merce, it was unquestionably pre-eminent; the commonwealth displayed in its government the principle of representation in greater activity than was seen anywhere else; and, from the very first day of its existence, freedom of conscience, the mother of every kind and degree of liberty, was established as the foundation on which the whole structure rested; moreover, her geographical position, between the North and South (there was then no West known to American civilization), gave her natural advantages which her sisters on either hand could not possess. Philadelphia thus became metropolitan it was the centre, to which every impulse, intellectual or physical, made its way, and from which it again went forth. Here were not only the libraries, but the printing presses which the Bradfords and Franklin made famous, and as most of the colonies were lamentably deficient in this respect, and some altogether destitute, the printers of this city naturally monopolized that industry, so far as the Middle and Southern colonies were concerned. It is evidence at once of no little intellectual activity, and of considerable industrial energy, that of works printed before the Revolution, in Philadelphia, there are in the City Library alone four hundred and fifty-nine books and pamphlets.'

1

Every where in America there was little or no poverty, and in Philadelphia and its vicinity there was less even than the density of row between each couple of ridges is as plainly to be seen as if a swath had been mown along. Yet it is no wider than a ploughshare, and it is as straight as an arrow. It looks as if the sower had gone along the furrow with his spectacles, to pick up every grain that should accidentally fall into it. The corn is just coming out of the ground. The furrows struck out for the hills to be planted in are each way as straight as mathematical right lines; and the squares between every four hills as exact as they could be done by plumb and line, or scale and compass. I am ashamed of our farmers. They are a lazy, ignorant set, in husbandry I mean; for they know infinitely more of every thing else than these.”—“ Familiar Letters" of John Adams, No. 185 (Phila., May, 1777). Thomas I. Wharton, "Prov. Lit. of Pa.,' "Mem. Hist. Socy. of Pa.," i, 156. The taste for reading was general. "You would be astonished," says Duché, in his " Observations," etc., p. II, quoted in Wharton's " Essay,' "at the general taste for books which prevails among all orders and ranks of people in this city. The Librarian (of the City Library) assured me, that for one person of distinction and fortune, there were twenty tradesmen that frequented this library." Again, id., p. 30, "Literary accomplishments here meet with deserved applause. Such is the prevailing taste for books of every kind, that almost every man is a reader; and by pronouncing sentences right or wrong, upon the various publications that come in his way, puts himself upon a level, in point of knowledge, with these several authors." Many excellent productions in the literary way have been published here. That spirit of freedom, which I have already mentioned, has given birth even to orators and poets, many of whose performances I have heard and read with the highest satisfaction."-Id., 150.

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population would lead one to reasonably expect. The mechanics, for whom it was then as noted as it is now, and the tradesmen, were, as a class, well off, and many were wealthy. Hospitals and benevolent institutions of one kind or another were established, encouragement was given liberally and practically to apprentices, the schools enjoyed a reputation that extended throughout the land, and, in short, during her colonial existence, Philadelphia displayed a lofty condition of civilization. Education was not confined to the city. At Bethlehem the Moravians were annually sending forth educated youth from the same school they are conducting to-day; and at Ephrata, in Lancaster County, a community of Dunkers relieved the tedium of a cloistered life by composing and publishing works on religion and morality.' Lindley Murray, who was a native of that county, was at that time, too, engaged in those studies which eventually produced his works on the English language.

Pennsylvania, during her colonial existence, owed much to the German element of her population. The Mennonites, from the Palatinate, settled Germantown, and a general immigration from other parts of Germany diffused itself through the rich valley. which extends on the south of the Blue Mountains, from the Delaware to the Susquehanna, and thence, southwardly through the land. Their knowledge of agriculture, their sagacity, and their patient toil and love of labor, made this valley a garden. For some time, indeed, the influx of these immigrants was so great, that a wide-spread alarm possessed the English-speaking colonists lest the Germans might get the ascendancy in government as well as in numbers, and thus transform Pennsylvania from an English into a German colony. But this fear gradually disappeared before the natural increase and the immigration of the former, and vanished entirely on the arrival of great numbers of Irish, Welch, Scotch, and Scotch-Irish. These last, for the most part, went directly to the frontier, which was not long in crossing the Susquehanna and advancing beyond the rich valleys of the interior. There the struggles of border life at once de

'See Israel Acrelius' visits to Bethlehem and Ephrata in "Mems. Hist. Socy. Pa.," and Watson's "Annals"; also John Adams, "Fam. Letters," No. 155. 2 See, sparsim, Logan's Letters in Penn and Logan Corresp. As late as 1755, Sam'l Wharton expresses his fears in this respect. MS. 198-202; Waison's "Annals," 256, 257.

