[54] Some one can render a service to civilization by publishing precisely what feudal rights, so called, were abolished in large parts of Germany and Hungary in 1848, and what results to the commerce of the districts affected the greater freedom and impulse to industry arising therefrom has had. If I am rightly informed, trade, in many cases, both export and import, has already much more than quadrupled in value, thousands of peasants now demanding numerous articles and being able to pay for them, which before only a few score or hundred proprietors were expected to buy.
[55] From an “Address on Climatology,” before the Academy of Science, by Dr. Barton, of New Orleans:—
“The institution of slavery operates by contrast and comparison; it elevates the tone of the superior, adds to its refinement, allows more time to cultivate the mind, exalts the standard in morals, manners, and intellectual endowments; operates as a safety-valve for the evil disposed, leaving the upper race purer, while it really preserves from degradation, in the scale of civilization, the inferior, which we see is their uniform destiny when left to themselves. The slaves constitute essentially the lowest class, and society is immeasurably benefitted by having this class, which constitutes the offensive fungus—the great cancer of civilized life—a vast burthen and expense to every community, under surveillance and control; and not only so, but under direction as an efficient agent to promote the general welfare and increase the wealth of the community. The history of the world furnishes no institution under similar management, where so much good actually results to the governors and the governed as this in the Southern States of North America.”
“It is by the existence of slavery, exempting so large a portion of our citizens from labour, that we have leisure for intellectual pursuits.”—Governor Hammond, in South. Literary Mess.
“Would you do a benefit to the horse or the ox, by giving him a cultivated understanding, or fine feelings? So far as the mere labourer has the pride, the knowledge, or the aspirations of a free man, he is unfitted for his situation, and must doubly feel its infelicity. If there are sordid, servile, and laborious offices to be performed, is it not better that there should be sordid, servile, and laborious beings to perform them?”—Chancellor Harper; Address to South Carolina Institute.
“The relations between the North and the South are very analogous to those which subsisted between Greece and the Roman Empire, after the subjugation of Achaia by the Consul Mummius. The dignity and energy of the Roman character, conspicuous in war and in politics, were not easily tamed and adjusted to the arts of industry and literature. The degenerate and pliant Greeks, on the contrary, excelled in the handicraft and polite professions. We learn from the vigorous invective of Juvenal, that they were the most useful and capable of servants, whether as pimps or professors of rhetoric. Obsequious, dexterous, and ready, the versatile Greeks monopolized the business of teaching, publishing, and manufacturing in the Roman Empire—allowing their masters ample leisure for the service of the State, in the Senate or in the field.”—Richmond Enquirer.
[56] The business committee of the South Carolina State Agricultural Society reported, Aug. 9, 1855:—
“Our old fields are enlarging, our homesteads have been decreasing fearfully in number. * * * We are not only losing some of our most energetic and useful citizens to supply the bone and sinew of other States, but we are losing our slave population, which is the true wealth of the State, our stocks of hogs, horses, mules, and cattle are diminishing in size and decreasing in number, and our purses are strained for the last cent to supply their places from the North-western States.”
[57] De Bow’s “Review,” vol. xviii. p. 790.
[58] “Georgia Scenes,” by the Rev. and Hon. Judge Longstreet, now President of the University of Mississippi. Harper’s edition, p. 76.