Page:The Civil War in America - an address read at the last meeting of the Manchester Union and Emancipation Society.djvu/59

Rh remarked, were readers; and when soldiers are readers, it it is difficult to use them as Prætorians or Zouaves. The fears, natural as they were, of the predominance of a military spirit, and of the ascendancy of the military over the civil power, have so far proved totally unfounded; the ascendancy of the civil power over the military has, on the contrary, been maintained in a manner very memorable and very full of comfort. No sooner was the war at an end than the armaments were reduced; and the soldiers, who were to be the tyrants of the country, returned not only willingly but eagerly to their peaceful occupations; though there were many officers, still young or in the prime of life, who had half run a brilliant career, and in whom the desire of completing that career must have been strong. If a larger standing army than usual is still kept on foot, it is partly because the fires of rebellion are hardly yet extinct, partly on account of the threatening presence of French ambition. General Grant himself is foremost in all measures for reducing the standing army, and he it is who, by his noble avoidance of military pomp and of everything that could inflame the military spirit, and by the magnanimity with which in his own person he has kept the soldier in subordination to the citizen, has done most to prevent military passions from gaining possession of the nation, and to avert the danger, if ever there was any, of sabre sway. He is greater in this than in his victories. The Duke of Wellington was deemed a high example of duty because, loaded with wealth and honours as the reward of his services, he did not attempt to overturn the constitution of his country, as Napoleon characteristically took it for granted that he would. Let this standard of conduct be applied to the American commanders, and