Lee Favorite Robert E. Lee Quotes

With tomorrow being the 148th anniversary of the General's passing, my mind wandered back to this thread. Here's another of my favorite quotes from one of the greatest Americans to ever live.

"Get correct views of life, and learn to see the world in its true light. It will enable you to live pleasantly, to do good, and, when summoned away, to leave without regret."
[R.E. Lee, in a letter to his daughter Mildred, dated for Dec. 21, 1866]
 
"The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known & ordered by a wise Merciful Providence.”
 
From Walter Alexander Montgomery, Company F, 12th North Carolina, The Days of Old, and the Years that are Past:

"I hardly dare narrate an incident which I witnessed at Spotsylvania; but I will venture it. Near the McCool house, at the base of the Horse Shoe Salient, the first line of Confederate troops was driven from the field in confusion. General Ewell, who was on the spot, personally engaged in trying to rally the men, lost his head, and with loud curses was using his sword on the backs of some of the flying soldiers. Just then General Lee rode up, and said: 'General Ewell, you must restrain yourself; how can you expect to control these men when you have lost control of yourself? If you cannot repress your excitement, you had better retire.' Then General Lee, in the quietest manner, moved among the men, and through their officers reformed the broken ranks."
 
"You do a gross wrong and injustice to the whole negro race in setting them free. And it is only this consideration that has led the wisdom, intelligence and Christianity of the South to support and defend the institution up to this time." Lee, interview, The New York Herald on Saturday, April 29, 1865

“The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially and physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, and I hope will prepare and lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known and ordered by a wise Merciful Providence." -Lee, letter to his wife, December 1856
 
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