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Title: Slavery Ordained of God
Author: Rev. Fred A. Ross, D.D.
Posting Date: April 6, 2014 [EBook #9171]
Release Date: October, 2005
First Posted: September 10, 2003
Language: English
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SLAVERY ORDAINED OF GOD
By
Rev. Fred. A. Ross, D.D.
"The powers that be are ordained of God." Romans xiii. 1.
TO
The Men
NORTH AND SOUTH,
WHO HONOR THE WORD OF GOD
AND
LOVE THEIR COUNTRY.
Preface.
The book I give to the public, is not made up of isolated articles. It is
one harmonious demonstration--that slavery is part of the government
ordained in certain conditions of fallen mankind. I present the subject in
the form of speeches, actually delivered, and letters written just as
published. I adopt this method to make a readable book.
I give it to the North and South--to maintain harmony among Christians,
and to secure the integrity of the union of this great people.
This harmony and union can be preserved only by the view presented in this
volume,--_i.e._ that _slavery is of God_, and to continue for the good of
the slave, the good of the master, the good of the whole American family,
until another and better destiny may be unfolded.
The _one great idea_, which I submit to North and South, is expressed in
the speech, first in order, delivered in the General Assembly of the
Presbyterian Church, Buffalo, May 27, 1853. I therein say:--
"Let us then, North and South, bring our minds to comprehend _two
ideas_, and submit to their irresistible power. Let the Northern
philanthropist learn from the Bible that the relation of master and slave
is not sin _per se_. Let him learn that God says nowhere it is sin. Let
him learn that sin is the transgression of the law; and where there is no
law there is no sin, and that _the Golden Rule_ may exist in the
relations of slavery. Let him learn that slavery is simply an evil _in
certain circumstances_. Let him learn that _equality_ is only the highest
form of social life; that _subjection_ to authority, even _slavery_, may,
in _given conditions_, be _for a time_ better than freedom to the slave
of any complexion. Let him learn that _slavery_, like _all evils_, has
its _corresponding_ and _greater good_; that the Southern slave, though
degraded _compared with his master, is elevated and ennobled compared
with his brethren in Africa_. Let the Northern man learn these things,
and be wise to cultivate the spirit that will harmonize with his brethren
of the South, who are lovers of liberty as truly as himself: And let the
Southern Christian--nay, the Southern man of every grade--comprehend that
_God never intended the relation of master and slave to be perpetual_.
Let him give up the theory of Voltaire, that the negro is of a different
species. Let him yield the semi-infidelity of Agassiz, that God created
different races of the same species--in swarms, like bees--for Asia,
Europe, America, Africa, and the islands of the sea. Let him believe that
slavery, although not a sin, is a degraded condition,--the evil, the
curse on the South,--yet having blessings in its time to the South and to
the Union. Let him know that slavery is to pass away in the fulness of
Providence. Let the South believe this, and prepare to obey the hand that
moves their destiny."
All which comes after, in the speech delivered in New York, 1856, and in
the letters, is just the expansion of this one controlling thought, which
must be understood, believed, and acted out North and South.
The Author.
Written in Cleveland, Ohio, May 28, 1857.
Contents.
Speech Before the General Assembly at Buffalo
Speech Before the General Assembly at New York
Letter to Rev. A. Blackburn
What Is the Foundation of Moral Obligation?
Letters to Rev. A. Barnes:--
I.--Results of the slavery agitation--Declaration of Independence--
The way men are made infidels--Testimonies of General Assemblies
II.--Government over man a divine institute
III.--Man-stealing
IV.--The Golden Rule
Speech Delivered at Buffalo, Before the General Assembly of the
Presbyterian Church.
To understand the following speech, the reader will be pleased to
learn--if he don't know already--that the General Assembly of the
Presbyterian Church, before its division in 1838, and since,--both Old
School and New School,--has been, for forty years and more, bearing
testimony, after a fashion, against the system of slavery; that is to say,
affirming, in one breath, that slave-holding is a "blot on our holy
religion," &c. &c.; and then, in the next utterance, making all sorts of
apologies and justifications for the slave-holder. Thus: this august body
has been in the habit of telling the Southern master (especially in the
Detroit resolutions of 1850) that he is a _sinner_, hardly meet to be
called a _Christian_; but, nevertheless, if he will only sin "from
unavoidable necessity, imposed by the laws of the States,"--if he will
only sin under the "obligations of guardianship,"--if he will only sin
"from the demands of humanity,"--why, then, forsooth, he may be a
slave-holder as long as _he has a mind to_. Yea, he may hold one slave,
one hundred or one thousand slaves, and till the day of judgment.
Happening to be in attendance, as a member of the body, in Buffalo, May,
1853, when, as usual, the system of slavery was touched, in a series of
questions sent down to the church courts below, I made the following
remarks, in good-natured ridicule of such preposterous and stultifying
testimony; and, as an argument, opening the views I have since reproduced
in the second speech of this volume, delivered in the General Assembly
which convened in New York, May, 1856, and also in the letters
following:--
BUFFALO, FRIDAY, May 27, 1853.
The order of the day was reached at a quarter before eleven, and the
report read again,--viz.:
"1. That this body shall reaffirm the doctrine of the second resolution
adopted by the General Assembly, convened in Detroit, in 1850, and,
"2. That with an express disavowal of any intention to be impertinently
inquisitorial, and for the sole purpose of arriving at the truth, so as to
correct misapprehensions and allay all causeless irritation, a committee
be appointed of one from each of the synods of Kentucky, Tennessee,
Missouri, and Virginia, who shall be requested to report to the next
General Assembly on the following points:--1. The number of slave-holders
in connection with the churches, and the number of slaves held by them. 2.
The extent to which slaves are held from an unavoidable necessity imposed
by the laws of the States, the obligations of guardianship, and the
demands of humanity. 3. Whether the Southern churches regard the
sacredness of the marriage relation as it exists among the slaves; whether
baptism is duly administered to the children of the slaves professing
Christianity, and in general, to what extent and in what manner provision
is made for the religious well-being of the slave," &c. &c.
Dr. Ross moved to amend the report by substituting the following,--with
an express disavowal of being impertinently inquisitorial:--that a
committee of _one_ from each of the Northern synods of ---- be appointed,
who shall be requested to report to the next General Assembly,--
1. The number of Northern church-members concerned, directly or
indirectly, in building and fitting out ships for the African slave-trade,
and the slave-trade between the States.
2. The number of Northern church-members who traffic with slave-holders,
and are seeking to make money by selling them negro-clothing, handcuffs,
and cowhides.
3. The number of Northern church-members who have sent orders to New
Orleans, and other Southern cities, to have slaves sold, to pay debts
owing them from the South. [See Uncle Tom's Cabin.]
4. The number of Northern church-members who buy the cotton, sugar, rice,
tobacco, oranges, pine-apples, figs, ginger, cocoa, melons, and a thousand
other things, raised by slave-labor.
5. The number of Northern church-members who have intermarried with
slave-holders, and have thus become slave-owners themselves, or enjoy the
wealth made by the blood of the slave,--especially if there be any
Northern ministers of the gospel in such a predicament.
6. The number of Northern church-members who are the descendants of the
men who kidnapped negroes in Africa and brought them to Virginia and New
England in former years.
7. The aggregate and individual wealth of members thus descended, and what
action is best to compel them to disgorge this blood-stained gold, or to
compel them to give dollar for dollar in equalizing the loss of the South
by emancipation.
8. The number of Northern church-members, ministers especially, who have
advocated _murder_ in resistance to the laws of the land.
9. The number of Northern church-members who own stock in under-ground
railroads, running off fugitive slaves, and in Sabbath-breaking railroads
and canals.
10. That a special commission be sent up Red River, to ascertain whether
Legree, who whipped Uncle Tom to death, (and who was a Northern
_gentleman_,) be not still in connection with some Northern church in good
and regular standing.
11. The number of Northern church-members who attend meetings of
Spiritual Rappers,--or Bloomers,--or Women's-Rights Conventions.
12. The number of Northern church-members who are cruel husbands.
13. The number of Northern church-members who are hen-pecked husbands.
[As it is always difficult to know the temper of speaker and audience from
a printed report, it is due alike to Dr. R., to the whole Assembly, and
the galleries, to say, that he, in reading these resolutions, and
throughout his speech, evinced great good-humour and kindness of feeling,
which was equally manifested by the Assembly and spectators, repeatedly,
while he was on the floor.]
Dr. Ross then proceeded:--Mr. Moderator, I move this amendment in the best
spirit. I desire to imitate the committee in their refinement and delicacy
of distinction. I disavow all intention to be _impertinently_
inquisitorial. I intend to be inquisitorial, as the committee say they
are,--but not _impertinently_ so. No, sir; not at all; not at all.
(Laughter.) Well, sir, we of the South, who desire the removal of the evil
of slavery, and believe it will pass away in the developments of
Providence, are grieved when we read your graphic, shuddering pictures of
the "middle passage,"--the slave-ship, piling up her canvas, as the shot
pours after her from English or American guns,--see her again and again
hurrying hogshead after hogshead, filled with living slaves, into the
deep, and, thus lightened, escape. Sir, what horror to believe that
clipper-ship was built by the hands of Northern, noisy Abolition
church-members! ["Yes, I know some in New York and Boston," said one in
the crowd.] Again, sir, when we walk along your _Broadways_, and see, as
we do, the soft hands of your church-members sending off to the South, not
only clothing for the slave, but manacles and whips, manufactured
expressly for him,--what must we think of your consistency of character?
[True, true.] And what must we think of your self-righteousness, when we
know your church-members order the sale of slaves,--yes, slaves such as
St. Clair's,--and under circumstances involving all the separations and
all the loathsome things you so mournfully deplore? Your Mrs. Stowe says
so, and it is so, without her testimony. I have read that splendid, bad
book. Splendid in its genius, over which I have wept, and laughed, and got
mad, (here some one said, "All at the same time?") yes--all at the same
time. Bad in its theology, bad in its morality, bad in its temporary evil
influence here in the North, in England, and on the continent of Europe;
bad, because her isolated cruelties will be taken (whether so meant by her
or not) as the general condition of Southern life,--while her Shelbys, and
St. Clairs, and Evas, will be looked upon as angel-visitors, lingering for
a moment in that earthly hell. The _impression made by the book is a
falsehood_.
Sir, why do your Northern church-members and philanthropists buy Southern
products at all? You know you are purchasing cotton, rice, sugar,
sprinkled with blood, literally, you say, from the lash of the driver! Why
do you buy? What's the difference between my filching this blood-stained
cotton from the outraged negro, and your standing by, taking it from me?
What's the difference? You, yourselves, say, in your abstractions, there
is no difference; and yet you daily stain your hands in this horrid
traffic. You hate the traitor, but you love the treason. Your ladies,
too,--oh, how they shun the slave-owner _at a distance_, in _the
abstract_! But alas, when they see him in the _concrete_,--when they see
the slave-owner _himself_, standing before them,--not the brutal driver,
but the splendid gentleman, with his unmistakable grace of carriage and
ease of manners,--why, lo, behold the lady says, "Oh, fie on your
slavery!--what a _wretch_ you are! But, indeed, sir, I love your
sugar,--and truly, truly, sir, _wretch_ as you are, I love you too." Your
gentlemen talk just the same way when they behold our matchless women. And
well for us all it is, that your good taste, and hearts, can thus
appreciate our genius, and accomplishments, and fascinations, and
loveliness, and sugar, and cotton. Why, sir, I heard this morning, from
one pastor only, of two or three of his members thus intermarried in the
South. May I thus give the mildest rebuke to your inconsistency of
conduct? (Much good-natured excitement.)
