the North and South will think and feel and act together on the subject
of slavery. I thank God for the agitation. May he forgive the folly and
wickedness of many who have gotten it up! May he reveal more and more,
that surely the wrath of man shall praise him, while the remainder of
wrath he will restrain!



_Declaration of Independence_.


I agree with you, sir, that _the second paragraph_ of the Declaration of
Independence contains _five affirmations_, declared to be self-evident
truths, which, if truths, do sustain you and all abolitionists in every
thing you say as to the right of the negro to liberty; and not only to
liberty,--to equality, political and social. But I disagree with you as to
their truth, and I say that not one of said affirmations is a self-evident
truth, or a truth at all. On the contrary, that each one is contrary to
the Bible; that each one, separately, is denied; and that all five,
collectively, are denied and upset by the Bible, by the natural history of
man, and by providence, in every age of the world. I say this now. In a
subsequent communication, I will prove what I affirm. For the present I
merely add, that the Declaration of Independence stands in no need of
these false affirmations. It was, and is, a beautiful whole without them.
It was, and is, without these imaginary maxims, the simple statement of
the grievances the colonies had borne from the mother-country, and their
right _as colonies_, when thus oppressed, to declare themselves
independent. That is to say, the right given of God to oppressed children
to seek protection in another family, or to set up for themselves somewhat
before _twenty-one_ or natural maturity; right belonging to them _in the