Sir, it is pa.s.sing strange that Protestant Christians and their children should be found side by side with you, Bishop Hughes, Gov. Johnson, and the thousands of bad men who are seeking to build up a Roman Hierarchy in this free country of ours! What do you promise the country and yourselves, if Romanism proves successful in this contest? The history of the past informs us that Rome has slain 1,000,000 of Albigenses and Waldenses; 1,500,000 Jews, in Spain; 3,000,000 Moors, in Spain. France will never forget St. Bartholomew's Night, when 100,000 souls perished in Paris alone! The blood of Protestants has fertilized the soil of England, Germany, and Ireland. I mean by this, that enough of Protestant blood has been shed to _enrich_ all the poor lands of England, Germany, and Ireland, if it were properly distributed. In all, the authentic records of the Romish Church show, (and of this she makes her boast,) that she has put to death SIXTY-EIGHT MILLIONS of human beings, for no other offence than that of being _Protestants_ in their religious faith!

Average each person slain at four gallons of blood, and medical writers say a healthy person yields more, and it makes TWO HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-TWO MILLIONS OF GALLONS!--enough to overflow the banks of the Mississippi, and destroy all the cotton and sugar plantations in Mississippi and Louisiana!

But you argue, in your blasphemous publication, that this is no longer a characteristic of the Romish Hierarchy. Why is it not? Has she ever changed for the better? When did she ever renounce these doctrines and practices? Never, no, never! Hers is the same tyrannical system now--where she has the power--that it always has been, and always must be, in the very nature of things! It is her boast, and the boast of her standard authors, that she is always right, and knows no change! And wo to this land of ours, if ever Rome gets the ascendancy here! Her whole system is adverse to our Republican inst.i.tutions, and she hesitates not to declare it! _Brownson_ says in his Review:

"Let us dare to a.s.sert the truth in the face of the _lying world_, and, instead of pleading for our Church at the bar of the State, _summon the State itself to plead at the bar of the Church, its divinely const.i.tuted judge_."

No wonder, sir, that the American people are aroused! Such bold and startling avowals are calculated to arouse and unite the somewhat divided bands of Protestant Christians; to wake up a host of Luthers, Calvins, Cranmers, and Wesleys; to bind together "the heretics condemned in a ma.s.s." The very latest thing I have seen is the "Pastoral Letter"

of the Bishops of the Province of St. Louis, just issued. That doc.u.ment explicitly says:

"We maintain the superiority of the _spiritual_ over the _temporal_ order. We maintain that the temporal ruler is _bound_ to conform his enactments to the Divine law. We maintain that the Church is the supreme judge of all questions concerning faith and morals; and that in the determination of such question, the _Roman Pontiff, Vicar of Jesus Christ_, const.i.tutes a tribunal from which there is no appeal; and to whose award all the children of the Church must yield obedience."

Now, sir, after this authoritative and official announcement, I don't want to see any more of your wire-drawn distinctions between spiritual and temporal allegiance to the Pope. These Bishops say that both are alike binding. Nor do I want to see any more of your malignant efforts to fix the _lie_ upon Mr. Wesley, for affirming in Europe, during the past century, what the Bishops of the United States have announced, in a Pastoral Address, in the present day!

Pope Pius IX. has, by a special act, made the Virgin Mary the special patron of these United States; but the Protestants of this country have also made a decree, and that decree is, that Jesus Christ, and not the Virgin Mary, shall be the patron of these United States.

And I am happy to have it in my power to inform you, notwithstanding the influence of your Address, that the "Bishops, Elders, and other Ministers" of the Methodist Church, both North and South, are ready to make a common, determined, prayerful effort to save our native land from the threatened slavery of submission to the decisions of the Council of Trent, and the equally corrupt conventions of Progressive Democracy!

a.s.suming what is notoriously _false_--that the Know Nothings are in favor of all measures fatal to the South, and destructive to the Const.i.tution--you ask on page 25 of your _infinitely infernal_ Address:

"What if a proposition be pending to repeal the Fugitive Slave Law--the Kansas and Nebraska law--the rejection of a State asking admission into the Union, because its const.i.tution may tolerate slavery?"

