by the efforts made to suppress it--Title to
Slaves, to Lands--Abstract Ideas--Is Slavery
Sin?--Argument from the Old Testament--Argument
from the New Testament--The "Higher
Law"--Political Influence of Slavery--Free Labor
Police--In war, Slavery is Strength--Code of
Honor--Mercantile Credit--Religion and
Education--Licentiousness and Purity--Economy of
Slave Labor, and of Free Labor--Responsibility of
Power--Kindness and Cruelty--Curtailment of
Privileges--Punishment of Slaves, children and
soldiers--Police of Slavery--Condition of
Slaves--Condition of Free Laborers in
England--Slavery a necessary condition of human
Society--Moral Suasion of the
Abolitionists--Coolie Labor--Results of
Emancipation in the West Indies--Revival of the
Slave Trade by Emancipationists--Results of
Emancipation in the United States--Radicalism of
the present Age.

SILVER BLUFF, (SO. CA.,) JANUARY 28, 1845.

SIR: I received, a short time ago, a letter from the Rev. Willoughby M.
Dickinson, dated at your residence, "Playford Hall, near Ipswich, 26th
November, 1844," in which was inclosed a copy of your Circular Letter,
addressed to professing Christians in our Northern States, having no
concern with slavery, and to others there. I presume that Mr.
Dickinson's letter was written with your knowledge, and the document
inclosed with your consent and approbation. I therefore feel that there
is no impropriety in my addressing my reply directly to yourself,
especially as there is nothing in Mr. Dickinson's communication
requiring serious notice. Having abundant leisure, it will be a
recreation to devote a portion of it to an examination and free
discussion of the question of slavery as it exists in our Southern
States: and since you have thrown down the gauntlet to me, I do not
hesitate to take it up.

Familiar as you have been with the discussions of this subject in all
its aspects, and under all the excitements it has occasioned for sixty
years past, I may not be able to present much that will be new to you.
Nor ought I to indulge the hope of materially affecting the opinions you
have so long cherished, and so zealously promulgated. Still, time and
experience have developed facts, constantly furnishing fresh tests to
opinions formed