On one occasion in Congress, the heart of the
whole matter was clearly shown, for at the very moment when the
Northerners of the democratic class were pressing one of their
frequent schemes for free land, Southerners and their sympathetic
Northern henchmen were furthering a scheme that aimed at the
purchase of Cuba. From the impatient sneer of a Southerner that
the Northerners sought to give "land to the landless" and the
retort that the Southerners seemed equally anxious to supply
"niggers to the niggerless," it can be seen that American history
is sometimes better summed up by angry politicians than by
historians.
We must be on our guard, however, against ascribing to either
side too precise a consciousness of its own motives. The old
days when the American Civil War was conceived as a clear-cut
issue are as a watch in the night that has passed, and we now
realize that historical movements are almost without exception
the resultants of many motives. We have come to recognize that
men have always misapprehended themselves, contradicted
themselves, obeyed primal impulses, and then deluded themselves
with sophistications upon the springs of action. In a word,
unaware of what they are doing, men allow their aesthetic and
dramatic senses to shape their conceptions of their own lives.
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