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LOYAL PUBLICATION SOCIETY, 
 
 863 BROADWAY. 
 
 No. GO. 
 
 PEACE THROUGH VICTORY: 
 
 A THANKSGIYIXG SERMON, 
 
 PREACHED IN BROADWAY TABERNACLE CHURCH, NEW YORK, 
 ON SABBATH, SEPTEMBER 11, 1864, 
 
 BY 
 
 JOSEPH P. TnOMPSOK D. D. 
 
 Psalm 98, 1. — O, sing unto the Lord ca new song, for He hath done marvel- 
 ous things ; His right hand and His liolj^ arm hath gotten him the victorj'. 
 
 IsALvn 32, 17. — And the work of righteousness shall be peace ; and the 
 effect of riglileousness, quietness and assurance forever. 
 
 THE VICTORIES OF SHERMAN AND FARRAGDT. 
 
 We have assembled to-night, on the recommendation of the 
 President of the United States, to render thanks nnto Almighty 
 God for the signal triumph of onr arms upon the land and upon 
 the sea. The annals of war contain few records so illustrious 
 as the campaign of our Western army, terminating in the cap- 
 ture of Atkxnta, and the achievements of our navy in the har- 
 bor of Mobile. For a hundred and fifty miles our army has 
 fought its way into a hostile territory, against hills terraced 
 with intrenchments and planted with cannon ; through rocky 
 defiles bristling with bayonets ; over morasses tangled with 
 thickets, and traversed by treacherous streams ; around moun- 
 tains fortified from base to summit, and across rivers whose 
 bridges were destroyed, and wliose fords were contested by 
 cavalry and by batteries ; — a march which for three months has 
 been one continuous fight with a wily and desperate foe ; as- 
 saults in front to dislodge him from his fastnesses, skirmishing 
 upon the flank and in the rear, to keep open commnnications, 
 and to guard against surprise ; the victory of to-day preparing 
 a new battle for the morrow^ — from Missionary Eidge to Ring- 
 gold, from Ringgold to Tunnel Hill and Buzzard's Roost, from 
 
2 
 
 Rocky Face to Dalton, from Dalton to Resaca, from Resaca to 
 Dallas and the Altoona Pass ; then to Lost Mountain, the Ken- 
 esaw and Marietta; from Marietta to the Chattahooche, and 
 thus on through all the weary and bloody, yet triumphant way, 
 until Atlanta, the westward focus of the rebel Confederacy, 
 with its network of railroads, its founderies and arsenals of war, 
 its magazines of food and ammunition, lay caj)tive at Sher- 
 man's feet. 
 
 A march so full of conflict and of peril, in which so many 
 natural obstacles and military obstructions have been over- 
 come by bravery, by strategy, and by perseverance, recalls the 
 sixth campaign of C^sar — to subdue the revolt of the Belgian 
 tribes, and to chastise the invading hordes of Germany. That 
 memorable campaign was fought in a couutr}'- which was " no 
 other than one great ambuscade ;" and Cesar's troops were ex- 
 posed to be cut off in detail, whenever they were separated 
 from the main body. The enemy, when repulsed, would re- 
 treat into the forests, and obstruct the march of the Romans 
 by felling trees, and multiplying the obstacles which nature 
 had created, so that it was almost impossible to bring them to 
 a pitched battle. " They could not be reached in any vital 
 part," and it was only by a kind of political flanking, dividing 
 the rebel allies through the jealousies of the barbarian tribes 
 toward each other, that Cjs^ar was enabled to make head 
 against a foe so favored by all the forces of nature. 
 
 Yet C-E3AR had before him an enemy who, though superior 
 in numbers and in sheer brute force, was far inferior to his vet- 
 eran legions in military discipline, and in the arms and naator- 
 ials of war — an enemy altogether ignorant of strategy, and not 
 even knowing how to fortify a camp with ditch and rampart ; 
 while our General, likewise marching through " one great am- 
 buscade," has had to contend with a foe who possessed all the 
 resources of war known to himself, who had weapons and ma- 
 terials of the same manufacture and the same destructive pow- 
 er, who had been educated in the same military school, who 
 could conduct his strategy with a familiar knowledge of the 
 country, and with the advantage of defensive engineering at 
 every step. 
 
 When the nature of the country and the resources of the foe 
 are considered, and the dilKculties in subsisting an invading 
 army at an ever increasing distance from its base of supplies, 
 and with desperate roving bands hovering upon its long, nar- 
 row line of communication, history will assign to the campaign 
 from Chattanooga to Atlanta, a place among tlie great achieve- 
 ments of military science and genius. Its crowwing victory 
 puts to shame those who have murmured at the slowness of 
 the advance ; shame that they should know so little of the 
 
syft> 
 
 physical geography of their own country; shame tiiat they 
 shouhl have so little sympathy with the hrave men who were 
 conquering, not armies alone, but rivers and forests, marshes 
 and mountains, an^j were winning for the arms of ^he Union a 
 record as proud as Roman legions ever bore. "Well does the 
 head of the nation give the nation's thanks to the AVestcrn 
 Army for such "glorious achievements." Well does he sum- 
 mon us to give thanks to God who hath done for us such " mar- 
 velous things." 
 
