putrirctit Ittobgtit
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 21, 1865.
Readers will bear with the numerous
advertisements. The pressure will di
minish from this week.
MANY ARTICLES are laid over tail
next week, including an account of a re
vival in Elmira, New York, in connec
tion with Mr. Hammond's labors.
NEW ARRANGEMENTS.
The very great and continuous pressure
upon our own and all literary enterprises,
by high prices, taxation, etc., point to a
rise in charges, or to a reduction in the
size of large papers. Many single sheet
papers charge the same subscription price
that we do, for our large and elaborately
composed sheet.
We, however, propose neither an increase
in our regular price, nor a diminution in
size, but sundry economical measures, will
be introduced to take effect from Jan
uary first,lB66. They are as follows :
1 Delinquent subscribers must expect to
be struck from our list. As many as seven
or eight hundred have failed to make any
payment during the last twelve months.
The paper alone consumed in sending to
those subscribers cost over one thousand
dollars. Some ha,ye,,#ot paid for a much
longer time. Pro t payment will be
necessary to secure a 'continuence of the
paper.
2 We shall indicate, by a difference in
the colors of the wrappers, the state of
subscriber's accounts. Red or reddish
Brown will signify unpaid ; the usual light
color will signify paid.
3 Home Missionaries will hereafter be
charged $2 in advance; all others will pay
regular rates. Clubs of ten or more,
strictly in advance, and in one payment,
$2 50 each.
4 The services of collectors are valuable
and must be paid. In some instances it
costs twenty per cent to collect bills. Here
after, no bills will be put into the hands of
paid collectors, until subscribers have had
a chance to make payment directly to our
office, or to such pastors and others as act
gratituously for us. After three menthe,
the bills, with the usual additional charge
of 50 cents, will be banded over to col
lectors.
5 A cash commission of seventy-five
cents, will be allowed on all new sub
scribers, paying full rates In advance.
When four or more are sent at once, $1 25
will be allowed for each. Very liberal
offers, in books are tnade, up to January
Ist. Old subscribers to the paper, (but
not to the magazines,) on sending Two
Dollars additional 'with the subscription,
will receive for one year, a copy of Hours
at Home, or Guthrie's Sunday Magozine.
Or, on sending the name of a new subscriber
to the paper and $3 50 (in the city $4)
they will receive for one year either of the
magazines.
THE NEW CHURCH PERIODICAL.
Our Permanent Committees have
made another demonstration of the thrif
tiness of our denomination by the issue,
from the Presbyterian House, 1334
Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, and the
Presbyterian Rooms,lso Nassau Street,
New York, of the first number of the
Presbyterian Monthly. The design of
this periodical is to keep the pastors,
sessions, and individual members of our
Church, well informed of the condition
of our great church enterprises—Home
and Foreign missions, the circulation of
Denominational and other evangelical Lit
erature, Education for the Ministry, and
the Relief of needy Ministers. The execu
tive officers of these several departments
will use the Monthly as a medium of
communication with the churches, and
they have always a sufficiency of mate
rial on hand to make it a rich treasure
of the current history of our Church work.
Each number will contain twenty-four
pages, enclosed in a beautifully designed
emblematic cover. The mechanical ex
ecution of the first number, from the
press of Mr. Alfred Martien, of this city,
with its excellent quality of paper,
and clear type, is tasteful and about
faultless—a feature which has become
characteristic of the issues of the Publi
cation Committee. It is to be furnished
to subscribers at one dollar per year.
THE REVIVAL IN BINGHAMPTON.- The
Republican, a local paper, assures us
that the religious interest in Binghamp
ton has by no means abated in conse
quence of the close of Mr. Hammond's
labors there. It says :
"On Sabbath days the churches are now
very full where vacant room was heretofore
found. The meetings in the several churches
of the villages during the week are well at
tended, and the interest manifested is still
great. The morning prayer -meeting at Bf,
o'clock, is still maintained in the Presbyterian
room, and the gatherings are marked with
the like feeling which they exhibited weeks
ago. The meetings during the week are held
in the evening, at the several churches. On
Saturday afternoons children's meetings are
held in some of the churches. During the
present week, meetings are to be held on the
evening of nearly every, if not every day of
the week, at Carmansville, and awakening of
religious interest is mentioned at Hancock,
on the Choeonut, and at Bigler's Mills. In
Another place we have mentioned how .the
interest manifested for the prisoners in the\
jail is continued. On Sabbath afternoon one
of the largest Young Men's Prayer -meetings
the village has witnessed, was held in Con
gregational chapel, on the west side of the
river; the interest in the gatherings seeming
rather to grow than diminish."
THE AMERICAN PRESBYTERIAN, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 21, 1865.
PEACE AND HONOR
A THANKSGIVING SERMON
Delivered in the First Presbyterian
Church, Philadelphia, Dec. 7, 1865.
