. The magazine of American history with notes and queries. fferson said, had a dash of biting cyni-cism. Of this, and the resolution of his character, two anecdotes give anillustration. When an opponent in politics said that the people of Fairfaxknew that Colonel Masons mind was failing him from age, he retortedthat his opponent had one consolation, When his mind failed him, noone would ever discover it ! And when, in 1788, he was informed that ifhe opposed the ratification of the Federal Constitution the people of THE VIRGINIA DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 385 Alexandria would mob him, he mount
. The magazine of American history with notes and queries. fferson said, had a dash of biting cyni-cism. Of this, and the resolution of his character, two anecdotes give anillustration. When an opponent in politics said that the people of Fairfaxknew that Colonel Masons mind was failing him from age, he retortedthat his opponent had one consolation, When his mind failed him, noone would ever discover it ! And when, in 1788, he was informed that ifhe opposed the ratification of the Federal Constitution the people of THE VIRGINIA DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 385 Alexandria would mob him, he mounted his horse, rode to the town, andgoing up the Court-house steps, said to the Sheriff, Mr. Sheriff, will youmake proclamation that George Mason will address the people ? Acrowd assembled, and Mason addressed them, denouncing the Constitutionwith bitter invective, after which he mounted his horse and returned was not opposed to Union, for he wrote in 1778 : If I can only liveto see the American Union firmly fixed, and can leave to my children but. a crust of bread and liberty, I shall die satisfied ; and speaking of theVirginia Constitution, he wrote: I trust that neither the power of GreatBritain nor the power of Hell will be able to prevail against it. It was this man of royalist descent, a thorough churchman and repre-sentative of the class denounced as ciphers of aristocracy, who was nowcalled upon to draw up the Bill of Rights proclaiming religious freedomand the rights of man. The paper was written in his room in the Raleightavern at Williamsburg, without books to refer to, and has been described Vol. XL—No. 386 THE VIRGINIA DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE as containing the quintessence of all the great principles and doctrines offreedom wrought out by the people of England from the earliest times,and which lie at the foundations of society. Its scope is much more ex-tensive than either Magna Charta or the Petition of Rights, and it may becalled with truth the
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