se of oppression, the
result is the same,--society is instructed, or may be.

Such are the limitations of the common mind, and so thoroughly
engrossing are the cares of common life, that only the few among men can
discern through the glitter and dazzle of present prosperity the dark
outlines of approaching disasters, even though they may have come up to
our very gates, and are already within striking distance. The yawning
seam and corroded bolt conceal their defects from the mariner until the
storm calls all hands to the pumps. Prophets, indeed, were abundant
before the war; but who cares for prophets while their predictions
remain unfulfilled, and the calamities of which they tell are masked
behind a blinding blaze of national prosperity?

It is asked, said Henry Clay, on a memorable occasion, Will slavery
never come to an end? That question, said he, was asked fifty years ago,
and it has been answered by fifty years of unprecedented prosperity.
Spite of the eloquence of the earnest Abolitionists,--poured out against
slavery during thirty years,--even they must confess, that, in all the
probabilities of the case, that system of barbarism would have
continued its horrors far beyond the limits of the nineteenth century
but for the Rebellion, and perhaps only have disappeared at last in a
fiery conflict, even more fierce and bloody than that which has now been
suppressed.

It is no disparagement to truth, that it can only prevail where reason
prevails. War begins where reason ends. The thing worse than rebellion
is the thing that causes rebellion. What that thing is, we have been
taught to our cost. It remains now to be seen whether we have the needed
courage to have that cause entirely removed from the Republic. At any
rate, to this grand work of national regeneration and entire
purification Congress must now address itself, with full purpose that
the work shall this time be thoroughly done. The deadly upas, root and
branch, leaf and fibre, body and sap, must be utterly destroyed. The
country is evidently not in a condition to listen patiently to pleas for
postponement, however plausible, nor will it permit the responsibility
to be shifted to other shoulders. Authority and power are here
commensurate with the duty imposed. There are no cloud-flung shadows to
obscure the way. Truth shines with brighter light and intenser heat at
every moment, and a country torn and rent and bleeding implores relief
from its distress an