BY REV. ALBERT BARNES.
[CORRESPONDENCE.I
PHILADELPHIA, December, 9th, 1865
REV. ALBERT BARNES : DEAR SIR : — The un
dersigned, having listened with deep interest to
your discourse on the day of our National
Thanksgiving, and believing that it presents
views of the existing state of our public affairs
calculated to inspire the high& sentiments of
Christian patriotism, respectfully but earnestly
request a copy for publication.
AMBROSE WHITE, ALEXANDERFULLERTON,
SAMUEL H. PERKINS, JAMES S. EARLE,
JAMES CROWELL, WILLIAM G. CROWELL,
CHAS. D. CLEVELAND, JOHN C. CLARK,
WILLIAM PURVES, SAMUEL C. PERKINS,
HENRY H. MEARS.
PHILADELPHIA, December 15th, 1865.
MESSRS. AMBROSE WHITE, SAMUEL H. PERKINS
AND OTHERS,
Gentlemen:—lt is very gratifying to me that
the sentiments of the discourse deliveied on the
day of our National Thanksgiving-naeeith
your approb9tion . I yield the discourse t you
for publication with great pleasure, hoping that
it may do something to "inspire high senti
ments of Christian patriotism."
I am, with very great respect,
Very truly yours,
ALBERT BARNES.
"Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into
his courts with praise; be thankful unto him, and
bless his name,"—Panmo c. 4.
There has never, in the history of our world,
been such an occasion for thanksgivingas this:—
an occasion when there has been so marked an
interposition of Providence; when great ca
lamities have been so suddenly arrested ; when
so momentous consequences would result from
the return of peace • when the causes of war
have been so entirely removed; when the es
tablishment of peace has been so definite and
decided, leaving so few difficulties to..hkad
justed, and so few questions undetermined;
when there has been no yielding the point in
volved in the controversy ; and when there have
been no dishonorable concessions by compro
mise, laying the foundation for future difficul
ties.
For four successive years we have come to
gether at our annual thanksgivings with sad and
burdened hearts. Even in the midst of the
fiercest civil war that has ever been waged, and
when there was much occasion for humiliation,
fasting, and prayer, we have exhibited to the
world the remarkable spectacle of a people
who have on no occasion omitted our custom
of National thanksgiving. We felt, even amidst
these bloody scenes, that there were reasons
for gratitude—for all-was dot lost, and there
was yet hope for our country. We felt that the
heart of the nation would be encouraged, its
arms strengthened, and its patriotism nerved.
by waiting on God, and by seeking, amidst the
desolations of war, occasions for encourage
ment and praise. There were great issues at
stake ; there were reverses ; there were vast
armies organized against- the Government ;
there were battle-fields strewed with the slain,
and hospitals filled with grounded and suffering
men ; there were thogtiands of families in the
land clothed in mourning, but still the nation
never despaired of success, norovas the hope of
the permanenee of the Gavernment, and the
preservation of the Union, ever for one moment
abandoned. We found occasion for thanksgiv
ing in the abundance of the harvests; in the
freedom ot the land from pestilence;in peace
preserved with foreign powers ; in th fact that
other nations had not the power, and were kept
from carrying out the disposition, to injure us ;
in the determined spirit ot fidelity to the
Government in the land ; in the readiness
of our brothers and sons to go to the defence
of the nation ; and in the large benevolence
which prompted all classes of our people
—mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, as well
as men, to contribute their time and their
money to promote the comfort of those engaged
in the war, to advance their spiritual good, and
to minister to the, sick and the dying. We
drew also sources ot thankfulness from the future
in the strong faith that the integrity of the na
tion would be preserved, and that the day would
come, at no distant period, when the rebellion
would be suppressed, and when peace and
union would again bless our land.
Thus we cheered our hearts in those gloomy
Aso: . For when we came together we saw the
Trigit day which has now dawned upon us only
through shadows and darkness. • We anticipated
great battles still, even such as had not as yet
occurred; possible reverses—for we had been
schooled to expect such things ; the flowing of
blood ; the shedding of tears ; the opening of
graves, and the multiplication of widows and
orphans. •
But the bright day longed for, prayed for, be
lieved-in, has come; and has come so that no
one can mistake in the time and the manner of
its coming that it is the act of God, and that,
therefore, it is proper to praise him; and we
come with unburdened hearts this day to per
form that service. , As there has been no such
occasion for thanksgiving before, so none of us
will live to see such an occasion again. What
a contrast with the state of things four years
ago, three, two, one ! Where are those great
armies that were in the field one year ago?
They have suddenly disappeared. The men of
war, North and South, have laid down their
weapons, and have returned to their homes.
