There was reason for the new young king, George III, to be the first Hanoverian to admit out loud that: I glory in the name of Britain.
年輕的喬治三世有理由成為漢諾威王朝首個能以此為榮的人:我以英國之名而榮。
Even an American in London like Benjamin Franklin couldn't help but agree.
甚至在倫敦的美國人本杰明·富蘭克林都情不自禁地贊同。
He wrote that: The foundations of the future grandeur and stability of the British Empire lie in America.
他寫道:大英帝國如同宏偉堅定的基石,深植于美利堅。
Just 17 years later, he was signing the American Declaration of Independence.
但才過了17年,他就簽署了《美國獨立宣言》。
So, what went wrong? How could it all have been thrown away in less than a generation?
那么,是哪里出了錯?為何不到一代人的時間就天翻地覆了呢?
Pitt would learn that even victories come at a cost. And, in Britain's case, that cost would be America.
皮特必須明白勝利也要付出代價。對英國來說,代價就是美國。
Perhaps the resources of the British Empire were now terminally over-stretched. Perhaps that young empire might turn out to be a 30-year wonder.
或許大英帝國的資源最終過度擴張了。或許年輕的帝國只能成就30年的奇跡。

At any rate, if they were going to defend the status quo, they were going to have to have a huge transcontinental army and even bigger navy.
無論如何,如果他們想維持現狀,就需要龐大的陸軍和更強大的海軍。
And if that army and navy were to be funded, the burden of taxes had better not just fall on the British themselves.
如果要建立這樣的軍隊,稅務負擔不單單落到了英國人自己頭上。
So, the colonists, who were supposed to enjoy their protection, would going to have to cough up their share of the money.
本該享受保護的殖民地居民,也被迫付出他們的份額。
And they'd do it through taxes. Taxation, the very thing that had triggered the British civil wars, would do so again, this time in America.
途徑便是稅收。而正是稅收曾觸發了英國內戰,這回又將在美洲重演。
The taxes may have been different, but the result would once again be disaster.
稅金可能不同了,但結果將再次成為災難。
What happened in America was really Round Two of those wars, the civil war of the British Empire,
美洲將是英國內戰的第二次輪回,
with the Hanoverians playing the part of the Stuarts, and the Americans the heirs of the revolutionaries -- of Cromwell and of William III, the inheritors of a true British liberty that had somehow got lost in its own motherland.
漢諾威王朝扮演著斯圖亞特王朝,美利堅人則繼承了革命家的衣缽--克倫威爾和威廉三世,在自己祖國已經迷失的真正英國式自由的繼承者。