ly what
this great document did for the English people. They traced in detail
the subsequent events that led to the establishment of the House of
Commons. All this was American history just as truly as if the events
described had occurred on American soil. They were gaining an
appreciation of one of the most fundamental of our national ideals,--the
ideal of popular government. And not only that, but they were studying
popular government in its simplest form, uncomplicated by the
innumerable details and the elaborate organizations which characterize
popular government to-day.

And when these pupils come to the time when this ideal of
self-government was transplanted to American soil, they will be ready to
trace with intelligence the changes that it took on. They will
appreciate the marked influence which geographical conditions exert in
shaping national standards of action. How richly American history
reveals and illustrates this influence we are only just now beginning to
appreciate. The French and the English colonists developed different
types of national character partly because they were placed under
different geographical conditions. The St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes
gave the French an easy means of access into the vast interior of the
continent, and provided innumerable temptations to exploitation rather
than a few incentives to development. Where the French influence was
dispersed over a wide territory, the English influence was concentrated.
As a consequence, the English energy went to the development of
resources that were none too abundant, and to the establishment of
permanent institutions that would conserve these resources. The barrier
of the Appalachians hemmed them in,--three hundred miles of alternate
ridge and valley kept them from the West until they were numerically
able to settle rather than to exploit this country. Not a little credit
for the ultimate English domination of the continent must be given to
these geographical conditions.

But geography does not tell the whole story. The French colonists
differed from the English colonists from the outset in standards of
conduct. They had brought with them the principle of paternalism, and,
in time of trouble, they looked to France for support. The English
colonists brought with them the principle of self-reliance and, in time
of trouble, they looked only to themselves. And so the old English
ideals had a new birth and a broader field of application