sprang the very ignorance and vice, which in the view of many, lie
in the way of their immediate enfranchisement. He it is, who has
darkened their eyes and crippled their powers. And are they to look
to him for illumination and renewed vigor!--and expect "grapes from
thorns and figs from thistles!" Heaven forbid! When, according to
arrangements which had usurped the sacred name of law, he consented
to receive and use them as property, he forfeited all claims to the
esteem and confidence, not only of the helpless sufferers themselves,
but also of every philanthropist. In becoming a slaveholder, he
became the enemy of mankind. The very act was a declaration of war
upon human nature. What less can be made of the process of turning
men to cattle? It is rank absurdity--it is the height of madness, to
propose to employ _him_ to train, for the places of freemen, those
whom he has wantonly robbed of every right--whom he has stolen from
themselves. Sooner place Burke, who used to murder for the sake of
selling bodies to the dissector, at the head of a hospital. Why,
what have our slaveholders been about these two hundred years? Have
they not been constantly and earnestly engaged in the work of
education?--training up their human cattle? And how? Thomas
Jefferson shall answer. "The whole commerce between master and slave,
is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions; the most
unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submission on
the other." Is this the way to fit the unprepared for the duties and
privileges of American citizens? Will the evils of the dreadful
process be diminished by adding to its length? What, in 1818, was
the unanimous testimony of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian
Church? Why, after describing a variety of influences growing out of
slavery, most fatal to mental and moral improvement, the General
Assembly assure us, that such "consequences are not imaginary, but
connect themselves WITH THE VERY EXISTENCE[15] of slavery. The evils to