he God-like image and superscription stamped upon him
by the hand of his Creator, and to write on the despoiled and desecrated
tablet, "A chattel personal!"

This, then, is slavery. Nature, with her thousand voices, cries out
against it. Against it, divine revelation launches its thunders. The
voice of God condemns it in the deep places of the human heart. The woes
and wrongs unutterable which attend this dreadful violation of natural
justice, the stripes, the tortures, the sunderings of kindred, the
desolation of human affections, the unchastity and lust, the toil
uncompensated, the abrogated marriage, the legalized heathenism, the
burial of the mind, are but the mere incidentals of the first grand
outrage, that seizure of the entire man, nerve, sinew, and spirit, which
robs him of his body, and God of his soul. These are but the natural
results and outward demonstrations of slavery, the crystallizations from
the chattel principle.

It is against this system, in its active operation upon three millions of
our countrymen, that the Liberty Party is, for the present, directing all
its efforts. With such an object well may we be "men of one idea." Nor
do we neglect "other great interests," for all are colored and controlled
by slavery, and the removal of this disastrous influence would most
effectually benefit them.

Political action is the result and immediate object of moral suasion on
this subject. Action, action, is the spirit's means of progress, its
sole test of rectitude, its only source of happiness. And should not
decided action follow our deep convictions of the wrong of slavery?
Shall we denounce the slave-holders of the states, while we retain our
slavery in the District of Columbia? Shall we pray that the God of the
oppressed will turn the hearts of "the rulers" in South Carolina, while
we, the rulers of the District, refuse to open the prisons and break up
the slave-markets on its ten miles square? God keep us from such
hypocrisy! Everybody now professes to be opposed to slavery. The
leaders of the two great political parties are grievously concerned lest
the purity of the antislavery enterprise will suffer in its connection
with politics. In the midst of grossest pro-slavery action, they are
full of anti-slavery sentiment. They love the cause, but, on the whole,
think it too good for this world. They would keep it sublimated, aloft,
out of vulgar reach or use altogether, intangible as Magel