God's Image in Ebony E-Book

H. G. Adams

• Herausgeber: Andura Publishing
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

A true and powerful story of the resilience of the human spirit. An American classic.

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Leseprobe

God's Image in Ebony:

Being a Series of Biographical Sketches, Facts, Anecdotes, etc.,

Demonstrative of the Mental Powers and Intellectual Capacities

of the Negro Race:

Edited by H. G. Adams

WITH A

BRIEF SKETCH OF THE ANTI-SLAVERY MOVEMENT IN AMERICA,

BY F. W. CHESSON

AND A

CONCLUDING CHAPTER OF ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE, COMMUNICATED

BY WILSON ARMISTEAD, ESQ.

LONDON:

PARTRIDGE AND OAKEY, 34, PATERNOSTER ROW,

AND 70 EDGWARE ROAD.

M DCCC LIV

TO

MRS. H. B. STOWE,

AS A TRIBUTE OF ADMIRATION FOR

HER GENIUS,

AND OF THAT PURE PHILANTHROPY, WHICH HAS IMPELLED

HER TO DEVOTE HER POWERS AND ENERGIES

TO THE CAUSE OF

THE OPPRESSED AND DOWN-TRODDEN NEGRO,

THIS VOLUME

IS, BY PERMISSION, RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED BY

THE EDITOR.

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PREFACE.

        AT the present juncture, when anti-slavery books are so rife, and, as it would appear, so acceptable to the reading public, it is scarcely necessary to apologize for the issue of a work like the present. It was projected, and partly written, some time prior to the appearance of that wonderful picture of "Life among the Lowly," by Mrs. Stowe; which has become a classic in almost every European language, and given such an impetus to the movement against Negro Slavery, as it, perhaps, never received before--never certainly from the operation of one mind and intellect. Other pressing engagements obliged the Editor to put his little work aside, from time to time, and at length to complete it more hastily than he could have wished. The subject is one which will amply repay a very careful and lengthened investigation--one which might well engage, to the full extent of its capacity, both the philosophic and philanthropic mind.

        To those who have had an opportunity of reading that costly and elaborate volume, entitled "A Tribute for the Negro" by Wilson Armistead, Esq., this book will afford little information that is fresh: as comparatively few, however, could have had this opportunity, it seems desirable to place before the public, in a cheap and easily accessible form, some of the most striking facts that could be collected, in refutation of the opinion, entertained, or at least urged, by some, that the Negro is essentially, and unalterably, an inferior being to those who

                         "Find him guilty of a darker skin."

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and therefore deny him the right of freedom, which is inalienably his.

        One word as to the title of this book, to which we anticipate some objections. "God's Image cut, or carved in Ebony," was a phrase first used, we believe, by the English Church Historian, Fuller,--a sayer of sententious things; and assuredly this phrase is among the most striking of the graphic sentences which he stamped so deeply into the walls of the republic of letters. There it stands, this beautiful and appropriate piece of imagery, and there it will stand, as long as those walls endure: and although to some it may appear to border upon irreverence, yet, with all due respect for those who think so, we must defend it as a powerful conception of a vigorous mind, and a lively illustration, applied to a particular case, of the scripture declaration--"In the image of God created he him."

        It will be seen, then, that ours is an anti-slavery book, and something more; it aims at disabusing a certain portion of the public mind of what we conceive to be a pernicious error, by shewing that the Negro is morally and intellectually, as well as physically, the equal of the white man. If it be urged that our examples are mere isolated cases, and prove nothing as to the capacities of the whole Negro race, we say that they are too numerous to be taken as such, and that if they were not half so numerous as they are, they would fully prove that our position is correct. For we are to look at the depressing circumstances out of which these black brothers and sisters of ours have arisen; at the almost insurmountable difficulties through which they have forced their way.

        But we are anticipating the arguments more fully urged in the introductory chapter, and other portions of our work, to which we invite the reader's serious attention. A few lines, suggested by the present aspect of the great anti-slavery struggle, may perhaps be here introduced as an appropriate conclusion of our Preface: --

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WHAT OF THE NIGHT?

Addressed to "The Anti-Slavery Watchman."

                         WHAT of the night, Watchman, what of the night --

                         The black night of Slavery? Wanes it apace?

                         Do you see in the East the faint dawnings of light,

                         Which tell that the darkness to day will give place?

                         Do you hear the trees rustle, awoke by the breeze?

                         Do you catch the faint prelude of music to come?

                         Are there voices that swell like the murmur of seas,

                         When the gale of the morning first scatters the foam?

                         And what of the fight, Watchman, what of the fight --

                         The battle for Freedom--how goeth it on?

                         Is there hope for the Truth--is there hope for the Right ?

