REMARKS.

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This discourse is published at the instance and upon the patriotic liberality of those who heard it.  The author has prepared it for the press in Camps, as he could snatch fragments of time from the pressing duties of an extensive and glorious revival of religion.  It is, therefore, not written for the eye of the critic, but “for the common people,” to whom he hopes it will be entertaining.  It is dedicated to them, with the devout prayer that God will “teach their fingers to fight” the battles of liberty, their tongues to speak for the defence of their country, and their souls to supplicate the throne of all grace for the speedy return of an honorable peace and the establishment of our national independence.

THE AUTHOR

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FAST-DAY SERMON.

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“And Jehoshaphat feared, and set himself to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a Fast throughout all Judah.  *   *   *  Then upon Jahaziel  *  *   *  came the Spirit of the Lord in the midst of the congregation; and he said:  *   *   *  Thus saith the Lord unto you, Be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great multitude; for the battle is not yours, but Gcd’s.”—2 Chro.  xx; 3, 14, 15.

My Countrymen and Brethren:—In concert with the patriotic and Christian people of our afflicted land, we are assembled to-day, with fasting, humiliation and prayer, for the purpose of publicly and devoutly acknowledging our dependence upon the Arm of the Lord God for the success of our country’s cause, and to implore ardently his blessings upon us in this the darkest hour of our national woe.  We are yet in the midst of horrid war; and war in any form is a calamity to any people,—a sad calamity!  It universally originates, so far as concerns human agency, in the unholy passions of men.  The Apostle James propounds a question on this subject, that demands the consideration of all the mighty peoples of this globe:—“From whence came wars and fightings among you?  Come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?”  It is a wonderful commentary upon the depravity of our race, to see with what seeming admiration the whole world gazes upon

“Battle’s magnificently stern array,”

 as if

“The number slain made slaughter glorious,”

 forgetting that

“Rash, fruitless war, from wanton glory wag'd, Is only splendid murder."

It is a satire upon civilization, a legalized and scientific artifice for the destruction of human life on a mammoth scale.  The wicked originators of war set themselves directly in defiance of every principle of Christianity, the quintessence of which is, Peace and good will to men.

And especially is war a calamity to an invaded people.  It is difficult to imagine in what form national affliction could be more terrible.  Of course, I speak of its calamities to the generation who exist cotemporaneously with a war of invasion; for, with all its horrid catalogue of crimes and afflictions, it is generally fruitful for good to succeeding generations.  M.  Victor Cousin, says, that history proves, even when viewed from a human stand point, that wars always terminate just as they should, and that their results are always full of blessings for coming generations.  This of itself, shows that the Great God pits at the helm of the ship of war, to vindicate the doctrine that the battle is His.

And, notwithstanding the wickedness of the originators of war, and the desolation that follows in the wake of large invading armies, and the bitter cups of tribulation consequent upon the varied casualties common to such a war, yet, a just and unoffending people may be—indeed they often are—called upon by every holy principle, to fly to arms for the maintenance of every right—every blessing—and every thing that they hold sacred and dear.

Such was the war of whose history the text is a part.  The fair land of Judah, so often ravaged by the desolating hand of war, was now threatened to be overwhelmed by the invading armies of three allied powers.  The Moabites, the Ammonites, and the inhabitants of Mount Seir, conspired for the overthrow of King Jehoshaphat and the subjugation of his kingdom, and marched their “great multitudes” against the devoted land of Judah.  It is remarkable that King Jehoshaphat seems to have known nothing of their malicious designs until their conspiracy was formed, their armies united, and they had already entered his borders.  This want of information, which would be unpardonable in a national ruler in these times, was altogether excusable in his case.  The representation of one nation, by embassy, at the court of another, did not exist in those remote ages as it does now.  Besides, such had been the forbearing magnanimity exercised towards these nations in other days, by the fathers of Israel, and Israel’s God, that Jehoshaphat, in the goodness of his heart, could not but expect that these kindly feelings would be reciprocated.

The proper intelligence, however, did not come too late.  It was in season.  “There came some that told him, There cometh a great multitude against thee from beyond the Sea, on this side Syria.—And Jehoshaphat feared!”  We, also, are engaged against the invading forces of a mighty power, under circumstances that religiously call upon every man every where in our country, to rise up and strike for the defence of his beleaguered land.  And now, without stopping to inquire for the special causes and nature of the fear of the King of Judah, let us take a dispassionate view of our own distracted country, and see if there are any that fear, and what are the nature and causes of their fears, and whether these fears may not be removed?

It is well enough to admit what is true, and, looking the naked facts in the face, meet them like true men.  For it is a fact not to be denied, that a spirit of fear has gained an influence over the hearts of many of our fellow citizens at home, and is creeping like a night mare upon some of the soldiers in some of our armies.  The evidence of existing fear comes to us in forms not to be mistaken.  Then, my countrymen, let us approach with reverence and deep humility, and yet with brave confidence, the precincts of the “faint hearted,” and take a view of the overhanging cloud, and see if there be danger.

 I.  “And Jehoshaphat feared.”  What are the causes for fear—why these apprehensions?  “Watchman, what of the night?”

Our national horizon, when viewed from a human stand-point, and in the light of human wisdom, is unpromising and full of threats.  It is not surprising that some are timid and fearful.  Indeed, it would be wonderful if there were no apprehensions among us, for this is an hour of tribulation and we are but men.  But why these troubles and fears?

1.  The complainer answers, We are in the midst of horrid war, a war of vast proportions, and a war that threatens to overwhelm our whole land with its sad calamities.  When we entered upon this revolution, we had not a thought of its continuing so long; and when we have so often looked to certain anticipated developments with hope that they would terminate the sanguinary struggle, our hopes have been as illusive as the spider’s web or the floating vapor, and, alas, we discover fewer signs of peace now than at the beginning.

This is the complaint of one class of the dissatisfied.  The very idea of bearing arms under any circumstances fills some with terror, and such persons have been whining and prophesying evil from the commencement of this struggle.  They do not know what patriotism means, or knowing, they do not care.

