‘THE OEUSE,

W

DEVELOPMENTS AND RESULTS

“' OF THE

WAER:

AN ORATION DELIVERED BEFORE TIIE MUNICIPAL AUTHORITIES AND
CITIZENS OF PROVIDENCE,

4'!

JULY 4, 1864.

EQ} Em. SIDNEY DEAN.

 

_ 1>EoVIDE1::rcE:
KNOWLES, ANTHONY 85 00., PRINTERS.
A 1864.

 

THE CITY OF PROVIDENCE.

 

BY THE CITY COUNCIL, July 00, 1864.
RESOLVED, That the Committee on the Fourth of July Celebration be, and
they are hereby, authorized to request of the Rev. Sidney Dean 2:. copy of the
O1-ation delivered by him on the fourth of July last, and to cause the same to

be published in such manner as they may deem expedient, for the use of the
City Council.

A true copy---witness:
SAMUEL W. BROWN, CITY CLERK.

t.

 

oaarion.

 

GENTLEMEN on THE CITY AUTHORITIES
on PROVIDENCE, AND FELLOW—CI'1‘IZENS:

On the Fourth day of July, 1776, or eighty»-eight years ago
this day, the immortal declaration of man’s rights was given to
the world by 21. Congress of the Representatives of the ‘Ameri-
can people, John Quincy Adams, in his masterly oration,
pronounced in the city of VVashington on the Fourth day of
July, 1821, styled it the prologue of an unparalleled drama, the
beginning of one mighty action, the middle of which was a
calamitous, sanguinary, but glorious war of seven years’ dura-
tion, and the end an acknowledged nationality.

The prologue contained the germinating 1' principles of a
nationality new to earth. It held, in its womb, the doctrine of
the created equality of man. Not as a gift from man’s fellow,
or a charter containing illgingly abandonment of power by
sovereign pleasure, but a common endowment by birth and
being, to certain rights natural and inalienable, prominent
among which were a right to the enjoyment and preservation
of human life, personal liberty, and the pursuit of the happi-
ness of our being._ The new doctrine declared, furthermore,
that for the security of these rights, nationalities were born of

the providences of God, and governments were established

among men.
The institution of governments by men gives us logically
the axiom found in the immortal declaratioii, and accepted 

4 ORATION.

an Americanism——-—yet to be an axiom for all peoples, “ that
governments derive their just powers from the consent of the
governed,” all other powers being unjust and usurped.

These great truths underlie the fabric of our American
nationality. The root of difference between these and the
principles which were at the .base of the governments among
whom we were born and cradled, is radical. They are alike
opposed to the claim of Divine authority for power appended
to the accident of birth, and transmitted from virtuous or
vicious loins, or the wild fanaticism of atheism which makes
inen divinities, creating governments in blood, lust and terror.
The cap upon the head of our emblematic Goddess does not

cover a mind crippled and led by the ignorance, the oppression, r

the usurped power of seventeen centuries of the modern age,
claimingwveneration because of antiquity, nor does it cover a
heart revolting against Grod’s moral code, applicable alike to the
individual and the nation. .

The birth of American liberty was an inspiration from God i

to the age. The ideal which filled the brain and heart of the
sages whom He -had called to their birth for the period, was
formed by the hand of a Divine moulder. Not alone, or in her
laws, was nature acknowledged. From nature’s God the
inspiration was drawn, and the title accepted. Before all the
rotten courts of the World the gage was thrown down. It was

the doctrine of personal, heaven-endowed rights for man, a

crown which God formed for the brows of the people. The
trinity of lustrous stars set in this new firmament were man’s
rigltt to life, man’surig/at to liberty, man’s 7°11";/ht to the pursuit
of happiness. Out from these came constellations of beauty
and harmony, filling all the sphere or firmament of a people’s
government. ‘

Strike either of these fundamentals from our national sphere,
and’“ruin to the fabric must ensue. Strikathem all out, and
anarchy, or the despotism of dead ages, seats itself upon the
throne of empire among us, and its hired minions keep watch
and ward over the grave of the worldis liberties. I loveflthose
stern old heroes; aye, I love their very graves.~ They all
sleep—they are not dead; for they “ were not born to die.”

ORATION. 5

Each succeeding anniversary of’ the nation’s birth brings them

before us. Woiild God that their inspiration might be ours,
and the portion of our children for all time to come!

The seven years’ war which followed this Declaration fulfilled
the great unwrittenlaw which all history has confirrned. It
laid and established every stone in our altarfvvith the cement of

.patriot blood. N 0 advance in the rights or lib_erties of a

people, no approxirnation to the practical , working in civil
government, of n1an’s.divine endowment is allowed except upon
a bloody war—path. But He who endows gives to the answering
patriotisrn, courage and trust, the benefit of providences more
clearpand startling in their tracings back to Himself, during

