of the sort.
They slightly strengthened the totally inadequate garrison which would
soon have to face a whole people in arms, and they issued a foolish
proclamation merely provocative and backed by no power that could
enforce it, forbidding the meeting of Continental Congresses in the
future. That was in January. In April the skirmishes of Lexington and
Concord had shown how hopelessly insufficient was their military force
to meet even local sporadic and unorganized revolts. In May the second
Continental Congress met, and in July appeared by its authority a
general call to arms addressed to the whole population of America.

Up to this point the colonists, if rebellious in their practical
attitude, had been strictly constitutional in their avowed aims. In the
"Declaration of Colonial Right" of 1774, and even in the appeal to arms
of 1775, all suggestion of breaking away from the Empire was repudiated.
But now that the sword was virtually drawn there were practical
considerations which made the most prudent of the rebels consider
whether it would not be wiser to take the final step, and frankly
repudiate the British Sovereignty altogether. For one thing, by the laws
of England, and indeed of all civilized nations, the man who took part
in an armed insurrection against the head of the State committed
treason, and the punishment for treason was death. Men who levied war on
the King's forces while still acknowledging him as their lawful ruler
were really inviting the Government to hang them as soon as it could
catch them. It might be more difficult for the British Government to
treat as criminals soldiers who were fighting under the orders of an
organized _de facto_ government, which at any rate declared itself to be
that of an independent nation. Again, foreign aid, which would not be
given for the purpose of reforming the internal administration of
British dominions, might well be forthcoming if it were a question of
dismembering those dominions. These considerations were just and carried
no little weight; yet it is doubtful if they would have been strong
enough to prevail against the sentiments and traditions which still
bound the colonies to the mother country had not the attack on the
charters forced the controversy back to first principles, and so opened
the door of history to the man who was to provide America with a creed
and to convert the controversy from a legal to something like a
religious quarrel.

Old Peyton