Who dares do more is none.”
So with us now. We are permitted to do all that may become men, but nothing more.
Surely nobody will argue that the “barbarities of Andersonville,” and all those tortures we deplore, can behoove men. As well undertake, by way of retaliation, to revive the boot and thumb-screw of the Inquisition, the fires of Smithfield, “Luke’s iron crown and Damien’s bed of steel,” or to repeat that execrable crime pictured by Dante, in one of his most admired passages, where Ugolino and his children were shut up in a tower, without food or water, and left to die slowly, cruelly, wickedly, by starvation:—
“Thou modern Thebes! what though, as Fame hath said,
Count Ugolino did thy forts betray?
His sons deserved not punishment so dread.”[61]
Thanks to the immortal poet who has blasted forever this sickening enormity, and rendered its imitation impossible! Thanks to that mighty voice which has given new sanction to the mandate of Public Law. And yet in this terrible case there was retaliation, and the famished victim is revealed as ferociously gnawing the skull of his tormentor. But this was not on earth.
It is when we consider precisely the conduct of the Rebels, as represented,—when we read the stories of their atrocities,—when we call to mind the sufferings of our men in their hands,—when we look on the pictures introduced into this discussion, where photographic art has sought to exhibit the living skeletons,—when the whole scene in all its horror is before us, and our souls are filled with unutterable anguish, that we confess how difficult, how absolutely impossible, it is for us to follow this savage example. And just in proportion as this treatment of our soldiers transcends the usages of civilized society must the example be rejected. Such is the law you cannot disobey.
Nor am I to be considered indifferent to the condition of those unhappy prisoners. I do not yield to the Committee, or to any Senator, in ardor or anxiety for their protection. Whatever can be done I am ready to do. But, as American citizens, they have an interest that we should do nothing by which our country shall forfeit the great place belonging to it in the vanguard of nations. It cannot be best for them that our country should do an unworthy thing. It cannot be best for them that the national destiny should be thus darkened. Duties are in proportion to destinies, and from the very heights of our example I argue again that we cannot allow ourselves, under any passing passion or resentment, to accept a policy which history must condemn. There is not a patriot soldier who would not cry out, “Let me suffer, but save my country!”
Even if you make up your minds to do this thing, you cannot. The whole idea is impracticable. The attempt must fail, because human nature is against you. “Nemo repente turpissimus.” A humane and civilized people cannot suddenly become inhuman and uncivilized. Conscience, heart, soul and body, will all rise against you. From every side will be repeated that generous cry which comes to us from the darkest day of French history, when the courageous governor said to the monarch who ordered the massacre of St. Bartholomew, “Sire, I have under me good citizens and brave soldiers, but not a single executioner”; or that other later cry, when the French Convention, under the lead of Barère, decreed that all English prisoners should be shot,—“We will not shoot them,” said a stout-hearted sergeant; “if the Convention takes pleasure in killing prisoners, let members kill them and eat them, like savages as they are.” But the citizens and soldiers of the armies of the United States are not less generous. They, too, would cry out, “Let members of Congress do this work, if it is to be done; but do not impose it upon a fellow-man.”