TRADE AND LETTERS:
(LhClE iouriie   in s?4~ounb          te    Z'orl i.
THREE DISCOURSES,
DELIVERED BEFORE THE MERCANTILE LIBRARY ASSOCIATION OF
SAN FRANCISCO, AND PUBLISHED AT THE REQUEST
OF THE ASSOCIATION.
BY
W. A. SCOTT, D.D.
Homo sum: humani nihil a me alienum puto.-TERENCE.
Etenim omnes artes, que ad humanitatem pertinent, habent quoddam
commune vinculum, et quasi cognatione quadam inter se continentur.-Clo.
I, io ARCH.
NEW YORK:
ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS,
No. 530  BROADWAY.
1856.




Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1856,
BY CARTER & BROTIIERS,
In the Clerk's Office  of the District Court of the Southern District of
New York.
STEREOTYPED  BY                                 PRINTED BY.
THOMAS B. SMITH,                          E. O. JENKINS,
82 & 84 Beekman-etreet,                        24 Frankfort-st.




a c I   t I o It.
TO
THE MEMBERS
OF THE
MERCANTILE LIBRARY ASSOCIATION
OF SAN FRANCISCO.
IN dedicating this little volume to you, gentlemen, I seek
to do honor to myself by recording the distinction you have
conferred upon me by inviting me to lecture before you,
and by expressing your approbation of my humble efforts.
" What is writ is writ," but for your sakes, as well as for the
cause, "I would it were worthier."
Yours, very respectfully,
W. A. SCOTT.
SAN FRANCISCO, 10th May, 1856.








CONTENTS.
LECTURE I.
HOMES OF TRADE AND LETTERS.
The East at war, and the West in peace.-The Tyre and Athens of the Pacific.-Ours an age of city building.-Cain the father of cities.-Sites of
cities.-Struggles of commerce.-Results in Great Britain.-Speeches
for Bunkum.-Commercial revolutions never go back.-Burke on "the
lungs of London."-The base of free institutions now too broad for them
ever to be wholly lost.-The warehouse and mill stronger than bayonets.
-Patronage of letters in great cities.-Cities the depositaries of the spirit
and forms of national strength.-History interpreting the designs of
Providence in regard to cities.-Their influence on political science, physical science and the fine arts.-The comforts of wealth contribute to
the length of lif. —Influence of statues and pictures.-Cities and popular
education.-Diffusion of knowledge.-Agricultural and manufacturing
districts.-City press.-Elements of great cities.-How  accumulated.Cities are a nation's SENSORIA.-They are the loved HOMES of men of
letters. —Historical illustrations, Jerusalem, Rome, Paris and London.Hlope for the future.......           11
LECTURE II.
TRADE AND LETTERS;  THEIR  CONNECTION  AND INFLUENCE  ON
THE PROGRESS OF NATIONS.
The American creed.-The seed-sowing time of Europe.-Our Public Schools.
-The earth never altogether without a civilized man.-The equatorial
current saves Europe from frozen deserts.-The general stratum of our
race.-Civilization of barbarous races always by the introduction of a
foreign element.-Christianity the only element that can satisfy the
hopes of mankind.-The cradle of the human races.-Oldest navigators
were first patrons of letters.-Herodotus and the old chroniclers.-The
1*




7:i                     CONTE NTS.
Pentateuch.-Man's first station after the flood.-First bargain a California speculation.-The camel.-The original of our expresses.-Influence of rivers.-The Nile.-Eastern products always in demand, and
their carriers have always enriched themselves.-Alexander the Great
the pioneer of the English East India Company.-Mohammed. —Fairs of
Mecca.-Arabs as carriers.-" Tadmor in the wilderness." —Discovery of
a passage by the Cape of Good Hope to India.-Portugal, Florence, Venice
Spain.-Productive industry essential as well as commerce.-Holland.
-"The fine arts" not the "whole duty of man."-The cotton handkerchief on its mission.-True elevation of a people comprehends all its
classes.-How Americans can govern theinselves.-Providence beneficent in the time of the discovery of America.-The precious metals
buying the treasures of the East.-The Aug'ustan age qf Egypt and of
the Hebrews.-Trade and the fine arts.-Enhanced importance of commercial integrity in our day-Division of labor.-Machinery and the
poor man at work.-Popular intelligence.-Foreign and domestic trade
not antagonistic, but must be united.-The newsboy an educator.-The
prevailing literature of any age Protean in its style.-Lorenzo and Cosmo
de Medici.-Their generosity and devotion to letters.-Patronage of
science and letters by merchants.-Canton and New York.-Religion an
element of civilization.-Science increases a nation's resources.-Principles established.-Examples of trading and non-trading nations.-Commerce the salt of life.-The pathway of Empire.-The influence of California.-The ocean wedded, and Shanghai wooing..  5T
LECTURE III.
HINTS ON THE COMMERCIAL SPIRIT OF THE AGE.
The ancients.-Antiquity of commerce-Union of commerce and agricul
ture.-The twins of Hippocrates.-Our "Magna Charta" for Trade.Commerce not to blame for its abuse.-" The mutuality of self-interest."
-The reservoir.-Integrity of English merchants and bankers.-Vast
reach of a dishonest act.-Enlargement of the commercial spirit.-The
"Westminster Review" gives us only two chapters in history: " Puritanism" and "Revolution."-The bridegroom of the Pacific.-Trade still
aggressie.-Progeny expected from Anglo-Saxons in an Asiatic clime.An experiment.-Commerce liberalizes our views.-Dangers of trade:
reckless speculation, absorption, and sefishnessf.-Necessity of relaxation.-Purity of conscience true strength.-Influence of mercantile associations...... 107




C(   1NT EN TS.                       Vii
APPENDIX.
A.
THE ARMY OF THE WAREHOUSE.
PAGE
The " Iron Duke" defeated,..                                  135
B.
REPUBLICS AND LETTERS.
Dr. Vaughan on Greece.-Florence.-Our Medici,.. 186
C.
COMMERCE CONQUERING.
Our national airs in India.-Present and past.-Brisbane to the Earl of
Derby.-Fate of savage nations,..... 189
D.
CRADLE OF OUR RACE.
Heeren's testimony.-Traditions.-Periodical migrations,. 141
E.
CARTHAGE.
A city of trade.-Her navigation.-Influence on the tribes in the interior of Africa.-Her literature.-Her fall a loss to trade and
letters.-Causes of her fall.-A warning,...       144
F.
ACCURACY OF OLD WRITERS.
Modern travelers verify credibility of ancient writers,... 148
G.
ANTIQUITY OF COMMERCE.
More trade and national intercourse among ancient nations than is
generally supposed.-Merchants of the Arabian Nights,. 149




Viii                    CONTENTS.
H.
AUSTRALIA.
PAGE
Why its natives so degraded,..                              151
I.
ALEXANDER TEE GREAT,....... 152
J.
MOHAMMED.
A traveler and a merchant.-Why he succeeded.-Why Mormonism
has gained a place in the world,..       153
GOD IN TRADE.
Goodness of God in distributing His bounties.-Salt and dates.-Cotton
and coal.-The oases and lines of travel,.        156
L.
CONNECTION OF TRADE AND THE FINE ARTS,.       158
M.
RISE OF POPULAR LIBERTY IN CITIES,.       159
N.
PREJUDICE AGAINST TRADE UNREASONABLE AND WICKED.
The Turks.-Plato did not allow good citizens to engage in commerce,  161
0.
LORENZO DE MEDICI.
Ahappy union of the elegant and useful pursuits.-The farmer and
miner patrons of art and letters.-God prepared an asylum for
literature.-Favorite thoughts of Lorenzo de Medici,.. 168
P.
CONSCIENCE IN BUSINESS.
Higginson on New England.-Every merchant still a man.-King Frederic's idea of religion.-Cowley's dilemma.-A new reading of an
old proverb,........ 165




LECTURE I.








I.
HOMES OF TRADE AND LETTERS.*
"The extreme regions of the habitable world have reoeived the fairest gifts
of nature."-HERODOTUS' " THALIA."
WHILE the Anglican and Roman crosses are leagued
with the Crescent against the Greek cross-Britain and
Gaul now united to uphold the Turk whom they together
sought to destroy when in the twelfth century their banners were last borne to the battle-field in concert; while
Europe and Western Asia are shaking under the tramp of
bannered hosts, and the bright blue waters of the Black
and Baltic Seas are stirred with the keel of ponderous
battle-ships, and are echoing with the murderous thunderings of Sinope and Odessa; here at the Golden Gate-the
great western gate of this vast continent, so far westward
that it looks boldly on the face of the jeweled East —very
different, more useful, and more glorious results are being
achieved. It was a proud and happy day for America,
when California, like Minerva, was born fully grown* Lecture delivered before the Mercantile Library Association
of San Francisco in Musical Hall, 16th June, 1854.




12              HOMES O F TRADE
and with the commerce of the great Pacific, the new and
long-sought highway to the Indies, forming the last link
in the belt of civilized enterprise which now clasps the
world, and when with her rich valleys and golden mountains, from the glittering snows of the Shasta to the burning deserts of the Colorado, she was declared a new State
in the confederacy, under the flag of Constitutional
Liberty and Representative Republicanism. In the Holy
Land the hills may be " everlasting," but they are not so
here. This metropolis of commerce in its antecedents
and prospects is absolutely without a parallel in the history of cities and nations. Here the rough places are
made smooth, and the mountains are made plains.  And
instead of sand-hills, luxurious houses, marble palaces, and
costly marts have risen up. Here I see the surplus waters
of one of the most magnificent bays on the globe conquered, and long lines of wharves stretched out, burdened
with the rich and useful products of all climes, and noble
ships, wearing the crest of every nation, locked to them, or
resting on their bosom. A busy, adventurous, enterprising population throng your thoroughfares, exhibiting the
complexion and costumes of many different lands. And
with wealth and intellect, and a bold, daring spirit, I see
here the taste, the refinement and elevation of character,
mental and moral, that ennoble the best portions of our
older States. And all this, where some five or six years




AND  LETTERS.                     13
ago, there were no buildings better than cane huts, hide
houses, or canvas cabins. Here I see the loftier, as well
as the grosser, pursuits of man, encouraged. Here I find
private and public schools, equal to those of any country,
and temples for the service of the living God with freedom
to worship Him. Here are established associations of
Christian young men, lyceums and libraries, scientific,
benevolent, and literary institutions, and a monthly periodical conducted with marked ability, whose contributors are, I believe, all your own citizens. Here I find
a newspaper press, which, in excellence of style and
matter, in tone and ability, has astonished me more than
almost any other thing in California, which is itself a
land of wonders, and an enigma not only to The Times,
the great thunderer of London, but to the civilized world.
And if the actual exports and the prospective commerce
of this city-when the great road to the Atlantic shall
have been, built-and when the wealth of China and
Japan, and the islands of the sea shall be poured into
your lap, and thence distributed over this entire continent,
and to western Europe-when the growth of the Pacific
States shall have as far outrun our present conceptions, as
the actualities of California have surpassed the anticipations
of 1847 and 1849; if, in view of all these things, San
Francisco is the TYRE, so when we look at her public
spirit, and her early devotion to public schools and liter2




14             H O MES OF  TRADE
ary institutions, we rejoice to hail her also as the ATHENS
of the Pacific.   It was with some such thoughts as
these, that I have ventured to accept your invitation to
lecture in behalf of the Mercantile Library Association,
and to offer some thoughts on the RISE, GROWTH, AND
INFLUENCE OF GREAT CITIES AS THE HOME OF TRADE AND
LETTERS.
I. Ours is not an age of iron, nor of brass, nor of gold,
though we are distinguished for our use of the useful and
precious metals. It is on the contrary, pre-eminently the
age of machinery, and of city building, and ocean traveling. The history of the rise and influence of the great
cities of our globe is the history of the emergency of our
race in each section of our planet, from barbarism into
civilization-and of course the history of the rise and
progress, power and fall of nations. Zoan, Memphis, Sais,
Thebes, Babylon, Persepolis, Tyre, Carthage, Athens and
Rome were great cities; but the earth has never been so
full, nor society. so thoroughly pervaded with the spirit
connatural to great cities, as at the present time. Truly
gold is
"Hoarded, bartered, bought and sold,
Stolen, borrowed, squandered, doled;
Price of many a crime untold;"
but still gold is not the only thought of mankind. There
are other pursuits and other ambitions than those of filthy




AND  LETTERS.                     15
lucre. The spirit that now broods over society has grown
by slow degrees, and in the midst of great difficulties;
bit it has eliminated itself from one prison hold after
another, until its presence is nearly commensurate with
that of our race. Modern civilization owes its extension
to commercial enterprise, and modern commerce in its
rise and progress is chiefly indebted to the powerful
awakening of the human mind at the period of the Crusades, and afterward by the great Reformation of the sixteenth century, and to the subsequent efforts of the Christian world for the evangelization of heathen nations.
The tendency of modern society is toward building
large towns and cities. This tendency is apparent even in
our newest States, but is seen more palpably in the older
ones, and on the continent of Europe, where the people
may be said to hardly live in the country at all.  This
city-building tendency is both cause and consequence of
agricultural extension. It discovers itself in the more general recognition of human rights acknowledged in our day,
and which is a starting-point in all the movements of modern society,-and which has eminently contributed to the
influence of congregated masses. Great cities have infused
into modern society an impulse to freedom and refinement, and a spirit that eminently favors equality of rights,
and full, and fair, and free opportunities for improvement, and for the pursuit and enjoyment of human happi



16            HIOMES OF  TRADE
ness.  The opening of the race of life equally to all classes of men, and the universal diffusion of knowledge and
power is the great object of the society that now is, and
will be still more the great object of the ages to come.
Twice has our race been indebted to cities for civilization
and civil liberty. First, with the rise of cities, civilization
and political institutions began, and, secondly, in and by
them were developed the principles of independence, selfgovernment, and equal rights in the middle ages. In the
Bible we are told Cain dwelt in the land of Nod, on the
east of Eden, and built a city, and called it after the name
of his son, Enoch.  It is strange that the first man who
shed the blood of his brother should have been the first
builder of cities.  Civilization, you know, is a word that
comes from civis, a citizen, and civis is a citizen because
he dwells in a city; and in this way, Cain is the founder
of civilization subsequent to the expulsion from Eden.
The origin of cities certainly belongs to the earliest period
of history.
Relationship, man's innate love for society, the necessity
of defense against wild beasts and more powerful neighbors, together with purposes of traffic, led first to permanent settlements.  The two great objects of cities in
ancient times were safety and trade. If security was the
object, then the site selected was generally the slope or
summit of some lofty rock, as is seen to this day in the




AND  LETTERS.                      17
sites of the old castles of the Rhine. If trade was the object, then the bank of some large river, or the head of
some bay of the sea, having a rich back country, was selected as the site for the city's foundation. In the latter
case, as security for life and property was necessary for
trade, so art and labor were required to provide the
means of defense, in the shape of massive walls, and
strong military towers.  As the population of these communities increased, so their wants and consequent trade,
skill and available force multiplied.  The great capitals
of Egypt and Asia were situated on the banks of their
principal rivers, and defended by extraordinary works of
art. In a commercial and military point of view, there is
scarcely on the globe a more eligible position than this.
I should say but one, and that is Constantinople, the prize
now so eagerly sought by the great powers of the world.
The All-wise Creator, in his munificence, has marked out
this place as the site of a great city.
II. Ancient cities may also be classed as either military, as Sparta and Rome, or commercial, as Tyre and
Carthage, or mixed, as Memphis, Thebes, Babylon, and
Nineveh. In all of these there was a blending together,
more or less, of the arts of war and peace. The cities of
Egypt, Assyria, and Greece were both marts of commerce, and centers of vast military power.  And even in
2*




18            I AOMES  OF  TRADE
ancient times, if commerce was not then king, still it was
more powerful and long-lived than despotism. Empires
rose and fell with astounding rapidity.  But the machinery of commerce outlived the enginery of war. Military
rule often rose as a mushroom, and perished in a night;
but companies of peaceful merchants such as are described in oriental tales, continued to pace their way from
one caravansera to another, alike regardless whether
Pharaoh, Sesostris, or Nebuchadnezzar sat upon the
thrione. They were but little affected by the change of
one dynasty for another. The great military roads of
Babylon, stretching from the Persian Gulf to the AEgvau
Sea, and from the Nile to the Oxus, were used as the
highways of merchants long after the soldiers of the golden empire had ceased to traverse them. Whether the
last conqueror were the "barbarian shepherd king," or
the more civilized Mede, all were sagacious enough to perceive that the wealth and power of empires must be derived mainly from the ingenuity and enterprise of commerce; and accordingly they did not fail to protect and
encourage the productive skill and extending trade of
their dominions.  The same remarks are true of the
Roman roads and of the policy of the Caesars. The cities
of Phenicia in their day, were to the known world what
the manufacturing and commercial cities of Europe and
the United States are now to the nations of the globe.




AD'  LETTERIS.                 19
Homer sung of their arts and of their enterprise. For
many centuries they were the great discoverers both by
land and sea; their navigators were found upon every
known water, and their wares were exposed for sale in
every market, and bartered in every recess and hovel of
barbarism. Similar was the trade of the cities of Arabia
Felix, with the empires and people between the Hellespont and Cape Comorin. Africa and Asia also were
their neighbors, and with them they carried on constant
commercial intercourse.  And the result was, that the
narrow drip of the great Arabian peninsula where this
great commercial people dwelt, from being a wilderness
became a garden, and their houses and public buildings
were adorned with the works of art like palaces, whose
ruins are now visited among the greatest wonders of the
world. By means of their commerce they derived wealth
and civilization from the older and more powerful nations,
and the looms and dyes of Babylon outvied the power of
her kings. The cities of Egypt and Asia, however, knew
nothing of the institutions of popular intelligence and suffrage, which at a later period adorned ancient Greece,
and now, with a thousandfold increased influence, vigor,
and purity, pervade a portion of Europe and America.
Even oriental merchant cities possessed very little of the
principle of self-government. In passing through their
streets, the largest mass of people to be seen were slaves




20             HOMES OF TRADE
engaged in the labors of city traffic, and offices of domestic servitude. Mixed with these were a few country farmers, selling their produce. The luxuries, the wealth, the
refinement, and the power were in the hands of a few.
Tyre had but little foreign commerce, but was a great
manufactory. Holy Scripture informs us that king Solomon sent year by year to that city, twenty thousand
measures of wheat, and twenty measures of pure oil, in
exchange for firs and cedars. Its inhabitants were merchants, priests, soldiers and sovereigns, with weavers,
traders and workmen, donkeys, dogs, and camels; yet
she was "filled with wisdom, and understanding, and
cunning to work all works of brass."
III. Commerce, manufactures, and agriculture, have, in
a great measure, taken the place of feudal wars, and semibarbarous f6tes. The feudal and the military have given
place to the commercial and civic. For several centuries
the forms and the spirit which characterize modern society, have been making their way into the place of those
which were characteristic of society in the middle ages.
In Europe, the ancient and modern states of society are
represented by the landlord class, and the mercantile
class. Aristocracy, royalty, and church establishments,
supported by the State, are the incorporation of what remains of the form and spirit of remote times. And in no




AND  LETTERS.                    21
part of Europe is the struggle between the feudal and
the civic, so prevailing, so organized, and so determined
as in England.  In no other Protestant country are
there so many and so great inconsistencies, and such
palpable contrasts as in Great Britain.  In no other
country is there so great wealth, luxury, intelligence,
and magnificence, in such close proximity with ignorance,
degradation, and vice. Great Britain is incomparably the
greatest, richest, best-governed nation in Europe; yet it
were difficult to find greater depravity, ignorance, and
vice on the globe, than prevails in the streets of Glasgow
and London. In no other Protestant country is there so
great a hierarchy, and so wealthy, intelligent, numerous,
and powerful an aristocracy; and in no part of the globe,
except in our own country, is there a commercial power
embodying so fully the spirit of the age, as in England.
And every fresh accession to the strength of the commercial party, becomes the occasion of a deeper jealousy
and of a more active hostility on the side of the parties
adhering to the ancient order of things. Every new spinning jenny, and locomotive, and ton of railroad iron that
is ordered from the shops and warehouses of England, is
an addition  to  the modern spirit of society.  Lord
Brougham said in his remarkably able speech in 1811, on
the "Order in Council"-" Circumstanced as the two
countries are, I use no figure of speech, but state the sim



22              HOMES OF TRADE
ple fact, when I say, that not an ax falls in the woods of
America which does not put in motion some shuttle, or
hammer, or wheel in England." (P. 454, vol. i., Speeches.) There is at every great era of the history of the
world, a leading principle, which gives direction to the
fortunes of nations, and the characters of distinguished
men. This principle in our times, is that of the action
and re-action upon each other of Europe and America, for
the advancement of free institutions, and the promotion
of national liberty. Ever since the discovery of America,
this principle has been in operation, but naturally and
necessarily with vastly increased energy, since the growth
of an intelligent population on this side of the Atlantic.
The restlessness of our times, and the fierceness of party
strife- even the murmurings of one nation against
another, is evidence of healthful activity. Where there
is no  life, there will be no movement.  The strugglings and overactings of some portions of modern society, is evidence of the depths of its breathings. They are
signs of life, struggling to throw off some unhealthy accretions, but of life that is youthful and vigorous. Where
there is great vigor, there will be action, and thinking,
and diversity of opinion, both as to what should be done,
and the best method of doing it. The many months that
our legislators spend making speeches at so much per
diem, are not lost. It is a great blessing to the country.




