THE BRITISH

QUARTERLY REVIEW.

FEBRUARY 1, 1845.

Art. I. History of the Colonization of the United States. By GEORGE BANCROFT. Vols. i. ii. iii. Boston and London.

It is instructive to observe how much is done in the government of the world by the ignorance of men more than by their knowledge. What we do from design is of small amount compared with what we do beyond our forethought. In all our plans we prophesy in part. The action of to-day generates the action of to-morrow. The scheme widens as it advances from purpose towards accomplishment. The one thing intended, brings along with it a host of things not intended; and as our vision takes in a wider compass, consequences and contingencies are seen to multiply. One man creates the void, and another gives it occupancy. One agency unlocks the stream, and a multitude are in waiting to affect its course and issue. Evil comes from good, and good comes from evil. Thus mockery is cast over all human foresight. In this twilight of perception the greatest men have laboured-Wycliffe and Luther, Columbus and Bacon. Much that was in their heart they have done, but much more which their heart never conceived have they accomplished. Being dead, they still speak, and they still act-but the further the undulations of their influence extend, the less is the semblance between the things which are realized and the things which were expected. They have done less than they hoped, and more-much that they would have done, and much that they would not have done. In short, in the providence of our world, enough is plain and fixed to give pulsation to virtue and hope in the right-hearted; but enough is obscure and uncertain to rebuke impatience, and to suggest many a lesson of humility.

It was the pleasure of Elizabeth, and of her successors James and Charles, to take upon them the office of the persecutor. In that honourable vocation they found coaches of suitable capacity and temper, in Whitgift, Bancrf, ind Land The sovereign and the priest gave themselves to such employment, in the sagacious expectation that the opinions of men were matters to be shaped according to the royal pleasure, with little more difficulty than the order of a court ceremonial. But the policy intended to secure an abject submission at home, became the unwilling parent of an enlightened independence abroad. Intolerance of freedom forced it upon new experiments, and proved eminently favourable to its development and power. The seed cast out found a better lodgment, and sent forth a richer fruit. The new world afforded space for its germination and growth which the old could not have supplied; and the new world has re-acted upon the old in the cause of freedom, as the old could not have acted upon itself. Even now, also, we are only in the beginning of that great outburst of enterprise and improvement which we trace to those memorable times, and in great part to the narrow and selfish policy of the agents above named.

The mind of the people of England two centuries since teemed with thoughts and excitements, of which the men of our time have no just conception. Our knowledge in this respect must depend on the force of our imagination, hardly less than on the extent of our reading. The great questions, both in politics and religion, which then agitated society, were comparative novelties. The wonders of the new world, and of the whole southern hemisphere, were discoveries of yesterday. National questions, accordingly, were debated with a degree of passionateness and earnestness, such as we seldom feel; while distant regions loomed before the fancies of men in alliance with everything shadowy, strange, and mysterious. The old world seemed to be waking at their side, as from the sleep of ages; and a new world rose to their view, presenting treasures which seemed to be inexhaustible. The wonder of to-day was succeeded by the greater wonder of to-morrow, and the revelations seemed to have no end. At the same time, to very many their native land had become as a house of bondage, and the waters of the Atlantic were the stream which separated between them and their promised home.

That feeling is now among the bygone in our social history. But the traces of it are still at times discoverable. The broader and deeper stream, now rolling on, leaves its nooks and eddying points, where something of the past still retains a place, and still

secures to it some influence over the present. It is now about twice seven years since we passed a few pleasant weeks in one of the less peopled districts of Dorsetshire-that county which Charles II. is said to have described as the only county in England fit to be the home of a gentleman. What the qualities were which, in the estimation of royalty, gave so much of the air proper to the home of gentle blood to the county of Dorset, it will not be difficult to conjecture. Dorsetshire is remarkable for the almost total absence of the usual signs of trade and manufactures. It is no less remarkable, as a natural consequence, for the absence of any considerable middle class to separate between the serfs who till the ground, and the lords who own it. Even agriculture is prosecuted within such limits as may consist with leaving an ample portion of its surface in the good feudal condition of extended sheep-walks and open downs. Such Dorsetshire has ever been, such it still is; but, thanks to projected railroads, such we trust it is not always to be.

