still be open for a peaceful solution. In no event can there be any need whatever of shedding one drop of fraternal blood. If our laws are wrong or inadequate, change or repeal them. If dissatisfied with the Constitution itself, take the steps prescribed for its amendment. What excuse can there be for war in any issue of our pending difficulties? We already have in our government the best possible provisions for peacefully righting all wrongs. Let the parties wait to try these expedients in good faith. Should the worst come, there would be no need of civil war, that concentration and climax of all social evils. The way, after all, would be open for a peaceful solution. If the parties cannot or will not remain united under our present or any other common government; if there is confessedly such an inevitable conflict of principles, institutions and interests in different sections, as to forbid the hope of their ever living together in harmony; if on the slave issue neither party will yield its settled convictions or preferences; if the South is irrevocably bent on demanding what the North is equally resolved not to grant, the adoption of slavery as a national institution, to be nursed and guarded, extended and perpetuated, in every part of our country, through all coming time; then let us, in a peaceful, orderly way, take the steps requisite for such a change of the Constitution as will allow the withdrawal of those who wish to leave, We might deeply regret the necessity of such a measure; but, as a last resort, it certainly would be infinitely preferable to civil war.

Civil war! what a world of crimes, calamities and woes would it bring. God forbid it should ever sweep its besom of wrath and vengeance over our land. The very thought is enough to make one's blood curdle with horror. No arithmetic could compute, no imagination conceive, the sum total of its evils. If money could avert such a doom, better bankrupt the whole country for ages. We have heard of plans to buy off slavery by paying some twenty five million dollars a year for twentyfive years to States voluntarily emancipating their slaves, more than six hundred millions in all; and better by far to pay all this, and ten times as much more, than plunge into war among ourselves. No man ought for a moment to think of such a thing as admissible in any event. Thirty millions, North and South, East and West, should cry out with one voice, it cannot, must not, shall not be. And why should it be in any event? Is it possible that the descendants of Washington and Jefferson, of Hamilton and Jay, of Hancock and Adams, should ever meet over the graves of such sires to imbrue their hands in each other's blood? Have we not among us enough of Christianity, patriotism, or common sense, to settle all our domestic controversies by legal, peaceful

means? Resort for such purpose to mutual slaughter! The whole world would cry shame upon such degeneracy and madness. Can we consent thus to make our peaceful religion or our free government a by-word, a hissing and a scorn over all the earth? Men of the North and the South, brothers all, joint heirs to a richer inheritance than the world ever saw before, shall we on any issue, or for any reason, steep in fratricidal blood the memory of our common ancestry, and thus blast the fairest hopes of freedom for the human race?

The answer to such appeals as these must depend chiefly upon those who create or control public opinion through the pulpit and the press. It is in their power, under God, to set at rest our fears on this subject, and make sure, sooner or later, of a peaceful issue to all our troubles. Could a better service than this be performed by our four thousand papers, and our forty or fifty thousand pulpits? The question of peace or war among ourselves for many ages to come, may now hang on the decision of a month or a day. Was there ever a louder, more imperative call upon us to diffuse far and wide the principles of peace? Here is the great source of our peril-we have been educated to habits of war, not in principles of Christian peace. It is the lack of such principles that has brought this present crisis upon us; for a people trained in habits of Christian peace, would never have resorted to acts or threats of illegal violence for the redress of their wrongs. If it be too late to meet the present case, now is certainly the time to avert like evils in future; and earnestly would we solicit the spontaneous, habitual co-operation of every pulpit and press in this work of patriotism, philanthropy and religion.

On behalf of the American Peace Society, by direction of its Executive Committee, J. A. Copp,

January, 1861.

J. W. PARKER,

G. C. BECKWITH.

THE RIGHT OF REVOLUTION.