Sir, may we know who are the descendants of the New England kidnappers?
What is their wealth? Why, here you are, all around me. You, gentlemen,
made the best of that bargain. And you have kept every dollar of your
money from the charity of emancipating the slave. You have left us,
unaided, to give millions. Will you now come to our help? Will you give
dollar for dollar to equalize our loss? [Here many voices cried out, "Yes,
yes, we will."]
Yes, yes? Then pour out your millions. Good. I may thank you personally.
My own emancipated slaves would to-day be worth greatly more than
$20,000. Will you give me back $10,000? Good. I need it now.
I recommend to you, sirs, to find out your advocates of _murder_,--your
owners of stock in under-ground railroads,--your Sabbath-breakers for
money. I particularly urge you to find Legree, who whipped Uncle Tom to
death. He is a Northern _gentleman_, although having a somewhat Southern
name. Now, sir, you know the Assembly was embarrassed all yesterday by
the inquiry how the Northern churches may find their absent members, and
what to do with them. Here then, sir, is a chance for you. Send a
committee up Red River. You may find Legree to be a Garrison, Phillips,
Smith, or runaway husband from some Abby Kelly. [Here Rev. Mr. Smith
protested against Legree being proved to be a Smith. Great laughter.
[Footnote: This gentleman was soon after made a D.D., and I think in part
for that witticism.]] I move that you bring him back to lecture on the
_cuteness_ there is in leaving a Northern church, going South, changing
his name, buying slaves, and calculating, without _guessing_, what the
profit is of killing a negro with inhuman labor above the gain of
treating him with kindness.
I have little to say of spirit-rappers, women's-rights conventionists,
Bloomers, cruel husbands, or hen-pecked. But, if we may believe your own
serious as well as caricature writers, you have things up here of which we
down South know very little indeed. Sir, we have no young Bloomers, with
hat to one side, cigar in mouth, and cane tapping the boot, striding up to
a mincing young gentleman with long curls, attenuated waist, and soft
velvet face,--the boy-lady to say, "May I see you home, sir?" and the
lady-boy to reply, "I thank ye--no; pa will send the carriage." Sir, we of
the South don't understand your women's-rights conventions. Women have
their wrongs. "The Song of the Shirt,"--Charlotte Elizabeth,--many, many
laws,--tell her wrongs. But your convention ladies despise the Bible. Yes,
sir; and we of the South are afraid _of them_, and _for you_. When women
despise the Bible, what next? _Paris,--then the City of the Great Salt
Lake,--then Sodom, before_ and _after the Dead Sea_. Oh, sir, if slavery
tends in any way to give the _honour of chivalry_ to Southern young
gentlemen towards ladies, and the exquisite delicacy and heavenly
integrity and love to Southern maid and matron, it has then a glorious
blessing with its curse.
Sir, your inquisitorial committee, and the North so far as represented by
them, (a small fraction, I know,) have, I take it, caught a Tartar this
time. Boys say with us, and everywhere, I _reckon_, "You worry my dog, and
I'll worry your cat." Sir, it is just simply a _fixed fact: the South will
not submit to these questions_. No, not for an instant. We will not permit
you to approach us at all. If we are morbidly sensitive, you have made us
so. But you are directly and grossly violating the Constitution of the
Presbyterian Church. The book forbids you to put such questions; the book
forbids _you to begin discipline_; the book forbids your sending this
committee to help common fame bear testimony against us; the book guards
the honour of our humblest member, minister, church, presbytery, against
all this impertinently-inquisitorial action. Have you a _prosecutor_, with
his definite charge and witnesses? Have you _Common Fame_, with her
specified charges and witnesses? Have you a request from the South that
you send a committee to inquire into slanders? No. Then hands off. As
gentlemen you may ask us these questions,--we will answer you. But,
ecclesiastically, you cannot speak in this matter. You have no power to
move as you propose.
I beg leave to say, just here, that Tennessee [Footnote: At that time I
resided in Tennessee.] will be more calm under this movement than any
other slave-region. Tennessee has been ever high above the storm, North
and South,--especially we of the mountains. Tennessee!--"there she
is,--look at her,"--binding this Union together like a great, long,
broad, deep stone,--more splendid than all in the temple of Baalbec or
Solomon. Tennessee!--there she is, in her calm valour. I will not lower
her by calling her unconquerable, for she has never been assailed; but I
call her ever-victorious. King's Mountain,--her pioneer
battles:--Talladega, Emucfau, Horse-shoe, New Orleans, San Jacinto,
Monterey, the Valley of Mexico. Jackson represented her well in his
chivalry from South Carolina,--his fiery courage from Virginia and
Kentucky,--all tempered by Scotch-Irish Presbyterian prudence from
Tennessee. We, in his spirit, have looked on this storm for years
untroubled. Yes, Jackson's old bones rattled in their grave when that
infamous disunion convention met in Nashville, and its members turned
pale and fled aghast. Yes, Tennessee, in her mighty million, feels
secure; and, in her perfect preparation to discuss this question,
politically, ecclesiastically, morally, metaphysically, or physically,
with the extreme North or South, she is willing and able _to persuade
others to be calm_. In this connection, I wish to say, for the South to
the North, and to the world, that we have no fears from our
slave-population. There might be a momentary insurrection and bloodshed;
but destruction to the black man would be inevitable. The Greeks and
Romans controlled immense masses of white slaves,--many of them as
intelligent as their lords. Schoolmasters, fabulists, and poets were
slaves. Athens, with her thirty thousand freemen, governed half a
million of bondmen. Single Roman patricians owned thirty thousand. If,
then, the phalanx and the legion mastered such slaves for ages, when
battle was physical force of man to man, how certain it is that
infantry, cavalry, and artillery could hold in bondage millions of
Africans for a thousand years!
But, dear brethren, our Southern philanthropists do not seek to have this
unending bondage; Oh, no, no. And I earnestly entreat you to "stand still
and see the salvation of the Lord." Assume a masterly inactivity, and you
will behold all you desire and pray for,--you will see _America liberated
from the curse of slavery_.
The great question of the world is, WHAT IS TO BE THE FUTURE OF THE
AMERICAN SLAVE?--WHAT IS TO BE THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN MASTER? The
following _extract from the "Charleston Mercury"_ gives my view of the
subject with great and condensed particularity:--
"Married, Thursday, 26th inst., the Hon. Cushing Kewang, Secretary of
State of the United States, to Laura, daughter of Paul Coligny,
Vice-President of the United States, and one of our noblest Huguenot
families. We learn that this distinguished gentleman, with his bride, will
visit his father, the Emperor of China, at his summer palace, in Tartary,
north of Pekin, and return to the Vice-President's Tea Pavilion, on Cooper
River, ere the meeting of Congress." The editor of the "Mercury" goes on
to say: "This marriage in high life is only one of many which have
signalized that immense emigration from Christianized China during the
last seventy-five years, whereby Charleston has a population of 1,250,000,
and the State of South Carolina over 5,000,000,--an emigration which has
wonderfully harmonized with the great exodus of the negro race to
Africa." [Some gentleman here requested to know of Dr. Ross the date of
the "Charleston Mercury" recording this marriage. The doctor replied, "The
date is 27th May, 1953, exactly one hundred years from this day." Great
laughter.]
Sir, this is a dream; but it is not all a dream. No, I verily believe you
have there the Gordian knot of slavery untied; you have there the solution
of the problem; you have there the curtain up, and the last scene in the
last act of the great drama of Ham.
I am satisfied with the tendencies of things. I stand on the mountain-peak
above the clouds. I see, far beyond the storm, the calm sea and blue sky;
I see the Canaan of the African. I like to stand there on the Nebo of his
exodus, and look across, not the Jordan, but the Atlantic. I see the
African crossing as certainly as if I gazed upon the ocean divided by a
great wind, and piled up in walls of green glittering glass on either
hand, the dry ground, the marching host, and the pillar of cloud and of
fire. I look over upon the Niger, black with death to the white man,
instinct with life to the children of Ham. _There_ is the black man's
home. Oh, how strange that you of the North see not how you degrade him
when you keep him here! You will not let him vote; you will not let him
rise to honors or social equality; you will not let him hold a pew in your
churches. Send him away, then; tell him, begone. Be urgent, like the
Egyptians: send him out of this land. _There_, in his fatherland, he will
exhibit his own type of Christianity. He is, of all races, the most gentle
and kind. The _man_, the most submissive; the _woman_, the most
affectionate. What other slaves would love their masters better than
themselves?--rock them and fan them in their cradles? caress them--how
tenderly!--boys and girls? honor them, grown up, as superior beings? and,
in thousands of illustrious instances, be willing to give life, and, in
fact, die, to serve or save them? Verily, verily, this emancipated race
may reveal the most amiable form of spiritual life, and the _jewel_ may
glitter on the Ethiop's brow in meaning more sublime than all in the
poet's imagery. Brethren, let them go; and, when they are gone,--ay,
before they go away,--rear a monument; let it grow in greatness, if not on
your highest mountain, in your hearts,--in lasting memory of the
South,--in memory of your wrong to the South,--in memory of the
self-denial of the South, and her philanthropy in training the slave to
be free, enlightened, and Christian.
Can all this be? Can this double emigration civilize Africa and more than
re-people the South? Yes; and I regard the difficulties presented here, in
Congress, or the country, as little worth. God intends both emigrations.
And, without miracle, he will accomplish both. Difficulties! There are no
difficulties. Half a million emigrate to our shores, from Ireland, and all
Europe, every year. And you gravely talk of difficulties in the negro's
way to Africa! Verily, God will unfold their destiny as fast, and as
fully, as he sees best for the highest good of the slave, the highest good
of the master, and the glory of Christ in Africa.
And, sir, there are forty thousand Chinese in California. And in Cuba,
this day, American gentlemen are cultivating sugar, with Chinese hired
labor, more profitably than the Spaniards and their slaves. Oh! there is
China--half the population of the globe--just fronting us across that
peaceful sea,--her poor, living on rats and a pittance of red rice,--her
rich, hoarding millions in senseless idolatry, or indulging in the
luxuries of birds'-nests and roasted ice. Massed together, they must
migrate. Where can they go? They must come to our shores. They must come,
even did God forbid them. But he will hasten their coming. They can live
in the extremest South. It is their latitude,--their side of the ocean.
They can cultivate cotton, rice, sugar, tea, and the silkworm. Their
skill, their manipulation, is unrivalled. Their commonest gong you can
neither make nor explain. They are a law-abiding people, without castes,
accustomed to rise by merit to highest distinctions, and capable of the
noblest training, when their idolatry, which is waxing old as a garment,
shall be folded up as a vesture and changed for _that_ whose years shall
not fail. The English ambassador assures us that the Chinese negotiator of
the late treaty was a splendid gentleman, and a diplomatist to move in any
court of Europe. Shem, then, can mingle with Japheth in America.
The Chinese must come. God will bring them. He will fulfil Benton's noble
thought. The railroad must complete the voyage of Columbus. The statue of
the Genoese, on some peak of the Rocky Mountains, high above the flying
cars, must point to the West, saying, "There is the East! There is India
and Cathay."
