YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY The ED-WIN J. BEINECKE, '07 FREDERICK W. BEINECKE, '09 S WALTER BEINECKE. '10 FUND Jf:ir^3^^^^\ f ESSE TT. PEEK. in- Soss ' CxntatUTT Graup THE HISTORY The Great Republic, CONSIDERED FROM A CHRISTIAN STAND-POINT. By JESSE T. PECK, D.D. WITH THIRTY-FOUR FINE STEEL PORTRAITS. SOLD BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY. NEW YORK: BROUGHTON AND WYMAN, 13 BIBLE HOUSE, 1868. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year j868, by JESSE T. PECK, D.D., In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of Ne-w York. Or f ¦1 ':. Geo. C. Ra.nd & Averv, Stereotypers and Printers, Boston. To Rev. Reuben Reynolds, who taught him the alphabet, and afterwards, at an important period of life, determined the sphere of his studies and labors ; to the memory of his deceased sister, Elizabeth, who gave him all the valuable instructions in the art of speaking he ever received, and by the force of whose clear, thorough teaching, and elevated Christian womanhood, his young mind was filled with noble aspirations ; to Amos R. Avery, M.D., whose gentle wordSi and kind, persistent efforts, in the schoolroom and elsewhere, strongly aided his struggling boyhood ; to Rev. Henry Halstkad, under whose searcliing appeals, on the day of his conversion, he was power fully convinced of sin ; to Rev. D. D. -Whedon, D.D., one of his earliest and best classical teachers, and who inspired his first hope of success in the use of the pen ; to his excellent brother, George Peck, D.D., who in his childhood tenderly bore him to school, who with truly paternal care superintended his education and preparation for the ministry, and whose character as a man and minister has ever been his noblest model ; to Rev. E. Foster, who almost literally compelled him to write this book ; and his FAITHFUL -Wife, to whose energetic promptings, and constant, earnest encouragement, he must refer all his important literary enterprises, — This Work IS MOST RESPECTFULLY AND GRATEFULLY DEDICATED B Y THE A UTHOR. Embellishments. FINE STEEL PORTRAITS. COLUMBUS. ROGER -WILLIAMS. COTTON MATHER. -WASHINGTON.JOHN ADAMS. BISHOP ASBURY. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. JOHN JAY. THOMAS JEFFERSON. PATRICK HENRY. JONATHAN EDWARDS. CHIEF-JUSTICE MARSHALL. JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. HENRY CLAY. DANIEL WEBSTER. CHIEF-JUSTICE McLEAN. THEODORE FRELINGHUYSEN. ARCHIBALD ALEXANDER. CHARLES SUMNER. MAJOR-GENERAL MITCHELL. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. SAMUEL LEWIS. FRANCIS WAYLAND. GENERAL GRANT. BISHOP McILVAINE. BISHOP SIMPSON. COMMODORE FOOTE. CHIEF-JUSTICE CHASE. MAJOR-GENERAL HOWARD. GEORGE T. DAY. GEORGE PEABODY. GEORGE H. STUART. SCHUYLER COLFAX. THE AUTHOR. PREFACE. The time has come for the reconsideration of the history of the United States. The moral revolution which onr recent struggle has developed indicates the existence of profounder principles and a loftier purpose in the origin, structure, and development of the Great Republic. than any heretofore distinctly recognized by historical writers. Ameri can history, -within the last few years, has brought out vices so deep and threatening, has shown in collision forces so formidable and terrific. and has revealed a moral grandeur so far above the precedents of mod ern civilization, that there is reason to believe the wisest men of our times -will be compelled to reconstruct their theories of government and of the powers and destiny of man. The stand-point which reveals distinctly the force by which the im probabilities of our progress have been achieved must be more com manding than any which has heretofore only shown to the world an energetic people struggling for ascendency among the nations of the earth. If we are to obtain a view of the real contents of our historical globe, it must certainly be by a clearer light and a more searching ex amination than any which have thus far revealed only its outer crust. I am aware that I thus present the problems of American and also of general history in a way to make any attempt to solve them appear formidable and ambitious. It may well be supposed that the writer would enter upon a task of such difficulty and magnitude with timid shrinking and very humble anticipations. His only explanation is, that the theory of moral and political as well as physical phenomena, if true, when once clearly defined, is very simple. If, from the fragmentary or elaborate teachings of clear minds and able pens along the line of nar rative or philosophical history, or from the revelations of the Holy Bible and the Divine Providence, or by a candid, thorough, prayerful scrutiny of the events of his times, he has been able to identify and clearly ex press the true and only principle which can adequately explain the facts of our remarkable career, then he, or any man of good common under- -VIU PREFACE. Standing, may search and think and write profitably, though by no means exhaustively, in the use of that principle. Let it therefore be stated, that the theory of this book is, that God is the rightful, actual Sovereign of all nations; that a purpose to advance the human race beyond all its precedents in intelligence, goodness, and power, fm-med this Great Republic ; and that religion is the only life- force and organizing power of liberty. If this is true, then all writers of American history must rise to this point of observation, or fail. It may be stated, without ostentation, that the writer has been, for at least a quarter of a century, a careful student of his country's history ; this, however, without a thought of attempting any of the functions of an historian. But gradually the principles recognized in this book assumed distinctness and organic form in his views and convictions. In their light, he entered, with all his powers of mind and heart, into the spirit of the late war, on the freedom side, and waited, with perfect composure and without a doubt, for the final result. When the war closed, he felt, and frequently said, that a new book of America must be written. He watched for its announcement, but failed to see it. He was at length surprised to find himself urged to undertake the task ; and, after much hesitancy and delay, he came to feel that it was his imperative duty to commence, and leave the event with God. Incapable, as he trusts, of the absurdity of any pretensions to origi nality in discovering either principles or methods of the divine govern ment, or of having in any sense superseded the labors of other men, he simply claims to have made, with perfect candor and some thoroughness, his humble contribution to what must be admitted to be a very impor tant, if not in some sense a newly-defined, method of American history. He now commits his work to the candid consideration of his readers and to the direction of Providence. If the devout recognition of God in the character, purposes, and history of this country and government shall be increased, and the loyalty of the American people to the great Sovereign of nations in any degree strengthened, the object of the author will be accomplished. JESSE T. PECK. Albany, September, 1867. ANALYSIS AND AUTHORITIES. The Republic is here presented in five periods. The Period of Preparation extends from the discovery of America to the well-defined mind-battles which introduce the War of the Revolution. It will be illustrated by the likeness of Columbus, as the great representative of the spirit of enterprise which manifested itself in discovery and coloni zation. The Period of Independence extends through the Revolutionary War to the adoption of the Constitution and the inauguration of the first President. As the only possible suggestion of history upon the subject, the likeness of Washington introduces this discussion. , The Period of DeveloptJient inclades the unprecedented growth ofthe country up to the time of our Great Civil War. This, let it be observed, is the growth of liberty and of good government under the control of Christianity, — the enlightening, liberalizing power which has conserved and developed our free institutions, and goes largely to account for our material prosperity. Seeking for some one man whose character, labors, and influence represent the largest, most pervading power of religion over the masses, and whose methods of evangelism have wrought most potentially in purifying and elevating our voting freemen, I have been pointed, by an inevitable historical necessity, to Francis Asbury. A su perb likeness of this grand pioneer Christian hero will therefore be found as the introduction to the Third Period. TkePeriod of Emancipation includes the great contest of liberty with the slave-power, and means, not the liberation of slaves alone, but of the nation. In the Period of Preparation, I speak of African slavery ; but, in the Fourth Period, oi American slavery and the emancipation of the Republic. Abraham Lincoln takes his true historical position here. In the Fifth Period, we glance at our country's future ; and we stand before it with astonishment and awe, overwhelmed by the visions of greatness which rise up before us. No man could fitly represent this coming grandeur. We give you a likeness ; but we mean by it express- 2 AJSTALYSIS AND AUTHORITIES. ly to symbolize the genius of religion acting through science and hero ism for the security and development of the Great Republic of the fu ture. Gen. Mitchell was a Christian, a scholar, a hero. After a brief but brilliant military career, he fell in his country's cause. He will, therefore, never dishonor the symbol we have adopted. Besides these five representative figures, we insert four groups of distinguished Americans, all acknowledged Christians, or men who have received their distinction fi-om their Christian birth, education, and prin ciples. The first is a group of distinguished philanthropists. We have selected these men from the large number of noble Americans whom we deem most worthy of honor as lovers of their race. The second is a group taken from the number of our great statesmen and orators. The third is a group of celebrated American divines. They repre sent the thorough Puritan and six different Christian denominations: and, taken together, they are distinguished among the hosts of Christian ministers who can be claimed exclusively by no church ; whose reputa tion and influence as teachers of religion, and leaders of soul-liberty, make them truly national. The fourth is a group of civilians and warriors, whose opinions and acts have entered largely into the history of American jurisprudence and of the emancipation of the nation. Here also the choice has been from a large number of truly great and national men, with the idea of representing true Christianity, either direct and personal or generally diffused, from different periods of our history, and portions of our country. Our readers will discover that this volume, though not professino- to present the full details of our country's progress, will answer the most valuable purposes of a new history of the United States, grouping the more important events, and using them, with a large number of facts not in any of our histories, to present to the American people a truthful picture of the Great Republic as it is and ought to be. Among the most valuable works quoted in this volume, it gives us pleasure to mention Bancroft's and Hildreth's Histories of the United States; Cooper's Naval History of the United States; Greene's Histori cal View of the American Revolution; The Pulpit of the American Revolution; Sir Morton Peto's Resources and Prospects of America- Stevens's History of the Methodist-Episcopal Church ; Baird's Religion in America; Statistical History, by Goss ; Partridge on the Makino- of the American Nation and on Democracy; The Power of Prayer by Iren83us Prime; The American Conflict, by Greeley ; America Before Europe, by Count de Gasparin ; Decisive Battles of the War, by Swin ton; The Eighth Census of the United States, by Kennedy; Our Country, its Trials and Triumphs, by George Peck, D.D. ; Mineral Re ANALYSIS AND AUTHOEITIES. 3 sources of the United States, by J. Ross Brown and James M. Taylor ; and Christian Life and Character of the Civil Institutions of the United States, by B. F. Morris, — a valuable " compilation," which the writer had not seen until half of the copy of this work, including the Preface, had been sent to the printer. The author would also gratefully acknowledge his obligations to Alexander Delmar, Director of the Bureau of Statistics at Washington, for important public documents; and to his friends, named in the proper places, for valuable papers contributed from their respective points of observation. If the authors of quotations have been inadvertently omitted in our notes of reference, we hope this gen eral acknowledgment may be deemed sufiicient. In addition to the above, the author has consulted God in History, by Reed; God in History, by Gumming; The Civil Policy and Civil War of America, by Draper ; Wyoming, its History and Romantic Adven tures, by George Peck ; New- York Convention Manual, by Hough ; Appleton's American Cyclopsedia ; Grant and Sherman, their Campaigns and Generals, and Farragut and our Naval Commanders, by Headley ; The Lost Cause, by Pollard ; The Women of the War, by Frank More ; Putnam's Rebellion Record ; and a great variety of oflScial documents and reports. CONTENTS. INTRODUCTION. THE GOD OP NATIONS. PAGE. The Grod of the Hebrews 13 The God of Ancient Gentile Peoples 14 The God of Modem Nations 16 PERIOD I. — PREPARATION. CHAPTER I. THE DISCOVERT. The Old Northmen 20 Columbns and the New -World 21 The Wisdom of God above the Folly of Man 22 CHAPTER II. THE COtlNTRT PROVIDED. The Area of Freedom 25 Zone and Climates 25 Abundant Supplies for Future -Want 27 CHAPTER III. COLONIZATION OVERRULED. France TJnsnccessful 31 Spain meets with Insuperable Difficulties 32 The English, Dutch, and Swedes controlled 34 CHAPTER IV. ENGLISH SUCCESS. The Epoch and the First Colonists of Virginia 36 Despotism- and Religion in Virginia 38 6 6 CONTENTS. Grave Errors God's Method African Slavery CHAPTER V. RELIGION AND CIVIL LIDERTT IN VIRGINIA. Neither Clear nor Dark . ... Providence and Progress ... ... Christianity the Life-force and Organizing Power of Liberty Liberty asserts her Rights, and advances 4143 45 48 505255 CHAPTER VI. THE SOCTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. Maryland ^^ Delaware ^-^ North Carolina ^6 South Carolina 'I Georgia '6 Review 80 CHAPTER VII. A NEW ENGL.iND EMERGES FROM THE OLD. Puritanism in England . . 85 The Puritans become Pilgrims in Search of Liberty 91 The Pilgrims have found Liberty ......'.... 98 CHAPTER VIII. COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. The Men and the Time ... 102 Plymouth Colony 104 Liberty reveals her Form and Strength 105 Colonies increase . ••-....... 107 Christianity and Freedom in Massachusetts . . . . . . . . 112 Limitations of Liberty in Massachusetts . . . . . . ng Maine . New Hampshire Connecticut . Rhode Island New York New Jersey . Pennsylvania The Great -West Providence and War-discipline CHAPTER IX. THE NOETnERN GROUP COMPLETED. 121 124 128130138140142 U7 149 CONTENTS. PERIOD IL — INDEPENDENCE. CHAPTER I. MIND-BATTLES POINT TO A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. The Right of Soil 152 The Rights of Trade 156 The Right of Representation and Free Legislation 158 The Right of Tax.ition 161 The Right of Free Speech, a Free Ballot, and a Free Press 163 The Right of Constitutional Liberty, and of Union for the Common Defence . 167 All these Rights denied, but never surrendered 173 Struggles of Religions and Civil Liberty in America 182 Accessory Forces 189 A New Inspiration 200 CHAPTER IL THE TIME CHOSEN SHOWS THE PROVIDENTIAL ADVENT OF THE NATIONAL LIFE. Historical Cycles must precede 208 Despotic Governments and Imperishable Ideas 209 The Grand Crisis of History 211 CHAPTER IIL WAR INDICATES AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. Lexington and Bunker Hill 215 Saratoga and Bennington 217 Trenton and Princeton 222 War on the Sea 225 Cornwallis and Yorktown 233 The Heroism of the National Life 243 CHAPTER IV. PATRIOTISM DEMONSTRATES A SUSTAINED NATIONAL LIFE. Patriotism, British, and then American 247 Patriotism in Office 250 The True Inspiration of American Patriotism 252 CHAPTER V. THE DECLARATION ASSERTS AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. ¦Wise Deliberation and Diplomacy 255 The Declaration 264 Superior -Wisdom • 263 CONTENTS. CHAPTER VL DISCIPLINE INSURES A VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. Trials from Poverty 2/4 Trials from Disloyalty and Treason . 277 Trials from Defeat 280 Trials from a Spirit of Compromise 284 CHAPTER VIL HISTORY RECORDS AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE The English acknowledge American Independence 288 European Governments acknowledge the new Nation 291 -Would the American People acknowledge the Independence of the National Life t 293 CHAPTER VIIL THE CONSTITUTION REVEALS AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. The Old Articles of Confederation 302 The Federal Convention 306 The Constitution formed 309 CHAPrER IX. TRUE CHRISTIANITY AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. The Religious Element in the Formation of the Republic 320 The Religion of the Nation i.i Official Acts and Public Men .... 325 Tho Religion of America constructs a Grand and Duivible Government . . 332 PERIOD IIL — DEVELOPMENT. CHAPTER I. DEVELOPMENT OF POPULATION. Increase of Population „gg Sources of Population „„- Character of Population The American Race Personal Liberty . Justice and Loyalty in Liberty Education and Religion in Liberty Extent and Sphere of Liberty CHAPTER II. DEVELOPMENT OP LIBERTY. 338342 349350351 353 CHAPTER III. DEVELOPMENT OF GOVERNMENT. A Popular Government A Representative Govemment .... ' ' ^^^ 358 CONTENTS. 9 A National Government 360 A Responsible Government 366 A Strong Government 368 CHAPTER IV. DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES. Products of the Soil 376 Manufactures and Machines 380 Precious Metals 384 Other Minerals and Ores 392 CHAPTER V. DEVELOPMENT OF COMMERCE. Value of Exports 406 Imports and Exports 408 Internal Commerce 410 Shipping 413 CHAPTER VL DEVELOPMENT OF THB WAR-PO-WEB. Self-respect of the Nation 416 Sandwich and Queenstown 419 Naval Engagements 421 Campaigns from the "West and East 425 Washington and Baltimore 429 Plattsbnrg 431 New Orleans 433 CHAPTER vn. DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. Public Schools 438 Sunday Schools 442 Academies 446 Colleges and Universities 448 The Press 452 Steam Navigation 455 Railroads 457 The Safety Steam-generator 461 Telegraphy 463 Architecture 468 Painting 470 Sculpture 472 Photography 476 CHAPTER VIII. DEVELOPMENT OF MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. True Manhood 479 Asylums for the Deaf and Dumb 482 2 10 CONTENTS. 484 Asvlnms for the Blind ^„„ . 400 Asylums for the Insane Asylums for Idiots and Inebriates CHAPTER IX. DEVELOPMENT OF NATURAL DEPRAVITY. 492 Intemperance . 495 Licentiousness ......••••••• Socialism and Spiritism *^^ Mormonism Corruption in Religion and Politics 504 CHAPTER X. DEVELOPMENT OF TRUE RELIGION. The Protestant-Episcopal Church 513 Congregational Churches 518 The Baptist Chureh 523 The Presbyterian Church 530 The Methodist-Episcopal Church 537 Other Churches 545 The American Bible Society 552 The American Sunday-school Union 553 The American Tract Society, Boston ......... 554 The American Tract Society, New York 554 The American Seamen's Friend Society 556 Yoring Men's Christian Association 557 The Great Revival 560 Pervading Christianity 561 PERIOD IV. — EMANCIPATION". CHAPTER I. AMERICAN SLAVERY. Men enslaved 5g.j Mind subjugated ggg Government inthralled jgg Civilization fettered ggg The Press and the Pulpit bound 5gg CHAPTER n. THE GREAT MORAL CONFLICT. Christianity revolts _ Humanity pleads .,, _. . , 5(6; Justice denounces Political Parties temporize The Strain and the Recoil ' . ••••.. 583 Another Grand Crisis in History • • ¦ 58/ CONTENTS. 11 CHAPTER III. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. Secession 590 Treason and Rebellion 593 Fort Sumter 598 Providential Adjustments 601 BuU Run s . . . 604 Ball's Bluff 612 Port Royal 614 Roanoke Island 617 Fort Donelson 619 Forts Jackson and St. Philip 625 " The Monitor " and " The Merrimack " 631 The Peninsula 634 Antietam 641 Vicksburg 643 Fredericksburg 646 Gettysburg 648 Shenandoah Valley ' . 655 Lookout Mountain . 656 The Bloody March to Richmond 659 The Triumphal March from Atlanta to the Sea 662 Richmond 663 Christianity and the War 666 Murderous Revenge 672 CHAPTER IV. THE TRIUMPH OF LIBERTY. The Great Proclamation 676 Black "Warriors 677 The Victories of Blood and of Truth 679 The Great Amendment 680 PERIOD v. — MISSION. CHAPTER I. THE NEW NATION. Organic Unity and Regenerated Patriotism 686 The Transition 687 Impartial Suffrage ^®' Universal Education ®^*^ The New American Church ¦ ... 692 The New American Manhood °'* 12 CONTENTS. CHAPTER II. THE GREAT REPUBLIC IN HISTORY. Republicanism passes out of its Experimental into its Historical Period . • 698 The People, as Sovereigns, advance to the Rank of a First-class Power . . 700 Population, and Influence Abroad 700 Tbe Nations of Earth acknowledge, respect, and trust the Great Republic . . 702 CHAPTER m. GOD IS THE SOVEREIGN. Rebellion is Ruin 705 Loyal Obedience is Safety and Success . 706 The United States a great Christian Power 707 The Representative of Progress 709 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. INTKODUCTION. THE GOD OF NATIONS. I PROPOSE to examine the history of the United States of America from a Christian stand-point. The divine administration of human affairs is a profound study. There is reason to believe that no event in that administration stands alone; that, however small or com paratively unimportant, it must be in some way intimately related to the grand scheme of a general Providence. I am well aware that an effort to ascertain the position of the great American Republic in that scheme, and correctly inter pret the acts of God in its origin, structure, and governraent, is a very grave responsibility ; and I make the attempt with much self-distrust, but with humble dependence upon God for help. Our task requires careful attention to the teachings of his tory in regard to the asserted rights of divine sovereignty. The Hebrew commonwealth as well as the Jewish church was a theocracy. The great Father sought thus to realize the highest idea of government among men. He appeared in personal form, revealing a glory infinitely above the glory of man. He uttered words of deepest tenderness and love, of highest wisdom and authority, that the people might be subdued by his grace, and awed by his power. He traced 13 14 THE GEE AT REPUBLIC. their laws upon tablets of rock, and openly took upon him self the vindication of their rights, and the punishment of their crimes, that they might know and love and fear their true and righteous Governor. The Hebrews, in their folly, became restless under this direct divine administration. Faith became unsteady, and national sins obscured the spiritual power in which they had been accustomed to confide. From the example of sur rounding nations, they were seized with an unconquerable desire for a human sovereign. Had it been the recognition of a human representative of divine sovereignty, there had been no curse in it. But as events showed, and God revealed, it was the practical rejection of Jehovah as the supreme civil authority of the nation ; and endless direful calamities followed. "And the Lord said unto Samuel, Hearken to the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee : for they have not rejected thee ; but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them." God permitted this uprising of human rebellion that its extreme wickedness might ap pear. But he did not abdicate the throne : thereafter, as before, he asserted all the rights of unimpaired sovereignty. Let the summary judgments which fell upon the nation, the anointing and dethroning of kings, the slaughters and discomfitures in battle, the captivity in Babylon, and the- destruction of Jerusalem, attest the fact, that the rebellion of man has no tendency to destroy or supersede the sover eignty of God. THE GOD OF ANCIENT GENTILE PEOPLES. Special divine governraent does not exclude, but reveals, the general. It does not show the limitation, but the method, of governmental prerogatives. Mistaken inferences from his evident sovereignty over one nation are corrected by author ity. In another connection, but conclusively here. St. Paul demands, " Is he the God of the Jews only ? Is he not also THE GOD OF NATIONS. 15 of the Gentiles ? Yes, of the Gentiles also." Broadly and triumphantly it is asserted, as in the Psalms, " God is the King of all the earth." Grant that earthly potentates reject him, and attempt to usurp his throne : faithful his tory reveals him still " the Lord of lords, and King of kings." The four great monarchies of the East filled up the space allowed them in human history ; and, one after another, the divine Sovereign laid them aside. The prophet of God fore saw these startling events, and yet another of grander pro portions and significance : "And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed ; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces, and consume all these kingdoms ; and it shall stand forever : " showing the con summation of all special purposes in one great, general pur pose, — the subordination of all anti-Christian civil powers to the righteous rule of God's Messiah. So the giving of the ceremonial and civil law to the Jews, only organized preparatory events for. the grand inaugura tion of that universal government, whose laws of order were written on Sinai with the finger of God, and whose law of liberty was traced on Calvary in the blood of the Eedeemer. The great Jehovah visibly exercised the rights of sover eignty over Abraham and his descendants ; but he was none the less arbiter of events in Egypt and Assyria. The God who guided Israel through the sea and the desert and Jor dan dashed down the walls of Jericho, and overthrew the vile idolaters of Canaan. The right to colonize the He brews implied the right to make summary disposition of the corrupt nations, whose crimes had forfeited all rights in the land " flowing with milk and honey." He whose sovereignty punished rebellious Israel brought proud Babylon into the dust. He whose justice over whelmed guilty Jerusalem buried the dishonored glory of IQ THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Tyre and Athens and Eome. Cyrus and Alexander and Tamerlane were as verily the chosen instruments of his sovereign power as Nebuchadnezzar, Antiochus, or Titus. He was no more a sovereign over the remnant of Israel than over the hosts of Sennacherib when " The Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast, And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed." The history of the divine government, as set forth in the Bible, and in contemporaneous records so far as they ex tend, shows clearly that God claimed to be the Supreme Euler of all nations, and that they rose and fell under the control of his omnipotent hand. THE GOD OF MODERN NATIONS. Because distinct acts of divine sovereignty are recorded in sacred history of ancient peoples and kingdoms only, is it hence to be inferred that modern nations have no God? Did he assert his divine prerogatives over Palestine and Egypt and Eome, and renounce all control over England and France, Austria and Prussia, Eussia and America ? Was he scrupulously exact to watch over the establishment of laws and dynasties, and punish national crimes,, in olden times? and is he indifferent to the same great events amid the ongoings and upheavals of later days ? Was it only in the days of Saul and Eehoboam, Xerxes and Alexander, Hannibal and Ceesar, that it could be truthfully said, " For promotion cometh neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from the south : but God is the Judge ; he putteth down one, and setteth up another"? To affirm this^ it would be necessary to show, with respect to rights, that asserted acts of divine control were then a usurpation ; or that the human race has somehow since out grown the obligations of allegiance to the great Sovereign of the universe ; or that the government of God is based upon accidental facts, and not upon unalterable relations. Who would dare to assert either ? THE GOD OF NATIONS. 17 To say this with respect to probabilities, it must be assumed that the divine nature has changed ; so that he has lost his regard for the right, or his fatherly concern for his suffering children on earth ; so that he has now no purpose to avenge the victims of an unjust judge, to arrest the proud career of oppression, to execute justice and judgment in the earth. It must be shown that his known interfer ences, by omnipotent crushing power, with nations and sov ereigns whose iniquities rose to heaven, were the result of accident or impulse rather than of essential rectitude and immutable principles. What man would dare to be so irrev erent as to say this ? To affirm that the government of God over nations is un- • necessary, it must be assumed that men as individuals need divine law, supervision, and aid, but, when organized into communities, they lose their dependence and responsibility ; that it is of the utmost importance to have divine control over the minutest acts which bear upon the individual, but none whatever over those momentous volitions which realize or crush the dearest hopes of millions ; that the moral ele ment perishes as soon as the life of society becomes organic, and indefinitely powerful for weal or woe ; that, as individ uals, our fellow-citizens are responsible to God, but as legis lative, judicial, and executive officers, they are wholly unac countable to him ; that a government can have no God, no religion, no Bible, no prayers, no account to render to " the Judge of all the earth ; " that the safety of the nation is wholly in the wisdom and patriotism of men, or subject to the mad ambition of demagogues, and the accidental whirl of political campaigns, with no pitying eye looking down from heaven, no hope from the interference of omnipotent justice, no retribution awaiting the blood-thirsty tyrant. He who has such ideas of God and man, of goodness and sin, might assert that there is no necessity for practical divine sovereignty over nations. Finally, to deny the certainty of just as all-seeing and 18 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. all-pervading a control over modern as over ancient nations, one must ignore all prophecy and all history. See what subduing of kingdoms appears, what breaking-down of op pression, what turning and overturning, what arraignments of rulers, what " gnawing of tongues for pain," what out- beamings of the Sun of Eighteousness, showing that the grand prophetic era hastens when "the kingdom and do minion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him." See with what unerring accuracy, as in past ages, history is literally record ing the events of prophecy. As certainly, therefore, as it is now as ever the right of • God to reign ; that he is now, as in ancient times, the common Father of our guilty race, the unchangeable " Judge of all the earth ; " that his great and free volitions are controlled by principles of unerring righteousness ; that men are, of themselves, blind and reckless in regard to the dearest inter ests of man, and wickedness is intensified by power, so that there is actually no hope for the down-trodden, but in God, — as sure as the verification of prophecy by inevitable history, so certainly is Jehovah to-day the Sovereign of all nations ; and the American Eepublic is responsible to him. © @ [LOJ ra [B TnjtijZlKaR. r T. -ny,nm. „M Fmil PERIOD I. PREPARATIOK CHAPTEE L THE DISCOVERY " The history of the world is nothing but the development of the idea of freedom. Philosophy concerns itself only with the glory of the idea mirroring itself in history, and. the process of its development. That history is this process of development, and realiza tion of spirit, is the justification of God in history." — Hegel. The old civilization required a new life. The race de manded an accession of ideas, a new theatre for the exer cise of its powers and the realization of the divine purpose in the creation. Up to near the close of the fifteenth cen tury, human governments had revealed little more than the struggles of liberty with the repressions of despotism ; and God evidently intended a new and nobler development of the human race, a larger sphere for the manifestation of his providence and the exposition of his p.lans of sovereign con trol over individuals and nations. He had given to man, as man, a strong love of liberty, the due expression and proper growth of which required room for free and independent action. Amid the despotic governments ofthe Old World, this would have been a moral impossibility. Such contiguity to old corrupt forms would have resulted inevitably in the infection of any new system, however just in itself On the side of oppression, there was power; and a novel theory must have room and oppor tunity to experiment. 18 20 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. Precisely adapted to the necessities and mission of a free government, God had reserved a continent in which the savage state of its predatory tribes invited the coming-in of a high and purifying civilization. Without forgetting the just rights of the native Indians, which the white man was sacredly bound to respect, it is philosophically and histori cally certain that Infinite Wisdom chose this land for the home of a broader liberty and higher Christian civilization than had been before known among men, and decreed the gradual occupancy of the Western World by the represen tatives of a new social order. Upon the authority of ancient Icelandic manuscripts, brought forward by the distinguished antiquarian of Copen hagen, Professor C. Eafn, it is confidently affirmed that the old Northmen discovered this continent some five hundred years in advance of Columbus. Greenland was discovered in 983 by Erik the Eed ; and it is asserted that his son, Leif the Fortunate, in the year 1000, with thirty-five hardy mariners, landed at Helluland (Newfoundland), Markland (Nova Scotia), and Vineland (New England). He is said to have remained in the latter place for some time, where he erected large houses, called after him Leifbudis (Leif's booths). Two years later, Thorwald, a distinguished brother of Leif, prosecuting these daring discoveries farther south, received his death-wound from the natives, and desired to be buried at the Cape, where he thought it "pleasant to dwell ; " supposed to be " Cape or Point Aldeston, not far from the Pilgrim city, Plymouth, State of Massachusetts, where the fearless Thorwald, shortly before the sad termination of life, chiselled in Eunes the exploits of his gallant crew." * In 1006, it is alleged that Thorfinn Karlsefne, "a man destined to become great," an Icelandic merchant, sailed to Greenland, where he married " Gudrid, the widow of Thor- stein (a third son of Erik the Eed);" after which, in three vessels, accompanied by his wife, and a crew of a hundred * History of Scandinavia, by Prof. Paul C. Sinding, of Copenhagen, pp. 77, 78. THE DISCOVERY. 21 and sixty-five men, he sailed to Vineland, where Gudrid " bore him a son called Snorre, who was the very first child of European parents born in America." It would seem that these " grim-visag-ed sea-kin^s of the North " continued their explorations, and attempts at settle ments, down to 1347. But, by sorae strange influence of an invisible power, they disappeared from the continent God threw a veil over it again until the plans of his wisdom should mature. He shut it up from the further gaze of the avaricious European until the fulness of the time was come ; and then he produced the man, the idea, the impulse, which led to its discovery. COLUMBUS AND THE NEW WORLD. Who can fail to trace the evidences of the Divine in the history of Columbus ? Whence came the splendid poetry of that conception, which gave to him another world in the ideal before the knowledge of the real had become practica ble ? Why was he so far in advance of his age and contem poraries as to give him the reputation of a madman, not among the low and the vulgar alone, but among scholars,' and courts far above him in opportunities and learning ? Whence that lofty heroism, that indomitable perseverance, which knew no danger ; which defied poverty, jealousy, and the boldest combinations of secular and ecclesiastical power? It was not human. It was too elevated and fiir-reaching, too patient and enduring, too potent in resisting and wear ing out opposition, too fruitful in expedients, and creative in resources, to admit of the idea for a moment. God only could have furnished such amazing foresight, such superhu man energief3. He felt the stirrings of divinity within him, and claimed that he was inspired for his great mission of discovery. Still unaware of the grand designs of that Provi dence which guided him through all his wonderful career, he was, in his sphere, as verily the chosen instrument of 22 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. God as Moses or Joshua or Elijah. Heaven directed the winds that filled his sails and brought him to the unknown land. What he had discovered he did not know ; what im pulses he had given to thought and enterprise, what new life he had poured into the mind of his age, he by no ineans understood. How much more was necessary to the realiza tion of the plans of Providence, and who would be the hon ored agents of continental discoveries, he could not tell ; nor was it in any way important. He had fulfilled his mission. He was not to be the successful founder of empire. He was not to wear the diadem of royalty. Neither heir nor kindred was to be the inheritor of the vast domain which rose up dimly before him. This was God's realm, and he would take the charge of its great future. Columbus could receive his discharge from cares and from earth. He was henceforth immortal. THE WISDOM OF GOD ABOVE THE FOLLY OF MAN. It is intensely interesting to observe the control of superior power over the devices of men for the accomplishment of high providential purposes. The success of Columbus aroused the spirit of enterprise ; and navigators from different nations, with ideas wholly their own, embarked for new discoveries. But how very absurd were their views ! how blind they were with respect to their true mission ! Portugal and Spain were moved by cupidity to adven turous expeditions in search for gold ; but God used their hardy mariners to reveal other lands in the Western oceans. A Papal bull had divided the world of discovery between them, assuming original proprietorship of unknown as well as known portions of the globe ; but God roused the spirit of exploration in another quarter. John and Sebastian Cabot sailed in 1497, under the au spices of England, to look for land, but especially for a north western passage to Asia. It was not material what were their THE DISCOVERY. 23 views. They might be wild and irrational : but God conducted them to the coast of Labrador, and made use of their enter prise to establish the claims of England to the first discovery of the continent; thus indicating a purpose to give the domi nant influence in the New World to the Anglo-Saxon race. In 1498, the younger Cabot, a truly great mind, moved by the same blind idea of the north-western passage, was available in the divine plans to open to the min'l of Eng land new sources of wealth in his further discoveries, of which he was never to become the proprietor. Why, let us ask, were these illustrious navigators not permitted to live and die in Venice, or to prosecute their adventures as Italians? The answer plainly is. The Italian people were not suited in the eyes of God to the task of founding the great empire of freedom. In 1551, the Portuguese thought they saw great gain in the returns of the ships of Caspar Cortereal, freighted with Indians, torn from their hunting-grounds, and doomed to in exorable slavery; but Providence intended and used the voyages of this daring mariner to reveal to the world some seven hundred miles of the North-American coast Three years later, it appeared that God had given to Ameri go Vespucci the idea of a new continent, and sent him out to explore its hidden lands, and report, as he did, to. Lorenzo de Medici, the accession of an additional quarter to the globe ; to which, as the only desirable reward of his enterprise, he had the honor of giving his name. France, in 1523, must also undertake the discovery of " a western passage to Cathay;" and to John Verrazzani of Florence was conceded the honor of this fresh attempt to gain the treasures of that fabled land for royal coffers. This was upon the surface ; but a profounder purpose appeared in conducting him to North Carolina, and far along the coast southward and northward, where " the groves, spread ing perfumes far from shore, gave promise of the spices of the East, and the color of the earth gave promise of abun- 24 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. dance of gold." As God willed, he brought to the knowledge of the world the spacious harbors of New York and Newport, and the rugged shores of New England ; but no French mon arch was ever to reign over this wonderful coast, the pur poses of which were yet wrapped in profoundest mystery. The brave and reckless Ferdinand de Soto could march with the air of a conqueror through Florida, as he had done through Peru ; and advance to the AUeghanies and the great Mississippi, as he did in 1542 : but he could bequeath no permanent empire to the Spanish throne. The grand Valley of the Mississippi was reserved by a higher Sover eign for the hosts of freedom in the great future. So of every act in the scene of discovery, revealing at the same time the narrow earthly schemes of human ambi tion, and the stern reservations and broad purposes of the Infinite Mind. Whether thirst for gold or lust of power, am bition for fame or the vagaries of fevered brains, prompted the efforts of kings and of daring navigators, human plans were tolerated and developed just so far as the profound purposes of God would allow, and no farther, and then de feated, or pressed into the service of the exalted power, which in wisdom infinite rose above and ruled over all ; and the divine plan of human freedom became the controlling law of discovery upon the Western continent So God or dained, and history reveals. CHAPTEE IL THE COUNTRY PROVIDED. " It is the goodliest soil under the cope of heaven ; the most pleasing territory of the world. The continent is of a huge and unknown greatness ; and very well peopled and towned, though savagely. The climate is so wholesome, that we have not one sick since we touched the land." — Lane, 1585. If the time had come for the recognition of higher capa bilities of freedom and moral power in the human race, God would certainly furnish territory large enough, and sufficient in natural resources, for the development of a great and numerous people. This he could do, and he only. "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein." His omnipotent power called this globe out of nothing when " the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy." " He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing." He, as sovereign Proprietor, could dispose of these conti nents and islands according to the laws of his infinite wisdom. He might at his discretion assign them temporarily to the wild bea.sts, or to roaming savages, or daring offenders against his sovereign laws ; but, when the purposes of his providence required it, he would surely order their possession by the people designed to illustrate his creative power and his administrative wisdom. AREA, ZONE AND CLIMATES. The vast extent of the Western World favored the idea of establishing here a model nation, with the opportunity of i 25 26 'The great republic. working out, as an example to the nations, the problem of government by the people. It was not necessary that the whole of this domain should be given at once. There must be room for enlargement ; and the gradual extension of territory has accorded precisely with the exigencies of the Eepublic. Not including the recent accession of Eussian America, it has reached 3,250,000 square miles : of land alone there are 3,010,370 square miles, or 1,926,686,800 broad acres! This is a "territory nearly ten times as large as that of Great Britain and France combined ; three times as large as France, Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Holland, and Denmark, together ; one and a half times as large as the Eussian Empire in Europe ; one-sixth less only than the area covered by the fifty-nine or sixty empires, states, and republics of Europe ; of equal extent with the Eoman Empire or that of Alexander." This is ample for the present It is large, like the plans of God ; and how utterly vain it has been thus far, and hereafter must be, for man to oppose these plans ! The great Proprietor of earth will give his favored nation room. The position at first assigned us on the continent strikingly illustrates the divine wisdom. Had our lot fallen in extreme latitudes, a symmetrical and full development of body and mind would have been impossible. We are at a proper remove from the eternal frosts of the north and the burn ing zone of the south. Taking a vast sweep through the heart of a continent, from ocean to ocean, there are no advantages possible to a cultivated people which are not included in the country provided. So wisely and beneficently has God chosen our inherit ance for us. Sir Morton Peto says, " As regards cHmate, the whole of the United States is within the temperate zone. The settler, however, in selecting his residence, can have any temperature he chooses, from St Petersburg to Canton. He may settle in a cold or warm climate, according to his health, his habits, his predilections, or the object which he seeks' THE COUNTRY PROVIDED. 27 whether he desires to farm, to fish, to hunt, to graze cattle, to cultivate garden-lands or vine-yards. He can select the shores of the lakes or of the ocean, live on or above the tidal waters of magnificent rivers, and have his choice of mountain or valley." abundant PROVISION FOR FUTURE WANT. Nothing more strikingly indicates the mind and presence of God than clear and extended foresight Anticipating the future by minute and ample arrangements for the demands of an immense population is the work of Omniscience alone. This our great Father has done everywhere ; a manifestation of paternal beneficence which the inhabitants of earth in all lands are under sacred obligations to recognize, and answer with unfailing gratitude and love. It is eminently so in this land of liberty. Who can look out upon our extended and productive soil, our towering mountains and Eden vales, our magnificent lakes and rivers, and not feel that they are the creation of Infinite Power for the most benevolent ends ? In their immense proportions and exhaustiess resources, in their wealth of beauty and over powering grandeur, they speak of God so distinctly, that all must hear. If Providence designed to build up a great nation of free men, he would demand of them a marked development of taste, and imbue them with a love of the beautiful and th« sublime. But this would imply arrangements for the grati fication and development of the finer and more elevated feelings of natural and cultivated humanity. A large, un interrupted plain would not have been suited to this pur pose. A land of morasses, and ditches of stagnant pools and dikes, would want the inspiration which so high a purpose implies. But no element of beauty or sublimity, no natural source of inspiration, is lacking here. Graceful hills and grand mountain -ranges break up the monotony of the 28 the great REPUBLIC. plains ; vastness and variety everywhere expand and elevate the soul. Who can ascend one of our lofty heights, and look out upon the panorama below and around him, without feelings of wonder and delight ? Whether you gaze upon the extended shores of New England, the vast prairies of the West, the gardens of the South, the forests of the North, or the valleys and hills of the Pacific coast, you behold a wealth of beauty and grandeur utterly beyond the power of description. The field of natural science is immense and inexhaustible. If God had designed, as he surely did, that the American people should be especially thoughtful and scholarly ; that choice minds should here develop their best powers of obser vation, analysis, and generalization, — he could not have more distinctly indicated his plan than by the endless variety in every department of natural history distributed through this large territory. The lover of flowers, the entomologist, the geologist, the mineralogist, indeed all students of Nature, find here their most intense interest gratified. E[ow benignly did God in his works of old adjust all this to the culture and development of a refined people ! How evidently did he, moreover, design that our vast lakes and navigable rivers and extended coast should call out the com mercial activity necessary to the highest civilization ! Dr. Baird, in his " Eeligion in America," well says, "No con tinental country in the world, of equal extent, can compare with the United States in regard to advantages for commerce. On the north, the great lakes, and their outlet the St Law rence, drain portions of ten States and Territories, which include 112,649 square miles; on the east, fifteen States touch the Atlantic, and the portion of the country which slopes in that direction contains 514,416 square miles • the Pacific slope contains 766,000 square miles; while the four States and a half which border on the Gulf of Mexico con tain 325,537 square miles. This leaves to the great Central Basin, dramed by the Mississippi and its branches, no le,ss THE COUNTRY PROVIDED. 29 than 1,217,562 square miles, in which are already at least 10,000,000 inhabitants." Our shore line reaches 33,069 miles, and " the extent of our navigable rivers is more than 40,000 miles." How clear also is the divine purpose that the mechanical exigencies of the coming ages here should be furnished with materials and inducements to render available the strongest propensities for invention and discovery, affording to the use ful arts their highest development, and providing that the American mind should lead the world in the great depart ments of steam and electricity ! What resources of agriculture, what quantities of the precious metals, of coal, iron, and timber, were produced here long ages before they would be wanted, that when this goodly land should swarm with an industrious, enterprising popula tion, there should be no want of bread, or valuable exchanges, or materials for comfort and toil needed for the highest prog ress and destiny ! We mean not that any of the natural advantages enumer ated in this chapter are restricted to this country : but they are here in a degree of perfection, in a richness of variety, and upon a scale so vast as to indicate the largest designs of a beneficent Creator with regard to the nation to be estab lished here. The immigrants with Newport affirmed that " heaven and earth seemed never to have agreed better to frame a place for man's commodious and delightful habita tion." "Take four of the best kingdoms in Christendom," said Sir Thomas Dale twenty-six years later, " and put them all together, they may no way compare with this country, either for commodities, or goodness of soil." Let two contrasts suffice to place our views upon this gen eral subject in the strongest light Eussia, the most power ful despotic government on the globe, must forever suffer from the severity of her climate and her vast fields of ice. What but empire itself would her emperor not give for the 30 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. single harbor of New York or of San Francisco, with sea room for commanding the commerce and fighting the battles of the world ? Is there no special Providence in shutting up the greatest rival power on earth within the frozen North, while the great oceans of the East and West, and finally of the globe, furnish sea room for the nation of free men ? England, the great representative of the transition state, the power through which free principles are to pass out to the nations of Europe and the East, has extensive colonies and vast territory; but there is a wide difference between her remote and scattered provinces and the compact ex tended domain of American freedom. Now, let it be remembered that all these ample provisions and adjustments were made in the remote past for a people, and order of civilization, known only to Omniscience, and how clear the evidence that the Infinite Mind has prepared this country for some notable progress in the history of the race, aiud the manifestation of his power and glory in the exercise of his own sovereignty ! CHAPTEE m. COLONIZATION OVERRULED. How quick was the love of gain to assume that a new world was thrown open to its adventurers; that whether the discovered land were ancient India or Ophir, or a suc cession of islands or a continent, it must be seized as the rightful possession of craving selfishness to fill up the coffers of individuals, of companies, and of monarchs, with shining gold and precious gems ! But how distinctly did Providence say. as colony after colony came to this virgin land, " I have not chosen you " ! It reminds one of the scene in the house of Jesse, when the prophet of God was there to anoint a king. One after another, the sons of this Bethlehemite passed by ; but the elect of Jehovah was not there. From the shepherd's field came up at last the ruddy boy who was the chosen monarch of Israel'-s hosts. Thus passed the greedy throngs who thought to claim this magnificent in heritance, only to be whelmed by the surges of disaster until " there was none of thjem." FRANCE UNSUCCESSFUL. Cartier, the gallant navigator of gallant France, could resolve to colonize New France in the region of the St. Law rence, and in 1535 take his departure with absolution and the benediction of the bishop ; but he must be defeated by influences against which no human foresight could provide. Eoberval could feel the elevation of his commission from Francis I. as " lord of the unknown Norimbza, and viceroy, 31 32 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. with full regal authority " * over New France ; but he must be thwarted by contentions with his predecessor and rival, Cartier. Fifty years later, the Marquis de la Eoche would try it again, but entirely fail. Chauvin and Pontgrav6 would make the effort in 1600, but without success. Champlain could found a settlement, but no French nation. The French monarch could cede by patent the whole Atlantic coast, from the future Philadelphia to Montreal, to the noble Calvinist De Monts, with religious toleration for the persecuted Hu guenots ; but hostile savages, fierce winds, and .shipwrecks, with successive discouragements to all future attempts of sovereign and adventurers, would deny to the French people the permanent occupancy ofthe future territory of freedom. We mourn the tragic end of the colony of French Protes tants in Carolina attempted under the auspices of the great Admiral Coligny, and we execrate the cruel Eoman-Catho- lic bigotry which doomed them to indiscriminate slaughter ; but it was not possible that they should establish French nationality here, nor that their murderers should ultimately profit by their enormous crime. The Huguenots would at length find a home in the bosom of the free EepubHc. SPAIN MEETS WITH INSUPERABLE DIFFICULTIES. Spain was heroic, and covetous of empire, and would defy all hardships to gain it in the. New World. Look at this desperate struggle against the plans of Providence. * Columbus discovered America in 1492, for so God willed ; but neither he nor his successors could make it a Spanish province, nor convert it into a continent of Eomanists. The pope, as we have seen, commanded the division of " the undiscovered world " between Portugal and Spain ; but the Power above would not suffer the order to be obeyed. The valiant Ponce de Leon, from his discovery of Florida in 1513, dazzled with charms of wealth and power, struo'cled * Bancroft, i. 22. COLONIZATION OVERRULED. 33 with unparalleled energy for eight years to effect a perma nent settlement, in the vast territory called by that name, on the Atlantic sea-board ; but an Indian arrow sent him to Cuba to die. The bewildering ambition of the reckless Narvaez, in a similar attempt five yetirs later, overwhelmed him and his comrades with still more sia;nal disaster. In 1520, Lucus Vasquez de Ayllon, with the cruel purpose of capturing Indians to be used as slaves on St. Domingo plantations, discovered a fertile coast, which promised afflu ence and dominion; and obtained from the Spanish monarch the right to conquer and govern "Cliicora," the future South Carolina: but calamity and disgrace terminated his proud career. Who can read without exciting interest the romantic stoiy of Francisco de Coronado, seduced by the fixlse accounts of the Franciscan friar Marcus de Niza, moving out from Mexico with his grand army to search for the seven great cities of '• Cibola" and the fabled wealth of mighty princes, enduring incredible hardships, traversing the wilds of Colo rado, and the Valley of the Del Norte, over the regions of vast future States, large and rich enough for empires, and then reporting as he did to the Emperor Charles V. that " the region was not fit to be colonized " ? Who can trace the history of this brave man, without reaching the convic tion that he was designed by Heaven as an explorer, while his nation would not be permitted to appropriate his dis coveries ? And with what feelings of wonder, and even pity, do we follow the daring career of Ferdinand de Soto, seeking for wealth and glory in the great Valley of the Mississippi, dreaming of conquests and dominion, wearing out his heroic men and his own iron constitution, at last bowing his stub born will to the only Power he could not defy, and sinking beneath the turbid waters of the great river, without estab lishing the permanent control of his nation over a single 34 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. acre of the land to be required in after-ages for the develop ment of the Great Eepublic ! Spaniards could become great discoverers and great con querors on the Western hemisphere; they could effect settle ments and establish governments which would remain for a period longer or shorter, as Providence willed : but they could on no account annex to the Spanish monarchy the regions set apart for "the union" of freemen, or hold their own colonists to loyal obedience, against the instincts of inde pendence which would ultimately give law to the continent. On the Sth of September, 1565, the bigoted Catholic Philip II. " was proclaimed monarch of all North America ; " but God did not sanction it. St Augustine, by more than forty years the oldest town in the United States, was founded in the same year : but it did not grow and become great like other cities of the Eepublic ; it could not be permanently Spanish ; nor could the founding of the distant Santa ¥6 and the establishment of New Mexico sixteen years later, under the indomitable spirit of the Franciscan friar Augustin Euyz, change the ultimate current of history. Santa Fe would in due time be the capital of a great republican State. THE ENGLISH, DUTCH, AND SWEDES CONTROLLED. God discriminates between men and occasions as well as nations. The English were to be the founders of empire here ; but they could not begin successfully with a system of heartless avarice. The daring attempts of Sir Humphrey Gilbert and his halfbrother Sir Walter Ealeigh may suffice as specimens of the discipline through which the nation would learn its wrongs, and be led gradually to success. The former might erect the standard of Britain over the mixed peoples at the fishing-station of Newfoundland, then sink to his grave in the ocean ; while the latter, after a most heroic connection with American enterprise, would become a victim of sovereign caprice, be dragged to the Tower of London, and then to the block of the executioner. COLONIZATION OVERRULED. 3u The Dutch, in 1610, could establish a brave working colony on the river discovered by the adventurous Hudson, and ex tend New Netherlands into the re2;ioii of the Delaware and the Connecticut ; but the States-General would ultimately resign the territory and the people to their predetermined independence and the legitimate government of the United States of America. The Swedish monarch and his great prime minister could form large plans of colonial power and grandeur in America ; but the rich territory settled at so much expense was not to be " New Sweden," but an important integral part of the Great Eepublic. CHAPTEE IV. ENGLISH SUCCESS. We now come to a most important period in the prepara tory history of the United States. Two grand representative colonies will soon appear on the continent Both will have noble spirits as their leaders ; both will have brave truth and damaging errors in their theories of man and of liberty. They will test the strength of aristocracy on the one hand, and of democracy on the other. One will bring out the power of despotism and caste to grapple with the inherent rights of man ; the other, the spirit of liberty to contend with usurpation and repression. The one including the most grievous wrongs will begin first Virginia shall have thirteen years the start of Massachusetts. Moreover, her land shall be rich, and her climate mild and attractive; while the land of the Pilgrims shall be rugged, and its winters severe. Chivalry shall be sustained by royal favor and am ple wealth : Liberty shall be a fugitive from royal oppression, and shall land on its rock-bound coast destitute au'.l unpro tected. Then the eyes of two hemispheres for moie than two hundred and fifty years shall watch the race. THE EPOCH AND THE FIRST COLONISTS OF VIRGINIA. The times were both threatening and auspicious. The Eeformation had broken up the foundations of Popery in England ; but the Popish and Protestant tendencies beo-an to appear in pohtics. The bigoted James saw no safety but from Prelacy, and no formidable danger but from Puritanism. 36 ENGLISH SUCCESS. 37 The noble sons of religious liberty who had served Elizabeth with loyal devotion were superseded, and began to look abroad for their future. Tlie art of printing brought new light to the age. It w.as time for the permanent colonization of the New World bv the Ando-Saxon race to betjin. We now catch a glimpse of the original material for an English colony in A'irginia. They were ''noblemen, gentle men, and merchants, in and about London," " London adven turers." "Edward Maria Wingfield, a grovelling merchant of the west of England," * was tlie first president of the coun cil. " Of one hundred and five on the list of emigrants, there were but twelve laborers, and very few mechanics." But Providence ordered that the noble and gallant Capt. John Smith and the faithful Eobert Hunt should be the representa tive men of State and Church. '¦ Gorges, a man of wealth and rank," and Sir George Popham, Lord Chief Justice of England, v/ould represent the aristocratic pretensions of the future South ; and " vagabond gentlemen and goldsmiths " would seriously interfere with the vigorous administration of the heroic Smith. "When you send again," he wrote, " I entreat you rather send but thirty carpenters, husband men, gardeners, fishermen, blacksmith.?, masons, and diggers- up of trees' roots, well provided, than a thousand of such as we have." Other settlers came, some better, but, let us honestly hope, none worse. As especially noteworthy, ninety women, "agreeable persons, young and incorrupt," came " at the expense of the company, and were married to its tenants, or to men who were able to support them, and who willingly defrayed the costs of their passage." This experi ment was so successful, that, next year, " sixty more were despatched, — maids of virtuous education, young, handsome, and well recommended. The price of a wife rose from one hundred and twenty to one hundred and fifty pounds of tobacco, or even more." How admirably simple, and yet how evidently providential, this method of founding * Bancroft, i. 120-124. 38 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. virtuous families, and building up the social fabric of America ! DESPOTISM AND RELIGION IN VIRGINIA. There was doubtless something of native independence in the daring adventures of navigators and explorers who found their way to the New World. But loyalty to sover eigns restrained and directed it The jealous eye of the asserted divine right of kings was everywhere. The earth belonged to them ; and the only question was, how it should be divided between them. The right of soil, whether in the form of islands or continents, was in the monarch ; and he might grant it to his loyal subjects in such quantities and upon such terms as he pleased. Charters and rights raight be conceded and revoked at his royal pleasure ; and, how ever meritorious the discovery, whatever sacrifices were made by the colonists, however exhausting the toil required to subdue and cultivate the soil, the people were all the ser vants of the crown ; and, under such regulations as he should be pleased to make, the ultimate benefits must inure to him. Additional colonists were about to embark for Virginia, and the rights of the crown must be carefully guarded. " Thus the first written charter of a permanent American colony which was to be the chosen abode of liberty gave to the mercantile corporation nothing but a desert territory, with the right of peopling and defending it ; and reserved to the monarch absolute legislative authority, the control of all appointments, and the hope of ultimate revenue. To the emigrants themselves it conceded not one elective franchise, not one of the rights of self-government " The summer was spent by the patentees in preparations for planting a colony, for which the vainglory of the king found a grateful occupation in framing a code of laws ; an exercise of royal legislation which has been pronounced in itself illegal. The superior council in England was permitted to name the colonial council, which was constituted a pure ENGLISH SUCCESS. 39 aristocracy, entirely independent of the emigrants whom they were to govern ; having power to elect or remove its presi dent, to remove any of its members, and to supply its own vacancies. Not an element of popular liberty was introduced into the form of government." * In May, 1569, three years later, the company received a new charter from the king. But "the lives, liberty, and fortune of the colonists were placed at the arbitrary will of a governor, who was to be appointed by a commercial cor poration. As yet, not one valuable civil privilege was con ceded to the emigrants." -f How impossible that this should last forever ! How inevi table the inquiry. Is this right? And, if it made a subject of despotism tremble to think it, he nevertheless would think, " The king is a man, — only a man ; and I also am a man." How natural and powerful the feeling of the struggling im migrant, " I am glad I am so far away from the centre of this despotism ! It cannot reach me quite so easily. This country is very large ; the air is very free and the land abun dant here. I wonder if some portion of this grand inheritance isn't mine ! At least, do I not own myself?" Tou can see, in the very forms of the patents and charters secured by the early settlers, this yearning for the rights of a real second party ; the petitions, if not demands, of this other high contracting power. It must be very deferential, obsequious even ; but you can almost hear it say, " If you will deal fairly with me, I will go ; if not, I will not" Gov ernors, proprietors, corporations, did not think,. it is true, of any considerable concessions to those below them ; but they did show some disposition to take care of themselves, which was something in the cautious advance of personal rights. Let it, however, be remembered that the aristocratic forms of civil government were fully sustained by ecclesiastical power. The monarch, in the creed of the Church, was " king by the grace of God." The organic life of the Church was * Bancroft, i. 122, 123. t Ibid., i. 137. 40 ' THE GREAT REPUBLIC. interwoven in every fibre with the life of the State, and de manded the exercise of ecclesiastical authority from the sov ereign, as the supreme head ofthe Church; and no devotion, either of bigotry or patriotism, is so strong as religious devo tion. The British government and British aristocracy un derstood this well; and, though it seemed an accident that the impetuous Henry VIII. had become the sovereign ecclesi astic of the realm, the force of this fact in the British Con stitution was ever thereafter too highly A^alued and too powerful to be waived or modified, except under a pressure that v/as practically irresistible. And Virginia, the control ling and representative colony of the South, had, as we have seen, received this spiritual despotism as a part of the abso lute government under which she wa.s to found a great State, and had undertaken the impossible task of harmonizing it with the vindication and development of personal and civil libertj. Military authority had the right to compel con formity to the Episcopal Church. Indifference was punish able with stripes, and infidelity with death, under the de cisions of courts-martial. In 1619, a legislature met in the Old Dominion for the first time. It was opened by prayer, as all decent legislative bodies should be. " The Church of England was confirmed as the Church of Virginia. It was intended that the first four ministers should each receive two hundred pounds a year. All persons wliatr soever, upon the sabbath days, were to frequent divine service and sermons both forenoon and afternoon ; and all such as bore arms, to bring their pieces or swords." *.. In 1621, a new constitution was granted ; and, " simultane ously with this civil constitution, an ecclesiastical organiza tion was introduced. The plantations were divided into par ishes, for the endowment of which contributions were col lected in England. A glebe of a hundred acres, cultivated by six indented tenants, was allowed by the company to each clergyman ; to which was added a salary, to be paid by a * Bancroft, i. 155. ENGLISH SUCCESS. 41 parl.sh tax. The governor was instructed to uphold public worship according to the forms and discipline of the Church of England, and to avoid ' all fictions and needless novel ties,' — a caution, no doubt, against Puritan ideas, at this time much on the increase in England, and not without par tisans even in Virginia." When '• the first extant colony statutes were enacted," " the first acts, as in many subsequent codifications of the Virginia statutes, related to the Church. In every plantation, there was to be a room or house ' for the worship of God, sequestered and set apart for that purpose, and not to be for any temporal use whatsoever ; ' also a place of burial, ' sequestered and paled in.' Absence from public worship, ' without allowable excuse,' exposed to the forfeiture of a pound of tobacco, or fifty pounds if the absence contin ued for a month. The celebration of divine service was to be in conformity to the canons of the English Church. In addition to the usual church festivals, the 22d of March was to be annually observed in commemoration of the escape of the colony from Indian massacre. No minister was to be absent from his parish above two months annually, under pain of forfeiting half his salary ; or the whole of it, and his cure also, if absent four months. He who disparaged a minister without proof Avas to be fined five hundred pounds of tobacco, and to beg the minister's pardon before the congre gation. The ministers' salaries were to be paid out of the first-gathered and best tobacco and corn ; and no man was to dispose of his tobacco before paying his church-dues, under pain of paying double. The proclamations formerly set forth against drunkenness and swearing were confirmed as law ; and the church-wardens were to present all such offenders." * GRAVE ERRORS. With our present information, it is easy to see the strange mixture of grave error with elevated truth in this ecclesias- « Hildreth, i. 126, 127. 42 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. tical system. It is sad to behold minds so great grappling with the serious questions of man's relation to God and eter nity, with the misleading idea that the human will can be coerced, and human beings made devout, and fit for heaven, by State authority. But an established religion, which makes the courts the judges of orthodoxy ; which compels attend ance at church ; which exacts from the people the support of the parish by arbitrary taxes ; which gives to the govern ment all authority to create priestly orders and preferments, — wholly disregards the great facts, that all piety must include the voluntary surrender of the heart to God ; that nothing is truly Christian which is not free ; that whatever in hu man action is merely the will of another is entirely without a moral element; that a man forced to religious observ ances is so far merely a machine, with no more right to the immunities of religion than the steam-engine. Upon the contrary, so far as the attempt results in a sense of per sonal injury, of an unjust interference with the rights of the soul, angry resentments are sure to follow, and men are made worse by the system which proposes to secure their highest interests. True, there is room for law in the protection of religion, in guarding the rights of religious assemblies, in preventing disturbances on the Lord's Day, and suppressing social dis order, so far as it interferes with good neighborhood, and tends to destroy the religious and social rights of commu nities ; but here the jurisdiction of the courts and the power of the executive must end. However perverse men may be in rejecting the true good, though, indeed, they may go headlong to ruin in the abuse of their freedom, still God permits it ; and man cannot, if he would, forcibly prevent it In the great work of personal humihation, of reverence and worship, of submission and trust, of preparation for death and eternity, every man must act for himself To his own master he must stand or fall. It is the unquestionable duty of everv man to attend ENGLISH SUCCESS. 43 divine service on the Lord's Day, when it is not physically or otherwise impracticable ; but, if the act is to be religious, he must go freely, not by coercion. The support of religion is undoubtedly a high duty : but every man must give " ac cording as he purposeth in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loveth a cheerful giver." All these positions are very clear from our present stand point, and were doubtless seen dimly in the days of Ameri can colonization by many sound and penetrating minds. But the grand error was in a religion established by law. It was not that the English people, who had been born and bred Episcopalians, should be Episcopalians in Virginia. It was most natural that the forms of service to which they were accustomed in England should be preferred in the New World. It was doubtless so far healthful and wise as the free action of choice preferred those modes of worship ; just as other modes, adopted in other colonies, were best suited to their habits of thought and feeling. At least, it was not the province of civil law to forbid nor to enjoin these forms. To establish Presbyterianism -by law in Virginia, thereby excludmg the right of the people to become Episcopalians, and to build up there the institutions of their venerated and beloved church, would be a grievous wrong, but no greater than to ordain Episcopalianism as the only lawful religion of New England or any other portion of the land. GOD S METHOD. It may be deemed strange that God did not so far over rule the prejudices of man as to secure freedom of religion in America from the first This, however, is not the divine method. He allows the tares and the wheat to grow togeth er. He shows his own sacred regard for human freedom in suffering the wrong to exert its power until hope of reform is gone, and the time has fully come for restraint or retribu tion. Then his judgments are conclusive. 44 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. It is, moreover, by grappling with error that truth reveals and augments its power. There were the asserted preroga tives of spiritual despotism, but the instinctive demand for the rights of conscience rising up firmly against them. There was the coerced attendance at church, but the gcspel of lib erty rolling out from the pulpit There were the pomp and display of ceremonial worship, but the pure word of God saying to the people, " Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up." There were legal exactions of tithes, but the revelation showing the moral value of free, liberal giving. There was worldly conformity; but there was also the new life, in all its purifying exalting power, quietly working frora within, under the agency of the Holy Ghost, seeking to develop to the gaze of men the great transformation and complete emancipation of the race de signed to realize the purposes of God in the creation. Let these two forces exist together in the trial period of a people. Let them exhibit their wrong and right, their vile ness and purity, in contrast. Let them grapple till the supe rior power of the true and the good shall appear. Give them time. Evil is exceedingly tenacious in this world. Its eradi cation raust be the work of ages. God is the example of patience and active energy, and " God is never in a hurry." Through the vast cycles of time, he maketh the wrath of men to praise him, and the remainder he doth restrain. Even we have lived long enough to see how wise and safe is this great plan of Providence, and to know what dispositions he would make of the attempt to establish a church by law in the sphere of the future Eepublic of liberty. There was no need of violence in resisting this usurpation. The periods of preparation and independence would not end till it was utterly overthrown by the action of power silent as the laws of gravitation, but omnipotent as the arm of Jehovah. The great privilege of free worship would then be all the more valuable for the contrast ; while the success of the right, in its own vindication and independent development, would ENGLISH SUCCESS. 45 be a sublime spectacle to angels and to men. In the mean time, grave responsibilities would attach to the leaders of oppression, against the will of God, now becoming so clear and emphatic in its revelations. SLAVERY IN THE SOUTH. We must mention here one more restriction of human rights, — the most intense form of despotism known among men : we mean American slavery. The spirit of this ancient wrong to humanity was inherent in the British aristocracy. Essential caste elevated the privi leged classes above the common obligations of society, and imposed corresponding burdens upon laborers. The relations of employers and employed, landlord and tenant, were, to a large extent, those of master and servant ; and this bondage, as the effect of inevitable dependence, descended to succeed ing generations. The laws of "indented tenants " adopted in this miniature and pretentious aristocracy were slavery in essence. It was simply an invention to avoid labor, and obtain for gentle men the avails of labor without just compensation. I wish therefore distinctly to deny that the slave systern was forced upon the South by the cupidity of dealers in human flesh and souls, and affirm that it was most evidently of Enghsh origin. It is hence easy to see how naturally the imbecile natives were subjected to unwilling and unrequited toil, and reduced to cruel slavery. It is also easy to explain the fact, that when Las Casas, from blind philanthropy, sought to mitigate the horrors of Indian servitude by simply changing the victims, the slave- dealer had no difficulty iu finding a market Continental despotism in the West-India Islands and elsewhere was not left to enjoy a monopoly of this nefarious traffic. Hence, when twenty negroes were brought to Jamestown, in Au gust, 1619, by a Dutch trading-vessel, to be exposed to sale 46 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. like brutes, it was " by the free consent and co-operation of the colonists themselves," who purchased and held them, " not as indented servants, but as slaves for life." * True, it had come to be the general conviction in England and upon the Continent, that Christians ought not to be re duced to slavery ; but captives in war and accredited pagans were not included in this exemption. It may thus be ex plained how English traders in captured victims could have immunity from punishment in Christian lands, and how even sovereign princes could assert claims to the enormous profits of the slave-trade. The development of this system of flagrant injustice was very gradual, and is not to be traced here, as it belongs to another part of this work ; but we desire sufficient attention to it now to show the startling fact of another powerful ac cession to the strength of despotism in the great representa tive colony of the South. * Hildreth, i. 119. CHAPTEE V. RELIGION AND CIVIL LIBERTY IN VIRGINIA. " Not democracy in America, but free Christianity in America, is the real key to the study of the people and their institutions." — Goldwin Smith. It would seem, that a hard problem had been raised, — hard for raan, but not too hard for the solution of Infinite Wisdora. With what intense interest do we now inquire. How will God himself release these fettered minds? How shall the rights of man emerge from this sea of oppression ? Let us not be in haste. It is God's question, and he takes time. Let us turn our attention to the gradual development of those principles, which, during this preparatory period, were quietly to assert their vitality and rights, and ultimately re veal their power to constitute and maintain a free republic. In all the history of colonization thus far traced, we see the evident hand of God. He overruled the plans of men in rejecting such colonists as were not adjusted to the pur poses of freedom. He chose the nation and the race of raen suitable to found an empire. Eomanists were not allowed the ascendency in the land appropriated to the future " United States." Protestantism included freedom of con science, and would ultimately assert the rights of man in church and in civil government God, moreover, suffered the vileness of immoral adventurers todestroy them, and steadily brought forward the representatives of virtue and piety. England was a religious country. The Eeformation, under Henry VIII and Elizabeth and Edward, had asserted the ri"-hts of conscience so far as to throw off the incubus of 47 48 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. Popery. James I. had given the people that marvel of in spiration, the English version of the Holy Bible. Eeligion was the law of the land, and it was Protestant The strug gles of bloody Mary and her bigoted husband Philip II. could in no wise re-establish the spiritual despotrsm of the sover eign pontiff. Wickliffe and Cranmer, with their compeers in godliness, had given a clear voice and majestic elevation to the pulpit, and claimed high and holy rights for wor.ship and the press. The laws of England, and especially the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer, had given to the nation, as such, a God, a revelation of immortality and of redempt'.on by Jesus Christ, and the grand idea of intercourse with heaven. How important this adjustment to the purpo.ses of a new civilization in the Western hemisphere ! NEITHER CLEAR NOR DAKE. Grant that the standard of vital godliness was low ; that, with the multitudes, religion was matter of form ; and that the English aristocracy, generally, were grievous sinners: still there were many notable exceptions ; and a sense of God and eternity pervaded the nation, and went everywhere with British colonists. With respect to the inner life, the doctrines of liberty, and the personal rights and responsibilities of men, it must be ' confessed, truth and error were strangely commingled. The high assumptions of prelacy and of monarchy were anti- Christian ; and there were interpretations of the Thirty-nine Articles which seemed to interfere with the freedom of the will. But the will would assert its own freedom, and, in America, go on with the grand problem of human rights with a manly independence of thought and expression here tofore but little known in the Old World. While, therefore we raay not expect to find a perfect theology nor a true system of government fully raatured and strongly developed in tlie infancy of these colonies, we shall find the germs of RELIGION AND CIVIL LIBERTY IN VIRGINIA. 49 true religion and civil liberty everywhere, fresh and vigorous with a new life. " The advancement of the- divine glory, by bringing the Indians and savages resident in those parts to human civil ity and quiet government, was alleged as the principal mo tive of James's grant." The conversion of the Indians was inserted in the charters and fundamental laws of all the great pioneer colonies as a prime object of their grand un dertakings. When, therefore, in 1585, the Eriglish sought to conciliate and improve the natives, they depended largely upon the book of inspiration. " In every town which Harlot entered he displayed the Bible, and explained its truths. When, in 1619, measures were adopted 'towards the erect ing of a university and college,' it was also enacted, that, ' of the children of the Indians, the most towardl}^ boys in wit, and graces of nature, should be brought up in the first ele ments of literature, and sent from the college tO the work of conversion ' of the natives to the Christian religion." True, there was much that was strangely inconsistent with this lofty missionary purpose ; but the felt obligation was acknowledged, and this acknowledgment was in evidence of the pervading religious convictions of the parent country. The patent of Ealeigh was made to conform strictly to the Christian faith, according to the Church of England. The virtuous Lord Delaware would not assume the duties of his high office in Virginia without a sermon from his chap lain, and the most solemn pubhc recognition of Providence ; and this w^as in harmony with public feeling in England. Virginia must be taught the wrong of profligacy and crime ; and God denied her the longer presence and high administrative abilities of the noble and gallant Smith. The colonists, four hundred and ninety at the time of his de parture for England, 1609, were "in six months, by indo lence, vice, and famine, reduced to sixty ; and they were so feeble and dejected, that, if relief had been delayed but ten days longer, they also must have utterly perished." 50 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. PROVIDENCE AND PROGRESS, Jamestown seemed about to be deserted. These miserable people embarked for England ; but, at the mouth of the river, they met Lord Delaware with additional colonists and abundant supplies. " The fugitives," says Bancroft, our great national historian, " bore up the helm, and, favored by the wind, were that night once more at the fort in Jamestown." And now mark. "It was on the tenth day of June, 1610, that the restoration of the colony was solemnly begun by supplications to God. A deep sense of the infinite mercies of his providence overawed the colonists who had been spared by famine; the emigrants who had been shipwrecked, and yet preserved ; and the new-comers, who found wretch edness and want where they had expected the contentment of abundance. The firmness of their resolution repelled de spair. ' It is,' said they, ' the arm of the Lord of hosts, who would have his people pass the Eed Sea and the wilder ness, and then possess the land of Canaan.' Dangers avoided inspire trust in Providence. ' Doubt not,' said the emigrants to the people of England, ' God will raise our state, and build his church in this excellent clime.' " At the beginning of the day, they assembled in the little church, which was kept neatly triraraed with the wild flowers of the country ; and, " after solemn exercises of reUgion, they returned to their houses to receive their allowance of food." Soon thereafter came the noble Gates with " six ships," and "three hundred immigrants, a hundred kine, as well as suitable provisions," and assumed the government What could a people, trained under the discipline of Providence, say better than " God bless England, our sweet native coun try " ? what more appropriate than to give this invocation of affectionate gratitude a prominent place in the service for morning and evening prayer ? About this time (August, 1611), "on the remote frontier, we catch a ghmpse of Alexander Whitaker, the self-denying RELIGION AND CIVIL LIBERTY IN VIRGINIA. 51 'Apostle of Virginia,' assisting in 'bearing the name of God to the Gentiles.' " How striking the indication of deep re ligious convictions and a high providential mission ! Glancing back for a few years, we see the hand of God in the rush of tender sympathy which brought the young and beautiful Pocahontas to the rescue of Capt John Smith, the true founder of Virginia. We behold the war-club of the stern Powhattan suspended over her fragile form as she pro tects the great white brave from instant death. Soon again we see this youthful Indian princess threading her way through the dark forests to save Jamestown from its im pending doom; and we say. Surely she was God's chosen instrument for the purposes of his own gracious providence. Now we see "John Eolfe, aii honest and discreet young Englishman, moved, as he thinks, by the Holy Ghost, to labor for the conversion ofthe unregenerated maiden." — "And soon, in the little church of Jamestown, — which rested on rough pine columns fresh from the forest, and was in a style of rugged architecture as wild, if not as frail, as an Indian's wigwam, — she stood before the font, that out of the trunk of a tree had been hewn hollow like a canoe, ' openly re nounced her country's idolatry, professed the faith of Jesus Christ, and was baptized.'" Soon she is the bride of the zealous Eolfe ; a beautiful princess, " the first Christian ever of her nation." Thus did God reveal the real humanity of the aboriginal American tribes, their capabilities of cultiva tion and religion, and the mission of Christianity in winning their confidence. Thus did he rebuke the murderous injus tice of converting them into enemies, slaughtering them on their own hunting-grounds, and selling them as bondsmen to unprincipled tyrants. Thus did he teach the world that a purpose higher than the gratification of wicked avarice and mad ambition had controlled him in founding a new empire. Men were free and responsible. They could, for a time, resist the plans of Divine Benevolence ; but grave lessons of wisdom arose from the progress of providential plans. 52 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. Wisdom is the legitimate result of discipline in the hands of God, however stern it may be. RELIGION THE LIFE-FORCE AND ORGANIZING POWER OP LIBERTY. Let US now pause to consider that religion is an active principle, a powerful divine life, in the souls of men. One of its first experimental effects is to impress the individual with a strong sense of responsibility, with a conviction of duty which no other person can discharge. It rouses and releases the conscience ; and, upon the exercise of true faith in the Eedeemer, it imparts liberty from the bondage of sin. The great preacher demonstrates the divinity and verity of his mission by thus proclaiming " liberty to the captive." The world is long in coming to the comprehension of the nature and scope of experimental religious freedom. Slowly, however, the great truth is reaching the general intelligence, that spiritual deliverance from the bondage of sin is the clear announcement of God's will that there should be no oppression in any part of the world ; that attempts to fetter the souls and deny the just rights of men are offensive to him ; and that each new man in Christ Jesus is invested with prerogatives of liberty which make him superior to oppres sion and torture and death. It is impossible that this should be a dormant power. It is in itself a high inward sense of justice. It does not, in deed, prompt to rebellion even against usurpation and un righteous laws. It is the profoundest submission to the great rule of right, and results in due consideration for the laws of public order represented by " the powers that be." But injustice is seen to be against God ; and the true mind, regen erate, learns at length that the rights of man and the rights of God are inseparably connected. The assertion and vin dication of these rights raust be contingent with respect to time and circumstances, and must especially depend upon EELIGION AND CIVIL LIBERTY IN VIRGINIA. 53 the progress of thought and the providential indications of the age. But they are felt in a new form, and commence a life of new vigor, from the moment of regeneration. They may be suppressed by cruel power, or restrained from motives of high discretion ; but they have a voice, and the ears of souls will not fail to hear it The quiet acts and utterances of truth and right and holy laws, the meekness of suffering without yielding to wrong, and especially the sublime com posure and triumph of martyrdom for the right to worship, teach the profoundest lessons of liberty. It is thus that the influence of true Christianity, silently it may be, but power fully, extends the spirit and the area of freedom ; and thus that we are to explain the slow but certain progress of civil and religious liberty together in England, and upon a larger scale in America. We must also recognize the blending of true religious principles and power with all other civilizing forces, in pro ducing that subtle and pervading sense of right which all men feel, and are sure in some form or other, sooner or later, to manifest. This is, in part, the religion of creation, and the direct work of the great Creator. Man emerges from bar barism under its living power. This is the source and reason of the uprisings of individuals and masses in forms of even savage resentment for wrongs which have been felt but un defined in the ages gone by, and have produced contortions as of a man in his sleep scorched with fire, who springs up at the moment of consciousness, and rushes he knows not how nor where. Long thinking and enduring ultimately give form to this pervading invisible life-force of the nations. Eevealed re ligion comes in to eliminate its vices, purify its feelings, exalt its motives, and direct its energy. Divine communications from heaven give it moderation, wisdom, and irresistible pow er ; and thus the unity of the great moral forces which are struggling for the emancipation of the race is found in God. The incarnate Son is revealed as the great Liberator of 54 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. inthralled humanity ; and the cross, wrested from the bloody hand of spiritual despotism, is held aloft as the truest, no blest emblem of freedom to the race. All this has its unequivocal expression in the gradual de velopment of American liberty. If faithful history has made one thing clearer than another, it is that Christianity can never retain its purity or its vital power, when, as in the hands of Eome, it is forced into the service of oppression and per secution. From a captivity and perversion so violent and vile it must be rescued before it is or can be the Christian religion again. And, as a part of the same clear historic revelation, we have come to understand that no attempt at the establishment of a sound and durable free governraent can be successful in the assertion of atheism, in the rejection ofthe Holy Bible, or "trampling under foot the Son of God." Whoever, therefore, should attempt to account for the growth of liberty in England, and its final vindication and triumph in America, without recognizing the vital organizing power of Christianity, would inevitably fail. As well explain and demonstrate the circulating system of the human body without the blood, or the perfecting of grain or fruits with out the vitalizing forces of atmospheric air. It is therefore to identify the life-power of this great sys tem of freedom that we have brought forward the small and larger manifestations of true religion in the British nation, and the earlier history of her first great colony in the New World. It was necessary first to recognize the presence of this holy principle, and mournfully to acknowledge its un natural alliance with the spirit of oppression ; and we must wait yet longer for a full manifestation of the liberating power of Christianity, a truer development of the great spirit of the Eeformation. In this place it has been our pur pose to present faithfully those indications of the influence of this supernatural power which really existed, and could alone account for such progress as had already been made in that portion of our territory destined for ao-es to be the EELIGION AND CIVIL LIBERTY IN VIRGINIA. 55 battle-ground of the great antagonist forces of freedom and despotism. LIBERTY ASSERTS HER EIGHTS, AND ADVANCES. As early as the days of Edward, in 1547, "the ascendency of Protestantism marked the era when England began to foreshadow her maritime superiority." Under the fearless Elizabeth, the same uprising of true Christianity " quickened the spirit of nationality, and gave a new impulse to the peo ple." This impulse was never lost. It stirred the hearts of noble pioneers, and gave vigor to emigrants. It struggled with monarch and corporation until it extorted reluctant but most valuable concessions. Protestantism colonized and ultimately moulded Virginia. Let us step forward to the month of April, 1619. Sir George Yeardly arrived, and took charge of the colony, with " commissions and instructions from the company for the better establishing of a commonwealth." He announced " that those crueU lawes by which the ancient planters had soe long been governed were now abrogated, and that they were to be governed by those free lawes which his majesties sub jects lived under in England ; " and, in order " that the planters might have a hande in the governing of themselves, yt was granted that a generall assemblie shoulde be helde yearly once, whereat were to be present the governor and counsell, with two burgesses from each plantation, freely to be elected by the inhabitants thereof; this assemblie to have power to make and ordaine whatsoever lawes and orders should by them be thought good and profitable for their subsistance." Sir George, therefore, "sente his summons all over the country, as well to invite those of the counsell of estate that Avere absente, as also for the election of burgesses ; " and on Friday, the thirtieth day of July, 1619, a day memorable in American colonial history, this grand free legislative assem bly met in James City, and God was solemnly recognized by prayer. 56 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. Their " great charter " sent over by Sir George Yeardly, these keen-eyed, heroic freemen would not attempt " to cor rect or control ; " but they would cautiously provide for re dress " in case they should find aught not perfectly squaring with the state of the colony." Brave, noble men ! How bright these luminaries of freedom shine through the dim haze of two and a half centuries ! " When the question was taken on accepting ' the great charter,' we are not surprised to find that ' it had the general assent and the applause of the whole assembly,' and, let it be observed, ' with thanks for it to Almighty God, and to those from whom it had issued in the name of the burgesses, and the whole colony whom they represented, the more so as they were promised the power to allow or disallow the orders of the court of the London company." * This was a little alarming to royal despotism. The office of treasurer was vacant. There might be necessity for as certaining whether this disloyal freedom had not gone too far, even in the London Company ; and the king determined to settle the question by sending in four nominees for treas urer. Astonishing! They are all rejected; and "the Earl of Southampton, the early friend of Shakspeare, was elect ed " 1 " Having thus vindicated their own rights, the com pany proceeded to redress former wrongs, and to provide colonial liberty with its written guaranties." Praise God ! Another test raust come up from the colony. Argall had pronounced sentence of death. The case went home on appeal. The Earl of Warwick, and other powerful friends of Argall, took this occasion to instruct these presuming American Englishmen " that trial by martial law is the no blest kind of trial, because soldiers and men of the sword were the judges;" but "this opinion was reversed, and the rights of the colonists to trial by jury sustained." How grand the triumph ! Two years later, — namely, on the 24th of July, 1621, — * Bancroft, i. 15-1-156. RELIGION AND CIVIL LIBERTY IN VIRGINIA. 57 the colony received from the London Company, by the hands of Sir Francis Wyatt, " a written constitution. The pre scribed form of government was analogous to the English Constitution ; and was, with some modific-ations, the model of the systems which were afterwards introduced into the various royal provinces. Its purpose was declared to be, ' the greatest comfort and benefit to the people, and the pre vention of injustice, grievances, and oppression.' " * By this important historical document, " the systern of representative government, and trial by jury, became in the new hemisphere an acknowledged right;" and, on this ordinance, Virginia erected the superstructure of her liberties. Thus Freedom asserts her rights, and advances. * Bancroft, i. 158. CHAPTEE VL THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. We have found in Virginia the true character of that great conflict between freedom and oppression which char acterized the preparatory period of American history. In this leading colony we have, therefore, sought our principal materials for illustrating this struggle as it went on in the southern portion of the first "United States." We have seen the gradual development of the plans of Providence in that splendid country, and especially the evi dent purpose to bring the true and the false, the good and the bad, in the forras of civil government, together, that they might try their strength, and exhibit their respective attrac tions and repulsions in marked contrast. We have found how anxiously vicious principles and op pressive institutions sought the alliance and support of reli gion, and in what forms of misinterpretation and misdirection it is possible for Christianity to be combined with the most flagrant injustice; and, again, how promptly and vigorously all its pure principles and living energies move to the sup port of true liberty; nay, rather, how inevitably Christianity appears as the only soul and vitalizing force of liberty. We are now to see these facts and developments upon a more extended scale. We must, therefore, look into the groupings around this pioneer colony, and see what addi tional evidence they afford of God in America, — planting colonies, placing and training men, forming institutions, and controlling antagonisms, for the ultimate formation of the Great Eepublic of Liberty. S8 THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 59 MARYLAND. Wilham Clayborne, first a surveyor for the London Com pany, then member of the Council, and then Secretary of State, was the pioneer of Maryland. Virginia held in proud esteem the fine harbors on the Chesapeake Bay, with the navigable waters flowing into it, and intended to make this portion of the coast the scene of an active and lucrative commerce; and Clayborne had commenced the settlement of the country, near the mouth of the Susquehanna, in the interests of Virginia. But Sir George Calvert, a true nobleman, who was intro duced to public life by the distinguished Sir Eobert Cecil, had become deeply interested in American colonization. He was a Catholic, and evidently entertained the idea of found ing somewhere on the Western continent a State in which his church could enjoy at least the benefits of free tolera tion. The first attempt was made in Newfoundland : but the French were annoying, the clime was inhospitable ; and, notwithstanding the immense sums of money lavished upon the undertaking, it was a notable failure. Why should they not go to Virginia ? There was ample territory, and a most genial climate. But Virginia was Prot estant. Her great pioneers had some knowledge of the grasping, oppressive power of Eome ; and they intended to exclude her intolerance by an intolerance of their own scarcely less censurable. However, Lord Baltimore would go to Virginia, and see for himself But he must take the oath of aUegiance ; and that was stringently anti-Catholic. He refuses, and understands that there is no reasonable prospect of forming a Eoman-Catholic colony within the jurisdiction of Protestant Virginia. Fortunately for him, James had dissolved the London Company, and cancelled the Virginia patents, resuming the asserted rights of the crown over the soil. He had a warm side toward the Catholics, and it was not difficult to per- 60 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. suade the monarch to grant a State to Lord Baltimore and his heirs out of the territory claimed by Virginia; and he saw proper to select her most important and valuable sea- coast The charter was issued, the boundaries were fixed ; and in honor of Henrietta Maria, daughter of Henry IV., and wife of Charles I., the province was named Maryland. These facts are important to our historical discussion. Catholic Maryland is claimed as the first province of Ameri ca affording free toleration to religion. By remarkable dis criminations in its favor, extraordinary concessions of liberty were made to it by the crown. The second Lord Baltimore, to whom this patent was given, was evidently a man of enlarged and liberal views, beyond the restricting precedents and principles of the bigoted sect to which he belonged. He seems to have con ceived ideas of liberty in advance of his times. There is little room to doubt, that, from an English stand-point, he had fully taken in the fact that Eoman intolerance could be made the precedent and apology for discrimination against the Catho lics ; and that, under certain circumstances, the question would be, not so much which is right, as which is strongest. Eelying, doubtless, upon the moral power of Eome finally to triumph over and utterly exterminate all heretical gov ernments, he took the liberty of practically but quietly dis senting from the settled traditional policy of the sovereign pontiff, and determined that religion should be free in Mary land. We raust assume, either that Lord Baltimore was pro foundly versed in the art of dissimulation so fundamental to Eomanism, or that he was better than his church. The great providential fact, however, is, that the toleration of a most artful and damaging perversion of rehgion carries with it fuU freedom for true Christianity, and opens the way for that unrestrained competition of the right with the wrong which Eome of her own accord never dares to invite, and which is sure, finally, to result in the triumph of the right. The danger of free religious toleration in Maryland, THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 61 including Eomanism as the dominant church, was, therefore, only apparent On the contrary, it was a necessity of Amer ican liberty, and the glory of the seventeenth century. It was enough that God would see that the unscrupulous power of the Eoman hierarchy should never be able to re verse the decisions of her virtuous son, and assert her claims to the right of proscription and persecution against the true religion of Christ, destined to prevail mightily in this origi nal Catholic province. It looks like a mere accidental exception in the life of a capricious monarch, it may have been favoritism in return for the boldness with which Eome acknowledged the right of James to the crown of England, it certainly was a high Providence, that this colony received concessions of freedom, wholly exceptional in the histoiy of American colonization. " The charter, which in April, 1623, had passed the great seal for 'Avalon,' secured to the emigrants themselves an independent share in the legislation of the province, of which the statutes were to be established with the advice and approbation of the majority of the freemen or their deputies. Eepresentative government was indissolubly con nected with the fundamental charter ; and it was especially provided that the authority of the absolute proprietary should not extend to the life, freehold, or estate of any emi grant So far was the English monarch from reserving any, right of superintendence in the colony, that he left himself without the power to take cognizance of what transpired ; and, by an express stipulation, covenanted that neither he, nor his heirs, nor his successors, should ever, at any time thereafter, set any imposition, custom, or tax whatsoever upon the inhabitants of the province." * Thus, through the high statesmanship of Sir George Calvert, under Providence, the right of the crown to tax this province was renounced forever. It is God's method, in the midst of imperfections and deformity, to provide himself with types of his exalted desio-ns. Thus did he cause a man of narrow mind and • Bancroft, i. 242, 243. 62 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. despotic pretensions, and a man of extraordinary breadth of view, subject to the power of restricting bigotry, to unite in founding a model State, — a type ofthe glorious civil liberty which in the next century was to become national on this continent. On Friday, the 22d of November, 1634, Leonard Calvert (brother of Lord Baltimore) and about two hundred people, most of them Eoraan-Catholic gentlemen and their servants, set sail for the northern bank of the Potomac ; and, on the twenty-seventh day of March following, they fixed the loca tion of their pioneeer town on the banks of the St. Mary's, " four leagues from its junction with the Potomac." Thus "religious liberty," says Bancroft, " obtained a home, its only home in the wide world, at the humble village which bore the name of St Mary's." Eead the immortal words in which the birthright of Americans received its first expression: " Whereas the enforcing of the conscience in matters of religion hath frequently fallen out to be of dangerous con sequence in those commonwealths where it has been prac tised, and for the more quiet and peaceable government of this province, and the better to preserve mutual love and amity among the inhabitants, no person within this prov ince, professing to beheve in Jesus Christ, shall be anyways troubled, molested, or discountenanced for his or her re ligion, or in the free exercise thereof." True, there was an apparent limitation in the phrase " pro fessing to believe in Jesus Christ," and in the proviso that " whatsoever person shall blaspheme God, or shall deny or reproach the Holy Trinity, or any of the three persons thereof, shall be punished with death;" yet it cannot be denied that the great principle of religious liberty had be come a vital and practical power in this State. After all the disorders of the protectorate, and notwith standing revolutions and counter-revolutions, in which, for the time being, liberty was sometimes veiled, « Maryland, like Virginia, at the epoch of the Eestoration was in full THE SOUTHEEN GEOUP COMPLETED. 53 possession of liberty, based upon the practical assertion of the sovereignty of the people." * How sadly must we record the fact, in exact contrast with all this, that slavery at length forced itself into this province, and assumed to dictate and control it ! This vile institution was not wanted in Maryland. If in her unpretending days it was freely tolerated, or even welcomed, when the negroes began to be numerous, and the price of their staples was, in consequence, alarmingly reduced, and debts for slaves were largely increased, Maryland, as well as Virginia and the Carolinas, greatly desired and preferred white laborers. But the English had become a nation of slave-dealers. Up to 1700, in twenty years, they " took from Africa about three hundred thousand negroes, or about fifteen thousand a year." The dealers must have a market; and the nefarious slave- trade, which civilization has pronounced " piracy upon the high seas," and which has just expired from the repeated death-strokes of freedom, must fix its fetters on this noble and rising State. Thus Maryland becomes a part of the slaveholding group of the South, and bears her crushing burden, in consequence, for some two hundred years. This was not her true position. She was much more nat urally allied to the Middle and Eastern States. Her climate gave the white laborer the advantage, and hence she had more " white servants " than any other colony. She was the most southern of the colonies which joined with the East for the defence of New York, paid her quota, and helped to form "an imperfect confederacy" extending "from the Chesapeake to Maine." DELAWARE. In the spring of 1631, the Dutch " planted a colony of more than thirty souls," "just within Cape Henlopen, on Lewes Creek ; " and thus by occupancy secured to the future * Bancroft, i. 265. 64 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. State of Delaware the right to exist as an independent com monwealth. They built a fort, attached the arms of Hol land to a pillar, and named the country Swaanendael. Godyn, Van Eensselaer, and their associates, in company with Pieter Heyes (the commander of the emigrant-ship), Hosset, and De Vries, did what they could to make this, a Dutch province ; but the colonists were murdered by Indians to avenge the death of their chief, slain by authority of Hosset, the com mander. Wouter van Twiller, who superseded Minuet, could not achieve success. The English swarmed everywhere, and claimed this land as a part of the whole. Dutchmen could live here, and on the Connecticut, and on the Hudson, where the right of discovery and settlement was undoubtedly with them ; but they could erect no States for Holland. The Eng lish, urged forward by religious zeal, resolved to occupy the ground, and devote it to the rights of the people. And there was soon another competitor. Gustavus Adolphus, the great king of Sweden, claimed a right for his subjects in the soil and traffic of America. He would attempt colonization upon a vast scale. A grand com mercial company was to be formed, and all Europe invited to take stock ; but he would not trouble the company to govern the colony. " Politics," he said, " lie beyond the pro fession of merchants." One thing in the views of this enlightened sovereign and his company is worthy of note. " Slaves," they said, " cost a great deal, labor with reluctance, and soon perish frora hard usage. The Swedish nation is laborious and intelli gent ; and surely we shall gain more by a free people with wives and children." "To the Scandinavian imagination, hope painted the Ncav World as a paradise;" the proposed colony as a benefit to the persecuted, a security " to the hon or of the wives and daughters " of those whom bigotry had made fugitives; a blessing to the "common man," to the "whole Protestant world." It may prove the advantage, said Gustavus, of « all oppressed Christendom." THE SOUTHEEN GROUP COMPLETED. 65 But the great question of the rights of conscience must be fought out on the plains of Germany ; and Gustavus Adol phus led his brave troops to the conflict Liberty of thought and religion triumphed at Lutzen : but the funds raised for the colony were ingulfed in the war, and the great hero of hberty passed away, bequeathing to Germany and his own loyal but bereaved subjects the grand colonial enter prise as " the jewel of his kingdom." Oxenstiern, " the wise statesman, one of the great men of all time, the serene chancellor," who felt himself to be the executive of the will of Gustavus Adolphu-s, " renewed the patent, and extended its benefits to Germany ; " saying, " The consequences will be favorable to all Christendom, to Europe, to the whole world." It seemed a singular providence that the " Key of Calmar and the Griffin," bearing the emigrants who were to repre sent the deceased Swedish monarch and the great Oxen stiern, should be directed to the Bay of Delaware ; and that the emigrants should plant their little colony, which was to aid in founding an American State, within the disputed ter ritory of the Dutch, the Quakers, and the Puritans. The Dutch would remonstrate, but did not then dare to defy the immense power of Sweden ; the Quakers would finally sell out, and the Yankees cluster elsewhere ; the Swedes would stay for a few years, and finally be overwhelmed by the Dutch ; the Dutch, in their turn, would be compelled to submit to the English; and finally the representatives of European nations would cease to be Swedes or Englishmen or Dutch or Germans, but would become Americans, and the dis tinguished Lord Delaware would give his name to the State. It is important to our inquiry to identify the sources of light, which, according to the plans of God, were to converge upon the land of the future Great Eepublic. I have, there fore, given position and consideration to the Scandinavian movement, which, under the guidance of great minds, colo nized "New Sweden." True, this laudable effort terminated disastrously, after a struggle of seventeen years; but the gg THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Swedes brought with them from the Protestant Eeformation of Germany the grand ideas of liberty and the dignity of labor. They rejected slavery, not, to be sure, from principles of justice and humanity, but upon economical grounds ; and history vindicates their opinions. The Dutch, who finally triumphed over them, were not so clear in their doctrines of political economy, and were unscrupulous with regard to the rights of the African race. They, with the English, deeply involved in the criine of kidnapping and selling " Guinea ne groes," sent the curse of slavery into New Netherlands, and at length fastened it upon the State of Delaware. Here, therefore, as well as in Virginia, the wrong of oppression cor rupted the morality and retarded the civilization of the peo ple ; and Delaware most unnaturally took her place in the Southern group. NORTH CAROLINA. Ealeigh failed to establish a colony in North Carolina; but his attempts were valuable in the history of discovery, and form an important link in the chain which connects the American Eepublic with the best minds and best impulses of the Old World. His daring as an adventurer, his heroism as a military commander, his shrewdness as a manager of both civilized and savage men, entitle him to a high rank among the great men of his times. James owed him a debt of gratitude that he repaid by acts of tyranny which will add infixray to his name as long as it is remembered. Ealeigh's real crime was, failing to discover gold-mines in Guiana. He was out of favor; and, "against law and against equity," he must be shut up for long years like a felon : but his elegant mind would devote these years to ennobling literature. His ungrateful sovereign could, in his old age, order lum to execution ; but England and America would embalm his memory as a great statesman and a splendid philanthropist Men perish; but ideas and impulses live. Ealeigh left for his countrymen large information concern- THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 67 ing the New World, and the enthusiasm of enterprise, which would ultimately make that world available to the civiliza tion of succeeding ages, and the glory of the nation to the narrow-minded bigotry of whose sovereign he fell a sacrifice. It is especially as a man of liberal opinions, imbued with a high sense of justice, that his relation to North Carolina and the United States is held most sacred. The spirit which moved him to resist the cruel orders against the nonconform ists, and every form of persecution for opinion's sake, was essentially new English, and thoroughly American ; and the influences ¦ which such men awake never cease to benefit the race. The North-Carolinians perpetuate his memory by the name of their capital ; and the nation, in the noble insti tutions which are true to his most thorough convictions. But the time for a permanent colony, and the people to found a State, would come. In 1663, Clarendon, Monk (Duke of Albemarle), Lord Cramm, Lord Ashley Cooper, the Earl of Shaftesbury, Sir John Colleton, Lord John Berkeley, Sir Wil liam Berkeley, and Sir George Carteret, " were constituted the proprietors and immediate sovereigns " of " the Province of Carolina." They were old men, and very avaricious. They were high-born royalists,* and, so far as possible, would stamp the future States with the impress of aristoc racy. They would drain the country of its resources, under pretence of " a pious zeal for the propagation of the gospel." They were to contend with numerous rivals for the right of domain. Spain made Florida to extend over this whole coast The everlasting Puritans were hunting about there for raore room, more traffic, and more liberty ; and claimed for themselves all " the region round about." The noncon formists of Virginia, shrinking from the exactions of a State church, had fled to the forests, and, in 1663, probably formed the first permanent settlement on Albemarle Sound, under patronage of Sir William Berkeley, at the same time Gov ernor of Virginia and one of the proprietors of Carolina. * Bancroft, ii. 129, et seq. gg THE GEE AT REPUBLIC. He was, however, more loyal to himself and to freedom than to Virginia ; " and, scorning the settlement from the Ancient Dominion, established a separate government over men who had fled into the woods for the enjoyment of independence, and who had already, at least in part, obtained a grant of their lands from the aboriginal lords of the soil." William Drummond, a Scotch Presbyterian, became the Governor of North Carolina ; and the people thought themselves happy in being allowed to manage their own affairs. Their con sciences were free, and " the child of ecclesiastical oppression was swathed in independence." * Planters from Barbadoes, seeking a place for the exercise of their own discretion, had found their way to the Cape- Fear Eiver; and, in 1666, their colony in "Clarendon" num bered eight hundred. But Sir John Yeamans, their gov ernor, was "the son of a Cavalier, a needy baronet, who, to mend his fortune, had becorae a Barbadoes planter. He would impart no element of freedom to the prospective State, and " Clarendon " must be allowed to disappear. But the ideas of the aristocratic English Company en larged. They asked and received a new charter, which gave them room for an empire. Their jurisdiction now ex tended from the Atlantic to the Pacific, over the territory of North and South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and large portions of Arkansas, Florida, Missouri, Texas, and Mexico. The allegiance of the people to the English monarch was to be only nominal. The soil and the actual sovereignty belonged to the company ; but the freemen must consent to the laws. Eeligion was to be free ; but an aristocratic nobility was to give character to the civil institutions of this vast territory. Liberty in Carolina was to suffer further trials. The Earl of Shaftesbury would becorae the guiding genius of the new government ; and he would call to his aid the great sensa tional philosopher, John Locke, who behoved in the power of * Bancroft, ii. 135. THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. gQ his own reason to create political institutions from the ideal forms of perfection floating in his own mind, without regard to the actual condition and private necessities of a people so simple, and near to nature, as the North-Carolinians. Shaftes bury and Locke were flrmly opposed to arbitrary power, but full of self-contradictions. They desired liberty, but sought it in control by the nobility. They could not sympathize with the simple feelings of the masses ; proposed to give them the avails of freedom by governing them ; and utterly dis carded democracy. Here, in Carolina, representation was to exist in name ; but real political power was to be connected with hereditary wealth. Two orders of nobility, earls and barons, were provided for : one fifth of the land would be long forever to the proprietaries, another fifth to the nobili ty, reserving three-fifths only " for the people." The culti vators of the soil were to be perpetually degraded. " All the children of the leet-men shall be leet-men, and so to all generations;" and "negro slaves" were to be in the absolute power of their masters. Of " the Grand Council," fifty in number, only " fourteen represented the Commons ; " and their "term of office was for life." And, finally, "popular enfranchisement was made an impossibility." In entire oppo sition to the first conceptions of freedom with which these experimenters began, and against the wishes of Locke in 1669, executive and judicial power were placed beyond the reach of the people. In a second draught of the constitu tion, the Church of England was established by law over a population chiefly of nonconformists, who had fled to this wilderness to obtain religious liberty. This strange mixture of genius and folly, destined to be alternately lauded to the skies and ridiculed as the product of fevered brains, could become sovereign on paper, and in royal decrees ; but it could never find its subjects. The rude inhabitants of North CaroHna had no use for this consum mate nonsense, and would not allow it to supersede their own unpretending government, which sought simply the personal 70 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. convenience and social rights of a self developing population. Long after the vagaries of Locke and Shaftesbury were con signed to oblivion, for more than fifty years, these primitive regulations, " confirmed by the population and re-enacted in 1715," continued to be the law of North Carolina. Shaftesbury was an infidel ; and doubtless, yielding to the idea of a State religion as a political necessity, and, for the time being, an indispensable part of an aristocratic govern ment, he relied upon the future development of the mate rialism concealed in the sensational philosophy of Locke, and the philosophical scepticism of the age, to relieve his grand colony frora what he deemed the superstitions of rehgion. But his infidelity, with his theories of government, raust give place to the heart's devotion to God, and the truths of di vine revelation. Even the quaint and humble teachings of Wilham Edmonson the Quaker would be joyfully welcomed to supply the long-felt spiritual wants of the people ; and the land of the dreamy splendors of aristocratic despotism and philosophic infidelity would become a quiet and grateful re treat to the eccentric but truly devout George Fox, whose honest searchings of heart had reduced him and his followers to the sternest simplicit}' and the most sublime self-denial. With characteristic humility, he could say he found the people " generally tender and open," and he had made " a little entrance for truth." More pretentious men would have said the people of North Carolina are turning Quakers ; while the candid historian must say the religion of the heart, represented in the very plainest style, showed itself superior, in adaptation to the wants of men, to either the formalism of a State religion or the cool cruelty of infidelity. While, therefore, we now see distinctly the hand of God in overruling the schemes of men in the forming period of this State, we see also the sarnie divine plan which we have found elsewhere. The right and the wrong, the true and the false, must come together, reveal their contrasts, and pass through their struggles upon the same arena. Liberty was THE SOUTHEEN GEOUP COMPLETED. 71 to be the grand law of Carolina ; but it must show its right to power and duration by meeting and putting down the tyranny from which it had in vain attempted to fiee. Pure religion must have a home in the hearts of the people ; but it must contend with the wit and sarcasm of Shaftesbury and the blind materialism of Locke. The State would be slave, and group itself with Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware ; but the period of emancipation, though long delayed, would finally come. The institutions introduced by the power of wealth and ambition, and sustained by the most persistent energy, would finally give place to those of primitive sim plicity and divinely-inspired truth, though the spirit of re jected assumptions of authority and caste would descend through a thousand invisible channels to vex and distress the poor, and betray the proud folly of its deluded votaries. SOUTH CAROLINA. The boundaries of States within the territory of the fu ture Eepublic could not be determined in Europe. Grasping proprietaries and dreaming speculators could fix them on paper, and sovereigns define them in charters and edicts, conceding kingdoms and empires to a few men or an individ ual ; but God, the great proprietor ofthe continent, adjusted the settlements and the distinct jurisdictions to his own plans. There was room for another State in Carolina on the sea board. Turbot said it was the " beauty and envy of North America," destined rather, as we painfully know, to become " the plague-spot " on the face of the nation. The proprietaries founded a settlement of turbulent men in the vicinity of Beaufort, in January, 1670. They were under the superintendence of Joseph West, and were to be governed in the name of the company by William Sayle, most likely a Presbyterian. This first location was soon abandoned. The grand model of a perfect government had just been 72 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. completed by Locke and Shaftesbury; and South Carolina was to be the scene of its complete demonstration. At least the idea of caste, of government by hereditary wealth, of a long line of ihustrious families, a splendid nobility, and the deg radation of labor, must introduce itself early, must set up its pretensions at the very foundation of South Carolina ; for it was to make its most desperatfe struggle here against true republican equality. For near two hundred years, it would contend against the most sacred rights of man ; but it would be promptly met by stubborn democratic antagonisms with a vigor which promised and finally obtained a triumph. The people were furnished at once with a copy of the splendid Utopian scherae which was to make them nobles and lords, and secure them indemnity frora toil ; but the ma jority could see no use for it They were not ready. The demands for shelter and bread were too urgent then for the enjoyment of paper rank and artificial dignities. Eepre sentative government would comraence at the same time that the claims of aristocratic governraent were set up. They were to battle for centuries, and must face each other promptly. Then there was the "landgrave," consisting of John Locke, Sir John Yearaans, and Jaraes Carteret ; and there were the representatives of the people. The High Church with its partisans would, of course, be with the former; but, for the present, the latter would show the great est strength, and govern in their own simple way. But " the aristocracy " would gain one great point Slavery should be recognized and established from the very beginning. In the other States of the Southern group, this vile institution was thrust upon the people after they began to develop the re sources of the soil, and their own energies, in the natural way; but South Carolina was slave from its very foundation upward. This would at least provide that the planters should be saved from the servility of labor, and raake them " o^en- tlemen." It might lay the foundation for an hereditary aris tocracy, and, at some future day, realize the splendid ideas THE SOUTHEEN GEOUP COMPLETED. 73 of the founders of the colony. The climate favored the plan of labor by Africans rather than Europeans ; but it suggested nothing with regard to the destruction of their original rights, and their reduction to the position of chattels. About 1672, a few people settled on Oyster Point, which gradually rose to the rank of a town, and was named for Charles, the reigning monarch. A century later, it became the growing comraercial city of Charleston, a place of high est distinction in the trade and history of the South. Now South Carolina becomes an attractive country to the adventurers of New England and of New York ; and they corae to its magnificent groves, its land of flowers and sunny skies, to seek an easier home. But especially the " impov erished Cavalier" and the Hiffh-Churchman see in this risinir colony strong inducements to emigrate, to attempt to im prove their fortunes, and build up an aristocratic government and a S.tate religion. But with them carae, as Providence wiUed, the intelligent industrious dissenters, fleeing from discomfort and proscription at home to the wilds of Ameri ca, where they hoped to enjoy the sacred rights of con science, and freedom of worship. This steady advance of parallel columns in the rising armies of Oppression and Lib erty cannot be an accident It has been too long continued, and implies the potent adjustment of too many contingencies, to admit of the thought for a moment It is here precisely that we see the hand of God in the special preparations for the future triumphs of the right. Let us now turn to another grand movement in the devel opments of Providence. We have seen how disastrously the attempts of French Protestant.?, under the great Coligny, failed in Carolina. In a preceding chapter, we mourned over the bloody destruction sent to their settlement by Spanish cruelty under the domination of Eome. They were then laboring for the aggrandizement of France, from whose per secuting tyranny they fled ; and they could not succeed : but, 10 74 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. as we saw, the Huguenots would eventually find a home in the bosom of American freedom. " John Calvin, by birth a Frenchman, was to France the Apostle of the Eeformation." God gave him and his fellow- laborers great success in winning souls in that populous and powerful kingdom. The struggle which arose with the Eo- mish Church was protracted and fearful. Bloody supersti tion exacted its hecatombs of victim.s. The wily Madame de Maintenon controlled the weak and bigoted Louis XIV. The tolerating Edict of Nantes was revoked, and Justice bled in her vales and in her high places. The humble peasant and the noble prince fell together in witness of the truth, that Jesus Christ had power on earth to forgive sins, without the presence of ghostly confessor or intervening priest God was glorified in the humble boldness and triumphant suffering of the martyrs of France. A signal providence now appears, as in the days of the apostles, in the dispersion of the saints. The north of Ger many, London, New England, New York, and other parts, received accessions of skill and industry in the useful and elegant arts from the bloody fields of Prance, at the same time that the paradise above received the souls, and the catacombs of Paris the bodies, of unnumbered thousands " for the testimony of Jesus." "But the warmer climate" of South Carolina "became the chief resort of the Huguenots." Finally, from their baptisms of blood, came " the fugitives from Languedoc on the Mediterranean, frora Eochelle and Saintange and Bor deaux, the provinces on the Bay of Biscay, from St Quentin, Poictiers, and the beautiful VaUey of Tours, from St Lo and Dieppe. Men who had the virtues of the English Puritans, without their bigotry, came to the land to which the toler ant benevolence of Shaftesbury had invited the befiever of every creed." * * Bancroft, ii. 180, 181. THE SOUTHERN GEOUP COMPLETED. 75 In Charleston and vicinity, these noble people found their home ; and how grateful must have been the return of the holy sabbath, when parents and children moved over the waters, or through their groves of palmetto perfumed with the odors of liberty and love, to their quiet church in Charles ton, where, with songs of gratitude and humble prayers, they remembered their sorrows and their deliverance, and listened to the simple and exalting truths of the gospel, with " none to molest or make them afraid " ! We must needs emerge from the sea of martyrdom to understand their joy. Well said Judith, the wife of Pierre Manigault, " God hath done great things for us in enabling us to bear up under so many tri als ; " and well might the paeans of victory rise from the church of the Huguenots in Charleston. Let us, however, note that this was God's gracious plan by which South Carolina should receive some of her best blood and noblest citizens from sunny France, and a strong infusion of liberty from the firm and sturdy Protestantism of the French Calvinists. Other portions of the United States shared in the benedictions, which, under God, arose from the horrors of Eomish persecution. We can now still better understand how it was that " the company of courtiers " could not succeed well in establish ing their splendid forms of aristocratic government ; and why their weakness must constantly appear, and gradually yield before the gathering power of the people, whose ideas of the rights and dignity of self-government rose with every new emergency : for God had sent enough of the nonconfor mists of Virginia, the dissenters of England, and the Hu guenots of France, into South Carolina, to make the battle for liberty heroic, and finally successful. In process of time, however, the centre of the Southern group would remove from Virginia to South Carolina, where slavery was fundamental, and revealed its utmost malig nity. 75 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. GEORGU. Spanish pride was slow to surrender the rights of discov ery clairaed on the Atlantic coast. The treaty which Eng land had extorted was held to be of no binding force, and the resumption of jurisdiction over Carolina was only a question of tirae. But these pretensions were becoraing every year more impracticable. So far from yielding to them, England determined to crowd down still nearer to St Augustine In 1717, it was seriously proposed "to plant a new colony south of Carolina, in a region that was heralded as the most delightful country of the universe." The time was at hand, but under providential auspices entirely differ ent from the spirit of avarice which controlled the British courtiers. From the dark and loathsome prisons, where, simply for the crime of poverty, thousands of British subjects sighed and pined away their precious lives, a wail of distress came up, which fell upon the ears of the noble philanthropist James Oglethorpe; and his whole soul promptly respond ed to the voice of agony. He went into those cells; he hstened to the tales of woe; he gazed upon the haggard forms of Avealth's suffering victims ; he took up and echoed their wail, until all England shuddered at the cry for justice wdiich smote the ears of lords and commons, of king and subjects ; and multitudes came out of their cells to breathe again the pure air of heaven. Oglethorpe interpreted Providence correctly. There must be an advance step in the humanizing power of government. These poor sufferers must get away from an administration of law, which in theory, and very largely in English practice, made the protection of property the grand aim of govern raent, and would, therefore, iraprison a man for a trifling debt, or hang him for petty theft Even the savage wilds of America might be a grateful retreat from such merciless barbarit}-. Oglethorpe would found a colony; and George II. THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 77 would grant a charter for the use of the famous country " between the Savannah and the Altamaha, stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific," wholly and solely " in trust for the poor." "Non sihi, sed aliis," was the noble motto upon the corporate seal. Not for themselves, but for others, did Oglethorpe and his friends undertake this grand enter prise. This great man could not be induced to intrust to others the execution of a plan so difficult, requiring so much sacri fice, and having such high claims to the patronage of God. In November, 1732, with "about a hundred and twenty emigrants," he embarked for the scene of his future toil. After a voyage of fifty-seven days, he reached Charleston ; exchanged civilities with the South-Carolinians ; and in Jan uary, 1733, located the principal town where Savannah now stands. The emigrants soon arrived at their long-sought home ; houses combining comfort with economy were con structed for the residence of governor and people alike ; and th6 great prison-philanthropist had become the founder of a State which was to be "the place of refuge for the dis tressed people of Britain and the persecuted Protestants of Europe." The preparatory period of Georgian history is of high moral significance, and of grave importance in this discus sion. The philanthropy of Oglethorpe was no transient sentiment. It arose from a high sense of man's responsi bility to God. It was, therefore, living, vigorous, and prac tical. It was deeply imbued with religious principle and motives, and therefore was consistent in its treatment of men under all circumstances. No promptings of avarice or ambition dictated cruelty to the native race. Tomo-chichi, chief of the Yainacraws, made to the governor a present of " a buffalo-skin painted on the inside with the head and feathers of an eagle," and beautifully said, "The feathers of the eagle are soft, and signify love ; the buffalo-skin is warm, and is the emblem s 78 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of protection ; therefore love and protect our little fami lies," — no vain appeal to a heart so noble as that of Ogle thorpe. His farae spread among the natives of the forest They carae from far off and near at his call to hear words of peace, and accept his powerful protection. "We are come," said the chief of Coweta, " twenty-five days' journey to see you. I was never willing to go down to Charleston, lest I should die on the way ; but when I heard you were corae, and that you are good men, I came down that I might hear good things." — " Call back," said Oglethorpe, " your kindred who loved you ; recall the Yamassees, that they may be buried in peace among their ancestors, and may see their graves before they die." How beautiful the prompt ings of true Christianity ! No wonder the Creeks and Chero kees, and distant nations, numerous and powerful, sought and received his kindly intervention to settle their tribal feuds, and protect them from the cruel aggressions of the white man. " The good faith of Oglethorpe in the offers of peace, his noble mien, and sweetness of temper, conciliated the con fidence of the red men ; and he in his turn was pleased with their simplicity, and sought for means to clear the glimmer ing ray of their minds, to guide their bewildered reason, and teach them to know the God whom they ignorantly adored." * Well may the " persecuted Protestants " come hither from Salzburg with their "Bibles, hymn-books, catechisms, and books of devotion," beginning their " pilgrimage cheerfully in the name of God;" "after a discourse and prayer and benediction," conversing as they go, on the banks of the Ehine, amid "hymns and prayers, of justification and of sanctification, and of standing fast in the Lord." How di-^ vinely upborne were they araid the perils of a terrific storm at sea as they raised their voices in prayer and song amidst the tempest, "and feared no evil"! How delightful to see these « wayfaring men " met at Charleston by the patern.al * Bancroft, ii. 423, e( seq. THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 79 Oglethorpe, and conducted to the site of their own town ! They named it " Ebenezer : " and here they would sojourn only for a time; for their "home was beyond the ^skies." "The grand success of Oglethorpe made the colony in crease rapidly by volunteer emigrants. 