The next Augustan age will dawn on the other side of the Atlantic. There will, perhaps, be a Thucydides at Boston, a Xenophon at New York, and, in time, a Virgil at Mexico, and a Newton at Peru. At last, some curious traveller from Lima will visit England and give a description of the ruins of St Paul’s, like the editions of Balbec and Palmyra.
Horace Walpole, letter to Sir Horace Mann (1774-11-24). — cited in Antonello Gerbi (2010). The Dispute of the New World: The History of a Polemic, 1750-1900. University of Pittsburgh Press. ISBN0822960818.