You know, sir, that the 12th Plank in the Philadelphia Platform of the American party is a safer guaranty upon this slavery question, and the perpetuity of existing laws, than is to be found anywhere in the creeds of political parties. Here it is in full:

"The American party having arisen upon the ruins, and in spite of the opposition of the Whig and Democratic parties, can not be held in any manner responsible for the obnoxious acts or violated pledges of either; and the systematic agitation of the slavery question by those parties having elevated sectional hostility into a positive element of political power, and brought our inst.i.tutions into peril, it has therefore become the imperative duty of the American party to interpose, for the purpose of giving peace to the country, and perpetuity to the Union. And as experience has shown it impossible to reconcile opinions so extreme as those which separate the disputants, and as there can be no dishonor in submitting to the laws, the National Council has deemed it the best guaranty of common justice and of future peace, to abide by and maintain the existing laws upon the subject of slavery, as a final and conclusive settlement of that subject in spirit and in substance.

"And regarding it the highest duty to avow their opinions upon a subject so important, in distinct and unequivocal terms, it is hereby declared as the sense of this National Council, that Congress possesses no power, under the Const.i.tution, to legislate upon the subject of slavery in the States where it does or may exist, or to exclude any State from admission into the Union, because its Const.i.tution does or does not recognize the inst.i.tution of slavery as a part of its social system; and expressly pretermitting any expression of opinion upon the power of Congress to establish or prohibit slavery in any Territory, it is the sense of the National Council that Congress ought not to legislate upon the subject of slavery within the Territories of the United States, and that any interference by Congress with slavery as it exists in the District of Columbia, would be a violation of the spirit and intention of the compact by which the State of Maryland ceded the District to the United States, and a breach of the national faith."

In the "wild hunt" for territory by the progressive Democracy, and their efforts to settle our Western lands with foreigners who are to a man Free Soilers and Abolitionists, the South has more to fear than from all other considerations. What is Gov. Johnson's iniquitous Homestead Bill, but a bid for foreigners? He proposes to give to the heads of families one hundred and sixty acres of land, thus _hiring_ all the convicts and paupers of Europe to come and settle in our Western States and Territories! Sir, but let your progressive, sublimated, double-distilled, converging-lines, Johnsonian Democracy bring into this Union one million of Spanish Papists--black, brown, sorrel, and tawny--under the guise of acquiring Cuba for the South: let them bring eight hundred thousand French and English Papists, under the name of acquiring Canada for the North: let them bring two millions of Mexican Papists--brown, tawny, red and black, being a mixture of all colors and all nations--under the specious pretence of "extending the area of freedom"--let all this be done--and your party, made up of native traitors, and foreign vagabonds, and Catholic paupers, are aiming at it--let it be done, I say, and farewell to liberty, and all that is sacred in this country! With five millions of Papists in our midst--four millions and a half being of foreign birth, and four millions speaking a foreign language--all taught from infancy to hate and detest Protestantism as a crime--an American party would become an absolute political necessity. Well do the Free Soil papers comprehend this matter. Hear the infamous but influential _Chicago Tribune_, one of your Dougla.s.s organs--one of your foreign Catholic organs. I quote from the paper itself:

"It is now a well-attested fact, that Atchison is a member of the Superior Order of the Spangled Banner, or Know Nothings, and that his infernal villainy in Kansas has been carried on under the protection and patronage of the lodges in Western Missouri. This is a matter that all men in the North should understand, that Northern voters may be exceedingly cautious how they give countenance or support to an Order that, in any of its phases or localities, is capable of producing such results. It is further said, that the members of that Kansas Legislature, now outraging all sense of right and justice by their devilish enactments, are the chosen men of the affiliated Know Nothings in Missouri and Kansas, who back then up in whatever thing they do. Atchison and his gang are the friends of the Order, and through it and Southern Know Nothing support they are sure that their efforts to establish a despotism in the Territory, if necessary, at the point of the bayonet, will be successful. These facts account for many things heretofore inexplicable, and they develop the true reason of the hostility of the border-ruffians to the foreign immigration that would, under other circ.u.mstances, people that vast and fertile country west of the Missouri."