AND  LETTERS.                    23
It is a great relief to the gentlemen themselves to be de
livered of superfluous excitement, and it is necessary to
their constituents. It will sometimes happen that a multitude of words darkens counsel; but generally by much
speaking is much light. Not a speech is lost. It has its
mission to fulfill.  A  man's neighbors will read his
speech, when they will not read any thing else. And I
should reckon it a something gained for society, if every
American constituent should read one speech a year, even
if it were made for Bunkum. For it can not be conceived
that any speech could be read without exciting a thought
of some kind, and the simple exciting of any mind to the
perpetration of a thought is an impulse toward something
better. Wherever there is thinking, there is hope of improvement. I am decidedly in favor of legislators making
speeches to their constituents, even if the reporter writes
them. Any thing that agitates the mass of mind-that
leads the people to think, to read, to examine, and to act
for themselves, is of vast moment in such a country as
ours. It is only under a despotism that men can neither
move nor mutter. It is under such a government that all
public feeling and popular intelligence are smothered to
death, and the people are left sitting, quietly, it may be,
but it is the quietness of dejection, the sullenness of despair, the lethargy of death.  There is no paradox in
saying that the most captious, hard to please, grumbling




24              H0 OMES OF  TRADE
nation, is, after all, the most moral and the most free. In
spite of the contempt which Napoleon sought to cast upon
Great Britain, when he called her a " nation of shop-keepers," his loftiest efforts of genius were directed toward the
pulling down of those shops, the arresting of her looms,
and the crippling of her commerce, and in the fruitless
but most gigantic scheme to make Antwerp the London
of the world.  And never was there a moment when
the commercial interests of England were so great as at
present, and never was her wealth, power, influence, and
domestic happiness greater.  The growth of her great
cities is the result of her commerce; and her commerce
is the result of her home industry, skill in machinery,
and enterprise in trade; and  these agencies in turn
have built her large towns, which, in their turn, operate upon the intelligence, agriculture, manufactures,
morals, and piety of the nation. It is because Great Britain is the HOME of great cities, that she is the greatest
commercial power on the globe, and is secure in the possession of her greatness in nearly all other respects.
So glorious is the progress of knowledge, so triumphant
the onward progress of civil liberty, so diffusive the spirit
of Christianity, and so broad the base of modern civilization, that the shadows of coming events of good things are
already descending upon the nations of the earth.  The
spirit of our age will have its way.  There will be no re



AND  LETTERS.                   25
trocession in the march of revolutions, however much the
sun may seem to go back on the dial of freedom. A
band of iron is making which is to be welded, and hold
within its circle a world with no other conflicts but those
of genius, and no weapons but those of honest rivalry, and
no institutions but those of freedom and Christianity.
For weal or woe, a revolution in favor of the commercial and civic states of society has been begun, that
can never go back. And of this revolution cities are the
palpable flesh and blood, or at least the brick and mortar
embodiments. They are the triumphal columns of the
victory of liberal principles over the rudeness and military
power of feudal ages, and the priestly arts of the debasing
superstitions of former times. The jealousy, envy, and
prejudices then that would blot them out of existence as
but little better than concretions of ignorance, vice, and
irreligion-and that would remove them from the body
politic as " unsightly wens," belong to the little, one-sided,
one-eyed, narrow, contracted, mean, and pusillanimous
spirit of the semi-barbarous ages that have long since
gone down the sky to the regions of eternal night.
It was once happily said by Burke, whose eloquence
and wit were surpassed only by his learning and philosophy, when pleading for the parks and public squares of
London against the littleness of soul and the greediness
of avarice that sought to convert them into shops and.8




26             HOMES  OF  TRADE
warehouses: "lthat they were the lungs of London, and
the Thames its great artery."  Keeping up the figure, we
would say, great cities are the lungs of modern society,
and steam navigation its great artery. Large towns are
the breathing apparatus of the last and best forms of civilization.
Philosophy teaches us that the broader the base of a
pillar, the stronger the foundation, and the higher the
apex of the shaft may rise. On this rule, then, we can
not doubt as to the permanence of Republican Institutions, and the complete triumph of the great principles infused into modern society by Christianity.  "The area of
freedom" is becoming so wide —the base of modern civilization so broad, that nothing short of the annihilation of
a large part of our race, and the total oblivion of man's
noblest achievements for six thousand years, can drive
mankind back to the darkness and despotism of former
ages. Time was when civilization was confined to Jews,
Egyptians, Greeks or Romans; and when their country
fell respectively beneath the stroke of barbarians, then
civilization was well-nigh blotted out from  the world.
But it is not so now.  If, by any revolution of things,
Europe should go back to skins and acorns, the monkeylike Paradise state of the human race, that so much delights some of our savans; and if St. Petersburg should
be sacked and given to the plunder of the Turk; if Vi



AND  LETTERS.                    27
enna, Paris and London should fall into ruins and become
as Thebes, Palmyra, and Nineveh now are, still America
would be left for the preservation of arts and arms, commerce and religion. And if America should be tossed by
civil commotions or endangered by the invasions of hostile and barbarous foes, her children embodying the spirit
of their fathers, as the seed for new generations, would
take up their abode in the islands of the sea, bearing with
them their civilization and arts, as AEneas bore old
Anchises from the walls of burning Troy. In spite of
kingcraft and priestcraft, of ignorance and despotism, of
earth and hell, I believe in the ever onward, upward,
hopeful view of our race. The highest form of human
civilization, and the most perfect state of civil liberty, is
that in which man was created-in the image and after
the likeness of the ever-blessed God-and as the Gospel
prevails and restores man to that image, so the base of
true freedom will become as wide as the world, and its
top shall reach unto heaven —to the throne of the Eternal
-and the angels of God will come down to sing the
preans of universal victory over selfishness, bigotry, ignorance and oppression, in the temple built by Liberty's
devotees.
IV. Notwithstanding the present war of the great nations, the commercial spirit is gaining over the warlike.




28           HOMES OF TRADE
The producer is superseding the destroyer. Peace hath
had her heroes no less than war. A half century ago,
causes more trifling than the marriage of Louis Napoleon
would have produced a war between England and France.
The fishery question, the boundary question, the Sandwich Islands, the Mosquito kingdom, Cuba, the Black
Warrior affair, and the costume regulations of the Secretary of State, would have plunged us into war before this,
but for the influence of commercial interests.*  Such is
the progress of freedom in thought, and in government,
and in trade, and so large the liberality of sentiment characteristic of our times, that the army of the warehouse
prevails over the army of the bayonet. The ledger of
Christian counting houses, express offices and insurance
companies, is converting the sword into the plowshare.
The power of the feudal lord has paled before the intelligence of the Christianized farmer. But as the forest is
subdued, and agriculture advances, and commerce increases, and nations are bonded together by intercourse
and trade, so will ships multiply and roads be constructed,
and large towns grow up, and the inhabitants of our
globe be emancipated from political and social vassalage.
Philosophers, and ciabinets, and monarchs, are beginning to see that science is lending her influence in many
powerful forms for effecting this great result. The new
* See Appendix A.




AND  LETTERS.                    29
and speedy communication between great cities in Europe
and Asia, and between Europe and Asia and America, will necessarily tend to swell the large towns into
still greater magnitude, and to diminish the weight of
the smaller intervening places, and the social influence
of the  country population.  Every-where, in  Europe
and America, there is a prevailing disposition to converge upon great points.  Large towns are increasing
in number, and absorbing all the smaller within their
vicinity. Investments in villages and small towns
are so hazardous that they have nothing better than
a nominal value. This may be unwise and perilous, but
it is so, nor do we see the slightest prospect of a change,
nor do we believe that it will ever be otherwise for any
considerable period of time.
Modern Europe is the offspring of the feudal system
that grew up amidst the ruins of ancient civilization.
The transition of power from the hands of the victims of
corrupt civilization to the ruder but stronger grasp of the
Northern barbarians, produced but little change on the
towns and cities of Europe. The spirit of popular liberty,
inherent in the Gothic institutions of the new settlers,
readily blended with something of the former policy and
jurisprudence. The bonds of society were soon so far replaced that life and health began slowly to return. During the darkest ages, something of social refinement and
3*




30             HOMIES. OF  TRADE
of the elements of improvement remained in the large
towns and cities, and in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, came the practice of granting charters to boroughs
and cities, and from that time the principles of self-government in our municipal system became more defined,
more fully recognized, and better understood. The Romans built colonial cities in Gaul, Africa, Spain, Germany
and Switzerland, under Augustus and his predecessors,
many of which exist to this day. Charlemagne, from a
strong desire to civilize the Germans, and cement his empire together, compelled many of them to live in cities.
Henry the First distinguished himself so much on account
of his zeal in building cities, and granting them privileges,
that he has been called Henry the city builder.  The
power and growth of the cities broke down the feudal
system. In many of the large cities, castles were erected
to protect the inhabitants, and the cruel oppression of feudal laws, and wandering knights and robbers, drove many
of the peasants to reside in cities.  This gave rise to
greater trade and to the cultivation of the various arts
within their walls. And as several neighboring lords
sometimes leagued together for the subjugation of a city,
so cities sometimes leagued together to resist their attacks, and the result of the contest was generally in favor
of a popular government.  The people of such towns,
choosing their own rulers, retaining their own keys, and




AND  LETTERS.                    31
enacting their own laws, soon began to understand the
doctrine of self-government, and the principles of representation-a principle that had no place in the free governments of antiquity. As early as the reign of Edward
III., English boroughs were deemed of sufficient importance to send members to Parliament, along with the
knights of the shield, and both sat together, constituting
conjointly, the second house of the British legislature.
Not less than seventy times during his reign were the representatives of boroughs assembled with the knights in
a legislative capacity. There was, however, but a feeble
approach in the Amphyctionic council and the Achaean
league of the Greeks, to any thing like the representative
system of the British House of Commons, and the Republican Representation of the Congress of the United
States.
As the immediate object of commerce is gain, commercial states are always reluctant to engage in war.  All
the glory of all the victories to be gained by the comnbined fleets and armies of France and England will not
satisfy the merchants of those countries. So intimate
and philosophical is the connection between commerce
and political freedom, that it is not too much to say,
that the treasure, as well as the blood of our ancestors,
is the price of our libeities. The principles of independence and self-government ascend from  the city to the




32             HOMES OF TRADE
Senate; from the chamber of commerce to the heads of
the departments of the State and of the Treasury. The
more fully and intelligibly the principles of independence
and self-government are acted upon in the towns and cities of a nation, the more generally will the people become
interested in its affairs, and the greater is the probability
that statesmen will regulate their conduct by principles that will abide the severest scrutiny. When the
spirit and forms of constitutional liberty are localized
in neighborhoods and cities, we have the best possible
guaranty against their being centralized at the seat of
government. "~ It has been found necessary," says Curran
in his speech on the election of Lord Mayor of Dublin in
1770, "to establish at least some few incorporated bodies, to serve as great depositories of popular strength." In
Great Britain he informs us the importance of such repositories has long been understood, and "hoarded up with
the wisest forecast and preserved with a religious reverence as an unfailing resource against those times of storm,
in which it is the will of Providence that all human affairs should sometimes fluctuate; and as such, they have
been found at once a protection to the people, and a security to the government." The intelligence and social
virtue of localized forms of popular government in cities,
seems to serve the same purposes of protection and security both for the people and the general government, that




AND  LETTERS.                    33
a nucleus of a few thousand regular soldiers do for the formation, discipline, encouragement, and comfort of new
volunteers.
The errors of enlightened and free cities in matters of
general government, if err they should, are only specks
that arise for a moment upon the surfaceg of a splendid
luminary; consumed by its own heat, or irradiated by its
own light, they soon disappear, as our cities soon renew
themselves after the ravages of a fire; but the perverseness
of an uneducated mass of mean and narrow intellect, without social habits and the kindly humanizing effects of close
and intimate society, are like the excrescences that grow
upon a body naturally cold and dark-no fire to waste
them, and no ray to enlighten; they assimilate and coalesce with those qualities congenial to their nature, and acquire an incorrigible permanence in their union with
kindred frost, and kindred opacity. It is only where men
are congregated in masses, and are subjected to the stimulus of each others' sympathies and rivalries, and are
brought under the influence of discipline and social virtues,
and the humanizing effects of civilization, and the refinements of education and wealth, that they have opinions
worth contending about, and that the great questions belonging to good government find their birthplace and advance toward maturity.




34             HOMES OF TRADE
"By mutual confidence and mutual aid
Great deeds are done, and great discoveries made,
The wise, new prudence from the wise acquire,
And one brave hero fans another's fire."-POPE'S HOMER.
V. If the designs of Providence in regard to great cities can be learned from their history and influence on
their respective territories, it is clear that they are powerful AGENTS for whatever Providence has designed man to
do upon earth. Human agency is necessary to keep the
earth from degenerating into a monstrous wilderness,
fruitful in every rank production, and every unclean thing.
In the command, then, to multiply and fill the earth, and
till the land, was included a command to build cities.
The wandering hordes of Mongolians and Tartars spread
over the vast flats of Central Asia, from earliest times to
the present, and the aborigines of Germany, Great Britain,
and America, and the Indians of your own mountains are
examples of what man is, and what he will be, without
cities. The ancient people of God, in Judea, and ancient
Egypt, Phenicia, Greece, and Rome, with their arms,
arts, and letters, and modern Europe, and the populous
educated States of America, are examples of what men
are, and may become under the humanizing and elevating
influence of great cities. So dependent is man upon a
combination of social agencies for means to diminish the
inquietudes and discomforts of a rude and uncivilized state,
and to procure peace and enjoyment for himself, that




AND  LETTERS.                     35
he is incapable of realizing his high destiny without associations with his fellow-man.
"God, working ever on the social plan,
By various ties attaches man to man."
The habit and capability of enjoying the romance and
seclusion and repose of the country, is usually derived
from the busy scenes of life. It is the education of the
city which man has built that gives us power to observe
and opens up the susceptibilities of the heart to the country God has made.  We are now prepared, I trust, to say,
in the next place,
VI. THAT THE INFLUENCE OF CITIES ON POLITICAL SCIENCE IS VERY GREAT.  To some extent this has been anticipated in what has been said of the rise, early history,
and constitution of cities. The first form of government
was patriarchal. As families enlarged, and the heads of
family-states died, it became necessary to ELECT a chief,
and thus political institutions began to assume a systematic character.
As purposes of trade and defense of life and property
caused men to build cities and surround them with walls
without, so necessity soon taught them to make laws
within.  And the very.first division of labor and distinction between meum and tuum, produced some idea of




36             HOMES OF TRADE
equal rights and of personal independence and self-respect.
And the intercourse of these towns, one with another,
called for laws and tribunals of justice, and a kind of
international code, and a desire for refinement and reputation were the natural results. And as these salutary
consequences were enjoyed, the idea of self-reliance, of
independence, of home, and of the love of country would
naturally be developed. And as a municipal body, every
city soon had its local regulations, and its local functionaries. These regulations, and the powers of these functionaries emanating from the people, were expressions of the
popular will. And thus a popular character was very
soon and very naturally attached to the municipal law and
authority of great cities. They became imperia in imperia. And such, in a great degree, they are still. In all
past ages, and in all countries, whether in Asia, Africa,
Europe or America, where the people have attained any
thing like free institutions, and achieved a high degree
of wealth, and consequently of civilization, it is found that
there were built great cities, and that in them were concentrated and longest preserved the elements of civilization and freedom.
HEEREN has justly remarked, that " the rise of cities
was the most important source of the Republicanism of
antiquity." This was particularly true of Greece. And
Lord Brougham has said that "the manufactures and




AND  LETTERS.                   37
commerce of England give life and vigor to the main pillars of liberty in the realm."  Speeches, vol. i., p. 457,
Edinburgh edition.
The necessities of city governments are of a strong Republican tendency. The cities of Italy are to this day the
most important remnants of the great fabric of ancient
civilization. It was amid their bloody contests with one
another, that they lighted the torch of modern civilization. It was the cities of Northern Italy that opened the
way for the progress of improvement, by confederating together against the Emperors of Germany, very much as
the most important cities of Greece entered into a confederation to oppose the power of Macedon. The Achaean
and the Hanseatic leagues, and the confederacy of the
High German and Rhenish cities from the foot of the
Alps to the mouth of the Mayne in 1253, and of the Suabian cities in 1488, and more recent commercial unions
and treaties will suggest something to your minds of their
immense influence on human affairs. Time peremptorily
forbids me to enter on the history of confederate cities,
and I am sorry to say, I do not know of any good history
in our language on the rise and influence of free cities.*
VII. Let us consider next the INFLUENCE OF CITIES ON
PHYSICAL SCIENCE.  And what are the monuments of
* See Appendix M.
4




38            HOMES  OF  TRADE
Thebes and Persepolis, of Athens and Rome, but the " mutilated treatises" of the ancients on science?  Their monuments, like their literature, are memorials of their minds,
showing us their developments of thought, reasoning,
imagination, and truth. Cities are known to us as once
having existed great in power and wealth, not so much
from their preserved written literature, as by the moldering fragments of their science. It is thus with Copan,
Uxmal, Palenque, Etruria, Petra, and the cities of the Nile
and Euphrates. Every region of country that has become
the seat of a great city, has become the HOME of an improved agriculture. This results in part from the wealth
of cities, and in part from their mechanical and scientific
skill. Do not the associations of the city fell the forest,
build the aqueduct and canal, drain the swamp, and open
up highways of travel and trade?
The Babylonians, the Carthaginians, the Moslems of
Spain, and the nations of modern Europe are scarcely less
celebrated for the adorning of their capitals than for the
agricultural improvements of their respective territories.
Lands nearest great cities are more valuable than those
remote, and the larger the city, the more valuable the
land in its neighborhood. Large portions of the earth's
surface is not fit for cultivation until it is cleared and
drained, and this requires means, money, and skill, which
the city alone can furnish. I know it is said that com



AND  LETTERS.                    39
mercial States are selfish and mercenary. If so, how does
it happen that Great Britain and the United States are at
the same time both the most benevolent and commercial
nations on the globe? How does it happen that sufferers
by flood and fire, by robbery and tyranny in all parts of
the world-from the cry of the Greeks to the refugees of
political proscription in 1848 —have shared our almsgivings? Where was it, and whence but from the great
marts of commerce, a hundred thousand dollars flowed
into the treasury of the Howards during the prevalence of
the epidemic of last summer in my own city?* And how
is it that, according to a well-informed newspaper, the
amount of money raised in the United States and sent
abroad within the last forty-five years for charitable purposes, far exceeds the amount due to Europe for interest
on all the debts of all the States of the Union? And
where, but in our large towns and cities, are the funds obtained to build churches, colleges, and asylums?
It is said again, that a city population is fickle and superficial-that they are " like Zimri, all things by fits and
starts, and nothing long." It may be that the mass of the
city are superficial thinkers, and do not achieve profound
scholarship. They may not excel in brilliant emanations
of intellect; but, still a commercial people are always an
ingenious, quick witted people. A commercial age is also
* New Orleans.




40             HOMES  OF  TRADE
a deep-thinking age.  And if the deep-thinking is not
done in the city, it is encouraged, supported, and directed
by the city. The cities of a trading people are the forges
and workshops of thought-deep, powerful, upheaving,
deathless thought. The profound thinkings of a commercial people may not be committed to paper in Parnassian
rythm, nor in Ciceronian periods. Its vehicle of communication with the outer world is more generally a
series of Arabic abstractions called figures, which soon
assume local habitations and names for the most substantial comforts and highest pursuits and enjoyments of man.
It is true that every one that has money to purchase fine
pictures and statuary, has not the taste of a Reynolds, a
West, a Canova, or a Powers. All men are not equally
able for all things. But an admiration for the fine arts
argues good taste. If
"To daily much with subjects mean and low
Proves that the mind is weak, or makes it so,"
then the disposition to patronize the higher departments
of letters and arts, is proof of a refined judgment and an
elevated taste. If the embellishing of the houses, halls,
temples and public institutions of cities, and the residences
of merchant princes, supports the artist; if it is the use of
the wealth of the city that creates the taste and furnishes
the means for the enjoyment of pictures and statues; if




AND  LETTERS.                    41
it is the demand that calls forth the supply, then it will be
found, that it is from  the emporiums of trade that the
mandate issues to send Nature forth
"To teach the canvas innocent deceit,
Or lay the landscape on the snowy sheet."
If the city gives value and beauty to the fields and gardens of the country, and tames the stubborn soil and
makes it fruitful, and furnishes a market for its products,
and builds and adorns the landlord's palace, much more
does it improve and elevate his taste to the possession and
enjoyment of the works of art. If all the world were
farmers they might have bread and beef enough, but the
mass of mankind would be idle, untaught and narrowminded. For it is the excitement of trade, the conflicts
of a generous rivalry, and the enlargement of ideas consequent upon the exchange of the products of one country for those of another, that call forth the powers of the
mind and the heart, that gathering wealth and social comforts expand into civilization.
Wealth, that is the comforts that wealth commands, has
a tendency to improve the general health and prolong the
mean duration of human life, and health and long life in
their turn produce wealth. They are mutually cause and
consequence-both the results of advancing civilization,
and both contributing every hour to carry on civilization
4*




42             IIO3IES  OF TRADE
to a yet higher point of excellence. History proves that
wealth and knowledge combined have done much to prevent human casualties, and have generated a nature favorable to a healthy physical condition of society alike
calculated to ward off the attacks of disease and to baffle
them when they are incurred. Philosophers, physicians
and educators have been successful in awakening the public mind to the vast importance of the proper ventilation
of sitting-rooms, sleeping chambers, and school-houses,
and the wicked absurdities of whalebones and thin soled
shoes. A French writer has shown that persons of. high
rank have better health and live longer than those that
are subjected to pain, anxiety and hard labor-that the
middle class far exceed the poor in health and length of
life. The cultivation of the mind, whether from direct
intuition, or from improved social circumstances, or from
a combination of these and other causes, increases the
mental power both to endure and to enjoy. The officers of the grand army of Napoleon stood out longer
than the privates in the retreat from Moscow, although
the previous habits of both parties would seem to have
indicated the very reverse.  The same observation is
true of our army in Mexico. Literary men, and artisans, and clergymen, in Europe and in this country,
who have a competence, are long-lived in their generation. The insurance offices of England show  that of




AND  LETTERS.                    43
the middle classes who have insured their lives, the
annual average of mortality compared with that of
the negro slaves of the British WVest Indies from 1800 to
1820, was one to eighty-one, while that of the negroes
was one to every five or six. As the wealth and domestic comforts of Europe and America have increased, so
has the average duration of life increased, and the ratio
of mortality diminished.
Statistical inquiries in this country have scarcely begun,
and in Europe they have hardly reached the maturity of a
science; yet they are so far advanced as to enable life insurance companies to operate with perfect safety. And it
were a blessing in the advancement of civilization, if the
foolish prejudices that still -exist against life insurance
offices were all overcome, and our salaried men, mechanics,
clerks and packers, laborers and drayren who are mariied-and they all ought to be married, and to have their
wives with them in California-if they all invested a portion of their income every month as a deposit for their
families in Life Insurances.
The influence of cities upon the fine arts is seen in the
fact, that the adornments of the castles of Europe were
borrowed from its merchant palaces. Germany and Flanders, Genoa and Venice, excited the envy of the feudal
aristocracy, and then military nobles and scions of royal
blood began to cultivate a taste for the fine arts. It is an




44            HOMES OF TRADE
undenied matter of fact, that the revival of the fine
arts in Europe, was much more the work of its merchants than of its nobles or of its princes. It is not an
aristocracy of privilege and blood, but of wealth and
genius that creates and fosters the fine arts, and when
they shall cease to have the patronage of the trader and
the citizen, then they will perish from the face of the
earth. Along with the skill that produces, comes the
means of possession and the capacity to enjoy. The Republican traders of Holland had a fine school of art a
hundred years before the aristocracy of England could
boast a single one.* But as England has become great in
commerce and in building cities, so has her tastes for the
fine arts improved also.  And the English art of the
nineteenth century is just such an improvement upon
the Dutch school, as English naval power and commercial greatness surpass that of Holland in the seventeenth
century. The pictures and statues and histories of Greece
that surrounded the Roman youth, educated them to be
the men they were, just as the atmosphere of the Alleghany makes the strong mountaineer. This, then, should
teach us to have public Squares, Fountains and Statuary,
Libraries, Lyceums, Museums and Fairs for the people.
It is by the presence of such things a healthful public
taste may be created.
* See Appendix B.




