In ILLINOIS, the murder of Mr. Lovejoy has multiplied and confirmed abolitionists, and led to the formation of many societies, which, in all probability, would not have been formed so soon, had not that event taken place.

I am not possessed of sufficient data for stating, with precision, what proportion the abolitionists bear in the population of the Northern and Middle non-slaveholding states respectively.  Within the last ten months, I have travelled extensively in both these geographical divisions.  I have had whatever advantage this, assisted by a strong interest in the general cause, and abundant conversations with the best informed abolitionists, could give, for making a fair estimate of their numbers.  In the Northern states I should say, they are one in ten—­in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, one in twenty—­of the whole adult population.  That the abolitionists have multiplied, and that they are still multiplying rapidly, no one acquainted with the smallness of their numbers at their first organization a few years ago, and who has kept his eyes about him since, need ask.  That they have not, thus far, been more successful, is owing to the vastness of the undertaking, and the difficulties with which they have had to contend, from comparatively limited means, for presenting their measures and objects, with the proper developments and explanations, to the great mass of the popular mind.  The progress of their principles, under the same amount of intelligence in presenting them, and where no peculiar causes of prejudice exist in the minds of the hearers, is generally proportioned to the degree of religious and intellectual worth prevailing in the different sections of the country where the subject is introduced.  I know no instance, in which any one notoriously profane or intemperate, or licentious, or of openly irreligious practice, has professed, cordially to have received our principles.

“6. What is the object your associations aim at?  Does it extend to abolition of slavery only in the District of Columbia, or in the whole slave country?”

ANSWER.—­This question is fully answered in the second Article of the Constitution of the American Anti-Slavery Society, which is in these words:—­

“The object of this society is the entire abolition of slavery in the United States.  While it admits that each state, in which slavery exists, has, by the Constitution of the United States, the exclusive right to legislate in regard to its abolition in said state, it shall aim to convince all our fellow-citizens, by arguments addressed to their understandings and consciences, that slaveholding is a heinous crime in the sight of God, and that the duty, safety, and best interests of all concerned require its immediate abandonment, without expatriation.  The society will also endeavor, in a constitutional way, to influence Congress to put an end to the domestic slave-trade, and to abolish slavery in all those portions of our common country which come under its control, especially in the District of Columbia; and likewise to prevent the extension of it to any state that may hereafter be admitted to the Union.”