or from the beginning the faintest wish of separation.

CHAPTER VIII.

PROBABLE CONSEQUENCES OF THE CRISIS.

General Cass was nearer right than he himself imagined. In arresting
from the beginning the development of the plans of the South, by a
vigorous attitude, and by the blockade, then easy, of Charleston, the
Government would not only have rendered it the trifling service of
maintaining its means of opposition in Congress, but also the
inappreciable boon of averting the dangers of war. What has happened, on
the contrary? Precisely what must have happened, the human heart being
such as it is. When on one side is found all the ardor, all the
activity, all the resolution, and, into the bargain, all the apparent
success, while on the other is found languor, hesitation, inaction, and
disgraceful delays, it happens almost infallibly that the undecided are
hurried away by the fanatics.

Let the United States take care! the chances of the future incur the
risk, at this moment, of becoming more grave. To-day, the border States
are on the point of declaring themselves; to-day, in consequence, it is
important to offer to their natural irresolution the support of a policy
as firm as moderate. Given over without defence to the ardent
solicitations of the extreme South, they are only too likely to yield,
particularly if the Federal Government give them reason to believe that
the separation will encounter no serious obstacle.

We must remember that ignorant communities are here in question, who are
ruled by their prejudices, and who have never tolerated the slightest
show of discussion upon questions connected with the subject of slavery.
Such communities are capable of committing the most egregious follies;
panics, sudden resolutions, mistaken unanimities, are common among them.
Formerly, kings were pitied who lived surrounded by flatterers, it was
said (we have provided against that) that the truth never reached them;
the, planters are the only men I see to-day that can be likened to these
monarchs of olden time; neither books, nor journals, nor preachers, are
permitted to point out to them their duties or their interests in the
matter of slavery.

The slightest symptom of inertia or of feebleness in the Federal
Government at this time, will, therefore, expose the border States to
great perils, and, through them, the whole Confederation. As easy as it
would have been, with a little energy, to prevent the evil, to c