in France in 1846, and entitled the "Immediate and Complete Emancipation of the Slaves," there are such powerful and eloquent arguments urged with such honesty and directness of purpose, that we cannot forbear quoting some passages as confirmation of opinions we have expressed.

"But the slaves, say you, are not fit for freedom. To emancipate them all at once would be to give them a fatal gift, and in the desire to deliver them too rapidly from a bad condition, we should plunge them into a worse one. They would cease to work because they associate the idea of servitude and shame with labor; aged persons, women encientes, and children would be abandoned; they would live in a state of vagabondage and distrust; neglecting all religious instruction, and retrograding towards barbarism. Let us then first teach the slaves to bear the weight of liberty. Let us civilize them by education and labor, adopting all such measures as may seem likely to ameliorate their condition, and when they are in a fit state for emancipation, we shall be happy to accord it them.”

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"Let us accept this argument as sound, and try to discover its real merit. "The immediate emancipation which we ask for the slaves, is not a lawless and limitless emancipation. There will be laws in our colonies, the strength of the public, a police, and tribunals. There will exist, in fine, all the means by which a State protects its existence, and its durability. The newly freed slaves can therefore always be prevented from committing depredations, or from changing the form of the Government. As to the rest, the English islands have never been so peaceable as since the day of the emancipation. There has been no attempt whatever to interrupt the established order of things; on the contrary, so much have individual crimes diminished everywhere, so great has been the general tranquillity, and so perfect the obedience to the laws, that the garrisons have been greatly reduced. If any one shall reply to this by reminding me of the massacres of Santo Domingo, I will advise him to read the history. I have no time to combat errors founded on the most stupid ignorance.

"What is meant, then, by the allegation that the slaves are not ready for freedom? Is it to be believed that the slaves from their lack of industry would be incapable of providing for the wants of existence? They perform now almost all the labor; they suffice for the maintenance of the colonists and their own; they know how to manage the spade and the hoe, how to cultivate the soil, gather the harvest, and prepare sugar for the market. Many, also, have trades; and when it be necessary they will be able to practice all the mechanical employments used in civilized society.

"This is not the question,' you will reply. We grant that they know how to work, but they will not work.'

"How then! Will they not have to earn their bread? and how can they earn it without labor?

'It is not true that the emancipated negroes would take advantage of their liberty to reduce their wants to the barest necessities. The experience of the English colonies has proved quite the contrary. The newly freed slaves have not gone to wander in the depths of the woods. Some have continued to work

on the plantations; others have bought little pieces of ground, built houses, and founded villages; thus commencing to form that class of small proprietors which constitute everywhere the most moral and useful part of the population. Can such a beneficial result be complained of? and since the affranchised slaves become honest and industrious peasants, will it still be asserted that they are not fit for the exercise of liberty?

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"Let us suppose the worst. The day after the act of emancipation, there would be a floating and uncertain condition of things; but after the first moments of agitation, the mass would subside to their level, only assuming an improved condition of spiritual and material order.

"Believe me, the best education for liberty is liberty itself; there is no preparation for it possible; it is only by its exercise that we become worthy of it. Nothing can be given to the slave that will really civilize him, whatever measures we may take for his protection, so long as he remains a slave. It is the possession of man by man that must be abolished, abolished entirely by declaring it like the slave trade, odious and infamous. Everything short of this that may be done will be null and void in the application."

Olmsted, in his Journey to the Seaboard Slave States, relates the following conversation which he had with a slave on this. subject, which tends singularly to confirm this view of the

matter.

"Well, now, would n't you rather live on such a plantation than to be free, William ?"

"Oh! no, sir, I'd rather be free! Oh, yes, sir, I'd like it better to be free! I would that, master."

"Why would you?"

Why, you see, master, if I was free-if I was free, I'd have all my time to myself. I'd rather work for myself. I'd like dat better."

But, then, you know, you 'd have to take care of yourself, and you'd get poor."

"No, sir, I would not get poor, I would get rich; for you see, master, then I'd work all the time for myself."

"Suppose all the black people on your plantation, or all the black people in the country were made free at once, what do you think would become of them ?— what would they all do, do you think? You do n't suppose there would be much sugar raised, do you?"

Why, yes, master, I do. Why not, sir? What would de black people do? Would n't dey hab to work for dar libben? and de wite people own all de land— war dey goin to work? Dey hire demself right out again, and work all de same as before. And den when dey work for demself, dey work harder dan dey do now to get more wages-a heap harder, I think so, sir. I would do so, sir. I would work for hire. I do n't own any land, I hat to work right away again for massa."

Again, in a work written in France very many years ago by

P. S. Frousard, entitled La Cause des Esclaves, the author commenting ably on this subject, quotes a remark of M. Poivre :

"Free labor is the foundation of abundance and prosperity in agriculture; and I have never seen this branch of industry flourish save in the countries where the rights of man are recognized. The earth, which yields with such prodigality to free labor, seems to become barren beneath the compulsory toil of slaves. The Creator of nature has thus ordained it. He has created man free, and given him the earth to cultivate with the sweat of his brow, but in liberty."

Then, in confirmation of M. Poivre's opinion, M. Frousard adds:

"It seems certain that the solidity of the State would be strengthened, and its revenue increased, if free labor were employed in the cultivation of the sugarcane and coffee plant in America, as the vine and olive are cultivated in France, or the sugar-cane in Cochin-China and Bengal. This is the strongest argument that can be adduced in favor of the emancipation of the slaves. When this great question shall be examined with a more profoundly analytical attention than I am able to give it, let our administrators compare what our colonies do now with what they might do under a new order of things, and they will perceive that in America as in Europe, personal liberty is the principle of national wealth as well as of individual happiness. That without it there can be neither patriotism, nor safety, nor energy in labor, nor progress in art, nor encouragement for manufacture.

