The weekly Anglo-African. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1859-1861, 1860-03-24


the coun ry at the present day. 1t Crap
pies with no popular sins extant in the
country; it eradicates no popular errors
prevalent among men. 1t shuns, rather,
plain, palpable, and well-known evils, and
teaches its votaries, and the outward world
too, how to cover up and gloss over the
wrongs they commit and the vices to which
they are addicted.
We ask again, can the Church thus cir
cumstanced, WELD an inAence sufficient to
check the rapid progress of barbarism in
the land ?
A morning paper, a few days since, gave
its readers chapter-only one-on slave
burnings in the United States, each in
stance of which was more horrible than
anything known, even among the most
savage tribes. Where was the Church
when these diabolical acts were perpetrat-
edf They extend over period of several
years, and were committed in open day;
and yet, so far as we have been able to as
certain, no voice Of condemnation ever
came from that quarter. Indeed, such is
the general Indifference to, or ignorance of,
such deeds, that when Mr. Van Wyck, in
Congress, asserted that such had taken
place in the country, grave statesmen from
the Southern side, led off by Mr.. Davis, in
stantly pronounced it lie. What state
of things we have here
Take another instance: A correspond
ent of a New York journal, after describ-
ing a slave auction, says: II left the scene
with far better opinion of the South and
our Southern brethren than / ever had be-
fore, and am convinced that all the TRADE
and fuss about their peculiar institution by
Northern Abolitionists is unjust and wick
ed" AS this auction took place on Mon
day, we wonder if this correspondent had
the good fortune to listen to good strong
Southern sermon the day previous-one of
those truly divine discoursts mentioned by
one of the reverend gentlemen last spring,
at the Southern Aid Society's soiree, as be-
ing the only real evangelical ones preached
in the country. We think that the strong
and divinely-wrought language and we'll
timed expressions Of that sermon must have
been whirling through our correspondents
brain as he looked on that scene and wrote,
and wrote and looked on. He speaks with
great gusto of the sale-the first he had ev-
er witnessed-of men, women, and child
rem, to the highest bidder, and commends
the fine price they brought He speaks al
SO in glowing terms of the little trouble
attendant on the separation of these slave
families, and denounces in no measured
terms the many unfavorable expositions of
these slave auctions by Northern fan
atics."
Now, where was this man born? What
Sabbath school was he trained in?-what
Bible-class? To what church does he be-
lOngl We might even ask, in what theo-
logical seminary was he trained 7 Where
is the Church in this matter of slave-burn-
ings and slave auctions What is its atti-
tude towards these and the many similar
great wrongs? If not in acquiescence,
does it cry out against them? Does it do
a 1.-THE of its duty in these relations, or has
it neither duty or relations in this matter?
Has the world, the flesh, and the devil so
completely got the mastery over her that
she can do no more nor better?
We might 60 further, and mention the
muzzled press, the muzzled and chained
Christian white man, the white slaves bound
down to the Belial of slavery, the rail, the
tar. the feathers, the bloody whip, the
thumb-screw, the knife, the pistol, the I'M
just laws, the perverted Justice, the stifed
NOhSC4CuCGoI INC MlChtu SISldIlOH
worse customs, all tending to show the ma
tional progress towards barbarism: but we
forbear to multiply them. Who but the
Church can arrest this tendency of things ?
To what source else shall we look2 Can
commerce. Can agriculture? Can me-
chanism or art Those whose office it is
to advance materialism, we have already
in full blast; but it is no part of their pro-
vince to bar the gap or stay the incoming
flood OF wickedness that is inundating the
land. No, moths belongs to the Church,
and if she fails to cry aloud against it, or
has no power over it, it will, as with the
bosom Of destruction, sweep her too-even
her-from existence among us.
Practically, the Church is stationary to-
day. Reorganization is the next step.
What will follow we need not predict. The
handwriting is already on the wall. 1t