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 REV. DR. LORD'S SERMON 
 
 IN SUPPOnX OF THE 
 
 
 FUGITIVE 8LAVE LAW. 
 
 J 
 
 i^-d^u^. 
 
SLAVERY IN ITS RELATION TO GOD, 
 
 A REVIEW 
 
 OF 
 
 REV. DR. LORD'S THANKSGIVING SERMON, 
 
 IN FAVOR OF 
 
 DOMESTIC SLAVEEY, 
 
 THE HIGHER LAW, 
 
 IN ITS APPLICATION TO 
 
 THE FUGITIVE SLAVE BILL. 
 
 > 
 
 t 
 
 r 
 
 A MINISTER OF THE GOSPEL, 
 
 IN MASSACHUSETTS. 
 
 M' KIT TEN BY SPECIAL KEQUKSJ'. y«<^^|LIy *' 
 
 
 
 BUFFALO: 
 
 A. M. CLAPP & CO. ..BOOK AND JOB PRINTERS, 
 
 Office of the Morning ExpresH. 
 
 1851. 
 
 

 c, 
 
 6^ 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The Autlior of the following Review, is greatly indebted for many of 
 the thoughts contained in it, to a work of Rev. Dr. Hague, of New 
 Jersev, entitled, " Christianity and Slaxeiy ;" also to the notice of a 
 Sermon some years since by Rev. Dr. Stow, of Boston, whicli made an 
 indehble impression on his mind at the time, but of which he has no 
 copy at th(^ present, and therefore can give no quotations ; and to the 
 writings and personal instruction of Rev. Dr. Wayland, President of 
 Brown University. 
 
REVI EW 
 
 REV. DR. LORD'S SERMON 
 
 The Higher Law in its application to the Fugitive Slave Bill. 
 A Sermon on the Duties men owe to God and to Govern- 
 ments, delivered at the Central Presbyterian Church [of 
 Buffalo,] on Thanksgiving Day, by John C. Lord, D.D., 
 Pastor of said Church, Author of Lectures on Govern- 
 ment and Civilization. Buffalo, George H. Derby & Co., 
 1851.— Text. Matt. 22: 17-21. 
 
 This is a singular Sermon. It is not singular, indeed, in the gramma- 
 tical sense of that word, for many such, we are told, are making their 
 appearance in these days of strange things. But it is remarkable in its 
 doctrine ; and for the deliberate boldness with which a Christian minis- 
 ter stands up in the pulpit and avows sentiments so entirely discordant 
 with the word of God, and so utterly antagonistic to the spiiit of Jesus 
 Christ, who came into this world to bind up the broken-hearted, to pro- 
 claim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them 
 that are bound. 
 
 In the process of time it will be regarded as a most remarkable fact, 
 in the history of Jesus Christ's church on earth, that a Christian minister 
 in the Jubilee year of the nineteenth century, and in the land of free- 
 dom, felt himself called upon in his work of love to show that CHRIS- 
 TIANITY SANCTIONS SLAVERY. In other words, to show ; that 
 Christianity allows one man by any means, to hold in ruthless bondage 
 the body, the mind, and the soul of his brother, and to make him an 
 article of merchandise for gain, and for lust ; and that therefore legisla- 
 tors may make laws for " protecting the right" of Slavery, and for 
 compelling Christian men by fines and prisons, to kidnap their brethren 
 
6 
 
 ami return tliein to the Louse of bondage ; notwithstanding GOD hath 
 said ''tliou shalt not dehver unto his master the servant wliich h;us 
 escaped from his m;ister unto thee," and hath uttered as liis Uiw for both 
 dispensations that the " Shwe dealer (andrapodistes) shall surely be put 
 to death;" — that Christianity by the authority of God, as vested in 
 Government, and illustrated in the Fugitive Slave Law, forbids us " to 
 deal our bread to the hungry, to clothe the naked, and to bring the poor 
 that arc cast out into om' houses," notwithstanding, Jesus Christ hath 
 said that in the great separating day he will say to them on the right 
 hand, " Come, ye blessed of my Father, iidierit the Kingdom prepared 
 for you from the foundation of the world : for I mis an hunr/crcd, and 
 ye gave me meat : I was thirsty, and ye r/ave me drink : I was a stranger, 
 and ye took me in: naki'd, and ye clothsd me: I was. in prison, and ye 
 came unto me. * * ''■ * Verily, I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have 
 done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto 
 me." And that he will also say \mto them on the left hand, " Depart 
 from me, ye cursed, into everlasting tire, prepared for the devil and his 
 angels : for I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat : I was 
 thirsty and ye gave me no drink : I tvas a stranger, and ye took me not 
 in : naked, and ye clothed me not : sick and in jvison, and ye visited me 
 not. * * * * Verily, I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not unto 
 one of the least of these, ye did it not unto me. And these shall go away 
 into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal." We 
 say, therefore, that that is a singular sermon which in recognizing the 
 Law of God "in its application to the Fugitive Slave I:'.iU " teaches us 
 that we ought to obey man rather than God, and then by false issues, 
 seeks to make God utter the same sentiment. 
 
 In calling ibr a co]iy of this sermon for publication, it appeai-s, from 
 a ].rct;itury untc it contains, tliat there arc nineteen men in DufFalo 
 morally, theologically and politically, competent to say that they have 
 " listened to it with great pleasure and profit," and " believe that its 
 wide dissemination would be productive of great good." But it seems 
 to us that a man, and specially a Christian man, who could sit under 
 the sound of such a sermon and not teel his heart hot within him " must 
 have a power of refrigeration that would cool the tropics." 
 
 We do not mean to say that there is nothing right in the sennon 
 before us, "With some of its j.rinciples we perfectly agree. It urges 
 to some right and dissuades from some wrong. And that indeed would 
 be a rare specimen of the American jndpit, in this day, which should 
 contain nothing tolerable ; and specially so from the heart and head 
 
of the Christian minister, who, in the title page of his Thanksgiving 
 sermon writes himself " Anthor of Lectures on Government and Civiliza- 
 tion." V\"\{h our author we would render no forcible resistance to the 
 laws, not even to the Fugitive Slave law. And we have no sympathy 
 whatever with fanatics, intidels and disunionists. We love the American 
 Union, and mean to do every thing in our power to preserve it, and 
 specially, we mean to obey God : for there is no peril to these States like 
 disobeying the Almighty Kuler of the Universe. " For except the LORD 
 build the house they labor in vain that build it." " Except the LORD 
 keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." And if we can only 
 say, " God is our refuge and strength," " then will not we fear though the 
 earth be removed," though the whole unanimous world be against us. 
 And we would not adnse any man to avenge himself, how much soever 
 he may be called to sutfer by this iniquitous law. If he suffer wrong, let 
 him suffer meekly as a Christian, and commit the keeping of his soul to 
 God in well-doing, as to a faithful Creator. For it is written " Ven- 
 geance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord," and " will not God hear 
 the cry of his elect though he bear long with them ?" 
 
 But it is not the " tolerable''^ in this sermon that has arrested our 
 attention. It is the naked fact that our author under the guise of per- 
 suading men to obey law, stands forth, confessedly, the champion of 
 American Slavery. His object is plain. The burden of his discourse is to 
 sustain and perpetuate the Fugitive Slave law. Therefore, he seeks to 
 give it the sanction of God, and so compel Christian men to bow down 
 in silence to this legalized edict of unrighteousness. 
 
 Slavery, according to our author, is an institution of God, and sanc- 
 tioned by Jesus Christ, and his Apostles ; and therefore Congress has the 
 right divine, to pass laws to protect it, and to command us by grave 
 penalties to obey those laws ; and for us to appeal to the law of God, in 
 protestation of our rights, civil and religious, is, to contravene the re- 
 vealed will of God himself, "to reject his authority," and to take the 
 position of infidelity. AVe hesitate not to say, that Dr. Lord in taking 
 such ground for the defence of slavery, has done a greater wrong to the 
 cause of truth, of God, and of humanity, than was ever perpeti-ated by 
 any kidnapper on the coast of Afiica, burning villages, butchering the 
 defenceless and fleeing inhabitants, and freighting his dark slave-ship 
 with captives to be murdered on the passage, or sold into a bondage a 
 thousand times more terrible than death itself. 
 
 And we do not wish to be understood as using figurative language, 
 when we thus speak. The work of kidnappers, and of Christian ministei"s, 
 
8 
 
 when they are of such a character as to fall into the same category, are 
 somewhat diflerent in the degree of wrong which they inflict. Kidnap- 
 pers proper, openly avow that they are engaged in a most wicked and 
 nefarious work, and committing sin against God of inconceivable magni- 
 tude ; and they freely confess that " of despicable men," themsleves are 
 " the most odious," and that of right, they ought to be regarded as the 
 enemies of the race by every friend of man ; and the laws of all civilized 
 countries call them pirates, and condemn them, if caught, to condign 
 punishment. 
 
 Hence such kidnappers can never corrupt public sentiment, nor 
 sanctify the sin of slavery, nor build around it a Chinese wall for its 
 defence, nor -wield any influence for protecting it by law, nor in any other 
 way add a feather's weight towards perpetuating the evil on earth. 
 Not so, however, the work of Dr. Lord in the sermon before us. 
 Baptizing this monster-wickedness into the name of the Father, and 
 of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, and giving the awful sanction of 
 Christianity to a " system of Avrong which hell itself might blush to 
 own," he has, by being a minister of the gospel, and an expounder of 
 God's law to men, given the full weight of his character and standing 
 as an embassador for Jesus Christ, towards weakening God's remedy of 
 this mighty wickedness, and towards strengthening those human enact- 
 ments by which the " trade in men" has ever been legalized and perpet- 
 uated. And this is a work for promoting wrong-doing which piratical 
 kidnappers could never do ; and perpetrated by whomsoever, and by 
 whatsoever sanctity his character may be surrounded, and by whatsoever 
 motive he may be urged on to the work ; nay, " be he the preacher of 
 righteousness and the most amiable of men," yet with God's law before 
 us we aver it to be the duty of every good man in the land to look him 
 calmly in the face, not in anger, but with sorrow, and say, — " Though 
 you or an angel from heaven preach this as a part of Christ's gospel, 
 we pronounce the doctrine to be wicked, inhuman, anti-Christian and 
 accursed." For ourselves, we write with no feeling of unkindness to Dr. 
 Lord. Indeed with that gentleman we are pei"sonally unacquainted, and 
 concerning his motives, of course, can know nothing. But concerning his 
 sermon, and its tendencies, we believe what we speak, and do but give 
 utterance to our calm conviction of truth in the fear of God. 
 
 The title of the sermon before us is : — "The Higher Law ix its 
 Application to the Fcgitive Slave Bill," and the position of its 
 author, in so far as it relates to that bill, and when divested of all 
 irrelevant and extraneous matter, is simply this, viz : That Slavery is 
 
9 
 
 an insfifution of God and sanctioned by Jesus Christ and his Apostles ; 
 an I therefore Conf/ress has divine authority to pass laws to protect it, 
 and no citizen is at li/)crfy to appeal lo the Lain of God, to justify him 
 for refusinr/ to aid and aliet in reduciny the alleged fugitive to 
 Southern bondage, according to the requirements of the Fugitive Slave 
 Bill. 
 
 To show th:it this is the position of ouv author, we will now give some 
 extracts from tho sermon before us. On page 15, we have the foUow- 
 il,^• ; — " Slaverv was universal throughout the Roman Empire, and 
 ths laws !xav!^ th:3 mv>ter the power of life and death over his 
 serva^it. Did the Siviour and his Apostles, on this account, reject their 
 authoritv, or incite th'ir disci[)l;:'s to disobedience and resistance ? Did 
 they interfere with existing civil institutions, urging the slave to escape 
 from his master, the citizen to rebel against the magistrate? Their 
 conduct was the exact reverse of this ; they jireaehed to the master for- 
 bsaranca and kindness — to the servant submission and obedience — to both, 
 the gospel. Paul sent Onesimus back to his master, on the very same 
 liriiirijiles wliicli h' enjoined upon the Romans — subjection to existing 
 civil authority. The inspired teachers of Christianity instructed both 
 masters and slaves in regard to the duties which grow out of the insti- 
 tution of Slavery, without either a] iproving or condemning the relation 
 itself." 
 
 Again on pa2;e 19 — 21, the autlior says: — " In certain conditions of 
 society, Slavery is universal; it was recognized and regulated by law in 
 all the free States of antiquity ; it is the first movement towards civiU- 
 zation by savage and barbarous nations, to reduce their captives taken 
 in war to slavery, instead of subjecting them to torture and death. A 
 recent traveller in the vast Empire of China, Mr. Lay, affirms that in 
 that country the institution of slavery is a positive blessing, as it pre- 
 vents infanticide by the poorer classes and provides for multitudes who 
 must other\vise perish of want. That it exists in a mild form in China 
 is admitted, but the question does not depend on tlu! laws of ditferent 
 countries on tlio subject, but whether it is a condition of society which 
 can in, any case bs allowed, whether civil governments have any autho- 
 rity or jurisdiction to enact laws upon the subject, or in any way to 
 recognize or regulate it." 
 
 " But there is higher authority for the determination of this question, 
 than any thing which we have yet suggested. The existence of domestic 
 slavery wa.s expressly allowed, sanctioned and regulated by the Supreme 
 Lawgiver, in that divine Economy which He gave the Hebrew State." 
 2 
 
10 
 
 " The fjict is open and undisputed ; the record and proof of it are in 
 the hands of every man Avho has in his possession a copy of the Bible. 
 All the inrronuity and art of all the Abolitionists in the United States 
 can never destroy the necessary conclusion of this admitted divine sanc- 
 tion of slavery, that it is an institution which may lawfully exist and 
 concerning which Governments may pass laws and execute penalties for 
 their evasion or resistance." 
 
 " To allege that there is a higher law, Avhich makes slavery, per se, 
 sinful, that all legislation that ])rotects the rights of mastei-s, and 
 enjoins the re-delivery of the slave, is necessarily void and without autho- 
 rity, and may be conscientiously resisted by arms and vtblence, is an 
 infidel position, which is contradicted by both Testaments ; — which may 
 be taught in the gospel of Jean Jacques Rousseau, and in the revelation 
 of the Sceptics and Jacobins, who promised P'rance, half a century ago, 
 universal equality and fraternity ; a gospel whose baptism was blood, 
 a revelation whose sacrament Avas crime ; but it can not be found in 
 the gospel of Jesus Christ or in the revelation of God's will to man. 
 We do not mean to affirm that sincere and conscientious persons may 
 not be found who have persuaded themselves that forcible resistance to 
 slavery is obedience to God ; and that in the increased light of the 
 nineteenth century the example of the Jewish Economy, and the teaching 
 and practice of our Lord and his Apostles, are antiquated and of no 
 binding force upon the consciences of men. Such honest, but mistaken, 
 persons should remember that if the institution of slavery is necessarily 
 and from its nature sinful noiv, it must always have Veen so ; as universal 
 princijiles admit of no change, and their argument is, therefore, an 
 impeachment of the benevolence of God and a denial of the supreme 
 authority of the Gospel, as a system of ethics. They must, to sustain 
 their position, assume that we are wiser and better men than the Sa\nour 
 and the Apostles, and that the government of God and the Gospel need 
 revision and emendation. Such a conclusion is inevitable from the pre- 
 mises, and I would affectionately warn all who have named the name of 
 Christ, and who have been betrayed by passion or sympathy into such a 
 position, to see to it before they take the inevitable plunge, with the 
 Garrison school, into the gulf of infidelity." 
 
 These extracts are sufficient to fix the position of the author ; and we 
 say, therefore, that in so far as it relates to the Fugitive Slave law, his 
 position divested of all extraneous and irrelevant matter is simply this, 
 viz. : — That Slavrri/ is an inslitution of God and sanctioned hij Jesus 
 Christ and his Apostles ; and therefore, (hat Conffress has divine authority 
 
11 
 
 to pass laws to protect it ; and no citizen is at liberty to appeal to 
 the law of Go I to justify him for refusing to aid and abet in reducing 
 the allege J fugitive to Southern bondage, according to the provisions of 
 the Fugitive Slave Bill. 
 
 AnJ hare it will ba expected of us that we state somewhat more par- 
 ticularly the argurmnt by which the author supports the position which 
 he his taken. L3t us then rehearse a few more of his statements that 
 we may not seem to misrepresent him in this particular. 
 
