But, though both the Duke of Grafton and Lord North were and are, in my opinion, rather inclined to satisfy us, yet the Bedford party are so violent against us, and so prevalent in the council, that more moderate measures could not take place. This party never speak of us but with evident malice; "rebels" and "traitors" are the best names they can afford us, and I believe they only wish for a colorable pretence and occasion of ordering the soldiers to make a massacre among us.

On the other hand, the Rockingham and Shelburne people, with Lord Chatham's friends, are disposed to favor us, if they were again in power, which at present they are not like to be; though they, too, would be for keeping up the claim of Parliamentary sovereignty, but without exercising it in any mode of taxation. Besides these, we have for sincere friends and well-wishers the body of Dissenters generally throughout England, with many others, not to mention Ireland and all the rest of Europe, who, from various motives, join in applauding the spirit of liberty, with which we have claimed and insisted on our privileges, and wish us success, but whose suffrage cannot have much weight in our affairs.

The merchants here were at length prevailed on to present a petition, but they moved slowly, and some of them, I thought, reluctantly; perhaps from a despair of success, the city not being much in favor with the court at present. The manufacturing towns absolutely refused to move at all; some pretending to be offended with our attempting to manufacture for ourselves; others saying, that they had employment enough, and that our trade was of little importance to them, whether we continued or refused it. Those, who began a little to feel the effects of our forbear

ing to purchase, were persuaded to be quiet by the ministerial people, who gave out, that certain advices were received of our beginning to break our agreements; of our attempts to manufacture proving all abortive and ruining the undertakers; of our distress for want of goods, and dissensions among ourselves, which promised the total defeat of all such kind of combinations, and the prevention of them for the future, if the government were not urged imprudently to repeal the duties. But now that it appears from late and authentic accounts, that agreements continue in full force, that a ship is actually returned from Boston to Bristol with nails and glass (articles that were thought of the utmost necessity), and that the ships, which were waiting here for the determination of Parliament, are actually returning to North America in their ballast, the tone of the manufacturers begins to change, and there is no doubt, that, if we are steady, and persevere in our resolutions, these people will soon begin a clamor, that much pains has hitherto been used to stifle.

In short, it appears to me, that if we do not now persist in this measure till it has had its full effect, it can never again be used on any future occasion with the least prospect of success, and that, if we do persist another year, we shall never afterwards have occasion to use it.

To Miss Mary Stevenson, dated Tuesday, 31 May, 1770.

I received your letter early this morning; and, as I am so engaged, that I cannot see you when you come to-day, I write this line just to say, that I am sure you are a much better judge in this affair of your own, than I can possibly be.*

Alluding to a proposal from Dr. Hewson. See ante, p. 41.-ED.

In that confidence it was, that I forbore giving my advice when you mentioned it to me, and not from any disapprobation. My concern (equal to any father's) for your happiness makes me write this, lest, having more regard for my opinion than you ought, and imagining it against the proposal because I did not immediately advise accepting it, you should let that weigh any thing in your deliberations.

I assure you, that no objection has occurred to me. His person you see; his temper and understanding you can judge of; his character, for any thing I have ever heard, is unblemished; his profession, with the skill in it he is supposed to have, will be sufficient to support a family; and, therefore, considering the fortune you have in your hands (though any future expectation from your parent should be disappointed), I do not see but that the agreement may be

a rational one on both sides.

I see your delicacy, and your humility too; for you fancy that if you do not prove a great fortune, you will not be loved; but I am sure, were I in his situation in every respect, knowing you so well as I do, and esteeming you so highly, I should think you a fortune sufficient for me without a shilling.

Having thus, more explicitly than before, given my opinion, I leave the rest to your sound judgment, of which no one has a greater share; and I shall not be too inquisitive after your particular reasons, your doubts, your fears, and the like. For I shall be confident, whether you accept or refuse, that you do right. I only wish you may do what will most contribute to your happiness, and of course to mine. P. S. Do not be angry with me for supposing your determination not quite so fixed as you fancy it.

Το

Samuel Cooper, dated

London, 8 June, 1770.

With this I send you two speeches in Parliament on our affairs by a member that you know. The repeal of the whole late act would undoubtedly have been a prudent measure, and I have reason to believe that Lord North was for it, but some of the other ministers could not be brought to agree to it; so the duty on tea, with that obnoxious preamble, remains to continue the dispute. But I think the next session will hardly pass over without repealing them; for the Parliament must finally comply with the sense of the nation.

As to the standing army kept up among us in time of peace, without the consent of our Assemblies, I am clearly of opinion that it is not agreeable to the constitution. Should the King, by the aid of his Parliaments in Ireland. and the colonies, raise an army, and bring it into England, quartering it here in time of peace without the consent of the Parliament of Great Britain, I am persuaded he would soon be told, that he had no right so to do, and the nation would ring with clamors against it. I own, that I see no difference in the cases; and, while we continue so many distinct and separate states, our having the same head, or sovereign, the King, will not justify such an invasion of the separate right of each state to be consulted on the establishment of whatever force is proposed to be kept up within its limits, and to give or refuse its consent, as shall appear most for the public good of that state.

That the colonies originally were constituted distinct states, and intended to be continued such, is clear to me from a thorough consideration of their original charters, and the whole conduct of the crown and nation towards them until the restoration. Since that period, the Parliament here has usurped an authority of making laws for them,

which before it had not. We have for some time submitted to that usurpation, partly through ignorance and inattention, and partly from our weakness and inability to contend. hope, when our rights are better understood here, we shall, by prudent and proper conduct, be able to obtain from the equity of this nation a restoration of them. And, in the mean time, I could wish, that such expressions as the Supreme authority of Parliament, the subordinacy of our Assemblies to the Parliament, and the like, which in reality mean nothing, if our Assemblies, with the King, have a true legislative authority; I say, I could wish that such expressions were no more seen in our public pieces. They are too strong for compliment, and tend to confirm a claim of subjects in one part of the King's dominions to be sovereigns over their fellow subjects in another part of his dominions, when in truth they have no such right, and their claim is founded only in usurpation, the several states having equal rights and liberties, and being only connected, as England and Scotland were before the union, by having one common sovereign, the King.

This kind of doctrine the Lords and Commons here would deem little less than treason against what they think their share of the sovereignty over the colonies. To me those bodies seem to have been long encroaching on the rights of their and our sovereign, assuming too much of his authority, and betraying his interests. By our constitutions. he is, with his plantation Parliaments, the sole legislator of his American subjects, and in that capacity is, and ought to be, free to exercise his own judgment, unrestrained and unlimited by his Parliament here. And our Parliaments have a right to grant him aids without the consent of this Parliament, a circumstance, which, by the way, begins to give it