The cautious, shrewd fellows, who hurrah loudly for the truth—after it has become safe and profitable to do so—they who run with the hound and hold with the hare—they may chuckle to themselves in their day, and rejoice at their shrewdness-but Time and GOD sift all things, however small—even such men as these. They shall not escape history.
And let them cry, 'After us the Deluge,' who will. You will live again in your children; the heritage of sin is repaid with compound interest to your name. How do you know but there is a GOD and a future knowledge of all this, that you act so boldly? What evil have your children or your name done you, that you should lay a curse on them? For if you do not put forth your hand to the great cause of truth and in the great battle of the Lord on behalf of Freedom, be certain that you are now shaping a malediction, and awaking the anathema maranatha, which shall go down into the deepest ages, and even in many lands, to cover you and yours with the dark shadow of shame forever. You shall not escape history.
But neither shall they escape who have fought the good fight for truth, for man and liberty. Truly, as the German proverb hath it, Zeit bricht Rosen und Zeit bringt Rosen—'Time breaks roses—but Time brings them also.' There is an age coming which will distinguish between the battles for conquest and idle glory and the honor of kings, and those which were fought for holy freedom. In that age, the great and good and wise, yes! even the smallest and weakest who chose the cause of Truth, will be prized above the men of all battles which ever were beforetime. Stand fast, O soldier! be firm, O friend of the good cause! let us see this thing bravely through to the end, come what may. GOD bless you!—and he will bless you! Die on the battle field, or labor humbly at home—if your heart and your hand have been given to the good work, you shall not escape history.
'Fate for you shall sheathe her shears,
You shall live some thousand years.'
It has been nobly proposed, and we doubt not that the proposition will be as nobly realized, that a shipload of food be sent to the relief of the starving operatives of England. If the wealthy classes of Great Britain were generous in proportion to the same order of men in this country, and in proportion to their own riches, it would be simply absurd for us to offer to relieve their paupers. But they are not so; and it is a matter to be deeply deplored, that the manufacturers who have made fortunes from their operatives, are, in Great Britain, the ones who are least inclined to relieve the sufferings of their poor dependants. And this we state entirely on the authority of the British press, and from the comments made by it on a recent and wretchedly abortive effort to collect from manufacturing capitalists somewhat to feed the poor who had enriched them. To an American, accustomed to hear of deeds of generosity and public spirit, the list of moneys subscribed for such an object, against the names of millionaires, would seem incredibly beggarly and pitiful.
However this may be, some one must feed the poor; and if John Bull cannot afford it, Jonathan must. There is a degree of suffering in which Englishman or confederate rebel becomes simply a suffering brother, and when he who would not act the good Samaritan becomes most truly an outlaw to all humanity. Therefore, let there be, not one, but many shiploads sent to the sufferers—let us cast our bread upon the waters, literally as well as figuratively, and give no heed or thought to its return. The London Times will, we presume, impugn the motives of the charity—call it Pecksniffian and Heep-ish—or possibly try to prove that the Federals had no hand in the good deed. Let it rave—the business in hand is to feed starving men, women, and children, and not to make political capital, or gain glory, or please a party—for that we most assuredly shall not—but to do good and act in the large-hearted manner which gives a good conscience, and which as a national trait is the noblest characteristic of a republican.
The South has been quicker than the North in perceiving that public opinion in England is rapidly changing in certain quarters in favor of the Federal cause, and it is for this reason that the press in Secessia has of late been so unamiable toward Great Britain, while Semmes has shown in his pirating so little kindness to English goods. Possibly Secessia may after all discover that she might do a more unprofitable thing than be in alliance offensive and defensive with us, and that she might go further and fare worse, either alone, or with foreign friends who are, after all, only foes in disguise.
But it is a mad and a foolish thing for England to hope to be benefited by our dissension. Have we grown weaker or less dangerous by the discovery that we are capable of raising the greatest armies and the most invincible fleets in the world? While we flourish in prosperity, we afford her an outlet for all her paupers, thieves, vagabond Bohemians, and refuse of all sorts, to say nothing of the vast mass of the really industrious poor who do well here, but who would have starved to death at home. With one person in eight in Great Britain dying as a pauper and buried at the public expense, it is hardly expedient for its people to wish to see us ruined. Were we to exclude her vagabonds and paupers by an alien act from entering this country, and at the same time close our markets to her goods, of what avail would all the cotton in the world be to her? The American public understand this thing perfectly—so perfectly that the first movement toward intervention would be to effectually shut out the offending party, to bear by itself the worst results of prostrated manufactures and a turbulent starving population.