The American mind, selections from the literature of the United States

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VOLUME 1. THE COLONIAL PERIOD, 1607-1761. Colonial beginnings in Virginia and New England. From A description of New England. A call for American colonists. From The generall historie of Virginia. Pocahontas / John Smith

Conditions at Jamestown, 1607-1609

From Of Plimoth Plantation. Showing ye reasons and causes of their remoovall. The compact and settlement / William Bradford

Of the Revells of New Canaan. Of a great monster. How the 9. worthies / Thomas Morton

From The journal. Price fixing. A scarlet letter. Problems of government. Murder of Oldham. A cruel schoolmaster. On liberty / John Winthrop . Seventeenth-century New England Puritanism. From God's promise to his plantation. Counsel to the colonists. From The Keyes of the kingdom of heaven. Of the fruits of congregational discipline / John Cotton

From the wonder-working providence. Founding of Harvard College / Edward Johnson

From The simple cobler of Aggawamm. Against toleration. Man's clear duty / Nathaniel Ward

From The blovdy tenent. Theses proved. Separation of church and state / Roger Williams

From The sincere convert. The everlasting fire. Nine easy ways to hell / Thomas Shepard

The prologue. Meditation. To my dear and loving husband / Anne Bradstreet

From The day of doom. God's judgment day. The easiest room in hell / Michael Wigglesworth

From A discourse about civil government. A defense of theocracy / John Davenport

From An essay for the recording of illustrious providences. A bewitched house. The probation by cold water / Increase Mather

From The wonders of the invisible world. Devils in New England. From Magnalia Christi Americana. The life of Mr. Thomas hooker. From A Christian at his calling. From Bonifacius, or Essays to do good. The duties of schoolmasters. From Manductio ad Ministerium. First philosophy. Rational mystery of Godliness. Ways to do good. On college love affairs. On poetry. On literary style. On music. Original sermons. Meeting popular ingratitude / Cotton Mather

From Diary. An act of friendship. A student's punishment. A dream. Trouble with Indians. A lover swoons. Great Boston fire. Religious problems. Social reform problems. Prayers, fears, and faith. A sense of guilt. Negro slavery. From The selling of Joseph / Samuel Sewall

The New England Primer. The alphabet. The dutiful child's promises. Verses. Good children must. Learn these four lines. Now I lay me down to sleep. The Colonial Frontier. From narrative of the captivity and restauration. The beginning of the captivity. The first remove. The second remove. The third remove. The eighth remove. The eleventh remove. The twelfth remove / Mary Rowlandson

From The history of the dividing line. Settlers' unwise Indian policy. Contented poverty. From A journey to the land of Eden. Primitive dentistry. From A progress to the mines. Visit to Governor Spotswood / William Byrd

Education of Indians / Alexander Spotswood

From A very brief account of the establishment of the colony of Georgia. The designs of the trustees

The flying spider. Sarah Pierrepont. Personal narative. Nature. Notes on natural science. From The Christian pilgrim. From Sinners in the hands of an angry God. From the freedom of the will. God the ruler of all things / Jonathan Edwards

From Journal. Early days. Thoughts at sea / John Woolman

From the history of Massachusetts-Bay. Trade in colonial America / Thomas Hutchinson

From Autobiography. Reasons for writing. A Boston childhood. Bookish inclination. The New-England courant. Deistic principles. Scheme for arriving at moral perfection. Poor Richard's Almanack. Electrical experiments. From Articles of belief and acts of religion. First principles. Advice to a young tradesman. The way to wealth. The sale of the Hessians. Letters / Benjamin Franklin. THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD, 1761-1783. Opposition to writs of assistance / James Otis

Resolutions, October 29, 1765 / Samuel Addams

From Letters from a farmer in Pennsylvania. Thoughts on some late transactions. Non-violent resistance. Liberty song / John Dickinson

Speeches in the Virginia Convention of Delegates, March 23, 1775 / Patrick Henry

Virginia Bill of Rights

From Common sense. Thoughts on the present state of American affairs

From the American crisis. The times that try men's souls. From the age of reason. The faith of a deist / Thomas Paine

