, which, both in regard to the number of
combatants engaged, and the magnitude of the interests involved, and its
far-reaching consequences, was the most colossal conflict of modern
times. Before presenting a few of my own personal recollections of the
struggle, let me say that when the struggle was over, no one was more
eager than myself to bury the tomahawk, and to offer the calumet of
peace to our Southern fellow countrymen and fellow Christians. Whenever
I have visited them their cordial greeting has warmed the cockles of my
heart. I thank God that the great gash has been so thoroughly healed,
and that I have lived to see the day when the people of the North feel a
national pride in the splendid prowess of Lee, and the heroic Christian
character of Stonewall Jackson, and when some of the noblest tributes to
Abraham Lincoln have been spoken by such representative Southerners as
Mr. Grady, of Georgia, and Mr. Watterson, of Kentucky. I had hoped ere
this to see the Northern and Southern wings of our venerable
Presbyterian Church reunited; but I am confident that there are plenty
of people now living who will yet witness their happy ecclesiastical
nuptials. Terrible as was that war in the sacrifice of precious life,
and in the destruction of property, it was unquestionably inevitable.
Mr. Seward was right when he called the conflict "irrepressible."
Abraham Lincoln was a true prophet when he declared, at Springfield,
Ill., in June, 1858, that "A house divided against itself cannot stand;
I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half
free." When in my early life I spoke to my good mother about some
anti-slavery addresses that had been delivered, she said to me, with
wonderful foresight, "These speeches will avail but little; _slavery
will go down in blood."_ That it has gone down even at the cost of so
much blood and treasure is to-day as much a matter for congratulation in
the South as it is in the North.

My first glimpse of the long predicted conflict was the sight of the
Seventh Regiment,--composed of the flower of New York,--swinging down
Broadway in April, 1861, on its way to the protection of
Washington,--amid the thundering cheers of the bystanders. Before long I
offered my services to the "Christian commission" which had been
organized by that noble and godly minded patriot, George H. Stuart, of
Philadelphia, and I went on to Washington to preach to our soldiers. I
found Washington a hu