{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_9171/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_9171","id":"gutenberg_9171","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9171","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: History - American","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Slavery -- Justification","Slavery -- United States","Slavery and the church -- Presbyterian Church","Slavery and the church -- United States"],"text":"Produced by Distributed Proofreaders\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nSLAVERY ORDAINED OF GOD\n\nBy\n\nRev. Fred. A. Ross, D.D.\n\n\n\"The powers that be are ordained of God.\" Romans xiii. 1.\n\n\nTO\nThe Men\nNORTH AND SOUTH,\nWHO HONOR THE WORD OF GOD\nAND\nLOVE THEIR COUNTRY.\n\n\n\n\nPreface.\n\n\n\nThe book I give to the public, is not made up of isolated articles. It is\none harmonious demonstration--that slavery is part of the government\nordained in certain conditions of fallen mankind. I present the subject in\nthe form of speeches, actually delivered, and letters written just as\npublished. I adopt this method to make a readable book.\n\nI give it to the North and South--to maintain harmony among Christians,\nand to secure the integrity of the union of this great people.\n\nThis harmony and union can be preserved only by the view presented in this\nvolume,--_i.e._ that _slavery is of God_, and to continue for the good of\nthe slave, the good of the master, the good of the whole American family,\nuntil another and better destiny may be unfolded.\n\nThe _one great idea_, which I submit to North and South, is expressed in\nthe speech, first in order, delivered in the General Assembly of the\nPresbyterian Church, Buffalo, May 27, 1853. I therein say:--\n\n\"Let us then, North and South, bring our minds to comprehend _two\nideas_, and submit to their irresistible power. Let the Northern\nphilanthropist learn from the Bible that the relation of master and slave\nis not sin _per se_. Let him learn that God says nowhere it is sin. Let\nhim learn that sin is the transgression of the law; and where there is no\nlaw there is no sin, and that _the Golden Rule_ may exist in the\nrelations of slavery. Let him learn that slavery is simply an evil _in\ncertain circumstances_. Let him learn that _equality_ is only the highest\nform of social life; that _subjection_ to authority, even _slavery_, may,\nin _given conditions_, be _for a time_ better than freedom to the slave\nof any complexion. Let him learn that _slavery_, like _all evils_, has\nits _corresponding_ and _greater good_; that the Southern slave, though\ndegraded _compared with his master, is elevated and ennobled compared\nwith his brethren in Africa_. Let the Northern man learn these things,\nand be wise to cultivate the spirit that will harmonize with his brethren\nof the South, who are lovers of liberty as truly as himself: And let the\nSouthern Christian--nay, the Southern man of every grade--comprehend that\n_God never intended the relation of master and slave to be perpetual_.\nLet him give up the theory of Voltaire, that the negro is of a different\nspecies. Let him yield the semi-infidelity of Agassiz, that God created\ndifferent races of the same species--in swarms, like bees--for Asia,\nEurope, America, Africa, and the islands of the sea. Let him believe that\nslavery, although not a sin, is a degraded condition,--the evil, the\ncurse on the South,--yet having blessings in its time to the South and to\nthe Union. Let him know that slavery is to pass away in the fulness of\nProvidence. Let the South believe this, and prepare to obey the hand that\nmoves their destiny.\"\n\nAll which comes after, in the speech delivered in New York, 1856, and in\nthe letters, is just the expansion of this one controlling thought, which\nmust be understood, believed, and acted out North and South.\n\nThe Author.\n\nWritten in Cleveland, Ohio, May 28, 1857.\n\n\n\n\nContents.\n\n\n\nSpeech Before the General Assembly at Buffalo\nSpeech Before the General Assembly at New York\nLetter to Rev. A. Blackburn\nWhat Is the Foundation of Moral Obligation?\n\nLetters to Rev. A. Barnes:--\n\n  I.--Results of the slavery agitation--Declaration of Independence--\n      The way men are made infidels--Testimonies of General Assemblies\n II.--Government over man a divine institute\nIII.--Man-stealing\n IV.--The Golden Rule\n\n\n\n\nSpeech Delivered at Buffalo, Before the General Assembly of the\nPresbyterian Church.\n\n\n\nTo understand the following speech, the reader will be pleased to\nlearn--if he don't know already--that the General Assembly of the\nPresbyterian Church, before its division in 1838, and since,--both Old\nSchool and New School,--has been, for forty years and more, bearing\ntestimony, after a fashion, against the system of slavery; that is to say,\naffirming, in one breath, that slave-holding is a \"blot on our holy\nreligion,\" &c. &c.; and then, in the next utterance, making all sorts of\napologies and justifications for the slave-holder. Thus: this august body\nhas been in the habit of telling the Southern master (especially in the\nDetroit resolutions of 1850) that he is a _sinner_, hardly meet to be\ncalled a _Christian_; but, nevertheless, if he will only sin \"from\nunavoidable necessity, imposed by the laws of the States,\"--if he will\nonly sin under the \"obligations of guardianship,\"--if he will only sin\n\"from the demands of humanity,\"--why, then, forsooth, he may be a\nslave-holder as long as _he has a mind to_. Yea, he may hold one slave,\none hundred or one thousand slaves, and till the day of judgment.\n\nHappening to be in attendance, as a member of the body, in Buffalo, May,\n1853, when, as usual, the system of slavery was touched, in a series of\nquestions sent down to the church courts below, I made the following\nremarks, in good-natured ridicule of such preposterous and stultifying\ntestimony; and, as an argument, opening the views I have since reproduced\nin the second speech of this volume, delivered in the General Assembly\nwhich convened in New York, May, 1856, and also in the letters\nfollowing:--\n\nBUFFALO, FRIDAY, May 27, 1853.\n\nThe order of the day was reached at a quarter before eleven, and the\nreport read again,--viz.:\n\n\"1. That this body shall reaffirm the doctrine of the second resolution\nadopted by the General Assembly, convened in Detroit, in 1850, and,\n\n\"2. That with an express disavowal of any intention to be impertinently\ninquisitorial, and for the sole purpose of arriving at the truth, so as to\ncorrect misapprehensions and allay all causeless irritation, a committee\nbe appointed of one from each of the synods of Kentucky, Tennessee,\nMissouri, and Virginia, who shall be requested to report to the next\nGeneral Assembly on the following points:--1. The number of slave-holders\nin connection with the churches, and the number of slaves held by them. 2.\nThe extent to which slaves are held from an unavoidable necessity imposed\nby the laws of the States, the obligations of guardianship, and the\ndemands of humanity. 3. Whether the Southern churches regard the\nsacredness of the marriage relation as it exists among the slaves; whether\nbaptism is duly administered to the children of the slaves professing\nChristianity, and in general, to what extent and in what manner provision\nis made for the religious well-being of the slave,\" &c. &c.\n\nDr. Ross moved to amend the report by substituting the following,--with\nan express disavowal of being impertinently inquisitorial:--that a\ncommittee of _one_ from each of the Northern synods of ---- be appointed,\nwho shall be requested to report to the next General Assembly,--\n\n1. The number of Northern church-members concerned, directly or\nindirectly, in building and fitting out ships for the African slave-trade,\nand the slave-trade between the States.\n\n2. The number of Northern church-members who traffic with slave-holders,\nand are seeking to make money by selling them negro-clothing, handcuffs,\nand cowhides.\n\n3. The number of Northern church-members who have sent orders to New\nOrleans, and other Southern cities, to have slaves sold, to pay debts\nowing them from the South. [See Uncle Tom's Cabin.]\n\n4. The number of Northern church-members who buy the cotton, sugar, rice,\ntobacco, oranges, pine-apples, figs, ginger, cocoa, melons, and a thousand\nother things, raised by slave-labor.\n\n5. The number of Northern church-members who have intermarried with\nslave-holders, and have thus become slave-owners themselves, or enjoy the\nwealth made by the blood of the slave,--especially if there be any\nNorthern ministers of the gospel in such a predicament.\n\n6. The number of Northern church-members who are the descendants of the\nmen who kidnapped negroes in Africa and brought them to Virginia and New\nEngland in former years.\n\n7. The aggregate and individual wealth of members thus descended, and what\naction is best to compel them to disgorge this blood-stained gold, or to\ncompel them to give dollar for dollar in equalizing the loss of the South\nby emancipation.\n\n8. The number of Northern church-members, ministers especially, who have\nadvocated _murder_ in resistance to the laws of the land.\n\n9. The number of Northern church-members who own stock in under-ground\nrailroads, running off fugitive slaves, and in Sabbath-breaking railroads\nand canals.\n\n10. That a special commission be sent up Red River, to ascertain whether\nLegree, who whipped Uncle Tom to death, (and who was a Northern\n_gentleman_,) be not still in connection with some Northern church in good\nand regular standing.\n\n11. The number of Northern church-members who attend meetings of\nSpiritual Rappers,--or Bloomers,--or Women's-Rights Conventions.\n\n12. The number of Northern church-members who are cruel husbands.\n\n13. The number of Northern church-members who are hen-pecked husbands.\n\n[As it is always difficult to know the temper of speaker and audience from\na printed report, it is due alike to Dr. R., to the whole Assembly, and\nthe galleries, to say, that he, in reading these resolutions, and\nthroughout his speech, evinced great good-humour and kindness of feeling,\nwhich was equally manifested by the Assembly and spectators, repeatedly,\nwhile he was on the floor.]\n\nDr. Ross then proceeded:--Mr. Moderator, I move this amendment in the best\nspirit. I desire to imitate the committee in their refinement and delicacy\nof distinction. I disavow all intention to be _impertinently_\ninquisitorial. I intend to be inquisitorial, as the committee say they\nare,--but not _impertinently_ so. No, sir; not at all; not at all.\n(Laughter.) Well, sir, we of the South, who desire the removal of the evil\nof slavery, and believe it will pass away in the developments of\nProvidence, are grieved when we read your graphic, shuddering pictures of\nthe \"middle passage,\"--the slave-ship, piling up her canvas, as the shot\npours after her from English or American guns,--see her again and again\nhurrying hogshead after hogshead, filled with living slaves, into the\ndeep, and, thus lightened, escape. Sir, what horror to believe that\nclipper-ship was built by the hands of Northern, noisy Abolition\nchurch-members! [\"Yes, I know some in New York and Boston,\" said one in\nthe crowd.] Again, sir, when we walk along your _Broadways_, and see, as\nwe do, the soft hands of your church-members sending off to the South, not\nonly clothing for the slave, but manacles and whips, manufactured\nexpressly for him,--what must we think of your consistency of character?\n[True, true.] And what must we think of your self-righteousness, when we\nknow your church-members order the sale of slaves,--yes, slaves such as\nSt. Clair's,--and under circumstances involving all the separations and\nall the loathsome things you so mournfully deplore? Your Mrs. Stowe says\nso, and it is so, without her testimony. I have read that splendid, bad\nbook. Splendid in its genius, over which I have wept, and laughed, and got\nmad, (here some one said, \"All at the same time?\") yes--all at the same\ntime. Bad in its theology, bad in its morality, bad in its temporary evil\ninfluence here in the North, in England, and on the continent of Europe;\nbad, because her isolated cruelties will be taken (whether so meant by her\nor not) as the general condition of Southern life,--while her Shelbys, and\nSt. Clairs, and Evas, will be looked upon as angel-visitors, lingering for\na moment in that earthly hell. The _impression made by the book is a\nfalsehood_.\n\nSir, why do your Northern church-members and philanthropists buy Southern\nproducts at all? You know you are purchasing cotton, rice, sugar,\nsprinkled with blood, literally, you say, from the lash of the driver! Why\ndo you buy? What's the difference between my filching this blood-stained\ncotton from the outraged negro, and your standing by, taking it from me?\nWhat's the difference? You, yourselves, say, in your abstractions, there\nis no difference; and yet you daily stain your hands in this horrid\ntraffic. You hate the traitor, but you love the treason. Your ladies,\ntoo,--oh, how they shun the slave-owner _at a distance_, in _the\nabstract_! But alas, when they see him in the _concrete_,--when they see\nthe slave-owner _himself_, standing before them,--not the brutal driver,\nbut the splendid gentleman, with his unmistakable grace of carriage and\nease of manners,--why, lo, behold the lady says, \"Oh, fie on your\nslavery!--what a _wretch_ you are! But, indeed, sir, I love your\nsugar,--and truly, truly, sir, _wretch_ as you are, I love you too.\" Your\ngentlemen talk just the same way when they behold our matchless women. And\nwell for us all it is, that your good taste, and hearts, can thus\nappreciate our genius, and accomplishments, and fascinations, and\nloveliness, and sugar, and cotton. Why, sir, I heard this morning, from\none pastor only, of two or three of his members thus intermarried in the\nSouth. May I thus give the mildest rebuke to your inconsistency of\nconduct? (Much good-natured excitement.)\n\nSir, may we know who are the descendants of the New England kidnappers?\nWhat is their wealth? Why, here you are, all around me. You, gentlemen,\nmade the best of that bargain. And you have kept every dollar of your\nmoney from the charity of emancipating the slave. You have left us,\nunaided, to give millions. Will you now come to our help? Will you give\ndollar for dollar to equalize our loss? [Here many voices cried out, \"Yes,\nyes, we will.\"]\n\nYes, yes? Then pour out your millions. Good. I may thank you personally.\nMy own emancipated slaves would to-day be worth greatly more than\n$20,000. Will you give me back $10,000? Good. I need it now.\n\nI recommend to you, sirs, to find out your advocates of _murder_,--your\nowners of stock in under-ground railroads,--your Sabbath-breakers for\nmoney. I particularly urge you to find Legree, who whipped Uncle Tom to\ndeath. He is a Northern _gentleman_, although having a somewhat Southern\nname. Now, sir, you know the Assembly was embarrassed all yesterday by\nthe inquiry how the Northern churches may find their absent members, and\nwhat to do with them. Here then, sir, is a chance for you. Send a\ncommittee up Red River. You may find Legree to be a Garrison, Phillips,\nSmith, or runaway husband from some Abby Kelly. [Here Rev. Mr. Smith\nprotested against Legree being proved to be a Smith. Great laughter.\n[Footnote: This gentleman was soon after made a D.D., and I think in part\nfor that witticism.]] I move that you bring him back to lecture on the\n_cuteness_ there is in leaving a Northern church, going South, changing\nhis name, buying slaves, and calculating, without _guessing_, what the\nprofit is of killing a negro with inhuman labor above the gain of\ntreating him with kindness.\n\nI have little to say of spirit-rappers, women's-rights conventionists,\nBloomers, cruel husbands, or hen-pecked. But, if we may believe your own\nserious as well as caricature writers, you have things up here of which we\ndown South know very little indeed. Sir, we have no young Bloomers, with\nhat to one side, cigar in mouth, and cane tapping the boot, striding up to\na mincing young gentleman with long curls, attenuated waist, and soft\nvelvet face,--the boy-lady to say, \"May I see you home, sir?\" and the\nlady-boy to reply, \"I thank ye--no; pa will send the carriage.\" Sir, we of\nthe South don't understand your women's-rights conventions. Women have\ntheir wrongs. \"The Song of the Shirt,\"--Charlotte Elizabeth,--many, many\nlaws,--tell her wrongs. But your convention ladies despise the Bible. Yes,\nsir; and we of the South are afraid _of them_, and _for you_. When women\ndespise the Bible, what next? _Paris,--then the City of the Great Salt\nLake,--then Sodom, before_ and _after the Dead Sea_. Oh, sir, if slavery\ntends in any way to give the _honour of chivalry_ to Southern young\ngentlemen towards ladies, and the exquisite delicacy and heavenly\nintegrity and love to Southern maid and matron, it has then a glorious\nblessing with its curse.\n\nSir, your inquisitorial committee, and the North so far as represented by\nthem, (a small fraction, I know,) have, I take it, caught a Tartar this\ntime. Boys say with us, and everywhere, I _reckon_, \"You worry my dog, and\nI'll worry your cat.\" Sir, it is just simply a _fixed fact: the South will\nnot submit to these questions_. No, not for an instant. We will not permit\nyou to approach us at all. If we are morbidly sensitive, you have made us\nso. But you are directly and grossly violating the Constitution of the\nPresbyterian Church. The book forbids you to put such questions; the book\nforbids _you to begin discipline_; the book forbids your sending this\ncommittee to help common fame bear testimony against us; the book guards\nthe honour of our humblest member, minister, church, presbytery, against\nall this impertinently-inquisitorial action. Have you a _prosecutor_, with\nhis definite charge and witnesses? Have you _Common Fame_, with her\nspecified charges and witnesses? Have you a request from the South that\nyou send a committee to inquire into slanders? No. Then hands off. As\ngentlemen you may ask us these questions,--we will answer you. But,\necclesiastically, you cannot speak in this matter. You have no power to\nmove as you propose.\n\nI beg leave to say, just here, that Tennessee [Footnote: At that time I\nresided in Tennessee.] will be more calm under this movement than any\nother slave-region. Tennessee has been ever high above the storm, North\nand South,--especially we of the mountains. Tennessee!--\"there she\nis,--look at her,\"--binding this Union together like a great, long,\nbroad, deep stone,--more splendid than all in the temple of Baalbec or\nSolomon. Tennessee!--there she is, in her calm valour. I will not lower\nher by calling her unconquerable, for she has never been assailed; but I\ncall her ever-victorious. King's Mountain,--her pioneer\nbattles:--Talladega, Emucfau, Horse-shoe, New Orleans, San Jacinto,\nMonterey, the Valley of Mexico. Jackson represented her well in his\nchivalry from South Carolina,--his fiery courage from Virginia and\nKentucky,--all tempered by Scotch-Irish Presbyterian prudence from\nTennessee. We, in his spirit, have looked on this storm for years\nuntroubled. Yes, Jackson's old bones rattled in their grave when that\ninfamous disunion convention met in Nashville, and its members turned\npale and fled aghast. Yes, Tennessee, in her mighty million, feels\nsecure; and, in her perfect preparation to discuss this question,\npolitically, ecclesiastically, morally, metaphysically, or physically,\nwith the extreme North or South, she is willing and able _to persuade\nothers to be calm_. In this connection, I wish to say, for the South to\nthe North, and to the world, that we have no fears from our\nslave-population. There might be a momentary insurrection and bloodshed;\nbut destruction to the black man would be inevitable. The Greeks and\nRomans controlled immense masses of white slaves,--many of them as\nintelligent as their lords. Schoolmasters, fabulists, and poets were\nslaves. Athens, with her thirty thousand freemen, governed half a\nmillion of bondmen. Single Roman patricians owned thirty thousand. If,\nthen, the phalanx and the legion mastered such slaves for ages, when\nbattle was physical force of man to man, how certain it is that\ninfantry, cavalry, and artillery could hold in bondage millions of\nAfricans for a thousand years!\n\nBut, dear brethren, our Southern philanthropists do not seek to have this\nunending bondage; Oh, no, no. And I earnestly entreat you to \"stand still\nand see the salvation of the Lord.\" Assume a masterly inactivity, and you\nwill behold all you desire and pray for,--you will see _America liberated\nfrom the curse of slavery_.\n\nThe great question of the world is, WHAT IS TO BE THE FUTURE OF THE\nAMERICAN SLAVE?--WHAT IS TO BE THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN MASTER? The\nfollowing _extract from the \"Charleston Mercury\"_ gives my view of the\nsubject with great and condensed particularity:--\n\n\"Married, Thursday, 26th inst., the Hon. Cushing Kewang, Secretary of\nState of the United States, to Laura, daughter of Paul Coligny,\nVice-President of the United States, and one of our noblest Huguenot\nfamilies. We learn that this distinguished gentleman, with his bride, will\nvisit his father, the Emperor of China, at his summer palace, in Tartary,\nnorth of Pekin, and return to the Vice-President's Tea Pavilion, on Cooper\nRiver, ere the meeting of Congress.\" The editor of the \"Mercury\" goes on\nto say: \"This marriage in high life is only one of many which have\nsignalized that immense emigration from Christianized China during the\nlast seventy-five years, whereby Charleston has a population of 1,250,000,\nand the State of South Carolina over 5,000,000,--an emigration which has\nwonderfully harmonized with the great exodus of the negro race to\nAfrica.\" [Some gentleman here requested to know of Dr. Ross the date of\nthe \"Charleston Mercury\" recording this marriage. The doctor replied, \"The\ndate is 27th May, 1953, exactly one hundred years from this day.\" Great\nlaughter.]\n\nSir, this is a dream; but it is not all a dream. No, I verily believe you\nhave there the Gordian knot of slavery untied; you have there the solution\nof the problem; you have there the curtain up, and the last scene in the\nlast act of the great drama of Ham.\n\nI am satisfied with the tendencies of things. I stand on the mountain-peak\nabove the clouds. I see, far beyond the storm, the calm sea and blue sky;\nI see the Canaan of the African. I like to stand there on the Nebo of his\nexodus, and look across, not the Jordan, but the Atlantic. I see the\nAfrican crossing as certainly as if I gazed upon the ocean divided by a\ngreat wind, and piled up in walls of green glittering glass on either\nhand, the dry ground, the marching host, and the pillar of cloud and of\nfire. I look over upon the Niger, black with death to the white man,\ninstinct with life to the children of Ham. _There_ is the black man's\nhome. Oh, how strange that you of the North see not how you degrade him\nwhen you keep him here! You will not let him vote; you will not let him\nrise to honors or social equality; you will not let him hold a pew in your\nchurches. Send him away, then; tell him, begone. Be urgent, like the\nEgyptians: send him out of this land. _There_, in his fatherland, he will\nexhibit his own type of Christianity. He is, of all races, the most gentle\nand kind. The _man_, the most submissive; the _woman_, the most\naffectionate. What other slaves would love their masters better than\nthemselves?--rock them and fan them in their cradles? caress them--how\ntenderly!--boys and girls? honor them, grown up, as superior beings? and,\nin thousands of illustrious instances, be willing to give life, and, in\nfact, die, to serve or save them? Verily, verily, this emancipated race\nmay reveal the most amiable form of spiritual life, and the _jewel_ may\nglitter on the Ethiop's brow in meaning more sublime than all in the\npoet's imagery. Brethren, let them go; and, when they are gone,--ay,\nbefore they go away,--rear a monument; let it grow in greatness, if not on\nyour highest mountain, in your hearts,--in lasting memory of the\nSouth,--in memory of your wrong to the South,--in memory of the\nself-denial of the South, and her philanthropy in training the slave to\nbe free, enlightened, and Christian.\n\nCan all this be? Can this double emigration civilize Africa and more than\nre-people the South? Yes; and I regard the difficulties presented here, in\nCongress, or the country, as little worth. God intends both emigrations.\nAnd, without miracle, he will accomplish both. Difficulties! There are no\ndifficulties. Half a million emigrate to our shores, from Ireland, and all\nEurope, every year. And you gravely talk of difficulties in the negro's\nway to Africa! Verily, God will unfold their destiny as fast, and as\nfully, as he sees best for the highest good of the slave, the highest good\nof the master, and the glory of Christ in Africa.\n\nAnd, sir, there are forty thousand Chinese in California. And in Cuba,\nthis day, American gentlemen are cultivating sugar, with Chinese hired\nlabor, more profitably than the Spaniards and their slaves. Oh! there is\nChina--half the population of the globe--just fronting us across that\npeaceful sea,--her poor, living on rats and a pittance of red rice,--her\nrich, hoarding millions in senseless idolatry, or indulging in the\nluxuries of birds'-nests and roasted ice. Massed together, they must\nmigrate. Where can they go? They must come to our shores. They must come,\neven did God forbid them. But he will hasten their coming. They can live\nin the extremest South. It is their latitude,--their side of the ocean.\nThey can cultivate cotton, rice, sugar, tea, and the silkworm. Their\nskill, their manipulation, is unrivalled. Their commonest gong you can\nneither make nor explain. They are a law-abiding people, without castes,\naccustomed to rise by merit to highest distinctions, and capable of the\nnoblest training, when their idolatry, which is waxing old as a garment,\nshall be folded up as a vesture and changed for _that_ whose years shall\nnot fail. The English ambassador assures us that the Chinese negotiator of\nthe late treaty was a splendid gentleman, and a diplomatist to move in any\ncourt of Europe. Shem, then, can mingle with Japheth in America.\n\nThe Chinese must come. God will bring them. He will fulfil Benton's noble\nthought. The railroad must complete the voyage of Columbus. The statue of\nthe Genoese, on some peak of the Rocky Mountains, high above the flying\ncars, must point to the West, saying, \"There is the East! There is India\nand Cathay.