We have made a good beginning here to-day. As our Methodist friends
would say, "I feel it is good to be here." While extremists may find
some fault with the moderation of our platform, they should recollect
that "the battle is not always to the strong, nor the race to the
swift." In grave emergencies, moderation is generally safer than
radicalism: and as this struggle is likely to be long and earnest, we
must not, by our action, repel any who are in sympathy with us in the
main, but rather win all that we can to our standard. We must not
belittle nor overlook the facts of our condition--that we are new and
comparatively weak, while our enemies are entrenched and relatively
strong. They have the administration and the political power; and, right
or wrong, at present they have the numbers. Our friends who urge an
appeal to arms with so much force and eloquence, should recollect that
the government is arrayed against us, and that the numbers are now
arrayed against us as well; or, to state it nearer to the truth, they
are not yet expressly and affirmatively for us; and we should repel
friends rather than gain them by anything savouring of revolutionary
methods. As it now stands, we must appeal to the sober sense and
patriotism of the people. We will make converts day by day; we will grow
strong by calmness and moderation; we will grow strong by the violence
and injustice of our adversaries. And, unless truth be a mockery and
justice a hollow lie, we will be in the majority after a while, and then
the revolution which we will accomplish will be none the less radical
from being the result of pacific measures. The battle of freedom is to
be fought out on principle. Slavery is a violation of the eternal right.
We have temporized with it from the necessities of our condition; but
_as sure as God reigns and school children read_, THAT BLACK FOUL LIE
CAN NEVER BE CONSECRATED INTO GOD'S HALLOWED TRUTH! [Immense applause
lasting some time.] One of our greatest difficulties is, that men who