor Savages make war upon their families; wherefore, the assertion, if true, turns to her reproach; but it happens not to be true, or only partly so, and the phrase, parent or mother country, hath been jesuit-ically adopted by the King and his parasites, with a low, papistical design of gaining an unfair bias on the credulous weakness of our minds. Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This New World hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still.

In this extensive quarter of the globe, we forget the narrow limits of three hundred and sixty miles, (the extent of England,) and carry our friendship on a larger scale; we claim brotherhood with every European Christian, and triumph in the generosity of the sentiment.

It is pleasant to observe by what regular gradations we surmount the force of local prejudice, as we enlarge our acquaintance with the world. A man born in any town in England divided into parishes, will naturally associate most with his fellow-parishioner, (because their interests in many cases will be common,) and distinguish him by the name of neighbour; if he meet him but a few miles from home, he drops the narrow idea of a street, and salutes him by the name of townsman: if he travel out of the County, and meet him in any other, he forgets the minor divisions of street and town, and calls him countryman, i. e. county-man; but if, in their foreign excursions, they should associate in France, or any other part of Europe, their local remembrance would be enlarged into that of Englishmen. And, by a just parity of reasoning, all Europeans meeting in America, or any other quarter of the globe, are countrymen; for England, Holland, Germany, or Sweden, when compared with the whole, stand in the same places, on the larger scale, which the divisions of street, town, and County do on the smaller ones; distinctions too limited for Continental minds. Not one-third of the inhabitants even, of this Province, are of English descent; wherefore, I reprobate the phrase of parent or mother country, applied to England only, as being false, selfish, narrow, and ungenerous.

But, admitting that we were all of English descent, what does it amount to? Nothing. Britain being now an open enemy, extinguishes every other name and title; and to say that reconciliation is our duty, is truly farcical. The first King of England, of the present line, (William the Conqueror,) was a Frenchman, and half the Peers of England are descendants from the same country; therefore, by the same method of reasoning, England ought to be governed by France.

Much hath been said of the united strength of Britain and the Colonies; that, in conjunction, they might bid defiance to the world. But this is mere presumption; the fate of war is uncertain; neither do the expressions mean any thing, for this Continent would never suffer itself to be drained of inhabitants, to support the British arms in either Asia, Africa, or Europe.

Besides, what have we to do with setting the world at defiance. Our plan is commerce; and that, well attended to, will secure us the peace and friendship of all Europe, because it is the interest of all Europe to have America a free port. Her trade will always be a protection, and hen barrenness of gold and silver will secure her from invader.

I challenge the warmest advocate for reconciliation to show a single advantage that this Continent can reap, by being connected with Great Britain. I repeat the challenge, not a single advantage is derived. Our corn will fetch its price in any market in Europe, and our imported goods must be paid for, buy them where we will.

But the injuries and disadvantages we sustain by that connection are without number, and our duty to mankind at large, as well as to ourselves, instruct us to renounce the alliance; because any submission to, or dependance on Great Britain, tends directly to involve this Continent in