So far as peaceful, voluntary emancipation is concerned, the condition of the negro slave in America, scarcely less terrible to the contemplation of the free mind, is now as fixed and hopeless of change for the better as that of the lost souls of the finally impenitent.
Lincoln expressed a grim assessment that the prospect of peaceful, voluntary emancipation for enslaved people in America was utterly hopeless, comparing their fate to eternal damnation.
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Provost-marshals and marshals of the United States will arrest and commit to military custody all such offenders as shall disregard this order, whether they have passports or not, and they will be detained in such custody until the end of…
If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.
As a general rule I abstain from reading the reports of attacks upon myself, wishing not to be provoked by that to which I cannot properly offer an answer.
To care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow, and his orphan, is our duty.
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