# A Sermon, Preached on the National Fast Day, at Church Green, Boston

A SERMON,
PREACHED ON THE
NATIONAL FAST DAY,
AT CHURCH GREEN, BOSTON.
BY REV. ORVILLE DEWEY.
PASTOR OF THE CHURCH.
BOSTON: TICKNOR AND FIELDS. 1861.
Printed by Geo. C. Rand & Avery, 3 Cornhill.
SERMON.
TEXT — THE 80TH PSALM.
I shall take for my text this morning, the Psalm which I have just read to you. It is applicable to the occasion on which we are met together. Its application here, to-day, is even more striking than it was originally. In this way it was that many a text of the old time was “fulfilled,” — filled fuller of meaning, when applied to the events of a later day. And so it is now.
For here God hath planted a nation, far greater and more prosperous than that of the Hebrews. He has “cast out the heathen, and planted it.” It is by ordinance divine, we believe, — though we do not defend every human action connected with it, — that poor, ignorant, wandering tribes were to give place to a great and civilized people. This North American continent was not meant to be a mere hunting-ground. Not wild native growths were to overrun and occupy it; but the seeds of civilized empire were to be planted here. They were ​planted; they grew, — let the toil and pains and sufferings of the early time, let its nurturing blood, tell how they grew, — till they took “deep root and filled the land; till the hills were covered with their shadow, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars; til they sent out their boughs to the sea, and their branches unto the river;” till, in short, a land a hundred times larger than Palestine, was filled with more than thirty millions of people, all abiding under one grand sovereignty, in such peace, and freedom, and prosperity, and abundance, and rapid progress, as were never seen in the world before.
This planting of a nation, but especially of such a nation, is something sublime and solemn to contemplate. Government of some kind, — without which social order and private security cannot exist, — is certainly the ordinance of God. And, therefore, all mankind have agreed to brand treason as a crime against heaven and earth, and they have stricken it with pains and penalties, with attainders and forfeitures, beyond any other crime against society. But if ever the footsteps of a divine providence have been seen in the growth of any nation, it appears to me that it is in this, our American nationality. If any government ever were, I believe that this is an ordinance of God. And if any treason were ever more inexcusable and monstrous than any other yet seen on earth, I believe it is this which we witness to-day.
​And, therefore, without wishing to use opprobrious terms, I cannot but regard the language of the text as applicable to the present painful crisis of our national affairs. “Why hast thou broken down her hedges, so that all they which pass by the way do pluck her? The boar of the wood doth waste it, and the wild beast of the field doth devour it.” It is a wild, self-willed, passionate, mad, and reckless invasion of the public order, — this Southern revolt; and if we have any self-respect, any loyalty, any regard for law and lawful rule, we must treat it accordingly. And well may we add the prayer, “Return, we beseech thee, O God of Hosts! look down from heaven, and- behold and visit this vine, and the vineyard which thy right hand hath planted, and the branch which thou madest strong for thyself.”
The President of the United States has invited us to assemble ourselves together, to offer such a prayer; and this, not merely as we do every Sunday, but with some special thoughtfulness, humiliation, and sorrow.
On one account, I am well disposed to do so, I do most heartily mourn over this dreadful conflict in which we are engaged with the revolted Departments of the South. I mourn over this awful spectacle of Christian men, who were lately fellow-citizens, embruing their hands in each other's blood. I mourn with those who mourn for the absent. the wounded. and the dead. All ​war is horrible, but this to me is the most horrible of all wars.
But, at the same time, I do most heartily respect, approve, and enter into, the feelings of those who have sprung to the support of the government in this great emergency. It is loyalty to law and lawful sovereignty. It is to defend the. national integrity and stability and honor, that our people have taken up arms. And yet, I cannot but wonder at the buoyancy and eagerness with which our soldiers go into the fight, — demanding it, and singing, shouting, as they march to the battle-field. I would rather see them on their knees. in prayer, and solemn self-consecration to that awful work. That awful work, I say; and I cannot look upon it in any other light. It is to me the most tragic spectacle under the sun. If our people must strike this blow, as I believe they must, yet they should strike with reluctance and sorrow. It is the act of Brutus, slaying his own sons for treason and conspiracy against the state.
