this stupendous difference between right and wrong, - make that to be just under one shade of color, which under another would be infinitely unjust? Is this the ethics of the slave system, - that a brand or a chain upon a white skin is a heinous wrong, to make all the world cry out with indignation, and that a brand or a chain upon a colored skin is a righteous and lawful mark and badge?

This is the strong ground of the "Free Soil" argument, but this is not all. The wrong principle works out bad effects. Not as visionary dreamers, not as mere moralizers, do we protest against the slave system; but as political economists, as patriot citizens, as those who wish to see upon their territories the most vigorous and prosperous growth of men. If there were a Upas-tree which could be introduced into California and New Mexico, to spread a fatal blight through all the land, who would permit it to be planted there? Slavery is that Upas-tree. It is a blight to industry, making it a degradation; it is a blight to the very soil, exhausting its fertility; it is a blight to the general education of the white. race, from the necessary sparseness of that class of the population; it is a blight to the whole internal activity and mechanical genius and commercial prosperity of any people. Why, one of the strongest pleas for the occupancy of a new soil is, that the old is worn out. It is said, we know, that the torrid zone cannot be cultivated by any but black men. Suppose it were true, is that an argument for making them slaves? But we doubt if it be so. We do not believe there is any region in which white men cannot be acclimated, and accustomed to toil. Are the people of Brazil and Hindostan and Siam black men? And even if the burning line bronzes the complexions of men as they approach it, is that, we repeat, any reason for making them slaves? Do the free and fierce elements, as they sweep around, write slave upon the brow which they have darkened?

No, complexion is not the brand of servitude even in the slaveholder's estimation. It is descent from the slave mother, even though her children be almost as white as their master. It is not nature's direction, but arbitrary enactment, that makes a slave. It is "local law." And it seems to us that it would have been much wiser for the slaveholder to have said that the law established a relation, rather than a tenure, a certain relation between him and the slave, like the old serfdom, rather than property in man.

A human

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Opposing Parties.

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being to be property! commodity, chattel, implement ! Universal human nature cries out upon it with abhorrence. The idea is not tenable, not tolerable, hardly conceivable. No, it is a relation established by arbitrary, particular, local law. The slaveholder is estopped by all natural law from arguing that he has just as good a right to carry his slaves to the new territory as to carry his horse or his plough or his cotton-mill.

But here is the trouble. If the planter were forbidden by the government to carry a certain machine for packing cotton to the new territories, because it was known to injure the fabric, doubtless then he would be offended. But it is a very different kind of offence that he takes at being forbidden to carry his slaves there. What is this difference? Why does this latter prohibition, or the proposal of it, awaken such a peculiar sensibility? It is that the refusal is put on moral grounds. It is our fixed conviction that slavery is morally wrong, that makes our position so exasperating to the people of the South. They say, "You proscribe us by the proposed law. You assail our character. You say that we have among us a practice so bad that it cannot be tolerated. Then we must be bad men. We cannot submit to this." For our own part, we are painfully sensible to this bearing of our position and our argument; to their bearing upon many excellent, honorable, and Christian men. But we must say, that the fault is not ours. We have taken no new ground upon this matter of slavery. It is they that have placed themselves in a new and a wrong position. Pressed by attacks from the North, and indeed from the whole civilized world, and led on by an eminent statesman of their own, they have forsaken the old defensive ground and assumed the offensive. They have forsaken the ground which their and our fathers held, that slavery was a system entailed upon them, and from which they could not immediately free themselves, and they boldly maintain that it is a most excellent, a most admirable, a most Christian institution, and ought to be permanent; that it is perfectly just and right to buy and sell men like cattle in the market, and to hold them in bondage for ever. It is this that has brought us into direct, moral collision as opposing parties.

Who shall yield? It is a solemn and momentous question. We cannot. If they will not, if the Southern States choose to break off from this republic and to set up a con

federacy for themselves, there are two things, we think, not to mention others, which are to be commended to their very serious consideration. First, it has been very well asked, Which of those States will consent to be border States? Will Virginia and Kentucky, or will North Carolina and Tennessee? They must build a wall far higher than the Chinese wall, or they cannot keep their slaves a month. The bondman will have but to pass an imaginary line, to cross a field, or to leap a fence, and he will be free. Next, the republic, that establishes itself with the feelings and on the simple footing of a preference of the slave system, will lay itself under the ban of the whole Christian world. We should not wonder if some civilized nations should refuse to send ambassadors to it. We should not wonder if by others the very courtesies of private life should be denied to its citizens. The reproach of which they now complain would gather into a weight of universal reprobation that would be enough to crush down any people. They may resent the suggestion now, they may say they are sufficient to themselves; but no family, no community, no nation, can long stand against universal scorn and indignation. The inhabitants of such a country would gradually forsake it ; or they would go down in self-respect, in virtue, in character, as certainly as there are laws of the social world that bind them in common with other men.

