Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1847-12-17
Slavery--ItS Ultimate Effects.

SlaVery--ltS Ultimate Effects.
Slavery, il is not to he denied, is an essen
TALLY barblrous institution. 1t gives us, too,
that sign which is the perpetual distinction
of barbarism, that it has no law of progress.
The highest level it reaches, is the level at
which it begins. Indeed, we need not scru-
pie to allow that it has yielded us one con-
siderable advantage, in virtue of the fact that
1t produces its best condition first. For
while the Northern people were generally
delvlng In labor, for many generations, to
create a condition Of comfort, Slavery sci the
masters at once on a footing of ease, gave
them leisure for elegant intercourse, for UNI
prof. %ssional studies, and seasoned their char
acter thus with that kind of cultivation which
distinguishes men of society. A class of
statesmen were thus raised up, who were
prepared TO figure as leaders in scenes Of
public life. where so much depends on man.
ners and social address. But now the scale
is changing. Free labor is rising at length
into a state of wealth and comic to take
the lead of American Society. a.. awhile
the foster sons of Slavery-the high fami-
lies, the statesmen-grddually receding in
character, as they must under this vicious in
s%titution, are receding also in power and in
~fuence, and have been ever since the Reyo-
luton.
Slavery is a condition against Nature the
curse Of Nature, therefore, is on it, and it
bow to its doom, by a law as irresistible as
gravity. 1t produces d condition of ease
which is not the reward of labor, and a state
of degradation which is not the curse of idle
ness. Therefore the ease it enjoys cannot
but end in a curse, and the degradation it
suffers cannot rise into a bles ing. 1t nour-
ishes imperious and violent passions. 1t
makes the masters solitary sheiks on their
estates, forbidding thus the possibility Of
public schools; and preventing also that
condensed form of society, which is neces-
sary to The vigorous maintenance Of church.
es. Education and religion thus displaced,
the dinner table only remains, and on this
hangs, in great part, the keeping Of the Sc
cial state. But however highly we may es-
innate the humanizing power Of hospitality,
it cannot be regarded as any sufficient spring
Of character. 1t is neither a school nor a
gospel. And when it comes Of selfindul-
gence, or only seeks relief for the tedium OF
an idle life, scarcely does il bring with it the
blessings of a virtue. The accomplishments
it yields are of a mock quality, rather than
OF a real, having about the same relation to a
substantial and finished culture, that honor
has to character. This kind of currency will
pass no longer for it is not expense without
comfort, or splendor set in disorder, as dia-
monds in pewter; it is not airs in place OF
elegance, or assurance substituted for ease
neither is it to be master of a fluent speech,
or to ganish the same with stale quotations
from the classics; much less is it TO live in
the Don Juan vein, accepting barbarism by
poetic inspiration-the same which a late no,
BILE poet, drawing out of Turks and pirate;
became the chosen laureate of Slavery-no
opv or all of those can mako n n Suph n CIvl
of man, or Of life, as we in this age demand
We have come up 20 a point, where we lool
for true intellectual refinement, and a rip
state Of personal culture. But how clearl'
is it seen TO be a violation of its own laws
for Slavery to produce "a genuine scholar, q
a man, who, in any department of eXcellence
unless it be in politics, is not a full centur
behind his time.
And if we ask for what is dearer and be-
ter still, for a pure christian morality, III
youth Of slavery are trained in no such hal
its as are most congenial to virtue. Th
point Of honor is the only principle many {
them know. Violence and dissipation brin
down every succeeding generation to a star
continually lower; so that now, after a hun
dred and fifty years are passed, the slavehol,
ing territory may be described as a vast mi
sionary ground, and one SO uncomfortable
the faithful ministry of Christ, by reason
its JEALOUS tempers, and the known repu!
nance it has TO many of the first maXims
the Gospel, that scarcely a missionary can
found TO enter it. Connected with this m
raj decay, the resources Of Nature also a
exhausted, and her fertile territories change
to a desert, by the uncroa,ing power OF
spendthrift institution. And then, havlr
made waste where God had madG a garde
Slavery gathers up the relics Of bankrupt
and the baser relics still Of virtue anL al
manly enterprise, and goes forth to rene
on a virgin soil, its dismal and forlorn hist
~. Thus at length, has been prod uced VIII
may be called the BOtcie-knJe style If civiI
gallon, and the new West of the South
ovsrrun by it-a spirit of blood which def
all laws Of God and man; honorable but n
honest prompt to resent an injury, slack
discharge a debt; educated to ease, and II
der, of course, when the means of livi
fail, to find them at the gaming table, or
background, than in any work OF industry
probably squandering the means of livi
there, to relieve the tedium of ease itself.
Such is the influence Of Slavery, as it
tiers into our American social state, and
parts its moral type Of barharism, throu
immigration, to the new West. Hence,
Mexican war, which had its beginning d
birth in what | have called the Bowie-kI
style Of civilization-a war in the nineteeI
century, which, il it was not purposely
gun, many are visibly determined shall b
war for the extension Of slavery. 1t was
enc political party, as some pretend, y
made this war, but it was the whole Sol
vest and West, father Of all parties, inst