I have had a singular conversation with a foreigner. This person is a cosmopolite, a —— by birth, who has lived much in England and America, and our discourse had reference to the opinions and expectations that prevail here concerning our own national character and national destiny. As my companion had no doubts as to the manner in which his communication would be received, he spoke without reserve.
He commenced by saying that a very general impression existed in England that the man of America was not equally gifted, in mind, with the man of Europe. This is merely the old opinion continued to our own times, and I was fully aware of its existence. Captain Hall, when he says that there is no want of natural ability in the American people, but that their deficiencies proceed from defective educations, is merely addressing his remark to this prejudice. Almost every English traveller, who has written of the republic, betrays the existence of the same notion, in some way or other. But it is so easy for an American, who is not completely blinded by national vanity, to ascertain these truths, by concealing his origin, while travelling in the stage-coaches, that, to me, it is matter of surprise any one who has visited England should be ignorant of them.
Almost every American, whose name reaches this country, in consequence of its being connected with any thing that is thought creditable, is incontinently claimed as an expatriated European. You can have no notion of the extent to which this prejudice is carried. I do assure you, that I have myself heard a respectable man, here, affirm that, in one of the counties of England, he had been a school-fellow of Washington, before the latter emigrated! Mr. Irving figures in biographical notices here, as a native of Devonshire, and even my own humble claims have not been overlooked, as by a sketch of a pretended life, which now lies on my table, my origin is traced to the Isle of Man, and in an elaborated sort of Blue Book, which contains a list of English writers, I find myself enrolled among men, who have far more reason to be ashamed of me, than I have to be ashamed of them. I have been asked quite lately, if Macdonough were not an Irishman, and I believe, my affirmation that poor Allen, who was killed in the Argus, was an American, was absolutely discredited. I met with an assertion, some time since, in one of the journals here, that “Commodore Rodgers was a Scotch baker, of the name of Gray!” The periodical publications of the day, are filled with spurious histories of most of our distinguished men, during the revolution, replete with the usual scurrility and untruths; and even the last war, brought with it, the same touches of amiable veracity.
The national prejudices of England, are freely commented on, by all other people. Prejudice, however, belongs to man, rather than to communities, and I am inclined to think France has almost as many as this country, though they are of a different quality, and are infinitely better cloaked. In making this comparison, I always except the subject of America, for that is a point on which an Englishman usually ceases altogether, to be either just, or discerning.
One of the traits which the English attribute to us, is a greater disposition than common to lie. I have no hesitation in saying, that this nation deems our own, addicted to this vice, altogether out of the ordinary way. On this point, there can be no mistake, for Captain Hall, Mr. De Roos, and several other recent writers, even by exonerating us from the charge, betray its existence; but we have high clerical authority for it, that will settle the matter. I quote Bishop Heber; he is speaking of the American sailors. “They are not so grievously addicted to lying, as they were once said to be. They have less animosity against the English than formerly, and their character seems to have recovered its natural English tone.” Dr. Heber might have been puzzled to explain, in what the natural English character differs from any other, on principles that would harmonize with the thirty-nine articles, of which, I believe, we possess a tolerably accurate copy, in our own church. But, putting orthodoxy out of the question, and not descending to a too rigid construction of words, how was this notion of the American people, and especially of their seamen, obtained? I think, I can explain it.
The English were accustomed to consider themselves the most skilful mariners of the earth. When their American competitors boasted of their own ships, that they could outsail those of England, and that their general qualities were better, verifying all by alleged facts, the latter, as a matter of course, were deemed lies. Were a hundred English ship-masters to assert to-day, that their vessels could outsail ours, the American seamen would have no more charity, but, at once, set them down as dealers in fiction. During the long wars, our shipping was the prey of the belligerents, the English, as the most numerous, doing it the most harm; vexing commerce, by impressing the seamen, and as often carrying off the native, as their own subjects. These acts created a bitter feeling, and the American government, influenced by a miserable penny-saving policy, which cost more in the end, than a prompt resistance, almost abandoned the seamen to themselves; writing long diplomatic notes, instead of arming. I know, by personal observation, that many of our ship-masters of that day, boasted they had mislead English squadrons and cruizers, by false information, for it was the only means they had, of avenging themselves.
