6. The prosecution of this work has a happy influence on the general interests of the blacks, by introducing into the slave-holding states inquiry and discussion respecting the evils of slavery, and the possibility of its abolition. Says the above writer in the Christian Spectator, “The great body of the friends of the Colonization Society, at the South no less than at the North, regard the scheme of that institution as something, which will ultimately, in some way, deliver the land of the curse of Slavery. All who oppose the Society there, oppose it on the same ground. They look upon it as being, in its tendency, and in the hopes of its supporters, an Anti-Slavery project. Thus, in those very regions, in which the system of Slavery sheds all its blasting influences, there is constituted a party, the members of which are recognized by their opposers, and more or less distinctly themselves, as hostile to Slavery, and as looking for an opportunity to move for an abolition. In this way it was, that when an occasion presented itself, a few months ago, the legislature of Virginia became a scene of earnest and public discussion on this long interdicted theme, and to the astonishment of the nation it appeared that the party opposed to slavery was only not a majority. Had Colonization never been thought of, had the scheme of the American Colonization Society never been undertaken, who believes that projects for the abolition of slavery would have been so soon if ever discussed in the legislature of Virginia? Without that preparation of the public mind, which the Colonization Society in the calm and peaceful prosecution of its labors has indirectly accomplished, insurrection and massacre, with all the fear and horrors which they occasion, would have led only to cruelties of legislation and of practice. There is no oppression so unrelenting and desperate as when the oppressor fears his subjects; and the unanimous feeling of Virginia would have been (erroneous indeed, but not on that account the less irresistible and inflexible,) a feeling like that of him who holds a wolf by the ears: it is dangerous to keep him, but more dangerous to let him loose; and therefore, the more furious the struggles of the prisoner, the fiercer and closer will be the despairing grasp that holds him.”