"Frenchmen they call those tobacco plants whose leaves do not spread and grow large, but rather spire upward and grow tall; these plants they do not tend, not being worth their labor."—Mr. Clayton's Letter to the Royal Society, 1688. Miscellanea Curiosa, vol. iii., p. 303-310.
[311] The colonists of Virginia, in a kind of manifesto published in 1622, expressed their satisfaction at some late warlike excursions of the Indians as a pretext for rubbing and subjugating them. "Now these cleared grounds in all their villages, which live situated in the fruitfullest parts of the land, shall be inhabited by us, whereas heretofore the grubbing of woods was the greatest labor. The way of conquering them is much more easy than that of civilizing them by fair means; for they are a rude, barbarous, and naked people, scattered in small companies, which are helps to victory, but hinderances to civility."—Tracts relating to Virginia in the British Museum, quoted by Merrivale. See Appendix, No. LXII. (vol. II.)
[312] "Il faut envisager surtout l'influence qu'à exercée le Nouveau Continent sur les destinées du genre humain sous le rapport des institutions sociales. La tourmente religieuse du seizième siècle, en favorisant l'essor d'une libre reflexion, a préludé à la tourmente politique des temps dans lesquels nous vivons. Le premier de ces mouvemens a coincidé avec l'époque de l'établissement des colonies Européennes en Amérique; le second s'est fait sentir vers la fin du dix-huitième siècle, et a fini par briser les liens de dépendance qui unissaient les deux mondes. Une circonstance sur laquelle on n'a peut-être pas assez fixé l'attention publique et qui tient à ces causes mystérieuses dont a dépendu la distribution inégale du genre humain sur le globe, a favorisée, on pourrait dire, à rendre possible l'influence politique que je viens de signaler. Une moitié du globe est restée si faiblement peuple que, malgré le long travail d'une civilisation indigène, qui a eu lieu entre les découvertes de Lief et de Colomb, sur les côtes Américaines opposées à l'Asie, d'immenses pays dans la partie orientale n'offroient au quinzième siècle que des tribus éparses de peuples chasseurs. Cet état de depopulation dans des pays fertiles et éminemment aptes à la culture de nos céreales, a permis aux Européens d'y fonder des établissemens sur une échelle qu'aucune colonisation de l'Asie et de l'Afrique n'a pu atteindre. Les peuples chasseurs ont été refoulés des côtes orientales vers l'interieur, et dans le nord de l'Amérique, sous des climats et des aspects de végétation très analogues à ceux des îles Britanniques, il s'est forme par émigration, des la fin de l'année 1620, des communautés dont les institutions se présentent comme le reflet des institutions libres de la mère patrie. La Nouvelle Angleterre n'étoit pas primitivement un établissement d'industrie et de commerce, comme le sont encore les factoreries de l'Afrique; ce n'étoit pas une domination sur les peuples agricoles d'une race différente, comme l'empire Britannique dans l'Inde, et pendant longtemps, l'empire Espagnole au Mexique et au Pérou. La Nouvelle Angleterre, qui a reçu une première colonisation de quatre mille familles de puritains, dont descend aujourd'hui un tiers de la population blanche des Etats Unis, étoit un établissement religieux. La liberté civile s'y montrait des l'origine inséparable de la liberté du culte. Or l'histoire nous revèle que les institutions libres de l'Angleterre, de la Hollande, et de la Suisse, malgré leur proximité, n'ont pas réagi sur les peuples de l'Europe latine, comme ce reflet de formes de gouvernemens entièrement democratiques qui, loin de tout ennemi extérieur, favorisés par une tendance uniforme et constante de souvenirs et de vielles mœurs, ont pris dans un calme longtemps prolongé, des développemens inconnus aux temps modernes. C'est ainsi que le manque de population dans des régions des Nouveau Continent opposées à l'Europe, et le libre et prodigieux accroissement d'une colonisation Anglaise audelà de la grande vallée de l'Atlantique, a puissamment contribué à changer la face politique et les destinées de l'ancien continent. On a affirmé que si Colomb n'avoit pas changé, selon les conseils d'Alonzo Pinzon,[313] le 7 Octobre, 1492, la direction de sa route, qui étoit de l'est à l'ouest, et gouverné vers le sud-ouest, il seroit entre dans le courant d'eau chaude ou Gulf Stream, et auroit été porté vers la Floride, et de là peut-être vers le cap Hatteras et la Virginie, incident d'une immense importance, puisqu'il auroit pu donner aux Etats Unis, en lieu d'une population Protestante Anglaise, une population Catholique Espagnole."—Humboldt's Géog. du Nouveau Continent, tom. iii., p. 163.
