In closing this record of the Christian words and deeds of our late President, it may be well to add that many more incidents might be given, did the limits of this volume allow. Enough has been given to show, that, whatever his peculiar belief on religious topics of a doctrinal character, at heart and in his life he was a child of God, and "lived religion."

"For modes of faith, let graceless zealots fight:

His can't be wrong whose life is in the right.” *

President Lincoln's life was right. He was ever giving the cup of cold water; and, verily, he shall receive a righteous man's reward.

*Pope's "Essay on Man."

"But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way, for he is a chosen vessel unto me; for I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake.” . ACTS ix. 15, 16.

...

In the sixth chapter, the course pursued by the President during the troublous times in which he governed was traced up to a certain point; though, designedly, not as minutely as a history of those times would require. The succeeding chapters have had reference more particularly to the man whom God gave to those times. Reference will now be had, briefly, to the course of events. These were of various character; sometimes bright with victory, sometimes shadowed with defeat.

"The ten months which divide the fall of Fort Donelson (Feb. 16, 1862) from the battle of Fredericksburg (Dec. 13, 1862) constitute the depressing era of military uncertainty. Administrative ability, executive resolution and hardihood, were never more impressively displayed than during this disheartening period; but, in spite of it, inconstant victory seemed to vibrate between the hostile banners.

"The encouraging results of Iuka and Corinth, and the opening of the Upper Mississippi, inspired the national heart with new confidence in the protection of Heaven and in the heroism of our Western soldiers. Brave old Farragut earns the grade of Admiral, and the sobriquet Salamander, by leading his thundering armada through the feu d'enfer which belched from Fort Philip on the right, and Fort Jackson on the left; and the martial and financial heart of the Rebellion in the South-west is palsied when the guns of his fleet sweep the streets of New Orleans, and the Tamer of Cities hangs up its scalp in his wigwam. War surges and resurges over the devoted plains of Missouri and Arkansas. The Peninsular campaign, with its checkered fortunes, alternately excites exultation and wailing; but its final failure plants in the national heart the seeds of despair, while the whirlwind which devours the army of Pope constrains us to doubt the justice of God. The victories of South Mountain and Antietam, fairly costing their weight in gore, and turning to ashes in our grasp, failed to re-animate our hopes; while Pittsburg Landing and Shiloh are more than counterpoised by the heart-rending butchery of Fredericksburg. The definitive proclamation was promulged on the first of January, 1863; and it seems instantly to have been visited with that 'gracious favor' which it so reverently implores. From that eventful date, Federal ascendency flows surely and steadily on to the capture of Richmond and the surrender of Lee. Reverses and checks, it is true, intervene; but they are only eddies in the Amazon. During these twenty-seven controlling months of the war, into which more general engagements were crowded than into any equal period of the world's history, the loss of but one attests the advent of higher inspiration and divine re-enforcement

to our struggling cause. The ink with which the proclamation is written is scarcely dry upon the parchment before the decisive victory of Murfreesborough expels invasion from Southern Tennessee. On the nation's birthday which next follows it, propitious Heaven almost visibly interfered by breaking the last barrier which prevents the 'loyal Father of Waters' from flowing free and unobstructed through the divided Rebellion, and by sweeping back from the bristling hills of Gettysburg the army of the alien in its last desperate raid into the bosom of the North. Away up in mid air, on the cloudcapped crests of the South-eastern Alleghanies, there is the roar and lurid flame of battle, as if the pent-up fires of the caverns of earth were bursting from their thunder-riven summits; while down, down in the deep valley, it seems as if the elements of Nature were battering chasms and pathways through their granite foundations. The gates of Georgia yield to the flushed battalions of the Cumberland; and, from the Altamaha to Cape Fear, three great States of the Confederacy soon

"Feel the rider's tread,

And know the conquered knee."

Hood is hurled by his infatuated chieftain against the battlements of Nashville, only to be dashed back broken and destroyed. The vale of the Shenandoah is swept by the besom and scourged by the wrath of Sheridan. Over the forest which sweeps from the Rapidan to the James, there hangs, in early spring-time, a dark and portentous cloud: the Wilderness is red, as if untimely autumn had purpled its foliage. We dimly hear, far in its resounding depths, that awe-inspiring roll, that sharp, suggestive rattle, which forewarns and terrifies na

tions; and ever and anon a woe-begone messenger, such as

'Drew Priam's curtain at the dead of night,
And told him half his Troy was buried,'

breaks from the sequestered thicket, with a tantalizing tale of the fierce, sanguinary, but indecisive shock and recoil of embattled hosts. What weeks of heart-rending surprise! But finally, from the saturnalia of death and butchery, long rampant in its sombre and haunted recesses, he of the iron will and inflexible tenacity at length emerges in the resplendent robes of victory, and day after day for persistent months, unmoved by clamor, undismayed by failure, unwearied by resistance, slowly tightens an irresistible coil round the wailing capital of sin, until, faint and gasping, it falls into the arms of a negro brigade. City after city, harbor after harbor, succumb. The coast is hermetically sealed from Norfolk to Galveston, and the magazines and arsenals of England and France no longer pour their strengthening tides into the decaying veins of the worn-out Confederacy. Sheridan rolls up the Confederate right like a scroll, and hangs on its flying flank with the scent of a hound and the snap of a terrier. Lee surrenders his decimated horde; and over the old, endeared, precious inheritance, from the Rappahanock to the Sabine, up flies the banner, down droops the rag."*

A more eloquent description of the events which transpired from the dawn of freedom for an enfranchised race, to the dawn of peace for a redeemed nation, could scarcely be penned. And, all the while that these events were transpiring, President Lincoln was sending up from the White House his fervent prayers, and forth to our

* Hon. H. C. Deming.