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040 - Chapter 31 · The American Revolution A Historical Overview Vol. 3

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  Speaker 1: Section forty of History of the Rise, Progress and Termination
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  Speaker 1: of the American Revolution, Volume three by Mercy Otis Warren.
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  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. The more information of the volunteer, please
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  Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. History of the Rise, Progress and
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  Speaker 1: Termination of the American Revolution, Volume three by Mercy Otis Warren,
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  Speaker 1: Chapter thirty one, Part one Supplementary observations on succeeding events
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  Speaker 1: after the termination of the American Revolution, Insurrection in the Massachusetts,
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  Speaker 1: a General Convention of the States, a new constitution adopted,
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  Speaker 1: General Washington chosen President, British Treaty negotiated by mister j
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  Speaker 1: General Washington's second retreat from public life. General observations, the
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  Speaker 1: narration of the relation motionary war between Great Britain and
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  Speaker 1: of former colonies brought down to its termination, least the
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  Speaker 1: mind at leisure for more general observations on the subsequent consequences,
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  Speaker 1: without confining it to time or place. At the conclusion
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  Speaker 1: of the war between Great Britain and America, after the
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  Speaker 1: rejection of the claims of a potent foreign nation, the
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  Speaker 1: dissevering of all the bands of governmental arrangement, and before
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  Speaker 1: nuance were adopted. The proud feelings of personal independence warned
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  Speaker 1: every bosom, and general ideas of civil and religious liberty
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  Speaker 1: were disseminated far and wide. On the restoration of peace,
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  Speaker 1: the soldier had returned to the bosom of his family,
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  Speaker 1: and the artisan and the husbandmen were stimulated to new improvements.
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  Speaker 1: Genius was prompted to exertion by the whitefield opened by
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  Speaker 1: the revolution, and encouraged by the spirit of inquiry to
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  Speaker 1: climb the heights of literature until it might stand conspicuous
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  Speaker 1: on the summit of fame. Under such circumstances, every free
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  Speaker 1: mind should be tenacious of supporting the honor of the
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  Speaker 1: national character and the dignity of independence. This claim must
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  Speaker 1: be supported by their own sobriety, economy, industry, and perseverance
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  Speaker 1: in every virtue. It must be nurtured by that firmness
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  Speaker 1: and principle that induced the ancestors to fly from the
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  Speaker 1: hostile arm of tyranny and to explore and begin a
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  Speaker 1: donation in the forlorn and darksome bosm of a distant wilderness.
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  Speaker 1: The social compacts, the religion, the manners, and the habits
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  Speaker 1: of these wandering strangers and their immediate successors taught their
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  Speaker 1: sons the noble example of fortitude and love of freedom
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  Speaker 1: that has led them to resist the encroachments of kings
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  Speaker 1: and nobles, and to dissipate the cloud that threatened to
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  Speaker 1: develop the mind in darkness, and for the veil of
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  Speaker 1: ignorance over the bright hemisphere that encircles the children of Columbia. Indeed,
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  Speaker 1: America is had this period possessed of a prize replete
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  Speaker 1: with advantages seldom thrown into the hand of any people
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  Speaker 1: divided by nature from three parts of the globe, which
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  Speaker 1: have grown under tyrants of various descriptions from time immemorial,
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  Speaker 1: or have slaughtered their millions to feed the ambition of princes.
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  Speaker 1: She was possessed of an immense territory, the soil fertile
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  Speaker 1: and productive, her population increasing, her commerce had bettered her
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  Speaker 1: resources ample. Je was now uncontrolled by foreign laws, and
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  Speaker 1: her domestic manufactures might be encouraged without any fear of
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  Speaker 1: check from abroad, and under the influence of a spirit
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  Speaker 1: of enterprise, very advantageous in a young country. She was
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  Speaker 1: looking forward with expectations of extending her commerce to every
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  Speaker 1: part of the globe. Nothing seemed to be wanted to
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  Speaker 1: the United States, but a continuance of their union and virtue.
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  Speaker 1: It was their interest to cherish true, genuine Republican virtue
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  Speaker 1: in politics and in religion, a strict adherence to a
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  Speaker 1: sublime code of morals, which has never been equal by
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  Speaker 1: the stages of ancient time, nor can ever be abolished
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  Speaker 1: by the statistical reasonings of modern philosophers. Possessed of this palladium,
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  Speaker 1: America might bid defiance both to foreign and domestic entrigue,
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  Speaker 1: and stand upon an eminence that would command the veneration
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  Speaker 1: of nations and the respect of their monarchs. But a
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  Speaker 1: defalcation from these principles may lead this saplis find of
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  Speaker 1: liberty to droop or to be wooted out by the
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  Speaker 1: hand that have been stretched out to numbership. If instead
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  Speaker 1: of the independent fieldings of ancient republics, whose prime object
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  Speaker 1: was the welfare and happiness of their country, we should
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  Speaker 1: see a dereliction of those principles, and the Americans ready
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  Speaker 1: to renounce their great advantages are the imitation of European
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  Speaker 1: systems in politics and manners. It would be a melancholy
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  Speaker 1: trade in the story of man. Yet they, like other nations, being,
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  Speaker 1: in time, by their servility to men in power, or
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  Speaker 1: by a chimerical pursuit of the golden poleece of the poets,
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  Speaker 1: become involved in the midst ascending from the pit of avarice.
