But the first part of the objectors' premise is also false; polygamy and causeless divorce never were sanctioned by Moses as domestic slavery was. Even admitting the more ignorant rendering of the matter, how wide is the difference in God's treatment of the two subjects! Slaves are mentioned as lawful property, not only in the biographies of God's erring and fallible servants,but in his own legislation; the acquisition of them is a blessing from him; their connexion with their masters is made the basis of religious sacraments; property in slaves is protected by laws of divine enactment; and the rights and duties of them and their masters defined. But when we pass to the subjects of plurality and change of wives, while we see the lives of imperfect, though good men, candidly disclosing these abuses, no legislative act recognizes them, except in the single case of divorce. In all God's laws and precepts, He always sayswife, notwives, so carefully does He avoid a seeming allowance of a plurality. The Decalogue throws no protection around concubines, against the coveting of others. The rights and duties of polygamists are never defined by divine law, save in seeming exceptions which will be explained. How unlike is all this to the legislation upon slavery!
What has been already said leaves our argument impregnable. But so much misapprehension exists about the two cases, that the general interests of truth prompt a little farther separate discussion of each. The two enactments touching divorce which present the supposed contradiction in the strongest form, are those of Moses in Deuteronomy xxiv. 1 to 4, and Matthew xix. 3 to 9. These the reader is requested to have under his eye. The form of the Pharisees' question to Christ, ("Is it lawful for a man to put away his wifefor every cause?") concurs with the testimony of Josephus, in teaching us that a monstrous perversion of Moses' statute then prevailed. The licentious, and yet self-righteous Pharisee claimed, as one of his most unquestioned privileges, the right to repudiate a wife, after the lapseof years, and birth of children, for any caprice whatsoever. The trap which they now laid for Christ was designed to compel him either to incur theodiumof attacking this usage, guarded by a jealous anger, or to connive at their interpretation of the statute. Manifestly Christ does not concede that they interpreted Moses rightly; but indignantly clears the legislation of that holy man from their licentious perversions, and then, because of their abuse of it, repeals it by his plenary authority. He refers to that constitution of the marriage tie which was original, which preceded Moses, and was therefore binding when Moses wrote, to show that it was impossible he could have enacted what they claimed. What then did Moses enact? Let us explain it. In the ancient society of the East, females being reared in comparative seclusion, and marriages negotiated by intermediaries, the bridegroom had little opportunity for a familiar acquaintance even with the person of the bride. When she was brought to him at the nuptials, if he found her disfigured with some personal deformity or disease, (the undoubted meaning of the phrase "some uncleanness,") which effectually changed desire into disgust, he was likely to regard himself as swindled in the treaty, and to send the rejected bride back with indignity to her father's house. There she was reluctantly received, and in the anomalous position of one in name a wife, yet without a husband, she dragged out a wretched existence, incapable of marriage, and regarded by her parents and brothers as a disgraceful incumbrance. It was to relieve the wretched fate of such a woman, that Moses' law was framed. She was empowered to exact of her proposedhusband a formal annulment of the unconsummated contract, and to resume thestatusof a single woman, eligible for another marriage. It is plain that Moses' law contemplates the case, only, in which no consummation of marriage takes place. She findsno favourin the eyes "of the bridegroom." He is so indignant and disgusted, that desire is put to flight by repugnance. The same fact appears from the condition of the law, that she shall in no case return to this man, "after she is defiled," i. e., after actual cohabitation with another man had made her unapproachable (without moral defilement) by the first. Such was the narrow extent of this law. The act for which it provided was divorce only in name, where thatconsensus, qui matrimonium facit, (in the words of the law maxim,) had never been perfected. The state of social usages among the Hebrews, with parental and fraternal severity towards the unfortunate daughter and sister, rendered the legislation of Moses necessary, and righteous at the time; but "a greater than Moses" was now here; and he, after defending the inspired law-giver from their vile misrepresentation, proceeded to repeal the law, because it had been so perverted, and because the social changes of the age had removed its righteous grounds. Let the Abolitionists show us a similar change in the law of domestic slavery, made by Christ, and we will admit that the moral conditions of the relation have changed since Moses' day.
The case of the polygamist is still clearer; for we assert that the whole legislation of the Pentateuch and of all the Old Testament is only adverse to polygamy. As some Christian divines have taught otherwise, wemust ask the reader's attention and patience for a brief statement. Polygamy is recorded of Abraham, Jacob, Gideon, Elkanah, David, Solomon; but so are other sins of several of these; and, as every intelligent reader knows, the truthful narrative of holy writ as often discloses the sins of good men—for our warning, as their virtues for our imitation. And he who notes how, in every Bible instance, polygamy appears as the cause of domestic feuds, sin, and disaster, will have little doubt that the Holy Spirit tacitly holds all these cases up for our caution, and not our approval. But, then, God made Adam one wife only, and taught him the great law of the perpetual unity of the twain, just as it is now expounded by Jesus Christ. (Genesis ii. 23, 24, with Matthew xix. 4 to 6.) God preserved but one wife each to Noah and his sons. In every statute and preceptive word of the Holy Spirit, it is alwayswife, and notwives. The prophets everywhere teach how to treat awife, and notwives. Moses, Leviticus xviii. 18, in the code regulating marriage, expressly prohibits the marriage of a second wife in the life of the first, thus enjoining monogamy in terms as clear as Christ's. Our English version hath it: "Neither shalt thou take a wife to her sister to vex her, to uncover her nakedness, besides the other, in her lifetime." Some have been preposterous enough to take the wordsisterhere in its literal sense, and thus to force on the law the meaning that the man desiring to practise polygamy may do so provided he does not marry two daughters of the same parents; for if he did this, the two sisters sharing his bed would, like Rachel and Leah, quarrel more fiercely than two strangers. But the word "sister"must undoubtedly be taken in the sense ofmates,fellows, (which it bears in a multitude of places,) and this for two controlling reasons. The other sense makes Moses talk nonsense and folly, in the supposed reason for his prohibition; in that it makes him argue that two sisters sharing one man's bed will quarrel, but two women having no kindred blood will not. It is false to fact and to nature. Did Leah and Rachel show more jealousy than Sarah and Hagar, Hannah and Peninnah? But when we understand the law in its obvious sense, that the husband shall not divide his bed with a second mate, the first still living, because such a wrong ever harrows and outrages the great instincts placed in woman's heart by her Creator, we make Moses talk truth and logick worthy of a profound legislator. The other reason for this construction is, that the other sense places the 18th verse in irreconcilable contradiction to the 16th verse. This forbids the marriage of a woman to the husband of her deceased sister; while the 18th verse, with this false reading, would authorize it.
