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Porter is, and as Dr. Dewey, and Dr. Parkman, and Dr. Gannett, and Dr. Olin, and Dr. Patton, and Dr. Cox, and a host of other Doctors of Divinity, who all profess to be just as anxious for the abolition of slavery as every member of the American Anti-Slavery Society is, but who yet do nothing for the emancipation of the coloured man, and are ever found foremost in the ranks of those who are drawing his chains tighter and tighter, and who never lose an opportunity of thwarting and maligning the men who are labouring for his immediate enfranchisement. If we are taking wrong measures to gain a righteous end, why, in the name of God and humanity, show us a better path: let us see you walking in it; do not keep your arms folded, and your ears for ever closed against "the cries of God's poor?"

I call upon the Rev. John Scott Porter to become an active member of the American Anti-Slavery Society, and to prove to the world by acts, and not by mere professions, that he is "as determined a foe to slavery as" myself "or any living man can be." Let him give his mind and soul to the work, as every Christian man is bound to do; and I am much mistaken if he do not soon feel with me, that a convert to Unitarianism who continues to reside in a slave-holding community is not a convert of whom a Christian people should feel proud. Every Unitarian-every Unitarian Minister in an especial manner-ought to be an advocate, a warm and zealous advocate, of everything that tends to improve mankind, physically, intellectually, or morally. Of what value is our profession of the pure principles of Christianity, if we do not prove to mankind that they influence and regulate our conduct in life? It is my conviction that, if we all did our duty as earnest men, we would convert the world. But talk wont do the work-profession wont do the work-preaching wont do the work. We must prove to the world by our practice that our faith is a living faith. It is worse than a dead faith, if it do not fill our souls with such a loathing of slavery that we can neither tolerate the thing itself nor any argument that tends, in any degree, to lessen the guilt of the man or the woman who participates in it. Let us behold our own children and dearest connexions on the auction table, torn from our arms by men who care not for human rights, and who can have no belief in the judgments of a just God. And as we would talk and act if this were a real, and not an imaginary, picture, so let us now act on behalf of those millions of our brethren whom we know to be the victims of such cruel tyranny.

. Mr. Editor, will you kindly excuse this long intrusion on your patience and on your space. I know how imperfectly I write, and how much I leave myself open to the criticisms of clever opponents; but these things cannot turn me aside from my purpose to labour with my poor ability, on behalf of my fellow-men, when I see them un

justly trampled upon. I have reason to know that if my "attack on Mrs. Dana," as Mr. Porter unfairly designates it, has called forth some expressions of disapprobation, it has also given rise to feelings of sympathy in many quarters; so that I should hope my "diatribe" (I cannot find this word in any dictionary that is in my house, but I understand it means something scurrilous in matter and manner) is not “well calculated to injure the cause" you have at heart; to wit, the promotion of true Christianity among your readers, but that it will aid you in the attainment of that desirable end. I beg to assure (I would like to say my friend, but his cold and uncourteous reply repels that freedom) Mr. Porter, that if he will labour with me on behalf of humanity-of down-trodden human beings-I do not say according to my standard-but in accordance with his own professions as a Christian Minister-he will find me a zealous coadjutor; and no unkind feelings towards him, because of his unkind expressions regarding me, shall dwell in my mind.

Wishing you much success in your labours for the prosecution of Christian truth among men,

I remain, my dear Sir,

Yours, very truly,

JAMES HAUGHTON.

THE PEACE MOVEMENT.

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WE take the following extracts from an able and eloquent course, delivered in the First Church, Boston, before the Ancient and Honourable Artillery Company, by George E. Ellis, Pastor of the Harvard Church, Charleston.

Although the preacher accepted an invitation to address the representatives of the military force of the American Commonwealth, on their anniversary day, we find in his sermon no palliation of war— no paltering with the great peace principle as inculcated in the Gospel. He proclaims sentiments and convictions which fairly cover the whole ground occupied by peace societies and peace advocates, whilst his discourse is entirely free from the unreasonable views which many sincere friends of peace entertain on this subject.

The officers and members of the Artillery Company have observed the first day of June, as an anniversary, for upwards of two hundred years. On these occasions there is always a religious service in the First Church (Unitarian), Boston, conducted by a Minister of the Gospel, chosen by them for that purpose. Many of the discourses delivered on former occasions are in print; and it is gratifying to the friends of peace and improvement, to mark the slow but wondrous

changes that have taken place. From the same pulpit in which Mr. Ellis pleaded the cause of peace, many of his audience had listened to attempted vindications of war, as consistent with true policy and revealed religion.

