en under any such responsibility.

It may not be a proper subject for criticism at this time, and
certainly is not for any that might seem harsh or unkind, yet it
is an instructive lesson which ought never to be forgotten, that
feeling and passion sometimes more than reason, sound military
principles, or wise statesmanship, dictated military as well as
political policy during and long after the Civil War.

No doubt all are now ready to admit this in respect to the political
measures which wrought so much evil in the South during the so-
called reconstruction period. But those who are not familiar with
the facts will, I think, be amazed when they see the evidences of
this influence in military operations, and perhaps at no time more
strikingly than during the last period of the Civil War. It would
seem that the official correspondence of that period ought to be
a sufficient warning to deter any future generation from bringing
the country into a condition where even some of the most distinguished
citizens, statesmen, and soldiers seem to be governed more by
passion than by reason in the conduct of public affairs. The
inevitable horrors of war are bad enough in any case, but they are
vastly increased when the passions begotten of civil strife become
dominant. While all parts of the United States have reason for
pride in the manhood and valor of American soldiers, and in the
patriotic devotion of citizens to the cause which they believed to
be right, and profound gratitude for the restoration of the Union
of the States, the people of this entire country should bow their
heads in humiliation when they think of the general low state of
civilization which made such a war possible, and much of its conduct
the dictate of passion and hate rather than of reason or regard
for the public good. Even if it is true, as some soldier-statesmen
have said, but which I do not believe, that occasional wars are
necessary to the vitality of a nation,--necessary to keep up the
fires of patriotism and military ardor upon which the national life
depends,--let them be foreign and not civil wars. It is a great
mistake, though apparently a common one, to suppose that a country
benefits ultimately, in some mysterious way, by civil war, in spite
of all its losses during the war. That able scientist General M.
C. Meigs demonstrated years ago that this country had, in accordance
with a general law, suffered permanent national injury, irreparabl