But You May Say, Why Don't You Describe Some Of The
More Ancient, Opulent Settlements Of Our Country, Where Even The Eye
Of An European Has Something To Admire?
It is true, our American
fields are in general pleasing to behold, adorned and intermixed as
they are with so many substantial houses, flourishing orchards, and
copses of woodlands; the pride of our farms, the source of every
good we possess.
But what I might observe there is but natural and
common; for to draw comfortable subsistence from well fenced
cultivated fields, is easy to conceive. A father dies and leaves a
decent house and rich farm to his son; the son modernises the one,
and carefully tills the other; marries the daughter of a friend and
neighbour: this is the common prospect; but though it is rich and
pleasant, yet it is far from being so entertaining and instructive
as the one now in my view.
I had rather attend on the shore to welcome the poor European when
he arrives, I observe him in his first moments of embarrassment,
trace him throughout his primary difficulties, follow him step by
step, until he pitches his tent on some piece of land, and realises
that energetic wish which has made him quit his native land, his
kindred, and induced him to traverse a boisterous ocean. It is there
I want to observe his first thoughts and feelings, the first essays
of an industry, which hitherto has been suppressed. I wish to see
men cut down the first trees, erect their new buildings, till their
first fields, reap their first crops, and say for the first time in
their lives, "This is our own grain, raised from American soil - on
it we shall feed and grow fat, and convert the rest into gold and
silver." I want to see how the happy effects of their sobriety,
honesty, and industry are first displayed: and who would not take a
pleasure in seeing these strangers settling as new countrymen,
struggling with arduous difficulties, overcoming them, and becoming
happy.
Landing on this great continent is like going to sea, they must have
a compass, some friendly directing needle; or else they will
uselessly err and wander for a long time, even with a fair wind: yet
these are the struggles through which our forefathers have waded;
and they have left us no other records of them, but the possession
of our farms. The reflections I make on these new settlers recall to
my mind what my grandfather did in his days; they fill me with
gratitude to his memory as well as to that government, which invited
him to come, and helped him when he arrived, as well as many others.
Can I pass over these reflections without remembering thy name, O
Penn! thou best of legislators; who by the wisdom of thy laws hast
endowed human nature, within the bounds of thy province, with every
dignity it can possibly enjoy in a civilised state; and showed by
thy singular establishment, what all men might be if they would
follow thy example!
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