2 THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 
the whole truth did not lie upon his conscience, for, speaking 
on the question of the number of Americans who were 
descendants from transported felons and indented servants, 
he said that “ Having a hand full, he opened his little finger.” 
Nevertheless, Bancroft constantly recurs in his writings to 
that “higher power’ which is operating in human affairs, 
although he avoids citing specific events which may be 
attributed to it. It appears to him to be the whole course 
of history, rather than any event or set of events, which 
justifies his theory. “However great,” he says, “may be 
the number of those who persuade themselves that there is 
in man nothing superior to himself, history interposes with 
evidence that tyranny and wrong lead inevitably to decay ; 
that freedom and right, however hard may be the struggle, 
always prove resistless. Through this assurance ancient 
nations learn to renew their youth; the rising generation is 
incited to take a generous part in the grand drama of time; 
and old age, staying itself upon sweet Hope as its companion 
and cherisher, not bating a jot of courage, nor seeing cause 
to argue against the hand or the will of a higher power, 
stands waiting in the tranquil conviction that the path of 
humanity is still fresh with the dews of morning, that the 
Redeemer of the nations liveth.” 2 
The second school of historical interpretation, which in 
the order of time followed that of Bancroft, may be called 
the Teutonic, because it ascribes the wonderful achieve- 
ments of the English-speaking peoples to the peculiar politi- 
cal genius of the Germanic race. Without distinctly re- 
pudiating the doctrine of the “higher power” in history, it 
finds the secret to the “free” institutional development of 
the Anglo-Saxon world in innate racial qualities. 
I American Historical Review, Vol. II, p. 13. 
} Bancroft, op. cit., Vol. I, p. 6.