 Of the achievements of the fleet at Mobile, it vrere impossi- 
 ble to speak in terms of exaggeration. Sailing right into the 
 concentrated fire of forts and of rams, battling with walls of 
 stone upon this side, and upon that with walls of iron, butting 
 wooden prows against iron plates, and pouring shot and shell 
 into the huge floating battery that thought to run them down, 
 crowding on into the deadly grapple through a channel sown 
 with torpedoes and raked by artillery from ship and shore — 
 crowding on and on, till the iron-hearted Admiral, lashed to 
 the rigging, signals to the fleet that the day is won. Before 
 the glory of that achievement the victories of the Nile and of 
 Trafalgar, with Nelson's fame, must readjust their claims to 
 naval pre-eminence ; while all faction at home and all prejudice 
 abroad should yield to Farragut "• an unconditional surrender." 
 Well does the President express the feeling of the nation in 
 thanks to the gallant navy and the co-operating troops ; well 
 does he call upon us as a Christian people to make devout 
 acknowledgment of " the signal success that Divine Providence 
 has vouchsafed to the o]ierations of the United States fleet and 
 army in the harbor of Mobile." 
 
 •WHY CHKISTIANS REJOICE IN VICTOKT. 
 
 And yet the question comes up, " Why should we, a Chris- 
 tian people, rejoice in the bloody triumphs of war V Why- 
 set apart these sacred hours, in the house of God, to give 
 thanks for victories? These victories have been achieved at a 
 fearful cost of suftering and life. Thousands have fallen in the 
 long campaign whose final success we celebrate. Other thou- 
 sands have been maimed or permanently enfeebled by disease, 
 while in thousands of homes there is mourning and wo, because 
 the young, the manly, the brave who went forth to the flght 
 with stout hearts and high hopes, will return no more, or have 
 been brought back to sleep in a soldier's grave. Why then, I 
 ask again, do we, a Christian people, rejoice in these victories 
 of war, and give thanks to God for success as a signal mercy ? 
 
 It is not fol' mere military success that we rejoice and give 
 
il^ 
 
 thanks. A triumph of material force alone could not awaken 
 lliosc congratulations that for a week past have brightened the 
 whole face of society. A military or a naval combat, arranged 
 to test the superiority of either party, we would turn from with 
 horror, as from the gladiatorial show of the Roman arena, or 
 the bull-fight of the Spanish theatre. 
 
 Our rejoicing is not simply the gratification of national pride 
 in the victory of oar arms. There might be victories that 
 would bring us shame. The wanton invasion of a weak neigh- 
 bor, the seizure of his ports and tow^ns, the desolation of his 
 territory, and the massacre of its inhabitants, or such wars of 
 aggression and conquest as Britain has sometimes waged in 
 India and Chint., might call for humiliation in proportion to 
 their success. The unprovoked destruction of the port of Ka- 
 gosima by a British man-of-war, elicited strong condemnation 
 from the pulpit, the press and the Parliament o-f England. 
 There was no glory in that victory. 
 
 Christianity has taught us that to warrant national rejoicing 
 in time of war, not only must the national arms be successful, 
 but the cause must be just. As a Christian people, we cannot 
 delight in war for its own sake ; we cannot exult in victory 
 simply as the evidence of superiyr strength or the occasiou of 
 military glory. Yet, though we are a Christian people, and 
 even hecause we are such, we may rejoice in military successes 
 that vindicate a righteous cause. 
 
 TUE BIBLE DOCTKINE CONCERNING WAS. 
 
 "When a nation is challenged by the assaults of evil men to 
 draw the sword in defence of justice, it may rightfully appeal 
 to God to grant it victory upon the field, and may appropri- 
 ately refer its victories to liis favoring Providence. 
 
 (1.) The Scriptures teach us that the arbitrament of war is 
 a method of referring to Almighty God the righteousness of a 
 cause against tlie machinations of bloody and deceitful men. 
 When David, the anointed of God, was set upon by conspira- 
 tors, he prayed: "Arise, O Lord, in thine anger; lift up thy- 
 self because of the rage of mine enemies ; and awake for me, 
 Thou who hast ordained judgment." When David took up 
 tlie challenge of Goliath, whose army threatened to annihilate 
 Israel, he said to the Philistine : "Thou comest-to me with a 
 gword, and with a spear, and with a shield ; but I come to 
 thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies 
 of Israel, whom thou hast defied ; for the battle is the Lord's, 
 and lie will give you into our hands." — (1 Sam. xvii. 45, 47.) 
 
 The children of Israel were instructed by the Lord to make 
 
jr 
 
 their warfare a service of religion, and to go to war only upon, 
 rightful occasion. The priests were to sound the alarm with 
 the sacred trumpets of silver. " If yon go to war against the 
 enemy that oppresseth yon, then ye shall blow an alarm with 
 the trumpets, and ye shall be remembered before the Lord, 
 and ve shall be saved from your enemies." — (Numbers x. 9.) 
 
