dopting them; but he
spares the Americans the bitterness which a detail of the
circumstances would have produced.

If any one chooses to say that some wicked antipathy to twelve
millions of strangers is the origin of my opinion, I must bear
it; and were the question one of mere idle speculation, I
certainly would not court the abuse I must meet for stating it.
But it is not so. I know that among the best, the most pious,
the most benevolent of my countrymen, there are hundreds, nay, I
fear thousands, who conscientiously believe that a greater degree
of political and religious liberty (such as is possessed in
America) would be beneficial for us. How often have I wished,
during my abode in the United States, that one of these
conscientious, but mistaken reasoners, fully possessed of his
country's confidence, could pass a few years in the United
States, sufficiently among the mass of the citizens to know them,
and sufficiently at leisure to trace effects to their causes.
Then might we look for a statement which would teach these
mistaken philanthropists to tremble at every symptom of
democratic power among us; a statement which would make even our
sectarians shudder at the thought of hewing down the Established
Church, for they would be taught, by fearful example, to know
that it was the bulwark which protects us from the gloomy horrors
of fanatic superstition on one side, and the still more dreadful
inroads of infidelity on the other. And more than all, such a
man would see as clear as light, that where every class is
occupied in getting money, and no class in spending it, there
will neither be leisure for worshipping the theory of honesty,
nor motive strong enough to put its restrictive doctrine in
practice. Where every man is engaged in driving hard bargains
with his fellows, where is the honoured class to be found into
which gentleman-like feelings, principles, and practice, are
necessary as an introduction?

That there are men of powerful intellect, benevolent hearts, and
high moral feeling in America, I know: and I could, if challenged
to do so, name individuals surpassed by none of any country in
these qualities; but they are excellent, despite their
institutions, not in consequence of them. It is not by such that
Captain Hall's statements are called slanders, nor is it from
such that I shall meet the abuse which I well know these pages
will inevitably draw upon me; and I only trust I may be
able to muste