ÆäÀÌÁö À̹ÌÁö
PDF
ePub

the power that is wanting to bind them, should commonwealths and sovereigns also be exempted from those laws of reason and right conduct, in their relations with other states, and their duty of abstaining from bloodshed and aggression, which are found to influence and govern individuals and bodies of men in civil

ducing. But the sympathies of the mind are not limited by the connections of blood; they extend themselves in attachments of kindness and friendship to those who, we conceive, entertain a similar feeling towards us. As these attachments increase, our affections become more enlarged.-On finding that others can dismiss their selfish propensities, we begin to tram-society? Shall we say, because such ple on them ourselves; and not only discard suspicions, but open our hearts to higher enjoyments, and purer pleasures. The extent to which this may be carried, is unlimited. Having experienced the excellence, affection, and generosity, of many individuals, we begin to acquire a high- | er opinion of, and a greater regard for, the rest of mankind, and we feel a desire to promote their happiness, even at the diminution or the expense of our own.

Powerful, however, as these natural sympathies and rational motives are, it is not to them alone that the operation of the selfish principle can be safely entrusted; so various and uncertain is their influence, so dependent upon the peculiarities of character and circumstances, that to leave it in the power of individuals to judge for themselves, would, in fact, be nothing less than to subject the weak to the powerful, and to make the only law that of the strongest. The perception of this truth united mankind in society; without which, they must have lived in a state of perpetual warfare. Thus the weak and the powerful were equalized, and man was no more allowed, for his own gratification, arbitrarily to encroach on the rights of another.

The regulations thus presented were sanctioned and enforced by penalties and privations, the infliction of which were intrusted into the hands of delegated powers; the wrongs of individuals became those of society, and private injuries and revenge were weighed in the balance of justice, and their retribution administered by the laws. If individuals, tribes, and societies, formerly independent of each other, have derived advantages from such associations; advantages of still greater importance must be derived from a general adoption of the same system, and the subjection of force to reason upon a still more extended scale. For what reason, except it be

laws are not acknowledged by them, and can no where be quoted on precedent, that they do not actually exist, that they are not in the eye of God and nature equally bound by them,and that princes and potentates, in the commission of wars and tyrannies from the throne, are not as responsible as the beggar or the peasant, who commits a petty theft, or a trespass on his landlord's field? Are not the laws of both equally well defined, though not equally well enforced? All laws are only a definition of the rules of common sense, humanity, and right reason, impressed by the power and goodness of the Almighty on all his works. True law is only the definition of the will of God, as revealed in the reason, conscience, and humanity, of his creatures; the violation of which, by despotism, by wars, and by public and private aggressions, is a crime amenable no less to the court of God, than to that of man, in the violation of whose rights, they deface or degrade the image of the Creator in which he was made. The contrary doctrine is both irreligious and ill-founded: and if the great mass of regulations and treaties which forms the law of nations were abolished, that law would still exist. The regulations of society do not create, they only define laws, which are either right or wrong according to the accuracy of such definition. And we are inclined to believe, from the tenor of some passages and allegorical allusions in scripture, that our Saviour and his apostles, in a comprehensive and general way, intended by very forcible figures to demonstrate to their hearers, the savage and disgraceful predicament, in which governments stand in regard to each other, and the necessity of submitting themselves to a common law-the great law of love, and settling their differences by a prescribed and rational mode, before they could be considered as civilized.

(To be concluded in our next. )

THE PROPHET OF THE ALLEGHANY.

fostering cares of thy people, and weathered the stormy career of their pernicious friendship." Thus saying, the tall chief darted into the wood, and the good missionary pursued his way with pious resolution.

In the year 1798, one of the missionaries to the Indians of the north-west, was on his way from the Tuscarora settlement to the Senecas. Journeying in pious meditation through the He preached the only true divinity, forest, a majestic Indian darted from and placed before the eyes of the wonits recesses, and arrested his progress.dering savages the beauty of holiness, His hair was somewhat changed with age, and his face marked with the deep furrows of time; but his eye expressed all the fiery vivacity of youthful passion, and his step was that of a warrior in the vigour of manhood.

the sufferings of the Redeemer, and the sublime glories of the Christian heaven. He allured them with the hope of everlasting bliss, and alarmed them with denunciations of an eternity of misery and despair. The awestruck Indians, roused by these accumulated motives, many of them adopted the precepts of the missionary so far as they could comprehend them; and, in the course of eighteen months, their devotion became rational, regular, and apparently permanent.

