Government and Rebellion

The Project Guten­berg EBook of Gov­ern­ment and Re­bel­lion, by E. E. Adams

This eBook is for the use of any­one any­where at no cost and with al­most no re­stric­tions what­so­ev­er. You may copy it, give it away or re-​use it un­der the terms of the Project Guten­berg Li­cense in­clud­ed with this eBook or on­line at www.guten­berg.net

Ti­tle: Gov­ern­ment and Re­bel­lion

Au­thor: E. E. Adams

Re­lease Date: De­cem­ber 23, 2003 [EBook #10517]

Lan­guage: En­glish

Char­ac­ter set en­cod­ing: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTEN­BERG EBOOK GOV­ERN­MENT AND RE­BEL­LION ***

Pro­duced by Dis­tribut­ed Proof­read­ers

GOV­ERN­MENT AND RE­BEL­LION

A ser­mon de­liv­ered in the North Broad Street Pres­by­te­ri­an Church, Sun­day Morn­ing, April 28 1861,

By

Rev. E. E. Adams.

Pub­lished by Re­quest.

1861.

Gov­ern­ment and Re­bel­lion.

An evil man seeketh on­ly re­bel­lion; there­fore a cru­el mes­sen­ger shall be sent against him.--Prov. xvii. 11.

We have in these words this plain an­nounce­ment--that Re­bel­lion is a crime, and shall be vis­it­ed with ter­ri­ble judg­ment. Solomon here speaks his own con­vic­tions; God de­clares his thought, and ut­ters his sanc­tion of law. This is al­so the ex­pres­sion of nat­ural con­science,--vin­di­cat­ing in our breast the Di­vine pro­ce­dure, when the majesty of in­sult­ed gov­ern­ment is as­sert­ed, and penal­ty ap­plied.

God nev­er over­looks re­bel­lion against his throne--nev­er par­dons the rebel un­til he re­pent and sub­mit. God does not com­mand us to for­give our of­fend­ing fel­low-​men, un­less they re­pent. “If thy broth­er tres­pass against thee sev­en times in a day, and sev­en times in a day turn to thee, say­ing, I re­pent, thou shalt for­give him.” God is in a for­giv­ing at­ti­tude; so ought we to be. But he does not _ex­press_ for­give­ness un­til the rebel ex­press­es pen­itence; nei­ther are we un­der obli­ga­tion to _pro­nounce_ an en­emy for­giv­en un­til he sig­ni­fy his com­punc­tion and sor­row, and de­sist from his in­ju­ri­ous con­duct. If my child rebel against my law and my right­ful dis­ci­pline, I am not al­lowed by the spir­it of love to pur­sue him with vengeance; nei­ther am I bound by the law of God to re­lease him from the penal­ty of his sin, un­til he shall have ex­hib­it­ed signs of sub­mis­sion, of sor­row, and of obe­di­ence. I may pity him, and cher­ish to­ward him the _spir­it_ of for­give­ness; but for his own sake, for the or­der of the house­hold, and on ac­count of my in­nate sense of jus­tice, I must not pro­nounce his ac­quit­tal, nor de­clare the con­tro­ver­sy end­ed, un­til he shall have sat­is­fied my gov­ern­men­tal au­thor­ity, and the sen­ti­ment of jus­tice which both his own con­science and mine, con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly, and there­fore by ne­ces­si­ty, cher­ish. And I do not see that Gov­ern­ment can safe­ly par­don a rebel against its statutes, its hon­or and its com­mon broth­er­hood, un­til his re­bel­lion cease; un­til he bow to law, con­fess his crime, and sig­ni­fy his sor­row. I speak not of op­pres­sive gov­ern­ment, of in­iq­ui­tous law; but of _good_ gov­ern­ment, of statutes health­ful, hu­mane, equal. Al­though in the for­mer case re­bel­lion can­not be jus­ti­fied un­til ev­ery con­sti­tu­tion­al mea­sure has been re­sort­ed to for re­dress,--then, if re­dress be not giv­en, the voice of the peo­ple in all rep­re­sen­ta­tive gov­ern­ments may legal­ly change op­pres­sive for just laws, and op­pres­sors for rulers who shall re­gard the pop­ular will. And in despo­tisms, when the peo­ple have the _pow­er_ to re­dress their wrongs, and to en­ter on a ca­reer of de­vel­op­ment in mind and morals, in the arts of civ­iliza­tion,--when ev­ery oth­er course fails--“re­sis­tance to tyrants is obe­di­ence to God!” Man was not _made_ for tyran­ny. He was not made for any form of gov­ern­ment that crush­es out his in­tel­lect and his re­li­gious ca­pa­bil­ities. He was made to be gov­erned moral­ly; to be un­der righ­teous law; law which, while it re­strains pas­sion, self­ish­ness and crime, gives a man all the free­dom that he is able and will­ing to _use_ safe­ly for him­self, and for the com­mon­wealth; all that is con­sis­tent with in­di­vid­ual de­vel­op­ment and the na­tion­al good.

I am not one of those who be­lieve that the voice of the peo­ple is, with­out ex­cep­tion, the voice of God. It was not so at the Del­uge, but quite the re­verse. It was not so when Is­rael clam­ored for a king--not in mer­cy but in anger, God gave them their re­quest. It was not so when Ab­sa­lom stole the hearts of the peo­ple, and stirred up re­bel­lion against his fa­ther. And yet, when a na­tion, in­de­pen­dent of par­ty, free from the ex­cite­ments of mo­men­tary in­ter­est, with­out the in­flu­ence of am­bi­tious lead­ers, un­der the calm guid­ance of rea­son, his­to­ry, and the spir­it of the age,--ris­es spon­ta­neous­ly against op­pres­sion, against in­iq­ui­ty, and _de­mands_ just laws; rights for all; free thought, free speech, free la­bor, free wor­ship; when com­pacts are not vi­olat­ed; when mod­er­ation is main­tained; when the spir­it of hu­man­ity is pre­served,--_then_, I be­lieve, “the voice of the peo­ple _is_ the voice of God.” I have no ques­tion that, in the great prin­ci­ple, Cromwell and his pu­ri­tan hosts were right in their rev­olu­tion­ary ac­tion. I could nev­er doubt that our fa­thers did a no­ble, glo­ri­ous, and Chris­tian deed in throw­ing off the yoke of Britain, and pro­claim­ing a new gov­ern­ment for them­selves and their pos­ter­ity. It was right to con­tend and bleed for equal rep­re­sen­ta­tion, for free­dom of con­science, and for an in­de­pen­dent na­tion­al­ity in which these high ends could be se­cured.