Let us, then, North and South, bring our minds to comprehend _two ideas_,
and submit to their irresistible power. Let the Northern philanthropist
learn from the Bible that the relation of master and slave is not sin
_per se_. Let him learn that God nowhere says it is sin. Let him learn
that sin is the transgression of the law; and where there is no law,
there is no sin; and that _the golden rule_ may exist in the relations of
slavery. Let him learn that slavery is simply an evil _in certain
circumstances_. Let him learn that _equality_ is only the highest form of
social life; that _subjection_ to authority, even _slavery_, may, in
_given conditions_, be _for a time_ better than freedom to the slave, of
any complexion. Let him learn that _slavery_, like _all evils_, has its
_corresponding_ and _greater good_; that the Southern slave, though
degraded _compared with his master_, is _elevated_ and _ennobled compared
with his brethren in Africa_. Let the Northern man learn these things,
and be wise to cultivate the spirit that will harmonize with his brethren
of the South, who are lovers of liberty as truly as himself. And let the
Southern Christian--nay, the Southern man of every grade--comprehend that
_God never intended the relation of master and slave to be perpetual_.
Let him give up the theory of Voltaire, that the negro is of a different
species. Let him yield the semi-infidelity of Agassiz, that God created
different races of the same species--in swarms, like bees--for Asia,
Europe, America, Africa, and the islands of the sea. Let him believe that
slavery, although not a sin, is a degraded condition,--the evil, the
curse on the South,--yet having blessings in its time to the South and to
the Union. Let him know that slavery is to pass away, in the fulness of
Providence. Let the South believe this, and prepare to obey the hand that
moves their destiny.
Ham will be ever lower than Shem; Shem will be ever lower than Japheth.
All will rise in the Christian grandeur to be revealed. Ham will be lower
than Shem, because he was sent to Central Africa. Man south of the
Equator--in Asia, Australia, Oceanica, America, especially Africa--is
inferior to his Northern brother. The _blessing_ was upon Shem in his
magnificent Asia. The _greater blessing_ was upon Japheth in his
man-developing Europe. _Both blessings_ will be combined, in America,
_north of the Zone_, in commingled light and life. I see it all in the
first symbolical altar of Noah on that mound at the base of Ararat. The
father of all living men bows before the incense of sacrifice, streaming
up and mingling with the rays of the rising sun. His noble family, and all
flesh saved, are grouped round about him. There is Ham, at the foot of
the green hillock, standing, in his antediluvian, rakish recklessness,
near the long-necked giraffe, type of his _Africa_,--his magnificent wife,
seated on the grass, her little feet nestling in the tame lion's mane, her
long black hair flowing over crimson drapery and covered with gems from
mines before the flood. Higher up is Shem, leaning his arm over that
mouse-colored horse,--his _Arab_ steed. His wife, in pure white linen,
feeds the elephant, and plays with his lithe proboscis,--the mother of
Terah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, David, and Christ. And yet she looks
up, and bows in mild humility, to _her_ of Japheth, seated amid plumed
birds, in robes like the sky. Her noble lord, meanwhile, high above all,
stands, with folded arms, following that eagle which wheels up towards
Ararat, displaying his breast glittering with stars and stripes of scarlet
and silver,--radiant heraldry, traced by the hand of God. Now he purifies
his eye in the sun, and now he spreads his broad wings in symbolic flight
to the _West_, until lost to the prophetic eye of Japheth, under the bow
of splendors set that day in the cloud. God's covenant with man,--oh, may
the bow of covenant between us be here to-day, that the waters of _this
flood_ shall never again threaten our beloved land!
Speech Delivered in the General Assembly
New York, 1856.
The circumstances, under which this speech was delivered, are sufficiently
shown in the statement below.
It was not a hasty production. After being spoken, it was prepared for the
"Journal of Commerce," with the greatest care I could give to it: most of
it was written again and again. Unlike Pascal, who said, as to his longest
and inferior sixteenth letter, that he had not had time to make it
shorter, I had time; and I did condense in that one speech the matured
reflections of my whole life. I am calmly satisfied I am right. I am sure
God has said, and does say, "Well done."
The speech brings to view a wide range of thought, all belonging to the
subject of slavery, of immense importance. As introductory,--there is the
question of the abolition agitation the last thirty years; then, what is
right and wrong, and the foundation of moral obligation; then, the
definition of sin; next, the origin of human government, and the
relations, in which God has placed men under his rule of subjection;
finally, the word of God is brought to sustain all the positions taken.
The challenge to argue the question of slavery from the Bible was thrown
down on the floor of the Assembly, as stated. Presently I took up the
gauntlet, and made this argument. The challenger never claimed his glove,
then nor since; nor has anybody, so far as I know, attempted to refute
this speech. Nothing has come to my ears (save as to two points, to be
noticed hereafter) but reckless, bold denial of God's truth, infidel
affirmation without attempt at proof, and denunciations of myself.
_Dr. Wisner_ having said that he would argue the question on the Bible at
a following time, Dr. Ross rose, when he took his seat, and, taking his
position on the platform near the Moderator's chair, said,--
"I accept the challenge given by Dr. Wisner, to argue the question of
slavery from the Scriptures."
_Dr. Wisner_.--Does the brother propose to go into it here?
_Dr. Ross_.--Yes, sir.
_Dr. Wisner_.--Well, I did not propose to go into it here.
_Dr. Ross_.--You gave the challenge, and I accept it.
_Dr. Wisner_.--I said I would argue it at a proper time; but it is no
matter. Go ahead.
_Dr. Beman_ hoped the discussion would be ruled out. He did not think it a
legitimate subject to go into,--Moses and the prophets, Christ and his
apostles, and all intermediate authorities, on the subject of what the
General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America had done.
_Judge Jessup_ considered the question had been opened by this report of
the majority: after which _Dr. Beman_ withdrew his objection, and _Dr.
Ross_ proceeded.
I am not a slave-holder. Nay, I have shown some self-denial in that
matter. I emancipated slaves whose money-value would now be $40,000. In
the providence of God, my riches have entirely passed from me. I do not
mean that, like the widow, I gave all the living I had. My estate was then
greater than that slave-property. I merely wish to show I have no selfish
motive in giving, as I shall, the true Southern defence of slavery.
(Applause.) I speak from Huntsville, Alabama, my present home. That gem of
the South, that beautiful city where the mountain softens into the
vale,--where the water gushes, a great fountain, from the rock,--where
around that living stream there are streets of roses, and houses of
intelligence and gracefulness and gentlest hospitality,--and, withal,
where so high honor is ever given to the ministers of God.
Speaking then from that region where "_Cotton is king_," I affirm,
contrary as my opinion is to that most common in the South, that the
slavery agitation has accomplished and will do great good. I said so, to
ministerial and political friends, twenty-five years ago. I have always
favored the agitation,--just as I have always countenanced discussion
upon all subjects. I felt that the slavery question needed examination.
I believed it was not understood in its relations to the Bible and human
liberty. Sir, the light is spreading North and South. 'Tis said, I know,
this agitation has increased the severity of slavery. True, but for a
moment only, in the days of the years of the life of this noble problem.
Farmers tell us that deep ploughing in poor ground will, for a year or
two, give you a worse crop than before you went so deep; but that that
deep ploughing will turn up the under-soil, and sun and air and rain will
give you harvests increasingly rich. So, this moral soil, North and
South, was unproductive. It needed deep ploughing. For a time the harvest
was worse. Now it is becoming more and more abundant. The political
controversy, however fierce and threatening, is only for power. But the
moral agitation is for the harmony of the Northern and Southern mind, in
the right interpretations of Scripture on this great subject, and, of
course, for the ultimate union of the hearts of all sensible people, to
fulfil God's intention,--to bless the white man and the black man in
America. I am sure of this. I take a wide view of the progress of the
destiny of this vast empire. I see God in America. I see him in the North
and in the South. I see him more honored in the South to-day than he was
twenty-five years ago; and that that higher regard is due, mainly, to the
agitation of the slavery question. Do you ask how? Why, sir, this is the
how. Twenty-five years ago the religious mind of the South was leavened
by wrong Northern training, on the great point of the right and wrong of
slavery. Meanwhile, powerful intellects in the South, following the mere
light of a healthy good sense, guided by the common grace of God, reached
the very truth of this great matter,--namely, that the relation of the
master and slave is not sin; and that, notwithstanding its admitted
evils, it is a connection between the highest and the lowest races of
man, revealing influences which may be, and will be, most benevolent for
the ultimate good of the master and the slave,--conservative on the
Union, by preserving the South from all forms of Northern fanaticism, and
thereby being a great balance-wheel in the working of the tremendous
machinery of our experiment of self-government. This seen result of
slavery was found to be in absolute harmony with the word of God. These
men, then, of highest grade of thought, who had turned in scorn from
Northern notions, now see, in the Bible, that these notions are false
and silly. They now read the Bible, never examined before, with growing
respect. God is honored, and his glory will be more and more in their
salvation. These are some of the moral consummations of this agitation in
the South. The development has been twofold in the North. On the one
hand, some anti-slavery men have left the light of the Bible, and
wandered into the darkness until they have reached the blackness of the
darkness of infidelity. Other some are following hard after, and are
throwing the Bible into the furnace,--are melting it into iron, and
forging it, and welding it, and twisting it, and grooving it into the
shape and significance and goodness and gospel of Sharpe's rifles. Sir,
are you not afraid that some of your once best men will soon have no
better Bible than that?
But, on the other hand, many of your brightest minds are looking intensely
at the subject, in the same light in which it is studied by the highest
Southern reason. Ay, sir, mother-England, old fogy as she is, begins to
open her eyes. What, then, is our gain? Sir, Uncle Tom's Cabin, in many of
its conceptions, could not have been written twenty-five years ago. That
book of genius,--over which I and hundreds in the world have freely
wept,--true in all its facts, false in all its impressions,--yea, as false
in the prejudice it creates to Southern social life as if Webster, the
murderer of Parkman, may be believed to be a personification of the
_elite_ of honor in Cambridge, Boston, and New England. Nevertheless,
Uncle Tom's Cabin could not have been written twenty-five years ago. Dr.
Nehemiah Adams's "_South-Side View_" could not have been written
twenty-five years ago. Nor Dr. Nathan Lord's "_Letter of Inquiry_." Nor
Miss Murray's book. Nor "_Cotton is King_". Nor Bledsoe's "_Liberty and
Slavery"_. These books, written in the midst of this agitation, are all of
high, some the highest, reach of talent and noblest piety; all give, with
increasing confidence, the present Southern Bible reading on Slavery. May
the agitation, then, go on! I know the New School Presbyterian church has
sustained some temporary injury. But God is honored in his word. The
reaction, when the first abolition-movement commenced, has been succeeded
by the sober second thought of the South. The sun, stayed, is again
travelling in the greatness of his strength, and will shine brighter and
brighter to the perfect day.
My only fear, Mr. Moderator, is that, as you Northern people are so prone
to go to extremes in your zeal and run every thing into the ground, you
may, perhaps, become _too pro-slavery;_ and that we may have to take
measures against your coveting, over much, our daughters, if not our
wives, our men-servants, our maid-servants, our houses, and our lands.
(Laughter.)
Sir, I come now to the Bible argument. I begin at the beginning of
eternity! (Laughter.) WHAT is RIGHT AND WRONG? _That's the question of
questions_.
