whether the taskmaster willingly or unwillingly relinquish his arbitrary power, whether by a peaceful or a bloody process-slavery must die. No matter, though, to effect it, every party should be torn by dissensions, every sect dashed into fragments, the national compact dissolved, the land filled with the horrors of a civil and a servile war-still, slavery must be buried in the grave of infamy, beyond the possibility of a resurrection. If the State cannot survive the anti-slavery agitation, then let the State perish. If the Church must be cast down by the strugglings of Humanity to be free, then let the Church fall, and its fragments be scattered to the four winds of heaven, never more to curse the earth. If the American Union cannot be maintained, except by immolating human freedom on the altar of tyranny, then let the American Union be consumed by a living thunderbolt, and no tear be shed over its ashes. If the Republic must be blotted out from the roll of nations, by proclaiming liberty to the captives, then let the Republic sink beneath the waves of oblivion, and a shout of joy, louder than the voice of many waters, fill the universe at its extinction.

Against this declaration, none but traitors and tyrants will raise an outcry. It is the mandate of Heaven, and the voice of God. It has righteousness for its foundation, reason for its authority, and truth for its support. It is not vindictive but merciful, not violent but pacific, not destructive but preservative. It is simply asserting the supremacy of right over wrong, of liberty over slavery, of God over man. It is only raising the standard of rectitude from the dust, and placing it on the eternal throne.

The Party or Sect that will suffer by the triumph of jus tice cannot exist with safety to mankind. The State that cannot tolerate universal freedom must be despotic; and no valid reason can be given why despotism should not at once be hurled to the dust. The Church that is endangered by

the proclamation of eternal truth, and that trades in slaves and souls of men, is the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird; therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.' The Union that can be perpetuated only by enslaving a portion of the people is a covenant with death, and an agree ment with hell,' and destined to be broken in pieces as a potter's vessel. When judgment is laid to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding-place. The Republic that depends for its stability on making war against the government of God and the rights of man, though it exalt itself as the eagle, and set its nest among the stars, shall be cast into the bottomless deep, and the loss of it shall be a gain to the world.

There must be no compromise with slavery-none whatever. Nothing is gained, every thing is lost, by subor. dinating principle to expediency. The spirit of freedom must be inexorable in its demand for the instant release of all who are sighing in bondage, nor abate one jot or tittle of its righteous claims. By one remorseless grasp, the rights of humanity have been taken away; and by one strong blow, the iron hand of usurpation must be made to relinquish its hold. The apologist for oppression becomes himself the oppressor. To palliate crime is to be guilty of its perpetration. To ask for a postponement of the case, till a more convenient season, is to call for a suspension of the moral law, and to assume that it is right to do wrong, under present circumstances. Talk not of other questions to be settled, of other interests to be secured, of other objects to be attain. ed, before the slave can have his fetters broken. Nothing can take precedence of the question of liberty. No interest

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is so momentous as that which involves the life of the soul;' no object so glorious as the restoration of a man to himself. It is idle to talk of human concerns, where there are not human beings. Slavery annihilates manhood, and puts down in its crimson ledger as chattels personal, those who are created in the image of God. Hence, it tramples under foot whatever pertains to human safety, human prosperity, human happiness. Hence, too, its overthrow is the primary object to be sought, in order to secure private advantage and promote the public weal.

In the present struggle, the test of character is as infalli ble as it is simple. He that is with the slaveholder is against the slave: he that is with the slave is against the slaveholder. He that thinks, speaks, acts, on the subject of slavery, in accordance with the feelings and wishes of the tyrant, does every thing to perpetuate the thraldom of his victims. When was it ever known for tyranny to devise and execute effective measures for its own overthrow? Or for the oppressor and the oppressed to be agreed on the great question of equal rights? Who talks of occupying neutral ground between these hostile parties? of reconciling them, by prolonging the sufferings of the one, and the cruelty of the other? of mutually satisfying them as to the means and the plan by which the rod and the chain shall be broken? I tell such vain babbler, or crafty hypocrite, that he is acting the part of a fool or a knave. Impossibilities are impossibilities; and to propose their adoption, as the only rational methods by which to dethrone injustice, is an insult to human intelligence. Slavery cannot be conquered by flattery or stratagem. Its dying throes will convulse the land and sea.

Abolitionists! friends of liberty! remember that the foe with whom you are in conflict is full of all deceivableness of unrighteousness,' and will resort to every artifice to make

you quit the field. Put on the whole armor of God; so shall you be invulnerable and invincible; so shall no weapon against you prosper. The war admits of no parley. No flag of truce must be sent or received by you; you must neither give nor take any quarters. As Samuel hewed Agag in pieces, so, with the battle-axe of Truth, you must cleave Slavery to the ground, and give its carcass to the fowls of the air. May Heaven reinspire your hearts, give new vigor to your arms, direct you blows aright, fill the breast of the enemy with dismay, and grant you a splendid victory!'

On completing my Thirty-Fifth Year,

DECEMBER 10, 1840.

IF, to the age of threescore years and ten,
God of my life! thou shalt my term prolong,
Still be it mine to reprobate all wrong,
And save from wo my suffering fellow-men.
Whether, in Freedom's cause, my voice or pen
Be used by thee, who art my joy and song,
To vindicate the weak against the strong,

Upon my labors rest thy benison !

O! not for Afric's sons alone I plead,

Or her descendants; but for all who sigh
In servile chains, whate'er their caste or creed:
They not in vain to Heaven send up their cry;
For all mankind from bondage shall be freed,
And from the earth be chased all forms of tyranny.

Letter to Bon. Peleg Sprague."

SIR-Whatever respect I have cherished, hitherto, for your character as a patriot and statesman, has fled on perusing your late speech in Faneuil Hall. In my opinion, there is not more of moral turpitude in firing a whole city, than in the delivery of such a speech, in such a place, on such an occasion, and under such circumstances. There seems to be no flesh in your heart. You are a man — and yet the eulogist of those tyrants, who are trampling your brother in the dust! You are a husband a parent and yet join in upholding a traffic and a system, which ruthlessly sunder the holiest ties of life! You are an American- and yet can look complacently, nay, approvingly, upon the brutal enslavement of more than one-sixth portion of YOUR OWN COUNTRYMEN! I was about to add, you are a Christian -but I dare not thus libel Christianity. 'He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in

*The speech which elicited this Letter was made at the great Anti-Abolition Meeting which was held in Faneuil Hall, August 21, 1835. Among other speakers on that occasion were Hon. HARRISON GRAY OTIS and RICHARD FLETCHER, Esq. The period was one of the hottest excitement against the abolitionists, in Boston, and in all parts of the country. Among the evil consequences of this meeting was the memorable mob, boastingly composed of 'five thousand gentlemen of property and standing,' on the 21st of October, which, in broad daylight, assailed a meeting of the Female Anti-Slavery Society, held at 46 Washington Street, violently dispersed it, overawed the city authorities, and seized Mr. GARRISON, for the purpose of wreaking their fury upon him, who, after being nearly stripped of his clothing, was with difficulty rescued out of their hands, and had to be temporarily committed to the jail in Leverett Street, to save his life! [SEE APPENDIX.]