Abraham
Lincoln
March
4, 1865
Fellow-Countrymen:
At
this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an
extended address than there was at the first. Then a
statement somewhat in detail of a course to be
pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the
expiration of four years, during which public
declarations have been constantly called forth on
every point and phase of the great contest which
still absorbs the attention and engrosses the
energies of the nation, little that is new could be
presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all
else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public
as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably
satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope
for the future, no prediction in regard to it is
ventured.
On
the occasion corresponding to this four years ago
all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending
civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it.
While the inaugural address was being delivered from
this place, devoted altogether to 'saving' the Union
without war, urgent agents were in the city seeking
to 'destroy' it without war--seeking to dissolve the
Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both
parties deprecated war, but one of them would 'make'
war rather than let the nation survive, and the
other would 'accept' war rather than let it perish,
and the war came.
One-eighth
of the whole population were colored slaves, not
distributed generally over the Union, but localized
in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted
a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this
interest was somehow the cause of the war. To
strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was
the object for which the insurgents would rend the
Union even by war, while the Government claimed no
right to do more than to restrict the territorial
enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the
war the magnitude or the duration which it has
already attained. Neither anticipated that the
'cause' of the conflict might cease with or even
before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked
for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental
and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to
the same God, and each invokes His aid against the
other. It may seem strange that any men should dare
to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their
bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let
us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of
both could not be answered. That of neither has been
answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes.
"Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it
must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that
man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall
suppose that American slavery is one of those
offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs
come, but which, having continued through His
appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He
gives to both North and South this terrible war as
the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall
we discern therein any departure from those divine
attributes which the believers in a living God
always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently
do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may
speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it
continue until all the wealth piled by the
bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited
toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood
drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn
with the sword, as was said three thousand years
ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of
the Lord are true and righteous altogether."
With
malice toward none, with charity for all, with
firmness in the right as God gives us to see the
right, let us strive on to finish the work we are
in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him
who shall have borne the battle and for his widow
and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and
with all nations.
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