There is always a certain glamour about the idea of a nation rising up to crush an evil simply because it is wrong. Unfortunately, this can seldom be realized in real life; for the very existence of the evil usually argues a moral weakness in the very place where extraordinary moral strength is called for.

The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America, 1638-1870 (1897), ch. XII: The Essentials in the Struggle, paragraph 93: "The Moral Movement"

The W.E.B. Du Bois Virtual University