Conversing with Mr. ——, he informed me that, for some time, an acquaintance of ours, a captain in the British navy, was supposed to have been killed in the attack on Fort Bowyer. On my asking how the information had been obtained, he quite unconsciously answered—“Oh! it was only the report of an American captain.” I laughed at him, for this confession, and he frankly admitted an opinion prevailed in England, that the American ship-masters were greater liars than usual.
Our facts are astounding, and, when related, appear marvellous to foreigners. Au reste, the Americans, more particularly those of New England, are a gossipping people, and though the gossip may not be a liar, he necessarily circulates much untruth. In this manner, the American lies with his tongue, while the rest of the world lie only in their thoughts. But lying is one of the commonest vices of humanity.
It is fortunate that Providence has reserved us for the justice of another state of being, for, it is certain, there is very little in this. Here is a nation, that, if a civil agent of its own, arrest John Doe, for Richard Roe, punishes him severely, throwing the onus of the proof of guilt, on the minister of the law, but which goes out of its own jurisdiction, to demand of foreigners proofs of innocence; failing of which, it lays violent hands on them, exposes them to mutilation and death, in a quarrel in which they have no concern, and then vilifies them, by way of atonement! This is bad enough, certainly, but it is, by no means, the worst feature in the affair. Men, in the condition of gentlemen, have been found among the oppressed, to justify the wrong, for you and I are both old enough, distinctly to remember the time, when England was loudly and openly vindicated by a party, at home, in a course that set all national honour, and national justice at defiance. It is said, that the world presents nothing new; that all its current incidents are merely new phases of old events; but, really, it sometimes seems to me, that the history of man has never before presented so strong an instance of national abasement, as is to be found in the feelings, language, reasoning, and acts of a very large portion of what are called the better classes of the American people, towards Great Britain. Of all burthens, that of the mental dependance created by colonial subserviency, appears to be the most difficult to remove. It weighs upon us yet, like an incubus, and, apart from matters of gain, in which we have all our eyes about us, and apart from party politics, in which men will “follow their leaders, though it be to the devil,” there is not an American, in my opinion, at this moment, of sufficient note fairly to attract foreign comment, who does not hold his reputation at home, entirely at the mercy of Great Britain. We do not see this fact ourselves, but strangers do, and deride us for the weakness. We have, indeed, reason to thank God, that the portion of the nation, which constitutes its bone and muscle, although of no account in its floating opinions, is so purely practical, so stubborn in its nationality, so right-thinking, at least, in the matters that come properly and fairly before it, and so little likely to be influenced to its destruction!
Another of the notions that exists in England, is that of the hostility of America to Great Britain. All the recent travellers among us, frankly admit that they see no evidence of such a feeling, but of one quite to the contrary. I have frequently told my friends here, that, in my opinion, and it is an opinion formed from a good deal of observation, in no other country are the English looked upon with as friendly eyes, as in the United States of America. I feel as certain of this fact, as I do of any other moral truth at which I believe myself to have arrived by investigation and travelling. I do not think that I have succeeded, however, in convincing a single individual.
A few of the public writers here, affect to maintain that there is no general inimical sentiment, or prejudice in England, against the United States, with the Edinburgh Review at their head. It might as well be denied that the sun appears in the east, and sets in the west. The feeling is as apparent as the day; it mingles with every thought, colours every concession, and even tempers the charities. Every American established in the country asserts it, all travellers believe it, even Captain Hall and other writers confess it, and four out of five, on the spot, when circumstances induce frankness, admit it. Let us look for the reasons of these contradictory feelings, in the two nations.
In the collisions between the two people, in the main, America has won and England has lost. The winner is usually complacent, the loser soured. In America facts have preceded opinion, and so far from their being a tendency to aid the first by appeals to prejudices, the disposition has been to retard them by comparisons favourable to the old system. The very opposite of this state of things exists in England. Power, in America, has nothing to apprehend from English example, while power, in England, has much to apprehend from the example of America. This reason applies with peculiar force to the church in England, which ought to be the first to foster the charities. It is natural for a young people to look back with affection to their ancestry, and to the country from which they sprung, and it is human for those in possession of advantages that once were exclusive, to look forward with distrust to the fortunes of a vigorous competitor that has arisen from their own stock.