“such a War, than canibe found in times , ofipeace. .l‘:Ience the

history of our first Ainerican Revolution is a clear chapter of
God’s providential hand in war. The young Sampson of
nations came down to the red fields of‘ carnage, and with the
inspiration which came with the world’s new endowment upon
him, he rent the lion as if it had been a l<;i(.l. . Seven years from
thence, he plucked the honey of an acknowledged nationality
from the carcass, and gave to the modern world the ancient
riddle: “ Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the
strong came forth sweetness.” W/Ve shall yet have to bring
another full comb from between the ribs of the old “lion’s, cub,
unless he absents himself from the path of our unity and
progress. , ,
The close of the war left us to the arts of peace. We are
not naturally a war-liking people. :.l.‘l1e little brush in 1812
awoke our slurnbering patriotism, turning it into the channels
of war again, until the boastf'ully proud mistress of the seas
struclc her flag and contented lierself with marine equality. VVe
were content then to go back to agriculture, connnerce, manu-
factures and the development of our national resources for the
benefit of’ the world. Our navy rotted at the docks, and our army
dwindled to a coinparative cypher. We became a national
beehive in our industry. VVealth flowed in upon us like a tide i
at high flood. The rninimurn of’ imports paid the necessary
workiiig expenses of our simple Republican Grovernrnent, and
so crowded the treasury that the surplus was distributed to the r

6. onarron.

. 2 r T
people of the States, lest the representative Wealth of the

country should be locked in idleness within the vaults of the_

treasury. History Was writing the new great fact, that an

intelligent Christian nation, taking its underlying principles‘

from God, could ‘govern itself; and with the least possible
infringemeiit upon the perfect liberty of the citizen, could
develop the greatest success in all departments of society.

The governments of the Old World clothed themselves in
priestly vestments, and prophesied of our speedy and irretriev--
able downfall. Honest, perhaps, at first, doubters neX_t,falsifiers
subsequently, they became mere parrots in their utterances, with
the old Wish ever father to the present thought,‘ until their own

people arose and hissed them out of their prophetic place. The .

ships of emigration covered the ocean with their white Wings,

the oppressed of other lands sought the shelter of our dear old  

starry flag, building for themselves and families, first, cabins,
then-cottages, then palaces of Wealth. State after State

Wheeled into line, and star after star was added to the blue,
ground-Work of our flag. WestWa1*d, .Nort7L~WestW-ard, the

living tide rolled. A cabin, a church, a school--house,ra college:

a city, then a State, were almost literally“ born in a day.” .

And yet our year of national age is not yet reached," for a
century to man is as a year to a nation.

Then came a War with our “vvayward sister,” Mexico. I A

confess to you that Idid not like it then, do not now. You

may differfrom the speaker; that is your right as American

citizens. It did not commend itself to me either in its causes
or results. But it showed that the American blood possessed
the necessary iron in its composition to make soldiers When:
soldiers were needed. Of course We were victorious. It was
intelligence, muscle, men and Wealth, against a poor, ignorant,
priest-ridden, corrupt people and government. That War did
not close the gates of our industry, or leave men idle in the

‘market-~plac’es of our commerce. g It hardly affected our surplus

population seriously. It gave the nation some graves, sanotified
because they held the ashes of heroes, and it brought us home
some ‘living ones, broken and maimed by the carnage of War,

' to be the pensioners upon the free heart-bounty of our great,

good government.

ORATION. 7

The lying tongues of old monarchies had ceased to prate of
our downfall. The currents of our national life flowed evenly,
with occasional hectic or chill from local disturbance. Our
anniversaries were glorifications, our quadrennial elections were
strong in their partizan diversity, but stronger still in their
unity, and in professions of attachment to the old landmarks of
liberty, the Constitution and one nationality._ The diseases of
our childhood were passed. We were pricling ourselves upon
a well-d_eveloped, perfect manhood, arising to a glorious
crowning of age, leading the nations in arts, in manufactures,
in agriculture, and in practical inventions. Even the path of

our literature was assuming the broad gauge. The college, the.

press, the bar, the pulpit, and the medical hall, all gave signs

of speedily leading the """ grave and reverend seigniors ” who a

delved in their departments among the mouldy relics of a past
faith and practice in the Old World. The provvs of our steam-
ers and ships parted all Waters, from the seas of India to
the Gulf of Finland. Our flag received the salute of all nations;
While the confession of his citizenship by the poorest exile from
among us, was his protection. , h i r
Were We too proud? God knows; I do not. We had
much to glory in. But had we become like Babylon of old
in our vain boasting and contempt of God, so that like her We
said: “I sit a Queen, and am no Widow, and shall see no

sorrow ?” God pity us if this has been our spirit, for we have

a nation filled with Widovvhood now, and a fullbaptism of sorrow
rests upon our hearts. fly

We are again at war“ For three years it has‘ raged at times
With a fury unparalled in the history of this demon who comes
‘‘ with his garments rolled in blood.” The nation is not at war
with other governments now. She is standing by her own
altars, fighting for ezxtistence itself, against banded assassins and
traitors, born and cradled under her own flag. Men in the
highest executive councils» and authority forecast the plans,
pilfering the nation to enrich and strengthen the Work of
villainy. Men raised to senatorial dignities and_ honor’ plotted
the treason with their ermine on, -drawing their daily pay‘ for

crime from the treasury of the people. Meneducated  the »

8 ORATION.

nation in her War-schools, have gathered and led the alien
armies. Even he Who was honored witli the highest dignity
which the suffrages of twentymillions of free people could
bestow, sat silentlyby, with the national sword rusting in its
scabbard in his hand, or offered apologies for the crimes of these
Worsefthan murderers. i ,

