The Continental Monthly, Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 | Page 6

stood in the list of permitted evils which all
condemn, yet which it seems impossible to get rid of. But it is one thing
to tolerate an evil, quite another to adopt it as a good. And we declare
that never in the world's history was there an attempt so shameless and
audacious as that to found a government on slavery as a cornerstone! Is
it possible to conceive of more ungoverned depravity or a madness
more complete?[2]

There have been contests innumerable on the earth. We read of wars for
conquest, to avenge national insults, about disputed territory, against
revolted provinces, and between dynasties; civil wars, religious wars,
wars for the succession, to preserve the balance of power, and so forth.
But never before was a war inaugurated to establish slavery as a
principle of the government. We can predict no other fate for the
leaders in this diabolical plot than discomfiture and defeat. We have an
unwavering faith that the Republic will come out of this contest
stronger than ever before; that it will become a light to lighten the
nations, the hope of the lovers of liberty everywhere. But we will not
anticipate.
In periods like the present, circumstances appear to be charged with
vital and intelligent properties, working out and solving problems
which have disturbed and puzzled the wisest and most astute. At such
times impertinent intermeddlers abound, who claim to interpret the
oracles, and who would hasten the birth of events by acting as midwife.
It is impossible to dispose of or silence such people. We should be
careful that we are not misled by their egregious pretensions. The fact
is, the whole history of our race should teach us a lesson of profound
humility. We do not accomplish half so much for ourselves as is
accomplished for us. True, we have something to do. The seed will not
grow if it be not planted; but all our skill and cunning can not make it
spring up and blossom, and bear fruit in perfection. Neither can man
work out events after a plan of his own. He is made, in the grand drama
of this world, to work out the designs of the Almighty. We must accept
this or accept nothing. In this light how futile are the intemperate
ravings of one class, the unreasonable complaints of another, the
cunning plots of a third. We see no escape from a threatening danger,
we perceive no path out of a labyrinthine maze of evil; when, lo!
through some apparently trifling incident, by some slight and
insignificant occurrence, the whole order of things is changed, the
impending danger vanishes, and we thread the labyrinth with ease.
We believe God will provide us a way out of our present troubles. Only
we must do our duty, which is to maintain our common country, our
flag, the Republic ENTIRE.

Thus much at present. Where this war is to carry us, what shall be its
effect on us as a people, what great changes are in progress, and what
may result from them, we will discuss at the proper time, in a future
number.

IS PROGRESS A TRUTH?
'Human nature has been the same in all ages.' 'Men are pretty much the
same wherever you find them.'
If there be anything in this world from which it would be desirable to
see men delivered, it is from a certain small, cheap wisdom which
expresses itself in general verdicts on all humanity, and enables the
fribbler or dolt who can not see beyond his nose to give an offhand
summary of the infinite. There is 'an aping of the devil' in this flippant
assumption of our immutability, which strangely combines the pitiful
and painful. Oh! if the ne plus ultra which antique Ignorance
complacently inscribes on the gates of its world should ever be worn
away, let it be replaced by this owlish credo in the unchangeableness of
man.
The refutation of these sayings has been the history of humanity, and
yet no argument on political or social topics fails to contain them in one
form or another. Even now, in the tremendous debate maintained by
common logic and 'fist law' between our North and South, we find
them enunciated with a clearness and precision unequaled in any state
paper, unless we except that in which William the Conqueror coolly
styled himself king 'by the right of the sword.' Science, which modestly
announces itself as incomplete the nearer it approaches completion, has
been assumed to be perfect by those most ignorant of it, in order that its
mere observations as to climate and races may be found to prove that as
man is, so he was in all ages, and so must be, 'forever and forever as we
rove.' Races now vanished