no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the Government, while I have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it.... We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic cords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature." {30} [Illustration: SHERMAN AND HIS GENERALS. Oliver O. Howard. John A. Logan. William B. Hazen. William T. Sherman. Jeff. C. Davis. Henry W. Slocum. J. A. Mower.] No such address had ever come from the lips of a {31} President before. Pierce and Buchanan had scolded the abolitionists like partisans; Lincoln talked to the secessionists like a brother. The loyal people throughout the country received the address with satisfaction. The secessionists bitterly denounced it. Overlooking all its pacific declarations, and keeping out of sight the fact that a majority of the Congress just chosen was politically opposed to the President, they appealed to the Southern people to say whether they would "submit to abolition rule," and whether they were going to look on and "see gallant little South Carolina crushed under the heel of despotism." [Illustration: GENERAL GRANT'S BODYGUARD.] [Illustration: GENERAL ULYSSES S. GRANT, WITH GENERALS RAWLINS AND BOWERS.]