A From the hour when rebel shot were hurled against Anderson

and Sumter, to the awful battles of the lVVi1derness, and the ,

appearance of Grant’s loyal legions atthe gates of Richmond,
East, West, North and South, one lurid sheet of War has
traversed, leaving the “dead, the maimed,‘ the bereaved in its
-track. Austerlitz, Marengo, ‘Waterloo, pale before Gettysburg,
Antietam, Shiloh, Fredericksburg and the Virginia Wilderness,
those bloody fields of American history. A Kentucky has been
Washed, Tennessee drenched, and Virginia deluged with the
blood of our brave boys. From the Rio Grande to the York
river inPennsylvania, and from thence to the Everglades of
Florida,’ the bloody tide has ebbed and flowed with its ever-—
changing crests of horror,-

Can We find a more profitable theme for our thoughts than a
consideration of the cause of this War, its developments, and
the lessons which it should teach us ‘.7 Not that you, gentlemen,
composing the City Authorities of this Capital of our State, or

i the intelligent citizens before me, are not thoroughly conversant
‘With the history which has been in a great measurelwritten
1 during your own lives, but as we give this day‘ to our country

as holy time, What more appropriate for consideration than our
country’s peril and the cause thereof? ~ W'hat vovv more sacred
to us as citizens than that made in our hearts when We swear

that any cause Whatever that bathes this land in fratricidal

blood, and drapes its households in crape, shall be removed,
unless it stands in our scmotomm, by ‘our American altar, and
with uplifted hand swears that this blood is shed for the heaven»
endowed and inalienable rights of inan?  did I say? All
men covered by our flag! Not as a “ glittering and sounding
generality ” should they pronounce the oath, but as one great
eternal truth, impressing, mind and conscience, baptized and
established at the font of Constitutional liberty by the purest

 

ORATION. 9

patriots God ever gave to the world. Let us make that vow
to-«day; for the blood We have given to preserve the life of the
Republic, is none the less holy, pure or patriotic.

What, then, is the cause of this War? Has the nation
violated the charter or compact of the sovereignties which
underlies nationality? No! Has it trampled upon the rights
of the individual traitor, that he has lifted his hand against it‘?
N o I Right of representation ; right of aspiration to any office
from lowest to highest ; right of choice in pursuits, of educa-
tion, of Worship; right of travel or domicile; right of Wealth,
and its hoarding and distribution; right of family; aye, the

right of selflexpatriation if aggrievecl-——all personal, social or

political rights not incompatible With, or destructive of the just
rights of others, have been theirs. Theirs by the sheltering
aegis and protection of the government, theirs by the great
American birthright. A

I Have they respectedthe rights of others ? No! Treason
against such principles, and such a government as our fathers
gave us, cannot leap out of pure minds and honest hearts.
Neither can it ‘be born and reach its 1nat,t11*ity, with its Medusa’s
head ,,full-serpent-crovvned and hissing, in a day. God does not
suffer monsters to be generated and born in a night, that they
may stal-ls: the earth on the coming day, with their fangs
dripping with the blood of the innocent.

The judgment of the Christian World has already uttered its
voice as to the cause of this war. "We but reiterate it when
We say, that it is to be found in a false system of society, con»
trary to the spirit and teachings of the Declaration of Indepen-
dence, created under local, Statp or municipal law, and fostered
by lust of Wealth and power. This is the germinal cause. Its
beginnings Were" small, its ~atio of increase terrible to con_tem-
plate. It was the universality of the system in alarge portion
of our country, which made such a revolt as this possible. The
census of every decade had a voice potent enough to awaken
all except those who were dead to patriotism, and alive only to
the pursuit of Wealth or ofiicial emoluments, or who had a blind
faith that the foulest despotism the sun ever shone upon, made
good dgnnocratic, republican citizens. It was a system of

10 . « onarion.

ti

man--ovvning, vvoman-ovvning, child»-ovvning. It claimed the
right of one to own another’s heart and brain, inuscle and blood,
SlI16WS and bone, with their utmost of labor, and power of
yielding enjoyment, from the first Wail of the new-«born child,
down to the burial of its gray hairs. A right to Whip it, right
to rob it, right to close the avenues of its mind, right to use or
sell it in the shambles of lust ‘or avarice, right to demand the
issue of its -body under the same conditions for all time, or
until God from eternity should abolish the system by closing
up all mundane affairs. And around this claimed right was
made to revolve all local and State law. Statutes were reduced
to a system, each striving to blot out the man, the vvoman, the
human child, and bring them to the plane of horses, oxen and
asses. D 7 '

The ozimer lived in his mansion of :elegance,‘his son inherit-
ing it after him. The owned living in his rude cabin——his son,
he never had one—-the master owned the child born in the
cabin of his nnstress--—--not Wife, and sold hinzii at will for money
or spite. The ozcner lived: as sumptuously as Dives, the owned
upon the coarsest and cheapest food, the one having a surfeit
of luxuries, the other a famine often of bare necessities. The
one kept his Creator’s endowment of life, the right to it; of
liberty, the enjoyment of it; and the pursuit of happiness ; the
other had neither 3 not even the liberty to hope that the accursed
mill—-stone would be lifted from him in this life, nzxuch more to
express it. Not one self:-evident Divine right, which came
fresh with birth and being from the Creator’s hand, but what
was supplanted, stolen, torn away from this born slave ‘by the
strong hand of power. The systeni was pitiless. Color was
nothing in the account; geniture Was nothing; the owner him--
self being father, and the mother the daugliterof a free white
man; still the child Was subject to all the conditions pertaining
to the slave relation. To—-day, the son of’ J eff’. Davis, Whose
mother Was the daughter of a free White man, is fighting in
the Union army against his own father. The young man is an
angel of purity and whiteness, even if the color of his skin is
as black as the plumage of  raven, compared with this
Jefferson Davis, who is typed in Milton”s story of the revolt in