The first gov­ern­ment of which we have ac­count was a Theoc­ra­cy--that is, “the gov­ern­ment of God.” _He_ was the on­ly King. He re­vealed the law, ap­point­ed lead­ers, gave rules for wor­ship, in­struc­tion and war­fare. Thus in the out­set did he set up his claims among men. He es­tab­lished the great prece­dent, which men ought to have fol­lowed, which the world has ig­nored; but to which the thoughts and the will of the race shall ul­ti­mate­ly re­turn. It is true _now_ that gov­ern­ment, as such, is or­dained of God. All gov­ern­ment, in its el­emen­tal au­thor­ity, is a theoc­ra­cy. All pow­er is of God; he or­dains law. He orig­inates the idea of civ­il com­pact. While, there­fore, the prin­ci­ples of gov­ern­ments among men may be de­fec­tive, and the ad­min­is­tra­tion wrong and hurt­ful, the great _fact_ of gov­ern­ment is a _Di­vine fact. Good_ gov­ern­ment is _em­phat­ical­ly God's_ gov­ern­ment--in­tend­ed to sup­press evil, to pro­mote ho­li­ness and hap­pi­ness. “The pow­ers that be are or­dained of God.” “Whoso­ev­er there­fore re­sisteth the pow­er, re­sisteth the or­di­nance of God: and they that re­sist shall re­ceive to them­selves damna­tion.” De­spis­ers of gov­ern­ment are enu­mer­at­ed by the Apos­tle as among the most flagi­tious of men. There are _statutes_ in al­most ev­ery gov­ern­ment which may not be ab­so­lute­ly right; some which may be op­pres­sive. These are to be dis­tin­guished from the prin­ci­ples, from the gen­er­al bear­ing of a gov­ern­ment, and en­dured for the good there­in, or be rid of by con­sti­tu­tion­al and safe meth­ods. It is a du­ty of each sub­ject and cit­izen to sur­ren­der some of his de­sires and pref­er­ences--some of his con­vic­tions pos­si­bly--for the _gen­er­al_ sen­ti­ment--the com­pre­hen­sive good; while he has the priv­ilege of con­vinc­ing by fair ar­gu­ment all oth­ers, and win­ning them to his views and mea­sures if pos­si­ble, with­out vi­olence, with­out in­fringe­ment of law. It is not to be ex­pect­ed that ev­ery man should be ab­so­lute­ly sat­is­fied with any gov­ern­ment. If he is called to yield on­ly his share of per­son­al in­ter­est and pref­er­ence, for the sake of all the pro­tec­tion and bless­ing in which he par­tic­ipates in com­mon with the state, his rea­son, his con­science, his pa­tri­otism will joy­ful­ly ac­qui­esce; he will freely make so much sac­ri­fice for the in­ter­ests of the whole, know­ing very well that ev­ery oth­er cit­izen is like­ly to be un­der an equal sac­ri­fice. Nat­ural, in­di­vid­ual lib­er­ty, with­out law, is on­ly bar­barism. Where ev­ery man is free to do what­ev­er his worst pas­sions prompt, there is in fact no free­dom; there is tyran­ny; for the strong will sub­due the weak, bone and mus­cle will gov­ern mind and con­science. In laws and gov­ern­ments men have their best thoughts; hu­man _law_ is like­ly to be bet­ter than hu­man na­ture. Men feel the need of re­straint--are con­vinced of the ne­ces­si­ty of law. They there­fore make laws in self-​de­fence; if there­by they would _not_ re­strain their own self­ish­ness, they _would_ re­strain the self­ish­ness of oth­ers; but that which is made a bar­ri­er to _one_ bad sub­ject is al­so a de­fence against all;--thus men do re­strain them­selves by their de­fences against oth­ers. Thus it is that, with health­ful con­vic­tions, men may con­trol dis­eased pas­sion; with a right _ide­al_ is in­ti­mate­ly joined a safe ac­tu­al­ity; with good law, a com­par­ative­ly good con­di­tion. Even in the worst ad­min­is­tra­tion, and when the pub­lic mind is most de­mor­al­ized, there may re­main the pu­ri­ty of law; the sub­lime thought. If the mind finds it­self sink­ing in­to law­less­ness and dis­or­gan­ism, and borne away by the pres­sure of evil, it can look up­ward, and, catch­ing new en­er­gy from the un­quenched light--

“Spring in­to the realm of the ide­al.”

Our des­tiny is ide­al. We are on our way to the Un­seen. The ide­al draws us up­ward,--_re­al_ now, to the spir­its of just men made per­fect--to be re­al to us when we are per­fect--_once_ ide­al to them, as now to us. We must keep above us the mod­el of life and of law which we have not yet at­tained. Let it nev­er be dim. It is a star shin­ing through time's night! A ban­ner wav­ing from the throne of God. It tells us of the goal. It points out our fu­tu­ri­ty--the al­ti­tude of our virtue, our ex­al­ta­tion, our bliss.

Our sub­ject is GOV­ERN­MENT AND MAN. We pro­ceed to con­sid­er it in a three-​fold as­pect, in­quir­ing

I. _What is good gov­ern­ment?_ II. _What con­sti­tutes re­bel­lion against such gov­ern­ment?_ III. _What is the du­ty of each cit­izen when re­bel­lion ex­ists?_

I. _What is a good gov­ern­ment_?

No cit­izen looks for an ab­so­lute­ly per­fect form of na­tion­al­ity--of law. But we have a right to ask for good gov­ern­ment. We have been ac­cus­tomed to think that it de­pends more on ad­min­is­tra­tion than on prin­ci­ple; and the line of the po­et, “That which is best ad­min­is­tered, is best,” is a proverb, to the sen­ti­ment of which we too freely yield. No doubt a gov­ern­ment with bad statutes and wrong laws, may be so ad­min­is­tered as to pro­duce a tol­er­able de­gree of na­tion­al com­fort and de­vel­op­ment for a sea­son; while a Con­sti­tu­tion per­fect in its the­ories and prin­ci­ples, may be so mal­ad­min­is­tered as to cor­rupt and dis­tract, im­pov­er­ish and de­mor­al­ize, a peo­ple. And yet, I agree with an old pa­tri­ot of the past cen­tu­ry who said, “There is no foun­da­tion to imag­ine that the good­ness or bad­ness of any gov­ern­ment de­pends sole­ly up­on its ad­min­is­tra­tion. It must be al­lowed that the ul­ti­mate de­sign of gov­ern­ment is to re­strain the cor­rup­tions of hu­man na­ture; and, since hu­man na­ture is the same at all times and in all places, the same form of gov­ern­ment which is best for one na­tion is best for all na­tions, if they would _on­ly agree to adopt_ it.”

There is a deep thought in this re­mark. We of­ten say, for ex­am­ple, “France is not fit for a re­pub­li­can form of gov­ern­ment,” and it is true; but that is _not_ to say, “A re­pub­li­can form of gov­ern­ment is not fit for France,” if the pop­ula­tion would agree to adopt and pre­serve it. Man, in his fall­en state, is not fit for the holy gov­ern­ment of God; but that holy gov­ern­ment is, nev­er­the­less, the _on­ly_ one that is fit for man as a moral be­ing; and it is man's ig­no­rance and fol­ly, his guilt and ru­in, that he does not adopt it. It is ow­ing to the ig­no­rance and wicked­ness of the world that it is not fit for a rep­re­sen­ta­tive gov­ern­ment; and that all do not choose Christ to be their King.

