really no _Constitutional election_,--that is, no such free expression of political preferences as the Constitution aims to secure--in a majority of the Slave States. From a multiplicity of facts like these, the inference is unavoidable, that Slavery tolerates no freedom of the press--no freedom of speech--no freedom of opinion. To expect that a whole-souled, manly literature can flourish under such conditions, is as absurd as it would be to look for health amid the pestilential vapors of a dungeon, or for the continuance of animal life without the aid of oxygen. III. Mental activity--force--enterprise--are requisite to the creation of literature. Slavery tends to sluggishness--imbecility--inertia. Where free thought is treason, the masses will not long take the trouble of thinking at all. Desuetude begets incompetence--the _dare-not_ soon becomes the _cannot_. The mind thus enslaved, necessarily loses its interest in the processes of other minds; and its tendency is to sink down into absolute stolidity or sottishness. Our remarks find melancholy confirmation in the abject servilism in which multitudes of the non-slaveholding whites of the South are involved. In them, ambition, pride, self-respect, hope, seem alike extinct. Their slaveholding fellows are, in some respects, in a still more unhappy condition--helpless, nerveless, ignorant, selfish; yet vain-glorious, self-sufficient and brutal. Are these the chosen architects who are expected to build up "a purely Southern literature?" The truth is, slavery destroys, or vitiates, or pollutes, whatever it touches. No interest of society escapes the influence of its clinging curse. It makes Southern religion a stench in the nostrils of Christendom--it makes Southern politics a libel upon all the principles of Republicanism--it makes Southern literature a travesty upon the honorable profession of letters. Than the better class of Southern authors themselves, none will feel more keenly the truth of our remarks. They write books, but can find for them neither publishers nor remunerative sales at the South. The executors of Calhoun seek, for his works, a Northern publisher. Benton writes history and prepares voluminous compilations, which are given to the world through a Northern publisher. Simms writes novels and poems, and they are scattered abroad from the presses of a Northern publisher. Eighty per cent. of all the copies sold are probably bought by Northern readers.