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Show 104 most remarkable, in one respect, ever held in that country, for it was a representation of all ranks and sects, including the greatest names in church and state, and, what was not less venerable, a multitude of both sexes, who have made themselves dear and honored by services to humanity. Whoever considers this, and other signs of the times in Europe, will see the dawn of a better era, when the wrongs of past age's are to be redressed, when the African is to be lifted up, and the sentence of moral outlawry is to be passsed on the enslavers of their brethren. Many among us are apt to smile and say; that nations have but one law, self-interest. But a new and higher force is beginning to act on human affairs. Religion is becoming an active, diffusive, unwearied principle of humanity and justice. All the forces of Christianity are concentrating themselves into a fervent, all-comprehending philanthropy. This is at length to be understood at the South, and it will be felt there. In that region, there are pious men and women who will not endure to be cut off from the religious communion of the world. There are self-respecting men, brave enough to defy all personal danger, but not to defy the moral sentiment of mankind. There are the wise and good, who will rejoice to learn, that Emancipation brings dignity and happiness to the slave, and safety and honor to the free. Here is power enough to ' 105 put down the selfish and unprincipled. Here are influences, which, joined with favoring events from God's good providence, are, we trust, to remove the wrongs and evils of slavery, and to give us a right to hold up our head among Christian nations. But if it is not ordained, that, by these and like influences, this great wrong is to be done away, of one thing we are sure, that God's righteous providence lacks not means for accomplishing his designs. He has infinite ministers, for humbling human pride and lifting up the fallen. The solemn lesson of our times is the instability of all human power. Despotic thrones have fallen, and surely private despotism cannot endure. We learn from history, that, in seasons apparently the most inauspicious, the seeds of beneficent re\·olutions have been sown, and have unfolded in silence. Much more, in these days of change and progress, causes must be at work for the redemption of the slave. Emancipation, universal freedom, must come. May God prepare its way, not by earthquakes and storms, but by" the still, small voice" of truth, by breathing into the hearts of this people, the spirit of wisdom, justice and love. It is a solemn thought, with which I close these remarks, that a people, upholding, or ·in any way giving countenance to slavery, contract guilt in proportion to the light which is thrown on the injus- |