 On page 13, he says: — " The decisions of Governments upon matters 
 within their jurisdiction, though they may be ERRONEOUS, are yet 
 from the necessity of the case absolute.'" 
 
 On pare 10, he says : — "To plead a higher law to justify disobedience to 
 a [any] human law, the subject matter of which is within the cognizance 
 of the State, is to reject the authority of God himself, who has committed 
 to governments the power and authority which they exercise in civil 
 affairs." 
 
 ATain, page 14 : — " The Government may recognize an oppressive 
 form of domestic servitude, or enact laws in relation to it which are 
 deemed by many oppressive. The State may engage in an UNJUST 
 war, but does this discharge the subject from his allegiance ? " * * * 
 " But the position which we have taken that the decisions of Govern- 
 ments are final in cases where they have jurisdiction EVEN WHEN 
 MISTAKEN OR OPPRESSIVE is not oidy sustained by the passages 
 which have been cited from the Scriptures but also by the example and 
 practice of the primitive Christians." * * * * " The Government 
 under which our Saviour and the Apostles lived, and of which they spake, 
 was habitually engaged in aggressive wars, aiming at the conquest of the 
 world." * * * " Whole legions in the armies that were sent out 
 for conquest by Rome, were composed of Christians, who were doubtless 
 drawn in the general conscription for this service, and who felt it to be 
 their duty to "rend:!r to Ciesar the things that are Ciesar's," however 
 much they might dislike the business of war." 
 
 Again he says : — "The State having jurisdiction of the subject, may, 
 as in the waging of an aggressive war abuse their poiver, by enacting 
 UNJUST AND OPPRESSIVE LAWS of Servitude, but is SUCH legislation 
 therefore, inoperative and void? To affirm this, is to contradict the 
 decision of the Apostle in his Epistle to the Romans and to subvert every 
 established principle, whether human or divine on whicli rests the autho- 
 rity of human Government." 
 
 Such then are some of the sentiments of this singular sermon, and 
 
12 
 
 without saying now wla'tlier all of our author's stateniL'Uts are either 
 scriptural or historically true in jioint of fact, one thing- at least may be 
 seen, I think, with sufficient exactitude, viz. : that we neither mistake nor 
 misrepresent him when we say his argium iit may be summed up in 
 this : — That in some things tJie »ia>/lstniri/ have the right divine for 
 doing wrong and for cornniandlag and vompeliing k^ in the name of God 
 to execute the wickedness. 
 
 The only exception that our author makes in this particular, relates 
 to the worship of God, "and the manner iu which we are to aj)proacli 
 him," and this, in his illustration, he limits to those laws of external 
 worship that are violated in cases of idolatiy. These, then, according to 
 Dr. Lord, are the only things that belong to (Iod himself, and 
 iu regard to wliich " lie has appointed no inferior or delegated authority." 
 All the rest b-dong to Ccesar. Says he [page 16:]—" NOT UNTIL 
 Coesar intermeddled with the things of God ; — NOT UNTIL passing the 
 legitimate jurisdiction of civil government, the Roman magistrate 
 commanded them to adore the image ofthe Empehok, and to offer 
 INCENSE to false GODS ; did the Christian refuse obedience." 
 
 The argument then of our author, reduced for the sake of simijlicity 
 to the form of a syllogism, is as follows : — 
 
 1. In matters committed l)y God to governments, Christianity gives 
 to the magistracy the right divine for doing wrong, and for committing 
 the citizen in the name of God to execute the wickedness. 
 
 2. To regulate domestic slavery, and protect it, is a matter committed 
 by God to government. Therefoi-e, — 
 
 3. To regulate domestic slavery, and protect it, Christianity gives 
 to the maoistracv the right divine for doing wrong, and for cominit- 
 tino- the citizen in the name of God to execute the wickedness. 
 
 It is due to t'.ie author of the sermon, however, to say that he is 
 careful not to commit himself in his argument as to the matter of fact 
 whether American Slavery is, or is not, oppressive in its character. A 
 frank avowal of an upright sentiment on this point might, ]ierhaps, have 
 been disastrous as to the beneficent object the sermon has in view. For 
 it was evidently " believed that its w^ifWc dissemination would be productive 
 of great good," specially so south of " Mason and Dickson's Line," " in 
 this day of agitation and alarm." 
 
 And further, it should b<^ noticed that the author, in his argument, is 
 "•uilty of frequently using the word "jurisdiction" with no very great 
 degree of exactitude as to tlie true meaning of the word. He evidently 
 means bv this word not the legal right or authority of Congress to 
 
13 
 
 legislate on the subject of slavery. For the le(ial right so to legislate 
 is derived exclusively from the Constitution of the United States. But 
 he manifestly means by the word "jurisdiction" the moral right so to 
 legislate ; — that right which God has given Congress by virtue of the 
 relation which the civil m:igistracy sustains to Him. Ilence the author 
 refers to Hebrew servitude to show that Congress has "jurisdiction," as 
 he calls it, in this matter ; — that is, to show, that Congress has divinely 
 delegated power to legislate respecting American slaveiy, and to enact 
 the Fugitive Slave Law to protect it. 
 
 According to our author, then, the magistracy in certain cases has the 
 right divine for doing wrong, and for compelling the citizen in the name 
 of God to execute the wickedness. 
 
 We do not dasign to detain the reader long on this part of his sermon. 
 But we would ask, was there ever a greater falsity ? Was there ever a 
 principle uttered by man more utterly at variance with both the spirit 
 and letter of the Bible I 
 
 According to him, in those cases, then, w^here civil Governments have 
 any authority to enact laws upon any subject, they may enact WIIAT- 
 EV^ER laws they may see fit, and these laws are " absolute," " final" and 
 " supreme," upon the citizen. Let us, now, just for one moment, see 
 how this doctrine will apply to some of those cases confessedly under the 
 cognizance of the ci\il magistracy. Most Governments have supposed 
 that they have the authority, or moral right, to pass laws respecting theft, 
 murder, adultery, false-swearing, violating the rights of conscience, des- 
 ecrating the Sabbath day, molesting the worship of God ; and in some 
 cases they have thought that they might also, rightfully prohibit the 
 slave trade and slavery. Now inasmuch as these matters are properly 
 Avithin their "JURISDICTION'" (to use for once the technicality of our 
 learned author,) therefore Governments may pass whatever laws they 
 may see fit on these subjects, and " their action" is " absolute," "final" 
 and " supreme," on the citizen. They may, therefore, pass laws permit- 
 ting the crime of theft, murder, adultery, false-swearing, violating the 
 rights of conscience, desecrating the Sabbath, molesting the worship of 
 God ; and they may also rightfully protect the slave trade ou the coast 
 of Africa, and enact slavery and protex?t it Noith and South, Eiist and 
 West, and any where, and may enact the Fugitive Slave Law and so 
 prohibit us from doing what God has expressly enjoined upon us to do 
 by the hope of heaven. And for any man to appeal to the law of God 
 " to justify disobedience to a human law " permittiny and protcctiny these 
 crimes, their " subject-matter being within the cognizance of the State, — 
 
14 
 
 is to reject the authority of God himself, who has committed to Gov- 
 ernments the power and authority which they exercise in [these] civil 
 affairs." Was there ever a sentimant more at war with reason and the 
 true principle of Christian duty ? 
 
 There is a sermon on this same text of our author, from the pen of 
 President Wayland, the author of the " Moral Science," from which, we 
 can do no greater service to the cause of truth, than to give here a some- 
 what lengthy extract. It is published in his Volume of " University 
 Sermons," and entitled the " Duty of Obedience to the Civil Magistrate." 
 On page 265, Dr. Wayland says : — " In the preceding discoui-se, I have 
 endeavoured to show that every disciple of Christ is undar imperative 
 obligations to ob^y the civil m igistrate, so long as the civil magistrate 
 obeys the social and moral laws by virtue of wliich his offic9 has been 
 created. While the magistracy employs itself in the administration of 
 justice, in the protection of innocence, and the punishment of crime, and 
 in the discharge of those duties, which, for the sake of convenience, the 
 public h;is voluntarily confided to it, Christ commands us not merely to 
 yield it our obedience but to proffer to it our cheerful and disinterested 
 support. * * * * So much as this, then, the gospel commands, 
 in respect to our obedience to ci\ il government. Beyond this I know not 
 that it utters any command whatever. The acts, therefore, the laws, the 
 requirements of Civil society, like the acts, the laws, the requirements of the 
 Church, or of any other Society, are amenable to the tribunal of reason, 
 and conscience, and the word of God. The Christian is at lib-'rty to inquire 
 whether any act of the government transgresses the limit within which its 
 action is, by reason and revelation, restricted ; and yet more, to determine, 
 concerning every one of its actions, whether it be right or wrong. At liberty, 
 did I say ? He is more than at liberty, — he is obliged thus to inquire and to 
 determine. He is a party to every act of the society of which he is a mem- 
 ber, lie is an intelligent moral agent, res):onsible to God for his actions, 
 whether they be pei-sonal or associated, and therefore he must think about 
 civil government, and act about it, according to the light which God has 
 given him, all things else to the contrary notwithstanding." 
 
 " I thor<>fore, as a Christian citizen, look u} on the civil government and 
 the civil magistracy with as unlionding an eye as I look upon any thing 
 else. In sinqilicity and godly sincerity, not in the spirit of strife, or parti- 
 zanship, I may pronounce my ojiinion upon its enactments, and measures, 
 just as I would express my opinion in any otherca.se. I see in presidents, 
 cabinets, senators, representatives and all the array of the civil magistracy 
 nothing but men, fallible men, of like passions with myself. Every page 
 
15 
 
 of the histor}' of the past has shown that men placed in such situations 
 have been exceedingly prone to err and to do wickedly. I can not there- 
 fore, worship men in power. In so far as they are virtuous men, I love 
 them. In so far as they are able men, I respect them. In so far as 
 with an honest and true heart they labor to discharge the solemn duties 
 to which they have been appointed, I honor and venerate them. I will 
 pay all due deference to the offices which they hold, and I will bow with 
 seemly respect to the men who hold them. These men are to me the 
 representatives on earth of eternal justice and unsullied truth ; and may 
 my arm fall palsied from my shoulder-blade when I refuse to raise it in 
 token of respect to him who is called of God to minister under so solemn 
 a responsibility." 
 
 " But all this veneration is due, not to the man, but to the magistrate ; 
 and it is due to him, therefore, only so long as he confines himself to the 
 duties of his office, and discharges them with pure and patriotic intentions. 
 I have a right to in-iuire whether his actions in his offic% conform to the 
 principles of justice. Hi mu^t claim for himself no immunity from 
 scrutiny on account of the dignity of his station. If he use the power 
 committed to hini for any other ]nu-pose than that for which it was 
 committed ; if he prostitute his official influence to pander to the Avishes 
 of a political party ; if he sacrifice the gravest interests of his country 
 for the sake of securing to himself the emoluments of office ; if he 
 trample the national honor in the dii-t in order to minister to the grasp- 
 ing selfishness of a contem;)tible clique, — that moment every vestige of 
 his sacredness is gone forever. He stands before me like Samson from 
 the lap of Delilah. Shake himself as he may, it mattei-s not to me, — 
 his strength is departed from him. Ikit this is not all; not only is his 
 official sacredness departed, — he has become to me the most odious of 
 despicable men. He has sacrificed his country to his lusts. He has bar- 
 tered away the well-being of millions for food to nourish his vices. 
 Whether in office or out of it, whether powerful or powerless, I can look 
 upon him henceforth with no other feeUngs than those of pity and dis- 
 gust." 
 
 " But this may become a yet more practical matter. The magistrate may 
 not only do wrong himself, but he may command me to do wrong. How 
 shall I regard this command ? I will regard it as I do any other com- 
 mand to do wrong, — T will not obey it. I will look the magistracy calmly 
 and respectfully in the face, and declare to it that in this matter I owe 
 it no allegiance. I will have nothing to do with its wrong-doing. T will 
 separate myself, as far as possible, from the act and its consequences, 
 
16 
 
 whether they be prosperous or advei-se. It is wickedness ; it has the ciii'se 
 of God inwrought into it, and I will have notliing to do with it. From 
 the beginnin<j^ to the end, I will eschew it, ainl tlie reward that it offers. 
 The magistracy may punish me; I can not help that, I will not resist, 
 but I will not d.) wrong, nor will I ba a party to wrong, let the magis- 
 tracy or aught else coininand me." 
 
 "In sajnng this, I hope that I arrogate to myself nothing in the least 
 peculiar. I am only in the plainest and simplest manner stating the 
 rights and obligations of an int 'lligent moral being, accountable to God 
 for his actions, and bound to reverence his Creator above all else in the 
 universe. Created imder such a responsibility, can I transfer the allegi- 
 ance which I owe to God to legislative a=;semblies, to political caueusses, 
 to mass meetings, to packed or unpacked conventions, representing or 
 pretending to represent the assumed omnipotence of public opinion ? My 
 whole moral nature witli loathing forl)id^ it. I could not do it withi)ut 
 feeling that I h^ become a d;'spicable slave. I could not do it without 
 knowing that I had exchanged the glorious and incorruptible God for an 
 image made like to corrn[)til»li.' man, and to l)irds, and foui'-foyted beasts, 
 and cree])ing things, and worshipjied the creature more than the Creator, 
 Avho is blessed foi'ever. My fellow citizens must not ask this of me ; I 
 will surrender for mv country, my possessions, my labor, my life, but I 
 will not sacritice my integrity; and that is unworthy of being the country 
 of a good man which '*hall ;isk it." 
 
 To this extract of Dr. Wayland, stating so clearly the duty of a Chris- 
 tian citizen in regard to any law requiring him to do' wrong, we do not 
 see how a conscientious, trust-worthy and patriotic citizen can refuse to 
 yield his most hearty assent. And yet the doctrine of Dr. Lord is that 
 the magistracy in certain cases has the right divine for doing wrong, and 
 for commanding, and compelhng the citiztu in the name of (iod to 
 execute the wickedness. According to him, therefore, it is the duty of 
 the Christian citizen to cany out the provisions of this infamous Fugitive 
 Slave law, although he knows them to be wrong. And if he refuses to 
 do what he knoios thus to be wrong, according to these ethics, he offends 
 God, and perils his own soul. We freely confess that we have never 
 seen a sentiment uttered by m ui in any part of the world more at war 
 with every true principle of Christian duty. 
 
 But Dr. Lord informs us that he sustains this doctrine from the Bible, 
 and he cites Scripture under the color of doing so. We can only refer 
 to a single one of his quotiitions to show the manner in which he presses 
 Scripture into his service. See Romaas, 13 : 1-7. "Let every soul be 
 
17 
 
 subject unto the higher powers : for there is no power but of God. The 
 powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the 
 power, resisteth the ordinance of God. And they that resist shall receive 
 to themselves damnation. For riders are not a terror to good works hut 
 to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the jwioer? Bo that which 
 is good and thou shall have praise of the same, for he is the minister of 
 God to thee for good. But if thou do that lohich is evil be afraid : for 
 he beareth not the sword in vain ; for he is the minister of God, a 
 revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. AVhorefore ye 
 must needs be subject, not only for wrath Imt also for conscience sake. 
 For, for this cause pay ye trilnite also ; fur they are God's ministers 
 attending continually upon this very thing. Render therefore to all their 
 dues, tribute to whom tribute is due ; custom to whom custom ; feai' to 
 whom fear ; honor to whom honor." 
 
 How it is, now, that this scrii>ture is authority for the magistracy, in 
 some cases to commit the citi/.en in the name of God to wrong-doing, 
 I freely confess that for one I am not (juite able to see. Surely it says 
 no such thing ; but it savs exactly the contrary. It says that rulers are 
 not a terror to good works but to the evil ; and that the magistrate " is 
 the minister of God to thee for GOOD," " to execute wrath upon him 
 that doeth e\-il." If therefore he be not a terror to good works, and if 
 he be God's minister only for good, and for punishing evil, how can he, 
 then, have God's authority for committing the citizen to do evil ? It 
 says, moreover, that the citizen is to obey also " for conscience sake," 
 and whv it is necessary that conscience be particularly active to aid a man 
 in doing what he knows to be evil, must bo somewhat dark, I think, to 
 most minds. 
 
