But what shall we say of that scheme which aims at a reconstruction of the Union by leaving New England out? Simply this: that, aside from any considerations of policy--without attempting to argue the question of a good or evil result from such a movement, the answer is plain enough: _you cannot do it_--and that which is impossible needs no argument for or against. The energy and activity of mind and body, the lofty independence, the firm self-reliance, the dogged determination and undaunted adherence to a great and high purpose, of the whole Saxon race, is concentrated in the people of that mountain land. Theirs have been the heads to plan and the hands to execute every great work we have accomplished since the foundation of our nationality. The railroads and canals and telegraphs of the North, the South, the East, and the West are their work; and their capital and their inventive, energetic minds still shape and control every great commercial enterprise of our land. Their sturdy emigrants have pushed civilization across the boundless prairies of the West, and opened the primeval forests of the Pacific States. Go where you will on the face of the earth, and you find them there before you, and ever the same busy, tireless apostles of progress, the leaders in every great work, and the rulers of commerce, everywhere looked up to as the type of the executive mind, and, by the tacit consent of Christendom, intrusted with the guidance of every enterprise requiring pluck, perseverance, and ceaseless activity. And theirs will still be the brains to control the destinies of our race, however isolated they may become, however they may be made the objects of distrust and contempt. Ay! shut them out if you will, and from that moment New England becomes the Switzerland of America, the home of great ideas and great men, the temple where Freedom shall take up her everlasting abode, and the altar fires of Liberty shall never die away. And her people will become the priests of that great religion which, taking its rise in a lofty appreciation of the true end of human existence, is already bursting out all over the Christian world, in fitful flames, which shall yet become the devouring element that shall wither and consume away oppression and kingcraft from the face of the earth. Shut her out, then, if you will, but you cannot shut out the flame which she shall kindle; you cannot shut out the tones of her trumpet voice, proclaiming to the world the doctrines of eternal truth. Self-reliant, possessing within themselves every element of success, her people can and will make their way, as heretofore, alone and unaided. Asking no favors of the world, they will pursue the even tenor of their way, undisturbed by the mutterings and growlings of their impotent foes, while their little republic, like a city set upon a hill, continues to reflect from her glittering pinnacles the sunlight of heaven to all quarters of the earth.