Now, my Lords and Gentlemen, suffer me I beseech you, to appeal to your own good Sense and Understandings on this Head.--Ask yourselves this plain Question, Is such a Plan of Reconciliation as Mr. BURKE proposes, a likely Method of terminating the present Disputes between the Mother-Country and her Colonies? Nay ask farther;--Hath it so much as a Tendency to cool and moderate them? Or rather doth it not seem much better contrived to enflame, than to extinguish; to kindle new Fires, than to quench old ones? Besides, when each of these _American_ Assemblies shall be erected into a distinct Parliament, supreme within itself, and independent of the rest,--Is it possible to suppose, that no _new_ Disputes, or _new_ Differences will arise between such co-ordinate States and rival Powers;--_neighbouring_, _jealous_, and _contending_ Powers, I say, whose respective Limits are in many Instances as yet undefined, if really definable! And is it at all consistent with any Degree of common Sense, or daily Experience, to suppose that such Combustibles as these will not speedily catch Fire?--Especially, if we take into the Account, the discordant Tempers of the Inhabitants of these respective Provinces, their inbred Hatreds and Antipathies against each other, their different Modes of Life, the Differences of Climate, Religion, Manners, Habits of Thinking, &c. &c. Now, when Tumults and Disorders shall arise from any of these various Causes,--What is to be done? And to whom, or to what common Head, or general Umpire is the appellant Province to carry her Complaint?--The Parliament of _Great-Britain_, it seems, must no longer interfere; for that is no longer the supreme Head of the Empire, to which all the Parts used to be subordinate, and professed to be obedient; therefore, being destitute of any authoritative or constitutional Right to _compel_ Submission, all it can do, is to offer its good Services by Way of Mediation; and that is, generally speaking, just nothing at all. Is then the KING (abstracted from the Parliament) to be appealed to in this arduous Affair? And is he alone (in his mere _personal Capacity_) to command the Peace to be preserved between State and State, or Province and Province.----[6]Is he, I say (abstracted from being a King of _Great-Britain_) to summon all the Parties before himself and his Privy Council, in order to hear their respective Allegations, and finally to determine, and settle the Differences between them? Be it so: Then if he only is to decide, _as in an Affair relating to his own private Patrimony, in which we have no more Concern than we have with Hanover_,--it necessarily follows, that he must be invested with sufficient Power (independent of, and without the Consent of Parliament) to enforce these Decisions; for a Decree without a Power to enforce it, and to compel Obedience, is altogether nugatory and vain.