It can only be from the Virtue and UNITED efforts of England and America, that the Constitution of Great Britain, and all our invaluable Privileges can be preserved; should you remain quiet Spectators of the present inhuman Massacres, and destructive Measures, you will deserve the worst of Slavery, and the cruelest Punishment ever inflicted on a People.
If you have any Honour, if you have any Virtue, or any Bravery, you will now stand forth and resist the Tyrants, you will demand the Heads of those Men, who advised those sanguinary, fatal, and ruinous Measures; you will declare to the World, you will not consent to Arbitrary invasions of your Liberties, Arbitrary dispensings with the Laws, and Arbitrary governing by an Army; that you owe no Submission to a King, beyond the Bounds of Law; that your Lives, Liberties, and Estates, shall not be disposed of at his PLEASURE, and that you are Bound by the Laws of God and Man, to resist a Tyrant; that you will oppose all unjust Violence, and those who attempt the Life of the Constitution, as the great Enemies of their Country; this has been practiced in all Ages, and all Nations determine, that when Kings invade the Lives, Liberties, or Properties of their Subjects, that tear up the Foundations of Public Freedom, and the sacred Constitution of their Country, MAY BE RESISTED, either by calling in and joining with Foreign Assistance, or by taking Arms in Defence of the Law and common Liberty; this is what was declared at the REVOLUTION, and this is the Foundation upon which the People took Arms in the Time of Charles the First.
The Axe is now at the Root of the Tree; the overthrow of the Constitution is the great Design of the King and his Ministers, the open and avowed Enemies to the natural Rights of Mankind, who have already sufficiently proved to the World, that they mean the Subversion of the universal Right of Christians and of Subjects. Let those, my Countrymen, who plead for Tyrants, submit to their Power; but let us esteem Liberty, Religion, and Property, equally with our Lives, every Mans Birthright by Nature; no Government ever received a LEGAL Authority
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to abridge or take it away; nor has God vested any single or confederated Power in any Hands to destroy it; and it is in Defence of these glorious Privileges, these common Rights, I have written this Paper, and to preserve them unviolated by the polluted Hands of Lawless Tyrants, I would lay down my Life, for Life is a burthen in any other State than that of FREEDOM.
It is notoriously known, notwithstanding all the Royal and ministerial Falshoods which have been, and are Daily advanced, to our Disgrace, it is known that we do not enjoy, undiminished, one single Privilege purchased by the Blood of our Ancestors, and confirmed to us by MAGNA CHARTA and the BILL of RIGHTS. Every Man then, who remains passive at this Time, is an Enemy and a Traitor to his Country. I loose all kind of Patience when I reflect upon the melancholy Situation of England and America, and the villainous Principles of those Men, intrusted by the Sovereign with the Management of the Affairs of this once great, free, and powerful Kingdom. I am fired with a just Indignation against the Authors of our Misfortunes; and if I appear too Warm, I hope it will be imputed to my Zeal in the Public Cause, and not to any Malice or Resentment, against Individuals, for I here declare to have none, but I most sincerely wish to stop the further Effusion of Human Blood, and would willingly sacrifice my Life, could I rescue my Country from the Hands of PARRICIDES and TRAITORS, and from that Destruction which now threatens it.
To the PUBLIC.
THE Necessity, Utility, and National Advantage of a political Paper in Defence of the natural Rights of Mankind at this IMPORTANT ÆRA, must appear greater than at the last glorious Revolution. We now see, and with infinite Concern, the King and Ministry, the Lords and Commons, all united, and firmly resolved, on persuing Measures, which (without a noble Opposition from the People) must end in the Destruction of the Laws, Rights, and Liberties, of the whole British Empire, in England and America. It is therefore only necessary to say, this Paper will be carried on by two Gentlemen of literay Abilities, alike Enemies to the Arbitary efforts of ONE, or a purchased Majority of FIVE HUNDRED
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and FIFTY EIGHT TYRANTS, to whom they, and they hope, their Fellow-Subjects, never will submit.
Potior visa est periculosa libertas quieto servitio.
SALLUST1
The CRISIS will be continued with Spirit, in defiance of every exertion of Lawless Power, upon the true Principles of the Constitution, against the secret Machinations, and despotic Designs, of the present corrupt Court and Ministry. The Authors being determined, even at the risk of every thing that is dear to Man, to rescue the Liberty of the Press, the natural Rights of Mankind, and the Constitution of the British Empire, in England and America, from that Ruin, with which they are now threatened. In order with more Ease to accomplish these great Ends, they earnestly beg the Assistance of those, who are real Friends to the Laws, Liberties, and Constitution of their Country.
Printed and published for the Authors, by T. W. Shaw, in Fleet-street, opposite Anderton’s Coffee House, where Letters to the Publisher, will be thankfully received.
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THE
CRISIS
| NUMBER XXIII | To be continued Weekly. |
| SATURDAY, JUNE 24, 1775 | [Price Two-pence Half-penny. |
To his TYRANNIC MAJESTY.—the DEVIL.
Most infernal Sir,
Do not affect the utmost Astonishment at this Address; it comes not in the tremendous form of a PETITION; of these your SULKY MAJESTY shall have no more during the short Time you can hope to Tyrannize over us in a regal Shape. What I humbly offer now, concerns, not your infested and afflicted KINGDOMS, so nearly as your dearer Self and Favourites. Your MAJESTY’S best beloved Spirits, Bute and Mansfield, the whole astonished World consider as the blackest Imps in all your Train; and yourself, as their humble Executioner. They advise, and you most condescendingly administer, Destruction. Their Ascendancy and your Humility, their Patriotism and your Discernment, their Wisdom and your Humanity, are Subjects of universal Admiration. But of all your most diabolical Virtues, satanic Sir, the most conspicuous is Hypocrisy. The Blaze of it, upon one Occasion, in particular, the Death of Lord Chancellor
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Yorke. (as Milton says) “far round illumin’d Hell.”1 As you can practise it so successfully for the Desolation, let me intreat you, gloomy Sir, to assume it now (by way of Frolic only) for the preservation of Mankind; but, above all, for your own precious Interest, much dearer to you than the Salvation of an inferior Universe. Your Majesty has disported yourself amidst the dangerous Indulgences of three most unprincely Passions; Pride, Anger, and Revenge, for Fourteen Years past; ever since the Demise of our good King, George the Second; in whose Reign your most hypocritical Highness was advised to wear the Mask of Decency and Circumspection. You then cast a favourable Glance only at Corruption; but you have since spurned the Reign of Policy, and broke out into such uncommon Tyrannies, such Bloody Inhumanities, unprovoked, that your despotic Highness must now either desist, or expect to be deserted and deposed. My great Tenderness for two of your Highnesses dearest Friends, the Scotch Lords Bute, and Mansfield, obliges me to give you this timely Notice. Should you still continue, dread Sir, to “have entire Confidence in the Wisdom of your Divan,” should you still “Steadily pursue those Measures which they have recommended”—your Reign can be but short; your animating Supporters Bute, and Mansfield, must surely fall. When these hellish Instigators of your Pride are gone, your unhappy Reign must end, when those Arch Fiends of Corruption and Iniquity, are no more, your wise Divan, will fall off from you like Water, they will neither support your wanton Slaughter in AMERICA, nor your pious Designs upon Great Britain, your faithful Pensioners will faint for want of these heartening supplies, with which