The Americans are nearly as good as older states, perhaps better than some. As three hundred years of civilization is, say, to six hundred, in that proportion they are as good as Europeans.
But the greatness of America has to come. Time will be when America, perhaps with Australian lands, will be arbiter of the civilized world—if it likes.
With some exceptions, if we take any one of the United States, it will be found to be monotonous; there is as much variety in an English county as in any one of these.
I compare the United States to a book: it is a new and cheap edition of England in one volume; price, one almighty dollar.
Altogether, there is no difference of moment between the best English and the best Americans, or the worst English and worst Americans.
Lawrence and Bancroft would have made good dukes!
I remember dining with a great merchant at Philadelphia, who told me that after receiving a classical education at the University of Dublin, he emigrated and became a clerk in an American house, and that after a time he saw his way to establish a business for himself, and had realized a large fortune. He told me this that he might add the singular assurance that he never once, in his almost lifelong residence in America, had an opportunity of showing how good his education had been, or of using a single Latin word.