It is, perhaps, too much to expect of a people, — a whole people,— that it will take up arms altogether in this spirit. We must take men as they are; and few are the men that can fight in pure sorrow for those whom they assail. But so, if possible, should men strike for the right. So should they wound and kill their fellows. — in sorrow, though indignation be mingled with their sorrow. So especially should a rebellion be put down, ​where the antagonists were lately our fellow-citizens, and may have been our friends. This is a contest, which, whatever passion or frenzy there be on the other side, requires on ours much reflection and cool determination.
If we were resisting foreign invasion, — if we were fighting people of another nation and name than our own, it would be a different thing. But we are fighting our own people. We wound those whom we would fain comfort and heal. We slay those whom we love. I say it, and maintain it. I will not be swept away from this ground by the passions of the hour. I have known many of the Southern people. I have seen them in their homes. I have seen the system of domestic service, by which their homes are supported. But, although I dislike their system, and think it in principle utterly wrong, I do not hate them; though I have brought upon myself their displeasure by my plain speaking of slavery, yet I held, and still hold them, in dear esteem for their many virtues. Still, and nevertheless, I oppose them; and I would do so, though they were the dearest friends on earth. Though they were Christians, as holy as the apostles, I would do so; as Paul “withstood Peter to the face;” and for the same reason, — “because they are to be blamed.”
But, though I think them wrong, and to be blamed, and to be resisted, yet is it right, one may say, to resist them in this manner? Since they desired to separate ​from us, why should we not have yielded to them, and have said, “Go in peace?” I answer, that to have done so would have been to strike at the roots of all civil government, All lawful sovereignty, all political order, any such thing as nationality, would be impossible upon this principle.
But let us consider first, the question of war in general, and then, the question of this particular war. The sadness and horror I feel at this war, drive me-upon considering what place war has in the world, — what place in the providence of God, — what place in the duties of men.
With regard to war in general then, in the first place, or with regard to war abstractly considered, I have been led of late, to ask whether we have not to revise our theories. I never went to the length of some of our Peace Societies; but thus far I went, — I was inclined to admit that war is never justifiable except for self-defence. When invaded, we might fight; but in no other case. Now, however, I doubt whether this limitation can be defended.
In reconsidering the subject I am struck at the outset with this potent fact, — that war seems to have been a part of the normal condition of nations, ever since the beginning of the world; in fact, just as defect, ignorance, mistake, conflict of opinion, is a part of its normal condition. It has been said in one of the discourses called ​out by the present crisis, that probably no man has ever lived to the period of seventy years without encountering this fact of war; and I am inclined to think that the statement might be made still stronger; namely: that no nation has existed forty years without being engaged in some war, external or internal. And there has hardly been a year, or perhaps a moment of time, since the world began, when war has not been going on somewhere. It is computed that more than six thousand millions of the human race have perished in battle, — about seven times the present population of the earth. Now such a fact must be resolved into some kind of consistency with a providential order. The fact stands; it stares us in the face; and it seems to be inevitable. How could it be so, if all war, or all but defensive war, is contrary to the will of God?
Mr. Prudhon, the French writer, in a work lately published, “on War and Peace,” has attempted to legitimate this fact; to show it as incorporated into the very constitution of the world, and as a part of the lawful and ordained condition of men and nations. He maintains that there is “a right of war,” founded on “the right of force;” that is to say, that any nation, deprived by another, or conceiving itself to be deprived, of what is lawfully its own, — a fishery or territory, a fort or arsenal, — has a perfect right to reclaim it by force, and, if ​necessary, by military force. He maintains that war is a divine thing; an ordinance of heaven, for the adjustment of national claims, not otherwise possible; that the right to use such force lies at the bottom of all nationality, of every political constitution; that the noblest nations are the surest to fight for their rights, and the meanest people to surrender them. And then he goes on to glorify war, as the tribunal of justice, the fountain of honor, the source of progress and improvement among nations, in a strain in which I confess, eloquent as he is, that he is too hard for me.
For I believe that peace is a diviner thing, — which he also seems to admit; I believe that patience and forgiveness are more divine than exaction and force; and that, as the world improves, there will be less war, and, ultimately, none at all; and that nations will yet find a way, by conventions and arbitrations, to settle their disputes without bloodshed, as citizens of the same State now do.
Still, I cannot refuse to see that something of what Mr. Prudhon says, is true. Force does lie at the bottom of all political order; and there are occasions when it must be used, and, in the imperfectness of our present civilization, must be used in war.