Yes, we are in the midst of war, not of choice but necessity.  No other alternative was left us at the beginning, and we have no choice now, but to realize, the fact that a great war is upon us, and confront it like freemen, unless we can tamely submit to the yoke of slavery, and surrender every indefeasible right guaranteed to us by the God of our being, and sell our posterity into a state of vassalage more cruel and merciless than that suffered by the Hebrews in the land of Egypt, or the subjugated parties under the reign of terror.  Surely there is no man—I know there is no patriot in all our land, who has watched the developments of Yankee character for the past two years, but will rejoice in the idea of national and social separation from that people.  Certainly, all men have seen that separation from them was necessary and inevitable.  It was necessary for the preservation of our institutions and social systems; it was necessary for the maintenance of that form of government transmitted to us by the patriots of the first American revolution; it was necessary for the defence of our own Constitutional liberty, and the liberty and happiness of our posterity for generations to come.  Our enemies were fast fixing the manacles of despotism upon us, and some of us knew it not.  We were astonished when aroused to a sense of our danger.  And when we attempted to leave them, we asked to be allowed to go in peace.  As Abraham said to Lot when they separated, so said we to them;— “Let there be no strife between us.”  But they replied, you shall not go in peace, you shall not go at all.  We will enforce our laws; we intend that your States shall remain obedient and true to our government.  The very act of refusing us peaceable separation shows that they had already learned to regard us as subject to them, and bound to obey their laws and submit to their rule, however prejudicial to our rights and liberties those laws and that rule might be.  And when they denied us peaceable separation, Liberty called for her Sons in the South to come to her rescue and defence; and those sons rose up in every town and city, in every hill and valley, and came forth from almost every hearthstone and sacred altar throughout the land;—leaving their peaceable avocations, forsaking for the time—and many of them forever—the unspeakable joys of domestic life, they rushed with heroic enthusiasm to their country’s standard, and there they pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor, to the defence of the heritage handed down to them by the fathers of American independence!  Nobly have they kept that pledge! With almost superhuman energy, endurance and courage, have they toiled and suffered and battled, at the altar of liberty.  And prominent among this mighty host of gallant men, stands Wilcox’s Brigade.  Sirs, do you regret that you obeyed your country’s call?  Are you ashamed of what you have done?   Is there a single man here who would retrace the honored steps he has taken for the defence of his native land?  No, there are none of that class here.  Your proud record vindicates your unrelenting courage.  I feel that I am not talking to one of those faint-hearted whiners, who cry peace, peace, when there is no peace, and who would sell his country or desert his country’s flag.  We have to fight on!  We cannot make peace.  We cannot even propose peace.  Our government has done all that could be done in that line.  A proposition for peace going from us now would be the essence of cowardice, and could but have the effect of causing our enemies to believe that we were about ready to yield everything.  Propositions for peace must emanate from them; and until then, we must stand by our arms, and be ready to strike at all times for our country and our country’s honor.

2.  But, says the objector, Our enemies are so much stronger than we.  They bring “great multitudes” against us.  They can raise, equip and supply armies so much larger than ours, that we cannot hold out much longer against the vast hosts with which they are invading our country.  Soldiers, let us not quail before the might of man.  Remember the encouraging words of the text, “Be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great multitude; for the battle is not yours, but God's.”  God teaches us that “The battle is not to the strong.”  Large armies and great powers do not always conquer the smaller and weaker.  The Bible and history show that the reverse comes nearer being true.  Let us, first, briefly consult the pages of history on this subject.

Sir William Temple, in his Essay on Heroic Virtue, says, “The second observation I shall make on the subject of victory and conquest is, that they have in general been made by the smaller numbers over the greater; against which I do not remember any exception in all the famous battles registered in story, excepting that of Tamerlane and Bajazet.”  History will sustain this observation.  Let us appeal to its record and see.

And to begin far back in historic battles, we will learn that the Persian army under Cyrus was but a handful when compared with the vast multitude of Assyrians over which they were completely victorious.  And afterwards these victorious Persians, with an army of six hundred thousand, were beaten by the Macedonians who were never more than forty thousand strong.  The little Athenian army of ten thousand, fighting for their liberty and independence, as we are, drove back and overcame one hundred and twenty thousand Persians at Marathon.  In all the famous victories of the Lacedemonians, they had never over twelve thousand soldiers at any time, though their enemies had often twenty times that number.  Almost every one of the celebrated victories of the Romans was achieved over far greater numbers than themselves.  The great Caesar’s armies, whether in Pharsalia, Gaul or Germany, were in no proportion to those conquered by him.  The army of Marius was never over forty thousand, while that of the Cimbres, which he conquered, was three hundred thousand.  The famous victories of Etius and Belisarius, over the barbarous Northern nations, were won with numbers astonishingly small.  The same is true of the first great victories of the Turks over the Persian Kingdom, and of the Tartars over the Chinese.  In all the immortal victories of the renowned Scanderbeg over the Turks, he never brought together more than sixteen thousand men, though his enemies often numbered over a hundred thousand.

To come down to later times, the English victories at Cressy and Agincourt, so famous in history, were gained with incredible disadvantages of numbers.  The same is true of the great victories of Charles the VIII, in Italy; of Henry the IV, in France; of Gustavus Adolphus, in Germany; and of Charles the XII, of Sweden, in Denmark, Poland and Muscovy.  The King of Poland, who had an army of twenty-four thousand, was defeated and driven from his throne by a force of less than twelve thousand; and the Prussian army of eighty thousand was beaten by him with a little army of only eight thousand.  Nor must we forget the fate of the great Napoleon in Russia.  He invaded that country with an army of six hundred and thirty thousand soldiers, and was finally completely vanquished, and driven out of the country, although the Russians had never over two hundred and fifty thousand men in the field at any one time.

These are the facts of history.  What do they prove?  Does not all history show that, “No king is saved by the multitude of an host?”  The battle is the Lord’s everywhere, and by whomsoever fought.  The same God who reigned over the battles now committed to classic story, reigns over the struggles of these Confederate States.  “The Lord God Omnipotent reigncth.”  He will defend the right!

But, I ask, does not your own history demonstrate the same great truth?  Follow the history of the Army of Northern Virginia, from the first battle of Manassas Plains to Gettysburg, and what is it but a living testimony that the battle is not yours, but God’s?  If their own showing be correct, our enemies have had in the field a million of men, more than half of whom have belonged to the “Grand Army of the Potomac?”  And this army you have met and vanquished on a score of bloody fields.  They have always vastly outnumbered you; often they have more than doubled you, and yet they have never beaten you.  Under God you have always mastered the field.

