Excerpt from The American Metropolis, From Knickerbocker Days, to the Present Time, New York City Life, in All Its Various Phases Mon people, as distinguished from the landed and aristocratic parties, moved with a common impulse, with directness, and with more or less wisdom, to un dertake the defense of popular rights, and to protect the City and its citizens from the invasion of enemies. Although the merchants frequently demonstrated their patriotism and their willingness to sacrifice their pecul iar interests for the general good, they were (and still are) a conservative class; the landed class also was afraid of the governing powers, which could do much to injure them in their possessions; but the Common People, led by the Sons of Liberty - few of whom were men of large means, or of large mercantile or landed interests-held our City in the front rank of the communities that stood for freedom, and led the way to independent government. The Leislerian movement was the forerunner of people's move ments, designed to protect the City and its inter ests, when the regularly constituted authorities failed to serve the people. All hope for good in the future of New York is based upon the disposition of the common people to rally together, not only for the support, but for the enforcement of the prin ciples of popular government. The popular move ment in New York in 1688 had no connection with the Pilgrim Spirit of the East, nor with what Burke called the arrogant love of liberty of the Cavaliers at the South. The people of New York were con cerned with the interests of their own City, and realized that their condition as individuals depended largely upon the condition and the government of. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.