complete. Thus, Delaware and
Missouri (alone of all the slave States) were ahead of Maryland in this
rate of profit, because both had comparatively fewer slaves; and all the
other slave States, whose servile population was relatively larger than
that of Maryland, were below her in the rate of profit. The law extends
to _counties_, those having comparatively fewest slaves increasing far
more rapidly in wealth and population. This, then, is the formula as to
the rate of profit on capital. First, the free States; next the States
and counties of the same State having the fewest relative number of
slaves. The census, then, is an evangel against slavery, and its tables
are revelations proclaiming laws as divine as those written by the
finger of God at Mount Sinai on the tables of stone.

For seventy years we have had these census tables, announcing these
great truths more and more clearly at each decade. They are the records
of the nation's movement and condition, the decennial monuments marking
her steps in the path of empire, the oracles of her destiny. They are
prophecies, for each decade fulfils the predictions of its predecessor.
They announce laws, not made by man, but the irrevocable ordinances of
the Almighty. We cannot, with impunity, refuse to obey these laws. For
every violation, they enforce their own penalties. From these there is
no escape in the present or the past, nor for the future, except in
conformity to their demands. These laws condemn slavery; and the
punishment for disobedience is recorded in the result of every census,
and finally culminated in the rebellion. Slavery and freedom are
antagonistic and discordant elements: the conflict between them is upon
us; it admits of no neutrality or compromise, and one or the other
system must perish.

We have seen that slavery is hostile to the progress of wealth and
population: let us now ascertain its influence on moral and intellectual
development.

By table 15 of the census of 1860, the result for that year was as
follows: In Massachusetts, value of books printed, $397,500; jobs,
529,347; newspapers, $1,979,069; total, $2,905,916. Same year in
Maryland, books printed, $58,000; jobs, $122,000; newspapers, $169,000;
total, $350,155. By table 37, census of 1860, Massachusetts had 222
newspapers and periodicals, of which 112 were political, 31 religious,
51 literary, miscellaneous, 28. Maryland had only 57, all political. The
whole number of copies issued in