 Prof. Stuart, of Andover, has a remark on this passage, in his Com- 
 mentary on Romans, showing that its teaching is exjictly the contrary to 
 that deduced by Dr. Lord ; and certainly Prof. Stuart will not be sus- 
 /pected of being unsound on this side of the question. Says he : — " This 
 clause [Rom. 13 : 3.] shows what sort, of rulei-s Paul expected Christians 
 to obey, and how far obedience was a duty, viz. : such rulers as protect 
 the good and repress the evil ; and while they do this, there can be no 
 question as to the duty of obeying them, lint suppose the revei-se, that 
 is, .suppose that they protect evil-doing and forbid good works, then 1 'aiil's 
 own conduct shows what other Christians ought to do." Such is Dr. 
 Stuart's idea of the teaching of this scripture. It is somewhat remarkable 
 that according to Dr. Lord, it also teaches doctrine directly the re\iMse 
 of this ; — that we arc bound to ob-v the magistrate to do evil on pain 
 
18 
 
 of offending God nm] periling our own souls, and that too if we refuse 
 to do what confessedly we know to be wrong. 
 
 But Dr. Lord, in proving tliis doctrine from the Bible, has omitted 
 that part of the passage quoted which we have put in italics ; and in this 
 particular he reminds us very forcibly of another case remarkably parallel 
 to his own. Satan once quoted scripture to Christ. After placing him 
 on a pinnacle of the temple, on a particular occasion, he said to him. " If 
 thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down, for it is written [Psalm 91 : 
 11 — 12.] He shall give his angels charge concerning thee, to keep thee 
 in all thy ways : and in their hands they shall 1>ear thee up, lest at any 
 time thou dash thy foot against a stone." Now Satan did not see fit to 
 quote the whole of the passage, omitting all that part which was material 
 to the question at issue, and which we have put in italics. I do not say 
 of Dr. Lord, that in this particular "he follows in the footsteps of his 
 illustrious predecessor," lest I seem to speak with unguarded lips. But 
 I do greatly marvel, that a minister of the gospel should be found 
 defending a cause which requires such an abuse of God's Word to 
 sustain it; — that when citing scripture to show that the magistracy may, 
 in the name of God, commit us to wTong-doing, he should feel it neces- 
 sary to omit that particular part of the p:issage quoted, which is material 
 to the point at issue, and which, according to Dr. Stuart, teaches us 
 " 2ohat sort of rulers Paul expected Christians to oljey, and hoia far 
 obedience was a duty.'''' Lideed, he might have quoted scriptm-e as 
 another once did, of whom we have heard: — "If sinners entice thee, 
 consent thou,^'' for such a version of the word of God would have been 
 no more flagrant in omission, than that perpetrated by Dr. Lord in 
 proving his doctrine from this passage in Romans. And such also, I may 
 add is the teaching of the other passage cited by our author, Titus 3:1. 
 " Put them in mind to be subject to ]>rincipalities and powers, to obey 
 magistrates, to be ready to every GOOD work." 
 
 In order to show more plainly the falsity of our author, in the major 
 premise of his argument, it may be well for us here for a moment to 
 refer to the true theory of human government regarded as an institution 
 of God. 
 
 Civil government is properly the agent of society, and " the great 
 object for which it is established among men is to protect every man in 
 the enjoyment of those rights conferred upon him by his Creator." It 
 is, therefore, also an ordinance of God. Said the authoi-s of the Declara- 
 tion of American Independence ; " we hold these truths to be self-evident : 
 that all men are created equal ; that they are endowed by their Creator 
 
19 
 
 with certain inalienable rights ; that among these are life, liberty and the 
 pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, Governments 
 
 ARE INSTITUTED AMONG MEN." 
 
 Life, hberty, and the pursuit of happiness, then, are among the rights 
 that God has conferred on all men as individuals of society, and civil 
 government of whatever form, in so far as it is ordained of God ; — in 
 so far as it is His ministry, is an agent of society to secure these rights 
 equally to all men without distinction of clime, color, or race. " ^^^lat- 
 soever ye would that men do unto you, do ye even so unto them," is the 
 law of Jesus Christ on this subject, and civil government has for its true 
 object the carrying out of this Divine precept in those cases where men 
 would be otherwise unwilling to do so. 
 
 Whenever, therefore, the rights of one man are invaded by any other 
 man or men, the individual has a rigiit, in the name of God, to turn to 
 civil government as his agent for protection and redress. He has a right 
 to demand of the Legislature those laws, of the Judiciary those decisions, 
 and of the Executive that action, that will fully protect him in those 
 rights conferred on him by his Creator ; and (i\\\\ government has no 
 right whatever to refuse the demand. And the magistracy, in thus pro- 
 tecting the rights of the citizen, has the power, in the name of God, 
 and of the State, to punish offenders by depi'iving them of those rights 
 which they have forfeited by the crimes which they have committed. 
 
 But the citizen has no right whatever to call for the interposition of 
 the magistracy except only when his rights have been invaded; and 
 the mao-istracy has no right whatever to interftire in his behalf except to 
 protect him in the enjoyment of those rights conferred on him by his 
 Creator. The civil magistracy is thus an ordinance of God, not very 
 unlike the ministry of the gospel. Both have their own legitimate objects 
 in view, the one to do justice^ the other \^ preach truth. And in so far, 
 ott/y, as they do so, can they act in the name of God. And in what 
 respect soever they depart from the legitimate objects of their office, by 
 so for exactly, do they, in these particulai-s, cease to be God's ministry ; 
 and God no more sanctions the injustice of the one, than he does the 
 heresy of the other. Cesar's power, therefore, in government, is a 
 RESTRICTED powcr. And he has no right to transcend his limits, either 
 by usurping power which does not belong to him, or by carrying out his 
 lawful measures by means which ai-e not innocent. And in so far as 
 Cajsar transcends his Umitations, by so far, he is not acting in the name 
 of God, and by so far, my allegiance to God, as accountable to him for 
 every one of my acts, forbids me to obey him. For where 1 have no 
 
20 
 
 nifhi to obey, Ojesar hsis no riLfbt to command me. Says Jesus Christ : — 
 " Render unto Ciesar tlie tliint,rs that AliE Caesar's," intimating, thereby, 
 that some things do not belong to him. Cjesar's tribute, and eustom, 
 and fear, and honor, and authority in so far as he uses it for protecting 
 the rights God lia.s conferred on Caesar's subjects, are all Csesar's ; and all 
 these render to Caesar. But when Caesar commands me to invade the 
 rights of others in order to gratify his selfishness, or injustice, or cruelty, 
 or pride, or ambition, or avarice, or his lust, though he be God's minister 
 to me for good in the rightful exercise of his power and authority, yet 
 in this particular he acts not in the name of God, but in the name of 
 Satan, and liore I must not obey him ; for God will hold me responsible 
 for all evil-doing in wliich I may thus engage. I am no more at liberty 
 to oU-y a civil magistrate commanding me to do wrong, than I am to 
 embrace lieresy ])ecause preached by Dr. Lord, or any other professed 
 minister of the gospel. And that the magistracy is of God, and therefore 
 may commit the citizen in the name of God to do wickedly, we deem to 
 be no argument, at all, in favor of wrong-doing. For then, indeed, would 
 e\en his Satanic majesty be entitled to the same prerogative. For we 
 strongly suspect that Satan himself may lay some claim to be regarded as 
 having been of Divine origin, and therefore, according to Dr. Lord, he 
 would be entitled to the special indulgence of most distinguished consid- 
 eration. Cicsar's power, therefore, is a restricted power, we say, and he 
 is (jud's minister, and has a right to command me, and I have a right 
 to obey him, onhj in so far as he commands me to aid in maintaining 
 those rights conferred on men by their Creator. In what i-espect soever 
 he goes beyond this " I will not obey him," " He may punish me if he 
 please." That will be his business and not mine, and for it he will be 
 accountable. "I will not resist him," but 1 \s\\\ not disobey GOD, all 
 the human magistracy in the univei-se to the contrary notwithstanding. 
 Such we deem to be the duty of every intelligent moral being. 
 
 And it was l^ecause Jesus Christ knew that the magistracy would 
 transcend the limits of its power, and endeavor to commit men to 
 wrong-doing, and that some ministers of the gospel would aid and abet 
 them in doing so, that he specially forewarns his disciples in such ca.ses 
 to fear God. Said he, " they will dehver you up to the councils, and 
 will scourge vou in their synagogues. And ye shall be brought before 
 governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony against them and the 
 Gentiles. What I t.U \o\\ in darkness, that speak ye in the light : 
 and what y.^ hear in the ear. that preach ye upon the house tops. And 
 
21 
 
 fear not them that kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul : but 
 rather fear Him that is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." 
 
 And so, accordingly, when Peter and John, not very long afterwards 
 were brought up before the Jewish Sanhedrim, and forbidden by the 
 authority of that high civil and ecclesiastical Tribunal, not to speak at 
 all, nor to teach in the name of the Lord Jesus, they answered, " whe- 
 ther it be RIGHT in the sight of God to hearken unto you, more tban unto 
 God judge ye, for we cannot but speak the things which we have seen 
 and heard." And when they were discharged from custody and were come 
 to their own, the burden of their prayer was, — "And now Lord behold 
 their threatening, and grant unto thy servants, that with all boldness 
 they may speak thy word ;" which was in effect, saying : — Grant unto 
 thy servants that with all boldness they may disobey this civil and ec- 
 clesiastical magistracy P And God shook the place where they were 
 assembled in token of the Divine ap]>robation, and they were all filled 
 with the Holy Ghost "and they spake the word of God with boldness,'' 
 the command of the magistracy to the contrary, notwithstanding. 
 
 And a few days after, when they were again summoned to appear 
 before the Sanhedrim, and the high priest asked them, saying, " Did 
 not we straitly command you that ye should not teach in this name, 
 and behold ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to 
 bring this man's blood upon us ? " To this accusation their characteristic 
 and noble reply was, and very unlike the doctnne of Dr. Lord, " We 
 ought to obey God rather than men." 
 
 And we would specially commend these scriptures, and a multitude of 
 other passages of like import, to the careful and prayerful reading of our 
 author, whenever he may again feel the need of scriptural proof to 
 sustain him in the position that the magistracy, in certain cases, has the 
 right divine for doing wrong, and for commanding and compelling the 
 citizen in the name of God to obey him in executing the wickedness. 
 
 And since our author seems to think that " the forms of freedom are 
 of little consequence to him who is made by color and caste a hewer of 
 wood and a drawer of water," and, that the moral obliquity of the Fu- 
 gitive Slave law is materially relieved from the fact that />«» onlv of these 
 persons are likely to suffer in consequence of its unrighteous provisions, 
 and that the faithful execution of this law will be for the great good of 
 the Union ; we would direct him to the particular reading of John 1 1 : 
 47 — 50, where he may find, for his tranquility, a very similar sentiment 
 recorded ; — " What do we," said the Pharisees in the Jewish Sanhedrim, 
 when thev were plotting the murder of ('hrist, " for this man doeth manv 
 
22 
 
 miracles. If we let liim alone all men will believe on him, and the Ro- 
 mans shall come and take away both our plixcc and our nation. And one 
 of them, named Caiaphas, being the high priest that same year, said 
 unto them, ye know nothing at all, nor consider that it IS EXPEDIENT 
 FOR US, that ONE man should die for the people, and that the whole 
 nation perish not." Surely then Dr. Lord is not the first man who has 
 preached that it is EXPEDIENT TO DO WICKEDLY in order to 
 " preserve the Union ;" and that human action loses from its moral 
 character whenever its evil tendency falls only on the few. It is, how- 
 ever, somewhat unfortunate for him that he does not truthfully represent 
 the fjicts in regard to the extent of misery, so great and appalling, occa- 
 sioned by this iniquitous Fugitive Slave Law, — that he deliberately shuts 
 his eyes on the truth respecting the thousands of innocent sufferei-s, 
 specially in our large cities, poor, sick, frightened and bereft men, 
 women and children, both fugitives and free persons of color, who alike 
 with us arc the children of our Heavenly Father, and as truly entitled, 
 in the sight of God, to their freedom jus is Dr. Lord to his, but who to- 
 day are hiding in garrets, corners and cellars, li\ing in a state of mind 
 bordei-ing on destraction, and wholly incapacitated by fear and real dan- 
 ger, from coming to the light of day to earn for themselves and families 
 their daily bread ; to say nothing of the numbers both of fugitives and 
 othere, inhumanly seized, manacled and dragged away into a bondage a 
 thousand times more to be dreadi^d than murder itself. Good (xod ! can 
 there be a Minister of the Gospel in thy universe competent to defend 
 a wrong so atrocious, so Heaven-daring as this Fugitive Slave Law ! ! 
 But what marvel, that there be some preachers who would dissuade from 
 agitation when deeds of darkness have been committed, and "Avhen with 
 them the inalienable rights of the weak and defenceless are but " art 
 inco)isequcntial abstraction.^^ " Did we not straitly command you 
 that you should not teach in this name, and behold ye have filled Jeru- 
 salem with your doctrine and intend to briny this man^s blood upon ?/5." 
 [Caiaphas.] "7 would that I had a voice to penetrate every habita- 
 tion in this great Empire, to reach every ear from ocean to ocean, from 
 Maine to Florida, — to entreat my countrymen to pause from a contro- 
 versy from which there will soon be no retreat, and of which if protracted, 
 thfre can be hut one issue — the dissolution of the Union and the ruin of 
 the Republic. * * * * J would beseech them to take care of tlie 
 Cnmmomvealth, than which there is no higher law for the Christian 
 citizen. * * * * f would beseech them to stand by the Union, to 
 
28 
 
 obey the laws and to frown upon AGITATION in this crisis of our 
 beloved country!''' [John C. Lord.] 
 
 And since it is so easy for our author to compromit the welfare of the 
 weak and defenceless, teaching men that they may engage to do their 
 neighbor WTong, and so by an oath, create the obligation to do wickedly, 
 and may thereby escape the curse, God has pronounced on him " that 
 frameth mischief by a law," we would further commend to him for 
 liis special edification the case of Herod, who, in his wine and lust, swore 
 to the daughter of a lewd woman on a particular occasion, that he would 
 give her whatsoever she would ask of him, and then for his oath sake 
 sent and cut off the head of John the Baptist, whose rights he had 
 already invaded by depriving hira unjustly of his lawful liberty. And 
 it may be as well for him to look at still another case. I mean that of 
 the forty ruffians who had entered into an engagement to murder Paul, 
 and then bound themselves by an oath that they would neither eat nor 
 drink till they had perpetrated the deed. From both of which cases he 
 may possibly learn, that as men have no right to do wickedly to others 
 before swearing to do so, so neither have they any such right afterward, 
 §ince neither oath, nor law, can make that right which GOD has made 
 wrong. Men, if they please, may swear to their " own hurt and change 
 not" That is another question. But as no man may take advantage 
 of his own foult, so swearing to do ill to another, can neither make it 
 right to do so, nor can it create the moral obligation to perpetrate the 
 wickedness. And if it be piracy before God, to kidnap a man on the 
 coast of Africa, I know it is piracy to kidnap him in Massachusetts, or 
 any where else on the face of this earth. Moral principles admit of no 
 change from any consideration of place. Nor is Congress competent by 
 any construction of the Constitution, or in any other manner, to frame a 
 wicked law so as to create a moral obligation for perpetrating a toicked 
 deed. And as for " compromises and compacts," which others may have 
 seen fit to make in our behalf, in defiance of reason, and the Word of 
 God, and in violation of our religious sentiments, and conscientious 
 convictions of right, " good faith, honesty and integrity, among men," 
 and before God, too, will compel a good man to respect none of them. 
 And since our author seems to think there " is no higher law" for him, 
 in these matters, than human enactments, " we would affectionately " 
 Hivitc him to re-pf'rus(! Math. 25: 31 — 4(3, where he will find for the 
 Judgment, a liill of Christian Rights somewhat diftcrent in charact<M- 
 from that of the Fugitive Slave Law, and the constructive "comprom- 
 ises of tlio Constitution" on which that law is said to be built. 
 
24 
 
 We have reache<l one conclusion, namely, that the major premise of 
 Dr. Lord's argument is an utter falsity ; — that it is not TRUTH " that 
 in some cases the magistracy has the right divine to engage in wrong- 
 doing and to commit the citizen in the name of God to execute the 
 wickedness. 
 