Thus it appears that a host of _lousy_ foreigners, fresh from the emigrant ships, in which they are brought over to this country as _ballast_--having the right to vote conferred upon them by an infamous _progressive_ Democratic feature in the Kansas Bill, were expected to get the control of affairs in Kansas. It further appears, however, that Senator Atchison and his pro-slavery a.s.sociates supposed that, though fresh from their farms, and crossing the line of their State into the new Territory, they too had the right to vote without being _naturalized_ in Kansas. Hence, in the estimation of this Sag Nicht organ at Chicago, a great outrage is committed upon Germany, Ireland, and Italy!

Sir, you need not lay the flattering unction to your soul, that you can drive the clergy generally from the n.o.ble stand they have taken upon this great question. Nor need you suppose, for one moment, that the American party are conquered, though defeated in several States in the recent elections. The party will remain true to its ends. Though it fail to command office, it cannot fail to exercise large power. Office is not always strength; but sometimes, nay, frequently, as in the case of the present Administration, weakness, as time will prove! The aim of the American party is, by fair party means, to correct a great social evil and political wrong; and if they cannot do that, to mitigate the evil and the wrong; if they cannot do that, to prevent its _further increase_; and if neither can be done, why, then I confess to you, the party will have failed. But, sir, if such a failure take place, rest a.s.sured that the "Bishops, Elders, and other Ministers" of the Methodist Church, South, will not help to bring about such a failure! We can afford to let such minions of party as you are, rave and rant, and publish their expositions, and issue their warnings to Churches: they will all serve to swell our ranks. All true American hearts, not chained to the car of party, or bound down by the cords of plunder, think alike upon the great questions that have called the American party into existence. Little do we regard the slanders of the pensioners of party.

Let their speeches and publications teem with wholesale slanders of our creed: the political jockeyism of these thimble-riggers, as in your own case, is too apparent!

From Maine to the sh.o.r.es of the Pacific the country is convulsed with intense excitement upon this subject. Shall Americans govern themselves, or shall Foreigners, unacquainted with our laws, and brought up under monarchical governments, rule? Shall those who are temporally and spiritually subject to a foreign prince be our legislators, post-masters, foreign ministers, and military leaders, and change our laws as they are directed by the Pope of Rome? Such results the American party have set out to prevent. The present excitement will not cease; true Americans and Protestants will labor and pray until our distracted country shall be redeemed from the influence of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny.

Now, Governor, I have noticed all your charges, arguments, and appeals, but one, and that is the allegation that Methodist clerical Know Nothings are _conspirators_. Your argument is--and I wish to represent you correctly--"The offence of conspiracy is not confined to the prejudicing of a particular individual; it may be to injure public trade, to affect public health, or to _violate public policy_."

You cite Blackstone's Commentary, and other English Law Books, to satisfy the Clergy as to the _law of conspiracy_. This done, you overwhelm them with this sage and logical conclusion:

"The gist of the offence of conspiracy consists in a confederacy to do an _unlawful act_, and the offence is complete when the confederacy is made."

I will concede, for the sake of the argument, that this is sound law, and that yours is a logical deduction. Nay, I will concede more--I grant that it is an unlawful act for native Americans, and Protestant Christians, whether ministers or laymen, to resolve, or swear, as we Know Nothings have all done, that we will not vote for Catholics and Foreigners for public offices! I take the ground you do, that a man's vote is not his own, and that it is only to be disposed of by the leaders of the party with which he may act!

And now, if you and I, both great men, and _Doctors of Law_, are correct in laying down the law, and the _privilege of voters in this free country_, what an infamous body of conspirators the Democrats are, and have always been! For a quarter of a century, they have conspired to keep the Whigs out of office--have succeeded in doing so most of that time--and have kept thousands of them who are poor from becoming rich!

More recently, they have conspired with Abolitionists, Free Soilers, Fourierites, Spiritualists, Roman Catholics, Irish, French, and German paupers, and all manner of European convicts, to keep the American party out of office, and have succeeded in Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Texas, and other States--thereby depriving the Americans of "lots" of money and honors, both of which they need, and both of which are their _birthrights_!

