JAMES WILSON — NATION BUILDER them, part with our Liberty. The sacred Gift descended to us from our Ancestors: We cannot dispose of it: We are bound by the strongest Ties to transmit it, as we have received it, pure and inviolate to our Poster ity. We have taken up Arms in the best of Causes. We have adhered to the virtuous Principles of our Ancestors, who expressly stipulated, in their Favour, and in ours, a Right to resist every Attempt upon their Liberties. . . . Our Troops are animated with the Love of Freedom. They have fought and bled and conquered in the Dis charge of their Duty as good Citizens as well as brave Soldiers. Regardless of the In clemency of the Seasons, and of the Length and Fatigue of the March, they go, with Cheerfulness, wherever the Cause of Liberty and their Country require their Service. . . . The Experience and Discipline of our Troops will daily increase. Their patriotism will receive no Diminution : The longer those, who have forced us into this war, oblige us to continue it, the more formidable we shall become. "The Strength and Resources of America are not confined to Operations by Land. She can exert herself likewise by Sea. Her Sail ors are hardy and brave : She has all the materials for Ship-building: Her artificers can work them into Form. . . . "Possessed of so many Advantages; fav oured with the Prospect of so many more; Threatened with the Destruction of our con stitutional Rights; cruelly and illiberally at tacked, because we will not subscribe to our own Slavery'; ought we to be animated with Vigour, or to sink into Despondency? When the Forms of our Governments are, by those entrusted with the Direction of them, per verted from their original Design; ought we to submit to this Perversion? Ought we to sacrifice the Forms, when the Sacrifice be comes necessary for preserving the Spirit of our Constitution? Or ought we to neglect and neglecting, to lose the Spirit by a super stitious Veneration for the Forms? We re gard those Forms, and wish to preserve them as long as we can consistently with higher Objects: But much more do we re gard essential Liberty, which, at all Events, we are determined not to lose, but with our Lives. . . We deem it an Honour to ' have raised Troops, and collected a naval Force '; and, cloathed with, the sacred Authority of the People, from whom all legitimate author ity proceeds, 'to have exercised legislative, executive, and judicial Powers.' "...
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Finally he declares : "It is in the Power of your Enemies to render Independency or Slavery your and our Alternative. Should we — will you, in such an Event, hesitate a moment about the Choice? Let those, who drive us to it, answer to their King and to their Country for the Consequences. We are desirous to continue Subjects: But we are determined to continue Freemen. We shall deem our selves bound to renounce; and, we hope, you will follow our Example in renouncing the former Character whenever it shall be come incompatible with the latter. . . . That the Colonies may continue connected, as they have been, with Britain, is our sec ond Wish: Our first is — that America may BE FREE." Such are a few excerpts from Wilson's great appeal. An amusing feature of cer tain portions of this address, and in that respect it is also a masterpiece, is Wilson's effort "to lead the public mind into the idea of Independence" and yet not to over step the instructions of the Pennsylvania Assembly, cited p. 7, supra, and for which he seems to have had an official respect, although no doubt a personal contempt, for John Adams records that on May 10, 1776, (June io)1 after referring to' the maxim that "All government originates from the people," he said: "We are the servants of the people, sent here to act under delegated authority. If we exceed it, voluntarily, we deserve neither excuse nor justification. Some have been put under restraints by their constituents; they cannot vote without transgressing this line." 2 But we are anticipating. Among other committees to which Wilson was appointed in 1776 were the following, and of some of which he was the chairman: to report con cerning vessels exporting produce of the Colonies and importing ammunition (Feb. 26); on memorial from merchants at Mon treal respecting Indian trade (March 4); on letters of marque and reprisal (March 19); 1 Jefferson has the date correctly, June 10: vide p. 1086. Vol. VI. Ford Reprint of Journals of Continental Congress.
- Ibid., p. 1075.
