Extract of a Letter from Kent County on Delaware

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With regard to political matters the people here begin to change their sentiments, concluding, in their more deliberate moments, that such violent measures as have been pursued will not heal, but, on the contrary, widen the breach; many who have kept their sentiments to themselves, begin to whisper their dislike of the proceedings gone into. I believe the Friendly Address, and other performances of the moderate stamp, have done much good

v1:1231

The people have not, till lately, considered the consequences of a civil war with so brave and powerful a Nation as that of Great Britain; the heat and rage of party had not given them leisure to reflect on the devastation and havock it would occasion; and if our rashness should yet bring one on, quere, if such reflections as these would not arise with many? I have seen this land blessed with peace and plenty, under the happiest form of Government in the world; every branch of business flourishing; men secured in their liberty and property; a trade open to foreign parts of the world, which occasioned a ready sale for our produce. I have been in possession of a wife and many children, some of whom are numbered among the slain, and others far separated; I have lived in a happy, harmonious neighbourhood, where the violence of party and the appelations of Whig and Tory were unknown. Who could think that a three-Penny duty on Tea could have occasioned all these difficulties, when only a refusal to purchase the article would have kept us free.