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civil anarchy by spiritual chicane . His , last act is to forbid the reading of Uncle Tom , perhaps because it contains the word " liberty . Perhaps the worst blow to slavery is the fact that it has been taken under the protection of the Pope , and that the Abolitionist novel has been put in the Index J&xpurgatorius . Prance groaning under an upstart despot , who has iust re-established the guillotine by which his predecessors suffered , is kept quiet for the moment by an extravagant expenditure that must ruin Government and State ; andthe country is seething everywhere with systematic oflicial corruption and secret conspiracy .
England , where the blessings of peace continue to be so uninterrupted , is stirred to its heart by the contest of capital and labour ; Ireland is yielding up its population to the western Republic ; and our peaceful metropolis just now is the scene of battle for every sectarian conflict by which mankind dan be divided . Here for the season is that convertible party of pious and benign people who under some form of " humanity " sleek band
pervert what they profess—that , who under the name of Abolitionists harden the hearts of the slave-owning interests ; who under the name of " peace , " keep clear the way for the tyrant invader , and sow the seeds of Kafir wars ; who under the name of Teetotallers render temperance ridiculous ; who under the name of Protestants , pamper the pious Madiai , and refuse support to Protestant Sardinia in her nascent struggle against the Pope .
Sitting in the midst , we see the national legislature endeavouring to prove , by its committees , that instead of representing the people , it represents onlj $ the colourmen , the dealers in " horsenails , " the riff-raff of boroughs , and the devices of parliamentary agents . Our House of Commons is a council of " stags , " a legislative Capel Court ; our administrators are proved to be such as railway managers , who " make tilings pleasant . " On the Continent , Government performs the work of the bravo ; in England , it is a man
of straw : abroad , wrong is imperially crowned ; in England , conscience disputing with itself in endless crotchets , leaves practical administration to adventurers and political blacklegs -. abroad , the world is governed by suppression ; with us by agitation : there , it is a great triumph to " detect" some trembling wretch , and to punish him with death or prison for a supposititious plot ; with us , the great triumph is to find out some new stimulus to the palled appetite for agitation : there , the object is to press down the lid upon the cauldron ; with us , to stir it up and throw in new explosives ; and exhausted political invention , stirring up our state agitations with the Exeter-hall ladle , peppers the indescribable broth with Mrs . Beecher Stowe .
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STOWE ON THE WHOLE DUTY OF ENGLISHMEN . Our powerful contemporary discovered last week that possibly the appointment of Mr . JSoule as envoy from the Government of Washington to that at Madrid ini < rlit mean something , and thai ; the selection of tho man who had proposed to pliieo 5 , 000 , 000 dollars in the hands of President Pierce , in ease of emergencies , Cuban or otherwise , might point to an ultimate transfer of insular territory from the Spanish to the American possession .
Now England has taken a decided part in the endeavour to suppress the- shivc-tmde ; that object is dear to the numbers who assembled in Kxeter Hull on Saturday , to learn wisdom from the mouths of Lord Slmfteslmry , Mrs . Beecher JStowe , and Mr . ( j ' eorge Oruikshnnk . But could any of the Wittenageinoto tell us what would bo lost to the hopes of the slave-trade suppression by tlio transfer of Cuba from Spain to America ? lor floiiu ! time past it haa boon notorious that the ( jiovemment of Cuba , not , without suuetion
from the Government at Madrid , has been secretly conniving at the slave-trade . A 'British ship which nwvtitly capture *! a Spanish whip , evidently intended for that traffic , wan obliged to nee its prize taken from it under circuniHtances of insult ho sorioiiH us to cast some shadow upon tho ollicers that submitted to it ; and that was Buffered beeuuHo , forwooth , our country is in alliance with Spain ! ft is strange that tho name of an all ' miieo on a piece of parchment is sufficient to I > re , von ( , our public servants from knowing our untiifroiuHiH uud thwartora from our real friends and coadjutor * . Iu Bpito , howover , of Hh
doubledealing and bullying , at last the Spanish Government is detected . One Capo , the master ot a slave-ship , goes to a Portuguese Negro colony on the coast of Caffraria , kidnaps a great number ot the population , intoxicated for the purpose ; carries off 1300 , of whom about 200 perish ; and lands the rest in the port of Cardenas , under American colours , with the knowledge and of course the connivance of the local authorities of the island . The Government instituted a colourable enquiry , but neglected real intervention . A portion of the slaves were given up ; for the rest , a fine sufficed to satisfy the Commissioners . Such is the manner in which the Spanish Government of Cuba fulfils the treaty of suppressing the slavetrade .