                         Have Wrong and Oppression the victory won?

                         Through the long hours of darkness we've listened in fear,

                         To the sounds of the struggle, the groans and the cries,

                         Anon they were far, and anon they were near,

                         Now dying away, and now filling the skies.

                         Say, what of the night, Watchman, what of the fight?

                         Doth gloom yet the bright Sun of Freedom enshroud?

                         Are the strongholds of Slavery yet on the height?

                         Is the back of the Negro yet broken and bowed?

                         Then send forth a voice to nations around;

                         Bid the peoples arise, many millions as one,

                         And say--"This our brother no more shall be bound--

                         This wrong to God's children no more shall be done!"

WATCHMAN.

                         THE night is far spent and the day is at hand,

                         There's a flush in the East, though the West is yet dark;

                         Creation hath heard the Eternal command,

                         And light--glorious light--cometh on: Brothers, hark!

                         There's a jubilant sound, there's a myriad hum!

                         All nature is waking, and praising the Lord,

                         And the voices of men to the list'ning ear come.

                         Crying--"Up, Watchman! send the glad tidings abroad!"

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                         In the dark Western valleys yet rageth the war,

                         And the heel of Oppression treads down the poor

                         But his eye sees the dawning of daylight afar,

                         And he knows there are hands stretched to succour

                         The Standard of Freedom, all bloody and torn,

                         And trampled, and hidden awhile from the view,

                         Upraised by the hand of a Woman, is borne

                         In the thick of the fight, and hope liveth anew.

                         Oh, joy to the Watchman! Whose eye can discern,

                         Through clouds and thick darkness, the breaking of day!

                         And, joy to the Negro! whose glances may turn

                         To the quarter whence cometh the life-giving ray.

                         It cometh--that Freedom for which we have striven!

                         We have seen the light gilding the hill-tops, and heard

                         The promise of ONE by whom fetters are riven:

                         'Tis is as sure as His high and immutable Word!

H. G. A.

Rochester, 1854

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CONTENTS.

A short Sketch of the Past History and the Present Position of the Slavery Question in America . . . . . v

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.--The Negro Race . . . . . 1

CHAPTER II.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.--Toussaint L'Overture. . . . . 15

CHAPTER III.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.--Jan Tzatzoe, Andreas Stoffles, etc. . . . . . 31

CHAPTER IV.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.--Testimony of the Abbè Gregoire.--Job Ben Solliman. Anthony William Amo. Geoffrey L'Islet. Capitien. Othello. James Derham. Attobah Cugoano. Benjamin Banneker. Francis Williams. Benoit the Black. Hannibal . . . . . 47

CHAPTER V.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.--Olaudah Equiano. . . . . 61

CHAPTER VI.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.--Phillis Wheatley. Thomas Jenkyns. Lott Cary. Paul Cuffee. The Amistad Captives. Ignatius Sancho. Zhinga. Placedo . . . . . 74

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CHAPTER VII.

VOICES FROM THE PAST. . . . . 93

CHAPTER VIII.

LIVING WITNESSES.--Frederick Douglass. James W. C. Pennington, D. D. Josiah Henson. William Wells Brown. Henry Bibb. Henry Highland Garnett. Moses Roper. Samuel R. Ward. Alexander Crummell. . . . . 106

CONCLUDING CHAPTER . . . . . 133

ANTI-SLAVERY LINES, suggested by Baird's Picture, entitled 'A Scene on the Coast of Africa'. . . . . 163

NOTES . . . . . 166

Page v

A SHORT SKETCH OF THE

PAST HISTORY AND THE PRESENT POSITION

OF THE SLAVERY QUESTION IN AMERICA.

        THE history of "the peculiar institution" in the United States of America since the Declaration of Independence, is one fraught with the most astounding wickedness. That a people who had engaged in a successful struggle for their political rights;--who had boasted throughout the long and exciting period of the Revolutionary War that their cause was that of universal Justice and Liberty; and who had asserted in their Declaration of Independence that "all men are created equal;"--that such a people should legalise a slavery which reduces its victims to the condition of "chattels personal to all intents, purposes, and constructions whatsoever;" that, in after years, instead of seeking to abolish it, or to narrow its boundaries, they should be constantly aiming at, and in too many instances securing, its extension; and that they should be seeking to establish it on a permanent basis, and to prevent agitation against it by Compromise Measures and Fugitive Slave Laws; that, in short, they should thus perpetuate and strengthen a tyranny ten thousandfold worse than the British yoke which they burst asunder, is a national hypocrisy so terrible, that history fails to furnish a parallel; and is a depth of moral degradation lower than that into which any other country has fallen. Well may the poet Whittier, speaking of his native land, exclaim--

                         "Is this, the land our fathers loved,

                         The freedom which they toiled to win?

