[17] August 1775
[Extract]
The Spirit of America is incredible. Who do you think the Mr [Thomas] Mifflin, Aid de Camp to Washington, is? ー A very grave and staunch Quaker, of large fortune and much consequence. What think you of that political Enthusiasm, which is able to overpower so much religious Fanaticism? Washington himself is a man of good Military experience, prudent and Cautious, and who yet stakes a fortune of about 5000 a year. God knows they are very inferiour in all human rescources. But a remote and difficult Country, and such a Spirit as now animates them, may do strange things. Our Victories can only complete our Ruin.
1. George H. Guttridge, ed., The Correspondence of Edmund Burke (London and Chicago, 1961), III, 185-188. Hereafter cited as Guttridge, ed., Burke Correspondence. O'Hara, an Irishman, was a close friend of Burke.