All at once, however, the little church, in which the good man was wont to pen his fold, became deserted. No votary came, as usual, to listen with decent reverence to the pure doctrines which they were there accustomed to hear; and only a few solitary idlers were seen of a Sunday morning lounging about, and casting a wistful, yet fearful, look at their little peaceful and now silent mansion.

"White man of the ocean,* whither wanderest thou?" said the Indian. "I am travelling," replied the meek disciple of peace, " towards the dwellings of thy brethren, to teach them the knowledge of the only true God, and to lead them to peace and happiness." "To peace and happiness!" answered the tall chief, while his eye flashed fire-"Behold the blessings that follow the footsteps of the white man! wherever he comes, the nations of the woodlands fade from the eye like the mists of morning. Once, over the wide forest of the surrounding world, our people roamed in peace and freedom, nor ever dreamed of greater happiness than to hunt the beaver, the bear, and The missionary sought them out, the wild deer. From the farthest ex- inquired into the cause of this mystremity of the great deep came the terious desertion, and told them of the white man, armed with thunder and bitterness of hereafter, to those, who, lightning, and weapons still more per- having once known, abandoned the nicious. In war, he hunted us like religion of the only true God. The wild beasts; in peace, he destroyed us poor Indians shook their heads, and by deadly liquors, or yet more deadly informed him that the Great Spirit frauds. Yet a few moons had passed was angry at their apostasy, and had away, and whole nations of invincible sent a prophet from the summit of the warriors, and of hunters, that fearless Alleghany mountain, to warn them swept the forest and the mountain, against the admission of new docperished, vainly opposing their tri- trines; that there was to be a great umphant invaders; or quietly dwin-meeting of the old men soon, and that dled into slaves and drunkards, and their names withered from the earth. Retire, dangerous man, leave us all we yet have left, our savage virtues and our gods; and do not, in the vain attempt to cultivate a rude and barren soil, pluck up the few thrifty plants of native growth, that have survived the

the prophet would there deliver to the people the message with which he was intrusted. The zealous missionary determined to be present, and to confront the impostor, who was known by the appellation of the Prophet of the Alleghany. He accordingly obtained permission from the chiefs to appear at the council, and to reply to *The Indians at first imagined that the white the charges that might be brought men originally sprung from the sea, and that forward. The 12th day of June, 1802, they invaded their country because they had was the time fixed for the decision of none of their own. They sometimes call them this solemn question, "Whether the in their songs, "The white foam of the ocean;' and this name is still often applied, contemp-belief of their forefathers, or that of tuously, by the savages of the north-west.

the white men, was the true religion?"

The usual council-house not being large enough to contain so great an assemblage of people, they met in a valley, about eight miles to the westward of the Seneca Lake. This valley was then embowered under lofty trees; it is surrounded on almost every side with high rugged hills, and through it meanders a small river.

It was a scene to call forth every encrgy of the human heart. On a smooth level, near the bank of the slow stream, under the shade of a large elm, sat the chief men of the tribes.Around the circle which they formed, was gathered a crowd of wondering savages, who, with eager looks, seemed to demand the true God at the hands of their wise men. In the middle of the circle sat the aged and travel-worn missionary. A few grey hairs wandered over his brow, his hands were crossed on his bosom, and, as he cast his hope-beaming eye to heaven, he seemed to be calling, with pious fervour, upon the God of truth, to vindicate his own eternal word by the mouth of his servant.

mighty ocean, your fathers were wont to enjoy all the luxuriant delights of the deep; now you are exiles in swamps or on barren hills, and these wretched possessions you enjoy by the precarious tenure of the white man's will. The shrill cry of revelry or war no more is heard on the majestie shores of the Hudson, or the sweet banks of the silver Mohawk. There where the Indian lived and died free as the air he breathed, and chased the panther and the deer from morn till evening-even there the Christian slave cultivates the soil in undisturbed possession; and, as he whistles behind his plough, turns up the sacred remains of your buried ancestors. Have ye not heard at evening, and sometimes in the dead of night, those mournful and melodious sounds that steal through the deep valleys, or along the mountain sides, like the song of echo? These are the wailings of those spirits, whose bones have been turned up by the sacrilegious labours of the white men, and left to the mercy of the rain and the tempest. They call upon you to avenge them-they adjure you by every motive that can rouse the hearts of the brave, to wake from your long sleep, and, by returning to these invaders of the grave the long arrears of vengeance, restore again the tired and wandering spirits to their blissful paradise far beyond the blue hills.*