Revolutionary songs and ballads. Virginia banishing tea. The American hero, by Nathaniel Niles. The yankee's return from camp. The ballad of Nathan Hale. Independence. The battle of the kegs, by Francis Hopkinson. A birthday song, by Jonathan Odell. Lords of the main, by Joseph Stansbury

From Essay on the use and advantages of the fine arts. Future glory of America. From the progress of Dulness. Tom Brainless at college. The quackeries of learning. From M'Fingal. The tarring of M'Fingal

From Letters from an American farmer. What is an American? From Sketches of eighteenth century America. A man of sorrows / Hector St. John de Crevecoeur

Letter to Colonel Nicola: refusing a crown. Address to the officers, March 15, 1783

Orders announcing the cessation of hostilities / George Washington

Tributes to Washington. From The Life of George Washington, by M.L. Weems. Columbia's first and greatest son. Truth and the cherry tree. From Under the old elm, by J.R. Lowell. At the tomb of Washington, by Clinton Scollard. Inscription at Mount Vernon. The Twenty-second of February, by O.W. Holmes. The character of George Washington, by W.L. Cross

From A Defence of the constitutions of government of the United States of America. Who are the people? Protecting the people. Characteristics of democracy. Mixed government best. Letters / John Adams. THE EARLY NATIONAL PERIOD, 1783-1829. A political litany. On the memorable victory of Paul Jones. To the memory of the brave Americans. The vanity of existence. Literary importation. The wild honeysuckle. The Indian burying ground. Ode: "God save the rights of man!" On a honey bee. On the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille. The Republican genius of Europe. To a caty-did. To my book. On the religion of nature / Philip Freneau

Columbia. From Greenfield Hill. The flourishing village. The duty of Americans, at the present crisis. From Travels in New-England and New-York. The foresters or pioneers / Timothy Dwight

From A grammatical institute of the English language, part I. From Dissertations on the English langauge. A national language / Noah Webster

From The vision of Columbus. American education and religion. From the Hasty pudding. A savory dish. From Advice to the privileged orders. Introduction. Equality in the United States / Joel Barlow

From The Declaration of Independence. From Notes on the state of Virginia. Religious toleration. Slavery. First inaugural address. Letters to: Francis Hopkinson, Joseph Priestly, John Adams, Dr. Walter Jones / Thomas Jefferson

Letter to Father Thorpe: a national Catholic Church / John Carroll

From Modern chivalry. Captain Farrago. On democracy. The society of philosophers. Visit to the hall of congress. Visit to a university / Hugh Henry Brackenridge

The nature of the constitution and the duty of the Supreme Court / John Marshall

Against universal suffrage / James Kent

From The pioneers. From The last of the Mohicans. From Gleanings in Europe. England. From The American democrat. From Satanstoe / James Fenimore Cooper

From Adventures of the first settlers on the Oregon or Columbia River / Alexander Ross

From Recollections of the last ten years / Timothy Flint

From The backwoods preacher / Peter Cartwright

From Journal. Reasons for coming to America / Thomas Hulme

From An address to the whites / Elias Boudinot

Sequoyah / Albert Gallatin

From Report on manufactures. Value of manufacturing. Iron. Fossil Coal. Printed books / Alexander Hamilton

The vision of an overland trade across the continent / Meriwether Lewis

Reflections on moralists and moral writing. From Wieland. Discovery of the murdered family / Charles Brockden Brown

From A history of New York (Chapters 1, 3, and 4). From The sketch book. The author's account of himself. Rip Van Winkle. Westminster abbey. From The Alhambra. Palace of the Alhambra. From A tour on the prairies. Frontier scenes. Trail of he osage hunters. Osage village. The honey camp. A bee-hunt / Washington Irving

From Prometheus. To Seneca Lake. To Coral Grove. New-England / James Gates Percival

Thanatopsis. The yellow violet. Inscription for the entrance to a wood. To a waterfowl. I cannot forget with what frvid devotion. O fairest of the rural maids. Monument mountain. A forest hymn. The death of the flowers. The past. Hymn o the city. To the fringed gentian. The prairies. The battle-field. The antiquity of freedom. O, mother of a mighty race. The poet. The right of workmen to strike / William Cullen Bryant. A MID-NINETEENTH CENTURY CIVILIZATION, 1829-1865. Children in Philadelphia factories. The factory system. Labor's view of immigration. Obtaining female operatives. The first ten-hour law. A factory idyl, by David Crockett

