Chapter X: Front Matter (10)

“It is impossible not to desire earnestly that this people may
attain to all the prosperity of which they are capable. They
are the hope of the human race. They can become its model. They
are to prove to the world, by the fact, that men can be free
and tranquil, and can dispense with the chains of all kinds
which the tyrants and charlatans of every cloth have pretended
to impose under the pretext of the public good. They are to
give the example of political liberty, of religious liberty, of
commercial and industrial liberty. The asylum which they open
to all the oppressed of all nations is to console the earth.
The facility thereby afforded for escape from a bad government
will force the European governments to be just and enlightened.
The rest of the world, little by little, will open their eyes
to the nothingness of the illusions in which politicians have
indulged. To this end it is necessary that America should guard
against them, and should not again become, as your ministerial
writers have so often repeated, an image of our Europe, _a mass
of divided powers_, disputing about territory or commercial
profits, and continually cementing the slavery of the peoples
with their own blood.”[345]

After these admirable thoughts, so full of wisdom and prophecy, Turgot alludes to the impending war between France and England:--

“Our two nations are going to do each other reciprocally much
evil, probably without either of them obtaining any real
advantage. The increase of debts and charges and the ruin of a
great many citizens will be, perhaps, the only result. England
seems to me even nearer to this than France. If instead of
this war you had been able to yield with good grace from the
first moment,--if it had been given to policy to do in advance
what infallibly it will be forced to do later,--if national
opinion could have permitted your Government to anticipate
events,--and, supposing that it had foreseen them, it had
been able to consent at once to the independence of America
without making war on anybody,--I firmly believe that your
nation would have lost nothing by this change. It will lose now
what it has already expended, and what it shall yet expend.
It will experience for some time a great falling off in its
commerce, great domestic disturbances, if it is forced to
bankruptcy, and, whatever may happen, a great diminution of
political influence abroad. But this last matter is of very
small importance to the real welfare of a people; and I am not
at all of the opinion of the Abbé Raynal in your motto.[346] I
do not believe that this will make you a contemptible nation,
and throw you into slavery. On the contrary, your troubles
will perhaps have the effect of a necessary amputation; they
are perhaps the only means of saving you from the gangrene
of luxury and corruption. If in your agitations you could
correct your Constitution by rendering the elections annual,
by apportioning the right of representation in a manner
more equal and more proportioned to the interests of those
represented, you would gain from this revolution as much,
perhaps, as America; for your liberty would remain to you, and
with this and by this your other losses would be very speedily
repaired.”[347]

Reading such words, the heart throbs and the pulse beats. Government inspired by such a spirit would become divine, nations would live at peace together, and people everywhere be happy.

HORACE WALPOLE, 1754, 1774, 1777, 1779.

Most unlike Turgot in character, but with something of the same spirit of prophecy, and associated in time, was Horace Walpole, youngest son of England’s remarkable Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole. With the former, life was serious always, and human improvement the perpetual passion; with the latter, there was a constant desire for amusement, and the world was little more than a curious gimcrack.

Horace Walpole was born 5th October, 1717, and died 2d March, 1797, being at his death Earl of Orford. According to his birth he was a man of fashion; for a time a member of Parliament; a man of letters always. To his various talents he added an aggregation of miscellaneous tastes, of which his house at Strawberry Hill was an illustration,--being an elegant “Old Curiosity Shop,” with pictures, books, manuscripts, prints, armor, china, historic relics, and art in all its forms, which he had collected at no small outlay of time and money. Though aristocratic in life, he boasted that his principles were not monarchical. On the two sides of his bed were hung engravings of Magna Charta and the Sentence of Charles the First, the latter with the inscription “_Major_ Charta.” Sleeping between two such memorials, he might be suspected of sympathy with America, although the aristocrat was never absent. His Memoirs, Journals, Anecdotes of Painting in England, and other works, are less famous than his multifarious correspondence, which is the best in English literature, and, according to French judgment, nearer than any other in our language to that of Madame de Sévigné, whom he never wearied in praising. It is free, easy, gossipy, historic, and spicy.

But I deal with him now only as a prophet. And I begin with his “Memoires of the last Ten Years of the Reign of George the Second,” where we find the record that the Colonists were seeking independence. This occurs in his description of the Duke of Newcastle as Secretary of State for the Colonies, during the long Walpole administration. Illustrating what he calls the Duke’s “mercurial inattention,” he says: “It would not be credited what reams of papers, representations, memorials, petitions from that quarter of the world [the Colonies], lay mouldering and unopened in his office”; and then, showing the Duke’s ignorance, he narrates how, when it was hinted that there should be some defence for Annapolis, he replied, with evasive, lisping hurry: “Annapolis, Annapolis! Oh, yes, Annapolis must be defended,--to be sure, Annapolis should be defended;--where is Annapolis?” But this negligence did not prevent him from exalting the prerogative of the Crown; and here the author says:--

“The instructions to Sir Danvers Osborn, a new governor of
New York, seemed better calculated for the latitude of Mexico
and for a Spanish tribunal than for a free, rich British
settlement, and in such opulence and of such haughtiness that
_suspicions had long been conceived of their meditating to
throw off their dependence on their mother country_.”[348]

This stands in the “Memoires” under the date of 1754, and the editor in a note observes, “If, as the author asserts, this was written at the time, it is a very remarkable passage.” By direction of the author the book was “to be kept unopened and unsealed” until a certain person named should attain the age of twenty-five years. It was published in 1822. Perhaps the honesty of this entry will be better appreciated, when it is noted, that, only a few pages later, Washington, whom the author afterwards admired, is spoken of as “this brave braggart” who “learned to blush for his rodomontade.”[349]

