minds the certainty of a final separation of the American States.
Compelled though they may be, reluctantly to admit the superiority of
our resources and the immense advantages we have recently gained over
the conspirators, they yet adhere with singular tenacity to the belief
that all our victories will be barren, and that all our vast
acquisitions of Southern territory will not avail for the ultimate
restoration of the Union. Though the domain originally usurped by the
rebellion is already sundered by our possession of that great
continental highway, the Mississippi river, and though no shadow of hope
remains that the enemies of the Union will ever be able to recover it;
though the recent boundless theatre of hostilities is gradually
contracting, and the resources of the rebellion are rapidly melting
away, until there remains no longer any doubt of our ultimate and even
speedy success in crushing the wasted armies of the desperate foe; and
though the boundaries of the boasted confederacy are uncertain,
ever-shifting, and mystical, while whole populations of recovered
regions of country hail the advent of our conquering flag with streaming
eyes and shouts of joy; yet our jealous friends across the water, in the
very act of acknowledging all this, never fail to assert, with the
utmost vehemence, that in spite of all our military advantages, the
Union is still irrecoverably destroyed. There is something remarkable in
this persistent opinion, which, through all the changes of condition
exhibited by the hostile parties in our struggling country, continues to
possess the mind of British statesmen with unshaken firmness. If they
undertake to justify their hasty recognition of the rebels as
belligerents, and to vindicate their alleged impartial neutrality, they
take apparently peculiar delight in fortifying themselves with the
declaration that the Union is effectually broken, and can never be
restored. It is necessary to throw the shield of this cherished
anticipation back on the unfriendly acts they have perpetrated against
us, in order fully to justify their conduct to themselves. If the
rebellious States should indeed be compelled to acknowledge the
authority of the Federal Government, and should return again to their
position in the Union, the hostile cruisers which have been fitted out
in England to harass our commerce, would occasion some unpleasant
negotiations, and perhaps some costly responsibilities. To brush these
all aside, and at the same time to get rid of a troublesome rival in
commerce and manufactures, by the final separation of the Union, is, to
them, on all accounts, 'a consummation most devoutly to be wished.' They
may yet have to learn, through the experience of their Southern friends,
that
'The ample proposition, that hope makes
In all designs begun on earth below,
Fails in the promised largeness.'
But perhaps, after all, it is we, ourselves, who are the victims of
delusive hope in reference to the destiny of our noble Union. Possibly
our disinterested friends across the water, calmly looking on from a
distance, may be better able to understand the tendency of events, and
to foresee the issue of the mighty civil contest which rages around us.
They are not at all involved in the awful passions which the war has
engendered in our bosoms, and thus, cool and deliberate, from the great
altitude of their assumed moral serenity and disinterestedness, they may
in reality behold the division of our country already accomplished,
whatever may be the result of our grand strategy and our bloody battles.
Let us open our eyes fully, and look this matter dispassionately in the
face. Let us try and ascertain whether we are in reality deceiving
ourselves and waging a vain and fruitless war against our exasperated
and misguided brethren of the South. We know they have instituted a
causeless rebellion, which has brought unnumbered woes upon our common
country. But if we cannot restore the Union, and reëstablish one great
and powerful nationality within the magnificent domain which we possess
as it was when this unhappy war began, then surely we are wasting our
blood and treasure--our lives and fortunes--with the most wanton and
wicked disregard of the sufferings and sacrifices of the people. If the
war is to accomplish nothing, then the sooner it is closed the better.
If the Union is indeed irrevocably broken and gone forever, let us, by
all means, hasten to arrange the terms of honorable peace, and stop the
effusion of blood at the earliest practicable moment. Unless we can
assure ourselves that there is some object to be gained, commensurate in
value with all the terrible sacrifices we are daily making, it is only
criminal stubbornness and passion which induce us to continue the awful
conflict.