veloped the hardy population heretofore described. To the north of the Blue Mountains, in the valley of the upper Susquehanna, and in what is the northeastern part of the territory, an immigration from New England, chiefly from Connecticut, had set in, which, claiming the soil under the Connecticut charter, led to long and sanguinary broils with those who attempted to head them off, or to expel them, under color of the charter granted to Penn. This conflict of tenure was suspended by the common necessity which compelled the contestants to take part in the Revolution, and it was not until after the return of peace that the strife was settled by the decision of the federal court, sitting at Trenton, invalidating the Connecticut title, or, to speak accurately, confirming that of Pennsylvania. Beginning, then, at the southeast, and advancing north and westwardly, we find that the population of Pennsylvania contained, first, Swedes, next English, then Germans, and lastly New Englanders; while the whole front of this mass, from the west branch of the Susquehanna southward, was covered by one consisting of Irish, Welch, Scotch, and Scotch-Irish, as the Protestant immigrants from the north of Ireland were called.

Thus Pennsylvania had a greater diversity of nationalities than any other colony, and offered, consequently, a greater variety of character. While agriculture drew to itself the largest number of people, the commercial class, from its greater concentration and wealth, exercised the weightiest influence, and the timidity of trade uniting itself with the natural tenacity of the farming class to ancient institutions, rendered this colony to a high degree conservative. As far as the ancient institutions of the race were concerned, the progressive party was as conservative as any other. It aimed principally at a modification of manners and a change of the ruling element; at a more active development of natural resources and greater facilities for commerce. Its strongest ally within the city was the industrial classes, and, in the country, the immigration that was not Quaker was on its side. This was

the class, which, once moved to act, carried the colony into rebellion.

Looking at the whole of Pennsylvania at once, it cannot be said that its spirit of liberty was a fierce one. The frontier population,

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of course, brooked no restraint,' but the natural placidity of the German farmers did not give way to an aggressive character, and the English counties were under the influence of the mercantile caution of Philadelphia, and of the deliberation natural to the Quakers and the wealthy class there gathered together. But the placidity of the Pennsylvania German is not to be taken for indifference his emotional character is undemonstrative and expends its force in simple tenacity. The stubborn, resisting quality of the English blood need hardly be mentioned. It takes much, yields little, and, when under such personal control as that maintained by the Quakers, is as little ostentatious as the phlegmatic temperament of the Germans.

2

Thus the Spirit of Liberty does not assume in Pennsylvania the aspect of defiance so familiar in the Northern and Southern colonies. It is tempered by gravity, and is stubborn rather than fierce.

'On the 4th July, 1776, the settlers on Pine Creek met and resolved that they were independent of Great Britain-and this without the knowledge, of course, of what was at that hour going on in Philadelphia.—M'Ginnes' nachson," 192.

Otzi

2 John Adams thus conveys the impressions he received of this people. It must be remembered, however, that he was then a fugitive at York, where, with Congress, he was constantly threatened by Howe-circumstances not calculated to favorably impress a man impatient of the delay, then being experienced, in resisting the enemy, and irritated by the patience he mistook for want of spirit. Moreover, his remarks are directed against those who, removed from the theatre of war, had not yet been excited by the spectacle of it:-"The people of this country are chiefly Germans, who have schools in their own language, as well as prayers, psalms, and sermons, so that multitudes are born, grow up, and die here without ever learning the English. In politics they are a breed of mongrels or neutrals, and benumbed with a general torpor." "Fam. Letts.," No. 223, Oct., 1777.

Burnaby, whose judgment is entitled to great respect, says of the Pennsy vanians in 1759-60: "They are great republicans, and have fallen into the same errors in their ideas of independency as most of the other colonies have." - Travels," 86.

CHAPTER VII.

New England's Five Advantages as enumerated by John Adams; and herein of Education.

A

CCORDING to the order adopted, the remaining reason for

the spirit of liberty being fierce in the colonies, given in Mr. Burke's analysis, namely Education, is now to be considered, and in connection with it the advantages mentioned by John Adams' which New England possessed "over every colony in America, and, indeed, of every other part of the world," may be reviewed with profit. These advantages are thus enumerated :

1. The people are purer English blood; less mixed with Scotch, Irish, Dutch, French, Danish, Swedish, etc., than any other; and descended from Englishmen, too, who left Europe in purer times than the present, and less tainted with corruption than those they left behind them.

"2. The institutions in New England for the support of religion, morals, and decency exceed any other; obliging every parish to have a minister, and every person to go to meeting, etc.

"3. The public institutions in New England for the education of youth, supporting colleges at the public expense, and obliging towns to maintain grammar schools, are not equalled and never were, in any part of the world.

4. The division of our territory, that is, our counties, into townships; empowering towns to assemble, choose officers, make laws, mend roads, and twenty other things, gives every man an opportunity of showing and improving that education which he received at college or at school, and makes knowledge and dexterity at public business common.

"Familiar Letters," 120, No. 75.

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