OCR Text |
Show 16 }'JRST DAY-l'rORNING SESSION. own species;-it matters not how limited may be the scale,-the momet~t we rise above our fellow creatures, we swell beyond our natural and legitimate proportions, and in the unjust extension of ou.r own righ.ts, unjustly limit and restrain the rights of others. Each successive gencrat1on, cradled under the influen ce of accumulated prejudice, and inhaling the tainted gale of tyranny in every breath, at last seems to claim a share in the divine righ t of kings, to fetter aml destroy, and wields the iron sceptre with a truly legal, though unlineal hand . Can this be said to ~e consistent with a republican principle ?-with liberty and equality ?-with ihe boasted charter of our rights !-with the happinet~s or welfare of the government ?-with our dut!es to this world, or our responsibilities to the next? But this is not all. While they profess to stand above the unhappy slave, in f!uperiority of political rights, the influence of slavery exercises an immense moral power over them. They see about them a herd of unenlightened blacks, with none of the restraints of morality, religion, or education,-nonc of the rewards of virtue to hope for,-none of the punishments of crime to fear; giving reins to the most unrestrained animal propensities, and reducing the immortal character of man below the level of mere brutish instinct. '\Vhat will be the effect of habit~1al intercourse or community with a soci~ty of this grade? I mean the effect upon the whites? The obvious result is that for the overweening pride and power which slavery imparts to the master, it deprives him of most of those valuable qualities which alone can render pride excusable or power tolerable. But why should we dwell any longer upon this branch of our subject? That slavery is an evil, all nature cries aloud. It is written as a curse in the very consciences of men. And really it is a matter of mingled horror and amazement, notwithstanding this, to find some reverend and learned gentlemen,fathers of the church, professed followers of the meek and lowly Saviour, avowed preachers of peace and good will to men,-attempting to justify it by references to the Bible. They have, it is true, succeeded in showing that there were slaves in the earliest ages, and that the Deity endured this outrage upon his own image. 'Vhy, they could claim a prescriptive right for all other sins, upon exactly the same ingenious plea, because they, also, have existed from the period of the first fall . \Vhat reflecting man dare speak of the sacred Scriptures, and sanction slavery at the same time? It is blasphemous. The fastest friends of slavery should shrink from the Bible, as from a sentence of condemnation; and yet, wonderful to relate, some of the very advocates for freedom, by way of sugaring the bitter pill of emancipation, and adapting it to the palate of the South, must, forsooth, be peering and prying into the mysteries of the Old Tet~ta ment, for the very laudable purpose of excusing this most flagitious offence in the eyes of God and man. Others of our friends, and well·mcaning friend s, too, deem it necessary, strange as it may seem, to resort to the same oracular source, to show that man, whatever might be his complexion, was never designed by the Deity to be converted into a beast, however his crimes and his sinful appetites may have degraded him, at times, to a level with the irrational creation. 'Vhat arguments can be required on such a subject? \Vhy ask if you are by nature free? \Vhy attempt to prove it? Is not your charter written upon your hearts with the very finger of the Deity? 'Vhy ask whether you alone are prescriptive and anointed freemen? Your boasted Declaration, or BiH of Rights, handed down to you by your great political apostles, and forming your political creed, if higher authority were wanting, declares all men equal, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, 1) .\VID l'AUL BROWN':; ORATION. 17 among which a re life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The question, then plainly resolves itself in this, Ar.e slaves m.en, or not ? Slavery, we say, is an unquesuonable ev1~ .. H ow, then, sh~ H that evil be removed? That ill\·olves the great difliculty. By restonng the slaves to freedom. This is my broad position, and I am neithe r to Lc driven , nor seduced from it. The manner is a secondary cons ide ration. Jf the bondage be unlawful or unjust, then should il not be con~inued .. ·~~h e sla\•eholde rs say that the slaves can never be ad mille~ to an .equalny .of poht1cal rights,-aml they further say, they will. free them 1n the ir ow1~ t1me. \Ve answer, restore them to their natural n ghts, and name you r lime; but let it be in lime, and not in etemily. The colonizationists, our soJ"netime cousins, seem to join in the notion of natural inferiority on the part of the blacks, and the im policy of their liberat ion at home; but advocate th eir right to freetlom, pro vitled they will consent to deportation; and justify this apparent incons istency, by allcgiug it is only in this way that the North and the South can be brought to unite in the liberation of slave~. The Abolition Sociely, though wholly devoted to the melioration of the condition of the blacks, manifes ts its power rather in its accu mulated moral intluence, than by any Uirect and urgent application of political means calcu latcd"U irectly to release them from ~h e ir thraldom; the Anti·Slavery Society boldly denounces slavery as a natwnal curse,-adopts means for its immediate emancipation,-denies that freedom should depend upon expatriation,-and pronounces colonization, in this res pect, to be actllally condm:ive to !!lavery. They are zealous, it is true, but what g reat work was ever accomplished without zeal'!. Yet wit~ all their zeal -founded, as it is, in the purest and least quest10nable plulanthropy.~ how prepostcrom~ it is to ?barge them with m?ra~ treason a~ainst the Constitution,-with cru el and bitter hatred and mallgmty,-a destgn to foment a servile war in the South,-to break up the Union, and to ~hed their brother's blood. Y ct of all this, and much more, do they stand accused. An<.! here publicly, in their behalf, as patriots and as Christians, that cilarge is indign:mtly denied <'!.nd repelled. Moral treason! for what? for the purpose of suppressing immorality? Admirable philosophy! Then your temperance so~ieties,-your Bible societi cs,-your missionary societies,ay, your sacred templt:s of worship, consecrated to an All-\"Y"iso and Almighty Dcing, ~ccording to th~s doctrine, ar~ all ro~nd ed 111 moral treason! for the obJeCt of all these IS the suppress10n of vJCe, and the promotion of the tempo1al and e ternal happincst~ of man. If t~1i s be ~reason, treason is a virtue. llut it is said, that the professors of th1s doctnne, are new men, forsooth! and, like the disciples and apostles , that they are unknown to fame ; while the only dispute, among their assailants seems to be which is the most of a patt· iot or a patriarch. Suppose we concede both to them; why, th en, certainly, they can rely upon th eir own intrinsic merit, without conjuring up these red rags, the~e bloody ph~ntoms, ~nd all the horrors of civil or servile war, to fright the Jand from tts propnety. Our motto is, "Our country,-our whole country,--one and inseparable,now and for ever." And 1 trust I speak the s entiment of every one who hear~; me, when I ~ay, th at, notwithstanding the abho~ret~cc in which s~avery is, and ever ought to be held by tl~e free states, sull, tf-as h:.~s been Industriously s uggested-the only ch01ce were bctweert that evil and a total dismemberment of the Union, we should undoubtedly and promptly prefer the former; yet, in so doing, it is possible we should be governed rather. by a tender rerrarJ fot· ourselves and brethren, than by a respect for postenty. Ne,•erthele;s, it becomes us to enlist and to exert all lawful means to avoid 3 |