The Iron, and Iron Hearted City.

Dear Friend Dougalss:—I am sojourning in this "Iiron" —(I was going to say Iron Hearted "City") for the present. Perhaps the latter adjective would be the most appropriate, as well as the most significant, for the mass of the people here, are as iron-hearted as the iron they manufacture, so far as any sympathy for humanity or reform is concerned. Indeed, it cannot be wondered, and perhaps they ought not to be blamed that such is the case—for life to them is but a battle for money and bread. The rattle of drays, and wagons,—the uproar and tumult—the hurrying to and fro which are to be seen and heard on all sides, are but so many discordant notes of music to this ceaseless war of trade and traffic. 'Tis true there are a few good spirits here—a few whose souls are sadly out of place, and out of harmony in this mighty struggle. They feel that whatever may be the professions of a people thus grasping, thus engaged and absorbed—their practices are "of the earth, earthly" —that to them Truth, Goodness, Righteousness and Freedom, are matters of incidental importance, are mere abstractions, which are very pretty to talk about, but impossible to practice.

There has occasionally been a momentary interest excited here, in behalf of the great question of Freedom—an interest which manifests considerable earnestness for a time—but soon the subject is forgotten, and the cry of perishing myriads is drowned by the uproar and clatter of money-getting. So long as society is now organized, perhaps it will be necessary to make accumulation, the paramount object—the "chief end of man." It is truly demeaning to make this the highest object of life—to cultivate that faculty, so much to the meglect of the higher and nobler attributes of the soul; but the people must have bread, and while the few infernal grabocrats and monopolists have all the bread and money, of course the many must work, and suffer and toil, or surrender and die. Few are disposed to do the latter, and therefore submit to the crushing, blinding, stultifying, influences that surround them.

It is not extenuating the matter to say there are upwards of one hundred churches in this city. Indeed, this is perhaps the saddest shade in the picture. It goes to show the utter inhumanity of a religion so extensively preached—so widely professed. Such a religion adapts itself very readily to the times and is very profitable and convenient to the priesthood; but Humanity must ride over it and its temples, before she can be free. Reformers will ever find the most virulent opposition, the greatest amount of calumny and odium coming from this source. let Humanity rejoice then, whenever there are indications of the fall and failure of the churches, for when they are superseded, her redemption draweth nigh.

Milo A. TownsendTownsend, Milo A.

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Pittsburgh, Pa., Oct. 9th, 1849.