his dearest ties of life are broken, never more to be united, and is driven by anguish and a sense of injustice, into an utter recklessness of his fate, is a fit instrument to plan desperate deeds, and to infuse into the bosoms of others a portion of his own spirit. Thus should we allow entire validity, which we do not, to all the arguments that are urged in favor of the continuance of slavery, no one of them affords the slightest plea for this unchristian practice. It is utterly at variance with every law of humanity and religion, and in its very existence is a curse to the land in which it is tolerated. Slave produce. That, if there were no consumers of slave produce, there would be no slaves, is an axiom too self-evident to the meanest capacity, to require us to use a single argument in its demonstration. But that the class of consumers share equally in the guilt of slavery with those who are the more immediate upholders of the system, will not probably, by the multitude, be so readily admitted. Even while they acknowledge themselves to be the main supporters of this scheme of oppression, they would exonerate themselves from any portion of its turpitude; as if it were possible for them to be innocent of a crime of which they are wilfully the cause! Can they employ another in the commission of evil, enjoy the advantage of his villany, and yet suppose that the stain of iniquity clings only to him who was but the agent of their will? Were they disinterested reasoners, we think such would not be their decision. Their own hands do not, it is true, wield the blood-extorting lash, or rivet the fetter, but they know that it is done by others, in order to afford at the cheapest rate the luxuries which they will neither resign, nor make one exertion to obtain from the hands of freemen. They have no hesitation in branding the trafficker in human flesh with the stigma of shame and cruelty, but while they would not for the universe engage personally in the exercise of so much barbarity, they will not relinquish one single iota of the comforts it procures for them. Is this consistency? Is such fastidiousness the result of humanity! or has it not rather, if fairly examined, its root in mere selfishness? Their education has unfitted them for mingling actively in scenes of cruelty, they would sicken and shudder at the sight of wantonly shed blood, and the agonizing cries of a breaking heart would frighten sleep from their pillows, or were like a haunting spirit to their dreams. Is it so vastly meritorious, then, to consign to other hands what would be revolting to their feelings? Or may such sensibility claim its spring from the nobler principles of beneficence and justice, while they unhesitatingly receive from the hands of another, that which they have not nerve enough to obtain for themselves? Let them remember when they execrate the enormities of the slave system, that it is themselves who hold out the inducements for their perpetration. Guilty as the slaveholder may be, let them not flatter themselves that he alone is guilty. To them the criminality and hideousness of slavery are clearly discernible. But he is mentally benighted. The bribe which they have given him, the unrighteous mammon, hath " perverted his judg ment." He is compassed about with the iron bands of prejudice,he fancies that to break the fetters of his slaves would be to insure his own ruin. But it is the purchasers of his ill-gotten produce who have woven around him the filmy web of prejudice. Let them but make it his interest to be just, and his moral perceptions will be clear as the daylight. Emancipation will no longer appear to him a visionary scheme, ruinous and impracticable. His opinions will be grounded on wiser and juster reasoning, and he will make haste to render back their liberty to those from whom he has so long withheld it. He who clings with so tenacious a grasp to his gathered stores of human wealth, while we hate his crime, may claim our pity for his self-delusion and his unhappy situation. But what have those to advance in behalf of their heartless conduct, who, with the full light of conviction around them, obstinately persist to abet him in his error? Nothing, absolutely nothing, beyond the miserable and even criminal plea of self-convenience, or a disinclination to encounter a trivial portion of salutary self-denial! And, they who can so lightly weigh their own gratification against the intolerable anguish of their sister's lot, who count the sacrifice of a few paltry luxuries, too vast a ranşom for the redemption of thousands and tens of thousands of their fellow-creatures from a state of servitude and darkness, are the good, the amiable, and the gentle of the earth. Such a maze of inconsistency is the human heart! We could fling away the pen, and weep in very shame and bitterness for the hard-heartedness of our sex. One would suppose that the bare knowledge of the terrible price at which those cherished comforts have been procured, would cause a woman to turn shuddering and loathingly away, as though they were infected with a taint of blood. And the curse of blood is upon them! Though the dark red stain may not be there visibly, yet the blood of all the many thousands of the slain, who have died amid the horrors and loathsomeness of the slave-ship-been hurled by capricious cruelty to the yawning wave, or sprang to its bosom in the madness of their proud despair of those who have pined away to death beneath the slow tortures of a broken heart, who have perished beneath the tortures of inventive tyranny, or on the ignominious gibbet-all this lies with a fearful weight upon this most foul and unnatural system, and that insatiable thirst for luxury and wealth in which it first originated, and by which it is still perpetuated. Think of our country's glory, All dimm'd with Afric's tears. Think of the frantic mother, Think of the prayers ascending, We have a goodly clime, Broad vales and streams we boast, Suns bless our harvest fair, But a dark shade is gathering there!- We have a birthright proud, By our dear fathers bought A fearful blot distains its white!- Our banner o'er the sea Looks forth with starry eye, What hand, with shameful stain, The yoke! the fetters! and the chain! E. M. C. This day* doth music rare Swell through our nation s bound, Bid our loved land the lesson learn- WILLIAM B. TAPPAN. Lift ye my country's banner high, Blood, blood, is on its spangled fold, These glorious stars and stripes that led Vailed only to the honored dead Beaming where fields and fame were won : These symbols that to kings could tell No! let the earthquake-utterance be Up then! determine, dare and do, What justice claims, what freemen may; What frowning heaven demands of you While yet its muttering thunders stay; That thou, for ever from this soil Bid SLAVERY'S withering blight depart; And to the wretch restore the spoil, Though thou may'st not the broken heart; That thou thy brother from the dust Lift Then to the universe wide spread * Fourth of July. JOHN PIERPONT. Quench, righteous God, the thirst, That Congo's sons hath curs'd- Shall not thy thunders speak, Cast down, great God, the fanes, Round us have risen- Then bolt the black man's door, The poor man's prison ! LYDIA MARIA CHILD. In order to show the true aspect of slavery among us, I will state distinct propositions, each supported by the evidence of actually existing laws. 1. Slavery is hereditary and perpetual, to the last moment of the slave's earthly existence, and to all his descendants, to the latest posterity. 2. The labor of the slave is compulsory and uncompensated; while the kind of labor, the amount of toil, and the time allowed for rest, are dictated solely by the master. No bargain is made, no wages given. A pure despotism governs the human brute; and even his covering and provender, both as to quantity and quality, depend entirely on the master's discretion. 3. The slave being considered a personal chattel, may be sold, or pledged, or leased, at the will of his master. He may be exchanged for marketable commodities, or taken in execution for the debts, or taxes, either of a living, or a deceased master. Sold at auction, "either individually, or in lots to suit the purchaser," he may remain with his family, or be separated from them for ever. 4. Slaves can make no contracts, and have no legal right to any property, real or personal. Their own honest earnings, and the legacies of friends, belong, in point of law, to their masters. 5. Neither a slave, nor free colored person, can be a witness against any white or free man, in a court of justice, however atrocious may have been the crimes they have seen him commit: but they may give testimony against a fellow-slave, or free colored man, even in cases affecting life. 6.The slave may be punished at his master's discretion-without trial-without any means of legal redress,-whether his offence be real, or imaginary: and the master can transfer the same despotic power to any person, or persons, he may choose to appoint. |