Two theories have obtained in the world. The one is, that right and wrong
are eternal facts; that they exist _per se_ in the nature of things; that
they are ultimate truths above God; that he must study, and does study, to
know them, as really as man. And that he comprehends them more clearly
than man, only because he is a better student than man. Now, sir, _this
theory is atheism_. For if right and wrong are like mathematical
truths--fixed facts--then I may find them out, as I find out mathematical
truths, without instruction from God. I do not ask God to tell me that one
and one make two. I do not ask him to reveal to me the demonstrations of
Euclid. I thank him for the mind to perceive. But I perceive mathematical
relations without his telling me, because they exist independent of his
will. If, then, moral truths, if right and wrong, if rectitude and sin,
are, in like manner, fixed, eternal facts,--if they are out from and above
God, like mathematical entities,--then I may find them for myself. I may
condescend, perhaps, to regard the Bible as a hornbook, in which God, an
older student than I, tells _me_ how to _begin_ to learn what he had to
study; or I may decline to be taught, through the Bible, how to learn
right and wrong. I may think the Bible was good enough, may be, for the
Israelite in Egypt and in Canaan; good enough for the Christian in
Jerusalem and Antioch and Rome, but not good enough, even as a hornbook,
for me,--the man of the nineteenth century,--the man of Boston, New York,
and Brooklyn! Oh, no. I may think I need it not at all. What next? Why,
sir, if I may think I need not God to teach me moral truth, I may think I
need him not to teach me any thing. What next? The irresistible conclusion
is, I may think I can live without God; that Jehovah is a myth,--a name; I
may bid him stand aside, or die. Oh, sir, _I will be_ the fool to say
there is no God. This is the result of the notion that right and wrong
exist in the nature of things.
The other theory is, that right and wrong are results brought into being,
mere contingencies, means to good, made to exist solely by the will of
God, expressed through his word; or, when his will is not thus known, he
shows it in the human reason by which he rules the natural heart. This is
so; because God, in making all things, saw that in the relations he would
constitute between himself and intelligent creatures, and among
themselves, NATURAL GOOD AND EVIL would come to pass. In his benevolent
wisdom, he then _willed_ LAW, to control this _natural good and evil_. And
he thereby made _conformity_ to that law to be _right_, and
_non-conformity_ to be _wrong_. Why? Simply because he saw it to be good,
and made it to be right; not because _he saw it to be right_, but because
he _made it to be right_.
Hence, the ten specific commandments of the one moral law of love are just
ten rules which God made to regulate the natural good and evil which he
knew would be in the ten relations, which he himself constituted between
himself and man, and between man and his neighbor. The Bible settles the
question:--_sin is the transgression of the law, and where there is no law
there is no sin_.
I must-advance one step further. _What is sin_, as a mental state? Is
it some quality--some concentrated essence--some elementary moral
particle in the nature of things--something black, or red, like
crimson, in the constitution of the soul, or the soul and body as
amalgamated? No. Is it self-love? No. Is it selfishness? No. What is
it? Just exactly, _self-will._ Just that. I, the creature, WILL _not
submit_ to _thy_ WILL, God, the Creator. It is the I AM, _created_, who
dares to defy and dishonor the I AM, not created,--the Lord God, the
Almighty, Holy, Eternal.
_That_ IS SIN, _per se_. And that is all of it,--so help me God! Your
child there--John--says to his father, "I WILL _not to submit_ to your
will." "Why not, John?" And he answers and says, "Because I WILL _not_."
There, sir, John has revealed _all of sin_, on earth or in hell. Satan has
never said--can never say--more. "I, Satan, WILL NOT, because I WILL _not
to submit_ to thee, God; MY WILL, not thine, shall be."
This beautiful theory is the ray of light which leads us from night, and
twilight, and fog, and mist, and mystification, on this subject, to clear
day. I will illustrate it by the law which has controlled and now
regulates the most delicate of all the relations of life,--viz.: that of
the intercourse between the sexes. I take this, because it presents the
strongest apparent objections to my argument.
Cain and Abel married their sisters. Was it wrong in the nature of things?
[Here Dr. Wisner spoke out, and said, "Certainly."] I deny it. What an
absurdity, to suppose that God could not provide for the propagation of
the human race from one pair, without _requiring them to sin!_ Adam's sons
and daughters must have married, had they remained in innocence. They must
then have sinned in Eden, from the very necessity of the command upon the
race:--"Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth." (Gen. i. 28).
What pure nonsense! There, sir!--_that_, my one question, Dr. Wisner's
reply, and my rejoinder, bring out, perfectly, the two theories of right
and wrong. Sir, Abraham married his half-sister. And there is not a word
forbidding such marriage, until God gave the law (Lev. xviii.) prohibiting
marriage in certain degrees of consanguinity. That law made, then, such
marriage _sin_. But God gave no such law in the family of Adam; because he
made, himself, the marriage of brother and sister the way, and the only
way, for the increase of the human race. _He commanded them thus to marry.
They would have sinned had they not thus married_; for they would have
transgressed his law. Such marriage was not even a natural evil, in the
then family of man. But when, in the increase of numbers, it became a
natural evil, physical and social, God placed man on a higher platform for
the development of civilization, morals, and religion, and then made the
law regulating marriages in the particulars of blood. But he still left
polygamy untouched. [Here Dr. Wisner again asked if Dr. R. regarded the
Bible as sustaining the polygamy of the Old Testament.] Dr. R.--Yes, sir;
yes, sir; yes, sir. Let the reporters mark _that_ question, and my answer.
(Laughter.) My principle vindicates God from unintelligible abstractions.
I fearlessly tell what the Bible says. In its strength, I am not afraid of
earth or hell. I fear only God. God made no law against polygamy, in the
beginning. Therefore it was no sin for a man to have more wives than one.
God sanctioned it, and made laws in regard to it. Abraham had more wives
than one; Jacob had, David had, Solomon had. God told David, by the mouth
of Nathan, when he upbraided him with his ingratitude for the blessings
he had given him, and said, "And I gave thee thy master's house, and _thy
master's wives_ into thy bosom." (2 Sam. xvii. 8.)
God, in the gospel, places man on another platform, for the revelation of
a nobler social and spiritual life. He now forbids polygamy. _Polygamy now
is sin_--not because it is in itself sin. No; but because God forbids
it,--to restrain the natural and social evil, and to bring out a higher
humanity. And see, sir, how gently in the gospel the transition from the
lower to the higher table-land of our progress upward is made. Christ and
his apostles do not declare polygamy to be sin. The new law is so wisely
given that nothing existing is rudely disturbed. The minister of God,
unmarried, must have only one wife at the same time. This law, silently
and gradually, by inevitable and fair inference of its meaning, and from
the example of the apostles, passed over the Christian world. God, in the
gospel, places us in this higher and holier ground and air of love. We
sin, then, if we marry the sister, and other near of kin; and we sin if we
marry, at the same time, more wives than one, not because there is sin in
the thing itself, whatever of natural evil there might be, but because in
so doing we transgress God's law, given to secure and advance the good of
man. I might comment in the same way on every one of the ten commandments,
but I pass on.
The subject of slavery, in this view of _right and wrong_, is seen in the
very light of heaven. And you, Mr. Moderator, know that, if the view I
have presented be true, I have got you. (Great laughter.)
[The Moderator said, very pleasantly--Yes--_if_--but it is a _long if_.]
(Continued laughter.)
Dr. R. touched the Moderator on the shoulder, and said, Yes, _if_--it is a
_long if_; for it is this:--_if_ there is a God, he is not Jupiter, bowing
to the Fates, but God, the sovereign over the universe he has created, in
which he makes right, by making law to be known and obeyed by angels and
men, in their varied conditions.
He gave Adam _that_ command,--sublime in its simplicity, and intended to
vindicate the principle I am affirming,--that there is no right and wrong
in the nature of things. There was no right or wrong, _per se_, in eating
or willing to eat of that tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
But God made the law,--_Thou shall not eat of that tree_. As if he had
said,--I seek to _test_ the submission of your will, freely, to my will.
And, that your test may be perfect, I will let your temptation be
nothing more than your natural desire for that fruit. Adam sinned. What
was the sin?
Adam said, in heart, MY WILL, _not thine_, SHALL BE. _That_ was the
sin,--_the simple transgression of God's law_, when there was neither sin
nor evil in the _thing_ which God forbade to be done.
Man fell and was cursed. The law of the control of the superior over the
inferior is now to begin, and is to go on in the depraved conditions of
the fallen and cursed race. And, FIRST, God said to the woman, "_Thy
desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." There,_ in
that law, is _the beginning of government ordained of God. There_ is the
beginning of the rule of the superior over the inferior, bound to obey.
_There_, in the family of Adam, is the germ of the rule in the tribe,--the
state. Adam, in his right, from God, to rule over his wife and his
children, had _all the authority_ afterwards expanded in the patriarch and
the king. This simple, beautiful fact, there, on the first leaf of the
Bible, solves the problem, whence and how has man right to rule over man.
In that great fact God gives his denial to the idea that government over
man is the result of a social compact, in which each individual man living
in a state of natural liberty, yielded some of that liberty to secure the
greater good of government. Such a thing never was; such a thing never
could have been. _Government was ordained and established before the first
child was born:_--"HE SHALL RULE OVER THEE." Cain and Abel were born in a
_state_ as perfect as the empire of Britain or the rule of these United
States. All that Blackstone, and Paley, and Hobbs, or anybody else, says
about the social compact, is flatly and fully denied and upset by the
Bible, history, and common sense. Let any New York lawyer--or even a
Philadelphia lawyer--deny this if he dares. _Life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness_ never were the _inalienable_ right of the
_individual_ man.
His self-control, in all these particulars, _from the beginning_, was
subordinate to the good of the family,--the empire. The command to Noah
was,--"Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed."
(Gen. ix. 6.)
This command to shed blood was, and is, in perfect harmony with the
law,--"Thou shalt not kill." There is nothing right or wrong in _the
taking of life_, per se, or in itself considered. It may or it may not be
a natural good or evil. As a _general fact_, the taking of life is a
natural evil. Hence, "Thou shalt not kill" is the general rule, to
preserve the good there is in life. To take life under the forbidden
conditions is sin, simply because God forbids it under those conditions.
The sin is not in taking life, but in transgressing God's law.
But _sometimes_ the taking of life will secure a greater good. God, then,
commands that life be taken. Not to take life, under the commanded
conditions, is sin,--solely because God then commands it.
This power over life, for the good of the one great family of man, God
_delegated_ to Noah, and through him to the tribe, the clan, the kingdom,
the empire, the democracy, the republic, as they may be governed by chief,
king, emperor, parliament, or congress. Had Ham killed Shem, Noah would
have commanded Japheth to slay him. So much for the origin of the power
over life: now for the power over liberty.
The right to take life included the right over liberty. But God intended
the rule of the superior over the inferior, in relations of service,
should _exemplify human depravity, his curse and his overruling blessing_.
The rule and the subordination which is essential to the existence of the
family, God made commensurate with mankind; for _mankind is only the
congeries of families_. When Ham, in his antediluvian recklessness,
laughed at his father, God took occasion to give to the world the rule of
the superior over the inferior. _He cursed him. He cursed him because he
left him unblessed_. The withholding of the father's blessing, in the
Bible, was curse. Hence Abraham prayed God, when Isaac was blessed, that
Ishmael might not be passed by. Hence Esau prayed his father, when Jacob
was blessed, that he might not be left untouched by his holy hands. Ham
was cursed to render service, forever, to Shem and Japheth. The _special_
curse on Canaan made the general curse on Ham conspicuous, historic, and
explanatory, simply because his descendants were to be brought under the
control of God's peculiar people. Shem was blessed to rule over Ham.
Japheth was blessed to rule over both. God sent Ham to Africa, Shem to
Asia, Japheth to Europe. Mr. Moderator, you have read Guyot's "_Earth and
Man_." That admirable book is a commentary upon this part of Genesis. It
is the philosophy of geography. And it is the philosophy of the rule of
the higher races over the inferior, written on the very face of the earth.
