THE WORLD'S FAMOUS ORATIONS but of interminable duration — an exterminating war would follow, until some Philip or Alex- ander, some Csesar or Napoleon, would rise to cut the Gordian knot, and solve the problem of the capacity of man for self-government, and crush the liberties of both the dissevered por- tions of this Union. Can you doubt it? Look at history — consult the pages of all history, ancient or modern; look at human nature, look at the character of the contest in which you would be engaged in the supposition of a war following the dis- solution of the Union, such as I have suggested — and I ask you if it is possible for you to doubt that the filial but perhaps distant termination of the whole will be some despot treading down the liberties of the people? — that the final re- sult will be the extinction of this last and glori- ous Hght^ which is leading all mankind, who are gazing upon it, to cherish hope and anxious expectation that the liberty which prevails here will sooner or later be advanced throughout the civilized world? Can you, Mr. President, lightly contemplate the consequences? Can you yield yourself to a torrent of passion, amid dangers which I have depicted in colors far short of what would be the reality, if the event should ever happen? I conjure gentlemen — whether from the South or the North — by all they hold dear in this world — ^by all their love of liberty — by all their veneration for their ancestors — ^by all their re- 102