AND  LETTERS.                   45
FINALLY. The more commercial and town building
States have always been in the van of POPULAR EDUCATION. This was true of Holland and Spain in their glory,
and is now eminently true of OLD an'd NEw ENGLAND.
It is not my purpose to enter upon an examination of the
difference between the state of education in agricultural
and mining districts, compared with those of the manufacturing districts of Europe, nor to consider the state of
popular education in large towns and cities, in contradistinction to that of rural districts; but it is believed that
such an examination would show a vast result in favor of
manufacturing districts and cities-both as to the number
of schools and their efficiency, and as to the number of
children receiving instruction and the proficiency of their
studies-nor can I now compare the state of education in
America with that of Europe, although when abroad in
the old world, I made some examination into the condition of European schools, and the result is that I am
more than ever satisfied that American schools and systems of education and elementary books and training are
in every respect, except that of physical education, worthy to be compared with the best in Europe. And in
some respects, especially in activity of mental habits, universality of attainments, and adaptedness to the nature of
free institutions and the useful pursuits of life, I consider
our schools superior to any in the world. There is a




46           HOIIMES  OF  TRADE
healthfulness and a purity and modesty, and a vigor in
the mass of the people in our oldest and best regulated
communities, that can not be found abroad. Our free institutions as they emanate from the Federal Constitution
and from Washington, and are possessed by our sovereign
States and in municipal bodies, and especially as they are
connected with the two dearest rights of man, the liberty
of the Press and the liberty of conscience, contribute to
render our country a scene of constant mental training.
Though our territory is immensely large and our population widely scattered, yet such is our mobility, our intercourse and activity, our traveling and intercommunion one
State with another, and one city with another, and of the
country with the city, and so universal the circulation of
newspapers and the diffusion of the blessings of education,
that substantially all our large towns and populous districts enjoy the advantages of a city population, with
a freer circulation of pure air. The newspapers, teachers
and books, and professional skill which our towns and remote neighborhoods enjoy are the products of city institutions.
The influence of the city press alone, every week, is
powerful beyond calculation upon millions of minds.
The earliest news hastens to and from the city; the most
startling and thrilling exhibitions of depravity are there
reported. Thither the country looks for the most saga



AND  LETTERS.                    47
cious conjectures of what is to come. The city press is
sometimes a combination of whatever is corrupt and debasing; but it is also often marked with whatever is
quick, powerful and comprehensive in intellect, and
almost as resistless as Fate. There is not such a newspaper reading population on the globe as that of America.
The intelligence thus imparted and the sharpening of the
faculties of our people by means of public lectures and
schools, and the influence of the Sabbath with its schools,
libraries, and pulpits, are all working out the great destiny
of this nation. It is in such a great school-house, with
the press and the temple of a pure Christianity for his
instructors, that every American has his place from earliest youth even to the end of his days.
The influence of great cities, then, is the combined
influence of wealth and mind. When a favored spot has
been selected for the building of a city, men gather there;
the laborer, the mechanic, and the merchant. These must
have houses to dwell in, and they must have sustenance.
This creates a market. Laborers, mechanics and merchants, are sometimes sick; this brings the physician;
and sometimes they quarrel, this brings lawyers and justices and creates courts. Teachers, too, are needed to
instruct their children, and ministers of the Gospel to
remind them of a world to come. The wants of such a
population bring ships with their cargoes, and the intro



48             HOMES  OF  TRADE
duction of foreign products calls for home manufactures
to pay for them, and this exchange of products introduces
fashion, taste, rivalry, and skill, and activity in the pursuit of wealth. Great cities are thus the exchange places
of commerce, agriculture, and manufactures, and these
exchanges can not be made without leaving heavy deposits, and the richer and larger the surface of the world
that trades to a particular city, the greater will be that
city in wealth and population. Mental efforts are usually
put forth either by high excitement or for large rewards
of money. Both of these are found in cities. The city
capitalist and merchant, are more likely to be men of
strong intellect, than the nobleman that pretends to trace
his blood back to William  the Conqueror, or Charlemagne. No men need keener wits, or more mature judgments, and more accurate and extensive views, than the
merchants of large cities. Large fortunes may be made
or lost, as their knowledge of different countries and markets may be correct or imperfect. The web of social policy is never more intricate than when wrought from the
threadwork of commerce. If I am not mistaken, no
courts require more available intelligence on all subjects
than the commercial. They are calculated to elicit a
keen, a comprehensive, and a robust, if not a highly
refined intelligence. The most flourishing schools of literature, and of the learned professions; the universities




AND  LETTERS.                    49
that mold the mind of the world, are found in Paris,
Berlin, Rome, Leipsic, Edinburgh, and other large towns
and cities in Europe and America.
The country and the village may be the best place for
the birth and early training of youth; but it is in the excitement of the city that the highest developments of
mind are made. The powerful minds that have swayed
the destinies of mankind, though not commonly born in
the great city, have generally gone to reside there, to feel
the pressure of that activity which would draw out
their strength, and to find a theater suitable for their talents. Our men of letters have their homes in or near our
largest cities. Hume, whose authority is great in all matters of mere literary experience, says that " a great city is
the only fit residence for a man of letters." This is true.
In the country there may be leisure, but there will be a
want of impulse for intellectual pursuits. The mind languishes in the midst of a wilderness. "'Tis better," in the
development of intellect, " to dwell in the midst of alarms,
than reign" in a horrible solitude. The mind without
congenial spirits stagnates.  "It gathers the rust of decay," as the immortal Chalmers says, " by its mere distance from sympathy and example." See his Polity of
Cities. It is in the presence of libraries and of literary
men, and under the pressure of intense excitement, that
the human mind ordinarily comes forth in its greatest
5




50             HOMES OF TRADE
power. The leading men in all departments of city life
are generally from the country; but it is in the city they
encounter one another, and iron sharpeneth iron. Here
they wrestle, they struggle, they grapple, they fall, they
rise, and they run together-and, side by side, and urged
on by the same kind of motives, they aim at the same
goal. Here rivalry, excitement, and discussion evolve
the highest kind of mental discipline, the keenest perception of things, and the loftiest sweep of intelligence and
mental vision.  Here the gravest questions on morals,
politics, and religion, are agitated and discussed, decided
upon, and settled. Here the highest kind of professional
skill is called for, under the pressure of the most intense
excitement, and the largest reward. In great cities have
been made the decisions in law which have settled great
national principles, and given stability to the whole of sotiety; the discoveries in medicine which have alleviated
the woes of countless myriads; the improvements in art,
which have thrown the world forward, centuries at a single leap; and the investigations in science and learning,
which have gradually changed the whole face of society.
Where, but in a city, flowed forth the eloquence that
" shook the arsenal, and fulmined over Greece to Macedon
and Artaxerxes' throne?"  In cities have been brought
forth the wonderful creations of the pencil; poetry has
tuned her loftiest rythm amid countless throngs of stirring




AND  LETTERS.                   51
men, and "the waters of Helicon" have gushed forth
from paved streets and narrow lanes. Holmer, Socrates,
Shakspeare, Blackstone and Milton lived in cities.  Socrates and the Son of Mary taught alike in the city and in
the desert waste. The influence of Rome was so decided,
that when it became Christian, the empire was converted,
and when she fell under the weight of her corruption, the
empire fell as if smitten with a palsy through every ligament and fiber. And all the world knows that Paris is
France, and that, as that city decrees, the mighty French
nation is a republic or a monarchy. And not only so,
but as Paris dresses, so dresses the world. The caprice or
taste of a Parisian, gives style to courts, and to all refined
nations. Jerusalem was Judea, and with its subversion,
the Jewish polity ceased.  The cry of independence first
raised in Mechlenberg county, North Carolina, was responded to by a mighty voice from Boston; and from the
New England metropolis went forth the strong pulsations
that severed the United Colonies from the British crown.
The mighty heart of the British Empire is London, the
greatest city of ancient or modern times. The government is there; the wealth is there; the press is there;
the mind is there; the hilt of the sword is there. The
whole world is under contribution by means of England's
commerce supported by her navy, for its wealth, luxury,
and glory. The whole world feels its every pulsation.




52             HOMES OF  TRADE
The thinkings of the British Cabinet run along the nerves
of civilization, to the extremities of the globe. If such be
the fearful influence of cities upon national destiny, it is a
matter of infinite moment that they should be pervaded
with sound principles. Our cities must be filled with the
waters of life that the whole nation may drink and live.
If they become the centers of pollution, their tainted
streams will flow forth afar and in every direction; if, by
means of corruption and vice, they become the great
slaughter-houses of our young men, fearful will be the
doom that will inevitably overtake the nation. But we
read the future with hope and confidence. The hitherto
almost impassable gulf that separated the ignorant from
the educated is bridged. An aggressive movement of
light is made upon the darkness that has hitherto covered
the poor. Sympathy is beginning to pour a drop of comfort into the cup of filth and poverty. Now, the poor
man sees the fair temple of science open to his children.
The darkened mass is beginning to live. A hope of respectability and of rising from suffering to comfort and
enjoyment is infused into the mass. The mind of the
multitude is beginning to be enlightened and inspired
with a taste for the beautiful and the good, and with a
desire for cleanliness of person, of clothes, and habitation
-with a taste for the morning paper, and for flowers,
and for the charms of domestic bliss, there is hope




AND  LETTERS.                    53
for the purification of the heart.  There is hope that
order, and sobriety, and industry will supplant idleness,
ignorance, and depravity.  And as every human soul
has a right patent from the Almighty for knowledge,
so must the children of the street, and of the alley be
gathered into our public and Sabbath-schools. The wealthy
and the benevolent must strive together to improve, refine, and elevate the public taste by libraries, scientific
lectures, and halls of painting and statuary. The million
must be baptized into knowledge and charity. The poor
man must be made to feel that respectability and comfort
here, and life everlasting are indeed within his reach-that
the promise of the Gospel, of a free education, and of unfettered political rights, as well as of his Maker's Bible and
of his Maker's grace, is unto him and his children forever.
5*








LECTURE I I.








II.
TRADE AND LETTERS:
THEIR CONNECTION AND INFLUENCE ON THE PROGRESS
OF NATIONS.*
Liberal trade is good scholarship popularized, and Commerce is literature
on a sign-board.
A MERE tithe of reflection on the part of an audience
so intelligent as the one I have to address, will show that
great breadth of knowledge in our day attaches to the art
of the farmer, and of the navigator, without whose joint
labors mankind can neither be happy, nor progress as
nations. Our banks, warehouses, express-offices, and custom-houses, and steamers, and clippers, are nothing without trade, and without them and the trade which is their
life-blood, where were our halls of art and science, and
asylums, and temples?  If some brief and fragmentary
thoughts on  Trade and Letters-their connection and
injfuence on national progress, are likely to be useful anywhere, I have ventured to hope they would be acceptable
* Delivered before the Mercantile Library Association, of San
Francisco, in Musical Hall, on Tuesday evening, November 27th,
1855.




58          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
before so intelligent; energetic, and practical a body as
the Mercantile Library Association of San Francisco,
who are the pioneers and founders of a vast empire on
the Pacific coast-whose influence is to travel with the
orb of day and expand with his genial rays over the
globe. Our position as an infant State, renders this subject an eminently practical one. Before it was known
that there were mountains of gold in this State, it was
said that the American's creed was utility-to do the most
and get the most, in the shortest time. If this were so,
then, without doubt his history now from the cradle to
the grave is all in the imperative mood of the infinitive
conjugation of the verb, to do-to do worship to the
almighty dollar. At least, gentlemen, I conceive our
times and responsibilities attach practical urgency to the
consideration of such a subject. Whatever we do here,
we do for coming ages, and what we fail to do, that we
should do, is a fraud upon millions yet to be born.
I. The fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were the seedsowing time of what Europe and America now are.
Almost all the great events that now distinguish Christendom, may be traced up to those times. The present
state of science and literature, of the ornamental and useful arts, of trade and social improvement, and of political
knowledge and rights, may be traced back to the revival




THEIR CONNECTION AND INFLUENCE.   59
of letters, consequent upon, and connected with the discovery of America, the Reformation, commenced by
Luther and his fellow-laborers, the invention of the art of
Printing, and the discovery of the passage to India, by
the Cape of Good Hope. In the progress of nations to
wealth and power, various movements may be observed,
and some of them may appear to be disconnected or antagonistic, but a more careful study of their respective histories reveals the fact, that their development has been
through a graduated series, the one preparing for the
other, and rising higher than the previous one; that sometimes the upward tendency has been checked, sometimes
thrown back; but that on the whole there has ever been
somewhere, a Goshen-spot, a rainbow-girt glen, where
man has continued to struggle for progress in truth, and
victory over the typhoon of evil, and where the light that
was in him could not be crushed out, nor his hopes be
driven to despair. In some spot or other of our globe,
the sacred fire of liberty has always been kept burning,
and in due time, the vestal flame will make luminous all
the dark places of the earth. I am aware that there is a
school of prophets who never see any thing hopeful in
the horoscope of our race. I am not one of these.
Thank God, I do not belong to that school. Over the
field of carnage and death, I see the rainbow of promise.
When I find the door of civilization rusted on its hinges




60          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
in Asia, and fallen from its portals in Africa, and covered
in ruins on the Acropolis, I remember the flight of " pious
_Eneas," bearing old Anchises; I remember that it has
raised new temples in other hemispheres, and that here
its doors are flung wide open, and by our Public Schools,
the latch strings are hung on the outside, so that whosoever will, may come, and whosoever is athirst may enter
and drink from the living fountains of knowledge.
From the day that the first man began his toiling pilgrimage, the earth has not lacked a civilized man to rule
over it. The oldest monumental records of our race are
records of man's highest civilization in " the gray dawn of
time." The further back we go in Egypt's history, the
higher are its forms of civilization; and it is now an
admitted fact by the savans of Europe, that civilization
entered Africa, by the isthmus of Suez, and then ascended
the Nile. The colonies from the Euphrates began the
mighty empire of the Nile by building a temple at Heliopolis for the worship of the setting sun.* There is a
tendency in the waters on the African coast to flow westward; this creates the great equatorial current that breaks
against South America, and expending some of its force
by sending off branches north and south, flows on itself
through the Caribbean sea; and here, gTowing warm, it
flows through the Gulf of Mexico, as if trying to get
* See Osborne's' Monumental Egypt," passim.




THEIR  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.   61
farther west; but being opposed by headlands, it is
obliged to trace its way along the Atlantic side of this
continent, to Newfoundland, and then shoots across the
Atlantic to Europe; and as it goes, throws its lesser
waves upon Iceland, and the Arctic sea.
And so great is the force of this equatorial current,
heated in the passage of the Gulf of Mexico, that it actually changes the line of perpetual frost, and carries it several degrees further north. But for the warmth of the
equatorial current thrown upon northern Europe, a very
large portion of Russia, Norway, Sweden, and Lapland,
would be perpetually frozen. Thus the fate of countries,
and the lives of millions of men, are made to depend on
a circumstance so slight as to be almost unknown or overlooked. If this great current could make its way through
the Isthmus of Panama, or of Tehuantepec, to the
Pacific, instead of being compelled to make its way north,
what would happen? Wily, if the Gulf Stream were
poured into the Pacific, it would not raise the temperature
of the higher latitudes of Europe, and, as a consequence.
a large portion of those countries that are now the granaries of men and beasts, would become deserts of ice. It
is owing to the heat diffused by the Gulf Stream, on its
northward progress, that France and Great Britain are so
much milder in winter than the same latitudes in America.
Now, this rebounding of the currents that flow westward




62          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
fiom the equatorial east, is a significant fact. If the
waves of immigration have brought principles, institutions
and races, from the East to our shores, it is that they may
be quickened, warmed into a better, a higher life, as the
equatorial current, and then made to flow back, to regenerate, beautify, enrich, and save the Old World. As a
considerable portion of Europe would be frozen up but
for the warmth of the return current from the New
World-so would it have starved but for our wheat-fields;
and would have sunken into the torpor of hopeless tyranny but for the impulses of Young America, whose
example is galvanizing it into newness of life. But seriously, I apprehend there is the same natural tendency in
the stream of civilization, that we find in the equatorial
current. It began to flow in nearly the same direction,
and has been arrested by the same continent, and is now
rebounding in the same general course. And is not this
a kind of prophetic omen to us, through the beneficence
of Providence that is ever gracious to man, pointing out
to this new world its high mission!
But geology, not less than geography, is our teacher
and prompter. The geologist tells us that the crust of
our globe consists of certain strata subsisting in certain
well-defined relations to each other. That is, in regard to
position, one stratum is higher than another. And that
this position of the superponent masses is owing to the




THEIR CONNECTION  AND INFLUENCE.   63
convulsions of the last days of the dynasty immediately
preceding the advent of our race upon the planet, and
that wherever we find these stratified rocks, the same relative position which they have in one part, will hold good
all over the globe, unless where, from some extraordinary
circumstance, this natural position has been disturbed.
Just so is it with human races. By some terrible moral
catastrophe, they are all found in the same stratified position, except where, by the agency of some great extraneous power, some of them have been raised above it. As
man came from the hand of his Maker, he was highly civilized. But by a sad delinquency he lost his innocence.
In him, however, were left the seeds or germs from which
by great culture in coming ages, he might repair the
ruins of his fall. And hence, human progress is widely
different, at different times and among different races; but
no instance has ever occurred of a savage nation raising
itself to civilization, without aid from abroad. A foreign
element has, in every instance, been introduced. And this
element now is found to be Christianity. This as a mere
reviewer of the world's progress, I am bound to say, and
without affirming any thing as to its Divine origin. True
or false, Christianity is now a world-wide fact, and the
dominant influence in human history. To it the hopes of
our race are turned, as the only light that can scatter the
darkness that broods over the nations, and exorcise the




64          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
unclean demons that have so long lorded it over the
earth.*
II. The almost universal, and certainly the oldest traditions of the human race point to the interior of Asia as its
cradle.t  It is on the Mediterranean, the Persian Gulf,
the Red Sea, and the Nile, that we find the oldest navigators mentioned in history, the Egyptians and Phenicians.$ And to one of these very earliest of trading nations
is said to belong the honor of inventing letters, if, indeed,
they were invented, and to both the Egyptians and Phenicians, certainly, belongs the place in the world's history,
of being the first and most devoted patrons of literature.
They are not more famous for their commerce and building of cities than they are for their knowledge of letters.
When they were the greatest traders and workers, and
the most wealthy and powerful, then they were the most
learned people in the world.  Herodotus,~ the father of
profane history, on many points is a doubtful authority,
for he was, as most travelers are, the victim of his Phrygian dragoman.  But beyond him, lies the unexplored territory of fable, conjecture, and  uncertainty.   Egypt's
lying priests told him that the gods reigned over their
country for eighteen thousand years before Menes, the
* See Appendix C.         f See Appendix D.: See Appendix E.         ~ See Appendix F.




