“Admitting, as all do, that slavery is a great evil, existing in the
land, we would anxiously inquire, Is there no remedy? Is there any
evil for which God has provided no remedy? No, I would not slander the
Bible, by making such an assertion. Let us all come up to the work,
shoulder to shoulder, in a pleasant way, (I don’t like scowls,) and
there is no danger but we can get right. I have heard many remedies
proposed; and one very queer one: ‘_Better let it alone._’ This is a
very popular remedy. In case of slight pain, or momentary head-ach, it
will do very well. But who ever heard that an acute disease, which
racks the whole frame, and threatens speedy dissolution, if left to
the operations of nature, will cure itself? Sin is an inveterate
disease――it has no curative principle――it never gets well of itself.
Slavery will never cure itself.――This _let-alone_ policy――if it were
in the church, I would call it _heresy_――it is _moral_ heresy.
“But, I have heard of another remedy: ‘Just leave that question to the
slave states. What have we at the north to do with slavery?’ But, here
is ground for caution. Have not we at the north our share in the
government of the District of Columbia? Do we not in fact govern it?
Yet, that district is the central mart of the traffic in human flesh.
Yes, sir, we at the north do govern slave shambles. Our hands are not
quite so clean as we have supposed――as in the dusty atmosphere of
Pittsburgh, we often get them a little smutty before we are aware of
it.
“My southern brethren never heard me slander them. I am candid on this
subject. Often do we hear it said, ‘What do northern people know about
slavery?’ Sir, I am not a stranger to slavery. I have resided eleven
years at the south, and three or four winters into the bargain, and I
know something about it. It is an immense evil. I can go, chapter and
verse, with the able document that has been read.[2] It is even
so――the very picture of slavery. Are our southern brethren infallible?
They are very kind-hearted brethren; yet some of them SELL THE IMAGE
OF JESUS IN THEIR SLAVES! Are they competent judges in the case?――The
wise man says, ‘A gift blindeth the eyes.’ They judge with the price
of human flesh in their hands.”
[2] The Declaration of the Ohio Anti-Slavery Convention.