f Life. Your intellect has been destroyed as much as
possible, and every ray of light they have attempted to shut out from
your minds. The oppressors themselves have become involved in the
ruin. They have become weak, sensual, and rapacious. They have cursed
you--they have cursed themselves--they have cursed the earth which
they have trod. In the language of a Southern statesman, we can truly
say, "even the wolf, driven back long since by the approach of man,
now returns after the lapse of a hundred years, and howls amid the
desolations of slavery."

The colonists threw the blame upon England. They said that the mother
country entailed the evil upon them, and that they would rid
themselves of it if they could. The world thought they were sincere,
and the philanthropic pitied them. But time soon tested their
sincerity. In a few years, the colonists grew strong and severed
themselves from the British Government. Their Independence was
declared, and they took their station among the sovereign powers of
the earth. The declaration was a glorious document. Sages admired it,
and the patriotic of every nation reverenced the Godlike sentiments
which it contained. When the power of Government returned to their
hands, did they emancipate the slaves? No; they rather added new links
to our chains. Were they ignorant of the principles of Liberty?
Certainly they were not. The sentiments of their revolutionary orators
fell in burning eloquence upon their hearts, and with one voice they
cried, LIBERTY OR DEATH. O, what a sentence was that! It ran from soul
to soul like electric fire, and nerved the arm of thousands to fight
in the holy cause of Freedom. Among the diversity of opinions that are
entertained in regard to physical resistance, there are but a few
found to gainsay that stern declaration. We are among those who do
not.

SLAVERY! How much misery is comprehended in that single word. What
mind is there that does not shrink from its direful effects? Unless
the image of God is obliterated from the soul, all men cherish the
love of Liberty. The nice discerning political economist does not
regard the sacred right, more than the untutored African who roams in
the wilds of Congo. Nor has the one more right to the full enjoyment
of his freedom than the other. In every man's mind the good seeds of
liberty are planted, and he who brings his fellow down so low, as to
make him contented with a condition of slavery, commits the highest
cr