As the difficulties with the Colonies increased, he became more sympathetic and prophetic. In a letter to Sir Horace Mann, 2d February, 1774, he wrote:--

“We have no news, public or private; but there is an
ostrich-egg laid in America, where the Bostonians have canted
three hundred chests of tea into the ocean; for they will
not drink tea with our Parliament.… Lord Chatham talked of
conquering America in Germany. _I believe England will be
conquered some day or other in New England or Bengal._”[350]

In May, 1774, his sympathies again appear:--

“Nothing was more shocking than the King’s laughing and saying
at his levee that _he had as lief fight the Bostonians as the
French_. It was only to be paralleled by James the Second
sporting on Jeffreys’s ‘campaign in the West.’”[351]

And under date of 28th May, 1775, we have his record of the encounter at Lexington, with the reflection:--

“Thus was the civil war begun, and a victory the first fruits
of it on the side of the Americans, whom Lord Sandwich had had
the folly and rashness to proclaim cowards.”[352]

His letters to the Countess of Ossory, written during the war, show his irrepressible sentiments. Thus, under date of 9th November, 1775:--

“I think this country undone almost beyond redemption. Victory
in any war but a civil one fascinates mankind with a vision of
glory. What should we gain by triumph itself? Would America
laid waste, deluged with blood, plundered, enslaved, replace
America flourishing, rich, and free? Do we want to reign over
it, as the Spaniards over Peru, depopulated? Are desolate
regions preferable to commercial cities?”[353]

Then under date of 6th July, 1777:--

“My humble opinion is, that we shall never recover America,
and that France will take care that we shall never recover
ourselves.”[354]

“Friday night, late,” 5th December, 1777, he breaks forth:--

“Send for Lord Chatham! They had better send for General
Washington, Madam,--or at least for our troops back.… No,
Madam, we do not want ministers that would protract our
difficulties. I look on them but as beginning now, and am
far from thinking that there is any man or set of men able
enough to extricate us. _I own there are very able Englishmen
left, but they happen to be on t’other side of the Atlantic._
If his Majesty hopes to find them here, I doubt he will be
mistaken.”[355]

“Thursday night,” 11th December, 1777, his feelings overflow in no common language:--

“Was ever proud, insolent nation sunk so low? Burke and Charles
Fox told him [Lord North] the Administration thought of nothing
but keeping their places; and so they will, and the members
their pensions, and the nation its infamy. Were I Franklin, I
would order the Cabinet Council to come to me at Paris with
ropes about their necks, and then kick them back to St. James’s.

“Well, Madam, as I told Lord Ossory t’other day, I am
satisfied: _Old England is safe,--that is, America, whither the
true English retired under Charles the First_: this is Nova
Scotia, and I care not what becomes of it.… Adieu, Madam! I am
at last not sorry you have no son; and your daughters, I hope,
will be married to Americans, and not in this dirty, despicable
island.”[356]

All this is elevated by his letter of 17th February, 1779, where he says:--

“Liberty has still a continent to exist in. I do not care a
straw who is Minister in this abandoned country. It is _the
good old cause of Freedom_ that I have at heart.”[357]

Thus with constancy, where original principle was doubtless quickened by party animosity, did Horace Walpole maintain the American cause and predict a new home for Liberty.

JOHN ADAMS, 1755, 1765, 1776, 1780, 1785, 1787, 1813, 1818.

Next in time among the prophets was John Adams, who has left on record at different dates predictions showing a second-sight of no common order. Of his life I need say nothing, except that he was born 19th October, 1735, and died 4th July, 1826. I mention the predictions in the order of utterance.

* * * * *

1. While teaching a school at Worcester, and when under twenty years of age, he wrote a letter to one of his youthful companions, bearing date 12th October, 1755, which is a marvel of foresight. Fifty-two years afterwards, when already much of its prophecy had been fulfilled, the original was returned to its author by the son of his early comrade and correspondent, Nathan Webb, who was at the time dead. After remarking gravely on the rise and fall of nations, with illustrations from Carthage and Rome, he proceeds:--

“England began to increase in power and magnificence, and
is now the greatest nation upon the globe. Soon after the
Reformation, a few people came over into this New World for
conscience’ sake. Perhaps this apparently trivial incident _may
transfer the great seat of empire into America_. _It looks
likely to me_: for, if we can remove the turbulent Gallics, our
people, according to the exactest computations, will in another
century become more numerous than England itself. Should this
be the case, since we have, I may say, all the naval stores of
the nations in our hands, it will be easy to obtain the mastery
of the seas; and then the united force of all Europe will not
be able to subdue us. The only way to keep us from setting up
for ourselves is to disunite us. _Divide et impera._ Keep us
in distinct colonies, and then some great men in each colony
desiring the monarchy of the whole, they will destroy each
other’s influence, and keep the country _in equilibrio_.[358]

On this his son, John Quincy Adams, famous for important service and high office, remarks:--