 Wlien Solomon, at the dedication of the temple, invoked the 
 favor of God in all national contingencies, he prayed : " If thy 
 people go out to battle against their enemy, whithersoever thou 
 chalt send them, and shall pray unto the Lord toward the city 
 which thou hast chosen, and toward the house that I have 
 built for thy name, then hear thou in Heaven their prayer and 
 their sup])lication, and Qnaintain their cause ^''^ or, as it reads in 
 the margin, maintain their right^ vindicate the rightness of 
 their cause, by granting them victory. — (1 Kings viii. 44.) 
 
 It was " the sword of the Lord and of Gideon " that pre- 
 vailed over the Midianites, when they were gathered against 
 Israel like the grasshoppers for multitude. " The Lord led 
 forth the armies of Israel." So strong is the testimony of the 
 Scriptures on the point that a just war is a necessary and a 
 lawful a])peal to God to maintain the cause of right, that a 
 curse is invuked upon those who stand aloof from such a con- 
 flict, and " come not to the help of the Lord against the mighty." 
 (Judges V. 23.) AVhen Amalek came up to destroy Israel, 
 Moses took a conspicuous place on the top of a hill, and 
 stretched forth over the people the rod of God — the symbol of 
 Jehovah's presence, the invocation of his power. While that 
 rod was uj)lifted, Israel prevailed ; and when the victory was 
 sure, Moses built an altar and called it Jehovah-nissi — " the 
 Lord my hanner.''^ 
 
 (2.) The Scriptures abound in examples of thanksgiving to 
 God for success in war. Deborah sang, " Praise ye the Lord 
 for the avenging of Israel. So let all thine enemies perish, O 
 Lord." — (Judges v.) The Psalmist sings : " Blessed be the 
 Lord my strength, which teacheth my hands to war, and my 
 fingers to fight"." — Psalms cxliv. 1.) 
 
 " O, sing unto the Lord a new song ; for he hath done mar- 
 velous things : His right hand and His holy arm hath gotten 
 Him the victory." "The Lord is the strength of my life ; of 
 whom shall I be afraid. Though a host should encamp against 
 rae, my heart shall not fear; though war should rise against 
 me, in this will I be confident. Now shall mine hand be lifted 
 lip above mine enemies round about me. Therefore will I 
 olfer in His tabernacle sacritices of joy, I will sing, yea, I will 
 sing praises unto the Lord." 
 
 A special victory is thus celebrated by name : 
 
 ^' Thou hast broken Rahab in pieces as one that is slain ; 
 
IS 
 
 6 
 
 thou hast scattered thine enemies with thy strong arm. la 
 thy name will we rejoice all the day. For the Lord is our de- 
 fetice, and the Holj One of Israel our King." 
 
 " The right hand of the Lord is exalted, 
 The right hand of the Lord doeth valiantly." 
 
 A national hymn of the Hebrews commemorated their vic- 
 tories upon all great religious occasions : 
 
 " O give thanks unto the Lord, 
 For his mercy endureth forever, 
 Who overthrew Pharaoh and his host 
 
 in the Red Sea ; 
 For his mercy endureth forever. 
 To him wlio smote great kings, 
 For his mercy endureth forever ; 
 And slew famous kings, 
 For his mercy endureth forever. 
 Sihon, King of the Amorites, 
 For his mercy endureth forever ; 
 And Og, King of Bashan, 
 For his mercy endureth forever." 
 
 Tlie eighteenth Psalm is a religious war song. 
 
 " The Lord liveth, and blessed be my rock ; and Vt the God of my salva- 
 ti»:i be exalted. It is God tliat avengeth me, and subdueth the pcoi)le under 
 me ; therefore, will 1 give thanks unto thee, O Lord, among the heathen, and 
 sing praises unto thy name." (See Psalms xxvii., Ixxxix., cxxxvi., xviii.) 
 
 (3.) The Scriptures teach us also, that war and its issues are 
 in the hands of God, Sometimes He sends war as a judgment 
 upon a gttilty land ; sometimes He calls for the sword to scourge 
 the oppressor and tlie wrong doei\ In the famous battle of 
 Barak against Sisera, when the Israelites struggled for their 
 very life as a nation, the " stars in their courses fought against 
 Sisera," and " the Lord discomfited him and all iiis chariots, 
 and all his host with the edge of the sword before Bai-ak." 
 "Some trust in chariots, and some in horses, but we will re- 
 member the name of the Lord our God." Moses, David, Hez- 
 ekitili, and other leaders of Israel were wont to inquire of the 
 Lord, by prayer and through his prophets, whether they should 
 go up against an enemy ; since tliey regarded the issue of war 
 as beyond all human foresight, and lodged in the secret pur- 
 pose of the Almighty. Aiul because the issue belongs to God, 
 it is a sin not to recognize His hand in our victories, but to 
 ascribe them to our own power, or to the skill and the strength 
 of our leaders. "There is no King saved by the multitude of 
 an host. A mighty man is not delivered by much strength." 
 "Our soul waiteth for the Lord* he is our help and our 
 skleld." 
 