'His undertaking will succeed,' said Johnson, the Governor of South Carolina ; ' for he nobly devotes all his powers to serve the poor, and rescue them from their wretchedness.' ' He bears a great love to the servants and children of God,' wrote the pastor of Ebenezer. He has taken care of us to the utmost of his ability. God has so blessed his presence and his regu lations in the land, that others would not accomplish in many years what he has brought about in one." * " Taking with him Tomo-chichi and others of the Creeks," he returned to England in the interests of his colony. Feb. 6, 1736, he came back with three hundred emigrants, among whom was the afterwards distinguished John Wesley, glow ing with missionary zeal, but as yet without evidence of the new life within. Charles Wesley, thereafter to be one of the greatest of lyric- poets, was the governor's secretary. The pious Moravians were here, and mark the presence of Chris tian faith in this new accession to the population of Georgia. They landed, and ascended a rising ground not far from Tybee Island, " where," said Wesley, " they all knelt, and re turned thanks to God for having safely arrived in Georgia." We have proceeded far enough to find in this province the ample and active presence of divine power, which we have identified thus far everywhere in the formation of these States ; and we should confidently expect to find this agency developing and organizing here the elements of a free government. The laws were few, and exceedingly simple. The trustees governed the colony in the absence of the governor. But the civil rights of the people depended chiefly upon the humane influence of Oglethorpe and his high sense of jus- * Bancroft, iii. 425. 80 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. tice. When he was absent, the people mourned, and thought the laws of the trustees too stringent Under control of the highest motives, and hoping to prevent a monopoly of lands, they had unwisely ordained that the right of soil should descend only to males. Far in advance of their times, they enacted a stringent prohibitory liquor-law, which, high as it was in its just morality, could not be enforced. They also took a firm stand against slavery, which secures them an elevated place in history, and speaks decisively for the effec tive power of Christianity in the judgments and life of Ogle thorpe. " No settlement was ever before established on so humane a plan." In London, in 1734, it could be truthfully said in praise of Georgia, "Slavery, the misfortune, if not the dishonor, of other plantations, is absolutely proscribed. Let avarice defend it as it will, there is an honest reluctance in humanity against buying and selling, and regarding those of our own species as our wealth and possessions." "The name of slavery is here unheard, and every inhabitant is free from unchosen masters and oppression." "Slavery," said Oglethorpe, " is against the gospel as well as the funda mental law of England. We refused, as trustees, to make a law permitting such a horrid crime." Brave words of a noble man! Happy had it been for the great State of Georgia if they had been heeded. But we must take mourn ful note of the fact that the influence of those who were termed " the better sort of people in Savannah " finally pre vailed ; and against her own principles, against the high- souled will of her noble founder, against the gospel as well as the fundamental law of England, this "horrid crime " was comraitted ; and, in other years, Georgia would, so far as pos sible, expiate her crirae by the blood of her best citizens. REVIEW. Thus have we passed over the original colonies of the Southern group. Later, Florida and the Gulf States would THE SOUTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 81 be added to their number, and four in the Central West receive the blighting curse ; and fifteen great States, other wise free, become the slaveholding confederated South. The institution extended itself, by sufferance, speedily through several of the Middle and Eastern States, but yielded, not so much, we fear, to the force of principle as to the resistance of the climate, — too cold for the negro, and returning much higher profits from the labor of free white people. Here, again, our urgent question returns: If God in tended this vast and splendid country for the occupaiicy of freedom, and for the development of a powerful homoge neous people, why did he suffer the intrusion of this antago nist institution ? Why must the grand natural development of liberty be obstructed, and in so many ways defeated, by an antagonism so direct, and armed by the fearful power of human selfishness ? There is, as we understand, but one answer to these interrogations. Man is free : and, in a state of trial, the power to do right must involve the power to do wrong; the appreciation and concession of personal rights upon the principles of common brotherhood and humanity must imply the power to withhold those rights ' upon prin ciples of selfishness and oppression. The disposition to justice and benevolence must depend upon the extent to which the great social law of Jesus Christ, "All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them," has taken possession of the soul, and con trolled its perverted self-love. The social wrongs of the world are in direct opposition to the divine law of morality expressed in another form, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" The rights of man will be universally con ceded and fully honored, when by the new creation, and the advancement of civilization, this law of love is universally obeyed. Because it is not, and perverted self-love rises above this great law of right, slavery is possible ; and, since 82 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. God did not forcibly interfere with human liberty, the bit ter wrongs of slavery fell upon our Southern States. But God does frequently, by special interference, inter rupt and control the wrong tendencies of men. When such restraint becomes a higher necessity than the indulgence of abused freedom, then the abuse comes to an end, affording another illustration of the revealed fact, "He maketh the wrath of man to praise him, and the remainder he doth restrain." But there is in the toleration of slavery a still higher manifestation of the divine purpose. He proposes no me chanical coerced freedom in this Great Eepublic, no feeble, ephemeral growth of liberty, such as might be the result of arbitrary protection and untried strength, but a sturdy, masterly power, such as can only be the result of discipline, of vigorous exercise and severe habit What, then, could be a higher manifestation of Divine Wisdom than to allow this intense form of despotism to rise up in the very midst of free institutions ? If it must exist anywhere upon the globe, it would seem well to import it even, to gather its scattered elements from every part of the world, and con dense them into their most dreaded and terrific forms, within the broad domain consecrated to freedom. Then let oppression do its worst Let it spread like leprosy upon the body pohtic, and see whether or not it has power to destroy the life of the nation. Bring up to the contest the truest, purest form of social right known am.ong men, and see whether it can grapple, first with the moral, and then with the physical force of tyranny. Let the dreaded con flict have a wide field and an ample range of time ; endow the vile usurpation with all the power of wealth and social distinction, with political skill and the highest culture ; and let it demonstrate its most subtle and most daring force, that the world may see whether civil and social wrong has any limits, or whether it has power to subjugate, and stamp into the earth, the liberties of the race. THE SOUTHEEN GROUP COMPLETED. 83 All this has been done before the eyes of men and angels and God, and we are permitted to behold the glorious tri umph of the right. This day, liberty in the United States of America is more perfectly defined, and armed with a more potential life, than could ever have been possible if " the vilest slavery that ever saw the sun," "the sum of all vil- lanies," had not been here to assault and try its strength, and, by the severest discipline to which the right on earth was ever subjected, augment and develop its power, and energize its action. Such transcendent skill has character ized the plans of God, that, by striking down oppression in America, he has destroyed its dominant force, for the whole race, and for all time to come. CHAPTEE VII. A NEW ENGLAND EMERG;ES FROM THE OLD. " The two or three main ideas whieh constitute the basis of the social theory of the United States were first combined in the Northern British Colonies, the States of New England. They now extend their influence over the whole American world." — Du TOCQUEVILLE. We now turn to a different quarter of the heavens, and behold the mornino; star of freedom risinjj;. Its soft and pleasing light gives promise of a charming day. We have traced the plans and movements of Providence in the colonization of the South. We have seen the princi ple of liberty, struggling with old aristocratic forms, gradu ally gaining position, and working its way upward and out ward with the growing population. We have been struck with its simplicity, vitality, and power. At the same time, the principle and passion of despotism have shown great strength. They have insisted with energy upon the divine right of kings, upon the hereditary claims of the governing class, and upon the right of sovereignty over the New World. Whatever they have yielded to the spirit of manly independence, rousing itself in Europe, and assuming greater boldness in America, they have yielded slowly, and with great reluctance. They continue through the whole period of preparation, varying with the narrow or broader views of the reigning sovereign, sustained by the usurpations of a State religion, and finally grasping and tena ciously holding all the power of human slavery. We watch the struggle with alternate hope and fear. We almost in voluntarily ask. Will the power of despotism extend over the western hemisphere, and last forever ? Is there no home ^En** %- B: E Bin. H.T, >liTii©iiiilIB rHitAilHgOPiSTS. A NEW ENGLAND EMERGES PROM THE OLD. 85 for Liberty, where she may reveal her true life, unfold her ¦power, and achieve for the world a new and nobler civiliza tion? In the midst of our anxious inquiries, we examine history in the light of true Christianity, and begin to re ceive our answer. God is yet the sovereign of nations. In the mean time, he is preparing a new development of the feeling of personal rights and responsibility. Let us look at this new development from our Christian stand-point PURITANISM IN ENGL.iND. The contest between radicalism and conservatism appears in every age, and in Church as well as State. When the Eeformation extended to England, the questions, as to how much that was peculiar to the Eoman-Catholic Church should be saved, and what should take the place of that which was destroyed, were not easily nor soon answered. Henry VHI. could see distinctly that his own independent sovereignty, and his purposes of divorce and marriage, would not permit the supreme ecclesiastical power claimed by the Eoman pontiff within his realm ; and he therefore summarily set it aside But he by no means intended gen eral liberty of religious faith and observances. It will not be forgotten, that, in his reign, men were burned at the stake for denying the Eomish doctrine of transubstantiation; and the superstitious ritualism of the Catholic Church was to constitute, to a great extent, the State religion of England. Elizabeth had been a thorough conformist during the reign of " bloody Mary," and was strongly inclined to continue it when she became the head of the kingdom and the Church. She believed in the real presence, and long struggled to re tain images, the crucifix, and tapers in her private chapel. She was inclined to offer prayers to the Virgin, favored the invocation of saints, and insisted upon " the celibacy of the clergy." She was too fond of absolute authority, and had too high an appreciation of the absolutism of the Eomish Church, to make her a willing radical Protestant 86 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. But her problem was difficult. She was obhged and dis posed to carry the movement commenced by Henry VIH. forward to its legitimate results. He had released the king dom frora the political domination of Eome : she must sever it from the spiritual domination. She must show that the Church of England, under the supreme control of the British sovereign, was as verily the true Cathohc Church as when under the control of the Eoraan pontiff. She was Protest ant as against the assumptions of the pope, rather than as against the superstitious rites and heretical dogmas of the Church of Eome. She expected, therefore, and not wholly without reason, to be able, by queenly grace and authority, to induce Catholic conformity to the rule of the new virtual pontiff, and substantially the old Catholic Church. Cranmer had done much to prepare the way for this re sult In many respects a very great and good man, he was yet a temporizer. With his conscience roused, and his heart essentially Protestant, he deprecated persecution, and de voutly wished for the growth of true spiritual Christianity. But, as a distinguished leader of the English hierarchy, he founded the Church of England with high notions of priestly authority and political expediency. It is, therefore, not a reason for surprise that he ultimately forfeited the confidence of both parties, and fell a victim to his own inconsistencies. But Ehzabeth must persist in her efforts at conformity to the divine right of prelacy and the State religion. Eoman ists, accustomed to the art of dissimulation, would to some extent seem to conform, but finally show that the supreme headship of the pontiff at Eome was essential to Eomanism ; .and the Virgin Queen would feel the blow of excommunica tion, while her subjects were absolved from their allegiance by a power that sovereigns had not ceased to dread. But Elizabeth must grapple with another formidable power. The Eeformation was not a mere effort at political emancipation. " Luther had based his reform upon the sub lime but simple truth which lies at the basis of morals,— A NEW ENGLAND EMERGES FROM THE OLD. 87 the paramount value of character, and purity of conscience ; the superiority of right dispositions over ceremonial exac tions ; " and against all papal and prelatical pretensions, im plying the confessional, indulgences, and priestly absolution, had insisted upon "justification by faith alone." It was only necessary for these grand doctrines to gain a clearer utterance to insure their propagation and spiritual power. They were essentially true, and hence iraraortal, and destined to win their way to the ends of the earth. England had long since received the evangelical leaven. Wickliffe and his Bible, and a host of illustrious confessors and martyrs, had sent these great truths down deep into the religious consciousness of the nation ; and they were destined to survive all persecution, and work their way up to the sur face, and all the more promptly and powerfully, now that papal authority was renounced by the head of the realm. Freedom of thought precedes freedom of expression, and leads directlj" to it. " The spirit of inquiry rebelled against proscription." Conformity to Eomish superstitions and pompous ceremonies, as a matter of " expediency," was de nounced as a crime ; and it soon began to be evident that multitudes of the English people did not allow that they had escaped from one form of ecclesiastical despotism to be immediately involved in another. In other words, the spirit of true piety would assert its right to worship God accord ing to the dictates of its own conscience. "The austere principle was now announced, that not even a ceremony should be tolerated, unless it was enjoined by the word of God. And this was Puritanism. The Church of England, at least in its ceremonial part, was established by an act of parliament or a royal ordinance. Puritanism, zeal ous for independence, admitted no voucher but the Bible, — a fixed rule which it would allow neither parliaraent nor hierarchy nor king to interpret The Puritans adhered to the Established Church as far as their interpretations of the Bible seemed to warrant, but no farther, not even in things 88 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of indifference They would yield nothing in religion to the temporal sovereign ; they would retain nothing that seemed a relic of the religion which they had renounced. They asserted the equality of the plebeian clergy, and direct ed their fiercest attacks against the divine right of bishops, as the only remaining stronghold of superstition. In most of these views, they were sustained by the reformers of the continent." * Here was a revolt from authority that was no sudden impulse, no transient passion. It wa^s Conscience rising up to assert her rights ; it was deep-seated conviction ; it was true manhood, under the inspirations of a new life, — the life of the age, the life of the Eeformation, — gradually becoraing " the life of God in the soul of man." What would temporal and spiritual sovereignty do with it ? Why, rise up and crush it Its most numerous repre sentatives were "plebeians," common people. What right had they to " prophesy " or to find fault with " the Church " ? How could they expect consideration or mercy ? It was of no use to parley with such obstinate heretics. Down with them! No, your Majesty: you do not understand these people. Some of your wisest counsellors see the roots of this " evil " striking deeper down than you think. This is a new England coming up which you have not known be fore : it is not merely Brown and "the conventicles;" it is the spirit of the age. Be careful how you treat it. It will rock the throne of England, and conduct royalty itself to the block, if you don't take your foot off of it But power enthroned is blind, and the terrible contest will go on. In 1571, the Thirty-nine Articles become the law of the land. Parliament exacts belief, at first, only in those which relate to the confession and the sacraments. But even this show of toleration will soon disappear. The order for absolute conformity is promulgated, and Protestant Po pery shows its persecuting, murderous spirit * Bancroft, i. 279. A NEW ENGLAND EMERGES PROM THE OLD. 89 In 1583, Whitgift was in power, and there was no further pretence of toleration. The forbearing disposition of Puritan ism was also wearing out Those who wished only to reforrii the Church of England, not to raise a new sect, could no longer restrain the more ardent of their number ; and " sepa ratists" began to talk and act defiantly. What if two men were hung for distributing Brown's " Tract on the Liberty of Prophesying " ? " Independents " were fast rising above the fear of death. The spirits who dared dissent were be coming very numerous : twenty thousand soon appeared at the conventicles; and nothing but utter extermination would put an end to this revolt from the usurpations of a State religion. The weak, perfidious James would finally undertake to do this. At first, the Puritans were misled by his bland and flattering airs, his protestations of faith in the purity of their principles and lives ; and began to trust him : but it was a false confidence. He was too imbecile and licentious to be honest " The conference at Hampton Court," granted to the nonconformists with a show of fairness, brought out his true character. Foiled in his reliance upon argument, he soon dispensed with it, and substituted despotic authority in its place. "I will have none of that liberty as to ceremonies," said he : " I will have one doctrine, one discipline, one religion in substance and in ceremony. Never speak more to that point how far you are bound to obey." " I will raake them conform, or I will harry them out of the land ; or else, worse, only hang them : that's all." " If any would not be quiet, and show their obedience, they were worthy to be hanged." Archbishop Whitgift was " the power behind the throne," and he was pleased. He had said before the conference, " I have not been greatly quiet in mind, the vipers are so many;" but the king's idea of "hanging" was wonderfully satisfac tory. "Your Majesty speaks by the special assistance of God's Spirit," said he. Bishop Bancroft, on his knees, ex- 12 QQ THE GREAT REPUBLIC. claimed that his heart melted for joy « because God had given England such a king, as, since Christ's time, has not been." ' But how grievously mistaken were these representatives of persecuting, blasphemous bigotry ! As though the thrust of a sword could kiH a thought, or the axe of an executioner could slaughter a principle ! The struggles of « dissent " from ceremonial worship es tablished by law had at length reached the result thus ad mirably summed up by Mr. Hildreth : " As the other tra ditions of the Church fell more and more into contempt, the entire reverence of the people was concentrated upon the Bible, recently made accessible in an English version, and read with eagerness, not as a mere form of words to be sol emnly and ceremoniously gone through with, but as an in spired revelation, as indisputable authority in science, politics, morals, and life. It began, indeed, to be judged necessary by the more ardent and sincere, that all existing institutions in Church and State, all social relations, and the habits of every day life, should be reconstructed, and made to conform to this divine model. Those who entertained these sentiments increased to a considerable party, composed chiefly, indeed, of the humble classes, yeomen, traders, and mechanics, but including also clergymen, merchants, landed proprietors, and even some of the nobility. They were derided, by those not inclined to go with them, as Puritans [an honorable evi dence of their elevated standard of purity in heart and life] : but the austerity of their lives and doctrines, and their con fident claim to internal assurance of a second birth and special election as the children of God, made a powerful im pression on the multitude ; while the high schemes they en tertained for the reconstruction of society brought them into sympathy with all that was great and heroic in the nation." * In 1604, parliament showed an astonishing increase of Pu ritan strength. The advocates of freedom in religion were a majority in the commons; andthe boldness with which * Hildreth, i. 153, 154. A NEW ENGLAND EMERGES FROM THE OLD. 91 they defended their views showed that ruthless oppression had failed, and the contest must go on. " The interests of human freedom were at issue on the contest." THE PURITANS BECOME PILGRIMS IN SEARCH OF LIBERTY. The light of the Eeformation would now, as ever hereafter, be the guide of freedom. Luther had said, " The gospel is every man's right, and it is not to be endured that any one should be kept therefrom. But the evangel is an open doc trine : it is bound to no place, and moves along freely under heaven, like the star which ran in the sky to show the wiz ards from the East where Christ was born. Do not dispute with the prince for place. Let the community choose their own pastor, and support him out of their own estates. If the prince will not suffer this, let the pastor flee into another land, 'and let those go with hira who will, as Christ teaches.' " These words are great, and, in the main, wise, as the promptings of inspiration ; and they predict the plans of Providence for the emancipation of conscience, and the ex tension of religious and civil freedom in the New World. We have thus fully identified the spirit andthe movement out of which the colonization of New England and the lib erties of our country arose. We must now leave the great mass of the Puritans to struggle with the usurpations of prelacy and the divine right of kings ; to battle their way up to the great Eevolution ; to reveal their high> virtues amid bloody persecutions and unjust inflictions of power, — intend ed only to be " a terror to evil-doers and a praise to them that do well," — until the head of the royal oppressor rolls in the dust ; then to reveal their energy and their follies amid the prosperity of the Protectorate ; and again to suffer under the reigns of profligacy and bigotry after the Eestoration. sometimes stealing away alone to pray, and daring even death itself to meet in " conventicles," and hsten to the gos pel from the lips of men who would peril their lives for 92 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. " the liberty of prophesying ; " then scattered abroad like the primitive saints after the stoning of Stephen, holding up the cross amid foreign people, and caUing wandering strangers to the fountain of God's blessed word ; and finaUy becoming a diffused element of freedom, a leaven of godliness amid the nations, and especially the English, to appear in power and glory after many days. We must step back a few years to the later period of Elizabeth's reign, where, in the north of England, we shall find a small company, " a poor people," who " became en- -lightened by the word of God," " presently both scoffed and scorned by the profane multitude, and their ministers urged with the yoke of subscription ; " led by suffering " to see that the beggarly ceremonies were monuments of idolatry," and that the lordly power of the prelates ought not to be submitted to. Many of them, " whose hearts the Lord had touched with heavenly zeal for his truth," resolved, " what ever it raight cost thera, to shake off the anti-Christian bond age, and, as the Lord's free people, to join themselves by a covenant into a church estate in fellowship of the gospel." " Of the same faith with Calvin, heedless of acts of parlia ment, they rejected ' the offices and callings, the courts and canons,' of bishops, and, renouncing all obedience to human authority in spiritual things, asserted for themselves an un limited and never-ending right to make advances in truth, and ' walk in all the ways which God had made known or should make known to thera.' " * John Eobinson, " a man not easily to be paraheled," was the pastor of this despised and persecuted primitive flock. Probably through the agency of William Brewster, their attention was directed to HoUand, " where, they heard, was freedom of rehgion for aU men." They loved their home ; but they would leave it, and live anywhere, only so that they could have liberty to pray and prophesy according to the dictates of conscience. * Bancroft, i. 299-301. A NEW ENGLAND EMERGES FROM THE OLD. 93 In 1608, after a costly failure the year before, the men had moved out to their ship ; but the vigilance of the gov ernment, which made it a crime to flee from persecution, detected them. "A company of horsemen appeared in pur suit, and seized on the helpless women and children who had not yet adventured on the surf Pitiful it was to see the heavy care of these poor women in distress : what weeping and crying on every side ! " At last the magistrates, seeing no way to punish them for devotion to their husbands and fathers, " glad to be rid of them on any terms," suffered them to depart, " though, in the mean time, they, poor souls ! en dured misery enough." Eobinson, Brewster, and their little church, were now on the water; and henceforth they were " pilgrims." They were shortly in Amsterdam, but had no assurance that this was their home. " They knew that they were pilgrims, and looked not much on those things, but lifted up their eyes to heaven, their dearest country, and quieted their spirits." In 1609, they were in Leyden, when " they saw poverty coming on them like an armed man." However, " careful to keep their word, and painful and diligent in their callings," they soon reached " a comfortable condition, grew in the gifts and grace of the Spirit of God, and lived together in peace and love and holiness." " Never," the magistrates said, "' did we have any suit or accusation against any of them." Noble testimony ! Now the hope of prosperity dawned upon thera. " Many came there from different parts of England, so as they grew a great congregation." They seemed to approach near to " the primitive pattern of the first churches," " such was the humble zeal and fervent love of this people towards God and his ways, and their single-heartedness and sincere affec tion one towards another." * But they were not to remain here. God would make use of the bitter hatred of James, reaching to the Continent, and of the shyness of their brother Puritans, and of poverty * Bancroft, i. 303. 94 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. and crushing toU, to stir them up to seek a permanent set tlement in the New World. Even " their chUdren, sharing their parents' burdens, bowed under the weight, and were becoming decrepit in early youth." God would thrust them out, but not under the patronage of Holland. Englishraen were to found the great governing colonies of the New World. Persecuted, and exiled from their native land, the " Pilgrims " were yet loyal English patriots, and would seek reconciliation with their govern ment, so as to go out in search of a new province for James, their bitter persecutor. ' John Carver and Eobert Cushman made the attempt, in the name ofthe Church of the Pilgrims, in 1617. They took over "the Seven Articles;" proposed to have "liberty to settle in the most northern parts of Virginia," " to live in a distinct body by themselves." They would consent to the Thirty-nine Articles, of course with their own Calvinistic interpretation; and " towards the king, and all civil authority derived from him, including bishops, whose civil authority they alone rec ognized, they promised, as they would have done to Nero or the Eoman pontiff, ' obedience in all things, — active if the thing commanded be not against God's word, or passive if it be' " The Virginia Company and the London Company thought favorably of so good a prospect of adding new resources to their colonies by such accessions of industry and persistent energy as these men represented ; but they must refer the matter to higher authority. The great Lord Bacon was to be consulted before their petition could be granted by " the king, for liberty of religion, to be confirmed under the king's broad seal." Bacon was an active patron of the colonists everywhere, and, from the necessities of phUosophy, inchned to free toleration. This, however, was theory merely. Prac tically he was "a crown courtier and an intolerant statesman." He therefore answered, " Discipline by bishops is fittest for monarchy of all others. The tenets of separatists and sec- A NEW ENGLAND EMERGES FROM THE OLD. 95 taries are full of schism, and inconsistent with monarchy. The king will beware of Anabaptists, Brownists, and others of their kinds : a little connivancy sets them on fire. For the discipline of the Church in colonies, it will be necessary that it agree with that which is settled in England, else it will make a schism and a rent in Christ's coat, which must be seamless ; and, to that purpose, it will be fit, that by the king's supreme power in causes ecclesiastical, within all his dominions, they be subordinate under some bishop and bish opric of this realm. This caution is to be observed, that if any transplant themselves into plantations abroad who are known schismatics, outlaws, or criminal persons, they be sent for back upon the first notice." Let the reader mark, that Providence did by no means in tend to release his people from the strengthening power of severe discipline. He therefore, in this crisis of their strug gles for self-emancipation, brought them into direct collision with the most stringent and vicious forms of oppressive bigot ry. Still they were to be allowed to go. James, the Pharaoh of his country and times, must think the enlargement of his dominions " a good, an honest motive ; and fishing was an honest trade, the apostles' own calling." He would refer the matter to the prelates of Canterbury and London, and go on with his persecutions against the Puritans of Lancashire. In the mean time, a "promise of neglect" was all the anxious PUgrims could obtain, and aU the plans of God would aUow. Discipline cleared up their vision, and they reasoned well. "If there should afterwards be a purpose to wrong us, though we had a seal as broad as the house-floor, there would be means enough found to recaU or reverse it We must rest herein on God's providence." Thus they were brought to the most perfect renunciation of dependence upon man, and to the simplest forms of trust in God. They were, however, to be reached by another temptation. The want of means turned even the iron-wUled Eobinson to the Dutch ; but this unwise expedient was overnUed. 96 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. At last, in 1619, "the Virginia Company" '' in open court demanded our ends of going ; which being related, they said the thing was of God, and granted a large patent" Eesolved now not "to meddle with the Dutch, or to de pend too much on the Virginia Company," relying upon God and their own endeavors, they made ready to depart Only a part of the community could embark at a time in " The SpeedweU " and " The Mayflower : " so the pastor re mained with those who were to be left behind, and Brewster went forward with " such of the youngest and strongest as freely offered themselves." God must be solemnly recognized in fasting and prayer. " Let us seek of God a right way for us and for our httle ones, and for all our substance." Eead now the lofty breath ings of liberty from the consecrated soul of Eobinson, in his farewell address : — " I charge you, before God and his blessed angels, that you follow me no farther than you have seen me follow the Lord Jesus Christ The Lord has more truth yet to break forth out of his Holy Word. I cannot sufficiently bewail the con dition of the reformed churches, who are come to a period in religion, and will go at present no farther than the in struments of their reformation. Luther and Calvin were great and shining lights in their times ; yet they penetrated not into the whole counsel of God. I beseech you re member it, — 'tis an article of your church covenant, — that you be ready to receive whatever truth shall be made known to you from the written word of God." These far- reaching instructions may well be deemed equivalent to the suggestions of inspirations. One scene more before the departure. " When the ship was ready to carry us away," writes Edward Winslow, " the brethren that staid at Leyden again solemnly sought the Lord with us and for us ; feasted us that were to go at our pastor's house, being large; where we refreshed ourselves, after tears, with singing of psalms, making joyful melody A NEW ENGLAND EJIERGES FROM THE OLD. 97 in our hearts as well as with the voice, there being many of the congregation very expert in music : and, indeed, it was the sweetest melody that ever mine ears heard. After this, they accompanied us to Delfthaven, where we went to embark, and there feasted us again ; and after prayer per formed by our pastor, when a flood of tears was poured out, they accompanied us to the ship, but were not able to speak one to another for the abundance of sorrow to part. But we only, going aboard, gave them a volley of small-shot and three pieces of ordnance ; and so, lifting up our hands to each other and our hearts for each other to the Lord our God, we departed." It would seem very strange that any sifting or reduction of this small force for the founding of free institutions in the New World should be required or even aUowed. But God sees not as man sees. He who, for an important mili tary undertaking, reduced the array of Gideon, made choice of one of the two vessels chartered to bear the Pilgrims to America. " The Speedwell," unseaworthy, could return to England, "and those who are wiUing return to London, though this was very grievous and discouraging;" whUe " The Mayflower, " freighted with " one hundred and two souls," could move on to her providential destination. " On the sixth day of September, 1620, thirteen years after the first colonization of Virginia, two months before the conces sion of the grand charter of Plymouth, without any warrant from the .sovereign of England, without any useful charter from a corporate body, the passengers in ' The Mayflower ' set saU for a new world, where the past could offer no favor able auguries." * They propose to make the mouth of the Hudson; but, under the guidance of Providence, they are sailing toward " the rock-bound coast," named years before, by the gaUant Capt. John Smith, New England. See that frail « pUgriin craft afloat upon the waste of wa ters " ! WiU not she go down amid the surges of ocean as * Bancroft, i. 308. 13 98 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. she « leaps madly from billow to bUlow " ? No : these are the chosen of God. No surges of ocean can overwhelm them, frora which they wiU not emerge ; no weapon formed against them can prevaU. In the land of oppression, they had sighed for liberty. They had tasted its sweets, and seen its golden light, untU at length, as God ordained, in comparison with it, property and home and friends lest their power to charm ; and they would go to a wUd and savage land in pursuit of one object alone, — "freedom to worship God." There was no danger to "The Mayflower." She was "the ark of a deluged world." She would bear proudly and gallantly her precious burden to her predestined haven. " The model Ee public was in ' The Mayflower.' " THE PILGRIMS HAVE FOUND LIBERTY. The ocean was very boisterous, and the voyage one of ex treme perU ; but, after sixty-five days of sailing and praying, " The Mayflower " rounded the hook of Cape Cod, and cast anchor in a quiet harbor. The landing, however, raust not be raade until they had determined the fundamental form of their government ; and thus they wrote and covenanted : — " In the name of God, amen. We whose names are under written, the loyal subjects of our dread sovereign. King James, having undertaken, for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith, and honor of our king and country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the northern parts of Vir ginia, do, by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one of another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic, for our better ordering and preservation, and furtherance of the ends afore said ; and, by virtue hereof, to enact, constitute, and frame such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most conve nient for the general good of the colony. Unto which we promise all due submission and obedience." A NEW ENGLAND EMERGES FROM THB OLD. 99 How admirably clear and concise is this great document! Never were more important words written by uninspired men. They were no rebels against the crown of England ; and hence they declare their loyalty to Jaraes, their lawful sovereign according to apostolic order. But they formed "a civil body pohtic," and thus asserted the right to self- government Who had a right to forbid them ? They had suffered every thing but death, sacrificed all the endearments of home, become pUgrims on earth, all to be free ; and they would be free, they were free : and as if all unconscious of the nobleness of soul which gave formal utterance to these exalted principles, and regardless of the fearful struggles it would cost to maintain them, they resolved to act as law makers and civil rulers, simply and only "for the general good of the colony." But it should be henceforth impossible to misunderstand them. They were not a company of mercenary adven turers. Their personal convenience and worldly interests were all subordinate to a lofty Christian purpose, which men purely selfish would find it impossible to comprehend. They had undertaken this whole daring enterprise " for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith." This is the highest conception of man on earth, the loftiest moral grandeur within the range of human thought and expres sion ; and, despite all the frailties and errors inevitably hu man appearing in their future, history nobly vindicates the sincerity and practical effectiveness of this high resolve. The record and the deeds are immortal. And let it not be forgotten that this was clear, unquestion able advance in the assertion of human rights. In the Pil grims, the race had stepped forward of its boldest ventures in the direction of civil liberty. There had been republics before ; high claims had been set up for the rights of man in the Old World and the New, and death-struggles had been risked to vindicate them: but "this was the birth of popular constitutional liberty." * * Bancroft, i. 310. 100 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Well indeed it was that an attempt so bold, and defiant of precedents and power, an achievement so improbable, should be undertaken " in the name of God ; " that a covenant so holy, and bearing in its bosom the fate of uncounted mil lions, should be made " in the presence of God," and avowed ly and sincerely " for the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian faith." In this alone there was hope of success ; and we shall see, as we advance, that our Pilgrim Fathers had thus identified and recognized the essential life- force of the great American system, — the vital active sov ereignty of God. Well, therefore, did President Stiles say, in 1783, "It js certain that civil dominion was but. the second motive, religion the primary one, with our ances tors, in coming hither, and settling this land. It was not so much their design to establish religion for the benefit of the State, as civil government for the benefit of religion, and as subservient, and even necessary, to the peaceable enjoyment and unmolested exercise of religion, — of that religion for which they fled to these ends of the earth." CHAPTEE VIH. COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. " Soon jifter the Reformation, a few people came over for conscience' sake. This apparently trivial incident may transfer the great seat of empire into America." — John Adams. Our Christian emigrants land on Cape Cod, just in the rear of our present beautiful Provincetown ; but they touch the land only to thank God, and begin the work of exploration for the site of their town. Their home is yet in " The May flower." It was chilly November. " It snowed, and did blow all the day and night, and froze withal." They must be in haste to prepare for their shivering families a cover from the storms of vsdnter. Standish and Bradford could not wait sixteen days for repairing the shallop. Eegardless of perils from the Indians, they pushed out by land, but found no place for a settlement The shallop was now qut coasting for some fair haven and for the land of promise ; but those who landed to search "were tired marching up and down the steep hills and deep valleys, which lay half a foot thick with snow." Thanks to Providence, the Indians had buried a little corn there for this dreadful time of need. Brave men continue the search. The war-whoop and death-arrows salute them as they rise from their morning prayers. "The Mayflower " moves along the coast, and seems about to wreck amid a storm of dreadful fury ; but Gpd moves a saUor to cry out to her frightened pilot, "About with her, or we are cast away ! " " About " she turns, skims over the surf, and is safe. Noble men are on the land ; demands are urgent : but they wiU by no means break the holy sabbath. On Monday they 101 102 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. are in " The Mayflower," and she moves cautiously. At length, on the " eleventh day of December, old style, the exploring party of the forefathers land " on the rock henceforth to be sacred in history as the place on which New-England freedom first firraly set her foot and began her mighty work. THE MEN AND THE TIME. Such men as our Pilgrim sires would not have been the world's choice for the founding of a new empire, at least not with the unpropitious events which crowded around Plym outh Eock. But what wisdom and foresight could have been more evidently infinite ? The Pilgrims were a hardy race, a firm, enduring stock. Trained to self-reliance under the direct guidance of Providence, baptized in the sea of suffering, they had the certain combinations of vast and irresistible power. Purer, nobler blood never flowed in An glo-Saxon veins. Eeligion was their element, their grand controlling power. They must worship. The triune Jehovah had revealed himself to them, and they were divinely raoved to adore him in spirit and in truth, in public and in private ; and when, in the land of their birth, they found they could not, they fled as from the plague, ready to go to the ends of the earth for the privUege of hearing the pure gospel preached, and offering up fervent prayers without the pres ence of a domineering, execrable censorship. They threw open the Holy Bible, and bade their sons and their daughters look in and see heaven's own light with their own eyes, before they were tempted to believe that only a dismal night of scepticism and woe was reserved for this guilty state. What could be more evident than the movement of a God among the suffering ones of the Old World, in stirring the spirit of enterprise, pouring dauntless courage into their throbbing bosoms, selecting the choicest among them, imbuing them with the spirit of a new social system, and COLONISATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. 103 guiding them to the chosen land ? What but Divinity could have produced such recognitions of his sovereign authority, the acceptance of a mission so mysterious and so difficult, and the high resolves and sustained energy mani fest in every step of their wonderful career? They were here at length to toU, to battle, to pray, and at length to die, but not until they had sent their heroic blood coursing down through the veins of future generations to the end of tirae. Here they would bravely enact the pledges of their farewell address on the strand of Delfthaven on the morning of their embarkation. " We are actuated," they said, " by the hope of laying some foundation, or making way for the propagation of the kingdora of Christ to the re mote ends of the earth, though we shall be but the stepping- stones to others." "Laying sorae foundation." Yes; and what a foundation they laid ! The lapse of ages will but suffice to show its amazing solidity and breadth. " The king dom of Christ" How sublimely their ideas of government and the destiny of man rose above the grovelling concep tions of avarice and ambition ! " The propagation of the kingdom of Christ to the remote ends of the earth." Did ever a feeble colony venture upon the heaving bosom of the ocean, to plant themselves upon a foreign shore amid wild and mercUess savages, for such an object as this? The truth is, the whole movement was, in all its grand features, super human, a clear demonstration of a reigning Divinity in the affairs of men. The period of this colonization was timely. Had it been " immediately on the discovery of the American continent, the old English institutions would have been planted un der the powerful influence of the Eoman-Catholic religion ; had the settlement been made under Elizabeth, it would have been before activity of the popular mind in religion had con ducted to- a corresponding activity in politics ; " * had it been before the orders for conformity and the bitter perse cutions for attempts to exercise the rights of conscience, * Bancro''t, i. 308. 104 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. New England might have been settled, like Virginia, by the advocates of prelacy and the divine right of kings. The deadly incubus of caste, and of aristocratic exemptions frora labor, and the expenses of government, would have borne down New England to the level of the old civilization. But the omniscient God had all these contingencies before him, and controlled the events which were likely to interfere with the certainty and high moral purposes of his general plan. Hence it was not courtiers nor nobles, not the scions of worn- out pretending families, but hard-handed, brave-souled, prac tical men, who were to colonize New England ; and, at the right time. Providence sent them out on their great mission. PLYMOUTH COLONY. Who can describe the gratitude and joy of these wander ing pilgrims ? True, they were shivering with cold ; they were surrounded by savages whose hostility they must dread even when they seemed to be friendly. Fierce hunger gnawed at their vitals, and gaunt famine stared them in the face ; but their Christian heroism endured the trial. They knelt as they stepped upon the rock, and poured out their souls in prayer to Hira whose glory they sought ; and he heard and answered. They proceeded at once to buUd a town ; and what should they caU it ? On the map made by Capt Smith, the harbor had been caUed "Plymouth." They had finally saUed from Plymouth in dear Old England. It was providential : they were in Plymouth again in New England ; and Plymouth it should be. Now God appeared in charge of this vast but unimposing interest He moved the savages to say, " Welcome, English men ! " or, when they would not listen to moderate counsel, he would permit the redoubtable Standish to scatter them as chaff before the wind. He would give the emigrants Indian corn and fish and game enough to keep the colony COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. 105 from extinction by starvation, and yet he would drive them by hunger and want to the cultivation of the soil. They had commenced to exercise the rights of freemen ; but would this be tolerated ? Would the crown be satisfied with assurances of loyalty in every thing not in conflict with the word of God, and grant them civil and religious freedom? It was at least very improbable. At the end of a year, thirty-five additional colonists arrived ; and Cushman was with them. He brought a patent for the Pilgrims from the Council for New England. This made Massachusetts distinct from Virginia. They could not be identical. Their settlements were too remote ; and they were to represent rival, and in some respects antagonist ideas of man and liberty. They raust demonstrate their theories, and try the strength of their opposing principles, quite apart from each other, before the great facts of their unity could become evident and practical. Cushman would make but a brief stay ; lecture the peo ple severely " on the sin and danger of self-love ; " gather his cargo of " furs, sassafras, clapboards, and wainscots," worth about twenty-four hundred dollars; and hasten back to report to "the merchant adventurers" the prcspects of their invest ments in money and Puritan industry for seven years. He would also become "a confidential agent" of the Plymouth Colony in London. We can but wish he had brought over a supply of provisions in " The Fortune," as the colonists were near to starving ; and that he had succeeded in securing a charter of liberty from the government : but they must do without this charter untU they have fuU opportunity to strengthen their self-rehance, and battle energetically with conservative repression at home. LIBERTY REVEALS HER FORM AND STRENGTH. How much we wish that good John Eobinson could come from Leyden with the company left behind, when the Pil- 106 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. grims saU from Delfthaven ! He would be a power in the struo-o-les with the crown. But he never came. By the cruel plottings of " the adventurers in England," he was re fused a passage ; and the Church of the PUgrims must be denied the privilege of hearing the voice and receiving the care of their own beloved pastor, that bigoted Churchmen might force upon them the yoke of a State religion and the services of a dreaded ritual. This, as it was fit, would be one of the first issues with the despotism from which they had fled. " The character of the Church had for many years been fixed by a sacred covenant. As the Pilgrims landed, their institutions were already perfected. Democratic liberty and independent Christian worship at once existed in Amer ica." * This principle they could therefore by no means give up. " For the first eight years, there was no pastor '' but Eobinson in Holland. " Lyford, sent out by the London part ners," makes the attempt to bring them under the control of Church authority ; but he is rejected, and expelled from the colony. They prefer to worship in their own simple way, and wait the action of Providence to give them a pas tor after their own hearts. The fort they had erected for defence against the Indians became their house of worship, as near to heaven and acceptable to God as any gorgeous cathedral in England. " Brewster, the ruling elder, and such private members as had the gift of prophecy, officiated as exhorters. On Sunday afternoons, a question was propound ed, to which all spoke who had any thing to say." f So the Pilgrims stand firm, and refuse yet to come under the bond age of ceremonies. I suppose the Yankees have the irrev erence to smUe, even at this day, when they read, that, in 1623, Eobert Gorges, the son of Sir Ferdinand, "' appointed lieutenant-general of New England, with power ' to restrain interlopers ' not less than to regulate the affairs of the corpo ration," brought with him one " Morrill, an Episcopal clergy man, who was provided with a commission for the supeSn- * Bancroft, i. 313. f Hildreth, i. 175. COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. 107 tendence of ecclesiastical affairs. Instead of establishing a hierarchy, MorrUl, remaining in New England about a year, wrote a description of the country in verse ; whUe the civil dignity of Eobert Gorges ended in a short-lived dispute with Weston. They came to plant a hierarchy and a general government, and they produced only a fruitless quarrel and a dull poem." * " The grand charter of Plymouth " neither advanced nor impeded New England in matters of civil libertj^ Neither their independence nor thrift waited for charter rights. Go ing on with their characteristic plan of managing for them selves, they bought out the " English adventurers," whose capital had furnished the means for beginning their colony. Submitting to a monopoly from eight of their own number for six years, they began to assert the rig'nts of property in their own labor, and work their way up to business independ ence. And all this was done in the name of rehgion, and in firra dependence upon Alraighty God. His guidance was humbly invoked upon every occasion, and the promotion of his glory avowed as the grand motive of all their resistance to tyranny, and vigorous efforts to constitute a governraent upon the basis of justice. To divest the history of Massa chusetts of its divine element would be to utterly destroy it COLONIES INCREASE. Plymouth wUl soon be the centre of a neighborhood of colonies. Englishmen were rapidly coming to the apprehen sion that a splendid empire would sorae day arise in America. A lucrative trade seemed to be easily within reach, and they promptly grasped for advantages which might soon be be yond reach. An early attempt at a settlement near Weymouth had resulted disastrously. This was now renewed. But the most * Bancroft, i. 326. 108 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. important demonstration began in 1624, near Cape Ann. It was meant to be a profitable business enterprise; but it received a higher impulse from " White, a minister of Dor chester, a Puritan, but not a Separatist Eoger Conant, having already left New Plymouth for Nantasket," became the ag;ent and the hero of this adventure. The merchants, O ' discouraged by the want of profits, settled honorably with those they had employed, and gave up " the unprofitable scherae ; " but Conant, " inspired as it were by sorae supe rior instinct," united with White and a few others, deterrained to persist in the endeavor to establish a colony ; " and, mak ing choice of Salem as opening a convenient place of refuge for the exiles for religion, they resolved to remain as sen tinels of Puritanism on the Bay of Massachusetts." In 1628, four years later, a more formidable combination of Puritan strength and enterprise appears in England for the religious colonization of New England. " The constraints of the English laws, and the severities of the English hie- rarch}^," threw the advocates of freedom more fully than ever upon the care of Providence. Great names, and men full of business energy and religious zeal, are found in the organi zation which followed. They wished " a* charter from the crown," obtained the friendship of the Earl of Warwick and Sir Ferdinando Gorges, and secured from the Council of Plymouth for New England " a large district on the Charles Eiver." " Endicott, who, ' ever since the Lord in mercy had revealed himself unto him,' had maintained the straitest judgment against the outward form of God's worship as prescribed by Enghsh statutes ; a man of dauntless courage, and that cheerfulness which accompanies courage ; benevo lent, though austere ; firm, though choleric ; of a rugged nature, which his stern principles of nonconformity had not served to mellow, — was selected as a ' fit instrument to begin the wilderness-work.' " With " his wife and famUy, the hos tages of his irrevocable attachment to the New World," he arrived in September. His party, with those he found there. COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS., 109 numbered some fifty or sixty ; and with these he " founded the oldest town in the colony, soon to be called Salem," and with eagle eye began to move about the future " hub of the universe." " Thomas Walford, a blacksmith," was now at Charles town ; " William Blackstone, an Episcopal clergyman," was on the opposite peninsula ; " Samuel Maverick, son of a pious nonconformist minister," but " himself a prelatist," was on " the island now known as East Boston ; " and " strag glers " were " at Nantasket and farther south." A small be ginning, one would say, for the elegant commercial city of Boston, " the Athens of America," only a little more than two hundred years ago. Let us hope that " the unruly com pany in what is now Quiney " profited by the faithfulness of our Puritan governor, who " visited them in person," and " rebuked them for their profane revels, and raonished them to look there should be better walking." We now come to an epoch of great importance in the history of America. A new monarch had ascended the throne of England. Urged by "the time-serving courtier, Lord Dorchester," and prompted by fear of the Dutch, who " were already trading in the Connecticut Eiver," and the French, who " claimed New England as within the limits of New' France," and discouraged by the repeated failures of " the prelatical party," and finally moved by " an offer of ' Boston men ' that promised good to the plantation," on the 4th of March, 1629, " a few days only before Charles I., in a public State paper, avowed his purpose of reigning without a parliament, the broad seal of England was put to the letters-patent for Massachusetts." " The charter, which was cherished for more than half a century as the most precious boon, constituted a body politic by the name of the Governor and Company of the Massa chusetts Bay in New England." The " governor, deputy, and eighteen assistants," were to be " elected annually by the freemen or members of the corporation." This was a most 110 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. important concession, made by a despotic sovereign. Provi dence directed the profligate Charles II. to record the judg ment, that " the principle and foundation of the charter of Massachusetts was the freedom of liberty of conscience ; " and would see that the privUeges it conferred should be passed over unimpaired to the struggling Puritans of New Eno-land. The advocates of prelacy and civil despotism would not emigrate in large numbers to the land of trials and fanatical reformers ; but swarms of praying PUgrims would come hither, and be sure to construe every word of the charter, and the very neglects of the king, in favor of their own asserted rights. This alone was necessary to found successfully the great free State of Massachusetts. With this charter came a goodly company of emigrants, and just in time to revive the drooping spirits of the rem nants of former colonists settled in and about Salem. Charlestown received a portion of the new population, and a town was laid out " about the hill." Higginson, the ordained teacher of Salem, availed himself of the press to rouse atten tion in England to the claims of this new country, and was successful. " The concessions of the Massachusetts charter seemed to the Puritans like a summons from heaven, inviting them to America ; " and on they came. The 28th of Jxdy, 1029, marks another grand transition period in the history of freedom in America. On this day, " Matthew Cradock, governor of the company," proposed "the transfer of the government of the plantation to those that should inhabit there;" and this would bring "persons of worth and quality" to the New World. "Wealthy com moners, zealous Puritans, were confirmed in the desire , of founding a new and a better commonwealth beyond the At lantic, even though it might involve the sale of their heredi tary estates, and hazard the inheritance of their chUdren." Now the noble Winthrop appears with his eleven associ ates, who " bound themselves in the presence of God, by the word of a Christian, that if, before the end of September, COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. HI an order of the court should legally transfer the whole government, together with the patent, they would them selves pass the seas to inhabit and continue in New Eng land." Singularly enough, " two days after this covenant had been executed, a general consent appeared, by the erection of hands, that the government and patent should ^be settled in New England." Henceforth the officers of the colony would reside in the midst of the people. The new emigration set forward ; and, " during the season of 1630, seventeen vessels brought over not far from a thou sand souls, beside horses, kine, goats, and all that was most necessary for planting, fishing, and ship-buUding." John Winthrop was elected governor, and he Avas a raan of rare excellences. MUd, loving, and firra, he was well adapted to overcome the discontents of his comrades. A royalist and conformist at home, he, nevertheless, had a strong desire for "gospel purity," and the highest forras of liberty under the British Governraent. He would be an heroic representative of the transition period from the Eef ormation to Eepublicanism, an inflexible defender of order and progressive freedom. Salem did not suit Winthrop as the head of the colony. Looking for a better place, on the 17th of June, 1630, he sailed into Boston Harbor ; and, as the result of the exami nation, headquarters were soon removed to Charlestown ; and' Boston, with its populous environs, soon begins its career of greatness and wealth as the comraercial and civil metropolis of a great State. It is not necessary to trace farther the growth of colonies in Massachusetts. We have advanced far enough to obtain a clear and comprehensive view of the vital principles which constructed and developed the civil and religious institutions of the Commonwealth. Let us now observe a little more minutely the application and Umitations of these principles. 112 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. CHRISTIANITY AND FREEDOM IN MASSACHUSETTS. We have seen with what a profound sense of responsibility to God the Puritans renounced their homes in England, and became pilgrims in quest of liberty. It is not now, how ever, their acknowledgment of God merely that requires our attention. The argument is deeper. The question is. What power was alone sufficient to produce the phenomena which have passed before us ? In examining the history of dis coveries in America, and con.sidering the colonization of Vir ginia and the minor raerabers of the Southern group, we have found that restless vagrancy and ambitious avarice could produce daring adventure, and heroic efforts to found despotic institutions. We have seen also the struggles of a purer vitalizing force in the midst of these dominant im pulses, gradually forcing its way to position as the true and rightful forming power of nations. In the raoveraent now under consideration, the representa tive colonists are stripped of all State patronage, and are exiles first in a land of civilization, and then in a land of sav ages. Siraple subsistence would seem to be enough to tax their highest energies. If comfort and abundance should be achieved, it must, one would say, be the result of an entire devotion to worldly pursuits. But they make a mere inci dent of worldly pursuits. Their grand absorbing object is the worship and glory of God. They see that freedom of conscience for themselves is indispensable to this result A clearer light shines deep down into their souls, and far out into the world and the future, and reveals liberty from thral dom of sin, from oppressions of governments civU and eccle siastical, as the inherent, inahenable right of all good men. Whence but from heaven could this light come ? The world, in its highest efforts of reason, has refused to supply it The light from God is clear and searching and steady. Coming from this source, how evidently would it be adequate to reveal the spirit and designs of human freedom as deter- COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. 113 mined in the original creation of mind, and to show the enormous crime of usurpation which denies, and attempts to crush, these inborn rights ! In the same way must we account for that firm adherence to right amidst the storms of persecution and the trials of colonization which the history of the Pilgrims reveals. What need had they to go to Amsterdam or Leyden or Plymouth ? They had nothing to do but " conform " to the wicked exactions of despotic power, and go on and prosper like other subjects of the British crown. But the souls of the martyrs were in them. Suffering and right were to them infinitely preferable to royal favor and a dishonored con science. And how came it so ? No worldly power, no selfish philosophy, ever gave them or others this lofty heroism while they floated with the mass of unquestioning sycophants in the wake of power. Admitting, however, that the plans of God for the emancipation of thought and conscience had matured ; that he had opened a virgin hemisphere for the planting and growth of a higher, purer civilization; and that he himself would undertake, by the discipline of suffer ing and inward regeneration, to provide the men for the movement which would illustrate these grand designs : what could have been more appropriate than the strange power of endurance and enterprise for the vindication of liberty which we have seen in these Puritan Pilgrims ? Just as evidently would the active agency of God in the souls of the colonists connect inseparably the rights of conscience and civU hberty. It is, however, in exact con formity with this theory of the providential colonization of New England, that the conflict should show our Puritan sires constantly engaged in the spirit of earnest prayer; that, when they formed the basis of constitutional governraent in "The Mayflower," they should do everything in the narae of God, and in solemn dependence upon his wisdom and grace ; that aU attempts to coerce them should utterly faU, serving only to render more iUustrious their supreme devotion to 114 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. exalted principle. It is thus easy to explain the undeniable fact that they stepped boldly forward of their nation and age in announcing new powers of humanity, and demonstrat ing the capability of man for a higher range of honor and glory on earth than had ever before been deemed possible. This is God in history, God in America. The illustrations of these positions, and especially of the inseparable identity of the rule of God and the develop ment of the higher forms of liberty in the minds of the Puritans, are so numerous and striking, that selections are difficult " To the European world, the few tenants of the huts and cabins of Salem were too insignificant to merit notice. To themselves, they were chosen emissaries of God ; outcasts frora England, yet favorites with Heaven ; destitute of se curity, of convenient food, and of shelter, and yet blessed as instruments selected to light in the wilderness the beacon of pure religion. The emigrants were not so much a body pol itic as a church in the wilderness, seeking, under a visible covenant, to have fellowship with God, as a family of adopt ed sons." " The New World shared in the providence of God : it had claims, therefore, to the benevolence and exertions of man. What nobler work than to abandon the comforts of Eno-land, and plant a church without a blemish, where it might spread over a continent ? " " The Ul success of other plantations could not chiU the rising enthusiasm. Former enterprises had aimed at profit : the present object was purity of reUgion. The earher settle ments had been filled with a lawless multitude : it was now proposed to form a " peculiar government," and to colonize THE BEST." When officers were to be elected at a very full General Court, " it was resolved that the business should be proceeded on with its first intention, which was chiefly the glory of God ; and to that purpose its meetings were sanctified by COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. Hg the prayers and guided by the advice of two faithful min isters in London." * xind there were faithful ministers with the colonies. The liberal Samuel Skelton, and " the able, fiiithful, and grave Francis Higgins," — the one elected pastor, and. the other teacher, in Salem, — took care that the people should not perish lor lack of knowledge. "The enjoyment of the gospel as the dearest covenant that can be made between God and man was the chief object of the emigrants." They therefore took care to organize their churches after the simple raodel of their own under standing of worship and the condition of the primitive Chris tian Church. Thus Winthrop, Dudley, Isaac Johnson, and Wil son became a church by covenant, — " the seminal centre of the ecclesiastical system of New England ; " and honest John WUson was chosen the first pastor of " the first church of Boston." Eoger Williams, renowned in the ecclesiastical and civil history of the Eepublic and the world, came hither to accomplish a mission not yet understood ; but he must have his place here among the worthies whose religion required and could produce freedom from " Episcopal and malignant practices." Cotton, Eliot the Apostle to the Indians, and a host of faithful godly men, appear in the train, all breath ing devout tempers and manly independence. Winthrop, the scholar, the statesman, and future govern or of Massachusetts, may represent the spirit of the whole movement. " I shall call that my country," he said in a let ter to his honored father, " where I may most glorify God, and enjoy the presence of my dearest friends. Therefore herein I submit myself to God's will and yours, and dedicate myself to God and the Company with the whole endeavors both of body and mind. The conclusions which you set down are unanswerable ; and that cannot but be a pros perous action which is so well allowed by the judgments of God's prophets, undertaken by so rehgious and wise * Bancroft, i. 347-351. 116 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. worthies in Israel, and indented to God's glory in so special a service." This is the statesmanship of New-England col onization. LIMITATIONS OP LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. The reader will observe that we have written not to eulo gize any thing, nor defend every thing, in the Puritan charac ter or opinions or administration. We have examined their history with one object alone, — to identify the divine in the origin and development of American institutions, and place the action of Providence in clear relief before the world. It is now time to admit that much which was merely human mingled with the divine in this movement, and that the liberty of Puritanism had its limitations, and required, as it received, the accession of other elements to make it ge nial, practical, and thoroughly American. Its theology included the Calvinistic interpretation of the Thirty-nine Articles, the strong tendency of which was not only to harmonize the permission of moral evil with the di vine plans, but to make sin in itself a part of those plans. The practical effect would naturally be to weaken hope in moral appeals to individual responsibility, and strengthen the idea of coercion, of which, in the most rigid forms of faith, God would be the great example in every thing. The first grand obstacle, therefore, that liberty must meet in the New World, would be the theoretical limitation of the will. Carried to what would seem its legitimate extreme, this limitation would be fatal to liberty ; for, if the soul itself is not free, there can be no freedom anywhere. But it is not in the nature of mind to make this limitation thoroughly practical. The instantaneous action of volition, and the freedom of choice, will raake place for the fact of accountabihty : and, if the lirai tation of the will is held to be absolute, the freeness of the act and the guilt of the trans gression wiU claim its place by its side; and, with more or less attempt at reconcUiation, freedom wiU become the great COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. 117 practical law of human life. This was Puritanism. In its first forms, it was a prompt, bold, and indignant protest against the infringements of liberty by the usurpations of kings and prelates ; then it was the most patient and en during of all forms of suffering among men ; and finally it was the uprising of an innate sense of justice, that would bear down every thing which dared to oppose it This was the real freedom of the wUl ; and the Puritans asserted it, in the most energetic form possible to man, by daring heroic action. They were, therefere, the most thorough Protestants (protes1>ants) in the world. It was vain to say that this grand resurrection of liberty did not belong to their system. They made it belong ; and, practically, all limitations of the will were forced to conform to the rising power of personal freedom. If, however, there was something in the severe doctrines of Calvin which suggested, and had a strong tendency to pro duce, intolerance, that tendency would be greatly strength ened by long connection with systems of despotic power ; and, when the misrule of authority was thrown off, authority itself in favor of the right would be likely to be retained. While the enormous wrong of a formal ritualistic State re ligion would appear, it might be deemed a grand achieve ment to establish a pure, simple, saving religion by law; and this was the real direction and grave error of the Puri tan mind. While their whole souls rose up in resistance lo every attempt to compel men to do wrong, they esteemed it a high virtue and a moral necessity to compel them to do right. This will explain the rigid exactions of the colonial gov emment in favor of the sabbath, going to church, paying the minister, and the like, which gave the Puritans the repu tation of " blue hghts." These were excellent things to do ; but the reUgious power of man could not be coerced. The same explanation is true of the exclusiveness of "the stand ing order " by which it was affirmed that men were ruined -j^-j^g THE GREAT REPUBLIC. if they used their liberty in the establishment of the English Church, or attempted to disturb the rights of "the Lord's people " by introducing the " pestilent heresy " of Arminian- isra into New England. It explains, but by no means vindi cates, Puritan intolerance. It is both curious and lament able to see the extreme spirit of Protestantism reaching the very prescriptive bigotry of Eoraanisra, and the brave assertion of Puritan rights resulting in the bitter persecuting intolerance of prelacy; and yet historical fidelity corapels the admission. We must confess, however reluctantly, that the spirit of proscription and intolerance in New England is exactly identical with the same spirit which we found in Virginia. Hence, when John and Samuel Browne would not consent to the CongregationaUsra of Salein, and " gathered a corapany in which ' the coramon-prayer worship ' was upheld," no mat ter how " sincere in their affection for the good of the plan tation," away with them ! " Should the hierarchy intrude on the forests of Massachusetts with the ceremonies which their consciences scrupled ? Should the success of the colony be endangered by a breach of its unity, and the authority of its government overthrown by the confusion of an ever- recurring conflict ? They deemed the co-existence of their liberty and of prelacy impossible," and it should not obtrude itself into the inheritance of the Lord's people. No argu raent could avail. " The supporters of the liturgy were re buked as separatists ; their plea was reproved as sedition, their worship forbidden as a mutiny : and the Brownes were sent back to England as men ' factious and evil-conditioned,' who could not be suffered to remain within the limits of the grant, because they would not be conformable to its govern ment Thus was Episcopacy professed in Massachusetts, and thus was it exiled." * Eoger WUliams was astounded both by the development of intolerance he found in the colony, and at the continued * Bancroft, i. 349, 350. COLONIZATION AND LIBERTY IN MASSACHUSETTS. 119 nominal connection of the colonists with the English Church. " On landing at Boston, he found himself unable to join its church. He had separated from the Establishment in Eng land, which wronged conscience by disregarding its scruples : they were an ' unseparated people,' who refused to renounce communion with their persecutors. He would not suffer the magistrate to assume jurisdiction over the soul by punishing what was no more than a breach of the first table, an error of conscience or belief They were willing to put the whole Decalogue under the guardianship ofthe civil authority. The thought of employing him as a minister was therefore aban doned ; and the Church of Boston was, in Wilson's absence, commended to ' the exercise of prophecy.' " He would soon become a pilgrim in the midst of pUgrims, an exile from the land of his adoption ; for he had the temerity to assert that " no one should be bound to worship, or to maintain a wor ship, against his own consent." " The civil magistr.ate may not intermeddle even to stop a church frora apostasy and heresy : his power extends only to the bodies and goods and outward estate of men." To the minds of the Puritans, these were monstrous heresies. There could be no room for such a man in Massachusetts. He must go away, or be punished till he will submit. The Antinomians, fresh from the school of Genevan the ology, and determined to carry out the system of Calvin to what they deemed its extreme logical results, must obtrude their heretical notions upon " the Lord's heritage," and accuse even the Puritans of being " priest-ridden magistrates," " un der a covenant of works." They had been emancipated from the bondage of the law. The Holy Spirit hved in and con troUed them, and his teachings were superior " to the minis try of the Word." Anne Hutchinson, a woman of abUity " and profitable and sober carriage," was their leader. " John Wheelright, a silenced minister," and " Henry Vane, the gov ernor of the colony," sustained her. Indeed, the orthodox faith and the State religion were in peril ; for " scholars, and 120 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. members of the magistracy, and the General Court, adopted her opinions." What was the reraedy ? Not argument, not the advancing light of reason and the skilful interpretation of the word of God. It was too early for this. The law must exclude such persons from the jurisdiction ofthe colony. The ministers insisted, and the civil magistrates exiled Wheel- right, Anne Hutchinson, and Aspinwall from the territory of Massachusetts, as " unfit for the society of its citizens." " The rock on which the State rested was religion. A com mon faith had gathered and stUl bound the people together. They were exclusive ; for they had come to the outside of the world for the privilege of living by themselves. Fugi tives from persecution, they shrank frora contradiction as frora the approach of peril. And why should they open their asylura to their oppressors ? Eeligious union was made the bulwark of the exiles against expected attacks from the hierarchy of England. The wide continent of America in vited colonization : they clairaed their own narrow domains for the brethren. Their religion was their life : they wel- coraed none but its adherents ; they could not tolerate the scoffer, the infidel, or the dissenter ; and the whole people met together in their congregations. Such w^as the system, cherished as the stronghold of their freedom and happi ness."* It is unnecessary to extend the history. The Quakers and the Eoman Catholics, the witches and the infidels, shared the same fate; a few even suffering the death-penalty for heretical contumacy. True religious free dom raust bide its tirae in Massachusetts. * Bancroft, i. 368. CHAPTEE IX. THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. As we found Virginia the representative colony of the Southern, so we find Massachusetts the representative of the Northern group. In discussing the principles which controlled the formation of Puritanic institutions iu this colony, I have, to a large extent, described those of all New England and the Middle States. Marked divergences will appear in de- tail; but in the grand fundamental position, that true religion is the life and organizing force of hberty, they all agree. Christian regeneration, freeing the soul of the individual from the bondage of sin, becomes the origin of cravings for outward freedom. Persecution in sorae form becoraes the occasion for assertino; these sacred ri2;hts ; and the hi";h con- O O ^ D trol of Providence converts the Puritan into the Pilgrim, and the Pilgrim into the founder of a State. MAINE. The district of Maine, which had been colonized by the French, and entered by Pring and Waymouth and Argall, was temporarily colonized by the English in 1607. Popham, the Chief Justice of England, and Gorges, the Governor of Plymouth, were the movers and patrons of the first expedi tion to this country. On the 8th of August, our adven turers reached " America, near the mouth of the Kennebec, and, offering public thanks to God for their safety, began their settlement under the aixspices of religion, with a gov- 16 "1 122 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ernment framed as if for a permanent colony ; " but the colo nists were not of the right stamp, and after a severe winter and raany raisfortunes, leaving the dead body of their presi dent, George Popham, as if in charge of the right of soil, they returned to England, and " did coyne many excuses " for their failure. ' This hardy territory, which had been included in the enormous grant made to the enterprising Capt. Smith and his companions in 1620, and became a portion of New England to be ruled absolutely by the Plymouth Company, was granted in part to the Pilgrims in 1623. A patent was conceded to Gorges and Mason; and their far-famed "Laconia" includ ed the whole country between the sea, the St Lawrence, the Merrimack, and the Kennebec ; " and, under the auspices of a company of merchants, permanent settlements were formed on the banks of the Piscataqua." But the bigoted and indomitable Gorges was not satisfied. Three years later, he set himself thoroughly at work to coun teract the Eoman Catholics and the French monarch in their determined purpose to claim the eastern coast of North America. Ilis effort, however, resulted in the grand failure of Sir William Alexander and his timid Scotch settlers, with his splendid paper order of nobilitj?, and a war with New France, in which the English gained a barren victory, and received the surrender of the starved garrison of Quebec ; but, under the genius of Eichelieu, they were compeUed to surrender all their conquests, and the French extended their boundary down into the district of Maine as far as the Penobscot To encourage agriculture, " a district of forty mUes square, named Lygonia, and stretching from HuntsweU to the Ken- nebunk, was set apart for the first colony of farmers ; " but the emigrants were ridiculed and discouraged by the more successful patrons of the forest and the sea. The persistent Gorges, however, was not to be discour aged. He obtained a right to the whole territory between THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 123 the Kennebec and New Hampshire. He accepted the ap pointment of Governor-General of New England, that he might set forward the enterprise; but Providence, much to the satisfaction of Massachusetts, defeated his plans. Maine is small in 1636 ; but she has succeeded in the or ganization of a court at Saco, and will struggle on against wind and tide until she falls into the arms of Massachu.setts. It is vain to contend against destiny. Gorges is dead. Piscat aqua, Gorgeana, and WeUs could, "by unanimous consent, form themselves into a body politic ; " but they were too weak for so formidable an undertaking. Massachusetts stretched her old convenient grant over the territory ; and in May, 1652, Maine lost her " independence," very much to the com fort, it would seem, of those who preferred stability and strength to struggle and mere form. Let us rejoice that the privileges of the English Church in the district were not to be interfered with. In May, 1677, when Charles II. had succeeded the Pro tectorate, and the Indian war was raging, Massachusetts is relieved of Maine by royal orders. The king does not like to have these Puritans cover too much ground. They may become impertinent and troublesome some day. He, more over, wants the territory for Monmouth, his reputed son. Of course, the king could do as he liked ; but Yankee shrewd ness came to the help of the great colony. Her represen tative men ascertained the rightful owners of the grant to Gorges, and quietly bought out " the State of ]\Iaine " for some six thousand dollars. Massachusetts found both the French and the Duke of York in her way ; but as " pro prietary " she organized the government, using " a little gentle force " when it was absolutely necessary. The religion of Maine was thus far only partly Puritan. It appears not to have assumed any decided character. But it must be noticed, that all the attempts at colonization in that territory were made under strictly worldly influences. It was, in truth, a most persistent attempt, upon the part of 124 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the great experimental Gorges, to secure a foothold in New England for royalty and prelacy, free from Puritan control; and our readers have seen that these attempts were a most extraordinary succession of failures. We shall henceforth find Puritan zeal and energy produ cing a new life in that district of Massachusetts. Let us hope that the Pilgriras propagated in Maine their love of liberty with as little as possible of their intolerance. The struggle between the prerogatives of the crown and the people went on, untU, under the lead of Providence, a strong, vigorous Protestant State rose up to maintain the liberty of her peo ple, and take her position in the Great American Eepublic. NEW HAMPSHIRE. From the discovery of this territory by Martin Pring, in 1603, to its formal annexation to Massachusetts on the 14th of AprU, 1642, there was comparatively little prosperity in New Hampshire. Mason covered the territory with a patent, which pro duced abundance of lawsuits. In the mean time, the inhabit ants themselves, about Dover and Portsmouth, obtained title to the soil, which was decidedly favorable to progress ; and a small number of people, about 1631, settled on the "Straw berry Bank" of the Piscataqua: but the country long re mained a wUderness. In 1653, Portsmouth had only " be tween fifty and sixty families." After a struggle with proprietaries, and various adverse influences, for a period of forty years, the people reached the conviction that an independent colony was impracticable in that rugged country, and hence deliberately handed them selves over to the strong and prosperous colony of Massa chusetts. We raust with this fact remember that these set tlers were not generally Puritans. They were without the energy and organizing power of that strange people. A little " worldly wisdom " seems to have already crept in THE NOETHEKN GROUP COMPLETED. 125 Hi among the Massachusetts Puritans ; for they, with true pro priety, conceded that their religious system could not be forced upon the new territory ; and an order was adopted in General Court, " that neither the freemen nor the deputies of New Hampshire were required to be church-members." For a long period, the fact was perfectly evident that this was not a Puritan " State ; " but with the liberty conceded, and the infusion -of Puritan energy, it might be hoped that the future of New Hampshire would be prosperous. At least, our Massachusetts " Jonathan," walking off with Maine in one pocket and New Hampshire in the other, was a little in danger of worldly pride, one would say. The coming of the " royal commissioners " to assert the prerogatives of the crown in Massachusetts, of course seri ously disturbed the future State of New Hampshire ; and when the commissioners were, by formal proclamation, re fused the right of holding a court, at the bar of which the colony was summoned to appear. New Harapshire was in volved in the embryo rebellion; and, some thirteen years later, — July 24, 1679, — her territory was arbitrarily de tached from Massachusetts, and made a royal province. The people met in " General Assembly " to consider the matter, when the infusion of the Puritan element became very evi dent ; and thus they wrote to Massachusetts : " We acknowl edge your care for us, we thankfully acknowledge your kind ness, while we dwelt under your shadow; owning ourselves deeply obliged, that, on our earnest request, you took us. under your government, and ruled us well. If there be opportunity for us to be anywise serviceable to you, we shall show how ready we are to embrace it Wishing the presence of God to be with you, we crave the beneflt of your prayers on us, who are separated from you." But how wiU New Hampshire respond to the act of royal " prerogative," aiming at the utter destruction of her liber ties ? Let the foUowing spirited words of the Assembly answer: "No act, imposition, law, or ordinance, shaU be 126 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. valid, urdess made by the Assembly, and approved b;v' the people." Brave, noble words! Feeble, indeed, the colony was. What would be its power to cope with the formidable strength of the British realm? Pliysically nothing, but morally ample : for God had moved New Hampshire up by the side of Massachusetts and Virginia in the great struggle for national freedom ; nor was she to be intimidated by threats or demonstrations of tyrannical power. The irrepressible Mason was again in sight, bound to claim all the land by proprietary right ; but the " granite " colonial government was an insuperable obstacle to his grasping schemes. He returns to England for a redress of grievances, and finds Edward Canfield a suitable instrument of his sin ister designs. The king was easily propitiated by " one-fifth part of all the quit-rents for the support of the government ; " and Canfield was sure of his salary, having " a raortgage on the whole province for twenty-one years " as security, and with certain prospects of " an abundant harvest of fines and forfeitures" as perquisites. He was in ecstasies, and was villain enough to boast openly of his purpose " to wrest a fortune frora the sawyers and luraber-dealers of New Hamp shire." * But what strange men he met when he came to take pos session of his grand estates ! They did not know him ; they questioned his rights ; they would indeed give him " two hundred and fifty pounds" (which, to tell the truth, he was very glad to get) ; " but they would not yield their liber ties: and the governor in anger dissolved the Assembly." This was a new issue. Such an assumption of power had been hitherto unknown in New England. " Liberty and ref ormation " began to ring out from the excited but inconsid erate multitude. This was treason against the king ; and poor " Edward Gove, an unlettered enthusiast," must suffer for it three years " in the Tower of London." MeanwhUe Canfield began to look after his perquisites. * Bancroft, ii. 116, 117. THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 127 Taxes and arbitrary fees, violent arrests, imprisonments, and false reports of invasions, only made the " granite " raen raore obstinate than ever. The ministers, Canfield thought, having something of the Puritan rebel in them, were exciting the people to re sist; and they must be suppressed. Moody, of Portsmouth, " replied to his threats by a sermon, and the Church was in- fiexible." He would now assert the jurisdiction ofthe Church of England, and command festivals and feasts, and the Lord's Supper, free to the people indiscriminately, and the use of " the English Liturgy ; " but the ministers and the people said " No ! " " The governor himself appointed a day on which he claimed to receive the elements at the hands of Moody, after the forms of the Church of England ; '' but the stern old Puritan saw nothing honorable or right against godly sim plicity. He could submit to be "prosecuted, condemned, and imprisoned ; " but no living man could compel him to be subject to carnal ordinances. Canfield sent word to Eng land, " that, while the clergy were allowed to preach, no true allegiance could be found : " " there could be no quiet till the factious preachers were turned out of the province." The king must certainly send round " a ship of war ;" for, " with out some visible force to keep the people of New Hampshire under, it would be a difficult or impossible thing to execute his Majesty's commands or the law of trade." But the people are not frightened. They are even violent. The men have " clubs," and the wives " hot water," for the sheriff and his officers, when they come to enforce the governor's unlawful exactions. Canfield at last was in as complete despair as Sancho Panza when he came into possession of "that same island." He was "governor," no doubt; but he could only see the sumptuous viands which his appetite craved, and he was thoroughly sick of his government In despair, he wrote imploringly to the government in England, " I shaU esteem it the greatest happiness in the world to be allowed to re- 128 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. move from this unreasonable people. They cavU at the royal comraission, and not at my presence. No one wiU be accepted by them who puts the king's commands in exe cution." We have traced these developments of liberty, under the promptings of religion, far enough to perceive their perfect identity with the spirit which colonized New England, and would ultimately constitute the Great American Eepublic. CONNECTICUT. We trace the settlement of this country from about the 8th of October, 1635, when people from the neighborhood of Boston came to found Hartford and Windsor and Wethers field. Sixty Pilgrims, including women and children, started to travel with their stock and effects through the forests to the VaUey of the Connecticut. They were bound for " the Far West," in the almost unknown wilds of Connecticut; and through the perils of a hard winter, the people living on the milk of the browsing kine, journeyed to the home of their future independence. Their numbers had diminished, and " the army of the Lord " was very much sifted by the way; but enough were left in the spring, and of the right kind, to organize a good, strong, free, civil government Other PUgrims found their way to " the new Hesperia of Puritanism ; " but the grand colony of about a hundred trav elled on foot, through the pathless forests of Massachusetts, to " the delightful banks " of the Connecticut They were superior people. John Haynes, formerly Governor of Mas sachusetts, and the unrivalled Hooker, were the great and true representatives of State and Church ; and many were from the wealthy and more intelligent families. Now the new colony is surrounded with perUs. The Pe quods are hostUe, and are about to succeed in forming most formidable combinations for the extermination of these white intruders. But the heroic exUe, Eoger WiUiams, with un- THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 129 exampled bravery, penetrates their wilds ; presents himself meekly, but fearlessly, in the midst of their councU of war ; and, by the help of God, dissolves the grand conspiracy. The Pequods, however, are desperate, and determined to pro voke war. " To John Mason, the staff of c^omraand was de livered at Hartford by the venerated Hooker; and after nearly a whole night, spent, at the request of the soldiers, in importunate prayer by the very learned and godly Stone, about sixty men, one-third ofthe whole colony, aided by John Underbill and twenty gallant recruits, whom the forethought of Vane had sent from the Bay State, saUed past the Thames." This Christian army would keep the holy sabbath on the way, and would open an honorable parley with the savages before firing a gun ; but there was no alternative. They must fight and conquer, or their wives and children would fall the bleeding victims of savage ferocity. The war is begun, and by bullets and swords, and raging flames, against bows and arrows : it is a war of extermination. How terrible the necessity ! How sad the record of history ! Peace has come; and now these thinking, worshipping pioneers proceed to construct a government. Its grand funda mental provisions are very few and simple ; but centuries of advancing civilization will hardly be able to improve them. A free, equal, representative government, a republic of jus tice, are the few words which express the whole. One such independent sovereignty, it would seem, ought to be enough for " the State of Connecticut" But the peo ple will be their own judges. In 1638, we see another Pu ritan colony rising up at New Heaven " under the guidance of John Davenport as its pastor, and of the excellent The- ophUus Eaton, who was annually elected its governor for twenty years, till his death." Here was " austere, unmixed Calvinism ; but the spirit of humanity had sheltered itself under the rough exterior." " Under a branching oak," whUe it was yet cold, the people gathered, and listened to the solemn words of Davenport. 17 130 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. They had been, " like the Son of man, led into :the wUder ness to be tempted." After a day of fasting and prayer, they rested their first form of government on a simple plan tation-covenant, — that " all of them would be ordered by the rules which the Scriptures held forth to them." They would recognize the rights of the Indians, and ob tain fairly a title to their lands. In another year, assembled in a barn, they sought to per fect their organization ; and, by the influence of Davenport, it was solemnly resolved that the Scriptures are the perfect rule of a commonwealth ; that the purity and peace of the ordinances to themselves and their posterity were the great end of civil order ; and that church-members only should be free burgesses." " Eaton, Davenport, and five others, were the ' seven pillars ' for the New Haven of wisdom in the wilderness." Other towns, as they arose, followed their unique example ; and the Bible became the grand statute-book of New Haven, and the elect were its freemen. This is Connecticut, substantially, for the whole period of preparation now under consideration. They will increase in numbers and wisdom ; but they are " gospellers and psalm- singers " to the end of the world, and all over creation. We deplore the narrowness which moved these stern primitive legislators. to limit the right of franchise to mem bers of the church ; but we bear to them profound respect for their loyal devotion to the grand truths of revelation, and their sincere homage to the " Lord of lords, and King of kings." In this they caught the true American thought and principle, in the neglect of which, we, as a nation, have suffered the most severe and well-deserved chastisements. RHODE ISLAND. The history of this State can never be separated from the character, opinion.s, and enterprise of Eoger Williams. We have already seen, that, when he entered Massachu- THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 131 setts, he was in advance of the general sentiment of the Pu ritans on the question of religious liberty. On the one hand, he would not consent to even a nominal connection with Prelacy : that he had calmly and deUberately renounced forever. On the other hand, he rose to the clearest concep tion of religious freedom known among men. However wrong the Church might be, it was not the right of any man nor any government forcibly to correct the wrong, even to save the Church from the most destructive heresy. • Though it was the highest, noblest right for every man to consecrate himself to the service of God, no man, no number of men, had the right to compel him to this service. Eoger Williams was more than a Puritan. He was the great mind ordained of Providence to advance beyond the position of indignant protest against oppression, to the revelation that the highest right must itself be the result of a freedom which might be abused by consenting to the deepest wrong. He was the first true type of the American freeman, conceding fully to all others the high-born rights which he claimed for hiraseif. This was farther than Puritanism could lead the race.; and, for the present, it was not ready to follow. Eoger WiUiams could not join the Church in Boston. It was vain to attempt to make him pastor of Salem. He could try it once and again ; but the spirit of the place and the standard of the people cramped him. He was too bold and outspoken against the intolerance of his brethren to stay there. Nor did God intend that he should remain in Plymouth. He must be thrust out to lead the nation on toward the goal of their providential future. He was a very troublesome man for bigotry to manage. He was too good, apparently, to be persecuted ; too strong in his logical position and defence to be put down by argu ment " An unbelieving soul," he said, " is dead in sin." To force him from one kind of worship to another " was Uke shifting a dead man into several changes of apparel." " No one should be bound to worship, or to maintain a worship. 132 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. against his own consent" No man ought to be disfranchised because he was not a member of the Church. " The re moval of the yoke of soul oppression, as it will prove an act of mercy and righteousness to the enslaved nations, so it is of binding force to engage the whole, and every interest and conscience to preserve the common liberty and peace." He denied the right to coerce a man to take the freeman's oath; but would not he himself be compelled to take it? No ; he refused : and such was the firm dignity of his bear ing, " that the government was forced to desist from that proceeding." But he was living under a religion established by law, — not Prelacy, but Puritanism, in which intolerance was just as vile to him, and just as determined against a nonconformist " The ministers got together, and declared any one worthy of banishment who should obstinately assert that ' the civil magistrate might not intermeddle, even to stop a church from apostasy and heresy.' " He was under the ban of the Church ; but the people would have him for a " teacher." They were punished by the loss of lands ; and he would unite with them in "letters of admonition unto all the churches whereof any of the magistrates were members, that they might admonish the magistrates of their injustice." This was treason, and the storm coming on was too severe for his church. They forsook him, and even his wife turned against him. He will promptly assert his right of with drawal. Hear him : " My own voluntary withdrawing from all these churches, resolved to continue in persecuting the witnesses of the Lord, presenting light unto them, I confess it was mine own voluntary act; yea, I hope the act of the Lord Jesus, sounding forth in me the blast, which shaU, in his own holy season, cast down the strength and confidence of those inventions of men." When arraigned before the civU magistrates, he " main tained the rocky strength of his ground ; ready to be bound and banished, and even to die in New England," rather than be untrue to his honest convictions. THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 133 "At a time when Germany was the battle-field for all Europe in the implacable wars of religion, when even Hol land was bleeding with the anger of vengeful factions, when France was still to go through the fearful struggle with big otry, when England was gasping under the despotism of intolerance, almost half a century before William Penn became an American proprietary, and two years before Descartes founded modern philosophy on the method of free reflection, Eoger WiUiams asserted the great doctrine of intellectual liberty. It became his glory to found a State upon that principle, and to stamp himself upon its rising institutions in characters so deep, that the impress has remained to the present day, and can never be erased with out the total destruction of the work." * " He was," contin ues Bancroft in one of his most eloquent passages, "the first person in modern Christendom to assert in its plenitude the doctrine of the liberty of conscience, the equality of opin ions before the law ; and, in its defence, he was the harbinger of Milton, the precursor and the superior of Jeremy Taylor." But before the bar of " civil liberty " in Massachusetts his doom was sealed. The stern urgency of Cotton seems to have been almost necessary to prevent, even then, a revolt from prescriptive bigotry. But the act was recorded. The immortal Williams was an exile ; but, in the struggle, so much light had forced itself into the surrounding darkness, that an apologetic tone was assumed in explaining and vin dicating the decree. It was necessary to preserve inviolate the "oaths for making trial of the fidelity of the people," and to avert a movement which seemed likely " to subvert the fundamental state and government of the people." It was not absolutely insisted that he should go out among the savages in the severity of the winter. He might remain tUl spring; but even this was not without danger to the stabUity of Puritan freedom. There were many in Salem who loved Eoger WiUiams, and who hung upon his lips * Bancroft, i. 375. 134 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. with intense delight "The people were much taken with the apprehension of his godliness." The fear of his contagious opinions determined the gov ernment to end the matter in a summary way. He was condemned to sail immediately for England. But once more, as God willed, he would disobey. In the midst of winter he went out, not knowing whither he went ; and, " for fourteen weeks, he was sorely tossed in a bitter season, not knowing what bread or bed did mean." But God had made him friends among the savages. He had, some tirae before, risked his rights as a citizen to affirm in a pamphlet that they were not to be forcibly dispossessed of their lands, but were to be bargained with for their homes, like white men. He had gone out into their wigwams and hunting-grounds to preach to them Jesus and the resurrec tion ; and his deep sympathy and holy sacrifice in their behalf had awakened in these savage bosoms the most ardent gratitude and affection. Exiled from Massachusetts, "he was welcomed by Massasoit;" and " the barbarous heart of Canonicus, the chief of the Narragansetts, loved hira as his son to the last gasp." " The ravens," he said, " fed me in the wUderness." It was thus that the grand pioneer of freedom was disciplined for his task. In June of 1636, we find this prince of exUes, with only five companions, landing frora a fraU Indian canoe, in a wUderness, outside of any patent claims of civihzed men, and very thankful, he said, " that ever-honOred Gov. Win throp wrote to me to steer my course to the Narragansett Bay, encouraging me from the freeness of the place from Enghsh claims or patents. I took this prudent motion as a voice from God." The spot on which these PUgrims from " the land of Pil griras " first placed their feet is marked, by tradition, as sa cred to liberty. WiUiams named it Providence ; and so it is to this day, the beautiful and capital city of the State found ed by his enlightened philanthropy. " I desired," said he, THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. I35. " it might be for a shelter for persons distressed for con science." Noble monumental record of a noble man ! Now, for a time, he cannot study much. He has no slaves, like Virginians, to fell the trees, and raise him bread. He has no great colony, like Cotton or Davenport, to see that he is supported from government tithes. " My time," he writes, "was not spent altogether in spiritual labors; but day and night, at home and abroad, on the land and water, at the- hoe, at the oar, for bread." His title to the soU of his colony came legitimately, and by fair stipulation, from, the Narragansetts, and bore the signa tures of the Indian princes, Canonicus and Miantonomoh, It- is a large, splendid territory, he thought, as he looked out upon his domain of freedom, and said it is " my own as truly as any man's coat upon his back." But he would be no grand monopolist of the gifts of God; indeed, he "reserved- to himself not one foot of land, not one tittle of political power, more than he granted to servants and strangers."' The government he founded: was to be "a pure democ-' racy," controlled by the will of a majority ; but this should be " only in civil things," and. over all was the sovereignty of God. In 1643, WUliams goes to England to settle the relations of his colony with "the mother-country." The colonies were under control of Warwick, with a council of five peers and twelve commons. Fortunately for Ehode Island; that noble phUanthropist, Henry Vane, was of the latter. Parliament. was surprised and deeply interested by the " printed Indian labors of Eoger Williams, the like whereof was not extant from any part of America." The favorable impression made by the great missionary led " both houses of Parhament to grant unto him, and friends with him, a free and absolute charter of civil government for those parts of his abode." Thus the oppressed of aU lands, would, it seemed, be guar anteed a home for " soul-liberty, with full power and author ity to rule, themselves." 136 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Eoger WUUams returned from England under " the Pro tectorate," free to pass unharmed through the land of his ban ishment ; to be met on the waters of his own Narragansett by a fleet of boats bearing the freemen of his colony, who whh gratitude, and shouts of welcome, haUed him as the founder and defender of their liberties, so that he was really " ele vated and transported out of himself." Let oppressed, per secuted Virtue learn to dare and to wait The time of her triumph will surely come. But how will this grand little " deraocracie " succeed in its wUd experiment ? There are " hardiness and tumults," we learn, at its " assemblies," caUed together "by the drum or the voice of a herald," under a tree, or by the sea-side No wonder ; for here were " Anabaptists and Antinomians, fana tics and infidels ; " unpromising materials, one would say, out of which to construct a self-governing State. But one pure, clear, lofty mind will guide the whole. They will have good men for officers, and may safely put on to their records, "Oner popularitie shall not, as sorae conjecture it will, prove an anarchic, and so a comraon tirannie ; for we are exceed ing desirous to preserve every man safe in his person, name, and estate." There was still danger. Coddington had obtained from the executive council of State in England " a commission for governing the islands ; " and Williams must go to Eng land again to preserve the integrity of his prospective State. He succeeded, and the gratitude of the people would have made him governor ; but he was wiser than they. He refused all honors, but gave a true account of the valuable efforts of Sir Henry Vane in their behalf Their letter to him sums up the history of the early colonization of Ehode Is land, and wUl complete the presentation of those features of its history most important to our discussion. On the 27th of August, 1654, they wrote, " From the first beginning of the Providence Colony, you have been a noble and true friend to an outcast and despised people : we have ever reaped the THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 137 sweet fruits of your constant loving-kindness and favor. We have long been free from the iron yoke of wolfish bish ops ; we have sitten dry from the streams of blood spUt by the wars in our native country ; we have not felt the new chains of the Presbyterian tyrants, nor, in this colony, have we been consumed by the over-zealous fire ofthe (so-caUed) godly Christian magistrates ; we have not known what an excise means ; we have almost forgotten what tithes are ; we have long drank of the cup of as great liberties as any people that we can hear of under the whole heaven : when we are gone, our posterity and children after us shall read in our town-record your loving-kindness to us, and our real endeavor after peace and righteousness." Eoger Williams is a Christian and a minister, and he will found a church. He is a Baptist, and his church will be ex clusive iminersionists ; but he will rise above precedents, and take no pains to establish the line of succession. He and his simple-minded people will baptize each other, and go on to serve the Lord, and proclaim the doctrine of justification by faith with might and main, and God will be with them. His denomination will feel obliged to restrict " communion " to those baptized as they understand it, and will accept the decrees as they understand them ; but the complete and stringent accountability of every man will be the ground of their practical appeals in all lands, and of their battle-cry of freedom to the end of the world. As the central power of the Southern group removed from Virginia to South Carolina, where she arose as the only original and most intensely slave State, so the centre of the Northern group removed frora Massachusetts to Ehode Island, where Eoger WiUiams, her noblest representa tive of freedom, exiled from her territopy for his brave pro test against intolerance, unfurled the banner of unrestricted liberty on the banks of the Narragansett Every step of this advance movement in the clear asser tion of the great Anlerican idea was made under the direc- 18 13S THE GREAT REPUBLIC. tion of a high-souled. Christian minister, and indicates the divine control in the development and' organization of free dom on the Western continent. The colonial history of Vermont is included in that of New Harapshire, Massachusetts,, and New York, and evolves no additional principle for consideration in this part of our wor]?;. New England', from the period of colonization, will go on with the development of her peculiar institutions under ex treme difficulties. Her battles with- prerogatives will pass her through the severest ordeals of suppression and tyranny, and lead to the union of her colonies, the development of her States, and her final incorporation into the grand union of freedom. NEW YORK. On the fourth day of September, 1609, just as Champlain was entering the future State of New York from the north, the gallant Henry Hudson rounded Sandy Hook, and. " The Half-moon " cast anchor. He had sailed in search of " the north-west passage " to Asia, under direction of the famous East-India Company ; and ended a long, perilous voyage in the discovery of the Hudson Eiver. This gave New York, with boundaries entirely undefined, to the Dutch by right of discovery. In 1610, Providence inspired the English with a wholesome dread of the " art and industry of the D-utch," and thus defeated a proposed alliance with the East-India Company for the joint coloni zation of Virginia, which would have probably destroyed Enghsh independence in America. After long and characteristic hesitation, the States-Gen eral gave authority to private adventurers to make " four successive voyages to any passage, haven, or country they should thereafter find;" and. in 1614 a fleet of "five smelh vessels" sailed for America, bearing as commanders the fa mous- Hendrick. Christaenson of Cieve, and "the worthy THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 139 Adriaen Block." Shipwreck did not destroy the courage, nor defeat the objects, of these daring navigators. Their dis coveries; on the northern coast of America resulted in a grant to the explorers from the assembly of the States- General of " a three-years' monopoly of trade with the ter ritory between Virginia and France, from forty to forty-five degrees of latitude." Their charter, given on the llth of October, 1614, named the extensive regions New Nether lands. John Smith had that same year called the northern part New England.* This provided for a conflict of jurisdiction between Eng land and Holland, and the latter seemed at that time much more likely to succeed than the former. This was an era of great ambition and boundless prospects upon the part of the United Provinces, now glorying in their freedorti after a long and desperate struggle to achieve it. We almost tremble to see how likely the colonists of the Anglo-Saxon race were soon to be crowded off from the continent by the grasping power of France, Holland, and Spain. But the plans of God would not permit it. These hardy adventurers were here, not to establish a permanently Dutch province, but to aet an important part in founding several strong States of the Eepubhc of freedom. After various conflicts with New Eng land and the agents of Lord Baltimore, conquering New Sweden, and bringing into striking contrast the right of free toleration and the institution of slavery, the govern ment of Holland was finally superseded by that of England. " New Amsterdam " soon disappeared from the map of Amer ica; and early in October, 1664, "for the first time,, the whole Atlantic coast of the old thirteen States was in posses sion of England." t The spirited little Eepublic had grappled heroically with the combined powers of France and England for the rights of free navigation, not for herself aloae, but for the world ; and by the noble patriotism of WiUiam of Orange, the * Bancroft, ii. 275, 276. t Ibid., ii. 315. 140 the great republic. bravery and genius of De Euyter and Tromp, and the power ful pen of Grotius, she had gained the grandest triumph of the age, — the " rights of neutral flags " upon the high seas. She had recovered her own European territory; but as a nation she appears no more in our history, except as an ally and friend of the Eepublic of American liberty. We must not, however, fail to mark the providence which made a free Protestant republic " the mother of four of our States," and gave to our country the cool, strong blood of the Hollander to mingle with that of the fiery Celt, the pro gressive Anglo-Saxon, the sturdy German, and the polished French, to produce the purest, noblest type of the new Amer ican race. We may hence also trace to a common origin the great Eeformation, the love of civil freedom, which became alike ineradicable in New York and New England. The settlement of the Empire State will henceforth go on in the ordinary way amid stirring rivalries and fierce antago nisms ; but her struggles will be those of the rising nation, and the spirit of the people will be grandly expressed in 1691 by the haughty accusation of a royal governor, " There are none of you but what are big with the privileges of Englishmen and Magna Charta." NEW jersey. In the spring of 1664, the Duke of York " assigned to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Carteret, both proprietaries of Carolina, the land between the Hudson and the Dela ware. In honor of Carteret^ the territory, with nearly the same bounds as at present, except on the north, received the name of New Jersey." * Moved by avarice to encourage population, these " lords of the soU " made liberal concessions to the people. They promised " security of persons and property under laws to be made by an assembly composed of the governor and * Bancroft, ii. 315. THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 141 council, and at least an equal number of representatives of the people ; freedom from taxation, except by the colonial assembly; a combined opposition of the people and the proprietaries to any arbitrary impositions from England; freedom of judgment, conscience, and worship to every peaceful citizen. " * Thus early did scheming, selfish men come to be aware, that, to achieve success with Americans, they must at least make profession of respect for American ideas. Swedish farmers soon appeared here and there in New Jersey ; Dutch families might have been found about Bur lington ; and, in 1618, traders took up a position, which be came a permanent settlement, on Bergen Heights. In 1664, the Quakers found a quiet retreat " south of Earitan Bay : " and the New-England Puritans contrived to get a claim for a home on the Earitan ; but they could not mix up with the ungodly. They must have their own jurisprudence. They would treat honorably with the Indians for their lands ; and, "with one heart, they resolved to carry on their spiritual and town affairs according to godly government." Like them selves, ever on the alert, when in May, 1668, the first "colonial legislative assembly convened at Elizabethtown, they were there to transfer the chief features of the New- England codes to the statute-book of New Jersey." f It was but a slight matter for these brave, plain people to dash aside the claims set up by Maryland to the land they had received by double right through the Duke of York and the natives of the soil. Just as ea.sy was it to repudiate the demands of Berkeley and Carteret for quit-rents upon their farms. It was a mere trifle, — only a half-penny an acre; but it was the right which they questioned. The mere intimation of a purpose to enforce this unlawful exaction cost Carteret his office, and sent him to England for a redress of grievances. West New Jersey was purchased by the Quakers of the * Bancroft, ii. 316. t Ibid., ii. 318. 142 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. aged Berkeley in 1674 ; and to this wUderness they came for rest, guided, as they believed, by the light within. And what form of government will they adopt ? The Friends in England, sustaining the relation of proprie taries for honest convenience, not to "lord it over God's her itage," received the views of the feeble colonists, and said, " The CONCESSIONS are such as Friends approve of We lay a foundation for after-ages to understand their liberty as Chris tians and as men, that they may not be brought into bond age but by their own consent ; for we put the power in the PEOPLE." And all the rights recognized by a pure democracy are defined and guarded in their fundamental laws adopted on the third day of March, 1677 : "All and every person in the province shall, by the help of the Lord ahd these funda mentals, be free from oppression and .slavery." How lovingly the savages responded to the gentle jus tice of these Friends! "You are our brothers," they said; " and we will live like brothers with you. We will have a wide path for you and us to walk in. If an Englishman falls asleep in this path, the Indian shall pass him by, and say, ' He is an Englishman ; he is asleep ; let him alone.' The path shall be plain : there shall not be in it a stump to hurt the feet" The principal settlements of New Jersey were begun. They would go on and prosper, and others would be added, until the population was sufficient for a State. The partition was at length broken down, and New Jersey was numbered with " the old thirteen." PENNSYLVANIA. WiUiam Penn was a thorough Quaker. He had been the counseUor of the Friends in New Jersey, and seen them multiplied and prosperous. He purchased East New Jersey from the heirs of Carteret ; but he desired to obtain a grant on the west side of the Delaware for the enlargement of the domain of peace. After much skUfuI management and THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 143 "great opposition," he finally obtained a charter from Charles II in 1680; and thus he writes March 5, 1681: "After many writings, watchings, solicitings, and disputes in council, my country was confirmed to me under the great seal of England. God will bless it, and make it the seed of a nation. I shall have a tender care of the government, that it be well laid at first." He was now the sole proprietor of a vast and fertile terri tory, including "three degrees of latitude by five degrees of longitude west frora the Delaware," — enough for a kingdom ; and, two months after he received his charter, he writes to the scattered settlers the following letter : " Mr friends, I wish you all happiness here and hereafter. These are to lett you know that it hath pleased God in his Providence to cast you within my Lott and Care. It is a business, that though I never undertook before, yet God has given me an understanding of my duty and an honest minde to doe it uprightly. I hope you will not be troubled at your change and the king's choice ; for you are now fixt, at the mercy of no governour that comes to make his fortune great You shall be governed by laws of your own making, and live a free, and, if you will, a sober and industrious people. I shall not usarp the right of any, or oppress his person. God has furnisht rae with a better resolution, and has given me his grace to keep it In short, whatever sober and free men can reasonably desire for the security and improve ment of their own happiness, I shall heartily comply with. I beseech God to direct you in the way of righteousness, and therein prosper you, and your children after you. I am your true friend."' Happy, indeed, were these Pennsylvania Quakers to be under the government of a man so thorough ly honest and paternal. Impartial history must, in spite of aU criticism, award to him the credit of fully redeeming these liberal pledges. With but a small fortune, quite reduced by expensive lawsuits in defence of his persecuted brethren, Penn had 144 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. now an opportunity of ample remuneration for aU his sacri fices and toil, by " the sale of domains." For a monopoly of the Indian trade, he was offered " six thousand pounds and an annual revenue." WiU he yield to the temptation ? Hear him: "I wiU not abuse the love of God, nor act un worthy of his providence, by defiling what came to me clean. No : let the Lord guide me by his wisdom to honor his name, and serve his truth and people, that an example and a standard may be set up to the nations. There may be room there, though not here, for the holy experiment." Subject only to the careless negligence or capricious exac tions of a weak king, Penn was now an absolute sovereign over a growing and confiding people. Was this right? Would he hold on to this power, and attempt to give it hereditary descent ? Hear him again : ' " For the matter of liberty, I purpose that which is extraordinary, — to leave my self and successors no power of doing mischief; that the will of one man may not hinder the good of a whole countrj^ It is the great end of government to support power in reverence with the people, and to secure the people from the abuse of power ; for liberty without obedience is confusion, and obedience without liberty is slavery." Noble words, and as real and sincere as they are noble. How high he rose above the governmental theories of English civilization ! If it be asked, " How carae this man to be so nobly superior to the selfishness of his tirae ? " we raust candidly answer. His views of hiraseif and his feUow-men arose directly from his conceptions of God. Glance at his history, and you see this distinctly. Bred an Iijdependent, he became, at twelve years, serious and thoughtful. It was only necessary for him to hear a Quaker at Oxford to start the train of spirit ual thought and expression which would expel him for nonconformity. From his own father's hand he received the first personal violence for the freedom he claimed for his conscience. Becoming a studied and traveUed gentle- THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 145 man, his way was open to preferment ; but he had met and once more heard his old friend Thomas Loe, and his spirit ual consciousness was at once attentive to " the voice within," and "WiUiam Penn was a Quaker again, or some very melancholy thing." "God," said he, "in his everlasting kindness, guided my feet in the fiower of my youth, when about two and twenty years of age." In jail for the free action of conscience, he said, " Eeligion is my criine and my innocence : it makes me a prisoner to malice, but my own freeman." For asserting his rights, and professing his faith, through the press, he was a prisoner in the Tower until he should learn the virtues of conformity. " My prison shall be my grave" was his noble answer. To the king he wrote grandly, " The Tower is to me the worst argument in the world." He was at large once more, but had spoken at a "conventicle," and was again under arrest "Not all the powers on earth shall divert us from meeting to adore our God who made us," said the lofty soul of this prince of men. When the magistrate remonstrated with him, he answered, " I prefer the honestly simple to the ingeniously wicked." His notes of freedom rang out from Newgate : " If we cannot obtain the olive-branch of toleration, we bless the provi dence of God, resolving by patience to outweary persecu tion, and by our constant sufferings to obtain a victory more glorious than our adversaries can achieve by their cruelties." He was before a committee of the Commons to plead for liberty, not for the Quakers merely, but for all. " We must give the liberty we ask," said he : " we cannot be false to our principles, though it were to relieve ourselves ; for we would have none to suffer for dissent on any hand." To the electors in a canvass he said, " Your well-being depends upon your preservation of your right in the government You are free; God and nature and the constitution have made you trustees for posterity. Choose men who wUl, by all just and legal ways, firmly keep and zealously promote your power." 10 146 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. This was the man, who, under the crown, was intrusted with the civU liberties of Delaware, a good part of New Jersey, and the vast State of Pennsylvania. Who could have any doubt as to what he would do ? With the great sovereign of human liberty before his eyes, and fresh from the cruel sufferings borne for conscience' sake in his native land, he hastened to the field of his mission across the waters. With his heart glowing with love, he entered the land of his inheritance, " a free colony for all mankind," to try "the HOLY experiment." Swedes, Dutch, and English hailed him as a common protector and friend ; and wUd savages were quiet as lambs at his feet, when they had heard his words, and gazed deep down into his heart under " the large elm-tree at Shakamaxon." " We will live," responded the Lenni Lenapes, "in love with William Penn and his children as long as the moon and the sun shall endure;" and no Quaker ever perished frora Indian arrow. "We have done better," said the Quakers, " than if, with the proud Spaniards, we had gained the mines of Potosi. We may make the ambitious heroes, whom the world admires, blush for their shameful victories. To the poor, dark souls round about us, we teach their rights as men." We have no reason to trace the action of these humane principles in the formation of a government. The people, so far as Penn could make them, were free as air. They might assemble as a general convention, or by represen tatives. They preferred the latter, and, in the simplicity of their faith, listened to the voice within to give them their laws; and be assured this voice would suggest nothing but pure freedom to a Quaker. Swedes, Finns, Dutch, and English were completely and alike invested with the rights of freemen, and could exult in the language of Lawrence Cook, " It is the best day we have ever seen." Penn had founded in the New World a pure democracy. It was not, to be sure, to be aU sunshine. The great pro prietor, who had reserved nothing for himself, must leave THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 147 his people to their own wisdom. There would be divisions among them' for a time. Delaware must set up for herself and finally his Majesty's commissioners must come to vex the honest Quakers, ^ot they had passed through the fire in other days. They would vindicate the hopes of their founder, and, amid the praises of the world, sustain their own liberties with the noblest moral heroism. THE GREAT WEST. We have thus traced the history of God's providence in the settlement of all the original thirteen States, so far as to identify the religious force active in their colonization and the foundation of their respective systems of civil liberty. The Northern group, commencing thirteen years later than the Southern, has shown great vigor, and attracted a hardy, enterprising population, and, before the war of the Eevolu tion, reached a commanding position in all the elements of a growing civilization. But the Northern group was far from being completed. Within the bosom of the great wilderness, stretching out over the vast prairies, and on over the Eocky Mountains to the Pacific, lay the great States and Territories of the West. The boundary-line between the Southern and Northern group was not at once clearly defined. The institution of slavery alone would determine it. During the period now under consideration, the colonies were alike free to adopt or reject the system of slave-labor, as States are free, if they will, to violate all moral principle, and fix upon themselves the guilt of crime which will some day demand a fearful and bloody retribution. And, with notable exceptions, there was a strange want of conscience in the North, which required the demonstration, that the nature of the soil and the severity of the climate would not allow reliance upon slave-labor, to place it clearly on the side of emancipation. Slowly the beginnings of this foul system of oppression in the North dis- 148 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. appeared ; and free labor moved southward, until the famous Mason and Dixon's Line became distinct, and the equally famous Missouri Compromise stretched the line between the two groups farther west But the boundary between free dom and slavery was not physically indicated in the West and South-west The interference of God's providence was necessary to save large portions of the Mississippi Valley and the Pacific coast from the deep stain ; and hence the popula tion went into these territories from American States and from Europe, firmly fixed against slavery. The struggle went on for two generations : and, under the divine control, the area of freedom extended so rapidly as to parallel, and at length fairly outstrip, the progress of slavery ; and the Northern group completed embraced, in addition to her large portion of the old thirteen, the vast territories and teeming population of Vermont, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, Dacotah, Col orado, New Mexico, Utah, Montana, Nevada, California, Ore gon, Washington, and Idaho. What could resist the spirit of freedom under guidance of Providence, controlling the millions who would inhabit a region so immense in extent, and inexhaustible in resources ? Slavery struggled hard for predominance over the southern portion of this great West, and thus over the nation ; and if the talents and shrewdness, the political scheming and wealth, of men could have produced it, this result would have been inevitable. The final defeat of this grasping tyranny, and the grand triumph of liberty in the West, argue a reigning Divinity in the affairs of men. The battle was at length fairly joined; and, when it reached its colossal proportions, the parties were so large and potent, and so nearly balanced, as to bring out before the eyes of men the extreme force and terrific energy of both slavery and freedom. This the purposes of God required ; and aU the efforts of humanity during a hundred years were utterly inadequate to pre vent it THE NORTHERN GROUP COMPLETED. 140 PROVIDENCE AND WAR-DISCIPLINE. To complete our view of the colonization period of Amer ican history, it is necessary to glance at the question of dominant races on the continent. The aboriginal tribes were numerous, and in many respects powerful, when the white men first appeared. Though sup posed to have already coraraenced their steady decline, they were estimated at one hundred and eighty thousand souls. A much larger estimate was made subsequently. The num ber of immigrants was for a generation so small as to make it fearfully probable that they would be overwhelmed by their savage foes whom they had taught to fight, and whose cruel ferocity they had roused to the extreme of vindictive rage. At length they found an opportunity of acting in concert with one white nation engaged in bloody war with another ; and the French and Indian War was to overwhelm the Eng lish, and subjugate or expel them from the continent. This contest was to reach proportions at first hardly deemed pos sible. Indeed, if God intended the final ascendency of the Anglo-Saxons here, he evidently intended that they should be themselves so .small and feeble, and their rivals should be so numerous and powerful, that their triumph would be clearly the work of his own hand. Spaniards held their position with great tenacity, and crowded strongly from Florida on the south, and Mexico on the west The Dutch were very strong on the Hudson and the Delaware, and were crowding New England hard in the Valley of the Connecti cut The boundaries of New France were stretching for midably from the St Lawrence round into the VaUey of the Mississippi. England had but a small strip of the Atlantic coast, and much of that was disputed territory. Who could have beUeved that New Spain, New Sweden, and New Amster dam, would, one after another, disappear under the spreading power of the little bands gathering around Jamestown and 150 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Plymouth Eock ? And yet they did disappear. An invisible agency most evidently moved within the outward forms of social life, and secured the result which the plans of Provi dence required. France might with apparently good reason expect to suc ceed. Her territory was so large, her energy so powerful, and her alliance with savage tribes so formidable, that there seemed almost a moral certainty that the Atlantic slope must yield to the ascendency of French arms and 'ideas ; and, if so, the final triumph of Popery on the Western continent was inevitable. Two bloody wars must settle the question. It is not our duty to trace their history ; but the purpose, of God came out at last when the brave English ascended to "the Heights of Abraham," and Montcalm, Quebec, and French domination, fell before the heroic Wolf and his com rades in arms. Under God, the Americans in sufficient numbers had en tered the conflict to secure the triumph of England over France, and received a military discipline which would pre pare America to triumph over England. A S [K] D [l © ¥ f/if* Jyy S JB Sail after ^j:Uirriy 1 PERIOD II. INDEPENDENCE. CHAPTEE I. MIND-BATTLES POINT TO A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. "As interesting mankind, the question was. Shall the Reformation, developed tothe fulness of free inquiry, succeed in its protest against the middle ages ? " — Bancroft. Essential freedom is in the mind. If this is inthralled, no outward forms can make a man free. Government creates no liberty. It can recognize it when it exists, respond to it, and provide for it ; or it can assault and repress it. Hence it is, that the emancipation of thought, and deliverance from mental tyranny in the regeneration, become the precursors of organized liberty. The legitimate result does not always follow. Oppression raay be for a time too strong for the inner force. The people may be wanting in clearness of views, or in public spirit, or in completeness of organization. Stern discipline may be required to bring them up to the point of proper resistance. The contest once commenced, however, can never be ended but by the triumph of the right In this examination of the early history of our country, we have reached a period in which the mental conflict pre ceding the War of the Eevolution must be sharper, and bet ter defined. Our duty is to trace the progress of this war of principle, so far as to determine the character of the effective power which presided over the contest, and finally controlled the result. isi 152 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. THE RIGHT OF SOIL. Upon the ground of pre-occupation, this would seem to have been in the Indian tribes. It is, however, to be con sidered that these wandering savages were, to a large extent, unsettled. In sorae instances, and in particular localities, they were sufficiently permanent to establish their claim. In every such case, the white people, whether English or Spanish or French, were bound to obtain the right of settle ment by fair negotiation, or pass on to other parts of the great continent, where it was possible to found their claims in justice. In every instance, God opened the way of those who, like Oglethorpe and Penn and Williams, endeavored to deal fairly with the natives ; but in the bloody wars which followed the summary processes of intruders, and those which resulted frora open robbery, or angry attadks of either party, an account of responsibility ran up of which Infinite Wisdora alone could judge, and which Infinite Justice alone can finaUy settle.