lso insisted, in our every issue, that, while emancipation should
be borne constantly in view and provided for as something which must
eventually be realized for the sake of the advancing interests of WHITE
labor and its expansion, everything should be effected as gradually _as
possible_, so as to neither interfere with the plans of the war now
waging, nor to stir up needless political strife. We simply asked for
some firmly-based official recognition of the rottenness of the 'slavery
plank in the Southern platform,' and trusted that the _utmost_ caution
and deliberation would be observed in eventually forwarding
emancipation. We were literally alone, as a publication, in these views,
and were misrepresented both by the enemies who were behind us and the
zealous friends who were before us. We have never cried for that
'unconditional and immediate emancipation of slavery' with which the
_Liberator_, with the kindest intentions, but most erroneously, credits
us. We should be glad enough to see it, were it possible; but, knowing
that the immediate-action theory has been delaying the cause for thirty
years, we have invariably suggested the _firm_ but gradual method. That
method has at last been formally advanced by the President, in a manner
which can reasonably give offense to no one. The beginning has been
made: it is for the country to decide whether it--the most important
suggestion of the age--shall be realized.

* * * * *

The news of the capture of Fort Donelson had barely reached us, the roar
of the guns celebrating our rapid successes had not died away, ere that
fragment of the Northern ultra pro-slavery party which had done so much
towards deluding the South into secession, impudently raised its head
and began most inopportunely and impertinently to talk of amnesty and
the rights of the South. There are things which, under certain
limitations, may be right in themselves, but which, when urged at the
wrong time, become wrongs and insults; and these premature cries to
restore the enemy to his old social and political standing are of that
nature. They are insufferable, and would be ridiculous, were it not that
in the present critical aspect of our politics they may become
dangerous. Since this war began, we have heard much of the want of true
loyalty in the ultra abolitionists, who would make the object of the
struggle simply emancipation, without regard to consequences; and we
have no