It has happened occasionally that a government has so wielded its powers as to contribute, unconsciously, to its own destruction.  But our experience furnishes the first instance of a government having been seized by a set of conspirators, and its vast powers used for its own overthrow.

It is now accredited generally that several members of Mr. Buchanan’s cabinet were conspirators, and that they used the power confided to them for the purpose of destroying the government itself.  Hence it appears, whatever the test applied, that the present rebellion is distinguished from all others in the fact that it does not depend upon any of the causes on which national dissensions have been usually based.

The public discontents in Ireland, in their causes, bore a slight analogy to our own.  There were existing in that country various systems and customs that were prejudicial to the prosperity of the island.  Among these may be mentioned the Encumbered Estates and Absenteeism; and it is worthy of remark that whatever has been done by the British government for the promotion of the prosperity of Ireland, and the pacification of its people, has been by a reformation of the institutions of the country.

Rebels in arms may be overthrown and dispersed by superior force, but the danger of rebellion will continue so long as the disposition to rebel animates the people.  This disposition can not be reached by military power merely; the exciting cause must be removed, or, at least, so limited and modified as to impair its influence as a disturbing force in the policy of the country.  As we have failed to trace this rebellion to any of the causes that have led to civil disturbances in other countries, it only remains to suggest that cause which in its relations and conditions is peculiar to the United States.  All are agreed that slavery is the cause of the rebellion.  Yet slavery exists in other countries,—­as Brazil, for example,—­and thus far without exhibiting its malign influence in conspiracy and rebellion.  This is no doubt true; but it should be borne in mind that, in the United States, slavery has power in the government as the basis of representation, and that the slave States are associated in the government with free States.  If the institution of slavery had not been a basis of political power, or had all the States maintained slavery, it is probable that the rebellion would never have been organized, or, if organized, it could never have attained its present gigantic proportions.

We have now reached a point where we can see the error of our public national life.  The doctrine announced by President Lincoln, while he was only Mr. Lincoln, of Springfield, that the nation must be all free or all slave, was not new with him.  The men who framed the constitution acted under the same idea, though they may not have so distinctly expressed the truth.  There is, however, abundant circumstantial evidence that they so believed, and that their only hope for