William Pitt

"I have read Thucydides, and have studied and admired the master statesmen of the world — that for solidity and reasoning, force of sagacity, and wisdom of conclusion, under such a complication of different circumstances, no nation or body of men can stand in preference to the general Congress at Philadelphia. I trust it is obvious to your lordships, that all attempts to impose servitude on such men, to establish despotism over such a mighty continental nation, must be vain — must be futile." —William Pitt, former Prime Minister of Great Britain, in the House of Lords, December 20, 1775