“The good people of Brooklyn have shared with us all the fears and anxiety of the past weeks. Yesterday there was, if possible, a more dense mass of human beings than usual packed within the walls of Plymouth Church, and a more than ordinary curiosity on the part of strangers, and a more than customary solemnity pervading the congregation. It was manifestly the belief of all there that the pastor would not fail to improve the occasion by preaching to the people of this age upon the duties of the present trying hour, and that he would deal with so grand a subject in a manner befitting its character, its importance, and its universal occupation of the American mind. Nor were they disappointed. Mr. Beecher delivered a sermon from the text, ‘Speak to the children of Israel that they go forward.’” The above appeared in one of the daily papers. We have not time to give the synopsis of the reporter. The sermon was a careful review of the present condition of affairs and a sober counting the cost of both advance and retreat. “Peace can be had by two-thirds of the nation yielding to the one-third; by legalizing the right of any discontented community to rebel; by changing our charter of universal freedom into a charter of deliberate oppression; by becoming partners in slavery and ratifying this gigantic evil; by surrendering all right of discussion, of debate or criticism. On these terms,” he said, “we may have peace. “You can have your American eagle as you want it. If, with the South, you will strike out his eyes, then you shall stand well with Mr. Davis and Mr. Stephens, of the Confederate States; if, with the Christians of the South, you will pluck off his wings, you shall stand well with the Southern churches; and if, with the new peacemakers that have risen up in the North, you will pull out his tail-feathers, you shall stand well with the Society for the Promotion of National Unity! But when you have stricken out his eyes, so that he can no longer see; when you have plucked off his wings, so that he can no longer fly; and when you have pulled out his guiding tail-feathers, so that he can no longer steer himself, but rolls in the dirt, a mere buzzard—then will he be worth preserving? Such an eagle it is that they mean to depict upon the banner of America. ”... So far as I myself am concerned, I utterly abhor peace on any such grounds. Give me war redder than blood and fiercer than fire, if this terrific infliction is necessary that I may maintain my faith in God, in human liberty, my faith of the fathers in the instruments of liberty, my faith in this land as the appointed abode and chosen refuge of liberty for all the earth! War is terrible, but that abyss of ignominy is yet more terrible!“