And if I go back to the natural and essential condition of humanity, I can come to no other conclusion. Suppose, — I hope you will pardon the homeliness of my illustration for its appositeness, — suppose, I say, that I ​and my neighbor are living side by side, in a state of nature, with no common government to appeal to; and he says to me, “This piece of land, this farm on which you live, is mine;” and I reply, “No, it is mine; it was my father’s before me; he gave it to me, and it is mine.” “Nay,” he says, “It is mine;” and he comes on with the strong hand to take possession. What am I to do? Am I to acquiesce? May I not resist him? And if, when I do so, he pulls a stake from the fence, and I another, and they become as spears in our hands, — nay, and if I am beaten down by him, better that I should fall asserting my right, than tamely to yield it to wrong. I should at least have bravely set forth my sense of justice; and I should help, though falling, to spread the sense of justice among my neighbors. But if I did nothing, and all men around me did nothing, in such a case, to vindicate the right, all justice would fall to the ground. And I myself should be despoiled on every hand. One man has taken my land, another would take my house, saying, “he will not resist;” another would snatch my purse; and I should be turned out, shelterless, to perish. No, that must not be; that was not meant to be. On the contrary, I believe that God has given me the right to protect my life, my person, and my property, in giving me the power and the instinctive will to do so.
So it is with nations. What sort of a nation would ​that be which should form its constitution in this wise? “We think it advisable that we should be one people, and should have a form of government; we hope that all the citizens will respect and obey it; — we wish that no one would steal or rob on the highway, or murder anybody, for we think it is very wrong; — and we desire that other nations will let us alone; that they will never attack our ships or our cities; that nobody will take our forts or arsenals, for we should be very much displeased at it.” No; that might be a constitution for a flock of sheep, but not for a nation of men. No. a mighty will lies at the bottom of every nationality; a will to use force to preserve its integrity and to execute its laws; and its language is: We, the king; or. we, the nobles; or, we, the people ordain the constitution and the laws; and we will use all necessary force to restrain and punish all crime, and, above all, the crime of treason. within; and to resist and overwhelm all invaders of our rights without. This latter is war.
And now let it be considered, that justice is not always palpably on one side. Nay, I believe that there is a conscience on both sides, always, at the bottom of every war; for war is not robbery nor piracy. where the marauder knows that he has no right, but a solemn levying of the national force. I do not believe that nations fight but upon the ground that they have the right upon their side. The greatest mystery, — if I sought to find one, — in the ​system of Providence, is this difference of opinion, with all its consequences; and yet I see, that among imperfect beings, it is inevitable; that it was, in the nature of things, impossible to constitute a race of moral and imperfect beings, without this clement of trouble. And the standards of war are the bloody signals lifted up to proclaim and defend opinions. Cousin has somewhere said that every battle is the conflict of ideas; nay, more, and that the right always gains the victory. This can be true only in one sense, viz: that the moral verdict of the world is always, ultimately, given in favor of the right, even though it sinks in the visible contest. Thus the Three Hundred at Thermopylæ fell; but the ages have rung with celebration and triumph over that mighty deed. Fallen, sunk in death, they are crowned with immortal victory.
I have said these things upon war in general; giving only hints instead of descriptions, for which I have no space at present; and I have said them to show you that war is not always unnecessary; that all war is not unholy and profane; that there may be such a thing as a righteous war, — and in such a war I believe we ave now engaged. Let us consider it.
Let me speak of this matter in the first place, as between us and the southern people, though I may have nothing in particular to say that is new upon it. But I have often imagined myself, knowing many of them as I ​do, to debate this question with them mm person, in conversation. I have thought of what they would say, and what I should reply to them.
“You put the blame of this war upon us,” they would say; “but it is not upon us. “We are wronged; we are oppressed; we are fighting for our liberties. We have a right to separate from you. You have made us desire to do so. You have contemned our social system. You have made the relation of fellow-citizens utterly disagreeable to us. Why do you attempt to hold us? Why will you not let us alone? Why will you not let us depart in peace?”
“In peace?” I answer, “in peace! do you say? Was not your very first step to arm yourselves, and to take your stand in armed defiance to the common Government over us all, to which we had all alike sworn fealty? Your leaders took that fatal initiative, and you followed. It was not we who began the fight, but you. You were long arming yourselves before we ever moved, — as we have found to our cast.