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The Preacher selected as his text a portion of the Saviour's sermon on the Mount, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God;" and his leading object is to the rulers of Christian nations the full burden of their responsibility, to prevent, for the future, the deplorable calamity of war." sponsibility on the part of rulers, he illustrates and enforces in a very spirited and eloquent manner. He argues for the two following po

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"1. That whatever be the sin or folly of war, the soldier who is most concerned in it may be the least culpable for it.

"2. That if ever, henceforward, throughout Christendom, recourse shall be had to arms, statesmen, legislators, and public teachers, rather than the military, will deserve the blame and incur the guilt."

This, we think, is putting the question in its true light. The responsibility must not be placed, as many are disposed to do, entirely on the soldier, since he is but the mere instrument and servant of others in the horrible work of war. It is justly the reproach of priests and statesmen, that after having produced strife and ministered to dissension, by their rapacity and ambition, they have then called on the soldier to settle their unhallowed quarrels.

In support of his two assertions, Mr. Ellis speaks in the following

terms:

"All the direful pages of the world's long wars might be read to you, and each page would verify my first position. Soldiers have been the agents and victims of other men's errors and passions. Of course, I except from this excuse all who for ambition or self-exaltation have led in wars; for such as these are in fact witnesses to the truth of the excuse which I am now urging for soldiers in general. Soldiers have fought, but rulers and priests have given them their arms, and opened the quarrels, and led on the strife. The first Christian Emperor turned the Holy Cross of Christ into a military emblem, and a Christian monk invented gunpowder. When clergymen and civilians denounce war and rebuke soldiers, they ought to remember that they themselves have had the first opportunity of doing the work which, failing to do, they leave to the wretched chances of war. The inefficiency of the right in this, as in all other matters, gives license to the wrong. Because legislators, rulers, senators, and teachers fail to do their appointed work by the methods of righteousness and peace, therefore force is called in, and the scales of justice are dropped from the hands of the magistrate, that the people may beat them into spears and helmets. When by the failure, or withdrawal, or confessed incompetency of the means of peace, recourse is had to force, it matters very little how that force is exerted; for if in such an emergency men have no swords r guns, they will take up clubs and stones. War is only an exhibition, through a solar microscope and on an open field, of a contest between two pugilists contending for right of way in a narrow street, and using dirt or pavements, whips or fists, when their tongues or their tempers fail them.

The spirit and the measures which appear in and carry on a war, find their sanction or their instigation at least in the reluctance of rulers to do

what is simply right-to regard justice and humanity. Neither the classic, nor even the barbarian, annals of ancient times, record a single scene of strife from the universal conquests of Alexander, to the last skirmishes that sundered the Roman Empire, which may not be traced either to the ambition or misgovernment of those who were entrusted with the guardianship of a righteous peace. And Christian annals, filled as they are with the harrowing recitals of war on every continent and island of the known earth, will prove that the causes of every war have been either the base faithlessness of rulers, or the evil spirit of priests. The weapon of death has been the unthinking and blameless implement of the soldier, and the soldier himself has been the almost as unthinking and blameless implement of his instigator to the battle. "Call up from their unshrouded and promiscuous graves, on all battle-fields, the huge masses of the slain in all the wars of Christendom. They are all victims of a strife which, in its early stage, one single man, wearing a cow! or holding a statute book, might have prevented. The twenty thousand bodies from the ashes of which the rich crops of Waterloo have grown for thirty summers, belonged to men no two of whom had any personal difference each with the other. They were summoned to that field from their farms and workshops, to bring to an issue a contest which they had not begun, but which their rulers were bound to have averted, and had the means of averting.........

"When the protracted intrigues of rulers, or the base machinations of politics, or the ripened ambition of despots, make a war, as is said, inevitable, then a new party is called into the contest. The military are appealed to, not, however, to be entrusted with any discretionary power. The alternative choice of peace or war is not committed to them: it has already been made by those to whose wisdom they have confided themselves, and war is the result. The last exercise of authority, on the part of rulers, is to put the country under martial law. Their proclamation is for war. This simple fact, which no sophistry can gainsay or evade, stares us all in the face. The rulers, representing the wisdom and force of a nation, tell the people they must fight, and every individual must either obey that command or suffer as its victim. The property of all is taxed for it. Our homes may be turned into barracks. The limits of certain ages define those who must fight. Levies, draughts, enlistments, conscriptions, and impressments fill up and renew the ranks. To resist is to yield one's self a prisoner, to desert is to risk a less honourable hazard for death or for life, than that of the open field. When rulers have brought their ill-governed and ill-served people to this hard contingency, they have taken from them the means of peace, and have in fact begun a war, before a tent has been pitched or a cannon charged. Then all that high councils can do is done to urge on that war. Every exercise of magistratical authority serves for it. A large party is at once called together, like the ravens around the carcass, who are to find their game and their profit in war. All public officers must resign and starve, or approve and prosper. All public funds are turned to open the great highway of blood, embanked by the ghastly bodies of the dead. The spirit of war is kindled, and it takes possession of some of the gentlest bosoms. The war is begun, and it cannot now be averted, and the hope of the best, and the prayer of all but the worst, is, that it may be speedily but gloriously concluded. Then rises the heaven-insulting cry, Our country, be she right or wrong!' Then the honour of the nation, the renown of bravery, the disgrace of being beaten, the hope of triumph, the exciting comments on each day's news, strain many reluctant and revolting hearts to the direful work. The happy farmer, artisan, or tradesman takes the bright musket in his hand and fearns its use, while his nerves are braced and his courage quickens. He parts with parents, wife, lover, and home, and goes to the field, made strong for its savage scenes by the help of many excitements which need not be rehearsed. He is weary with his marches, he is wakeful on the eve of battle. He thinks many thoughts; but he must be of a sluggish sense, if he does not entertain among them the question whether the issue for which he is to contend might not have been decided by wise and just counsels better than by the defilement and the extinction of his humanity... He will fall dead or wounded upon the field, or he will survive to bear away the stain, if not the guilt, of blood. Oh! who would have upon his soul the tor