He tells you why the continents are shaped as they are shaped; why the
mountains stand where they stand; why the rivers run where they run; why
the currents of the sea and the air flow as they flow. And he tells you
that the earth south of the Equator makes the inferior man. That the
oceanic climate makes the inferior man in the Pacific Islands. That South
America makes the inferior man. That the solid, unindented Southern Africa
makes the inferior man. That the huge, heavy, massive, magnificent Asia
makes the huge, heavy, massive, magnificent man. That Europe, indented by
the sea on every side, with its varied scenery, and climate, and Northern
influences, makes the varied intellect, the versatile power and life and
action, of the master-man of the world. And it is so. Africa, with here
and there an exception, has never produced men to compare with the men of
Asia. For six thousand years, save the unintelligible stones of Egypt, she
has had no history. Asia has had her great men and her name. But Europe
has ever shown, and now, her nobler men and higher destiny. Japheth has
now come to North America, to give us his past greatness and his
transcendent glory. (Applause.) And, sir, I thank God our mountains stand
where they stand; and that our rivers run where they run. Thank God they
run not across longitudes, but across latitudes, from north to south. If
they crossed longitudes, we might fear for the Union. But I hail the
Union,--made by God, strong as the strength of our hills, and ever to live
and expand,--like the flow and swell of the current of our streams.
(Applause.)
These two theories of Right and Wrong,--these two ideas of human
liberty,--the right, in the nature of things, or the right as made by
God,--the liberty of the individual man, of Atheism, of Red Republicanism,
of the devil,--or the liberty of man, in the family, in the State, the
liberty from God,--these two theories now make the conflict of the world.
This anti-slavery battle is only part of the great struggle: God will be
victorious,--and we, in his might.
I now come to particular illustrations of the world-wide law that service
shall be rendered by the inferior to the superior. The relations in which
such service obtains are very many. Some of them are these:--husband and
wife; parent and child; teacher and scholar; commander and
soldier,--sailor; master and apprentice; master and hireling; master and
slave. Now, sir, all these relations are ordained of God. They are all
directly commanded, or they are the irresistible law of his providence, in
conditions which must come up in the progress of depraved nature. The
relations themselves are all good in certain conditions. And there may be
no more of evil in the lowest than in the highest. And there may be in the
lowest, as really as in the highest, the fulfilment of the commandment to
love thy neighbor as thyself, and of doing unto him whatsoever thou
wouldst have him to do unto thee.
Why, sir, the wife everywhere, except where Christianity has given her
elevation, is _the slave_. And, sir, I say, without fear of saying too
strongly, that for every sigh, every groan, every tear, every agony of
stripe or death, which has gone up to God from the relation of master and
slave, there have been more sighs, more groans, more tears, and more agony
in the rule of the husband over the wife. Sir, I have admitted, and do
again admit, without qualification, that every fact in Uncle Tom's Cabin
has occurred in the South. But, in reply, I say deliberately, what one of
your first men told me, that he who will make the horrid examination will
discover in New York City, in any number of years past, more cruelty from
husband to wife, parent to child, _than in all the South from master to
slave_ in the same time. I dare the investigation. And you may extend it
further, if you choose,--to all the results of honor and purity. I fear
nothing on this subject. I stand on rock,--the Bible,--and therefore, just
before I bring the Bible, to which all I have said is introductory, I will
run a parallel between the relation of master and slave and that of
husband and wife. I will say nothing of the grinding oppression of capital
upon labor, in the power of the master over the hireling--the crushed
peasant--the chain-harnessed coal-pit woman, a thousand feet under ground,
working in darkness, her child toiling by her side, and another child not
born; I will say nothing of the press-gang which fills the navy of
Britain--the conscription which makes the army of France--the terrible
floggings--the awful court-martial--the quick sentence--the
lightning-shot--the chain, and ball, and every-day lash--the punishment of
the soldier, sailor, slave, who had run away. I pass all this by: I will
run the parallel between the slave and wife.
Do you say, The slave is held to _involuntary service?_ So is the wife.
Her relation to her husband, in the immense majority of cases, is made for
her, and not by her. And when she makes it for herself, how often, and how
soon, does it become involuntary! How often, and how soon, would she
throw off the yoke if she could! O ye wives, I know how superior you are
to your husbands in many respects,--not only in personal attraction,
(although in that particular, comparison is out of place,) in grace, in
refined thought, in passive fortitude, in enduring love, and in a heart to
be filled with the spirit of heaven. Oh, I know all this. Nay, I know you
may surpass him in his own sphere of boasted prudence and worldly wisdom
about dollars and cents. Nevertheless, he has authority, from God, to rule
over you. You are under service to him. You are bound to obey him _in all
things_. Your service is very, very, very often involuntary from the
first, and, if voluntary at first, becomes hopeless necessity afterwards.
I know God has laid upon the husband to love you as Christ loved the
church, and in that sublime obligation has placed you in the light and
under the shadow of a love infinitely higher, and purer, and holier than
all talked about in the romances of chivalry. But the husband may not so
love you. He may rule you with the rod of iron. What can you do? Be
divorced? God forbids it, save for crime. Will you say that you are
free,--that you will go where you please, do as you please? Why, ye dear
wives, your husbands may forbid. And listen, you cannot leave New York,
nor your palaces, any more than your shanties. No; you cannot leave your
parlor, nor your bedchamber, nor your couch, if your husband commands you
to stay there! What can you do? Will you run away, with your stick and
your bundle? He can advertise you!! What can you do? You can, and I fear
some of you do, wish him, from the bottom of your hearts, at the bottom of
the Hudson. Or, in your self-will, you will do just as you please. (Great
laughter.)
[A word on the subject of divorce. One of your standing denunciations on
the South is the terrible laxity of the marriage vow among the slaves.
Well, sir, what does your Boston Dr. Nehemiah Adams say? He says, after
giving eighty, sixty, and the like number of applications for divorce, and
nearly all granted at individual quarterly courts in New England,--he says
he is not sure but that the marriage relation is as enduring among _the
slaves in the South_ as it is among white people in New England. I only
give what Dr. Adams says. I would fain vindicate the marriage relation
from this rebuke. But one thing I will say: you seldom hear of a divorce
in Virginia or South Carolina.]
But to proceed:--
Do you say the slave is _sold and bought?_ So is the wife the world over.
Everywhere, always, and now as the general fact, however done away or
modified by Christianity. The savage buys her. The barbarian buys her. The
Turk buys her. The Jew buys her. The Christian buys her,--Greek, Armenian,
Nestorian, Roman Catholic, Protestant. The Portuguese, the Spaniard, the
Italian, the German, the Russian, the Frenchman, the Englishman, the New
England man, the New Yorker,--especially the upper ten,--_buy the
wife_--in many, very many cases. She is seldom bought in the South, and
never among the slaves themselves; for they always marry for love.
(Continued laughter.) Sir, I say the wife is bought in the highest
circles, too often, as really as the slave is bought. Oh, she is not sold
and purchased in the public market. But come, sir, with me, and let us
take the privilege of spirits out of the body to glide into that gilded
saloon, or into that richly comfortable family room, of cabinets, and
pictures, and statuary: see the parties, there, to sell and buy that human
body and soul, and make her a chattel! See how they sit, and bend towards
each other, in earnest colloquy, on sofa of rosewood and satin,--_Turkey_
carpet (how befitting!) under feet, sunlight over head, softened through
stained windows: or it is night, and the gas is turned nearly off, and the
burners gleam like stars through the shadow from which the whisper is
heard, in which that old ugly brute, with gray goatee--how fragrant!--bids
one, two, five, ten hundred thousand dollars, and _she_ is knocked off to
him,--that beautiful young girl asleep up there, amid flowers, and
innocent that she is sold and bought. Sir, that young girl would as soon
permit a baboon to embrace her, as that old, ignorant, gross, disgusting
wretch to approach her. Ah, has she not been sold and bought for money?
But--But what? But, you say, she freely, and without parental authority,
accepted him. Then she sold herself for money, and was guilty of _that_
which is nothing better than legal prostitution. I know what I say; you
know what I say. Up there in the gallery you know: you nod to one another.
Ah! you know the parties. Yes, you say: All true, true, true. (Laughter.)
Now, Mr. Moderator, I will clinch all I have said by nails sure, and
fastened from the word of God.
There is King James's English Bible, with its magnificent dedication. I
bring the English acknowledged translation. And just one word more to
push gently aside--for I am a kind man to those poor, deluded anti-slavery
people--their last argument. It is _that_ this English Bible, in those
parts which treat of slavery, don't give the ideas which are found in the
original Hebrew and Greek. Alas for the common people!--alas for this good
old translation! Are its days numbered? No, sir; no, sir. The Unitarian,
the Universalist, the Arminian, the Baptist, when pressed by this
translation, have tried to find shelter for their false isms by making or
asking for a new rendering. And now the anti-slavery men are driving hard
at the same thing. (Laughter.) Sir, shall we permit our people everywhere
to have their confidence in this noble translation undermined and
destroyed by the isms and whims of every or any man in our pulpits? I
affirm, whatever be our perfect liberty of examination into God's meaning
in all the light of the original languages, that there is a respect due to
this received version, and that great caution should be used, lest we
teach the people to doubt its true rendering from the original word of
God. I protest, sir, against having a Doctor-of-Divinity _priest_, Hebrew
or Greek, to tell the people what God has spoken on the subject of
slavery or any other subject. (Laughter.) I would as soon have a Latin
priest,--I would as soon have Archbishop Hughes,--I would as soon go to
Rome as to Jerusalem or Athens,--I would as soon have the Pope at once in
his fallible infallibility,--as ten or twenty, little or big, anti-slavery
Doctor-of-Divinity priests, each claiming to give his infallible
rendering, however differing from his peer. (Laughter.) I never yet
produced this Bible, in its plain unanswerable authority, for the relation
of master and slave, but the anti-slavery man ran away into the fog of
_his_ Hebrew or Greek, (laughter,) or he jabbered the nonsense that God
permitted the _sin_ of slaveholding among the Jews, but that he don't do
it now! Sir, God sanctioned slavery then, and sanctions it now. He made it
right, they know, then and now. Having thus taken the last puff of wind
out of the sails of the anti-slavery phantom ship, turn to the
twenty-first chapter of Exodus, vs. 2-5. God, in these verses, gave the
Israelites his command how they should buy and hold the Hebrew
servant,--how, under certain conditions, he went free,--how, under other
circumstances, he might be held to service forever, with his wife and her
children. There it is. Don't run into the Hebrew. (Laughter.)
But what have we here?--vs. 7-11:--"And if a man sell his daughter to be a
maid-servant, she shall not go out as the men-servants do. If she please
not her master, who hath betrothed her to himself, then shall he let her
be redeemed: to sell her unto a strange nation he shall have no power,
seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her. And if he hath betrothed her
unto his son, he shall deal with her after the manner of daughters. If he
take him another wife, her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage
shall he not diminish. And if he do not these three unto her, then shall
she go out free without money." Now, sir, the wit of man can't dodge that
passage, unless he runs away into the Hebrew. (Great laughter.) For what
does God say? Why, this:--that an Israelite might sell his own daughter,
not only into servitude, but into polygamy,--that the buyer might, if he
pleased, give her to his son for a wife, or take her to himself. If he
took her to himself, and she did not please him, he should not sell her
unto a strange nation, but should allow her to be redeemed by her family.
But, if he took him another wife before he allowed the first one to be
redeemed, he should continue to give the first one _food_, her _raiment_,
and her _duty of marriage_; that is to say, _her right to his bed_. If he
did not do _these three things_, she should go out free; _i.e._ cease to
be his slave, without his receiving any money for her. There, sir, God
sanctioned the Israelite father in selling his daughter, and the Israelite
man to buy her, into slavery and into polygamy. And it was then right,
because God made it right. In verses 20 and 21, you have these
words:--"And if a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die
under his hand, he shall be surely punished; notwithstanding, if he
continue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money."