Were a score of the pro­fes­sion­al politi­cians of our land to frame a Con­sti­tu­tion for us in full ac­cor­dance with their own schemes and choice, we would soon find our­selves un­der an oli­garchy of schemers, who cared for the Re­pub­lic on­ly so far as to se­cure from it their own fame and emol­ument. Were as many bro­kers or mer­chants to make and ad­min­is­ter our laws, with­out re­gard to oth­er in­dus­tri­al in­ter­ests, we should have an oli­garchy of trade. Were as many hus­band­men, or me­chan­ics, or lawyers, to have full con­trol of our leg­is­la­tion and gov­ern­ment, we would have one in­ter­est tow­er­ing above all oth­ers, and true equal­iza­tion, true broth­er­hood, just rep­re­sen­ta­tion, health­ful na­tion­al­ity would be im­pos­si­ble. Or, were we de­pen­dent on of­fi­cers in the army or navy for our gov­ern­ment, leg­isla­tive and ad­min­is­tra­tive, we would be like­ly to have many of our rights cir­cum­scribed. Were as many cler­gy­men to frame a Con­sti­tu­tion, and ad­min­is­ter laws, we might be un­der a crush­ing priest­hood. A gov­ern­ment of mere schol­ars, po­ets or or­ators, would be on­ly a sub­lime dream. A Con­sti­tu­tion of philoso­phies alone, would glit­ter with ab­strac­tions beau­ti­ful, cold, grand as the snow-​capt Alps, and as dis­tant, too, from the ac­tu­al­ities of men! A gov­ern­ment of mere gen­tle­men who have noth­ing to do but think for slaves, to en­joy the chase and the race-​ground, to ex­tol their pedi­gree, and tra­duce la­bor, and lead re­tain­ers to war--would be a gov­ern­ment for the few over the many, an aris­toc­ra­cy of blood and priv­ilege, of curled mous­tache and ta­per fin­gers; but not a re­pub­lic of pa­tri­ots, of self-​made men, of equal priv­ilege and just laws. It would be a re­turn to se­mi-​bar­barism, to the age of Louis XIV., or even of Charles I.

This is now the strong ten­den­cy in the Rebel States: even along our free bor­der, but be­low it, such is the sys­tem of rep­re­sen­ta­tion, that a coun­ty con­tain­ing on­ly about 3,000 in­hab­itants, sends as many rep­re­sen­ta­tives to the leg­is­la­ture as an­oth­er coun­ty of 30,000, and a sin­gle pro­pri­etor casts as many votes as a whole com­mune. So much lib­er­ty of cit­izens is al­ready sac­ri­ficed to the cheva­lier, to the sys­tem of forced ser­vice.

But were a se­lect num­ber of ex­pe­ri­enced men, of true states­men, em­brac­ing dif­fer­ent pur­suits and pro­fes­sions, ed­ucat­ed in dif­fer­ent parts of the world, and drawn to­geth­er by grand na­tion­al events,--states­men born in the age when lib­er­ty had its first grand re­vival, and was guard­ed by sober­ness of thought, and tried by ev­ery va­ri­ety and ex­tent of sac­ri­fice--by men who had no pro­fes­sion­al, ex­clu­sive in­ter­est to pro­vide for, but who ex­pect­ed to fight and die for their con­vic­tions, who sought on­ly to lay the foun­da­tion of a na­tion­al­ity for fu­ture gen­er­ations, and for the world; who aimed at a health­ful union of all pop­ular in­ter­ests, both among poor and rich, among mas­ters and de­pen­dents; who pro­vid­ed for free­dom of ac­tion un­der law; of wor­ship and ed­uca­tion, of com­merce, agri­cul­ture, and the arts; for the easy and eq­ui­table sup­port of gov­ern­ment,--for its per­pe­tu­ity in­deed, in­fus­ing in­to it el­ements that ap­peal pow­er­ful­ly, both to the self-​in­ter­est and the pa­tri­otism of the cit­izens,--I say, were such men, with such ends in view, by such sac­ri­fice, to frame such a gov­ern­ment, con­tain­ing the most del­icate bal­ance of in­ter­ests, with strong checks against the en­croach­ment of any branch, ei­ther the leg­isla­tive, ex­ec­utive or ju­di­cial, giv­ing all trades and pro­fes­sions, and all men, an equal chance for ex­cel­lence, in­flu­ence, and hon­or; you would not hes­itate to pro­nounce that a good gov­ern­ment, even though you might find slight ex­cep­tion to some of its terms, though you might not in­ter­pret as oth­ers do, all its con­sti­tu­tion­al phras­es.

In view of the pro­tec­tion which such a con­sti­tu­tion af­fords, es­pe­cial­ly if it had been test­ed, for a pe­ri­od of eighty years, by all the in­ward strain of do­mes­tic evils, and all the out­ward pres­sure of in­va­sion; by the in­flu­ence of for­eign en­vy, of in­trigue, of hos­til­ity; by the de­bas­ing pow­er of dis­loy­al­ty, the in­com­pe­ten­cy of rulers, and the gen­er­al de­gen­er­acy of hu­man na­ture; I say, in view of all these un­to­ward in­flu­ences, the gov­ern­ment which could still re­tain its majesty and pow­er, still stretch its Aegis over ev­ery na­tion­al and in­di­vid­ual right--you would pro­nounce the best, both for ruler and peo­ple, that ev­er blessed a na­tion. And you would not hes­itate to de­clare _that_ man a _traitor_, who should at­tempt _to weak­en_ and de­stroy it!

Now we pre­tend to say that _our_ gov­ern­ment was thus formed by the choic­est wis­dom and pa­tri­otism of the world, with the largest lib­er­ty in view, un­der the re­straint of law, giv­ing eq­ui­table priv­ilege to all its cit­izens, and so bal­anc­ing its dif­fer­ent de­part­ments that they are mu­tu­al­ly a de­fence. We pre­tend to claim for our gov­ern­ment the lofti­est pur­pose, the most com­pre­hen­sive views, and the best prac­ti­cal re­sults. We claim for it jus­tice, equal­ity, and pow­er. It does not stand out--a thing dis­tinct from the peo­ple and the states. It is not an ob­jec­tive pow­er on­ly, but sub­jec­tive; it is in ev­ery State and in ev­ery free­man. It is not in ma­chin­ery, which can be set in mo­tion and work out cer­tain re­sults, as if ev­ery part of it were iron or steel, and put in­to ac­tion by ap­plied heat; but in _men_, in minds, in hearts, in the fam­ily cir­cle, in the church, in ev­ery throb of pa­tri­otism, in ev­ery fi­bre of the hus­band­man and the ar­ti­zan, in the pas­tor's prayers, and the stu­dent's liv­ing thoughts. It is in the _na­tion_ like la­tent fire, like a hid­den life--evoked in time of per­il, and flash­ing along the tele­graph, breathed in song, ut­tered in or­ato­ry, thun­dered from the can­non's mouth, hung out in stream­ing ban­ners whose “ev­ery hue was born in heav­en,” felt in firm re­solve, il­lus­trat­ed in re­sponse to the call of coun­try and of law. Where is our gov­ern­ment? Not at Wash­ing­ton alone. That is but its sym­bol. It is through­out all our Loy­al States. It is en­throned on the gran­ite hills of New Hamp­shire, sends its voice along the Al­legha­nies, and on the swelling floods of the Mis­sis­sip­pi, and spreads its wing over the chil­dren of the West, even to the shores of Ore­gon. It lives in ev­ery cot­tage, and ev­ery man­sion, and has a throne in ev­ery true, free, no­ble, Chris­tian heart.

