Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1858-04-10
WHOLE NO. 652.


tehdcfeet chords Of domestic affection. No circle
Of joys is too sacred for its fatal inroads No obi
cations are too strong TO be sundered, and no
appeals Zoo affecting to be disregafded by this fen
spirit. 1t rioc upon The sorrows Of the pour
This il fiction 0f the Imagination, but the cruel
story of American slavery. Everybody knows
that il is not fiction. but heart breaking real
lity that in our country. earned with life and
redeemed. with blood. wife is torn from husband
child from parent. and sister from brother and
this. is but the beginning of sorrow and iufamy !
Now, ask If here is not sin ngainet God p
" no walked the domestic affections in the breast
Of manf Who gave them their sacred and pierc.
! ing cry? Who inscribed th0ee eternal laws upon
the human constitution Every man knows tnat
they were written by the finger Of God. and that
the authority Of Sinai was not more binding than
those sacred mandates that issue from the domes-
tic nature Of man. The conclusion is inevitable.
Slavery Is a violation VI the Divine law Of tho
domestic affections.
The sentiment that the Creator sanctions syss
tenn whose existence depends on the legal ght to
tear ssunder the holiest ties Of conugn and paren-
tai love,is monster of blssphemy. IL impiously
charges the holy God with that extreme Of deprsv.
ity which himsl has described as without natur-
al affection.
Fellow man, is there no inviolsble sacredness in
the tie which binds you to the wife of your chucef
Go tell her 80 and il she ever squnuders another
affection upon your unrepenting spiritshe s guilty
ot treason against her sex.
your own darling from its mothers arms aud dash
it against the wsll-or worse, sell it for gold!
Nay, tear out the quvering aesh of your own
heart, and give il to its legitimate possessors, the
beasts of pray, and then stride the earth heart
less monsteri But while you profess the homer
of q husbands devotion and the magnanimity Of
a fathers tenderness, never lend your sanction to-
barbarous repeal Of all domestic law!
5. There is another law of human nature
peculiar to the female rex, the wantun violation Of
which ought forever to damn the system Of slavery
iron civilization and decent society | refer to
that innate law Of the female mind which revoits
from prostitution. This sacred instinct, which
seeH1s like the last virtue of Eden--an eierrens
of social refinement so ETHEREAL az to survive tic
wreck of the fall-has ever been the guardian
gel of domestic virtue and the true source of ele-
waited happiness. But it though what
had escaped the malice Of hell in the garden of
Eden, had becOme the helpless prey of the more
gross and malignant self hness Of slavery!
Under the pow er Of this ravenous monster. the
food gates of lcentiorsness have been opened up
on the entire female sex Hear it. We Americans.
Senators and high fnnctionaries Of this Govern
ment, doom 20 Sldrery doom TO resstless pros
ttution Tell me. | say shall an American
citizen, when he becomes politician. cease 10 BE-
a man Where, then, is the L1anhoud and gene.
rosity OF American statesmen, that more than
fifteen hundred Thousand Amer can females are
subjected to the lawess will of a master? IIark!
what tones Of woe those ,hat strike my cart
Ii is the ceasless wall Of millions of cUttn-
trywomen in slavery. Shut your ears to tho
clanking chains Of the stronger sex-steel your
hearts to the scenes Of blood and cruelty through
which they are passing; nature will SOON relieve
them by death, and trust cornpensate their
trials 10y better life. hut qnench not the gefe.
ruus impulses of pity for abused and suffering
women. The old Roman breast. with all its saw
age ferocity. was incapable of such neglect OF
the wrongs Of women That iron hearted peo-
pie Indignantly hurled q munarch from his throne.
in vindicaton If the rights of one detpnceless e-
male And shall the "unnr mbered woes" of
two millions of American women in slavery be
neglected in a country called chrietian- and by q
people called republican,
Can there he rational doubt that slavery is 8
violation of the law Of God inscribed upon the
peculiar constitution of woman? Who is willing
tn deny to his mother, his sister his wife. or
daughter. this Divine instinct Yet slavery
tramples ruthlessy upon it All the nobler i'm.
pulses Of human ity. all the finer sentiments Of the
soul revolt AT this unparalleled outrage upon fe.
male help'essnes. Every sacred principle of our
constitution ie in eternal antagoni.n with it, Yet
man is il is insepnrnhle from the property prin
,iple--itis is the general effec, OF slavery.
In the discussions upon our Mormon difficulties.
hear alluSions to the polygamv Of that degraded
class OF American citizens. | hear of the licen-
ousness of the commercial metropolis of our
'ountry and nf the degrading sensuality nf the
furkish seraglio but hear not word of that
Earth, existing under the INSTITUTION Of slavery
md that sanctioned by the model Republic. Ilnw
my son-how any husband-how any father or
'rother. justify tolerate slavery, it is diff
,ult TO conceive
1t is not only to my mind ursnsweratlv clear
hat slavery is a sin. always and everywhere, but
hat this should be questioned ia the must aston.
shing and incredible phenomenon Of the age
can account for II only from the binding nfu-
ance OF the tolerated crime of ages God in iudg.
ment has "seht strong delusion, that they should
believe 4 lie that thew oil might be damned who
helievs not the truth but had pleasure in unright
This seems like the terrihle doom Of
nur country. While the national mind ia enlight-
rned. the national heat seems 70 grow cnrrupt
f"r pr est and people. statesmen and private cti.
zens, have held the truth in unrighten BUSINESS,
As a nation. we have acknowledged the right
and done the wrong. Having prac'icalv repndi-
afad liberty. we nre being subjected to despotism
Is it not msnifest that slavery il an aggravated
violation of the will of God rs indicated in the
creation of man. the noblest ~ his worksf IN
,ther words, is not s!arery SIM
In order To invalidate the above argument in
'cference TO the negro y0u muet prove that he 10
rot free agent, that he has constitutional de-
ire of liberty nr knowledge. that the negro hna-
'hild that they spontaneously seek n condition
II slavery "a their legitimate destiny. and that
slavery is naturally promotive of the well being
# the parties concerned.
l suppose no intelligent person will endorse
that series Of propositions. conclude then that
he Argument is conclusive against American
slavery. believe il can be answered only BY
affacing from the human constitution the natural
law of its Eternal Creator.
/. infer from this subject tha. slavery can
never be right.
1t is proved 10 be wrong nv ths eternal and i'm.
mntahle nature Of thipgs Hence it must he
eernally and immutaby wrong. No continuation
r;f ~ altar sha
nature of things Hence no circumstances can
make slavery anything but q violation Of natural
law. 1t is therefore intrnsically and unchanges-
bly wrong.
We infer that enactments which snsfain slavery
can impose no Obligation of obedience. Human
enactments are mere expressions at human will.
These expressions of human will cannot change
the eternal nature Of things. They cannot make
that right which. by the natural constitution Of
things, is wholly wrong, An ac, Of rebellion can.