These Things Grow By Degrees, And The Mind Also Grows In
Becoming Used To Them; But I Cannot See That
There was any moment
at which Mr. Lincoln could have stayed his hand and cried peace.
It is easy to
Say now that acquiescence in secession would have
been better than war, but there has been no moment when he could
have said so with any avail. It was incumbent on him to put down
rebellion, or to be put down by it. So it was with us in America
in 1776.
I do not think that we in England have quite sufficiently taken all
this into consideration. We have been in the habit of exclaiming
very loudly against the war, execrating its cruelty and
anathematizing its results, as though the cruelty were all
superfluous and the results unnecessary. But I do not remember to
have seen any statement as to what the Northern States should have
done - what they should have done, that is, as regards the South, or
when they should have done it. It seems to me that we have decided
as regards them that civil war is a very bad thing, and that
therefore civil war should be avoided. But bad things cannot
always be avoided. It is this feeling on our part that has
produced so much irritation in them against us - reproducing, of
course, irritation on our part against them. They cannot
understand that we should not wish them to be successful in putting
down a rebellion; nor can we understand why they should be
outrageous against us for standing aloof, and keeping our hands, if
it be only possible, out of the fire.
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