lest and the falsest charges of moral and
political turpitude; while there were produced in their
assemblies placards, calling on the mob for appropriate
deeds, and designating the time and place of holding their
meetings, that its violence might know at what point it might
most effectually spend itself; yet, never elsewhere have I
seen so much of sedate deliberation of sober conclusion, of
dignified moderation, sanctified by earnest prayer to God,
not only for the oppressed, but for the oppressor of his
fellow; not only for such as they loved, but for their
slanderers, and persecutors, and enemies.

The above is a fair account, so far as my knowledge enables
me to speak, of the character of those whom you are pleased
to describe "a band of fanatical abolitionists." Light and
rash minds, unaccustomed to penetrate to the real causes of
great revolutions in public sentiment, will, of course, think
and speak contemptuously of them, while the philosophic
observer clearly sees, that such antagonists of error, armed
with so powerful a weapon as the Truth, must, at all times,
be invincible; and that in the end they will be triumphant.

A word, too, before I come to the state of the churches, with regard
to Mr. Breckinridge's concluding topic last evening; to which I had
not, of course, any opportunity to reply; and, as the time allotted
for this discussion is now determined, I shall be permitted to dwell a
few moments on the subject. Mr. Breckinridge did, I am ready to
acknowledge, with tolerable fairness, state the views of the
abolitionists with regard to prejudice against color; that it was
sinful, that it ought to be abandoned, and that the colored man should
be raised to the enjoyment of equal civil and religious privileges
with the whites. But after he had laid down, generally speaking
correctly, the views of the abolitionists, he proceeded to put the
most _unfair_ interpretation upon those views, and strangely contended
that they were directly aiming to accomplish the amalgamation of the
races in the fullest sense of that word. Once again, I _deny_ this.
Once again I appeal to all that the abolitionists have ever written or
spoken: to their published, official, solemn, authoritative
disclaimers; and I say on my behalf and on theirs, that with the
intermixture of "the races," as they are called, (a phrase I do not
like,) the abolitionists have