 Thus f;ir we have confined ourselves, chiefly, to the falsity of our au- 
 thor in the major premise of his argument, with no more than making 
 allusion to that in his minor premise, which, after all, contains the more 
 objectionable, if possible, as well as the more prominent feature of this 
 notorious discourse. This minor premise, in substance, is this, viz : — that 
 to regulate slavery and protect it, is a matter committed by God to 
 governments and sanctioned by Christianity. The author, after making 
 slavery one step of improvement in the progress of« " Civilization,''^ and 
 showing its blessedness at the present time " in the vast Empire of 
 China," passes on to what he regards the strong hold of his position, 
 viz.: the "DIVINE SANCTION" of the Institution. From this, he 
 affirms that slavery is an institution of God, and " may lawfully exist " 
 at the present time, " and concerning which, governments may pass 
 laws" to "protect the rights of masters," in this kind of property, 
 and to " enjoin the redelivery of slaves," and may also " execute pen- 
 alties " for evading or resisting these enactments. 
 
 Does Christianity then sanction slaver}% so as to authorize a 
 Christian code of laws to protect the institution ? Dr. Lord most posi- 
 tively affirms that it does, aud brands every man with sentiments of 
 infidelity, who ]iresumfts to dissent from him. We shall proceed to 
 examine his argument, that Christianity sanctions slavery, in the light 
 of the sacred scriptures. 
 
 By comparing different parts of the discourse before us, and granting 
 the author his greatest latitude, we perceive that he rests his argument 
 in favor of slavery as having a " sanction divine," on the five following 
 points : 
 
 1. God enacted slave laws in the code of Moses. 
 
 2. Jesus Christ came in contact with slavery under the Jewish law, 
 but did not expressly condemn it. 
 
 3. The Apostles met with Roman slavery among the Gentiles, but did 
 not denounce it, nor the government which protected it by laws which 
 gave the master the power of life and death over his servant. 
 
 4. The Apostles preached the gospel to slaves among the Gentile 
 converts, and enjoined upon them the observance of duties which grow 
 out of the relation of slavery itself. 
 
25 
 
 5. The Apostles legislated fur slaveholders iu Christian churches, 
 respecting the treatment of their slaves, but said nothing respecting the 
 duty of emancipating them. 
 
 We do not perceive that the author presents any consideration material 
 to the subject in question, which may not be fairly included vnthin the 
 compass of some one of these particulars. AVe shall therefore proceed 
 to take up these several points in their respective order, and see how far 
 they may be true in point of fact, and what bearing they may have in 
 determining the question at issue, " Does Christianity Sanction 
 Slavery, so as to authorize government to protect it by law?" 
 
 And, First ; — It does not quite follow that Christianity sanctions 
 Slavery, so as to authorize a Christian code of laws to protect the insti- 
 tution, because there were slave laws enacted in the code of Moses. 
 True, our author says, that, " if the institution of slavery is necessarily, 
 and from its nature sinful now, it always must have been so, as universal 
 principles admit of no change and the argument " that it is sinful now, 
 "is therefore an impeachment of the benevolence of God." 
 
 But let us see how this principle will apply in sanctioning, as Chris- 
 tian, some other things found in the code of Moses. 
 
 From the Old Testament Scriptures we learn, that in a case of acci- 
 dental homicide (as for instance " when the head of an axe slipped from 
 the helve and wounded a man to death,") he that was akin to the 
 slain man might, with impunity, and without judge, or jury, slay 
 the innocent person, if he overtook him before he arrived at a city of 
 refuge. We learn, further, from the law of Moses, that when a man, 
 already united to one wife, chose to take another, he was at liberty 
 to do so, and to put away the first wife if he pleased. And when 
 he wanted to divorce his wife because " he had no delight in her," 
 the way of doing it was prescribed by positive enactment. Neither 
 did the law prohibit his having more than one living wife, if he 
 chose to have more, and made particular provision for the rights of 
 the first-born under such circumstances. It was thus that " the exist- 
 ence " of what our laws call Murder, Polygamy, and Divorce without 
 Criminal Cause "was expressly allowed, sanctioned, and regulated by 
 the Supreme Law-giver, in that divine economy which he gave the 
 Hebrew State. The fact is open and undisputed ; the record and 
 proof of it are in the hands of every man who has in his possession 
 a copy of the Bible" And according to the reasoning of Dr. Lord 
 these are institutions, therefore that may claim the "Divine Sanction" 
 and ^^ which may lawfully exist" at the present time ^^ and cancern- 
 4 
 
26 
 
 nuj which, (/ovcnuncnts may pass laws in order to protect the rights of 
 such murderers and adulterers in the commission of these very acts, and 
 may execute penalties for the evasion or resistance" of these enactment^. 
 And for any one to appeal to the law of God in protestation of his 
 rights, civil, religious, and domestic, against the invasion of these 
 murderers and adulterers, is to contravene the revealed will of God, 
 and take the "position of iufidehty." It is of no service at all to 
 our autlior, but the contrary, that Jesus Christ has forbidden murder, 
 and repealed the law of polygamy and divorce in the code of Moses ; 
 for according to Dr. Lord, " Universal principles admit of no change," 
 and if the intentional slaying of an innocent man be murder, and having 
 more than one living -wife, be adultery, noio, they must always have 
 been so, -svhich to assert, according to his logic, *' would be an impeach- 
 ment of the benevolence of God" as displayed in "that divine economy 
 which he gave the Hebrew State." Now the question is, does Chris- 
 tianity sanction Murder, Polygamy and Divorce under such circum- 
 stances ? And is the law of Christ forbidding Murder, and positively 
 declaring this Polygamy and Divorce to be adultery, " an impeachment 
 of the benevolence of God " in his suffering these things, and others 
 like them, in the code of Moses? The process of reasoning, so far 
 as the logic of Dr. Lord is concerned, I aver to be parallel in the two 
 cases. 
 
 And since it is intended to make so much for American slavery, out 
 of the slave-laws in the code of Moses, it may be well, here, to state 
 some of the facts respecting those laws, in their -application to this 
 subject, and see how they bear on American slavery, and what sanction 
 di\-iue they afford for protecting the " peculiar institution " as it exists 
 in this country. I can only indicate some of these facts, believing that 
 they will hardly be denied by any intelligent " and fair-minded man." 
 
 1. Slavery did not have its origin in the law of Moses. Moses did 
 not enact the institution among his countrymen. Abraham, more than 
 three hundred yeare before Moses was born, had men-servants and 
 maid-servants, just as he also had a plurality of ^nves. And the prac- 
 tice of slavery also, obtained, with \o\-\ great generality and severity, 
 among the surrounding nations. The law of Moses, therefore, is no 
 more responsible for the origin of slavery than for the polygamy of 
 ancient times. 
 
 2. And God has seen fit at particular times, and for particular 
 reasons, to give to particular persons, peculiar directions. He com- 
 nianded Abraham to slay his son for a burnt sacrifice. He commanded 
 
'21 
 
 the Hebrews to invade the territory of the Canaanitos and utterly to 
 annihilate the inhabitants thereof, slaying without mercy, men, women 
 and children, and seizing upon their houses and lands for a perpetual 
 possession. In like manner, he commanded Saul to destroy the 
 Amalekites. The reason God gave for this, I may say, extraordinary 
 command m these l:v<t two cases, was, that " the cup of their iniquity 
 was full." And surely, He who had the right to drown a Avorld for 
 their sin, might certainly chose his own mode for destroying some of 
 the wicked nations thereof. But extraordinary commands require a 
 special revelation from God, before we can feel that they are a part 
 of our duty. Xo man is at liberty to sacrifice a child on the ground 
 that God commanded Abraham to do so. The wars of Canaan would 
 not authorize a people to wage war on a neighboring repubhc, for 
 accumulating five hundred thousand square miles of her territory, 
 over which to extend the area of slavery, without a special revelation 
 to that eftect. Much less can the magistracy rightfully commit me to 
 the nefarious work of kidnapping men, women and children for the 
 slave market until it can show me its dinne credentials for enacting 
 so extraordinary a requirement into the fonn of a law. 
 
 3. God saw fit to sufier the Hebrews, " because of the hardness 
 of their hearts," to put away their wives, and for the same reason, 
 no doubt, he suffered them to do some other things, specified in the 
 law of Moses, which Christianity does not sanction. And we see no 
 (Tood reason why Hebrew servitude, in so far as it was sin, might not 
 be put into the same category. Certain it is, that the ancient polygamy 
 and divorce were the occasion of no greater curse to the Jews, than was 
 thou- 2)ractice, at last, respecting their bondmen and women. [See the 
 58th Chapter of Isaiah, and the 34th Chapter of Jeremiah at the 
 12 — 22 verses.] And whether slavery, in whatever form, has not, ever 
 since, had a little more to do with hard hearts and God's curse, than 
 with soft hearts and God's blessing, it does not belong to my object just 
 now to say. The fact, however, that slavery w\a«i recognized in the code 
 of Moses and therefore must, of necessity, be sanctioned by the Gospel, 
 I am not quite able to see, any more than I can the fiu-t, that the 
 polygamy there recognized, will, therefore, justify a Christian man, nou\ 
 for keeping a seraglio or harem. 
 
 4. But there is another view to be taken of this subject. It is very 
 evident from scripture, that the law of slavery and the practice of 
 slavery in the Hebrew State were not altogether identical. From the 
 scripture just referred to in .leremiah, it is plain that the curse of the 
 
28 
 
 Babylonian captivity, in great part, was brought upon the Jews tor 
 " transgressing God's covenant," in " not hearkening unto him" to 
 proclaim liberty, every one to his brother, and every man to his 
 neighbor. It will be specially important for us, therefore, to look at 
 some of the enactments in God's covenant respecting which the Jews, 
 it appears, had thus transgressed. And it may, after all prove to be 
 true that God has been less intent to protect slavery among his people, 
 than he has to emancipate the slave ; and that the *' divine economy 
 which God gave the Hebrew State " may therefore be found to furnish 
 less " aid and comfort " to Dr. Lord in behalf of kidnapping and the 
 Fugitive Slave Law, than he, in his sermon, would have us suppose- 
 The following are among the provisions expressly stipulated in behalf of 
 those held to service, according to the law of Moses : 
 
 1 . No Hebrew, except by voluntary contract, could be held to service 
 for a period longer than six years. Meanwhile, he was never to be 
 treated as a slave but as a hired servant. And this was the law also 
 for all children born in the State from whatever parents, and for all 
 naturahzed subjects called proselytes. Moreover, the law gave to every 
 person in service the right to become naturalized, if he chose to do so. 
 (See Exodus, 21 : 2—4. Levit. 25 : 39—43. Deut. 15 : 12. Gen. 17 : 
 12-13. Also, Jahn's Archae, Sect. I7l.) Such a law of ''Apprentice- 
 ship " respecting slavery was passed a few years since in some of the 
 West India States, and the world called it "EMANCIPATION." 
 
 2. No person of another nation and not a proselyte could be held to 
 Hebrew service longer than till the year of Jubilee, be it in any given 
 case a longer or a shorter period. The command on this point in the 
 law of Moses is very clear and explicit. It may be found in Le\nticus, 
 25: 8 — 10, and reads as follows: — "And thou shalt number seven 
 Sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years ; and the space 
 of the seven sabbaths of years shall bo unto thee forty and nine years. 
 Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubilee to sound, on the tenth 
 day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall you make the 
 trumpet sound throughout all your land. And ye shall hallow the 
 fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all 
 THE inhabitants THEREOF : it shall be a jubilee unto you ; and ye 
 shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every 
 man unto his family." The 46th verse, therefore, of this same 25th 
 Chapter, where it is written that " Children of strangers shall be your 
 bondmen forever,''^ must be interpreted according to this general law 
 of the Jubilee. For the design of this passage was not to abolish, in a 
 
•2U 
 
 given case, this law of the Jubilee, but to limit the Hebrews '' always 
 and forever'" to those of another nation in buying those who were 
 properly their bondmen and women. 
 
 This regulation of limited service to those who were unwilling to 
 become naturalized citizens of the Hebrew State was modified by still 
 further enactments. Respecting the rights of person, cruelty and 
 oppression were strictly prohibited. And if a slave was maimed in any 
 way he was at once entitled, in consequence of the injury, to his 
 freedom. (Exodus, 21 : 26-27.) And if at any time he saw fit to run 
 away, he was in no wise to be re-delivered to his master. "Thou shalt 
 not deliver unto his master the ser\ant that is escaped from his master 
 unto thee." (Deut. 23 : 15.) And if there was an exception of priv- 
 ilege to this rule in favor of Hebrew masters, as some contend, no such 
 exception can obtain now, and specially so in favor of American slavery 
 under the Gospel. For Christianity has " broken down " all such 
 "middle walls of partition." With such a law, therefore, as this in our 
 Slave-holding States, American slavery could not survive an hour. 
 
 3. Respecting the religious rights of the slave in the Hebrew State, 
 it was specially provided that he should receive stated instruction in the 
 knowledge of God and of his law, besides being entitled to the privi- 
 lege of attending all the religious festivals of the year. Moreover, a 
 large portion of the time of the slave was his own. He was to be a 
 guest at all the family festivals. (Exod. 12 : 44. Deut. 12 : 12-18.) 
 He was entitled by law to the whole of the seventh year (Levit. 25 : 
 3 — 6), and also to every Sabbath day (Exodus, 20 : 10.) He was to 
 go up to Jerusalem from whatever part of the land thrice, yearly, to 
 attend the three great national festivals, each a week long, besides 
 attending the feasts of the New Moon, and of the Trumpets, and of 
 the great day of Atonement, (Leviticus, 23 : 27 — 32. Leviticus, 33 : 
 24-25.) The time thus allowed every person held to service in the 
 Hebrew State, of whatever nation, must have been about two-fifths of the 
 whole period. 
 
 4. Besides this, the law of Moses made it death for any person to 
 kidnap a man, or to hold in his possession a man stolen, " He that 
 stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall 
 surely be put to death." (Exodus, 21 : 16.) Nor is this Moses law 
 alone. Paul, in his first epistle to Timothy, 1 : 10, alludes to this law, 
 in a way to show that it is still in force. He puts " Man-stealers," (an- 
 drapodistes,) properly Slave-dealers, Into the same category with 
 "Murderers of fathers," and "Murderers of mothers," and "Men- 
 
30 
 
 slayere," and with some other characters whoso crimes are atrocities 
 of the first degree the world over, in whatever dispensation. 
 
 Who does not see, therefore, that if the law of Moses respectiuoj 
 servitude were to-day re-enacted in the Slave states of this Republic, it 
 would be the trumpet of the Jubilee before sunset to every bondman in 
 the land? Nay, more; who does not see, that the "divine economy 
 which God gave the Hebrew State," both in its spirit and letter, not 
 only does not sanction American slavery, but that it, and God's law for 
 the new dispensation, also, are doion upon this mighty wickedness with 
 the very penalty of death itself. " How strange it is," says Dr. Barnes 
 of Philadelphia, when referring to these laws of Moses, "that laws like 
 these should ever be appealed to now, and in the United States of 
 America, and by ministers of the gospel of Christ too, to justify the 
 perpetual bondage of the Afiican here, — a system between which and 
 that of Moses there can scarcely be found the slightest resemblance." 
 
 To see, if possible, in a still clearer light the irrelevancy of Dr. Lord's 
 referring to " that divine economy God gave the Hebrew State," in order 
 to Christianize American slavery, it will not be wrong for us to give an 
 outline of some of the more prominent feature of this great wickedness, 
 which by the Fugitive Slave Law we are commanded to sustain, and 
 which, according to the doctrine of Dr. Lord, we are compelled by the 
 the authority of God to protect. We shall hazard nothing, we think, in 
 saying that God's law " makes " this " slavery, per se, sinful." 
 