                         Is this the soil whereon they moved?

                         Are these the graves they slumber in?

                         Are we the sons by whom are borne

                         The mantles which the dead have worn?"

        There is no doubt that during, and immediately after, the Revolutionary era, the gradual emancipation of every

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slave, on the soil of the new Republic, was regarded as an event which would not be delayed for many years. Public opinion was then, unquestionably, in favour of such a course; although, unfortunately for American honour and the cause of the down-trodden, the immediate emancipation doctrine of the revered Dr. Samuel Hopkins was entertained but by few. From the time of the first American Congress in 1774 until the adoption of the Federal Constitution in 1789, several legislative bodies, and numerous associations, conventions, ecclesiastical organizations, and public meetings, reiterated the sentiments indorsed by the Virginian Convention of '74, which were, in substance, as follows:--"The Abolition of American Slavery is the greatest object of desire in these colonies." By an Act of Congress passed in 1787, Slavery was abolished in Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Iowa; and in the Convention that prepared the draft of the Constitution, the most thorough Anti-Slavery sentiments were freely expressed and cordially received. But, strange to say, notwithstanding these facts, and the testimonies given against Slavery by statesmen no less illustrious than Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, and Jay, the Federal Constitution provided for the reclamation of Fugitive Slaves, empowered the use of the United States army and navy to put down outbreaks of the Slaves, and bestowed three votes to the Slaveholder for every four Slaves he possesses. The subsequent history of "the peculiar institution" is most lamentable. True it was that in course of time Slavery ceased to exist in those States that are north of Mason and Dixon's line; but it has increased in strength at the South; it has been fortified by the recreant public opinion of the North; it has widely extended its boundaries; and it has added millions to its victims. With the exception of Cassius Clay, in Kentucky, a few Anti-Slavery Wesleyans in North Carolina, the National Era newspaper at Washington, and solitary individuals scattered here and there, where is to be heard the voice of Anti-Slavery truth on the Slavery-cursed soil of the South?

        And if we look at the North what do we see? We find the great political parties chained to the car of

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Slavery: "The Union and Southern rights", is their battle-cry. To be an Abolitionist is to be a "traitor"--to talk of "the rights of the coloured race," is to speak in the language of "madmen"-- to deny that the Bible sanctions compulsory servitude, is to be unpardonably heterodox. Look, too, at the sordid, ambitious, never-satisfied desire of the Slaveholders for fresh soil upon which to plant the upas tree of Slavery. Their limits are being constantly widened; but still they ask for more territory, heeding not the coming day of retribution, nor the warning voice of a just God. Since the adoption of the Constitution, Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisana, Alabama, Mississipi, Missouri, Arkansas, and, lastly, Texas (all Slave States) have been added to the Union to weaken the strength of Freedom, and to add fresh power to that institution which has somewhere been called "the corner-stone of the Republican edifice;" and while in 1776 the number of Slaves in the Southern States was but four hundred and fifty-six thousand, it is now more than three million two hundred thousand. But many earnest voices, and many brave hearts, were protesting against the Pro-Slavery course of American statesmen during the dark years to which we have hastily referred. Truth was not without its witnesses; men, and women too, who were ready not only to devote their lives to the Anti-Slavery work, despite the storm of obloquy to which they were exposed, but to meet death itself if such a testimony were needed. Among the early pioneers of the Anti-Slavery movement, none deserve more respectful mention than President Edwards, and Dr. Samuel Hopkins, men who in their day fought the battles of Freedom with holy faithfulness. Among the greatest of the heroes of the cause of Abolitionism, William Lloyd Garrison must ever hold a front rank. It was he who, at a time when his fellow-countrymen seemed to be wholly prostrate at the feet of the Slave power, stepped forward, and boldly grappled almost single-handed with the monster, and, in reply to the threats of his enemies, declared that he "would be heard;" he "would not be put down;" but would wage war against Slavery until either he or it perished in the conflict. The annals of history do not

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present a brighter example of disinterested and self-denying devotion to a noble principle. Beautifully appropriate was the language of the great Anti-Slavery poet adressed to him:--

                         "Champion of those who groan beneath

                         Oppression's iron hand,

                         In view of penury, hate, and death,

                         I see thee fearless stand;

                         Still bearing up thy lofty brow

                         In the steadfast strength of truth,

                         In manhood sealing well the vow

                         And promise of thy youth."