Never, in the history of the world, has there
been such a disbanding of armies—so sudden,
so entire, with so cheerful a return to the
peaceful pursuits of life :—the farmer to his
farm, the mechanic to his workshop, the pro
fessional man to his office. The soldier be
comes a citizen again—a neighbor, a cultivator
of the earth, a quiet participant of the liberty
which he has aided to secure on the battle-field.
The nation is now once more at peace; peace
in our own borders ; peace with all the world
—an honorable peace secured by battle at
home ; an honorable peace preserved by skilful
diplomacy with the nations abroad. ft is not
a peace preserved at home by dishonorable
compromise, leaving an opportunity again for
war ; it is not a peace secured abroad by dis
honorable compliances, leaving questions un
settled for the future that may lead to
war. It is peace, in the one ease, secured by
a more complete suppression of a rebel/ion
than has ever occurred before is the history of
the world ; in the other case, by justice done to
all on our part, and by demanding, in tones
that commanded respect, that justice should be
done to us by all. it is peace at home with our
institutions intact; with our Union preserved;
with a country not dismembered; with no part
of our vast territory divided off; and with all the
arrangements of . government and law, of re
ligion and learning, of restored agriculture,
and the arts—courts and railroads, and postal
arrangements,—steadily making their way in
the portions of our country where the insurrec
tion had its origin, and which have been most
desolated by war. For all this we should to
day render humble and hearty thanks.
And now that the war is over, and the four
years' struggle ended, we cannot but inquire
whether in that fearful conflict any thing has
been gained for which :we should also give
thanks; whether any good has come out of the
struggle which will go into our future history,
and which will make la a greater and a better
people ; whether the results are worth the sac
rifices made, and are such as to show that the
struggle was right and wise,, or whether it would
have been better to have yielded to the insur
gents, to have suffered the Union to be de
stroyed, and to have divided ourselves into two
or more nations. No such advantage can, in
deed, repair all the evils of the war. It cannot
recall to life the brave men who have fallen in
the service of their country. It cannot restore
to their homes the sons and brothers who have
pined in hospitals, or who have died on the field
of battle. It cannot unpeople the cemeteries
at Gettysburg and Andersonville, or call forth
again the warriors that sleep "their last
sleep." It cannot restore the limbs of those
maimed in battle. The one class sleep in their
graves—honored graves ; the other will be re
membered in their wants by a grateful country,
nor will the services of either be forgotten.
What is there then, as the result of the war,
for which the nation should be grateful? •
I. We have, first, a Government. It is now
a settled question that we have a "govern
ment," properly so called ; that the idea of a
government is not identical with that of a mon
archy, or a despotism, but may be found con
nected with a Republic ; that, in fact, "no
government is 'So strong as a republic, con
trolled, under the Divine guidance, by an edu
cated, a moral, and a religious people."
The idea of a government is, that it has a
right to make laws ; that it has power to
enforce its own laws ; that it can maint a i n
itself against the aggressions of other pow
ers, and against insurrection and rebellion
at home; that its laws have sanctions and pen
alties, and that those sanctions and penalties
can be enforced and inflicted if it is disobeyed;
that it can put down revolt within its own lim
its, as well as defend itself from aggressive
force abroad. It is not an advisory power ; it
is a power to command, and to. be obeyed.
Whether there was to be a government in this
country, properly so called, was the great ques
tion before the minds of our fathers, second in
importance in their view only to the qiestion
whether there was to be independence of for
eign nations. The Revolutionary Congress was
not a government. The Confederation which
succeeded it was not agovernment. Both were
advisory bodies only ; and the question whether
their laws were to be obeyed was a question
which they could not deterinine, but was to be
left to the voluntary action of the several States.
No State was obliged to obey. No State could
be compelled to raise men or money to defend
the country ; and if any State refused to comly
with the requisition of the Congress, there was
no power to enforce obedience. The evil of this
was felt, even with the existence of extraordi
nary patriotism, through all the war of the Re
yolution • the evil became more apparent under
the Cqniederation, and threatened to produce
tinfirerhal anarchy, bankruptcy, and disorder.
To meet these evils ; to form a government,
p.l9i3erly so called, the Constitution of the
United States was framed and adopted. Every
feature in that Constitution is properly that of
a government, and not that of an advisory body.
In every article of the Constitution, law, and
not advice, is contemplated ; with every Con
stitutional enactment of the Government, and
every proper act of the departrdents of the Go
vernment, executive, judicial, and legislative,
lth
there is express cirjt h y to secure the exe
cution of the laftS ' r the:Cl:ingress of the na
tion has power ;t ia make All laws which shall
be necessary andproper for' carrying into execu
tion the powers vested by the Constitution in
the Government of the United States, or in any
department or officer thereof." Art. I, Sec.
