931428 15.5458,23 HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY 1863, 0704.15. TO MY COUNTRY! "IN FRETA DUM FLUVII CURRENT, DUM MONTIBUS UMBRÆ SEMPER HONOS, NOMENQUE TUUM, LAUDESQUE MANEBUNT, Eneid, lib. it -807 PREFACE. THE origin of the following pages was a letter written by me to a friend in England. It was suggested to me to publish it, and I consented to do so, enlarging and modifying the original letter. The epistolary style has been preserved for convenience sake. It may be said that this pamphlet appears "very late in the day." But, since the real questions involved in the American Civil War have become so much masked and perverted, in England, by passions and interests, it may not be amiss to recal attention to the truths and the real issues at stake. In justice to my subject, I may be permitted to express a regret that the materials for my paper have not been more abundant and weighty than I have been able to procure, in so small a place as Nice. But to those English friends and advocates of the cause of the United States to whose writings and speeches I have been much indebted, I render my most grateful acknowledgments. No one admires the really great elements of the English character more than I do, or more cheerfully acknowledges the debt which humanity owes to England, for wise lessons taught, and great deeds done. I feel almost a personal interest that English opinion and action should be right, not only with regard to my own country, but in general. And if, in these pages, I have criticised what has seemed the public sentiment of England towards the United States, as being unwise and unjust, I have done so as a friend to England; "Not that I have loved Cæsar less, but that I love Rome more." F. W. SARGENT, M.D. NICE, May, 28th, 1863. |