Well, the Japs also yielded to these arguments, and thenceforth have been happy. Trade has prevailed. Rice has gone up, and a good many Japs have gone to the ethereal spaces, overcome with hunger. Railways have been built, national debts have been created; the Mikado and Tycoon have fought, the Daimios have quarrelled, white men have been assassinated, beggary has begun, taxes press upon the people; and indeed all the signs which mark the high civilization of trade have appeared. "Progress," we are assured, is now certain, and Japan is "developing her resources." Bliss ensues. All of which is written down and printed in many volumes for all men to read. And "Perry's Expedition" can be read in beautiful volumes which cost you, we'll say, $50 for the books and a million for the glorious expedition.
We make any sacrifices for the new religion, and are willing to waste the filthy lucre of gold to extend a divine idea.
We did it!
We opened their ports!
We extended the blessing of trade!
We have made the Japs into Yankees!
They are learning the benefits of cheap and nasty!
Glory be to the new god!
Massachusetts! Massachusetts has held herself and has been held as the heart and the brain of New England. She has had (so she has believed) the heart to feel a moral principle and the head to accept a great thought. She has had brave-hearted men and clear-eyed women. Once—let us make a brief retrospect—she had "pilgrim fathers." She had what she and the world too thought a religion, which she believed in. She had a people of sound English stock, who in this clear New England air grew to hate squalor, vice, beggary, debt, and damnation. Once, fifty years ago, she had no great cities; her "Hub," Boston, in 1830 had but the poor population of 61,392, nearly all born on her soil, few of them dirty or beggared. Once, fifty years ago, all through Massachusetts were clean, decent, white-housed towns, such as Worcester, and Springfield, and Northampton, and Concord, and Salem, and Newburyport, centres of small but most cultivated and earnest social life.
Then small farms were cultivated by families of New England birth, out of whom came able men and handsome women. Children lived with parents, and did not tyrannize them. Silk gowns were rare, and pianos unknown; "art" and "culture" had not become household words, but butter was made at home, and the mystery of bread was known to ladies. Few then had been to Paris, and few therefore knew how vulgar they were. But "where ignorance is bliss," etc. They got on, and did not know what poor creatures they were.