8. It was designed to place the administration
of affairs in this country on the same footing,
though in a different form, with the other na
tions of the earth—where a government had
the power to maintain itself, and to secure the
execution of its own laws. In other countries
such powers of government were then, and are
now, administered almost exclusively in the
form of a monarchy ; in our country the great
question was to be tested whether these powers
could be connected with the idea, and with the
power, of a republic.
For eighty years, mostly in peaceful times,
and never in the form of a rebellion, that idea
had been carried out in our country. We had
a ,government. The laws were peacefully
obeyed. There had been, except in small lo
calities, and with slight exceptions, no organ
ized resistance. Every law of Congress; every
decision of the Surireme - Court, however impor
tant were the interests involvoil, pertaining to
customs; to commerce, to tye tariff, to the
intercourse of the States with each other, or
with foreign nations, ,had been as faithfully
obeyed as any law emanating 'from the legisla
tures,the judicial powers, or the thrones of the
Old orld.
• Still, the world doubted whether a govern
ment under the form of a republic could main
tain and perpetuate itself and the nations
of the Old World, even amidst their own
revolutions, were reluctant to adopt our
mode of government, and after a temporary
experiment, returned, with no exception,
to the old idea that government can be con
nected only with a monarchical form of
administration. Some great trial was neces
sary to convince the world that the government
of a republic might be as firm in times of con
vulsion as in times of peace ; that it has power
to maintain itself under the most formidable
domestic insurrection, as well as in conflict
with nations abroad.
That question has now been put to the test;
and has been determined forever. No govern
ment in similar circumstances has ever been
more firm - none could have done more than
has been-done in this land to suppress so for
midable a rebellion. Not for one day or hour
have the regular operations of the Government
in the three great departments been suspended;
not for one moment has it been a matter of
doubt in our land, or in other countries, whe
ther there was still such a "government" as
that of the United States. Especially is this
fact important in respect to foreign nations.
With nearly all those nations it has been a fa
vorite idea that a republic lacked the essential
thing involved in the idea of a government;
that it must soon show its weakness and insuf
ficiency; and that it would evince so much
weakness, and tend so much to anarchy, that
it would be necessary ultimately to adopt the
stronger forms of government that exist under
the ide of a monarchy. After eighty years'
experiduce in times of peace and of war with
foreign powers ; and now after the suppression
of the most formidable rebellion ever known on
earth, it can be, with no nation, a question
whether the object contemplated by our fathers
in the formation of the Constitution has been
accomplished.
These two points have been shown, and they
will now go into our history as points that have
been settled forever :—first, that our Republi
can Government is capable of the exertion of
all the power which the most absolute despot
ism could exert in the maintainance of its own
authority, and in the suppresSion of a rebellion ;
and, second, that it emerges from such a strife
a Republic still—with no power in the Consti
tution impaired;. with every right of freedom
maintained; with no tendency to military des
potism ; and with no necessity even of modify
ing the Government with reference to a future
similar emergency.
We are, then, in view of this fact, prepared
to reflect on what would have been the condi
tion of the country if this had not been the re
sult of the conflict. Instead of peace and unity
now, there would have been wide-spread an
archy. The right of " secession" would have
been established ; and this henceforward would
have become a fundamental idea in relation to
all questions of confederation or union :—a
right that would soon have been exercised in
every direction—more amply still in the States
of the South; and not improbably in the North,
and the East, and the West. The hopes of
foreigners in regard to our country would have
been realized, and instead of being one nation
occupying an honorable position among the
nations of the earth, we should have been bro
ken in a large number of feeble and contending
States, each struggling for its own existence
against the rest. It was well said in the begin
ning of the contest, by the Secretary of State in
a letter to the Minister to France,* "If it be
Message and Documentz. 1861-62 Part I. PP- iss.
199.
true, as the consent of mankind authorizes us
to assume, that the establishment of this Gov
ernment was the most auspicious political event
that has happened in the whole progress of his
tory, its fall must be deemed not only a na
tional calamity, but a misfortune to the human
race. The success of this revolution would not
only be a practical overthrow of the entire sys
tem of government, but the first stage by such
confederacy in the road to anarchy, such as so
widely prevails in South America. The con
test then," he adds, " involves nothing less
than a failure of the hope to devise a stable
system of government upon the principle of
the consent of the people, and working through
the peaceful expression of their will without de
pending on military authority."
We should not, perhaps, be justified in saying
that if this struggle had been disastrous to the
Government and the Union, the last hope of
the successful establishment of free institutions
would have died out in the world, but we may
say that long periods 'must have elapsed before
such a government would be formed again
under auspices so favorable, and that the hope
of the establishment of free institutions must
have been pushed indefinitely into the future.
That, with the return of peace, therefore, we
have a 'government still ; that the results of the
fearful conflict have shown that the hope and
aim of our fathers in founding a government in
the place of the advisory Congress of the Revo
lution, and the very limited power of govern
ment underthe Confederation, is the first ground
for our thanksgiving to-day. Had there been
nothing more than this, theappoitnment of such
a day would have been eminently appropriate.
