I aver there is a fatal fallacy adopted by a large number of the American people, which, if not rejected, will lead us down to national oblivion. That fallacy is exposed in the following pages, by showing what is right, and what is wrong, and explaining the fundamental error by which our public opinion is divided, and the way of a reunion pointed out. No one can desire to remain in error. It is the desire to do right which animates the great mass of the American people. It was, perhaps, the _desire_ to do right, that made John Brown a rebel and a traitor, and which consigned him to a traitor's doom. There is no safety, then, in _desiring_ to do right; but to KNOW what is right, and to DO it. The time has now arrived when the American people must do right, or suffer the penalty of doing wrong. Good _intentions_ will not do. Good DEEDS are demanded,--actions founded upon truth and justice, and in accordance with nature's irrevocable laws. We boast of our greatness, and power, and intelligence. Of what avail are all these, if they will not save us from national ruin? What boots it that a slumbering giant dreams of his strength while he is falling upon the bosom of a burning lake? The mightiest empires have sunk to oblivion. Are we soon to follow them? Our material greatness and vigor seem to forbid the idea of premature decay; but let us not be blind to the delusive dream of an immortality springing from mental imbecility, nor the chimera of a political finality in governmental system which establishes and tolerates INJUSTICE, nor the permanence of a State in the midst of preponderating elements of fluctuating popular delusion. Either the institutions under which we live are founded in truth, or they are founded in error. Our constitution is the work of wisdom, or of folly. It is founded in justice, or injustice; in RIGHT, or _wrong_. Shall we honor the astuteness of its founders, and perpetuate these institutions to remotest ages? or shall we prove recreant to this trust, unworthy of these manifold blessings, and in our mental blindness and moral imbecility invoke the scorn of future ages, and the just execrations of all mankind? The _material_ elements of greatness of the Great American Republic, must be vivified and enlivened by a corresponding degree of INTELLECT; they must be permeated by an adequate element of illuminating soul, or they will fall, a lifeless mass, into chaotic ruin. Let us remember "That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay, As ocean sweeps the labored mote away; Whilst self-dependent power can time defy, As rocks resist the billows and the sky." THE RIGHT OF SLAVERY. INTRODUCTION.