George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 4, 15th edition.

[158] the strongest motive depends on the character

chap. VI.} 1754.

of the will. Hence, the education of that faculty was, of all concerns, the most momentous. The Calvinist of New England, who longed to be ‘morally good and excellent,’ had no other object of moral effort than to make ‘the will truly lovely and right.’

Action, therefore, as flowing from an energetic, right, and lovely will, was the ideal of New England. It rejected the asceticism of entire spiritualists, and fostered the whole man, seeking to perfect his intelligence and improve his outward condition. It saw in every one the divine and the human nature. It did not extirpate, but only subjected the inferior principles.¹ It placed no merit in vows of poverty or celibacy, and spurned the thought of non-resistance. In a good cause its people were ready to take up arms and fight, cheered by the conviction that God was working in them both to will and to do.