From Constitution of the New-Harmony Community of Equality, preamble

The constitution of the Brook Farm Association

From Hints toward reform, by Horace Greeley. Communistic philosophies

From The Harmony of interests. The fallacies of classical economics / Henry Charles Carey

The perishing classes in Boston. The problem. Vagrant boys and girls. The adult poor. The intemperate poor. Solutions / Theodore Parker

From Sociology for the south. A southern defense of slavery and a criticism of industrialism / George Fitzhugh

From Two years before the mast. A flogging / Richard Henry Dana, Jr

From Memoial to the Legislature of Massachusetts. Neglect of the insane / Dorothea Dix

On district school libraries. Pecuniary value of education. The aims of education / Horace Mann

From Thoughts and things at home and abroad. Inhumanity of war. The pioneers of peace. The patriotism of passive resistance / Elihu Burritt

From Nattative of the expedition ... to Japan. Reception, July 14, 1853. Presentation of credentias. Exchange of gifts, March 24, 1854. American hospitality / Matthew Calbraith Perry

From Col. Crockett's exploits and adventures in Texas. Frontier politics. A great swamp fight / David Crockett

From Indian depredations in Texas. The frontiersman's attitude toward the Indian. A Comanche princess. Massacre of the Kennon and Paschal families / John Wesley Wilbarger

From The report of the exploring expedition to the Rocky Mountains / Sutter of California. Indian attacks / John Charles Fremont

From The Diary. A mill site. The first gold. The gold rush / Johann Augustus Sutter

From Speech on the Oregon question. The Oregon country. The Columbia River. Superiority of the white race / Thomas Hart Benton

From Discovery of the Yosemite / Lafayette Houghton Bunnell

From Discourses of Brigham Young. The settlement in the West. Political government / Brigham Young

Missionary activity in the Mississippi Valley

An Indian plea for Christian knowledge

Unitarian Christianity. The moral argument against Calvinism / William Ellery Channing

From Orphic sayings. Emerson. Thoreau. Wendell Phillips. Garrison / Amos Bronson Alcott

Good-bye. Thought. The rhodora. The apology. Concord hymn. Uriel. Each and all. The humble-bee. The problem. The sphinx. The snow-storm. Grace. Politics. Fable. Ode inscribed to W.H. Channing. Guy. Alphonso of Castile. Days. The Bohemian hymn. Brahma. Two rivers. Waldeinsamkeit. Terminus. Nature. The American scholar. Brook Farm / Ralph Waldo Emerson

The inward morning. Nature. Independence. Mission. From A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers. From Walden / Henry David Thoreau

Sights from a steeple. The gray champion. Wakefield. The maypole of Merry Mount. The birthmark. Ethan Brand / Nathaniel Hawthorne

From Moby Dick. From Mardi and a voyage thither / Herman Melville. A dream within a dream. Romance. Sonnet to science. To Helen. Israfel. The city in the sea. The sleeper. Lenore. To one in paradise. The raven. Ulalume. The bells. To my mother. Annabel Lee. Eldorado. Ligceia. The fall of the House of Usher. The masque of the Red Death. The purloined letter. The poetic principle / Edgar Allan Poe

A psalm of life. Hymn to the night. The wreck of the Hesperus. The village blacksmith. Excelsior. The rainy day. The arsenal at Springfield. Nuremberg. The day is done. The bridge. The arrow and the song. From The building of the ship. My lost youth. The children's hour. Paul Revere's ride. Christmas bells. Divina commedia. A shadow. Nature. The cross of snow / Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Old Ironsides. The last leaf. My aunt. Non-resistance. The chambered nautilus. The deacon's masterpiece. The boys. A hymn of tust. Never or now. From the Autocrat of the breakfast-table. From Elsie Venner, The Brahmin caste of New England / Oliver Wendell Holmes

I would not have this perfect love of ours. For this true nobleness. An incident in a railroad car. Sonnet, Wendell Phillips. Rhoecus. Stanzas on freedom. The present crisis: 1844. Hebe. Bibliolatres. After the burial. From the Biglow papers. From A fable for critics. Thoreau / James Russell Lowell

