It Seems To Me That Such A Man Must Feel
Himself Half A God, If He Has The Power Of Comparing What He Is With
What He Was.
It is right that all this should be acknowledged by us.
When we
speak of America and of her institutions, we should remember that
she has given to our increasing population rights and privileges
which we could not give - which as an old country we probably can
never give. That self-asserting, obtrusive independence which so
often wounds us is, if viewed aright, but an outward sign of those
good things which a new country has produced for its people. Men
and women do not beg in the States; they do not offend you with
tattered rags; they do not complain to heaven of starvation; they do
not crouch to the ground for half-pence. If poor, they are not
abject in their poverty. They read and write. They walk like human
beings made in God's form. They know that they are men and women,
owing it to themselves and to the world that they should earn their
bread by their labor, but feeling that when earned it is their own.
If this be so, if it be acknowledged that it is so, should not such
knowledge in itself be sufficient testimony of the success of the
country and of her institutions?
END OF VOL. II.
End of North America, V. II by Anthony Trollope
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