TIIEIR CONNECTION AND  INFLUENCE.   65
founder of their first mortal dynasty, but they throw
not a ray of light on the world's early days. The same
thing may be said of the Hindoo and Chinese records.
They are not, after all, as old as Moses, and not to be believed, whether old or new. The Pentateuch is the oldest
and only reliable record of what took place in the early
ages of the vwrld. It is only incidentally, however, that
the inspired writers make mention of heathen nations.
As the original station allotted to man was in the
East, so there our race began its career of travel and improvement. The wisdom of the East would therefore become proverbial at an early day, and its productions be in
demand among the nations emerging from it. The remains of the sciences which were cultivated in India, as
well as of the arts which were exercised there in remote
ages, authorize us to conclude that it was one of the first
countries in which man made any considerable progress.
ORIGIN OF TRADE.
Trade, doubtless, began with the awakening of human
desire. I think the first bargain was made in Paradise,
and it was a bargain to gratify the eye and taste, but it
was a California bargain-a ruinous speculation.  Cain,
and Lamech, and Tubal-Cain, and the builders of cities,
and the workers in metals, however, were not deterred
6*




66          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
from trading with Nimrod for skins and furs. The first
trading after the flood was between the mothers and
daughters of Noah's three sons, when they were packing up to come out of the ark, and no doubt it was then
found that those who had been the neatest, and had preserved the best order in their part of the vessel, were able
to make the best bargain, and I have but very little doubt
that Shem's family were the best traders.*
For a considerable time the intercourse of the scattering
families of these three great patriarchal fathers must have
been carried on wholly by land and on foot. It was ordained, however, by the beneficent Creator, that man
should have dominion over the beasts of the field. Accordingly, among his very first and most important conquests was that of the camel, without whose aid the vast
deserts of Asia and Africa would be absolutely impassable.
But as mankind became more and more numerous, and
more widely dispersed, journeying between them became
long, and toilsome, and perilous, and yet more and more
frequent. It then happened that mercantile adventurers
would collect together, and for mutual safety and comfort, form a temporary association, which was afterward
called a caravan, and this was the original of our express,
mercantile, and joint-stock companies.
Still, as emigration west and east, north and south pro* See Appendix G.




THEIR  CONNECTION  AND INFLUENCE.   67
gressed, and the tribes of men became separated by
rivers, and bays, and seas, it became more and more difficult to keep up trade and intercourse. Necessity then
became the mother of invention, and rivers and arms of
the sea, and the ocean itself was made man's carrier. Shipbuilding and navigation were a great advance upon foot
carriers and camels. And from the raft or canoe that the
savage constructed to ferry him over the river that he encountered in the chase, to the steamship of our day, the
progress of improvement is immense.  But when men
were once able to travel by sea, trade soon took wings.
Ships are on water what rivers and railroads are on
land. The earliest caravan routes, were along the rivers,
and from one river to another. In early times, as now,
rivers and mountains have much to do in shaping the
course of the current of humanity, and in giving character to a country. Not only does a river have a great
influence on the agricultural and manufacturing'rofits of
a country, but on its products. Without the great rivers
of this continent, its interior would be comparatively useless to our race. It would be less fertile, if not wholly
barren, and its products much more expensive when delivered in the markets. Australia* is an example of what
a continent may be without rivers. In many respects the
Nile is one of the most wonderful rivers of our globe, and
* See Appendix H.




68          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
well illustrates the influence of a river in giving character
to a country. For more than two thousand miles of
wandering, it receives no tributary-not the smallest.
And though its valley was called the granary of the Old
World, and did actually sustain an immense population,
and is still proverbial for its fertility; yet the Nile from
its fountains to the sea flows through nothing but deserts.
On the one side the Sahara stretches into the African continent for four or five thousand miles; and on the other,
the Arabian and Asiatic, for some two thousand miles.
All the countries bordering on the Nile are bounded by
deserts, and but for it, they would themselves have formed
a part of the great deserts of Arabia and Africa.
TRADE OF THE EAST ALWAYS DESIRED.
It is a singular fact, that ever since the dispersion of
mankind from the valley of the Euphrates, when some
came west, and some went east; those who came west
have wanted the products that grew in the east; and
that whatever nation has been the carrier of these products from the east to the west, has become rich and powerful; and that along whatever line this trade has
vacillated, great cities have grown up; and when, and in
the degree that that trade has been diverted, they have
generally  perished.  For this, the Tyrians, Greeks,




THIEIR  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.   69
Romans, Saracens, Venetians, Portuguese, Dutch, and
English, are our monumental proof.
Alexander the Great penetrated to India by land, but
found that the overland route thither by the Indus would
not do. He therefore sent Nearchus with a fleet down
the Indus to explore the Indian Ocean to the mouth of
the Euphrates, but he was not satisfied with the valley of
the Euphrates, and extended his idea of bringing the
wealth of India to Europe by the way of the Red Sea
and the Nile. He therefore fixed upon the western mouth
of the river, as the place for a great city, and called it
after himself, Alexandria. Nor was he mistaken. And
as Alexandria grew by the Indian trade, so Petra, Palmyra, Tyre, and Constantinople, declined. Alexander's
Syrian successors, and Antiochus the Great, Tamerlane,
and Nadir Shah, all coveted the rich commodities of
India, and the  countries beyond.  They led armies
thither by land, or attempted to do so; but failed of
their object. It is to Alexander the Great, more than any
other man, Europe is indebted for the knowledge that a
great city could be built up, and an empire erected by
trading with the East. Alexander the Great* was the
pioneer of the English East India Company.
Mohammed,t whether knave or fanatic, had the art of
seeing what would enhance the power of his followers.
* See Appendix I.        t See Appendix J.




70          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
In his injunction upon them, to visit once in their lifetime the Caaba, or square building, in the temple of
Mecca, it is difficult to determine whether he did more to
awaken and concentrate their religious feelings, or to
awaken and extend their commercial desires.
As the Mohammedan religion spread with amazing
rapidity over all Asia and a large part of Africa, and as
its adherents were taught to make a pilgrimage to Mecca,
so trade grew with the extension of their creed. Commercial intercourse by sea and land received a new impulse. From the shores of the Atlantic, and from the
distant regions of the East, annually, large caravans of
pilgrims wended their way to Mecca. Commercial ventures were mingled with devotion. Numerous camels
had to be sold and bought. Large supplies for long
journeys had to be provided. This bartering and selling,
even for a holy pilgrimage, quickened their wits, increased
their knowledge of the commodities produced in different
countries, and readily suggested that a few camels might
be loaded on speculation; and their utmost ingenuity
would at the same time be exerted to find out the easiest
mode of conveyance, the shortest route, the safest way,
and the largest sale. The Koran had expressly taught
them that they might trade during their pilgrimage to
Mecca: "It shall be no crime in you, if ye seek an




THEIR  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.   71
increase from your Lord, by trading during the pilgrimage."  (Koran, ch. ii., p. 36.)
Accordingly the holy city became a mart for commerce.
Here were the chintzes and muslins of Bengal and the
Deccan, the shawls of Cashmere, and pepper and spice of
Malabar, the diamonds of Golconda, the pearls of Kilcare, the cinnamon of Ceylon, the nutmegs, cloves, and
mace, of the Moluccas, the silks of Persia and China, and
an immense quantity of other oriental commodities. For
a number of years, the mercantile transactions of the
annual fair of Mecca, were the largest in the world.
There was to be found whatever was deemed necessary
for the preservation, and comfort of life, and for its elegance, and pleasure, and the costly things required for
worship, and for the embalming of the body. Something
to suit the taste of every climate, and the fancy of every
superstition-for the "infidel" European, the luxurious
Asiatic, and the rude natives of Africa.
In early times the Arabs were satisfied with national
independence, and personal liberty. They tended their
camels or reared their palm-trees within their own peninsular domain, and sought no further intercourse with the
rest of mankind, than to sally out occasionally, and plunder a caravan, or rob a traveler. But their conquest of
Egypt changed their habits, particularly as to trade, and
their intercourse with other nations. It was to gain and




72          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
hold a monopoly of trade, that Caliph Omar built Bassora. Nor was it long till they were the sole carriers
between China and Europe. They pushed their discoveries further in the East, than had ever been done before,
and from being the despisers of commerce, civilization
and letters, they became their zealous promoters, and did
actually make a considerable atonement for the burning
of the Alexandrian Library, by their contributions to art,
science, and literature. Their trade covered the Indian
Archipelago. From the Red sea and Persian Gulf, their
vessels plied to all the seas and harbors of China. Many
Mohammedans settled in India, and in the countries
beyond. Many of the inhabitants of India are Mohammedans to this day. Indeed, I believe her majesty, the
Queen of Great Britain, has more Mohammedans in her
dominions than the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. So
numerous were the Saracens, at one time, in Canton, that
the Emperor allowed them a Cadi of their own religion.
And the Arabian language was then in the East as the
lingua Franca is now in the Levant. It was spoken in
almost every known sea-port. To the Arabs Europe is
indebted for the first reliable account of the tea-tree, and
of the city of Canton, and of the Chinese manufacture of
porcelain, as well as for the use of coffee.
When the Mohammedans became lords of Egypt, they
would not allow Christians to trade through their empire




TIIEITR CONNECTION AND INFLUENCE.   73
to the East. Henoe, they were compelled to seek out a
way beyond the limits of the Saracen empire.  Trade
then flowed fiom north-western China and India, to Constantinople, by an interior land and sea route, requiring a
journey of two hundred and fifty to three hundred days
for camels. But from this trade Constantinople immediately received new life. The way, however, was long, and
perilous. The caravans usually stopped on the Oxus, and
their goods were carried down that river to the Caspian
sea, up the river Cyrus, and then again by land over the
portage to the Phasis, which flows into the Black sea, and
thence by vessels to Constantinople. So much, however,
did the trade with India and China increase the wealth and
splendor of this city, that Robertson, the historian, boldly
asserts that it retarded for some time the decline of the
whole Roman empire, of which it was then the capital.
When the trade of India was carried, by the way of
the Euphrates and the great Syrian Desert, to the Mediterranean, then arose "Tadmor in the Wilderness."  It
was the trade from the Persian Gulf with the West that
raised Palmyra to great opulence and power. Its situation amid a few palm-trees, in the heart of the Desert,
was unique.  Its form  of government, however, was
republican, which, according even to Robertson, "is the
best suited to the genius of a commercial city." With
no other source of power and aggrandizement than the
7




74          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
profits of the trade between the Euphrates and the Mediterranean, it grew in the heart of the Desert, to most
astonishing wealth. Amid powerful and ambitious neighbors, it long maintained its splendor, and even rivaled
Rome itself. Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia, and a large
portion of Asia Minor, were conquered by its arms, and
its Queen, Zenobia, contested dominion with one of the
most warlike Roman Emperors.
When the trade of the East changed from the Persian
to the Arabian Gulf, then Babylon, Bassora, Palmyra,
and Tyre declined, and Petra became the storehouse of
Europe, and subsequently Alexandria, and those cities
respectively, on the western side of the Mediterranean,
which became its distributors of oriental merchandise. I
have not time now to show why the West has always
coveted the treasures of the East; nor why it is that
oriental commodities are different from those of the West.
But it is doubtless a wise and beneficent Providence. As
the saltness, and eternal heaving of the ocean are ordained for good, so are the respective products of the
different parts of the globe adjusted in such a way as to
call forth effort and intercourse among men. There is
doubtless the same philosophical necessity, and kind
design, in the relative condition of the different parts of
our globe, and its diversified products, that there is in the
mutual attractions of the sexes. Whatever may be the




TIIEIR CONNECTION  AND INFLUENCE.   75
philosophy of the matter, the fact is plain enough. So
important has the trade of the East been deemed in all
ages, both ancient and modern, that every nation and city,
of any life, or lofty aspirations, has struggled to obtain it,
and whatever city or nation has monopolized it, has
thereby grown rich, and predominant in influence. In
proof of this, you need only turn to the history of Tyre,
Palmyra, Babylon, Petra, Byzantium, and Alexandria;
and of Venice, "the bride of the sea;" of Genoa, "the
superb, the city of places;" of Florence, the home of the
arts; and of her daughter Bruges, the great store-house
of her merchants for Europe, under the Hanseatic league,
of Antwerp, Lisbon, and London. And in all these cases,
not equally, but in all, prominently does it appear, that, as
the oriental trade has enriched European cities, so have
they become the homes of manufactures and the patrons
of learning and science.
The discovery of a way to India by the Cape of Good
Hope by Vasco de Gama, led to great revolutions, not
only in the course of commerce, but also in the political
state of Europe.  Portugal pushed her trade at once
into the East with such energy and judgment that she
soon built up a commercial empire to which, for splendor and opulence, and also for the genius by which it was
governed, other nations could offer no parallel.
We may form some idea also of the profits of the trade




76          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
carried on by the Venetians, previous to the discoveries of
I)e Gama, with the East, from the interest they paid on
money. By a treaty with Sultan Mahmoud, they monopolized the trade of Alexandria with Europe, and so profitable was this trade, that they could pay 20 per cent
premium for money, and sometimes even a higher rate.
The premium paid for the use of money is, perhaps, the
best standard by which to measure the profits arising
from the capital stock employed in commerce. During
this time of high interest, the wealth of Venice, individual
and public, increased almost beyond description or belief.
The magnificence of the houses of her merchants, and the
richness of their furniture, and the profusion of their plate,
and their revenues were greater than those of the reigning
princes of most other countries.
Two great events, however, caused the glory to depart
forever from Venice, which she could neither have foreseen
nor have prevented.  These events have been already
named-the passage to India by the Cape of Good Hope,
and the discovery of America. The seats of power and
wealth were now changed. Portugal and Spain rose to
wealth, but Spain did not become commercial or literary,
and consequently her wealth was neither abiding nor beneficial.  The immense treasures of the New World were
poured into her lap, but it was merely to be consumed.
It was not employed in productive industry, nor distrib



THEIR  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.   77
uted by trade, nor devoted by the promotion of science
and general intelligence. She built some cathedrals, and
palaces, and gilded domes; but, with immense wealth and
domains, she sank into commercial torpor, ignorance,
and poverty: and, like Venice, she leaves scarcely an
honorable name to posterity, as the child of her glory in
the New World.
Productive industry is essential to the permanent prosperity of a country. The Holland of to-day is not the
Holland of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
What is there now to be seen in the almost deserted
streets of Delft, Leyden, and Haarlem, but the sweet,
hopeful faces of the Dutch women, who seem to be waiting, like the women at the sepulcher, for the return of the
glory of the Low Countries.'The grass now grows
through the seams of the brick pavements, and ragged
clothes flutter in the wind, out of the drawing-room casements of the palaces; and the echo of wooden shoes,
clattering through empty saloons, tells of past magnificence and present indigence." Why are the streets of
Holland's cities silent, and her canals green with undisturbed slime?  Because her commercial prosperity was
not supported by productive industry.  Her capital was
not employed in producing what man consumes.  She
had scholars, theologians, and artists.  Her literature
grew with her commerce; but her genius and wealth
7*




s78         TRADE AND  LETTERS:
were not so employed as to multiply her thinkers and
workers, and keep command of the markets of the world.
Her fields and shops did not keep pace with her ships and
counting-rooms. She had no public schools nor mercantile libraries. She was a mere broker for other countries;
and, as soon as they could become their own brokers, she
was left behind in the race, and has finally buried herself
within her own dykes; a plain proof that national greatness always implies progress. As soon as a nation ceases
to grow, it begins to decay. Venice, Holland, and Spain
are a demonstration that the greatness of a nation depends
not on the amount of its wealth, but on the employment
and distribution of its wealth, and its power to create
wealth. This implies intelligence, industry, and integrity.
A people pre-eminent in agricultural skill, and in manufacturing and in mining skill, are prepared to sustain vast
commercial enterprises.  The riches and glory of the
world lie at their feet. The productions of all climes are
at their command. The means of enjoyment and of advancement are in their hands.
IV. FINE ARTS AND USEFUL ARTS.
We have some knowledge of cities and empires partly
commercial and partly military —of commercial greatness
and military renown-that have perished. It remains for
us to combine these with popular intelligence and a high




TIIEIRI CONNECTION  AND INFLUENCE.   79
moral culture, and by productive industry make our
material prosperity progressive and abiding.  In pleading
for the highest mental culture, I do not sympathize with
the reproaches that are cast upon us as a cold, machinecalculating, utilitarian people. After all, what does this
cloud-rocked, dreamy love of the fine arts, in contradistinction to the useful arts, do for the improvement of our
race. In developing the mental powers and moral qualities of human nature, they are not equal to works of benevolence, nor to the common useful arts. I have yet to
learn that the painter, the sculptor, the musician, or the
theatrical performer, is really a more cultivated, more intellectual, more refined and benevolent, or more moral
member of society than the manufacturer, the mechanician, the engineer, the shopkeeper, or the merchant. I
have yet to learn that the city of Rome, the mother of the
fine arts, possesses a higher grade of morals, of intellect
and piety, than Manchester or Boston.  The fact is, lest
we should be called New Zealanders or Digger Indians, or
what is worse, unmannerly clowns, and be excommunicated fromr the pale of fashion, we are wont to attach an
undue importance to the fine arts of the white kid tribe.
I do not consider a picture, a statue, or a palace, so high
an effort of human faculties, as a foundery, a printingpress, a cotton-mill, or a ship. Homer, Virgil, Dante,
Milton, Shakspeare, Phidias, Praxiteles, Raphael, Michael




80          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
Angelo, Canova, were great, sublimely great, immortal
men; but greater still are the scientific inventors and producers in the useful arts. The inventors of the spade, the
shovel, and the hoe, of movable types, ship-masts and tiller-ropes, power-presses and telegraph wires, have wielded
a greater influence for good than all the royal heads that
have ever lived. They have opened up the earth and
called forth its treasures for man's good. The exponent
of the civilization and intellectual progress of our race
now is not a statue, but a steam-engine-not an epic, but
a telegraph.  The toiling teacher who awakens thought
and belabors a single mind into a consciousness of mental
power, does more good than all the lisping amateurs that
could hop and bow about in a saloon as long as fiom the
Golden Gate to John O'Groat's house. The hard-handed
manufacturer, who makes a printed cotton handkerchief,
and the tarry-fingered sailor who carries that handkerchief to Africa, to adorn the woolly head of the ebonyfaced daughters of the Mount-ains of the Moon, have done
more for civilization and the extension of humanizing influences, than all the poets and professors of dillettanteism
in the world.
I would seek for the general elevation of all classes of
society, of the farmer and the mechanic, of the trader and
merchant, as well as of the learned professions-because
in our age all have peculiar opportunities for mental and




TIIEIRI  CONNECTION AND  INFLUENCE.   81
moral improvement, and great moral responsibility rests
upon all. Hiistory shows that as a people improve in
knowledge, so their wants will increase, and the deeper
will be their sensibility to their wants, and consequently,
if they have the means of gratifying them, the more they
will advance in civilization. It is plain, therefore, that
the increase of luxuries may be made a blessing, and not
a curse. And of all people in the world, it is the most
important that Americans should know how to possess
themselves of the power to pass hours of leisure either in
solitary meditation, or of social discussion on the origin
and nature of the human mind, and on the high duties of
free and enlightened citizenship.
To govern others, we must first govern ourselves, and
be established in virtuous habits, and our understanding
enlightened with that knowledge which will enable us
clearly to discern why we are called into existence, and
also as to what is due from us to others, and to our Crestor as well as to ourselves.
V. PROVIDENCE DESIGNS THE PROGRESS OF THE
NATIONS.*
It is a singular Providence, that the discovery of America and of the passage to India by the Cape of Good
Hope, should have occurred so nearly at the same
* See Appendix K.




82          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
time. In all ages the commodities of the East have been
purchased with the precious metals. As the demand for
oriental commodities was increased in Europe, by the
opening up of the route thither by the Cape, so it was
necessary that the supply of gold and silver should be
increased. It was therefore just at the time that Europe
was drained, that America opened her mines, and poured
her treasure into the lap of the old world, far beyond
what had ever before been known. And from that day
to this the productions of India and China, if we except
the "damning trade" in opium, have been purchased
chiefly with the silver of Peru and Mexico. Nor is this
the only way in which the new world has supplied the
exhausted stores of the old.  Her granary has poured
forth bread to her millions, and furnished the raw material that has clothed and fed millions more, and but for
the gold of California, the great nations now at war,
would have been unable to set their squadrons in the field,
or man their fleets before Sebastopol, or Cronstadt.
I am well aware that the connection I advocate between
Trade and Letters, and their joint and reciprocal influence
on the progress of nations, is in whole, or in part denied.
But I submit candidly and confidently that the true reading of history makes it "palpable to the thinking," that
with a revival of the commercial spirit of Europe, we had
a revival of Letters, and a grand epoch in the progress of




THEIR  CONNECTION AND  INFLUENCE.   83
nations. The same thing is seen inll ancient as well as in
modern times. In the eighteenth dynasty of Egypt, her
Augustan age, that kingdom was greatly in advance of
the rest of mankind in the knowledge of agriculture as
an art, and in the extent of her foreign commerce. And
in all that remains of that dynasty, we have evidences of
a high state of the arts, of skill and labor, and of extended trade, and as a consequence its monumental history tells us that during that dynasty there was a great
increase both of public and private wealth by foreign
trade.*  The very same thing is true of the Hebrew monarchy under Solomon. His ships were the world's carriers. Its gold therefore filled his capital. His kingdom
was more extensive than the Hebrew dominions had ever
been before, or than they ever were afterward. But who
of all Israel's kings was an author and patron of Letters,
like the royal preacher, the son of David? Is it not by
her commercial genius that Europe discerns the respective wants and resources of all the other great nations of
the earth, and by rendering them reciprocally subservient
to one another, has gained a tremendous power over
them, and derived from them an immense increase of
opulence, power, and elegant enjoyment? It is also a
notable fact that the promoting causes of the progress of
nations, the moral and physical improvements of society,
* See Osborne's " Monumental History of Egypt," vol. i., 376, 377.




