Vandalism at Philadelphia

From Diary of the American Revolution, Vol II.  Compiled by Frank Moore and published in 1859.

September 10.—Last night, a fit time for the sons of Lucifer to perpetrate the deeds of darkness, one or more volunteers in the service of hell, broke into the State House in Philadelphia, and totally defaced the picture of his Excellency General Washington, and a curious engraving of the monument of the patriotic General Montgomery, done in France in the most elegant manner. Every generous bosom must swell with indignation at such atrocious proceedings. It is a matter of grief and sorrowful reflection that any of the human race can be so abandoned, as to offer such an insult to men who are and have been an honor to human nature, who venture and have ventured their lives for the liberties of their fellow-men. A being who carries such malice in his breast must be miserable beyond conception. We need wish him no other punishment than his own feelings.

The motions of his spirit are black as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus.¹

¹ Bailey’s Freeman’s Journal, (Philadelphia,) September 12.