the fiends, which, all armed, have sprung from the bowels of slavery! What must be the fate of an army marshalled under such leaders? They must of course be 'CARRIED ALONG"! If the friends of human nature put themselves under such guides, they will richly deserve the defeat, disgrace, and destruction, to which they will inevitably be "carried along"! Let them be warned by the prophetic voice of Dr. Rice! Let them be instructed by what they themselves have witnessed. They have been urged again and again, and from every quarter have they been vehemently urged, to leave the slave in the hands of his oppressors, without uttering a word in his behalf. The tender mercies of the South will best provide for his welfare. Why should the Northern abolitionist interfere? Are there no churches in the land of slaves? No ministers of the gospel? Are they not best qualified to plead with felicity and effect the cause of the enslaved? At least confide in them for such ways and methods as may be best adapted to work deliverance for the oppressed. Why should not Northern philanthropists be content to act merely as auxiliaries to the "good christians" of the South? Auxiliaries in what? In "going on minding their own business"! Auxiliaries in "not touching the matter"! Auxiliaries in giving up "the subject to political papers, reviews, &c. to be discussed as a question of political economy!" Auxiliaries in being "carried along" with "the whole mass of the community," set in motion by the apprehension that " a step" may be taken towards " touching what are called the rights of property" in the bodies and souls of the poor! Let abolitionists beware! If they would not see their dearest hopes blasted; the slave dying in despair, or breaking his fetters with the hand of violence, let them not commit themselves, as auxiliaries with those, who are "carried along" down-stream with "the whole mass of the community."

To Dr. Rice's plan for the abolition of American slavery, we have strong objections.

1. It is founded on what we cannot but regard as a gross and monstrous falsehood. A crime of appalling magnitude-a sin of crimson die is to be "treated," merely "as a matter of state-concernment"! It is to be disposed of "as a question of political economy"! But this would be to deal falsely with transgressors. All sin involves injury.

It occasions waste and inflicts injury. It blasts and ravages and ruins. What then? Is it to be regarded as "a question of political economy"? So to regard it is obviously to practice falsehood. And as "no lie is of the truth," so no lie can promote the cause of righteousness. Painful as the task may be, we shall continue to "rebuke" our brethren, while they "go on minding" the "business" of man-stealing; and leave it to those, who " are accustomed to calculate consequences" to reckon up the dollars and cents, which rebellion against God and treason against man may happen to

cost!

And

2. Dr. Rice overlooks the strongest props which support the system of American oppression.-What if he could convince the petty tyrants around him, that slaveholding was unprofitable? Would they for that give up their vassals? What; and subdue their idleness? And yield their power? And crucify their lusts? What; and break the cord of caste? And work with their own hands? form habits of sobriety and industry, and chastity? Such power in the interest table? Has talk about dollars and cents such resistless energy? Go, give lessons on political economy to a bloated aristocracy. How soon they will surrender their gilded coaches, their beds of ease, their sumptuous fare! Go, tell the debauchee, that he is violating the rules of political economy. With what disgust and horror will he not forsake the slough, in which he had been wallowing! Go, tell the aspiring demagogue, that his ambition must, on the principles of politial economy, be an expensive article. How soon will he turn his eye away from the giddy eminence which he is straining every nerve to reach! Political economy contending with slavery! Stubble against fire! Slaveholders know, as well as any political economist can tell them, that their pride and lusts and cruelty are unprofitable. Of this, they have demonstration in the blasted things-the mouldering ruins, which slavery has scattered all around them. But Leviathan is not so tamed. Political economy never yet brought one sinner to repentance. No, We shall continue under God to wield His truth, and invoke His Spirit, in contending with the foe, which we have dared to grapple with. Thus, and only thus can he be laid prostrate in the dust.

no.