* It is here, however, due to state, that it cost our ancestors incredible suffering, and raany precious lives, to establish their right to live where the Indians had roaraed. It is not necessary for us to trace these desolating Indian wars at length. They were only preliminary to the severe struggles which the colonists were compelled to pass through with the mother-country on the same ground. These were really moral rather than physical battles. But when the savages resigned their hunting-grounds to the steady advance of civUization, or bargained them away to the colonists, to whom did they belong ? The government answered, " They are the property of the crown." Indeed, as we have already seen, they were claimed originally by right of discovery. One after another, the square mUes of our continent, extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific, were " granted " away for certain defined or undefined immunities yet to be realized by the monarch, but extending indefinitely into the future. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 153 Proprietaries and companies, with enormous privileges, might hold the land under the Crown ; but their rights could be reversed, and concessions revoked, at the pleasure of the king. This involved the comfort and rights of the settlers ; for they gradually obtained privileges from these grand monopolies, which were valuable. Under various acts of spontaneous legislation, and by capricious acts of the mon arch, there grew up a feeling of ownership in the soil, upon the part of individuals ; and the people would first contend with the proprietaries and companies against the crown, and then against all monopolists, for the right to own the lands which they had rescued from the forests, and with incredible toil brought under cultivation, and thus given them their real value. . One of these famous contests came on in 1623 between James and the London Company. As the shares were un productive, it revealed only a very doubtful property-interest; but it brought out a spirit of political independence, which surprised the king, and which became the true reason for the destruction of the company. The king could not suppress the freedom of debate in the company, nor control the elec tions. He would, therefore, demand the surrender of their charter. This they stubbornly refused, undertaking to secure private and corporate rights against a despotic government ; but it was of no avaU. Pretexts could be found in the mis management of the company in Virginia. Commissioners appeared there to investigate the acts of alleged malefeasance. And now the Virginians appear to assert property-rights, which had never been argued before the crown. There were wrongs which they would like to have redressed, but not by the destruction of the fundamental rights under which they claimed to own their estates. The company went down by royal decree ; but the new power just coming into notice in the colony could not be so easily disposed of E,spionage, king-craft, and intimidations were alike unavaiUng. Liberty had taken deep root in this virgin soil. As easily might his 154 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Majesty tear up the giant trees of the American forests as to eradicate it The Assembly convened under this very charter would vindicate the rights of property " against arbi trary taxation " at all hazards. Not an inch would they yield to despotic exactions. " The governor shall not lay any taxes or ympositions upon the colony, their lands, or commodities, other way than by authority of the General Assembly, to be levyed and ymployed as the said Assembly shall appoynt." Now, the origin of this controversy was farther back. If these colonists had a right, as individuals, to the soil on which they lived, if the right of discovery was not ^ right to mo nopolize the continent, then the king, in granting patents to adventurers, had no right to pre-empt this vast domain, and exclude, at pleasure, the individuals and famihes who were to reclaim it from the wild beasts. Then they were men, and not merely loyal subjects of the king; and their right to the soil came through a great law of the Creator to which kings as well as people are subject Then an attempt to govern them as mere tenants at will, or dispose bf the avails of their industry as serfs, was oppressive ; and, when the Virginians stood up inflexibly against it, they began to assert the rights which man had assailed, and which God would defend. This was the opening battle in the war of independence, and the colonists triumphed. The Plymouth Colony could obtain no " royal patent ; yet their claim to their land was valid, according to the principles of English law as well as natural justice." * One after another, the colonies set up the rights which belong only to freeholders. Companies, as the profits of their investments were exceedingly small, and the balance was not unfrequently against them, were more easily shaken off than the king. The value of proprietary estates was seen to be in the increase of the population, and the con tentment and thrift of the people : hence extravagant de- * Bancroft, i. 320. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 155 mands became unprofitable, and concessions to settlers were steadily accumulating in the form of vested rights. . The transfer of the official residences and headquarters from Eng land to Massachusetts was one of the great steps indicating progress .in the right direction. But on the 23d of July, 1664, his Majesty's commissioners arrived; and they would assume control over this question of the right of soil, and all other questions. " The lands " claimed by the settlers in Massachusetts, the royalists said, "belonged to Eobert Gorges;" but these Puritan intruders had " made themselves a free people." " The right of England to the soil, under the pretence of discovery, they derided as a Popish doctrine, derived from Alexander VI. ; and they pleaded, as of more avaU, their just occupation, and their purchase from the natives ;" " and, as the establishment of a commission with discretionary powers was not specially sanctioned by their charter, they resolved to resist the orders of the king, and nullify his commission." * In 1672, Carteret began to think it time to collect his quit-rents of half a penny an acre from the New-Jersey Puri tans ; but they resisted the lawyers with the very primitive doctrine, that " the heathen, as the lineal descendants of Noah, had a rightful claim to their lands." They chose, therefore, to get their titles from the Indians, refuse to pay their " quit- rents " to parties who never had lawfully owned the soU, and, by act of assembly, to drive away " Mr. Carteret," and keep him away, until he could leam not to speak of " quit-rents " for " the lands belonging of right to New-Jersey freemen." These are specimens of the contest which arose inevitably in this virgin land. Titles acquired from the natives by honest contract, or acquired under the priraal laws of dis covery and occupation by hardy Christian enterprise, or obtained by concessions -wrung from proprietaries, compa nies, or the crown, as the result of firmness in asserting the right, were so many victories in the great mind-struggle which preceded the wars of the Eevolution. • Bancroft, ii. 79. 156 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. THE BIGHTS OP TRADE. As soon as the feeble colonists began to discover native products which could be converted into articles of traffic, or to produce from the soU a Uttle corn and tobacco, companies and proprietaries began to dictate the laws of trade, exact revenue, and establish grand monopolies, the tendency of which was to impoverish the settlers, and enrich the govern ing classes. When, therefore, the spirit of Virginians rose sufficiently high to say, " For the encouragement of men to plant store of corn, the price shall not be restricted, but it shall be free for every man to sell it as deare as he can," they used brave words, which contained the fundamental principle of free and successful trade. In 1622, the comraerce of New England began to attract attention. These Puritans were likely to have advantages, which, in the judgraent of men " at home," from whose op pression they had fled, were of very questionable right. " In the second year after the settlement of Plyraouth, five and thirty sail of vessels went to fish on the coasts of New Eng land, and raade good voyages. The monopolists appealed to King Jaraes; and the monarch, preferring to assert his own extended prerogatives rather than to regard the spirit of the House of Commons, issued a proclamation which forbade any to approach the northern coast of America, except with the special leave of the Company of Plymouth or of the Privy CouncU. It was monstrous thus to attempt to seal up a large portion of an immense continent" * "VViU the at> tempt succeed ? " Your patent," said Sir Edward Coke to Gorges, " contains many particulars contrary to the laws and privUeges of the subject : it is a monopoly, and the ends of private gain are concealed under color of planting a colony. Shall none visit the seacoast for fishing ? This is to make a monopoly upon the seas, which wont to be free. If you alone are to pack and dry fish, you attempt a monopoly of the wind and the sun." It was in vain for Sir George Calvert to * Bancroft, i. 325. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. I57 growl, " The fishermen hinder the plantations ; they choke the harbors with their ballast, and waste the forests by im provident use." The Commons were determined. The biU repealing this odious patent " passed without amendment" James refused his assent; but neither that nor his royal orders already quoted availed any thing. Both patent and orders went down with the monopoly of the company in a struggle with a handful of Pilgrims representing the principles of eternal justice. In 1642, the Virginians come up to this question again. Under the administration of Sir William Berkeley, they assert their rights in the clearest and most dignified language. " Freedom of trade," they insist, " is the blood and life of a commonwealth." Spain and Portugal were greedy of the profits X)f trade ; and, based upon the enterprise of discovery, sanctioned by the authority of Eome, they resolved upon a monopoly of the commerce of the world, and " denounced the severest penalties " against those who should dare to intrude. God, however, made use of the commercial freedom of Holland to antagonize this usurpation, and wrest from the usurpers the dominion of the seas. Then the Dutch, in their turn, became the commercial monopolists of Europe. England rose up to dispute this sovereignty of the ocean. Cromwell resisted Holland, and established the fa mous Navigation Act He was friendly to the colonies ; and, intending to make America the great commercial inter est of the commonwealth, he accorded to her the unrestricted sale of her great staple in all the markets of the world. Monarchy restored returned immediately to its old pas sion for revenues, and determined upon monopolies of Amer ican trade, and especially of the tobacco-trade, as the means of accomplishing the purpose. Charles "invoked the au thority of the Star Chamber to assist in fiUing his exchequer by new and onerous duties on tobacco." He sent commis sioners to buy up the whole crop. The colonists dared to 158 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. resist; and he would try other proclamations, restricting the markets to London, deterrained in some way, by " his wiU and pleasure, to have the ,sole pre-emption of all tobacco." Whenever it seemed necessary, for the time being, to con sent to the measures which sought to forge commercial fet ters for the colonists, it was done with such caution as to give no historical advantage to tyranny. In 1663, " the importation of European commodities into the colonies, except in English ships from England," was pro hibited by a stringent law. Even exchanges between New England and the Southern colonies were prohibited ; and duties were levied upon little articles of traffic between these future States, the same as ou foreign goods. Americans were forbidden to manufacture articles which would compete with England ; and this odious system of monopoly was fortified by all the cruelty, that ingenuity could crowd into at least " twenty-nine acts of Parliament" The contest must, therefore, go on. The right to cripple and virtually destroy American trade, so fiercely asserted, was just as persistently denied, until the battles of mind resulted in blood. THE RIGHT OP REPRESENTATION AND FREE LEGISLATION. We have seen that one of the first instincts of colonists, whether under the patronage of England, or refugees from her tyranny, was to provide laws for the protection of per sonal and social rights, and the preservation of public order. This necessity, at first acquiesced in by aU parties, at length became a question of vigorously-contested prerogative. In 1621, Virginia received through Sir George Yeardley a written constitution for " the great comfort and benefit of the people, and the prevention of injustice, grievances, and oppression;" and " the system of representative govern ment, and trial by jury, thus became in New Hemisphere an acknowledged right" This concession was, however, only A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 159 indirectly from the crown, and would be recalled whenever the caprice of tyranny suggested it Virginia, however, would and did make her own laws. " There is more likelihood," she said distinctly in the ears of power, " that such as are acquainted with the clime and its accidents may upon better grounds prescribe our advan tages than such as shall sit at the helm in England." Maryland, one day in advance of Virginia, in the house of Eobert Sly, claimed through her lawful representatives the right of independent legislation. , The other colonies of the Southern group followed in the train. Severe contests arose ; but the future Eepublic never retraced her steps. The Pilgrims, as we have seen, asserted their right of self- government in " The Mayflower." This right they never surrendered. " The Bay State " resisted every encroach ment upon her fundamental rights, and, in 1634, enacted " the test oath," requiring from every freeman sworn alle giance, " not to King Charles, but to Massachusetts." No charter granting prerogatives of government could as yet be obtained. The Plymouth colonists would like to have it, would try hard, and expend much money in an attempt to get it ; but, if they failed, they would surrender no right, and omit no act necessary to vindicate the righteous prerog atives of God's freemen. " Eelying upon their original compact, the colonists gradu ally assumed all the prerogatives of government ; even the power, after some hesitation, of capital punishment. No less than eight capital offences are enumerated in the first Plym outh code, including treason or rebellion against the colony, and ' solemn compaction or conversing with the Devil.' Trial by jury was ^arly introduced ; but the punishments to be in flicted on minor offences remained, for the most part, discre tionary. For eighteen years, all laws were enacted in gen eral assembly of aU the colonists. The governor chosen annually was but president of a councU, in which he had 160 TBM GREAT REPUBLIC. a double vote. It consisted first of one, then of five, and finally of seven councillors, called ' assistants.' So Uttle were political honors coveted at New Plymouth, that it became necessary to inflict a fine upon such as, being chosen, declined to serve as governor or assistant. None, however, were to be obliged to serve for two years in succession." * New Hampshire asserted the rights of self-government, and with great boldiless defied the measures of power. By the people on the Island of Ehode Island, it was " unanimously agreed upon that the government which this body politic doth attend, unto in this island, and the jurisdic tion thereof in favor of our province, is a democracie of popular government ; that is to say, it is the power of the body of freemen orderly assembled, or major part of them, to make or constitute just lawes by which they will be regu lated, and to depute from among themselves such ministers as shall see them faithfully executed between man and man." In November, 1681, there was a legislature of true repre sentatives of the honest people in West New Jersey ; " of men who said thee and thou, and wore their hats in presence of beggar or king." " They framed their government on the basis of humanity. Neither faith nor wealth nor race was respected. They met in the wUderness as men, and founded society on equal rights." t New York, in public assembly held in 1683, said, " Supreme legislative power shaU forever be and reside in the governor, council, and people met in general assembly." Pennsylvania in 1693, in contest with Fletcher, governor under WiUiam and Mary, would not aUow that their legisla tive acts required even " the great seal of the proprietary." " We know the laws to be our laws," the " poor men " who "represented the people" said; "and we are in the enjoy ment of them. The sealing does not make the law, but the consent of governor, councU, and assembly." * Hildreth, i. 175. f Bancroft, ii. 360. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 161 Thus one colony after another took up the same position in effect ; and the Northern group also became a unit in af firming the right of the people to make laws for themselves. The statutes of freedom, rising directly up from Nature, defining practical justice according to the subtle, all-pervad ing public sense, in distinction from the sophistries of learned dishonesty, became the materials of State governments, and, at length, of the fundamental constitution of the Great Ee public. THE RIGHT OF TAXATION. The home government assumed the right to tax the American colonists wholly in the interests of the crown, allowing them no representation in Parliament This was the grand question at issue : Had the government of Eng land the right to judge for the people of America, with out information direct from them, what they ought to pay ? Was the king in council the lord paramount of the colonies, so that he could, at discretion, appropriate such avails of the labor of men, virtually expatriated, as he chose? The American people said, "No. Taxation with out representation is oppression. We cannot, will not, submit to it." At first, this seemed to England a mere freak of these colo nists ; an indication that indulgence had produced haughti ness, and contempt of authority ; and it was deemed only a question of convenience how far this should be indulged, and when it should be effectually put down. But gradually it assumed the proportions of a grave issue, and became a question of principle, which could not be determined by mere prerogative. As early as 1624, the voice of Virginia, as we have seen in another connection, was clear and firm upon this ques tion. Let her words of independent manhood be repeated : " The governor shall not lay any tax or ympositions upon the colony, their lands or commodities, otherway than by 252 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. the authoritie of the General Assembly, to be levyed and ymployed as the said Assembly shall appoynt." Mark the la,nguage. "The governor shall not." No weak petition, no words of imploring suffering, but words of authority, bringing out thus early the feeling of sovereignty in the colonists, destined to appear in the world's future as a new function of our common manhood. In 1634, this contest began to assume distinctness in Massachusetts. The mUd and liberal Winthrop, cautiously representing the crown, finaUy suggested that the power in question resided in the " assistants." But no influence could aUay the spirit of personal independence which Providence intended to develop. Officers were not masters in America ; certainly not upon questions of civil rights so sacred as those which then pressed upon the hearts of New England's bravest, noblest men. " The people established a reformation of such things as they judged to be amiss in the government;" and, among other things, a " law against arbitrary taxation " was passed. "None but the immediate representatives of the people might dispose of lands, or raise money. Thus early did Massachusetts echo the voice of Virginia, like the moun tains replying to the thunder, or like deep calling unto deep." * In 1683, New York, in her first free Assembly under English rule, responded to Virginia and Massachusetts in the same clear, ringing notes of freedom, " No tax shall be assessed, on any pretence whatever, but by the consent of the Assembly." " It were madness," cried out the Quakers of West New Jersey against the Duke of York, " to leave a free country to plant a wUderness, and give another person an absolute right to tax us at will. The King of England cannot take his subjects' goods without their consent." Let this controversy go on for a quarter of a century, tiU * Bancroft, i. 367. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 163 royalty returns from its banishment, and Puritanism in Eng land is reduced to cruel subjection amid the death-throes of liberty, and what will then be the condition of the contest in the New World ? Then, it is presumed, prerogatives may be absolute in New England. Parliament formally assumed it ; and the subsidy of " five per cent on all merchandise exported from or imported into the kingdom of England," or " any of his Majesty's dominions thereunto belonging," granted to Charles II., was made by express definition to apply to the American colonies. But the king could by no possible means obtain his five- per-cent subsidy from America. The temper of the people would not allow it It was unlawful. The colonies were not bound by any act of Parliament, unless expressly named ; and it was useless to levy the tax. Nor would a hundred-years' conflict subdue American resistance to such high-handed injustice. The final decis ion was in Boston Harbor, where the resistance of the people to "taxation without representation" dashed the cargo of tea into the ocean. The people of these colonies could listen to the growl and murmur of power ; they could bleed, and, if need be, die, in defence of their rights : but they could by no means bow down their necks to the yoke of oppression. God had sent them to America for an entirely different purpose. THE BIGHT OP FREE SPEECH, A FREE BALLOT, AND A FREE PRESS. The time had come when " the freemen of every town in the Bay State were busy in inquiring into their liberties and privUeges." Said the representative of royal prerogative, " Elections cannot be safe there long ; " but the people an swered by publishing boldly their understanding of human rights, and going on with the " elections." The Enghsh Government began to realize that to enforce the high prerogatives of the crown in America would re quire absolute and continuous subjugation. This was no 154 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. trifle ; and the men in power roused themselves to a more vigorous and determined effort " The general patent of New England was surrendered " by royalists " to the king." The Plymouth Colony, greatly desiring release from the overshadowing influence of her powerful neighbor, determined to secure of the king "a confirmation of their respective grants," and a repeal of the Massachusetts patent The cOrapany was arraigned before the court Terrible persecutions followed. The malicious cruelty of the infamous Laud condemned men to the most horrible mutUations for the crime of longing to be free. Wentworth stirred up the resentment of power firmly resisted. " The very genius of that nation of people," he said, " leads them always to oppose, both civilly and ecclesi astically, all that ever authority ordains for them." The faithful Prynne stood before the bar of tyranny a second time for daring to write and speak, to print and publish, his principles. " I thought," said Lord Finch, " that Prynne had lost his ears already ; but there is something left yet : " and an officer of the court displayed the mutilated organs. "I pray to God," rephed Prynne, " you may have ears to hear me. Christians," said he, as he presented the stumps of his ears to be grubbed out by the hangman's knife, " stand fast, be faithful to God and your country, or you will bring on yourselves and your chUdren perpetual slavery." This was the noblest heroism, the highest moral grandeur. The spirit of the martyrs was in this life-and-death struggle for liberty. Its friends were " enforced by heaps to desert their native country. Nothing but the wide ocean, and the savage des erts of America, could hide and shelter them from the fury of the bishops." But even this poor resort was soon denied, and Puritan sufferers were forbidden the right of expatria tion. In the mean time, two grand movements in New England revealed the presence and active power of Providence in behalf of liberty. The people were about to exercise their A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 165 rights in an election. Conservatism was alarmed. The de termined Cotton delivered a sermon to the masses of assem bled freemen " against rotation in office." But the people boldly advanced ; and now for the first time the ballot-box, the palladium of American liberty, appeared. It was hence forth to be the grand reliance of the people, and must and should be free. By the side of the ballot a free press promptly arranged itself It began to sound out its notes of liberty in 1639, and no power on earth could thenceforth silence or destroy it Let us see what further these feeble colonists will do. In firm and dignified language they will attempt remonstrance against the cruel tyranny which seeks to deprive them of vested rights, and cautiously warn the king by foreshadow ing the probable future. " If the patent bc taken from us, the common people will conceive that his Majesty hath cast them ofl^ and that hereby they are freed from their allegiance and subjection, and therefore will be ready to confederate themselves under a new government for their necessary safety and subsistence, which will be of dangerous example unto other plantations, and perilous to ourselves of incurring his Majesty's displeasure." But God interposed. Before this remonstrance reached the throne, the Scots had risen against Eomish prayers and the superstitions of Prelacy. The monarch went down, and the colonists had twenty years of neglect in which to grow. " Twenty-one thousand two hundred " emigrants had reached New England before the Long Parliament. They had come in " two hundred and ninety-eight ships," " and the cost of the plantations had been almost a million of dollars." "In a httle more than ten years, fifty towns and viUages had been planted; between thirty and forty churches buUt; and strangers, as they gazed, could not but acknowl edge God's blessing on the endeavors of the planters." * The liberty embodied in the commonwealth could not well * Bancroft, i. 415. 156 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. avoid extending its influence to the New World. In March, 1643, in response to the petitions of the colony presented by Hugh Peters and his two coUeagues, as special messengers, charged with the general duty of vindicating colonial rights, the House of Commons publicly acknowledged that "the plantations in New England had, by the blessing of the Almighty, had good and prosperous success, without any public charge to the parent State ; " " and their imports and exports were freed from all taxation " " until the House of Comraons shall take action to the contrary." For the time being, the people breathed more freely. The blessings of firmness in the defence of the right were begin ning to appear, and liberty must gather strength for the terrific battles yet to come. American freemen would, when ever emergency required, show that the elective franchise was, with them, no merely nominal thing. By choosing for important responsibilities "men of the inferior sort," and rejecting every man nominated by an aristocratic caucus, the people of Boston took occasion to teach the magis trates that they were not to receive dictation from power, even amongst themselves. The freedom of the ballot, free speech, and a free press, had becorae so dear to the people, that they would be guarded by the most vigUant care, and defended at all hazards. They were the very soul of Amer ican liberty. In 1683, the people of New York in a free Assembly said, " Every freeholder and freeman shall vote for representatives without restraint; no freeman shall suffer but by judgraent of his peers ; and aU trials shall be by a jury of twelve men." Said the Quakers of West New Jersey, " The General Assembly shaU be chosen, not by the confused way of cries and voices, but by the balloting-box. Every man is capable to choose or be chosen. We lay a founda tion for after-ages to understand their liberty as Christians and as men, that they may not be brought into bondage but by their own consent; for we put the power in the PEOPLE." A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 167 THE RIGHT OF CONSTITUTIONAL LIBERTY, AND OP UNION FOR THB COMMON DEFENCE. D uring the early history of the American colonies, the pen had been busy. In every settlement, there were documents and records, which, in strong rhetoric and stern logic, defined the rights of the people. These gradually combined in the forms of fundamental law; and the era of constitutions came on. In May, 1635, " to limit the direction of the Executive, the people demanded a written constitution ; and a commis sion was appointed " " to frame a body of grounds of laws in resemblance to a Magna Charta," " to serve as a bill of rights. The ministers, as well as the General Court, were to pass judgment upon the work." Cotton would lead the people to seek their model in " the laws from God to Moses." Ee ligion controlled every thing ; and this stern old Puritan di vine wrote to his " friends in Holland," " The order of the churches and the commonwealth is now so settled in New England by common consent, that it brings to mind the new heaven and new earth wherein dwells righteousness." The era of neglect, and consequent unparalleled prosperity, which preceded the Eestoration, the people thought favorable for giving more definite constitutional form to a " body of Uberties." The magistrates, who had acquired a love of power, hardly saw the necessity for it ; but the people saw it, and Cotton had already prepared what he thought would serve the purpose, and probably prevent something more radical and disloyal, fortifying every part of it with texts of Scripture. But to Nathaniel Ward of Ipswich belongs the honor of framing " the fundamental code," which combined " the hu mane doctrines of the common law with the principles of natural right and equity, as deduced from the Bible." "After mature deliberation, this ' model,' which, for its comprehen siveness, may vie with any simUar record from the days of 168 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Magna Charta, was adopted in December, 1641, as 'The Body of Liberties ' of the Massachusetts Colony." This was a representative government, including in gen eral and in detail nearly aU the great essential rights of free men. These Puritan minds were, however, yet a little hazy on the subjects of slavery and religious toleration. " There shall never be any bond-slaverie, villanage, or captivitie amongst us, unless it be lawful captives taken in just warres, and such strangers as willingly selle themselves or are sold to us; and these shall have aU the liberties and Christian usages which the law of God, established in Israel concerning such persons, doth morally require. This exempts none from servitude who shaU be judged by authoritie" "If any man stealeth a man or mankind, he shall surely be put to death." Witchcraft was classed with blasphemy, and provided with the punishment ordered in the laws of Moses. The crimes now recognized in civilized countries as capital offences, and several in addition, were punishable with death. The practice and forms of religion were free to the virtu ous and orthodox. Thus fairly commenced the formal assertion of constitu tional rights, which would be repeated by different colonies and combinations, until the celebrated Articles of Confedera tion issued from an American Congress, and finally the noble Constitution of the United States of America came from the people in representative convention assembled at the close of the Eevolutionary War. The year 1643 marks an important epoch in the progress of American Uberty. The desire for union amongst the colonies, which had been seeking expression since the Pequod War in 1637, assumed definite form. "The united colonies of New England " were " made all as one." The alleged motives for the confederacy were " protection against the encroachments of the Dutch and the French, security against the tribes of savages," and " the liberties of the gospel in purity and peace." A DISINTHRAI,LED NATIONAL LIFE. 169 Connecticut, jealous of the leadership of Massachusetts, demanded for each State a negative on the acts of the con federation. Massachusetts refused ; and Connecticut was driven, by fear of the Dutch, to waive her doctrine of State rights. Plymouth Colony led the way in determining that the acts of the confederation should have no force until they were " confirmed by a majority of the people." This first form of the Union included " the colonies and separate governments of Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecti cut, and New Haven." The guidance of Providence thus early appeared in the growth and elevation of national ideas. They were ap parently the result of increasing illumination on the great subjects of human rights and despotic assumptions, and of a common danger of rivals and enemies in the immediate neighborhood of the colonies. But, if the wisest men of the times foresaw but dimly that another much more formidable necessity for union would arise, God, under whose direc tion the nation was forming, saw that coming necessity clearly, and provided for it. It is natural to ask why the plantations of Providence and Ehode Island were not admitted into this confederacy. The answer, we presume, ought to be substantially that assigned for not taking in the people beyond the Piscata qua : " They ran a different course, both in their ministry and civil administration." They would not be Puritans. The old prejudice against Eoger Williams is very evident. The Puritans had too high a sense of the sacredness of their orthodoxy to seem to indorse the grievous heresies of Provi dence by political association with them. The Island of Ehode Island could not be admitted, ostensibly because the friends of Anne Hutchinson had refused the jurisdiction of Plymouth. If there was a deeper reason, it was probably in the fact that they were nonconformists with respect to the Church of the Puritans. These facts are due here, notwithstanding their exposure 22 170 THE GREAT REPUBLIC, of the pitiable narrowness of the governing minds of the Massachusetts Colony, that our readers may see how pro found were the religious convictions which formed the foundation of our national organizations. The erroneous application of these convictions does not impair their his torical verity or importance. It is easy for us to see, that, without thera, no part of our peculiar national organization would have been possible. This New-England union, imperfect as it was, and reveal ing alarmingly as it did the stern antagonisms of National and State rights, was nevertheless of great importance, as the bold assumption of the right of union for the comraon defence. This, in the eyes of English despotism, was con spiracy and constructive treason ; but, under the control of God, it was a prudent advance in the career of republi can liberty, the beginning of national organization. Like every other essential right, when once asserted by the American people, it was to be steadily maintained until it should be triumphantly vindicated and formally acknowl edged by the civilized world. A broader representation of the people took place in New York in 1690. Delegates from Massachusetts, Plym outh, Connecticut, and New York, met, in response to a call from the General Court of Massachusetts, to agree upon plans for the invasion of Canada. "And it is worthy of reraark, that the Massachusetts- Government, which made the call, was the government which sprang up between the overthrow of Andros and the arrival of the new charter, and in which the popular element w^as more freely mingled ; and the New- York Government, which accepted it, was the government of Leisler, which sprang directly from an up rising of the people. Thus the earliest utterance of the people's voice was a caU for union ; " * but this union was for war. As we have before seen, another and highly important * Greene's Historical View of the American Revolution, pp. 69, 70, et seq. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 171 congress assembled in Albany on the 19th of June, 1754. To the colonies of New England and New York were now added those of Pennsylvania and Maryland. Twenty-five delegates, representing seven colonies, met, " ostensibly to renew the treaty with the six nations, really to take counsel together about a plan of union and confederacy." Benjamin Franklin appears among the distinguished men of this Congress. His calm deliberation and keen insight had discovered the necessity for union, and a plan for its consummation. The idea of independence was held in abey ance for the present ; but the union of men and means for common security seemed to many as no more than the dic tate of common prudence. The extreme difficulty of the undertaking soon appeared; for after the perplexing labors of the Congress had brought out its best ideas in the form of a virtual though not osten sible constitution, the provincial assemblies condemned it as having "too much of the prerogative in it." England condemned it for a reason exactly opposite, — it had " too much of the democracy." The great purpose of the Con gress failed ; but the moral effect was of the highest im portance. The facts and principles brought out by this comparison of views could never go out of existence. Through their representative men, they became the common property of the colonies, and greatly strengthened the pur pose to preserve with inviolable fidelity the liberties of the people, while all just demands of the crown were to be loy ally met The feeling of the necessity of unity became stronger as the danger became more threatening. " War was at the door ; war on the seaboard ; war all along their northern and their western frontier." In 1765, the Massachusetts House of Eepresentatives saw the stamp act impending, and resolved to ask counsel from the other colonies. In a circular, Samuel White, their speaker, invited their several assemblies " to appoint committees to meet in the city of New York, on the first Tuesday in Octo- 172 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ber next, to consult together on the present circumstances of the colonies, and the difficulties to which they are and must be reduced by the operation of the acts of Parliament for levying duties on the colonies ; and to consider of a gen eral and united, dutiful, loyal, and humble representation of their condition to his Majesty and the Parliament; and to implore relief" Nine colonies were now represented by twenty-seven dele gates, who met in the city of New York on the 7th of Octo ber, in obedience to the call of Massachusetts. " Then James Otis first took John Dickinson by the hand." " Then Lynch and Gadsden and John Eutledge of South Carolina first sat on the same bench with Thomas McKean and Caesar Eodney, of the counties that were to become Delaware ; and Philip Livingston of New York, and Dyer of Connecticut, to com pare feelings and wishes, as ten years later, when the horizon, now so dark, was already glowing with the swift approach of day, they were to meet and compare them again." * It was a great achievement for liberty to bring such men together. The result of this Congress was a petition to the king in language profoundly respectful, but firm and dignified; a petition to Parliament equally calm, but with more freedom of expression ; and " a declaration of rights and grievances " to the people of England and America, " claiming the right of taxing themselves, either personally or by representatives of their own choosing, the right of trial by jury, and the right of petition." f These were all State-papers of very great merit, showing that God had prepared rainds of the clearest discrimination and highest culture to lead the struggle for American lib erty. The Congress of 1765 accomphshed its mission. It had given clear definition and great enlargement and assur- rance to its statesmen, and, through thera, to the people gen erally. It had also ascertained and increased the providen tial unity and the true patriotism which would decide the * Greene, p. 75. f Ibid., p. 77. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 173 contest. There was henceforth no necessity that the British nation should misunderstand the issues between them and their American colonies. No right-minded man could fail to see that simple justice would secure perpetual and devoted loyalty; persistent oppression, revolution. ALL THESE RIGHTS DENIED, BUT NEVER SURRENDERED. Let us examine more minutely the sharpest points of this battle of mind with mind. A crisis of the gravest impor tance came on. The Long Parliament was in power, and, in a famous case, had assumed "the right to reverse the decisions and control the government of Massachusetts." This was the grand question of the age, and the Puritans in America were instantly roused. Neither parliament nor king should be allowed this style of sovereignty. The commonwealth of England was Puritan ; but she must not usurp authority over the Puritans of New England. Cromwell was kind and plausible. He wished them to sur render their charter, and would give them another, broader, better, than the old. But these Americans were shrewd and far-seeing. The Stuarts might return to the throne ; and to yield the charter now would be to be without it then. Policy in England had to grapple with a statesmanship in the New World which was amazing to men in power. " An order from England," thundered liberty across the waters, " is preju dicial to our chartered liberties, and to our well-being in this remote part of the world. We have not admitted appeals to your authority; being assured they cannot stand with the hberty and power granted by our charter, and would be destructive to all government The wisdom and experience of that great council, the English Parliament, are more able to prescribe rules of government, and judge causes, than such poor rustics as a wUderness can breed up ; yet the vast distance between England and these parts abates the virtue of the strongest influences. Your counsels and your judg- 174 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ments can neither be so well grounded, nor so seasonably applied, as might either be useful to us, or safe for yourselves, in your discharge, in the great day of account If any mis carriage shall befaU us when we have the government in our own hands, the State of England shall not answer for it" What words are these for "such poor rustics" to use! But, members of Parliament, it will be safer for you to heed them. You are going to the judgment : do you hear ? Yes ; and we yield. " We encourage no appeals from your justice. We leave you with all the freedom and latitude that may, in any respect, be duly claimed by you." Thus another grand crisis had passed. The Stuarts did indeed return, and with them their heredi tary dread of liberty, and love of irresponsible power; and soon a formal and obstinate assertion of legislative suprem acy over the colonies commenced. Charles II. was acknowledged in Massachusetts ; but a weak and dissolute man had no power to understand the value of growing colonies, fostered by parental care, and their loyalty consecrated by freedom. He must immedi ately take measures to raake these ambitious, headstrong Puritans feel the force of kingly prerogatives. The four colonies, he believed, had united for the express " purpose of throwing off dependence on England." Eoyal commis sioners were soon on their way to bring these rebels under due subjection. The people took the alarm, and moved promptly for the protection of their invaluable rights. "The patent" was intrusted to prudent hands, and was soon safe from the clutches of tyranny. An appeal was made to God, in hum ble fasting and prayer, for the protection of liberty. On the 23d of July, 1664, the fleet arrived in Boston Har bor, ostensibly to subdue the Dutch, but reaUy to sustain the commissioners, who had come "with fuU authority to provide for the peace of the country, according to the royal instructions and their own discretion." A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 175 In anticipation of this formidable usurpation of the crown, the General Court of Massachusetts had with great delibera tion, and under the lead of such men as Bradstreet, Haw thorne, Mather, and Norton, prepared "a declaration of natural and chartered rights." They are " to choose their own governor, deputy-gov ernor, and representatives ; to admit freemen on terms to be prescribed at their own pleasure ; to set up all sorts of offices, superior and inferior, and point out their places ; to exercise by their annually-elected magistrates and deputies all power and authority, legislative, executive, and judicial ; to defend themselves by force of arms against every aggres sion ; and to reject, as an infringement oT their right, any parhamentary or royal imposition prejudicial to the country, and contrary to any just act of colonial legislation." These were no idle words. They were solemnly uttered and recorded, never to be revoked. The commissioners were received with studied coolness; and there was no more certain method of securing the contempt and ridicule of the people than to show them any attention, or even to be found wUlingly in their company ; while the remonstrance of the people to the king was in a style of stern directness and dignified statesmanship which must have made the capri cious despot tremple on his throne. Eead it : — "Dread Sovereign, — the first undertakers of this planta tion did obtain a patent, wherein is granted full and absolute power of governing all the people of this place by men chosen from among themselves, and according to such laws as they should see meet to establish. A royal donation, under the great seal, is the greatest security that may be had in human affairs. Under the encouragement and security of the royal charter, this people did, at their own charges, trans port themselves, their wives and families, over the ocean, purchase the land of the natives, and plant this colony, with great labor, hazards, cost, and difficulties ; for a long time 176 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. wresthng with the wants of a wilderness, and the burdens of anew plantation; having also now about thirty years en joyed the privUege of government within themselves, as their undoubted right in the sight of God and man. To be governed by rulers of our own choosing, and lawes of our own, is the fundamental privUege of our patent. " A commission under the great seal, wherein four persons (one of them our professed enemy) are empowered to re ceive and determine all complaints and appeals according to their discretion, subjects us to the arbitrary power of stran gers, and will end in the subversion of our all. " If these things go on, your subjects here will either be forced to seeke new dwellings, or sink under intolerable burdens. The vigor of all new endeavors will be enfeebled ; the king himself wiU be a loser of the wonted benefit by customs exported and imported from hence into England ; and this hopeful plantation wiU, in the issue, be ruined. " If the aime shall be to gratify some particular gentlemen by livings and revenues here, that will also fail for the poverty of the people. If all the charges of the whole government by the year were put together, and then doubled or trebled, it would not be counted for one of those gentlemen a considerable accommodation. To a coalition in this course the people will never come ; and it will be hard to find another people that will stand under any consider able burden in this country, seeing it is not a country where raen can subsist without hard labor and great frugality. " God knows, our greatest ambition is to live a quiet life in a corner of the world. We came not into this wildernesse to seek great things to ourselves ; and, if any come after us to seeke them heere, they wUl be disappointed. We keep ourselves within our line. A just dependence upon and subjection to your Majestic, according to our charter, it is far from our hearts to disacknowledge. We would gladly do any thing within our power to purchase the continuance of your favorable aspect ; but it is a great unhappiness to A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 177 have no testimony of our loyalty offered but this, — to yield up our liberties, which are far dearer to us than our lives, and which we have wilhngly ventured our lives, and passed through many deaths, to obtain. " It was Job's excellency, when he sat as king among Ins people, that he was a father to the poor. A poor people, destitute of outward favor, wealth, and power, now cry unto their lord the king. May your Majesty regard their cause, and maintain their right ! it wUI stand among the marks of lasting honor to after-generations." * But what were these words of solemn warning and en treaty to a man governed by the most degrading passions, in the midst of sycophant courtiers and flirting courtesans ? The commissioners must go on, and bring under this haughty, rebellious spirit. "There is fear," said the mon arch, " of their breaking from all dependence on this nation." Indeed there is, your Majesty ; and God will use your des potic folly to accomplish the very result which you seek to prevent by absolute power. The commissioners at length determined to bring on a crisis in this controversy. They appointed a court, and summoned the colony to appear as defendant ; but the General Court of the colony " forbade the procedure. The commissioners refused to recede. The morning for the trial dawned : the parties had been summoned ; the commissioners were pre paring to proceed with the cause ; when, by order of the court, a herald stepped forth, and, having sounded the trum pet with due solemnity, made a public proclamation, in the name of the king and by authority of the charter, declaring to all the people of the colony, that in observance of their duty to God, to the king, and to their constituents, the Gen eral Court could not suffer any to abet his Majesty's honor able commissioners in their proceeding." t This was the first overt act of the Eevolution, which would * Bancroft, ii. 80, 81. t Idem, ii. 85. 23 178 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. require a hundred years to render lucid, forraidable, and ef fective. The king's letter rebuking the disloyalty of Massa chusetts was to be considered. The General Court was con vened, and the morning was spent in prayer. Six elders solemnly appealed to God for help in this great crisis. Sun dry persons appeared disposed to yield to the king, whose dis pleasure they greatly feared. " We raust as well consider God's displeasure as the king's," said Willoughby. " Prerogative is as necessary as law," pleaded the friends of loyalty. " Pre rogative is not above law," retorted the inflexible Hawthorne. Obedience was refused, and the grand issue once raore settled. Some of the colonies were not, for the present, ready to acqui esce in the resistance of Massachusetts. The people were in a transition state, and would not unhesitatingly follow their leaders. Feeble attempts were made to conciliate the crown ; but the general result was a much closer union, and a firmer advance in the progress of republican freedom. Fortunately for the colonies, the French war with England for final ascendency on this continent now commenced, and America could again grow by neglect Commerce greatly enlarged ; and wealth from Spain and Italy, France and Hol land, began to pour in upon the colonists. Portsmouth raust have been very prosperous, as it could afford "sixty pounds a year to the college," and plenty of "schisraatics to the Church;" whUe New Hampshire abounded "in rebels to the king." New England rose in the elements of prosperity, untU, in 1675, the population was estimated at fifty-five thousand people. But the grand controversy was now to be renewed. Charles II. had at length fully determined upon the destruction of the great charter. " The colony resolved, if it must fall, to faU with dignity. Eeligion had been the motive'of the setr tlement : religion was now its counsellor. The fervors of the most ardent devotion were kindled ; a more than usually solemn form of religious observance was adopted ; a synod of all the churches in Massachusetts was convened to in- A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 179 quire into the causes of the dangers of New-England liberty, and the mode of removing the evils." * Messages, remonstrances, despotic edicts, prayers, and en treaties followed each other. Magistrates, "their brethren the deputies," and the people, deliberated for two weeks prayerfully ; and the final decision carae out in these memora ble words : " Ought the government of Massachusetts submit to the pleasure ofthe court as to alterlltion of their charter? Submission would be an offence against the Majesty of heaven. The religion of the people of New England, and the court's pleasure, cannot consist together. By submission, Massachusetts will gain nothing. The court design an essen tial alteration destructive to the vitals ofthe charter." "We ought not to act contrary to that way in which God hath owned our worthy predecessors, who in 1638, when there was a quo warranto against the charter, durst not submit. In 1664, they did not submit to the commissioners. We, their successors, should walk in their steps, and so trust in the God of our fathers that we shall see his salvation. Sub mission would gratify our adversaries, and grieve our friends. Our enemies know it will sound ill in the world for thera to take away the liberties of a poor people of God in the wil derness. A resignation wiU bring slavery upon us sooner than otherwise it would be, and will grieve our friends in other colonies, whose eyes are now upon New England, ex pecting that the people there wUl not, through fear, give a pernicious example unto others. " Blind obedience to the pleasure of the court cannot be without great sin, and incurring the high displeasure of the King of kings. Submis.sion would be contrary unto that which has been the unanimous advice of the ministers, given after a solemn day of prayer. The ministers of God in New England have more of the spirit of John Baptist in thera, than now, when a storm hath overtaken them, to be reeds shaken with the wind. The priests were to be the first that set their foot in the waters, and there to stand tiU the * Bancroft, ii. 121. 180 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. danger be past. Of aU men, they should be an example, to the Lord's people, of faith, courage, and constancy. Un questionably, if the blessed Cotton, Hooker, Davenport, Mather, Shepherd, MitcheU, were now living, they would, as is evident from their printed books, say, ' Do not sin in giving away the inheritance of your fathers.' " Nor ought we submit without the consent of the body of the people. But the freeraen and church-members through out New England will never consent hereunto : therefore the government may not do it. " The civil liberties of New England are part of the inher itance of their fathers ; and shall we give that inheritance away ? Is it objected that we shall be exposed to great suf ferings ? Better suffer than sin. It is better to trust the God of our fathers than to put confidence in princes. If we suffer because we dare not comply with the wills of men against the will of God, we suffer in a good cause, and shall be accounted martyrs in the next generation and at the great day." Sublime words ! No language can reach a higher moral elevation. The act followed the words as the thunder follows the lightning. " The deputies consent not, but adhere to their former biUs." The charter fell; and there was left for the people no guaranty of their rights but their own inflexible integrity, and the sleepless vigilance of omnipotent justice. ' Let us now turn to the rising State of New York. In 1683, the people in lawful assembly thus define their inalien able rights. Let us read the whole passage from which we have made important extracts for their proper places : « Su preme legislative power shaU forever be and reside in the governor, council, and people met in general assembly. Every freeholder and freeman shaU vote for representation without restraint. No freeman shaU suffer but by judgment of his peers, and aU trials shaU be by a jury of twelve men. No tax shaU be assessed, on any pretence whatever, but by the consent of the Assembly. No seaman or soldier shall be A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 181 quartered on the inhabitants against their will. No martial law shall exist. No person professing faith in God by Jesus Christ shall at any time be anyways disquieted, or ques tioned for any difference of opinion." Leisler and Milborn, too rash in their assertions of freedom, expired on the gal lows; but even the royalist assembly which consented to their execution, finally re-affirmed the rights of freemen in the strong words of the grand old declaration quoted above. Mark also the broad-minded statesmanship of the West- Jersey Quakers. In response to the attempt of the Duke of York to " extort customs of the ships ascending to New Jersey," they say, " The customs imposed by the government of New York are not a burden only, but a wrong. By what right are we thus used ? The King of England cannot take his subjects' goods without their consent. This is a home- born right, declared to be law by diverse statutes." They were heard, and they deserved to be. These people are very meek and harmless apparently ; but let the minions of power tread upon thera here in America, and they will soon feel the recoil of independent manhood. BylUnger assumes the right to nominate their lieutenant- governor ; and what do these Quakers do ? Why, simply change their constitution, bring forward the free ballot, and elect their own governor. They are Americans, not serfs. These may suffice as specimens of the conflict between liberty and prerogative, between the colonies and England, before the bloody war of the Eevolution commenced. It was a contest of intellectual giants in the field of human rights. The victory seemed for a long time undetermined ; but the greatest of all facts in the political history of the world was, that, in a struggle of more than a hundred and fifty years, not a right belonging to freemen could be wrenched from these feeble colonists by any power which despotism could command. This proves incontestably that God himself had assumed control of the great mind-battle in progress on this continent. 182 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. STRUGGLES OF RELIGIOUS AND CIVIL LIBERTY IN AMERICA. We may now recognize the fact, that collisions of mind were going on at the same time within the colonies. It might not be expected that the people would be equally clear in their apprehensions of personal and social rights, nor perfectly harmonious in their ideas of the best method of promoting thera. They would not therefore advance simul taneously toward the result intended by Providence, and which rose up but dimly before them. It would rather be highly probable that there would be many and serious dif ferences among them, and that they would reveal alarming tendencies to anarchy on the one hand, and despotic rule on the other ; while some of the great wrongs of their father land would seek to transfer themselves here, changing only the form and the objects of oppression. We have seen that the irrepressible desire for " freedom to worship God " was the grand impulse which colonized New England, and that God raade use of the stern conscience, the experimental piety, and severe discipline, of Calvinistic Puri tanism, to establish irrevocably, as against the assumptions of English despotism, the right to worship God in spirit and in truth in the New World. We have seen, however, that the Puritan spirit could not, without accessory force, carry forward Christian civUization quite to the point of universal toleration. We shall now see that civU and religious liberty act vitaUy upon each other; that they are so intimately related, that one cannot be perfect without the other. We shall there fore see Puritanism in its transition state, struggling against its own reservations to realize the highest idea of true liberty. This contest wiU reveal the sharpest antagonisms, but steady advance toward the goal of true national liberty and unity. In 1641, the great " model " of a free government ordained that " aU the people of God who were orthodox in judg- A DISINTHRALLED NATIO-NAL LIFE. 183 ment, and not scandalous in life, had full liberty to gather themselves into a church estate, to exercise all the ordi nances of God, and from time to time to elect and ordain all their officers, provided they be able, pious, and ortho dox." The rights of conscience could not be ignored in this grand fundamental document. There must be " liberty," " full liberty ; " but, alas ! it was only for the " orthodox." Thus far, but, for the present, no farther. Five years passed, and very clearly two distinct tenden cies might be traced in the leading New-England colonies, — a disposition to an easier toleration of diverse opinions amongst Americans, and an increased strictness of judgment against the encroachments of England. In 1646, the tone is apologetic, and quite liberal. Jeremy Taylor even, in an argument for liberty, had said, "Anabaptism is as much to be rooted out as any thing that is the greatest pest and nuisance to the public interest." The Puritans say that cer tain wild and turbulent spirits, " whose conscience and reli gion seemed only to set forth themselves, and raise contentions in the country, did provoke us to provide for our safety by a law that all such should take notice how unwelcome they should be unto us, either coming or staying. But for such as differ from us only in judgment, and live peaceably amongst us, — such have no cause to complain ; for it hath never been as yet put in execution against any of them, although such are known to live amongst us." But, on the other hand, it was said, " If the king, or any party from him, should attempt any thing against this com monwealth," it was the common duty " to spend estate and life and all, without scruple, in its defence." " If the Par liament itself should hereafter be of a malignant spirit, then, if the colony have strength sufficient, it may withstand any authority from them to its hurt." This was the precise spirit of the Eevolution ; and the attempt to conciliate nonconform ist colonies aimed directly at the increase of strength in the incipient union, to provide for contingencies thus distinctly 184 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. seen more than a hundred years before the war of blood actually began. Now " great questions about the authority of magistrates and the liberty of the people " come up. The " assistants " had become a little too exacting in the intervals of legisla tive sessions. " You will not be obeyed," said the people by the lips of Hawthorne. Parties began to reveal distinctness of organization. The popular party were jealous of the ministers; for they now favored the magistrates, which seemed to them the party of order. Eliot, however, the Apostle to the Indians, did not hesitate to show his dissent from his brethren, and very boldly came forward in defence of the people. He would have rotation in office, even against the mild and philanthropic Winthrop. The contests which fol lowed revealed " a presbyterial spirit," of which thorough Puritanism was very much afraid. The voice of Winthrop was, as usual, soothing and instructive. " Civil liberty," he said, " is the proper end and object of authority; and we can not subsist without it. It is a liberty to that only which is good, just, and honest This liberty you are to stand for, with the hazard not only of your goods, but, if need be, of your lives. Whatsoever crosseth this is not authority, but a distemper thereof" He "retained the affectionate confi dence of the colony." Liberty of conscience now came again boldly to the front It was impossible that it should be forever in abeyance, shut up, as it had been in Massachusetts, to the simple right to be Congregational Puritans. " Why have not we a right, in this great, free country, to be Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Anabaptists, if we choose ? " some courageous people would say. And the courts began to show liberal tendencies. Winthrop said the rule of hospitality required more mod eration and indulgence ; but the Calvinists sternly insisted that this tendency, if unrestrained, was sure " to eat out the power of godliness." In Plyraouth, the proposition was boldly made " for a fuU A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 185 and free toleration of religion to all men, without excep tion against Turk, Jew, Papist, Arian, Socinian, FamUist, or any other." This was terrible to Winslow. He wrote to Winthrop, "You would have admired to have seen how sweet this carrion relished to the palate of most of them." Delay defeated the measure, and the battle moved back to Massachusetts. The ministers, in the mean time, stood firm against all encroachments of liberty from the mother-country. The people trusted them. " It had been as unnatural for a right New-England man to live without an able ministry, as for a smith to work his iron without a fire." " The union be tween the elders and the State could not, therefore, but become more intimate than ever ; and religion was vene rated and cherished as the security against political subservi ency." * It was now 1651; and Puritan intolerance, severely pressed by the advancing liberties of the age, became convulsive in its struggles to maintain its position. Saltonstall deplored these severities. If they had been liberal, they might have been "the eyes of God's people in England." Sir Henry Vane had wisely suggested that " the oppugners of the con gregational way should not, from its own principles and practice, be taught to root it out" But Dudley said, " God forbid our love for the truth should be grown so cold, that we should tolerate errors ! I die no libertine." Cotton was inflexible. " Better tolerate hypo crites and tares than thorns and briers." Ward responded, " Polypiety is the greatest impiety in the world. To say that men ought to ha.ve liberty of conscience is impious ignorance." " Eehgion," said Norton, " admits of no eccen tric notions." In 1649, the people of Massachusetts resolved, quite against the will of their magistrates, to put their laws into the form of a complete code, with specified penalties affixed. * Bancroft, i. 443. 24 186 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. A committee of two magistrates, two ministers of the gos pel, and two men directly from the people, accomphshed this delicate task ; and the first published code of this colony went into full effect Would it show a clear advance in the direction of liberty? No: it was yet too early for this. As. might have been expected, when these old representatives of Puritanic justice put pen to paper, they went promptly back to what they deemed first principles, and adopted the sternest measures to check and utterly put down the weak ness and vice of toleration. They had demanded for themselves simply liberty to do right This they would concede to all others : nothing more, upon the peril of their souls. Hear them : " Albeit faith is not wrought by the sword, but the Word, never theless, seeing that blasphemy of the true God cannot be excused by any ignorance or infirmity of human nature, no person in this jurisdiction, whether Christian or Pagan, shall wittingly and willingly presume to blaspheme his holy name, either by wilful or obstinate denying the true God, or his creation or government of the world ; or shall curse God ; or reproach the holy religion of God, as if it were but a public device to keep ignorant men in awe ; nor shall utter any other eminent kind of blasphemy of like nature or degree." If they did, the penalty was death. Hear them again ; they are terribly in earnest : "Although no huraan power be lord over the faith and consciences of men, yet because such as bring in damnable heresies, tend ing to the subversion of the Christian faith, and destruction of the souls of men, ought duly to be restrained from such notorious impieties, any Christian within this jurisdiction, who shaU go about to subvert or destroy the Christian faith and religion by broaching and maintaining any damnable heresies, as denying the iramortality of the soul, or resurrec tion of the body ; or any sin to be repented of in the regen erate ; or any evU done by the outward man to be accounted sin ; or denying that Christ gave himself a ransom for our A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 187 sins ; or shaU affirm that we are not justified by his death and righteousness, but by the perfections of our own works ; or shall deny the morality of the fourth commandment ; or shall openly condemn or oppose the baptizing of infants; or shall purposely depart the congregation at the administra tion of that ordinance ; or shall deny the ordinance of magis tracy, or their lawful authority to make war, or to punish the outward breaches of the first table ; or shall endeavor to seduce others to any of the errors and heresies above mentioned," — any such were liable to banishment. "Jesuits were forbidden to enter the colony, and their second coming was punishable with death. Another law a few years after subjected to fine, whipping, banishment, and finally to death, any who denied the received books of the Old and New Testament to be the infallible word of God." * These were fearful crimes, in the main enormous heresies, beyond a doubt; and the horror with which they were con templated shows the depth and strength of religious princi ple and feeling which controlled the spirits of these noble men. But assuming that civil force and legal penalties were for such sinners, and that only the good and the ortho dox were entitled to the blessings of protection and citizen ship, they reached the point where Puritan logic took on its most subtle and obstinate fallacy, and beyond which it could not pass. Arrests, whipping, imprisonment, banishment of Ana baptists and Quakers upon pain of death, would be possible for a while longer. Eeligion, however, was not to be a subjugated element in New England : it was to be the guide of civil law and the paramount power of the land. " New England," the Puri tan said, " was a religious plantation, not a plantation for trade. The profession of the purity of doctrine, worship, and devotion, was written on her forehead." " We all," said the constitution of the oldest confederacy, " came into these * Hildreth, i. 370. 188 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. parts of America to enjoy the liberties of the gospel in purity and peace." " He that made religion as twelve, and the world as thirteen, had not the spirit of a true New- England man." " New England was the colony of con science." These transcendent facts, united with convictions of exclusive rights, produced intolerance, but with "another spirit," under the conduct of Omniscience, would lead to the highest, noblest forms of organic freedom. Outside of New England, religious freedom was firmly and steadily advancing. But God had not changed the order of his providence. The sun of American liberty would rise in the east The morning star to the Western continent sent forth a mild and beautiful radiance from the little common wealth of Ehode Island. We may now distinctly see the character and mission of the Puritans. They were the Protestants of liberty. God had given thera that singular corabination of meekness and self-respect, of self-abnegation and sharply-defined individu ality, which dashed aside the minions of power, while they humbly acknowledged the sacredness of the traditional authority under which they suffered all the horrors of martyrdom. They were bold, persistent protestants against the bitter wrongs inflicted by king, prelates, and parliament, but devoted friends of the crown and church of England. Imbued with the feelings and purposes of reUgious, irresisti ble destiny, they rose up against the tyranny which op pressed them in the Old World ; and they would resist to the death the same tyranny in the New. With respect to the Church, they were not separatists ; with respect to the Government, they were royalists : but holding that God was above both Church and State, and that nothing belonged legitimately to the British Constitution which was in the slightest degree contrary to the Holy Bible, they appealed from cruel laws to the statutes frora Heaven, and from tyrants to God. Puritanism was therefore Christian loyalty to God, and to British sovereignty subjected to the divine A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 189 wiU. As the Lord's people, they were his representatives : they would therefore arraign royalty for its crimes, and punish heretics. Precisely here Puritanism alone reached its ultimate power in behalf of liberty. ACCESSORY FORCES. Let us now observe hoW evidently the grasp and reach of that power which presided over the mental struggle that pre ceded the War of Independence exceed every thing merely human. The combinations which seem to have most of finite man in them must be of materials which lie im mediately about him, or at least are easily accessible, and whose relations are naturally and superficially suggested. When, however, a work is to be accomplished which is too profound and vast for delegated human wisdora, too good and important to be intrusted to human discretion, you may then see how wide the circle of power, how numerous and improbable, how distant and unlike each other, are the agencies and elements which produce the result that all sound minds must declare is the work of God. In nothing is this more evident than in the great combinations now under review for the structure of the American Eepublic. From Italy, France, Spain, Holland, and England, God called up the men and movements for the discovery and colonization of the continent. Under his controlling hand, the strongest went down, and the weakest rose to power : the first became last, and the last became first. From the ruling classes in England he brought forward " gentlemen " who would try the strength of aristocratic power for the for mation of States in the South, and place within fair reach of liberty the grand antagonist force with which it was to grap ple in deadly conflict, and over which it must finaUy triumph. From the middle and laboring classes of the same country he summoned the mind and the muscle which would iUus trate the force and sphere of man, as man, in conducting 190 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the grand movements of civilization belonging to all subse quent ages and to all climes. He wrought up the solid qualities ofthe British yeomanry, by severest discipline, into the hardiest and boldest of pioneers. He imbued thera with the sternest devotion to his righteous law, and thrust them out to found, by the action of conscience, a new England on the Western continent Using one species of force as far and long as its spirit would permit, and moving liberty under its agency as far forward as the imperfect, undeveloped personal freedom of one class of free agents would allow, at precisely the right time he brought forward such other forces as the progress of his plans required. The first necessity of the Puritans was help to release themselves frora traditional attachment to the Church of England as the religion of the realm established by law. They looked upon all the assumptions and exactions of Prelacy with feelings of indescribable horror ; but all these they regarded as perversions of the true Church of England : whUe upon the State policy, which assumed the care of the Church, and absorbed and controUed its power as vital to the government, they looked with superstitious reverence. " We separate," said the ministers, " not from the Church of England, but from its corruptions. We came away from the common prayer and ceremonies in our native land, where we suffered ranch for nonconformity. In this place of liberty we can not, wiU not, use them. Their iraposition would be a sinful violation of the worship of God." ^ The Separatists in England had shocked their ecclesiastical piety by denouncing not merely the wrongs of Prelacy, but the Church of England itself They battled " come-outers " with a zeal scarcely less furious than that with which they attacked the persecuting bishops and magistrates. But, in the course of this two-sided conflict, the thought must have forced itself home, that sorae day they might be compeUed either to separation or guilty conformity. They were at tempting the impossible. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 191 The Pilgrims of Plymouth were in advance of the Massa chusetts Puritans, and from them the leaven of church inde pendence spread through all the colonies. The Congrega tionalists of Salem and Boston were slowly moving towards outward separation ; while in reality they had already com menced the formation of a State church of their own. Eoger WiUiams thundered in their ears the crimes of their ungodly attempts at conformity on the one hand, and of ec clesiastical tyranny on the other, and then retired to the companionship of savages, and finally to Ehode Island, that he might be free, and, in the hands of God, become the found er of religious, and hence of civil, liberty in America. Providence, as we have seen, compelled the Catholics under Lord Baltimore to make contribution to the sum of forces gathering to sweep away the restrictions thrown around liberty. This must have been a most suggestive and per plexing rebuke to intolerance in New England and Virginia. Eomanism would nevertheless be historically true to its fun damental principles ; while the expediency of free worship would make a free and finally a Protestant State of Mary land. Let us read again the words from the colony of Lord Baltimore, which laid, the foundation of the present goodly structure upon which we look with so much pleasure : "No person within this province, professing to believe in Jesus Christ, shall be anyways troubled, molested, or dis countenanced for his or her religion, or in the free exercise thereof" Notwithstanding the limitation implied here, which might be used against infidels and atheists, these strong words went very far towards the exact expression of Ameri can thought. The colony founded by the free States of Holland on the banks of the Hudson had brought with them much of the true spirit of the Eeformation. They had not proceeded far in the growth of civU institutions before they thought proper to record a silent but powerful protest against the Umitations of religious liberty rising up from Eoman usurpations on the 192 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Continent, repeating themselves in church prerogatives in England, and now so strongly attempted in America. Let us consider the words included in the first great State- paper announced by the freemen of New York : " No per son professing faith in God by Jesus Christ shall at any time be anyways disquieted or questioned for any difference of opinion." Still nearer to the true American idea than the announcement from Maryland. The necessity of at least a profession of faith in God by Jesus Christ in order to secu rity was apparently invidious; but they were not to be " questioned." Virginia, up to 1643, revealed the spirit of ecclesiastical bigotry and proscription from the side of Prelacy as Massa chusetts had from Puritanism. " AU ministers are to use the Liturgy, and to conform to the Church of England : the gov ernor and council to compel nonconformists ' to depart the colony with all conveniency.' No Popish recusant is to hold any office ; and all Popish priests are to be sent out of the colony within five days after their arrival. Travelling and shooting on the sabbath are made punishable by fines." * It was not untU 1776 that Virginia was emancipated from the legal domination of the Church of England. " By the influx of Scotch-Irish Presbyterians and other dissenters, especially Baptists, into the upper counties, the Episcopalians had becorae a minority of the people. But they stiU had a majority in the assembly ; and it was only after warm de bates that Jefferson" and George Mason procured the passage of a law repealing aU the old disabUng acts, legalizing aU modes of worship, releasing dissenters from parish-rates, and suspending their coUection untU the next session, — a suspen sion made perpetual in 1779, and the more readily as most of the clergymen of the Church of England were Tories." t So far, in this fundamental particular, was Virginia Ameri canized ; and she was stronger because of it in the War of Independence The battle was not ended, and we shaU come to it again. * Hildreth, i. 336. f Ibid., iii. 384. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 193 In the great governmental theory formed for Carolina in 1670 by Shaftesbury and Locke, it was provided that none could be freemen who did not acknowledge a God and the obligation of public worship. The Church of England was to be supported at the public expense, — a provision inserted by the proprietaries against the opinion of Locke, who wished to put all sects on the same footing. Any seven freemen, however, might form a church or religious society, to be recognized and tolerated, provided its members admitted the rightfulness of oaths, — a provision which excluded Quakers. By another provision, it was decreed that " every freeman of Carolina shall have absolute power and authority over his negro slaves, of what opinion and reUgion soever." In 1676, a colony of dissenters came to Carolina under Blake, the brother of the famous admiral. Twenty years thereafter, Joseph Blake was appointed governor by Arch- dale. He was a dissenter, and the little company became stronger by an accession from Massachusetts. They estab lished Dorchester, twenty mUes from Charleston; and, in 1698, John Cotton, son of the " famous Cotton," organized a Congregational church in Charleston, which survived the War of the Eevolution and the ecclesiastical proscription of Carolina and New England. In 1703, "the Churchmen, though not a third part of the inhabitants, happened to have a majority of one in the Assem bly : " and " an act was passed requiring all members of As sembly to take the sacrament according to the rites of the Church of England ; or, if they thought themselves unquali fied for that solemnity, to subscribe a declaration of their adhesion to that church." The dissenters and Archdale re monstrated ; but the proprietaries approved, and the Church of England was, in 1705, estabUshed by law. It was not tiU 1784, that, "by the second constitution of South Carolina, the ' Christian Protestant religion ' was de clared to be the established religion of that State. AU per sons acknowledging one God, and a future state of rewards 25 294 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. and punishments, were to be freely tolerated : if, in addition, they held Christianity to be the true religion, and the Old and New Testaments to be inspired, they might form churches of their own, entitled to be admitted as a part of the Estab lishment." * Thus much the dissenters had extracted from the prelatists by majorities led by great statesmen, after a long and desperate struggle. From the State of Georgia came a stronger influence in favor of liberty. Light from the clear mind of Oglethorpe traveUed through the darkness of ages, and mingled at length with the brightest revelations from heaven. About this period, the constitution in Massachusetts "seemed to guarantee the entire freedom of religious opin ions, and the equaUty of aU sects ; yet the legislature, being left with authority to compel the support of the ministers, and attendance on service, acted up to the full measure of their authority, inflicting heavy penalties for heterodox opinions." New Hampshire and Connecticut enacted similar laws ; and we pass out of the period of preparation and independence, leaving the Congregationalists in New England the standing order, and their form of religion established by law. We may now generalize by referring to another distinct religious movement. George Fox came forward to show the world " that the kingdom of God is within ; " that tyr anny is of a man's own conceptions ; and that liberty is of the soul, and not of kings or nobles or commons ; that the grand bane of life is pride, and all artificial distinctions are of the Devil ; that prince and subjects, lords and beggars, are men, only men, suffering under a common bondage, with one only hope, and that must be revealed by the voice of God in the soul. For the rest, kings and protectors and presidents, who followed not the light within, were usurpers and tyrants. Men were free only as they were governed by God. Conscience was supreme, because it was the voice of God. Men might meditate, be still, suffer, die, but never obey a man against the inward monitor. * Hildreth, iii. 383. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 195 There was room amid the upheavals of the age for such a man as this. How anxiously the people asked, " Is this the Ught for which I have been straining my darkened sight ? Is it true that I can bid adieu to these bewUdering worldly fictions, renounce and defy the usurpations of tyrants, and retire into myself, and find rest ? " They felt moved to try it. In vast throngs they did; and presently the sacrifice was ready : the victims of fines, imprisonments, banishment, and torture, were innumerable. And what lessons of endurance for conscience' sake they taught the age and the world ! How the moral rose above the physical amid the serene composure of passive sufiering and tranquil martyrdom! How mightily the levelling power of justice wrought through the " quietism " of conscious right to dash down the proud pretenders to despotic power, and lift up the masses to the dignity of manhood ! God would allow even their fanaticism to illustrate their virtues ; their tortures and dying to rebuke the madness of oppression ; and finally their cruel exile to bring to America the doctrine of equal rights, and found States to Ulustrate the principles and reveal the weaknesses of a pure democ racy. He would permit them to become thorns in the sides of Puritan and Prelatical bigotry and proscription, until enough of them were murdered, and the rest were hurled away, to show that another inspiration was needed to move the world forward to the full realization of the divine idea of human freedom. They laid the foundations of religious lib erty in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, New Jersey, and Dela ware. They fulfilled their mission, took their place in history as warnings to tyrants, and against worldly folly and corrup tion, and waited to be absorbed into the life of the nation they had so powerfully helped to form. Christian hberty must be aggressive : Friends could not be aggressive, and they could lead frfeedom no farther. Let it now be asked whether the infidel, worldly spirit is not equal to this task ; whether this power may not take up 196 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. liberty where the chief religious movements of the prepara tory period have left it, and complete the release of the na tional life, and the thorough Americanization of our foreign and home-born population. It shall have a fair opportunity to make the experiment God will allow it to do its best, under the most favorable auspices, by the hand of its most brilliant representative man. From the same England whence came the Prelatists, the Papists, the Puritans, and the Quakers, later in the struggle came Thomas Paine to sound the blast of freedom so loud and clear, that the whole civilized world must hear it. He seemed the appointed leader of the Eevolution. He was voice for the dumb, courage for the timid, daring and defi ance for the handful of the oppressed against the host of their oppressors. But his career was brief He wrote of " common sense," and " the rights of man " as a being of time merely, a crea ture of accident He abridged the scope of these rights from the infinite to the finite, from the eternal to the tem poral, from the grand whole of being to a miserable frag ment He found himself without adequate motives and power. He was a raan, — a mere man ; at length, a very vile man. He could teach the people to hate ; but there was no organizing power in hatred. They idolized, and then de spised hira. When they saw that he would leave them with " no hope, and without God in the world," they broke away from him. His rage was terrible, but irapotent He fled from the land of the Bible to the land of infidelity like a suf fering demon seeking an easier heU. He had burst upon the world a briUiant luminary, and suddenly went out amid the horrors of a darkness that could be felt He showed how far an infidel, worldly spirit could carry liberty, attracted the gaze of anxious multitudes, scoffed, and died. Education must seek its place among the accessory forces of liberty in the earlier period of our nation's history. A high degree of culture had appeared in the vigorous intel- A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 197 lects of the legislators and ministers of the colonies. It would be difficult to find more sturdy thinkers, more skilful dialecticians, or more complete masters of language, than the leading statesmen and divines of the age under review. But a new race was rising up. Vigorous, daring young Americans were coming upon the stage. What would be the direction of their minds under the stimulating power of free dom ? It was plain, they must be educated ; but how and where ? True, the sons of wealth might be sent home to college ; but this would tend to produce a privUeged class, while the great mass of the rising generation would grow up in stubborn, dangerous ignorance. America must have her own institutions of learning. As early as 1621, the London Company undertook "to establish plans of education " in Virginia. " The Bishop of London collected and paid a thousand pounds towards a university ; which, like the several churches of the colony was liberally endowed with domains." * Seminaries of learning were not numerous in the South ; but they were sufficient to show the intelligent enterprise of the great patrons of learning in the age of colonization ; and coming in as tributaries to the culture of American children educated in England, and the drilling of here and there a family by a thoughtful, cultivated mother at home, they helped to save the land from the crimes and desolations of general ignorance. In New England, the movement for general education was thoroughly characteristic. In 1636, "six years after the ar rival of Winthrop, the General Court voted a sum equal to a year's rate of the whole colony towards the erection of a college. In 1638, John Harvard bequeathed to the coUege one-half of his estate and aU his library." f It was hence called Harvard College. " The infant institution was a fa vorite. Connecticut and Plymouth, and the towns in the east, often contributed httle offerings to promote its success ; the » Bancroft, i. 179. t Ibid., i. 459. igg THE GREAT REPUBLIC. gift of the rent of a ferry was a proof of the care of the State ; and once, at least, every famUy in each of the colonies gave to the college at Cambridge twelve pence, or a peck of corn, or its value in unadulterated wampumpeag ; whUe the magistrates and wealthier men were profuse in their hberal- ity. The college, in return, exerted a powerful infiuence in forming the earlier character of the country." * But it was not coUege-learning only that the liberal-minded Puritans sought to promote. Custom, and finally law, pro vided that " none of the brethren shaU suffer so much bar barism in their famUies as not to teach their chUdren and apprentices so much learning as may enable them perfectly to read the English tongue." * One most iraportant purpose for which they insisted upon general education appears in their venerable code in quaint and characteristic style : " It being one chief project of that old deluder, Sathan, to keep men from the knowledge ofthe Scriptures, as in former times keeping them in an unknown tongue, so in these latter tiines by persuading men from the use of tongues, so that, at least, the true sense and meaning of the original might be clouded with false glosses of saint- seeming deceivers, and that learning might not be buried in the graves of our fathers," it was ordered " that every town ship, after the Lord hath increased them to the number of fifty householders, shall appoint one to teach all children to write and read ; and, when any town shall increase to the number of one hundred families, they shall set up a gram mar-school, the masters thereof being able to instruct youth so far as they may be fitted for the university." The colonies of Connecticut, Plymouth, and New Haven, enacted the same law. After some rather plain promptings frora Massachu setts, " the General Court of Plymouth," in 1657, required by law " the towns to tax themselves for the support of minis ters and gramraar-schools." Thus we discover the foundation of the New-England * Bancroft, i. 459. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 199 common-school system, which has risen to be its strength and its glory. It had due relation to the grammar-school and the university ; but " every child as it was born into the world was lifted from the earth by the genius of the country, and, in statutes of the land, received as its birthright a pledge of the public care for its morals and its mind." * Ehode Island did not promptly unite with other New- England colonies in this great movement The zeal of Eoger WiUiams -and his people for pure religion made them sus picious of too much of the human, especially in religious education, and carried them into the region of superstition, leading them to expect direct instruction from heaven which would supersede the human and prevent the peril. Doubt less, the scholarly old Puritans had sorae reference to these good people when they wrote of " saint-seeraing deceivers." Within the period now before us, in 1696, Maryland passed a law establishing free schools. The measures adopted for the support of the system did not, however, go into proper effect until 1723. The arrangements were liberal, and men were appointed to employ " good schoolmasters, members of the Church of England, men of pious and exemplary hves and conversation, and capable of teaching well the grammar, good writing, and the mathematics, if such can conveniently be got" These were apparently small beginnings ; but they were of the most vital importance. They indicate a vigorous ele ment of national strength, to be developed chiefly in the Northern States. Powerful and perpetual, the mission of education was not, however, alone to coraplete the liberation of mind and the constitution of freedom. The bondage of the Puritan was in his conscience, and this mere human learning could not reach. As an accessory force, education had done its best, and could not emancipate even the New-England mind from the power of bigotry and public injustice. * Bancroft, 1. 458, 459. 200 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. A NEW INSPIRATION. Eecognizing, as historical fidelity has compelled us to do, the great facts of the limitation, if not the exhaustion, of all the important forces which have passed before us, it is time to bring prominently forward that power, which, released from outward restrictions, and brought into thorough legitimate action, would complete the liberation of the American mind, and, by vitalizing and organizing liberty, prepare it for its mission of power among men. The Bible was the great book of the Puritans. They received it as the revelation of God, and would allow no man to shut it, or wrest it from them. It was everywhere with thera. In its light they undertook to form their system of government, their churches, and their schools. Whatever of traditional bigotry they had inherited, or of prescriptive exclusiveness had arisen from the recoil of their free spirits frora the assaults of persecution, the pure truth of the Bible would work quietly, but steadily and bravely, against it. Their tendency to rigid formalisra it would antagonize ; and, so far as the free consent and the trusting faith of individuals would allow, it would bring to their souls the power of the atonement, and the new life " born of the Spirit" To a large extent, this power from above pervaded the masses, and gave them the right to say, " This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." Sufficient intro version, and a clear, strong development of this force, would have given them hberty completed : undue attention to the external and to the outward battles of technical Puritanism brought them to their limits, and demanded help. Many of the Puritans were Presbyterians. They came in considerable numbers about the commencement of the civU war in England, and at the period of the Eestoration. The Dutch who began the settlement of New York were Pres byterians; the Germans who came into Pennsylvania and Northern Virginia were generally Presbyterians; the Hu- A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 201 guenots from France were nearly all Calvinists and Presby terians. All these had separate organizations corresponding with their traditions in the Old World. They assumed dif ferent names accordingly, .but were all Presbyterian in dis tinction from Episcopal. From Scotland and Ireland came multitudes of very devout but very rigid Presbyterians. The first presbytery was organized in Philadelphia in 1705. In these incipient churches was much of the indomitable, unconquerable spirit of the Scotch Presbyterians, but also the devout glowing piety of John Knox and the martyr-heroes of the Eeformation. Here we identify again the vital power which liberated the soul from the fetters of sin, and which bore heavily against the bondage of Puritanism. Practically independent of all limitations, the great preachers and noble laymen of this church moved into the future with the blast of freedom sounding from their lips ; and extensive revivals, and the con sequent extension of liberty, showed that from this great evangelical communion would come large accessions to the common vital power which would emancipate the nation. The Episcopal Church, trammelled by State prerogatives, and fearfully restricted by formalism and aristocratic preten sions, nevertheless bore in its bosom much of the life of God, a part of which had come down from the days of Cranmer and Latimer, Burnet and Butler, but a much larger propor tion of which came from the great revival of the eighteenth century. Its extremes would repel each other; but the church of the Wesleys, of Oglethorpe, and of Bishops White and Hobart, would make large contributions to the aggre gation of spiritual power which would contend mightUy with the intolerance of caste, and give most effective aid to the nation struggling to be free. The life of God in the soul of the devout Quaker wrought powerfully on the same side. The Baptists, in their fervent piety and native independ ence, contained in large measure the spirit which was des- 26 202 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. tined to achieve completed liberty for the American nation. They were at first chiefly from Wales, then from England and the Continent ; but, from whatever country they came, they loved liberty. If there were, tendencies to exclusive ness in any of their doctrines and their single mode of bap tism, these were practically overcome by the deep and ear nest spirit of piety, which, by inevitable laws, connected them with the goodly fellowship of believers everywhere, and with the freedom-side of all the great controversies of Church and State. The great Eoger Williams, though, as we have seen, deemed irregular in his views and acts with regard to the baptismal succession, was nevertheless, in a strong sense, a Baptist Concerning hira and his brethren. Chief Justice Story said, " In . the code of laws established by them in Ehode Island, we read, for the first time since Christianity ascended the throne of the Caesars, the declaration that con science should be free, and men should not be punished for worshipping God in the way they were persuaded he re quires." Let me now be distinctly understood. Ecclesiastical organ izations raay, in their peculiar structure and sectarian cast, be for or against the doctrines of liberty ; but, in the lib erty wherewith Christ hath made them free, they are not sectarian, they are not exclusive. This we have identified in all as the common life-force by which God intended to organize, perfect, and develop civil and religious freedom on this continent for the world. Its origin was divine, its chan nel the Bible, and its scope the world. There is yet another grand historical development of this common life-force of the Great Eepublic. Now let us look to England again. " Man's extremity," says Augustine, "is God's opportunity." " WhUe Seeker was de ploring the deraorahzation of England, as threatening to ' become absolutely fatal,' and the aged Burnet saw ' immi nent ruin hanging over the Church' and over the whole. A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 203 Eeformation ; while Watts was writing that ' religion was dying in the world,' and Butler, that ' it had come to be taken for granted that Christianity was no longer a subject of in quiry, but at length was discovered to be fictitious;' when, in fine, the Anglican Church had become ' an ecclesiastical system, under which the people of England had lapsed into heathenism, and nonconformity was rapidly in course to be found nowhere but in books ; ' and meanwhile, across the Channel, rationalistic infidelity was invading the strongholds of the Eeformation, and the French philosophers were spread ing moral contagion through Europe, — God was preparing the means, apparently disconnected, but providentially coinci dent, which were to resuscitate the ' dying ' faith, and intro duce the era of modern evangelism in the Protestant world."* From Oxford came an indigent student, who, by faith in Jesus, after lying prostrate on the ground for whole days in silent or vocal prayer, had received a new life from heaven. This was George Whitefield, soon to become liie greatest preacher of his age. His rebukes of sin in high places were too scathing, and his appeals to the conscience too over whelming, for the churches : and it was well ; for no church could hold his audiences. Ten, fifteen, and even twenty thousand anxious human beings gathered in the fields to hear from his lips the way of salvation by faith. The Holy Spirit fired his great soul with a zeal which no ocean or con tinent could limit Scarcely had the echoes of his voice died away in England before it broke upon the ears of New Eng land, rousing the slumbering '^orthodoxy" of " the standing order," and pouring a new life-current through the masses from Maine to Georgia. Back and forward over the ocean and the continents this wonderful man flew like the wind, untU it seemed that he was the very angel of the Apoca lypse, " having the everlasting gospel to preach unto men." This was the very spirit which moved the great Edwards, and the multitudes around him, during " the great awaken- hig ; " which gave such zeal and holy power to Payson and * Stevens's History of Methodism, i. 33. 204 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the Tennants, causing thousands to cry out for mercy, and then to triumph in " the blood of the Lamb." These great revivahsts were of the school of Calvin in divinity: and thus God brought the powerful principle of "soul-Uberty" to wrestle with the assumed limitations of the wUl in the same individuals ; and the limitations, however firmly guarded by careful logic, opposed no effective resistance to the power of a free gospel and a triumphant faith. Whatever migh t be the metaphysics of freedom, and whatever its relations to God's plans, it was nevertheless a great fact, which was now rapidly translating itself into action, and opening a new world to the American mind. A little English boy had been snatched from the upper window of a house in flames. His mother had, with special devotion and remarkable grasp of intellect, consecrated him henceforth to God. He had become a student at Oxford, and then an awakened sinner, and then a missionary to Georgia, " to convert the Indians," as he supposed, but, in God's purposes, to bring him into communication with Peter Bohler, and the spirit of deep and living German piety. He was at length at home a new man, and before the gath ered multitudes in groves and fields, proclaiming " liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." The whole kingdom was moved. The Anglican Church received a new infusion of spiritual life ; the missionary spirit was roused. ' Wesley was in Ireland. Many received the word which was in demonstration of the " Spirit and of power." Barbara Heck and PhUip Embury were among them. They had fled from Eomish persecutions in the Palatinate in Germany ; but God brought them thence in time to receive the new life through the labors of this great evangelist And they were soon in John Street, New York. Humbly they sought to win the approbation of Heaven, and the souls of men, by proclaiming the " liberty wherewith Christ had made them free." In October, 1766, these servants of the A DISINTHRALLED NATIONAL LIFE. 205 Most High God founded a church, which would send its life through the new nation, and, in a century, number more than a million of souls. Here was a form of the Eeformation which belonged to the universal religion. No restrictions of creed or of spirit shut it up in cloisters, bound it in conscience, or erected a barrier between it and the mass of mankind. It moved over the oceans, and out into the forests ; proclaimed its glad tidings in the West Indies, and amid the Puritans in New England. At length there appeared a man at its head, a grand pioneer bishop, directing its heralds, and organizing its bands for the conquest of the world. Asbury was in his saddle, moving from city to city, from town to country, over mountains and rivers, far out into the frontier, pro claiming the glorious Uberty of redemption, and gathering the weeping throngs into the fold of the Eedeemer. Now, precisely here is the mistake of historians. They regard religion as a thing by itself; the great revivals under Whitefield and Edwards, Asbury and Payson, as isolated spiritual movements, having no connection with the great events of national history: whereas they constitute the very soul of civil Ufe and political development. When Whitefield and Jesse Lee moved through New Eng land, they were the heralds of freedom. They bore a new revelation to the Puritan mind, which at first roused the most obstinate resistance, but soon quickened the inner life, and extended it to the life of the State ; at length sweeping away every vestige of intolerance, and revealing the mar vellous identity of the liberty for which the Pilgrims fled to America, which honest Episcopalians, Quakers, Baptists, and Methodists were demanding at their hands, and which Christ came to proclaim to universal man. When Asbury and Coke and Strawbridge opened the batteries of freedom in Maryland, they swept down the re strictions which Eomanism had thrown around the con science, and proclaimed emancipation from the fetters of 206 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. priestrcraft As they moved through Virginia and the Car olinas, they sounded the death-knell of Prelatical tyranny, and thundered in the ears of oppressors the crime of slavery. " The fervid spirit of Edwards, seeing with Bossuet, in all history, only the 'history of redemption,' dreamed, in his New-England retirement, of a millennium which was to dawn in the New World, and thence burst upon the nations, and irradiate the globe." * ' Eecognizing this spirit of evangelization as truly abroad upon its mission of love and liberating power. Dr. Baird says, " No American Christian who takes a comprehensive view of the progress of religion in his country, and con siders how wonderfully the means and instrumentalities em ployed are adapted to the extent and the wants of that country, can hesitate for a moment to bless God for having, in his mercy, provided them all. Nor will he fail to recog nize in the Methodist economy, as well as in the zeal, the devoted piety, and the efficiency of its ministry, one of the most powerful elements in the religious prosperity of the United States, as well as one of the firmest pUlars of their civil and political institutions." f This divine afflatus, limited, as we have shown, to no age or sect or clime, was powerful and evident in the days of which we write. Liberty received its new inspiration from the baptisms of love which came in the fresh evangelism of the great Eeformation, and moved out to become truly national in the American Eepublic. * Stevens's Methodist-Episcopal Chureh, i. 18. t Baird's Religion in America, p. 497. CHAPTEE H. THE TIME CHOSEN SHOWS THE PROVIDENTIAL ADVENT OF THE NATIONAL LIFE. "America is therefore the land of the future, where, in the ages that lie before us, the burden of the world's history shall reveal itself. It is the land of desire for all who are weary of tbe historical lumber-room of old Europe." — Hegel. " Westward the course of empire takes its way." — Bbekelbt. It is to be observed that God does not make abrupt and arbitrary changes in the social state, as man would fre quently prefer to do. He does not produce a tree before the seed, the germ, and the growth ; no more does he sud denly project upon the world a completed form of civil and political order. With much longer delay than we can com prehend, through the conflicts of ages he carries truth on to its destination in the future. Sometimes it appears spar kling upon the surface like the gurgling mountain rill, reveal ing its fertilizing power by the freshness of the verdure upon its banks ; and then, plunging from sight amid arid sands and desert wastes, it appears again with accumulated power farther on towards the great ocean. . Slowly, therefore, it might be expected the great prepara tions for a new era of freedom would move on under the guidance of Providence ; and in the fulness of time the plans of God would be evident to men. As numerous attempts had sufficiently shown, it was rashness in man to precipitate events. The result could only be the exposure of human folly, and the destruction of hopes based upon mere finite discretion and power ; but God could use even these experiments and calamities to correct the mistakes of men. 207 208 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. HISTORICAL CYCLES MUST PRECEDE. Time must be allowed for human depravity to work out its legitimate results. This was realized in the antediluvian age ; and the desolations of the Flood were the appropriate termi nation of the first grand epoch of human madness and sin. The moral and political force of learning and the arts must be accurately measured ; and this occurred in the history of Greece, under the genius of Aristotle, Themis- tocles, and Solon. The irresistible energy of the sword must work out its results ; and this was done in the life of Eome. The competency of a symbolic religion must be ascer tained ; and this had been seen in the extraordinary develop ment of the Hebrew institutes and people, reaching back to the infancy of the race. Old and decaying systems of human wisdom and folly must be crumbled to atoms to make way for the foundations of modern civilization ; and this was achieved by the wander ing, barbarous hordes of Tamerlane and Gengis Khan. The age of chivalry had reached its climax and spent its force in the wild and fiery crusades to the Holy Land. Feudal rights and lordly pretensions had expired under the agency of their own usurpations and the rising power of the masses. Spiritual and temporal despotism had tried their strength, separately and combined, in grappling with the inherent rights of man ; and aU questions of human progress had been answered by the aggrandizement of the sovereign alone. Compromise between the most concentrated individualism and the rising power of the people had done its best, and rapidly completed its circle back to the unmitigated tyranny in which it had its origin. Then the time had come for projecting upon the plane of human vision the grand experiment of government by the people. Had it been earlier, its appeal to enlightened reason would have been far less conclusive and powerful. PROVIDENTIAI. ADVENT OF THE NATIONAL LIFE. 209 DESPOTIC GOVERNMENTS AND IMPERISHABLE IDEAS. The patriarchal principle arises naturally out of the con stitution of the human mind and the existence of family. It was adapted to a perfect, moral condition. Had this con tinued, it would undoubtedly have remained, as it was, at first, God's mode of conducting a universal theocracy. This primitive, simple, and charming method of order gave place to monarchy, which, under the power of extending depravity, became the vilest usurpation. But it was StiU a favorite method, and must be tried over and over again. Its natural development in one form, it was assumed, could not be accepted as demonstration of its inadequacy in another. Its growth and extension gave it power to comraand respect, and win the confidence of vast generations of men ; whUe its violent abuses, its revolutions and decay, it was presumed, were attributable to accidental defects in men, or obtrusive modifying circumstances over which it would be possible for superior wisdom to exert adequate control. Time was necessary to allow it to prove historically its inadequacy to solve the great political problems ever return ing to perplex the thoughtful and the wise. It must fail, in the hands of numberless dynasties, in all its endless variety of forms, with every conceivable advantage, in order to loosen its hold upon the confidence of men. Its popular power must be virtually destroyed to make way for the true principle of civil order, upon a scale sufficiently large to insure its success. To understand this historical teaching, it must be remem bered that ideas are imperishable Individuals and nations pass away; but their acts remain. In numberless forms, their acquisitions of experience and philosophy diffuse themselves through the social fabric, and descend with their precise and legitimate power amid the antagonisms of the future. This result does not depend upon historical organizations. 27 210 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. It requires no authorized supervision of facts or principles to preserve them. It is in their nature to perpetuate them selves. New generations, as they arise, do not determine the influences which shaU surround them, nor the point in civihzation at which they wiU commence their own experi ments : they are themselves, in soul, body, and spirit, the product and embodiment of the past To this constitu tional provision may be added the influence of recorded and contemporaneous history. It is thus that we account for the traditional and philo sophical forces which operate upon the social order from the vast cycles of the past, amid the dissolutions of time and the decay of nations ; and thus that we explain the tedious but ultimately effectual lessons of wisdom which the world learns from the records of folly. We may therefore understand that time had been allowed for the school of ages, and a notable preparation for the in troduction of a new social order was evolved from the chaos of anarchy and despotism. Indications of the grand fundamental fact, that the power of government resides in the people, accordingly appeared in the history of Providence and the developments of empirical systems ; but the great decisive movement of freedom raust bide its tirae. The irapression of its necessity raust be profound and pervading before its advent into the scenes of battle through which it must pass : and just tirae enough for this had elapsed, when it appeared to assert its right to do minion over the destinies of raen ; not iramediate, universal dominion, — certainly not in its outward forms ; for we are not of the number who believe that formal republicanism has any natural or divine right to take forcible possession of the world. And yet we believe fully that its mission is uni versal. It is to be the visible or invisible animus which shaU inhabit the body politic of all the peoples under the sun ; and, for precisely the reason that its advance to rank and power must be gradual, it must for ages co-exist with other and antas^onist forms. PROVIDENTIAL ADVENT OF THE NATIONAL LIFE. 211 THE GRAND CRISIS OF HISTORY. But as the reality of government by the people could not have earlier moved up to its central position among the powers of the earth, so neither could it have been longer delayed without an entire change in the fundamental laws of human progress and incalculable harm to the race. When the combinations began to appear for the organization of the American Eepublic, there was nothing for dissatisfied intellect to take hold of All other forms had been tried, and proved wholly unsatisfactory. Without something clearly in ad vance of former experiments, the action of liberty must have recoiled upon itself; and erratic and irrepressible vio lence must have crushed the hopes and changed the destinies of mUlions. God, who had guided the elements and superintended the preparations of more than five thousand years, knew well the grand crisis in which the hopes of longing, restless minds must pass over to another and more enduring reliance. Besides, for the great mission of a model Eepublic, there was none too much time. How much time in the great cycles of the world's future remained, certainly none but Omniscience could tell. We are not, however, of the number convinced by the hypothesis, that we are now in the middle period of the worlcT.s history. The rising, towering grandeur of moral ideas and events indicates to us rather the strong probability that the world has not yet passed its vigorous youth ; and precisely this is Avhat we mean by the position, that, for the mission of the great model Eepublic, there was none too much time. During its infancy, not half its power to bless mankind could appear. Immense as are its advan tages during the development of its minority, its grand providential task must be accomphshed after it reaches its majority. Not the lofty purposes of government merely, but the ris ing- power of every other force upon which the destiny of 212, THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the race depends, indicates a vast sweep of redeeming agen cies in the world's future for the realization of the divine idea in the creation and the atonement It was evident that some great crisis in history was at hand. Men were in death-struggles as the representatives of the dying past and the oncoming future. There was yet vitality enough in tyranny to make a formidable effort to tighten its grasp of power in England and in America. It was confident of success. It had yet at comraand a vast enginery of torture and coercion. It could avail itself of ecclesiastical pains and penalties. It had all the advan tage of an ancient aristocracy and a splendid hereditary nobility. Its attractions included all the pomp and circum stance of a State-religion, and the gorgeous splendor of courts and courtiers, decorations and crowns. The enormous wealth of ages had accumulated in the coffers of the govern ing classes. Learning and the arts gathered around the seat of despotic power. A defiant military spirit had emerged from wars with Continental armies. A new energy had ap peared upon the sea. The " invincible Armada " had been scattered to the winds, and England was rising to greatness as a maritime power. Men of rare gifts had risen up to execute the commands of royalty, while defeated liberty was branded with the crime of regicide. All this appeared, to bring up to their highest point of ui- solence the usurpations which insulted and defied the yearn ings of the people for freedom. Human nature could endure the suspense no longer. The grand crisis had come. The life of a new nation had been long waiting for its in carnation. The birth-throes of a century announced its advent. God revealed his attendant guardian-power, and exalted the new-born prince, through its baptisms of blood, to a dominion before unknown in the history of the world. CHAPTEE III. WAR INDICATES AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. " For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them ; but Thy right hand, and Thine arm, and the light of Thy countenance, because Thou hadst a favor unto them.'' — Ps. xliv. If the encroachments of power were to be resisted, who were to do it ? There was no king and councU or parlia ment to declare war ; to say, " Thus far shalt thou come, and no farther." The people had already said and done enough to show that they felt themselves to be in possession of rights which no power on earth raight defy with irapunity. They began to feel and act like freemen ; like a nation having at least the right and the duty of self-defence. Precisely what it meant they seem not to have inquired ; but individuals, to-wns, colonies, felt the throbbings of a new life. Why should they all feel so much alike ? Why should it be just as im possible to enforce stamp-duties in one portion of America as in another ? Why should the attempt to land cargoes of tea, the test of the great question of taxation without repre sentation, produce the same uprising of the people, and caU out the imperious " No " in Boston and New York and Balti more and Charleston ? Evidently there was a strange unity manifesting itself under the action of Providence. They were a people, a power on earth ; and an assault upon the lives of a small number, any number, would show that it was upon all, and that the life of a new nation was here to thrUl the souls of the people from Maine to Georgia. Neither king nor parliament knew what had occurred in America. They thought they were deahng with a few proud 213 214 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. colonists who had been spoUed by indulgence. They had no idea of the advent of this new national life. They had, however, only to try a simple experiment, and they would find it. The people of Boston, in the matter of the tea, had been decidedly riotous, and must be punished ; otherwise their example would be contagious. They would simply close up the harbor, and remove the seat of governraent to Salem. The famous " Boston Port Bill " was designed for this pur pose ; but, in the hands of Providence, it served simply to show that the right to resist arbitrary government was in the peo ple. An invisible power had made them one. The colonies of Ehode Island, promptly assembling, assured Massachusetts of hearty sympathy, and made the first suggestion of a Con tinental Congress. Connecticut, in legislature assembled, took similar action. New York, Philadelphia, and Maryland uttered their notes of indignation, and made the cause of Boston their own. The House of Burgesses in Virginia ap pointed the first day of June, 1774, when the oppressive bill was to go into operation, " a day of fasting and prayer." They were promptly dissolved by their royalist governor, Dunmore: but they as promptly re-assembled, and declared that " an attack upon one colony was an attack upon all ; threatening ruin to the rights of all, unless repelled by the united wisdom of the whole" Gage was in Boston, and his ships and materials of war were in the harbor. He came out with fuU powers, as com mander-in-chief and governor, "for better regulating the government of Massachusetts Bay." The acts of despotic power were commenced. Boston was no longer a capital city. The British authorities removed to Salem. Eesistance was everywhere ; but who should direct it ? The people could not act in mass. They must avail themselves of the representative principle already asserted and firmly established here. Who should take the lead ? The brave little State of Ehode Island, where the heroic WiUiams had , AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 215 reared aloft the standard of unrestricted liberty, had made the first suggestion ; and it was fitting that she should lead the van. Two days in advance of Massachusetts, she ap pointed the first delegates to the first American Congress. Other colonies. North and South, rapidly followed ; and on the fifth day of September, 1774, the national life showed itself represented and embodied in a Congress of fifty-three delegates assembled in the city of Philadelphia, from Ehode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, Mary land, North Carolina, and South Carolina, — twelve States just coming into form as distinct but mutually dependent civil governments. Georgia, at present restrained by power, was not yet in Congress ; but her people would soon triumph, and her representatives would show that she also belonged to the new nation. The war-power of the " Union " was now a visible reality. A rich, haughty, and populous kingdom might despise it, but not with impunity. God had called together this Congress, and he was in it. The war must now begin ; and England would slowly come to the knowledge of the fact, that, when she fired upon a company of " disloyal people," she had killed Ameri can citizens. LEXINGTON AND BUNKER HILL. A common feeling of danger had produced the beginnings of military organization amongst the colonists. A small amount of military stores had been collected at Concord, some tv/enty mUes from Boston. Gates ordered the destruc tion of these mUitary stores. He had four thousand men under his command, and with these he determined to end this rebeUion. On the 19th of AprU, 1775, a detachment of eight hundred men, sent out to strike a decisive blow, met at Lexington, six mUes from Concord,, about one hundred "minute-men " of the colony with arms in their hands, who were peremptorily ordered to " lay down their arms, and dis- 21 g THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ^ perse" It was very strange that they did not do it They stood up, and received the fire of his Majesty's well-dressed troops. Eight fell dead, the first " martyrs of the Eevolu tion." The survivors retired to join other "minute-raen" on the hiU ; and the next fire was returned. The " regulars " fled in their turn; and soon the whole British coluran was in rapid retreat, with minute-raen swarraing on their front flank and rear; and the whole detachment would have been cap tured but for the arrival of re-enforcements under Lord Percy. With the utmost caution, the British forces made their way to Bunker Hill, with a loss of three hundred men kiUed and wounded. The American loss was about eighty-five The startling news flew over New England, and Boston was soon in a state of siege. When the British forces found protection under the guns of the fleet, they felt reheved. They were no cowards ; but they now knew that the colonists would fight, and that to conquer the rebellion was no child's play. The patriotism of the provincials was roused. Assurances of support came to Massachusetts from New Hampshire to Virginia and the Carolinas ; and men, with such arras as they could get, gathered to the carap of freedora outside of Boston. In the raean tirae, the Green-Mountain Boys rallied under stern old Ethan Allen, who on the 10th of May appeared suddenly in the midst of the fort at Ticonderoga, and demanded its surrender "in the name ofthe great Jeho vah and the Continental Congress," — an authority which the British comraander did not choose to resist. In the afternoon of the seventeenth day of June, 1775, twelve hundred raen under Col. Prescott, with a few from New Hampshire under Stark, having six pieces of artillery behind a redoubt hastUy thrown up, waited the attack of three thou sand British regulars, commanded by Gens. Howe and Pigot, and covered by destructive batteries in Boston and a terrific fire from war-vessels in the harbor. But these volunteers do not flee. How strangely cool they are ! From hills and roofs and steeples, and from worlds invisible, eyes look down AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 217 upon the scene, while the most intense anxiety pervades the spectators. On move the powerful assailants until within a hundred yards of this handful of freemen, when suddenly a sheet of flame rises up from behind the redoubt : volley after volley rolls from the little band of heroes ; and sud denly the regulars break and flee. A fire so steady, and an aim so deadly, no troops could endure. From this moment, provincial volunteers rose to the rank of a respectable and dreaded enemy. Again the British forces were led up to the attack, and again they recoiled from the terrific fire of the Americans. Not until the third desperate assault, and the ammunition of the colonists was exhausted, did they retire to take up another position, and form the nucleus of the Continental Army under command of the newly-appointed commander-in-chief, the iramortal Washington. For nearly a hundred years, the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill have been under review. They have taken their position as great historical events. They revealed the resolute purpose of right to stand up firmly against might. They settled the question of resistance to despotic force by the force of liberty. They showed that numbers, backed by enormous power, could neither overawe nor conquer a handful of men sustained by the arm of God. The great disproportion between these human forces in battle seemed as if intended to render illustrious the divine power which controUed the conflict. SARATOGA AND BENNINGTON. In the spring of 1777, combinations were formed in Cana da for the invasion of the United States. A briUiant army of eight thousand men, " besides a large number of Canadian boatmen, laborers, and skirmishers," all under command of Gen. Burgoyne, advanced by the way of Lake Champlain. We held the Fort of Ticonderoga under St Clair ; but the British, dragging their cannon to the top of a high hill south and west from the fort, compeUed its evacuation. Our forces 28 218 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. retired southward. The baggage and stores were taken to Skenesborough (now Whitehall) by water, whUe the principal array moved by land east of the lake. Disaster attended the retreat. Burgoyne pushed on with such energy as to cap ture all the stores despatched to Skenesborough ; and twelve hundred men stopping at Hubberton were attacked by the British under Eraser and Eeidesell, and completely routed. Some fled disgracefully, others made a stout resistance ; .but the triumph of the enemy was complete. Some two hun dred were taken prisoners ; and the fugitives gathered by St Clair united with his main command, which, after seven days of toil and suffering, joined Schuyler on the Hudson. Burgoyne, in the mean time, slowly struggled through the forest, and the obstructions which had been thrown in his way by the Americans, and soon appeared on the Hudson with all the spirit of a conqueror. He had thus far swept every thing before him, and had reached his first great ob jective point with the loss of only two hundred men. He felt himself sufficiently at leisure to bring up his stores, and re-adjust his command, before driving the rebel Americans into the clutches of Clinton, who, according to the plan of the campaign, was advancing from New York, capturing our posts on the Hudson, expecting to meet Burgoyne in the neighbor hood of Albany. He now issued a new proclamation, calling for ten depu ties from each township to assemble at Castleton, to organize under Gov. Skene a loyal government over a conquered country. He expected the prompt submission of " the Green- Mountain Boy,s," just now smarting under the act of Congress refusing to acknowledge their State independence ; but he was deceived. The patriotism of Vermont w;is too profound and pervading to be destroyed by trials, however severe or unjust they might be. Burgoyne determined to make the caimpaign comprehen sive and decisive. He therefore sent out « Col. St Leger with two hundred regulars. Sir John Johnson's Eoyal Greens, AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 219 some Canadian Eangers, and a body of Indians under Brant, to harass the New- York frontier from the west." * Eallying his neighbors to repel this' assault, the gallant Herkimer fell, mortally wounded. St. Leger laid siege to Fort Schuyler, our most western post, near the head of the Mohawk, com manded by Gansevoort and Willett A sally under WiUett repelled the enemy; but four hundred brave Americans fell in the conflict, or under the merciless strokes of savages after they were prisoners of war. Another collateral plan of the campaign developed itself on the east of the Hudson. Burgoyne sent out Col. Baum, with a strong detachment of Germans, EngUsh Canadians, and Indians, as far as Bennington, " to try the affections of the country, to mount Eeidesell's Dragoons, to complete Pe- ters's corps of loyalists, and to obtain a larger supply of cat tle, horses, and carriages," all of which seemed quite prac ticable and judicious ; but the brave Stark, at the head of the New-Hampshire volunteers, was there, and, pointing his fin ger toward the British, .said, " There they are ! We beat to-day, or Molly Stark's a widow ! " Baum, seeing the danger began to intrench, and sent in haste to Burgoyne for re- enforcements. But the impetuous Stark led up his volunteers in four columns in front and rear; and, afters hot engage ment of two hours, the works of the enemy were carried. There was a fearful slaughter among the Germans, and many of the survivors were taken prisoners. Burgoyne came up to re-enforce the British ; but, as Provi dence ordered, at the same time Warner appeared on the field with his regiment from Manchester, and the battle raged tiU dark, when victory turned on the side of liberty. The Americans had slain two hundred of their foes; taken "near six hundred prisoners, a thousand stand of arms, as many swords, and four pieces of artiUery ; " having only fourteen kiUed, and forty-two wounded." The victory was complete, and " Molly Stark " was not " a widow." The faUure of these * HUdreth, iii. 201. 