These reasons might suffice, but there are others, which, though less evident, have perhaps been more active in producing the unfriendly feeling in England. In this country, it should always be remembered, there is a contradiction between the theory of the government and its facts. By the first the sovereign possesses an authority, that is denied him in practice. No well-informed man really thinks that the King of England, of his own free will, could declare war, for instance, and yet the commentators will tell you he may. In curbing his authority, the aristocracy is compelled to keep in view the nation, and the principal means that have been resorted to for influencing it, have been to act on its prejudices. Nothing has struck me more forcibly, here, than the manner in which the higher classes keep themselves free from the national prejudices, that their organs, the press, studiously excite in the mass. This is said without any reference to America, however, for the aristocracy certainly likes us as little as any portion of the community, and without alluding to the mere difference that always exists between knowledge and ignorance, but to notions, which if true, ought to be found more general among the instructed, than among the ignorant.
I perceive that Capt. Hall lays much stress on the loyalty of the English, as a healthful sentiment that is quite unknown in America. He has not attached too much importance to this feeling, in my judgment, though he has scarcely analysed it with sufficient penetration. This loyalty is a pure abstraction in England, on which, by dint of management, the self love of the nation has been concentrated. It is national pride, interest, and national prejudice, to all of which this direction has been given, so far as they are connected with sentiment, for to say that the usual personal attachment has any thing to do with it, in regard to a monarch whom his people have quietly seen stripped, one by one, of the free exercise of all his prerogatives involves an absurdity. No one is more loyal in England, than the Duke who is acquiring boroughs, with a view to return members whose principal duty will be to vote down and curb the royal authority. Such a man, it is true, declaims against disloyalty as a crime; he defends the prerogative both in person and by his nominees; but then he takes good care that it shall be exercised by a minister, whom he has an agency in creating, and with whom he can make his own terms. It would not do to transfer this sentiment from him who has not, to those who actually wield the power of the state, and who are compelled to live so much before the common eye, for there are too many of them; they are unsupported by the prejudice of birth, and familiarity would soon destroy the portion of the feeling that is the most useful.[9] The force of this fiction, loyalty (it is purely fiction, as it relates to the individual), is inconceivably strong; for I question if the English, after their own fashion, are not the most loyal people in Europe. Their feelings, in this particular, give one good reason to doubt whether men will not defer more to an abstraction, than to a reality.
Another of the prejudices of the English arises from the devotedness of the faith with which they subscribe to the fictions of their own system. In no other country is society so socially drilled. Lord —— observed to me, “England is a pyramid, in which every man has his place, and of which the king forms the point.” The remark has some truth in it, but the peer overlooked the essential fact, that where the summit ought to be the base of his pyramid is. This social drilling, however, like almost every thing else, has its advantages and its disadvantages. The better soldier you make of a man the more he becomes disqualified to be any thing else. You have no notion of the extent to which the ethics of station are carried, in this country; being probably quite as much beyond the point of reason and manliness, in one extreme, as the canting of the press, and the brawls of low party politicians are driving it to the other, with us. I have seen a footman’s manual, in which, besides the explanations of active duties, the whole morale of his station, is set before the student, with great precision and solemnity. It is a sort of social catechism. So effectually has the system of drill been pursued, that I firmly believe, a majority of Englishmen, at this moment, attach an idea of immorality, to any serious effort to alter the phases of society. It is deemed social treason, and like other treason, the notion of crime is connected with it. The benefits of this drilling, are great order, with perfect seemliness and method, in conducting the affairs of life; the defects, the substitution of artificial for the natural links of society, form for feeling, and the inward festering of the mind, which, sooner or later, will be certain to break out on the surface, and disfigure, if it do not destroy, the body politic. There is no comparison between the finish of an English, and that of a French servant, for instance, as regards the thousand little details of duty. One is as much superior to the other, as an English is superior to a French knife. But, when it comes to feeling, the advantage is all the other way. The English servant will not bear familiarity, scarcely kindness: the Frenchman will hardly dispense with both. To the first you never speak, unless to order; the latter is treated as an humble friend. The revolution in France, has shown instances of devotedness and affection, in consequence, that no revolution in England will ever be likely to see equalled.
