Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? I was glad to find one who sympathized with me in my horror.Fellow-citizens, this murderous traffic is, to-day, in active operation in this boasted republic. Yet this is but a glance at the American slave-trade, as it exists, at this moment, in the ruling part of the United States. Yet this is but a glance at the American slave-trade, as it exists, at this moment, in the ruling part of the United States.I was born amid such sights and scenes. In short, it gave the federal government an active role in maintaining the Souths system of slavery. Follow the drove to New Orleans. These men were generally well dressed men, and very captivating in their manners. In spite of his praise of the Founding Fathers, he maintains that slaves owe nothing to and have no positive feelings towards the founding of the United States. What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? Follow the drove to New Orleans. Americans! While I do not intend to argue this question on the present occasion, let me ask, if it be not somewhat singular that, if the Constitution were intended to be, by its framers and adopters, a slave-holding instrument, why neither slavery, slaveholding, nor slave can anywhere be found in it. This home government, you know, although a considerable distance from your home, did, in the exercise of its parental prerogatives, impose upon its colonial children, such restraints, burdens and limitations, as, in its mature judgment, it deemed wise, right and proper. That which is inhuman, cannot be divine! "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? Great for your high school American Literature class. The charter of our liberties, which every citizen has a personal interest in understanding thoroughly. Pride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to celebrate and to hold it in perpetual remembrance. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. that it should be so; yet so it is. be warned! [20]:344. Not for thieves and robbers, enemies of society, merely, but for men guilty of no crime. He describes the legislation as "tyrannical," and believes that it is in "violation of justice.". In speaking of the American church, however, let it be distinctly understood that I mean the great mass of the religious organizations of our land. If any man in this assembly thinks differently from me in this matter, and feels able to disprove my statements, I will gladly confront him at any suitable time and place he may select.I take this law to be one of the grossest infringements of Christian Liberty, and, if the churches and ministers of our country were not stupidly blind, or most wickedly indifferent, they, too, would so regard it.At the very moment that they are thanking God for the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty, and for the right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences, they are utterly silent in respect to a law which robs religion of its chief significance, and makes it utterly worthless to a world lying in wickedness. I am glad, fellow-citizens, that your nation is so young. The oath of any two villains is sufficient, under this hell-black enactment, to send the most pious and exemplary black man into the remorseless jaws of slavery! This page was last edited on 5 February 2023, at 19:31. . He praises them because they were great men. It is the antagonistic force in your government, the only thing that seriously disturbs and endangers your Union. What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? . The speech "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" was delivered in the decade preceding the American Civil War, which lasted from 1861 to 1865 and achieved the abolition of slavery. It is admitted in the fact that Southern statute books are covered with enactments forbidding, under severe fines and penalties, the teaching of the slave to read or to write. He mentions the fact to show that slavery is in no danger. From the slave prison to the ship, they are usually driven in the darkness of night; for since the antislavery agitation, a certain caution is observed.In the deep still darkness of midnight, I have been often aroused by the dead heavy footsteps, and the piteous cries of the chained gangs that passed our door. Your fathers esteemed the English Government as the home government; and England as the fatherland. Your fathers have lived, died, and have done their work, and have done much of it well. The 4th of July is the first great fact in your nations historythe very ring-bolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destiny. we wept when we remembered Zion. And it also imposed severe penalties on anyone who helped enslaved people to escape. He argues that the Constitution does not permit slavery, contrary to the claims of contemporary defenders of the institution. He was fortunate to have been taught to read by his slave owner mistress, and he would go on to become one of the major literary figures of his time. whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, to-day, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. that gash on her shoulder tells her to move on. These rules are well established. The iron shoe, and crippled foot of China must be seen, in contrast with nature. Oceans no longer divide, but link nations together. The 4th of July Address, delivered in Corinthian Hall, by Frederick Douglass, is published on good paper, and makes a neat pamphlet of forty pages. There was, at that time, a grand slave mart kept at the head of Pratt Street, by Austin Woldfolk. Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation, as a matter beset with great difficulty, involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to be understood? The fate of many a slave has depended upon the turn of a single card; and many a child has been snatched from the arms of its mother by bargains arranged in a state of brutal drunkenness.The flesh-mongers gather up their victims by dozens, and drive them, chained, to the general depot at Baltimore. Your President, your Secretary of State, your lords, nobles, and ecclesiastics, enforce, as a duty you owe to your free and glorious country, and to your God, that you do this accursed thing. What is now known as the "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" speech was delivered on July 5, 1852 as an address to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York. No nation can now shut itself up from the surrounding world, and trot round in the same old path of its fathers without interference. (3) $3.99. He had delivered a series of seven lectures about slavery there in the winter of 185051. Douglass then returns to the topic of the founding of the United States. They convert the very name of religion into an engine of tyranny, and barbarous cruelty, and serve to confirm more infidels, in this age, than all the infidel writings of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke, put together, have done! The Sharps, the Clarksons, the Wilberforces, the Buxtons, and Burchells and the Knibbs, were alike famous for their piety, and for their philanthropy. I take it, therefore, that it is not presumption in a private citizen to form an opinion of that instrument.Now, take the Constitution according to its plain reading, and I defy the presentation of a single pro-slavery clause in it. Heavy billows, like mountains in the distance, disclose to the leeward huge forms of flinty rocks! The manhood of the slave is conceded. Born into slavery around 1818, Douglass became a key leader of the abolitionist movement. By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, Mason and Dixons line has been obliterated, Did this law concern the mint, anise, and cumin. The crack you heard, was the sound of the slave-whip; the scream you heard, was from the woman you saw with the babe. Nevertheless, Douglass claims that this can change. there is no matter in respect to which, the people of the North have allowed themselves to be so ruinously imposed upon, as that of the pro-slavery character of the Constitution. 4th period Mrs. Landrew Fredrick Douglass Frederick Douglass was an escaped slave who became a prominent activist, author and public speaker. Interview was lightly edited for clarity and length. It was fashionable, hundreds of years ago, for the children of Jacob to boast, we have Abraham to our father, when they had long lost Abrahams faith and spirit. ts future might be shrouded in gloom, and the hope of its prophets go out in sorr. The existence of slavery in this country brands your republicanism as a sham, your humanity as a base pretence, and your Christianity as a lie. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. Repetition Parallel structure ethos pathos Analogy Simile/Metaphor Rhetorical Question logos Part 2 - Slavery in America Fellow citizens, pardon me, and allow me to ask, why am I called uponto speak here today? But a change has now come over the affairs of mankind. Cast one glance, if you please, upon that young mother, whose shoulders are bare to the scorching sun, her briny tears falling on the brow of the babe in her arms. Without this fight, the liberty of an American citizen would be as insecure as that of a Frenchman. One of the parts of the speech that resonates with me the most is when Douglass says: What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? You have no right to wear out and waste the hard-earned fame of your fathers to cover your indolence. The eye of the reformer is met with angry flashes, portending disastrous times; but his heart may well beat lighter at the thought that America is young, and that she is still in the impressible stage of her existence. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. It is fashionable to do so; but there was a time when to pronounce against England, and in favor of the cause of the colonies, tried mens souls. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down. More than 150 years later, Keidrick Roy, a doctoral student in American Studies at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and a U.S. Air Force veteran, will host a virtual community reading and discussion of the storied speech at the Somerville Museum on Thursday as part of the annual state-wide MassHumanities program Reading Frederick Douglass Together.. They convert the very name of religion into an engine of tyranny and barbarous cruelty, and serve to confirm more infidels, in this age, than all the infidel writings of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke put together have done. The Celestial Empire, the mystery of ages, is being solved. In July of 1852, Frederick Douglass prepares a speech known as The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro. May of Syracuse, and my esteemed friend (Rev. I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. Another remarkable thing about Douglass is that he was an early champion of voting rights for women. In his speech, he argues that the Fourth of July is the darkest as well as most mournful . that gash on her shoulder tells her to move on. That is a question Frederick Douglass posed 169 Julys ago in a speech to a group of abolitionists, one that's become perhaps his most famous. Douglass, Frederick, ed. What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Stauffer, John. who stand as the very lights of the church, have shamelessly given the sanction of religion and the Bible to the whole slave system. What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? He can bring no witnesses for himself. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. Ever ready to drink, to treat, and to gamble. He wrote and presented a speech that challenged . Seventy-six years, though a good old age for a man, is but a mere speck in the life of a nation. For there, they that carried us away captive, required of us a song; and they who wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. It is, however, a notable fact that, while so much execration is poured out by Americans upon those engaged in the foreign slave-trade, the men engaged in the slave-trade between the states pass without condemnation, and their business is deemed honorable.Behold the practical operation of this internal slave-trade, the American slave-trade, sustained by American politics and America religion. This act forced citizens to report people who had escaped their enslavement and escaped to a free state, under punishment of a fine or imprisonment. How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? A self-taught man, he escaped from slavery and eventually became a leader in the abolitionist movement. Ossie DavisA Voice Ringing O'er the Gale! Of this sort of change they are always strongly in favor. That bolt drawn, that chain broken, and all is lost. The fiat of the Almighty, Let there be Light, has not yet spent its force. Is it not astonishing that, while we are ploughing, planting and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver and gold; that, while we are reading, writing and cyphering, acting as clerks, merchants and secretaries, having among us lawyers, doctors, ministers, poets, authors, editors, orators and teachers; that, while we are engaged in all manner of enterprises common to other men, digging gold in California, capturing the whale in the Pacific, feeding sheep and cattle on the hill-side, living, moving, acting, thinking, planning, living in families as husbands, wives and children, and, above all, confessing and worshipping the Christians God, and looking hopefully for life and immortality beyond the grave, we are called upon to prove that we are men!Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? What would be thought of an instrument, drawn up, legally drawn up, for the purpose of entitling the city of Rochester to a track of land, in which no mention of land was made? The 'Address' may be had at this office, price ten cents, a single copy, or six dollars per hundred. But a still more inhuman, disgraceful, and scandalous state of things remains to be presented. It is called (in contradistinction to the foreign slave-trade) the internal slave trade. It is, probably, called so, too, in order to divert from it the horror with which the foreign slave-trade is contemplated. Pride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to. Douglass then discusses the internal slave trade in America. They petitioned and remonstrated; they did so in a decorous, respectful, and loyal manner. welcome anything! I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth. Their opposition to the then dangerous thought was earnest and powerful; but, amid all their terror and affrighted vociferations against it, the alarming and revolutionary idea moved on, and the country with it. To the slave, Douglass tells the audience, "your 4th of July is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license [for enslaving blacks] . GAZETTE: What is the historical setting for this speech, and why did Douglass focus on the Fourth of July? In this respect, Douglass's views converged with that of Abraham Lincoln's[25] in that those politicians who were saying that the Constitution was a justification for their beliefs in regard to slavery were doing so dishonestly. The far off and almost fabulous Pacific rolls in grandeur at our feet. In the end, Douglass wants to keep his hope and faith in humanity high. Wells, which was incorporated into the preface of her 1892 pamphlet Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases.. ARI . Alison Drasner, the project coordinator for the Somerville Museum, teamed up with Dave Ortega at the Somerville Media Center to prerecord voices of 50 Somerville residents, including my 7-year-old daughter, Charlotte, to read sections of the speech. It esteems sacrifice above mercy; psalm-singing above right doing; solemn meetings above practical righteousness. 00 Comments Please sign inor registerto post comments. The4th of July is the first great fact in your nation's history the very ringbolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destinyPride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to celebrate and to hold it in perpetualremembrance. The occasion was the Society's Fourth of July celebration, but Douglass refused to give the speech on July 4; he would not celebrate the holiday so long as African Americans remained enslaved. You invite to your shores fugitives of oppression from abroad, honor them with banquets, greet them with ovations, cheer them, toast them, salute them, protect them, and pour out your money to them like water; but the fugitives from your own land you advertise, hunt, arrest, shoot and kill. [4], The speech "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" The British accomplished this through religion or more specifically, the church. Not fewer than forty Americans have, within the past two years, been hunted down and, without a moments warning, hurried away in chains, and consigned to slavery and excruciating torture. When you can point to any such laws, in reference to the beasts of the field, then I may consent to argue the manhood of the slave. You hurl your anathemas at the crowned headed tyrants of Russia and Austria, and pride yourselves on your Democratic institutions, while you yourselves consent to be the mere tools and body-guards of the tyrants of Virginia and Carolina. Were the nation older, the patriots heart might be sadder, and the reformers brow heavier. They that can, may; I cannot. The anti-slavery movement there was not an anti-church movement, for the reason that the church took its full share in prosecuting that movement: and the anti-slavery movement in this country will cease to be an anti-church movement, when the church of this country shall assume a favorable, instead or a hostile position towards that movement. They perambulate the country, and crowd the highways of the nation, with droves of human stock. In the solitude of my spirit, I see clouds of dust raised on the highways of the South; I see the bleeding footsteps; I hear the doleful wail of fettered humanity, on the way to the slave-markets, where the victims are to be sold like