That it is a _good_ gov­ern­ment, you have on­ly in imag­ina­tion to blot from the face of the earth what­ev­er has grown up un­der its pro­tec­tion and en­cour­age­ment, by the will and the bless­ing of the Almighty, dur­ing the fourscore years of its ex­is­tence; lev­el all the cities, sink the com­merce, pros­trate the schools and church­es, oblit­er­ate all the sci­ence, his­to­ry and thought it has fos­tered, quench the light of or­ato­ry, turn back the wheel of im­prove­ment, and leave us at the open­ing of 1776; es­ti­mate all the free­dom of act, of ut­ter­ance, of in­dus­try; reck­on the sum of hu­man com­forts, even of lux­uries, it has brought to our hand. Look at all our ships, our mech­anism, our homes, our sanc­tu­ar­ies, our in­sti­tu­tions of moral­ity, of mer­cy and of re­li­gion; our wealth, in­tel­li­gence, or­der, pow­er; con­sid­er the el­eva­tion giv­en to mil­lions in the worst form of civ­iliza­tion in the land, show­ing that such is the vi­tal­iz­ing force of our na­tion­al life, that even slav­ery here, bad as it is--and we know of noth­ing worse as a sys­tem--lifts men above the nat­ural li­cense of sav­age ex­is­tence. Con­sid­er all this, and much more, that I may not stop to ut­ter, and you can­not--you _do_ not--no sane mind _can_ ques­tion the supreme ex­cel­lence--I had al­most said the _di­vine_ ex­cel­lence--of our gov­ern­ment. And if there were need of oth­er proof, we have on­ly to re­mind you with what prompt­ness the call of our no­ble Chief Mag­is­trate was an­swered from ev­ery free State--from the city and the ham­let; from the bank, the bar, the press and the pul­pit; from the work­shop and the soil; from the calm and com­fort of home and ease and af­flu­ence, and from the cot­tage of the poor, as if the pulse of the gov­ern­ment were beat­ing in ev­ery vein, and the will of the Cab­inet had its home in ev­ery bo­som! Strong men, young men, aged men, men of leisure, Chris­tian men--all ready to march un­der the stars and stripes, or to pour out their trea­sure for oth­ers. Moth­ers and wives and sis­ters, with break­ing hearts and tremu­lous bene­dic­tions, bid­ding the heroes go--of­fer­ing them on their coun­try's al­tar. Oh, it would not be thus but for the true man­hood which our gov­ern­ment in­fus­es in­to loy­al cit­izens. It would not be so, but for the Chris­tian­ity it pro­tects with­out dic­ta­tion, and ac­knowl­edges with­out os­ten­ta­tion.

II. We come now to the ques­tion, _What con­sti­tutes re­bel­lion against good gov­ern­ment_?

There may be crim­inal re­bel­lion even against a wicked and op­pres­sive gov­ern­ment. The peo­ple may take the law in­to their own hands, and put to death, or im­prison their rulers, with­out _first_ hav­ing tried con­sti­tu­tion­al meth­ods of re­dress. But I speak of re­bel­lion against _good_ gov­ern­ment--such as we have al­ready had in re­view. There is a dif­fer­ence be­tween in­sur­rec­tion and re­bel­lion. The for­mer is an act of a peo­ple or pop­ula­tion against a sin­gle statute, or against a por­tion of the leg­isla­tive en­act­ments, with­out nec­es­sar­ily grow­ing in­to war­fare, or re­volt against the whole con­sti­tu­tion and the laws. This may be­come re­bel­lion. There is al­so a dif­fer­ence be­tween re­bel­lion and rev­olu­tion. The lat­ter, in a po­lit­ical sense, is a change, ei­ther whol­ly or in part, of the con­sti­tu­tion. This may be ef­fect­ed by ar­gu­ment and a peace­ful vote--by ab­di­ca­tion, by a change of na­tion­al pol­icy in view of some new re­la­tion, and by gen­er­al con­sent, or by war­fare. “The rev­olu­tion in Eng­land in 1688, was oc­ca­sioned by the ab­di­ca­tion of James II., the es­tab­lish­ment of the House of Or­ange on the throne, and the restor­ing of the con­sti­tu­tion to its prim­itive state.”

Our rev­olu­tion of '76, and on­ward, was not a re­bel­lion; it was re­sis­tance of op­pres­sion, of bur­den­some tax­ation with­out equal rep­re­sen­ta­tion, and it re­sult­ed in our dis­tinct na­tion­al­ity.

The rev­olu­tions of France have been of a sim­ilar char­ac­ter; they have sprung from op­pres­sion of the most se­vere and un­nat­ural kind. This was the fact, at least, in 1797 and in 1830. In 1848, when it was my lot to be in the midst of it, the rev­olu­tion arose from the self­ish con­duct of Louis Philippe, who en­riched him­self and his fam­ily out of the na­tion­al trea­sury, and en­cour­aged his sons in a course which was at war with na­tion­al prece­dent, with the com­mer­cial in­ter­ests and demo­crat­ic in­di­vid­ual­ism of the French; for with their im­pe­ri­al pres­tiges and tastes they are ex­treme in their per­son­al democ­ra­cy.

But all these rev­olu­tions re­sult­ed in good to the peo­ple. Ed­uca­tion, pub­lic spir­it, en­ter­prise, la­bor, all the arts of civ­iliza­tion, and even evan­gel­ical Chris­tian­ity re­ceived a new im­pulse. Mind was opened and en­larged; the peo­ple thought for them­selves, and sighed for knowl­edge and a bet­ter faith.

Rev­olu­tion is go­ing on silent­ly, from year to year, in Eng­land. The no­bil­ity yield by slow, al­most im­per­cep­ti­ble de­grees, to the de­mands of the peo­ple. It is by this pro­cess that the Gov­ern­ment avoids the shocks which star­tle Aus­tria, France and Italy.

