Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1873-09-04

the torture wrung Il rtC"...,-
the truth from Galileo, di,! the Garth
cease to revolve onils axis? Did the
waves that swept the ashes Of Huss
to the sea. bury forever the trnth he
had proclaimed When our Divlpe
Master perished on the cross, did the
doctrines Tor which ho died perish
with him? We believe we have truth
on our side; let us then assert and
maintain our faith, and God will i'll
His own good time make it manifest
that we were right. If We were
right. If we were wrong in our
struggle, then was the Declaration of
Independence i'll '76 a terrible mis-
take, and the revolution to which it
led p:lpable crime; Washington
should be stigmatized as traitor, and
Benedict Arnold canouized as patriot,
If the principles which justified the
first revolution were true in l716,
they were no less true in that Of 1861.
The success of the former can add
not one jot or title to the abstract
truth Of the principles which gave it
birth, ,.nor can the failure of the lat
ter destroy one particle Of those ever
living principles. If Washington was
a patriot. Lee cannot have been a
rebel; i. tie grand enunciation of
the truths of the Declaration of In
dependence made Jefferson immortal,
the observance of them cannot make
Davis traitor. 1t has been urged
by our enemies that the Constitution
of the United States did not recog-
nize explicitly the right of secession;
but does that compact between SOW
ereign States, which was entered into
with such solemnity, forbid the exer-
else of this right, in any clause, di
rectly or by implication? Does it
give to any of the parties to it the
right or the semblance Of Alright to
coerce the others? Does it permit
any State or States to wage war OF
determination on the others? If it
does not, or rather did not, allow any
of these things, how comes it that we
are gathered here to-day around the
graves of Southern men who were
slain only because they believed that
the principles Of l776, which gave
birth to our Republic, were equally
true in 1861? 1t comes because the
people of the North have never stud
led and do not comprehend that Con-
stitution about which they have raw
ed so madly, because they have not
consulted the fathers Of the Repub-
lie because their great teachers
blind leaders of the blind-have ig-
nored and often falsifed the records
of the Convention Of l7S7, and have
led their deluded followers into that
downward and crooked path that
leads to the destruction of the i. Re-
public, and to the subversion of con-
stitutional liberty under republican
institutions in the new world.
But this is not the time nor the
place to discuss these grave questions,
and they are touched on only as il
lustrations. If we believe that jus
tice was on our side, have we Alright,
in the name of the dead who gave
their lives in defence of the South,
! in the name of Our children who are
to live in the land of their fathers, to
| yield the principle for which. we
fought? know that it is the fash
ion now in certain quarters to tell
our people fiat these are dead issues,
and that they should be put behind
US as wepress on in that new and
glorious era which has dawned on
the reconstructed South that we must
turn from all that gave us.tpeaca,
happiness. prosperity, dignity, and
glory in the past that we must cease
to honor the men who died for us,