Year: 1861

1ue oplulous VI 1archUlsuop huSues up
ou the civil war, which have been looked
for with much interest, are given to the
public in the Metropolitan Record. We
extract portion Of the remarks:


Above all the wars, civil war is the
most deplorable and the most destructive in
its consequences, both to the victor and
and vanquished. Its progress is marked
" ruin and desolation. It gives loose
rein to the worst passions of human nature; !;
rapine and carnage, though horrible to gaze
upon, though terrible to witness, cannot be
compared to the moral evils which it in-
hicts upon society. 1t Is not in civil strife
that the nobler attributes of our nature are
shown the mind of man becomes hardened
and callous amid scenes of blood and de-.
vastation. The transition from peaceful
republic to military despotism is more
easily effected through such medium than
people suppose. Mankind are pretty much
the same in every age of the world Mate
rial civilization, it is true, may develope
the mind and sharpen the intellect, but it
does not purify the aspirations nor elevate
the moral nature of the race.


We have heard proposition made by a
prominent speaker at the great demoustra
tion which was lately held at Union Square,
that we trust was either not seriously en-
tertained, or had its origin in the excite.
ment of the moment. 1t was nothing more
or less than a recommendation of the policy
which England has pursued towards Ire.
land. The speaker expressed himself in
favor of taking away the plantations from
the Southern owners and bestowing them
as land bounties upon the Northern sold
iers. The idea, as We have intimated, is
not an original one, as it was partially car
ried into effect against the people Of Ire
land, and as means by which that people
were to be utterly exterminated. For our
part, We protest against such wholesale
system of spoliation-a system which is
calculated to plunge the country irremedia.
bly, into a war that this generation may
never see the end of, and to arouse feelings
of hatred and revenge that may live through
centuries.


The proposition to which We have refer.
red is, however, comparatively mild in its
character when compared with the sugges'
tion that has been published in one or two
of our New York daily papers. 1t is moth,
ing more nor less than proposal to incite
the negroes to iusurrection, and by so do.
ing to precipitate the Southern portion Of
our country into all the horrors of a servile
war. This would be to re enact cI our
own soil the 6eudish brutality recorded 10
the history Of S.. Domingo. 1t would be
to rouse the savage nature Of the negro a
ganst our brothers in race and blood it
would be to countenance atrocities and bar
barities at the sight of which our whole
country would stand appalled,; it would be
to encourage the whole black population Of
the South to rise in arms against the whites,
to murder women and children, to massa-
ere helpless Infancy ard age, and to give a


license to the excuses and cruelties which
characterize all negro Instructions. X
X Have We now sunk so low in the
scale of humanity? Have we so far forgot
ten our obligations az Christian nen, even
before We have fairly entered into the heat
of the conflict, to calmly tolerate or sanction
proposition as 6endish and as inhuman
as that against which the elder Pitt raised
his voice?