Such is the va­ri­ety of hon­est opin­ion among men on all sub­jects; so dif­fer­ent are the de­grees of in­for­ma­tion, and the op­por­tu­ni­ties of judg­ing with re­gard to the best mea­sures of gov­ern­ment; such a di­ver­si­ty ex­ists in the in­ter­ests and abil­ities of a peo­ple,--that they may be good cit­izens with­out be­ing sat­is­fied al­to­geth­er with the con­sti­tu­tion, or with those who ad­min­is­ter its laws. There will be dif­fer­ent po­lit­ical par­ties. It is the glo­ry of a gov­ern­ment that the peo­ple are al­lowed to think and vote as they please, and to ex­press their hon­est opin­ions. Per­haps with us, ex­pres­sion is too free, es­pe­cial­ly in re­gard to pub­lic men and mea­sures. We may have di­verse views and con­vic­tions, and yet feel and act loy­al­ly. But men who en­deav­or by any in­flu­ence or means to lessen the loy­al­ty of oth­ers, to alien­ate the love of the peo­ple from the gov­ern­ment, and who sig­ni­fy their own aver­sion, not by con­demn­ing a sin­gle statute and seek­ing its law­ful re­peal, but by heap­ing abuse on the con­sti­tu­tion and on those who are cho­sen to ad­min­is­ter the laws, by avow­ing their hos­til­ity to the gov­ern­ment and its pol­icy, or their pur­pose to re­sist and war against it,--are in a pos­ture of re­bel­lion. Those who, be­ing in of­fice, com­mand­ing the arms and oth­er prop­er­ty of the gov­ern­ment, cause them to be re­moved so as to weak­en its pow­er and strength­en those in ac­tu­al re­bel­lion, or who are threat­en­ing the same; those who aid and com­fort a pop­ula­tion or sol­diery who are in a state of ac­tu­al re­sis­tance, and fi­nal­ly, those who do open­ly and avowed­ly re­nounce the au­thor­ity of the gov­ern­ment to which they have sworn al­le­giance, or take up arms to at­tack its strongholds, seize or de­stroy its prop­er­ty, or in­jure the sol­diers and cit­izens who are sent to pro­tect it,--are in a state of re­bel­lion against its laws and against the com­mon­wealth over which it holds the shield of its au­thor­ity.

Ko­rah was a rebel and a traitor, who hav­ing, by in­trigue, in­spired some oth­er lead­ers with the spir­it of sedi­tion, suc­ceed­ed in draw­ing from their al­le­giance to Moses and Aaron, a large num­ber of the peo­ple, who came to­geth­er in a mob to de­mand a dif­fer­ent ad­min­is­tra­tion. They were in­vit­ed to re­fer the mat­ter to the Di­vine de­ci­sion, but they stout­ly re­fused, ac­cus­ing Moses of as­sump­tion, thus en­deav­or­ing to de­stroy his au­thor­ity over the na­tion. That was re­bel­lion. Again, in the reign of David, his son Ab­sa­lom drew the peo­ple from their al­le­giance, then seized the reins of gov­ern­ment and pur­sued his fa­ther with an army. That was re­bel­lion against whole­some law, against the will of God.

Now we have the painful fact be­fore us, that re­bel­lion has sprung up against our good gov­ern­ment. Men in many quar­ters have se­cret­ly plot­ted, and open­ly avowed hos­til­ity to our Fed­er­al Union. Eight of our States have passed the Or­di­nance of Se­ces­sion, four or five oth­ers are as­sum­ing an at­ti­tude of hos­til­ity to the Gen­er­al Gov­ern­ment, or re­fus­ing to com­ply with the Ex­ec­utive, who calls on them to aid in the de­fence of the Cap­ital. This state of things has been pre­ced­ed by acts of treach­ery on the part of lead­ing men in the States, by seizure of arms, mon­ey, and pub­lic de­fences,--the prop­er­ty of the gov­ern­ment. A new Con­fed­er­acy is formed, con­trary to oaths and com­pacts, for the pur­pose of de­stroy­ing our Union, and giv­ing per­pe­tu­ity to slav­ery. It has at­tacked our forts, adul­ter­at­ed our coin, stolen our arms, pro­claimed pira­cy against our com­merce, set a price on the head of our Chief Mag­is­trate, threat­ened our Cap­ital, and raised armies to ex­ter­mi­nate, if pos­si­ble, our na­tion­al­ity. And all this it has done with­out one act of the Gov­ern­ment to pro­voke such pro­ce­dure; with­out any op­pres­sion; with­out any threat; but in the face of ev­ery hon­or­able pro­pos­al on our part, af­ter long and pa­tient en­durance of their en­croach­ment and plun­ders; even un­til for­eign jour­nals de­ride us for our for­bear­ance, and the rebels them­selves in­sult our de­lay.

There are those who have com­pared this re­bel­lion with our rev­olu­tion of '76. There could hard­ly be a wider dis­tinc­tion, both in prin­ci­ple and in fact, than be­tween these two move­ments. The Colonies, had been op­pressed by “nav­iga­tion laws,” in­tend­ed by the British Par­lia­ment to crush out their com­merce for a whole cen­tu­ry, from 1660 to 1775. Their weak­ness dur­ing that pe­ri­od did not al­low of re­sis­tance. They were taxed op­pres­sive­ly, while they were not al­lowed a rep­re­sen­ta­tion. This was in vi­ola­tion of Magna Char­ta; for the gov­ern­ment of Great Britain was rep­re­sen­ta­tive. Hav­ing been aid­ed by the Colonists dur­ing the Sev­en Years' War, in the sub­ju­ga­tion of Cana­da, the Par­ent Gov­ern­ment--with­out ask­ing tax­ation through the reg­ular ac­tion of the Colo­nial Gov­ern­ment--as­sumed the right to tax our ex­pand­ing com­merce, and com­menced a vig­or­ous en­force­ment of rev­enue laws. “Writs of As­sis­tance” were is­sued, where­by of­fi­cers of the king were al­lowed to break open any cit­izen's store or dwelling, to search for, and seize for­eign mer­chan­dise; sher­iffs al­so were com­pelled to as­sist in the work. The sanc­tions of pri­vate life might, by this act be in­vad­ed at any time by hirelings; and bad as it was in it­self, it was li­able to more mon­strous abuse. Then came the “_sug­ar bill_,” im­pos­ing enor­mous du­ties on var­ious ar­ti­cles of mer­chan­dise from the West In­dies, and great­ly crip­pling Colo­nial com­merce: then the in­fa­mous Stamp Act, by which ev­ery le­gal in­stru­ment, in or­der to va­lid­ity, must have the seal of the British Gov­ern­ment--deeds, diplo­mas, &c., cost­ing from thir­ty-​six cents to ten dol­lars apiece: then the du­ty on tea; and, fi­nal­ly, the quar­ter­ing of sol­diers on our cit­izens in time of peace, for the ex­press pur­pose of sub­ju­gat­ing our in­dus­try and en­er­gy to the self­ish pur­pos­es of the crown.

It is enough to say, that the rebels against our Gov­ern­ment have suf­fered no op­pres­sion. They do not set forth any le­gal ground of Se­ces­sion. The gov­ern­ment has done noth­ing to call out their in­dig­na­tion, or to in­flict on them a wrong. They have had more than their share of pub­lic of­fice; they have had a larg­er rep­re­sen­ta­tion, in pro­por­tion to their free cit­izens, than we have; they have been pro­tect­ed in their claims, even against the con­vic­tions of the North; we yield­ing, as a po­lit­ical de­mand, what we do not whol­ly ad­mit as a Chris­tian du­ty. We have as­sist­ed them by en­act­ments, by mon­ey, and by arms, in the preser­va­tion of a sys­tem at war with our con­science, and with our lib­er­ties. We have paid for lands which they oc­cu­py; and af­ter all their in­dig­ni­ties and taunts, and at­tacks on our cit­izens, their plun­ders, and their war­like demon­stra­tions, we have been pa­tient; and are even now im­pos­ing on our­selves re­straint from the ex­ecu­tion of that chas­tise­ment, which many of their sober and awed cit­izens ac­knowl­edge to be just, and which, if the call were made by the Ex­ec­utive, would at once be hurled on the rebels by an in­dig­nant peo­ple, like the rush of des­tiny.