84          TRADE AND LETTERS:
have not had their rise among hierarchies, aristocracies
and the proprietors of entailed landed estates. Too often
have the exploits of conquerors who have desolated the
earth, and the freaks of tyrants who have slaughtered
whole nations, been recorded with a disgusting accuracy,
and fulsome adulation, while the discovery of useful arts,
and the progress of the most beneficial branches of trade,
have been passed over in silence, and suffered to sink into
oblivion. The great moral and physical improvements of
society have usually begun with practical, hard-working
men, who have most keenly felt their necessity.  Almost
all improvements in conducting business, inventions, and
discoveries, have had their origin among a hard-working
and trading people. It is the mercantile class and the
active and industrious mechanic that tread on the heels of
what has already been achieved, and therefore feel the
necessity of doing something by which they can advance. When the analysis of soils, or the invention of
machinery, or the deep thinking and profound experimentings of the laboratory have brought to light something that can be turned to the use of the laborer, it is
the trading town that fosters it and pays for it. Every
extension of commerce is like opening a new avenue for
blessings upon society. As commerce is enlartged, so is
labor divided, and the demand for money, and exchange,
and handicraft of every kind, increased.*
* See Appendix L.,




THEIR  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.   85
And the very magnitude of the commercial transactions of our day, enhances the obligation to high morality
in trade. An enlargement of commerce carries with it an
augmented necessity for punctuality and integrity. If integrity is not the rule of a trade that encircles the globe,
and is spoken in a hundred tongues, exposure, decline,
and ruin are certain consequences.  The more money we
have, and the more extended our credit and trade, the
greater is the necessity for rigid business morality. And
in spite of the forgeries and frauds that disgrace our age
from Australia and California to New York, London, and
Paris, I dare affirm, and that without eulogizing the piety
of our merchant princes, that modern trade gains every
year in the standard of a high morality. The appearance
to the contrary lies on the surface, and is chiefly among
officials rather than in legitimate trade, and appears greater than it really is by comparison, because the comparison
is made with commercial transactions much more extended both as to their territory and their intrinsic amountsand also because wherever the English tongue is their vehicle, there great publicity is given to every instance of
bad faith, or of dishonesty. It is absolutely certain that
trade can not thrive or be a permanent blessing without a
rigid morality.  As religion is contaminated by hypocrites, as statesmanship is brought into discredit by noisy
politicians, so is trade degraded by rogues. But its legit8




86          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
imate tendency is to enlarge the mind, and to produce
punctuality and honesty. Dishonest traders are false to
their calling.
VI. LABOR-SAVING MACHINERY.
Smith and McCulloch, great names on such a subject,
tell us that the saving of labor and time by machinery,
and by a division of labor, adds to national wealth, for it
enables the laborer to employ his time and strength in
other employments, or to devote himself to such practice
and pursuits as may enable him to reach higher perfection
in his chosen art or trade. All that is wanted, then, is
room and means, for all to find productive employment,
and then, the more laborers, and the more labor by machinery, the greater will be the product of our industry,
and consequently, the greater will be the strength of the
country. Every pound of steam employed in pumping
water out of the mines, or in moving machinery, or in
grinding grain or quartz, adds to our national wealth, because the men that would be employed in pumping out
the water, or in grinding by hand engines, or implements
in their own unaided strength, can be occupied with other
productive labors. If there were not room for all who
want employment-if there were not millions of acres
that want hands-her labor-saving machinery might in



THEIR  CONNECTION  AND INFLUENCE.   87
terfere with the profits of the poor man's toil. But while
the door is open, as with us, and motives are presented for
more and higher inventions, and increased labor, there is
not wanting any thing needful to call forth our energies.
We have capital, commerce, and foreign markets, we have
rich lands, mines of coal, lead, silver and gold. We have
every thing to produce a national pre-eminence, such as
the world has never known, if we are faithful to the behests of Providence.
VII. DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN TRADE.
Without the activity, physical and mental, produced
by, and necessary to, the carrying on of extensive domestic and foreign trade, popular intelligence would be
a thing unknown. The great advantage of trade to a
city and a State consists in this: it pushes the division of
labor to the furthest extent, and brings its population
under the strongest motives to exertion, and supplies
them with many necessaries and comforts of life, which,
by their own individual efforts, they could not procure.
As commerce is not a direct but an indirect source of
wealth, it must be both domestic and foreign. The capital of a nation must be employed in productive industry
within itself, as well as in sending out ships to other
lands. McCulloch declares, there is " no reason for think



88          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
ing that we should have been at this day advanced beyond the point to which our ancestors had attained during
the Heptarchy, had Great Britain been cut off from all
intercourse with strangers.  It is to the products and the
arts derived from others, and to the emulation inspired by
their competition and example, that we are mainly indebted for the extraordinary progress we have already made,
as well as for that we are yet destined to make."
There are rural districts in Europe and in our transmontane States, where the father of a family lives and
dies as if tethered to the column of his own chimney's
smoke, unable to give the traveler the necessary directions
to find his way to the neighboring village, whose church
steeple has glittered in the sunshine before him all his life
time. But it is not so in the trading village. The shrill
morning cry of the newsboy with red nose and ragged
elbow is a potent call to thought, to inquiry, and to
reflections that lead to knowledge. In a traveling and
trading community without formal text books and set
hours in study, there is a sharp process of education going
on all the time. Knowledge like sparks fiom  a flint is
flying about.  And here and there, the sparks will catch,
and acuteness, and expansion, and power of mind will
appear.  Without intercourse between different communities there is but little variety of occupation. A dull
monotony like a nightmare lies upon the character. It is




TIEIR CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.   89
when trade opens up a mnarket for the products of the
milk of the dairy, the shop and the poultry-yard, that
there is an awakening and a competition.  And out of
this ambition of style, of fashion, and feeling of rivalry,
something good may come.  It is as men have settled
dwelling-places, and begin to adorn their homes, that they
will begin to think of books and pictures, and indulge in
intellectual pleasures.  And as is the demand so will the
supply be.  Accordingly the literature  of commercial
nations is not composed chiefly of such materials as
entered into the prevailing literature of the age of Pericles, of Augustus, or of Louis XIV.  The literature that
prevails in any community acts upon it, and thea is itself
affected. The patronage it receives is the air upon which
it lives. It is a reflection of the public taste. It is a
Texas tree-frog, that is black or green according to the
prevailing color of the branches where it finds lodging.
And hence the style and form of literature are subject to
changes like the furniture of a drawing-roonm, or the contents of a wardrobe.  Again, apart from the INCENTIVES
of trade, the higher developments of intellect in relation
to science would never have been made. Mental capacities of the highest order are required for the management
of commercial afifirs. The mlaking or the  losing of
large fortunes sometimes depends upon the information
that comprises a knowledge of markets and supplies all




90          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
over the globe. The result of an operation depending of
course upon the information as to its being correct and
timely, or incorrect, or too late. And hence it is that few
statesmen have been superior to those that have grown up
in the midst of great commercial cities, or have represented great mercantile interests*-the great mass of those
engaged in trade, and even of those who in trading communities are citizens of the world. And as their knowledge of mankind is extended by mingling in the great
world around them, so their prejudices are modified.
And the consciousness that they are citizens of the great
world, combined with the power that wealth gives, makes
their homes the centers, where nearly all the civil liberty
of mankind has been preserved, and from which it has
been diffused among the nations. It is said that the absorption of the mind of a shop-keeping and trading people is so great, that they are incapable of appreciating the
beauty of Letters-that the highest culture can only be
reached by men of a hilgher order of genius and more
devoted to the pursuit of knowledge, than belongs to the
producers, carriers, and brokers of mankind.  But I
apprehend it requires no argument to prove that a
taste for literature and the refinements of good society
may be attained without matriculation into College HItalls.
It may be created and elevated by the means and embel* See Appendix Al.




THEIR CONNECTION AND INFLUENCE.   91
lishments of life procured through trade and by intercourse with the world. What is called a liberal education is greatly to be desired. Colleges and Universities
are essential to the development of a nation's strength.
But if the encouragement of the fine arts in Europe and
America had been left wholly to noble blood and that
order of genius that can alone fully appreciate works of
art, and the higher pursuits of literature, then our race
bad been deprived of nine tenths of all that is now our
boast.*
VIII. CONNECTION  OF  TRADE  AND
LETTERS.
There are honored names, and not a few, that might
be given in proof of the connection that may, and ought
to exist between trade and letters, and of the progress
of nations in benevolence and science, as they have increased in wealth and power.  The wealthiest men of
Europe in their day, were Cosmo and Lorenzo de Medici.t
And yet they were merchants, farmers, bankers, and miners, and more pre-eminent still for their generosity and devotion to letters. To this family belongs the honor of
having restored the empire of science and true taste to
Europe after a dreary night of darkness. By their efforts
many valuable manuscripts were saved from total destruc* See Appendix N.        f See Appendix O.




92          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
tion. The Medici thought the discovery of a manuscript
equivalent to the conquest of a kingdom.  It is doubtful
if we are not indebted to them for most of the perfect copies now known of the Greek and Roman classics. It is
renmarkable too, that Providence should have raised up
these men to find and preserve so many valuable manuscripts just before the invention of printing, and just before the wonderful extension of discoveries and trade.
The Medici were educated as merchants, and yet devoted
their energies for a long life time to collect manuscripts,
and found libraries, and extend their commercial relations.
In the period of thirty years, they are known to have expended in relieving the poor, nearly seven hundred thousand florins. Their wealth followed chiefly from their
monopoly of the trade of the East, but amid all the care
and complications of increasing commercial relations, and
of making improvements in manufacturing, and on their
Italian farms and vines, they never seemed to lose sight of
man's true dignity; nor of the proper objects of his regard. The same re-union of a commercial spirit with
generosity, and the promotion of popular education is seen
in the United States and Great Britain. Who but merchants enabled Lady Franklin to continue her long search
for a lost but gallant husband? And who but a merchant
and a banker (Grinnell and Peabody) have sent out the
exploring expedition under the heroic Kane?




THEIR CONNECTION  AND INFLUENCE.   93
Again, as trading towns and cities are but storehouses
of commerce, we are justified in considering their relation
to science and education as a proof of the connection
which exists between trade and letters. I speak not now
of the materials-the facts and discoveries that trade has
contributed to science and literature, but of the fact,
that commercial and scientific knowledge are interwoven
in the texture of all cities.  Witiout the mental activity natural to men associated together, there would have
been but little, if any progress in any department of
human knowledge, and consequently no advance in civil
rights. In the monumental fragments of the great cities
of other days we are able to trace their developments of
thought, reasoning, imagination and taste.  It may be
that the patronage of letters and science by trade and
wealth is, in some measure, mercenary and vain. There
is, indeed, something of vanity and selfishness in all human
enterprises; but the encouragement to art and science
is none the less real. It is of but little moment to our
Powers, whether the order inclosing five thousand dollars
for a bust flows from  domestic affection, from  patriotic
fervor, or from vanity or pedantry. It is enough for the
toiling chemist, artist, teacher, or author, that his works
are appreciated at least so far as to get abroad in the
world, and procure bread for him and his, and a fair opportunity for him to work out his mission. We can not




94          TRADE AND  LETTERS:
always be worshiping the beautiful in the gilded, sequestered Madeleine of our imagination. We have to do with
stern realities, that require the useful as well as the beautiful. We must draw inspiration then from Arkwright,
Watt, Fulton, and Davy, as well as from Canova, Milton,
Aristotle, and the divine Plato.
The investigation of this subject has impressed upon
my mind some remarks which I have seen in the newspapers about New York and Canton. The contrast is a
striking illustration of the influence of Christian Letters
on national well-being. The contrast is to the following
effect. New York and Canton are about the same size as
to population. The one is the great commercial emporium of the East, as the other is of the West. They are
on nearly opposite sides of the planet. One particular is
selected as an exponent of the known and unknown
well being of humanity in the two cities. In Canton
while they were chopping off heads at the rate of about
eight hundred per day, until some seventy thousand victims were executed, many of whom were skinned alive
and then hacked to pieces at the leisure or pleasure of the
executioners, on the other hand in the western emporium, the same mail that brought us the news of the Canton executions, informed us that the New Yorkers were
looking at the happy faces and listening to the simple
songs of three thousand children, whom misfortune had




THEIR CONNECTION AND  INFLUENCE.  95
placed in need of their kindness. Now why this difference?  Canton is ten times older than New York, and
should, therefore, be ten times wiser? In manufacturing
industry, too, Canton is in advance of her western rival.
Fifty thousand persons are said to be employed in manufacturing cloth in Canton, and nearly twenty thousand in
silk weaving, and the workers in wood, stone, iron, brass,
and leather, beyond computation. Nor is Canton poor in
literature, such as it is. She has fourteen high schools,
and about thirty colleges. Her commerce is large, but
she herself is a mere d6p6t or storehouse. The ships that
trade with her are not hers, nor do they belong to her
side of the world. They rest at her wharves as mere
birds of passage.  The root of the difference then
between these cities lies in the difference there is between
a false and a true religion. Canton has one hundred and
twenty temples, while New York has one hundred and
sixty Christian Churches. The temples of Canton are
dedicated to a horrid superstition, the essence of which is
hate and malignity. The religion taught in them is false
and is embodied in false theories of the earth, and identified with false science, and in every way an obstacle to
the awakening of the mind, and its emancipation from
error, and opposed to the enlargement of trade and the
extension of fraternal intercourse among mankind.
Among the Chinese there is no creative genius, no origin



96          TRADI)  AND  LETTERS:
ating mind-no invention.  They are mere imitators.
Their being is the monotony of the tread-mill. There is
no life, no expansion, no upward tendency. A false religion mildews their manufacturing, commerce, and letters.
But the churches of New York are dedicated to the one
living and true God. The essence of the religion taught
in them, is peace on earth and good will to men. Expansion, benevolence, piety: these are its attributes.  Its
advance is marked  by discoveries, inventions, and the
outgoings of trade. It fosters science, and the fine and
useful arts. The influence of religion on mankind is itself
a theme deserving far more attention than it has received.
The influence is seen in the deep and all pervading traditions of all nations-the strong hold it has on their
hopes and fears-and in the many colonies that have
been planted from religious motives. Its sanctuaries have
become dep6ts of trade as well as the radiating points of
light. And not a few articles of trade lhave become such
in order to supply the wants of the devotee. Scarcely
one among all the half civilized nations of the ancient
world would dare offer a gift to their gods without the
frankincense or aromatic perfumes of Arabia. It is also
well known that modern missions have been important
auxiliaries to the extension of science and trade. The
most important element in modern civilization is Christianity. We are painfully conscious that our cities are not




THEIR  CONNECTION AND INFLUENCE.   97
the homes of saints, but the worst form of true religion is
immeasurably better than the best form of a radically
false one. Sadly imperfect as the Christianity of the commercial emporium of our Republic may be, it is immeasurably superior to the system of faith and morals that
prevails in the Buddhist emporium on the other side of
our globe.
It is true that natural science has a direct and powerful
money bearing on the property of men, and that moral
science has an equally direct and powerful bearing on
their happiness. Without a knowledge of the natural
capabilities of a country, and of their relations to the
comfort and welfare of man, its inhabitants will remain
ignorant and weak. And without letters, or a written literature, no nation has ever made great progress in knowledge or art. It is the light of science that teaches us how
to multiply one acre so as to make four of it. That is, so
to improve its cultivation as to make it yield as much as
four would produce without such improvements, and then
to make its yield effective in like proportion. The light
of experience under the tutorship of science makes one
ship now as valuable as a whole fleet was a few centuries
ago. In increasing the quantity of our agricultural and
manufacturing products, the light of experience and
science also improves their quality, and increases their
demand, and the facilities of trade for supplying that
9




98          TRADE  AND  LETTERS:
demand. It is by improvements in agriculture and in the
art of navigation that countries comparatively sterile and
far removed from markets are able to enter into successful
competition with richer soils and more favored localities.
But the knowledge of these improvements is not born
with us, nor can we acquire it by yawning, nor by mere
absorption as an oyster obtains his subsistence. Effort is
the price that must be paid for the experience and science
that make the arts of peace so poweful. Hence we want
public schools, high schools, colleges, lyceums, galleries
of the fine arts, scientific lectures, and the aid of the
printing press, and the countenance and support of all
classes to such enterprises as foster the growth of knowledge and elevate public sentiment. Though the fine arts
and literature have in all ages been found in close connection with human progress, it is in comparatively modern
times only that institutions have been established with an
avowed or sole reference to the improvement of the mercantile classes.
FINALLY. I hope I have succeeded in showing that the
new ideas of the value and importance of commerce and
the new channels of trade made known to Europe by the
discovery of America and of the passage of the Cape of
Good Hope, mark the line of the chief distinction
between the manners and political institutions of modern




TIEIRI  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.   99
and ancient times.  I hope enough has been said to
show,
I. That the progress of a nation is just in the ratio of
its skill in the employment of capital in productive industry, and in commercial enterprises.
II. That foreign as well as domestic trade sustained by
the employment and distribution of wealth in productive
industry is as necessary to the healthful progress of
nations, as the circulation of the blood and the inhaling
of fresh air is to the health of the body. And,
III. That such a progress requires the harmonious
working of capital, and skill in all the industrial, useful,
and ornamental arts that have distinguished the greatest
nations of past ages.
IV. That trade and intercourse with mankind is necessary to the development of the individual species, and of
national resources. The nations of the West have been a
traveling, trading, noise-making, fighting, and at times a
blustering family. But with them travels the power of
the race. The Japanese, Chinese, and iHindoos, are a fair
sample of what nations are, even with a high home-made
literature, shut out from intercourse with the great world.
The children of the East, according to their tribes, have
vailed their women, and palissaded themselves with castes,
or surrounded themselves with walls and refused to trade
with the rest of mankind.  And what is the result?




100         TRADE AND  LETTERS:
Degeneracy of every kind covers their whole escutcheon.
As goods in bales unopened to the sun spoil; as plants in
cellars without light and air languish; so are individuals
and nations without intercourse with their fellow-men. It
is a knowledge of what our neighbor has done or can do,
that teaches us what we can do. It is a part of the Divine allotment that men should divide the earth among
themselves, and jostle and elbow one another through it,
in order to keep the weeds down, and the wild beasts in
subjection.  Commerce is the salt that preserves the
ocean of life. But for trade and the literature necessary
to carry it on, one half of the globe would now be covered
with jungle, chapparel, and cactuses, and the other half
inhabited by such smoke-dried specimens of humanity as
the Camanches and our brethren of the "Flowery Kingdom."
As the European and civilized American nations require the commodities of the East, as the nations that are
the carriers of these commodities command the most powerful resources of wealth and influence, so are we literally
and actually, geographically and commercially, in the
PATHWAY OF EMPIRE. The wealth of the world, and the
hopes of future generations are before us. In doing our
duty is our glory. And as with us rests especially the
privilege of " rounding chaos into form," on this vast coast,
so the responsibility devolving upon us as patriots and




THEIR  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.  101
philanthropists is of fearful magnitude. This must be felt
by every one who may consider the influence of this coast
fifty years hence. As the pioneer population of the older
States are here arrested by a flood of waters they can nei*ther swim nor bridge, so will they beat back and fill up
the mountains and the valleys of this continent until they
shall beam with life and riches subservient to human comfort and elegance, as a beehive on the western prairies
does with honey-making citizens. These radiant shores
are destined to reflect a tremendous influence upon the
great valley of the Mississippi by way of the Cordilleras
and Rocky Mountains, and thence to the St. Lawrence
and to Europe. I speak not now of the influence of California upon the ship-building and the looms of the Atlantic States, nor of her gold in Wall-street, Lombard-street,
and the Bourse. Nor do I speak altogether of reflective
influences. For the day will come, sure as the ordinances
of heaven, when our Pacific States shall rival the Atlantic.
We look out upon the richest portions of the earth, and
upon the broadest ocean of our planet. The commerce of
the East, the desire of all great nations, on its way to Europe, is coming to us. Nor is there a sheet now catching
the wide ocean breeze, that does not carry the influence
of California in its folds.  Nor is there an invoice registered, or a bill of exchange drawn, that is not affected by
the auriferous dust under our feet. It is then for the Eu9*




102         TRADE AND  LETTERS:
REKA State, by her popular intelligence and public morality, and geographical and commercial position and relations, to mold the political and moral future of the entire
Pacific world, from Panama to Cape Horn and Behring's
Straits, and from  the icy ocean to Jerusalem.  The
race of people now here, their antecedents, institutions,
language, religion, and present position, and acknowledged aspirations, clearly foretell that in sober verity, their
"manifest destiny" is to advance.  The continent, the
boundless continent, is theirs. Their order of mind, as well
as their form of civilization, renders them the most powerful and fit people on earth to impress their character upon
their neighbors. The English language is gradually, but
certainly making itself the channel of communication in
every sea-port, and along every coast of the world. No
other language is spreading like it. It is in this tongue
LIGHT from this coast will, at no very distant day, penlcil
into living pictures of beauty the thousand islands that repose on this vast ocean, and make luminious the mountains and harbors of Japan and China, and travel up the
Amoor, and Hoogley, and the Ganges, to meet its kindred
rays breaking eastward from Europe; and mingling with
the light of Trade and Letters, converging on the East,
and the mission posts of Christianity, will kindle into a
constellation that shall proclaim the cross triumphant over
the crescent and every other opposing power. Is it not




TIEIR  CONNECTION  AND  INFLUENCE.  103
written in the books of Providence, that, if as patriots
philanthropists, and Christians, you would regenerate the
great eastern world with its millions of human beings, you
must first fill this Pacific coast with an enlightened, educated, and pious population? The great world fact of the
passing year is the wedding of the two great oceans of our
globe. Never before on this planet was there ever celebrated so sublime a bridal. The nuptial ring that binds
the rough old Atlantic to the fair Pacific is of wrought
iron-significant of the indissoluble bonds that now bind
two willing hemispheres.  The dowry is to all nations,
and consists of the millions of treasure, and of the precious things of the earth, that are to flow through this
union henceforth in unremitting streams to and fro over
the globe.
Another wedding, and in high life, is soon to take
place. The bands are already published. Lord Shanghai
is soon to lead to the altar the blooming daughter of
the Pacific. The enchasings of the wedding ring now
making, are to be surpassingly rich, and significant of the
glowing ardor of the young couple. And I have only to
wish that Miss California's rich old uncle would hasten
the wedding, and that we may all be there. Meanwhile
it is our privilege to hear the epithalamium in praise of
the bride and bridegroom from the poet laureate.*
* Poem followed by Hon. Frank Soul6, editor of the Chronicle.








LECTURE III.