Once more: Malachi, (chapter ii. 14, 15.) rebuking the various corruptions of the Jews, evidently includes polygamy; for he argues in favour of monogamy, (and also against causeless divorce,) from the fact that God, "who had the residue of the Spirit," and could as easily have created a thousand women for each man as a single one, made the numbers of the sexes equal from the beginning. He states this as the motive, "that he might seek a godly seed;" that is to say, that the object of God in the marriage relation was the right rearing of children, which polygamy notoriously hinders. Now the commission of an Old Testament prophet wasnot to legislate a new dispensation; for the laws of Moses were in full force; the prophets' business was to expound them. Hence, we infer that the laws of the Mosaic dispensation on the subject of polygamy had always been such as Malachi declared them. He was but applying Moses' principles.
To the assertion that the law of the Old Testament discountenanced polygamy as really as the New Testament, it has been objected that the practice was maintained by men too pious towards God to be capable of continuing in it against express precept; as, for instance, by the "king after God's own heart," David. Did not he also commit murder and adultery? Surely there is no question whether Moses forbids these! The history of good men, alas, shows us too plainly the power of general evil example, custom, temptation, and self-love, in blinding the honest conscience. It has been objected that polygamy was so universally practised, and so prized, that Moses would never have dared to attempt its extinction. When will men learn that the author of the Old Testament law was not Moses, but God? Is God timid? Does he fear to deal firmly with his creatures? But it is denied that there is any evidence that polygamy was greatly prevalent among the Hebrews. And nothing is easier than to show, that if it had been, Moses was a legislator bold enough to grapple with it. What more hardy than his dealing with the sabbatical year, with idolatry? It is objected that the marriage of the widow who was childless to the brother of the deceased, to raise up seed to the dead, presents a case of polygamy actually commanded. We reply, no one can show that the next of kin waspermitted or required to form such marriage when he already had a wife. The celebrated J. D. Michaelis, a witness learned and not too favourable, says, in his Commentaries on the Laws of Moses, of this law, "Nor did it affect a brother having already a wife of his own." Book III., ch. vi., § 98. It is objected that polygamy is recognized as a permitted relation in Deuteronomy xxi. 15-17, where the husband of a polygamous marriage is forbidden to transfer the birthright from the eldest son to a younger, the child of a more favoured wife; and in Exodus xxi. 9, 10, where the husband is forbidden to deprive a less favoured wife of her marital rights and maintenance. Both these cases are explained by the admitted principle, that there may be relations which it was sin to form, and which yet it is sinful to break when formed. No one doubts whether the New Testament makes polygamy unlawful; yet it seems very clear that the apostles gave the same instructions to the husbands of a plurality of wives entering the Christian church. There appears, then, no evidence that polygamy was allowed in the laws of Moses.
We have thus shown that the objection of Dr. Channing to our Old Testament argument for the lawfulness of domestic slavery, is false in both its premises. First, it is not true that Moses sanctioned polygamy and causeless divorce in the sense in which he sanctioned slavery. And second, if he did, it would prove that those practices were lawful until they were prohibited by our Redeemer; but domestic slavery has met no such prohibition from him, and is therefore lawful still. If not, why did the divine Reformer strike down the two "sistersins," and leave the third, the giant evil, untouched? There is but one answer: He did not regard it as a sin.
If too much space has been devoted to this objection, the apology is, that it is a subject much misunderstood by Christian divines. The explanation is, that the study of Hebrew antiquities has, in our day, been left so much to German rationalists and secret Socinians; the late essays of British and Yankee scholars being to so great a degree servile imitations of theirs. But these skepticalliteratiof Germany, while wearing the clergyman's frock for the sake of the emoluments of an established church, have usually been unsanctified men, harbouring the most contemptuous views of Old Testament inspiration. The reader will bear in mind that, whether he is convinced, with us, that Moses actually prohibited polygamy, or not, the refutation of the Abolitionist objection is still perfectly valid.
The seventh and last objection against our Old Testament argument consists of various passages from the Hebrew prophets, which denounce the oppression of the poor, and the withholding of the labouring man's wages. Every phrase which sounds at all like their purpose is violently seized by the Abolitionists, and pressed incontinently into the service of condemning slavery, without regard to the sacred writer's intention or meaning. Were all the texts thus wrested discussed here, this section would be swelled into a book. A few passages which our opponents regard as their strongest will be cited, therefore; and the reply to these will be an answer to all. One such is Isaiah, lviii. 6: "Is not this the fast which I have chosen, to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let theoppressed go free; and that ye break every yoke?" Another is found in Jeremiah xx. 13: "Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong; that useth his neighbour's services without wages, and giveth him not for his work." Another is in Jeremiah xxxiv. 17: "Therefore, thus saith the Lord: Ye have not hearkened unto me in proclaiming liberty every man to his brother, and every man to his neighbour." And to find a scriptural stone to pelt the fugitive slave-law, they quote Isaiah xvi. 3: "Hide the outcasts; betray not him that wandereth."
Now, one would think that it should have given some pause to these perversions of Scripture, to remember that these same prophets were undoubtedly slaveholders. Witness, for instance, Elisha, who was so large a slaveholder as to have eleven ploughmen at once, and who, after he devoted himself exclusively to his prophetic ministry, still had his servants, Gehazi and others. (2 Kings, v. 20, and vi. 15.) How could they have aimed such denunciations at slave-owners, and escaped the sarcasm, "Physician, heal thyself?" It should have been remembered again, that Moses' laws, in which slaveholding was expressly sanctioned, were enacted by authority just as divine as that by which Isaiah and Jeremiah preached; that Moses was more a prophet than even they—"the greatest of the prophets;" that his laws were still in full force; that they bore to these prophets' instructions the relation of text to exposition; and that always the great burden of their accusations against their guilty countrymen was, that they had forsaken Moses' statutes. Were the guardians and expounders of the Constitution armed with power not only to repeal,but to vilify, the very law which they were appointed to expound? May the sermon contradict its own text?
Before these rebukes of oppression can be applied, then, as God's condemnation of domestic slavery, it must be proved that in His view slavery is oppression. To take this for granted is a begging of the whole question in debate. But not only is it not proved by any such texts; it is obvious from the above remarks, that it cannot be proved by them, unless God can be made to contradict himself. But when we examine a little the connected words of these prophets themselves, we learn from them what they do mean; and we see an instance, ludicrous if it were not too painful, of the heedless folly with which the Word of God is abused. Thus, in Isaiah, lviii. 6, 7, we proceed to the very next words, and learn that the duty in hand consists in "bringing to their homes the poor that are cast out," and being charitable to "their own flesh." Were the Gentile slaves of the Hebrews "their own flesh" in the sense of the Old Testament, i. e., their kindred by blood? Manifestly, the phrase intends their fellow-citizens of Hebrew blood in distress. Are slaveholders in danger of sinning by driving away from their houses their domestic slaves; and do they need objurgation to make them receive them back? Such is the "infinite nonsense" forced upon Isaiah's words by Abolitionists. There is, then, no reference here to the emancipation of Gentile slaves; but to the duties of charity, justice and hospitality towards the oppressed of their fellow-citizens. And if the passage has any reference to servants, it is only to the sin of detaining Hebrew servants beyond the Sabbatical year's release.
