Even his burly frame and rugged strength were overborne by the weight of his cares and by the strain upon his nerves, but not until his work was finished, not until the great salvation had come.

Persecution and obloquy have followed him into the grave, but an impartial verdict must be that he was inspired with the devotion of a martyr, and that he wore out his life in a service of priceless value to all the generations of his…

But they would take care to let the government which multiplied provocations and sought for quarrels understand that their forbearance sprung from the consciousness of strength and not from the timidity of weakness.

They would warn a government which was making political capital out of blustering demonstrations that our patience might be tried too far.

It is difficult to account for the manifest irritation of its tone except upon the ground that Lord John Russell saw in a possible reconciliation, between North and South, something that threatened the interest or jarred upon the sympathy…

The fact is worthy of emphasis that since the cordial interchange of notes touching the visit of the Prince of Wales there had not been a single word of unkindness in the correspondence of the two governments.

Neither party thoroughly realized the horror of the work before them, though every day made it more clearly apparent.

The vital element of that government was Union.

Whatever might be the complicated relations of their domestic law, to the world and to themselves the United States of America was the indivisible government.

This instinct of union had gathered them together as colonies, had formed them into an imperfect confederation, had matured them under a National Constitution.

To destroy their union was to resolve them into worse than colonial disintegration.

But the separation of the States was more than the dissolution of the Union.

For, treating with all due respect the conviction of the Southern States as to the violation of their constitutional rights, no fair-minded man can deny that the central idea of the secession movement was the establishment of a great…

When English statesmen were called upon to deal with such a crisis, the United States had a right to expect, if not active sympathy, at least that neutrality which would confine itself within the strict limit of international obligation…

As the United States had extended its territory, had developed in wealth, had increased in population, richer and richer had become the returns to England's merchants and manufacturers; question after question of angry controversy had been…

But the recognition of belligerency or independence may be the means to achieve a result, and not simply an impartial acquiescence in a result already achieved.

The question therefore was not whether foreign powers had a right to recognize, but whether the time and method of such recognition were not distinctly hostile,-- whether they were not the efficient and coldly calculated means to…

Events proved that if the English Government had postponed this action until the Government of the United States had been allowed a frank discussion of its policy, no possible injury to English interests could have resulted.

It was therefore an invitation, not to a belligerent but to the Southern Confederacy, to accept and thus become a part to an international compact to which in the very nature of things there could be no parties save those whose acceptance…

It would have been impossible to invent a process more gainful to British commerce, more harmful to American commerce.

Any reasonable man, looking at the condition of affairs, could not doubt that the public recognition of the independence of the Confederacy by England and France, was a foregone and rapidly approaching conclusion.

Their avowed object was to obtain the recognition by those governments of the independence of the new Southern Republic, and their success would have been a most dangerous if not a fatal blow to the cause of the Union.

The difficulty of adjustment lay not in the temper or conviction of either government, but in the passionate and very natural excitement of popular feeling in both countries.

The American people would more easily tolerate a spontaneous offer of reparation made by its government from a sense of justice than a compliance with a demand for satisfaction from a foreign minister.

It is only to be regretted that the spirit and discretion exhibited by the eminent diplomatist who represented England here with such wisdom and good temper, had not been adopted at an earlier date and more steadily maintained by the…