"The Diet had strenuously endeavored to have added to that treaty
some conditions to which they supposed the lamentable state of the
country would have extorted an acquiescence, even from the heart of a
conqueror's power. But the Diet were deceived: they found such power
was unaccompanied by humanity; they found that the foe, having thrown
his victim to the ground, would not refrain from exulting in the
barbarous triumph of trampling upon her neck.
"The Diet rely on the justice of Poland--rely on her belief that they
would not betray the citadel she confided to their keeping. Her
preservation is dearer to them than their lives; but fate seems to be
on the side of their destroyer. Fresh insults have been heaped upon
their heads and new hardships have been imposed upon them. To prevent
all deliberations on this debasing treaty, they are not only
surrounded by foreign troops, and dared with hostile messages, but
they have been violated by the arrest of their prime members, whilst
those who are still suffered to possess a personal freedom have the
most galling shackles laid upon their minds.
"Therefore, I, the King of Poland, enervated by age, and sinking
under the accumulated weight of my kingdom's afflictions, and also
we, the members of the Diet, declare that, being unable, even by the
sacrifice of our lives, to relieve our country from the yoke of its
oppressors, we consign it to our children and the justice of Heaven.
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