ween the Rev. missionary
and that clear-headed, bold, and eccentric old Methodist, Dr. McFarlane.
Both believe that the Bible can do ignorant, sensual savages no good;
both believe that nothing but compulsatory power can restrain
uncivilized barbarians from polygamy, inebriety, and other sinful
practices.

The good missionary, however, believes in the possibility of civilizing
the inferior races by the money and means of the Christian nations
lavishly bestowed, after which he thinks it will be no difficult matter
to convert them to Christianity. Whereas the venerable Methodist
believes in the impossibility of civilizing them, and therefore
concludes that the Written Word was not intended for those inferior
races who can not read it. When the philosophy of the prognathous
species of mankind is better understood, it will be seen how they, the
lowest of the human species, can be made partakers, equally with the
highest, in the blessings and benefits of the Written Word of God. The
plantation laws against polygamy, intoxicating drinks, and other
besetting sins of the negro race in the savage state, are gradually and
silently converting the African barbarian into a moral, rational, and
civilized being, thereby rendering the heart a fit tabernacle for the
reception of Gospel truths. The prejudices of many, perhaps the majority
of the Southern people, against educating the negroes they hold in
subjection, arise from some vague and indefinite fears of its
consequences, suggested by the abolition and British theories built on
the false assumption that the negro is a white man with a black skin. If
such an assumption had the smallest degree of truth in it, the more
profound the ignorance and the deeper sunk in barbarism the slaves were
kept, the better it would be for them and their masters. But experience
proves that masters and overseers have nothing at all to fear from
civilized and intelligent negroes, and no trouble whatever in managing
them--that all the trouble, insubordination and danger arise from the
uncivilized, immoral, rude, and grossly ignorant portion of the servile
race. It is not the ignorant semi-barbarian that the master or overseer
intrusts with his keys, his money, his horse or his gun, but the most
intelligent of the plantation--one whose intellect and morals have
undergone the best training. An educated negro, one whose intellect and
morals have been cultivated, is worth double the price of the wild,
uncul