Note i-23 — INTRODUCTION

Prior to the Treaty of Paris (1763) the American colonies were indebted primarily to English liberalism for ideas subversive of colonial orthodoxy. If works of Fénelon, Fontenelle, Bayle, Voltaire, and Rousseau are occasionally found in the colonies prior to 1763, these are dwarfed beside the impact of such English minds as those of Trenchard and Gordon, Collins, Wollaston, Tillotson, Boyle, Shaftesbury, Locke, and Newton. It was only in the twilight of the century that French liberalism, itself nursed on English speculation, began to impinge on the thought-life of the colonies. See H. M. Jones, America and French Culture. Also see L. Rosenthal, "Rousseau at Philadelphia," Magazine of American History, VII, 46-55. See works of Riley, Koch, Gohdes, Morais, in Bibliography, pp. cli ff., below.