This hope, however, was sadly disappointed. The second
battle of Bull Run, which occurred one week after the Greeley letter,
proved a serious defeat, and necessitated a further postponement of his
contemplated action.
As a secondary effect of the new disaster, there came upon him once more
an increased pressure to make reprisal upon what was assumed to be the
really vulnerable side of the rebellion. On September 13, he was visited
by an influential deputation from the religious denominations of
Chicago, urging him to issue at once a proclamation of universal
emancipation. His reply to them, made in the language of the most
perfect courtesy nevertheless has in it a tone of rebuke that indicates
the state of irritation and high sensitiveness under which he was living
from day to day. In the actual condition of things, he could neither
safely satisfy them nor deny them. As any answer he could make would be
liable to misconstruction, he devoted the larger part of it to pointing
out the unreasonableness of their dogmatic insistence:
"I am approached with the most opposite opinions and advice, and that by
religious men, who are equally certain that they represent the divine
will. I am sure that either the one or the other class is mistaken in
that belief, and perhaps, in some respects, both.
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