"I give thefe Sxmis
for Utefoundiag sf a. Collegt, &l^^^£i>loiy>

\8^[,

REMARKS
ON TUE
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
&c. &c.

- REMARKS

THE UNITED STATES

AMERICA,

WITH REGARD TO THE ACTUAL STATE OF

EUROPE.

By HENRY DUHRING.

LONDON :
PUBLISHED BY W. SIMPKIN AND R. MARSHALL ;
C. G. SULPKE, AMSTERDAM; and
W. JACKSON, NEW YORK.
1833.

fcgf.^3Zj}

W. WILSON, FKINTER, 57, SKINNER-STREET, LONDON.

PREFACE.

While the Americans are painted in most
diverging- colours; while by some^ indi
viduals the institutions of the United
States are recommended to the Europeans
as the only political system worthy of
their imitation, and by others the sta
biUty of these institutions, even in Ame
rica, is much doubted ; and while annu
ally so large a number of Europeans flock
to America as to a land of golden promise,
the Author of the following Reraarks will,
he hopes, not be deemed guilty of vanity
or presumption, when, under these cir
cumstances, he has thought it no useless

PREFACK.

task to sift the truth from falsehood ; and,
by submitting those difFerent opinions
and representations to the stern test of
reason, to lift the veil of mystery.
September 1832.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
Page
Will the North American Union last ?  I

CHAPTER II.
Examination of an Opinion somewhat preva
lent in the Mother Country, that the want
of an Established Church has produced want
of Religion in the United States  27
CHAPTER HI.
Ou Washington, and his projected Monument in
the City of Washington  51
CHAPTER IV.
Some Reraarks regarding a Statement made by
a very popular English Writer, that " the
Women do not enjoy in the United States
that Station in Society which has been allotted
to them elsewhere"  61

viii CONTENTS.
CHAPTER V. Page
On Education, and its Connexion with Civil and
Political Institutions  87
CHAPTER VI.
On Emigration  147
CHAPTER VII.
Some Remarks on Agriculture, and the Advan
tages which an Agriculturist, emigrating to
the United States, has to expect there  169
CHAPTER VIII.
On the Golden Age  193"

CHAPTER I.
MILL THE NORTH AMERICAN UNION LAST ?

CHAPTER I.
" Les gouTememeno sont des edifices politiques : leur duree,
leur solidite, dependent des bases sur lesquelles ils leposent ;
et comme tous lesmonumens elevfes par les mains <ies hommes,
ils s'ecroulent, quelque soit leur apparence, si les bases ne re-
pondent pas a leur charge, et ne sont appuyees elles mSmes
sur un terrain ferme et stable.'' GnAssr.
" Young nations, like young children, seem destined to endure
certain diseases before their constitution can be said to be
well established. So also must they encounter a great variety
of experience, before they can become wise." Paulding.

What is a government, or, more properly^
what is a free, a constitutional government,
but a power constituted for the promotion
of mutual intercourse, pi'otection, and hap
piness, and regulated or circumscribed by
certain pacts laid down for that purpose?
Frederick the Great has said : — " Ne faudrait
il pas ^tre en demence pour se figurer, que
les hommes ont dit k un homme leur sem
blable : nous vous elevons au dessus de
nous, parceque nous aimons I'esclavage, et
nous vous donnons la puisance de diriger

nos pensdes h votre volonte ? lis ont dit
au contraire : nous avons besoin de vous
pour maintenir les lois auxquelles nous vou-
lons obeir, pour nous gouverner sagement,
pour nous defendre, au reste nous exigeons
de vous que vous respectiez notre liberte."
Of similar constituted governments there
are in the United States of America as many
as there are states ; every state having its
own, modified according to the local circum
stances, and the peculiar wants of its inha
bitants ; and with regard to its own, or its
domestic concerns, totally independent, in all
the tliree branches of government — the legis
lative, the executive, and the judiciary. Be
sides these state governments, the Americans
have also their federal government. This
is a compact entered into by all the States
of the Union ; according to whicb, every
state has yielded some of its powers to a su
perior power, instituted by the difFerent
states collectively, for the regulation and
manageraent of their combined interests ; as,
the protection of their trade, internal as well
as external — the integrity of tbeir respective
boundaries — their relations with foreign
powers, and with each other— and further,
whatever may concern the welfare of the
whole Union.

If time and experience should have proved,
as I think they have, that these different com
pacts suit the different States, and that also
the federal government does not, nor can, at
least for any length of time, misuse its dele
gated rights, or exercise them to the preju
dice of one or more of the different states of
which the Union is composed, what reason
may we then have to doubt the stability of the
Union ? And let us suppose that those con
tracts above alluded to, were found defective,
what prevents the Americans to alter them,
witliout thereby disturbing the whole Union ?
Have not the Americans, sepai-ately and col
lectively, the power to do so ? Does not the
history of the United States prove that many
such revisions of their constitutions have al
ready taken place without the least emotion
or embarrassment ? To presume the diffei'ent
governments of tbe Union perfect, or lasting
through ages which are still to come, would
be ridiculous. All that possibly can be re
quired from such institutions is, that they go
hand in hand with the public feeling and in
terest : the character, the customs, and the
genius of that nation, which is to be ruled by
them. In the United States of America all au-
th<)rity being delegated by the people, every

6
authority must bear the character of the
people, or it would not be borne.
What governments, also, have lasted the
longest, or proved the most respected and the
most fruitful — those that were egotistical, do
mineering, and tyrannical, or those that, by
consulting the true interest, the character, the
intellectual station, and the local wants of the
nations, have modified their government sys
tem ? How long did the mighty dynasty of
Alexander exist ? How long that not less
mighty one of Napoleon ? By these govern
ments were the characters and wishes of the
different nations, that by force had become un
willing members of so unnatural an empire,
ever consulted, ever fostered ? Were not, on
the contrary, the national feelings, rights, or
predilections of these nations, disregarded,
msulted, and even trampled upon ? Fortu
nately for mankind, that degrading period,
when the rulers of nations were allowed to
deal with their fellowmen as with beasts of
burden, and to exchange them according
to their own convenience or pleasure, has
gone by-
Governments, too dull and too uniform,
may also be compared to standing waters,
which, after a time, corrupt. Do we not ob-

serve a perpetual change in all the innume
rable surrounding objects ? Is any creature,
any plant, nay, the grain of sand we tread
on, exempted from it ? Would it, therefore,
not be idle to suppose human institutions
more stable ? Do not the principles which
constitute the groundwork of these institu
tions depend on the minds that first con
ceived them ? If, however, these minds have
become enlarged, or died away, and yielded the
place of authority to others ofa different stamp,
will not this change affect the institutions
themselves ? Have not all human attempts to
impede this change proved as vain as they
have been destructive ? Must we not ac
knowledge herein the hand or power of Pro
vidence? How beautiful is this idea ex
pressed in the following words of Pasthofer : —
" Ne maudissons point les peuples. Ils sont
les instrumens d'un pouvoir supreme ; soit
qu'ils renversent les digues des lois, solt
qu'ils se r^pandent comme des torrens de
lave sur des pays fertiles, ou se jettent sur les
paisibles cabanes, ou qu'aveugles dans leur
servile obeissance, ils portent, au moindrie
signal d'un conquerant, la devastation sur le
globe entier. La nation Frangaise a ete
pour le monde moral ce que sont pour le
monde physique les grands moyens de fer-

mentation. La matl^re qui fermente se cla-
rifiera; la vapeur empoisonn6e deviendra
de I'ether pur, et de belles formes sortlront
du sediment. Telle est la loi de la nature,
et la destination de I'esp^ce humaine est lc
developpement de toutes ses facultes, non
le repos ou I'inerte jouissance ; et cette desti
nation elle I'atteindi'a, dussent toutes les
nations et toutes les puissances de la terre
se conjurer contre elle." — And is this idea
not further elucidated and confirmed by the
following words of a man so enlightened as
Herder : — " Das Mashienenwerk der Revo-
lutionen irret mich nicht mehr ; es ist un-
serm Geschlecht so nbthig wie dem Strom
seine Wogen. Immer verjungt in neuen
Gestalten bliihet der Genius der Humanitat
auf, und niehet in Volkern, Generationen und
Geschlechtern weiter."
To expect, likewise, that a constitution
when first established will directly suit the
interests and habits of every one, or will give
no reason to partial commotions or to party
spirit, would be demanding something that
always has been, and ever will be, beyond
human capability. Ofthe respective contracts,
according to which the different States of the
Union are governed, some at least certainly do,
as yet, leave wishes unsettled ; but no doubt

9
these imperfections will, in the course of time
and experience, be removed. The federal go
vernment will likewise, I think, require to be
altered, when a more dense population, and
with it civilization, shall have extended over
all those virgin forests which still abound in
this immense empire. And if it should be no
presumption in the autlior of these remarks
to utter an idea about it, then he might be in
clined to believe that, out of a supercilious
fear for their person.al privileges, the Ame
ricans in general do trust too little power to
those whom they invest with office. It seems
to the writer that the members of the respec
tive governments, at least in some States of
the Union, are too dependent on their con
stituents, and are often removed from office
when they have just learned to perform it
well. it may also be questioned whether these
too often repeated changes of the delegates of
the people, have not given too much occasion
to the renewal of those passions which are in
separable from all popular elections ? Is it
not to be dreaded, that thereby a great num
ber of citizens will learn to look on these
scenes of contest either with disgust or in
difference ? Would not, however, in this
case, corruptions and intrigues be favoured ?
b2

10
By these annually renewed elections, are not
men taken too often from their different avo
cations ? Does it not follow that the domestic
habits, so necessary for the prosperity of every
family, are too much disturbed ? A greater
degree of experience, a greater mutual con
fidence between the people and their dele
gates, will in time produce, I should think, a
prolongation of that period for which the go
vernment members of some States are actu
ally elected. The Americans will probably
conceive, that though it certainly is for them
of the greatest consequence to guard them
selves against all arbitrary acts of their office
bearers, it is of no less importance to their
well-being always to have at the head of their
affairs men, not only of some independence
and character, but also of tried judgment and
experience. To devise a safe and pi'actical
combination of these two objects, or to guard
themselves against both evils — arbitrary
power, and want of energy, or weakness —
without too much increasing or impairing the
necessary power of their respective govern
ments, is, perhaps, the most difiicult task
which the Americans have been called upon
to perform.
It also appears that the right of suffrage in
the United States has been too far extended.

11
When the actual dfegree of general indepen
dence shall have become somewhat affected
by an increase of population; the Americans
will find it necessary to modify this right ; to
guard themselves against that influence which
talented and wealthy, but selfish and ambi
tious characters, under similar circumstances,
but too often know how to gain and to wield
over more dependent and less enlightened
minds. That, however, the Union of North America
is already making rapid strides towai^ds its
dissolution, which is so often asserted in
Europe, is an opinion contrary to my judg
ment. Are not the different States which
compose the Union linked together by the
most intimate connexions ; as, a common lan
guage ; a common general character ; the
self-sufficing variety and luxuriance of their
soil ; their unbounded collective resources ;
the general activity, intelligence, and enter
prising spirit, of their inhabitants ; an unfet
tered interior commerce ; the fondest recol
lections, and the happiest prospects ; in short,
by the strongest tie which ever kept a con
federation together — their mutual interest ?
That this mutual interest of late has been
disturbed, by some restraints laid by the fede
ral government on the foreign trade, is a fact

12
of public notoriety. The right of the federal
government to impose those I'estraints on
foreign commerce, and to impose taxes beyond
what is deemed necessary for the purpose of a
national revenue, has not only been doubted,
but openly denied. Whether, however, this
opinion can be fully justified, I am rather
inclined to doubt. The question is here not
so much a question of revenue as of commerce;
or, in other words, the federal government
seems to have acted in this case, not so much
in virtue of its power to impose taxes for the
purpose of a revenue, as in virtue of its autho
rity to regulate and to protect commerce.
The said government seems to have acted in
accordance to that principle, neither by reason
nor by experience in the maxim, that the
adoption of a restrictive policy, by one or
more nations, makes it the interest of others
to countervail those foreign regulations by
reciprocating those restrictions. The chief
question in the given case certainly is, whether
by those commercial regulations, commonly
called the tariff, the general interest of all the
States, which to protect and to foster is the
constitutional and only avowed object of the
federal government, has not been more
destroyed than protected. If the enemies of
the tariff should be able to prove that this

13
tariff has been oppressive, unequal in its ope
rations, and really detrimental to the interest
and to the commerce ofthe whole Union— or
that the participation in the benefits and in
the burthens of the Union, has thereby indi
rectly been rendered unequal, with regard to
all the States — then the true object of the
federal government has thereby not been
attained, and the tariff must be altered. After
such a proof, any longer to enforce these
commercial restrictions would be acting
against the spirit of the confederation, or
against those concessions which were made
by the several independent States, when for
their general welfare, by way of compromise,
they instituted the federal government. This
federal government does not fulfil its duties,
when it does not equally protect the rights
and interests of all the States : it always, more
or less, steps out of its proper province, when,
to relieve the inhabitants of some States that
by false or untimely speculations may have
entangled themselves in difficulties, it enforces
commercial restrictions, which do not only
deeply affect the well-being of other States,
but which also, by alienating from each other
the mutual affections of the Americans, are
calculated to endanger the harmony of the
Union.

14
To prevent the further spreading of the
existing seeds of discord, and to regulate to
the satisfaction of all the States those mutual
concessions which may be deemed of absolute
necessity for the prosperity of some branches
of industry, and which an independent nation
always ought to cultivate, or on which too
great a number of individuals depend already
for their maintenance, this is of the greatest
consequence for the federal government of
the United States. It is obvious, however,
that in the regulation of these conflicting
interests the said government cannot proceed
with too much caution.
Though at present it certainly would be
connected with many and great difficultiesj
yet I entertain the strongest hope that, sooner
or later, the government of the United States
will gradually introdtice into practice the
principles of free trade. No nation ever was
in circumstances more propitious for such an
act than the American. The debt of the
United States is to be paid off within a very
short lapse of time ; and the annual national
revenue promises to be beyond the wants of
the federal government. Taxes of small amount
will therefore be necessary for the future, to
raise by their meansa sufficient revenue ; and
it would perhaps be better if for this purpose

15
another source were adopted. The Americans
have so far surpassed all other nations in free
institutions, that it hcis become their bounden
duty also, to be the first of all nations that
shall fully bring into practice the principles
offree trade. This is a debt which they owe
to mankind and to themselves.
As all branches of human industry work
together to a mutual benefit, and jointly co -
operate in the prosperity of each, so also will
the different countries of the globe best in
crease their own wealth when they freely
exchange the produce of their respective in
dustry. Restrictive laws always intei'fere
with the natural right of every citizen in ap^
plying his mental and bodily energy to such
purposes as he may think most conducive to
his own iuterest. In all industrious pursuits
the partial protection of one generally means
the oppression of another. By protecting one
labourer by bounty, the government deprives
others of their just rewards ; or, in the false
opinion to do good, it takes money from the
pocket of one man to give it to another.
The exports of a nation cannot prosper
without importation ; both grow out of each
other : so that we cannot reduce imports with
out also reducing some branches of exports.
If, however, as above stated, the prosperity

16
of individuals is best secured by allowing them
to follow their own inclination in the different
modes of employing their stock of industry,
should this same principle be less true with
regard to large communities ? — What Is a na
tion but a society of individuals ?
Mr. Cullen justly remarks, " that if free
dom of commerce was established, and no
monopolies existed, those commercial revul
sions which occasion so much distress in the
manufacturing districts, by throwing out of
employment a great number of workmen,
would but seldom, if ever, happen ; or be of
short duration, and far less disastrous than
they have often been." The rates of profit of
manufacturers and merchants would then also
be less uncertain, or only liable to those
changes which are common to the whole
productive industry of the couutry.
The restrictive policy of a nation may affect
the interest of another nation, by excluding
her from an accustomed and a profitable
market ; but is a retaliatory system calculated
to diminish the evil ? Is it, on the contrary, not
calculated to increase it ? An American, for
instance, who has invested his capital in the
production of grain, may suffer in his interest
by the corn laws of Grcat Britain ; but are
his sufferings increased or diminished by a

1?
retaliation? — are they not increased? Me
suffered by being partially excluded from a
good market ; but he doubly suffers by im
posing upon himself an additional sacrifice,
in laying taxes on English manufactures,
which to him are of an indispensable neces
sity, and which he can no where else procure
at the expense of so small a portion of his
stock or labour. If retaliation did not affect
home production and consumption, then it
might be just : in all cases, however, where
this happens, it will bvit increase the evil ;
and the evil does not stop here. Such a re
strictive policy is also calculated to produce a
displacement of capital from its natural chan
nel, by inducing men to establish manufac
tures that would afford no reasonable profits,
if such a prohibitive system was not in exist
ence. These manufactures being founded on
an artificial basis, are therefore but a very
precarious branch of industry ; and exposed
lo all the vicissitudes of such an artificial
existence. As in Europe such an artificial
system, which dates from a period when poli
tical economy was but little understood, has
been followed by almost all nations for cen-
turies,the interest of the greatest number of
industrious classes is so intimately connected
with it, that it would lead to the greatest pos-

1-8-
sible confusion and misery if this system, false
as it is, were given up, and in its stead the
principles of free trade were established.
But if ever freedom of commerce should be
established amongst all nations — if so simple
an act of common reason should be no vi
sionary dream — then the respective interests
of all nations would become thereby so in
terwoven, the bonds of mutual dependence
and friendship would thereby be so much
strengthened, that men but very seldom, if
ever, would be exposed to the horrors of war;
which, if all nations were equally enlightened,
and all men equally blessed with the divine.
gift of reason, would be a disgrace to man
kind. The AmericanSj with regard to a restrictive
policy, are in circumstances very different
from those of the Europeans. The United
States form a young, and in all other respects
free country, abounding in numerous re
sources, and where, if any sort of industry
should cease to be profitable, the capital in
vested in it may far easier be withdrawn than
in Europe. The evil occasioned by a restric
tive policy in America may perhaps still be
cured by' a wise system, and gradual change
of policy. The Americans, by leaving all
experiments, whether a manufacture will yield

19
profit or loss to individual enterprise, intelli
gence, and capital, would but act in strict
conformity to the spirit of their constitution,
framed for the equal protection of all the
States. The federal government, so eminently
popular and enlightened, sooner or later will
be forced, I think, to adhere to these princi
ples; and when thereby the well-founded
cause of the existing international animosities
shall have been removed, then it will be dif
ficult to persuade me that the Union is any
longer in danger. The benefits of this Union
to the Americans in general, are however al
ready so great, that the disaffected members
would be very unwise and unjust if they did
not bear with resignation the actual existing
differences in the equal division of the bur
dens and profits of the whole nation, till, by
the irresistible force of reason, they will have
earried the point in question, and be as un
fettered in their foreign commercial transact
tions, so far as this will depend on them, as
they actually are with regard to their internal
commerce. All the fruits of those distinguished talents.
which conducted the Americans to their ele
vated station — all those advantages which
they derive from the finest situation and com
bination which on eai'th are to be met with — i

20
Would be destroyed by a dissolution of the
Union. Look on the map of the United
States 1 what part of them would you separate
from the others, without more or less disturb
ing the prosperity, the wealth, the influence,
and the happiness of the whole ? Wherefrom
would these States derive that necessary pro
tection for their far extending commerce, but
from their united naval power ? Wherefore
were expended fifteen millions of dollars to
France for Louisiana ? — wherefore five other
millions for Florida ? Was it to create new
custom-house offices ; or was it not to remove
them to the utmost and natural boundaries of
the Union ? Are those vexations to which a
merchant is exposed while carrying his goods
along the rivers and roads of divided Germany,
of so enviable a nature as to be thought wor
thy of imitation by a free and an enlightened
people ? Should the Americans already have
forgotten the difficulties under which their
commerce laboured after the peace of 1/85,
before its regulation had been entrusted to the
federal government ? How boundless are not
at present the markets for every industrious
American, in whatsoever State of the Union
he may have fixed the abode of his industry ?
What country is connected by so manj', so easy,
and such natural interior communications ?

21
And are not these natural and artificial bonds
of the Union yearly increased, or brought to
a greater degree of perfection ? What was
New Orleans under the Spanish government ?
— a swampy village ! What is it now ? — after
New York, the first and most important mer
cantile city of the whole Union. The Ame
ricans united may defy all other nations, — se
parated, they are nothing 1 If, therefore, it
should be permitted to suppose, as 1 think it
is, that a sound judgment with regard to its
true interest does or ultimately will prevail
with a nation that perhaps excels all other
nations in common sense — if one may also
suppose that on such a nation the powers and
intrigues of personal ambition or party spirit
never will be permitted, at least for any length
of time, to exercise their baneful sway — then
one may also entertain the opinion, I think,
that the Union of North America will not be
disturbed. Further : does the national character of the
Americans justify the apprehensions of those
who predict a dissolution of the Union, or a
change of government in the United States ?
Do we meet in America with that turbulent
spirit, that discontent, that ignorance, that
fanaticism, we have observed nearer home ?
Does not a high degree of independence, of

22
personal confidence and dignity, form vei'y
conspicuous parts of the American character ?
Do we not find the feelings of liberty so
strongly identified with the soul and body of
¦the American people, that we might pretend
as well to extinguish the latter as the former ?
Does a nation, wherein these principles so
generally .prevail, where they are almost ira
bibed with the mother's milk — does a nation,
whereof every citizen is jealous, perhaps to a
fault, of his personal rights and privileges —
does such a nation, I say, give us any reason
to suppose that it will forget so far its real
welfare ; that it will sacrifice to those insti
gators who preach separation and disunion,
its dearest feelings, its strongest interest, nay,
its very existence ? Not the least, I pre
sume. " The cement of this Union is the heart blood of every Ame-
lican." Jeffehson.
Where also do we meet in the United
States with the elements of an hereditary mo
narchy? Where with the elements of a
powerful, a firm, a tolerated aristocracy ?
With what justice, however, do we predict
the establishment of powers, where the ele
ments thereof are no where to be found ?
Cunningham has said, — " In matter of

23
opinion, man is like a pig ; if you atterapt to
force him on he only retrogrades from the
point you wish to urge him to, and you must
coax him along quietly, if you are really se
rious in attaining your object, or else drive
him onwards by making him believe the re
verse is the object you have in view." Now
I shall confess myself, as having been much
mistaken with regard to the true character of
the Araericans, unless they prove themselves,
in this sense of the word, to be the most
obstinate sort of pigs that ever formed a part
of this useful family of grunters ; and in par
ticular so, whenever instigators may attempt
to lead them to a point in so direct an oppo
sition to their individual as well as to their
general interest, as the separation of their
Union. When that great work, national indepen
dence, had been achieved, and before the
confederation had been properly cemented,
there certainly were some popular commo
tions, — the fruits of roused passions, party
spirit, and of some vague, indefinite, or disap
pointed views and expectations ; commotions
that for a short time kept the country in agi
tation, as the waves of the sea continue to
run high after the storm has subsided; but
wei'e not these disturbances checked without

24
the sacrifice of a single drop of blood ? That
" safety-valve," a term so often app'' d to the
great extent of still unlocated land, and the
numerous resources which in America are
still at the command of every one, has con
tributed much, without doubt, to diminish
this agitation ; but may we also not ascribe
this, with much justice, to the national cha
racter ?
To deny all local animosities, prejudices, or
party spirit, in America, would be painting
the Americans like angels, and prove the
greatest ignorance of their history, their in
stitutions, and of human nature in general.
But when, as we have seen, the recent planted
tree, while isolated and unprotected, except
by its intrinsic vigour and the peculiar fa
vourable constitution of its soil, brave the
fury of the storm, will the oak, after having
spread its root far asunder, be uprooted by it ?
It is but too true what Addison says- — " The
natural love which the gross of mankind have
for the constitution of their fathers is very
great. A man that is not enlightened by
travel or reflection grows as fond of arbitrary
power, to which he has been used from his
infancy, as of cold climates or barren coun
tries, in which he jiias been born and bred.
Besides, there is a kind of sluggish resignation

25
as well as poorness and degeneracy of spirit
in a stat; oi slavery, that we meet with but
very few who will be at the pains or danger
of recovering themselves out of it." But
have the Americans been used to arbitrary
power ? Have they been born and bred
under arbitrary rules of government ? Do
we meet amongst them with that sluggish
resignation, that poorness and degeneracy of
spirit ? Is their actual government not
founded upon reason ? Is, perhaps, this rea
son less strong or powerful than habit, to
maintain its once obtained rights > No ! the
power of reason is immense, is irresistible,
wheresoever it dares to show itself. And do
the institutions of tbe United States place any
bar against the free intercourse of this our
better judgment ?
What united the different branches of the
German nation into one whole body ? — what
inspired the Prussians, the Bavarians, the
Hanoverians, and others, with the same feel
ing, the same enthusiasm, with the same pa
triotism ? — what animated them with the same
courage, with an entire forgetfulness of all
local and personal affairs, when struggling
against a powerful enemy, but their roused
spirit — their keen perceptloi of long-suffered
Avrong and humiliation ? Will, then, citizens,
c

26
who from their very infancy have breathed the
air of freedom, and felt its inspiring energy,
who by the experience of more than a cen
tury have learned to appreciate the great
influence of their civi! rights, their indepen
dence, and prosperity, will not such citizens
feel a deep interest in the preservation of their
actual independent and prosperous condition ?
Will they not have resolution enough to de
fend their rights, if necessary ? Yes, they
will !

