NEW YORK.
 

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CHAPTER III.

, Peter Stuyvesant^s expedition into the East
Country^ shewing that though an old bird, he
did not understand trap.

Great nations resemble great men in this
particular, that their greatness is seldom known
until they get in trouble; adversity therefore,
has been wisely denominated the ordeal of true
greatness, which like gold, can never receive its
real estimation, until it has passed through the
furnace. In proportion therefore as a nation, a
community, or an individual (possessing the in¬
herent quality of greatness) is involved in perils
and misfortunes, in proportion does it rise in
grandeur—and even when sinking under cala¬
mity, makes, like a house on fire, a more glori¬
ous display, than ever it did, in the fairest
period of its prosperity.

The vast empire of China, though teeming
with population and imbibing and concentrating
the wealth of nations, has vegetated through a
succession of drowsy ages; and were it not for its
internal revolution, and the subversion of its an¬
cient goverment by the Tartars, might have pre-