III.
SOME HINTS ON THE MORAL INFLUENCE OF THE
COMMERCIAL SPIRIT OF THIE AGE.*
"Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they?"
There is the moral of all human tales;'Tis but the same rehearsal of the past I
First freedom and then glory-when that fails,
Wealth, vice, corruption-barbarism at last.
CcILDE HAROLD.
Then westward ho! in legions, boysFair Freedom' s star
Points to her sunset regions, boys.
No clime so bright and beautiful
As that where sets the sun;
No land so fertile, fair, and free,
As that of WASHINGTON.
MOaIaS.
You are aware that the sages of the great cities and
empires of the old world, in the fullness of their wisdom
and the brilliancy of their imagination, could not see beyond the pillars of Hercules. They sailed across the Styx
long before the compass enabled Columbus to unfurl
"An eastern banner o'er the western world,
And teach mankind where future empires lay,
In these fair confines of descending day."t
* Delivered at the second Anniversary of the Mercantile Library
Association, of San Francisco, January 25, 1855.      f Barlow.




103        MORAL  INFLUENCE  OF
Columbia's early bard was more prophet than poet, in
writing of empires in the future of these climes of " descending day." And " westering still," says another poet
of a later day; but I beg pardon for quoting so much
poetry, I will leave that to the poet of the evening, my
honorable friend here on my left.* Well, prose or poetry,
"westering still" is the star that leads
"The new world in its train,"
and westward will the stream of humanity, in its best
forms, continue to flow, and it may be, sometimes, with
the gush of a cataract, until it shall run eastward and the
circle be complete.
As citizens of public spirit, you desire to see the
physical resources and wealth of the country developed,
and for this purpose you are constantly urging the erection of railroads and telegraph lines. You are striving to
facilitate emigration by having a road across the mountains, and the great plains opened and safe for the wagon
and children of the hardy pioneer. These, and a thousand
other appliances for bringing out the resources of the
country are all right; they are to be commended. But it
is my purpose, now, to look in a brief and simple manner
at the MORAL INFLUENCE OF THE COMMERCIAL SPIRIT OF
OUR AGE.
* Hon. F. S. Soul.




THE  COMMERCIAL  SPIRIT.              109
The subject at once commends itself to you, both as a
subject of history and of experience. It is too great,
however, for me to attempt any thing more than to suggest hints, and of them only such as relate to national
experience. Every one of you must feel that our commercial relations are interwoven with the very framework of
our national existence.
The history of free cities, and of the commerce of
nations, is now receiving more attention than at any
former period, but our language is still shamefully
poor in its contributions to this subject. The history
of commerce is a most interesting one, because of its great
antiquity, for as soon as men learned the difference
between meum and tuum, which was doubtless very near
the beginning of their existence, they began to bully,
barter, swap, and exchange, meum for tuumn, with the
hope of obtaining both. The history of human migrations, which is essentially connected with the commerce
of nations, is also interesting to every one that studies the
progress and destiny of mankind. The migrations and
traffic of nations are developments of national mind. It
is as the national mind is awakened and enlightened and
directed toward utility, that the schemes of commerce
are apprehended; in the mind of a nation are all the
springs of its activity; as we trace, therefore, the outgoings
of commerce, we see the progress of mind. The pro10




110         MORAL INFLUENCE OF
gressive power of a nation is always in proportion to its
progressiveness of mind; the extension of a nation's commerce is, therefore, evidence of its growth, both in intelligence and in the development of its resources. We must
guard against the idea, however, that our commercial
greatness can be segregated from our mechanical skill or
agricultural power. This can not be done. Commerce
is nothing without the products of the farm, and the manufactory. Commerce and agriculture are joined together
by the Creator through the mechanic. Not a single vessel can go to sea without the aid of the stalwart "tiller of
the ground," and the handicraft of the knight of tools.
The oaks, and pines, and hemp, without which the carpenter can not build the ship, and the products which
make the ship's cargo, are all to come from the farmer's
soil.
" Our commerce and agriculture, like the twins of Hippocrates, must flourish or must die together; one can not
exist and prosper without the other. The lords of the
sea will be strongest when the lords of the soil are most
honored."
In modern times no nation can be truly great without a
powerfully awakened mind and opportunities for the
development of its national resources; millions of sinews,
muscles, bones, and heads; thousands of bays, harbors,
rivers, and lakes; millions of millions of treasure in coal




THE  COMMERCIAL SPIRIT.                111
and lead, and in the precious metals; the savannas and
the sierras; the forests and all the wealth that lies undeveloped in the soils and streams of a continent, are nothing without mind to bring it out and to place it before
mankind, so-as to increase the influence of the nation.
The produce of the soil, the products of the mills, and
the wares of the shop, and the riches of the mines are
exponents of the activity and skill of the national mind.
As it was the Creator's design for man to labor, to till the
earth and subdue it, and have dominion over it, so it was,
doubtless the Divine intention that men should trade one
with another, and this divine beneficent intention is the
MAGNA CHARTA of human progress; and every contribution obtained from air and water, from the ocean and the
clouds, from chemistry and geology, to the advancement
of human science and art, is a fulfillment of the Divine
mind in giving man dominion over the earth. The commerce of nations is evidently, then, agreeable to the Great
Father of all; it is one of Heaven's approved agencies
for overcoming the barbarism of the savage, and for
elevating the moral feelings of the civilized. It is by diffusion and reciprocation that the necessities of our race
are to be supplied. The Creator has wrought into the
soil of the globe a capacity to feed all its tenantry; the
overplus of one portion in any article of consumption is
evidently intended for the deficiency of another portion,




112         3ORAL INFLUENCE  OF
and the transfer of such commodities is left to the industry and intelligence of the human family. It is thus that
the Creator has given to every unit of the human family
a specific part to do for the well-being of himself, and
through his individual well-being to promote the wellbeing of the whole race. The object of commerce is not
to enable one man to live from the misfortunes of another;
not to enable one man by his wits to overreach another,
and live on his brother's losses. The legitimate object of
commerce is to meet the necessities of one part of mankind, by supplying them with the over supplies of another
part. If there are wrongs perpetrated, and evils connected with the extension of commerce, they are chargeable
to its abuse, and not to its legitimate fruits; its blessings
far transcend its evils; they are as the stars of the firmament, while its evils are but fire-flies in the swamps, or
fire-damps in the mines. It is not the fault of commerce
that some are left in want, and some are defrauded in
trade; this is owing to the clogs that human depravity
has fastened to its wheels.  "It is man's inhumanity to
man," and not any of the Creator's laws, " that has made
countless thousands mourn."
The laws of commerce are good. It is only when the
moral sense is blunted, that the friction of its vast
machinery is dangerous. The real basis then of the commerce of nations may be, as it has well been styled, the




THE  COMM1ERCIAL  SPIRIT.               113
mutuality of self-interest.*  By this is not meant selfishness. For the moral evil of self-interest is neutralized in
a pure commerce by its mutuality, and "every man
engaged in commerce, whether he knows it or not, consents to this mutuality of self-interest;" that is, while he
honestly watches over his own interests, he allows and
expects his neighbor to do the same thing, and so long as
honorable principles govern men's actions, the self-interest
of trade is kept from  degenerating into selfishness. The
importance of rightly understanding this point may be
illustrated by a comparison suggested by another, and
which he uses on a kindred subject: suppose, which is
necessary to the very existence of commerce, that there is
a common stock for human subsistence and well-being,
and that this common stock is represented by a reservoir,
which contains the water that is to refresh and nourish
the vast population of the city, and that each individual
in the city needing supplies from the reservoir is equally
interested in maintaining its embankments in strength,
and its waters healthful. Now, it is evident, that the
well-being of the aggregate of the city's population is
dependent on the faithfulness of each individual to the
performance of his individual duty, in keeping up the
embankments, and in watching over the purity of its
waters. Now suppose that this reservoir represents the
* By Rev. Dr. Fisk of England. See his lecture.
10*




114        MORAL INFLUENCE  OF
common stock of America and of all the nations with
which she trades; and again, that the United States and
each nation she trades with has its own reservoir, and
that each individual of each nation is intrusted with
a specific duty, in reference to the keeping up of the
embankments, and the preservation of the purity of the
water, and you can not fail to see how each individual in
the United States, and in every nation we trade with, is
interested in the individual honesty and skill of every
farmer, artisan, banker, tradesman, and sailor, engaged in
all these nations.
And what but intelligence can keep up the embankments and keep the water pure? I am sure the history
of mankind will show that those nations that are the most
pure in their principles, are the greatest in their power
and glory.  Commercial extension is in proportion to the
prevalence of Christian intelligence and integrity. And
additional importance is affixed to this part of our subject
when we consider that the age of barter in shells, hides,animals, stone, and such-like things, has given place to an
age remarkable for a circulating medium, called money,
consisting of precious metals, and that, on this basis,
credit has become as available as money. On this point, I
will not say much, for it is in the line of my friend of the
"Flush Times of Alabama," who is also to address you.*
* J. G. Baldwin, Esq.




TIHE COMAIAlERCIAL SPIRIT.              115
The abuses of credit have been, and may be great, but the
exigences of commerce require it.  Public credit is, and
must be coined and stamped with the die of public approbation, in such a form as to make capital as available as
the actual presence in force of the precious metals. The
commerce of nations can not now be carried on without
express.offices and bills of exchange; but what is commercial credit without moral worth? It is by confidence
in the honesty of those engaged in banks and trade, that
capital becomes as available as the precious metals themselves. But what stability can there be in such mnomentous transactions —7transactions that stretch  round the
circumference of our globe, and require, even with the
facilities of travel that we now have, almost a year to bring
a bill of exchange home, without abiding moral principles?
And I am happy to say, and from some little personal experience in different quarters of the globe, that the mercantile honesty of Great Britain, the reliability of her merchants, is one of the mightiest bands of her strength.
The continentals may affect to despise her as a "nation of
shopkeepers," and attempt to rival her in arms and in
arts, but they are compelled both to love and fear her for
her commercial integrity. I am not speaking of the
haughty aristocracy, nor of the government of Great Britain, nor of her huge, imperial monopolies, but of her private bankers, manufacturers, and merchants.  It is to




116         MORAL  INFLUENCE  OF
their credit more than to her prowess in arms, great as it
is, or to the gold in the vaults of her bank, that she owes
her greatness; and the way for us to extend our commercial power, is to make our flag the herald ensign of national integrity.  When heathen nations learn that the
word of an American skipper is equal to an oath, and the
promise of our merchantmen sacred as a covenant, then
will they open their hearts and their treasures to us.  We
must gain their confidence by mildness, forbearance, firmness and truth. The interflexions of commercial life are
so numerous and so vast, that, like the nervous system of
the human body, you can not touch one nerve without
having a response from all. The individual and aggregate well-doing of all commercial nations is, therefore, the
necessary basis of their individual and aggregate wellbeing. The dishonesty of the artisan in making a clock,
or of the weaver in making a print, of the weigher or
measurer, or of the clerk, shipper, consignee, vendor, or
banker, affects the whole transaction from the inception of
the design of the fabric to its consumption, and is reflected
back in the product of the consumer, by which the article in question was purchased; and there is as much
dishonesty in the consumer, who wishes to purchase an
article below its value, as there is in a vendor who sells it
for more than its worth; and the dishonesty of the purchaser who wishes to get an article for less than it can be




TIlE  COMMERCIAL SPIRIT.                 117
honestly afforded at, leads the artisan to make a cheap article that will resemble the high-priced one, and to sell
the inferior article as the high-priced one to such customers as are not familiar with the qualities and value of such
things. It is evident that the moral spirit of commerce is
a subject that interests, not only the coNscI:NcE and the
soul, both here and hereafter, but is also deeply connected
with the progress and success of commerce itself; it is not
merely a moral habitude that gives intensity and coloring
to an existence in a state of endless retribution, but it is
necessarily interwoven with success in business, and still
more with the enjoyment of the fruits of success in business, even in this life.
But how shall I draw a picture of the commercial spirit
of our age? Whither can we fly to escape from its presence?
The "snowy cones" and green woods of Oregon, the
jungles of India, the canals of China, the sands of Coromandel, the gulches of the Sierra, and the mountains of
Africa, are witnesses of its adventures, failures, and successes. I know not that there is a sea on which our ships
do not float, nor a wind that does not unfurl our flag, nor
a haven, upon earth, into which our merchants do not
send their vessels, nor a nation on the globe with which
we do not transact business. The goings forth of our
commerce have covered the Atlantic with our sails, and
while the Great Powers of Europe are measuring their




118         MO RAL INFLUENCE  OF
strength for mutual destruction, to gain an ascendency
over the little bright blue Mediterranean sea, it is ours to
make the vast Pacific an American "lake."
The Westminster Review rather piquantly admits, that
" cousin Jonathan does a vast stroke of actual work in the
practical way; preparing the wilderness for the use of
man; transforming things unowned into property, and
European pauperism into American prosperity." "A very
respectable, useful, and valuable relative, indeed," of his
English uncle.  "Altogether modern, and with a history
of only two short chapters-Puritanism and Revolution"we are nevertheless "a remarkable family of cousins-of
singular, and perhaps, the most expanding, mobile, multiplying,'go-a-head' human creatures that ever' exploited'
this terrestrial globe. * * * Hardly more settled
than the halt of the exploring traveler whose night's rest
is hurried and feverish with onward thoughts for to-morrow; our keen faculties and energies are all set on' progress'-working for times that are not, but will be —for a
Future that is to' beat all creation.'"
And even the London Daily News finds time amid
its pictures to say, "To watch the spirit of American
commerce is to witness some of the finest romance of our
times." The equator and the poles, the mountain passes
and desert oases, the forest, lake, and waterfall, the sunny
South and Arctic snows are as familiar to our traders and




THE  COMMERCIAL SPIRIT.                 119
explorers as of any other nation. In traffic ours are the
pearls of the South, " with birds of bright plumage," the
gums and the sweets, and the spices and tea, of the
East, and the gold, and silver, and gems of the New
WVorld. Our Salem rivals the fame of the Hansc-Towns,
and of old Venice, the bridegroom of the sea, that
has been dead and hearsed many a year.   But the
spirits of the Adriatic Queen have already witnessed
the nuptials of the beautiful Pacific with her bridegroom of the Golden Gate. And brilliant is the wedding,
and numerous as the stars will be the offspring, when
Santa Claus shall come sailing in steam vessels, and riding
on iron horses to pour the bonbons of both the East and
West into her lap on Christmas Eve.
In sober reality our merchant princes are the aristocracy of Neptune; the lords of the sea. Their scepter is
the trident of the floods, and the ocean's waves are their
baronial acres.
In our harbors we see ships of the most distant nations
riding safely.  Pactolian streams literally flow into our
lap; and we are in a fair way to gain the lion's share of
the wealth of the world.  Many of our ships carry the
treasures of kings, or sufficient wealth to have founded an
-empire, or have created a new dynasty. Every day witnesses something contributive to our resources and mercantile power. And when we consider the shipping con



120        IM ORAL INFLUENCE  OF
nected with the outlet of the St. Lawrence, the IHudson, the
Chesapeake, the Mississippi and San Francisco, and anticipate the day when our valleys and mountains, from the
Northern Lakes and the Eastern Atlantic to the Pacific,
shall be reticulated by railroads, and filled with prosperous villages and cities, and farms and manufactories, and
bound into one web of affection, and reciprocal advantage,
and of Christian principle, we can not refrain from uttering the great Statesman's prayer: THAT WE MAY EVER BE
ONE PEOPLE, WITH ONE CONSTITUTION AND ONE DESTINY.
What, but the urgencies of the commercial spirit could
have enacted the neutrality laws now existing between us
and the belligerent powers of Europe? The treaties now
between the United States and Russia, and the other great
nations, are an acknowledgment of the power of our commerce. The magnitude of our commercial interests, I am
not able to set before you in detail. The reports of the
Secretary of the Treasury and of the Census Bureau are in
your hands; our tonnage and marine transactions are
equal to the greatest, and superior to that of any other
nation, with, perhaps, one exception. The mightiness of
our commercial interests, the magnitude and extent of our
mercantile operations far surpass the expectations of our
forefathers, and just in the proportion of their greatness, is
there danger in them involving our interests. But vast as
are our commercial transactions, the spirit that is in them,




THE COMSIERCIAL SPIRIT.               121
is still progressive and aggressive. You know that the
great weight of. a body once in motion on an inclined
plane increases its velocity, and that its progress is accelerated with every revolution of the wheel. In proportion,
then, to the magnitude of the commerce of our nation, and
the number and power of the various facilities by which it
can be increased, will be the rapidity and force of the
progress which it makes. The spirit that broods over the
workshop, the plow, the loom, the ledger, and the bank,
cry out for progress; there is a cry for the extension of
the area of trade, whether there is for the widening of
" the area of freedom" or not. In every mail that brings
the news that some improvement has been made in
ship-building, in agriculture, in railroads, telegraphs, and
steamships, or that some new port is open to trade, some
new mine discovered, or some invention made, by which
elements and things already known can be turned to account; in every breeze that fills the sails of the clipper,
and in the lashing of the restless waves of the great ocean
at our gate, there is a loud voice calling for progress, saying to us, from the nations beyond, " Come over and help
us" —and we are going; we have already gone. Loo
Choo and Niphon bay have saluted American keels, and
the waters of Jeddo itself have fondly embraced " the Lady
Pierce."* And one of the necessary results of this vast
O American ship, Captain Burrows.
11




122        MORAL INFLUENCE  OF
increase of mercantile pursuits Is A POWERFUL AWAKENING
OF THE HUMAN MIND.
Every improvement in manufacturing, or discovery in
agricultural chemistry, and every new channel that is
opened up for trade, is a stimulus to human activity.
The whistle of the steam-car, and the click of the telegraphic key have not only awakened old Rip Van Winkle
from his sleep of ages, but have created in his history an
era of new and terrible thinking, where there was scarcely
a thought before. The old order of society is disintegrating everywhere; everywhere cracking and crumbling to
pieces. The vast armies of Europe are but police forces
to preserve order among those very refined and well behaved people called kings and emperors, and their families. The current of men's thoughts is quickened; the
old tread-mill round of business is forsaken; the circle of
knowledge is enlarged; the field of vision extended, and
the mind awakened to the idea, to the possibility, to the
actual effort of achievement; and the world has yet to
see what the product will be on these glorious shores of
the Pacific, of Anglo-Saxon blood warming and multiplying in an Asiatic climate. The poetry, the dreaming enthusiasm of the East, is here in living contact with the
eternal activity and courage of the descendants of the followers of the Odin religion, converted to Christianity.
Our blood through Cromwell and Luther runs up to the




TIIE COMSIERCIAL SPIRIT.              123
aspirants for Valhal. The Anglo-Saxon is here for the
first time since the primeval emigrations from Asia westward, on a soil and under such stars and sunshine, and in
the face of such hills, and mountains, and oceans, as have
heretofore been identified with the developments of Oriental mind. Who can tell what will be the progeny of the
blood of the heroes of Western Europe, flowing in the
veins of fieemen, under the mighty stimulus of republican institutions, and warmed by a Syrian sun, and
fanned with breezes like those of the sacred mountains?
The generations to grow up here under the ministry of
life and joy from the ocean air and mountain skies, and
watched over'by such a galaxy of stars, and playing by
springs like those of Siloa and Jordan, and wandering in
valleys like those of Sharon and Esdraelon, and gazing on
mountains like Lebanon and Carmel, must be generations
of deep and pious thinking, and high and noble daring;
and if I could say it without interrupting my thread of
discourse, I would say positively, that there is no climate
in Italy, or on the Mediterranean, equal to that of this
State.
ANOTHER RESULT OF THE EXPANSION OF COMMERCE IS A
LIBERALIZING OF OUR VIEWS.-Just in the proportion that
we are well acquainted with other nations, will our prej-ldices and dogged notions be removed. "Every body and
his wife" now travels and trades, and in the hard jostlings




124        MORAL INFLUENCE  OF
of the dusty thoroughfare many of the sharp corners of
humanity are rubbed off. The inhabitants of such countries, as of China and Japan, that are the most closely
shut up against intercourse with other countries, are the
most bigoted and narrow-minded, and filled with the idea
of their superiority to other nations.  But as "the
John's" and " John Bulls" and "Jonathan's" and the F. F's
of the " Old Dominion" travel abroad, and see the world,
they become more and more tolerant and kindly disposed,
and at last begin to feel that there may be, after all, some
other country beside their own on the globe. As there
are many beautiful objects in nature that we do not admire, because we do not see them, we are ignorant of
them, so there are good and great people in all nations
that we do not love, because we are not acquainted with
them. Intercourse with mankind must, therefore, liberalize our views and remove many of our prejudices. In
this point of view, the Congress of Nations at the World's
Fair, where the various improvements in the modes of
agriculture, methods of education, and uses of the
mechanical arts were exhibited, did much good. And as
the knowledge of different nations is mutually extended,
so may they be bound together in bonds of mutual
respect, affection and interest. Every ship that plows her
way from this port to the seas of the Flowery Kingdom,
is a chain that draws the two continents nearer and nearer




TIIE  C O MM E RC I AL SPIRIT.        125
to one another. Every new trail of the hunter over the
mountains; every new path blazed through the forest by
the buckskinned pioneer to his log cabin on the hill side,
and every sod that is turned up by the spade or the plow,
and every stream that is harnessed and put to work at the
mill, and every railroad and telegraph wire that is stretched across this great continent, is a band of iron binding
the different races and portions thereof more firmly
together.
Among the dangers growing out of, and in some measure inseparable from the amplitude of our commercial
transactions, are RECKLESS SPECULATIONS. Men are now
found who play with ships, land lots, and " water lots"
that can not be confined by stakes, and ingots of gold, as
with dice; invoices, rents and commissions are staked at
the gambling table, and even legitimate business is pursued as a game of chance. And of near a-kin to this
demoralizing speculation, is the tendency of the day to
bring down every thing to the level of the market. The
Rule of Faith on'change is the Rule of Three, and the
Rule of Practice is-will it pay?
ANOTHER DANGER IS THE TOTAL ABSORPTION OF THE
FINEST AND BEST FEELINGS IN A COLD AND NARROW SELFISHNESS.-It is a natural law of the mind, that in proportion to the strength with which it is fixed upon any
one object, it will be drawn from all other objects. There
11*