THE JUSTNESS OF OUR CAUSE. 
 
 TVe are upon Biblical ground, tlierefore, when we invoke God 
 in doing battle for a just cause, and we are following Biblical 
 precedent when we ascril)e to liini the victory. And, surely, 
 we can appeal to God with pure hearts for the justness of our 
 cause as a nation. Whatever our sins as individuals and as a 
 people — sins that deserve that oiir liberties should be threatened 
 if not taken away — yet the cause for whicli we light is a just 
 cause. 
 
 (1.) We draw the sword in defence of a Government that 
 was ordained " to establish justice, to promote the general wel- 
 fare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our 
 ]M.sterity." Concerning such a Government, thus detined in 
 its own Constitution, there can be no doubt that it was ordained 
 of God, not only as to the fact of its existence, but as to the 
 spirit and intent of it as a Government. Its spirit is freedom, 
 based upon the recognition of the rights of all its subjects ; its 
 object, " to establisli justice," and " to promote the welfare of 
 all." No Government, in its theory, could approach more 
 nearly the apostolic ideal of government as " the minister of 
 God ibr good, and a terror to evil-doers." And in view of the 
 Scriptural requirement of respect to Government as Govern- 
 ment, as a permanent ordinance of God, it lias been iitly said, 
 that " the great duty of submission to civil authority should be 
 made a part of our elementary morality.''^ 
 
 THE GUILT OF THE KEBELLION. 
 
 That elementary morality, the first principles of right, the 
 foundations of order, of justice, of society were assailed by a 
 rebellion against such a Government — a rebellion wanton, reck- 
 less, long-plotted, seeking pretexts in vain, and at last creating 
 pretexts for its own desperate use ; a rebellion that aimed at 
 the overthrow of this Government, and that would set up in 
 its stead the sovereignty of separate States, each claiming the 
 right to make the laboring man a slave, and to practice injus- 
 tice and cruelty upon the mass of its working population, with- 
 out interference of law and without protest from the moral sen- 
 timent of mankind. Rather would the rebels destroy all lib- 
 erty than suffer the liberty of denying their right to nudce men 
 slaves. Pwather than that you and I should be free to say, that 
 to seize the wife of another and defile her before his eyes and 
 then lash and torture him for complaining, is a crime against 
 man and God, the wretches who commit such crimes would 
 blot out from the land all freedom of the pulpit and the press, 
 
^^"> 
 
 8 
 
 the freedom of speech, and of thoiisjht itself. The war which 
 they are waging upon the Government of the United States is 
 au unholy war, a monstrous conspiracy of crime. 
 
 WHAT WE AKE FIGHTIXG FOK. 
 
 Our war in defence of that Government is a just war — a war 
 to maintain a just and good Government — to maintain the ex- 
 istence of a nation which has in its history, its spirit and its 
 institutions, more elements of hope aud of blessing for man- 
 kind than can be found in any other ; a war to preserve a home 
 of liberty for the laboring man, for the exile from other lands, 
 for all coming times. Every victory in such a war tends to 
 make more firm and sure, not this Union and Government 
 alone, but ^j>c)/j»?i^^<?r government and constitutional liberty for 
 after ages. We have drawn the sword for the hope of univer- 
 sal humanity, for a stable libert}-, in opposition alike to anarchy 
 and to despotism ; and may God speed the right ! 
 
 THE QUESTION OF SLAVERY. 
 
 (2.) In the progress of the M-ar, the way has been opened for 
 the deliverance of an oppressed race from the house of bondage, 
 and this is laid upon ns as a necessity for our own lite. 
 I care not to argue again the question of Slavery upon moral 
 and Biblical grounds. It is a waste of time to seek to con- 
 vince men who refuse to be convinced. And those who will 
 rot acknowledge the iniquity of Shivery, after the revelations 
 which the war has made of its effects upon Southern society, 
 of its vices and its cruelties, of its hostility to education, to 
 free Government, to an independent press, and to an honest 
 and humane Gospel, of its utter inconq^atibility Avith the pro- 
 gress of the laboring classes in the comforts and the arts of life, 
 in knowledge and in social elevation, and with the family rela- 
 tion as ordained by God at the beginning — those who will not 
 acknowledge that Slavery violates the simplest elements of jus- 
 tice, and all those rights of man which this nation has declared 
 to be his inalienable endowment from the Creator, are beyond 
 the reach of ethical and Biblical argument touching any moral 
 or social wrong. 
 
 But aside from moral considerations, there is a military and 
 political necessity for the destruction of Shivery. We under- 
 mine the rebellion by sapping Slavery. And our future peace 
 as a nation demands the removal of that system of injustice 
 and outrage which was the spring and motive of the rebellion, 
 and which, in vindication of the divine justice, has drawn upon 
 us the awful scourge of war. The path of victory opens tho 
 
3 5 
 
 9 
 
 way for the emancipation of an unhappy race, and for tlic de- 
 liverance of the nation from a stupendous crime. AVe rejoice 
 and give thanks for victories that mark the sublime march of 
 freedom and of justice in the land. 
 