Of one thing, at least, there is no shadow of doubt. The people of the
loyal States, who, by an immense majority, have just emphasized their
determination to sustain the war, are firmly convinced that they are not
laboring and suffering in vain. It is no spasmodic impulse of blind
passion, or even of useless though just resentment against wrong, which
impels them, after nearly three years of ruinous war, to redouble their
sublime efforts to conquer the treason that still obstinately resists
the lawful authority of the Union. Whatever else may be truly said of
this great conflict and its terrible results, it cannot be questioned
that the people of the loyal States are profoundly impressed with the
inestimable value of their free institutions and of the constitutional
integrity and unity of the Government which shall administer them on
this continent. They have faith in the exalted destiny of their country.
They at least do not admit that the Union is irrecoverably lost; on the
contrary, they believe, with a religious sincerity, which no temporary
disaster can shake, in the certainty of its speedy restoration. This
earnest faith is not merely the result of education and national
prejudice. While it is to some extent an instinctive or intuitive
insight of the American people, prophetically anticipating the future,
it is also a matter of sober judgment, founded upon the most substantial
and convincing reasons.
In the first place, the loyal people of the United States plainly see
that the true interests of both sections demand the restoration of their
old connection under one free and benign Government. Having originated
and developed a mighty republican government, until it became
continental in its dimensions, and having through it achieved results
unexampled in history, with the promise of future prosperity
immeasurably grand and imposing, the lovers of the Union would hold
themselves utterly unworthy of their lineage and of their inherited
freedom, if they could consent, in the presence of whatever dangers and
difficulties, to see the glorious destiny of their country defeated.
They would justly consider themselves traitors, not only to their
country, but also to the highest interests of humanity itself; and they
would feel the ineffable shame of imprinting the brand of their
degradation upon their own brows. Partakers of the noblest forms and the
most precious blessings of liberty, under a splendid, powerful, and
growing nationality, they are too conscious of the dignity and glory of
the American character ever to be willing to fall from that high estate
without a struggle which shall fully demonstrate their lofty patriotism
and their intelligent appreciation of the priceless political and social
structure they seek to preserve for the benefit of the whole country and
of the world. The history of Europe, and indeed the experience of the
entire human race, have taught them the immense value of a mighty
continental organization, such as our Union has hitherto established.
Solemnly impressed with this great lesson of human history, they will
never consent to see their country broken up into discordant fragments.
As they plainly foresee the tremendous and ever-increasing evils of such
a national disintegration, they have deliberately come to consider the
worst calamities of this war as mere dust in the balance when weighed
against them. It is this awful picture of bloody conflicts, perpetuated
through coming generations, wasting the substance and paralyzing the
fruitful energies of this mighty nation, perhaps for centuries to
come--it is this vista of inevitable calamities and horrors, which
reconciles the loyal people of North America to the dreadful war in
which they have been so earnestly engaged for the last two years and
more. They feel the inspiration of a sacred cause, the mighty impulse of
an idea as grand as their cherished hopes for their country, and as
immense as the interests of all humanity. They hear the mute appeals of
a swarming posterity, gathered from all nations in pursuit of freedom,
progress, and happiness, and they know that these countless millions
will justly hold them responsible for the deeds of the present momentous
hour. Is it strange that, penetrated and nerved with the high motives to
be derived from these solemn considerations, the American people are
prepared to accept the responsibilities of the great occasion, and even
to wade through blood for the realization of the grandeur of those human
hopes which are now intrusted to their keeping? One nation--one
government--one universal freedom within those imperial boundaries which
have heretofore been the theatre of our glorious achievements as a
people! This is the grand thought of the Union men of America. This is
the principle of their organization, and this it is which gives them
hope, and strength, and courage. What weakness, what degeneracy, what
dwindling of power for good and retrogression of thought and aim would
be the consequence of permanent division! What a lamentable fall in our
position among the nations of the earth, and what a diminution of our
capacity for progress among ourselves and for usefulness to mankind! It
is our duty and our destiny to develop all the physical resources of the
continent--to stimulate its agricultural capabilities--to bring to light