Now, I grant, for I do not wish to make the mat­ter worse than it is against them, that in the North, in­di­vid­uals have de­mand­ed more than the South were able, at once, to give. Some have pushed re­form faster than it would bear, faster than the laws of Prov­idence would al­low; but it was hon­est­ly and con­sci­en­tious­ly done. We have some­times in our warmth, ut­tered ir­ri­tat­ing words; but all this has been re­turned by blows, and by sav­age vin­dic­tive­ness. We have shown a will­ing­ness, of late, to yield some things; to abide by the sense of the whole peo­ple; but these States are, by their rulers, de­clared _out of the Union_, with­out ap­peal to the peo­ple; they have com­menced the war, and now they are re­gard­ed by the whole world as in a state of re­bel­lion, not of jus­ti­fi­able rev­olu­tion. They would sub­mit to no method of ad­just­ment that we could hon­or­ably al­low. They de­sired war, as they have been for years prepar­ing for it, at the ex­pense of the Gov­ern­ment, and in its ser­vice and trust, draw­ing their life from the bo­som which they now sting; and be­cause free­dom will no longer bow, as it has done for a whole gen­er­ation, to their will, they rebel, pro­claim a sys­tem of pira­cy, and threat­en the sub­ju­ga­tion of the whole Amer­ican peo­ple. It is a deep, and long de­ter­mined trea­son, run­ning in­to the whole na­tion­al life, and is be­come to our­selves a ques­tion of _per­son­al_ lib­er­ty.

III. What then, we ask, _is the du­ty of all cit­izens when good gov­ern­ment is as­sailed by re­bel­lion_?

Doubt­less, _one_ du­ty is to in­quire whether they have in any way con­tribut­ed crim­inal­ly to the oc­ca­sion or the caus­es of such re­bel­lion; whether they have de­mand­ed too much of the dis­af­fect­ed, or en­cour­aged a wrong spir­it in them by co­in­cid­ing with views lead­ing to their present at­ti­tude; whether they have par­tic­ipat­ed in any way with a pol­icy cal­cu­lat­ed to ir­ri­tate, to de­fy, to pro­voke hon­est minds to anger? Whether as in­di­vid­uals, as Chris­tians, they have been bit­ter and harsh, and venge­ful, or are so now; and if they find any such spir­it, it be­comes them to re­pent, and school them­selves in­to Chris­tian char­ity and mod­er­ation. But, notwith­stand­ing any pos­si­ble er­ror in the past, the Chris­tian cit­izen must con­se­crate him­self to the de­fence of the gov­ern­ment and its _pol­icy_; for how­ev­er, there is a dis­tinc­tion or­di­nar­ily be­tween the two; in a cri­sis that in­volves a na­tion's life, the pol­icy which would save it, is the spir­it of gov­ern­ment and or­der.

The true Chris­tian will pray, and speak, and write, and la­bor, and die for its suc­cess! Will give as­sur­ance of his sym­pa­thy and sup­port, and refuse to do any act that can be con­strued in­to _com­fort_ to the rebels. He will en­cour­age troops called to sup­port the gov­ern­ment, and its pol­icy, giv­ing them food, cloth­ing, ad­vice, BIBLES AND ARMS. He will rouse their pa­tri­otism, and call down on them the bene­dic­tion of heav­en. This is the du­ty of min­is­ters, and mag­is­trates, of church­es and in­di­vid­ual Chris­tians. And if the re­bel­lion con­tin­ue, it is their du­ty to ad­vo­cate and help to form armies of suf­fi­cient num­bers and pow­er to ut­ter­ly sub­ju­gate the rebels, and, if they can­not oth­er­wise be brought to sub­mit, put an end to their ex­is­tence. That is what God did by the hand of Is­rael, to Ko­rah and Ab­sa­lom; and it is the le­git­imate is­sue, if needs be, of all suc­cess­ful re­sis­tance,--of all de­fen­sive war­fare. To de­ny it, is to de­ny the right of self-​de­fence. It is to put a man in a po­si­tion where he must love his en­emy bet­ter than him­self and chil­dren, which even Chris­tian­ity does not de­mand, though it does en­join for­bear­ance, char­ity, and sac­ri­fice. To de­ny this is to con­demn the prin­ci­ples of our Rev­olu­tion, and to sanc­tion the plun­der and de­struc­tion of na­tion­al prop­er­ty and be­ing.

What, there­fore, is our du­ty, now that re­bel­lion ac­tu­al­ly rages against our mild, equal, good Gov­ern­ment--the best, on the whole, that the world ev­er saw? re­bel­lion with­out cause; with no le­git­imate ground of of­fence; re­bel­lion for the sake of a dark and de­mor­al­iz­ing sys­tem, that has robbed half the na­tion of its con­science, and cursed it with an in­vet­er­ate idol­atry. What is our du­ty? What is mine as a cit­izen, a Chris­tian, a min­is­ter of God--as a man? What is yours? Plain­ly to ask, What have I--ei­ther by de­mand­ing too much, not in ab­stract right, but in the light of present pos­si­bil­ity--con­tribut­ed to­wards this fear­ful con­di­tion? What by my love of mon­ey, my sanc­tion of op­pres­sion, my apolo­gies for wrong, my com­plaint against gov­ern­ment, my sup­port of wrong prin­ci­ples, my ne­glect to vote and pray for the right, my boast of na­tion­al great­ness, my wor­ship of pow­er and ne­glect of good­ness, my for­get­ful­ness of God? What by all these, and more that I do not think of, have I done pal­pa­bly, pos­si­bly, to­ward bring­ing on this ter­ri­ble crime against jus­tice, hu­man­ity and law? Then it is my du­ty to re­pent of all this and de­plore it. It is al­so my du­ty to strive against per­son­al ha­tred and re­venge, and to pray for my coun­try's en­emies just as I would for my own, and _be­cause_ they are my own--not that they pros­per in their re­bel­lion, but that they re­pent and find mer­cy, and ac­knowl­edge the au­thor­ity against which they are at war. It is our du­ty spe­cial­ly to pity and pray for the mul­ti­tudes of good cit­izens and their fam­ilies, who can­not es­cape from among the rebels, and who are in great jeop­ardy; men who love law and the Con­sti­tu­tion, and the whole coun­try; who are ei­ther re­sist­ing, un­der the great­est pres­sure, the evil that is up­on them, or yield­ing through fear and force. We feel for them; we call them our broth­ers. But it is al­so my du­ty and yours to sup­port our gov­ern­ment--our ad­min­is­tra­tion; to pray for and sym­pa­thize with our Pres­ident and his Cab­inet in their most try­ing pos­ture, in the midst of such per­ils, and with so mea­gre means for the mo­ment, of es­tab­lish­ing or­der, and set­ting the na­tion­al­ity in per­ma­nent se­cu­ri­ty. It is our du­ty to re­port traitors to the po­lice, that they may be law­ful­ly cared for; to help our mili­tia and vol­un­teers with ev­ery com­fort and de­fence; to hold up the arm of gov­ern­ment so long as rebels re­main.

