The mistaken sympathy which foreign powers bestow upon Slavery,--or, it may be, the mistaken insensibility,--under the plausible name of “neutrality,” which they profess, will be worse for them than for us.

For them it will be a record of shame, which their children would gladly blot out with tears.

For us it will be only another obstacle vanquished in the battle for Civilization, where, unhappily, false friends are mingled with open enemies.

Come weal or woe, this is the place for us to stand.

Thus far we have been known chiefly through that vital force which Slavery could only degrade, but not subdue.

Now, at last, by the death of Slavery, will the Republic begin to live.

Stretching from ocean to ocean, teeming with population, bountiful in resources of all kinds, rejoicing in that righteousness which exalteth a nation, and thrice happy in universal enfranchisement, it will be more than conqueror.

Triumphant over the foulest wrong ever inflicted, after the bloodiest war ever waged, it will know the majesty of Right and the beauty of Peace, prepared always to uphold the one and to cultivate the other.

Strong in its own mighty stature, filled with all the fulness of a new life, and covered with a panoply of renown, it will confess that no dominion is of value that does not contribute to human happiness.

It is a protest and a warning against those which are imminently threatened.

Sumner’s is the authentic voice, not of the mob, but of the people.

He utters the sentiments of the conscientious, the intelligent, the peace-loving.

It is a simple, but most cogent demonstration, by the application thereto of the established principles of International Law, of the systematic injustice to which we as a people have been subjected.

A miracle of historical and statesmanlike erudition, his address is severe without being harsh,--an indictment judicial in its calmness, its candor, its resistless cogency.

Let us hope that it will help to open the eyes of the people of England and France to the treachery of their rulers to the progress of civilization and the spirit of the age.

The trial of Hastings was really a trial of England herself.

The bill of charges and the speech upon them was more of an appeal against the rulers of England than the despot of India.… As he arraigned England against herself, so does Sumner.

He has constrained the haughty powers to appear at the bar of the Nations.

It is a grand effort in behalf of those principles which are to underlie our renovated nationality; it is a noble assertion of our rights against wrongs which are emphatically condemned by the best minds of England and France themselves.

Its facts and arguments must produce a strong impression upon the popular mind in England; and every American who has friends abroad should hasten to put in circulation in Great Britain as many copies of the speech as he can command.

Its tone, at once dignified, firm, and conciliatory, will help our cause wherever it is read, while it cannot fail to ally to us all who really value truth and honor between nations, and who abhor Slavery and its abettors.

It is an instinct upon which you can always rely, even when the conscience that ought never to slumber is drugged to death.

I cannot withhold my mite of praise for the truly masterly manner and matter of the whole pamphlet.

I have read it with great attention, and with the highest pleasure, for the principles it announces, the facts it narrates, and the firm and manly discussion of them.

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