McKinley, William (American, 1843 -.)

Abra Kohn to Abraham Lincoln-What more beautiful conception than that which prompted Abra Kohn, of Chicago, in February, 1861, to send to Mr. Lincoln, on the eve of his starting to Washington to take the office of President to which he had been elected, a flag of our country, bearing upon its silken folds these words from the fifth and ninth verses of the first chapter of Joshua: "Have I not commanded thee? Be strong and of good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord our God is with thee whithersoever thou goest. There shall no man be able to stand before thee all the days of thy life. As I was with Moses, so shall I be with thee. I will not fail thee nor forsake thee." Could anything have given Mr. Lincoln more cheer or been better calculated to sustain his courage or strengthen his faith in the mighty work before him? Thus commanded, thus assured, Mr. Lincoln journeyed to the capital, where he took the oath of office and registered in heaven an oath to save the Union; and "the Lord our God" was with him and did not fail nor forsake him until every obligation of oath and duty was sacredly kept and honored. Not any man was able to stand before him. Liberty was enthroned, the Union was saved, and the flag which he carried floated in triumph and glory upon every flagstaff of the Republic. - (Cleveland, 1894. )

"Benevolent Assimilation »- Finally it should be the earnest and paramount aim of the military administration to win the confidence, respect, and affection of the inhabitants of the Philippines by so saving them in every possible way that full measure of individual rights and liberty which is the heritage of free people, and by proving to them that the mission of the United States is one of benevolent assimilation, substituting the mild sway of justice and right for arbitrary rule.-(From instructions sent to General Otis, December 27th, 1898, signed by the President, December 21st.)

Mackintosh, Sir James (Scotland, 1765-1832.) "Pernicious Activity of Government »— A government on the spot, though with the means of obtaining correct information, is exposed to the delusions of prejudice; for a government at a distance, the only safe course to pursue is to follow public opinion. In making the practical application of this principle, if I find the government of any country engaged in squabbles with the great mass of the people,- if I find it engaged in vexatious controversies and ill-timed disputes, especially if that government be the government of a colony,-I say that there is a reasonable presumption against that government. I do not charge it with injustice, but I charge it with imprudence and indiscretion; and I say that it is unfit to hold the authority intrusted to it.

Corruptionists in Politics-Some, indeed the basest of the race, the sophists, the rhetors,

the poet laureates of murder, who were cruel only from cowardice and calculating selfishness, are perfectly willing to transfer their venal pens to any government that does not disdain their infamous support. These men, republicans from servility, who published rhetorical panegyrics on massacre, and who reduced plunder to a system of ethics, are as ready to preach slavery as anarchy. But the more daring, I had almost said the more respectable, ruffians cannot so easily bend their heads under the yoke. These fierce spirits have not lost "the unconquerable will, the study of revenge, immortal hate." They leave the luxuries of servitude to the mean and dastardly hypocrites, to the Belials and Mammons of the infernal faction. They pursue their old end of tyranny under their old pretext of liberty. The recollection of their unbounded power renders every inferior condition irksome and vapid, and their former atrocities form, if I may so speak, a sort of moral destiny which irresistibly impels them to the perpetration of new crimes. They have no place left for penitence on earth. They labor under the most awful proscription of opinion that ever was pronounced against human beings. They have cut down every bridge by which they could retreat into the society of men. Awakened from their dreams of democracy, the noise subsided that deafened their ears to the voice of humanity; the film fallen from their eyes which hid from them the blackness of their own deeds; haunted by the memory of their inexpiable guilt; condemned daily to look on the faces of those whom their hands made widows and orphans, they are goaded and scourged by these real furies, and hurried into the tumult of new crimes, which will drown the cries of remorse, or, if they be too depraved for remorse, will silence the curses of mankind. Tyrannical power is their only refuge from the just vengeance of their fellow-creatures.-(On the French Revolution in the case of Peltier, 1803.)

Mann, Horace (American, 1796 – 1859. )

Ignorance a Crime-In all the dungeons of the old world, where the strong champions of freedom are now pining in captivity beneath the remorseless power of the tyrant, the morning sun does not send a glimmering ray into their cells, nor does night draw a thicker veil of darkness between them and the world, but the lone prisoner lifts his iron-laden arms to heaven in prayer, that we, the depositories of freedom and of human hopes, may be faithful to our sacred trust; while, on the other hand, the pensioned advocates of despotism stand, with listening ear, to catch the first sound of lawless violence that is wafted from our shores, to note the first breach of faith or act of perfidy among us, and to convert them into arguments against liberty and the rights

of man.

The experience of the ages that are past, the hopes of the ages that are yet to come, unite their voices in an appeal to us; they