No more will that
strong attachment manifest itself in their greetings. Fathers will
be fathers no longer-it is unlawful. Mothers cannot longer clasp
their children in their arms with warm affections. Children will no
longer cling around their mothers,--no longer fondle in that bosom
where once they toyed and joyed.
The articles murmur among themselves, cast longing glances at each
other, meet the gaze of their purchasers, with pain and distrust
brooding over their countenances. They would seem to trace the
character-cruel or gentle-of each in his look.
Was it that God ordained one man thus to doom another? No! the very
thought repulsed the plea. He never made one man's life to be sorrow
and fear-to be the basest object, upon which blighting strife for
gold fills the passions of tyrants. He never made man to be a dealer
in his own kind. He never made man after his own image to imprecate
the wrath of heaven by blackening earth with his foul deeds. He
never made man to blacken this fair portion of earth with storms of
contention, nor to overthrow the principles that gave it greatness.
He never made man to fill the cup that makes the grim oppressor
fierce in his triumphs over right.
Come reader-come with us: let us look around the pale of these
common man shambles. Here a venerable father sits, a bale of
merchandise, moved with the quick pulsation of human senses. He
looks around him as the storm of resentment seems ready to burst
forth: his wrinkled brow and haggard face in vain ask for sympathy.
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