126        MiORAL INFLUENCE  OF
is danger then that the mind, absorbed in the magnitude
and progressiveness of commerce, will be withdrawn too
much from higher and nobler things. The claims of God
and man, of body and soul, of family and society, are too
often neglected through an intense application to business.
Perhaps such men think or say-this is true; but we
can not help it; it must be so. The vessel is to be
steered over dangerous seas and threatening rocks, and
under the lowering clouds that may break over it at any
moment. The pilot must, therefore, ever be at the helm.
This may be so sometimes. But is it not often allowed
to interfere with the improvement of the mind and heart
when there is no absolute necessity for it? Is it not the
making haste to be rich, that dares not look up to heaven,
and dares not take time to bend the knee in fervent supplications for divine blessings, rather than the pursuits of
a legitimate and well regulated commerce that absorbs
the mind and draws it from mental and social recreations?
Would it not be a gain to your families and to society,
and to business in general, if there was more reading, and
more domestic enjoyment among merchants and business
men?  Would it not be a great guide to healthfulness
both of body and heart, if the mind were more perfectly
drawn from the trammels of office, and allowed to escape
to the library and the picture-gallery, or to enjoy the
sweetness of domestic repose? There is great danger of




THE  COMMERCIAL SPIRIT.                127
mental contraction in our day. The horizon of some
men's minds is so fearfully knit together at the corners by
rent-rolls, per cents., and deposits, that they live and move
and have their entire being in a hogshead, a ship, a house,
or a bag of gold. Several thousand of such souls may be
baled up in a single package, and leave sufficient room to
breathe.  So intently and strongly do they gaze upon
their gains, that while they have no range without, and
never lift a telescope to the glories of the vast Universe,
they resort to the microscope to see how fast the grains
increase their "pile." Multitudes of men, who might
with proper mental, moral, and social discipline, have
grasped the world of science, and the wealth of history,
and "walked in the starry way of intelligence, and have
gone up to the highest places of spiritual enjoyment," are
groveling like worms in the dust, and in a circle of exceedingly small dimensions. They turn their meals into
seasons of calculation, and their homes into countinghouses. So terrible is the despotism of the heart once
yielded to the love of money, that there are not wanting
some who would blast down Mount Sinai for lime or for a
railroad track, if its stock could be made to pay ten per
celt. O i there is terrible injustice and cruelty upon the
father of a family, who allows his business to rob them of
what is beyond the price of all merchandise-high moral
culture and religious elevation. What if a man does gain




128         M ORlAL INFLUENCE  OF
wealth for his children, and go down to the grave with
the approbation of his fellow-citizens as a successful,
honest merchant, and still leaves them without a mental
or moral capacity to profit by it, and to enjoy or do
good with his wealth? The case is a painful one, but
it is often seen. The absorbed father with his heart and
mind filled with the objects and affairs of every day,
returns late, wearied and worn, yet anxious for the morrow, and utterly unfit for the holy duties of his office
as the head and priest of his household. The rest of
the Sabbath comes in vain. The exhaustion of the week
hangs over it, so that it is not a day of recreation or
improvement, much less a foretaste of that rest which
remaineth for the people of God. The commercial spirit
of our day is so incessant, so unrelaxing in its demands
upon mind, time, and strength, that it cuts off opportunities and even strength for the proper consideration of
higher objects. Now, fellow-citizens, it is with such views
of commerce, its mighty influence and the progress of
mind of which it is both a fruit and an exponent, and at
the same time aware of the dangerous tendency of the
absorbing, ubiquitous spirit of trade in our day, that wise
and good men in this and other cities have established
Mercantile Library Associations, and have sought to
awaken attention to the high morals of commerce, and to
diffuse intelligence and sound principles among the masses




TIIE  COMMERCIAL SPIRIT.               129
of men engaged in trade. It is chiefly owing to the efforts
of the agents, committees, lectures, and publications of
such institutions in Great Britain, that the hours of business have been so shortened as to give young men employed in manufactures and counting-houses opportunities
for repose, for instruction, and for moral and religious
cultivation. It is in the example of heads of business
houses, in the annunciations of Chambers of Commerce,
and in the lectures and libraries of Mercantile Associations
that we see the power to awaken and spread abroad such
a moral spirit as may elevate society, and make the gains
of commerce contribute to national prosperity.  The
purity of the conscience of our commerce is the tower of
our strength.*
The right reading of the brave old nations of yore,
shows that as the idea of supernatural beings was lifted
off from their minds, they became gross and stupid.' As
Jupiter vanished out of their sky, conscience faded in the
heart." As a sense of the presence of Divine beings and
of a personal accountability hereafter for the deeds of
this life became feeble, and a dull and dreary Atheistic
night shut down on their vision, so their energies died out
and the darkness of falsehood and of ignorance settled
over them in terrible gloominess. Kings may confederate
and sow the earth with dragon blood; but "God makes
* See Appendix P.




130        MORAL  INFLUENCE  OF
facts." And all God's facts are revelations speaking of a
glorious future for man. Happy the day, when commerce
that swings the great hammer —" the Miollnir of Thor"shall have broken the mountains of tyranny to pieces;
and when the spirit of commerce, itself, and the toiling of
the field, shop, and mill, shall be baptized into the spirit
of Peace. Then will the iron of the mountains be beaten
into railroads and plows, and not into muskets, shells,
and sabers; and our great ships shall be the messengers of
plenty and joy, and not be the floating batteries of death
and woe. Happy the day when on earth's every high
place, the Janus temple of the Cross shall point its soiled,
dust-worn and weary millions to glory and immortality,
and the din of our great cities shall be mingled with the
holy music of the Gospel.
The nature of our population and our local influences,
render such an Institution as this, more important to us,
perhaps, than to any other city in the world. A large
proportion of our population are young men who have
some knowledge of the world and of books-young men
of enterprise and noble daring —who are just entering
upon the active pursuits of life, far away from  home
influences, and often placed under strong temptations to
vice. This Association throws open to them its doors and
its thousands of selected volumes. It is intended to continue their education which was begun at home-to culti



THEI  COMMERICIAL SPIRIT.              131
vate the mind, and so elevate the heart that it will scorn
vice and bear misfortunes.
In the libraries of this Society, they will find friends
that no adversity can alienate and gain ornaments for
society more precious than rubies. Here the young man
from home may find solace in a weary hour, and acquire
knowledge, that will dissipate prejudice, overthrow superstitious fears, chasten vice, guide virtue, and give grace
and government to genius. In building up, therefore,
this useful and noble Institution, you throw around young
men, at a most critical period of their lives, the example
of intelligent, and high moral business men; and you
promote harmony and good feeling among citizens, and
contribute to elevate the standard of public morals.








APPENDIX.








APPENDIX A.-PAGE 28.
THE ARMY OF THE WAREHOUSE.
"Lord Stafford mines for coal and salt;
The Duke of Norfolk deals in malt,
And the Douglass in red herrings."
HALLECIK.
The lords of the mill, of the mines, and of the countingroom, now build castles, and sway a scepter more powerful than that of the old baronial halls.  Feudalism has
paled before king cotton and the steam engine. It is at
the Bourse, or on the Exchange, that war is declared, or
peace concluded. In the Chronicles of England, just before the passage of the Reform Bill, it is written:
"The Duke of Wellington was quite prepared with
Scotch Greys, with rough-ground swords and the like, to
bolster up the abuses of the Church and State; he was
prepared to make the Bank bristle with bayonets, and repel any attack on it with armed bands; but men began
to present checks in undue abundance, and ask for gold in
exchange for notes. Frightened Directors told the Duke
that the Bank could not stand the monetary siege twentyfour hours longer; and the old soldier, finding that there
were powers in society not dreamed of in his gunpowder
philosophy, saw immediately that he must give way to
more pacific counsels."




APPENDIX B.-PAGE 44.
REPUBLICS AND LETTERS.
"It would seem," says Dr. Vaughan, in his volume on
great cities, "to be the notion of some men that where
there is no high hereditary class, possessing large hereditary wealth, there can be no successful cultivation of art,
or of intelligence of any kind, in their higher forms. But
the slightest acquaintance with the history of ancient
Greece should have sufficed to prevent such an error. It
may well be doubted, if the world would hitherto have
seen such an age as that of Augustus, or that of Louis
XIV., if it had not previously seen the age of Pericles. It
is a remarkable fact, and one which the class of persons
adverted to would do well to consider, that the States of
Greece, which knew nothing of hereditary distinctions,
which were not possessed of large wealth, which consisted
of so many city communities, and were pervaded generally
by the spirit of Republicanism, colonization, and commerce-that it was given to those states to supply, to all
subsequent time, the highest models of the wonderful in
science and art, models which the proudest empires have
done well to imitate, which they have rarely equaled, and
never surpassed." P. 133.
Dr. Vaughan is an Englishman, and can not be supposed to be prejudiced in favor of republican institutions.




REPUBLICS  AND,LETTERS.               137
He is one of the ablest writers of Great Britain.  His
work on cities is worthy of attention from all who seek information as to their influence on the various departments
of human industry. But it is not only in Greece that we
find a Republic the home and patron of Letters and of the
Fine Arts.  CARTHAGE, PALMYRA, and ROME in her greatest power, as well as ATHENS, were Republics. And
FLORENCE rose out of the wreck of the dark ages essentially a republican city. It became distinguished as the
home of rich traders and manufacturers, as well as the
asylum  of the arts.  The extraordinary wealth of the
Florentines flowed from  their numerous manufactures at
home, and their trade and banking speculations carried on
by their merchants abroad. Their most important manufactures were in silks, woolens, and jewelry.  Every citizen, to be eligible to office, was required to have his name
on the rolls of one or other of the. Trades. DANTE had
his name put down as an apothecary, but he never
practiced his profession. And so numerous were the influential traders of Florence residing abroad, that when
Pope Boniface VIII., after his election, received the congratulatory addresses of foreign states, twelve of the envoys accredited to him, were citizens of Florence; on
which Boniface exclaimed, "The Florentines constitute
the fifth element of creation!" And Roscoe says, " The
freedom of the Italian governments, and particularly that
of Florence, gave to the human faculties their full energies."  It was in their cities, the labors of the painter and
the statuary were early associated with the mysteries of
religion as it then prevailed, and the wealth and ostentation of individuals and of states, held out rewards sufficient to excite the endeavors even of the phlegmatic and
the indolent.  And in our day, where, but among our
12*




138                APPENDIX.
trading cities can we find a Florence?  And who but our
merchant princes are our Medici? Where were our benevolent enterprises, and our schools, asylums, libraries and
universities, but for our Perkinses, Lawrences, and commercial benefactors?
It has been well said by Roscoe " that those periods of
time which have been most favorable to the progress of
Letters and Science have generally been distinguished by
an equal proficiency in the arts." (Life of Lorenzo de
Medici, p. 306.)
The revival of letters, arts, and commerce, was cotemporaneous in Italy. They are still respectively cause and
effect. Nor can any one of the great branches of human
art or industry flourish segregated from the rest.




APPENDIX C.-PAGE 64.
COMMERCE CONQUERING.
"-W hose sounding
O'er the whole earth is echoing and rebounding."
MORGANTE MAGGIOBE.
BAYARD TAYLOR tells us that our national airs are heard
in the jungles of India and on the slopes of the Himmalayas. There is not a nook or corner of Asia or Africa, and
but few, if any, of the remote islands of the sea, where the
traveler does not now find the manufactured goods of Europe and America.  One of the great distinctive features
of our day is the goings forth of the trade of Christian
nations. And its influence in elevating society and supplying human wants justly entitles it to its pre-eminence.
Compared with a recent past, the present attainments of
human industry are an astonishing spectacle. But what
are the highest conquests of the present to those of the
rapidly coming future? The progress of coming years
will be in geometrical ratio. The day of discoveries and
inventions is by no means past. There is a great future
still before the Church on earth, and for our race on this
planet. BRISBANE, in a letter to the Earl of Derby, in Lingard, the Roman Catholic historian of England, says,
" that the trade of England in the reign of Charles II. was
at such a height that it is as hard to think it can continue




140                  A r P E  D IX.
so, as it was to believe once it would ever rise to it."
Think of the trade of England under Charles II. and her
Majesty Queen Victoria! What vould Brisbane think
could he write a letter now to the present Earl of Derby
about clipper ships and steamers?  The progress made
now in seven years in all the industrial departments of the
great Protestant nations of the earth exceeds that of any
previous period of the same duration; and I fancy, whether
our physical constitution changes every seven years or not,
that great changes will take place in the affairs of the
world as often as once in every seven years henceforward,
and I hope always for the advance of truth. If we may
judge from the history of America and Australia, all savage nations will become extinct. Wealth will prevail over
the destitute. The commercial races will always succeed
at last in buying out or conquering their savage neighbors.
No other issue is possible, unless they adopt the arts of
their trading and conquering neighbors.  The savage
races in contact with the civilized must submit, either to
be swept away, or adopt the arts of civilization.




APPENDIX  D.-PAGE 64.
THE CRADLE OF OUR RACE.
IN view of the theories put forth in our day by some of
our savans, it may be of use to remember what eminent
European scholars have said on the origin of the human
races.
HEEREN tells us explicitly that Central Asia " from  the
earliest times has been regarded as the magazine of our
race. And the further back we go into the history of the
first ages of the world, the more probable does it appear
that the whole of Western Europe received its population
from thence" (Central Asia).*
And in nlany other places in his volumes of " Historical
Researches into the Politics, Intercourse, and Trade, of the
Principal Nations of Antiquity," does this great historian
and profound scholar express his opinion that the interior
of Central Asia is the place whence, both east and west,
the human races were dispersed. It is a singular fact that
as far as any traditions are known to exist among the aborigines of this continent and the far east, that they all
agree substantially in claiming their origin from the same
portion of the globe. And history points us with unerring
certainty to the fact, that great periodical emigrations of
tribes and nations have taken place fiom  east to west,
* Heeren's Asiatic Nations, vol ii., p. 4.




142                 APPENDIX.
and from  Central Asia to the further East.  It was
national pride that caused some of the ancients to call
themselves autocthones, or natives of their soil, for their
national traditions and histories  testified to the  contrary.  And if it be admitted that it is in India and Egypt
that we find man first advanced in civilization-that we
first find extraordinary progress in science and architecture, agriculture, and in laws and in judicial proceedings,
it only proves that there man first established himself
under such favorable circumstances as enabled him to develop his mental faculties in the useful and elegant arts.
Dr. Latham, in his work, "Man and his Migrations," and
in his larger work, " The Natural History of the Varieties
of Man," substantially sustains these views.  And Colonel Smith says:
" There is constantly a record of antecedent existence,
though not a history, among early nations.  It is variously told, but not the less the same in substance, in both
hemispheres, and in the South Sea islands. Although in
Central Asia, no very distinct evidence of a general diluvian action, so late as to involve the fate of many nations,
can be detected, still there can not be a doubt that, with
scarce an opposable circumstance, all man's historical dogmatical knowledge and traditionary records, all his acquirements, inventions, and domestic possessions, point to that
locality, as connected with a great cataclysis, and as the
scene where human development took its first most evident
distribution.  W1rest of central Asia, all records agree in
pointing to the E'ast for the direction whence nations migrated."*
It is a singular coincidence also, as to man's primeval
* Lieutenant Colonel Charles Hamilton Smith's Natural History
of the Human Species, pp. 109, 110, 218.




THE  CRADLE  OF  OIUR  RACE.              143
location, that all " our historical dogmatic knowledge and
traditionary records" not only as to man himself, but also
as to the source of the animals, fruits, birds, and inventions that have accompanied him in his migrations, should
all point to the same locality. The animals subdued for
household purposes-like the dog, ox, ass, camel and
horse, sheep and goats, and birds, and fruit-bearing trees
and shrubs, and the wheat and barley of our fieldsshould all historically and by tradition point to Central
Asia as the place where they were first domesticated, and
whence they have been dispersed over the globe.  "Even
the LOTUS, celebrated in Egypt, was derived from some
part of India."  The evidence in our day has become complete, that even Egypt was connected with, and dependent
on Asia, for the beginning of its colonies, and the origin
of its civilization. In the monumental records of the Nile,
many objects, living plants and shrubs, carefully transported for replanting, and also animals and other objects of
value offered as tribute, "are evidently from an eastern
region." The religion of Egypt was closely allied to that
of India, though no doubt, both, after their separation,
were modified by revolutions, innovations, and the successive incorporations of foreign elements.  Colonel Smith
informs us that the British sepoys, forming a part of General Sir R. Abercombie's expedition for the re-conquest of
Egypt, " no sooner entered the ancient temples in the valley of the Nile, than they asserted their own divinities
were discovered on the walls, and worshiped there accordingly. They even pointed out the Cresvaminam, or
Brahmin distinguishing cord, as likewise a decoration of
the painted divinities."




APPENDIX E.-PAGE 64.
CARTHAGE.
WHETHER Carthage was founded by Queen Dido, or by
Zorus and Carchedon, is of but little concern to us. The
lessons of its rise and fall are much more important. It
was from the beginning a trading city, and by its trade
grew to opulence and power. Its wealth was the product
of mines, manufactures, trade both by land and water, and
its fall was the result of avarice and wealth not employed
in productive industry. Her caravans passed from the
Nile to the Niger, and from the Deserts of Libya her
gates were crowded with camels. Spain was to Carthage
what Mexico and Peru became to Castile and Leon.
While the tribes of the interior were farmers, hunters, and
carriers to Carthage, she could sustain her immense
army of mercenaries, but with the decline of her trade,
her ability to carry on war declined also. The settlement
of the Phenicians in Africa was for the purpose of trade.
Being well situate, and gaining dominion over many of
the normal tribes, and a footing in Sicily and Spain, Carthage soon became independent of Tyre. It is said by
some that their navigation extended round the African
continent, and to Iceland, and America. Their most salutary influence was on the native tribes, whom they caused
to till the soil. In her day Carthage was the center of
mmerce and one of the greatest cities of the world.




C A R T I A   E.              143 
When she fell, all the dominion of commercial civilization
over the tribes of Africa ceased, and it has so continued
to our day. It is only of late years that even an attempt
has been made to recover what was lost in the fall of Carthage. She was the only center of Letters and of Trade
in Africa. Never celebrated, it is true, for her literature,
nor was she wholly without libraries and authors. SALLUST informs us that King Hiempsal had a collection of
Carthaginian historians, who furnished much valuable information about the early history of Africa.*  PLINY
makes mention of Juba's African Chronicles gathered from
Punic, Libyan, Greek, and Latin authorities, which work
however is lost. When the Romans conquered the Carthaginians they gave their libraries to their Numidian
allies. But that it now appears as a chapter in a wise
Providence, we could never forgive the Romans for their
selfishness and cold blood in destroying Carthage. At
her fall, the world lost her literature, and her colonies beyond the Pillars of Hercules were forgotten, and the
key of their discoveries and extensive trade was lost for
ages. Some of the causes that contributed to her fall
were the means of extending trade and kind offices
among mankind. We have already stated that she caused
many of the nomadic tribes of northern Africa to become agriculturists, by demanding their tribute in corn.
This was a great blessing to her and to them. But these
tribes never loved her. They were always ready to rise
in revolt on the approach of an enemy. It was a knowledge of this fact that made two Roman generals invade
Africa at different times with an army of only fifteen thousand men. It was a great error in her policy not to make
friends of the nations she conquered.  Another cause of
* De bello Jugurtha.




1-1 6               APPEND I X.
her fall was the immellnse army of mercenaries she cupioye,].
Her great armies were composed almost entirely of foreigners.  So rich was Carthage from her monopoly of trade,
that at one time, almost half Afriical and Europe were in
the pay of this rich republic.'"*  Libyans, Spanish, Gallic,
Celtic, Greeks, Moors, Numidians, Liguriians, Italian!s, Campanians, and Balearic slingers were all found in their
armies.  At one time, in an army of seventy thousand
men, there were only two thousand Carthaginians, who
were the sacred legion, or body-guard of heavy-armed infantry for the commanding general. In one of their great
sea-fights with the Romans, they employed three hundred
and fifty galleys and one hundred and fifty thousand men,
and the Romans three hundred and thirty galleys and one
hundred and forty thousand men.  By the employment of
hiredtroops, however, the way of trade was extended.  For
as distant nations learned to know one another as comrades in arms, and fought as allies of Carthage, so did their
gates open to Carthaginian traders.  And her merchants
cemented the friendship begun by national alliances. The
same results followed the mingling of nations in Alexander's vast armies, and from the wars of the Crusades; and
similar results will follow the alliances of the present war
of the great nations of Europe, and from the " assemblage
of nations at universal exhibitions of the world's industry."
The fall of Carthage was not, however, owing altogether to her hired troops, nor to the revolt of her nomadic
tribes, nor to the power of her rival, Rome.  The seeds of
her decay were sown before this.  Her decline began inll
two great abuses, the sale of the highest places, which was
connected with bribery and elections, and in the accrnulation of several high offices in the same p3rson.  These
* Heeren, Carthaginians, p. 123.




CARTHA GE.                     1-4-7
abuses led to gross corruption, centralization and factions,
which destroyed the Great Republic of Africa.  It was by
the fierceness of party spirit fed by unscrupulous demagogues, that the republic was overthrown. A nation
united in itself is unconquerable.  A  brave nation can
only die by suicide; but the most mighty are an easy prey
to their enemies when the spirit of faction prevails over
patriotism.




