That time is past and she in her turn is
petitioning our acceptance. We now stand on higher ground, and offer
her peace; and the time will come when she, perhaps in vain, will
ask it from us. The latter case is as probable as the former ever was.
She cannot refuse to acknowledge our independence with greater
obstinacy than she before refused to repeal her laws; and if America
alone could bring her to the one, united with France she will reduce
her to the other. There is something in obstinacy which differs from
every other passion; whenever it fails it never recovers, but either
breaks like iron, or crumbles sulkily away like a fractured arch. Most
other passions have their periods of fatigue and rest; their suffering
and their cure; but obstinacy has no resource, and the first wound
is mortal. You have already begun to give it up, and you will, from
the natural construction of the vice, find yourselves both obliged and
inclined to do so.
If you look back you see nothing but loss and disgrace. If you
look forward the same scene continues, and the close is an
impenetrable gloom. You may plan and execute little mischiefs, but are
they worth the expense they cost you, or will such partial evils
have any effect on the general cause? Your expedition to Egg Harbor,
will be felt at a distance like an attack upon a hen-roost, and expose
you in Europe, with a sort of childish frenzy. Is it worth while to
keep an army to protect you in writing proclamations, or to get once a
year into winter quarters? Possessing yourselves of towns is not
conquest, but convenience, and in which you will one day or other be
trepanned.
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