When we turn to Jeremiah xxii. 13, a glance at the connexion shows us that the woe against using a neighbour's services without wages, is denounced against Shallum, the wicked king of Judah, who built his palaces, not by his domestic servants, but by unlawfully impressing his political subjects. Such is the marvellous accuracy of Abolitionist exposition! So in Jeremiah xxxiv. 17, which rebukes the Jews for not "proclaiming every man liberty to his brother," one little question should have staggered our zealous accusers: Were Gentile slaves "brethren" to Jews, in the sense of the prophet? And we have only to carry the eye back to verse 14, to see him explaining himself, that they did not comply with the Mosaic law, "at the end of seven years to let go every man his brother a Hebrew, which hath been sold unto thee." From the obligation of that law, the masters of Gentiles were expressly excepted.
But the illustration of crowning folly is Isaiah xvi. 3, which is so boldly wrested to countenance the harbouring of runaway slaves. The words are not the language of the prophet at all! The chapter is a dramatic picture of the distress of the pagan nations near Judea, and especially of Moab, one among them, in a time of invasion which Isaiah denounces upon them in punishment for their sin; and this verse represents the fugitive Moabites as entreating Jews for concealment and protection when pursued by their enemies. So that there is no slave nor slave-owner in the case at all; nor does the prophet's language contain any thing to imply whether it was righteous or not for the Jews to grant the request of these affrighted sinners in the hour of their retribution.
We have now reviewed, perhaps at too much length, the various impotent attempts made to escape from the meshes of our inexorable Old Testament argument. It is an argument short, plain, convincing. Although every thing enjoined on the Hebrews is not necessarily enjoined on us, (because it may have been of temporary obligation,) yet every such thing must be innocent in its nature, because a holy God would not sanction sin to his holy people, in the very act of separating them to holiness. But slaveholding was expressly sanctioned as a permanent institution; the duties of masters and slaves are defined; the rights of masters protected, not only in the civic but the eternal moral law of God; and He himself became a slave-owner, by claiming an oblation of slaves for his sanctuary and priests. Hence, while we do not say that modern Christian nations are bound to hold slaves, we do assert that no people sin by merely holding slaves, unless the place can be shown where God has uttered a subsequent prohibition. But there is no such place, as the next chapter will show. While we well know that to secret infidels and rationalists, as all Abolitionists are, this has no weight, to every mind which reverences the inspiration of the Old Testament it is conclusive. And let every Christian note, that with the inspiration of the Old Testament stands or falls that of Christ and the apostles, because they commit themselves irretrievably to the support of the former.
Inspiration always represents the New Testament as its final teaching. Revelation is there completed; and all the instruction concerning right and wrong which man is ever to ask from God, must be sought in this book. We have done, then, with all sophistical pleas concerning the twilight of revelation: for we have come now to the meridian splendour. If slaveholding was allowed to the Old World for the hardness of its heart, here we may expect to see it repealed. Wherever the New Testament leaves the moral character of slavery, there it must stand. What, then, is its position here?
The word commonly translated servant in the authorized version of the New Testament is Δουλος, (doulos,) which is most probably derived from the verb δεω, (deo,) 'I bind.' Hence the most direct meaning of the noun is 'bondsman.' Many Abolitionists, with a reckless violence of criticism which cannot be too sternly reprobated, have endeavoured to evade the crushing testimony of the New Testament against their dogma, by denying that this word there means slave. Some ofthem would make it mean son, somehired servant, and somesubject, or dependent citizen. Even Mr. Albert Barnes, in his Commentaries on the Epistles, denies that the Word carries any evidence that a servile relation, proper, is intended by the sacred Writers. Every honest and well-informed biblical scholar feels that it would be an insult to his intelligence to suppose that a discussion of this preposterous assertion was needed for him: but as our aim is the general reader, we will briefly state the evidence that δουλος, when not metaphorical, means in the mouth of Christ and his apostles a literal, domestic slave.
Judea and the Roman Empire in their day were full of domestic slaves, so that in many places they were more numerous than the free citizens. Δουλος is confessedly the Word used for slave by secular writers of antiquity, in histories, statutes, works on political science, such as Aristotle's, in the allusions of Greeks to the Roman civil law, where they make it uniformly their translation forServus, so clearly and harshly defined in that law as a literal slave. Did apostles and evangelists use the Greek language of their day correctly and honestly? And if δουλος in them does not mean slave, there is no stronger word within the lids of the New Testament that does; (nor in the Greek language;) so that there is in all the apostolic histories and epistles, no allusion to this world-wide institution which surrounded them! Who believes this? Again: The current Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, whose idioms are more imitated in the New Testament than any other book, uses δουλος, as in Leviticus xxv. 44, for translation of theEbed, bought with money from theGentiles. The places where the New Testament writers use δουλος metaphorically imply the meaning ofslaveas the literal one, because the aptness of the trope depends on that sense. Thus, Acts iv. 29, xvi. 17, Romans i. 1, apostles are called God's δουλοι, servants, to express God's purchase, ownership and authority over them, and their strict obedience. Make the literal sense any thing less than slave proper, and the strength and beauty of the trope are gone. Again, the word is often used in contrast withson, andpolitical subject, so as to prove a different meaning. Thus, John viii. 34, 35: "Whosoever committeth sin is the servant (δουλος) of sin. And the δουλος abideth not in the house forever: but the son abideth ever." Luke xix. 13, 14: "He called his ten δουλοι, and delivered them ten pounds, etc.; but his citizens (πολιται = political subjects) hated him," etc. Galatians iv. 1: "Now the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a δουλος, though he be lord of all, but is under tutors and governors," etc. In conclusion: all well-informed and candid expositors tell us, that by δουλος, the New Testament means slave. We may mention Drs. Bloomfield, Hodge, and Trench. The classical authorities of the Greek language give this as the most proper meaning; and the biblical lexicons of the New Testament Greek testify the same. Of the latter, we may cite Dr. Edward Robinson, of New York, no friend to slavery. He says:
"Δουλος ου.δ = (subst. fr. δεω,) a bondsman, a slave, servant, properly by birth, diff. from ανδροποδον, 'one enslaved in war.' Compare Xen. Anab. iv. 1, 12, αιχμαλωτα αυδραποδα. Hell. i. 6, 15; Thuc. viii. 28, τα ανδραποδα παντα, και δουλα και ελευθερα. But sucha captive is sometimes called δουλος, Xen. Cyr. 3, 1, 11, 19, ib., 4, 4, 12. Different also from ὁ διακονος, see that art. No. 1. In a family, the δουλος was onebound to serve, a slave, the property of his master, a 'living possession,' as Aristotle calls him, Pol. 1, 4. ὁ δουλος κτημα τι εμψυχον. Compare Gen. xvii. 12, 27; Exod. xii. 44. According to the same writer, a complete household consisted of slaves and freemen, Polit. 1, 3. οικια δε τελειος εκ δουλων και ελευθερον. The δουλος, therefore, was never ahiredservant, the latter being called μισθιος, μισθωτος, q. v. Dr. Robinson then proceeds to define δουλος in detail as meaning, "1, Properly of involuntary service, aslave, servant, as opposed to ελευθερος. 2, Tropically, of voluntary service, aservant, implying obligation, obedience, devotedness. 3, Tropically, aminister, attendant, spoken of the officers and attendants of an Oriental court, who are often strictly slaves."
