ord._ Edited by Frank Moore. Six vols.

[7] See especially _The Old Sergeant_, a remarkable poem by
Forseythe Willson, in the sixth volume.

It is of importance, especially considering the part which what are
called the "leading minds" of the South are expected to play in
reconstruction, to keep clearly before our eyes the motives and the
manner of the Rebellion. Perhaps we should say inducements rather than
motives, for of these there was but a single one put forward by the
seceding States, namely, the obtaining security, permanence, and
extension for the system of slavery. We do not use the qualifying
epithet "African," because the franker propagandists of Southern
principles affirmed the divine institution of slavery pure and simple,
without regard to color or the curse of Canaan. This being the single
motive of the Rebellion, what was its real object? Primarily, to
possess itself of the government by a sudden _coup d'etat_; or that
failing, then, secondarily, by a peaceful secession, which should
paralyze the commerce and manufactures of the Free States, to bring
them to terms of submission. Whatever may have been the opinion of some
of the more far-sighted, it is clear that a vast majority of the
Southern people, including their public men, believed that their
revolution would be peaceful. Their inducements to moving precisely
when they did were several. At home the treasury was empty; faithless
ministers had supplied the Southern arsenals with arms, and so disposed
the army and navy as to render them useless for any sudden need; but
above all, they could reckon on several months of an administration
which, if not friendly, was so feeble as to be more dangerous to the
country than to its betrayers, and there was a great party at the North
hitherto their subservient allies, and now sharing with them in the
bitterness of a common political defeat.[8] Abroad there was peace,
with the prospect of its continuance; the two great maritime powers
were also the great consumers of cotton, were both deadly enemies, like
themselves, to the democratic principle, and, if not actively
interfering, would at least throw all the moral weight of their
sympathy and encouragement on the Southern side. They were not
altogether mistaken in their reckoning. The imbecility of Mr. Buchanan
bedded the ship of state in an ooze of helpless inaction, where none of
her guns could be brought to bear, and whence nothing but the tide o