"And with that virtue, every virtue lives."
As peace is assured, the traditional sensibilities of nations will disappear. Their frontiers will no longer frown with hostile cannon, nor will their people be nursed to hate each other. By ties of constant fellowship will they be interwoven together, no sudden trumpet waking to arms, no sharp summons disturbing the uniform repose. By steam, by telegraph, by the press, have they already conquered time, subdued space,—thus breaking down old walls of partition by which they have been separated. Ancient example loses its influence. The prejudices of another generation are removed, and the old geography gives place to a new. The heavens are divided into constellations, with names from beasts, or from some form of brute force,—as Leo, Taurus, Sagittarius, and Orion with his club; but this is human device. By similar scheme is the earth divided. But in the sight of God there is one Human Family without division, where all are equal in rights; and the attempt to set up distinctions, keeping men asunder, or in barbarous groups, is a practical denial of that great truth, religious and political, the Brotherhood of Man. The Christian's Fatherland is not merely the nation in which he was born, but the whole earth appointed by the Heavenly Father for his home. In this Fatherland there can be no place for unfriendly boundaries set up by any,—least of all, place for the War System, making nations as hostile camps.
At Lassa, in Thibet, there is a venerable stone in memory of the treaty between the courts of Thibet and China, as long ago as 821, bearing an inscription worthy of a true civilization. From Eastern story learn now the beauty of peace. After the titles of the two august sovereigns, the monument proceeds: "These two wise, holy, spiritual, and accomplished princes, foreseeing the changes hidden in the most distant futurity, touched with sentiments of compassion towards their people, and not knowing, in their beneficent protection, any difference between their subjects and strangers, have, after mature reflection and by mutual consent, resolved to give peace to their people… In perfect harmony with each other, they will henceforth be good neighbors, and will do their utmost to draw still closer the bonds of union and friendship. Henceforward the two empires of Han (China) and Pho (Thibet) shall have fixed boundaries… In preserving these limits, the respective parties shall not endeavor to injure each other; they shall not attack each other in arms, or make any more incursions beyond the frontiers now determined." Then declaring that the two "must reciprocally exalt their virtues and banish forever all mistrust between them, that travellers may be without uneasiness, that the inhabitants of the villages and fields may live at peace, and that nothing may happen to cause a misunderstanding," the inscription announces, in terms doubtless Oriental: "This benefit will be extended to future generations, and the voice of love (towards its authors) will be heard wherever the splendor of the sun and the moon is seen. The Pho will be tranquil in their kingdom, and the Han will be joyful in their empire." [Footnote: Travels of the Russian Mission through Mongolia to China, and Residence in Peking, in 1820-21, by George Timkowski, Vol. I. pp. 460-64.] Such is the benediction which from early times has spoken from one of the monuments erected by the god Terminus. Call it Oriental; would it were universal! While recognizing a frontier, there is equal recognition of peace as the rule of international life.
THE REPUBLIC.
In the abolition of the War System the will of the people must become all-powerful, exalting the Republic to its just place as the natural expression of citizenship. Napoleon has been credited with the utterance at St. Helena of the prophecy, that "in fifty years Europe would be Republican or Cossack." [Footnote: See the New York Times of August 11, 1870, where the reputed prophecy is cited in these terms, in a letter of the 27th July from the London correspondent of that journal, with remarks indicating an expectation of its fulfilment in the results of the present war.] This famous saying has been variously represented; but the following are its original terms, as recorded at the time by Las Cases, to whom it was addressed in conversation, and as authenticated by the Commission appointed by Louis Napoleon for the collection and publication of the matters now composing the magnificent work entitled "Correspondance de Napoleon Ier":—-
"Dans Petat actuel des choses, avant dix ans, toute l'Europe peut etre cosaque, ou toute en republique."—LAS CASES, Memorial de Sainte-Hellene, (Reimpression de 1823 et 1824,) Tom. III. p. 111,—Journal, 18 Avril 1816. Correspondence de Napoleon I, (Paris, 1858-69,) Tom. XXXIL p. 326.] Evidently Europe will not be Cossack, unless the Cossack is already changed to Republican,—as well may be, when it is known, that, since the great act of Enfranchisement, in February, 1861, by which twenty- three millions of serfs were raised to citizenship, with the right to vote, fifteen thousand three hundred and fifty public schools have been opened in Russia. A better than Napoleon, who saw mankind with truer insight, Lafayette, has recorded a clearer prophecy. At the foundation of the monument on Bunker Hill, on the semi-centennial anniversary of the battle, 17th June, 1825, our much-honored national guest gave this toast: "Bunker Hill, and the holy resistance to oppression, which has already enfranchised the American hemisphere. The next half-century Jubilee's toast shall be,—To Enfranchised Europe."[Footnote: Columbian Centinel, June 18, 1825.] The close of that half-century, already so prolific, is at hand. Shall it behold the great Jubilee with all its vastness of promise accomplished? Enfranchised Europe, foretold by Lafayette, means not only the Republic for all, but Peace for all; it means the United States of Europe, with the War System abolished. Against that little faith through which so much fails in life, I declare my unalterable conviction, that "government of the people, by the people, and for the people"— thus simply described by Abraham Lincoln [Footnote: Address at the Consecration of the National Cemetery at Gettysburg, November 19, 1863: McPherson's Political History of the United States during the Great Rebellion, p. 606.]—is a necessity of civilization, not only because of that republican equality without distinction of birth which it establishes, but for its assurance of permanent peace. All privilege is usurpation, and, like Slavery, a state of war, relieved only by truce, to be broken by the people in their might. To the people alone can mankind look for the repose of nations; but the Republic is the embodied people. All hail to the Republic, equal guardian of all, and angel of peace!
Our own part is simple. It is, first, to keep out of war,—and, next, to stand firm in those ideas which are the life of the Republic. Peace is our supreme vocation. To this we are called. By this we succeed. Our example is more than an army. But not on this account can we be indifferent, when Human Rights are assailed or republican institutions are in question. Garibaldi asks for a "word," [Footnote: "The cause of Liberty in Italy needs the word of the United States Government, which would be more powerful in its behalf than that of any other."—Message to Mr. Sumner from Caprera, May 24,1869.] that easiest expression of power. Strange will it be, when that is not given. To the Republic, and to all struggling for Human Rights, I give word, with heart on the lips. Word and heart I give. Nor would I have my country forget at any time, in the discharge of its transcendent duties, that, since the rule of conduct and of honor is the same for nations as for individuals, the greatest nation is that which does most for Humanity.