hy of his lofty spirit. There is
no rivalry among the saints. Would that Armstrong could here be
portrayed as he appeared in life. The outer man spoke well the inner. To
look upon, he was a thoroughbred; of soldierly bearing, alert, vivid,
noble; with the twinkle of mirth, the flash of resistless purpose,--a
man to love, to revere, to follow. As a sort of mental portrait-sketch,
we may glean a few of his sayings. It was as true of him as of Luther
that his words were half-battles. They were flashed out like sparks
struck from action. As to his special work, these:

"The North thinks that the great thing is to free the negro from his
former owner; the real thing is to save him from himself."

On the dissolution of the American Anti-slavery Society, (because
nothing remained for it to do): "It failed to see that everything
remained. Their work was just beginning when slavery was abolished."

"I cannot understand the prevailing views of the war among pious and
intelligent Americans. It is simply barbaric--to whip the South and go
home rejoicing, to build monuments of victory, leaving one-third of
their countrymen in the depths of distress."

"The reconstruction measures were a bridge of wood over a river of
fire."

(In 1878): "Hereafter it will be seen that negro suffrage was a boon to
the race, not so much for a defense, but as a tremendous fact that
compelled its education. There is nothing to do but attempt its
education in every possible way. In their pinching poverty the Southern
States have seized the question of negro education with a vigor that is
the outcome of danger."

(In 1887): "The political experience of the negro has been a great
education to him. In spite of his many blunders and unintentional crimes
against civilization, he is to-day more of a man than he could have been
had he not been a voter."

"The war was the saving of the South. Defeat and ruin brought more
material prosperity to the South than to the North, and the future has
untold advantages in store. Education is part of it, but capital and
enterprise, which make men work, are the greater part. The negro and
poor white, and, more than all, the old aristocrat, are being saved by
hard work, which, next to the grace of God, saves our souls."

"We hew from the raw material, men who have come out of deep darkness
and wrong, without inheritance but of savage nature, the best product we
can, and care as much to infuse it with a spiritual life