“Had the political part of it been written by the minister
of state of a European monarchy, at the close of a long
life spent in the government of nations, it would have been
pronounced worthy of the united penetration and experience of a
Burleigh, a Sully, or an Oxenstiern.… _In one bold outline he
has exhibited by anticipation a long succession of prophetic
history, the fulfilment of which is barely yet in progress,
responding exactly hitherto to his foresight_, but the full
accomplishment of which is reserved for the development
of after ages. The extinction of the power of France in
America, the union of the British North American Colonies,
the achievement of their independence, and the establishment
of their ascendency in the community of civilized nations by
the means of their naval power, are all foreshadowed in this
letter, with a clearness of perception and a distinctness of
delineation which time has hitherto done little more than to
convert into historical fact.”[359]

* * * * *

2. Another beautiful instance followed ten years later. In the beginning of 1765, Jeremy Gridley, the eminent lawyer of Colonial days, formed a law club, or Sodality, at Boston, for the mutual improvement of its members. Here John Adams produced the original sketch of his “Dissertation on the Canon and Feudal Law,” which appeared in the “Boston Gazette” of August, 1765, was immediately and repeatedly reprinted in London, and afterwards in Philadelphia.[360] The sketch began:--

“This Sodality has given rise to the following speculation of
my own, which I commit to writing as hints for future inquiries
rather than as a satisfactory theory.”[361]

In this Dissertation, the writer dwells especially upon the settlers of British America, of whom he says:--

“After their arrival here, they began their settlement, and
formed their plan, both of ecclesiastical and civil government,
in direct opposition to the canon and the feudal systems.”[362]

This excellent statement was followed, in the original sketch communicated to the Sodality, by this passage, which does not appear in the printed Dissertation:--

“I always consider the settlement of America with reverence
and wonder, as the opening of a grand scene and design in
Providence for the illumination of the ignorant and the
emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the
earth.”[363]

On these prophetic words, his son, John Quincy Adams, remarks:--

“This sentence was perhaps omitted from an impression that
it might be thought to savor not merely of enthusiasm, but
of extravagance. Who now would deny that this magnificent
anticipation has been already to a great degree realized? Who
does not now see that the accomplishment of this great object
is already placed beyond all possibility of failure?”[364]

His grandson, Charles Francis Adams, alluding to the changes which took place in the original sketch, says:--

“As not infrequently happens, however, in this process, one
strong passage was lost by it, which at this time must be
regarded as the most deserving of any to be remembered.”[365]

Thus again, at an early day, did this prophet discern the future. How true it is that the mission of this Republic is “the illumination of the ignorant,” and, still further, “the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth”! Universal enlightenment and universal emancipation! And the first great stage was National Independence.

* * * * *

3. The Declaration of Independence bears date 4th July, 1776, for on that day it was signed; but the vote which determined it was on the 2d July. On the 3d July, John Adams, in a letter to his wife, wrote:--

“Yesterday the greatest question was decided which ever was
debated in America; and a greater, perhaps, never was nor
will be decided among men.… I am surprised at the suddenness
as well as greatness of this revolution. Britain has been
filled with folly, and America with wisdom. At least this is
my judgment. Time must determine. _It is the will of Heaven
that the two countries should be sundered forever.…_ The day
is passed. The second day of July, 1776, will be the most
memorable epocha in the history of America. _I am apt to
believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as
the great anniversary festival._ It ought to be commemorated,
as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God
Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with
shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations,
from one end of this continent to the other, from this time
forward, forevermore. You will think me transported with
enthusiasm, but I am not. I am well aware of the toil and blood
and treasure that it will cost us to maintain this Declaration,
and support and defend these States. _Yet, through all the
gloom, I can see the rays of ravishing light and glory. I
can see that the end is more than worth all the means, and
that posterity will triumph in that day’s transaction_, even
although we should rue it, which I trust in God we shall
not.”[366]

Here is a comprehensive prophecy, first, that the two countries would be separated forever; secondly, that the anniversary of Independence would be celebrated as a great annual festival; and, thirdly, that posterity would triumph in this transaction, where, through all the gloom, shone rays of ravishing light and glory: all of which has been fulfilled to the letter. Recent events give to the Declaration additional importance. For a long time its great premises, that all men are equal, and that rightful government stands only on the consent of the governed, were disowned by our country. Now that at last they are beginning to prevail, there is increased reason to celebrate the day on which the mighty Declaration was made, and new occasion for triumph in the rays of ravishing light and glory.

* * * * *

4. Here is another prophetic passage, in a letter dated at Paris, 13th July, 1780, and addressed to the Comte de Vergennes of France, pleading the cause of the Colonists:--

“The United States of America are a great and powerful people,
whatever European statesmen may think of them. If we take into
our estimate the numbers and the character of her people, the
extent, variety, and fertility of her soil, her commerce, and
her skill and materials for ship-building, and her seamen,
excepting France, Spain, England, Germany, and Russia, there is
not a state in Europe so powerful. Breaking off such a nation
as this from the English so suddenly, and uniting it so closely
with France, is one of the most extraordinary events that ever
happened among mankind.”[367]

Perhaps this may be considered statement rather than prophecy; but it illustrates the prophetic character of the writer.

