e with those men
all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their
local interests, and their selfish views. From such an assembly can a
perfect production be expected? It, therefore, astonishes me, sir, to
find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does: and I
think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to
hear that our councils are confounded, like those of the builders of
Babel, and that our States are on the point of separation, only to meet
hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another's throats. Thus I
consent, sir, to this Constitution because I expect no better, and
because I am not sure that it is not the best. The opinions I have had
of its errors I sacrifice to the public good. I have never whispered a
syllable of them abroad. Within these walls they were born and here they
shall die. If every one of us, in returning to our constituents, were to
report the objections he has had to it, and endeavour to gain partisans
in support of them, we might prevent its being generally received, and
thereby lose all the salutary effects and great advantages resulting
naturally in our favour among foreign nations as well as among
ourselves, from our real or apparent unanimity. Much of the strength and
efficiency of any government, in procuring and securing happiness to the
people, depends on opinion--on the general opinion of the goodness of
the government as well as of the wisdom and integrity of its governors.
I hope, therefore, that for our own sakes, as a part of the people, and
for the sake of posterity, we shall act heartily and unanimously in
recommending this Constitution (if approved by Congress and confirmed by
the Conventions) wherever our influence may extend, and turn our future
thoughts and endeavours to the means of having it well administered. On
the whole, sir, I cannot help expressing a wish that every member of the
Convention who may still have objections to it would, with me, on this
occasion doubt a little of his own infallibility, and, to make manifest
our unanimity, put his name to this instrument.

He then moved that the Constitution be signed by the members, and
offered the following as a convenient form, viz.: "Done in Convention
by the unanimous consent of _the States_ present the seventeenth
of September, etc. In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed
our names." This ambiguous form had been drawn up by Mr. Gouverneur
Morris, in ord