A plantation can be cultivated far more profitably by free labor than by slave. A slave, ill-fed, ill-treated, and over-worked, without encouragement in his labor, without interest in his own success, must inevitably work slowly, since there is nothing to attach him to his master, and he detests his own condition. A free man, on the contrary, works for his own sustenance and that of his family. He will naturally do all that is possible to obtain the good will of the employer who gives him bread, so that he may continue to engage his services. The slave, condemned to groan through life beneath the yoke of slavery, and hopeless of ever seeing his condition improved, is consequently devoid of ambition and energy. He will do only what he is obliged to do in order to escape punishment, and far from desiring to cater to the cupidity of his master, he is rejoiced whenever he can balk it. The free man is afraid of being discharged if he does not give satisfaction, and sustained by the hope of advancement, he is prompted to labor by the most powerful motives. He does not need the severe surveillance of an overseer to oblige him to do his duty. Do we not notice a great difference between daily workmen, and workmen by the job? The latter has no need to be watched; the hope of earning more animates and encourages him; while the other, having sold his services for a definite time, works with more indifference, and though he receives less wages, he becomes in the end less profitable to his employer."

With regard to the second point, the impossibility of white

labor at the South, let us be permitted in the first place to quote once more from De Tocqueville. We cannot have the opinion of a more eminent and impartial writer.

"Many of the Americans even assert that within a certain latitude the exertions which a negro can make without danger are fatal to them; but I do not think that this opinion, which is so favorable to the indolence of the inhabitants of Southern regions, is confirmed by experience. The Southern parts of the Union are not hotter than the South of Italy and Spain, and it may be asked why the European cannot work as well there as in the two latter countries. If slavery has been abolished in Italy and in Spain without causing the destruction of the masters, why should not the same thing take place in the Union?"

In this view De Tocqueville is confirmed by many who have witnessed life at the South and in the tropics. In Cuba, where the meridional sun pours down its burning, overpowering rays, the railroads are laid entirely by Irishmen; and on the plantations the exposure and fatigue of the mayoral (over. seer) are almost equal to that of the slaves. We may therefore safely conclude, until we have some more convincing proof, that there is far more of plausible pretext than of truth in these assertions. Were slavery abolished at the South its fields would be peopled and re-peopled by the emigrant population that swarms in the large cities of the North; a population oftentimes festering in misery and want on account of the impossibility of obtaining employment; and who would gladly run the imagined risk to better their condition. With the tide of emigration that would flow Southward, it might be that ere long black labor would be to a great degree superseded; and in this case it would seem a natural consequence that the blacks should move on towards the tropical latitudes so much more in consonance with their nature and inclinations. Santo Domingo and Hayti would doubtless, in the course of time, absorb, through the medium of voluntary emigration, the larger portion of the negroes on this continent; and thus at last deliver us from the incubus of a black population in our midst. The contest, if thus decided, will leave us stronger as a nation than ever before, for we shall not only have got rid of our elements of discord, but we shall also have vindicated the supremacy of the Federal over the fractional State Governments. The doctrine of State rights, as opposed to the ruling power of the whole, has always been dangerous to our greatness and

durability as a nation. It is an idea which debilitates instead of strengthening, by substituting petty jealousies for a noble national pride. That even in the early days of the Republic this spirit was condemned by patriots is evinced by the subjoined paragraph of a letter addressed to Washington by James Duane :

"I once flattered myself that the dignity of our Government would have borne some proportion to the illustrious achievements by which it was successfully established; but it is to be deplored that Federal attachment, and a sense of national obligation, continue to give place to vain prejudices in favor of the independence and sovereignty of the individual States."

Let those who, infected by this false doctrine, doubt our right to enforce obedience from the revolted States, read the following lines and learn the opinion of the great, wise father of our country on this subject:

From Governor Lee to Washington in 1794, alluding to the insurrection in the western part of Pennsylvania ::

"My grief for the necessity of pointing the bayonet against the breasts of our countrymen is equaled only by my conviction of the wisdom of your decision to compel immediate submission to the authority of the laws, and by my own apprehensions of my inadequacy to the trust you have been pleased to honor me with. I never expected to see so strange a crisis; much less to be called to the command of an army; on the judicious direction of which may perhaps depend our national existence. But being ready to give my aid on the awful occasion, I was willing to take any part in the measures you might think proper to order for quelling the insurrection without regard to rank or station.”

"By their fruits ye shall know them," said the holy Nazarene, and this eternal principle is true of all time. The evil tree of slavery has produced naught but accursed fruits. A system founded on the absolute denial of human rights, and sustained by the force and terror of despotism, could only be consistent with itself by destroying patriotism and all sense of justice. Those who believe in and uphold this system are like those who have sat so long beneath the shade of a poisonous tree that their perceptions are obscured. The very atmosphere they breathe is infected, and they can no longer distinguish right from wrong. In vain shall our noblest sons offer up their lives; in vain shall we each and every one be called on to sacrifice our dearest affections, and our most precious interests, if, after all, the cause of our difficulties is still to remain. All our efforts, all our sufferings, will be but a barren sacrifice.