Now it is notorious that the American Government not only prohibits the trade nominally , but prevents it actually . If Cuba were annexed to the United States , the slave-trade between Africa and Cuba would cease . At the Exeter Hall meeting , Mr . Stowe used an argument which ought to come home very forcibly to Englishmen . England , he says , has a right to interfere in the slavery of the United the since
States , because she shares in guilt ; , without the assistance of Great Britain , the cotton $ rhich the slaves are used to grow could not be consumed . Now it is a very extraordinary argument for a professor and a clergyman , is that plea that the participation in guilt gives to the accomplice the right to be a judge and policeman over his principal . But let us pass by the bad logic and moral of the reverend gentleman , and come to the application of his " solemn truth . "
" What did the slaveholders and cotton-growers say ? Why , that the English loved to stand up in Exeter-hall and denounce them and condemn them , but would they take any less cotton from them , —would they diminish their profits one penny in their zeal to emancipate slaves by adopting the way in which their zeal might be beneficial ? The price of cotton regulated the price of the slave . At present they averaged from 800 to 1000 dollars , and to stock a cotton plantation took from
200 to 400 ; so that an immense outlay had to be made before slave labour could be brought into competition with free labour . The Chinese were now flocking into America , and would work at the rate of 6 d . a day , and the people of Great Britain now had an opportunity of making the slaveholders feel that they were in earnest , and determined to do something towards the abolition of the system . If they could abolish slavery by making speeches in that hall , or by legislation in Parliament , he should be most happy for them to do so . But they could not . The only way was by making them compete with free labour ; and , if the English could not make as much profit by using free cotton as slave cotton , they must bo content with practising a little of the denial they so properly preached to the slaveholder . "
This is not very well said , but there is some force in the argument . While Englishmen , use slave-grown cotton , they scarcely have the right to preach to those who grow slave cotton . But does Mr . Stowe really imagine that his proposition can be carried out F Does he think it possible that the English people would be brought to discontinue the use of cotton garments ; or that the English manufacturer could be persuaded , for tho sake of philanthropy , to buy cotton which is dearer than that of America ? Even ? he anti-Free-trade fervour of Uush'eld Ferrand
could not induce any large number of his countrymen to join tho woollen and anti-cotton-lord league . If our manufacturers procured cotton at a price as low as the American , but of a staple less good , does Mr . Stowo imagine that tho English housewife would be content to buy a fabric which could not " wear" so wellP The very idea is a delusion , liko that which none but a closetread professor could fall into . It would be easier to tear Queen Victoria from her throne , than to tear away the cotton shirting which Britannia wears next , her skin .