11. We have, secondly, as a ground of thanks
giving, an assurance, as clear as anything in the
future can be to mortal view, that this Govern
ment can never be overthrown by internal civil
war.
We have hitherto felt ourselves safe in regard
to the unity and the duration of the Republic
from any effort which foreign powers might
make to destroy us. Once, since the Revolu
tion, we have engaged in a fearful conflict of
war with a nation then the most formidable of
any in the world on the sea and on the land.
Whether the result of that conflict was to ob
tain the object of the war or not, it settled one
point forever, that the Government of the
United States could maintain its rights on the
seas, and was safe from any invasion by land.
Our great distance from the Old Wo . rld, if no
thing else, would save us from the danger of
invasion from abroad, or from being involved
in any of those revolutions which may, as in
former times, convulse the European powers.
From danger from Austria, or Prussia, or Rus
sia,, or France, or England, still more from
India, and Persia, and China—we were safe.
But there was another question not less im
portant, which there was no means of determin
ing from anything pertaining to our position, or
anything in our history. It was, whether the
Republic might not be overthrown by civil war ;
by an organized rebellion within in its own bor
ders. That was an open question ; and that,
so far as foreign nations cherished any desire
that our Government might be overthrown, and
the plan of self-government fail, was to them
the .only ground of hope. There was nothing
in our history, or the history of any other na
tion, to which we could appeal to determine
that. All history had shown that there could
not be under any form of government, immu
nity from civil war. Egypt, Assyria, Babylo
nia, Persia, Greece, Rome, in ancient times—
Italy, France, England, in modern times—had
all been the theatres of armed and organized
insurrection. Some of those nations had
emerged from the conflict unscathed ; not a
few of them had changed their form of govern
ment under the power of such insurrections ; in
no one perhaps had the result been such as to
discourage all hope that an insurrection better
planned might not be successful. In our own
country there had been two instances of insur
rection the " whisky" insurrection in our
own State, and "Shay's Rebellion in Massachu
setts," both on a small scale; both easily sup
pressed ; and neither determined the question
whether an armed insurrection, on a large scale,
and better planned, might not be successful in
overthrowing the Government, and dismember
ing the Union.
That question may now be regarded as set
tled forever; and it is worth much, though it
has cost much, to have a question so vital de
termined, and so determined that the mind
may be calm on that point in regard to all the
future ; that in reference to that danger, as in
reference to the danger of destruction by any
foreign power, our Union is safe.
Never was a purpose of this kind better
planned; better matured; carried out with a
more determined spirit; or prosecuted with a
greater amount of skill, self-sacrifice and talent,
than this rebellion has been ; and it is not pos
sible to conceive that in all the future an insur
rection on so large a scale can be so well
planned and developed again, orthat the nation
will be found slumbering again on the eve of
such a rebellion; that plans could be formed
so that the strong places of defence—the forts
and arsenals could be so suddenly seized; that
armies so formidable in numbers, and so well
officered, could be called suddenly, as it by
magic, into the field; that foreign powers would
be so hasty to recognize an insurrection as en
titled by sea and land to the rights of belliger
ents, or be so anxious to recognize in such an
insurrection the rights of an established Gov
ernment ; that they would be so ready to furnish
arms and money, or to fit out ships of war to
break through an established blockade, or to
arm and to man piratical ships to prey upon the
commerce of a nation with whom they were
professedly at peace.
For the purpose was formed more than thirty
years ago at the instigation and under the in
fluence of one of the most eminent men in the
Southern States, or in our whole country—John
C. Calhoun. The doctrine that was really at
the foundation of the late rebellion—the doc
trine of State Rights held in such a form as to
justify nullification of the acts of Congress—the
substantial doctrine of secession and rebellion,
was then advanced, and was defended by all
his great powers ; and that doctrine would then
have been practically carried out if it had not
been for the firmness, the patriotism, and the
talent—the unconquerable will of one man—
Andrew Jackson.
The purpose of the separation and indepen
denky of
s the Southern States has been prac
tically'pursued for-more than thirty years; the
doctrines which tended to it have been props
fated with untiring zeal, and have never been
4 I
or a m o ment. abandoned ; the opportunity has
been waited for to carry on this purpose, and to
give a practical form to the doctrines. Yet
there was a great preparatory work to be done.