Why, in both battles of Manassas, were the enemy routed in disorder?  Because there was not a mountain, or a river, or a gunboat to save them from rout!  Go to Seven Pines, and you find them saving themselves in the swamps of the Chickahominy.  Go to the seven days’ battles in front of Richmond, and you see them first seeking safety in the swamps and then under cover of their gunboats in James river.  Go to Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, and you see them twice hurled back across the Rappahannock.  Go to Sharpsburg and Gettysburg, and you find them seeking refuge in the mountain’s heights, while you fight in the open valleys.  Are you afraid of this “grand army?”  No, I know you are not.  You have never had to fly to a gunboat, or seek refuge in a mountain, or hide in a swamp, or run across a river.  And yet, to adopt the words of one of their own writers, “It cannot be denied that these ‘natural defences’ have saved our (their) army from annihilation on almost every field.”  And, according to their own admissions, of the million of men called to arms by them, they have lost more than five hundred thousand.  And to day they are of necessity recruiting by a forced conscription, while our own army is, perhaps, as strong as it ever was on any field.

I contend that the comparative difference in the size of the two armies is not greater now, and cannot be in the future, than it has been on every immortal field where you have measured strength with them.  I repeat, it is an incontestable fact, that their armies have generally been vastly larger than our own.  Soldiers, you do not need information on this subject.  You have too often borne your brave hearts against the immense multitudes of the foe—you have too often marched your single unsupported line of battle against their two, three and four well-ordered lines, to need to be informed about numbers now.  It matters not what newspaper correspondents may say, you who have breasted the storm of battle know that in human strength they have been superior to you.  While you have stood through the long bloody day without support or reinforcements, you have seen these brigades crumble away, or run away, before your onward march, and you were left victors of the field.  Several times over have they had to recruit their army that has been confronting you, by the addition of scores of thousands; and yet, without recruits, without reinforcements from any quarter, you have always been more than a match for them, and here you are to-day, armed and equipped, ready to strike at any time, and sufficient—the Lord helping—for any number that they can bring against you!

But is it true that they cannot have strength of numbers over us in the future, superior to the advantages they have had in the past?  I contend that it is true.  They are compelled to have a producing class of laborers at home, as well as ourselves.  The slaves of the South have done, and can still do, the principal part of the producing labor necessary for the support of our armies and our country.  Having no such class among them, they will be compelled to leave white men at home, to produce the provisions and other supplies necessary for the support of their country and their armies.  And it will require the labor of hundreds of thousands of them to meet this unavoidable demand.  And then there is a large amount of discontent among them, a large amount of disposition to resort to every subterfuge to keep out of the war.  So that upon the whole, their armies cannot be increased to proportions superior to what they have been in the past.

But suppose the size of their armies shall become everything that they ask.  Suppose that in numbers they shall be all that the timid affirm of them.  Are we to yield our freedom to the might of man?  Is it not the essence of cowardice to think of succumbing to great numbers?  Would we not prove ourselves infinitely unworthy of the heritage of liberty, if we should bow our necks to man because he comes in the form of great multitudes?  Is there not a God in these Confederate States?  “The battle is not to the strong.”   “The battle is not yours, but God’s.”  Then “be not afraid or dismayed by reason of this great multitude.”  Let us put our confidence in Him who hath blessed us hitherto.  He can give us victory against any sort of odds.  He can make “ten chase a thousand!”

3.  But then our enemies are as cruel as the spirits of the infernal region.  They come against us to desolate our country, to destroy our property, to ruin our all.  Rapine and murder, tears and woe, accompany their march wherever they advance upon our soil.  So horrid are the crimes that follow in their wake, that we ought, says the complainer, to strike for peace.  Strike for peace!  Every blow we have struck has been a blow for peace.  We have asked for nothing but peace.  We have fought for nothing but peace.  We have begged and battled to be let alone, to the peaceful enjoyment of our own holy birthrights.

The very fact that our enemies visit ruin and devastation upon our country, should add infinite strength to our determination to be free.  Have our homes been desolated, or are they threatened with desolation?  Has our fair land been wasted?  Are our sacred edifices and holy altars desecrated?  Does a merciless foe come with fire and sword to overwhelm our country in ruin?  Then, sir, never were the words more appropriate, nor the action more demanded than now:

“Strike, till the last armed foe expires!
Strike, for your altars and your fires!
Strike, for the green graves of your sires!
God, and your native land!”

Do I hear you say that your mothers and sisters, wives and children, have been insulted and imprisoned, wronged and oppressed, or threatened with these evils?  Then hear the stirring words of God’s holy prophet: “Be not ye afraid of them; remember the Lord, which is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses.”  Here is patriotism, and here is religion!  And he, in the South, who does not sympathize with the spirit of this passage, is the enemy of God and his own posterity!

Do you say that millions of property in the South have been destroyed, and that if the war continues it may result in the destruction of yours?  I ask what could we expect other than the loss of all things, if we should submit to the merciless despotism attempted to be thrust upon us by our enemies?  In view of their purposes, how can we obtain peace and save our property, otherwise than by conquering a peace?  I appeal to your manhood, to your patriotism, and to your religion, if your property is necessarily lost in the struggle for the independence of your country, arc you not prepared to make the sacrifice?  Yes, my countrymen, I know you are prepared.  You who have offered your lives upon your country’s altar, cannot fail to sacrifice your property rather than entail a cruel state of bondage upon your offspring.  Then, brave soldiers, when the enemy comes in like a flood, to overwhelm your land in desolation and woe, let us put our trust in the God of battles and strike like men determined to be free!

4.  But again, says the objector, Our arms have been unsuccessful of late on some of the most important fields of battle.  The strongholds of Vicksburg and Port Hudson, after all their noble daring and gallant fighting, have fallen into the hands of the enemy.  The Mississippi river is open to his transports.  Gen.  Johnston has given up Jackson, Mississippi.  Gen.  Bragg has fallen back.  Charleston is besieged, Mobile is threatened, and several of the States are measurably and some of them entirely overrun.  And round our entire borders and coasts, we are skirted by the anaconda that threatens to close in and crush the life of our country; and amid this dark hour, and increasing its darkness, Gen.  Lee has had to quit the enemy’s land, and seek a resting-place again in the bosom of the “Old Dominion.”   I answer, would it not be wonderful if it were otherwise?  Our cause is just, and God hath greatly blessed us; still we are but men.  We have failed to confide in the God of our mercies, we have trusted in our own strength, and he is subjecting us to severe vicissitudes.  It is as necessary to test a people’s patriotism as it is to try their religion.  The Lord is proving our confidence in him and our country’s cause.  He is leading us to see ourselves, that we may know whether we be in earnest in our struggle for liberty, and at the same time he will teach us that we are but men, and that he alone can fight our battles.