'But still the argument ought not to bo lost upon us . If we , in England , find such insepa rable difficulty in divorcing ourselves from cotton garments , can we suppose that it will bo more easy for any statesman of the Union to re-arrange their system of industry , or tho whole of that machinery which is necessary to produce the raw material , not only of that singlo garment , but of that cigar , wlfich londn its questionable perfume to tho garment , and also of somoother" notions " of price in our market ; to say nothing of tho domestic arrangements in a largo portion of tho republic . A delusion is systematically omployod to
conceal the real bearing of this question , and to betray England into a course of conduct which would really impede the professed object in view . At the very meeting at Stafford House , which ought to have been superior to such tricks , a letter was read from " C . M . Clay , " and it has since b een cited as an epistle from a statesman whose name will be more readily remembered by the common English reader than even the recent fact of his death . Everybody knows that "C . M " . Clay" is not Henry Clay , and yet there is a jingle in the sound of the two names , which was allowed to take its chance of deceiving any who might forget the distinction . But the name of Clay ought to be a rebuke to those who would recruit for English intervention on American soil . It ought to remind us that the most hopeful prospect for the Negro lies in the suggestion which Clay put forth , for a prospective emancipation of the Negroes by the action , with mature preparation , of the States themselves . And this should be a spont aneous measure , and not one dictated from without or procured by importunity from Exeter Hall . No ! Let us who cannot part with our slave-grown shirting , learn to remember that the Americans may have some difficulty in suddenly getting rid of the shirting-growing slaves .
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A REBUKE FROM MAZZINI . Kossuth has been blamed for declaring that he would talk no more , but confine himself to action ; a patriot whose conduct has been more familiar to Englishmen , and more unmistakably direct in their sight , now indignantly puts forth a declaration very similar . A friend sends us an extract from a letter , by Mazzini , apropos to the affair of Hale , of which he had seen an account in the papers . " The declarations of your Ministers are very foolish , not to say immoral ; they reveal all the political atheism which is the ruling principle of their policy . You are quite right in what you say about England ' s duty . " But what would be tlie use of protesting against Government , when the same atheism is pervading in all classes of your society ? I except a powerless minority ; you all , and some hundreds like yourselves . Is there amongst you a single society feeling the oneness of life , and tracing duties therein ? " Your so-called religious societies are declaring that the Pope is a living lie , that Papacy is the enthronement of the evil principle : are they helping me to put it down ? They know that one of our first acts would be the proclamation of freedom for all religious ideas to manifest themselves in Italy : they believe , they say , in the truth—consequently , in the triumph of Protestantism , once allowed to expound itself : do they volunteer to help me in tho opening of the arena , on which what they profess to be truth and salvation would peacefully triumph ?
" Your peace societies are witnessing tho daily loss of lives ; they must feel convinced that one day ' s battle would lead to peace : are they helping us to that short decisive battle ? Mr . Groto declares that he is fond of Italy , that her cause is , in his eyes , a sacred one ; but ho has promised to himself never to devote pecuniary help , except to domestic affairs : tho testifying for universal truth is not , for him , part of an Engl ishman's duty . Christian brotherhood is talked of everlastingly in all your chapels : is there a singlo token of brotherhood given to those 21 , 000 , 000 of Italians , who aro Hud ' criiiir in their souls and bodies ?
" Your ( Jovurmnont in the echo of your society . I am sick of writing , talking , and everything but action . Words have no meaning whatever with tho majority of men , and T feel really inclined to slmt my mouth for ever , and not to open it , except amongst yourselves . " The force of this appeal is undeniable . Our different Roeiefcies profess to be ardent in the support of Protestant truth ; they enn work themselves into a fervour of zeal about tho
Madiai—a courier and his wife ; tho one a fooblo mind , and tho other a meritorious woman , probably , but not very likely to move tho world ; but , in tho moan time , Piedmont has boguu , and still maintains , a contest with the Pope , animated , throughout , by tho true spirit of Protestantism ; and yet our religious Bociotios would bo amongst ( he fjrst to restrain our Government from any Htop which could risk . oithor war or expenditure . They droad Popery much , but taxes more .
Nny , it , would ho posaiblo for England thoroughly to counteract tho whole power of absolutism and of popery , by declaring , in oxplicit terms , that nho would bo tho leader and con-
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490 THE LEADER . [ Satprpay ,
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Leader (1850-1860), May 21, 1853, page 490, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1987/page/10/
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