\"\n\nLet us, then, North and South, bring our minds to comprehend _two ideas_,\nand submit to their irresistible power. Let the Northern philanthropist\nlearn from the Bible that the relation of master and slave is not sin\n_per se_. Let him learn that God nowhere says it is sin. Let him learn\nthat sin is the transgression of the law; and where there is no law,\nthere is no sin; and that _the golden rule_ may exist in the relations of\nslavery. Let him learn that slavery is simply an evil _in certain\ncircumstances_. Let him learn that _equality_ is only the highest form of\nsocial life; that _subjection_ to authority, even _slavery_, may, in\n_given conditions_, be _for a time_ better than freedom to the slave, of\nany complexion. Let him learn that _slavery_, like _all evils_, has its\n_corresponding_ and _greater good_; that the Southern slave, though\ndegraded _compared with his master_, is _elevated_ and _ennobled compared\nwith his brethren in Africa_. Let the Northern man learn these things,\nand be wise to cultivate the spirit that will harmonize with his brethren\nof the South, who are lovers of liberty as truly as himself. And let the\nSouthern Christian--nay, the Southern man of every grade--comprehend that\n_God never intended the relation of master and slave to be perpetual_.\nLet him give up the theory of Voltaire, that the negro is of a different\nspecies. Let him yield the semi-infidelity of Agassiz, that God created\ndifferent races of the same species--in swarms, like bees--for Asia,\nEurope, America, Africa, and the islands of the sea. Let him believe that\nslavery, although not a sin, is a degraded condition,--the evil, the\ncurse on the South,--yet having blessings in its time to the South and to\nthe Union. Let him know that slavery is to pass away, in the fulness of\nProvidence. Let the South believe this, and prepare to obey the hand that\nmoves their destiny.\n\nHam will be ever lower than Shem; Shem will be ever lower than Japheth.\nAll will rise in the Christian grandeur to be revealed. Ham will be lower\nthan Shem, because he was sent to Central Africa. Man south of the\nEquator--in Asia, Australia, Oceanica, America, especially Africa--is\ninferior to his Northern brother. The _blessing_ was upon Shem in his\nmagnificent Asia. The _greater blessing_ was upon Japheth in his\nman-developing Europe. _Both blessings_ will be combined, in America,\n_north of the Zone_, in commingled light and life. I see it all in the\nfirst symbolical altar of Noah on that mound at the base of Ararat. The\nfather of all living men bows before the incense of sacrifice, streaming\nup and mingling with the rays of the rising sun. His noble family, and all\nflesh saved, are grouped round about him. There is Ham, at the foot of\nthe green hillock, standing, in his antediluvian, rakish recklessness,\nnear the long-necked giraffe, type of his _Africa_,--his magnificent wife,\nseated on the grass, her little feet nestling in the tame lion's mane, her\nlong black hair flowing over crimson drapery and covered with gems from\nmines before the flood. Higher up is Shem, leaning his arm over that\nmouse-colored horse,--his _Arab_ steed. His wife, in pure white linen,\nfeeds the elephant, and plays with his lithe proboscis,--the mother of\nTerah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, David, and Christ. And yet she looks\nup, and bows in mild humility, to _her_ of Japheth, seated amid plumed\nbirds, in robes like the sky. Her noble lord, meanwhile, high above all,\nstands, with folded arms, following that eagle which wheels up towards\nArarat, displaying his breast glittering with stars and stripes of scarlet\nand silver,--radiant heraldry, traced by the hand of God. Now he purifies\nhis eye in the sun, and now he spreads his broad wings in symbolic flight\nto the _West_, until lost to the prophetic eye of Japheth, under the bow\nof splendors set that day in the cloud. God's covenant with man,--oh, may\nthe bow of covenant between us be here to-day, that the waters of _this\nflood_ shall never again threaten our beloved land!\n\n\n\n\nSpeech Delivered in the General Assembly\nNew York, 1856.\n\n\n\nThe circumstances, under which this speech was delivered, are sufficiently\nshown in the statement below.\n\nIt was not a hasty production. After being spoken, it was prepared for the\n\"Journal of Commerce,\" with the greatest care I could give to it: most of\nit was written again and again. Unlike Pascal, who said, as to his longest\nand inferior sixteenth letter, that he had not had time to make it\nshorter, I had time; and I did condense in that one speech the matured\nreflections of my whole life. I am calmly satisfied I am right. I am sure\nGod has said, and does say, \"Well done.\"\n\nThe speech brings to view a wide range of thought, all belonging to the\nsubject of slavery, of immense importance. As introductory,--there is the\nquestion of the abolition agitation the last thirty years; then, what is\nright and wrong, and the foundation of moral obligation; then, the\ndefinition of sin; next, the origin of human government, and the\nrelations, in which God has placed men under his rule of subjection;\nfinally, the word of God is brought to sustain all the positions taken.\n\nThe challenge to argue the question of slavery from the Bible was thrown\ndown on the floor of the Assembly, as stated. Presently I took up the\ngauntlet, and made this argument. The challenger never claimed his glove,\nthen nor since; nor has anybody, so far as I know, attempted to refute\nthis speech. Nothing has come to my ears (save as to two points, to be\nnoticed hereafter) but reckless, bold denial of God's truth, infidel\naffirmation without attempt at proof, and denunciations of myself.\n\n_Dr. Wisner_ having said that he would argue the question on the Bible at\na following time, Dr. Ross rose, when he took his seat, and, taking his\nposition on the platform near the Moderator's chair, said,--\n\n\"I accept the challenge given by Dr. Wisner, to argue the question of\nslavery from the Scriptures.\"\n\n_Dr. Wisner_.--Does the brother propose to go into it here?\n\n_Dr. Ross_.--Yes, sir.\n\n_Dr. Wisner_.--Well, I did not propose to go into it here.\n\n_Dr. Ross_.--You gave the challenge, and I accept it.\n\n_Dr. Wisner_.--I said I would argue it at a proper time; but it is no\nmatter. Go ahead.\n\n_Dr. Beman_ hoped the discussion would be ruled out. He did not think it a\nlegitimate subject to go into,--Moses and the prophets, Christ and his\napostles, and all intermediate authorities, on the subject of what the\nGeneral Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America had done.\n\n_Judge Jessup_ considered the question had been opened by this report of\nthe majority: after which _Dr. Beman_ withdrew his objection, and _Dr.\nRoss_ proceeded.\n\nI am not a slave-holder. Nay, I have shown some self-denial in that\nmatter. I emancipated slaves whose money-value would now be $40,000. In\nthe providence of God, my riches have entirely passed from me. I do not\nmean that, like the widow, I gave all the living I had. My estate was then\ngreater than that slave-property. I merely wish to show I have no selfish\nmotive in giving, as I shall, the true Southern defence of slavery.\n(Applause.) I speak from Huntsville, Alabama, my present home. That gem of\nthe South, that beautiful city where the mountain softens into the\nvale,--where the water gushes, a great fountain, from the rock,--where\naround that living stream there are streets of roses, and houses of\nintelligence and gracefulness and gentlest hospitality,--and, withal,\nwhere so high honor is ever given to the ministers of God.\n\nSpeaking then from that region where \"_Cotton is king_,\" I affirm,\ncontrary as my opinion is to that most common in the South, that the\nslavery agitation has accomplished and will do great good. I said so, to\nministerial and political friends, twenty-five years ago. I have always\nfavored the agitation,--just as I have always countenanced discussion\nupon all subjects. I felt that the slavery question needed examination.\nI believed it was not understood in its relations to the Bible and human\nliberty. Sir, the light is spreading North and South. 'Tis said, I know,\nthis agitation has increased the severity of slavery. True, but for a\nmoment only, in the days of the years of the life of this noble problem.\nFarmers tell us that deep ploughing in poor ground will, for a year or\ntwo, give you a worse crop than before you went so deep; but that that\ndeep ploughing will turn up the under-soil, and sun and air and rain will\ngive you harvests increasingly rich. So, this moral soil, North and\nSouth, was unproductive. It needed deep ploughing. For a time the harvest\nwas worse. Now it is becoming more and more abundant. The political\ncontroversy, however fierce and threatening, is only for power. But the\nmoral agitation is for the harmony of the Northern and Southern mind, in\nthe right interpretations of Scripture on this great subject, and, of\ncourse, for the ultimate union of the hearts of all sensible people, to\nfulfil God's intention,--to bless the white man and the black man in\nAmerica. I am sure of this. I take a wide view of the progress of the\ndestiny of this vast empire. I see God in America. I see him in the North\nand in the South. I see him more honored in the South to-day than he was\ntwenty-five years ago; and that that higher regard is due, mainly, to the\nagitation of the slavery question. Do you ask how? Why, sir, this is the\nhow. Twenty-five years ago the religious mind of the South was leavened\nby wrong Northern training, on the great point of the right and wrong of\nslavery. Meanwhile, powerful intellects in the South, following the mere\nlight of a healthy good sense, guided by the common grace of God, reached\nthe very truth of this great matter,--namely, that the relation of the\nmaster and slave is not sin; and that, notwithstanding its admitted\nevils, it is a connection between the highest and the lowest races of\nman, revealing influences which may be, and will be, most benevolent for\nthe ultimate good of the master and the slave,--conservative on the\nUnion, by preserving the South from all forms of Northern fanaticism, and\nthereby being a great balance-wheel in the working of the tremendous\nmachinery of our experiment of self-government. This seen result of\nslavery was found to be in absolute harmony with the word of God. These\nmen, then, of highest grade of thought, who had turned in scorn from\nNorthern notions, now see, in the Bible, that these notions are false\nand silly. They now read the Bible, never examined before, with growing\nrespect. God is honored, and his glory will be more and more in their\nsalvation. These are some of the moral consummations of this agitation in\nthe South. The development has been twofold in the North. On the one\nhand, some anti-slavery men have left the light of the Bible, and\nwandered into the darkness until they have reached the blackness of the\ndarkness of infidelity. Other some are following hard after, and are\nthrowing the Bible into the furnace,--are melting it into iron, and\nforging it, and welding it, and twisting it, and grooving it into the\nshape and significance and goodness and gospel of Sharpe's rifles. Sir,\nare you not afraid that some of your once best men will soon have no\nbetter Bible than that?\n\nBut, on the other hand, many of your brightest minds are looking intensely\nat the subject, in the same light in which it is studied by the highest\nSouthern reason. Ay, sir, mother-England, old fogy as she is, begins to\nopen her eyes. What, then, is our gain? Sir, Uncle Tom's Cabin, in many of\nits conceptions, could not have been written twenty-five years ago. That\nbook of genius,--over which I and hundreds in the world have freely\nwept,--true in all its facts, false in all its impressions,--yea, as false\nin the prejudice it creates to Southern social life as if Webster, the\nmurderer of Parkman, may be believed to be a personification of the\n_elite_ of honor in Cambridge, Boston, and New England. Nevertheless,\nUncle Tom's Cabin could not have been written twenty-five years ago. Dr.\nNehemiah Adams's \"_South-Side View_\" could not have been written\ntwenty-five years ago. Nor Dr. Nathan Lord's \"_Letter of Inquiry_.\" Nor\nMiss Murray's book. Nor \"_Cotton is King_\". Nor Bledsoe's \"_Liberty and\nSlavery\"_. These books, written in the midst of this agitation, are all of\nhigh, some the highest, reach of talent and noblest piety; all give, with\nincreasing confidence, the present Southern Bible reading on Slavery. May\nthe agitation, then, go on! I know the New School Presbyterian church has\nsustained some temporary injury. But God is honored in his word. The\nreaction, when the first abolition-movement commenced, has been succeeded\nby the sober second thought of the South. The sun, stayed, is again\ntravelling in the greatness of his strength, and will shine brighter and\nbrighter to the perfect day.\n\nMy only fear, Mr. Moderator, is that, as you Northern people are so prone\nto go to extremes in your zeal and run every thing into the ground, you\nmay, perhaps, become _too pro-slavery;_ and that we may have to take\nmeasures against your coveting, over much, our daughters, if not our\nwives, our men-servants, our maid-servants, our houses, and our lands.\n(Laughter.)\n\nSir, I come now to the Bible argument. I begin at the beginning of\neternity! (Laughter.) WHAT is RIGHT AND WRONG? _That's the question of\nquestions_.\n\nTwo theories have obtained in the world. The one is, that right and wrong\nare eternal facts; that they exist _per se_ in the nature of things; that\nthey are ultimate truths above God; that he must study, and does study, to\nknow them, as really as man. And that he comprehends them more clearly\nthan man, only because he is a better student than man. Now, sir, _this\ntheory is atheism_. For if right and wrong are like mathematical\ntruths--fixed facts--then I may find them out, as I find out mathematical\ntruths, without instruction from God. I do not ask God to tell me that one\nand one make two. I do not ask him to reveal to me the demonstrations of\nEuclid. I thank him for the mind to perceive. But I perceive mathematical\nrelations without his telling me, because they exist independent of his\nwill. If, then, moral truths, if right and wrong, if rectitude and sin,\nare, in like manner, fixed, eternal facts,--if they are out from and above\nGod, like mathematical entities,--then I may find them for myself. I may\ncondescend, perhaps, to regard the Bible as a hornbook, in which God, an\nolder student than I, tells _me_ how to _begin_ to learn what he had to\nstudy; or I may decline to be taught, through the Bible, how to learn\nright and wrong. I may think the Bible was good enough, may be, for the\nIsraelite in Egypt and in Canaan; good enough for the Christian in\nJerusalem and Antioch and Rome, but not good enough, even as a hornbook,\nfor me,--the man of the nineteenth century,--the man of Boston, New York,\nand Brooklyn! Oh, no. I may think I need it not at all. What next? Why,\nsir, if I may think I need not God to teach me moral truth, I may think I\nneed him not to teach me any thing. What next? The irresistible conclusion\nis, I may think I can live without God; that Jehovah is a myth,--a name; I\nmay bid him stand aside, or die. Oh, sir, _I will be_ the fool to say\nthere is no God. This is the result of the notion that right and wrong\nexist in the nature of things.\n\nThe other theory is, that right and wrong are results brought into being,\nmere contingencies, means to good, made to exist solely by the will of\nGod, expressed through his word; or, when his will is not thus known, he\nshows it in the human reason by which he rules the natural heart. This is\nso; because God, in making all things, saw that in the relations he would\nconstitute between himself and intelligent creatures, and among\nthemselves, NATURAL GOOD AND EVIL would come to pass. In his benevolent\nwisdom, he then _willed_ LAW, to control this _natural good and evil_. And\nhe thereby made _conformity_ to that law to be _right_, and\n_non-conformity_ to be _wrong_. Why? Simply because he saw it to be good,\nand made it to be right; not because _he saw it to be right_, but because\nhe _made it to be right_.\n\nHence, the ten specific commandments of the one moral law of love are just\nten rules which God made to regulate the natural good and evil which he\nknew would be in the ten relations, which he himself constituted between\nhimself and man, and between man and his neighbor. The Bible settles the\nquestion:--_sin is the transgression of the law, and where there is no law\nthere is no sin_.\n\nI must-advance one step further. _What is sin_, as a mental state? Is\nit some quality--some concentrated essence--some elementary moral\nparticle in the nature of things--something black, or red, like\ncrimson, in the constitution of the soul, or the soul and body as\namalgamated? No. Is it self-love? No. Is it selfishness? No. What is\nit? Just exactly, _self-will._ Just that. I, the creature, WILL _not\nsubmit_ to _thy_ WILL, God, the Creator. It is the I AM, _created_, who\ndares to defy and dishonor the I AM, not created,--the Lord God, the\nAlmighty, Holy, Eternal.\n\n_That_ IS SIN, _per se_. And that is all of it,--so help me God! Your\nchild there--John--says to his father, \"I WILL _not to submit_ to your\nwill.\" \"Why not, John?\" And he answers and says, \"Because I WILL _not_.\"\nThere, sir, John has revealed _all of sin_, on earth or in hell. Satan has\nnever said--can never say--more. \"I, Satan, WILL NOT, because I WILL _not\nto submit_ to thee, God; MY WILL, not thine, shall be.\"\n\nThis beautiful theory is the ray of light which leads us from night, and\ntwilight, and fog, and mist, and mystification, on this subject, to clear\nday. I will illustrate it by the law which has controlled and now\nregulates the most delicate of all the relations of life,--viz.: that of\nthe intercourse between the sexes. I take this, because it presents the\nstrongest apparent objections to my argument.\n\nCain and Abel married their sisters. Was it wrong in the nature of things?\n[Here Dr. Wisner spoke out, and said, \"Certainly.\"] I deny it. What an\nabsurdity, to suppose that God could not provide for the propagation of\nthe human race from one pair, without _requiring them to sin!_ Adam's sons\nand daughters must have married, had they remained in innocence. They must\nthen have sinned in Eden, from the very necessity of the command upon the\nrace:--\"Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.\" (Gen. i. 28).\nWhat pure nonsense! There, sir!--_that_, my one question, Dr. Wisner's\nreply, and my rejoinder, bring out, perfectly, the two theories of right\nand wrong. Sir, Abraham married his half-sister. And there is not a word\nforbidding such marriage, until God gave the law (Lev. xviii.) prohibiting\nmarriage in certain degrees of consanguinity. That law made, then, such\nmarriage _sin_. But God gave no such law in the family of Adam; because he\nmade, himself, the marriage of brother and sister the way, and the only\nway, for the increase of the human race. _He commanded them thus to marry.\nThey would have sinned had they not thus married_; for they would have\ntransgressed his law. Such marriage was not even a natural evil, in the\nthen family of man. But when, in the increase of numbers, it became a\nnatural evil, physical and social, God placed man on a higher platform for\nthe development of civilization, morals, and religion, and then made the\nlaw regulating marriages in the particulars of blood. But he still left\npolygamy untouched. [Here Dr. Wisner again asked if Dr. R. regarded the\nBible as sustaining the polygamy of the Old Testament.] Dr. R.--Yes, sir;\nyes, sir; yes, sir. Let the reporters mark _that_ question, and my answer.\n(Laughter.) My principle vindicates God from unintelligible abstractions.\nI fearlessly tell what the Bible says. In its strength, I am not afraid of\nearth or hell. I fear only God. God made no law against polygamy, in the\nbeginning. Therefore it was no sin for a man to have more wives than one.\nGod sanctioned it, and made laws in regard to it. Abraham had more wives\nthan one; Jacob had, David had, Solomon had. God told David, by the mouth\nof Nathan, when he upbraided him with his ingratitude for the blessings\nhe had given him, and said, \"And I gave thee thy master's house, and _thy\nmaster's wives_ into thy bosom.\" (2 Sam. xvii. 8.)\n\nGod, in the gospel, places man on another platform, for the revelation of\na nobler social and spiritual life. He now forbids polygamy. _Polygamy now\nis sin_--not because it is in itself sin. No; but because God forbids\nit,--to restrain the natural and social evil, and to bring out a higher\nhumanity. And see, sir, how gently in the gospel the transition from the\nlower to the higher table-land of our progress upward is made. Christ and\nhis apostles do not declare polygamy to be sin. The new law is so wisely\ngiven that nothing existing is rudely disturbed. The minister of God,\nunmarried, must have only one wife at the same time. This law, silently\nand gradually, by inevitable and fair inference of its meaning, and from\nthe example of the apostles, passed over the Christian world. God, in the\ngospel, places us in this higher and holier ground and air of love. We\nsin, then, if we marry the sister, and other near of kin; and we sin if we\nmarry, at the same time, more wives than one, not because there is sin in\nthe thing itself, whatever of natural evil there might be, but because in\nso doing we transgress God's law, given to secure and advance the good of\nman. I might comment in the same way on every one of the ten commandments,\nbut I pass on.\n\nThe subject of slavery, in this view of _right and wrong_, is seen in the\nvery light of heaven. And you, Mr. Moderator, know that, if the view I\nhave presented be true, I have got you. (Great laughter.)\n\n[The Moderator said, very pleasantly--Yes--_if_--but it is a _long if_.]\n(Continued laughter.)\n\nDr. R. touched the Moderator on the shoulder, and said, Yes, _if_--it is a\n_long if_; for it is this:--_if_ there is a God, he is not Jupiter, bowing\nto the Fates, but God, the sovereign over the universe he has created, in\nwhich he makes right, by making law to be known and obeyed by angels and\nmen, in their varied conditions.\n\nHe gave Adam _that_ command,--sublime in its simplicity, and intended to\nvindicate the principle I am affirming,--that there is no right and wrong\nin the nature of things. There was no right or wrong, _per se_, in eating\nor willing to eat of that tree of the knowledge of good and evil.\n\nBut God made the law,--_Thou shall not eat of that tree_. As if he had\nsaid,--I seek to _test_ the submission of your will, freely, to my will.\nAnd, that your test may be perfect, I will let your temptation be\nnothing more than your natural desire for that fruit. Adam sinned. What\nwas the sin?\n\nAdam said, in heart, MY WILL, _not thine_, SHALL BE. _That_ was the\nsin,--_the simple transgression of God's law_, when there was neither sin\nnor evil in the _thing_ which God forbade to be done.\n\nMan fell and was cursed. The law of the control of the superior over the\ninferior is now to begin, and is to go on in the depraved conditions of\nthe fallen and cursed race. And, FIRST, God said to the woman, \"_Thy\ndesire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.\" There,_ in\nthat law, is _the beginning of government ordained of God. There_ is the\nbeginning of the rule of the superior over the inferior, bound to obey.\n_There_, in the family of Adam, is the germ of the rule in the tribe,--the\nstate. Adam, in his right, from God, to rule over his wife and his\nchildren, had _all the authority_ afterwards expanded in the patriarch and\nthe king. This simple, beautiful fact, there, on the first leaf of the\nBible, solves the problem, whence and how has man right to rule over man.\nIn that great fact God gives his denial to the idea that government over\nman is the result of a social compact, in which each individual man living\nin a state of natural liberty, yielded some of that liberty to secure the\ngreater good of government. Such a thing never was; such a thing never\ncould have been. _Government was ordained and established before the first\nchild was born:_--\"HE SHALL RULE OVER THEE.\" Cain and Abel were born in a\n_state_ as perfect as the empire of Britain or the rule of these United\nStates. All that Blackstone, and Paley, and Hobbs, or anybody else, says\nabout the social compact, is flatly and fully denied and upset by the\nBible, history, and common sense. Let any New York lawyer--or even a\nPhiladelphia lawyer--deny this if he dares. _Life, liberty, and the\npursuit of happiness_ never were the _inalienable_ right of the\n_individual_ man.\n\nHis self-control, in all these particulars, _from the beginning_, was\nsubordinate to the good of the family,--the empire. The command to Noah\nwas,--\"Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed.\"\n(Gen. ix. 6.)\n\nThis command to shed blood was, and is, in perfect harmony with the\nlaw,--\"Thou shalt not kill.\" There is nothing right or wrong in _the\ntaking of life_, per se, or in itself considered. It may or it may not be\na natural good or evil. As a _general fact_, the taking of life is a\nnatural evil. Hence, \"Thou shalt not kill\" is the general rule, to\npreserve the good there is in life. To take life under the forbidden\nconditions is sin, simply because God forbids it under those conditions.\nThe sin is not in taking life, but in transgressing God's law.\n\nBut _sometimes_ the taking of life will secure a greater good. God, then,\ncommands that life be taken. Not to take life, under the commanded\nconditions, is sin,--solely because God then commands it.\n\nThis power over life, for the good of the one great family of man, God\n_delegated_ to Noah, and through him to the tribe, the clan, the kingdom,\nthe empire, the democracy, the republic, as they may be governed by chief,\nking, emperor, parliament, or congress. Had Ham killed Shem, Noah would\nhave commanded Japheth to slay him. So much for the origin of the power\nover life: now for the power over liberty.\n\nThe right to take life included the right over liberty. But God intended\nthe rule of the superior over the inferior, in relations of service,\nshould _exemplify human depravity, his curse and his overruling blessing_.\n\nThe rule and the subordination which is essential to the existence of the\nfamily, God made commensurate with mankind; for _mankind is only the\ncongeries of families_. When Ham, in his antediluvian recklessness,\nlaughed at his father, God took occasion to give to the world the rule of\nthe superior over the inferior. _He cursed him. He cursed him because he\nleft him unblessed_. The withholding of the father's blessing, in the\nBible, was curse. Hence Abraham prayed God, when Isaac was blessed, that\nIshmael might not be passed by. Hence Esau prayed his father, when Jacob\nwas blessed, that he might not be left untouched by his holy hands. Ham\nwas cursed to render service, forever, to Shem and Japheth. The _special_\ncurse on Canaan made the general curse on Ham conspicuous, historic, and\nexplanatory, simply because his descendants were to be brought under the\ncontrol of God's peculiar people. Shem was blessed to rule over Ham.