Mercy Otis Warren Quotes

Great advantages are often attended with great inconveniences, and great minds called to severe trials.

The waves have rolled upon me, the billows are repeatedly broken over me, yet I am not sunk down.

In the midst of death’s relentless power, I yet among the living stand

The circumstances of the world are continually changing, and the opinions of men change also,Government is for the living, and not for the dead; it is the living only that has any right in it.

Her life was expected to be as anonymous as the era's needlework.

Scene I. A little dark Parlour in Boston: Guards standing at the door. Hazlerod, Crusty Crowbar, Simple Sapling, Hateall, and Hector Mushroom. Simple. I know not what to think of these sad times, The people arm'd,—and all resolv'd to die Ere they'll submit.—— Crusty Crowbar. I too am almost sick of the parade Of honours purchas'd at the price of peace. Simple. Fond as I am of greatness and her charms, Elate with prospects of my rising name, Push'd into place,—a place I ne'er expected, My bounding heart leapt in my feeble breast. And ecstasies entranc'd my slender brain.— But yet, ere this I hop'd more solid gains, As my low purse demands a quick supply.— Poor Sylvia weeps,—and urges my return To rural peace and humble happiness, As my ambition beggars all her babes. Crusty. When first I listed in the desp'rate cause, And blindly swore obedience to his will, So wise, so just, so good I thought Rapatio, That if salvation rested on his word I'd pin my faith, and risk my hopes thereon. Hazlerod. Any why not now?—What staggers thy belief? Crusty. Himself—his perfidy appears— It is too plain he has betray'd his country; And we're the wretched tools by him mark'd out To seal its ruins—tear up the ancient forms, And every vestige treacherously destroy, Nor leave a trait of freedom in the land. Nor did I think hard fate wou'd call me up From drudging o'er my acres, Treading the glade, and sweating at the plough, To dangle at the tables of the great; At bowls and cards to spend my frozen years; To sell my friends, my country, and my conscience; Profane the sacred sabbaths of my God; Scorn'd by the very men who want my aid To spread distress o'er this devoted people. Hazlerod. Pho—what misgivings—why these idle qualms, This shrinking backwards at the bugbear conscience; In early life I heard the phantom nam'd, And the grave sages prate of moral sense Presiding in the bosom of the just; Or planting thongs about the guilty heart. Bound by these shackles, long my lab'ring mind, Obscurely trod the lower walks of life, In hopes by honesty my bread to gain; But neither commerce, or my conjuring rods, Nor yet mechanics, or new fangled drills, Or all the iron-monger's curious arts, Gave me a competence of shining ore, Or gratify'd my itching palm for more; Till I dismiss'd the bold intruding guest, And banish'd conscience from my wounded breast. Crusty. Happy expedient!—Could I gain the art, Then balmy sleep might sooth my waking lids, And rest once more refresh my weary soul.

Committees were everywhere chosen, who were directed to keep up a regular correspondence with each other, and to give information of all intelligence received relative to the proceedings of administration, so far as they affected the interest of the British colonies throughout America. The trust was faithfully and diligently discharged, and when afterwards all legislative authority was suspended, the courts of justice shut up and the last traits of British government annihilated in the colonies, this new institution became a kind of juridical tribunal. Its injunctions were influential beyond the hopes of its most sanguine friends, and the recommendations of the committees of correspondence had the force of law. Thus, as despotism frequently springs from anarchy, a regular democracy sometimes arises from the severe encroachments of despotism. This institution had given such a general alarm to the adherents of administration and had been replete with such important consequences through the union, that it was justly dreaded by those who opposed it, and considered by them as the most important bulwark of freedom. A

In the wake of that uproar, Boston settled into a sullen calm, probably at the stern insistence of Sam Adams, who reprimanded the street gangs, printers and "wharf rats" who often identified themselves as Sons of Liberty.

By then Mercy, too, had evolved from the decorous wife of an affluent patriot into a reporter for those removed from the theater of war.

In late summer, when sprays of purple loosestrife, goldenrod, and ripening cranberries burst into color along the old road cutting through the Great Marsh of West Barnstable on Cape Cod, the air vibrated with the drumbeat of cicadas, the caws of seagulls and geese.

Within a day Mercy heard the news. She never forgot it. A few months later, that riot became the backdrop for her first political satire.

...a later scene...was perhaps Mercy's strongest indictment of the colonial disregard for women and families.

With the distanced drumbeat of the Revolution, the chink of coins suddenly became more important than commitment to the cause.

Nor was the monster public the only one deceived.

What, after all, was the point of describing a Revolution meant to create a democratic republic of free men that was destroyed by power-hungry men determined to create a new 'aristocracy?

Penwoman to Posterity.

Like the threads of finely woven linen, the warp and woof of friendship uniting the Warrens and Adams through successive generations was once again seamlessly bound.

A young woman's ability to read beyond the bible had little practical value.

The usual method for starting a fire in colonial America was to strike flint against steel. the usual way to protest an injustice was to bring a suit to the colonial courts.

Inevitably, the British barrier ringing Boston created new hardships for residents. While initially forbidden to leave the city, new food shortages sweltering summer temperatures convinced Gage to grant some citizens passes. ...Even after the arrival of fishing boats civilians could not buy the catch until the British were supplied. Outbreaks of disease became common.

...to capture those momentous events in print seemed as daunting to Mercy as was the triumph of the Revolution itself.

Hope Is an Airy Queen.