is the most respectable in principle, less selfish, and more generous in
impulse. I have all my life been disposed to leave the South in
undisturbed possession of its constitutional pound of slavery flesh. But
when the slaveholders showed an inveterate determination not to be
content with that, but to _nationalize_ slavery, to carry it everywhere,
and to make it the great element of political control throughout the
nation, I felt no constitutional obligation to submit. And when the
conspirators, foiled in their designs, rushed into open rebellion, I
made up my mind that slavery had best be destroyed--for only when it is,
will the conditions of true unity between the South and the North begin
to exist--then only will the prosperity and peace of the nation be
established on a permanent basis. This is now the opinion of a great
many of the best and wisest men at the South. I believe that slavery
will be destroyed in the progress and sequel of this war--to the
ultimate incalculable advantage of the South.

One word more: You have seen fit to quote Burke and Milton, for the sake
of a fling at the _clergy_ who venture to discuss the questions of the
day. I do not know how far some of your associates will be disposed to
thank you. Perhaps their being on your side gives them a capacity not
possessed by the others, and exempts them from the application of your
rebuke. I have an impression that the culture and habits of thinking of
the members of the clerical profession do not particularly unfit them
for taking just and sound views on the questions that agitate the public
mind, and that their position--cutting them off from all offices and
emoluments that are the objects of ambition to party politicians--gives
them some special advantages for doing so. For myself, having all my
life been devoted to study and thought on the great principles of social
and moral order, I feel myself as well qualified, at least, to offer an
opinion, as though I had been devoted to the mechanical application of
the principles of physical science.

C. S. HENRY.

BUCKLE, DRAPER, AND THE LAW OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT.

_FIRST PAPER._

So parallel are the lines of thought in Mr. Buckle's 'History of
Civilization' and Professor Draper's 'Intellectual Development of
Europe,' while they continue within the same limits in discussing the
law of individual and social progress; and so exactly does the latter
work resume the consideration of this law at