, 1862-12-17
Chicago Gribn,re.
GEN. BUTLER,s pREacHKns

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER II, 1862 |
GEN. BUTLER,s PREACHERS.
Ihe clauaor Of certain Journals against
Gen. Butler at New Orleans, for shutting
the mouths Of sundry clergymen Of the
Man-selling sort, who persisted in the st
Tempt to make their churches nests of
treason and rebellion, is curious commen-
tary On the sincerity Of the defamation, in
which these same journals have INDUCED,
against the introduction of politics into the
pulpit. It was rare sport to rottcn-egg or
tar-and feather men who maintained that
Gods latest revelation taught the right Of
every man, black or white, to own himself,
and the duty Of paying days wages
for q days work-rare sport in
deed We remember the JUNCTION
with which the Southern Journals used to
describe the inflietion Of these penalties,
and the esger readiness Of their Northern
coadjutors in the rro-slaveFy cause to
blacken with opprobious epithets and lying
charges the character of every man who
fell into the clutches Of an infu1iate
Southern mob. Weremember the fiendish
exultation with which the Texan atroci-
ties, when, On the charge Of abolition
ism,' incendiarism, - ~ niger stealing" |
"e1citlng insurection," many religious
Societies were broken up, and scores Of
c1ergymen were whipped, cropped, tarred
and feathered, shot or hung, were received
-e1ultation not whit abated by the oc-
casional and feeble protests from pro-
slavery papers that did not deprecate the
murders but feared their effects. |
We csn still hear the wall that
came up from all the Southwest only
two years ago, over affairs desecrated, rel-
gious societies disrupted, lay communi-
cants driven into the swamps and hunted
like wolves, venerable clergymen Of blame
less lives and sanity manners cut down in
the house of prayer or mercilessly butcher
ed on their own hearth stones-all because
the barbaIbians whom slavery had bred
would believe that Methodism Of the
Church North had an Abolition faint.
Had Herod, the tetrarch Of. Galilee, had
newspaper organ when the Son Of Man
bore his cross to Calvary, it could not
have been more ribald or profane than
the Southern press was when the disci-
pies Of Wesley, in this age and this our
country, were trodden out. We hay re in
our minds, now, scores Of cases, in the in
cipiency Of the rebellion; in which clergy
men, for the crime Of lo7ing loyalty better
than treason-the Union Of the States bet-
Ter than the rule Of JEFF: Davis and his COZ
tederates-Were stripped Of all their DOS
sessions; condemned to witness in silent
Indignation the insults offered to their
: wives, and at last forced to fee, sometimes
IN disguise, st other times under assumed
names, and always in haste, from persecu-
lion, that nothing but Slavery and the pas
sions that 1t engenders, could invent. Yea,
every year IN thecalendar since the aggres-
sions Of the Slave Power commenced, has
;been marked with infamies akin
to those that We relate; and there
is hardly a county in the South, in
which slavery is strong, that has not
been the scene Of violence and blood, in
(which Christians who valued the command
Of God more than the behests Of men, hare
not been the sufferers for conscience sake.
The record is iilll. It is marked by clots
of blood, open it where You will In no
other country in Christendom could such
another one be made. No despot of mod
~ ~.
has impudent1y and defantly done--done
not to the desp1sed and outraged four mil
lions Of the black race, but to white men,
Christian men, in mind, body and estate
the peers If not the supcriors Of those
whose hands have been guilty Of the
wrong, And the country has been silent.
The canker Of slavery has deadcned the
national conscience save to crimes COM
mitted in other lands. While a Mortara
case, or the injury done to Protestant men
and women in Naples, were -sufa-
clent to make the stones in ou1
streets cry out in rebuke, oul
people could hear Tecitals of wrong ane
outrage against our countrymen, guilty
of no crime against God OF man-recitall
of events which, happening in Austria
Naples or France, would have made q rev
olution in . month-our people could hea
them with no impulse save to bIacken Wit
1nalevolence and blast with SANDER tn
names Of the sufferers. And these journal
that are now SO Ted with rage over wha
Gen. Butler has done, were either contemp,
uously silent, as if the hanging Of q
American clergyman was matter too Il
significant to engage their attention, g
were blatant and jubilant over the act {
vengeance which had overtaken "niggel
stealer' and an " "Abolitionist'' at last
Two wrongs do not make one RICH
The atrocities Of Slavery upon clergyme
charged with not believing that the essent
Of Christianity is the right Of one COMMIT
nicant in the Christian church to Sc
another, to debauch his wife and max
merchandise Of his children, are, thoug
numberless, no excuse for Gen. Butler
he has initiated the least Of them in h
dealings with the priests Of the man-scllin
religion in New Orleans. We assume til
Re has done only that which the exigenc
of his situation, the peace of tie city an
the safety Of his command made ilupers
tVe-that he has done nothing not clearl
justified by the martini law and militar
usage. We do not attack, we do not dt
fcnd him Our quarrel is with the hyre
critical organs Of opinion that, after or
: couraging. kissing on and defending tn
outrages upon the clergy that we have en-
ume1ated, should now become so suddenl
the advocates Of the sanctity Of the clerics
garb. Their shamelessness and their in
fanny are written in the history at wldc
we have glanced. With such antecedent