The incident filled the South with consternation. The prompt
condemnation of it by many Republican leaders did not offset, in
the minds of Southerners, the fury of praise accorded by others.
The South had a ghastly tradition derived chiefly from what is
known as Nat Turner's Rebellion in Virginia, a tradition of the
massacre of white women and children by negroes. As Brown had
set opt to rouse a slave rebellion, every Southerner familiar
with his own traditions shuddered, identifying in imagination
John Brown and Nat Turner. Horror became rage when the
Southerners heard of enthusiastic applause in Boston and of
Emerson's description of Brown as "that new saint" who was to
"make the gallows glorious like the cross." In the excitement
produced by remarks such as this, justice was not done to
Lincoln's censure. In his speech at Cooper Institute in New
York, in February, 1860, Lincoln had said: "John Brown's
effort...in its philosophy corresponds with the many attempts
related in history at the assassination of kings and emperors.
An enthusiast broods over the oppression of a people, until he
fancies himself commissioned by Heaven to liberate them. He
ventures the attempt which ends in little else than in his own
execution." A few months afterwards, the Republican national
convention condemned the act of Brown as "among the gravest of
crimes.
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