Garrison was peculiarly the man for the times. Although one of the people, he possessed a rich and cultivated intellect, a vigorous and eloquent pen, that accustomed itself to write the truth with transparent clearness, and in language terribly just. His powers as an orator, although inferior to those of his brilliant colleague, the "golden-mouthed" Wendell Phillips, were of no mean order, and those who have heard him know how convincing is his logic, and how scathing is his invective; and above all he possessed that enthusiastic love of right principles, which eminently fitted him for the post of a great moral reformer. We have not space fully to trace the course of Mr. Garrison and his friends, since he became associated with Benjamin Lundy in the publication of The Genius of Universal Emancipation at Baltimore. While occupying this important post, he was imprisoned for his energetic denunciations of a particular instance of Pro-Slavery wickedness, but, after fifty days confinement, he was released, through the generous aid of Mr. Arthur Tappan. In January, 1832, the New England Anti-Slavery Society commenced its important career; shortly afterwards other societies were organized, and the Anti-Slavery cause began to exhibit a vitality and a power that alarmed the Slaveholders and their abettors. Then came the time of trial and persecution, Rewards were offered for the heads of William Lloyd Garrison, Arthur Tappan, and other leaders of the Abolition movement. Riots took place in New York, and Tappan's house was sacked. Garrison was dragged through the streets of Boston with a halter

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round his neck. George Thompson was secreted that he might escape assassination. The devoted Lovejoy was murdered for editing an Anti-Slavery newspaper in Alton, Illinois. Pennsylvania Hall was burned down by an infuriated gang of Pro-Slavery ruffians. The coloured people of Philadelphia, Cincinnati, and other places, were shamefully maltreated. Then with regard to those who, from their high position, ought to have been the first to stem the torrent of popular passion, it is a fact that the legislatures of several Southern States passed resolutions similar to one adopted by the legislature of North Carolina, which was as follows:--"Resolved that our sister States are respectfully requested to enact penal laws, prohibiting the printing, within their respective limits, of all such publications as may have a tendency to make our Slaves discontented." To the disgrace of several of the Northern States, they assented to the propriety of these demands, which happily, however, were not enforced. An attempt was then made to prevent Anti-Slavery documents from being transmitted to the South by post. Then the right of the Abolitionists to petition Congress against Slavery was, for a time, successfully assailed; but, mainly through the labours of John Quincy Adams, in 1845 the right was restored. But, throughout these long years of the most unscrupulous opposition, the friends of the Slave stood by the cause they had taken in hand with unflinching courage. Some desertions, produced by ecclesiastical influences, political ambition, love of gain, or cowardice, have unquestionably taken place, but the Stantons have been but few in number, while the great mass of the Abolitionists, like Garrison, Jackson, Quincy, Mrs. Chapman, and others, have proved faithful always. The persecutions with which the Abolitionists were attacked, necessarily helped to increase their numbers and to strengthen their agitation, by rallying around them multitudes of thinking, right-minded persons, whose dormant consciences were awakened by the violence of the advocates of Slavery. Such is the aid that persecution ever renders to truth

        In 1848 and 1849, an exciting controversy agitated Congress on what is known as the Wilmot Proviso, which

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proposed to prevent the existence of Slavery in any territories that might be annexed to the United States after it was passed. It was the time of an Anti-Slavery revival in the Free States; and no less than fourteen States "protested, through their legislatures, against any enlargement of the area of Slavery." This vigorous agitation caused the Pro-Slavery conspirators to plot mischief; and the result was an attempt to introduce into the Union the territory of California as a State, without Slavery being interdicted on its soil. This "non-intervention" policy met with the favour of all the great party leaders, as well as of the Cabinet, as it was confidently believed that a majority of the citizens of California would vote for the legalization of Slavery in the State. California was accordingly urged to apply for admission into the Confederacy; but, to the horror of the South, and the astonishment of the whole country, the Constitutional Convention determined that one of the articles of the new Constitution, should be as follows:--"Neither Slavery nor involuntary servitude, except for the punishment of crime, shall be tolerated in this State;" and this article was ratified by the votes of the people. A furious re-action took place at the South: with black inconsistency, the Pro- Slavery party in Congress, headed by that embodiment of despotism, John C. Calhoun, demanded that the application of California should be rejected! Then followed one of the fiercest struggles in American history. The writer was in the United States during this eventful era, and never shall he forget the intense excitement that prevailed.

