Baltimore daily commercial. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1865-1867, 1865-11-07
NORTH AND S9NFEH,

The London Quarterly HerieW is lugubrlOus
on the subject of the preservation of the Union.
1t admits that the recognition of Southern in
dependence by England would have been die
tated by ''the most obvious considerations of
selfinterest." 1t charges upon the Northern
literature of the war, that its appeals were all
made to glory, to nationality, to the flag, never
''to any such thing as duty" and it winds up
It's doleful catalogue of complaints by mounting
the prophetic tripod and predicting perpetual
discordance between the North and the South.
at would be difficult" it says, ito find an
instance of "A republic whose first civil war
was its last;'' and it is of opinion that ''the
prospect most apparent in the future is, that
of a proud people chatting under the bitterness
of injustice and the remembrance of defeat.
We ought not to look for any very cheerful
vaticinatons in respect to our future from the
London Quarterly Reriem, representing, as it
does, that anxious aristocratic element in Eng
fish society," which, half mistrustful of the
vitality of system under which privileged
order is permitted to exist, looks with Joy upon
any symptom of weakness in republican insti-
tutions, and regards the elevation of the labor
ing class us the lowering of its own. But we
think it does injustice to the Southern charac-
Ter in supposing it to be tenacious of vindictive
feelings against the North, simply because the
latter has been victorious i'll the recent contest.
The reviewer looks for his historical prece-
dents, in wars of conquest waged by arbitrary
monarchs against neighborng countries. He
Il l..
republic based on popular rights, and having
for its object the largest happiness of the
largest number. 1t is not under such Gov
eminent as ours that the people lately in re-
bellion against our flag will cherish those ran
cors to which the reviewer hopefully looks for
ward as initiatory to another civil war. What
we all now want, and what we believe Presi-
dent Johnson is sincerely and prayerfully
laboring for, is justice; for in that lies the
truest mercy to all parties.
We are apt to think Of justice, especially of
Divine justice, as something distinct from
mercy. But, in the nature of things, such a
separation cannot exist. What is Just for
man or for a community must always be- in
the long run, what is best and most beneiicent
Any rigor that does not have reference to the
ultimate weli-being Of the subject of it cannot
be just. Mercy inheres in Justice
We do not anticipate any immediate resto-
ration of kindly feeling between parties who
were lately arraved against each other in dead
ly hostility. We make all due allowances for
the frailty of human nature and the tenactv
of prejudice. Friendship is plant of slower
growth than enmity. We indulge in no SEN
timental anticipation that the thousands who
have lost relatives and property in this war
will at once be restored to state of Christian
magnanimity and resignation. But we do
believe that the General Government has only
TO be conducted with supreme regard to JUS
tice-hberally, sagaclouSly, prudently-to ex-
clude forever all those dangers, arising from
continued arrangement and chatting vim
dictiyeness, which the London reviewer pre-
diets as imminent.
Already We see a disposition among the
leading minds of both sections to Judge of
each other more charitably. Those bitter
vituperatons and contemptuous epithets, so
freely INDUCED in by the secession press be-
iore ana during the war, are getting TO be
more and more infrequcnt. At the North
there is a disposition to do justice to all the
nobleness, courage and self sacrifice which
was developed among the men and women Of
the South during the war. The fame of Jack
son, Lee, Longstrect and others will be as
tenderly guarded in Northern as in Southern
literature. The evidences of this are already
abundant. Time will soften the asperities
and qualify the opinions that have led us to
do injustice to each other The South will
not forever chafe, as the Quarterly Rerieu
anticipates, but, finding that justice will be
done by the General Government, it will
accept the great fact of a regenerated repub-
lie, and renew, with redoubled affection, its
attachment to the old flag