What does this passage mean? Surely this:--if the master gave his slave a
hasty blow with a rod, and he died under his hand, he should be punished.
But, if the slave lived a day or two, it would so extenuate the act of the
master he should not be punished, inasmuch as he would be in that case
sufficiently punished in losing his money in his slave. Now, sir, I affirm
that God was more lenient to the degraded Hebrew master than Southern laws
are to the higher Southern master in like cases. But there you have what
was the divine will. Find fault with God, ye anti-slavery men, if you
dare. In Leviticus, xxv. 44-46, "Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids, which
thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them
shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. Moreover, of the children of the
strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their
families that are with you, which they beget in your land: and they shall
be your possession. And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your
children after you, to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your
bondmen forever."
Sir, I do not see how God could tell us more plainly that he did command
his people to buy slaves from the heathen round about them, and from the
stranger, and of their families sojourning among them. The passage has no
other meaning. Did God merely permit sin?--did he merely tolerate a
dreadful evil? God does not say so anywhere. He gives his people law to
buy and hold slaves of the heathen forever, on certain conditions, and to
buy and hold Hebrew slaves in variously-modified particulars. Well, how
did the heathen, then, get slaves to sell? Did they capture them in
war?--did they sell their own children? Wherever they got them, they sold
them; and God's law gave his people the right to buy them.
God in the New Testament made no law prohibiting the relation of master
and slave. But he made law regulating the relation under Greek and Roman
slavery, which was the most oppressive in the world.
God saw that these regulations would ultimately remove the evils in the
Greek and Roman systems, and do it away entirely from the fitness of
things, as there existing; for Greek and Roman slaves, for the most part,
were the equals in all respects of their masters. Æsop was a slave;
Terence was a slave. The precepts in Colossians iv. 18, 23, 1 Tim. vi.
1-6, and other places, show, unanswerably, that God as really sanctioned
the relation of master and slave as those of husband and wife, and parent
and child; and that all the obligations of the moral law, and Christ's law
of love, might and must be as truly fulfilled in the one relation as in
the other. The fact that he has made the one set of relations permanent,
and the other more or less dependent on conditions of mankind, or to pass
away in the advancement of human progress, does not touch the question. He
sanctioned it under the Old Testament and the New, and ordains it now
while he sees it best to continue it, and he now, as heretofore, proclaims
the duty of the master and the slave. Dr. Parker's admirable explanation
of Colossians, and other New Testament passages, saves me the necessity of
saying any thing more on the Scripture argument.
One word on the Detroit resolutions, and I conclude. Those resolutions of
the Assembly of 1850 decide that slavery is sin, unless the master holds
his slave as a guardian, or under the claims of humanity.
Mr. Moderator, I think we had on this floor, yesterday, proof conclusive
that those resolutions mean any thing or nothing; that they are a fine
specimen of Northern skill in platform-making; that it put in a plank
here, to please this man,--a plank there, to please that man,--a plank for
the North, a broad board for the South. It is Jackson's judicious tariff.
It is a gum-elastic conscience, stretched now to a charity covering all
the multitude of our Southern sins, contracted now, giving us hardly a
fig-leaf of righteousness. It is a bowl of punch,--
A little sugar to make it sweet,
A little lemon to make it sour,
A little water to make it weak,
A little brandy to give it power. (Laughter.)
As a Northern argument against us, it is a mass of lead so heavy that it
weighed down even the strong shoulders of Judge Jessup. For, sir, when he
closed his speech, I asked him a single question I had made ready for him.
It was this:--"Do you allow that Mr. Aiken, of South Carolina, may, under
the claims of humanity, hold three thousand slaves, or must he emancipate
them?" The Judge staggered, and stammered, and said, "No man could rightly
hold so many." I then asked, "How many may he hold, in humanity?" The
Judge saw his fatal dilemma. He recovered himself handsomely, and fairly
said, "Mr. Aiken might hold three thousand slaves, in harmony with the
Detroit action." I replied, "Then, sir, you have surrendered the whole
question of Southern slavery." And, sir, the Judge looked as if he felt he
had surrendered it. And every man in this house, capable of understanding
the force of that question, felt it had shivered the whole anti-slavery
argument, on those resolutions, to atoms. Why, sir, if a man can hold
three slaves, with a right heart and the approbation of God, he may hold
thirty, three hundred, three thousand, or thirty thousand. It is a mere
question of heart, and capacity to govern. The Emperor of Russia holds
sixty millions of slaves: and is there a man in this house so much of a
fool as to say that God regards the Emperor of Russia a sinner because he
is the master of sixty millions of slaves? Sir, that Emperor has certainly
a high and awful responsibility upon him. But, if he is good as he is
great, he is a god of benevolence on earth. And so is every Southern
master. His obligation is high, and great, and glorious. It is the same
obligation, in kind, he is under to his wife and children, and in some
respects immensely higher, by reason of the number and the tremendous
interests involved for time and eternity in connection with this great
country, Africa, and the world. Yes, sir, _I know_, whether Southern
masters fully know it or not, that _they hold from God_, individually and
collectively, _the highest and the noblest responsibility ever given by
Him to individual private men on all the face of the earth._ For God has
intrusted to them to train millions of the most degraded in form and
intellect, but, at the same time, the most gentle, the most amiable, the
most affectionate, the most imitative, the most susceptible of social and
religious love, of all the races of mankind,--to train them, and to give
them civilization, and the light and the life of the gospel of Jesus
Christ. And I thank God he has given this great work to that type of the
noble family of Japheth best qualified to do it,--to the Cavalier
stock,--the gentleman and the lady of England and France, born to command,
and softened and refined under our Southern sky. May they know and feel
and fulfil their destiny! Oh, may they "know that they also have a Master
in heaven."
Letter from Dr. Ross.
I need only say, in reference to this letter, that my friends
having questioned my position as to the good of the agitation, I
wrote the following letter to vindicate that point, as given, in
the New York speech:--
HUNTSVILLE, ALA., July 14, 1856.
_Brother Blackburn_:--I affirmed, in my New York speech, that the Slavery
agitation has done, and will accomplish, good.
Your very kind and courteous disagreement on that point I will make the
occasion to say something more thereon, without wishing you, my dear
friend, to regard what I write as inviting any discussion.
I said _that_ agitation has brought out, and would reveal still more
fully, the Bible, in its relation to slavery and liberty,--also the
infidelity which long has been, and is now, leavening with death the whole
Northern mind. And that it would result in the triumph of the _true_
Southern interpretation of the Bible; to the honor of God, and to the
good of the master, the slave, the stability of the Union, and be a
blessing to the world. To accomplish this, the sin _per se_ doctrine will
be utterly demolished. That doctrine is the difficulty in every _Northern
mind,_ (where there is any difficulty about slavery,) whether they confess
it or not. Yes, the difficulty with every Northern man is, that _the
relation of_ master and slave is felt _to be_ sin. I know that to be the
fact. I have talked with all grades of Northern men, and come in contact
with all varieties of Northern mind on this subject. And I know that the
man who says and tries to believe, and does, partially in sober judgment,
believe, that slavery is not sin, yet, _in his feelings, in his educated
prejudices_, he feels that slavery is sin.
Yes, _that_ is the difficulty, and _that_ is the whole of the difficulty,
_between the North and the South_, so far as the question is one of the
Bible and morals. Now, I again say, that that _sin per se_ doctrine will,
in this agitation, be utterly demolished. And when that is done,--when the
North will know and feel fully, perfectly, that the relation of master and
slave is not sin, but sanctioned of God,--then, and not till then, the
North and South can and will, without anger, consider the following
questions:--Whether slavery, as it exists in the United States, all
things considered, be or be not a great good, and the greatest good for a
time, notwithstanding its admitted evils? Again, whether these evils can
or cannot be modified and removed? Lastly, whether slavery itself can or
cannot pass away from this land and the world? Now, sir, the moment the
sin question is settled, then all is peace. For these other questions
belong entirely to another category of morals. They belong entirely to the
category of _what is_ wise _to realize_ good. This agitation will bring
this great result. And therefore I affirm the agitation to be good.
There is another fact also, the result, in great measure, of this
agitation, which in my view proves it to have been and to be of great
good. I mean the astonishing rise and present stability of the slave-power
of the United States. This fact, when examined, is undeniable. And it is
equally undeniable that it has been caused, in great part, by the slavery
question in all its bearings. It is a wonderful development made by God.
And I must believe he intends thereby either to destroy or bless this
great Union. But, as I believe he intends to bless, therefore I am
fortified in affirming the good there has been and is in this agitation.
Let me bring out to view this astonishing fact.
1. Twenty-five years ago, and previously, the whole slave-holding South
and West had a strong tendency to emancipation, in some form. But the
abolition movement then began, and arrested that Southern and Western
leaning to emancipation. Many people have said, and do say, that that
_arrest_ was and is a great evil. I say it was and is a great good. Why?
Answer: It was and would now be premature. Had it been carried out, it
would have been and would now be evil, immense, inconceivable,--to master,
slave, America, Africa, and the world; because neither master, slave,
America, Africa, the world, were, or are, ready for emancipation. God has
a great deal to do before he is ready for emancipation. He tells us so by
this _arrest_ put upon that tendency to emancipation years ago. For He put
it into the hearts of abolitionists _to make the arrest_. And He stopped
the Southern movement all the more perfectly by permitting Great Britain
to emancipate Jamaica, and letting that experiment prove, as it has, a
perfect failure and a terrible warning. JAMAICA IS DESTROYED. And now,
whatever be done for its negroes must be done with the full admission that
what has been attempted was in violation of the duty Britain owed to
those negroes. But her failure in seeing and doing her duty, God has given
to us to teach us knowledge; and, through us, to instruct the world in the
demonstration of the problem of slavery.
2. God put it into the hearts of Northern men--especially
abolitionists--to give Texas to the South. Texas, a territory so vast that
a bird, as Webster said, can't fly over it in a week. Many in the South
did not want Texas. But many longer-headed ones did want it. And Northern
men voted and gave to the South exactly what these longer-headed Southern
statesmen wanted. This, I grant, was Northern anti-slavery fatuity,
utterly unaccountable but that God made them do it.
3. God put it into the hearts of Northern men--especially
abolitionists--to vote for Polk, Dallas, and Texas. This gave us the
Mexican War; and that immense territory, its spoil,--a territory which,
although it may not be favorable for slave-labor, has increased, and will,
in many ways, extend the slave-power.
4. This leads me to say that God put it into the hearts of many Northern
men--especially abolitionists--to believe what Great Britain
said,--namely, that _free trade_ would result in slave-emancipation. _But
lo! the slave-holder wanted free trade_. So Northern abolitionists helped
to destroy the _tariff policy_, and thus to expand the demand for, and the
culture of, cotton. Now, see, the gold of California has _perpetuated free
trade_ by enabling our merchants to meet the enormous demand for specie
created by free trade. So California helps the slave-power. But the
abolitionists gave us Polk, the Mexican War, and California.
5. God put it into the hearts of the North, and especially abolitionists,
to stimulate the settlement of new free States, and to be the ardent
friends of an immense foreign emigration. The result has been to send down
to the South, with railroad speed and certainty, corn, wheat, flour, meal,
bacon, pork, beef, and every other imaginable form of food, in quantity
amazing, and so cheap that the planter can spread wider and wider the
culture of cotton.