 LONGINGS FOR PEACE. 
 
 3. And, thirdly, we rejoice and praise God for victory 
 as the way to peace, through the establishment of just 
 government, and tlie destruction of the cause and animus of 
 the rebellion. Years of familiarity with war have not inured 
 us to its horrors, nor made us oblivious of the blessings of peace. 
 Even a just and necessary war, a war that tends to tlie enlarge- 
 ment of freedom and the advancement of civilization througli 
 the overthrow of oppression and wrong, a war that the Provi- 
 dence of God lavs upon us in the interest of humanity, and 
 that the word of God sanctions as right, a war that animates 
 patriotism, develops the national life, that unifies and invigo- 
 rates the Government, that purifies public sentiment and evokes 
 the moral sense of the nation — even such a war carries with it' 
 BO much of calamity that we shrink from the cost and the pain 
 when within reach of the prize. The nation yearns for peace. 
 Wounded hearts and sorrowing households, ready to bleed and 
 mourn afresh for the bereavements of others, sigh and pray 
 for the return of peace. Parents, wives, children, who througli 
 anxious months and years have watched the lists of the sick, 
 the wounded, the dead, and who still thank God that their 
 soldier lives, pray and long the more for the peace that shall 
 bring him home again. And the soldier in tli(f trenches, in 
 the hospital, in the prison, turns homeward many a wistful 
 look, with the prayer of peace upon his lips. Peace, 'pcace, 
 PEACE, is the supplication of this whole people to Almighty 
 God, even amid the rejoicings of victory. It is the daily prayer 
 of him who from the Executive mansion at Washington calls 
 for yet another and another hundred thousand men, no less 
 than of the poor widow who hopes, even against hope, that 
 her one soldier-boy yet lives. 
 
 How hase it is then to pcnwert this holy aspiration for peace, 
 into a partisan cry, that means not peace hnt place ; not peace 
 for the nation but place for a candidate ! How cniel to de- 
 ceive the ignorant and unreflecting, with promises of peace 
 that could "be kept only by parting'" with the honor, the sover- 
 eignty, the life of the nation, and after that could not be kept 
 at all ! How mean, how dastardly, how utterly faithless to- 
 wards those who for years have stood the brunt of war, and 
 are now in the final grapple with the foe, to unfurl the 
 white flag in order to march over their trenches — trampling 
 
10 
 
 under foot the siifferingg and the victories of our defenders — 
 to march over these into the cunip of the enem}^, there to 
 strike liands with the authors of all tliis destruction and misery, 
 and to beg of tiiem a dispensation of ])ardon and peace! There 
 is an ignominy worse than war ; there is a shame harder to be 
 endured than suffering ; there is a pusillanimity and a palter- 
 ing in presence of treason that only mocks the sacred name of 
 peace. 
 
 NO PEACE WITHOUT JUSTICE. 
 
 Peace? "VYo long for peace ; but let us be admonished by 
 tha^ saying of Burke, that " the deliberations of calamUij are 
 rarely wise." Let us not take counsel of our fears ; let us not 
 talce counsel of our losses ; let us not take connsel of our 
 pockets ; let us not take counsel of our enemies, nor of those 
 who, since the war began, have been covertly upon their side, 
 but too cowardly to take the risk of avowing it. ]S'"o ; if we 
 would have peace let us take counsel of judgment, of experi- 
 ence, of ])rinciple, of the "Word of God; and ''the work of 
 righteousnc>s shall be peace, and the effect of righteousness, 
 quietness and assurance forever." Unrighteousness hath dis- 
 turbed our peace. Injustice and wrong, the robbery of the 
 poor, the oppression of the needy — legalized by States, and 
 connived at for years by the dominant party in politics — had 
 filled the cup of our iniquity, so that the Almighty Judge of 
 nations must come forth injustice and in judgment. And we 
 can never settle the controversy that God hath with this nation, 
 until we are willing to settle it upon the basis of justice to our 
 fellow-men. AVe may try peace-mongering and compromising, 
 and submitting ourselves again to the insolent domination of 
 the slave power ; — and if we attempt to barter awa}^ the liber- 
 ties of others as the price of peace, we shall have to pay for it 
 over and over again in our own debasement and deprivation 
 of liberty — but there can be no peace and union, thus cemented, 
 that will Inst. "For thus saith the Lord: Judgment will 1 
 lay to the line and righteousness to the plummet ; and the hail 
 shall sweeo away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall over- 
 flow the hiding-place. And your covenant with death shall 
 be annulled, and your agreement with hell shall nut stand." 
 
