o the effect of witchcraft, Desdemona's
passion for Othello--though, as Coleridge has said, we are to conceive
of him not as a negro, but as a high bred Moorish chief.

If the negro race, as I have contended, be inferior to our own in mind
and character, marked by inferiority of form and features, then ours
would suffer deterioration from such intermixture. What would be thought
of the moral conduct of the parent who should voluntarily transmit
disease, or fatuity, or deformity to his offspring? If man be the most
perfect work of the Creator, and the civilized European man the most
perfect variety of the human race, is he not criminal who would
desecrate and deface God's fairest work; estranging it further from the
image of himself, and conforming it more nearly to that of the brute? I
have heard it said, as if it afforded an argument, that the African is
as well satisfied of the superiority of his own complexion, form, and
features, as we can be of ours. If this were true, as it is not, would
any one be so recreant to his own civilization, as to say that his
opinion ought to weigh against ours--that there is no universal standard
of truth, and grace, and beauty--that the Hottentot Venus may perchance
possess as great perfection of form as the Medicean? It is true, the
licentious passions of men overcome the natural repugnance, and find
transient gratification in intercourse with females of the other race.
But this is a very different thing from making her the associate of
life, the companion of the bosom and the hearth. Him who would
contemplate such an alliance for himself, or regard it with patience,
when proposed for a son, or daughter, or sister, we should esteem a
degraded wretch--with justice, certainly, if he were found among
ourselves--and the estimate would not be very different if he were found
in Europe. It is not only in defense of ourselves, of our country, and
of our own generation, that we refuse to emancipate our slaves, but to
defend our posterity and race from degeneracy and degradation.

Are we not justified then in regarding as criminals, the fanatical
agitators whose efforts are intended to bring about the evils I have
described? It is sometimes said that their zeal is generous and
disinterested, and that their motives may be praised, though their
conduct be condemned. But I have little faith in the good motives of
those who pursue bad ends. It is not for us to scrutinize the hearts of
men, and we