One of the effects of the prejudices of the country, is to supercede facts and reasoning, by a set of dogmatical inferences, which the Englishman receives quite as a matter of course, and as beyond discussion. I could give you a hundred examples of what I mean, but a recent instance shall suffice.
In a discussion with the conductor of a periodical work, who is friendly to America, I have had occasion to note the following errors in relation to ourselves. Speaking of the expedition of Captain Parry to the north, he bestows very merited encomiums on the conduct of the crews, which he attributes to their good training, as Englishmen. By way of illustrating the difference between such a system, and one that may, with great justice, pass for its converse, he gave an account of an exploring expedition sent out by the government of the United States, to the Pacific Ocean, in which the men had put their officers on shore, and had gone a sealing! You are to understand, that my acquaintance had been pressing me to contribute to his work, with the object of correcting the erroneous notions, which prevail in England, in regard to America.
“Here, said I, is an instance of the sweeping deductions that you form. You imagine a fact, and directly in the teeth of testimony, go to work to produce your inferences. The United States never sent an expedition of the sort any where, and, of course, no such occurrence could have taken place. Now, as to the principle, I may speak from some personal knowledge, and I tell you that, according to my experience, the English seamen are much the most turbulent, and the Americans much the most tractable, and the least likely to violate law, of any with whom I have ever had any thing to do. In point of fact, the officers of no American cruizer, ever lost the command of their vessel, for an hour, or, perhaps I might say, a minute, though two or three slight instances of insubordination did occur, under the old laws, and when the terms of service of the men were legally up; but, owing to the spirit of the officers, and the habits of subordination in the crews, in every one of even these instances, the resistance was immediately quelled. What is the other side of the picture? Did not the crews of several English vessels, murder their officers, and run away with the ships, during the last war? There are the cases of the Hermione, and the Bounty, for instance, and this assertion of yours is made in face of the notorious historical fact, that, within the memory of man, the British empire was made to tremble to its centre, by the mutiny of the Nore!”
I believe my acquaintance was struck with this representation, and I expected to see an explanation in his work, but the next number contained a paragraph, which deprecated the admission of matter that conflicted with the national prejudices!
So far as mere manner is concerned, the English drilling produces better results, in every day life, than our own pêle mêle. A good portion of the grossieretè, at home, is for the want of the condensed class of well-bred people, of which I have so often spoken, and the moral cowardice of men, who have too often ardent longings for the glitter of life, without the manliness to enforce its decencies.[10] Could the two nations meet half way, in this respect, both would be essentially gainers, we in appearances, and in the decencies connected with manner, and the English in the more kindly feelings, and in security. There is undeniably, a cant obtaining the ascendancy at home, that is destructive of all manner, in conducting the ordinary relations of life, and which is not free from danger, as it confounds the substance of things with their shadow. Democracy has no necessary connexion with vulgarity, but it merely means that men shall have equal political rights. There can be no greater fallacy than to say, one man is as good as another, in all things. In the eye of God, men are equal, and happy is the country, in which it is not dangerous to declare, also, that they shall be perfectly equal in all their legal privileges. But beyond this, the principle cannot be carried, and civilization maintained. One man has higher tastes, more learning, better principles, more strength, more beauty, and greater natural abilities, than another. I take it, that human institutions, are intended to prevent him, who is the most powerful; in consequence of the possession of these advantages, from injuring him who is weaker. The relations between master and servant, are not all affected thereby, and he who submits to labour for hire, under the directions of an employer serves, while the other commands. These duties may be conducted with too little, as well as too much deference of manner. The tendency in civilized society, is always toward the latter, when the usual proportions between surface and population are obtained, for it is a consequence of the pressure of society, and there is little fear that we shall not get our share of it, in time; though, en attendant, we find occasional instances, in which the individual mistakes insolence, for independence. Perhaps, after all, insolence is too strong a word. I think, I have met more pure insolence from Englishmen in low situations, than from Americans; it is the natural consequence of reaction; though it is rare, indeed, to meet with the same deference from the last, as from the first. Assemble, in any reasonable space in America, a dozen genteel families, and they will, of their own influence, create an atmosphere of decency, about them, that shall contain all that is really desirable, in this respect. The inherent sense of right, which is implanted in every man by nature, and which becomes conscience in moral things, may be safely confided in, as the surest means of regulating the deportment of the different castes of society, towards each other.
