Bradford reporter. [volume] (Towanda, Pa.) 1844-1884, 1865-04-27
gradford &eporter.
Towanda, Thursday, April 27, 1865.
THE NATIONS SORROW.

A week of National mourning ; week
of National sorrow, of humiliation, of heart
felt anguish ! AS the lifeless remains of
the wisA, the good, the gentle LINCOLN are
borne towards their final resting place IN
the West, the people flock to testify their
respect, to manifest their grief, and to show
how deep hold he had upon the heart of
the Nation Business is at a stand-still !;
for once the greed of gain loses its power !;
the sombre embems of mourning darken
the streets, and the universal expressions
of sorrow attest the public appreciation of
the worth of the man, and of the great loss
the nation has sustained
Eulogies of the illustrious dead, are well
enough panegyrics upon his sagacity, his
craftsmanship, his kind heart, overflowing
with good will towards his fellow-men, de-
served but he who does not see i'll this
awful and mysterious dispensation the hand
of Divine Providence, fails to read Alright
the lesson of the hour. For four years
ABRAHAM LINCOLN had borne burdens such
as seldom fall to the lot of those in power; Z;
four long years of blood and carnage :;
years of trial and gloom, armed traitors
at the South assaulting the integrity of the
Union, and partisan prejudice, and covert
treason, endeavoring to undermine the
Government, at the North. With a wisdom
which seemed almost inspired with pa
tience unexampled, he had guided the Ship
of State through the dangers which threat
ened, until he saw a safe deliverance, and
the dawn Of peace which is, we fondly
trust, to be the full frution of our Coun-
try's trials and her prosperity
The same intatuation which brought up
on the Country the troubles of the past
four years, has struck LINCOLN down when
he was preparing to astonsh the world
with an exhibition of magnanimity such as
was never before witnessed as if in the
Providence of God it was willed that Sla-
very should become so blackened by crime,
SO hated by the American people, so abhor-
rent to the world, that its extinction should
be certain and swift. The cowardly hand
which struck down the President, has
struck deadlier blow at the accursed in
stitution, whose barbaric teachings are
blOodshed and assassination, and the effect
will be to eXterminate, root and branch, the
curse which has produced so much misery.
Years of prayers and and preaching, of
honest effort, had seemingly failed to break
the power of Slavery-propagandists, up
to the day when the first gun was fired at
Fort Sumpter. 1t appeared as if the polit-
ical and social power of the Slave aristoc-
racy, was increasing with each hour From
that position of power, they have been
hurled by the madness of the men who
had ruled the government for so many
years. What agitation had failed to do,
what it might not have accomplished in
centuries, the infatuatiOn of the South has
done in four years. Slavery is dead to-day
in the United States, never to be recusita-
ted If it had any vitality, the murder of
ABRAHAM LINCOLN has crushed out the last
sign Of it. HencefOrth there is to be no
place for it where waves the flag of the
free" and throughout this broad republic
there is to be universal liberty