has resolved to die rather than longer groan in shameful slavery."[1]
To the citizens he wrote:
"Fellow-citizens! Summoned so often by you to save your beloved country, I stand by your will at your head, but I shall not be able to break the outraging yoke of slavery if I do not receive the speediest and the most courageous support from you. Aid me then with your whole strength, and hasten to the banner of our country. One zeal in one interest ought to take possession of the hearts of all. Sacrifice to the country a part of your possessions which hitherto have not been yours, but the spoils of a despot's soldiers."
He begs them to give men, weapons, horses, linen, provisions, to the national army, and then proceeds:
"The last moment is now here, when despair in the midst of shame and infamy lays a weapon in our hands. Only in the contempt of death is the hope of the bettering of our fate and that of the future generations. … The first step to the casting off of slavery is the risk taken to become free. The first step to victory is to know your own strength. … Citizens! I expect all from your zeal, that you will with your whole hearts join the holy league which neither foreign intrigue nor the desire for rule, but only the love of freedom, has created. Whoso is not with us is against us. … I have sworn to the nation that. I will use the power entrusted to me for the private oppression of none, but I here declare that whoever acts against our league shall be delivered over as a traitor and an enemy of the country to the criminal tribunal
- ↑ March 24, 1794. Given in Letters of Kościuszko, ed. L. Siemienski.
