It may be a fact, that, to some, the having control over and owning a slave have a greater tendency to produce the effect of _puffing up_ the owner than would his value in money or other property; because it may be a fact that a given amount in one kind of property may possess such tendency to a greater extent than another. But the truth probably is, that one man would be the most puffed up by one thing, and another man by another. We agree that being thus _puffed up_ is a sin; that it leads to consequences extremely ruinous, and often fatal. Very small men are also liable to the disease, and they sometimes take it from very slight causes. It is true, “there is no passion that needs a stronger curb.” What we contend is, that it is not a necessary consequence of owning slaves, any more than it is of owning any other property, or of possessing any other command of men; and that so far as it is an argument against owning slaves, it is also an argument against owning any other property, or of having any other control, or of possessing any other command among men. ------------------ LESSON VII. Dr. Channing continues his view of the evils of slavery, and says, p. 80, 81— “I approach a more delicate subject, and one on which I shall not enlarge. To own the persons of others, to hold females in slavery, is necessarily fatal to the purity of a people: that unprotected females, stripped by their degraded condition of woman’s self-respect, should be used to minister to other passions in man than the love of gain, is next to inevitable. Accordingly, in such a community, the reins are given to youthful licentiousness. Youth, everywhere in peril, is, in these circumstances, urged to vice with a terrible power. And the evil cannot stop at youth. Early licentiousness is fruitful of crime in mature life. How far the obligation to conjugal fidelity, the sacredness of domestic ties, will be revered amid such habits, such temptations, such facilities to vice as are involved in slavery, needs no exposition. So sure and terrible is retribution even in this life! Domestic happiness is not blighted in the slave’s hut alone. The master’s infidelity sheds a blight over his own domestic affections and joys. Home, without purity and constancy, is spoiled of its holiest charm and most blessed influences. I need not say, after the preceding explanations, that this corruption is far from being universal. Still, a slave-country reeks with licentiousness. It is tainted with a deadlier pestilence than the plague.