CHAPTER II.
EXAMINATION OF AN OPINION SOMEWHAT PREVALENT
IN THE MOTHER COUNTRY, THAT THE WANT OF
AN ESTABLISHED CHURCH HAS PRODUCED WANT
or RELIGION IN THE UNItA STATES,

29

CHAPTER II.
" Nature is indeed the only temple worthy of Deity. There
is a mute eloquence in her smile, a majestic severity in her
frown, a divine charm in her harmony, a speechless energy in
her silence, a voice in her thunders, that no reflecting being
can resist. It is in the beautiful scenes and seasons that the
heart is deepest smitten with the power and goodness of Pro
vidence, and that the soul demonstrates its capacity for main
taining au existence independent of matter, by abstracting
itself ftom the body, and expatiating alone in the boundless
regions ofthe past and the future." Paulding.

" Sie (die Tugend) ist kein Wahlgesetz, das uns die Weisen
lehren ;
Sie ist des Himmel's Ruf, den nur die Herzen horen,
Ihr^innerlich Gefiihl beurtheilt jede That,
Wamt, billigt, mahnt, wehrt, und ist der Seele Rath,
Wer ihrem Winke folgt, wird niemals iinrecht wahlen." Gellert.

Where, on earth, did men ever meet with a
people or a congregation of human beings
without all traces, rational or profane, of re
ligion — without some kind of worship, direct
or symbolical, of one or more superior spirits,,
that were considered as the creator or the
creators, the bestower or the bestowers, the

30
preserver or the preservers, of all earthly and
spiritual blessings ; and to whom, in one
shape or other, prayers were addressed at
stated intervals, or in cases of momentary
need or distress ? Where do we meet with a
large and prosperous community without
observing at the same time strong feelings of
morality generally diffused amongst its mem
bers ? Can independence of thought — the
free exercise of mental and bodily energy —
submission to established laws — security of
property — can these elements of prosperity
any where subsist, without a high degree of
intellectual and virtuous feeling ?
The Creator of the universe — the Founder of
those sublime laws we see established in na
ture — the Oranipotent Ruler of us all, and of
every thing on earth and in heaven— has, to
guide us frora evil, instilled in our hearts a
feeling of right and wrong, which only by a
long course of vicious life, and by the most
unfavourable external circumstances, can be
smothered, or totally worn out. This " voice
of God," this feeling of right and wrong, may,
without doubt, by culture, be brought to a
greater degree of perfection ; but the exist
ence of such an innate feeling we cannot
deny. This heart's instinct of ours, and the
love and reverence of its Giver, as likewise

31
the hope for a superior existence after thia
life, are the fundamentals of religion. To
improve these feelings of right and wrong,
to confirm this love and reverence of the
goodness and power of Providence, and to
strengthen that belief in a future remu
nerating existence, is, if we consider their
importance for the happiness of mankind, one
of the noblest objects of philosophy. Those
who act otherwise, or who, by the spreading
of doubts and false reasoning, atterapt to
destroy or to. weaken in us this inward mo
nitor, this love and reverence of God, and
this prospect of a better world, are under-
raining the chief source, not only of individual
happiness, but also of every state and com
munity whereof religion forms one of the
most essential parts. The true mission of a
philosopher is to solve the various probleras
which have been advanced in different times
and by different minds, and to elicit the
truth from the various disguises and fallacies
by which it is concealed ; but not to use those
reasoning powers with which we have been
gifted by Providence, for destroying the foun
dations of human society and happiness ; or for
the overthrow of those religious maxims
which in all ages and countries have proved

32
the best support and solace of mankind;
Wollaston correctly observes : — " Unless
there is a future state, which implies the
most extended of all schemes of Providence,
the pleasures of brUtes, though but sensual,
are more complete — they go wholly into
thera — their sufferings are not heightened
by reflection — they are not perplexed with
cares of families and posterity — are not
anxious about a future state — have no disap
pointments — and, at last, some sudden and
unforeseen blow finishes them, before they
ever knew they were mortal."
In every community where,- by whatsoever
events, this our better self, these moral habits
and feelings, are suppressed, or not allowed to
exercise on us their natural benevolent in
fluence, there a total disorganization of the
whole commonwealth soon raust follow. These
moral principles are of the uppermost neces
sity for the prosperity of every community;
They teach us our duties towards others and
ourselves ; they form our understanding, and
lead us to the true happiness of soul and
body. Where could we meet with security,
where with real liberty, without them ? All
ties of farailies and friendships, like those of
larger coramunities, would be broken, because

33
all mutual confidence would have vanished ;
nor could that superior blessing, peace of
mind, any longer be enjoyed.
That governments, considering the import
ance of these moral or virtuous feelings and
habits for the prosperity and secui'ity of man-i
kind, have always been anxious to establish
and to promote one or more particular man
ners of worshipping God, is very natural;
nor is it strange to me, that in less enlightened
ages, and still in less enlightened parts of the
globe, governments thought, or still think, it
their duty to enforce a particular kind of
jjublic worship. But has true religion by
these measures really been propagated ? Can
you, by enforcing a particular sort of -public
worship, enforce true religious feelings, true
moral or virtuous acts ? Has not experience
proved how fruitless governments have em
ployed tbe sword in religious controversy;
and how vain their cares have been to watch
with a rigid eye over orthodoxy of one kind
or other ? Have not the most unworthy, the
most unreasonable, not to say the most ridi
culous disputes, been carried on under the
pretext of religious controversies ? Has it
not occurred that a garb, a gesture, nay, a
metaphysical or grammatical distinction, vvhen
rendered important by the disputes of theolo-
c 2

34
gians, and the zeal of the magistrates, have not
these proved sufficient to destroy the unity of
a church, and even the peace of society ?
The seat of true religion is the heart, where
no power can reach, where no eye can scru
tinize. Those same thoughts, those same
fears, those same hopes in the all-powerful
Director of events, which in moments of the
utmost need and danger pervade every breast
of a medley crowd, professing all sorts of reli
gion, \^hat do they pi'ove but a common
source ? And this common source, what part
of us can it be ? Our mind, differing almost
in every individual ? No ! this common
source is our heart, or that divine emanation
which cannot entirely be perverted either by
customs the most absurd, by climates the most
barren, or by forms of worship the most un
reasonable. Whether the outward skin of
man be white, red, or black, the heart that
beats under it is guided nearly by the same
impulses, though modified according to the
cares bestowed on the mind's cultivation.
True religion is a gift from heaven ; it is a
subject above human legislation, and too
sacred and too venerable to be profaned by
the acts of moral governments, or by discusr
sions in a popular assembly. You may regu
late by law the manner of public worship.

35

but true religion does not consist in public
worship alone. This latter serves to cultivate,
to encourage it; in itself, however, it is
nothing more than an outward manifestation
of religious sentiments, whereof the true na
ture or depth is unfathomable for the huraan
eye. True religion consists in the love and re
verence of that perfect wisdom and goodness
which regulated the universe ; and is exem
plified in the will and act to imitate that per
fection, as far as human beings are capable,
and as much as our own individual position
perraits. And the Holy Scriptures teach us to
raanifest our belief, not so rauch by adopting
certain religious opinions, or forms of wor
ship, as by a true and active love of God and
of our fellow men.
To pretend that in the United States pf
America the want of an established church
has produced want of religion, is, if my own
judgment does not mislead me, not only
false, but shews a misconception of religion
itself. What is a church, but a society of men
agreeing in opinion, and who meet together
in search of mutual instruction and devo
tion to the Supreme Being ? What is an
established church, but a civil institution for
the same purpose j or, in other words, for

36
disseminating morality and religion among
the people ? Are they without those societies
of men, agreeing in opinion, and meeting
together in search of mutual instruction and
devotion to the Supreme Being ? Through
out the United States, wheresoever circura
stances have permitted their institution, sueh
are to be found. Are those societies left with
out control or wholesome regulation ? No !
Have the Americans no general conventions,
no presbyteries, no synods, or synodical meet
ings, and other institutions of that kind?
They have 1 And is it not in the United
States of America where every one is allowed
to worship God according to his own intel
lectual and physical station, and where, for
the first time, it has been fully proved that
refined religion, though unsupported by au
thority, the wealth of an establishment, or by
any other aid except its own dignity and use
fulness, it will not only maintain its ground,
but prosper ? Of what consequence is it, for
the promotion of true religious principles,
that all the externals of religion are duly or
even ostentatiously observed, when the hearts
and rainds of the people remain unaffected or
anmoved ; or vvhen the raany follow but me
chanically a prescribed course, which perhaps
they neither understand or approve, and

37
therefore cannot properly appreciate and
cultivate ? —
" Words without thoughts never to heaven go.''
Shakspeare.
I am entirely misconceived, if any one
should suppose in me an intention to lower
the influence on the people in general of a
well-regulated public worship. It teaches
those to pray, who, not being accustomed to
think, cannot of themselves pray with judg
raent. It teaches mankind to consider each
other as members of one community, and it
awakens our mutual regard and benevolence.
There are some who, if religious sentiraents
have not already taken deep root in their
minds, are unable to keep up in silence and
solitude an intercourse of which they are
only reminded by regulated periods, or by
external impressing circumstances. It is
truly remarked by Mr. Paulding, in his "Let
ters from the South" — "Nothing can more
completely shew the importance of religion,
not only to the raorals, but the raanners of
the great raass of mankind, than the contrast
afforded by a village where there is a regular
service every Sabbath-day, and one where
there is none. In the former you see a dif
ferent style of manners entirely. Instead of

38
lounging at a tavern, dirty and unshaven, the
men are seen decently dressed and shaved, for
the purpose of going to church, and the
women exhibiting an air of neatness quite
attractive. Whether they go to church to
pray or pass their time, to see the neighbours
and be seen, or to shew off their Sunday clothes,
it keeps thera frora misusing the Sabbath, and
polluting the periods of rest and relaxation, by
practices either injurious to themselves or
disagreeable to society. Whoever has become
acquainted with the nature of man, first by
his own experience, and next by an observa
tion of others, must be fully convinced of the
importance of giving him amusements that
are not vicious, and raodes of relaxation that
are innocent. 'All work and no play raakes
Jack a dull boy;' so does it raake hini a dull
aind stupid man. Men, in truth, cannot ahvays
be employed, and those that are unable to
supply the tedium of bodily inertness by the
exercise of mind, will, I say, amuse them
selves in some way or other. If you afford
them the means of attending church on the
Sabbath, the raost dangerous day of the week,
because a day of idleness, whatever be their
motives for going there, both their morals
and their manners will be softened, by having
some object for decency in dress and behaviour.

39
and something salutary to attract them in the
dangerous interregnum of a day of leisure."
All that I contend for is, that the object of
public worship,'*ban be attained, and is attained
in the United States, without an established
church. " Public worship," to use the words of Mrs.
Barbauld, " is the public expression of homage
to the Sovereign of the Universe. It is that
tribute from men united in families, in towns,
in communities, which individually men owe
to their Maker. This public worship, as well
as every other practice, must stand on the
basis of utility and good sense, or it must not
stand at all ; and in the latter case it is imma
terial whether it is left to moulder like the
neglected ruin, or battered dovvn like the
formidable tower. It will stand upon this
basis, if it can be shewn to be agreeable to
our nature, sanctioned by universal practice,
countenanced by revealed religion, and that
its tendencies are favourable to the morals
and manners of mankind. There has never
existed a nation at all civilized which has not
had some organ by which to express this
homage — some language, rite, or symbol, by
which to make known their religious feelings.
These modes of worship were not all equally
rational, equally edifying, equally proper for

40
imitation ; they have varied, according as a
nation was more or less advanced in refinement
and decorum, more or less addicted to syra
bolical expression, and more or less conversant
with abstract ideas and metaphysical specu
lation. But whether the Deity is worshipped
in this way or the other, wherever men toge
ther perform a stated act as an expression of
horaage to their Maker, there is the essence
of public worship ; and public worship has
therefore this raark of being agreeable to the
nature of raan^ — that it has been found agree
able to the sense of mankind in all ages and
nations." As the national character of the Americans,
as their feelings and institutions, differ from
those of the general mass of Europeans, so
also must their manner of public worship
differ from that followed by the Europeans iu
general. That same independence we meet
with in their character — that same popularity
we meet with in all their institutions — will
also, as a matter of course, enter into their
manner of public worship ; because all regu
lations for public worship, like those regard
ing their olher institutions, must emanate
from their real authority— the people. If
unity of church and state is of a paramount
importance for the well-being of a nation,

41
then it is in the United States perfect ; he-
cause there, no collision between church and
state is possible; so long, at least, as both
emanate from the same authority — the people.
To accuse the Americans of want of religion,
where they observe public worship, though
in a different manner, yet as much and per
haps raore than in Europe, merely because
their own experience has induced them not to
allow their Congress to make laws for the es
tablishment of a national religion, is forming
a very erroneous judgment ; and while advo
cating the cause of freedom of religion, is
subversive of the end.
Certainly we do not, in the United States,
meet with those splendid temples which are
seen in some parts of Europe : but do these
splendid edifices form an unquestionable cri
terion of true piety and religion? You who
have travelled in different parts of the world —
you who have investigated and admired both
the far faraed beauties of nature and the supe
rior productions of huraan art and ingenuity —
speak I — was not your heart raore affected by
the living pictures of nature than by dead
heaps of stones, though raoulded in the raost
classical forms of antiquity ? Where, in general,
did you find more innocence, raore sincere and
virtuous dispositions — in the country or in the

42
towns ? Was it not in the former ? Can we,
the humble creatures of the Deity, pretend to
build for him a superior dwelling than he
has judged pi'oper to create for himself?
Where is a temple, made by human hands, to
be compared with nature ? Who can view
that connexion which in nature all objects
bear to each other, without thinking of that
part which he has to perforra himself? Who
can contemplate the face of nature, without
feeling religious eraotions ? Is not every
root, every plant, every beast, a work of the
Deity? Can you inhale that fragrance of
awakened nature, that very breath which
prolongs your existence, without thankful
ness to its Giver ? Have you never felt those
pure and heavenly eraotions witnessed in
every well constituted and well-cultivated
mind, by the imposing beauties of nature ; by
the contemplation of the glorious majesty of
heaven ? Have you never, when surrounded
by sublime mountainous scenes, felt the swell
ing of your heart — a superior fervour of
religion ? If not, I pity you 1
We see in the United States no ministers
of the gospel in splendid attire, or leading a
life of luxury ahd grandeur : but was such a
life their primitive destination ? Is this in
harmony with the doctrines, the life, and

43
the death of Christ, the founder of our reh
gion ? Is their kingdom of this world ? He
that cannot submit hiraself to privations is no
fit minister of the gospel. He who would
instruct others in submission to God's will, in
resignation to what Providence has thought
wise to decree for us, must follow his prirai
tive instructions, or he is no good divine. He
who pretends to teach others how to walk
with righteousness in a hurable way of life,
must practise the sarae himself That holy
spirit, that direction of the mind towards
another, a better world, which it is his duty
to infiise into the hearts of his fellow-men,
must first have penetrated hiraself.
In the United States the station of a cler
gyraan, though often connected with a hand
sorae incorae, is not however an object of
arabition, but that of doing good ; it offers no
worldly rewards to those who are unfit for it,
and who do not feel a real calling for so
sublime a career in life. Every appointed
clergyman must also live in his parish. He
cannot lead a life somewhat unspiritual in a
foreign capital or country, while a poor cu
rate, who gets for his labours perhaps not the
twentieth part of what the parishioners have
to pay for their religious instruction, is or
dered to perforra the local duties. Such a

44
state of things has no existence in the United
States, nor is it likely to last in the mother
country. Already have inquiries been re
peatedly urged, " whether the benefices of the
church are not many of them too splendid for
its true object ; and whether their tendency
is not rather to give the clergy secular than
spiritual views."
It has further been said, that the clergy
men of the United States are too dependent i
and this certainly is true, in so far as the
American clergymen greatly depend for the
continuance of their situation on their good
conduct, and on the favourable opinion of the
majority of their parishioners. That this ma
jority has in all cases proved itself to be cor
rect in this raatter, or that it has never de
prived of his situation a worthy clergyman, I
am far fi'ora asserting. But are the clergy,
belonging to the established church in Eng
land, as independent as sorae persons seem
disposed to believe ? It is stated in a late
number of the Christian Observer, — " Eccle
siastical preferment for the last hundred years
has been esteemed a bait and a reward, by
which the ministers of state are to keep the
aristocracy in good huraour." Is such policy
calculated to render the clergy independent ?
And are not the lower clergy also greatly de-

45
pendent for their livings on the bishops ?
Whether the American or the English policy
be the most likely to promote the principles
of true religion, further experience sooner or
later will teach us. If, however, it should be
permitted to judge this question according to
events of a very recent date, then what we
have seen happen in the month of May of the
preceding year certainly does not plead much
in favour of that policy which is followed in
the raother country. For who can maintain,
that the election at Cambridge, and more re
cently the conduct ofthe bishops in the House
of Lords, with regard to the Reform question,
has raised the clergy of the established church
in the general esteem of the English nation ?
To what truly laraentable discussions in the
public journal shas not this conduct given oc
casion ? That opposition to the feelings of so
great a portion of the nation, publicly avowed
ou both occasions by the raajority of the
clergy belonging to the established church, is
it calculated to promote the true interest of
this church, and indirectly of religion itself?
This clergy, and at this particular time, by
thus openly clinging to dictation aud worldly
dominion, which so little suits their proper
character and calling — by loudly professing
tbat they have no sympathy with the majority

46
of the people on the subject of reform — by
showing themselves decided friends of the
oligarchy, and bitter opposers to the correc
tion of abuses — have they not rendered them
selves unpopular ? And can they, by render
ing theraselves unpopular, proraote the true
spirit of Christianity ?
What was the duty of the English clergy in
this struggle, between so great a portion of
the people and the aristocracy of Great Bri
tain, but to preserve undirainished, by the
strictest irapartiality, that superior feeling and
benevolent influence which becomes their
high station ? When his Majesty, William
the Fourth himself, honestly and openly ac
knowledged the rights of his people, and
when his ministers used all the influence in
their power to save the country from a threat
ening revolution, what was, under such cir
cumstances, tbe duty of the teachers of the
Christian faith ? Was it not their duty to
appease this hostile feeling ; to favour, even
by a sacrifice of their own worldly interest, an
arrangeraent beneficial to both parties ? Have
they fulfilled this duty ? Have they not, on
the contrary, thrown the weight of nearly all
their infiuenee into one scale ?
The American policy, by which the church
is prevented from becoming a legal and poli-

47
tical establishment, and according to which
the union of civil and religious duties in the
same person is considered as incompatible
with the profession of the ministei's of the
gospel ; is not this policy more in conformity
with the true and avowed object ofa church,
and with the proper station and duty of a
clergyman ?
The caUing of a clergyman, professing the
Christian faith, is ofa nature so superior, and
requires so much devotion and elevation of
character, that no one should undertake the
public discharge of its duties, and pretend to
teach and to enforce the doctrines ofthe purest
systera of morality, benevolence, meekness,
indulgence, and philanthropy, that was ever
presented to mankind, before all his faculties
have had ftill time, not only to develop thera ¦
selves, but also to be enlightened and con
firmed by experience ; by the knowledge of
the human heart and raind ; and the season of
passions passed away ; and left him a perfect
master of his own actions. That mass of
knowledge required for a man who intends to
conduct others in their moral, and, more or
less, also in their worldly concerns, is not the
fruit of a few years spent at an University or
in a seminary. " How rauch cant and seve
rity," to use the just though forcible words of

48
Paulding, " do the beardless apostles of the
present day not impose upon us. In their
zeal to put down the innocent amusements of
life, they seem to forget that vice, and not
amusement, is the proper object of pulpit
criticism. It is curious, as it is true, that
among our aged pastors, whose years confer
authority, whose whitened locks and blameless
lives, and long-established character, give thera
a right to speak with all the authority of ex
perience and virtue, we find religion repre
sented in the beautiful and alluring garb of
chaste and innocent vivacity. As drawn by
their pencils, she enjoins no stripes or sac-
cloth, nor calls for any sacrifices at her shrine
but those of vice and iramorality : but our
beardless youth, when first they essay their
powers frora the pulpit, appear to think they
must signalize themselves by some new and
stricter principles, than their liberal and vir
tuous predecessors thought sufficient to the
welfare of mankind, here and hereafter. Ex
perience has long since taught these aged
pastors that mankind must have amusements,
or they will indulge vices ; that by rendering
the yoke of religion too heavy, it was apt to be
east away; and that overheated or over
acted zeal was a more dangerous enemy to the
church, in an enlightened age at least, than

49
even the most inflexible unbelief. The
younger race of preachers, on the contrary,
are heard to rail, with a sort of senseless im
petuosity, against all that adorns, embellishes,
and sweetens the leisure hours of an exist
ence which at best is but a succession of
labours. With an utter and monkish igno
rance of human nature, they think themselves
reforming it, by lopping away its fiowers ; and
with an arrogance, to which I feel too much
respect for their calling to apply the proper
epithet, they call down reprobation on the
heads of their aged parishioners, because they
have permitted their children to partake of
those amusements, and to visit those places
of polished recreation, heretofore considered
innocent."

CHAPTER III.
ON WASHINSTON, AND HIS PROJECTED MONUMENT
IN THE CITY OF WASHINGTON.

53

CHAPTER IIL
"The purest treasure mortal time affords'
Is spotless reputation ; that away.
Men are but gilded loam or painted clay.
A jewel in a ten times barr'd up chest,
Is a bold spirit in a loyal breast.
Mine honour is my life, both grown in one ;.-
Take honour from me, and my life is done." ShakspeXke.
" La gloire est un grand mot, mais quand elle depeuple les
hamaux, desole les campagnes ; quand elle arrache le fils du
sein de sa mere, separe deux tendres ^poux, et detruit I'avenir
des families ; quand la veuve, dans sa couche solitaire, croit en
vain presser I'objet qu'elle cherit, le protecteur que I'orphelin
reclame ; alors les maledictions assaillent ces conquerants in-
satiables, ces fleaux de I'humanite ; alors le laurier des con-
quotes n'est qu'une plante v^neneuse." Une Mere Franfaise.
What signify these stones ? They arte the
monument of Washington. The monument
of Washington ! A gilliflower in a gardener's
nursery ! Traveller, cast your eyes around !
Does not the name of this place, does not all-
you see, remind you ofthis illustrious name ? Is
it possible, that here the- name of Washington
can ever be forgotten? What is a niouu-

54
ment but gilded loara, or painted clay ?
Wherefore these stones ? Leave thera to the
vulgar great, whose farae is in want of such
common materials. Washington's true monu
ment is — "his spotless reputation." This
wants no coat of lime against the injuries of
time and season, nor will it ever want repair.
But if to the eyes of a grateful nation his
simple cave was wanting in outward show
and splendour, why not adorn it with all the
ornaraents that the arts are capable to afford ?
Can you disturb his venerable ashes ? Mourn
you may, ye shades of Mount Vernon I for the
treasure ye are threatened to lose. It is
yours ! Though you shaded not the infent ;
though you yielded no sport to the spirited
boy ; though it was, perhaps, not under you
that his soul was first instilled with that hea
venly fire which was to spread its glory over
both heraispheres; it was to you the full-
grown raan retired, after nuraberless fatigues
and cares, with still increasing delight;
in your secluded quietude he cultivated all
those unobtrusive, but not less glorious
virtues of a private citizen. Where are you,
guardian eagle ? Will you not desert your
charge ? Will not the bustle of a rising
town drive you into obscurity ? Friends,
permit me to share your mournful feelings !

