Becoming America - An Exploration of American Literature from Precolonial to Post-Revolution, 2018a

BECOMING AMERICA
REVOLUTIONARY AND EARLY NATIONAL PERIOD LITERATURE
And all Persons in the said Island are hereby cautioned not to oppose in any
wise the Execution of this Our Edict, or any Part thereof, such Opposition being
HIGH TREASON, of which all who are suspected shall be transported in Fetters
from Britain to Prussia, there to be tried and executed according to the Prussian
Law.
Such is our Pleasure.
Given at Potsdam this twenty-fth Day of the Month of August, One Thousand
Seven Hundred and Seventy-three, and in the Thirty-third Year of our Reign.
By the KING in his Council
RECHTMAESSIG, Secr.”
Some take this Edict to be merely one of the King’s Jeux d’Esprit: Others
suppose it serious, and that he means a Quarrel with England: But all here think
the Assertion it concludes with, “that these Regulations are copied from Acts of
the English Parliament respecting their Colonies,” a very injurious one: it being
impossible to believe, that a People distinguish’d for their Love of Liberty, a Nation
so wise, so liberal in its Sentiments, so just and equitable towards its Neighbours,
should, from mean and injudicious Views of petty immediate Prot, treat its own
Children in a Manner so arbitrary and TYRANNICAL!
3.4.3 “Rules by Which a Great Empire May Be Reduced to a
Small One”
(1773)
For the Public Advertiser.
RULES by which a GREAT EMPIRE may be reduced to a SMALL ONE.
[Presented privately to a late Minister, when he entered upon his Administration;
and now rst published.]
An ancient Sage valued himself upon this, that tho’ he could not ddle, he knew
how to make a great City of a little one. The Science that I, a modern Simpleton,
am about to communicate is the very reverse.
I address myself to all Ministers who have the Management of extensive
Dominions, which from their very Greatness are become troublesome to govern,
because the Multiplicity of their Aairs leaves no Time for ddling.
I. In the rst Place, Gentlemen, you are to consider, that a great Empire, like a
great Cake, is most easily diminished at the Edges. Turn your Attention therefore
rst to your remotest Provinces; that as you get rid of them, the next may follow
in Order.
II. That the Possibility of this Separation may always exist, take special Care
the Provinces are never incorporated with the Mother Country, that they do not
enjoy the same common Rights, the same Privileges in Commerce, and that they
are governed by severer Laws, all of your enacting, without allowing them any
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