ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 151 



We felt an only too natural distrust of immense public 

 meetings and enthusiastic cheers. 



That a reaction should follow the holiday enthusiasm 

 with which the war was entered-on, that it should follow 

 soon, and that the slackening of public spirit should 

 be proportionate to the previous over-tension, might well 

 be foreseen by all who had studied human nature or 

 history. Men acting gregariously are always in ex- 

 tremes ; as they are one moment capable of higher 

 courage, so they are liable, the next, to baser depression, 

 and it is often a matter of chance whether numbers shall 

 multiply confidence or discouragement. Nor does de- 

 ception lead more surely to distrust of men, than self- 

 deception to suspicion of* principles. The only faith that 

 wears well and holds its color in all weathers is that 

 which is woven of conviction and set with the sharp 

 mordant of experience. Enthusiasm is good material 

 for the orator, but the statesman needs something more 

 durable to work in, — must be able to rely on the delib- 

 erate reason and consequent firmness of the people, with- 

 out which that presence of mind, no less essential in 

 times of moral than of material peril, will be wanting at 

 the critical moment. Would this fervor of the Free 

 States hold out 1 Was it kindled by a just feeling of the 

 value of constitutional liberty % Had it body enough to 

 withstand the inevitable dampening of checks, reverses, 

 delays'! Had our population intelligence enough to 

 comprehend that the choice was between order and anar- 

 chy, between the equilibrium of a government by law 

 and the tussle of misrule by pronunciamiento ? Could a 

 war be maintained without the ordinary stimulus of 

 hatred and plunder, and with the impersonal loyalty of 

 principle ? These were serious questions, and with no 

 precedent to aid in answering them. 



At the beginning of the war there was, indeed, occa- 



