admits not, the intrusion of external things. And when the soul is thus permitted to enter, as it were, into the sanctuary of God; when it is humble in his presence; when all its desires are involved in the one desire of devotedness to him; then is the hour of acceptable worship, then the petition of the soul is prayer, then is its gratitude thanksgiving, then is its oblation praise. p. 92.

In the next chapter, Mr. Dymond has expressed, with his wonted fearlessness, the thousand immoralities more or less gross, which are committed in society, without the forfeiture of character, in the acquisition and management of property. This he has done by a number of miscellaneous examples, not all of them selected on account of their individual importance, but rather as illustrations of the principle of rectitude, which is so often violated. We commend what he has written on this subject to our fellow citizens. One of their besetting sins, as all the world knows, is an undue eagerness in pursuit of money. Into this they have been led, perhaps it may with truth be said, by peculiar temptation. country was impoverished by the struggle for independence. The success which crowned that enterprise filled the hearts of the people with exultation, and animated them to effort for the repair of their losses, and the improvement of the advantages they had secured. Then the long continued wars in Europe threw into their hands a large share of the commerce of the world, and afforded them opportunities to accumulate wealth with unexampled rapidity. Thus it is they have come to be "possessed of" the spirit of trade. And this spirit is not always in communion with the spirit of Christ.

The

We take this opportunity to record an illustrative anecdote, told us several years ago by a truly wise and good man, who, to escape the commotions of Europe under Bonaparte, sought an asylum in this country, and spent here the last years of his life in dignified retirement. He sat aloof from the strifes of parties, and from the bustle of the busy and the gay; and watched with the eye of a Christian philosopher the manners and tempers of those about him. At the time to which we refer, he had been speaking to us of the devotion of our countrymen to the accumulation of wealth. "It seems to me," said he, "that there are few who care about any thing else. And such are the customs of trade, and the habits of most who are involved in it, that those who would compete

6

with them, whatever be their tastes for higher pursuits, must be equally exclusive in their devotion to what your countrymen seem to regard as the one thing needful.' There is in this city,' ‚”* said he, “a man who was one of my early friends. In our own country, though an enterprising merchant, he was fond of letters; and, such were the habits of business men there, that he found leisure to indulge his literary dispositions. Since I came to live here, I have frequently visited him, but have always found his mind absorbed in the cares of trade. Why,' said I to him one day, 'why do you never incline to converse, as you used to do at home, upon subjects of science and taste?' 'Ah!' he replied, with a shrug I can read but one book now, my leger.'

We will introduce here a short passage from the next chapter, which we wish every man who is engaged in the pursuit of riches would seriously ponder.

"It were idle to affect to specify any amount of property which a person ought not to exceed. The circumstances of one man may make it reasonable that he should acquire or retain much more than another who has fewer claims. Yet somewhat of a general rule may be suggested. He who is accumulating should consider why he desires more. If it really is, that he believes an addition will increase the welfare and usefulness and virtue of his family, it is probable that further accumulation may be right. If no such belief is sincerely entertained, it is more than probable that it is wrong. He who already possesses affluence should consider its actual existing effects. If he employs a competent portion of it in increasing the happiness of others, if it does not produce any injurious effect upon his own mind, if it does not diminish or impair the virtues of his children, if they are grateful for their privileges rather than vain of their superiority, if they second his own endeavours to diffuse happiness around them, he may remain as he is. If such effects are not produced, but instead of them others of an opposite tendency, he certainly has too much. - Upon this serious subject let the Christian parent be serious. If, as is proved by the experience of every day, great property, usually inflicts great injuries upon those who possess it, what motive can induce a good man to lay it up for his children? What motive will be his justification if it tempts them from virtue?" pp. 123, 124.

Our readers must pardon us, if we turn back a few pages,

* New York.

in order to notice the following paragraph in the chapter on Property.

"SLAVES. If a person left me an estate in Virginia or the West Indies, with a hundred slaves, the law of the land allows me to keep possession of both; the moral law does not. I should therefore hold myself imperatively obliged to give these persons their liberty. I do not say that I would manumit them all the next day; but if I deferred their liberation, it ought to be for their sakes, not my own; just as, if I had a thousand pounds for a minor, my motive in withholding it from him would be exclusively his own advantage. Some persons who perceive the flagitiousness of slavery retain slaves. Much forbearance of thought and language should be observed towards the man in whose mind perhaps there is a strong conflict between conscience and the difficulty or loss which might attend a regard to its dictates. I have met with a feeling and benevolent person who owned several hundred slaves, and who, I believe, secretly lamented his own situation. I would be slow in censuring such a man; and yet it ought not to be concealed, that if he complied with the requisitions of the moral law, he would at least hasten to prepare them for emancipation. To endeavour to extricate one's self from the difficulty by selling the slaves were self-imposition. A man may as well keep them in bondage himself as sell them to another who would keep them in it, A narrative has appeared in print of the conduct of a gentleman to whom a number of slaves had been bequeathed, and who acted towards them upon the principles which rectitude requires. He conveyed them to some other country, educated some, and procured employment for others, and acted as a Christain toward all." p. 113.