To William Lloyd Garrison. Massachusetts to Virginia. Proem. Dedication to songs of labor. The shoemakers. Ichabod. First day thoughts. Maud Muller. The barefoot boy. Skipper Ireson's ride. Telling the bees. The Kansas emigrants. Barbara Frietchie. Laus Deo! The eternal goodness. Snow bound / John Greenleaf Whittier

Proclamation to the people of South Carolina / Andrew Jackson

Speech on the slavery question, March 4, 1850 / John C. Calhoun

Speech on the constitution and the union, March 7, 1850 / Daniel Webster

Nelly was a lady. Old folks at home. My old Kentucky home. Old black Joe / Stephen Collins Foster

From Southward Ho!, Southern economy / William Gilmore Simms

From Uncle Tom's cabin. The slave warehouse / Harriet Beecher Stowe

Final speech / John Brown

Inaugural address / Jefferson Davis

Autobiography. From Speech at Cooper Union, February 27, 1860. Farewell speech to his friends in Springfield. Letter to Horace Greeley, August 22, 1862. Gettysburg Address. Second inaugural address / Abraham Lincoln

Tributes to Lincoln: From ode recited at the Harvard commemoration. The master, by E.A. Robinson. Abraham Lincoln walks at midnight, by Vachel Lindsay. A farmer remembers Lincoln, by Witter Bynner. Lincoln at thirty-seven, by Carl Sandburg. Lincoln, the ideal democratic man, by Herbert Croly

Letters to General Winfield Scott, Resignation from the United States Army. To Mrs. Lee, Death of their daughter and Cruelty of war. To his soldiers, a leader's gratitude / Robert E. Lee

Tributes to Lee: Robert E. Lee, by Julia Ward Howe. Lee on the third day at Chancellorsville, by Charles Marshall. The pattern of a life, by D.S. Freeman

Songs and ballads of the war. Dixie, by Albert Pike. Glory hallelujah, or John Brown's body, by Charles Sprague Hall. Battle hymn of the republic / Julia Ward Howe. Maryland, my Maryland, by James Ryder Randall. Three hundred thousand more, by John Sloan Gibbons

Tenting on the old camp ground, by Walter Kittredge

Ethnogenesis. Charleston. The cotton boll. Ode sung at the occasion of decorating the graves of the Confederate dead

From A constitutional view of the late war between the states. States' rights. Slavery did not cause secession / Alexander Stephens. VOLUME 2. TRANSITION TO THE MACHINE AGE, 1865-1919. From Leaves of grass. One's self I sing. As I ponder'd in silence. To the states. Poets to come. For you O democracy. To a pupil. Song of myself. Out of the cradle endlessly rocking. A noiseless patient spider. Pioneers! O pioneers. Cavalry crossing a ford. Come up from the fields father. As toilsome I wander'd Virginia's woods. O captain! My captain! When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd. On the beach at night. Song of the redwood tree. Spirit that form'd this scene. Nationality and literature. American character / Walt Whitman

Folk songs and ballads. The cowboy's dream. Whoopee ti yi yo, git along little dogies. Oh bury me not on the lone prairie. A plantation serenade. All God's chillun got wings. Satan's a liah. De blues ain' nothin'. Water boy. John Henry. Casey Jones. Jesse James. The jam on Gerry's rock. When the curtains of night are pinned back

The outcasts of Poker Flat / Bret Harte

Kit Carson's ride. From The last Taschastas. Exodus for Oregon. The Missouri. Columbus / Joaquin Miller

From Steep trails. Nevada's dead towns / John Muir

The shade of the arrows / Mary Austin

The symphony. The stirrup cup. The marshes of Glynn. A ballad of the trees and the master / Sidney Lanier

From Uncle Remus, his songs and sayings. The wonderful tar baby. How Mr. Rabbit was too sharp for Mr. Fox / Joel Chandler Harris

The new south / Henry Woodfin Grady

We wear the mask. Sympathy. The turning of the babies in the bed / Paul Laurence Dunbar

The mood of the mid-nineteenth century farm / John Burroughs

From The empire of business. Business men and speculators. Merchants and professional men. Rewards of a business career / Andrew Carnegie

