The resolution was not taken up for consideration, until three days afterward, when it was resolved to "postpone its further consideration until the first day of July next; and in the mean while, that no time be lost, in case Congress agree thereto, that a committee be appointed to prepare a declaration to that effect." That committee was appointed on the eleventh of June, and consisted of Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, John Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, and Robert R. Livingston of New York. Mr. Lee would doubtless have been appointed the chairman of the committee, had not intelligence of the serious illness of his wife compelled him, the evening previous to its formation, to ask leave of absence. At the hour when the committee was formed, Mr. Lee was in Wilmington, on his way to Virginia. Mr. Jefferson, the youngest member of the committee, was chosen by his colleagues to write the Declaration, because of his known expertness with the pen; and in an upper chamber of the house of Mrs. Clymer, on the southwest corner of Seventh and High-streets, in Philadelphia, that ardent patriot drew up the great indictment against George the Third, for adjudication by a tribunal of the nations. [Illustration: JOHN DICKENSON.] On the first of July, pursuant to agreement, Mr. Lee's resolution was taken up in the committee of the whole house, Benjamin Harrison of Virginia (father of the late President Harrison), in the chair. Jefferson's draft of a declaration of independence, bearing a few verbal alterations by Franklin and Adams, was reported at the same time, and for three consecutive days its paragraphs were debated, altered, and agreed to, one after another. No written record has transmitted to us the able arguments put forth on that occasion, and the world has lost all except a few reminiscences preserved by those who listened to, and participated in the debates. While all hearts were favorable to the measure, all minds were not convinced that the proper time had arrived for "passing the Rubicon." Among the opponents of the resolution was John Dickenson of Pennsylvania, whose powerful arguments in a series of _Letters of a Pennsylvania Farmer_, published eight years before, had contributed greatly toward arousing the colonies to resistance. He did not regard the measure as impolitic _at all times_, but as premature and impracticable at _that time_. He urged the want of money, munitions of war, of a well-organized and disciplined army; the seeming apathy of several colonies, manifested by their tardiness in declaring their wishes on the subject; the puissance of Great Britain by sea and land, and the yet unknown course of foreign governments during the contest which would follow. Richard Henry Lee, on the other hand, had supported his resolution with all his fervid eloquence, in Congress and out of it, from the day when he presented it. He prefaced his motion with a speech,