We are the more careful to notice this, because we have seen it and heard it quoted, with an air of exultation, as proof that this uncompromising, evangelical moralist would not approve the doctrine which, since his death, has accomplished the abolition of British Colonial Slavery, and is destined ere long, we trust, to attain a far more signal triumph.

By the expression "I do not say that I would manumit them all the next day," he may have meant no more than that he would not forthwith dismiss them, - send them away from under his hand, which is the exact signification of the word manumit. He would not abandon them to themselves. He would endeavour, and every benevolent slave-holder ought to endeavour, to retain his freedmen within the sphere of his influence and parental control, that he might make them all the

amends in his power for the cruel injustice they had hitherto suffered, and advise and assist them to the best use and enjoyment of their liberty. But we are confident he would at once renounce all claim to them as his property. Aware of the legal contingencies, to which slaves are exposed, it seems to us that he could not, would not hold them as such one moment longer, than might be necessarily occupied by the process of emancipation. He would rid himself of the fearful responsibility as soon as possible. He would immediately recognise, and do all in his power to secure to them, their rights as men. How much soever he might endeavour to keep them still with him, he would not by any means infringe upon their rights. In the case he supposes, and in most cases, coercion would be unnecessary to bind them to him, even if it could be justified. The slaves are in general very strongly attached to the spot where they were born, where they have long lived, and especially where they have buried their dead. That is to say, they have the feelings, which other human beings have. They love home. Very few slaves would choose to leave the plantations, where they now are, if they could remain there freedmen. Such was the fact in St. Domingo, after the abolition of slavery by the National Assembly in 1794. And such has been the fact in the Islands of Bermuda, Antigua, and its dependencies, where the apprenticeship system has not obtained. The only general exceptions would be where husbands and wives, or parents and children, are now on separate plantations. They might wish to live together. Such removals as might be necessary to unite families, all benevolent men would surely encourage, as one of the first improvements to be made upon their present condition. Also, in cases where the slaves have been treated with particular cruelty, they might not be willing to remain with their masters. But, if humane masters would not have any need of power to coerce them to remain where they now are as freedmen, inhuman ones surely ought not to be trusted with such power. The unhappy operation of the apprenticeship plan in the British West Indies is making this sufficiently apparent to those who are the most "slow of heart to believe."

Mr. Dymond's opinion of slavery itself is seen more at length in another part of his volume; where he says:

"He who had no right to steal the African, can have none to sell him. From him who is known to have no right to sell, another 15

VOL. XVIII.

N. S. VOL. XIII. NO. I.

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can have no right to buy or to possess. Sale, or gift, or legacy imparts no right to me, because the seller, or giver, or bequeather had none himself. The sufferer has just as valid a claim to liberty at my hands as at the hands of the ruffian who first dragged him from his home. Every hour of every day, the present possessor is guilty of injustice. Nor is the case altered with respect to those who are born on a man's estate. The parents were never the landholder's property, and therefore the child is not. Nay, if the parents had been rightfully slaves, it would not justify me in making slaves of their children. No man has a right to make a child a slave, but himself. What are our sentiments upon kindred subjects? What do we think of the justice of the Persian system, by which when a state offender is put to death his brothers and his children are killed or mutilated too? Or, to come nearer to the point, as well as nearer home, what should we say of a law which enacted that of every criminal who was sentenced to labor for life, all the children should be sentenced so to labor also? · And yet if there is any comparison of reasonableness, it seems to be in one respect in favor of the culprit. He is condemned to slavery for his crimes; the African, for another man's profit.

"That any human being, who has not forfeited his liberty by his crimes, has a right to be free, and that whosoever forcibly withholds liberty from an innocent man robs him of his right, and violates the moral law, are truths which no man would dispute or doubt, if custom had not obscured our perceptions, or if wickedness did not prompt us to close our eyes.

"The whole system is essentially and radically bad: injustice and -oppression are its fundamental principles. Whatever lenity may be requisite in speaking of the agent, none should be shown, none should be expressed, for the act. I do not affirm or imagine that every slave-holder is therefore a wicked man; but, if he be not, it is only upon the score of ignorance. If he is exempt from the guilt of violating the moral law, it is only because he does not perceive what it requires. Let us leave the deserts of the individual to Him who knoweth the heart of his actions we may speak; and we should speak in the language of reprobation, disgust, and abhorrence." - pp. 388, 389.

The fourth and fifth chapters of the second Essay are upon Litigation, Arbitration, and the Morality of Legal Practice. We deem them so valuable, that, were we able to bear the expense, we would republish them in a pamphlet, and put a copy into the hands of every lawyer in the land. Money could not be better expended. In no part of our civil institutions is there more need of thorough reform, than in the administration of law. We are not ignorant that the legal prac