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LETTER I. On the Overtures of Peace.
MY DEAR SIR,
OUR last conversation, though not in the tone of absolute despondency, was far from chear∣ful. We could not easily account for some un∣pleasant appearances. They were represented to us as indicating the state of the popular mind; and they were not at all what we should have expected from our old ideas even of the faults and vices of the English character. The disastrous events, which have followed one upon another in a long unbroken funereal train, moving in a procession, that seemed to have no end, these were not the principal causes of our dejection. We feared more from what threatened to fail within, than what me∣naced to oppress us from abroad. To a people who have once been proud and great, and great because they were proud, a change in the national spirit is the most terrible of all revolutions.
•• shall not live to behold the unravelling of the intricate plot, which saddens and perplexes the