Respect and affection remained behind for
the parent land, from which the United States had derived trial by jury,
the writ for personal liberty, the practice of representative
government, and the separation of the three great co-ordinate powers in
the state. From an essentially aristocratic model, America took just
what suited her condition, and rejected the rest. Thus the transition of
the Colonies into self-existent commonwealths was free from vindictive
bitterness, and attended by no violent or wide departure from the past."
A considerable portion of this volume is occupied by a consideration of
the relations between Europe and America. Advancing years do not seem to
chill Mr. Bancroft's faith in progress, his confidence in democracy, his
love of popular institutions, or to check his tendency to throw his
speculations into an aphoristic form, and to present his conclusions
positively, and with less of qualification and limitation than men of a
more cautious temperament would do. So far as literary merit is
concerned, the European chapters will be found the most attractive in
the volume. They are sparkling, rapid, condensed, and pointed; they
gratify our national pride; their animated and picturesque style never
suffers the attention to flag for a moment;--and yet it is in these very
chapters that judicial criticism will find the most frequent occasion to
pause and doubt, whether we consider the direction in which the stream
of thought flows, or their merely rhetorical features.
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