That is the way we are
"diffusing" humanity, and its sentiments with it.
Prominent and influential editors, accustomed to deal with politicians,
men of an infinitely lower grade, say, in their ignorance, that
he acted "on the principle of revenge." They do not know the man.
They must enlarge themselves to conceive of him. I have no doubt
that the time will come when they will begin to see him as he
was. They have got to conceive of a man of faith and of religious
principle, and not a politician or an Indian; of a man who did not
wait till he was personally interfered with or thwarted in some
harmless business before he gave his life to the cause of the
oppressed.
If Walker may be considered the representative of the South, I wish
I could say that Brown was the representative of the North. He
was a superior man. He did not value his bodily life in comparison
with ideal things. He did not recognize unjust human laws,
but resisted them as he was bid. For once we are lifted out of
the trivialness and dust of politics into the region of truth and
manhood. No man in America has ever stood up so persistently and
effectively for the dignity of human nature, knowing himself for a
man, and the equal of any and all governments.
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