ter
than negroes, and there is no outlay or risk. [Hear, hear!]. If good
cotton fields can be obtained, as they may in time, here is an opening
which will tend to weaken the slave system. If Christians will
investigate this subject, and if philanthropists generally will pursue
these inquiries in an honest spirit, it is not long before we shall see
a movement throughout the civilized world, and the upholders of slavery
will feel, where they feel most acutely--in their pockets. Until
something of this kind is done, I despair of accomplishing any great
amount of good by simple appeals to the conscience and right principle.
There are a few who will listen to conscience and a sense of right, but
there are unhappily only a few. I suppose, though you have good
Christians here, you have many who will put their consciences in their
pockets. [Hear, hear!] I have known cases of this kind. There was a
young lady in the State of Virginia who was left an orphan, and she had
no property except four negro slaves, who were of great commercial
value. She felt that slavery was wrong, and she could not hold them. She
gave them their freedom--[cheers]--and supported herself by teaching a
small school. [Cheers.] Now, notwithstanding all the unfavorable things
we see--notwithstanding the dark cloud that hangs over the country,
there are hopeful indications that God has not forgotten us, and that he
will carry on this work till it is accomplished. [Hear!] But it will be
a long while first, I fear; and we must pray, and labor, and persevere;
for he that perseveres to the end, and he only, receives the crown. Now,
there are very few in the United States who undertake to defend slavery,
and say it is right. But the great majority, even of professors of
religion, unite to shield it from aggression. 'It is the law of the
land,' they say, 'and we must submit to it.' It seems a strange doctrine
to come from the lips of the descendants of the Puritans, those who
resisted the law of the land because those laws were against their
conscience, and finally went over to that new world, in order that they
might enjoy the rights of conscience. How would it have been with the
primitive church if this doctrine had prevailed? There never would have
been any Christian church, for that was against the laws of the land. In
regard to the distribution of the Bible, in many states the laws
prohibit the teaching of slaves, and the distribution of the Bible is
not allowe