INTRODUCTION. 97 
how unspeakably beneficial must it appear when the contemplation should be ex- 
tended to the great lakes, and the country that surrounded them; waters extending 
two thousand miles, and a country containing more territory than all Great Britain 
and Ireland, and at least as much as France. After demonstrating that New- 
Orleans and Montreal were the only formidable rivals of New-York for the 
great prize of the western trade, and showing the advantages in that competition 
which New-York would derive from the proposed Erie canal, a glowing view of 
its prospective benefits was presented. Leaving to her rivals no inconsiderable 
portion of the western trade, New-York, said the memorialists, would engross 
more than sufficient to render her the greatest commercial city in the world. 
The whole line of the canal would exhibit boats loaded with the various produc- 
tions of our soil, and with merchandise from all parts of the world ; great manufac- 
turing establishments would spring up; agriculture would establish its granaries, 
and commerce its warehouses, in all directions; villages, towns and cities would 
line the banks of the canal and the shores of the Hudson from Erie to New- 
York; the wilderness and the solitary place would become glad, and the desert 
would blossom as the rose. 
The petitioners then presented the superior advantages of a continuous canal 
from the Hudson to Lake Erie, over one which would terminate at Lake Ontario, 
with a passage between that lake and Lake Erie around the falls of Niagara. 
They then showed that the work might be completed by the use of the credit of 
the state, provision being made to pay the interest on the money borrowed until 
the canal should become productive of revenue. They urged with earnestness 
the immediate commencement of the work. Delays, said they, are the refuge 
of weak minds; and to procrastinate on this occasion is to show a culpable inat- 
tention to the bounties of nature, a total insensibility to the blessings of Provi- 
dence, and an inexcusable neglect of the interests of society. If, they added, it 
were intended to advance the views of individuals, or to foment the divisions of 
party ; if the scheme promoted the interests of a few at the expense of the prospe- 
rity of many ; if its benefits were limited as to place, or fugitive as to duration, 
Inrr. 13 
