saw the fatal consequences of attempting to coerce the colonies where the determination to resist was so genceral and determined, warned the ministers that, "In such a cause, your success would be deplorable, and victory hazardous. America, if she fell, would fall like a strong man. She would embrace the pillars of the State, and pull down the constitution along with her. Is this your boasted peace ?-not to sheath the sword in its scab. bard, but to sheath it in the bowels of your countrymen? The Americans have not acted in all things with prudence and good temper. But they have been wrong ed. They have been driven to madness by injustice. Will you punish them for the madness you have occasioned? Rather let prudence and benignity first come from the strongest side."

But the men of the genius and wisdom of Burke and Pitt struggled in vain against the madness of the British Government.

When a nation once becomes mad with the pride of power, and with a thirst for revenge upon those who affect to despise it, it is seldom that prudence and reason return in time to save it from the fatal consequences of its own folly.

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The colonies were thus, against their own wills, against their own faithful love of the home gov. ernment," forced into resistance and revolution by the follies and crimes of the government itself.

While these things were progressing in the colonies. an event happened in London which disclosed the fact that the British ministers were deceived as to the character of the discontent in this country. In 1773 Doctor Franklin, who was at that time agent for several colonies at London, had found means to obtain from the office of State several letters of Governor Hutchinson and Lieutenant Governor Oliver, of Massachusetts,

which purported to acquaint the ministers with all that passed in the colonies, and in which they delivered their opinions with great freedom.

They represented that all the parties arrayed against the British Government in this country, were persons of. little weight,-audacious, turbulent, and but few in number-that they were even without influence with the multitude that the mildness and forbearance of the government had been the sole cause of all their boldness-and that, if it should take vigorous measures, all would return to their duty.

Franklin transmitted these letters to Massachusetts -they were printed and distributed copiously everywhere, and you can well imagine that the scenes which followed were little favorable to the longer peaceful abode of Hutchinson and Oliver in the Colony.

The following year, 1774, the British Parliament passed the famous Boston Port Bill, designed as a special act of revenge upon the Massachusetts Colony for its active hostilities against the laws and officers of the Crown.

The Virginia Colony promptly resented this act of tyranny, as though it had been designed against itself; and its legislature passed a resolution, recommending that a congress should meet annually to consult upon the interests of the colonies; and agreeably to this recommendation such a congress was called at Philadelphia in September of that year (1774).

This was a year of great events: events which began a new history for the world: this was the year of the celebrated tea-party in Boston harbor.

Parliament had put a small duty of three pence a pound on tea, and our fathers resolved that they would therefore use no more tea.

And to make sure work that no more of this taxed

tea should be used, when a large cargo of it was coming up Boston harbor, the populace boarded the ship, and threw every chest overboard, thereby converting the Atlantic ocean into a tea-pot for the use of the British ministry, if it had a mind to partake.

In New-York and Philadelphia, as no person could be found who would venture to receive the tea on consignment, all the ships, laden with the article, were returned to England.

This was the last blow. War upon the colonies was instantly resolved upon by the British ministry.

That is, the colonists were to be forced into obedience at the point of the bayonet.

The port of Boston was declared closed, by the ministry. The tramp of the soldiers of the Government was heard in its streets.

Every other colony regarded these things as a menace to themselves. The cause of one was the cause of There was a union of danger, which could be averted only by a union of resistance.

all.

From this time we may date the American Union.
It was not established, you perceive, for the purpose

of a unity, or similarity, of civil institutions.

The Union really had nothing to do with the local laws and institutions of the colonies.

We shall find that each colony was as independent, and as much the master of its own domestic affairs, after as it was before the Union was formed.

Indeed, it is certain that there was no intention on the part of any of the colonies to form a union for any other purpose than that of a general united defense against a powerful enemy.

Each colony elected its delegation to the Congress of 1774 in its own way. There was no regularity, no concert of action in the manner of their election.

It was simply, so far as each other was concerned, thirteen distinct independent sovereignities doing bu siness in their own way, and joining in a general congress for mutual protection.

I know of nothing in history more remarkable than the meeting of those fifty-two colonial deputies in a room in Carpenter's Hall, Philadelphia.

"They locked the doors, enjoining by word of honor secrecy on the members; and all the while the people, from New-Hampshire to Georgia, waiting quietlywillingly, resolutely prepared to do, not the bidding of that congress, but to accept its conclusions as the voice of thirteen nations !"

There was Union!

Thirteen independent colonies lifting their hands to Almighty God with one prayer for strength to combat a common foe! That was union!

Thirteen colonies grasping the sword as with one hand! That was union!

Thirteen colonies, by their deputies, locked up in one room, resolving what to do, while all the people listened with one breath to know what they had done! That was union!

These fifty-two men, locked up in that dingy room in Carpenter's Hall, had no idea of what they were doing themselves. They had no idea they were forming a union of their colonies which would at length become the proudest nation on earth. But that was just what they were doing!

It is true, that Congress contemplated nothing more than "association" (that was the term they applied to it) in a policy of non-importation and non-exportation, and the employment of whatever defensive means might needed to secure their object.

"When the Congress adjourned, it was a contingent

adjournment, leaving it to be determined by the course of events whether the colonies would again be found acting in concert.

The plan of a confederation, proposed by Franklin the next year (1775), looked to no duration beyond the continuance of the obnoxious acts of Parliament.

Even after the war began, and the continental army was in the field, perpetuity of union formed no part of the plan of operations.

It was not until the wearied patience of the people was worn out, and the sense of freedom driven to the last resort, that the coalition of the colonies began to assume the aspect of permanence.

Then, and not till then, it became apparent what had long been the tendency to a final union between these distinct communities.

Together they had sought redress for their grievances -together they had declared their rights-together they had petitioned, appealed, and remonstrated.

And when they had encountered the same repulse, and the same disappointment, they "associated" under solemn pledges for a combined resistance.

At length, when all had failed, and they saw that the hour had come for the last appeal, they bowed down together in "public humiliation, fasting, and prayer," and with hearts thus fortified, they stood up together to face the common danger.

"It was one war to all."-And that was Union.

In the meanwhile, the British ministry looked on the whole thing as a farce, which would be ended in sixty days.

One of them said: “ Can we, in fact, make a serious matter of the resistance of the Americans? Cowards by nature, incapable of any military discipline, their bodies are feeble, and their inclinations are dastardly.”