Hamilton, Robert Lewis, Doctors Charles Bensel, Samuel Swift, Messieurs Joseph Mathers, Jonathan Pascall, and Isaac Hughes, be appointed to serve as a Committ.ee of Correspondence.

Resolved, That it be recommended to those few Townships which have yet neglected to choose a person to represent them in this Committee, that they would proceed to do it as soon as possible, as their members will be expected to attend when the Chairman shall think proper to call another meeting.

By order of the Committee:

ENOCH EDWARDS, Secretary,

TO THE PEOPLE OF PENNSYLVANIA.—LETTER III.

When I sat down to address you, a resolve or vote of our Committee of Inspection for calling a Convention had alarmed many good friends of the Province, on account of our Charter Constitution; and, therefore, I determined freely to examine the right of the Committee to convene such a body, the necessity of their being convened, the powers which they might assume, and the confusion such a measure must produce. But, in the evening of the same day on which my first letter was published, we were acquainted, “by order and in behalf of the Committee, that they had recalled their former vote;” and therefore, as the resolution for this recall was probably formed before my publication, I shall claim no merit in it. The publick seems willing to ascribe it to motives of prudence, suggested by the general disapprobation of the Convention scheme, the zeal shown among all ranks of people for the support of our ancient Government by Assemblies, and the little prospect that any regard would have been paid to the edicts of a body of men constituted without necessity, even if we could suppose any number of our County Committees willing to unite in assuming powers which were never delegated to them.

But those who correspond in behalf of the Committee give us other reasons than the above. They tell us that they have held a “conference with several Members of Assembly,” and have, in behalf of this Province, told them their duty; that the said members have promised all future attention to the same; but that the Committee, watchful for our good, and not willing to trust them too far, still hold the rod over them, and therefore have not annulled their vote, but have only been graciously pleased to forbear,“for the present, the forwarding the letters [or issuing the writs] for calling a Convention.”

This is rather spoken in a lordly style, if it be anything more than the assuming language of the few who correspond in the name of the Committee. But if there be those who think a back door more honourable for a retreat than the front, I would not wound their dignity, nor throw a straw in the way to retard them. It is probable that our Assembly may now be permitted to exercise their own judgment, without further attempts to intimidate them in the discharge of the important trust committed to them by the voice of their country; and therefore, as I would avoid contention at all times, and especially at this dangerous crisis, I shall likewise, for the present, forbear sending to the Press everything which I had prepared in vindication of our injured Representatives, except so far as relates to Independency. But that topic I propose, as occasion offers, to handle at some length; for I find the chief resentment levelled against them, appears to be on account of their instructions to their Delegates. These, in the eyes of some men, stand as an insurmountable barrier in the way of their destructive purposes, and I trust will continue so to stand till removed by the clear sense of an uncorrupted majority of the good people of this Province. Without full proofs of this, the Assembly can neither consent to any change of our Constitution, or to make the least transfer of our allegiance; and these proofs ought to be more pure than what can flow through the foul pages of interested writers, or strangers intermeddling in our affairs, and avowedly pressing their Republick schemes upon us, at the risk of all we hold valuable. Nor would I be willing to receive these proofs from Committees, as proposed in the Evening Post of the 9th instant, by one who signs himself “A Lover of Order,” but should be styled an Author of Confusion.

“It would be proper (says he) that the constituents of the Congress should declare their sentiments upon that head [Independence] as soon as possible. This may be done by the various Committees and Conventions on the Continent. Their votes and resolves should determine the question in the Congress. The first Congress was nothing but the echo of Committees and Conventions. In the present important question concerning Independence, the Congress should only (as in the former case) echo back the sentiments of that people;” that is, of Committees and Conventions. And thus we may be echoed and re-echoed put of our liberties, our property, our happiness, and plunged deeper and deeper into all the growing horrours of war and bloodshed, without ever being consulted. For I insist upon it. that no Committees were ever entrusted with any authority to speak the sense of the people of Pennsylvania on this question. I have already observed by how few voices our largest Committee of a hundred was chosen; and I know some Counties where the whole Committee was named by six or seven voices only. At this rate, three or four hundred people would take upon them to declare the sense of as many hundred thousands, in a matter of the greatest importance that ever came before us. Can you, my countrymen, acquiesce in such a horrible doctrine? Or does not the bare mention of it still further convince you that your liberties can nowhere be so safe as in the hands of your Representatives in Assembly? “Those who are not inebriated with Independency will certainly allow, that the instructions to their Delegates were dictated by the true spirit of peace, justice, and exalted policy. Who so proper to instruct them as those chosen by yourselves, not in the hour of passion, riot, and confusion, but in the day of peace and tranquil reflection?” These words I borrow from a pamphlet just published, under the title of Plain Truth; which I would recommend to your perusal, as containing many judicious remarks upon the mischievous tenets and palpable absurdities held forth in the pamphlet so falsely called Common Sense.

I have, in my second letter, freely declared my political creed, viz: “That the true interest of America lies in reconciliation with Great Britain upon constitutional principles, and that I wish it upon none else." I now proceed to give my reasons for this declaration. It is fit, in so great a question, that you should weigh both sides well, and exercise that good sense for which the inhabitants of these Colonies have been hitherto distinguished; and then I shall be under no apprehensions concerning the pernicious, though specious plans, which are every day published in our newspapers and pamphlets. The people generally judge right, when the whole truth is plainly laid before them; but through inattention in some, and fondness for novelty in others, when but one side of a proposition is agitated and persevered in, they may gradually deceive themselves, and adopt what cooler reflection and future dear-bought experience may prove to be ruinous.

Agriculture and commerce have hitherto been the happy employments, by which these Middle Colonies have risen into wealth and importance. By them the face of the country has been changed from a barren wilderness into the hospitable abodes of peace and plenty. Without them, we had either never existed as Americans, or existed only as Savages. The oaks would still have possessed their native spots of earth, and never have appeared in the form of ships and houses. What are now well cultivated fields, or flourishing cities, would have remained only the solitary haunts of wild beasts, or of men equally wild.

That much of our former felicity was owing to the protection of England is not to be denied; and that we might still derive great advantages from her protection and friendship, if not valued at too high a price, is equally certain; nor is it worth inquiring whether that protection was afforded us more for her own sake than ours. That the. former was the case, more especially since the Colonies grew into consequence, I have not the least doubt; but that this is a reason for our rejecting any future connection with her I must utterly deny. Although I consider her as having, in her late conduct towards us, acted the part of a cruel step-dame, and not of a fostering parent; I would not therefore quarrel with the benefits I may reap from a connection with her, and can expect to reap nowhere else. If, by her fleets and armies, every nation on the globe is deterred from invading our properties, either on the high-seas, in