There is a very general notion prevalent in England, that we seized a moment to declare war against them, when they were pressed upon hardest, by the rest of Europe. A portion of their antipathy is owing to this idea, though the idea itself is altogether owing to their prejudices against America, for there is not a particle of truth in it. I do not remember to have conversed on the subject, with any Englishman, who did not betray this feeling. It is of no consequence, that dates disprove the fact. America declared war, on the 18th of June, 1812, after twenty years of submission to impressment, and illegal captures, and at a moment when the government was put in possession of proof of an effort, on the part of England, to dissolve the Union, as well as of her fixed determination, not to alter her Orders in Council. As respects the latter, history gives all the necessary evidence of the expediency of the war, for it had not been declared three months, when the British government offered to do, what it had just before officially affirmed it would not do. In June 1812, Spain and Portugal were in arms, on the side of England, Russia and Sweden, were secretly preparing to join her, and that great effort which finally broke down the power of France, was just about to commence. But in the face of all these facts, the opinion I have mentioned, certainly exists.
The English have been persuaded that a religious establishment is indispensable to religion. As regards the establishments of Italy, France, Spain, Turkey, and all the rest of the world, they are ready enough to admit that there are capital faults, connected with the several religious systems, but having got the truth themselves, it is expedient to fortify it with legal and exclusive advantages. Of all the profane blasphemies the world has witnessed, that of prostituting the meek doctrines of Christ, by pampering his professed ministers with riches and honours, under the hollow pretence of upholding his faith, is the most insulting to evident truths, and offensive to humility. Such are the fruits of establishments, and of enlisting religion in the support of temporal political systems. Good men may prosper, even under these disadvantages, but bad men will. It is a device of the devil, if that fallen angel is, at all, permitted to meddle with spiritual things.
As we have no establishment, it is the prevalent opinion, here, that we have no religion. Several intelligent English, have confessed this much to me; an admission that was not at all necessary, for I detected the prejudice, before I had been a month in the country: and one person has actually appealed to me for facts, with a view to repel the arguments of those who uphold the present state of things; since it is assumed, that the actual condition of America, is a proof of the necessity of a religious establishment, in the interests of order and morality. My answer was, “that were the upper classes of the English, to be placed in America, with their present habits and notions, there is not one of them in a hundred, who would not immediately begin to declaim against the religious fanaticisms and exaggeration of the country!” This reply, I believe, to contain the truth. There is an exterior affectation of a deference for spiritual things, here, among people of condition, that does not always, or rather so universally exist with us; for, the government being an aristocracy, and the establishment enlisted in its support, it would be a singular indiscretion, in times like these, for those who reap the peculiar advantages of the existing order of things, to neglect so powerful an ally. Some of these persons, often remind me of that anecdote of the English sailor, who, falling into the hands of the Turks, was urged to become a mussulman—“What, change my religion? No, d—n my eyes, never.” The religious tone of a community, is best ascertained through its facts. Since I have been in Europe, the following circumstances, among many others of a similar character, have come under my eye.
A duel was fought at Boulogne in France, between the Rev. —— ——, and Mr. ——; the former was attended by his brother, the Rev. —— ——. Both the reverend gentlemen were ordained clergymen of the church of England, and the latter was said to be married to the daughter of a bishop.
A complainant appeared before a London magistrate, in the case of an assault. The defendant justified himself, by saying, “that he was driving a gig, with a female; that the complainant passed him on horseback repeatedly, and insulted his companion, by staring under her hat; whereupon he horsewhipped the offender.” “You handed this card to your assailant?” said the magistrate, to the complainant. “I did.” “With what intention?” “As is usual among gentlemen, when an outrage like this has been committed.” “One corner of the card is torn off—why did you tear it off!” “Because I am in the church, sir, and I thought the ‘Rev.’ misplaced on such an occasion.” The substance of this statement, with the names of the parties, has appeared in the police reports, during my visit here.