 In referring, however, to the sinfulness of this slavery, we are far from 
 denouncing the whole South, and the South onhj, as. guilty in this 
 matter. Some of the South are as separate from the slavery there, 
 and from any fellowship with it, or with the Fugitive Slave Law, which 
 protects it, as any at the North. And oAei-s may be identified with it 
 in the relation of master, and yet free from its guilt. " For," in the 
 truthful language of Dr. Hague on this point, " a man may hold this 
 lelation in a legal sense, against his consent. He may deem himself the 
 victim of misfortime; he may feel bound to avail himself of his legal 
 power for the protection of his brethren ; and especially he may, before 
 God, as a Christian man, abjure all right and title to his fellow- men 
 as property. Such a man, though master of a thousand slaves, is more 
 truly a philanthropist, and more worthy the fellowship of the univei-sal 
 church, than is the northern Christian who never saw a slave, and still 
 declares that Christianity sanctions slavery. Tlie former is a slaveholder 
 in name, but not in truth and In spirit ; the latter is called a non-slave- 
 holder, but a change of residence would make him an owner of men 
 
31 
 
 and women ; and be is now a alaveliolder in principle, in feeling, and 
 in o-uiltiness. The Author of the Sermon on the Mcunt assures us, that 
 God judges men, not merely according to their overt acts, but according 
 to the intents of their hearts, — the objects of their approval or abhor- 
 rence." But those who are thus innocent, we are confident, would not 
 be very ready to advocate the enormities of the Fugitive Slave Law ; 
 much less, would they give the awful sanction of Heaven to that system 
 of iniquity, which this enactment is designed to protect. 
 
 There is a slavery recognized in the Bible, though not exactly sanc- 
 tioned as divine, to which Dr. Lord might have appealed, in behalf of 
 the American system, with great propriety, as its analogies, in many 
 points, are very striking and peculiar. I mean the bondage of Israel 
 under Pharach, king of Egypt. " I have seen, / have seen,'" said God, 
 in the bush, to Moses, " the affliction of my people which is in Egypt, 
 and I have heard their groaning, and am come down to deliver them." 
 Pharoah, it seems, had made the people slaves, and they groaned by 
 reason of their hard bondage, and God's ear was open to their cry. By 
 what right Pharaoh claimed them as slaves, it does not appear. Israel 
 was not stolen, nor does it appear that they were ever bought. In this 
 respect, thie slave-claim of Pharaoh must have been an unusual one ; for 
 when Jacob went down into Egypt to dwell, he had a perfect under- 
 standing with the king of the country. It was the express stipulation that 
 Pharoah should ffive him of the " fat of the land." The word, that the 
 king sent to Jacob, inviting him to leave Canaan, was, " regard not your 
 stuff, for the good of all the land of Egypt is yours." And Pharoah 
 adhered to his promise on the arrival of the patriarch. Said he to 
 Joseph, " Thy father is come. The land of Egypt is before thee ; in 
 the best of the land make thy father and brethren to dwell." This, 
 surely, is not the language of Uiyiny or of stealing men. 
 
 Nor could the younger Pharaoh claim them on the ground of inher- 
 itance ; for then, there must have been an antecedent claim to them, on 
 the part of some one, since that can not be inherited, which some other 
 pei-son has not already possessed. 
 
 The usual claim to the so-called property of this kind, particularly in 
 modern times, and in a land where it is believed that " all men are crea- 
 ted equal," is founded on theft ; and after this, by purchase or inheritance 
 of what is known to have been originally stolen ; and that too when 
 the rightful owner is ever present to claim what God hath given him 
 to hold, as a right inalienable. 
 
:\2 
 
 But after Israel iiad been once, enslaved, Pharaoh niighi then possibly 
 have supported some claim to continue them in bondage, on the ground 
 of color. For Pharaoh was black, and his slaves white, and he might 
 have said " that blacks can not work under the scorching sun of Egypt ; 
 that white skin does not so absorb the rays of the sun as black. That 
 God therefore has made white men to be slaves, that slavery is an insti- 
 tution of God, and that as the king of the country he was only carrying 
 out the divine right of slavery in holding white Israel in bondage." 
 Certainly he would not have been alone in reasoning thus. Be this as it 
 may, one thing is certain : Pharaoh did claim some extraordinary rights 
 and powers over this people. He made them serve, by any means, and 
 by all means, with great rigor, and with hard bondage. He placed task- 
 masters over them, or "c^nvers," as they are more properly called in 
 modern times. And he took it upon him to say that the people should 
 not worship God as Jehovah had commanded them. Moreover, he 
 claimed the right to double their task of already too hard bondage, 
 because some others, who feared God, and felt for humanity, and loved 
 right and justice, had, in the name of God, interfered. He then claimed 
 the right to flog them, because they did not do what they could not do, 
 and finally to kill them at pleasure. We venture to say that these are 
 most remarkable rights to claim over the bodies and souls of men, and 
 are almost equal to the rights and powers claimed by American slavery. 
 It does not appear, however, that there were ministers of religion in the 
 land of Egypt, who felt themselves called upon in their work of love, to 
 preach obedience to these extraordinary requirements of sin against (lod, 
 because they happened to be in the form of a law. 
 
 American slavery began its career, by stealing men and women, and 
 murdering whatsoever opposed itself to this high-handed violence. It 
 is confessedly peculiar in this respect. It then claims the right to hold 
 by the purchase, and inheritance of what is known to have been thus 
 stolen. The laws teach us that a horse, known to be stolen, can neither 
 be purchased nor inherited. It then puts forth a strong plea for contin- 
 uing men in bondage, on the ground of color. 
 
 " He finds his fellow guilty of a skin 
 " Not colored like his own ; and having power 
 " T' enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause, 
 " Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey." 
 
 The law is explicit, — "No white person can be enslaved." And then, 
 having power to enforce these rights, like Pharaoh, it enslaves, — it 
 tasks, — it drives, — it whips, — it treats with cruelty, — it takes away 
 
38 
 
 the rii);ht to worship God, — it kills ; — nay, more, — it claims the right 
 to make chattels of human flesh, and to regulate and protect "the trade 
 in men," by the arm of the fugitive slave law. No ! it never occurred 
 to Pharaoh, how profitable it would be to breed slaves for the home- 
 market, and thus made their multiplication a source of revenue, instead 
 of alann to the State ; and when his home-market began to be dull, 
 because glutted, we do not read that he annexed any part of the adjoin- 
 ing country to his dominions, or made war on a neighboring state, in 
 order to open a vndev market for the surplus he could not well use in 
 his own brick -yards ; or, that he enacted a fugitive slave law, to whip 
 into his ser\dce of sustaining slavery, and protecting it, all the free of his 
 states, under the plea that he had erected these enormities into " a law, 
 and that they must be obeyed and faithfully executed in order to pre- 
 serve the Union." 
 
 But this Pharaoh died, and went up to his account, as all slave-deal- 
 ers, and apologists must, and he was succeeded by his son, who felt him- 
 self a much stronger man than his father. The younger Pharaoh was 
 afraid of nothing. He could not only cope with Israel, but with God him- 
 self. Said the man Moses, when he stood before this king, and in the name 
 of the great God commanded him, " Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, 
 let my people go, that they may serve me ;" Pharaoh replied, " Who 
 is the Lord, that I should obey his voice to let Israel go ? I know not 
 the Lord, neither will I let Israel go." It is not wonderful that the 
 oppressor, and the apologist for slavery, should not be veiy ready to 
 recognize God, and God's law. They have always been slow to do this. 
 
 But Pharaoh had recourse to strategem to cut oft" this interference 
 of othei-s in his own matters. He doubled the task of his slaves, and 
 flogged them for not doing it. It was saying, in so much, to Moses 
 and Aaron, " You had better lot them alone, for these ' bills,' to regulate 
 and protect slavery, would never have been enacted, but for your inter- 
 ference to abolish it — the more you 'agitate,' the worse it will be for 
 Israel ; " and a short-sighted compassion would have begged Moses to 
 desist on this very ground. But God, it seems, thought otherwise. He 
 commanded Moses to prosecute his object, without flinching, unto the 
 end. And Moses obeyed God. Eight times did he stand before the 
 king of Egypt, and say, " Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, let my 
 people go, that they may serve me." But it w;us not until this oppressor 
 had surtered the tenth judgment — an awful visitation from the hand of 
 God — that he loosed his grasp. The destroying angel passed through 
 the land. There is, and there are, at the present time, who preach that 
 5 
 
34 
 
 lo st:u the clestroviiig aiigvl, :ukI " save the Union," we nuist, now, 
 protect the oppressor and crush the oppressed, and so spread the curse 
 of shivery over what part of the hind God has hitlierto not bhjrhted 
 with tliis mildew of divine wrath. 
 
 And it is Avorthy of special remark, that God expresses his great 
 aV)horence at this system of Egyptian slavery, on the ground that it 
 interfered with the relation -which the oppressed sustained to himself. 
 Tlie command was, " Let my people go, that they may serve we." 
 .lehovah might have demanded their release, on other grounds. But 
 lie takes this, as the gi-eatest reason against slavery. He has heard 
 their groans, indeed, on account of t]ie\v physical sufferings, but still He 
 does not command Pharaoh, on this ground, to let them go. He de- 
 mands their release, because their bondage interfered wth their scrvin;/ 
 God. And this we take to be the great evil of Southern slavery. It 
 interferes with the relation man sustains to God. It hinders the slave 
 from servhiy Him. This, v,'e beheve, to be its crying sin, "ashi^of 
 inconceivable magnitude," and which, nothing holy in this universe can 
 either sanction, or sustain. 
 
 There are other atrocities, I know, connected with the system. It is 
 a system of law which licenses one man to compel another to labor for 
 him, for life, without his contract or consent, half clad and half fed ; 
 and dooms his posterity, after him, to the same curse. It licenses that 
 same man to secure that same service, by whatsoever means ; — by beat- 
 ings, — by lashings, — by brandings, — by maimings, — by prisons, — 
 by starvings, — by hunting with blood hounds, — by shootings, — and 
 bv enacting the fugitive sla\e law. Nay, and in case of resistance, on 
 the part of the slave, to such outrage on the inalienable rights which 
 God has given to every human being, it licenses the master to kill him 
 with im[)unity, whose only alleged crime is that of his birth, or having 
 at some time been kidnapped or stolen. It thus licenses one man to 
 U-ratify his selfishness, injustice, avarice, ambition, pride, cruelty, and lust, 
 and still j.rotects him, in the atrocity, by law. These, I say, are some 
 of the 2ihysical e^■ils which the system licenses. The master may not be 
 guilty of them, and he may, and in not a few cases he is thus guilty. 
 But these are e\nls, so far as they are physical, that die with the body. 
 Its high-handed wickedness is, that it hinders immortal beings from 
 serving God, and so crushes the energies of the soul, and inflicts incon- 
 ceivable injury u])on the deathless spirit, and thus, except by a miracle 
 of mercy, it hands over the immortal man to the blackness of darkness 
 forever. For example, it hindei-s a man from reading the Bible. He 
 
n5 
 
 can not serve God where he i.loes not know his will. 'I'ho laws of the 
 slave states, in most cases, do not allow a slav(^ to learn to read. An 
 immortal being, as lie is, and capable, and desirous too, of learning to 
 read and of knowing God's Word, yet he is hindered by law. Slavery, 
 at the south, hinders a man from obeying God's commands, to keep the 
 Sabbath day holy. He may be allowed to keep it ; he may not be. 
 lie may attend public worship ; or he may not. The master decides. 
 "The Sabbath is made for man," for all men: all need it, the bond 
 and the free, the black and the white, and God has given every man a 
 right to it, and this right is inalienable ; and no man can take it from 
 him, without robbing both God and man. But he is dependant on his 
 master, to know whether he may serve God in this way or no. And 
 southern slavery hinders a man from obeying God, in bringing up his 
 children in the " nurture and admonition of the Lord." His children 
 are not his, but his master's ; and this is sometimes true in more senses 
 than one, as the color of the offspring, in some cases, abundantly testifv. 
 Children can not be taught obedience, according to the fifth command- 
 ment, in Southern slavery, — " Honor thy father and thy mother." They 
 must obey the master. "And \actims of the slave system at the south, 
 can not serve God under the seventh commandment. No man in 
 slaverv can have his own wife, and no woman her own husband. Both 
 are the property of the master, and may be separated from each other 
 for life, and made to form other alHances, as the master pleases. ]^)Ut. 
 farther than this : There is not a female slave at the south, that has the 
 least protection for her chastity. She has none in public sentiment, for 
 there is not a white person in the land that will avenge her wrongs. A 
 colored person can not, except under penalty of death. She has no 
 protection in the laws, for there is not a fragment of law that shields her 
 from any form of insult. She has no protection in muscular power, for 
 if a slave strike a white person, it is death. She is the victim of any, 
 and every, human brute, and no father, no husband, no brother, no 
 neighbor, no human being, can afford her redress. She is PROPERTY ; 
 she can not obey God." * 
 
 There was a man from New England, who removed to Virginia. In 
 process of time, he married a mulatto slave on his own plantation, by 
 whom he had two daughters, as white in appearance as most people ;it 
 the south. The father sent them to New England, and educated them 
 in one of our best seminaries. They tecame pious ; and, after a while. 
 
36 
 
 retuniod to tlicir father's liouse, in Virginia. The father suddenly died, 
 without the legal formality of giving them their freedom. They were 
 therefore slaves in the eye of the law, on account of their mother. An 
 uncle came forward, seized the two hundred thousand dollars of property, 
 as the heir of their father at law, (for " slaves can not inherit,") sold the 
 girls for fifteen hundred dollars each, to be put into a New Orleans 
 brothel, and put the money into his own pocket. They brought double 
 price, because they were so white and accomplished. 
 
 Such are some of the features of American slavery, ''per se," which, 
 according to Dr. Lord, receives " sanction divine," by " that divine econ- 
 omy which God gave the Hebrew State," and "which may lawfully 
 exist," and to protect which Congress has a right divine to enact the 
 " fugitive slave law," and in the name of God to " to execute penalties 
 for its evasion or resistance ; " and no citizen may appeal to the law 
 of God, in protestation of his rights, 6s\\ and religious, under such 
 circumstances, without forfeiting his right to be regarded as a christian, 
 and without being just ready to " take the inevitable plunge into the 
 gulph of infidelity." We freely confess oui-selves to be of that number, 
 who do not quite see that Christianity sanctions American slavery, or 
 the fugitive slave law that protects it, notwithstanding slave laws were 
 found in the code of Moses. 
 
 Thus we have considered American slavery, in its relation to the slave 
 laws enacted in the code of Moses ; and we have seen that there is 
 nothing whatever there, to give divine sanction to that system of iniquity 
 in this repubhc, for which Dr. Lord wishes to apologize. 
 
 We proceed now to the second point in this part of the disscussion, 
 which is: — That Jesus Christ came in contact with slavery, under the 
 Jewish law, but did not expressly condemn it; and therefore Christian- 
 ity sanctions slavery, so that governments may protect it by law. 
 
 There is a mistake here, in the premises of our author, in point of 
 fact. Jesus Christ did not come in contact with slavery, under the 
 Jewish law. And since he, as a religious teacher, was " not sent save 
 to the lost sheep of the house of Israel," so neither did he come in 
 contact with it, under any other law. The fact is, slavery, some sLx 
 hundred years before Christ, had become extinct in the Hebrew com- 
 monwealth, by the natural force of the laws of Moses, strengthened by 
 the teachings of the prophets, and the judgments of God. From the 
 thirty-fourth chapter of Jeremiah, it would seem that at about this 
 period, there was an eflfort on the part of certain covetous rulere, and 
 others of Judea, to reduce to bondage certain of the Hebrews, native 
 
37 
 
 born, or naturalized, whose six years' service had expired, and who 
 therefore were, by the laws of God entitled to their freedom. (Jeremiah, 
 34: 12 — 22.) "Therefore the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, 
 from the Lord, saying, Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel ; I 
 made a covenant with your fathers in the day that I brought them forth 
 out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondmen, saying : At the 
 end of seven years, let ye go every man his brother a Hebrew, which 
 hath been sold unto thee ; and when he hath served thee six years, 
 thou shalt let him go free from thee ; but your fathers hearkened not 
 unto me, neither inclined their ear. And ye were now turned, and had 
 done right in my sight, in proclaiming liberty every man to his neigh- 
 bor ; and ye had made a covenant before me in the house which is 
 called by my name : but ye turned and polluted my name, and caused 
 every man his servant and every man his handmaid, whom he had set 
 at liberty at their pleasure, to return, and brought them into subjection, 
 to be unto you foi* servants and for handmaids. Therefore thus saith 
 the Lord ; Ye have not hearkened unto me, in proclaiming liberty, 
 every one to his brother, and every man to his neighbor : behold, I 
 proclaim a liberty for you, saith the Lord, to the sword, to the pesti- 
 lence, and to the famine ; and I will make you to be removed into all 
 the kingdoms of the earth. And I will give the men that have 
 transgi-essed my covenant, which have not performed the words of 
 the covenant which they had made before me, when they cut the calf 
 in twain, and passed between the parts thereof, the princes of Judah, 
 and the princes of Jerusalem, the eunuchs, and the priests, and all the 
 the people of the land, which passed between the parts of the calf; I 
 wdll even give them into the hands of their enemies, and into the hand 
 of them that seek their Hfe : and their dead bodies shall be for meat 
 unto the fowls of the heaven and the beasts of the earth. And Zede- 
 kiah king of Judah and his princes will I give into the hand of their 
 enemies, and into the hand of them that seek their life, and into the 
 hand of the king of Babylon's army, which are gone up from you. 
 Behold, I will command, saith the Lord, and cause them to return to 
 to this city ; and they shall tight against it, and take it, and burn it 
 vfitix fire : and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation without an 
 inhabitant." 
 