It was not easy to teach even the South to for
get the war of the Revolution, the struggle for
Independence, and the efforts of her own
statesmen in ming the Union, and in estab
lishing the Constitution. It was not easy so to
resent imaginary wrongs as to arouse great
States to efforts to establish a' separate
government, and • to make war on the
Union. It was needful to change the current
sentiment of the South, and to obliterate the
recollection of other days. Especially was it
necessary to change the public view respecting
slavery; to awaken a zeal for perpetuating and
-propagating it; to connect it with all the in
dustrial, social, political and religious interests
and opinions of the South ; to exalt it into a
national question ; to put the public mind into
such a state that any refusal to extend the insti
tution into new territories and States, and to
spread it all over the Union—any attempt to
check it—to restrain it—or to -remove it, even
by the most peaceful means—would be regard
ed as hostility to the South, and would justify
rebellion and separation. It was a slow work,
but it was done. The long process of edu
cating the mind of the South to this point
was commenced. The politicians advanced
the doctrine—Mr. Calhoun leading the way—
that slavery is right; that it violates more of
the principles of just morality; that it is in
accordance with the spirit of both the Old and
the New Testament; that the best thing that.
can be done for the inferior African race is that
they should be placed under the wholesome re-
straints and the elevating influences of slavery
Forthwith this idea was embraced by the lead
ing, ministers of religion, and the work was
undertaken of educating the whole religious
mind of the South to that view, and of changing
all the sentiments on the subject which they
bad derived from the teachings of Patrick
Henry, of Madison, of Jefferson, of Washing
ton. With marvellous facility, evincing
change of sentiment on a great moral subject
such as the world never saw before, the new
doctrines were embraced, and with entire
unanimity as bodies, and almost as individuals,
the Churches, Baptist, Methodist, Episcopal,
Presbyterian, embraced the new revelation,
and made the doctrine that slavery is in accord
ance with the Bible, a practical doctrine of
their creed. On this ground they drew off
from their Northern brethren, and the division
of the country began where, perhaps, the poli
ticians most desired it, in the Church of God.
At the commencement of the rebellion the
whole Southern mind had been united in this
belief.
Then arrangements were quietly made for
carrying out the idea. Connected with the
national administration there was, as there
usually has been, a majority in numbers, and
a vast preponderance in talent, from the South,
or that sympathized with the South. The doc
trine was distinctly stated in the highest place
of the nation, that the Constitution of the Uni-
_ • • - • - •
ted States gave no power to coerce a State or
States by arms. Munitions of war were quietly
removed from the armories of the North to
. ...
forts and arsenals of the South. The few ships
of war that constituted the navy-of the United
States had been sent to distant seas, and could
not soon be recalled to suppress a rebellion.
A large portion of the little army of the United
States readily engaged in the service of the
South; and the most numerous portion,!and
the ablest, of the military men that had been
educated at the public expense for the protec
tion of its Union, became leaders of the South
ern army. The North—the Government had
neither army nor navy, and was itself divided.
It was the work almost of a moment to seize
the arsenals, the forts, and the public property
in the South, and they passed into the hands of
the insurgents without a blow. There was in
deed one fort that dared to make resistance. A
little band of brave men, under the command
of one of the noblest men in the army, dared to
resist the power of the South. But the little
garrison could not be reinforced or fed; the
flag of Fort Sumter came honorably down, and
the war began.
But this is the end of all such dangers. We
are certain that such a state of things can never
occur again, and that our country will be hence
torward safe from such an organized insurrec
tion. On the basis of slavery, the grand cause
of all the trouble—such a rebellion can never
be organized again, and as to-day we have oc
casion for thanksgiving that we have a Govern
ment, so we have had a demonstration that that
Government cannot be overthrown by rebel
lion.
We are prepared, then, to consider what
would have been our condition if this insurrec
tion had been successful, or if there had been
any other' termination of the war than that
which has actually occurred. One of two
things would have followed. One, if the suc
cess of the rebellion had been complete, and
there had been two rival and contending nations
here, with long lines of conterminous territory ;
with great rivers running through both ; with
the usual causes of dispute between contiguous
nations; with separate interests; and with
new divisions and conflicts, for no one can sup
pose that if the insurrection had been success
ful the number of independent sovereignties on
what now constitutes the territory of the United
States could have been long limited to two.
The other supposition would be, that the rebel
lion had been for a time suppressed, but still
leaving to the subdued and vanquished part all
the original causes of irritation and alienation,
with the:hope that better arrangements could
be made for a successful isurrection ; that the
public mind could be more fully trained for it;
that larger armies could be brought into the
field, aid a more powerful navy created; that
by more successful negotiations a recognition
could be secured by foreign powers; that, by
delay, a state of things more favorable to suc
cess would exist in the general Government,
and a more decided influence in their favor
might exist in the North. In what a condition
would our country be now, and ever onward, if
there were held over it the idea—the possibility
—of such a war again ; if it should be necessary
to call forth hundreds of thousands of men to
the scenes of bloody strife; if at any time the
horrors of battle—the desolate homes—the
wasted fields and ruined cities and towns—the
conversion of so large a part of our territory
into the graveyards of the slain might occur
again. From this apprehension we are now
free, for the great problem has been solved,
that under the most favorable circumstances,
and with the most careful training, there can be
no such insurrection organized again, and no
hope that the Government of the United States
can be overturned by an armed rebellion. Let
us thank God for this.