The mere absence of a condemnation of slaveholding in the New Testament is proof that it is not unlawful. In showing that there is no such condemnation, we are doing more than we could be held bound to do by any logical obligation: we might very properly throw the burden of proof here upon our accusers, and claim to be held innocent until we can be proved to be guilty by some positive testimony of holy writ. But our cause is so strong, that we can afford to argue exabundantia; to assert more than we are bound to show. We claim then the significant fact, that there is nowhere any rebukeof slaveholding, in express terms, in the New Testament. Of the truth of this assertion it is sufficient proof, that Abolitionists, with all their malignant zeal, have been unable to find a single instance, and are compelled to assail us only with inferences. The express permission to hold slaves given by Moses to God's people, is nowhere repealed by the 'greater than Moses,' the Divine Prophet of the new dispensation. Let the reader consider how this fact is strengthened by the attendant circumstances. Christ and his apostles preached in the midst of slaves and slaveholders. The institution was exceedingly prevalent in many parts of the world. Potter tells us that in Athens, (a place where Paul preached,) the freemen citizens, possessed of franchises, were twenty-one thousand, and the slaves four hundred thousand. The congregations to which Christ and his apostles preached, were composed of masters and their slaves. The slavery of that day, as defined by the Roman civil law, was harsh and oppressive, treating the slave as a legal nonentity, without property, rights, or legal remedy; without marriage, subject, even as to his life, to the caprice of his master, and in every respect a human beast of burden. Again: to this institution Christ and his apostles make many allusions, for illustration of other subjects; and upon the institution itself they often speak didactically. Yet, while often condemning the abuses and oppressions incident to it, they never condemn the relation. Several times the apostles give formal enumerations of the prevalent sins of their times; as in Romans i. 29, 31; Galatians v. 19 to 21; Matthew xv. 19; Colossians iii. 8, 9; 2 Timothy iii. 2 to 4. These catalogues of sins areoften full and minute; but the owning of slaves never appears among them.
Now, we are entitled to claim, that this silence of the later and final revelation leaves the lawfulness of slaveholding in full force, as expressly established in the earlier. On that allowance we plant ourselves, and defy our accusers to bring the evidence of its repeal. On them lies the burden of proof. And we have indicated by the circumstances detailed above, how crushing that burden will be to them.
This is the most appropriate place to notice the evasion attempted from the above demonstration. They plead that slavery is not specially forbidden in the New Testament, because the plan of the Bible is to give us a rule of morals, not by special enactments for every case, but by general principles of right, which we must apply to special cases as they arise. "Inspiration has not," say they, "specially condemned every possible sin which may occur in the boundless varieties of human affairs, because then the whole world would not contain the books that should be written; and the voluminous character of the rule of duty would disappoint its whole utility; and if any sin were omitted in order to abridge it, this would be taken as a sanction. Hence, God gives us a set of plain general principles, of obvious application under the law of love." Therefore, it is argued, we are not to expect that the sin of slaveholding should be singled out. Enough that general principles given exclude it.
There is a portion of truth in this statement of the matter, and in the grounds assigned for it. But waiving for the present the exposure of the groundless assertionthat there are any general principles in the New Testament condemnatory of slaveholding, we deny that this book teaches morals only by general rules. It also does it, in a multitude of cases, by special precepts. A multitude of special sins prevalent in that and all ages are singled out. This being so—the lists of particular sins being so full and specific as they are—we assert it would have been an unaccountable anomaly to pass over a thing so important, open, prevalent, had it been intrinsically wrong. But why does Revelation omit a number of particulars, and state general principles? For the lack of room, it is said. The other plan would have made the Bible too large. Now we ask, as the case actually stands in the New Testament, would not a good deal of room have been saved as to slavery, by simply specifying it as wrong? It is a queer way to economize space, thus to take up a subject, define it at large, limit, modify it, retrench its abuses, lay down in considerable detail a part of its duties and relations; and then provide by some general principle for its utter prohibition! Would not the obvious way have been, to say in three plain words, what was the only fundamental thing, after all, which, on this supposition, needed to be taught, "Slavery is sinful?" This would have settled the matter, and also have saved space and ambiguity, and made an end of definitions, limitations, abuses, inferences and all, in the only honest way. But farther, we admit that the Bible has left a multitude of new questions, emerging in novel cases, to be settled by the fair application of general principles, (which are usually illustrated in Scripture by application to some specific case.) Now must not an honest mind argue,that since the human understanding is so fallible in inferential reasonings, especially on social ethics, where the premises are so numerous and vague, and prejudices and interests so blinding, a special precept, where one is found applicable, is better than an inference probably doubtful? Will it not follow a 'thus saith the Lord,' if it has one, rather than its own deduction which may be a blunder? Well, then, if God intended us to understand that he had implicitly condemned slavery in some general principles given, it was most unlucky that He said any thing specific about it, which was not a specific condemnation. For what He has specifically said about it must lead His most honest servants to conclude that He did not intend to leave it to be settled by general inference, that He exempted it from that class of subjects. Had God not alluded to it by name, then we should have been more free to apply general principles to settle its moral character, as we do to the modern duel, not mentioned in Scripture, because it is wholly a modern usage. But since God has particularized so much about slaveholding, therefore, honesty, humility, piety, require us to study his specific teachings in preference to our supposed inferences, and even in opposition to them. Here, then, we stand: Inspiration has once expressly authorized slaveholding. Until a repeal is found equally express, it must be innocent.