* * * * *

5. While at Amsterdam, in 1780, Mr. Adams met a gentleman whom he calls “the giant of the law,” Mr. Calkoen. After an unsatisfactory attempt at conversation, where neither spoke the language of the other, it was arranged that the latter should propound a series of questions in writing, which the American minister undertook to answer. The questions were in Dutch, the answers in English. Among the questions was this: “Whether America in and of itself, by means of purchasing or exchanging the productions of the several provinces, would be able to continue the war for six, eight, or ten years, even if they were entirely deprived of the trade with Europe, or their allies, exhausted by the war and forced to make a separate peace, were to leave them?” To this question our prophet replied:--

“This is an extreme case.… Why, then, should we put cases that
we know can never happen? However, I can inform you that the
case was often put before this war broke out; and I have heard
the common farmers in America reasoning upon these cases seven
years ago. I have heard them say, if Great Britain could build
a wall of brass a thousand feet high all along the sea-coast,
at low-water mark, we can live and be happy. _America is most
undoubtedly capable of being the most independent country upon
earth._ It produces everything for the necessity, comfort, and
conveniency of life, and many of the luxuries too. So that, if
there were an eternal separation between Europe and America,
the inhabitants of America would not only live, but multiply,
and, for what I know, be wiser, better, and happier than they
will be as it is.”[368]

Here is an assertion of conditions essential to independence of “the most independent country upon earth,” with a promise that the inhabitants will multiply.

* * * * *

6. In an official letter to the President of Congress, dated at Amsterdam, 5th September, 1780, the same writer, while proposing an American Academy “for refining, correcting, improving, and ascertaining the English language,” predicts the extension of this language:--

“_English is destined to be in the next and succeeding
centuries more generally the language of the world than Latin
was in the last or French is in the present age._ The reason of
this is obvious,--because the increasing population in America,
and their universal connection and correspondence with all
nations, will, aided by the influence of England in the world,
whether great or small, force their language into general use,
in spite of all the obstacles that may be thrown in their way,
if any such there should be.”[369]

In another letter, of unofficial character, dated at Amsterdam, 23d September, 1780, he thus repeats his prophecy:--

“You must know _I have undertaken to prophesy that English will
be the most respectable language in the world; and the most
universally read and spoken, in the next century, if not before
the close of this_. American population will in the next age
produce a greater number of persons who will speak English than
any other language, and these persons will have more general
acquaintance and conversation with all other nations than any
other people.”[370]

David Hume, in a letter to Gibbon, 24th October, 1767, had already written:--

“Our solid and increasing establishments in America, where
we need less dread the inundation of Barbarians, _promise a
superior stability and duration to the English language_.”[371]

But these more moderate words, which did credit to the discernment of the philosopher-historian, were then unpublished.

The prophecy of John Adams is already accomplished. Of all the European languages, English is most extensively spoken. Through England and the United States it has become the language of commerce, which sooner or later must embrace the globe. The German philologist, Grimm, has followed our American prophet in saying that it “seems chosen, like its people, to rule in future times in a still greater degree in all the corners of the earth.”[372]

* * * * *

7. Another field was opened by a European correspondent, John Luzac, who writes from Leyden, under date of 14th September, 1780, that, in pleading the cause of American Independence, he has twenty times encountered, from sensible and educated people, an objection which he sets forth as follows:--

“Yes, but if America becomes free, she will some day give the
law to Europe. She will take our islands, and our colonies
at Guiana; she will seize all the Antilles; she will absorb
Mexico, even Peru, Chili, and Brazil; she will carry off
our freighting commerce; she will pay her benefactors with
ingratitude.”[373]

To this Mr. Adams replied, in a letter from Amsterdam, 15th September, 1780:--

“I have met often in Europe with the same species of reasoners
that you describe; but I find they are not numerous. Among
men of reflection the sentiment is generally different, and
that no power in Europe has anything to fear from America.
The principal interest of America for many centuries to
come will be landed, and her chief occupation agriculture.
Manufactures and commerce will be but secondary objects, and
always subservient to the other. America will be the country
to produce raw materials for manufactures, but Europe will be
the country of manufactures; and the commerce of America can
never increase but in a certain proportion to the growth of its
agriculture, until its whole territory of land is filled up
with inhabitants, which will not be in some hundreds of years.”

After referring to tar, iron, and timber as American articles, he says:--

“In fact, the Atlantic is so long and difficult a navigation,
that the Americans will never be able to afford to carry to the
European market great quantities of these articles.”

If the prophet fails here, he is none the less wise in the suggestion with which he closes:--

“If Europe cannot prevent, or rather if any particular nations
of Europe cannot prevent, the independence of America, then
the sooner her independence is acknowledged, the better,--the
less likely she will be to become warlike, enterprising, and
ambitious. The truth is, however, that America can never unite
in any war but a defensive one.”[374]

Had the prophet foreseen the increasing facilities of commerce, the triumphs of steam, the floating masses of transportation, the wonders of navigation, quickened and guided by the telegraph, and to these had he added the diversified industry of the country, extending, expanding, and prevailing, his remarkable vision, which already saw so much, would have viewed other glories in assured certainty.

* * * * *

8. There is another prophecy, at once definite and broad, from the same eminent quarter. In a letter dated London, 17th October, 1785, and addressed to John Jay, at the time Secretary for Foreign Affairs under the Confederation, John Adams reveals his conviction of the importance of France to us, “while England held a province in America”;[375] and then, in another letter, dated 21st October, 1785, reports the saying of people about him, “_that Canada and Nova Scotia must soon be ours_; there must be a war for it,--they know how it will end,--but the sooner, the better; this done, we shall be forever at peace,--till then, never.”[376] These intimations foreshadow the prophecy found in the Preface to his “Defence of the American Constitutions,” written in London, while minister there, and dated Grosvenor Square, 1st January, 1787:--

“The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the
first example of governments erected on the simple principles
of Nature.… Thirteen governments thus founded on the natural
authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or
mystery, and _which are destined to spread over the northern
part of that whole quarter of the globe_, are a great point
gained in favor of the rights of mankind. The experiment is
made, and has completely succeeded.”[377]

Here is foretold nothing less than that our system of government is to embrace the whole continent of North America.

