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SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & CO., STATIONERS' HALL COURT;

WARREN HALL & CO., CAMDEN ROAD, N.W.

1862.

Price Threepence.

7313,50-
U.S.5450.29

1865. May 5..

By each. of dufel, given

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by Rev. Loamini G. Ware (H.C. 1850.) 57460

PRINTED BY WARREN HALL AND CO.,

CAMDEN ROAD, N. W.

PREFACE.

IN submitting a few facts to the good people of Great Britain, I will just remark that I am not acting under the auspices or instructions of any party, political or otherwise; but finding in the minds of so many of my friends here a misapprehension of the principal facts and issues of the American war, I felt impelled by a sense of duty to the cause of truth and righteousness to write. I am a native of the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, spent twentyeight years of my life in the South, and have since spent thirteen years in extensive explorations through nearly all the free states from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and am therefore quite familiar with the facts which I here respectfully submit.

LONDON, October 15th, 1862.

WILLIAM TAYLOR.

THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA.

CHAPTER I.

CAUSE AND PROBABLE RESULTS OF THE WAR.

IF "not a sparrow falleth to the ground without our heavenly Father," it is not at all likely that such a war as is now raging in the United States could occur without Him. Does it not therefore become all reflecting men, especially such as fear God, to inquire what are probably the Lord's designs in permitting this war? While it is quite impossible for us adequately to anticipate or fathom his designs, still in the light of well defined principles and precedents in his government, we may anticipate and define them sufficiently for ordinary purposes of practical faith and action. From the commencement of the war I have believed that the Great Arbiter of battles had at least two ends to accomplish by it. I. A severe chastisement of the American nation for national

sins.

The chastisement is both retributive and disciplinary. In regard to discipline I may simply say, that no man, or corporation or nation can attain to humble permanent greatness without great struggles in the school of adversity. If they cannot stand the ordeal, they cannot reach the end to which it is a means.

In regard to God's retributive dealing with the American people, it is generally admitted by all concerned, that as a nation we have been very ungrateful, haughty, and wicked in the sight of the Lord. We have sinned grievously against God and humanity, not only by our complicity with slavery, but in numerous ways besides. Proportionate to the light enjoyed, and the consequent responsibility involved, so is the guilt of disobedience; hence we may reasonably expect that the retributions of God to be visited upon the nation will be terribly severe. The Secessionists are the principal rod used by the Lord for the chastisement of the loyal states, not simply by the action of armies in the field, but also by all the humiliating concomitants of the war at home and abroad. Had the Federal armies been uniformly successful, the chastening purpose of God would not have been realized at all. Why, as late as last June I travelled extensively through the northern,

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