Never had any rebellion been followed by treatment so lenient, forgiving, and generous on the part of the triumphant Government.

The great mass of those who had resisted the National authority were restored to all their rights of citizenship by the simple taking of an oath of future loyalty, and those excepted from immediate re-instatement were promised full forgiveness on the slightest exhibition of repentance and good works.

Mr.Seward believed, and had induced the President to believe, that frank and open generosity on the part of the Government would be responded to in like spirit on the part of those who had just emerged from rebellion.
The Administration, therefore, waited with confidence for its justification, which could be made complete only by the display of a manly appreciation and noble course on the part of those who had participated in the Rebellion.
The desire for a complete restoration of all the States to their normal position, as pictured so attractively by Mr.Seward, was general and deep throughout the North.

The policy of the President was therefore essentially aided by the patriotic and ardent love for the Union,--a love always present with the loyal people of the free States, but developed in an extraordinary degree by the costly struggle which the slaveholders' rebellion had precipitated.

If the Southern States should meet the overture of the Administration in the spirit in which it was made, the probability was decidedly in favor of their restoration to their old places without condition, without promise, without sacrifice.