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DISCOURSE, &c.

Mr. President, and

Gentlemen of the Historical Society,

It was my purpose, in obeying your orders, to make a sketch of our history from the year 1763 to the year 1783, and compare our condition at the close of two victorious wars, in both of which this state was distinguished among her brethren as the principal theatre and greatest sufferer. This important period, of twenty years, marked by one of those events on which history delights to dwell, will, I trust, be related with philosophic impartiality by some future Hume, to amuse and instruct posterity, when their ancestors shall have mouldered to dust. But reflection told me the time was not yet arrived. Moreover, the bounds of a discourse like this are too narrow to embrace the more prominent incidents and characters. Another circumstance contributed to deter me: however rapid and concise the narrative, egotism could not wholly have been avoided. This circumstance not only forbade the attempt first contemplated, but raised difficulties, which I feared to encounter, in selecting some anterior term. Connected, by the ties of consanguinity, with persons deeply engaged in those feuds by which, at an early day, the colony was agitated, I trembled lest duty and affection

should wrong the memory of their foes: lest some incautious word of praise or blame should obscure the lustre of truth. I must therefore entreat your pardon, that shunning what may be deemed the more proper course, I venture to present some reflections on prominent historical facts and geographical circumstances which distinguish our state. On a cursory glance at the map of North America, our eye is caught by that deep indent, where Long Island (whose eastern point lies between thirty and forty leagues west of the south end of Nantucket shoal) after stretching thirty leagues, on a course but fifteen degrees to the southward of west, is separated by a deep bay from the main land, whose general direction, from Sandy Hook to Cape Hatteras, is but seventeen degrees to the westward of south. The upper end of that bay, divided from the lower by Staten Island, is nearest to the valley which embosoms the great lakes, the St. Lawrence, and the Mississippi, of any seaport on the Atlantic; and the hills which intervene are neither so numerous, so lofty, nor so steep, as those by which other routes are obstructed. The city of NewYork, at the head of this bay, from causes which will probably endure as long as the earth itself, is generally accessible; and the navigation to it is frequently open when that of more southern situations is barred by frost. The channel on the west end of Long Island, though broad and deep, may be so obstructed as to frustrate hostile attempts. The other channel, whose mouth is two degrees to the eastward, and therefore of easier and safer access in dark bad weather, presents a secure and pleasant passage till within eight miles of this city. There a rapid whirlpool and projecting rocks (our Scylla and Charby dis) render it so narrow and difficult, that, although perfectly safe at a proper time, and with a good pilot, it may easily

be rendered too hazardous for an enemy. By the first of these channels, vessels outward bound, within a few hours after casting off from their moorings, gain the open sea. By the second, those which arrive can, with common prudence, reach safe anchorage without a pilot; and the distance from the mouth of the one to that of the other is such that both cannot easily be blockaded by the same squadron. These circumstances alone point out New York as a commercial emporium.

But there are others which contribute largely to the same effect. Beside many small streams, the great Connecticut River pours its waters into the eastern channel; and the western shore of Manhattan Island is washed by the Hudson, navigable fifty leagues by large vessels; and what is peculiar to this noble canal, ships take with them a favouring tide beyond all the ranges of mountain east of that great valley already mentioned, which stretches upward of fourteen hundred miles in a southwestern direction from the island of Orleans, in the St. Lawrence, to the city of Orleans, on the Mississippi. To this valley an inland navigation from the Hudson can easily be extended northward to the St. Lawrence, and westward to the great lakes, whose depth, whose extent, whose pellucid water, and whose fertile shores, are unparalleled. It is probable, that if our western hemisphere had been known to antiquity, those immortal bards who crowned their thundering Jove on the peak of Olympus, would have reared to commerce a golden throne on the granite rock of Manhattan. They might have pictured her as receiving, in a vast range of magazines from Haerlem village round to Haerlem cove (a distance of twenty miles) the willing tribute of mankind; as fostering industry in the remotest regions; scattering on barren shores that plenty which nature had denied; dis

pensing to millions the multiplied means of enjoyment, and pouring the flood-tide of wealth on this her favoured land. Not, indeed, that wealth, which, the plunder of war and the wages of vice, exalts a rapacious head over a servile crowd; but that honest wealth, which, accompanied by freedom and justice, comforts the needy, raises the abject, instructs the ignorant, and fosters the arts. Such are the outlines of a picture which, adorned by classic colouring, might, with the Iliad, have been recommended to his royal pupil by that sage whose mind, acute and profound, was equally skilled in moral, physical, and political science.

The first settlement of this state coincided with its natural advantages. While Englishmen came to America, either flying from ecclesiastical intolerance, or pursuing the treasure its savages were supposed to possess; Dutchmen, inspired with the spirit of trade, instead of sitting down on the skirts of the new world, boldly penetrated to the head navigation of the Hudson. They built there a fort, in the year 1614, and gave it the name of that august family, whose talents and labours, in the cabinet and the field, secured the liberty of England, as well as of Holland, and established the independence of Europe.

The Dutch exhibited a new and interesting spectacle. Near half a century had elapsed since, confederated with the other ten provinces of the low countries, they took up arms to oppose the establishment of the inquisition. After a struggle of thirteen years, abandoned by their associates, they had to contend for civil as well as for religious liberty, not only against their bigoted and bloody foe, but against their former friends also; then submitted to his power. They had, for many preceding ages, been free. The supreme authority belonged to the states, who met on their own adjournment, and

without whose consent neither laws could be passed, nor taxes raised, nor war declared.* These privileges, which every sovereign had sworn to defend, were respected by Charles V. but formed no obstacle to the ambition of his unfeeling son. Thus the revolutions (if without the violation of language that term can be so applied) of Holland, of England, and of America, bear a striking resemblance to each other. Each was a contest to maintain the liberty already enjoyed, and defend it against usurpation. In England, a powerful nation, surrounded by the sea, dismissed their prince, and placed on his throne the husband of his daughter. This work was easy and effectual. In America, the inhabitants of a great continent, separated from the invader by the Atlantic ocean, favoured at first by the wishes and at last by the arms of other nations, were successful after a short, though severe struggle. But in the case of Holland, seven poor provinces, whose surface (about eight and a half million of acres) does not exceed one of our senatorial districts,† whose population, a century after establishing their independence, and when they had reached to the highest point of prosperity, was but two million; about double our present number. These poor provinces sustained a conflict of thirty years with the most powerful nation in Europe. They opposed the ablest generals, at the head of the best troops of that most warlike age. An awful scene! interrupted, not closed, in April, 1609, by a truce of twelve years. When that expired, another contest ensued of seven-and-twenty years. At length, on the 24th October, 1648, almost a century (eighty two years)

* Grotius de Anti. Repub. Bat. cap. 5.

Busching's Geography, Introd. to the Netherlands, sec. 3. and 5. The Germans divide the degrees into 15 geographical miles, which gives, in round numbers, about 13,600 acres to the square geographical mile: of which he gives to the Netherlands 625.

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