Full well I know the doubts, cavils, and misrepresentations to which this argument for the integrity of the nation is exposed; but I turn with confidence to the people.

The heart of the people is right, and all great thoughts come from the heart.

All hating Slavery and true to Freedom will join in effort, paying with person, time, talent, purse.

Ledger, discount, and political aspiration will have small value, if the war continues its lava flood, shrivelling and stifling everything but itself.

Therefore, under spur of self-interest, if not under the necessities of self-defence, we must act together.

Blood enough has been shed, victims enough have bled at the altar, even if you are willing to lavish upon Slavery the tribute now paying of more than a million dollars a day.

In the providence of God there are no accidents; and this seeming reverse helped to the greatest victory which can be won.

The life of Meleager, so powerful and invulnerable to mortal weapon, is now revived in this Rebellion, and Slavery is the fatal brand.

It is the peril from some new surrender to Slavery, some fresh recognition of its power, some present dalliance with its intolerable pretensions.

Worse than any defeat, or even the flight of an army, would be this abandonment of principle.

Do justice and you will be twice victors; for so will you subdue the Rebel master, while you elevate the slave.

Do justice frankly, generously, nobly, and you will find strength instead of weakness, while all seeming responsibility disappears in obedience to God’s eternal law.

Such things as you there so eloquently express give the soldiers of Freedom in Kansas heart and courage in the work of giving Freedom to all.

The battle must be fought out, and we must settle the question once and forever, whether we are a nation or are not.

Thirty of those years have been almost exclusively spent in a war of ideas against Slavery, as a Garrisonian Abolitionist.

Never again let man be discouraged in a conflict between humanity and its incidents.

But a cardinal principle in my ethics is, that men should always be ‘open to conviction.’ I am happy to confess that I have been doubly deceived: first, in the principles and intentions of the Democratic party; and, second, in the…

A friend handed me your great oration delivered in New York, and I am so favorably struck with its logic and patriotism that I am completely proselyted.

Beside being irrational and inhuman on its face, it practically authorizes the surrender of fugitive slaves beyond any constitutional obligation.

Such an order must naturally be disheartening to our soldiers, and it gives a bad name to our country, both at home and abroad.

Common sympathy, common humanity, and common sense must prevail in the conduct of this war.

I take the liberty of saying--and I wish that my words may reach his distant head-quarters--that every fugitive slave he surrenders will hereafter rise in judgment against him with a shame which no possible victory can remove.

Is it not an inhuman act for these poor people to be made outlaws for no crime, only that they refused to join their traitor masters in onslaught on our beneficent Government?

A Black Code still prevails in this District, imported from the old legislation of Maryland, which is a shame to the civilization of our age.

Let us at all hazards prevent the extension of Slavery and the increase of the Slave Power.