These are painful things to say; but, in common with many other considerations, they persuade us that there will be no dissolution of this Union. It is painful to say them; but, on such a subject, free, frank, plain words are to be spoken. The true courtesy between honest and honorable men is perfect and fearless sincerity. If we had brothers of our own blood in the South, we should say this to them. We should say, "You cannot separate from us; you cannot arrange any feasible plan of separation; and you would bring upon yourselves the deepest injury and dishonor before the whole world, if you could."

We say dishonor before the world. There is no doubt about that. But we mind not mainly, in this matter, what the world says, what the world calls dishonor. We stand upon the ground of eternal right. Freedom is our nature's birthright. Where is the man on the face of God's earth who will say, that for the slave to break the chain which binds him, and to flee from it, is an unworthy deed, is forbidden by

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nature's law? Nowhere. The voice of all the world thus adjudges slavery to be a wrong to humanity. Freedom, we say, is our nature's birthright. We are called to liberty" by the voice of Heaven, and now, emphatically, of earth also. A cry has gone through the world, saying, "Up, and demand justice! Up, and be free!" Justice! Empires are shaken, thrones tremble, kings grow pale at that word. Justice! It is the stability of the universe; it is the throne of Heaven; it is the guardianship of the world; it is the law of all time; it is the empire of eternity!

If we have detained our readers long, the importance of the subjects upon which we have been engaged must be our apology. This is a time for clear, discriminating, fixed, and firm opinion and decision. Never were the moral elements. of the world in such commotion as now; and they are all tending to one point, the enfranchisement of humanity from all unjust bonds. Freedom! the moralist's, poet's, sage's theme in all ages, we do not yet know, perhaps, how precious is this boon to our very nature. No commendation, no boasting, can tell or explain what it is to us. Free speech, free thought, free action! Speech, thought, action, are nothing without this living element. Friendship is free, and retired life is free, and leisure after success is free; and more than half the charm of them lies in this. Whatever befalls us, whatever calamity, affliction, or sorrow, O, let us be free! Put no manacle upon our hand, put no dogma in our head, put no superstition in our heart. The trees wave in freedom on the hills; the streams flow in freedom; beast, bird, and insect are free; the creation is the theatre of freedom: shall man sigh in it, as a dungeon-slave? One bond there is for him, bond to lawful headship in the family and the state, bond to justice, bond to the infinite Rectitude; but that bond is perfect freedom.

0. D.

ART. II.-SCOTUS ERIGENA.*

SCOTUS ERIGENA has, perhaps, exerted as great an influence on the course of philosophy as any man since the days of Aristotle. His name has lain for centuries in darkness, condemned to oblivion by the judgment of Popes and Councils. But his books were eagerly read by those who durst not quote them, and proved the fruitful seed that brought forth both the scholasticisin and the mysticism of the Middle Ages. We propose, in the presenti article, to give a brief sketch of his system, as unfolded in his great work, De Divisione Naturæ. But, first, it may be proper to say a few words of his life and writings, taking for our authority Schlüter's preface to his edition of this work.

John Scotus Erigena, an Irishman by birth, born probably about the year 828, in a country then celebrated for the culture of letters, was learned in all polite branches, and especially in Greek philosophy and literature. Having perfected himself in these studies, and being consecrated to the priesthood, he went, like many of his countrymen, to France, where Charles the Bald appointed him teacher of mathematics and logic in his famous school at Paris. His natural goodhumor, with his witty and lively conversation, greatly pleased the king, whose friendship aided him in promoting sound learning in France. He soon, however, fell into a controversy with the Saxon monk, Godeschalk, concerning predestination. His work defending the Archbishop Hincmarsh, who had condemned Godeschalk, is yet extant. But the Pope Nicolas I. approved the doctrines of Remigius, a defender of Godeschalk, and confirmed the canons of the Council of Valence, which condemned the dogmas of Erigena. After this, Charles induced him to translate the works of the pseudo Dionysius the Areopagite, which Michael Balbus had, A. D. 827, given to Louis the Pious. But when Scotus had finished the translation, he found his only reward from the

1. JOHANNIS SCOTI ERIGENE De Divisione Naturæ Libri Quinque. Editio recognita et emendala. Accedunt Tredecim Auctoris Hymni ad Carolum Calvum, ex Palimpsestis Angeli Maii. Monasterii Guestphalorum Typis et Sumptibus Libraria Aschendorffiance. 1838. 8vo. pp. 610. [With a preface in Latin, by C. B. Schlüter.]

2. Scot Érigine et la Philosophie Scholastique. Par M. SAINT-RENÉ TAILLANDIER, Professeur suppléant à la Faculté des Lettres de Strasbourg. Strasbourg et Paris. 1843. 8vo. pp. 331.