34 RURAL SOCIOLOGY 



ance with such ideas, home missions were established and west- 

 ern colleges were erected. Thus an intellectual stream from New 

 England sources fertilized the West. Other sections sent their 

 missionaries ; but the real struggle was between sects. The con- 

 test for power and the expansive tendency furnished to the va- 

 rious sects by the existence of a moving frontier must have had 

 important results on the character of religious organizations in 

 the United States. The multiplication of rival churches in the 

 little frontier towns had deep and lasting social effects. The 

 effects of western freedom and newness in producing religious 

 isms is noteworthy. Illustrations of this tendency may be seen 

 in the development of the Millerites, Spiritualists, and Mormons 

 of western New York in its frontier days. 



To the frontier the American intellect owes its striking char- 

 acteristics. That coarseness and strength combined with acute- 

 ness and inquisitiveness ; that practical, inventive turn of mind, 

 quick to find expedients ; that masterful grasp of material things, 

 lacking in the artistic, but powerful to effect great ends; that 

 restless, nervous energy; that dominant individualism, working 

 for good and for evil; and, withal, that buoyancy and exuber- 

 ance which comes with freedom, these are traits of the fron- 

 tier, or traits called out elsewhere because of the existence of 

 the frontier. We are not easily aware of the deep influence 

 of this individualistic way of thinking upon our present condi- 

 tions. It persists in the midst of a society that has passed away 

 from the conditions that occasioned it. It makes it difficult to 

 secure social regulation of business enterprises that are essen- 

 tially public, it is a stumbling-block in the way of civil-service 

 reform; it permeates our doctrines of education; but with the 

 passing of the free lands a vast extension of the social tendency 

 may be expected in America. 



THE SPIRIT OF THE PIONEER 1 



RAY STANNARD BAKER 



THE peopling of the country makes one of the most interesting 

 and significant stories in the history of the nation. For many 



i Adapted from "The Great Southwest," Century, 64:9, May, 1902. 

 (Copyright by Century Company, 1902.) 