55
But at whatsoever place these remains may
finally be preserved, it may safely be asserted
that no reflecting being will approach them
without a deep impression ; without that
wholesome self-investigation which checks
the growth of sordid passions, and prepares
the raind for noble and heroic eraulation.
Where do we meet with a character that
leads us to purer and sweeter reflections
than that which once aniraated this heap of
huraan ruins ? To what object, as an exam
ple, can a father lead his youthful son with
raore propriety ? What course of life may he
point out to him with less hesitation, than that
of this illustrious hero ? How often can we
enter upon a rainute investigation of the
character, the actions, and the raotives of men
who have been called great, without mistrust
ing that our enthusiasra may be changed into
indifference, or, perhaps, into contempt?
Those superior endowments, bestowed upon
them by our Creator, how seldom have they
been used for the benefit of mankind ! Has
that being who feels a divine spirit stir within
him — who, by the acuteness of his reasoning,
the fascination of his eloquence, the autho
rity or elevation of his station, may be enabled
to impose upon the judgment of others, hide
the deformity of a vicious action, render

56
deviation frora truth more subtle and insinu
ating, and lead the multitude captive at his
will — ^has that being no superior obligations,
no superior responsibilities ? Are his priu'-
ciples, are his feelings of right and wrong, as
indifferent to raankind as those of comraon
individuals >
If we reflect on that lasting influence which
the inspirations of genius have on the feel
ings and the actions of the raass of the
people ; if we consider how many ages some
tiraes raust pass before a false theory, set
forth by a commanding spirit, is overthrown ;
if we also reflect on the general inclination of
raen, to shelter theraselves under the cover of
an illustrious name ; then we must admit that
all men endowed with genius labour under
great responsibilities ; and that in all cases
where these superior minds cease to consider
whether the end at which they aim be lawful,
or worthy of their elevated character, the
finest faculties are abused, and becorae
poisonous to society.
The responsibility of those characters I
speak of is naturally much greater than that
of common raen, as they are responsible to
God not only for their own actions but also
for all those which have been committed by
their superior influence on others. But how

57
few men that history has called great, have
cared about this responsibility ! How few of
them have been impelled to those actions by
which their names have becorae iramortal, by
a real desire to benefit their country 1 That
patriotism, openly so rauch extolled, was it
not, secretly, often totally disregarded ? Am
bitious men in general, whatever their pro
fessions may be, have nothing in view but to
gratify their depraved passion, and look upon
their fellowmen but as the steps by which
they hope to mount to the summit of their
desires. Ambition, indeed, is a noble passion,
when kept under due regulation by a powerful
and a virtuous mind, which never permits a
resort to means injurious to the welfare of
others ; but for the most part ambition has
no fixed aim, and may be considered as in-
saturable. The old woman who always began
her morning prayers with — " O Lord, pre
serve us from great men 1" did so from expe-*
rience and sound judgment. The author of
" Briefe eines Verstorbenen," vvell observes/
" Liebe befriedigtzuweilen, Wissenschaft be-
ruhigt, kunst erfreut, aber Ehrgeiz — Ehrgeis
gibt nur den qualvollen Genuss eines Hun
gers, den nichts stillen kann ; oder glelcht
der Zagd nach einem Phantom, das immer-
unerreichbar bleibt."
d2

58
Truly sublime is that character who, after
having freed his country frora oppression,
tyranny, and anarchy — after having achieved
the highest honours, and the greatest influ
ence — can, by his own free will, divest him-
of his elevated station ; who, through the
whole of his exalted career, civil and railitary,
has uniformly and conscientiously discharged
his important duties according to the laws of
his country ; who never permitted human
vanity to mislead him frora the path of ho
nour and integrity; and whose exeraplary
conduct has thus given to succeeding ge
nerations the raost heroic example of mo
deration, of firmness of character, of loyalty
to his country, and, in short, of the most ele
vated principles which ever directed the acts
of a human being ! Such a character was
Washington. His spirit was "a bold spirit
in a loyal breast ; a jewel in a ten tiraes barred
up chest."
How different the world already judges
another hero, who, not yet twenty years ago,
saw nearly all the potentates ofEurope bowing
at his command ; and, by his single will or
caprice, created, extended, or dissolved the
greatest kingdoms on earth ! Where is that
everlasting, that commanding fame, he longed
for ? Where that dj'nasty that was to govern

59
half Europe? Where that empire which
extended from the Bidassoa to the Baltic;
from the mountain shores of Italy to the rich
meadows of Holland ? Where are his eagles ?
— gone ! While the United States of Ame
rica, frora year to year, increase in population,
prosperity, wealth, and happiness ; while the
twenty-second of February is celebrated an
nually with joy, and grateful feelings, through
all the States; and while, in the remotest
parts of the globe, her navy are seen, with
the American eagle hovering over her gallant
sons, ready to defend the proud erablera of
their country's Union !
Bright were Napoleon's talents ; his cam
paigns in Italy set them forth in perfect glory,
and rapidly spread his fame from province to
province, from land to land. But the more he
acquired the more his ambition extended, till
at length all but his personal interest was
disregarded by him. Millions of men were
slaughtered, and the happiness and fortunes
of other millions were destroyed, only to gra
tify his depraved passion. Did he not like
wise desert his followers whenever he was
forsaken by fortune ? Did he not leave them
in the scorching plains of Egypt ? Did Le
not desert them in Russia's frozen fields ?
Even at Waterloo, where his last resources

60
were assembled — where the issue of all his
further projects, where his very existence^
depended on the chance of the battle — did he
not even there coraraand his faithful guards
to attack, without risking a single effort for
the achieveraent of tbat which personal cou
rage and influence raight have produced ?
And when the long-contested palm of victory
was lost, did he not hastily quit the field of
battle, without one endeavour to save the
remaining thousands by a well-conducted re
treat ? The mass of wretchedness heaped by
bim upon innumerable beings, had long since
overshadowed all the splendour of his former
actions ; he was still to confirra, bya conduct
so opposite to his former character, the degra
dation of his own nature. What possible
happiness could life still afford to him afteij
such a day ? '• Take honour frora me, and
my life is done."

CHAPTER IV.
SOME REMARKS REGARDING A STATEMENT MADE BY A
VERY POPULAR ENGLISH WRITER, " THAT THE
WOMEN DO NOT ENJOY IN THE UNITED STATES THAT
STATION IN SOCIETY WHICH HAS BEEN ALLOTTED TO
THEM ELSEWHERE."

63

CHAPTER IV.
" Lorsqu'une femme, a ses desirs fidele
Suit de ses'douces moeurs la pente naturelle,
Un sentiment plus tendre en son coeur repandu ,
Par sa delicatesse epure sa vertu.
Mais lorsque la douceur, avec peine abjur^e.
Nous fait voir une femme k ses fureurs livr^e,
S'irritant par I'effort que ce pas a coute,
Son ame, avec plus d'art, a plus de cruaute." Dtjeelloy.
 " Nature formed you (women)
To temper man : we had been brutes without you."-
Otway.
When we contemplate the union and har
mony by which are connected all the innu
merable surrounding objects, then must we
almost everywhere observe a certain order,
in conformity to which every being, aniraate
as well as inanimate, has been subraitted by
Providence to a proper sphere or place,,
wherein it will best thrive or vegetate ; and
from which it cannot be taken without dan
ger to the continuance of its growth, if not
of its very existence. The huraan being, by
a particular favour, and in conformity to. all

64
his Other predominant excellence, has been
endowed by Providence with such a peculiar
combination of qualities, that it is easier for
him, no doubt, than for any other living crea
ture, to change that situation in which he was
placed at his birth; to accustora hiraself to
different climates; to break through those
ranks of society ; and to create for himself,
by his superior mental and bodily energy, a
station by far superior to that in which he
first began to move. But though the truth
of what has been said cannot be contested, as
it is daily confirmed by what we see take place
on the wide surface of the globe, it has,
hovvever, if I am not misled by prejudice, by
far a greater force, when applied to men than
to women.
To contest with so various and with so
many obstructions as we usually meet with
in our common daily struggles, and in parti
cular on the road to distinction ; to bear with
all the privations, all the offensive rebukes or
vulgar sneers, all those disappointments which
even the most fortunate vvill fail entirely to
avoid ; and to pursue stedfastly, without be
ing misled by all sorts of contradictions or
opinions, the once conceived plan or course ;
requires a combination of knowledge, a pene
tration of judgment, a firmness of mind, a

65
strength and even a boldness of character,
which is not combined, in the same degree at
least, with those charming qualities, so sweet,
so attractive, nay, so irresistible, in women.
That raodesty, that delicacy, that softness,
that uUobtrusiveness, which are the principal
charms in women, would they not be totally
destroyed by an unshrinking display to all
the world ? This delicacy, this softness, this
sensitiveness of women, are of too fine, too
delicate a coraposition, to be exposed to the
breath of the raultitude. Would they not be
profaned by mixing in a too indiscriminate
society of men ? And if those qualities of
women cannot endure the public gaze with
out danger of their destruction, would they
be able to withstand the passions of contend
ing spirits, such as envy, hatred, disrespect,
and calumniation ? What would become of
that bloom and alacrity of the female spirit ?
What of all those graces, which so pecu
liarly distinguish the senses and manners of
woraen ?
" Women," says Dr. Goldsmith, " are not
naturally formed for great cares themselves,
but to soften ours. Their tenderness is the
proper reward for the dangers we undergo
for their preservation ; and the ease and
cheerfulness of their conversation, our de-

66
sii-able retreat from the fatigues of intense
application. They are confined within the
narrow liraits of domestic assiduity ; and when
they stray beyond thera they move beyond
their sphere, and consequently without grace."
"La nature," says a French writer, " ne
defend aucune profession; elle admet le
bien dans toutes, mais dans toutes elle a
voulu que la femme fut filie ch6rie et sur-
veill^e, epouse fiddle et protegee, m^re
soigneuse. Si I'homme peut s'aventurer,
parceque fortj il peut partout se proteger lui
mferae ; la femme ne peut sortir de ses rap
ports naturels sans succomber de faiblesse et
souffrir de tous les maux."
The true sphere of women seems accord
ingly to be — their home, their family, their
domestic love. It is there that women, the
" Fairest gift of powers above !
Source of every household blessing" —
shine in undisputed excellence ; and where
all their never too rauch praised qualities are
of so superior an influence on their own hap
piness as well as on those around them.
What is a horae, what is the raost perfect
dwelling-place, without them, but forlorn and
corafortiess ? " Siraple nature," to use the
words of the author of Treraaine, " certainly

G7
abounds in happiness, for every one is made
to feel it : the whole treasure of nature — the
earth, the air, the sky, the freshness of the
morning, the sedatives of eve^ a walk with a
friend, are all full of gratifications; but if a
mistress adds grace to the scene —
' What pleasing seemed, for her now pleases more.' "
To cultivate, then,, in young women their
natural graces and those domestic virtues,
talents, and habits, is but preparing them for
their future situation in life ; is assuring, in
the safest way, their future happiness as well
as that of their families. The higher studies,
like the raore independent pursuits, seem not
to be made for them ; and iew women, even
when in very independent circurastances, will
derive from them the expected benefits. But
to stipulate how far the raind of young ladies
ought in general to be cultivated, would per
haps be presuraptuous in any man ; it is
therefore with no sraall satisfaction that I am
enabled to quote, with regard to this subject,
the opinion of that excellent character Mrs.
Barbauld, whose experience and judgment in
this matter are above all doubts and praises.
" Young ladies," she says, " ought only to
have such a general tincture of knowledge as
to make them agreeable companions to a man

68
of sense, and to enable them to find rational
entertainment for a solitary hour. The thefts
of knowledge in our sex are only connived at
while carefully concealed, and if displayed,
punished with disgrace. I am full well con
vinced, that to have a too great fondness for
books is little favourable to the happiness of
women, especially of those not in affluent
circumstances. My situation, having myself
stepped out of the bounds of female reserve,
in becoming an author, has been peculiar, and
would be no rule for others."
Women of an elevated station in life, and
of independent circumstances, seem above all
others in danger to forget, if not guarded
against it by a very careful education, their
true interest, their real destination and sphere
in life ; and often thereby heap upon them
selves unconsciously and unwillingly a heavy
burden of discontent and misery. " Die
gefahrlichste klippe des weiblichen Gesch-
lechtes," says Schraidt Phizeldek, " ist der-
jenige aussere Zustand, welcher dasselbe,
seyes aus Reichthura oder Bediirfnislosigkeit,
der angeraessenen Sorge fiir den Hausstand
enthebt, und dera Miissiggange Vorschub
thut, in welchein Gefallsucht, Eitelkeit und
jede sonst schluramernde Leidenschaft zu
verderblicher Entwickelung Raum findet.

69
Die dem Geschlechte einwonende Regsamkeit
wird nemllch, in Ermangelung eines passen-
den Wirkungskreises, sich leicht auf Abwege
verliehren, denn trage Ruhe und Hinbruten
ueber eigene Gedanken, wie es wohl dem
Manne behagen kann, sind keinesweges die
Fehler des Weibes, das vielmehr ver'anderlich
in seinen Gedanken und desultorish in Thun
und Treiben, weil es zur Auzrichtung einer
uuzahlbaren Menge kleiner Geschafte bes
timmt scheint, die sich nicht in einer zusam-
menhangenden Gedankenreihe abspinnen
lassen, sich eine Sph'are mannigfaltiger Tha-
tigkeit erschaffen muss, wenn kein ausserer
Drang seinen naturlichen Wirksaamkeitstrieb
in Anspruch nimmt."
To condemn, however, all literary occupa
tions in women, is, I think, going too far.
Why should not highly-gifted women as well
as men grace some hours of their existence
by coraraitting to paper their thoughts and
feelings, when this is done without detriment
to those duties which their individual position
and their sex may demand from them ? I
must confess, that the examples of authoresses
working at their needle, making their own
dresses, or caring rauch about their families
or household duties, are not very numerous ;
but such examples are not totally wanting.

70
and that is sufficient to prove the injustice of
those who declare themselves decided ene
mies of all women that have become au
thoresses. For women, hovvever, in general,
it is very dangerous to erabark in occupations
which seem not properly to belong to the
calling of their sex; and this seems to be
confirmed, as well by history as by the
judgment of some of the most gifted and most
accomplished of their own sex, who have left
to us the written fruits of their genius.
If a woman, mentally or physically elevated
above the general mass of her sex, forsakes
her true character — forsakes those qualities
with which she is so wisely and so abundantly
gifted by our Creator — if, impelled by an
ambitious and aspiring mind, she succeeds
to sraooth, and perhaps to suppress, those
kind affections, intended for the solace and
benefit of mankind —• what is she, or what
does she become ? What, when by a false
ambition she is driven to pursuits totally in
opposition to her destination — to her duty ?
That esteem in which I hold the sex forbids
me to narae her character. And let us sup
pose that she succeeds in all her wishes, or
in all her ambitious views, what are her
triumphs, what her victories ? Have they
not justly been compared to those of a de-

serter, who has stolen away from his lawful
camp, and whose victories are his disgraces ?
Does not ancient and modern history furnish
us with sufficient proofs ? What criraes have
not been committed, even in modern times,
by vvomen, who, after having entirely lost
sight of their true destination, were checked
in their ruling passions, neither by virtue nor
by want of power ? Who can, without hor
ror, bring back to his mind those diabolical
acts and raachinations which were planned
and coraraitted by princesses, such as Eliza
beth and Catharine of Russia ; Christina of
Sweden ; Maria Juliana of Denmark ; Caro
lina of Naples, with her confidant Lady Ha
milton; Charlotte Joachimo of Portugal;—
but let me not prolong a catalogue so dis
gusting. What was in general the lot of women
during the French revolution, when they,
amidst the wreck of all order and propriety,
were drawn frora their proper sphere ; and
when in that general uproar and confusion,
they also gave theraselves over to the in
fluence of that dreadful conflict of passions ?
Let one of their own countrymen answer this
question. " Les ferames," says M. de Segur,
" perdaient beaucoup k ce grand change-
^nent ; les passions douces conviennent seules

72
k leur gr^ce, k leur delicatesse, k leur voix,
comme k leur traits ; la modestie est leur
preraier charrae : aussi rien ne leur sied
plus raal que les passions politiques; I'huraeur
les d^pare et la colore les enlaidit."
" Kraft erwart ich vom Manne, des Gesetzes Wiirde behaupt'er I
Aber durch Anmuth allein herrschet und herrsche das Weib.
Manche zwar haben geherrscht durch des Geistes Macht und
der Thaten ;
Aber dann haben sie dich, hochste der kronen entbehrt." Sciiii-Len.
All that hitherto has been said proves that
woraen in general seldora Increase their share
of huraan happiness, or struggle successfully
with the vicissitudes of this world, except by
respecting that order of things which so
wisely, no doubt, has been estabhshed, with
regard to both sexes, by the Supreme Governor
of the Universe. With regard to men, can
they, in justice, be accused of presumption,
or of exercising an arbitrary power, vvhen
such an order of things as above alluded to
was established by a power to which we must
all submit ? And ai'e woraen gifted with
fewer sources of happiness than raen ? Even
if Providence had inspired me with less con
fidence in the just distribution ofher blessings
than that which I profess to feel, even then I
should be still inclined to doubt it. Do we.

73
men, poor creatures ! not feel enough already
the powerful influence of the charms, so nu
merous and so superior in the other — the fairer
sex ? To what does our so much boasted of
independence amount ? Is it not dissolved
into mere vapour, by a single glance of a
woman's eye? Did there ever exist a man
who never felt the power of these soul-sub
duing looks ; or who was never led in chains
by some dear member of the fairer sex?
Have not the greatest heroes, the proudest,
nay even ferocious characters, been obliged
to bow before the superiority of the sweet
and entangling charms of women — the irre
sistible influence of their softening powers ?
That wild robber, who is not checked in his
habits by the severest laws, nor by any fear of
God or raan, can he resist the idol of his
affections, the girl of his heart ? Must we
not, and do we not cheerfully and thankfully
acknowledge, that to women we owe the
best, the happiest hours of our existence ?
Well might the author of Falkland say :
" constantly engaged as we are in looking
behind as before, if there be one hour in
which we feel only the time being — in which
we feel sensibly that we live, and that the
moraents of the present are full of enjoyment,
the rapture of existence — it is when we are
E

74
with the one person whose life and spirits have
becorae the great part and principles of our
own." And, " where," justly asks the author
of Treraaine, " where are the friends to be
put in competition with a wife ? Envy,
selfishness, inconstancy, are perpetually lay
ing siege to every other attachment; in a
wife alone is there a security for unalterable
friendship, because in her alone is there an
absolute identity of interest; in her alone
will it remain unalloyed by prosperity, and
undiminished by reverses."
Let us then be mutually satisfied with our
respective stations in life. If we only take
the trouble to study them, and be candid
enough to do mutual justice, then we cannot
but increase thereby our mutual happiness.
Should it however be proved, as I am myself
disposed to believe it is, that the true sphere
of woraen has been placed by Providence in
their home, in their domestic love and happi
ness, where, then, may women expect to feel
the greatest enjoyments, or to raeet with that
degree of happiness which they are capable
of, but in their home, in the circle of their
parents or of tbeir offspring, in the affectionate
society of their husbandsj and in all those
tender cares which are the necessary conse
quences thereof ? Are, however, these domestic

75
habits of the fair sex not generally cultivated
aud respected in the United States ? Do not
the Americans pay the greatest esteem, the
greatest and sincerest horaage, to the fairer
sex, in every station of life ? Are their feraales
not preserved frora all unwomanly employ
ments ? Are their labours not almost wholly
domestic ? Do you see them working in the
fields, exposed to all the varieties of weather,
as in Europe ? Have we therefore no right
to be astonished, when, in a work entitled
-< " Travels in North America during the years
1827 and 1828," written by a man of high
public character, we see it affirmed — " that it
was the result of all the observations and
inquiries of the author, that the women do
not enjoy in the United States that station in
society which has been allotted to them else
where, and that consequently much of that
iraportant and habitual influence, which, from
the peculiarity of their nature, they alone can
exercise over society, in more fortunately ar
ranged commimities, seems to be lost."
When I further found, that this statement
was in total contradiction to many observations
made by the writer hiraself in the very sarae
volurae, and that the gallant Captain seeraed
more in particular to have been led to so
strange a statement when, at a cattle-show at

76
Brighton, in the vicinity of Boston, he counted
during the whole day, amongst several thou
sand persons, only nine females, my astonish
ment was, if possible, still more increased.
Though I am myself a professed admirer of
all which concerns agriculture, and though 1
should have been highly delighted, had it been
my good fortune to spend that day at the cat
tle-show of Brighton, in the Captain's cora
pany, I should, however, most positively not
have entertained the least expectation to
meet with the fair lasses and ladies of the
neighbourhood, or of Boston, at a fair, whereof,
according to the writer himself, the chief
attractions were — " a ploughing match with
20 teams of oxen, various trials with regard to
the strength of cattle in drawing loaded carts,
and numerous pens with inclosed bullocks
and sheep." The author in question, however,
was, to use his own words, " struck to the
heart, with what seeraed to him the cruel
spectacle of such a nuraerous assembly of
people on such a fine sunny day, in as pretty
a little valley as ever was seen, close to a
roraantic village, and within four railes of a
great and populous city like Boston, and yet,"
our author exclaims, " amidst all this crowd
there were no woraen, no groups of lads and
lasses were seen roraping on the grass."

11
At Stockbridge, in Massachusetts, where the
author also had the good fortune to assist at a
cattle-show, a considerable number of women
were present, but they were carefully separated
from the men, and afterwards occupied one
side of the church. Some other attractions,
however, than a raere cattle show and whisky
booths, were raost probably the chief cause
why so large a portionof thefairersex attended
the cattle show of Stockbridge. For there
were also, according to the writer, raerry
flutes, drums, gay flags waving over the heads
of the lads and lasses, and bright muskets of
the militia. But most unfortunately the hila
rity of this meeting was essentially impaired
by a heavy rain, that destroyed very uncere
moniously the poor people's best clothes and
finery, the merry flutes no longer yielded forth
their melodious tunes, soaked the drums, so
that they would scarcely yield a sound, though
ever so well thumped, made the gay flags hang
dripping down in the very raud, tarnished the
splendour of the rauskets, and kept the whole
multitude silent and dissatisfied.
That the Captain was struck, as he says, in
every part of the country through which he
passed, with the strong line of demarcation
between the sexes, is probable. Many Euro
peans, while unacquainted withthe manners,the

78
feelings, and the character of the Americans,
have shai'ed these impressions. Had our
author, however, pushed his observations Or
inquiries a little farther, before he finally
made up his mind about the matter, and
committed his statement to paper, then also
he, like so raany others, would have come, I
cannot doubt, to a soraewhat different re
sult, notwithstanding those human prejudices
which vve all share, but with which our author
seems to be rather abundantly gifted.
Want of good female attendants, and of pro
per servants, must increase household duties,
and are certainly obvious reasons why, in
general, the American ladies have less time
at their disposal than their European sisters
for idle gossipping and shopping, and why
they are perhaps deficient in that sort of re
finement which is the fruit of idleness and
dissipation, and not unfrequently careless
ness of morals, provided that the prevailing
rules of society are observed; but in what
way these doraestic cares, this " raixing of
puddings and cakes," this non-attendance of
cattle shows, and of electioneering parties,
do affect the sanctity of the female character,
and the benevolent influence of women on
human society in general, or how these
habits disturb the intimate and even elegant

79
and enlightened corapanionship of farailies,
relations, and friends of both sexes, this I
never could understand.
When we hear others, who also, like the
author in question, trusted to their own senses,
to their own eyes and ears, then it becoraes
somewhat difficult not to share their opinion,
that the veneration in which the better, the
fairer sex, are held in the United States, is, if
not superior, certainly not inferior, to that
which in general is paid to thera in Europe.
That the writer in question has not seen or
heard the contrary, seems to be confirraed, as
clearly as possible, by his own words ; be
cause in the same volume which contains his
grave statement, he says : — " He never saw
or heard of any rudeness towards feraales, nor
had he any reason to suspect that incivility
towards females was ever practised, or would
be tolerated, even in those parts of the coun
try which have enjoyed the least advantages
in the way of civilization and refinement."
He further says, " that he found it to be a
rule, which he saw universally observed in
Araerica, never to think how the raen shall
fare till every feraale has been fully accommo
dated." Can any one who has visited those
high emporiums of European good breeding,
manners, and fashions — as London,. Paris,

80
Berlin, and Vienna, say as much; how well
disposed he otherwise may be to acknowledge
and to praise all those peculiar charms and
numerous resources in which the said cities
may excel?
With regard to that alleged " strong line
of demarcation between the sexes," we raay
also observe that it is but a very relative one.
The intercourse between the young unmarried
persons is, perhaps, in no country easier, and
submitted to less restraint, than in the United
States of America. The freedora with which
in general the young people visit and see each
other, has, by some European travellers, even
been thought highly injudicious. This familiar
and unconstrained intercourse between both
sexes ofthe rising generation in America, can
therefore by no means be said, I should think,
to be of such a nature as to check that
wholesome influence of female society on the
manners, the good breeding, and the temper
of the future men of America: nor does the
Captain seem to have met with any symptoms
of the contrary ; for when speaking of those
sharp but araicable national discussions in
which he and the corapany in which he found
himself sometimes took their respective sta
tions at the opposite poles of the question, he
is candid enough to state, " that he does not

