e fire-eating little city
in which four years back had been fired the gun that opened the War,
than they would have been by an immediate and strenuous occupation.
Sherman had more important matters on hand than the business of looking
after the original fire-eaters. He was hurrying northward, close on the
heels of Johnston, to prevent if possible the combination of Johnston's
troops with Lee's army which was supposed to be retreating from
Virginia.

On the 4th of March comes the second inaugural, in which Lincoln speaks
almost in the language of a Hebrew prophet. The feeling is strong upon
him that the clouds of war are about to roll away but he cannot free
himself from the oppression that the burdens of the War have produced.
The emphasis is placed on the all-important task of bringing the
enmities to a close with the end of the actual fighting. He points out
that responsibilities rest upon the North as well as upon the South and
he invokes from those who under his leadership are bringing the contest
to a triumphant close, their sympathy and their help for their
fellow-men who have been overcome. The address is possibly the most
impressive utterance ever made by a national leader and it is most
characteristic of the fineness and largeness of nature of the man. I
cite the closing paragraph:

"If we shall suppose that slavery is one of those offences which in
the providence of God needs must come, and which having continued
through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He
gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe to those
by whom the offence came, shall we discern therein any departure
from those Divine attributes, which the believers in the Living God
always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that
this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet if God wills
that it should continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsmen
in two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and
until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid for by
another drop of blood drawn by the War, as was said two thousand
years ago so still it must be said, that the judgments of the Lord
are true, and righteous altogether.... With malice towards none,
with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to
see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in, to bind
up the na