the Union? No one will for a moment doubt that the movement was
revolutionary, and yet infinite pains are taken to prove a fact
that is patent to every one.

It is revolutionary; but what then? Have the Northern States of
the American Union taken upon themselves, in 1861, to proclaim
their opinion that revolution is a sin? Are they going back to the
divine right of any sovereignty? Are they going to tell the world
that a nation or a people is bound to remain in any political
status because that status is the recognized form of government
under which such a people have lived? Is this to be the doctrine
of United States citizens--of all people? And is this the doctrine
preached now, of all times, when the King of Naples and the Italian
dukes have just been dismissed from their thrones with such
enchanting nonchalance because their people have not chosen to keep
them? Of course the movement is revolutionary; and why not? It is
agreed now among all men and all nations that any people may change
its form of government to any other, if it wills to do so--and if
it can do so.

There are two other points on which these Northern statesmen and
logicians also insist, and these two other points are at any rate
better worth an argument than that which touches the question of
revolution. It being settled that secession on the part of the
Southerners is revolution, it is argued, firstly, that no occasion
for revolution had been given by the North to the South; and,
secondly, that the South has been dishonest in its revolutionary
tactics. Men certainly should not raise a revolution for nothing;
and it may certainly be declared that whatever men do they should
do honestly.

But in that matter of the cause and ground for revolution, it is so
very easy for either party to put in a plea that shall be
satisfactory to itself! Mr. and Mrs. Jones each had a separate
story. Mr. Jones was sure that the right lay with him; but Mrs.
Jones was no less sure. No doubt the North had done much for the
South; had earned money for it; had fed it; and had, moreover, in a
great measure fostered all its bad habits. It had not only been
generous to the South, but over-indulgent. But also it had
continually irritated the South by meddling with that which the
Southerners believed to be a question absolutely private to
themselves. The matter was illustrated to me by a New Hampshire
man who was conversant with black bears. At the hotels in the New
Hampshire mountains it is customary to find black bears chained to
poles. These bears are caught among the hills, and are thus
imprisoned for the amusement of the hotel guests. "Them
Southerners," said my friend, "are jist as one as that 'ere bear.
We feeds him and gives him a house, and his belly is ollers full.
But then, jist becase he's a black bear, we're ollers a poking him
with sticks, and a' course the beast is a kinder riled. He wants
to be back to the mountains. He wouldn't have his belly filled,
but he'd have his own way. It's jist so with them Southerners."

It is of no use proving to any man or to any nation that they have
got all they should want, if they have not got all that they do
want. If a servant desires to go, it is of no avail to show him
that he has all he can desire in his present place. The
Northerners say that they have given no offense to the Southerners,
and that therefore the South is wrong to raise a revolution. The
very fact that the North is the North, is an offence to the South.
As long as Mr. and Mrs. Jones were one in heart and one in feeling,
having the same hopes and the same joys, it was well that they
should remain together. But when it is proved that they cannot so
live without tearing out each other's eyes, Sir Cresswell
Cresswell, the revolutionary institution of domestic life,
interferes and separates them. This is the age of such
separations. I do not wonder that the North should use its logic
to show that it has received cause of offense but given none; but I
do think that such logic is thrown away. The matter is not one for
argument. The South has thought that it can do better without the
North than with it; and if it has the power to separate itself, it
must be conceded that it has the right.

And then as to that question of honesty. Whatever men do they
certainly should do honestly. Speaking broadly, one may say that
the rule applies to nations as strongly as to individuals, and
should be observed in politics as accurately as in other matters.
We must, however, confess that men who are scrupulous in their
private dealings do too constantly drop those scruples when they
handle public affairs, and especially when they handle them at
stirring moments of great national changes. The name of Napoleon
III. stands fair now before Europe, and yet he filched the French
empire with a falsehood. The union of England and Ireland is a
successful fact, but nevertheless it can hardly be said that it was
honestly achieved. I heartily believe that the whole of Texas is
improved in every sense by having been taken from Mexico and added
to the Southern States, but I much doubt whether that annexation
was accomplished with absolute honesty. We all reverence the name
of Cavour, but Cavour did not consent to abandon Nice to France
with clean hands. When men have political ends to gain they regard
their opponents as adversaries, and then that old rule of war is
brought to bear, deceit or valor--either may be used against a foe.
Would it were not so! The rascally rule--rascally in reference to
all political contests--is becoming less universal than it was.
But it still exists with sufficient force to be urged as an excuse;
and while it does exist it seems almost needless to show that a
certain amount of fraud has been used by a certain party in a
revolution. If the South be ultimately successful, the fraud of
which it may have been guilty will be condoned by the world.



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