1. "Buckle's History of Civilization" (1858), in The American Scholar, p. 413.
2. Dissertation on the Origin of the Scythians or Goths (1787), quoted in Peardon, Transition, p. 115. Cf. Peardon's discussion of Gilbert Stuart, Mrs. Macaulay, and others who adopted similar ideas, chaps. iii-v.
3. "History can have neither value nor charm for those who are not impressed with a sense of its continuity." Motley, United Netherlands, IV, 549; cf. Bancroft, History, IV, 9. Ibid., III, 397.
4. Prescott, in Biographical Miscellanies, p. 89. Sharon Turner, History of the Anglo-Saxons (1799-1805), quoted in Peardon, Transition, p. 219. Prescott, Ferdinand and Isabella, I, vi.
5. Ferdinand and Isabella, I, xxxii, xxxiii ff. Cf. "Irving's Granada," in Biographical Miscellanies, p. 104.
6. Ferdinand and Isabella, I, xxxii-xxxiii. See J. C. Levenson, The Mind and Art of Henry Adams (Boston, 1957), pp. 39-52.
7. Ferdinand and Isabella, I, xxxiii, xxxiv.
8. Ibid., pp. xxxv, xxxvi-xxxvii, xxxviii.
9. Mexico, I, 476-77; cf. ibid., II, 4; and Peru, I, 7.
10. Ferdinand and Isabella, I, xl-xli.
11. See Gooch, History and Historians, pp. 60-61. Ferdinand and Isabella, I, xli.
12. Ibid., pp. xlv-xlviii. He was careful, here, to date the first record of "popular representation" in Castile.
13. Philip II, I, 379. Ferdinand and Isabella, I, xliv-xlv.
14. Motley, United Netherlands, III, 522. Parker, "Hildreth's United States," in The American Scholar, pp. 266, 277. Emerson, Works, II, 82; cf. III, 59-60. Motley, "Historic Progress and American Democracy," in Representative Selections, pp. 105-6.
15. History, X, 86; IV, 4. For relationships, see, for example, II, 452-64; IX, 499-501.
16. Ibid., IV, 11. Cf. IV, 7; and "Office of the People," in Literary Miscellanies, pp. 411-13.
17. History, IV, 456-57, 74; VII, 22.
18. Ibid., C, 63; VII, 295; II, 454 (cf. IV, 5); IV, 7. Prescott pointed out that the motto misquoted Berkeley-s poem (Biographical Miscellanies, p. 272). Bancroft himself had a precedent, however, for John Quincy Adams misquoted it first (1802).
19. Bancroft, "The Necessity, the Reality, and the Promise of the Progress of the Human Race," in Literary Miscellanies, p. 508. (Cf. History, VII, 295, 355.) History, IV, 456; II, 454. See II, 214, 451.
20. H. B. Adams, "The Germanic Origins of New England Towns," Johns Hopkins Studies in Political Science, I-II (Baltimore, 1882-83), 2. Bancroft, History, II, 59. Prescott also refers to "our Anglo-Saxon ancestors" (Ferdinand and Isabella, I, 274).
21. Bancroft, History, IV, 456 (cf. II, 74; IV, 13); X, 226-27; II, 225. Prescott said that simplicity was Dante's "most conspicuous quality," and he compared Dante to Homer on this basis. Letter to Ticknor (n.d.), quoted in Ticknor, Prescott, pp. 63-64.
22. Letter to Prescott, July 28, 1848, Bancroft Papers, MHS. History, IV, 456-57.
23. History, II, 458. Letter to Mrs. J. C. Bancroft Davis, September 4, 1870, quoted in Howe, Bancroft, II, 239-40. See History, IX, 2-3. Except for the Bancroft Papers in MHS, and for Howe's Bancroft, I have relied on Russel B. Nye, George Bancroft: Brahmin Rebel (New York, 1944), for biographical information on Bancroft.
24. History, X, 61, 62, 78.
25. Ibid., pp. 79 (cf. II, 457-59), 81, 82.
26. Parkman, Montcalm and Wolfe, II, 38-39. Bancroft, History, X, 86, 97 (cf. Ibid., pp. 8-9), 110-14.
27. Bancroft, "The Age of Schiller and Goethe," in Literary Miscellanies, p. 189. History, X, 87, 87-92. Cf. Ibid., IX, 473-76.