        Inspired by the noble example of California, New Mexico framed an Anti-Slavery Constitution, and asked for admission into the Union. The advocates of the South then demanded a compromise--they required that the equilibrium of political power should be restored. They felt that their influence in the national councils was imperilled--that a spirit of freedom was being evoked which, if not speedily quelled, would endanger the very existence of Slavery itself. Then came the midnight time of the Anti-Slavery cause. A dissolution of the Union was threatened by the Slaveholders unless their demands were

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complied with. Never was there a cry more unreal--never was empty bombast carried to a higher pitch; for if the Union were dissolved, the fugitive Slave would find the road to freedom some hundreds of miles shorter than it is now; no Fugitive Slave Law could then reach him in the Free States; Northern soldiers could no longer be employed to suppress Slave insurrections, or to extend the area of Slavery, as in the case of Texas; and how could thirty thousand Slaveholders put down a rising of their victims, who are numbered by millions, if they were unable to appeal to the North for aid? But the miserable cry of "disunion" answered its base purpose. Symptoms of treachery and cowardice, dressed up in the borrowed garb of patriotism, appeared at the North. "Our glorious Union is in danger;" "the Compromises of the Constitution must be fulfilled;" "the rights of our Southern brethren must be protected;" and similar cries were shouted by Northern merchants who held mortgages on slave-property; who dealt largely in the Southern markets; who had many Slaveholders among their best customers; or who had friends and relations possessing a large stake in the man-merchandise of the peculiar institution; and who for these and other reasons sold their souls, and allowed their consciences to be gagged.

        Henry Clay--the statesman who said that "a hundred years' legislation had sanctified Slavery"--early in 1850 successfully played his part in the national tragedy. He proposed a "Compromise." It was accepted, not, however, without a severe struggle on the part of a noble band of Free Soilers, who, in a spirit, and with a courage, more God-like than that of the ancient Spartans, defended "the Anti-Slavery Thermopylae" Their championship of freedom was in vain: Slavery again triumphed. By "the Compromise," California was received into the Union as a Free State. New Mexico and Utah, while they continued territories, and when they were formed into States, were to maintain or prohibit Slavery, as they pleased. The importation of Slaves into the District of Columbia for sale was interdicted. Such were the benefits conferred on the cause of freedom by "the Compromise:" but now

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for the dark side of the picture. Ten millions of dollars were paid into the Treasury of Texas, and ninety thousand square miles of free soil were given to that State, upon which the accursed institution of Slavery was to be established; and the Fugitive Slave Law was granted to the South--a measure whose atrocity language utterly fails to depict; and whose manifestly flagrant violation of the first principles of justice was so great that, had not the Congress that passed it, and the President who sanctioned it, been utterly devoid of moral integrity and the common feelings of humanity, it would, from the first moment it was brought forward, have been treated as a proposal fit only to be entertained by a nation of savages. This law, which is supplementary to that of the law of 1793, gives extraordinary facilities for the reclamation of Fugitive Slaves who have found a refuge in the Free States. It vests all the powers of judge and jury in Commissioners, who, in the majority of instances, are appointed in consequence of their Pro-Slavery tendencies, and who receive ten dollars if they convict the supposed fugitive, while five dollars only is their fee if they declare him innocent of the crime of running away with himself; and, as the Hon. Horace Mann says, "the law provides that evidence taken in a Southern State, at any time or place which a claimant may select, without any notice, or any possibility of knowledge on the part of the person to be robbed and enslaved by it, may be clandestinely carried or sent to any place where it is to be used, and there spring upon its victim, as a wild beast springs from its jungle on the passer-by; and it provides that this evidence, thus surreptitiously taken and used, shall be conclusive proof of the facts, and of escape from slavery. It does not submit the sufficiency of the evidence to the judgment of the tribunal, but it arbitrarily makes it conclusive whether sufficient or not." The consequence was that four, out of the first eight persons who were enslaved under this law, were free men. We have it on the authority of the Hon. Horace Mann that, "in a case in Philadelphia, Commissioner Ingraham decided some points directly against law and authority; and when the

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decision of a judge of the United States Court was brought against him, he coolly said he differed from the judge, made out the certificate, pocketed the ten dollars, and sent a human being to bondage. There could be no appeal from this iniquity, for the law allows none."

        The Fugitive Slave Law also renders all persons aiding in the escape of Slaves liable to a fine of two thousand dollars, and six months imprisonment. A re-action, however, took place. The arrests of Hamlet, Long, William and Ellen Crafts, and other Fugitive Slaves, caused an intense excitement in the Northern mind, which induced thousands to rally around the standard of liberty, who had never previously been identified with the cause of the oppressed. The Abolitionists everywhere openly avowed their intention to violate the law. Numerous mass meetings were held, at which resolutions were passed denouncing the measure in the fiercest language, The authorities in some towns refused to aid in its execution. Some, though not many, ministers, like Henry Ward Beecher and Theodore Parker, advised their congregations to obey the "higher law,"and protect the fugitive even at the risk of imprisonment and death. The Slave-hunters wherever they went were the subjects of the most unmitigated public opprobrium and, contempt. A panic at first seized the coloured population, but their courage did not long fail them. They provided themselves with revolvers; and, hundreds, if not thousands, of Fugitive Slaves, armed to the teeth, fled into Canada to seek that security under the flag of Queen Victoria which was denied them in the model Republic. The re-action was so great that, in the language of the Fifteenth Report of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society,* "the Fugitive Slave Law, though still in our statute books, is shorn of its terrors, and is fast falling into contempt." Except in some places where, the light of Anti-Slavery truth has not effected an entrance, the Fugitive Slave Law is almost a dead letter.** The

        * An auxillary of the American Anti-Slavery Society, the President of which is William Lloyd Garrison.