[313] Alonzo s'étoit écrié "que son cœur lui disoit que pour trouver la terre, il falloit gouverner vers le sud-ouest." L'inspiration d'Alonzo étoit moins mystériuse qu'elle peut le paraître au premier abord. Pinzon avoit vu dans la soirée passer des perroquets, et il savoit que ces oiseaux n'alloient pas sans motif du côte du sud. Jamais vol d'oiseau n'a eu des suites plus graves.
CHAPTER X.
The Protestant Reformation was eminently suited to the spirit of the English people, although forced upon them in the first instance by the absolute power of a capricious king, and unaccompanied by any acknowledgment of those rights of toleration and individual judgment upon which its strength seemed mainly to depend. The monarch, when constituted the head of the Church, exacted the same spiritual obedience from his subjects as they had formerly rendered to the Pope of Rome. Queen Elizabeth adopted her father's principles: she favored the power of the hierarchy, and the pomp and ceremony of external religious observances. But the English people, shocked by the horrors of Mary's reign, and terrified by the papal persecutions on the Continent, were generally inclined to favor the extremes of Calvinistic simplicity, as a supposed security against another reaction to the Romish faith. The stern and despotic queen, encouraged by the counsels of Archbishop Whitgift, assumed the groundless right of putting down the opinions of the Puritans by force. [1583.] Various severities were exercised against those who held the obnoxious doctrines; but, despite the storm of persecution, the spirit of religious independence spread rapidly among the sturdy people of England. At length a statute was passed of a nature now almost incredible—secession from the Church was punishable by banishment, and by death in case of refusal on return.[314] [1593.]
The Puritans were thus driven to extremity.[315] The followers of an enthusiastic seceder named Brown[316] formed the first example of an independent system: each congregation was in itself a Church, and the spiritual power was wholly vested in its members. This sect was persecuted to the uttermost: the leader was imprisoned in no less than thirty-two different places, and many of his followers suffered death itself for conscience' sake. Some of the Brownists took refuge in Holland[317] [1598]; but, impelled by a longing for an independent home, or perhaps urged by the mysterious impulse of their great destiny, they cast their eyes upon that stern Western shore, where the untrodden wilderness offered them at least the "freedom to worship God." They applied to the London Company for a grant of land, declaring that they were "weaned from the delicate milk of their native country, and knit together in a strict and sacred band, whom small things could not discourage, nor small discontents cause to wish themselves home again." After some delay they accomplished their object; however, the only security they could obtain for religious independence was a promise that, as long they demeaned themselves quietly, no inquiry should be made.[318]
Much of the history of nations may be traced through the foundation and progress of their colonies. Each particular era has shown, in the settlements of the time, types of the several mother countries, examples of their systems, and the results of their exigencies. At one time this type is of an adventurous, at another of a religious character; now formed by political, again by social influences. The depth and durability of this impress may be measured by the strength of the first motives, and the genius of the people from whom the emigration flows.[319] The ancient colonies of Asia Minor displayed the original characteristics of the mother country long after her states had become utterly changed. The Roman settlements in Italy raised upon the ruins of a subjugated nation a fabric of civilization and power that can never be forgotten. The proud and adventurous, but ruthless spirit that distinguished the Spanish nation at the time of their wonderful conquests in the New World, is still exhibited in the haughty tyranny of Cuba, and the sanguinary struggles of the South American republics. The French Canadian of to-day retains most or many of the national sentiments of those who crossed the Atlantic to extend the power of France and of her proudest king. And still, in that great Anglo-Saxon nation of the West, through the strife of democratic ambition, and amid the toils and successes of an enormous commerce, we trace the foundations, overgrown perhaps, but all unshaken, of that stern edifice of civil and religious liberty[322] which the Pilgrim fathers raised with their untiring labor, and cemented with their blood.
The peculiar nature of the first New England emigration was the result of those strong tendencies of the British people soon afterward strengthened into a determination sufficiently powerful to sacrifice the monarch and subvert the Church and State.