In the present instance they were betrayed into one of the worst possible sins against the national bond--into the sin of doing a gross personal injustice to a large group of their fellow-countrymen.

Inasmuch as the Southerners were willfully violating a Divine law, they became in the eyes of the Abolitionists, not merely mis-guided, but wicked, men; and the Abolitionists did not scruple to speak of them as unclean beasts, who were fattening on the fruits of an iniquitous institution.

But such an inference was palpably false.

The Southern slave owners were not unclean beasts; and any theory which justified such an inference must be erroneous.

They were, for the most part, estimable if somewhat quick-tempered and irascible gentlemen, who did much to mitigate the evils of negro servitude, and who were on the whole liked rather than disliked by their bondsmen.