The Oxford Book of American Essays

The two workmen whose talk Theocritus overhears and reports in the Tenth Idyll are not discussing the welfare of their souls; they are not even awake to the hard conditions of labor, and take no thought about shorter hours and higher wages: they are interested chiefly in Bombyca, "lean, dusk, a gypsy,"

" …twinkling dice thy feet,Poppies thy lips, thy ways none knows how sweet!"

And they lighten the hard task of the reaper of the stubborn corn in this fashion:

"O rich in fruit and corn-blade: be this fieldTilled well, Demeter, and fair fruitage yield!"Bind the sheaves, reapers: lest one, passing, say —'A fig for these, they’re never worth their pay!'"Let the mown swathes look northward, ye who mow,Or westward – for the ears grow fattest so."Avoid a noon-tide nap, ye threshing men:The chaff flies thickest from the corn-ears then."Wake when the lark wakes; when he slumbers closeYour work, ye reapers: and at noontide doze."Boys, the frogs’ life for me! They need not himWho fills the flagon, for in drink they swim."Better boil herbs, thou toiler after gain,Than, splitting cummin, split thy hand in twain."

In Sicily no reckoning of the waste of life had been kept, and armies and fleets had been spent as freely in the tumultuous centuries of conquest as if, in the over-abundance of life, these losses need not be entered in the book of account. Theocritus distils this sense of fertility from the air, and the leaves of the Idylls are fairly astir with it. The central myth of the island has a meaning quite beyond the reach of accident; poetic as it is, its symbolism seems almost scientific. Under skies so full of the light which, in a real sense, creates the landscape, encircled by a sea which was fecund of gods and goddesses, Sicily was the teeming mother of flower-strewn fields and trees heavy with fruit, trunks and boughs made firm by winds as the fruit grew mellow in the sun. Demeter moved through harvest-fields and across the grassy slopes where herds are fed, a smiling goddess,

"Poppies and corn-sheaves on each laden arm."

Forgetfulness of the ills of life, dreams of Olympian beauty and tempered energy in the fields – are not these the secrets of the fair world which survives in the Idylls?

The corn and wine were food for the gods who gave them as truly as for the men who plucked the ripened grain and pressed the fragrant grape. If there was a sense of awe in the presence of the gods, there was no sense of moral separation, no yawning chasm of unworthiness. The gods obeyed their impulses not less readily than the men and women they had created; both had eaten of the fruit of the tree of life, but neither had eaten of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Anybody might happen upon Pan in some deeply shadowed place, and the danger of surprising Diana at her bath was not wholly imaginary. Religion was largely the sense of being neighbor to the gods; they were more prosperous than men and had more power, but they were different only in degree, and one might be on easy terms with them. They were created by the poetic mind, and they repaid it a thousand-fold with the consciousness of a world haunted by near, familiar, and radiant divinity. The heresy which shattered the unity of life by dividing it between the religious and the secular had not come to confuse the souls of the good and put a full half of life in the hands of sinners; religion was as natural as sunlight and as easy as breathing.

There was little philosophy and less science in Sicily as Theocritus reports it. The devastating passion for knowledge had not brought self-consciousness in like a tide, nor had the desire to know about things taken the place of knowledge of the things themselves. The beauty of the world was a matter of experience, not of formal observation, and was seen directly as artists see a landscape before they bring technical skill to reproduce it. So far as the men and women who work and sing and make love in the Idylls were concerned, the age was delightfully unintellectual and, therefore, normally poetic. The vocabulary of names for things was made up of descriptive rather than analytical words, and things were seen in wholes rather than in parts.

From this point of view religion was as universal and all-enfolding as air, and the gods were as concrete and tangible as trees and rocks and stars. They were companionable with all sorts and conditions of men, and if one wished to represent them, he used symbols and images of divinely fashioned men and women, not philosophical ideas or scientific formulæ. In this respect the Roman Catholic Church has been both a wise teacher and a tender guardian of lonely and sorrowful humanity. Homer was not a formal theologian, but the harvest of the seed of thought he sowed is not even now fully gathered. He peopled the whole world of imagination. Christianity is not only concrete but historic, and some day, when the way of abstraction has been abandoned for that way of vital knowledge, which is the path of the prophets, the saints, and the artists, it will again set the imagination aflame. Meantime Theocritus is a charming companion for those who hunger and thirst for beauty, and who long from time to time to hang up the trumpet of the reformer, and give themselves up to the song of the sea and the simple music of the shepherd’s pipe.