111. We may find a third reason for thanksgiv
ing, growing out of this conflict, in the moral
certainty that a better feeling will exist between
the North and the South; that there will be
more mutual respect: that there will be a closer
Union. than there ever has been.
The attachment to the Union, by our fathers,
as formed under the Constitution, was sincere
and genuine. There was great nobleness of
conduct ; there,was a large spirit of patriotiSm ;
there were great and generous sacrifices of local
interests, in forming that Union. But there
were still seeds of disaffection which soon ger
' minated, and rapidly matured. It was a Union,
in a great measure, based on compromise—an
arrangement which impliesthat some great evil
is for a time only laid to sleep, that may
be revived again. For, we cannot thus" finally
dispose of evils and wrongs in a human govern
ment, any more than it could be done in the
government of God. In His government it is
never attempted.
It cannot be denied now that there were
causes of alienation laid far back in history,
which; in their growth and development, could
not be removed by any ordinary and peaceful
course of things; which time tended only to
strengthen and confirm; and which, whether
they could have been removed in any other way
or not, we may hope have been removed by
this conflict forever. Perhaps in no nation
united under one government—even in Austria,
made of dissimilar nations altogethdr, and held
together by one will, have there been such can
ess of irritation and alienation as have grown
up in the different portions of our own country
though originally of the same race, speaking the
.same language, and professing the same relig
ion.
It is not necessary now to recall, or dwell on,
those causes of irritation and alienation. They
sprang partly from rival interests, and from
differences in the laws and arrangements ne
cessary for the protection of those interests.
The questions connected with manufactures,
commerce, agricultural pursuits, made a differ
ence in the laws respecting the tariff, commerce,
and the protection of domestic industry neces
sary, tending to constant alienation. But it
was mainly the question of slavery that produc
ed the irritation, and that tended to divide the
South and the North. The demands on the
one side, and the concessions on the other;
the compromises asked and secured for its de
fence; the effort on the one hand to extend it,
and on the other to check it ; the influence
which it had on the Government, and the at
tempts to abate that influence; the claims on
the part of Northern philanthropists to diffuse
what they regarded as just views on this and all
subjects all over the world, and therefore the
right to diffuse these views where-slavery pre
vails, and the claim, on the other hand, that
slavery was strictly a domestic institution
with which the North had nothing to do; the
Fugitiv'e Slave Law; the Missouri Compromise ;
the war with Mexico; the annexation of Texas;
the admission of Kansas to the Union; the loss
of California to the South.as a slave State; the
`iDred Scott" decision. in the Supreme Court—
all these tended to keep up the irritation, and
perpetuate the alienation. The feelings of the
North towards the South were becoming well
defined. The people of the North regarded
those of the South, as aggressive, arrogant,
boastful, overbearing, savage; as inferior in
thrift, and the comforts of life, in arts, in litera
ture, in refinement to themselves ; as coarse
and brutal, and regardless of law in their man
ners ; as having an undue influence in the ad
ministration of the General Government ;.as
guilty in sustaining a barbarous system, and as
being themselves corrupted through the influ
ence of that system. On the other hand, the
prevailing feeling of the South toward the
North was rapidly forming itself into contempt.
The name by which the people of the North
were commonly designated was, with them, sy
nonymous with all that is implied in contempt.
It could not be denied, indeed, that they were
characterized by industry, but labor in their
view was degrading ; they were successful in
business, but it was by trick and cunning ;' they
made advances in commerce, but it was by an
iinjest discrimination in the laws in their favor;
they made advances in arts and in man
ufactures, but it was by an unequal tariff. They
intermeddled with that which did not pertain
to them ; they sought to change institutions
which in no way were subject to their control;
they disregarded the compromises of the Con
stitution, and the laws made for the protection
of property in man ; they enticed slaves to
leave their master s they sought to produce
disaffection in the families of the South, and to
encourage insurrectio n among their servants.
They refused to admit the holders of slaves to
preach in their pulpits. o r to membership in
their churches ; they held them up to the re
proach and scorn of the World, as sustaining a
barbarous institution in a land of freedom,
while all the rest of mankind were seeking to
put an end to slavery. In the meantime, each
party—North and South — undervalued the
power, the energy, the resources, the m ilitary
ability, she determined purpose of the other;
and each, at the beginning of the stri, sup
posed that the whole matter of dispute would
be soon settled—the South supposing that the
North would not " fight," and the North be
lieving that the rebellion was in fact so feeble,
that the insurrection could be soon suppressed.
Neither party dreamed of a fierce controversy
in which hundreds of thousands of men would
fall on the field of battle, and extending through
four terrible years ; neither party dreamed of
the power, the energy, the determination, the
resources of the other.
