why not?...

The history of England, the history of any free country has not on
record a position thus anomalous, even humiliating, as is that of
the patriots in Congress, thanks to Mr. Lincoln's helpless
stubbornness. The patriots forcibly must consider Mr. Lincoln, even
Sewardised, Blairised, Halleckised as he is, as being the only legal
power for the salvation of the country. The patriots must support
him, and instead of exposing the wretched faults, mistakes, often
ill-will of his administration, must defend the administration
against the attacks of the Copperheads, who try to destroy or
disorganize the administration on account of that atom of good that
it accidentally carries out on its own hook. And thus the patriots
must suffer and bear patiently abuses heaped on them by the
treasonable or by the stupid press, by intriguers and traitors; and
patriots cannot make even the slightest attempt to vindicate their
names.

_January 26th._--The visits to the White House and the "_I had a
talk with the President_," are among the prominent causes of the
distracted condition of affairs. With comparatively few exceptions,
almost everybody expands a few inches in his own estimation, when he
says to his listeners, nay, to his friends: "I had a talk with the
President." Of course it is no harm in private individuals to have
such _a talk_, but I have frequently observed and experienced that
public men had better refrain from having any talk with him. Very
often he is not a jot improved by their talk, and they come out from
the interview worsted in some sort or other.

Sumner, the Roman, the Cicero, was to-day urged by several
abolitionists from Boston to expose the mischief of both the foreign
and the domestic policy of Seward. The Senator replied that he is
more certain to succeed against that public nuisance and public
enemy by not attacking him openly. I vainly ransack my recollection
of my classic reading for the name of any Roman who ever made such a
reply.

_January 26th: Two o'clock P. M._--Hooker is in command! And
patriotic hearts thrill with joy! Mud, bad season, mortality, loss
of time, demoralization, such is the inheritance left by McClellan,
Halleck and Burnside--such are the results prepared by the infamous
West Point and other muddy intriguers in Washington, and in the
army,--such is the inheritance transmitted to Hooker, by the cursed
Administration procrastinations. In all military history there is
seldo