 Such then was the doom which the God of heaven pronounced upon 
 Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, for the crime of re-capturing and 
 reducing to bondage those whom God's law regarded a? free men and 
 women. And this doom God most fearfully executed, as a warning 
 
38 
 
 to all friends of fugitive slave laws, in whatever age of the world. 
 "Jcnisualem was plundered and l)unit, and the Babylonian captivity 
 made short work of the remnants of Jewish slavery which had resisted 
 the spirit of the Mosaic institutions." And after tliis, in all future time, 
 we find, on divine record, but one single instance in which the eftbrt 
 was ever made to revive the institution and practice of slavery in the 
 Hebrew commonwealth. This took place in the year 445, before Christ, 
 and about ninety years after the return from the Babylonian captivity. 
 And when the thing was promptly met by Nehemiah, the governor 
 of Judea, the effort was entirely abandoned, and thus ended utterly, 
 and forever, every vestige of slavery, or any attempt to resuscitate the 
 institution among the Jews. (See Nehemiah 5 : 1 — 1;3. 
 
 And such, I believe, to be the uncontradicted conclusion reached by 
 our ablest writers on this subject.* Dr. Barnes, in relation to this point, 
 and in reference to this time, after saying that slavery had altogether 
 ceased in the land of Palestine, asks; — "On what ^evidence would a 
 man i-ely to prove that slavery existed at all in that land in the time 
 of the later prophets ; of the Maccabees ; or when the Saviour ajipeared ? 
 There are abundant proofs that it existed in Greece and in Rome ; but 
 what is the evidence that it existed in Judea ? So far as I have been 
 able to ascertain there are no declarations that it did, to be found in the 
 Canonical books of the Old Testament, or in Josephus.f There are no 
 allusions to laws, or customs which imply that it was so prevalent. 
 There are no facts, no coins, no medals that suppose it." 
 
 Jesus Christ, therefore, did not come in contact with slavery mider 
 the Jewish law. Sent, as he was, specially " to the lost sheep of the 
 house of Israel,^'' it was only necessary for him to treat slavery as he 
 treated every other wicked and criminal relation which he did not have 
 occasion personally to rebuke. For example, " The slave trade on tke 
 coast of Africa," " The caste of India," " The cannibalism of the South 
 Sea Islands," "The sports of the Roman Gladiatore," and "The saciifice 
 of infants to Moloch." There is no express command of Christ, in the 
 New Testament, requiring us to "call the African slave trade PiEAcy." 
 
 ♦ « Christianity and Slavery," p. 15. " Barnes." p. 226. 
 
 t Josephua when speaking of the Jubilee gires us to understand what kind of slavery 
 he is familiar with in Palestine. Says he :— "And that fiftieth year is called by the Hebrews 
 the Jubilee, wherein debtors are freed from their debts, and slaves aro set at liberty, which 
 slaves became such, though they were of the same stock, by tran.sRres.-sing some of those 
 laws whose punishment was not capital; but they were punished by this method of slavery." 
 Ant. B. III. Chap. 12: 3. 
 
31) 
 
 .lesiis Christ never forbade his disciples, in so many words, from " fight- 
 ino- one another as o-ladiators.'' lie has no where said to Christians, 
 " thou shalt in no wise feed on the flesh of thy brother man." Nor has 
 he ever commanded parents, " not to cast their infant children to the 
 fires of Moloch." And yet what monstrous doctrine to infer, because 
 Jesus Christ did not expressly condemn these crimes, that therefore he 
 (lives his divine sanction to these abominations of earth; and so author- 
 izes Christian governments to protect them hy law. 
 
 And further ; had Jesus Christ legislated, in detail, respecting every 
 sin that ever was, or would be on the earth, then would have been the 
 New Testament more voluminous than the law records of Great Britain; 
 which, it is said, would require a period of not less than one hundred 
 and fifty years for an individual to read them through. 
 
 It was sufficient, therefore, for Jesus Christ, and for the faith of his 
 followers, and for the practice of his disciples, that he rebuke whatever 
 of sin he came in immediate contact with ; and then to provide against 
 all other forms of wickedness " by saturating and permeating every par- 
 ticle of his teachings with injunctions against selfishness, injustice, cruelty, 
 pride, avarice, lust, love of domination, and love of adulation," which 
 are, by way of eminence, if not the essentials, at least in great part 
 the inseparable concomitants of Southern slavery. So much for the 
 teachings of the Saviour in deaUng with what Dr. Lord calls " the 
 EXISTING civil institution" of slaveiy, and his relation to it under the 
 Jewish law. 
 
 We proceed to consider the third point in this part of the discus- 
 sion, which is: — That the Apostles met with Roman slavery, among 
 the Gentiles, hut neither denounced it, nor the government ivhich p)ro- 
 tected it by " laws that gave the master the power of life and death over 
 his servants;'' and therefore Christianity sanctions slavery, so as to 
 authorize governments to protect it by laio. 
 
 Our author here is true in regard to his premises, but false in his 
 conclusion. It is true, that " slavery was universal in the Roman 
 Empire " in apostolic times. And it is true that " that the laws gave 
 the master the power of life and death over his servants." And it is 
 also true that the Apostles did not therefore denounce the Roman 
 jrovernment, in relation to these wicked laws of servitude and murder. 
 But it is not therefore true that apostoUc Christianity sanctions these 
 wicked laws, and the crimes which they permitted, or that it aftbrds any 
 authority whatever for a Chi-istian government, either to recognize or 
 protect similar forms of wickedness by law. If, indeed, from these 
 
40 
 
 premises^ Christianity would sanction a law to enslave a man, it would 
 also sanction a law for the master to kill his slave ; for the Roman law 
 allowed both alike, and the Saviour and his Apostles did not, in so 
 many words, denounce either the enslaving, or the killing of the slave. 
 Both alike were parts of the same " existing civil institution." And 
 further ; from such premises, Christianity would also sanction a law 
 to enslave, and then murder, white men and women, as well as black ; 
 for the Roman law respecting slaves, and which the Saviour and his 
 Apostles did not denounce, made no distinction whatever in the colw 
 of men. We say, therefore, that Dr. Lord is most manifestly false in 
 this thing. A minister of the gospel, for instance, may be in Rome at 
 the present time, and as a teacher of rehgion not feel called upon 
 particularly to denounce the government of the Pope, on account of 
 the Papal Inquisition, nor to sit in formal judgment on the iniquitous 
 laws of that horrible tribunal. He might feel — like the Apostles in 
 their epistles to the little independent communities of Christians that con- 
 stituted the individual churches which had already separated themselves 
 from the iniquitous laws of ancient Rome, and who had voluntarily put 
 themselves under the LAW OF CHRIST, and sworn allegiance to 
 the Saviour, even to the giving up of " father and mother, wife and 
 children, brethren and sisters, houses and lands, and doubtless their 
 slaves also ; — he might feel, I say, that in his relation to such a little 
 community of Christians, thus having renounced the iniquity of popery, 
 that he was not specially called upon, in his communications to them, 
 either to denounce the })apal government or its inquisition. But it 
 would by no means follow therefrom that the Christianity he was 
 promulgating would either sanction popery in general, or the legal 
 murder of men for their rehgion in particular, or that it would in 
 any way authorize a Christian code of laws to protect "the Beast" 
 and its bloody tribunal, or to re-enact its laws here, there or elsewhere. 
 Nor would it follow, moreover, thence, that a Christian minister in 
 America could see such a tribunal erected and protected by law in 
 this commonwealth, without great sin on his part, unless he lifted " up 
 his voice like a trumpet" against the bloody measure, and specially so, 
 when, as in this government, he is a part of the body politic, and is 
 therefore, like every other citizen, accountable to God for every one 
 of his acts, whether single or associated. 
 
 And if it be true that Christianity sanctions slavery, from such prem- 
 ises, then, by parity of reasoning, Christianity would sanction other 
 forms of wickedness recognized by the old Roman law ; and in what 
 
41 
 
 respect so ever the Apostles did not denounce that government, and 
 sit in formal judgment ujmh its enactments, there it would be right 
 for governments to re-enact these forms of wickedness, and protect them 
 bg a Christian code of laws at the present time. Let us see then, how 
 this reasoning ^^A\\ apply to some other things " that were existing ci\il 
 institutions" of Rome at the time in question, but whicli tlie Apostles, in 
 their Epistles to the churches, did not see fit in so many words to de- 
 nounce. 
 
 There w^ere three forms of domestic slavery amongst the Romans in 
 the days of Paul, all of which were equally abhorrent to the principles, 
 and the spirit of the Christian religion. At that time there was not 
 only a servile slavery throughout the Roman Empire such as our author 
 refers to, but there was also a conjugal, and filial slavery, wherein " the 
 laws gave the husband and father the power of'' life and death over his wife 
 and children." The Roman law respecting the relation of a father to 
 his children is set forth in Roman antiquities, by Prof. Eschenburg, in the 
 follo\\'ing language : — '' Among the Roman customs connected with the 
 birth of children, that was the most remarkable Avhich left it to the ar- 
 bitrary will of the father whether to preserve his new born child or leave 
 it to perish. In reference to his decision of this point, the mid-wife 
 placed it on the ground ; if the father choose to preserve it, he raised it 
 from the ground, and was said " tollere infantem. " This was an inti- 
 mation of his purpose to educate and acknowledge it as his own. If the 
 father did not choose to do this, he left the child on the ground, and 
 this expressed his wish to expose it, — {exponcrc.) This exjjosing, was an 
 unnatural custom borrowed from the Greeks, by which children were left 
 in the streets, particularly at the " Columna lactaria, " and abandoned 
 to their fate. Generally the power of the father was very great, but the 
 mother had no share therein. This power extended not only over the 
 life of his children, but the father could three times sell his son, and 
 three times reclaim him, and appropriate all his gains as his own. * * * 
 The freeing of a son from the power of a father, was effected by what 
 was called Emancipation, or a fictitious tlirico repeated selling of his 
 son, * * * The father and the son appeared together wth the pretended 
 purchaser, a friend of the fii-st, and with a body of witnesses, before the 
 tribunal of the Praetor. And here the imagitiary thrice repeated sale, 
 and thrice repeated manumission was completed with certain established 
 usages. * * * The power of the fother over his son was otherwise rare- 
 ly terminated, except by the death or banishment of the father ; it be- 
 longed to the peculiar rights of the Roman citizen. By emancipation 
 
42 
 
 the soil became his own muster, and possessor of iiis own property, of 
 which, however, he must give the father half, as an acknowledgment of 
 his freedom. "* 
 
 In relation to this same law of ancient Rome, Dr. Adam says : — 
 " Even when his childi-en were grown up, a father might imprison, 
 scourge, send them bound to work in the countiy, and also put them to 
 death by any punishment he pleased if they deserved it. Hence a father is 
 called a domestic judge by Seneca. A son could acquire no property but 
 by his father's consent ; and what he did thus acquire, was called his '■'■pecu- 
 Uum, " as that of a slave.f The condition of a son was in some respects 
 harder than that of a slave. A slave when sold once became free ; but 
 a son not, unless sold three times. The power of the father was sus- 
 pended when the son was promoted to any public office, but not extin- 
 guished. For it continued not only during the Hfe of the children, but 
 hkewdse extended to grand-children, and great grand-children. None of 
 them became their own masters, [^suijuris,^ till the death of their fath- 
 er and grandfather. A daughter, by marriage, passed from the power 
 of her father to that of her husband. " J 
 
 Tn further confirmation of the Roman law in this particular, Gibbon 
 in his history of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, says: — 
 " The exclusive, absolute, and the perpetual dominion of the father over 
 his children, is pecuhar to the Roman jurisprudence, and seems to be 
 coeval with the foundation of the city. The paternal power was insti- 
 tuted or confirmed by Romulus himself ; and, after the jiractice of three 
 centuries, it was inscribed on the fourth table of the Decemvirs. In 
 the forum, the senate, or the camp, the adult son of a Roman citizen, 
 enjoyed the public and private rights of a person ; in his father's house he 
 was a mere thing ; confounded by the laws with the moveables, the cattle, 
 and the slaves, whom the capricious master might alienate or destroy, 
 without being responsible to any earthly tribunal. The hand which be- 
 stowed the daily sustenance might resume the voluntary gift ; and what- 
 ever was acquired by the labor or fortune of the son, was immediately 
 lost in the property of the father. At the call of indigence or avarice, 
 the master of a fajnily could dispose of his children or his slaves. Ac- 
 cording to his discretion, a father might chastise the real or imaginary 
 faults of his children, by stripes, by imprisonment, by exile, by send- 
 ing them to the country to work in chains among the meanest of his 
 
 • Manual of Classical Lit., 317, 318. 
 
 t Livy, ii. 41. 
 
 ) Roman Antiquitlca, SO. 51 
 
43 
 
 servants. The majesty of the parent was armed with the power of life 
 and death ; and the example of such bloody executions which were 
 some times praised, and never punished, may be traced in the annals of 
 Rome, beyond the time of Pompey and Augustus. Without fear, though 
 not without danger of abuse, the Roman legislators had reposed an un- 
 bounded confidence in the sentiments of paternal love ; and the oppres- 
 sion \v;is tem])ered by the assurance that each generation must succeed in 
 its turn to the awful dignity of parent and master."* 
 
 Such, then, were Roman practices and laws, in the time of Christ and 
 his Apostles, respecting the relation of parent and children ; and with- 
 out fear of contradiction, we affirm, \h.-Ai filial slavery and murder, was 
 at that period an " existing ci\"il institution of Rome. " And similar to 
 this also \\ere Roman practice and laws, at the same period respecting 
 the slavery and murder of the wife, by the husband. Dionysius Hali- 
 carnassus, when speaking, respecting the relation of husband and wife, 
 says : — " The [Roman] laws obliged the married women, as having no 
 other refuge, to conform themselves entirely to the temper of their hus- 
 bands. But if she committed any fault, the injured person was her judge, 
 and determined the degree of her punishment. In case of adultery, or 
 when it was found that she had drunk wine (which the Greeks would 
 look upon as the least of all crimes,) her i-elations together with her 
 husband were appointed her judges, who were allowed by Romulus to 
 punish both these crimes with death. " f 
 
 And that this law respecting conjugal slavery and murder, was not a 
 dead letter, but really " existing " in the times of Christ and his Apostles, 
 is endent from a case mentioned by Tacitus, which occurred at Rome, in 
 the year 5V, in the reign of Nero. — " Pomponia Graecina, a woman of 
 illustrious birth, and the wife of Plautius, was accused of embracing a 
 foreign superstition. The matter was referred to the jurisdiction of her 
 husband. Plautius, iii conformity to ancient usage, called together a 
 number of her relations, and in their presence sat in judgment on the 
 conduct of his wife. "J 
 
 Such, then, were the " existing civil institutions " of the Roman Em- 
 pire, respecting the slavery and murder of the wife and children by the 
 husband and father, And yet, strange as it may seem to some, neither 
 husband nor father, " in all the realm of the Caesars " is told in the 
 New Testament that he must not scourge his wife for drinking wine ; 
 
 • Milman's Gibbou, iii. 1G9. 
 fDionys. Hal., ii. 25. 
 J Annal, x iii. 32. 
 
