check.  The ‘Free Soil’ men, in claiming that name, indirectly attempt a deception, by implying that Whigs were not Free Soil men.  In declaring that they would ’do their duty and leave the consequences to God,’ they merely gave an excuse for taking a course they were not able to maintain by a fair and full argument.  To make this declaration did not show what their duty was.  If it did, we should have no use for judgment; we might as well be made without intellect; and when divine or human law does not clearly point out what is our duty, we have no means of finding out what it is but using our most intelligent judgment of the consequences.  If there were divine law or human law for voting for Martin Van Buren, or if a fair examination of the consequences and first reasoning would show that voting for him would bring about the ends they pretended to wish, then he would give up the argument.  But since there was no fixed law on the subject, and since the whole probable result of their action would be an assistance in electing General Cass, he must say that they were behind the Whigs in their advocacy of the freedom of the soil.

“Mr. Lincoln proceeded to rally the Buffalo convention for forbearing to say anything—­after all the previous declarations of those members who were formerly Whigs—­on the subject of the Mexican War because the Van Burens had been known to have supported it.  He declared that of all the parties asking the confidence of the country, this new one had less of principle than any other.

“He wondered whether it was still the opinion of these Free Soil gentlemen, as declared in the ‘whereas’ at Buffalo, that the Whig and Democratic parties were both entirely dissolved and absorbed into their own body.  Had the Vermont election given them any light?  They had calculated on making as great an impression in that State as in any part of the Union, and there their attempts had been wholly ineffectual.  Their failure there was a greater success than they would find in any other part of the Union.

“Mr. Lincoln went on to say that he honestly believed that, if all those who wished to keep up the character of the Union, who did not believe in enlarging our field, but in keeping our fences where they are, and cultivating our present possessions, making it a garden, improving the morals and education of the people, devoting the administrations to this purpose—­all real Whigs, friends of good honest government—­will unite, the race was ours.  He had opportunities of hearing from almost every part of the Union, from reliable sources, and had not heard of a county in which we had not received accessions from other parties.  If the true Whigs come forward and join these new friends, they need not have a doubt.  We had a candidate whose personal character and principles he had already described, whom he could not eulogize if he would.  General Taylor had been constantly, perseveringly, quietly standing up, doing his duty, and asking no praise or reward for it.  He was and must be just the man to whom the interests, principles, and prosperity of the country might be safely intrusted.  He had never failed in anything he had undertaken, although many of his duties had been considered almost impossible.