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Quote#Wisdom

I felt attaching the name of rebellion hastily, and traitors, to the…

Quote byWilliam Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne · 1737–1805

Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: Letter to William Pitt (21 December 1765), quoted in Correspondence of William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, Vol. II, eds. William Stanhope Taylor and John Henry Pringle (1838), p. 354.

English (original)

I felt attaching the name of rebellion hastily, and traitors, to the Americans, and comparing them to the Scots at Derby—which was the language used—dangerous, and perhaps both imprudent and unjust.

— William Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne

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