For more than half an hour there was silence in the valley, save the whispering of the trees in the south wind, and the indistinct murmuring of the river. Then all at once a sound of astonishment passed through the crowd, and the Prophet of the Alleghany was seen descending one of the high hills with furious and frenzied "These are the blessings you owe to step he entered the circle, and, wav- the Christians. They have driven ing his hand in token of silence, the your fathers from their ancient inherimissionary saw, with wonder, the tance-they have destroyed them with same tall chief, who, four years be- the sword and poisonous liquors— fore, had crossed him in the Tusca- they have dug up their bones, and rora forest. The same panther skin there left them to bleach in the wind hung over his shoulder, the same toma--and now they aim at completing hawk quivered in his hand, and the your wrongs, and insuring your desame fiery and malignant spirit burn-struction, by cheating you into the beed in his red eye. He addressed the awe-struck Indians, and the valley rung with his iron voice.

[blocks in formation]

lief of that divinity, whose very precepts they plead in justification of all the miseries they have heaped upon your race.

"Hear me, O deluded people, for the last time!-If you persist in deserting my altars, if still you are determined to listen, with fatal credulity, to the strange pernicious doctrines of

[blocks in formation]

gospel; he painted in glowing and fervid colours the filial piety, the patience, the sufferings of the Redeemer, and how he perished on the cross for the sins of the whole human race: and, finally, he touched, with energetic brevity, on the unbounded mercies of the Great Being, who thus gave his only begotten Son a sacrifice for the redemption of mankind.

these Christian usurpers-if you are unalterably devoted to your new gods and new customs-if you will be the friends of the white man, and the followers of his God-my wrath shall follow you. I will dart my arrows of forked lightning among your towns, and send the warring tempests of winter to devour you. Ye shall become bloated with intemperance, your numbers shall dwindle away until but a few wretched slaves survive, and these shall be driven deeper and deeper into the wild, there to associate with the dastard beasts of the forest, who once fled before the mighty hunters of your tribe. The spirits of your fathers shall curse you from the shores of that happy island in the great lake, where they enjoy an everlasting season of hunting, and chase the wild deer with dogs swifter than the wind. Lastly, I swear, by the lightning, the thun-joying all the comforts of cultivated der, and the tempest, that in the space of sixty moons, of all the Senecas, not one of yourselves or your posterity shall remain on the face of the earth."

The Prophet ended his message, which was delivered with the wild eloquence of real or fancied inspiration, and all at once the crowd seemed to be agitated with a savage sentiment of indignation against the good missionary. One of the fiercest broke through the circle of old men to dispatch him, but was restrained by their authority.

When this sudden feeling had somewhat subsided, the mild and benevolent apostle obtained permission to speak in behalf of him who had sent him. Never have I seen a more touching pathetic figure than this good man. He seemed past sixty-his figure tall, yet bending-his face mild, pale, and highly intellectual-and over his forehead, which yet displayed its blue veins, were scattered, at solitary distances, a few grey hairs. Though his voice was clear, and his action vigorous, yet there was that in his looks, which seemed to say his pilgrimage was soon to close for

ever.

With pious fervour, he described to his audience the glory, power, and beneficence, of the Creator of the whole universe; he told them of the pure delights of the Christian heaven, and of the never-ending tortures of those who rejected the precepts of the

When he had concluded this part of the subject, he proceeded to place before his now attentive auditors, the advantages of civilization, of learning, science, and a regular system of laws and morality. He contrasted the wild Indian, roaming the desert in savage independence, now revelling in the blood of enemies, and in his turn the victim of their insatiable vengeance, with the peaceful citizen, en

life in this happy land, and only bounded in his indulgencies by those salutary restraints which contribute as well to his own happiness, as that of society at large. He described the husbandman enjoying, in the bosom of his family, a peaceful independence, undisturbed by apprehensions of midnight surprise, plunder, and assassination; and he finished by a solemn appeal to heaven, that his sole motive for coming among them was the love of the Creator and of his creatures.

