372 THE YOUNG AMERICAN’.

system of society, and which seem to impose the
alternative t0 resist or to avoid it. That there are
mitigations and practical alleviations to this rigor,
is not an excuse for the rule. Commanding worth
and personal power must sit crowned in all compa~
nies, nor will extraordinary persons be slighted or
affronted in any company of civilized men. But
the system is an invasion of the sentiment of 
tice and the native rights of men, which, however
decorated, must lessen the value of English citizen~
ship. It is for Englishmen to consider, not for us;
we only say, Let us live in America, too thankful
for our want of feudal institutions. Our houses
and towns are like mosses and lichens, so slight
and new; but youth is a fault of which we shall
daily mend. This land too is as old as the Flood,
and wants no ornament or privilege which nature
could bestow. Here stars, here woods, here hills,
here animals, here men abound, and the vast ten-
dencies concur of a new order. If only the men
are employed in conspiring with the designs of the
Spirit who led us hither and is leading us still, we
shall quickly enough advance out of all hearing of
others’ censures, out of all regrets of our own, into
a new and more excellent social state than history
has recorded.