APPENDIX F.-PAGE 64.
ACCURACY OF OLD WRITERS.
IT is clear from the learned labors of Heeren, supported
as he is in most part by the researches of Denham, Clapperton, Lyon, Oudney, Hornemann, Gau and others more
recent, or of less note, that much more credit is due to
what the ancients, such as Pliny, Appian, Scylax, Strabo,
Livy, Diodorus, Polybius and Herodotus, have written of
Asia and Africa than has generally been supposed. And
it is also clear that a much greater intercourse was carried
on between the nations of antiquity, and that, in fact, they
were further advanced in civilization, than has been generally allowed. There are sufficient vestiges still remaining of the commercial intercourse that once existed between the nations of the interior of Afiica, to show that it
must have been very great, and, that their commerce was
the soul of whatever life they had. The story of Bruce is
well known. Once reputed the greatest of traveling liars,
he is now restored to his place as a veracious historian.




APPENDIX G.-PAGE 66.
ANTIQUITY OF COMMERCE.
SAIS, Thebes, Memphis, Carthage, and Alexandria have
perished. Ammonium has dwindled into the insignificant
Siwah, and Axum and Carthage are no more. But it was
to commerce they owed their existence, their magnificence, and their splendor.  And according to Heeren,
CEYLON was the principal emporium of oriental trade for
more than two thousand years. It is certain that in the
Persian era there was an active commerce carried on between the Greek cities on the Black Sea, and all the interior of Scythia, north and east from Siberia to India.
Different caravan routes were used, and cities grew up at
both ends of these routes, and large dep6ts were established on the way. The trade of these consisted of corn,
furs, slaves and aromatics. And it is a remarkable fact,
that in this era, the interior of Scythia, and of all the
countries north and east of the Black Sea and by the
Caspian Sea, and of the interior of north-eastern Africa
was better known than in  our day.  The Hindoos
in their most ancient works are represented as a commercial people. Their commodities were known in the
markets of Phenicia, Carthage, Egypt and Babylon. In
the Arabian Nights, and in the Ramayana, merchants
appear as having traveled from one place to another, and




150                 AP P END I X.
all over the world, and as men possessed of liberal views
high rank, and of the highest intelligence. It is the conclusion of IHeeren, supported by a great many other authorities, that a regular chain of mercantile nations
extended at a very remote day from  China to India, and
to the Black Sea, and to the nations on the Mediterranean,
and also to Arabia and Egypt, through the cities of the
Indus, the Euphrates, and the Red Sea.  Gold was so
plenty that iron was more precious.  Their armor, and
horses' bridle-bits were plated with it, or made of it, as
also many of their vessels. This supports several allusions
to gold in the Bible.




APPEENIIX  H.-PAGE 67.
A USTP  ALIA.
THE walnt of an indented sea margin, and the vast
square mass of inland in Australia, and the barren uniformity of its scenery, or rather the want of scenery, is believed by some writers and naturalists to be the cause of
the degradation of its aborigines.  And the gloom of its
future history is only relieved by the fact that it is now in
the possession of a race who, by education and commercial energy are superior to the accidents of physical geography.  These facts, if admitted as facts, and applied to us
are much in our favor.  We are possessed of every thing
requisite to overcome any unfavorable tendencies that may
exist in any part of our domain.  We have a vast and
variegated sea margin, inland and transmarine trade, and
an endlessly variegated interior scenery.
A glance at the map of those countries distinguished
for their civilization, shows that their extent of sea coast
has called out their ingenuity. Sea-inlets, adjacent islands,
and transmarine shores lhave been found favorable to enterprise and corporeal exertion.  Witness "the isles of
Greece" and Scotland.  Facilities of intercourse are also
promoted by a general proximity to the great highways
of nations.




APPENDIX I.-PAGE 69.
ALEXANDER THE GREAT.
So intent was this conqueror to render the union of his
subjects complete, that a tablet was found after his death,
among his magnificent plans, containing a resolution to
build several new cities, some in Asia, and some in Europe,
and to people those in Asia with Europeans, and those in
Europe with Asiatics, that by intermarriages, and exchange
of good offices, the inhabitants of these two great continents might be gradually molded into a similarity of sentiments, and become attached to each other with mutual
affection. (Diod. Sicul., lib. xviii.., c. 4.)




APPENDIX J.-PAGE 69.
M O H A I MM E D.
IT is not within the design of this little work to discuss
the rise and progress of Mohamnmedanism, nor to settle the
question as to whether Mohammed was a fanatic or a
knave. Our countrymen, Dr. George Bush and Washington Irving have each written eloquently and learnedly on
the life and doings of the great Arabian prophet. A few
items seemed call for, however, in illustration of the remarks made in the second lecture on the trade of the
Saracens or followers of Mohammed. It was as a traveler
and merchant that the founder of Islamism acquired the
knowledge and means to make himself a prophet. At
one time in early life we find him going with his uncle
Zobier with a caravan to Yemen, and then to Syria. And
sometimes with the same uncle, or another one, engaged in
warlike expeditions. It was, however, as a commercial
agent or factor, that we find him  chiefly employed. His
business enlarged his sphere of observation both of men
and things, and gave him a quick insight into the state of
human affairs. He was also a frequenter of the great
fairs held at Mecca, which were common before he
preached the new faith. These fairs were not merely exhibitions of trade, but sometimes, like the games of Greece,
they were also poetical contests between different tribes.
Poems and other literary compositions were read, and




154                APPENDIX.
prizes adjudged to the victors, and the prize pieces were
treasured up in the archives of the city. At the fair of
Ocadh seven prize poems were hung up as trophies in the
CAABA. At these fairs also popular traditions were recited, and in this manner various religious faiths and the
legends of the religions of remote times and distant countries were kept afloat in Arabia. And thus the trade,
religion, and letters of the times were all blended together.
Mohammed married the widow of a rich merchant. Her
business was extensive and she required some one to manage it. Mohammed was now about twenty-five years of
age, and reputed to have been possessed of extraordinary
beauty and engaging manners.
It was no strange thing, therefore, that Mrs. Widow Cadijah employed him to conduct her caravans to Syria. She
promised to give him double wages, and so much was she
pleased with his management of her affairs, that on his
return, she paid him double the amount of wages agreed
on. And after sending him on several other trading expeditions to Southern Arabia, she rewarded him not only
with double wagres, but with herself. Now in the traditions with which Mohammed was well acquainted, Heathen, Hebrew, and Christian, and in the enlargement and
quickening of his intellect by trade, and the improvement
of his manners by intercourse with men, and in the power
of his wealth and of his mighty connections, and the influence of his tribe, on the one hand, and in the fact that
the whole world was then almost overrun with idolatry
both Pagan and Christian so called, on the other hand,
there seems to be no difficulty in accounting for his success
in preaching the Divine unity and spirituality. Similar
causes to some extent will explain the progress of Mormonism. Mormonism is not really a new religion. It has




Mi O H A lI M  E D.          155
existed in all ages; and the apathy of Christendom, the
deadness of the churches, the neglect of the temporal wellbeing of the masses by nominally Christian countries, the
appeal made to the poor of Europe to better their worldly
condition and gain political rights by becoming Mormons
and emigrating to this country, and the natural selfishness
and corruption of man are quite sufficient to account for
the success of the wicked and abominable faith established
in the modern Sodom on the banks of the American
Dead Sea.
14




APPENDIX K.-PAGE 81.
GOD IN TRADE.
PROVIDENCE has, in a most remarkable manner, ordained commerce, and given TRADE a fixed place among
the laws of the universe, by conferring treasures on some
portions of the earth that others have not, and displayed
supreme goodness and wisdom in having so constituted
the races of men that, respectively, they do not, and can
not exist in the higher and best states of civilization without the mutual exchanges of the products of the different
portions of the globe, and the exercise of the kind offices
of good neighborhood, and reciprocal GOOD WILL. "Nature
compels mankind to a mutual intercourse, by endowing
even the desert with articles necessary for human existence."7*
Take Africa as an illustration of this remark of Heeren.
Salt and dates are two great essential commodities of the
Africans. But the salt pits are in the interior, where the
date does not grow. And gold dust is not found where
the date grows, nor where the salt is obtained. And so
also we find coal and cotton usually remote from each
other, and the precious metals alike remote, at least in
large quantities, from both. It is thus God has distributed his bounties that men may be compelled to establish
* Heeren.




GOD IN  TRARDE.                 157
a mutual intercourse. It is thus that Providence urges
man to industry, intercourse, and trade; and also indicates by the course of rivers and mountains, by estuaries and
seas, and oases, the routes or channels of human intercourse.
In large portions of the Old World the great routes of
travel are unchangeably fixed. But for the oases of the
deserts large regions of Asia and Africa must have remained
forever unknown to man. But with the oases God has
given man animals that can sustain great heat, carry great
burdens, and perform tedious journeys without water. It
is the God of all mercies who both dotted the sandy
wastes with islands as resting-places for travelers, and
pointed out the routes by which human intercourse shall
be carried on. Hence it is that the caravans of Africa are
moving along to-day the very same routes their forefathers
traveled thousands of years ago. From the days of Hannibal, when Carthage monopolized the wealth of Africa, to
our own, there has been but little changed in its caravan
routes. The same route is pursued now between Fezzan
and Upper Egypt, that the Garamantes traveled when they
hunted for men. We have heard of late years a great deal
of " God in Science," and " in History."  This is all right
enough, but why do we not hear something also of God
in Cormerce?




APPENDIX L.-PAGE 84.
CONNECTION OF TRADE AND LETTERS.
"THE more the refined arts advance, the more sociable
do men become; nor is it possible that, when enriched
with science, and possessed of a fund of conversation, they
should be contented to remain in solitude, or live with
their fellow-citizens in that distant manner which is peculiar to ignorant and barbarous nations. They flock into
cities; love to receive and communicate knowledge; to
show their wit or their breeding; their taste in conversation or living; in clothes or furniture.  Curiosity allures
the wise, vanity the foolish, and pleasure both. Particular
clubs and societies are everywhere formed; both sexes
meet in an easy and sociable manner; and the tempers of
men, as well as their behavior, refine apace. So that beside the improvement they receive from knowledge and
the liberal arts, it is impossible but they must feel an
increase of humanity from the very habit of conversing
together, and contributing to each other's pleasure and
entertainment. Thus industry, knowledge, and humanity
are linked together by an indissoluble chain; and are
found, from experience as well as reason, to be peculiar to
the more polished, and what are commonly denominated
the more luxurious ages." (Essay on Refinement in the
Arts.)




APPENDIX M.-PAGE 90.
RISE OF POPULAR LIBERTY IN CITIES.
THE history of Europe shows that with the granting of
charters to cities soon after the Crusades, a new era dawned
in regard to popular liberty. The enlargement of ideas
consequent upon the Crusades awakened the spirit of commerce, especially in Venice, Genoa, and Pisa., and wealth
flowed in such abundance into those cities that they were
soon able to secure a large measure of liberty and independence. The oppression of the feudal system caused
many of. the cities of Europe to form themselves into communities or corporations. Dr. Robertson thinks that the
granting of municipal jurisdiction to the cities of Europe as
bodies politic " contributed more than any other cause to
introduce regular government, police, and arts, and to diffuse them over Europe." (Charles V., View, etc., p. 19.)
But it was the advantages of commerce that first led
the cities of Italy to think of shaking off the yoke of feudalism, and to establish among themselves such a free and
equal government as would render property secure and
industry flourishing.  "The great increase of wealth
which the crusades brought into Italy occasioned a new
kind of fermentation and activity in the minds of the
people, and excited such a general passion for liberty and
independence, that before the conclusion of the last Cru14*




160                  AP PEENDIX.
sade, all the considerable cities in that country had either
purchased or had extorted large immunities from the emperor," (Ib.)  The same immunities were soon extended to
France and over Europe. And so jealous were the corporated cities of their liberty, that if any slave found
refuge in any one of them and was not claimed for a year
he was declared a freeman, and admitted as a member of
the community. The immediate effects of the rise of corporated cities and of their leagues against the violence of
the feudal lords, were that industry revived, and commerce
began to flourish, and population increased; and wealth
flowed into them; and as they became more populous and
wealthy, and extended their intercourse among  themselves, and into foreign countries, it became more and more
necessary to adopt salutary and liberal laws, and to execute
them with promptitude and integrity. The influence of
liberal institutions and of polished manners in wealthy cities
was of course soon insensibly diffused through the rest of
society. And as their inhabitants had obtained personal
freedom, and municipal jurisdiction, so they soon acquired
civil liberty and political power. To the entrance of the
representatives of cities into the legislatures of Europe
must we ascribe the rise of popular liberty in the feudal
kingdoms. They became an intermediate power between
the king and the nobles, and the guardians of civil rights
and privileges.  "Almost all the efforts," says Robertson,
"in favor of liberty in every country of Europe, have
been made by the representatives of cities in their legisla.
ture." This fact is also illustrated in the rise and history
of the cities that became great from the trade of the Lombards carrying the treasures of the East to the Baltic. (See
the History of the Hanseatic League).




APPENDIX N. —PAGE 91.
PREJUDICE AGAINST COMMERCE.
Trade is ordained of God. Still there is a considerable prejudice against it. The Turks are strongly prejudiced against shop-keeping  and tavern-keeping.  The
Greeks keep their hotels, and the Armenians and Jews do
their customs, collecting and Bank-shaving.  Many honest
and hard-working people in Christian countries entertain
also a kind of prejudice against merchants and traders, as
if they were getting their living by their arts, rather than
by their work, and not only living without work, but living off other people. It is considered a hardship to have
to work to raise or manufacture articles of trade, and then
that somebody else should make a living better than ours
merely by selling our articles. But in the long run, it is
found best there should be a division of labor and of trades,
and that things should be in these matters very much as
they are. Such affairs are like water, if just let alone they
will regulate themselves, and find their true level.
This prejudice against trade is not confined to the ignorant. PLATO taught that in a well regulated commonwealth
the citizens should not engage in commerce, nor the State
aim at obtaining maritime power. He contended that
commerce corrupts the purity of the morals of the citizens,
and the sea-service would accustom them to find so many




162                APrr PE  D1X.
pretexts for wrong-doing, that all military discipline would
be destroyed, and every manly habit. He asserted that it
would have been better for the Athenians to have continued to send annually the sons of seven of their principal citizens to be dlevoured by the Minotaur, than to have
changed their ancient manners and have become a maritime power. Aristotle adopted the same ideas. Plato says
that the capital of the perfect republic which he delineated
should be situated at least ten miles from the sea.  (De
Legibus, lib. iv.)




APPENDIX O.-PAGE 91.
LORENZO DE MEDICI.
" Those are to be esteemed peculiarly happy, who, having improved their
minds by study, can withdraw themselves at intervals from public engagements and private anxiety, and in some agreeable retreat indulge themselves
in ample range through all the objects of the natural and umoral world."-RosCOE's "LO.ENZO  IDE MEDICI," p. 67.
A WORD more may be allowed about this great mnan, to
whom literature owes so much; and this the more, because
in lim we find a happy union of the elegant and the useful pursuits of life.  We find him at the same time searching' over Italy and Greece for manuscripts, and seeking to
govern his own city and to preserve the peace of Italy,
and to defend Christendom  against the Turk.  And we
find him delighted in his farm  and library and with his
literary associates; and yet his cows were the best in the
world; his stables remarkable for order and neatness; his
dairy supplied Florence with cheese, so that they were no
longer obliged to procure it from Lombardy; and his hogs
fed by the whey fiom  his cheese grew to a remarkable
size; and his poultry-yard was graced by peacocks, and
quails, and pheasants. And his gardens and orchards, and
especially of mulberries, were so extensive that it was hoped
the price of silk would be greatly reduced. And yet this
is the man to whom we are to ascribe in a great degree
the revival of a taste in Europe for the works of the an



164                 A PPENDIX
cients, and the establishment of public libraries, which in
their turn became the active agents of further movements
in the world of science. And thus had God ordained that
when Constantinople fell, eastern science should find a home
in Italy-and that as letters were flying from  the cimiter
of the fierce Mohammed II., there should be an asylum
for them at the foot of the Alps. This is the man-this
worker in mines, this overseer of farms, and this factor of
goods; this swine-raising, cheese-making, garden-planting
patron of letters and of the fine arts-that is represented
as the father of all such as dwell in the tents of dilletantism, or dance before the glass of nambypambyism.
When the factors and correspondents of Lorenzo de Medici gave him so much trouble by their incompetence and
negligence that he closed his mercantile concerns and relinquished the fluctuating advantages of commerce for the
more certain revenue of his farms in Tuscany, one object
he had in view was that he might enjoy more leisure for
pious reading.. The existence and attributes of God were
favorite subjects of meditation with him. Often was he
accustomed to say, "he is dead even to this life, who has
no hopes of another." Often did he discourse eloquently
of the insufficiency of temporal enjoyments to fill the mind,
and of the probability and moral necessity of a future
state.
It is difficult to define or fully conceive how much we
owe to those who in past ages have been instrumental in
preserving the treasures of wisdom. Such collections of
manuscripts and of books as were gathered on the foundation begun by the Medici are the SENSORIUM of our race.
They were torch-bearers to the great MARTIN LUTHER and
his co-laborers.




APPENDIX P.-PAGE 129.
CONSCIENCE IN BUSINESS.
MR. JOHN HIGGINSON at Salem, Mass., in 1663 uttered
the following potent words:
"My brethren, this is never to be forgotten, that our
New England is originally a plantation of religion, and not
a plantation of trade. Let merchants, and such as are making cent. per cent., remember this. Let others who have
come over since at several times, remember this, that
worldly gain was not the end and design of the people of
New England, but religion. And if any man among us
make religion as twelve, and the world as thirteen, let such
an one know he hath neither the spirit of a true New England man, nor yet of a sincere Christian." This extract
is highly suggestive. It is true that New England was
" originally a plantation of religion, and not a plantation
of trade."  " Freedom to worship God," and not gain, was
the chief end of the Puritan colonists. And yet where on
the face of the earth has the gain of godliness in this life
been more speedily and munficently realized? It may be
true now as is alleged, that we are a money-loving people
-that many New England men " make religion as twelve,
and the world as thirteen, but it is also true that our fathers were refugees from political and religious persecution.
They were led by faith. And if some of their descendants




166                 ArPENDIIX.
have lost their spirit, it does not follow but that the Sayiour is faithful in fulfilling his promise, that whosoever
should give up houses and lands for his sake, should receive an hundredfold.   There is no portion of this continent equal, in regard to actual wealth, to that settled by
New England men.  It is not to be inferred from  this
statement, that wealth is in itself inconsistent with religion,
nor that the true worldly interests of a man require him
to give up his piety.  Without doubt a merchant's interests lie in the line of his commercial transactions.  It consists in his invoices, insurances, commissions, profits, rent
rolls, and bills of exchange.  But is this all?  Was not
every merchant a man before he was a merchant?  And
are his interests as a man sunk in his interests as a merchant?  Does the merchant's relation to his money rend
asunder his relation, as a man, to virtue and society, social
and domestic. Hath not God joined principle, truth, and
duty to our every individuality as firmly as our imnmortality? The philosophy of the Bible, brought down from
heaven to the counting-room, teaches, that " inside of
every merchant there is, or has been, and ought still to be,'a man."'" His circumstances may have been favorable to
his integrity, or the reverse. His education, and habits,
and pursuits may be varied, almost infinitely so; but in
every merchant there ought still to be a masn.
It is as short-sighted a policy in business as it is wicked
in the sight of God to suppose that swe may regard our
conscience in dealing with our fellow-men as Frederic II.
is said to have considered religion in a king.  "Religion,"
said he, "is absolutely necessary to the well-being of
States, and he is not a wise king who allows his subjects
to abuse it; nevertheless, he is not a wise king who hinmself has any religion at all." But how does the merchant




CO N SCIENCE IN  B U SIXESS.             167
expect his clerks to be honest with him, if they see him
cheating his customers? Is it reasonable for the fraudulent
banker to expect his debtors to be honest to him, if he is not
honest toward his creditors? In the long run, as we measure to others, it is measu ed to us again. "A rogue in grain
becomes a rogue in spirit in every thing."  It is thought,
somehow or other, by some people, that to be a merchant is
to pursue such a calling as endangers one's integrity. Dr.
JOHNSON said, a long time ago, that " an English merchant
is a newly-discovered species of gentleman"-a species
that live without work. If this were ever true of English
merchants, it is not true now, for merchants are now
hard toilers. Another satirical Englishman, and no mean
poet, COWLEY, says, "A  man in much business, must
either make himself out a knave, or the world will make
him out a fool; and if the illjury went no further than being laughed at, a wise man would content himself with
retaliation; but the case is much worse, for these civil
cannibals, as well as the wild ones, not only dance round
such a taken stranger, but at last devour him." Now, are
these derisive and severe remarks just? Do business men
deserve them? I am firmly persuaded to the contrary.
Or if such remarks are well-founded, merchants are themselves to blame, and to blame either because they do
not recognize a proper standard in their business, or if
they do, they do not live up to it. There is no necessity
for wrong-doing in legitimate trade.  There may be as
much honesty and piety among merchants as among any
other class of men. Generally they are like Jeremiah's
figs. The good are very good, and the bad are very bad.
In trade, as among military men, there should be a high
standard of honor, and all departures from it should be
visited with deserving penalties.




168                 A Pr  END I X.
It is humiliating to hear so much of fiaudulent failurles,
false swearing, and false entries, and false marking of
goods, and of petty villianies.  But there is still such a
thing as business honor. It is not yet laid away with antediluvian fossils. Yet there is danger of adopting a modification of the maxim, that " honesty is the best policy."
It has already been suggested that it should read, " It is
not always the best honesty which is the best policy." For
it is contended that a great merchant is made, as Lord
Bacon said an eminent statesman was, by " the union of
great and mean qualities."  But who has written the
Novum Organum, or the Principia, or the " Essay on Geographical Distribution of Right and Wrong," that demonstrates how a man may lay aside his great principles when
he goes to his place of business, and put on his meanness
as he does his office coat? Has any La Place discovered
laws by which it is established that an act that is base
and dishonorable in private life becomes legitimate on
the street, or in the Exchange?  A  good conscience in
business is the only source of perennial peace, and the
more extended are our business relations, the more important it is to preserve our commercial integrity as a
people.