There was paralysis, there was disintegration; worse than either, there was an utter lack of straight sense and clear thought. There were politicians, editors, writers, agitators, reformers in multitudes whose reiteration of their moral convictions, whose intense addresses and uncompromising articles, had for years been bringing about precisely this event; yet when it came, it appeared that no one of them had contemplated it with any realizing appreciation, no one of them was ready for it, no one of them had any sensible, practical course of action to recommend. There was no union among them, no cohesion of opinion or of purpose, no agreement of forecast; each had his own individual notion as to what could be done, what should be done, what would be the train of events. Politically speaking, society was a mere parcel of units, with topical proximity, but with no other element of aggregation. The immensity of the crisis seemed to shake men's minds; the enigma of duty involved such possibilities, in case of a wrong solution, that the wisest leaders, becoming dazed and overawed, uttered the grossest follies. Men who had been energetic and vigorous before, when they were pursuing a purpose, who became so again afterward, when the distinct issue had taken shape, now lost for a time their intellectual self-possession. The picture of the country during three or four months, or rather an observant study of the prominent men of the country, is sufficiently interesting historically, but is vastly more so psychologically. I know of no other period in history in which this peculiar element of interest exists to anywhere near an equal degree. It is the study of human nature which for a brief time absorbs us, much more than the study of events.