 This war was conceived in the most foul injustice. It was 
 a violation of solemn faith; it was perjury, and fraud, and 
 robbery ; it was a conspiracy against liberty, against civiliza- 
 tion, against mankind ; and we can never settle the contro- 
 versy between the nation and the rebels save by the destruc- 
 tion of the conspiracy, and by a defeat of the criminals, so 
 signal and complete that their crime shall never again be at- 
 tempted. The question between the nation and the insurgents 
 
11 ' 
 
 will never be settled until it is settled rigJit ; for the issue is 
 fundainental in politics and in etliics, and a fundamental 
 principle must be laid down squarely by line and plummet, 
 or woo be to that which is built upon it. 
 
 THE KEAL QUESTION. 
 
 Viewed on its political side, the cpiestion is not merely one 
 of the national domain, nor of the national Union and Consti- 
 tution as a device in government. These are but superficial 
 indications of the real question. TJiat lies whole ages deeper. 
 It is the question whetlier a free and a Ciiristian people shall 
 govern themselves peaceably by their own laws, or be bullied 
 out of their laws and their liberties by the bayonet. "We are a 
 nation. Shall we become a mob ? We have a form of Govern- 
 ment defined by law. Shall we surrender it to faction and to 
 anarchy? We have a legal, peaceable, constitutional way of 
 electing rulers, in which every citizen has his voice. Shall we 
 yield the sanctity of the ballot-box to a band of conspirators in 
 arms, who seek by violence that which they have failed to get 
 bj'- votes ? The great issue, I repeat, is whether in this Nine- 
 teenth century, after all the struggles of the past, a tree people 
 can govern themselves peaceably bj their own just and equal 
 laws, or whether we must go back to the bloody factions and 
 military feuds of the last days of the Roman Republic. And 
 that issue can be met only by blotting out the conspiracy — its 
 whole ]3olitical and military organization — from tiie face of 
 the country and from the page of history. Either that must 
 go down, or you and I and all of us go down — " and bloody 
 treason triumph over us." It is a question of foundations, and 
 must be settled right. 
 
 Upon its moral side, it is a question of fundamental ethics 
 aftecting the rights of man, made in God's image. It was for 
 Slavery that they conspired ; for Slavery they rebelled ; for 
 Slavery they organized their government ; and in every declar- 
 ation they make the rights of Slavery the condition of reunion 
 and peace. But conscience and humanity, Christianity and 
 civilization, God and eternal justice are at war with Slavery, 
 and the controversy now opened before God and the world, 
 can never be settled till it is settled right. Victory compell- 
 ing '■' the abandonment of Slavery" can alone give peace. 
 
 TEE DELUSION OF AN ARMISTICE. 
 
 I know that men deceive themselves with words ; and, what 
 is worse, some try to deceive others with words. Lut we 
 must watch against that treachery, by instructing the iguoraut 
 
12 
 
 and supporting the weak. In the midst of onr thanksgiving 
 for victory, the cry is raised for " an immediate cessation of 
 hostilities," with the confession that a war which has saved to 
 the nation the States of Maryland, Kentucky, and Missonri, 
 and has recoveredone-half of Virginia, the whole of Tennessee, 
 — a territory equal to the empire of France — a war which has 
 opened the Mississippi from St, Louis to the Gulf, which has 
 secured the keys of Louisiana and of Georgia, has sealed up 
 Mobile,Charleston and Savannah, and commands the coast from 
 Fortress Monroe to Galveston, a war which has never turned 
 backward from a territory that it had fairly conquered to hold, 
 and that has now shut up the enemy in his own capital, and is 
 worming its way into his vitals — we are called upon, I say, to 
 proclaim an armistice, with the confession that such a war has 
 been a failure, and are told that this will bring us Peace ! 
 Peace ! Peace ! With rebels still in arms, asserting indepen- 
 dence and breathing defiance ! Peace? Peace? With rebel 
 ports opened for the exchange of cotton and tobacco for ships 
 and munitions of war, and the rebel Government reinforced to 
 ride over our Constitution and our commerce with jtn Anglo- 
 French alliance at its back ! Peace, bj strengthening an al- 
 most exhausted foe, and by conceding to hitn that national 
 status as a treaty -making power, which he has begged in vain, 
 of every Court in Europe ! Nay, nay, my friends ; that way 
 is war ; fierce, long, dreary, doubful, terrible war ; in which 
 submission or extermination were the issue. Would you vote, 
 to-morrow, to recall the Union fleets and armies, to abandon 
 your hard-won territory, to open the rebel ports to European 
 supplies and the rebel capital to European recognition, and 
 then fold your arms and trust for peace to the magnanimity of 
 men who stole your arsenals, robbed your treasury, spat upon 
 the Constitution they had sworn to uphold, and levied war 
 against their slumbering, confiding, forbearing fellow-cttizens ? 
 Peace! That way lies WAE, bloody, protracted, doubtful, 
 dreadful, — or submission to the terrorism that rules the un- 
 happy South. 
 
