Antiqued parchment document that really looks and feels old!
Although short, the Declaration is in four parts:
1) the Preamble explains the purpose of the document--to "declare the causes" that led to revolution; 2) the most familiar section ["We hold these truths to be self-evident"] outlines the philosophical basis for independence; 3) the third segment lists abuses by King George III; 4) the actual declaration repeats Lee's resolution and pledges "to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor."
Congress hoped the Declaration would rally support around the world.
What they could not know is the impact that it would continue to have centuries later. Abraham Lincoln said that he "never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence." Martin Luther King, Jr. often spoke of the Declaration in his passionate cries against racial discrimination Jefferson, said historian Dumas Malone, imparted a "quality of timelessness and universality to what might have been merely a national document."