“The Rev. Mr. O——, fought Mr. ——, at Boulogne, quite recently, the reverend gentleman hitting his man.”
There is, no doubt, much vice among the clergy every where, for they are frail, like all of us. Probably the vicious men in the church of England, are not at all more numerous, than those of every established church necessarily must be, with the temptations to enter it for the possession of rich livings. But what I wish to lay before you, is a comparison between England and America on these points. I think, it would be hard to find a layman in all America, who would fight a clergyman; much less a clergyman who would openly fight a duel. If “hypocrisy be the homage which vice pays to virtue,” the inference is fair, that a public sentiment in America, keeps a clergyman in closer bounds, than he would be kept in England.
It is denying the effects of the most common natural influences, to pretend that a church, whose avenues lead to vast wealth, and to the highest rank in the state, is as likely to be as pure in its ministers, as one which offers less temporal inducements than any one of all the liberal occupations of life. If it be contended that an establishment is indispensable to religion, it must be confessed that its advantages are to be taken with this essential drawback. It is a notorious fact, that sons are set aside for the church here when children, in order that they may receive particular livings, in the gift of the family, or its friends, or that their fortunes may be pushed in it, by family influence. Nothing of the sort exists with us.
Lord ——, at a dinner in his own house, observed to me, that the best thing we had in America was our freedom from the weight of a religious establishment. Encouraged by this remark, I told an anecdote of a conversation I had once overheard in America. It was while making a passage in a sloop, on the coast, with two young whalers, just returned from sea, as fellow-passengers. A gentleman on board asked me what had become of young Napoleon, then a boy of ten or twelve years. I answered, there was a report that the Austrians were educating him for the church. My two whalers listened intently to this conversation, in which the tender years of the child had been mentioned, when one of them suddenly exclaimed to the other—“Did you hear that, Ben? Bringing a parson up by hand!”—“Ay, ay; making a cosset-priest!”
I was much amused by the point and sarcasm of these remarks, and every American will feel why; but, I was more so, I think, by the manner in which my English auditors received the anecdote. I do not think one of them felt its point; but as the Sag-Harbour-men used agricultural figures to illustrate their meaning, I was at once applied to, to know whether such people could be more than half-seamen, and whether America could supply mariners sufficient to become a great naval power!
A lady, here, with whom I am on sufficiently friendly terms to converse freely, was speaking of the son of a noble family, a near connexion of hers, who is in the church. “It is very unpleasant,” she said, “to find one whom you esteem, getting to be wrong-headed in such matters. Now —— was becoming quite serious, and a little fanatical, and I was employed by the family to speak to him!” This ——, is a clergyman whose piety has been highly extolled by one of our bishops, and whose devotion to the Redeemer is thought, at home, to be highly creditable to the English aristocracy. So far as he himself is concerned, all this is well enough; but as to the manner in which “the nobility and gentry,” of his connexion, regard his course, you have sufficient proof in what I have just told you.
I shall dismiss this part of the subject as unpleasant to myself. The Church of England, so far as its religious dogmas are concerned, is that in which I was educated, and in which I am training my children; and no one is more sensible of its excellencies, when they are separated from its abuses. I should have been silent, altogether, on its defects, but I feel convinced that a grasping, worldly spirit, has made it an instrument, in the hands of artful or prejudiced men, of defaming a state of society which is probably as exempt from its own peculiar vices, as it ever fell to the lot of men to be.
Another notion deeply rooted in the English mind, is a strange opinion, that all men of liberal education and gentlemanly habits, must, of necessity, be hostile to popular rights, and, by the same necessity, advocates of some such liberty as their own, if the advocates of any liberty at all. One of the first things that the clerical critic, on the well-known sermon of Bishop Hobart, remarks, is his surprise that a man of “gentlemanly habits” should have taken such a view of matters! There is, unquestionably, a strong disposition in men, who do not look beyond the exterior of things, (and this, perhaps, embraces the majority,) to confound “taste” with “principles.” There are many things in which the results of the English system are more agreeable to my tastes, and even my habits, than those of our own, though I believe ours will be eventually softened by the pressure of society; but, it does not strike me that this is a sufficient reason, why an honest man should overlook more essential points. One cannot have the thorough, social drilling of a government of exclusion, and escape its other consequences. All power that is not based on the mass, must repress the energies and moral improvement of that mass for its own security, and the fruits are the vast chasm which exists every where, in Europe, between the extremes of society.