28. Ibid., IX, 499, 500-501. In his third volume (p. 396), Bancroft tried to show how naturally the colonies had grown toward "national freedom and independence." In America, he said, these two qualities "were not the offspring of deliberate forethought; they were not planted by the hand of man; they grew like the lilies, which neither toil nor spin." The contrast to the French Revolution is implicit.
29. Cf. Emerson, "Race," in Works, II, 47-50. Bancroft to Levi Frisbi, April 13, 1821, Bancroft Papers, MHS. Letter to Prescott, July 28, 1848. Letter to Polk, August 5, 1848. All in Bancroft Papers, MHS. Letter of February 4, 1849 (no addressee), in Howe, Bancroft, II, 96.
30. Ibid., II, 170-71. Bancroft to Department of State, March 5, 1869, Bancroft Papers, MHS. Bismarck to Motley, September 19, 1869, in Correspondence, II, 313-14. Bancroft to Mrs. J. C. Bancroft Davis, September 4, 1870; and Bancroft to C. C. Perkins, June 12, 1869. Both in Howe, Bancroft, II, 235-40, 228.
31. Quoted in Nye, Bancroft, pp. 249, 257-59.
32. Thiers, whom he had once praised, now typified such "ignorance." Letter to Mrs. Hamilton Fish, December 11, 1870, in Howe, Bancroft, II, 249.
33. Letter to Bancroft, Bancroft Papers, MHS. Letters to his daughter, Lily: April 23, 1866, in Correspondence, II, 215-16; July 3, 1866, Ibid., pp. 224-25; and August 7, 1866, ibid., p. 241. Letter to Holmes, August 17, 1872, ibid., p. 351.
34. Letter to his wife, July 25, 1872, ibid., p. 340. "Historic Progress," in Representative Selections, p. 108. Four Questions for the People, p. 12. "Slavery," he said, "had eaten out that respect for nationality which is the most noble and vital part of any organized form of associated humanity, and the leading characteristic of the present epoch in the world's history." ibid., p. 20.
35. "Historic Progress," in Representative Selections, p. 108; cf. Correspondence, II, 352.
36. Letter to his daughter Lily, August 7, 1866, ibid., p. 242. Morton's Hope, II, 18.
37. Dutch Republic, I, 1-2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 11.
38. Ibid., pp. 7, 11-12, 7-8, 9, 10, 10-11.
39. Ibid., pp. 9,10,11.
40. J. C. F. Schiller, "History of the Revolt of the Netherlands," in Nathan H. Dole, ed., The Works of Friedreich Schiller, trans. E. B. Eastwick and A. J. W. Morrison (Boston, 1901), pp. xxxviii-xxxix. Motley, Dutch Republic, I, 13-15, 17. Prescott, citing Livy, made the same comparison when describing a Spanish victory over the French, who "resembled their Gaulish ancestors in the facility with which they were discouraged by unexpected obstacles, and the difficulty with which they could be brought to rally." Ferdinand and Isabella, III, 163.
The best example of Motley's atavism in the narrative sections combines the very scene of a victory won by "Hermann, first of Teutonic heroes," and the racial traits of Louis of Nassau, "another German warrior," who fought to defend "not only the rights of man, but the rights of God." II, 190. In this battle, won by the Germanic forces, the Spaniards are "very hot" (later, "fiery"); the Teutons, "very cool," pp. 192-93.
41. Dutch Republic, I, 19-20 (cf. United Netherlands, III, 17-18). Parkman, Jesuits, p. 88. Dutch Republic, I, 21.
42. Ibid., pp. 39, 91.
43. Ibid., pp. 91, 92, 143-44; II, 500.
44. United Netherlands, III, 270; II, 195, 281-82. John of Barneveld, I, 227, 230. United Netherlands, I, 362; III, 271; IV, 10-11; III, 26-27 (cf. Schiller, "Revolt of Netherlands," in Works, p. xxxi); II, 300, 448; III, 18, 20.
45. Vassal Morton, p. 301; Pioneers, p. 188; Pontiac, I, 158; Half-Century, I, 311-12; Montcalm and Wolfe, II, 411-12. Consider this comment on the Canadians: "The Canadians, though brave and patient, needed, like Frenchmen, the stimulus of success" (Montcalm and Wolfe, II, 171).