its boundless mineral treasures--to pierce its mountains and level its
valleys--to control its mighty floods--and to make it worthy to be the
seat of human freedom and of human empire. Nor is it less our destiny to
build up a moral and social power and a political organization, which
shall shed abroad a new and glorious light, beaming with immortal hopes,
and penetrating to the farthest verge of the habitable globe. Nature, in
every form of benignant usefulness and unequalled grandeur, invites us
to this tremendous task. The loyal people of the nation have not been
insensible to these mystic calls and the noble anticipations growing out
of them, fraught as they are with the happiness and progress of the
human race. They have projected works of the most gigantic proportions,
nor, although they are conscious that union is indispensable to their
success, have they hesitated to begin them, with all the high confidence
necessary to their completion. Even amid the perils and the vast
expenditures of civil war have they embarked in the grand enterprise of
uniting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans by a continental highway, equal
in its cost and its importance to the power and resources of a mighty
empire. Vast internal streams and lakes call for union by canals, which
shall typify the union of hearts and of interests destined to bind
together millions of freemen, whose connection of brotherhood and
national unity shall be as lasting as the perpetual flow of our mighty
rivers, and as full of blessings as our great lakes are of their pure
and crystal waters. The agitation of these momentous schemes, under
existing circumstances, is a phenomenon indicating a consciousness of
security and of vast power in the community, which, at the same time
that it is engaged in the perilous and bloody work of preserving the
Union, is preparing to perform the most important duties appertaining to
the nation in the hour of its most perfectly established and permanent
authority. It is the instinct of the national destiny working out its
ends in spite of the difficulties and dangers of the hour. It is the
prophetic vision of the popular mind, unconsciously preparing for a
great future not yet visible to the natural eye, but which the
providence of God, in its own good time, will verify to the firm and
courageous hearts of our people.
The loyal people of our country, those who are determined to restore the
Union, are well aware that it cannot be maintained by force. That great
political organization was voluntary in its origin, based on the consent
of the governed; and it has been upheld through all its marvellous
career of prosperity by the free and unconstrained will of the people,
who rejoiced in its common benefits and blessings. The novel system on
which it was built, not only required the largest liberty for its very
conception and for its practical embodiment, but was also admirably
devised to secure the complete and permanent enjoyment of that
individual independence in thought and action, which is the first of
human privileges. Those States of the Union which are preëminently loyal
to it, have ever cherished the most liberal principles of civil polity,
and have framed their constitutions in accordance with the most modern
and advanced maxims of popular rights. So far are they from any
disposition to usurp authority or to impose unjust or unnecessary
restraints upon the political action of the people, that they are
charged with the opposite fault of carrying liberty to the extreme of
ungoverned license. Of all the American States, these are the least
likely to interfere with the great principles of civil liberty, or to
impose an unacceptable government on the people by force. All the
violence, so far as any has been shown, is wholly on the other side.
Leaving entirely out of view the exceptional irregularities arising from
a state of civil war, and it must be acknowledged that the social and
political system of the Southern States is one which rests on arbitrary
force as its corner stone. It is this arbitrary and tyrannical spirit
embodied in Southern institutions which has seized on the pretext of
secession in order to destroy the Government of the Union. The efforts
of the loyal States and of the Federal authority in the present war are
antagonistic to this spirit. Their purpose is to break down and destroy
this system of arbitrary power, which has set itself up against the
Union; and in its stead to bring into play the great principle of
popular assent to the fundamental principles and conditions of
government. Annihilate the despotism which controls in the pretended
confederacy, give the masses of the people absolute freedom of choice
under the conditions necessary for deliberate and intelligent decision,
and they will certainly pronounce for the restoration of the old Union,
under which they have enjoyed such boundless prosperity. No friend of
the Union entertains any serious thought of disregarding or destroying
the great principle that governments are only rightly founded on the
consent of the governed. But it is not every temporary aberration of
thought, nor every outbreak of revolutionary violence, which may
properly be allowed to avail in changing the forms of an established
government. Some respect is due to obligations once assumed and long
