Southern standard. [volume] (Columbus, Miss.) 1851-1856, 1852-05-08


graves, to the issue? In what but utter futility
The supposition that it will come to anything else
is weak delusion. These contrivances of polit
cal men to constrain the free and natural action of
the Northern wing mind and not alone whig
minds but those of every shade of political opin-
ion) are feeble and foolish beyond expression.
Now that is very plain and sensible talk it seems to
us The action of Congress has not, undoubtedly at
ALL changed the opinion of one Southern man, as to
the character social bearing of system OF slave
ry Itnever will Those who defended it on princl-
pIe defend it still the ground and Tor the same
reason. Such is not the case in the free States The
assaults have been yearly growing in strength and ire
uuency and in drectness. The outposts of the nsti
tuition long since FELL with the fall of the 21st rule &
when that went down, the council hall of the Nation
became the theatre for the gladatorial efforts of the
anti-slavery spirit Its voice became National and af
ter season. potential with party. This is all history
and needs iteration at our hands. But propose
illustrate, and historical items best
employ them. From the goth annual Report of the
anti-savery society," for 1851, take the following
.sIn no previous year. 1851 for many years
past, has the society been active carried on
its operations extensively. This has been es-
peciay true since the New England Anti-Savery
Convention in May last. Nearly one hundred an
agents Of the society, in different parts Of New
England during the year, and much greater
number OF evening lectures have been given. In
these we do not include the numerous meetings
held by George Thompson, Esq, in this and
neighboring States during the first months of the
year. We speak of conventions and lectures sus-
tanned wholly, mainly, by the agents of the So
ciety. We have been enabled to employ larger
number Of these, during the year past, than for
] II
utmost confidence, of the value and success of
their labors.''
Does this look like ''fnality'! But after boasting
ofwhat has been accomplished, the report continues
'Yet this is but the beginning of the end
Where in ten short years will be the that now,
lords of the scene, strut their little hour upon the
stage? Calhoun has already had his exit, and
the curtain has already fallen upon him. In ten
years, Webster Clay, Benton Houston, Cas-
almost all the prominent men in public lifc-will
have passed away in the due course of nature,
from the stage of affairs, though they may still
lnger, tagging veterans, upon that of life. Who
are to take their places God knows. But we
know that the school in which men are now train
ed for the is very different from the one that
formed the passing generation of politicians
Here men who wait on Time they look be-
yond to-day-ther vision is upon the future. They
fast and pray, and eat their brown loaf in peace
for their mission has been open the way destroy the
barriers thrown around the institutions of the South
by the constitution and educate the uprising genera
ton upon slavery until it shall exist
this continent The minds of the youth are educated
to hate slavery-it is settled SYSTEM carried in
to every school house, academy and college, the press
teens with it the who speaks to the masses de-
nounces slavery curse; and the preacher of the
word of God, as he steps into the altar Of the most
High, and opens the lid of the inspired volume calls
down the curses of heaven upon those who maintain
and uphold the institution These the instrument
talities by which these men work Every ril cours-
ing its varied way through society is ladened with
nathemas against slavery. Social intercourse noursh-
es these feelings, and well may these men say that
''ths is but the beginning Of the end.'' They may
not live the end but they have sown the seed of
fanatcism, and the Cass Clays, Websters Bentons
Daases Dickinsons, and Pauldings pass from the
stage of acon--men who have grown with the growth
of the Republic, educated in another school, men
whose youth was famed by the poisonous breath of
sectonalsm whose hostility slavery is nexnguish-
able, will enter upon the public ARENA and control the
destines Of this Union. But very little conservatism
yet fingers at the North. Time will soon sweep it a.
way and the South will be called to face storm from
which she sinks ike coward, first under one pre-
text and then another, andth fnality the Compro-
mise' is the last Quixotsm, and if there is any one
shift in the long catalogue expedients meaner than
another, this, in Judgment, is the meanest.
But the report continues thus
THE third stage of our history-that of action
will come in due time. What shape it will take,
by what machine the god that is to disentangle this
knot will descend upon the stage, remains to be
revealed. 1t is none of our business, who are but
the heralds and harbngers of him that is to come,
to pry into the details of his mission Our duty is
by faithful cooperation to make straight his path
When he will come is also hidden from our eyes ;
but have faith in the signs which tell that be is
at hand. The mighty passions which are abroad
in the land, the desperate struggle between the
wealth and ideas of the nation, the servy and sell
ishness which are bringing contempt upon Chris
tianity and republicanism, all speak of coming
change.
These not the canting who live by politics,
and their by numbers of their defeats
ing satisfied on that point, they bend themselves to
labor, and labor to them is nothing-money is nothing
for moremoney is individually contributed and expen-
ded in arousng public opinion against the institution
of slavery in the State of Massachusetts in one
than is expended in the whole fifteen slave States in
defending that institution in five years. But the re-
port continues
stThe abolition Of slavery preSupp0Ses a rev.
olutioa. II oiH be reoolution. For It sciU radi-
coIy overthroso and reconstruct the institutions OF
the nation. II may be a reuolution fought out on