he saw any prospect of bettering
the condition of the objects of her tender and solicitous benevolence. I
trust, too, that this admission will go far to prove the emptiness of
your declaration, that the abolitionists "have thrown back for half a
century the prospect of any species of emancipation of the African race,
gradual or immediate, in any of the states," and the emptiness of your
declaration, that, "prior to the agitation of this subject of abolition,
there was a progressive melioration in the condition of slaves
throughout all the slave states," and that "in some of them, schools of
instruction were opened," &c.; and I further trust, that this admission
will render harmless your intimation, that this "melioration" and these
"schools" were intended to prepare the slaves for freedom. After what
you have said of the great value of the slaves, and of the obstacle it
presents to emancipation, you will meet with little success in your
endeavors to convince the world, that the South was preparing to give up
the "twelve hundred millions of dollars," and that the naughty
abolitionists have postponed her gratification "for half a century." If
your views of the immense value of the slaves, and of the consequent
opposition to their freedom, be correct, then the hatred of the South
towards the abolitionists must be, not because their movements tend to
lengthen, but because they tend to shorten the period of her possession
of the "twelve hundred millions of dollars." May I ask you, whether,
whilst the South clings to these "twelve hundred millions of dollars,"
it is not somewhat hypocritical in her to be complaining, that the
abolitionists are fastening the "twelve hundred millions of dollars" to
her? And may I ask you, whether there is not a little inconsistency
between your own lamentations over this work of the abolitionists, and
your intimation that the South will never consent to give up her slaves,
until the impossibility, of paying her "twelve hundred millions of
dollars" for them, shall have been accomplished? Puerile and insulting
as is your proposition to the abolitionists to raise "twelve hundred
millions of dollars" for the purchase of the slaves, it is nevertheless
instructive; inasmuch as it shows, that, in your judgment, the South is
as little willing to give up her slaves, as the abolitionists are able
to pay "twelve hundred millions of dollars" for them; and how unable the
abolitionists are to pay a sum of mone