recognized as the basis of a permanent political organization; and when
the minority in that organization have taken up arms against it, the
majority, in possession of the lawful power of the nation, are bound to
vindicate its constitutional authority. If the Union cannot be
maintained by force, it ought not to be destroyed by force. The instinct
of self-preservation, which is but the impulse of a solemn duty, would
necessarily and rightfully lead it to suppress the lawless force that
assailed it. If this assault is wholly wrong and unjustifiable, if it is
in reality as injurious to the seceding States themselves as to those
which remain in the Union, then it is certain that, with the suppression
of the violence prevailing in the disaffected region, the spirit of
disunion itself will disappear. The Federal Government cannot escape the
necessity of performing this duty, of suppressing and destroying the
lawless power which assails it, and permitting the Southern people to
return to the Union. At the present moment, in the midst of a sanguinary
conflict, they are blinded with passion and overflowing with enmity. But
set them free from the power which now deceives and abuses them, which
arrays them against their own best interests, and makes them the
helpless victims of a wicked war, and they will, at no distant period,
gladly pronounce for the unity of the great nation with which Providence
has cast their lot. Innumerable indications of this disposition among
the masses of the Southern people are visible in the events of every
day; and these will multiply in proportion to the success of our arms
and the decline of power in the rebellion. If we are mistaken in this
view, then our argument falls to the ground. If, upon a full
consideration of all the circumstances and with perfect freedom to act
according to their understanding of their best interests, the people of
the Southern States should deliberately determine upon a permanent
separation, our noblest hopes would be sadly disappointed. But this is
utterly impossible. In moments of frenzy, men may perpetrate deeds of
desperation. Among the masses of all communities, some are found who,
under various impulses, will commit suicide. But the conduct of the
great majority everywhere is controlled by the dictates of reason and
self-interest. Whatever folly, even to the extremity of
self-destruction, a few madmen in the Southern States may counsel, it
may confidently be expected that rational thoughts will prevail among
the masses. The paths of duty and of interest are for them the same;
and, upon the whole, are too broad and plain to be mistaken. Their
self-constituted leaders have already overwhelmed them with calamities.
The emancipated people will scarcely heed the advice of these, when
their plausible schemes shall have been all baffled, and their usurped
power utterly overthrown.
It is, therefore, very far from the thoughts of loyal men, in upholding
the Federal Government, to establish the principle of force as the bond
of the American Union. They repel the lawless force which now assails
it; and even while they do so, they invite the misguided people of the
rebellious region to return again to their allegiance and to take
shelter under the political system which is their only security for
permanent peace and prosperity. The result of the contest in the
restoration of the Union, so far from establishing force as the basis of
political authority, on the contrary, will certainly destroy it, and
give a far wider scope to the voluntary principle of consent, which is
the only solid foundation of freedom. In the normal condition of the
larger number of the loyal States, that is to say, in times of peace,
liberty prevails in its broadest and most universal sense. Force nowhere
holds a place in society, except for the protection of individual rights
and of public order. Every man is permitted to pursue happiness in his
own way, and to enjoy perfect freedom of thought, of speech, and of
action, except when his published words or his overt acts are calculated
to interfere with the acknowledged rights or interests of others. This
is, theoretically, the consummation of the greatest possible human
liberty. It provides only for order and justice, and leaves everything
else to the control of individual will and social coöperation. In the
present war for the Union, the loyal States are by no means contending
for the abrogation of this principle of liberty, but for its extension.
They desire neither to abolish it with reference to the Union, when
exercised through the forms provided in the Constitution, nor to prevent
its operations within the limits of the Southern States themselves.
It is not possible that the great civil conflict now pending could take
place without causing, in the end, an important extension of liberal
principles. These, when they once acquire a firm hold upon any society
possessed of the requisite intelligence, are altogether too strong for
the antagonistic principle of force, because the latter can be nothing
but an authority usurped by the few and exerted against the many; while
the former is the accumulation of the whole power of society wielded for
the benefit of all. Obviously, this affords the only basis broad enough
to sustain a social structure of any stability and permanence.