COLONIALISM IN THE UNITED STATES 9

HENRY CABOT LODGE

NOTHING is more interesting than to trace, through many years and almost endless wanderings and changes, the fortunes of an idea or habit of thought. The subject is a much-neglected one, even in these days of sweeping and minute investigation, because the inherent difficulties are so great, and the necessary data so multifarious, confused, and sometimes contradictory, that absolute proof and smooth presentation seem well-nigh impossible. Yet the ideas, the opinions, even the prejudices of men, impalpable and indefinite as they are, have at times a wonderful vitality and force and are not without meaning and importance when looked at with considerate eyes. The conditions under which they have been developed may change, or pass utterly away, while they, mere shadowy creations of the mind, will endure for generations. Long after the world to which it belonged has vanished, a habit of thought will live on, indelibly imprinted upon a race or nation, like the footprint of some extinct beast or bird upon a piece of stone. The solemn bigotry of the Spaniard is the fossil trace of the fierce struggle of eight hundred years with the Moors. The theory of the Lord’s day peculiar to the English race all over the world is the deeply branded sign of the brief reign of Puritanism. A certain fashion of thought prevailed half a century ago; another is popular to-day. There is a resemblance between the two, the existence of both is recognized, and both, without much consideration, are set down as sporadic and independent, which is by no means a safe conclusion. We have all heard of those rivers which are suddenly lost to sight in the bowels of the earth, and, coming as suddenly again to the surface, flow onward to the sea as before. Or the wandering stream may turn aside into fresh fields, and, with new shapes and colors, seem to have no connection with the waters of its source or with those which finally mingle with the ocean. Yet, despite the disappearances and the changes, it is always the same river. It is exactly so with some kinds of ideas and modes of thought, – those that are wholly distinct from the countless host of opinions which perish utterly, and are forgotten in a few years, or which are still oftener the creatures of a day, or an hour, and die by myriads, like the short-lived insects whose course is run between sunrise and sunset.

The purpose of this essay is to discuss briefly certain opinions which belong to the more enduring class. They are sufficiently well known. When they are mentioned everyone will recognize them, and will admit their existence at the particular period to which they belong. The point which is overlooked is their connection and relationship. They all have the same pedigree, a marked resemblance to each other, and they derive their descent from a common ancestor. My intention is merely to trace the pedigree and narrate the history of this numerous and interesting family of ideas and habits of thought. I have entitled them collectively "Colonialism in the United States," a description which is perhaps more comprehensive than satisfactory or exact.

In the year of grace 1776, we published to the world our Declaration of Independence. Six years later, England assented to the separation. These are tolerably familiar facts. That we have been striving ever since to make that independence real and complete, and that the work is not yet entirely finished, are not, perhaps, equally obvious truisms. The hard fighting by which we severed our connection with the mother-country was in many ways the least difficult part of the work of building up a great and independent nation. The decision of the sword may be rude, but it is pretty sure to be speedy. Armed revolution is quick. A South American, in the exercise of his constitutional privileges, will rush into the street and declare a revolution in five minutes. A Frenchman will pull down one government to-day, and set up another to-morrow, besides giving new names to all the principal streets of Paris during the intervening night. We English-speaking people do not move quite so fast. We come more slowly to the boiling point; we are not fond of violent changes, and when we make them we consume a considerable time in the operation. Still, at the best, a revolution by force of arms is an affair of a few years. We broke with England in 1776, we had won our victory in 1782, and by the year 1789 we had a new national government fairly started.