* * * * *

9. This series may be concluded by other words, general in character, but deeply prophetic, showing a constant sense of the unfolding grandeur and influence of the Republic.

The first is from the concluding chapter of the work last cited, and in harmony with the Preface:--

“A prospect into futurity in America is like contemplating the
heavens through the telescopes of Herschel. Objects stupendous
in their magnitudes and motions strike us from all quarters,
and fill us with amazement.”[378]

Thus, also, he writes to Thomas Jefferson, November 15, 1813:--

“Many hundred years must roll away before we shall be
corrupted. _Our pure, virtuous, public-spirited, federative
Republic will last forever, govern the globe, and introduce the
perfection of man._”[379]

Then, again, in a letter to Hezekiah Niles, 13th February, 1818:--

“The American Revolution was not a common event. Its effects
and consequences have already been awful over a great part of
the globe. _And when and where are they to cease?_”[380]

The prophetic spirit which filled the “visions” of youth continued in the “dreams” of age. Especially was he constant in foreseeing the widening reach of the great Revolution he had helped at its beginning; and this arrested the attention of his eloquent eulogist at Faneuil Hall.[381]

MARQUIS DE MONTCALM, 1758, 1759.

If I enter the name of the Marquis de Montcalm on this list, it is because prophetic words have been attributed to him which at different periods have attracted no small attention. He was born near Nismes, in France, 1712, and died at Quebec, 14th September, 1759, being at the time commander of the French forces in Canada. As a soldier he was the peer of his opponent, Wolfe, who perished in the same battle, and they have since enjoyed a common fame.

In 1777, amidst the heats of our Revolutionary contest, a publication was put forth by Almon, the pamphleteer, in French and English on opposite pages, entitled “Letters from the Marquis de Montcalm, Governor-General of Canada, to Messrs. De Berryer and De la Molé, in the Years 1757, 1758, and 1759,” and the soldier reappeared as prophet.

The first letter is addressed to M. de Berryer, First Commissioner of the Marine of France, and purports to be dated at Montreal, 4th April, 1757. It contains the copy of an elaborate communication from “S. J.” of Boston, proposing a scheme for undermining the power of Great Britain in the Colonies by free trade with France through Canada, and predicting that “all our colonies in less than ten years will catch fire.”[382] In transmitting this letter Montcalm did little more than indorse its sentiments; but in his second letter to the same person, dated at Montreal, 1st October, 1758, he says:--

“All these informations, which I every day receive, confirm me
in my opinion that _England will one day lose her colonies on
the continent of America_; and if Canada should then be in the
hands of an able governor who understands his business, he will
have a thousand opportunities of hastening the event: this is
the only advantage we can reap for all it has cost us.”[383]

In the third letter, addressed to M. Molé, First President of the Parliament of Paris, and dated at the camp before Quebec, 24th August, 1759, on the eve of the fatal battle in which both commanders fell, Montcalm mounts the tripod:--

“They are in a condition to give us battle, which I must not
refuse, and which I cannot hope to gain.… The event must
decide. But of one thing be certain, that I probably shall not
survive the loss of the Colony.[384] … I shall at least console
myself on my defeat, and on the loss of the Colony, by the
full persuasion that this defeat will one day serve my country
more than a victory, and that the conqueror, in aggrandizing
himself, will find his tomb the country he gains from us.[385]…
All the English Colonies would long since have shaken off the
yoke, each province would have formed itself into a little
independent republic, if the fear of seeing the French at their
door had not been a check upon them.[386]… Canada, once taken
by the English, would in a few years suffer much from being
forced to be English.… They would soon be of no use to England,
and perhaps they would oppose her.”[387]

At once, on their appearance, these letters played an important part in the “high life” of politics. The “Monthly Review”[388] called them “genuine.” The “Gentleman’s Magazine”[389] said that “the sagacity of this accomplished general was equal to his bravery,” and quoted what it characterized as a “remarkable prediction.” In the House of Lords, 30th May, 1777, during a debate begun by Lord Chatham, and flashing with great names, Lord Shelburne said that they “had been discovered to be a forgery”;[390] but Lord Mansfield, the illustrious Chief Justice, relied upon the letters, “which he insisted were not spurious.”[391] In another important debate in the House of Lords, 5th March, 1778, Earl Temple observed that “the authenticity of those letters had been often disputed; but he could affirm that he saw them in manuscript, among the papers of a minister now deceased, long before they made their appearance in print, and at a time when American independency was in the contemplation of a very few persons indeed.”[392] Such was the contemporary testimony; but the pamphlet shared the fate of the numerous brood engendered by the war.