 And if you could vote yourself under that, what right have 
 you to remand to it the loyal men of Tennessee, of Missouri, of 
 Louisiana, of Georgia, who have suflered the loss of all things 
 for their country ? What right have you to remand to this 
 fate the thousands of freedmen who have fought your battles ? 
 — to remand them to the tender mercies of Fort Pillow and the 
 fate of Union prisoners in Georgia pens ? 
 
 NO PEACE FROM EECOGNITIOIT. 
 
 Shall we seek peace by a recognition of the rebels as an in- 
 depoident j)ower l And shall we gain peace, think you, by 
 
sc^ 
 
 13 
 
 creatine^ npon onr borders a hostile and defiant race — a rest- 
 less and reckless rival ? Could there be a lasting peace be- 
 tween a Rcpnblic of freemen and an aristocracy of slave- 
 holders who had robbed ns of half our territory, and then bul 
 lied ns into ncqnicscence ? Wonld it tend to peace to set np 
 two sucli antagonistic nations npon a once common soil, with 
 a long chain efforts between them, and a standing army on 
 either side ? 
 
 Besides, if we yield to one rebellion against the people's 
 choice at the polls, how long before we shall have anotiier ? 
 How long before the secret traitors at the West wonld plot 
 another insurrection, with the Southern Confederac}' as an 
 ally ? Recognition means sectional war for generations. 
 
 By recognizing the South M-e should sink to a third-rate 
 Power. We shonld stand before the nations degraded as a 
 people who had relinqnished one half of our territory to one 
 third of our population, because we could not defend our own 
 flag from treason. And what respect could remain for a flag 
 that we would so ignominiously abandon ? 
 
 But let us conquer this rebellion, and we rise to a position 
 ofpowGcthat will inake us masters of peace at home and 
 abroad. Then will the nation hold the place given to irs 
 continent in Mercator's projection of the globe — the centi-al 
 figure of the civilized world; the seas kissing its feet upon 
 either side ; the isles and continents bowing their obeisance 
 from afar. That is the recognition that we shall win for the 
 Union itself by a decisive victory. 
 
 COMPROMISE KOT PEACE. 
 
 But may not peace come through compromise ? Compro- 
 mise with what ? With an armed insurrection against law, 
 and freedom, and popular liberty ? Such compromise, by its 
 fatal precedent, would transform our elections into bloody 
 feuds. Compromise with Slavery ? And is any weak enough 
 to dream that conscience, and speech, and humanity and reli- 
 gion can be silenced with respect to that stupendous wrong ? 
 Or that the abettors of Slavery would receive in silence the 
 rebukes of humanity and religion % Compromise is but chron- 
 ic war. Justice, and this alone, will give us peace. 
 
 THE SOLEMN ORDEAL. 
 
 The Providence of God is once more bringing this nation to 
 the test of its virtue. Three years ago God brought us to the 
 test of physical courage, sacrifice, endurance — demanding 
 ■whether for the sake of the free and beneticeut Government 
 
u 
 
 h« li fid given lis, for tlio sake of tlie fathers who had toiled 
 and fought for that, for the sake of the nations who were 
 slowly, hravely, struggling toward its light, for the sake of 
 the ages whose character we are shaping and whose institu- 
 tions we have in charge, we would stand up and quit ourselves 
 like men, and save freedom for this continent and for man- 
 kind. And blessed be God we were equal to that test. Blessed 
 be God for the heroism of our young men, the valor of our 
 yeomanry, tlie lavish offerings of our merchants, the passion- 
 ate patriotism of woman. Blessed be God for all the dead 
 who gave themselves for the redemption of the nation ; for 
 the sons whose blood has gone to feed afresh the springs of 
 liberty opened by our revolutionary sires. 
 
 For all thy saints, O God, 
 
 Accept our thankful cry ; 
 
 Who counted this their great reward, ' ■ 
 
 That they for us might die. 
 
 And now once more God is calling us to a higher, sterner 
 test ; the test of moral courage, the test of intelligent and re- 
 sponsible patriotism, the test of religious principle. I tremble 
 at such a strain upon poor human nature. This crisis, more 
 tlian any known to history, will test the progress and the sta- 
 mina of tlie race — the reality and the worth of a Christian 
 civilization. We are presently to decide whether all this cost, 
 and toil, and suffering shall have been in vain, or whether we 
 shall gather its ripening fruit by enduring to the end. We 
 are presently to decide whether we shall be a nation of free- 
 men, or a land of jealous, frenzied, fighting hordes. AVe 
 must determine whether principles and patriotism or prices 
 current shall decide our destiny. "Whether we will sell- our 
 birthriiiht for a mess of pottage and the cry of cheap bread, or 
 defend it against the robber bands that would wrest it from 
 us and our children. Every man of you will carry the honor, 
 the safety, the nnity, the peace, the liberty of this nation — oi 
 its infamy and disruption, the destruction of Union and o^' 
 frecduui, wrapped in the little paper that he will drop into the 
 ballot box within fifty days. God is putting you to the test ; 
 the world awaits the issue. 
 
