e, bravely announces in Parliament that
the New World is before the Colonists, and that liberty is theirs; and
afterwards, as diplomatist, instructs his government that, through the
attraction of our public lands, immigration will be quickened beyond
precedent and the national debt cease to be a burden. D'Aranda, the
Spanish statesman and diplomatist, predicts to his king that the United
States, though born a "pygmy," will soon be a "colossus," under whose
influence Spain will lose all her American possessions except only Cuba
and Porto Rico. Burns, the truthful poet, looks forward a hundred years,
and beholds our people rejoicing in the centenary of their independence.
Fox, the liberal statesman, foresees the increasing might and various
relations of the United States, so that a blow aimed at them must have a
rebound as destructive as itself. Canning, the brilliant orator, in a
much-admired flight of eloquence, discerns the New World, with its
republics just called into being, redressing the balance of the old.
Cobden, whose fame will be second only to that of Adam Smith among all
in this catalogue, calmly predicts the separation of Canada from the
mother country by peaceable means. Alaman, the Mexican statesman and
historian, announces that Mexico, which has already known so many
successive races, will hereafter be ruled by yet another people, who
will take the place of the present possessors; and with these prophetic
words, he draws a pall over his country.

All these various voices, of different times and countries, mingle and
intertwine in representing the great future of our Republic, which from
small beginnings has already become great. It was at first only a grain
of mustard-seed, "which is, indeed, the least of all seeds; but when it
is grown, it is the greatest among herbs and becomes a tree, so that the
birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof." Better still,
it was only a little leaven, but it is fast leavening the whole
continent. Nearly all who have prophesied speak of "America" or "North
America," and not of any limited circle, colony, or state. It was so, at
the beginning, with Sir Thomas Browne, and especially with Berkeley.
During our Revolution the Colonies, struggling for independence, were
always described by this continental designation. They were already
"America," or "North America," thus incidentally foreshadowing that
coming time when the whole continent, with all its various Stat