Our Lord has thrown at least a probable light upon his estimation of slaveholders by his treatment of theCenturion of Capernaum, and his slave. The story may be found in Matthew viii. 5 to 13, and Luke vii. 2 to 10. This person, though a Gentile and an officer of the Roman army, was, according to the testimony of his Jewish neighbours, a sincere convert to the religion of the Old Testament, and a truly good man. He had a valued slave very sick, called in Matthew his "boy," (παις,) a common term for slave in New Testament times; but Luke calls him again and again his "slave," (δουλος.) Hearing of Christ's approach, he sent some of his Hebrew neighbours, (rulers of the synagogue,) to beseech our Lord to apply his miraculous power for the healing of his sick slave. A little later he appears himself, and explains to Jesus, that it was not arrogance, but humility, which prevented his meeting him at first, with his full confidence. For as he, though a poor mortal, was enabled, by the authority of an officer and master, to make others come and go at his bidding, so he knew that Christ could yet more easily bid away his servant's disease. And therefore he had not deemed it necessary to demand (what he was unworthy to receive) an actual visit to his house. Hereupon Christ declares with delight, that he "had not found so great faith, no, not in Israel." This was high praise indeed, after the faith of a Nathanael, a John, a James, a Mary Magdalene, a Martha, and a Lazarus. Yet this much-applauded man was a slaveholder! But our Lord comes yet nearer to the point in dispute. He speaks the word, and heals the slave, thus restoring him to the master's possession and use. Had the relation been wrong, here, now, was an excellent opportunity to set things right, when he had before him a subject so docile, so humble, so gratefuland trustful. Should not Christ have said: "Honest Centurion, you owe one thing more to your sick fellow-creature: his liberty. You have humanely sought the preservation of his being, which I have now granted; but it therefore becomes my duty to tell you, lest silence in such a case should confirm a sinful error, that your possession of him as a slave outrages the laws of his being. I cannot become accomplice to wrong. The life which I have rescued, I claim for liberty, for righteousness. I expect it of your faith and gratitude, that instead of begrudging the surrender, you will thank me for enlightening you as to your error." But no; Christ says nothing like this, but goes his way and leaves the master and all the people blinded by his extraordinary commendation of the slave-owner, and his own act in restoring the slave to him, to blunder on in the belief that slavery was all right. Certain we are, that had Dr. Channing, or Dr. Wayland, or the most moderate Abolitionist, been the miracle-worker, he would have made a very different use of the occasion. However he might have hesitated as to immediate and universal emancipation, he would have felt that the opportunity was too fair to be lost, for setting up a good strong precedent against slavery. Hence we feel sure that Christ and they are not agreed in the moral estimate of the relation.
We find the apostles everywhere treating slavery, in one particular, as the Abolitionists refuse to treat it; that is to say, distinguishing between the relation andits incidental abuses. Our accusers now claim a license from the well-known logical rule, that it is not fair to argue from the abuses of a thing to the thing itself. Hence they insist that in estimating slavery, we must take it in the concrete, as it is in these Southern States, with all that bad men or bad legislation may at any time have attached to it. And if any feature attaching to an aggravated case of oppression should be proved wrong, then the very relation of master and slave must be held wrong in itself. The bald and insolent sophistry of this claim has been already alluded to. By this way it could be proved that marriage, civil government and church government, as well as the parental relation, are intrinsically immoral; for all have been and are abused, not only by the illegal license of individual bad men, but by bad legislation. Just as reasonably might a monk say to all Mohammedans, that marriage is a sin, for the character of the institution must be tried in the concrete, with all the accessaries which usually attend it in Mohammedan lands, and most certainly with such as are established by law; and among these is polygamy, which is sinful; wherefore the marriage relation is wrong. And this preposterous logick has been urged, although it has been proved that, in the vast majority of cases in these States, masters did preserve the relation to their slaves, without connecting with it a single one of the incidents, whether allowed by law or not, which are indefensible in a moral view. To say that the relation was sinful, in all these virtuous citizens, because some of the occasional incidents were sinful, is just as outrageous as to tell the Christian mother that her authority over her child is awicked tyranny, because some drunken wretch near by has been guilty of child-murder. But our chief purpose here is to show, that the apostles were never guilty of this absurdity; and that, on the contrary, they separated between the relation and its abuses, just as Christian masters now claim to do.
Let the reader note then, that the type of slavery prevailing where the apostles preached, was, compared with ours, barbarous, cruel, and wicked in many of its customary incidents, as established both by usage and law. Slaves were regarded as having neither rights nor legal remedies. No law protected their life itself against the master. There was no recognized marriage for them, and no established parental or filial relations. The chastity of the female slave was unprotected by law against her master. And the temper of society sanctioned the not infrequent use of these powers, in the ruthless separation of families, inhuman punishments, hard labour, coarse food, maiming, and even murder. Such were the iniquities which history assures us connected themselves only too often with this relation in the apostles' days, and were sanctioned by human laws.
But did they provoke these inspired law-givers to condemn the whole institution? By no means. As we have seen, they nowhere pronounce the relation of master and slave an inherent wrong. They everywhere act as though it might be, and when not abused, was, perfectly innocent. And that it might be innocent, they forbade to the members of the Christian church all these abuses of it. Thus they separated between the relation and its abuses. Doubtless, thestandard which they had in view, in commanding masters to "render to their servants those things which are just and equal,"was the Mosaic law. We have seen how far this was in advance of the brutalities permitted by pagan laws, and how it protected the life, limbs, and chastity of servants among the Hebrews. This law, being founded in righteousness, was in its general spirit the rule of the New Testament church also. When this separation is made by the apostles between the relation and its abuses, we find that the former includes, as its essentials, just these elements: a right to the slave's labour for life, coupled with the obligation on the master to use it with justice and clemency, and to recompense the slave with a suitable maintenance; and on the slave's part, the obligation to render this labour with all good fidelity, and with a respectful obedience. Is not this just the definition of slavery with which we set out?
The Apostle Paul teaches that the condition of a slave, although not desirable for its own sake, has no essential bearing on the Christian life and progress; and therefore, when speaking as a Christian minister, and with exclusive reference to man's religious interests, he treats it as unimportant. The proof of this statement may be found in such passages as the following: 1 Cor. xii. 13, "For by one Spirit we are all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free: and have all been made to drink into one Spirit." Galat. iii. 28, "There isneither Jew nor Greek; there is neither bond nor free; there is neither male nor female; for we are all one in Jesus Christ." So, substantially, says Colos. iii. 11. But the most decisive passage is 1 Cor. vii. 20, 21: "Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called. Art thou called being a servant? care not for it; but if thou mayest be made free, use it rather." (Paul had just defined his meaning in the phrase "calling in which he was called," as being circumcised or uncircumcised, bond or free.)
The drift of all these passages is to teach that a man's reception by Christ and by the Church does not depend in any manner on his class or condition in secular life; because Christianity places all classes on the same footing as to the things of the soul, and offers to all the same salvation. When, therefore, men come to the throne of grace, the baptismal water, the communion table, distinctions of class are left behind them for the time. Hence, these distinctions are not essential, as to the soul's salvation. The last passage quoted brings out the latter truth more distinctly. Is any Christian, at his conversion, a Jew? That circumstance is unimportant to his religious life. Was he a Gentile? That also is unimportant. Was he a slave when converted to Christ? Let not this concern him, for it cannot essentially affect his religious welfare: the road to heaven is as open to him as to the freeman. But if a convenient and lawful opportunity to acquire his freedom, with the consent of his master, occurs, then freedom is to be preferred. Such is the meaning found in the words by all sober expositors, including those of countries where slavery does not exist. Whocan believe that the apostle would have taught thus, if slavery had been an iniquitous relation?
