olitical consciousness as to be
trite and commonplace are presented as the new possession of a young man
lately from college, and it is fair to judge of the current speculation
of his time by the results here gathered into logical order. Webster, as
I said before, may be taken in this pamphlet as an admirable example of
the American political thinker, who has worked out, under the new
conditions of this continent, ideas and principles which his ancestors
brought from England. He thinks he has invented something new, but the
worth of his thought is in its experience. In a period when every one
was engaged in rearranging the universe upon some improved plan of his
own, it is not surprising that those who thought they had a brand-new
nation on their hands should have made a serious business of
nationalizing themselves. They thought they were starting afresh from a
purely philosophical basis, and they were greatly concerned about their
premises; as a matter of fact, their premises were often highly
artificial, while their conclusions were sound, for these really drew
their life from the historic development of free institutions, and the
nation which was formally instituted had long had an organic process.
Webster himself, twenty years after, when referring to this pamphlet,
had the good sense to say, "The remarks in the first three sketches are
general, and some of them I now believe to be too visionary for
practice; but the fourth sketch was intended expressly to urge, by all
possible arguments, the necessity of a radical alteration in our system
of general government, and an outline is there suggested." He adds, "As
a private man, young and unknown, I could do but little; but that little
I did."

In the autumn of 1786 he went to Philadelphia at the invitation of
Franklin, and stayed there a year. He maintained himself in part by
teaching, being master of an Episcopal academy; but his interest
centred upon the debates of the Constitutional Convention, then in
session, and a month after it rose he published "An Examination of the
Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution," which was, in effect, a
popular defense of the work of the Convention, especially as regards the
division of the legislature into two houses. The paper shows rather zeal
and fervor than acuteness, and seems to have been hastily written to
serve some special and temporary purpose. It has a magniloquence not
elsewhere found in his writings, as when he