220 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. two incidental movements of the campaign had seriously changed the aspect of affairs before the great conflict came on. The work had been so hot, that Burgoyne found his Indian and Canadian alhes unreliable. They scattered to the winds. In the mean time, the courage of the Americans rose to the highest pitch. Volunteers poured in from aU di rections. Col. Brown with a party of Lincoln's militia had dashed into the British fort at the outlet of Lake George, taken three hundred prisoners, and a fleet of vessels and bateaux, thus destroying the communications of Burgoyne with his base of supplies. Gates, by order of Congress, had superseded Schuy ler ; and on the 19th of September, 1777, the Americans with six thousand men confronted the British with about nine thousand on Behmus Heights. As the enemy came up on the left, the impetuous Morgan fell upon him with such fury as to break his ranks ; and his men became temporarily confused. But heroes from New Hampshire under Cilley, Scamraell, and Hale, and frora New York under Van Courtr landt and Henry Livingston, and two regiments from Con necticut, moved up to the conflict It was three o'clock in the afternoon, and the battle raged till dark. The British and Germans fought with desperate valor. The contested field was won and lost again and again. The Americans rushed upon the cannon of the enemy, and captured them several tiraes ; but they were as often recaptured. The Bril> ish left, re-enforced by the Germans, advanced with intre pidity ; but they were confronted by Learned with four regiments from Massachusetts and one from New York. More than five hundred British, and nearly three hundred Americans, had fallen, when night arrested the carnage. The news electrified the American people. They rushed to arms, and swarmed to the scene of conflict The situation of Burgoyne had becorae critical. He would, however, in the midst of his perUs, show the bravery and skill of a good commander. Early the next morning, he sent out a recon- AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 221 noitring party of fifteen hundred choice men ; but they were promptly and furiously assaUed by Poor's New-Hampshire brigade. The gallant but perfidious Arnold, superseded for his insubordination the day before, fired by the sound of battle, appeared on the field, dashing from rank to rank on his powerful charger, throwing new courage into the bosoms of the patriot volunteers. The enemy's right feU back to pre vent being cut off from the main army, and his left staggered and broke. The gallant Eraser fell, mortally wounded. Ar nold forced an entrance within the enemy's works ; his horse was killed under him; he was wounded, and his column hurled back. Col. Brook, with Jackson's Massachusetts regi ment, assailed a German brigade, overwhelmed them, and captured their camp-equipage and artillery. Again and again the British rallied, and charged upon these brave men ; but they were invulnerable. Night again came on, and the bleed ing heroes slept upon the field. Burgoyne, under cover of darkness, skilfully changed his position, and, at dawn of the third day, appeared in battle array. But the great victory was already won. We catch a glimpse of the brave Lin coln, falling, dangerously wounded, in a skirmish ; the burial of the heroic Eraser on the hill ; the angelic tenderness of the Baroness de Eeidesell amid the wounded of our foes, with her children nestling by her side ; the burning build ings of Gen. Schuyler ; and then of the desperate retreat of the enemy six miles to Saratoga, amid drenching rains, frightful mud, and tangled forests. But it is of no avail. The proud Burgoyne surrenders five thousand six hundred and forty-two veteran soldiers to the victorious Gates, leav ing; near four thousand dead and wounded on the fields of slaughter. Let us pause to reflect The British army, composed chiefly of regulars, brave, and ably comraanded, outnurabered the American raw recruits by nearly one-third. Congress had ventured the dangerous experiment of changing com manders on the eve of a great battle. Schuyler, who,- as 222 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. results showed, deserved only the gratitude of his country, had fallen under the injustice of rivalry and suspicion ; and Gates, in no way his superior in command, unknown to many of the noble men who were to fight and conquer or die for their country, out of sight and danger during the slaughter of his troops ; the ammunition short, and the commissariat in a revolution frora a change of its head ; Arnold, the best fighting general on the field, in disgrace ; and the heroes of Bennington claiming and taking their discharge from the expiration of time, — amid all these adverse facts, what was the natural result to be expected ? Surely nothing less than the utter defeat of the army of liberty. But the crisis of the war had corae, and God was the coraraander of the American forces that day. The proud army of invasion from the North was destroyed, and the heroes of Uberty moved on to their future conflicts, with a fresh inspiration from heaven. TRENTON AND PRINCETON. The distinguished military abilities of Washington began to appear as well in his retreats as his advances. In Europe, his masterly skill in tactics was at length eulogized as indi cating the highest rank among the great commanders of modern times. Few generals, it was believed, could have kept so small an array together, for so long a tirae, in the presence of so formidable a foe. Few could have saved his men as he did when he lost New York, and his forts, and munitions of war, on the heights above the city, and espe cially when he lost New Jersey. The haughty tone and pat ronizing airs of the British commander in his famous procla mation showed that he believed, and with good reason, that the war was virtually ended. When the Howes thought it safe to go into winter-quar ters, and finish their task at their ease in the spring ; just as the effects of their proclamation as king's commissioners be gan to appear in the abandonment of the American cause by AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 223 Tucker, president of the New-Jersey convention that formed the State constitution ; by Allen and Galloway, members of Congress from Pennsylvania ; and as McKean and Eawley had been recalled by the convention of Delaware for giving her votes in favor of independence, — while treachery was in the air he breathed, and every support of freedom seemed shaking to its fall, Washington was busy re-organizing his army. Not a word to Congress, or in councUs of war, about surrendering his suffering men, or making terms with the enemy, but the most powerful and dignified appeals to Con gress and the people to give him soldiers, — not militia who so frequently fled at the first fire, and communicated panic to the continentals ; not a mass of temporary men whose terra of service would expire, and leave hira without fighting-men on the eve of a battle. He insisted upon having national troops, who, despite all the prejudice against a standing army, were to serve during the war ; and, by the moral power which true greatness alone can inspire, he had finally brought up his forces to seven thousand men. Before the sixty days had expired, during which the British general had graciously permitted rebel Americans to return to their allegiance and accept his Majesty's pardon, and just before the terms of service for many of his troops had expired, Washington deterrained to attack his antagonist amid the holiday festivities of his soldiers. Fifteen hundred Hessians were at Trenton. On the evening of Christmas, he crossed the Delaware, about nine miles above Trenton, with two thousand five hundred men and six pieces of artil lery. He had ordered Cadwallader to cross with two corps of militia in front of Trenton and below at the same time ; but floating ice prevented. It required the whole night -and the most resolute efforts for Washington to cross with his men. Near four o'clock in the morning, he commenced his march on Trenton, amid a violent snow-storm, in two col umns, led by Greene and SuUivan, with Stark's regiraent of New-Hampshire troops in advance. They reached the Hes- 224 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. sians at eight, a.m., and found them sleeping after their Christmas debauch. They were completely surprised. Their commander fell, mortally wounded, while attempting to form his men. Eesistance was vain. The light horse and a small number of infantry escaped to Bordentown ; but the expe dition was completely successful. Washington recrossed the Delaware with a thousand prisoners and six cannon, leaving his proud enemy to wonder how a dying antagonist could strike a blow so sudden and decisive. While the Hessian prisoners were parading through the streets of Philadelphia, the British were prudently withdrawing from Trenton to Princeton. Cornwallis, detained by Howe from his intended voyage to England on account of the astonishing activity of the Americans and the capture of the Hessians, assumed the comraand. The great Fabian general would show that he could assume the offensive whenever it was prudent to do so. Cornwallis moved his army iraraediately for an attack on Washington at Trenton. He encamped for the night ; and Washington, sustained in his own judgment by a council of war, resolved neither to wait for an attack, nor to cross the Delaware in face of his enemy. He quietly sent away his baggage, kindled blazing camp-fires, left a detachment at work throwing up intrenchments in hearing of the enemy, and at midnight suddenly moved on Princeton in the rear of CornwaUis. Three regiments had been left there, two of which were on the march for Trenton. The first regiment met was attacked by Mercer and his mUitia. He fell, mor tally wounded ; and the regiment, getting away, moved on toward Trenton. The second regiment made a stout resist ance, but broke and fled. The regiment in town threw themselves into the college ; but the cannon of Washington soon compelled them to surrender. Cornwallis, who had anticipated an easy victory over the feeble Americans early in the morning, was astounded by the roar of cannon in his rear, and immediately comprehended A2? HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 225 the designs of Washington. The British were just begin ning to appreciate the profound military genius with which they had to contend. It was a startling fact, that they had an antagonist whom it was of no use to defeat; who was just as much alive after he had been crushed, and driven from New York and New Jersey, as before ; and whose plans of de fence or attack could never be known except by the roar of his cannon and the charges of his brave army. Corn wallis, of course, started in hot haste for New Brunswick, to save his military stores. Washington knew his business too well to run any further risks ; and, just as Cornwallis thought he was about to reach him, he quietly passed away with his three hundred Princeton prisoners to Morristown. Though he was reduced to the greatest straits by the retiring of soldiers whose term of office expired, and found his men miserably provisioned and clothed, and his skeleton regiments constituting but an apology for an army, yet the moral effects of his late movements were most salutary. Courage came again to the American heart ; and the fame of Washington, after nearly three years of consummate gen eralship, began to reach the ears and understandings of warriors and princes abroad. WAR ON THE SEA. Our first warlike movement on the water was in 1613, when Capt. Argall went from Virginia with eleven small vessels, fourteen guns in all, to the coast of Nova Scotia, to capture the French port of St. Sauveur. It was an easy task, as the French were entirely without artillery. Capt. Argall, on his way back, dashed into the harbor of New York, frightened the Dutch terribly, and took pos session of New York; leaving them, however, as entirely Dutch as before. They kept the government in the hands of their own nation for some fifty years thereafter. The first American decked vessel was buUt in New York 29 226 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. by Skipper Adraen Block in 1614. New England built her first vessel of any size at or near Boston, in 1633. Capt GaUop's naval engagement with the Narragansett Indians for the rescue of Capt Oldham's pinnace, which had been seized and the captain murdered, was our first fight on the water ; and it was brave and victorious. About 1666, the career of the buccaneers commenced, and the daring exploits of the famous Capt Kidd followed. There is, however, more of romance than history in the frightful tales told of him to excite our childish fears. The capture of Port Eoyal in Acadia (now Annapohs, Md.) in 1710, and the failure of the attempt upon the French possessions on the St. Lawrence in 1711, are the next important events of our naval history. The whale-fisheries then became the naval school for American seamen. War with Spain was declared in 1739, and native Ameri cans began to exercise their skill in naval warfare. In 1714, a large number of the transports sent against Cuba were built by the colonists. The year 1744 found the English at war with France. This furnished the American colonists their first opportunity to undertake by sea and land an enterprise of importance. Without aid from England, the commander of our little co lonial marine, Capt Edward Tyng of Massachusetts, with twelve small vessels besides the transports, sailed for Louis- burg, an iraportant port commanding the entrance of the St Lawrence. The co-operating land-forces, 4,070 strong, all from New England, were commanded by Col. William Pepperell of Maine Commodore Warren of the British navy arrived, with a part of the southern squadron from the West Indies, in time to take command. After forty-seven days' vigorous siege, and a severe cannonade, Louisburg sur- rended. The peace of Aix la Chapelle arrested for the time being the opening career of American bravery on the sea. It was 1748. The American colonies had now been little AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 227 more than a century struggling upward, and they numbered something over a million of souls. The growtli of naviga tion had been very rapid. That year five hundred vessels sailed from Boston, and four hundred and thirty entered her port ; whUe the shipping from and to Portsmouth, N.H, New York, Philadelphia, Newport, E.I., and Perth Amboy, N. J., was quite extensive. Peace was of short duration. The two nations could not live together on this continent "The old French war" was opened on the 17th of May, 1756 ; which, though it furnished little opportunity for naval enterprise, ended in the complete destruction of French power in America. This result, so largely due to the energy of the Earl of Chatham, harmonized with the evident purposes of Providence, and left the colonies, with the military discipline they had re ceived, free to go on in the accumulation of power for the great struggle which was rapidly approaching. Peace was declared Feb. 10, 1763 ; and France ceased the struggle for territory here, holding nothing above Louisiana. The colonies were then to prepare for the great conflict with the mother-country, now just at hand. The first overt act of hostility between the colonies and England was the famous chase between the Providence packet " Hannah " and the British schooner " Gasp^." How characteristic for the Yankee craft to lead "The Gaspe," which she could not fight, on to a bar where she must remain until a company on shore was extemporized to attack and destroy her during the night! On "The Gaspg" was shed the first blood of the Eevolution. This daring adventure pro duced great indignation in England. But neither a thousand pounds sterUng for the arrest of the leader from Providence, nor five hundred pounds to any informer, nor the commis sion of inquiry under the great seal of England, sitting for five months, could secure the least information for the cro-wn. England did not comprehend this mysterious event ; America did°not It was little Ehode Island opening the War of In- 228 TTTF. GREAT REPUBLIC. dependence This was in 1772 : the battle of Lexington was, as we have seen, in 1775. The first engagement on the water, after the opening of the war, was between a lumber-sloop of Machias, Me., and " The Margaretta." Capt. Moore had not heard of the war ; but the news had reached the Maine lumbermen, and they promptly resolved upon the capture of "The Margaretta." It was Sunday, and the captain and his men, seeing danger, escaped from the church through the window. He moved his vessel, as he thought, to a place of safety, but was fired upon, and summoned to surrender, from a high bluff. He moved farther, and would have run away, rather than fight; but the ugly-looking Yankee craft came down upon him suddenly and roughly. "The Margaretta" was boarded, her commander shot down; and, after the fall of twenty men on both sides, the British vessel was surrendered. Though su perior in numbers and armament, she could by no means resist the dreadful energy with which she was assailed. The volunteer crew of the lumber-sloop sailed without a com mander, but made one on the way to the battle. Jeremiah O'Brien has the historic honor of conducting the forces of this Lexington of the seas. We shall now see the .slow growth of the naval power of the Eepublic. The persistent idea in America that this was a temporary struggle for certain rights under the crown, and not a war between equals, rendered the action of the colonies slow, and their preparations inadequate, both on the land and on the sea. The Americans were looking anxiously to the ocean : but it was not tUl the 13th of Oc tober, 1775, that Congress passed a law initiating the or ganization of naval arrangements ; and not tiU the 10th of November of the same year that Massachusetts " established courts of admiralty, and enacted laws for the encouragement of nautical enterprises." * On the 13th of December foUowing, Congress ordered * Cooper's Naval History of the United States, p. 37. AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 229 thirteen ships of war bmlt ; and on the 22d of December, 1775, Eseck Hopkins was appointed commander-in-chief. Thus began the navy of the United States. Commodore Hopkins soon made a dash at New Provi dence, where his marines behaved with the steadiness and gallantry which have ever since characterized the men of our navy when brought into action on land or on the sea. About a hundred cannon, a large quantity of other mili tary stores, and the governor, were the trophies of his vic tory. The first considerable naval engagement under orders of Congress was on the 6th of April, 1776. Commodore Hop kins, with a part of his squadron, fell in with " The Glasgow," a large ship of twenty guns. "The Cabot" boldly attacked the stranger, delivering her broadside skilfully; but her metal was too light for important effect She dexterously moved away from her enemy; and "The Alfred" came up hand somely into her place, and delivered her fire. " The Andrea Doria " came into action, and did her best ; while " The Providence " moved under the stern of " The Glasgow," and blazed away in vigorous style. Capt. Howe, soon perceiving that he was in danger if he continued the fight, shook off his spunky little assailants ; and " The Glasgow," by dexterous sailing, escaped after con siderable damage. This affair, which at first was taken for an important vic tory, produced, when the true history came to be known, extreme mortification among the American people, and cost the commodore and several of his commanders the loss of position. By way of compensation for the escape of " The Glasgow," our spirited little " Lexington," Capt. Barry, fell in with the armed tender " Edward," and in a brave fight of an hour cut her nearly to pieces, and captured her. The famous Capt Paul Jones now comes in sight In com mand of "The Providence," he mistook an English fast-sail- 230 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ing war-frigate for a large merchantman. Finding his mistake, he tacked ship ; and " The Providence " " showed her heels." The chase continued for four hours ; and the stranger gained so rapidly as to get within musket-shot; when, to the aston ishment of the British comraander, just as he was sure of his prize, she edged away, tacked, filled all her sails, and bore directly down on her antagonist Passing within pistol-shot, she sailed away before the wind ; and, before the commander of " The Salisbury " had fairly recovered from his surprise, " The Providence " was out of reach. "The Providence" was a lively little craft. She led off " The Milford," thirty-two guns, for hours, just keeping out of reach of harm ; whUe " The Milford " kept up a roaring fire for the whole tirae, without giving " The Providence " a single shot. She glided about like the spirit of the sea, gathering up her prizes as if by magic. Independence was now declared, and we had war in ear nest, on the ocean as well as on the land. . " The Andrea Doria," Capt Biddle, even outdid " The Providence " in the number of her exploits and captures. In the mean time, Boston had been evacuated ; but, as no notice of the fact could reach the British ships at sea, some thirty sail fell into our hands. The Connecticut brig "Defence" leaving Plymouth on the 17th of June, 1776, Capt Harding soon heard the noise of an engagement Crowding saU for the scene, he came up with four light American schooners, which had been en gaged with two British transports, using metal too heavy for them. Capt. Harding made his arrangements for battle, and moving boldly in between the transports, " within pistol- shot," called out to the enemy to " strike." " Ay, ay, I'll strike ! " responded a voice from the largest vessel ; and a ter rific broadside instantly followed. The action was very severe, and lasted for an hour, when both British transports struck, and " The Defence " led away her prizes, containing nearly AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 231 two hundred British soldiers, with Lieut-Col Campbell, com mander of the regiment She had eight men wounded ; whUe the transports, besides many wounded, lost eighteen kUled, including Major Menzies, who gave the defiant an swer to the challenge of Capt Harding. The next morning, " The Defence," notwithstanding she had suffered a good deal aloft, made sail, and, discovering a stranger, overhauled and captured her. She proved to be another transport with raore than a hundred British soldiers ; and these, with those taken by " The Doria," raised the number of prisoners from one of the best corps of the British army to about five hundred men. We now see the brave Capt. Wickes with his extempo rized squadron sailing entirely around Ireland, and sweep ing the seas of every craft not too heavy for him to engage ; and then mournfully watch the gallant little " Lexington," as, at the close of a second hotly-contested engagement, she strikes her flag to the English " Alert ; " and then see " The Eeprisal," foundering upon the banks of Newfoundland, and the gallant Wickes, with every man on board but the cook, perishing in the water. Presently Capt Gustavus Conyngham appears amid the strife He is in " The Surprise ; " and on the 7th of March, 1777, he dashes up to the Harwich packet "Prince of Orange," and captures her so suddenly, that he walks quietly down into her cabin, and salutes her comraander and his passengers at breakfast The captain, by this little transaction, became involved in a French intrigue, and was imprisoned, his cut ter seized, and his prizes were released. English confidence in France was thus, for the time being, restored ; and, with perfect assurance, vessels were sent to Dunkirk to convey Capt Conyngham and his men to England to be " tried as pirates." American enterprise had, however, forestalled this action. Another cutter was promptly purchased at Dunkirk. Capt Conyngham and his people were ingeniously released ; and. 232 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. on the 18th of July, they were out on the water in " The Eevenge," a name terribly prophetic. She took prizes every day, many of which were soon placed to our credit on our account with Spain. Having suffered from a gale, artfully disguised, she slipped into an English port, and refitted, took in supplies in Ireland, made a cruise of unprecedented suc cess among the English shipping, refitted in Ferrol, and sailed for home. These daring movements in British waters made a sensa tion. Mr. Deane, writing to Eobert Morris, says that the cruise of Capt. Wickes "effectually alarmed England, pre vented the great fair at Chester, occasioned insurance to rise, and even deterred the English merchants from ship ping goods in English bottoms at any rate ; so that, in a few weeks, forty sail of French ships were loaded in the Thames with freight, — an instance never before known." In the same letter, with regard to the exploits of Conyng ham, he says, "In a word, Conyngham, by his first and second bold expeditions, is become the terror of all the eastern coast of England and Scotland, and is more dreaded than Thurot was in the late war." Glancing back a little, we find Capt. Mugford in "The Franklin " capturing " The Hope," with " fifteen hundred bar rels of powder arid a large quantity of intrenching tools, gun- carriages, and other stores," and taking his valuable prize into Boston " in sight of the British squadron." Then Capi Eobinson, in " The Sachem," fell in " with an English letter of marque, a Jamaica-man, and captured her after a sharp ac tion ; " and, as a reward for his bravery, he was made com mander of the fine historic vessel " The Andrea Doria." She was a mischievous craft, and was so well known to the Brit ish navy, that " The Eacehorse," twelve guns, Lieut. Jones, was sent out expressly to capture her. Off Porto Eico, Capt Eobinson saw the stranger bearing down upon him, and had hardly time to prepare for action before he received her broadside. A very sharp contest of nearly two hours foi- AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 283 lowed, when the Englishman found herself fearfully crippled, her commander and a large number of her men being slain ; and she struck her colors to " The Andrea Doria." Capt Eobinson came safely and proudly into PhUadelphia, leading as a prize " The Eacehorse," sent defiantly out to capture him. The British could never have the satisfaction of mak ing " good and lawful prize " of " The Andrea Doria." She had done her work, and was burnt by American orders, " when the evacuation of Fort Mifflin gave the British the command of the Delaware," into which they went, to be driven out after a terrible contest with galleys claiming those waters as their home. We have now followed the young and rising Araerican navy far enough to. see, that, in the hands of Providence, our experimental people found themselves as much at home in war on the sea as on the land ; that the American marines were a powerful arm of the Eevolutionary service ; and that the proud reliance of England on her naval strength was utterly vain against a power that could simultaneously create a navy, and command victories on an element for which the feeble colonists were supposed to be wholly unprepared. Here, on the sea as on the land, we see that " the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong ; " but " God is the Judge. He putteth down one, and setteth up another." Let us now turn again to the land. CORNWALLIS AND YORKTOWN. Early in April, 1780, Lord CornwaUis appeared in com mand of the British army in the South. He was a fearless commander, and evidently indulged a feeling of contempt for American rebels. He sought for our little suffering army with the eagerness of a conqueror. He met them under command of Gates, near Camden, S.C, attacked them with impetuosity, and swept them from the field. Gates and CasweU were borne away by the flying volunteers; and 30 234 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. De Kalb, who stood firmly with his smaU band of continen tals, fell, mortally wounded. His men, taken in flank, broke, and fled for their lives. The army of Freedom left nine hundred dead on the field, and as many prisoners in the hands of the British. The track of their retreat, strewn with arms, knapsacks, and broken wagons, indicated a crush- ino- defeat. Some three or four days after, Gates, the hero of Saratoga, found himself eighty miles from the scene of his disaster, at Charlotte, N.C., with only two hundred men. Would not this end the war in the South ? In the mean time, the daring Sumter had dashed into a convoy on its way to Cornwallis from the South, and ca|> tured it with two hundred prisoners ; but Tarleton, a foe by whom he was well matched, moving with great celerity, rushed into his camp while his tired raen in fancied security sought rest and refreshment, recaptured the British stores, released their prisoners, killed a hundred and fifty men, and took three hundred prisoners. The news of this disaster met Gates at Charlotte. What now was to prevent the abandonment of the struggle in complete despair ? There was no American array worth the name in either of the Carolinas. Gates, stripped of his laurels, and fleeing from the foe he dared not meet, was, by order of Congress and appointment of Washington, superseded by Greene. Cornwallis renewed his supplies, and, as a warning to others, hung a few Americans who had before, in their ex tremity, accepted British protection ; then moved on with the spirit of a conqueror. Marion, the bold partisan leader, came out from the swamps of the Pedee, and, dashing about amongst the Tories of the North-west district, made them very uncomfortable Sumter, though vanquished, was not yet dead. Gathering his scattered forces around him, and uniting them with a few from over the mountains, he soon showed that an heroic life survived the calamities of defeat. CornwaUis moved on North to find a foe if he could, and AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 235 complete his campaign by a triumphant march through the conquered territory. He did not know the American peo ple, nor the power which guided their strange career. Irregular multitudes of "insurgents" appeared before Augusta ; but, upon the approach of the British forces, they suddenly disappeared. Ferguson was sent out to intercept them. Moving close along the base of the mountains, he was to destroy, capture, or disperse whatever " rebels " he might find. But, to his astonishment, he was suddenly con fronted by two thou-sand mounted rough backwoodsmen, comraanded by Shelby and Sevier, future governors of Ken tucky and Tennessee. He saw his danger, and raade haste to retreat Very despicable foes they were ; but a thousand of them were after him with their fleetest horses and best rifles. It was a mad break-neck race of thirty-six hours; and the British commander was at length brought to bay at King's Mountain. Ferguson was amazed. Enemies seemed to spring from the ground to stare at him with fiery eyes, and gnash their teeth in defiance of his proud superi ority. He threw up hasty defences, and fought bravely. Volley after volley rolled out from his veterans, and charge after charge of the British bayonets drove the cold steel into the bosoms of these struggling freemen ; but their trusty rifies flashed with unerring aim, and they returned every charge with desperate valor, rushing into the arms of death to save their bleeding country. Such terrific onsets no foe could resist Ferguson fell, and the victory was gained. Eia-ht hundred men surrendered to the survivors of the thou- sand from the mountains. These backwoodsmen were not very refined in the art of war. Caring httle for forms, they hung ten of the most odious of their prisoners ; and, dashing again into the forests, they disappeared as suddenly as they came. CornwaUis now thought it time to be more prudent, and commenced a retrograde movement The wUd, furious men who had annihilated Ferguson's command began to appear 236 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. formidable. Eetiring to Winnsborough, S.C, he waited for the arrival of re-enforcements. Three thousand under Les- Ue were on their way from New York; but, hearing of Ferguson's disaster and the retreat of Cornwallis, they re- embarked for Charleston. Marion again came out of his swamp, and threatened the communication of the British with Charleston. The vigi lant Tarleton drove him back. Sumter appeared suddenly in the field, and, this time, was more than a match for his old adversary Tarleton. The British attacked furiously, and were bravely repulsed; but Sumter fell, dangerously wounded, and his men dispersed. Greene now commenced in good earnest the re-organization of the army in the South. " He found the troops without pay, and their clothing in tatters. There was hardly a dol lar in the mUitary chest Subsistence was obtained entirely by military impressment" * A few drafted men came from North Carolina. Morgan with his Maryland regiment, and "Washington's dragoons of Lee's corps," appeared across Broad Eiver on the left and rear of the enemy ; " while the main body encamped on the Pedee to cover the fertUe dis trict to the northward, and to threaten the British communi cation with Charleston."! A new enemy now appeared in the field. The perfidious Arnold, anxious to show his gratitude to the British for his fifty thousand dollars, the reward of his treachery, and for his promotion to the rank of brigadier, sent out an " Address to the Inhabitants of America," and a " Proclamation to the Officers and Soldiers of the Continental Army," hoping to ex cuse his treason, and seduce honest patriots from their loyalty to freedom. In this he signally failed. The American sol diers scorned him and his proclamation. He was in the field with sixteen hundred men, chiefly Tories, on his way from New York to join Cornwallis. Washington had been obliged to contend with the spirit * Hildreth, iii. 328. t Ibid., p. 29. AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 237 of revolt in the New-Jersey and Pennsylvania lines: but firm patriotism, and the spirit of concUiation, triumphed over these formidable trials also ; and the army of Liberty, which had so recently seemed to be utterly annihUated, now gath ered about the proud British commander in formidable numbers. The gaUant Baron Steuben brought together a smaU force in Virginia, and watched Arnold, who, with the ferocity of a savage, was burning and destroying the country he had deserted. Fearing to be taken prisoner, as weU he might, he hastily retreated to Portsmouth beyond the reach of the French fleet, which threatened his communications. In the mean time, a brief naval engagement sent the worsted French fleet back to Newport Lafayette, on his way to join the army of the South, hearing of this, the fourth failure of the navy from France, halted his command at Annapolis " in a great state of desti tution, without shoes, hats, or tents." Now the plot thickens. Tarleton is sent out to attack Morgan, whose hope of safety was in crossing the Broad Eiver before Tarleton reached him, or running the risk of a battle. He preferred the latter, and at "the Cowpens" waited the coming-up of the enemy. The attack was furi ous and terrible. Morgan seemed to retreat, and the Brit ish rushed on in pursuit, when the continentals turned sud denly upon their pursuers, and poured into their ranks a fire so deadly, that they recoiled and broke. The flying mi litia wheeled, charged upon the British cavalry, and routed them ; and the brave Tarleton's command scattered and fled, leaving more than six hundred dead and wounded on the field, with all their baggage and artillery in the hands of the foe they had so recently despised. CornwaUis had moved up rapidly to rescue his favorite commander; but he was too late. He could only receive him and his few remaining horsemen as fugitives from the field of destruction. Leslie came up with his two thousand 238 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. men from New York, and Cornwallis resolved upon the bold est measures to retrieve his losses in the two great defeats under Ferguson and Tarleton. He burned all his stores and superfluous baggage, and, " converting his whole army into a light-infantry corps," dashed on to destroy Morgan's force before he could cross the Catawba. But this enterprising comraander was thoroughly alive to his danger, and pushed forward with such rapidity as to gain the opposite bank, with all his men and stores, two hours before the British van reached the river; and God sent the waters, which produced a sudden rise in the Catawba, and rendered it impossible for Cornwallis to follow. Hearing of the American victory at "the Cowpens," Greene had strained every nerve to form a junction with Mor gan, which he accomplished on the 21st of June. Assuming the comraand of Morgan's raen, and caUing out the militia to guard the fords, he hoped to hold Cornwallis untU the main body of his army came up. But one detachment of the British dashed aside the militia under Gen. Davidson, and secured the ford. The energetic Tarleton overwhelmed another smaU body of militia, and the forces of CornwaUis crossed the river. Greene now pushed on for the Yadkin ; but the race was so close, that Cornwallis captured several of his wagons. At GuUford Court-house, Greene met his main array, now nurabering two thousand three hundred men; and, by the celerity of his movements, he gained another advantage over his wily antagonist, crossing with his men over into Virginia, where CornwaUis did not attempt to pursue him. Newborn, whither the North-Carolina authorities had fled at the ap proach of the British, was attacked, and destroyed with aU its stores, by a British force from WUmington; and the people of the State were again caUed upon to make their submis sion, and the well-disposed to join the British army. There were numerous Tories in those parts; but they were begin ning to doubt the safety of open disloyalty to their country. AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 239 Fearless partisan troops dashed in wildly among thera, and taught them caution ; and severe exemplary punishment very frequently fell upon those who were caught in the act of rebellion. Greene showed himself an adept in tactics. He was not strong enough to risk a battle ; but he worried his antagonist by his sudden movements, and held the Tories in check by seeming almost ubiquitous. His suffering sol diers were full of patriotic energy ; and, though they could frequently be tracked to the place of their uncertain repose by the blood from their bare feet, they were ready for an other rapid march, or skirmish with the British, or to dash into a neighborhood of Tories at any moment of the day or night. Fresh troops came up from Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina ; and now, numbering about four thousand five hun dred men, Greene determined to risk a general engagement. Cornwallis, reduced to less than half this nuraber, thought it safe to rely upon superior valor and discipline, and accepted the challenge. On the 15th of March, 1781, the battle near Guilford Court-house was fought. The struggle was severe. The victory wavered between the contending armies. The British finally gained the field, but with the loss of five hun dred men, and were so crippled, that they did not dare to attempt pursuit ; while the Americans lost four hundred, and effected an orderly retreat : but a large part of the militia disbanded, and rendered the campaign again critical. Cornwallis found himself driven to act on the defensive. His army, bleeding and nearly starved, commenced a re treat on Wilmington, N.C ; and Greene boldly marched into South Carolina, and ordered Lee to unite with Marion, and attack Eawdon's communications with Charleston. Corn waUis had failed to penetrate the designs of his antagonist untU it was too late to prevent thera ; and he imitated them by pushing boldly into Virginia to join the forces under Arnold and Phillips. Eawdon, by a circuit through the edge of a swamp, gained 240 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the rear of Greene's army ; but the American commander formed his men, and faced him so quickly as to defeat the intended surprise. The British line was now furiously as saulted in front and on both flanks, while Washington's horse fell upon their rear. Lord Eawdon ordered up his reserves ; and the veteran Maryland regiment, under Granby, gave way before the British bayonet. Confusion, and a retreat of Greene's troops over the hill, followed ; but the American cavalry rushed into the British lines, held them in check, and brought away the cannon the infantry had left Greene went into camp twelve mUes from the battle-ground for temporary rest. In the mean time, Lee and Marion had attacked and taken Fort Watson, between Camden and Charleston ; and the re leased patriots between the Pedee and the Santee flew to arms. Eawdon, alarmed for his communications, abandoned Camden, and " retreated to Monk's Corner." The Ameri cans took Fort Motte, Orangeburg, Fort Granby, and Au gusta. Uniting his forces with Lee, an attack was made upon the main stronghold of the British at " Ninety-six ; " but Eawdon approaching, re-enforced by three regiments from Ireland, Greene retired ; and swamps fifteen mUes broad, and a circuit of seventy miles, the only practicable route, separated the hostile armies. Greene had now relieved a large part of South CaroUna, and shut up the British to a small territory between the Santee and the Lower Savannah. A season of comparative quiet foUowed, neither party being prepared to commence aggressive moveraents. In AprU, 1781, Lafayette appears in command of a smaU New-England force to observe PhiUips and CornwaUis in Virginia, just in tirae to save Eichraond from the clutches of Phillips, who hastened to unite his forces with those of Corn wallis to aid in the vain attempt to prevent the junction of Lafayette and Wagner. Count de Grasse approaching the Chesapeake with a AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 241 powerful French fleet, and the British commander fearing, ¦with reason, an attack of the allied armies and the French just arrived from Newport, orders were sent to Cornwallis to take up, for the present, some strong position in Virginia. But Washington and Eochambeau determined to leave New York undisturbed, and make a vigorous effort against Corn wallis. Lafayette was therefore ordered to cut off his retreat into North Carolina. Greene was now again in the field. Uniting his continen tals to Pickens's militia and Marion's dashing corps, he moved towards the enemy, now commanded by Col. Stuart. The bloody battle of Eutaw Springs followed. Both armies fought with the bravery and skUl of veterans. The Americans, after a fierce conflict, broke the English left, and seemed upon the verge of a great triumph, when a body of British threw themselves into a stone house ; and, while Greene's men were attempting in vain to dislodge them, Stuart's veterans repulsed a cavalry attack, and gained the rear of the Ameri cans, and compelled them to retreat. The army of Congress numbered a few more than two thousand, and the British a few less. Of this small force, the British lost sorae seven hundred men, and the Americans nearly as many. The victory of this fiercely-contested field was claimed by both parties ; but all the fruits of victory were with the Americans. The British retreated to Monk's Corner ; and, being shut up between the Cooper and Ashley, they had no power to extricate themselves. The sufferings of Greene's soldiers were dreadful. They were barefoot, and almost destitute of clothing. They must go back to the Santee Hills to rest. At length, the long-expected French fleet appeared in American waters. Count de Grasse, after a cautious defen sive engagement with a portion of the English fleet, safely conducting a large number of merchantmen into a place of safety, and convoying another large fleet so far towards France as to be out of danger, by skUful manoeuvring 31 242 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. entered the Chesapeake about the last of August The Brit ish Admiral Graves, now commanding the combined British fleet, arriving off the mouth of the bay on the 5th of Sep tember, was greatly astonished to find De Grasse securely inside with twenty-four ships of the line. After four most distressing faUures, the French fleet now became able to ren der most effective service. The count, put into immediate communication with Lafayette, sent ships to block up James and York Elvers, and thus prevented the retreat of Corn wallis, who intrenched himself strongly at Yorktown. Send ing three thousand French troops to re-enforce Lafayette, De Grasse at once ordered his fleet to sea. Avoiding a gen eral engagement, he succeeded in covering the French fleet from Newport under Du Barras, who availed himself of a favorable moraent to slip into the bay with his invaluable cargo of military stores and heavy guns for the siege of Yorktown. Arrangements for the contemplated attack on Cornwallis were promptly consummated by Washington, De Grasse, and Eochambeau. The French and American forces were brought down the Chesapeake in transports, and were soon united under Lafayette at Williarasburg. Gov. Nel son carae up with three thousand five hundred Virginia militia, and the whole besieging army rose to sixteen thousand men. The British forces, about eight thousand strong, with the advantage of their strong defences, firmly but anxiously waited the attack. Two advance redoubts were stormed, one by the French, the other by the Americans under Alexander HamUton, whose thirst for mUitary glory had thrown him into the lines. These rival forces rushed to their objects with the greatest daring. Both were irresisti ble, and these " redoubts were included in the second par allel." The works about Yorktown began to crumble under the guns of the assailing forces. A brave sally was attempted, and faded. " As a last resort, Cornwallis thought of passing his army across to Gloucester, forcing a passage through the troops on that side, and making a push for New York ; but AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 243 a violent storm drove his boats down the river, and even that desperate scheme had to be abandoned." * The long- dreaded end had come at length. For more than fourteen months, this brave commander had struggled against destiny with incredible energy. He entered the field with the air of a conqueror. He fought pitched battles ; he marched and suffered, advanced and retreated ; blew up his stores ; dashed into the ranks of his enemies, and scattered them to the winds ; received coolly the most astounding defeats of his auxiliary expeditions ; and, when at length brought to bay, he planned his defences skilfully, and made the best of his faUing munitions of war. But he saw at length that it was all in vain ; and, like a true soldier, he resolved to spare the further effiision of blood, and surrendered his forces, now sev en thousand in number, to Washington, as prisoners of war. This grand event in the South had at length answered to the capture of Burgoyne in the North, and the War of American Independence was virtually ended. THE HEROISM OF THE NATIONAL LIFE. The bravery of war is not of itself true heroism. It appears on both sides ; is no certain evidence of the right, or guaranty of victory ; and may be evinced, in a high degree, by heaven-daring offenders against the claims of God and the rights of man. Nor would the reckless courage of individuals, or of com panies of American volunteers, in separate and unorganized warfare, give hope of success against the sturdy, weU-planned measures of a powerful nation for a period of eight long bloody years. But the following great facts appear appro priately to conclude this chapter. The resistance of force by arms came after a war of prin ciples had been going on for a hundred and fifty years. The rights of freemen had been searched out and defined * Hildreth, iii. 369. 244 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. with the vigor of the keenest logic and the clearness of lio-ht The usurpations of despotism had exhausted argu ment, prerogative, and administrative ability ; and at length had drawn the sword with the avowed purpose of subjugating or destroying the colonists, who could not be overawed. When this crisis came on, individual patriots found whole communities with them : the menaced colonies found all other colonies promptly arranged by their side. When the necessity for State action arose, inchoate but real States appeared with the habits of independent legislation already formed, and under the direction of a statesmanship of which any people might be proud. When the peril of irregular, unorganized warfare was seen, a living nation appeared clothed with representative powers to consolidate the belligerent forces, and exalt the struggle to national dig nity. This was the mysterious comraon life of a growing people. Few could comprehend its character, or explain its origin. It was not anticipated ; it was hardly invoked ; it was certainly not well understood. And yet it was here, throbbing in the bosoms of three miUions of people, and organizing the scattered elements of a nation into the power of a formidable unity, without uttering a word in regard to its predestined independence. If any raan had asked the wisest American, " What is the character of this life ? " he would probably have answered, " Feeble, uncertain, very humble, and limited in its aim." If the same question had been put to an English absolutist, he would have said, " There is nothing of it : a few brief ebuUitions of passion, and it is gone." But a profounder insight into the phUosophy of history and the plans of God. would have revealed the life of a new and powerful nation throbbing with energy, and instinct with a heroism which would measure its power, not by the numbers of its men, but by the divine justice of its cause. This is true heroism. Hence, when the British Government coolly calculated the force and expense of overwhelming this rebeUion, the Ameri- AN HEROIC NATIONAL LIFE. 245 can Congress and people made no dependence upon the probability of matching them by similar strength. They only knew that their country was to be invaded by formi dable armies, sustained by enormous power at home, and that they were to resist by such means as they had, and to be identified with liberty, whether in honor or disgrace ; simply believing, that, with a just God on their side, they ought to triumph : they surely would triumph. Thus all human calculation of chances must be thrown to the winds. For instance, raw recruits cannot fight veterans ; citizen commanders cannot match scientific experienced generals; soldiers well dressed, well armed, well fed, and promptly paid, must conquer the hungry, barefoot, and uncompensated; superior numbers, with inexhaustible re cruits, must subdue small numbers ; successive defeats must finally annihUate a few poor and ill-provisioned men. These and a multitude of other military aphorisms, true beyond a doubt in a comparison of merely huraan forces, were all utterly at fault in a war of tyranny with God and liberty ; and the rapidly-accumulating consciousness of this super human power supplied and revealed the heroism of the national life. CHAPTEE IV. PATRIOTISM DEMONSTRATES A SUSTAINED NATIONAL LIFE. " In short, it was ultimately owing to this influence of the God of heaven that the thoughts, the views, the purposes, the speeches, the writings, and the whole conduct, of those who were engaged in this great affair, were so overruled as to bring into effect the desired happy event." — Chaunot. Love of country is God's provision for promoting the sta bility and regular development of civil institutions. The wandering tribes of barbarism make no progress in agricul ture, in the arts or sciences. Scythians, Indians, Gypsies, know little of the blessings of home ; and their unnumbered generations live and die without the advantages of civiliza tion. They have shown, it is true, enough of preference for one land over another to indicate the presence of the ori ginal tendency, but so little as to deprive them of its intended practical results, and .show, that, in the long ages, violence has been done to one of the best provisions of the creation. Patriotism, or love of country, is perfectly consistent with philanthropy, or love of the human race. As the best possi ble good to raan, as man, is found in the highest development of domestic and home institutions, so, on the other hand, the strongest, purest love of our own country imphes the truest devotion to the wants and rights of universal man. There is, therefore, never any conflict between real patriotism and true philanthropy. In a low state of cultivation, the love of country may degenerate into degrading selfishness, ?ind give to war all the horrors of barbarism ; but Christian re finement extends all patriotism into the sphere of true justice and general benevolence. 240 A SUSTAINED NATIONAL LIFE. 247 PATRIOTISM, BRITISH, AND THEN AMERICAN. The love of country which our ancestors brought to America was essentially British. Of their devotion to the fatherland they gave the strongest possible evidence. They were British by birth and education; British of choice. They believed heartUy that England was the grandest, noblest part of earth ; that her wealth, learning, heroism, and antiquity made her the centre of the globe, and the grand type of civilization. They fully believed in an heredi tary monarchy, and considered devoted loyalty to the crown the soul of honor. The upheavals of the Protectorate were exceptional. After the surges of passion subsided, they longed for a king. Cromwell would have been immensely more popiUar if he had been a sovereign in form, as he was in fact. With this love of monarchy was incorporated a strong love of liberty, which is as truly and essentially Eng lish as her patriotism. When, therefore, these American forefathers endured for long years the oppression of a tyranny which was directly opposed to the spirit of Magna Charta and the British Constitution, they gave a very strong evi dence of devoted patriotism. They intended to give one more, yet stronger. To flee across the ocean, subdue the forest and the savages, and yet claim only the rights be longing to British subjects, and, with loyal devotion, hand over all their acquisitions of empire to their sovereign, was this additional evidence of patriotic devotion to England, to which they were pledged in heart and soul. But, in course of time, it fully appeared that neither the folly of man nor the wisdom of God would allow it. They were slowly taught that this was their country ; and, almost im perceptibly, their patriotism passed over from the country of their birth to the country of their adoption. And a new race of native Americans had risen up here, who knew no other country but this. They loved its " bil lowy heights " and delightful vales, its wUd forests and its 248 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. growing towns, its mighty rivers and inland seas ; they loved its rocks and snow-capped mountains, its genial skies and balmy air, and especially its broad impress of free dora, and starap of the Infinite everywhere ; and grew great in muscle, mind, and heart, as they felt the power of this great country in their aspirations and plans. The transition made included a revolution in opinions as well as in interest. This, Americans began to feel, is our country. We found it here waiting for us. God gave it to our fathers and to us ; and it belongs to us, and surely not to those who denied us the rights of British subjects at home and in America. Thus patriotism here became strongly identified with love of liberty. Slowly the minds of the people awoke to the dangers arising from caste in society and the exclusive privileges of the governing classes ; and, just in proportion as freedora in this great country became real, Americans increased in patriotic devotion. The attachment, at first naturally fixed on the physical beauty and greatness of the country, passed over to its growing institutions. Americans began to love the freedom of thought and speech, of the ballot and the press, which had grown up here, they hardly knew how. They loved the birthplace of their chUdren and the graves of their fathers, but vastly more their rising free schools and their "freedom to worship God ; " and, if they did acknowledge a foreign sovereign, they gloried in the right of electing their own legislators, and judging for themselves when the adminis tration of law was just and when it was oppressive. This seemed a country made for all these things ; and they loved it American patriotism was, therefore, eminently rational. It was not merely of the senses, nor was it merely tradi tional and hereditary. It was discriminating, and hence inspiring as a new revelation. Its thinking, its impulses, and its possibUities, were new. No such grasp, such ele vation of patriotism, it may be safely affirmed, had ever before been known in history. A SUSTAINED NATIONAL LIFE. 249 Let it now be asked," WiU this national life be sustained?" The answer to this question must be comprehensive and far-reaching. It is to be found, not in one period merely, but in the whole history and profoundest philosophy of the Eepublic. We shall reach the great fact upon which it depend.s, and state it more formally, hereafter ; but we begin the answer here. As the life of a new nation has gradually rolled up be fore us, we have marked its beauty and its vigor : but we have been compeUed instinctively to fear that it would be overwhelmed; that its antagonisms would be too strong for its intrinsic power. It was very vigorous during the mental conflicts which preceded the war. Would it endure the ordeal of blood ? The answer is in part before us. The representative battle-scenes of the Eevolution have re vealed a heroism which could resist the firmest onsets of power, and finally wear out the resolution of despotism. But why did it ? Whence this heroism in battle, this par tience in unparalleled suffering ? Precisely here the deep and pervading patriotism of the American people presents itself Love of country was at first indi-vidual. Each man, woman, and child was conscious of its presence and growing power. The single citizen would have asserted it in some form if he had known he was alone, if no other American cared for his country. It was, however, most agreeable to find his neighbors possessed of the same feeling ; and when the dark hour came on, which made each man a hero, and every volunteer feel as if he could fight the British nation alone, what thrills of joy flashed through the hearts of the country as it began to appear that patriotism was the absorbing sentiment of the whole people ! At length, it was evident that American pa triotism was organic ; that it was not now the love of Eng land, but first and everywhere the love of America and her incipient institutions of liberty. It was not the love of a British colony, of a dependency upon a foreign power, but 33 250 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of the new empire of freedom rapidly rising up under the guiding influence of a comprehensive Providence. It was the patriotism of a new Christian nation : it must, therefore, be a strong defence of the national life. PATRIOTISM IN OFFICE. We have seen the discriminating and energized character of American patriotism among the people : let us now in quire what were its manifestations when exalted to rank and power. The great leaders of resistance to oppression rise up before us as men of giant intellects and astonishing wis dom. Their statesmanship was bewildering to the represen tatives of despotism, who began by despising them. Their State-papers and forensic discussions are to-day the admira tion of the world; but their love of country rises high above all other qualities of greatness, and must stand fore most in the explanation of success. It must be remembered, that, if the Americans failed to vindicate their rights, every member of the Continental Congress would be found guilty of treason. When these great men calmly took their seats to organize resistance to the British army, each one of them knew that he put his life in jeopardy ; that faUure in the contest would require the sacrifice of responsible leaders in what must be regarded as a grand conspiracy against the British crown. Diplomatic agents, and officers of state, would be involved in the general ruin. And yet what manly firmness, what self-abandonment, do these representative men reveal! Their country rose above all selfish considerations ; and for eight long years they stood in the breach, to rise or fall with the rights of freemen. True, aU were not reliable. Men who at first promised weU showed weakness of mind and nerve when the grand crisis came on. The numbers of men who were at their posts in the periods of extreme perU sometimes seemed A SUSTAINED NATIONAL LIFE. 251 exceedingly smaU ; but this made no difference with Wash ington, Jefferson, and Adams, with Franklin, Livingston, and Witherspoon. When the immortal Patrick Plenry cried, " Give me liberty, or give me death," he uttered the sublime sentiment of these great statesmen and their compatriots in rank, as well as of the American people generally. Treason to liberty tested the strength of this patriotic devotion. Poverty and suffering made the blaze burn all the more brightly. The blandishments of baffled power had no influence against its calm assertion and unflinching vindication. History is slowly bringing to light the wisdom of Providence in the elev^ited Christian leadership of the American struggle for liberty. In the army, the dreadful sufferings of the rank and file were shared by their officers. Men whose exalted position would have entitled them to comforts, if not luxuries, en dured long and weary marches, slept on the ground, ate their half-rations, or suffered with hunger, all with uncomplain ing dignity. To save their country, no sacrifice was too great, no suffering too hard to endure. Washington, the grand type of American patriotism, was not merely a cool and skilful commander, was not merely willing to risk his life as the most distinguished chief of what England regarded a treasonable revolt from the authori ty of the crown ; but he was " the father of his country." He came forward at the call of Congress, when there was no army to command, no treasury whence to draw the support of an army if he should be able to organize one; when the art of war and the ability to command must be learned and acquired. He took the position of commander-in-chief, and held it through the war, refusing all pay, standing firm amid jealousy, slander, and treason ; and, when all earthly hope seemed to be dying around him, he was found on his knees, calmly lifting up his tearful eyes to heaven, praying to God to save his bleeding country. This was patriotism: this was the embodiment, in a single man, of the feehng and determination and hope of the American nation. 252 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. THB TRUE INSPIRATION OF AMERICAN PATRIOTISM. To understand the strength and patient endurance of this love of country ,1 we must refer to the evidence, already de veloped, of a divine plan to constitute an empire of freedom on the Western continent ; we must recall the deep religious devotion of our chivalrous and Puritan sires ; we must ap preciate the moulding power of reverence for God, and con secration to his holy service and worship ; and, finally, the new, divine inspiration of ideas and principles. These great facts were everywhere present as the struggle came on ; and they imparted an exaltation to the patriotism of the Eevo lution which atheism could never give, nor infidelity com prehend. Controlling public acts recognized it ; deep humil iation and fervent prayer revealed the dependence of the nation upon it, and the faith which inspired the masses of the people with unconquerable energy. On the 6th of July, 1775, the Continental Congress concluded a public manifesto in the following memorable words : — " With an humble confidence in the mercy of the supreme and impartial Judge and Euler of the universe, we most devoutly implore his divine goodness to protect us happily through this great conflict; to dispose our adversaries to reconcihation upon reasonable terms, and thereby relieve the empire from the calamities of civil war." The twentieth day of the same month was, by order of Congress, observed as a day of fasting, humihation, and prayer, in view of " the present critical, alarming, and car lamitous state of the colonies." Let us now see how this proclamation was received by the immortal Washington and the brave army under his command. In the American ar chives, vol. u., page 1708, we find the following order : — "Headquarters, Cambridge, July 16, 1775. "The Continental Congress earnestly recommend that Thursday next, the 20th inst, be observed by the inhabitants A SUSTAINED NATIONAL LIFE. 253 of all the EngUsh colonies upon this continent as a day of public humiliation, fasting, and prayer, that they may with united hearts and voice unfeignedly confess their sins before God, and supplicate the all-wise and merciful Disposer of events. The general orders that day to be religiously ob served by the forces under his command exactly in manner directed by the proclamation of the Continental Congress. It is therefore strictly enjoined on all officers and soldiers (not upon duty) to attend divine service at the accustomed places of worship, as well in the lines as the encampments and quarters; and it is expected that all those who go to worship do take their arms, ammunition, and accoutrements, and are prepared for imraediate action if called upon. If, in the judgment of the officers, the work should appear to be in such a state of forwardness as the utmost security of the camp requires, they will command their men to abstain from all labor upon that solemn day." Solemn day, verUy. A struggling nation, with their little army of heroes mangled and bleeding, under authority of Congress and their glorious military chief, all prostrate before God, confessing their sins, and imploring help ; they who feared not the face of clay, who could bare their bosoms to the storm of war, and would bow to no tyrant upon the face of the earth, all humbly and reverently kneeling before the great Jehovah, — this was the heroism of the Eevolution, the patriotism which demonstrates a sustained national life. CHAPTEE V. THE DECLARATION ASSERTS AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. " You will think me transported with enthusiasm ; but I am not. I am well aware of the toil and blood and treasure that it will cost us to maintain the declaration ; yet, through all the gloom, I can see that the end is more than worth all the means, and that posterity will triumph in that day's transaction." — John Adams. " Jefferson poured the soul of the continent into the monumental act of Independ ence." — Peesidestt Stiles. Written words must represent facts or principles, or they are powerless. Many declarations of independence have been promulgated with great rhetorical display ; but they have perished with the subsidence of passion and the men who gave them origin. In like manner, a premature announcement of American independence would have brought only disgrace upon her suffering people, and ruin to her cause. The declaration could only be potential when sustained by great underlying realities. It was because the people of these colonies had sufficient reasons for separation from Great Britain ; because Providence had allowed the institutions of tyranny to exert their legitimate influence on minds formed for a higher, nobler life ; because, araid the mind-battles of more than a century, the shackles of the soul had been so far shaken off, that a real independence was felt and lived everywhere from Maine to Georgia, from the Atlantic sea-board to the AUe ghanies ; because God had led the people to real self-protec tion, and to all the high functions of governraent, — that it was safe and right to make the declaration. Said Samuel Adams, " Is not America already independent ? Why not, then, declare it ? " 251 ¦^^ifH.BaU.'S^- 6BEAT STAfiSliilAKlB OlAlOSi AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 255 WISE DELIBERATION AND DIPLOMACY. Pausing a little upon the eve of this great event, we may behold the strength, the firmness, the self control, of great minds. It is the twenty-sixth day of June, 1775; and the Provincial Congress of New York, addressing Washington, " from whose abUities and virtue they were taught to expect peace," " declare an accommodation with the mother-coun try to be the fondest wish of each American soul, in the full est assurance, that, upon such an accommodation, he would cheerfully resign his trust, and become once more a citizen." " 'When we assumed the soldier, we did not lay aside the citi zen,' announced Washington for himself and his colleagues ; but, having once drawn the sword, he postponed the thought of private life to the ' establishment of American liberty on the most firm and solid foundation.' " * The Assembly of the future Empire State proposed a plan of adjustment between the colonies and Great Britain. It insisted on every right, with regard to legislation, taxation, and religion, heretofore demanded, excepting the regulation of trade. This it conceded to the home government ; pro posing also, upon proper conditions, to help in the general defence. Then they instructed their delegates in the Conti nental Congress to " use every effort for compromising this unhappy quarrel ; so that, if our well-meant endeavors shall faU of effect, we may stand irreproachable by our own con sciences in the last solemn appeal to the God of battles." The other colonies met the stern issues of that great epoch in history in a similar spirit, though not all with the same caution. It has been suggested that New England and the South had less to dread from the British fleet and from the war than the commercial state and city of New York ; and that this, in part, explains the difference in demonstra tive independence. This difference would, however, soon disappear ; and John Adams and John Jay would take their * Bancroft, viii. 34. 256 • 'THE GREAT REPUBLIC. places side by side in the great struggle which had not yet reached its crisis. In the mean time, as danger increased. Congress became more explicit Eead these clear, strong words : "Why should we enumerate our injuries in detail? By one statute, it is declared that Parliament can of right make laws to bind us in all cases whatever. What is to defend us against so un- hraited a power ? Not a single man of those who assume it is chosen by us, and an Araerican revenue would lighten their own burdens in proportion as they increase ours." " These colonies now feel the coraplicated calaraities of fire, sword, and famine. We are reduced to the alternative of choosing an unconditional submission to irated ministers, or resistance by force. The latter is our choice. We have counted the cost of this contest, and find nothing so dreadful as volun tary slavery. Our cause is just, our union is perfect, our in ternal resources are great ; and, if necessary, foreign assists ance is undoubtedly attainable. Before God and the world we declare, that the arms we have been compelled by our enemies to assume* we will employ for the preservation of our liberties, being with one mind resolved to die free men rather than live slaves. We have not raised armies with designs of separating from Great Britain, and establish ing independent States : necessity has not yet driven us into that desperate measure. We exhibit to mankind the spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked enemies, with out any imputation or even suspicion of offence. In our own native land, in defence of the freedom that is our birth right, for the protection of our property against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease on the part of the aggres sors, and aU danger of their being renewed shaU be removed; and not before." John Adams would have foUowed this firm announcement by an immediate declaration of independence. Franklin revealed his opinion by writing to Strahan, through whom AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 257 he had heretofore communicated with Lord. North, the fol lowing burning words : " You are a member of Parliament, and one of that majority which has doomed ray country to destruction. . You have begun to burn our towns, and mur der our people. Look upon your hands : they are stained with the blood of your relations ! You and I were long friends : you are now my enemy, and I am yours." But he did not resist the opinion of the considerate Jay, and another appeal was made to the king. It was written by Dickinson of Pennsylvania, and contained these words : " We beseech your Majesty to direct some mode by which the united applications of your faithful colonists to the throne, in pur suance of their common councils, raay be iraproved into a happy and permanent reconciliation; and that, in the mean time, measures may be taken for preventing the further destruction of the lives of your Majesty's subjects ; and that such statutes as more immediately distress any of your Majesty's colonies may be repealed." Surely this was suffi ciently humble and deferential. But the people of England must not interpret the petition for justice as the language of craven submission. The American people would do nothing now as colonies. They were a nation ; and their Congress alone could negotiate terms of peace. Their address to the British nation was calm and unanswerable. Their thanks to the officers of the city of London, who opposed a raanly resistance to the despotic raeasures of the crown and parliament, were expressed in language most dignified and sincere. The American Congress would not be misunderstood ; and thus they write : " North America wishes most ardently for a lasting connection with Great Britain on terms of just and equal liberty ; less than which, generous minds will not offer, nor brave and free ones receive." Evidently it was no part of the scheme of our fathers to erect an independent government in the Western hemi sphere. They were subjects of the British crOwn ; and so S3 258 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. intended, with unaffected loyalty, to remain. But that Prov idence which had guided them through all their wonderful career unfolded to them their high destination gradually. Dependence upon a foreign government was evidently incompatible with the divine plans of a model government for the instruction of the race. God would conduct the people of the new nation through such discipline and suffer ings as would lead them to a clear understanding of his pur poses, and secure them from the fatal error into which such pliable, brilliant men as Dickinson would lead them. It required yet a full year of stern, cruel, bloody war, to bring the masses up to the position occupied by their daring leaders, and produce the Declaration. Washington reached the camp around Boston. He re ceived the enthusiastic congratulations of officers and civil ians with true diffidence and noble dignity. " Now be strong and very courageous," said Trumbull, governor of Connecti cut " May the God of the armies of Israel give you wisdom and fortitude, cover your head in the day of battle and danger, and convince our enemies that all their attempts to deprive these colonies of their rights and liberties are vain ! " Washington replies, with the calmness of a great Christian statesman and warrior, " The cause of our common country calls us both to an active and dangerous duty : Divine Pro-vi- dence, which wisely prders the affairs of raen, wiU enable us to discharge it with fidelity and success." In the raean tirae, Eichard Penn made aU possible haste to cross the water, and lay the humble petition, drawn up by Dickinson, at the foot of the throne ; but George the Third would not see bim. " The king and his cabinet," said Suf folk, " are deterjnined to listen to nothing from the iUegal Congress, to treat with the colonies only one by one, and in no event to recognize them in any form of association." By every act, and in the most vehement language, the king " showed his determination to prosecute his measures, and force the deluded Americans into submission." At leno-th. AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 259 his insulting proclamation, which followed, but did not deign to be an answer to, the humble petition borne by Penn, reached the colonies. Thoughtful men said, " WhUe Ameri ca is still on her knees, the king aims a dagger at her heart" Woman felt her indignation roused. The wife of John Adams wrote to her husband, when her house was a hospital, " This intelligence will make a plain path for you, though a dan gerous one. I could not join to-day in the petitions of our worthy pastor for a reconciliation between our no longer parent State, but tyrant State, and these colonies. Let us separate : they are unworthy to be our brethren. Let us re nounce them ; and instead of supplications, as formerly, for their prosperity and happiness, let us beseech the Almighty to blast their counsels, and bring to nought all their devices." James Warren wrote to Samuel Adams in Congress, " The king's silly proclamation wUl put an end to petitioning. Movements worthy of your august body are expected, — a declaration of independence, and treaties with foreign powers." Cono-ress felt that the hour of final separation was at hand, and advised New Hampshire and South Carolina to set up State governments, independent of Great Britain, " during the continuance of the present dispute." Pennsylvania, under the lead of Dickinson, whUe the great Franklin stood up alone for the rights of America, said to her delegates in Congress, " We strictly enjoin you, that you, in behalf of this colony, dissent from and utterly reject any propositions, should such be made, that may cause or lead to a separation from our mother-country, or a change of the form of this government." Delaware, Maryland, and New Jersey, seemed to be swayed by the powerful infiuence of Pennsylvania, and reached simUar results. Under these cir cumstances. Congress could not enact its own views. They must wait for the people, the only real source of power here: but they appointed Harrison, Franklin, Johnson, Dickinson, and Jay a secret "committee for the sole purpose 260 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of corresponding with friends in Great Britain, Ireland, and' other parts of the world;" and funds were appropriated " for the payment of such agents as they might send on this service." Jefferson said, " There is not in the British Em pire a man who more cordially loves a union with Great Britain than I do ; but, by the God that made me, I wUl cease to exist before I yield to a connection on such terms as the British Parliament propose : and in this I speak the sentiments of America." Thomas Paine, before he became a blasphemous infidel, among other words which rang through the hearts of the people, said, " Every thing that is right or natural pleads for separation. Even the distance at which the Alraighty hath placed England and America is a strong and natural proof that the authority of the one over the other was never the design of Heaven. It is not in the power of Britain or of Europe to conquer America, if she does not conquer herself by delay and timidity." The sixth day of AprU, 1776, witnessed the close of the colonial system, and the first formal act of independence. The ports of the Old Thirteen were, by act of Congress, opened to all the world " not subject to the King of Great Britain." In May foUowing, Congress adopted, against all tempo rizers, a proposition made by John Adams, that " each one of the united colonies, where no government sufficient to the exigencies of their affairs had as yet been established, should adopt such government as would, in the opinion of the representatives of the people, best conduce to the hap piness and safety of their constituents in particular, and of America in general." A committee, consisting of John Adams, Edward Eutledge, and Eichard Henry Lee, was then appointed to draught a preamble to the resolution. In this we discover the bold and determined spirit of John Adams, who held Lee firmly by his side. The preamble declared it to be " absolutely irreconcUable with reason and AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 261 good conscience for the people of these colonies now to take the oaths and affirmations necessary for the support of any government under the crown of Great Britain; and that it was necessary that the exercise of every kind of authority under the crown should be totally suppressed, and all the powers of government exerted under the authority of the colonies, for the preservation of their peace, and their defence against their enemies." This was really the whole question of ind'ependence, and it called out a most vigorous debate. Some men of true patriotism indorsed it in principle and fact, but deemed it premature ; others denounced it, as leading to immediate anarchy and ruin ; but the majority rose to the greatness of the occasion, and adopted it. " The Gordian knot is cut," said John Adams, as he thought seriously and profoundly upon the great issues pending upon that action, and the highly responsible part he had taken in securing it In the mean time, Virginia was preparing to advance to the front in the leadership of this grand movement. One hundred and thirty of her most distinguished men were chosen by the people to assemble in convention, and take the charge of their provincial and civil rights in this irapor tant crisis. On the fifteenth day of May, 1776, resolutions reported by Archibald Carey were adopted unanimously (one hundred and twelve delegates being present), in which the State of Virginia decreed " that their delegates in Con gress be instructed to propose to that body to declare the united colonies free and independent States, absolved from all allegiance or dependence upon the crown or parliament of Great Britain ; and that they give the assent of this col ony to such declaration, and to measures for forming for eign alhances and a confederation of the colonies: provided that the power of forming government for, and the regula tion of the internal concerns of, each colony, be left to the respective colonial legislatures." Her famous Declaration of Eights, reported frora a com- 262 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. mittee of thirty-two iUustrious men, including such names as Carey, Henry, Blair, Eandolph, Madison, and Mason, was soon adopted ; and " Virginia presented herself at the bar of the world, and gave the name and fame of her sons as hostages that her public life should show a likeness to the highest ideas of right and equal freedom among men." * It was the will of the people of Pennsylvania that this colonial legislature, whose functions had expired by the act of the Eevolution, and whose instructions, under the influ ence of the proprietary and the lead of Dickinson, had for bidden her delegates to vote for the declaration of independ ence, should be superseded by their own representatives. This great change was announced by a gathering of more than four thousand people, under the lead of John Bayard and Daniel Eoberdeau ; and the convention and representa tives in Congress came forward to place this great common wealth in harmony with her sister States and the spirit of the age. Finally, the maturer judgment of the nation was calmly expressed by her greatest representative citizen, the illus trious Washington, in these few calm, decisive words: "A reconciliation with Great Britain is impracticable, aud would be in the highest degree detrimental to the true interest of America. When I first took the command of the army, I abhorred the idea of independence ; but I am now fully convinced that nothing else will save us." On the seventh day of June, Eichard Henry Lee, in the narae of Virginia, offered in Congress the decisive resolu tion, " That these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States; that they are absolved from all aUegiance to the British Crown ; and that a plan of confederation be prepared, and transmitted to the respective colonies for their consideration and approbation." After careful thought, the final action on this momentous question was postponed until the second day of July. In * Bancroft, viii. 383. AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 263 the interval, great events had occurred. Our struggling army had been driven from Canada ; Howe, with forty-five ships " laden with troops," had approached the coast ; the whole British fleet, with a strong land-force, had been gal lantly defeated in the harbor of Charleston by a small force under command of the brave Moultrie, in spite of the incom petency and vacUlation, not to' say treachery, of his supe rior officer. Gen. Lee; and the delegates in Congress of twelve of the old thirteen States appeared in their seats, with instructions fresh from the people, to declare the sepa ration of these colonies from the British crown. And on this memorable day the representatives of these twelve colonies, without a dissenting vote, did resolve, " That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States ; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown; and .that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totaUy dissolved." "At the end of this great day," says Bancroft, "the mind of John Adams heaved like the ocean after a storm." " The greatest question," he wrote, " was decided, which was ever debated in America ; and a greater, perhaps, never was nor will be decided among men. When I look back to 1761, and run through the series of political events, the chain of causes and effects, I am surprised at the suddenness as weU as greatness of this revolution. Britain has been fiUed with folly, and America with wisdom." Jefferson, John Adams, Franklin, Sherman, and Eobert E. Livingston, had been appointed to prepare a Declaration in accordance with the resolution of independence offered by Lee, seconded by John Adams, and adopted, with an appro priate addition, on the second day of July. They brought forward their report. Thomas Jefferson was the honored writer of this immortal document, which, with but one im portant amendment, was adopted, as he wrote it, by the representatives of twelve States without a dissenting vote. 264 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. The delegates from New York still waited for instructions, soon to come from a convention of the people; but her master-minds, with Jay at their head, most heartily con curred in the great act, to which, as soon as permitted, they put their names. Let us now read and carefully ponder this Magna Charta of American liberty. THE DECLARATION. " When, in the course of human "events, it becomes neces sary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect for the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them tp the separation. " We hold these truths to be self-evident, — that all men are created equal ; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights ; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed ; that, when ever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long estab lished should not be changed for light and transient causes ; and, accordingly, aU experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, whUe evUs are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpa tions, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 265 new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies, and such ¦ is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systera of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having, in direct object, the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be sub mitted to a candid world : — " He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome, and necessary for the public good. " He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of imme diate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained ; and, when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. • " He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relin quish the right of representation in the legislature, — a right inestimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only. "He has called together legislative bodies at places un usual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. "He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing, with manly firmness, his invasions on the rights of the people. " He has refused, fOr a long time after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise ; the State remaining, in the mean time, exposed to all the danger of invasion from without, and convulsions within. " He has endeavored to prevent the population of these States ; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturaliza tion of foreigners, refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appro priations of lands. 31 266 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. " He has obstructed the administration of justice by refus ing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers. " He has made judges dependent on his wUl alone for the tenure of their offices and the amount and payment of their salaries. " He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. " He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our legislatures. " He has affected to render the mUitary independent of and superior to the civil power. " He has combined with others [that is, with the Lords and Commons of Britain] to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws ;, giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation, — for quarter ing large bodies of armed troops among us ; for protecting them, by a mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these States ; for cutting off our trade with all parts of the world ; for im posing taxes on us without our consent ; for depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury ; for trans porting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offences ; for abolishing the free system of English law in a neighbor ing province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries, so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same abso lute rule into these colonies ; for taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering, fundamen tally, the forms of our government; for suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in aU cases whatsoever. " He has abdicated government here by declaring us out of his protection, and waging war against us. " He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 267 " He is, at this time, transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny already begun, with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation. " He has constrained our fellow-citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands. " He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions. " In every stage of these oppressions, we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms : our petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince whose character is thus marked by. every act which may define a tyrant is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. " Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them, from time to time, of attempts made by their legislature to extend an unwarranta ble jurisdiction over us ; we have reminded them of the cir cumstances of our emigration and settlement here ; we have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity ; and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably inter rupt our connections and correspondence. They, too, have been deaf to the voice of justice and consanguinity. We must therefore acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of man kind, enemies in war ; in peace, friends. "We therefore, the representatives of the United States of America in General Congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our inten tions, do, in the name and by the authority of the good 268 THE- GREAT REPUBLIC. people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and INDEPENDENT States ; that they are absolved from all alle giance to the British crown ; and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved ; and that, as free and independent States, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor." SUPERIOR WISDOM. Pausing to consider the history and character of this great State-paper, we are impressed with the evidences of superhuman wisdom, under the guidance of which these results were reached. If clear-sighted statesmanship had prevailed in the Brit> ish Parliament, and especially if a wise sovereign had been on the throne of England, there would have been no hope of American independence. As we have seen, the Ameri cans migbt have been easily concihated. They had no idea of separating from England. It was necessary to bring them to this result by the severest trials. They must be made to feel the weight of oppression, almost unparaUeled in the history of freemen, before they could be brought to the conviction that this was the wUl of Providence. We are inclined to accept the construction of Eev. George Duf field, pastor of the Third Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, in his fiiraous sermon, with John Adams for a hearer, when the cause of independence was trembling in the balance in Pennsylvania. He "drew a paraUel between George the Third and Pharaoh, and inferred that the same provi dence of God which had rescued the Israelites intended to AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 269 free the Americans " * Beyond a doubt, the providence of God alone will explain this infatuation, this judicial blind ness. How clearly we mark the hand of God in the patience which delayed this act of formal separation until every fact and principle it involved had been examined over and over in the most searching discussions, and the whole nation had been penetrated by a conviction of its high justice and inevitable necessity ! Had a few rash leaders brought on this contest prematurely, or a few headstrong men enacted and proclaimed the overt act of independence, the self- respect and caution of the American people would have rejected it, and assisted in bringing its authors to condign punishment. What sovereign control there must have been over all resentments, restraining all angry passions, and pre venting all rashness, until the time for action had fuUy come, — until the catalogue of grievances, such as no people under heaven had ever suffered, was completely full, and the vindication of the declaration was beyond the reach of a doubt ! What majestic minds rose up, under God, to take the lead ; to show, by the calmest, clearest statesmanship, that not a single step was taken but as the result of a necessity forced upon the people by the arbitrary acts of the British government ; to be of the people, and yet the leaders of the people in the midst of the storm ; to define the rights of the American people, not as demanded by accident or pas sion, but as based upon immutable principles; and coolly advance, step by step, in the way to independence, amid the provocations of tyranny and the carnage of war, only as Providence clearly opened the way ! God makes great men for great occasions. He gave to suffering, bleeding America her Adams and Jefferson, her Lee and Eutledge, her Jay and Franklin, her Marion and Washington, with their compeers in patriotism and wisdom ; raising them far * Bancroft, viii. 385. 270 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. above the ordinary level of even great men in all the high quahties which prepared them to grapple with the problems of their times. And the principles ofthe great Declaration had been slowly evolved from the chaos of anarchy and despotism, during a period of more than three hundred years, under the same great Providence. So distinctly had they been written upon the current history of civil governments and religion, that plain people saw them, and rendered them into their own dialect When, in May, 1776, Virginia was in her transition state from dependence to independence, and her people were electing and instructing the delegates to her assembly of freemen, these strange words came from the people of Buck ingham County, and fell upon the ears of its delegates, Charles Patterson and John Cahill: "We instruct you to cause a total separation from Great Britain to take place as soon as possible ; and a constitution to be established, with a full representation, and free and frequent elections. As Ameri ca is the last country of the world which has contended for her liberty, so she may be the most free and happy, taking the advantage of her situation and strength, and having the experience of all before to profit by. The Supreme Being hath left it in our power to choose what government we please for our civil and religious happiness : good govern ment, and the prosperity of mankind, can alone be in the divine intention. We pray, therefore, that, under the superin tending providence of the Euler of the universe a govern ment may be established in America, the most free, happy, and permanent that human wisdom can contrive and the perfection of man maintain." Let the reader look at this profound Christian revelation of the phUosophy of freedom and government: "The Supreme Being hath left it in our power to choose what government we please for our civU and religious happiness; good government, and the prosperity of mankind, can alone be in the divine intention : " and prayer to " the Supreme Euler of the universe " for the superintend- AN INDEPENDENT NATIONAL LIFE. 271 ing care is indispensable to the formation and maintenance of good government. Oh, this is splendid ! How devoutly we adore the Spirit above and around and through all, who gave to the minds of this new providential nation so clear and divine an idea of the advanced position now to be assumed in the development of human destiny. It is delightful to read from the pen of the great civU commander of the forces of independence, John Adams, as his heart glowed over the great irrevocable resolution of the 2d of July, " It is the wUl of Heaven that the two coun tries should be sundered forever. It may be the will of Heaven that America shall suffer calamities still raore wastr ing, and distresses yet more dreadful. If this is to be the case, the furnace of affliction produces refinement in States, as well as individuals ; but I submit all my hopes and fears to an overruling Providence, in which, unfashionable as the faith may be, I firmly believe." Thus the great wisdom, which alone could so order the new Eepublic as to render its cause successful, is seen by the American people to be from above ; and the extraordinary character of our great charter of liberty is clearly explained. When, for our separate and equal station among the nations of the earth, our patriotic fathers refer to " Nature and to Nature's God," and they say, " We hold these truths to be self evident, — that all men are created equal ; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights ; that among these are life, Uberty, and the pursuit of happi ness ; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed," — we are led, by light from the celestial world, into the very depths of civU and political wisdora, and are put in possession of the profoundest principles of right and freedom ever known to man, — a power which would ultimately destroy all the forms of oppression and injus tice which the infirmities of men, or the capital wrongs ef our future constitution, might leave amongst us. WeU 272 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. might these sages of the great Eevolution, when they were about to pledge their lives, their fortunes, and sacred honor "for the support of this Declaration," solemnly appeal to "the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of their in tentions," and assume their high and sacred responsibUities " with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence." Thus have we ascertained that the Declaration reveals a national life, independent of Great Britain, but humbly reliant upon the arm of God. How utterly unlike the tendencies of despotism,* away from God, and hence, of necessity, away from political wis dom! How clearly does the rule of a divine Sovereign exalt the thoughts of a free people to firm faith in his direc tion, and the ultimate triumph of the right ! The breadth and reach of the great " Declaration " can be distinctly seen from this stand-point alone. It was by inspiration from Heaven that "Jefferson poured the soul of the continent into the raonuraental act of independence." CHAPTEE VI. DISCIPLINE INSURES A VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. " These adventurous worthies, animated by sublimer prospects, dearly purchased this land : they and their posterity have defended it with unknown cost, in continual jeopardy of their lives, and with their blood." — Samuel Cooke. We value that most which costs us most. Whatever comes to us without a struggle, without trials, we are likely to part with without regrets. But blessings gained by years of toil and suffering we hold as inexpressibly valuable to us, and would make great sacrifices to retain. Hence it was that American liberties were so dear to the brave men of the Eevo lution. They knew their cost, and clung to them with the utmost tenacity. Hence the immensely higher estimate we place upon our noble institutions since our recent death- struggle to defend them. American history ought to explain to all men, with sufficient distinctness, the reasons for the depth and glow of American patriotism. Discipline is strength. The unused muscle is without power ; but the arm of the blacksmith is vigorous and able. The neglected mind is feeble, and an object of pity ; but the mental vigor of the scholar commands our respect and admiration. The heart unaccustomed to virtue or piety is easily captivated by vice ; but the practised Christian is a moral hero in the conflicts of temptation and sin. So the life of a nation springing up by sudden and suc cessful revolution is effeminate and temporary ; but the life which passes with severe trials from generation to generation, which wears for agonizing years its galling chains, and bat tles its way out of inthralraent araid the sufferings of blood, 33 2~3 274 the great republic. and feels in its progress to power all the pressure which mal ice can inspire, is likely to endure. It moves on to higher rank and mightier conflicts with a vigor which no easy life could insure. trials from poverty. War is enormously expensive ; and one of the first prob lems of belligerent powers is how to subsist an army. Six hours cannot pass before demands will be made upon the commissariat which would startle an inexperienced man. When the American people took up arms in defence of their Uberties, they had no treasury, no funds. Before there could be any thing for the military chest, some plan of finance must be devised that would actually create funds. The colonies first in the struggle immediately began the ruinous but apparently inevitable policy of issuing bills of credit They could be used at first with some success ; but they were not money. They were promises to pay ; and, in proportion as their redemption in specie became difficult or irapossible, they depreciated, and finally became valueless. Congress reluctantly adopted this dangerous policy, which, while it would postpone for a while the demand for hard money, could not prevent its return with greatly increased urgency. The only dependence of the forming nation was upon the colonies ; and their embarrassments on their own account seriously interfered with the financial credit based upon their local resources. In June, 1775, Congress, at the suggestion of New York, issued two miUions of eontinental bUls of credit for the immediate reUef of the army : but this was very soon exhausted ; and as it was exchanged for necessary suppUes, like the colonial bUls, it soon began to be regarded as something less than money. The Canadians could not be induced to take continental money ; and our army in the North was subsisted with the greatest difficulty. For the rest, the only expedient was to issue more paper-biUs; and in a year and a half they had risen to twenty mUlions. A VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. 275 The credit of this money had been quite well kept up by the patriotism of the people and the reputation of our distinguished men ; but it had at length become so abun dant, that no existing power could prevent its depreciation. An attempt to loan five miUions at four per cent; the experi ment of a lottery; the authority of Congress given to Wash ington to punish aU who refused to receive the nation's money, and thus disparage continental credit; and the attempt of a New-England convention to establish by law the prices of necessary coraraodities, — aU showed the public distress, while they afforded very inadequate relief It was quite in vain for Congress to resolve that their biUs " ought to pass current in all payments, trade, and dealings, and be deemed equal in value to the same nominal sums in Spanish dollars;" that those who refused them were "enemies ofthe United States;" and to menace offenders with " forfeitures and other penalties." The traders could invent methods of evading all such regulations. If a piece of paper was not a dollar, and no man would give a dollar for it, no law could make it buy a dollar's worth of provisions. In the mean time, the army was often driven to the great est extremes of suffering. The demands of nature justified unlawful seizures of food ; the people were indulgent ; and various providential resources preserved our poor soldiers from actual starvation. In March, 1778, after having issued ten mUlions, then two mUlions, then a million, and then another million, of continental bUls of credit, the depreciation became so alarm ing, that renewed efforts to obtain a loan became indispen sable. The public money sank to three or four to one. In these times of distress, men were found who were " endeav oring by every means of oppression, sharping, and extor tions, to procure enormous gains ; " and commissaries were authorized to seize and receipt for necessary provisions "purchased up or engrossed by any person with a view of seUing the same." We blush for our race at these revela- 276 the GREAT EEPUBLIC. tions of intense meanness ; and, as we meet these creatures in human form in the history of other times and our own, we feel that the halter of CromweU ought to be the protec tion of right Washington burned with indignation at these outrages in Pennsylvania. To Eeed he wrote, " It gives me very sincere pleasure to find that the Assembly is so well disposed to second your endeavors in bringing those murderers of our cause — the monopolizers, forestaUers, and engrossers — to condign punishment It is much to be lamented that each State, long ere this, has not hunted them down as pests to society, and the greatest enemies we have to the happiness of America. I would to God that sorae one of the more atrocious in each State were hung in gibbets upon a gallows five tiraes as high as that prepared for Hainan ! No punishment, in my opinion, is too severe for the man who can build his great ness upon his country's ruin." " Laws unworthy the character of infant republics," said Congress, " are become necessary to supply the defects of public virtue, and to correct the vices of some of her sons." For, after government had purchased clothing of some of these sharpers in Boston " at the most extravagant rate of frora ten to eighteen hundred per cent," they demanded pay before they would deliver the goods ; "thereby adding to ex tortion the crime of wounding the public credit," " mani festing a disposition callous to the feelings of humanity, and untouched by the severe sufferings of their countrymen, exposed to a winter's carapaign in defence of the common liberties of their country." The accusations in this particu lar instance were denied, and probably the goods were really of more value than any amount of continental money; but the bitter complaints of Congress show the extreme of suffering in the army and the nation for the want of means to clothe and feed the men who were exposing life and en during incredible hardships to preserve the life of liberty. Sixty-seven millions of doUars in continental paper-money A. VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. 277 were expended during the year 1778, raising the aggregate amount outstanding to $113,456,269 ; and the depreciation was six and eight dollars to one. In May, 1780, a committee from Congress visited the camp : and from their report we learn " that the army was five months unpaid ; that it seldom had raore than six days provisions in advance, and was, on several occasions, for sun dry successive days, without meat ; that the army was des titute of forage ; that the medical department had neither sugar, tea, chocolate, wine, nor spirits ; and that every department was without money, or even the shadow of credit" We need not pursue this subject further. We all under stand that the currency of the nation, raised at length to $869,547,027, was finaUy valueless ; and we may see the severity of the trials through which, in consequence, the nation was compelled to pass; what shiverings from cold, and o-nawings of hunger, tested the fortitude of our brave soldiers ; what sufferings of their wives and little ones, as the ineans of their scanty subsistence became worthless on their hands ; what demands upon economy checked all dis position to luxury among the great civUians and warriors, who stood together, a colossal tower of strength and wisdom, during those days of perU ; what grand lessons of financial skill, and finaUy what trust in Providence, were taught this nation by the extreme poverty of her people, her States, and her General Government TRIALS FROM DISLOYALTY AND TREASON. Some men there were whose mental processes could not keep up with the progress of events. They were English men by birth and in spirit, and Eoyalists from principle and habit They were " Tories " of course, honest let us trust, and yet none the less enemies to the American nation in its struggles for independence. Others were stupid, and had no 278 THE GREAT REPUBLIC, power to understand the nature of the contest ; craven cow ards, with no intellectual abUity to discover the superior safety of the right, and that the right was with the Ameri can Eepublic. They were " Tories " because they thought the king was sure to triumph in the confiict with a few feeble colonists, without an army, without a navy, without veteran officers, or money to procure the materials of war. They were excessively impudent, and brutally cruel. Here was a source of the greatest trial and danger. In New York, in New Jersey, throughout the South, and all along the Northern frontier, they were spies, mingling with our forces ; detecting and revealing to our enemies the plans of every campaign; harboring and feeding the British, and withholding, whenever it was possible, the raeans of subsist ence from their brethren in the Araerican army ; conducting the secret or public expeditions of the enemy through routes otherwise unknown, and impracticable to them ; and not unfrequently, with their own hands, applying the torch to the houses of their suffering neighbors. They became the instinctive allies of the merciless savages, and joined in their shouts of triumph, reeking in the blood of their own brethren. These internal foes raust be raet and conquered, raust be tracked to their hiding-places, and overwhelmed with disaster and disgrace, at the same time that the vete rans of Clinton and Howe, Burgoyne and CornwaUis, must be met and conquered in the field. How sensibly, then, did Hawley write to Gerry, " Can we subsist, did any State ever subsist, without exterminating traitors? It is amazingly wonderful, that, having no capital punishment for our intes tine enemies, we have not been utterly ruined before now." When the loyal people of New York were rejoicing over the Declaration of Independence, " a large number of the wealthier citizens looked on with distrust; and the Epis copal clergy showed their dissatisfaction by shutting up the churches." * * Hildreth, iii. Ul. A VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. 279 When Howe, the British commander, entered PhUadelphia in triumph, "he found many to welcome him; among others, Duch^, the late chaplain of Congress, who presently sent a letter to Washington, advising him to give over the ungodly cause in which he was eng-ao-ed." * This great commander, whUe he bore upon his heart the burden of the war, with aU the sufferings of his soldiers, with whom he endured every deprivation as a father, was obUged to know that he was the object of cruel jealousy, and that, even in Congress, men were forming combinations for his overthrow. Eichard. Henry Lee and Samuel Adams gave infiuence to the disaffection towards Washington. The Pennsylvanians, smarting under the mortification of losing Philadelphia, sought to strengthen the increasing prejudice. Mifflin lent his splendid abilities to ripen the plot Gates, who aspired to be commander-in-chief, corresponded with Mifffin and Conway, with the view of hastening the down fall of Washington. And what was his offence ? Simply that he did not render his feeble band of famished continen tals and militia everywhere superior to the well-fed and well-clothed hosts of the British veteran army. For want of shoes, the marches of his army "had been tracked in blood ; " " for want of blankets, many of the men were obliged to sit up all night before the camp-fires ; " " more than a quarter part of the troops were reported unfit for duty, because they were barefoot and otherwise naked : " and he had the greatness to withdraw them from action when they were in danger of annihilation, and to endure calmly all the obloquy of impetuous discontent, whUe he carefully pre served the only possibUity of future success. To add to the cares of Washington, and bring upon the national cause the greatest perU, Benedict Arnold, a chiv alrous, daring warrior, turned traitor, and had just escaped, with his life and infamy, to join the enemies of his country, -after having made aU his arrangements to surrender West Point, with its men and munitions of war, to the British. * Hildreth, iii. 221. 280 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Thus were the hearts of Araerican patriots tried. Thus did the folUes of some, who, if honest, were exceedingly sim ple, and the treason of reckless, unprincipled men, unite to try the brave spirits upon whose integrity the cause of American liberty depended. TRIALS FROM DEFEAT. The invasion of Canada, commenced under Schuyler, Aug. 30, 1775, resulted in the capture of the bold Ethan Allen, who was sent to England in irons, and the death of the gallant Montgomery in a desperate attack upon Quebec. Arnold was borne from the field, severely wounded ; and the reraains of the spirited array of invasion went into winter-quarters behind raraparts of frozen snow. Oglethorpe, the senior general in the British army, having declined the command in America, Gen. Howe received the appointment; and the forces designed to subdue the freemen of the colonies were raised to more than forty thousand men. Dunmore, in Virginia, by proclamation roused the negro slaves and indented apprentices to accept arms, and take the field against their masters, promising them liberty as their reward. Soon he deemed himself strong enough for aggressive action; and Norfolk was bombarded, and then committed to the flames. He ascended the rivers, and burned and plundered, with the ferocity of a savage, the province of which he claimed to be governor. In the spring of 1776, our poor army in Canada suffered from hunger and the sraall-pox, of which Thomas, then in comraand, died. Four hundred men surrendered to a party of Canadians and Indians. Thirteen thousand men now confronted our reduced and suffering patriots. Sullivan ordered an attack upon one division of the enemy, which was repulsed with the loss of two hundred and thirty men kiUed, wounded, and prisoners. Wayne was wounded, and A VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. 281 Thompson (who commanded the detachment) and Col. Ir ving were among the prisoners. All offensive measures in that quarter must now be abandoned, and our brave Northern army must seek safety in retreat from Canada, "disgraced, defeated, discontented, dispirited, diseased, un disciplined, eaten up with vermin ; no clothes, beds, blankets, nor medicines ; and no victuals but salt pork and flour, and a scarce supply of that." These words from John Adams indicate the severity of suffering through which our patriotic soldiers were compelled to pass, and the bitter trials of the nation. We had gathered a flotiUa of sixteen vessels on Lake Champlain. These, after a severe engagement, were swept from the waters; and Crown Point fell into the enemy's hands. In August of this year, the whole army of the Eepublic scarcely numbered twenty thousand men. One-fifth of these were sick, and another fifth were away on detached duties, when Washington was confronted by Gen. Howe with twenty-four thousand disciplined troops. All attempts to prevent their landing on Long Island were unavailing. A sharp, spirited battle took place between fifteen thousand British and five thousand Americans. Sullivan and Sterling were made prisoners ; and New York, the commercial me tropolis of the United States, fell into the hands of the enemy, to be held till the war was ended. The soldiers now became unsteady uhder fire, and broke in so disgraceful a manner as to extort from Washington the indignant demand, " Are these the men with whom I am to defend America ? " He was driven from York Island altogether. Fort Washington, and the works on Harlem Heights, under command of Magraw, were suddenly attacked by four columns. Four hundred men of the enemy feU in the onset : but our men, demoralized, refused to man the works ; and the fort, with two thousand prisoners and a great quantity of artiUery, feU into the hands of the British. 36 282 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. The time of enlistment for many of the continentals expired, and multitudes left before their time. Thus Wash ington saw his little army rapidly melting away. Eeduced to some four thousand men, he conducted a masterly retreat southward, and finally recrossed the Delaware New Jersey was lost to the Eepublic for the present This was a dark day for America. Disaffection spread in Pennsylvania. Lee, too self-conceited to be subordinate, virtually repudiated Washington's orders, and aspired to a separate command. A British fleet, bearing six thousand troops, now appeared off Newport ; and that harbor was lost During the winter of 1777, Washington was at Morris town, N. J. He had retired from Princeton too weak to strike another blow. " His troops were exhausted : many had no blankets ; others were barefoot ; all were very thinly clad." * He joined a few skeletons of regiments which had been detached from the army of the North, and a few volunteers ; and thus our brave men, hardly fit to be called an army, shivering with cold and suffering from hun ger, waited the orders of their great commander. Again the country was scoured for men. Those who had been left for the comfort of needy families, and many who had, for reasons of cowardice or from sinister motives, evaded their country's call, were now brought into camp ; and the army was re-organized. The tone of England, in the mean time, may be judged by a single fact American commissioners proposed that captured British seamen brought into French ports should be exchanged for so raany Araerican prisoners of war. Lord Stormont replied, " The king's ambassador receives no appli cation from rebels, unless they come to implore his Majesty's pardon." The note which contained these haughty words was promptly returned for his lordship's " better consider ation." * Hildreth, iii, 170. A VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. 283 The summer campaign gave no decisive advantage to the Americans anywhere. We lost our important defences in the Highlands on the Hudson, and in September fought the disastrous battle of the Brandywine ; and PhUadelphia feU into the hands of the enemy. Our forces in the South were quite inadequate to defend so large a territory against a foe so formidable ; and the Caro linas were treated by the British as conquered territory. The Indians were officered, and trained to deeds of cruelty for which the vilest eneraies in civilized warfare could not fail to blush in sharae. Let the reader trace these savages, with their Tory allies under Butler and Brant, through the massacre of Wyoming, in the vivid pages of "Wyoming, its History, Stirring Incidents, and Eomantic Ad ventures," by George Peck, D.D., and he will have some idea of the horrors through which America passed to the triumphs of the Eevolution. We may now pause to wonder how the struggling forces of Freedom were sustained through these years of agony. Why did they not abandon the effort ? They were a mar vel to their enemies, to themselves, and to the civilized world. Again and again the English thought they were conquered ; that they had exhausted their last resources of men and money ; and that, from very anguish of soul, they must sub mit to their enemies. But no. A Being above all human events would not permit them to yield. A courage that -knew no danger, a fortitude that defied all suffering, was given them from above, rendering them actually invincible. If they had passed on in uninterrupted triumph to easy success, if they had never felt the horrors of poverty, the bitterness of treachery and defeat, they would have known nothing of the value of freedom, and have entered upon the struggles of re-organization, with no adequate patience, or wisdom or patriotism, to sustain a form of government so new and so exceedingly critical. But God had sifted and tried them that they might be equal to their task. 284 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. TRIALS FROM A SPIRIT OF COMPROMISE. To a superficial eye, it might have seemed a hopeful fact that the American colonists had strong advocates in the British Parliament; that noble friends of liberty opposed with matchless argument and faithful warnings every meas ure of oppression which the king and his ministers imposed upon the colonies : but it is precisely here that we discover the origin of our greatest peril. If Pownal and Fox and Burke could have succeeded in tearing the mask from the eyes of George the Third, and unveiling the depth of disgrace into which he was plunging the nation; could they have made ministers believe, what they so confidently affirmed, that they could not conquer America, and that the war would rob England of the brightest jewel in her crown, — the odious Stamp Act would have been promptly repealed, taxar tion without representation would have been abandoned, and then, so far as we can see, all idea of independence would have perished in America. It was from her friends that the greatest danger to Liberty arose. Their sense of justice was truly exalted ; their plea for humanity worthy of their noble rank. They were honored in the right ; but the men they addressed were judicially blinded. Their hearts were hardened, like the heart of Pharaoh ; for God evidently in tended to lead out his people " with a high hand and an outstretched arm." Kindred dangers arose on every hand. Petition after pe tition went from the American colonists to the crown. Had any one of these been heeded, and the heavy yoke upon their necks been lightened, the rising nationahty of freedom would have been crushed in its beginnings. It reminds us of the oppressive decisions of Eehoboam. Strange infatua tions, now as then, had seized the monarch ; for " the cause was from the Lord." When, in 1774, Galloway proposed to Congress his meas ures of compromise, they were rejected by a majority of A VIGOROUS NATIONAL LIFE. 285 only a single vote. Who controlled that single vote ? We tremble to think of so narrow an escape. When temporizers, led on by Dickinson, a man of splen did abUities, and the most captivating style of manners and rhetoric, had it in their power, again and again, to postpone the declaration of independence, and to secure a last humil iating petition to the throne, how marked the Providence that denied even the royalist Penn an audience with the king, or access to official power, to present it, and which made it the occasion of a most despotic and cruel proclama tion, denouncing the colonists and their congress as rebels, and, in effect, menacing their immediate subjugation or utter extermination ! What strength of self-interest in the various proprietary governments ! what plausibUity in the peace doctrines of the Quakers, and in pleas for loyalty from legislators and capitalists, from merchants and lawyers, who saw nothing but ruin in resistance to the power of England ! Especially what power did the leaders of compromise acquire, when it arose from the boldest and firmest remonstrants against ty ranny, and promised to accept nothingbut justice, which the British Government, it was with reason affirmed, would ulti mately yield ! The apathy of Congress amid the general distress of 1779 added to the public peril. Many of its strongest men left it for various reasons, wholly incompatible with the high trust committed to them by the people. The number in attendance was frequently reduced below thirty, and even below twenty-five. Finally, when the triumphant leaders of the British army came with the sword in one hand and the olive-branch in the other, offering " peace and liberty and wealth " in the place of bloody war and insupportable suffering, sus tained by the whole influence of the Church of England at home and in America, how improbable it was that the offers of pardon would be rejected ! But God gave to the Ameri- 286 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. can nation a high-souled honor, a sacred regard for prin ciple, an unconquerable bravery, which exalted them above the blandishments of hypocrisy as well as the terrors of war. He nerved the souls of Jefferson and Henry, of Adams and Jay, and, above all, of the immortal Washington, with a patriotism so incorruptible, that they led the nation through the perils of smiles and of tears, of bribery and of blood, with a firmness and devotion which made them a sublirae spectacle to enemies and friends. By such discipline did God separate the precious from the vile, drive away or destroy the cowardly tiraidity and craven selfishness unfit for use in constructing the Teraple of Lib erty, and nerve with highest energy the raaster-spirits chosen to lead the hosts of Freedom in the ages to come. Thus have we found and brought forward the facts which clearly justify the proposition which stands at the head of this chapter, — discipline insures a vigorous national life. CHAPTEE VIL HISTORY RECORDS AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE. "O Peace, thou welcome guest, all hail! Thou heavenly visitant, calm the tumults of nations, and wave thy balmy wing over this region of liberty ! . . . May this great event excite and elevate onr first, our highest acknowledgments to the Sovereign Mon arch of universal nature, to the Supreme Disposer and Controller of all events ! Let this our pious, sincere, and devout gratitude ascend in one general effusion of heartfelt praise and hallelujah, in one united cloud of incense, even the incense of universal joy and thanksgiving to God, from the collective body of the United States." — Pkesident Stiles. The neighborhood of nations requires mutual concessions. It is not merely the question of each, whether it has a right to exist, or whether its institutions are sound and benign in their infiuence upon the people. As individuals are under obligations to be good and acceptable neighbors, so each nation is bound to be a peaceable and useful member of the famUy of nations. Every other member of the great fam ily has a right to exact it The happiness and prosperity of the whole depend upon it. When, therefore, colonies, however remote from the home government, assert their independence, they are greatly concerned in the question of acknowledgment Are they right ? Do the principles of their uprising commend themselves to sound reason, to the approval of leading minds, to the men in power in other nations ? Have they vindicated their nationality ? Are they a nation with the indispensable resources, rights, and powers of separate in dependent government ? UntU these questions are answered, there is still cause for anxiety with regard to the new experiment There was cause for anxiety in America. 287 288 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. THE ENGLISH ACKNOWLEDGE AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. Before the coraraencement of actual hostUities, the popu lar feeling was strongly with the government. The Ameri cans were rebels, and his Majesty must subdue them at all hazards. Writers and speakers vied with each other in opposing all ideas of future separation. There was, how ever, one exception. Dean Tucker, in a published pam phlet, urged upon Parliament a peaceful release of the colonies from all obligations of loyalty to the British crown. It is true, he placed it upon grounds of forfeiture ; but the principle of Araerican independence was conceded even by his proposition, that the way should be open for the return of any colony repenting its attempt to live with out the mother-country. Burke would not tolerate the noble proposition of Tucker, though he was a warm friend of the colonies. His desire for reconciliation, however, carried with it a confession of Araerican rights, which had been denied, and formed the nucleus of an opposition, which finally gathered around it a strong public sentiment in favor of Araerican independence. In a recent election, the ministry had obtained an over whelming majority in favor of coercion. Lord North could go on with his measures for the suppression of rebellion, but not heartily ; for even he was, in principle and feeling, really opposed to the war. Officially, he favored the king ; but, personaUy, the colonies. This fact was of great moral importance to America. The minority had strength among the merchants, who were not long in discovering that free colonies fostered by the British Government, or even an independent nation with the best resources of a continent at command, would furnish a more lucrative trade than a subdued, oppressed, and discouraged people. The principles of civil Uberty, now apparently endangered in the whole kingdora, were roused to a new and vigorous life by the Araerican strug- AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE. 289 gle ; and the English dissenters were firm and really formi dable in their opposition to the tyrannical measures of the king and his ministers. Some portions of the old Whig party, led by the Marquis of Eockingham, the Earl of Chatham, Pownal and Johnstone, and urged forward by the eloquence of Burke, Barre, Dunning, and Fox, revealed the nucleus of a power which gave voice and effect to the English sense of justice, and would finally bring up the convictions and moral force of the British nation to the ac knowledgment of American independence. Jamaica petitioned Parliament most earnestly against the " plan, almost carried into execution, for reducing the colonies into the most abject state of slavery." At that time, however, remonstrance was in vain. Eesolutions . ao-ainst the oppressive measures of the ministry, offered by Burke and Hartley, and sustained by the most powerful elo quence, were promptly voted down ; but they were a voice for justice which the civilized world must hear. Wilkes, Lord Mayor of London, led the power of that great city in official and public expression of " abhorrence " of all meas ures for "the oppression of their feUow-subjects in the colonies." Good men were on opposite sides in this struggle. The great John Wesley, whose loyalty was a part of his religion, wrote and pubUshed his earnest advice to the colonies to submit to the crown ; whUe Oglethorpe had earUer the broad views which Wesley subsequently reached, and, as we have seen, refused to act as commander-in-chief of the British army of forty thousand men ordered to subjugate the colonies, for which he felt an interest truly paternal. At the opening of Parliament, Oct 6, 1775, Gen. Conway and the Duke of Grafton abandoned their official positions rather than be longer identified with this unrighteous tyran ny, and joined the opposition. ¦ The Declaration of Independence discouraged many of the English advocates of concUiation, and gave strength to 37 290 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the idea that rebellion must first be crushed before over tures of peace could be made. But the victorious march of the Howes through Long Island, New York, and New Jersey, encouraged even Lord North to bring forward new measures of conciliation. He declared his real sentiments, which had been from the first opposed to forced taxation ; and his humane feelings, really revolting from the murder ous acts which he had felt obliged to promote, gave power ful influence to the public sentiment, which brought the people of Great Britain to the acknowledgment of American independence. France, roused by the sympathies of her people, came forward to help the struggling colonies at the expense of a perilous war with England ; and this gave great additional strength to the opposition, and led to a new commission for conciliation. By the spring of 1778, the demand for peace had become importunate in England ; and as the hon orable commissioners under Lord North's Conciliatory Act — the Earl of Carlisle, William Edwin, afterward Lord Auk- land, and Gov. Johnstone — could gain no audience with Congress (still officia*lly regarded and treated as a rebel assembly), it was coming to be thoroughly understood that there could be no peace but by the acknowledgment of the independence of the United States. This, so far frora operating against the public desire for peace, deepened and extended it When a noble earl said in his place, " My lords, you cannot conquer America," he gave expres sion to the profoundest convictions of the British people; and this was the predetermined acknowledgment of our independence. Spain now came forward as a party to the war, aiming chiefly at the recovery of her territorial rights in America, but incidentally contributing to the general dissatisfaction in England with the war against America. The capture of Burgoyne and his army, the consummate skUl of Washington in the recovery of New Jersey, and the AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE. 291 indomitable persistence of the armies with their aUies result ing in the surrender of Cornwallis, brought this feeUng to a crisis ; and no ministry could stand before it The king's speech in November, 1781, breathed nothing but slaughte'r ; but on the first division, the House of Commons showed that the war party was losing its power. The motion, that " any further attempt to reduce the Americans by force would be ineffectual and injurious," was lost by a majority of only forty-one. A little more than a month later, a motion for " an address to the king to put a stop to the war " was lost by only a single vote. Five days later, " a siraUar raotion was carried," and the British people had acknowledged the inde pendence of America. EUROPEAN GOVERNMENTS ACKNOWLEDGE THE NEW NATION. The sword had been wielded with sufficient effect to usher in the period of diplomacy. In 1780, brave John Adams appears in Paris with power from the Araerican Congress to form treaties of peace and commerce. He was, however, too impetuous for the cautious Vergennes, and was soon trans ferred to Holland. Finding the way gradually opened, and obstructions thrown in his way overcome, he matured and ef fected a treaty with the States-General at the Hague ; and the heroic government of Holland was the first in the world to acknowledge the independence of the United States of America ; a distinction of which she may well be proud, and for which the Great Eepublic will never cease to be pro foundly grateful. In the mean time, our struggling country encountered a new peril from the offer of the Empress of Eussia to mediate between the contending parties. The desire of England for peace may be seen in the proposition, that the German em peror should be associated with the empress in this media tion. Such had been the discouragements of Southern members from the success of the British army at the battle 292 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of Camden, and the conquest of South Carolina and Geor gia, that Congress was induced to waive the demand for a formal acknowledgment of independence, insisting only upon virtual independence ; but, by the blessings of Provi dence, complications arose, which destroyed all the combina tions formed under the auspices of the Empress of Eussia, and once more our rising nation escaped a ruinous tempta tion. The honest, firm, and fearless spirit of Franklin, who was our representative at Paris, was doubtless the most for midable obstacle in the way of a treaty urged by the South against the determined resistance of New England, which would have sacrificed the national life for which the American people had shed their blood like water. When the Marquis of Eockingham, who openly advocated the independence of these colonies, had succeeded Lord North, Adams and Frank lin were approached with some official overtures of peace, with every advantage excepting formal independence. Sir Guy Carlton and Admiral Digby were empowered to approach Washington and the Congress with the same propositions ; and Oswald, a British merchant, was sent to Paris to ascer tain of Franklin the American ultimatum, and returned with the information that " independence, a satisfactory boundary, and a participation in the fisheries, would be indispensable requisites in a treaty." * Eockingham, the friend of America, died, and Shelburn, from the school of Chatham, succeeded him. His private opinions, however, were of no avaU. The British people demanded peace, and neither ministry nor king could silence their demand. Just at this time, the news reached Europe that the British Admiral Eodney had almost literally destroyed the French fleet under Count de Grasse in the West Indies. This had, of course, a strong tendency to strength the diplomacy of England, whUe it increased the desire of France to reach the end of the war. But America was firm. At length, an act * Hildreth, iii. 416. AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE. 293 of Parliament authorized negotiations on the basis of Frank lin's previous announcement Oswald met Franklin and Jay in Paris with full powers to conclude a peace with certain " colonies " in America. Jay, however, firmly refused to treat in behalf of British " colonies ; " and Oswald soon pro- - cured amended prerogatives to make peace with " the United States of America." Not exactly in accordance with instructions, but prompted by what seemed to be sufficient reasons, Franklin and Jay negotiated a separate peace with Oswald in behalf of Eng land ; not, however, to take effect until approved by France. Vergennes was too noble to take offence at so critical a mo ment, and resumed negotiations, to which Spain also was a party. At length, on the 19th of April, 1783, — just eight years from the opening of this fearful war, — the proclamation of peace issued by Congress reached the army at New burg. The Eevolutionary War was ended, and the inde pendence of America was acknowledged by Holland, Eng land, France, and Spain. What exultant joy rang through the camp of those scarred veterans ! What ecstasies of de light thrUled the American people. The great task of constructing and consolidating a free government was not yet completed. Formidable difficulties threatened the new nation on every side ; but the same calm endurance, lofty patriotism, and trust in God, which had borne us through the struggles of war, would sustain us through the conflicts of opinion which must inevitably fol low. Men rose to sight, and disappeared ; armies combined, and melted away ; local selfishness warred with the general good : but the nation lived. WOULD THE AMERICAN PEOPLE ACKNOWLEDGE THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE NATIONAL LIFE? This would seem a strange question ; and yet history re veals the astonishing fact, that the acknowledgment to come 294 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. from the American people themselves would be the hardest to obtain, and the longest withheld, of any upon which true national freedom and dignity were made to depend. The doctrine of " State rights " arose in the earliest at tempts at national organization. It was indeed a very grave problem, how the separate States could retain sufficient power for efficient internal government, and at the same time concede the prerogatives required to constitute a nation. The question was too profound and far-reaching to be easily or suddenly solved. The greatest minds stag gered under the pressure of its difficulties, and most extreme and opposite views were advanced by men of high merit as statesmen. The time had come when some of these difficult questions must be settled. To the General Government belono-ed the right of eminent domain. The public lands were rightfully the property of the whole people, not of the States sever ally ; and the people, individually, were represented, not by the legislatures of the several States, but by the Congress of the nation. It was indispensable, therefore, that ques tions of State boundaries should be settled with the least possible delay ; that Congress should begin to see its sources of revenue in the unsettled lands, and the field for enlargement in the forming of new States, released from State claims. If the concessions required were refused, then perilous conflict between the General and State Gov ernments would soon follow. New York set the example of ceding lands to the General Government which she claimed iu the West Virginia had ceded vast territories, but claimed the whole of Kentucky ; and all that was done in this direction indicated the crude, unsettled state of affairs at the close of the war, and the reluctance with which the States parted with any asserted rights in favor of the nation. To discharge the debts of the United States, especially to raeet the demands of the array, five per cent impost duty was proposed to the States. All, excepting Georgia and AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE. 295 Ehode Island, had formally or virtuaUy consented. Just as Morris, struggling with the grave financial difficulties of the nation, began to hope for rehef from this source, Ehode Island utterly refused her consent ; Virginia imme diately repealed her act acquiescing in the measure ; and Georgia, having only just returned to the Union, could do nothing in the premises. Where, then, was the treasury of the nation to find money to meet the eight millions due for the service of the pending year, and pay the army and other current expenses of the government? Loans slowly gathered from HoUand; and $1,111,111 magnanimously furnished by France, notwithstanding the slight in the matter of the treaty, rendered a little aid, but could hardly be felt in so desperate a financial struggle. In the mean time, the discontent of the army became alarming. Notices appeared about the camp at Newburg of a meeting of officers to consider the condition of affairs ; and an inflammable address, written by Capt. Arm strong, an aide-de-camp of Gates, was circulated among the men, showing a dangerous conspiracy to coerce Con gress, or take the redress of grievances into their own hands. Fortunately, Washington was too wise and great to fall into such a snare. He boldly superseded this un lawful assemblage by one appointed by himself, in which he so energetically denounced the incipient treason, that no one dared to assume the responsibility of the measure. But would the army acknowledge the nation in its poverty, and utter inability to pay their honest dues, and secure them from suffering ? The highest faith in their patriotic devotion hardly dared to affirm it There was again uneasiness at Newburg. Some three hundred soldiers from Pennsylvania wrote insolently to Congress, demanding pay. Part of a corps started from Lancaster to Philadelphia, and they were joined by troops from the barracks under seven sergeants ; and for three hours these insurgent soldiers beleaguered Congress and the 296 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Council of Pennsylvania, demanding their pay and a re dress of grievances. There was too much sympathy with them among the creditors of Congress and the mUitia to relieve Congress from this disgrace. Only Washington was great enough for this trying crisis. As soon as the intel ligence reached hira, he ordered fifteen hundred men to Philadelphia, who dispersed the insurgents. Congress adjourned to Princeton. Massachusetts was not free from the spirit of insubordina tion. Maine began to raove for an independent State or ganization ; and, still more, taxes were enormously high. The courts attempting to enforce their payment were some times assailed by mobs. Discontent spread among the people, until acts of violence threatened the overthrow of the government. Shay's Eebellion had to be put down by loyal troops under comraand of Gen. Lincoln, and the loss of several lives was the result ; and yet the Araerican army did finally acknowledge American independence, and were disbanded amid the strongest demonstrations of grati tude and mutual affection. But the acknowledgment of one man transcends all others. Washington had reached the greatest height of popular influence and power. He had, with unaffected modesty and self distrust, accepted the position of gravest responsibiUty and greatest personal danger in this war of revolution. No one knew better than himself what must foUow to hira if the colonies faded in their struggle, first for right, and then for independence. No one knew better than he the desperate nature of this undertaking. Humanly speaking, the probabihties were all against success. But the people had seen him move calmly into the field of danger. They had seen him attracting to the standard of Liberty the old and the young, and seen the confused masses reduced to order and^ efficiency by the firmness of his com mand and the strength of his military wisdom. They had seen him stand up in the face of the enemy with colossal AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE. 297 majesty when his feeble army was reduced by expiration of time, by desertions, and by slaughter on the field of battle. They had seen him great enough to retreat in the teeth of reproaches from his own countrymen when an engagement would imperil the army and the sacred cause for which they were ready to battle and to die. They had seen him share with his soldiers the sufferino-s of hunscer, of long and weary marches, of cold, and of sleeping upon the ground. They had seen his struggles for the army when the poverty of his country denied them necessary clothing and tents to protect them from the cold, and the scanty pittance they had so severely earned for their suffering fami lies at home. They had seen him rise above all sectional ism 'and personal jealousy and treasonable conspiracies when he had failed to accomplish impossibilities. They had seen him in the might of his firm will punishing cow ardice and disloyalty, until they did not dare to whisper their complaints or treason, lest he should somehow hear them ; and yet winning the hearts alike of the roughest and hardiest and the noblest and most polished of men. They had seen that his courage was no passion ; that his fortitude was no temporary resolution to suffer when he could not avoid it ; that he was just as calm and firm after a defeat as after a vic tory ; just as thorough and great in his appeals when Con gress was paralyzed, or the nation apparently sinking from exhaustion, as he was grateful for the noble endeavors to achieve apparent impossibiUties. They had seen him mov ing in strength to and fro amid the perils of the camp for eight years, and all this time firmly refusing all pay, receiv ing not one penny for his valuable services, and handing over literally every thing that his indefatigable industry and great talents and the noble sacrifice and zeal of his country could gather to the comfort and relief of the men under his command. Finally, they had seen him on his knees in prayer to God. He had triumphed sublimely over the armed foes of his 298 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. country, — over poverty, jealousy, and ignorance, over perils the most imminent and fearful, — and gathered around him the most sacred affections and gratitude of a nation. What would he expect in return ? A kingdom. Surely nothing less, the world, in the light of history, would answer. Indeed he was a king, — a sovereign of hearts, and, we raay almost say, of American destiny. But the test came. Eepublican ideas had been very popular in oratory, and very inspiring in promise ; but the soldiers were starving in despite of them. They seemed to be wanting in power. They could not create bread nor money, for bUls of credit were neither ; and the distress of the hour would combine with the lingering love of mon archy which the people had inherited, and the tr(5ason of selfish ambition, to offer Washington a crown. Col. Lewis Nicola, then of Pennsylvania, but a foreigner by birth, would be raade the bearer of this tempting offer. Now look at the raan. See the storm of wrath gathering in his great soul and lowering upon his brow. Hear the words of indignant, scathing rebuke which fall from his lips. See the fawning sycophants trembling, and fleeing from his presence as from the face of terrific inexorable justice. Washington a king? — a traitor to the country he had so long struggled to free ? — to the liberties for which the people had bled for eight years ? No ! What did aU this long agony of the American colonists raean? Simply a change of masters ? — a military despotism ? No ! it meant "liberty or death;" and the whole moral significance of the American spirit, and the battles of mind and blood for a hundred and fifty years, were represented aud impersonated in Washington. He could only think the thoughts and feel the yearnings of America. He Avas free, and Araerica was free We may now see the British army retire from New York, from Long Island, from "the United States of America." Washington takes leave of his companions in arms, bathed AN ACKNOWLEDGED NATIONAL LIFE 299 in tears. He is hailed in PhUadelphia, and everywhere, as the deliverer of his country. Loud hurrahs ring at bis approach. The eyes of gratitude gaze at his stately form, dimmed with tears. Flowers are strewed in his path by fair hands. SmUing affection wreaths his brow with the garland of laurel and roses. But he hastens on. He is at Annapolis, before Congress, delivering his farewell address ; and these are its closing words : " Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theatre of action ; and bidding an affectionate fiirewell to this august body, under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my comrais sion, and take my leave of all the employments of public life" The grandest act recorded in history. Moral sub limity could rise no higher. Mifflin was in the chair. Providence had arranged that one who had been with good reason suspected of plotting for the removal of Washington, when gloom enveloped the carap and the nation, should atterapt to give voice to the feelings of that great hour. Mifflin thus responded: "The United States, in Congress asserabled, receive, with emotions too affecting for utterance, the soleran resignation of the authority under which you have led their troops with suc cess through a perilous and doubtful war. Called upon by your country to defend its invaded rights, you accepted the sacred charge before it had found alliances, and while it was without friends or a government to support you. You have conducted the great mUitary contest with wisdom and forti tude, invariably regarding the rights of the civil power, through all disasters and changes. You have, by the love and confidence of your fellow-citizens, enabled them to dis play their martial genius, and transmit their fame to pos terity. You have persevered, tUl these United States, aided by a magnanimous king and nation, have been enabled, under a just Providence, to close the war in freedom, safety, and independence ; on which happy event we sincerely join you in congratulations. Having defended the standard of 300 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. liberty in this New World, having taught a lesson useful to those who inflict and to those who feel oppression, you retire from the great theatre of action with the blessings of your fellow-citizens : but the glory of your virtues will not terminate with your military command ; it will continue to animate remotest ages." Washington had acknowledged the indejjendence of the national life ; the American people had acknowledged it, but with one grand and damaging reservation. Virginia, and the Southern States generally, insisted upon setting the State above the Nation ; that the first devotion of loyalty was to the State ; that nothing belonged to the General Government but what had been formally conceded to it ; and that the Union was a simple confederacy, frora which either of its raerabers, sovereign in itself, might withdraw at pleas ure. Strange, therefore, as the fact may appear, while- sove reigns and courts abroad acknowledged the new nation as a free and independent nation, many of the States, as such, denied it ; and history must wait ninety years before it could record this latest acknowledgment of the independent national life in the United States of America. CHAPTEE VIIL THE CONSTITUTION REVEALS AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. "Every nation, when able and agreed, has a right to set up over themselves any form of government which to them may appear most conducive to their common welfare." — L.