44 
 
 tliat he must not kill her, as the law of Home c/ave him power to do, and 
 without judfje or jury, for certain alleged faults, of which he might 
 suppose her guilty, and of ivhich he himself ivas the judge ; that he 
 must not cast out his new born child to die for the crime of birth ; that 
 he must not sell his son, nor treat him as a slave, nor kill him. outright, 
 according to the " existing civil institutions " of the day. Nor is there 
 a single command issued in all the JVeio Testament, enjoining upcm the 
 Christian father, the duty of emancipating his children from the bond- 
 age of that filial slavery, into which they had been so unceremoniously 
 thrust by the act of being born. "We come then to the question, " does 
 Christianity, therefore, sanction these forms of slavery in the Roman 
 Empire, because it is written " let every soul be subject unto the liigher 
 powers, " and because, forsooth, Jesus Christ and his Apostles, did not 
 see fit, in so many words, to denounce such wickedness, and the 
 government that enacted and protected it by law! And have civil 
 governments therefore the divinely delegated pouter to re-enact these stat- 
 utes now, and by legal forms and penalties, to protect these crimes 
 against God and humanity ! According to the i-easoning of l")r. Lord, in 
 the case of servile slavery, they have, and according to that same reasoning, 
 we say, then, they also have in the case of filial and conjugal slavery. 
 The cases, in so far as they are "existing civil institutions," and in re- 
 gard to the manner in which the New Testament deals with them, and 
 with the government which enacted and protected them, we aver to be 
 precisely tarallel. 
 
 The difficulty, into which our author has fallen here,- in regard to his 
 reasoning, arises, we think, from his not viewing rightly the service- 
 relation which God has instituted among men. The fact is, there is 
 a three-fold relation by divine appointment, in our civil condition in this 
 life. The first is the conjugal relation, growing out of the constitution 
 of the sexes. The second is the reciprocal relation of parent and child, 
 growing out of the helplessness and dependency of infancy and of old age. 
 The third is the service-relation, growing out of the connection of cap- 
 ital with labor. These three forms of civil relation are established by 
 di\-ine appointment ; and within their proper limits, they confer great 
 and mutual benefits, respectively, upon the parties so related. And the 
 LAW OF CHRIST restricting them, respectively, within their appro- 
 priate limit«, utterly forbids, both in its spirit and letter, every mark of 
 slavery in these relations in any form. We may have occasion to allude to 
 this three-fold relation again. Meanwhile we come to the fourth point 
 in this part of the discussion, which is: — That the Apostles preached the 
 
45 
 
 ffospel to slaves, among the. gentile converts, and enjoined upon them 
 the observance of ^'■duties that grow out of the relation of slavery itself'' 
 and therefore christanity sanctions slavery so that government may pro- 
 tect it by laio. 
 
 This argument of our author is quickly answered. Christ said : — 
 "Blessed are ye whom men shall revile you, and persecute you, and 
 shall say all manner of enl against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice 
 and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven. For so 
 pei-secuted they the prophets, which were before you." Now this preach- 
 ing of Christ, to suflfering Christians, by no means authorizes men to re- 
 \-ile or persecute or speak evil of them. Much less does it authorize 
 government to protect such wrong doing by law. Again ; Christ has 
 issued his command in the New Testament, to Christians : " That ye re- 
 sist not evil ; but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn un- 
 to him the other also." But verily, this does not authorize a man to 
 smite a Christian on either cheek, or warrant government to protect the 
 outrage by law. Precisely of this character is the instruction of the 
 New Testament, to slaves who were suffering " wrongfully " under the 
 cruel and unjust treatment of their masters. An example of this teach- 
 ing may be seen in 1st Peter, 2 : 18 — 19, where servants are exhorted 
 to be obedient to " froward '' masters, '■ for this," says Peter, " is thank- 
 worthy, if a man for conscience toioard God, endure grief, suffering 
 WRONGFULLY." Aud the christian servant under such circumstances, 
 is exhorted to suffer the wrongs of slavery, taking Christ for an example : 
 " For even hereunto were ye called ; because Christ also suffered for us, 
 leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps." See a similar 
 passage, also, in Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians, 6 : 5 — 8, where, as in 
 general, obedience is urged upon the Christian servant by motives such as 
 the following : " as the servants of Christ doing the will of God from 
 the heart, with good will doing service as to the Lord, and not to 
 MEN." See also, Coloss. 3 : 22 — 25, and 1st Tim. 5 : 1 — 5, and Titus 
 2 : 9 — 10, which, I believe constitute the only passages in the New Tes- 
 tament containing instructions to servants ; and they teach us one and the 
 same doctiine, so far as the servants thus addressed were slaves, prop- 
 erly so called. And such precepts to Christian servants, in -relation to 
 patient obedience under wrong treatment, and to the prohil)ition of vice on 
 their part, no more demonstrate that christanity sanctions slavery, and 
 authorizes government to protect it by law, than would an exhortation 
 forbidding revenge, and encouraging meekness, fortitude and faith in the 
 Christian martyr, justify the papal inquisition in lighting the fagot to 
 
46 
 
 consume his body, because he would not give up his soul for safe keep- 
 ing into the hands of the Pope of Rome. It was thus that the Apostles 
 preached the gospel to slaves among the gentile converts, and enjoined 
 upon them the observance of " duties which grow out of tJie relation of 
 slavery'" itself 
 
 We proceed therefore to the fifth and last point in this part of the dis- 
 cussion, which is: that the Apostles legislated for slave-holders in Chris- 
 tian churches, respecting the treatment of their slaves, but said nothing 
 respecting the dutg of emancipating them; and therefore Christianity sanc- 
 tions slavery so that government may protect it by laio. 
 
 We gather this sentiment of our anther from some general remarks 
 in his sermon, one or two of which it may be well here to quote in his 
 own words. They are as follows : " Paul sent Onesimus back to his 
 master on the same principles which he enjoined upon the Romans, sub- 
 jection to existing civil authority:'' "The inspired teachers of Christian- 
 ity instructed both masters and slaves, in regard to the duties which grow 
 out of the institution of slavery, without either approving or con- 
 demning the relation itself." 
 
 We are prepared to show that our author does greatly depart from 
 the truth in his statement, respecting the instructions which masters 
 have received from the inspired teachers of Christianity, in this respect. 
 On a point of such Altai importance to his argument, we certainly should 
 have supposed that he would have been particular to give the chapter 
 and verse of the New Testament, where such instructions as he describes, 
 are to be found ; and would moreover, have taken particular pains to prove 
 that the masters thus instructed, were addrassed respecting ''duties 
 which grow out of the institution of SLAVERY." rather than duties 
 which gi'ow out of a free sei-vice-relation of servants, properly so called. 
 But as Dr. Lord has, as in general, chosen to give us nothing but asser- 
 tion without proof, on this point, we can do no more now, nor indeed 
 less, than to collate the different piissages in the New Testament, so far 
 as we remember, where masters are addressed respecting servants, and 
 see what proof they afford us, " that the inspired teachers of Christianity 
 instructed masters in regard to SLAVES." Our position is, that mas- 
 ters in the relation of s/a i-e-holdors, are no where instructed in the New 
 Testament, repecting the duties of slave-holding any more than 2)irates, 
 are instructed in the New Testament, respecting the duties and modes of 
 robbing and murdering men. 
 
 There are two passages in the New Testament, addressed to masters, 
 and they are a.s follows : " And ye masters do the same things unto 
 
47 
 
 them, forbearing threatening, knowing that your master also is in heav- 
 en, neither is their respect of persons with him." [Ephesians 6:9.] 
 "Masters give to your servants that which is just and equal, knowing 
 that ye also have a master in heaven." [Colossians 4:1.] 
 
 These tivo passages, together with Paul's instructions to Philemon 
 respecting Onesimus, constitute, so far as we have been able to learn, the 
 entire instructions in the New Testament, claimed to be addressed to 
 slave-holders, respecting their slaves. To say the least, we think 
 they atford a somwehat slender platform upon which to rear 
 so mighty a system of wickedness and crime, as that of modern do- 
 mestic slavery. Dr. Wayland, when referring to these two passages of 
 scripture as giving divine sanction to slavery, asks ; " Was there ever 
 such a moral supei-struction raised from such a foundation ? The doc- 
 trine of purgatory, from a vei-se in Maccabees — the doctrine of the papa- 
 cy, from the saying of Christ to Peter — the establishment of the Inqui- 
 sition, from the obligation to extend the knowledge of religious truth ; 
 all of these seem to me as nothing to it. I say it with entire kindness, 
 for on such a subject I am incapable of any other feeling, if the rehgion 
 of Christ allows xis to take such a license from such precepts Jis these, 
 the New Testament would be the greatest curse that ever was inflicted 
 on our race. " * 
 
 The simple question now to be determined in regard to these scrip- 
 tures, is this : does Paul address these men as masters, in relation to 
 SLAVES, under the civil authority of the law of Rome ; or does he ad- 
 dress them as viasters in relation to free servants, under the existing 
 religious authority of the law of Christ ? Are they sLAVE-holders who 
 are thus instructed, or are they masters of servants in a. free service-rela- 
 tion ? The following considerations will show conclusively we think, to 
 every intelligent and " fair minded man," that they are mastera, only in 
 this latter relation, who are thus " instructed." 
 
 1. They are evidently masters who were professors of religion, and 
 membei-s of the Christian church. Indeed the Epistles of Paul to the 
 Ephesians, and to the Colossians, were addressed " to the Saints," and 
 '' to the faithful in Christ Jesus," in these places. And Philemon is 
 distinguished by Paul particulariy, as being his " fellow laborer," and 
 for his " love and faith toward the Lord Jesus and towards all Saints." At 
 all events then, they were the sworn subjects of Jesus Christ, to whom 
 these instructions respecting their so-called slaves, are thus addressed. 
 
 Fuller and Wayland, on Slavery, p. p. 83—84. 
 
48 
 
 2. In regard to tliu words "■ karios"" and ''doiilos," in the original 
 language of Scripture, used here to designate the relation of master and 
 servant, it is proper to notice that they are not terms which imply man's 
 ownership of man ; but they are entirely generic in their meaning, 
 without determining whether the service rendered by the servant, is that 
 of a slave or of a servant under voluntary engagement. The specific 
 Avord for slave, in the Greek language is '' andrajyedon," while '' duolos" 
 is used in the bible to designate our voluntary service to God, as his ser- 
 vants, and is frequently made to denote the condition of men in 
 other relations not compulsory. In the modern dialect of the Greek 
 language, " doulos " is the name of a free hired servant, while " sklahos, " 
 from the French or Italian, is the name of a slave. Indeed, " doulos," 
 by a well understood idiom in the original language of the New Testa- 
 ment Mould also be a proper designation of a freed man, where in a 
 given case it had before even denoted the servile relation, as may be illus- 
 trated in the following cases. One of the discijjles of Christ is called 
 Matthew the publican, some time after ho had ceased to be a tax- 
 gatherer ; and on the same principle another is called " Simon the CA- 
 NANiTE, " or the ZEALOT, after, he had for years, ceased to be such : 
 while again, particular mention is made of the christian faith of Ra- 
 hab the harlot. In Grecian Antiijuities, Prof. Eschenburg says, that 
 " freed men were still termed douloi. "* Nothing certain therefore is to 
 be determined respecting the social condition of the ser\ants in these 
 passages, from the words by which their relation is designated in the 
 original Scriptures. The word " doidos, " being (/enerit, and not specific, 
 would, in South Carohna, like the woi-d servant, mean a slave ; while in 
 Massachusetts, or New Yoi-k, it would mean a servant by voluntary en- 
 gagement. And " kurios, " the word used for master, would in either 
 case be only the correlative of ''doulos'' a servant. If the servant was 
 a slave, then " kin-ios " would be a slave-holder. But if the servant was in 
 a free ser\-ice relation, then " kurios " would designate only the relation 
 of employer. 
 
 3. Having now shown that the " masters " who received '• instruc- 
 tions " respecting their servants in the New Testament, were Christian 
 men, and that nothing certain in regard to their social condition, may 
 be learned from the words master and servant in the Greek text, these 
 words being generic rather than specific in their meaning : we proceed 
 to adduce some considerations as positive proof from the bible, that 
 
 Manual of Classical Lit. 99, 
 
49 
 
 tliese masters were not SLAVE-HOLDERS, but on the cuiitrary, tbo 
 masters of servants, properly so called ; and this, in the first place, may 
 be seen from the manner in which the New Testament addresses skr- 
 vANTs who have BELIEVINU masters. 
 
 In the first Epistle to Timothy, 6 : 1-2, Paul gives Timothy some 
 directions, respecting the discharge of his duty as a Christian teacher, in 
 regard to this subject. And, " here," as Dr. Hague lias well obsei'ved, 
 " No advice is given to the young pastor, as to his manner of addres- 
 ing masters ; it relates to servants only. And of servants, two classes 
 are contemplated ; first, those who were ('hristian servants of heathen 
 mastei-s are considered. This class is designated by being '' under tlni 
 yoke." " Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their 
 own masters worthy of all honor, that the name of God and his doctrine 
 be not blasphemed." This, as Christians, they were urged to do, even 
 though they might be subject to the worst oppression ; in agreement 
 with the address of Peter to the same class ; — " For this is thankworthy, 
 if a man for conscience toward God, endure grief, suffering wrongfully. " 
 A heathen master, interpreting the rights of a servant by the light of 
 the Roman Law, would be very likely to commit acts of gross injustice; 
 Imt the precejit enjoining a meek endurance of this wrong for Christ's 
 sake, can, of course, furnish no sanction to the master's continuance t)f 
 it. But now, in this Epistle to Timothy, Paul proceeds in the next sen- 
 tence, to speak of a different class of cases ; those in which both the })ar- 
 ties were Christians. And here it is quite remarkable, that instead of 
 directing masters to treat their servants kindly, he calls upon servants, 
 themselves to beware lest theij should despisk tiikir mastkrs I His words 
 are: — "And they that have bellevinq masters, let them not despise, 
 them, because they are brethren ; but rather do their service, because 
 they are faithful and beloved, partakers of tlie benefit." Who does 
 not see that this exhortation ai-ose fiom the fact, that when both the 
 jKirties had come under the law of Christ, Christianity had chanycd 
 the relation in ivhich they stood — had enfranchised the slave — had 
 made him one of the " urkthren " — had invested him with a new di(j- 
 nity, and neiv riyhts ; so that noAv, instead of the master being under a 
 new temptation to treat the servant wrongfully, there was a great<,'r 
 danger lest the servant should abuse his elevation, shuuhl aband(Mi l,h<; 
 master's service, or treat him with contemj)t? EvidtMitly the style, the. 
 letter, and the spirit of thesi; directions to 'Juiiothy, indicate a funda 
 mental change, which Christianity had wrouglil in the relation of tliesM 
 chisses of persons, wliere both had come '' under the law " of the new 
 
50 
 
 dispensation. They had now risen to that high condition described in the 
 words of their common Lord, "One is your Master, even Christ, and 
 ALL ye are brethren." Violence, or invohmtary subjection to bondage, 
 was incompatible with such a change ; and now the Apostle was chiefly 
 anxious that the parties should not separate from each other, but by 
 continuing together on friendly terms, and, in the discharge of mu- 
 tual duties, should prove to the world, that the law of Christian love is a 
 better cement for society, than the law of force. No class of persons 
 had it in their power to afford a brighter demonstration of this, than 
 that of enfranchised servants. If they availed themselves of their 
 acknowledged rights to forsake their old master, the new reli- 
 gion would be dishonored ; if they remained, and yielded faithful ser- 
 vice, from a principle of love and of religious obligation, Christianity 
 would, through them, reveal its moral and conservative tendency, and 
 would be sure to gain new victories. The appeal which was made there- 
 fore to Christian servants on this behalf, has a most important bearing, 
 and proves alike that they had all " been called unto liberty," and that 
 it was expected that the spirit of their religion would dispose them not 
 to " use their liberty for an occasion to the flesh." * If any one deem 
 the case to be otherwise, just let him imagine how preposterous it would 
 seem for any grave and reverend bishop of our day, or for any public 
 body in the country, to send a message to the young pastoi-s of South 
 Carolina, urging them to teach the slaves of Christian planters, " not 
 to despise their masters 1 " Surely, such a message would sound 
 strangely to the planters themselves ; and if it were carried into effect 
 by some obedient Timothy, they would see the "foolishness of preach- 
 ing," in a new point of light, f 
 
 It may therefore be laid down as a general rule, that wherever in the 
 New Testament, masters wiio are believers " are instructed," respect- 
 ing their duties to their servants, then the servants of these masters are 
 not slaves, but persons in a free service-relation ; and since no masters 
 but those who are Christians are instructed, at all, in the New Testament 
 on this subject, therefore it follows that Dr. Lord does not state the 
 facts when he says : — "The inspired teachers of Christianity instructed 
 masters in regard to the duties which grow out of the institution of 
 slavery, without either approving or condemning the relation itself." 
 And that the masters were not slave-holders, who were thus instructed 
 in the New Testament may be inferred again from the very nature of 
 the instructions themselves, as found in the two passages in question. 
 
