to the eyes, also those other tears which "patriots shed o'er dying laws."

Sir, I shall speak frankly. If there be an exception to this feeling, it will be found chiefly with a peculiar class. It is a sorry fact that the "mercantile interest," in its unpardonable selfishness, twice in English history, frowned upon the endeavors to suppress the atrocity of Algerine slavery; that it sought to baffle Wilberforce's great effort for the abolition of the African slave trade; and that, by a sordid compromise, at the formation of our Constitution, it exempted the same detested, heaven-defying traffic from American judgment. And now representatives of this "interest," forgetful that commerce is the child of freedom, join in hunting the slave. But the great heart of the people recoils from this enactment. It palpitates for the fugitive, and rejoices in his escape.

وو

66

I have said, sir, that this sentiment is just. And is it not? Every escape from slavery necessarily and instinctively awakens the regard of all who love freedom. The endeavor, though unsuccessful, reveals courage, manhood, character. No story is read with more interest than that of our own Lafayette, when, aided by a gallant South Carolinian, in defiance of the despotic ordinances of Austria, kindred to our Slave Act, he strove to escape from the bondage of Olmutz. Literature pauses with exultation over the struggles of Cervantes, the great Spaniard, while a slave in Algiers, to regain the liberty for which he says, in his immortal work, we ought to risk life itself, slavery being the greatest evil that can fall to the lot of man.' Science, in all her manifold triumphs, throbs with pride and delight that Arago, the astronomer and philosopher-devoted republican also—was redeemed from barbarous slavery to become one of her greatest sons. Religion rejoices serenely, with joy unspeakable, in the final escape of Vincent de Paul. Exposed in the public square of Tunis to the inspection of the traffickers in human flesh, this illustrious Frenchman was subjected to every vileness of treatment; like a horse, compelled to open his mouth, to show his teeth, to trot, to run, to exhibit his strength in lifting burthens, and then, like a horse, legally sold in market overt. Passing from master to master, after a protracted servitude, he achieved his freedom, and regaining France, commenced that resplendent career of charity by which he is placed among the great names of Christendom. Princes and orators have lavished panegyrics upon this fugitive slave; and the Catholic Church, in homage to his extraordinary virtues, has introduced him into the company of saints.

Less by genius or eminent services, than by sufferings, are the fugitive slaves of our country now commended. For them every sentiment of humanity is aroused:

"Who could refrain

That had a heart to love, and in that heart
Courage to make his love known?"

Rude and ignorant they may be; but in their very efforts for freedom, they claim kindred with all that is noble in the past. They are among the heroes of our age. Romance has no stories of more thrilling interest than theirs. Classical antiquity has preserved no examples of adventurous trial more worthy of renown. Among them are men whose names will be treasured in the annals of their race. By the eloquent voice they have already done much to make their wrongs known, and to secure the respect of the world. History will soon lend them her avenging pen. Proscribed by you during life, they will proscribe you through all time. Sir, already judgment is beginning. A righteous public sentiment palsies your enactment.-Hon. Charles Sumner, 1852.

CHRISTIAN RESISTANCE TO THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT.

MR. President, The Slave Act violates the Constitution and shocks the public conscience. With modesty and yet with firmness let me add, sir, it offends against the divine law. No such enactment can be entitled to support. The mandates of an earthly power may be discussed; those of Heaven must at once be performed; nor can any agreement constrain us against God. Such is the rule of morals. Such, also, by the lips of judges and sages, has been the proud declaration of the English law, whence our own is derived. In this conviction patriots have fearlessly braved unjust commands, and martyrs have died.

And now, sir, the rule is commended to us. The good citizen, as he thinks of the shivering fugitive, guilty of no crime, pursued, hunted down like a beast, while praying for Christian help and deliverance, and as he reads the requirements of this act, is filled with horror. Here is a despotic mandate, "to aid and assist in the prompt and efficient execution of this law." Again let me speak frankly. Not rashly would I set myself against any provision of law. This grave responsibility I would not lightly assume.

But

here the path of duty is clear. By the supreme law, which commands me to do no injustice; by the comprehensive Christian law of brotherhood; by the Constitution, which 1 have sworn to support, I AM BOUND TO DISOBEY THIS ACT. Never, in any capacity, can I render voluntary aid in its execution. Pains and penalties I will endure; but this great wrong I will not do. "I cannot obey, but I can suffer," was the exclamation of the author of Pilgrim's Progress, when imprisoned for disobedience to an earthly statute. Better suffer injustice than do it. Better be the victim than the instrument of wrong. Better be even the poor slave, returned to bondage, than the unhappy commissioner.

There is, sir, an incident of history which suggests a parallel, and affords a lesson of fidelity. Under the triumphant exertions of that Apostolic Jesuit, St. Francis Xavier, large numbers of the Japanese, amounting to as many as two hundred thousand-among their princes, generals, and the flower of the nobility-were converted to Christianity. Afterwards, amidst the frenzy of civil war, religious persecution arose, and the penalty of death was denounced against all who refused to trample upon the effigy of the Redeemer. This was the pagan law of a pagan land. But the delighted historian records that scarcely one from the multitudes of converts was guilty of this apostacy. The law of man was set at naught. Imprisonment, torture, death, were preferred. Thus did this people refuse to trample on the painted image. Sir, multitudes among us will not be less steadfast in refusing to trample on the living image of their Redeemer.