But when he tells the Christian servant that freedom is to be preferred by him to bondage, if it may be rightfully acquired, we must remember the circumstances of the age, in order to do justice to his meaning. The same apostle, speaking of marriage, says, "Art thou loosed from a wife? seek not to be bound." Does he mean to set himself against the holy estate of matrimony, and to contradict the divine wisdom which said that "it is not good for man to be alone?" By no means. He explains himself as advising thus "because of the present distress." Exposure to persecution, banishment, death, made it a step of questionable prudence at that time, to assume the responsibilities of a husband and father. Now the laws and usages of the age as to slaves were, as we have seen, harsh and oppressive. But worse than this, many masters among the heathen were accustomed to require of their slaves offices vile, and even guilty; and scruples of conscience on the slave's part were treated as an absurdity or rebellion. In such a state of society, although the relation of servitude was not in itself adverse to a holy life, the prudent man would prefer to be secured against the possibility of such a wrong, by securing his liberty if he lawfully could. Moreover, society offered a grade, and a career of advancement, to the "freedman" and his children. Master and slave were of the same colour; and a generation or two would obliterate by its unions the memory of the servile condition. But in these States, where the servant's rights were so much better protected by law and usage, andwhere the freed servant, being a black, finds himself only deprived of his master's patronage, and still debarred as much as ever from social equality by his colour and caste, the case may be very different. Freedom to the Christian slave here, may prove a loss.
Now who can believe that the Apostle Paul would have spoken thus of slavery, if he had thought it an injurious and iniquitous relation, as hostile to religion, as degrading to the victim's immortal nature, and as converting him from a rational person into a chattel, a human brute? He treats the condition of bondage, in its religious aspects, precisely as he does accidents of birth, being born circumcised or uncircumcised, a citizen of the Empire or a subject foreigner, male or female. We have a practical evidence how incompatible such language is with the Abolitionist first principle, in their very different conduct. Do they ever say to the Christian slave: "Art thou called being a servant? care not for it." We trow not. They glory in teaching every slave they can to break away from his bondage, even at the cost of robbery and murder. And Mr. Albert Barnes informs his readers, that in his interviews with runaway slaves, he long ago ceased to instruct them that it was their duty to return to their masters. It is evident, therefore, that this abolitionist and St. Paul were not agreed.
We now proceed, in the sixth place, to a fact of still greater force: that slaveholders were admitted by Christ to full communion and good standing in the Christian church. Let us first establish the fact. InActs X. 5-17, we learn that the pious Cornelius had at least two household servants, (οικετων, one of the Septuagint words for domestic slave.) There is no hint of his liberating them; but the Apostle Peter tells his brethren, Acts xi. 15-17, that he was obliged to admit him by baptism to the church, by the act of God himself. Says he: "Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as he did unto us," (power of miracles,) "who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, what was I, that I could withstand God?" So he baptized him and his servants together. Again we find the Epistle to the Ephesians addressed in the first verse, "to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful brethren in Christ Jesus," with a blessing in the second verse appropriate to none but God's children. When, therefore, in subsequent parts of the Epistle, we find any persons addressed in detail with apostolic precepts, we conclude of course that they are included in "the saints and faithful." But all expositors say these terms mean church members in good standing. If we find here any persons commanded to any duty, we know that they are church members. This thought confirms it, that St. Paul knew well that his office gave him no jurisdiction over the external world. He had himself said to the church authorities at Corinth, "What have I to do, to judge them that are without?" 1 Cor. v. 12. Now, in the sixth chapter and ninth verse of Ephesians, we find him, after commanding Christian husbands, Christian wives, Christian parents, Christian children, and Christian slaves, how to demean themselves, addressing Christian masters: "And ye, masters, do the same things unto them, forbearing threatening,knowing that your Master also is in heaven," &c. Here, therefore, must have been slaveholders in good standing in this favourite church, which was organized under St. Paul's own eye. The Epistle to the Colossians is also addressed "to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colosse:" and in ch. iv. 1, Christian slaveholders are addressed: "Masters, give unto your servants that which is just and equal," &c. There were, therefore, slaveholders in full communion at Colosse. Again: Mr. Albert Barnes (whom we cite here for a particular reason which will appear in the sequel) says correctly, that Timothy received his first Epistle from St. Paul at Ephesus, three or four years after that church was planted, having been left in charge there. But in Ephes. vi. 2, St. Paul Writes: "And they" (i. e. these Christian slaves) "that have believing masters, let them not despise them because they are brethren, but rather do them service because they are faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit," (i. e. of the blessings of redemption.) "These things teach and exhort." There were still slaveholders then, in this church, three or four years after its organization; and Timothy is commanded to have them treated as brethren faithful and beloved, partakers of the favour of God. The Epistle to the Ephesians, according to the same Mr. Barnes, was written from four to seven years after the founding of the church, and that to the Colossians from ten to thirteen. So that this membership of slaveholders had continued for these periods.
But we have a stronger case still. St. Paul, during his imprisonment at Rome, addresses Philemon of Colosse thus: "Paul, a prisoner of Jesus Christ, andTimothy our brother, unto our dearly beloved and fellow-labourer, (συνεργος) and to our beloved Apphia and Archippus, our fellow-soldier, and to the church in thy house." Philemon, then, was a church member; his house was a place of meeting for the church; he was beloved of Paul; and last, he was himself a Christian minister. (Such is the only meaning of συνεργος here, according to the agreement of all expositors, of whom may be mentioned Bloomfield, Doddridge, and Dr. Edward Robinson of New York.) But Philemon was a slaveholder: the very purpose of this affectionate epistle was to send back to him a runaway slave. Here, then, we have a slaveholder, not only in the membership, but ministry of the Church.
Now when we consider how jealously the apostles guarded the purity of the church, it will appear to be incredible that they should receive slaveholders thus, if the relation were unrighteous. The terms of admission (for adults) were the renunciation of all known sin, and a credible repentance leading to reparation, where ever practicable. Even the Baptist, who was unworthy to loose the shoe-latchet of Christ, could say: "Bring forth therefore the fruits meet for repentance." From all the prevalent and popular sins of Pagan society, the church members were inexorably required to turn away; else excommunication soon rid the church of their scandal. Thus, 1 Cor. v. 11, says: "But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat." Christ separated his church out of the world, to secure sanctity and holyliving. To suppose that he, or his apostles, could avowedly admit and tolerate the membership of men who persisted in criminal conduct, betrays the very purpose of the church, and impugns the purity of the Saviour himself. And here, all the evasions of Abolitionists are worthless; as when they say that Christ's mission was not to meddle with secular relations, or to interfere in politics; for the communion of the church was his own peculiar domain; and to meddle with every form of sin there was precisely his mission. Entrance to the church was voluntary. The terms of membership were candidly published; the penalty for violating them was purely spiritual, (mere exclusion from the society,) and interfered with no man's political rights or franchises. So that within this spiritual society, Christ had things his own way; there was no difficulty from without that could possibly restrain his action; and if he tolerated deliberate sin here, his own character is tarnished.
