entire capital of the land. Better one million of negative negroes than
a million of positive soldiers!

There was never yet in history a time when such a glorious future
offered itself to a nation as that which is now within our grasp. In its
greatness and splendor it is beyond all description. The great problem
of Republicanism--the question of human progress--has reached its last
trial. If we keep this mighty nation one and inseparable, we shall have
answered it forever; if not, why then those who revile man as vile and
irreclaimably degraded may raise their pæans of triumph; the black
spectres of antique tyrants may clap their hands gleefully in the land
of accursed shadows, and hell hold high carnival, for, verily, it would
seem as if they had triumphed, and that hope were a lie.

But who are they who dare accuse us of wishing to weaken the
administration and impede its course? Bring the question to light! If
there be one thing more than another which those who demand emancipation
desire, it is that the central government should be _strengthened_--aye,
strengthened as it has never been before; so that, in future, there can
be no return of secession. We have never been a republic--only an
aggregate of smaller republics. If we _had_ been one, the first movement
toward disunion would have hurled the traitors urging it to the dust.
Aye, strengthen the government; and let its first manifestation of
strength and will be the settling of the negro question. Give the
administration as full power as you please--the more the better; it is
only conferring strength on the people. There is no danger that the men
of the North will ever lose a shadow of individual rights. They are too
powerful.

And now let the freemen of America speak, and the work will be done. A