Indeed, as Judge .lones, whose opportunities for ascertaining the exact truth and whose integrity and fearlessness in uttering it no one will seriously question, ,has emphatically stated, "all parties, denominations, and religions, apprehended, at that time, " that the Colonies laboured under grievances which wanted redressing ;" and no one, tlicrefore, opposed any reasonable movement which tended, or appeared to tend, to a peaceful redress of those serious grievances.

It will be seen, from this comparison of the original authorities with the use which has been made of them by the several leading writers of history in our countrj', just how little or how much reliance can b*? place<l on what is called " liislonj," in what relates to less important subjects, while this, which was second to few others, in thehistorj' of the Revolution, has been treated with so little of rcsiwct and of fidelity to the truth.

cians ; and, very evidently, they had fairly overcome their plebeian, revolutionary rivals, in an ap)>eal to the body of the inhabitants. With a complete knowledge of the small number of those who had ])reviously assumed to represent the masses of the unfranchised inhabitants, and with as complete a knowledge of the general harmlessness of those masses, in the absence of their self-constituted leaders, the high-toned promoters of the uni)ublished scheme of abridging the political power of the great body of the people had disarmed the former of their animosity, by rendering them harmless, as the helpless minority of the Committee of Fifty-one* -- an empty honor with which, however, for the time being, they were evidently satisfied -- while the latter were made contented, for a. short time, also, by receiving a recognition of their political preten:iions, in the privilege which was extended to them of confirming or rejecting the nominations made by the Caucus, among whom, with two or three exceptions, the names of their self-constituted leaders were conspicuously presented. '