The views of each have been change'd : the
causes of irritation and alienation, have 'been
in a great measure removed ; and, as among
different nations mutual respect is kept up in
a great measure by the poWer displayed, so the
North and the South have learned to respect
each other.
(a) The grand source of irritation and
alienation has been removed. The celebrated
" Mason and Dixon's line" is obliterated, and
no longer designates any division of the nation.
The Missouri Compromise would be useless if
not repealed; the " Wilmot Proviso" unneces
sary ; the law of the Northwest Territory of
1;87 has become the law of all the Territories;
the annexation of Texas can furnish no further
occasion for irritation ; the Dred Scott decision
has ceased to have any significance or any
bearing on our interests; and the fugitive slave
law has disappeared as a source of irritation
forever.
(b) There is mutual respect for the power,
the ability, the resources, the military skill of
each other. I do not believe that military
glory as such is that of which a nation should
be proud, nor do I attempt a comparison, in a
field where I am competent to say nothing, of
the relative military power and skill evinced
by the North and the South, but it is not im
proper to say that, as in the war of Independ
ence, equal military ability was evinced by
the troops of South Carolina and Massachn
setts, so now, with the single exception of the
last campaign, it might be difficult to determine
in which, in that which the world calls "glory,"
the praise of eminence belongs. The world,
too, has learned to respect powers so vast on
either side when contending with each other,
and that would be so overwhelming if com
bined.
(c) Once more—the conduct of the two great
parties that were engaged in the strife, on
the cessation of the war, has been, and is such,
as to secure in the future a degree of respect
and confidence hitherto unknown since the
Revolution.
This is true, on the whole, in regard to the
South. There may be—there are—undoubted
ly individual exceptions, perhaps exceptions
embracing Stales. There may be galled and
irritated feelings. There may be lingering en
mity of the North. There may be a spirit of
insubmission and insubordination. There may
be a want of " loyalty," and a desire still of
an Independent Confederacy. There may be
an abuse of clemency. There may be a secret
wish to restore the old order of things, and to
reduce the emancipated millions again to bond
age. There may be a purpose, if that cannot
be accomplised in form,• to accomplish it in
fact, and under another name. There may be
cases of individual insincerity in taking the oath
of allegiance, and in submitting to the acts of
the General Government. There may be with
some, a love of power and office that has not
died, and a purpose, in connection with aparty
in the North, if possible, to regain it. There
may be a desire of revenge.
But, admitting all this, and more than this—
for all this and more as human nature is was
natural—l hesitate not to say that, on the
whole, the conduct of the South in the feelings
evinced on the termination of the conflict, has:
been such as to demand the confidence of the:
North, and to secure the admiration of mankind.
The surrender of the armed forces was so com-i
plete and entire; the cessation of hostilities,
was BO immediate and universal; the acknow-i
ledgment that they had been overcome was/
so prompt, frank, and manly; the readiness to
return to the Union has been so general, and
apparently so sincere ; the recognition of the
fact that slavery is extinct forever has been so
widely admitted as a fact—vast as are the con.;
sequences involved, and as is the change it
their habits ; the readiness to come under tin
arrangements for collecting the revenue hat
been so prompt; the disposition to resum.
commercial intercourse with the great citi
of the North has been so marked; and
willingness to come into the great srrang
ments of the nation for perpetuating freedo
has been so general, that we see in this,
think, the return of the feelings of the be
days of the Republic. There are exception
principally where we should least have e
pected them—in the heart of woman, and
the ministers of religion—but there has nev
been a civil war closed where there was le
lingering animosity, or more willingness ton
again under the same government. Can we f ,
get when we think of what is in the South •
bosom still, that long-cherished opinions, fe
ings, and customs do not soon change amon:
people? Can we forget how long after
wars of the "-Roses,' and after the civll w
that resulted in the establishment of the "Co
monwealth" in England, on the cessation
the forms of war, the feelings which had b
engendered lingered in the bosom of En:li
men? Can we forget how long after tht
lution, the banishment of James, and the ac
sion of William and Mary, love for the "
tender" lingered in the hearts of a portio
that nation ; how firm was the conviction
he was the rightful heir of the crown ;
strong the hope that he would yet come k
throne? Shall we blame our Southern bre "
if some similar feelings linger in heir boa
Equally worthy of the admiration of
world ; equally fitted to inspire returning. -
fidence, has been the conduct of the •
In the annals of all suppressed rebellions e
has never been a more , magnanimous
shown, or a spirit which, if anythin g
should make a nation proud; which we, o
much command the admiration of the i
or which has been so well fitted tto oblite e
memory of the past, and to secure the con e
and regard of those who, though rebels ~ e
been constrained to submit to the trim, 't
arms of the Republic. With entire succor: e
part of the North—if we must still for a whY