heaven, bearing the name of Lucifer. D

ORATION. 11

All State laws, all local community regulations, all custom
protected and defended this system. The young scions, sons
and daughters of’ the lordly house, grew up under its influence,
felt it in every fibre of their opening; being, and scoffed at the
democratic doctrine enunciated by Jefferson and the fathers as
Divine. Their intelligence,p their system so utterly at variance
With the genius of our governinent, made them political econo-
mists by study. The South bred statesmen among its free
White population, whorwere possessors of Wealth. For years
John C. Calhoun has been their model. . He was in advance of
his u1a11~o\vI1i1ig peers in this, that he saw the marlied antago-
nisms of the system, saw that they must culminate, and sought
to destroy a true Ainerican nationality by iiiakiiig the States
independent. The revolt of South Carolina during the Ad1ninis—
tration of Aiidrew Jiaclszson, was intended by him to pave the
Way for the iimnediate establiishment of a Southern Contecle1'acy,

the model of which has been copied in the treason now organ-

ized with Jefferson Davis at its head. I sympathize with the
confession of the heroic Jackson, that he ought to have hung
Calhoun for treason. T It would have saved A.bral_1am Lincoln
the necessity of signiiig the death—Warrant of Jefferson Davis.
The Southern mind followed Calhoun. The practical Working
of their system of society, so antagonistical in all respects to
the spirit and letter of our nationality, made them traitors at
heart before the bibs were fairly off their necks. The men and
Women owners of the South were rotten-«ripe for the treason
before the gun aimed at Suinter gave them therallying call.

o Exceptioiis there have been and are. Their names will be
inscribed upon an :immortal page Whenever the fog shall be
lifted, the cloud parted and dispersed by the blaze of our
cannon, so that the nation and 'W'O1‘lCl can read their illustrioug
names, and lsnow the living‘ nlartyrdozm tlirough which they
have passed, because of their love of liberty and country.
Many of them have been hero martyrs, losing all, even life
itself’, for their integrity. llvlay their souls repose in the great
peace of God!

Such is the state of society where treason lifts its head to-

day. J udged by our declaration of rights,ior by the genius

12 o:a_AtrIoN.

of our government formed upon it, it is false, aristocrati"c,
despotic. It is destructive to a just government of the people:

First, In its educational effects upon all the pa.rties in inter-
est. It educates the owner in the spirit of the most selfish des-
potism. It teaches him to be cruel, barbarous, passionate,
proud, haughty and insolent towards his fellows. It educates
the puppet to be a slave, a machine. It shuts up his mind in
a prison-house of darkness from whence death alone releases
it. I care nothing for blatant discriminations or criticisms
upon equality. Standing upon our articles of national faith,
with their covenants of truth, I believe in the equal rights of

Divine endowment. If the tawny or mulatto son of the planta--- .

tion has not an equal endowment of brain power, he has what

God in nature gave him, with a full right to its use. ‘Who is
it that God has commissioned as the robber to steal it from
him‘? Let him exhibit his parchment, bearing, the Divine
signature and seal, and not go into the libraries of the post»-
diluvian age, beyond the exodus of‘ the slaves of Egypt, to
find it. '

A Secoml, The system is ‘destructive, because of its moral
debauchment. Not merely because it annihilates the sanctity
of the marriage relation, which was God-ordained for the
whole race, but because the breaking down of any of the great
fundamentals of society, as given by Divine law, leads to a
spirit of infidelity and a practical atheism. ‘Look at this one
feature for illustration. When this treason was being plotted,
aye, when it had already unshreathed its dagger, the leading
conspirators engaged in it were in places ef trust and power
in the nation, acting under the solemn sanction of an oath,
taken in the name of Almighty God, that they would support
add defend the very Constitution and Government which they
were then seeking to overthrow. In the high places of the

 Cabinet, the Senate and the people’s House of Representatives,

these perjured infidels held high court. Did devils blush at
the extent of their infidelity and infamy? They had ‘cause so
to do. It shocked the heart of the nation, but did not produce
the shudder of horror over the moral debauchment, such as
the cause demanded. One hundred years from to-day, a pure,

\

~* as
ORATION.

enlightened and free people will blush upon reading the history
of our tame sayings and dgings concerning this great moral
crime. i

T7m'roZ, It is destructive also in the character of its. power.
Power in a Republic must be scattered, guarded, protected
from liability to abuse, if liberty is to be preserved. Centrali-
zation, focalization leads to corruption, if not to crime. The
system of society which we are contemplating puts all the.
power in the hands of the few against the many. The few own
its wealth, inake its laws, and execute them. They control its
commerce, and coalescing w.ith coinrnercial men in the North,
have ‘successfully dictated and directed the policy of the general
government against free labor, and in the interests of the
despotism of slavery. Commerce is always sensitive, yielding
a right rather than defending it when profit is at stake.

