The Weekly Perrysburg journal. [volume] (Perrysburg, O. [Ohio]) 1861-1???, 1863-02-11

preconceptions of neatly thirty years.
When | strike at Slavery, it is because
Slavery strikes at my country: and for that
would sh'ike IL do,cn!
During those two years, we have wit
messed the bloody climax of a conspiracy
which began in the preceding generation
70 entllrone Slavery rs = political power III
this land, and to extend its sway over ad-
acent countries, in the wild hope that, in
the grasp and under the lead of the indom.
liable Anglo.SaXon race, il might become
what il had failed to become in any other
hands---d poper in The earth. Ii is too late
in the day for the arch-traitor. Jefferson
Davis, to to delude the world with such ly-
ing words as those quoted in one of the res
olutions reported by your committee, af-
iirming that lac ai.I bis armies "aro not en-
gagged in n conflict for conquest, or for ag-
Srandzemcnt." Docs he comprehend Che
import of language? Does he know what
conquest mcansg Does he suppose that the
world has turned idiot, not TO see that tho
South is aiming to strip by conquest from
United States u large part Of its territory,
three thousand miles of its sea oGast, and
the mouth OF that great Mississippi, whose
waters roll in ccaselcsS and stately flow past
this city of our habitation? Is there no vision
of aggrandi2ement in that empire of the
GOtden Circle, which, sweeping from the
capes of Virginia to Cape Sable, and career
ing around the shores of the Gulf of Mexico
and the Caribbean sca, Nes 10 plant its
lurthcst standard in some yet unthought of
point III South American wildsg And does
he believe humanity in its dotage, that it
cannot see that that standard is to bo borne
onward in its blood-staincd march Of pi-
rdcy and subiugation by Slavery and for
Slavery. No, my friends, he believes no
such miserable folly. lie knew, long yeais
ago, and he knows nov, better than any
but his co-consprators could know, that II
vast Empire of Slavery was the promise of
his and their tIeachery to the noble Rcpub-
lie of freedom, which gave them birth, and
nurtured them into men of mark, only, as
time has proved. that they might be more
powerful and dangerous than common men
III their accrrscd treason. 1t suits their
purpose to deny what two years ago they
deHantly proclaimed; but men do not forget
nor can the world be mocked. The Ethi-
opian does not change his skin, nor the leop-
ard his spots; nor have Southern traitors
abandoned the infinitely atrocio,ls purpose
to destroy this Union, bought with cur faith
ers blood. for ''the spread of Slavery
Your committee have, therefore, rightly
judged that il the yery forefront of the
declarations of this meeting should be pro-
claimed anew the great and solemn truth.
that it is SOUTHERN SLAVERY, embodied in and
acting through its lawess and conscience
less aristocracy, that has drenched the land
in blood. Why should not that truth be de-
clared, not only here and how, but every
where and all the time? Of what avail is it
TO MS, to our country, or to the cause of hui
manity, to bury it out of sight, and parade
before our eyes some speCiOuS pretcXt Tor
this rel lion. which we know to he false?
Shall we 'rnr 10 own the truth, because
some muzz,, traitor amongst Us scowls in
lmpotent wr,,l. or because his vote may
some day be dcIicd Hs, for having been true
to truth? Let him who will, shirk this
mighty issue. meet il at all times and in
all places alike. If there was never before
ar occasion when ii should be fairly and
tearlessly met, that occasion lis here and
now. My voice is and ever will be, that
Southern Slavery atone is the cause of the
horrible calamities of this civil war, and the
human race in all the future will Join with
out dissent in that verdict. ] would say
otherwise. if could; butlike Martin Luther
before the Diet Of Wrnps, answer: HERE
! STAND, | CAN Do 80 OTHER; MAY Con nELP
ME-, AMEN" ..
What then is the essential character of
this war? My friends, the judgment and
conscience of the whole civilized world,
when the question comes to be fully under
stood, never can he, never will be, aught
else, than that it is a war of the aristocratic
against the democratic principle; u war of
AN aristocratlc form Of society, resting upon
and vitalizcd by asystein Of human slavery
against form of society in which each in
dividual is as free as every other; war
based upon the sacrilegious idea that
Slavery is divine institution, and that--in
the words of Alberto. Brown, late Senator
from Mississippi--its blessings should be
spread, like the religion of our Divine Mas
ter, to the uttermost ends OF the cartl;" a
war for tho spread of those BLESSINGS, not
as "the religion Of our Divine Master goes
forth, on the wings of dove, bearing
peace on earth and good will toward
men" but as that of the False Prophet, with
intolerance, wrath, fire, sword; a war, in one
word, of human Slavery, as a dominant aud
aggressive power, against human Freedom
as II bulwark of human rights--of African
lzed Americans against AmeriCanized Amer
leans of proud, conceited and ferocious
aristocracy against THE PEOPLE here, and
against all people, everywhere, that would
be free.
And it is not war of to-day merely. 1t
has already borne fruits which, for good or
for i'll, will never die. Were il terminated
this hour its influence must reach onward
into the unexplored future, blessing or ours
ing, freeing or enslaving, frightening or
darkening, till the last hour of recorded time,
There is no difficulty in deciding on which
side is the light, and on which the dark
ness. 1t was the light of freedom which
llumined the pathway of our fathers, in
their mighty struggle, and.in the formation
of that grant and unequaled fabric of Gov
ernment we are now defending; and it Is
the darkness Of Slavery under which that
glorious fabric is now sought TO be buried
by it's own children : @Tls .
The conflict is indeed irrcpressible; as
irrepcSsihle as that between good and evil.
between right and wrong, between truth
and falsehood, between Heaven and He'll.
And who made il SO? None but they who
made OF Slavery" AN IMAGE OF GOLD, and
"set il mp in the plain" of the Sonth, and
because the North would not "fall down
and worship the golden image that this
Southern "NebuchadneZZar had set up,
iecreed that this nohle country should be
east into the midst of the burning fiery fur
lace of this cruel and devouring war,
This, my friends, is Gods own truth about
his unnatural aud amazing conflict. His,
'ory has yet to record, that they who cast
America into the furnace, were themselves
slain by it's "seven times heated" fame,
while she walked in the midst" with no
smell of fire" upon her resplendent, robes
If in this war Slavery was and is the ag-
Srossor; il the war was begun and is coli
cinued tor "the planting and spreading OF
SlaYaru.r if Slavery has hacnmA The ..rnldnn