somehow or other, in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent, and pass away.  This idea, though not incorporated in the Constitution, was the prevailing idea at the time.  The Constitution, it is true, secured every essential guaranty to the institution, while it should last; and hence no argument can be justly used against the Constitutional guaranties thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong.  They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races.  This was an error.  It was a sandy foundation; and the idea of a government built upon it—­when ‘the storm came and the wind blew, it fell.’

“Our new government is founded upon on exactly the opposite ideas:  its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and moral condition. (Applause.) This our new government is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.

“This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science.  It is so even amongst us.  Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day.  The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago.  Those at the North who still cling to these errors with a zeal above knowledge we justly denominate fanatics.  All fanaticism springs from an aberration of the mind, from a defect in reasoning.  It is a species of insanity.  One of the most striking characteristics of insanity, in many instances, is forming correct conclusions from fancied or erroneous premises.  So with the anti-slavery fanatics:  their conclusions are right, if their premises are.  They assume that the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is entitled to equal privileges and rights with the white man.  If their premises were correct, their conclusions would be logical and just; but their premises being wrong, their whole argument fails.

* * * * *

“In the conflict thus far, success has been on our side complete, throughout the length and breadth of the Confederate States.  It is upon this, as I have stated, our social fabric is firmly planted; and I cannot permit myself to doubt the ultimate success of a full recognition of this principle throughout the civilized and enlightened world.

“As I have stated, the truth of this principle may be slow in development, as all truths are, and ever have been, in the various branches of science.  It was so with the principles announced by Galileo; it was so with Adam Smith and his principles of political economy; It was so with Harvey in his theory of the circulation of the blood.  It is said that not a single one of the medical profession, at the time