But if we are slower than other people in the conduct of revolutions, owing largely to our love of dogged fighting and inability to recognize defeat, we are infinitely more deliberate than our neighbors in altering, or even modifying, our ideas and modes of thought. The slow mind and ingrained conservatism of the English race are the chief causes of their marvelous political and material success. After much obstinate fighting in the field, they have carried through the few revolutions which they have seen fit to engage in; but when they have undertaken to extend these revolutions to the domain of thought, there has arisen a spirit of stubborn and elusive resistance, which has seemed to set every effort, and even time itself, at defiance.

By the treaty of Paris our independence was acknowledged, and in name and theory was complete. We then entered upon the second stage in the conflict, that of ideas and opinions. True to our race and to our instincts, and with a wisdom which is one of the glories of our history, we carefully preserved the principles and forms of government and law, which traced an unbroken descent and growth from the days of the Saxon invasion. But while we kept so much that was of inestimable worth, we also retained, inevitably, of course, something which it would have been well for us to have shaken off together with the rule of George III. and the British Parliament. This was the colonial spirit in our modes of thought.

The word "colonial" is preferable to the more obvious word "provincial," because the former is absolute, while the latter, by usage, has become in a great measure relative. We are very apt to call an opinion, a custom, or a neighbor "provincial," because we do not like the person or thing in question; and in this way the true value of the word has of late been frittered away. "Colonialism," moreover, has in this connection historical point and value, while "provincialism" is general and meaningless. Colonialism is also susceptible of accurate definition. A colony is an off-shoot from a parent stock, and its chief characteristic is dependence. In exact proportion as dependence lessens, the colony changes its nature and advances toward national existence. For a hundred and fifty years we were English colonies. Just before the revolution, in everything but the affairs of practical government, the precise point at which the break came, we were still colonies in the fullest sense of the term. Except in matters of food and drink, and of the wealth which we won from the soil and the ocean, we were in a state of complete material and intellectual dependence. Every luxury, and almost every manufactured article, came to us across the water. Our politics, except those which were purely local, were the politics of England, and so also were our foreign relations. Our books, our art, our authors, our commerce, were all English; and this was true of our colleges, our professions, our learning, our fashions, and our manners. There is no need here to go into the details which show the absolute supremacy of the colonial spirit and our entire intellectual dependence. When we sought to originate, we simply imitated. The conditions of our life could not be overcome.

The universal prevalence of the colonial spirit at that period is shown most strongly by one great exception, just as the flash of lightning makes us realize the intense darkness of a thunder-storm at night. In the midst of the provincial and barren waste of our intellectual existence in the eighteenth century there stands out in sharp relief the luminous genius of Franklin. It is true that Franklin was cosmopolitan in thought, that his name and fame and achievements in science and literature belonged to mankind; but he was all this because he was genuinely and intensely American. His audacity, his fertility, his adaptability, are all characteristic of America, and not of an English colony. He moved with an easy and assured step, with a poise and balance which nothing could shake, among the great men of the world; he stood before kings and princes and courtiers, unmoved and unawed. He was strongly averse to breaking with England; but when the war came he was the one man who could go forth and represent to Europe the new nationality without a touch of the colonist about him. He met them all, great ministers and great sovereigns, on a common ground, as if the colonies of yesterday had been an independent nation for generations. His autobiography is the corner-stone, the first great work of American literature. The plain, direct style, almost worthy of Swift, the homely, forcible language, the humor, the observation, the knowledge of men, the worldly philosophy of that remarkable book, are familiar to all; but its best and, considering its date, its most extraordinary quality is its perfect originality. It is American in feeling, without any taint of English colonialism. Look at Franklin in the midst of that excellent Pennsylvania community; compare him and his genius with his surroundings, and you get a better idea of what the colonial spirit was in America in those days, and how thoroughly men were saturated with it, than in any other way.

In general terms it may be said that, outside of politics and the still latent democratic tendencies, the entire intellectual life of the colonists was drawn from England, and that to the mother country they looked for everything pertaining to the domain of thought. The colonists in the eighteenth century had, in a word, a thoroughly and deeply rooted habit of mental dependence. The manner in which we have gradually shaken off this dependence, retaining of the past only that which is good, constitutes the history of the decline of the colonial spirit in the United States. As this spirit existed everywhere at the outset, and brooded over the whole realm of intellect, we can in most cases trace its history best in the recurring and successful revolts against it, which, breaking out now here, now there, have at last brought it so near to final extinction.

