In the midst of that
hideous civil contest which was provoked, perhaps unnecessarily, by
hatred, irresponsibility, passion, and disloyalty, and which has been
the fruitful cause of national disloyalty down to the present day,
Lincoln did not for a moment cherish a bitter or unjust feeling against
the national enemies. The Southerners, filled as they were with a
passionate democratic devotion to their own interests and liberties,
abused Lincoln until they really came to believe that he was a military
tyrant, yet he never failed to treat them in a fair and forgiving
spirit. When he was assassinated, it was the South, as well as the
American nation, which had lost its best friend, because he alone among
the Republican leaders had the wisdom to see that the divided House
could only be restored by justice and kindness; and if there are any
defects in its restoration to-day, they are chiefly due to the baleful
spirit of injustice and hatred which the Republicans took over from the
Abolitionists.
His superiority to his political associates in constructive
statesmanship is measured by his superiority in personal character.
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