So cogent is this, that Mr. Albert Barnes, in his 'Notes' on 1 Tim. vi. 2, seeks to evade it thus: "Nor is it fairly to be inferred from this passage that he (Paul) meant to teach that they (masters) might continue this (i. e. slaveholding) and be entitled to all the respect and confidence due to the Christian name, or be regarded as maintaining a good standing in the church. Whatever may be true on these points, the passage before us only proves, that Paul considered that a man who was a slaveholdermightbe converted, and be spoken of as a 'believer' or a Christian. Many have been converted in similar circumstances, as many have in the practice of all other kinds of iniquity. Whatwas their dutyaftertheir conversion was another question."
That is, as a murderer or adulterermightbecome a subject of Almighty grace, so might a slaveholder; but all three alike must cease these crimes, when converted, in order to continue credible church members! To him who has weighed the Scripture facts, this statement will appear (as we shall find sundry others of this writer) so obviously uncandid, that it is mere affectation to refrain from calling it by its proper name, dishonesty. The simple refutation is in the fact, by which Mr. Barnes has convicted himself, that the slaveholders were still in the churches from three to thirteen years after they were organized, with no hint from the apostle that they were living in a criminal relation; that they were still beloved, approved, yea applauded, by Paul; and that one of them was even promoted to the ministry. The last case is particularly ruinous to Mr. Barnes. For when did Philemon first acquire his slave Onesimus? Before the former first joined the Church? Then Paul permitted him to remain all these years a member, and promoted him to the ministry, with the 'sin of slavery' unforsaken! Was it after he joined the church? Then a thing occurred which, on Mr. Barnes' theory, is impossible: because buying a slave, being criminal, must have terminated his church membership.
We thank God that it is true that some sinners of every class are converted. But their conversion must be followed by a prompt repentance and forsaking of their sins. Thus, it is said to the Corinthians, 1 Cor. vi. 9 to 11: "Be not deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers ofthemselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you; but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." According to the Abolitionists, another class of criminals fully deserving to be ranked in the above black list—slaveholders—enter the church under Paul's administration, without being washed or sanctified. If slaveholding is wrong, it was their duty on entering the Church to repent of, forsake and repair this wrong; to liberate their slaves, and to repay them for past exactions so far as possible. If this was their duty, it was the duty of the apostle to teach it to them. But he has not taught it: he has taken up the subject, and merely taught these masters that they would discharge their whole duty by treating their slaves, as slaves, with clemency and equity; and then he has continued them in the Church. It remains true, therefore, that this allowed membership of slaveholders in the apostolic churches, proves it no sin to own slaves.
Another fact equally decisive is, that the apostles frequently enjoin on masters and slaves their relative duties, just as they do upon husbands and wives, parents and children. And these duties they enforce, both on master and servant, by Christian motives. Pursuing the same method as under the last head, we will first establish the fact, and then indicate the use to be made of it.
In Ephesians vi. 5 to 9, having addressed the otherclasses, the Apostle Paul says: "Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart as unto Christ; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers; but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart; with good-will doing service as to the Lord and not unto men; knowing that whatsoever good thing any man doeth, the same shall he receive of the Lord, whether he be bond or free. And ye masters, do the same things unto them, forbearing threatening: knowing that your Master also is in heaven; neither is there respect of persons with him."
In Colos. iii. 22 to iv. 1, inclusive, almost the same precepts occur in the same words, with small exceptions, and standing in the same connexion with recognized relations. Let the reader compare for himself. In 1 Tim. vi, 1, 2, we read: "Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of all honour, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed. And they that have believing masters, let them not despise them because they are brethren; but rather do them service, because they are faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit. These things teach and exhort." So, in the Epistle to Titus, having directed him how to instruct sundry other classes in their relative duties, he says, ch. ii. 9 to 12: "Exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to please them well in all things: not answering again; not purloining, but showing all good fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things. For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldlylusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in this present world," etc. So, the Apostle Peter, 1 Ep. ii. 18, 19: "Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward. For this is thankworthy, if a man for conscience towards God endure grief, suffering wrongfully."
The word forservantin all these passages is δουλος, except the last, where the Apostle Peter uses οικετια. But this is also proved to mean here, domestic slaves proper, by the current Septuagint and New Testament usage, by its relation to δεσποταις, (masters,) which always means in this connexion the proprietor of a slave, and by the reference in the subsequent verse to being buffeted for a fault; an incident of the slave's condition, rather than of the hired freeman's. Now the drift of all these precepts is too plain to be mistaken. Slaves who are church-members are here instructed that it is their religious duty to obey their masters, to treat them with deferential respect, and with Christian love where the masters are Christian, and to render the service due from a servant with fidelity and integrity, without requiring to be watched or threatened. The motives urged for all this are not carnal, but evangelical, a sense of duty, love for Christ and his doctrine, the credit of which was implicated in their Christian conduct here, and the expectation of a rich reward from Jesus Christ hereafter.
But the apostles are not partial. In like manner they positively enjoin on masters who are church-members, the faithful performance of their reciprocal duties to their slaves. They must avoid a harsh and minatory government: they must allot to the slave an equitablemaintenance and humane treatment, and in every respect must act towards him so as to be able to meet that judgment, where master and slave will stand as equals before the bar of Jesus Christ, at which social rank has no weight. These precepts imply, of course, that both master and servant are church-members; otherwise they would not have been under the ecclesiastical authority of the apostles. They imply with equal clearness, that the continuance of the relation was contemplated as legitimate: for if this is terminated as sinful, the duties of the relation are at an end, and such precepts are so much breath thrown away. Does any sophist insist that the "rendering of that which is just and equal" must not be less than emancipation? The very words refute him; for then he would no longer be his servant, and the master no longer master; so that he could owe no duties as such. Further, the same passage proceeds to enjoin on the slave the duties of a continued state of servitude. We repeat: all these passages contemplate the continuance of the relation among church-members, as legitimate. What would men say of the Christian minister who should instruct the penitent gambler how to continue the stated practice of his nefarious art in a Christian manner: and the penitent adulterer how to continue his guilty connexion exemplarily? When such a law-giver as Christ legislates concerning such a thing, there is but one thing he can consistently enjoin: and that is its instant termination. If slaveholding is a moral wrong, the chief guilt, of course, attaches to the master, because on his side is the power. When the apostles pass, then, from the duties of servants to those of masters, it is unavoidablethat they must declare the imperative duty of emancipation. But they say not one word about it: they seek to continue the relation rightfully. Therefore, either slaveholding is not wrong, or the apostles were unfaithful. The explanation of these passages, which we have given, is that of all respectable expositors, especially the British, no friends of slavery.