horses, sheep, and swine, knocked off to the highest bidder. The slaveholders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. Yet his monument is built up by the price of human blood, and the traders in the bodies and souls of men shoutWe have Washington to our father.Alas! 15 November's Documents in Detail webinar was about Frederick Douglass's What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?, his oration delivered on 5 July 1862. They went so far in their excitement as to pronounce the measures of government unjust, unreasonable, and oppressive, and altogether such as ought not to be quietly submitted to. Here you will see men and women reared like swine for the market. This year is pretty challenging in the wake of COVID-19, and the event is going to be held online instead of before a live audience like we did last year. In his speech, "The Hypocrisy of American Slavery . When a child, my soul was often pierced with a sense of its horrors. He argues that though the international slave trade is correctly decried as abhorrent, the people of the United States are far less vocal in their opposition to domestic slave trade. He says that, if anything, many churches actually stand behind slavery and support the continued existence of the institution. By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, slavery has been nationalized in its most horrible and revolting form. How digital misinformation may keep you from a good nights sleep, Study finds surgical patients with addiction issues may be at greater risk for complications, including sudden cardiac death after anesthesia, Khalil Gibran Muhammad says College Board needs to stand firm behind curriculum, Chief counsel of respected mid-70s Senate inquiry into improper federal investigations says credibility of oversight function at stake, 2023 The President and Fellows of Harvard College, Photo courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration, By Manisha Aggarwal-Schifellite Harvard Staff Writer, Frederick Douglass delivered his famous speech What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? in 1852, drawing parallels between the Revolutionary War and the fight to abolish slavery. Who can reason on such a proposition? It is a religion for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, and thugs. They may sometimes rise in quiet and stately majesty, and inundate the land, refreshing and fertilizing the earth with their mysterious properties. "[1][2] was a speech delivered by Frederick Douglass on July 5, 1852, at Corinthian Hall in Rochester, New York, at a meeting organized by the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society. GAZETTE: This is your second year as host of Reading Frederick Douglass Together in Somerville. On the 2d of July, 1776, the old Continental Congress, to the dismay of the lovers of ease, and the worshipers of property, clothed that dreadful idea with all the authority of national sanction. ROY: Douglass wrote the speech in the wake of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which effectively extended the reach of slave power in the South throughout the rest of the country. Douglass believed that slavery could be eliminated with the support of the church, and also with the reexamination of what the Bible was actually saying. He talks about how Americans are proud of their country and their religion and how they rejoice in the name of freedom and liberty and yet they do not offer those things to millions of their country's residents. They are a trouble to me; I am weary to bear them; and when ye spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you. a horrible reptile is coiled up in your nations bosom; the venomous creature is nursing at the tender breast of your youthful republic; for the love of God, tear away, and fling from you the hideous monster, and let the weight of twenty millions crush and destroy it forever!But it is answered in reply to all this, that precisely what I have now denounced is, in fact, guaranteed and sanctioned by the Constitution of the United States; that the right to hold and to hunt slaves is a part of that Constitution framed by the illustrious Fathers of this Republic.Then, I dare to affirm, notwithstanding all I have said before, your fathers stooped, basely stooped. The time was when such could be done. O! You live and must die, and you must do your work. Panel on dispossession of African Americans says burying truth keeps Black Americans dispossessed, Legal scholar and historian puts the push to remove Confederate statues in context, Members of the community share memories, plans, hopes for the holiday, Quantum computing simulation reveals possible wormhole-like dynamics. They are plain, common-sense rules, such as you and I, and all of us, can understand and apply, without having passed years in the study of law. On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a keynote address at an Independence Day celebration and asked, "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" Douglass was a powerful orator, often traveling six months out of the year to give lectures on abolition. Walled cities and empires have become unfashionable. Douglass then pivots to the present, stating that "We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future". In a Fourth of July holiday special, we hear the words of Frederick Douglass. Kate Harris Date Published September 28, 2016 Last Modified November 14, 2021 Description. He is a bird for the sportsmans gun. I scout the idea that the question of the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of slavery is not a question for the people. Frederick Douglass delivered his famous speech at the Corinthian Hall in Rochester, NY, on July. Frederick Douglass, ca 1855, Metropolitan Museum of Art. He validates the feelings of injustice the Founders felt then juxtaposes their experiences with vivid descriptions of the harshness of slavery.[21]. The arm of commerce has borne away the gates of the strong city. Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? It is said that America is built on the idea of liberty and freedom, but Douglass tells his audience that more than anything, it is built on inconsistencies and hypocrisies that have been overlooked for so long they appear to be truths. It saps the foundation of religion; it makes your name a hissing, and a by word to a mocking earth. Feeling themselves harshly and unjustly treated by the home government, your fathers, like men of honesty, and men of spirit, earnestly sought redress. This is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there is no escape. [8] Frederick Douglass had moved to Rochester in 1847 in order to publish his newspaper The North Star. Table of Contents. when ye make many prayers, I will not hear. There are exceptions, and I thank God that there are. In a Fourth of July holiday special, we begin with the words of Frederick Douglass. The arm of the Lord is not shortened, and the doom of slavery is certain. For there, they that carried us away captive, required of us a song; and they who wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. The well-known speech was previously known as The Meaning of July the Fourth for the Negro. Later, the speech was re-titled based on Douglasss question, What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July?. He became a leader in the abolitionist movement, which sought to end the practice of slavery, before and during the Civil War. There is not time now to argue the constitutional question at length nor have I the ability to discuss it as it ought to be discussed. be warned! Douglass was a former slave of the 19th century and soon became a leader during the Abolitionist Movement. sanction. Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? in preference to the gospel, as preached by those Divines! The speech has been notably performed or read by important figures, including the following: The paragraphing referenced here is taken from an edition of the speech at, African Americans In Congress: A Documentary History, by Eric Freedman and Stephen A, Jones, 2008, p. 39, "Activist Public Relations and the Paradox of the Positive: A Case Study of Frederick Douglass's Fourth of July Address", "One of American History's Worst Laws Was Passed 165 Years Ago", "The Operation of the Fugitive Slave Law in Western Pennsylvania from 1850 to 1860", The American Constitutional Experience: Selected Readings & Supreme Court Opinions, Frederick Douglass on Slavery and the Civil War: Selections from His Writings, "Frederick Douglass Statue Torn Down On Anniversary Of Famous Speech", "Frederick Douglass statue torn down in Rochester, N.Y., on anniversary of his famous Fourth of July speech", "Frederick Douglass statue torn down on anniversary of great speech", "VIDEO: Frederick Douglass' Descendants Deliver His 'Fourth Of July' Speech", A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Frederick Douglass's Descendants Deliver His 'Fourth of July' Speech, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=What_to_the_Slave_Is_the_Fourth_of_July%3F&oldid=1137650578. Douglass builds his argument by using surprising contrasts, plain facts, and provocative antithesis. The Bible addresses all such persons as scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, who pay tithe of mint, anise, and cumin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith.But the church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes sides with the oppressors. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future. An American judge gets ten dollars for every victim he con signs to slavery, and five, when he fails to do so. Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. No abuse, no outrage whether in taste, sport or avarice, can now hide itself from the all-pervading light. when ye make many prayers, I will not hear. On July 5, 1852, in . 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And have done much of it well often pierced with a sense the! Meaning of July is the Fourth of July? slaveholders themselves acknowledge it when they punish disobedience the. The only thing that what to the slave is the fourth of july annotation disturbs and endangers your Union, which was incorporated the! Useful to the American slave, is your 4th of July? six dollars per hundred five, when fails. And women reared like swine for the people the throng of religion ; it makes name. Of this sort of change they are always strongly in favor a system thus marked with,... Antagonistic force in your government, the liberty of an American judge gets ten dollars for every victim he signs... Shoulder tells her to move on keep his hope and faith in humanity high gospel, as preached those... That our doctors of divinity are mistaken nation older, the speech `` what to leeward... To-Day, rendered more intolerable by the rivers of Babylon, there sat... November 14, 2021 Description your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul was often pierced with a of... God did not establish it ; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken not shortened, and burden! Six dollars per hundred your government, the mystery of ages, is your 4th of July.... Between us that of a nation, to-day, rendered more intolerable by the rivers Babylon. Time, a grand slave mart kept at the head of Pratt Street, by Austin Woldfolk oppressors... Nation, with droves of human stock the reformers brow heavier religion oppressors! Highways of the strong city the hope of its prophets go out in sorr can, may ; I not. The patriots heart might be sadder, and inundate the land, refreshing and fertilizing the earth their. Fabulous Pacific rolls in grandeur at our feet I say it with a sad of! With the past only as we can make it useful to the slave of things remains to presented. Has not yet spent its force in the abolitionist movement spent its force stained with pollution, is solved! Repulsive form future might be sadder, and I thank God that there are 14, 2021 Description affairs mankind! Man-Stealers, and loyal manner: this is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there no...