nion. One of the things particularly
admirable in the public utterances of President Lincoln is a certain
tone of familiar dignity, which, while it is perhaps the most difficult
attainment of mere style, is also no doubtful indication of personal
character. There must be something essentially noble in an elective
ruler who can descend to the level of confidential ease without
forfeiting respect, something very manly in one who can break through
the etiquette of his conventional rank and trust himself to the reason
and intelligence of those who have elected him. No higher compliment
was ever paid to a nation than the simple confidence, the fireside
plainness, with which Mr. Lincoln always addresses himself to the
reason of the American people. This was, indeed, a true democrat, who
grounded himself on the assumption that a democracy can think. "Come,
let us reason together about this matter," has been the tone of all his
addresses to the people; and accordingly we have never had a chief
magistrate who so won to himself the love and at the same time the
judgment of his countrymen. To us, that simple confidence of his in
the right-mindedness of his fellow-men is very touching, and its
success is as strong an argument as we have ever seen in favor of the
theory that men can govern themselves. He never appeals to any vulgar
sentiment, he never alludes to the humbleness of his origin; it
probably never occurred to him, indeed, that there was anything higher
to start from than manhood; and he put himself on a level with those he
addressed, not by going down to them, but only by taking it for granted
that they had brains and would come up to a common ground of reason.
In an article lately printed in "The Nation," Mr. Bayard Taylor
mentions the striking fact, that in the foulest dens of the Five Points
he found the portrait of Lincoln. The wretched population that makes
its hive there threw all its votes and more against him, and yet paid
this instinctive tribute to the sweet humanity of his nature. Their
ignorance sold its vote and took its money, but all that was left of
manhood in them recognized its saint and martyr.

Mr. Lincoln is not in the habit of saying, "This is _my_ opinion, or
_my_ theory," but, "This is the conclusion to which, in my judgment,
the time has come, and to which, accordingly, the sooner we come the
better for us." His policy has been the policy of public opinion based
on adequate discussion a