re Essays 71
admitting them to such an equitable participation in
the government of the whole.
Then the next best thing seems to be, leaving
them in the quiet enjoyment of their respective constitutions;
 and when money is wanted for any public
service, in which they ought to bear a part, calling,
upon them by requisitorial letters from the crown
(according to the long-established custom) to grant
such aids as their loyalty shall dictate, and their abilities
 permit. The very sensible and benevolent author
 of that paper seems not to have known, that
such a constitutional custom subsists, and has always
hitherto been practised in America; or he would not
have expressed himself in this manner: “It is evident,
 beyond a doubt, to the intelligent and impartial,
 that after the very extraordinary efforts, which
were effectually made by Great Britain in the late
war to save the colonists from destruction, and attended
 of necessity with an enormous load of debts
in consequence, that the same colonists, now firmly
secured from foreign enemies, should be somehow induced
 to contribute some proportion towards the exigencies
 of state in future.” This looks as if he
conceived the war had been carried on at the sole
expense of Great Britain, and the colonies only
reaped the benefit, without hitherto sharing the burden,
 and were therefore now indebted to Britain on
that account. And this is the same kind of argument
 that is used by those who would fix on the
colonies the heavy charge of unreasonableness and
ingratitude, which I think your friend did not intend.
Please to acquaint him, then, that the fact is not

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