\nJapheth was blessed to rule over both. God sent Ham to Africa, Shem to\nAsia, Japheth to Europe. Mr. Moderator, you have read Guyot's \"_Earth and\nMan_.\" That admirable book is a commentary upon this part of Genesis. It\nis the philosophy of geography. And it is the philosophy of the rule of\nthe higher races over the inferior, written on the very face of the earth.\nHe tells you why the continents are shaped as they are shaped; why the\nmountains stand where they stand; why the rivers run where they run; why\nthe currents of the sea and the air flow as they flow. And he tells you\nthat the earth south of the Equator makes the inferior man. That the\noceanic climate makes the inferior man in the Pacific Islands. That South\nAmerica makes the inferior man. That the solid, unindented Southern Africa\nmakes the inferior man. That the huge, heavy, massive, magnificent Asia\nmakes the huge, heavy, massive, magnificent man. That Europe, indented by\nthe sea on every side, with its varied scenery, and climate, and Northern\ninfluences, makes the varied intellect, the versatile power and life and\naction, of the master-man of the world. And it is so. Africa, with here\nand there an exception, has never produced men to compare with the men of\nAsia. For six thousand years, save the unintelligible stones of Egypt, she\nhas had no history. Asia has had her great men and her name. But Europe\nhas ever shown, and now, her nobler men and higher destiny. Japheth has\nnow come to North America, to give us his past greatness and his\ntranscendent glory. (Applause.) And, sir, I thank God our mountains stand\nwhere they stand; and that our rivers run where they run. Thank God they\nrun not across longitudes, but across latitudes, from north to south. If\nthey crossed longitudes, we might fear for the Union. But I hail the\nUnion,--made by God, strong as the strength of our hills, and ever to live\nand expand,--like the flow and swell of the current of our streams.\n(Applause.)\n\nThese two theories of Right and Wrong,--these two ideas of human\nliberty,--the right, in the nature of things, or the right as made by\nGod,--the liberty of the individual man, of Atheism, of Red Republicanism,\nof the devil,--or the liberty of man, in the family, in the State, the\nliberty from God,--these two theories now make the conflict of the world.\nThis anti-slavery battle is only part of the great struggle: God will be\nvictorious,--and we, in his might.\n\nI now come to particular illustrations of the world-wide law that service\nshall be rendered by the inferior to the superior. The relations in which\nsuch service obtains are very many. Some of them are these:--husband and\nwife; parent and child; teacher and scholar; commander and\nsoldier,--sailor; master and apprentice; master and hireling; master and\nslave. Now, sir, all these relations are ordained of God. They are all\ndirectly commanded, or they are the irresistible law of his providence, in\nconditions which must come up in the progress of depraved nature. The\nrelations themselves are all good in certain conditions. And there may be\nno more of evil in the lowest than in the highest. And there may be in the\nlowest, as really as in the highest, the fulfilment of the commandment to\nlove thy neighbor as thyself, and of doing unto him whatsoever thou\nwouldst have him to do unto thee.\n\nWhy, sir, the wife everywhere, except where Christianity has given her\nelevation, is _the slave_. And, sir, I say, without fear of saying too\nstrongly, that for every sigh, every groan, every tear, every agony of\nstripe or death, which has gone up to God from the relation of master and\nslave, there have been more sighs, more groans, more tears, and more agony\nin the rule of the husband over the wife. Sir, I have admitted, and do\nagain admit, without qualification, that every fact in Uncle Tom's Cabin\nhas occurred in the South. But, in reply, I say deliberately, what one of\nyour first men told me, that he who will make the horrid examination will\ndiscover in New York City, in any number of years past, more cruelty from\nhusband to wife, parent to child, _than in all the South from master to\nslave_ in the same time. I dare the investigation. And you may extend it\nfurther, if you choose,--to all the results of honor and purity. I fear\nnothing on this subject. I stand on rock,--the Bible,--and therefore, just\nbefore I bring the Bible, to which all I have said is introductory, I will\nrun a parallel between the relation of master and slave and that of\nhusband and wife. I will say nothing of the grinding oppression of capital\nupon labor, in the power of the master over the hireling--the crushed\npeasant--the chain-harnessed coal-pit woman, a thousand feet under ground,\nworking in darkness, her child toiling by her side, and another child not\nborn; I will say nothing of the press-gang which fills the navy of\nBritain--the conscription which makes the army of France--the terrible\nfloggings--the awful court-martial--the quick sentence--the\nlightning-shot--the chain, and ball, and every-day lash--the punishment of\nthe soldier, sailor, slave, who had run away. I pass all this by: I will\nrun the parallel between the slave and wife.\n\nDo you say, The slave is held to _involuntary service?_ So is the wife.\nHer relation to her husband, in the immense majority of cases, is made for\nher, and not by her. And when she makes it for herself, how often, and how\nsoon, does it become involuntary! How often, and how soon, would she\nthrow off the yoke if she could! O ye wives, I know how superior you are\nto your husbands in many respects,--not only in personal attraction,\n(although in that particular, comparison is out of place,) in grace, in\nrefined thought, in passive fortitude, in enduring love, and in a heart to\nbe filled with the spirit of heaven. Oh, I know all this. Nay, I know you\nmay surpass him in his own sphere of boasted prudence and worldly wisdom\nabout dollars and cents. Nevertheless, he has authority, from God, to rule\nover you. You are under service to him. You are bound to obey him _in all\nthings_. Your service is very, very, very often involuntary from the\nfirst, and, if voluntary at first, becomes hopeless necessity afterwards.\nI know God has laid upon the husband to love you as Christ loved the\nchurch, and in that sublime obligation has placed you in the light and\nunder the shadow of a love infinitely higher, and purer, and holier than\nall talked about in the romances of chivalry. But the husband may not so\nlove you. He may rule you with the rod of iron. What can you do? Be\ndivorced? God forbids it, save for crime. Will you say that you are\nfree,--that you will go where you please, do as you please? Why, ye dear\nwives, your husbands may forbid. And listen, you cannot leave New York,\nnor your palaces, any more than your shanties. No; you cannot leave your\nparlor, nor your bedchamber, nor your couch, if your husband commands you\nto stay there! What can you do? Will you run away, with your stick and\nyour bundle? He can advertise you!! What can you do? You can, and I fear\nsome of you do, wish him, from the bottom of your hearts, at the bottom of\nthe Hudson. Or, in your self-will, you will do just as you please. (Great\nlaughter.)\n\n[A word on the subject of divorce. One of your standing denunciations on\nthe South is the terrible laxity of the marriage vow among the slaves.\nWell, sir, what does your Boston Dr. Nehemiah Adams say? He says, after\ngiving eighty, sixty, and the like number of applications for divorce, and\nnearly all granted at individual quarterly courts in New England,--he says\nhe is not sure but that the marriage relation is as enduring among _the\nslaves in the South_ as it is among white people in New England. I only\ngive what Dr. Adams says. I would fain vindicate the marriage relation\nfrom this rebuke. But one thing I will say: you seldom hear of a divorce\nin Virginia or South Carolina.]\n\nBut to proceed:--\n\nDo you say the slave is _sold and bought?_ So is the wife the world over.\nEverywhere, always, and now as the general fact, however done away or\nmodified by Christianity. The savage buys her. The barbarian buys her. The\nTurk buys her. The Jew buys her. The Christian buys her,--Greek, Armenian,\nNestorian, Roman Catholic, Protestant. The Portuguese, the Spaniard, the\nItalian, the German, the Russian, the Frenchman, the Englishman, the New\nEngland man, the New Yorker,--especially the upper ten,--_buy the\nwife_--in many, very many cases. She is seldom bought in the South, and\nnever among the slaves themselves; for they always marry for love.\n(Continued laughter.) Sir, I say the wife is bought in the highest\ncircles, too often, as really as the slave is bought. Oh, she is not sold\nand purchased in the public market. But come, sir, with me, and let us\ntake the privilege of spirits out of the body to glide into that gilded\nsaloon, or into that richly comfortable family room, of cabinets, and\npictures, and statuary: see the parties, there, to sell and buy that human\nbody and soul, and make her a chattel! See how they sit, and bend towards\neach other, in earnest colloquy, on sofa of rosewood and satin,--_Turkey_\ncarpet (how befitting!) under feet, sunlight over head, softened through\nstained windows: or it is night, and the gas is turned nearly off, and the\nburners gleam like stars through the shadow from which the whisper is\nheard, in which that old ugly brute, with gray goatee--how fragrant!--bids\none, two, five, ten hundred thousand dollars, and _she_ is knocked off to\nhim,--that beautiful young girl asleep up there, amid flowers, and\ninnocent that she is sold and bought. Sir, that young girl would as soon\npermit a baboon to embrace her, as that old, ignorant, gross, disgusting\nwretch to approach her. Ah, has she not been sold and bought for money?\nBut--But what? But, you say, she freely, and without parental authority,\naccepted him. Then she sold herself for money, and was guilty of _that_\nwhich is nothing better than legal prostitution. I know what I say; you\nknow what I say. Up there in the gallery you know: you nod to one another.\nAh! you know the parties. Yes, you say: All true, true, true. (Laughter.)\n\nNow, Mr. Moderator, I will clinch all I have said by nails sure, and\nfastened from the word of God.\n\nThere is King James's English Bible, with its magnificent dedication. I\nbring the English acknowledged translation. And just one word more to\npush gently aside--for I am a kind man to those poor, deluded anti-slavery\npeople--their last argument. It is _that_ this English Bible, in those\nparts which treat of slavery, don't give the ideas which are found in the\noriginal Hebrew and Greek. Alas for the common people!--alas for this good\nold translation! Are its days numbered? No, sir; no, sir. The Unitarian,\nthe Universalist, the Arminian, the Baptist, when pressed by this\ntranslation, have tried to find shelter for their false isms by making or\nasking for a new rendering. And now the anti-slavery men are driving hard\nat the same thing. (Laughter.) Sir, shall we permit our people everywhere\nto have their confidence in this noble translation undermined and\ndestroyed by the isms and whims of every or any man in our pulpits? I\naffirm, whatever be our perfect liberty of examination into God's meaning\nin all the light of the original languages, that there is a respect due to\nthis received version, and that great caution should be used, lest we\nteach the people to doubt its true rendering from the original word of\nGod. I protest, sir, against having a Doctor-of-Divinity _priest_, Hebrew\nor Greek, to tell the people what God has spoken on the subject of\nslavery or any other subject. (Laughter.) I would as soon have a Latin\npriest,--I would as soon have Archbishop Hughes,--I would as soon go to\nRome as to Jerusalem or Athens,--I would as soon have the Pope at once in\nhis fallible infallibility,--as ten or twenty, little or big, anti-slavery\nDoctor-of-Divinity priests, each claiming to give his infallible\nrendering, however differing from his peer. (Laughter.) I never yet\nproduced this Bible, in its plain unanswerable authority, for the relation\nof master and slave, but the anti-slavery man ran away into the fog of\n_his_ Hebrew or Greek, (laughter,) or he jabbered the nonsense that God\npermitted the _sin_ of slaveholding among the Jews, but that he don't do\nit now! Sir, God sanctioned slavery then, and sanctions it now. He made it\nright, they know, then and now. Having thus taken the last puff of wind\nout of the sails of the anti-slavery phantom ship, turn to the\ntwenty-first chapter of Exodus, vs. 2-5. God, in these verses, gave the\nIsraelites his command how they should buy and hold the Hebrew\nservant,--how, under certain conditions, he went free,--how, under other\ncircumstances, he might be held to service forever, with his wife and her\nchildren. There it is. Don't run into the Hebrew. (Laughter.)\n\nBut what have we here?--vs. 7-11:--\"And if a man sell his daughter to be a\nmaid-servant, she shall not go out as the men-servants do. If she please\nnot her master, who hath betrothed her to himself, then shall he let her\nbe redeemed: to sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power,\nseeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. And if he hath betrothed her\nunto his son, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters. If he\ntake him another wife, her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage\nshall he not diminish. And if he do not these three unto her, then shall\nshe go out free without money.\" Now, sir, the wit of man can't dodge that\npassage, unless he runs away into the Hebrew. (Great laughter.) For what\ndoes God say? Why, this:--that an Israelite might sell his own daughter,\nnot only into servitude, but into polygamy,--that the buyer might, if he\npleased, give her to his son for a wife, or take her to himself. If he\ntook her to himself, and she did not please him, he should not sell her\nunto a strange nation, but should allow her to be redeemed by her family.\nBut, if he took him another wife before he allowed the first one to be\nredeemed, he should continue to give the first one _food_, her _raiment_,\nand her _duty of marriage_; that is to say, _her right to his bed_. If he\ndid not do _these three things_, she should go out free; _i.e._ cease to\nbe his slave, without his receiving any money for her. There, sir, God\nsanctioned the Israelite father in selling his daughter, and the Israelite\nman to buy her, into slavery and into polygamy. And it was then right,\nbecause God made it right. In verses 20 and 21, you have these\nwords:--\"And if a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die\nunder his hand, he shall be surely punished; notwithstanding, if he\ncontinue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money.\"\nWhat does this passage mean? Surely this:--if the master gave his slave a\nhasty blow with a rod, and he died under his hand, he should be punished.\nBut, if the slave lived a day or two, it would so extenuate the act of the\nmaster he should not be punished, inasmuch as he would be in that case\nsufficiently punished in losing his money in his slave. Now, sir, I affirm\nthat God was more lenient to the degraded Hebrew master than Southern laws\nare to the higher Southern master in like cases. But there you have what\nwas the divine will. Find fault with God, ye anti-slavery men, if you\ndare. In Leviticus, xxv. 44-46, \"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids, which\nthou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them\nshall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. Moreover, of the children of the\nstrangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their\nfamilies that are with you, which they beget in your land: and they shall\nbe your possession. And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your\nchildren after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your\nbondmen forever.\"\n\nSir, I do not see how God could tell us more plainly that he did command\nhis people to buy slaves from the heathen round about them, and from the\nstranger, and of their families sojourning among them. The passage has no\nother meaning. Did God merely permit sin?--did he merely tolerate a\ndreadful evil? God does not say so anywhere. He gives his people law to\nbuy and hold slaves of the heathen forever, on certain conditions, and to\nbuy and hold Hebrew slaves in variously-modified particulars. Well, how\ndid the heathen, then, get slaves to sell? Did they capture them in\nwar?--did they sell their own children? Wherever they got them, they sold\nthem; and God's law gave his people the right to buy them.\n\nGod in the New Testament made no law prohibiting the relation of master\nand slave. But he made law regulating the relation under Greek and Roman\nslavery, which was the most oppressive in the world.\n\nGod saw that these regulations would ultimately remove the evils in the\nGreek and Roman systems, and do it away entirely from the fitness of\nthings, as there existing; for Greek and Roman slaves, for the most part,\nwere the equals in all respects of their masters. \u00c6sop was a slave;\nTerence was a slave. The precepts in Colossians iv. 18, 23, 1 Tim. vi.\n1-6, and other places, show, unanswerably, that God as really sanctioned\nthe relation of master and slave as those of husband and wife, and parent\nand child; and that all the obligations of the moral law, and Christ's law\nof love, might and must be as truly fulfilled in the one relation as in\nthe other. The fact that he has made the one set of relations permanent,\nand the other more or less dependent on conditions of mankind, or to pass\naway in the advancement of human progress, does not touch the question. He\nsanctioned it under the Old Testament and the New, and ordains it now\nwhile he sees it best to continue it, and he now, as heretofore, proclaims\nthe duty of the master and the slave. Dr. Parker's admirable explanation\nof Colossians, and other New Testament passages, saves me the necessity of\nsaying any thing more on the Scripture argument.\n\nOne word on the Detroit resolutions, and I conclude. Those resolutions of\nthe Assembly of 1850 decide that slavery is sin, unless the master holds\nhis slave as a guardian, or under the claims of humanity.\n\nMr. Moderator, I think we had on this floor, yesterday, proof conclusive\nthat those resolutions mean any thing or nothing; that they are a fine\nspecimen of Northern skill in platform-making; that it put in a plank\nhere, to please this man,--a plank there, to please that man,--a plank for\nthe North, a broad board for the South. It is Jackson's judicious tariff.\nIt is a gum-elastic conscience, stretched now to a charity covering all\nthe multitude of our Southern sins, contracted now, giving us hardly a\nfig-leaf of righteousness. It is a bowl of punch,--\n\n  A little sugar to make it sweet,\n    A little lemon to make it sour,\n  A little water to make it weak,\n    A little brandy to give it power. (Laughter.)\n\nAs a Northern argument against us, it is a mass of lead so heavy that it\nweighed down even the strong shoulders of Judge Jessup. For, sir, when he\nclosed his speech, I asked him a single question I had made ready for him.\nIt was this:--\"Do you allow that Mr. Aiken, of South Carolina, may, under\nthe claims of humanity, hold three thousand slaves, or must he emancipate\nthem?\" The Judge staggered, and stammered, and said, \"No man could rightly\nhold so many.\" I then asked, \"How many may he hold, in humanity?\" The\nJudge saw his fatal dilemma. He recovered himself handsomely, and fairly\nsaid, \"Mr. Aiken might hold three thousand slaves, in harmony with the\nDetroit action.\" I replied, \"Then, sir, you have surrendered the whole\nquestion of Southern slavery.\" And, sir, the Judge looked as if he felt he\nhad surrendered it. And every man in this house, capable of understanding\nthe force of that question, felt it had shivered the whole anti-slavery\nargument, on those resolutions, to atoms. Why, sir, if a man can hold\nthree slaves, with a right heart and the approbation of God, he may hold\nthirty, three hundred, three thousand, or thirty thousand. It is a mere\nquestion of heart, and capacity to govern. The Emperor of Russia holds\nsixty millions of slaves: and is there a man in this house so much of a\nfool as to say that God regards the Emperor of Russia a sinner because he\nis the master of sixty millions of slaves? Sir, that Emperor has certainly\na high and awful responsibility upon him. But, if he is good as he is\ngreat, he is a god of benevolence on earth. And so is every Southern\nmaster. His obligation is high, and great, and glorious. It is the same\nobligation, in kind, he is under to his wife and children, and in some\nrespects immensely higher, by reason of the number and the tremendous\ninterests involved for time and eternity in connection with this great\ncountry, Africa, and the world. Yes, sir, _I know_, whether Southern\nmasters fully know it or not, that _they hold from God_, individually and\ncollectively, _the highest and the noblest responsibility ever given by\nHim to individual private men on all the face of the earth._ For God has\nintrusted to them to train millions of the most degraded in form and\nintellect, but, at the same time, the most gentle, the most amiable, the\nmost affectionate, the most imitative, the most susceptible of social and\nreligious love, of all the races of mankind,--to train them, and to give\nthem civilization, and the light and the life of the gospel of Jesus\nChrist. And I thank God he has given this great work to that type of the\nnoble family of Japheth best qualified to do it,--to the Cavalier\nstock,--the gentleman and the lady of England and France, born to command,\nand softened and refined under our Southern sky. May they know and feel\nand fulfil their destiny! Oh, may they \"know that they also have a Master\nin heaven.\"\n\n\n\n\nLetter from Dr. Ross.\n\n\n\nI need only say, in reference to this letter, that my friends\nhaving questioned my position as to the good of the agitation, I\nwrote the following letter to vindicate that point, as given, in\nthe New York speech:--\n\nHUNTSVILLE, ALA., July 14, 1856.\n\n_Brother Blackburn_:--I affirmed, in my New York speech, that the Slavery\nagitation has done, and will accomplish, good.\n\nYour very kind and courteous disagreement on that point I will make the\noccasion to say something more thereon, without wishing you, my dear\nfriend, to regard what I write as inviting any discussion.\n\nI said _that_ agitation has brought out, and would reveal still more\nfully, the Bible, in its relation to slavery and liberty,--also the\ninfidelity which long has been, and is now, leavening with death the whole\nNorthern mind. And that it would result in the triumph of the _true_\nSouthern interpretation of the Bible; to the honor of God, and to the\ngood of the master, the slave, the stability of the Union, and be a\nblessing to the world. To accomplish this, the sin _per se_ doctrine will\nbe utterly demolished. That doctrine is the difficulty in every _Northern\nmind,_ (where there is any difficulty about slavery,) whether they confess\nit or not. Yes, the difficulty with every Northern man is, that _the\nrelation of_ master and slave is felt _to be_ sin. I know that to be the\nfact. I have talked with all grades of Northern men, and come in contact\nwith all varieties of Northern mind on this subject. And I know that the\nman who says and tries to believe, and does, partially in sober judgment,\nbelieve, that slavery is not sin, yet, _in his feelings, in his educated\nprejudices_, he feels that slavery is sin.\n\nYes, _that_ is the difficulty, and _that_ is the whole of the difficulty,\n_between the North and the South_, so far as the question is one of the\nBible and morals. Now, I again say, that that _sin per se_ doctrine will,\nin this agitation, be utterly demolished. And when that is done,--when the\nNorth will know and feel fully, perfectly, that the relation of master and\nslave is not sin, but sanctioned of God,--then, and not till then, the\nNorth and South can and will, without anger, consider the following\nquestions:--Whether slavery, as it exists in the United States, all\nthings considered, be or be not a great good, and the greatest good for a\ntime, notwithstanding its admitted evils? Again, whether these evils can\nor cannot be modified and removed? Lastly, whether slavery itself can or\ncannot pass away from this land and the world? Now, sir, the moment the\nsin question is settled, then all is peace. For these other questions\nbelong entirely to another category of morals. They belong entirely to the\ncategory of _what is_ wise _to realize_ good. This agitation will bring\nthis great result. And therefore I affirm the agitation to be good.\n\nThere is another fact also, the result, in great measure, of this\nagitation, which in my view proves it to have been and to be of great\ngood. I mean the astonishing rise and present stability of the slave-power\nof the United States. This fact, when examined, is undeniable. And it is\nequally undeniable that it has been caused, in great part, by the slavery\nquestion in all its bearings. It is a wonderful development made by God.\nAnd I must believe he intends thereby either to destroy or bless this\ngreat Union. But, as I believe he intends to bless, therefore I am\nfortified in affirming the good there has been and is in this agitation.\nLet me bring out to view this astonishing fact.\n\n1. Twenty-five years ago, and previously, the whole slave-holding South\nand West had a strong tendency to emancipation, in some form. But the\nabolition movement then began, and arrested that Southern and Western\nleaning to emancipation. Many people have said, and do say, that that\n_arrest_ was and is a great evil. I say it was and is a great good. Why?