But what do our reverses amount to?  The fall of Vicksburg and Port Hudson does not constitute a disaster of much magnitude.  The moral effect of the fall of these two strongholds is against us, because their intrepid resistance had gained them a fame world-wide, and we had gotten to consider them important, because every attempt to capture them failed until they were literally starved into capitulation.  But they were of no real importance to us, except as they were sources of annoyance to the enemy; and there is good reason to believe that he will be as much annoyed with these places in his possession, as he was when they resisted his use of the “Father of Waters.”   When New Orleans fell, every one of us considered the Mississippi river gone into the enemy’s possession for the rest of the war.  We then never thought of Vicksburg.  Why should we be in agony now, at misfortunes which we were then so ready and able to bear!  Wherein is the enemy strengthened, and wherein are we weakened by the fall of these places?  Oh, the Confederacy is cut in two!  Suppose it is, is it more so than it was before?  What intercourse have we been able to hold with the trans-Mississippi part of our country since the fall of New Orleans except by occasional mails?  This has been almost all, and this can be continued in spite of the enemy.

And you know right well, that you had no disaster at Gettysburg.  You failed to carry the mountain heights in which the enemy was lodged, and lost many brave and good men, but in everything else you gained a great victory.  Nothing on this earth but that mountain saved him from complete rout.  Facts show that you injured him much worse than he did you.  Let any one who thinks this army was beaten at Gettysburg, remember the length of time you lay in line of battle around Hagerstown and Williamsport, anxiously awaiting the attack of the enemy.  There he was, with his whole army at hand, an4 for three days you offered him battle and he refused to accept it.  Never have 1 seen this army so anxious to engage in battle.  The feeling was universal.  And why this spell of inactivity on the part of the foe?  Does it not make a significant revelation of the stunning blows he received at Gettysburg?

But suppose we have defeats, and disasters even, shall we, therefore, give up our country and surrender everything sacred and dear?  Have not our past blessings and successes been sufficient to afford us undying confidence in our cause and the Author of all successes?  Shall we, in the hour of trial, distrust Him who hath brought us through so many difficulties—difficulties which human wisdom and human strength never could have surmounted?  It is in the hour of severest trial that a noble people show their greatness.  Anybody can do well in times of prosperity, but in the days of adversity true courage manifests itself most gloriously.  Our fathers saw darker days than these.  Our own great Washington found himself environed by calamities far greater than have yet befallen us.  I do not mean that his was a war of such magnitude as this—of course I know it was not.  I mean that he met defeat after defeat, and often found it necessary to retreat rapidly from one State to another.  He was traduced with the greatest severities, by strong men both in and out of the army.  All the seacoast cities were captured by the enemies of his country.  Several of the States laid down their arms, and were ready to bow their necks to the British yoke.  Tory organizations—cruel and strong—existed almost in all parts of the land.  These bands of internal enemies visited heart-rending calamities upon the families of the patriotic soldiers.  The whole country was in such turmoil that it did not produce provisions half enough to supply the wants of the army and people, and large quantities of this incompetent supply were destroyed by the tory and British marauders.  And worse than all, Washington’s army deserted him in parties until only a handful of brave, determined men stood by him in the hour of tribulation.

Yet, amid all these trials, he, with his little army of noble patriots, was firm, resolved to be free, and resolved to free their country.  Did they succeed?  The blessings enjoyed by every American citizen for the past three generations, all conspire to resound the answer, They did succeed!  How did they succeed?  Surely not by gaining all the victories.  Every one who has attentively read the history of the revolution, must know that the British gained more than half the victories—and especially the great victories, while the Americans did all the retreating.  Nay, they had a will to be free!  They had confidence in the goodness of their cause, and the God of their being.  They had no measure by which to count the sufferings, which they would endure rather than submit to the tyrannies of the British crown.  They did not whip the British! They did not conquer their independence by gaining great victories.  They did it by holding on!  They did it with a determined, unwavering purpose to submit cheerfully to any form of sufferings, and finally to die, rather than surrender the cause to whose defence they had pledged their all! Shall we, their sons, prove unworthy of our noble sires?  Will we supinely yield to our enemies the inestimable heritage for which Washington fought and freemen died?

God has given us many great victories—a list of victories unparalleled in the annals of modern warfare; and especially is this true, when these victories are viewed in the light of all the circumstances.  Let us, then, in the hour of our country’s crisis, show a manliness worthy of those who are battling for liberty against the chains of the despot; and when we have reverses, let us not despair; but fight on, and remember that,

“In struggling with misfortune lies the proof of virtue;”

 and—

“What though the field be lost?
All is not lost; the unconquerable will,  *  *  *  *
And courage never to submit or yield,
And what is else not to be overcome.”

5.  But the objection is urged, that the nations of the earth refuse us recognition—they refuse to receive us into the great family of nations, thereby manifesting a want of confidence in the final success of our cause.  I admit, that foreign powers have done many things, the results of which were deleterious to the interests of the Confederacy; and for reasons of interest to themselves—for reasons of national policy important to them, they have not extended to us the courtesy of a formal recognition; but in a variety of ways they have shown that they desire and expect us to sustain our nationality.  Their leading periodicals, their greatest statesmen, and their popular assemblies, have iterated and reiterated the doctrine that we cannot be conquered.  The voice of the great people in foreign nations has loudly called for our recognition.  These governments themselves have urged our enemies to settle the difficulty upon the terms of Southern independence.  And more than this, they have virtually recognized us in three substantial ways.  1st.  Their ideas of neutrality cannot exist in reality, without a virtual recognition of the belligerents as equals.  2nd.  We have obtained among them, with little difficulty, the loan of an immense amount of money, while every attempt of our enemies to accomplish such an event has failed.  In view of this fact, can any one suppose for a moment that they doubt the stability of our government?  3d.  And then we have gained the privilege of building and fitting out vessels of war in foreign ports.  Do not these things constitute a virtual and a substantial recognition?

But what would formal recognition be worth? There is a very great mistake abroad in the land on this subject.  It seems to be the opinion of many, that recognition and intervention are synonymous, or that intervention must rapidly follow recognition.  This is not necessarily true—not at all.  Foreign powers might lawfully recognize our national independence, and continue to maintain their “strict neutrality.”  The only real advantages that I can see that would accrue to us from recognition without intervention, are, first, the moral effect upon the minds of our people, and our enemies, and the world at large, would be beneficial to our cause; and, next, the recognition would afford to our privateers the privilege of carrying captured vessels into foreign ports, and hence privateering would become an arm of mighty power in our management of the war.

