essly to anger and
alienate those whom it should be our aim to win. A cause that is
intrinsically good may be advocated in a bad spirit, or with improper
weapons; and such may have sometimes been the case with ours. Would that
all men had ever borne it in mind, that truth and love are the only
weapons with which to wage a successful conflict with this or any other
deep-seated moral evil.

2. We must not, in our zeal for emancipation, allow mere feeling or
benevolent impulses partially to dethrone reason; and thus disqualify
ourselves for taking impartial views of the subject, or for accurately
discriminating between truth and error. There may have been men in the
anti-slavery ranks, with whom sympathy was every thing, and reason--and
even the Bible--comparatively nothing. In obeying the injunction to
"remember them that are in bonds," they may have neglected to remember
any thing else. Slavery seemed to occupy their entire field of vision.
Hence, not fully informed in regard to the actual condition of things at
the South, they have erroneously supposed that the slave codes
prevailing there were the standard by which to judge of the actual
condition of the slaves, and that all the Southern church was actually
practising the barbarities authorized by those codes. As there was no
just appreciation of the actual conduct of masters towards their
servants, so there was no allowance made for the circumstances which
conspired to render them masters, nor for the obstacles which stand in
the way of their ceasing to be masters. It must be admitted, that
generally, where unrighteous laws are suffered to exist, the mass of the
community will not be better than the laws; but there are
exceptions,--men who intend to give heed to a higher law. So much for
allowing an amiable but blind sympathy to usurp that throne which reason
and revelation were designed conjointly to occupy. It scarcely need be
added, that these ultraisms have done much to prejudice the anti-slavery
cause, and bring it, in the eyes of some, into unmerited contempt. We
must wipe away that reproach, by so conducting our warfare with slavery
as to evince that we are neither men of one idea, nor men whose judgment
is led captive by their sensibilities.

3. We must not, in opposing slavery, indorse the sentiment, that one
cannot in any conceivable circumstances give credible evidence of piety,
and yet continue in form to hold slaves; that being a master is,
in any and i