causes, he enters the world with miserable notions of
self-importance, and under the government of an unbridled temper."

The late JUDGE TUCKER of Virginia, a slaveholder, and Professor of Law
in the University of William and Mary, in his "Letter to a Member of
the Virginia Legislature," 1801, says,--

"I say nothing of the baneful effects of slavery on our _moral
character_, because I know you have been long sensible of this point."

The Presbyterian Synod of South Carolina and Georgia, consisting of
all the clergy of that denomination in those states, with a lay
representation from the churches, most, if not all of whom are
slaveholders, published a report on slavery in 1834, from which the
following is an extract.

"Those only who have the management of servants, know what the
_hardening effect_ of it is upon _their own feelings towards them._
There is no necessity to dwell on this point, as all _owners_ and
_managers_ fully understand it. He who commences to manage them with
tenderness and with a willingness to favor them in every way, must be
watchful, otherwise he will settle down in _indifference, if not
severity."_

GENERAL WILLIAM H. HARRISON, now of Ohio, son of the late Governor
Harrison of Virginia, a slaveholder, while minister from the United
States to the Republic of Colombia, wrote a letter to General Simon
Bolivar, then President of that Republic, just as he was about
assuming despotic power. The letter is dated Bogota, Sept. 22, 1826.
The following is an extract.

"From a knowledge of your own disposition and present feelings, your
excellency will not be willing to believe that you could ever be
brought to an act of tyranny, or even to execute justice with
unnecessary rigor. But trust me, sir, there is nothing more
corrupting, nothing more _destructive of the noblest and finest
feelings of our nature than the exercise of unlimited power_. The man,
who in the beginning of such a career, might shudder at the idea of
taking away the life of a fellow-being, might soon have his conscience
so seared by the repetition of crime, that the agonies of his murdered
victims might become music to his soul, and the drippings of the
scaffold afford blood to swim in. History is full of such excesses."

WILLIAM H. FITZHUGH, Esq. of Virginia, a slaveholder, says,--"Slavery,
in its mildest form, is cruel and unnatural; _its injurious effects on
our morals and habits are mutually felt."_

HON. SAMUEL S. NICHOLAS,