The editor comments on the beginning of his work, recalling his work with Benjamin Lundy, and indicates that since he started his work at twenty-three years of age, “we are not venerable in years, as some imagine us to be”. …he indicates that Stanton and Lincoln, whom he met at the recent Baltimore Convention, in June, both remarked that they expected him to appear older than he does. “We are not unfrequently asked, whether we ever expected to live to see the marvelous revolution which has taken place in the views and feelings of the people, as to the duty and necessity of the prompt and utter extinction of slavery. Our reply is, that we were never much given to conjecture on the subject.”… He then indicates a belief that the nation is being punished for its sin of slavery, and here he remembers Jefferson’s fear of God’s justice. “The precise manner of our national punishment was hidden from all eyes, but of its certainty and severity none who believed in the indissoluble connection of retribution with sin could doubt…..As that vast system of robbery and cruelty is the essential cause of this awful visitation, so its instant and total abolition will give the land rest, stop the effusion of blood, and procure for us, as a people, an enduring union based on liberty and justice for all, whereby; our peace shall be like a river, and our prosperity as the waves of the sea.”
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