The life that she describes upon the model plantation is the necessary life of Slavery everywhere,—injustice, ignorance, superstition, terror, degradation, brutality; and this is the system to which a great political party—counting upon the enervation of prosperity, the timidity of trade, the distance of the suffering, the legal quibbles, the moral sophisms, the hatred of ignorance, the jealousy of race, and the possession of power—has conspired to keep the nation blind and deaf, trusting that its mind was utterly obscured and its conscience wholly destroyed.
But the nation is young, and of course the effort has ended in civil war. Slavery, industrially and politically, inevitably resists Christian civilization. The natural progress and development of men into a constantly higher manhood must cease, or this system, which strives to convert men into things, must give way. Its haughty instinct knows it, and therefore Slavery rebels. This Rebellion is simply the insurrection of Barbarism against Civilization. It would overthrow the Government, not for any wrong the Government has done, for that is not alleged. It knows that the people are the Government,—that the spirit of the people is progressive and intelligent,—and that there is no hope for permanent and expansive injustice, so long as the people freely discuss and decide. It would therefore establish a new Government, of which this meanest and most beastly despotism shall be the chief corner-stone. In a letter to C.G., in the appendix of her book, Mrs. Kemble sets this truth in the clearest light. But whoever would comprehend the real social scope of the Rebellion should ponder every page of the journal itself. It will show him that Slavery and rebellion to this Government are identical, not only in fact, but of necessity. It will teach him that the fierce battle between Slavery and the Government, once engaged, can end only in the destruction of one or the other.
This is not a book which a woman like Mrs. Kemble publishes without a solemn sense of responsibility. A sadder book the human hand never wrote, nor one more likely to arrest the thoughts of all those in the world who watch our war and are yet not steeled to persuasion and conviction. An Englishwoman, she publishes it in England, which hates us, that a testimony which will not be doubted may be useful to the country in which she has lived so long, and with which her sweetest and saddest memories are forever associated. It is a noble service nobly done. The enthusiasm, the admiration, the affection, which in our day of seemingly cloudless prosperity greeted the brilliant girl, have been bountifully repaid by the true and timely words now spoken in our seeming adversity by the grave and thoughtful woman.
An Historical Research respecting the Opinions of the Founders of the Republic on Negroes as Slaves, as Citizens, and as Soldiers. Read before the Massachusetts Historical Society, August 14, 1862. By GEORGE LIVERMORE. Third Edition. Boston: A. Williams & Co.
This Historical Research is one of the most valuable works that have been called out by the existing Rebellion. It is a thorough and candid exposition of the opinions of the founders of the Republic on negroes as slaves, as citizens, and as soldiers, and has done more, perhaps, than any other single essay to form the public opinion of the present time in respect to the position that the negro should rightfully hold in our State and our army. It has, therefore, and will retain, a double interest, as exhibiting and illustrating the opinions prevalent during the two most important periods of our history. It was first printed, several months since, for private distribution only. More than a thousand copies were thus distributed by its public-spirited author. By this means the attention of persons in positions of influence was more readily secured than it could have been, had the essay been published in the ordinary way. The manner in which the research was conducted, the evidence afforded by every page of the author's conscientious labor, impartial selection, and exhaustive investigation, won immediate confidence in his statements, while his obvious candor, fairness of judgment, and love of truth secured respect for his conclusions. The interest excited by the work extended to a wider circle than could be satisfied by any private issue, while its value became more and more evident, so that, after its publication in the Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, the permission of the author was obtained by the New-England Loyal Publication Society to issue the work in a form for general circulation.
We are glad to assist, by our hearty commendation, the extension of the influence of this essay. It forms, as now issued, a handsome pamphlet of two hundred pages, with a full Table of Contents and a copious Index, and is for sale at a price which brings it within the means of every one who may wish to obtain it. It is a book which should be in the reading-room of every Loyal League throughout the country, and of every military hospital. Editors of the loyal press should be provided with it, as containing an arsenal of incontrovertible arguments with which to meet the false assertions by which the maligners of the negro race and the supporters of Slavery too often undertake to maintain their bad cause.
Exhibiting, as Mr. Livermore's book does, the contrast between the opinions of the founders of the Republic and those professed by the would-be destroyers of the Republic, and showing, as it does, how far a large portion even of the people of the North have fallen away from the just and generous doctrine of the earlier time, it must lead every thoughtful reader to a deep sense of the need of a regeneration of the spirit of the nation, and to a confirmed conviction of the incompatibility of Slavery with national greatness and virtue. The Rebellion has taught us that the Republic is not safe while Slavery is permitted to exercise any political power. It ought to teach us also, that, as long as Slavery exists in any of the States, it will not cease to exercise political power, and that the only means to make the nation safe is utterly to abolish and destroy Slavery, wherever it is found within its limits. Nor is this all; the lesson of the Rebellion is but half learned, unless we resolve that henceforth there shall be no fatal division between our consciences, our principles, our theories, and our treatment of the black race, and unless we acknowledge their inalienable right to that justice by which alone the most ancient heavens and the most sacred institutions are fresh and strong.
There is no better textbook for enforcing these lessons than Mr. Livermore's Research.