In 1789, after the seven years of disorder and demoralization which followed the close of the war, the United States government was established. Every visible political tie which bound us to England had been severed, and we were apparently entirely independent. But the shackles of the colonial spirit, which had been forging and welding for a century and a half, were still heavy upon us, and fettered all our mental action. The work of making our independence real and genuine was but half done, and the first struggle of the new national spirit with that of the colonial past was in the field of politics, and consumed twenty-five years before victory was finally obtained. We still felt that our fortunes were inextricably interwoven with those of Europe. We could not realize that what affected us nearly when we were a part of the British Empire no longer touched us as an independent nation. We can best understand how strong this feeling was by the effect which was produced here by the French revolution. That tremendous convulsion, it may be said, was necessarily felt everywhere; but one much greater might take place in Europe to-day without producing here anything at all resembling the excitement of 1790. We had already achieved far more than the French revolution ever accomplished. We had gone much farther on the democratic road than any other nation. Yet worthy men in the United States put on cockades and liberty caps, erected trees of liberty, called each other "Citizen Brown" and "Citizen Smith," drank confusion to tyrants, and sang the wild songs of Paris. All this was done in a country where every privilege and artificial distinction had been swept away, and where the government was the creation of the people themselves. These ravings and symbols had a terrific reality in Paris and in Europe, and so, like colonists, we felt that they must have a meaning to us, and that the fate and fortunes of our ally were our fate and fortunes. A part of the people engaged in an imitation that became here the shallowest nonsense, while the other portion of the community, which was hostile to French ideas, took up and propagated the notion that the welfare of civilized society lay with England and with English opinions. Thus we had two great parties in the United States, working themselves up to white heat over the politics of England and France. The first heavy blow to the influence of foreign politics was Washington’s proclamation of neutrality. It seems a very simple and obvious thing now, this policy of non-interference in the affairs of Europe which that proclamation inaugurated, and yet at the time men marveled at the step, and thought it very strange. Parties divided over it. People could not conceive how we could keep clear of the great stream of European events. One side disliked the proclamation as hostile to France, while the other approved it for the same reason. Even the Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson, one of the most representative men of American democracy, resisted the neutrality policy in the genuine spirit of the colonist. Yet Washington’s proclamation was simply the sequel to the Declaration of Independence. It merely amounted to saying: We have created a new nation, and England not only cannot govern us, but English and European politics are none of our business, and we propose to be independent of them and not meddle in them. The neutrality policy of Washington’s administration was a great advance toward independence and a severe blow to colonialism in politics. Washington himself exerted a powerful influence against the colonial spirit. The principle of nationality, then just entering upon its long struggle with state’s rights, was in its very nature hostile to everything colonial; and Washington, despite his Virginian traditions, was thoroughly imbued with the national spirit. He believed himself, and insensibly impressed his belief upon the people, that true nationality could only be obtained by keeping ourselves aloof from the conflicts and the politics of the Old World. Then, too, his splendid personal dignity, which still holds us silent and respectful after the lapse of a hundred years, communicated itself to his office, and thence to the nation of which he was the representative. The colonial spirit withered away in the presence of Washington.

