Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1863-05-28

down their arms and march away unmoleSted.
This General Grant refused. A report from
Tennessee states that Bragg's army has begun
to move towards Vicksburg; and also that
General Rosecrans is about to give us stirring
news.
There can be no honest love of the republic
and its free Institutions, without hostility to
whatever tends to destroy them. One may
as well talk of a sun without light, as OF pa
triotic devotion to the republic which does not
inspire hostility to its enemies, whether they
be armed men, traitorous conspirators, or
the corrupting influences of a barbarous
institution. The institution of slavery is the
worst enemy our free institutions have
ever encountered. This is now too plain
to be denied by reasonable men. This
evil thing was barely tolerated at first.
Through the influence of civilization, it
should have diminished and disappeared here,
as it has in almost every other part of chris
tendon; but, in the southern part of the
country it spread, and grew in power and
boldness, until it transformed the people and
made its influence supreme. 1t has made
them enemies of the ideas that presided at the
formation of the republic, and finally inspired
their leaders withthe treason that organized war
against the government. Without the train
ing that slavery has given them the southern
people would have been incapable of such
treason. Can we be faithful patriots, and, at
the same time, seek to shield this dangerous
institution fromIha
Nevertheless. there are men at the nortf
whose chief anxiety seems to be to have tht
war so conducted as n t to hurt slavery; anC
some OF them denounce it altogether because
they see that slavery and the rebellion are 81
intimately connected that we cannot harm one
without harming the other. Out of this yea
in behalf of slavery, the copperhead fraternity
have sprung into active existence, seeking Il
embarrass the government, gain influence
and win favor with the leaders of rebellion by
denouncing the, war as an ''abolition war -
and seeming to care bnt little what becomes
of the republic and its institutions, provided
slavery and the secessionists lose nothing by
their attempts to destroy the Union The
zeal of these men is not for the Union, but fol
slavery and their old political allies who nov
control and direct the southern treason
They cannot properly be treated as the slave
of an illusion by which they are misled
while meaning to be honest. Some o
their followers may be so heavily wrapped il
the mattings of partizan habits and prejudicet
that they can neither nor hear anything as
they should; but the leaders of this fierce
crusade against the government know well
what they do, and they intend, deliberately, to
aid the rebellion and give it triumph ovel
the government; and that, too, by destroying
the republic, if necessary, and reconstructine
the nation in whatever form the rebel leaders
may demand. If slavery and the traitorous
oligarchy it has created can be saved to rule
the nation, they will be content. Even now
the most moderate of these encouragers OF
treason do not talk of what they call ''restor.
ing the Union," without proposing radical
reconstruction of the federal constitution
such as will give slavery perpetual security
and supremacy.
Our best hope for the future of the nation
comes to us in the belief that slavery will be
exterminated with the rebellion; that the slave
power must die of its present madness and
that the republic will secure everlasting de.
liverance from the barbarous institution which
has bred contempt and hatred of republican
principles, subjected the political administra
ton of the country to its foul influence, trained
men and communities to violence and trea
son, and attacked with its deadly poison the lf
of the republic. Men must be strange
blind, or mad, or wicked, who do not see, o
will not see, that while slavery continues tn
nation contains within itself disease, fatl
trouble, felt in every department of its gov
eminent and in all its affairs; a terrible dis
ease that had become well nigh incura
BILE, and of which it must be relieved
OF die. The war was not undertaken
10 abolish slavery, but to crush armed
treason but it is impossible to deal thor
oughiy with the rebellion without striking in
earnest at Its cause. To save the copptrv we
must not only crush this rebellion but alsc
make another like it impossible. Thoro :. =.
safety for the republic in ANYTHING .h,,., :,
this; and to this we must adhere So :.
we would have assured peace and see tho :.
ton resued from the curse that dehosao :.
civilization, corrupts its whole life. an,
threatens to make it ruin and bywor
throughout christendom.