Two hundred and fifty thousand have not only owned and
controlled four millions of laborers, but they have owned the
parties and officers of the Government, controlled its legisla-
tion, swayed its executive sceptre, and sat upon the bench of
the Judiciary, its controlling power. How was this result
accomplished? Cotton, commerce, threats of revolt, with a
vigorous use of all power attained in the interests of the
system, give the answer to our question. It finally crept out
from the chambers of locality, dictated party platforms, execu-
tive messages, legislative enactinents and judicial decisions.
And it did it by the unity of its purpose, the focalizing of its
power. For every man in its interests, North or South, had
to follow in the track of its measures or receive its anathemas.
Honest men in ‘party affiliation with its leaders, have dreaded
the thunder of its anathemas, more than they have feared the
avenging sword of a righteous God. Thanls: God, that power
is now broken. Thousands of our fellovwcitiaens breathe more
freely, and can and do lift up their faces in God’s sunlight as
freemen should, uttering honest words of loyalty, without a
quiver of fear shalszing their political muscles. They with us
should thank God for this great grant to the nation. This
is a true “U. S. Grant.” .

Now, such is slavery in its nature and tenor. ‘Where should it
strike its blow'of revolt ? Wlien would it be most likely to cease

14 ‘ r onarron.

its wordy coercions,and take up the sword against a GroVer1i-
ment of liberty?” Simply when itjotiiicl that the people could
not be led into a change of their national principles, or when
fearful of the effect of continued encroachments upon their
rights, they should at the ballot box utter a united majority
voice, and dema:nd a return to the old landmarks.
A-few saw the peril and sounded the ‘alarm, almost a half
century agro. They were branded with opprobious epithets,
and cast out of the pale of all existing parties. But Grod
caused the genius of liberty to give their words diamond points,
and they cut through the accretions of party, takiiig hold at
last upon the great popular heart—that living, sensitive, honest
heart of the coinmunity, which, under God, is our country’s
hope. The stone cut out of the mountain filled the land. The
despised mustard seed lifted its branches of hope between the
two oceans.

The edict of slavery consolidated the two parties. Of course

one of them died. Died, bearing its illustrious and iinniortal
names to its own grave. ‘What could those who revolted
against this sale of free1nen——white, educated, refined, laboring
fireenien, VOl3G1‘S and law-—mal{ersl of the country»--—wl1at could
they do but unite and form a party upon a living issue, taking
the side of their country’s safety, honor and future weal against

those mad councils which sought to make it in all its Territo-  

ries and States one Vast lazar house of despotism‘? All faiths
had been sliivered, all covenants brolezen, all coinpromiises
annulled; because they did not satisfy the rapacious cravings
of this stalwart despotism. '

To go back to the old line of national policy, was death to
the institution, brealcing the sceptre of its power. It must
have a iratioiial acknowledgment and protection. It must by
law have right of transit and domicile in the free States, at the

individual 1naster’s pleasure. It must have as much of the

Virgin soil of the territories as it should elect to occupy, and
that was all which the country possessed or might acquire by
treaty or war. The nation must declare that slaves, white,
black or blonds, had no civil or political rights which the citi-
zens or courts of the country werebound to respect. The press
.

osAm1oN. 15

must utter only leticlatioiis of the system. The pulpit must
curse, in the nzune of infinite Wiscloin and goodness, all these
supposed descen<lents——-—sons, nephews or cousins-—~—of one of
good old Noah’s unprincipled boys. The people must stop
agitating political or 11101‘£Ll questions pertaining to the institu-
tion, catch micl return the fleeing bondnmn to the labor and
lush for which they were born. All these slavery deinztnded,
‘and more. Thouszuids of the North and lVest shouted for
i1n1nedia,te acquiescence to every new deinand. i But the ‘great
.gl"OL1I1Ll-SVV®ll of 1’1101‘:lLllty zuicl Vital Christianity Wes giucltinlly

'sVvi11gui11g the 11”12:1-SS of our int.elligent laboring citizens round to

the old 1i1oo‘i*inp;s of the Divine, self’-eviclent rights of men, as
set forth in 1776. Cotton was not yet the Supreme God. The
golden ertlf of Coinnoeree was not yet enthroned over the
publid ooiiseienee. The “ Eic»L1tl1—sicle ” D. D.’s Wl1osep:.u:cl1--
ments were Witnesses of their e:_unestness and zeal in uttering
“ Cursed be Clanztan,” l'.1€L(.l. not enjoyed revi eels or poured the
Wetter of slztvery’s bnptisni upon inany converts. The intelligent,
Cliristinn, l2‘tl)0l‘lI1g people of Ainerice. love liberty. Tliank
God for tlmt I

The one great p2t1*:1ly*zi11g; fear of these petty despots of the
South, lay in 21. simple sum of numbers. l3allots count in this
government, not swords. Swords count now, because sla:ve1'y
willed it, but it will prove now as of old that they “ who
telce the sword will perish by it.” Two hundred and fifty
thousand SltLV0l’l()lCl(3l‘:E3---£l(:l(l to it but one hundred per cent.
and you lrizwe lutlt‘ at million; f'our——fold it with _syn1po.t.l1izers,
North, East, West and i:fi()11tl1, and you lmve but at million ell
l30l(l-----~Wl1£Lt are these compared with the gireot innss of liberty-
lovers who are building towns, cities and States by the imtgio

of free labor, vitalized by eclucetion and Christizm intelligence?

