We have fought this fight as long, and as well as we know how. We have been defeated. For us as a Christian people, there is now but one course to pursue. We must accept the situation.

Private and public life are subject to the same rules-truth and manliness are two qualities that will carry you through this world much better than policy or tact of expediency or other words that were devised to conceal a deviation from a straight line.

I am now considered such a monster, that I hesitate to darken with my shadow, the doors of those I love, lest I should bring upon them misfortune.

I have fought against the people of the North because I believed they were seeking to wrest from the South dearest rights. But I have never cherished toward them bitter or vindictive feelings. And have never seen the day when I did not pray for them.

Let us go home and cultivate our virtues.

So far from engaging in a war to perpetuate slavery, I am rejoiced that slavery is abolished.

There is no more dangerous experiment than that of undertaking to be one thing before a man's face and another behind his back.