"If this should not be sufficient, and the curious and incredulous inquirer should suggest that the contrast which has been adverted to, and is so manifest, might be traced to a difference of climate, or other causes distinct from slavery itself, permit me to refer him to the two States of Kentucky and Ohio. No difference of soil--no diversity of climate--no diversity in the original settlement of those two States, can account for the remarkable disproportion in their national advancement. Separated by a river alone, they seem to have been purposely and providentially designed to exhibit in their future histories the difference, which necessarily results from a country free from, and a country afflicted with, the curse of slavery. The same may be said of the two States of Missouri and Illinois. "Slavery, it is admitted, is an evil--it is an institution which presses heavily against the best interests of the State. It banishes free white labor--it exterminates the mechanic--the artisan--the manufacturer. It deprives them of occupation. It deprives them of bread. It converts the energy of a community into indolence--its power into imbecility--its efficiency into weakness. Sir, being thus injurious, have we not a right to demand its extermination! Shall society suffer, that the slaveholder may continue to gather his _vigintial crop_ of human flesh? What is his mere pecuniary claim, compared with the great interests of the common weal? Must the country languish and die, that the slaveholder may flourish? Shall all interest be subservient to one?--all rights subordinate to those of the slaveholder? Has not the mechanic--have not the middle classes their rights?--rights incompatible with the existence of slavery?" Sutcliff, in his Travels in North America, says: "A person not conversant with these things would naturally think that where families employ a number of slaves, every thing about their houses, gardens, and plantations, would be kept in the best order. But the reverse of this is generally the case. I was sometimes tempted to think that the more slaves there were employed, the more disorder appeared. I am persuaded that one or two hired servants, in a well-regulated family, would preserve more neatness, order, and comfort, than treble the number of slaves.