Ira Ingram

“ They have seen the enthusiasm and the heroic toils of an army bartered for a capitulation, humiliating in itself, and repugnant in the extreme to the pride and honor of the most lenient, and no sooner framed than evaded or insultingly violated. ”

“ They have seen the busy aspirants for office running from the field to the council hall, and from this back to the camp, seeking emolument and not service, and swarming like hungry flies around the body politic. ”

“ They have seen the energies, the prowess, and the achievements of a band worthy to have stood by Washington and receive command, and worthy to participate of the inheritance of the sons of such a Father, frittered, dissipated, and evaporated away for the want of that energy, union, and decision in council, which, though it must emanate from the many, can only be exercised efficiently when concentrated in a single arm. ”

“ They have seen the deliberations of the council and the volition of the camp distracted and paralyzed, by the interference of an influence anti-patriotic in itself, and too intimately interwoven with the paralyzing policy of the past, to admit the hope of relief from its incorporation with that which can alone avert the evils of the present crisis, and place the affairs of the country beyond the reach of an immediate reaction. ”

“ The laws and guarantees under which we entered the country as colonists,tempted the unbroken silence, sought the dangers of the wilderness, braved the prowling Indian, erected our numerous improvements, and opened and subdued the earth to cultivation, are either abrogated or repealed, and now trampled under the hoofs of the usurper's cavalry. ”

“ That we, who hereto set our names, pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor, to sustain this declaration—relying with our entire confidence upon the co-operation of our fellow-citizens, and the approving smiles of the God of the living, to aid and conduct us victoriously through the struggle, to the enjoyment of peace, union, and good government ”

“ They have seen their camp thronged, but too frequently, with those who were more anxious to be served by, than to serve their country—with men more desirous of being honored with command than capable of commanding. ”

“ Even a willingness on our part to defend therm has provoked the calamities of exterminating warfare. Why contend for the shadow, when the substance courts our acceptance? The price of each is the same. War—exterminating war—is waged: and we have either to fight or flee.
We have indulged sympathy, too. for the condition of many whom, we vainly flattered ourselves, were opposed, in common with their adopted brethren, to the extension of military domination over the domain of Texas. ”

“ The foregoing, we are fully aware, is a blunt, and in some respects a humiliating, but a faithful picture. However much we may wish, or however much we may be interested, or feel disposed to deceive our enemy, let us carefully guard against deceiving ourselves. ”

“ An army, recently powerless and literally imprisoned, is now emancipated. From a comparatively harmless, passive, and inactive attitude, they have been transferred to one pre-eminently commanding, active, and imposing. ”

“ The North and East of Mexico will now become the stronghold of centralism. Thence it can sally in whatever direction its arch adviser may prefer to employ its weapons. The counter-revolution in the interior once smothered, the whole fury of the contest will be poured on Texas. She is principally populated with North- Americans. ”