The ensuing three Months—The National Uprising and Volunteering.
—I have said in
another place that the three Presidentiads preceding 1861 show'd how the weakness and
wickedness of rulers are just as eligible here in America under republican, as in Europe under
dynastic influences. But what can I say of that prompt and splendid wrestling with
Secession-Slavery, the arch enemy personified, the instant he unmistakably show'd his
face?......The volcanic upheaval of the Nation, after that firing on the flag at Charleston, proved
for certain something which had been previously in great doubt, and at once substantially settled
the question of Disunion. In my judgment it will remain as the grandest and most encouraging
spectacle yet vouchsafed in any age, old or new, to political progress and Democracy. It was not
for what came to the surface merely—though that was important; but what it indicated below,
which was of eternal importance......Down in the abysms of New World humanity there had
form'd and harden'd a primal hardpan of National Union Will, determin'd and in the majority,
refusing to be tamper'd with or argued against, confronting all emergencies, and capable at any
time of bursting all surface-bonds, and breaking out like an earthquake. It is indeed the best
lesson
of the century, or of America, and it is a mighty privilege to have been part of it......(Two great
spectacles, immortal proofs of Democracy, unequall'd in all the history of the past, are furnish'd
this War—one at the beginning, the other at its close. Those are—the general Voluntary Armed
Upheaval—and the peaceful and harmonious Disbanding of the Armies, in the summer of
1865.)