81
recal a single instance in which any thing
captious, or personally uncivil, was ever said
to hira, though openly and in all corapanies
he repeated every thing which he had written
in his work, and even a good deal raore, that,
upon cool reflection, he did not choose to say
again." He further says, " that he raust do
the Americans the justice to say, that he has
rarely met a more good-natured or more good-
tempered people ; that though he never dis
guised his sentiments, even when opposed to
the favourable opinions of the Americans,
whereby he often must have bored them, he
never saw an American out of teraper." He,
the author himself, on the contrary, was often,
as he frankly confesses, a good deal harassed
by these national discussions, and not always
able to keep himself in good teraper. How
far this proves the influence of that superior
control or scrutiny of his fair countrywomen,
which control or scrutiny extends itself in his
own country, as the author informs us, over
all manners, and over every conduct, public
as well as private, of the men ; that I shall be
somewhat puzzled to make out, unless the
gallant Captain, without much justiee, how
ever, in honour be it said of his profession,
should claim a reasonable allowance of our
indulgence, for that time of his life which he
B 2

82
has spent on board a man-of-war, where, most
probably, even when she is bearing the Stan
dard of Great Britain, such a superior female
scrutiny is but seldom to be met with.
When I further consider, that the writer in
question is of high parentage, that he is a
meraber of those aristocratical classes, which,
according to his opinion, expressed in another
work, — " can alone give a right tone to raan
ners, by setting the fashion in every thing
which is true in principle, or practically wise
in morals and in politics ;" — then my doubts
about the inferior female scrutiny in America,
or about the Captain's ability to profit by that
in his own country which he considers supe
rior, are, if not increased, certainly not re
moved. I entirely agree in opinion with the author
when he says, " that the whole texture of
society shows the extent of feraale infiuenee ;
and that we all know that the result is emi
nently powerful in its reaction upon the men,
in every walk of life." But that the under
standing, and the discriminating faculties of
the mind and heart, of the fairer sex, in
America, would be elevated, if, as the author
thinks, the ladies and lasses of the United
States shared with the men in all the intel
lectual, moral, and bodily enjoyments of cattle

83
shows; when they participated in all those
angry discussions about politics, electioneer
ing, and money-making concerns, which in
all public and more mixed societies form the
predominant topics for conversation ; or when
they were equally exposed to the rancour of
party feelings ; this my own experience and
judgment will not permit me to believe.
A traveller cannot be too cautious in his
judgment on the institutions, the manners,
and the feelings of a foreign nation; and
above all is this caution necessary to a man
who intends to communicate to others his
opinion concerning so tender an object as the
more intimate intercourse of the two sexes in
a foreign country. Never should he send
forth his opinions undigested into the world.
Otherwise he may, perhaps, often have the
mortification to learn, that his inferences were
drawn after too superficial an investigation,
and that, of consequence, his statements will
prove incorrect, and even highly injurious, as
the statement in question certainly is.
According to my own experience in dif
ferent countries, it seldom happens that a
stranger, of whose manners, feelings, and
character, the inhabitants must, in every
case, be more or less ignorant, is readily ad
mitted into the intimate and domestic circles

84
of a family ; or into the less guarded raeetings
ofa few chosen friends. This cannot well be
expected. Besides, every nation has some
peculiar habits, manners, and feelings, which
frequently escape the attention of a passing
stranger ; or, if observed, cannot in all cases
be clearly explained to others. " The good
ness of a land," to use the words of an able
writer in the North American Review, " is
not built up in its bricks and stones ; does not
abide in the bridges and turnpikes, nor chaffer
on its exchanges : but it retreats to the fire
side ; it exists, if it exists any where, in
family and social circles ; it slumbers com
monly in every-day times, and only awakes at
a loud call, and on a great occasion. The
traveller raay not be present at these rao
raents ; he cannot get an uncereraonious
admission to these domestic retreats; he
makes a few dinner-table acquaintances, picks
up a few dates, and names, and facts, and fills
up the rest of his book from the geographers,
the newspapers, former travellers, and his
own imagination."
After what has been said and quoted, I
cannot help professing my opinion, that, if
the Captain was fairly asked how he came to
publish such a statement as above given, he
would be gallant and good -hearted enough.

85
nor consider it beneath his new dignity of
Doctor of Laws, conferred upon hira by that
abna mater, the university of Oxford, also to
answer in this case like Dr. Johnson, when a
lady asked him how he came to define pas
tern, the knee of a horse : " Out of ignorance,
madam, pure ignorance."
That I ara only doing justice to the cha
racter of our author, in supposing hira capable
of so much candour, he has sufficiently proved,
by giving a similar answer to Mr. Du Pon
ceau, at Philadelphia, when, by more learning
than he could stand, the incorrectness of
another statement, respecting the nature of
the languages used on the shore of the China
sea, and published by him on a former occa
sion, was easily and clearly pointed out to hira.
As my rambles on the surface of our globe
cannot enter into competition with those of
the gallant Captain — having navigated neither
in the South-Sea, nor on the coast of China —
my own judgment may be supported by less
authority ; but such as it is, I am of opinion
that the fair ladies and lasses of Araerica have
no cause to envy the lot of their sisters in
Europe. " The sweetest days in summer are those in which the sun,
partly hid behind the light clouds, warms without dazzling ;
and the sweetest women are those who never shine, except to
those they love.'' Paulding.

CHAPTER V.
ON EDUCATION, AND ITS CONNEXION WITH CIVIL AND
POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.

CHAPTER V.
" Provide for the mind as you provide for the body ; first
necessaries, then convenienoes, lastly luxuries."
" A little leaming is a dangerous thing 5
Drink deep, or taste not the Pirian spring.
These shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
Aud drinking largely sobers us again." Pope.
The word Education, is, according to my
understanding, a word of a very comprehen
sive signification. That scientific or me
chanical instruction given by private teachers,
or in public institutions, forms but a small
part of it. A far superior influence on edu
cation, are numerous circumstances, private
as well as public, bodily as well as mental.
Instructing young persons in reading and
writing, in arithraetic, in book-keeping, in a
mechanical art, in the language of their
country, in foreign languages, in geography,
history, and all the higher sciences ; as che
mistry, the law, medicine, &c. : or young girls
iu those arts which more particularly regard
their future domestic avocations ; these are

90
only fitting thera, more or less, for a particular
trade or calling ; or enabling them to spend,
with dignity, those hours which less fortunate
beings spend in their various trades, or in the
daily struggles for their means of subsistence.
It is, however, of no inferior importance
for the rising generation, to be instructed
with regard to other relations in life ; as the
relations with our Creator, and the duties
which we have to perforra as men and as
citizens. All men ought further to be made
acquainted with the true bonds of huraan
society, and its natural gradation — with the
necessity we are placed under by Providence
to exert our faculties — and with the total
irapossibihty of others to better our condition,
without our own active co-operation.
But as those moral and civil rights and
duties greatly depend on the intellectual,
physical, and political station of raen and of
nations, the education of the rising genera
tion cannot be the sarae in the different ranks
of society, and in the different countries. I
subrait, therefore, that the real object of edu
cation would consist in the following : — to
make the young individual a proper member
of huraan society ; to enable him, sooner or
later, to provide for his own existence, in any
honourable or lawful career of life ; to infuse

91
into his mind the principles of true religion ;
to teach him his moral and civil duties ; and
to instruct hira in his national rights or pri
vileges ; each raodified according to his indi
vidual station, situation, and probable ftature
prospects in life.
This object raay partly be obtained by
public or private instruction, but, as already
stated, only in part. Education, in general,
depends not less, nay, perhaps even raore,
upon the exaraple, the conversation, the busi
ness, the likings and dislikings, of those who
daily surround the youth in his progress.
Direct precepts have but little share in edu
cation. Children know better than we are
generally inclined to believe ; they discern
between the maxiras we bring forward for
their use, and those by which otir own conduct
is directed. How difficult is it, in education,
to succeed with children who belong, or daily
retum to farailies, wherein domestic, amiable,
and virtuous dispositions and habits are but
little cultivated ; or wherein no regulated
periods of occupation are observed ? Must
we not agree with M. Delacroix, when he
says : — " On croiroit, qu'apres tant de beaux
traites sur I'^ducation pour la jeunesse ellfe a
beaucoup gagn§ en politesse, en modestie, en
delicatesse d'expression, en puret6 de senti-

92
mens; par qu'elle fatality n'est il donc arrive?
Ne seroit ce pas, parceque les exeraples do
mestiques dfetruisent les meilleures legons ?"
Even under very favourable domestic and
external influences, false ambition, extrava
gant zeal, parental fondness, but too often
have an evil influence on education. " Si
vous voulez que vos enfans soient heureux,"
says a French writer, " soyez donc justes mais
severes envers eux, ne bouleversez pas l'ordre
de la nature, ne faites pas vos idoles de vos
creatures, que ceux qui doivent vous obeir
ne deviennent pas vos maitres et vos tyrans.
Commencez de bonne heure k les endureir
contre les maux qui les attendent dans la vie;
apprenez leux k supporter la contrainte et les
con trar iet6 s ; formez leur caractere, et n'en
faites pas de petites despots Asiatiques ; car
en sortant de votre maison pour entrer dans
le vaste champ des peines, des contradictions,
leur despotisra les rendra aussi ridicules que
malheureux. L'education est le noviciat de la
societe. C'est un spectacle revoltant que celui
de cette idolatrie pour les 6tres faibles et de-
pendans de la nature : on n'est occup^ que
d'eux, ils sont le centre de tout ce qui les'en-
vironne ; on les rassaie de plaisirs qui ne sont
point de leur kge; on oublie que des enfans
qui ne sont pas encore membres de la society.

93
doivent avoir leur jeux k part; on ensence
tous leur caprices ; on admire leur habit ; et
ce qu'ils retiennent le mieux de leur premiere
education, c'est de parler sans savoir ce qu'ils
disent." It is very fortunate, though at first sorae
what surprising, that, notwithstanding all the
faults, frora which no systera of education is
exempt — only because it is a systera, and
notwithstanding so many unfavourable do
mestic and external influences, still we find
superior and shining characters, from time to
time, irapress themselves on our notice, and
serve as beacon-lights to their own and to
future generations. But to whora are we
principally indebted? The All-Governing
Providence ! What the best education has
not been able to produce, what want of edu
cation, or many unfavourable circumstances,
did not permit us to expect, are thus accom
plished. But what are the evident means ?¦—
how do they operate ? Affliction, loss of for
tune, disappointed ambition, hurabled self-
consequence, faded beauty, and numberless
difficulties ; these are the means by which
Providence araeliorates our temper, corrects
the offensive petulance of youth, develops a
thousand latent good qualities, inspires true

94
genius, and brings out all the energies of a
finished character.
•' Le malheur affaise les ^mes communes, et redouble
l'6hergie des ^mes superieures." De Segue.
Education may be decisive for ordinary
men ; but does not the history of distinguished
characters prove, that most of thera, if not all,
wrought an education for themselves ; or, at
least, greatly improved that which they had
received ? And how many shining and excel
lent characters have not started up from ob
scurity, with scarcely any foreign aid at all.
" Avoir I'iraperfectlon de toutes les machines
d'education," says M. Sismondi, " et que de
tous les metiers, celui d'instituteur se fait en
general le plus negligemment et le plus mal,
on serait tente de s'6tonner de ce qu'il-y-a
tant de gens si bien eleves, tandis qu'il devroit
y en avoir si peu ; mais si Ton y fait attention,
on trouve, que la plupart de ces gens 1^
ont commence leur Education apr^s qu'elle a
6t6 finie, et souvent sans le savoir et sans
dessein." It certainly will always be found more or
less difficult to raodify education, not only ac
cording to the different classes of human
society, but also according to the different

95
civil or political institutions of a country ;
but modifications of some such sort there
must be. Whether, however, these limits
of learning have always been well chosen,
well observed, or whether in some cases
or countries they have not been too far ex
tended, and in others too rauch contracted,
appears to me of the utmost importance to
examine. In countries where tbe leading raen enter
tain and profess the conviction, that men, in
general, are incapable of self-government —
that absolute, monarchical, or aristocratical
forms of government suit best to the cha
racter, the capacities, and the happiness of a
people taken en masse — there, the duty of the
leading men would be to modify accordingly
the instruction of the general mass of the
people, and to inculcate into their minds
those maxiras only which harmonize with the
leading principles of the government. You
should banish, then, from your schools all
lectures, by which the independent feelings
of man, the knowledge of his natural rights,
might be awakened, cultivated, and developed.
The whole nation should be kept, as much as
possible, from all contact with any other na
tion enjoying institutions or forms of govern
ment more liberal. The least you deviate in

96
the given case from the said raaxim, the least
occasion that is given by you, or by the in
fluence of others, to the development of
man's feelings of independence, of self-dig
nity, your whole social system will imme
diately be exposed to great danger ; the ne
cessary harraony between the forms, the acts
of the government, and the ideas and views of
the people will be disturbed; the old doc
trines, prerogatives, and supposed rights, till
now believed indisputable, sacred almost,
will be nearer investigated, questioned, per
haps opposed ; and the fundamentals of the ex
isting government will thus become paralyzed;
the tranquil or passive submission to its laws
can no longer be expected ; and the peace
of society is in danger of being disturbed.
Though many governments have for centuries,
and in times of peace and tranquillity, been
following such a maxim as above alluded to,
and sorae are so doing at this moraent, the
period has however arrived, when it will not
rauch longer be possible to follow similar
principles. You raay chain men, but you
cannot chain a spirit. Barriers and citadels
are no defence against it. But though we
cannot prevent the spreading of a spirit,
mightier than all earthly power combined,
we may — direct its course.

97
Do you, however, acknowledge equal rights
in every man ? are you guided by disinterested
views ? is the greatest possible developraent
of raan's capacities — is the eraancipation of
the rainds of the people from ignorance, su
perstition, and bigotry — your professed ob
ject ? then let your acts become in accordance
with your professions ; no longer pretend to
keep a nation, whose minds have been eman
cipated under your own sanction, and by your
own acts and institutions, in the same sub
jected state as heretofore ; no longer pretend
to govern despotically men whose mental
faculties have been enlightened ; do not pre
tend to keep them in fetters which, after the
generally acquired or diffused notions, can
and will no longer be borne by thera. A na
tion, thus constituted, ceases to be an inert
raass of raatter which may be moulded ac
cording to your will or fancy. That spirit
vvith which a people, in whose bosoms the
ideas of our natural rights have been awak
ened, will oppose your arbitrary commands,
is but natural ; such a people, far from doing
wrong, only act in strict conformity to the
coraraon laws of nature. As sound seed,
after it has been committed to its proper soil,
will sprout, flourish, and fructify, so also
will human efforts be in vain to prevent a
F

98
nation from following the said course, after
the mental faculties of its greater portiou
have become enlightened by instruction.
Every nation on earth, that is at all capable
of mental culture, sooner or later must and
will follow this same course. Under such
circumstances it becomes your duty, your
strongest interest — that of self-preservation,
to develop the once awakened faculties ; to
cultivate the rainds of the people as much as
circumstances perrait ; to prepare such a
people for a participation in the management
of its own concerns ; or to lead it in the
smoothest way possible to the enjoyment of
free institutions ; a gift, nay, a debt, which
now, without endangering the well-being, the
continuance of the whole fabric, you cannot
longer withhold fi'om it. That authority
which forraerly you exercised can now only
be preserved by interesting all orders of the
state in its preservation ; by convincing the
general mass of the people, that it is for their
interest, for their own welfare, and for the
protection of aU that is dear to them, that
you are invested with it, and exercise it to
that end. It is by reason only that you can
now maintain your former influence. The
institutions of a nation nmst therefore be in
constant harmony with its physical, intel-

99
lectual, and moral station ; or their stability
cannot longer be depended upon.
" Donner des lumi^res h ceux qu'on retient dans la.servitude,
c'est les feclairer sur leur malheur." De Segur.
With many governraents, this harmony, this
unity between the leading principles, and the
wants, the desires, and views of the people
they govern, have been disturbed ; and that the
consequences thereof are becoming apparent
in Europe, canuot well be contested. The
facts recorded already by history, which jus
tify this opinion, are too numerous and too
obvious to be overlooked or misunderstood.
All those popular commotions, those nume
rous revolutions, those fallen dynasties, known
to us all, what do they prove but a breach of
harmony between the feelings, the character,
the intellectual station, the wants of the na
tions ; and the leading principles, or the acts
of their respective governments ? Whether
these principles and acts are in favour of ab
solute prerogatives and absolute customs, or
whether, on the contrary, they are in favour
of more liberal institutions, and of a more
popular government, that, in both cases,
leads to the same consequences, whensoever
those acts or principles are not well adapted

100
to the actual intellectual and physical circum
stances of the nation which is to be ruled by
thera. To ascribe these revolutions, which has
often been done, only to a desire of the poorer
classes to possess themselves of the property
of the rich, is solving the question in a very
erroneous, or, at least, a very superficial way.
Certainly, as in nearly all European states,
the working classes hardly earn the bare
means of a raiserable existence, even when
willing to exert all their powers to the ut
most, it cannot be a matter of surprise, when,
under such circumstances, these less enlight
ened classes of the community soraetimes be
come disaffected, begin to grumble, and
greedily listen to all schemes which may be
presented to tbem, for the stated purpose, to
extricate them from such a state of sufferance.
But to accuse these classes of the desire to
rob the affluent of their property, is doing
them, I believe, a great injustice : collec
tively, at least, they certainly have no such
intention. To be doomed to work, without
being able to accumulate some property, or
even to enjoy life in a decent way, is a hard
case, and may affect even the strongest spirit,.
And when, besides, these industrious classes
of the community have perhaps learned to

101
feel and to understand, that contempt in
which they are still often kept by the higher
classes, then it is unreasonable to wonder
that then' patience is sometimes exhausted,
and that, in a moment of excitement, or
while labouring under the influence of un
controlled passions, they follow but the insti
gations of an unhappy moment ; and, by de-
stronng the property of the rich, increase
only their own portion of moral and physical
wretchedness. The chief reason of all those
revolutions must be looked for in tbat mani
fest and irresistible transition from the abso
lute to the liberal system of government.
This is actually shaking nearly all parts of
Europe ; and as all governments have been
instituted for the promotion of human inter
course and happiness, so it is their bounden
duty, in every possible way, to avoid these
dreadful contests of conflicting interest and
opposed principles, by introducing liberal
measures, and such alterations as may restore
the necessary harmony and confidence of the
people. For this purpose it is much to be lamented,
that, even in our age, the education of princes
is still often conducted with so little regard
to the altered circumstances in human society.
jNIen, who frora their very infancy were gra-

102
tified in all their fancies and passions — who
saw every body bend before them, when they
had no direct claims to such a distinction-^
such men, indeed, must be gifted by nature
with a very high degree of understanding, or
they will becorae infatuated, idle, and sensual
men ; not at all fit to be placed at the head
of those constitutional forms of government,
and which are daily on the increase ? What
occasion have such men to know the real
cares of life, and the true springs of human
society ? Surrounded by an artificial, a luxu
rious, and a flattering world, they cannot
learn to understand the true nature of their
position with other nations - For the interest
of the peace of Europe, for the interest and
prosperity of those high families themselves,
who form such old constituent parts of the Eu
ropean comraunities, and who are so strongly
linked to their actual welfare, such a state of
things as above alluded to, can, where it still
does exist, no longer be allowed to go on.
Acts of such stupidity and wickedness as
those of Charles X. are as dangerous for the
royal farailies as for the people of Europe,
and cannot but raise feelings which greatfy
disturb the rautual confidence between the
nations and their governments.
Several of those expensive court- pageants,

103
are they still in harmony with the feelings of
a more civilized and a more enlightened com
munity ? — are they still compatible with the
heavy burthens by which almost all nations of
Europe are depressed ; and with the actual
condition of the generally dirainished national
resources ? Do they really contribute to the
happiness or enjoyments of an enlightened
prince ?
Can it be a matter of wonder to an impar
tial observer, not totally unacquainted with
the progress of intellect, and with the spirit
of the age we live in, when he sees, that many
of those artificial and unnatural distinctions
which formerly separated the rulers from the
people, and which, by surrounding them with
an imposing splendour, or a mysterious holi
ness, imposed upon the multitude ; when he
sees, I say, that such unnatural distinctions
aire no longer respected by a more enlightened
comraunity ? The tiraes, when you might
expect from a people to believe and to obey
without inquiry, or to worship, at a respectful
distance, a mysterious idol, without prying
into its nature, no longer exist. That veil,
w^hich during centuries covered (to the eyes
of the multitude) numerous imperfections,
has been rent astinder. In raany countries
the citizens are no longer afraid to look into

104
the innermost recesses of all those govern
ment institutions which so much affect their
dearest interest — their very life. Men are no
longer divided in such distinct classes as for
merly, and the higher classes are no longer
more, nor the lower less, than men. Every
thing daily appears more and more in its true
light. All that is really good, and in con
formity to the age vve live in, will remain —
all that is false, or contrary to huraan reason,
will and must, sooner or later, disappear.
This progress of human intellect is but na
tural ; and no power on earth will be capable
to arrest it. It is, hovvever, the duty of all
superior minds to use their influence in re
gulating this progress, so that in the actual
animated contest for changes and improve
ments, nothing is demolished that is worthy
of being preserved ; and that no well-founded
and beneficial institution be totally overturned,
on account of real or imaginary abuses,
which ultimately may be found intrinsically
uniraportant. We cannot be surprised with less enlight
ened nations, where we observe egotism and
tyranny, supported by a crafty priesthood and
the fanaticism of the people, succeed to crush
the liberal principles of liberal governments,
or of well-intended patriots. As, however.

105
the greatest portion of all those popular com
motions, those thunder-storms of the political
horizon, certainly may be attributed to that
manifest transition frora the absolute to the
liberal forms of government, one may ask,
whether they might not be made more harra
less, or perhaps even totally avoided, by a
more general and gradual abrogation of old
and fading powers— by showing more prac
tical tact in the exercise of them — and, by
yielding in time, and with grace, a reasonable
share of absolute prerogatives, which, being
no longer in harmony with the spirit of the
age, can no longer be consistent with the
welfare of the nations and with the stability
of the several governments ? If the natural
and reasonable wishes of the more enlightened
people were listened to with attention, it
would be found that liberal enthusiasts and
insurrectionists would lose much of their
importance; they would seldom, if ever,
succeed in kindling the flame of revolt, or in
overwhelming whole nations with the evils
of disorganization, anai'chy, or tyranny.
Liberty, or liberal institutions, can only
take root and grow by the slow progress of
reason, and are totally inconsistent with
bigotry, superstition, and ignorance. When,
in consequence of insurrection, or any other
F 2

106
sudden change, self-government is offered to
a people who are unprepared for it, then such
a nation will generally derive therefrora raorC
evil than benefit. Sudden changes are always
dangerous ; the result of good as well as evil,
when sudden and excessive, are equally rais
chievous. And, as every art requires regular
and progressive instruction, before it can be
exercised with benefit, so also raust a people
gradually be led to self-government, to ensure
its advantages and duration. Besides, both
ancient and modern history seem to confirm
the truth ofthe humiliating observation, that it
has been found more difficult to maintain the
equilibrium of liberty thau to sustain the
weight of tyranny. It is therefore not with
out reason, that in Europe, where the general
character of the Americans is seldom un
derstood; the stability of the government of
the United States is so often doubted. Cer
tainly, all attempts which have been hitherto
made in Europe, strictly to imitate the North
Americans in their forms of government, have
entirely failed, and will fail.
Should it be necessary to prove by evidences
the ti-uth of whathas been said, I would ask-^
has not (at the close of the last century) a
great and civilized nation of the European
continent, in its struggle for a higher degree

107
of personal liberty, for a greater share of par
ticipation in its own government, and for a
diminution in the burden df its taxes, been
led, first, to the most desolating anarchy ; and
later to the very reverse of that liberty it vvas
contending for ? The passions of unen
lightened raen, uncontrolled, if once they
have been roused to a certain pitch, will rush.
into the raost destructive avalanche, and can
then no longer be arrested. Nations gene
rally receive with gratitude all concessions
which are raade in due tirae ; but, if neglected,
and when their passions are let loose, when
once they have learned that they have the
right to demand and the power to enforce,
they then seldom perceive how far their own
demands are reasonable ; and they will not
easily be persuaded to listen or to place con
fidence in existiug powers, or to the dictates
of reason. The minds of many in those con
flicts soon get debauched by factions, intrigue,
and corruption ; lose all sense of honour and
decorum, and are no longer capable of being
influenced or directed by circumspect and
patriotic characters. The voice of these
patriots is no longer heard ; violence, tu
mult, and disorder, become the order of the
day. The flarae of destruction will go on
raging, till, exhausted by its own violence.

