istible natural
tendency of free labor_. The Irishman who voted against the negro was
breaking his chain with every blow of his pick. The Wall-street banker,
the great railroad king, the cotton manufacturer, who railed against
abolitionism like mad, were condemning the slave aristocracy every day
they lived. There is a divine law by which the work of freemen shall
root out the work of slaves; and no law enacted by the will of Northern
doughfaces could repeal this statute of nature. These Northern friends
of the aristocracy supposed themselves to be helping their ambitious
allies by their political support. But the slaveholders knew how
fallacious was this aid. They saw that the North was gaining a huge
superiority to the South; that the people were slowly consolidating;
that when the free-labour interest did finally concentrate, it would
carry every Northern interest with it, and, when the pinch came, no
Northern party or statesman could or would help them do their will. They
carefully sifted all offers of aid from such quarters, and having used
every Northern interest and institution and party till it was squeezed
dry of all its black blood, they turned their backs haughtily on the
white sections of the Union, plundered friend and foe alike, and flew
into civil war, out of spite and rage at the census of 1860; in other
words, _declared war against the providence of God as manifested in the
progress of free society_. They have fought well; at first, perhaps,
better than we; but when General Lee 'flanks' the industrial decrees of
the Almighty, and Stuart 'cuts the communications' between free labor
and imperial power, they will destroy this republic--and not till then.

But was this great material gain of the people to be accompanied by a
corresponding spiritual advancement? _Was man to become the chief object
of reverence in this wonderfully expanding industrial empire?_ If not,
all this progress was deceptive, and nobody could predict how soon our
very superiority should be turned to the advantage of that aristocracy
which had perverted so many things in the republic.

It could not be denied that the Free States were making wonderful
strides, during these forty years, in mental cultivation and power. The
free industry of the North was an education to the people, and nowhere
has so much popular intelligence been carried into the business of life
as here. This period also witnessed the organization of the free school
ev