Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1855-02-03
MICHIGAN CORRESPONDENTS
Plymouth, Mich. Jan. %. 1

PLYMOUTH, Mich, Jan. 25, 1854.
DEAR MAR1us Having noticed in the Buglo Of
Dec. 10Th, a spirited, but not very doubtful COM
plimcnt paid to the characte r of your Flint corres-
pondent, by n gentleman of the school Of ID. D.hs.
| have obtained my own Unwilling consent to give
my testimony in favor Of any correspondent who.
in these days of popular storytelling, has tho good
fortune to stumble upon an ingenious truth.
If the writer under the head Of Michigan
Correspondence" in the Bugle of Dec. Sd, referred
to by the Dr., was, as he says, understood TO be-
lieve that thorough investigation of the dissimilar
sides of any question produces Disturbance" or
that free and manly discussion interrupts tho
progress of an anti-slavery meeting" it was GER
tainly n most unfortunate expression of hcr
thought, for which she deserves rather pity than
blame.
If, in attempting ito heap odium npon the
Church" sustaining allegations by "falsifyingev i-
dence," the friends of the Church have been in
vited to refute those positions by facts and argu-
ments, and still fail of triumph, it must be that tho
magazines are empty, and the materials for war
are without the Capitol.
1t is, without doubt, far less difficult to misap-
%prehcnd arguments than make it appear that the
Gospel of Christ and religious teaching,
are convertible phrases. Mr.. Foss assumed and
proved that the slaves of this country have not the
teaching of the gospel of Christ. Whether
they have slaveholding religious teaching, in tho
main" or entirely" is only q question of guam
tity, as in mathematics, so here, the less is includ-
ed in the greater.
The declaration of Mr.. Foss, in reference to tho
Methodist ministry, docs not come under tho wri-
ter's "misstatements," but is, without doubt,
thrown in to give prominence to an idea that was
not before nppre;ended that the declaration was
completely refuted." The DIS logic would bs
acceptable For common purposes, but in relation to
the priesthood of the Church, whose license for
the practice of pious fraud runneth back to the
era of the creation, it happens to prove moth
ing.
That a time will come in New England and in
Ohio, when it will be no longer polite for Method
list ministers to deny the obvious fact that the NJ,
+. Church is a participant in the crime of slave
holding, the advance Of anti-slavcry sentiment
strongly indicates. But that this has been, and ia
still, a successful e~xpedient of that body to a con-
siderable extent, East and West, cannot bc de-
MED.
The Corrector must be strongly inclined to a.
figure, or have obtained license of Mr.. Jenningsr
VI ho COHSClenCe--J Dy Strctch oil metaphOr
we may assume that he has such an element of
characterize practice, as well as to expose and
condemn fabrication as all who attended tho
Saturday afternoon session at Saline will bear wit
ness. The sentence referred to, needs only this
qualification, which will Go both the writer aud
MIR. Jennings justice THAT he tMr. J.) had no
hope of anti-slavery action in the General Confer
ence' of the M. L. Church, Judging from her
past action, together with the influence of her
present corps Of Bishops.
S 1t would have been manly toward us, and gen-
crous toward the DR., in Mr.. Fulton, to have met
the issue upon his statement Of tho time, Of Mr..
Garrison's development of Infdelity, at the timo
q OF our meetings, and thus saved himself a foolish
n exposure, and the DIR. the ma unanimous failure of
a cutting his plaster too small for the wound. If
Mr.. Fulton be allowed to fix the time between
C twenty and twcnty-threc years, which will be
granted as a grace, not as a right. even then he re-
r mains ~culpable for deplorable ignorance, or for
downright duplisity in the matter.
n In regard to the ~'rabble," the drunken DR. -
Mr.. Root, and the dem onstrations," might Mev
e not have been thero, and acted, upon the principle
of elective af6nities? and so return the com.
pliment of too great responsibility.
o The DR.. has a right to demand justice, and, per-
h haps, complain, that any reference was made to.
: "boisterous manners" that should leave the pub
q lie in doubt in reference to the meaning of tho
&c phrase, or the character of the man.
y That the devotees to arbitrary rules and system
P lied etiquette have been too busy in manufacturing
! patent restraints and improved thumb-scrcws, is
ilamentably true. But when q gentleman of pro-
q fession so far transcends the common rules of civ
" ility as to light and smoke his cigar in church, nj
d the close of the meeting, in the public audience
when he persists in and maintains his right to do
q go, from the fact of his position and consequent
# license of the best parlors T. in community-when
he continues to breathe out his hateful nausea in
=, the faces and heaving stomachs of those necessar-
lily in contact with him, against all remonstrances,
and at last meets the issue in the chivalrous style
of a challenge to fight, why then the most facetious
or morbid might hope for pardon for Withholding
admiration from such an outrage upon good taste
y and wholesome atmosphere.
n Unquestionably this rejoinder was unnecessary,
for that part of the community of Saline who at
J tended the anti-slavery meetings there, and might
s" be very much condensed for community in general
who are not usually much edited in listening
e to
"Thc re-echo of conversations dull and dry,
u Embcllished with he said, and so said L."
Yours, with respect,
JOSEPHINE S.. GRIFFING.
THE COLUMBIAN has absorbed the Home Visitor.
h The new editor and proprietor of the Columbian
says he is losing subscribers, in consequence Of
his opposition to acknowledgment. But he takes
o this demonstration of opposition like a true man.
lie says:
a at may not be necessary for the cause of Free