The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863: Devoted to Literature and National PolicyVarious
History
The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863: Devoted to Literature and National Policy
Various
Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; United States -- Politics and government -- 19th century -- Periodicals
The Washingtons were connections, and rather humble ones, of the
Spencers. Yet the latest account of the families show Henry Lord Spencer
'standing by the side of the Lords Northumberland and Essex, and the
other noblemen who were afterward the leaders of the Parliament during
the civil war.'
Puritan and Cavalier! The phrase only means that those, both of gentry
and yeomanry, who had sufficient brains to understand liberty, and the
courage to fight for it, combined and forever broke the chains of royal
or oligarchical oppression. If the gentry were a minority in the party,
so much the less reason to boast of such an ancestry.
Still, as no point in a contest should be thrown away, let it be avowed
that Puritanic New England could always display a greater array of
'gentlemen by birth' than Virginia, or even the entire South. This is
said deliberately, because we know whereof we speak. If the fact be of
service in any way, it can easily be substantiated. A list of such names
as I can at present remember is longer than any list I have been able to
collect from Southern publications. These are, Adams, Amory, Anderson,
Appleton, Belcher, Bond, Bowdoin, Bromfield, Browne, Burrill, Chauncy,
Chester, Chute, Checkley, Clark, Clarke, Cotton, Coolidge, Corwin,
Cradock, Davenport, Downing, Dudley, Dummer, Eyre, Fairfax, Foxcroft,
Giffard, Jaffrey, Jeffries, Johnson, Hawthorne, Herrick, Holyoke,
Hutchinson, Lawrence, Lake, Lechmere, Legge, Leverett, Lloyd, Lowell,
Mascarene, Mather, Miner, Norton, Oliver, Pepperell, Phips, Phippen,
Prince, Pynchon, Saltonstall, Sears, Sewall, Thornton, Usher, Vassall,
Ward, Wendell, Wetmore, Wilson, Winslow, Winthrop, Wyllys.
I insert this list only for the benefit of those who have yielded to the
claims of Virginia through ignorance on points which are peculiarly the
care of genealogists. It can easily be extended, and every year, as our
records are more fully examined, it will increase.
If we leave the dry details, which I have presented simply as
indications of the method in which this question can be discussed, and
regard the problem in a more general view, it is surprising to see how
theory and fact agree. The United States are essentially English to-day,
despite the millions of foreigners which have been absorbed into its
population. The tendency of its citizens has been toward a democracy,
and yet not toward anarchy and lawlessness. The throes of a gigantic
revolution have not sufficed to outweigh the instinctive love of law and
order peculiar to the English race. Though events unforeseen by the
authors of the Federal Constitution have called for exercises of power,
obscurely permitted perhaps by that instrument, yet unknown to former
practice, still there has been no popular convulsion at the North, no
armed outbreak, no phrensy of mob power. There is as yet no such thing
known as an American mob.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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