This dogma is claimed by nearly all advocates of government by the people, as self-evident and undeniable. We are not aware that the Peace Society has ever had occasion to express its views respecting it; but in our editorial capacity, we have ventured, at the hazard of some severe criticism, to call in question its truth, and assert its direct contrariety to the teachings of the New Testament. On this point we have no doubt; and we challenge any man to show the slightest trace of such a Politico-moral dogma in the Bible of the principle that subjects, wheth

er few or many, have from God permission at will to overthrow or resist by violence the government over them. Men have indeed a right to govern themselves; but self-government does not necessarily involve the right of violent revolution, or any opposition to established authority; and the application of such a principle in practice would breed universal anarchy.

The claim of this right was, in our view, the fundamental error of our forefathers; and their example is made to justify all the lynchings and revolutions that have since occurred in our country. It is a legitimate application of the principle. The men of 1776 did not like the government over them, and so set themselves at work to supersede it by another one more to their mind, To this example the Dorr rebels in Rhode Island appealed for their own justification; and from the inaugural speech of Jefferson Davis as President of the new Southern Slaveholding Confederacy, we see how these wholesale rebels argue :

"Our present condition has been achieved in a manner unprecedented in the history of nations, and illustrates the American idea that government rests upon the consent of the governed, and that it is the right of the people to alter and abolish governments whenever they become destructive of the ends for which they were established. As the compact of the Union from which we have withdrawn, has, in the judgment of the sovereign States now composing this Confederacy, been perverted from the purposes for which it was ordained, and ceased to answer the ends for which it was established, a peaceful appeal to the ballot box declared that, so far as they were concerned, the government created by that compact, should cease to exist. In this they merely asserted the right which the Declaration of Independence of 1776 defined to be inalienable. Of the time and occasion for the exercise of this right, they, as sovereigns, were the final judges, each for himself; and the impartial and enlightened verdict of mankind will vindicate the rectitude of our conduct. Thus have the sovereign States here represented, proceeded to form this Confederacy; and it is by an abuse of language that their act has been denominated REVOLUTION."

If this be not revolution, it is difficult to see what is, or can be; but it is clearly after the model of 1776, and in principle fully justified by that example. It is a principle fatal to all reliable government; and the very people that adopt it, are obliged, sooner or later, to contradict it in their own practice. No government can recommend it in practice, and 'continue to exist. Shay followed the revolutionists of 1776, and Massachusetts, as a matter of sheer necessity, put him down as a rebel. South Carolina, in one month after her rebellion against the United States, inflicts summary vengeance on some of her citizens for presuming to follow her own example! There is no end to the absurdities and mischiefs that must flow from this alleged right of revolution. It is in this belief that we call attention anew to the subject. This principle pushed into legitimate practice, will assuredly prove the ruin of our government.

PRACTICAL QUESTIONS ON PEACE.

Neighbor B., I know your peace society, and its professions, sound well, kind and Christian on paper; but, after all, what can be their practical application? Suppose an invading army enters our territory, what would you do in such a case?

B. I would treat them as offenders against the peace and dignity of the state. How would you treat them?

A.-I would treat them according to the laws of civilized warfare.

B.-Then you, being the chief executive, would raise an army, and bind the commander-in-chief by oath to annoy the enemy by all the means placed within his power, and all the subalterns and all the private soldiers severally to obey the orders of the officers that shall from time to time be set over them. Would you not?

A. Yes. Nothing less could render an army efficient.

B.-Then your army being thus organized, and sworn by their religious faith, you would send them into the field to meet the invaders in deadly strife as a game of competition, conceding to both armies equal right to practice violence and slaughter on the other.

A.-No; war cannot be right on both sides: so says Vattel.

B.-True. Yet Vattel also says, ' War in form, as to its effects, is to be accounted just on both sides.' Whatever is permitted to one by virtue of a state of war is also permitted to the other.' Civilized warfare, falsely so called, places both parties on equal footing. But suppose victory decides in your favor, or, to use a phrase more acceptable to the pious warrior, suppose the God of battles decides in your favor, and the invading enemy falls into your hands, how will you then treat them?

