We Remain Thus
Sometimes For Whole Hours, Our Hearts And Our Minds Racked By The
Most Anxious Suspense:
What a dreadful situation, a thousand times
worse than that of a soldier engaged in the midst of the most severe
conflict!
Sometimes feeling the spontaneous courage of a man, I seem
to wish for the decisive minute; the next instant a message from my
wife, sent by one of the children, puzzling me beside with their
little questions, unmans me: away goes my courage, and I descend
again into the deepest despondency. At last finding that it was a
false alarm, we return once more to our beds; but what good can the
kind sleep of nature do to us when interrupted by such scenes!
Securely placed as you are, you can have no idea of our agitations,
but by hear-say; no relation can be equal to what we suffer and to
what we feel. Every morning my youngest children are sure to have
frightful dreams to relate: in vain I exert my authority to keep
them silent, it is not in my power; and these images of their
disturbed imagination, instead of being frivolously looked upon as
in the days of our happiness, are on the contrary considered as
warnings and sure prognostics of our future fate. I am not a
superstitious man, but since our misfortunes, I am grown more timid,
and less disposed to treat the doctrine of omens with contempt.
Though these evils have been gradual, yet they do not become
habitual like other incidental evils. The nearer I view the end of
this catastrophe, the more I shudder. But why should I trouble you
with such unconnected accounts; men secure and out of danger are
soon fatigued with mournful details: can you enter with me into
fellowship with all these afflictive sensations; have you a tear
ready to shed over the approaching ruin of a once opulent and
substantial family? Read this I pray with the eyes of sympathy; with
a tender sorrow, pity the lot of those whom you once called your
friends; who were once surrounded with plenty, ease, and perfect
security; but who now expect every night to be their last, and who
are as wretched as criminals under an impending sentence of the law.
As a member of a large society which extends to many parts of the
world, my connection with it is too distant to be as strong as that
which binds me to the inferior division in the midst of which I
live. I am told that the great nation, of which we are a part, is
just, wise, and free, beyond any other on earth, within its own
insular boundaries; but not always so to its distant conquests: I
shall not repeat all I have heard, because I cannot believe half of
it. As a citizen of a smaller society, I find that any kind of
opposition to its now prevailing sentiments, immediately begets
hatred: how easily do men pass from loving, to hating and cursing
one another! I am a lover of peace, what must I do? I am divided
between the respect I feel for the ancient connection, and the fear
of innovations, with the consequence of which I am not well
acquainted; as they are embraced by my own countrymen. I am
conscious that I was happy before this unfortunate Revolution. I
feel that I am no longer so; therefore I regret the change. This is
the only mode of reasoning adapted to persons in my situation. If I
attach myself to the Mother Country, which is 3000 miles from me, I
become what is called an enemy to my own region; if I follow the
rest of my countrymen, I become opposed to our ancient masters: both
extremes appear equally dangerous to a person of so little weight
and consequence as I am, whose energy and example are of no avail.
As to the argument on which the dispute is founded, I know little
about it. Much has been said and written on both sides, but who has
a judgment capacious and clear enough to decide? The great moving
principles which actuate both parties are much hid from vulgar eyes,
like mine; nothing but the plausible and the probable are offered to
our contemplation.
The innocent class are always the victim of the few; they are in all
countries and at all times the inferior agents, on which the popular
phantom is erected; they clamour, and must toil, and bleed, and are
always sure of meeting with oppression and rebuke. It is for the
sake of the great leaders on both sides, that so much blood must be
spilt; that of the people is counted as nothing. Great events are
not achieved for us, though it is by us that they are principally
accomplished; by the arms, the sweat, the lives of the people. Books
tell me so much that they inform me of nothing. Sophistry, the bane
of freemen, launches forth in all her deceiving attire! After all,
most men reason from passions; and shall such an ignorant individual
as I am decide, and say this side is right, that side is wrong?
Sentiment and feeling are the only guides I know. Alas, how should I
unravel an argument, in which reason herself hath given way to
brutality and bloodshed! What then must I do? I ask the wisest
lawyers, the ablest casuists, the warmest patriots; for I mean
honestly. Great Source of wisdom! inspire me with light sufficient
to guide my benighted steps out of this intricate maze! Shall I
discard all my ancient principles, shall I renounce that name, that
nation which I held once so respectable? I feel the powerful
attraction; the sentiments they inspired grew with my earliest
knowledge, and were grafted upon the first rudiments of my
education. On the other hand, shall I arm myself against that
country where I first drew breath, against the play-mates of my
youth, my bosom friends, my acquaintance?
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