108
nothing remains but the ashes of the general
conflagration; or till it is arrested by a coun
teracting, a domineering power, to which a
ready subraission will be given by a wearied
people, panting for rest.
May that nation I am speaking of derive
all possible benefits frora her second revolu
tion ! — may she succeed in recovering her
former character, free from all pollution, high
and low ! — and may she, while modifying her
own institutions, according to her own pecu
liar wants and circumstances, never forget to
respect those of others. Let her, therefore,
keep in raind those excellent words addressed
to her in the Chamber of Deputies, on the
13th of April, 1831, by Casimir Perrier : —
" La France se sent remontee k son rang ;
elle sait que le monde a les yeux sur elle ; elle
I'a frappee par fecial de sa revolution ; elle
I'eclaire par I'exemple de sa liberte ; elle doit
le rassurer par son respect pour la justice."
Let her also, in her eager desire for more
liberal forms of government, pause, and well
consider the practical importance of those
wise admonitions giv^en to her deputies, on the
9th of August of that year, by that same
distinguished statesman already quoted : —
" Apr^s I'intervalle immense que la France a
franchi depuis un an, ce dont elle a besoin.

109
c'est de prendre haleine. Ses habitudes,
vous pouvez le remarquer souvent, sont en
core en arriere de ses lois, et ce n'est que dans
un avenir eloigne qu'elle pourra trouver in-
suffisantes les institutions qu'elle vient de con-
querir. II faut donc la preserver d'une de
ces croissances trop pr6coces qui enervent et
font d6p6rir le corps social."
Is a second evidence necessary to prove
the truth of what has been previously stated ?
Has not recently another nation, in the ani
mated contest to get rid of some real, but more
imaginary grievances, been led to such a
pitch of excitement, and to such a forgetful
ness of its own history and dearest interests —
the true foundations of its previous unrivalled
state of prosperity and wealth — as completely
to overturn a combination of states which
were, lo tliemselves al least, so highly useful
and important, and blessed with one ofthe
most enlightened and the most liberal govern
ments ofEurope — a government, whereof the
venerable head is by no means an unworthy
member of an illustrious fainily, whose strug
gles in favour of religious and political liberty
may be traced back till lost in the darkness of
age's ? and that at the very moment when the
said government, though perhaps tardy, had
already assembled the lawful delegates of the

110
people, for the purpose of investigating the
nature of the complaints or grievances of the
nation, with a view, if possible, to remove
thera, observing a perfect conformity with the
prescribed forras of the constitution. Acts so
inconsiderate, not to say of wickedness or
madness — acts so decidedly and so peculiarly
obnoxious lo those who were led to coramit
them, by drawing on themselves all sorts of
raisery; by deraoralizing the people; by
destroying social happiness ; and by blasting
the reasonable prospects of thousands — acts
of such gross stupidity, but too clearly prove
what mischief a once roused and infuriated
raob (for that is the proper term by which the
comraon mass of a bigotted and unenlightened
people ought to be styled) is not capable, when
guided by ultra-liberal enthusiasts, and when
further instigated by a most illiberal priest
hood, and by the wealth of some ignorant and
bigotted noblemen.
Wilh what right can a nation boast of
liberty while her constituted government is
overruled by a selfish faction ? while in her
very bosom, and in the very face of her mock
authority, the greatest crimes are coraraitted
wilh impunity ? while respectable citizens,
who do not choose to worship the domineering
faction, are not only insulted, but murdered ?

Ill
while the presses and houses of journalists,
who are bold enough to doubt the wisdom of
acts emanating from a factious body of in
triguers, and who, in labouring lo promote
order and justice, are destroyed and plun
dered? and while other acts are committed,
of which hitherto savages only were thought
capable ?
Gefahrlichist's den Leu zu wecken,
Verderblich ist des Tigers Zahn,
Jedoch das schrechlichste der Schrecken
Das ist der Mensch in seinem Wahn.
Weh, wenn sich in dem Schoss der Stadte,
Der Feuerzunder still gehauft,
Das Volk, zerreissend seine kette
Zur Eigenhiilfe schreitlich "greift,
Da werden Weiber zu Hyanen
Und treiben mit Entsetzen Scherz :
Noch zuckend, mit des Panihers Zahnen,
Zerreissen sie des Feindes Herz.
Nichts Heiliges ist mehr, es losen
Sich alle Banden frommer Scheu ;
Der Gute raumt den Platz dem Bosen
Und alle Laster walten frey. ScHILlEK.
Freedom, liberty, constitutional forras of
governraent, certainly are raost excellent in
stitutions, if well understood and well gua
ranteed. They are seeds which promise the
richest fruits, when planted in a soil conge
nial lo their nature and favourable to their

112
growth and fructification. But too many in
dividuals, however, still associate wilh these
words such splendid imaginations and exalted
ideas as are by no means consistent with
the real truth, or the real meaning. To cor
rect these extravagant notions, these futile
conceptions, and lo reduce thera lo their just
liraits, is of the utmost consequence for the
promotion of true liberty. Perfect liberty is
a visionary dream, an indefinite chaos, and
totally inconsistent with the well-being of so
ciety : it is so far from being wholesome lo the
human race, that it vvould prove to be a total
dissolution of human society. Is il not en
tirely against those laws we see established in
nature — that just standard of all our institu
tions ? For where do we observe in nature
such an ideal freedom ? Has nature, on the
contrary, not prescribed to every object, ani
mate as well as inanimate, celestial as well as
earthly, a more or less circumscribed sphere ?
Are we not all connected by a great and mys
terious chain, without which that sublime
harmony in nature would have no existence ?
by a chain whicb, according to Lady Mor
gan, " is so nicely and delicately constructed,
that not a link snaps, rusts, or refuses its
proper play, without the shock being felt, like
an electric vibration, to its utmost limits ?"

113
Does our Almighty Father encourage by pros
perity any infraction in those laws which
have been established in nature by His all-
governing wisdom ? Is He not, on the con
trary, most inflexible in the punishment of
those infractions ? Has not every plant,
every tree, been subjected to a fixed order of
vegetation ; to well-regulated periods in the
production of their leaves, their flowers, and
their fruits ? Can a fish leave with impunity
its element ; an owl or a bat their dark abode ?
Can eveu the most perfect, the most inde
pendent creature on earth — man, — supported
and guided, as he is, by his mental faculties,
can he entirely withdraw himself from the
influence of these laws ?
What is the true meaning oi freedom, li
berty, free institutions, the sovereignty of the
peoplie, but personal liberti/, freedom of indus
try, security of property, equaUty before the
laws of the land, and absence of all personal
privileges ? Where a raan raay use the powers
given to him by nature, in any way nol in
jurious to others ; where he is sure to enjoy
in peace the fruits of his industry; where he
is subjected to no control, except lo the laws
of the nation ; where he may worship God
according to the dictates of his own con
science, as far as thereby he does not disturb

114
the general peace of society ; where no single
being, or a favoured few, are allowed |to direct
the public affairs to their private advantage,
and to quarter, as Lady Morgan has it,
" noble indigence upon plebeian activity ;"
where the road to distinction is open to every
one ; and where every citizen, by his per
sonal industry and his superior intellect, raay
rise in the scale of society — there a man is
free ! If freedom were synonymous with anar
chy — if it professed raorai license, profligacy
of manners, or, in short, the corruptions of
all those principles which constitute the
ground-work of our peaceful social existence,
then there would be no true liberty al all,
and, like the beasts of the field, men would
be ruled by the strongest or the raost cun
ning of their species.
Further : what means community of pro
perty ?- and how far consistent with truth
is the assertion, that all men are born free,
equal, and independent ? If, by any proceed
ing whatever, fortune or wealth could be
equally divided amongst men, would such a
state of things exist for any length of time ?
Is not perfect equality between human beings
denied by natui'e itself? In what is a babe in
swaddling clothes free and independent ? Where
is the equality of children in size, in health.

115
in strength, and in mental capacity ? Do we ob
serve in all workmen the same degree of iil-
tellect and dexterity ? Are all men equally
capable to direct, with sound judgmeht and
advantage, the affairs of a community, or
the concerns of industrious pursuits ? Is
every mechanic an Arkwright or a Fulton ;
every sculptor a Canova; every painter a
Raphael or a Rubens ? Is every soldier a
Buonaparte, or a Wellington ; every sailor a
Perry, a CoUingwood, or a Die Ruyter ? Does
every advocate plead like a Brougham ; every
physician advise like a Boerhaave or a Hufe- *
land; every surgeon operate like a Dupuy-
Iren or a Cooper ? What, however, is wealth
but the produce of human power aiid intel
lect ? and what is therefore raore natural
than that the raost industrious and the raost
intelligent men are, in general, also the most
successful in life ; or that this difference of
human power arid intellect leads to a difference
in worldly circumstances ? Further, this dif
ference oif inteUect and of bodily strength^ or
dexterity, which we also observe in the whole
creation, are they not the wise aim of Provi
dence ? Are not these gradations that which
constitutes our rautual happiness ? Is it not
that bond Which keeps us all together, and
which raakes us all dependent ori each other.

116
for our mutual benefit ? If accumulated
wealth never had existed, would so many and
such highly-important inventions ever have
been accomplished ? And if wealth were actu
ally destroyed, could numerous and highly-use
ful pursuits, vvhich require a large advance or
investment of accumulated wealth, any longer
be followed ?
A certain degree of independence, if not of
wealth, forms the great object, which, by some
industry to acquire, all individuals raore or
less have in view. But if its possession or
enjoyment were not assui'ed to those who have
acquired it, would men persevere under so
raany hardships and privations for that end ?
Would not labour and enterprise cease?
Would not the whole frame of society be dis
solved? In all communities property must
be sacred. ' Render it insecure, and the ruin
of all prosperity is its unavoidable consequence.
If the popular systera was incompatible with
the honest possession and secure enjoyment
of large private fortune, it would no where
have existed for a year. Such an imaginary
equality of condition, falsely assumed to be
necessary to a republic, exists as little in
the United States as it does in Europe, and
it certainly cannot be said that on account of
that the popular system does not work well

117
in America. These plans of comraunity of
property, therefore, are but the dreams of
vulgar and presumptuous ignorance — they
are the miserable sophistry of some wrong-
headed men, misnamed philosophers.
According lo free institutions, all persons
are born free, equal, and independent, only
in so far as their civil equality and indepen
dence, or their equal protection by tbe laws,
are concerned. The law creates no bodily
power or dexterity ; no mental faculties, nor
wealth ; but it affords equal protection to
all men, or guards the existing wealth of all.
Thus it affects but indirectly the industrious
pursuits by which this wealth is amassed.
By the laws, that difference which exists
among men in conformity to nature itself, is
properly regulated. Without those laws no
human society could exist. No peace of
society can be enjoyed where the right of
property is not sufficiently guaranteed, because
men must there look upon each olher more as
enemies than as friends. The moment that
this protection, this guarantee of accumulated
properly, is withdrawn from us, both the
moral and political bonds of society are dis
solved, and we return lo a comparative state
of anarchy or of despotism.
In every community, ruled according to

118
free institutions, all its raembers, without dis
tinction, are subjected to ils laws, and live in
it, under the penalty of being punished, or even
of being e'ected from it, if they do not con
duct themselves according lo the existmg
laws. It is but just that he who wishes to
enjoy undisturbed, those gifts with which
nature or fortune may have blessed him, or those
which he may have earned by his industry,
should not be allowed to disturb others in the
enjoyment of their blessings. If every one
were allowed to follow his own caprice or pas
sions, if the different members ofa coramunity
were not kept under a ceriain restraint im
posed upqn them by the laws of the nation,
then we couldenjoy no reslorsecurity whatever.
The natural and common desire to enjoy these
blessings, imposes on us the necessary obli
gation to renounce a certain share of our
personal liberty, and to submit ourselves to
some restraint. The extent of those re strainls
which the laws of the coramunity impose on
us — the gi'eater or smaller guarantee which
secures to us a just regulation and application
— the degrees of privations or of bodily labour
whichare required fromusfor the raaintenance
of that establishraent which is to assure to us
the security of our property, the free exercise
of our religious tenets, &c. — these are some

119
ofthe most essential points required to form
a scale, by which the degree of our civil, mo
ral, and political liberty, is to be ascertained.
The laws ofa nation are regulated, under
all forms of government, by a more or less
numerous body of raen, who compose the
legislative part of the government. The most
exalted champion of liberty never entertained
an idea that every member of the comraunity,
whatever be his capacities, raust have a direct
share in the making of these laws. But
though the greatest part of the nation cannot
be admitted into the council of those men
who are to legislate for the community, a
great part, however, of an enlightened people,
can and ought lo have a direct share in the
appointment of those of their fellow-citizens
lo whom the manageraent of so iraportant a
part of their public concerns is to be entrusted.
And it is only so far as a people has a direct
share in the choiceof its office-bearers, and
by which il exercises a certain degree of con
trol over tbe conduct of its delegates, that a
people can be said to be ils own Sovereign.
In all countries, however, where the laws
assure to a great portion of the citizens a
certain share in the management of tbe
national affairs, it is of the utmost importance
that these citizens should have been properly

120
instructed with regard to their real wants and
necessities, before they are allowed lo parti
cipate directly or indirectly in the raanage
ment of the public concerns. The minds of
men raust first have been enlightened— their
reason must already have been formed, or it
is irapossible for thera lo understand those
pacts which form the groundwork of their
social system ; much less can they be expected
to reason upon them, lo respect, to aller, to
ameliorate, or to preserve them. It is there
fore highly important to observe, that, before
we emancipate the body, we must emancipate
the mind, by making it capable and worthy
of freedom. This desired object can, however,
only be obtained by a very extended system
of national education, and by bringing the
institutions for elementary instruction to the
greatest possible perfection. Elementary
schools, established on sound principles, in
harmony wilh the institutions of the nation,
the character, and the raanners or customs of
its inhabitanls, and conducted by skilful
raasters, to spread, through every township,
and through every village of a free country,
is the first duly, the duty of self-preservation,
individually and collectively. In the United
Slates of America, the great fountain, from
which flows all authority, is thepeople; its

121
voice is the lavv of the Union. To enlighten
this omnipotent, this all-directing voice, or
the source from which it proceeds, is an impe
rious duty, demanded by the institutions of
these States; and when the duties which
every citizen has lo perform are taken into
consideration, the wisdora of such policy will
be evident : it is in perfect harmony with the
pacts by which these States are governed,
and with their general and mutual interests,
as well as with the private rights of every
citizen. The efforts of all free nations must
therefore be directed to the promotion of
elementary instruction as a leading principle,
and never be permitled to sluraber.
A nation labouring under superstition,
bigotry, or raental incapacity in general, may
prove herself to be a-very good, a very power
ful nation, under au absolute government ;
but such a nation can never enjoy free insti
tutions in perfect safely; for every nation
that is still divided by a great physical, intel
lectual, and moral inequality, political or
civil equality, can never constitute a sound
groundwork of its government. Minds inca
pable of reasoning on their own concerns are
also incapable of guiding thera, and in such
case, these concerns, as well as the men them
selves, raust be guided by others ; for, by

122
what stipulations could it possibly be pre
vented in a country enjoying free institu
tions, that the guidance of the raass of such a
people as above alluded to raight not be taken
up by selfish and ambitious characters ?
What are the reasons that the South Americans,
notwithstanding their independence, and
their free institutions, still labour under all
the evils of anarchy or despotism ? What
are the reasons that these nations are still so
far from having realised their splendid dreams
of prosperity and happiness, but their igno
rance, their superstition, their total general
incapacity lo understand, to foster, to preserve
free institutions, and to live under thera in
peace and harraony ?
Before a nation can enjoy free institutions
or self-government, she raust not only have
been properly instructed, but also previously
taugbt and practically administered, a wise
domestic policy. > The policy, however, pur
sued by Portugal and Spain, with regard to
their American possessions, might well be
calculated to rouse, to the utmost degree of
indignation, the minds of a misused, and even
of a degraded people ; but this policy was,
with regard to popular instruction, and to the
preparation of a people for self-government,
certainly the worst possible in existence.

123
At the Pennenden Heath raeeting in the
year 1828, an Irish orator (Shell) has said : —
"Republic after republic is bursting out
through that immeasurable continent (Ame
rica), and the fire of liberty mounts like a
volcanic flame frora the summits of the Andes,
and with its vast illumination lights up one
half of the world." These words may be very
oratorical, but the orator himself, I cannot
doubt, will lament with rae the truth of his
own metaphor. For the fire of liberty has
proved itself as destructive in South Ame
rica as a volcanic flarae possibly ever can be :
and, lo pursue the raelaphor, as innocent and
thoughtless beings of a hurabler nature are
attracted by tbe brilliancy of a coramon flarae,
so were the South Araericans attracted by the
brilliant glare of liberty ; but not knowing its
nature, they carelessly rushed into it, not
perceiving its burning, its destroying qualities,
till their wings had been singed, and till they
had become the blind instruments of those
contending factions, those different divisions
and conspiracies, which still impede the pro
gress and the development of the natural
resources of these republics. How well did
Bolivar know his countryraen, when, in a
speech to the congress of Venezuela, he used
the following words: — "With members be-

124
numbed by fetters, and eyesight weakened by
the darkness of dungeons, are they capable of
marching with a firm step towards the august
teraple of liberty ? Are they capable of sup
porting its splendid rays, or breathing freely
the pure ether that reigns there ? The relics of
Spanish dorainion will continue a long lime
before we can completely destroy them; our
atmosphere is impregnated with the contagion
of despotism, and neither the flame of war,
nor the specific of our salutary laws, has
purified the air we breathe. Our hands are
indeed free, but our hearts are slill suffering
from the effects of servitude."
In the United States of America, self-go
vernment — the majesty of man — was planted
in a soil, and under circumstances, both to
tally different. The North Americans never
were slaves, but, like all British subjects,
free men, and accustomed lo act and to be re
spected accordingly. Liberty was their cradle.
The Araerican Stales, whilst but colonies, had
their own institutions, framed by the colonists
theraselves, and adapted to their local cir
cumstances, and to the genius of the people.
These institutions were as free, if not fi'eer,
than those of Great Britain. Though the go
vernors and councils of these colonies were
appointed by the crown, each colony, hy

125
virtue ofa royal charter, was allowed to have
ils own legislative assembly, for the regula
tion of all matters regarding the internal go
vernment and taxation. The members of
this assembly, like the merabers of the House
of Commons in Eugland, were chosen by the
people; and like the Coramons in England,
so also the Commons in America, enjoyed the
constitutional right of giving and granting
their own money, or of raising taxes. Thus
the English colonies in America gi'ew in
liberty. As long as the British governraent
respected their chartered rights and privileges,
these colonies entertained no idea of declaring
themselves independent, and granted aids
whenever these were required of thera in the
constitutional way ; that is, by an application
to the colonial legislature. But wheu the Bri
tish government, instead of directing ils requi
sitions to the governor, council, and general
assembly of the colonies, wished lo lax the
Americans by the British parliament, where
the Americans were not represented, then
this naturally led to a more strict inquiry
intolhe extent of the powers of parliaraent
over them.
Men who had been accustomed to the bless
ings of free institutions for more tban a cen
tury, were naturally alarraed when their

126
dearest feelings, their ideas of justice and
freedora, were disregarded, by a haughty,
jealous, and selfish government ; when their
chartered rights and privileges,were, one after
another, wrested from thera ; when, finally,
all power was taken out of their hands, and
when they were condemned to be dragged
before a British court, at the option of their
Crown officei's. It was but after a long train
of similar abuses and usurpations, and when,
as Mr. Pitt said in parliament, " the Ame
ricans had been driven to raadness by injus
tice," that the natural affections of the colo
nies for the raother country were alienated,
and that they were forced by self-defence to
declare themselves independent. By this act,
by the declaration of their independence, the
Americans overthrew no old and deep-rooted
forms of government, abolished no dear and
long-possessed privileges, nor customs, sanc
tioned by ages. The right of suffrage was
not thereby suddenly delivered over to hands
unprepared and unaccustomed lo wield it.
The Americans, by declaring themselves in
dependent, by placing their free institutions
beyond all foreign control, and on a greater,
a raore natural, and on a raore independent
basis, only assured to theraselves the peaceful
enjoyment of rights which they and their

127
forefathers had already enjoyed for raore than,
a century. As a friend of liberty and of free institutions,
I implore from the Almighty the salvation of
the American Union 1 May this noble, ver
dant, and flourishing tree of liberty, planted by
a free hand on a savage but fertile strand,
which has already struck ils roots deeply in
the American soil, and produced tbe richest
and the most abundant fruits, slill gain in
strength and in majestic stateliness ! May its
bark be preserved frora any injury ; its wood
from the meanest worm 1 May its roots never
moulder; its sap never dry]
The able Arnerican author ofthe " Prospect
of Reforra in Europe," justly observes, " we
cannot but feel the peculiarly delicate position
in which our own country is placed. It rests
with us to make the popular systera attractive
and respectable. Our political errors will
not only fall heavily upon ourselves, but they
vvill, in the most exaggerated form, be held up
to discountenance their iraitation in Europe.
We can in no way so much accelerate the
political emancipation of the Old World, as by
showing mankind that liberty is a spirit of
justice, law, raorality, and intellectual im--
provement. At present, the word revolution
is a word of dread, made, by the reign of;

128
terror in France, the abhorrence of mankind.
Let us show to the world that blood is not
the natural ceraent of liberal institutions ;
that the arts of society flourish under their
influence, and that man is not the worst
enemy ofhis neighbour or himself."
But while we thus openly adraire the in
stitutions of the Americans, and send our
fervent prayers to heaven for their stability
and prosperity, we cannot suppress a very
natural desire that justice may also be done
to the Europeans, and tbeir forms of govern
ment. The circumstances wherein the Euro
peans in general are, and always have been
placed, are very different from those of the
Americans. Hitherto, of the European na
tions, few have enjoyed liberal institutions,
and many of thera are slill, by their raorai and
physical position, but litlle, if al all, capable
of understanding, and of enjoying thera.
According to the Americans, an hereditary
succession lo the chief magistracy is an in
stitution in arrear of the present state of civi
lization. We will not dispute the truth of
this doctrine, as far as it concerns the Ame
ricans themselves ; but with regard to its just
application lo the European nations in gene
ral, we have strong and well-founded doubts.
The governments of Europe, consecrated by

129
the veneration of countless ages, do not only
rest on a dry historical basis, but not less also
on a strong moral principle. They are firmly
entwined around the hearts of the people in
general ; so that if even reason should con
demn them, a strong voice from within would
still plead in their favour. The mass of every
nation, as it has been well observed, are not
philosophers, and in their view long-standing
forms of government are too venerable to be
surrendered wilhout an age or two of delibe
ration, if not of positive or doubtful struggle.
It cannot be wondered at, that the Americans,
who comparatively have no recollections of
former times, and, at least in their country,
no old renowned ancestors to boast of, should
rate loo lightly their influence on nations that
live as well in the past as in the present. But
as, for instance, the deepest veneration for the
memory of Williara of Nassau has already
propagated itself in the Netherlands, during
three centuries, so also will the raeraory of
Washington equally adhere to the Araericans
through all future ages. While, however,
these remembrances of former times survive ;
while they adhere lo us as closely as the con
sciousness of our own existence ; while the
monarchical systems of government form so
vast an edifice on the European continent ;
G 2

130
and while the characters of several European
nations remain what we loo distinctly see
thera to be, it will be idle lo talk of the esta
blishraent of democracies in Europe.
To all those wrong-headed demagogues,
and ultra- liberal enthusiasts, who preach their
doctrines without the least consideration of
moral and physical circumstances, or without
any respect for long-cherished habits and
feelings, and who thereby only sow the seeds
of discord, withoul in any way favouring the
promotion of true liberty, I would address
the following words, translated (by Moir)
frora Schiller : —
" What is your purpose 1 Have you fairly view'd it
Yourself ? You seek from its broad base to shake
The calm enthroned majesty of power.
By ages of possession consecrate,
Pirm rooted in the rugged soil of custom.
And with the people's first and fondest faith,
As with a thousand stubborn tendrils twined.
That were no strife where strength contends with strength.
It is not strength I fear — I fear no foe
That wilh my bodily eye I see and scan,
Who, brave himself, inflames my courage too.
It is an urseen enemy I fear.
Who in the hearts of mankind fights agaiast me —
Fearful to me, hut from his own weak fear.
Not that which proudly towers in life and strength
Is truly dreadful ; but the mean and common,
The memory of th' etemai yesterday,
Which ever warning, ever still returns,
And weighs to-morrow, since it weigh'd to-day ;

131
For out of common things is man made up.
And clings to custom as her foster-son.
Woe then to him whose daring hand profanes
The cherish'd heirlooms ofhis ancestors ! ^
There is a consecrating power intime,
And what is grey wilh years to man is godlike.
Be in possession, and thou art in right ;
The crowd will lend their aid to keep it holy."
Cooper has said, " Europe has not yet had
an opportunity of learning that the most
durable government is that which makes it
the intei'est of every citizen to yield it cheer
ful support." Europe is in no need lo look to
America for such an opportunity ; it had it
long ago in the United Provinces of the Ne
therlands, and has it now again in the same
country. When lately this land was in a most
critical position — when the least tiraid looked
with dejection inlo futurily,and the most faith
ful were shaken in their confidence — a noble
candour saved all f A glorious campaign, and
numerous instances of the greatest patriotism,
have loudly proclaimed to the whole world
the energy of this small but honest and loyal
people. Awakened are the feelings of former
ages ; renewed are the links with dear an
cestors 1 and while in the raging struggles
between diverging opinions and contested
rights, kings and emperors have been de
throned and exiled, and many a throne rests

132
on a tottering basis, Holland and Oranien's
banner are but one again ! Heavy is the
burden which time and many vicissitudes have
heaped upon the land, but, wilh due submis
sion to the will of our coraraon Ruler, they
are borne ; scarcely a murmur is heard ! But
by what superior qualities has so small a
nation for ages been able successfully to
struggle with furious elements, and with the
secret and avowed workings of powerful
enemies? By what means has a nation
that numbers only about two raillions of
citizeus, been able to bear the burden of its
enormous and overwhelming debt? Those
qualities, those means, are — Religion, Patrio
tism ,and Industry !
That which in the present age and circum
stances, all men who labour to promote true
liberty, and to wbom the welfare of their
country is dear, have most to dread, is less of
despotisra than anarchy. The greatest ene
mies of mankind are not kings or emperors,
but ignoi'ance, superstition, and bigotry ; for
no ruler on earth can now-a-day, without
danger, brave the mighty and daily-growing
power of public opinion. To vanquish these
worst of tyrants, and to subdue them for ever,
we want no soldiers, no fire-arms, no men of
1 1 is.