3. The results which have already followed Dr. Rice's

The

plan at the South, where, for ages, it has been acted on, do it great discredit. How cautiously all along have not ministers and churches abstained from touching the subject of slavery! How steadily have they "gone on minding their own business," leaving their "crushed brethren, unaided in the hands of the oppressor! How magnanimously and cautiously have they committed the whole matter "to political papers and reviews," to be discussed as a "question of political economy"! And so, master and slave, generation after generation, passed away, infected with guilt and involved in darkness, to their final account, till Dr. Rice opened a prophet's eye upon the future. And what said the seer? "The jealousy among our countrymen on this subject is such, that we cannot move a step in this way (the way of touching slavery) without wakening up the strongest opposition and producing the most violent excitement. whole mass of the community will be set in motion, and the great body of the church will be carried along!" So much for the success of the doctor's plan, when he stood upon the watch-tower! And what have we been called since to witness? Throughout the whole South-the entire length and breadth of the land of leprosy-Sophistry wagging its tongue, and Violence swinging its fist, in defence of perpetual slavery! Nay, the spirit of oppression has summoned the energies of the nation, to protect his magazine of whips and chains, and engines of murder! The priest has laboured hard to prove from the Bible, that the groans, and tears, and blood of "the poor innocents" are an acceptable sacrifice to God! And the statesman has exerted himself to show, that our republican edifice is constructed of bones, broken by the rod of tyranny! And a thousand voices have been heard shouting the praises of servitude! And a thousand hands have been stretched out, eager to extend the chain, which is fastened on the slave of the South to the free laborer of the North! And what has thus "set the whole mass of the community in motion," while "the great body of the church" has been "carried along"? Why some of our fellow-citizens have had the audacity to examine the principles, on which our free institutions are professedly founded. In the light of these principles they have seen, that slavery under all its aspects and in all its bearings was wicked, abominably wicked, and that

it was speedily and certainly, working the ruin of the republic. What they have seen they have dared to proclaim. "Sighing over the abominations," which are multiplied around them, they have called upon their fellow-citizens to act upon the noble principles, on which our government claims to be based. For thus "touching the subject of slavery," they have exposed themselves to the fierce denunciations and malignant violence of "the whole mass" of legalized manstealers, not excepting the "good christians," who have been "carried along"! We think, therefore, that Dr. Rice's plan has worked badly. The evil he was so anxious to escape, has grown worse and worse. Had the friends of humanity "gone on" a little longer "minding their own business," the ruin of the republic would have been inevitable and complete.

4. Just such results as have now been described, every sound philosopher must have confidently expected. Even in the nursery, I hear him say, it is well understood, that pride and selfishness and passion always gather strength from indulgence. The more they are humored, the more eager, imperious, and violent they become. They must be exposed, resisted, subdued, or they will transform the human spirit, which they possess, into a malignant and miserable fiend. And what is true of the nursery, is true in such matters of every department of human life. No wonder, then, that the pride, and selfishness, and passions of American slaveholders have attained such a growth-have become so imperious and violent, as to throw off all restraints, and threaten the subversion of the republic. Those, who were under obligations as sacred as the throne of Heaven, to expose, and rebuke the "evils" which prevailed around them, have all along to a fearful extent, and in accordance with the advice of Dr. Rice, been "going on minding their own business"-" calculating consequences"-" treating" sin "as a matter of state concernment""giving up the subject to political papers and reviews, to be discussed as a question of political economy"! No wonder, "the whole mass of the community" have been "set in motion" to strengthen and rivet the chain of servitude, while "the great body of the church" has been "carried along."

On what grounds any "christian spectator" can regard the views of Dr. Rice as "both just and important," we "are

quite sure" we cannot tell. "Most fully convinced" we are, that the hearty friends of human nature can never adopt them. They are false in theory and ruinous in practice. Such views, too generally embraced, have already well nigh reduced the American churches to apostacy Their prevalence has opened a broad way to the "slippery steep," on the verge of which the giddy republic now totters! They are at war with sound philosophy and true religion ;-with every principle and arrangement of the divine government. Why then should not those, who amidst reproach and blasphemy, and violence, have dared "to consider the poor" go on plainly and boldly to expose the guilt and folly of oppression. Why should they not "treat it" as a SIN-a mothersin, pregnant with abominations? Why should they not, as with trumpet-tongue, warn their country of her danger, and call her to repentance? God, the long-suffering, and the gracious, may crown their labors with a blessing as rich, as it must be undeserved. "Let us not be weary in well-doing; for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not."

THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM IN OUR COUNTRY.

BY DR. CHARLES FOLLEN.

THE following remarks are intended to set forth in its various bearings, and consequences, one principle, which seems to me of the last importance to the success of the cause of Freedom in this country. Little as I can expect to do justice to the subject, I feel assured than in itself it is entitled to the attention and earnest inquiry of every one who looks upon the history and condition of his country, not with the eye of patriotic vanity, or party prejudice, but with the clearsighted and enlarged interest of one whose patriotism is nothing else than philanthropy at home; whose judgment is not misled either by assumed names under which, as under a convenient temporary incognito, parties and sects know how to promote their real designs; nor by occasional diversions which local interests and personal attachments sometimes produce in the great operations of antagonist powers.