I shall say little of the mere vulgar prejudices, which piously believe in the inherent superiority, moral and physical, of Englishmen over all the rest of mankind; for something very like it is to be found in all nations. Still, I think, the prejudices of England, in this respect, are more than usually offensive to other people, as, I believe, are our own. Those of England, however, are to be distinguished from those of America, in one important particular. The common Englishman cannot believe himself superior to his transatlantic kinsman, with a whit more sincerity, than the feeling is returned by the common American. But, while the Englishman of the upper classes thinks lightly of the American, the American of the upper classes over-estimates the Englishman. There are doubtless many exceptions, in both cases, especially among those who have travelled; but such, I think, is the rule. Our own weakness is a natural consequence of a colonial origin, of reading English books, and of the exaggerations of distance and dependency. It is a weakness that is seen and commented on, by every body but those who feel it.
I question if the inbred and overweening notion of personal superiority ascends as high in the social scale, or is as general among people of education, in any other community, as in England. In this respect, we are deficient rather than exaggerated; for while all America (I now speak of the upper classes, you will remember) can be thrown into a fever, by an intimation that our things are not as good as those of other nations, there is a secret and general distrust of our equality on the points that alone can give dignity and character to man. A friend of yours has been accused of national vanity, and national conceit, (an odd charge, by the way, for I question if there is a man in the whole republic who prides himself less in the national character, than the person in question,) because he has endeavoured to repel and refute some of the grosser imputations that artifice and prejudice, in this quarter of the world, have been studiously and industriously heaping on us; and the simple circumstance that, in so doing, he has conflicted a little with English supremacy, has been the means of destroying whatever favour he may once have possessed with the American reading public, as a writer; for England, at this moment, holds completely at her mercy the reputation and character of every American she may choose to assail, who is not supported by the bulk of his own nation. As a matter of course, she writes up all who defer to her power, and writes down all who resist it. The statements of your friend have been publicly derided, because they have affirmed the rights and merits of the mass, on which alone we are to ground all our claims to comparative excellence; and I now ask you, if, in any review, comment, or speech, at home, you have ever met with the sweeping assertions of an abstract, innate national superiority, that is contained in the following paragraph.
“It would be in vain to inquire whether this superiority, which we do not hesitate to say has been made manifest, with very few exceptions, whenever the British have met foreign troops upon equal terms, arises from a stronger conformation of body, or a more determined turn of mind; but it seems certain that the British soldier, inferior to Frenchmen in general intelligence, and in individual acquaintance with the trade of war, has a decided advantage in the bloody shock of actual conflict, and especially when maintained by the bayonet, body to body. It is remarkable also, that the charm is not peculiar to any one of the three united nations, but it is common to the natives of all, different as they are in habits and education. The guards, supplied by the city of London, may be contrasted with a regiment of Irish recruited among their rich meadows, or a body of Scotch, from their native wildernesses; and while it may be difficult to assign the palm to either over the other two, all are found to exhibit that species of dogged and desperate courage, which without staying to measure force or calculate chances, rushes on the enemy as the bull-dog upon the bear.”
Lest you should think I have rummaged one of the productions of the Minerva Press, for some of its inflations, it may be well to explain, that this quiet, deeply-seated naïve proof of ignorance and prejudice, is quoted from Sir Walter Scott’s account of the battle of Maida, in the Life of Napoleon. We are justly enough deemed conceited, but our literature contains nothing to compare with this. I have cited this instance of prejudice, in order to prove how high the weakness of believing in the personal superiority of their own people, ascends in the scale of intellect, for I have no doubt, that Sir Walter Scott religiously believed all he wrote.
The exhibition of many of the prejudices of the English, are not always restrained by propriety, even among those who ought to know better.[11] Of this, all foreigners complain, and I think, with reason. As respects us, there is a quiet assumption of superiority, that has the appearance of an established right to comment on the nation, its character, and its institutions. There is a mode of doing this, which removes all objections, among men of the world, but there is, also, a mode which amounts to positive personal disrespect.