Finally, sir, for the sake of peace and tranquillity, cease to shock the public conscience; for the sake of the Constitution, cease to exercise a power which is nowhere granted, and violates inviolable rights expressly secured. Leave this question where it was left by our fathers, at the formation of our national government, in the absolute control of the states, the appointed guardians of personal liberty. Repeal this enactment. Let its terrors no longer rage through the land. Mindful of the lowly whom it pursues; mindful of the good men perplexed by its requirements; in the name of charity, in the name of the Constitution, repeal this enactment, totally and without delay. Be inspired by the example of Washington. Be admonished by those words of Oriental piety-"Beware of the groans of the wounded souls. Oppress not to the utmost a single heart; for a solitary sigh has power to overset a whole world."

Hon. Charles Sumner, 1852.

SLAVERY FORCED INTO KANSAS.

I WILL grant, for the sake of the argument, that with Federal battalions you can carry slavery into Kansas, and maintain it there. Are you quite confident that this republican form of Government can then be upheld and preserved? You will then yourselves have introduced the Trojan horse. No republican government ever has endured, with standing armies maintained in its bosom to enforce submission to its laws. A people who have once learned to relinquish their rights under compulsion, will not be long in forgettting that they ever had any. In extending slavery into Kansas, therefore, by arms, you will subvert the liberties of the people. Senators of the free States, I appeal to you. Believe ye the prophets? I know you do. You know, then, that slavery neither works mines and quarries, nor founds cities, nor builds ships, nor levies armies, nor mans navies. Why, then, will you insist on closing up this new Territory of Kansas against all enriching streams of immigration, while you pour into it the turbid and poisonous waters of African slavery? Which one of you all, whether of Connecticut, or of Pennsylvania, or of Illinois, or of Michigan, would consent thus to extinguish the chief light of civilization within the State in which your own fortunes are cast, and in which your own posterity are to live? Why will you pursue a policy so unkind, so ungenerous and so unjust toward the helpless, defenceless, struggling Territory of Kansas, inhabited as it is by your own brethren, depending on you for protection and safety. Will slavery in Kansas add to the wealth or power of one of your own States, or to the wealth, power or glory of the Republic? You know that it will diminish all of these. You profess a desire to end this national debate about slavery, which has become for you intolerable. Is it not time to relinquish that hope? You have exhausted the virtue, for that purpose, that resided in compacts and platforms, in the suppression of the right of petition and in arbitrary parliamentary laws, and in abnegation of Federal authority over the subject of slavery within the national Territories. Will you end the debate, by binding Kansas with chains, for the safety of slavery in Missouri? Even then you must give over Utah to slavery, to make it secure and permanent in Kansas; and you must give over Oregon and Washington to both polygamy and slavery, so as to guaranty equally the one and the other of those peculiar institutions in Utah; and so you must go on, sacrificing, on

the shrine of peace, Territory after Territory, until the prevailing nationality of freedom and of virtue shall be lost, and the vicious anomalies, which you have hitherto vainly hoped Almighty wisdom would remove from among you without your own concurrence, shall become the controlling elements in the Republic. He who found a river in his path, and sat down to wait for the flood to pass away, was not more unwise than he who expects the agitation of slavery to cease, while the love of freedom animates the bosoms of mankind. Hon. William H. Seward, 1856.

THE WRONGS OF KANSAS.

TAKE down your map, sir, and you will find that the Territory of Kansas, more than any other region, occupies the middle spot of North America, equally distant from the Atlantic on the east, and the Pacific on the west; from the frozen waters of Hudson's Bay on the north, and the tepid Gulf Stream on the south, constituting the precise territorial centre of the whole vast continent. To such advantage of situation, on the very highway between two oceans, are added a soil of unsurpassed richness, and a fascinating, undulating beauty of surface, with a health-giving climate, calculated to nurture a powerful and generous people, worthy to be a central pivot of American institutions.

A few short months only have passed since this spacious mediterranean country was open only to the savage, who ran wild in its woods and prairies; and now it has already drawn to its bosom a population of freemen larger than Athens crowded within her historic gates, when her sons, under Miltiades, won liberty for mankind on the field of Marathon; more than Sparta contained when she ruled Greece, and sent forth her devoted children, quickened by a mother's benediction, to return with their shields or on them; more than Rome gathered on her seven hills, when, under her kings, she commenced that sovereign sway which afterwards embraced the whole earth; more than London held, when, on the fields of Crecy and Agincourt, the English banner was carried victoriously over the chivalrous hosts of France.

Against this territory, thus fortunate in position and pop ulation, a crime has been committed, which is without exam ple in the history of the past. Not in plundering provinces, nor in the cruelties of selfish governors, will you find its par