\NGDON. Constitutions grow. They are not the sudden product of genius or talent. They cannot be resolved into perfect maturity by any body of men. Their materials, like inor ganic matter in chaos, seem to be floating about amid the confusion of ages, seeking affinities and organization. A careful study of history, however, will reveal the vital element of Christian liberty, surviving all changes, and superior to all antagonist forces, slowly attracting to itself the materials of its growth, and in all its local manifesta tions holdinsr secret but indissoluble connections with all the true principles of liberty on the globe. Magna Charta, so fundamental to the British Constitution, was not the creation of the powerful nobles in conflict with King John. It was the grand original right of man, which had been felt and asserted somewhere in all the ages, but which had been long denied, insulted, and stamped out of sight. It must, then, assert itself, claim a human voice to utter its demands and enforce its authority, that the race might not believe it dead, or forever powerless against oppression. And, when it was once expressed, it was not for England alone, but for the worid. It slowly, but with steady progress, leavened the masses, so that British freedom from henceforth embodied a thought, a grand fact, which could never be safely ignored. The conflicts of Puritanism with 302 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. despotic power showed the pressure and strength of this life-force on its way to the New World. Now freedom begins to show dimly its constitutional form in the colonies, — first in its indignant utterances against the tyrannical acts of the mother-country ; then in the strong State-papers, which showed inchoate State authority ante dating the formal organization of independent government; then in the bonds of union, which indicated a comraon interest and common life in the separate colonies'; then in the organized State governments which rose up amid the birth-throes of the great Eevolution. A project of union was brought before Congress, by Franklin, in 1775; but it could only show the conviction of its necessities, and the difficulty of ascertaining of what the unity of the colonies consisted. THE OLD ARTICLES OP CONFEDERATION. When the declaration of independence destroyed the unity which the colonies had formerly recognized in the British crown, and left thera to ascertain and define the pro- founder and less evident ties, which, as parts of a new nation, bound thera together, they sought to define in words the sense in which they were separate States, and at the same time a General Government A most difficult thing; to do. The history of the effort affords a striking iUustration of the fact, already stated, that reliable' constitutions are not raade, but grow. In June, 1776, a committee of one from each State was appointed to draught a project of national government, then simply understood as a confederacy of colo nies. Samuel Adams, Sherman, Dickinson, and John Eut ledge, were of the number of this important committee ;. a sufficient guaranty that the effort would be able, and faith ful to the people, so far as the progress of events had de fined the possibUities of national organization. Dickinson drew the document in twenty articles. But the report AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 303 proved at once the difficulties of the task, and the inevi table demand for mutual concessions. Eepeated attempts were made to consider and adopt it; but the difficulty of agreement, and the disturbed condition of Congress, driven from Philadelphia, deferred the final vote for six inonths. The Articles of Confederation were at length sanctioned by Congress, and went to the States for their "imraediate and dispassionate action." In the docuraent accompanying the Articles, it was weU said, " that to form a permanent Union, accommodated to the opinions and wishes of the delegates of so many States, differing in habits, produce, comraerce, and internal police, was found to be a work which nothing but tirae and reflection, conspiring with a disposition to concUi ate, could mature and accomplish." During the following winter, only New Harapshire, New York, North Carolina, and Virginia accepted the Articles " without objections." After proposing " various amend ments," however, all the States, excepting New Jersey, Del aware, and Maryland, adopted thera. These States had no difficulty in pointing out valid objections to the plan ; for it was really very imperfect : but New Jersey and Delaware yielded to the urgent entreaties of Congress. Maryland stood alone for two years in resisting the ratification, which prevented the official promulgation of the Articles. To reach even a confederation, the following grave and perplexing questions must be settled : — How should the votes in Congress be given ? Virginia was large, populous, and central ; and she said, " According to population : " but she was overruled, and the vote was to be by States ; and not less than nine States were required to determine any question of grave importance. How should taxes be levied ? The East said, " According to population ; " but the South said, " No : slave labor Is not so profitable as wdilte." The casting vote which settled this controversy fell upon New Jersey ; and she gave it to the South, against the North, exempting forever slave property from taxation." 304 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. In the result, real estate alone became the basis of taxa^ tion ; but, as the General Government had no power to fix the valuation, this measure was fatal to the confederacy. To whom should the Western lands belong ? This was, as we have already seen, a very difficult question. A .prompt and unrestricted concession of the right of eminent domain to the nation would have been just and wise, and this was urged by the States holding no claims in the Great West ; but the claiming States made an obstinate resistance. The severe contest was ended, for the tirae being, by such partial concessions to Congress as led to acquiescence, if not approval ; and the government began to exercise a territorial sovereignty, which would ultimately be a source of vast revenue, but which, for a long period, was more troublesome than profitable. This controversy being settled, on the first day of March, 1781, Maryland yielded, signed the Articles of Confederation, and they became the law of the land. Navigation was made dependent exclusively upon the wUl of each State, and the control of imports as well ; thus bar ring the right of the United States to prohibit the slave- trade. The States, In the mean tirae, refused to commit the settle ment of future land-claims and boundaries, north-west of the Ohio, to the United States ; thus providing for an almost interminable contest of jurisdiction In the future. The most obstinate prejudices against a standing army had frequently paralyzed the efforts of Washington and Con gress to raise continental forces to give greater reUableness and efficiency to American arras ; and now the States would peremptorily deny to the General Government military control over their separate jurisdictions. There should not be one grand national army, but thirteen armies. How utterly destructive of government this must have been, had there not been vital power in the underlying unity, which, when emergency demanded, would rise up, and reveal its strength, despite the vicious assumptions of "State rio-hts" ! AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 305 The United States might declare war, and make peace, and make treaties ; but " the power reserved to the States over imports and exports, over shipping and revenue," reaUy destroyed the force of these concessions. The States must share in " the right of coining money, the right of keeping up ships of war, land-forces, forts, gar risons," and must make their own laws of treason. Finally, it must require the unanimous vote of the thir teen States to adopt or amend the Articles of Confederation. Well might It be said, " A government which had not power to levy a tax, or raise a soldier, or deal directly with an individual, or keep its engageraents with foreign powers, or amend its constitution without the unanimous consent of its members, had not enough of vital force to live." * If now it is asked. Was there no indication In the old con federation of an organic national life, I answer, with great satisfaction, that the assumption by Congress, that the most extended territory, however diverse In local interests and prejudices, might be Included in one Great Eepublic, was a fundamental position, distinguishing this modern from the ancient republics of Greece and Eome, and conforming bravely to the future plans and developments of Providence. The right of citizenship and the franchise had been settled variously in the States according to caprice or prejudice. " One State disfranchised Jews, another Catholics, another denlers of the Trinity, and another men of a complexion different from white;" but " the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union made no distinction of class, and knew no caste but the caste of humanity." t That which gave reality to the Union was the article which secured to " the free inhabitants " of each of the States " all privUeges and immunities of free citizens in the several States." South Carolina and Georgia, moved by their prejudice against color, resisted this broad national assumption, but without success. The General Government had absurdly admitted * Bancroft, ix. 446. t Ibid., 447. 306 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the word " free," thereby discriminating against slaves ; but they could by no means be induced to make color alone the basis of proscription. " Congress, whUe It left the regula tion of the elective franchise to the judgment of each State, in the Articles of Confederation, in Its votes, and its treaties with other powers, reckoned all the free Inhabitants, with out distinction of ancestry, creed, or color, as subjects or citizens," thus conforming to the civilization of the age. It must be considered strange that this grand principle should again be In contest, and require the confiicts of near a cen tury, extending down to this very day, for its complete vin dication. Finally, as In all these respects the American Eepublic presented thus early a complete contrast with the republics of Greece and Eome, so also did it rise Irameasurably above them In Its consideration for the individual man. In the ancient republics, the people existed for the government, and they failed : In this great modern experiment, the government would exist for the people, and it would suc ceed ; for the people would ultimately eradicate Its vices, and Identify and conserve the true elements of Its vitality, and conditions of Its growth. The Articles of Confederation would be superseded, but not until they had been the means of bringing distinctly to the view of the American people the inherent viciousness of the doctrine of State rights, demon- strating clearly the inadequacy and utter impracticabUIty of a mere confederation of independent States, and usher ing in the era of organic nationality under the new and permanent Constitution of the United States of America. THE FEDERAL CONVENTION. For four years and a half the confederated States had struggled on with aU the burdens of enormous debts, and no power to raise money to pay ; of confilctmg jurisdiction between the Nation and the States ; with peril of incipient AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 307 rebellion, and the confusion of various governmental func tions without proper classification and division of labor; and a general feeling of discouragement was the result. The French and English people had expected great im provements from the confederation, but with no good reason. The want of power was evident upon the face of the document ; and the conviction that there must be some change In the direction of a vital union and stronger gov ernment was becoming general. New York proposed a most radical change in the Articles Immediately after their adoption. Massachusetts followed In the same track. Vir ginia, at length, invited a convention of all the States to consider the question of duties and commerce generally ; and In September, 1786, delegates from Virginia, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York, assembled in Annapolis. The discussions, of course, brought under search ing review the radical defects of the General Government, and resulted in the caUIng of a General Convention, to be held in the following May, to consider amendments to the Articles of Confederation, and propose such changes as would be " adequate to the exigencies of the Union." The old Continental Congress had expired. It bad been a power in the earth. It had carried on a frightful war for eight years, and reached the most magnificent and improba ble results. Its functions had subsided with the extraordi nary condition of society which originated them; and it passed away in silence, leaving to the future historian the grateful task of recording its heroic achievements, under such deprivations and limitations as would have utterly destroyed any assembly not vigorously sustained by Divine Providence. The life of the nation survived the slow decay and final extinction of this its first visible body, and promptly appeared in the Congress of the confederation. Soon eliminating other incongruous elements. It would take the form of the Congress of the United States of America, under the new constitution. 308 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. The convention to which the task of preparing this im portant document was assigned assembled in Philadelphia on the fourteenth day of May, 1787. It was not, however, until the twenty-fifth, eleven days later, that a quorum of States appeared in Independence Hall. Washington was very properly called to preside over this august body. It included many of " the most illustrious citizens of the States ; men highly distinguished for talents, character, practical knowl edge, and public services. The aged Franklin had sat in the Albany Convention of 1754, In which the first attempt had been made at colonial Union. Dickinson, who sat in the present convention as one of the raerabers from Delaware, William S. Johnson of Connecticut, and John Eutledge of South Carolina, had participated in the Stamp-Act Congress of 1765. Besides Washington, Dickinson, and Eutledge, who had belonged to the Continental Congress of 1774, there were also present, frora among the members of that body, Eoger Sherman of Connecticut, William Livingston, Govem or of New Jersey, George Eead of Delaware, and George Wythe of Virginia ; and of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, besides Franklin, Eead, Wythe, and Sher man, Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts, and Eobert Morris, George Clymer, and James Wilson, of Pennsylvania. Eigh teen members were at the same time delegates to the Con tinental Congress ; and, of the whole number, there were only twelve who had not sat at some time in that body. The officers of the Eevolutionary army were represemted by Washington, Miffiln, HamUton, and Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, who had been colonel of one of the South-Caro lina regiments, and at one time an aide-de-camp to Washing ton. Of those members who had come prominently forward since the Declaration of Independence, the most conspicu ous were Hamilton, Madison, and Edward Eandolph, who had lately succeeded Patrick Henry as Governor of Virginia. The members who took the leading part in the debates were Madison, Mason, and Eandolph, of Virginia ; Gerry, Gorham, AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 309 and King, of Massachusetts ; WUson, Gouverneur Morris, and Franklin, of Pennsylvania ; Johnson, Sherman, and Ellsworth, of Connecticut; HamUton and Lansing, of New York; Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, of South Carolina, the latter chosen governor of that State the next year ; Patterson, of New Jersey; Martin, of Maryland; Dickinson, of Delaware; and Williamson, of North Carolina." * It is evident, that. In this historic convention, God had brought together in a very remarkable degree the strength, experience, and wisdom of the nation ; and the task under taken required all, and more than all, they could command. THE CONSTITUTION FORMED. Let us now glance at the difficulties of the work taken in hand by these distinguished men. A government of free dom by the people themselves had been now experimented only far enough to show the evils which threatened its de struction. The great men of the nation had become con servative by the very necessities arising from the novelty and extreme difficulties of their experiment. Jefferson, almost the only representative raan who had full faith in the competency of the people to form and sustain a democratic government, was abroad. There was little danger of rash ness in such an assembly. But it was certain that the great est distinctness of individual opinions and most obstinate local prejudices would appear. We may now wonder at the wisdom which controlled their final decisions ; at the nice and accurate balances of the Constitution they produced ; the dehcate adjustment of re served and conceded rights between the people and the gov ernment, between the several States and the Union, and between the legislative, the executive, and judicial depart ments. In each of these particulars, there were almost in finite chances for fatal mistake, and but a single one for * Hildreth, iii. 483, 484. 310 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. perfect success. What surer evidence of divine guidance do we need than the superhuman skill shown In the clear definitions of rights which came from the chaos foUowing the death-struggle for liberty ? Not merely were the complicated difficulties which arose from a crude and forming state of society to be overcome, the destructive errors of empirical systems to be avoided, the strong tendencies to dissolution and anarchy to be counteracted, but the vast future was to be provided for, — emergencies which at that time did not exist even in conception, states of society which no huraan sagacity could foresee, powers to grapple with and crush an- tagonlsras which did not then appear even in the sphere of possibility, all requiring a compass and reach of wisdom which is under no condition the natural attribute of man. We cannot wonder that there was at first confusion of Ideas inthe convention ; that Washington and his compeers in this great crisis trerabled for the fate of their country. We are compelled to admit that this distinguished body seemed to have forgotten their true dependence. There does not appear to have been that devout temper of mind, that humble, fervent spirit of prayer, which had pervaded the Eevolution. In accounting for the success of their efforts, and for the great wrongs which found place In the Constitu tion, one event must be mentioned as of the utmost historical Importance. For long days they labored, apparently in vain : anarchy and ruin alone stared thera in the face. At length. Dr. Franklin arose, and said, " I will suggest, Mr. President, the propriety of noralnating and appointing, before we sepa rate, a chaplain to this convention, whose duty it shall be uniformly to assemble with us, and Introduce the business of each day by an address to the Creator of the universe and the Governor of all nations, beseeching him to preside In our councils, enlighten our minds with a portion of heavenly wisdom. Influence our hearts with a love of truth and jus tice, and crown our labors with complete and abundant suc cess." "The doctor sat down," says Mr. Dayton of New AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 31 X Jersey; "and never did I behold a countenance at once so dignified and dehghted as was that of Washington at the close of this address. Nor were the members of the con vention generally less affected. The words of the venerable Franklin fell upon our ears with a weight and authority even greater than we may suppose an oracle to have had on a Eoman senate." How delightful this revelation of a returning sense of propriety to these representatives of a reUgious people ! What honor It reflects upon the Araerican sage and the Father of his Country, as well as upon " the members of the convention generally " ! and what hope it inspires that threatening dangers wIU be averted, and God appear in the words which would define our constitutional liberties ! With what mortification, then, must the Christian histo rian record the fact, that " the motion was evaded by an adjournment It was feared, according to Madison, lest prayers for the first time, at that late day, might alarm the public by giving the impression that matters were already desperate." * Alas ! what blindness can come over the mind of a man ! what wrong can be done by the adroitness of an astute politician ! While, however, we mournfully record the success of the intrigue which prevented the official enactment of this meas ure, so high In dignity and profound in wisdom, we can not doubt that the open acknowledgment of God in the address and resolution offered by Franklin, and the gene ral and hearty mutual response which followed, were an swered by the divine recognition and blessing. Both the right of this sublime proposal, and the wrong of the dispo sition made of it, appear in the result. It is not necessary for us to follow In detail the struggles in the convention between the smaller and larger States. The former feared that their interests would be compromised hy a strong consolidated government ; but they were paci- * Hildreth, iii. 495. 312 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. fied by the concession of an equal vote -y^Ith the largest States in the Senate of the United States. The advocates of " States rights," as against a strong Cen tral Government, were those from Connecticut, New Jersey, and Delaware, with a majority from Maryland and New York. The delegates from New Hampshire had retired from the convention ; and Ehode Island had become so fear ful of a destruction of her Influence by a consolidated Gen eral Government, that she had declined to send delegates to the convention. The " National Party," as it was then termed, represented Virginia, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. How strange these facts appear to us at the present day ! Precisely at this point, the peril of the nation and the control of Provi dence appear. If New Hampshire and Ehode Island had been present, they would doubtless have voted with the " States-rights " party, and no General Government would have been possible. It must be determined by whom the House of Eepresen tatives should be chosen. Sherman, sustained by Gerry, the States of South Carolina and New Jersey, and a portion of Connecticut and Delaware, vehemently opposed election by the people. Had God suffered them to succeed, there would, so far as we can see, have been a complete end to the attempt to found a true republic. How wisely, then, was it ordered that Wilson, Madison, and Mason should stand up to defend successfully the rights of the people ! Thus, against numbers and Influence and the highest proba bility, God preserved inviolate another fundamental prin ciple of our Great Eepublic. HamUton was not easily reconcUed to democracy in any form. He was sustained by WUson in demanding an abso lute executive veto on the acts of Congress. This would have been the establishment of an Insufferable despotism, which God would not permit. Two most important concessions were made to the Gen- AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 313 eral Government, — in giving it power to veto all State laws in conflict with the Constitution or " inconsistent with the harmony of the Union," and fully investing it with the treaty-making power. Without these, no nation could have been constituted. The most formidable difficulty arose from the institution of slavery. The conflict was long and perUous ; but it ended in a compromise which gave the slave States a three- fifths representation for their human chattels. Cautiously avoiding the name of slavery, it tolerated the institution in substance, and provided for the rendition of " persons held to service." This was the grand vice of the great Consti tution. But the demand was imperative. Davis, of North Carolina, expressed the true spirit of this persistent wrong when he arose and said " it was time to speak out. He saw that it was meant by some gentlemen to deprive the Southern States of any share of representation for their blacks. He was sure that North Carolina would never con federate on any terms that did not rate them at least as three-fifths. If the Eastern States meant, therefore, to ex clude them altogether, the business was at an end." The opponents of the vUe institution yielded exactly where they should have stood firm ; and the irrepressible conflict was handed down to the great future. If It be said that without this compromise there could have been no national union, we answer. This is to affirm that men would defeat the great national plans of God by simply doing right; that, to secure the future of the United States, It was neces sary to incorporate into its fundamental law an indorse ment of the largest and most complicated crime known among men, — a statement which cannot be written or read without a feeling of horror. No: the true national spirit loathed the corruption which so far marred the work of the convention, and shamelessly confronted the funda mental doctrine of human freedom, for the support of which the American Eepublic was instituted, and threw the faith 314 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of the nation firmly back on to the Declaration of Inde pendence, as the clear and unalterable definition of its principles. But the nation was to be further humiliated by the per sistent determination of the South to provide for the im portation of slaves. The grand committee of detail, to whora the project of a constitution had been coramltted to perfect It, reported against taxing Imports, which was so far the triumph of the Southern purpose to steal the bodies and souls of men in Africa, force them across the high sea,s, and coin money from their sale and unpaid labor. This atterapt to render constitutional a traffic so inhuman, and revolting to all the feelings of justice and honor, brought on a storm of indignation. King " denounced the admis sion of slaves as a most grievous circumstance to his mind ; and he believed It would be so to a great part of the people of America." " He had hoped that some accommodation would have taken place on this subject; that at least a time would have been llralted for the Iraportation of slaves. He never could agree to let them be imported without limitation, and then be represented in the national legis lature." Governeur Morris declared slavery " was a nefari ous institution. It was the curse of Heaven on the States where It prevaUed." He drew In vivid contrast the deso lations of the South by slavery, and the prosperity of the North with the labor of freemen ; and then demanded, "Upon what principle Is it that the slaves shall be com puted in the representation? Are they men? -Then make them citizens, and let them vote. Are they property? Why, then. Is no other property Included ? " " The admis sion of slaves into the representation, when fairly ex plained, comes to this, — that the inhabitant of Georgia and South Carohna, who goes to the coast of Africa In defiance of the most sacred laws of humanity, tears away his fellow- creatures from their dearest connections, and damns them to the most cruel bondage, shaU have more votes In a AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 315 government instituted for the protection of the rights of mankind than the citizen of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, who views with a laudable horror so nefarious a practice." Now listen to a voice from the Soutli : "South Carolina," said C. Pinckney, " can never receive the plan if it prohib its the slave-trade. In every proposed extension of the powers of Congress, that State has expressly and watchfully excepted the power of meddling with the importation of negroes." The battle was a severe one; but Southern tenacity again triumphed, so far as to give free license to the infamous traffic In slaves for twenty years. For givino- the majority to this wicked act, the North received " the unrestricted power of Congress to enact navigation laws," — a miserable consideration for the utter sacrifice of rloht in favor of the most consuraraate villany the human race ever knew. Still another degradation must be fastened upon the nation, to appease the foul spirit of slavery. Without debate, the infamous clause went into the Constitution, " bearing," says Hildreth, " the plain marks of a New-Eng land hand," — "No person held to service or labor In one State, under the laws thereof, escaping Into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be dis charged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." We may now place together, as the grand facts of this period of our history which stand out distinctly against the true spirit and aim of the new government, the failure to adopt the motion of Franklin, providing for a soleran recog nition of the sovereignty of God by daily prayer in the Constitutional Convention ; the entire omission of the name and authority of Jehovah from the Constitution ; the recog nition of the right of property in man ; and the infamous toleration of the slave-trade, and the rendition of slaves. These aU show that no moral or political mUlenniuin had 316 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. come; that sin was yet mighty in the earth; and that years of heroic battle for the right must precede the triumph of those principles of American freedom defined by the Immortal Declaration. But marked progress had been made In the development of national unity. Compared with the old Articles of Con federation, the Constitution was a bold advance in asserting the rights and functions of the nation, as such, in triumph ing over local prejudices and sectional demands, advocated under the name of " State rights." The question sent to the several State conventions, in submitting the plan for approval, was not whether it was perfect or satisfactory In Its details, but whether, on the whole, It should be accepted as the best that could be obtained. Four months of desperate efforts to find the true organic unity of the nation had reached this result, and could do no more. Should the Constitution be ratified and tried, or anarchy and civil war be preferred ? Two parties had been developed by the struggles of this trying period. The Federalists wanted a strong, centrahzed government Dissatisfied with what they termed the weak ness of the plan agreed upon by the Convention, they sub mitted to It with the hope of amending it in the direction of greater power. The Democrats opposed it, as tending to a central despotism. They would have defeated it; but hoping finally to secure amendments granting more power to the States, and fearing the most calamitous results If it should be rejected, one State after another- formally ratified It The most desperate efforts were made to secure a conditional approval ; but, as this would have been fatal, the efforts of a large and powerful statemanship finally secured an unconditional ratification from Delaware, Penn sylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maryland, South Carolina, Virginia, and New York. Several of these States, foUowing the lead of Massachusetts,' sent forward with their official notice of AN ORGANIC NATIONAL LIFE. 317 ratification various fundamental amendments, which served chiefly to show what concessions the sections had made for the sake of unity. North CaroUna imposed conditions ; and Ehode Island was too democratic to hold a convention. These two States could not, therefore, be counted ; but, as the vote of the nine States was conclusive, the new Consti tution became the organic law of the nation. For three hundred years, God had been steadily and visi bly moving the elements of civil liberty and moral power for the accomplishment of this grand result. The most improbable combinations had been formed ; the resources of remote islands and continents had been gathered ; peoples of distant origin, and tongues unknown to each other, had been drawn together by forces which they little understood; the most formidable arrangements of power had been dashed to atoms; and minds utterly diverse in opinions, prejudices, and culture, had been quietly moulded by invisible agency to render this sublime result possible. But the American people were no longer floating bodies of aimless adven turers ; nor mere separate colonies, dependent upon the will of a distant power; nor independent confederate States. They were a new, vigorous, and completely organized nation. CHAPTEE IX. TRUE CHRISTIANITY AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. " The great comprehensive truths written in letters of living light on every page of our history are these : Human happiness has no perfect security but freedom, freedom none but virtue, virtue none but knowledge; aud neither freedom nor virtue has any vigor or immortal hope except in the principles of the Christian faitli and in the sanctions ofthe Christian religion." — Phesident Quinct. A FORM of governraent is to be distinguished frora the life of a nation. Peoples find theraselves thrown into neigh borhood relations, and a social order rises up frora the very necessities of contiguity, reciprocal wants, and acts of kind ness. They raay Increase so much in numbers, and reach over a territory so far, as to have the magnitude and the outward forms of a nation. They raay organize with all the laws of civil society, make treaties, and perform all other acts of national sovereignty; and yet they may be without any essential pervading vitality. Angry disputes and sectional jealousies will separate and destroy them. Their local organizations and cIvU liberties will become a prey to the ambition of the most powerful chief and his bands of raarauders. No national life will appear to rescue the coraraon government frora the hand of violence, or pre serve the organization from dissolution. Then a despotic ruler may assert sovereignty over provinces near or remote. Conquered territory may be annexed, by the action of force, to a kingdom of vast resources and mUitary power ; but if nothing homogeneous appears, if there are no common bonds of interest and mutual dependence, if no vital force circulates through the 318 AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 319 whole, when the restraints of power are removed, disintegra tion, revolution, and separate independencies, become inevi table. There are various forming influences and organlzina: forces which enter into the combinations of separate governments. They collect and associate and develop until they reach their limits; and then, unless they are supplemented by others of greater vigor, and compass of effect, the national organism goes into decay. Its life is shown to be tem porary, and goes out before our eyes. Whenever the com binations are arbitrary and in defiance of geographical or other physical facts, or when they are accidental, prompted by mere temporary convenience, and against historical affini ties and moral necessities, they soon break up, and end in anarchy, or perhaps in destructive war. The length of tirae that heterogeneous peoples may be kept together In civil compacts is of no importance In this discussion. This is generally a question of power ; and also, doubtless, of the ulterior designs of Providence in regard to the timely development of organizing forces which shall show work designed to last through the ages to come. Such has been the ceaseless round of rise and decline, of the growth and decay, of nations, that many have doubted strongly whether there is any such thing as an indestructi ble national life It seems to have been largely concluded that nations must follow the analogy of huraan bodies ; pass their Infancy, youth, manhood, and decay, by inevitable laws : and It must be confessed that there is much in the ceaseless revolutions , of cIvU society to render this view plausible. We are, however, convinced that it is a grand fallacy. Its assumptions and arguments are all regardless of the great fact and power of right in human organiza tions. The right, the good, the true, must certainly be immortal. Let the law of justice have its place, let God control the organization and administration of government, let human obstructions to the plans of the Infinite dis- 320 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. appear, and the wUl of God be enacted in organic and statute law and maintained In the administration, and there is no reason why a nation should not be as orderly in develop ment, as vital and Indestructible, as any form of life on this earth. The grand question is, whether this can be, whether It Is, or wiU be, anywhere reahzed. We now direct our attention to the solution of this question, feeling that every step In the logical progress is upon solid rock. THE RELIGIOUS ELEMENT IN THE FORMATION OF THE REPUBLIC. The nations are like their gods. The ideas which a people entertain of the Supreme Power will mould their opinions and control their actions. In other words, the religion of a government will determine its character, and settle the question of its duration. Hero-worship is one form of religious devotion. The highest wisdom of a people under its control will be simply human. The real or assumed virtues of the hero will be the highest type of public virtue ; while his vices will be as much matters of imitation and admiration as though they were virtues. Hence the governments which deified war riors were bloodthirsty and cruel. Those who exalted to the honors of worship the patrons of Inebriety and lust became deeply depraved In private and public morals. The gods and goddesses of Greece and Eome were the creations of corrupt imaginations, and apologies for the deepest degradation. Hence the life of these nations could only endure till these natural and acquired elements of corruption had wrought out their legitimate results. There was, moreover, an assault upon the rights and requirements of the one true God in this guUty idolatry, which must bring down his displeasure upon them, and result in their signal destruction. Take a modern instance of the power of religious opinion AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 321 and the rejection of the true worship to destroy freedom. France, in its terrific revolution, saw the violent culmination of theoretical and practical infidelity. When the blas phemous atheists of those degenerate times installed a prostitute as the Goddess of Eeason, aboUshed the Christian sabbath, and decreed that death is an eternal sleep, they prepared the way for the power of faction ; for the murder of thousands of the best citizens and the worst ; for the sub version of all right, and the enthronement of passion as the sovereign ofthe hour. The liberties of England were never consoUdated untU the worship of God became national ; and never endangered, excepting as the rights of the Individual conscience were denied as to the modes of that worship. The struggles of Puritanism intensified the reUgious con sciousness of the nation, and brought forward the grand principle of the Eeformation, — the rights of the Individual conscience, — demanding prompt acknowledgment from the throne. The power of the Eeformation, but gradually developed, was, under the surface, more active and influ ential than could be evident in the forms of a State religion and a forced external conformity. It moulded the thinking and the deepest convictions of the masses, imperceptibly constructed the great controlling laws and administration of the kingdom, and bore the people onward toward truer liberty by the action of a broad and deep and irresistible current. It was evidently the divine purpose that it should con duct in England its grand preparations for constructing and inspiring a government of liberty in the New World. In the Old, it could insist upon the right ; it could appeal from the decisions of man to the Searcher of hearts ; it could be overborne and crucified, but not destroyed. It rose with a new power from its baptisms of blood, and gathered its friends and representative heroes for an advent to a scene of development and influence hitherto unknown. 322 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. It may here with propriety be re-affirmed that Christianity was the guiding power of American colonization, and the forming force of American institutions. When the people came to Virginia, they came to estab lish religion by law as the divine right of Prelacy in the New World. When they moved out among the Indians, their first object was to make them Christians. The Quakers carae to New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and elsewhere, that they might follow, without obstruction, the light within; the Huguenots came to this virgin land that they might worship the true God, with no bloody persecutions, no reeking St. Bartholomews, for the exercise of a sincere conscience ; the Eoman Catholics sought a home In Balti more that they raight plant their degenerate faith in the New World; and the Puritans of New England were in America for no other reason than that they might secure freedom to worship God. The Congregationalists felt that there was something pleasing to God in the very act of independence in the individual Church. The Presbyterians meant nothing but acceptable service to the God of order in the strict conventional responsibilities of the presbytery, the synod, and the assembly. The Baptists believed that Ehode Island was a model State, under the genius of Eoger Williams, In the free exercise of Immersion, and the great power assigned to spiritual thought, true conscience, and devout worship. The Methodists came Into all the land like a flaming fire, to consume iniquity, and show that creeds and dogmas were all nothing without true conversion, and reformation of life Upon the whole, the really great com mon universal Idea and prevalent power of the American colonies was religion. Whatever might be held subject to expediency, this could not Whatever might be subjugated, compromised, surrendered, this could not If any thing was truly American, it was the feeling of worship. We have seen how its defective education and slow de-^ velopment brought its various theories into spirited coUis- AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 323 ions; how indispensable it was that Its errors should be eliminated, and Its pure principles should shine out without obstruction. And we have seen, also, that American Chris tianity was growing to power under at least two new con ditions : first, that it was master here, and not subordinate, — umpire, and not convict; that. Instead of asking leave of the civU power to exist. It would decide rather what else but itself should exist here. Slowly, but obviously. Chris tian right, Christian justice, rose to the head of affairs, and, instead of humbly pleading for toleration, claimed the right to denounce and put down every form of Iniquity known among men. Next it gradually awoke to the fact that the weapons of its warfare were not carnal, but spiritual, and mighty, through God, to the puUing-down of strongholds. The force of traditional prerogatives and prescriptive usage became weaker every year; and the holy Bible rose in clearness and power as the great standard of appeal. The redundant appendages of pure, simple Christianity, which had come down from Papal authority, were seen rapidly falling off and disappearing. Simple and raore simple every day became the great truth, that a free, personal application of the blood of Christ alone cleansed frora sin, and that onl}'- the pure In heart were blessed; and the great Eeformation (re-formation) of souls and society which followed the plain, honest, searching publication of divine truth, proved that the tabernacle of God was with men, and that the spirit of humble Christianity was from heaven. Hence appeared more and more distinctly the great fact, that soul-liberty revived in the regeneration was the essence and type of civil Uberty, and that there could be no gov ernment entitled to permanence and universal sway that did not acknowledge the sovereignty of God, the rights of man, and the principles of eternal justice. Then vanished the obstructions which had been thrown around the indi vidual conscience ; and State after State, and finally the General Government, declared the worship of God to be 324 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. free, and man to be personally accountable to God alone for the honest fulfilment of religious obligation. Just In proportion as the freedom of discussion In this fair field should work out the Popish element of coercion in religion, and give ascendency to the pure forms of experi mental and practical Christianity, it would become a power In the new nation. It would, moreover, exert a vast influ ence upon the thinking and convictions of statesmen and educators, in the exaltation of justice and every form of public virtue. It would slowly but powerfully mould the laws and administrative government of the country. Private and public men would be imperceptibly controlled by its holy teachings, sin would be discountenanced as a reproach to any people, and righteousness Invoked, which alone ex alteth a nation. Far from being always ostensible and out wardly exacting, this humble, quiet spirit would silently permeate all public bodies, and powerfully control all public functionaries. All this became historical in America. For though pure religion was far from being universal In the period of inde pendence, and though for ages to come great public wrongs would assert their right to place amid the institutions of American freedom, they kept their position against the energetic protest of divine Christianity ; and one after an other yielded to the vigor of a force which they could in no wise withstand. Men and manners, institutions and administrations, practically acknowledged the presence of a silent influence which had, from the beginning, asserted Its right to be the dominant power of the nation. This at length may be claimed to be the most sacred faith of the people : The Bible, freely read, and Interpreted according to the best judgment of the individual, is the great standard of right and justice, — the guide to purity on earth, and happiness in heaven ; God is the great Sovereign of nations ; no law, no usage, however venerable in prece dent or high in authority, to be considered legitimate or AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 325 permanent, if at war with the wUl of God ; the most feariess condemnation of sin, the most complete recognition of the brotherhood of the race, the most humble trust in the Ee deemer, and the most thorough forms of gospel evangelism, are the most acceptable to the people. This is the religion of the Great Eepubhc. THE RELIGION OF THE NATION IN OFFICIAL ACTS AND PUBLIC MEN. Let US now see the action of this great pubhc force through the representatives of the people. On the 16th of March, 1776, Mr. WiUiam Livingston, pursuant to leave granted, brought in a resolution for appointing a fast ; which, being taken into consideration, was agreed to as foUows : " In times of irapending calamity and distress, when the liberties of America are eminently en dangered by the secret machinations of a vindictive admin istration. It becomes the duty of these hitherto free and happy colonies, with true penitence of heart and the most reverent devotion, publicly to acknowledge the overruling providence of God ; to confess and deplore our offences against him ; and to supplicate his Interposition for averting the threatened danger, and prospering our strenuous efforts in the cause of freedom, virtue, and prosperity. The Con gress, therefore, considering the warlike preparations of the British ministry to subv^ert our invaluable rights and privi leges, and reduce us by fire and sword, by the savages of the wilderness, and our own domestics, to the most abject and Ignominious bondage ; desirous, at the same time, to have people of all ranks and degrees duly impressed with a sol emn sense of God's superintending providence, and of their duty devoutly to rely, in all their lawful enterprises, on his aid and direction, — do earnestly recommend that Friday, the seventeenth day of May next, be observed by the said colo nies as a day of humiliation, fasting, and prayer, that we may, with united hearts, confess and bewail our manifold 326 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. sins and transgressions, and by a sincere repentance, and amendment of life, appease his righteous displeasure, and, through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, obtain his pardon and forgiveness; humbly imploring his assist ance to frustrate the cruel purposes of our unnatural ene mies, and, by Inclining their hearts to justice and benevo lence, prevent the further effusion of kindred blood. But if, continuing deaf to the voice of reason and humanity, and inflexibly bent on desolation and war, they constrain us to repel their hostile Invasions by open resistance, that it may please the Lord of hosts and the God of armies to ani mate our officers and soldiers with invincible fortitude, to guard and protect them in the day of battle, and to crown the continental arms, by sea and land, with victory and suc cess ; earnestly beseeching him to bless our civil rulers, and the representatives of the people. In their several assem blies and conventions; to preserve and strengthen their Union ; to inspire them with an ardent, disinterested love of their country ; to give wisdora and stability to their counsels, and direct them to the more efficacious measures for establishing the rights of America on the most honorable and permanent basis ; that he would be graciously pleased to bless all his people In these colonies with health and plenty, and grant that a spirit of Incorruptible patriotism, and of pure undefiled religion, may universally prevail, and this continent be speedily restored to the blessings of peace and liberty, and enabled to transmit them inviolate to the latest posterity. And It is recommended to Christians of aU denominations to assemble for public worship, and abstain from all servile labor, on said day." This was the statesmanship of the Eevolution, — a clear, calm recognition of God, and " the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ," as our only hope of " pardon," and the " assist ance " which our struggle for Uberty required. And let it not be supposed that this was a sudden ebulUtion of fear. It was so often repeated, and these holy principles were AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 327 asserted in such a variety of forms, in language and acts of such deep solemnity, as to show clearly a firm, unalterable faith in the attributes and promises of God, in the efficacy of Christ's mediation, and in the power of prayer. On the eleventh day of December of the same year, we find these noble representatives of struggling freedom adopting a report from a committee, consisting of Mr. With erspoon, Mr. E. H. Lee, and Mr. Adams, couched in the fol lowing language : " Whereas, The war in which the United States are engaged with Great Britain has not only been prolonged, but is Ukely to be carried to the greatest extremity; and whereas it becomes all public bodies, as well as private persons, to reverence the providence of God, and look up to him as the supreme Disposer of all events and the arbiter of the fate of nations : therefore " Resolved, That it is recommended to aU the United States, as soon as possible, to appoint a day of solemn fasting and humiUation, to implore of Almighty God the forgiveness of the many sins prevailing among all ranks, and to beg the continuance and assistance of his providence in the prose cution of the present just and necessary war. The Congress do also, in the most earnest manner, recomraend to all the members of the United States, and particularly the officers^ civil and mUitary, under them, the exercise of repentance and reformation ; and further require of them the strict observation of the articles of war, and particularly that part of the said articles which forbids profane swearing and all immorality, of which all such officers are desired to take notice." These grave and formal recognitions of fundamental, evangelical truth are truly national, promulgated In language of deepest solemnity by the highest authority of the people, corresponding precisely with the tone and expressions of that immortal document, the Declaration of Independence, which in this place we present again : " We therefore, the repre sentatives of the United States of America in General Con- 328 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. gress assembled, appeaUng to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions ; . . . and for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the pro tection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor." Before such appeals, tyrants must have stood awe-struck and trembling, as in the presence of inevitable doom. When the storm of war was still raging, and it would seem that nothing could divert for a moment the attention of these wonderful men from the immediate preparation which the contest required, on the llth of September, 1777, we find them gravely considering and adopting the report of a committee on a memorial of Dr. Allison and others, asking for means for a supply of the Holy Scriptures. And what do they say ? Sceptically, " We attend to the exi gencies of the war : we have neither time nor disposition to consider questions of religion ; we leave them to clergymen and enthusiasts " ? No. They say, " That the use of the Bible Is so universal, and Its importance so great, that your com mittee refer the above to the consideration of Congress ; and, if Congress shall not think It expedient to order the impor tation of types and paper, the committee recommend that Congress will order the Committee of Comraerce to import TWENTY thousand Bibles from Holland, Scotland, or else where, into the different ports of the States of the Union." "Wherefore It was moved and carried. That the Committee of Commerce be directed to Import twenty thousand copies of the Bible" The embargo prevented the carrying-out of this worthy enterprise ; and In 1782 we find another "Na tional Act in behalf of the Bible." Mr. Eobert Aitkin of PhUadelphia proposed to Congress to print an edition of the Scriptures. The matter was given to a committee, who, with the chaplains, thoroughly examined the copy he sub mitted, and reported in favor of the measure : whereupon it was " Eesolved, That the United States, in Congress assembled. AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 329 highly approve of the pious and laudable undertaking of Mr. Aitkin, as subservient to the Interests of rehgion, as weU as an instance of the progress of the arts in this country ; and being satisfied, from the above report, of his care and accuracy In the execution of the work, they recomraend this edition of the Bible to the inhabitants of the United States, and hereby authorize hirn to publish this recom mendation in the manner he shall think proper." Thus did the Holy Bible become the great and only national book of the United States of America, and the only definition of the rella-Ion of the nation. We have seen how devoutly the fathers of the Eevolution turned to God for help in the day of battle. Did they forget in the hour of victory the principles which had controlled them In their deepest distress ? Surely no ! When the glo rious news arrived fro^n the battle of Saratoga, Congress set apart the eighteenth day of December, 1777, as a day of solemn thanksgiving and praise throughout the United States ; and, upon the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, " Congress resolved to go in a body to the Dutch Lutheran Church to return thanks to Alraighty God for crowning the allied arms with success ; and issued a proclamation, appoint ing the thirteenth day of December, 1781, as a day of gen eral thanksgiving and prayer on account of this signal interposition of Divine Providence." " God," — in the judg ment of these great representative men, — " Almighty God, had crowned the Araerican arms with success ; " and they were soon, as a body, reverently bowed before him, to render thanks to him for the triumph of the people in their bloody conflict with oppression. The War of the Eevolution was over ; and on the twenty- sixth day of August, 1783, the immortal Washington was summoned to Congress to receive the official congratulations of his countrymen. The expressions of gratitude and eulogy were dignified, but exceedingly strong ; and It is In tensely interesting to know with what feelings he came out 42 330 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of this fearful struggle. The following words conclude his terse and appropriate reply : " Perhaps, sir, no occasion may offer, more suitable than the present, to express my humble thanks to God, and my grateful acknowledgments to my country, for the great and uniform support I have received in every vicissitude of fortune, and for the many distin guished honors which Congress has been pleased to confer upon me In the course of the war." Washington renders " humble thanks to God," the Being who, as we have seen, had been so devoutly addressed in the prayers urgently invited by Congress for the success of the American arms. In the great act of the resignation, we find him alluding reverently to "the patronage of Heaven," and his " gratitude for the interposition of Providence." Who can read, with out profound emotion, the following language ? — "I consider It an indispensable duty to close this last act of my official life by committing the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty God ; and those who have the superintendence of them, to his holy keeping." Iramortal sage, honored of God and man ! — raay the inspirations of thy exalted statesmanship fall upon the future represen tatives of American liberty ! We have thus before us the devout manner In which the Father of his Country passed through the eight years of his mUitary life. Let us now observe the spirit with which he began his cIvU career. On the thirtieth day of April, 1789, he who had surrendered his sword to the people he had saved, at the very time when, according to the history of human ambition, he should have used it to fasten upon them the chains of a military despotism, was Inaugurated the first Chief Magistrate of the new nation. With unaffected dig nity and humUity, he had mentioned the anxieties and self distrust which mingled with his gratitude and joy; and he then added, " Such being the impressions under which I have, in obedience to the public sumraons, repaired to the present station, It would be peculiarly iraproper to orait in AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 331 this first official act my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who rules over the universe, who presides in the councils of nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human defect, that his benediction may con secrate to the liberties and happiness of the people of the United States a government instituted by themselves for these essential purposes ; and may enable every instru ment, employed in its administration, to execute with suc cess the functions allotted to his charge. In tendering this homage to the great Author of every public and private good, I assure myself that it expresses your sentiments not less than my own, nor those of my fellow-citizens at large less than either. No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible Hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency; and In the iraportant Eevolution just accomplished, In the system of their united government, the tranquil deliberations and voluntary con sent of so many distinct communities from which the event has resulted cannot be compared with the raeans by which most governments have been established, without some re turn of pious gratitude, along with a humble anticipation of the future blessings which the past seems to presage. The refiections arising out of the present crisis have forced them selves too strongly upon my mind to be suppressed. You will join with me, I trust, in thinking that there are none under the infiuence of which the proceedings of a new and free government can more auspiciously commence" Thus spake the great Washington, — the broadest, truest represen tative man of his country and of his age. He felt the heavy pressure of this hitherto unequaUed responsibiUty, and bore his burden immediately to the throne of grace. He could not perform his first official act without presenting his " fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who presides over the 332 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. councUs of nations, and whose providential aid can supply every human defect ; " and, " In tendering this homage to the great Author of every public and private good," he believes that he expresses the sentiments of the members of Congress, and of his " fellow-citizens at large," not less than his own; states most forcibly the paramount obliga tion of the American people to " acknowledge and adore the invisible Hand which conducts the affairs of men ;" and solemnly affirms " that every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency." With what profound satisfaction do we find here thus vigorously and reverently stated, as if from the very heart and intellect of the Great Eepublic, the broad, funda mental idea under the control of which this book is written ! THE RELIGION OP AMERICA CONSTRUCTS A GRAND AND DURABLE GOVERNMENT. We have seen that the outward forms of the nation were marred with great defects, and that vices utterly inconsistent with the fundamental principles of liberty sought to incor porate themselves into the organic law, and, by obstinate persistence and astute scheming, obtained an apologetic, deprecatory expression In that great Instrument ; but we have also seen that the grand, fundamental fact of repub lican freedom took its position of rank and power to fight the battles of justice through the ages, and to triumph glo riously when the fulness of time had come. But we may now glory In the potential reason why right triumphed over raight in the War of Independence ; why the true theory of government emerged with such clear ness and vigor from the conflicts with English despotism ; why the freedom of speech and the press, the ballot and the pulpit, triumphed over the restrictions which Papal big otry had for ages imposed upon the energies of mind and AN INDESTRUCTIBLE NATIONAL LIFE. 333 the struggles of modern civUization ; why there was power enough in conceded rights to eradicate the most inveterate evUs which had come down from the past God was the recognized Sovereign of, the nation. In the spirit of true humility, all the great achievements of the past were ascribed to him ; and. In fervent prayer, aU the difficult problems and severe trials of the future were confided to his infinite wisdom and sovereign control. Besides, and above all that could be found in the convic tions and acts of men, there was the historical development of a divine plan for establishing a nation In advance of any that had gone before in the great principles of civil and religious liberty, and providing for a new development of Christian civilization. Hence, and hence only, the amazing foresight and prospective adjustments of that forming age, — provisions as complete for future unknown emergencies as for those which were present. For this reason, despite all its imperfections and wrongs conderaned for future destruc tion, the government has risen In majesty and glory, while rival theories have paled before its steady and Increasing light Philosophical attempts to show its irapractlcability, and malignant prophecies of Its failure, have alike disap peared amid the splendors of Its march, until jealous tyrants have alternately eulogized and cursed it ; and the longing eyes of the oppressed of all nations have turned to It as the star of hope amid the darkness of despotism. How evidently, therefore, Is the whole system pervaded by the elements of an iraraortal life ! The religious Influence which presided over its councils, and gave more than human energy to Its contending armies, has entered into every organ and tissue of the body politic, and rendered clear as light the fact of a divine purpose in its organization and development. American liberty — what language can express the glow of rapture with which we contemplate it? We feel the thrill of its life and the throb of Its joy as it courses through our veins. Liberty to think and utter our thoughts ; 334 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. liberty to write and print and read, and no fear of servUe police or loathsome cells or murderous injustice; liberty to study and proclaira God's holy word, kneel at his sacred altar, and claim for ourselves the blood of atonement, with no intervening priest, and no artificial terrors from the thun ders of the Vatican, — with what gratitude ought we to rec ognize privileges so exalted, as the gift of Providence alone ! But If God be the author of the American system, then here is our grand reliance for perraanence and prosperity. We need not be alarmed at the threatening rivalry of selfish politicians, nor the murmurlngs of sectional strife. Our gallant ship of State will mount the foaming crest, or plunge Into ocean deeps, with no peril or harm. Amid the waillngs of the storm, you shall hear from her towering mast the joyous cry of " Land ahead ! " to hush every fear, and fill every throbbing heart with joy. The ambitious partisan may sound the alarm of impending ruin, — ruin upon a given contingency, and ruin upon the exact opposite : but, by the hand of power which guides our destiny, mere poli ticians will hereafter, as before, be used or swept aside like cobwebs ; while our glorious Eepublic will move on, In the sphere of a wise and comprehensive Providence, to accom plish her great mission. The life-power of the nation is Indestructible. FISAMSDS iisilBQJEi^ i"n; ¦'IrfE.h' SaU, 2T T if^r. PERIOD IIL DEYBLOPMENT. CHAPTEE I. DEVELOPMENT OF POPULATION. " Whilst our old European centre is like a volcano, consuming itself in its own crater, the two nations. Oriental and Occidental, proceed unhesitatingly toward perfection, — the one at the wiU of one man, the other by liberty. Providence has confided to the United States of America the care of peopling, and of gaining over to civilization, all that immense territory whieh extends from the Atlantic to the South Sea, and from the North Pole to the Equator." — Louis Napoleon. The stirring events which have passed before us Indicate a grand providential preparation for the organized develop ment of Christian civilization. This purpose would, of course, require a numerous population. The severe trials of the Eevolution had seriously retarded immigration. In 1775, the estimates of population made by Congress were as follows : — Massachusetts . . 400,000 Pennsylvania . . 350,000 New Hampshire . 150,000 Maryland . . . 320,000 Rhode Island . . 50,678 Virginia . . . 650,000 Connecticut . 192,000 North Carolina . 300,000 New York . . . 250,000 South Carolina . 225,000 New Jersey . 130,000 Total . . 3,017,678 In a brief period, the plans of God for the ingathering of the people upon a larger scale would be evident and effectual. 335 536 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. INCREASE OF POPULATION. The country soon became more attractive to those who desired to improve their circumstances. The iraraense forests of valuable tiraber, the fisheries, the broad acres of productive grain-lands, and the extraordinary facilities for manufacturing and comraerce, invited enterprise from every country of the Old World. There was, moreover, in the Idea of liberty, a charm which the aristocratic governments of Europe could In no way counteract. In the absence of steam and telegraphs, and on account of the llralted circulation of newspapers, Inforraatlon forced Its way slowly, but at length widely, through the masses ; and, soon after the close of the Eevo lutionary War, considerable numbers found means to trans port theraselves to this land of liberty and plenty. In 1800, the United States nurabered 5,305,925 ; In 1810, 7,239,815; In 1820, 9,638,121; in 1830, 12,866,020; in 1840,17,069,453; in 1850, 23,191,876 ; In 1860, 31,443,322; Including Indian tribes, &c., 31,747,514 ; and, at the close of 1866, the nuraber had risen to 34,605,882. Sir Morton Peto remarks that " there is nothlna; in the Old World to equal this rate of progress. The population of Great Britain and Ireland In 1800 was 16,000,000, and in 1861 was under 30,000,000. Since 1830, the population of the United States has Increased 19,000,000, whilst that of our kingdora has increased less than 6,000,000." In 1860, the fifteen then slaveholding States contained 12,240,000 Inhabitants ; a gain, in ten years, of 2,627,000, or 27.33 per cent. The nineteen free States, seven Territories, and District of Colurabia, contained 19,201,546 persons; showing an increase, in ten years, of 5,598,603, or 41.24 per cent The whole gain in the decade frora which most of our figures are taken was 8,225,603 souls; and from 1860 to 1866 the increase was 3,162,560. DEVELOPMENT OP POPULATION. 337 SOURCES OF POPULATION. It is a remarkable fact, that not more than one-third of this rapidly-increasing population Is native in birth and descent; or, in other words, two-thirds are iramigrants and their descendants. Without this element, it is estimated that, in 1863, our population would have reached less than 10,500,000 ; while the population from abroad, and their descendants, exceeded 21,000,000. The ratio of increase from immigration is as follows : In the ten years ending 1829, the nuraber was 128,502 ; in ten years ending 1839, we received 538,381 ; in ten years ending 1849, 1,427,337 ; in eleven years ending 1860, 2,968,194 ; making, in some forty-one years, 5,062,414. The following figures will show us in detail the sources of our incoming population for forty years, ending with 1860 : — Spain 16,248 Italy 11,202 Belgium 9,862 South America .... 6,201 Denmark 5,540 Azores 3,242 Portugal 2,614 Sardinia 2,080 Poland 1,659 Russia 1,374 Great Britain & Ireland. 2,750,874 Germany .... 1,486,044 France . . . 208,063 Prussia . . . . 60,432 China . . 41,443 West Indies . 40,487 Switzerland . . . . 37,733 Norway and Sweden 36,129 Holland 21,579 Mexico .... 17,766 It thus appears that Providence designs to bring accessions to our Anglo-Saxon population from all the peoples and civilizations of Europe, with considerable numbers from Asia and the islands of the ocean. The native stock, amounting, as we have seen, to over ten millions, may be found pervading all our comraunltles, and mingling with all classes of Imraigrants in active business relations, organizing American institutions, and developing the resources of the Great Eepublic. The people of African descent, in 1860 numbering « 338 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. 4,435,709, have by unparalleled toil, despite all the disabili ties of a cruel servitude, contributed largely to the material wealth of the country. They have been used, in the order of Providence, to Impose upon us sorae of the hardest prob lems which cIvU liberty has ever had to solve. In regard to them, the plans of God are becoming more evident, cul minating in the severest rebuke of caste, and punishment of despotic usurpation, and in the forced acknowledgment of universal manhood and equal rights. Only a small number of the aborigines of our territory, estlraated in 1860 at 294,431, have become citizens. Gen erally they roam through our vast forests, retaining their barbarous habits, adopting only the vicious customs of the whites ; sometimes receiving with artless gratitude the acts of justice or paternal care bestowed by the government; sometimes submitting in passive suUenness to the wrongs inflicted upon them, and then rousing In terrific revenge for real or fancied injuries. The benevolent labors of Christian missionaries have, however, greatly ameliorated the condi tion of many of their tribes, securing to considerable num bers the blessings of Christian education and experience, and the arts of civUized life ; thus bringing out the fact of their manhood, and revealing capabUItles of honorable rank among the famiUes of earth. It Is painful to think of the savage cruelties and bloody wars which ' might have been avoided by a prompter Christian civUization. CHARACTER OF POPULATION. High rank, professional ability, and capital seeking Investr ment, have found their way to this country from abroad ; but iramigrants have generally been of the Industrial classes. These, together with our native-born people, have given to our frontier settlements an unusual degree of enterprise and vigor, and brought out rapidly the resources of our virgin soil. DEVELOPMENT OP POPULATION. 839 The employments of our foreign-born population strik ingly Indicate their habits of thought and feeling, and the character of their influence upon American Industry and society. The public registers give their occupations only to a limited extent, and yet sufl&clently for our present purpose. Of, say two millions, 872,317 are laborers; 764,837, farmers; 407,524, mechanics ; 231,852, merchants ; 49,494, servants ; 39,967, miners ; 29,484, mariners ; 11,557, weavers and spinners ; 5,246, seamstresses and mUliners ; 7,109, physicians; 4,326, clergymen; 3,882, clerks; 3,634, tailors; 3,474, shoemakers; 3,120, manufacturers; 2,670, law yers; 2,490, artists; 2,310, masons ; 2,016, engineers ; 1,528, teachers; 1,272, bakers; 945, butchers; 729, musicians; 705, printers; 647, painters ; 631, miUers; 588, actors. These figures show that the people were used to work in the Old World, and that they came here to work. The employments of a large number of the whole nation at any one time will furnish a broader view of the character of the American population. In 1860, there were about 8,217,000 heads of famUies. The occupations of some 6,000,000, of various conditions, were as foUows : — Drivers 19,521 Druggists 11,031 Farmers & Farm-laborers 3,219,574 Gardeners 21,323 Grocers 40,070 Harness-makers . . . 12,728 Hatters 11,647 Innkeepers .... 22,818 Jewellers 10,175 Laborers 969,301 Laundresses .... 38,633 Lumbermen .... 15,929 Lawyers and Judges . 33,980 Mantuarmakers . . • 35,165 Masons 48,925 Merchants 123,378 Millers 37,281 Apprentices . . . 55,326 Bakers 19,001 Barbers .... 11.140 Bar-keepers . . . 13,263 Blacksmiths . 112,357 Boarding-house Keepers 12,148 Bricklayers 14,311 Brickmakers . . . 13,736 Butchers .... 30,103 Carpenters . . . 242,958 Cabinet-makers . . 29,223 Carters 21,640 Civil Engineers . . 27,437 Clerks 184,485 Clergymen . . . 37,529 Coach-makerB . . . 19,180 Coopers . . . • 43,624 340 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Seamstresses .... 90,198 Servants 559,908 Shoemakers .... 164,608 Students 49,993 Stonecutters .... 19,825 Tailors and Tailoresses . 101,868 Tanners 10,491 Teachers 110,469 Teamsters 34,824 Tinsmiths 17,412 Tobacconists .... 21,413 Wheelwrights .... 32,693 Milliners 25,722 Miners 147,750 Overseers 37,883 Peddlers 16,594 Painters and Varnishers . 51,695 Plasterers 13,116 Printers 23,106 Public Officers . . . 24,693 Physicians & Surgeons . 55,055 Railroad Men .... 36,567 Saddlers 12,756 Sawyers 15,000 It thus appears that more than one-half of the whole are employed In agricultural pursuits, while nearly all are engaged In some useful business. Only 12,236 bar-keepers and 21,413 tobacconists, included in the above tables, are engaged In labor that is harmful to society. This small num ber, compared with the grand array of productive industry and professional honor, affords the highest encouragement to the future of our country. If it follows that the time . given to the cultivation of mind and the fine arts must be less, and the standard of intelligence, on the whole, propor tionally lower, it maybe justly claimed that practical knowl edge Is more general, and society more healthy. The attempts at aristocratic distinctions in the Southern portion of the United States, and the release of large num bers froni the pursuits of Industry, have not proved favorable to the cultivation of sound learning ; whUe the popular sen timent rendering the labor of the hands dishonorable has produced results suflBcIently disastrous to serve as a warning against all endeavors to estabUsh here a form of society so entirely anti-American. A much graver question relates to the moral character of our population. Of course, the various nationalities brought together here must include every variety of opinions, habits, and condition. The grades of civUization from many por tions of Europe extend downward even below the semi- barbarous state. Crimes of the grosser kind must become DEVELOPMENT OF POPULATION. 341 correspondingly frequent. Lust and revenge are rank, and possibly ferocious in many instances. Offences against per son and property will render both insecure in proportion as these barbarous elements prevail. Crowded cities, afford ing most victims and most convenient concealment, will include large and dangerous numbers of thieves and mur derers; and the false ideas of liberty which pervade the lower forms of society in Europe will encourage the emi gration of multitudes of their vilest men and women. Now, if it be a vice, it is one not easily remedied, apparently, — that these human beings, who are yet hardly human, may suddenly become Araerican citizens ; and, though without a single qualification for the high and sacred responsibilities of freemen, they are as potential at the ballotrbox as an equal number of our most intelligent and Christian citizens. The religious creeds and institutions of large numbers who come to us claim the first and highest obedience for a foreign ecclesiastical prince, and make loyalty a mere matter of temporary convenience, liable to be disturbed and over thrown by causes wholly concealed from the ordinary observation of the American people. Candor also compels the acknowledgment, that no small number of vicious people in this country are born here, and that the antagonisms to virtue are, to a shameful extent, of native origin and growth ; while the highest virtues, both of Church and State, are alike of foreign and of domestic origin ; the whole resulting in the stern fact, that, in our mixed population, the extremes of virtue and vice confront each other, and all the grades of human character that can be found in any civUized country are here strongly marked and vigorously developed. To complete this brief analysis of American population, it is imperative to bring prominently forward the fact, that a high sense of reUgious responsibility brought the founders of our free institutions here. As the rights of conscience were extensively denied in the Old Worid, and fully con- 342 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ceded in the New, yearnings for the privUege of free worship brought multitudes to the wUds of America who would have been otherwise more comfortable in the land of their birth. Providence thus secured numerous accessions to the Chris tian population of the Eepublic ; and, from the first, moral and reUgious influences largely predominated in the several colonies. The fuU development of this organic force wUl be noticed In another chapter. Here the claim, manifestly true, is, that the broad liberty which the earlier citizens of the Eepublic brought with them, and passed through the death- struggles of the Eevolution to establish, was vitally Christian ; and that only the growing power of this controlling eleraent can explain the high moral status of American citizens, on the whole. THE AMERICAN RACE. By the large comprehensions and mysterious selections of living materials for the formation of this new nation. Provi dence has clearly indicated a purpose to produce a popula tion diflfering from any before known. In other countries, peoples utterly strange to each other, and diverse in origin, language, and religion, are brought into juxtaposition: but, from the nature of aristocratic governments, they are only subjects; they never do, never can, become an organic unit In the United States, it Is quite otherwise. Here men must cease to be Anglo-Saxon, Teutonic, Sclavonic, or Celt, and, by the very force of our free Institutions, become .Americans, — simply and only Americans, — at once sover eign and subject. Hence In a period longer or shorter, according to circumstances which are neither fundamental nor permanent, republican ideas take possession of incoming peoples, gradually, but at length entirely, mastering and dis placing all predilections in favor of despotic or even mUd monarchical institutions; and the most profound religious prejudices slowly, and almost Imperceptibly, yield to the grand Idea of free toleration, and the paramount rights of DEVELOPMENT OP POPULATION. 343 conscience ; so that Eomish bigotry Is modified to an extent alarming to the hierarchy, sworn to implicit obedience to the sovereign pontiff! In opinions, religious and political, the people will differ ; but. In the sense and rights of per sonal responsibUity, they tend rapidly to unity. Immense as is the influx of population, we afifirm the deliberate con viction, that the process of homogeneous Americanization follows it so closely as to avert the most Imminent perUs to our free Institutions, and furnish strong ground for the belief that God himself controls the mixing-up of nations here, for the grand purpose of making one, Immensely stronger and nobler than either of them could possibly be. Conventional arrangements of foreign origin which relate to exclusive education, religion, and government, are very tenacious, and not unfrequently rise to menacing propor tions, as antagonists to the system of free schools, free churches, and a free Eepublic ; but whUe the history of the contest furnishes ample reasons for eternal vigilance, and firm, manly independence, it does In no way Indicate the ultimate triumph of European despotism on this continent, or the fundamental perversion of our great providential scheme of self-government. Free schools, tending to universal education, bear with them their own vindication, make their own proselytes, and produce the intelligence which must render them superior to the assaults of ignorance and bigotry ; and even coerced sectarian education with an anti-republican animus, by the mere force of contiguous free thinking and free acting, and the permeating vital forces of a free government, imper ceptibly assimUates the common faith of Christian liberty. It, moreover, appertains to unrestricted truth to show its superiority to prescriptive error. An open field and a fair fight Is aU It demands, all it will allow. The wrong has no chance of ultimate triumph in such a contest. God wiU not permit it The inherent weakness of bigotry and Injustice becomes evident in such a country as this. When they rise 344 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. up and bluster and threaten, before alarmists have ceased to utter their warnings of Impending destruction to freedom and the right, they have gone down under the heavy blows which men, women, and chUdren are so free to wield against them here. The press, untrammelled, arrays Itself on one side and the other in this Titanic war ; but how evidently and rapidly, if It be vile, does its vileness destroy its power to rule against the educated. Christianized freedom of the land ! and how soon must it tell the tale of Its disgrace by extinction, or falling back upon the patronage of the openly vicious ! On the other hand, when was it ever known that a free, truth ful, fearless. Christianized press finally lost caste in America by standing up boldly for private and public virtue, and advocating the true republican rights of man ? It may have passed through fiery trials, and fallen, for a time, under the ban of Infidel vice and party corruption ; but short indeed must be the life that has not been long enough to see schools of infidelity, and parties becoraing corrupt from pros perity or vile leadership, disappear before the triumphant power of an enlightened public opinion, led on by a free press and an unfettered church. Thus forming, moulding, assimilating all to Itself, the Great Eepublic of America goes on with the process of constructing a race of its own, strangely and even miraculously adjusted to its providen tial purposes, and the accomplishment of Its grand mission among the governments of the earth. If, now, it be asked how has all this become possible, and what Is the vitalizing force which is thus transforming peo ples of various and antagonistic governments into one, we aflSrm, without hesitancy, It Is the Sovereign of nations, God Omnipotent, who " maketh the wrath of man to praise him," unfolding the plans of the Christian dispensation, purging the people by the fires of law and of justice; It Is the gospel, the potent, at length the neariy omnl-potent, spread of truth from heaven ; a free, open Bible ; the bap- DEVELOPMENT OF POPULATION. 345 tisms of light and love, which are fast converting our nine teenth century into one grand Pentecost It Is the voice of resurrection, saying, " Arise, shine ; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." The unity of the American race Includes also the mingling of blood, which, subject to the control of true Instincts and sound conventional propriety, obeys the physiological laws of animal regeneration and strength, and must gradually bring out proportions and powers fitted for great achieve ments, — a physique which shall rise to possibUities, only indicated by the endurance and stalwart might of our armies in all the wars through which we have yet passed. Our varied climates, invigorating air, and Inevitable ac tivity, have contributed to this result. In subduing the for ests, cultivating our vast prairies, and developing the mechan ical industry and commerce of the country, our people have added much to the size of bone and strength of muscle, the power of nerve and energy of will, which tend to give the true American unparalleled powers of endurance and triumph in any field of conflict which God may require him to enter. No doubt, disobedience to the laws of health, and deep- seated iramoralities, have often antagonized and defeated this great providential plan of forming a mighty race of men for achievements above the reach of dwarfed and enfeebled humanity. It is the mission of true Christian education to counteract these depraved tendencies; the grand purpose of a true inward and outward regeneration, and a progres sive scientific system of moral and physical health, to rescue our new and vigorous race from these destructive agencies, and test the rights of purified, elevated humanity to long life and great deeds in a sphere as much above that which we have yet reached, as our present is above that of the wasting savages of these continental forests. Then the magnificent scenery of our mountains and rivers and lakes, the vastness of our country, and the ever-Increas- 346 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ing demands upon our utmost powers, will come in to help God and conscience make us great. Freedom relieved from the taint of slavery, and the sove reign rights of freeraen exercised by Americans, without the restrictions of caste, will give dignity and power to the true American ; while the far-famed Ingenuity, Industry, ver satility, and energy of the Eepublic will render her exhaustr less resources available. With these advantages, under the prestige of a mighty past, and with these healthy, vitalizing forces working against our vices, thirty-four ralUions six hundred and five thousand eight hundred and eighty-two American people are now, under the control of Providence, moving onward in the front ranks of raodern Christian civilization. CHAPTEE IL DEVELOPMENT OF LIBERTY. " Freedom of a low and limited order is mere caprice. Freedom does not exist as original and natural. Rather must it be first sought out and won, .and that by an in calculable medial discipline of the intellectual and moral powers. Freedom is spirit in its completeness. Society and the State are the very conditions in which freedom is realized. Reason is the comprehension of the divine work. The strength of a nation lies inthe reason incorporated in it. The conception of God constitutes the general basis of a people's character." — Hegel. The earliest struggles of liberty are Indications of torture under the wrongs of oppression. Men In pain seek relief; and^ the right to relief from the miseries inflicted by des potism is an instinct which moves the sufferer to act in self-defence, without waiting for a logical vindication : hence the violence which struggles with power, without regard to the question whether there is any hope or possibility of relief, but which must sometimes be followed by a conviction of Impotence, and a feeling of sullen despair, and finally of unavoidable submission. But God does not permit this submission to pass Into sat isfaction. He rouses up the soul to a consciousness of ita individuality, of its own dignity, of Its felt claims to freedom. He stirs up the reason; and a higher sense of justice takes position, and begins to question the rights of despotic rulers, and to demand release from exactions which are unjust and oppressive. When these demands are resisted and denied, then comes the question of power. If the reason Is low, and its arguments are unreliable, the attempts at self-vindi cation are likely to be premature and reckless. In the higher exercise of reason, two questions are considered, — 347 348 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. can the wrong be conquered by force ? and are not moral means, without force, due under the circumstances, and hopeful of success ? The founders of the Great Eepublic had passed through all these stages, — first in England, then in America. They had shown the higher manifestations of reason In the per sistent struggles of logic before resistance in battle. They had passed through the conflicts of the Eevolution, and found theraselves free, in the sense of release from foreign domi nation. They had, moreover, settled the form of govern ment, determined that it should not be monarchical, but republican; that it should not be irresponsible, but consti tutional ; that It should be democratic, but representative ; that the paramount allegiance of the citizen should be to the General Government, and all State authority should adjust Itself to the good of the nation. This was the evi dent purpose ; and it was undeniably In the scope and in tention of the Constitution which superseded the old Arti cles of Confederation. But it was not universally acknowl edged. It was contested by the States-right party, through a period of nearly a hundred years, with great ability and zeal ; and the opposition to a true nationality finally led to treason and blood. The question was left to the arbitrament ofthe sword; and the vindication of national over State sovereignty foUowed one of the most gigantic and cruel wars of modern times. This, however, was the growth of liberty. The freedom of the individual seemed, at first, aU that could be expected, and almost too much to ask. Deliverance from persecution on account of religious belief and practice, from unjust and tyrannical executions, seemed the greatest blessing that could be conferred. When, however, the struggle rose to a com plete emancipation from foreign power, and American inde pendence had been proclaimed, vindicated, and acknowl edged, large ideas of personal rights were the natural result ; and the growth of national feeling and intelligence was at DEVELOPMENT OP LIBERTY. 349 first slow, revealing only gradually its organic existence and power. When, however, it rose distinctly to sight, it was found to be the true American idea ; and the feeling that the national character and rights of the people must outgrow, or conquer by force, aU local and State assumptions inconsistent with it, at length became strong and irresistible. PERSONAL LIBERTY. It was not easy to ascertain precisely what the colonists had gained. Liberty was the word instinctively used to express it ; but the people, generally, were far from a clear apprehension of the meaning of the term. The great statesmen of the Eevolution excluded from the idea many of the radical and irresponsible notions of the masses, but differed widely as to what it did actually include Indeed, broad and comprehensive views of liberty cannot be claimed for the times in which our republican institutions had their birth. From the very necessities of historical civilization, these must be an outgrowth frora the radical principles, obtaining position amid the life-and-death struggles of a great revolution. Eeflectlon is subsequent to passion or sentiment ; and, when it commences its examinations, it condemns and excludes much which feeling asserts and demands. Con sciousness finds free volitions within. The mind, from the mere love of power, exercises itself in willing ; takes excur sions in various directions to show to itself that it can deter mine one way and another, — that it can resolve exact opposites. It receives and repels influences from without; weighs motives, and first accepts, then rejects them ; even choosing to be governed, apparently, for the mere Independ ence of the thing, by those which are felt and acknowledged to be by far the less in strength and claims. This is primary liberty, the starting-point of all free action and free institutions; and, in the perverseness of human 350 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. nature, it is very likely to assert boldly, and even defiantly, the right to do wrong. To realize the full force of the im portant distinction between the ability to do wrong and the liberty to do wrong requires thought, moral culture, and, finally, regeneration. It is the province of discipline, under divine inspiration and guidance, to bring out the conscience of liberty. Then, when the soul proposes to itself free action, finds itself acting freely, it begins to ask, " Is this right ? " Then it begins to realize that there are limitations to freedom ; In other words, that there are great laws of free action grounded in our relations to other men and to God. JUSTICE AND LOYALTY IN LIBERTY. Justice is an element so broad and far-reaching, that it is not easily nor soon understood. It defines itself In laws for self protection ; and this involves the protection and rights of others, and finally rises to the dignity of constitutional law, assuming to have found the fundamental and perma nent right as between man and man. But both the idea and the expression of justice must, of necessity, be imperfect and inadequate in the earlier attempts to define constitutional rights. Constitutions, therefore, as we have before said, are not made, but grow ; and pure justice, as it is the rarest and most precious ele ment of fundamental government, so it Is the least likely and the latest to have full sway In the systems of fallen and depraved humanity. This must be the true explanation of the unquestionable but humUiating fact, that the struggles of a hundred years in this republic of liberty have been over the question. How much, or rather how little, justice can we dispense to man as man, and establish a govern ment of freedom for ourselves ? Slowly, therefore, has true liberty developed itself even here; sometimes seeraing to diminish rather than enlarge, to retrograde rather than advance. But we can now see, that, upon the whole the DEVELOPMENT OF LIBERTY. 351 progress has been powerful and really grand. Now it is known and almost universally felt among the governing minds of America, that justice, fair, full, impartial justice, is indispensable to liberty. Is the very soul of liberty. Almost as slowly has the great fact come to the surface, that true loyalty is a fundamental element of liberty ; that we must be governed to be free. WUd, ultra democracy denies this; licentious passion denies it: but calni reason affirms It, history asserts it, revelation demands It A republican government must be outwardly and formally a government by majorities; and, when the free elections of the people have placed a man In office, he Is and must be the officer until he is superseded according to due forms of law. If it Is alleged that he is unjust, and that he has transcended or made a vicious and oppressive use of his power, the appeal Is not to private judgment, not to public passion, but to the umpire provided by the Constitution. Obedience, one of the hardest things for a republican to learn, is one of the first and most imperative obligations of freemen in a free government Eejected, superseded by individual obstinacy or confederate passion, lawless anarchy and headlong rebellion must be the result. We say that a republic must be ostensibly governed by majorities; but In reality it is far otherwise. Sad experience shows us that by low intrigue a small number of political demagogues may dictate candidates and control elections ; and that, were there no counteracting forces, the govern ment would be Irredeemably lost amid contending factions, or the people in their miUions subjected to the merciless tyranny of a contemptible minority or a military despotism. EDUCATION AND RELIGION IS LIBERTY. Intelligence, sound and widely diffused, is not a mere con tingency or accidental fact of free institutions such as ours : it is a part of them. Liberty, in its highest, truest sense, 352 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. cannot be known apart from it There is not only the primary fact that the people are the government, that they must therefore be sufficiently educated to understand the simple but mutual principles of the government, and the true sphere and responsibilities of the elective franchise, but they must be qualified to grapple with and triumph over the astute scheming of corrupt leaders ; at least they must reveal ability to hurl these men occasionally from power, so as to compel them, by their fears, to a degree of caution which will secure the liberties of the people. But mere secular learning leaves selfishness undisturbed, or rather stimulates Its growth, and multiplies its expedients for mischief The tendency of mental Increase in corrup tion Is to make men rivals In intrigue, not antagonists to political vice : hence the multiplication of demagogues by schools of " philosophy, falsely so called," has come to be a well-known and generally-recognized fact. There must, therefore, be a special eleraent in the intel ligence of freeraen; a distinct controlling animus which will raake it broad and true and safe ; a spirit of patriotism which subordinates and finally destroys the natural selfish ness ; which raises patriotism to the dignity of phUanthropy, and enthrones justice over the passions and the wiU, In the heart. In the family, and In the nation. This is loyalty to God, a principle and a feeling given In the new birth, which, " sufficiently produced," exalts the human to the sphere of the divine, and resolves the government of liberty into the will of God. In our present mixed state as to Individual and public regeneration, only a slight approximation to this sublirae standard Is possible Happy for us that enough of this " good and perfect gift from the Father of Ughts," this " wis dora that Is from above, which is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy," has been given to man to show Its existence, reveal its power, and secure DEVELOPMENT OF LIBERTY. 353 our liberties; whUe the "earthly, sensual, and devilish" are sufficiently evident to inspire our hatred and dread, and move the people to more general and earnest heart-yearn ings after the spirit of Christ for the soul of the nation. How we long for the day when we can claim for the Ameri can Eepublic, without mortifying reservations, a well-defined place within the circle of the divine beatitudes ! — " Happy IS that people that is in such a case; yea, happy is that people whose God is the Lord." Here we reach a position from which we can announce the fact, that government by a repubUc may be perfectly safe in the hands of the majority, or under the control of the whole people, swayed by the power of a small minority. It is useless for the American people longer to shut their eyes to the inevitable fact, that governing mind is a crea tion of God ; that the power and the will to govern are inborn where there is a providential designation to the functions and responsibUities of office. Setting aside, as we have done, the vain pretenders whose dishonest usur pations of power are an offence to God and man, we have risen to a contemplation of humanity re-formed for the high prerogative of representing God in the government of men ; and even now we see that the general intelligence is too broad and clear-sighted to be long misled or misgoverned, and too largely imbued with common sense to refuse to be represented or led by men of superior wisdom and goodness. EXTENT AND SPHERE OF LIBERTY. In consequence of the natural blindness of souls. It has come to be a very urgent question. How far shall liberty extend ? — who shall be free ? It is mortifying that this could ever be a question in the Great Eepublic. It must be acknowledged that we did for a long time ask, " May a man of heterodox faith be free?" But we outgrew our Prelatical bigotry in Virginia and our Puritanic bigotry In 45 354 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. New England, and found, to our abundant relief, that It was perfectly safe to hand over Anabaptists and State Church men, Papists, Jews, and Quakers, to the mercy of God and free Inquiry. We did ask, "May the tawny Indian and the swarthy African be free? Must not liberty be restricted to the white race, and denied to darker color ? " Heaven pity us ! How long we struggled to find out what tinge of color should mark the impassable boundary between liberty and bondage ! and how grandly, at length, have we risen to know that a man Is to be free because he is a man ! Let us boast as lit tle as possible over the fact that a part of us have reached this great plain truth only in the last period of the nine teenth century of the Christian era. But the reasons are now sufficiently evident why liberty, even In our favored country, has been so slow of growth. Including, as It does, our own reflective consciousness of personal freedom, a rectified conscience, a clear sense of justice, a devoted loyalty, a broad intelligence, a sincere piety for the people generally, and the public and govern mental recognition of the universal manhood of man, we may not expect the spontaneous growth of liberty, nor its rapid development The more reason have we, therefore, to be profoundly grateful for the certain historical evidence of Its sure and steady advance to strength and dominant power on this continent. CHAPTEE III. DEVELOPMENT OP GOVERNMENT. " Hitherto the world has assumed some inherent antagonism between freedom and centralization. A true democracy has as last established itself, that not only develops an intenser centralization than despotism ever boasted, but that develops and also vin dicates it by a completer freedom than ever before could be permitted." — Parteidoe. It cannot be said that society in America was ever resolved into its original elements. The first successful emigrants came here with no feeling of reckless anarchy, no idea of release from the restraints of law. If there were some vicious and irresponsible men among them, who fled from needed control or merited punishment at home, they were never strong enough to overwhelm the stern representatives of order placed by Providence at the head of affairs. Gov ernment in some form was clearly recognized in the organi zations of companies. In grants and charters at home ; and the power of control, however falsely conceived or unwisely located, was, from the first, evident and vigorous. This was so far civilization, in distinction from barbarism. A POPULAR GOVERNMENT. Government by the people came to this land in " The May flower," and began at once a career of development which has never been successfully resisted. The Idea of govern ment by an oligarchy came to the South earUer. It asserted hereditary rights, and gathered to itself the power of king and councU, nobles and proprietaries, the church and the sword. It antagonized and suppressed the will of the peo- 3S5 356 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. pie ; and the people, in their turn, stood up against it calmly, but firraly, and wrenched from it one concession after anoth er, until, by the struggles of a hundred and fifty years, they overthrew and utterly destroyed it In the mean time, the people were the government in fact, and of right. It is interesting to observe that the preten sions of oligarchy In Araerica have always been subject to the will of the people, sometlraes shrinking frora sight to avoid a storra and the wreck of property interests, and some times, with an 111 grace, yielding to the claims of constitutional law. When, however, it exerted ostensible power, it was obliged first to seduce the people from their allegiance to God and the right, prostitute them to Its own level of deraorahzation and injustice, and thus make them the fit instruments of usurpation and oppression. But the inchoate United States were never without gov ernraent by the people. While their legal relations to the crown of Great Britain were loyally acknowledged, they arranged promptly and everywhere to supply the defects of the home government by the quiet organization of their own power. It may be naturally supposed that those earlier forms of democratic government were very crude and imperfect ; but whoever studies them carefully will perceive that they contained nearly all the great principles of justice and the most profound elements of constitutional law. The parent government of the Great Eepublic was a pure democracy, — a government by all the people. They were few In number, and their acts of legislation were the voice of the whole. Their great concern was liberty. Oppression had taught them so thoroughly, and the steady light of Christianity revealed to thera so clearly, the way to obtain it, that they were resolved from the first that they would keep in their own hands whatever authority they could wrest frora the grasp of the king. It raay be regarded as strange that they did not bring with them a love of monar chy so strong that it would be their first and only thought, DEVELOPMENT OF GOVERNMENT. 357 as the power of the king of England so far declined as to suggest the possibUity, and at length the necessity, of Amer ican independence. But it was exactly and sternly other wise. The entire period of preparation was, as we have seen, pervaded by the Idea of a democracy. The public acts of the people aU indicated the conviction that they were their own rulers; that no man was ever born to be king over them. So clear and general and lasting was this im pression, that we must refer it to the providence of God. It avaUed nothing with the statesmen of these early times to suggest that all attempts at republican government had been utter faUures ; that the people were too ignorant and selfish to establish a firm and enlightened government Something within them said, " We are free, and no man or number of men shall wrest our liberties from us : others could not, but we can govern ourselves. Paganism could form no bond of union strong enough to hold the republics of Greece and Eome together ; but Christianity can do for us what no other system of religion ever did, ever could do, for any people. God will help us, and we can be free." They had heard a solemn voice pronounce the potent word, '^ Ephrata!" and their eyes were open. They could see that a new dispensation of government was dawning upon the race ; that they were the vanguard of liberty in a new world : and with the vision came a feeling of power that was too mighty for the despotism of the old and dying past This was God, slowly bringing to the inhabitants of earth the knowledge of the fact that he Is the Sovereign of na tions ; that the regeneration originates a- new and all-per vading sense of justice; and this alone realized the idea and the fact of equality among men, and complete subordi nation to the wiU of God. Here it was to be demonstrated that " He whose right it is to reign would reign untU he had put aU enemies under his feet" The doctrine of liberty and of equal rights is wrapped up in this announcement ; is utterly and forever inseparable from it 358 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. But this, with every other great truth, was mUitant in America. It must fight for its place among the philosophies and politics of its times ; and so it did through the genera tions, achieving its progressive and final triumphs amid the sweat and grime, the tears and blood, of battling ages. But its triumph is at length complete. The people, the whole people, are the acknowledged rulers of the Great Eepublic. A REPRESENTATIVE GOVERNMENT. It soon became, of course, impossible for the people to assemble en masse for purposes of legislation and adminis trative law ; and they were sufficiently sensible to adopt a systera of representation. The great legal maxim, " What a man does by another he does himself," was well under stood: and hence the great "town-meetings," which were available for local purposes, became convenient for the earliest use of the elective franchise ; and the orderly use of the ballot chose men to whora matters of general interest to neighborhoods could be submitted. These contiguous colonies had interests In common ; and they could not meet as a whole for the settlement of colonial policy, but they could meet by their representatives. Hence conventions and commissions of various kinds began to struggle with this immense problem of unity, and com menced the search, through mists and darkness profound, for those subtle principles and spheres of prerogatives which belonged to the whole, and to separate them from duties and powers which were local In their rights and necessities. This was not only convenient on account of numbers, but it was indispensable for the security of wisdom. These grave deliberations upon matters vital to the commonwealth could thus be intrusted to men of calmer, broader, riper thought than can be expected from the great whole of any com munity. And such men were here. Men of long and pro- DEVELOPMENT OF GOVERNMENT. 359 found experience in problems of State came with the earilest settlers ; and it is of intense interest now to mark the shrink ing diffidence with which these great men accepted positions of trust actually thrust upon them by the will and necessities of the people. We must, however, concede that the true idea of repre sentation has been slow in reaching its exact definitions and place in this Eepublic. It was a grand propriety that assumed from the first that a Christian man was, all other things being equal, far the most eligible for official rank ; that true rehgion would qualify a man for the better, safer exercise of the elective franchise : but it was a narrow judg ment that disfranchised all others, and a still narrower opinion that excluded from the right of the ballot all Chris tians, however pure, unless they were members of a particular church. Property quahfications were more naturally sug gested, but they were not consistent with republican equali ty of rights ; nor could it ever be made to appear that either wisdom or patriotism dwelt alone in the purse. Still more absurd was the notion, that the right of the vote depended upon the color of the skin ; as though honesty and fidelity, social wants and available intelligence, were of the com plexion rather than of the soul. And the extreme of all absurdity and injustice was the idea that disfranchised slaves should become the basis of free representation, and that the same arbitrary minds which should rob the black man of his inborn rights should confer these rights upon theraselves. From all these ideas, foreign to the doctrine of liberty, it has been necessary to free the people. It may seem strange to us that they could ever obtain rank and influence, in any part of our country, with those who seemed predestined by Providence as the pioneers of representative liberty. But we must again come to the remembrance of the great fact, so frequently recurring In these discussions, that every great principle must have its conflicts ; that this is the trial state for all political virtue : and then the slow development of 360 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the great law of universal right, in a government of repre sentation from the governed, will become intelligible, how ever Impatient may have been our waiting. With our rapidly-Increasing millions of population and wealth, representation has not only become clearer in truth and broader in spirit, but more extended in reach and irre sistible In effect In our municipal and civil bodies, our legis lative, judicial, and executive departments of the states and the nation, representation receives its contents, significance, and responsibilities frora the personal rights and conse quence of thirty-four millions of freemen, and all their vast interests of education, religion, and commerce. Our consuls In every port, and our ministers plenipotentiary abroad, rep resent the moral power of living, growing millions, rapidly accumulating wealth, pure, free Christianity, inviolable unity, unparalleled energy, and an invincible army and navy. In this vital potency, the government of the Great Eepublic is everywhere. It reaches to the ends of the earth, to protect its citizens, and seize Its criminals. Well may its represen tatives feel that their country confers on them high honor, and that, in their humblest mission, they are rendered truly great Well may the American citizen mention his nation anywhere with feelings of honorable satisfaction and sus tained confidence. A NATIONAL GOVERNMENT. A careful study of the growth of American history will re veal the curious but important fact, that Providence rendered necessary all the essential measures for organizing liberty. Left to themselves, the people would have been quite satis fied with government by towns or neighborhoods, or, at most, of single colonies. But God permitted danger to be come one of the first of all the combining forces. They soon found it unsafe to exist in fragmentary communities. The savages were too hostile and powerful. They must combine ; DEVELOPMENT OP GOVERNMENT. 361 and, to do this, they must find those subtle, common interests and rights w^hlch constitute the larger unities. There were, moreover, questions of boundary and juris diction, not between themselves merely, but between the ho mogeneous English colonists and the French from the North and North-west, the Dutch from the Hudson, and the Span iards from the South and South-west Encroachments from all directions demanded defence, — first by diplomacy, and then, as they thought, by the sword. Defence required con federacy ; and, however obstinate and threatening internal rivalry and collision, the pressure of invasion from with out was allowed to Increase until union was an absolute ne cessity, and sectional jealousies were held In abeyance by extreme peril from menacing or actual hostile invasions. The English colonies, therefore, went into the great French and Indian wars a unit, which was the foreshadowing and the actual beginning of the great union which made them a nation. The common danger from the tyranny of the home gov ernment, as we have before seen, tended strongly to the same result If, when one class of dangers subsided, the colonies showed again the internal repulsions that threat ened to break the tender ties which began to bind them together, and destroy the divine plans of organic, vital union, then God aUowed the prompt development of new dangers to absorb colonial interest ; and immediately these tender, fretted ties began to grow again. And thus it has been as generations have come and gone. Our unity has been fostered by our perils from the rivalry and hostility of other nations. But the larger, broader unity, which indicated national power, appeared and disappeared alternately during the pe riod of preparation. In the mean time, narrower local boundaries, on the basis of colonial neighborhood, began to reveal themselves more and more distinctly ; and, at the declaration of independence, thirteen distinct Common- 4S 362 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. wealths, or States, appeared with the forms of local, inde pendent governments well defined, all for reasons of de fence against enemies who interfered in various ways with the providential purposes of a free government Hence arose our grand civil and political system, — State con stitutions. State legislatures, judicial and legislative func tions, with their high incumbents, all occupying their seats of power by the free election, and during the will, of the people. To these original thirteen were added frora time to time the free civil organizations of new States, North and West, South and South-west, until thirty-seven States are now organic and vital, with well-defined republican forras of government. This great result, we have seen, has arisen from the ideas of defence which first brought contiguous colonies into close confederation ; which made the protection of their own firesides and property, their harbors and liberties, first in Importance and in order of time. The convictions which gave paramount consideration to common dangers and des tiny arose subsequently, leaving the organizations which were first for local protection free in the period of develop ment, to devote themselves to the advancement of produc tive industries, education, and commerce. With respect to the Great Eepublic, they simply form coraponent parts of an organic whole, and provide wisely for all the advantages of a division of labor. *One of the evidences of divine control in the organization of this government is in the fact that actual unity existed before it was known to the people. God, who had called these separate colonies to this virgin land, arranged the elements of a grand Union, far In advance of the concep tions of man. Common blood, common sufferings, common dangers, and a common destiny, gradually brought to the nation of colonists the great good sense of harmony, and ultimately the unsuspected fact that they were one nation. God had predetermined this result; and he would super intend all the jealous rivalries, the bitter sectional animosi- DEVELOPMENT OP GOVERNMENT. 363 ties, which were in the way of its realization. He would clear up the vision of the people, and slowly unfold to their view the plan of a great organic national life. On the morning of the 5th of September, 1774, the first Continental Congress assembled In Carpenter's HaU, Philadelphia. There were forty-four and soon fifty-two delegates from all " the old thirteen " except Georgia. Here were many oT the great founders of our free institutions, and they argued with the skill of experienced statesmen. Eichard Henry Lee said, " Our rights are built on a fourfold foundation, — on Nature, on the British Constitution, on char ters, and on immemorial usages. The Navigation Act Is a cap ital violation of them all." " There is no allegiance without protection," said John Jay ; " and emigrants have a right to erect what government they please. I have always with held my assent from the position, that every man discover ing land does it for the State to which he belongs." Eoger Sherman declared, " The colonies are not bound to the king or crown by the act of settlement, but by their consent to it There is no other legislature over them but their respective asserablies. They adopt the common law, not as the common law, but as the highest reason." " But Eut ledge thought that the British Constitution gave them a sufficient foundation; and Duane, that the law of Nature would be a feeble support." * After a severe struggle, it was resolved to vote by colo nies ; and thus the equal rights of the future small States were conceded. A plan of compromise was introduced by Galloway, proposing a union between Great Britain and the colonies, " so Ingeniously defended, that even the clear headed Jay was led to adopt it" This gave it Influence, and It only failed by one vote. This was another of our providential escapes, not the last time that God interfered to save the American people from the danger of compro mises when a great principle was involved. * Greene, pp. 84, 85. 364 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. From this Congress went out a "bill of rights," an address to the king, another to the people of Great Britain, one to the British Provinces, and one to the Province of Quebec. " When your lordships," said Lord Chatham, " look at the papers transmitted to us from America, when you consider their decency, firmness, and wisdom, you cannot but respect the cause, and wish to make it your own." The meinory of Lord Chatham is dear to the heart of every American. " Non-importation, non-exportation, non-con sumption " of British goods were the high-souled resolves which went out from this Congress. " Negotiation, suspen sion of comraerce, and war," said Jay, " are the only three things. War is, by general consent, to be waived at present I ara for negotiation, and suspension of commerce." The most important effect of these grave deliberations had been to reveal and strengthen the union of the colo nies, which more distinctly indicated the existence of a new nation on this continent Josiah Quiney wrote, " Permit me to congratulate my countrymen upon the integrity and wisdom with which the Congress have conducted. Their policy, spirit, and union have confounded their foes and inspired their friends." Before adjournment, provision was made for calling another Congress. The War of the Eevolution commenced, and the representatives of the people were again called together. They met on the 10th of May, 1775, in the State House In Philadelphia, that grand old HaU of Independence, stUl well preserved, and sacred in the feelings of the Ameri can nation. This was the Congress from which came, as we have seen In another part of this work, the Declaration of Independ ence and the old Articles of Confederation, and which fouo-ht the great battles of diplomacy resulting in the acknowledg ment of our national independence. It had been irregularly constituted. There were no general laws of representation, nor election ; there was no constitution. It was necessary. DEVELOPMENT OF GOVERNMENT. 365 that, by whatever bodies elected, they should honestly repre sent their constituents; that they .should have the confidence of the people, so far as that, wiUing or reluctant, confiding or doubting, they would respect them as the rulers of the land. It must be a voluntary or conceded obedience. Force could not be the method of law, nor the means of loyalty. There would be criticism, just and unjust; there would be wUd and fiery spirits to manage. Men from dif ferent regions, with various prejudices, must yield to the government of men, most of whom they had never known. They must surrender many of their most cherished opinions, and go to slaughter and death at the command of this body, cautiously assuming legislative, executive, and judicial responsibilities forced upon them by invisible power. How was all this to be done ? This was God's question, and clearly did he answer it He held the brain of the nation steady during all these perilous days and years, and brought order out of chaos, revealing his governing hand in the grad ual formation and progressive development of an organic nation. It will, however, be seen that the exigencies of war had been the means of this political organization and unity. For mere defence and internal growth, civil governments had been instituted in the different colonies, founding thir teen States. But what was at first only resistance to force for self-preservation had now risen to the dignity of a war for national existence and rights. God had so far made the wrath of man to praise him as to compel the declaration of independence, as the result of long-continued acts of British oppression; and at length, by murderous injustice and cruel war, he would allow the continuance of oppression under the same sovereign control, until the people had risen, through discipline and blood, to the power of self-govern ment; and the remainder of wrath he would restrain. The return of peace removed the outside pressure which had forced the people together. Individual Independent 366 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Interests and sectional jealousies, as we have seen, rose up in anger to assert their rights ; and God stUl had in charge the problem of consolidating and developing a political government suited to a great and free nation, — a problem which rose immediately and distinctly above the reach of human wisdom and power. A RESPONSIBLE GOVERNMENT. The growth of ideas In the Eepublic, from the first inau guration of Washington, is most remarkable; and, In this country. Ideas are power. The exigencies of the nation found the governraent expansive and adjustable to a re markable degree. Free discussion in the preliminary assem blies, the choice of men under Providence, notwithstanding the Intrigues of demagogues and the perils of great political crises and vigorous forensic conflicts, with a certain indispen sable amount of broad statesmanship, gradually perfected our system. The powers and duties of the Executive were care fuUy defined by law, so that even the administration of a bad President cannot destroy our liberties. The cabinet grew up with the iraraense Increase of public business, and surrounded the President with Ministers of State, of War, and of Finance, with officers In charge of the Post Office and the business of the Interior. These, with the official expounder of the public law, became the advisers of the Executive, the supporters of his legitimate power, and the administrators of immense departments of public business. Their associate councU might be marred by the perverseness of an Incumbent ; but under the vIgUant eye of the Senate and House of Eepresentatives, and the more jealous watch-- fulness of the people, long progress In any disastrous policy would be highly improbable, and ultimate ruin morally Irapossible. On the whole, the guaranties of the people are largely increased by these combinations, hardly anticipated or discoverable by the reason of our wisest men, and there fore the more evidently the work of God. DEVELOBMENT OF GOVERNMENT. 367 It cannot be claimed that executive power is yet per fectly defined, nor its necessary liraits all clearly known ; but a President of the United States has only to violate the spirit of the Constitution, or Intimate a disposition to tran scend his legitimate prerogatives, to bring out with almost miraculous promptness and irresistible energy the remedies lying within the Constitution and the Intelligent patriotism of the nation. The judiciary of the Eepublic arose partly out of the experience of the past and the records of history, but more out of the emergencies and legal necessities of a growing people. Very recent modifications show that its forms are deemed susceptible of improvement ; but its vital functions are unimpaired. The extreme democratic tendencies of States, making judges elective directly by the people, and only for a term of years, is yet an experiment, and may be reversed. This measure has not been adopted by the General Government ; and there is a feeling quite general among the people, that the judges of law ought to be lifted above the reach of party power and political campaigns. All this, with every other contingency, can be easUy brought to obey the commands of experience and the will of the nation. Collisions between the different departments of the gov ernment are known to be possible. Thus far, however, they have been very rare, and limited to opinions and asserted rights, without the perpetration of treason. Calmly and steadily the Government goes on, however great the stram upon the Constitution, and however imminent the perils from perverse judgment or sectional strife. The law-making power of the people represented in Con gress may overstep the limits of well-defined powers, only, however, to be promptly checked by the Supreme Court The Executive and Congress may reveal grave differences In principle and policy; but both are responsible to the judiciary, and all, finally, to the people. So far. In the midst 368 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of the severest tests ever endured by any government, the Eepublic has shown itself capable of resisting its enemies from without, counteracting its dangerous tendencies from within, and coming out of every struggle with its principles better defined, and Its effective power largely enhanced. There is, therefore, nothing in our history to indicate the probability of our overthrow, or the loss of our liberties, by the abuse of power. In the mean time, the period of development, so far as it has advanced, has witnessed the elimination of many of our political vices, especially those which tended to sectionalize our people and intensify personal hostility ; and the founda tions now appear of a broader, firmer unity than has ever before seemed possible. Our civil and political institutions are more perfectly assimilated ; our mutual responslbihties are better defined ; and from our great extremes. North and South, East and West, we are drawn more compactly together than at any former period of our history. Our Increasing millions are becoming more homogeneous in spirit ; and the feeling of mutual dependence is stronger as events subject our intelligence and patriotism to severer tests. A STRONG GOVERNMENT. History not unfrequently reverses our judgments. The most natural suggestion of a free democracy was the largest possible liberty for the individual and for the local State : in other words, the concessions to the General Govern ment, it was determined, should be as few, and the reservar tions as many, as possible. It is not, therefore, matter of surprise, that at first the conceded prerogatives of the nation should be utterly inadequate, and that the questions of power which would inevitably arise would originate strong and even angry discussions. The old controversy between Federals and Democrats, and the protracted strug gle between State and National rights, were most natural, DEVELOPMENT OF GOVERNMENT. 369 and really inevitable. Boundaries so obscure as those be tween civil and political jurisdictions must, of necessity, be contested : and, so far as a due degree of moderation was possible In the contest, it was not to be regretted ; for it must be conceded that distinctions are so difficult, and sacri fices of private and local rights for the national good are so exacting upon human selfishness, and, moreover, that the danger of anarchy on the one hand, and despotism on the other, is so great, that long-continued, searching discussions, the severest analysis, such as can result from the collisions of stern intellects only, can bring out the exact truth which will stand the test of history, and render local and general government by the whole people practicable and harmo-. nious. All this, we must freely acknowledge, was too criti cal and perilous for the conduct of human wisdom ; and yet the higher gratitude Is inspired for the superhuman con trol which has prevented our ruin, and gradually revealed and established the principles of our unity In harmony with our complete Independence. " And as. In every State, each town, while performing some of the functions of govern ment for itself, and possessing all the machinery which the performance of them required, looked to the State govern ment for the performance of other functions, and cheerfully submitted to the curtailment of municipal authority, and the partial subordination which such relations towards the State required ; so was it only by the sacrifice of certain rights that the States could build up a central power strong enough to perform for them those indispensable acts of general gov ernment which they could not perform for themselves." * Just as certainly, therefore, as the plans of God required the estabUshment, on this continent, of a great, free, and in dependent nation, so certainly must personal and State claims, inconsistent with this purpose, yield to the impera tive demands of the General Government But it was inevitable that the asserted prerogatives of the * Greene, p. 135. 47 370 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. subdivisions of our great territory should be bold and demon strative. Falsely assuming that States were primary, and that the authority of the General Govemment was derived from the States, to justify the denial of any new claim of the nation, it was deemed sufficient to show that the States sev erally had never made that concession. In the mean time, the General Government was cautious and paternal, moving forward slowly, and even timidly, when it might have assert ed its rights peremptorily as the paramount law of the land. It was not from the States, but from the people, that the Ee public derived its powers. Not a third of the future States had existence when the people, by the choice of presi dential electors, and members of the House of Eepresen tatives, formally assumed the government under the Consti tution. While the House of Eepresentatives, without which government would, of course, be impossible, came directly ^om the people, the States, as such, were represented by the Senate. But the functions of senators were derived from the people, and they would be compelled to act as coraponent parts of a popular government ; for the people, not as isolat ed members of a State, but as American citizens, as freemen having rights in common with the whole American nation, which these senators would be bound to respect, would reach and control them. Congress would therefore mahe States, not be dependent upon and governed by them; and when. In the last resort, it became necessary to test and forever settle the question of relative prerogatives, the peo ple, as Americans, would rise up, and put down all sectional assumptions as against the nation. It was necessary not only that this security of the Gov ernraent should be In the original inherent and asserted rights of its citizens, regardless of state, county, city, and town boundaries, but gradually the forms of constitutional and statute law must be adjusted to this high necessity, so that disorders might be suppressed, or rebeUion put down, in accordance with the highest dignity and demands of pub- DEVELOPMENT OP GOVERNMENT. 371 lie order. Hence the Constitution expressly declares Con gress shall have power " to declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water; to raise and support armies; to provide and maintain a navy; to make rules for the government and reg ulation of the land and naval forces ; to provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions ; to provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia ; " finally, " to make all laws which shall be necessary -and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any department or office thereof." These are fundamental provisions for a strong govern ment ; but the actual strength of the government will de pend upon the legislation under this constitution, and the administration of the laws it enacts. Now, the history of Congress shows the caution to which we have already re ferred ; and when the fears of the people were roused, and a central despotism began to be dreaded, amendments were adopted which would secure the people their just rights against all usurpation : and Congress joined with the sev eral States, to say, in effect, that no form of religion should be established by law ; the freedom of speech and the press, and the right of petition, should not be abridged ; the peo ple should have a right to bear arms ; the houses of citizens should not be invaded by quartering soldiers upon them in times of peace, nor, in war, contrary to law. Amendments were adopted to guarantee the people against unreasonable search ; to secure the rights of justice through a grand jury, and of trial by a jury of their countrymen ; to forbid that they should be deprived of Ufe, liberty, or property, without due process of law ; and to save them from excessive bail, fines, and cruel and unreasonable punishment. The rights enumerated should "not be construed to deny or dispar age others retained by the people;" and it was said ex- 372 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. pressly, that " the powers not delegated to the United StateiS by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." Let It thus be observed, that with the highest sense of justice, and with the utmost paternal care, the Government of the United States guards the rights of the people. But let It also be observed, that it does this In such a manner as to reserve and strengthen the central, power required to vin dicate those rights, and secure the integrity of the nation in violate. For instance, the right of the people to bear arms still left the Articles Intact conceding to Congress the control of the militia, and making " the President commander-in- chief of the army and navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States when called into actual service of the United States." The reserved rights not to be in fringed were those " retained by the people ; " and, what all fair construction raust allow to be completely destructive of the absurd doctrine of State sovereignty as against the Gen eral Government, the Tenth Article of Amendments speaks of " powers not delegated to the United States by the Consti tution, nor prohibited by it (the Constitution) to the States ; " or, in other words, the powers not necessary for the full and vigorous exercise of the General Government " are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." But the sover eignty was In the Constitution, and the General Government the judge. Fully to sustain the argument of this chapter, to show that this permanent sovereignty of the nation was derived from the people, and not from the States, we have only to refer to the preamble ofthe Constitution, — " We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquUlIty, provide for the comraon defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of Uberty to ourselves and posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." " The people " ordain the Constitution : the Constitution, with its necessary and ample provisions for DEVELOPMENT OF GOVERNMENT. 373 arnendments, is the definition of the powers delegated to the United States by the people, and of the acts which the States are not permitted to do. All other powers " are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." In the light of these amendments, the prohibition of all State acts, and the exercise of all powers which could in any wise interfere with the permanent sovereignty of the nation, becomes very evident. Article I., section 10, reads, " No State shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal ; coin money ; emit bills of credit ; make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payraent of debts ; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligations of contracts ; or grant any title of nobility. " No State shall, without the consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or duties on Imports or exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing Its Inspection- laws ; and the net produce of all duties and imposts laid by any State on imports or exports shall be for the use of the treasury of the United States ; and all such laws shall be subject to the revision and control of the Congress. " No State shall, without consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troops or ships of war In time of peace, enter Into any agreement or compact with another State or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay." How utterly Incompatible all this is with every act of secession, and aU such assumptions of " State rights " as have been relied upon to justify treason, aU who can read or understand must know. One thing more. " The writ of haheas corpus " Is a very sacred privilege ; but the founders of our government fore saw that contingencies might arise in which this privilege would seriously interfere with the administration of justice or the prompt suppression of rebeUion. The Constitution 374 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. therefore provided that "the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when, in cases of rebel lion or Invasion, the public safety may require it" Then, of course, It may and ought to be suspended. Let the provisions for an effective government now be care fully summed up as follows : The people as a nation are an organic unit. They are so, not by the loss of their individu ality or personal rights, but by the maintenance of them. They have made their own government, and are pleased with it They have thrown around it such guards, and so imbued It with their own life, that no man, nor number of men, can by any possibility destroy It, unless by actual force. It is invested, therefore, with the strength of all our growing mil hons, acting under control of common principles and one comraon life. In its fullest expression, this is the will of God as manifested in the mental constitution and fortified by rev elation, — the free responsible action of the human soul. " With Christianity came Individual rights as the necessary consequence of individual responsibilities ; the right of decid ing and acting for self In civil society, as a necessary conse quence of the obligation to answer for self at the bar of God." * How these freemen have considered it proper to use this right, we have seen ; and a grand consolidated Ee public rises up before us as the result. It Is now more distinctly understood than heretofore that our government must be strong as weU as free. Our ex tended domain, and still more extended commercial and dip lomatic relations, suggest it, and the ambition of sectional leaders demonstrates it The government of the United States is strong in the freedom, the affection,s, the union, the moral power, of its people : hence It is, that, when the exi gencies of the nation demand It, immense armies, sustained by inexhaustible resources of wealth, intelligence, and vir tue, can be commanded with unprecedented promptness, and concentrated in unparalleled energy. If the people find * Greene, p. 109. DEVELOPMENT OF GOVERNMENT. 375 obstructions in their way, they remove them. If usurpers attempt to destroy their national unity, they crush them ac cording to due forms of law. When enemies become peni tent and harmless, the sovereign people are magnanimous. This is what we mean by a strong government. When all citizens. In time of danger, are soldiers and patriots by in stinct, and the government is invested with full power to command them at discretion, and the reign of God over the career and destiny of the Eepublic is the most sacred faith of the people, we may well adopt the words at the beginning of this chapter: "A true democracy has at last established itself, that not only develops an intenser centralization than despotism ever boasted, but that develops and also vindicates it by a completer fireedom than could ever before be permitr ted." On the fourth day of July, 1776, the grandest fact In history was the Declaration of American Independence. Less than a hundred years have passed ; and the exclamation, " I am an American citizen," has become the proudest claim and surest guaranty possible to a human being. CHAPTEE IV. DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOUECES. " The more a man is versed in business, the more he finds the hand of Providence everywhere." — Chatham. The field to be surveyed in this chapter is very large. The facts condensed from a great variety of sources are of the greatest importance to the American people, and fundamental to our argument The materials are ample for a volume ; but those which properly belong to this historical discussion may be brought within the compass of a few pages. It is not material from which census of American products we gather Our figures. The decade now passing, and ending with 1870, will furnish many startling facts, showing the growth of the country during the great war of emancipa tion, which will increase the scope of the argument, bringing out the plans and acts of God In the great American system. We have, however, now before us more than we are likely to comprehend or appreciate. PRODUCTS OF THE SOH.. The soU is the first grand source of American wealth. Farming is the most natural and most important occupation of large nurabers of our people. The census of 1860 shows, that, out of 8,217,000, more than 3,000,000 were engaged in this department of industry. The proportion exceeds one-third of all heads of famihes and others laboring for themselves. In the year above named, there were improved 376 DEVELOPMENT OP INTER>iAL RESOURCES. 371 lands, 116,110,720 acres; lands enclosed, but not improved, 244,101,818 acres; outside lands, a large proportion tillable, 1,466,969,862 acres. The farms of the Eepublic in 1850 were estimated at $3,271,575,000; in 1860, $6,645,045,000, — an increase of a hundred and three per cent In ten years. It cannot be claimed that agriculture has reached any thing like perfection In the United States. The farms are so large, so many productions are so nearly spontaneous, and the lands, with even negligent cultivation, produce so abundantly, and withal the price of labor is so high, that the people generall}' lack the stimulus felt In England to make the most of every foot of ground. Enough progress, it is true, has been made in agricultural chemistry, and the use of fertilizers, to show that Araerican lands respond to the various modes of scientific farming as generously as the most highly-cultivated lands of Europe, and to show that the capabilities of the soil are practically without limits. But our productions, notwithstanding our negligence in cultivation, and waste in harvesting, are actually enormous. The foUowing tables show the produce of 1860 : — Wheat, bushels, Indian Com, ,, Oats, ,, Barley, ,, Buckwheat, ,, Pease and Beans, ,, Bye, „ Potatoes, ,, Sweet Potatoes, ,, Clover-seed, ,, Grass-seed, ,, Flax-seed, ,, Wine, gallons, Cane Molasses, ,, Maple ,, „ Sorghum ,, ,, Wool, pounds, 13 173,104,924 838,792,740172,643,185 15,825,898 15,571,818 15,061,995 21,101,380 111,148,867 42,095,026 956,188900,040566,867 1,627,242 15,000,000 1,597,000 6,749,123 60,264,913 878 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Butter, pon nds, 460,000,000 Cheese, , . 103,663,927 Hops, . 10,991,996 Elax, 4,720,145 Tobacco, , . 434,209,461 Eice, , 187,167,032 Ginned Cotton, , 2,104,096,500 Silk Cocoon, , 11,944 Maple-sugar, , 40,120,205 Cane , , , 230,982,000 Honey, , 23,366,357 Beeswax, , 1,322,787 Hay, tons. 19,083,896 Hemp, ,, 74,493 Orchard Produce, value, dollars. 20,000,000 Market ,, ,, ,, 16,159,498 Animals slaughtered, ,, ,, 213,618,692 Home-made Manufa ctures ,, >f 24,546,876 It ought to be stated that the most rapid increase of products from the soil Is In our great North-west. Take a few facts in Illustration of this unparalleled growth. Grain and flour were shipped from Milwaukie, Wis., as follows : — Tear. 1841 1845 18501852 1855 1860 1862 Bushels. 4,000 143,260 820,033 1,772,753 3,758,900 9,995,000 18,712,380 Shipments eastward from Michigan ports, chiefly from Chicago : — Year. Bushels. 1858 27,879,293 1859 25,829,753 I860 43,211,448 1861 69,489,118 1862 78,214,675 1863 74,710,664 DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES. 379 " The production of grain in the North-western States of America is estimated to have increased frora 218,463,583 bushels in 1840 to 642,120,366 bushels in 1860. The eight food-producing States west of the Lakes embrace an area of 262,549,000 acres, of which only 52,000,000 acres were under cultivation In 1860. Having regard to the rapid progress of cultivation, and the immense extent of territory remaining to be tlUed, I think it is not to be questioned that there is ample room and scope for increased production ; in fact, I look upon the exportation of grain from these States as only to be limited by want of facilities for transporta tion." * California, so recently considered valuable only for its extensive gold-fields, now raises large quantities of grain in excess of the wants of her population. " In 1861, the export of wheat from San Francisco amounted to 2,379,617 bushels, valued at $2,550,820; and the export of flour to 186,455 barrels, valued at $1,001,894. In 1863, California is esti mated to have produced 11,664,000 bushels of wheat, and 5,293,000 bushels of barley." In 1866, large numbers on the Atlantic slope received their bread for months from the vast and splendid ranches of California, where an average of forty bushels of wheat to the acre is not at all unusual. In cereals, vegetables, and fruit, the productions of this State are unrivalled, and almost incredible. California is one of the greatest grazing countries in the world. Its fooi>hills and mountains are covered with wild oats, which furnish a very rich food for cattle, horses, and sheep. On the coast, and far back into the Interior, the various grains and grasses cure on the stalk; and the cattle grow fat on them during the long drought of the summer. The cattle-ranches take in thousands of acres each, on the mountains, of such land as would be of no value in the East ; while the vast old Spanish ranches, leagues in extent, * Resources and Prospects of America, by Sir Morton Peto, pp. 56-58. 380 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. cover the valleys, and are occupied by thousands of sheep and cattle, under the care of " herders," who stay with them constantly. In 1863, there were 3,000,000 sheep in Cali fornia, since which the flocks have Increased immensely. The number of horses In this State advanced In ten years from 27,719 to 160,610. Cattle have Increased in propor tion ; and In every class of domestic animals are included some of the best-blooded stock In the world. In the United States, In 1860, we numbered 87,000,483 useful live animals, estimated at $1,089,329,915. Our immense grazlng-fields are therefore easily converted into wealth. In the form of wool, hides, butter, cheese, &c. This resource of the United States is capable of indefinite increase. Our vast surplus of Indian corn is easily converted into ready money by fattening our herds of swine. Exact esti mates here are difficult; but it is approximately true to say, that. In the year of the last census, some 3,000,000 were slaughtered, their estimated value being $35,000,000. To this sum add $15,000,000, the cost of" packing and trans portation, and this one department of trade reaches $50,- 000,000 ; while the value of all the animals slaughtered in the United States In 1860 araounted to $213,000,000. The products of the great Southern staples deserve special mention. Cotton, spinning-jennies, and Whitney's cotton- gin, connect us with the largest industries of the world. In 1820, we produced 430,000 bales of cotton ; in 1850, 2,755,- 257 bales ; In 1860, 4,675,770 bales, or 2,104,096,500 pounds. The cash value of this product, from 1850 to 1855, amounted to $491,477,517. MANUFACTURES AND MACHINES. We are not professedly a manufacturing people. The country Is too large, there are too many departments of productive industry, and labor is too high. Our citizens are, moreover, too much averse to routine and fixed posi- DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOURCES. 381 tions to make- the best use of their mechanical powers. In Europe, restrictions to certain trades amount almost to caste, and in Asia quite. The father's employment becomes that of the son, and so on, generation after generation. The boy sees littie but his father's trade, knows littie else. He begins to learn it by observation as soon as he is capable of Intelligent perception. He grows up with fellow-craftsmen, hears hardly any thing else, and, at a lawful age, sits down to his seven-years' trade as a matter of course. England is In this way turned Into one vast workshop. Hence, also, the great skill in manufacturing costly fabrics acquired in France, Belgium, Germany, and Thibet But it is quite otherwise in Araerica. Here, If the boy does not like the trade of his father (and he is pretty sure not to like it), he immediately looks for something else ; and hereditary skill and experience are very generally lost If he does not take a fancy to the occupation he has chosen, he dashes off, and tries something else. Then there Is a species of personal ambition and pride which Is quite American ; and, though it may lead to good results In some instances. It Is very likely to be Injurious. Every child expects to rise higher than his parents. He knows he has better oppor tunities for education. He wishes a more elevated, or at least a more lucrative, employment He has no idea, therefore, of settiing dowm on the old homestead, and making a life-drudgery of his father's trade. He wIU be off for the West, or to the city, or to the gold-fields of California. He has an Idea that he may be In the Legislature or Congress yet ; that he shaU come back, a governor or president, to visit his parents, and confer honor upon them In their old age. At least, he expects to become a great merchant and a mUlionnaire, a lawyer, minister, doctor, school-teacher, or pohtlcian, and in some way rise to distinction and useful ness, or, at the very worst, get his living by his wits. Now, these changing, experimenting, rushing tendencies produce a few great men, but many more failures. They 382 THE GREAT REPUBLIC give vigor and rapidity of development to the nation, but, it may be feared, at the expense of solid virtue and patient perfection. If a hundred to one of our young men would be content with the avocations of honest industry to which they are suited, there would be much more stability and happiness, and a much stronger development of the mind and heart and wealth of the nation. But, at all events, It may be asked, "How are a large relative number of splendid mechanics and a manufacturing people to be made of our hot-brained American youth?" It may be fairly answered, that this is irapossible. But there will, nevertheless, be a real and considerable success from American genius and tact, and an ample accession of trained artisans from abroad. So far has this providential arrange ment for compensation proceeded, as to make our past highly respectable, and to render all necessary independ ence certain in the future. The manufacture of cotton fabrics in the United States has increased rapidly. New England, in 1860, eraployed 3,959,297 spindles, using 237,844,854 pounds of cotton, producing goods valued at $80,301,535; the Middle States, 861,661 spindles, 75,055,666 pounds, value of goods, $26,272,111 ; In the remaining States, this class of fabrics manufactured amounted to $8,564,280. In the whole country, we employed that year 45,315 males and 73,605 females, making 118,920 operatives ; an increase of 20,964 in ten years. The value of our cotton manufactures for the year was $115,137,926 ; an advance of 76 per cent since 1850. In the manufacture of wooUen and mixed goods, in 1860, we employed a capital of $35,520,527 ; 28,780 males, and 20,120 females; 639,700 spindles, and 16,075 looms, work ing up 80,000,000 pounds of wool, with 16,008,625 of cotton. The value of the raw material was $40,360,300 ; and of the manufactured goods, $68,865,963 ; an increase of fifty-one per cent in ten years. DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOURCES. 383 "The total value of domestic manufactures (Including fisheries and the products of the mines), according to the census of 1850, was $1,109,106,616. The product of the same branches for the year ending June 1, 1860," would reach " an aggregrate value of nineteen hundred millions of dollars ; an increase of more than eighty-six per cent in ten years, exceeding the increase of even the white popu lation by a hundred and twenty-three per cent." Our various manufactories have thus given " employment to about 1,100,000 men and 285,000 women, or 1,385,000 persons ; and direct support to 4,847,500 persons, or nearly one-sixth of the entire population." These facts exalt our manufacturing interests, far above the popular estimate, to the first rank of Importance among the industries of the country. Extensive manufactures carry with them a large amount of machine-making. Our ample steam and water power are made extensively available by our skilful machinists for the production of enormous wealth. " The construction of hydraulic machinery, of stationary and locomotive steam- engines, and all the machinery used in niinps, mills, fur naces, forges, and factories, In the building of roads, bridges, canals, railways, &c., and for all other purposes of the engineer and manufacturer," produced returns from "ma chinists' and millwrights' establishments. In 1850, amounting to $27,998,344; and In 1860, not including the sewing- machine, to $47,118,550." The proud distinction of Inventing the sewing-machine belongs to America. It is an Invention of the greatest prac tical importance " It has opened avenues to profitable and healthful Industry for thousands of industrious females, to whom the labors of the needle had becorae wholly unre munerative, and injurious in their effects." The manufac ture and sale of the machines has become a lucrative busi ness. In 1860, In nine States, 116,330 machines were made, worth $5,605,345. In 1861, we exported machines to the amount of over $61,000. 384 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. The value of clothing made in twelve States and the District of Columbia rose, chiefly by the power of this in valuable machine, from $43,678,802 in 1850 to $64,002,975 in 1860 ; an increase of $20,324,173, or seventy-three per cent. In ten years. The rapid progress of the Americans in the invention of labor-saving machines, largely employed in the various departments of husbandry. Is worthy of special attention. Though the honor of Inventing and bringing first to practical use the threshing-machine belongs fairly to the Scotchmen Michael Menzies and Andrew Melkle, the Idea soon thoroughly seized the practical American mind. In 1833, a strange instruraent. Invented by Obed Hussey of Ohio, it was said, " cradled wheat as fast as eight persons could bind it" Within the brief period which has since elapsed, inventions and Improvements In machinery have wrought a complete revolution in the despatch and economy of farming In America. Fairs and exhibitions have greatly stimulated the spirit of invention ; and " the Great Exhibi tion of 1851 " placed American implements for farming uses at the head of the world. In 1850, the value of our manufactures in this depart ment amounted to $6,842,611. In 1860, the amount rose to $17,802,514; an increase of one hundred and sixty per cent. The value of agricultural implements employed In the United States In 1860 reached $246,118,141. You may add for wagons, carts, and wheelbarrows, $11,796,991 ; mak ing an aggregate of $257,915,132. Cotton-gins, hoes, shovels, spades, and forks, are omitted. PRECIOUS METALS. "On the nineteenth day of January, 1848, ten days before the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo, James W. MarshaU, whUe engaged in digging a race for a sawmiU at Caloma, about DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOURCES. 385 thirty-five miles eastward from Sutter's Fort, found some pieces of yeUow metal, which he and the half-dozen men working with him supposed to be gold." He coUected a large number of specimens, and submitted them to Isaac Humphrey, an experienced miner from Georgia, who saw at a glance the evidence of " rich diggings." He went to the locality of Marshall's discovery, and immediately commenced washing out the precious metal, making an ounce or two a day. Others, of course, promptly joined him, using pans, or " rockers " of their own construction. On the 15th of March, the following announcement was made in the California paper at San Francisco : — "In the newly-made raceway of the sawmill recently erected by Capt. Sutter, on the American Fork, gold has been found in considerable quantities. One person brought thirty dollars to New Helvetia, gathered there In a short time." This vast country now belonged to the United States ; and Americans were beginning to look through it to see what were the prospects for future wealth in this new addition to the Great Eepublic. Of course, the above announcement produced a stir among them ; and, on the 29th of May, the same paper announced its suspension, and said, " The whole country from San Francisco to Los Ange les, and from the seashore to the base of the Sierra Nevada, resounds with the sordid cry of ' Gold, gold, gold ! ' while the field is left half planted, the house half built, and every thing neglected but the manufacture of picks and shovels, and the means of transportation to the spot, where one man obtained a hundred and twenty-eight dollars' worth of the real stuff in one day's washing; and the average for aU concerned is twenty dollars per diem." From this the excitement spread abroad through every part of the United States and in foreign countries ; and 1849 became distinguished as the year of the hegira to the New Eldorado, and the beginning of a new era in tiie wealth of the United States and the basis of commerce. 386 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. The processes adopted for obtaining the precious metal illustrated the American genius. Scientific mining was not known. But various inventions and unparalleled enter prise supplied all defects. The pan, the rocker, the tom, the flume, the shaft, the tunnel, the prospecting, the wander ing and rushing from place to place, the ditches, the dams, the turning of rivers, the quarrying of quartz, the stamps, the blankets, the vats, the races, the quicksilver, the blasting, the hydraulics, and innumerable other methods of gathering the shining dust, all Indicated the passionate vio lence and the unconquerable energy of the American people. Towns sprang up In the gulches and on the foot-hills ; the beds of rivers were explored for miles and miles ; whole re gions were torn up by the blast, the pick, the shovel, and the hose ; hills and small mountains were literally blown or washed to pieces ; and the mining-belt stretched the length of the Pacific cOast, and far up on the Sierras. Europeans and Asiatics mingled in the strife ; and the population of the State Increased with unprecedented rapidity. Mining processes have at length become much more regu lar and economical. New Inventions have superseded not only the rustic implements of 1849 and 1850, but the best heretofore known ; and though many of the metallurgic pro cesses established by science have yet to be introduced for separating the precious metals from their ores, and exhaust ing the localities prematurely abandoned. It must be admitted, that, as a whole, the processes of mining for gold and silver have advanced rapidly under the inventive genius of the American mind. The discovery of silver in Washoe is an event of historic Importance. Gold was found In Gold Cailon, a littie tribu tary of Carson Eiver, In 1849. Miners, however, did not Uke the locality. There was so much silver mixed with the gold as to reduce the price of dust to from ten to twelve dollars per ounce, whereas " that obtained from the western slope of the Sierra usually sold for seventeen or eighteen dollars." DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOURCES. 387 In 1859, a quartz lode was found on what is now known as Goldhill. " Two months later, some miners, in foUowing up a placer-bed in which the gold was mixed with about an equal weight of silver, came on the lode from which the metal had been washed down." This was the famous "Com stock Lode," the discovery of which formed Virginia City and the State of Nevada, and introduced a new era In the mining wealth of the continent " It is now the most pro ductive mineral vein in the world. A strip of land six bundled yards wide, and three miles long, yields $12,000,000 annually." James Walsh, an intelligent quartz-miner from Grass Valley, seems to have been the first to detect the real value of the " dark-gray stone " found here, a ton and a half of which he sent to San Francisco, where it was sold for $3,000 per ton. He and some of his friends bought four- fifths of 1,800 feet for $22,000, or $14 a foot So rapidly did the estimate of this claim rise, that, before the end of the year, its market-value was $1,000 a foot " The silver- panic " in Washoe soon exceeded the former gold-panic in California. Discoveries in Esmeralda, Humboldt, Eeese Eiver, and other localities, followed, and at length the mines which gave new impulse and development to Oregon and Wash ington, and founded the Territories and future States of Idaho and Montana. Let the following estimates, made by the superintendent of the mint at San Francisco, Indicate the results of these various discoveries, and this unparalleled energy. Gold and silver from California, Oregon, Nevada, and Washington Territory : — 1861 $43,391,000 1862 49,370,000 1863 52,500,000 1864 63,450,000 1865 70,000,000 The second report of J. Eoss Brown, just finished, gives as the product of gold, the last year, $70,000,000 ; and of Nevada silver, $19,000,000. 388 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. The estimate for 1866 is as follows: — California . $25,000,000 Montana 18,000,000 Idaho . 17,000,000 Colorado 17,000,000 Nevada 16,000,000 Oregon 8,000,000 Other sources 5,000,000 Total $106,000,000 In the mean time, the capital in business circulation In California must have been in the neighborhood of $30,000,000, and some $10,000,000 are shipped annually to the mines to pay current mining-expenses. In a recent financial crisis in Europe, the power of American wealth from the mines appeared, in the export from San Francisco of $12,000,000 of gold and silver in sixty days. The first eight months of 1866, the shipments of specie from San Francisco amounted to $27,729,010. It is safe to consider our gold-fields and silver-mines practicably inexhaustible. Some idea of "the importance of the gold and silver mines of the Pacific coast on the national welfare " may be obtained from the fact, that " the product of these metals, for a single year," exceeds in amount all the gold and silver in the national treasury, and in all the banks in all the States : — Bullion in the Treasury, Aug. 1, 1865 . Banks at New York, at same date, held Banks at Boston and Philadelphia National Banks in the United States State Banks, outside of those, estimated . Amounting in the aggregate to $61,000,000 5,000,000 600,000 1,600,0001,500,000 $69,700,000 Whereas the products of the mines of the Pacific coast iu 1866 amount to at least $106,000,000. The whole " amount of treasure manifested for exporta tion from San Francisco" from 1849 to 1865, inclusive, was DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOURCES. 389 $740,832,623. To this must be added some $50,000,000 In use in the Pacific States and Territories ; for gold jewelry, sUver plate, and specimens of nuggets and rich ores, say $5,000,000 ; gold-dust buried by miners in distant camps, some $5,000,000 more. Dust, coin, and bars carried away by miners, and not manufactured, must swell this additional amount, in sixteen years, to $200,000,000. In round num bers, therefore, the yield of precious metals from our Pacific fields, in sixteen years, must have risen to the enormous sum of $1,000,000,000. We must now glance at the mining regions east of the Eocky Mountains. These include portions ofthe Territories of New Mexico, Colorado, and Montana; Minnesota, north west of Lake Superior, and upon the eastern slope of the Alleghany range ; the States of Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland ; and recently gold has been found in New Hampshire. The yields from the various auriferous and argentiferous localities in these States and Territories cannot be accurately ascertained. The deposits of gold at the United-States mint and its branches, between 1804 and 1866, from the States traversed by the Appalachian gold-field, are reported as follows : — Virginia .... North Carolina . South Carolina . Georgia .... Alabama .... . $1,570,182.82 9,278,627.671,353,663.98 6,971,681.50 201,734.83 Aggregate . . $19,375,890.80 If we assume, what is doubtless true, that about an equal amount passed into manufactures or foreign comraerce, with out deposit for coinage, the aggregate production would be about $40,000,000, of which fully three-fourths, or $30,000,000, was mined between 1828 and 1848. Nuggets were found in North Carolina from 1799 to 1835, varying from a pound and a half to twenty-eight pounds. 390 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. "The auriferous veins of Colorado are represented to be from six inches to nine feet in width. Gov. Evans clalras, that, In most of the lodes now worked, the quartz rock yields an average of thirty-six dollars per ton, but that a production threefold greater may be expected when the re duction of ores reaches the perfection of a scientific assay." From Montana, the yield was estimated as follows : — 1863 $2,000,000 1864 5,000,000 1865 6,000,000 1866 12,000,000 Amounting to . . . $25,000,000 " The assays of argentiferous galena have exhibited results from $100 to $1,700 per ton." It is hardly necessary to say that the vast fields of wealth in the newer portions of our country remain to be thoroughly explored. It Is carefully estimated that the production of gold and sUver in the worid in 1866 amounted to $210,000,000, of which $80,000,000 were from the United States. By com parison with the foregoing, it will be seen that the figures relating to our country are far below the facts. Copper is an immense source of wealth in the United States. The copper regions of Lake Superior have long been famous the world over. Eecent discoveries on the Pacific coast have brought out enormous accessions to this wealth. Some of these deposits were known before California became a State of the Eepublic. Dr. Trask, however. State geologist from 1851 to 1854, brought forward evidence that valuable copper ore was found in nearly every county. Nothing of Importance was done toward the development of these mines until 1860, when Hiram Hughes discovered the famous Napoleon Mine among the Gopher HUls in Cala veras County. Not understanding the character of his dis covery, he sent " a lot of the ore to San Francisco, where DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOURCES. 391 it was pronounced thirty per cent copper ore, and worth about a hundred and twenty dollars per ton." The copper excitement then commenced ; and it has raged at different times up to the present, fairly equaUing, if not exceeding, the excitement from the discovery of gold and sUver. The most important mining districts from which ores have been exported are CopperopoUs, Table Mountain, Napoleon, Lancha Plana, Campo Seco, and Copper HiU, in Calaveras County, the Newton in Cosumnes, Hope Valley in Ama dor County, the Buchanan in Fresno County, the Osos in San Louis Obespo County, the Soledad in Los Angeles County, the Eockland in Oregon, the Pea-vine In Nevada, the Favorita and Sauce in Lower California, and the WU liams Fork in Arizona. Of these, the best developed, and, thus far, the most pro ductive, are the CopperopoUs Mines, in Salt-spring Valley, Calaveras County, about thirty-five miles nearly east from Stockton. " The lode on which the Union, Keystone, Em pire, Calaveras, and consolidated mines are located, passes through this valley, in the direction of north, 30*^ west. It has been more or less developed for about fifteen miles. There seem to be four other nearly .parallel lodes, from a few feet to six miles' distance from the main lode. This cupriferous belt has been traced, with comparatively slight Interruptions, from this valley to the American Eiver ^ its general course being about north, 15'' west." " The Union " contains, in all probability, " the largest body of yellow sulphurets of copper ever discovered." The stock holders have never been obliged to pay assessments. In December, 1862, It paid a dividend of $11,000 a share ; and, " during the year 1863, the dividends amounted to $20,000 per share, clear of all expenses." Since this time, the yield has been prudently withheld from the public. It is alleged, that, " in the winter of 1863, the firm paid Mr. Eeed, one of the original locators, $60,000 in cash for nine hundred and seventy-eight feet." " In 1864, Mr. Hardy, another of the 392 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. orlo-inal locators, It is stated, sold his interest In the mine tO the same firm for $650,000." The extent of wealth and business in these copper-mines Is such as to justify the con struction of a railroad to Stockton, thirty-five miles, chiefly for freight. Doubtless many other mines of this valuable ore are to be developed, adding to the increasing wealth of the Pacific States. The lodes are innumerable, and practically inexhaust ible. OTHER MINERALS AND ORES. Quicksilver is very abundant in Califomia. " Cinnabar is the only valuable ore of the mercury of commerce, which is prepared from it by sublimation. It is a sulphide (sulphuret) of mercury, composed, when pure, of quicksilver 82.21, sul phur 13.8 ; in which case it is a natural vermilion, and iden tical with the vermilion of commerce." There are mines of cinnabar at Almaden, near Cordova, in Spain, Idria in Upper Carmlthia, in China, Japan, and In Pluanca Vllica in South Peru. One of the richest mines, however, thus far discovered, is at New Almaden, some thirteen miles from San Jos^, Cal. Prof B. Silliman, jun., states that " a charge of 101,000 pounds, of which 70,000 were composed of this rich ore, 31,000 pounds of ' granza,' or ordinary ore, and 48,000 pounds of adobes, worth four per cent, making a total charge of 105,800 pounds, yielded, on the day of our visit, 460 flasks of mercury, at seventy-six pounds and a half to the flask." The ore mined and reduced in 18''' j amounted to 16,000 tons, or 31,948,400 pounds ; yieldh ^ 47,194 flasks, or 3,604,- 465J pounds, of quicksilver. During ten months of 1866, the product of quicksilver from this mine was 30,029 flasks. Large quantities are used in the mines of California ; but the extent of the yield may be inferred from the fact th^ , quicksilver was exported from New Almaden to New York, DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES. 393 Great Britain, Mexico, China, Peru, Chili, Central America, Japan, Australia, Panama, and Victoria, V. I., as follows : — 1859 3,399 flasks 1860 9,448 1861 35,995 1862 33,745 1863 26,014 1864 36,918 1865 47,194 ler mines add to this production of wealth : Guadaloupe, average flasks per month 150 New Idria, ,, ,,.,,,- 500 Knox and Redington, ,, ,, . 300 We must be content with a simple catalogue of the prin cipal mineral species hitherto recognized in California and the adjoining States and Territories : — Actinolite.Alabaster.Andalusite. Antimony (sulphuret). Antimony, ochre. Agates and camelian. Arsenic.Arsenolite.Asbestos.Azurite (blue carbonate of copper). Biotite. Bitumen.Blende.Borax.Boracic acid. Carbonate of magnesia. Cassiterite. Cerusite (carbonate of lead). Chalcedony.Chalcopyrite (yellow copper-ore). Chloride of alvar. ChrysocoUa (silicate of copper). 60 Chromic iron. Chrysolite. Cinnabar. Corundum. Copper, native. Copper glance. Derbyshire spar. Diallogite (carbonate of manganese). Diamond. Dolomite. Embolite. Emerald nickel. Feldspar.Fluorspar. Galena (sulphuret of lead). Garnet. Gold (crystalline). Gold and tellurium. Gray copper-ore. Graphite. Gypsum. Hematite (specular iron-ore). 394 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Hessite. Hornblende . Hyalite. Idoorase.Iodide of mercury. Ilmenite. Iron-ores.Iridosmine. Iron pyrites. Jasper.Kerargyrite.Lignite. Limonite. Made. Magnesite (carbonate of magnesia). Magnetite.Malachite (green carbonate of copper) . Manganese, oxide. Manganese, carbonate of Mercury.Mercury, iodide of Mispickel. Molybdate of lead. Molybdenite.Movintain cork. Nickel.Orthoolase. Opal, — semi-opal. Pearl spar. Petroleum.Platina.Proustite (light-red silver-ore). Pyrargyrite (dark-red silver-ore). Pyrolusite.Pyrophyllite. Pyroxene. Pyromorphite (phosphate of lead). Pyrrhotine (magnetic pyrites). Quartz.Red oxide of copper. Ruby silver (pyrargyrite). Salt-rock salt. Schorl-selenite.Selenide of mercury. Silver, native. Silver (telluret of). Smoky quartz. Sphene. Stephanite (brittle sulphuret of sil.). Stibnite.Stroymeyerite. Sulphur. Sulphuret of silver. Sulphuret of iron. Telluret of silver. Tetrahedrite (gray copper). Tellurium and gold (tetradymite). Tin-ore (oxide of tin). Topaz. Tourmaline. Tremolite. Tungstate of manganese. Variegated copper-ore. Vitreous copper. Zinc. Coal Is found in sufl&clent quantities on the Pacific slope to be of great importance It Is not of the best quality. The carboniferous formations frora which the coals of Pennsyl vania and the Mississippi VaUey are taken do not exist on the Pacific slope ; but coal has been found in all the other great groups of rocks. " The brown coal of Germany, of nearly the same geological age as that of the Oregon mines' has been worked for many years with profit" Bellinghara Bay, DEVELOPMENT OP INTERNAL RESOURCES. 395 In the extreme north-west of Washington Territory, furnishes coal of compensating quality and quantity. The quality of that taken from Coos Bay is above the average on the coast. Considerable quantities have also been brought into the San-Francisco market from Monte Diabolo. The growth and promise of the coal-trade on the Pacific coast may be indicated by the foUowing estimate of imports into San Francisco since 1860: — Foreign Co^Is. Eastern. Domestic Tons. Tons. Tons. 1860 . 23,045 40,955 8,635 1861 65,905 29,035 21,305 1862 . 40,625 41,655 36,265 1863 . 39,085 44,330 52,135 1864 . 54,600 48,955 50,495 1865 . 45,675 26,815 74,760 1866 (last nine months) . 48,375 13,127 66,177 These figures show a very large relative increase of coals in use from the Pacific coal-fields ; a tendency which is likely to increase. But the great coal-regions of the United States are in the East, and chiefly in Pennsylvania. Anthracite " coal was first employed at a forge In Wyo ming Valley, close to the scene of its production, by a blacksmith, in 1775. In 1778, a naUer in the same place Is known to have employed it in his factory ; and, twenty years after (that is, in 1808), he contrived a grate for burning it as fuel in his house. It was not, however, until 1829, that any extensive mining operations were commenced at that most appropriately named village, Carbondale ; which, about 1832, began to send regular supplies of coals to Philadel phia. The construction of railroads, the increase of popula tion, and the consequent increase in the price of other articles of fuel, soon, however, stimulated the supply of coal." * * Sir Morton Peto, 173-175. 396 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Bituminous coal first appeared in PhUadelphia in 1845 ; and, in 1860, the quantity "raised" in the United States was 6,218,080 tons. The sources of this supply were as follows : — States. Tons. States. Tons. Pennsylvania . . 2,690,786 Iowa . 41,920 Ohio 1,265,600 Alabama 10,200 Illinois . 728,400 Washington . 5,374 Virginia . 473,360 Missouri 3,880 Maryland 438,000 Rhode Island 3,800 Kentucky 285,765 Michigan 2,320 Tennessee 165,300 Georgia 1,900 Indiana . 101,280 Arkansas 200 Now, add to this the amount of anthracite coal from Penn sylvania, — 8,115,842 tons, — and you have the aggregate of " coals raised In the United States in 1860, 14,333,992 tons." For the sake of comparison, we give the following coal produce of the world during the same year, or from the re turns nearest that year : — Great Britain United States Prussia, Saxony, and Hanover Belgium .... France ..... Spain ..... Japan, China, Borneo, and Australia British Possessions, North America Austrian Empire . Russian Empire Grand Total Tons. 71,979,765 14,333,922 12,000,000 8,900,0007,900,000 3,000,000 2,000,000 1,500,000 1,162,9001,500,000 121,000,000 Of this large amount, 14,333,922 tons from the United States must be regarded as a small proportion, especially in view of the fact that our territory includes " nearly three- fourths of the coal-areas of the principal coal-producing countries of the world." It raust be considered, however, that our country yet in- DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES. 397 eludes immense forests of excellent fuel. Wood Is more or less available everywhere, and abundant in many portions of our States : as this diminishes, and as railways and steam navigation increase, facilitating and cheapening the passage of freight, our immense and inexhaustible coal-fields will be proportionally developed, and this source of wealth largely Increased. Petroleum, or rock-oil, has been known to exist for a long period. In Sicily, the Island of Zante, and on the shores of the Caspian, on the banks of the Irrawaddy, and In the col ony of Trinidad, this article has been found and used, but not in such quantities as to attract general attention. In America, the most remarkable discoveries have been recently made ; and, by American enterprise, it has becoine an article of great commercial importance : while the phe nomena connected with its production are objects of great interest, and astonishing even to men of science. The Indians are said to have known of rock-oil in Oil- creek Valley, and used it for medicinal purposes. An arti cle in " The Massachusetts Magazine," as early as 1791, de scribed the locality, and stated that soldiers collected oU at the springs, and found it to be good for rheuraatisra and a gentle purgative. But Mr. Patterson of Pennsylvania first converted this production to a practical use for lubricating the machinery of a cotton-factory In Pittsburg. This was in 1845. Some ten years later, the Pennsylvania Eock-oil Company was formed in New York, with Professor SiUiman at its head. The company coUected surface-oU only, untU 1858, when Col. Drake commenced sinking a weU. After one faUure, he "struck oU" at a depth of seventy-one feet "On the tools being withdrawn, oil rose to within five inches of the surface. This weU yielded at once four hundred, and afterwards a thousand, gaUons a day." Another excitement now came on, equaUing, If not ex ceeding, the rage for gold and sUver and copper in Califor- 398 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. nia. Lands in the neighborhood of the Drake Well rose to fabulous prices. Wells were sunk in great numbers. Some " prospectors " sunk fortunes in sinking wells ; but others rose suddenly from extreme poverty to aflluence In a day. The first " flowing well " was on the farm of a poor man by the name of Funk. Oil was struck In June, 1861 ; and the well immediately began to pour out two hundred and fifty barrels a day. It flowed on for fifteen months, and then ceased. Another, on the Tarr Farm, " yielded two thousand barrels daily ; and the Empire Well yielded three thousand barrels daily." It was now difficult to obtain vessels for the oil, and vast quantities flowed away in " Oil Creek." A glut in the mar ket resulted ; but this was temporary. Prospecting went on ; new discoveries followed. Towns and cities sprang up as if by magic. Flat-boats and various craft went down the Alleghany freighted with oil ; and the Atlantic and Great Western Eallway was driven forward with great en ergy to reach the " oil regions," and claim its share in the enormous " carrying " profits of this new and wonderful dis covery. " Corey," a poor farm, became a central city. In four years, it reached some 10,000 inhabitants; had "nearly twenty banks, and two newspapers." " The quotations made in the oU exchange at Corey, whether of oil, gold, or bread- stuffs, Influenced Wall Street," and its business rose to some $15,000,000 annually. All this in four years. Oil City, and especially PIthole, rose to the rank of rivals in excite ment and business. Of course, great fluctuation would occur in this novel busi ness. Many would expend thousands, and even millions, and faU to find the flowing oU. Some of the most pro ductive wells would become " sullen," irregular, and then cease to flow. Thousands would bitterly rue the day when they invested their all In oil ; while the sudden afSuence of others would throw upon the Fifth Avenue and into Sara toga a new race of aristocrats. DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES. 399 The statistics of this trade are yet quite imperfect Some Idea of its growing importance may be obtained, however, from the exports of a few years. They were as follow : — Year. Gallons. 1862 . 10,887,701 1863 28,250,721 1864 31,792,972 1865 42,273,508 The yield of the entire oil-district of Pennsylvania was estimated from 80,600 to 90,000 barrels a week ; say 400,000 barrels per annum. "The quantity forwarded from the stations of the Atlantic and Great Western EaUway was 533 barrels in 1863, and 675,028 barrels In 1864." « The aver age prices show a heavy rise, despite the largely-increased production : " — PETKOLEtJM IN NEW YOF.K, PER GALLON. 1860, Crude, 28 cents. . 1864, 41 cents. ,, Refined, 28 „ )j 39 „ ,, ,, in bond. 44 „ j> 65 „ free, 51 „ ,, 74 „ The supply must be considered inexhaustible ; while the demand will inevitably increase, adding another source of enormous wealth to the people of the United States. Iron is an indispensable agent of civilization. To have left the territory of the United States destitute of this valu able metal would not agree with the theory of this book, "that God had predetermined to constitute here a large, free, and independent nation. No such strange omission or con tradiction can occur in the divine puposes and action. Who ever from the beginning entertained the true idea of the plans of Providence must have expected to find here kbun- dant supplies of a material without which independence would have been quite impossible. Iron-ore, fit for all the ordinary uses of industry, and capable of being wrought Into the finest of steel, is abundant 400 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. In America. The following table shows the work done in the several States during the year 1860 : — states. tons ore mined. Tons pig iron. Value. New Hampshire Vermont 1,000") 4,500 i 3,224 $92,910 Massachusetts . 25,000 13,700 403,000 Connecticut . 20,700 11,000 379,500 New York 176,375 63,145 1,385,208 Pennsylvania 1,706,476 553,560 11,427,379 New Jersey 57,800 29,048 574,820 Maryland 79,200 30,500 739,600 Ohio . . 228,794 94,647 2,327,261 Indiana . 375 9,375 Michigan 17,900 10,400 291,400 Wisconsin 4,500 2,000 40,000 Missouri 42,000 22,000 575,000 Kentucky 73,600 23,362 534,164 Virginia . 23,217 9,096 251,173 Tennessee 53,220 18,417 457,000 Total . 2,514,282 884,474 $19,487,790 Product in 1850 jer cent) • 13,491,898 Difference (41.4 $5,995,892 Look at these figures. Here are 884,474 tons of pig-iron prepared in a single year, worth $19,487,790. Contrasted with the year 1850, it is an advance of nearly $6,000,000. '' Bar and other rolled Iron amounted to 406,298 tons, of the value of $22,248,796 ; an Increase of 39.5 per cent over the united products of the rolling mills and forges, which, In 1850, were of the value of $15,938,786. This large production of over one and a quarter million of tons of iron, equivalent to ninety-two pounds for each inhabitant, speaks volumes for the progress of the nation In all Its industrial and material Interests. The manufacture of Iron holds relations of the most beneficial character to a wide circle of Iraportant Inter ests, Intimately afiecting the entire population. The proprie tors and miners of ore, coal, and limestone lands ; the owners and improvers of woodlands, of raUroads, canals, steamboats, DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES. 401 ships, and of every other form of transportation ; the pro ducers of food, clothing, and other supplies ; in addition to thousands of workmen, merchants, and capitalists, and their famUies, — have directly participated in the benefits resulting from this great industry. It has supplied the material for an immense number of founderies, and for thousands of blacksmiths, machinists, mUlwrights, and manufacturers of nails, hardware, cutlery, edged tools, and other workers in metals, whose products are of immense aggregate value, and of the first necessity. The production of so large a quantity of iron, and particularly of bar-iron, and the demand for additional quantities from abroad, tell of the progress of the country in civil and naval architecture and aU the engineering arts ; of the construction of raUroads and telegraphs, which have spread like a net over the whole country; of steam engines and locomotives; of spinning, weaving, wood and metal working, milling, mining, and other machinery ; and of all the multiform instruments of science, agriculture, and the arts, both of peace and of war; of the manufacture of every conceivable article of convenience or luxury ofthe household, the field, or the factory." The aggre gate statistics of iron exhibit the extent to which the general condition of the people has been improved by this great agent of civilization during the ten years embraced in this retrospect. " The materials for the manufacture of iron-ore, coal, and other fuel, water-power, &c., are so diffused, abundant, and cheap, that entire independence of foreign supplies appears to be alike desirable and attainable at no distant period;" practicable, we may add, at any time determined by the convenience or political economy of the American people. Technical chemistry is just beginning to reveal its power to enhance the wealth and comfort of our people. Its prod ucts in 1850, exclusive of white lead, ochres, paints, var nish, glue, perfumes, cements, pot and peari ashes, &c., amounted to nearly $5,000,000 ; since which time, this practical science has made rapid advances. 61 402 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Gas manufactured for iUumination and other purposes amounted, in a single year, to 5,000,000,000 cubic feet, worth about $13,000,000. Salt was manufactured in 1860 as follows : — states. Busliela. Value. Massachusetts 30,900 7,874 New York . 7,521,385 1,289,511 Pennsylvania 604,300 154,264 Ohio . 1,744,240 276,879 Virginia 2,056,513 478,684 Kentucky 69,665 21,190 Texas . 120,000 29,800 California 44,000 7,100 Total . . 12,190,953 $2,265,302 In 1850, we employed 340 establishments in the manufac ture of salt, producing $2,177,945 in value of this article, indispensable for culinary and other purposes. These, created supplies are all marvellous, and equally so are the exact adjustments of our developing resources to the wants of our growing population. Well does Mr. Ken nedy speak of " that beneficent law of compensation which pervades the economy of Nature, and, when one provision fails for her children, opens to them another in the exhaust- less storehouse of her material resources, or leads out their mental energies upon new paths of discovery for the supply of their own wants. Thus, when mankind was about to emerge from the simplicity of the primitive and pastoral ages, the more soft and friable metals no longer suflBced for the artificer ; and veins of iron-ore revealed their wealth and use in the supply of his more artificial wants, and became potent agents of his future progress. When the elaboration of the metals and other igneous arts were fast sweeping the forests from the earth, the exhaustiess treasures of fossil-fuel, stored for his future use, were disclosed to man ; and, when the artificial sources of oU seemed about to fail, a substitute DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNAL RESOURCES. 403 was discovered, flowing in almost perennial fountains from the depths of these same carboniferous strata." Now, let the reader pause, and inquire, "Whence are all these wonderful adaptations, these various elements of national prosperity? Who formed this continent with a variety so vast, and materials so rich for the development of a great population ? " God, let us reverently answer, formed the land, with its immense agricultural resources. He made the sUver and the gold. His are the cattle upon a thousand hills. It would seem that no man could be so much an atheist as to deny to Omnipotent Power the glory of this splendid creation. Just as unworthy of us would be the denial of his omniscient wisdom in the exact adjustment of so fine a portion of a large continent to the purposes of a great free people ; in the wide and improbable combina tions which brought our ancestors here, and gave them the energy to grapple with the formidable difficulties of a new country, conquer their liberties, and then turn themselves so promptly and vigorously to the avocations of peaceful industry ; in the inspirations of genius, seen in their inven tions, the growth of inquiry, with population leading to a system of raUroads, telegraphs, and internal commerce, so vast as to outrun the calculations of enthusiasts, and bewil der the political economists of other nations. Who but God could have foreseen the gathering of these thirty-four mil lions here in an era so momentous in the history of the race, and provided for it ? made them the representatives of principles so vital to the civihzation of the world, and imbued them with the spirit and energy, the high moral qualities, necessary to defend and develop them ? drawn attention, at the right time, to the concealed treas ures of a continent, and produced the business energy to develop them? We know absolutely that such wisdom and power, such combinations and achievements, are not the prerogatives of mere man. With what gratitude, there fore, should we ascribe them to Him whose are " the king- 404 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. dom and the power and the glory for ever" ! How thankfully should we acknowledge the Providence which has infused into the minds of so large a number of this great nation the spirit of true Christian enterprise and Protestant liberty, and given to the purest forms of Christianity in the world the disposal of all these immense resources ! Surely the infidelity which would refuse here to acknowledge and reverence the Infinite Being would be most impious, and deserving of signal retribution. CHAPTEE V. DEVELOPMENT OP COMMERCE. " The consequences will be favorable to all Christendom, to Europe, to the whole world." — Oxenstiern. The commerce of this country has great providential advantages. Our extended coast^llne includes innumerable bays, river-entrances, and harbors,- so that the shipping of , the world can reach our Atlantic and Pacific States with the greatest convenience. External commerce seems thus to have been indicated by the Creator of this continent upon a scale of greatness corresponding with the purpose of estab lishing here a large and prosperous nation. God makes only what he wants. The exercise of his creative power might therefore be studied, with the reasonable hope of ascertaining, to a great extent, the plans of his providence. True, his acts are largely prospective. For ages, the pur poses of his special creations may remain unavailable and unappreciated : they are, however, thus the stronger evi dences of his omniscient control. As the exigencies of a nation arise, the urgent demands of progressive civilization appear. How instructive and inspiring to find that they have been all anticipated by the foresight of the great Creator; that He whose wisdom is infinite, even in the original formation of a continent, provided amply, and in the most minute detail, for every emergency of the coming ages ! ¦ This must be God. No finite power or wisdom could possibly produce such results ; and surely nothing could be more grateful to the inteUigent mind than the recognition of this most important fact 405 406 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. VALUE OF EXPORTS. It Is not much more than two centuries since our exports were a smaU quantity of furs, sassafras, clapboards, and wainscoting, and a littie corn and tobacco ; hardly enough to deserve a name in the commerce of the world, and yet enough, as we have seen, to rouse the jealousy of England, and secure arbitrary requisitions on the trade of the colonists for the support of the crown. The foUowing figures wiU indicate, imperfectly however, the development of the country in the materials of trade From 1847 to 1860, our exports were as follows: — From Products of 1847. 1850. 1855. I860. The sea . . $3,468,033 $2,824,818 $3,516,894 $4,156,480 The forest . 5,996,073 7,442,503 12,603,837 13,738,559 Agriculture 68,450,383 26,547,158 42,567,476 48,451,894 Tobacco . . 7,242,086 9,951,023 14,712,468 15,906,547 Cotton . 53,415,848 112,315,317 88,143,844 191,806,555 Manufactures . 10,476,345 20,136,967 28,833,299 39,803,080 Raw produce . 1,526,076 1,437,680 2,373,317 2,279,308 Specie and bullion 62,620 18,069,580 53,957,418 56,946,851 The increase in national resources and wealth is thus shown to be constant and very rapid. The discovery and developraent of the gold-ralnes in California serve largely to explain a remarkable advance in our exports for the year 1851. They rose from $151,000,000 to $218,000,000. In 1862, we supplied foreign countries with American products as follows : — Great Britain . France . British North America Hamburg and Bremen Spanish West Indies British West Indies China and Japan Brazil . $105,898,554 26,014,181 18,652,012 12,672,64610,626,642 6,928,5274,328,506 2,748,249 DEVELOPMENT OP COMMERCE. 407 British East Indies and Australia Holland and her Possessions Belgium .... Hayti and St. Domingo . New Granada and Venezuela . British Possessions in the Mediterranean Mexico ..... Italy Chili Denmark and Danish West Indies Liberia and Ports in Africa Spain and Canary Islands Buenos Ayres and Argentine Republi( French West-India Colonies Portugal and her Colonies PeruSandwich Islands Turkey . UruguayRussia . Central America Pacific Islands Sweden and Norway Austria ic Total $3,520,663 3,237,022 3,192,6913,088,108 2,968,871 1,859,4601,840,720 1,560,361 1,010,051 1,007,667 994,112 ^ 990,449974,279 924,515 708,029 571,652496,983 444,397 290,259153,471 115,640 100,414 78,773 35,615 $213,069,519 When we consider the facts brought forward in this chap ter showing the resources of the American Eepublic, we are impressed with the conviction, that we have but just fairly entered upon our great career of commercial pros perity. The increase of our population, and the consequent demands for home consumption, can in no way keep pace with the rapid development of our agricultural, mineral, and mechanical resources. It is fair to conclude, that, as the rate of increase in exports has been thus far largely in advance of population, our exports are to advance with our increase of industrial citizens and the consequent increased develop ment of our resources. To estimate the future, the relations of submarine telegraphy and steam navigation to commerce must be carefully considered. 408 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. IMPORTS AND EXPORTS. The laws of exchange must, of course, extend to distant continents and islands, and tend strongly to make neighbor hood of nations. In our growing civilization, we must want articles produced or manufactured by other people, and they must want the productions of our land and industry. Equi table exchange of commodities would hence become desirable. This is the great function of external commerce. But even a superficial view of such a country as ours would suggest the superabundance of the necessary means of life and hap piness, and abundance of many of the luxuries of life, from our own soU and mines and handicraft ; and that, though the doctrines of " free trade " were to become the law of the land, the " balance of trade " ought to be largely in our favor. And so It unquestionably would be, were it not for the grow ing follies and prodigality of our people. Preference for foreign over American fabrics and wares of equal and even superior value, and the extravagance of fashions dictated in a foreign capital, discourage home manufactures, and run up a heavy account against us in European markets. A protec tive tariff, however high, has thus far shown but little power to combat these American vices, and make up the losses they produce. Our policy In this respect has not been suf ficiently settied and steady to determine historically the results of protection as compared with free trade. The foUowing table wUl be valuable to our readers, as it wIU show the amount of our foreign trade for some seven teen years, and the proportion of imports and exports for the same time : — Tears. Imports. Exports. 1844 $108,435,035 $111,200,046 1845 117,254,564 114,646,606 1846 121,691,797 113,488,516 1847 146,545,638 158,648,622 1848 154,998,928 154,032,131 DEVELOPMENT OP COMMERCE. 409 Years. Imports, Exports. 1849 $147,851,439 $145,755,820 1850 178,138,318 151,898,720 1851 216,224,932 218,381,011 1852 212,945,442 209,658,366 1853 167,978,647 230,976,157 1854 304,562,381 278,241,064 1855 261,468,520 275,156,846 1856 314,639,942 326,964,908 1857 360,890,141 362,960,682 1858 282,613,150 324,644,421 1859 338,765,130 356,789,462 1860 362,163,941 400,122,296 It thus appears that our trade with foreign nations ad vanced steadUy on the whole, and very nearly quadrupled, during this growing period of our history; reaching In a single year the enormous sum of $762,286,237, and showing a balance in our favor of $37,958,355. Our exports from the products of agriculture are rapidly Increasing. They reached, In 1861, $101,655,000 ; and In 1862, $124,561,000. This Indicates the future comraercial greatness of our favored country. The youngest of the great nations, we have already outstripped all but one. Great Britain alone exceeds us. During the late war, the fluctuation in the value of gold rendered it dif&cult to estimate the commerce of the coun try. It Is, however, very creditable to our people, that in 1865 they Imported only $234,000,000, saving $128,000,- 000 as compared with 1860. At the close of the war, trade rose again very rapidly: so that, during the fiscal year endino- June 30, 1866, our exports (specie value) amounted to the unprecedetited sum of $415,965,459, and our imports (.specie value) to $423,975,036 ; declared value, $437,640,354. The same year we received customs-duties, $179,046,651 ; being forty-one per cent of the total imports. It thus ap pears that a protective tariff is convenient as a method of adjusting our balance-sheet in trade with nations abroad. 52 410 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. INTERNAL COMMERCE. Only a limited view of our commercial activity can be obtained from the estimates of our foreign trade. Vast as this is, it is very greatly exceeded by the traffic among ourselves. The immense extent and variety of our country, with an in dustrious, enterprising population, amounting In the aggre gate to 34,605,882 souls, must produce an internal trade of very great magnitude. Mr. W. E. Baxter, member of the British Parliament, in his book on America says, " It is astonishing to observe the vast quantities of produce in course of transit throughout the country. Huge steamboats on the Mississippi and the Alar baraa are loaded to the water's edge with bales of cotton. Those on the Ohio are burdened with barrels of pork, and thousands of hams. Propellers on the lakes are filled with the finest wheat from Wisconsin and Michigan. Canal-boats In New York and Pennsylvania are deeply laden with flour. Eailroad-wagons are filled with merchandise, and locomo tives struggle in the Western wilds to drag trains richly freighted with the productions of every country under the sun. The United States reminded me, sometimes, of a great antrhlU, where every member of the community is either busy carrying a burden along a beaten pathway, or hasten ing away in search of new stores to Increase the national prosperity." In 1860, our internal sail tonnage and our enrolled and licensed tonnage reached nearly 3,000,000 tons. " Such an amount of tonnage shows an Immense Internal traffic. If we multiply It by ten, we shaU not get at more than the average result of the deliveries of goods by American ves sels employed in navigation of Umited duration and ex tent" * This estimate makes our internal trade between our States and Territories, east and west, north and south, about equal to that of Great Britain with all her provinces. * Sir Morton Peto's Resources of America, p. 224, et seq. DEVELOPMENT OF COMMERCE. 411 It must be observed that our means of carrying commodi ties for trade among ourselves are very inadequate. The business enlarges so rapidly as to make it apparently impos sible to reach the demand by the utmost capacity of our vessels, cars, and wagons. Wind and steam and horse power are all in requisition to carry westward " groceries. Including sugar and salt, dry-goods, hardwares, empty bar rels, machinery and castings, soda, pearl and pot ash, earthern- ware, boots, shoes and hats, copper, tin and lead, drugs, medi cines, and dies, furniture and oil-cloth, crockery, green and dried fruits, rolled iron, hemp and cordage, brown sheeting and bagging, marble, cement, lime and plaster, paper, rags, and stationery, oysters, nails and spikes, salted meats and fish, tobacco and cigars, and carriages and wagons ; " and eastward, " agricultural products, cotton, corn, flour, seeds, live stock, butter, cheese, and eggs, poultry, pork, beef, and other meats (both fresh and salted), lard and tallow, ma nure, lumber, malt, petroleum, hides, lead, raw tobacco, and wool and woollen yarn." There is, moreover, an iraraense trade in staves, of which there were brought Into Buffalo alone. In 1862, 30,500,000, and lumber amounting to 125,- 000,000 feet Ores shipped on Lake Superior the same year were worth $4,000,000. " The imports of lake fish at Buffalo, in 1860, amounted to 26,655 barrels." Enterprise is straining every nerve to provide for this Internal carrying- trade. From 1850 to 1860, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin extended their raUroads from 1,275 inUes to nearly 10,000 mUes ; adding more than 8,000 mUes in ten years. Corresponding Increase is seen in all directions ; and yet our thoroughfares are UteraUy choked with freight, the product of American lands, ingenuity, and industry. A glance at the California trade, via Panama, wUl help the reader to an idea of what Is going on In this country ; and yet it may be considered impossible fully to grasp and comprehend it We have been at work In earnest on the Pacific coast, only since 1849 ; and more than a thousand 412 TS^ GREAT REPUBLIC. vessels annuaUy enter and clear at the port of San Francisco. The trade with China, Japan, Europe, and the islands of the Pacific, is growing to large proportions ; but the principal business is with the old States. The travel and transpor tation over the Isthmus of Panama, In the year ending 30th of September, 1862, may be seen in the foUowing figures : — Passengers towards the Pacific, 21,456 Towards Atlantic, 9,706 Gold „ $4,444,268 '„ $34,605,407 Silver „ .. 14,286,935 Jewelry ,, $578,062 „ American mails „ 232,886 lbs. „ 31,964 lbs. English mails ,, 35,565 „ „ 10,127 „ Extra baggage „ 345,547 „ „ 217,901 „ Freight by weight „ 54,758,378 „ „ 20,061,601 „ Freight by measure „ 737,684 ft. „ 32,279 ft. A careful study of this table wUl show that the passengers chiefly go from the Atlantic to the Pacific ; whUe the gold and silver, In much the largest quantities, move from the Pacific to the Atlantic coast. Eeturns from Panama show that transactions between the Pacific coast and other parts of the United States, in 1862, amounted to $40,000,000. Of course, the war has Interfered with the current of trade ; but it has opened up new sources of wealth, j\nd stimulated the business energy of the people. As the country south returns to its Industrial pursuits, and the equilibrium of gov ernment Is restored, the free action of trade will show a large advance beyond the figures we have submitted. There will, however, be no change in the argument. I repeat, it Is not material from what particular period our facts are taken ; for the data above are so large as to baffle our com prehension. The inevitable Increase of the future can hardly add to the strength of our convictions. Already, and every where, the provisions for a vast population, and the devel opraent of a great Christian civUization, rise immeasurably above all finite power, and reveal the plans and acts of God in the constitution and moral purposes of this new creation. DEVELOPMENT OP COMMERCE. 413 SHIPPING. It is an obvious suggestion, that a commerce so vast must require a large amount of shipping. The following facts will show this interest as it was in American hands before the civil war : The estimate given in the last census shows that our tonnage, at the end of the fiscal year 1851, was 3,772,439 tons. If to this we add the tonnage since buUt, and officially reported as 3,589,200 tons, it will show a total of 7,361,639 tons. But our loss in ten years, by decay, wreck, and other causes, was 1,821,827 ; leaving, as actually reported June 30, 1861, 5,539,812 tons. Of this amount, " the State of New York owned 1,740,940 tons, or nearly thirty per cent of the whole. During the same fiscal year, the tonnage built was 233,194 tons ; of which New York built 46,359 tons, or nearly twenty per cent." Maine took the lead as a ship-building State ; New York was the second ; Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and other States, followed. The immense value of this large property in tonnage owned by our people in 1861, both as a source of temporary profit to the owners and as an active means of extending abroad and at home the commerce and manufactures of the country, can scarcely be over-estimated. Assuming the aver age value per ton at forty dollars, the worth of this ton nage may be stated at $221,592,480. "The superior capacity and very fine character of the American merchant-ships wiU be appreciated by all who remember the beautiful class of saUIng-vessels which were formerly on the New- York and Liverpool stations as what were called Uners. Those vessels were the very best ves sels of their class, and they no doubt acquired wide celebrity for American shipping." "The fame of these celebrated vessels has enabled the Americans not only to possess them selves of the largest proportion of the emigration-trade, but also to lay on lines of packets between Havre, MarseUles, Hamburg, Eio de Janeiro, Bahia, Panama, the West Indies, 414 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. and various parts both of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans." This compliment from an intelligent Englishman (Sir Morton Peto), fine as it is, only partly indicates the facts as they were, and may yet be again under a wise and paternal policy upon the part of the government. It Is, however, matter of profound regret that the course of certain Eno-llshmen and the British Government made our valuable merchant-marine the prey of pirates under the rebel flag, and nearly swept American vessels from the seas. The effect has been a severe depression of the business of ship-building, and the transfer of a vast proportion of the American carrying-trade to English bottoms. The high prices of materials and labor, and the taxation resulting from the war, render it impossible for the American ship builders and merchants to reclaim these lucrative occupar tions, and restore our commerce to its legitimate channels. The solution of this problem is yet to come from the fruitful resources of the American mind. The business of the United States upon the ocean, large as it has been, is destined to extend itself to such propor tions as to place the Great Eepublic, at no distant day, at the head of commercial nations. Her merchan<>marine, under the direction of sound political economy and the protection of her powerful navy, is destined to be still more in the future than in the past the admiration of the world. CHAPTEE VI. DEVELOPMENT OF THE WAR-POWER. " I was bom among the hardy sons of the ocean, and I cannot so doubt their courage or their skill. If Great Britain ever obtains possession of our present little navy, it will be at the expense of the best blood of the country, and after a struggle which will call for more of her strength than she has ever found necessaiy for a European enemy." — Story. War is a great evil, a crime, indeed, when it assumes the form of aggression upon the rights or safety of a nation ; but force in defence of the right against force in the wrong Is an absolute necessity and a high moral right In watch ing the progress of a country, it is therefore indispensable to mark the development of its power to defend itself and enforce its just demands. The war of 1812 sufficiently tested this question. It was to be expected that the wars of Napoleon with England and nearly the whole of Europe would, in some way, involve the United States. Our commercial relations were extensive; and the " orders in councU " of Great Britain, and the famous BerUn, MUan, and Bayonne decrees by Napoleon, mutually retahatory, and designed to cripple each other, had the effect of despotic assaults upon the international rights of neutrals, and were exceedingly dis astrous to the commerce of the United States. The em bargo, the non-intercourse and non-Importation acts of Con gress, were intended for self-defence ; but the tendency of the whole was to compel the Eepublic to choose between the two great beUigerents, or to come into collision with both. The Eepubhcans, under the lead of Jefferson, were exceed ingly hostUe to England, but inclined to favor France. The 416 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. FederaUsts were opposed to war, especially with England. The election of Madison to the high office of President was a triumph of the Eepublican, or new Democratic party, and a precursor of war. The judgment of Mr. Madison was against it ; but influenced, it was aUeged, by the hope of a second term, he was carried fowar^ by the current, and be came gravely responsible for the final decision. SELF-RESPECT OF THE NATION. No sovereign power can with safety allow the violation of its flag. The redress may not be in open hostUities; prudence may require delays : but remonstrance and ener getic protests at least should show that the government understands its rights, and will protect Its citizens. Our merchantmen, denied the freedom of the ocean, for bidden on the one hand to carry English goods to any European port, and, on the other, to carry goods of any description which had not been examined in England, were sure to be victimized by the French or the English. The British Insisted on^ the right of forcible search for articles contraband of war ; which was, of course, a high indignity to free Americans upon the seas. Under pretence of some violation of " orders In council," — which orders America held to be In violation of international law, and therefore not binding, — our merchantmen were seized, and the rights of property sacrificed. The true remedy was, no doubt, a very difficult question. The United States could not venture, unprepared, to declare war ; and the contest between parties rendered any decision doubtful in policy at home and In effect abroad. The expe dient of an embargo on foreign vessels seemed to be natural, but It was destructive to our own trade ; and, as it aided Napoleon in his attempts to destroy the commerce of Great Britain, it was tolerated by France, and regarded as virtually hostile to England. The purposes of the embargo were, to a DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 417 large extent, Impracticable, as our navy was not capable of enforcing it, and the administration shrank from the responsi bUities of war. But the self-respect of the nation rose with the Increase of dangers ; and more stringent enforcement acts were passed, which made our own merchants cry out In dis tress, but which Indicated the purpose of the governraent to corapel England at least to respect our flag. It seeraed a severe deprivation to the American people ; but Congress passed the non-intercourse and non-Importation acts, which, so far as it was possible to enforce them, would deny to those who refused our rights on the seas and in foreign ports the benefits of American markets, and, distressing as it was, began a new era in the development of home resources and the protection of home Industry. There was another grievous wrong in the pretensions of England. She denied to her citizens the right of expatria tion. She claimed the right of impressing Into the British service all English-born subjects, wherever found. To en force this claim, also, she assumed the right of search ; and for this purpose, our ships, dominated by British guns, were arrested on the high seas ; and, with no careful discrimination as to the real citizenship of the men, they were taken vio lently from under our flag, and consigned to an odious war- service or to loathsome prisons. That so gross an outrage would be long endured by a people of courage and spirit could not be reasonably expected, and great efforts at some accommodation were made by England. She was by no means anxious for an additional war. A large number of Impressed sailors In the British navy claimed to be American citizens, and the right of England to coerce them was assumed ; while they must prove that they were American citizens, or suffer the penalties due to deserters from his Majesty's service. When the war com menced, twenty-five hundred of these men affirmed their American rights, and, refusing to fight against their country, " were committed to Dartmoor and other prisons." The 418 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. British Government alleged as an excuse for this enormous wrong, that, If they did not compel the services of these men, half their naval force might set up the claim to be Araerican citizens. This, while it is a fallacy that would excuse any acts of aggression and Injustice whatsoever against other nations, was, to say the least, a poor compli ment to British patriotism. The Americans expressed no fears of this kind with regard to their citizen soldiers or sailors. There was, obviously, but one alternative, — England must repeal her " orders in council," and desist from her insults to the flag of the United States by her forcible search for goods contraband of war and the Impressment of seamen, or she must accept war. The former she declined to do ; the latter she dreaded : she would therefore negotiate. Lord Erskine was well disposed toward America. He agreed with our representative here upon a treaty which would have averted the war ; but, when It was sent home for confirmation, Canning rejected it This was matter of severe mortification to the president, and the greatest annoy ance to the people : for the administration had relaxed the stringency of retaliatory measures ; and the people, for a brief time, rejoiced in the opening prospects of comraerce, and relief frora the perils of war. There seeraed, however, now no way to avoid the dreaded conflict ; and war was declared by Congress on the 18th of June, 1812. With an array nurabering on paper 30,700, but an actual force of only 10,000 men, half of whom were raw recruits, we were now at war with a powerful nation. On the water, "we had three first-class frigates, ' The President,' ' The Consti tution,' and 'The United States;' 'The Congress' and 'Essex,' frigates of the second class ; ' The John Adams,' which was soon laid up as unfit to cruise ; 'The Wasp' and 'The Hornet,' sloops-of-war; 'The Argus," Siren,' 'NautUus,' 'Enterprise,' and 'Vixen,' brigs. Three second-class frigates, 'The Chesa peake,' 'Constellation,' and 'John Adams,' were undero-oln"- DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 419 repairs. These, with a hundred and seventy gunboats, and three old frigates too rotten to be repaired, constituted the entire American navy." * Our population, however, had largely increased. The third census (1810) showed that the United States numbered 5,862,093 free whites; 1,191,364 slaves ; aU others, 186,446 ; making a population of 7,239,903 souls. We had, In effect, therefore, more than twice the strength of the nation in our Eevolutionary struggle with Great Britain ; and our antago nist, worried by her death-struggles with Napoleon, was still fighting for supremacy on the Continent, and the suppression of what she deemed a colossal and destructive revolutionary power. SANDWICH AND QUEENSTOWN. Henry Dearborn was appointed first major-general, with command of the Northern Department Hull, Governor of Michigan Territory, was raade a brigadier-general, and with sorae eighteen hundred raen, the militia of his own Territory included, undertook the conquest of Canada, a territory then Including, in the Upper and Lower Provinces, some four hun dred thousand people. It was very discouraging that his ves sel of supplies was overhauled and captured at Fort Araherst- burg. He, however, moved on as far as Sandwich. In the absence of McArthur's detachment, he now numbered sorae eight hundred men. He was about to be attacked by Brock with seven hundred and thirty regulars and mUitia, and six -hundred Indians under the renowned Tecumseh. " Though he at first refused," he at length responded to a chaUenge to surrender, thus saving " the effusion of blood ; " and as a mat ter of prudence. If not necessity, included McArthur's cora- mand among the prisoners of war handed over to the British. This, it must be confessed, was not a very encouraging com mencement of the war. About the 9th of October, Commodore EUIot, taking com- * Hildreth, 2d Series, iii. 364, 365. 420 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. mand on Lake Erie, succeeded in cutting out "The Adams "and " The Caledonia " from under the guns of Fort Erie This brought up the spirits ofthe troops along the frontier, and they were anxious to make another attack upon Canada. Gen. Van Eensselaer determined to gratify them, and selected Queens town as the point of attack. Every movement, however, showed a want of preparation for the brave attempt. As the supply of boats was entirely inadequate, he could only pass over two or three hundred men, who were exposed to a galling fire from a battery sweeping the river and the American shore Col. Van Eensselaer, a relative of the general, soon fell, severely wounded ; but he gave orders to storm the battery, which was promptly and gallantly done by Capt OgUvie and Capt Wool, and the British were driven into a stone house. Gen. Brock, who carae up hastily, was slain. While the eneray held the stone house, and annoyed our little army with a rausketry-fire, sorae five or six hundred raore Araericans, with a single piece of artillery, got across the river. For the want of tools, no intrench ments were attempted. In the mean time, a body of Indians rushed out frora the woods, and assaUed a straggUng body of ralUtia, who fled before thera, producing a serious panic in the American forces ; but our citizen-soldiers were brave, and, as they always have done, began on the battle-field to learn how to fight Lieut-Col. Scott, who had crossed as a volunteer, put himself at the head of a few regulars, and promptly re pulsed the Indians. The British general, Sheafe, now advanced frora Fort George ; and the sound of his rausketry alarmed the militia on the American side, and they denied the right of their commanders to lead them Into Canada. Our forces, engaged In attempting to faU back to the river, were thrown into confusion, and compelled to surrender. We had lost In this ill-managed affair. In kiUed, wound ed, and prisoners, a thousand men; the British, about a hundred. DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 421 Neither party seemed anxious to go on with^ the war. Negotiations for peace were attempted, it must be admitted, in good faith. The British " orders in council " had been quietly repealed ; but their obstinate adherence to the right of search, and the impressment of seamen taken violently from under our flag, rendered all negotiations fruitless. Nothing could be more aggravating to a free and honorable nation. " Up wards of six thousand cases of alleged impressments were recorded in the Department of State ; and it was estimated that at least as many more might have occurred of which no information had been received. Castlereagh himself admitted, on the floor of the House of Commons, that an inquiry insti tuted early In the preceding year had discovered In the British fleet thirty-five hundred men claiming to be Impressed Americans." * Federalists, as well as Democrats, felt the galUng effects of this bitter wrong ; and tbe war-spirit rose in the Eepubhc, though, as a nation, we were never united in the war. NAVAL ENGAGEMENTS. Commodore Eogers had collected in the harbor of New York as many vessels of our little navy as possible, and, upon the declaration of war, moved out promptly to sea. " The Constitution," Capt Hull, attempting to join Eogers, feU in with the British squadron, and, after a desperate race of four days, escaped into Boston. Without waiting for orders, he at once put to sea, making a fearless cruise in search of the Jamaica fleet Not meeting with any adventure equal to his ambition, he returned ; and, cruising in the Gulf of St Lawrence, he spied "The Guerriere," an English war- frigate, Capt Dacres. The prospect of an engagement was immediately clouded by the appearance of three other hos tUe ships and a brig. A chase soon began, — one of the most exciting and remarkable in history. Capt HuU found him self in the midst of the squadron of Commodore Broke, * Hildreth, 2d Series, iii. 349. 422 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. with three sail on his starboard quarter, and three more astern. It was not a question whether " The Constitution " alone could fight the whole British squadron, but whether her commander and raen had skill and energy enough to. baffle all the efforts of the British squadron to bring on an engageraent This desperate nautical contest commenced on Friday, July 17 ; and at length, after exhausting all the skill and power at their command, " the English ships aU hauled to the northward and eastward, fully satisfied, by a trial that had lasted nearly three days and as many nights, under all the circumstances that can attend naval manoeu vres, from reefed topsail to hedging, that they had no hope of overtaking their eneray." * " The Constitution," after a daring cruise, which showed that she was neither worried nor intimidated, went into port to prepare for further adventures. In the mean time, " The Essex," Capt. Porter, soon after the departure of Eogers, got to sea, and took valuable prizes almost at her leisure. Among them was the frigate "Minerva," thirty-six guns, conveying a large number of British troops, about a hundred and fifty of whom were made prisoners. " A few days after this success, ' The Essex ' made a strange sail to windward." As she was disguised as a mer chantman, the stranger bore down upon her fearlessly, and opened fire; when suddenly "The Essex" "knocked out her ports, and opened upon the enemy." Surprised and panic-stricken, the Englishmen " left their quarters, and ran below." Capt Porter took easy possession of his prize, which proved to be « his Majesty's ship ' Alert," Capt Langham, mounting twenty eighteen-pound cannon, and with a full crew." Let us now return to " The Constitution." She had gained a world-wide reputation for the naval skill of her commander and men in avoiding an unequal combat with a whole Brit- * Cooper's Naval History of the United States, p. 256. DEVELOPMENT OF THE WAR-POWER.* 423 ish squadron. She was restless for a fight with some worthy antagonist, with a fair chance to test her prowess in battle. For this she did not have to wait long. She feU in with a daring craft, evidently searching for her. Both parties pre pared for action. Firing a few guns as they approached, and moving dexterously to prevent being raked, they seemed willing to fight at close quarters. " At six o'clock, the enemy bore up, and ran off" under his three topsaUs and jib, with the wind on his quarter. As this, was an indication of a readiness to receive his antago nist in a fair yard-arm and yard-arm fight, ' The Constitu tion ' immediately set her maintop-gallant-sall and foresail to get alongside. At a little after six o'clock, the bows of the American frigate began to double on the quarter of the English ship ; when she opened with her forward guns, draw ing slowly ahead with her greater way, both vessels keeping up a close and heavy fire as their guns bore. In about ten minutes, or just as the ships were fairly side by side, the mizzen-mast of the Englishman was shot away ; when the American passed slowly ahead, keeping up a tremendous fire and luffed short round the bows of the enemy to pre vent being raked. In executing this manoeuvre, the ship shot into the wind, got sternway, and fell foul of her antago nist. While in this situation, the cabin of ' The Constitution ' took fire from the close explosion of the forward guns of the enemy, who obtained a small but momentary advantage from his position. The good conduct of Mr. Hoffman, who commanded In the cabin, soon repaired this accident ; and a gun of the enemy's, that threatened further injury, was dis abled. As the vessels touched, both parties prepared to board. The English turned all hands up from below, and mustered forward with that object ; while Mr. Morris, the first lieutenant, with his own hands endeavored to lash the ships together. Mr. Alwyn, the master, and Mr. Bush, the lieutenant of the marines, were upon the taffrall of ' The Constitution ' to be ready to spring. Both sides now 424 * THE GREAT REPUBLIC. suffered by the closeness of the musketry ; the English much the most, however. Mr. Morris was shot through the body, the bullet fortunately missing the vitals ; Mr. Alwyn was wounded In the shoulder ; and Mr. Bush fell by a bullet through the head. It being found impossible for either party to board in the face of such a fire, and with the heavy sea that was on, the sails were filled ; and, just as ' The Con stitution ' shot ahead, the foremast of the eneray fell, carry ing down with it his mainmast, and leaving him wallowing in the trough of the sea a helpless wreck." * Ee-adjusting his ship, and taking a raking position, Capt Hull saw the English Jack hauled down frora the sturap' of the raizzen-raast, and the great battle was over. His prize was " The Guerriere," Capt Dacres, one of his raost persistent antagonists In the reraarkable contest of naval skill, so re cently terminating In one of our greatest naval triumphs. " The Constitution " was soon refitted, and ready for sea ; while " ' The Guerriere ' was completely disraasted, had seventy-nine killed and wounded, and, according to the stateraent of her coraraander in his defence before the court which tried hira for the loss of his ship, she had received no less than thirty shot as low as five sheets of copper beneath the bends." All this had occurred within two hours, the whole period of the engagement ; and the most destructive execution must have been within thirty minutes. It Is vain, at this distance of time, to attempt to describe the joy of the Araerican people as the news of this great naval triuraph flew over the land. It was haUed as decisive evidence that the boasted superiority of the British on the seas was at an end. This Impression was deepened by the grand victory of Commodore Decatur, In "The United States," over "The Macedonian," thirty-eight guns, Capt Carden, after a most desperate engagement. In which " The Macedonian," a beauti ful ship with forty-nine guns, was almost literally cut to * Cooper's Naval History of the Uuited States, pp. 258, 259. ' DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 425 pieces. The terrific conflict In which "The Wasp," Capt Jones, triumphed over and captured "The Frolic," Capt Whinyates, heightened the enthusiasm of the American people, and produced most Iraportant moral effects bearing upon the historical power of the two nations. Our first naval defeat was on the first day of June, 1813, when " The Chesapeake " was captured by " The Shannon," after a most heroic struggle on both sides. Subsequent engagements were numerous, great gaUantry being displayed on both sides, the results varying, but, upon the whole, very clearly vindicating the prophetic judgment of Story, placed at the head of this chapter. CAMPAIGNS FROM THE WEST AND EAST. Harrison, rallying troops for the defence of Indiana with out regard to form, was made a brevet major-general of Kentucky. On his way to the scene of action, Information reached him from Washington that Winchester had been placed in command ; while he, with the rank of a brigadier- general, was to defend Indiana and Illinois. The West, however, already beginning to be a power in the nation, demanded and secured the appointment of Harrison to the chief command of the Western army, now raised to the nominal force of ten thousand men. Harrison was brave and active. He deterrained to destroy some hostile Indian settlements, and then by a bold dash, If possible, recover Detroit. But the crude masses of volun teers under his command, not having yet learned to obey, were not an army ; and his plans were frustrated. Capt Taylor now appears, foiling with skill and bravery the attack of the Indians upon Fort Harrison, on the Wabash. It is interesting to see these two future presidents In their young manhood thus gallantly coming into the field together. They were both to display great generalship, endure severe trials, rise high in popular favor, be exalted to the first place Si 426 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of distinction in the Eepublic, if not in the world, and both to fall by death soon after their respective inaugurations. Gen. Dearborn attempted a demonstration in the direction of Montreal, which evidently, for want of capacity in the commander, became a disastrous failure. Smyth, after his valorous and " grandiloquent proclamations," made another disgraceful failure on the Niagara frontier. In the winter of 1813, Harrison made his second attempt to reach Detroit As a prellralnary raeasure, Winchester was ordered to occupy the Eaplds. He reached this objec tive point without casualty, and was iraraediately drawn into an atterapt to relieve Frenchtown, where our little array was attacked by Proctor from Maiden. Winchester was taken prisoner, and Induced to surrender his command. The bar barous treatraent of the prisoners frora the British and their Indian allies disgraced their victory. The advancing troops of Harrison met the fugitives from Frenchtown ; and, pru dently abandoning his plan of attacking Maiden, he was compelled to content himself for the present by fortifying the Eaplds, named, for the governor of Ohio, Fort Meigs. As an evidence, however, of the confidence of the govern ment, he was soon raised to the rank of major-general, Jackson now appears in the South, taking the responsibility of disobeying orders, that he might perform a great act of huraanity in raarching his men four hundred and sixty mUes back to NashvUle and disbanding thera near their horaes. WUkinson had contrived, without bloodshed, to get possession of the fort at Mobile ; the only " victory " on land we have been permitted to record since the success of Capt Taylor at Fort Harrison. In the summer of 1813, the gallant Perry moved the small nucleus of his fleet out into Lake Erie. With nine ves sels and fifty-five guns, he confronted the British squadron, commanded by Capt Barclay, with six vessels and sixty- three guns. Having a hundred and fifty of Harrison's men on board, he aimed to reach and assault the fort at Mai- DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 427 den. The two fleets met ; and, after a desperate engagement of three hours, every ship of the British squadron struck to the victorious Perry. He now promptly converted such of his prizes as were manageable into transports, and conveyed Harrison's troops across the lake. Proctor, consulting his prudence, burned the fort at Maiden, and commenced his retreat. Harrison was once more on his way to Detroit In two days he overtook Proctor's rear, and captured all his stores and ammunition. The main body of the British, some eight hundred In number, were drawn up in order of battle " near the Moravian town," with Tecumseh and his Indians on the right in a swamp. Johnson with his mounted men rushed upon them with such fury, that they were completely overpowered, threw down their arras, and surrendered. " Proctor and his suite, with sorae two hundred men, escaped by timely flight." * The Indians fought desperately; but the renowned Tecumseh was slain, probably by Johnson's own hand, and his braves were killed or dispersed. It was now the spring of 1814 ; and the war party In Eng land rose in spirits as the British had triumphed over the great Napoleon, and they demanded the exemplary chastise ment of the democrats of America. The veterans of the English army were to be brought over for this purpose. Brown, now a major-general, was a man of courage ; and Scott, now a brigadier, stood by his side, burning with desire to prove that the Americans were competent to resist and conquer the British regulars. They obtained perraisslon to attempt another invasion of Canada. This expedition re sulted in the severe battie of Bridgewater, or Lundy's Lane. Crossing the lake from Buffalo on the 2d of July, our army of about three thousand five hundred men had the good for tune to receive the surrender of Fort Erie. Scott advanced with intrepidity to attack the British under Eiall ; and a smart but brief engagement drove the enemy from his in trenchments, from Chippewa, and from Queenstown, with the * Hildreth, 2d Series, iii. 437, 438. 428 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. loss of some five hundred men, whUe the loss of the Ameri cans was about three hundred. Fort George, however, still manned by the British, was promptly re-enforced ; and both parties prepared for a severe conflict On the 25th of July, Scott, with a thousand men, fear lessly advanced, and suddenly encountered the whole of Eiall's army. In a brief time, near a third of Scott's force had fallen before the terrific fire of the enemy. Scott, how ever, again and again rallied his men to the onset." By his orders, Major Jessup reached the enemy's rear, and pressed him severely, making many prisoners; among them Gen. Eiall, retiring, severely wounded, from the front. " Brown now came up with Elpley's brigade, which was ordered between Scott and the enemy." The British park of artil lery, raised to nine pieces, was the key of his position ; and Col. James Miller was ordered to storm It, which he did in gallant style, driving the artillery-men from their guns at the point of the bayonet. Elpley brought up the Twenty- third, and secured the guns. Porter's volunteers promptly supported him on the right; and Jessup soon reached the front, routing a British brigade on his way. The enemy, now re-enforced by Drummond, made a des perate effort In the darkness of the night to recover their guns. The Americans, however, were on their guard ; and, after three terrific assaults, the British recoUed from their fire and bayonets, and retired from the field of slaughter. Brown and Scott, severely wounded, were compelled to retire, leaving aU the regimental officers wounded, and seven hundred and forty-three men dead or wounded. The loss of the British was eight hundred and seventy-eight The Araericans had at length risen to the greatness of the eraer gency. They had fought a desperate battie, and gained a decisive victory; but for the want of horses, they could not take away their trophies, and retired, under coraraand of Eipley, to care for their wounded. The British, unopposed, returned to the battle-ground, and reclaimed their guns. DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 429 WASHINGTON AND BALTIMORE. About the middle of August, " a new and large British fleet," commanded by Cockburn, appeared In the Chesapeake, bearing four thousand of Wellington's veterans under Eoss. President Madison at length began to realize the danger, and to show an utter Incapacity to make provisions against it. Gov. Winder of Maryland made the best dispositions In his power for the defence of his State, and especially of Balti more But, by the 20th, the Potomac was blockaded, and the main fleet had ascended the Patuxent as far as Benedict, and landed Eoss, with forty-five hundred men, within fifty miles of Washington. Without horses, these indefatigable soldiers and sailors marched through the heat, which was to them almost insufferable, dragging three pieces of ligh1> artillery, and carrying munitions of war. On this dreadful march, exhausted and encumbered as they were, they raight, it would seera, have been cut to pieces without difficulty ; but, quite unopposed, they reached Bladensburg on the 24th, In no condition to coraraence an engagement. At that Instant, the Americans should have made the attack with vigor, and by sudden victory saved their capital and the honor of the nation. We cannot avoid thinking, that if Brown and Scott with the raen of Lundy's Lane, or Jackson from New Orleans, had been in comraand, this would have been done ; but the president and other civilians and araateur warriors were there to distract the counsels of Winder and his officers, and communicate their fears to the men. In the raean time, the British, ready to sink frora fiitigue, were led on to the attack : the battle of Bladensburg was lost, aud the veterans of Wellington marched into Washington. The Capitol, the President's House, and all the public build ings but the Patent and General Post Offices, were comraitted to the flames. Valuable papers and the public library were consumed, — a piece of Vandalism which nothing in civUized warfare could excuse. 430 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. It would seem that Providence had now placed the Eepub lic at the disposal of England. But strange events Indicated an opposite result. A tremendous tornado came on, add ing to the horrors of war, and seeming to threaten the Capitol with completed destruction. The British column about to fire the only remaining government buUding, alarmed at the gathering forces of Nature, now marshalled by God himself as if to do a work which the confused army had failed to do, fled to the nearest edifices for protection, many of which were dashed to the ground by the fury of the storm, burying numbers of men amid their ruins. Then an explo sion at Greenleaf 's Point, more likely providential than acci dental, killed or wounded nearly a hundred more of these grim, fearless warriors: and the exaggerated fears of the British commander assumed that a formidable "army of Indignant citizen-soldiers were mustering on the Heights of Georgetown," and large forces were gathering from the South, to overwhelm hira before he could escape their just vengeance ; and he hastened his men toward their ships at Benedict, where he embarked with the satisfaction of a retreating enemy rescued frora Iramlnent perils, when. In point of fact, there had been no army on his track ; and It was twenty-four hours before the frightened Americans could gather courage enough to venture on to Capitol Hill, and disarm sorae sixty British invalids left in care of the wounded. God, no doubt for purposes of discipline, suffered this ex treme mortification to a proud, presumptuous people, and then directly Interfered to prevent a subjugation which would have endangered his own purposes. In less than two weeks, the British fleet came up the Chesapeake, landed their army at North Point, and made a bold combined attack upon Baltimore ; expecting, doubtless, no more formidable obstacles in the way of Its intended destruction than they had found in approaching the doomed capital. But from the indications at Washino-ton in the DEVELOPMENT OF THE WAR-POWER. 431 midst of the conflagration, and the prompt action of good sense and courage, arraying ten thousand men for the de fence of Baltimore, it was evident God had at length said to these hitherto invincible men, " Thus far, and no farther." A severe engagement and a brave defence, in which the British Gen. Eoss was slain, soon resulted in the retreat of the British army. Taking advantage of rain and darkness, they re-embarked, and left the Baltimoreans to their triumphs. "The Star-spangled Banner," written by Key on board a British ship, where he was forcibly detained during the action, commemorates in fitting strains the rising heroism of America represented on the bloody field of Baltimore. PLATTSBURG. We may now again turn our eyes to the North. Other veterans from the wars with Napoleon came to join in the conquest of America. Prevost, on the 1st of Septem ber, advanced upon Plattsbnrg with ten thousand men. McDonough's squadron had providentially just anchored in Plattsbnrg Bay. Macomb with three thousand men, Includ ing many invalids, had been left in command of the town. Volunteers from New York and Vermont, to the number of three thousand, now came at his call to join his little array ; but what could be the hope of resistance to the formidable force which Prevost led up to the attack ? Nothing, unless God should interfere. Prevost menaced Macomb in front, but sent a strong force to ford the river above. Now, while they are searching for the ford, let us turn our eyes to the lake. "The British fleet, commanded by Commodore Downie, consisted of a new ship of thirty-seven guns, a new brig of sixteen, the two sloops captured from the Americans the year before, and mounting eleven guns each, besides twelve gunboats, — ninety-five heavy guns to the whole squadron, which was manned by a thousand seamen from Quebec." * * Hildreth, 2d Scries, iii. 518, 519, ct seq. 432 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. McDonough's squadron consisted of " The Saratoga," twenty- six guns, the brig "Eagle," twenty guns, the schooner " Ticonderoga," seventeen guns, the schooner " Preble," seven guns, and ten gunboats. With his largest vessels, he lay directly across the harbor, his gunboats forming a second line against the Intervals between the ships. Downie was thus obliged to attack " bows on, which he did gallantly, reserving his fire till he came to close action." His largest vessel was soon crippled, and hastily anchored beyond the reach of harm. A " British sloop standing on to gain a raking position was so disabled, that she drifted down on the Araerican line, and was taken." Another, driven from her berth, drifted ashore. The American schooner " Preble " was then driven from her anchorage, and " The Ticonderoga " was vIgorou.sly attacked and completely disabled on one side ; but McDonough, by "winding," brought the other side to bear. Downie, attempting to imitate him, failed ; and after a brave action, lasting two hours and a half, the British flag was lowered. The victory was complete. Prevost, hearing of this result, abandoned his search for the ford, and retreated with his army of veterans in a panic, leaving his wounded and much of his baggage and stores behind. In the raean time. Brown, shut up In Fort Erie, had sent pressing messages to Izard for re-enforcements. Taking a strong force, and leaving the glory of defending Plattsbnrg to Macomb, he marched off toward the Nias;ara frontier. Before he reached Fort Erie, however, the lion-hearted Brown had determined upon a sortie. Issuing at mid-day with his chosen men, he " surprised the British batteries some two miles in advance of their carap, exploded their magazines, and spiked their guns ; took some four hundred prisoners; and skilfully retired, having inflicted upon the enemy a loss of nearly a thousand men. Drummond, as soon as he could raove, raised the siege, and retired behind the Chippewa." * * Hildi-oth, 2d Series, iii. 520, 521. DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 433 NEW ORLEANS. The indomitable Jackson had taken the responsibUity to resist an attack of the British on Fort Bowyer, in which they were aided by the Spanish and Indians. This was a ma terial point, as its capture would not only open a harbor to the French privateersmen from Barataria Bay, but It would give the British a fair opportunity to approach New Orleans. Jackson rallied the mUitia, and, without regard to men or money, poured a destructive fire into the British squadron, burned up their best ship, " The Hermes," and sent the whole fleet away in haste, with the loss of two hundred and thirty- two men. Lafitte, the leader of the buccaneers, rejected with disdain the offer of an honorable rank for himself and his outlaws in the British army ; and, shrewdly conducting his intrigues, gave himself, with all his valuable Information, to the Americans. This enabled them to set forward an expedition from New Orleans, under Commodore Patterson, for an attack upon the pirates. The expedition was com pletely successful, the Americans capturing ten vessels, with twenty guns. The blaze of light from Plattsbnrg, Fort Erie, and Mobile Bay, and the triumphs on the sea of " The Peacock " and "The Wasp," were, however, soon clouded. The latter, after a hard battle with "The Avon" (which she conquered and sunk) and taking several prizes, must have gone down alone, as she was never heard from after ; and Chauncey was shut up by Yeo in Sackett's Harbor. We had not, at this time, a national vessel at sea. Izard's boaistful expedition, with six thousand men, against Drummond, behind the Chippewa, completely failed. Think ing that the confinement of Chauncey's fleet at Sackett's Har bor, and of Brown in command there, would leave the British at full liberty to re-enforce Drumraond, he refused to attack, blew up Fort Erie, and retired. ¦ Discontent, which now became general, especiaUy in New ss 434 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. England, gave additional strength to the Federalist opposi tion, and culminated in the famous Hartford Convention. We greatly needed a decisive victory. New Orleans now seemed a doomed city. A formidable British fleet approached, bearing four thousand sailors and raarlnes and twelve thousand veterans, "corainanded by Packlngham, Kean, Lambert, and Gibbs, able and experi enced generals of Wellington's late Peninsular army; whence, also, the troops had mostly been drawn." * Jackson, upon returning to New Orleans, found every thing In confusion. The defences he had commenced were in dilapidation. The squadron on the water was entirely inadequate, and really no army was at his command But his daring genius and Indomitable will suppUed every thing. He soon made drilled soldiers of raw recruits, now gathering at his call, of the citizens of New Orleans, who knew him too well to refuse to drill when he ordered, and of "the noble-hearted, generous free men of color," who sprang to arms with the greatest alacrity when he announced their hearty welcome : he made soldiers even of Lafitte and his fugitive buccaneers, and of the convicts whom he released, all of whom became orderly and daring warriors under the Inspiration of one powerful mind. When the British landed two thousand light troops, under Kean, frora the Bayou Benevenu, about fifteen miles from New Orleans, Jackson found himself at the head of five thousand men of all kinds, only about a thousand of whom were regulars. He did not wait for the enemy to approach, but left Carroll and the Louisiana mUitia in charge of the city, and moved at once to the attack. Coffee, who, by forced marches, came up in time with his brigade, was sent to the right Jackson moved directly upon the enemy In front, and the schooner " Caroline " opened upon his left Night had come on ; but the impetu ous Jackson would not wait for the day. The battle rao-ed * Hildreth, 2d Scries, iii. 559. DEVELOPMENT OF THE WAR-POWER. 435 furiously until the British found security from further assault between the old and the new levee. Jackson, having astonished Wellington's veterans by the vigor and skUl of his attack, and taught them caution, which gave him time, retired within his main lines of defence. The enemy wait ing for re-enforcements from the fleet, Jackson used every moment In strengthening his works. His rampart was con structed of cotton-bales : the ditch in front was broad and deep, and both were extended into the swamp. The British sent hot shot into our ship " Caroline," and burned it to the water's edge ; but " The Louisiana " was towed away, and saved for future action. The next day, the eneray opened furiously upon Jackson's line "with artillery, bombs, and Congreve rockets : " but they were answered so frightfully by the five heavy guns of the Americans, and the raking fire of " The Louisiana," that fur ther advance was impossible ; and, after seven hours' des perate fighting, the British retired. Just at this crisis, Jackson had to direct his attention to the city ; and as there seemed danger of a pusillanimous sur render under orders of the legislature, then In session, he despatched Clayborne to watch them, who, though governor, acting under martial law, promptly obeyed Jackson's orders. He, believing he was conforming to the iron will of his com mander, " placed a miUtary guard at the door of the hall, and broke up the legislative assembly." The intrepid general then scoured the city for shrinking cowards, ordered a registration of all the male inhabitants, and went on with his fortifications. He directed Gen. Mor gan to erect defences on the right bank of the river similar to those on the left, and his orders were obeyed. The Ken tucky militia, two thousand two hundred and fifty strong, arrived ; and, though only part of them had arms, the rest were ordered to the works. On the eighth day of January, 1815, the grand final attack of the British was made, under command of Sir E. Packing- 436 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ham in person. Thornton was directed to make a night- attack upon Morgan on the right bank of the river, which he did with bravery ; and, Morgan's militia becoming un steady, this attempt was successful. In the mean time, the main British force, under Packlngham, covered by the terrific fire of six eighteen-pounders, advanced with the degrading cry of "booty and beauty" as their watchword. The col umn moving by the river carried an advanced American redoubt, the guns of which had raked the whole British lines as they came up. The main column, coraraanded by Gibbs and Kean, was hurled against Carroll's division, near est the swamp. The storming-party encountered the ditch, and fell in large numbers before the unerring aim of the American sharpshooters and the belching fires of nine pieces of heavy artillery. They could not endure this storm of death. They staggered and recoiled. Sir Edward, in attempting to rally them, was slain ; Gibbs fell, mortally wounded ; Kean was dangerously wounded ; and Lambert, succeeding to the command, withdrew his mangled forces, caUIng back Thornton frora his advantageous position on the opposite side of the river. The battle of New Orleans was gained, apparently, by the heroism and intrepidity of one great man, and the brave troops under his command ; but God, who " maketh wars to cease from the ends of the earth," had determined to end this frightful contest, and usher In the era of peace. The joy with which the people hailed the announcement of the treaty, agreed to by commissioners and ratified by the British Government, Indicated their decided aversion to the war; while the admlnLstratlon, by waiving utterly the great question of the right of search, to resist which the war was coraraenced, made sufficient acknowledgment of the highest indiscretion, either in declaring war, or In consenting to a peace which did not secure the only grave point In dispute. The glorious victory of Jackson alone saved the president and the war Democrats from overwhelmino- diso-race. DEVELOPMENT OP THE WAR-POWER. 437 In the mean time, it had fully appeared, on the land and on the sea, that the war-power of the Eepublic was in the people ; that it was not in the administration nor in a stand ing army, but in the freedom of American citizenship. These men from the farm, the shop, the store, and the study, would not come first into action with the skill of veterans ; but they would include all the elements of a grand mUitary force, and the war-power of the nation would be developed in the field. This, therefore, may be considered as Ameri can history in advance of the world, — the people in the midst of peaceful industry are their own standing army. CHAPTEE VIL DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. " Consent to bad government is consent to ruin. Good government can come only of general intellectual and moral development." — Paetkidge. Education in the United States has received considerable attention ; and, whUe we do not boast of great learning, history will accord to us a degree of comparative progress quite equal to our age. The first wants of a new people are physical. Attention must be given to clearing away the forests, cultivating the soil, mechanical industry, and trade. The people must construct roads, bridges, houses, barns, churches, ships, and whatever else will provide them food, clothing, shelter, and the means of commerce. These are necessities ; and hence the useful precede the fine arts. Our rapid development and real greatness withdraw atten tion from the fact of our recent origin as a people. It could hardly be credited, that, dating from the Declaration of Independence, we have not yet completed the first cen tury of national existence. We are stUl very largely occu pied with the rough labor of pioneers, slowly subjecting the soil of our vast territory to imperfect cultivation. These are facts eminently fit to be considered in estimating our real and relative progress in learning and the arts. PUBLIC SCHOOLS. In the year ending June, 1860, about five millions of our population were at school. About one-sixth of our people are doubtless receiving tuition. A large proportion of them 438 DEVEJ.0PMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 439 are children from five to fifteen years of age, who are in our common schools. These institutions are fundamental in the United States. They began early in our history, and formed a part of the constitutional provisions of Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. The idea of imparting the rudiments of an education without charge to the children of the Eepublic was a New- England idea, and it grew up from small beginnings to be a thoroughly American idea. It was opposed, on the one hand, to the neglect and degrading Ignorance which per vaded the lower classes in England ; and, on the other, to the aristocratic feeling that education was for the children of gentlemen, and they were to be kept apart from the children of the comraon people. To the thinking phUan thropist, there was a deep and destructive vice In this gen eral ignorance and in these invidious distinctions. Schools, therefore, began to be provided for all. But this Idea, like all others of great value, must contend for its position. Two public enemies of the common schools have been very determined in their opposition. The affectations of caste, esteeming the common mind vulgar, and the higher bred entitled to the distinction of exclusiveness in the manner If not in the fact of education, have long withheld the sup port which these great institutions of phUanthropy have needed and deserved, and in whole States prevented their effective organization. Eomish bigotry contends for the right of exclusive educa tion from public funds, that chUdren, not merely their own, but as many others as they can control, may be educated Catholics at the public expense. The Government of the States generally treats them as Americans. It makes no objections to denominational schools; but they cannot be the public schools which the people, as Americans, support. Taxes must be equal and privUeges equal under the law. Differences may exist, and be provided for by individuals and churches; but, as States and a General Government, we 440 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. can know but one class, and they are citizens. We can have but one basis of taxation, and that is the public interest ; ahd but one obligation, and that is to afford equal privileges to all. Of course, just so far as the anti-American idea of exclusive Eoman-Catholic education at the expense of the State extends. It interferes with our noble scherae of equal educational privUeges. It is a disguised or open public en emy of a fundamental part of our free institutions. The contest on this issue is not yet concluded. Catholics, prop erly Americans, sometimes give expression to the correct Idea of citizenship; contending that their people are not Irish, not German, not Italian, but American. Foreign in fluence and the hereditary bigotry of the sect, however, for bid this growing feeling to adjust itself to our system of free schools. The patronage received from this source is, therefore, quietly extended or reluctantly tolerated by the priests, because it cannot be prevented. Notwithstanding these adverse influences, public schools are moving forward with free thought, and under the pro tection of the enlightened public opinion which they so powerfully aid In forming. Their progress may be seen not only in the Increasing millions who attend them, but in the extension of the system Into parts of the country where they have been before unknown, and In the improved build ings and grounds appropriated to them. So strong are they becoming In the affections of the people, that any amount of money may be had for their convenience and enlargeraent. The country schoolhouse is now generally found to be a neat and comraodious buUding, with finely- cultivated and shaded grounds about it; and, not unfre quentiy, the conveniences of the gyranasium are beginning to appear, showing an appreciation of physical with intel lectual education. This is particularly true of the cities. Some of our common-school houses are magnificent struc tures, costing as high as a hundred thousand dollars, and even more. DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 441 The branches taught in the common schools are increas ing, and raising the general standard of education in our midst. Not merely reading and orthography, geography and writing, arithmetic and grararaar, but the higher Eng lish, the natural sciences, mathematics, and the languages, are taught most thoroughly. Our graded schools have all the advantages of classification and division of labor, affording opportunity for graduation from the lowest section of the primary to the high school, which Is frequently a first-class academy, fitting our children well for college or for business- life ; and all without charge to the pupil. It is falsely alleged by Eomanists that these are Infidel schools. It Is true, they do not teach sectarian Christianity ; but they are thoroughly imbued with the great fundamental principles of the true religion. The Bible is very frequent ly read as a part of the opening services of the school, and most appropriately used as a text-book ; and the children absorb from this great common revelation, as well as from other text-books, and from the devout minds of many of their teachers, true ideas of God, revelation, and the duties of morality and piety. In many of these schools, prayer Is devoutly offered, and the spirit of true worship slowly Imparted. The Lord's Prayer is devoutly repeated in con cert; and the singing — a frequent daily exercise — brings out the glowing sentiment of gratitude and love for the Saviour of men. True Christianity Is so extensively diffused among the masses, that it comes in like the sunlight through the pores of society, and diffuses its genial influences through the schools. The great leaders of public education are very generally devout Christians ; and our common education Is thus becoming largely, and in the best sense. Christian. The feeUng of Invidious caste is gradually wearing away, and the children of the wealthiest and best citizens are not unfrequently found In our public schools. As one of the strong historical facts of the Eepublic, it 66 442 THE GREAT BEPUBLIC. should be stated that large numbers of our best business and public men have received their education only from the common schools ; while multitudes of scholars and literary men are indebted to this fundamental American institution for their thoroughness in higher academic and collegiate education. The larger benefits of the common-school sys tem appear, however. In the fact of their pervading, quiet influence upon the citizenship of our country ; the general intelligence and elevation they impart to the freemen upon whom the elective franchise and the government of the nation devolve rendering it morally impossible to deceive, and finally wrest from our patriot princes, the people, the liberties which, by reading, song, instruction, and prayer, become the high trust of each individual and of the whole combined. It would seem almost unnecessary to suggest to the American people the sacred duty of guarding and de veloping their public schools as the source of patriotic devotion, and the indispensable means of high Christian civilization. If it were possible to conceive of the wreck of this system upon the rock of sectarian bigotry, we might well say the days of the Eepublic are numbered. SUNDAY SCHOOLS. The Sunday school has, beyond question, become in America a truly national institution. No man writes a true history of the United States who fails to give It prominent position. As a legitimate product of the great revival of spiritual religion, — first in England, and then in America, — it seemed very humane to assemble poor children together on the Lord's Day, and teach them to read. It was most fortunate, that, to the devout Christian minds engaged in this benevolent enterprise, the Holy Scriptures should be at once regarded as the appropriate text-book for the more advanced among the chUdren. Soon, quite naturally, por tions of these sacred revelations were committed to memory, DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 443 lessons were explained, and the most happy results were seen in the true conversion and great moral improvement of many of the children. As the efforts of good men and women extended, the in stitution began to assume definite form, and the plans of God In regard to it became raore evident. It was seen at length to arise directly out of the Church, to be a legiti mate outgrowth of Christianity, an Institution of God, and thoroughly organic as a grand department of missionary labor and effective discipleship. The Sunday school thus comes in appropriately to supple ment the pubhc schools. It is free to all, It uses In a proper manner holy time, its labors are a noble charity, and It be comes more eminently and distinctly religious than the com mon school can be. It is universally known that children who attend these schools will be taught sacred history and geography, the fall and sinfulness of man, the redemption of the world by Jesus Christ, the divine agency of the Holy Spirit in the production of goodness, the regeneration of man, and the hope of everlasting life ; the extreme wicked ness of idolatry, theft, murder, adultery, and Sabbath-break ing; the propriety and duty of penitence, and faith in the Saviour of the world ; membership in the Church of Christ, and a life of strict honesty, holiness, and love. They will be gradually raised to noble views of God and duty, to the highest conceptions of private and public virtue ; and from purest motives they wiU be led, so far as practicable, to be come genuine patriots and broad-minded phUanthropists. And all this, not from mere human instruction, but from the legitimate appropriation of forces coming directly from God in answer to many fervent prayers, resulting in true conviction for sin, and genuine conversion by the power of the Holy Spirit, through the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ. So far as this extends, the reformation, both of character and manners, among these children, becomes radical, and truly astonishing. The legitimate result Is not to make 444 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. them Sunday scholars of another grade, not to produce any new independent organization, but to lead thera directly into the visible Church of God. From the Sunday schools come the best instructed, most Intelligent, reliable Christians of the age ; and we behold here the grand nursery of the Church of the future. But a still wider Influence goes out from this great provi dential institution. On the sabbath, the education of the week is extended Into Its legitimate sphere, imbued more deeply with the spirit of right and of justice ; and its defects are measurably supplied. Like a diffusible stimulant, the Inspirations of the Sunday school enter every organ and tis sue of the body politic ; and who would question its health- giving power ? Through the more thoughtful and devout, negligent and wicked children come to feel the wrong of sin, and the duty of a holy life. Through the children, the parents come to be largely impressed with the value of the Bible, the worth of the soul, and the need of a Saviour. Thus, through the Sunday school, quiet missionary influences reach the courts and lanes, the garrets and cellars, of our crowded cities ; the sick and the poor are relieved, and the ignorant are instructed ; not unfrequently other schools, and even churches, are founded ; thus showing the pioneer agency of this institution in the hands ofthe Church. Young people learn to love the sabbath and the privUeges of the sanctuary, the Bible-class, and the company of the good, and are here comparatively guarded against the attractive and ruinous Influences of popular sinful pleasures. Thus teach ers and officers are provided for Sunday schools, and the Institution re-acts powerfully and usefully upon itself Thus scholars, writers, professional men, and statesmen become Imbued with the spirit of truth and justice, and the great public functions of popular sovereignty become healthful, free, and powerful in their action ; a broad-minded philan thropy becomes prevalent, and at length national. We affirm that these are not only the legitimate, but the DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 445 actual historical results of thorough Sunday-school instruc tion, under the guidance of the Church, as a part of the great whole of religious influence, and a method of moral power now clearly providentially indicated. It requires, therefore, no great sagacity to see that the institution has already become a part and a mode of the national life ; that it has ceased to be experimental, and has becorae historical ; and that both those who raake and those who write history must recognize this vitalizing force of the modern ages. Those who Ignore or neglect this great power in this last half of the nineteenth century are unhistorical. And especially must the present and future development of the Eepublic of Liberty depend upon this and all other forms of culture which purify the heart, correct the judgment, and recognize God as the great Sovereign of mind, and Source of moral power. Let It not be deemed strange, therefore, that this institu tion is slowly correcting its own mistakes, gradually per fecting its course of study, and making Its literature ; and that great public men in the United States, governors and judges, senators and assembly-men, learned gentlemen and splendid women, as well as the most humble, are sitting down humbly every Lord's Day before- their classes of little ones, rich and poor, to give and receive lessons from the word of God. The Sunday school is one grand reliance for the Christian culture of freemen, and the constitution of a pure, exalted statesmanship. It is, we repeat, truly national In the United States of America. In 1786, Bishop Asbury, of the Methodist -Episcopal Church, established the first Sunday school proper on the Western Continent In 1861, the number of Sunday-school children in the Eepublic was estimated to be considerably above three mUUons. Since that time, the numbers in attend ance have Increased rapidly ; the Sunday-school force of the Methodists alone having reached over a million and a half 446 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ' It is even more Important to state, that the institution is revealing more distinctly its organic Ufe. It rises up as the great training department of the Church, full of energy and missionary power. Its graded classes and normal discipline give It order In " theory and practice," and secure perma nence as weU as rapid development Let American states men and philanthropists cherish the Sunday school. ACADEMIES. The word "academy," as commonly used in this country, has a peculiar meaning. It applies to intermediate institutions between common schools and colleges. We have seen, that, in our public schools, the highest grade reaches the acade mies, and becomes, to some extent, a scientific and classical school, actually free to aU. The growing intelUgence of our chUdren and young people of both sexes, however, requires institutions of higher grade ; and they are found in nearly every county, and especially at the centres of distinct com munities. In buildings of great beauty and convenience, with regular gradations of studies and classes.' They are under the direction of teachers and executive officers generally well educated, sometimes masters of their respective sciences and of the art of teaching ; thus furnishing to our more aspiring and promising young people a sound symmetrical education, which answers a good purpose for business and professional life, or a preparation for college. In all these Institutions, the languages, the natural sciences, and mathematics are taught, and In some of them with great thoroughness. Their students number from perhaps thirty to five hundred each, many of whora remain from one to three years, and others for even a longer period, going through a practical or preparatory course of great value, and securing a mental drill and development which give them great power In the future. The number of students now annually issuing from our academies, seminaries, and DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 447 coUegiate institutes, is becoming so large as to perceptibly elevate the average range of general intelligence and the standard of national character. Germany raight as well do without her gymnasium as America without her academy. These institutions are sometimes founded and supported by the counties and municipalities, and partially endowed by the State ; but much more generally they are erected by the churches. The great Christian denominations, while they omit from their courses of instruction and discipline every thing which is peculiarly sectarian, feel the obligation Imper ative to provide liberally for the education of their own chil dren and the general public under the thorough transforming Influence of Christianity. They insist that true education must recognize God and his holy word ; must present Christ in the atoneraent, and the Holy Ghost in regeneration, as the restorer of heart and Intellect and volition to their ori ginally-intended righteousness. While, therefore, they seek thus to guard against infidel demoralization in the higher training of their young men and women, they look for the divine blessing upon their schemes of science and true wis dom. The churches expend large sums of money, freely given by the rich and the poor, to build, and, at least in part, endow, these Institutions. It is a form of Christian enter prise in which their very best minds, lay and clerical, expend their most sacrificing and consecrated efforts, not unfre quently for a lifetime, actually to rear the national fabric in soundness, strength, and beauty. These schools, to a greater or less extent under the patronage of the evangelical churches, have ceased to be regarded as ecclesiastical estab lishments for local or sectarian purposes, and come to be considered, as they really are to a large degree, great public vitalizing forces In every commonwealth for the proper cul ture of the rising generation, the growth of the State, and the exaltation of the Eepublic. Thus, In the most enlightened as well as the darkest age 448 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of the world, the Church appears as the grand conservator of learning, the regenerator of society, and the strength of the nation. We also use the word " academy " in its higher sense. The Military Academy at West Point ; the Araerican Academy of Arts and Sciences, Boston, founded In 1780 ; the Connec ticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, founded In 1799 ; the Academy of Natural Science, Philadelphia, founded In 1818 ; the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, established in 1807 ; the National Academy of Design, and the Medical Acaderay, at New York, — are all institutions of high grade for improvement In the arts and sciences. The historical, classical use of the term " academy " is not so frequent here as on the continent of Europe. It is, however, sometimes applied generally to all the higher institutions of learning. COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES. In a former part of this work, we have seen that the broad comraon sense and true statesmanship which regard high mental culture, under the control of religion, as vital to the Commonwealth, came with our fathers to this country. This spirit Incorporated the Bible, the pulpit, the public school, and the college into the very framework of society ; and there, despite the rage of Infidels, Eomanists, and char latans, they have ever since remained, not as dead In opera tive elements, but living, expanding forces, without which the growth of our nation would have been utterly impossible Let any man who doubts the soundness of this conclusion undertake to account for our national development and power, leaving out the Bible, the pulpit, the coraraon school, and the college, and he wUl soon convict himself of inex cusable superficiality and ridiculous narrowness of thou'J'ht and opinion. It cannot be claimed that the greatest wisdom has con troUed our higher educational movements in this countrv. DEyELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 449 We have shown and felt. In this respect as weU as others, the weakening infiuence of ultra democracy. More regard for the general, and not less for the particular, more for the whole, though not less for the local interests of the people, or, in other words, stronger centralization, would have given us fewer but much better colleges and universities, and a much riper, broader scholarship. We have not unfrequently wasted our means by localizing tendencies and divisions, thus producing a large number of colleges and universities quite unworthy of the name If we have In this manner subjected ourselves to just criti cism, and even damaging ridicule, we have, nevertheless. Increased our academic popular power, and done In this what we do In every thing, — allowed the free range of facts and elective affinities to correct our opinions and revise our actions. We have learned, to some extent, where are our true centres, and what are our true methods. We are slowly accumulating the logic of age: for though our history Includes but a sraall number of years, and denies us the moral force of a venerable antiquity, the rush of events in our new country crowds our brief years with so large a number of facts, and so much vitahzing force, that time, actuaUy brief, becomes virtually long ; and It is no vain boast that we are much older than our years. It will be found to be historical at length, as it certainly is philosophical, that republican liberty rapidly multiplies the ages by its powerful attractions of wisdom and facts, the vigor of its thinking, the reckless ness of its ventures, and the velocity of Its movements. These strange elements of a new measurement of duration are gradually coming to the surface; but they are only beginning to be recognized by thinkers In America and Europe. They wiU force their own acknowledgment when a few years have gone by, and It comes to appear, that In vitalizing power. If not in the numbers of their alumni, Yale and Michigan are older than Cambridge and Oxford. The State and the Church are separate in America, and 57 450 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. SO they will ever remain ; while religion and political wisdom in Europe will slowly approach, aiid finally reach, the Ameri can standard of moral freedom in all the great conditions of Christian progress. In the mean time, the two great thoughts and facts, the Church and the State, are slowly revealing their common Identity of Ufe, development, and mission. In the spirit of this truth, wherever In this country the State Institutes a college or university. Christian life fills and develops It, or it dies. Wherever the Church organizes a college or university, the State incorporates it, and some times (more rarely heretofore than it will hereafter) assists in endowing or supporting it with the Christian wealth of a Christian State ; and whether Its patronage Includes money or land, or only Influence, It absorbs the rising goodness and talent, the public virtue and power, which the Church, through her institutions, generates. Hence it is that we can not know education nor the State, in the Great Eepublic, apart from the Influence of the Church. Here therefore, as elsewhere, we are not surprised to find the Church, In her evangelical departments, the great organ izer and inspirer of educational enterprise. The Bible, prayer, and regeneration come in to give life and direction to study and training; and consciously or unconsciously, officially or unofficially, the highest Institutions of learning In America take their mould and receive their distinction from ecclesiastical life and action. Let the following table of facts illustrate these remarks. It is imperfect ; but, com pUed by the Andover, Lane, and Chicago Societies of Inquiry, it is reliable for the purposes of this discussion. Colleges. AmherstAlleghany AppletonBates . Beloit . Bowdoin Professors Conversions Ministry Students. of Religion. during Year. in View 218 151 50 38 93 27 26 319 75 10 15 48 31 13 194 92 21 44 121 38 13 DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 451 Professors Conversions Ministry Colleges. Students. of Eeligion. during Year. in View. Brown University . . . 