The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1903-07-29

his belief in the prime importance OF
the Union. He was offered the COM
mand Of the armies Of the Union ID
which he believed passionately but
answered the messenger from Presl-
dent Lincoln with the exclamation :.
ssMr. Blair, I look upon secession as
anarchy. II / owned the four million
slaves in the south, I would sacrifice
them all to the Union; but how can
I draw my slword upon Virginia, my
native states''' TO him duty meant
duty to his state honor meant going
with his state to victory or defeat.
We can we'll believe that he inflicted
upon his own sensitive soul wounds
which never wholly healed when he
took up the cause of disunion, which
he dreaded, the cause Of anarchy,
which he denounced, for the sake of
the state to which he felt himself in
highest duty bound to cleave.
4 It is hardly possible that any man
In the north could have gone through
the spiritual struggle that Robert
E. Lee went through during the days
when war was threatened. In the north
those men that wayered were choosing
between low motive and high one.
Robert E. Lee was beset by two con-
Ricting high motives. That he
chose to, follow that high motive
which kept him with his state. The
Outlook believes to have been an error
of political judgment but it was not
an error of political morality. He
who is loyal cannot be traitor, and
Lee and the men of his stamp were
loyal to their conscientious convictions
as we're the men who fought against
them. The test Of patriotism, like
the test of any other moral quality,
is not success, but loyalty to conviction !;
and by that test Robert 3. Lee stands
today among the purest, though
among She most tragieally misled and
misunderstood Of aptriots.
One of the most patheiic, from one
point of view, from another one of the
most stimulating and enighSening. ut
terances that have come to Us from the
desperate day before the breaking out
of the war is In letter IN which Lee
mentions his own son, an officer in
the regular army at the time: The
times are indeed calamitous. The
brightness Of Gods eoUntenance seems
turned from rs, and His mercy stopped
in its blissful current. Tell Custis he
must consult his own Judgment, rea-
son and conscience as to the course
he may take. I douot wish hiGn to be
guided by my wishes 'or example. II
I have done wrong, let him do better.
The present is momentous question,
which every man must settle for him.
self, and upon principle -
The man who wrote these worGs can
teach lessons of patriotism to America
of today. The defeat of his armies,
which meant triumph to the south as
well as to the north, may have changed
his conception, OF what duty to his
country signifed bzrt his loyalty to
that duty as he conceived it was as
steadfast as after his defeat. It is such
steadfast loyalty chat is the essence of
patriotism.
At some other time we may inquire
into the nature of the two diverse
conceptions Of patriotism which con-
tended for supremacy during the days
of the civil war;. It is our purpose
here to emphasize the truth that
others who we're loyal to the one con-
ception were as truly patriots as those
who were loyal to the other. The
| real issue was not between patriotism
and want of it, bus between two
forms of patriotism, one state,
the other national. IF willing
ness to sacrifice what is passionate
| ly priced next to honor itself is any
criterion as to the degree Of patriotism
that begets such sacrifice, then those
southerners of whom Robert z. Lee is
the type are to be counted among the
patriots whose lives constitute the
real riches of the nation