New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1862-07-12
:" THE INTEREST OF HUMANITY"

Inc EL8Hsu Hdhc Pni"oo, "u" %" ~
morality. popular "cry" stands with them
as the representative of noble principle.
cry which affords at once protection and con-
cealment to their instructive selhshness Is
adopted as an expression of the purest VIE
dom. There is no other nation capable of
such mastery self-deception. Cunning and
baseness are garnshed with wholesome
epthet, aud labeled sayory virtues comely
phrase is the British philosophers stone for
transmitting the spirit OF national meanness
into dignity and justice.
| Since the outset Of the Southern rebellion,
the phrase .inoDeers have been busily at work.
Each new battle has evoked a cry, more or
less lugubrious, according TO the nuctuations OF
the British market. As the prospect of cotton
became precarious, the cries grew dirge-llke,
and pealed like funeral chime. SorrOwful
spectacle, said Britain. Brothers at strife
Unnatural contest Let US weep! From
weeping to railing the transition was easy.
What was at first sorrowful spectacle be-
came presently brutal display. At last the
British temper ripened to active impertinence.
Vague hints, then positive appeals for inter-
yention were put forth Commercial conscience
could endure it no longer. Cotton is thicker
than blood, cried England and the interest
of humanity" demands that We Lift our strong
arm aud bring this unnatural war to timely
end
! The interest of humanity" That is the
new phrase which has just come over to US
IN the last steamer. Its liberal use by the
English journals suggests some pertinent reilec-
tons. The first, though not the most import
ant, is that /" the interest of humanity" in
the mouth OF an Euglishman at the present
time, means nothing more nor less than the
commercial and manufacturing interest Of bis
own country. This is a fact so patent as to
need no demonstration. Every American
knows it, The Southern Rebels know it as
well as the men of the North, and feel it, per-
haps, more deeply. But setting this aside, and
yeuturing for moment the hypothesis that
England is sincere, by what right can she
come forward at this late day with warning
and remonstrancel There was time when
/ her word would have stled the Rebellion n
It's infancy. The formal withdrawal Of her
sympathy from the South sixteen months ago
would have been a protest from which the
Rebel leaders would have recoiled in dismay.
To what end, now that she is powerless
to interrupt it, are these tardy lamentations
Was human interest less weighty then than
now Or seemed the interest of England in
less danger sixteen months ago.
la all the worlds history there has probably
never been war in which the truest and
most sacred interest of humanity was so linked
with one party as it is with the North at this
moment. It seems incredible that England
should continue blind to this great truth.
What honest mind can hide from itself the
facts that in this contest the North has staked
the nobest principles of humanity known among
men that it is waging the war Of freedom
against bondage, of pure government against
misruls, of reason against frenzy, Of cViliza-
ton and progress against rigid semi-bar-
barisml In which of Englands wars can so
worthy a cause DO shown In her last CONT
mental fray she indicated the interest of
humanity by fighting two years to sustain the
most despicable Government Of Europe; the
result bolstering anew q decrept country
which exists only upon principles contradictory
to every Christian sentiment. Az her sym
psthies were then, so also are they now. Self
interest controls them ever. The tissue Of
morality is too transparent to deceive. 1t is
only the story of Pecksnif, the defender of the
worlds virtue, over and over again.
Ono fact The London Times aud kindred or.