ribute its harmful influence upon our interests and
prospects into three very different methods, all of which combined to
injure or obstruct the Northern cause,--the National cause. Thus, this
opinion of the hopelessness of our resistance of the men of our
Union was of great value to the Rebels as an encouragement under any
misgivings they might have; it was calculated to prejudice our position
in the eyes of the world; and it had a tendency to dispirit many among
ourselves. A word upon each of these points.--How quickening must it
have been to the flagging hopes or determination of the Rebels to read
in the English journals that they were sure of success, that the result
was already registered, that they had gained their purpose simply by
proposing it! Nor was it possible to regard this opinion as not carrying
with it some implication that the cause of the Rebels was a just one,
and was sure of success, if for other reasons, for this, too, among
them, namely, that it was just. Why else were the Rebels so sure of a
triumph? Was it because of their superior strength or resources? A very
little inquiry would have set aside that suggestion. Was it because
of the nobleness of their cause? A very frank avowal from the
Vice-President of the assumed Confederacy announced to liberty-loving
Englishmen that that cause was identified with a slavocracy. Or was
the Rebel cause to succeed through the dignity and purity of the means
enlisted in its service? It was equally well known on both sides of the
water by what means and appliances of fraud, perfidy, treachery, and
other outrages, the schemes of the Rebellion were initiated and pursued.
If, in spite of all these negatives, the English press prophesies
success to the Rebels, was not the prophecy a great comfort and spur
to them?--Again, this prophecy of our sure discomfiture prejudiced us
before the world. It gave a public character and aspect of hopelessness
to our cause; it invited coldness of treatment towards us; it seemed to
warn off all nations from giving us aid or comfort; and it virtually
affirmed that any outlay of means or life by us in a cause seen to be
impracticable would be reckless, sanguinary, cruel, and inhuman.--And,
once more, to those among ourselves who are influenced by evil
prognostications, it was most dispiriting to be told, as if by cool,
unprejudiced observers from outside, that no uprising of patriotism, no
heroism of sacrifice, no combination of wisdom