The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1860-05-17
FROM the New York Tribans.l
The amcrfcan Tract Socheyvs

This Society holds lite annual business
meeting this morning. Did the managers
know and acknowledge the fearful work they
have helped TO accomplish during the past
year, the report would fall with startling ef-
feet upon the large body of Christians whom
they represent. In the great struggle be-
tween Freedom and Slavery, they have taken
their part on the eide of the oppressor and
against the helpless victim Of his avarice;
and they have stamped Slavery with the seal
Of Evangelical Christianity.o However
this may be doubted by amiable persons at
the North, it ia we'll understood by the mas
ters and overseers on slave plantations; and
the Journal OF Commerce declared with ex-
ultation that In case life members were ena-
bied to vote by proxy the managers could re-
ly upon the voses of stthe entire Southern
States, however remote"
The Society was originally founded ssto
promote the interests OF morality and vital
Goodness by tie circulation of tracts caIcu-
lated to receive the appreciation of all evan
gelieal Christians" The Religious Tract
society Of London, based upon q similar
principle, has published numerous tracts
against Slavery, as, for instance, "Jamai o.
Enslaved and, Free;n "Slave- Trade and Abo-
ltion;" "Demcralixing Influence Of Slavery"
Freedom" and the like, and very many OF
tdch CoAs0Ah paoS0kcc Implying
that slave traders are thieves, that slave
holding is crime, and that the system OF
Slavery as il now exists is monstrous vio-
lation, not alone Of Evangelical Religion,
bus of the commonest morality and Justice.
| The management of the American Tract
| Society, OF less clear ness of vison as TO what
constitutes Evangelical Christianity" and
| becoming more and more the representative
OF the comm erclal spirit OF this city, dicta
ted the adoption OF q compromising systsu, }.
whose bitter fruits are now seen In the de-
moraliEation of public sentiment, and that
practical national atheism which has culmi-
mated in the re-ope ming Of the Slave-rrads.
With no open avs,wal that they intended to
extsnuate or approve Slavery and the slave
trade, they have, in reproducing the standard
works OF Engis 81 es angeiical writer's, some
times mutiiatec them, by omissions, and some
times interpoia-ed ft.bfieatiens of their own
te suit the slave mar ket of the South. They
! 'streated them as class OF felons treat the
coin of the realm, clipping their golden
edges and swe ating them out Of their sterling
value, and th OH circulated the base counter
felt without a sign that it was not genuine"
One instance of mutilatiop is thus noted by
DIR. Keith in the new edition Of bis "Eviden-
ces OF Prop becy:"
. sit is WORTHY OF remark that in copies OF
this treatise reT ublisAed and extensively orr
Gu ated in the Slave States of America, this
paragraph 10 oratted."
: In the same manner, from tract OF the
:. Few Leigh Ricumond, still circulated hg the
+ Society, was struck out sentence about "the
price which so, did, unfeelng avsrioe has af-
0 fixed to the hooy of poor negro slave."-
OF the forgeries, slight perhaps IN seeming,
but Immensely significant ia meaning, II will
!, be sufficient to quote twos one from tract
Q entitled .sThe African Servant" where a
verse in the original runs
o .'l was helpless negro boy,
That wandered the shore,
!: Thieves took me from NY parents arms,
), Who never saw me more.
As re. issued from the Pro-Slavery print
!. OF the Tract Society, it reads:
Twas helpless negro boy,
t. And wandered on the shore;
M<n took from my parents arms,
I never ssw them more
Another more elaborate forgery occurs il
the reprint OF the following passage from
Gurnev's "Habitual Exercise of Love To
b. ward Co.'s"
s'lf this love had always prevailed, wher
n would have been the sword OF the Crusader
There the 41frican SIaus Trade2 Wher
es the odious system which permits to man
10 property in bis fellow man, and converts "a
tional beings into marketable chattels?"
How could the African Slave Trade b
v held part and parcel OF Evangelical Christi
n. anity If it we're indeed inconsistent wit
I'd 'shabitual love toward God?" To rsooncil
he the inconsistency, the managers OF the Soci
ETY. carefully e1punge the pertinent rehectio
OF this latter sentence, and substitute this IN
y. meaning passage:
"Where the tortures OF the lpouisition
r. Where every system of oppression and wron
al, by which he who has the power revels in luz
% ury at the expense Of his fellow menp"
=, II would be easy to refer to similar NUT
lations in "Aiather's Essays to do Good,
ed +" Harris's Mammon," "Memoirs of Mar
Lundie' "Lfa of Isabella Graham &c
&C.; but enough has been quoted to show ii
~ spirit by which the managers have been 20,
to erned, and the method they have taken /,
The accomplish their purpose.
While Slavery and the slave-tr are tn,
upheld as not Inconsistent with the authorit
of OF evangelical religion, and the habitual el
an erciso OF love toward God, the manage
:. have never, in their zeal for evangelical rel
- gion. failed in bearing testimony .S=:as. -
Ion race course, the theater and the circn,
against drinking wine, and selling ru,
against gambling and Sunday travelling; ii
~. most vehemently OF all, against tobacco,
!. "benumbing to Christians moral sense
in By this sin Of omission, ~ we'll a. by the .
and OF commission, unquestionably the Soce
the exerted far wider and more direct inHuen
ials in behalf Of Slavery, than could possit
the have been done had |. openly commend
Slavery in q series Of tracts commenting
every phase OF the system, and eulogizi
&C. each separate feature. They might hs
hat published ia vain tracts entitled oTne Sair
her ly Slaveholder;n ssThe Cody Slave hunter
late 1.-The Pious Slave breeders" "The Console
nee tinus Pirate: ~ 1The Holy kidnapner.u ct
rs Evangelical Slave Trader % ss1he Go
'ase Aduterer,' "The Father OF the Plantation
has continuing through the various phasss
- muster and slave. or touching upon the rich