the zenith, it concentrates its rays in a glass, and fires off a cannon. Whilst in the North civilisation has traced itself in the unfolding of new truths and of higher institutions, and the closing up of the old; in the South the mounting sun of civilisation has been replied to by the gun at Fort Sumter,-that was its reply to civilisation, to freedom, to the yearning of the human heart for justice. And our banner-those stars which, when they were first placed on that flag, were meant to symbolise the morning stars singing together; those stripes which, when they were placed there, were meant to symbolise the streaks of humanity's dawning day; these, though they had been trailed for many years in the dust by usurpers, were reflecting the best and noblest light of this world, on that day when South Carolina fired its gun against that sacred banner. One of these must prevail. If the South, in the war which it has inaugurated against the North, shall prevail, it will bear its ignorance, its lash, its handcuffs over the whole North. I say ignorance, for whilst in the North there is not one man or woman grown up who is not educated, if he or she was born there; in my native state of Virginia, by her own statistics, there are 100,000 grown-up white people who cannot read or write. I say, that the South suppresses all free speech and free discussion, because I remember well that eleven years ago I was banished from the spot where I was born, simply because it was sup posed that I was an abolitionist, because I would not help a man to catch his runaway slave. Simply for thinking slavery an evil, I was met by my old schoolmates on the spot where I was born, and told to leave the state instantly, on pain of any suffering they could inflict. And I say that if the South succeeds, these things are to spread over that whole country, a padlock on every free tongue, a suppression on every heart, or else it must leave its land and be an exile. When you see Poles, and Hungarians, and Italians in your midst, you know why they are here. It is because the rod of oppression is on them at home. Why is it that for the last 20 or 30 years we Southern antislavery people have all been in New England? why have we been forced into that climate and neighbourhood which is against all our associations? Why are we cast out from our homes? I can name 20 Southern abolitionists who are now in the North, and have been there for 15 years. Not

We

one of them could remain in the South, and you know the reason; it is because slavery cannot stand the burst of a free thought or a free word. It is for slavery the South is fighting by her own confession. I need not say more about the disposition of slavery to suppress free speech; slavery has spoken for itself, and I therefore pass on to say that we have in the North symbols of liberty, and if in this conflict the North should conquer the South, if her arms should triumph, where she goes she will carry her institutions, and her great revenge on the South will be to load her with the blessings of education and civilisation. therefore ask you to remember that it is simply as representing institutions which are necessary to the progress of humanity in that continent, that we call upon every English heart that beats in the right place for sympathy and for confidence. I ask your attention to these simple facts -when South Carolina seceded from the Union, she declared that her object in so doing was, because slavery was threatened by the continued progress of that Union. That was in her ordinance of secession; and though there have been those whom you have heard declare that every thing in the world has been the reason for this rebellion except slavery, yet I put South Carolina's own testimony and words against them all. She, when she seceded, said it was for slavery; you will find it in her ordinance of secession; and those who took the line of battle by her side agreed to her statement of the case. Some have told you it was because of the tariff, that the North did not want free trade, and that all the money went out of the pockets of the South into the pockets of the Northern people. As a Southerner, I protest against such a low estimate of the Southern people, as that which says that they plunged the nation into civil war all for a little money in their pockets. I know that the South is the victim of a mad fanaticism, of an idolatry to slavery, of a devotion to it passing that of an idolator for his god. I know that they are in dead earnest, and that instead of instituting this war because of a tariff, or any pecuniary reason, they are sacrificing their means, their money, and their lives to their idol, which is human bondage. If you will turn to Mr. Jefferson Davis's speech at Washington, on leaving the congress of the United States, you will find that he is particular to say, 66 we leave not for a pecuniary reason." On the other hand, I believe that our

cause is the cause of liberty and union, and that they are one and inseparable, now and for ever. We have seen the practical results of this war in the liberation of our country and the liberation of the negro; for, mark you, the liberation of the negro is not more dear to us than the liberation of our own whites from the despotism of slavery, which for years has corrupted our best men, and sowed our country with every wrong and corruption. We are all the slaves of slavery; its chain is around every heart and every neck; all have been bending to its behests; and in fighting for the freedom of the negro, we are fighting just as much to strike the manacles from our own hands in America. We have seen our desert rejoice under this war, terrible and fearful as it is.