And suppose the nations do continue to refuse us recognition, we can do about as well without them as they can without us.  We are about as independent as they are.  All nations are dependent upon the God of the whole earth.  He casts down one and raises up another.  It is infinitely better that we should forget the crowned heads of the earth, and look for recognition to that Power enthroned over universal empire, who has so often and so materially intervened in our behalf.  “It is better to trust in the Lord, than to put confidence in princes.”

6.  And withal, it is urged that there is an immense deal of suffering, want and bereavement in our land, consequent upon the war.  It is filling the country with helpless widows and orphans.  Many who were in affluent circumstances are reduced to poverty, and the poor of the land are pressed with want as they never felt it before.  Thousands of our noble youth and men of greatest worth, are being hurried into eternity.  Mothers are called upon to sacrifice their sons, wives their husbands, children their fathers, sisters their brothers, and all have to give up some of their best and dearest friends.  0 sirs, we must not deny that these are times of tribulation!

But then, this is the price of liberty!  It is purchased at terrible cost; still it is the price that has been paid by those determined to be free, in all ages of the world; and awful as it is, we cannot refuse to pay it.  We must submit to it with unflinching determination, “lest a worse thing come upon us”—the loss of all things.  The sufferings of our country are great, but they will be infinitely greater if we allow ourselves to be subjugated by the fiendish foe that now invades our once happy homes.  We have not realized a tithe of the woe in which we will be engulfed, when the despotic chains of New England fanaticism shall have been fastened upon our land.  It is awful to retrospect the loss of the pure and noble of our heroic compatriots who have fallen on the gory fields, where liberty struggled for her homes against the cruel might of her despoilers.  We have all seen and felt, after stern battles have passed away, that,

“It is humbling to tread
O'er the weltering field of the tombless dead,”

and there behold the strength and intellect of our land—the leaders and benefactors of dependent women and helpless children, scattered and laid low by the missiles of the enemy.  The blow often strikes us in the tenderest place—where sensation is keenest.  You have all felt it.  The most terrible blow I ever felt was one of the casualties of this war.  This world can never be to me, what it was prior to the 13th day of last December*.  But these noble heroes have not died in vain.  They are the martyrs of liberty.  They died noble deaths; they fill honored graves!  And their blood cries to their survivors from every battle-field; calling upon us to avenge their wrongs, and the wrongs of their bereft posterity.  Shall we call their blood an unholy thing?  Will we say that they have died in an unworthy cause?  Will we allow the murderers of the father to enslave the child?  Have the blood and tears of the past two years all been spilt at an unholy altar?  Will we turn our backs upon the graves of our honored dead, who fought among the bravest of the brave, and say they died the death of traitors, and bow our necks to the yoke of those who slew them?  No, let us shed the tear of fond recollection upon their graves, and there renew our first resolves to be free, strengthen our trust in the God of battles, and march forth again to do, and, if necessary, to die, for the cause of liberty!  It is awful to retrospect the past, but it is infinitely more so to contemplate the calamities of a state of subjugation.

We must defend the orphans and widows of our brave dead.  It is cheering to witness the patriotic and Christian devotion, with which the noble women of our land submit to the trials and bereavements of the war.  God bless them.  Their worth to our country in these times of national tribulation can never be properly estimated!  These women, these widows, these orphans, and the poor of the land, look to you for protection.  They call upon you, they trust in you, they believe you will protect them.  Will you betray their confidence?  The whole country turns its eyes of hopeful confidence to the Army of Northern Virginia, and exclaims, “Under God, here is the stay of our liberties.”  We will not prove unfaithful to the trust committed to us; no, no!  The patriotism of this army at this time, presents the sublimest spectacle known to the history of revolutions.  A dark cloud, full of threatening woe hangs over the country.  At home there are extortioners, speculators, blood-suckers, Shylocks, deserters and tories, oppressing the poor and needy, preying like vultures upon the vitals of the country, and conspiring in demon conclave against the liberties of our posterity.  But amid all these deplorable calamities this army is true, these soldiers are resolute.  In the history of wars, it has usually been necessary for a patriotic people at home to write words of encouragement to their [*An allusion to the fall of my last dear brother—the Rev.  N.  D.  Renfroe.] soldiers, to stir and stimulate them, but with us the reverse is true.  I find almost every officer and private in our camps writing earnest letters home, exhorting the patriotism of their constituency!  To me, it is sublime!  It will shine in glorious sublimity on the pages of our country’s history, when you, brave soldiers, are slumbering with the dead! Your children, and children yet unborn, will rise up and call you blessed! You are leaving footprints on the sands of time, which will cheer those who battle for liberty in coming ages.  No age will ever be ashamed of your history!  But then it is said that the poor are suffering—this war is so hard upon the poor.  Yes, the poor are suffering.  It is the lot of the poor to suffer.  They would suffer were there no war.  And yet it is questionable, whether they have more of real suffering than the rich.  I know that they do not have as much, if they can but trust in the God of the poor, who makes them “rich in faith.”  It is sometimes alleged that this is “the rich man’s war and the poor man’s fight.”  I ask, are not the rich and the poor both liberally represented here to-day?  0, but there are so many rich men at home!  Yes, and there are poor men at home.  The rich man shirked his country’s call by the power of his money, some of the poor have shirked the same call by skulking into the mountains.  They are alike dishonorable.  In the first American revolution, the richest and the poorest, comprised the whining, complaining, internal enemies of the country, while the medium classes fought the battles of liberty.  History has not failed to record this fact.  And there are significant signs of treason in similar circles in our day.

I contend, however, that the poor of our country have more reason to desire Southern independence than the rich.  I speak it, too, as the representative of the poor.  I am a poor man myself, and if I ever had a wealthy relative I never heard of him.  I stand up before you to represent my own offspring and many orphan relatives, and I urge, most earnestly, that I have more interest in the war—more at stake—than any rich man can have.  The rich man’s property is at stake, while the freedom of my children, and children’s children is involved in the issue.  I never owned a slave in my life, and yet I contend that I have more interest in the institution of slavery than the man who owns five hundred.  Abolish the institution of slavery, and your children and my children must take the place of that institution.  Abolish that institution—as is the design of our enemies—and in less than a half century, the poor of the land must become the carriage drivers, body servants, waiting maids and tenants of the rich.  You may say that the poor would not submit to this.  How would they avoid it?  The capital of the rich would be converted into land—they would own the land of the entire country.  The poor man has to live somewhere, and he must have something upon which to subsist—he cannot live on the air.  Sheer necessity would drive him to gladly accept the tenantcy and employment of the rich.  I ask you, soldiers, to contemplate first the subjugation of your country, and the abolition of slavery, and then look down through a few generations, and behold your worthy offspring grinding in a factory, scouring a tavern, tilling the soil of the wealthy, and blacking the boots of the dandy; and then tell me whether the poor have any thing to fight for?  See your posterity in cruel bondage—see them reduced to an equality with the negro man and woman, and then remember that those whom they serve are the proud descendants of the very people who subjugated your country, and overthrew your government; and then tell me if this is not pre-eminently the poor man’s war?