133
and ever will continue to be, the duty of free
nations zealously to promote elementary in
struction; the widest possible diffusion of
knowledge, through all classes of society, is
the ground-work of their very existence. It
is not, however, necessary to infuse inlo the
minds of the labouring people, idle theories,
vain ideas of the fine arts, or other luxuries
of that description : such a superfluity of be
nevolence would only lend to create an appe
tite which, with few exceptions, is not in our
power lo satiate ; it would only animate facul
ties lhal, if left in a half cultivated slate to
their fate, seldom lead lo a happy end. What
vve must endeavour to spread by elementary
instruction, are, sound practical doctrines,
useful for every day or common life. The
rational faculties of the people must be
awakened and exercised, to enable them
thereby lo reflect and lo judge for theraselves,
and to appreciate those infusions, those clan
destine insinuations, by which arabitious and
depraved characters too often gain the assist
ance of the vulgar and thoughtless, to pro
mote their personal views and interests.
Another reason of no small moment, why the
greatest possible perfection, and the greatest
possible number of eleraentary schools, are
above every thing necessary for all free na-

134
tions, is — their free press. In all nations ofa
religious, calm, steady, reflecting, and Indus-
trious character, and all governments where
mystery has been banished, it must be desir
able that all views and raeasures regarding
the adrainistration and the general welfare of
the country, be discussed openly and freely by
all parties. These views and raeasures are
thereby properly sifted and winnowed from
all the chaff which rany still adhere lo thera ;
or, if already enforced, they raay be modified
before they will have done much harra, ifany.
These thousands of channels, however, created
by a cheap and unfettered pre.'^s, (and which are
even more enlarged in the United States by an
exemption frora all duties whatsoever,) raight
they not be, or have they never been, used for
a wrong purpose, by wicked and selfish cha
racters ? That these numerous channels, by the
means ofwhich, all sorts of opinions, theories,
and inventions, spread to the utmost borders of
the empire, rauch contribute to enlighten the
general mass of the people, I by no means
deny ; nor do I entertain the slightest desire
to see them suppressed or even curtailed.
The only object I have in view is, to guarantee
the comraunity against those evils which a
free press is capable of coraraitting ; and this
can only be done by multiplying good ele-

135
mentary schools, and by improving by their
means the understanding of the people of all
ranks and condition.
What regards classical learning, is, accord
ing to the prevailing opinion, less cultivated
in the United States than in Europe, An
eminent American author has said, " The
purely intellectual day of America is yet in
its dawn," The Americans have slill too
many incitements lo occupy themselves wilh
objects of immediate and practical utility, and
therefore seldom push learning beyond ils
practical or most useful point. ^' We culti
vate our literature," says another American
writer, " as we cultivate our soil, with the
greatest possible economy of labour. A poem
is made like a shoe, to answer the present
demand." Purely or strictly literary men,
who, as often is the case in Europe, pursue
their studies without Caring much about the
bustling world around them, can therefore
hardly have an existence in the Uriited States.
" Our atmosphere," the remark also of an
American writer, " is one of active impulses,
in which the delicate plant of pure literary,
industry droops and dies. The institutions of
the country require the participation of every
citizen to sustain them, and the first symptom
of fatal decay will be the abandonment of

136
that universal trust to the oligarchy of poli
ticians." But classical learning is a sort of luxury.
It is in a man what fine pictures or silk trap
pings are in a roora — an ornament of refined
society, which cannot well be expected to
abound but in those countries where such a
stale of society is raore universally established.
In the United States, however, whereof a vast
extent is still uncultivated land, such society
can only be partial. But that sooner or later
the Americans will not linger behind other
nations in these graces, numerous instances
already sufficiently show. Of how great an
importance these graces undoubtedly are for
the intellectual enjoyments of a nation, and
for what we call the comforts of life, or for
those elegant luxuries which give a zest and
an agreeable variety to human existence, it
would be mistaking the" effect for the cause if
we did consider thera more as the sources
than as the consequences of the prosperity,
the power, or the wealth of a nation. The
more physical qualities of a people, on the
contrary, will generally be in a better condi
tion in countries which are slill in the pro
gress of their growth, than in ihose that have
passed already the zenith of their prosperity.
And let me add, lhal, as a heart may beat as

137
happy under a home-spun waist as an em
broidered coat, as the body fares as well and
belter when fed with simple bacon or hominy,
than when nourished wilh p4tes de foies, or
dindons aux truffes, so, likewise, will the
human mind be more fruitful and content
when well stocked wilh simple practical
truth, than when intoxicated by those be
witching vanities, as mental theories and de
lusions ; or when totally absorbed by those
luxuries, as poesy, , archiology, and super
natural philosophy. To wander in the realms
of fiction may be both delightful and harm
less for hours and even days ; but we should
enjoy these wanderings only occasionally.
As soon as they are allowed to interfere with
the duties of that active and real life, from
which we cannot disengage ourselves, then
they will seldom, if ever, promote our mind's
content or our body's vigour.
Culture of the mind, like culture of the
soil, is intended to produce wholesorae fruits.
But if a soil is to produce good fruits, it must
not only be scratched, but carefully cultivated,
properly divided, and trenched ; it must be
cleared of its obnoxious weeds, or these will
affect the growth of the desired plants. Not
less cares are lo be bestowed afterwards upon
these plants, by keeping them clear of weeds.

138
and by protecting them against nuraerous
enemies. To be able to perform all this
work as it ought to be, the ground you cul
tivate must stand also in proportion to the
working hands that are at your disposal. By
this metaphor I only wish to indicate, that an
unfinished or an imperfect culture of the
raind is as unproductive in sound fruits as a
sirailar culture of the ground. That short
space of time which the great mass of a rising
generation has to bestow upon its intellectual
cultivation, should therefore entirely be de
voted lo that instruction only which after
wards may be of practical use to thera. No
desires, no feelings, no wants, should be
created which it is impossible lo satisfy ; and
which, under these circumstances, can and
will only serve to disgust the individuals from
that course of life which it is their destination
to pursue.
If possible, occasion must be given to every
person to instruct himself in the general
principles of true religion, in his moral and
civil duties, in reading and writing, in the
fundamentals of arithmetic, and of some rae
chanical art or of some handicraft work.
You may, without risk of harm, instruct the,
people in the general outlines of geography
and history, but no farther. More is neither

139
wanted nor desirable for the well-being of
the social systera. If in a young person a
particular disposition should be noticed, open
to him, if possible, the access to a higher cul
tivation of his faculties ; but let this only be
an exception from the general rule.
No one, I trust, will suppose me insensible
to the advantages of a highly cultivated edu
cation of the mind. Nature has created those
resources for that philosophic mind on which
she best can work — lo those inestiraable in
tellectual pleasures, always in our power, and
totally independent of season, fate, and for
tune — to tbose lofty and heavenly eraotions
she in particular knows how to produce and
to cultivate ; by no raeans would I be accused
of such an insensibility. I fully feel all these
advantages. But though I do acknowledge
all this, its dazzling brilliancy has not affected
my judgraent ; nor have I been able to shut
my eyes to those obnoxious effects of a shallow
cultivation of the raind ; such as vanity, pride,
arrogance, dissatisfaction, and unhappiness.
By such an unfinished education — by imbibing
vain ideas and views — by penetrating them
selves with conceptions at least undigested, if
not totally false — the minds are alienated only
from Industrious pursuits, while thereby they
neither do nor can become learned enough

140
to be of any real service in the ranks of
science. By far the greatest number of huraan
beings have neither the time nor the means
to extend their studies to that degree which is
likely to produce the fruits of a superior edu
cation ; such as indulgence, perfect inde
pendence, sublirae recreation, rational con
tent and happiness. The higher sciences,
like refinement and delicacy of feelings, do
not suit every one ; nor are they suitable to
every station in life. They were never in
tended by Providence to share the woods
with the huntsman, the fields with the shep
herd, or the manufactory with the workman.
If we raeet them there it is only by accident,
or under very particular circumstances. No
one expects to meet in a farraer's cottage
with ornaments that suit tbe dwelling of a
counsellor or a senator.
Dr. Goldsmith truly observes : " In order
to make the sciences useful in any country,
it must first become populous; tbe inha
bitants must go through the different stages
of hunter, shepherd, and husbandman ; then,
when properly becoraes valuable, and conse
quently gives cause for injustice, then laws
are appointed lo repress injury, and secure
possession : when raen become, by the sane-

141
tion of those laws, possessed of a superfluity,
when luxury is thus introduced, and demands
its continual supply, then it is that sciences
become necessary and useful — the state then
cannot subsist without thera — they must then
be introduced, at once to teach men to draw
the greatest possible quantity of pleasure from
circumscribed possession, and to restrain them
within the bounds of moderate enjoyment.
The sciences are not the cause of luxury, but
its consequences ; and this destroyer thus
brings with it an antidote which resists the
virulence of ils own passion."
With regard to the study of the old or dead
languages, many erroneous ideas slill prevail.
To maintain, that without having passed
through those studies men will never become
good scholars in the living languages, is, at
least, as regards the more northern lan
guages, certainly gojng too far. Nor can I
agree with those who profess, that, in awaken
ing the faculties of the human mind, the study
of the old or dead languages is of so decided
a superiority to the study of the raodern or
living languages as lo raake it a general rule
to begin wilh il, in order lo the instruction of
all the more elevated classes of society. Teach
ers who have been brought up according lo
the old fashion naturally cling to imbibed

142
prejudices, and not less, perhaps, to their per
sonal interest. Among young men generally,
who have no intention to enter what we call
the more learned professions, the period is
but very short for their intellectual culture,
and should carefully be made use of to in
struct them in all that may be practically
useful for them. The knowledge of several
living languages is daily becoming of more
importance ; and to study the works of dis
tinguished writers of their own age certainly
will be found more generally useful, and yield
greater satisfaction, than a vain ability to ira
pose upon the vulgar raind by some Latin or
Greek quotation.
" Even allowing the works of our ancestors
better wriiten tban ours," to use a striking
illustration of this doctrine, given by Dr.
Goldsmith, " yet those of the moderns acquire
a real value, by being marked with the im
pressions of the times. Antiquity has been in
the possession of olhers, the present is our
own ; let us first, therefore, learn to know
what belongs to ourselves, and then, if we
have leisure, cast our reflections back to the
reign of Shonou, who governed twenty thou -
sand years before the creation of the moon.
The volumes of antiquity, like medals, may
very well serve to amuse the curious, but the

143
works of the moderns, like the current coin
of the kingdom, are much better for imrae
diate use ; the former are often prized above
their intrinsic value, and kept with care ; the
latter seldom pass for more than they are
worth, and are often subject to the merciless
hands of sweating critics, and clipping com
pilers ; the works of antiquity were ever
praised, those of the moderns, read ; the trea
sures of our ancestors have our esteem, and
we boast the passion ; those of contemporary
genius engage our hearts, although we blush
to own it. The visits we pay the former re
semble those we pay the great ; the ceremony
is troublesome, and yet such as we would not
choose lo forego : our acquaintance with the
modern books is like sitting with a friend ;
our pride is not flattered in the interview, but
il gives us more internal satisfaction."
Very justly says also a writer in the Revue
Britannique : — " Apr^s une fausse ojiinion
I'erudition antique usurpe tous les honneurs,
enlev^s au savoir ; opinion d'apres laquelle
un chlmiste est range parmi nous, dans une
classe presque voisine de celles des artisans ;
tandis qu'un annotateur d'Euripide, p^re
d'un volurae en 4to, marche d'un pas rapide
k la consideration. Pour que l'education fut
raisonnable, et servit au bien Hre de la so-

144
ciete, il faudroit qu'une revolution totale,
detr6nat I'erudilion, et mit le savoir k sa
place ; que le jeune horarae apprit, non plus
comme autrefois quelques mots d'une langue
morte, raais les sciences qui lui seront neces
saires pendant tout le cours de sa vie."
Private instruction in the United States, as
compared with Europe, is of rare occurrence.
The general opinion in Araerica is strongly in
favour of public instruction. In a country
under a democratical government, this me
thod of education is well chosen, as it pre
pares the young men, better than any other,
for their future public duties, and for their
necessary intercourse wilh very different and
independent characters, all equally ambitious
to be heard and to see their opinions, though
not adopted and followed, at least duly re
spected. " Prendre un instituteur pour un
seul el^ve," to use the words ofthe Chevalier
Jacob, " c'est vouloir manquer son instruc
tion. Les efforts du precepteur seront faibles
et les progr^s de I'el^ve y seront propor-
tionn^s. L'enfant n'a point de rivaux qui
stimulent ses efforts, pourtant, point d'emula-
tion : aussi lout est languissant dans l'educa
tion priv6e ; les recreations elles meraes sont
depourvues d'impulsions et de vrai plaisir.
Comme il ne peut pas comparer ses progr^s

145
avec ceux des enfans de son kge, il en juge
avec vanite; la fatuit6 lui tient souvent lieu
d'insti'uction. L'arausement devient de trfes
bonne heure sa principale affaire, et il s'estime
moins par ses progr^s dans ses etudes que
par ses petits talents, sa grace, et son addresse.
Il-y-a d'ailleurs rarement cette ingenuite
courageuse de I'^leve des ecoles, parceque
I'hahitude et la necessity d'6ludier le caractere
de ceux avec lesquels il vil le disposenl k la
dissimulation, k la ruse. II est reserve, mais
par politique, et non par principe. D'ailleurs
il est en quelque sorte impossible qu'il ne se
trouve pas souvent dans la society des domes
tiques, et qu'il n'oublie dans la cuisine ou
I'ecurie ce qu'il apprend dans le salon ou
dans le cabinet d'6tude. L'indulgence qui
accompagne presque toujours l'education
privee n'etablit pas ordinairement le carac
tere d'une maniere forte, et qui raet le jeune
homme k I'abri des effets des passions."

CHAPTER VI.

ON EMIGRATION.

149

CHAPTER VI.

" But what is life t
'Tis not to stalk about, and draw fresh air
From time to time, or gaze upon the sun :
'Tis to be free. When Uberty is gone.
Life grows insipid, 2ind has lost its relish." Addison.

" What is man.
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed 1 a beast no more.
Sure he that made us with such deep discourse.
Looking before snd after, gave us not
That capability and godlike reason
To rust in us unused." Shakspeabe.
In no country, perhaps, has the progress of
human industry and national prosperity ever
been beyond human conception so rapid, as in
the United States of America. It is therefore
not to be wondered at that this unprece
dented developraent of the natural resources
wherewith these Slates were blessed by our
Creator, has attracted the attention of other
nations, and that whole raasses of individuals
h ave emigrated lo this land of proraise, attracted

150
by the hope of gain, or of enjoying life free
from those hardships vsrhich we are almost
every where destined to endure for its pre
servation. Even men of a superior under
standing, and not without experience in life,
are apt to magnify in their own minds the
resources of distant countries, and to nourish
with regard to them so ardent, so extrava
gant, and such romantic notions of perfection,
which cannot but end in disappointment.
The truth, however, is, that man is doomed
by Providence, and wisely so, to labour evei'y
where. Nothing worth having can be gained
without effort ; and there is on earth no real
enjoyraent without it. To change the forest
or the prairie into cultivated fields ; to cover
thera with those productions which are neces
sary for our existence ; to raise dwellings for
our shelter ; is done only by the agency of
labour 1 labour ! labour ! Land in its natural
state, however rich, produces very little or
nothing whereof man may derive nourish
ment, or clothing, vvithout personal exertion,
or without a sacrifice of accumulated fruits of
former induslTy. Richness of soil ; an advan
tageous situation; proximity of a good market ;
extent of territorial possession; and few
taxes; are, with regard lo the productive-
jness of huraan labour, certainly circumstances

151
of very great imporiance ; but without
wealth, talent, and industry, they are of no
use lo any one.
The profits which we have in view, vvhen
we pursue any branch of industry, depend as
much, and often more, on the institutions of
a country, than on its fertility. " National
prosperity," to use the words of M'^Culloch,
" does not depend nearly so rauch on an ad
vantageous situation, salubrity of cliraate, or
fertility of soil, as on the adoption of raeasures
fitted to excite the inventive powers of genius,
and to give perseverance and activity to in
dustry. The establishraent of a wise system
of public economy can compensate for every
other deficiency ; it can render regions natu
rally inhospitable, barren, and unproductive,
the comfortable abodes of an elegant and re
fined, a crowded and wealthy population;
but where it is wanting, the best gifts of
nature are of no value ; and countries pos
sessed of the greatest capacities of improve
ment, and abounding in all the materials ne
cessary for the production of wealth, with
difficulty furnish a miserable subsistence to
hordes distinguished only by their ignorance,
barbarism, and wretchedness. Countries^
with every iraaginable capability for the pro
fitable employment of industry and stock,

152
may have the raisfortune to be subjected to
an arbitrary government, which does not
respect the right of property ; and the inse
curity thence resulting may be sufficient to
paralyze all the exertions of those who are
otherwise placed in the most favourable situ
ation for the accuraulation of capital and
wealth." All raen have a strong attachment for the
land in which they were born and educated,
or which, by ties of family, friendship, and
long habit, has become their own ; and when
this love of country is founded on just grounds
it brings forth the best and most lasting pa
triotisra ; it ceases to be a blind passion, and
becomes a rational, and thereby an irresistible
power. But how strong soever this love of
country may be, it has its limits like every
thing else. When the public profession of
our religious tenets is not tolerated; when
our personal freedora is laid under vexatious
fetters ; when our personal property is not
respected ; when our industrious under
takings, after that produce expended in car
rying them on has been replaced, hardly yield
to us any surplus or profit ; when all reason
able hope to improve our condition, lo rise in
the world, or to provide for the exigencies of
a rising family, of old age, or sickness, is

153
taken from us ; then this loye of country will
naturally be weakened, and raen becorae dis
posed to emigrate.
The love of gain is also not a less and con
stantly operating principle ; and whenever
capitalists feel assured that their stock raay
be laid out with security, and greater advan
tage, in a foreign state than at home, its
efflux, to a greater or less amount, invariably
takes place. Every capitalist is naturally
tempted to convey his capital to a country
where tbe rate of profit is highest, and to re
move it fi'om a place or country where it is on
the decline. Emigration raay thus be con*
sidered but as a speculation, which raust be
regulated bythe sarae laws by which every
olher speculation is regulated : for in what
does emigration consist, but in the transfer of
a man's capital, be it wealth, talents, or the
mere dexterity of a common workman, to
another country, where that man expects that
the said capital will yield to him larger profits
than it did to him at home ? However, this
speculation, like all others, may fail; and it
certainly requires no common foresight and
judgment in a person to be successful in it.
Common workmen, by emigrating to the
United States, risk but little, if any thing,
as, if industrious, they have a well-founded
h2

154
hope to better their circumstances. There is
in America so much demand for labour, at
one place or another, that no workraan need
be long out of employ. But emigrants who
have enjoyed the comforts and refinements of
cities, and who have at their disposal but a
small capital, will, in the United States, have
to overcome many and great difficulties, what
ever may be their manner of industry.
A large field for the exercise of industry, in
the United Stales of Araerica, is certainly
open to all classes of emigrants. Nature is
there not frugal and grudging; she offers
freely and bountifully all her capacities and
powers to those who know how to use and to
profit by them. The greater fertility of the
soil in many parts of the Union also makes a
given quantity of labour produce more than
could be obtained by it in long cultivated
lands, or in a soil less rich. Security of pro
perty ; freedom of religion ; liberty in all pro
fessions ; an unrestricted internal trade, the
Americans enjoy to a very high degree ; and
the great progresses, made by the United
States, may justly be considered but as the
natural consequences of their superior sources
of prosperity. Human industry is so active,
that, wherever impediments do not obstruct
its development, it vvill press forward, nor cease

155
to work until it has reached those limits which
are established in nature by the all-regulating
Providence. Millions of fertile acres are still
unoccupied in America, and will araply re
ward those who locate upon, and cultivate
them. " If you have room and subsistence
enough," says Dr. Franklin, " you may make
ten nations out of one, all equally populous
and powerful."
The average rate of profit, which is gene
rally considered as the criterion whereby the
progress or decline of any country ought to
be measured, is also, in nearly all industrious
undertakings, higher in the United States
than in many, if nol all, European countries.
In America nearly every branch of industry
is still in a progressive slate of development,
and population is far from being checked by
a scarcity of the ordinary means of subsist
ence. A general fall of profits can never take
place but where industry in general has
become less productive, and industry will not
become less productive but where the pro^
gress of society has been impeded. How
ever much a particular, and it may be an
important, branch of industry is depressed,"
to use again the words of M'Culloch, slill, " if
the average rale of profit be high, we may be
assured that the depression cannot continucj

156
and that the condition of the country is really
prosperous. On the olher hand, though there
should be no distress in any particular branch ;
tbough agriculture, manufactures, and cora
merce, should be carried to a greater extent
than they have ever been carried before;
tbough a nation should have numerous, pow
erful, and well-appointed armies and fleets ;
and though the style of living araong the
higher classes should be more than ordinarily
sumptuous ; still, if the rate of profit should
have becorae comparatively low, we may
pretty confidently affirm that the condition
of such a nation, however prosperous in ap
pearance, is bad and unsound at bottom ;
that the plague of poverty is secretly creeping
on the mass of the citizens ; that the founda
tions of her power and greatness have been
shaken ; and that her decline raay be antici
pated, unless measures be devised for reliev
ing the pressure on the national resources,
by adding lo the productiveness of industry,
and consequently to the rale of profit."
Smith has said, — " The progressive stale
is cheerful and hearty to all the different or
ders of society ; the stationary is dull ; the
declining, melancholy." Is the truth of these
words not confirmed by the general prospe
rity, the general satisfaction, which prevails

157
in the United States ; and by the decline and
dissatisfaction evinced in so many parts of
Europe ? One does not want a high degree
of intelligence to be convinced of the de
clining slate against which so great a num
ber of Europeans have to struggle, and per
haps in vain. Much dissatisfaction is already
felt, nearly from one end of Europe to the
olher, and still threatens lo increase. The
decline of whole empires, though more lardy,
seems to be not less certain than that of men.
History not only confirras this in ils records,
but the present age furnishes us with raany
proofs of ils truth. Does not also the course
of nature clearly show that the descendants of
men, whose talents elevated thera above the
common mass of raankind, but seldom for
two or three generations maintain this supe
riority ? Should this be otherwise with large
communities, subjected, only on a larger scale,
to the fluctuations of the world ? Are not
-centuries for comraunities what years are for
individuals? " The genius of culture," says
the author of ' Austria as it is,' " draws to
wards the west : it rose on the beautiful
plains of the Euphrates, Tigris, Araxes, and
Ganges. They are now a desert. It moved
towards the borders of the Mediterranean,
and Lydia and Ephesus shone forth. Their

