Beginnings of the American PeopleBecker, Carl L. (Carl Lotus)
History
Beginnings of the American People
Becker, Carl L. (Carl Lotus)
United States -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775; United States -- History -- Revolution, 1775-1783
This period is fully treated in Channing's _History of the United
States_, I, chaps, VIII-XIV; and in Tyler's _England in America_, chaps.
V-VII, IX-XIX. See also Fiske's _Old Virginia and Her Neighbours_, I,
chaps. VII-XI, XIV; and Eggleston's _Beginners of a Nation_ and _The
Transit of Civilization from England to America_. The constitutional
aspects of the colonial settlements are exhaustively treated in Osgood's
_The American Colonies in the 17th Century_. For the economic and social
history of the colonies, see Bruce's _Social Life in Virginia_ and _The
Economic History of Virginia in the 17th Century_, and Weeden's
_Economic History of New England_. Contemporary pamphlets relating to
the colonies are to be found in Force's _Tracts and Other Papers_, 4
vols. Washington, 1838. To understand the motives and ideals of the
Separatists and Puritans one must read their own accounts. Of these, the
most charming is Bradford's _History of Plymouth Plantation_. This, as
well as Governor Winthrop's _Journal_, is printed in Jameson's _Original
Narratives of Early American History_. Johnson's _Wonder Working
Providence_, in the same collection, is a history from the point of view
of a loyal Puritan of average education and intelligence. Morton's _New
English Canaan_ (1632) and _The Simple Cobler of Aggawam_ (1647) are
printed in Force's _Tracts and Other Papers_, vols. II, III. A hostile
account of the Puritan experiment is in Samuel Gorton's _Letter to
Nathaniel Morton_, in Force's _Tracts_, etc., vol. IV. About three
quarters of a century after the founding of Massachusetts, Cotton Mather
wrote his _Magnalia Christi Americana, or the Ecclesiastical History of
New England_, 2 vols. Hartford, 1855. In Bk. I he gives an account of
the founding from the point of view of one who felt that New England was
then departing from the "primitive principles."
CHAPTER IV
ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES IN THE SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES
_Your trade is the mother and nurse of your seamen; your seamen are
the life of your fleet; your fleet is the security of your trade,
and both together are the wealth, strength, and glory of Britain._
LORD HAVERSHAM.
I
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