so that the South, with its inferior numbers, is almost on a footing in effective war-population with the North.  Again, as long as we fight without any affirmative step taken by the Government, any word intimating forfeiture in the rebel States of their old privileges under the law, they and we fight on the same side, for Slavery.  Again, if we conquer the enemy,—­what then?  We shall still have to keep him under, and it will cost as much to hold him down as it did to get him down.  Then comes the summer, and the fever will drive our soldiers home; next winter, we must begin at the beginning, and conquer him over again.  What use, then, to take a fort, or a privateer, or get possession of an inlet, or to capture a regiment of rebels?

But one weapon we hold which is sure.  Congress can, by edict, as a part of the military defence which it is the duty of Congress to provide, abolish slavery, and pay for such slaves as we ought to pay for.  Then the slaves near our armies will come to us:  those in the interior will know in a week what their rights are, and will, where opportunity offers, prepare to take them.  Instantly, the armies that now confront you must run home to protect their estates, and must stay there, and your enemies will disappear.

There can be no safety until this step is taken.  We fancy that the endless debate, emphasized by the crime and by the cannons of this war, has brought the Free States to some conviction that it can never go well with us whilst this mischief of Slavery remains in our politics, and that by concert or by might we must put an end to it.  But we have too much experience of the futility of an easy reliance on the momentary good dispositions of the public.  There does exist, perhaps, a popular will that the Union shall not be broken,—­that our trade, and therefore our laws, must have the whole breadth of the continent, and from Canada to the Gulf.  But, since this is the rooted belief and will of the people, so much the more are they in danger, when impatient of defeats, or impatient of taxes, to go with a rush for some peace, and what kind of peace shall at that moment be easiest attained:  they will make concessions for it,—­will give up the slaves; and the whole torment of the past half-century will come back to be endured anew.

Neither do I doubt, if such a composition should take place, that the Southerners will come back quietly and politely, leaving their haughty dictation.  It will be an era of good feelings.  There will be a lull after so loud a storm; and, no doubt, there will be discreet men from that section who will earnestly strive to inaugurate more moderate and fair administration of the Government, and the North will for a time have its full share and more, in place and counsel.  But this will not last,—­not for want of sincere good-will in sensible Southerners, but because Slavery will again speak through them its harsh necessity.  It cannot live but by injustice, and it will be unjust and violent to the end of the world.