** As a proof of this statement, we cull the following from the Buffalo Republic, a Democratic paper:--"There is at this day, all through the Free States, four times the sympathy for Fugitive Slaves that there was in 1849. This increase of sympathy produces a corresponding increase of facilities for safe escape, when once the runaway is out of the territory of Slavedom And even those who are prejudiced against an increase f coloured population, and would on that account send information to masters of runaway Slaves, will do no such thing now, but rather help them over the line, as a most ready way of getting clear of them. And we do not suppose that there is a ferryman on the whole frontier that would not take one of them across free, merely for cheating a cruel statute of its victim.

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following statistics carefully prepared by the Rev. Edward Mathews, the excellent agent to the American Free Mission Baptists, show that Slavery has not gained much by the Fugitive Slave Law, while it has lost a great deal of its power in the North by the outrageous character of the enactment:--

        It will be seen that the total number of Slaves is 50; rescued, 6; shot, 1; purchased, 5; set free after trial, 5; now held in Slavery, 33.*

        Although the Fugitive Slave Law has almost become a nullity, it does not necessarily follow that all who oppose it are equally arrayed against Slavery itself. On the contrary, we have great reason to believe that a very large proportion of those who have been strenuous in their hostility to a measure which converts the Free States into a hunting-ground on which Fugitive Slaves are to be pursued, do not take any decided action against the "peculiar institution,"but, on the contrary, are disposed to allow it to continue undisturbed within its present

        * Mr. Mathews, who prepared the above statistics, was mobbed in Kentucky in 1851, and barely escaped with his life.

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boundaries. We have even heard a, New York audience cheer a Southern senator when he was boasting that he was the owner of the largest amount of slave-property in that part of the South in which he resided; and not a few meetings have we attended at which speeches in favour of maintaining the Compromise Measures and the Fugitive Slave Law were enthusiastically cheered by large assemblages of persons, in which all classes were represented, not even excepting the clergy. Everywhere, too, in the North is the foul prejudice against colour manifested. The most remote connexion by birth with the African race is sufficient to render a man an outcast from society; to prevent him from filling any office of trust or honour; to make him an object of degradation and contempt; and to place him in the Negro pew in the very church of God, so that he may not pollute by his touch the white believers in that Great Teacher (Himself dark-complexioned!) who said, "As ye would that others should do unto you, do ye even so unto them."

        Such are some of the usages of society in the Free States; and they apply to such men even as Professor Allen, Frederick Douglas, Dr. Pennington, Charles L. Remond, and William Wells Brown, men who, by their characters and talents, would adorn any society, and who are infinitely elevated above their miserable oppressors in everything that constitutes true dignity and moral worth. It is sometimes imagined that universal suffrage exists in the Free States. This is entirely a mistake; for no coloured man is allowed the right to vote unless he possesses a certain amount of property, which varies in different States; and as every possible obstacle short of Slavery itself is placed in the way of his success in life it follows that if he enjoys the elective franchise he is one of the very few exceptions to the general rule. The Illinois Legislature has recently passed a law against coloured persons which is equal in its infamy to its accursed predecessor, the Fugitive Slave Law. This measure declares that any Negro or Mulatto entering the State, and remaining there a longer period than ten days, shall be fined; and if unable to pay the fine, he shall be

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sold on an auction-block, and the proceeds shall be devoted to charitable purposes. What execrable villany! The money raised by the sale of MEN, created in the image of God, and endowed with noble intelligences and a still nobler immortality, to be appropriated to benevolent objects--perhaps to the conversion of the heathen! Judas Iscariot has many successors. An enactment somewhat similar was previously passed by the Legislature of Indiana; so that custom and law are alike the enemies of that unfortunate race--whose colour is made a crime-- in the Free States of a land boasting of her liberty, and of the number of her churches. And then, after having sought to keep them as low as possible in the social scale, hypocritical apologists for Slavery point, with malevolent exultation, to their backward condition as a proof that they are a very imperfect and degraded type of humanity!