6. God has, by this growth of the Northwest, made the demand for cotton
enormous in the North and Northwest. Again, he has made English and French
experiments to procure cotton somewhere else than from the United States
_dead failures_,--in the East Indies, Egypt, Algeria, Brazil. God has
thus given to the Southern planter an absolute monopoly. A monopoly so
great that he, the Southern planter, sits now upon his throne of cotton
and wields the commercial sceptre of the world. Yes, it is the Southern
planter who says to-day to haughty England, Go to war, if you dare;
dismiss Dallas, if you dare. Yes, he who sits on the throne of the
cotton-bag has triumphed at last over him who sits on the throne of the
wool-sack. England is prostrate at his feet, as well as the abolitionists.
7. God has put it into the hearts of abolitionists to prevent half a
million of free negroes from going to Liberia; and thereby the
abolitionists have made them consumers of slave-products to the extension
of the slave-power. And, by thus keeping them in America, the
abolitionists have so increased their degradation as to prove all the more
the utter folly of emancipation in the United States.
8. God has permitted the anti-slavery men in the North, in England, in
France, and everywhere, so to blind themselves in hypocrisy as to give the
Southern slave-holder his last perfect triumph over them; for God tells
the planter to say to the North, to England, to France, to all who buy
cotton, "Ye men of Boston, New York, London, Paris,--ye hypocrites,--ye
brand me as a pirate, a kidnapper, a murderer, a demon, fit only for hell,
and yet ye buy my blood-stained cotton. O ye hypocrites!--ye Boston
hypocrites! why don't ye throw the cotton in the sea, as your fathers did
the tea? Ye Boston hypocrites! ye say, _if we had been in the days of our
fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the
slave-trade!_ Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves that ye are the
children of them who, in fact, kidnapped and bought in blood, and sold the
slave in America! for now, ye hypocrites, ye buy the blood-stained cotton
in quantity so immense, that _ye_ have run up the price of slaves to
be more than a thousand dollars,--the average of old and young! O ye
hypocrites! ye denounce slavery; then ye bid it live, and not die,--in
that ye buy sugar, rice, tobacco, and, above all, cotton! Ye hypocrites!
ye abuse the devil, and then fall down and worship him!--ye
hypocrites,--ye New England hypocrites,--ye Old England hypocrites,--ye
French hypocrites,--ye Uncle Tom's Cabin hypocrites,--ye Beecher
hypocrites,--ye Rhode Island Consociation hypocrites! Oh, your holy
twaddle stinks in the nostrils of God, and he commands me to lash you
with my scorn, and his scorn, so long as ye gabble about the sin of
slavery, and then bow down to me, and buy and spin cotton, and thus work
for me as truly as my slaves! O ye fools and blind, fill ye up the measure
of your folly, and blindness, and shame! And this ye are doing. Ye have,
like the French infidels, made _reason_ your goddess, and are exalting her
above the Bible; and, in your unitarianism and neology and all modes of
infidelity, ye are rejecting and crucifying the Son of God."
Now, my brother, this controlling slave-power is a world-wide fact. Its
statistics of bales count by millions; its tonnage counts by hundreds of
thousands; its manufacture is reckoned by the workshops of America and
Europe; its supporters are numbered by all who must thus be clothed in the
world. This tremendous power has been developed in great measure by the
abolition agitation, controlled by God. I believe, then, as I have already
said, that God intends one of two things. He either intends to destroy the
United States by this slave-power, or he intends to bless my country and
the world by the unfoldings of his wisdom in this matter. I believe he
will bless the world in the working out of this slavery. I rejoice, then,
in the agitation which has so resulted, and will so terminate, to reveal
the Bible, and bless mankind.
Your affectionate friend,
F.A. Ross.
REV. A. BLACKBURN.
What Is the Foundation of Moral Obligation?
My position as to this all-important question, in my New York speech, was
made subject of remark in the "Presbyterian Herald," Louisville, Kentucky,
to which I replied at length in the "Presbyterian Witness," Knoxville,
Tennessee. No rejoinder was ever made to that reply. But, recently, an
extract from the younger Edwards was submitted to me. To that I gave the
following letter. The subject is of the first and the last importance, and
bears directly, as set forth in my New York speech, on infidelity, and, of
course, the slavery question:--
Mr. Editor:--In your paper of Tuesday, 24th ult., there is an article,
under this head, giving the argument of Edwards (the son) against my views
as to _the foundation of moral obligation_.
I thank the writer for his argument, and his courteous manner of
presenting it. In my third letter to Mr. Barnes, I express my preparation
to meet "_all comers_" on this question; and I am pleased to see this
"_comer_". If my views cannot be refuted by Edwards, I may wait long
for an "_uglier customer_."
A word, introductory, to your correspondent. He says, "His [Dr. Ross's]
theory was advanced and argued against in a former age." By this, I
understand him to express his belief that my theory has been rejected
heretofore. Well. It may, nevertheless, be the true theory. The Copernican
astronomy was argued against in a former age and rejected; yet it has
prevailed. Newton's law of gravitation was argued against and rejected by
a whole generation of philosophers on the continent of Europe; yet it has
prevailed. And now all school-boys and girls would call anybody a fool who
should deny it. Steam, in all its applications, was argued against and
rejected; yet it has prevailed. So the electric telegraph; and, to go back
a little, the theory of vaccination,--the circulation of the blood,--a
thousand things; yea, Edwards's (the father) theory of virtue, although
received by many, has been argued against, and by many rejected; yet it
will prevail. Yea, his idea of the unity of the race in Adam was and is
argued against and rejected; yet it will prevail. I feel, therefore, no
fear that my theory of moral obligation will not be acknowledged because
it was argued against and rejected by many in a former age, and may be
now. Nay; facts to prove it are accumulating,--facts which were not
developed in Edwards's day,--facts showing, irresistibly, that Edwards's
theory, which is _that_ most usually now held, is what I say it is,--_the
rejection of revelation, infidelity, and atheism_. The evidence amounts to
demonstration.
The question is in a nutshell; it is this:--_Shall man submit to the
revealed will of God_, or _to his own will?_ That is the naked question
when the fog of confused ideas and unmeaning words is lifted and
dispersed.
My position, expressed in the speech delivered in the General Assembly,
New York, May, 1856, is this:--"God, in making all things, saw that, in
the relations he would constitute between himself and intelligent
creatures, and among themselves, NATURAL GOOD AND EVIL would come to pass.
In his benevolent wisdom, he then _willed_ LAW to control this _good_ and
_evil_; and he thereby made _conformity_ to that law to be _right_, and
_non-conformity_ to be _wrong_. Why? Simply because he saw it to be
_good_, and _made it to be_ RIGHT; not because _he saw it to be right_,
but because _he made it to be right_."
Your correspondent replies to this theory in the following words of
Edwards:--"Some hold that the foundation of moral obligation is
primarily in the will of God. But the will of God is either benevolent
or not. If it be benevolent, and on that account the foundation of moral
obligation, it is not the source of obligation merely because it is the
will of God, but because it is benevolent, and is of a tendency to
promote happiness; and this places the foundation of obligation in a
tendency to happiness, and not primarily in the will of God. But if the
will of God, and that which is the expression of it, the divine law, be
allowed to be not benevolent, and are foundation of obligation, we are
obliged to conform to them, whatever they be, however malevolent and
opposite to holiness and goodness the requirements be. But this, I
presume, none will pretend." Very fairly and strongly put; that's to say,
if I understand Edwards, he supposes, if God was the devil and man what
he is, then man would not be under obligation to obey the devil's will!
That's it! Well, I suppose so too; and I reckon most _Christians_ would
agree to that statement, Nay, more: I presume nobody ever taught that the
mere naked _will_, abstractly considered, if it could be, from the
_character_ of God, was the ground of moral obligation? Nay, I think
nobody ever imagined that the notion of an infinite Creator presupposes
or includes the idea that he is a malevolent Being! I agree, then, with
Edwards, that the ultimate ground of obligation _is_ in the _fact_ that
God is benevolent, or is a good God. I said _that_ in my speech quoted
above. I formally stated that "_God, in his benevolent wisdom, willed law
to control the natural good and evil_," &c. What, then, is the point of
disagreement between my view and Edwards's? It is in _the different ways
by which we_ GET AT _the_ FACT _of divine benevolence_. I hold that the
REVEALED WORD _tells us who God is and what he does_, and is, therefore,
the ULTIMATE GROUND OF OBLIGATION. But Edwards holds that HUMAN REASON
_must tell us who God is and what he does_, and IS, therefore, the
PRIMARY GROUND OF OBEDIENCE. _That_ is my issue with Edwards and others;
and it is as broad an issue as _faith in revelation_, or the REJECTION OF
IT. I do not charge that Edwards did, or that all who hold with him do,
deny the word of God; but I do affirm that their argument does. The
matter is plain. For what is revelation? It is that God has appeared in
person, and _told_ man in WORD that he is GOD; and _told_ him first in
WORD (to be expanded in studying _creation_ and _providence_) that God is
a Spirit, eternal, infinite in power, wisdom, goodness, holiness,--the
Creator, Preserver, Benefactor. That WORD, moreover, he proved by
highest evidence--namely, supernatural evidence--to be _absolute,
perfect_ TRUTH as to all FACT affirmed _of him_ and _what_ he _does_.
REVELATION, as claimed in the Bible, was and is THAT THING.
Man, then, having this revelation; is under obligation ever to believe
every jot and tittle of that WORD. He at first, no doubt, knew little of
the meaning of some _facts_ declared; nay, he may have comprehended
nothing of the sense or scope of many _facts_ affirmed. Nay, he may now,
after thousands of years, know most imperfectly the meaning of that WORD.
But he was and he is, notwithstanding, to believe with absolute faith the
WORD,--that God _is_ all he says he is, and _does_ all he says he
does,--however that WORD may _go beyond_ his reason, or _surprise_ his
feelings, or _alarm_ his conscience, or _command_ his will.
This statement of what revelation is, settles the whole question as
presented by Edwards. For REVELATION, as explained, does FIX _forever the
foundation of man's moral obligation in the benevolence of God_,
PRIMARILY, as it is _expressed_ in the word of God. REVELATION does then,
in that sense, FIX _obligation in the_ MERE WILL OF GOD; for, the moment
you attempt to establish the foundation _somewhere else_, you have
abandoned the ground of revelation. You have left the WILL OF GOD _in his
word_, and you have made your rule of right to be the WILL OF MAN _in the_
SELF _of the_ HEART. The proof of what I here say is so plain, even as the
writing on the tables of Habakkuk's vision, that he may run that readeth
it. Read, then, even as on the _tables_.
God _says_ in his WORD, "I am all-powerful, all-wise, the Creator." "You
may be," says Edwards, "but I want _primary foundation_ for my faith; and
I can't take your _word_ for it. I must look first into _nature_ to see if
evidence of infinite power and wisdom is there,--to see if evidence of a
Creator is there,--and if thou art he!"
Again, God _says_ in his word, "I am benevolent, and _my will_ in my law
is expression of that benevolence." "You may tell the truth," Edwards
replies, "but I want _primary ground_ for my belief, and I must hold your
word suspended until I examine into my reason, my feelings, my conscience,
my will,--to see if your WORD _harmonizes_ with my HEART,--to see if what
you reveal tends to _happiness_ IN MY NOTION OF HAPPINESS; _or tends to
right_ IN MY NOTION OF RIGHT!" That's it. That's the theory of Edwards,
Barnes, and others.
And what is this but the attempt to know the divine attributes and
character in _some other way_ than through the divine WORD? And what is
this but the denial of the divine WORD, except so far as it agrees with
the knowledge of the attributes and character of God, obtained in THAT
_some other way?_ And what is this but to make the word of God
_subordinate_ to the teaching of the HUMAN HEART? And what is this but to
make the WILL _of God_ give place to the WILL _of man?_ And what is this
but the REJECTION OF REVELATION? Yet this is the result (though not
intended by him) of the whole scheme of obligation, maintained by Edwards
and by all who agree with him.