190 130 4 50 Burlington 99 22 6 Chicago University 280 75 30 Cornell 516 150 102 9 Columbia 65 15 11 Dartmouth 234 100 20 20 Dickinson 120 80 40 20 Eleutheria 32 5 Genesee 81 55 19 Hamline 339 155 25 10 Hanover 39 15 Harvard . 419 80 24 Hamilton . 164 78 11 42 Hlinois Wesleyan Universi ty 298 95 30 15 Indiana State University 253 50 21 4 Indiana, Asbury . 368 Kenyon . 143 48 31 Louisburg 95 59 33 Madison . 130 102 10 74 Marietta . 46 27 McKendree . . 130 17 19 11 Miami . . 67 18 Michigan . 280 121 19 Middlebury , . . 53 20 1 12 New Jersey . . 232 69 50 North-western University 135 85 60 Oberlin 1,145 624 200 Ohio, Wesleyan 162 118 100 73 Otterbein . 225 90 20 10 Rutgers . 105 46 3 25 Shurtleff . 185 150 5 61 Pennsylvania . . 104 65 18 48 Trinity . . 59 41 18 Union . . 150 44 8 18 Vermont University . 38 18 5 2 Wabash 150 48 40 17 Washington and Jeflferson 142 82 3 47 Western Reserve . 126 59 25 10 Wesleyan University 133 114 40 Wilberforce University 42 24 6 Williams 190 118 30 18 Yale . 500 229 40 452 TELE GREAT REPUBLIC. To a very large extent, the intelligent liberality inspired by our holy religion has produced these institutions; and they are hence thoroughly pervaded by the religious spirit With what propriety, therefore, is one day In every year devoted by the evangelical churches to fervent prayer to God for his blessing on the colleges of our land ! Our universities are generally colleges, and not, as on the continent of Europe, a higher grade for advancing the education of graduates from the gymnasium or college ; nor, as in England, grand corporations, including colleges, fellowships, sinecures, professorships, and their ancient and peculiar traditions. We have, however, several universities, including schools of law, medicine, and divinity. Learning in America, it may be conceded. Is rather gen eral than great or profound ; but we can claim an increasing number of scholars who are recognized and felt throughout the scientiflc and literary world. THE PRESS. In 1822, Lord John Eussell mentioned before the House of Lords "the multiplication and improvement in news papers, as gratifying evidences of the augmented wealth and expanding culture of the middle classes in Great Britain." Some eighty years later, Mr. Kennedy said of America, " A free press has become the representative, and, for the masses, the organ, of that free speech which is found indis pensable to the development of truth, either in the rehgious, the political, the literary, or the scientific world." Both these remarks are now receiving their fulfilment in the United States. Our periodical literature has become one of our grand "popular educators;" and the "augmented wealth and expanding culture " of our free citizens have given, at the same time, evidence of the power of a free press, and scope for the development of its power. The United States has been caUed "a newspaper-reading na- DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 453 tion." In 1860, we published 4,051 papers and periodicals, amounting to 927,951,548 copies, valued at $39,678,043; which would be 34.36 copies to each white man, woman, and child of the country. Our book-printing amounted to $11,843,459 ; job-work, to $7,181,213. In twenty States, — New England, Western, and Middle, and the District of Columbia, — the work of the press. In its various depart ments, reached, in the single year 1860, $39,678,043. The increase of this power is beyond all parallel. A single religious publishing-house has turned out more than twelve bound books a minute for every working minute of a year ; an Indication of the reading-matter actually demanded and paid for by the American people. It is of little avail to attempt to estimate the power of the press in this Eepublic. It has its vicious elements ; is seized by infidels, Eomanists, spiritists, and demagogues to mislead the people for selfish ends, or to promote a perverted class interest. Blit this exceptional use of the great power of the nineteenth century does by no means render Its free dom questionable, or its influence, as a whole, pernicious. Its teachings, good and bad. Illustrate the freedom of true re publicanism ; while its collisions of mind and principle reveal the safety of free discussion, and bring out with enhanced power all the great doctrines of liberty. Licentiousness in the press as well as in every thing else must, of course, be suppressed ; but the Americans are sensitive with regard to any other limitations. The purest and noblest in our nation say, " Let the battle go on ; let error and fiction war with truth; let the selfish passions of leaders and parties dash against the fortress of liberty ; let infidehty and superstition assault the pure principles of the gospel and the true church of God : there is no dano-er." ' Truth, crushed to earth, will rise again ; The eternal years of God are hers : While Error, wounded, writhes in pain, And dies amid her worshippers." 454 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. In the art of printing, the Americans have made great Improvements. Conceding priority in experimental inven tions for stereotyping to Vander Mey in Leyden, Ged of Edinburgh, M. Firmin Didot, France, and the Earl of Stan hope, England, it may be affirmed that American genius has carried the art to Its highest present point of utility. The same may be clairaed in regard to electrotyping, an Impor tant branch of electro-metallurgy ; a department of industrial art, the power of which, for convenience, beauty, economy, and despatch, cannot be regarded as yet fully developed. Type-setting and distributing-machines. Invented by Wil liam H. Mitchell of New York, and C. W. Felt of Salem, Mass., Indicate the labor-saving power of genius, and mark the progress of practical art in America. Perhaps nothing more distinctly Indicates this progress than the contrast between the printing-press used by Frank lin, and preserved In Washington as a sacred relic, and the rapid power-press of to-day. England, through the inven tive genius of WUliam Nicholson In 1790, may claim the honor of commencing experiments which led to the inven tion of power-presses. Friederich Konig of Saxony, begin ning In 1804 under the patronage of T. Bentley and E. Taylor of London, made vigorous efforts in this direction, but did not reach practical success. He abandoned the at tempt to work a hand-press by power. He, however, by the help of A. F. Bauer, a German of Stuttgard, made fur ther experiments; and Nov. 28, 1814, "The London Times" was printed on a steam-press constructed secretly by these Germans. Cowper and Applegath, both Englishmen, gave new form and considerable advancement to this important department of mechanlsra ; producing a cylinder-press which struck oflf six thousand two hundred copies per hour, and worked daily for raore than ten years. In the mean time, " Isaac Adams of Boston, Mass., took up the problem abandoned by Konig, of working a hand- DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 455 press by power, and succeeded in making the machine de scribed In his patents of 1830 and 1836." The success realized by Mr. Adams in these experiments was largely In advance of his predecessors. But to Eichard M. Hoe, of New York, the world is in debted for complete succes.s. In 1847, he made " a perfect machine, on the cylinder of which the types are held by friction between bevelled column-rules." Thus at length was produced a complete revolution in the art of printing. " The ten-cylinder presses, such as are used in New York and London by the leading journals, strike oflf fifteen thousand Impressions per hour. They are only eraployed for news papers of large circulation." Setting types by machines, stereotyping, electrotyping, the use of power-presses, and the statistics of the periodical and book trade, sufficiently prove that the Americans are a reading people. STEAM-NAVIGATION. When Watt brought his great invention of the steam- engine to practical perfection, men were by no means aware of the revolution it would produce in the navigation and locomotion of the world. Before its power could be appreciated or applied, numerous unsuccessful efforts would, of course, be made. Experiment ers in England and France up to 1730, Jonathan Hull in 1736, the Count d'Auxiron, the Perlers, the Marquis de Jouflfry, and M. des Blancs, from 1774 to 1796, made praise worthy efforts, but with no practical results. John Fitch of Pennsylvania, in 1786, succeeded in propeUIng a smaU sklflf by steam, and in subsequent attempts, in 1790, on the Dela ware, obtained so much success as to justly entitle him to the credit of establishing the practicability of steam-navigation ; but his efforts fell short of the complete triumph which seemed to be just before him. Eumsey of Virginia, on the Potomac in 1787, and in England in 1793, made progress In 456 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. this direction. Enough had been done prior to the experi ments of MiUer and Symington in Scotiand, In 1788, to secure to Araerica the claim of priority In this great discovery, so clearly as never to have been successfully controverted. Chan cellor E. E. Livingstone of New York, Oliver Evans of PhU adelphia, and John Stevens of Hoboken, N. J., made experi ments which rendered still clearer the practicability of future success, but did not quite reach it. Well, therefore, was It remarked by the committee of the first Universal Exhibition in 1851, that " many persons in various countries claim the honor of having first invented sraall boats propelled by steara ; but it is to the undaunted perseverance and exertions of the American Fulton that is due the everlasting honor of having produced this revolu tion both In naval architecture and navigation." In " The Clermont " of " a hundred and sixty tons burden, a hun dred and thirty feet long, eighteen feet wide, and seven feet deep, on the morning of Aug. 7, 1807, Fulton, with a few friends and mechanics and six passengers, started from New York for Albany, leaving on the shore an incredulous and jeering crowd." This was the first steamboat excursion in the world. It was successful, and commenced a new era In navigation and commerce, rendering the name of Eobert Fulton iraraortal, and conferring imperishable honor upon the country which gave him birth. Stevens came very near anticipating his great countrymen In the credit of their success. His competing steamer, forced to avoid the New-York waters by the monopoly granted by the legislature to Livingstone and Fulton, pushed out boldly into the Atlantic, and reached Philadelphia In safety; thus becoming the pioneer in ocean steam-navigation. " In 1818, 'The Savannah,' a New-York-buUt ship, with side-wheels, and propelled by steam and sails, crossed the Atlantic to St. Petersburg, via Liverpool ; reaching the latter place, direct from New York, In twenty-six days, and returning in safety." Thus to Araerican genius and daring belongs the first honor DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 457 of the great revolution in ocean-navigatioti, as well as that on internal waters. In fifty years from the first trip of " The Clermont " on the Hudson, the number and influence of steamboats and steamships had exceeded computation. The world is alive with the quickened activity which has resulted to mind and commerce. Time, beyond computation, is saved in the transaction of business. The style of convenience in moving over the waters, and the nearer approach of nations, con tribute to general improvement in civUization and the real ized brotherhood of man. In all this we cannot faU to see the distinct manifestation of God. His were the waters and caloric ; his the timber, the metals, and the fuel •; his the mind and the muscle. He made them all, and controlled the time and the place of their mysterious combinations ; thus revealing clearly his purpose, in the colonization and government of this country, to advance the race boldly beyond all former standards and methods of civilization. RAILROADS. To England fairly belongs the first honor of this great invention and the use of steam-locomotives. The begin nings, of course, were very small and rude ; but they demon strated the fact that steam-power could be rendered available for impelling carriages and removing freight on land. The development of this power has been very rapid both in Europe and America. It began In this country in 1829 ; and the decade Immediately under review marks a splendid advance in this great method of civilization and progress. Previous to 1850, our railroads " sustained only an unim portant relation to the internal commerce of the country. Nearly all the lines then in operation were local or Isolated works, and neither in extent nor design had begun to be formed into that vast and connected system, which, like a web, now covers every portion of our wide domain, enabling 58 458 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. each work to contribute to the traffic and value of all, and supplying metos of locomotion and a market, almost at his own door, for nearly every citizen of the United States." Only one line of road, the various links of the New-York Central, connected the tide-waters of the East with the great internal basins of the country ; and this was encurabered with such tolls In the Interest of the Erie Canal, as to amount to an embargo on freight. The next line, extending from Boston to Ogdensburg, was completed within the year 1850. The New-York and Erie was next; and this was opened April 22, 1851. The next was the Pennsylvania, which completed its " mountain divis ion In 1854." The Baltimore and Ohio, fifth in time, was opened in 1853. " The Tennessee Elver, a tributary of the Mississippi, was reached In 1850 by the Western and Atlan tic Eailroad of Georgia; and the Mississippi Itself, by the Memphis and Charleston Eailroad, in 1859. In the extreme North, the Atlantic and St Lawrence, now known as the Grank Trunk, was completed early in 1853. In 1858, the Virginia system was extended to a connection with the Mem phis and Charleston and with the NashvIUe and Chattanooga Eailroads." "The eight great works named, connecting the interior with the seaboard, are the trunks or base lines upon which Is erected the .vast systera that now overspreads the whole country. They seem as outlets to the Interior for Its prod ucts, which would have little or no commercial value with out improved highways, the cost of transportation over which does not equal one-tenth of that of our ordinary roads." The foUowing will exhibit the nuraber of miles of rail roads constructed In ten years, from 1850 to 1860 : lacrcaso in Ten Years. Miles. . 237.22 . 89.92 . 190.74 1,162.91 Increase in States. Ten Years. States. Miles. Maine • 226.58 Massachusetts New Hampshire . . . 191.27 Rhode Island Vermont 277.18 Connecticut Nqw-Endand States . . . DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 459 States. New York . New Jersey . Pennsylvania DelawareMaryland . ¦ Increase in Ten Yeara. HiLES. 1,298.74 353.97 1,620.15 97.50 126.90 Middle Atlantic States . 3,497.26 Virginia . North Carolina . South Carolina . Georgia . Florida . . 1,256.01 640.92 698.97760.50 380.50 Southern Atlantic States, 3,736.90 Alabama . . . 610.66 Mississippi . . . 797.30 Louisiana . ... 255.25 Texas 306.00 Gulf States .... 1,969.21 Arkansas 38.50 Tennessee .... 1,197.92 Kentucky . . . 489.72 Interior States South . 1,726.14 States. Ohio . . . Indiana . MichiganIllinois Wisconsin . Minnesota . Iowa . Kansas . . Interior States North Increase In Ten Years. Miles. California .... Oregon Pacific States New-England States . Middle Atlantic States Southem Atlantic States Gulf States . . . Interior States South . Interior States North . Pacific States . . . Total in United States 2,325.481,897.90 457.30 2,757.40 902.61 679.67 9,020.36 70.05 3.80 73.85 1,162.91 3,497.263,736.90 1,969.211,726.14 9,020.36 73.85 21,186.63 Let the reader observe that we began this ten years with 8,588.79 miles of railroad in operation in the whole United States, costing |296,260,128 ; during the progress of the de cade, we increased 21,186.63 miles, at a cost of $838,192,781 ; making 29,775.42 mUes of road, costing $1,134,452,909. This progress is so great, that we cannot extend our concep tions or reason so as fully to grasp and comprehend it In the decades to come, additions will be still more incompre hensible. These roads, it was estimated by Mr. Kennedy, "trans ported in the aggregate at least eight hundred and fifty tons of merchandise per annum to the mile of road In operation. Such a rate would give twenty-six million tons as the total 460 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. annual tonnage of railroads for the whole country. If we estimate the value of this tonnage at a hundred and fifty dollars per ton, the aggregate value of the whole would be three billion nine hundred million dollars. Vast as this com merce is, more than three-quarters of it has been created since 1850. Up to the close of 1866, we had extended our lines so as to reach 36,890 miles ; making about thirty-eight per cent of all the railroads in the world. In all Europe there are 50,117 miles, in North and South America 40,866 miles, in Asia 3,660 miles, in Great Britain and Ireland 13,286 miles, In France 3,082, and in Prussia 5,704, miles of rail road. In the United States there are eighty-one square miles to each mile of railroad, and a mile of railroad to each thousand inhabitants. In Great Britain and Ireland, the proportion is nine miles of area to one of railroad, and one mile of road to each 2,189 of population ; and in France the ratio Is twenty-four square railes, and 4,172 of population, to one mile of railroad. One of the two grandest enterprises of the age is the Trans continental Eailroad connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and bringing America and Asia Into neighborhood relations. The Union Pacific Eailroad is now rapidly moving westward. It reached the Eocky Mountains in September, 1867, — a distance of five hundred and seventeen miles from Omaha, Nebraska, where it connects with the great Eastern systems of roads centring at St Louis, Chicago, Boston, and New York. The California Central is buUding from the Pacific Ocean, eastward, to meet the Union Pacific ; and they have already tunnelled the Sierra Nevadas, and hasten to meet their Eastern co-laborers at the earliest possible mo ment. By this road. New York is within a week of San Francis co ; and, by steam, Asia is within twenty-eight days of our great port on the Pacific. With these connections, the vast trade of Europe with Eastern Asia must cross this continent. DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 461 and San Francisco and New York be raised to a position of commercial enterprise heretofore unequalled. This vast work was boldly coraraenced by the United States in the raidst of our gigantic civil war. Individual capital is munificentiy aided by the government with a grant of twelve thousand eight hundred acres of land to every mile of road ; to which are added United-States bonds, for the least expensive portion, sixteen thousand dollars per raile ; the next class, thirty-two thousand doUars; and, for the mountain section, forty-eight thousand dollars per mUe. This immense undertaking is now (faU of 1867) more than half completed. The cars will doubtless pass from ocean to ocean early in the year 1870. In the mean time, American genius has rapidly iraproved the comfort of railroad travelling. We may now at our pleasure enjoy our saloons and refreshments in the splendid cars fitting up for this and other roads ; and, when weary, at night we can retire to our state-rooms, and enjoy our repose, and wake in the morning to find that we have moved as rapidly and safely in the hours of sleep as in the day. THE SAFETY STEAM-GENERATOR. We have not reached the highest perfection in the use of steam. Invention and discovery ought to reduce the bulk and expense of steam-apparatus, and secure us against the possibility of explosions. In this connection, it gives us great pleasure to introduce to our readers a recent Invention by our fellow-countryman, Thomas Mitchell of Albany, N.Y., which promises to accomplish these invaluable results. It has been examined and fully indorsed by scientific men and practical engineers. John Johnson, LL.D., Professor of Natural Science in the Wesleyan University at Middle- town, Conn., in a letter to the inventor, says, " Having been favored with an opportunity to witness the working of your recently-invented safety steam-generator, I take pleasure in 462 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. expressing my views of it The Irapression made upon my mind is altogether favorable ; and, if I may not affirm posi tively that It Is the greatest invention of the age, I can say, conscientiously, that I believe it will have the effect very considerably to Increase the importance and value of steam as a motive-power, by diminishing both the cost of its per fection and the danger of its use. I am happy to say that I consider your Invention one of great importance and Inter est, as it cannot fail of coming into general use very soon." Other testimonials express the same and even stronger convictions, without reservation. I have seen the movement of this beautiful invention as employed in working machine ry; and I cannot see how it can fail to revolutionize the whole system of available steam-power in mechanism, loco motion, and steam-navigation. From the following descrip tion by the Inventor, the reader will receive a clear idea of the steara-generator : — " This generator takes the place of steam-boilers. Its con struction Is simply a cast-iron cylinder, lying horizontally within a furnace ; which furnace is formed of two-eighths of an inch wroughtrlron plates riveted together, with a space between of about one inch. This space is kept filled with water, thus protecting the Iron case from the effects of the heat. The water thus heated is pumped Into the generator. From this water, there is an open pipe into the air, so that no pressure is possible. The generator is made to rotate by the steam-pump, making about two revolutions per minute over the fire in the furnace ; thus securing an equal tempe rature in its metal, and, of course, obviating the injurious effects of unequal expansion and contraction, and therefore giving it the greatest possible durabUIty. One of these cylinders of ten-horse power is only thirty inches long by twenty diameter. There Is a valve constructed like a safety- valve, on which a scale of .figures Is made. A spring, or weight, is placed on any of these, giving any number of pounds of water-pressure desired. The pump is kept con- DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 463 stantly in operation. There Is a half-Inch water-pipe passing through the trunnions of the generator horizontally, which does not revolve, made tight by stuffing-boxes, and contain ing holes on its upper side about two Inches apart, and about a sixteenth of an inch in size. The water, passing into the generator through this pipe, becomes so highly heated, that It foams out of these little nozzles, and, coming in contact with the surrounding highly-heated steam, becomes steam itself before touching the metal of the generator. Suppose It is desired to run at sixty pounds of steam : the water- valve is set at this figure. The generator Is now heated to a degree which will convert the water let into it immediately Into steam : thus sixty pounds of steara is produced In about five seconds. This pressure, being equal to the water- pressure, prevents the introduction of any more water ; and, there being no water in the generator from which to make steam, the steam cannot rise above the sixty pounds, and that, too, without regard to the degree of heat In the furnace. The two pressures, being thus equally balanced, render ex plosions impossible. Now, as the steam-pressure Is reduced by use, that remaining lets just water enough into the gene rator to keep up the corresponding pressure, thereby secur ing a steady supply of steam without regard to the quantity being used, and limited only by the amount of water a given size of cyUnder is capable of converting into steam." TELEGRAPHY. Telegraphic communication began by the use of signals. Eoman generals and North-American Indians alike avaUed themselves of this convenient method of overcoming distance and time. Fires, flags, symbols formed of blocks of wood, illuminated letters, figures, telescopes, and mirrors were among the means adopted for this purpose. The way for' the electric telegraph was prepared by the discovery, " about the year 1729, that the shock could bf. 464 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. transmitted long distances through conducting media with great rapidity ; " by the invention of the Leyden jar ; the experiments of Franklin ; " firing alcohol by an electric charge, sent through wires, under water, across the Schuyl kill In 1748;" and the Voltaic pile, discovered in 1800. In 1747, Dr. Watson discovered that " the earth Itself and intervening bodies of water might be made use of to com plete the electric circuit" The names of Lesage of Geneva, Lamond of France, Eeizen of Gerraany, Don Francisco Salva, and Sr. Betancourt, are connected .with iraportant experi ments extending frora 1774 to 1797. On the track of this discovery appear the names of Francis Eonalds, England, in 1816; Harrison G. Dyer, New York, In 1827; and Sommer- Ing, Germany, beginning his experiments in 1809. The discoveries In electro-magnetism, commencing with Oersted of Copenhagen In 1819, opened a new era .in the scientific efforts tending to the solution of this important problem. Then appear the names of Schwelgger of Halle ; Ampere of France ; Prof StelnheU of Munich ; Cooke, Wheat- stone, Barlow, and WUliam Sturgeon, of England; all of whom made their contributions to the accumulating elec trical thought of the age. Another stage of progress is distinctly marked by the experiments of Prof Henry, made in Albany, N.Y., in 1828- 1830, greatly multiplying avaUable magnetic force by the use of a covered wire. " The current was so increased in in tensity, that the electric telegraph was at once made practi cable for any distance." Now Baron ScheUing of St Peters burg, CouncIUor Gauss, and Prof Weber of Gottingen, enter the field, bringing their valuable experiments down to 1834. In 1836, Prof Danlell, England, discovered the method of sustaining a continuous current; and Prof Faraday, Eng land, brought forward the Inductive current ; both iraportant steps In advance toward the great practical result destined to distinguish the age In which we live. In 1832, at Havre, on board the packet-ship "Sully," our DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 465 great countryman. Prof Samuel Finley Bruce Morse, con ceived the true Idea of the electro-magnetic telegraph, and proceeded at once to make the drawings, which, after the most thorough legal sifting, have demonstrated his claim to be considered the true inventor of a system of telegraphic communication with all the essential apparatus required to render electro-magnetic and chemical power avaUable In the grand system of telegraphy which now extends throughout the world. Slowly and carefully Prof Morse advanced in the prepara tion of his machine and in practical experiments ; bringing out his invention successfully in New York In 1835, and producing communications through a circuit of half a mile. He then came before the governraent for an official recog nition of his great discovery, but shared the usual fate of genius, — delays and vexations AvhIch seeraed to be endless. Discouraged at home, he went abroad. England and France then had the opportunity of becoming the first great patrons of one of the greatest benefactors of the race ; but they suffered national prejudice, forras, and doubts to deprive thera of this honor. Eeturning to his own government, and passing throuo-h conflicts and trials almost unendurable, he retired, on the last night of the session of 1842-1843, in complete despair. " But in the morning — the morning of March 4, 1843 — he was startled with the announcement, that the desired aid of Congress had been extended In the midnight hour of the expiring session, and thirty thousand dollars placed at his disposal for his experimental essay between Washington and Baltimore. In 1844, the work was com pleted, and demonstrated to the world the practicability and the utility of the Morse system of electro-magnetic tele graphs." * In consequence of these vexatious delays, he was antici pated. In the production of the first actual working telegraph, by Prof C. A. StelnheU of Munich, in 1836. It was brought * Appleton's Cyclopaeclia. 466 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. forward under the patronage of the Bavarian Government, and extended twelve miles, using the earth to complete the circuit About the same time, Mr. WlUiara F. Cooke, a student at Heidelberg, taking his hint frora the experlraents of Prof Moncke, coraraenced a series of experiments, which, through the assistance of Prof Wheatstone, resulted In the English telegraph. The electro-chemical telegraph was brought to this country In 1849 by the inventor, Mr. Alexander Bain. It was a valuable Improvement ; but for legal reasons, and by arrangement, it has been incorporated with the working system of Morse. Prof Wheatstone has continued his labors with Important results. In the mean time, " Mr. Alfred Vail of New York, M. Frornent in France, Eoyal E. House of Vermont, David E. Hughes of Kentucky, and Jacob Bret in Great Britain," Invented printing-telegraphs, which are doubtless of great value in the art The system of Mr. House " is regarded as one of the most wonderful and com plete of the extraordinary Inventions developed by the tele graph." To him belongs the honor of the first printed despatch ever produced upon a telegraph-line. It was sent In the autumn of 1847 from Cincinnati to JeffersonvUle. Experiments are, of course, rapidly progressing. Defects are eliminated and excellences combined, whUe the invention of Prof Morse remains the grand basis of the whole, and the great practical method of telegraphy for the largest portions of the world. Indeed, it is a most unusual thing for any original Inventor to Include so nearly and so fully all the fundamental principles of a great public improveraent as did Prof Morse. The civilized world corabines to recognize his claim, and extend to him the highest honors. From the sovereigns and governments of France, Eussia, Prussia, Swe den, Belgium, Holland, Austria, Sardinia, Tuscany, Eome, Denmark, Spain, and Turkey, and from citizens of England, he has received testimonials of gratitude such as have never been the lot of any American citizen. DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 467 To him also belongs the honor of originating the sub marine telegraph. He " laid the first submarine telegraph- lines in New- York Harbor in the autumn of 1842, and received at the time, from the American Institute, a gold medal for that achievement ; " and it is claimed that the first suggestion of the Atlantic telegraph was made " in a letter from Mr. Morse to the Secretary of the United-States Treas ury, dated Aug. 10, 1843." * I mentioned the Araerican trans-continental railroad as one of the two greatest enterprises of the age. The Atlantic telegraph is unquestionably the other. From the first successful experiments of Mr. Morse in New- York Harbor, submarine telegraphy went on rapidly. The great leading mind in the struggles of twelve years, extend ing from 1854 to July 27, 1866, resulting in placing the Old and the New World in almost instantaneous connection, was Cyrus W. Field, — a name which must ever stand high, not merely in the annals of America, but of the world. Dis tinguished no less for his huralllty than for his high sense of justice, he awards to the great scientific men and noble patrons of progress in England the highest praise for their indispensable co-operation and unparalleled exertions uniting to secure for this great providential movement complete suc cess ; but the world combines to place the crown upon the head of our distinguished fellow-countryman, Cyrus W. Field. It is now wholly unnecessary to trace the steps by which this grand result was reached. It is enough, that, through out the lentrth and breadth of our land, we can read at our homes the great events transpiring in Europe on the same day of their occurrence, and even in anticipation of tirae by the clock. When we consider the genius by which this result has been achieved, and think of FrankUn, Morse, and Field, with their great co-laborers in the field of discovery ; when we * For a full and valuable history of tlie telegraph, I refer the reader to Appleton's Cyclopedia, articles " Telegraph " and " Morse." 468 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. see the gathering neighborhood of nations, and the grand unity of the race coming out of the confusion and strife of six thousand years, — we are constrained to exclaim, in the language Of the first telegraphic despatch in the world's history, penned by an American woman, " What hath God wrought ! " Up to 1866, there were sixty-one Important submarine or telegraph cables, amounting to ten thousand two hundred and thirty-one mUes. The first coraraenced operation in ' 1851 ; but they had, at the above date, accomplished jointly three hundred and thirteen years of telegraphic work. Look, now, at the results of railroad and telegraphic com munication, and behold the literal, of which the spiritual was seen by our great Christian poet a hundred years in advance : — " Mountains rise, and oceans roU, To sever us, in vain." ARCHITECTURE. Civil, military, and naval architecture may be regarded as progressive in the United States. It is treated as belonging to the useful rather than the fine arts. The utUitarian ten dency of the repubhcan mind shows itself in this depart ment of Industry. Our best architects study the practical and useful first, the elegant and beautiful if they have time. Many of them are good mechanics, have buUt houses for the convenience of poor men ; and the developments of genius, lifting them above the toU of handicraft, bringing them into the sphere of the beautiful, have generally been amid the liraitatlons and discipline of poverty and the constant demand for cheap plans and low prices. The achievements of our clever artists are, on this account, the more creditable, and, at the same tirae, the more useful. We, moreover, harmonize with the tendencies of our tiraes. The really grand in architecture seems to belong to other DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 469 ages. The obelisks, pyramids, temples, palaces, and tombs of Egypt wUl never be reproduced nor Imitated in America or elsewhere. The magnificent temples of India, and the grand and Iraposing structures of Greece and Eome, belong wholly to the past Paganism could exceed Christianity in the enormous wastes of power which struggled to symbolize the greatness of their conceptions of the gods. It has long since exhausted its resources in these efforts, and lapsed into barbarism in Its attempts at architecture as well as Its modes of living. The earl};- Christians introduced In their splendid cathedrals a much purer ideal of God and worship, but gave undue position to ornaments in their church architecture and dec orations. This era also, we believe, has departed, not to re turn. There will, probably, be no other specimens of imposing grandeur and inspiring beauty thrown around the simple worship of the Lord Jesus, at all coraparable to those which still remain In Europe the admiration and wonder of trav ellers. The movement in this department of art is away from the physical toward the spiritual. Hence simplicity and beauty have taken the place of grandeur and extravagance ; a fact which shows clearly that America is in harmony with the age. The manifestations of tyranny, which absorb the toil and means of a generation of millions for the aggrandize ment of the sovereign, are superseded by the Christian utili ties, which distribute resources of enjoyment among the masses. Pyramids and cathedrals are the types of the dead past; raUroads, steamboats, telegraphs, chaste, convenient church-edifices, and haUs of learning, the types of the pres ent We have no lamentation for the departure of the symbols of despotism, paganism, and corrupted Christianity, but rather glory in the fact that the Great Eepublic leads the world in the direction of the useful, the beautiful, and the true. This is the direction of democratic freedom and pure Christianity. 4'J^O THE GREAT REPUBLIC. In the mean time, under the control of simple good sense, our artists and artisans, acting In harmony, are keeping pace with the advancing wealth and culture of our people. Palatial residences, fine public buUdings, and especiaUy beautiful houses of state and of worship, are rising up rapidly around us. We can, it is true, show but few specimens of pure Doric, Ionic, or Corinthian ; but we have preserved and used something of the spirit of them all, whUe the semi- Gothic, Old English, Eomantlque, and various composites, are giving an air of wealth and taste to our church and other edifices. PAINTING. We are not disposed to make pretentious claims of prog ress in the fine arts In America. This would be absurd, as we are yet in the infancy of national life. We are quite con tent with the simple truth, which shows a real and relative development of taste worthy of our land and our freedom. In portraits, we began In Boston as early as 1667 ; but, ac cording to Mr. Tuckerinan, the colony now known as Ehode Island was the scene of our earliest art* Here Smybert began his work, and by a copy of a cardinal by Vandyke, placed in Yale-College Gallery, kindled the fires of genius in the soul of young Alston, so famous In a later day. In Pennsyl vania, Benjamin West arose from obscurity to becorae the great representative of Araerican genius, and give distinction to our country by such productions of his master skill as " Christ Eejected," and " Christ healing the Sick." Jarvis, the eccentric nephew of John Wesley, came for ward to attract attention. His " Perry at Lake Erie," and numberless other productions, combined with his genial social qualities to make him a general favorite. The " Ariadne " of Vanderlyn was also " regarded as a miracle of beauty." * It gives us pleasure to refer to "Araerican Artist-Life," by Mr. H. T. Tuckerman, — a new work of great value. We are under special obligations to the publishers, G. P Putnam & Son, for the use of the jiroof-sheets in advance of publication. DEVELOPMENT OP LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 471 " Henry Inman, than whom no votary of the pencil in America had more of the true traits of artist-genius, whose few refined and graceful compositions, and portraits of Wordsworth, Chalmers, Macaulay, and others, araply attest his skill and originality, was cut off in the prirae of his years and his faculties. Thomas Cole, a landscape-painter, as truly alive to the significance of our scenery as a subject of art as is Bryant as one of poetry, and who united graphic pow ers with poetical feeling, had but just reached his meridian when he passed away." * Charles Wilson Peale, an honest mechanic, found the spirit of art stirring within him, and became a student of West ; rose to distinction as a portrait-painter, and contributed much to the progress of art and natural history by his museum In Philadelphia, and his influence In founding the Pennsyl vania Academy of Fine Arts, to seventeen annual exhibitions of which he was a contributor. Eerabrandt Peale, second son of Charles Wilson, added to the reputation of his family and his country by his brUlIant talents as a painter. His " Eoman Daughter," " Court of Death," and portrait of Washington, gave him an enviable fame as a spirited idealist as well as a truthful delineator. The name of Charles Loring EUiott, born in Scipio, N.Y., 1812, has become historical In American art He is justly celebrated for the accuracy of his likenesses. Eraser, Trum bull, Stuart, and Durand have also add^d lustre to the art-. fame of their country. Frederick Edwin Church was born at Hartford, Conn., In 1826. His spirited drawings and briUiant colorings have raised him to the highest po.'iitlon as a representative of American art at horae and abroad. His faraous view of Niagara FaUs, in the judgment of English critics, " in the rush of the waters and the fine atmospheric effects, realizes the idea of sound as well as of motion, and has done more tiian any other of its class to impress Europeans whh a knowledge and * Tuckcrman's American Artist-Life, p. 10. 472 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. appreciation of American art" * But we cannot give even a catalogue of our deserving historical portrait and landscape painters. " Within the last few years, the advance of public taste and the increased recognition of art In this country have been among the most interesting phenoraena of the tiraes. A score of erainent and original landscape-painters have achieved the highest reputations, private collections of pictures have become a new social attraction, exhibitions of works of art have grown lucrative and popular, buildings expressly for studios have been erected, sales of pictures by auction have produced unprecedented sums of money, art-shops are a delectable feature of Broadway, artist-recep tions are favorite re-unions of the winter, and a splendid edifice has been completed devoted to the Academy, and owing its erection to public munificence ; while a school of design Is In successful operation . at the Cooper Institute. Nor is this all : at Eorae, Paris, Florence, and Dusseldorf, as well as at Chicago, Albany, Buffalo, Philadelphia, Boston, and New York, there are native ateliers, schools, or collections, the fame whereof has raised our national character, and en hanced our intellectual resources as a people." f SCULPTURE. , In this department of the fine arts, American genius has reached a very high distinction. A few names are sufficient to represent the progress of our brief history. Horatio Greenough was a native of Boston, born In 1805. He was a natural sculptor from his boyhood. WhUe a col lege-student, he formed the model after which Bunker-hiU Monuraent was constructed. In 1825, he was In Eorae. Here he enjoyed the instructions of Thorwaldsen, but learned more from his fellow-students. At Boston ao-ain. In 1826 we * Appleton's Cyclopaedia, art. " Church, Frederick Edwin.'' t Tuckerman, p. 12. DEVELOPMENT OF LExVRNING AND THE ARTS. 473 find him modeUIng busts of John Quiney Adams, Chief Jus tice Marshall, and others. But soon again he is in Italy, with his residence in Florence. His first marked encouragement came from James Fennimore Cooper, who commissioned him to execute the " Charity Cherubs." This act of Mr. Cooper was highly appreciated, and gratefully acknowledged. From the example and infiuence of this distinguished American he received numerous orders from his countrymen for busts and other pieces of statuary, the most important of which Is the colossal statue of Washington, now standing in the eastern grounds of the Capitol. A memorial of this worthy artist, by Mr. H. T. Tuckerman, has done much to preserve the record of his labors and moral worth. He says, " Horatio Greenough left a void not only In the thin rank of our sculp tors, but among the foremost of Art's InteUigent and eloquent advocates and expositors. Not soon will be forgotten his copious ideas, independent spirit, and genial fellowship. No American artist has written more effectually of the claims and. defects of art-culture among us." Hiram Powers was born in Woodstock, Vt, July 29, 1825. His early life was that of an ordinary American farmer's boy. Aj length he worked his way to Cincinnati, where he showed his mechanical genius and business capacity in connection with a clock-maker. A German sculptor awakened in him the desire to be an artist, and taught him to model in plaster. Then, for seven years, he had the charge of the Western Museum in the wax-work department In 1835, he began at Washington a successful career in modelling busts of dis tinguished men. Then, under the patronage of Nicholas Lo.ngworth, he went to Italy; since which, Florence has been his home. He now needs neither eulogist nor monuraent. His " Eve," " Greek Slave," and " Fisher-Boy," with nuraer- ous other miniature works, give him a world-wide farae, and reflect the highest honor upon his country. He has led the way in departing from the ideal, and embodying in marble a loving devotion to Nature and truth. 474 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Thomas Crawford, a native of New- York City, was bom an artist, March 22, 1814. He began to draw and sketch as soon as he was able to move a pencU. His studies were con ducted first with a wood-engraver ; then with Messrs. Frazer and Launltz, monumental sculptors. In his native city ; and at the school of the National Academy of Design. After pro ducing Indications of talent In portrait busts, he was found at Eome in the summer of 1835. Here he spent several years of the most devoted study and labor in the studio of Thorwaldsen. During this time, his almost incredible devo tion and splendid genius produced many fine pieces, and raised the hopes of his friends to a very high degree. In 1839, he brought out his celebrated " Orpheus." This secured him the patronage of the Hon. Charles Sumner in an order from Boston for a copy in marble, which, exhibited with other works from Mr. Crawford, formed the opening to a career of the greatest success. His studios in the Plaza Barberini were highly attractive to men of genius from all countries. His colossal equestrian statue of Washington, twenty-five feet high, for the State of Virginia ; his grand historical and allegorial pieces ; his figure of Liberty, in group with allegorical representations of the Arts, Commerce, and Civilization, fi)r the new Capitol, — are works of the highest merit FinaUy, the colossal statue of the Genius of America is a fitting crown for the Capitol at Washington and the genius of the artist I cannot deny myself the pleasure of mentioning one other name, — Mr. E. D. Palmer. In the city of Albany is a .quiet studio which any gentleman of taste may feel himself privUeged to enter. It is the home of calm thought, pure sentiment, bold conception, and chaste imagination. It is where the artist studies and toils from pure affection for the beautiful and the true. It is where the "Infant Ceres " throws out the Ught of a soul through marble features; where "The Morning and Evening Star " shine in bass-relief with a soft radiance Indicating the very incarnation of light ; where the DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 475 " Spirit's Flight," with the eyes of the mother resting on the symbol of the atonement, and a true chUd "full of graceful simplicity," fixes the gaze of tenderness and love. Then look at the " Indian GIri." She has found a crucifix, and holds it carefully and inquiringly in her right hand : in her left, loosely held as if forgotten, are the feathers gathered for the adornment of native grace, — beautiful, touching, spiritual. There the '• White Captive" seems ready to speak, whUe you are mute with sympathy and admiration. "The moment chosen by the sculptor is evidently that when the fuU con sciousness of her awful fate is awakened, — perhaps the morning after the capture, when, no longer fearing pursuit, the savages despoil their beautiful victira, and gloat over her anguish. She is no longer breathlessly hurried onward, but standing there In the wilderness, desolate and nude, realizes through every vein and nerve the horrors of her situation ; but virgin purity and Christian faith assert themselves In her soul, and chasten the agony they cannot wholly subdue. Accordingly, while keen distress marks her expression, an inward comfort, an elevated faith, combines with and sub limates the fear and pain. Herein is the triuraph of the artist The ' White Captive ' illustrates the power and inevitable victory of Christian civilization. Not in the face alone, but in every contour of the figure. In the expression of the feet as well as the lips, the same physical subjugation, and moral self-control, and self-concentration are apparent. The ' beauty and anguish walking hand In hand the down ward road to death ' are upraised, intensified, and hallowed by that inward power born of culture, and that elevated trust which comes from religious faith." * These and many other works of exquisite art are only in part the outward manifestations of the inner life of thought and feeling of our fellow-citizen, — Mr. E. D. Palmer, too diffident to allow himself to be named, and yet so far almost unconsciously demonstrative as to add lustre to the future of American art. * Tuckerman's American Artist, "Palmer." 476 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. CompeUed as we are to pause here, we can only ask our readers to stand reverently before the great Creator of mind and genius, and adore the wisdom, the power and love, so richly blended in these splendid creations. photography. This means the art of depicting objects by means of light Priestley seems to have been the first to discover by chemical experiments that this was possible. The experi ments of Schule, a Swedish philosopher, who shared with Priestley the honor of discovering oxygen gas, tended further to demonstrate this possibility. The names of Count Eum- ford, Mr. Wedgwood, and Sir Humphry Davy, are also men tioned as having made valuable contributions to discov eries In this field. Daguerre in France In 1839, and, about the same time, Talbot In England, Invented methods "for the fixation of the Images of the camera obscura;" and the results were deemed of great Importance. The process came to be called the daguerrotype. In honor of the distinguished French discoverer ; and the pictures of outward objects were exceed ingly sharp and fine. It is, however, to Dr. Draper of the New- York University that the world is indebted for the discovery that likenesses could be taken by light from the living presence. Dr. Draper announced his discovery In the London, Edinburgh, and Dublin phUosophlcal magazines ; and it is believed that he carried the art to so high a degree of perfection, that some of his portraits have not been excelled. "This great im proveraent was accoraplished at a time when the inventor of the daguerrotype had given It up as impossible." * Frora this point, experlraents have advanced until photog raphy has become an immense business In the United States and elsewhere. The various forms of the art are so well known as hardly to need description. Ambrotype and pho- * Appleton's Cyclopasdia, art. " Photography." DEVELOPMENT OF LEARNING AND THE ARTS. 477 tOgraph portraits have nearly superseded the old daguerro- types in popular use, but not in real artistic perfection. The result of the whole is to give to people of the most ordinary means the luxury of likenesses painted by the sun, which preserve the features of friends living and dead. The discovery is, therefore, of great value. The miniature in oU was so costly, that only the few could afford it ; hence pho tography is a very large accession to the happiness and improvement of the masses, as well as the wealthy and most highly cultivated. It has come to be applied to depicting landscapes and copy ing manuscripts with great distinctness and beauty, and is a grand accession to the convenience and perfection of the portrait-painter and engraver. Large as is the field of this art, its applications are destined to be still farther extended. It undoubtedly deserves to rank high among the astonishing discoveries of our own evehtful times. Thus have we endeavored to present the developraent of learning and the arts in America, that our readers may see how high above mere human possibility the mind of the Great Eepublic has been raised by the direct power of God. CHAPTEE VIIL DEVELOPMENT OP MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. " The Americans are a very old and a very enlightened people, who have fallen upon a new and unbounded country, where they may extend themselves at pleasure, and which they may fertilize without difficulty. This state of things is without a parallel in the history of the world." — De Tocqueville. There is a higher, more important progress than the merely physical, — a greatness that rises above the greatness of wealth and commerce, and quite as far above the merely intellectual. If the effect of climate or the configuration of our conti nent had been to make us earthly and sensual, and, as a nation, we had become only large consumers and large tra ders, the period of developraent in our history had been only the animallzatlon of the race with an enormous growth of individualism, which would have made us the contempt and scorn of all pure Intelligences on earth and in heaven. The Western continent. It has been noticed, is concave toward the sky ; while the Eastern Is convex. Our rivers run from the outer rims toward the great inward trough, and so seek the sea by the way of the Mississippi ; therefore, it has been very learnedly explained, our minds run downward, earth ward, and we are material, naturally and necessarily mate rialists: whUe the land ofthe Europeans and Asiatics arches towards the centre, and their waters are drained each way towards the oceans ; therefore the Europeans and Asiatics by great physiological laws look up, and are inevitably religious, superstitious. 4?8 DEVELOPMENT OF MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. 479 If this argument were not a most ridiculous conceit, and therefore utteriy unworthy of serious consideration, and if the tendencies were exactly what this physical theory of the moral man assumes, we have a strong and triumphant answer in the facts ; for, despite the convexity of the East and the concavity of the West, materialism and sensuality are rank and extended in both hemispheres. Even the present forms of reUgion are compeUed to resist the downward tendency of fallen human nature, everywhere, by the most heroic exertions ; an era of rationalistic scepticism and another of kindred ritualism not unfrequently following rapidly on the track of great religious reformations. TRUE MANHOOD. The great truth is, that, in the Orient as well as the Occi dent, men can be good and great only by aid from above. Under the action of this inspiration, selfishness and corrup tion, there as here, recede, and give place to all the en nobling feelings and acts of regenerated huraanity. There and here, human pride and ambition substitute the raaterial for the spiritual, the worship of the fine arts for the worship of the great Architect of the heavens and the earth, of church architecture instead of the Holy Being to whom these stately, magnificent edifices are consecrated. In Amer ica, just as much, and no more, must be conceded. With out the regeneration and the new life, we are earthly and sensual, exactly like Europeans ; and tend to idolatry in some form, like the Asiatics : while, just like both, under the power of the great spiritual resurrection, despite tbe concavity of our part of the globe, our nations are refined and exalted ; and we rise in the scale of greatness to the highest spirituality and benevolence. One grand announce ment includes us all. " Ye must be born again" reveals at once the reasons for our despair and our hope. In the new moral creation, we have a marked development 480 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of the native capabUItles of man, and learn how the disabUi ties of our race may be effectually helped, and our inherent vices eradicated. There man begins to live for man in distinction from self It cannot be controverted, just so far as the power of experimental religion extends in reforming and moulding the nature of a man, he moves from littleness to greatness, from selfishness to beneficence; humility takes the place of pride ; chastity, the place of lust ; honesty, the place of fraud ; love, the place of hatred ; truth, the place of falsehood ; industry and enterprise, the place of idleness and decay. These are all great elements of true manhood; and the growth is so visible, that a man who denies it simply condemns himself for absurdity or dulness, narrowness or falsehood. Just as in Individuals, so in nations. So far as the regene ration of human nature advances, so far the nation rises in character and moral power. For all great moral achieve ments of the race, sin is the infancy of a people, righteousness their manhood. Virtue begins to reveal its strength under the cross, and piety unfolds its power in the exercise of true faith, — "faith that works by love, and purifies the heart." True manhood appears In its types. The first Adam was a raan combining the powers and susceptibilities directly created by Infinite perfection. His descendants were less than men by all their Infidelity, disloyalty, depravity, false hood, sorrows, groans, and dying. The second Adam was a man, — a God, It is certain, but nevertheless a man, a typal man ; and as the race became less than men by receding from the first typal man, so they become men just as they approach the second. In his fullest form, the second man was the Lord from heaven ; and thus the divine in union with the human becomes the highest type of manhood. Just as the human race becomes imbued with the grace and power of God under the power of the second man, who becomes to beheving sinners " a quickening spirit," do they approach this highest type of manhood. DEVELOPMENT OF MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. 481 The true manhood of a nation wUl therefore be, first the regenerated manhood of the Fall ; then, so far as the new Ufe succeeds, the restored manhood of Eden ; and thence the developed manhood of the old in the new creation. Let it be remarked, then, as a matter of fact, that the grow ing greatness of the American nation is, so far as it has advanced, the progressive development of the new manhood. This is seen In the individual instances of reformation in the domestic Edens, which come of the restoration of love ; the social elevation, which makes vice disgraceful, and installs virtue and piety as the dominant forces of reason ; and in the grand uprising of a whole people, courting martyrdom to honor and secure a great principle. We must reckon as the result of the regeneration, not only the persons in whom it is developed as a new life, but those In whom any divine influences have found room and liberty to begin their work. The general faith in the being of God ; the public universal acknowledgment that Jesus is the Christ, that he Is the only hope of the world ; the condemna tion of professing Christians for their improprieties and sins; and the universal homage paid to goodness, with the equally universal acknowledgment of the duty and necessity of reformation in order to perfect happiness and safety, — must be referred to the same source. These all broaden and heighten the manhood of our nation. Then comes the elevating power of science, confirming the truth and reflecting the glory of Christianity ; then the spirit of the press, imbued with the Ufe of a great regeneration, raoving the world mightily God-ward ; then the broad expansion of liberty, accepting and proclaiming the universal brotherhood of man ; finally the uplifting of the lowest, and the conse quent rising of the whole to the sphere of power which reveals the inevitable, the indestructible, the endlessly-pro gressive, in the national life. This era of the Great Eepublic dawns upon us to-day. It would happen, of course, in the coming of generations, 61 482 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. under such quickening influences, that Individual minds, highly susceptible and broadly formed, would grow to dis tinguished greatness. Hence, though not thoroughly Chris tian, yet reached and stimulated by Christian forces, Franklin and Webster rose in statesmanship above MIrabeau and Talleyrand. Hence Washington and Lincoln, deeply Imbued with the religious spirit, were greater than Jefferson and Calhoun. Thus WUliams and Edwards, Marshall and Mc Lean, Judson and Olin, rose higher In historic renown than other men of equal mental greatness, and approached very nearly to the sublime purity and majestic strength of true manhood. But the elevation of the common mind by the power of a pervading Christian life, until justice is enthroned by the wUl of the people, will be a broader, greater fact From this epoch in the nation's history, the approach to typal manhood will be more rapid and more thoroughly sustained. ASYLUMS FOR THE DEAP AND DUMB. Works of humanity foUow promptly the development of true manhood under the benevolent influence .of Christianity. The best Christian minds of all countries, from mere love of the race. Inquire anxiously after the welfare of the suffering and unfortunate. " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" Is the second great commandment of our beneficent Christi anity ; and the law of action toward the needy is distinctly announced by our Saviour, — "AU things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them." Not merely the authority of these comraands, but the actual feeling of regenerated natures, and the longing desires of enlightened good men In the spirit of a religion of love, move them to make efforts to reUeve distress, to exalt char acter, and enlarge the sphere and amount of positive enjoy ment and usefulness. Hence it is that institutions for the education of the deaf and dumb, the blind, the insane, the DEVELOPMENT OF MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. 483 intemperate, and the idiot, arise in Christian qountries, and are not found In heathen lands. As is usual in all great developments of civUization, the first efforts made for the deaf and dumb were crude and un satisfactory, — a kind of feeling around In the dark after facts and agencies which only revealed their dira outlines. The code of Justinian held deaf-mutes incapable of the legal management of their affairs ; and the wisest phUosophers regarded the calamities of these unfortunates irremediable. In the middle ages, they were debarred from the rights of feudal succession. To Pedro Ponce, a Benedictine monk of Spain, belongs the honor of one of the first recorded attempts to educate the deaf and dumb. He died in 1504. Bouet followed, a half- century later. The Germans claim the precedence of a full century for efforts attended with success recorded by Eodolph Agrlcola, and thus make the successful endeavors of Parch, a clergyman of Brandenburg, to educate his deaf-mute daugh ter by pictures, contemporary with those of Ponce. In the seventeenth century, small advance is asserted in this humane endeavor. The great error, however, was in attempting to educate by articulation ; and it was reserved for the Abb^ de I'Epee of France to originate the great raoveraent which resulted in the use of signs, the natural language of deaf mutes, and to found the first institution for their education. From this went out suggestions and teachers which founded schools in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Holland, and Spain. "It was only from this time" (1755 to 1760) " that the duty of educating them began to take hold of the public con science." About the same time, the efforts of Thomas Braid- wood in Scotland, and Samuel Heinecke in Saxony, came to public notice. , Our own system was brought from the school of De I'Ep^e, in 1816, by our distinguished citizen, Thomas H. GaUaudet, whose equally distinguished son has done so much to perfect and extend the system in America. 484 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. As late as 1850, there were only a hundred and eighty institutions fOr the deaf and dumb in the world, numbering about six thousand pupils. There were about eighty small schools in Germany, forty-five in France, and twenty-two in the British Isles. Our highly-valued pioneer institution in Hartford was opened in 1817. The next began In New York, in the same year; and the next in Pennsylvania, in 1820. Kentucky fol lowed in 1823, Ohio in 1829, and Virginia m 1839. In 1834, we had six institutions, thirty-four teachers, and four hun dred and sixty-six pupils ; in 1860, twenty-two institutions, a hundred and thirty teachers, and two thousand pupils. It is easy to see that the work must be largely extended, as. In 1860, the number of deaf-mutes had reached fifteen thou sand and severity-seven. These Institutions cost the several States about three hundred and fifty thousand dollars annually ; while over a million and a half has been Invested in buildings, grounds, &c. The Columbia Institution in Washington is an ad vance movement designed further to perfect the system, and extend to these unfortunates the benefits of a college-course. ASYLUMS FOR THE BLIND. The appeal of the blind to our sympathies and humanity is perhaps still more touching. Shut out as they are from the world of external beauty ; denied the pleasure of looking upon the landscape with its hill and dale, its flowers and fruit ; not permitted to see the countenances of those they love, nor read a line of aU the world of literature so acces sible to us, — It would be really strange if Christian benefi cence should make no efforts to Improve their condition. " L'HopItal Imperial des Quinze VIngts was founded by St Louis In 1260, and still exists. It, however, makes no efforts to Instruct its three hundred inmates. Valentine Haiiy, receiving his hints from the success of the Abbe de DEVELOPMENT OP MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. 485 I'Epge in relief of the deaf-mutes, determined to see if the blind could not be aided by the sense of touch. Letters, maps, and finally books, were printed in relief: blind children touched them, and soon commenced to read. This good work began to assume form in Paris in 1784, and in Liverpool in 1791 ; extending through France and England, and finally through all Europe. In the United States, in 1860, 12,635 were blind ; being one to every 2,470 of the whole population. This, however, is only two-fifths of the number in Great Britain and Ireland, and three-fifths of the number in France. The bauses of this difference in our favor have not yet been so well defined as to belonsj to historical records. But we have sufficient numbers to excite our deepest Interest and most liberal ef forts. Our institutions for the blind began in Boston in 1833. In I860, they numbered twenty-three, and a thousand one hundred and twenty-six pupils and inmates ; and so sure Is the progress, that we may regard It as morally certain, that this unfortunate class will be well provided for by the provi dent wisdom of our Christian States. The culture of so many good minds, otherwise completely dormant, is not only humane as a relief to deprivation and suffering, but a clear gain to the world. The Bible is the great book of the blind ; and it is intensely interesting to see with what fixed attention they trace, by the sense of touch, the name and revelations of God, and the plan of redemption by Jesus Christ. The educated blind manifest great love of music, arid some of them considerable talent They sing, and touch the instrumental keys and strings, with a delicacy and tender ness quite peculiar to themselves ; while their cheerful piety very largely sustains the Christian hope which founded their institutions. Surely no philanthropy rises to a nobler eleva tion than that which becomes " eyes to the blind." 486 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ASYLUMS FOR THE INSANE. Perhaps no sufferers appeal more piteously to the Chris tian philanthropist than the insane. It is amazing to see how long they were considered and treated as beyond the reach of remedy, mad enemies of all, fit only to be shut up within dark prisons and darker cells, under control of physical power only. God only knows what tortures have been endured from this sad mistake, what rage and horror have resulted from a sense of injustice upon the part of those who were only partially insane, having sense enough of conscious right to make the wrongs of Imprisonment and personal abuse severe and dreadful. It is hardly yet a hundred years since the light of true reason began to dawn upon the problem, " Can any thing be done to ameliorate the condition of the Insane ? " The first raoveraent in this direction was a general cura tive hospital in Philadelphia, instituted by philanthropists, and incorporated In 1751. The charter, under the title of " the constitutors of the Pennsylvania Hospital," provided for " the reception and cure of lunatics." The hospital was opened on Feb. 11, 1752; and thenceforward one of its departments was specially appropriated to that class of pa tients. To Virginia belongs the honor of estabUshing the first Institution exclusively for the Improvement of the insane- Under an act of incorporation, passed Nov. 10, 1769, a hos pital was opened at Williamsburg about Sept 14, 1773. In the war, the buildings were occupied as barracks for' the colonial troops ; but, after the war, they were restored to their legitimate use. The New-York Hospital was chartered by the Earl of Dunmore in 1771. It was opened Jan. 3, 1791 ; and insane patients were admitted in 1797. These were aU the formal efforts made for this humane purpose before the beginning of the nineteenth century ; and " the character of the treat- DEVELOPMENT OP MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. 487 ment was more custodial than curative." Still they were beginnings of great historical value, as they indicate the genesis and growth of phUanthropic feeling and inquiry in this important direction. In 1791, the benevolent Dr. Pinel, amid the horrors ofthe French Eevolution, gave his thoughts anxiously to the relief of maniacs. " He was connected with the Bicetre Hopltal, in which many of the insane were confined In cells, and loaded with manacles and chains. After repeated solicita tions, he at length obtained permission from the public au thorities to remove these torturing implements of bodily restraint. He commenced by relieving an English captain who had been chained for forty years. The result was so favorable, that he relieved eleven others in the course of the day, and, in a few days, forty-one more. Thus began a move ment of humanity which spread rapidly over Europe and America, and which. In the relief it has extended and the blessings it has conferred, has had no parallel in the history of Christian civUization. About the same date, William Fuke, of York, England, in augurated a more humane treatment for the insane by found ing the Friends' Ee treat for the Insane at York, opened in 1796. In 1808, a separate building for the insane was erected at the New- York Hospital. In 1797, seven acres of land were given to the State of Maryland by Mr. Jeremiah Yellot of Baltimore, " on con dition that the government should found a hospital for the treatment of insanity and general diseases." This institution was not opened until 1816. The Friends of PhUadelphia "formed an association in 1812 ; obtained a charter ; erected a building near the vil lage of Frankford, but now within the limits of the city of Philadelphia ; and under the titie, ' Asylum for the Eellef of Persons deprived of the Use of their Eeason,' the institution was opened in May, 1816." 488 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. The McLean Asylum for the Insane, a branch of the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, was opened on the 6th of October, 1818. Up to 1830, we had five insane asylums. The Blooming- dale Asylum, New York, dates in 1821 ; the asylums at Hartford, Conn., and at Lexington, Ky., 1824 ; Stanton, Va., and Columbia, S.C, 1828 : since which period these institu tions have extended rapidly throughout the States, regarded everywhere as indispensable to Christian civilization. As a material portion of the history of this humane move ment, we mention with high satisfaction the efforts of Miss Dorothea L. Dix to Improve the whole system for the treat ment of the insane. Her enlightened, self-sacrificing, and successful endeavors place her among the foremost philan thropists of her sex and age. Her name and acts deserve to be written in letters of gold, and transmitted to coming generations. In the mean time, visits to the hospitals of Europe by Dr. Pliny Earle in 1839, and, later, by Dr. Eay ; the Association of Medical Superintendents of American Institutions for the Insane, suggested by Dr. Francis T. Stribling, superintend ent of the Western Lunatic Asylum of Virginia, at Stan ton ; and " The American Journal of Insanity," started in July, 1844, by Dr. Amarlah Brigham, afterwards edited by Dr. John P. Gray and his associates of the asylum at Utica, N.Y. ; with raany other agencies conducted by our most enlight ened phUanthropists, — have contributed largely toward the Improvement of institutions and means for the accompUsh ment of these most beneficent ends. The cause conducted so largely by private benefactors, and then chiefly by the several States, has at length become national. Congress, by the wise appropriations of suras at different times for grounds and bullding.s, amounting In the aggregate to $473,040, makes the people of the United States as such the benefactors of their most unfortunate brethren. " The Government Hospital for the Insane was DEVELOPMENT OF MANHOOD AND HUMANITY. 489 specially intended for the insane of the army, the navy, the revenue-cutter service, and the indigent of the District of Columbia. It is situated on the eastern shore of the Poto mac Eiver, within the limits of the District of Columbia, and about two miles south of the Capitol in Washington. The principal building, constructed of brick, is seven hundred and twenty feet In length. Its architectural plan and Inter nal arrangements are among the best which have resulted from the experience and the studies of many able men era ployed in this speciality. A farm of a hundred and ninety- five acres belongs to the establishraent." Dr. Charles H. Nichols, its first superintendent, deserves great credit for the perfection of the building commenced under his direction in May, 1853, and completed in 1862. Its number of patients, beginning in 1855 with sixty-three, had increased, up to 1861, to a hundred and eighty. According to the eighth census, the Insane of the United States and Territories numbered 23,999. In 1859, 4,140 were admitted to thirty hospitals ; and 1,728, or 41.7 per cent, were discharged as cured. Forty per cent may be regarded as the average of cures from all classes of patients considered as a whole; whereas, of cures placed under proper treatment within the first year, from sixty to seventy out of every hundred recover. This is wonderful : it is the clearest possible demonstration ofthe advance in humanity which constitutes one ofthe chief glories of the nineteenth century. Instead of thinking of our sufiering brethren as shut up in dark dungeons, chained to stone floors, looking out through iron grates, and raving in anguish at evils which they can in no way comprehend, we may now look at them in splendid buildings, with prudent access to large airy halls and beautiful grounds, their con finement and Uls relieved by medical and moral treatment from skilful men and gentle nurses, with all the sanitary blessings of wholesome air, wholesome food and beverage, 490 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. beautiful and fragrant flowers, and inspiring landscapes. Who can estimate the value of such a change ? ASYLUMS POR IDIOTS AND INEBRIATES. Another class of human beings calling for pity are idiots ; of whom there were in our States and Territories, in 1860, 18,865, or one In every 1,666 of our population. The idea of doing any thing for the benefit of these mind less ones is wholly modern and Christian ; and now we see, through the exhaustiess skill and patience of humane sci entific men and kind woraen, these unfortunates also slowly returning to consciousness and perception, and graduaUy rising to the exercise of reason, and even usefulness. Inebriates, the most criminal and yet pitiable of all de mented people, are also at length finding an asylura from the reach of their relentless murderers, the dealers In intoxi cating liquors; and hope dawns upon minds and families over which has heretofore brooded only the darkest, deepest despair. At Binghamton, N.Y., and San Francisco, Cal., are the two parent horaes for the Inebriate, for the Atlantic and Pacific slopes ; to be followed, let us trust, by others, until this also shall take its place among the great Christian movements of this noble country. CHAPTEE IX. DEVELOPMENT OF NATURAL DEPEAVITY. " Let us consider, that, for the sins of a people, God may suffer the best government to be corrupted or entirely dissolved ; and that nothing but a general reformation can give good ground to hope that the public happiness will be restored by the recovery of the strength and perfection of the State ; and that Divine Providence will interpose to fill every department with wise and good men." — President Langdon. If, in any land beneath the sun, human nature might be expected to exhibit natural freedom from sin, and from infancy grow up to angelic manhood, it surely ought to be here. It would be difficult to mention one condition of natural perfection outside of the moral character of man, as man, which God has omitted in the preparation of this coun try. We have found, moreover, an evident purpose to bring extraordinary moral power to bear upon the judgments, feelings, and purposes of the race in this Eepublic, with the view of accomplishing the most for human nature that can be done by means divine and human. But what are the facts? Evidently, there is no paradise here. We have utterly failed to demonstrate the natural purity of souls. We can boast of no national perfection growing up under the natural laws of development Indeed, we have not even a state or country or city or neighborhood where depravity does not show itself, rising up so directly out of the natural moral condition as to suggest strongly that it must be hereditary. Every family finds rebellion against the right in its nursery, and even in the cradle. The neglect of even the sterner forms of discipline will soon reveal its absolute necessity; and all assumptions of the righteous tendency 191 492 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. of chUdhood are painfully corrected by the production, as well as the Influence, of pernicious example. Penal laws must go Into every statute-book. The police, the seats of justice, the penitentiaries, the houses of correction, must be everywhere. The States of this Union are no exception to the moral delinquencies of peoples and governments ; and historical fidelity requires the chapter I am about to write. INTEMPERANCE. Love of strong drink is at least as natural to Americans as to any people ; and it Is cultivated to a depth and extent of vice which can gather no comfort from comparison with other countries. Official reports for 1860 show that we were then employ ing 1,138 establishments in the manufacture of spirituous liquors, producing 80,453,089 gallons of whiskey, high wines, and alcohol, 3,397 gallons of brandy, gin, &c., and 4,152,480 gallons of New-England rum ; being a total of 88,002,988 gallons of strong liquors to circulate chiefly among our own people, and be used as a beverage just so far as a vicious appetite and depraved public sentiment, urged on by a vile class Interest, can secure this result. To this must be added 970 establishments for the man ufacture of beer, yielding 3,239,545 barrels annually, to stupefy and poison our citizens. The estimated value of these pernicious liquors was $42,255,311 ; and, making aU proper allowance for those portions used for mechanical and medicinal purposes, we have here one intimation as to the cost of this ruinous Indulgence. It Is, however, only an In timation ; for these liquors, before they get to the people, are multiphed by Incredible dUutlons. "Their cost is Increased by enormous profits ; and the whole price which supports manufacturers, jobbers, and retaU dealers and their fami lies, — many of them in splendid attire, furniture, and equi page, — comes from consumers, who are thus wickedly Im- DEVELOPMENT OF NATURAL DEPRAVITY. 493 poverished ; and multitudes of helpless women and chUdren are reduced to the extreme of wretchedness, and perhaps of crime. To this expense must be added, for these poor people to pay, the cost of clerk-hire and agencies, bar-keep ers and rents, until the frightful aggregate rises above the reach of accurate estimate. Then taxes on the grand list must be added to the burdens of the people to support the poor-houses, penitentiaries, and hospitals required to sustain this accursed traffic. But the deep depravity, the wreck of virtue, and the untold horrors, which must be traced directly to this crime, can by no means be estimated In this world ; and it is the disgrace of our country, that, in so many of our States, the guilty traffic is sustained by law. With less than half our present population, it was estimated that we sent into the realms of the dead thirty thousand drunkards a year, and that " one-fourth of the families of the United States were sufferers " from this vicious habit. Some of our great men, like Dr. Benjamin Eush, sought to rouse the people to their danger. The strong ground of the Methodist-Episcopal Church, in her discipline and administra tion against the use of intoxicating drinks, saved multitudes from ruin, and helped mightily to create the public sentiment out of which temperance societies arose, — a movement which began in Moreau, Saratoga County, N.Y., In 1808, at the sug gestion of Dr. B. J. Clark, and which has swept over a large part of the civiUzed world. If we must confess that the vice of dram-drinking did, at the close of the last century and the beginning of the present, go far toward fixing upon us the disgrace of being a nation of drunkards, it may be accepted as sorae rehef that this great reform arose under the guidance of American phUanthropists. Their heroic struggles, under the old pledge, to abstain from the use of spirituous liquors ; and the pledge of total abstinence from all that can intoxicate, dating from August, 1836 ; the or ganization of the Washlngtonlans in 1840, with all their successes and faUures, — indicate the depth of their con- 494 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. vlctloris that a destructive vice was preying upon the public morals and health. Sons of Temperance, Eechabltes, Cadets of Temperance, Good Templars, Dashaways, and other bene ficial societies, sought In other ways to exterminate the evil. The boldest measure of a virtuous and Christian people to protect themselves from this public wrong dates from Maine in 1851. Her legislature came forward with a law that pro hibited, under severe penalties, the sale of this pernicious beverage ; and prohibitory laws were adopted by several States. Around this question of the right and efficiency of absolute prohibition the battle has raged for many years, saving vast multitudes, and even whole towns, for the time being, from the dreadful scourge, and rousing all the energy of wicked men In defence of their traffic, with the fell purpose of saving their unrighteous and enormous profits from the interdict of law. In the mean time, the constitutional right of the suflferlng people to protect themselves by law from this baleful scourge has been established by the written opinions of the ablest jurists of our land, and, finally, by appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States. With the record of the American Temperance Union and its subordinate and cognate organizations on the pages of history; with such names on the roll of philanthropy as Dr. Beecher, Marsh, Neal Dow, and Gough ; and with the grand reforms actually accomplished in America, in England, and on the Continent, — we have some relief from the odium which otherwise adheres to our national honor. But the battle is by no means ended. The churches, the schools, the lovers of the race in our midst, and the virtuous press, are rousing to the conflict with a new vigor ; whUe all the vices of the land are combined In the resistance. This war will now rise to grander proportions than ever before ; and Chris tian REGENERATION, TOTAL ABSTINENCE, AND ABSOLUTE PROHIBinON, wUl be the rallying-cry of the good and the brave on the side of the right. The struggle wUl be long and varied in results ; but it can never end until our country is saved. DEVELOPMENT OP NATURAL DEPRAVITY. 495 LICENTIOUSNESS. Whatever may be the desire prompted by self-respect, we cannot be faithful to the history of our nation without ac knowledging that the crimes of lust are alarmingly preva lent in the United States. We have no desire to avail our selves of statistics to show the extent of prostitution in our great cities, nor would it be any relief to demonstrate the fearful and even deeper degradation of France or England. It is sufficient to know that the extent in the United States of this common ruin furnishes sad evidence that depravity has its home in the passions, in the very fountains of domes tic and social life. We cannot, therefore, feel that we have fathomed our private and social corruptions when we have searched with painful thoroughness the abodes of public and shameless vice, or the secret retreats of blushing crime In houses of assignation. The marred visage, the trembling limbs, the 'excitable nerves, the prescriptions of physicians, and the disruption of domestic ties, tell how rapidly splendid hypocrisy is leading its victims to the doora of the shame less debauchee. To a kindred origin we must ascribe much of the levity with which, in large circles, the marriage-contract is regarded. The number of divorces, and the corrupt adjustment of law to the convenience of this forra of social vice, are shameful evidences of the want of public virtue. We must, moreover, recognize " the serpent in the dove's nest," and come to the understanding, that licentious abuse of marital rights, lead- Ino: to the crimes of minded men would now attempt to justify; but, on the other hand, the cool complacency, the endless delays, of conservatism, the apologies for slavery, and, finally, the studied attempts to vindicate It In the face of its vUe corruptions and atroci ties, were very provoking. In the mean time, It began to appear that God was In the midst of the storm ; that he suffered, if he did not actually order, this terrific agitation to break up the reign of stupid ity and death. It was. In fact, the trump of resurrection to the slumbering justice of the Church and the Nation. There was really no danger. Of course, as suppression began to appear hopeless, the principles of the conflict began to release themselves ; and a THE GREAT MORAL CONPLICT. 575 potent Providence compelled men to take sides in the great battle, the moral grandeur of which few men could distinctly see, none could comprehend. Conservative Christians and churches in the North began to reveal a strength of anti- slavery principle which had been hardly suspected. In the South, members of the churches, and the ministry, seemed shut up to a fatal blindness. For many years, they generally conceded the wrong of the system ; but they felt the power of that terrorism which was everywhere, and shrank from the mission of " liberty to the captives," upon which they were sent by their great Master. They excused the wrong, and at length placed themselves at the head of its violent defenders. Thus it must be mournfully confessed that Southern churches committed a crime for which the atone ment required has been bloody, protracted, and terrible. When will the hour of forgiveness come ? Let us mingle our tears of penitence with theirs. We have been too deep ly involved in their guUt to avoid a frightful participation in the demand for retribution ; and it may be feared that we have not yet exhausted the cup of our merited sorrow. But, all this time, true Christianity never wavered. Its great historic truth of the brotherhood of the race came out more and more distinctly ; and, even from the lips of " unreasonable men," it was a grand gospel, the very evan gel of God to the oppressed American mind. Ardent and perhaps not very well regulated men In the Church took it up, and rang it through the land, until con servatism was startled, said it was perverted, and made to mean " another gospel ; " then affirmed that it was an old truth, and that, in obedience to Its behest, the Church had always cared most wisely for both master and slave. But at length great and grave conservative men began to speak with authority to the men who held human bodies and souls in thraldom, and say, " Let the oppressed go free," so Irre sistibly did the right work its way to the surface, and, amid the roar of battie, compel the people to listen to its procla mation. 576 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. True, schism rent church organizations here and there; secession spurned what it thought an ecclesiastical monster, and fled away, to be alone, or form new combinatIon.s, which would give voice to justice In the name of God. Then slavery reached out Its arm to grasp more power, and dominate over more millions ; and the Church came sud denly up to the question. Would she submit to these new aggressions, or risk her threatened losses ? This was the first great public test which indicated that the age of compro mises was worn out and must soon be laid aside. And the Church endured the trial. Challenged to show her submis sion and her shame, by accepting the advance of the slave- power Northward, or be torn asunder and go out ofthe way, she dug down after her old principles, and found them sound and bright as ever. She threw herself upon the arm of God, and dared to do right. The crash came; and one after another of the great denominations received the blows of the tyrant, looked mournfully upon their severed members, and, bowing reverently before God, found that their strength was in justice. In the land of the slave there were found souls strong enough to endure the trial, and. In the face of the vilest persecution, deny the right of property in man. Faith in God, and the ultimate triumph of the right, brought up from the South to the throne of grace many fervent prayers, and into the ranks of God's liberating army many strong, brave men. Loyalty, first to the truth, and then to the govern ment, cost something there ; and Its day of recognition and honor before earth and heaven was sure to come. HUMANITY PLEADS. The first great mission of truth in this grand upheaval was to show the wrong of the slave-system by the sufferings of its victims. The fair exterior of this pagan temple was always to be seen. The worshippers at its shrine were proud of it. THE GREAT MORAL CONPLICT. 577 See the soft luxuriance of its petted domestics, their com fortable and even splendid costumes, their sumptuous, fair, and boasted Indolence ! See the fond attachment of these house-servants to their master and mistress, the devoted love between the children of fortune and the enslaved chUdren of slaves ! See how reluctant they are to leave their masters ! — how they beg not to be sold away from the home of their chUdhood ! Mcst of all, see those multiplied thou sands of converted, praying slave Christians ! — how they sing and jump and shout in exultant joy, in despite of their bonds ! And see how comfortable ,we are while these black people do oar bidding, toil for us, and surround us with lux urious elegance ! Is it not a beautiful system, a glorious structure ? But the age had become inquisitive. Groans and sighs were heard faintly from the inside of this temple. It was getting old ; and openings here and there let in the hght, and revealed miserable objects to the eyes of strangers ; and men, persistent, — Impertinent if you wUl, — demanded to know what was done inside. Scores, hundreds, fled away, guided by the north star; and they told horrid tales, and showed wounds fresh and bleeding, and scars deep and old. A wail came-up from the rice-swamps, and the world heard It. The baying of blood hounds, and the screech of lacerated victims, came from the dark woods and bloody streams. What did it all mean? Was this Christian slavery ? — a loving, voluntary, coveted, civUized bondage ? The world absolutely would know. Timid honesty, from the heart of the slave empire rising up in such formidable proportions amid the institutions of republican liberty, whispered explanations of these wounds and scars, these waillngs and tears, — these men and women were not wiUing slaves ; in large numbers they had to be scourged to their task ; and the brooding horrors of fear alone could keep them in bondage ; their occasional J03-, and their affectionate gratitude, told that they were human. 73 578 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. if they were "chattels," and could respond to kind treat ment ; that they could be Christians by the grace of God, If they were denied the privUege of reading the word of God. But nothing In all this had prevented, or could pre vent, the absolute demand for force. Why did not those ser vants go where they pleased? work where they could make honest bargains and obtain honest wages ? Why could not they be the judges as to whether they would learn to read, or were well used ? and why could they not, in the absence of white witnesses, come into court, testify to the violence inflicted upon them, and receive justice ? No : the truth must come out, and go abroad the world over, — it was a system of cruel coercion. Travellers would tell it; poets would echo its wail; and the pen would turn away from fiction, and write truth, stranger, wilder, more terrible, than fiction. And what was to be the response to all this ? From Christianity, as we have seen, clear, strong, unequivocal con demnation, with a kind but peremptory demand for free dom. But this condemnation and demand were unheeded ; and " the sighing of the poor and the needy " went on. Then pity began to weep and to plead. Christian humanity entreated, " Let these poor peqple change their residences and employers If they desire It. Let them learn to read God's holy word. They long to know for themselves what con solation it has for mourning captives and for penitent sin ners : let them read it." Even natural humanity said, " Don't strike again ! See how the blood gushes, how the flesh quivers ! Don't strike again ; don't tear that infant from its mother's arms ; don't sell these poor people away from their little ones, and chain them together like felons, and drive them off Into the swamps, — husbands, wives, and children, — far and forever away from each other." There was no possibility of suppressing this cry of hu manity : it became increasingly tender and earnest ; it swelled louder and louder its notes of plaintive sorrow ; its THE GREAT MOEAl CONFLICT. 579 circle of prayer and weeping spread wider and wider. Never before were such pleadings addressed to God or man ; never was the ear of man so utterly deaf, never the ear of God so quick and listening. JUSTICE DENOUNCES. There was another voice for the ear of oppression, — a deeper, sterner, more commanding voice. For what purpose was it said, "Rob not the poor, because he is poor; neither oppress the aflfilcted in the gate : for the Lord will plead their cause, and spoil the soul of those that spoiled them " ? Surely this was not simply an announcement for the people then to hear and forget. It must have been a great fact for all time, an inevitable law which God would certainly exe cute in his righteous wisdom everywhere. Then it spake in tones of authority to these masters as well as to oppressors of old, " Rob not that poor man ; I am his witness, and I am your omniscient Judge : I will be his advocate. You have cruelly beaten him to get more labor out of him for yourself, and you give him no wages. But you have committed a higher crime than this : you have robbed him of himself, and made him your slave. The day of retribution is coming." Oh, this is dreadful ! But listen again : " Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver is cankered ; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days. Behold, the hire of the laborers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth; and the cries of them which have reaped are en tered Into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth." Read thought fully one word more : " Whoso stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, he also shall cry himself, but shall not be heard." Thus did justice thunder in the ears of slaveholders their 580 TH^ GREAT REPUBLIC. crime and their impending calamities. They might see with their own eyes the beginnings of retribution. There were. In vast extent, all desolate and valueless, the fields which had been reaped by those who had been denied their wages. There were the figures of the census, showing the border slave States cursed by some strange power, and, as compared with the free States by their side, doomed to inferiority; and, more frightful still, these figures showed the alarming relative Increase of the black over the white population. What could that mean ? Then there were prophets In these latter days. Grave, devout old negroes were on their knees night and day in prayer. They returned from their Interviews with God, alarmed for the fate of their masters. Perhaps no intelligi ble words were spoken ; but the deep sigh and the ominous shake of the head meant justice. Many poor black men were listeners, and understood the still small voice when It said, " The cries of them which have reaped are entered Into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth." How quick and prompt Is that subtle public sense which blanches the faces of oppressors when the word " insurrection " is whispered ! The quaklngs of fear when the armless hand appears writing on the wall are the beginnings of justice. Just before the storm broke, justice had a thousand tongues. The warnings came from violent and fanatical men, from great and good men, from political economists, from sober judges, from profound statesmen. Men every where could feel It. There was sorrow In the air. There were signs of wrath In the clear sky as well as in the gather ing storm-cloud. Great and wise men of other lands gave the alarm. They told us, in books. In periodicals, in mes sages of kindness from across the sea, that we were nearing the fatal gulf Flippant jests and loud bravado did but In crease the awful apprehensions which came to the souls of men from this quickened sense of - nail, but recently an honored officer of the American navy. Still farther in the rear was " a fleet of steamboats, that had come from Charleston to witness the destruction of the Yankee fleet." As Dupont approached Hilton Head, a tremendous fire was opened upon him from Fort Walker; but he moved on In silence until three vessels were In position, when their broadsides were delivered ; and " the shot and shell from seventy-five guns fell in one wild crash on the fort." He moved on; and, one after another, the ships followed, dellv- erina: their fire while in motion. Thus the wooden vessels were at no time stationary targets for the artiUery of the fort ; and, moving in a splendid eUIptlcal circle, they poured a constant fire, first into " Walker," and then into " Beaure gard." An eighty-pound rifle-ball went clear through the mast of "The Wabash;" another pierced her after-magazine, 616 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. letting the water into it : but she kept on her sublime way, proudly leading the long file of flaming ships. Capt. Ro gers said, " ' The Wabash ' was a destroying angel ; hugging tho shore; calling the soundings with cold indifference; slowing the engine so as to give only steerage-way ; signal ling the vessels their various evolutions ; and, at the same time, raining shell, as with target-practice, too fast to count." The gunboats found an available position in a cove, and commenced an enfilading fire on Hilton Head. At twelve, M., Admiral Dupont gave the signal, and his ships withdrew for his men to rest, and take refreshments ; but the gunboats kept up a galling fire. At three o'clock, p.m., just as Admiral Dupont was about to commence again his dreadful circuit of death, the firing from the forts ceased. Capt. Rogers rowed directly to Fort Walker, and found It deserted. He promptly raised the stars and stripes above the ruins. No pen can describe the elec trical effect of this sight. For five hours, these grim mariners and the army of Gen. Sherman had endured the perils, or watched the progress, of this terrific battle ; and now the flag of their country waved in triumph In token of victory. Cheers rose from thousands of heroes; and "The Star-span gled Banner" rang out through the Southern air. Gen. T. W. Sherman landed his troops, and assumed command. It Is Impossible to exaggerate the happy effects of this victory. The government of the Republic had re sumed Its functions within the territory of South Carolina. Port Royal promptiy rose to importance as a naval depot. Her piers and docks were alive with improvements. This first great achievement of the navy had fiUed the country with triumphant joy. Our disasters on land were well-nigh forgotten. The rebel coast was thrown into the greatest alarm. Dupont, the naval hero, whose praise was upon the lips of patriots everywhere, moved from place to place ; and, driving the rebel forces inland, he raised the flag of our Union over Fort Clinch, Fernandina, and St. Augustine, THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 617 Fla.; and the whole coast of Georgia was held by his squadron." *' ROANOKE ISLAND. Jan. 11 and 12, 1862, Commander L. M. Goldsborough left Fortress Monroe with a fleet of thirty-one steam gunboats, mounting ninety-four guns, accompanied by eleven thousand five hundred men under command of Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside. This army was mainly from New England ; and its three brigades, commanded by Gens. Foster, Reno, and Parke, " embarked with their materiel on some thirty to for ty steam transports." The expedition had been fitted out, chiefly in New York, to break the silence in the East. Roanoke Island was included In the rebel command of Ex-Gov. Henry A. Wise. His force was notoriously In adequate for so important a defence ; and he made the most energetic appeals to the Confederate War Department for in crease of men and means. He was, however, simply ordered to repair to his post. The rebel Secretary of War, Benjamin, despised the Union forces and people, and showed, as did the improvident Southern people generallj' on the Eastern bor der, the slackness resulting from their disastrous victory at Manassas. Arriving at Hatteras Inlet on the loth, our ships met with great difficulty and some serious disasters in attempting to cross the bar. It was the 5th of February before our fleet and stores could be re-adjusted, and the order given to move. On that day, sixty-five vessels passed slowly up Pamlico and Croatan Sounds, and anchored within ten miles of Roanoke Island. At eight o'clock, a.m., on the 6th, the fleet moved ; and at eleven o'clock It was arrested by a storm, and delayed till ten, a.m., of the next day. Passing through the Roanoke Inlet, a rebel fleet of seven gunboats appeared, but, moving before our vessels, showed no disposition to engage. At * Farragut and our Naval Commanders, by Headley, p. 135 : see also the whole chap ter. 78 618 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. twelve, M., our fleet came under fire of a strong battery known as Fort Bartow, when the rebel gunboats, which had evidently intended to lead us there to destruction, paused, and joined In the battle. Our brave men tore away, or moved over, the piles Intended to obstruct their advance. " Soon," says Mr. Pollard, " the air was filled with heavy reports, and the sea was disturbed in every direction by fragments of shell. Explosions of shell rang through the air ; and occasionaUy a large hundred-and-twenty-four pounder thundered across the waves, and sent its ponderous shot In the midst of the flotilla. At times, the battery would be enveloped In the sand and dust thrown up by shot and shell." The rebel flag-ship, " The Curlew," was struck by a hundred-pound shell from " The Southfield," and soon enveloped in flames; the propeller " Forrest " was disabled ; and the remainder of the rebel fleet retired finaUy from the conflict. The barracks of the enemy were consumed by our fire, and heroic efforts were required to subdue the flames bursting from the fort. By eleven o'clock at night. Gen. Burnside had landed seven thousand five hundred men within two miles of the fort. Through a long, rainy night, these heroic men crouched in the marsh, eagerly waiting for the dreadful work of the morning. Before them was Fort Bartow, a substantial earthwork, with abatis, moat, and ten guns ; farther oh, batteries Huger and Blanchard, with fourteen guns. Leading to Bartow was a single causeway swept by the enemy's guns, and, on either hand, bogs, which could be passed only with the greatest dif ficulty ; and they were crossed by an ihtrenchment, behind which the rebels Intended to make a desperate stand. At the word, our heroic men rushed upon the enemy's line, and carried it with the utmost gallantry. Here among the slain fell a brave and splendid young man, 0. Jennings Wise, son of the governor. Fighting through the morass, up to within easy range of the guns from the fort, Burnside's troops, finding it Impracticable to obey the order to turn the enemy's flank through the marsh, were ordered to charge THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEl50M. 619 over the causeway. " The order was obeyed with such prompt ness and energy as to defy all resistance : then, throwing themselves down to escape a fire of grape from the batteries, part of the Fifty-first New- York, with Hawkins's Zouaves and the Twenty-first Massachusetts, instantly rose, and rushed over the rebel breastworks, chasing out their defenders', and foUqwing them In their retreat, securing by their Impetuosity the capture of a large number, as no time was given for their escape from the island." * The results of this grand achievement were of the greatest importance. Remaining forts and batteries fell ; the rebel fleet was pursued ; and, there being no hope of escape, it was burned by its own men. Mr. Pollard says we " had taken six forts, forty guns, nearly two thousand prisoners, and up wards of three thousand small arms ; secured the water-ave nues of Roanoke River, navigable for a hundred and twenty miles ; got possession of the granary and larder of Norfolk, and threatened the back door of that city." The fall of Newbern, after a tremendous battle, was a direct sequence of the triumph on Roanoke Island : the time had come for the pride of the Rebellion to be humbled. FORT DONELSON. Let us now turn our eyes to the West. We there see Missouri saved to the Union by the prompt decisions and energetic action of Capt, (afterwards Gen.) Lyon, who fell in the moment of' victory, greatly lamented by the American people ; the formidable and imposing measures of Gen. Fremont, and the famous, terrific charge of his "body-guard;" the treason of Gov. Jackson, with his pretences to take Missouri out of the Union against the de clared will of a large majority of her people ; the reckless attack upon his own State by the rebel general Price, and. the cruel siege and slaughter at Lexington. We see also * Greeley, ii. 76. 620 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the gathering of Union forces from the West, — men whose pioneer habits had prepared them for this war, and whose large Intelligence and clear-sighted patriotism had deter mined them to hew their way to the mouth of the Missis sippi; we see the first iron-clad fleet afloat on the Mis sissippi, commanded by the brave, devout, and energetic Commodore Foote ; and we catch the first sight of Gen„U. S. Grant, the great American, whose calm judgment, keen eye, and desperate valor, were to shed undying lustre upon our arms and nation. The Confederates, finding that Kentucky and Missouri had settled down into their proper position as loyal States of the Union, determined to repudiate the doctrine of State rights, and made war upon their brethren in slave territory. They determined to take military possession of the " upper centre zone " of the West, lying above the Tennessee River. This enormous task was intrusted to the command ot Gen. Albert Sydney Johnson, an officer formerly of high repute in the regular army of the United States. When the war broke out, he had control of our forces on the Pa cific, with headquarters at Alcatraz, San Francisco. As he evidently waited his opportunity to turn his command against his country, and tear from the head of the nation her golden crown, California, Oregon, and the Territories of our vast Pacific empire, were saved from the horrors of the Rebellion by the sudden, unannounced arrival of Gen. Sumner, who promptly relieved the future rebel general of his command. True to his purposes of treason, he soon found his way to the Southern army, where he was recog nized as first in importance among the commanders of treason. Commodore Foote with his formidable war-fleet, and Gen. Grant, now intrusted with the command, under Gen. Halleck, of a large mUitary district, had agreed upon the plan of their campaign. The Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers were guarded by Forts Henry and Donelson. These THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 621 were the keys to the upper and lower centre zones of this great war of the West ; and after the preludes of Belmont, where Grant gained a surprising advantage over the rebels, and destroyed the camp, but was flanked, and obliged to retire; and of MUl Springs, where Gen. Thomas gained our first briUiant victory on land, — Grant and Foote moved boldly into the rebel territory to attempt the reduction of these forts. The combined land and naval attack upon Fort Henry was ordered for the 6th of February, 1862. Grant was to move to the rear of the fort to co-operate with Foote, and to prevent the escape of the garrison ; but the energetic naval commander ran up the Tennessee to within cannon-shot of the enemy, and commenced the action with such promptness and spirit, and dashed the rebel batteries to pieces with such fury, that the garrison surrendered to the commodore before Gen. Grant could force his way to his intended position. Johnson saw his danger, and, resolving to defend Nash ville at Donelson, threw into the fort sixteen thousand of his best troops. The works had been constructed under the eye of a skilful engineer, and were very strong. Its river-defences were admirable ; but, for the arrest of land-forces, the place was badly chosen. Anticipating the approach of Gen. Grant from Fort Henry directly toward a line of hills which would command the works, the Confederates took possession of these hills, shielding their forces by a line of earthworks, rifle-trenches, and abatis. By the greatest exertions, they were completed before Grant arrived. Gen. Grant, with two divisions of fifteeen thousand men, reached his position on the afternoon of the 12th. The second division, under Brig.-Gen. C. F. Smith, moved to the left; and the first, under Brig.-Gen. J. A. M'Clernand, to the right. On the morning of the 13th, the action com menced by a furious cannonade. In the afternoon, a bold attempt was made to take an Important point by assault, In which the forces of Grant were vigorously repulsed by the Confederates. 622 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Friday the 14th, Commodore Foote appeared with his noble fleet of iron-clads, gunboats, and transports, bringing ample supplies of rations and ammunition and ten thousand men, all welcomed by ringing cheers from the army. This splendid re-enforcement, constituting a third division under Gen, Lew. Wallace, was ordered to take position between the commands of Gens. M'Clernand and Smith. The 14th was occupied by Gen. Grant in getting the troops just arrived into position. Commodore Foote, having perfect confidence in his iron-clads, moved up promptly, and commenced the action ; but he met a far different reception from that at Fort Henry. The rebels had arranged two formidable bat teries so as to take frightful effect by plunging fire upon the vessels of the fleet. They consisted of eight thlrty-two- pounders, three thirty-two-pound carronades, one ten-Inch and one eight-Inch columblad, and one rifled thirty-two- pounder. The rebels reserved their fire until the com modore brought up his fleet within less than four hundred yards of their batteries : then they suddenly opened with so terrific a fire as to soon end the strife on the water side of the fort. This action lasted only an hour and a half; but fifty-four patriots were kUled or wounded, while not a Confederate was kUled, nor had their batteries received any injury ! The American people had learned one more lesson; and the brave commodore retired to repair his fleet, while Grant prepared to reduce the fort by siege. He was one of those extraordinary men who could fight with the most chivalrous daring, or wait in perfect self-command untU his time should come. Two days had sufficed to show the army of the Republic that the Confederate general had prepared this position for a most stubborn defence, to cripple and send out of the action a valuable and trusted fleet, and also to convince the rebel chiefs in command that Fort Donelson must soon become untenable. A Confederate councU of war, therefore, resolved upon a desperate effort to clear the only practicable road to Nashville. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 623 At five o'clock on the morning of Saturday, the 5th, they moved out to assault M'Clernand's division promptly drawn up in order of battle, — the right under M' Arthur, the centre under Oglesby, and the left under W. H. L. WaUace. Adroitly taking advantage of a ravine, the Confederates gained the rear of the Union right flank. Sustained by a corresponding movement by Pillow's whole line, they swept the Union right brigade from their position. Buckner brought up his forces, and furiously attacked M'Clernand's left, commanded by Col. W. H. L. Wallace. The Union infantry stood firm, and poured In so deadly a fire from rifles and batteries, that the rebels recoiled, and settled back, greatly demoralized. The brigade of Oglesby was overborne by the masses brought to bear upon them by Pillow, who followed up his successes vigorously, and pays the Union troops the compliment to say, " They did not retreat, but fell back fighting, and contesting every inch of ground." Col. Wallace's brigade stood firm as a rock against all the shocks of superior numbers of perfectly des perate rebels: but, about to be enveloped by Buckner's divis ion, Wallace withdrew his men ; and at nine, a.m., by throw ing their whole force upon one-third of the Union army, the first purpose of the Confederates had succeeded, and the road to NashvUle was cleared. Gen. Lew. Wallace, on M'Clernand's left, had sent one brigade to the assistance of the right ; only, however, to be overborne by the advancing tide of Confederate success. Seeing the critical condition of the army. Gen. Wallace now despatched his remaining force under Col. Thayer, who moved up at double-quick, and deployed on the top of the hlU, forming a firm waU against the Confederate advance, and behind wdiich the troops, who had not fled, but retired to refill their cartridge-boxes, could re-organize. He reminds us of Stonewall Jackson on the heights of Manassas. Just at the time when the Confederates were in triumph over their supposed victory, moving eagerly up the slope, they met a fire so deadly, that they recoUed and retired. Drawn 624 THE GREAT EEPUBLIC. up again out of range, they were forced to another attack, and were again repulsed with severe loss. Gen. Grant now appeared on the field. He had been absent In conference with Commodore Foote, arranging the future of the campaign. Then the firm greatness and bold daring of the commander appeared. He afterwards said, " I saw that either side was ready to give way if the other showed a bold front. I took the opportunity, and ordered an advance along the whole line." Wallace, on the right, was simply ordered to retake the ground he had lost in the morning ; Smith, to storm the enemy's works in front. Gen. Smith put himself at the head of Lauman's brigade In battalion, with Cook's brigade in line of battle on its left, to cover that flank, and make a feint against the front. Buck ner's cokimn, seeing the danger, moved up rapidly to attack the storming party, but staggered back under the Union fire as often as they returned to the onset. The Union troops, " tearing away the abatis, rushed forward, and seized the breastworks." Buckner with his men took shelter within the defences, and left the brave Union men In possession of the heights which commanded the main works of the enemy. * Let us now return to Wallace. He promptly obeyed his orders. He assailed Pillow's troops with such fury as to overwhelm him on the ground he had wrested from the Union forces In the morning, and drove him within his own lines. This was a dreadful day's work : some two thousand men on each slue were strewn over the bloody field, ghastly in death, or agonizing with pain from their severe wounds. The Confederate forces had been successful everywhere till they struck against Wallace on the hill and the great com mander appeared on the field. They had missed their only possible opportunity of escape, received the rallying energy of the troops they supposed they had destroyed, and were shut up within their defences now dominated by Union guns. * Swinton, p. 78, and the whole description of the battle. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 625 On that dreadful Saturday night, there was no rest for the exhausted troops on either side. On the cold, frozen field, amid the peltings of rain, sleet, and snow, the defenders of liberty must lie upon their arms : but not a murmur arose from their lips ; they were there to conquer or die. There was another council of war in the rebel fort. It was a time of terror and deep perplexity. We know the result. Floyd was too guilty a coward to share the fate of his companions in arms, and handed over the command to Pillow. Pillow 'remembered his base treachery, and, fear ing the recoil of justice, passed over the command to Buck ner, who had both the courage and discretion to share the fate of his brethren in rebellion. Floyd and PUlow made their escape with the men they could possibly smuggle away. Buckner sent a flag of truce to Grant to know his terms, and received for answer, " No terms other than unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works." Forgetting the sol dier in his mortification, Buckner characterized the terms as " ungenerous and unchlvalric," and accepted them. The battle of Fort Donelson was over. Nine thousand men surrendered at discretion, and the Union flag floated grace fully over the fort. This was the Bull Run of the West : it was more ; for it broke up the whole line of Confederate defences, saved Mis souri, Kentucky, aud a large part of Tennessee, from the powder of rebellion, moved the usurped government of trea son two hundred miles down the Mississippi, gave us Nash ville, prepared the way for the grand and costly triumphs of Shiloh and Stone River, and, by its moral effects, took away courage from rebeUion, and gave it to freedom. FORTS JACKSON AND ST. PHILIP. While the nation waited for the slow development of the plans of M'CleUan, at Washington active minds were busy 626 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. with the question. What can be done in the mean time ? The West, as we have seen, answered by moving down the Mis sissippi, and fighting the terrible but decisive battles of Donelson and Shiloh. One distinct meaning of all this was, that the great artery of Western trade must be opened to the Gulf Gen. B. F. Butler believed that he could aid this great effort by troops from the East, and operations from the out lets of the Mississippi. Encountering many and formidable difficulties, he was at length on Ship Island with thirteen thousand and seven hundred men. On the third day of February, 1862, Capt. David Glascoe Farragut sailed from Hampton Roads in " The Hartford." He had been appointed to command a powerful fleet which was to unite with Gen. Butler in an attempt to gain control of the Lower Mississippi. This fleet consisted of forty-seven armed vessels : eight of them were large steam sloops-of-war, seventeen heavily-armed steam gunboats, two sailing sloops- of-war, and twenty-one mortar-schooners. " The whole num ber of guns and mortars was three hundred and ten, many of them very heavy and very good." * The secrecy with which these formidable land and naval forces had been directed created the most excited public interest. Various theories of their destination were Intimated ; the North hop ing that something would be done, and the South dreading the blow wherever it might fall. All doubt was at an end when Farragut and Butler met In consultation on Ship Island. The defences of New Orleans were such as to give plausi bUity to the popular idea, that they were absolutely Invulner able. Twiggs, of Infamous Texas memory, had been supersed ed by Major-Gen. Lovell, who had fully completed an Interior line of fortifications, which were deemed secure against anv force the United States could bring to bear upon them. In the extreme necessities of the Confederacy, however, the * Greeley, ii. 87, 88. THE WAR OP SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 627 troops and materials of war which Gen. Lovell, by great industry, had collected to make these works avaUable, were ordered away to contend with Grant and BueU. Two large iron-clads, " The Louisiana " and " Mississippi," which the citi zens of New Orleans thought were to sink any vessels of war which might by any means come within their reach, were not finished. The exterior line of defence, including Forts Jackson and St. Philip, seventy-five miles below New Or leans, was made as strong as means within the power of the rebels would permit. A first formidable obstruction to the passage of our fleet having been washed away, another, less difficult to manage, was constructed of " eleven dismantled schooners, extending from bank to bank, strongly moored, and connected by six heavy chains." * Glancing now for a moment at New Orleans, we find the people given up to pleasure. With the utmost contempt for Northerners, they talked and laughed about the spectacle of a mad attack upon their invulnerable forts, which was about to add a new zest to their entertainments. Balls, parties, theatres, operas, and the like, were the incidents of every twenty-four hours. On the 16th of April, the American fleet moved up the river to attack the forts. As they neared the scene of the combat, they saw coming down upon them a huge fire-ship. With blazing wood and turpentine and tar, it threw Its glare over the scene ; and, roaring with flame, it floated directly toward our fleet. Our men, it would seem, ought to have been stupefied with horror, as it moved on untU its flames must, in a few moments, be communicated to our vessels of war. But there were no signs of panic : commands were . coolly given and obeyed. A smaU company from " The Iro quois" entered a row-boat, moved up feariessly, and, grap pling the ship of fire, towed it away to the bank, where it could burn itself out at leisure. On the morning of the 17th, we were within two and a * Pollard, p. 250. 628 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. half miles of the forts ; and, at nine o'clock, the guns of Fort Jackson opened upon our fleet. Capt. Porter, in command of our mortar-vessels, directed the fire in response, and trained his guns, so that, by ten o'clock, their terrible mis siles began to reach their object. Three more fire-rafts came menacingly down to consume our valuable ships ; but they were disposed of with the same coolness and bravery as the first. For a whole week, the roar of cannon and mor tars told the frightful power of the combatants ; but the only apparent effect on the fort was an alarming fire from our hot shot, which threatened to consume every thing combustible it contained. The fire was, however, finally subdued. A change In the position of the fleet was necessary ; and, after a councU of war, Capt. Farragut calmly decided that some, at least, of his vessels of war must pass the forts. " What ever is to be done," he said, " must be done quickly. When, In the opinion of the flag-officers, the propitious time has arrived, the signal will be made to weigh, and advance to the conflict." An officer of a French vessel which had been up to the forts told Capt. Farragut that It was impossible to pass them. His reply was, "I am ordered to go to New Orleans, and I intend to go there." Farragut could depend upon the prompt obedience and extraordinary skill of his commanders and men. He says, " Every vessel was as well prepared as the ingenuity of her commander and officers could suggest, both for the preser vation of life and the vessels." Capt. Bell, with « The Pinola," "Itasca," " Iroquois," "Ken nebec," and "Winona," had been despatched to perform the difficult task of cutting away the obstructions which the Confederates had estabUshed near the forts. A rocket from the fort gave our daring men a momentary light ; and, with chisels and hammers, they assaulted the chains. A storm of shot and shell feU upon them : but they wrought on untU the chains parted; and slowly the vessels swung around, leaving the channel clear. Three days after, a gallant recon- THE WAR OP SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 629 noissance, and a gun fiom " The Itasca," announced that the passage was stiU open. At two o'clock, the signal rose on the flag-ship ; and the men promptly prepared for the dread ful work before them. Some had slept quietiy ; others had paced the decks with nervous anxiety ; but many of our men had been engaged in solemn prayer. "The Hartford," with the flag of Capt. Farragut, "The Rich mond," and " The Brooklyn," moved up close to the west bank, opening fire upon Fort Jackson as they advanced. " The Ca yuga," "Pensacola," "Mississippi," "Oneida," "Jaruna," "Ka tahdin," "KIneo," and " Wissahickon " passed close along the eastern shore, responding to the fire of Fort St. Philip. Capt. Bell, commanding a third line, consisting of " The Sciota," '• Iroquois," " Pinola," " Winona," " Itasca," and " Kennebec," moved between the two other divisions. The mortar-boats, under Capt. Porter, kept their position, and opened a new and most terrific fire upon the forts; while "The Harriet Lane," "Westfield," " Owasco," "CUnton," "Miami," "The Jackson," and " The Portsmouth," attacked the water7battery below the fort. The roar of these guns, the rolling thun ders of the forts and batteries, the blazing shells streaming in circles through the air, made the scene terribly sublime. Capt. Bailey, with "The Cayuga," first drew the fire of the forts as he passed through the opening in the obstruc tions. He, however, ran close under the guns of Fort St. Philip, which received broadside after broadside of grape and canister as his whole line passed safely through this frightful gantiet. "The Pinola," "Sciota," and "Iroquois," of Capt. Bell's line, also rushed through unharmed. The most terrible destruction seemed to centre upon the flag-ship " Hartford." A frightful fire-ship came down, with the ram "Manassas" in its rear. Moving as if directed by an evU spirit. It came directly on toward "The Hartford." Far ragut's guns kept up their fire as though no danger were near. Sheering a little, he avoided the fire-raft for a moment, poured in a most destructive broadside upon Fort Jackson, 630 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. and ran aground. The fire-ship dashed against him, and in stantly the rigging of "The Hartford" was in flames. At this awful moment, there was no disorder : the firemen turned the hose upon the flames; the engines tugged away, and moved the vessel from the ground ; the orders of Farragut were calm and imperious, and promptly obeyed ; the gun ners served their guns, and fired as regularly as If they were out of harm ; the flames were subdued ; and the head of the noble ship was turned upward, and rushed by the forts. The terrible ram "Manassas" drove her huge iron beak furi ously into the starboard gangway of "The Brooklyn," firing from her opened hatchway at the smoke-stack of the latter as she came up, whose bags of sand protected her smoke- pipe, and her Ingenious chain-armor saved her hulk. The ram passed on, and " The Brooklyn " rushed up the stream. Still under the raking fire of Fort Jackson, she was furiously assailed by a large rebel steamer ; but she hurled against her a heavy broadside, and sent her out of the fight. Next, abreast of Fort St. Philip, with only thirteen-feet soundings, she brought all her guns to bear, and poured In a storm of grape and canister that silenced the fort; while the men were seen from the masts of "The Brooklyn," by the blaze of her shells, running in terror for a place of safety.* The apparently impossible was achieved. Farragut's squadron had passed the forts, the rebel squadron was de stroyed, and the great battle was over. The sequel of this naval engagement, which will ever be renowned in history, rapidly developed. Our vessels of war moved on to New Orleans, sUencIng every battery on their way. The scene in the city beggars all description. We have no pleasure in detaUing the anguish and the rage of these misguided people. Their obstinacy and insolence, however unwise, were perfectly natural. The flag of rebeUion was hauled down, and the stars and stripes waved In its place. The rebel army, under Lovell, had wisely left the city to the * See Greeley, ii. pp. 83-93 ; also Headley's Farragut, pp. 67-69. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 631 mercy of its conquerors. Ships and cotton had become, by their own hands, blazing masses of fire on the water : their stores were consumed, or given up to piUage ; their forts were surrendered ; their costly munitions of war were de stroyed or captured; their capital was taken; and the American fleet moved boldly up the Mississippi to be haUed with shouts of joy by the fleet from above. Europe saw that there was no safety in acknowledging the Confederacy. "the monitor" and "the MERRIMACK." In the ordinary materials of a navy, the Confederates could not rival the United States. It was, therefore, a just con clusion upon their part, that, by at least one iron-clad, they must be made stronger than the Union at any given place or time. For this purpose, they raised our fine ship " Merri mack," cut her down, and covered her with enormous plates of iron, weighing In all over seven hundred tons. They furnished her also with a strong cast-iron beak, designed to be driven furiously into the sides of our wooden vessels, and sink them. She was finished, and had received her battery of eight nine-inch Dahlgren, and four seven-and-a-half-inch Brooks rifle-guns, by the fifth day of March, 1862. At about one o'clock on the 8th, she was seen, in company with two gunboats, rounding Sewall's Point, and advancing toward Newport News. Her advent had been for some time expected and dreaded ; and, now that she actually appeared, all true hearts were moved with dread. Receiving the terrific broadsides of "The Congress" as she passed, without showing the least concern, she bore down upon " The Cumberland." The fire of both these brave ships was well delivered ; but their heavy shot glanced from the ar mor of " The Merrimack," doing her no harm. Presently, with a full head of steam, she drove her strong beak Into the side of " The Cumberland," and opened a chasm, through which 632 the great republic the water rushed ; and she began at once to fill and settle. Her brave officers and men resolved never to strike her col ors to the defiant rebel monitor ; and, firing broadside after broadside, they went down with their colors flying. " The Congress " had been engaged by " The Jamestown " and "Yorktown," consorts of " The Merrimack;" and, attempt ing to escape, she ran aground. She gallantly maintained the unequal fight until the crushing shot of " The Merrimack " had torn her almost literally to pieces, and she had taken fire in several places ; then, to save her wounded from the flames, she lowered her flag. "The Minnesota," "Roanoke," and "St. Lawrence," at tempting to escape one after another, ran aground In water so shallow, that they could not be reached by the monster, or they would have been destroyed with the utmost ease. Evening coming on, "The Merrimack" with her two attend ants turned her prow toward Norfolk. Her Confederate offi cers and men, proud of her achievements, had no doubt of being able to finish the destruction of our squadron In the morning, and move on to New York if they pleased. The joy In Norfolk, and soon throughout the Confederacy, was unbounded, only equalled by the dismay and forebodings at Fortress Monroe and through the North. At eight o'clock that evening, a small, low, nondescript vessel made her appearance : It was Ericsson's " Monitor," commanded by Capt. John Lorimer Worden. But, seeing her diminutive size, the hearts of our brave officers and men sank within thera. The night wore away ; and, early on the 9th of March, "The Merrimack" came out again. Moving deliberately toward "The Minnesota," she saw what, in derision, was termed a " Yankee cheese-box," steam directly up by her side. The great battie promptly began. The heavy shots of "The Merrimack" rolled harmless from the turret of "The Moni tor ;" and her commander, amazed at the audacity ofthe littie craft, and seeing that he could not penetrate her armor. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 633 dashed over her to crush and sink her : but this also failed. In the mean time, a shot from " The Monitor" found way into the armor of " The Merrimack," and she began to leak. She turned suddenly, and hurled her missUes at '• The Minnesota " and " The Oregon ; " but " The Monitor " slipped In between her and her victims. Angry at this Impertinence, gathering frightful momentum, she drove her beak fiercely at the httle " Monitor," and, shivering her own timbers, passed by, leaving only a dent In th-3 armor of the mysterious, audacious little craft. After four hours' conflict, mortified and crippled, the monster rebel limped away ; and her career of destruction was ended. It is useless to attempt a description of the results of this great battle. The exultation passed from the rebels to the friends of the government. Our surviving naval heroes could only cheer, and offer thanks to God for their deliver ance. The American people, and presently the world, knew that a complete revolution in naval warfare had been wrought, as it were, in a day. There are no limits to the effect of this grand historic triumph of liberty In Hampton Roads. But how came this mighty little stranger here at this precise juncture ? The genius and science of Ericsson had triumphed. The government had made a cautious contract with him ; and he had, with Incredible energy, embodied his original elaborate thoughts In this little floating, masked, turreted battery. If, in his wandering search for patronage, France or Eng land had seized this invention ; if the timid confidence of our government had been delayed a single day ; if there had been one particle less of executive ability in the great Swedish American ; if there had been one failure in mate rial, or the adjustments of numerous parts of this wonderful combination of inventions constructed In so many different places ; finally, if the ocean had been wild and perUous, so as to have detained "The Monitor," — our squadron In Hampton Roads must have been utterly ruined, the blockade broken, 80 634 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. and our wooden ships everywhere dashed to pieces and sunk. But God superintended this whole affair. All these contingencies were In his hand; and every one of them obeyed his will to save a favored nation. THE PENINSULA. The winter had worn away; the early spring was rapidly passing; and the vast Army of the Potomac was still engaged in drilling In and around Washington. President Lincoln, who always acted for the people, ordered an advance. Gen. M'Clellan had under his Immediate command about one hundred thousand men. With this splendid force he moved upon Yorktown; but not deeming It prudent to at tack Magruder, who had only about seven thousand men in command, he "sat down" before the town, and "sent to Washington for siege guns." He continued thirty days in trenching, and preparing to open fire upon the enemy's works by breaching batteries. He would have been ready by the 6th of May; but, on the 4th, he discovered that there were no rebels there : Magruder had retreated, with the purpose of findmg a better place for resistance. A prompt pursuit fol lowed, under Gen. George D. Stoneman. Hooker, under com mand of Heintzelman, reached the enemy's new position at Williamsburg, and, with characteristic Impetuosity, ad vanced at once to battle, Intending to give him no time for preparation. Gen. J. E. Johnston, commander of the Confed erate forces, had hastened his troops to meet Gen. M'Clellan and defend Richmond. Gen. Hooker was therefore confrontr ed by Longstreet in force; and a fierce and terrible con flict ensued. By some strange oversight, this brave com mander was left to contend against enormous odds for nine hours without re-enforcements. At length. Gen. Hancock, by order of Gen. Sumner, reached the enemy's left, and by a brUliant charge drove him from his position at the point of the bayonet. