diff --git a/00-declaration-of-individual-sovereignty.md b/00-declaration-of-individual-sovereignty.md
index 82d0b63..93702c0 100644
--- a/00-declaration-of-individual-sovereignty.md
+++ b/00-declaration-of-individual-sovereignty.md
@@ -4,8 +4,13 @@ As the founders of the Forerunning republic said, "_When in the Course of human
 which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of
 Reason entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation._"
 
-Existence exists and the act of grasping this implies two corollary axioms: that something exists which one perceives and that one exists possessing consciousness to perceive it. These two -- existence and consciousness -- are axioms humankind cannot escape; these two are the irreducible primaries implied in any action one undertakes, in any
-part of one's knowledge. Whatever one knows, the axioms remain the same: that it exists and that you know it. Moreover, to be is to be something, of a definite nature -- all existents are identities.
+We concur with those founders and follow their example by issuing this statement declaring our causes for separation:
+
+Whereas it is an axiom that that existence exists; and that the act of grasping this implies two corollary axioms: that something exists which one perceives and that one exists possessing consciousness to perceive it;
+
+And whereas these two -- existence and consciousness -- are axioms humankind cannot escape: these two are the irreducible primaries implied in any action one undertakes, in any part of one's knowledge.
+
+And whereas whatever one knows, the axioms remain the same: that it exists and that the subject does know it; and moreover, whereas to be is to be something, of a definite nature and all existents are identities:
 
 We who are present here, hold these axioms to be self-evident and self-reaffirming: that **Existence is Identity and Consciousness is Identification**.