 An Italian patriot, who in former days has suffered all 
 thill u^s for his country, writes me by a late mail : "I follow 
 with the deepest interest all the events of the great struggle, 
 and my admiration increases in proportion to the magnitude 
 of character which the people are ]n'ogressively developing. 
 You are fighting the battles of freeduui for old Europe. We 
 are threatened with a reaction of the worst character, which 
 does not dare to show itself, but keeps in readiness for th^^ lay 
 when they hope to see the death of liberty among you. . it 
 
15 
 
 I feel the greatest confidence in the final triumph of liberty 
 atid justice." And shall Ave, my countrymen, destroy tlie hope 
 of liberty in the Old "World, by voting liberty out of the JVew / 
 
 THE WORDS OF ROEEKT HALL. 
 
 Seeking almost in vain words worthy of so great a crisis, I 
 recall the magnificent appeal of Robert Hall to the soldiery 
 of England, when marshalled to meet the threatened invasion 
 of the First Kapoleon : " Go forth with alacrity to the battle 
 of the civilized world, where God himself musters the hosts to 
 war. The faithful of every name will employ that ]>rayer 
 which has power with God ; the feeble hands which are une- 
 qual to any other weapon, will grasp the sword of the Spirit. 
 While you have everything to fear from the success of the 
 enemy, you have every means of preventing tliat success, so 
 that it is next to impossible for victory not to crown your ex- 
 ertions. The extent of your resources, under God, is equal to 
 the justice of your cause. 
 
 " As far as the interests of freedom are concerned, the most 
 important by far, of sublunary interests, you, my countrymen, 
 stand in the capacity of tlie Federal represencafives of the 
 human race, for with you it is to determine (under God) in 
 what condition the latest posterity shall be born ; their fortunes 
 are intrusted to your care, and on your conduct at this mo- 
 ment depends the color and complexion of their destinj-. If 
 liberty, after being extinguished on the continent of Europe, 
 is suffered to expire here, whence is it ever to emerge in the 
 midst of that thick night that will invest it? It remains with 
 you, then, to decide whether that freedom, at whose voice the 
 kingdoms of Europe awoke from the sleep of ages, to run a 
 career of virtuous emulation in everything great and good; the 
 freedom which dispelled the mists of superstition, and invited 
 Illations to behold their God ; whose magic touch kindled the 
 '•ays of genius, the enthusiasm of poetry, and the flame of elo- 
 quence ; the freedom which poured into our laps opulence and 
 arts, and embellished life with innumerable institutions and 
 improvements, till it became a theatre of wonders ; it is for 
 you to decide whether this freedom shall yet survive, or be 
 covered with a funereal pall, and wrapt in eternal gloom." 
 
 Then, rising to a yet loftier eloquence, he adds : " I cannot 
 but imagine the virtuous heroes, legislators and patriots of 
 every age and country are bending trom their elevated seats 
 to witness this great contest, as if they were incapable, till it be 
 brought to a favorable issue, of enjoying their eternal repose." 
 jEnjoy that repose, illustrious immortals ! Your mantle fell 
 
 hen you ascended ; and thousands, inflamed with your spirit 
 
16 
 
 ar.d impatient to tread in yonr steps, are ready to S'vvear by 
 Him that sittcth upon the throne and liveth for ever and ever, 
 they will protect freedom in her last asylum, and never desert 
 that canse wliicli you sustained by your labors and cemented 
 by your blood. 
 
 ''And Thou, sole Ruler among the children of men, to whom 
 the shields of the earth belong, gird on Thy sword, Thou Most 
 Mighty ; go forth with our hosts in the day of battle! Impart, 
 in addition to their hereditary valor, that confidence of success 
 which springs from Thy presence ! Pour into their hearts the 
 spirit of departed heroes ! Inspire them with Thine own ; and, 
 while led by Thine hand, and fighting under Thy banners, 
 open Thou their eyes to behold in every valley and in every 
 plain Avhat the prophet beheld by the same illumination — 
 chariots of fire and horses of fire !" 
 
 Already do those chariots and horses appear for our defence. 
 Oh, let us prove ourselves worthy of the hour! Worthy of our 
 ancestors ; worthy of the Government they provided for us ; 
 worthy the name of Christians ; worthy a place in history ; wor- 
 thy a future of unending fame ! The path of victory is the 
 path of peace, " and I'ighteousness shall give us assurance for- 
 ever." Stand by the Government to the end : ffive it confi- 
 aence ; give it votes ; give it prayer ; give :t money ; give it 
 men, and soon this tottering rebellion shall go down like the 
 Alabama tinder the guns of the Kearsarcje., and there shall 
 not be seen of it a wieck, a plank, a floating spar, nor remain 
 a ripple on the surface to mark the soot where it was engulph- 
 ed forever. 
 
 Loyal Leagues^ Clubs, or iiidividuals may obtain any 
 of OUT Publications at the cost price, by application to the 
 JE'jcecutive Committee, or by calling at the liooms of the /So- 
 cicty, No. 863 Broadway, where all information may be ob- 
 tained relating to the Society. 
 
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