Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1861-07-11

pcufcu uiuIe cTellJhUiy IN tnelr cups, ana
one would gladly appeal from Pbhip sober
TO Philip drunk. Intimate intercourse has
lost its charm. New York merchants more
than ever desire an increased acquaintance
with the Golfers oftheir repudiating debtors
but 80 far as the knowledge of their peculiar
moral traits is concerned, enough is as good
as feast. No Abolitionist has ever dared
to pillory the slave -propagandists 80 conspic-
uously as they are doing it for themselves
every day. Summers ''Barbarism of Slave
ry" seemed tolerably graphic in its time but
how tamely n reads beside the ''New Or
leans Delta"
A Scotchman once asked DR.. johnson
what opinion he would form of Scotland
from what strangers had said of it.
'Sir, said the doctor, II should think
it region Of the earth 20 be avoided, go far
as convenient"
But how, persisted the patriot, ''if you
listened to.what its natives say Of it?"
Then, Sir" roared Old Obstinacy, 81
should avoid it altogether"
Take the seeded States upon their own
showing, and it is absurd to suppose that
they can ever resume their former standing
IN the nation. Are there any stronger oaths
than their generals have broken, any closer
ties TO honesty than their financiers have
spurned any deeds more damning than their
legislatures have voted thanks for? No one
supposes that the individual traitors can be
restored to confidence, that Twiggs can re-
dye his reputation, or any deep-sea-sound-
lngs fish up Maury's drowned honor. But
the influence Of the States is gone with that
OF their representatives. They may wor-
ship the gravenimage of President Lincoln
in Mobile; they may do homage to the ample
stuffed regimentals of General Butler in
Charleston but it will not make the ma
tion forget. Could their whole delegation
resume its seat in Congress tomorrow, with
the three-ffths representation intact, it
would not help them. Can we ever trust
them to build a ship or construct rife again?
No time, no formal act can restore the past
relations, so long as slavery shall live. 1t
is easy for the Executive to pardon some
convict from the penitentiary; but who can
pardon him out of that sterner prison of pub
lie distrust which closes its disembodied walls
around him, moves with his motions, and
never suffers him to walk unconscious oft
again? Henceforth he dwells as under the
shadow of swords and holds intercourse with
men only by courtesy, not confidence. And
so will they.
Not that the United States Government
is yet prepared to avow itself anti-slavery,
in the sense in which the South is pro-
slavery. We conscientiously strain at gnats
of Constitutional clauses, while they gulp
down whole camels of treason. We still look
after their legal safeguards long after they
'have hoisted them with their old petards
But both sides have trusted themselves to
the logic of events, and there is no installing
the direction in which that tends In times
n hoo f.r
phrases, and reason quite as rapidly as they
act 1t is Impossible to blink the fact that
Slavery is the root of the rebellion; and so
War is proving itself an Abolitionist, who
ever else is. Practically speaking, the yer-
diet is already entered. and the doom of the
destructive institution pronounced in the
popular mind. Either the Secessionists will
show fight handsomely, or they will fail to
do so. If they fail to it, they are the de-
rision of the world forever,-since no one
ever spares beaten bully,-and thencefor-
ward their social system must go down itself
If, on the other hand, they make resist
ance which proves formidable and costly,
then the adoption ofthe joint Quincy Adams
policy ofmilitary emancipation is an ultimate
necessity, and there is nobody more likely
to put it in effective operation than certain
gentleman who lately wrote an eloquent
letter to his Governor on the horrors of slave
insurrection. No doubt insurrection is u
terrible thing, but so is all war, and every
man OF humanity approaches either with a
lnsurrection is one of the risks voluntarily
assumed by Slavery, and the greatest Of
them. The slaves know it, and so do the
masters When they seriously assert that
they feel safe on this point, there is really
no answer to be made but that by which
Traddles in David Copperield" puts down
Uriah Heep's wild hypothesis Of believing
himself an innocent man. ''But you don't,
you know" quoth the straightforward Trad
dies; therefore, if you please, we won t
suppose any such thing" They cannot de-
ceive us, for they do not deceive themselves.
Every traveller who has seen the faces of a
household suddenly grow pale, in a Southern
city, when some street tumult struck to their
hearts the fear of insurrection, every one
who has seen the heavy negro face brighten
unguardedly at the name of John Brown,
though thousand miles away from Har-
per's Ferry,-has penetrated the final Sc
cret of the military weakness which saved
Washington for us and lost the war for
them.
h 1t is time to expose this mad Inconsistency
which paralyzes common sense on all South
ern tongues, SO soon as Slavery becomes the
topic. These same negroes, whom We hear
claimed, at one moment, as petted darlngs
whom no allurements can seduce, are de.
nounced, next instant, as fiends whom O
whisper can madden. Northern sympathi.
zers are first ridiculed as imbecile, then
lynche1 as destructive Either position is
in itself ineligible, but the combination i,
an absurdity We can understand why the
, proprietor of powder-house trembles al
the sight Of flint and steel and we can alsc
understand why some new journeyman, be-
ing inexperienced, may regard the peri
without due concern. But We should decide
either to be a lunatic, if he in one breath
! proclaimed his gunpowder to be incombus
tible, and at the next moment assassinateC
: visitor for lighting his cigar on the prem
ises. A slave population is either contentcc
! and safe, or discontented and unsafe; it can
not at the same time be friendly and hostile
blissful and desperate.
! The result described is inevitable, shoult
n the Secessionists dare to tempt the ordea
by battle long enough. If it stop short o
!. this, it will be because the prestige of South
! ern military power is SO easily broken dow
r that there is no temptation to declare tn,
\ Adams policy. But even this consumma
!, ton must have the most momentous results
and entirely modify the whole anti -alover