The propriety, therefore, of addressing these papers to a gentleman, who, for so many successive parliaments, with so much honour to himself and satisfaction to the public, has been at the head of the commons of Great Britain, cannot be called in question.
You will smile, sir, perhaps, as you read the references of a provincial assembly to the rights and claims of parliament; but we humbly conceive, it will be without the least mixture of resentment; those assemblies having nothing more in view, than barely to establish their privileges on the most rational and solid basis they could find, for the security and service of their constituents.
And you are humbly besought, sir, not to think the worse of this address, because it has been made without your permission or privity.
Nobody asks leave to pay a debt: every Briton is your debtor, sir: and all we have said, or can say, is but a poor composition for what we owe you.
You have conferred as much honour on the chair you fill, as the chair has conferred on you.
Probity and dignity are your characteristics.
May that seat always derive the same lustre from the same qualities!
This at least ought to be our prayer, whether it is or not within our expectations.
For the province of Pensylvania, as well as in my own private capacity, I have the honour to be, with the most profound respect,
Sir,