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  Speaker 1: This may lead to peculation, to you, sorious contracts, to
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  Speaker 1: illegal and dishonest projects, and to every private advice to
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  Speaker 1: support the factitious appearances of grandeur and wealth, which can
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  Speaker 1: never maintain the claim to that rich inheritance which they
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  Speaker 1: so bravely defended. Thus it was but a short time
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  Speaker 1: after the restoration of peace and the exhilarating view of
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  Speaker 1: the innumerable benefits obtained by the general acknowledgment among foreign
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  Speaker 1: nations of the independence of America, before the brightened prospect
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  Speaker 1: which had recently shown with so much splendor, must be
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  Speaker 1: clouded by the face of general discontent. New difficulties arose,
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  Speaker 1: and embarrassments thickened, which called for the exercise of new energies, activity,
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  Speaker 1: and wisdom. The sudden sinking of the value of landed
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  Speaker 1: and indeed of all other real property immediately on the
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  Speaker 1: peace involved the honest and industrious farmer and innumerble difficulties.
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  Speaker 1: The produce of a few acres had been fired from
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  Speaker 1: sufficient for the support of a family and at the
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  Speaker 1: same time to supply the necessary demands of the use
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  Speaker 1: of the army. When from the scarcity of provisions every
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  Speaker 1: article thereof or an enhanced price, or their resources were
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  Speaker 1: exhausted and their spirits wasted under an accumulated load of debt.
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  Speaker 1: The General Congress was yet without any compulsory powers to
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  Speaker 1: enforce the liquidation of public demands, and the state legislatures
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  Speaker 1: totally at a loss how to devise any just and
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  Speaker 1: ready expedient of the relief of private debtors. It was
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  Speaker 1: thought necessary by some to workdayred again to a paper medium,
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  Speaker 1: and by others this was viewed with the utmost abhorrence. Indeed,
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  Speaker 1: the iniquitous consequences of a depreciating currency have been recently
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  Speaker 1: felt too severely by all classes to induce any to embrace,
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  Speaker 1: the second time with cordiality such a dangerous expedient. Thus,
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  Speaker 1: from various circumstances, the state of both public and private
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  Speaker 1: affairs presented a very serious and alarming aspect. The patriotic
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  Speaker 1: feelings of the Yeo memory of the country had prompted
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  Speaker 1: them to the utmost exertions of the public service unwilling
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  Speaker 1: to withhold that quote of attacks of beef, blankets and
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  Speaker 1: other necessaries indispensable for the soldiery exposed to cold and hunger.
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  Speaker 1: Many of them had been induced to contract debts which
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  Speaker 1: could not be easily liquidated and which was impossible to
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  Speaker 1: discharge for the products when the usual occupations of husbandry,
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  Speaker 1: while at the same time a rage for privateering and
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  Speaker 1: traffic by which some had suddenly grown rich, had induced
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  Speaker 1: others to look with indifference on the ideas of a warm,
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  Speaker 1: moderate accumulation of wealth. They sold their patrimonial inheritance for
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  Speaker 1: trifling considerations in order to raise ready species for adventure
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  Speaker 1: in some speculative project. This, with many other clauses, reduced
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  Speaker 1: the price of land to so low a rate that
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  Speaker 1: the most valuable farms and the best accommodated situations which
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  Speaker 1: appreciated to such a degree that those who were obliged
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  Speaker 1: to aly and aprial property were bankrupted by the sales.
