“A battle is to be fought. If we are wise it will be bloodless. If we listen to the pusillanimous counsels of men who have never shown one throb of sympathy for liberty, we shall have blood to the horses’ bridles. If we are firm and prompt to obvious duty, if we stand by the men of Kansas and give them all the help they need, the flames of war will be quenched before it bursts forth, and both they of the West and we of the East shall, after some angry mutterings, rest down in peace. But if our ears are poisoned by the advice of men who never rebuke violence on the side of power, and never fail to inveigh against the self-defence of wronged liberty, we shall invite aggression and civil war. And let us know assuredly that civil war will not burst forth in Kansas without spreading. Now, if bold wisdom prevails, the conflict will be settled afar off in Kansas, and without blows or blood. But timidity and indifference will bring down blows there, which will not only echo in our houses hitherward, but will by and by lay the foundation for an armed struggle between the whole North and the South. Shall we let the spark kindle, or shall we quench it now? But, that intelligent citizens may the better judge, let the facts of this case be reviewed.... “There was never so strong an appeal to public sympathy as that which is presented in the case of Kansas free settlers. Their emigration was a mission of mercy, full of the ripest fruits of Christianity. Their conduct has been noble. They have borne hardships without faltering, they have borne outrage and persecution with patience, returning good for evil. They have suffered wrongs manifold and infinitely provoking, without retaliation. When aggression on one occasion was pushed so sorely that their patience failed, some of the men said: ‘We cannot bear such wrongs.’ The reply made by Pomeroy will become a maxim of Christian men: ‘Be patient! your wrongs are your very strength.’ “When the armed day came, and their adversaries came out to consume them, then, and only then, they took up arms and surrounded their homes with living men, determined not to attack, but never to surrender.... Once when England only asserted the right to tax the colonies without representation, the colonies rebelled and went to war. But now a foreign Legislature has been imposed upon Kansas. That Legislature has legalized slavery against the known wishes of nine-tenths of the actual settlers. It has decreed that no man shall enter the Territory who will not take an oath of allegiance to this spurious Legislature. It has made it death to give liberty to the man escaping from oppression. It has muzzled the press. It has forbidden discussion. It has made free speech a penitentiary offence. The rights for which the old colonists fought were superficial compared with these. These are the rights which lie at the very heart of personal liberty.