Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker volume 6.djvu/305

292 a great English-Saxon-Teutonic people, with diverse mixtures from the rest of mankind. All the four act on the fifth, and influence our treatment of this question of Slavery.

I. Russia is mighty by itsv ast territory, its great natural resources, its immense population, its huge army—appointed and commanded well—its strong central government, its diplomatic talent, and the people's ability to spread. The Government is despotic, but yet one of the most progressive in Christendom. With the bondage of Africans, Russia has no direct concern; she has much to do with that of white Caucasians. She is rapidly putting an end to Slavery in her own borders. Not many years ago, the late emperor Nicholas emancipated the serfs he had inherited as his own private property. They amounted to more than 7,500,000 men; he established over 4000 schools for the education of their children. Alexander, his son, had not been in the imperial seat three years before he published a decree for the gradual and ultimate emancipation of all the serfs in the empire. Their number must exceed the entire population of the United States. Here is the decree, dated the 20th of last November—the 2nd of December by our New Style calendar. The proprietors of two large provinces—St. Petersburg and Lithuania (containing nearly three million souls) some weeks since asked permission to emancipate their serfs at once. Yesterday's steamer brings also the welcome news that the proprietors of Nishni-Novogorod have just done the same. This province is as large as Virginia, with a population of 1,500,000, and, with the exception of the capital and its environs, is the richest and most intellectual part of the empire. It abounds with manufactories; every year, 300,000 strangers from Asia and elsewhere trade in its fairs. You would expect the most enlightened population to demand the immediate freedom of the serfs. Russia has become an ally on our side. Her example favours freedom. So you will find a change in the Southern newspapers, and in the American Government, which they direct and control. In the Crimean war, when Russia fought for injustice, they sustained her as the ally of their own despotism, and fought against England as their foe. All that will soon change; and already Southern papers denounce the enfranchisement