The Old Bell of Independence; Or, Philadelphia in 1776 by Henry C. Watson
page 22 of 154 (14%)
page 22 of 154 (14%)
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to avenge, and sure to punish guilt, then will the man, George of
Brunswick, called king, feel in his brain and in his heart the vengeance of the Eternal Jehovah! A blight will be upon his life--a withered brain, an accurst intellect; a blight will be upon his children, and on his people. Great God! how dread the punishment! 'A crowded populace, peopling the dense towns where the man of money thrives, while the labourer starves; want striding among the people in all its forms of terror; an ignorant and God-defying priesthood chuckling over the miseries of millions; a proud and merciless nobility adding wrong to wrong, and heaping insult upon robbery and fraud; royalty corrupt to the very heart; aristocracy rotten to the core; crime and want linked hand in hand, and tempting men to deeds of woe and death--these are a part of the doom and the retribution that shall come upon the English throne and the English people!' "This was pronounced with a voice of such power, that its tones might have reached almost to the Briton's camp, and struck upon the ear of Howe as the prophetic inspiration of one whose keen eye had read from the dark tablets of futurity. "Looking around upon the officers, he perceived that Washington and Lafayette had half risen from their seats, and were gazing spell-bound at him, as if to drink in every word he uttered. "Taking advantage of the pervading feeling, he went on:-- "'Soldiers--I look around upon your familiar faces with a strange interest! To-morrow morning we will all go forth to battle--for need I tell you that your unworthy minister will march with you, invoking God's |
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