A Review of Uncle Toms Cabin | Page 3

is thus that the public mind is poisoned, public morals vitiated, and honest but ignorant men led to say and do many things, which must, sooner or later, result in deplorable consequences, unless something can be brought to bear on the public mind that will counteract the evil. The writer hopes, through the blessing of God, that the following pages will prove an efficient antidote.
Southern people have their faults; they err in many things: and far be it from me, under such circumstances, to become their apologist. It is not as a defender of the South I appear before the public, but in defense of my country, North and South. We are all brethren; we are all citizens of the same heaven-favored country; and how residents of one part of it can spend their lives in vilifying, traducing, and misrepresenting those of another portion of it, is, to me, unaccountable. It is strange, indeed! I entreat my countrymen to reflect soberly on these things; and in the name of all that is sacred I entreat you, my abolition friends, to pause a while, in your mad career, and review the whole ground. It may be that some of you may yet see the error of your course. I cannot give you all up. I trust in God that you are not all given over to "hardness of heart and reprobacy of mind." A word to the reader. Pass on--hear me through--never mind my harsh expressions and uncouth language. Truth is not very palatable, to any of us, at all times. Crack the nut; it may be that you will find a kernel within that will reward you for your trouble.
False impressions have been made, and continue to be made by the writers alluded to above; sectional hatred is engendered, North and South; and if this incessant warfare continues, it will, at no very distant day, produce a dissolution of this Union. This result is inevitable if the present state of things continues. Has the agitation and discussion of the question of African slavery, in the free States, resulted in any good, or is it ever likely to result in any? I flatter myself that I have clearly shown, in the following pages, that hitherto its consequences have been evil and only evil, and that nothing but evil can grow out of it in future. I think that I have adduced historical facts which clearly and indisputably prove that northern agitation has served but to rivet the chains of slavery; that it has retarded emancipation; that it has augmented the evils and hardships of slavery; that it has inflicted injury on both masters and servants; that it has engendered sectional hatred which endangers the peace, prosperity, and perpetuity of the Union. Why, then, will abolitionists persist in a course so inconsistent; so contrary to reason; so opposed to truth, righteousness, and justice? They need not tell me that slavery is an evil; that slavery is a curse; that slavery is a hardship, and that it ought to be extinguished. I admit it; but this is not the question. On this head I have no controversy with them. The question is, whether their course of procedure is ever likely to remove or mitigate the evils of slavery. Are we prepared, in our efforts to remove the evils of slavery, to incur the risk of subjecting ourselves to calamities infinitely worse that African slavery itself? Or rather, is there the remotest probability, supposing the plans and schemes of abolitionists should be carried out, the Union dissolved, and the country plunged into civil war, that slavery would thereby be abolished in the southern States?
These are the questions at issue between the abolition party and the writer; and these are among the prominent questions discussed in the following pages. It is true that I have hastily glanced at slavery in all its bearings, but it was the fell spirit of abolitionism which first attracted my attention, and induced me to investigate the subject. It was its revolutionary designs and tendencies, its contempt of all law, human and Divine, that first impressed my mind with the necessity of prompt and efficient action on the part of the friends of our country. It was the unparalleled circulation of Uncle Tom's Cabin that aroused my fears, and excited in my mind apprehensions of danger. If such productions as Uncle Tom's Cabin are to give tone to public sentiment in the North, then assuredly are we in danger. Should Mrs. Stowe's vile aspersion of southern character, and her loose, reckless and wicked misrepresentations of the institution of slavery in the southern States ever become accredited in the northern section of the Union I fear the consequence. I sometimes survey the condition of my country with consternation and dismay, and