Political Sermons of the American Founding Era: 1730–1805: In Two Volumes

44. The Revolution in France [1794]

--44-THE REVOLUTION IN FRANCE Noah Webster NEW-YORK I 7 9 4 NoAH WEBSTER (1758-1843). Son of the Congregational deacon Noah Webster, Sr., the author of this discourse on the French Revolution was the great lexicographer who gave birth to An American Dictionary of the English Language. The younger Noah received his preparatory training for college from Reverend Nathan Perkins in West Hartford, Connecticut. He entered Yale but then briefly served in the Revolutionary War; he resumed his studies at Yale and was graduated in 1778. Intent upon a legal career, he was in due course admitted to the bar in Hartford, only to give up law practice in 1793. From 1782 onward, he had been increasingly drawn to his true career, the study and teaching of the English language in its distinctive and patriotic modes. His grammars, readers, and spellers began to be published in 1784 and were issued and reissued well into this century. Webster estimated that fifteen million copies of The American Spelling Book had been printed by 1837 and, in all, a hundred million (running through four hundred editions) of the blue-backed speller had been printed by the twentieth century. Webster agitated throughout the country for a copyright law to protect his publications and eventually saw one passed. A strong Federalist , he campaigned for the adoption of the Constitution. He also lectured far and wide on the English language and collaborated with Benjamin Franklin in devising a phonetic alphabet. Though Franklin 's version proved too radical for full adoption, his and Webster's efforts helped shape the American language. In New York, Webster edited magazines and newspapers off and on over a ten-year period. By I8o3-having moved to New Haven, Connecticut, in I798-he had abandoned that line of work and turned to his chief concern, the study of language. Beginning with the publication of a preparatory lexicon in I8o6, he brought forth the Dictionary in two quarto volumes in I828. The most ambitious publishing project in America up to that time, this work demonstrated a great advance in the field of lexicography. Webster spent most of his later years in Amherst, Massachusetts, and in New Haven, and in that period he published five revisions of the Dictionary, a revised translation of the King James Version of the Bible, and many essays and addresses. Captured by the inspirations of the Second Awakening, he became a strong Calvinist and Congregationalist , especially after I8o8. NOAH WEBSTER In The Revolution in France, Webster brilliantly reflects on the religious and philosophic implications of the upheaval. Always concerned to find a balance between virtue and liberty, this piece marked Webster's departure (in the words of William F. Vartorella) "from his tenets espousing the rights of man to self-enhancement. The indiscriminate use of the guillotine made him shudder; his philosophical foundation crumbled under the strain and man, a sullen being, emerged as depraved" (American Writers Before z8oo, p. 1534). PREFACE n the progress of the French Revolution, candid men find much to praise, and much to censure. It is a novel event in the history of nations, and furnishes new subjects of reflection. The end in view is noble; but whether the spirit of party and faction, which divided the National Assembly, sacrificed one part, and gave to the other the sovereign power over the nation, will not deprive the present generation of the blessings of freedom and good government, the objects contended for, is a very interesting question. Equally interesting is it to enquire what will be the effects of the revolution on the agriculture , commerce, and moral character of the French nation. The field of speculation is new, and the subject curious. The writer of the following remarks came into society, during the late war with Great-Britain; his heart was very early warmed with a love of liberty; his pen has often advocated her cause. When the revolution in France was announced in America, his heart exulted with joy; he felt nearly the same interest in its success, as he did in the establishment of American independence. This joy has been much allayed by the sanguinary procedings of the Jacobins, their atheistical attacks on christianity, and their despicable attention to trifles. He is however candid enough to believe much of the violence of their measures may be attributed to the combination of powers, formed for the most unwarrantable purpose of...