Happy Boston (1788)

BY JEAN PIERRE BRISSOT DE WARVILLE

(ANONYMOUS TRANSLATION, 1792)

. . . WITH what pleasure did I contemplate this town, which first shook off the English yoke! which, for a long time, resisted all the seductions, all the menaces, all the horrors of a civil war! How I delighted to wander up and down that long street, whose simple houses of wood border the magnificent channel of Boston, and whose full stores offer me all the productions of the continent which I had quitted! How I enjoyed the activity of the merchants, the artizans, and the sailors! It was not the noisy vortex of Paris; it was not the unquiet, eager mien of my countrymen; it was the simple, dignified air of men, who are conscious of liberty, and who see in all men their brothers and their equals. Every thing in this street bears the marks of a town still in its infancy, but which, even in its infancy, enjoys a great prosperity. . . .

. . . You no longer meet here that Presbyterian austerity, which interdicted all pleasures, even that of walking; which forbade travelling on Sunday, which persecuted men whose opinions were different from their own. The Bostonians unite simplicity of morals with that French politeness and delicacy of manners which render virtue more amiable. They are hospitable to strangers, and obliging to friends; they are tender husbands, fond and almost idolatrous parents, and kind masters. Music, which their teachers formerly proscribed as a diabolic art, begins to make part of their education. In some houses you hear the forte-piano. This art, it is true, is still in its infancy; but the young novices who exercise it, are so gentle, so complaisant, and so modest, that the proud perfection of art gives no pleasure equal to what they afford. God grant that the Bostonian women may never, like those of France, acquire the malady of perfection in this art! It is never attained, but at the expence of the domestic virtues. . . .

Neatness without luxury, is a characteristic feature of this purity of manners; and this neatness is seen every where at Boston, in their dress, in their houses, and in their churches. Nothing is more charming than an inside view of the church on Sunday. The good cloth coat covers the man; callicoes and chintzes dress the women and children, without being spoiled by those gewgaws which whim find caprice have added to them among our women. Powder and pomatum never sully the heads of infants and children: I see them with pain, however, on the heads of men: they invoke the art of the hair dresser; for, unhappily, this art has already crossed the seas.

I shall never call to mind, without emotion, the pleasure I had one day in hearing the respectable Mr. Clarke, successor to the learned Doctor Chauncey, the friend of mankind. His church is in close union with that of Doctor Cooper . . . I remarked in this auditory, the exterior of that ease and contentment of which I have spoken; that collected calmness, resulting from the habit of gravity, and the conscious presence of the almighty; that religious decency, which is equally distant from grovelling idolatry, and from the light and wanton airs of those Europeans who go to a church as to a theatre

Spectatum veniunt, veniunt spectentur ut ipsæ.

. . . The discourse, the prayer, the worship, every thing, bore the same simplicity. The sermon breathed the best morality, and it was heard with attention.

The excellence of this morality characterizes almost all the sermons of all the sects through the Continent. The ministers rarely speak dogmas: universal tolerance, the child of American independence has banished the preaching of dogmas, which always leads to discussion and quarrels. All the sects admit nothing but morality, which is the same in all, and the only preaching proper for a great society of brothers.

This tolerance is unlimited at Boston; a town formerly witness of bloody persecutions, especially against the Quakers; where many of this sect paid, with their life, for their perseverance in their religious opinions. . . . Every one at present worships God in his own way at Boston. Anabaptists, Methodists, Quakers, and Catholics, profess openly their opinions: and all offices of government, places and emoluments, are equally open to all sects. Virtue and talents, and not religious opinions, are the tests of public confidence. . . .

There are many clubs at Boston. M. Chastellux speaks of a particular club held once a week. I was at it several times, and was much pleased with their politeness to strangers, and the knowledge displayed in their conversation. There is no coffee-house at Boston, New-York, or Philadelphia. One house in each town, that they call by that name, serves as an exchange.

One of the principal pleasures of the inhabitants of these towns, consists in little parties for the country, among families and friends. The principal expence of the parties, especially after dinner, is tea. In this, as in their whole manner of living, the Americans in general resemble the English. Punch, warm and cold, before dinner; excellent beef, and Spanish and Bordeaux wines, cover their tables, always solidly and abundantly served. Spruce beer, excellent cyder, and Philadelphia porter, precede the wines. . . .

It is remarked, that, in countries chiefly devoted to commerce, the sciences are not carried to any high degree. This remark applies to Boston. The university certainly contains men of worth and learning;

but science is not diffused among the inhabitants of the town. Commerce occupies all their ideas, turns all their heads, and absorbs all their speculations. Thus you find few estimable works, and few authors. The expence of the first volume of the Memoirs of the Academy of this town, is not yet covered; it is two years since it appeared. Some time since was published, the history of the late troubles in Massachusetts; it is very well written. The author has found much difficulty to indemnify himself for the expence of printing it. Never has the whole of the precious history of New Hampshire, by Belnap, appeared, for want of encouragement.

Poets, for the same reason, must be more rare than other writers. . . .

They publish a Magazine here, though the number of Gazettes is very considerable. The multiplicity of Gazettes proves the activity of commerce, and the taste for politics and news; the merits and multiplicity of Literary and Political Magazines are signs of the culture of the sciences.

You may judge from these details, that the arts, except those that respect navigation, do not receive much encouragement here. . . .

Let us not blame the Bostonians; they think of the useful, before procuring to themselves the agreeable. They have no brilliant monuments; but they have neat and commodious churches, but they have good houses, but they have superb bridges, and excellent ships. Their streets are well illuminated at night; while many ancient cities of Europe, containing proud monuments of art, have never yet thought of preventing the fatal effects of nocturnal darkness.

Besides the societies for the encouragement of agriculture and manufactures, they have another, known by the name of the Humane Society. Their object is to recover drowned persons. It is formed after the model of the one at London, as that is copied from the one at Paris. They follow the same methods as in Europe, and have rendered important succours.

The Medical Society is not less useful, than the one last mentioned. It holds a correspondence with all the country towns; to know the symptoms of local diseases, propose the proper remedies, and give instruction thereupon to their fellow-citizens.

Another establishment is the alms-house. It is destined to the poor, who, by age and infirmity, are unable to gain their living. It contains at present about 150 persons.

Another, called the work-house, or house of correction, is not so much peopled as you might imagine. In a rising country, in an active port, where provisions are cheap, good morals predominate, and the number of thieves and vagabonds is small. These are vermin attached to misery; and there is no misery here. . . .

An employment which is, unhappily, one of the most lucrative in this state, is the profession of the Law. They preserve still the expensive form s of the English practice, which good sense, and the love of order, ought to teach them to suppress; they render advocates necessary; they have likewise borrowed from their fathers, the English, the habit of demanding exorbitant fees. But, notwithstanding the abuses of law proceedings, they complain very little of the Lawyers. . . .

J.P. Brissot de Warville, (Dublin, 1792), 93–114 passim.