40 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS. 



WHAT THE U. S. OWES TO BRITAIN. 



Our liberties, our law, our literature, our learning, our enterprising 

 spirit, the land we stand upon, were won for us by England. Wolfe 

 won for us, on the Heights of Abraham, every foot of land between the 

 AUeghanies and the Mississippi. But for that most decisive victory 

 this would now be an appanage of France and we would not be here at 

 all. Mexico, with its peculiar Spanish and Indian population, would 

 now extend to Alaska. Do we hate England on account of Blackstone's 

 commentaries, Skakespeare, Walter Scott, Robby Burns, Tennyson? 

 or because she stuck to Napoleon, the butcher of Europe, sparing neither 

 blood nor money till she stopped him ? By the way, where would Ger- 

 many be but for England ? What made the difference between Jena 

 and Waterloo ? Emperor William hates England. Where would he be 

 but for England? " 



And this worthier type of patriotism, cultivated by the read- 

 ing of history, will make every patriot honest — so honest that he 

 will not shrink from the acknowledgement of the truth, how- 

 ever unpalatable that truth may be ; will proudly assert that he 

 can easily afford to make honorable admission of error on the 

 part of a country with a great history. In truth, it should 

 make a man very humble to read history, for the old adage 

 about glass houses must be frequently in his mind. Will any 

 Englishman have the hardihood to deny the mistakes of England? 

 Does he dethrone Queen Elizabeth when he admits her vanity, 

 duplicity and cold-hearted calculation where sentiments of relig- 

 ion and humanity should have borne sway? Thackeray, proud 

 of his British blood, did not hesitate to characterize the royal 

 Georges as they deserved, and that Englishman of Englishmen, 

 Lord Macaulay, told the historic truth regarding the misgovern- 

 ment of Ireland. Admirers of that uncrowned king of England 

 and born leader of men, that fearless defender of liberty and 

 conscience, Oliver Cromwell, do not stultify themselves when 

 they admit that his conquest of Ireland showed the savage while 

 it revealed the general. After every mitigating circumstance 

 has been offered in extenuation of the expulsion of the Acadians 

 in 1755, history will yet rank it as one of the cruel edicts of 

 modern times. No member of our planetary system need shrink 

 in shame because the sun has spots ; and no Briton need admit 