Slaughterhouse opinion / Stephen J. Field

From the absurd efforts to make the world over / William Graham Sumner

Dynamic sociology and laissez faire / Lester F. Ward

The cross of gold / William Jennings Bryan

Platform of the American Anti-imperialist League / Carl Schurz

From The Education of Henry Adams. The individual as primitive energy

From A charter of democracy / Theodore Roosevelt

From the shame of the cities. The faith of the muckrakers / Lincoln Steffens

Do we want more democracy / William Howard Taft

The role of the Supreme Court in a changing civilization / Elihu Root

What is liberty? For a league of nations / Woodrow Wilson

Americanism / William E. Borah

People retain right to control government. A judicial oligarchy. General amnesty is demanded / Robert LaFollette. From Progress and poverty. The persistence of poverty. The single tax / Henry George

From Looking backward. The regimentation of labor / Edward Bellamy

Henry Demarest Lloyd / Jane Addams

From Race questions, provincialism and other American problems. Regionalism and democracy / Josiah Royce

Anglo-saxon supremacy. America's opportunity / Josiah Strong

From The war of the classes. Stolen thunder / Jack London

The theory of anarchy / Emma Goldman

A political credo / Eugene Debbs

The ruling class. The union of two great fortunes / Finley Peter Dunne

From The Jungle. The speed up system / Upton Sinclair

Under the lion's paw / Hamlin Garland

The man with the hoe / Edwin Markham

From a ten years' war. The battle with the slums / Jacob August Riis

An unfinished story / O. Henry

How I found America / Anzia Yezierska

The discovery of America. The rise of idealism in American science / Michael Pupin

From the melting pot mistake. A metaphor gone wrong / Henry Pratt Fairchild

The eternal home / Dwight Moody

Through science and humanism to theism / Noah Porter

The Catholic church. Relations of religious and civil society / John Spalding

The religion of humanity / Robert Ingersoll

From A history of the warfare of science with theology in Christendom. Reconstructive force of scientific criticism / Andre Dickson White

From The will to believe. A man's religious faith / William James

From Acres of diamonds / Russell H. Conwell

From In his steps. What is the Christian way? / Charles Munro Sheldon

From Christianizing the social order. The mood of the social gospel. For children who work. For workingmen. For the cooperative commonwealth / Walter Rauschenbusch

The social creed of the Methodist church. Woman's rights. The negro question / Artemus Ward (Charles Farrar Browne)

From Roughting it. From the gilded age. Wall Street and congressional appropriations. From Old times on the Mississippi. Boyish ambition. The sub pilot's first lessons

From The mysterious stranger. Mankind's low nature / Mark Twain

From Criticism and fiction A defense of realism. Breaking new ground. Tests of fiction. From the Lady of Aroostook. Preparing for the journey. Boston / William Dean Howells

Four meetings / Henry James

From Pike county ballads. Little breeches. Jim Bludso / John Hay

The old swimmin'-hole. When the frost is on the punkin. Little Orphant Annie / James Whitcomb Riley

A valentine. The snake. Success. The soul selects. Afraid? He put the belt around my life. He preached upon 'Breadth.' I never saw a moor / Emily Dickinson

From the Black riders. Black riders came from the sea. In the desert. In heaven. I saw a man pursuing the horizon. A man saw a ball of gold in the sky. A man toiled on a burning road. From War is kind. Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind A newspaper is a collection of half-injustices. The wayfarer. From The red badge of courage. Death of Jim Conklin / Stephen Crane

An occurrence at Owl Creek bridge / Ambrose Bierce

Gloucester Moors. An ode in time of hesitation / William Vaughn Moody

Unmanifest destiny. Comrades. The wander lovers. Spring / Richard Hovey

The Dulham ladies / Sarah Orne Jewett

From The portion of labor. The shutdown / Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

Xingu / Edith Wharton. CONTEMPORARY THOUGHT. From I'll take my stand. An agrarian economic policy / Liberty Hyde Bailey

From My life and work. What we may expect / Henry Ford

From The theory of the leisure class. Conspicuous leisure. From The engineers and the price system. The captains of finance and the engineers / Thorstein Veblen

The trade union movement / John Mitchell

Labor and democracy / John L. Lewis

Freedom of speech / Oliver Wendell Holmes

From The challenge to liberty. We may sum up / Herbert Clark Hoover

A revised concept of democracy. The challenge of democracy to communism and fascism / Franklin Delano Roosevelt

