In addition to the fact that Lanier's first poems were published
in this journal,* it is to be noted that it exerted considerable influence
over him -- especially in two directions. Its broad national policy
-- more sympathetic than that of the "Nation" even -- was evidence to him
that there were Northern people who were magnanimous in their attitude
to Southern problems. He was especially impressed with an editorial
on the "Duties of Peace" (July 7, 1866) as "the most sensible discussion"
he had seen of the whole situation. In it were these striking words:
"The people of the South are our brothers, bone of our bone
and flesh of our flesh. They have courage, integrity, honor,
patriotism, and all the manly virtues as well as ourselves. . . .
Can we realize that our duty now is to heal, not to punish? . . .
Consider their dilapidated cities, their deserted plantations,
their impoverished country, their loss of personal property
by thousands of millions; far more than this, their buried dead
and desolate hearts. . . . No one with a heart can realize
the truth of their condition without feeling that the punishment
has been terrific. We should address ourselves to the grave task of restoring
the disrupted relations of the two sections by acts of genuine kindness,
truthfulness, fairness, and love. . . . In a word, let the era of blood
be followed by another era of good feeling." The whole editorial
is in accordance with the previously announced policy of the paper:
"The Rebellion extinguished, the next duty is to extinguish
the sectional spirit, and to seek to create fraternal feeling
among all the States of the Union.
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