\nAnswer: It was and would now be premature. Had it been carried out, it\nwould have been and would now be evil, immense, inconceivable,--to master,\nslave, America, Africa, and the world; because neither master, slave,\nAmerica, Africa, the world, were, or are, ready for emancipation. God has\na great deal to do before he is ready for emancipation. He tells us so by\nthis _arrest_ put upon that tendency to emancipation years ago. For He put\nit into the hearts of abolitionists _to make the arrest_. And He stopped\nthe Southern movement all the more perfectly by permitting Great Britain\nto emancipate Jamaica, and letting that experiment prove, as it has, a\nperfect failure and a terrible warning. JAMAICA IS DESTROYED. And now,\nwhatever be done for its negroes must be done with the full admission that\nwhat has been attempted was in violation of the duty Britain owed to\nthose negroes. But her failure in seeing and doing her duty, God has given\nto us to teach us knowledge; and, through us, to instruct the world in the\ndemonstration of the problem of slavery.\n\n2. God put it into the hearts of Northern men--especially\nabolitionists--to give Texas to the South. Texas, a territory so vast that\na bird, as Webster said, can't fly over it in a week. Many in the South\ndid not want Texas. But many longer-headed ones did want it. And Northern\nmen voted and gave to the South exactly what these longer-headed Southern\nstatesmen wanted. This, I grant, was Northern anti-slavery fatuity,\nutterly unaccountable but that God made them do it.\n\n3. God put it into the hearts of Northern men--especially\nabolitionists--to vote for Polk, Dallas, and Texas. This gave us the\nMexican War; and that immense territory, its spoil,--a territory which,\nalthough it may not be favorable for slave-labor, has increased, and will,\nin many ways, extend the slave-power.\n\n4. This leads me to say that God put it into the hearts of many Northern\nmen--especially abolitionists--to believe what Great Britain\nsaid,--namely, that _free trade_ would result in slave-emancipation. _But\nlo! the slave-holder wanted free trade_. So Northern abolitionists helped\nto destroy the _tariff policy_, and thus to expand the demand for, and the\nculture of, cotton. Now, see, the gold of California has _perpetuated free\ntrade_ by enabling our merchants to meet the enormous demand for specie\ncreated by free trade. So California helps the slave-power. But the\nabolitionists gave us Polk, the Mexican War, and California.\n\n5. God put it into the hearts of the North, and especially abolitionists,\nto stimulate the settlement of new free States, and to be the ardent\nfriends of an immense foreign emigration. The result has been to send down\nto the South, with railroad speed and certainty, corn, wheat, flour, meal,\nbacon, pork, beef, and every other imaginable form of food, in quantity\namazing, and so cheap that the planter can spread wider and wider the\nculture of cotton.\n\n6. God has, by this growth of the Northwest, made the demand for cotton\nenormous in the North and Northwest. Again, he has made English and French\nexperiments to procure cotton somewhere else than from the United States\n_dead failures_,--in the East Indies, Egypt, Algeria, Brazil. God has\nthus given to the Southern planter an absolute monopoly. A monopoly so\ngreat that he, the Southern planter, sits now upon his throne of cotton\nand wields the commercial sceptre of the world. Yes, it is the Southern\nplanter who says to-day to haughty England, Go to war, if you dare;\ndismiss Dallas, if you dare. Yes, he who sits on the throne of the\ncotton-bag has triumphed at last over him who sits on the throne of the\nwool-sack. England is prostrate at his feet, as well as the abolitionists.\n\n7. God has put it into the hearts of abolitionists to prevent half a\nmillion of free negroes from going to Liberia; and thereby the\nabolitionists have made them consumers of slave-products to the extension\nof the slave-power. And, by thus keeping them in America, the\nabolitionists have so increased their degradation as to prove all the more\nthe utter folly of emancipation in the United States.\n\n8. God has permitted the anti-slavery men in the North, in England, in\nFrance, and everywhere, so to blind themselves in hypocrisy as to give the\nSouthern slave-holder his last perfect triumph over them; for God tells\nthe planter to say to the North, to England, to France, to all who buy\ncotton, \"Ye men of Boston, New York, London, Paris,--ye hypocrites,--ye\nbrand me as a pirate, a kidnapper, a murderer, a demon, fit only for hell,\nand yet ye buy my blood-stained cotton. O ye hypocrites!--ye Boston\nhypocrites! why don't ye throw the cotton in the sea, as your fathers did\nthe tea? Ye Boston hypocrites! ye say, _if we had been in the days of our\nfathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the\nslave-trade!_ Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves that ye are the\nchildren of them who, in fact, kidnapped and bought in blood, and sold the\nslave in America! for now, ye hypocrites, ye buy the blood-stained cotton\nin quantity so immense, that _ye_ have run up the price of slaves to\nbe more than a thousand dollars,--the average of old and young! O ye\nhypocrites! ye denounce slavery; then ye bid it live, and not die,--in\nthat ye buy sugar, rice, tobacco, and, above all, cotton! Ye hypocrites!\nye abuse the devil, and then fall down and worship him!--ye\nhypocrites,--ye New England hypocrites,--ye Old England hypocrites,--ye\nFrench hypocrites,--ye Uncle Tom's Cabin hypocrites,--ye Beecher\nhypocrites,--ye Rhode Island Consociation hypocrites! Oh, your holy\ntwaddle stinks in the nostrils of God, and he commands me to lash you\nwith my scorn, and his scorn, so long as ye gabble about the sin of\nslavery, and then bow down to me, and buy and spin cotton, and thus work\nfor me as truly as my slaves! O ye fools and blind, fill ye up the measure\nof your folly, and blindness, and shame! And this ye are doing. Ye have,\nlike the French infidels, made _reason_ your goddess, and are exalting her\nabove the Bible; and, in your unitarianism and neology and all modes of\ninfidelity, ye are rejecting and crucifying the Son of God.\"\n\nNow, my brother, this controlling slave-power is a world-wide fact. Its\nstatistics of bales count by millions; its tonnage counts by hundreds of\nthousands; its manufacture is reckoned by the workshops of America and\nEurope; its supporters are numbered by all who must thus be clothed in the\nworld. This tremendous power has been developed in great measure by the\nabolition agitation, controlled by God. I believe, then, as I have already\nsaid, that God intends one of two things. He either intends to destroy the\nUnited States by this slave-power, or he intends to bless my country and\nthe world by the unfoldings of his wisdom in this matter. I believe he\nwill bless the world in the working out of this slavery. I rejoice, then,\nin the agitation which has so resulted, and will so terminate, to reveal\nthe Bible, and bless mankind.\n\nYour affectionate friend,\n\nF.A. Ross.\n\nREV. A. BLACKBURN.\n\n\n\n\nWhat Is the Foundation of Moral Obligation?\n\n\n\nMy position as to this all-important question, in my New York speech, was\nmade subject of remark in the \"Presbyterian Herald,\" Louisville, Kentucky,\nto which I replied at length in the \"Presbyterian Witness,\" Knoxville,\nTennessee. No rejoinder was ever made to that reply. But, recently, an\nextract from the younger Edwards was submitted to me. To that I gave the\nfollowing letter. The subject is of the first and the last importance, and\nbears directly, as set forth in my New York speech, on infidelity, and, of\ncourse, the slavery question:--\n\nMr. Editor:--In your paper of Tuesday, 24th ult., there is an article,\nunder this head, giving the argument of Edwards (the son) against my views\nas to _the foundation of moral obligation_.\n\nI thank the writer for his argument, and his courteous manner of\npresenting it. In my third letter to Mr. Barnes, I express my preparation\nto meet \"_all comers_\" on this question; and I am pleased to see this\n\"_comer_\". If my views cannot be refuted by Edwards, I may wait long\nfor an \"_uglier customer_.\"\n\nA word, introductory, to your correspondent. He says, \"His [Dr. Ross's]\ntheory was advanced and argued against in a former age.\" By this, I\nunderstand him to express his belief that my theory has been rejected\nheretofore. Well. It may, nevertheless, be the true theory. The Copernican\nastronomy was argued against in a former age and rejected; yet it has\nprevailed. Newton's law of gravitation was argued against and rejected by\na whole generation of philosophers on the continent of Europe; yet it has\nprevailed. And now all school-boys and girls would call anybody a fool who\nshould deny it. Steam, in all its applications, was argued against and\nrejected; yet it has prevailed. So the electric telegraph; and, to go back\na little, the theory of vaccination,--the circulation of the blood,--a\nthousand things; yea, Edwards's (the father) theory of virtue, although\nreceived by many, has been argued against, and by many rejected; yet it\nwill prevail. Yea, his idea of the unity of the race in Adam was and is\nargued against and rejected; yet it will prevail. I feel, therefore, no\nfear that my theory of moral obligation will not be acknowledged because\nit was argued against and rejected by many in a former age, and may be\nnow. Nay; facts to prove it are accumulating,--facts which were not\ndeveloped in Edwards's day,--facts showing, irresistibly, that Edwards's\ntheory, which is _that_ most usually now held, is what I say it is,--_the\nrejection of revelation, infidelity, and atheism_. The evidence amounts to\ndemonstration.\n\nThe question is in a nutshell; it is this:--_Shall man submit to the\nrevealed will of God_, or _to his own will?_ That is the naked question\nwhen the fog of confused ideas and unmeaning words is lifted and\ndispersed.\n\nMy position, expressed in the speech delivered in the General Assembly,\nNew York, May, 1856, is this:--\"God, in making all things, saw that, in\nthe relations he would constitute between himself and intelligent\ncreatures, and among themselves, NATURAL GOOD AND EVIL would come to pass.\nIn his benevolent wisdom, he then _willed_ LAW to control this _good_ and\n_evil_; and he thereby made _conformity_ to that law to be _right_, and\n_non-conformity_ to be _wrong_. Why? Simply because he saw it to be\n_good_, and _made it to be_ RIGHT; not because _he saw it to be right_,\nbut because _he made it to be right_.\"\n\nYour correspondent replies to this theory in the following words of\nEdwards:--\"Some hold that the foundation of moral obligation is\nprimarily in the will of God. But the will of God is either benevolent\nor not. If it be benevolent, and on that account the foundation of moral\nobligation, it is not the source of obligation merely because it is the\nwill of God, but because it is benevolent, and is of a tendency to\npromote happiness; and this places the foundation of obligation in a\ntendency to happiness, and not primarily in the will of God. But if the\nwill of God, and that which is the expression of it, the divine law, be\nallowed to be not benevolent, and are foundation of obligation, we are\nobliged to conform to them, whatever they be, however malevolent and\nopposite to holiness and goodness the requirements be. But this, I\npresume, none will pretend.\" Very fairly and strongly put; that's to say,\nif I understand Edwards, he supposes, if God was the devil and man what\nhe is, then man would not be under obligation to obey the devil's will!\nThat's it! Well, I suppose so too; and I reckon most _Christians_ would\nagree to that statement, Nay, more: I presume nobody ever taught that the\nmere naked _will_, abstractly considered, if it could be, from the\n_character_ of God, was the ground of moral obligation? Nay, I think\nnobody ever imagined that the notion of an infinite Creator presupposes\nor includes the idea that he is a malevolent Being! I agree, then, with\nEdwards, that the ultimate ground of obligation _is_ in the _fact_ that\nGod is benevolent, or is a good God. I said _that_ in my speech quoted\nabove. I formally stated that \"_God, in his benevolent wisdom, willed law\nto control the natural good and evil_,\" &c. What, then, is the point of\ndisagreement between my view and Edwards's? It is in _the different ways\nby which we_ GET AT _the_ FACT _of divine benevolence_. I hold that the\nREVEALED WORD _tells us who God is and what he does_, and is, therefore,\nthe ULTIMATE GROUND OF OBLIGATION. But Edwards holds that HUMAN REASON\n_must tell us who God is and what he does_, and IS, therefore, the\nPRIMARY GROUND OF OBEDIENCE. _That_ is my issue with Edwards and others;\nand it is as broad an issue as _faith in revelation_, or the REJECTION OF\nIT. I do not charge that Edwards did, or that all who hold with him do,\ndeny the word of God; but I do affirm that their argument does. The\nmatter is plain. For what is revelation? It is that God has appeared in\nperson, and _told_ man in WORD that he is GOD; and _told_ him first in\nWORD (to be expanded in studying _creation_ and _providence_) that God is\na Spirit, eternal, infinite in power, wisdom, goodness, holiness,--the\nCreator, Preserver, Benefactor. That WORD, moreover, he proved by\nhighest evidence--namely, supernatural evidence--to be _absolute,\nperfect_ TRUTH as to all FACT affirmed _of him_ and _what_ he _does_.\nREVELATION, as claimed in the Bible, was and is THAT THING.\n\nMan, then, having this revelation; is under obligation ever to believe\nevery jot and tittle of that WORD. He at first, no doubt, knew little of\nthe meaning of some _facts_ declared; nay, he may have comprehended\nnothing of the sense or scope of many _facts_ affirmed. Nay, he may now,\nafter thousands of years, know most imperfectly the meaning of that WORD.\nBut he was and he is, notwithstanding, to believe with absolute faith the\nWORD,--that God _is_ all he says he is, and _does_ all he says he\ndoes,--however that WORD may _go beyond_ his reason, or _surprise_ his\nfeelings, or _alarm_ his conscience, or _command_ his will.\n\nThis statement of what revelation is, settles the whole question as\npresented by Edwards. For REVELATION, as explained, does FIX _forever the\nfoundation of man's moral obligation in the benevolence of God_,\nPRIMARILY, as it is _expressed_ in the word of God. REVELATION does then,\nin that sense, FIX _obligation in the_ MERE WILL OF GOD; for, the moment\nyou attempt to establish the foundation _somewhere else_, you have\nabandoned the ground of revelation. You have left the WILL OF GOD _in his\nword_, and you have made your rule of right to be the WILL OF MAN _in the_\nSELF _of the_ HEART. The proof of what I here say is so plain, even as the\nwriting on the tables of Habakkuk's vision, that he may run that readeth\nit. Read, then, even as on the _tables_.\n\nGod _says_ in his WORD, \"I am all-powerful, all-wise, the Creator.\" \"You\nmay be,\" says Edwards, \"but I want _primary foundation_ for my faith; and\nI can't take your _word_ for it. I must look first into _nature_ to see if\nevidence of infinite power and wisdom is there,--to see if evidence of a\nCreator is there,--and if thou art he!\"\n\nAgain, God _says_ in his word, \"I am benevolent, and _my will_ in my law\nis expression of that benevolence.\" \"You may tell the truth,\" Edwards\nreplies, \"but I want _primary ground_ for my belief, and I must hold your\nword suspended until I examine into my reason, my feelings, my conscience,\nmy will,--to see if your WORD _harmonizes_ with my HEART,--to see if what\nyou reveal tends to _happiness_ IN MY NOTION OF HAPPINESS; _or tends to\nright_ IN MY NOTION OF RIGHT!\" That's it. That's the theory of Edwards,\nBarnes, and others.\n\nAnd what is this but the attempt to know the divine attributes and\ncharacter in _some other way_ than through the divine WORD? And what is\nthis but the denial of the divine WORD, except so far as it agrees with\nthe knowledge of the attributes and character of God, obtained in THAT\n_some other way?_ And what is this but to make the word of God\n_subordinate_ to the teaching of the HUMAN HEART? And what is this but to\nmake the WILL _of God_ give place to the WILL _of man?_ And what is this\nbut the REJECTION OF REVELATION? Yet this is the result (though not\nintended by him) of the whole scheme of obligation, maintained by Edwards\nand by all who agree with him.\n\nCarry it out, and what is the progress and the end of it? This. Human\nreason--the human heart--will be supreme. Some, I grant, will hold to a\nrevelation of some sort. A thing more and more transcendental,--a thing\nmore and more of fog and moonshine,--fog floating in German cellars from\nfumes of lager-beer, and moonshine gleaming from the imaginations of the\ndrinkers. Some, like Socrates and Plato, will have a God supreme,\npersonal, glorious, somewhat like the true; and with him many inferior\ndeities,--animating the stars, the earth, mountains, valleys, plains, the\nsea, rivers, fountains, the air, trees, flowers, and all living things.\nSome will deny a personal God, and conceive, instead, the intelligent mind\nof the universe, without love. Some will contend for mere law,--of\ngravitation and attraction; and some will suggest that all is the result\nof a fortuitous concourse of atoms! Here, having passed through the\nshadows and the darkness, we have reached the blackness of\ninfidelity,--blank atheism. No God--yea, all the way the \"_fools_\" were\nsaying in their hearts, no God. What now is man? Alas! some, the Notts and\nGliddons, tell us, man was indeed _created_ millions of ages ago, the Lord\nonly knows when, in swarms like bees to suit the zones of the\nearth,--while other some, the believers in the _vestiges of creation_, say\nman is the result of development,--from fire, dust, granite, grass, the\ncreeping thing, bird, fish, four-footed beast, monkey. Yea, and some of\nthese last philosophers are even now going to Africa to try to find men\nthey have heard tell of, who still have tails and are jumping and climbing\nsomewhere in the regions around the undiscovered sources of the Nile.\n\nThis is the progress and the result of the Edwards theory; because, deny\nor hesitate about revelation, and man cannot prove, _absolutely_, any of\nthe things we are considering. Let us see if he can. Edwards writes, \"On\nthe supposition that the will or law of God is the primary foundation,\nreason, and standard of right and virtue, every attempt _to prove the\nmoral perfection or attributes of God is absurd_.\" Here, then, Edwards\nbelieves, that, to reach the primary foundation of right and virtue, he\nmust not take God's word as to his perfection or attributes, no matter how\nfully _God_ may have _proved_ his word: no; but he, Edwards, he, man, must\nfirst _prove_ them in _some other way_. And, of course, he believes he can\nreach such primary foundation by such other proof. Well, let us see how he\ngoes about it. I give him, to try his hand, the easiest\nattribute,--\"POWER.\" I give him, then, all creation, and providence\nbesides, as his _black-board_, on which to work his demonstration. I give\nhim, then, the lifetime of Methuselah, in which to reach his conclusion of\nproof.--Well, I will now suppose we have all lived and waited that long\ntime: what is his _proof_ OF INFINITE POWER? Has he found the EXHIBITION\nof _infinite power?_ No. He has found _proof_ of GREAT POWER; but he has\nnot reached the DISPLAY of _infinite power_. What then is his _faith_ in\ninfinite power after such _proof?_ Why, just this: he INFERS _only_, that\nTHE POWER, _which did the things he sees, can go on, and on, and on, to\ngive greater, and greater, and greater manifestations of itself!_ VERY\nGOOD: _if so be, we can have no better proof_. But _that_ PROOF is\ninfinitely below ABSOLUTE PROOF _of infinite power_. And all\nmanifestations of power to a _finite creature_, even to the archangel\nMichael, during countless millions of ages, never gives, because it never\ncan give to him, ABSOLUTE PROOF _of infinite power_. But the word of GOD\ngives the PROOF ABSOLUTE, _and in a moment of time!_ \"I AM THE ALMIGHTY!\"\nThe _perfect proof_ is in THAT WORD OF GOD.\n\nI might set Edwards to work to prove the _infinite wisdom_, the _infinite\nbenevolence_, the _infinite holiness_--yea, the EXISTENCE--of God. And he,\nfinite man, in any examination of creation or providence, must fall\ninfinitely below the PERFECT PROOF.\n\nSo then I tell Edwards, and all agreeing with him, that _it is absurd_ to\nattempt to _prove_ the moral perfection and attributes of God, if he\nthereby seeks to reach the HIGHEST EVIDENCE, _or if he thereby means to\nfind the_ PRIMARY GROUND _of moral obligation_.\n\nDo I then teach that man should not seek the _proof_ there is, of the\nperfection and attributes of God, in _nature and providence_? No. I hold\nthat such proof unfolds the _meaning_ of the FACTS declared in the WORD of\nGod, and is all-important, as such expansion of meaning. But I say, by\nauthority of the Master, that _the highest proof, the absolute proof, the\nperfect proof_, of the FACTS as to _who God is, and what he does_, and the\nPRIMARY OBLIGATION _thereupon, is in the_ REVEALED WORD.\n\nFRED. A. ROSS.\n\nHuntsville, Ala., April 3, 1857.\n\nN.B.--In notice of last Witness's extract from Erskine, I remark that\nThomas Erskine was, and may yet be, a lawyer of Edinburgh. He wrote\n_three works_:--_one_ on the _Internal Evidences_, the _next_ on\n_Faith_, the _last_ on the _Freeness of the Gospel_. They are all\nwritten with great ability, and contain much truth. But all have in them\nfundamental _untruths_. There is least in the Evidences; more in the\nessay on Faith; most in the tract on the Freeness of the Gospel,--which\nlast has been utterly refuted, and has passed away. His _Faith_ is,\nalso, not republished. The Evidences is good, like good men,\nnotwithstanding the evil.\n\n\n\n\nLetters to Rev. A. Barnes.\n\n\n\n\nIntroduction.\n\n\n\nAs part of the great slavery discussion, Rev. A. Barnes, of Philadelphia,\npublished, in October, 1856, a pamphlet, entitled, \"The CHURCH and\nSLAVERY.\" In this tract he invites every man to utter his views on the\nsubject. And, setting the example, he speaks his own with the greatest\nfreedom and honesty.\n\nIn the same freedom of speech, I have considered his views unscriptural,\nfalse, fanatical, and infidel. Therefore, while I hold him in the highest\nrespect, esteem, and affection, as a divine and Christian gentleman, and\ncherish his past relations to me, yet I have in these letters written to\nhim, and of him, just as I would have done had he lived in France or\nGermany, a stranger to me, and given to the world the refined scoff of the\none, or the muddy transcendentalism of the other.\n\nMy first letter is merely a glance at some things in his pamphlet, in\nwhich I show wherein I agree and disagree with him,--_i.e._ in our\nestimate of the results of the agitation; in our views of the Declaration\nof Independence; in our belief of the way men are made infidels; and in\nour appreciation of the testimonies of past General Assemblies.\n\nThe other letters I will notice in similar introductions.\n\nThese letters first appeared as original contributions to the Christian\nObserver, published and edited by Dr. A. Converse, Philadelphia.\n\nI take this occasion to express my regard for him, and my sense of the\nability with which he has long maintained the rights and interests of the\nPresbyterian body, to which we both belong; and the wise and masterly way\nin which he has vindicated, from the Bible, the truth on the slavery\nquestion. To him, too, the public is indebted for the first exhibition of\nMr. Barnes's errors in his recent tract which has called forth my reply.\n\n\n\n\nNo. I.\n\n\n\nRev. A. Barnes:--\n\n_Dear Sir_:--You have recently published a tract:--\"The Church and\nSlavery.\"\n\n\"The opinion of each individual,\" you remark, \"contributes to form public\nsentiment, as the labor of the animalcule in the ocean contributes to the\ncoral reefs that rise above the waves.\"\n\nTrue, sir, and beautifully expressed. But while, in harmony with your\nintimation, I must regard you one of the animalcules, rearing the coral\nreef of public opinion, I cannot admit your disclaimer of \"special\ninfluence\" among them in their work. Doubtless, sir, you have \"special\ninfluence,\"--and deserve to have. I make no apology for addressing you. I\nam one of the animalcules.\n\nI agree, and I disagree, with you. I harmonize in your words,--\"The\npresent is eminently a time when the views of every man on the subject of\nslavery should be uttered in unambiguous tones.\" I agree with you in this\naffirmation; because the subject has yet to be fully understood; because,\nwhen understood, if THE BIBLE does _not_ sanction the system, the MASTER\nmust cease to be the master. The SLAVE must cease to be the slave. He must\nbe _free_, AND EQUAL IN POLITICAL AND SOCIAL LIFE. _That_ is your\n\"_unambiguous tone_\". Let it be heard, if _that_ is the word of God.\n\nBut if THE BIBLE _does_ sanction the system, then _that_ \"unambiguous\ntone\" will silence abolitionists who admit the Scriptures; it will satisfy\nall good men, and give peace to the country. That is the \"_tone_\" I want\nmen to hear. Listen to it in the past and present speech of providence.\nThe time was when _you_ had the very _public sentiment_ you are now trying\nto form. From Maine to Louisiana, the American mind was softly yielding to\nthe impress of emancipation, in some hope, however vague and imaginary.\nSouthern as well as Northern men, in the church and out of it, not having\nsufficiently studied the word of God, and, under our own and French\nrevolutionary excitement, looking only at the evils of slavery, wished it\naway from the land. It was a _mistaken_ public sentiment. Yet, such as it\nwas, you had it, and it was doing your work. It was Quaker-like, mild and\naffectionate. It did not, however, work fast enough for you. You thought\nthat the negro, with his superior attributes of body and mind and higher\nadvantages of the nineteenth century, might reach, in a day, the liberty\nand equality which the Anglo-American had attained after the struggle of\nhis ancestors during a thousand years! You got up the agitation. You got\nit up in the Church and State. You got it up over the length and breadth\nof this whole land. Let me show you some things you have secured, as the\nresults of your work.\n\n\n\n_First Result of Agitation_.\n\n\n1. The most consistent abolitionists, affirming the sin of slavery, on the\nmaxim of created equality and unalienable right, after torturing the Bible\nfor a while, to make it give the same testimony, felt they could get\nnothing from the book. They felt that the God of the Bible disregarded the\nthumb-screw, the boot, and the wheel; that he would not speak for them,\nbut against them. These consistent men have now turned away from the\nword, in despondency; and are seeking, somewhere, an abolition Bible, an\nabolition Constitution for the United States, and an abolition God.\n\nThis, sir, is the _first result_ of your agitation:--the very van of your\nattack repulsed, and driven into infidelity.\n\n\n\n_A Second Result of Agitation_.