Year: 1872

of principle which separates them as ehooe-
ually from their kind as might convent
wall. They utterly reject and despise the ex-
istence of sentiments as elements OF human
motives. All that powerful class OF impulses
of which the professional demagogue makes
40 ready and so bad a use these amateur re-
formers not only deride but positively refuse
n recognize. They stigmatize them all together
under the despised name OF Heart. They
adopt the counterpart OF Mrs. Skewtons
wall. and their own grievance In life
ia that there is too much Heart.


IF man dares to think of such


emotiors as gratitude, patriotism, generosity,
forgiveness, brotherhood, as possible incentives
to political action, he is called blatherskite,


q brawling talker, ferociOus sentimentalist'


Politics should be considered purely as mat


ter of facts and figures, of law and expediency.


AS long as the human race is constituted as


it is at present, the men who profess and who


act upon this theory are doomed to sterility


because they throw away most important
political and social force, and voluntarily as


sumo weight too heavy for any one to carry.
Sentiments still move men somewhat, and 1t
will be long before their influence is eradcated
even in the most intelligent classes. They
have elected many Presidents they will elect
many more.


1t is not merely because these so-called SEN


timental views of political questions are strong


and controlling that we say it is foolish to


despise and ignore them. There is deeper


reason than this. No man is great and wise
enough to say that the popular demand, based


on an apparently sentimental issue, has not


in il something authoritative and respectable.
1t will usually be found to correspond with


the result reached by the severest logic and
study of positive and intelligent men. There


was certainly a great deal of Heart in the


long struggle against Slavery, which tri-


umphed in the election of Lincoln. But there
| was also, underlying the anger and the pity and


the cant, firm though unexpressed. conviction
that the Slave Power must be met and checked
in the interest of the permanent welfare. When
the war came, our army gathered in storm
of enthusiasm which was far more effectual for
the purpose than could have been the demon


stration of the fact that Secession would be the


ruin of all our material interests. Yet this was


also true. And to-day, while the evils the
Cincinnati movement is combating with bril-
liant promise of success are as plain and posi-


tive as they can well be, being corruption,
ilegality, Capitalization, and an utter subordi-


nation of the public good to private ends;
still the life of this campaign and its highest
reliance for victory is what these frigid
critics would brand as a sentiment-the


passionate longing felt by the masses North
and South for restoration of the Union in


spirit and in truth. The war is long ago


ended. Slavery is dead, never to rise again.
| never even to stir in its ashes. Equality be-
fore the law is fully established, never again
to be disturbed. The national authority is


everywhere unquestioned The time has come
for political combination which, while saw
ing all the acquisitions Of the war, shall treat
the men of the South like men and brethren,
| with the same rights, the same privileges the
same dignity and self-respect with ourselves.
| This may be called a mere sentiment, and


sneered at as such by gentlemen who


are equally above human weaknesses and


human virtues. But it is nevertheless
powerful influence. 1t is fusing
together elements which seemed abso-
| lutelv incompatible. If the Liberal cause
this year gains the victory which seems more
| and more probable all the details of practical
reform will be rendered possible and easy by
the triumph of this fraternal sentiment And
| if it should fail, the very effort to accomplish
| this benefcent end will do more to reunite
the country and to purify our politics than
| all the icy essays of the last half century.