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  Speaker 1: The state of trade and the derangement of commercial affairs
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  Speaker 1: were equally intricate in distressing, at the close of the war,
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  Speaker 1: the natural eagerness of the mercantile body to take every
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  Speaker 1: advantage that presented in that line induced many immediately on
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  Speaker 1: the piece to send forward for large quantities of goods
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  Speaker 1: from England, friends in Holland and wherever else they could
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  Speaker 1: gain a credit. Thus, the markets loaded with every article
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  Speaker 1: of luxury as well as necessaries, and the growing scarcity
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  Speaker 1: of species, united with the reduced circumstances of many who
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  Speaker 1: had formerly been wealthy. The enormous implantations either lay upon
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  Speaker 1: hand or obliged the possessor to sell without any advance,
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  Speaker 1: and in many instances much under the prime claused. In
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  Speaker 1: addition to these embarrassments on the mercantile interest, the whole
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  Speaker 1: country from north to south was filled with British factors
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  Speaker 1: that their cargoes of goods directly from the manufacturers, who
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  Speaker 1: drew customers to their stores from all classes that were
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  Speaker 1: able to purchase. Every capital was crowded with British agents
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  Speaker 1: sent over to collect debts contracted long before the war,
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  Speaker 1: who took advantage of the times, oppressed the debtor and
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  Speaker 1: purchased the public securities from all persons who's necessity bodies
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  Speaker 1: obliged them to sell at the monstrous discount of seventeen
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  Speaker 1: showings and sixpence on the pond. At the same time
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  Speaker 1: the continents wound with British emissaries, who so discord among
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  Speaker 1: the people, infused jealousies and weakened their reliance on the
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  Speaker 1: public faith, and destroyed all confidence between man and man.
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  Speaker 1: Not the religion or morals appreciate amidst the confusion of
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  Speaker 1: the long war, which is ever unfavorable to virtue and
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  Speaker 1: to all those generous principles which ennoble the human character.
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  Speaker 1: Much more than ribbon stars and other playthings of a
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  Speaker 1: distempered imagination, these soon sink to the level of their
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  Speaker 1: own insignificance, and leave the sanclem avivirus second. By the
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  Speaker 1: chance of ideal felicity, the white fields of more minute
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  Speaker 1: observation on these great and important subjects shall at present
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  Speaker 1: be waged. Agriculture may be left to the philosophic theorists,
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  Speaker 1: who may speculate on the real value and product of
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  Speaker 1: the lands and a country in such an improvable state
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  Speaker 1: as that of America, while the advance in the profits
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  Speaker 1: of the husband must be estimated by the ratio of
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  Speaker 1: future experiment. A statesman versed in the commerce and politics
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  Speaker 1: of Europe and the commercial treaties which may be or
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  Speaker 1: have already been formed, has a labyrinth to trace and
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  Speaker 1: investigations to unfold, before everything can be fixed on the
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  Speaker 1: principles of equity and rootsiprocity that will give complete satisfaction
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  Speaker 1: to all nations. Religious discussions we leave to the observation
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  Speaker 1: of the theologian, who, however human nature may be vilified
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  Speaker 1: by some and exalts by others, traces the moral causes
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  Speaker 1: and effects that operate on the soul of man. The
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  Speaker 1: effects only are levels of the common eye, which weeps
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  Speaker 1: that the result is more frequently productive of misery than
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  Speaker 1: felicity to his fellow beings. Besides the circumstances already hinted,
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  Speaker 1: various other combinations caused the cloud of chagrin to sit
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  Speaker 1: on almost every brow, and a general uneasiness to pervade
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  Speaker 1: the bosoms of most of the inhabitants of America. This
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  Speaker 1: was discoverable on every occasion. They complained that the governments
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  Speaker 1: of their own instituting and of Congress, whose powers were
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  Speaker 1: too feeble for the redress of private wrongs or the
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  Speaker 1: more publican general purposes of government. They murmured at the
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  Speaker 1: commutation which Congress had agreed to for the compensation of
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  Speaker 1: the army. They felt themselves under the pressure of burdens
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  Speaker 1: for which they had not calculated, the pressure of debts
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  Speaker 1: and taxes beyond their ability to pay. These discontents, artificially
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  Speaker 1: brought up by men who wished for a more strong
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  Speaker 1: and splendid government, broke out into commotion in many parts
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  Speaker 1: of the country, and finally terminated in open insurrection in
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  Speaker 1: some of the states. This general uneasy and refractory spirit
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  Speaker 1: had for sometimes shown itself in the states of New Hampshire, Roeland, Connecticut,
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  Speaker 1: and some other portions of the Union, but the Massachusetts
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  Speaker 1: seemed to be the seat of sedition. Bristol, Middlesex, and
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  Speaker 1: the western counties Worcestern, Hampshire and Berkshire were more particularly culpable.
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  Speaker 1: The people met in county conventions, drew up addresses to
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  Speaker 1: the General Assembly, to which were a next long lists
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  Speaker 1: of grievances, some of them real, others imaginary. They drew
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  Speaker 1: up many resolves, some of which were rational, others unjust,
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  Speaker 1: and most of them observed. In the extreme. They censured
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  Speaker 1: the conduct of the officers of government, called for a
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  Speaker 1: revision of the constitution, voted the Senate and judicial courts
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  Speaker 1: to be grievances, and proceeded in the most daring and
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  Speaker 1: insolent manner to prevent the sitting of the courts of
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  Speaker 1: justice in the sad several counties. End of Section forty