r, but a very small portion of the number included
in the term. Nine-tenths of these hold that neither the Constitution
nor the Union should be brought into question at all. They consider
that the resort to them as a protection and safeguard to slavery, by
ill-judging and rash conservatives, has done more to put them into
serious danger, than the acts of all others combined during the
present century. Any man who relies upon a good government to sustain
acknowledged evil, does much to modify the notions of goodness which
honest and conscientious men have entertained respecting that
government. He furnishes an entering wedge for doubt and distrust,
which, if not removed, will grow into aversion. Anti-slavery men
reason differently. They separate slavery from the Constitution and
the Union, and, by seeking to destroy the former, desire to perpetuate
the latter. They hold, that against the concentrated moral sentiment
of the whole country, acting through its legitimate public channels,
and aided by the prayers and the hopes of all the civilized world, it
would be much more difficult to maintain slavery in the States, than
if the dangers of general misgovernment and disunion were to come in
to distract the public attention, and open up social disasters of a
worse kind than those which they seek to remedy.

3. The spirit of this reform is denunciatory, violent, and
proscriptive.

It is inevitable that all movements directed against the established
errors of communities originate with men more or less fanatical in
spirit. None but they have the necessary elements of character to
advance at all. But, as others become convinced of the fundamental
truths which they utter, the tendency of their association is to
modify and soften the tone, and make it more nearly approximate the
correct sentiment. At this period, there is quite as much of
liberality among anti-slavery men as is consistent with a determined
maintenance of their general purpose. Though disposed to be just to
all who conscientiously differ with them in opinion, they cannot
overlook the fact that many honest persons are too indifferent, and
more are too compromising in their views of slavery. To rouse the one,
and alarm the other class into a conviction of their responsibility
for their apathy, is one of the most imperative duties. It may be that
this is not always done in the most courtly or the choicest terms.
Some allowances must be made for the spirit of libert