aristocracy favors the
growth of personal eminence, even in those who are not of it, but only
near it.

The essential antagonism of Virginia and New England was afterwards to
become, and to remain for a century, an element of the first influence
in American history. Each might have learned much from the other; but
neither did so till, at last, the strife of their contending principles
shook the continent. Pennsylvania differed widely from both. She was a
conglomerate of creeds and races,--English, Irish, Germans, Dutch, and
Swedes; Quakers, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Romanists, Moravians, and a
variety of nondescript sects. The Quakers prevailed in the eastern
districts; quiet, industrious, virtuous, and serenely obstinate. The
Germans were strongest towards the centre of the colony, and were
chiefly peasants; successful farmers, but dull, ignorant, and
superstitious. Towards the west were the Irish, of whom some were
Celts, always quarrelling with their German neighbors, who detested
them; but the greater part were Protestants of Scotch descent, from
Ulster; a vigorous border population. Virginia and New England had each
a strong distinctive character. Pennsylvania, with her heterogeneous
population, had none but that which she owed to the sober neutral tints
of Quaker existence. A more thriving colony there was not on the
continent. Life, if monotonous, was smooth and contented. Trade and the
arts grew. Philadelphia, next to Boston, was the largest town in British
America; and was, moreover, the intellectual centre of the middle and
southern colonies. Unfortunately, for her credit in the approaching war,
the Quaker influence made Pennsylvania non-combatant. Politically, too,
she was an anomaly; for, though utterly unfeudal in disposition and
character, she was under feudal superiors in the persons of the
representatives of William Penn, the original grantee.

New York had not as yet reached the relative prominence which her
geographical position and inherent strength afterwards gave her. The
English, joined to the Dutch, the original settlers, were the dominant
population; but a half-score of other languages were spoken in the
province, the chief among them being that of the Huguenot French in the
southern parts, and that of the Germans on the Mohawk. In religion, the
province was divided between the Anglican Church, with government
support and popular dislike, and numerous dissenting sects, chiefly
Lutherans, Indepe