There has been war in America for the last thirty years, war of man against man, war in every home, war at Washington, war down in the South, battles, coercions, suppression of all discussion: it has been war, only it was hidden war; it had not broken out into a cutaneous cor ruption, which it has now done, but it was in the vitals, and it was inevitable, if things took a healthy course, that it should break out on the surface. If it had not broken out on the surface, it would have gone into the heart and killed the nation. It is always healthier when a disease comes to the surface, instead of remaining hidden and going to the vitals. I say, that the present condition of America is simply the manifestation of a war that has been going on in that country for 30, 40, or 50 years,-a war that had to come on, and that was always raging in the system. It is the conviction of those who most value peace, that there is more actual peace in the United States to-day, than there has been any time for 20 years, because there was only the lamb that had the appearance of a lamb before, but had the cruel horn of wrong, and the dragon voice of slavery, and prospective war: whereas we are now looking forward to a peace which shall be the LAMB of GOD, because it will take away the sin from which alone war proceeds. I will not stop here to criticise the sayings of Mr. Lincoln, or Mr. Seward, or anybody else. They may say that the war is for the Union or not for the Union, they may say this or that; but we who have watched for years the interests of that country in its relation to human freedom, we know as a practical fact that we are meeting daily the actual harvests

of freedom, which prove that whatever technical cause or object may be assigned for the war, it is really a war that is to wipe out the sin and shame of that land for ever. Since this war began, we have got advantages for liberty which men had been toiling threescore years in vain to get. Many great things are accomplished by people who do not aim at them; men in this world often build better than they intend. When Cæsar conquered this land where we now stand, he did not mean to plant Christianity here, he did not mean to build your seats of learning, your libraries, and to plant your religion; he was actuated only by his own mad selfishness; but yet by his conquests he did prepare the way for Christianity to flood the land. When Alexander conquered the world, he did not mean to fill the world with learning and Greek civilisation; and yet behind him went the genius of letters and civilisation, and sowed the furrows which he made with the seeds whose fair harvests we reap to-day through all the western world. And for whatever object Mr. Lincoln's army goes forward into the South, where all is night and darkness to-day, in the furrows which the ploughshare of civil war makes in our land, the seeds of liberty, justice, and Christianity are being sown, and the result already is, the liberation of one million human beings. We have seen slavery abolished from the capital of our nation; we have seen every territory of our land, wherever the national flag waves, consecrated to liberty; we have seen the Fugitive Slave Law annulled, so that a man is free now throughout the North; we have seen various other states on the border, such as Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri, turn their prows towards the blessed shores of freedom and justice. We have got that from this war in two years; and so long as we get these solid gains for justice and liberty, so long as we see not only the negro set free, but ourselves liberated from that base fugitive law to which we had bowed our necks, so long as we see ourselves and them liberated,—we shall see the genius of GOD following this ploughshare of war as it drives through the heart of our nation.

Seven years ago, when I was down in Virginia, on my last visit there, I was appealed to by a large number of my father's slaves (for my father, who lived at Fredericksburg, Virginia, owned over 100) to tell them how they could escape. I was astonished, for I had always supposed

that these negroes really did not ardently desire to be free; and I said to them-"I have known you for twenty years, how is it I have never heard a whisper from one of you that you wanted to be free?" "Oh," said they, "we never heard a whisper before that you wanted us to be free." At that time I could not help them; I feared even to point them out the North star, Test (so did slavery rule that land) one of them should presently be brought back a bleeding corpse, and I feel responsible for it; so I feared to advise them to go but no sooner did General McDowell, with the banner of the United States, plant himself at Fredericksburg, than all those slaves who were not hired to Richmond, 40 in number, marched up to Washington as free as the President of the United States himself. Those negroes came to Washington. I was in Cincinnati and heard of it; that is, I heard that one negro had arrived at Washington who had belonged to my father. Swiftly I went over the 600 miles which lay between Cincinnati and Washington, travelling night and day. I went about amongst the contrabands who had arrived, and finally I found my man. He was doing well, with his wife and little daughter. These people were all working, and all glad to be free. They told me that the rest of my father's slaves were free, but that they were down in the heart of Virginia. I made arrangements to go down into Virginia (so great was the protection of our flag to liberty), find these slaves, and take them far away out of the reach of slavery, lest some chance ebb tide might roll them back again into bondage. I was to go early in the morning, and Wm. Henry Channing, who was once minister in Liverpool, was going with me. The night before we were to start we had a terrific storm in Washington, the most fearful storm I ever witnessed, of lightning, thunder, and rain. About nine o'clock I felt one of those strange impulses of which I had often read, but which I had never experienced before; I felt that I must go to an old negro shanty over by Georgetown, to a negro whom I had known in my boyhood. So, in the storm of rain, so strong was the impulse, I went over to this negro shanty. I arrived there at midnight when the storm was at its height, and there in his cellar I found all the 40 of my father's slaves, who had arrived there just five minutes before me. They had travelled that weary way, bringing their women and little ones, their beds and clothing, with