Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

"that they must not think it hard if they suffer wrongfully?"

No, there is no blessedness in the above, or in the soddening of the battle-fields with rivers of blood, already made memorable with horrid butcheries; and, as those historical and tragical scenes flit before them, they will no more make the children of the Southerners revere the people of the North, or pay homage to their genius or chivalry, than the scenes at Yorktown, Lexington, Concord, or Bunker Hill, lead Americans to revere the Britishers. When we look at the bitter struggle as it now moves along in its bloody and devastating course, the words of Milton sound strangely in

our ears:

"For never can true reconcilement grow,

Where words of deadly hate have pierced so deep."

And should the war crusaders succeed, with their gospel of torches, faggots, fire, and sword, in conquering and devastating the South, the slaves whom they had freed from the galling tyranny of their masters would not feel themselves, amidst Northern treatment, to be "a heap much more men," when sold on the auction block in Northern cities as paupers recently illustrated in the case of a number of fugitive slaves in Illinois-neither would they lift up their hands in blessing and shout, "Bressed be de Lord dat brought us to see dis first happy day of our lives," if shipped out of the country by the chivalrous white man on their

landing in Africa. The thought is madness. Such a state of things may be in accordance with strong delusion, judicial blindness, and hardness of heart, but certainly not with the doctrines of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the teachings of His most holy Word, or the merciful spirit of Christianity; and yet these wilful and chosen delusions are spreading in this country as well as in America, shown in the vigorous attempts now being made to manufacture a public opinion in honour of these war crusaders in America, who charge the British with "a decline of anti-slavery fire." It is to be hoped that the people of this country will not be blinded by the subterfuges resorted to in dwelling upon the black picture of the South, in order to heighten the virtues of the North, when, by its double dealing, it has excited the pity and deserves the execrations of mankind, or be favourably impressed with the means employed to promote the progress of human liberty. May it ever be the exalted privilege and happiness of this highly favoured nation to endorse a gospel of emancipation founded on reason and argument, and not one of physical force associated with rash and bloody hands the folly that seeks, through evil, good.

GLASGOW, February 1st, 1863.

COONS, FALSE SHEPHERDS, AND PRESIDENT OF THE WESLEYAN CONFERENCE.

WHEN President Lincoln was a farmer, he called together his friends and neighbours for consultation in regard to a number of coons which were very destructive in his corn fields. A plan was resolved on to catch some of them; and when caught, farther action was to be taken. It was not long before their labours were crowned with success; but when Lincoln and his friends met to deliberate on what they should do to them, they were unanimously agreed in their opinions that if they killed them, the stench would be so loathsome and intolerable, that they concluded, in view of all the circumstances of the case, "it would be best to let them go." If Lincoln and his advisers had taken a leaf or chapter out of their experience concerning the above unpleasant and disagreeable animals, and applied it to the Southern people, they would soon have got rid of slavery, as we have already shown in a previous letter, and have prevented the fearful stench arising from the red field of battle, which is now filling the world. And how sad to think that no parties have added more to the loathsomeness of the present war in America than the false shepherds in Israel, whose maddening cry

has virtually demanded "war to the knife, and the knife to the handle," associating our country with rivers of flowing blood, charnel houses full of festering corpses, commercial ruin, disaster, and woe, the widow's wail and orphan's moan. When referring to one of these false shepherds, the correspondent of the Daily Telegraph, July 22d, says :

There was a public meeting some few days since in New York, called for a very admirable and philanthropic purpose-the formation of an association to give permanent aid to sick and wounded soldiers. The attendance was large and influential; the array of orators on the platform imposing. In the course of the evening, Parson Brownlow made a speech. Let me cull a few, a very few, flowers of rhetoric from his harangue: If I had the power, sir,' said the reverend Brownlow, I would arm and uniform in Federal habiliments every wolf, and panther, and tiger, and catamount, and bear in the mountains of America; every crocodile in the swamps of Florida and South Carolina; every negro in the Southern Confederacy; and every devil in Hell and Pandemonium. This war, I say to you, must be pursued with a vim and a vengeance, until the rebellion is put down, if it exterminates from God's green earth every man, woman, and child south of Mason and Dixon's line. And we will crowd the rebels, and crowd and crowd them, till I trust in God we will rush them into the Gulf of Mexico, and drive the entire race, as the devil did the hogs into the Sea

[ocr errors]

of Galilee.' He wound up by saying, 'We can whip the Southern Confederacy; we can take in England and France; and I want to carry it on till we whip out all creation.' Every point in this discourse told immensely, and it would be difficult to determine whether the loudest cheers were elicited by the allusion to the hogs in the Sea of Galilee, or the aspiration of whipping out all creation.""

[ocr errors]

Most of the above class have generally been found far away in the rear of the army. There are some, however, who have moved to the forefront on the tented field, whose voices have been heard to exclaim amidst the confused noise of the warrior, and garments rolled in blood- "Let us at least kill and maim each other like christian gentlemen." One of these is the Rev. Colonel Jacques, a Methodist clergyman, who has the command of a Federal regiment, officered with reverend clergymen from the same branch of the Church, under him to do the church militant on the battle-field! And according to the statement of the Rev. W. L. Thornton, President of the Wesleyan Conference, as given in the Leeds Mercury, August 4th, "more than one hundred thousand Methodists have actually been in the war; and reckoning the slain, and the wounded, and the captives, more than half are gone!"

Here is war Christianity with a vengeance! Right reverend Fathers in God, and Brothers in Christ, showing their love to their fellowmen, and cutting each other's throats at the same time! And what is

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »