America

While protesting England’s injustices, the poem’s speaker also celebrates the virtues she attributes to America and the promising future the country could have. In doing so, the speaker presents America as a place that could both bring glory to England while also representing a new, more enlightened way of life.

From the opening of the poem, the speaker idealizes America as a place that is—or has the potential to be—a land of freedom, success, and merit. The speaker claims that “New England first a wilderness was found” (Line 1) by the earliest settlers, with “wilderness” conjuring up a sense of untamed landscapes and potential threats. This wilderness was filled with “savage monsters” (Line 3) that had to be driven “from field to field” (Line 3) to bring the new country under control, thus converting it from a “wilderness” (Line 1) into a place of cultivation and, it is implied, civilization. The speaker presents this colonization process as something decreed by fate, asserting “’twas destin’d” (Line 2) that these events should occur. In celebrating the colonists’ triumphs over the “wilderness” (Line 1) and even imbuing America’s rise as a destiny fulfilled, the speaker presents America as a new country that has always been fated to succeed.

The speaker also closely associates America with freedom, reflecting the Enlightenment ideals of liberty and greater equality gaining currency at the time. In detailing the triumphs of the American colonial experiment, the speaker says, “Thy Power, O Liberty, makes strong the weak” (Line 5). In crediting the “Power” of “Liberty” as being America’s source of strength, the speaker suggests that freedom is an integral part of both the American experience and American identity. The speaker also extolls the moral qualities this freedom has led to, describing America through the metaphor of the son as a nation that “grew up daily virtuous” (Line 9, emphasis added) and that is “the Best of Infants” (Line 16, emphasis added) of the mother country. America is also slow to anger, the speaker insists, depicting the colonies as only complaining after Mother England has “his goodness try'd” (Line 15) beyond all endurance.

The speaker closes the poem by prophesying further greatness for America. The speaker urges England to take pride in the “Industry” (Line 40) America can offer, explicitly linking America’s potential with England’s own gain: “O Britain See / By this New England will increase like thee” (Lines 41-42). In presenting America as freedom-loving and fated for greatness, the speaker depicts America as a fledging nation already forming its own important identity. In insisting that England should view America’s “increase” as a positive outcome instead of a threat, the speaker suggests that even England’s continuing greatness is further enhanced by the prosperity of its American colonies.