ll administered as if there had been
volumes of sage acts and statutes yearly made, and daily neglected and
forgotten.

[Footnote 51: William Kieft, the predecessor of Stuyvesant in the
government of New Amsterdam, was a tyrannical, blundering
administrator, whose rule was marked by disastrous wars with the
Indians and dissension among his own people which nearly ruined the
province. He was recalled by the home government, and while on his way
to Holland was lost in the wreck, on the English coast, of the ship in
which he had sailed.]

He was, in fact, the very reverse of his predecessors, being neither
tranquil and inert, like Walter the Doubter, nor restless and
fidgeting, like William the Testy; but a man, or rather a governor of
such uncommon activity and decision of mind that he never sought nor
accepted the advice of others; depending bravely upon his single head,
as would a hero of yore upon his single arm, to carry him through all
difficulties and dangers. To tell the simple truth, he wanted nothing
more to complete him as a statesman than to think always right; for no
one can say but that he always acted as he thought. He was never a man
to flinch when he found himself in a scrape; but to dash forward
through thick and thin, trusting, by hook or by crook, to make all
things straight in the end. In a word, he possest, in an eminent
degree, that great quality in a statesman, called perseverance by the
polite, but nicknamed obstinacy by the vulgar. A wonderful salve for
official blunders; since he who perseveres in error without flinching
gets the credit of boldness and consistency, while he who wavers in
seeking to do what is right gets stigmatized as a trimmer. This much
is certain; and it is a maxim well worthy the attention of all
legislators, great and small, who stand shaking in the wind,
irresolute which way to steer, that a ruler who follows his own will
pleases himself; while he who seeks to satisfy the wishes and whims of
others runs great risk of pleasing nobody. There is nothing, too, like
putting down one's foot resolutely, when in doubt, and letting things
take their course. The clock that stands still points right twice in
the four-and-twenty hours: while others may keep going continually and
be continually going wrong.

Nor did this magnanimous quality escape the discernment of the good
people of Nieuw Nederlandts; on the contrary, so much were they struck
with the independent will and vigorous