The attempt is made to argue, that if this were correct, then the holy apostles would be implicated in a connivance at the excesses and barbarities which, the history of the times tells us, often attached to the servile condition. The answer is: that they condemn and prohibit all the wrongs, as criminal, and leave the relation itself as lawful. No other defence can be set up for their treatment of the conjugal and parental relations. Antiquarians tell us they also were then deformed by great abuses. The wife and child were no better than slaves. Over the latter the father had the power of life and death, and of selling into bondage. From the former he divorced himself at pleasure, and often visited her with corporal punishment. How do the apostles treat these facts? They recognize the relation and forbid its abuses. Shall any one say that because these abuses were current, therefore they should have denounced the domestic relations, and invented some new-fangled communism? Or shall it be said that, because they have not done this, they wink at the wife-beatings, the child-murders, and the other barbarities so common in Greek and Oriental families? We trow not. Why then should these absurd inferences be attached to their treatment of domestic slavery?
But the favourite evasion of these Scriptures is that of Dr. Wayland: "The scope of these instructions to servants is only to teach patience, fidelity, meekness, and charity, duties which Christians owe to all men, even their enemies." In like strain, Mr. Albert Barnes, in his 'Notes on Ephesians,' vi. 7, writes: "But let not a master think, because a pious slave shows this spirit, that therefore the slave feels the master is right in withholding his freedom; nor let him suppose, because religion requires the slave to be submissive and obedient, that therefore it approves of what the master does. It does this no more than it sanctions the conduct of Mary and Nero, because religion required the martyrs to be unresisting, and to allow themselves to be led to the stake. A conscientious slave may find happiness in submitting to God, and doing His will, just as a conscientious martyr may. But this does not sanction the wrong, either of the slave-owner or of the persecutor." It is difficult to restrain the expression of natural indignation at so shameless a sophism as this, which outrages at once the understanding of the reader and the honour of Christ. It represents the pure and benign genius of Christianity as walking abroad, and finding oppressor and oppressed together, the oppressor avowedly within her reach, as well as his victim, as a subject of her spiritual jurisdiction and instruction. To the one she is represented as saying: "Oh, injured slave! glorify thy meek and lowly Saviour under this unrighteous oppression, by imitating His patience." Turning then to the other, who is present, and equally subject to her authority, must she not, of course, give the correlative injunction: "Oh, master! since thy yokeis wicked, cease instantly to persecute Christ in the person of his follower." But no: abolitionism represents her as saying nothing at all on this point; but merely dismissing his side of the case with the injunction to oppress equitably! The honest mind meets such a statement, not only with the 'Incredulus sum,' but with the 'Incredulus odi,' of the Latin satirist. And the suffering victim of oppression could not but feel, while he recognized the duty of patience, that the counterpart treatment of his oppressor by Christianity was a foul injustice. The fact that Christ and apostles admitted these masters, with these slaves, to the same communion, proves that the comment of Mr. Barnes is preposterous. The fact that these Christian slaves are commanded to treat these pretended oppressors as "brethren, faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit," proves it. Do the apostles, while enjoining patience under the persecutions of a bloody Nero, admit that Nero, with his brutality, to the same Christian communion with the peaceful and holy victims, address him as "saint and faithful in Christ Jesus," and instruct him to burn and tear the Christians for their faith, in a godly manner? The comment is disproved by Peter, when he says that there were slave-owners who were "good and gentle," as well as others who were "froward." Does truth or common sense distinguish "good and gentle" persecutors? It is disproved farther, by the fact that the apostles do not enjoin patience only, on these servants, as on Christians forbearing under an injury; but they enjoin duty, obedience, and fidelity also, as upon Christians paying reciprocal obligations. It is not patience under ruthless force, whichthey require, as a tribute to Christ's honour; but it is obedience due to the master's legitimate authority, and that, a tribute due to the master also. Servants must "show all good fidelity." This implies an obligation to which to be faithful. Fidelity does not exist where there is no debt. To unrighteous exaction we may be submissive; but fidelity has no place. But the crowning refutation is, that St. Paul sent back an escaped slave to his master Philemon, from Rome to Colosse, hundreds of miles away. Will any one say that the duty of Christian submission and patience under wrongs extends so far as to require an injured Christian to go back several hundred miles, and hunt up his oppressor in order to be maltreated again, after Providence had enabled him to escape from his injuries? If Mr. Barnes is correct, Onesimus should have claimed that he had now availed himself of Christ's own command: "When they persecute you in one city, flee ye into another;" and was rightfully concealed in the midst of the vast metropolis. This was requiring him to "turn the other cheek" with a vengeance: to waive the right of peaceable escape which his Divine Lord had given him, and go all the way to Asia to be unjustly smitten again! There is this farther absurdity: the pious servant is required to stretch his forbearance to so Quixotic a degree, as to waive, not only the claim of forcible self-defence, but that of legal protection. (Oh that the holy Abolitionists had practised towards the injured South a little tythe of this forbearance which their learned scribe so consistently inculcates!) Is it Christ's requirement, that the Christian under oppression must refuse the shield of legal protection? Did Paul thinkthus, when, prosecuted at the bar of Porcius Festus by unscrupulous enemies, he claimed the rights of his citizenship with so admirable a union of forbearance and courage? Now, if Messrs. Wayland and Barnes are right, these oppressed slaves possessed a tribunal in common with their oppressors, to which they could lawfully, peacefully, forgivingly, yet righteously summon them:the church court. They could have demanded of these authorities, with the strictest Christian propriety, to use all their spiritual powers, so far as they went, to induce the masters, their fellow-members, to give them that liberty which was their due. But, so exceedingly forbearing are they, that they not only forego forcible resistance, but the peaceable claim of their ecclesiastical right, for fear they might be thought to act in an impatient manner! A highwayman meets me in a wood, and begins to beat me and rob me: I have a weapon, but I forbear to use violence against him. Meantime, the legal authorities pass by, and I also forbear to claim their protection under the law, lest it should scandalize the amiable highwayman, and make him think less favourably of my religion!
It may be well, in concluding this point, to notice the plea that Christians were required by the apostles to render not only patience and submission to the Emperor Nero, but also allegiance and hearty obedience. Yet none will say that Nero was a righteous ruler. We reply, the case is precisely in our favour: for it proves the proposition exactly parallel to ours, that civil government is a lawful institution, notwithstanding it is abused. The government of the Cæsars was providentially thede factoone, and Nero, bad as hewas, its recognized head. As such, all his magisterial acts which were not specifically contrary to God's law, were legitimate, and were the proper objects of the civic obedience of the Christian subject. Otherwise, the apostles would never have exacted it for him. The instance does imply, therefore, that civil government is a lawful relation; and this is precisely what we infer from the parallel instances of obedience enjoined on servants to masters. If Abolitionists are not willing to argue that the relation of ruler and subject is sinper se, notwithstanding the obedience required to Nero, they cannot argue from their proposed analogy between Nero's cruelties and slaveholding. But an equally conclusive reply is, that apostles never admitted a Nero, with his barbarities in full sway, to the same communion-table with his patient Christian victims, commanding the latter to forbear as towards a wrongdoer, and yet failing to give him the correlative command, to cease the wrong-doing.