20 CLINTON'S 



knowledge. The small country of Attica, not so large as Long-Island, 

 can ue^er be contemplated without the mingled emotions of veneration 

 and sorrow. " Ab Atbrnis enim humanitas, doctrina, religio, fruges, 

 jura, leges, ort<E, atque in omnes terras distributa, pulantur." " It is 

 acknowledged," said Cicero, * that literature, polite arts, religion, agri- 

 culture, laws, and social rights, originated in Athens and were thence 

 distributed over a51 nations." The fertility of the soil, the excellence 

 of the climate, the freedom of the government, and the enterprising spirit 

 of il.t; people, must have cooperated in producing this transcendent and 

 preeminent state of human exaltation. And if a comparison was institu- 

 ted :ii those respects, between that country and ours, in what important 

 part would we be deficient ? 



We are, perhaps, more favoured in another point of view. Atlica was 

 peopled from Kgypt ; but we can boast of our descent from a superior 

 stock. I speak not oi families or dynasties; I refer to our origin from 

 thost nations where civilization, knowledge, and refinement have erected 

 their empire; and where human nature has attained its greatest perfection. 

 !;.tr Holland. Great Britain, Ireland, France, and Germany, and 

 what wouU -me of civilized man ? this country, young as it is, would 

 be tfi-' great Atlas remaining to support the dignity of the world : and 

 perhaps our mingled descent from various nations may have a benign 

 influence upon genius. We perceive the improving effects of an analo- 

 gous state upon vegetables and inferior animals. The extraordinary 

 characters which the United States have produced may be, in some 

 measure, ascribed to the mixed blood of so many nations flowing in our 

 veins ; and it may be confidently predicted that the operation of causes, 

 acting w ith irresistible effect, will carry in this country all the improvable 

 faculties of human nature to the highest state of perfection. 



Taking it for granted that the United States afford every reasonable 

 facility and inducement for the cultivation of letters, it cannot be doubted 

 but that this city is the proper scite for a great literary and scientific insti- 

 tution. When we view the magnitude of its population, the extent of 

 its commerce, the number of its manufactures, and the greatness of its 

 opulence ; when we contemplate its position near the Atlantic, its nume- 

 rous channels of communication by land and by water with every part of 

 the United States, and the constant and easy intercourse it can maintain 

 with all parts of the civilized world; when we consider the vast fund of 

 talent, information, enterprise, and industry which it contains; and when 

 ive take a prospective view of the rank which it is destined to occupy as 

 the greatest commercial emporium in the vmrld, we must acknowledge 

 that no position could be selected better adapted for acquiring informa- 

 tion, concentrating knowledge, improving literature, and extending 

 science : and we may say ol this place as Sprat, in his history of the 

 Royal- Society, said of London : " It has a large intercourse with all the 



