I find it impossible in the small compass I am limited to, to
trace out the progress which independence has made on the minds of the
different classes of men, and the several reasons by which they were
moved. With some, it was a passionate abhorrence against the king of
England and his ministry, as a set of savages and brutes; and these
men, governed by the agony of a wounded mind, were for trusting
every thing to hope and heaven, and bidding defiance at once. With
others, it was a growing conviction that the scheme of the British
court was to create, ferment and drive on a quarrel, for the sake of
confiscated plunder: and men of this class ripened into independence
in proportion as the evidence increased. While a third class conceived
it was the true interest of America, internally and externally, to
be her own master, and gave their support to independence, step by
step, as they saw her abilities to maintain it enlarge. With many,
it was a compound of all these reasons; while those who were too
callous to be reached by either, remained, and still remain Tories.
The legal necessity of being independent, with several collateral
reasons, is pointed out in an elegant masterly manner, in a charge
to the grand jury for the district of Charleston, by the Hon.
William Henry Drayton, chief justice of South Carolina, [April 23,
1776]. This performance, and the address of the convention of New
York, are pieces, in my humble opinion, of the first rank in America.
The principal causes why independence has not been so universally
supported as it ought, are fear and indolence, and the causes why it
has been opposed, are, avarice, down-right villany, and lust of
personal power.
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