The Lancaster ledger. [volume] (Lancaster, S.C.) 1852-1905, 1854-02-22
John Mitchefs Reply to the Rev. n.
w. Beecher.

"u"'SSseu 10 you Oy one Whom
you supposed to be dead. In your anti
slavery lecture, as reported in the Tribune,
| lnd that you announce my decease to
large congregation: and with christian
meekness repressed the loud Kisses Of your
hearers, in consideration Of the respect.
due to the deceased. This morning |
have read my own epitapa in the Tri-
bune, and even an account of Coroner's
inquest, which must have greatly affected
my friends, i'll have any left.
find myself therefore, in the position
of Partridge, the Almanac maker, who
had to come before the public to pr owe
himself alive, Notwithstanding the obitu-
AIRY notice of Dean Swift, and had even
much trouble in establishing the fact. It
is hard necessity. You may be difficult
to convince, and may choose even to re-
gard this communication as de profin-
DIS ctaRdt, or voice from the tombs but
will try to satisfy your reverence.
The New York Tribune first, next a
small fry of newspapers whose names
forget, and lately your factious reverence,
IN Your paper, the Independent, all have
have poured out on Inc a torrent of vir-
trous Indignation, simply because | re-
fused to brand as criminal large portion
OF the citizens Of this republic, and about
one haitof all the human beings who have
ever lived in the world besides. You and
the Tribune and the "benevolists," of this
enlightened cantury, have found out
new crime, rs ifthere had not been enough
before! and, when any man hesitates to
load his fellow citizens, and fore fathers,
with this latclyinvented sin, over and a.
bove all their other sins, YOU cry out that
he is "catitf," "thistle," "hideous
hag," and dead man.
You write this epetaph and find YER
dict of teIo de Sc upon his corpse.
Il seems also that have disappointed
You and the Tribune which is painful
But what if the disappointment is owing
not to my fault, but TO your stupidity !;
For here is your reasoning: | tried to
destroy British dominion in Ireland, but
decline to say that half the American
citizens are vile criminals therefore ''there
could be no principle in my struggle with
England" Il quote from your article in
the independently And the Tribune
ma kcs no scruple to say "lhat if liberty
for Ireland and the Irish is sought in the
spirit evinced, and on the principles avow-
eel 10y the Citizen, it can hardly be neces-
sary to say that the effort will be fruitless
and the hopes Of its champions mockery
Alas, for the aspirations of the oppressed
and eNiIed if their incitemcnt to struggle
for liberty is the horrible desire of buying,
selling, and lashing each other" | CON
fess that | can make no sense out of such
language. Renevolence is good, but lit
tie logic also would be no harm. Let us
see how it would apply to another case.
General Washington, the Father of his
Country, saw no crime and no peccadilo
IN holding slaves, and in making them
work on his farm. General Washington
wished to possess, and did possess till he
died, and always took good care of plan
tation stocked with negroes, not in Alaba-
ma, but in Virginia. Nay he wished to
possess more plantations; otherwise he
certainly never would have offered $500
far Mr.. Cifton's. Thomas Jefferson, the
greaest OF the founders of American de-
mocracy, lived and died STAKEHOLDER, and
beIueathed his slaves to his relatives.
Therefore, " there could DO no principle in
their struggle with England" The " ef-
fJrt ought to have been fruitless, and the
hopes of its champions mockery; for
their incitement, (Jetferson's and Wash.
Ing'on's incitemenD "to struggle for iber-
~ was the horrible desire of buying, sell
ing each other" If your reverence would
boldly speak your mind, you would tell
your hearers in the Tabernacle that Wash
ington was a catiff and Jefferson thristle
or hideous hag.
know what you will say-that those
Illhstrious men, those Shareholders, always
felt and said that slavery was an incubus
and curse to the country. Possibly it
may be so. That is a subject on which |
give no opinion. But the national debt
IS an incubus and curse to England, and
yet many good men believing it to be so,
hold debentures, and even 60 so far as TO
buy stock in the three-and-a. half per
cents.
But you crusaders of abolition arc not
content to rest the case on grounds Of pol
icy. You will have it that those who diff
fer from you, and agree with all the
wisest of mankind, are tools and villains.
You have a number of exclamations and
inteUections always ready, and you seem
to think that people will take them for
reasons. "What ~ you cry, "can a man
he chattel ~ To which | answer, why
notl The Legislator of the Jews saw no
harm in it. :" Would you sell being
With an immortal soull" Certainly; Mo-
ses and the Prophets did the same.
Would you send back fugitive to his
nasterl" Assuredly; Paul the Apostle
very honestly sent back the abscondng
Oncsimus, and begged of his owner the
worthy Philemon, Paul's dearly-beloved
and fellow-laborer, to forgive his returning
slave
Was Paul hideous hagl Believe
me it is your reverence that is an old wo-
man. You will never get new code Of
morality established among men. We
win never consent to believe that you are
q better Christian than the founder Of
that religion; that you love liberty better
than those immortal Greeks who invented
It; that you are a truer republican than