Once more the country is aroused by a call to arms. It is now
nearly a century ago that our fathers assembled in mass meetings in
this city to devise ways and means for this very flag which to-day
we give to the winds of heaven, bearing defiance from every star.
Fired, then, with the same spirit of freedom that kindles on this
spot to-day, for the time throwing aside the habiliments of peace,
our fathers armed themselves for vengeance and for war. The history
of that war, read it in the hearts of the American people; the
trials and struggles of that war, mark them in the teardrops which
the very allusion brings to every eye; the blessings from that war,
count them in the temples of industry and trade that arise
everywhere around us; the wisdom of that war, and the honor and the
perpetuity of its triumphs, behold the one in our unexampled
prosperity as a nation, and the other in the impulses that, like an
electric flash, bind heart to heart, throughout this vast
assemblage, in the firm resolve that, cost what it may, rebellion
shall go down. Again, the American people are assembled in mass
meetings throughout the nation, while the States once more rock in
the throes of revolution. Once more the cry to arms reverberates
throughout the land; but this time we war against domestic foes.
Treason has raised its black flag near the tomb of Washington, and
the Union of our States hangs her fate upon the bayonet and the
sword. Accursed be the hand that would not seize the bayonet;
withered the arm that would not wield the sword in such a cause!
Everything that the American citizen holds dear hangs upon the issue
of this contest. Our national honor and reputation demand that
rebellion shall not triumph on our soil. In the name of our heroic
dead, in the name of our numberless victories, in the name of our
thousand peaceful triumphs, our Union shall and must be preserved!
Our peaceful triumphs? These are the victories we should be jealous
to guard. Let others recount their martial glories; they shall be
eclipsed by the charity and the grace of the triumphs which have
been won in peace. "Peace hath her victories not less renowned than
war," and the hard-earned fruits of these victories rebellion shall
not take from us. Our peaceful triumphs? Who shall enumerate their
value to the millions yet unborn? What nation in so short a time
has seen so many? On the land and on the sea, in the realms of
science and in the world of art, we have everywhere gathered our
honors and won our garlands. Upon the altars of the States they yet
lie, fresh from gathering, while their happy influence fills the
land. Of the importance and value of our thousand peaceful triumphs
time will permit me to mention only one. It is now just two years
ago when up the waters of the Potomac sailed the representatives of
an empire till then shut out from intercourse with all Christian
nations. In the Eastern seas there lay an empire of islands which
had hitherto enjoyed no recognition in the Christian world other
than its name upon the map. No history, as far as we know,
illuminated it; no ancient time-marks told of its advancement, step
by step, in the march of improvement. There it has rested for
thousands of years, wrapped in the mysteries of its own
exclusiveness--gloomy, dark, peculiar. It has been supposed to
possess great powers; and vague rumors have attributed to it arts to
us unknown. Against nearly all the world, for thousands of years
Japan has obstinately shut her doors; the wealth of the Christian
world could not tempt her cupidity; the wonders of the Christian
world could not excite her curiosity. There she lay, sullen and
alone, the phenomenon of nations. England and France and the other
powerful governments of Europe have at various times tried to
conquer this Oriental exclusiveness, but the Portuguese only partly
succeeded, while all the rest have signally failed. At length we,
bearing at our masthead the glorious old Stars and Stripes, approach
the mysterious portals and seek an entrance. Not with cannon and
the implements of death do we demand admission, but, appreciating
the saying of Euripides, that
"Resistless eloquence shall open
The gates that steel exclude,"
we peacefully appeal to that sense of justice which is the "touch of
nature that makes the whole world kin," and behold! the
interdiction is removed; the doors of the mysterious empire fly
open, and a new garland is added to our commercial conquests! Who
shall set limits to the gain that shall follow this one victory of
peace, if our government shall be perpetuated so as to gather it for
the generations? Who shall say that in an unbroken, undivided
union, the opening of the empire of Japan shall not accomplish for
the present era all that the Reformation, the art of printing,
steam, and the telegraph have done within the last three hundred
years? New avenues of wealth are thrown open; new fields are to be
occupied; arts new to us, perhaps, are to be studied; and science,
doubtless, has revelations to make us, from that arcana of nations,
equal to anything we have ever learned before. Fifty millions of
people are to be enlightened; the printing press is yet to catch the
daily thought and stamp it on the page; the magnetic wire must yet
tremble along her highways, and Niphon yet tremble to her very
centre at each heart-beat of our ocean steamers, as they sweep
through her waters and thunder round her island homes. All hail,
all hail, to these children of the morning; all hail, all hail, to
the Great Republic of the West that calls them into life! From
every age that has passed there comes a song of praise for the
treaty that has been consummated. The buried masters of three
thousand years start again to life and march in solemn and grand
procession before the eyes of the new-found empire. Homer with his
songs, Greece with her arts, Rome with her legions, and America with
her heroes, all come to us with the freshness and novelty of the
newly born. Wipe off the mold that time has gathered upon their
tombs, and let them all come forth and answer, at the summons of a
new-born nation that calls them again to life!
Tell to these strangers the story of the resurrection. Clutching in
their hands their dripping blades, the warriors recount their
conquests, and joined at last in harmonious brotherhood, Copernicus,
with bony fingers pointing upward, tells to Confucius his story of
the stars!
Fellow-citizens, I have recounted but one of our many peaceful
triumphs. Shall all these hopes of the future, shall all these
peaceful victories of our people, shall all these struggles of the
past be swept away by the dissolution of this Union and the
destruction of the government? Forbid it, Almighty God! Rather
perish a thousand times the cause of the rebellion, and over the
ruins of slavery let peace once more resume her sway, and let the
cannon's lips grow cold. _Delenda_ _est_ _Carthago_, said the old
Roman patriot, when gloom settled upon his State. The rebellion
must go down in the same spirit, say we all to-day. Down with
party, sect, and class, and up with a sentiment of unanimity when
our country calls to arms! New England leads us in the contest.
The legions of Vermont are now _en_ _route_ for the field. Again,
she can say with truth that "the bones of her sons lie mingling and
bleaching with the soil of every State from Maine to Georgia, and
there they will lie forever." New York must not be behind the Old
Bay State which led a year ago. In the spirit world, Warren calls
to Hamilton, and Hamilton calls back to Warren, that hand in hand
their mortal children go on together to fame, to victory, or to the
grave. Where the ranks are full, let us catch an inspiration from
the past, and with it upon us go forth to conflict. Go call the
roll on Saratoga, Bunker Hill, and Yorktown, that the sheeted dead
may rise as witnesses, and tell your legions of the effort to
dissolve their Union, and there receive their answer. Mad with
frenzy, burning with indignation at the thought, all ablaze for
vengeance upon the traitors, such shall be the fury and impetuosity
of the onset that all opposition shall be swept away before them, as
the pigmy yields to the avalanche that comes tumbling, rumbling,
thundering from its Alpine home! Let us gather at the tomb of
Washington and invoke his immortal spirit to direct us in the
combat. Rising again incarnate from the tomb, in one hand he holds
that same old flag, blackened and begrimed with the smoke of a
seven-years' war, and with the other hand be points us to the foe.
Up and at them! Let immortal energy strengthen our arms, and
infernal fury thrill us to the soul. One blow,--deep, effectual,
and forever,--one crushing blow upon the rebellion, in the name of
God, Washington, and the Republic!