“But wherein were you wronged? What right was denied you? You held your slaves, and had power over them, untouched. Slavery was a municipal institution, with which the General Government did not propose to interfere, and docs not now. Is some Northern criticism, grant it were severe at times, a sufficient reason for breaking the national bond? And do you really demand, as the ​price of a mere political union with you, that our months and minds shall be shut in silence on this subject? It would be greater bondage than any you complain of. We must speak; all the world must speak of it. The fires of criticism are burning all around you; and the South, instead of reasoning or letting others reason, seems ‘like scorpion girt with fire,’ more likely ta destroy itself and its favorite institution together. Yes, ‘the institution!’ — this, disguise it who may, is the cause, at bottom, of the whole difficulty. You are indignant with our opinions about slavery. Only let us of the North say, ‘We have changed our mind; you have convinced us that we were wrong; we have come to see that slavery is a just and admirable thing, and are sorry that we opposed it,’ and you would be good friends and good fellow-citizens with us to-morrow.
“But, at any rate,” they say, “we have a constitutional right to separate.” That is the fatal theory, — the other feeling is the impulse, — but that is the fatal theory which supports this whole Southern movement. Not treason, revolt, rebellion, is it, — but secession is the word that covers up all the mischief. John Bell, of Tennessee, is the only man that I have heard of, connected with this movement, that plainly said, “I am going to be a rebel.” But he said what is true. For it is rebellion. It is just as much rebellion as it would be for Normandy or Burgundy, provinces of France, or for Scotland or Ireland, ​parts of Britain, to break off, arm themselves, and bid defiance to their respective governments.
Thus should I argue with the Southern people, or any company of them, if I could meet them face to face. But sorrowfal is the arguing which, carried into action, must cost thousands, and perhaps ten thousands, of human lives, I mourn over the necessity by which it is urged. A day of thoughtfulness, humiliation, and grief, is a fit season for it. It is fit that a great people, engaging in such a contest, should bow down before God in prayer and sorrow.
And I do not wonder that the heart of a humane man should sink within him at the prospect of this bloody encounter between the loyal people of America and the rerolted States. Nor am I surprised that there are some among ourselves who say, “Let us have peace rather than all this sacrifice of blood and treasure;” who say, “Although the Southern people are in the wrong, yet they think themselves in the right, and it is hard to crush them down, even if we can do so; let us go on with a Northern and Southern republic; there are evils and perils in the plan, but it is better than this fratricidal war.” And again, I am not surprised that people abroad, looking as idle spectators upon what is passing in a far-distant country, regard this-war as a contest between rival States, — Mexican or South American States; or, at any rate, have come to the conclusion that a revolt which has assumed such immense proportions, should be considered as a ​successful revolution, or as warranting a permanent political division.
Yet I firmly maintain that all these ways of thinking are wrong; here in the house of God, and amidst the solemnities of prayer and humiliation, I firmly maintain that neither the horror of bloodshed, nor brotherly sympathy, nor cold, unsympathizing foreign criticism, are entitled to be our guidance in the awful circumstances in which we are placed.
There is a higher plane of thought, I conceive, than that on which these considerations are placed. Above the mere impulses of humanity and sympathy, I believe, we must rise, if we would rise to the height of this great argument. And we must look farther than our foreign critics do, if we would understand the duty of the hour.
I see, first, a grand question of right, of lawful sovereignty, as between ourselves and the Southern people. There is a right, there is a lawful sovereignty, somewhere in this controversy? Whose is it? Somebody must yield here. Who? Some principles must give way. Which? Loyalty or rebellion? The freedom interest or the slave interest? The right of a majority, or the right of a minority? The conscience of a nation, or of a broken fragment of a nation? The claim, our lawful claim to the national property and domain, — our claim to the national fortresses, arsenals, munitions, and mints; or the claim to ​seize and despoil them? Which, I say, shall be surrendered, — supposing that there were an equally strong conviction on both sides? When it is demanded of us that we shall give up what we believe to be the national law and sovereignty, or that we shall suffer the grand fabric of the government to be broken down with impunity, can it in justice be expected of us that we should consent to it? In honor, can we do it, — in conscience, in loyalty, in obedience to any principle of virtue or religion?
Even in a private relation, where I might have a personal right to make any sacrifice I pleased, — yet even then, if a man were to assail me who was only half as strong as I am, — if he were to snatch my purse, and should lift his hand to strike me, could it be expected that I should let him go on and work his will upon me? Would it be thought strange if I should lay my hand upon him, and, using only so much force as was necessary to restrain him, should consign him to the police or to prison? And certainly the plea for forbearance and humanity, — the claim to be “let alone,” — the exclamation that he was very hardly and cruelly dealt with, would be thought, by every bystander, to be a very strange one in his mouth.