Oblivion seemed to have settled on these letters, when their republication at Gibraltar, as late as 1858, by an author who treated them as genuine,[393] attracted the attention of Thomas Carlyle, who proceeded to make them famous again, by introducing them as an episode in his Life of Frederick, sometimes called “the Great.” Montcalm appears once more as prophet, and the readers of the career of the Prussian monarch turn with wonder to the inspired Frenchman, with “his power of faithful observation, his sagacity and talent of prophecy, so considerable.”[394] Then, quoting a portion of the last letter, the great author exclaims at different points: “Prediction first”; “This is a curiously exact prediction”; “Prediction second, which is still more curious.”[395]

If the letter quoted by Carlyle were genuine, as he accepted it, (also as it was evidently accepted by Lord John Russell,)[396] and as the family of Montcalm seem to believe, it would indicate for the soldier all that was claimed by his descendant, when, after speaking of his “political foresight,” he added that it “was proved by one of his letters, in which he made a remarkable prophecy concerning the American Revolution.”[397] Certainly,--if the letter is not an invention; but such is the present impression. On the half-title of the original pamphlet, in the Library of Harvard University, Sparks, whose judgment is of great weight, has written: “The letters are unquestionably spurious.” Others unite with him. It is impossible to read the papers in the “Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society,” already quoted, and the pungent note of Henry Stevens, in his “Bibliotheca Historica,” under the title of the much-debated pamphlet, without feeling, that, whatever may have been the merits of Montcalm as a soldier, his title as a prophet cannot be accepted. His name is introduced here that I may not omit an instance which has attracted attention in more than one generation.

DUC DE CHOISEUL, 1767, 1768.

Another Frenchman in this far-sighted list was the Comte de Stainville, afterwards Duc de Choiseul, born 28th June, 1719, and died 8th May, 1785. His brilliant career as diplomatist and statesman was preceded by a career of arms with rapid promotion, so that at the age of forty he became lieutenant-general. Meanwhile he was ambassador at Rome and then at Vienna, the two pinnacles of diplomatic life. In 1758 he became Minister of Foreign Affairs, also duke and peer; then Minister of War, and of the Marine; but in 1766 he resumed the Foreign Office, which he held till 1770, when he was disgraced. The King could not pardon the contempt with which, although happy in the smiles of Madame de Pompadour, the Prime-Minister rejected the advances of her successor, the ignoble Du Barry; and he was exiled from court to live in his château of Chanteloup, in the valley of the Loire, where, dispensing a magnificent hospitality, he was consoled by a loving wife and devoted friends.

He had charm of manner rather than person, with a genius for statesmanship recognized and commemorated in contemporary writings. Madame du Deffant speaks of him often in her correspondence, and depicts him in her circle when Franklin was first presented there. Horace Walpole returns to him in letters and in his memoirs, attributing to him “great parts,” calling him “very daring, dashing, and whose good-nature would not have checked his ambition from doing any splendid mischief.”[398] The Abbé Barthélemy, in his “Travels of Anacharsis,” portrays him under the character of Arsame. Frederick of Prussia, so often called the Great, hailed him “Coachman of Europe.” And our own historian Bancroft, following Chatham, does not hesitate to call him “the greatest minister of France since Richelieu.”

The two volumes of Memoirs purporting to be written by himself, and printed under his eyes in his cabinet in 1778, were accidental pieces, written, but never collected by him, nor intended as memoirs.[399] In the French treasure-house of these productions they are of little value, if not unworthy of his fame.

Besides a brilliant and famous administration of affairs, are several acts not to be forgotten. At Rome his skill was shown in bringing Benedict the Fourteenth to a common understanding on the bull _Unigenitus_. Through him in 1764 the Jesuits were suppressed in France, or were permitted only on condition of fusing with the secular clergy. But nothing in his career was more memorable than his foresight and courage with regard to the English Colonies. American Independence was foreseen and helped by him.

The Memoirs of Choiseul have little of the elevation recognized in his statesmanship, nor are they anywhere prophetic. Elsewhere his better genius was manifest, especially in his diplomacy. This was recognized by Talleyrand, who, in a paper on the “Advantages to be derived from New Colonies,” read before the Institute toward the close of the last century, characterized him as “one of the men of our age who had the most forecast of mind,--_who already in 1769 foresaw the separation of America from England_, and feared the partition of Poland”; and he adds that “from this epoch he sought to prepare by negotiations the cession of Egypt to France, that on the day our American colonies should escape from us, he might be ready to replace them with the same productions and a more extended commerce.”[400]

Bancroft, whose work shows unprecedented access to original documents, recognizes the prevision of the French minister at an earlier date, as attested by the archives of the French Foreign Office. In 1766 he received the report of a special agent who had visited America. In 1767 he sent Baron de Kalb, afterwards an officer in our Revolution,--sparing no means to obtain information, and drawing even from New England sermons, of which curious extracts are preserved among the State Papers of France.[401] In August of this year, writing to his plenipotentiary at London, the Minister says with regard to England and her Colonies: “Let her but attempt to establish taxes in them, and those countries, greater than England in extent, and perhaps becoming more populous, having fisheries, forests, shipping, corn, iron, and the like, will easily and fearlessly separate themselves from the mother country.”[402] In the next year Du Châtelet, son of her who was the companion of Voltaire and the French translator of Newton, becomes his most sympathetic representative. To him the Minister wrote, 15th July, 1768: “According to the prognostications of sensible men, who have had opportunity to study the character of the Americans, and to measure their progress from day to day in the spirit of independence, this separation of the American Colonies from the metropolis sooner or later must come.… I see all these difficulties, and do not dissemble their extent; but I see also the controlling interest of the Americans to profit by the opportunity of a rupture to establish their independence.”[403] Again he wrote, 22d November, 1768: “The Americans will not lose out of their view their rights and their privileges; and next to fanaticism for religion, the fanaticism for liberty is the most daring in its measures and the most dangerous in its consequences.”[404] That the plenipotentiary was not less prompt in forecast appears in a letter of 9th November, 1768: “Without exaggerating the projects or the union of the Colonies, the time of their independence is very near.… Three years ago the separation of the English Colonies was looked upon as an object of attention for the next generation; the germs were observed, but no one could foresee that they would be so speedily developed. This new order of things, this event which will necessarily have the greatest influence on the whole political system of Europe, will probably be brought about within a very few years.”[405] The Minister replied, 20th December, 1768: “Your views are as subtle as they are comprehensive and well-considered. The King is perfectly aware of their sagacity and solidity, and I will communicate them to the Court of Madrid.”[406]

