Granted, however,
that it is a free and a noble spirit, I feel a doubt as to whether
it is possible for any nation, at any time in the world's history,
really to take a new start. The American nation is not a new
nation; it is in a sense a very old' nation. It has had a perfectly
new and magnificent field for its energies, and it has made a sweep
of the old conventions; but it cannot get rid of its inheritance of
temperament; and I think that, so far as I can judge, it is too
anxious to emphasize its sense of revolt, its consciousness of
newness of life. Whitman himself would not be so anxious to declare
the ennui of the old, if he did not feel himself in a way
trammelled by it. The moment that a case is stated with any
vehemence, that moment it is certain that the speaker has
antagonists in his eye. There is a story of Professor Blackie at
Edinburgh making a tirade against the stuffiness of the old English
universities to Jowett, the incisive Master of Balliol. At the end,
he said generously, "I hope you people at Oxford do not think that
we are your enemies up here?" "No," said Jowett drily; "to tell the
truth, we don't think about you at all!" The man who is really
making a new beginning, serenely confident in his strength, does
not, as Professor Blackie did, concern himself with his
predecessors at all. Perhaps, indeed, the democratic spirit of
America may be quietly glorying in its strength, and may be merely
waiting till it suits it to speak.
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