Perhaps it was that so-called divine inspiration which seems
always a part of the highest human fitness. The fact which is distinctly
visible is, that a fair, plain and honest method of thinking saved him
from the perplexities which beset subtle dialecticians in politics and
in constitutional law. He had lately said that his course was "as plain
as a turnpike road;" it was, to execute the public laws.
His duty was simple; his understanding of it was unclouded by doubt or
sophistry; his resolution to do it was firm; but whether his hands would
be strengthened sufficiently to enable him to do it was a question of
grave anxiety. The president of a republic can do everything if the
people are at his back, and almost nothing if the people are not at his
back. Where, then, were now the people of the United States? In seven
States they were openly and unitedly against him; in at least seven more
they were under a very strong temptation to range themselves against him
in case of a conflict; and as for the Republican States of the North, on
that fourth day of March, 1861, no man could say to what point they
would sustain the administration. There had as yet come slight
indications of any change in the conceding, compromising temper of that
section. Greeley and Seward and Wendell Phillips, representative men,
were little better than Secessionists. The statement sounds ridiculous,
yet the proof against each comes from his own mouth.
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