As the good missionary closed his appeal, Red Jacket, a Seneca chief of great authority, and the most eloquent of all his nation, rose, and enforced the exhortations of the venerable preacher. He repeated his leading arguments, and, with an eloquence truly astonishing in one like him, pleaded the cause of religion and humanity. The ancient council then deliberated for nearly the space of two hours; after which the oldest man arose, and solemnly pronounced the result of their conference, "That the Christian God was more wise, just, beneficent, and powerful, than the Great Spirit; and that the missionary who delivered his precepts, ought to be cherished as their best benefactor- their guide to future happiness."

[ocr errors]

When this decision was pronounced by the venerable old man, and acquiesced in by the people, the rage of the Prophet of Alleghany became terrible. He started from the ground, seized

his tomahawk, and, denouncing the speedy vengeance of the Great Spirit on their whole recreant race, darted from the circle with wild impetuosity, and disappeared in the shadows of the forest.

ESSAYS, MORAL AND LITERARY.

No. 1.-On the Forgiveness of Injuries.

"To err is human, to forgive divine.---POPE. THERE is something in a forgiving temper so noble and endearing, that it alike commands our reverence and our love. We almost consider it,

[ocr errors]

when contrasted with the usual acts of men, as a possession scarcely belonging to human nature, and look upon it as a disposition of feeling which is not of this world. It wipes away from our remembrance every painful reflection; it makes us more in love with mankind; and it atones for a thousand errors. We cherish a kindly regard for its possessor, and feel an interest in every thing which he undertakes. We view him as a being with something more of humanity about him than appears to be the common lot,as one, who, partaking of the evil and the good, travels over the path of this life scattering peace and good will around him; whose track is strewed with blessings, and brightened with the deeds of pity and forbearance. The man whose heart is thus fashioned, has a consciousness of peace in his own bosom, which the world can neither give nor take away, and will ever have the gratitude and respect of the better portion of his species. Whether in the higher or humbler walks-whether in public or private life, he will be followed by the same regards and associations, and of him it will be said, "When the ear heard him, then it blessed him; when the eye saw him, then it gave witness of him."

But, alas, if we examine the general body of mankind, how widely different appears to be the feelings by which they are usually actuated. As if the world did not present difficulties enough-as if life itself was not attended with sufficient evils-as if the state of human nature was not sufficiently degraded, we see men acting as though their only object was to injure their fellow creatures. It is

lamentably true, that the evils arising out of a state of society are almost all the creation of man's perversity of will, and are rendered so numerous by the neglect of that noble maxim, "Do unto all men as ye would they should do unto you." If a fault is committed, it is viewed in a thousand lights, and magnified in a thousand ways; it is scattered far and wide; and, although the inadvertency be, perhaps, small in reality, it becomes a by-word for the wicked to mock at, and the hypocritical to rejoice in. Well might that sweet-soul'd poet, who himself experienced no small portion of such treatment, say,

"Man's inhumanity to mau
Makes countless thousands mourn."
BURNS.

Charity is a virtue which every one claims, but of which very few are in possession. It does not appear in the distribution of certain sums of money,

it is not in the supporting of the various institutions which at present exist,-it is not in the performance of those splendid acts which have their reward in this world; but, it shews itself in the humble prayer of piety, in the secret act of benevolence, in the expansion of that heart, whose philanthropy takes in the boundaries of the world, and which, forgetting every variation of custom, and colour, and tongue, looks upon every man as a "friend and a brother." And here, if we would observe this feeling in its widest and most unqualified exertion, we must turn our attention to those devoted men, who are yearly leaving the shores of their native country-who forfeit every national comfort, and every friendly enjoyment-who, in the loftiness of their views overstep the limits of almost all that makes life desirable; and, instead of the society of friends and kindred, are content to take up their abode with the scowling savage, and the long-forgotten heathen. These "angel visitants," whose only object is to plant "peace upon earth, and good-will towards men," are swayed by other motives than those which belong to this world-by hopes which are to be realized hereafter, and by feelings which have " their answering chords in heaven."

To forgive an injury, is to call for gratitude on the part of the offender, to insure the good-will of every real Christian, and to act in obedience to,

« ÀÌÀü°è¼Ó »