The "Bishops, Elders, and other Ministers," whom you address, in opposition to the great sin of _conspiracy_, would more cheerfully unite with you to enforce law and order, and to prosecute offenders, but for the fact that the _Abolition wing of your party_ once conspired against them, to deprive their wives, children, widows, and orphans, of their lawful portion of the great Book Concern in New York, and they were compelled to punish the conspirators, at great expense, however, in the District and Supreme Courts of the United States!

But, Sir, upon the subject of _oaths_, you are eloquent, apt in your quotations of Scripture, and evince great learning in the legal profession! You charge that "Know Nothingism is both unchristian and unlawful, because of its _oaths_, which have no Scripture warrant for their administration!" One of your quotations from the Bible is this: "Swear not at all: neither by heaven, for it is G.o.d's throne: nor by the earth, for it is his footstool." Your mind has undergone a great change upon the subject of _oaths_ and _hard swearing_, since the 21st of June, 1845, when you delivered your celebrated "Mount Pisgah" speech at Athens. You then advised the people of the State to administer "horrible oaths," and to swear by the "_heavens_," aye, "G.o.d's throne." But then you were a Know Nothing. Here is what you say in your _revised_ copy of that memorable speech:

"Go up with me in imagination and stand for awhile on some lofty summit of the Rocky Mountains. Let us take one ravishing view of this broad land of liberty. Turn your face toward the Gulf of Mexico: what do you behold? Instead of one lone star faintly shining in the far distant south, a whole galaxy of stars of the first magnitude are bursting on your vision and shining with a bright and glorious effulgence. Now turn with me to the west--the mighty west--where the setting sun dips her disk in the western ocean. Look away down through the misty distance to the sh.o.r.es of the Pacific, with all its bays, and harbors, and rivers. Cast your eyes as far as the Russian Possessions, in lat.i.tude fifty-four degrees and forty minutes.

What a new world lies before you! How many magnificent States to be the future homes of the sons and daughters of freedom!

But you have not gazed on half this glorious country. Turn now your face to the east, where the morning sun first shines on this land of liberty. Away yonder, you see the immortal old thirteen, who achieved our independence; nearer to us lie the twelve or fifteen States of the great valley of the Mississippi, stretching and reposing like so many giants in their slumbers. O! now I see your heart is full--it can take in no more. Who now feels like he was a party man, or a southern man, or a northern man? Who does not feel that he is an American, and thankful to Heaven that his lot was cast in such a goodly land? When did mental vision ever rest on such a scene? Moses, when standing on the top of Mount Pisgah, looking over on the promised land, gazed not on a scene half so lovely.

O! let us this day _vow_ that whatever else we may do, by whatever name we may be called, we will never surrender one square acre of this goodly heritage to the DICTATION of any king or potentate on earth. SWEAR IT! SWEAR IT! my countrymen, and let HEAVEN RECORD THE VOW FOR EVER!"

In conclusion, Governor, suffer a few words of advice, and I will bring this letter, already too long, to a close. You are advanced in years, nay, you have grown gray in the service of sin, and political intrigues; and at most you have not long to live. Cease your political aspirations, and turn your attention to future and eternal things! You have been a member of our State Legislature; subsequently, a member of Congress; and more recently the Governor of our State; honors and stations, to say the least of it, equal to your merits and talents!

As a true "son of a now sainted father," from whom you have been separated for many years, so demean yourself in future, that you may not be separated, world without end! Humble yourself before G.o.d; confess your numerous sins; and instead of lecturing G.o.d's ministers upon the subject of party politics, ask them, with tears in your eyes, to pray for you! Exercise a living faith in Christ, who came down from heaven, and made upon the cross a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world. Thus obtaining forgiveness, cease your Sunday discussions on political subjects; attend at the house of G.o.d, and set an example to other unG.o.dly Sag Nichts, and lead a new and different life!

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

W. G. BROWNLOW,

_A Local Methodist Minister._

GOVERNOR JOHNSON AND EDITOR EASTMAN.

