Being able to read and write he "attained an extraordinary and dangerous influence over his fellows." "Permitted by his owner to occupy a house in the central part of this city, he was afforded hourly opportunities for the exercise of his skill on those who were attracted to his shop by business or favor." "Materials were abundantly furnished in the seditious pamphlets brought into the State by equally culpable incendiaries, while the speeches of the oppositionists in Congress to the admission of Missouri gave a serious and imposing effect to his machinations."[1] It was thus brought home to the South that the enlightened Negro was having his heart fired with the spirit of liberty by his perusal of the accounts of servile insurrections and the congressional debate on slavery.
[Footnote 1: _The Norfolk and Portsmouth Herald_, Aug.

30, 1822.] Southerners of all types thereafter attacked the policy of educating Negroes.[1] Men who had expressed themselves neither one way nor the other changed their attitude when it became evident that abolition literature in the hands of slaves would not only make them dissatisfied, but cause them to take drastic measures to secure liberty.

Those who had emphasized the education of the Negroes to increase their economic efficiency were largely converted.

The clergy who had insisted that the bondmen were entitled to, at least, sufficient training to enable them to understand the principles of the Christian religion, were thereafter willing to forego the benefits of their salvation rather than see them destroy the institution of slavery.
[Footnote 1: Hodgson, _Whitney's Remarks during a Journey through North America_, p.

184.] In consequence of this tendency, State after State enacted more stringent laws to control the situation.