I am sure that there are few, if any, Englishmen who, however much they may deplore the animosities which have been evoked out of that episode in our common history, would now wish to undo the results of the American Revolution. France looks with envious and covetous eyes upon her ancient provinces, Alsace and Lorraine, wrenched from her by a foreign power, but England regards with pride the development, accomplishments, and wealth {92} of her offspring, and, with genuine regret for the past, turns yearningly towards it.
In thus restoring the subject to its historical integrity, so far from weakening, we strengthen our side of the question. Why should we sacrifice any fraction of the truth when we have so little need to do so? Nakedly, under the circumstances, and free from all legal and metaphysical abstractions for or against, it was plain that the claims of the English Parliament did, practically, involve consequences that we might well regard as fatal to liberty, and, constitutional remedies failing, as justifying an appeal to arms. The conviction of our ancestors that nothing less than this was at stake rightly superseded all other considerations, and was as profound and sincere as similar convictions for similar principles, recorded in the annals of the race. The more clearly we obtain a view of the subject in its simplicity, the less will we be disposed to conceal, exaggerate, or distort its contemporary aspects, either of facts or morals. "It was against the recital of an Act of Parliament, rather than against any suffering under its enactments, that they took up arms. They went to war against a preamble."[11]
And yet we are likely to be told that one of the barriers against any present alliance between the two nations grows out of this Revolutionary War. If that event constitutes no impediment to England, why should it cause embarrassment to the United States? England was defeated and the colonists {93} established their government. Is this event, now shown to be a natural step in the expansion and development of the English-speaking people, to be used as an argument against their further progress? If so, why? The English nation does not put forth such a claim. Why should we Americans allow a spirit of hatred or prejudice to grow out of our own triumphs? In a sense England fought for union with us, and if the war of 1776 furnishes any ground against the present establishment of a union of feeling and interest between ourselves and her, how much more forcible would be the argument when applied to the present and future relations of the North and South? The results of that fratricidal struggle, by which the latter people sought to separate from the Union, have been fully acquiesced in. The animosities and prejudices which were engendered by it have disappeared, and the relations of the people of the North and South are solidified by new feelings of deep and sincere friendship, union, interest, and patriotism. The results of that struggle, unhappy, dreadful as it was, have proved to be of profound moral and material benefit to the people of both sections. The results of the Revolution of 1776 have been of like great advantage to both England and the United States. History is full of civil wars, of family quarrels among kindred peoples, in which the result has been, not separation of the parts of the community, but their better integration. Look at England herself; all her internal dissensions grew out of the same {94} principle, which, when established, left the people more firmly united, and on a higher plane than before. Indeed, as all national systems are based upon an association of families, it would be impossible to form any political society if past wars and animosities between them were not forgotten; and the same principle applies to communities homogeneously related, although technically separated. Look again at England and Scotland before and after the union!
The motive and reason for the unification of the English-speaking people is manifest, and certainly nothing is more unsound, nothing is more vain, than to search in the closets of history to find skeletons of past quarrels, battles, hatreds, and conquests, to frighten them away from their true duty and interests.
Examine the history of England before the time when the separate kingdoms into which she was divided were consolidated, and what do we find? Constant and bloody wars between them! And yet, the instant a union was established, and these different people became one, how quickly the old spirit of prejudice and hatred was buried in the grave of the past, and how joyously the people entered upon a new era of progress and national success! Assume that King George and the English Ministry bitterly tried to prevent our independence; take it for granted that England compelled us to go to war with her in 1812; admit that a portion of her people sympathised with (and gave substantial support to) the South in the {95} Rebellion of 1861. What then? Does it follow that these events, buried in the vaults of the past, should be brought out as arguments against the accomplishment of acts clearly for our present interest, conducive, if not necessary, to our future security and peace? The individuals who composed the British Empire when all the above facts transpired, are no more, and the causes which then operated upon them have also long since disappeared. A learned historian has said: "The God of History does not visit the sins of the fathers upon the children."[12] Shall men be less liberal—less forgiving? Why should we then reject the proffered and sincere friendship of our own kindred? Is it only among nations, and such nations, that "no place is left for repentance, none for pardon"?
England to-day, in respect to the individuals who compose it, is not the England of yesterday. She recognises the independence of the United States as the work of her own offspring; that which she once sought to prevent she now hails as a blessing. The past is buried; a new era is ushered in; new light illumines our purposes, motives, and acts. Through the instrumentality of a closer and quicker communication, we have become better acquainted, our mutual wants and necessities are better understood, the relations of each nation to the other are more clearly defined, and out of all these conditions we can plainly foresee that we have a common purpose and destiny to fulfil—which can only be {96} accomplished by a genuine fusion of the whole people.
Let the words of a poet, which have become a household possession of the English race, be applied in letter and spirit to the situation.
"I doubt not through the ages one increasing purpose runs,
And the thoughts of men are widening with the process of
the Suns.[13]
These truths are happy "prologues to the swelling act of the imperial theme." The sublimest is now before us. The unification of the English-American people in the glorious mission of civilisation and peace is the next great preordained step in their national life. Diplomacy might have laboured in vain to create it; but neither prejudice nor demagogism can now thwart or prevent it. Who will stand forth to challenge or prohibit the banns of such a national matrimony? Let him show cause in the Court of Civilisation why the doctrines of religion, liberty, humanity, and peace should not control the result.