Page:The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 Volume 3.djvu/35

 to hear by the post of this day that you are completely organized. Mr Peirce, & Mr Houston from Georgia set off from this place for Philadelphia yesterday. Mr Sherman & Doctor Johnson will be in Philadelphia in the course of the week. I have not heard any thing from New Hampshire, but I am persuaded, from circumstances, that the delegates from that state will be with you by the 10th of June. I am indeed happy that the convention will be so full, as to feel a confidence that they represent the great majority of the people of the United States.

Philadelphia, May 30th, 1787.

After a very fatiguing and rapid journey I arrived here on the 22d. The gentlemen of the Convention had been waiting from day to day for the presence of seven States; on the 25th the members from Jersey attended, and Gen. Washington was chosen President. Yesterday nine States were represented, and the great business of the meeting was brought forward by Virginia, with whom the proposition for a Convention had originated.

As no progress can yet be expected in a business so weighty, and, at the same time, so complicated, you will not look for any news now from this quarter.

Philadelphia 30th May 1787.

But, having since been appointed by my native State to attend the national convention, and having been pressed to a compliance in a manner, which it hardly becomes me to describe, I have, in a measure, been obliged to sacrifice my own sentiments, and to be present in Philadelphia.…

The business of this convention is as yet too much in embryo to form any opinion of the conclusion. Much is expected from it by some; not much by others; and nothing by a few. That something is necessary, none will deny; for the situation of the general government, if it can be called a government, is shaken to its foundation, and liable to be overturned by every blast. In a word, it is at an end; and, unless a remedy is soon applied, anarchy and confusion will inevitably ensue.