aggregated nearly four million dollars; they had a wide and profitable
trade; and the only thing they could complain of was the worthless or
infamous character of the majority of the officials which the shameless
corruption of the Walpole administration sent out to govern--in other
words, to prey upon--them. But if this was the only subject of complaint,
it could not be termed a small subject. It meant the enforcement of the
Navigation Acts in their worst form, and the restriction of all manner of
manufactures. Manufactures would tend to make the colonies set up for
themselves, and therefore they must be forbidden:--such was the
undisguised argument. It was a case of the goose laying golden eggs.
America had in fact become so enormously valuable that England wanted it
to become profit and nothing else--and all the profit to be England's.
They still failed to realize that it was inhabited by human beings, and
that those human beings were of English blood. And because the northern
colonies, though the more industrious, produced things which might
interfere with British goods, therefore they were held down more than the
southern colonies, which grew only tobacco, sugar, rice and indigo, which
could in no degree interfere with the sacred shopkeepers and mill-owners
of England. An insanity of blindness and perversity seized upon the
English government, and upon most of the people; they actually were
incapable of seeing justice, or even their own best interests. It seems
strange to us now; but it was a mania, like that of witchcraft, though it
lasted thrice as many years as that did months.

The will of England in respect of the colonies became as despotic as
under the Stuarts; but though it delayed progress, it could not break down
the resistance of the assemblies; and Walpole would consent to no
suggestion looking toward enforcing it by arms. Stamp duties were spoken
of, but not enacted. The governors raged and complained, but the
assemblies held the purse-strings. Would-be tyrants like Shute of Boston