Horace Greeley: A Shared Belief in the Goodness of God Would Let “reason o’er the world prevail”

A signed quotation that sold publicly at Henkels in Philadelphia in 1895

As the owner of the New York Tribune newspaper, Greeley was always influential in political circles. Greeley had first entered the political arena in 1840, promoting the candidacy of William Henry Harrison. He remained a politician for the rest of his life, promoting first Whig and, later, Republican causes. He helped to organize the Republican Party in 1854 and campaigned for Abraham Lincoln in 1860. Having developed a “thirst for public office” while serving three months in Congress in 1848-49, he ran unsuccessfully for the Senate in 1863, for the House in 1868 and 1870, and the presidency in 1872. Greeley’s political and social views reflected his strongly held religious beliefs. His reforms aimed at creating a society in which men and women would be less inclined toward moral transgressions and more inclined toward actions that “shall ultimately result in universal holiness and consequent happiness.”

Soame Jenyns, a member of the British Parliament from 1741 to 1780, was a member of the Board of Trade and Plantations when he wrote “The Objections to the Taxation of our American Colonies by the Legislature of Great Britain, briefly consider’d.” In this he argues the case for Parliament’s right to tax the colonies, and states briefly the theory of virtual representation.

He was an essayist, poet, and politician, whose writings on various topics, though now nearly forgotten, were highly esteemed by his own generation and evidently by Greeley.

Autograph quotation signed, New York, November 25, 1855. “From Soame Jenyns.” “Were these truths understood – that God is our friend, Virtue our good and Happiness our end, How soon must reason o’er the world prevail, And error, fraud and superstition fail!”

This piece sold at Henkels in Philadelphia in 1895.