"It being our opinion that the united wisdom of North America should be collected in a general congress of all the colonies, we have appointed the honorable Peyton Randolph, Esquire, Richard Henry Lee, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Richard Bland, Benjamin Harrison, and Edmund Pendleton, Esquires, deputies to represent this colony in the said congress, to be held at Philadelphia on the first Monday in September next. And that they may be the better informed of our sentiments touching the conduct we wish them to observe on this important occasion, we desire that they will express, in the first place, our faith and true allegiance to his majesty King George the Third, our lawful and rightful sovereign; and that we are determined, with our lives and fortunes, to support him in the legal exercise of all his just rights and prerogatives; and however misrepresented, we sincerely approve of a constitutional connection with Great Britain, and wish most ardently a return of that intercourse of affection and commercial connection that formerly united both countries; which can only be effected by a removal of those causes of discontent which have of late unhappily divided us.... The power assumed by the British Parliament to bind America by their statutes, in all cases whatsoever, is unconstitutional, and the source of these unhappy differences."[101] The convention at Williamsburg, of which, of course, Patrick Henry was a member, seems to have adjourned on Saturday, the 6th of August. Between that date and the time for his departure to attend the congress at Philadelphia, we may imagine him as busily engaged in arranging his affairs for a long absence from home, and even then as not getting ready to begin the long journey until many of his associates had nearly reached the end of it. FOOTNOTES: [90] MS. [91] Wirt, 70, 71. [92] Wirt, 71, 72. [93] Randall, _Life of Jefferson_, i. 49; Wirt, 77. [94] Wirt, 71. [95] Jefferson's _Works_, vi. 368. [96] 4 _Am. Arch._ i. 350. [97] Campbell, _Hist. Va._ 573. [98] 4 _Am. Arch._ i. 350, 351. The narrative of these events as given by Wirt and by Campbell has several errors. They seem to have been misled by Jefferson, who, in his account of the business (_Works_, i. 122, 123), is, if possible, rather more inaccurate than usual. [99] Campbell, _Hist. Va._ 573. [100] Mason to Martin Cockburn, _Va. Hist. Reg._ iii. 27-29. [101] The full text of this letter of instructions is given in 4 _Am. Arch._ i. 689, 690. With this should be compared note C. in Jefferson's _Works_, i. 122-142. CHAPTER VIII IN THE FIRST CONTINENTAL CONGRESS