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smote, and at the exact moment, to take advantage of the vibration effected by that predecessor. All these things are matters requiring the most skilfull engineers. The number of the guns in each battery, must be sufficient to apply a shot, before the wall can recover from the tremor caused by the previous one; and the munitions must be adequate to supply the guns. If all these matters are adjusted right; when the battery begins to play, and the shot to smite with precision and without interruption, so that the stroke of each successive one begins, where the other left off; the accumulation of power rises, not in the ratio of the number of shot, but in the ratio of the cube of that number. It amounts to the power of an earthquake. No work of man can withstand its vehemence. An adequate combination, would tumble the Andes from their foundations. Let no garrison put their trust in walls, or their confidence in muniments of stone, when a combination that accumulates power like this, can be brought to act against them. When the fortress begins to feel distresses hourly, and tremors to run to and fro as the strong ramparts stagger to the furious strokes of the bullet, and the blocks of stone to fall from their places into the mote; and anon a breach becomes visible: a wise general does not order the assaulting column to form in the trenches: he waits until the breach becomes practicable, before the forlorn hope is marshaled at the head of the assault. A prudent general understands perfectly, that a column of infantry, however brave, cannot be made to pass through a cat hole, so fast as they can be decapitated after they have got through.
The system of slavery is a strong-hold of sin. The implements in the warfare of those who war against it, need not be carnal, for the ramparts of that strong-hold are not made of stone. Yet all the address, the patience, the skill and discipline are necessary to reduce the strong-hold, as if its walls were granite. When those who purpose to pull it down, have quieted all means of molestation from without, so that during the seige, not so much as a dog can wag his tongue to their disadvantage—when they have suppressed every out-work, and reduced the garrison to the smallest possible compass, and to the protection of their lost defences—when they have looked and found, that its ramparts are works of man and not God when they are satisfied as to the most feasible point of
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