Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1861-07-27

and never did an atrociOus conspiracy n
gainst Right and Law more imperativeIy
demand unqualified suppression, in the in
Grest alike Of country and humanity, than
does that whereof Jefferson Davis is the
chosen head. And that the issue will be
auspicious to the integrity and stability Of
the American Republic, we will not harbor
q doubt.
But the signal punishment Of reckless,
criminal ambition is by no means the ouIy
lesson which this contest should teach. 1t
will not have yielded all its proper fruit un-
less it imprints deeply OIL the hearts of our
countrymen these lessons
/. War is always aud everywhere hor.
rible calamity. A great general is record
ed as having humanoly and truly observed
that, next 10 great defeat, great vic.
tory is most deplorable. Many life lcng
warriors have been humane, Christian men
yet it is nevertheless true that participa-
tion in deeds Of violence and carnage tends
to harden the heart. The ex-soldier return
ed to his home and his former peaceful uvo,
cations may be sober, Industrious, and eve.
ry way exemplary but his military expe-
rence will not have tended to make him so.
Where one will have been made better by
the influence and experiences OF camp life,
there is strong probability that many
will have been made worse However
promptly the war may be fought ont aud
ended, it is hardly doubtful that a new
flood tide of demoralzation and intemper-
ance will be among its amentable results
III. Tie wasteful aud ruinouS cost of a
great war have seldom been fully realized
That our government is now rushing into
debt at the rate Of nearly million dollars
per day, is generally understood but this
is only the first item in the heavy bill
which is rolling up against the authors of
this atrocious rebellion The destruction
and consumption of stocks and stores of
timber, powder, lead, cartridges, firearms,
etc, etc, laid up in navy yards, armores,
and arsenals in time of peace, the burning
of ships and other property to save them
from capture Oh one side or prevent their
use on the other, are among the inevitable
incidents of sucha struggle. But the rcb-
els would seem to have resolved to make
this contest as ruinous as possible by the
wanton, wholesale destruction of canal
dams, railroad bridges, engines, cars, etc,
ETC., and of property generally. Their
ocean forayS will have cost much in vessels
and cargoes captured, but far more in the
paralysis of our commerce aud navigation
through fear of a kindred fate. Industry
arrested, families piuing in hunger and mis-
cry because of the sudden withdrawal of
their means Of subsistence, und thousands
sinking through want into vice and crime
such are among the inevitable consequences
of such a struggle. This war cannot be
ended so soon that it will not have cost our
people One Thousand Millions of Dollars,
or about the actual cash value of all the
property in the State of Ohio, or half that
of the state of n. York. A few years of
peace will enable us to recreate the proper.
ty 4; but who can feel confident that the
moral disasters Of the conflict can be re.
paired SO speedily ? We shall have borne
these trials to less than their proper profit
if one OF the lessons deeply imprinted on
the national heart by them is not a pro.
founder, ntenscr loathing Of war, and of
the dreams of conquest, Of extended area
and Of imperial domination, wherewith po
teal aSpirantS are too apt to drug the ma
tiOnal conscience aud debauch the popular
heart.
III. Another lesson which this war is
calculated to teach, and of which no peo.
pie ever stood more in need than Ours. is
that Of respect for constituted authority
and obedience to the mandates of law. We
have been sadly deficient in this regard
and the punishment of our transgression is
now upon US. Our habits of free and fear
less criticism of public men and measures
have tended to this laxity, but in defiance
Of the plainest and most necessary dis,inc
tions. You do not asSume the pietY, geni-
US, wisdom, bencYolcnce, or integrity. of
the constable whose summons you defer to.
he may within your knowledge be person.
ally knave, Ounce, or II sot but YOU
recognize him in bis official capacity as
representative of the State--a messenger
and minister of her will embodied in law
and you obey the precept of which he is
the bearer in Difference not at all to him
but to her. And so the man Pierce, or
Buchanan, or Lincoln, may be ever so wor.
thy or indifferent but his personal deserts
or dement's in no degree qualify the obedi
ence which you pay 10 the President Of
the United States, and which you cannot
refuse without a clear defiance of christian
ethics and patriotic duty.
These are very simple truths, but lack
of clear conceptions Of their scope and
force is now costing this country thousands
of lives and millions of money. Our Ma. !
tiOnaI existence having originated in sue,
cesful resistance TO oVerstrained authority, |
a tendency to confound authority with
has ever been latent ia our
blood, as Shay's Rebellion, the Whisky In.
surrectiOn, and some less matured manifes-
tations of the same spirit, have too painful !
ly attested But we must teach our chill. !
dren to distinguish clearly, in the language
of Burke, between the extreme medicine of
the constitution and its daily bread Arm
ed resistance to lawfully constituted authori- |
ty is the last, desperate recourse of peo-
pie to whom all other escape from ntolera-
ble oppression is conclusively denied 10 |
appeal from an open and free balot-boX to |
a revolt is like appealing from the Supreme
Court of the U. States to a mass meeting |
at the Five Points Even though the re.
suit of an election be clearly wrong-nay,
because it is wrong-there is hope that the |
\ Al