\n\n\n2. Many others, and you among them, are trying in exactly the same way\njust mentioned to make the Bible speak against slave-holding. You get\nnothing by torturing the English version. People understand English. Nay,\nyou get little by applying the rack to the Hebrew and Greek; even before a\ntribunal of men like you, who proclaim beforehand that Moses, in Hebrew,\nand Paul, in Greek, _must_ condemn slavery because \"_it is a violation of\nthe first sentiments of the Declaration of Independence_.\" You find it\ndifficult to persuade men that Moses and Paul were moved by the Holy Ghost\nto sanction the philosophy of Thomas Jefferson! You find it hard to make\nmen believe that Moses saw in the mount, and Paul had vision in heaven,\nthat this future _apostle of Liberty_ was inspired by Jesus Christ.\n\nYou torture very severely. But the muscles and bones of those old men are\ntough and strong. They won't yield under your terrible wrenchings. You get\nonly groans and mutterings. You claim these voices, I know, as testimony\nagainst slavery. But you cannot torture in secret as in olden times. When\nputting the question, you have to let men be present,--who tell us that\nMoses and Paul won't speak for you,--that they are silent, like Christ\nbefore Pilate's scourging-men; or, in groans and mutterings,--the voices\nof their sorrow and the tones of their indignation,--they rebuke your\npre-judgment of the Almighty when you say if the Bible sanctions slavery,\n\"it neither ought to be nor could be received by mankind as a divine\nrevelation.\"\n\nThis, sir, is the _second result_ you have gained by your agitation. You\nhave brought a thousand Northern ministers of the gospel, with yourself,\nto the verge of the same denial of the word of God which they have made,\nwho are only a little ahead of you in the road you are travelling.\n\n\n\n_A Third Result of Agitation._\n\n\n3. Meanwhile, many of your most pious men, soundest scholars, and\nsagacious observers of providence, have been led to study the Bible more\nfaithfully in the light of the times. And they are reading it more and\nmore in harmony with the views which have been reached by the highest\nSouthern minds, to wit:--That the relation of master and slave is\nsanctioned by the Bible;--that it is a relation belonging to the same\ncategory as those of husband and wife, parent and child, master and\napprentice, master and hireling;--that the relations of husband and wife,\nparent and child, _were ordained in Eden for man, as man_, and _modified\nafter the fall_, while the relation of slavery, as a system of labor, is\n_only one form of the government ordained of God over fallen and degraded\nman_;--that the _evils_ in the system are _the same evils_ of OPPRESSION\nwe see in the relation of husband and wife, and all other forms of\ngovernment;--that slavery, as a relation, suited to the more degraded or\nthe more ignorant and helpless types of a sunken humanity, is, like all\ngovernment, intended _as the proof of the curse of such degradation, and\nat the same time to elevate and bless_;--that the relation of husband and\nwife, being for man, as man, _will ever be over him_, while slavery will\nremain so long as God sees it best, as a controlling power over the\nignorant, the more degraded and helpless;--and that, when he sees it for\nthe good of the country, he will cause it to pass away, if the slave can\nbe elevated to liberty and equality, political and social, with his\nmaster, _in_ that country; or _out of_ that country, if such elevation\ncannot be given therein, but may be realized in some other land: all which\nresult must be left to the unfoldings of the divine will, _in harmony with\nthe Bible_, and not to a newly-discovered dispensation. These facts are\nvindicated in the Bible and Providence. In the Old Testament, they stare\nyou in the face:--in the family of Abraham,--in his slaves, bought with\nhis money and born in his house,--in Hagar, running away under her\nmistress's hard dealing with her, and yet sent back, as a fugitive slave,\nby the angel,--in the law which authorized the Hebrews to hold their\nbrethren as slaves for a time,--in which parents might sell their children\ninto bondage,--in which the heathen were given to the Hebrews as their\nslaves forever,--in which slaves were considered so much the money of\ntheir master, that the master who killed one by an unguarded blow was,\nunder certain circumstances, sufficiently punished in his slave's death,\nbecause he thereby lost his money,--in which the difference between\n_man-stealing_ and _slave-holding_ is, by law, set forth,--in which the\nrunaway from heathen masters may not be restored, because God gave him\nthe benefits of an adopted Hebrew. In the New Testament:--wherein the\nslavery of Greece and Rome was recognised,--in the obligations laid on\nmaster and slave,--in the close connection of this obligation with the\nduties of husband and wife, parent and child,--in the obligation to return\nthe fugitive slave to his master,--and _in the condemnation of every\nabolition principle_, \"AS DESTITUTE OF THE TRUTH.\" (1 Tim. vi. 1-5.)\n\nThis view of slavery is becoming more and more, not only the settled\ndecision of the Southern but of the best Northern mind, with a movement so\nstrong that you have been startled by it to write the pamphlet now lying\nbefore me.\n\nThis is the _third result_ you have secured:--to make many of the best men\nin the North see the infidelity of your philosophy, falsely so called, on\nthe subject of slavery, in the clearer and clearer light of the\nScriptures.\n\n\n\n_Another Result of Agitation_.\n\n\n4. The Southern slave-holder is now satisfied, as never before, that the\nrelation of master and slave is sanctioned by the Bible; and he feels, as\nnever before, the obligations of the word of God. He no longer, in his\nignorance of the Scriptures, and afraid of its teachings, will seek to\ndefend his common-sense opinions of slavery by arguments drawn from \"Types\nof Mankind,\" and other infidel theories; but he will look, in the light of\nthe Bible, on all the good and evil in the system. And when the North, as\nit will, shall regard him holding from God this high power for great\ngood,--when the North shall no more curse, but bid him God-speed,--then he\nwill bless himself and his slave, in nobler benevolence. With no false\nideas of created equality and unalienable right, but with the Bible in his\nheart and hand, he will do justice and love mercy in higher and higher\nrule. Every evil will be removed, and the negro will be elevated to the\nhighest attainments he can make, and be prepared for whatever destiny God\nintends. This, sir, is the _fourth result_ of your agitation:--to make the\nSouthern master _know_, from the Bible, his right to be a master, and his\nduty to his slave.\n\nThese _four results_ are so fully before you, that I think you must see\nand feel them. You have brought out, besides, tremendous political\nconsequences, giving astonishing growth and spread to the slave power: on\nthese I cannot dwell. Sir, are you satisfied with these consequences of\nthe agitation you have gotten up? I am. I thank God that the great deep\nof the American mind has been blown upon by the wind of abolitionism. I\nrejoice that the stagnant water of that American mind has been so greatly\npurified. I rejoice that the infidelity and the semi-infidelity so long\nlatent have been set free. I rejoice that the sober sense North and\nSouth, so strangely asleep and silent, has risen up to hear the word of\nGod and to speak it to the land. I rejoice that all the South now know\nthat God gives the right to hold slaves, and, with that right,\nobligations they must fulfil. I rejoice that the day has dawned in which\nthe North and South will think and feel and act together on the subject\nof slavery. I thank God for the agitation. May he forgive the folly and\nwickedness of many who have gotten it up! May he reveal more and more,\nthat surely the wrath of man shall praise him, while the remainder of\nwrath he will restrain!\n\n\n\n_Declaration of Independence_.\n\n\nI agree with you, sir, that _the second paragraph_ of the Declaration of\nIndependence contains _five affirmations_, declared to be self-evident\ntruths, which, if truths, do sustain you and all abolitionists in every\nthing you say as to the right of the negro to liberty; and not only to\nliberty,--to equality, political and social. But I disagree with you as to\ntheir truth, and I say that not one of said affirmations is a self-evident\ntruth, or a truth at all. On the contrary, that each one is contrary to\nthe Bible; that each one, separately, is denied; and that all five,\ncollectively, are denied and upset by the Bible, by the natural history of\nman, and by providence, in every age of the world. I say this now. In a\nsubsequent communication, I will prove what I affirm. For the present I\nmerely add, that the Declaration of Independence stands in no need of\nthese false affirmations. It was, and is, a beautiful whole without them.\nIt was, and is, without these imaginary maxims, the simple statement of\nthe grievances the colonies had borne from the mother-country, and their\nright _as colonies_, when thus oppressed, to declare themselves\nindependent. That is to say, the right given of God to oppressed children\nto seek protection in another family, or to set up for themselves somewhat\nbefore _twenty-one_ or natural maturity; right belonging to them _in the\nBritish family;_ right sanctioned of God; right blessed of God, in the\nresistance of the colonies _as colonies_--not as individual men--to the\nattempt of the mother-country to consummate her tyranny. But God gives no\nsanction to the affirmation that he has _created all men equal_; that this\nis _self-evident,_ and that he has given them _unalienable rights;_ that\nhe has made government to _derive its power solely from their consent_,\nand that he has given them _the right to change that government in their\nmere pleasure_. All this--every word of it, every jot and tittle--is the\nliberty and equality claimed by infidelity. God has cursed it seven times\nin France since 1793; and he will curse it there seventy times seven, if\nFrenchmen prefer to be pestled so often in Solomon's mortar. He has cursed\nit in Prussia, Austria, Germany, Italy, Spain. He will curse it as long as\ntime, whether it is affirmed by Jefferson, Paine, Robespierre, Ledru\nRollin, Kossuth, Greeley, Garrison, or Barnes.\n\nSir, that paragraph is an _excrescence_ on the tree of our liberty. I pray\nyou take it away. Worship it if you will, and in a manner imitate the\nDruid. He gave reverence to the _mistletoe_, but first he removed the\n_parasite_ from the noble tree. Do you the same. Cut away _this mistletoe_\nwith golden knife, as did the Druid; enshrine its imaginary divinity in a\ngrove or cave; then retire there, and leave our oak to stand in its glory\nin the light of heaven. Men have been afraid to say all this for years,\njust as they have been timid to assert that God has placed master and\nslave in the same relation as husband and wife. Public sentiment, which\nyou once had and have lost, suppressed this utterance as the other. But\nnow, men speak out; and I, for one, will tell you what the Bible reveals\nas to that part of the Declaration of Independence, as fearlessly as I\ntell you what it says of the system of slavery.\n\n\n\n_How Men are made Infidels_.\n\n\nI agree with you that some men have been, are, and will be, made infidels\nby hearing that God has ordained slavery as one form of his government\nover depraved mankind. But how does this fact prove that the Bible does\nnot sanction slavery? Why, sir, you have been all your life teaching that\nsome men are made infidels by hearing any truth of the Bible;--that some\nmen are made infidels by hearing the Trinity, Depravity, Atonement,\nDivinity of Christ, Resurrection, Eternal Punishment. True: and these men\nfind \"_great laws of their nature,--instinctive feelings_\"--just such as\nyou find against slavery, and not more perverted in them than in you,\ncondemning all this Bible. And they hold now, with your sanction, that a\nbook affirming such facts \"_cannot be from God_.\"\n\nSir, some men are made infidels by hearing the Ten Commandments, and they\nfind \"_great laws of their nature_,\" as strong in them as yours in you\nagainst slavery, warring against every one of these commandments. And\nthey declare now, with your authority, that a book imposing such\nrestraints upon human nature, \"_cannot be from God_\" Sir, what is it\nmakes infidels? You have been wont to answer, \"They _will not_ have God\n_to rule over them_. They _will not_ have the BIBLE _to control the great\nlaws of their nature.\"_ Sir, that is the true answer. And you know that\n_the great instinct of liberty_ is only one of _three great laws_,\nneeding special teaching and government:--that is to say, _the instinct\nto rule; the instinct to submit to be ruled; and the instinct for\nliberty._ You know, too, that the instinct _to submit_ is the strongest,\nthe instinct _to rule_ is next, and that the _aspiration for liberty_ is\nthe weakest. Hence you know the overwhelming majority of men have ever\nbeen willing to be slaves; masters have been next in number; while the\nfew have struggled for freedom.\n\nThe Bible, then, in proclaiming God's will _as to these three great\nimpulses_, will be rejected by men, exactly as they have yielded forbidden\ncontrol to the one or the other of them. The Bible will make infidels of\n_masters_, when God calls to them to rule right, or to give up rule, if\nthey have allowed _the instinct of power_ to make them hate God's\nauthority. Pharaoh spoke for all infidel rulers when he said, \"_Who is the\nLord that I should obey his voice?_\"\n\nThe Bible will make infidels of _slaves_, when God calls to them to aspire\nto be free, if they have permitted _the instinct of submission to_ make\nthem hate his commands. The Israelites in the wilderness revealed ten\ntimes, in their murmuring, _the slave-instinct_ in all ages:--\"_Would to\nGod we had died in the wilderness!_\"\n\nYou know all this, and you condemn these infidels. Good.\n\nBut, sir, you know equally well that the Bible will make infidels of men\n_affirming the instinct of liberty,_ when God calls them to learn of him\nhow _much liberty_ he gives, and _how_ he gives it, and _when_ he gives\nit, if they have so yielded to this law of their nature as to make them\ndespise the word of the Lord. Sir, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram spoke out\njust what the liberty-and-equality men have said in all time:--\"_Ye, Moses\nand Aaron, take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy,\nevery one of them: wherefore, then, lift ye up yourselves above the\ncongregation?\"_ Verily, sir, these men were intensely excited by \"_the\ngreat law of our nature,--the great instinct of freedom.\"_ Yea, they told\nGod to his face they had looked within, and found the _higher law of\nliberty and equality--the eternal right--in their intuitional\nconsciousness_; and that they would not submit to his will in the\nelevation of Moses and Aaron _above them_.\n\nVerily, sir, you, in the spirit of Korah, now proclaim and say, \"Ye\nmasters, and ye white men who are not masters, North and South, ye take\ntoo much upon you, seeing the negro is created your equal, and, by\nunalienable right, is as free as you, and entitled to all your political\nand social life. Ye take, then, too much upon you in excluding him from\nyour positions of wealth and honor, from your halls of legislation, and\nfrom your palace of the nation, and from your splendid couch, and from\nyour fair women with long hair on that couch and in that gilded chariot:\nwherefore, then, lift ye up yourselves above the negro?\"\n\nVerily, sir, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram said all we have ever heard from\nabolition-platforms or now listen to from you. But the Lord made the\nearth swallow up Korah, Dathan, and Abiram!\n\nI agree with you then, sir, fully, that some men have been, are, and will\nbe, made infidels by hearing that God, in the Bible, has ordained slavery.\nBut I hold this to be no argument against the fact that the Bible does so\nteach, because men are made infidels by any other doctrine or precept they\nhate to believe.\n\nSir, no man has said all this better than you. And I cannot express my\ngrief that you--in the principle now avowed, _that every man must\ninterpret the Bible as he chooses to reason and feel_--sanction all the\ninfidelity in the world, obliterate your \"_Notes_\" on the Bible, and deny\nthe preaching of your whole life, so far as God may, in his wrath, permit\nyou to expunge or recall the words of the wisdom of your better day.\n\n\n\n_Testimonies of General Assemblies_.\n\n\nI agree with you that the Presbyterian Church, both before and since its\ndivision, has testified, after a fashion, against slavery. But some of its\naction has been very curious testimony. I know not how the anti-slavery\nresolutions of 1818 were gotten up; nor how in some Assemblies since. I\ncan guess, however, from what I do know, as to how such resolutions passed\nin Buffalo in 1853, and in New York in 1856. I know that in Buffalo they\nwere at first voted down by a large majority. Then they were reconsidered\nin mere courtesy to men who said they wanted to speak. So the resolutions\nwere passed after some days, in which the _screws_ were applied and\nturned, in part, _by female hands_, to save the chairman of the committee\nfrom _the effects_ of the resolutions being finally voted down!\n\nI know that, in New York, the decision of the Assembly to spread the\nminority report on the minutes was considered, in the body and out of it,\nas a Southern victory; for it revealed, however glossed over, that many in\nthe house, who could not vote directly for the minority report, did in\nfact prefer it to the other.\n\nI was not in Detroit in 1850; but I think it was established in New York\nlast May that that Detroit testimony was so admirably worded that both\nSouthern and Northern men might vote for it with clear consciences!\n\nI need not pursue the investigation. I admit that, after this sort, you\nhave the stultified abstractions of the New School Presbyterian\nChurch,--while I have its common sense; you have its Delphic words,--I\nhave its actions; you have the traditions of the elders making void the\nword of God,--I have the providence of God restraining the church from\ndestroying itself and our social organization under folly, fanaticism, and\ninfidelity.\n\nYou, sir, seem to acknowledge this; for, while you appear pleased with the\ntestimony of the New School Presbyterian Church, such as it is, you lament\nthat the Old School have not been true to the resolutions of 1818,--that,\nin that branch of the church, it is questionable whether those resolutions\ncould now be adopted. You lament the silence of the Episcopal, the\nSouthern Methodist, and the Baptist denominations; you might add the\nCumberland Presbyterian Church. And you know that in New England, in New\nYork, and in the Northwest, many testify against _us_ as a pro-slavery\nbody. You lament that so many members of the church, ministers of the\ngospel, and editors of religious papers, defend the system; you lament\nthat so large a part of the religious literature of the land, though\nhaving its seat North and sustained chiefly by Northern funds, shows a\nperpetual deference to the slave-holder; you lament that, after fifty\nyears, nothing has been done to arrest slavery; you lament and ask, \"Why\nshould this be so?\" In saying this, you acknowledge that, while you have\nbeen laboring to get and have reached the abstract testimony of the\nchurch, all diluted as it is, the common-sense fact has been and is more\nand more brought out, in the providence of God, that _the slave-power has\nbeen and is gaining ground in the United States_. In one word, you have\ncontrived to get, in confused utterance, the voice of the Sanhedrim; while\nChrist himself has been preaching in the streets of our Jerusalem the true\nmeaning of slavery as one form of his government over fallen men.\n\nThese, then, are some of the things I promised to show as the results of\nyour agitation. This is the \"_tone_\" of the past and present speech of\nProvidence on the subject of slavery. You seem disturbed. I feel sure\nthings are going on well as to that subject. Speak on, then, \"in\nunambiguous tones.\" But, sir, when you desire to go from words to\nactions,--when you intimate that the constitution of the Presbyterian\nChurch may be altered to permit such action, or that, without its\nalteration, the church can detach itself from slavery by its existing laws\nor the modification of them,--then I understand you to mean that you\ndesire to deal, in fact, with slave-holders as _offenders_. Then, sir,\n_you mean to exscind the South_; for it is absurd to imagine that you\nsuppose the South will submit to such action. You mean, then, to _exscind\nthe South, or to exscind yourself and others_, or to _compel the South to\nwithdraw_. Your tract, just published, is, I suppose, intended by you to\nprepare the next General Assembly for such movement? What then? Will you\nmake your \"American Presbyterian,\" and your Presbyterian House, effect\nthat great change in the religious literature of the land whereby the\nsubject of slave-holding shall be approached _precisely_ as you deal with\n\"theft, highway-robbery, or piracy?\" Will you, then, by act of Assembly,\nSynod, Presbytery, Session, deny your pulpits, and communion-bread and\nwine, to slave-holding ministers, elders, and members? Will you, then,\ntell New England, and especially little Rhoda, We have purified our skirts\nfrom the blood: forgive us, and take us again to your love? What then?\nWill you then ostracize the South and compel the abolition of slavery?\nSir, do you bid us fear these coming events, thus casting their shadow\nbefore from the leaves of your book?\n\nSir, you may destroy the integrity of the New School Presbyterian Church.\nSo much evil you may do; but you will hereby only add immensely to the\ngreat power and good of the Old School; and you will make disclosures of\nProvidence, unfolding a consummation of things very different from the end\nyou wish to accomplish for your country and the world.\n\nI write as one of the animalcules contributing to the coral reef of\npublic opinion.\n\nF. A. Ross.\n\n\n\n\nNo. II.\n\nGovernment Over Man a Divine Institute.\n\n\n\nThis letter is the examination and refutation of the infidel theory of\nhuman government foisted into the Declaration of Independence.\n\nI had written this criticism in different form for publication, before Mr.\nBarnes's had appeared. I wrote it to vindicate my affirmation in the\nGeneral Assembly which met in New York, May last, on this part of the\nDeclaration. My views were maturely formed, after years of reflection, and\nweeks--nay months--of carefully-penned writing.\n\nAnd thus these truths, from the Bible, Providence, and common sense, were\nlike rich freight, in goodly ship, waiting for the wind to sail; when lo,\nMr. Barnes's abolition-breath filled the canvas, and carried it out of\nport into the wide, the free, the open sea of American public thought.\nThere it sails. If pirate or other hostile craft comes alongside, the good\nship has guns.\n\nI ask that this paper be carefully read more than once, twice, or three\ntimes. Mr. Barnes, I presume, will not so read it. He is committed.\nGreeley may notice it with his sparkling wit, albeit he has too much sense\nto grapple with its argument. The Evangelist-man will say of it, what he\nwould say if Christ were casting out devils in New York,--\"He casteth\nout devils through Beelzebub the chief of the devils.\" Yea, this\nEvangelist-man says that my version of the golden rule is \"diabolical;\"\nwhen truly that version is the _word_ of the Spirit, as Christ's casting\nout devils was the _work_ of the Holy Ghost.\n\nGerrett Smith, Garrison, Giddings, do already agree with me, that they are\nright if Jefferson spoke the truth. Yea, whether the Bible be true, is no\nquestion with them no more than with him. Yea, they hold, as he did, that\nwhether there be one God or twenty, it matters not: the fact either way,\nin men's minds, neither breaks the leg nor picks the pocket. (See\nJefferson's Notes on Virginia.) Messrs. Beecher and Cheever will find\nnothing in me to aid them in speaking to the mobs of Ephesus and Antioch.\nThey are making shrines, and crying, Great is Diana. Mrs. Stowe is on the\nDismal Swamp, with Dred for her Charon, to paddle her light canoe, by the\nfire-fly lamps, to the Limbo of Vanity, of which she is the queen. None of\nthese will read with attention or honesty, if at all, this examination of\nwhat Randolph long ago said was a _fanfaronade of nonsense_. These are all\nwiser \"than seven men that can render a reason.\"\n\nBut there are thousands, North and South, who will read this refutation,\nand will feel and acknowledge that in the light of God's truth the notion\nof created equality and unalienable right is falsehood and infidelity.\n\n\n\nRev. A. Barnes:--\n\nDear Sir:--In my first letter I promised to prove that the paragraph in\nthe Declaration of Independence, which contains the affirmation of\ncreated equality and unalienable rights, has no sanction from the word of\nGod. I now meet my obligation.\n\nThe time has come when civil liberty, as revealed in the Bible and in\nProvidence, must be re-examined, understood, and defended against infidel\ntheories of human rights. The slavery question has brought on this\nconflict; and, strange as it may seem, the South, the land of the slave,\nis summoned by God to defend the liberty he gives; while the North, the\nclime of the free, misunderstands and changes the truth of God into a\nlie,--claiming a liberty he does not give. Wherefore is this? I reply:---\n\nGod, when he ordained government over men, gave to the individual man\nRIGHTS, _only_ as he is under government. He first established the family;\nhence all other rule is merely the family expanded. The _good_ of the\nfamily limited the _rights_ of every member. God required the family, and\nthen the state, so to rule as to give to every member the _good_ which is\nhis, in harmony with the welfare of the whole; and he commanded the\nindividual to seek _that good_, and NO MORE.\n\nNow, mankind being depraved, government has ever violated its obligation\nto rule for the benefit of the entire community, and has wielded its\npower in oppression. Consequently, the governed have ever struggled to\nsecure the good which was their right. But, in this struggle, they have\never been tempted to go beyond the limitation God had made, and to seek\nsupposed good, not given, in rights, prompted by _self-will_, destructive\nof the state.\n\nGovernment thus ever existing in oppression, and people thus ever rising\nup against despotism, have been the history of mankind.\n\nThe Reformation was one of the many convulsions in this long-continued\nconflict. In its first movements, men claimed the liberty the Bible\ngrants. Soon they ran into licentiousness. God then stayed the further\nprogress of emancipation in Europe, because the spread of the asserted\nliberty would have made infidelity prevail over that part of the\ncontinent where the Reformation was arrested. God preferred Romanism,\nand other despotisms, modified as they were by the struggle, to rule for\na time, than have those countries destroyed under the sway of a\nlicentious freedom.\n\nIn this contest the North American colonies had their rise, and they\ncontinued the strife with England until they declared themselves\nindependent.\n\nThat \"Declaration\" affirmed not only the liberty sanctioned of the Bible,\nbut also the liberty constituting infidelity. Its first paragraph, to the\nword \"_separation_,\" is a noble introduction. Omit, then, what follows,\nto the sentence beginning \"_Prudence will dictate_,\" and the paper, thus\nexpurgated, is complete, and is then simply the complaint of the colonies\nagainst the government of England, which had oppressed them beyond\nfurther submission, and the assertion of their right to be free and\nindependent States.\n\nThis declaration was, in that form, nothing more than the affirmation of\nthe right God gives to children, in a family, applied to the colonies, in\nregard to their mother-country. That is to say, children have, from God,\nRIGHT, AS CHILDREN, when cruelly treated, to secure the good to which they\nare entitled, as children, IN THE FAMILY. They may secure _this_ good by\nbecoming part of another family, or by setting up for themselves, if old\nenough. So the colonies had, from God, _right_ as colonies, when oppressed\nbeyond endurance, to exchange the British family for another, or, if of\nsufficient age, to establish their own household. The Declaration, then,\nin that complaint of oppression and affirmation of right, in the colonies,\nto be independent, asserts liberty sanctioned by the word of God. And\ntherefore the pledge to _that_ Declaration, of \"lives, fortune, and sacred\nhonor,\" was blessed of Heaven, in the triumph of their cause.\n\nBut the Declaration, in the part I have omitted, affirms other things, and\nvery different. It asserts facts and rights as appertaining to man, not in\nthe Scriptures, but contrary thereto. Here is the passage:--\n\n  \"We hold these truths to be self-evident,--that all men are created\n  equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain\n  unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the\n  pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are\n  instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of\n  the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes\n  destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or\n  abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation\n  on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to\n  them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.\"\n\n_This is the affirmation of the liberty claimed by infidelity._ It teaches\nas a fact _that_ which is not true; and it claims as right _that_ which\nGod has not given. It asserts nothing new, however. It lays claim to that\nindividual right beyond the limitation God has put, which man has ever\nasserted when in his struggle for liberty he has refused to be guided and\ncontrolled by the word and providence of his Creator.\n\nThe paragraph is a chain of four links, each of which is claimed to be a\nself-evident truth.\n\nThe _first_ and controlling assertion is, \"that ALL MEN ARE CREATED\nEQUAL;\" which proposition, as I understand it, is, that _every man and\nwoman on earth is created with equal attributes of body and mind_.\n\n_Secondly_, and consequently, that every individual has, by virtue of his\nor her being created the equal of each and every other individual, the\nright to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, _so in his or her\nown keeping that that right is unalienable without his or her consent_.\n\n_Thirdly_, it follows, that government among men must derive its just\npowers only from the _consent_ of the governed; and, as the governed are\nthe aggregate of individuals, _then each person must consent to be thus\ncontrolled before he or she can be rightfully under such authority_.\n\n_Fourthly_, and finally, that whenever any form of government becomes\ndestructive of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,\n_as each such individual man or woman may think_, then each such person\nmay rightly set to work to alter or abolish such form, and institute a new\ngovernment, on such principles and in such form as to them shall seem most\nlikely to effect their safety and happiness.\n\nThis is the celebrated averment of created equality, and unalienable right\nto life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, with the necessary\nconsequences. I have fairly expanded its meaning. It is the old infidel\naverment. It is not true in any one of its assertions.\n\n\n\n_All Men not created equal_.\n\n\nIt is not a truth, _self-evident,_ that all men are created equal.\nWebster, in his dictionary, defines \"Self-evident--Evident without proof\nor reason: clear conviction upon a bare presentation to the mind, as that\ntwo and three make five.\"\n\nNow, I affirm, and you, I think, will not contradict me, that the\nposition, \"_all men are created equal\"_ is _not_ self-evident; that the\nnature of the case makes it impossible for it to be self-evident. For the\ncreated nature of man is not in the class of things of which such\nself-evident propositions can by possibility be predicated. It is equally\nclear and beyond debate, that it is not _self-evident_ that all men have\n_unalienable rights_, that governments derive their just powers from the\n_consent_ of the governed, and may be altered or abolished whenever _to\nthem_ such rights may be better secured. All these assertions can be known\nto be true or false only from revelation of the Creator, or from\nexamination and induction of reasoning, covering the nature and the\nobligations of the race on the whole face of the earth. What revelation\nand examination of facts do teach, I will now show. The whole\nbattle-ground, as to the truth of this series of averments, is on the\nfirst affirmation, \"_that all men are created equal_.\" Or, to keep up my\nfirst figure, the strength of the chain of asserted truths depend on\n_that_ first link. It must then stand the following perfect trial.\n\nGod reveals to us that he created man in his image, _i.e._ a spirit\nendowed with attributes resembling his own,--to reason, to form rule of\nright, to manifest various emotions, to will, to act,--and that he gave\nhim a body suited to such a spirit, (Gen. i. 26, 27, 28;) that he created\nMAN \"_male and female_,\" (Gen. i. 27;) that he made the woman \"_out of the\nman_,\" (Gen. ii. 23;) that he made \"_the man the image and glory of God_,\nbut the woman _the glory of the man_. For the man is not of the woman, but\nthe woman of the man. Neither was the man _created for the woman_, but the\nwoman _for the man_,\" (1 Cor. xi.;) that he made the woman to be the\nweaker vessel, (1 Pet. iii. 7.) Here, then, God created _the race_ to be\nin the beginning TWO,--a male and a female MAN; one of them _not equal_ to\nthe other _in attributes of body and mind_, and, as we shall see\npresently, not equal in rights as to government. Observe, this inequality\nwas fact as to the TWO, in the perfect state wherein they were _created_.\n\nBut these two fell from that perfect state, became depraved, and began to\nbe degraded in body and mind. This statement of the original inequality in\nwhich man was created controls all that comes after, in God's providence\nand in the natural history of the race.\n\n_Providence_, in its comprehensive teaching, \"says that God, soon after\nthe flood, subjected the races to all the influences of the different\nzones of the earth;\"--\"That he hath made of one blood all nations of men\nfor to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times\nbefore appointed and the bounds of their habitation; that they should\nseek the Lord if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he\nbe not far from every one of us.\" (Acts xvii. 26, 27.)\n\nThese \"bounds of their habitation\" have had much to do in the natural\nhistory of man; for \"_all men_\" have been \"_created_,\" or, more\ncorrectly, _born_, (since the race was \"created\" once only at the first,)\nwith attributes of body and mind derived from the TWO unequal parents,\nand these attributes, in every individual, the combined result of the\nparental natures. \"_All men_,\" then, come into the world under influences\nupon the amalgamated and transmitted body and mind, from depravity and\ndegradation, sent down during all the generations past; and, therefore,\nunder causes of inequality, acting on each individual from climate, from\nscenery, from food, from health, from sickness, from love, from hatred,\nfrom government, inconceivable in variety and power. Under such causes,\nto produce infinite shades of inequality, physical and mental, in\nbirth--if \"all men\" were created equal (_i.e._ born equal) in attributes\nof body and mind--such \"creation\" would be a violation of all the known\nanalogies in the world of life.\n\nDo, then, the facts in man's natural history exhibit this departure from\nthe laws of life and spirit? Do they prove that \"all men are created\nequal\"? Do they show that every man and every woman of Africa, Asia,\nEurope, America, and the islands of the seas, is created each one equal in\nbody and mind to each other man or woman on the face of the earth, and\nthat this has always been?\n\nNeed I extend these questions? Methinks, sir, I hear you say, what others\nhave told me, that the \"Declaration\" is not to be understood as affirming\nwhat is so clearly false, but merely asserts that all men are \"created\nequal\" in _natural rights._\n\nI reply that _that_ is _not_ the meaning of the clause before us; for\n_that_ is the meaning of the next sentence,--the _second_ in the series we\nare considering.\n\nThere are, as I have said, four links to the chain of thought in this\npassage:--1. That all men are created equal. 2. That they are endowed by\nthe Creator with certain unalienable rights. 3. That government derives\nits just powers from the consent of the governed. 4. That the people may\nalter and abolish it, &c.\n\nThese links are logical sequences. All men--man and woman--are created\nequal,--equal in _attributes of body and mind_; (for _that_ is the only\nsense in which they could be _created_ equal;) _therefore_ they are\nendowed with right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness,\nunalienable, except in their consent; _consequently_ such consent is\nessential to all rightful government; and, _finally_ and _irresistibly_,\nthe people have supreme right to alter or abolish it, &c.\n\nThe meaning, then, I give to that first link, and to the chain following,\n_is_ the sense, because, if you deny that meaning to the _first link_,\nthen the others have no logical truth whatever. Thus:--\n\nIf all men are _not_ created equal in attributes of body and mind, then\nthe _inequality_ may be _so great_ that such men cannot be endowed with\nright to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, unalienable save in\ntheir _consent_; then government over such men cannot rightfully rest upon\ntheir _consent_; nor can they have right to alter or abolish government in\ntheir mere determination.\n\nYea, sir, you concede every thing if you admit that the \"Declaration\"\ndoes _not_ mean to affirm that all men are \"_created_\" _equal in body\nand mind_.\n\nI will suppose in the Alps a community of Cretins,--_i.e._ deformed and\nhelpless idiots,--but among them many from the same parents, who, in body\nand mind, by birth are comparatively _Napoleons_. Now, this _inequality_,\nphysical and mental, by birth, makes it impossible that the government\nover these Cretins can be in their \"_consent_.\" _The Napoleons must rule_.\nThe Napoleons must absolutely control their \"life, liberty, and pursuit of\nhappiness,\" for the good of the community. Do you reply that I have taken\nan extreme case? that everybody admits sensible people must govern natural\nfools? Ay, sir, there is the rub. _Natural fools_! Are some men, then,\n\"_created_\" natural fools? Very well. Then you also admit that some men\nare _created_ just a degree above natural fools!--and, consequently, that\nmen are \"_created_\" in all degrees, gradually rising in the scale of\nintelligence. Are they not \"_created_\" just above the brute, with savage\nnatures along with mental imbecility and physical degradation? Must the\nNapoleons govern the Cretins without their \"consent\"? Must they not also\ngovern without their \"consent\" these types of mankind, whether one, two,\nthree, thirty, or three hundred degrees above the Cretins, if they are\nstill greatly inferior by nature? Suppose the Cretins removed from the\nimagined community, and a colony of Australian ant-catchers or California\nlizard-eaters be in their stead: must not the Napoleons govern these? And,\nif you admit inequality to be in birth, then that inequality is the very\nground of the reason why the Napoleons must govern the ant-catchers and\nlizard-eaters. Remove these, and put in their place an importation of\nAfrican negroes. Do you admit _their inferiority by_ \"CREATION?\" Then the\nsame control over them must be the irresistible fact in common sense and\nScripture of God. _The Napoleons must govern_. They must govern without\nasking \"consent,\"--if the inequality be such that \"_consent_\" would be\nevil, and not good, in the family--the state.\n\nYea, sir, if you deny that the \"Declaration\" asserts \"all men are created\nequal\" in body and mind, then you admit the inequality may be such as to\nmake it impossible that in such cases men have rights unalienable save in\ntheir \"consent;\" and you admit it to be impossible that government in such\ncircumstances can exist in such \"_consent_\" But, if you affirm the\n\"Declaration\" _does_ mean that men are \"_created_ equal\" in attributes of\nbody and mind, then you hold to an equality which God, in his word, and\nprovidence, and the natural history of man, denies to be truth.\n\nI think I have fairly shown, from Scripture and facts, that the first\naverment is not the truth; and have reduced it to an absurdity. I will now\nregard the second, third, and fourth links of the chain.\n\nI know they are already broken; for, the whole chain being but an electric\ncurrent from a vicious imagination, I have destroyed the whole by breaking\nthe first link. Or was it but a cluster from a poisonous vine, then I have\nkilled the branches by cutting the vine. I will, however, expose the other\nthree sequences by a distinct argument covering them all.\n\n\n\n_Authority Delegated to Adam_.\n\n\nGod gave to Adam sovereignty over the human race, in his first\ndecree:--\"_He shall rule over thee_.\" _That_ was THE INSTITUTION OF\nGOVERNMENT. It was not based on the \"_consent_\" of Eve, the governed. It\nwas from God. He gave to Adam like authority to rule his children. It was\nnot derived from their \"_consent_\". It was from God. He gave Noah the same\nsovereignty, with express power over life, liberty, and pursuit of\nhappiness. It was not founded in \"_consent_\" of Shem, Ham, and Japheth,\nand their wives. It was from God. He then determined the habitations of\nmen on all the face of the earth, and _indicated_ to them, in every clime,\nthe _form_ and _power_ of their governments. He gave, directly, government\nto Israel. He just as truly gave it to Idumea, to Egypt, and to Babylon,\nto the Arab, to the Esquimaux, the Caffre, the Hottentot, and the negro.\n\nGod, in the Bible, decides the matter. He says, \"Let every soul be subject\nunto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that\nbe are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth\nthe ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves\ndamnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil.\nWilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and thou\nshalt have praise of the same: for he is the minister of God to thee for\ngood. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid, for he beareth not the\nsword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath\nupon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for\nwrath, but also for conscience' sake. For this cause pay ye tribute also:\nfor they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing.\nRender, therefore, to all their dues; tribute to whom tribute is due;\ncustom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor.\" (Rom.\nxiii. 1-7.)\n\nHere God reveals to us that he has _delegated to government his own_ RIGHT\n_over life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness_; and that that RIGHT is\nnot, in any sense, from the \"_consent_\" of the governed, but is directly\nfrom him. Government over men, whether in the family or in the state, is,\nthen, as directly from God as it would be if he, in visible person, ruled\nin the family or in the state. I speak not only of the RIGHT simply to\ngovern, but the _mode_ of the government, and the _extent_ of the power.\nGovernment _can do_ ALL which God _would do,--just_ THAT,--_no more, no\nless_. And it is _bound to do just_ THAT,--_no more, no less_. Government\nis responsible to God, if it fails to do _just_ THAT which He himself\nwould do. It is under responsibility, then, to rule in righteousness. It\nmust not oppress. It must _give_ to every individual \"_life, liberty, and\npursuit of happiness_,\" in harmony with the _good_ of the family,--the\nstate,--_as God himself would give it_,--_just_ THAT, _no more, no less_.\n\nThis passage of Scripture settles the question, From whence has\ngovernment RIGHT to rule, and what is the _extent_ of its power? The\nRIGHT is from God, and the EXTENT of the power is _just_ THAT to which\nGod would exercise it if he were personally on the earth. God, in this\npassage, and others, settles, with equal clearness, from whence is the\nOBLIGATION to _submit_ to government, and what is the _extent_ of the\nduty of obedience? The OBLIGATION to submit is not from individual RIGHT\nto consent or not to consent to government,--but the OBLIGATION _to\nsubmit_ is directly from God.\n\nThe EXTENT of the duty of obedience is equally revealed--in this wise: so\nlong as the government rules in righteousness, the duty is perfect\nobedience. So soon, however, as government requires _that_ which God, in\nhis word, _forbids the subject to do_, he must obey God, and not man. He\nmust refuse to obey man. But, inasmuch as the obligation to submit to\nauthority of government is so great, the subject must _know_ it is the\nwill of God, that he shall refuse to obey, before he assumes the\nresponsibility of resistance to the powers that be. His _conscience_ will\nnot justify him before God, if he mistakes his duty. _He may be all the\nmore to blame for having_ SUCH A CONSCIENCE. Let him, then, be CERTAIN he\ncan say, like Peter and John, \"Whether it be right, in the sight of God,\nto hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye.\"\n\nBut, when government requires _that_ which God _does not forbid_ the\nsubject to do, although _in that_ the government may have transcended the\nline of its righteous rule, the subject must, nevertheless,\nsubmit,--_until_ oppression has gone to _the point_ at which _God makes_\nRESISTANCE _to be duty._ And _that point_ is when RESISTANCE will clearly\nbe _less of evil, and more of good_, TO THE COMMUNITY, than further\nsubmission.\n\n_That_ is the rule of _duty_ God gives to the _whole_ people, or to the\n_minority_, or to the _individual_, to guide them in resistance to the\npowers that be.\n\nIt is irresistibly _certain_ that _He who ordains_ government _has, alone,\nthe right to alter or abolish it_,--that He who institutes the powers that\nbe has, alone, the right to say when and how the people, in whole or in\npart, may resist. So, then, the people, in whole, or in part, have no\nright to resist, to alter, or abolish government, simply because _they_\nmay deem it destructive of the end for which it was instituted; but they\nmay resist, alter, or abolish, _when it shall be seen that God so regards\nit_. This places the great fact where it must be placed,--_under the_\nCONTROL _of the_ BIBLE _and_ PROVIDENCE.\n\n\n\n_Illustrations_.\n\n\nI will conclude with one or two illustrations. God, in his providence,\nordains the Russian form of government,--_i.e._ He places the sovereignty\nin one man, because He sees that such government can secure, for a time,\nmore good to that degraded people than any other form. Now, I ask, Has the\nemperor _right_, from God, to change at once, in his mere \"_consent_,\" the\n_form_ of his government to _that_ of the United States? No. God forbids\nhim. Why? Because he would thereby destroy the good, and bring immense\nevil in his empire. I ask again, Have the Russian serfs and nobles,--yea,\nall,--\"consenting,\" the right, from God, to make that change? No. For the\ngovernment of the United States is not suited to them. And, in such an\nattempt, they would deprive themselves of the blessings they now have, and\nbring all the horrors of anarchy.\n\nDo you ask if I then hold, that God ordains the Russian type of rule to be\nperpetual over that people? No. The emperor is bound to secure all of\n\"_life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness_,\" to each individual,\nconsistent with the good of the nation. And he is to learn his obligation\nfrom the Bible, and faithfully apply it to the condition of his subjects.\n_He will thus gradually elevate them_; while they, on their part, are\nbound to strive for this elevation, in all the ways in which God may show\nthem the good, and the right, which, more and more, will belong to them in\ntheir upward progress. The result of such government and such obedience\nwould be that of a father's faithful training, and children's\ncorresponding obedience. The Russian people would thus have, gradually,\nthat measure of liberty they could bear, under the one-man power,--and\nthen, in other forms, as they might be qualified to realize them. This\ndevelopment would be without convulsion,--as the parent gives place, while\nthe children are passing from the lower to their higher life. It would be\nthe exemplification of Carlyle's illustration of the snake. He says, A\npeople should change their government only as a snake sheds his skin: the\nnew skin is gradually formed under the old one,--and then the snake\nwriggles out, with just a drop of blood here and there, where the old\njacket held on rather tightly.\n\nGod ordains the government of the United States. And _He places_ the\n_sovereignty_ in the _will_ of the majority, because He has trained the\npeople, through many generations in modes of government, to such an\nelevation in moral and religious intelligence, that such sovereignty is\nbest suited to confer on them the highest right, as yet, to \"life,\nliberty, and the pursuit of happiness.\" But God requires that _that will\nof the majority_ be in perfect submission to Him. Once more then I\ninquire,--Whether the people of this country, yea all of them consenting,\nhave right from God, to abolish now, at this time, our free institutions,\nand set up the sway of Russia? No. But why? There is one answer only. He\ntells us that our happiness is in this form of government, and in it, its\ndeveloped results.\n\n\n\n_The \"Social Compact\" not recognised in the Divine Institute_.\n\n\nHere I pause. So, then, God gives no sanction to the notion of a SOCIAL\nCOMPACT. He never gave to man individual, isolated, natural rights,\nunalienably in his keeping. He never made him a Caspar Hauser, in the\nforest, without name or home,--a Melchisedek, in the wilderness, without\nfather, without mother, without descent,--a Robinson Crusoe, on his\nisland, in skins and barefooted, waiting, among goats and parrots, the\ncoming of the canoes and the savages, to enable him to \"_consent_\" if he\nwould, to the relations of social life.\n\nAnd, therefore, those five sentences in that second paragraph of the\nDeclaration of Independence are not the truth; so, then, it is not\n_self-evident_ truth that all men are created equal. So, then, it is not\nthe truth, in fact, that they are created equal. So, then, it is not the\ntruth that God has endowed all men with unalienable right to life,\nliberty, and pursuit of happiness. So, then, it is not the truth that\ngovernments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. So,\nthen, it is not the truth that the people have right to alter or abolish\ntheir government, and institute a new form, whenever to them it shall seem\nlikely to effect their safety and happiness.\n\nThe manner in which these unscriptural dogmas have been modified or\ndeveloped in the United States, I will examine in another paper.\n\nI merely add, that the opinions of revered ancestors, on these questions\nof right and their application to American slavery, must now, as never\nbefore, be brought to the test of the light of the Bible. F.A. Ross.\n\nHuntsville, Ala., Jan. 1857.\n\n\n\n\nMan-Stealing.\n\n\n\nThis argument on the abolition charge, against the slave-holder,--that he\nis a man-stealer,--covers the whole question of slavery, especially as it\nis seen in the Old Testament. The headings in the letter make the subject\nsufficiently clear.\n\n\n\nNo. III.\n\n\n\nRev. Albert Barnes:--\n\nDear Sir:--In my first letter, I merely touched some points in your tract,\nintending to notice them more fully in subsequent communications. I have,\nin my second paper, sufficiently examined the imaginary maxims of created\nequality and unalienable rights.\n\nIn this, I will test your views by Scripture more directly. \"To the law\nand to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is\nbecause there is no light in them.\" (Isaiah viii. 20).\n\nThe abolitionist charges the slave-holder with being a _man-stealer_. He\nmakes this allegation in two affirmations. First, that the slave-holder\nis thus guilty, because, the negro having been kidnapped in Africa,\ntherefore those who now hold him, or his children, in bondage, lie under\nthe guilt of that first act. Secondly, that the slave-holder, by the very\nfact that he is such, is guilty of stealing from the negro his unalienable\nright to freedom.\n\nThis is the charge. It covers the whole subject. I will meet it in all\nits parts.\n\n\n\n_The Difference between Man-Stealing and Slave-Holding, as set forth in\nthe Bible_.\n\n\nThe Bible reads thus: (Exodus xxi. 16:)--\"He that stealeth a man\nand selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be\nput to death.\"\n\nWhat, then, is it to kidnap or steal a man? Webster informs us--To kidnap\nis \"to steal a human being, a man, woman, or child; or to seize and\nforcibly carry away any person whatever, from his own country or state\ninto another.\" The idea of \"_seizing and forcibly carrying away\"_ enters\ninto the meaning of the word in all the definitions of law.\n\nThe crime, then, set forth in the Bible was not _selling_ a man: but\nselling a _stolen_ man. The crime was not having a man _in his hand as a\nslave_; but......in _his_ hand, as a slave, a _stolen_ man. And hence, the\npenalty of _death_ was affixed, not to selling, buying, or holding man, as\na slave, but to the specific offence of _stealing and selling, or holding_\na man _thus stolen, contrary to this law_. Yea, it was _this law_, and\nthis law _only_, which made it _wrong_. For, under some circumstances, God\nsanctioned the seizing and forcibly carrying away a man, woman, or child\nfrom country or state, into slavery or other condition. He sanctioned the\nutter destruction of every male and every married woman, and child, of\nJabez-Gilead, and the seizure, and forcibly carrying away, four hundred\nvirgins, unto the camp to Shiloh, and there, being given as wives to the\nremnant of the slaughtered tribe of Benjamin, in the rock Rimmon. Sir,\nhow did that destruction of Jabez-Gilead, and the kidnapping of those\nyoung women, differ from the razing of an African village, and forcibly\nseizing, and carrying away, those not put to the sword? The difference is\nin this:--God commanded the Israelites to seize and bear off those young\nwomen. But he forbids the slaver to kidnap the African. Therefore, the\nIsraelites did right; therefore, the trader does wrong. The Israelites,\nit seems, gave wives, in that way, to the spared Benjamites, because they\nhad sworn not to give their daughters. But there were six hundred of these\nBenjamites. Two hundred were therefore still without wives. What was done\nfor them? Why, God authorized the elders of the congregation to tell the\ntwo hundred Benjamites to catch every man his wife, of the daughters of\nShiloh, when they came out to dance, in the feast of the Lord, on the\nnorth side of Bethel. And the children of Benjamin did so, and took them\nwives, \"whom they caught:\" (Judges xxi.) God made it right for those\nBenjamites to catch every man his wife, of the daughters of Shiloh. But he\nmakes it wrong for the trader to catch his slaves of the sons or daughters\nof Africa. Lest you should try to deny that God authorized this act of the\nchildren of Israel, although I believe he did order it, let me remind you\nof another such case, the authority for which you will not question.\n\nMoses, by direct command from God, destroyed the Midianites. He slew all\nthe males, and carried away all the women and children. He then had all\nthe married women and male children killed; but all the virgins,\nthirty-two thousand, were divided as spoil among the people. And\n_thirty-two_ of these virgins, _the Lord's tribute_, were given unto\nEleazar, the priest, \"as the Lord commanded Moses.\" (Numbers xxxi.)\n\nSir, Thomas Paine rejected the Bible on this fact among his other\nobjections. Yea, _his_ reason, _his_ sensibilities, _his_ great law of\nhumanity, _his_ intuitional and eternal sense of right, made it impossible\nfor him to honor such a God. And, sir, on your now avowed principles of\ninterpretation, which are those of Paine, you sustain him in his rejection\nof the books of Moses and all the word of God.\n\nGod's command _made it right_ for Moses to destroy the Midianites and make\nslaves of their daughters; and I have dwelt upon these facts, to reiterate\nwhat I hold to be THE FIRST TRUTH IN MORALS:--that a thing is right, not\nbecause it is ever so _per se_, but because God _makes it right_; and, of\ncourse, a thing is wrong, not because it is so in the nature of things,\nbut because God makes it wrong. I distinctly have taken, and do take, that\nground in its widest sense, and am prepared to maintain it against all\ncomers. He made it right for the sons of Adam to marry their sisters. He\nmade it right for Abraham to marry his half-sister. He made it right for\nthe patriarchs, and David and Solomon, to have more wives than one. He\nmade it right when he gave command to kill whole nations, sparing none. He\nmade it right when he ordered that nations, or such part as he pleased,\nshould be spared and enslaved. He made it right that the patriarchs and\nthe Israelites should hold slaves in harmony with the system of servile\nlabor which had long been in the world. He merely modified that system to\nsuit his views of good among his people. So, then, when he saw fit, they\nmight capture men. So, then, when he forbade the individual Israelite to\nsteal a man, he made it crime, and the penalty death. So, then, that crime\nwas not the mere _stealing_ a man, nor the _selling_ a man, nor the\n_holding_ a man,--but the _stealing and selling_, or _holding_, a man\n_under circumstances thus forbidden of God_.\n\n\n\n_Was the Israelite Master a Man-Stealer?_\n\n\nI now ask, Did God intend to make man-stealing and slave-holding the same\nthing? Let us see. In that very chapter of Exodus (xxi.) which contains\nthe law against man-stealing, and only four verses further on, God says,\n\"If a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die under his\nhand, he shall be surely punished: notwithstanding, if he continue a day\nor two he shall not be punished; for he is his money.\" (Verses 20, 21.)\n\nSir, that man was not a hired servant. He was bought with money. He was\nregarded by God _as the money_ of his master. He was his slave, in the\nfull meaning of a slave, then, and now, bought with money. God, then, did\nnot intend the Israelites to understand, and not one of them ever\nunderstood, from that day to this, that Jehovah in his law to Moses\nregarded the slave-holder as a man-stealer. Man-stealing was a specific\noffence, with its specific penalty. Slave-holding was one form of God's\nrighteous government over men,--a government he ordained, with various\nmodifications, among the Hebrews themselves, and with sterner features in\nits relation to heathen slaves.\n\nIn Exodus xxi. and Leviticus xxv., various gradations of servitude were\nenacted, with a careful particularity which need not be misunderstood.\nAmong these, a Hebrew man might be a slave for six years, and then go free\nwith his wife, if he were married when he came into the relation; but if\nhis master had given him a wife, and she had borne him sons or daughters,\nthe wife and her children should be her master's, and he should go out by\nhimself. That is, the man by the law became free, while his wife and\nchildren remained slaves. If the servant, however, plainly said, \"I love\nmy master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: then his\nmaster brought him unto the judges, also unto the doorpost, and his master\nbored his ear through with an awl, and he served him forever.\" (Ex. xxi.\n1-6.) Sir, you have urged discussion:--give us then your views of that\npassage. Tell us how that man was separated from his wife and children\naccording to _the eternal right_. Tell us what was the condition of the\nwoman in case the man chose to \"go out\" without her? Tell us if the Hebrew\nwho thus had his ear bored by his master with an awl was not a slave for\nlife? Tell us, lastly, whether those children were not slaves? And, while\non that chapter, tell us whether in the next verses, 7-11, God did not\nallow the Israelite father to sell his own daughter into bondage and into\npolygamy by the same act of sale?\n\nI will not dwell longer on these milder forms of slavery, but read to you\nthe clear and unmistakable command of the Lord in Leviticus xxv. 44,\n46:--\"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou shalt have, shall be\nof the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and\nbondmaids. Moreover, of the children of the strangers that do sojourn\namong you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you,\nwhich they beget in your land: and they shall be your possession: and ye\nshall take them for an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit\nthem for a possession; and they shall be your bondmen forever.\"\n\nSir, the sun will grow dim with age before that Scripture can be tortured\nto mean any thing else than just what it says; that God commanded the\nIsraelites to be slave-holders in the strict and true sense over the\nheathen, in manner and form therein set forth. Do you tell the world that\nthis cannot be the sense of the Bible, because it is \"a violation of the\nfirst principles of the American Declaration of Independence;\" because it\ngrates upon your \"instinct of liberty;\" because it reveals God in\nopposition to the \"spirit of the age;\" because, if it be the sense of the\npassage, then \"the Bible neither ought to be, nor can be, received by\nmankind as a divine revelation\"? _That_ is what you say: _that_ is what\nAlbert Barnes affirms in his philosophy. But what if God in his word says,\n\"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou shalt have shall be of the\nheathen that are round about you\"? What if we may then choose between\nAlbert Barnes's philosophy and God's truth?\n\nOr will you say, God, under the circumstances, _permitted_ the Israelites\n_to sin_ in the matter of slave-holding, just as he permitted them _to\nsin_ by living in polygamy. _Permitted_ them _to sin!_ No, sir; God\n_commanded_ them to be slave-holders. He _made it_ the law of their social\nstate. He _made it_ one form of his ordained government among them.\nMoreover, you take it for granted all too soon, that the Israelites\ncommitted sin in their polygamy. God sanctioned their polygamy. It was\ntherefore not sin in them. It was right. But God now forbids polygamy,\nunder the gospel; and now it is sin.\n\nOr will you tell us the iniquity of the Canaanites was then full, and\nGod's time to punish them had come? True; but the same question comes\nup:--Did God punish the Canaanites by placing them in the relation of\nslaves to his people, by express command, which compelled them to sin?\nThat's the point. I will not permit you to evade it. In plainer\nwords:--Did God command the Hebrews to make slaves of their fellow-men, to\nbuy them and sell them, to regard them as their money? He did. Then, did\nthe Hebrews sin when they obeyed God's command? No. Then they did what was\nright, and it was right because God made it so. Then _the Hebrew\nslave-holder was not a man-stealer_. But, you say, the Southern\nslave-holder is. Well, we shall see presently.\n\nJust here, the abolitionist who professes to respect the Scriptures is\nwont to tell us that the whole subject of bondage among the Israelites was\nso peculiar to God's ancient dispensation, that no analogy between that\nbondage and Southern slavery can be brought up. Thus he attempts to raise\na dust out of the Jewish institutions, to prevent people from seeing that\nslaveholding then was the same thing that it is now. But, to sustain my\ninterpretation of the plain Scriptures given, I will go back five hundred\nyears before the existence of the Hebrew nation.\n\nI read at that time, (Gen. xiv. 14:)--\"And when Abraham heard that his\nbrother was taken captive, he armed his trained servants, born in his own\nhouse, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them even unto Damascus,\"\n&c. (Gen. xvii. 27:)--\"And all the men of his house, born, in the house,\nand bought with the money of the stranger, were circumcised.\" (Gen. xx.\n14:)--\"And Abimelech took sheep and oxen, and men-servants and\nwomen-servants, and gave them unto Abraham.\" (Gen. xxiv. 34, 35:)--\"And he\nsaid, I am Abraham's servant; and the Lord hath blessed my master greatly,\nand he is become great; and he hath given him flocks and herds, and silver\nand gold, and men-servants and maid-servants, and camels and asses.\"\n\n\n\n_Was Abraham a Man-Stealer?_\n\n\nSir, what is the common sense of these Scriptures? Why, that the\nslave-trade existed in Abraham's day, as it had long before, and has ever\nsince, in all the regions of Syria, Palestine, Arabia, and Egypt, in which\ncriminals and prisoners of war were sold,--in which parents sold their\nchildren. Abraham, then, it is plain, bought, of the sellers in this\ntraffic, men-servants and maid-servants; he had them born in his house; he\nreceived them as presents.\n\nDo you tell me that Abraham, by divine authority, made these servants part\nof his family, social and religious? Very good. But still he regarded them\nas his slaves. He took Hagar as a wife, but he treated her as his\nslave,--yea, as Sarah's slave; and as such he gave her to be chastised,\nfor misconduct, by her mistress. Yea, he never placed Ishmael, the son of\nthe bondwoman, on a level with Isaac, the son of the freewoman. If, then,\nhe so regarded Hagar and Ishmael, of course he never considered his other\nslaves on an equality with himself. True, had he been childless, he would\nhave given his estate to Eliezer: but he would have given it to his slave.\nTrue, had Isaac not been born, he would have given his wealth to Ishmael;\nbut he would nave given it to the son of his bondwoman. Sir, every\nSouthern planter is not more truly a slave-holder than Abraham. And the\nSouthern master, by divine authority, may, to-day, consider his slaves\npart of his social and religious family, just as Abraham did. His relation\nis just that of Abraham. He has slaves of an inferior type of mankind from\nAbraham's bondmen; and he therefore, for that reason, as well as from the\nfact that they are his slaves, holds them lower than himself. But,\nnevertheless, he is a slave-holder in no other sense than was Abraham. Did\nAbraham have his slave-household circumcised? Every Southern planter may\nhave his slave-household baptized. I baptized, not long since, a\nslave-child,--the master and mistress offering it to God. What was done\nin the parlor might be done with divine approbation on every plantation.\n\nSo, then, Abraham lived in the midst of a system of slave-holding exactly\nthe same in nature with that in the South,--a system ordained of God as\nreally as the other forms of government round about him. He, then, with\nthe divine blessing, made himself the master of slaves, men, women, and\nchildren, by buying them,--by receiving them in gifts,--by having them\nborn in his house; and he controlled them as property, just as really as\nthe Southern master in the present day. I ask now, _was Abraham a\nman-stealer?_ Oh, no, you reiterate: but the Southern master is. Why?\n\n\n\n_Is the Southern Master a Man-Stealer_?\n\n\nDo you, sir, or anybody, contend that the Southern master seized his slave\nin Africa, and forcibly brought him away to America, contrary to law?\nThat, and that alone, was and is kidnapping in divine and human statute.\nNo. What then? Why, the abolitionist responds, The African man-stealer\nsold his victim to the slave-holder; he, to the planter; and the negro has\nbeen ever since in bondage: therefore _the guilt_ of the man-stealer has\ncleaved to sellers, buyers, and inheritors, to this time, and will\nthrough all generations to come. That is the charge.\n\nAnd it brings up the question so often and triumphantly asked by the\nabolitionist; _i.e._ \"You,\" he says to the slave-holder,--\"you admit it\nwas wrong to steal the negro in Africa. Can the slave-holder, then, throw\noff wrong so long as he holds the slave at any time or anywhere\nthereafter?\" I answer, yes; and my reply shall be short, yet conclusive. It\nis this:--_Guilt_, or criminality, is that state of a moral agent which\nresults from _his_ actual commission of a crime or offence knowing it to\nbe crime or violation of law. _That_ is the received definition of\n_guilt_, and _you_, I know, do accept it. The _guilt_, then, of kidnapping\n_terminated_ with the man-stealer, the seller, the buyer, and holders,\nwho, knowingly and intentionally, carried on the traffic contrary to the\ndivine law. THAT GUILT attaches in no sense whatever, as a personal, moral\nresponsibility, to the present slave-holder. Observe, I am here\ndiscussing, _not the question of mere slave-holding,_ but whether the\nmaster, who has had nothing to do with the slave-trade, can _now_ hold the\nslave without the moral guilt of the man-stealer? I have said that _that_\nguilt, in no sense whatever, rests upon him; for he neither stole the\nman, nor bought him from the kidnapper, nor had any _complicity_ in the\ntraffic. Here, I know, the abolitionist insists that the master _is_\nguilty of this _complicity_, unless he will at once emancipate the slave;\nbecause, so long as he holds him, he thereby, personally and _voluntarily,\nassumes the same relation which the original kidnapper or buyer held to\nthe African_.\n\nThis is Dr. Cheever's argument in a recent popular sermon. He thinks it\nunanswerable; but it has no weight whatever. It is met perfectly by adding\n_one_ word to his proposition. Thus:--_The master does_ NOT _assume the\nsame relation which the original man-stealer or buyer held to the\nAfrican_. The master's _relation_ to God and to his slave is now _wholly\nchanged_ from that of the man-stealer, and those engaged in the trade; and\nhis obligation is wholly different. What is his relation? and what is his\nobligation? They are as follows:----\n\nThe master finds himself, with no taint of personal concern in the African\ntrade, in a Christian community of white Anglo-Americans, holding control\nover his black fellow-man, who is so unlike himself in complexion, in\nform, in other peculiarities, and so unequal to himself in attributes of\nbody and mind, that it is _impossible, in every sense_, to place him on a\nlevel with himself in the community. _This is his relation to the negro_.\nWhat, then, does God command him to do? Does God require him to send the\nnegro back to his heathen home from whence he was stolen? That home no\nlonger exists. But, if it did remain, does God command the master to send\nhis Christianized slave into the horrors of his former African heathenism?\nNo. God has placed the master under law entirely different from his\ncommand to the slave-trader. God said to the trader, _Let the negro\nalone_. But he says to the present master, _Do unto the negro all the good\nyou can; make him a civilized man; make him a Christian man; lift him up\nand give him all he has a right to claim in the good of the whole\ncommunity_. This the master can do; this he must do, and then leave the\nresult with the Almighty.\n\nWe reach the same conclusion by asking, What does God say to the\nnegro-slave?\n\nDoes he tell him to ask to be sent back to heathen Africa? No. Does he\ngive him authority to claim a created equality and unalienable right to\nbe on a level with the white man in civil and social relations? No. To\nask the first would be to ask a great evil; to claim the second is to\ndemand a natural and moral impossibility. No. God tells him to seek none\nof these things. But he commands him to know the facts in his case as\nthey are in the Bible, and have ever been, and ever will be in\nProvidence:--that he is not the white man's equal,--that he can never\nhave his level--that he must not claim it; but that he can have, and\nought to have, and must have, all of good, in his condition as a slave,\nuntil God may reveal a higher happiness for him in some other relation\nthan that _he must ever_ have to the Anglo-American. The present\nslave-holder, then, by declining to emancipate his bondman, does not\nplace himself in _the guilt_ of the man-stealer or of those who had\ncomplicity with him; but he stands _exactly_ in that NICK _of time and\nplace_, in the course of Providence, where _wrong_, in the transmission\nof African slavery, _ends_, and _right begins_.\n\nI have, sir, fairly stated this, your strongest argument, and fully met\nit. _The Southern master is not a man-stealer._ The abolitionist--repulsed\nin his charge that the slave-owner is a kidnapper, either in fact or by\nvoluntarily assuming any of the relations of the traffic--then makes his\nimpeachment on his second affirmation, mentioned at the opening of this\nletter. That the slave-holder is, nevertheless, thus _guilty_, because,\nin the simple fact of being a master, he _steals_ from the negro his\nunalienable right to freedom.\n\nThis, sir, looks like a new view of the subject. The crime forbidden in\nthe Bible was stealing and selling a man; _i.e._ seizing and forcibly\ncarrying away, from country or State, a human being--man, woman, or\nchild--contrary to law, and selling or holding the same. But the\nabolitionist gives us to understand this crime rests on the slave-holder\nin another sense:--namely, that he steals from the negro a metaphysical\nattribute,--his unalienable right to liberty!\n\nThis is a new sort of kidnapping. This is, I suppose, _stealing the man\nfrom himself_, as it is sometimes elegantly expressed,--_robbing him of\nhis body and his soul_. Sir, I admit this is a strong figure of speech, a\nbeautiful personification, a sonorous rhetorical flourish, which must make\na deep impression on Dr. Cheever's people, Broadway, New York, and on your\ncongregation, Washington Square, Philadelphia; but it is certainly not the\nBible crime of man-stealing. And whether the Southern master is _guilty_\nof this sublimated thing will be understood by us when you prove that the\nnegro, or anybody else, has such metaphysical right to be stolen,--such\ntranscendental liberty not in subordination to the good of the whole\npeople. In a word, sir, this refined expression is, after all, just the\nold averment that the slave-holder is guilty of _sin per se!_ That's it.\n\nI have given you, in reply, the Old Testament. In my next, I propose to\ninquire what the New Testament says in the light of the _Golden Rule_.\n\nF.A. Ross.\n\nHuntsville, Ala., Jan. 31, 1857.\n\n\n\n\nThe Golden Rule.\n\n\n\nThis view of the Golden Rule is the only exposition of that great text\nwhich has ever been given in words sufficiently clear, and, with practical\nillustrations, to make the subject intelligible to every capacity. The\nexplanation is the truth of God, and it settles forever the slavery\nquestion, so far as it rests on this precept of Jesus Christ.\n\n\n\n\nNo. IV.\n\n\n\nRev. Albert Barnes:--\n\nDear Sir:--The argument against slave-holding, founded on the Golden Rule,\nis the strongest which can be presented, and I admit that, if it cannot be\nperfectly met, the master must give the slave liberty and equality. But if\nit can be absolutely refuted, then the slave-holder in this regard may\nhave a good conscience; and the abolitionist has nothing more to say. Here\nis the rule.\n\n\"Therefore, all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to\nyou, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the prophets.\"\n(Matt. vii. 12.)\n\nIn your \"_Notes_,\" on this passage you thus write:--\"This command has been\nusually called the Savior's _Golden Rule_; a name given to it on account\nof its great value.--_All that you_ EXPECT or DESIRE _of others, in\nsimilar circumstances_, DO TO THEM.\"\n\nThis, sir, is your exposition of the Savior's rule of right. With all due\nrespect, I decline your interpretation. You have missed the meaning by\nleaving out ONE word. Observe,--you do not say, All that you OUGHT to\n_expect_ or _desire_, &c., THAT _do to them_. No. But you make the\nEXPECTATION or DESIRE, _which every man_ ACTUALLY HAS _in similar\ncircumstances_, THE MEASURE _of his_ DUTY _to every other man_. Or, in\ndifferent words, you make, without qualification or explanation, the MERE\nEXPECTATION or DESIRE which every man,--with no instruction, or any sort\nof training,--wise or simple, good or bad, heathen, Mohammedan, nominal\nChristian,--WOULD HAVE _in similar circumstances_, THE LAW OF OBLIGATION,\n_always binding_ upon him TO DO THAT SAME THING _unto his neighbor!_\n\nSir, you have left out _the very idea_ which contains the sense of that\nScripture. It is this: Christ, in his rule, _presupposes_ that the man to\nwhom he gives it _knows_, and from the Bible, (or providence, or natural\nconscience, _so far as in harmony_ with the Bible,) the _various\nrelations_ in which God has placed him; and the _respective duties_ in\nthose relations; _i.e._ The rule _assumes_ that he KNOWS what he OUGHT to\n_expect_ or _desire_ in similar circumstances.\n\nI will test this affirmation by several and varied illustrations. I will\nshow how Christ, according to your exposition of his rule, speaks on the\nsubject,--of _revenge, marriage, emancipation_,--_the fugitive from\nbondage_. And how he truly speaks on these subjects.\n\n\n\n_Revenge--Right according to your view of the Golden Rule_.\n\n\nIndian and Missionary--Prisoner tied to a tree, stuck over with burning\nsplinters.\n\nHere is an Indian torturing his prisoner. The missionary approaches and\nbeseeches him to regard _the Golden Rule_. \"Humph!\" utters the savage:\n\"Golden Rule! what's that?\" \"Why\" says the good man, \"all that you\n_expect_ or _desired_ other Indians, in similar circumstances, do you\neven so to them.\" \"Humph!\" growls the warrior, with a fierce\nsmile,--\"Missionary--good: that's what I do now. If I was tied to that\ntree, I would _expect_ and _desire him_ to have _his_ revenge,--to do to\nme as I do to him; and I would sing my death-song, as he sings his.\nMissionary, your rule is Indian rule,--good rule, missionary. Humph!\"\nAnd he sticks more splinters into his victim, brandishes his tomahawk,\nand yells.\n\nSir, what has the missionary to say, after this perfect proof that you\nhave mistaken the great law of right? Verily, he finds that the rule,\nwith your explanation, tells the Indian to torture his prisoner. Verily,\nhe finds that the wild man has the best of the argument. He finds he had\nleft out the word OUGHT; and that he can't put it in, until he teaches\nthe Indian things which as yet he don't know. Yea, he finds he gave the\ncommandment too soon; for that he must begin back of that commandment,\nand teach the savage God's ordination of the relations in which he is to\nhis fellow-men, before he can make him comprehend or apply the rule as\nChrist gives it.\n\n\n\n_Marriage--Void under your Interpretation of the Golden Rule_.\n\n\nLucy Stone, and Moses--Lady on sofa, having just divorced herself--Moses,\nwith the Tables of the Law, appears: she falls at his feet, and covers her\nface with her hands.\n\nThis woman, everybody knows, was married some time since, after a fashion;\nthat is to say, protesting publicly against all laws of wedlock, and\nentering into the relation so long only as she, or her husband, might\ncontinue pleased therewith.