other means, less laborious and more certain; the hardships and dangers of the original settlers; the revolutionary war; the unsettled state of things for several years after its termination; and the origin and progress of the French revolution; all tending to divert the American mind to the love of gain, to military pursuits, to political strife, rather than to the calmer pleasures of the pen and page.

These reasons, doubtless, are correct, and are urged with considerable force, both of thought and expression. It is now, and has been for some years past, a subject of complaint among our most respectable writers, that the British are too apt to underrate the literary claims of the United States, and arrogantly condemn their productions, as being, for the most part, coarse and superficial. Mr. Walsh, in the first volume of his "American Review," expresses his indignation at this conduct, in terms pointed and eloquent; and Mr. Washington Irving, in his very interesting " Biographical Sketch of Campbell," the Scottish poet enters more largely into the subject, in a strain exquisitely touching. The complaints urged by these gentlemen have too much foundation in truth; and it would be reciprocally beneficial, if the United States and England were both to abstain from mutual recrimination; and to enter upon a friendly and honourable rivalry in the career of literary exertion, of scientific pursuit, and liberal praise. It may be useful, perhaps, to inquire into some of the principal causes which have influenced the progress of letters in this country; premising, however, a theory of the French philosophers respecting the nature of American intellect, and its practical refutation by Dr. Franklin.

The essence of this theory was, that something in the nature and constitution of the American soil and climate necessarily diminishes the powers, physical and intellectual, of all its inhabitants, whether human or brute. This position the Count de Buffon first advanced, in his disquisitions on Natural History; and has been followed by a numerous host of philosophers, who maintain that all our animals are smaller and weaker

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than those in Europe; that our dogs do not bark; that no hair grows on the bodies of our aboriginal Indians; that Europeans, who migrate hither, degenerate both in body and mind; and that their descendants are exceedingly deficient in physical activity and force, and in intellectual quickness and strength. One of these precious theorists received an adequate entertainment from the Arabs, into whose hands he fell a prisoner, during Bonaparte's expedition to Egypt, in 1798. This French sçavant, in order to escape manual drudgery, when questioned by his captors respecting his usual occupations, replied that he had led a sedentary life: the descendants of Ishmael immediately covered him with tar and feathers, and set him to hatch eggs, by preserving a sedentary posture on them in the hot sand.

Dr. Franklin, while American ambassador at Paris, undertook to refute this theory. He invited six of his own countrymen, and six Frenchmen, to dine with him. As was expected, the French gentlemen, who were all profound philosophers, began to enquire into the causes of the declension of nature, vegetable, animal, and moral, in America; one said, the reason why man, in particular, became feebler in body and mind, was owing to the climate being too hot; another insisted that it arose from the climate being too cold; a third assigned, as the efficient cause, the too great quantity of rain; a fourth attributed the deficiency to too much drought; while the two last demonstrated that both man and beast were dwarfed in America from a want of food in the country. Each Gallic disputant maintained his own side of the question with characteristic volubility for a length of time: when, at last, they all referred to Franklin, for a philosophical solution of the cause, why all American creatures are so inferior to Europeans in size and strength? The Doctor very gravely desired his six countrymen to stand up, side by side; which they did, and exhibited a goodly spectacle; for they were all stout, well-proportioned, tall, handsome men; the halfdozen Frenchmen were then requested to stand up, side by side; they did so, and presented a ludicrous

contrast to the degenerate Americans; for they were all little, lank, yellow, shrivelled personages, resembling Java monkeys. They all peeped up at their opposite neighbours, and were silent, though not satisfied.

