Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1861-08-07
For the Herald.
Causes and Effects.

Not only human governments, but divine,
will be canyassed by such people as we
are. If the policy and purpose Of
Heaven in allowing Adam and Eve to
stray through the garden Of Eden without
a body guard of angels to protect them,
does not escape the criticism aud comment
Of common minds, certainly neither Lin
coin, Scott or Mcdowell should expect
| greater courtesy. But what a panic !!
Even General Greeley retreats and dis
plays the white feather, and imposes on
the Tribune the penance of half an hours
silence at least; and Gen. Scott owns his
weakness and confesses himself to be the
puppet Of newspaper editors. Away with
newspapers, railroads and telegraphs2 they
give such momentum and velocity to an
idea that it strikes down the nation at
once; we have felt paralytic shock and
can't stand the reeoil of our own ma
chinery. THE stocal Russian and the
phlegmatc Austrian would have been IN
capable Of such world-renowned panic.
Young America, flushed with hope and
pride, was massed together at Manassas as
he never was before. He knew all things,
be could do all things; he could create a
locomotive out Of box stove, could carry
printing press on his back and publish
| bulletins and shoot bullets at the same mo-
ment. The beams Of the Divine lntelli-
gence were drawn to a focus in that army
Of McDowell's; nothing that man had
ever done but that some in that army
could do; nothing that man had ever
known but that some in that army knew.
/ Had al the world around them persisted,
the fruits Of the worlds experience and
knowledge would have been preserved in
that living Encyclopedia. There was cul-
tivated intellect, versatile genius and judg-
ment matured in practical life to degree
unknown among the armies Of Caesar OF
Napoleon; but there was the acute sensi-
bility vaguely termed animal magnetism,
highly developed; the mysterious power
Of sympathy causing every part to vibrate
at the same instant with the same emo
ton. The world has come back By new
route to the precincts Of the forgotten
heather deity, Pan. 1t was his sport to
| frighten and scatter tho bravest armies
/ Cesar says he scattered his army once,
aud he has played the same prank with
General Mcdowell. Greeley has caught
the contagion and spiked bis own guns,
and even General Scott falls down before
the god and pologizes. The highest de
grees Of cultivation or the loves depths o.
ignorance and superstition, though for diff
ferent reasons, furnish the best conditions
for panic The yiyacious and suscepti-
bic French, $4,000 strong, saw the ghosts
Of murdered Apstrians At Sollerino charg-
ing upon them with black horses and
bloody banners, to drag them down to
Hades, and they fled like cattle from the
gobblins Of THEN own excited and over
wrought nraiues. Gideon defeated one Of
The largest armies of antiquity by the aid
1 Of panic. Let us all be men again. Gen.
Scots fame had not suffered had he sane
tio-ed McDoweIl's attack. That General
was not contented wnh victory, but de-
termined to annihilate The Southern Con-
federacy at blow. An hours more work
and he viii build for himself a monument
grander than any in American history.
/ For all that | can see, the same disaster
might have happened under like motives,
and not the meanest motives either, il
Gen. Scott had trained his volunteers on
the Potomac till their hairs were gray.
The drilling theory is good, but it lacks
one lesson which can only be taught at
such school as Bulls Run. 1t IS not a
part Of camp education q pour hot shot
/ and shell into our volunteers, to innure
them to the horrors of wa-. We have now
an army that will not run. " FORWARD 10
Richmondp might have proven success
had there been no blunder in carrying out
the plan. a great blunder almost always
initiates war among people accustomed
to peace. Hull, an experienced veteran,
had to surrender his army at Detroit to
awaken the nation from its security in
1912. But the panic will reform the army,
provided the innovations are not made un-
der its influence. Some persons, influ-
enced by the fight, are in favor OF surren-
dering the entire army to West Point ca
diets. The regulars displayed no more
courage or order in this stampede than the
volunteers. General Mcdowell, who made
the principal blunder WAS graduate from
West Point. The only regiment that re-
treated in good order was Colonel Blenker's
New York Volunteers 1t would be dis
astrous TO subject volunteers to the social
inferiority which exists between the reg
ular officer officer and his men. Volun-
tecrs do not cutter into war for livelihood
The strength Of a despotism is in its files
Of neutrality-suspicious.; the strength Of our
country, as lSng as it i free, must be in
its volunteers, called from the pursuits Of
peace, to return to them as soon as the war
is over. Governor Yates, of Illinois, i
think, has adopted the best policy TO OH
tain the greatest amount of force from a
given number Of men. Though he is by
law the Commander in Chief OF the voun-
teers in his own State, he commissions no
fed or company officers not freely and
first chosen by the regiment or company
itself, either from its own ranks or out of
them. Gti,eg things being eqnal, such an
officer would have hold on the confidence
and attachment Of the men, which he
eould not have If apD0infel. Ha would 10