[From the Liverpool Daily Post, April 27, 1865.]
abraham lincoln.
In the hour of northern victory the northern President has been martyred. His faithfulness to his sworn duty has cost him his life. A few hours after he had uttered in council sentiments of kindness and conciliation towards the prostrate South, the remorseless aim of an assassin robbed the almost reunited [Page 410] republic of its wise and honest guide. The world will echo with loud and bitter detestation the hellish act by which Abraham Lincoln was sacrificed; while those who have watched with sympathy the conduct of the departed President will rejoice that he lived just long enough to be consoled by appreciation and success.
It were futile to endeavor to express the feelings which the horrible occurrence at Washington has excited, for as yet they are too poignant for utterance. The vast issues which impend almost daze the understanding and numb the sensibilities. It is only possible at such a moment to retrace the story of the life so sadly ended, and to balance with forced calmness the elements of the character which now lies like a fallen tree, unchangeable, with no trait to be developed and no lineament to be added. If there ever was a man who in trying times avoided offence it was Mr. Lincoln. If there ever was a leader in a civil contest who shunned acrimony and eschewed passion, it was he. In a time of much cant and affectation he was simple, unaffected, true, transparent. In a season of many mistakes he was never known to be wrong. Where almost all were dubious, he was clear; where many were recreant, he was faithful. Yet there was nothing ill timed or blunt in his sincerity and straightforwardness. By a happy tact, not often so felicitously blended with pure singleness of soul, Abraham Lincoln knew when to speak, and never spoke too early or too late. True from the first to his solemn purpose, the restoration of the Union, many who remembered that he had been chosen as a man opposed to slavery deemed him almost a traitor because he did not constantly thrust forward, as imprudently as they hoped he would, the principle of emancipation. But those who approached him never failed to discover what was nearest his heart and what most truly animated his policy. The result has justified his conduct, for it was Abraham Lincoln who put an end to American slavery, against which men who seemed greater—for Heaven’s ways are not as ours—had long contended in vain.
It is especially to be remembered that one of the sublimest state papers of modern times was that simple message in which, at the turning point of the war, Lincoln expressed, in language worthy of the grandest theocratic eras, his faith in the justice of Heaven, and his devout willingness to accept in common with the leaders of the rebellion the character of instruments in the hand of Providence. The English press deserves little honor for its behavior towards America; but the Americans will not forget that, even before success had tinged Mr. Lincoln’s career with what has sadly proved a setting glory, the simple grandeur of his recent speeches, delivered, be it observed, at the earliest proper moment, had extorted even from organs which deeply sympathized with the confederacy the acknowledgment that he was a good, a strong, a generous, a stately man. Fine gold such as this could not be dimmed by the breath of calumny, nor will it be shattered by the shot of the assassin. The mortal part of Abraham Lincoln will be consigned to an honorable and long-remembered tomb; but the memory of his statesmanship, translucent in the highest degree, wise above the average, and openly faithful more than almost any this age has witnessed to fact and right, will live in the hearts and minds of the whole Anglo-Saxon race as one of the noblest examples of that race’s highest qualities. Add to all this that Abraham Lincoln was the kindliest and pleasantest of men, that he had raised himself from nothing, and that to the last no grain of conceit or ostentation was found in him, and there stands before the world a man whose like we shall not soon look upon again.
Happily it is not needful as yet—let us hope it will not be—to sketch the character of Mr. Lincoln’s Secretary of State. Mr. Seward may yet recover; and though nothing can mitigate the horrors of the attack to which he was subjected, every one would be well pleased to evade the duty of dwelling upon an event so horrible.
[Page 411]As to the future, the speculations of yesterday were very anxious. The reputed character of the Vice-President, Mr. Lincoln’s legal and actual successor, filled many who were friendly towards the United States with vague uneasiness, and more than one scheme was suggested by which the dangers of Mr. Johnson’s accession might be averted. Some told us that General Grant would at once become provisional dictator, and keep Washington calm and the ark of the Union secure, until some new and safe arrangement could be made for the carrying on of the government. Others suggested that Andrew Johnson would be induced to resign, so that both offices might be left vacant, an understanding being entered into with him that he should be re-elected to his old office of Vice-President. These were the most moderate of the ideas which prevailed, many not hesitating to anticipate anarchy of the wildest kind, and a complete collapse of American institutions. But, before the afternoon had worn over, the telegraph bore to us a rebuke of these imaginings. The Americans have done the best thing possible to reassure the world, and to attest the immobility of their government. Immediately after Mr. Lincoln’s decease, the Vice-President was sworn in before the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and Andrew Johnson is now de jure and de facto President of the United States. It is said that he exhibited the most appropriate emotion, and indeed the circumstances could hardly have failed to solemnize any mind; but the satisfaction to be derived from his demeanor is not so solid as that which is afforded by the regular and simple manner in which the installation of Mr. Lincoln’s successor has been proceeded with. No Amurath ever succeeded Amurath, or Harry Harry, with more certainty or less disturbance. The Americans know, if we do not, that institutions such as theirs depend upon no one man for their Stability. Even when assassination rudely severs the line of the presidential succession it is instantaneously and noiselessly repaired. Englishmen have learned much of late about America and the Americans. They have now an opportunity of understanding that to an American the idea of a break in the chain of his government’s history is as little likely to occur as is the notion of a hiatus in the English succession among ourselves.
We shall indulge in no guesses as to the effect of Mr. Lincoln’s assassination on the settlement of American affairs. Some prophesy the application of vengeful rigor to the defeated South. We would rather foretell such a ready and unanimous burst of manly indignation throughout the southern States as will effectually disarm the North and unite the whole republic in abhorrence of the atrocious crime which has sullied the conclusion of a gallant war, and in yearnings for a renewal of the Union which was the object of the dead President’s dutiful devotion. Who can believe that men who have astounded the world by the noblest virtues of warfare, and the boldest determination of policy, could be driven even by the chagrin of failure to the degrading, cowardly, and criminal expedients of the bravo and the cutthroat? Rather let us suppose that these horrible catastrophes were the result of individual fanaticism, or even, as the name of Booth suggests—though one laments to find a name long linked with genius associated with crime—from theatrical and bombastic excitement. Any hypothesis rather than affix to a brave and noble people, who but lately were deemed a nation, the black blood-guiltiness of these terrible deeds! There will probably be no violence and no general vengeance; but in repentant mournfulness the ashes of good, brave, sterling Abraham Lincoln will be strewn upon the grave of civil discord.