158
glory is gone too, to make place for the bright
star of beautiful Greece, whose splendour
sunk with the walls of Corinth, and iraperial
Rorae took the command of the world. She
is now only extant in the records of history,
and Europe's hope rests on the proud rock of
Albion. But the tide runs towards America,
and, perhaps, before two centuries shall have
elapsed, the genius of Europe, to avoid
Scythian fetters, will have alighted on the
banks ofthe mighty Mississippi."
But how rauch soever the United States of
America may abound in natural resources for
improvement, and in all the chief materials
necessary to render a nation prosperous and
happy, these States, like all other countries,
produce, as already said, nothing of the ne
cessaries and comforts of life, withoul labour.
Here, also, nothing that is valuable has ever
been obtained, except by the exertion of that
physical force, or those talents with which we
have been gifted by our Creator. In America,
as every where else, it is an absolute impossi
bility to obtain any thing of our numei'ous
wants and coraforts, except for personal or
accumulated industry. The bread we eat, the
clothes we wear, the house we live in, are the
produce only of exertion ; or can be had only
for money, which also is obtained only at'the

159
expense of great toil and suffering of those
that work in the raines. The inclination of
mankind to enjoy without labour is checked
every where, and vve are constantly taught
that on the exertion of our faculties depends
our existence as we progress in society.
Wherefore did Providence endow us wilh
reason, if not to profit by il, and to use it for
our benefit ?
Men, when persecuted by the vicissitudes
of huraan life, have often gone so far as to
question the goodness of the Deity 1 Every
one must, perhaps, confess that in moraents
of despondency, when affiicted by severe
losses and misfortunes, we have grurabled
at Providence. But have these calamities
not always proved themselves of the greatest
benefit to us ? Did they not re-animate our
lost activity ? Did they not rouse and restore
our necessary vigilance and energy ? Have
they not been the means by which we were
purified from many an obnoxious quality ?
" The gods in bounty work up storms about us.
That give mankind occasion to exert
Their hidden strength, and throw out into practice
Virtues which shun the day, and lie conceal'd
In the smooth seasons and the calms of life.'' Addtson.
Providence compels us, and wisely so, in

160
all situations of life, to exert our faculties, if
we will not be left behind, or sink inlo a lower
class of society. Il is to this pressure of want,
or of rival industry, and to the spurs of am
bition, that society is indebted for every im
provement. Without such a stimulus men
would seldom subrait themselves to the fa
tigues of extraordinary exertion, whether of
mind or of body. This is clearly proved by
the fact, that comparatively few men who
were born in affluence, and thereby enabled
to live comfortably without any personal ex
ertions, have ever distinguished themselves by
superior inventions, or productions of genius.
An easy raediocrity of circumstances, which
does not keep a man conslantly occupied in
providing for the immediate wants of life, nor
perrait him to be totally idle, seems best cal
culated to produce those superior beings who
are the honour of their country and of man
kind in general. " C'est dans la classe raito-
yenne," says Mr. Slorch, " egalement 6loig-
nee des extremes du luxe et de la misure ; c'est
dans la classe ou se rencontrent les fortunes
honnetes, les loisirs raeles k I'habitude du tra
vail, les libres coraraunications de I'amitie," le
gout de la lecture et des voyages ; c'est dans
cette classe que naissent les lumi^res ; et c'est
de 1^ qu'elles se repandent chez les grands et

161
chez le peuple ; car les grands et le peuple
n'ont pas le tems de mediter ; ils n'adoptent
les verites que lorsqu'elles leur parviennent
sous la forme d'axiome, et qu'elles n'ont plus
besoin de preuves."
There is a most valuable capital in every raan
of a cultivated and active raind, consisting in
nothing else but the union of all his faculties,
vvhich, called into activity by favourable cir
cumstances, and aniraated by favourable pros
pects, will, under proper direction, yield large
profits, and open resources that were before un
known. This peculiar encouragement, how
ever, in the ordinary course of things, is
chiefly confined to such communities alone
as are in the progress of their development.
In old and crowded countries, where all in
dustrious pursuits are overstocked, the par
ticular bias ofa man's mind is circumscribed.
Considered in this point of view, the United
States of America have numerous advantages
over Europe. In many States of the Union a
progress of culture and of general prosperity
is observed, vvliereof, with the single excep
tion, perhaps, of Odessa, we have no example
in modern Europe. In these Stales is
ample space for the development of the va
rious powers and resources of huraan talent
and ingenuity; and raany hidden doors of

162
opulence are, as yet, raost probably still un
opened, and wailing only for those who shall
have the nieans, talents, and energy, lo call
thera into life and action.
Those checks on the successful expansion
of huraan capacities, which we so often meet
with in Europe, are certainly less frequent in
nearly all the States of the American Union,
yet there also a great deal of sagacity and
foresight is required, if a man will succeed in
any superior industrious undertaking. With
out prudence or judgment a person will but
seldom prosper any where, nor succeed to
better his circumstances by emigration, even
when thereby he should be placed in the
most favourable external circurastances. If,
therefore, a person who is deprived of the
necessary talents and raeans, by eraigrating
to Araerica only increases his misery, this is
nobody's fault but his own. The disappoint<-
ment of a speculator, who can offer elegant
services of cut-glass and china to South
Americans, whose most splendid drink-ves
sels consist still of horn, or the shell of a
cocoa-nut; or who sends skates to Rio- Ja
neiro ; or a large consignment of spectacles
to Lima, is but natural ; and nobody, the
speculator himself perhaps excepted, will
throw the blame of it on the South Araericans,

163
the Brazilians, or the sharp-sighted Indians.
That some European emigrants have been
disappointed in their expectations, with re
gard lo the superior resources of the United
States, proves therefore nothing but their own
want of foresight, want of means, want of
energy and perseverance, or an accidental
pressure of local or bodily calaraities, to which
men are exposed every where. What also is
a single being, what are whole families, in
such a rising country as Araerica, but drops
of the Ontario ?
Whoever may have taken the- trouble to
inquire into the circumstances and expecta
tions of emigrants in general, will, I dare say,
have made the observation, that not a small
portion of them were mere enthusiasts or pro
jectors, allured by the most extravagant and
romantic accounts or notions, and very im
perfectly, if at all, prepared for so important
an undertaking. Others were unfortunate
men with families, who, pressed by unfavour
able circumstances, formed the resolution to
emigrate in a moment of dejection or despe
ration. Unacquainted wilh the nuraerous
difficulties which unavoidably awaited them,
they lost all their remaining portion of mental
and bodily energy, at the very first, and often
but trifling difficulties, they met with ; and

164
thus, by the speculation in question, aggra
vated only their different embarrassments.
That confidence which is only the fruit of a
long and deep investigation into every object
regarding any certain plan which we may have
in view, could not exist in them. Often, with
out any plan at all, or without a true judg
raent of their means, they becarae the sacrifice
ofa hasty and an ill-considered step. All that
a person, with but a sraall capital, by eraigrating
to a new country reasonably may expect there
to earn by his labours, is siraple plenty, total
independence, and cheering prospects.
Before a man finally resolves to leave his
country, to forsake his forraer habits, and
to break the ties of family, friendship, and of
social corafort, he should well reflect on what
he is doing, and whether the prospects or
advantages, which he reasonably may expect,
are worth the trouble and danger he, in all
cases, will raore or less be exposed to. With
out these precautions, our imagination is so
active that it hardly leaves us any rest to enjoy
in comfort a few moments of repose. Constantly
seeking a distant and imaginary advantage or
felicity, which we are, perhaps, never destined
to realize, we lose many opportunities of im
proving our condition, or of enjoying life at
home. Thus while sighing for a shadow, and

165
while neglecting the reality, or while on the
full gallop through life, riding post after our
own conceits, the best raoraents of our life are
oflen spent without profit or enjoyraent. If
men, in their course through life, could only
find some leisure, and the necessary inclina
tion lo stop a lillie, or to turn out of their
road, and while enjoying for a while " otium
cum dignitate," reflect al their leisure, and
with the necessary peace of mind, on their
own conceits, then they would find them, as
I can assure them by my own experience,
highly amusing. How well did Shakspeare
know human nature, when he wrote,
" Against our peace we arm our will ;
Amidst our plenty something still
For horses, houses, pictures, planting.
To thee, to me, to him is wanting.
That cruel something, unpossessed.
Corrodes and leavens all the rest."
The gratification of a want or wish is with
us oflen but a step lo some new desire. After
we have attained to that which at a distance
appeared to be the summit of our expecta
tions, we in reality have come only lo a point
at which new objects present themselves to
our imagination and ambition ; and thus we
are constantly urged on by the spurs of our

166
once- awakened love of wealth, power, or
consideration. Few feeling and thinking minds wander
through their earthly course without those
vivid pictures drawn by the pencil of imagi
nation. These, however, are but very seldom,
if ever, to be realized. These feelings seem
intended by our Creator to soften the hard
ships of human existence ; to reanimate that
earthly blessing, hope ; and to keep the pas
sions in due submission to our mental facul
ties ; but in theraselves they are as light and
as inconstant as the rainbow's ethereal colours.
Men who have been gifted by nature with
an abundant share of the powers of iraagina
tion ; all who have been accustomed to the
elegancies and luxuries of a refined life ; all
who have been brought up in large towns, and
have tasted the allurements of the European
capitals ; all who do not merely exist upon
bodily nourishment, but for whom men
tal recreations are alraost as necessary as
meat and drink ; all these should deeply reflect
on the object which they have in view, before
they embark, if not through necessity, and
quit the shores of Europe, to wander, per
haps, to the outskirts of civilized life. They
never can be perfectly sure whether their

167
imagination does not mislead them ; whether
their keen senses do not point out to them a
phantora, which, like an " ignis fatuus," will
lead them into a pool, and — vanish.
When, however, we recal once more lo our
memory the great resources, and the many
superior encouragements, to industry, wherein
the United States of America abound, as a
vast extent of ferlile soil ; a combination of
very different, but in general salubrious cli
mates ; a yearly-extending inierior communi
cation, both natural and artificial ,• security of
properly ; personal liberty ; freedom of re
ligion and industry ; diffusion of sound and
practical information ; a wise system of public
economy; and a highly enterprising nalional
character ; when we also reflect on the asto
nishing progresses already attained by the
Americans since their independence, — then it
becomes impossible to say to what greatness
the United States in justice may nol aspire ;
and well might that highly-gifted American —
Cooper — say, "That Alraighty Being, who
holds the destinies of nations in his hands,
must change the ordinary direction of his own
great laws, or the American population will
stand at the head of civilized nations long be
fore the close of this century."

CHAPTER VII.
SOME REMARKS ON AGRICULTURE, AND THE ADVAN
TAGES WHICH AN AGRICULTURIST, EMIGRATING TO
THE UNITED STATES, HAS TO EXPECT THERE.

171

CHAPTER VII,
" Blest who can unconcem'dly find
Hours, days, aud years, slide soft away.
In health of body, peace of mind.
Quiet by day.
Sound sleep hy night ; study and ease.
Together mixt, sweet recreation ;
And innocence, which most does please.
With meditation." Pope.
" O, friendly to the best pursuits of men.
Friendly to thought, to virtue, and to peace.
Domestic life in rural leisure passed.
Friends, books, a garden, and perhaps his pen.
Delightful industry enjoyed at home.
And nature in her cultivated trim.
Dressed to his taste, inviting him abroad ;
Can he want occupation who has these ?" Cowpeh.
Agriculture is of all branches of industry,
the object which by far the greatest nuraber of
persons who migrate to the United Slates of
America intend to pursue for their subsistence,
or lo better their circurastances and future pros
pects in life. Even men, who in Europe never

172
handled a plough, or who knew nothing of its
construction and application, have iraagined
that in America ihey might prosper as agri
culturists, and that, loo, wilhout the assistance
of scarcely any capital, — so prevailing is that
false notion, that every man rnay become a
farmer withoutprevious learning or education.
The fact, however, is very different from
what many seera to anticipate. No business
requires greater sagacity or more constant
application and prorapt activity than that
of the agriculturist. A farraer, to name only
sorae of the raost iraportant of his occupa
tions, has to seize upon the proper mo
ment for performing the various opera
tions of the farm, and to arrange them in
such a raanner that none may be neglected
or cause the neglect of others ; he has lo
study the best rotation of crops for that soil
which he cultivates, and to make a proper
choice with regard to the different breeds of
cattle; he must understand the different com
positions and application of raanure ; he should
know the principles on which his different
machines have been constructed ; he has to
ascertain the mosl advantageous period for
the sale of his produce ; and to perform or
to superintend so many other practical mat
ters requiring experience as would be tedious

173
further to enumerate. And is he sure to reap
the fruits of all his labours ? Does not the
success of his speculation depend on so many
influences over which he has not the least
control ? Are not his best laid combinations
and plans liable to be overturned by sudden
changes of weather, by devouring insects, or
by accidental alterations in the anticipated
market prices? And if he does not succeed
according to his expectation, is it very easy
for him to withdraw his already invested
capital from this sort of industry ?
It is true the United Slates still abound in
unappropriated and fertile land, which in some
States ofthe Union m ay be h ad for coraparatively
liltie raoney. Bulof what value are thousands
of acres of exeellent land unless the owner has
an opportunity of disposing lo his advantage
that produce he has raised on it ? This, how
ever, is not so easy in those Slates where the
acre of land is still lo be had for a few dollars,
or even for less. In these distant parts of the
country the roads are in so rough a state
that bulky produce cannot well be transported
on them, except at certain periods of theyear,
and even then not without considerable wear
and tear. And at the said periods, when the
access to the markets is coraparatively easy
for the farmer, these markets are in general

174
overstocked, because the greatest nuraber of
farmers are men of but littie property, and
therefore totally without the means of with
holding their produce from market, in order to
speculate upon any further advance in prices.
Men of wealth are in those parts of the Union
I am speaking of rather scarce, as they are
generally deterred frora them by the difficul
ties attending a new settlement.
As also the ability of a raan to raaintain him
self in comfortable circumstances depends on
the quantity of necessaries for which his
earnings, be it corn, tobacco, wheat, or money,
will exchange, he cannot, in general, be but
in poor circumstances, where this exchange of
produce is still in its infancy. And when a
cultivator of the soil meets with so many dif
ficulties to exchange his produce for other
coramodities, he will hardly be tempted to
produce more than is sufficient to supply the
necessaries for his own family and household.
If we further consider how many different
processes of industry are necessary before the
most common of our utensils are brought to
a tolerable degree of perfection, and how
small a part of what is required for our sub
sistence and enjoyment is produced by a
single individual in a raore cultivated state of
society, then we must clearly perceive how

175
many wants those have to struggle for who
reside in parts of the Union which have but a
few years been under cultivation.
It is also perfectly clear, that no productj
whatever may be its nature, can be brought
to market, unless the rate of wages be such as
will at an average suffice to raise it. The
rate of wages of farm hands is, however, very
high in nearly all the States, so that these
wages often absorb the greatest part of what
the farmer can make for his produce. Hence
it is, that a large family, as long as its raem
bers keep togeiher, and perform the greatest
part of the farm labour themselves, will be
more likely to prosper than single individuals
or small families unaccustomed to farm labour.
For those Who work their farras by hire
lings, it often becomes difficult to obtain any
rate of profit for the capital which has
been invested by them in the undertaking.
That assertion, hovvever — that a farra, even if
well managed, cannot be cultivated to a profit
in America, if the whole labour ori it is dorie
by hireliflgs — has been found to be erroneous.
That some large fortunes have been raade
in the land business, is. With few exceptions,
ifany, entirely owing lo Sorae men of wealth
having invested a part, or the whole of their
property, in a certain tract of land, to which

176
the annual influx of new comers, desiring lo
buy land, was particularly directed. Those
landholders were thereby often enabled lo
sell again for a very high price, that, which
only a few years back, they had bought for
coraparatively a raere trifle. But let no one
suppose that such speculations are at little or
no risk. The land bought as just stated is
subject to sorae annual taxes, and when the
owner or capitalist does not reside upon it
hiraself he also has to defray the expenses of a
residing agent, who is to take care of his
interest. However moderate these annual
charges may be, the capital invested in the
land is annually increased by them, and if the
rise of the price of the land does not exceed
the annual increase of the capital invested in
it, the whole speculation will at last prove
itself to be but a very profitless, if not a
ruinous concern.
The chief advantages which the United
States offer to agriculturists with a sraall ca
pital, and which Europe (if I except European
Turkey, which, if under raore liberal institu
tions, would be still enabled to offer roora to
millions of industrious beings) no longer
affords, consists in the circumslances, that the
ground property in nearly all the States of the
Union has not yet become so valuable as to

177
be totally out of their reach ; and that too
in good situations, or in those parts which
nature has blessed in point of fertility, situa
tion, and climate, with all the elements that,
besides good institutions, are necessary to
render an industrious manas prosperous and
happy as any vvhere on the whole face of the
earth. Even a man who at his outset can
purchase only two hundred acres of good land,
with the necessary stock of cattle, agricultural
impleraents, &c. and who understands Arae
rican farraing — whose mind does not revolt at
the idea of working with his own hands, and
of living with assistants and neighbours, as
unrefined as, in every country, men placed
under similar circumstances will be — may
look into futurity with an always increasing
delight, as every succeeding year he may
reasonably expect a new harbinger of raeans
for the increase of his prosperity and happi
ness. But such a man must look for his
comforts into futurity, and submit during
many, many years, to numerous and great
privations. Should, however, such an emi
grant expect lo lead in the new States of the
Union, an elegant country life, wbich wilh
reason can only be expected in a highly culti
vated and well-peopled country, or should he
dream of a cottage orne, and neatly kept
i2

178
pleasure grounds, then he will be most
grievously di sappointed. Such rural luxuries,
which are the offsprings of long accumulated
wealth, and the protracted labour of years,
can have no existence in a country just eraerg
ing out of a state of wilderness. In a new
country, where so rauch personal labour is
required — where a raan is chiefly dependent
on hiraself for the supply of nearly all his
wants, and has to perforra the greatest part
of the labour of his farm — there all that is
useful must predominate over the ornaraental.
As far as my own information reaches,
agriculture yields in no country so great a
return to the capital invested, as other Indus '
trious pursuits. It is but seldom that a
farmer makes a fortune. To live respectably,
and to leave sorae decent competence to his
children, is all, if not more, than he may expect.
That preference which has oflen been given
to agriculture over manufactures and com
merce, even by men of high authority in all
that regards political economy, is, at least
as far as pecuniary profits and general
utility are concerned, without any sound
foundation. To call agriculture the only
source of wealth, as Mr. Quesnay and his
followers did, or to call it the only honest way
for a nation to acquire wealth, as Dr. Frank-,

179
lin did, is equally erroneous. Men Who enter
tain similar ideas, completely overlook that
connexion, in which all branches of useful
industry stand and work together to the com
mon end. It is true that the soil must first
be occupied, and the raw produce of the earth
procured, before the raanufacturer can begin
to work and prosper, but tbe farmer cannot
do withoul the raanufacturer, nor the raanu
facturer without the merchant, and so on.
" All the modes," says M'Culloch, " in
vvhich capital can be employed in productive
industry, or, in other words, the raising ofthe
produce, the fashioning of that raw produce
after it is raised into useful and desirable
articles, the carrying of the raw and manu
factured products from place to place, and the
retailing of them in such portions as may suit
the public demand, are equally advantageous ;
that is, the capital and labour employed in
any of these departments contributes, equally
with that which is employed in the others, to
increase the mass of necessaries, conveniences,
and luxuries. Without a previous supply of
raw produce, we could have no manufactures ;
and without raanufactures and commercial
industry, the greater part of tbat raw produce
would be entirely worthless. Manufacturers
and raerchants are to the body politic what

180
the digestive powers are to the human body.
We could not subsist without food, but the
largest supplies of food cannot lengthen our
days, vvhen the machinery by which nature
adapts it to our use, and incorporates it with
our body, is vitiated and deranged. Nothing,
therefore, can be more silly and childish than
the estimates so frequently put forth of the
comparative advantages qf agricultural, ma
nufacturing, and commercial industry. They
are inseparably connected, and depend upon,
and grow out of each other. The agricultu
rists raise raw produce for tbe manufac
turers and merchants, while the latter manu
facture and import necessary, convenient, and
ornamental articles, for the use of the former.
Whatever, consequently, contributes to pro
mote or depress the industry and enterprise of
one class, must have a beneficial or injurious
influence upon the others." "Land and
trade," lo borrow the just and forcible expres
sion of Sir Josiah Child, " are Twins, and have
always, and ever will, wax and wane together.
It cannot be ill with trade but land will fall,
nor ill with land but trade will feel it."
But though agriculture offers no unusual
rate of profit, requires great energy of thought
and action, and subjects a man to great pri
vations and disappointraents, it may, how-

181
ever, in justice be considered as a very noble,
a very independent, and as the most natural
profession which a raan of some wealth can
resolve upon ; for that employment is doubt
less best suited to our nature which engages
at the sarae tirae our physical and our intel
lectual powers, wilhout impairing thera by
too rauch excitement. And if it is with some
good reason that agricultural habits and
education have been considered as the two
indispensable conditions for political self-
government, we may with reason look for
those independent feelings and habits — those
soul and body strengthening pursuits — which
prevail araongst an agricultural nation, as
also in tbe superior force of those bonds which
bind the owners of the soil lo their country
and its liberty. As the raore speculative and
elegant studies are best prosecuted by those
who, in the possession of a decent compe
tence, are attracted lo these pursuits more
by the gratification resulting frora thera thaii
by those pecuniary emoluments which may be
attached to them, so also raust those who
pretend to pursue agriculture as a science,
not so much have in view pecuniary profits
as those peculiar enjoyments which a judi
cious culture of the soil certainly affords. If
the study and practice of agricultural pursuits

182
did not yield these peculiar enjoyments, and
men of talent, activity, and wealth, had not
been tempted to become practical agricul
turists, few iraproveraents coraparatively
would have been made in agriculture ; as it
is a very general observation, that comraon
farraers, in all countries, are liltie disposed to
innovations ; that they remain strongly at
tached to ancient customs or routine; andbut
seldom acquire much more knowledge than
what is traditionary.
Poets, novelists, and panegyrists of the
country, by mistaking the delusive fabrica
tions of their heated imagination for the
reality, have so much extolled the charms of
a country life that coraparatively but few
beings really know what to raake of it. In
general, however, it raay be said, that men
who cannot be happy in a town will not be
happy in the country. With them it is not
the place that brings them satisfaction. If a
person quits a town or city under a temporary
disgust, or if perpetual agitation was his de
light, the country will to such a character
produce no relief; he may remove his body,
but his temper will remain unchanged. Some,
at an advanced age, have retired lo the coun
try, in the hope there to enjoy, in unmolested
happiness, the remaining part pf their days :

183
that they experience disappointraent is the
fault of none but themselves. How can a
man who, during his vvhoie life, has toiled in
a totally different career — that retires only
frora other business, or frora town, because he
is worn out — how can sUch a being create for
hiraself an agreeable existence in the country?
If a man has not laid the foundations for it in
the spring of his life, or, if later, he has not
becorae properly prepared for it, let hira ex
pect no gratifications from a country life. To
cultivate it, as il may be cultivated ; to enjoy
il, as it may be enjoyed ; and to bear it cheer
fully, with all those privations which are ge
nerally connected with it, requires an exten
sion of knowledge little known to those bred
in towns. Even a person well prepared for
a country life, and gifted with great and va-.
rious endowraents, will, afler having tasted
for years the conveniences and excite-*
ments of what vve call a more refined life,
perhaps not enjoy a life of seclusion, and
bear, without danger to his happiness, vvith
the evils of comparative solitude. If possible,
to unite the charras of a country life with the
occasional intercourse of a large town, will
doubtless after all be the most agreeable.
Of the different enjoyments which are to be
found in nearly all careers of life, none are so

184
pure, so lasting, so direct, and so agreeable,
as those whicb arise from the studied or scien
tific culture of the soil. The book of nature
is so voluminous and so entertaining, that no
one who in the least understands its language
will be able eilher lo exhaust or become
weary. And when we thus conslantly see
before us the benevolent intention of the Al
mighty displayed in the meanest object of his
creation, must we nol also perceive, and raay
we nol without blushing confess our convic
tion, that life has been bestowed upon us for
our own benefit, and that we cannot be wrong
in the endeavour to proraote ils improvement ?
Where, however, can we look for greater en
joyments than in the occupations vvith the
works of nature, or in the study of the laws
by which those works exist ? That object
whereupon the agriculturist bestows his
cares and affections, is the least changeable,
the least uncertain occupation, in human life ?
What passion but that for agriculture never
dies ? Does it not increase with our increas
ing age ? And what occupations offer also to
a leisure raind sweeter reflections ?
" Je voudrais," says the amiable Prince
de Ligne, " echauffer tout I'univers de mon
gout pour les jardins. II me semble qu'il est
impossible qu'un mechant puisse I'avoir. Ab-

