As to the policy I " seem to be pursuing," as you say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt. I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored, the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was." If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. What I do about slavery and the colored race I do because I believe it helps to save this Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors, and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.

I have here stated my purpose according to my views of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free. Yours,

A. LINCOLN.

Hon. HORACE GREELEY.

I believe I might put that to the vote of my honorable friends around me, and that with the exception of the honorable gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Harris], and perhaps the honorable gentleman from Ohio, whose case we have under consideration, it would get a universal "aye." I do not think my friends on the Republican side will back down from so broad and liberal a policy as is indicated in that letter.

Mr. Speaker, yet another word. I have referred to the immense interests at stake in the struggle that is now going on between this Government and those who are in rebellion against it. Defeat to us is eternal, everlasting disgrace and dishonor to ourselves and our children. We must succeed. It cannot be otherwise.

In the mighty struggle that we suppose is now impending, when a more terrible crash of arms will be felt than any that has yet taken place during this terrible strife, suppose that accomplished general, the most accomplished perhaps of all the generals on either side, at least equal to any in military skill and power, Robert E. Lee, should beat down our forces and drive them back across the Potomac; what then? Are our hearts to sink within us, are we to give up the struggle in despair? Suppose this Capital is taken, suppose the President at the other end of the avenue is compelled to remove a few hundred miles further north, and this Congress to go elsewhere for the purpose of holding its sessions! Suppose the Potomac is crossed!

the Chesapeake reached! Baltimore taken! Suppose they march to the Susquehanna, and pass victoriously through Maryland and Pennsylvania, will you then be contented to give up the struggle? Never, never! Stand by your flag! Stand by your Constitution! Rally the power and strength of the loyal States that have not yet exhibited themselves. Bring out your middle classes; bring out your gray-headed and gray-bearded men, and put the Union at last upon its real trial.

Will it take a year longer; two years longer; five years longer? What are years in the history of a nation; what is time, what is money, what is blood, compared to the preservation and salvation of a government like this? Will you say that we have already lost $2,000,000,000; that five hundred thousand men are already missing from the nation's muster-roll, and that you are therefore ready to acknowledge the effort to save the Union a failure? Sir, here are five hundred thousand more of our sons to be sacrificed, and here is a government to be saved. Which is of most value$2,000,000,000 and five hundred thousand men for putting down this rebellion, or this Government? Will you weigh these sacrifices against the preservation of liberty and free institutions for ourselves, our posterity, and all who shall make America their happy home? God forbid! God forbid! We will not give it up, let the war last five years or ten years. We will continue it as long as any power remains in this Government. And if I could send the same spirit to the children that God has blessed me with, it should descend to them from sire to son until that flag which is now streaming from the dome of this Capitol should wave over every portion of this once happy country as the flag of a free, powerful, happy, and redeemed people.

Sir, if we do not bring ourselves out of these troubles, if we are so degenerate as to permit a government like this to die, if we are such unworthy sons of noble sires as to shrink from and give up this contest, we deserve all the curses that will fall upon us. Let us fight on, trusting in that Providence which sustained our ancestors. We are in his hands, and if we are sufficiently worthy of the trust that has been placed in us not to basely surrender it up, God will see to it that this nation was not born to die so soon.

Look at the bright destiny that awaits this country if we can get over the dark and stormy sea that lies before us. Look at the West, at the Fatherof-Waters upon which it is my good fortune to live, and see the larger, brighter, and richer heritage than that which lies east of that mighty stream that is yet in store for it. Even during the present session of Congress we are preparing to admit three new States, which the enterprise and energy of our sons have already rendered populous, extending to the base of the Rocky Mountains. In Nevada, Colorado, and in California are to be developed untold riches that of themselves will be the means of relieving us from the burdens which will have been brought upon us in consequence of

this cruel and unnatural war. Let us come out of it, and let the angel of peace once more spread his bright wings over the continent, over a free and united people, and the energy of our masses will be revived. Like a young giant they will spring up at a bound; their activity renewed, their hopes inspired, their prospects brightened, they will go forward in the enjoyment of peace, of free institutions, and with a success altogether unknown in our previous history.

[Here the hammer fell.]

