eve that civilization and Christianity must
steadily work to establish freedom for all men. On that ground, and in
that sense, do we believe that 'this government cannot permanently
endure half slave and half free.' Pending that advance, we propose only
to exclude slavery from the common domain; to tolerate slavery as
sectional, while upholding freedom as national. If you are still
dissatisfied, yet is it not better to bear the evils that we have than
fly to others that we know not of? Nay, do we not too well know, and
surely if dimly foresee, the terrific evils which must attend the
attempted disruption of this nation?

"A nation it is, and not a partnership. A nation, one and inseparable,
we propose that it shall continue. We deny that the founders and fathers
ever contemplated a mere temporary alliance dissoluble at the caprice of
any member. To the Union, established under the Constitution, just as
earnestly as to the cause of independence, they virtually pledged 'their
lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.' With every year the
nation has knitted its texture closer, as its benefits increased and its
associations grew. A nation is something other than a pleasure party, or
a mutual admiration society,--it includes a principle of rightful
authority and necessary submission. The harmony vital to national unity
is not merely a mutual complacence of the members,--at its root is a
habitual, disciplined obedience to the central authority, which in a
democracy is the orderly expressed will of the majority. You cannot
leave us and we cannot let you go. And if you attempt to break the bond,
it is at your peril."

CHAPTER XXII

HOW THEY DIFFERED

If the typical Secessionist and the typical Unionist, as just described,
could rally a united South and a united North to their respective views,
there was no escape from a violent clash. Whether the two sections could
be so united each in itself appeared extremely doubtful. But below these
special questions of political creed were underlying divergences of
sentiment and character between North and South, which fanned the
immediate strife as a strong wind fans a starting flame. There was first
a long-growing alienation of feeling, a mutual dislike, rooted in the
slavery controversy, and fed partly by real and partly by imaginary
differences. Different personal and social ideals were fostered by the
two industrial systems. The Southerner of the dominant class looked