The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1864-11-10

which every great people is obliged to take
soon or late. We are sufficient for our
selves Our own national conscience our
wn sense of right and duty, our own pub
lie sentiment is our guide henceforth. By
that we stand or fall. By that, and thai
only, will we consent that men should Judge
US. We are grown-up nation from this time
forth. We answer for ourselves to human.
ity and the future. We decide all cause,
at our judgement seat.
1T seems to be the in
variable law, Of earthly life at least. that
humanity can advance only by the road Of
suffering 1t is SO with individuals There
is 10 spiritual growth without pain. Pros
perity alone never makes grand character
Purple and fine linen never clothe the hero
There are powers and gifts in the soul OF
man that only come to life and action il
some day of bitterness There are wells II
the heart, whose crystal waters lie in dark.
ness till some earthquake shakes the man |
nature to its centre, bursts the fountain
open and lets the cooling waters out to re-
fresh parched land. There are seeds no
blest fruit that lie latent in the soul, til
some storm OF sorrow shakes down tears tc
moisten, and some burning sun of scorchine
pain sends heat to warm then into bar.
vest of blessings.
By trouble met and patiently mastered
by suffering endured and conquered by
trials tested and overcome, so only does a
man's soul grow to madness.
'FFhere never was a great
nation nursed on pap, and swatled in silk
Storms broke around its rude cradle instead
The tempests rocked the stalwart child
The dragons came to strange the baby
Herlcules i'll his swaddling clothes. The
magnificent commerce, the increasing man
ufactures, the teeming soil, the wealth fast
accommodating, they would never have made
us, after all, great people They would
have eaten manhood out of us at last We
were becoming selfish, self.indulgert ssyba-
rite rapidly. The nations muscle was
softening its heart was hardening. If we
were to become great nation, we needed
more than commerce, more than plenty,
more than rapid riches, more than q com
Portable, indulgent life If we were to be
one of the worlds great peoples, people
whose name and fame the world was to &C
cept as part of itself, we must look to pay
the price inhexibly demanded at every peo-
pies hand, and count it out in sweat drops,
tear drops, to the the last unit.
Y $50 the heart of the nation
has been touched and softened, while its
muscles have been steeled. While it has
grasped the sword, it has grasped it weep
ing in infinite pity. 1t has recognized the
truth of human brotherhood as it never did
before. All ranks have been drawn togeth-
er in mutual sympathy. All barriers that
hedge brethren apart have been broken
down in the common suffering.
News comes to-day, that great battle
has been fought, and wounded thousands of
our brothers need aid and care. You tell
the news in any city or hamlet i'll the land,
and hands are opened, purses emptied, stores
ransacked for comforts for the suffering, and
gentle women in hundreds, are ready to
tend them as they would their own Is
this no gain? Is it nothing that the selfish
ness of us all has been broken up as by an
earthquake, and that kindness, charity, and
pity to the sick and needy have become the
law Of our lives Count the millions that
have streamed forth from people whose
heart has been touched by common suffer-
ing, in kindness to wounded and sick SOL
diers and to their needy families Benevo-
lence has become the atmosphere of the
land.
Four years ago we could not have be-
lieved it. That the voluntary charity of
Americans would count by millions yearly,
would flow out in steady, deep, increasing
tide; that giving would be the rule, free
glad giving, and refusing the marked ex-
ception, the world would not have believed
it a0e would not have believed it oursel ves
Is this nothing?
"Here. at least, are some of
the gains of our civil war. We seek not to
penetrate the councils of the Omniscient, or
guess His purposes, though we may humbly
hope there are vaster things than these in
store for humanity and the world as the re-
suits of the struggle. Believing that He
governs STILL that He reigns on the James
as He reigned on the Jordan. that He de-
cides the end, and not President Lincoln or
Jefferson Davis, and not General Grant or
General Lee, we have firm faith that this
awful struggle is no brute fight of beasts or
ruffians, but grand worlds war of heroes.
We believe He will justify His government
in the end, and make this struggle praise
Him, in the blessed days that are to come.
But we leave all these dim results ungues-
sed at, as we leave the purposes of the war
itself.unmentioned, and the ends which JUS
tify us in fighting On. Men, by this time,
have made up their minds, once for all, on
these last points. The nation has chosen,
and in its own conscience. let others think
as they may, accepts the responsibility
cheerfully.