Madison on the Constitutional Convention

Two years before George Washington became the first president of the United States, James Madison wrote to Thomas Jefferson about constitutional convention and the mood prior to publishing its conclusions. He wrote:

Nothing can exceed the universal anxiety for the event of the Meeting here. Reports and conjectures abound concerning the nature of the plan which is to be proposed. The public however is certainly in the dark with regard to it. The Convention is equally in the dark as to the reception wch. may be given to it on its publication. All the prepossessions are on the right side, but it may well be expected that certain characters will wage war against any reform whatever. My own idea is that the public mind will now or in a very little time receive any thing that promises stability to the public Councils & security to private rights, and that no regard ought to be had to local prejudices or temporary considerations. If the present moment be lost it is hard to say what may be our fate.

[Emphasis added]

Indeed, what would have been our fate?

The entire letter in which this quote appears is available here