“What’s liberty of conscience, I’ th’ natural and genuine sense? ’Tis to restore, with more security, Rebellion to its ancient purity.”[266] On the one side are loyal multitudes, and the generous freedmen who bared themselves to danger as our allies, with Grant still at their head; and on the other are Rebels, under the name of the Democratic Party, all dripping with blood from innumerable fields of slaughter where loyal men gasped away life,--from Fort Pillow, from Andersonville, from pirate decks,--hurrying, with Seymour at their head, to govern the Republic in the name of the Lost Cause. Not so fast, ye men of blood! Stand back! They who encountered you before will encounter you again. I would not make this statement too strong. I wish to keep within bounds. But the facts are too patent to admit of doubt. Yes, it is the old Democracy, which, after giving to the Rebellion its denationalizing pretension of State Rights, and all its wicked leaders, from Davis to Forrest and Semmes,--after thwarting every measure for its suppression as “unconstitutional,” from the Proclamation of Emancipation to the firing of a gun or the condemnation of Vallandigham,--after interfering with enlistments also as “unconstitutional,”--after provoking sympathetic riots,--after holding up “blue lights” for the guidance of the enemy,--after hanging upon the country like a paralysis,--and after, finally, under the lead of Seymour, declaring the war a “failure,”--this same Democracy, still under the lead of Seymour, champions the Lost Cause. Under the pretence of restoring Rebels to rights, it seeks to restore them to power; and this is the very question on which you are to vote. The Tories at the end of the Revolution were more moderate. They did not insist upon instant restoration to rights forfeited by treason; nor did they bring forward a candidate against Washington. This is reserved for the Tories of our day. * * * * *