It is as :1. Cl0(:l1‘11€Ll in the 1nillioi1’s place, ooinpzired with 21. unit
or Whole number. These traitors are adopts in the science of

ipolitical coniputation. The first sum in party zuldition, cost up

in an exciting canvass Where the slavery question was involved,
broke down their last hope of stealing our liberties While the
Aiiierionii Szunpson should" sleep with st cotton bale for l11S

pill0W.”'. From that moment the Work of dividing the country i

16 or.Ar_1oN.

commenced in earnest.“ We were trained only to the arts of’
peace. l\/Iilitary prowess was not our forte. 'VVar,---—and
especially a war with our “ wayward sisters,”——-«would not of
course be tliouglit of. So, when their plans were ripe, their

proper tools in office, they split their own Convention in f1'ag~

ments for the purpose of hastening the crisis, ran a slavery
candidate for the Presidency, nominally, but a clisunion candi-
date really; and tl1en, when the constitutional majority had
elected the executive officers, they, by a concerted plan, stole ‘all
the public property in their possession, and turned the en—-
ginery of war upon the home government, with its dear old
emblematic flag. This was the how and when as history has

'4 written it for the future to peruse. The event has proved that

they did not know the people. It has proved more.__ The
people did not know themselves, and their slumbering volume

i of power. The whole world is learning it now.

This leads me to speak of the developments brought about
by this war. And first aniong these I place a knowledge~of
the sterling military talents of our people. It shows the
versatility of the American nature. The plain, unassuming
civilian ‘leads armies almost as fabulous in numbers as that of
Xerxes, and handles them with a skill and precisionwhich even
the first Napoleon might well imitate, were he fighting over
again the battles of his empire upon the fields of Europe.
All Europe stands astonished at the military skill and science
which leaps out of the brains of our civilian Generals. Let

them not provoke our patience until it is weary of’ forbearance, '

for the lair of our lion has been disturbed by them already,
and the avengement of his honor will be terrible. '
Good men have prayed God earnestly that this taste of blood

Illlgllt not cha.nge the American nature, making us a warlike .

people. Most devoutly do we join in that prayer to—day, for
the world’s sake. But the lcnowleclge of the depth and extent
of our military ability, should lead the prudent among the
monarchies of Europe not to insult us when cliastising the re-
fractory cubs of our own lair, or to attemptto place crowns
upon the heads of imported Kings or Emperors in our imme-
diate national neighborhood. For our temporary hurt will but

ORATION. 17

develop our strength and create a military channel for our
skill.

This war has also developed a financial ability equal to our
love for and trust in our country’s greatness and perpetuity.
Thousands of millions have been literally poured into the vaults
of our national treasury from the money pouches of our own
people. ‘We have not asked a dime from the coffers of the Old
VVorld. The national notes-of-hand, with no collaterals as
security, have been the only evidence of the fact, but upon
their face has been stalnped the pledge of the nation’s honor for
their redemption, and it has been legible to every patriot’s eye.
The financial minds of other countries pronounced us bankrupt
at the start. They croakecl with the hoarseness of a raven,
and with unfaltering vigilance for two years. N ow they await
any financial miracle which the genius of the American mind
may be pleased to create. The days of astonishment over new
successes in the art of. fin-anciering have passed away with the
old 1nilita.1iy regime of the battle—field. The American people
are showing the world new things in every department; not
only new, but better, wiser, surer in successful results. “T6
are Americanizing the brain of the world.

Taxatiorn is new to us. Our fathers felt it as onerous, and
shook it off’. But it was dictated by a King, and enacted by a
parliament in which wehad no representation. N ow we vol-
untarily assume the yoke, and tax ourselves for our country’s
sake. But one voice has been heard speaking from the columns
of our loyal press, or from the lips of loyal men and women,
and that has been a demand for heavier taxation, in order that
the national faith shall not be dishonored until the back of this
accursed treason shall be broken, and all its accursed limbs
shall be ground to powder. Did a people ever ask for such a
thing before? Never gr and for the reason tliatithe ruler taxed
the ruled, Awhile here the rulers tax themselves ; for everyman
is an American sovereign by acknowledged, self-evident, Divine
right. We are carrying a financial load that would stagger an
Aj ax, or crush the shoulders of a Hercules, but we carry‘ it
lightly. We can double its weight and still move lightly, such
is the compactness and elasticity of the‘American nature.

18 ORATION.

_ This War has also developed the benevolence, the almost
limitless generosity of our people. Treasuries of voluntary
benevolence have been created almost by magic. They have
seemed to possess the beauty as Well as the resources of Alad-
din’s palace. Their receipts have been counted by millions of
dollars, While their unpaid, volunteer agents have been an army
of’ themselves. It is like ourselves, nevv,--—born out of the great
sympathies and charities of our people. Not an army of ghouls
following our strong columns, to rob the Wounded living. and
the quiet dead on the battle—-field, but an army of Christian men

and Women; each one a Sainaritan indeed, with heart and

hand full of practical benevolence. The young daughter, not
having reached her teens, and the aged mother pressing up to

her century of years, with all in the intermediate ages, poor:

and rich together, have brought their ofl"erings of love and
benevolence. To inc it is a bright spot, shining With diamond
brilliancy, f'ro1n the deep of the American nature. "When the
great record volume of our Sanitary and Cliristiani CoIn1nis-
sions shall be Written up, the Whole civilized World Willvvonder
at the extent of our benevolent outpourings.

