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man, will join in honors to the memory of him who freed a race and saved a nation.

What fame that is human merely can be more secure? What glory that is of earth can be more enduring? What deed for good can be more widespread?

The influence of the great act of his life will extend to every continent and to all races. It will advance with civilization into Africa; it will shake and finally overthrow slavery in the dominions of Spain and in the Empire of Brazil; and at last, in that it saved a republic, and perpetuated a free representative government as an example and model for mankind, it will undermine the monarchical, aristocratic, and despotic institutions of Europe and Asia. What fame that is human merely can be more secure? What glory that is of earth can be more enduring? What deed for good can be more wide-spread?

Yet this great act rested on a foundation on which all may stand. In the place where he was, he did that which, in his judgment, duty to his country and to his God required. This is, indeed, his highest praise, and the only eulogy that his life demands.

That he had greater opportunities than other men, was his responsibility and burden; that he used his great opportunities for the preservation

of his country and the relief of the oppressed, is his own glory.

Had Mr. Lincoln been permitted to reach the age attained by Jefferson or Adams, his death would have produced a profound impression upon his countrymen.

Had he now, in the opening months of his second administration, fallen by accident or yielded to disease, the nation would have been bowed down in inexpressible grief. Every loyal heart would have been burdened with a weight of sorrow, and every loyal household would have felt as though a place had been made vacant at its own hearthstone.

That he has now fallen by the hand of an assassin is in itself a horror too appalling for contemplation. Had the deed been committed in ancient Greece or Rome, we could not now read the historian's record without a shudder and a tear. All those qualities in the illustrious victim which we cherish were spurs, ever goading the conspirators on to the consummation of their crime.

His love of country and of liberty, his devotion to duty, his firmness and persistency in the right, his kindness of heart, and his spirit of mercy, were all reasons or inducements influencing the purposes of the conspirators. Neither greatness nor goodness was a shield. Had he been greater and bet

ter and wiser than he was, his fate would have been the same.

In this hour of calamity, let not the thirst for vengeance take possession of our souls. But justice should be done. The circle of conspirators is already broken and entered by the officers of the law, and mankind will finally be permitted to see who were the authors and who the perpetrators of this great crime. For the members of this circle, whether it be small or large, and whomsoever it may include, there should be neither compassion nor mercy, but justice and only justice. Judged as men judge, this crime is too great for pardon. The criminals can find no protection or harbor in any civilized country. Let the Government pursue them with its full power until the last one disappears from earth. Vex every sea, visit every island, traverse every continent; let there be no abiding-place for these criminals between the Arctic seas and the Antarctic pole !

This, Justice demands, as she sits in judgment upon this unparalleled crime.

One duty and one consolation remain. He who destroyed slavery was himself by slavery destroyed. Whoever the assassin, and however numerous the conspirators, love of slavery was the evil spirit which had entered into these men and taken possession of them. Slavery is the source

and fountain of the crime, and all they who have given their support to slavery are in some degree responsible for the awful deed. Let, then, the nation purify itself from this the foulest of sins. And this is our duty.

In the providence of God, Mr. Lincoln was permitted to do more than any other man of this century for his country, for liberty, and for mankind. Mr. Lincoln is dead; but the nation lives, and the providence of God ever continues. No single life was ever yet essential to the life of a nation. This is our consolation and ground for confidence in the future.

GENERAL GRANT.

THE representative, republican system of government in the United States is no longer an experiment. In the period of the existence of this government, now nearly a hundred years, its Constitution has been perfected, its methods of admi_istration improved, its faculties enlarged, its pow. ers tested, and the limits of its authority and jurisdiction ascertained and established either by a recognized public opinion, or by the force of accepted judicial decisions.

While there are with us differences of opinion upon measures of administration, there are no substantial differences of opinion as to the fundamental principles of the government under which we are living. In this respect we are distinguished favorably from every other great government, unless a parallel can be found in the Oriental world. In England, Russia, Germany, and France, there are bodies of men who would welcome the overthrow of the existing forms of government, and the advent of a new order of things.

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