The Lamp of Experience

Chapter I. History and the Eighteenth-Century Colonist

LAMP_001-050.indd 3 5/27/11 1:15 PM CHAPTER I History and the Eighteenth-Century Colonist 0 ne ofJohn Adams's favorite questions was, "What do we mean by the revolution? The War?" No. "That was no part of the revolution. It was only an Effect and consequence of it." As he told Hezekiah Niles, "the real American Revolution" was the "radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people." Effected between 1760 and 1775, this took place "before a drop of blood was shed." 1 The shift in American sentiment was startlingly rapid and comprehensive . Americans basked in the reflected glory of the British imperial victory in 1763, secure in the knowledge that the French menace was finally removed. Benjamin Franklin noted that the colonies felt closer to the mother country than to one another? Yet fifteen years later Americans were engaged in a bloody war with the very King and country who had won for them their prized security. And in resisting England the colonies found unity: "Thirteen clocks were made to strike together," observed Adams.3 r. John Adams to Hezekiah Niles, Feb. 13,1818, Charles Francis Adams, ed., The Works ofjohn Adams, 10 vols. (Boston, 1856), X, 282-83, hereafter cited as Adams, Works. 2 . Cited in Arthur M. Schlesinger, Prelude to Independence: The Newspaper War on Britain , 1774-1776 (N.Y., 1958), 4· 3. John Adams to Hezekiah Niles, Feb. 13, 1818, Adams, Works, X, 283. 3 LAMP_001-050.indd 4 5/27/11 1:15 PM ENGLISH HERITAGE AND COLONIAL HISTORICAL VIEW How was this radical change accomplished? In large part it was the achievement of literate politicians who enlightened and informed American opinion. A French observer, the Marquis de Chastellux, passed along Benjamin Harrison's engrossing picture of "a number of respectable but uninformed inhabitants" waiting upon their intellectual betters: "'You assert that there is a fixed intention to invade our rights and privileges; we own that we do not see this clearly, but since you assure us that it is so, we believe it. We are about to take a very dangerous step [against England], but we have confidence in you and will do anything you think proper.' " The American Revolution , the Marquis concluded, was made possible, in Virginia at least, by the popular trust in "a small number of virtuous and enlightened citizens." 4 David Ramsay, participant in and historian ofthe Revolution, concurred with this judgment. In his History of the American Revolution, published in 1789, he paid eloquent tribute to "the well-informed citizens" who made the Revolution possible. Theirs had been the enormously difficult task of first arousing the people to their danger , theirs the subsequent task of sustaining popular feelings over the years of political crisis preceding the war. "In establishing American independence," Ramsay remarked, "the pen and the press had merit equal to that of the sword." Upon the literary contributions of the Revolutionary leadership "depended the success of military operations ."5 Both the responsibility and the accomplishment of these "virtuous and enlightened citizens" is difficult to exaggerate. In standing against their mother country the patriot leaders knew they were 4· Marquis de Chastellux, Travels in North America in the Years 1780, 1781 and 1782, ed. Howard C. Rice, Jr., 2 vols. (Chapel Hill, 1963), II, 429, 435· 5· David Ramsay, The History ofthe American Revolution, 2 vols. (Philadelphia, 1789), II, 322-23. Possibly Ramsay may yet secure the respect that is his due; see; as grounds for such a hope, Page Smith, "David Ramsay and the Causes of the American Revolution," William and Mary Quarterly, 3d ser., 17 (r96o): 51-77. 4 LAMP_001-050.indd 5 5/27/11 1:15 PM History and the Eighteenth-Century Colonist undertaking a hazardous experiment. But they knew the justness of their cause. They were devoted to liberty, but it was liberty based upon "English ideas and English principles." The patriots believed themselves inheritors of the privileges of Englishmen, and "though in a colonial situation," they believed they "actually possessed them." 6 They knew the origins and the history ofthe rights to which they so persuasively laid claim. I To the eighteenth-century colonist, the study of history was a prestigious and a practical pursuit. The Enlightenment furnished arguments for man's ability to re-create, with his God-given reason, a Heavenly City in this world (rather than patiently awaiting the...