White carpenters witnessed the transaction, but, instead of interposing, cried, "Kill the nigger! he struck a White person!" Finding his only safety in flight, he made as much speed as his wounded condition would permit to Mr. Auld, who heard of the outrage with much indignation, and without delay sought for redress. But no White man would corroborate Douglass's statements, and the testimony of coloured people availed nothing. He speaks with gratitude of Mrs. Auld's attentions to him during his convalescence; and Mr. Auld would not afterwards allow him to return to the same ship-yard, but took him into the one where he was himself foreman. Here Douglass learnt caulking, and soon became a source of great profit to his master, earning for him 1 dollar and 50 cents a day.

With this improvement in his outward condition, his intolerance of bondage again augmented. He felt it a most galling yoke thus to be deprived of his hard-earned wages; and when his master occasionally, as a reward for unusual industry, gave him back a few cents, it only served to irritate him by making him feel more keenly his right to the whole.

In the spring of 1838, he obtained permission to hire his own time, paying his master three dollars a-week out of his earnings, and finding his own board, lodging and tools. His labour was greatly increased by this arrangement, but as it was one step towards freedom, he embraced it joyfully. On a slight cause, however, of dissatisfaction, this privilege of working on his own account was taken from him, and he was compelled to bring the whole amount of his earning to his master every Saturday.

Becoming daily more and more impatient of the evils of his dependent and degraded condition, he resolved at all hazards to attempt his escape, which he effected on the 3rd of September, 1838. He arrived in safety at New York, where he met with a kind friend in Mr. David Ruggles. He describes his greatest struggle to have been the leaving for ever many friends in Baltimore to whom he was deeply attached, and says "that thousands would escape every year from Slavery, but for the strong cords of affection which bind them to their friends."

Douglass purposely avoids giving the particulars of his escape. It is well known that an organized system for facilitating the efforts of fugitive Slaves to emancipate themselves is established by benevolent Abolitionists, the nature of which it is of course necessary to conceal from the Slaveholders.

He feelingly describes his sensations when he found himself in freedom and in safety, and the delight with which he worked for the first time-an independent man.

"There was no work," he said, "too hard-none too dirty. I was ready to saw wood, shovel coal, carry the hod, sweep the chimney, or roll oil-casks, all of which I did for nearly three years in New Bedford, before I became known to the Anti-Slavery world."

Soon after his escape, he was married to a young free woman, to whom he was engaged before leaving Maryland, and who joined him in New York.

A few months after settling in New Bedford, he became a subscriber to the Liberator, and made himself acquainted with the principles and

measures of the Anti-Slavery reform. It was a source of much happines to him to be present at Anti-Slavery meetings, but he never spoke at any till August 11, 1841, when he was pressed to address an audience at Nantucket. He found it difficult, he said, to forget that he had been a Slave, and shrank from the idea of addressing White people. His first effort, however, proved more successful than he had anticipated; "and from that time," he says, "till now, I have been engaged in pleading the cause of my brethren-with what success and with what devotion, I leave those acquainted with my labours to decide."

We prefer leaving this Narrative to make its own impression upon our readers, instead of adding comments upon the system which it so painfully exposes. We have on a former occasion expressed our regret that, with such a powerful cause as the Abolitionists have to plead, they should think it necessary to use the strong language they often employ; and we are certain that, in so doing, they miscalculate the mode of carrying with them the sustained sympathy of an English audience. Yet, we suspect that but few readers of Frederick Douglass's Narrative, who have the opportunity at a public meeting of contemplating his manly figure and graceful action, of hearing him vindicate his right as a human being, and portray the sufferings of his enslaved brothers and sisters, will be disposed to feel surprise, or to bestow censure, if he is sometimes betrayed into the employment of too forcible expressions.

To those who found fault with Mr. Garrison for the severe language he applied to Slaveholders, he invariably replied," I place myself in the Slave's condition, and in this way only do I feel that I can fully appreciate his wrongs. If your mother, your wife, your sister, your daughter, were torn from you, sold at the auction-block, manacled before your eyes, and then led away to be for ever banished from your sight, in what terms would you denounce the conduct of your oppressors ?"

The more we contemplate the iniquities of Slave-holding, the more do we become impressed with its extreme sinfulness; and when venturing to blame those who, after long attention to the subject, condemn the sin in language which we consider offensive, or in a spirit which we deem unchristian, we are sometimes inclined to examine whether we may not also have erred in permitting a regard for individuals, or a want of due investigation into a system which we believed might be carried on with kindness and humanity, to close our eyes against the appalling truths which, sooner or later, American Slavery must reveal to the whole world.

THE WOUNDS OF POVERTY.

No one deserves the name of a man who makes a greater fuss about the wounds of poverty than a girl makes about those of her ears, since equally, in both cases, hooks whereby to suspend jewels are inserted into the wounds. JEAN PAUL.

THE ASCENT OF THE SON OF MAN.

John vi. 62: "What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before?"

I AM not aware that there are any more than three ways in which these words can be understood, and I think it will be generally granted that that mode which is the most "pertinent" and "suitable" to the context has the greatest claim to be adopted as the true sense of the language of Jesus.

1. The words may mean, What, if ye should see the Son of Man ascend up into heaven, where he was before he became flesh.

2. They may mean, What! if ye should see the Son of Man ascend up into heaven, i. e. obtain "deep insight into the counsels of heaven." 3. They may mean simply and plainly what they express, What! if ye should see the Son of Man ascend up (into the mountain, Ke, there, understood) where he was yesterday.

Of these three interpretations, the first and second are inadmissible, because, as I shall briefly shew, in either of these meanings the language of Jesus" contains nothing pertinent, nothing that suits the circumstances, nothing in harmony with his manner of thinking and speaking." He was very cautious and reserved even with his apostles in speaking about his pre-existence, if he said any thing about it; for they certainly did not know it while he was with them. Assuredly he would not cast these pearls before swine-disciples whose chief motive for following him was to obtain a regular supply of their bodily wants. But were there no doctrinal objection to the first way of explaining the words, its total irrelevancy to the subject which was in dispute between Jesus and his new converts, and the equally inapplicable meaning of the second sense to the purpose for which Jesus was speaking, would forbid either of these senses to be attached to his words. In the first, it would make him say in effect, "What if you should see what you shall not see;" for none but the apostles witnessed the ascension, and Jesus foreknew that they alone would be the witnesses of that event. In the second sense, it would make him say, "If you saw as I see, and knew as I know, you would think as I do"-a truism too bare to be put in the mouth of him who spake as never man spake. I may add, as no slight objection to adopting the second sense, that the verb Jewpйre is more especially applied to a spectacle, an object of the senses, than είδεω : but nobody could see the Γνῶθι σεαυτὸν come down from heaven.

The third sense cannot be said to have "nothing in harmony with his (Christ's) manner of thinking and speaking," unless it was his manner never to put a plain question in plain words, or never to speak as he thought. Jesus had been "up into a mountain" the day before. He had miraculously fed "the great company that came unto him." By this they were converted, and said of him, "This is the great prophet that should come into the world." The next day they came to him at Capernaum; and he plainly told them that they sought him again because they "ate of the loaves and were filled;" not because they understood the intent of the miracle, for they did see it performed. When he told them that to believe on him was to work the work of God, they still, harping upon yesterday's supply, said, "What sign