And this plea for humanity, it must be remembered, has two sides to it. There are other human beings to be considered, besides those who are engaged in this revolt. If the Southern rebellion could succeed, the slave-trade would ​he reopened; a great slave empire would be built up upon our borders; it would extend itself over new regions; and all the misery and injustice of African bondage would be perpetuated, through what period none can tell. In the interest of humanity and of the human race, in a just participation in the recognised duty of all civilized nations, I think we are bound to prevent that, if we can. Not to say that if this slave government could establish itself, and stand side by side with ours, instead of a war of a year or two, we should open the bloody history of endless wars.
To any man among ourselves who dissents from a whole loyal people in this matter, I would say, — what ground do you take? Do you say that secession is right? Then, doubtless, we are all wrong. Do you admit that it is wrong, — politically, morally wrong, — a false and fatal principle in all government, and without all just cause as against ours; and then do you say that we are to yield everything that this false and ruinous principle demands of us? Where is our manhood, if we can do so? I have heard this called a politician’s war. It is utterly false to say so. Opposition to it, rather, is a politician’s opposition. It is a nation’s war. And we should stand with bent head, — cowed and ashamed before all nations, if we could thus tamely submit to national dismemberment and ruin. We should incur the scorn of the Southern people themselves, and should deserve the taunts which they cast upon our courage and manhood.
​Yet, not before our own people alone, but before all nations and all ages, we stand in this dread controversy. I say again that there is a higher plane of thought from which this contest is to be surveyed, than that on which we place an ordinary civil war. The world has far more at stake here than it had in the struggle between the houses of York and Lancaster. That was a war of family interests; this is a war of principles—principles of universal concern. In the breadth and permanence of the interests involved, it is more like the Thirty Years’ War in Germany, or that of Holland and the Netherlands with Spain, or that of the French Revolution.
I see here a great government, with a peculiar, a popular, and what is to us a precious title to sovereignty, which the rude hand of rebellion would pluck down, and cover with opprobrium, and blight with failure, before the eyes of all the world. I see a great Republic, seated on the shores of a new world, spreading from the Atlantic to the Pacific sea; built up in the affections of (till lately) thirty millions of people; the pride and hope of its loyal subjects; the resort and refuge of multitudes from the old world; with unexampled prosperity in itself, and dwelling in peace and honor with all nations. And now, for no justifying cause, for an interest in slavery, for the gratification of passions that have sprung from that bitter root, a violent hand is raised to strike at this great image of the public authority, to ​break it in pieces, and to seatter it in the dust. And the question is — Shall we permit it? It is truly said that “Democracy is on its trial” in this crisis. Has it nurtured in us a faint-heartedness, a recklessness, a love of ease or of property, that is willing to let this mighty fabric go to wreck and ruin? Has it emasculated the noble Saxon race, and made us mere worldlings and cowards? For one, I answer, No. Shall the aristocracies of the old world pass by, wagging their heads in scorn and saying, “Aha! ye could boast of your great Republic, but ye cannot fight for it?” Shall all noble lovers of liberty in the world hang their heads in shame for us and say, “Alas! for our hopes and the hopes of mankind!” And again I answer, No.
And I say no, not in pride or passion, not in any hatred of the South, but under the most solemn sense of duty. To us this is a holy war. Religion — in the highest and widest view of it — commands us to do what we are doing. We have a trust committed to us, as we believe, by the Infinite Authority, and it is in fealty to God, and fidelity to man, that we feel bound to keep it. We cannot yield up lawful sovereignty, the national domain and honor, and the peace and welfare of unborn generations, to the reckless assault that is made upon them. We believe that we should displease the just God, if we did so. We believe that ours is a righteous cause, and, I repeat, a holy war. And if the Southern people say, We, too, have a conscience; ​be it so. All men, I suppose, have a conscience of some kind. The question is — Whose is the right conscience? The rebel conscience, or the loyal conscience? They may say, Why cannot you yield to us? We say, Why cannot you yield to us? The question is, Who ought to yield? Upon this question we have no doubt. If upon this question there must be an awful and bloody conflict, — if conscience on either side can find no other solution, God pity us! and God defend the right!
This work was published before January 1, 1930, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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