CHAPTER XXVI 



THE CONCILIATION PROPOSALS, 1774, 1775 



Wo eine absolute Gerechtigkeit, was so selten moglich 1st, noch 

 nicht Statt finden kann, wenigstens eine friedliche Ausgleichung, nach 

 dem Princip der Billigkeit und dem christlichen Gesetz der Liebe, 

 allem andern voranstellt. SCHLEGEL. 



I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound 

 to succeed, but I am bound to live up to the light I have. ABRAHAM 

 LINCOLN. 



Of all sad words of tongue or pen, 



The saddest are these : "It might have been." 



WHITTIER. 



What is our failure here but a triumph's evidence 

 For the fulness of the days ? 



R. BROWNING. 



IN the autumn of 1774 events were moving on rapidly 

 to a rupture between the American colonies and the home 

 government. In the minds of the colonists loyalty still 

 struggled with the sense of outraged liberties, but rebellion 

 was in the air. Boston was the centre of the trouble, 

 since it was principally affected by the four penal acts 

 which had been passed in the spring, but the other 

 colonial Assemblies were also fermenting with clamours 

 for resistance and for the boycott of British manufactures, 

 and a general Congress had been summoned to meet at 

 Philadelphia in September. 



Franklin was still in London. Attacked as he had 

 been and denounced, his authority denied, and his char- 

 acter maligned, yet the philosophic temperament and 

 the bonhomie of the old statesman kept him serene, and 

 he moved, erect and unashamed, hardly even embittered, 



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