ng to blast the fondest hopes of mankind by destroying this
glorious augury of a mature civilization, where man shall develop into
the full earthly stature of a being created in the divine image. Shall
it be? Not if the North is faithful to God, to mankind, and to itself.

Let us take courage. The westward-travelling sunbeams have ever to
oppose the western darkness, but they conquer always. So American
civilization, also, has its darkness and barbaric elements to battle
with, but they too, God willing, shall vanish before it.

Why have we been forced into this desperate, unexpected conflict? One
reason may possibly be, that by it, we may be aroused to a living sense
of the great value of our inheritance, the Union, when threatened with
its loss. 'Blessings brighten as they take their flight.' Benefit's
daily enjoyed, with hardly a care or effort on our part, are not prized
as they should be. When, however, we are threatened with their loss, we
awaken from indifference. A new sense of their value springs up, and a
severe contest for their preservation stamps their true worth indelibly
on the heart. Threaten to cut off the air a man breathes, the food and
drink that sustains him, and you rouse all his energies into new life;
and he now prizes these common but unthought-of blessings as he never
did before. And so it will be one effect of this contest, to arouse us
as a nation to see clearly our vantage ground in the world's progress,
and to stir us up as individuals, to lead higher and truer lives, each
for his own and for his country's sake. And when this Southern insane
wickedness is quelled, and the great American nation can rest and
breathe freely once more, it will then calmly ponder the past, and
survey the future. In the degree of its religion and virtue, and next of
its intelligence and energy, it will, in the course of time, clearly
perceive and wisely inaugurate a new social and industrial life, which
will be as far in advance of the present system of free labor as the
latter is itself in advance of slavery. What that is, cannot here be
stated. It will, however, be but the inevitable result of agencies and
influences now at work, and only interrupted and endangered by this
pro-slavery rebellion.

With these remarks, we enter upon our topic: 'Why is the Union
priceless?'

* * * * *

There are two reasons, among others, why it is so, upon which we shall
dwell at some length.