The only thorough-going nationalist among the leaders of that time was Alexander Hamilton. He was not born in the States, and was therefore free from all local influences; and he was by nature imperious in temper and imperial in his views. The guiding principle of that great man’s public career was the advancement of American nationality. He was called "British" Hamilton by the very men who wished to throw us into the arms of the French republic, because he was wedded to the principles and the forms of constitutional English government and sought to preserve them here adapted to new conditions. He desired to put our political inheritance to its proper use, but this was as far removed from the colonial spirit as possible. Instead of being "British," Hamilton’s intense eagerness for a strong national government made him the deadliest foe of the colonial spirit, which he did more to strangle and crush out than any other man of his time. The objects at which he aimed were continental supremacy, and complete independence in business, politics, and industry. In all these departments he saw the belittling effects of dependence, and so he assailed it by his reports and by his whole policy, foreign and domestic. So much of his work as he carried through had a far-reaching effect, and did a great deal to weaken the colonial spirit. But the strength of that spirit was best shown in the hostility or indifference which was displayed toward his projects. The great cause of opposition to Hamilton’s financial policy proceeded, undoubtedly, from state jealousy of the central government; but the resistance to his foreign policy arose from the colonial ignorance which could not understand the real purpose of neutrality, and which thought that Hamilton was simply and stupidly endeavoring to force us toward England as against France.

Washington, Hamilton, and John Adams, notwithstanding his New England prejudices, all did much while they were in power, as the heads of the Federalist party, to cherish and increase national self-respect, and thereby eradicate colonialism from our politics. The lull in Europe, after the fall of the Federalists, led to a truce in the contests over foreign affairs in the United States, but with the renewal of war the old conflict broke out. The years from 1806 to 1812 are among the least creditable in our history. The Federalists ceased to be a national party and the fierce reaction against the French revolution drove them into an unreasoning admiration of England. They looked to England for the salvation of civilized society. Their chief interest centered in English politics, and the resources of England formed the subject of their thoughts and studies, and furnished the theme of conversation at their dinner tables. It was just as bad on the other side. The Republicans still clung to their affection for France, notwithstanding the despotism of the empire. They regarded Napoleon with reverential awe, and shivered at the idea of plunging into hostilities with anyone. The foreign policy of Jefferson was that of a thorough colonist. He shrank with horror from war. He would have had us confine ourselves to agriculture, and to our flocks and herds, because our commerce, the commerce of a nation, was something with which other powers were likely to interfere. He wished us to exist in a state of complete commercial and industrial dependence, and allow England to carry for us and manufacture for us, as she did when we were colonies weighed down by the clauses of the navigation acts. His plans of resistance did not extend beyond the old colonial scheme of non-importation and non-intercourse agreements. Read the bitter debates in Congress of those years, and you find them filled with nothing but the politics of other nations. All the talk is saturated with colonial feeling. Even the names of opprobrium which the hostile parties applied to each other were borrowed. The Republicans called the Federalists "Tories" and a "British faction," while the Federalists retorted by stigmatizing their opponents as Jacobins. During these sorry years, however, the last in which our politics bore the colonial character, a new party was growing up, which may be called the national party, not as distinguished from the party of state’s rights, but as the opposition to colonial ideas. This new movement was headed and rendered illustrious by such men as Henry Clay, John Quincy Adams, the brilliant group from South Carolina, comprising Calhoun, Langdon Cheves, and William Lowndes, and at a later period by Daniel Webster. Clay and the South Carolinians were the first to push forward the resistance to colonialism. Their policy was crude and ill-defined. They struck out blindly against the evil influence which, as they felt, was choking the current of national life, for they were convinced that, to be truly independent, the United States must fight somebody. Who that somebody should be was a secondary question. Of all the nations which had been kicking and cuffing us, England was, on the whole, the most arrogant, and offensive; and so the young nationalists dragged the country into the war of 1812. We were wonderfully successful at sea and at New Orleans, but in other respects this war was neither very prosperous nor very creditable, and the treaty of Ghent was absolutely silent as to the objects for which we had expressly declared war. Nevertheless, the real purpose of the war was gained, despite the silent and almost meaningless treaty which concluded it. We had proved to the world and to ourselves that we existed as a nation. We had demonstrated the fact that we had ceased to be colonies. We had torn up colonialism in our public affairs by the roots, and we had crushed out the colonial spirit in our politics. After the war of 1812 our politics might be good, bad, or indifferent, but they were our own politics, and not those of Europe. The wretched colonial spirit which had belittled and warped them for twenty-five years had perished utterly, and with the treaty of Ghent it was buried so deeply that not even its ghost has since then crossed our political pathway.