And--strange coincidence--while Southern men presided over the
destinies of the Union, its gigantic prosperity was the astonishment
of the world. In the hands of Northern men, that edifice, raised
with so much care and labor by their predecessors, comes crashing
down, threatening to carry with it in its fall the industrial future
of every other nation. For long years the constant efforts of the
North, and a certain foreign country, to spread among the blacks
incendiary pamphlets and tracts have powerfully contributed to
suspend every Southern movement towards emancipation. Its people
have been compelled to close their ears to ideas which threatened
their very existence.'"
"But," said Mr. North, "here we have been, for thirty years or more,
living on an anti-slavery excitement. Grant that it is all wrong; will
you ask or expect that we shall change all at once? in a week? or in a
month? or in a year? We will not kneel to anybody; if we change, it must
be upon conviction."
"I strike hands with you there," said I, "most heartily. Our Southern
friends must understand this; they must now approach us once more with
reason and persuasion.
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