The writings of George Washington; being his correspondence, addresses, messages, and other papers, official and private, selected and published from the original manuscripts; with a life of the author, notes and illustrations. By Jared Sparks.

224 LIFE OF WASHINGTON. [1776.
military ascendency, the present crisis was such, as to
silence the opposition, if not to change the sentiments,
of the members who had looked with distrust upon
every measure tending to strengthen the military arm.
General Washington was at once invested with extraordinary powers. By a formal resolve he was authorized
to raise sixteen battalions of infantry, in addition to the
eighty-eight already voted by Congress, and appoint
the officers; to raise and equip three thousand lighthorse, three regiments of artillery, and a corps of engineers; to call upon any of the States for such aids
of militia as he should judge necessary; to form magazines of provisions; to displace and appoint all officers
under the rank of brigadiers, and fill up vacancies in
every part of the army; to take whatever he should
want for the use of the army, allowing the inhabitants
a reasonable price for the same; and to arrest and
confine persons, who refused to receive the Continental
currency, or who were otherwise disaffected to the
American cause, and to report them for trial to the
States of which they were citizens. These powers
constituted him in all respects a military Dictator.
They were to continue six months; and in his exercise
of them he fully justified the confidence of Congress,
as expressed in the preamble to the resolve, in which
it is said they were granted in consequence of a perfect
reliance on his wisdom, vigor, and uprightness.
In this case, as in all others where power was in
trusted to him, whether acting in a military or civil
capacity, he was cautious to exercise it no farther than
to effect the single end for which it was designed.
Fearless in the discharge of duty, and never shrinking
from responsibility, he was at the same time free from
the vanity, which too often besets men in high stations,
of gaining personal consequence by making himself