These passages show a persistency of view, which became the foundation of French policy; so that the Duke was not merely a prophet, but a practical statesman, guided by remarkable foresight. He lived long enough to witness the National Independence he had foretold, and to meet Franklin at Paris, while saved from witnessing the overthrow of the monarchy he had served, and the bloody harvest of the executioner, where a beloved sister was among the victims.

ABBÉ RAYNAL, 1770-1780.

Guillaume Thomas François Raynal, of France, was born 11th March, 1711, and died 6th March, 1796, thus spanning, with his long life, from the failing years of Louis the Fourteenth to the Reign of Terror, and embracing the prolonged period of intellectual activity which prepared the Revolution. Among contemporary “philosophers” his place was considerable. But he was a philosopher with a cross of the adventurer and charlatan.

Beginning as Jesuit and as priest, he somewhat tardily escaped the constraints of the latter to employ the education of the former in literary enterprise. A long list of acknowledged works attests the activity of his pen, while others were attributed to him. With these avocations, yielding money, mingled jobbing and speculation, where even the slave-trade, afterwards furiously condemned, became a minister of fortune. In the bright and audacious circles of Paris, especially with Diderot and D’Holbach, he found society. The remarkable fame which he reached during life has ceased, and his voluminous writings slumber in oblivion, except, perhaps, a single one, which for a while played a great part, and by its prophetic spirit vindicates a place in our American gallery.

Only the superficial character of this work appears in its title,--“Philosophical and Political History of the Establishments and of the Commerce of the Europeans in the two Indies,”[407] being in six volumes. It was a frame for pictures and declamations, where freedom of thought was practically illustrated. Therefore it was published without the name of the author, and at Amsterdam. This was as early as 1770. Edition followed edition. The “Biographie Universelle” reports more than twenty regular and nearly fifty pirated. At least twelve editions of an English translation saw the light. It was translated, abridged, and reprinted in nearly all the languages of Europe. The subject was interesting at the time, but the peculiar treatment and the open assault upon existing order gave the work zest and popularity. Though often vicious in style, it was above the author in force and character, so that it was easy to believe that important parts were contributed by others. Diderot, who passed his life in helping others, is said to have supplied nearly a third of the whole. The work at last drew down untimely vengeance. Inspired by its signal success, the author, in 1780, after the lapse of a decade, put forth an enlarged edition, with frontispiece and portrait, the whole reinforced with insertions and additions, where Christianity and even the existence of a God were treated with the license already applied to other things. The Parliament of Paris, by a decree dated May 21, 1781, handed the work to the public executioner to be burned, and condemned the author in person and goods. Several years of exile followed.

The Revolution in France found the Abbé Raynal mellowed by time, and with his sustaining philosophers all dead. Declining active participation in the great conflict, he reappeared at last, so far as to address the President of the National Assembly a letter, where he pleaded for moderation and an active government. The ancient assailant of kings now called for “the tutelary protection of the royal authority.” The early _cant_ was exchanged for _recant_.

The concluding book of the enlarged edition of his famous work contains a chapter entitled “Reflections upon the Good and the Evil which the Discovery of America has done to Europe.”[408] A question of similar import, “Has the Discovery of America been hurtful or useful to the Human Race?” he presented as the subject for a prize of twelve hundred livres, to be awarded by the Academy of Lyons. Such a question reveals a strange confusion, inconsistent with all our prophetic voices, but to be pardoned at a time when the course of civilization was so little understood, and Buffon had announced, as the conclusion of science, that the animal creation degenerated on the American Continent. In his admirable answer to the great naturalist, Jefferson repels with spirit the allegation of the Abbé Raynal that “America has not yet produced one good poet, one able mathematician, one man of genius in a single art or science.”[409] But he does not seem aware that the author in his edition of 1780 had already beaten a retreat from his original position.[410] This is more noteworthy as the edition appeared before the criticism.

It was after portraying the actual condition of the English Colonies in colors which aroused the protest of Jefferson that the French philosopher surrendered to a vision of the future. In reply to doubts, he invokes time, civilization, education, and breaks forth:--

“Perhaps then it will be seen that America is favorable to
genius, to the creative arts of peace and of society. A new
Olympus, an Arcadia, an Athens, a new Greece, on the Continent,
or in the archipelago which surrounds it, will give birth,
perhaps, to Homers, Theocrituses, and, above all, Anacreons.
Perhaps another Newton will rise in the new Britain. It is from
English America, no doubt, that the first ray of the sciences
will shoot forth, if they are to appear at last under a sky so
long clouded. By a singular contrast with the ancient world,
where the arts passed from the South toward the North, in the
new we shall see the North enlighten the South. Let the English
clear the land, purify the air, change the climate, meliorate
Nature; _a new universe will issue from their hands for the
glory and happiness of humanity_.”[411]

Then, speculating on the dissensions prevailing between the Colonies and the mother country, he announces separation, but without advantage to the European rivals of England:--

“Break the knot which binds the ancient Britain to the new;
soon the Northern Colonies will have more strength alone than
they possessed in their union with the mother country. That
great continent, set free from all compact with Europe, will
be unhampered in all its movements.… The colonies of our
absolute monarchies, … following the example of the English
colonies, will break the chain which binds them shamefully to
Europe.”[412]

The New World opens before the prophet:--

“So everything conspires to the great dismemberment, of which
it is not given to foresee the moment. Everything tends to
that,--both the progress of good in the new hemisphere, and the
progress of evil in the old.

