It was the gracious ordinance of Providence, both
in the natural and moral world, that good should often arise out of evil.
Hurricanes cleared the air; and the propagation of truth was promoted by
persecution. Pride, vanity, and profusion contributed often, in their
remoter consequences, to the happiness of mankind. In common, what was in
itself evil and vicious was permitted to carry along with it some
circumstances of palliation. The Arab was hospitable; the robber brave. We
did not necessarily find cruelty associated with fraud, or meanness with
injustice. But here the case was far otherwise. It was the prerogative of
this detested traffic to separate from evil its concomitant good, and to
reconcile discordant mischiefs. It robbed war of its generosity; it
deprived peace of its security: we saw in it the vices of polished society,
without its knowledge or its comforts; and the evils of barbarism without
its simplicity. No age, no sex, no rank, no condition was exempt from the
fatal influence of this wide-wasting calamity. Thus it attained to the
fullest measure of pure, unmixed, unsophisticated wickedness; and, scorning
all competition and comparison, it stood without a rival in the secure,
undisputed, possession of its detestable preeminence.
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