Oration on the Life and Character of Henry Winter Davis

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U.S. Government Printing Office, 1866 - 43 pages

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Page 24 - In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend it.
Page 24 - I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend it." I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
Page 24 - Besides, this Duncan Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been So clear in his great office, that his virtues Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against The deep damnation of his taking off...
Page 39 - The tears that flow on this fond recital will never dry up. My heart, penetrated with the remembrance of the man, grows liquid as I write, and I could pour it out like water.
Page 23 - Northern cities, where the pavements have been worn off by the tread of commerce. We will carry war where it is easy to advance — where food for the sword and torch await our armies in the densely populated cities...
Page 22 - I say that the Constitution of the United States, and the laws made in pursuance thereof, must be enforced ; and they who stand across the path of that enforcement must either destroy the power of the United States, or it will destroy them.
Page 33 - Union, and submission the path to victory, shall throw down their arms before the advancing foe ; when vast chasms across every State shall make apparent to every eye, when too late to remedy it, that division from the South is...
Page 18 - ... or grave-makers I am become stupid, or have forgot the apprehension of mortality; but that marshalling all the horrors, and contemplating the extremities thereof, I find not anything therein able to daunt the courage of a man, much less a well resolved Christian...
Page 34 - ... banner of the Republic, still pointing onward, floats proudly in the face of the enemy; that vast regions are reduced to obedience to the laws, and that a great host in armed array now presses with steady step into the dark regions of the rebellion.
Page 27 - Though not elected, he never ceased his efforts. With us it was a struggle for homes, hearths, and lives. He said at Brooklyn, " You see the conflagration from a distance ; it blisters me at my side. You can survive the integrity of the nation ; we in Maryland would live on the side of a gulf, perpetually tending to plunge into its depths. It is for us life and liberty; it is for you greatness, strength, and prosperity.

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