APPENDIX. 461 



Sty confifts ? Or have no order of clergy any valicl commifTlons, bu^ 

 thofe who receive thoufands and ten thoulands ot the money earned by 

 the labors and ruftVrinos of the people? Are thete the men. vv'ho, above 

 all others, are th^ followers of him who liad not whereto lay his head ? 

 It i> imp- fiible not to discern in the reiigimss eftablifhments of Europe, 

 the powers, the m^xim'., 'he policy, and the abufes of monarchy and ef- 

 tabljihed corruption. And it is apparent, that in Amerira the people 

 have wholly rfjf£led this iyftem of tyranny and iniquity, and have every 

 where eftablifhed t'le righ's of Cfnfcience, and that unlimited equality and 

 freedom to which all men are jnftly entitled, and which nature and Chrif- 

 eianiiy enjoin and require Inflead then of being degraded by refiding in 

 •America, (he men of Europe have here become much more cn- 

 lighiened and improved in their religious principles than their 

 brethren whom they left behind : And it was in the country where every 

 ihirif; partook of the (pirit of freedom, that they firft difcovercd the true 

 principles of religious freedom, and ecclefiaflical policy. 



3 If the degradation of the European cannot be found in their civil 

 or religious attainments, it will be moft natural to look'for it in their phy- 

 Tical qualities and propeitiei. — And what has been the cafe here ? Are the 

 fnen ol America degenerated in their (ize, ftrengih, vigour, and courage ? 

 So the Britifh minifiern talked and talked; and nothing could make them 

 be'ieve to the contrary, till two of their armies were takeoj their generals 

 and troops every where defeated, and na fecurity remaiued for any of them 

 b«it in the neighborhood of their fhipping. It then bccams necefTary to 

 fave their own honor, by contefling that the men who had captured their 

 generals and armies, had probably as much courage and ftrcngth as the 

 troops they had taken cnptive. If fuither proof is neceffary here, the matter 

 is referred to the Britifh nation M decide : No people have faid fo much of 

 the American v/eakneis and cowaidice, as you accultomed yourlelves to be- 

 fore ihc late American war. Will you nov/ be fogood as to tell us at: 

 what time, and by what nation, ycJiir !;ing and parliament were ever fo ef» 

 fetbiallv humbled as by the captures of Burgoyne ar>d Cornwallis ? Could 

 rhdfe Americans, by whom your beft generals and troops were thus 

 diflioaorfd, be men, whofe bodies and minds were enervated in a foreign 

 climate f Is it then in lefpect tn the increafe and prefervation of the hu- 

 man fpeciei, that the Amtricins are become inferior to the Europearis ? 

 In this refppft one of the beff informed writers in Europe has told us, 

 tbat " in Great Britain and mofl other European countries, they are not 

 '■' fuppofed to double iiilels than five hundred years.*" In America, 

 thepeiiod of doublings from the moft authentic obfervations, in every 

 part ol tlie United States, is between twenty and twenty five years. + Strange 

 degradation tha: has proved above twenty times more favorable to popu- 

 lation, than the lla'.e cjf fociety in Europe .' ' 

 4. Is it then in thofe arts which tend to render human li.^c more eafy 

 snd liappv, tha: the Ameiicans have degenerated ? So far from this, that 

 they have mzde great improvements in all thofe arts, which are of the 

 greaiell necf iTity and convenience to man. Among the moft ufeful arts, 

 agriculture, by the conftnt of all men, is to be ranked firft, as moft of all 

 fleccffary and ufetul. And is there in the annals of mankirid, any inftance 

 in which !o rouch has been done, and fuch improvements made in the 

 courfe of one century and a half ? from north to fou'.h, through a trait -yi 



* Smith's Wealth of Nations, Vol. I. p. 9 > 

 t Hiftory of Vermont, p. 4?r, 



