Sir Charles Adderley[37] says to the Warwickshire farmers:--
"Talk of the improvement of breed! Why, the race we ourselves
represent, the men and women, the old Anglo-Saxon race, are the best
breed in the whole world.... The absence of a too enervating climate,
too unclouded skies, and a too luxurious nature, has produced so
vigorous a race of people, and has rendered us so superior to all the
world."
Mr. Roebuck[38] says to the Sheffield cutlers:--
"I look around me and ask what is the state of England? Is not property
safe? Is not every man able to say what he likes? Can you not walk from
one end of England to the other in perfect security? I ask you whether,
the world over or in past history, there is anything like it? Nothing. I
pray that our unrivalled happiness may last."
Now obviously there is a peril for poor human nature in words and
thoughts of such exuberant self-satisfaction, until we find ourselves
safe in the streets of the Celestial City.
"Das wenige verschwindet leicht dem Blicke
Der vorwaerts sieht, wie viel noch uebrig bleibt--"[39]
says Goethe; "the little that is done seems nothing when we look forward
and see how much we have yet to do.
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