N ow, with these are to be found manifestations which to the
loyal mind appear as the brute instinct of the beast, compared
with the Well»-balanced, comprehensive mind and soul of the
man. Fevvtliey are, for which God be praised! But there
are enough to show us to what depths man can fall. Wre have
oily sympathisers with treason; caustic natures who burn with
an inward hate at the mention of freedom and equality for the
race; secret plotters, WO1‘l{eI‘S of the night and clarkness, giving
aid and comfort, to our country’s foes; ghouls and vampires
who feed and fatten upon “ shoddy ” in all departments, grow»
ing plethoric While drinking the life-blood from every available

  vein and artery bf tliegovernment ; worshippers at the shrine

of past political divinities who died from sheer inanition ; timid
spirits Who take the full Weight of the serpentis original curse

upon their natures, and; fall prone before the feet of this incar-

nated devil of treason, sueing for peace, on any terms, even to
their country’s dismemberment and death; and lastly, loud‘-
mouthed traitors of the Wood, Cox and Vallandigham school.

onagrror.   19

These are the small spots upon our sun’s disc, but the patriotic
glory of the national character in this hour only makes their
darkness and hideousness the more apparent. . r

In spite of then1,—-———over them, if need be--——we shall riseto our
glorious culmination. Treason will be crushed, and traitors
punished; slavery, the cause of this war, will be abolished;
proclamations of efnancipatioii, embodying the will of every
patriot, will be signed by every loyal hand; the Constitution
will speak uninistakably the language of the immortal Decla-

, ration of “Y6 ; the land shall be free from the pressure of a slave’s
. foot; manacles shall be broken, and the old principles reinstated,

both in the law and policy of‘ the government, God and the
people will it, and that is a majority in the universe.

Lastly, in the developments of this war. As the rising sun
of our national hope, I hail the return of the old patriotism of
1776. It has come upon our liearts like a baptism ‘of old fire.
We lznovy now what our fathers and mothers felt, suffered and
performed through patriotic love. Over a million men have
gone out from home and church ; from academic hall and counting
office; from pulpit and bar; from farm and artizan’s shop;
gone from the care, the com"f’orts, the eye of love, with its
answering sympathy, as it brightened life’s short day; from
mother, wife, sister, the love and afliancecl, and have given
wealth, health and all they have and had, to country. Mothers,
fathers, wives, sisters, sons, daughters and sweethearts, have
given them up with just as pure and patriotic a devotion.
Alas! that treason should create such an Aceldama for our
people. But better this than that anarchy or national obliterm
ation should be our doom, for with us go the civilrights and
religious hopes of the world’s great brotherhood. ‘Every life

sacrificed in our national army or navy, is an attestation of as

pure a patriotism as the world has ever witnessed. To love
country better than life, is the purest patriotic devotion. r

I was powerfully impressed in reading a letter from the im-
mortal penman of our Declaration, written to a young namesake
of his, bearing the date of hlonticcllo, Feb. 21st, 1825. It
coininenced thus : “ This letter will, to you, be as one from the
dead. The writer will be in the grave before you can weigh

20 ORATION.

its counsels.” 9* *' 9*‘ * Then he adds: “ Adore God,
reverence and cherish your parents, love your neighbor as your-—
self, and yam" country more titan 3/0urseZf.”

That was patriotism in J8lfGl"SO11’S day, andI thank God that
our sons are patriots up to the utmost limit of the definition.
‘And when J efherson closes this letter by saying : “That if to
the dead it is permitted to care for the things -of this ,_vvorld,

‘ every action of your life will be under my regard,” I could not

but feel that if God does permit the immortal dead to behold
the life of the living, all these brave patriots of ours are and

have been under his regard, and that of all his illustrious com-,

peers in our revolutionary history.

Has the World ever witnessed such a voluntary leaping to
arms? Has it recorded upon its historic pages subliiner courage,
gre'ater daring, more heroic and sublime dying? ternember
these are not the serfs, the slaves, the hired or impressed minions
of despotism, but they are volunteers—-citizen volunteers, Who
followed their free ballot to the field, when the foe mcnaced
liberty, and with unfaltering tread,

i“ ’Mid shout, and groan, and sabre»-stroke
And deat11—shot talliiig tliiok and fast ”
bore the flag of our country to victory. Citizens of all the
loyal States, citizens both by birth and adoption, have stood
side by side in the great fields of carnage, and have slept side

by side in their graves, Wrapped in the garments of blood.

VVhere all were brave and patriotic, it would be invidious to
discriminate. But, as a State, We can and ought to speak both
in pride and sorrow. Our territory has grown patriotic heroes,
equal giants among the armies of’ our sister conunonwealths.
In ofiice, or in the rank and file, Rhode Island counts her heroes
by thousands. The plume ofour brave, gallant, good Maj. Gen.
AMBROSE E. BURNSIDE l1as never drooped in dishonor, but
he has borne it proudly for himself’, for us, and for the Whole
country,‘ upon the hardest—fought and bloodiest fields.

