In drafting the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson was to be both poetic and prosaic, creating sympathy for the larger cause while condemning Britain in compelling terms. His purpose, he said, was “not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of … but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject; in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we were compelled to take.”