Under the operation of this voluntary principle--the principle of
voluntary consent and of universal freedom--the conflicting elements of
Southern society will be compelled to adjust themselves to each other
more wisely, and therefore more safely and profitably, than under the
arbitrary system which has hitherto prevailed.
Some of the wealthiest men and the largest slaveholders have already
discerned the necessities of their condition, and are fully prepared to
accept the new order of things, and to make their arrangements for
future operations accordingly. Under the law of liberty, the races, in
their new relations, will soon find their appropriate positions in the
social organization, subject chiefly to the natural influences of
intelligence, morality, industry, and property, but not without the
inevitable pressure and disturbance of traditional prejudice to hinder
and embarrass the operation of the principle of freedom. It is
impossible to prevent this, so long as human nature retains its present
tendency to selfishness and violence. The only alternative is to await
the soothing operation of time, which gradually softens the asperities
of prejudice, and may be expected ultimately to bring the noblest
harmony out of the present confusion and disorder.
Many good and humane men apprehend the most serious evils from the
sudden change of relations, now certain to be effected, between the two
races in the South. It will be a rude and violent shock to the interests
and feelings of the whites, and will undoubtedly produce that
inconvenience which always results from great social transformations.
But the anticipation is doubtless worse than the reality will prove to
be. There is a plastic capacity in human nature which enables it readily
to adjust itself in new situations when overruling necessity compels
submission. It remains to be seen what will be the results, immediate
and remote, of freedom in a society composed of so nearly equal
proportions of the two races. Whatever may be the mere temporary
difficulties at the outset, we do not doubt that, in the long run,
freedom will produce the best results to both. Nature is unerring in the
wisdom of her general purposes and in the selection of the means by
which she fulfils them, when left free to pursue her own laws. Whatever
oscillations may take place, the mean result is always good. The
experience of a single generation will dissipate all the delusions which
now blind and enrage the Southern people.
With the disappearance of the principle of arbitrary power now embodied
in Southern society, the last motive for a dissolution of the American
Union will have vanished forever. Should that principle only decline to
a subordinate authority, with the certainty of gradual extinction, the
interests of freedom will be in the ascendant, and their influence
secure the restoration of the Federal authority. Here lies the whole
problem: let despotism continue to prevail in the South, and the
separation, with all its terrible consequences, must inevitably be
accomplished; let freedom succeed, and from that moment, every hostile
sentiment at once subsides, and the sundered sections, 'like kindred
drops,' again 'mingle into one.' A free community will gravitate to the
central orb of liberty; one that is repellent to freedom will fly off on
its erratic course to the regions of outer darkness, and will never
return until, having completed the cycle of its destiny of ruin, it
shall be brought back to be regenerated at the fountain of light, and
truth, and liberty.
WAS HE SUCCESSFUL?
_PART THE LAST._
'Do but grasp into the thick of human life! Every one _lives_
it--to not many is it _known_; and seize it where you will, it is
interesting.'--GOETHE.
'SUCCESSFUL.--Terminating in accomplishing what is wished
or intended.'--WEBSTER'S _Dictionary_.
CHAPTER I.
More than twenty-five years have elapsed since the events narrated in
the last chapter.
New York has become a great and magnificent metropolis. The avenues of
the city extend for miles beyond the old landmarks. The adjacent farms
have been converted into lots, and covered with handsome houses. The old
buildings are torn down, and new and elegant ones erected in their
place. The streets are thronged with a purely cosmopolitan class. You
behold specimens of every nation under the heavens jostling the citizens
on the sidewalk, or filling the omnibuses which choke the way. And from
the commingled sounds of the tramp of horses, the rolling of vehicles,
and the tread of human beings, there arises through the day and far into
the night a perpetual but muffled roar from this great thoroughfare.
* * * * *
It is a lovely October afternoon--one of those mellow days for which
this latitude is so remarkable--possessing the softness and genial
temperature of summer, without its scorching heat.
The world of fashion has returned from the Spas, the mountains, the
seaside. Elegant equipages pass up and down, or stop before the favorite
resorts for shopping. The streets and sidewalks are literally crowded,
as if it were some grand gala-time.