In our country, color is the distinction of classes—the only real distinction.  Here the rich man and the poor man and their families are equals in every important respect.  The poor, if they do their duty, are as free and independent as the rich.  The rich do sometimes try to establish distinctions in classes and grades in society, but they have hitherto failed of [in?] the establishment of anything like a controlling aristocracy; while our institutions remain as they are, they must forever fail.  The poor man is often more respected and influential than his wealthy neighbor.  The preponderance of intellect and moral power is with the poor, and society is compelled to recognize the fact.  The poor young man rises, in every noble virtue, head and shoulders above the son of his wealthy neighbor.  This is not true of any free State on the face of the earth—I mean any State where domestic slavery does not exist.  With them, the grades of society are controlled by the weight of the purse.  Examine any nation in any age of the world where the existence of this institution is not allowed, and the poor of the land are the slaves of the rich.  It is so in the North, it is so in Europe, and I had almost said, it is so of every people on this globe except our own sunny South.  And here it will be so, when the “free-labor” fanaticism shall have ruined our land.

Another thought: it is a matter of very great importance to the poor of any country, that the value of labor be kept at the highest price possible.  It is the constant interest of the laboring man to use every fair and honorable means to keep the price of labor up.  In the South, the poor have the cooperation of the rich in estimating the worth of labor, because it is also the interest of the rich that the price of a day, or a week, or a month’s work, stands at the highest possible figure.  The rich man wants a high estimate placed upon the labor of his servants, and the poor man desires a similar estimate to be fixed for his labor; thus they co-operate to keep up the price of labor, while there is no considerable part of our people who have any reason to wish its worth reduced.  With us, all classes conspire for the constant increase of the value of labor—because it is their interest to do so.  But remove the institution of African slavery, and will this be true any longer? No, verily; at once it becomes the interest of every rich man to put the price of labor down to the lowest figure.  He owns the land, he owns the factories, he holds the property and the money of the country, and he must have his tenants, his laborers and his hired servants.  Then the rich conspire to reduce the price of labor in all its departments, and the poor man must work at the prices established for him by the rich; I say must, because he must eat; and if he eat, he must work; and if he work, he must work at the rich man’s price, though it be but a penny a day.  And the only means of raising the worth of labor is an occasional bread riot—such as so often occurs in the so-called free countries.  The institution of slavery constitutes the reason why labor is worth so much more in the South than anywhere else on the globe.

7.  We have sinned!  Here is a cogent complaint.  Here is cause for fear!  We have sinned against Heaven and in the sight of God.  How have we sinned?  Let our great and good General Lee answer this question, in his recent matchless order calling your attention to the President’s proclamation, setting apart this day as a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer.  Hear him: “Soldiers!  We have sinned against Almighty God.  We have forgotten His signal mercies, and have cultivated a revengeful, haughty and boastful spirit.  We have not remembered that the defenders of a just cause should be pure in His eyes—that ‘our times are in His hand’—and we have relied too much on our own arms for the achievement of our independence.  God is our only refuge and our strength!”  How appropriately sublime these words are, descending to us, as they do, from the military chieftain, who, under God, has led us through so many terrific straits against such wonderful odds, and in whom we all have to-day almost boundless confidence.  Look at it again:

“We have sinned against Almighty God.”  How?  “We have forgotten His signal mercies.”  Is not this true?  God’s mercies to us have been wonderful, and our successes under His mercies have astounded the nations of the earth.  We began this struggle for liberty without an army, without a navy, without arms, without munitions of war, and without a government, against a nation of gigantic powers, possessed of every natural and artificial qualification necessary for the conduct of war on a mammoth and successful scale.  And yet the blessed Lord God watched over the infant nation struggling for liberty, and He gave us a government where wise counsels have prevailed; He brought us together, and formed mighty armies; He crowned your efforts with great victories; He enabled you to conquer from the enemy’s hands, and otherwise, arms for all our soldiery; He gave you great naval victories; He made the land yield its increase, so that we have had the necessaries of life, and this year He has poured out His mercies, and our country furnishes almost an unbroken harvest of bread to the sower and meat, to the cater.  And yet “we have forgotten His signal mercies.”  We have not devoutly recognized the interposition of His merciful hand.  We have not humbled ourselves before Him.  We have not given Him the glory.  Nay, we have sinned, in that “we have cultivated a revengeful, haughty and boastful spirit.”  We have boasted of our valor, and talked largely of Southern blood and great Generals, and forgotten that this is the blessed God’s battle.  “We have not remembered that the defenders of a just cause should be pure in His eyes—that ‘our times are in His hand.’” No, we have boasted of the justness of our cause, and while defending that cause, we have sinned against God in a thousand ways, forgetting that the Lord says, “I will be with you while ye be with me.”  We have profaned His name, we have violated His Sabbaths, we have neglected His worship, and distrusted His Almighty Arm.  “We have relied too much on our own arms for the achievement of our independence.”  We have too much acted as if we were resolved to have our national independence independently of the help of God; and when we have wanted assistance, we have looked to the “powers that be”—to the nations of the earth, instead of bowing our knees and lifting our supplications to the Sovereign of the universe.

Many of our fellow-citizens at home, have practiced every form of speculation and extortion upon articles of prime necessity.  They have preyed upon the vitals of the country, they have sucked the blood of the land, they have oppressed the poor by raising the price of the necessaries of life almost beyond their reach.  They have underrated our national currency, they have slandered our noble President, and they have tried, by unholy conspiracies at the ballot-box, to corrupt and overthrow the patriotism of our national Legislature.  Some have encouraged desertions from the army and tory organizations.  Many have violated every principle of Christianity, and trampled patriotism beneath their feet.  0! sirs, how shall our country’s cause tunnel its way through this huge mountain of iniquity?

This question finds an answer in the history of Jehoshaphat’s preparation to meet the allied powers that invaded his kingdom.  And this brings me to the consideration of another branch of this subject.

