et, in the
year 1829, slavery was abolished throughout that vast region by a royal
decree of the then sovereign of Mexico. Will you please tell me by what
right slavery exists in Texas to-day? By the same right as, and no higher
or greater than, slavery is seeking dominion in Kansas: by political
force--peaceful, if that will suffice; by the torch (as in Kansas) and the
bludgeon (as in the Senate chamber), if required. And so history repeats
itself; and even as slavery has kept its course by craft, intimidation,
and violence in the past, so it will persist, in my judgment, until met
and dominated by the will of a people bent on its restriction.

We have, this very afternoon, heard bitter denunciations of Brooks in
Washington, and Titus, Stringfellow, Atchison, Jones, and Shannon in
Kansas--the battle-ground of slavery. I certainly am not going to advocate
or shield them; but they and their acts are but the necessary outcome of
the Nebraska law. We should reserve our highest censure for the authors
of the mischief, and not for the catspaws which they use. I believe it was
Shakespeare who said, "Where the offence lies, there let the axe fall";
and, in my opinion, this man Douglas and the Northern men in Congress
who advocate "Nebraska" are more guilty than a thousand Joneses and
Stringfellows, with all their murderous practices, can be. [Applause.]

We have made a good beginning here to-day. As our Methodist friends would
say, "I feel it is good to be here." While extremists may find some fault
with the moderation of our platform, they should recollect that "the
battle is not always to the strong, nor the race to the swift." In grave
emergencies, moderation is generally safer than radicalism; and as this
struggle is likely to be long and earnest, we must not, by our action,
repel any who are in sympathy with us in the main, but rather win all that
we can to our standard. We must not belittle nor overlook the facts of our
condition--that we are new and comparatively weak, while our enemies are
entrenched and relatively strong. They have the administration and the
political power; and, right or wrong, at present they have the numbers.
Our friends who urge an appeal to arms with so much force and eloquence
should recollect that the government is arrayed against us, and that the
numbers are now arrayed against us as well; or, to state it nearer to the
truth, they are not yet expressly and affirmatively for us; and we should
r