in congress, they shall
sit still more securely in their seats there, and like the _chief
rulers_ in the days of our Saviour, though _many_ believed on him, yet
they did _not_ confess him, lest they should _be put out of the
synagogue_; John xii, 42, 43. Or perhaps like Pilate, thinking they
could prevail nothing, and fearing a tumult, they determined to release
Barabbas and surrender the just man, the poor innocent slave to be
stripped of his rights and scourged. In vain will such men try to wash
their hands, and say, with the Roman governor, "I am innocent of the
blood of this just person." Northern American statesmen are no more
innocent of the crime of slavery, than Pilate was of the murder of
Jesus, or Saul of that of Stephen. These are high charges, but I appeal
to _their hearts_; I appeal to public opinion ten years from now.
Slavery then is a national sin.

But you will say, a great many other Northerners tell us so, who can
have no political motives. The interests of the North, you must know, my
friends, are very closely combined with those of the South. The Northern
merchants and manufacturers are making _their_ fortunes out of the
_produce of slave labor_; the grocer is selling your rice and sugar; how
then can these men bear a testimony against slavery without condemning
themselves? But there is another reason, the North is most dreadfully
afraid of Amalgamation. She is alarmed at the very idea of a thing so
monstrous, as she thinks. And lest this consequence _might_ flow from
emancipation, she is determined to resist all efforts at emancipation
without expatriation. It is not because she _approves of slavery_, or
believes it to be "the corner stone of our republic," for she is as much
_anti-slavery_ as we are; but amalgamation is too horrible to think of.
Now I would ask _you_, is it right, is it generous, to refuse the
colored people in this country the advantages of education and the
privilege, or rather the _right_, to follow honest trades and callings
merely because they are colored? The same prejudice exists here against
our colored brethren that existed against the Gentiles in Judea. Great
numbers cannot bear the idea of equality, and fearing lest, if they had
the same advantages we enjoy, they would become as intelligent, as
moral, as religious, and as respectable and wealthy, they are determined
to keep them as low as they possibly can. Is this doing as they would be
done by? Is this loving their n