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 635 This desperate battle cost us fifteen hundred and seventy- five men in kiUed, wounded, and missing ; but it compeUed the Confederates to retreat, leaving more than a thousand wounded on the field. Gen. FrankUn's division had been sent by Gen. M'CleUan up York River to West Point. He was joined by Gen. Dana with a part of Gen. Sedgwick's division. After a severe engagement, the enemy, composed in part of Wade Hamp ton's legion and Whiting's Texan division, withdrew. Gen. Stoneman now moved to open communication with Gen. Franklin. Gen. Smith's division followed on the direct road to Richmond. The Confederates, deeming Norfolk unsafe, abandoned it, blowing up and burning every thing that could be destroyed, including the renowned "Merrimack" and two other iron clads unfinished. The city was surrendered to Gen. Wool by the civil authorities. Norfolk in our hands, and " The Merrimack " destroyed, our fleet, under command of Commodore Rogers, now moved up the James River to within eight miles of Richmond. This brought him Immediately under the enemy's heavy guns at the famous Drury's Bluff, two hundred feet above the water, with the river obstructed by pUes and vessels ; sharp-shooters and Infantry in rifle-pits greatly increasing his danger. His men fought bravely, until the bursting of a hundred- pound Parrott on " The Naugatuck " added a new terror to the situation ; and the fleet moved down the river. M'Clellan's forces were now on the Chickahominy, a slug gish stream passing through a miserable, sickly swamp. At New Bridge, on the 24th of May, the hostile forces came into collision. The battle was fierce ; but the triumph of the government forces compelled the retreat of the rebels, and removed the contest to Seven Pines or Fair Oaks, on the direct road to Richmond. On the 31st of May, at one o'clock, p.m., the bloody battle of Fair Oaks was initiated by an overwhelming attack 636 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. from Gen. D. H. Hill's division on Gen. Casey, who was not quite prepared for it. Prodigies of valor were achieved by both sides on this dreadful field. Men fell, wounded and dying, or slain in heaps. Distinguished officers, In large num bers, were sacrificed as of no value. The advantage was decidedly with the Confederates, until a quarter-past three o'clock, p. m., when Gen. Helntzelman's division came warmly into the battle. The rebel commander-in-chief fell danger ously wounded. The command devolving upon Gen. G. W. Smith, he was suddenly paralyzed, and borne from the field. Jefferson Davis, In person, led a rebel charge to repel the advancing columns of the Republic. The spirited comraand of Gen. Sedgwick now came In between Heintzelman and Couch, and poured a torrent of canister from his twenty- four guns ; and Sedgwick, moving his columns gallantly for ward, swept the field. Farther to the right the battle raged, where Gen. Abercrombie was fighting against overwhelming forces ; and Gorman's brigade of Sedgwick's division moved promptly to his assistance : other regiments, under Gen. Burns, came up under a most destructive enfilading fire ; and, as they were in danger of being overwhelmed, the voice of Burns, " Steady, men, steady ! " rolling along their ranks, was an swered by cheer after cheer, and the rebels were checked. Farther still to our right the Confederate forces were hurled against our ranks, where Gens. Sumner, Sedgwick, Dana, Burns, and Gorman, with the greatest bravery and skill, com manded our men. At eight o'clock, p.m., the rebels gave up the contest for the day, and left our forces in possession of the field. There was more fighting on the next day ; but the Confed erates were not fierce and hopeful as before. It was the sequel of a great battle already decided. Neither party could crush the other ; but the advantage was decidedly with us. M'Clellan's despatch to the War Department said, " The victory is complete, and all credit is due to our officers and men," THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 637 Next morning, June 2, a bold reconnoissance by Gen. Hooker to within four miles of Richmond showed no enemy but pickets. Gen. Robert E. Lee was now in command of the Confed erates, and had evidently resolved to coUect aU his forces to resist M'CleUan and save Richmond. June 25, we were vigorously attacked by A. P. HUl at Mechanicsville. D. P. HiU's and Longstreet's divisions came into action ; but our brave men repulsed thera with dreadful slaughter. M'Call's reserves, who had never before been In battle, behaved with the courage and daring of veterans. M'Clellan, perceiving that the enemy would soon be strongly re-enforced, withdrew our troops to what he deemed a better position. This order was obeyed at some risk, as our forces were compelled, while they were falling back, to resist furious onsets of the eneray. We were at length ready, and the terrible battle of Gaines's MIU Immediately followed. Stonewall Jackson, generally supposed to be in the Shenan doah Valley, at the most critical moment of the battle came on to the field with his splendid corps, and fell upon our right flank with the greatest fury. The carnage was dread ful. After a long and brave resistance, overwhelmed by num bers. Porter's Infantry were compelled to fall, back; when he opened upon the Confederates with eighty cannon, and checked their advance. Cook charged their right flank with his cavalry, but was received with such a withering fire, that his horses became utterly unmanageable, and, by their wild movements, threw some of Porter's men into confu sion. At this critical moment, French's and Meagher's men rushed with cheers > to the front, and the eneray postponed the battle till morning. During the night, however, our forces were withdrawn across the Chickahominy. This movement enabled the enemy to claim a victory, and cost us the loss of our .base of supplies, with enormous quantities of military stores. During these contests, there was the greatest consternation 638 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. In Richmond. " The Confederate Congress had adjourned In such haste as to show that the members were anxious to pro vide for their own personal safety. President Davis sent his family to North Carolina, and a part of the government archives were packed ready for transportation. At the rail road depots were piles of baggage awaiting transportation ; and the trains were crowded with women and children, going to distant points in the country, and escaping from the alarm and distress In Richmond."* What must have been the surprise of the rebels, when the next morning, after the display of .such bravery and strength, the Union army had commenced a most perilous retreat from the Chickahominy towards the James River ! The pursuit, at first cautious in the extreme, became a succession of most violent assaults from an army roused by all the moral effects of a great victory. At Malvern HIU, while two-thirds of his men were yet struggling to disengage theraselves from the swamps of the Chickahominy and the furious attacks of the enemy, Gen. M'Clellan found It necessary to make a bold stand to save the Army of the Potomac from destruction. On the first day of July, Jackson moved on to the attack, with Whiting's division on his left, D. H. HiU's on the right, and Ewell's in the centre. Huger's and Magruder's men came up to join In the action, while Longstreet and A. P. Hill were held in reserve. The forces of D. H. Hill advanced against our right ; but they were swept down by a fire that no men could resist. Jackson sent his own division and a part of EweU's to HiU's support ; but success on that part of the field was Impossible. On our left, Magruder ordered fifteen thou sand infantry to charge. « There was," says PoUard, " a run of raore than six hundred yards up a rising ground, an un broken flat beyond of several hundred yards, one hundred pieces of cannon behind breastworks, and heavy masses of infantry in support. The brigades advanced bravely across the open field, raked by the fire of the cannon and large * Pollard, p. 211. THE WAR OP SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 639 bodies of infantry. Some were broken, and gave way; others approached close to the guns, "driving back the in fantry, compeUIng the advanced batteries to retire to escape capture, and minghng their dead with those of the enemy. To add to the horrors of the scene, and the immense slaughter in front of the batteries, the gunboats Increased the rapidity of their broadsides ; and the immense missUes came through the air with great noise, tearing off the tree- tops, and bursting with loud explosions. Towards sunset, the concussion of artiUery was terrific. The hlU was clothed In sheets of flame ; shells rained athwart the horizon ; the blaze of the setting sun could scarcely be discerned through the canopy of smoke which floated from the surface' of the plains and rivers. Piles of dead lay thick, close to the enemy's batteries ; and the baleful fires of death yet blazed among the trees, where our shattered columns had sought an imperfect cover behind the slight curtain of the fort." Night came on to stop this dreadful carnage. The rebels retired, feeling that they had not strength enough left for what they had hoped would be a grand final triumph. They had failed in their briUiant charge, and innumerable fugitives carried dis may to Richmond. Our right was unbroken. We had gained a great victory, and yet Gen. M'Clellan fled from It as from a crushing defeat. The rebel brigadier-general J. R. Tremble says, " The next morning, by dawn, I went off to ask for orders, when I found the whole army In the utmost disorder ; thousands of straggling men, asking every passer-by for their regiment; ambulances, wagons, and artillery obstructing every road ; and altogether, in a drenching rain, presenting a scene of the most woful and disheartening confusion." Just when our splendid troops, with spirits still unbroken, were expecting every moment to receive the order to advance through these shattered rebel forces to Richmond, which was now so nearly helpless at their feet, they were ordered to retreat. It was too much to bear. Some cursing, and gnashing their teeth with rage, others weeping with 640 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. disappointment, these noble men were hurried away to seek a place of safety, leaving multitudes of their dead and wounded to the care of the enemy. For three months of excessive caution, these heroic men had fought their way up to within four miles of Richmond, during which the Confederates had every opportunity to rally all their men, and prepare for the conflict ; and they had used it with the utmost industry and skill. After one continuous battle, lasting seven days, during which they had suffered in credible hardships, amid the carnage of battle-fields and the mire and miasma of the swamps, and seen raore than fifteen thousand of their brave comrades slaughtered, wounded, or captured, they had at length wrenched victory frora the grasp of their deadly eneraies, and were yet eighty-six thou sand men of unfaltering courage and unconquerable prowess; but they were now to leave their fields of heroic daring In disgrace ! Never was obedience a sterner test of loyalty ; but they obeyed. The campaign of the Peninsula was over ; and our enraged, dispirited army must haste to unite with Pope's command to save Washington. Cedar Mountain, and " the second Bull Run" as it is com monly called, followed not long after ; and, while men and parties differed as to the responsibility, the disgrace came upon the nation to heighten the dissatisfaction with the con duct of the war. Why were all these disasters ? Why did not our brave and superb army of the Potomac capture the rebel capital ? Why, Instead, raust our own capital be raenaced in conse quence of disgraceful defeat, when our forces were apparent ly strong enough to achieve victory ? By many it wiU be answered, they were not well commanded ; by others, that they were not properly re-enforced, and were attempting ImpossIbUItles. Only one answer, however, can be fihal. The nation was not yet ready to do justice. If we had closed the war then, there would have been no proclamation of liberty. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 641 ANTIETAM. The Confederate idea of carrying the war into the North had been delayed much longer than was intended ; but the result of M'CleUan's Peninsular campaign, and Pope's defeat at " the second BuU Run," determined this question. On the first day of September, Gen. Lee, with a large por tion of the Army of Virginia, moved towards Maryland: on the 6th he was in Frederick City, from which he marched his aggressive force to the severe defeat of South Mountain. On the 16th, these old antagonists, M'CleUan and Lee, with large armies, met on the field of Antietam. The im petuous Hooker hurled his brave division against the veter ans of Stonewall Jackson, and compelled them, after a dreadful conflict, to recede from their position. Early came forward to replace Jackson's division, which, however, un subdued, would soon re-appear on the field. RIckett and Meade now moved forward with spirit, and drove back the rebel lines. Hood's division, which had disappeared, came up again with great energy. Doubleday's " best brigade " moved forward In double-quick, and seized the crest of the hUl. Their brave commander, Hartsuff, fell, severely wounded ; but they held this critical point alone for half an hour. Rickett's division marched boldly to this centre, but recoiled from the terrific fire of the foe. Mansfield came to their help, but was driven back. On our right, Doubleday's guns destroyed a rebel battery. Rickett's men raUIed and stood firm, but were not able to advance. Hooker brought up Crawford's and Gordon's brigades and Mansfield's troops to his aid, and commenced a forward movement, to carry the woods ; but, receiving a severe wound, was compelled to retire from the field. Sumner, now in command here, brought up to the bloody cornfield Sedgwick's division of his own corps. The rebel M'Laws, after a severe night's march, moved into the field to the support of Jackson, and, 81 642 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. with WaUier's and Early's divisions, assaUed our brave men with dreadful energy, and retook the cornfield, but re coUed firom the murderous fire of our batteries. Franklin, with his fresh troops, now appeared in the battle. He sent Slocum to the centre, and ordered Smith to retake the contested ground. Rushing suddenly upon the rebels, they were swept from the field, which thereafter remained in our hands. For four dreadful hours, French's division of Sumner's corps withstood the onsets of the Confederates, having gained an advanced position at the close of the day. Rich ardson's division of the same corps came into action, the Irish brigades being conspicuous for gaUant and fearless bear ing. The enemy now attempted to turn, first the left, and then the right, of this division, but were repulsed with heavy loss. They then charged with desperation upon the centre, but were hurled back with great slaughter. The brave Gen. Richardson fell, and Hancock took his place. Fur ther attempts of the rebels showed that they had been seri ously weakened by their losses ; and the night closed the action here, leaving the advantage with us. In the afternoon, M'Clellan ordered up a large number of Porter's corps, held till then in reserve. Burnside, now re- enforced, charged across the bridge and up the hill, and took the heights. A. P. HiU's division, coming up fresh from Harper's Ferry, rushed upon our ranks, now disor dered by victory, and hurled them back ; but, recoUIng from the terrific fire of our batteries, they raade no attempt to cross the bridge. The lion-hearted Jackson, after recon noitring, declined the attempt to obey the orders of Lee to turn our right, and wrench a victory from the firm, deter mined ranks of our bleeding freemen. So closed, indeci sively, " the bloodiest day that America ever saw." * More than eighty-seven thousand Union men and at least sixty thousand Confederates entered the field; while the num- * Greeley, ii. 211. THE WAR OP SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 643 bers, courage, and skiU of the forces actually engaged were so nearly balanced, that a decisive victory was impossible. Some twenty thousand Americans on both sides fell that day, bleeding or dead. The Confederates fled from Mary land, and sought refuge beyond the lines. VICKSBURG. Let us now return to the West. There we find our brave freemen stiU struggling to remove rebel obstructions to the navigation of the Mississippi. The rebel flag yet floated over Vicksburg and Port Hudson. Farragut and Porter moved up the river. The noble fleet came down from above, under Flag-officer Davis, successor to the gallant Foote. A portion of Farragut's squadron shot by the blazing, roaring batteries; and the North-west and the East shook hands on the great Mississippi. On the 27th of June, a most terrific bombardment commenced. The brave fleet "steaming up stream, in front of the city, the gunboats deUvered broadside after broadside at the batteries, while the mortar-ketches from below filled the air with bombs." For eighteen days, this storm of fire and iron hail fell upon " The Queen City of the Bluffs " and its formidable batteries, to be answered only by belching flames and frown ing defiance. At length, an ugly ram, — " The Arkansas," — mailed and fearless, came out, and showed power to trample down our fraUer wooden crafts. Farragut, too wise and brave to risk his noble fleet, shot down the river; and " Vicksburg ! " was shouted by ten thousand voices, as " the Gibraltar of the Confederacy." The problem of Vicksburg now came back upon Grant and his army of Western heroes. For one whole year, this cool, great mind struggled with this problem ; much of the time in the midst of disasters and difficulties which would have overwhelmed almost any other man. But the Great Republic, at length, had found her man. The dashing, chiv- 644 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. alrous commander of Donelson was as calm and patient as he was energetic and daring. He had made five desperate attempts to reach the rear of Vicksburg, and failed : the sixth was now resolved upon. It would have been earlier adopted ; but it was so perUous, that Gen. Grant had deemed it his duty to try every possible method Involving less of hazard to his army. On the 29th of March, 1863, Gen. M'Clernand's corps, fol lowed as soon as possible by ammunition and provisions and by M'Pherson's corps, raoved across the country, thirty-five miles from Milliken's Bend, to a point below New Carthage. Admiral Porter ran the gantlet of the batteries, and, with several vessels and transports, reached the place of rendez vous. On the 30th of April, the troops were quietly ferried over the river, opposite Brulnsburg. In the mean time, Sherman made a very pretentious demonstration towards Haynes's Bluff, which so far deceived the Confederates as to call off attention from Grant and his movements below. At the right time, however, he disappeared from the menaced point, and moved rapidly on to Grant's line. May 1, M'Clernand's corps, and Logan's division of M'Pher son's, fought the spirited battle of Port Gibson, with five thousand rebels under Gen. Bowen, and beat them, both parties losing heavily. Gen. J. E. Johnston was now commander-in-chief of the rebel armies of the West ; and he, understanding the power of his antagonist, was gathering forces at Jackson, the capi tal of Mississippi, to resist his advance. But Grant's forces were there before he was prepared ; and, having no chance of successful resistance, he retired. Gen. Sherman promptly destroyed raUroad bridges and mUitary stores, and moved on after Grant, who had suddenly faced about, and was on the rapid march towards Vicksburg. Gen. Pemberton, the rebel comraander of this stronghold, thought the whole Confederacy depended upon It, and, dis obeying the orders of Johnston to evacuate it and save his THE WAR OP SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 645 army, sent a strong force to strike what he supposed to be Grant's line of communications. But Grant had no commu nications. He had boldly swung loose from his base of suppUes at Grand Gulf, and moved out fearlessly Into the enemy's territory, to fight his men, and compel him to feed his army. Finding his mistake when it was too late, Pem berton sought to return, without a battle, to the defences of Vicksburg ; but the movements of the Union troops were too rapid to allow it. Finding Grant's men moving up to Ed ward's Station, he was compelled to form in order of battle on Champion Hills. This was " a position of great natural strength," and the conflict was very severe. It is frightful to think of the result If Grant had been crushed that day between the forces of Pemberton and Johnston : but Gen. Johnston could not organize a sufficient force, and repair the track of war, in time to come Into this decisive action ; and Pemberton was overthrown. His scattered forces, rush ing to their fortifications, carried dismay to the citizens of Vicksburg, whose hope had been strong that Gen. Grant and his forces would meet their destruction in their desperate attempts to reach the rear of their city. The last obstacle to the advance of the conqueror was swept away ; and, just eighteen days from the crossing of the Mississippi, he moved up to a position near the fortifi cations of Vicksburg. It was the 10th of May when the doomed city was fully Invested. Then brave and desperate assaults, mines and counter-mines, thundering cannonades, bursting shells, and storming canister, followed each other in terrific violence, until the morning of the glorious 4th of July ; when the suffering garrison stacked their arms, and twenty-seven thousand Confederates surrendered to the veteran com raander who that day grandly represented the calra, irre sistible power of the Great RepubUc. Three days after, as a legitimate sequence. Port Hudson was surrendered to Gen. Banks, and the solemn pledges of the West had been fully 646 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. redeemed : the great Mississippi was open, from its source to the Gulf FREDERICKSBURG. Gen. Burnside now commanded the Army of the Poto mac. He had not coveted this heavy responsibility. It was forced upon him when the government was literally and painfully searching for a man. He resolved upon the direct line to Richmond, through Fredericksburg. His intentions were too soon ascertained by his antagonist. Gen. Lee. His advance reached Fal mouth, on the Rappahannock, opposite Fredericksburg, too late for a surprise. There was a further most unfortunate delay in the arrival of pontoons for crossing his army. This enabled the Confederates to make ample preparations to receive their assailants. The town, lying directly under our guns, was at our mercy ; but Marye's Heights, In its rear, with formidable defences, was to be the principal scene of the bloody strife. On the night of the llth and 12th of December, our pon toons, laid amid storms of rebel missiles costing us three hundred raen, were deemed practicable ; and our brave troops began to rush over. To drive In the enemy's ad vance, and clear the town, was but a brief work. Opposite Franklin's corps of forty thousand raen, on our left, behind the strongest defences, lay Stonewall Jackson, with his veter ans, his left commanded by A. P. HIU. Opposite the superb divisions of Hooker and Sumner, numbering sixty thousand, was Longstreet, whose men, with Jackson's, brought the rebel army up to about eighty thousand. At precisely this moraent it should have been seen that an attack upon Marye's Heights, against formidable waUs, and in the face of three hundred cannon raking every inch of our ground, with eighty thousand brave men, skilfully coraraanded, in the rear, was impracticable. The army should have been promptly and quietly withdrawn during THE WAR OP SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 647 the night, and an attempt made to turn the enemy's posi tion; but Gen. Burnside dreaded more the moral effect, upon the minds of an irritated nation, of a retrograde move ment, than he did the cannons and breastworks of Lee. Couch's division, under cover of a dense fog, formed for the assault. Brave and noble men they were ! When the sun came up and dispelled the mist, they obeyed the order, and moved up to be swept down by the storra of death frora rebel guns. There was no flinching, no hesitancy. On they pressed, subUmely rising above the fear of death, and seeraed alraost ready to triumph ; when they dashed against a solid stone wall, from behind which the guns of the rebels poured destruction Into their ranks. They could by no possible exertions advance farther, but stood firmly up to the dreadful slaughter. At length, when two-thirds of their nuraber had fallen, the bleeding, staggering survivors were led away, for others, equally brave, to take their places. Rank after rank, during all that long and dreadful day, our men, some of them fresh recruits who had never seen a battle, were led up to that stone wall to be swept down like grass, and with no hopes of success. Franklin, on the left, came into action too late for deci sive effect ; but, defying death, his men rushed against rebel columns and defences. Commanded iraraediately by Rey nolds and Bayard, they went into action to conquer or die. Meade's division, and a large nuraber of Hooker's, re-en forced these struggling heroes, and fought with the utmost gallantry. Portions of A. P. HiU's rebel corps were over powered and separated by their dreadful energy ; and two hundred prisoners were taken. Here, as success seeraed to be just at hand, the fresh troops of Early and D. H. Hill rushed to the front. They had marched all night from Port Royal, and came up in tirae to turn the scale against us. The carnage of that dreadful day defies aU description. It was the same everywhere ; moving on calmly, or rushing impetuously ; faUing, dead and wounded together, in writh- 648 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ing, gory piles of martyrs to liberty. Fifteen thousand men, as brave as ever marched to the field of death, had fallen, dead or wounded, or were prisoners, reserved for a harder fate. The next morning, Burnside was determined to make another assault: but the stern remonstrance of Sumner, sustained by other commanders, controlled his desperate purpose ; and, after facing his antagonist for two days, he withdrew his forces across the river, the keenest sufferer of all the suffering millions upon whose ears the news of that day's disaster fell. Burnside, a brave soldier, a noble man, and a good division commander, was relieved by Hooker. Bold, dashing, irre sistible In command of forces which he could fairly wield, Hooker was, nevertheless, quite Inadequate to the respon sibilities of comraanding a vast aggressive army. The par tial successes and ultimate failure of Chancellorsville fol lowed Fredericksburg ; and the scene of conflict changed. GETTYSBURG. In the judgment of Lee and the Confederate authorities at Richmond, the time had now fully come to advance in earnest into the territory of freedom. The Union forces had just been twice beaten, and must be supposed to be greatly demoralized. The time of considerable numbers of men had expired, and they were mustered out. The anxious politicians of France and England, making nothing of South Mountain and Antietam, and turning their eyes from the West, argued frora the Peninsular carapaign, and frora Fred ericksburg and ChancellorsviUe, that the grand catastrophe of the Great Republic was at hand ; and it is probable that rebel emissaries near their courts had reason for saying that a bold and successful advance into the North would be fol lowed by a recognition of the Confederacy. The rebel army was In the highest spirits, and believed it was absolutely In- THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 649 vincible. These brave and desperate men longed to com mence their proud march through the fields of rich and abundant supplies, for the destruction of Philadelphia, Balti more, and Washington ; and even New York and Boston seemed to them to be within the reach of their Irresistible power. Immense preparations had been made for the grand Inva sion. During the first days of June, this movement com menced. Soon Hooker, who was on the alert, found Lee's advance at Culpeper. Presently he was pouring troops through the Shenandoah VaUey. EweU dashed across into Maryland, and, as the van of a large army of invasion, pro duced the greatest alarm, extending through Pennsylvania into the North. Hooker did not dare to uncover Washing ton until Lee left the Shenandoah Valley. The Confederate general had thus ample time to bring up his forces ; and, by the 24th of June, he was ready to follow Ewell across the Potomac. Ewell was already in Pennsylvania : Chambersburg and Carlisle had been entered in triumph ; and Harrisburg, the capital, was menaced by his advance. Hanover and York were soon reached by other rebel forces. In the mean time, under the prompt orders of Gov. Cur tin, the hardy sons of Pennsylvania were rallying to the defence of their noble State. At Harrisburg and at Colum bia, they were gathering to dispute the passage of the Sus quehanna and the rebel advance on Philadelphia. The Army of the Potomac showed the unconquerable spirit of the North. Re-organized, and strengthened by re cruits moving to the front at the call of their beloved Pres ident, Hooker was soon at Frederick, Md., with a powerful force, making demonstrations towards Lee's communications at Harper's Ferry. Lee's advance upon Harrisburg was now arrested. The army of the United States, he discovered, was not, as he had supposed, broken and powerless, hovering about the defences of Washington to preserve Its existence, but a strong, active force, too formidable to be left in his rear. 82 650 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. A retreat was not to be thought of The moral effect upon his proud army of invasion, and on his own reputation, would be perilous In the extreme : besides, it was too late ; a great battle was inevitable. He wisely called In his troops, and beo-an to threaten our communications. Hooker asked Gen. Halleck, now commander-in-chief at Washington, for ten thou sand troops at Harper's Ferry to join with Slocum's corps, and make a vigorous demonstration In the rear of the rebel force. Being refused, he resigned ; and our government again tried the perilous experiment of a change of comraanders on the eve of a great and decisive battle. Gen. G. G. Meade was advanced to the command. Greatly surprised, he, how ever, acted promptly. On the 29th of June, he issued his orders, and moved his army from Fredericksburg, deter mined to give battle. The two armies, raarching at right angles, carae unexpect edly Into collision at Gettysburg. Gen. Meade had selected his battle-field on Pipe Creek. Gen. Lee had resolved to wait for an attack. But Providence selected the field: and it was well ; for, to all human appearance, the future of the armies, and perhaps of the nation, depended upon it. On the morning of the 1st of July, a Union force of cav alry, under Buford, was reported as being in Gettysburg. Gen. A. P. HUl moved up with two divisions of his corps to drive Buford away. HIU attacked at once, but found him self dealing with a strong, wily antagonist. Buford kept his forces active, but chiefly in reserve; until, at about ten o'clock, A.M., as he expected, the head of Reynolds's column appeared, commanded by the gaUant Wadsworth. Without waiting for orders, he resolved to aid and reUeve Buford. He moved to the rear of the town, beyond Seminary Ridge, and was attacked before he had time to form a line, and with but one brigade and a single battery at comraand. The brave and daring Gen. Reynolds ordered his men to charge; when he was struck by a rebel buUet, and fell, mortally wounded. His heroic command, energized rather than disheartened THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 651 by this great disaster, rushed forward with such impetuosity as to sweep every thing before them ; taking the whole rebel brigade, including their commander, prisoners. At this mo ment, Davis's Mississippi brigade appeared on the right, rush ing for our only battery ; but they were overwhelmed, and also taken prisoners. Doubleday's and Robinson's divisions of our first corps, and Pender's rebel division, now reached the field ; and the battle raged with still greater fury. At noon, the gallant first corps, greatly diminished by the numbers of their slain, stood firm; and the Union troops had thus far been superior to their assailants. At one, p.m., Howard came up with our eleventh corps, and moved to the west and north of Gettysburg. Jackson's veterans, now commanded by Ewell, marched rapidly up from the Susque hanna, and, seizing a superior position, broke through the weak centre of the extended Union line, and took five thou sand prisoners. It was not till late in the afternoon that Gen. Meade re ceived intelUgence of the battle in progress and the death of Gen. Reynolds. He ordered Gen. Hancock to Gettys burg to survey the field, and report. This brave man ar rived just In time to meet the fugitives from our great dis aster, with the Confederates in hot pursuit. He assisted our noble Gen. Howard in raUyIng the troops and forraing a new line of battle, presenting so firm a front as to induce the Confederate commander to pause. Night came on, and we were not destroyed. Meade, perceiving that the field of the great battle had been determined for him, ordered his main army to march ; and all night these brave men pressed forward, so that. In the morning, aU but the sixth corps had reached their positions. On the morning of the 2d, Lee saw that he was in the midst of a great battle, which, entirely contrary to his in tentions, had been brought on by his own troops. God, and not the great commanders, controUed events that day. Gen. Lee determined upon his order of battle. EweU 652 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. moved against our right on Gulp's Hill, occupied by the twelfth corps and Wadsworth's division of the first. Gen. Hill threatened our centre on Cemetery Hill, where the eleventh corps stood by the side of Robinson's and Double- day's divisions of the first, connecting with Hancock's sec ond corps. But the principal attack was to be delivered by Longstreet upon our left under Gen. Sickles, who. Instead of making firm connection with Hancock's left, as Gen. Meade expected, had thrown his right half or three-quarters of a mile forward of Hancock's flank. At four o'clock. Long- street's forces moved boldly upon our left, which, exposed by the peculiar position of Sickles's corps, could not resist the shock. Fighting desperately, we were flanked and broken ; and the Confederates, rushing up the ravine with exultant shouts to seize Little Round Top, the key of the position, met Vincent's brigades, which grappled with them In fierce conflict. Woods's brigade re-enforced Vincent. Both these brave men fell amid the dreadful carnage ; but, by the death-struggles of these two heroic brigades, the position was saved. In the mean tirae, Longstreet's right advanced with great Intrepidity, enveloping Sickles's left; BIrney's division was coinproinised, and driven over the ridge ; Sic kles was borne from the field, severely wounded. Humphrey's division, handled with consummate skill, and fighting des perately, gained the crest, and formed bravely and defiantiy, with only three thousand raen. Hancock proraptly re-en forced him ; and the Confederates, exhausted, recoUed from a fire too severe for their strength or courage. Terrific batties raged on Humphrey's left. There Barnes's division went down, and Caldwell's division lost half their ¦ nuraber. Ayers's regulars rushed in : but the Confederates were soon thundering at their flank and rear; and they bravely cut their way through to Littie Round Top, leaving nothing to protect our centre. The Confederates raoved up with the hope of completing their triumph, but saw sud denly before them the unbroken ranks of the fifth and THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 653 sixth corps. They hesitated ; and Crawford's division of Pennsylvania reserves moved down upon them with such fury, that they fell back, and adjourned the conflict tUl another night should pass. These heroic Confederates slept on their arms in the wheat-field. At six o'clock, P.M., EweU formed Jackson's veterans in two columns, — one attacking Cemetery HUl; the other, Culp's HUl. So many of our forces had been removed from Culp's HUl, that EweU's troops easily entered our works, and remained for the night. Eariy's brigades swept away such portions of the Ill-fated eleventh corps as remained, and gained a foothold on Cemetery HiU within our works ; but the brave resistance of our artillerists, and the rapid and powerful advance by Carroll's brigade of the second, hurled thera back, and the battle of the 2d of July was closed. On the 3d of July, Lee raade his last terrible assault upon the Union forces on the heights of Gettysburg. He determined upon a grand cannonade and charge by Long- street's corps, and expected great assistance from Ewell against our right, who retained and re-enforced his irapor tant position on Culp's HUl ; but, before daylight. Gen. Meade hurled the twelfth corps upon EweU's advance, and by successive struggles, lasting till near noon, drove his men from the invaluable position they had left on the afternoon of the 2d to aid their struggling brethren in arms. At one o'clock, p.m., a hundred and fifty-five rebel cannon opened their terrific fire upon our ranks of embattled free men ; and for three dreadful hours this frightful cannonade continued. Eighty Union guns replied from Cemetery Ridge and Cemetery HIU, producing, in grandeur of display, " the greatest artillery combat that ever occurred on this conti nent." But prudent energy and military science had pro tected our men, so that the casualties from the rebel guns were comparatively few. At three o'clock, p.m., Pickett's assaulting columns, number ing, with their supports, about eighteen thousand superb 654 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. veterans, moved slowly and steadUy out from the front of Seminary Ridge. Our wise artillery commander had econo mized ammunition and strength ; and, at precisely the right moraent, he poured Into them a fire so destructive, that per fect order seemed a physical Impossibility. Pickett's left sup- .porting division, under Heath, staggered, and fell back : his right supporting column, writhing In death-agonies, fell in the rear. On, on, came the calm, dreadful colurans, clos ing up their ranks, as heavy missiles from Union cannon ploughed through thera. Our Infantry reserved their fire until these heroic men had reached almost to Hancock's front. Suddenly a storm of bullets from Stanard's brigade fell upon their right ; then a withering fire from the divisions of Gibbon and Hays, with canister from Woodruff's battery. At this point, the Con federates responded ; but they were swept down In numbers so appalling, that they broke and fled ; and fifteen hundred men, wdth their colors, rushed for safety to the ranks of our grim warriors, and surrendered. The right of the attacking column was assailed with so deadly a fire from Hall's and Harrow's brigades and the brave Green-mountain regiments, that they fell Into the cen tre. Still Pickett sternly held his assaulting column to its dreadful task, and hurled his men against the brigade of Gen. Webb, which, for the moraent, seemed to give way ; and daring rebels leaped our breastworks, and terrible hand- to-hand death-struggles ensued. Col. Devereux, of the Nine teenth Massachusetts, begged permission of Gen. Hancock to lead his men Into the very centre of this destructive conflict; and it was granted. Col. Mallon's Forty-second New-York was ordered up with him, and Harrow's brigade followed. Our colors waved in the breach ; the rebels feU in heaps of dead and wounded; the survivors broke and fled in dismay, or surrendered to our brave men ; and the victory was ours. The glorious 4th witnessed the retreat of Lee's shattered THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 655 columns from the field of Gettysburg, and the surren der of Vicksburg to Grant. A day of loftier triumph had never shone upon the Great Republic. SHENANDOAH VALLEY. This fine portion of Virginia was destined to be the scene of almost innumerable conflicts. Here the renowned Stone wall Jackson met Shields, and recoiled from his terrible blows ; then, moving swiftly to meet Fremont, fell suddenly upon Kenerly, and crushed him ; drove Banks from Stras burg, and delivered battle at Winchester ; failed to destroy seven thousand men, or even capture their principal trains, with twenty thousand victorious veterans ; compelled the President to call off M'Dowell's troops from re-enforcing M'Clellan on the Peninsula ; fought and retreated by turns ; eluded his gathering pursuers by the celerity of his move ments ; and, when he was expected to dash into Washington, suddenly fell upon our forces In death-struggles on the Chick ahominy. In this valley, the chivalrous Sheridan struck, with stun ning blows, the reckless Early, fighting him desperately and beating him at Opequan, then, two days later, at Fisher's HUl. Sheridan, having chased his antagonist out of the val ley, dashed through its principal towns as far as Staunton, and destroyed railroads, forage, and every thing else that could sustain a rebel army, made a flying visit to Washington. Early, informed of this, resolved to make a desperate effort during his absence to retrieve his fortunes. He made a hasty night-march, and, just at break of day, feU upon our un suspecting troops at Cedar Creek; killing, scattering, and taking them prisoners, almost without resistance. AU efforts to rally our flying men were useless : every brigade rushing up to stay the tide was overwhelmed. The rebels seized our camp and provisions, taking twenty-four guns and twelve hundred prisoners. 656 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Sheridan, on his return frora Washington, had slept at Winchester. Rumors threw him early into the saddle. Riding rapidly south, he learned the news of his disaster, and then met the fugitives of his beaten army. Address ing words of encouragement to them In the raost pleasant and assured raanner, and deliberately re-forming his lines, he ordered an attack, which, after a dreadful struggle, over whelmed the rebels, restored our guns and many of our prisoners, and virtually destroyed Gen. Early's army. LOOKOUT MOUNTAIN. Gen. Rosecrans, with his brave Western men, had defeated Price at luka. Van Dorn at Corinth, and Bragg (after four days' hard fighting) at Stone River. He fought his way to Chattanooga, the key to a campaign against the rebels of Georgia. After a desperate and disastrous engagement at Chickamauga, he was superseded, and resigned his immediate command into the hands of Gen. George H. Thomas, whose almost Incredible skUl and energy saved our army from destruction on that field of slaughter. Gen. Burnside now appeared In East Tennessee, where the old flag was haUed with tears and shouts of joy by multi tudes, who, in the midst of unparalleled suffering, had pre served their patriotism unimpaired since the beginning of the war. Gen. Grant was now appointed to the command of our forces In the West. Our army was In distress at Chattanoo ga, with scanty subsistence, and their long communications In the greatest perU. The eleventh and twelfth corps, under Hooker, were ordered to re-enforce Grant ; and twenty thousand men were moved from the Rapidan to the Tennes see in eight days. It was a special Providence. Our com munications had been cut, and miUions in supplies destroyed, for which our brave men were nearly starving. Bragg felt certain of completing the victory of Chickamauga. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 657 At this critical moment, Grant arrived. He made his dispositions promptly to open up a shorter line of suppUes, and connect Chattanooga with Hooker's command at Wau hatchie. Hazen, with eighteen hundred men of Brig.-Gen. Smith's division, dropped quietly down the river on pontoon- boats, passing the rebel pickets, and constructing a bridge for the passage of our army ; Smith moved down with the balance of his four thousand men ; and Bragg awoke on the morning of the 28th to find the heights rising up from Lookout Valley in our possession. We were, moreover, safe from famine, as our supplies now reached us by eight mUes of wagon-road, instead of twenty-eight over a fright ful mountain-road as before. Soon the astonished rebels saw the head of Hooker's columns winding through the mountain gorges. These effective forces, so far as they knew, were far below Washington on the Rapidan ; but now they formed in battle-array right before their eyes. On the night of Oct. 29, Geary was furiously attacked ; but he was on his guard, and his assailants were re pulsed with dreadful slaughter. Sherman was rapidly coming up with his army from the Big Black by the way of Memphis ; and Grant, with some anxiety, waited his arrival. Longstreet was beleaguering Burnside at Knoxville ; and Grant wished to fight this battle promptl}', and re-enforce Burnside. Sherman soon reported in per son ; and, Nov. 23, Grant's i^ovements coraraenced. Sheri dan's and Wood's divisions of Granger's corps seized Orchard Ridge, and held it. Geary, on the 24th, capturing pickets at the bridge, extended his force to the base of the raoun- tain. At eleven, a.m., our guns opened a terrific fire. Hooker's men were ordered to charge up the mountain at the very muzzles of the enemy's guns ; and they moved promptly. Up those heroes toiled, over rocks, through ravines, and around precipitous cliffs, untU about twelve, when Geary's men rounded the peak, and they were 83 658 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ordered to pause. But they could not, would not, hear : on they rushed, till they reached the summit, and hurled their astonished foes over the precipitous eastern declivities of the mountain. The battle was above the clouds. It was soon dark, and the carnage ceased. Geary was here re-en- enforced by Carlisle from the fourteenth corps ; and the enemy fled, leaving twenty thousand rations to our raen. By daylight, eight thousand of Sherraan's men were over the river. Others crossed rapidly ; and he fought his way up, and carried the north end of Mission Ridge. Thomas pushed forward Howard's corps till It united with Sher man. Hooker's brave men gallantly charged the enemy, and took Mission Ridge, capturing large numbers of pris oners. Sherman attacked at daylight on the 25th. A fierce and bloody conflict raged till three, p.m. Message after mes sage carae to Grant that we were beaten ; but he calmly waited for Hooker's advance. Judging that the crisis had corae, he rode bravely along the ranks, saying, in his strong, brief way, " Men, get ready : I want you ! " Cheers answered the call of their beloved commander-in-chief Thomas now received orders; and Baird, Ward, and Sheridan's divisions rushed forward, driving the rebels from their rifle-pits. On they pressed, in the face of grape and canister from more than thirty pieces of artillery. The ridge was gained ; and our brave men had achieved a victory that opened the door to Georgia. Sherman and Hooker pursued the flying forces, while Thomas promptly organized the expedition for the re lief of Burnside and our noble patriots of East Tennessee. Before our men had time to rest, they were dashing on towards Knoxville under the tireless Sherman ; and making the last eighty-four mUes, over dreadful roads. In three days, they soon convinced Longstreet that he must raise the siege. Our brave, hard-fighting, suffering men at KnoxviUe hailed their deliverers with transports of joy. THE WAR OP SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 659 THE BLOODY MARCH TO RICHMOND. Experience had taught the governraent that concentra tion was Indispensable to success. The clear mind of Mr. Lincoln saw this ; and, waiting patiently untU he was sure the people saw it, he brought forward the measure, and Congress adopted it, creating the office of Lieutenant-Gen eral : and on the second day of March, 1864, upon his nomi nation, Ulysses S. Grant was confirmed Lieutenant-General by the Senate, and, under the President, coraraander-in-chief of all the armies of the United States. In notifying Gen. Grant of his appointment, Mr. Lincoln said, "As the country herein trusts you, so, under God, it will sustain you." Gen. Grant, In his reply, said, "I feel the full weight of the responsibilities now devolving on rae ; and I know, that. If they are properly met, it will be due to those armies " [the " noble armies " mentioned above], " and, above all, to the favor of that Providence which leads both nations and men." Never did two men rise more grandly up to the highest responsibilities: God was, to their great minds, the sover eign and the trust of the nation. Gen. Grant announced that his headquarters would be in the field, and, for the present, with the Army of the Poto mac, now raised to more than a hundred thousand troops. They were re-organized in three corps, — the second com manded by Hancock, the fifth by Warren, and the sixth by Sedgwick ; the whole under the general orders of Major- Gen. Meade. The ninth corps, under Burnside, was subse quently added. A grand campaign how received form in the quiet, colos sal mind of the Lieutenant-General, commanding, in effect, a miUion of men. It comprised two great features. The Army of the Potomac, moving towards Richmond, would seek the rebel army of Northern Virginia, their main force under Gen. R. E. Lee ; and Gen. W. T. Sherman, command ing the departments of Ohio, Cumberiand, Tennessee, and 660 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Arkansas, would move eastward from Chattanooga, and seek the other great army of the Rebellion under Gen. J. E. Johnston. The two forces were to be sustained by auxiliary commands, all concentrating at Richmond. We were amazed at the greatness of the conception, pleased by its simplicity, and rendered hopeful by its unity of design. Now, for the first time, the military power and grandeur of the United States would appe'ar. All things beirig ready, on the night of" the 3d and 4th of May, Gen. Grant's army moved. He crossed the Rapidan in the face of his antagonist commanding eighty thousand veterans, and fought the terrible battle of the Wilderness; where, during three dreadful days, on both sides, probably, thirty thousand men fell In the struggles of death. He penned the famous despatch, " I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer," and followed Lee rapidly to Spottsylvania Court-house. Here another terrific battle was fought, in which some twenty thousand of our brave men fell, killed or wounded. Grant, believing that he had inflicted upon the enemy all the injury practicable at that place, and having stormed one set of breastworks and been arrested before another, proceeded quietly to flank his antagonist. He made a desperate effort to reach the North Anna first, and throw his array between Lee and Richmond ; but the rebels had the Interior line and the best roads. When, therefore, Grant reached this point, he found them directly In his track, protected by formidable works pro vided for just this contingency. Warren and Hancock bravely forced the passage of the river, but to find Lee strongly Intrenched In a position which could only be taken at an enormous expense of life. Gen. Grant, therefore, ordered his men to recross the river ; and the next Gen. Lee knew of him, he was on the direct way to Richmond. Soon, confronted by Lee in a position not to render an en gagement desirable, Grant made another flank movement, with the view of crossing the Chickahominy ; and accepted THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 661 battle at Cold Harbor. Here, on a portion of the old battie- ground of M'CleUan and Lee, a most destructive engage ment occurred. Near ten thousand of our brave men fell in less than half an hour. In kUled, wounded, and missing, we sacrificed thirteen thousand one hundred and fifty-three men; and the battle was not decisive. Grant performed another perilous flank movement ; crossed the Chickahominy, despite the resistance of his foes ; dashed across to the James ; and was soon heard thundering frorn the south of Rich mond. Butler had been firmly intrenched at Bermuda Hundred, and had made various movements for the destruction of railroads, taking Petersburg, &c. He met with some suc cesses, but failed to produce that powerful diversion in favor of Grant which was to form an important part of the campaign. Sheridan had been almost ubiquitous, — now hanging like a storra-tloud around the flanks of the enemy, now cutting his comraunlcations and destroying his supplies, and now fighting desperate battles with rebel cavalry, — displaying everywhere those dashing qualities, directed by the clearest judgraent, which have placed him by the side of the best cavalry and corps commanders known In history. We had fought our way to the end of that line ; we had placed hors de combat some forty thousand of the enemy : but, alas ! this had cost us, in killed, wounded, and prison ers, nearly one hundred thousand men. We had adopted the only alternative, — pursuing and fighting our foes when we could find them, and, by bold and skilful tactics, avoiding a conflict when necessary. We had diminished the force threatening Washington frohi sixty thousand to twenty thousand men. We had Impaired the strength of the enemy, rendering it impos,sible for him to regain It; and developed the enormous resources of the nation, fiUing up our wasting ranks with unfaUing recruits. We had made our bloody inarch to Richmond. 662 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. THE TRIUMPHAL MARCH FROM ATLANTA TO THE SEA. Gen. Sherman had fought his way to Atlanta, and, by a series of brilliant engagements, had seized this southern stronghold of the Confederacy. Well might the rebel authorities ask, " What will he attempt next ? " They were, doubtless, men of great sagacity; but it may be presumed, that, in all their theories, they did not include the slightest conception of what was about to occur. It was a natural suggestion to the minds of the Southern people, and taken up by the brave and chivalrous Hood, that Sherman was now so far from his base of supplies, that his communications could be easily cut, and his whole array de stroyed. With this idea, Hood was soon in his rear, breaking up railroads, and preparing obstructions to the Union retreat. Sherman pursued him as If his very life depended upon it, until he drove hira so far as to develop another part of the grand carapaign, under coramand of the Indomltable'Thomas, with headquarters at Nashville ; and the next Gen. Hood knew of him, he had burned the rebel works at Atlanta and much of the city, simply putting it out of the power of the eneray to use them, and was on his way towards the Atlantic Ocean. Men North and South looked on with amazement. Our splendid array, severed from Its base of supplies, was marching madly into the very heart of the enemy's country. What would the Confederates do ? The chivalrous South proudly answered, " Rise in mass, and destroy them." Gen. Hood could not hope to overtake Sherman. He, how ever, raoved on to his destruction in the very engagements intended for him by Gen. Grant, under the cool, strong gen eralship of Thomas. The rising which was to destroy Sherman did not occur. The skirmishes on his way could hardly be termed battles. He swept through a rich country, over a breadth of thirty mUes, his army faring sumptuously, dashing away all oppos ing forces, and destroying raUroads and the supplies of war. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 663 The worid held its breath as he passed out of sight, but cheered with unparaUeled enthusiasm when he reported from Savannah. He had performed the triumphal march " from Atlanta to the sea ; " he had destroyed the richest granary of Confederate suppUes, severed their comraunlcations, flanked Charleston, and compelled its evacuation; and moved up grandly to within supporting distance of Grant at Richmond. RICHMOND. The commander-in-chief of the armies of the Great Re public had not reached his position to sit down to the work of a quiet siege ; nor was he there simply to take Richmond. His great theory of breaking up the RebelUon by destroying its armies appears everywhere. One attack, therefore, fol lows another; one day's failure is succeeded by another day's effort. His wily foe, with the view of compelling him to loose his terrible hold, sends all the force he can spare into the Shenandoah Valley to menace Washington. Grant can not be frightened. He makes the necessary provisions to meet that emergency by the genius of Sheridan, and holds on to the throat of the Rebellion. One of his collateral plans requires that Fort Fisher should be taken; and Butler undertakes it, without success. Grant hands over the task to Gen. Terry, and It is done. His brave troops are beaten off from one line of communication, and he attacks another. The enemy rejoices in silencing his guns on one front, and presently they are thundering away on another. A terrific mine is sprung, and an assault fails ; but a charge in another quarter immediately taxes all the energies of the rebels. He positively gives them no rest. Their successive beating to quarters, their exhausting vigils and charges, are actually painful to see. If any demanded, " Why don't he take Richmond ? " the answer plainly was, " He is not there for that purpose. He is simply seeking to destroy the rebel armies of Lee and Johnston." For this he had struggled to 664 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. get between Lee and his fortifications ; for this he de spatched Sheridan to destroy railroads and canals, and cut off supplies, and prevent re-enforcements; for this he dashed up to Washington, on his way to Tennessee, when he thought Thomas would delay his attack upon Hood until the grand opportunity had passed ; for this he ordered Sherman to drive ruin through the heart of the Confederacy, and come up in the rear of Richmond, forcing Johnston to move con stantly nearer and nearer to the common vortex ; finaUy, for this he waived all means of hopeful attack which did not Include the shutting-up of every way of escape to the rebel army. The grand crisis had corae at last. The great carapaign was about to close at the rebel capital. In and near which, by the vast combinations of one great mind, every vital ele ment of the Rebellion had been literally compelled to gather. The final orders were given, and the army of freemen moved to its desperate work. The fighting was terrific ; but there was no yielding. On, on, our brave heroes pressed : one position after another yielded to their valor: they stood firm amid grape and canister and bursting shells; rushed fearlessly upon the gleaming bayonet ; stormed through the breach at the cannon's mouth ; assailed the re treating foe with long miles of blazing fire ; until that morning of Sunday, the second day of April, 1865, carae, and the trembling chief, Jefferson Davis, received in his pew. In the midst of the service, that ominous despatch from the heroic Lee, " My Unes are broken In three places. Richmond must be evacuated this evenino-." Richmond had faUen ! The glorious InteUigence was flashed over the Union. The dismay and the screeching, the rush and the whirl, the fleeing throng and the roaring flames, at the capital of the RebeUion ; and the ringing of bells, the notes of thrilling joy from bands of music, and shouts of freeraen in ecstasies, in every part of the North, — made this day memorable in the annals of the Republic. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 665 The last desperate struggles of Gen. Lee were painful to behold. They were very bloody, but all of no avaU. The toUs of the great commander were too strong for him to break through. The terms were truly magnanimous. The Army of Northern Virginia surrendered. The final surrender of Johnston to the gallant Sherman, after instructions from the government, and council with his noble friend Gen. Grant, soon followed ; and the War of the Rebellion was ended. The Confederates intended it for a grand moral and phys ical triumph of slavery ; the government at Washington intended it for the restoration of the Union ; God intended it for the destruction of slavery, and the full development of his plans of freedom on this continent. God's plans tri umphed, and the war closed. The storm is past ! So soon, so fast. The sulphurous cloud hath hurried by That hung so heavy on the sky, — A dark, oppressive canopy ! It parts so gently as we gaze. We wonder at the morning haze. How swift it came With march of flame ! And, while we paused to dream of war, The rush of battle broke afar. And through the smoke shone not a star : We only saw by battle-gleams The startling image of our dreams. Its earthquake tread We heard with dread ; And far-ofl' nations, wondering, gazed, As high the flame of battle blazed. And loud the shout of war was raised. The days were dark ; we paled with fear ; And summer skies were sad and drear. We saw the brave, Both gay and grave, 666 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. In awful combat haste to die, And sink so low aud silently. As if such life were but a sigh : The battle-greed, unsated still. Of friend and foe yet sought its fill. It seems a spell ; So quick it fell, And hushed the cannon's deafening boom, And set ajar the doors of doom To brothers sitting in the gloom : It fell like beauty from a cloud On us so long in sadness bowed. It spans the sky In victory. The bow of Peace is firmly set Against the storm-cloud's front of jet. Upraised by gleaming bayonet : We see the harmless lightning's play ; The thunder dies in peace away. Now homeward pour. From fields of gore, The broken columns of the brave ; Their tattered banners proudly wave i Behind them lingers not a slave. But, ah ! the sleeping tarry long : They only live in deathless song. The prayers we said Are answered. In God's own way we own 'twas done : The price was great ; and God alone Unsevered keeps the Union one. And still we pray, O God of peace ! In Freedom's reign let battles cease.* CHRISTIANITY AND THE WAR. The religion of Jesus allows no personal resentments : it requires love for hatred, and meekness under suffering. Nor wIU it permit national Injustice or unrighteous retribution; but it requires the magistrate to protect the right, and punish aggressors who seek to destroy civil government. "He Is the minister of God for this very thino-," and "he * Dwight Williams. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 667 beareth not the sword in vain." When, therefore, liberty is assaUed, the executive justice of the nation must defend it, and destroy the power which would overthrow it. Hence, when the Great RebeUion broke out, as In the days of the Revolution, the pulpit sounded the alarm, and the holiest Christian ministers and laymen called the nation to the defence of liberty. As in Philadelphia, Cincinnati, and other places threatened by the foe, distinguished preach ers of the gospel led their people to the defence, wrought with their own hands in constructing field-works, or, when allowed, took their places in the ranks. In very large num bers, they filled distinguished positions In the army, or fought with common soldiers, and shared to the utmost their dan gers and sufferings. They served as chaplains, and per formed the offices of religion for the well, the sick, and the dying. The Christian Alliance, under the active agency of Rev. C. C. Goss, in AprU, 1861, began a series of most vigorous efforts for the relief and religious instruction of the soldiers. He at once instituted means for the distribution of reading- matter ; and large numbers of our soldiers were soon per mitted to read in the camp their own valued church and secular periodicals and other useful literature. As the voice of the Christian Alliance sounded out in warm, earnest ap peals, noble citizens, ministers, pubUshers, responded ; and the means of mental relief and support came into their depots, and were passed out in steady streams. Kind visitations, faithful rehgious instruction and services, and unnumbered offices of kindness, accompanied these suppUes of mental aliment. The Sanitary Commission arose from the earnest and hu mane examinations of distinguished phUanthropists into the condition, perUs, and wants of our vast armies in the field. It was ascertained that the legally-appointed methods of medical and surgical treatment, and supplies of food and nursing for the sick, were not, and could not be, sufficiently 668 the great republic. prompt and tender to meet the wants of our suffering, bleeding thousands in the camp and on the battle-field. They were dying In large nurabers — dying in agonies in describable — for the want of attention. These facts were brought out, and the heart of the nation was moved. Plans for organizing relief were promptly submitted to the gov ernment; and on the 9th of June, 1861, "a commission of inquiry and advice. In respect of the sanitary interests of the United-States forces," was appointed. Henry W. Bel lows, D.D., was at its head ; and, in an Incredibly short time, an army of philanthropists moved into the field, and ample stores of medicines, clothing, and food suitable for the sick, were supplied by the liberal. The Comraission, with Its of fices of kindness, and by its generous hands and syrapathizing hearts, was everywhere, — upon the battle-field, in the hospi tals, on the track of advance and retreat, bearing away the wounded, putting the cup of cold water to the lips of the dying, dressing wounds, nursing the sick, and thus saving thousands of valuable lives. Money flowed into their treas ury like water. California alone gave 1 1,233,831.31 ; other Pacific States and Territories, with the greatest liberality, added to these contributions ; till the aggregate amount from that coast swelled to the large sum of $1,473,407.07, — all to send relief to our suffering soldiers in the field of slaughter. From every State and every town in the loyal Union, and from other countries far off and near, these supplies came In, amounting in all, frora Dec. 4, 1862, to Jan. 1, 1866, to $4,924,048.99. The world stood amazed before these efforts of humanity, rising up frora the pervading Christian sense of the American people. The United-States Christian Commission arose from the conviction, that, with rehef for the bodies of our soldiers, there was an imperative demand for more thorough atten tion to the wants of their souls. Just as the Sanitary Com mission carae in to supplement the labors and supply the defects of the medical staff and commissariat of the army, THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 669 the Christian Commission came In to the aid of chaplains and other Christian philanthropists, to give the blessings of experimental Christianity, with temporal supplies, to our needy soldiers. It was organized in Philadelphia on the 16th of Novem ber, 1861, In response to a call from the Young Men's Chris tian Association. George H. Stewart, Esq., its most promi nent man, and a multitude of other noble philanthropists, devoted time and wealth and prayers to this great enter prise until the war wa^ over. " In both means and men there was no lack, but a steady and rapid growth, of abundance, without a parallel in the history of Christian charities. Every day of its ex istence seems to have given the Commission a wider range, and a firmer hold upon the affection and confidence of the churches and patriots of the land. In the first year. Its receipts amounted to |231,000; In the second year, they reached $916,837; In the third year, $2,282,347. From January to May of the fourth and last year of its activity, the donations were $2,228,105." For the whole period of Its services, from the 16th of November, 1861, to May, 1866, in cash, services, provisions, clothing, &c., its Christian charities and labors for the relief of our soldiers were estimated at $6,291,107.68. Dele gates commissioned, 4,859, — working In the aggregate, without compensation, 185,562 days; boxes of stores and publications, 95,066 ; Bibles, Testaments, and other portions of Scripture, 1,466,748 ; hymn and psalm books, 1,370,953 ; knapsacks, books In paper and flexible covers, 8,308,052 ; bound library-books, 296,816; magazines and pamphlets, 767,861 ; religious weekly and monthly periodicals, 18,126,- 002'; pages of tracts, 39,104,246; "SUent Comforter," &c., 8,572; sermons preached by delegates, 58,308; prayer- meetings held by delegates, 77,744 ; letters written by dele gates for soldiers, 92,321.* « For the above extracts and figures, I am indebted to Eev. T. A. Peknlet. 670 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. "The home-comforts, provisions, delicacies, clothing, and ten thousand appliances, for the relief of the suffering, which people showered upon the armj^, were conveyed to the sol diers through the hands of volunteer laborers fresh from horae, whose only pay for their toil was the blessing of God, and the gratitude and happiness of those for whom they labored. Coffee-wagons, called by the soldiers ' Chris tian artillery,' were drawn along the lines, furnishing the men with hot coffee, fresh toast, &c., during the battle. On the field, gathering up the wounded; In the field-hospitals, bathing and dressing wounds; by the side of the dying, offering prayer, or snatching a few last words for the be reaved family at home, — these laborers were found in large numbers. It was estimated by the officers and surgeons of the Army of the Potomac, that, during the Wilderness cam paign alone, at least three thousand lives were saved, besides all the suffering alleviated. But while these men carried In one hand bread which perisheth, in the other they carried the bread of heaven. While they labored to heal the wounds of the body, they also aided the wounded soul to step into the fountain opened, and be healed." * Woman in the War was an angel of mercy. From the coraraon walks of virtuous life, from the highest circles of culture and affluence, Christian women entered the hospitals and the fields of blood, to sacrifice comfort, health, and even life itself, to relieve our sick and dying soldiers; to bless them with woman's tenderness, her gentle voice, her kind instructions, and faithful prayers. Frora Maine to California, they bore incredible hardships, tolled night and day In societies, festivals, and fairs, and in manufacturing lint and bandages for the wounds of our martyr-heroes. Christian labor went beyond direct army-work; and noble, heroic men volunteered without pay to bear all the trials of the carap and the march and the field, rushlno- into the very jaws of death to save souls. Everywhere the build- * Communication of Rev. C. P. Ltpobd. THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 671 ing of rude chapels, faithful preaching, . and meetings for prayer, frequentiy amid the bursting of sheUs, revealed the noblest Christian heroism in the work of regeneration. Gra cious revivals and conversions, numbering hundreds and thousands, resulted from these self-sacrificing labors. Let It now be observed that every church in the loyal North, In all their official bodies, sustained the government by the most hearty resolutions, the outpouring of their treasures and men, and the boldest action. The reUgious life poured through the nation's heart to its very extremi ties, giving great force to these words from our beloved President, Abraham Lincoln. They were spoken in response to a thoroughly loyal message, through their coraraittee, of the General Conference of the Methodist-Episcopal Church, In the midst of the bloody march of Grant to Richmond. " Nobly sustained as the government has been by all the churches, I would utter nothing which might In the least appear invidious against any. Yet, without this, it raay fairly be said that the Methodist-Episcopal Church, not less devoted than the best, is, by its greater numbers, the most Important of all. It is no fault in others that the Methodist Church sends more soldiers to the field, more nurses to the hospitalsj and raore prayers to Heaven, than any. God bless the Methodist Church, bless all the churches ! And blessed be God, who, in this our great trial, giveth us the churches ! " No mind in America rose more grandly up to the reli gious significance of the war than that of Abraham Lincoln. Let us record the solemn words uttered in his last inaugu ral address : " Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wUls that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toU shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still It must be said, ' The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous alto gether.' " 672 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. MURDEROUS RKVENGE. The nation was In triumph. A day had burst upon our sky more glorious than any which ever before shone upon any land beneath the sun. Joy and gratitude swelled the hearts of our free millions. The Rebellion was crushed ; slavery was dead. Peace came, with her rich consolations, to bless our land, so long distressed and bleeding. No oppressed heart, no tired brain, felt such relief as the heart and brain of Abraham Lincoln. No spirit of haughty triumph appeared. He had tears for the suffering and the bereaved, pity for the conquered, and pardon for the rebel lious. He was the grandest type in existence of a great, magnanimous, conquering. Christian nation. From these heights of exultant joy, the millions of Ameri can citizens were suddenly plunged Into the deepest distress. Abraham Lincoln was slain ! The hand of a vile assassin had taken away the most precious life on the continent. No intelligence so direful ever burdened the telegraphic wires, no sorrow so deep and awful ever settled down upon the heart of a nation. At twenty-two minutes past seven o'clock, on the morn ing of the 15th of April, 1865, the great and good Mr. Lin coln breathed his last. The last expression of the vileness of slavery, the fell revenge of expiring oppression, the concentrated malignity of thirty years, struck the highest, purest representative of American freedom ; and he died for the country, which. In the hands of God, he had lived to save. War and darkness o'er the nation gloomed ; Terror ruled the Capitol. The chief. Still great in death, lay pale and unentombed, Embalmed in myriad flowers of love and grief; While round him sadly, higher, day by day, The dirges rose and slowly died away. What reck we now the assassin's word or blow ? The struggling Samson with his dying pi-ayer THE WAR OF SLAVERY AND FREEDOM. 673 Did Dagon's temple with its gods o'erthrow, And plant the holier shrine of Freedom there. Foul Treason tangled in his meshes lies. While radiant Truth soars upward to the skies. 'Tis done ! Bear slowly out the sleeping form, The mighty dead. Triumph succeeds the strife. He saw the sun arise beyond the storm, And drank from him the glorious tides of life. Oh ! death is but tlie hero's tranquil rest When nations honor, and when Heaven has blest. Now bear him slowly out by mufiled di-um. Ye soldiers, comrades whom he loved so well ; Around him let the mighty heroes come Whose stars their fields of death and victory tell : Bow low, and tenderly that name repeat, — Your watchword in advance or dark retreat. Now bear him out where seaport cities rise, And wealth and commerce on the nations wait ; Where masts and spires, encircling, kiss the skies In The Republic's eastward golden gate. A nation's moan rises the mountains o'er ; Atlantic answers the Pacific shore. Now rest him here ; for, lo ! the people come, — The high, the low, — his children all, they seem, — With ashy face, and lips of marble, dumb. This pageant vast — 'twere like a mighty dream Of some far planet, where the light of day Had for eteinal ages died away. But no : earth yet may claim Jehovah reigns ; The nation of the free is still his care : He, though the great may die, the right maintains ; He gently bends to heed the lowliest prayer : And, now crushed hearts of nations to him call. He heeds their cry ; he marks the sparrow's fall. Homeward still bear him on. There shall he rest 'Mid prairie-flowers that hail the golden sun. When Freedom's States, from east to glorious west, For God and Truth and Liberty are one. Ye heroes, who for freedom lie so low, The noble soul of Lincoln joins you now. Build high the monuraent; the storied bust Crown with flowers ; let childhood's tender years With beauty bend lamenting o'er his dust, And hallow deathless glory with their tears ; Then on the skies the bright inscription read, — His noblest mo-n-ument is a nation freed. 85 674 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Arise, MT CouNTET ! gird thee for the fight; Lead on the van of nations yet to come : The heavens are arming for the struggling right. And star-eyed Freedom seeks her sunset home ; Immortal Hope to glory guides thy way ; And Time's last twilight kindles into day.* ? Burial of Lincoln. By L. W. P. CHAPTER IV. THE TRIUMPH OF LIBERTY. " As for me, I dare not, will not, be false to Freedom. Where the feet of my youth were planted, there, by PVeedom, my feet shall ever stand. I will walk beneath her ban ner ; I will glory in her strength. I have seen her friends fly from her, her foes gather around her ; I have seen her bound to the stake ; i have seen them give her ashes to the winds : but, when they turned to exult, I have seen her again meet them face to face, resplendent in complete steel, brandishing in her right hand a flaming sword red with in suflFerable light. I take courage. The people gather around her. The Genius of America will at last lead her sons to freedom." — Senator Baker. " We know how to save the Union. The world knows we know how to save it. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free, — honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last, best hope of earth. Other means may succeed : this could not, cannot, fail. The way is plain, peace ftil, generous, just, — a way, which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless." — Abraham Lincoln. Amid the carnage of terrific battle, it was almost impos sible not to ask, Why must this desolating war continue ? why must our brave troops be slaughtered, and no decisive victory follow 1 Some there were who thought they saw the reason in the crying injustice of slavery. It began to be raost earnestly said that Providence demanded justice as the condition of victory. Was it true that the American people had not yet comprehended the meaning of this dreadful chastisement, — that God would lead them through their trials to see their great sin, and renounce It? Did God Intend to destroy slavery by this war? Many thought so ; a few said it in eloquent words, and appealed to Heaven In fervent prayer for this result. Among others, the Prot estant ministers of Chicago and vicinity intensely believed it, and sent a deputation to lay their views before the Presi dent. They were kindly received ; and, whUe he held his own opinions in abeyance, he drew out their strongest ar-> 6?5 676 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. guments in favor of emancipation by proclamation, as a war measure, and their answers to objections not his own. He said, "I raise no objections against it on legal or con stitutional grounds ; for, as commander-in-chief of the army and navy In time of war, I suppose I have a right to take any measure which may best subdue the enemy." He was simply anxious to know the state of the public mind, the degree of advancement In the track of his own profound judgments. He had checked his own commanders because they were In advance of the people : but he at length came to the conviction that the people would sustain him ; and hence, on the twenty-second day of September, 1862, he issued a proclamation containing these words : " On the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves In any State, or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be In rebellion against the United States, shaU be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The people were electrified. Good men were fiUed with delight and gratitude. The rebels were wild with fury. The Northern enemies of the President denounced it as a most tyrannical assumption of power : but, having taken his position, he was immovable ; and according to promise, when the hundred days had expired, he issued THE GREAT PROCLAMATION. " I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, by virtue of the power In me vested as commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States In time of actual armed rebeUion against the authority and government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war-measure for suppressing s*d rebellion, do on this first day of Jan uary, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and In accordance with my purpose so to do, publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days THE TRIUMPH OF LIBERTY. 677 from the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the States, and parts of States, wherein the people thereof respectively are this day In rebellion against the United States, the foUowing ; to wit " [the names of the rebel States, with exceptions, are then mentioned]. " And, by virtue of the power and for the purpose afore said, I do order and declare, that all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be, free ; and that the executive govern ment of the United States, Including the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons. " And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free to abstain from all violence, unless in necessary self- defence ; and I recomraend to them all, that, in all cases when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages. " And I further declare and make known that such per sons, of suitable condition, will be received into the armed service of the United States, to garrison forts, positions, sta tions, and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service. " And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of jus tice, warranted by the Constitution upon mUitary necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind, and gra cious favor of Almighty God." Thus spake the wisest, best man of our tinies ; and near four miUions of slaves leaped at once into liberty ! From that moment, God commanded victory to the armies of Free dom. BLACK WARRIORS. Prejudice against color so thoroughly pervaded the North as well as the South, that the government did not at first entertain the idea of admitting Africans to the army.^ The most determined purpose was manifested to fight their bat- 678 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. ties, but allow them no opportunity to fight for themselves. Dreadful reverses, and the absolute necessity for men, joined with the devoted loyalty of the blacks to the government, overcame these scruples. People of color showed most val uable kindness to Union men attempting to escape from rebel prisons, by furnishing food and relief to famishing soldiers, and as guides to our armies. At length, they raet with a friendly reception as " contrabands ; " and finally they rose to the dignity of soldiers in the army of Freedom. The proclamation Indicated some of the perilous methods In which they might serve their country, and they moved proraptly into all the positions declared open to them. The outcry of the rebels against this measure, characterizing it as R barbarous attempt to encourage all the horrors of insurrec tion, and their terrible threats and proclamations of retali ation, were strangely inconsistent. From the first moment of hostilities, they availed themselves of the services of their able-bodied slaves to strengthen their army ; and If the slaves did not appear In the rank and file, yet their hard field-labors released others, and added them to the fighting force. Indeed, as no insurrection, no acts of barbarism, followed, and our strong colored troops were performing prodigies of valor, in their last extremity the rebels undertook to devise a method of making soldiers of their slaves ; but It was too late. Indeed, it might be unsafe for thera, but safe for the nation ; for the instincts of the slaves were in favor of liberty. When the world saw the proraptness with which, to the number of 178,975, they volunteered to enter the army, the ease with which they accepted the most stringent disci pline, their noble military bearing, and the desperate valor with which they charged the enemy or led a storming col umn, there was no longer any question as to the rank and value of black warriors. A recognition of the true manhood of the oppressed race was thus, by act of Providence, forced upon the American people. This was the second great triuraph of liberty. THE TRIUMPH OP LIBERTY. 679 THE VICTORIES OF BLOOD AND OF TRUTH. The American people had passed through unparaUeled suf ferings. Our dead, fallen in the struggle, numbered at least 325,000 ; and some 200,000 had gone into the spirit-worid fighting for slavery. More than half a mUlion of the American people had perished to settle the question, whether America should be slave or free ; and the wail of sorrow, coming up from every part of the land, pierced the heavens. Great was our anguish, and great had been our crime ; but God's purposes in regard to the United States were now becom ing more evident, and men were awed before the majesty of his power. We began to realize " the mission of great suffering." Our victories were not merely over the em battled hosts of rebellion, but over the prejudices of ages. We had conquered ourselves. See what opinions had gone down in this struggle, and what truths had taken their place ! We thought slavery was chiefly a misfortune : we had learned that it was an enormous individual and national crime. We thought it could be met by concessions, but learned that it must be destroyed. We thought it could be eradicated by truth, but learned that it could go out only in blood. We thought the war must be one of white men, but learned that the slaves were to have place and rank in the battle for free dom. We thought we could save the Union, and concede " the right " of property in man ; but we learned that liberty and Union must stand or fall together. We thought we were fighting for the sovereignty of the government, but learned • that we were fighting to emancipate the negroes and the nation. We thought, when the war was over, we must then deal with slavery as we might be able, but learned that the war could not be ended untU we had " proclaimed liberty throughout the land to all the inhabitants thereof" We thought the manhood of slaves must be the result of long and almost impossible culture ; but we learned that it was in their very being, and must have recognition and justice 680 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. before the era of education could begin. Finally, we had learned that God had determined to extend to the nation the regeneration which had long been recognized as the privi lege of the individual only. So grandly rose truth in Its new Incarnation to enter upon its broader, mightier mission to the world. THE GREAT AMENDMENT. The Great Proclamation had released the slaves in the ter ritory dominated by the Confederacy, and, with what seemed anomalous inconsistency, left in slavery those who were within the actual sovereignty of the United-States Govern ment. This showed, not the principles or wishes of the Presi dent, but his loyal obedience to the Constitution. He would not advance a single step In favor of his most sacred princi ples without the clear authority of law; but the nation must make the great fundamental change. When the Constitution was established, it seemed to have but one great task ; which was, to work out of itself the wrong of a blind, almost concealed, Indorsement of slavery. Broad and strong and sound In the main as it was, it was not equal to the work of shielding so enormous a vice from the blows which would be levelled at It by the hand of justice. Sorae there were, who, even In the earliest days of its authority, foresaw that It must some time purge itself from this vice, or be overthrown by It. Nothing could be logically clearer ; and yet the power and sophistry of class interest and astute political leaders bewildered the people, and nearly succeeded in making the vUest tyranny and most odious caste appear to be the true Intent of the fundamental law. It was only when the ruin which had been so long and insidiously work ing within the government broke out in overt acts of rebel hon that the nation roused Itself to the necessity of casting out from the Constitution this warring element of defiant oppression. Accordingly, on the thirty-first day of January, 1865, the great amendment was finally adopted by Congress. THE TRIUMPH OF LIBERTY. 681 Subsequently indorsed by the required numbers of States, It became Article XIIL of the Constitution ; namely : " Sect. 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a pun ishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. Sect. 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation." This achievement, reserved for our own day, was the strong est possible development of essential liberty. Other previous amendments were of comparatively small Importance. There are some to follow, which will render more distinct and un deniable the equality of all men before the law, and make still clearer acknowledgment of the humble dependence of our great providential nation upon the arm of Almighty God. • It was, of course. Indispensable that the States should adjust their civil governments to this grand development of national freedom. This they are now In the act of doing. Amid the agonies of revolution, under authority practically irresisti ble, the oligarchy yields to democracy, and the Declaration of Independence comes out distinctly to take Its place In the State governments. " We," now of modern times, we South and North, we the representative power of the nation. In Congress, conventions, and legislatures a.ssembled, now, as did the Revolutionary fathers, " hold these truths to be self evldent, — that all men are born free and equal, and endowed by their Creator with certain Inalienable rights, and among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and that all true governments derive their just powers from the con sent of the governed." These grand old announcements are at length to be thoroughly practical in the Great Republic, and take their place in essence and form In the Constitu tions of the Nation and the States. This is development such as ought to mark the century just following the great year of 1776. Other amendments yet to be made, whether general or 8U 682 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. local, radical or conservative, liberalizing or guarding the fundamental law, are of comparatively little importance. They may be tried, found imperfect and improved, or im practicable and abandoned ; but this advance is organic and irrevocable. At the close of this remarkable period, we look back with amazeraent at the events which have occurred. It may well be said, there have been no other such ten years of history on this continent. The work of long ages seems to have been crowded into a few brief years. The most sanguine reformers did not expect to live long enough to see revo lutions so grand, and all in favor of liberty ; but we have seen them, and are constrained to say, " It is the Lord's doings, and it is marvellous in our eyes." ©[£«'„, DTCCCfliTJi ;,"'' by n. Ji. Jiaii, N. '. PERIOD V. MISSION. CHAPTER I. THE NEW NATION. " It is the third huge gate of barbarism, the monarchical gate, which is closing at this moment. The nineteenth century hears it rolling on its hinges." — Hugo. "America is now the grandest combination of power, stability, unity, freedom, and happiness, the world has seen.'' — Partridge. A REVOLUTION SO great as that through which we have just passed could not leave us precisely the same as before. It Is true, we have the same country, the sarae climates, the same physical resources of wealth and happiness : but we have changed ; and, in our changed condition, we present a strong contrast to almost all nations emerging from pro tracted, desolating wars. The strength of the Great Republic has been but partiaUy tested ; for we have been at war with a large portion of our own people. Looking at the development of our resources, and the achievements of our arms, in this divided state, we are compelled to ask. What would they have been if our war had been against invasion from a foreign foe ? Look at the men brought into the field from the numbers of our loyal citizens. From April 15, 1861, to AprU 15, 1865, the calls of the President charged against the several States amounted to 2,759,049 men. Of these, 2,656,553 are credited, showing that the Northern States and Territories 684 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. actually sent this large number of men into the great strug gle, lacking only 102,496 of the whole number called for; and these were rapidly coming in when the close of the war arrested the people in their march to the field. Besides the above, 120,000 "emergency men" and 178,975 colored troops sprang to arms, at the call ofthe government, to save their country and their liberties. On the 1st of March, 1865, our military force of all arms, officers, and men, amounted to 965,591. On the 1st of May, 1865, — just two months later, — the number had swelled, by enlistments alone, to 1,000,516. According to the public judgment of the most enlightened of other nations, these facts are without a parallel in history. Of our brave citizen-soldiers, there were, during the war, killed, wounded, and missing, 441,316 ; while the killed, wounded, and missing of our rebel foes reached 765,765: making the frightful aggregate of victims to this Rebellion 1,207,081. When the war closed, we held of our Confederate foes 98,802 as prisoners of war; while the whole number of men surrendered to our arms amounted to 174,223. Now, when we place by the side of these exertions of power, and exhaustions of numbers, the fact, that our popu lation steadily increased during the whole period of the war, we shall have some Idea of the moral force of people, with which we enter upon our future mission. Look at the cost of the war. As a single fact toward an approximate estimate, consider, that, for the five years ending June 30, 1866, the expenditures for the war and navy de partments increased more than $300,000,000. Add the amount paid for pensions (already between |15,000,000 and $16,000,000 annuaUy), add also the interest of the public war debt, the expenditures of the loyal States for bounty, rehef of soldiers through the great commissions and other wise, the maintenance of mUitary force in the rebel States during their unsettled condition, the enormous destruction THE NEW NATION. 685 of property in the war districts, and the value of the labor of our millions taken away from the pursuits of industry to exhaust their time and strength in military campaigns, and the amount swells beyond our power of estimation or proper conception. Notwithstanding all this, we begin our new career with largely Increased wealth and business energy. Look at the national debt. On the 31st of August, 1865, it rose to $2,735,689,571, — its highest point. To this must be added the debts of the several States and local corpo rations, amounting to about $650,000,000. The aggregate of these public debts seems so enormous, that great financiers in England and on the Continent have regarded repudiation and the utter bankruptcy of the nation as Inevitable. We moved from the war into the future with this debt. Look at our resources. The Great Republic does not stagger under these enormous burdens. Our people paid Income-tax, in one day, — viz., the 31st of August, 1865, — $2,315,000; on the 4th of September, 1865 (a Sunday preceding), $4,066,731.42 ; and on the 2d of January, 1866 (New-Year's holiday preceding), $4,068,000. These figures show the highest amounts reached In a single day. The. growth of wealth may be seen by the following figures. In come-tax yielded in 1864 $14,919,279.58 1865 20,567,350.26 1866 60,894,135.85 The whole amount realized from this source from 1862 to 1866 is $164,865,018. Our aggregate revenue from cus toms, internal revenue, and direct tax (including also loans and treasury-notes), reached in 1864 $1,358,758,614.58 1865 1,805,939,345.93 1866 1,270,884,173.11 Can a people commanding such resources, with reasonable 686 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. financial economy, be wrecked for the want of funds ? Let it be observed, that, notwithstanding the predictions of our foreign friends, we have paid all our interest, amounting, as it did for 1866 (including treasury-notes), to $133,067,741.- 69 ; and from the 31st of August, 1865, to the 1st of October, 1867, we had reduced the principal of our national debt $262,412,124.24. Thus we begin our great future.* ORGANIC UNITY AND REGENERATED PATRIOTIS.M. During the reign of slavery, sectional tendencies greatly impaired and threatened our united strength. Though the ultra doctrine of State against National rights was thoroughly exploded by our clearest-minded statesmen. It nevertheless exerted an Injurious Influence over the national feeling of multitudes. The first great fact of the new nation is the acknowledged Indissoluble unity of all the States and Terri tories We are not merely so many millions of people, liv ing In good or bad neighborhood ; we are not so many great soveieign States of rival and antagonist power. We now know for ourselves, and the world understands, that, like " liberty and, union," our great States are " one and insep arable now and forever." This aggregates our strength, bringing all our millions of people and wealth into one grand whole ; and this can no longer be regarded as a unity of accidents, a unity by external pressure or arbitrary power. It is a unity of principles, of national life and development ; by the clearly expressed will of God, an organic, indissoluble unity. Strong and enthusiastic has been the feeliilg of American patriotism from the first. It has, however, been vitiated by sectional institutions and vices, especially those of slavery. But the patriotism of the new nation has passed through the fire. Its dross has been given to the flames. It has been "tried, and comes forth as gold." Now we love, not one town or one State merely, not the North or the South * Official statistics, from Hon. C. Cole, senator from California. THE NEW NATION. 687 alone ; but we love our whole country. Southern patriots have suffered by the assault made upon its integrity, and Northern people in its defence, as hardly any people ever suffered before ; and now the whole land, baptized in tears and blood, is unspeakably dear to us all. Woe to the nation which shall attempt to place hostile foot upon it ! Every inch of this vast country is now sacred soil, — sacred to liber ty and to God. True, the time has not yet come for the largest, fuUest realization of this regeneration of national patriotism. The bitter prejudices of a generation at least must pass away before its obstacles will be removed, and the love of country throughout our growing millions shall reach the national breadth and power which now rises up before us as our cer tain destiny. True, also, the task of experimental Christian ity, in grappling with our personal and national vices, is hard, and practically endless. Just so far, however, as it advances, it will extend our patriotic devotion to our whole great country into the sphere of a true philanthropy, and proportionally increase its power. THE TRANSITION. The history of reconstruction cannot now be written. It is not yet accomplished. The chaos immediately following a bloody war and a great revolution must have time to re solve itself into order. Popular legislation and a passing administration cannot lead as promptly to executive strength as could a pure-minded, absolute despotism. There will, of necessity, be a great variety of opinions as to the methods of rehabilitating States resolved by rebellion Into their in organic elements. Party spirit wUl struggle hard for the mastery, and only by degrees wUl the true methods of wis dom evolve from the strife. We shall not, therefore,, chroni cle the contests or the decisions that are seeking to iden tify the facts and principles which must assume the mastery in our final adjustments and future developments. 688 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. A few things incident to our critical, transition period, we have distinctly seen. The feeling of revenge, gradually nar rowing the scope of its hostUity, and triumph moderating Into magnanimity and fraternity, point the way to a hopeful future. In the mean time, It has been evident that our released mil lions could not, without help, wisely and safely assume their new relations of independence and equality before the law ; and hence the Freedmen's Bureau has been an absolute neces sity. It has been shown by indisputable facts that former rebel masters would seek to Invent methods of virtually re manding them back to slavery ; that they would not, with out the presence and authority of the General Government, deal with their former slaves as freemen, nor would they all render obedience to civil national law without the pres ence of a power competent to enforce it. Hence acts of Congress for the reconstruction of State governments have Included adequate military force ; and obstinate local inj us tice has been, in sorae instances, compelled to yield to the power of a strong national government, now, more than in any former period of ou;" history, beginning to be known and realized as everywhere present. In the mean time, it can be affirmed with gratitude that regenerating influences from the various churches have found their way through our distracted South ; and, subduing rebel lion against God, they have Inspired consideration and love for man, until It may be claimed that the most hostUe parties are gradually losing their asperities. Around and within the newly-organized churches of the South a true and noble citizenship is rising up In loyal obedience to the government and to God. Thus another Indication of the true power of reconstruction reveals Itself It is not yet, however, time to write the history of this great regenerating force in its work of re-organizing civil society. The loyal people, white and colored, by thousands and tens of thousands, are getting their places in the Church of Christ ; .and, just so far as this work extends, the strength and harmony of the new nation appears. THB NEW NATION. 689 IMPARTIAL SUFFRAGE. The vindication of justice in a free government requires a free ballot. Loyal men must be allowed to express their wishes as to their representatives. They must choose their own rulers, and, subordinately to the Constitution, make the laws of their own States, and bear their just part in the law making, judicial, and executive departments of the General Government. The growth of ideas on this subject has been very rapid in this country during the period of emancipation. The basis of suffrage has been changed ; the privilege has been greatly extended : but the questions raised have not yet been settled. The partiality of the old nation seems to have been marked in the new for destruction. The persistent pur pose manifested by disloyal men to reclaim the control of government in their respective States, and to resume the positions in the General Government which would enable them, as In other days, to control the nation, has been used, In the providence of God, as the means of giving the ballot to the black men of the South. This decision we regard as irreversible ; and it is utterly impossible to over-estimate its importance. The colored people are peaceable and loyal. They seem to want only simple justice. Their good be havior amid the great changes which have been going on In their favor has astonished both enemies and friends. They have no disposition to fight for their rights; but going in vast numbers as they now do to the polls, by the side of their former masters, they can protect themselves. Heaven and earth proclaim this just. It is as surely the order of Providence as was the Great Proclamation. God would not permit the war to close tUl liberty was proclaimed ; he would not permit the South to settie down upon any pohcy of reconstruction until their former slaves, the victims of hoary oppression, were proclaimed to be men, and, as men, were permitted to exercise the rights of freemen. For 87 690 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the poor oppressed race it was a proud day when they first went to the polls in the District of Columbia, and wielded the ballot, which demonstrated their emancipation, and proclaimed their right and ability peacefully to defend their freedom. Here m,en would have arrested this innova tion ; but right onward it moved, until the very obstinacy of rebels became its most potent instrument, and in every State of the South the stalwart men of the proscribed race were seen marching to the polls. So much is irrevocable. It seems now difficult to tell when our people of color In the Northern States will be admitted to the same privilege ; nor can it now be said what will be the basis of suffrage when the nation is finally settled : it surely will not be the color of the skin. The new light of the Great Revolution has destroyed forever the darkness of this gross absurdity. It certainly will include loyalty to the nation. Treason in the Great Republic has slain its right to vote. It may be that the American people w^ill be able to. find some standard of intelligence which belongs to true responsible civil man hood, and that the right of the ballot will be as broad as this ascertained legal manhood. But whatever may be its basis, when the new nation is completed, the asserted, conceded right of suffrage will be impartial. UNIVERSAL EDUCATION. Free as our noble country is, there has hitherto been too much of caste in the privileges of education. We have felt the power of wealth and rank to some extent, and more of prejudice, in the superior opportunities for learning afforded the children of fortune. Our great common-school system has battled bravely with this odious discrimination ; but it has not been broad enough nor high enough to realize the true idea of universal education. The slave-system at least must be dashed down before we dared to say and insist that every child in the United States should learn to read and THE NEW NATION. 691 write. But that formidable barrier to progress is gone ; and now the school-book, the pen, and the pencU follow the gos pel in the track of the sword. Christian people, naturally and of right foremost in every great missionary work, promptly moved American citizens to care for the four mil lions freed from the shackles of slavery, and save them and the nation from the perils which must arise from their igno rance. Freedmen's-ald societies in various forms, local and general, sprang up in every part of the country ; and vigorous educational measures were adopted, and extended to many parts of the South. These associations showed In the abun dance of their funds, and supplies in kind, and in the aston ishing self-sacrifice and moral courage of volunteer Instruci> ors, how deep and pervading were the convictions of the American people that slaves were not freed to becorae the victims of anarchy and reckless passion. " The needy must be fed, and all must be educated, and prepared for citizen ship," was the prompt and universal judgment of the North, the East, and the West, and of many noble patriots In the South. These voluntary associations, in their pioneer investiga tions and labors, brought to the nation and the government a large amount of information in regard to the destitute, suffering condition of mUlions of freed people and " poor whites." They exposed promptly, and frequently at the risk pf their lives, the cruel injustice of many former mas ters, and lawless villains who had never owned a slave. They powerfully moved and influenced the government to the or ganization of " The Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands," which, under the superintendence of our noble Christian major-general, 0. 0. Howard, became their effective co-laborer in this field of sacrifice and generous toil. This, as was fitting, identified the nation with the great paternal work of relieving and educating the nation's wards. They gave to the missionary workers In these perilous fields mUitary protection from the hand of ruthless violence, paid 692 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. the fare of teachers, and, as far as practicable, furnished buildings for the work of instruction. At length the Christian churches, whose ministers and members had given largely and wrought effectively through these voluntary societies, and co-operated with all their hu manizing, secular measures, believing that the time had come to make the philanthropic labors of the nation more thor oughly Christian than heretofore, began a system of edu cation In connection with evangelical missionary work among the freedmen and other people of the South. This, whUe it brought a new and vital force Into the field, furnished the societies with another accession of co-operative labor ; so that now we have working side by side, and in departments of the same general field, all the freedmen's-aid societies, the Freedmen's Bureau, and all the great evangelical churches. At last reports, their corabined labors had established and maintained among these needy people 1,399 schools, in charge of 1,658 teachers, numbering 90,513 pupils. There are, moreover, reported 782 Sunday schools, with 70,610 scholars. Thus moves on the work of education among the freedmen. Of these pupUs, 15,248 are paying tuition amounting to $11,377.03 per month. Let our readers accept these facts as a part of the evi dence that universal education will become the character istic of the new nation. THE NEW AMERICAN CHURCH. There Is a sense In which we can speak of the Church of England as we shall never be able to speak of the Church of the United States of America. Episcopahanism is established by law in England. It is the legal religion of the kingdom : aU other forms of worship are tolerated merely. This, let us trust, will never be true of any denomination in the Great Republic. We are nobly emancipated from a form of churchship so thoroughly condemned by revelation, philosophy, and history ; and it need not be feared that we THE NEW NATION. 693 shall ever hereafter be re-inthraUed. Most happy are we to notice that the upheavals of society In England promise deliverance to the Church In that nation frora political dicta tion. It must not, however, be assumed, that, In America, we have only a confused mass of conflicting sects. Such an opinion of American Christianity would be whoUy superficial and untrue. While we glory In the freedora of opinion, and ad mit the historical circumstances which have made us several large ecclesiastical organizations, we exalt the grace of God which has made us one Church. In the great object of wor ship, the triune Jehovah, In simple, absolute dependence upon a common Saviour, in the pervading power of the new life, we are and always have been one. But the Church of the new nation will have a broader, more powerful unity than the Church of the past. The fun damental facts of our old brotherhood are more evident and imposing than before. The upheavals of a great moral revolution have summarily disposed of the feeling of differ ence, always stronger than the reality. Our method of unity is not that of despotic authority, but of development. We have reversed the theories of Europe. For a thousand years, they have sought unity by repression ; we have found it in liberty : and the unity of Christian work is the grandest, most potential fact of the age. The new American Church will therefore be, not the Church of prescriptive dogma, but, in a sense higher, stronger, than the old, the Church of vital ized and harmonized action. The Great Revolution has released the intellect and heart and enterprise of the American Church frora the restraints imposed by a powerful internal despotism. It will now, therefore, be broader and freer In Its outspoken veracity, its gushing sympathies, and aggressive labor, than heretofore. God has spoken to her in a voice that wiU ring in her ears tiU the day of judgment, saying, " Move to the front in this great battle of liberty! If you allow again the reign of 694 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. caste or political corruption, you are responsible. ' The weap ons of your warfare are not carnal, but spiritual, and mighty through God to the puUing-down of strongholds.' The well-springs of life are within you : pour its streams into dead men, and social, civil organisms, everywhere. Send the power of soul-liberty throbbing through the hearts of the people and the nations. ' Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free, and be not entangled again In the yoke of bondage.' " If these orders are heard and obeyed, the new Araerican Church will be a living, united, free, evangelical Church, the vital force and grand working power of the new nation. THE NEW AMERICAN MANHOOD. A raan is narrow and weak when he is not willing that another human being shall be a man. The manhood of Araerica, strong as has been its developraent, has been limit ed by Its selfishness. Its prejudices, its exclusiveness. In every attempt to announce his own freedom, the American citizen has felt his self-contradictions. In every indulgence of national pride, he has been humbled by national injustice. At home or abroad, in his jubUant praises of republican free dom, he has been arrested, and stung to madness, by the abrupt response, " Look at your four millions of slaves ! " Only in one condition for a hundred years has an American been a man, always and everywhere a true man ; that Is, In a genuine Christian life that revealed a plain, clear, working antagonism to America's great wrong. Humbling as is the confession. In all our cringing, apologetic submission to this grandest, vUest despotism, we have been less than men ; and there has been enough of this to dwarf the general manhood of the nation. Thanks to God only, we have done with that ; and we are stronger, greater, than we were. It Is true, the emancipa tion is not yet universal ; but it will be. The fiat has gone forth. No true American will hereafter be awed into silence THB NEW NATION. 695 by insulting threats of violence when he undertakes to ex pose a vice or denounce a great injustice. The press and the pulpit wUl speak out in any part of our great country in the cause of the defrauded, the poor, and the helpless. So thorough and bold are the workings and outpushings of Liberty, that she will go everywhere. She wUl paralyze the hand that seizes a man to bind upon him the fetters of slavery. And the new nation Is more humane for Its justice. No vindictive spirit is born of Freedom's struggle and triumph. No deeper sympathy, no truer love, has ever honored the manhood of man than that, which, in the might of Christian justice, arose to strike off the fetters of slavery, and which, In the spirit of Jesus, Is now endeavoring to " beat our swords into ploughshares, and our spears into pruning-hooks ; " and love still aspires to absolute dominion in the new American manhood. The free spirit of science and the true genius of art, the heroism of truth and the omnipotence of prayer, will power fully crowd forward our manhood march toward its typal per fection ; and it will include every American, every man. " I verify the fact, that America is one of the most moral and enlightened nations on earth. I verify the fact, that, if democratic leveUing be detestable, America has at least known how to extract from it what makes the man, — con science. If certain acts of violence have taken place, the electoral contest in America has almost always preserved complete liberty. These orators of the different parties arriv ing like princes to the sound of salutes of artillery ; these assemblies of ten thousand, twenty thousand, auditors; these vast questions, in which the fate of nations is involved, dis cussed from the shores of the Atlantic to the recesses of the desert, — all this is a spectacle which does not lack majesty ; " * and which, we may add, fitly characterizes the new nation. * America before Europe, by Count be Gasparin, pp. 374, 375. 696 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. See the poet's prophecy rapidly passing into history : On the rocks we read the story Of the revolntions grand Which in ages past and hoary Swept o'er mountain, sea, and land : There we trace the mighty stages Of the world's historic time ; And we mark the buried ages By their monuments sublime. Out of fiery storms of forces. Out of cycles never calm, Nature, in ber mystic courses. Shapes the mammal and the palm. History points with solemn finger To her records dim and old ; And, as thoughtfully we linger. Still the lesson there is told. Through the struggles and the burnings. Through the stem and frantic strife, Through the nations' fierce upturnings, Put they on a fresher life ; Then they pass to higher stages Both of greatness and renown : In the conflict of the ages Glory doth the nations crown. Lo ! we feel the wild upheaval Of a nation's hidden fires : Right is battling with the Evil, And the smoke to heaven aspires ; War, tumultuous and red-lighted, Sweepeth with sirocco blast ; And our green young land is blighted As the tempest whirleth past. Not the death-throe of the nation Is this wild and awful hour : 'Tis its painful transformation To a nobler life of power . As the fossils huge were buried In the massy folds of rock, So our saurian crime is hurried To its death-throe in the shock. 'Neath the Union's broad foundations Shall the monster Slavery lie. While the coming generations Ponder o'er the mystery. On to years of coming glory, Through a long triumphal prime. On through paths of deathless story. Shall the Union live sublime. THE NEW NATION. 697 Nobler, freer, and more glorious, Shall the future Union be : O'er tho despot's rod victorious, All the lands its strength shall see. North and South in one dominion, One in freedom evermore. O'er one land on loving pinion Shall the lordly eagle soar : Northern lake and Southern harbor. Cotton-field and prairie wide, Seaside slope and greenwood arbor, AU shall boast the Union's pride. On, through all the stormy trial, God shall bring us on our way : Let us meet the stern denial ; Let us watch and wait and pray. Up from all this tribulation We shall rise a nobler land, And in peerless exaltation 'Mid the nations envied stand. Welcome storm and fire and peril ! Fields Elysian yet shall rise O'er our war-worn wastes and sterile, Wrought by freemen's sacrifice.* • The Union as it Shall Be, by Dwight Williams. CHAPTER IL THE GEEAT REPUBLIC IN HISTORY. " A nation of such men is the only true national unity, and is alone fit to enter witli other such nations into those grander combinations of economy, of harmony, and of the progress and ambitions of peace, for which the world prepares." — Pakteidge. The place of the Great Republic In the history of the race is now becoming distinct and important. Arguing from the character and government of God, it might have been inferred, and was, long ages ago, that he would some where, and at some time, undertake to establish a govern ment which should conform In Its principles to the plans of the creation. There are reasons to believe, as we trust this discussion has shown, that this Is that grand attempt. The country, the colonization, the independence, the develop ment, the government, and the emancipation, all under the controlling power of the Christian religion, clearly indicate it. In the prosecution of this great providential purpose, the following results have become evident. REPUBLICANISM PASSES OUT OF ITS EXPERIMENTAL INTO ITS HISTORICAL PERIOD. That is often an experiment to the eyes of men which cannot be so to the mind of God. Representing the human view, we concede the fact, that governments attempted by the people, in the history of the world, have been unsuccess ful experiments. We need not trace them. They have been the recoU of natural freedom from the usurpations of tyranny, the change and multiphcation of the agents of THE GREAT REPUBLIC IN HISTORY. 699 oppression without the possibility of freedora, or the bold daring of a few brave patriots ; all, however, under the genius of Paganism or some corrupted form of Christianity. How, in the light of these histories, our venerated fathers could venture to make another experiment, must have seemed strange to the believers in " the divine right of kings ; " but they resolved to raake it. Whether the clear definitions of civil and political rights could be reached by the representa tives of the people ; whether a few feeble colonists could resist the oppression of a mighty nation, and, by eight years of bloody war, establish their independence ; whether the Constitution adopted could be sustained as the fundamental law of the land, until It had triumphed over and worked out its own vices ; whether the freedom of the ballot and elec tions could be maintained ; whether minorities would submit to majorities ; whether the permanence of executive govern ment could be secured without a dynasty and an hereditary nobility; whether a nation made up of people separated by State lines could vindicate its sovereignty ; whether the people could put down a great rebellion ; and whether a re public could grapple with and ultimately destroy the intensest form of despotism known among men, — were questions of most critical experiment. But, under the control of Providence, they are all settled ; and wise men abroad have just ceased to speak of the Republic of America as a grand experiment, destined to a signal failure. It has passed through the severest tests to which a nation has ever been subjected, and endured them all ; emerging at last, with the smile of a seraph, from its baptisms of blood. True, it is still mUitant. The spirit of liberty is aggressive, and has many formidable enemies. From the past, however, we learn the manner in which it wUl fight its battles. Faithful to the principles of liberty, loyal to the Sovereign above, ultimate triumph is certain. Great as are the events which we have sketched in the experimental period of our nation, its history has now just fairly begun. 700 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. THE PEOPLE, AS SOVEREIGNS, ADVANCE TO THE RANK OF A FIRST- CLASS POWER. The rank of a civil power must depend partly upon its population, partly upon its Internal resources and external coramerce, and partly upon the nurabers and perfection of its army and navy. In these respects, the Great Republic has, by general consent, taken Its place by the side of the first nations ofthe globe. But, in modern civilization, profounder facts must be considered. The laws of increase in popula tion, the laws of unity, the development of physical and moral force and executive power, the spirit of governmen tal institutions, the progress of inteUigence and virtue, and the guidance and approval of Providence, must determine the relative position of any people among the nations of the world. In all these respects, hereditary sovereigns have watched their new rivals across the ocean, anxiously expect ing to witness their failure, until the last grand crisis has passed, and at length the people of Araerica take their place by the side of the mightiest princes ; and no haughty power affects to despise or dares to insult thera. Indeed, the affectation of superiority over the Great Republic In the elements of a growing, vital civUization, In the energies and resources of a great government, has passed away from the most powerful nations of earth; whUe the ease and mag nanimity, the firmness and Influence, of the governraent of the Araerican people in such august presence, demonstrate their rank as a first-class power. POPULATION, AND INFLUENCE ABROAD. Thus we enter upon our future mission ; and, regarding the regular laws of increase as they have been established through a great number of years, our official census shows, that, in 1880, we shall have a population of 56,450,241 people; in 1890, 77,266,989 ; in 1900, only thirty-two years hence. THE GREAT REPUBLIC IN HISTORY. 701 we shaU number 100,355,802 ! Assuming that there is to be no great judicial interruption by decree of Providence, what grandeur of development is before us ! Looking for ward only a generation, the results of God's great plans for this vast continent are positively overwhelming. But the growth of population Is not to be considered alone : it is only one condition of real progress. We may look out upon the future increase of all the products of the soil, the advance in all the useful and elegant arts, the prog ress in discoveries, in manufactures, and commerce, the development of our mines, of our institutions of learning, of our great and powerful American manhood, with the spirit of a living, renovating Christianity pervading the whole; and we may form some idea of what is before us. But all this must come in to swell our influence abroad. We have passed the period when it is desirable to think of it as the power of legitimate protection ; and it would be equaUy unworthy of us to consider our coming greatness as the ability to overawe or triumph over other nations, smaU or great. Rather let it be considered as an indication of a responsibUity so high and extended as to call for the profoundest humility and the noblest sense of justice. Our Influence over the governments of the Western continent must not be that of overshadowing greatness, but of mag nanimous fraternal kindness. To the nations of Europe we must present an example of liberal opinions, sustained by firm integrity and high-souled international right. How utterly unworthy of the Great Republic would be airs of superiority In strength or wisdom ! How much have we yet to learn from other nations ! how long shall we have reason to dig in their mines of greater antiquity ! and how much that is great and true in the liberty-loving millions of the Old World will demand our recognition ! Y02 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. THE NATIONS OF EARTH ACKNOWLEDGE, RESPECT, AND TRUST THE GREAT REPUBLIC. If It be matter of grave importance for us as a nation to know what are our accumulating elements of power, and in what manner we are entering upon the historical period of our mission, it Is also matter of decided interest to know in what spirit we are received by the great family of nations. This is not a recent question. It began to receive its answer immediately after the Declaration of Independence ; but now it assumes a new aspect. The question Is no longer one of patronage, but of the matured, decisive response to the per manent establishment of this new element among the gov ernments of earth. Now that It can no. longer be regarded as exceptional or experimental, how Is it regarded ? The answer is most grateful to the American people. Diplomatic relations are desired and established between the United States and all the nations of the civilized world. There is the highest regard for our rights and opinions. Our citizenship commands the most fraternal and honored consideration. Our free institutions and rapid growth have come to be the admiration of the greatest statesmen, as well as of the masses of Europe. English lords do not hesitate to quote our financial policy and discretion as a model for the British Empire. The French emperor imitates our pop ular elections, by submitting to the people, in some form, the question of his crown : when he attempts to Impose a gov ernraent upon Mexico, he deraands a vote ; when he deter mines to annex provinces to his empire, he calls the people to vote; when he proposes the transfer of Venice from Austria to Italy, the people are asked to express their wUl. When an Italian prime minister wishes to adopt free tol eration and universal equality of religious rights in the new nation, he refers to the Great Republic as his model. Scandinavia opens the way for evangelical Christianity. Prussia, under the lead of the great Bismarck, establishes THE GREAT REPUBLIC IN HISTORY. 703 a constitutional government for reconstructed Germany ; and even Austria dashes aside the Concordat, and her em peror talks, in Hungary and at home, of a free government. What is all this but a spontaneous homage to the great and free institutions of our own noble Christian Republic ? From our Pacific metropolis we communicate directly with Asia. Our commerce follows rapidly In the track of our Christian missionaries; and by both we are becoming extensively known by the millions of China, Japan, Bur- mah, and India. The silent, powerful workings of Christian liberty must inevitably accompany our progress. These facts indicate clearly our position in history, and our future mission. CHAPTER IIL GOD IS THE SOVEREIGN. " We recognize God as the Supreme Disposer of our national afifairs : our peace and true prosperity depend upon our aUegiance to him and his eternal principles of justice and right." — Calipoknia Conp. op M. E. Chuech, 1867. The history, which. In Its principal and controlling facts, has passed before us, has shown the hand of God so distinct ly, that it must be a strange blindness which can conceal it. He appears everywhere, not only as the Creator of our great continent, but as the grand, directing Providence, the gra cious Sovereign, of the nation. We have his laws, not only In the book of revelation, but in the spirit of liberty which he has Imparted to our government ; In the Christian char acter of our institutions ; in the succession of facts rising above the power, and contrary to the inclinations, of men. These all reveal his stern condemnation of our personal and national sins, and his divine approval of individual and national virtue, of the true spirit of worship and piety throughout the land. We know his will. His orders to us are as distinct and peremptory as though they had been written upon the fair face of the heavens, or proclaimed In an audible voice to every ear from his throne above. We know, that, as our Sovereign, he forbids us to worship Idols ; to be a nation of swearers, murderers, or adulterers ; to steal, bear false witness, or covet houses or beasts, people or lands, which belong to our neighbors ; that he requires us to keep sacred the holy sabbath, and to honor fathers and mothers ; to love him with all our hearts, and our neishbors as our- selves. We know that all our attempts to enslave men are GOD IS THE SOVEREIGN. 705 denounced by his law and his administrative justice in our guUty laud; and that he requires justice of us, — clear, dis tinct, elevated, universal justice. We know, that, as our great common Ruler, he disallows aU our dishonesty, politi cal corruption, intemperance, and bribery. If the plea of ignorance with regard to the wIU of a sovereign could ever avaU for any nation, after the marvellous revelations of God in our history, it certainly cannot avaU for us. REBELLION IS RUIN. We must obey. To be found In the wrong in the midst of such distinct and sublime revelations must be a grave of fence ; but to be a nation of deliberate, pi-actical atheists must be the highest crirae. If our rulers dare to defy God ; if they treat his holy laws with conterapt, profane his sabbaths, blas pheme his name, become corrupt In character and In adminis tration, — they will call down wrath upon us. If the people — the great body of the people, who are the source of civil and political justice — become corrupt and oppressive, forget ting t^he lessons which have been taught them by unparal leled mercies and the most awful judgments, we may now certainly know that overwhelming disasters are before us. If the Church should become recreant to her holy trust, now that she has been shown so clearly her high position and responsibility ; If her ministers should become proud and ambitious, her members earthly and sensual, and her pure, spiritual life be sacrificed for forms and a dead ritualism ; If the vain pretensions of philosophy and science should super sede the pure, simple, and honest revelations of God's word, — we shall be cursed for such ecclesiastical and national crimes. We know that this is God's method of deahng with fallen churches and infidel peoples. Let the wrath which has fallen upon the Jew and the Pagan, the Mahometan and the Christian, for proud defiance of God, be our soleran warning. We are not above Almighty Power : we can by 706 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. no possible means go beyond the reach of Infinite Justice. True, the life of liberty is indestructible : but this vitalizing, pervading, immortal power raay be transferred to other people ; and we may go down amid the shouts of defiance and the waUIngs of despair, and the very name of the Great Republic becorae a hissing and a byword forever. Beyond all question, rebellion against God — intentional, persistent, prevailing rebeUion — would overwhelm this nation in de struction. LOYAL OBEDIENCE IS SAFETY AND SUCCESS. Let God be honored ; let righteousness, which exalteth a nation, prevail everywhere ; let the Church become purer as she enlarges, more exalted in her sense of duty, clearer in her vision as she looks out upon her future responsibUities ; let the ballot become the emblem of liberty and justice, and the life of divine love permeate the nation, inspiring and exalting rulers, lifting up the poor and distressed, vitalizing all legislation and administration of law, — and we are safe. It is in the light of this grand revelation of power, in the presence of these great equities, that our future rises up sublimely before the eyes of men and angels to-day. It is time for us to believe, without reservation. In the eternal safety of justice, in the infalhble wisdom of God's revelations, and the absolute security of a nation ruled by a high and all-pervading sense of God, — God everywhere ; God in every thing, infusing life into the public organism, health and vigor Into the nation's patriotism ; giving intelli gence, breadth, and efficiency to the nation's philanthropy. What power can prevail against a people rendering loyal obedience to a Sovereign so high, so pure, so omnipotent ? " If God be for us, who can be against us ? " In the presence of such a possibility even, the very conception of our nation's future is sublime. Let this loyal devotion to the right, to God, prevaU over our personal and national vices ; let the regeneration of our humanity, under the redeeming agency GOD IS THE SOVEREIGN. 707 of the great Messiah, go on until purified by divine power and invigorated by divine inspirations, according to the now distinctly manifested purposes of our great Sovereign, — and this nation shall stand forth " fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners." THE UNITED STATES A GREAT CHRISTIAN POWER. We have seen that God has intended the Great Republic for this, and this only. Whoever seeks to destroy the religious faith of its people, or their sound, trusting devotion to the purifying, elevating doctrines of Jesus Christ, is the enemy of our government ; for, with this destroyed, it has absolutely no basis on which to rest. It has no other reason for existing, only that a grand Christian power was the choice and purpose of God for this Western continent and that its lead in the march of justice before the eyes of men was required for the great future. In point of fact, therefore, no treason in this land is so guilty as moral treason ; no enmity to republican liberty is so perUous as enmity against God ; no disloyalty so menacing as infidelity. We certainly cannot exist as a nation of atheists. With what humble gratitude, therefore, have we traced in our remarkable history the Christian elements of our national character! How strong we have felt as we have seen clearly that God, and not man, provided the place, and formed the plan, of our national existence ; that the Christian religion, embodying the purest principles known in the world, became the very first, and ultimately the controlling, organizing power of our government ! How vigorously has this principle wrestied with oppression, and dashed it to the ground ! How thoroughly has this, and this alone, wrought against our own personal and national vices ! How evi dently has this only eradicated any one of these vices ! How quickly, in the absence of the laws and dominion of Jesus Christ, would they rise against and overpower us ! 708 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. Let no man, therefore, no number of men, attempt to rob us of this our glory. We are not a Pagan or Mahometan, but a Christian power. As such, we are closing up the first century of our national existence; as such, we have put down our raost infidel vice, American slavery, and entered upon the second great era of the development of liberty. We must now go on to perfect our system as a great system of Christian governraent. Our laws raust all be rendered just and equal. From our State and National Constitutions the last vestige of oppression and infidelity must be elimi nated, and God enthroned In all our forms of government and social life. Personal regeneration must extend until political corruption shall become iraprobable, unpopular, im possible ; until the only way to preferment shall be that of Christian patriotism, and an honest, broad, and noble philan thropy. Then the laws which shield the public enemies In the sale of intoxicating liquors, or In any way poisoning the public morals, wUl disappear from our statute-books, and ample protection to Innocent sufferers will take their place. Do you say this can never be ? Never ? Then the re generation which God extends to some men cannot extend to others ; then the gospel of Christ is a failure, and " our preaching is vain ; " then, in the grand conflict of ages, vice Is to prove Itself raore than a match for virtue ; then the word of unchangeable truth, that " righteousness shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea," shall be demonstrated a failure. This cannot be. Long and terrible indeed will be the conflict ; but the triumph Is going on before our eyes. Its type Is In every man created anew in Christ Jesus. Its progress is in the accumulating numbers of " the sacramental host of God's elect," and In the masterly style In which our national virtues triumph over vile forces and untoward events mighty enough to destroy any governraent not sustained by Omnipotent Power. Unwavering faith In the ultimate tri umph of the right reposes to-day securely on the verities of history as well as upon the unalterable veracity of God. GOD IS THE SOVEREIGN. 709 Let us, therefore, confidentiy expect the gradual but cer tain development of Christian principles in the RepubUc, and beUeve in its future greatness as a Christian power. Let us contemplate the Immense resources of this country In agriculture, precious metals, commerce, and moral Influence, aU wielded by the hand and for the purposes of Christian justice. How immense must be Its Influence in every part of the world against despotism of every forra ! How inev itably will it blend with all forms of liberty everywhere, lifting up the down-trodden and oppressed of every land beneath the sun! How potentially wIU it command wars to cease, and all the forces of Christian civUization to march on for the conquest of the world ! THE REPRESENTATIVE OP PROGRESS. We have seen how rapid has been the development of this nation under the genial, vitalizing power of Christianity, Its material progress, so remarkable, is but the beginning and the least fact of this development. The growth of Ideas and the advance of principles are much more important and re markable. Take, as the central fact of this grand movement, religious liberty. With what giant strength this human right has lifted up the superincumbent mass of despotic in tolerance under which it rested, and exploded its authority like the eruptive force of volcanic fires! With what un conquerable might it has triumphed over antagonist bigotries, and moved out to proclaim everywhere " freedom to worship God " ! This is the American development of a grand old truth, and in it the moral power of the Great Republic Is felt to the ends of the earth. In the great work of extending and applying this power, however, our mission is not yet aceomplished ; nor will it be until the last vestige of religious despotism is swept away frora Italy, Spain, Austria, and the world. And with religious intolerance will pass away all other forms of oppression. The free spirit of true Christianity, 710 THE GREAT REPUBLIC. wherever it goes, works out the problem of soul-Uberty, and tends to universal eraancipation. The great fact of this mission of progress is, that it is the mission of peace, and not of war ; of love, and not of blood. Our example must shine In uninterrupted light. Our literature — volume and peri odical — will pass into other languages, and it will be the calra expression of liberty. Our representative citizenship will assurae the dignity, and coraraand the consideration, through out the world, due to great organic living truth. Our mis sionaries of religion, with the most scrupulous obedience to all governments in which they are found, will be perpet> ual representatives of progress in the true American spirit. Our foreign ministers and consuls, with influence ever in creasing, will be the calm, clear, manly expositors of the doctrine of liberty for princes, courts, and people. Our ships abroad will be laden with the word of God, and messages of salvation to the perishing. " Liberty to the captives " will move over the world by our grand steam-navies, and flash through the air by our telegraphs ; and the power of our growing prosperity, under the genius of Christianity, will be the silent, pervading influence which will blend harmoniously with all freedom everywhere as the grandest missionary of progress ever known among men. THE END. Gbo. C. Baiu) & Avert, Stereotypers and Printers, Boston. 3 9002 00477 1003 Si to' ¦¦^-!m?^ ¦®