Take, for example, the division of opinion among the colonists themselves,--a division far more serious and far more nearly equal in numbers than is commonly supposed. It was not true, as the popular histories of the Revolution used to assume, that all the brave, the wise, the virtuous, and the honest were on one side, and all the cowardly, the selfish, the base, and the insincere were on the other. There was probably as much sincerity and virtue among the loyalists as among the patriots. There was certainly as much intelligence and education among the patriots as among the loyalists. The difference was this. The loyalists were, for the most part, families and individuals who had been connected, socially and industrially, with the royal source of power and order, through the governors and other officials who came from England or were appointed there. Naturally they felt that the protection, guidance, and support of England were indispensable to the colonies. The patriots were, for the most part, families and individuals whose intimate relations had been with the colonial assemblies, with the popular efforts for self-development and self-rule, with the movements which tended to strengthen their confidence in their own powers. Naturally they felt that freedom of action, deliverance from external control, and the fullest opportunity of self-guidance were indispensable to the colonies. The names chosen by the two parties--"loyalist" and "patriot"--were both honourable, and seem at first sight almost synonymous. But there is a delicate shade of difference in their inward significance. The loyalist is one who sincerely owns allegiance to a sovereign power, which _may_ be external to him, but to which he feels bound to be loyal. The patriot is one who has found his own country, _of which he is a part_, and for which he is willing to live and die. It was because the patriotic party appealed primarily to the spirit of self-reliance that they carried the majority of the American people with them, and won the victory, not only in the internal conflict, but also in the war of independence.