Of the latter class, is an occurrence that took place at the table of Lord ——, quite lately. One of the guests very quietly went to work, without preface of any sort, to prove, that the improper deportment of the members of congress, as compared with those of parliament, was owing to a want of refinement in the nation! I met him at once (for I never witnessed in the society of gentlemen, a greater instance of personal indecorum,) by denying his premises. Seriously, I believe, of the two, congress is better mannered than parliament, though there is less mystification; all that has been written to the contrary, being founded rather on what ought to be, according to certain notions, than on what is.
Whenever I meet with this disposition, it chills all my sympathies. I hope I can be just to such men, but I can never like them. What renders these unfeeling and ignorant comments less inexcusable, is the fact, that any attempt to turn the tables, is instantly met with a silence that cannot be misconstrued. Surprised to find the depth, and universality of prejudice against America, here, as well as the freedom with which remarks are made, I determined to try the experiment of retorting in kind. In most instances, I have found that they who were willing to talk all night, on the defects of America, become mum, the instant there is an allusion to any similar weaknesses in England, or in English character. As there can be no wish to keep up acquaintances, on such terms, I have generally dropped them; always unless I have seen that the prejudice is sincere, and acting on a benevolent nature. I presume the history of the world, cannot offer another instance of prejudice in one nation against another, that is as strong and as general, as that which, at this moment, exists in England against America; the community of language, and the art of printing, having been the means of provoking, rather than of mitigating the failing.
Although prejudice must result in ultimate evil, it may measurably produce intermediate good. The prejudices of England are at the base of the nationality of her people. With us the people are national, from affection, and a consciousness of living under a system that protects their rights and interests. But true nationality is very much confined to the mass, though national conceit is pretty generally diffused. No man in America, can have national pride, (the ground-work of all true nationality,) who has not pride in the institutions; and this is a feeling that all the training of the higher classes has taught them to repress. Our social aristocracy, in this respect, are a mere reflection of the commoner English prejudices—prejudices that are received ignorantly, in pure faith, and as the stone admits water by constant dropping. A more impudent piece of literary empiricism has never been palmed on the world, than the pretension that the American reading public requires American themes; it may require American things, to a certain extent, though its quite natural and perhaps excusable that it should prefer foreign, which I believe to be the real fact; but as to distinctive American sentiments and American principles, the majority of that class of our citizens, hardly know them when they see them. A more wrong-headed and deluded people there is not, on earth, than our own, on all such subjects, and one would be almost content to take some of the English prejudices, if more manliness and discrimination could be had with them. Our faults of this nature, are the results of origin and geographical position; those of England are the results of time, power, artifice, and peculiar political and physical advantage.
All great nations are egotistical, and deluded on the subject of their superiority. The constant influence of an active corps of writers, (who from position become so many popular flatterers,) acting on the facts of a strong community, has a tendency to induce men to transfer the credit that is only due to collective power, to national character and personal qualities. The history of the world proves that the citizens of small states have performed more great and illustrious personal acts, and out of all proportion to numbers, than the citizens of great nations, and the reason is probably to be found in the greater necessities of their condition; but, fewer feeling an interest in extolling their deeds, it is not common for them to reap the glory that falls to the share of even the less deserving servitors of a powerful community.
I shall close this brief summary of national peculiarities, by an allusion to one more. Foreigners accuse the English of being capricious in their ordinary intercourse. They are allowed to be fast friends, but uncertain acquaintances. The man, or woman, who receives you to-day with a frank smile, and a familiar shake of the hand, may meet you to-morrow coldly, and with a chilling or repulsive formality. I have seen something of this, and believe the charge, in a degree, to be merited. They are formalists in manners, and too often mistake the spirit that ought to regulate intercourse. Jonathan stands these caprices better than any one else, for he is so devout a believer that he sees smiles in his idol, when other people see grimaces. Your true American doctrinaire studies the book which John Bull has published concerning his own merits, with some such faith as old women look into the almanac in order to know when it will snow.[12]