On the 9th of October, 1855, and while the Legislature was in session at Nashville, we delivered a speech to an immense crowd on the Public Square; which, after certain preliminary remarks, we will give to the public, just as it was spoken. The reason why the call was made on us to deliver the speech was, that we had, the previous weeks, delivered the same, in _substance_, at Shelbyville and Clarksville, and the American party at Nashville hearing of it, and approving what was said, desired us to repeat it; and, to be candid, we desired to repeat it there and then!

Mr. Wise, of Virginia, gained great notoriety, in the spring of 1855, by his abuse and blackguardism, heaped upon the American party. He was successful; and Johnson, of Tennessee, whose ambition was to gain a more infamous notoriety, profiting by the example of Wise, plunged into the lowest depths of Billingsgate, and piled his vulgar epithets upon the party _indiscriminately_. Wise, then, like all inventors and originators, has had numerous _imitators_, and among the most successful of these are Johnson, of Tennessee; Stephens, of Georgia; and Clingman, of North Carolina. But as an adept in low Billingsgate slang, coa.r.s.e blackguardism, and as a slanderer and maligner of better men than himself, Johnson has excelled his patron, Wise, and left far in the shades of the distant caverns of abuse, both Stephens and Clingman!

To prepare the public mind for the degree of severity we used in reference to the Governor of the State, we will introduce as many as _five_ different extracts from his speeches, in his late canva.s.s for Governor, at Murfreesboro' and Manchester; as reported by his partisan organ, the _Nashville Union_, and his _pliant tool_, its Abolition editor, _E. G. Eastman_:

"THE DEVIL, HIS SATANIC MAJESTY, THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS, WHO PRESIDES OVER THE SECRET CONCLAVE HELD IN PANDEMONIUM, MAKES WAR UPON ALL BRANCHES OF CHRIST'S CHURCH. THE KNOW NOTHINGS ADVOCATE AND DEFEND NONE, BUT MAKE WAR UPON ONE OF THE CHURCHES, AND THUS FAR BECOME THE ALLIES OF THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS."--[Speech of ANDREW JOHNSON, at Murfreesboro'.

"A DENOMINATION LIKE THIS, TO SET UP AS THE GUARDIANS OF THE RELIGION AND MORALS OF THE COUNTRY! A DENOMINATION BOUND TOGETHER BY SECRET AND TERRIBLE OATHS: THE FIRST OF WHICH, ON THE VERY INITIATION, FIXES AND REQUIRES THEM TO CARRY A LIE IN THEIR MOUTHS."--[Speech of ANDREW JOHNSON, at Murfreesboro'.

"SHOW ME THE DIMENSIONS OF A KNOW NOTHING, AND I WILL SHOW YOU A HUGE REPTILE, UPON WHOSE NECK THE FOOT OF EVERY HONEST MAN OUGHT TO BE PLACED."--[Speech of ANDREW JOHNSON, at Manchester.

"THEY ARE LIKE THE HYENA, AND COME FROM THEIR LAIR AFTER MIDNIGHT TO PREY UPON HUMAN CARCa.s.sES."--[Speech of ANDREW JOHNSON, at Manchester.

"I WOULD AS SOON BE FOUND IN THE CLAN OF JOHN A. MURRELL AS IN A KNOW NOTHING COUNCIL."--[Speech of ANDREW JOHNSON, at Manchester.

The _blackguard_ and _calumniator_ using this language, was elected by a majority of two thousand votes: that majority being cast by _Foreigners and illegal voters_; and consequently, his compet.i.tor, COL. GENTRY--than whom there is not a more talented, patriotic, and honorable gentleman in Tennessee--was fairly and justly elected. This, then, is the language used by the Governor of Tennessee, _towards a majority of the legal voters of the State_! Under these circ.u.mstances, we made the speech that follows, to an immense crowd on the Square: the correspondence preceding which, will explain itself:

NASHVILLE, Oct. 10th, 1855.

W. G. BROWNLOW, ESQ.:

_Dear Sir_:--The undersigned, having heard your speech on the Square, last night, respectfully request that you embody the substance of the same, and publish it in the Knoxville Whig.

The desire to see it in print is very general; and those who heard it approved its severity, without it were such as were bitter against the American party.