On the occasion adverted to, we were indebted for a season to the hospitalities of an honest yeoman, whose residence had been occupied in other days by personages of much higher pretension than our host. It was an ancient mansion on a hill-side, overlooking an extended valley, which, from the corresponding forms of the hills fronting each other, resembled the bed of some departed Ganges, or St. Lawrence. The lower part of the valley was cultivated and wooded, but the high slopes of the hills were treeless and shrubless, except on the spot where the dwelling of our yeoman friend presented itself. That structure, with its somewhat castellated front, with its long ascent of half-decayed steps, its mutilated balustrades, and its ample terrace, rose amid lofty elms and chesnuts, forming a picture not the less pleasant to look upon, from its contrast with the surrounding barrenness. Altogether this Dorset mansion was of a sort to work powerfully on that superstitious feeling and credulity, which are so deeply rooted in the mind of every rural and secluded population. The sounds which came after nightfall, in the autumnal and winter season, across that valley, from the distant sea, and which passed in such wild and strange notes through the branches of those ancient trees, and through the crazy apertures of that more ancient building, did not fall upon the ear without some awakening effect upon the imagination. The dead, who once had paced those terrace walks, were not forgotten; and where could there be a more fitting haunt for those sights which " we fools of nature," shrink from, than the spaces covered with the deep shadows of those overhanging trees-the living things, which budded and grew in the times of other generations, and which seemed to lift

It was the pleasure of Elizabeth, and of her successors James and Charles, to take upon them the office of the persecutor. In that honourable vocation they found coadjutors of suitable capacity and temper, in Whitgift, Bancroft, and Laud. The sovereign and the priest gave themselves to such employment, in the sagacious expectation that the opinions of men were matters to be shaped according to the royal pleasure, with little more difficulty than the order of a court ceremonial. But the policy intended to secure an abject submission at home, became the unwilling parent of an enlightened independence abroad. Intolerance of freedom forced it upon new experiments, and proved eminently favourable to its development and power. The seed cast out found a better lodgment, and sent forth a richer fruit. The new world afforded space for its germination and growth which the old could not have supplied; and the new world has re-acted upon the old in the cause of freedom, as the old could not have acted upon itself. Even now, also, we are only in the beginning of that great outburst of enterprise and improvement which we trace to those memorable times, and in great part to the narrow and selfish policy of the agents above named.

The mind of the people of England two centuries since teemed with thoughts and excitements, of which the men of our time have no just conception. Our knowledge in this respect must depend on the force of our imagination, hardly less than on the extent of our reading. The great questions, both in politics and religion, which then agitated society, were comparative novelties. The wonders of the new world, and of the whole southern hemisphere, were discoveries of yesterday. National questions, accordingly, were debated with a degree of passionateness and earnestness, such as we seldom feel; while distant regions loomed before the fancies of men in alliance with everything shadowy, strange, and mysterious. The old world seemed to be waking at their side, as from the sleep of ages; and a new world rose to their view, presenting treasures which seemed to be inexhaustible. The wonder of to-day was succeeded by the greater wonder of to-morrow, and the revelations seemed to have no end. At the same time, to very many their native land had become as a house of bondage, and the waters of the Atlantic were the stream which separated between them and their promised home.

That feeling is now among the bygone in our social history. But the traces of it are still at times discoverable. The broader and deeper stream, now rolling on, leaves its nooks and eddying points, where something of the past still retains a place, and still

secures to it some influence over the present. It is now about twice seven years since we passed a few pleasant weeks in one of the less peopled districts of Dorsetshire-that county which Charles II. is said to have described as the only county in England fit to be the home of a gentleman. What the qualities were which, in the estimation of royalty, gave so much of the air proper to the home of gentle blood to the county of Dorset, it will not be difficult to conjecture. Dorsetshire is remarkable for the almost total absence of the usual signs of trade and manufactures. It is no less remarkable, as a natural consequence, for the absence of any considerable middle class to separate between the serfs who till the ground, and the lords who own it. Even agriculture is prosecuted within such limits as may consist with leaving an ample portion of its surface in the good feudal condition of extended sheep-walks and open downs. Such Dorsetshire has ever been, such it still is; but, thanks to projected railroads, such we trust it is not always to be.

On the occasion adverted to, we were indebted for a season to the hospitalities of an honest yeoman, whose residence had been occupied in other days by personages of much higher pretension than our host. It was an ancient mansion on hill-side, overlooking an extended valley, which, from the corresponding forms of the hills fronting each other, resembled the bed of some departed Ganges, or St. Lawrence. The lower part of the valley was cultivated and wooded, but the high slopes of the hills were treeless and shrubless, except on the spot where the dwelling of our yeoman friend presented itself. That structure, with its somewhat castellated front, with its long ascent of half-decayed steps, its mutilated balustrades, and its ample terrace, rose amid lofty elms and chesnuts, forming a picture not the less pleasant to look upon, from its contrast with the surrounding barrenness. Altogether this Dorset mansion was of a sort to work powerfully on that superstitious feeling and credulity, which are so deeply rooted in the mind of every rural and secluded population. The sounds which came after nightfall, in the autumnal and winter season, across that valley, from the distant sea, and which passed in such wild and strange notes through the branches of those ancient trees, and through the crazy apertures of that more ancient building, did not fall upon the ear without some awakening effect upon the imagination. The dead, who once had paced those terrace walks, were not forgotten; and where could there be a more fitting haunt for those sights which "we fools of nature," shrink from, than the spaces covered with the deep shadows of those overhanging trees-the living things, which budded and grew in the times of other generations, and which seemed to lift