        The mercantile influences existing at the North in favour of Slavery, or of neutrality on the question, are among its mightiest supporters. The cotton merchants and manufacturers are averse to any interference with "the exciting topic,"because it harmonises with their sordid interest to be on good terms with their "Southern brethren." "The agitation of Slavery at the North endangers the security of the Union," say they in effect. "It might provoke a civil war; it might lead to a general revolt of the Slaves; in short, twenty things prejudicial to trade might ensue. Let the South alone: she knows best what to do with her own institutions. And besides, are we not seeking to elevate the coloured race by our support of the Colonization Society? and may not Slavery, after all, be a Missionary Institution?"--(as the Rev. W. Hooker, of Philadelphia, says it is)--"the object of which is, through the Colonization Society, to evangelise the dark regions of Africa in due time." We are not now putting the case unfairly; we are giving the ideas which are almost daily expressed in that time-serving paper, the New York Journal of Commerce, the organ of the Pro-Slavery merchants of the North. We know not to what extent any of these individuals may be owners, or part

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owners, of Southern cotton plantations; but we do know that many a Northern merchant, bearing a high character for piety, possesses mortgages on slave-estates, and does not scruple, if his sordid interests demand it, to bring them to the hammer; and, like a Theological Synod in North Carolina, who sold eight Slaves to assist in the education of some Presbyterian ministers, the merchants who thus dispose of the liberties of their fellow-creatures can, with the pride of a Pharisee, subscribe towards the conversion of the inhabitants of Madagascar, or talk of intervention by force of arms in the affairs Of Hungary against the Austrian oppressor, as did that creature of Slavery, General Cass.

        Never did these men of "property and standing" show their subserviency to the South more clearly than after the passing of the Compromise Measures. In New York, we remember, some thousands of them signed a requisition convening a meeting to consider those measures, and to adopt means for the due execution of the Fugitive Slave Law. We attended this meeting. Of course the Abolitionists were there regarded as most detestable characters, being especially the enemies of "the Union" and the Church. A "Union Safety Committee" was formed, and some thousands of dollars were subscribed to its funds; but, with the exception of publishing the names of all who signed the requisition, and endeavouring to effect the conviction of a few Fugitive Slaves, we believe that all their bluster has gone for nothing. The publication of the names of the requisitionists was a commercial speculation, inasmuch as Southern traders were advised not to do business with any merchant in New York whose name was not printed in the list; indeed at one time it was proposed that the names of all persons who refused to sign the document should be prominently published, so that their enmity to "Southern rights" might become more widely known, and their "stores" more generally shunned by the friends of "the Union." This was actually done in the case of Messrs. Bowen and Mc'Namee, the proprietors of that excellent journal, the New York Independent, and in one or

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two other instances. But it was almost too disgraceful even for the depravity of New York Pro-Slavery morals. These facts serve to show what a powerful instrumentality in favour of Slavery the great commercial party of the North forms.

        As would be anticipated, the two chief political parties--the Whig and the Democratic--do not essentially differ from each other in their action on the Slavery question, excepting that perhaps the greatest number of "fillibusters," or annexationists, exist among the Democrats. The Democratic platform adopted at Baltimore in June, 1850, declared that that party "will abide by and adhere to a faithful execution of the acts known as the Compromise Measures settled by the last Congress--the act for reclaiming fugitives from service or labour included--which act being designed to carry out an express provision of the Constitution, cannot with fidelity thereto be repealed, or so changed as to restore or impair its efficiency. Resolved that the Democratic party will resist all attempts at renewing in Congress, or out of it, the agitation of the Slavery question, under whatever shape or colour the attempts may be made." Shortly after the adoption of these principles by the Democratic party, the Whig Convention was held at Baltimore also, and a resolution was passed which, after approving of the Compromise Measures, declared that, "so far as the Fugitive Slave Law is concerned, we will maintain the same, and insist on its strict enforcement, until time and experience shall demonstrate the necessity of future legislation against evasion and abuse, but not impairing its present efficiency."

        Enough has been quoted to show that both parties are deeply involved in Pro-Slavery guilt; and yet many men professing Anti-Slavery principles (some of whom we could name,) blinded by party feeling, voted for Pierce, or Scott, as the case might be, although there was a Free Soil Candidate in the field in the person of John P. Hale. But although General Pierce is unquestionably as unsound on the Slavery question as a man can be, we cannot but rejoice at the defeat of the Candidature for the Presidency .in their respective party Conventions, of Webster, Cass,

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and Douglass, men who had sought to raise themselves into the highest office of the State by their support of the Compromise measures. They utterly failed to secure the prize which had caused them to sacrifice their consciences, and to blast their characters for ever. The first died broken-hearted--miserably disappointed in the great object of his ambition just as he thought he had it within his grasp, and conscious that his fame was darkened with a stain that time could never obliterate. Thus does judgment sometimes descend on the statesman who, for the sake of power, dares to trifle with the sacred rights of humanity, and to act as if he were a God. But let us

                         "Revile him not--the Tempter hath

                         A snare for all;

                         And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath,

                         Befit his fall!