II.  “And Jehoshaphat feared, and set himself to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah.”

He saw the portentous cloud that was gathering over his country, he knew that unless it was successfully met and dispelled, it must overwhelm his land in woe, and he was afraid.  He did not begin his preparations to meet his enemy with haughty boastings, neither did he expect to surrender his kingdom to that enemy, nor yet did he think of depending upon the strength of his nation.  He was conscious of his dependence upon the arm of God, and was not ashamed to own it.  He felt his own weakness, and was ready to acknowledge it.  And if he or his people had sinned against God, he desired to confess it.  He saw his danger and his needs.  He saw that “vain is the help of man,” and “he set himself to seek the Lord.”  How did he seek the Lord?

1.  “He proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah.”  He assembled his people in holy convocation.  The President of these States has seen our danger.  He knows, as we do, that we have sinned, and he has exhorted us to seek the Lord, and, to begin that work, he has proclaimed a fast throughout all our afflicted Confederacy.  And General Lee informs us that “A strict observance of the day is enjoined upon the officers and soldiers of this army.”  Here we are to-day, assembled in obedience to this praiseworthy call, and the King in Zion says, “When ye fast, be not as the hypocrites.”  Fellow-soldiers, let us not make a mock of this consecrated day.  I feel that it is as one of the holy Sabbaths.  We ought to observe it.  We ought to observe it strictly and religiously.  We ought to use it as a means of bringing ourselves into holy communion with God.  The religious institution of fasting is intended to humble us, and lead us to recognize the Source whence our blessings and our help come.  Let us, then, get down at the feet of our God, and seek His salvation for our souls, and the revelation of His arm for the defence of our country.  We are not to seek Him with reference to our country alone; for God cannot hear the supplications of a man's lips for his country while his heart is afar off.  The prophet tells us how to seek the Lord: “Seek ye the Lord, seek righteousness, seek meekness: it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger.”  If you would have God’s blessings poured out upon your country, and be yourself shielded in the day of His anger, seek Him with reference to your own soul; reform your life, cease to profane His name; discontinue all your ungodly habits, and give Him the confidence and affections of your heart.  “Let the sinner forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him turn unto God who will have mercy upon him, and unto our God who will abundantly pardon.”  And then they will have nothing to fear.  The great God will hide them in the day of His wrath, and for His people’s sake He will save their country from the ravages of the despoiler.

2.  Jehoshaphat humbled himself before the Lord.  The whole context shows that he sought the Lord in deep humility.  The Lord will not have respect unto the approaches of the proud and haughty.  “He resisteth the proud” because “a high look and a proud heart is sin.”  Therefore, “humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God,” for “He forgetteth not the cry of the humble.”  Humility is, perhaps, the most delightful and potent of all the Christian graces, and certainly it would clothe a nation with unconquerable strength, if it were a common characteristic of the people.  Hear what the living God says to us in this season of national sorrow, and obey His voice: “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”  Wonderful motives!—the forgiveness of your own sins, and the healing of your land! Beloved soldiers! let me urge you, with these inestimable considerations before you, to turn from your sins, seek the Lord, seek Him in humility, and seek Him in earnest prayer.  Seek Him in prayer, did we say?

3.  Yes; the king of Judah prayed.  He sought the Lord in an earnest, pointed, argumentative prayer; and all the people prayed with him.  When he issued his proclamation, “Judah gathered themselves together, to ask help of the Lord; even out of all the cities of Judah, they came to seek the Lord.”  Help was the thing they wanted, and just such help as God alone could give; and they came together in holy convocation, with fasting, humiliation and prayer, asking help of the Lord.  “And Jehoshaphat stood in the congregation of Judah and Jerusalem, in the house of the Lord, before the new court.”  And he prayed.  The holy king led his people in prayer!  What a sublime spectacle, to see the great man, the wise man, the man of lofty position and worldly renown, when evil threatens the land, standing in the midst of his assembled people, not ashamed to acknowledge his dependence upon God—but confessing it heartily, he leads them to the mercy seat, to the throne of grace, and gathering strength there, he leads them to battle and to glorious victory!  I feel—I trust that there is, at the capital of these Confederate States, a pious President, who at this hour, unites with his fellow-citizens in earnest invocations at the throne of the King of kings!  And then there is at the head of this army an illustrious hero, whom the world admires as a tower of strength, who comes to us with the confession and exhortation: “God is our only refuge and our strength.  Let us humble ourselves before Him.  Let us confess our many sins, and beseech Him to give us higher courage, a purer patriotism, and more determined will: that He will convert the hearts of our enemies: that He will hasten the time when war, with its sorrow’s and sufferings, shall cease, and that He will give us a name and a place among the nations of the earth.”  At this hour this man lays his laurels at the feet of the God of battles, and implores the interposition of the Prince of Peace.  Under God, he has led you to victory; now he proposes to lead you to the Power whence all victories come.  Let us not revolt now.  Let us accompany him to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and “find grace to help us in this our time of need.”

But how did the king of Judah and his people pray?  They appealed to God as the God of their fathers: “O Lord God of our fathers.”  May we not approach God thus?  He is the God of our fathers.  He is “Washington’s God, and the God of his coadjutors.  And then they recognized the universal rule of their father’s God: “Rulest not Thou over the kingdoms of the heathen?”  We must not forget, in this war, that “the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth.”  And again, the people of Judah recognized the almightiness of this universal Ruler: “In Thine hand is there not power and might, so that none is able to withstand Thee?”  Here is a fortress of infinite strength—a power that can withstand our enemies.  Let us hide ourselves in this Divine pavilion, and all shall be well.  Why may we not go to God and claim Him as our God, and honor Him with our confidence, recognize His power, and implore His mercy, expecting that mercy to be bestowed?

Jehoshaphat and his people went before God with their souls and their mouths full of arguments, with which they urged their supplications.  They urged that God was their God, and that the land they inhabited was transmitted to them by their fathers, who received it as an everlasting heritage from their God; and that in this land they had builded God a sanctuary, and had honored His name.  They saw their danger, they urged their national affliction, and humbly referred to the multitudes that were invading and desolating their land.  And then closed their prayer with the following earnest words: “Behold, how they reward us, to come to cast us out of Thy possession, which Thou hast given us to inherit.  0 our God, wilt thou not judge them?  for we have no might against this great company that cometh against us; neither know we what to do; but our eyes are upon Thee.”  Our enemies come in great companies, in great multitudes, in grand armies, to cast us out from the inheritance given to us by the God of our fathers.  Let us turn our eyes to Him.  Let us lean upon His blessed arm, and beseech His mediation.  Let us be willing that God shall judge between us and our enemies; and let us implore the speedy interposition of that judgment.

