brothers, but to swell the chorus of fratricidal hate, let out deluges of blood in order, as they say, to purify the land; and after the fashion of Artemus Ward present their "wife's relations," or the model of Henry Ward Beecher, set apart their children, as sacrifices for the redemption of the land from the manifold evils of slavery.

Their growth is of recent origin; and it is somewhat remarkable that the writer first conceived and developed the necessity of their being organized into a society on a moral force basis, which was taken up and acted upon at the commencement of their official existence as shewn in the following clause contained in their declaration of principles :-"The word of God our charter for freedom, and armoury against slavery." To the sword of the Lord they soon called the sword of the President of America. The first was not sufficient for them. With the latter they hoped to do wonders, as in a circular issued by them at their annual meeting in the spring of 1861, they expressed the hope "by another year they might lay down their trust, and advise the dissolution of a society whose work should have been done." Their work, therefore, was to be short, sharp, and decisive; grim, terrible, and very bloody. On the abrogation or perversion of their fundamental principles, like Washington, Jefferson, and Madison, they must have a compromişe to their constitution, that they might claim for the President supreme power over all the states;

define the Union to be one of law, to be upheld by force; and demand that all resistance to the authority of the President, and to the so-called "binding power" of the Union, which General Sherman calls "common law," should be put down as rebellion.

These views and policies were first promulgated in August 1859, at the extraordinary church meeting already referred to. The Rev. Dr. Cheever added to them the doctrine of servile insurrection, in his thanksgiving sermon, preached in the Church of the Puritans, New York, during the same year.. With the above party the commercial men of the North, and also the idolaters of the Union, allied themselves; the former dreading the abrogation of the navigation laws by the South, and a direct trade with England; and the latter filled with the gorgeous phantom of an empire stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, gathering in its embrace one hundred millions of inhabitants, whose president should dictate terms of peace to the world. At length the Beecherites joined their ranks, and then the Garrisonians, and last of all the Quakers, represented by Whittier, Coffin, and others; so that by a combination of circumstances the "War Christians" acquired an immense power, which they did not fail to bring to bear on the President and Congress.

The late President Buchanan was deaf to their entreaties; but Lincoln, being a man of easy virtue, and fond of power, having "adopted for his creed,"

according to Frederick Douglas, one of his menials, "evil from choice, and good from necessity," readily acquiesced in their will to form a centralized power from which imperious mandates should be issued, and bells of absolute and despotic power touched on the right hand, and on the left; and also to draw on the " war power" for the invasion of the sovereign states of the South in defiance of state sovereignty doctrines, and the "rights of 1776;" that he might cripple their ancient allies, and use slavery, if necessary, for that purpose; but refused to apply the freedom power of the Constitution, which by sharp practice on the part of both North and South had been turned into a slave power in our whole history, and given the Constitution through usage and custom all the force of a law to uphold, protect, and foster the slaveholding interest. The war Christians were disappointed in the rejection of their favourite theory regarding the Constitution; but elated with their partial success, they resolved to be on the look out for chances to press the application of the constitution for freedom. The firing on Fort Sumter by the Southerns, in consequence of Seward's indignity and wanton insult, formed a grand pretext to be used in favour of urging their pleas with renewed power and vigour. On the occasion the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher was preaching a sermon on the "Crisis," to incite the people to war. By arrangement, a telegram was handed to him on the pulpit platform, which he

read to the people, declaring "that Sumter is reinforced, and Moultrie lies in ruins."

To describe the scene which ensued," says the reporter of the New York Times, "surpasses our ability—it beggars description-cheers, hurrahs, and shouts made the building ring-the waving of hats and handkerchiefs, and the simultaneous uprising of many hundreds of people made the scene one of the most remarkable and solemnly impressive that has ever been witnessed in that church of well defined opinion. Mr. Beecher appeared about six inches taller than usual, and his eye flashed fire as he looked on the enthusiasm of his charge." The reporter adds that "the audience sat spell-bound by the eloquence of the preacher, and woke from their trance only to sing the magnificent anthem, commencing

'My country, 'tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing,'

which was given with such a pronounced emphasis as to startle the neighbourhood for blocks around, and cause the very blood of the listener to leap with patriotic fervour." A "majestic uprising of Northern sentiment" for war, it is said, followed the fall of Fort Sumter; although it would have been more majestic to let the "wayward sisters go in peace." Such are the men who have originated the

war.

FREAKS IN THE CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS.

Passing over the "War of Tariffs" in South Carolina, and what Massachusetts called the "War of Commerce" in 1812, when each threatened to secede, we come to the more recent incidents which have threatened an explosion. There had been a considerable encroachment on the rights of the South by the North, on the acknowledged basis of the "Compromises of the Constitution. The Missouri Compromise had been adopted for the sake of peace. This act said to the Southerns, beyond a certain line you shall not bring what both North and South call property, into the common territory which belonged equally to both; and to which both were entitled on their own terms and arrangement. The repeal of this act opened up a race for the settlement of Kansas and Nebraska; brought into existence Ward Beecher's "Holy Rifles," and the mightier and purer heroism of John Brown, who saved Kansas for freedom, in opposition to both North and South-tearing to pieces before their faces the "Black Compromises" of the Constitution, in defiance of, and expressing his utter contempt for, the Union.

Lincoln and Seward each in turn threatened a war on the Southern states themselves, by an invasion of their acknowledged claims on which the Compromises" were based, in order to make a bid