MORRIS BIRKBECK, ESQ. 



to sun-set, and sleep, if need be, upon the bare boards. What, 

 then, must it be in an English Farmer and his family of helpless 

 mortals ? Helpless, I mean, in this scene of such novelty and 

 such difficulty ? And what is his wife to do ; she who has been 

 torn from all her relations and neighbours, and from every thing 

 that she liked in the world, and who, perhaps, has never, in all her 

 life before, been ten miles from the cradle in which she was nursed? 

 An American farmer mends his plough, his waggon, his tackle 

 of all sorts, his household goods, his shoes and, if need be, he 

 makes them all. Can our people do all this, or any part of it ? 

 Can they live without bread for months ? Can they live without 

 beer ? Can they be otherwise than miserable, cut off, as they 

 must be, from all intercourse with, and hope of hearing of, their 

 relations and friends ? The truth is, that this is not transplanting, 

 it is tearing up and flinging away. 



981. Society ! What society can these people have ? Tis true 

 they have nobody to envy, for nobody can have any thing to enjoy. 

 But there may be, and there must be, mutual complainings and 

 upbraidings ; and every unhappiness will be traced directly to 

 him who has been, however unintentionally, the cause of the 

 unhappy person s removal. The very foundation of your plan 

 necessarily contained the seeds of discontent and ill-will. A 

 colony all from the same country was the very worst project that 

 could have been fallen upon. You took upon yourself the charge 

 of MOSES without being invested with any part of his authority : 

 and absolute as this was, he found the charge so heavy, that he 

 called upon the Lord to share it with him, or to relieve him from 

 it altogether. Soon after you went out, an Unitarian Priest, upon 

 rny asking what you were going to do in that wild country, said, 

 you were going to form a community, who would be &quot; content 

 &quot; to worship one God.&quot; &quot; I hope not,&quot; said I, &quot; for he will have 

 &quot; plagues enough without adding a priest to the number.&quot; But, 

 perhaps, I was wrong : for AARON was of great assistance to the 

 leader of the Israelites. 



982. As if the inevitable effects of disappointment and hardship 

 were not sufficient, you had, too, a sort of partnership in the 

 leaders. This is sure to produce feuds and bitterness in the long 

 run. Partnership-sovereignties have furnished the world with 

 numerous instances of poisonings and banishments and rottings 

 in prison. It is as much as merchants, who post their books every 

 Sunday, can do to get along without quarrelling. Of man and 

 wife, though they are flesh of flesh and bone of bone, the harmony 

 is not always quite perfect, except in France, where the husband 

 is the servant, and in Germany and Prussia, where the wife is the 

 slave. But, as for a partnership sovereignty without disagree 

 ment, there is but one single instance upon record ; that, I mean, 

 was of the two kings of Brentford, whose cordiality was, you know, 

 so perfect, that they both smelt to the same nosegay. This is, 

 my dear Sir, no bantering. I am quite serious. It is impossible 



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