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shewest thou-what dost thou work? Our fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat," not one meal only, but successive supplies. Jesus said-" Moses gave you not the bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven; for the bread of God is that which descendeth from God and giveth life to the world." "Lord," said they, evermore give us this bread;" as the woman of Samaria had said, "Sir, give me this water, that I thirst no more." Jesus then announces himself as the bread of life, and plunges into that strain of metaphor suggested by the image of bread; asserting that he is the bread from heaven, that his flesh is meat indeed and his blood drink indeed, and that he who eats his flesh and drinks his blood shall have eternal life. We can hardly in justice to the great Teacher suppose that these, to us, harsh metaphors, were so obscure to the Jews. Eating the Messiah, we learn by extracts from Rabbinical writers, made by Lightfoot and others, was a figure not unknown for receiving and believing in him; and Jesus knew that their mercenary views, their selfishness, their mere desire of more loaves and fishes, were the true cause of these "disciples" of yesterday coming to him, and of their taking offence at the metaphorical language he used, which the better they understood, the more disappointment would it give to their sordid hopes. He therefore says to them, "Does this offend you," and incline you to desert me? What would you do if you saw the Son of Man ascend up where he was before? You would then most probably follow him. The spot would revive your expectations. But these expectations are gross and unprofitable. It is the spirit (the design of the miracle) that giveth life in producing conviction; the flesh (the mere accidental supply of food) profiteth nothing in furtherance of my great object to make mankind partakers of eternal life. The question was a cutting reproof of their sordid thoughts, and it is only necessary to prove that he ever resorted to the use of eipwvéia to render it almost certain that this third mode of explaining his languge is natural and most probably the true one. Of this figure, I think Mark ii. 17, Matt. vi. 2 and 5, Matt. vii. 6, Matt. xv. 14, are instances. This plain sense of the passage was no vagary of my own poor wits, but a suggestion of an intelligent friend above thirty years ago. After carefully examining it, I thought it sound and satisfactory. But if your learned and deservedly respected correspondent N. will forgive me that I am "Nullius addictus jurare in verba magistri," and will furnish reasonable proof to back his assertions respecting this passage,-to justify the disapproval which he expresses, and to display the pertinency of the meaning which he prefers,-I am not wedded so strongly to an opinion of such short standing as to be blind to conviction. I was told by some students long ago, that this third opinion is a sense which one in high authority amongst us had adopted; but as it was merely a report, I have no right to urge it in defence.

H. H. P.

VOL. III.

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MAN'S ENMITY TO GOD.*

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We know not whether our readers would thank us for devoting to this singular work a space proportioned to its extent, to the striking nature of its doctrines, or even to the talent which in some respects it undoubtedly exhibits. The title of the book is startling enough; and the first sentence, which runs as follows, still more so: Enmity to God is not merely a quality of human nature, but constitutes the very basis, principle or essence of human nature. This is a truth of which the great majority of mankind is profoundly ignorant; and a truth which, when brought under their notice, is by many systematically rejected.” Socinians," he adds, (taking that term, we presume, in its usual popular acceptation,)" absolutely loathe it." He is perfectly right; we plead guilty to the sentiment; and if he could have found a stronger expression by which to characterize our repugnance, we would equally have admitted it. We know not how adequately to describe our utter want of sympathy with the strange propensity which so many display thus to slander the nature which God has given them, and revile their fellowcreatures who bear it along with themselves. We have been accustomed to regard human nature as the most excellent and glorious of all the works of God which are laid open to our view; as created in the image of its Maker; as endowed with mental and moral faculties which enable man to cultivate this image in his soul by a devout contemplation of the works, the providence and the word of God. True, he has fallen lamentably short of what might have been expected; there is not one of the human race that has not often been guilty of folly and of sin. Nay, even of those who, in a perversion (as we deem it) of Scripture phraseology, flatter themselves that they are among the "elect," called to be saints, members of the church of Christ here, and set apart to rise with him in the glory of his kingdom hereafter, there is not one, we presume, even of these holy men, who will venture to say that he is altogether perfect. But what then? Shall we say that all those who are thus from time to time transgressors of the law of God, are therefore enemies to him? God forbid!

With respect to the present world, we have been accustomed to regard it as provided by its almighty and beneficent Creator to be the school of discipline and improvement for his rational offspring; and have derived, as we thought, both pleasure and advantage from tracing the analogy of the divine dispensations of our gracious moral Governor in this respect; contemplating with admiration, on the one hand, the wise adaptation of the outward circumstances and social position of each individual to his original constitution, with its tendency to develop the most elevated principles of his intellectual and moral nature, the germs of which lay dormant in the infant mind,-and, on the other, the progress of the race, from infancy to maturity, with the agency of Divine Providence, both in its ordinary and extraordinary manifestations, to exalt, refine and purify those principles of human nature by which, as one generation succeeds to another and learns wisdom from

The Three Grand Exhibitions of Man's Enmity to God. By David Thom, Bold-Street Chapel, Liverpool. London-Simpkin, Marshall and Co. 8vo. Pp. 558.