It is, indeed, quite philosophical to measure genius by geographical lines, and to suppose that Providence apportions talent according to degrees of latitude. The limits of the present work will not allow the discussion, or it were easy to show, both by reasoning, a priori, on general principles, and also by a regular induction from facts, that although individuals differ from each other in degrees of native talent, yet large masses of human beings average an equal aggregate amount of capacity, in all ages and countries. Indeed, when it is said there must be an average equality of talent in the whole, or in any large portions of the human race, in all ages and countries, it is only saying, in other words, that man is substantially the same being, in body, mind, and spirit, from the beginning to the end of the human creation. Whence, although individuals differ from each other in their respective proportions of talent, so that scarcely any two persons, perhaps, bring into the world precisely the same extent of capacity, the gradations of intellect being as various as the forms and countenances of men, yet the whole, or any large portion of mankind, averages an equal aggregate of talent with that of the same number in any other age or country. For instance, the ten millions of people who now, in 1817, inhabit these United States, average as large an aggregate of native genius as ten millions of French, or British, or Greeks, or Romans, or any other people, of whatever age or country, ancient or modern.

At all events, it is too late now to oppose any mere theory respecting the degeneracy of men in America, to the irresistible argument of contrary facts, seeing, that the Americans have, for a series of years, displayed the utmost intelligence, enterprise, spirit, and perseverance in all the occupations of peace; and likewise exhibited the most consummate skill, intrepidity, and heroism in war, whether conflicting in the field or on the ocean.

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The truth is, that the great mass of the American people surpasses that of all other countries in shrewdness or intellect, in general intelligence, and in that versatile capacity which enables men to enter upon, and prosecute successfully, new situations and untried employments. It would be difficult for any country to show that it has produced men of greater genius, in their respective departments, than Rittenhouse, Franklin, and West.

The causes, therefore, why the United States have not yet equalled the most civilized European nations in the refinements of art, the improvements of science, and the splendours of erudition, are to be sought in other sources than those of any natural deficiency in intellectual vigour and strength. Some of these causes are now to be examined.

Compare, for a moment, the relative situation of a student in the United States and in England, and there will be no necessity of recurring to physical causes, in order to account for the comparative inferiority of American to British literature. In Britain the candidates for literary fame are in possession of the accumulated learning of several centuries; they have access to ample libraries, containing books written upon almost every subject of human inquiry; from the great crowding of population, they enjoy the benefit of a continual competition of talent: owing to the great opulence of the country, there is a constant demand for literary productions, which are multiplied alike by the magnificent liberality of the hereditarily wealthy, who collect together innumerable volumes, and by the spirit and intelligence of the middle orders of the people, including the learned professions, the country gentlemen, the merchants, the manufacturers, and the who exyeomanry, amine for themselves into the merits of the writers they peruse; from the liberally endowed seminaries of education, both schools and colleges, a high bounty of emolument and honour is perpetually offered for the exertions of lettered men; by the extensive circulation and salutary influence of so many literary journals, replete with various information, and full of the most vi

gorous displays of genius, the republic of letters in Great Britain is lopped of its luxuriance, swept of its frivolity and absurdity, cleansed of its dulness and ignorance, chastened in its strength, and brightened in its ornament. All these, and many other causes, are continually operating to excite the men of letters in Britain to a display of the most energetic and brilliant exhibitions of talent and learning; and do we therefore marvel that in every department of literature and science, the nation has produced, and still continues to produce, works of such transcendent excellence, that her philosophers, poets, orators, historians, moralists, and critics, command the applause and homage of their contemporaries, and ensure the admiration of all future ages?

But what is the case with respect to the United States? The very condition of society in this country forbids its people, as yet, to possess an axalted literary character. A comparatively thin population, spread over an immense surface, opposes many serious obstacles to the production and circulation of literary effusions: the infancy of its national independence, and the peculiar structure of its social institutions, do not allow a sufficient accumulation of individual and family wealth to exist in the community, so as to create an effectual demand for the costly or frequent publications of original works: the means of subsistence are so abundant, and so easy of attainment, and the sources of personal revenue so numerous, that nearly all the active talent in the nation is employed in prosecuting some commercial, or agricultural, or professional pursuit, instead of being devoted to the quieter and less lucrative labours of literature: the scarcity of public libraries and of private collections of books, renders any great attainments in science and erudition exceedingly toilsome and difficult: the want of literary competition, rewards, and honours, the entire absence of all government patronage, whether state or federal, together with the very generally defective means of liberal education, necessarily deter men of high talents from dedicating themselves solely to the occupation of letters; and consequently prevent the