“We knew these b1‘otl1wei*s of ours in the arts of’ peace; we
loved to meet them in the social coiiclav-‘e; We niouriii the dead
among them With a high and just pride struggling rm;-” supre-
macy over our tears, and We honor them all as the brave,

OSRATION. 21

patriotic, noble sons of’ Rhode Island. All---those, who in com-
mand at the head of the stroiig columns Win for themselves a
national renown; those of the sturdy rank. and file, every inch
of them patriots and heroes, Whether they sleep in death, or
whether returned to us battle-scarred with veteran honors, their
names shall live in our State and country’s history when We
are dead, and have passed from the memory of all the living.

Side by side with Putnam, Starks, VVolfe, Ledyard, Greene
and Perry, and the great galaxy of veterans of the first Revolu-
tion, shall stand enrolled Slocum, Rodman, Stevens, Sayles,
Ballou, Tower, Bates, Slierman, Mclntyre, Shaw, Prescott,
Curtis, Ives, Babbitt, Brown, hlilne, Kelley, Carr, Carpenter,
Bartliolomew, Manton, Tillingllast, Gladding, Prouty, Pierce,
Taylor, Sawyer, Ainsworth, Grove, Chedel, Nicolai, Hopkins,
Briggs, Pendleton, Holbrook, Searkis, A. _L. Smith, Kellen,
and their no less illustrious, though now unnamed, brothers—in-
arms and in death. These are the heroes of Freedom’s second
great battle upon our soil. S

Such devotion, such heroism, must bear its rich fruit into
the ,great unborn future of our country. It must strengthen
the palsied arm of the oppressed of all lands, and give to them
the courage of a true hope, as well as an example for emulation._
It will bear its goldengt matured car into the harvest of the
World’s true nationality ; it Will. in the death of slavery and the

restitution of the doctrine “of the Divine 1‘igl1t of man to- life, i

liberty and the pursuit of liappiness, cover our whole land with
a sheen of glory, commensurate with our coming national great-
ness. S

Already, some of the great blows made necessary by an over-
1'L1li11g Providence, have been struck. They all point freedom-—
Ward, and admit of no backward steps. They all move us toward

the great goal of a fraiik acknowledginent of the rights of all '

men, and they move us almost at the rate of a century for each
step. , _

An immortal "Declarat-ion of 1il11:1.a.ncipation h leaps d out of
the hot furnace of necessity, I1.1elti.11g the chains froln the bond-
men; henceforth they are freedmen, and their, children after

22 r ORATION.

them, forever. Thus slavery begins its death throes in edicts .

and blood. It took the sword; it perishes by it.

A false pride of caste and color into which We were educated
by the slave system, has been obliterated. Our svvarthy broth-
ers kiss our dear old flag theirs now also—-—and bear it bravely
upon fields Where death gathers his greatest harvest, undaunted
by the assassination of their fellows, by these inhuman fiends

.Wl1O violate all rules of civilization. Fort Pillow, with its mas-

sacre of the unarnied, Will stand~as another blasting evidence
of the barbarism of slavery. But in spite of the terrors which
that example foreshadovvs for the Wounded or captured, these
colored soldiers of the Union fight with a courage almost With-—
out a parallel, and die for freedom and country with a heroisin
which the World may well emulate. Is not God causing them
to earn their lost or stolen rights as our fathers earned theirs,
or as We bleed noiv to preserve the gift ? VVill the most bitter
partizan dare to ask that the battle-scarred veterans who survive
the horrors of this War shall be remanded to life-long servitude,
their wives to lust, and their children to the auction blocks and
human shambles ? N 0, never I

Emancipation by conventions of the States has also been
inaugurated. VVest Virginia has set up her altar of’ freedom,
and come out from under the .dark sligclowv which has so long
rested like a blight upon lierm, industry. Missouri takes her

a place among the free States of the Union ; and Maryland, after

the deepest conviction, has found her great awakening result
in alstatute pf eternal clearance from the crushing influences of
slavery. Other States must follow.

National legislation is keepingpace with this great march of
omnipotent justice across the face of our country. The infamous
lFugitive Slave Law, Which, as a yoke of ignominy, was laid
upon the consciences of a loyal, Christian people, has been
blotted out. Henceforth, to “ feed the hungry, clothe the
naked, and bewray not him that Wandereth ” from servitude,
will not subject an American Christian to the pains and penal-
ties of an Ainerican law. ‘  

“ Other signs and tokens ” are in our heavens. The shackles

are breaking everywhere. Slavery must give up the ghost.‘

ORATION. 23

It is the only cause of this zwvfiil war. Let us, to-day, as patriots,
swear tlmt it shall die the death. belonging to the blaelzest of
crimes ; V that it slmll be locked in a. grave which no trumpet of
resurrection shall ever disturb. This is our lesson.

Rise, 0 my countrymen, to the full comprehension and sub-
limity of. your mission I Your governinent embodies all rights
for 1na.n, present and future I All nations shall yet tlmnk God
for its founding, and for this its bloody purification. Lustrous
in the sublimity of its glory, like the €L‘L1l3111I111 sun when it bathes
itself in splendor at its settiiig, so sliall this government of the
people melt into the millennial beauty of earth’s lest golden
days.