\n\nVery well. Then I, without insult to her or offense to my readers, suppose\nthat about this time she has shown her unalienable right to liberty and\nequality by giving her husband a bill of divorcement. Free again, she\nreclines on her couch, and is reading the Tribune. It is mid-day. But\nthere is a light, above the brightness of the sun, shining round about\nher. And _he_, who saw God on Sinai, stands before her, the glory on his\nface, and the tables of stone in his hands. The woman falls before him,\nveils her eyes with her trembling fingers, and cries out, \"Moses, oh, I\nbelieved till now that thou practised deception, in claiming to be sent of\nGod to Israel. But now, I know thou didst see God in the burning bush,\nand heard him speak that law from the holy mountain. Moses, I know ... I\nconfess.\".... And Moses answers, and says unto her, \"Woman, thou art one\nof a great class in this land, who claim to be more just than God, more\npure than their Maker, who have made their inward light their God. Woman,\nthou in '_convention_' hast uttered _Declaration of Independence_ from\nman. And, verily, thou hast asserted this claim to equality and\nunalienable right, even now, by giving thy husband his bill of\ndivorcement, in thy sense of the Golden Rule. Yea, verily, thou hast done\nunto him all that thou _expectedst_ or _desiredst_ of him, in similar\ncircumstances. And now thou thinkest thyself free again. Woman, thou art a\nsinner. Verily, thine inward light, and declaration of independence, and\nGolden Rule, do well agree the one with the other. Verily, thou hast\nlearned of Jefferson, and Channing, and Barnes. But, woman,\nnotwithstanding thou hast sat at the feet of these wise men, I, Moses, say\nthou art a sinner before the law, and the prophets, and the gospel. Woman,\nthy light is darkness; thy declaration of equality and right is vanity and\nfolly; and thy Golden Rule is license to wickedness.\n\n\"Woman, hast thou ears? Hear: I, by authority of God, ordained that the\nman should rule over thee. I placed thee, and children, and men-servants,\nand maid-servants, under the same law of subjection to the government\nordained of God in the family,--the state. I for a time sanctioned\npolygamy, and made it right. I, for the hardness of men's hearts, allowed\nthem, and made it right, to give their wives a bill of divorcement.\nWoman, hear. Paul, having the same Spirit of God, confirms my word. He\ncommands _wives_, and children, and servants, after this manner:--'Wives,\nsubmit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord;\nchildren, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing unto\nthe Lord; servants, obey in all things your masters according to the\nflesh; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers; but in singleness of heart,\nfearing God.' Woman, Paul makes _that rule_ the same, and _that\nsubmission_, the same. The _manner_ of the rule he varies with the\nrelations. He requires it to be, in the _love_ of the husband, even as\nChrist loved the church,--in the _mildness_ of the father, not provoking\nthe children to anger, lest they be discouraged,--in _the justice and\nequity_ of the master, knowing that he also has a master in heaven:\n(Colossians.) Woman, hear. Paul says to thee, the man _now_ shall have\none wife, and he _now_ shall not give her a bill of divorcement, save for\ncrime. Woman, thou art not free from thy husband. Christ's Golden Rule\nmust not be interpreted by thee as A. Barnes has rendered it; Christ\n_assumes_ that thou _believest_ God's truth,--that thou _knowest_ the\nrelation of husband and wife, and the _obligations and rights_ of the\nsame, _as in the Bible; then_, in the light of this _knowledge_, verily,\nthou art required to do what God says thou _oughtest_ to do. Woman, thou\nart a sinner. Go, sin no more. Go, find thy husband; see to it that he\ntakes thee back. Go, submit to him, and honor him, and obey him.\"\n\n\n\n_Emancipation--Ruin--Golden Rule, in your meaning, carried out_.\n\n\nIsland in the Tropics--Elegant houses falling to decay--Broad fields\nabandoned to the forest--Wharves grass-grown--Negroes relapsing into the\nsavage state--A dark cloud over the island, through which the lightning\nglares, revealing, in red writing, these words:--\"_Redeemed, regenerated,\nand disenthralled by the irresistible genius of universal\nemancipation\"_.--[Gospel--according to Curran--and the British\nParliament.]\n\nJamaica, sir, to say nothing of St. Domingo, is illustration of your\ntheory of the Golden Rule, in negro emancipation. You tell the Southern\nmaster that all he would _expect_ or _desire_, if he were a slave, he must\ndo unto his bondman; that he must not pause to ask whether the relation of\nmaster and slave be ordained of God or not. No. You tell him, _if_ he\nwould _expect_ or _desire_ liberty were he a slave, _that_ settles the\nquestion as to what he is to do! He must let his bondman go free. Yea,\n_that_ is what you teach: because the moment you put in the word OUGHT,\nand say, all that you OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire_,--_i.e._ all that you\n_know_ God commands you to _expect _ or _desire_ in your relations to men,\n_as established by him,_--THAT _do to them_. Sir, when you thus explain\nthe Golden Rule, then your argument against slave-holding, so far as\nfounded on this rule, is at once arrested; it is stopped short, in full\ncareer; it has to wait for reinforcement of FACT, which may never come up.\nFor, suppose the FACT to be, that the relation of master and slave is one\nmode of the government ordained of God. Then, sir, the master, _knowing\nthat_ FACT, and _knowing_ what the slave, _as a slave_, OUGHT to _expect_\nor _desire_, he, the master, then FULFILS THE GOLDEN RULE when he does\nthat unto his slave which, in similar circumstances, he OUGHT to expect\n_to be done unto himself_. Now comes the question, OUGHT he then to\n_expect_ or _desire_ liberty and equality? THAT is the question of\nquestions on this subject. And without hesitation I reply, The Golden Rule\nDECIDES _that question_ YEA or NAY, _absolutely_ and _perfectly_, as God's\nword or providence shows that the GOOD _of the family, the community, the\nstate_, REQUIRES that the slave IS or IS NOT _to be set free and made\nequal_. THAT GOOD, _as God reveals it_, SETTLES THE QUESTION.\n\nLet the master then see to it, how he hears God's word as to THAT GOOD.\nLet him see to it, how he understands God's providence as to THAT GOOD.\nLet him see to it, that he makes no mistake as to THAT GOOD. For God will\nnot hold him guiltless, if he will not hear what he tells him as to THAT\nGOOD. God will not justify him, if he has a bad conscience or blunders in\nhis philosophy. God will punish him, if he fails to bless his land by\nletting the bond go free when, he OUGHT to emancipate. And God will punish\nhim, if he brings a curse upon his country by freeing his slave when he\nOUGHT NOT to give him liberty.\n\nSo, then, _the Golden Rule does not_, OF ITSELF, _reveal to man at all\nwhat are his_ RELATIONS _to his fellow-men; but it tells him what he is\nto_ DO, _when he_ ALREADY KNOWS THEM.\n\nSo, then, you, sir, cannot be permitted to tell the world that this rule\nmust emancipate all the negro slaves in the United States,--no matter how\nunprepared they may be,--no matter how degraded,--no matter how unlike and\nunequal to the white man by creation,--no matter if it be a natural and\nmoral impossibility,--no matter: the Golden Rule must emancipate by\nauthority of the first sentiments of the Declaration of Independence, and\nby obligation of the great law of liberty,--the intuitional consciousness\nof the eternal right!\n\nNo. The Rule, as said, _presupposes_ that he who is required to obey it\ndoes already _know_ the relations in which God has placed him, and the\nrespective duties in those conditions. Has God, then, established the\nrelations of husband and wife, parent and child, master and slave? Yes.\nThen the command comes. It says to the husband, To aid you in your known\nobligations to your wife,--to give you a lively sense of it,--suppose\nyourself to be the wife: whatsoever, therefore, you OUGHT, in that\ncondition, to _expect_ or _desire_, that, as husband, do unto your wife.\nIt says to the parent, Imagine yourself the child; and whatsoever, as\nsuch, you OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire, that_, as parent, do unto your\nchild. It says to the master, Put yourself in the place of your slave;\nand whatsoever you OUGHT, in that condition, to _expect_ or _desire,\nthat_, as master, do unto your slave. Let husband, parent, master, _know_\nhis obligations from God, and obey the Rule.\n\n\n\n_Fugitive Slave--Obeying the Golden Rule under your version_.\n\n\nHonorable Joshua R. Giddings and the Angel of the Lord--Hon. Gentleman at\ntable--Nine runaway negroes dining with him--The Angel, uninvited, comes\nin and disturbs the feast.\n\nGiddings has boasted in Congress of having had nine fugitive slaves to\nbreak bread with him at one time. I choose, then, to imagine that, during\nthe dinner, the angel who found Hagar by the fountain stands suddenly in\nthe midst, and says to the negroes, \"Ye slaves, whence came ye, and\nwhither will ye go?\" And they answer and say, \"We flee from the face of\nour masters. This abolitionist told us to kill, and steal, and run away\nfrom bondage; and we have murdered and stolen and escaped. He, thou seest,\nwelcomes us to liberty and equality. We _expect_ and _desire_ to be\nmembers of Congress, Governors of States, to marry among the great, and\none of us to be President. Giddings, and all abolitionists, tell us that\nthese honors belong to us equally as to white people, and will be given\nunder the Golden Rule.\" And the angel of the Lord says to them, \"Ye\nslaves, return unto your masters, and submit yourselves under their hands.\nI sent your fathers, and I send you, into bondage. I mean it unto good,\nand I will bring it to pass to save much people alive.\" Then, turning to\nthe tempter, he says, \"Thou, a statesman! thou, a reader of my word and\nprovidence! why hast thou not understood my speech to Hagar? I gave her, a\nslave, to Sarah. She fled from her mistress. I sent her back. Why hast\nthou not understood my word four thousand years ago,--that _the slave\nshall not flee from his master?_ Why hast thou also perverted my law in\nDeuteronomy, (xxiii. 15, 16?) I say therein, 'Thou shalt not deliver unto\nhis master the servant which is escaped from his master unto thee: he\nshall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place which he shall\nchoose, in one of thy gates where it liketh him best: thou shalt not\noppress him.' Why hast thou not known that I meant the _heathen slave_ who\nescaped from his _heathen master?_ I commanded, Israel, in such case, not\nto hold _him_ in bondage. I made this specific law for this specific fact.\nWhy hast thou taught that, in this commandment, I gave license to all\nmen-servants and maid-servants in the whole land of Israel to run away\nfrom their masters? Why hast thou thus made me, in one saying, contradict\nand make void all my laws wherein I ordained that the Hebrews should be\nslave-owners over their brethren during years, and over the heathen\nforever? Why hast thou in all this changed my Golden Rule? I, in that\nrule, _assume_ that men _know_ from revelation and providence the\nrelations in which I have placed them, and their duties therein. I then\ncommand them to do unto others what they thus _know_ they _ought_ to do\nunto them in these relations; and I make the obligation quick and\npowerful, by telling every man to imagine himself in such conditions, and\nthen he will _the better_ KNOW '_whatsoever_' he should do unto his\nneighbor. Why hast thou made void my law, by making me say, 'All that thou\n_expectest_ or _desirest_ of others, in similar circumstances, do to\nthem'? I never imagined to give such license to folly and sin. Why hast\nthou imagined such license to iniquity? Verily, thou tempter, thou hast in\nthy Golden Rule made these slaves thieves and murderers, and art now\neating with them the bread of sin and death.\n\n\"Why hast thou tortured my speech wherein I say that I have made of _one\nblood_ all nations of men, to mean that I have created all men equal and\nendowed them with rights unalienable save in their consent? I never said\nthat thing! I said that I made all men to descend from _one parentage!_\nThat is what I say in that place! Why hast thou tortured that plain truth?\nThou mightest as well teach that all 'the moving creatures that have life,\nand fowl that fly above the earth, in the open firmament of heaven,' are\n_created equal_, because I said I brought them forth _of the water_. Thou\nmightest as well say that 'all cattle, and creeping thing and beast of the\nearth, _are created equal_, because I said I brought them forth _of the\nearth_, as to affirm the _equality of men_ because I say they are _of one\nblood_. Nay, I have made men unequal as the leaves of the trees, the sands\nof the sea, the stars of heaven. I have made them so, in harmony with the\ninfinite variety and inequality in every thing in my creation. And I have\nmade them unequal in my _mercy_. Had I made all men equal in attributes of\nbody and mind, then _unfallen man_ would never have realized the varied\nglories of his destiny. And had I given _fallen man_ equality of nature\nand unalienable rights, then I had made the earth an Aceldama and Valley\nof Gehenna. For what would be the _strife_ in all the earth among men\nequal in body and mind, equal in power, equal in depravity, equal in will,\neach one maintaining rights unalienable? When would the war end? Who would\nbe the victors where all are giants? Who would sue for peace where none\nwill submit? What would be _human social life?_ Who would be the weak, the\nloving? Who would seek or need forbearance, compassion, self-denying\nbenevolence? Who would be the grateful? Who would be the humble, the meek?\nWhat would be _human_ virtue, what _human_ vice, what _human_ joy or\nsorrow? Nay, I have made men _unequal_ and given them _alienable rights_,\nthat I might INSTITUTE HUMAN GOVERNMENT and reveal HUMAN CHARACTER.\n\n\"Why hast thou been willingly ignorant of these first principles of the\noracles of God, which would have made thee truly a Christian philosopher\nand statesman?\"\n\n\n\n_Fugitive Slave--Obeying the Golden Rule as Christ gave it_\n\n\nRev. A. Barnes and the Apostle Paul--Minister of the gospel in his\nstudy--Fugitive slave, converted under his preaching, inquiring whether it\nis not his duty to return to his master--Paul appears and rebukes the\nminister for wresting his Gospel.\n\nWith all respect and affection for you, sir, I imagine a slave, having run\naway from his master and become a Christian under your preaching, might,\nwith the Bible in his hands and the Holy Spirit in his heart, have,\ndespite your training, question of conscience, whether he did right to\nleave his master, and ought not to go back. And I think how Paul would\nlisten, and what he would say, to your interpretation of his Epistle to\nPhilemon. I think he would say,--\n\n\"I withstand thee to thy face, because thou art to be blamed. Why hast\nthou written, in thy '_Notes_,' that the word I apply to Onesimus may\nmean, not _slave_, but _hired servant?_ Why hast thou said this in\nunsupported assertion? Why hast thou given no respect to Robinson, and all\nthy wise men, who agree that the word wherein I express Onesimus's\nrelation to Philemon never means a hired servant, but a _slave_,--the\nproperty of his master,--a living possession?\n\n\"Why hast thou called in question the fact that Philemon was a\nslave-holder? Why hast thou taught that, if he was a slave-holder when he\nbecame a Christian, he could not _continue, consistently_, to be a\nslave-owner and a Christian,--that if he did so _continue_, he would not\nbe in _good standing_, but an _offender_ in the church? (See Notes.)\n\n\"I say Philemon was the master of Onesimus, in the real sense of a\nslave-owner, under Roman law, in which he had the right of life and death\nover him,--being thereby a master in possession of power unknown in the\nUnited States. And yet I call Philemon 'our dearly beloved and\nfellow-laborer,' I tell him that I send to him again Onesimus, who had\nbeen unprofitable to him in time past; but now, being a Christian, he\nwould be profitable. I tell him, I send him again, not a slave, (only,)\nbut above a slave, a Christian brother, beloved, specially to me, but how\nmuch more unto him, both _in the flesh_ and in the Lord. Dost thou know,\nAlbert Barnes, what I mean by that word, _in the flesh?_ Verily, I knew\nthe things wherein the master and the slave are beloved, the one of the\nother, in the best affections of human nature, and in the Lord! therefore\nI say to Philemon that he, _as master_, could receive Onesimus _as his\nslave_, and yet as a _brother_, MORE _beloved, by reason of his relation\nto him as master_, than I could regard him! Yea, verily,--and I say to\nthee, Albert Barnes, thou hast never been in the South, and thou dost not\nunderstand, and canst not understand, the force, or even the meaning, of\nmy words _in the flesh_; i.e. _in the love of the master and the slave to\none another_. But Philemon I knew would feel its power, and so I made that\nappeal to him.\n\n\"Why hast thou said, that I did not send Onesimus back _by authority?_ I\ndid send him back by authority,--yea, by authority of the Lord Jesus\nChrist? For it was my duty to send him again to Philemon, whether he had\nbeen willing to go or not; and it was his duty to go. But he was willing.\nSo we both felt our obligations; and, when I commanded, he cheerfully\nobeyed. What else was my duty and his? Had I not said, in line upon line\nand in precept upon precept, 'Servants, obey in all things your masters\naccording to the flesh; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers, but in\nsingleness of heart, pleasing God'? (Coloss. iii. 22.) Had not Peter\nwritten, 'Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to\nthe good and gentle, but also to the froward'? (1 Pet. ii. 18.) Onesimus\nhad broken these commandments when he fled from his master. Was it not\nthen of my responsibility to send him again to Philemon? And was it not\nChrist's law to him to return and submit himself under his master's hand?\n\n\"Why, then, hast thou not understood my speech? Has it been even because\nthou couldst not _hear_ my word? What else has hindered? What more could I\nhave said, than (in 1 Tim. vi. 1-5) I do say, to rebuke all abolitionists?\nYea, I describe them--I show their principles--as fully as if I had called\nthem by name in Boston, in New York, in Philadelphia, and said they would\nlive in 1857.\n\n\"And yet thou hast, in thy commentary on my letter to Timothy, utterly\ndistorted, maimed, and falsified my meaning. Thou hast mingled truth and\nuntruth so together as to make me say what was not and is not in my mind.\nFor thou teachest the slave, while professing not so to teach him, that I\ntell him that he is _not_ to count his master worthy of all honor; that he\n_is_ to _despise_ him; that he is _not_ to do him service as to a\nChristian faithful and beloved. _No_. But thou teachest the slave, in my\nname, to regard his Christian master an _offender_ in the sight of\nChrist, if he _continues_ a slave-owner.\n\n\"Thou tellest him to obey _only_ in the sense in which he is to submit to\ninjustice, oppression, and cruelty; and that he is ever to seek to throw\noff the yoke in his created equality and unalienable right to liberty.\n(See Notes.)\n\n\"This is what thou hast taught as my gospel. But I commanded thee to\nteach and exhort _just the contrary_. I commanded thee to say after this\nway:--'Let as many servants as are under the yoke, count their own\nmasters worthy of all honor, that the name of God and his doctrine be not\nblasphemed. And they that have believing masters, let them not despise\nthem, because they are brethren; but rather do them service, because they\nare faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit. These things teach\nand exhort.'\n\n\"Thou, in thy 'Notes,' art compelled, though most unwillingly, to confess\nthat I do mean _slaves_ in this place, in the full and proper sense; yea,\nslaves under the Roman law. Good. Then do I here tell slaves to count\ntheir masters, even when not Christians, worthy of all honor; and, when\nChristians, to regard them as faithful and beloved, and not to despise\nthem, and to do them service? Yet, after all this, do I say to these same\nslaves that they have a created equality and unalienable right to liberty,\nunder which, whenever they think fit, I command them to dishonor their\nmasters, despise them, and run away! Sir, I did never so instruct slaves;\nnay, I did never command thee so to teach them. But I did and do exhort\nthee not so to train them; for I said then and say now to thee, 'If any\nman teach [slaves] otherwise, [than to honor their masters as faithful and\nbeloved, and to do them service,] and consent not to wholesome words, even\nthe words of the Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according\nto godliness, he is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and\nstrifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings,\nperverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and DESTITUTE OF THE TRUTH,\nsupposing that gain is godliness; from such withdraw thyself,'\n\n\"What more could I have said to the abolitionists of my day? What more can\nI say to them in this day? _That_ which was true of them two thousand\nyears ago, is true now. I rebuked abolitionists then, and I rebuke them\nnow. I tell them the things in their hearts,--the things on their\ntongues,--the things in their hands,--are contrary to wholesome words,\neven the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. Canst thou _hear_ my words in\nthis place without feeling how faithfully I have given the head, and the\nheart, and the words, and the doings of the men, from whom thou hast not\nwithdrawn thyself?\n\n\"Verily, thou canst not _hear_ my speech, and therefore thou canst not\ninterpret my gospel. Thou believest it is impossible that I sanction\nslavery! Hence it is impossible for thee to understand my words: for I do\nsanction slavery. How? Thus:--\n\n\"I found slavery in Asia, in Greece, in Rome. I saw it to be one mode of\nthe government ordained of God. I regarded it, in most conditions of\nfallen mankind, necessarily and irresistibly part of such government, and\ntherefore as natural, as wise, as good, in such conditions, as the other\nways men are ruled in the state or the family.\n\n\"I took up slavery, then, as such ordained government,--wise, good, yea\nbest, in certain circumstances, until, in the elevating spirit and power\nof my gospel, the slave is made fit for the liberty and equality of his\nmaster, if he can be so lifted up. Hence I make the RULE of magistrate,\nsubject, master and servant, parent and child, husband and wife, THE SAME\nRULE; _i.e._ I make it THE SAME RIGHT in the _superior_ to control the\n_obedience_ and the _service_ of the _inferior_, bound to obey, whatever\nthe difference in the relations and service to be rendered. Yea, I give\n_exactly the same command_ to all in these relations; and thus, in all my\nwords, I make it plainly to be understood that I regard slavery to be as\nrighteous a mode of government as that of magistrate and subject, parent\nand child, husband and wife, during the circumstances and times in which\nGod is pleased to have it continue. I saw all the injustice, the\noppression, the cruelty, masters might be guilty of, and were and are now\nguilty of; but I saw no more injustice, oppression, and cruelty, in the\nrelation of master and slave, than I saw in all other forms of rule,--even\nin that of husband and wife, parent and child. In my gospel I condemn\nwrong in all these states of life, while I fully sanction and sustain the\nrelations themselves. I tell the magistrate, husband, father, master, how\nto rule; I tell the subject, wife, child, servant, how to submit. Hence, I\ncommand the slave not to flee from bondage, just as I require the subject,\nthe wife, the child, not to resist or flee from obedience. I warn the\nslave, if he leaves his master he has sinned, and must return; and I make\nit the duty of all men to see to it, that _he shall go back_. Hence, I\nmyself did what I command others to do: I sent Onesimus back to his\nmaster.\n\n\"Thus I sanction slavery everywhere in the New Testament. But it is\nimpossible for thee, with thy principles,--thy law of reason,--thy law of\ncreated equality and unalienable right,--thy elevation of the Declaration\nof Independence above the ordinance of God,--to sustain slavery. Nay, it\nis impossible for thee, with thy interpretation of Christ's Golden Rule,\nto recognise the system of servile labor; nay, it is impossible for thee\nto tell _this_ slave to return to his master as I sent Onesimus back;\nnay, thou art guarded by thy Golden Rule. Thou tellest him that, if thou\nhadst been in his place, thou wouldst have _expected, desired_ freedom,\nthat thou wouldst have run away, and that thou wouldst not now return;\nthat thou wouldst have regarded thy created equality and unalienable\nright as thy supreme law, and have disregarded and scorned all other\nobligations as _pretended revelation from God_. Therefore thou now doest\nunto him '_whatsoever_' thou wouldst _expect_ or _desire_ him to do unto\nthee in similar circumstances; _i.e._ thou tellest him he did right to\nrun away, and will do right not to return! This is thy Golden Rule. But\nI did not instruct thee so to learn Christ. Nay, this slave knows thou\nhast not not given him the mind of Christ; nay, he knows that Christ\ncommands thee to send him to his master again. And thus do what thou\nOUGHTEST to _expect_ or _desire_ in similar circumstances; yea, _do_ now\n_thy duty_, and this slave, like Onesimus, will bless thee for giving him\na good conscience whenever he will return to his obedience. Thus Paul,\nthe aged, speaks to thee.\"\n\nSo, then, the Golden Rule is the whole Bible; yea, Christ says it is-\"the\nlaw and the prophets;\" yea, it is the Old Testament and the New condensed;\nand with ever-increasing glory of Providence in one sublime aphorism,\nwhich can be understood and obeyed only by those who _know_ what the\nBible, or Providence, reveals as to man's varied conditions and his\nobligations therein.\n\nI think, sir, I have refuted your interpretation of the Golden Rule, and\nhave given its true meaning.\n\nThe slave-holder, then, may have a good conscience under this commandment.\nLet him so exercise himself as to have a conscience void of offence\ntowards God and towards men.\n\nYours, &c. F.A. Ross.\n\n\n\n\nConclusion.\n\n\n\nI intended to, and may yet, in a subsequent edition, write two more\nletters to A. Barnes. The _one_, to show how infidelity has been passing\noff from the South to the North,--especially since the _Christian death_\nof Jackson; the other, to meet Mr. Barnes's argument founded on the spirit\nof the age.\n\n\nThe End.","title":"Slavery Ordained of God","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":37008}