185
sorbe par cette passion, qui est la seule qui
augmente avec I'^ge, I'horarae perd tous les
jours celles qui d^rangent le calme de I'^rae ou
l'ordre des societes. Quand il a passe le pont
levis de la porte de la vUle, I'asyle de la cor
ruption raorale et physique, pour aller ira-
vailler, ou jouir de la campagne, son coeur
rit k la nature, et eprouve la ra^rae sensation
que ses poumons k la reception d'un vent
fi'ais qui vient les rafraichir. P^res de families,
inspirer la jardiomanie k vos enfans. lis
en deviendront raeilleurs. Quand on pense a
ombrager un ravain, quand on cherche k at-
trapper un ruisseau k la course, on a trop k
faire pour devenir jaraais citoyen dangereux,
general intrigant, et courtisan cabaleur. Si
l'on vouloit 6crire contre les lois, se plaindre
au conseil de guerre, culbuter son sup^rieur,
ou raanigancer k la cour, on arriveroit trop
tard, puisqu'on aurolt dans la tele son bosquet
d'arbres de Judde, ou son buffet de fleurs, ou
son bosquet de platanes a arranger."
How many arts and professions have not
the last fifty years only, produced by fashion ?
Thoughout al I ages, civilized society ever has de
pended, and must continue to depend for exist
ence, on the cultivation of the soil. The earth
is the great primary source of the supply of
human wants: whatever we eat or drink

186
comes originally frora her bosora. If, there
fore, agriculture has an advantage superior to
those offered by other branches of huraan in
dustry, then this advantage must consist, I
should think, in the comparative greater se
curity of that prosperity which is founded on
a judicious and speculative agriculture. Mani
fold are the vicissitudes to which manufac
turers and merchants are exposed, and
where, by their industry, this year thousands
live in a degree of coraparative affluence, the
next year poverty and wretchedness may
dwell. " God made the country," to use the
words of Paulding, " and man raade the town ;
and the difference of the work is exemplified
in their progress and decay. The one is sub
ject only to the operations of the elements,
while the other depends for its growth
and prosperity on a thousand accidents. The
variable course of trade, the caprices of a
despot, the establishment of a college, or the
opening of a canal, can make a city flourish
or decay. But he who draws his support from
the bosom of the earth is independent of these
chances, accidents, and caprices. This is il
lustrated by the unceasing complaints, pe
titions, remonstrances, and clamours, of mer
chants and raanufacturers, asking protectioH,
monopoly, or bounty, when contrasted with

187
the independent silence of the farmer, who
asks nothing from his government but equal
lavvs ; and nothing of heaven, but rain and
sunshine." But when the charms of nature have faded
away ; when the earth is no longer covered
with that virgin green our eyes are so much
pleased to dwell upon ; when no leaves, no
flowers, and no birds, animate the shrubbery^
and pelting showers and furious winds suc
ceed, what enjoyment offers then a country
life ? Even then, under these circumslances,
they are, though curtailed, yet not entirely
wanting. Many lillie household wants will
give occasion to exercise the carpenter's "and
joiner's skill. Perhaps an uninvited stranger,
of rather a vulgar appetite, has also suc
ceeded to enter into your cabbage- garden,
and, by feasting there at your expense, rouses
your passion, and out you start, gun in hand,
lo expel an intruder, that probably, on a
following day, furnishes your lable with no
unwelcome morsel. Your books, too, which
during the fair season had reraained in quiet
and neglected, will now afford an agreeable
and useful entertainraent : their society, if
well chosen, will be valuable. " Quoiqu'on
dise," says M. Sisraondi, " personne apr^s
tout ne cause raieux et plus agreablement

188
qu'un livre. Personne n'est plus complai
sant et plus discret ; vous pouvez interrompre
cette conversation quand il vous plait,
faire un somme mferae, la renouer ou vous
I'avez laisse, revenir sur ce qui vous interesse,
sauter sur ce qui vous n'int6resse pas, et vous
enferraer tele-^-lfete avec un livre, toujours
sfir de ne jamais en avoir plus que vous ne
voudriez. Cet sentiment de sureld est in
estiraable 1"
While thus cultivating the raind, and pre
serving health by useful exercise, while en
joying the well-regulated society of a faraily,
and the occasional visits of friendly inter
course, or while planning near a cheerful
fireside new scheraes for occupation and en
joyment during the approaching summer,
your hours, days, and nights, will glide imper
ceptibly away, and you will never, or very
seldora, have occasion to coraplain of the
length of an evening, but often, perhaps, of
the shortness of a day.
" 11 n'-y-a point de saisons steriles pour celui qui veut cul-
tiver k la fois sa terre et son esprit." Delacroix.
For a raan who is fond of what is called the
world — who has so few resources within hira,
that he entirely depends for his recreation on
public arauseraents, or to whora the constant

1B9
agitation of a public life, and all the super
fluities of an artificial one, have becorae, by
habit or sentiraent, of absolute necessity ; and
who thinks it beneath his personal dignity
occasionally to use in some household occu
pations tbose limbs intended for industry — for
such a being to spend the winter in the coun
try, will prove itself to be but a very irk
some affair. Those gay resorts of fashion
which of late have supplanted the more inti
mate and friendly intercourse of men,
and which large towns only afford, do
these medley meetings really contribute to
further mutual enjoyraent, rautual instruc
tion, mutual benevolence, not to say friend
ship ? Are they not, on the contrary, cal
culated to destroy the more solid, the more
wholesome, and the more lasting enjoyments,
of domestic and familiar society ? Have they
even no bad influence on all those domestic
affections and virtues which constitute, if not
the highest, certainly the most usefiil qua
lities of man ?
" Si on veut etre de bonne foi," says Mr.
Jacob, " cette societe qu'on appelle en general
la bonne compagnie, donne peu de satisfaction
k ceux qui I'observent avec attention ; con-
venez, que ce n'est ni le gout ni le coeur, pas
m^me la certitude du plaisir, mais plutot une

190
vaine et monotone habitude, qui rassemble
parmi nous tant d'etres bizarres qui ne savent
point apprecier les verilables jouissances.
On se cherche sans s'aimer, on sevoit sans se
plaire, et on se perd dans la foule, sans se re-
gi'etler. Quels sont donc les raolifs de ces
reunions des gens du bon ton ? L'egalite du
rang, de la fortune, I'erapire de I'usage, I'en-
nui d'eux-raeraes, et ce besoin de s'elourdir
qu'ils sentent continuelleraent, et qui serable
etre le partage exclusif de la grandeur et de
la richesse."
Fortunately we are blessed with soraething
by far superior to such sources of pleasure-—
something that is constantly in our power
when we seek it, and which lo cultivate and
to embellish, be it in the town or in the
country, should be our constant duty and de-
light^tbis something is, our horae ! " There
is," to use the words of the author of ' De
Vere,' " such a charra in this magic word,
that he must be lost indeed lo whom it does
not bring sorae comfort. For there is nol, in
the whole range of moral observation, any
thing so pregnant wilh satisfaction or interest
as the associations that cling to this simple
word. Shelter, if not independence of all that
may be without, togeiher with the gratifica
tion of all the charities that are within, are

191
the general notions whicb here lay hold of us.
They are not confined to any rank or any
station — to any scale of enjoyments, or any
degree of wealth. On the contrary, the more
modest the home the greater the chance for
those peaceful reflections upon which the
whole value of it depends. If ever the poor
man thinks himself a man, if ever his mind
is erect, or his raanners are softened, it is 9.t
home. It is there he feels himself God's
creature equally with his master ; it is there
that he may laugh at the struggles of ambi?
tion, which, if even successful, can give no
more than the power he has already— of fan-
eying himself suprerae in his own little do
main. Hence it is not raarble, nor gold, nor
crowds of followers, that form any part of the
value of this treasure, but the self-sufficing
spirii which it calls up, and which, in a morai
sense, equals us with monarchs. That this is
true, is proved hy every man who has ever
found pleasure in the silent hour, when he
shuts out the world, to converse with hiraself.
Nor do I know a raore enviable situation than
his, who, with his thoughts at peace, turns
the key of his chamber upon the struggles of
man, and while the lords of kingdoras quar
rel with fortune for not giving thera wider
rule, says to his own heart, within the precinqt

192
of perhaps a few sq.uare feet, " Here ara I,
lord of myself !"
If, then, our siraple horae abounds in so
many gratifications, why should we, by look
ing for them out of it, disturb so often our
body's ease or our mind's peace ? You honest
wanderer, however, whora persecution, want,
orother circumslances, may have driven from
your native land, and who art in search of a
distant home, be not dejected ! The life of a
new settler, though far from being easy or
comfortable, is not bereft of all charms. That
constant, though slow change, of a mere wil
derness into a more habitable place, and this
according to one's own peculiar taste and
habits, and under one's own direction and
influence, has offered to many cultivated
beings pleasures in a high degree attractive.
" Einshones Her2 hat bald sich heimgefunden,
Es schafft sich selbst, still wirkend seine Welt.
Und wie der Baum sich in die Erde schlingt,
Mit seiner Wurzeln kraft und fest sich kettet.
So rankt das Edle sich, das TreiBiche
Mit seinen Thaten an das Leben an." Schiller.

CHAPTER VIII.

ON THE GOLDEN AGE.

195

CHAPTER VIII.
" Wenn Du daa grosse Spiel der Welt gesehen
So kehrst Du reicher in Dich selbst zuruck ;
Denn wer den Sinn aufs Ganze hilt gerichtet,
Dem ist der Streit in seiner Brust gesohlichtet." Schiller.
" Those who have various resources in themselves feel that
independence of mind which all must covet ; nor are they ever
conscious of the oppression of time ; they meet its approach
with joy, and only blame the rapidity with which he seems to
steal away from them. Such as have the most of them will
ever he found the happiest. Cheerfulness is the natural resuk
of exertion ; and man the only being we know of, in creation,
to whom time appears often burthensome." Keate.
In all times men have much drearaed of a
golden age — when the human race was yet
free from frailties, aud allowed to enjoy life
in a blessed primitive simplicity ; that is, un
molested, and nearly without labour. It is
only with regard to the time and place, when
and where, this El-Dorado existed, that
men rather differ. If we were to believe
some wi'iters, then, to enjoy again those days
of perfect simplicity, innocence, and happi-

196
ness, we have only to destroy all those nu
merous inventions and perfections in the
different arts and institutions which hitherto
were regarded and respected by us, as the
true sources of our iraproved and more com
fortable position in life, and to return again
to a stale of comparative brutality. Accord
ing to those men who profess sirailar opinions,
the true period of human happiness must be
looked for iu the age of our great great
grandfathers ; or of those patriarchs, called
Abrahara, Isaac, and Jacob, who lived sorae
what about two thousand years before Christ,
our Redeemer from misery, was born. If we
consult more modern writers aboul this El-
Dorado, they tell us that perfect happiness
cannot exist in a civilized society ; that it
fled frora earth when civilization was intro
duced ainongst us; and that we can only
meet with it again by emigrating to countries
which have scarcely ceased to be a mere
wilderness : as, for instance, the shores of the
Swan River, sorae parts of the Brazils, some
Islands in the South Sea, or Mr. Owen's late
eslabHshment on the Wabash. There are
still others who pretend that men enjoy no
perfect happiness except in their childhood,
when the cares and vices of the world are yet
unknown to thera. It raay be worth while

197
to examine somewhat more minutely what we
ought to believe of these diverging opinions.
Those raen who praise so rauch the age of
the patriarchs, and who seera to believe that
at that period raankind was not exposed to
those huraan passions, such as envy, selfish
ness, cupidity, brutality, and so forth, could
they ever have read the first book of Moses ?
Does this book, however, not contain the
history of that period they are speaking of in
such high terms ? If we consult the said
book, do we find it there confirmed, that our
old, old grandfathers, the patriarchs and their
progeny, were free frora those huraan weak
nesses we still every where meet with ? Did
not both Abraham and Isaac deny their wives ?
Were they nol afraid to be killed, on account
of their wives being fair women ? Does that
prove that the fear of God was in tbe land ?
Were Abraham and Lot not obliged lo sepa
rate, to avoid strife between them ? Did both
Abraham and Jacob not go in to the hand
maids of their wives, and had children by
them ? Did Abraham not cast forth into the
wilderness his concubine Hagar, with her son
Ishraael ? Did Jacob not deprive his brolher
Esau of his birthright, and of his father's
blessing ? And if we go back still further in
human history, and see why God destroyed

198
the world by the flood, then we shall see that
it was because " God saw that the wickedness
of man was great on the earth, and that every
imagination of the thoughts of his heart was
only evil continually. And God said unto
Noah : The end of all flesh has come before
me, for the earth is filled with violence
through them, and behold I will destroy them
with the earth. And as thou art a just man
thou shalt be saved. Make thee an avk of
gopher wood, and go thou and all thy house
inlo it, when the flood of waters shall come
upon the earth."
To what do we owe those perfections in all
the different arts and sciences which are of
so great an influence on our coraforts and
general happiness ? Is it not to the labour
and inventions of whole generations which
have preceded us ? Those ameliorations in
our political institutions — that personal and
mental liberty which we enjoy, and which is
spreading with an irresistible step from land
to land — rare they nol the fruits of severe
struggles, of numerous disappointments, and
of much perseverance and hard-earned expe
rience ? Those refinements in all our daily
wants, are they not the fruits of a dense po
pulation, and of the division of labour ? All
the more speculative and elegant studies.

199
which contribute so much lo our enjoyments,
can they prosper where wealth has not yet
been amassed, or where man is constantly
occupied in providing the bare means of his
existence? Is there any or much time left
for the culture of their minds to men placed
in similar circumstances ? What degree of
happiness, then, raay we reasonably expect in
regions that are inhabited only by a few poor
settlers, living at great distances, wilhout so
cial comfort and all the resources of civilized
life ? What comforts can men possibly enjoy,
who, by their situation, are exposed lo a con
tinual struggle with the eleraents, wild beasts,
savages, or the stubborn quality of a virgin
soil ; and surrounded by an atmosphere filled
with wide-spreading pestilence, the necessary
consequence of the powerful action of a
southern sun on a soil suddenly stripped of
its long enjoyed shade, and covered with
inpuldering. trees and a putrifying vegeta
tion ?
Is it in, the spring of life only that happi
ness may be, iCnj^oyed ? Are we not generally
loo fpudjof .extolling this charming period of
huraan , nature^ — thjs season of human life,
when our heartland mind, filled with fire and
confidence^; aspire to. the very summit of hu
man happiness. When, yet unacquainted with

200
indulgence, all but perfection is disregarded
by us, is this period really the happiest of
our existence ? To what do those exalted
plans lead a youthful raind, if not guided by
prudence or checked by Providence ? " Cette
fievre qui pousse lajeunesse sur le chemin de
la vie, ces passions qui renlrainent, cette
ardente curiosity qui I'attire, si elle ne trouvent
d'obslacles dans les conseils de la sagesse, que
trouvent elles au bout de la carri^re qu'elles
ont devoi'6 qu'un fant&rae, le d^senchente-
raent?" Let every one enjoy his youth and the
alacrity of his spirits while he can ; they will
not wait for him ; they yield a tune which has
no dacapo in human life. I ara no preacher
of raonkish abstemiousness in tbis sprightly
period of our existence ; all I wish is, to
irapress upon others ray conviction, that he
who in the prirae of life destroys not his con
stitution, or who, in the enjoyment of that
delicious period of his existence, forgets not
lo cultivate his mind, will, without regret,
exchange buoyancy of spirit for happiness
raore tranquil. Our coramon Father is so
just and benevolent, and so well balanced are
the advantages and disadvantages of all hu
man conditions, that there is happiness for us
all, if reasonably pursued.

201
In youth there are so many objects and
passions which divide and distract our life,
that we are scarcely sensible of a collected
conviction of our existence. " Spring," says
the author of the Borderers, " is the youth of
the year, and, like that probational period of
life, raost fitted to afford the proraise of better
things. There is a constant struggle between
reality and hope throughout the whole of this
slow raoving and treacherous period, which
has an unavoidable tendency to deceive. All
that is said of its grateful productions is falla
cious, for the earth is as liltie likely lo yield
a generous tribute, without the quickening
influence of the summer's heat, as man is
wont to bring forth commendable fruits with
out the agency of a higher moral power than
any he possesses in virtue of his innate pro
pensities. On the olher hand, the fall of the
year possesses a sweetness, a repose, and a
consistency, which raay be justly likened to
the decline of a well-spent life. It is in all
countries, and in every cliraate, the period
when physical and moral causes unite to fur
nish the richest sources of enjoyment. If the
spring is the time of hope, autumn is the
season of fruition. There is just enough of
change to give zest to the current of exist
ence, while there is too little of vicissitude
k2

202
to be pregnant of disappointment.^' How
pften, also, are those charras which captivate
our senses in the spring of nature, not sud
denly interrupted by a cold or rainy day ?
How raany trees covered with blossora, pro
mising the most abundant harvest, have not
lost this beauty in a single night ? How oflen
did those human plants, which in youth spread
an almost supernatural splendour around
them, bear sound fruit ? On the contrary, he
whose spring of life was rainy and stormy
has oflen enjoyed a fine summer. And should
a man even be disappointed in his summer,
let him look into the book of nature, and he
will there learn, that often, nay, in general,
the finest autumn succeeds to an unpros
perous summer and to a rainy spring.
" En avancant en Sge, en se caiman I,"
says Azais, " I'horarae acquiert la faculte de
supporter plus patiemment les contrarietes de
la vie. Corarae il se retire chaque jour un
peu plus en lui raeme, il demande raoins de
plaisirs aux hommes et k la nature ; il desire
avec raoins de vivacite ceux qu'il deraande
encore ; il eprouve par consequent moins de
refus, et il est moins agit^ par le refus qu'il
eprouve ; il voit chaque jour diminuer le
nombre de ses rivaux, de ses ennemis, des
hommes auxquels il porte ombrage ; il s'affecte

203
moins vivement de I'ardeur avec laquelle
d'autres horames portent ombrage k ses desirs
et k son sort ; sa raison , lui monlre qu'une
telle ardeur, dans tous les homraes, est le
gitime et naturelle. L'homme qui peut rai
sonner est toujours pr^s de la paix interieure,
puisqu'il est juste avec raoins d' efforts."
To what period in life but to that of our
youth are also most applicable the following
words of the sarae author : — " Dans tout
I'homme sensible, les corabats int6rieures,
entre de nouveaux pencbans et des idees an
ciennes, sont le ferraent de I'drae. Les pensees,
ainsi que les resolutions, sans cesse agitees et
discordantes, irapriment k la conduite ainsi
qu'au langage ; le desordre en mSme teras que
I'eclat. Alternativeraent jetee vers ce qu'elle
desire, et vers ce qu'elle regrette, Vkme est
etrang^re k la moderation paisible ; elle
s 'exalte, s'irrite, elle defend avec vehemence
ce que bientot elle abandonne ; elle repousse
avec ardeur ce que bient6t elle va soutenir;
il lui faut des passions, des ressentimens, des
paradoxes ; la raison tente rarement k se
faire entendre; prudente et discrete, elle se
tait et attend."
When Dr. Franklin was asked by Madame
Helvetius, whether he did not feel himself
happy, he said, " Je n'ai jamais eu la maladie

204
de me trouver raalheureux. D'abord pauvre,
puis riche, j'ai toujours 6te content de ce que
je tenois, sans regarder ce que je ne tenois
pas; mais depuis que je vieillis, depuis que
les passions se sont ^teintes, je sens un bien
^Ire d'esprit et de cceur, que je n'avois point
connu, et qu'il est impossible de connoitre
6lanl jeune. A cet age I'ame est au dehors, au
raien elle est ep, dedans ; elle regarde par la
fenetre le bruit des passans sans prendre part
k leurs querelles."
That perfect happiness we in youth raay
dreara of, is seldora, if ever, realized in this
world. Nothing is perfect but what dwells
above. Here, on earth, no happiness will be
found without alloy, and we raust lake every
thing with ils possible chances of good and
evil. The sensations of our raind and body
also depend on too raany circurastances which
are totally beyond the limited range of our
humble raeans, and whereon our foresight
and actions have but a very limited influence.
There cannot exist, therefore, a human being
who has not been disappointed, more or less,
in his dreams of earthly happiness ; though
the following words, used by Chateaubriand
in expressing the same opinion, are certainly
loo gloomy : — " Point de cceur qui n'entretient
une plaie cachee. Le coeur le plus serein en

205
apparence ressemble au puil naturel de la
Savane Alahua : la surface en parait calme et
pure, mais lorsque vous regardez au fond du
bassin, vous appercevrez un large crocodile
que le puil nourit dans ses eaux."
But what is human happiness ? Is it an
effect without a cause — a spontaneous pro
duction, that is created and that grows, one
cannot tell hovv, without hunian care or trou
ble ? Is it a gift of caprice or of the goddess
Fortune ? Wealth, power, and even honour,
she may confer, but can she give happiness ?
Are her gifts instilled alone into the minds of
a favoured few ? Does she reside in the
dwelling of the rich only ? Or does she dwell
with the poor ? Is she lo be found with the
idler, or with the constant toiling labourer ?
Is she the effect of our earthly or of our hea
venly elements ? What then is happiness, and
where may we look for it ? Happiness is lo
be found every where around us, and nearly in
all circumslances of life. Place, riches, and
other outward circumstances, have but an in
direct influence on it, and all that is required
to enjoy it is but an eye to discern and a
heart to feel it. The discerning powers of
our raind raay be strengthened — the suscep
tibility of our heart may be awakened and

206
cultivated— but without a discerning eye and
a feeling beart there is no happiness in this
world. " Smaeht u een dayf gelijk patrijs,
De geerst soo wel ais eiuigh rijs,
Het eiide-vleys gelijk kapqen,
Wat habje met veel goeis te doen ?
Het is alieen een lukigh man
Die sijn gemoet vernoegen kan." Cats.
As, however, things not known or under
stood can be of no interest to us, as know
ledge extends our interest, and ignorance and
indifference are almost the same, we raay
justly believe that that being will be the
happiest or the raost content araong us who
has conquered time, who has ceased to know
what herculean work it is— the killing pf
time; and who, endowed with such a self-
sufficing spirii, has, rendered himself inde
pendent of others.
Pleasure or happiness, also, often comes
" ^ saute et ^ gambade," as Lady .Morgan
expresses herself, and are then only caught
by the alert and attentive. And, like every
thing else in this world, so also pleasure is
mortal. M. Dupr6 de St. Mauer very justly
observes, " Demander que I'existence soit

207
une fete perpetueUe, un enchaine^menl de
plaisirs, c'est tyer le plaisir, c'est n'avoir au
cune science du bonheur veritable." \Vquld
the charms of nature be so agreea,ble to us if
they did not continually, change, if they did
not totally fade away, lo reappear clothed in a
new and in a fresher garb ? This uninter
rupted change, this constant growth and de
cline of every thing in. nature— and of course
our own decay — do they not constitute the
sources of deep felt pleasures ? The idea of
decline certainly is in itself nol very fas
cinating; but is there a single reflecting
mortal who would renounce all those plea--
sures, raental as well as bodily, vyhich natu
rally grow out of this continual change of
circumstances, and who would prefer to thera
the absence of that transient, though for the
moment depressing idea, of the inconstancy
and mortality of our nature, and of all thstt is
dear lo us ? Would our existence, vvould the
whole nature, not be of the most monotonous
and depressing character ? Would there be a
creation at all ?
Every day I become more and raore pf
Dryden's opinion, " that if a straw can be
made the instrument of happiness, he is a
wise man who does not despise it." To cnl-

208
tivate this art, to draw pleasure and entertain
ment frora the meanest object, should be our
study, our delight. For the art to live requires
study, like every other art ; and we raust sub
ject ourselves to a certain course of training
and champooing, before we learn to under
stand it. It certainly, however, does consist
in an endeavour to content ourselves with the
present, and to draw from every siluation in
which we may be placed by Providence,
whatever amusement it is capable of af
fording. " The art of life," to conclude my remarks
in the words of Jefferson, " is the art of
avoiding pain ; and he is the best pilot who
steers the clearest ofthe rocks and shoals with
which it is beset. Pleasure is always before
us, but misfortune is at our side ; while run
ning after that, this arrests us. The most
effectual means of being secure against pain,
is to retire within ourselves, and to suffice for
our own happiness. Those which depend on
ourselves are the only pleasures a wise raan
will count on, for nothing is ours which
another raay deprive us of. Hence the ines
timable value of intellectual pleasures. Ev^er
in our power, alvvays leading us to soraething
new, never cloying, we ride serene and su-

209
blime above the concerns ofthis mortal world^
contemplating truth and nature, matter and
inotion, the laws which bind up their exist
ence, and that Eternal Being who raade and
bound thera up by those laws."

THE END.

W. WILSON, PRINTER, S7, SKfNNER-STBEET, LONDON.

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