| 1133 [The clerk here read as follows: "Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure. Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree: the Lord hath said unto me, Thou are my Son: this day have I begotten thee."]
And again:
"All power is given to me in heaven and in earth: Go, ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptising [baptizing] them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world."
It is a favorite theory of many that we have a right to conquer, in order to civilize and Christianize, and upon the passage thus quoted that pretensions rests. But it is calculating rather largely upon public credulity to suppose that common sense can be hoodwinked thus in the present controversy, and that any one is weak enough to believe the propagation of Christianity to be one of our objects in setting up our claim so steadily to the territory in dispute. Does the language of Holy Writ, thus pressed into the service, designate us, more than any other people, as the exclusive proprietors of 'the heathen,' and the 'uttermost parts' that they inhabit? Are we commissioned, any more than English, Russians, Frenchmen, to teach and baptize? And what have naval stations, trading stations, block houses and the fur trade, harbors and islands to do with the teaching of the gospel. What is there of religion in the pretended rights given by discovery and exploration? What above all-in threats of war-in angry contention-in blood? If the strife is to be for the bringing in of the heathen within the pale of the church of Christ, why diplomatic controversies-why notices, war speeches, preparing the heart of the nation for violence and sin? There is the territory. Ignorance, debasement and barbarity are all over it. Does any one say nay to the devoted missionaries who may be anxious to win their benighted brethren to God? Who stays them? Not England-not America. Two thousand Mormons have recently taken up their line of march to Oregon, as the papers tell us. Do the heathen and their possessions belong to them too? If the book of Joe Smith has free ingress, who prohibits it to the Holy Gospel?
The truth is that the more we probe the attempts which public men are making to conceal, under specious pretexts, and to sanctify by sacred appellations, what is and can be made no more than a wild thirst for territorial aggrandizement, the deeper must grow our conviction of the utter emptiness of all the 'right' which is so vociferously claimed. Among the most unworthy of all the plans for popular delusion on the subject it is submitted that there is none less worthy than the attempt to give to the Oregon land-squabble the character of a religious dispute-a holy war. It is impossible to see scripture quoted and perverted to such ends, without applying the anecdote told of the late excellent cardinal Cheverus, when bishop of Boston. That amiable prelate had been worried by a pestilent polemic, who had endeavored to provoke him into a controversy, and whose chief weapons were sentences from scripture, selected at random, and strung together, odd and even, to suit the exigencies of the argument. Worn out at last, the bishop's patience yielded: 'Is it not written,' said he, 'that Judas went out and hanged himself?' 'It is,' was the reply. 'Then it is also written, 'Go thou and do likewise!'
W.
At a camp meeting lately held in Connecticut, a preacher, delivered himself of the following: "I would that the gospel were a wedge, and I a beetle, I would whack it into every sinner's heart among you."-Exchange Paper.
Just so; if the Devil handles the beetle and wedge; "The gospel is the power of God unto salvation."
(->) A slip from the Salem Register office, gives the following account of the capture of a slave vessel, supposed to be from Philadelphia-and the dreadful sufferings of the slaves:
Capture of an American Slaver, with 900 Slaves,-Captain Ryder, of the Otho, from Port Praya, has furnished us with Monrovia papers to December 10, and a Circular from the Methodist Missionaries at Monrovia, dated Dec. 17. The Circular gives the particulars of the capture of the bark Pons, of Philadelphia, with 900 slaves, on the 1st of December, by the United States ship Yorktown, Captain Bell, in latitude 3 south, three days out from Cadunda, bound to Rio Janeiro. When the Pons was first seen, she raised American colors, supposing the Yorktown was a British cruiser; but discovering the mistake, immediately hoisted the Portuguese flag. On boarding her, and demanding her papers of the Portuguese captain, he replied, "I have thrown them overboard." On being asked what was his cargo, he said "about 900 slaves." On further examination it was found that she had shipped 913, between the ages of 8 and 30, and 47 of them females, and left at the factory 4 or 500 more, which they had intended to have taken in the same vessel, but
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