were
adopted which gave to the several States a semblance of unity, and
smoothed the path to the more perfect union which was established ten
years later. These events present themes peculiarly congenial to Mr.
Bancroft's powers of brilliant generalization and rapid condensation,
and tempt him into that field of discursive reflection where he is fond
of lingering, and where we follow him always with interest, and
generally with assent. We quote with peculiar pleasure the following
observations from the fifteenth chapter, on the constitutions of the
several States of America, as being sound in substance and happy in
expression:--

"The spirit of the age moved the young, nation to own justice as
antecedent and superior to the state, and to found the rights of the
citizen on the rights of man. And yet, in regenerating its institutions,
it was not guided by any speculative theory or laborious application of
metaphysical distinctions. Its form of government grew naturally out of
its traditions, by the simple rejection of all personal hereditary
authority, which in America had never had much more than a
representative existence. Its people were industrious and frugal.
Accustomed to the cry of liberty and property, they harbored no dream of
a community of goods; and their love of equality never degenerated into
envy of the rich. No successors of the fifth-monarchy men proposed to
substitute an unwritten higher law, interpreted by individual
conscience, for the law of the land and the decrees of human tribunals.
The people proceeded with self-possession and moderation, after the
manner of their ancestors. Their large inheritance of English liberties
saved them from the necessity and from the wish to uproot their old
political institutions; and as happily the scaffold was not wet with the
blood of their statesmen, there was no root of a desperate hatred of
England, such as the Netherlands kept up for centuries against Spain.
The wrongs inflicted or attempted by the British king were felt to have
been avenged by independence. Respect and affection remained behind for
the parent land, from which the United States had derived trial by jury,
the writ for personal liberty, the practice of representative
government, and the separation of the three great co-ordinate powers in
the state. From an essentially aristocratic model, America took just
what suited her condition, and rejected the rest. Thus the transition of
the Colonies into