Aging & Wisdom Quote by Mercy Otis Warren

A young republic is a fragile thing, and Mercy Otis Warren writes like someone who knows how quickly lofty language can curdle into faction. Calling the United States a "confederacy" is doing pointed work: this is not yet the inevitable nation-state of later mythology, but a stitched-together experiment whose seams can split under stress. Her verb choice, "cemented", is almost architectural, a reminder that unity is a construction project, not a vibe. Cement has to be mixed, applied, maintained; it can also crack.

Warren pairs "interests" with "affection" to sketch a theory of political durability. Interests alone drift toward bargaining and resentment; affection alone risks sentimentality without staying power. She insists on both, and that insistence carries subtext: the new republic is already in danger of becoming a collection of rival regions and ambitions, held together by convenience rather than commitment. That worry tracks with the post-Revolution moment when the glow of shared victory faded into disputes over debt, representation, and federal power.

The final clause is her moral tripwire: union should exist "under the influence of those principles which obtained their independence". Independence wasn’t merely a change of management; it was justified by principles meant to discipline the victors too. Warren, a playwright and political writer who watched revolutions betray themselves, is warning against a republic that keeps the flag but loses the ethic. The sentence flatters the founding story while quietly demanding that the country live up to it.