Notice one more of Judah's arguments before the throne of God: “And all Judah stood before the Lord, with their little ones, their wives and their children.”  What a touching scene was that!  0 sir?, let us take our aged fathers and mothers, our wives and sisters, and our helpless little ones, in the arms of our supplications at the mercy-scat, and tell our holy God how they are threatened with oppression, insult, and cruel slavery, and devoutly pray Him to strike with His Almighty hand for the life and liberty of those for whom we live, for whom we battle, and for whom we are ready to die.

But then our prayers must have the spirit of honest confession, as well as supplications.  We must confess our sins.  We must repent of our sins.  We must rend our hearts instead of our garments before the throne of God.  We should appear before Him with deep contrition, despising our sins against His holy will, and asking, begging His forgiveness.  If we repent of our sins—if we confess our sins, He is faithful to forgive and pardon.  0 for national repentance to-day! 0 that our whole people and soldiery throughout the land, may at this hour approach, with deep repentance and sincere confessions, the Lord of all grace, and besiege Ilis throne for national pardon and deliverance!

And again, we must seek the Lord in faith.  Faith is the medium through which we approach a merciful God.  It is that attribute of our religion which gives us power with God.  It is a power itself—a working, active power.  It works by love, it purifies the heart, it overcomes the world.  “This is the victory which overcometh the world, even our faith.”  All our prayers arc worthless unless they are offered in faith.  “The effectual fervent prayer of the righteous man availeth much,” because it is the prayer of faith.  God will be sought unto for His blessings upon our country.  He will make us feel our need of His blessings.  He will make us believe that our help must come from Him.  Then let us trust His power, let us believe His promises, let us confide in His willingness to defend our cause.  Let us imitate the ancient worthies, “who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.”  0 for that faith that will trust God at all times!  For “blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord,” but “cursed is the man that trusteth in man.” 

4.  We need to be deeply convinced that the battle is not ours, but God’s.  God has always fought the battles of liberty.  He was “the God of the armies of Israel.”  He battled for His people in those remote ages; and when He marshalled their hosts, they always waxed valiant in fight, escaped the edge of the sword, and put to flight the armies of the aliens.  He fought the battles of our fathers, and they gave Him the glory.  He has fought our battles hitherto, and we ought to acknowledge it with profound reverence and humility.  He can defeat the plans and confuse the counsels of our enemies, as He did those of Ahithophel of old.  He can divide our enemies against themselves, that they may devour each other, as He did the invaders of Jehoshaphat’s kingdom.  He can visit disorder and panic upon the armies of the enemy, as He did when the Philistines drew near to battle against Israel, and “the Lord thundered with a great thunder on that day upon the Philistines, and discomfited them, and they were smitten before Israel.”  He can make vast armies become faint-hearted and quail before the few, as He did the armies of Ben-hadad, when they were routed and slain with a great slaughter, by the little army of Ahab.  He can encompass us with invincibility, and crown our struggles with unbroken success, as He did the Hebrew armies of Gideon and David, and the Christian armies of Cromwell and Havelock.  And He can change the hearts of our enemies, He can possess them of a better mind, He can convince them of the wrongs they are trying to inflict upon us; and finally, He can strike the blow that shall thrill every heart throughout our land with the joyous news of peace!  O that our whole armies and our whole people could be convinced that “The Lord is a man of war”—that He rides upon the storm of battle, and controls every conflict of arms!  0 that we could believe—as we ought—that when He musters the hosts for battle, victory always follows in His wake!  “The battle is not yours, but God’s.”

III.  Closing remarks. 

My countrymen,—let us keep ourselves intelligently impressed with the momentous questions at issue.  Let us remember that we are fighting for liberty, for the liberties of posterity, for everything dear to ourselves, or worth transmitting to our children.  And then, trusting in God and the justness of our cause, let us resolve for the redemption of our country, and stand ready to seal that resolution with our blood.

2.  Let us be united.  This army is united!  Thanks be to God for the unity that permeates this gallant army.  You have harmonized your faith, co-operated in your heroism, sacrificed your comrades, and mingled your blood, on too many fields made classic by your own deeds of valor, to be anything else than brothers now.  God grant that it may continue so!  0 that this patriotic feeling may pervade our whole country, and destroy forever the whining complaints that exist in so many sections of our native South!  Let our country stand united, and it can never be conquered.  And hence, those who create distractions and schisms at this juncture, administer the most fatal blows against the vitals of their country.  Alas, how the heart of the true patriot sickens at the slander and abuse that are heaped upon the devoted head of our noble President.  He is not perfect, of course.  It is human to err.  And with the awful responsibilities that devolve upon him, it would be wonderful if he had committed no blunders.  But is it not passing strange, that some of his own fellow-citizens are the only people on earth that have doubted his fitness for his elevated position?  All peoples, great and small, friends and enemies, proclaim him the man for the place and for the times, except a disappointed set of demagogues and their satellites in his own country.  I thank God for such a President.  Let us sustain him with our sympathies, give him the benefit of our prayers, and co-operate with him in the struggle for our liberties.  A thousand blessings on his devoted soul. 

 3.  Let us submit to our hardships with that cheerfulness which has distinguished your enviable history for more than two years.  You have had many severe trials, and you may have still severer ones.  God only knows what He has in store for us.  Let us “endure hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ,” remembering that the Captain of our salvation was “made perfect through sufferings.”  Let us, every one of us, go to Him in these times of trial and woe, with the prayer of the Psalmist: “Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me, for my soul trusteth in Thee; yea, in the shadow of Thy wings will I make my refuge, until these calamities be overpast.”

4.  Let us never forget that God alone can give us peace.  “He maketh wars to cease from the earth.”  He alone can bring the happy time when it will not be necessary for us to learn war any more.  Then let us go to Him in the never-failing name of His Son, and confidently ask for peace.  For God reigns over nations, over individuals, and over battle-fields, in the person of His Son.  The government of the universe is on His shoulder, all judgment in Heaven and on earth is placed in His hands, and “He shall reign until He hath put all His enemies under His feet.”  Then let us go to this all-controlling Prince of Peace, and importune His throne for the peace of our country and the peace of our souls!  In the meantime—

“Let us be up and doing.
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.”

THE END.