12 is making this nation purer. The Fugitive Slave Law is a dead letter. There is no slavery at the seat of the national government. We have conceded the right of search on the African coast. We have hung one or two slave-traders. We have broken up the outfitting business in New York and elsewhere. We are growing just to the black slaves ; we are giving them freedom and wages. The nation is putting itself right before God ; it will do it completely if the war only lasts until the first of January. Now can any man say there is no cause why we should give thanks for some good springing out of this war — the great good of a national purification from our original sin before God ( I think not. V. This war is making us safe, as a nation. We were not safe before this war. This spirit of rebellion has been nurtured for thirty years or more. These rebels might have been far wiser than they have been. Suppose their plan had been first to embroil us with England, as they did with Mexico, and then made terms of coalition with her, while as a nation we were so poor and weak in every arm of national uefence. They might easily have done it. Then where had been our nearly defenceless national capitol ? But irrespective of that, although no nation could have conquered us, we
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