The slightest symptom of inertia or of feebleness in the Federal Government at this time, will, therefore, expose the border States to great perils, and, through them, the whole Confederation.  As easy as it would have been, with a little energy, to prevent the evil, to confine secession within its natural limits, and to weaken the chances of civil war, so difficult has it become, at present, to attain the same end.  Painful duties, perhaps, will be imposed on Mr. Lincoln.  I wonder, in truth, at the politicians who advise him to a “masterly inactivity,” that is, who urge him to continue Mr. Buchanan!  Doubtless he does right to leave to the insurgents all the odium of acting on the offensive, but his moderation should detract nothing from his firmness, and it is even of importance that the means of action which he is about to prepare, should manifest so clearly the overwhelming superiority of the North, that the resistance of the South will be thereby discouraged.

Adversaries of slavery are not wanting, who are almost indignant at the adoption of such measures by the new President.  Did they fancy then that a formidable question could be resolved without risking the repression of the assaults of force by force?  Away with childishness!  In electing Mr. Lincoln, it was known that the cotton States were ready to protest with arms in their hands; he was not elected to receive orders from the cotton States, or to sign the dissolution of the United States on the first requisition.  Who wills the end, wills the means.  No one, certainly, desires, more than myself, the peaceful repression of the rebellion.  May the success of the blockade render the employment of the army useless!  May the resolute attitude of the Confederation arrest the majority of the intermediate States on the dangerous declivity upon which they are standing!  Once let them be drawn into the circle of influence of the extreme South, and little chance will remain of confining the civil war within the limits beyond which it is so important that it should not spread.

Then will appear the irrepressible conflict of Mr. Seward.  Whether desired or not, if the two Confederations are placed side by side, the one representing all the slavery, the other representing all the liberty, the conflict will take place.  It will take place perhaps now, perhaps a little later; however this may be, no one will have the power to hinder it.  Suppose the South, thus completed, relinquish (and nothing is less certain) the opening by itself of a war in which it must perish, and its great plans of attack, against Washington, for instance, be abandoned; suppose the United States, on their side, avoid a direct attack, which might give the signal for insurrections; suppose they limit themselves to purely maritime repression of the revolt; that, after striking off the Southern harbors from the list of seaports, and declaring that custom-house duties cannot be legally paid there, they maintain this blockade, which Europe ought to applaud; would they have averted all chances of conflict?  No; alas!  However temporary such a situation might be, complaints, recriminations, and, ere long, violent reprisals, would be seen everywhere arising.  Rivalries of principles, rivalries of interests, bitter memories of past injuries, such are the rocks on which peaceful policy would be in continual danger of shipwreck.