Samuel Johnson’s disdain for the colonial perspective is made clear through his outright contempt for our ideals of liberty and beliefs in the natural rights of men. In fact, he sees us less as men and more comparable to beasts. Perhaps domesticated animals, subdued over many years by the gentle hand of the Crown, and now, after showing the first signs of disobedience, deserve to be punished for disobeying our master. He begins with a thinly veiled threat toward the colonies, implicitly suggesting that regardless of any valid reasoning for our refusal to submit to British taxation, our resistance may effortlessly be overruled by the might of the British empire. However, he’s willing to temporarily cast aside this tenet of his beliefs and fight a war with words, admitting that “power is no sufficient evidence of truth.” Yet, despite his willingness to humor intellectual discourse on the matter …show more content…
This fight or flight attitude is reactionary and exemplifies the stubbornness of the English crown to entertain our demands. All we ask is for no taxation without representation, and although Johnson argues that taxation not in itself tyranny, this is contradicted by the definition of tyranny as cruel and oppressive government that does not represent the will of the people it governs. Although Johnson holds firmly to his, perhaps delusional, belief that American resistance is futile under British naval power, he might be surprised to learn how well we can navigate our native and rough terrain unlike that of the motherland and he perhaps underestimates the spirit of the colonies and our commitment to win our just liberties, whether that victory be won, preferably through logic, but nonetheless through insurrection if