A. As prisoners of war, of course.

B.-Then you would treat them, not as offenders, but the officers as unfortunate gentlemen, defeated in the prosecution of a respectable and highly honorable calling, and the private soldiers as their faithful and worthy helpers, would you?

A.-Why, yes. If I should hang, or in any way punish a conquered army, the civilized world would be out against me at once, and justly, as an Algerine, a savage barbarian.

B. So you would not treat them as offenders. Here then is one issue between the advocates of peace, and the abettors of war, viz:-Is an invading foe to be treated as an offender against the peace and dignity of the state? One object of the peace society is to change public sentiment on this subject.

A. But it would be cruel and unjust for a conquerer to punish soldiers for obeying orders which they are bound to obey, and must obey, or be shot. Says Vattel, "All, by whom the sovereign makes war, are only instruments in his hands; they execute his will, not their own. They are not responsible. The arms, and all the apparatus, are only instruments of an inferior order."

B. This brings forward another issue between the friends of peace, and the war system: Can a man, by becoming a military man, so far absolve himself from obligation to God, as not to be guilty in his sight for practicing wholesale murder? Or, can martial law place him beyond the purview of both moral and civil law?

A. It is absolutely necessary that martial law and military discipline should be sufficiently rigorous to leave the soldier no discretion as pertains to war and its prosecution. War could not be prosecuted without all this strictness and sovereignty.

B. Very true; and this brings forward the main issue between the

friends of peace, and the abettors of war: Ought the practice of international war to be continued or discontinued? To this question I answer, it ought by all means to be discontinued. War, as we see, unmans the military man, and makes him a mere tool wielded in the work of death. Or if we look at it as it pertains to international relationships, it is not the action of a state sovereignty in its legitimate sphere, but a horrid conflict between two mighty powers where false honor is the prize at stake, and human lives the dice, the mere playthings; for war among civilized nations settles no controversies, nor is it expected to do so.

A. It is an easy matter to find fault; but I wish to know a little more of the ground you stand on. You say you would treat an invader as an offender. How is that?

B.—I would treat a banditti of foreign invaders the same as an internal insurrection.

A. But could that be just and right in the present state of international law?

B.-If not, our object is to bring about such a change in public sentiment, and public law (for international law is the mere creature of popularity) as would do away all license allowed a civilized government to send hostile troops within the jurisdiction of a neighboring state, and there screen them from guilt by claiming a right to make war.

A. But would you not need military force to bring such invaders to justice? And would not that be war?

B.-No. It would not be war, but the legitimate, peaceful action of a sovereign power. I make no objections to military force placed under the restraints under which the constitution of our state place it, "in strict subordination to, and governed by the civil power." The ultimate difference between the two theories is this, the peace principle admits the exercise of physical force by the state authorities against all offences committed as a sovereign power engaged in the administration of justice. But, on the other hand, the war system regards physical force as the criterion of right brought into requisition by two competitors on equal ground; and the more we look at the system of war, whether at its theories, or its practice, the more obviously will it appear in contrast to wholesome legitimate civil government. Middlebury, Jan. 1, 1861.

B.

SOLDIERS. A mere soldier is not a very high type of man. He is a person in whom the higher attributes 1einforce the lower. Foresight, calmness, intellectual superiority and power strain themselves to make the animal qualities more available. A soldier is a gun multiplied by human intelligence into a battery. Military genius is the skilful application of intellectual power to the most absolute physical coercion of men. It may operate by means of mental impressions, as where a line of battle is so displayed, or fortifications are so constructed, that the enemy is conquered before a blow is struck, or a life lost. But the end is the same The result is not wrought by reason. It is the victory of a cat over a mouse. It is not a victory like that of Columbus, or Galileo, or Jenner. This conviction is the secret of our popular satisfaction with Washington. His military success was episodical. He was not a soldier merely or essentially. His soldiering, in fact, does not seem to have been so much a special military endowment, as the application of ordinary good sense to war, which is not always true of great soldiers or fighters. It certainly was not of Nelson, nor of Wellington; nor was it of Alexander