Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1846-02-06

The following document, though the re-
port of a local society, is general in its char
acter, and is so well suited to the people of
Ohio that we give it entire.
annual Report Of the Philadelphia Female I'm
ti-SIarcry Society.
Another year of our Society's existence is
numbered with the past. 1t has borne with
it, in its rapid flight, new evidence of our de-
votedness to the cause of freedom, of our self
denying and active bcnoyolence, or sad proofs
Of our delinquency, our selfish love of ease,
our unfaithfulness TO the right. Progression
or retrogression is the law of cur being. We
stand net to-day where we stood a year ago.
1t is to us an important and deeply interest
ing question, What is the testimony Of the
past concerning us? and a rigid self-scrutiny,
in the review Of the year cannot but be prof
table. If we have lone with our might W hat
our hands have found to do, if we have lost
no opportunity of aiding in the dcliverance of
the oppressed, if we have been diligent in bu-
%sinesS, ~"fervent in spirit" remembering
'those in bonds, as bound with them,'' we
have, indeed, cause for grateful Joy to-day
If we must acknowledge deficiency in all
these things, we have cause, not for despon-
dency, but for penitence and better resolu-
tons for the coming year. And in our annu-
al retrospect it is also profitable to stand at
that point Of view which the slave occupies;
to look upon the long, weary year of hope de.
ferred, which he has spent. All the power
of Imagination which we may possess, aided
by a sensitive heart, will not enable US to
conceive fully the weight of anguish which
has been crowded into that year, yet the view
will be amply sufficient to excite shame and
sclf-condemnation for our apathy and to rouse
us to noblcr deeds for the cause of Freedom.
The course Of our Society during the past
year has been similar to that Of former years;
and at the close of each we invariably find
reason for increased confidence in the funda-
mental principles of our Association, and in
the measures by which we seek the promo
ton of these principles. Those principles
and measures are few and simple, although
the work which they are destined to do, is
mighty and arduous. Frequently reiterated
as they have been, we are still asked, with
incredulous wonder, how We hope to accom-
plish our end! and what is our plan1 Our
plan for the abolition of slavery is simply
this "Let him that stole, steal no more,b but
rather let him labor, working with his own
hands," honestly, instead Of reaping his fields
Shy Fraud" instead of building "his house
by unrighteousness and his chambers by
wreng;'' let him who has bound letters upon
his brother, ''undo" them, that the oppressed
may go free; and let all who have aided, or
any way countenanced this system of iniqui-
ty, do so no more. This is the plan proposed
by christianity, and who will offer one more
simple and practicable, more just and ration
all
The fundamental principles of our Asso-
citation ara thOCa on which pur national npp-
~laration of Independence is based, that "all
men are born equal, and have an inalienable
right to liberty" If all men have an inahi-
enable birihright to liberty, then it must be
the duty of every one who is Withholding it
from another, immediately to restore it to him.
Our measures are, as they have ever been,
the dissemination Of these truths, by the
voice, the pen, and the press. In pursuance
of them, our Society has circulated seventy
copies of anti-slavery newspapers; viz: forty
COPIES of the Pennsylvania Freeman, ten of
the National A. S. Standard, and twenty of
the Liberator. We believe that so much good
seed has not been sown in vain, and trust
that the weekly entrance Of an antl-slavery
journal into families where, perhaps, the slave
had no advocate, has wrought a good work,
and won many a true, brave heart to the hosts
of Freedom. By individual effort, tracts and
other publications have been widely distribu-
ted. In the work of sustaining agents to lee
ture and otherwise labor in behalf of the
cause, our Society has acted through the EX-
~ecutive Committee of the State Society, by
placing in their hands a large portion Of our
funds, this being the most economical and
profitable arrangement which we could adopt.
In that Committee, our Society has a large
representation. The School mentioned il
previous reports, still receives share of oul
patronage, and the claims of the fugitive slave