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| Ulysses S. Grant -- Civil War General and U.S. President |
Grant was traveling on horseback in late June, 1862, on his way to Memphis. Except for various outposts, this was Confederate territory, only lightly held by Union troops.
Watch what happens when men of honor meet; men who hold quite different perspectives (emphasis added):
I halted at La Grange. General Hurlbut was in command there at the time and had his headquarters tents pitched on the lawn of a very commodious country house. The proprietor was at home and, learning of my arrival, he invited General Hurlbut and me to dine with him.
I accepted the invitation and spent a very pleasant afternoon with my host, who was a thorough Southern gentleman fully convinced of the justice of secession.
After dinner, seated in the capacious porch, he entertained me with a recital of the services he was rendering the cause. He was too old to be in the ranks himself--he must have been quite seventy then--but his means enabled him to be useful in other ways.
In ordinary times the homestead where he was now living produced the bread and meat to supply the slaves on his main plantation, in the low-lands of Mississippi. Now he raised food and forage on both places, and thought he would have that year a surplus sufficient to feed three hundred families of poor men who had gone into the war and left their families dependent upon the "patriotism" of those better off.
The crops around me looked fine, and I had at the moment an idea that about the time they were ready to be gathered the "Yankee" troops would be in the neighborhood and harvest them for the benefit of those engaged in the suppression of the rebellion instead of its support.
I felt, however, the greatest respect for the candor of my host and for his zeal in a cause he thoroughly believed in, though our views were as wide apart as it is possible to conceive.
Grant could have had the gentleman imprisoned. Instead, they listened to one another with honor, and, no doubt, took their leave with courteous words.
Today, it feels as if we a nation degenerating into rival tribes based on perceived identities. One pictures tribesmen with shields and spears shouting and brandishing their weapons in defiance at one another, each tribe nursing grievances toward the other.
Martin Luther King wrote this: "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
If Dr King is right, and I believe he is, then it also seems right that "We will never with hate drive out the hate of those who hate from the left or from the right. Only love will drive out hate."
I accepted the invitation and spent a very pleasant afternoon with my host, who was a thorough Southern gentleman fully convinced of the justice of secession.
After dinner, seated in the capacious porch, he entertained me with a recital of the services he was rendering the cause. He was too old to be in the ranks himself--he must have been quite seventy then--but his means enabled him to be useful in other ways.
In ordinary times the homestead where he was now living produced the bread and meat to supply the slaves on his main plantation, in the low-lands of Mississippi. Now he raised food and forage on both places, and thought he would have that year a surplus sufficient to feed three hundred families of poor men who had gone into the war and left their families dependent upon the "patriotism" of those better off.
The crops around me looked fine, and I had at the moment an idea that about the time they were ready to be gathered the "Yankee" troops would be in the neighborhood and harvest them for the benefit of those engaged in the suppression of the rebellion instead of its support.
I felt, however, the greatest respect for the candor of my host and for his zeal in a cause he thoroughly believed in, though our views were as wide apart as it is possible to conceive.
Grant could have had the gentleman imprisoned. Instead, they listened to one another with honor, and, no doubt, took their leave with courteous words.
Today, it feels as if we a nation degenerating into rival tribes based on perceived identities. One pictures tribesmen with shields and spears shouting and brandishing their weapons in defiance at one another, each tribe nursing grievances toward the other.
Martin Luther King wrote this: "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
If Dr King is right, and I believe he is, then it also seems right that "We will never with hate drive out the hate of those who hate from the left or from the right. Only love will drive out hate."
