The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, August, 1864, page 9 by Various Authors
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layed; that benefits, large and excellent, have already resulted to the nation. He sees already visible uses, which, to some extent at least, should comfort and sustain a people, even under the awful curse and agony of a civil war. He writes to show these uses to others, that they too may take heart and hope, when the days are darkest.
In the first place, this war is, at last, our national independence. To be sure, we read of a war carried on by our fathers to secure that boon. They paid a large price for it, and they got it, and got all nations to acknowledge they deserved it, including the great nation they fought with. It was their political independence only. It secured nothing beyond that. Morally we were not independent. Socially, we were not independent. There was a time, we can all remember it, when we literally trembled before every cockney that strangled innocent aspirates at their birth. We had not secured our moral independence of Europe, and particularly not of our own kindred and people. We literally crouched at the feet of England, and begged for recognition like a poor, disowned relation. We scarcely knew what was right till England told us. We dare not accept a thing as wise, proper, or becoming till we had heard her verdict. What will England say? How will they think of this across the water? In all emergencies these were the questions thought, at least, if not spoken. We lived in perpetual terror of transatlantic opinion. Some cockney came to visit us. He might be a fool, a puppy, an intolerably bore, an infinite ass. It made no difference. He rode our consciousness like a nightmare. He and his note book dominated free America. 'What does he think of us? What will he say of us?' We actually grovelled before the creature, more than once begging for his good word, his kindly forbearance, his pity for our faults and failures. 'We know we are wicked, for we are republicans, O serene John! We are sinful, for we have no parish beadle. We are no better than t