From People at work. Government and cooperation / Frances Perkins

From Democracy and education. The inner and the outer. The opposition of duty and interest / John Dewey

From A charter for the social sciences. The climate of American ideas / Charles A. Beard

Go down, death. From the Book of American negro poetry. The negro's contribution to American art / James Weldon Johnson

Brief history of my opinions / George Santayana

From Humanist sermons. Modern humanism / Curtis Williford Reese

From The Modern temper. The disillusion with the laboratory / Joseph Wood Krutch

From An appreciation of Christian ethics. A criticism of Protestant modernism / Reinhold Niebuhr

From Sketches in criticism. The critical movement in America / Van Wyck Brooks

Tradition and the individual talent / T.S. Eliot

An apology for crudity / Sherwood Anderson

An old story. Sonnet. Cliff Klingenhagen. Richard Cory. Octaves I, IV, VI, X, XIV, XX. Two quotations. Credo. How Annandale went out

Flammonde

Mr. Flood's party

Karma / Edwin Arlington Robinson

The pasture. The tuft of flowers. Mending wall. Birches. Home burial. The road not taken. Stopping by woods on a snowy evening. The cow in apple time. The runaway. Not to keep. A lone striker / Robert Frost

A gospel of beauty. General William Booth enters into heaven. Incense. To reformers in despair. Shakespeare. Michelangelo. Lincoln. The leaden-eyed. Factory windows are always broken. The unpardonable sin. A net to snare the moonlight. The moon's the north wind's cooky. The scientific aspiration. Another word on the scientific aspiration. The modest jazz-bird / Vachel Lindsay. Benjamin Pantier. Mrs. Benjamin Pantier. Reuben Pantier. Emily Sparks. Trainor, the druggist. Seth Compton. Anne Rutledge. Archibald Higbie / Edgar Lee Masters

Chicago. Nocturne in a deserted brickyard. Fog. Happiness. Mag. Anna Imroth. Iron. Buttons. Under a telephone pole. I am the people, the mob. Cahoots. Prayers of steel. From Prairie. Cool tombs / Edgar Lee Masters

Patterns / Amy Lowell

The wayfarer. Spring night. I shall not care. The inn of earth. Barter. Night song at Amalfi. Day's ending / Sara Teasdale

Renascence. God's world. Lament. And you as well must die / Edna St. Vincent Millay

The eagle and the mole. Madman's song. Velvet shoes. From Wild peaches. Let no charitable hope. Hymn to Earth / Elinor Wylie

From John Brown's body. Prelude, the slaver. Litany for dictatorships / Steven Vincent Benet

Ballad for gloom. Revolt. A pact. In a station at the metro. Portrait d'une femme. Commission / Ezra Pound

The hippopotamus. The love song of J. Alfred Prufrock. The hollow men. From the Rock / T.S. Eliot

To the stonecutters. Apology for bad dreams. Hurt hawks. Age in prospect. Credo. Pelicans. Shine, perishing republic / Robinson Jeffers

All lovely things. Discordants. Morning song of Senlin. Prelukes for Memnon, I / Conrad Aiken

Lines for an interment. Speech to Those who say comrade. Speech to the detractors / Archibald MacLeish

A boy of twenty. Emerson: last days at Concord. Chorus for Survival I / Horace Gregory. The lost phoebe / Theodore Dreiser

From Yellow Gentians and blue. The charivari / Zona Gale

From Giants in the earth. Home-founding. Facing the great desolation. On the border of utter darkness. The power of evil in high places. The great plain drinks the blood of Chistian men and is satisfied / Ole Rolvaag

I am a fool / Sherwood Anderson

The golden honeymoon / Ringgold Wilmer Lardnes

From Babbitt. The Babitts of Zenith. The Babbit family at breakfast / Sinclair Lewis

From The big money. Charley Anderson. Newsreel XLV. The American plan. Newsreel XLVI. The camera eye. Newsreel XLVII. The camera eye / John Dos Passos

The evening sun / William Faulkner

Snake / William Saroyan

Death the proud brother / Thomas Wolfe

The Emperor Jones / Eugene O'Neill