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with whipping or hanging, it was deemed no more than was deserved for such sentiments and conduct as he was reasonably suspected" of entertaining.

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Beyond this, the mass of the religious portion of the nation was against them, and had no manner of sympathy with or for them. The pulpits belonging to the larger part of the various denominations were opposed to them, . whether any thing was preached in that line or not. The pulpits they controlled, or even had access to, were remarkably small in number. In the religious bodies of every Church,-Conventions, Associations, Conferences, and General Assemblies,-resolutions were passed against them, again and again. To be known as an "Abolitionist," or to be branded as such, whether justly or otherwise, was enough to shut a man out of the social circle, and out of the sympathy of religious men and religious bodies, in many places where the cue was given to the habits and usages of the higher grades of society; while "distinguished consideration," with more than a diplomatic significance, was often shown at the North to men who were identified with Southern institutions, and simply because they were so identified.

All this is well known to the world. And yet, this "vile faction," in the face of such opposition, and with the simplest means, has revolutionized a mighty nation; has led even the mass of the people who have been their revilers to sustain the Government in now at length vindicating those sentiments, and sustaining by a powerful array of armies that cause, for the whole origin of which they are held responsible. This is the aspect which the charge puts on, from the lips of those who make it, when it is confronted with the facts. What power wielded by a contemptible faction," thus to take twenty millions of enlightened people by the nose and mould them as though they

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were but a nose of wax! Did the world ever see the like before, except under Jesus of Nazareth and the twelve fishermen of Galilee? Either, then, it must be admitted that it was the ideas which this "faction" propagated which have done the work,-horrible as those ideas were held to be,-or we must look elsewhere for the responsibility for the revolution through which we are passing.*

RESPONSIBILITY OF ABOLITIONISTS DISCLAIMED AT THE

SOUTH.

It is well to note, that the more considerate among the advocates and apologists of the rebellion, even at the South, in Church or State, do not hold the Abolitionists responsible, as furnishing in their conduct the justifiable ground for secession. Take one example, from the South

*Here is a recent charge of the responsibility upon the abolitionists, from one of the most influential secular prints of the country, illustrating and sustaining what is said above. It is one of a thousand similar cases. The New York Herald, of July 16, 1864, closes an article upon "The Truth of History," thus:

"The abolition agitators did cause the rebellion at the South; for they gave the rebel leaders the only pretext they needed to fire the Southern people and drag them into civil war. The fire-eaters tried to raise a rebellion on the tariff question; but the people would not revolt. Then Greeley, Garrison, and the other abolitionists deliberately set to work to drive the South out of the Union. This has been confessed by Greeley, by Garrison, and by Wendell Phillips, all of whom were original disunionists. Greeley wrote the first article in favor of secession that appeared in a Northern paper; Wendell Phillips delivered the first speech in favor of the rebel confederacy from a Northern rostrum. Garrison declared that he trampled upon the infamous Constitution. The rebel leaders simply took advantage of the ulterances of these abolitionists to coax and frighten the people of the South into treason. They used the weapons with which Northern fanatics supplied them. They employed the arguments which Greeley and his colleagues furnished them. They worked in concert with the abolitionists, and for the same traitorous end. When South Carolina seceded, Greeley and Wendell Phillips raised howls of joy, which were only silenced by fears of the consequences when Northern patriots began to arm themselves against the rebels. This, we assert, is the exact truth of history. If Greeley's history asserts any thing different it is a false and lying book, and if General McClellan is abused for stating these facts he is abused for speaking the truth, and Greeley knows it."

ern Presbyterian Review, April, 1861, where the grounds of secession are argued at length, and justified. This is a fair specimen of the view taken by the more calm and reflecting portion of the rebel leaders:

Let us proceed to the second question: Why do the cotton-growing States desire to secede? What reasons have induced them to brave all the real difficulties, and all the possible dangers of secession? Among the reasons assigned by the Princeton writer, only one is true, and that one is stated as it never entered the mind of any Southern man, living or dead, and could not, therefore, be subjectively a motive for their conduct. The fierce ravings of the Abolitionists have not caused the secession of the Southern States. This has, for many years, been a great annoyance; but it could hardly be called a grievance. The wild outcries of the Abolitionists have excited very various emotions in the breasts of different Southern men. Some have been aroused to anger and scorn; others have been amused; while those who agree with the Princeton Review, that their language and spirit are execrably wicked, have heard them more in sorrow than in anger. They have felt that the danger to be feared was for those in whose hearts these fierce fires were burning, and by whose lips such words of blasphemy were uttered. The high-spirited and fiery Southerners, as they are called, have borne for thirty years all that the fanatics could say, and they might very well have endured it a little longer. The proceedings of the incendiaries sent to the South to entice the slaves to abscond, or to stir them up to revolt and massacre, have not caused the secession of the Southern States. This is undoubtedly a very great grievance, but by no means so formidable as the people of the North generally suppose.

As this disclaimer comes from a high source in the Presbyterian Church at the South, and undoubtedly represents the sentiment of leading Southern men,-except among noisy politicians, who had sinister ends to gain by giving the abolitionists a prominence, we ask for it the particular attention of a large class at the North (of whom Rev. Drs. Nathan L. Rice, of New York, and Samuel J. Baird, of New Jersey, are a good type among clergymen, and embracing also the editorial corps of the

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major portion of the religious press, weekly and quarterly), who have wasted much time in trying to convince the passing generation of mortals, that, among Northern men, the abolitionists, and others whom they have stigmatized and misnamed such, have been the great fomenters of discord between the North and the South; predicting that their course would at length bring the country into open conflict; and, therefore, holding them now chiefly responsible for a fratricidal war. The world well knows how persistently such declamation has been uttered for many years past. But the most serious-minded men of the South openly deny this. They "hardly" regard such opposition to slavery as a "grievance," in the manner in which they have most commonly waged it. The real cause of their secession is quite another thing; in a word, the unwillingness of the whole people of the North and the National Government to yield to their exorbitant demands.

And here is just where Judge Robertson and others make a serious mistake in interpreting the sayings of certain men in the South Carolina Convention. They deny that the "ravings of the abolitionists" had disturb ed them seriously, just as the writer in the Review we have quoted does. But, at the same time, they present the fact that the Northern people and Government as a WHOLE were against them; that is, could not agree in admitting "their rights" upon the slavery question to the full extent to which they demanded them; and hence they were determined to remain in the Union with them no longer.

Instead of the abolitionists being held to the responsibility for what has occurred, so far as the revolt has any extenuation in the conduct of Northern men, it may yet be found that the chief responsibility rests upon quite another class; upon many of those who have been the loudest in

their denunciations of them, and who are ranked as leading men in the Church and in the State.

DISCUSSION THE GERM OF THE TROUBLING ELEMENT.

The real difficulty, so far as irritating the South is concerned, was far more wide-spread than any thing which could be charged upon the abolitionists. It was not so much that they would "agitate" and act in their peculiar way, as it was that any action whatever should be taken upon slavery. That man has been a poor observer of events who does not know that the offensive manner of dealing with the question was not the thing which gave the South uneasiness. It certainly was not, so far as the religious portion of the community was concerned. It was, rather, the discussion of the subject at all, in any manner, in any place, and by any persons. It had come to be fashionable to regard any entertainment of the subject as "agitation,' and the term "abolitionist" was freely applied in order to frown down the most respectful inquiry. It had not been possible for many years to introduce the subject into any of the large religious bodies in which men of the extreme South were members, without giving mortal offence, and leading to threats of ecclesiastical secession. The pleas against it were specious and plentiful, and somewhat contradictory. The matter had been "acted upon and settled" by the Church, and therefore should be "let alone." It was a political question, with which the Church has nothing to do," and therefore should not be introduced. It was a "troublesome subject, and would rend the Church asunder." These and many more reasons were given; while Southern extremists, who would keep the subject out of the Church lest the Church should be defiled by its examination, were ever contending that it was an institution sanctioned and regulated by the word of God. Any

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