But the President's endeavors did not cease. His was one of those tempers which opposition aggravates, and he became at last violent in his obstinacy. He went over entirely to those whom he had fought for a lifetime; he made political bedfellows of his bitterest enemies, and of those who had been the avowed enemies of his country. He used all the authority of his office to dissuade the Southerners from accepting the amendment which the entire North had ratified. His counsels proved more than pernicious, for the Southerners were dazzled by the fallacious hope of obtaining all that he promised. They forgot that they had been conquered and were still at the mercy of the conquerors, and assumed the airs of wronged and outraged claimants; they acted as if they were already equals in that Union which they had attempted to destroy. They, however, were far less to blame than the injudicious and ill-tempered man whom Fate had placed at this critical moment at the head of affairs. Human nature can hardly be expected to resist such overtures as he proposed, to put away the chance of escaping the penalties they had expected, and
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