citizens of the world, correcting national faults, as a father would
his beloved children? The greatest man, and the most nigh to perfection,
could not, would not, should not boast of his fine qualities. If an
Aristides is rare, very rare among us, how can a nation boast supremacy
over another? From my own experience I always found the best the modest;
and he who has no merit boasting merit. It is a pity in seeing writers
finding fault with nations, because these eat with a knife and fork, or
because they do not eat three eggs in a tumbler. Knifes and forks are
convenient, when the meat is hot; and I, who am fond of eggs, like to
crack four eggs in a tumbler, provided the present sensible american does
not care of the puerile english observation. Besides, if I am pleased in
looking at the fine architecture of an italian palace, I am pleased also
in seeing that the small, modest, and nearly uniform houses of the United
States of North America, have the blessed appearance of a nation, whose
richest citizens do not outshine the poor.

What right has he, the man of talent, or the handsome man to ridicule he
who has no talent, or he who is deformed? He who ridicules a nation shows
his perfect ignorance of nations. Can we find a nation without faults?
When the egyptians were the most civilized, all the other nations were
either savage or barbarous. The egyptians went down, and the greeks rose:
the old age of these, reached them too, and the romans shot forth. These,
also, had their days as the formers; and civilization went progressively
around the world with such propagating means, and discoveries, that the
citizen of any nation now, who undertakes to ridicule an ancient nation,
he is nothing else but like that bad son of Noah, who saw the nakedness of
his father, and told his two brethren without.

CHAPTER III.

THE AMERICAN LITERATURE IS RATHER TOO MUCH MIXED WITH THE BELIEF OF
DIFFERENT RELIGIOUS FAITHS.

Six or seven years ago, I opened a book which I found on the central table
of the house's parlor in which I lodged. It was the fifth, or seventh
edition of Notes, or Letters by a minister of the christian reform who
went through Italy. The reverend says in his book that the pope received
him kindly, and during the long conversation he had with him, that very
head of the catholic religion, praised America, which is to say his
country, because the american people tolerated the catholic religion.
Besides, the au