Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Women and Men

The key to this alleged Anglomania, therefore, is simply this: that the American habit of mind is essentially cosmopolitan, and goes to each nation for that which it finds best of its kind. As unerringly as it goes to Germany for its scientific instruction, or to France for its cools, so it goes to England for what is not so well to he found in France or Germany--the minor conveniences and facilities which belong to a highly trained leisure class. Itself newly developed, this American class turns to England for a good standard of minor essentials, as horse equipments and coachmen's clothes. It borrows more than these; it borrows those accessaries of high-bred life which promote daily comfort and convenience, the organization of a large household, the routine of social life. In these directions England is very strong, though it may be doubted if this is the highest sphere; if it can be set against the dignity of the best Spanish or Italian manners, the keenness of French wit, and the depth and solidity of German knowledge. These also are fully appreciated among us, but their traces do not lie so much on the surface. All these things, so far as we can, we borrow ; why not? If older nations borrow from one another, why not younger from older? It is no discredit to England that her one high philological