180 The Winning of the West 



edged deeds of their soldiers; they yielded to the 

 spell of mighty names which sounded alien to all 

 men save themselves. But though the successful 

 struggle had laid deep the foundations of a new na 

 tion, it had also of necessity stirred and developed 

 many of the traits most hostile te assured national 

 life. All civil wars loosen the bands of orderly lib 

 erty, and leave in their train disorder and evil. 

 Hence those who cause them must rightly be held 

 guilty of the gravest wrongdoing unless they are 

 not only pure of purpose, but sound of judgment, 

 and unless the result shows their wisdom. The 

 Revolution had left behind it among many men love 

 of liberty, mingled with lofty national feeling and 

 broad patriotism; but to other men it seemed that 

 the chief lessons taught had been successful resist 

 ance to authority, jealousy of the central Govern 

 ment, and intolerance of all restraint. According 

 as one or the other of these mutually hostile sets of 

 sentiments prevailed, the acts of the Revolutionary 

 leaders were to stand justified or condemned in the 

 light of the coming years. As yet the success had 

 only been in tearing down; there remained the 

 harder and all-important task of building up. 



This task of building up was accomplished, and 

 the acts of the men of the Revolution were thus jus 

 tified. It was the after result of the Revolution, not 

 the Revolution itself, which gave to the govern 

 mental experiment inaugurated by the Second Con 

 tinental Congress its unique and lasting value. It 

 was this result which marks most clearly the differ- 