“Alas! the sudden and rapid decline of our morals and our
strength, the crimes of kings and the woes of peoples, will
render even universal that fatal catastrophe which is to
detach one world from the other. The mine is prepared beneath
the foundations of our rocking empires.… In proportion as our
peoples are growing weak and all succumbing one to another,
population and agriculture are increasing in America. The
arts transported by our care will quickly spring up there.
That country, risen from nothing, burns to figure in its turn
upon the face of the globe and in the history of the world. O
posterity! thou wilt be more happy, perhaps, than thy sad and
contemptible ancestors!”[413]

The edition of 1780 exhibits his sympathies with the Colonies. In considering the policy of the House of Bourbon, he recognizes the grasp of the pending revolution. “The United States,” he says, “have shown openly the project of drawing to their confederation _all North America_”; and he mentions especially _the invitation to the people of Canada_. While questioning the conduct of France and Spain, he adds:--

“_The new hemisphere is to detach itself some day from the
old._ This great disruption is prepared in Europe by the
fermentation and the clashing of our opinions,--by the
overthrow of our rights, which made our courage,--by the
luxury of the court and the misery of the country,--by the
everlasting hate between the effeminate men, who possess all,
and the strong, even virtuous men, who have nothing to lose but
life. It is prepared in America by the growth of population,
of agriculture, of industry, and of enlightenment. _Everything
tends to this scission._”[414]

In a sketch which follows are pictured the resources of “the thirteen confederate provinces” and their future development. While confessing that the name of Liberty is sweet,--that it is the cause of the entire human race,--that revolutions in its name are a lesson to despots,--that the spirit of justice, which compensates past evils by future happiness, is pleased to believe that this part of the New World cannot fail to become one of the most flourishing countries of the globe,--and that some go so far as to fear _that Europe may some day find its masters in its children_, he proceeds to facts which may mitigate anxiety.[415]

The prophetic words of Raynal differ from others already quoted. Instead of letters or papers buried in secrecy or disclosed to a few only, they were open proclamations circulated throughout Europe, and their influence began as early as 1770. A prompt translation made them known in England. In 1777 they were quoted by an English writer pleading for us.[416] Among influences coöperating with the justice of our cause, they were of constant activity, until at last France, Spain, and Holland openly united with us.

JONATHAN SHIPLEY, BISHOP OF ST. ASAPH, 1773.

Not without heartfelt emotion do I write this name, never to be mentioned by an American without a sentiment of gratitude and love. Such goodness and ability, dedicated so firmly to our cause, make Shipley conspicuous among his contemporaries. In beauty of character and in prophetic spirit he resembles Berkeley. And yet biographical dictionaries make little mention of him, and in our country he is known chiefly through the friendship of Franklin. He was born about 1714, and died 9th December, 1788.

His actual preferments in the Church attest a certain success, arrested at last by his sympathy for us. At an early day John Adams spoke of him as “the best bishop that adorns the bench.”[417] And we learn from Wraxall, that it was through the hostility of the King, that, during the short-lived Coalition Ministry, Fox was prevented from making him Archbishop of Canterbury.[418] But his public life was better than any prelacy. It is impossible to read his writings without discovering the stamp of superiority, where accuracy and clearness go hand in hand with courage and truth.

The relations of Franklin with the good Bishop are a beautiful episode in our Revolutionary history. Two men, one English and the other American, venerable with years, mingled in friendship warm as that of youth, but steady to the grave, joining identity of sentiment on important public questions with personal affection. While Franklin remained in England, as Colonial representative, watching the currents, he was a frequent guest at the Englishman’s country home; and there he entered upon his incomparable autobiography, leaving behind such pleasant memories that afterwards the family never walked in the garden “without seeing Dr. Franklin’s room and thinking of the work that was begun in it.”[419] One of the daughters, in a touching letter to him, then at his own home in Philadelphia, informed him of her father’s death,[420] and in reply to his “dear young friend,” he expressed his sense of the loss, “not to his family and friends only, but to his nation, and to the world,” and then, after mentioning that he was in his eighty-fourth year and considerably enfeebled, added, “You will, then, my dear friend, consider this as probably the last line to be received from me, and as a taking leave.”[421]

* * * * *

This brief story prepares the way for the two productions illustrating his service to us. The first has the following title: “A Sermon preached before the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, at their Anniversary Meeting in the Parish Church of St. Mary-le-Bow, on Friday, February 19, 1773.” Of this discourse several editions appeared in London, New York, and Boston.[422] Lord Chatham, after confessing himself “charmed and edified” by it, wrote: “This noble discourse speaks the preacher not only fit to bear rule in the Church, but in the State; indeed, it does honor to the Right Reverend Bench.”[423] Franklin, coupling it with another of his productions relating to America, wrote: “Had his counsels in those pieces been attended to by the Ministers, how much bloodshed might have been prevented, and how much expense and disgrace to the nation avoided!”[424]