Welcome or unwelcome, such decision is probably coming, and will soon be upon us, unless the power of the present political dynasty shall be met and overthrown.

We shall lie down, pleasantly dreaming that the people of Missouri are on the verge of making their State free, and we shall awake to the reality instead, that the Supreme Court has made Illinois a slave State.

To meet and overthrow the power of that dynasty is the work now before all those who would prevent that consummation.

Our cause, then, must be intrusted to, and conducted by, its own undoubted friends--those whose hands are free, whose hearts are in the work, who do care for the result.

Did we brave all then to falter now?--now, when that same enemy is wavering, dissevered, and belligerent?

Wise counsels may accelerate or mistakes delay it; but sooner or later the victory is sure to come.

If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could better judge what to do, and how to do it.

A house divided against itself cannot stand." I believe this government cannot endure permanently, half slave and half free.

I do not expect the Union to be dissolved,--I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect it will cease to be divided.

It will become all one thing, or all the other.

Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward till it shall become…

Under the Dred Scott decision, "squatter sovereignty" squatted out of existence, tumbled down like temporary scaffolding; like the mould at the foundry, it served through one blast, and fell back into loose sand,--helped to carry an…

Put this and that together, and we have another nice little niche, which we may, ere long, see filled with another Supreme Court decision, declaring that the Constitution of the United States does not permit a State to exclude slavery from…

Now I protest against the counterfeit logic which concludes that because I do not want a black woman for a slave, I must necessarily want her for a wife.

It is grossly incorrect to say or assume that the public estimate of the negro is more favourable now than it was at the origin of the government.

In some trifling particulars the condition of that race has been ameliorated; but as a whole, in this country, the change between then and now is decidedly the other way; and their ultimate destiny has never appeared so hopeless as in the…

All the powers of earth seem rapidly combining against him.

Mammon is after him; ambition follows, philosophy follows, and the theology of the day is fast joining in the cry.

Its authors meant it to be as, thank God, it is now proving itself, a stumbling-block to all those who in after times might seek to turn a free people back into the hateful paths of despotism.

They defined with tolerable distinctness in what respects they did consider all men created equal,--equal with "certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." This they said, and this they meant.

They knew the proneness of prosperity to breed tyrants, and they meant, when such should reappear in this fair land and commence their vocation, that they should find left for them at least one hard nut to crack.

These coloured persons were not only included in the body of 'the people of the United States' by whom the Constitution was ordained and established; but in at least five of the States they had the power to act, and doubtless did act, by…

The assertion that "all men are created equal," was of no practical use in effecting our separation from Great Britain; and it was placed in the Declaration, not for that, but for future use.

I think the authors of that notable instrument intended to include all men, but they did not intend to declare all men equal in all respects.

In some respects she certainly is not my equal; but in her natural right to eat the bread she earns with her own hands without asking leave of any one else, she is my equal, and the equal of all others.