The United Empire Loyalists period takes us back to a period antecedent to that of their historical prominence as a factor in the events of the war of the American Revolution. In order, therefore, to estimate the value of the educational influence of those times on the future of the provinces in which the U. E. Loyalists settle, we must take a glance at the Colonial chapter in the History of American Education. COLONIAL CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF AMERICAN EDUCATION. It is, therefore, interesting in taking note of our educational progress to give a brief glance at what was done by our fellow colonists at a corresponding early period in the history of the "old thirteen colonies," which formed the nucleus of the present American Confederation. It has been the custom, probably unwittingly, but chiefly on the part of certain American writers, to exalt every good in their political and social condition, as of revolutionary origin, and reluctantly to admit that anything which was really excellent in both, in the early colonial times, was of British origin. One unacquainted with the processes and progress of civilization in America would, on consulting such writers, suppose that, Minerva-like, the young Republic had sprung from the head of Revolutionary Jove, fully equipped, if not fully armed for the battle of life, into the arena of the new world, and that this phenomenon happened just at the extinction of British power in the old colonies, and as the result of it. The policy of these writers has been either to ignore the facts of history, or to keep entirely out of view the forces which had been operating in the British colonial mind, before and at the time of the Revolution. They have never stopped to enquire as to the source whence they derived their idea of political freedom, but have attributed it to their own sagacity, or regard it as the outgrowth of their own enlightened speculations and thinkings when emancipated from British control. There never was a greater mistake as to fact, or a greater wrong done to the memory and example of such noble English patriots as Hampden and his compeers, who laid down their lives for political principles which, considering the times in which they lived, were even more exalted and ennobling than those which were professed by the American revolutionists of 1776. In fact, no proper parallel can be instituted between them. John Hampden, in our humble judgment, was as far superior to John Hancock, "President of the Continental Congress," in the purity of his political motives and aspirations, as Cromwell was above Jack Cade.[14] However, it is not our purpose to discuss this question, but rather to vindicate the sagacity of the old colonists, who (at a time when loyalty was the rule, and not the exception), laid the foundation of those educational institutions, which to this day are the glory of the American Republic.