This is _our_ coun­try, bought with blood. It is sec­ond on­ly to the re­demp­tion which Christ pur­chased for us! And if we are called to con­tend with prin­ci­pal­ities and pow­ers, and spir­itu­al wicked­ness in high places, for the safe­ty of our souls, sure­ly we may con­tend with flesh and blood, with rebels and traitors, to save this glo­ri­ous in­her­itance from the gulf of an­ar­chy and the bonds of a last­ing servi­tude. _War is ter­ri­ble_, but slav­ery and plun­der and the silent gan­grene of na­tion­al dis­hon­or, bribery and per­vert­ed con­science are worse. The burst of a thun­der cloud may break down a for­est of lofty pines, but the slow delv­ing of the mole may un­der­mine a thou­sand habi­ta­tions. The se­cret cor­ro­sions of the ship-​worm will sink a fleet.

This deep-​work­ing, in­ward ru­in is ap­pear­ing on the face of so­ci­ety. The stu­pen­dous fact is, that from Bal­ti­more, on­ward through­out the dis­af­fect­ed States, the pop­ula­tion is un­der the guid­ance of mad lead­ers, and ex­posed to mob pow­er. Thou­sands of good cit­izens are fly­ing to us for pro­tec­tion; thou­sands more forced in­to the war against the coun­try, and oth­er thou­sands sigh­ing and pray­ing in se­cret that God will give suc­cess to our arms and res­cue them­selves and their fam­ilies from ru­in. For these, as well as for our lib­er­ties and hon­ors are we sum­moned to war; it were a crime to be in­ac­tive. The Bible is mil­itant. Chris­tian­ity is a war­fare with sin. Life is mil­itant,--a per­pet­ual fight with death. If our bless­ings are worth pray­ing for and prais­ing for, they are worth _fight­ing_ for, and if not to be oth­er­wise se­cured, _must be fought for_.

I want this coun­try to live! I want my chil­dren to grow up un­der its shield! I want to see con­sti­tu­tion­al lib­er­ty mount above the ob­sta­cles of ages, and rise high­er and high­er here, I want Italy to look to­ward us now with hope! I can­not bear to hear the cry of shame that will come over the At­lantic from the vine­yards of France, from the glaciers of Switzer­land, and from the steppes of Rus­sia, if we per­mit the walls of our blood-​bought in­her­itance to be bro­ken down. For the sake of God, lib­er­ty, re­li­gion, all over the earth, I want our flag to be hon­ored abroad.

In the French rev­olu­tion of '48, a dep­uta­tion came to me to de­mand the Amer­ican church at Havre, for the pur­pose of hold­ing a po­lit­ical meet­ing, I re­fused. They in­ti­mat­ed that it would be torn down. I had on­ly to as­sure them that I would plant our flag on it, and if they touched it with rude hands, they would have to an­swer to our gov­ern­ment. That was the last of the mat­ter. This pow­er we must have still; and to se­cure this the whole North and West must awake, and act--for the mul­ti­tudes who in the Bor­der States de­mand our aid; for the thou­sands of la­bor­ing, suf­fer­ing poor who trem­ble be­neath the glance of the proud cheva­lier; for the sake of our ed­uca­tion, our lands, our homes, our Chris­tian­ity. We are sure that suc­cess on our part now will demon­strate to the world the in­her­ent pow­er of our na­tion. They can­not be­hold the unit­ed ac­tion and of­fer­ing of _nine­teen mil­lions_ in the free States--all an­imat­ed with the spir­it of lib­er­ty, re­li­gion and law, and re­solved to crush trea­son and re­bel­lion at any cost--with­out a deep­er con­vic­tion of our re­al might, with­out a new im­pres­sion of the majesty that re­pos­es in a peo­ple's will! All Eu­rope ap­proves of this war; and strug­gling na­tion­al­ities look with anx­ious ex­pectan­cy for the is­sue.

It is a war for gov­ern­ment, for or­der. It is against the pow­er and rage of the mob, led on by am­bi­tious men who are mad at the loss of pow­er. There is noth­ing more sub­lime than law; hold­ing un­seen the hearts and in­ter­ests of mil­lions, pro­tect­ing their rights, and giv­ing them full, hap­py de­vel­op­ment. Our flag rep­re­sents law, lib­er­ty, sub­lime sac­ri­fice, na­tion­al life. It is there­fore right even for the Chris­tian to fight for its per­pe­tu­ity. If I may de­fend my­self and fam­ily, the na­tion is greater than my fam­ily and my­self; and calls more pow­er­ful­ly for my ser­vice. And this war, en­tered on by ne­ces­si­ty, and with the grand pur­pose of pro­tect­ing or­der and law, and res­cu­ing a whole pop­ula­tion from ru­in, is in­spir­ing in its mo­tive, and there­fore el­evat­ing in its in­flu­ence. We are con­scious­ly bet­ter, no­bler, in pro­por­tion as we for­get our­selves in the sub­lime idea of our na­tion­al­ity, and all that this na­tion­al­ity can do. When men fight for plun­der, or vic­to­ry alone, they la­bor down­ward, they be­come brutish; but a war for true lib­er­ty, for na­tion­al life, for our homes and our in­her­itance, and for the op­pressed, is el­evat­ing, pu­ri­fy­ing. War is ter­ri­ble in it­self, and in some of its con­se­quences, but there is a bow on the cloud. When the bolt has spent it­self in the pes­tif­er­ous air, all na­ture is bright and glo­ri­ous. With true dis­ci­pline, sol­diers are made vig­or­ous in body; they are al­so quick­ened in mind by the tac­tics and in­cite­ments of war­fare, they are en­no­bled by high mo­tives, and may leave the cam­paign bet­ter than when they en­tered it. Courage is awak­ened; love of lib­er­ty and or­der in­spired; benev­olence in­creased; and loy­al­ty ex­alt­ed by this war. What men bleed for they val­ue. I have been de­light­ed with the ea­ger­ness with which many sol­diers whom I have vis­it­ed, lis­tened to Chris­tian ad­dress, and re­ceived the word of God. It is a mat­ter of grat­ula­tion that but few ar­rests are made in our city in these days, not be­cause the po­lice are less watch­ful, but be­cause the de­based por­tion of the pop­ula­tion are in­spired with a bet­ter thought. It is al­so hope­ful to find, that many who en­tered our city as vol­un­teers, or as draft­ed sol­diers, are ac­tu­al­ly be­ing re­formed from their evil habits, un­der the greater strict­ness of camp dis­ci­pline.