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ments which come in the death-thirst of that soldier! He has done a work which lays upon some soul a heavy burden of folly and sin; but his, I main-. tain, is the least share in that burden. He has been the most concerned in it, but he is the least culpable for it. Woe-woe-be upon him by whom the offence has come !...

"My second position in this plea for peace, is, that statesmen, legislators, and public teachers, will deserve the blame and incur the guilt of any war that shall henceforward vent its destruction upon any portion of Christendom, or employ the arms of a civilized people. This assertion, taken with that already advanced, while together they excuse the military, throw the whole burden of responsibility for the heaviest of calamities upon rulers and teachers. If our public men will realize this lesson, and feel that they are entrusted with the settlement of all disputes without the power of appealing to arms, peace must triumph.

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Certainly we have a right to look to the constituted authorities and guides of a people for the prevention of war and the settlement of all difficulties peacefully. They ought to be held to this as the very object of their office, the law, the method, and the end of their delegated authority. They should be ridiculed, assailed, dishonoured, if they are faithless to it. It is the very noblest object of their power, their sceptre, their glory. They are set upon thrones and high places that they may see trouble advancing from afar off, and may prevent its approach. They have their messengers to speed with their commands, their attendants to watch and warn. It is the most sublime protraiture of God that he dwells in light, whence he rules the kingdom of darkness; making the winds obey and the fire serve, while still he is a God of peace. And princes and rulers are gods-for to them the Word of God has come. They are delegated with divine authority to do on earth what God does in heaven. The care of commerce and mail-bags, of custom-houses and light-houses, is but a poor trifling with mere straws in comparison with the high calling of our rulers as the guardians of the nation's peace.

Consider for a moment what an array of means, mighty and all-sufficient, if we would only call them so, are now at the service of Christian nations and entrusted to rulers to cause that justice, and tranquillity, and peace shall crown their lands. The prosperity of a people affords those means, and multiplies and strengthens them every day; and thus peace has an easier purchase than that paid by Cromwell. It is indeed an indisputable fact, that any two Christian nations must now seek a war rather than encounter one: they must fight from choice, not from necessity. They must overcome the resistance of righteousness, of policy, of interest, and of shame; and if, after all, they fight, even the winner is the loser, and the vanquished may be the truly victorious. Whatever else they gain, they must alike part with glory, and enter upon the long penance which history will make everlasting. And why? Simply because there are means at the service of rulers which will avert war honourably. Honourably, do I say? Yes, means which will make the averting of war the only honourable way. Consider and sum up these means. Here are the bands of mutual service and dependence, commerce, trade, the transmission of the wealth of mind, chaining nations together by ships which link the bending waves of the oceans. Here are ambassadors and consuls, the hosttages of a truce between empires, or rather, by more affectionate interpretation, serving as the sponsors at the bridals of God's separated families, with bearers of their despatches as pages to carry their letters of love. Here are senate houses and conventions. Here are chosen men selected from the mass and entrusted with every honourable and ennobling privilege. These are the ties of nations now, while one heavenly religion, pure, and holy, and perfect, and beneficent as its great exemplar, speaks gently but solemnly to all alike"If one member suffer, all the members suffer with it." These are the means of peace. And what are they all for? The advanced civilization of the world has gathered them all together, and wrought them into an apparatus of means which resemble indeed the preparations for a great jubilee for all the children of men. When thus we contemplate these means for ensuring peace, are we not all tempted to exclaim-Peace is inevitable; it cannot but be that civilized men will put away war, for before they can fight with each other, they must kill the children which they have mutually begotten?"

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