Meanwhile, I am not
sure that I can keep my hands free from blood. Cobden is good; but if
he had stood in Kossuth's place, would he not have drawn his sword
against the Austrian? You, could you let a Croat insult your wife,
carry off your son to be an Austrian serf, and leave your daughter
bleeding in the dust? Yet it is true that while Moses slew the
Egyptian, Christ stood still to be spit upon; and it is true that
death to man could do him no harm. You have the truth, you have the
right, but could you act up to it in all circumstances? Stifled under
the Roman priesthood, would you not have thrown it off with all your
force? Would you have waited unknown centuries, hoping for the moment
when you could see another method?
Yet the agonies of that baptism of blood I feel, O how deeply! in the
golden June days of Rome. Consistent no way, I felt I should have
shrunk back,--I could not have had it shed. Christ did not have to see
his dear ones pass the dark river; he could go alone, however, in
prophetic spirit. No doubt he foresaw the crusades.
In answer to what you say of ----, I wish the little effort I made for
him had been wiselier applied. Yet these are not the things one
regrets.
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