                         Oh! dumb be passion's stormy rage,

                         When he who might

                         Have lighted up, and led his age,

                         Falls back in night.

                         Scorn! would the angels laugh to mark

                         A bright soul driven,

                         Fiend-goaded, down the endless dark,

                         From hope and Heaven?"

        Franklin Pierce, the present President of the United States, in his inaugural address, plainly described the policy on the Slavery question, that would guide him. He said "I believe that involuntary servitude as it exists, in different states in this confederacy, is recognized by the Constitution. I believe that it stands like any other admitted right, and that the states where it exists are entitled to efficient remedies to enforce the Constitutional Provisions. I hold that the laws of 1850, commonly called the Compromise Measures, are strictly constitutional, and to be unhesitatingly carried into effect. I believe that the constituted authorities of this Republic are bound to regard the rights of the South in this respect, as they would any other legal and constitutional right, and that the laws to enforce them should be respected and

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obeyed; not with a reluctance encouraged by abstract opinions as to their propriety in a different state of society, but cheerfully and according to the doctrines of the tribunals to which their expositions belong. Such have been and are my convictions, and upon them I shall act." It is well known that he is in favour of the annexation of Cuba, and of the conquest of Mexico.

        We have glanced at some of the causes of the retrogression of America as regards Slavery, and of the present powerful position of the Slaveholders; but we have not yet given that prominence to the primary cause which it deserves. We have no hesitation in pointing to the recreancy of the American Church as the principal reason why Slavery was not abolished years ago. Is not trading in human bodies and immortal souls justified in her pulpits, and sanctioned in her synods and assemblies? Do not Doctors of Divinity, like Moses Stuart and Gardiner Spring, blasphemously assert that the righteousness of American Slavery is proved by the Mosaic law, and allowed by the religion of Him who said "I come to break the bonds of the oppressor." And when the professed ministers of the Most High, speaking with all the authority of their sacred office, assert with the Reverend Doctor Joel Parker, (the threatened prosecutor of Mrs. Stowe,) that "Slavery is a good-- a great good," who can wonder that church members should prove false to the Slave; and that men whose God is Mammon, should sacrifice the rights of their fellow-man on its altars! To prove the guilt of the Southern Church, we need not quote from the sermons of its ministers, or the resolutions of its synods. The following figures, compiled with great care by the Rev. Edward Mathews, speak for themselves:--

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Six hundred and sixty thousand five hundred and sixty- three Slaves held by members of Christian Churches in the South! How frightful is the iniquity perpetrated within the pale of what professes to be the Church of Christ! Comparing Slavery to a fearful fire that has been raging for a long time, Mrs. Stowe admirably remarks "The Church of Christ burns with that awful fire! Evermore burning, burning! Burning over church and altar; burning over senate-house and forum; burning up liberty, burning up religion! No earthly hands kindled that fire. From its sheeted flame and wreaths of sulphurous smoke glares out upon thee the eye of that enemy who was a murderer from the beginning. It is a fire that burns to the lowest hell!"

        But it would naturally be supposed that however the Southern Churches may have apostatised from the true faith, yet the religious bodies of the Free States would remain steadfast in supporting the cause of the oppressed. The ministers and churches of the South exist amid the contaminating influences of Slavery itself; but in the North the church of God can plead no such extenuating circumstances. How fearful, then, is the fact that many prominent ministers of the North, defend Slavery as a religious institution; that a still larger number support the Fugitive Slave Law; and that the leading ecclesiastical organizations either openly avow their Pro-Slavery predilections, or endeavour to take a neutral course; in which latter policy, however, they invariably fail, as silence on such a question is impossible. Since the Declaration of Independence, the action of the American Church on Slavery has more and more retrogressed. At that period the testimonies against Slavery, in the pulpit and the synod, were very general; but gradually they have become less and less in number and faithfulness. The Episcopalian Church in the North, admits Slaveholders within its pale; and its principal organ, the New York Churchman, is notorious for its hostility to the Abolitionists. An important body of Anti-Slavery men exists among the Congregationalists, but the vast majority are either Pro-Slavery, or they adopt a temporizing course. In 1851, Mr. Fisk, who

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delivered a sermon in favour of the Fugitive Slave Law, was appointed by the Maine Congregational Conference, as a delegate to a kindred religious society. Many prominent divines of this denomination, (as, for example, Dr. Moses Stuart,) have distinguished themselves by their advocacy of Slavery. The Baptist Churches, by their general subserviency to the Slave power, as well as by the admission of Slaveholders into their Missionary Society, have earned a dark reputation. The Presbyterian and the Methodist Episcopal Churches, are notorious for their unblushing recreancy on the Slavery question.