What did Abraham lincoln mean in his second inaugural address?

What did Abraham Lincoln mean in his second inaugural address when he stated, ""Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with, or even before, the conflict itself should cease"?





any input would help! Thanks!|||This part of the third paragraph refers to





"parties" -- those seeking to save the Union and those seeking to dissolve it (i.e. Secession politicians and state groups)





Neither the Federal government's proponents nor the "insurgents" (as Lincoln put them) had a clear forecast that SLAVERY (the cause as he put it at the top of the third paragraph) would be halted before a surrender and the end of military fighting and occupation of rural and urban locales by Union troops. . .