"That the probability of an offer of peace, on the part of Great Britain, to United America, whereof the petitioners made mention in their former request, having at present become a full certainty, by the revolution arrived since in the British Ministry, they have not learnt without uneasiness, the attempt made at the same time by the new Ministers of the Court of London, to involve this State in a negotiation for a separate peace, the immediate consequence of which would be (as the petitioners fear) a cessation of all connexions with the American Republic; whilst, that in the meantime, our Republic, deprived on the one hand of the advantages, which it reasonably promises itself from those connexions, might, on the other, be detained by negotiations, spun out to a great length, and not effect till late, perhaps after the other belligerent powers, a separate peace with England. "That, in effect, the difficulties which oppose themselves to a like partial pacification, are too multiplied for one to promise himself to see them suddenly removed; such as the restitution of the possessions taken from the State, and retaken from the English by France, a restitution, which thereby is become impracticable; the indemnification of the immense losses, that the unexpected and perfidious attack of England has caused to the Dutch nation in general, to the petitioners in particular; the assurance of a free navigation for the future, upon the principles of the armed neutrality, and conformably to the law of nations, the dissolution of the bonds, which, without being productive of any utility to the two nations, have been a source of contestations always springing up, and which in every war between Great Britain and any other power, have threatened to involve our Republic in it, or have, in effect, done it; the annihilation (if possible) of the act of navigation, an act, which carries too evident marks of the supremacy affected by England over all other maritime people, not to attract attention at the approaching negotiation of peace; finally, the necessity of breaking the yoke, that Great Britain would impose upon our flag, to make hers respected in the Northern Ocean, as the seat of her maritime empire; and other objects of this nature, which, as the petulant proceedings of the Court of London even have given rise to them, with certainty furnish matter for claims and negotiations.