But do the Abolitionists reply, “that if we enter on the fields of Europe, or of any other countries, for political action, by any efficient force, to rescue the oppressed, we shall lose our heads.” That, indeed, may be a wise thought. Or, “if we attempt it by secret operations, and by emissions of the press, clandestinely introduced, we shall embroil our country in a foreign war.” There is little doubt of that. Or, “if we organize a political machinery at home, industriously occupying years of preparation for descent, waiting for an opportunity, and it is known that our force is likely to tell with effect, when the time of aggressive action shall arrive, it will produce the same result, unless our own Government shall interpose, and suppress our movement.” This, too, is doubtless a fair conclusion. But, let it be remembered, that a foreign war is infinitely less to be dreaded, than a domestic and civil one; and that it is no less certain, if the Abolition movement is not suppressed, we must have the last. The cases are parallel: as a foreign Nation could not endure such interference, neither can the slave States of the South. There is as valid and justifiable a right of interference in one case, as in the other, and an equal provocation for resort to arms, if the General Government should not interpose its authority, and arrest the movement. CHAPTER X. THE ROMANCE OF ABOLITIONISM. We live in an age of romantic sympathy and religious sentimentalism. There is a charity that prefers a remote object, to one that is near. A blind beggar, with every appearance of want and wretchedness, sits daily by the way side, to ask alms. Floods of population swim along, and now and then he gets a penny; but no body stops to ask him of his misery, or sympathize with his woes. He is a solitary, uncheered being during the day, in the midst of a busy, moving, and apparently happy world; and as night comes on, he feels his way to his wretched hovel, if he has one, and lies down in rags and filth, to sleep as he can. He may, or may not, have some one to comfort him there; but the world never asks. In every crowded population there are hundreds of poor and wretched beings, whose wants are fruitful of sorrow, and whose pains are without relief. They live in misery, and die without comfort; and that, too, while surrounded with an affluence that knows not how to dissipate its treasures. The sound of the light steps of the happy is heard in the street, but they enter not the uninviting abode to inquire into the wants of its tenants; the carriages of the wealthy roll onward; but the suffering poor, so near at hand, are not remembered. Even if you apply to the public in their behalf, you will chance to receive for answer, “they are worthy of their doom, and are only reaping the wages of their sins. We have known them well, and generally speaking, there is little merit, and a slender reward, in relieving such objects.”