Mr. ROLLINS of Missouri: Mr. Speaker, I ask but a minute or two more. Mr. ELDRIDGE: There is no objection on this side of the House to the gentleman having the additional time he asks.

Mr. ROLLINS of Missouri: Mr. Speaker, I will not detain the House at this late hour. That, sir, is the bright day to which I look; that is the view to which my vision turns. I want to see this disastrous war brought to an honorable close, and these difficulties adjusted free from prejudice, and by a liberal, enlightened, wise, and philanthropic policy that will enable the people of all the States to meet once more in council upon terms of fraternity and equality, and consult dispassionately and sensibly in regard to their own true interests and those of their posterity. Burying the sad memories of the last few years, being purified by the misfortunes and calamities which unhappily have overtaken us, and relying with unshaken confidence upon the good Providence that watched over the great Republic in its infancy, it cannot be but that a bright destiny still awaits the American people. Our American nationality preserved, with a name known and honored as heretofore throughout all the earth, our Government will be at once the envy and admiration of mankind. Beneath the broad ægis of a free Constitution and equal laws, with the States and the general Government working in harmony under the influence of well adjusted and appropriately balanced powers, our country will be the home and asylum of all who seek to cast their lot where men are protected in all their rights, where the avenues to honor, to fame, and to usefulness are open to the humblest citizen having energy, virtue, and talent to recommend him.

Let our watchword be, "Upward and onward," and even during the present generation we shall behold our Government the first among the nations of the earth. Wearing the proud title of American citizen, the rights of the humblest man will be respected in every part of the habitable globe. And looking to our hitherto unparalleled advancement in all the elements of national power, in population, in wealth, in the intelligence of the masses, in mechanical skill, in agricultural industry, the day cannot be far distant when that bright and beautiful banner, the emblem of Western civilization, will have gathered upon its ample folds an hundred stars representing the

independent States stretching across this continent from the Atlantic to the Pacific seas, wearing the proud motto, " E pluribus unum," and resting securely within an American Union that shall give to all a consciousness of strength sufficient to strangle treason at home and repel invasion from abroad, thus reassuring the world that at last the United States of America is

The land of the free and the home of the brave.

Speech in the House of Representatives, May 30, 1864, on his

Resolution Declaratory of the Objects of the War.

The House then proceeded, as the regular order of business, to the consideration of a resolution offered on the 16th of December, 1863, by Mr. Rollins of Missouri, as follows:

Resolved, That, prompted by a just patriotism, we are in favor of an earnest and successful prosecution of the war, and that we will give a warm and hearty support to all those measures which will be most effective in speedily overcoming the rebellion and in securing a restoration of peace, and which may not substantially infringe the Constitution and tend to subvert the true theory and character of the Government; and we hereby reiterate that the present deplorable civil war has been forced upon the country by the disunionists now in revolt against the constitutional Government; that in the progress of this war Congress, banishing all feeling of mere passion or resentment, will recollect only its duty to the whole country; that this war is not waged on our part in any spirit of oppression, nor for any purpose of conquest or subjugation, nor purpose of overthrowing or interfering with the rights or established institutions of those States, but to defend and maintain the supremacy of the Constitution, and to preserve the Union with all the dignity, equality, and rights of the several States unimpaired; that as soon as these objects are accomplished the war ought to cease.

The Speaker stated the pending question to be, on the motion of Mr. Morrill, to refer the resolution to a select committee.

Mr. ROLLINS of Missouri: Mr. Speaker, the resolution that has just been read I had the honor to offer to the House on the 16th day of December last. It is in effect the same resolution that was adopted at the July session, 1861, of the Thirty-seventh Congress, with only two dissenting voices Potter of Wisconsin, and Burnett of Kentucky; the last named individual being now a member of the Confederate Congress at Richmond. I believed it to be right then,-I voted for it,- and I believe it to be right now. It is presented in no partizan spirit. At the time of its introduction it was pronounced by a member on this floor, now deceased [Mr. Lovejoy], a "secession document." Upon a motion to lay the resolution on the table the vote stood, 59 yeas, 114 nays. After the vote, the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Washburn] proposing to debate it, it went over under the rules of the House, and now for the first time since comes up for consideration to-day. While it is not my purpose to detain the House long, I feel that it is but right, as the mover of the resolution, that I should say a few words