 * Galatiana, 5 : 13. 
 
 t Christianity and Slavery, pp. 36-39. 
 
51 
 
 Let us look again at these two passages carefully, and see how they 
 read. Colossians 4 ; 1 : — " Masters give unto your servants that which 
 is JUST AND EQUAL, knowing that ye also have a master in heaven." 
 Every person conversant with the Greek text of this scripture, will at 
 once recognize that by this command of God, every servant is entitled 
 to JUSTICE AND EQUITY at the hand of his master. ''Justice and 
 equity" is precisely the meaning of the words in the original Scripture 
 rendered here ''just and eqtial." Now, while justice respects the laws of 
 society, equity is founded in the laws of nature, and respects all of those 
 rights conferred on men by the Creator, whether those rights be recog- 
 nized by tlie laws of the land or not. The divine injunction in this 
 Scripture, therefore is, that the master shall render unto his servant all 
 of his RIGHTS, both of property and of person, whether they be ac- 
 cording to the laws of society, or the laws of God : nay, that the mas- 
 ter is bound to give equity to his sei'vant, as truly as he is to give him 
 justice ; — to respect the rights conferred on him by grant of the Creator, 
 not less, to say the least, than those secured to him by the statute. If 
 therefore, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, be among the 
 rights God has conferred on men, then the divine command to render to 
 the servant " that which is just and equal " utterly forbids that he even 
 be found in the condition of a slave. We will submit it to any man who 
 has a decent respect for his own intelligence and integrity, to say, whether 
 " EQUITY, " in behalf of a servant will allow a man to hold him as a 
 SLAVE, either according to the laws of Rome, which " gave the master 
 the power of life and death over the servant ; " or according to the laws 
 of the Southern States of this Republic, which allow one man to hold in 
 ruthless bondage the body, the mind, and the soul of his brother, and to 
 make him an article of merchandise for gain and for lust! And it 
 wa>^ particularlv pertinent that Paul sliould command his brethren who 
 were masters, in regard to their duties in this matter. These servants, 
 who had been slaves, had obtained their freedom, and were holding it — 
 not l)y the force of state laws operating upon their masters, but by the 
 power of an enlightened conscience under the LAW OF CHRIST, and 
 this same law of Christ, was their only safe-guard for freedom in the 
 future. It was therefore that masters are thus commanded at their 
 peril, to ^we. justice and equity to their servants, "knowing" according 
 to the divine word " that ye also have a master in heaven," to whom ye 
 are responsible in this matter, whatever may l)e your relation in this 
 respect, to the laws of tin- state. And similar also to this, is the teach- 
 ing of that other Scri])ture containing instructions to masters, and 
 found in Ephesians, 6 ; : — " And yc masters do the saiae things unto 
 
52 
 
 ilieni, [i.e. the st'iv;uits| kokhkaiung tukeateninc;, kuuwiiiii' tliai yinir 
 iiijuster also is in licavcii, neither is their respect of persons with liiiii.'" 
 
 There is no respect of persons with God. This is only another mode 
 of saying that God demands equity among men in all their relations, 
 and will hold every man accountable at the judgment for not rendering it. 
 
 And as to the injunction in this Scripture, — " do the same things " unto 
 their servants, reference is evidently had to what had been enjoined just be- 
 fore upon servants themselves, viz : that tliey should in all of their relations 
 be men of integrity, and of kindness, and of respect for the will of God. 
 
 In addition to this, the masters were forbidden not only to use force, 
 in the government of servants, but they were required to refi-ain even 
 from THREATEXiNG to do SO. Dr. liloomiield, in his notes on the New 
 Testament, ni>tices that the word " thrcateniny,''' in tlie Greek text has 
 the article before it, and that it therefore is specif c in its meaning ; and 
 after a careful examination of all the passages in the classics, where he 
 could meet with this word, he adduces proof to show that this con- 
 struction with the article signifies "the punishment awarded by law." 
 'i'his being the case, this Scripture affords us very important proof 
 that these masters cannot be slave-holders. For certainly, no man of 
 ordinary self-respect would have us suppose, that the slavery of Rome, 
 or of the Southern States, could be maintained for one hour, where the 
 master's religion would not only not allow him to punish his slaves ac- 
 cording to the laios, but would not even permit him to threaten them 
 with punishment. 
 
 It was very evidently Paul's object to show these Colossian and 
 Ephesian mastere, among the former of whom was also Philemon, that 
 they must never again attempt to hold servants according to the " exist- 
 ing civil institutions" of Rome, and that God in the judgment, would 
 hold them responsible for regulating their comluct towards their ser- 
 vants, according to the law of Christ, to whom they had sworn allegiance 
 by the Vi^rj act of their becoming Christians. It is not trne, therefore, ac- 
 cording to Dr. Lord, that "the inspired teachers of Christianity instructed 
 masters in regard to duties which grow out of the institution of slavery, 
 without either approving or condemning the relation of slavery itself ^ 
 
 And that these Christian mastei-s, who received instructions from the 
 " inspired teachers of Christianity," were not slave-holders, is evident, 
 again, from the spirit of tliose teachings in the New Testament, which 
 constitute the fundamental principles of the Christian religion, wliieh they 
 had embraced. 
 
 The author of the sermon on the Mount, said : "All things whatso- 
 ever vo would that men should do to vou. do ve even so to them, for 
 
this is the law and the pro[)liets." — Matth. 7 : 12. And that the law 
 of equal love to our fellow men, is as binding upon the human famil}- 
 as that of sujyreme love to God, is plain from the words of Christ, in 
 Matth. 22 ; 37 — 40: — "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy 
 heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first, 
 and the great commandment. And the second is likk unto it : TImi 
 shalt love tluj nelc/hbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang 
 all the law and the prophets." In the parable of the good Samaritan, 
 Christ has taught us whom God regards as our neighbor, whom we are 
 thus to love, showing that this law of love extends to the whole human 
 family, without distinction of race or condition of life. And that the 
 law of mutual love is pre-eminently fundamental as the law of 
 Christ for Christians in their relation to each other, is most emphatical- 
 ly taught us by the Saviour, in his last interview with his disciples, before 
 the crucifixion. Thi'ice did Christ enjoin upon them, on that occasion, 
 this duty of mutual love : — "A now commandment I give unto you, 
 that ye love one another, AS I loved you, that ye also love one another." 
 " This is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved 
 YOU." "Tliese things I command you, that ye love one another."* 
 To the early Christians, these precepts of Christ were no idle words. In 
 the very act of their baptism they liad vowed allegiance to the Saviour, 
 and had sworn to abandon every thing incompatible with his commands. 
 Says Paul : " For as many of you as have been baptised into Christ, 
 have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek — there is neither 
 bond nor free — there is neither male nor female — for ye are all one 
 IN Christ jESUS.f That legislature, therefore, which had raised one 
 class above another by distinction, founded in rank, sex, birth, blood, 
 and nationality, and created by human enactments in violation of those 
 rights, conferred on men by the Creator, the primitive Christians did most 
 heartily renounce as being incompatible with the law of Christ, in 
 this relation of love to each other. The several relations themselves, as 
 for instance, that of husband and wife, parent and child, master and ser- 
 vant, properly so called, these the law of Christ not only allows to re- 
 main but binds men in them, in still more sacred bonds, because these 
 are ordained of God, as we have already hinted. But this law of Christ 
 utterly annihilates whatever of slavery it finds in any of these relations, 
 as being perfoctlv inconsistent with the fundamental law of mutual love 
 among disciples, who are breth^rn, and who know Vmt one master, and 
 that master Jesus Christ. Indeed so stringent was the law of Christ 
 
 •John 13: 34. 15 : 13 and 17. 
 t Galatians 3 : 27-28. 
 
54 
 
 upon those in the relation of the Christian brotherhood, that God did 
 not allow them to institute against each other, any process of law lohat- 
 ever, " according to the existing civil institutions of Rome." Said Paul 
 to some who needed special instuction in this respect, " Bare any of 
 you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unjust, and 
 not before the saints ?"— 1st Cor. 6:1. And are. we to be told that 
 there were Christians, in the days of Paul, allowed of God to hold their 
 brethren as property ; to bind them by the civil law to do service with- 
 out their contract or consent ; to exact their toil and sweat by stripes 
 and violence ; nay, to doom them to perpetual bondage, and their child- 
 ren after them, in accordance with the law of Rome, " that gave the 
 master the power of life and death over his servants ! " 
 
 Alas ! how very different from the naked assertion of Dr. Lord, is 
 the testimony of history, concerning the very early Christian church in 
 this particular, Clement, in his Epistle to the Corinthians, writes : " We 
 have knovm many among ourselves who have delivered themselves into 
 bonds and slavery, that they might restore others to liberty.'''' This 
 Clement, "whose name is in the book of life," ( Phil. 4 : 3. ) hved in 
 the first century, and was cotemporary with the Apostles. " Faulinus, 
 Bishop of j^ola, expended his whole estate and then sold himself, in 
 order to accomj)lish the same object. " " Cyprian sent to the Bishop of 
 of Numid'ia 2.500 crowns, in order to redeem some captives.''^ " Socra- 
 tes, the historian, says : that after the Romans had taken 7000 Per- 
 sian captives, Acacius, Bishop of Amida melted down the gold and sil- 
 ver plate of his church, with toh'tch he redeemed the iaptives.''' ^^ Am- 
 brose, of Milan, did the same in respect to the fwniture of his church.''''* 
 Such was the spiiit of Christians in Apostolical times and subsequently 
 in regard to slavery. Instead therefore of being slave-holders, they even 
 felt it to be the most urgent duty of the disciples of Christ, to redeem 
 at great sacrifice the slaves of the heathen, even among whom they 
 dwelt. And so strong was their abhorrence to the system, and so 
 marked their position before the world, in relation to it, that by the 
 force of their example, that slavery was, early in the Christian era, abol- 
 ished by law throughout the whole Roman Empire, f And is it credible 
 therefore, that there was slavery in the Apostolical church, when Christ- 
 ians of those days were taking such ground, and exerting such an iiifiu- 
 ence against it, among the heathen around them ! 
 
 Precisely in accordance with this view of the subject, are Paul's in- 
 structions to Philemon concerning Onesimus. Dr. Lord makes the as- 
 
 ' Biblical Repository, Oct. 1835. Art. Roman S/nrrry. 
 t Fuller & Wayliind on sflavery, p 10 !. 
 
55 
 
 sertion again, tliat Paul sent Onesimus back to his master, on the prin- 
 ciple of that ^'subjection to existing civil atithoriti/,''^ winch made Onesi- 
 mus a slave to Philemon. "NVe should like to see the first intimation in 
 the Bible, to show that this assertion of our author is tmth. Hear 
 what Paul himself says in refutation of so gross a calumny uj^on his 
 Apostolical character : " I beseech thee [Philemon] for my son Onesi- 
 mus, whom I have begotten in my bonds, * * * thou therefore receive 
 him that is my own bowels, * * * NOT now AS A SERVANT, but 
 ABOVE a servant, a BROTHER^ beloved specially to me, but how 
 much more unto thee, noxH in the flesh and in the Lord." Does 
 Paul then send Onesimus back to Philemon as a SLAVE, according to 
 the "existing civil institution," of Rome, that gave the master the pow- 
 er of life and death over his servant? AVe had supposed that Paul 
 spake the truth, when he besought his old Colossian friend and fellow 
 laborer to receive Onesimus not now as a serVxVnt, but above a ser- 
 vant, a brother, beloved. And pray, Avhat is the meaning of the word 
 " brother " in the Bible, " brother in the flesh," and " brother in the 
 Lord?" For ourselves, we had supposed that "brother in the Lord," 
 was a ftro^Aer Christian in his eccleciastical relation^ and one entitled 
 to a treatment of love, according to the new commandment of Christ : 
 " That ye love one another^ as / have loved you.'''' And we had sup- 
 posed, further, that a " brother in the Jlesh" was a brother man in his 
 civil relation, and one entitled to a treatment of equity, according to 
 the " inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the jnirsuit of happiness," 
 which God has conferred on all men. We therefore need something 
 more than assertion — something like evidence in the case, before we 
 can believe that Paul describes by this language, the condition of a slave, 
 either according to the laws of Rome, or of the Southern States of this 
 Republic. So much then for slave-holders being instructed by the 
 inspired teachers of Christianity, in regard to the duties which groto out 
 of the institution of slavery. 
 
 We have thus walked leisurely through this Thanksgiving Sermon of 
 Rev. Dr. Lortl, in favoi- of domestic slavery ; and we have at length 
 reached onr conclusion. The sermon is bad in logic, bad in theolog}', 
 and bad in humanity. It is not TRUTH, that in matters committed by 
 God to governments, Christianity gives to the magistracy the right di- 
 vine for doing wrong even, and for committing the citizen in the name 
 of God to execute the wickedness. It is not TRUTH, that to regulate 
 slavery and protect it, is a matter committed by God to Governments. 
 And it is therefore an utter FALSITY, that mngress has right divine to 
 enact the fugitive slave law, in order to kidnap men, ivomen and children, 
 
56 
 
 atul reduce them to bondage, and by Jinen and prisons, to compel us to 
 aid IN THIS MIGHTY wicKEDNKSs, and to forbid us from exercising the 
 the Christian rites of humanity in favor of the poor and defenceless, who 
 crave at our hands, a crust of bread, a cup of water, and a shelter from 
 the cold. 
 
 Let no mean therefore be deceived in this thing. As for ourselves, 
 we intend calmly to OBEY GOD, the fugitive slave law, and the sneei-s 
 at divine authority, of infidel men in high places, and in low, to the con- 
 trary notwithstanding. For if this law be treason against God, then 
 will God hold every man guilty for committing the crimes which it 
 commands. A wicked law may legalize crime upon earth, but it can- 
 not relieve a man from his accountability at the bar of God. Nor will 
 public officers have the least possible excuse at the Judgment, for having 
 executed this wicked enactment. So long as any man, at any time, is 
 permitted to resign his official station, no one in office cau be comjiolled 
 to do a wicked act, contrary to his own consent. 
 
 But while it is the duty of every man to disobey the fugitive slave 
 law, it is no part of the duty of any to offer forcible resistance to the 
 magistracy in executing it, however wrong such action on the part ot 
 the magistrate may be. The reason is plain, violence is not the way to 
 dispose of this evil. Neither are private citizens the proper persons to 
 execute those penalties on men, which their crimes may deserve. It is 
 
 THEREFORE THE DUTY OF NO MAN IN THIS GOVERNMENT TO RESIST THE 
 MAGISTRACY BY FORCE, IN THE EXECUTION OF LAW, uudcr cirCUmstanCCS 
 
 of wrong. The only remedy we have in a free government like ours, is 
 
 FIRMLY TO OBEY GOD ; CALMLY TO SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES; MAN- 
 FULLY TO AVOW OUR ADHERENCE TO RIGHT, and OUr OPPOSITION TO 
 
 EVIL ; and so take measures to repeal whatever is unjust and oppressive in 
 our laws. " Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." 
 
 We now take our leave of Rev. Dr. Lord, and his Thanksgiving Ser- 
 mon, entitled "The Higher Law, in its application to the Fugi- 
 tive Slave Bill." We have found him among those who in their 
 sneer at the ''higher law," as they call it, pour contempt on the author- 
 ity of the great God. We leave him with this atfectiouate advice : 
 " Be not deceived ; God is not mocked : for WHATSOEVER a 
 
 MAN SOWETH, that shall HE ALSO REAP." 
 
LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS 
 
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