The River Falls journal. (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1857-1861, 1858-07-07
Mistellanfous.
THE AMERICAN TRACT so.
GETTY.

The ATLANTIC MONTHLY for July is
superb number. Besides the wit fan
cy and pathos of the 'Autocrat," the usu-
al rich variety of the poetry and prose,
there is strong and pithy article on the
American Tract Society. which alone is
worth the price of the number. 1t is an
honor to the country that there is one
able fearless magazine which dares to
grapple earnestly with the great vital
questions of Politics and Morality.l
There was no apologize more popular
in the Middle Ages than that of The her
NIT, who, musing on the wickedness and
| tyranny of those whom the inscrutable
wisdom of Providence had Entrusted with
the government of the world, fell asleep
and awoke to find himself the very mon
arch whose abject life and capricious VIC
lence had furnished the subject of his
moralizing. Endowed with irresponsible
power, tempted by passions whose exist
ence in himself he had never suspected,
and betrayed by the political necessities
of his position, he became gradually gull
ty of all the crimes and luxury which
| had seemed so hideous to him in bis her
rnitage over dish of water-cresses.
The American Tract Society from
small beginnings has risen to be the dis
penser OF a yearly rev.nue of nearly halt
million. 1t haze become great estab-
lishment, with traditional policy. with
the distrust of c ange aud the dislike OF
ci,turbing questions Especially of such as
would Lessen It's reyenue) natural tothegrea
1t had been poor and weak; it has be-
come rich and powerful. The hermit has
,me king.
If the p.ous men who formed the A
merican Tract Society had been told tina;
within forty years they would be watch
ful of their publications, lest, by inadver-
tence, anything disrespectful might be
spoken of the African Slave Trade,-that
they would consider it an ample equiva-
lent for compulsory dumbness on the
vices of Slavery, that their colporteurs
could awaken the minds of Southern
brethren to the horrors of st Bartholo-
mew,-that they would hold their peace
about the body of CUTIE dancing to tie
music of the cart whip, provided only they
could save the soul of Sambo alive bv
presenting him aramphlet which he could
not read, on the depla5ity o the double
shrfle,-tha. they would consent to be
fellow-members in the Tract Society with
him who sold their fellow members in
Christ on the auction block, if he agreed
with them in condelnning Transubstan-
tiation, land it would not be difficult for
a gentleman who ignored the real pres
ence of God in his fellow-man to deny il
in the sacramental wafer, )-if those ex-
cellent men had been told this, they would
have shrunk in horror, and exclaimed =
care thy servants dogs that they should
do these things?'
Yet this precisely the present position
of the Society.
If strict construction of the words
tall Evangelical Christians, be insisted
on, we are at loss to see where the CON-
mittee could draw the dividing line be-
tween what might be offensive and what
allowable. The Society publish tracts in
which the study of the Scriptures is en-
forced and their denial to the laity by Ro-
manists assailed. But throughout the
; SScnth it is criminal to teach a slave to
read; throughout the South no book
could be distributed among the sefs'ie
population more incendisry thai tic Dl-
BILE, if they could only read it. Will not
our Southern brethren take alarm! The
Society is reduced to the dilemma of e.
Their denying that the African has soul
to be saved, or of conserving to the ter
rible mockery of assuring him the way Of
life is to be found only by searching q
book which he is forbidden to open.
If we carry out this doctrine of strict
construction to its legitimate results, we
shall find that itinvolves logical absurd
ity. What is the number of men whose
outraged sensibilities may claim the sup.
preston of a tract? Is the taboo Of 8
thousand valid? Of hundreds o.
ten? Or are tracts to be distributed on
" to those who will find their doctrine
agreeable, and are the Society's colpor
tours to be instructed that Temperance
essay is the proper thing for total-absti-
nenee inhdel, and sermon on the atone
ment for a distlling deacon? If the ain
J of the Society be only TO convert men