We are cheered al­so by the fact that the peo­ple gen­er­al­ly are more earnest than for­mer­ly in their at­ten­dance on di­vine wor­ship; more solemn, and full of feel­ing, and dis­posed to study the Bible, They need God. They look to God. We all feel the Bible to be more than ev­er pre­cious. Its solemn prophe­cies are swelling in­to ful­fill­ment. The day of God is ap­proach­ing, and the king­doms of the earth are giv­ing way for the com­ing of the Great King!

The feel­ing is, and ought to be, in­tense for the con­flict. Let the ques­tion be de­cid­ed. Let half a mil­lion of freemen be called, when the time shall in­di­cate, to form a line of fire along the bound­ary that sep­arates Se­ces­sion from loy­al­ty. Let them take up their mighty march through the re­volt­ed ter­ri­to­ry, if it will not oth­er­wise sub­mit, and pro­claim as they go, “Lib­er­ty through­out the land!” Let the flag that waved over the suf­fer­ing heroes of Val­ley Forge, and the con­querors of York­town, wave for­ev­er on the Capi­tol, and over ev­ery vil­lage and sub­ject in the land! Nay, it must be so. We must bow, if we do not con­quer. They have pro­claimed it. Come down, then, from the North­ern moun­tains, and out from the forests and the fields, ye sons of the Pil­grims, with your firm force of will, and your achiev­ing arms! Come up from the marts of com­merce, ye dar­ing chil­dren of the Em­pire State, and ye firm hearts of New Jer­sey and of Delaware! Come forth from the echoes of Erie, and the shores of Michi­gan and Su­pe­ri­or! Come from the free air of West­ern Vir­ginia and Ohio, from the loy­al dis­tricts of Mary­land, Ken­tucky, and Ten­nessee! Come forth from the great West! and with them, go, ye strong and true of my adopt­ed State and City, who lis­tened even in your cra­dles, to the bell which gives out its tones over the birth-​place of our lib­er­ties! Go forth, and live the epic that fu­ture ages shall sing: be yours the glo­ry of _root­ing this trea­son out_! And as they go, bless them, aged fa­thers with tremu­lous voice! and moth­ers, bid them God speed! wives and sis­ters and Chris­tian hearts, load them with your gifts and your prayers! And when they are gone, re­mem­ber them at the home al­tar, and bless God that your coun­try does not want de­fend­ers; and when your tears are dried up, and your cause is pro­claimed tri­umphant, weep again tears of joy as you clasp the re­turn­ing heroes to your arms! Or, if they shall be borne home to you wound­ed and worn in their coun­try's ser­vice, be grate­ful that your eye can watch over them, and your hand min­is­ter to their ne­ces­si­ties and griefs. Or fi­nal­ly, should they fall in bat­tle, you will have the con­so­la­tion of know­ing that they saved your coun­try; that they did some­thing to con­sol­idate its strength, and il­lus­trate its glo­ry be­fore the world. For we are des­tined to con­quer,--and af­ter this tri­al the na­tion will come forth as gold. We need to suf­fer that we may val­ue our lib­er­ties. From the val­ley of tears arise notes of vic­to­ry and hal­lelu­jahs. Na­tions as well as saints, come up out of great tribu­la­tion.

“None die in vain Up­on their coun­try's war-​fields! Ev­ery drop Of blood, thus poured for faith and free­dom, hath A tone, which from the night of ages, from the gulf Of death, shall burst, and make its high ap­peal Sound un­to earth and heav­en.”

The mot­to now is--“No com­pro­mise! _Sub­mis­sion_! Give up the lead­ers of re­bel­lion! Bow to law! Nay, more--no longer _ask_ us to pro­tect your dark sys­tem!”

But it is pos­si­ble that, while we stir our­selves up to a fierce bel­ligeren­cy against re­bel­lion, and rush in­to hot con­dem­na­tion of those whom we once called “_brethren,” we_ are rebels against God! Some of you who are equip­ping for the war, and ready to take the field in de­fence of your coun­try and her laws, are in heart at war with ho­li­ness and God! You may see in the fever of our whole pop­ula­tion what men think of trea­son against a good earth­ly gov­ern­ment! See al­so in the com­mands of God, in the life and death of Je­sus, in the de­clared in­ter­est and anx­ious watch­ful­ness of an­gels, in the whole glo­ri­fied army that shall at­tend the Great King when he comes to set up his fi­nal as­size,--what the Prin­ci­pal­ities and Pow­ers in Heav­en think of your trea­son against the holy gov­ern­ment of Je­ho­vah! Be­hold in the up­lift­ed arm of Jus­tice--hear in the voice of the Judge, what shall be done to him who will not re­pent! Now the of­fers of par­don are made through the death and sac­ri­fice of Je­sus. Re­pent; for­sake your sin; lay down your arms; re­tire from your re­bel­lious at­ti­tude; and from the throne of Mer­cy shall the fact be pro­claimed, that _you_ are par­doned and re­stored!

End of the Project Guten­berg EBook of Gov­ern­ment and Re­bel­lion, by E. E. Adams

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTEN­BERG EBOOK GOV­ERN­MENT AND RE­BEL­LION ***

***** This file should be named 10517.txt or 10517.zip ***** This and all as­so­ci­at­ed files of var­ious for­mats will be found in: http://www.guten­berg.net/1/0/5/1/10517/

Pro­duced by Dis­tribut­ed Proof­read­ers

Up­dat­ed edi­tions will re­place the pre­vi­ous one--the old edi­tions will be re­named.

Cre­at­ing the works from pub­lic do­main print edi­tions means that no one owns a Unit­ed States copy­right in these works, so the Foun­da­tion (and you!) can copy and dis­tribute it in the Unit­ed States with­out per­mis­sion and with­out pay­ing copy­right roy­al­ties. Spe­cial rules, set forth in the Gen­er­al Terms of Use part of this li­cense, ap­ply to copy­ing and dis­tribut­ing Project Guten­berg-​tm elec­tron­ic works to pro­tect the PROJECT GUTEN­BERG-​tm con­cept and trade­mark. Project Guten­berg is a reg­is­tered trade­mark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, un­less you re­ceive spe­cif­ic per­mis­sion. If you do not charge any­thing for copies of this eBook, com­ply­ing with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for near­ly any pur­pose such as cre­ation of deriva­tive works, re­ports, per­for­mances and re­search. They may be mod­ified and print­ed and giv­en away--you may do prac­ti­cal­ly ANY­THING with pub­lic do­main eBooks. Re­dis­tri­bu­tion is sub­ject to the trade­mark li­cense, es­pe­cial­ly com­mer­cial re­dis­tri­bu­tion.

*** START: FULL LI­CENSE ***

THE FULL PROJECT GUTEN­BERG LI­CENSE PLEASE READ THIS BE­FORE YOU DIS­TRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK

To pro­tect the Project Guten­berg-​tm mis­sion of pro­mot­ing the free dis­tri­bu­tion of elec­tron­ic works, by us­ing or dis­tribut­ing this work (or any oth­er work as­so­ci­at­ed in any way with the phrase “Project Guten­berg”), you agree to com­ply with all the terms of the Full Project Guten­berg-​tm Li­cense (avail­able with this file or on­line at http://guten­berg.net/li­cense).