It is unnatural and impolitic to admit men who would root up our
independence to have any share in our legislation, either as
electors or representatives; because the support of our independence
rests, in a great measure, on the vigor and purity of our public
bodies. Would Britain, even in time of peace, much less in war, suffer
an election to be carried by men who professed themselves to be not
her subjects, or allow such to sit in Parliament? Certainly not.
But there are a certain species of Tories with whom conscience or
principle has nothing to do, and who are so from avarice only. Some of
the first fortunes on the continent, on the part of the Whigs, are
staked on the issue of our present measures. And shall disaffection
only be rewarded with security? Can any thing be a greater
inducement to a miserly man, than the hope of making his Mammon
safe? And though the scheme be fraught with every character of
folly, yet, so long as he supposes, that by doing nothing materially
criminal against America on one part, and by expressing his private
disapprobation against independence, as palliative with the enemy,
on the other part, he stands in a safe line between both; while, I
say, this ground be suffered to remain, craft, and the spirit of
avarice, will point it out, and men will not be wanting to fill up
this most contemptible of all characters.
These men, ashamed to own the sordid cause from whence their
disaffection springs, add thereby meanness to meanness, by endeavoring
to shelter themselves under the mask of hypocrisy; that is, they had
rather be thought to be Tories from some kind of principle, than
Tories by having no principle at all.
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