Carry it out, and what is the progress and the end of it? This. Human
reason--the human heart--will be supreme. Some, I grant, will hold to a
revelation of some sort. A thing more and more transcendental,--a thing
more and more of fog and moonshine,--fog floating in German cellars from
fumes of lager-beer, and moonshine gleaming from the imaginations of the
drinkers. Some, like Socrates and Plato, will have a God supreme,
personal, glorious, somewhat like the true; and with him many inferior
deities,--animating the stars, the earth, mountains, valleys, plains, the
sea, rivers, fountains, the air, trees, flowers, and all living things.
Some will deny a personal God, and conceive, instead, the intelligent mind
of the universe, without love. Some will contend for mere law,--of
gravitation and attraction; and some will suggest that all is the result
of a fortuitous concourse of atoms! Here, having passed through the
shadows and the darkness, we have reached the blackness of
infidelity,--blank atheism. No God--yea, all the way the "_fools_" were
saying in their hearts, no God. What now is man? Alas! some, the Notts and
Gliddons, tell us, man was indeed _created_ millions of ages ago, the Lord
only knows when, in swarms like bees to suit the zones of the
earth,--while other some, the believers in the _vestiges of creation_, say
man is the result of development,--from fire, dust, granite, grass, the
creeping thing, bird, fish, four-footed beast, monkey. Yea, and some of
these last philosophers are even now going to Africa to try to find men
they have heard tell of, who still have tails and are jumping and climbing
somewhere in the regions around the undiscovered sources of the Nile.
This is the progress and the result of the Edwards theory; because, deny
or hesitate about revelation, and man cannot prove, _absolutely_, any of
the things we are considering. Let us see if he can. Edwards writes, "On
the supposition that the will or law of God is the primary foundation,
reason, and standard of right and virtue, every attempt _to prove the
moral perfection or attributes of God is absurd_." Here, then, Edwards
believes, that, to reach the primary foundation of right and virtue, he
must not take God's word as to his perfection or attributes, no matter how
fully _God_ may have _proved_ his word: no; but he, Edwards, he, man, must
first _prove_ them in _some other way_. And, of course, he believes he can
reach such primary foundation by such other proof. Well, let us see how he
goes about it. I give him, to try his hand, the easiest
attribute,--"POWER." I give him, then, all creation, and providence
besides, as his _black-board_, on which to work his demonstration. I give
him, then, the lifetime of Methuselah, in which to reach his conclusion of
proof.--Well, I will now suppose we have all lived and waited that long
time: what is his _proof_ OF INFINITE POWER? Has he found the EXHIBITION
of _infinite power?_ No. He has found _proof_ of GREAT POWER; but he has
not reached the DISPLAY of _infinite power_. What then is his _faith_ in
infinite power after such _proof?_ Why, just this: he INFERS _only_, that
THE POWER, _which did the things he sees, can go on, and on, and on, to
give greater, and greater, and greater manifestations of itself!_ VERY
GOOD: _if so be, we can have no better proof_. But _that_ PROOF is
infinitely below ABSOLUTE PROOF _of infinite power_. And all
manifestations of power to a _finite creature_, even to the archangel
Michael, during countless millions of ages, never gives, because it never
can give to him, ABSOLUTE PROOF _of infinite power_. But the word of GOD
gives the PROOF ABSOLUTE, _and in a moment of time!_ "I AM THE ALMIGHTY!"
The _perfect proof_ is in THAT WORD OF GOD.
I might set Edwards to work to prove the _infinite wisdom_, the _infinite
benevolence_, the _infinite holiness_--yea, the EXISTENCE--of God. And he,
finite man, in any examination of creation or providence, must fall
infinitely below the PERFECT PROOF.
So then I tell Edwards, and all agreeing with him, that _it is absurd_ to
attempt to _prove_ the moral perfection and attributes of God, if he
thereby seeks to reach the HIGHEST EVIDENCE, _or if he thereby means to
find the_ PRIMARY GROUND _of moral obligation_.
Do I then teach that man should not seek the _proof_ there is, of the
perfection and attributes of God, in _nature and providence_? No. I hold
that such proof unfolds the _meaning_ of the FACTS declared in the WORD of
God, and is all-important, as such expansion of meaning. But I say, by
authority of the Master, that _the highest proof, the absolute proof, the
perfect proof_, of the FACTS as to _who God is, and what he does_, and the
PRIMARY OBLIGATION _thereupon, is in the_ REVEALED WORD.
FRED. A. ROSS.
Huntsville, Ala., April 3, 1857.
N.B.--In notice of last Witness's extract from Erskine, I remark that
Thomas Erskine was, and may yet be, a lawyer of Edinburgh. He wrote
_three works_:--_one_ on the _Internal Evidences_, the _next_ on
_Faith_, the _last_ on the _Freeness of the Gospel_. They are all
written with great ability, and contain much truth. But all have in them
fundamental _untruths_. There is least in the Evidences; more in the
essay on Faith; most in the tract on the Freeness of the Gospel,--which
last has been utterly refuted, and has passed away. His _Faith_ is,
also, not republished. The Evidences is good, like good men,
notwithstanding the evil.
Letters to Rev. A. Barnes.
Introduction.
As part of the great slavery discussion, Rev. A. Barnes, of Philadelphia,
published, in October, 1856, a pamphlet, entitled, "The CHURCH and
SLAVERY." In this tract he invites every man to utter his views on the
subject. And, setting the example, he speaks his own with the greatest
freedom and honesty.
In the same freedom of speech, I have considered his views unscriptural,
false, fanatical, and infidel. Therefore, while I hold him in the highest
respect, esteem, and affection, as a divine and Christian gentleman, and
cherish his past relations to me, yet I have in these letters written to
him, and of him, just as I would have done had he lived in France or
Germany, a stranger to me, and given to the world the refined scoff of the
one, or the muddy transcendentalism of the other.
My first letter is merely a glance at some things in his pamphlet, in
which I show wherein I agree and disagree with him,--_i.e._ in our
estimate of the results of the agitation; in our views of the Declaration
of Independence; in our belief of the way men are made infidels; and in
our appreciation of the testimonies of past General Assemblies.
The other letters I will notice in similar introductions.
These letters first appeared as original contributions to the Christian
Observer, published and edited by Dr. A. Converse, Philadelphia.
I take this occasion to express my regard for him, and my sense of the
ability with which he has long maintained the rights and interests of the
Presbyterian body, to which we both belong; and the wise and masterly way
in which he has vindicated, from the Bible, the truth on the slavery
question. To him, too, the public is indebted for the first exhibition of
Mr. Barnes's errors in his recent tract which has called forth my reply.
No. I.
Rev. A. Barnes:--
_Dear Sir_:--You have recently published a tract:--"The Church and
Slavery."
"The opinion of each individual," you remark, "contributes to form public
sentiment, as the labor of the animalcule in the ocean contributes to the
coral reefs that rise above the waves."
True, sir, and beautifully expressed. But while, in harmony with your
intimation, I must regard you one of the animalcules, rearing the coral
reef of public opinion, I cannot admit your disclaimer of "special
influence" among them in their work. Doubtless, sir, you have "special
influence,"--and deserve to have. I make no apology for addressing you. I
am one of the animalcules.
I agree, and I disagree, with you. I harmonize in your words,--"The
present is eminently a time when the views of every man on the subject of
slavery should be uttered in unambiguous tones." I agree with you in this
affirmation; because the subject has yet to be fully understood; because,
when understood, if THE BIBLE does _not_ sanction the system, the MASTER
must cease to be the master. The SLAVE must cease to be the slave. He must
be _free_, AND EQUAL IN POLITICAL AND SOCIAL LIFE. _That_ is your
"_unambiguous tone_". Let it be heard, if _that_ is the word of God.
But if THE BIBLE _does_ sanction the system, then _that_ "unambiguous
tone" will silence abolitionists who admit the Scriptures; it will satisfy
all good men, and give peace to the country. That is the "_tone_" I want
men to hear. Listen to it in the past and present speech of providence.
The time was when _you_ had the very _public sentiment_ you are now trying
to form. From Maine to Louisiana, the American mind was softly yielding to
the impress of emancipation, in some hope, however vague and imaginary.
Southern as well as Northern men, in the church and out of it, not having
sufficiently studied the word of God, and, under our own and French
revolutionary excitement, looking only at the evils of slavery, wished it
away from the land. It was a _mistaken_ public sentiment. Yet, such as it
was, you had it, and it was doing your work. It was Quaker-like, mild and
affectionate. It did not, however, work fast enough for you. You thought
that the negro, with his superior attributes of body and mind and higher
advantages of the nineteenth century, might reach, in a day, the liberty
and equality which the Anglo-American had attained after the struggle of
his ancestors during a thousand years! You got up the agitation. You got
it up in the Church and State. You got it up over the length and breadth
of this whole land. Let me show you some things you have secured, as the
results of your work.
_First Result of Agitation_.
1. The most consistent abolitionists, affirming the sin of slavery, on the
maxim of created equality and unalienable right, after torturing the Bible
for a while, to make it give the same testimony, felt they could get
nothing from the book. They felt that the God of the Bible disregarded the
thumb-screw, the boot, and the wheel; that he would not speak for them,
but against them. These consistent men have now turned away from the
word, in despondency; and are seeking, somewhere, an abolition Bible, an
abolition Constitution for the United States, and an abolition God.
This, sir, is the _first result_ of your agitation:--the very van of your
attack repulsed, and driven into infidelity.
_A Second Result of Agitation_.
2. Many others, and you among them, are trying in exactly the same way
just mentioned to make the Bible speak against slave-holding. You get
nothing by torturing the English version. People understand English. Nay,
you get little by applying the rack to the Hebrew and Greek; even before a
tribunal of men like you, who proclaim beforehand that Moses, in Hebrew,
and Paul, in Greek, _must_ condemn slavery because "_it is a violation of
the first sentiments of the Declaration of Independence_." You find it
difficult to persuade men that Moses and Paul were moved by the Holy Ghost
to sanction the philosophy of Thomas Jefferson! You find it hard to make
men believe that Moses saw in the mount, and Paul had vision in heaven,
that this future _apostle of Liberty_ was inspired by Jesus Christ.
You torture very severely. But the muscles and bones of those old men are
tough and strong. They won't yield under your terrible wrenchings. You get
only groans and mutterings. You claim these voices, I know, as testimony
against slavery. But you cannot torture in secret as in olden times. When
putting the question, you have to let men be present,--who tell us that
Moses and Paul won't speak for you,--that they are silent, like Christ
before Pilate's scourging-men; or, in groans and mutterings,--the voices
of their sorrow and the tones of their indignation,--they rebuke your
pre-judgment of the Almighty when you say if the Bible sanctions slavery,
"it neither ought to be nor could be received by mankind as a divine
revelation."
This, sir, is the _second result_ you have gained by your agitation. You
have brought a thousand Northern ministers of the gospel, with yourself,
to the verge of the same denial of the word of God which they have made,
who are only a little ahead of you in the road you are travelling.
_A Third Result of Agitation._
3. Meanwhile, many of your most pious men, soundest scholars, and
sagacious observers of providence, have been led to study the Bible more
faithfully in the light of the times. And they are reading it more and
more in harmony with the views which have been reached by the highest
Southern minds, to wit:--That the relation of master and slave is
sanctioned by the Bible;--that it is a relation belonging to the same
category as those of husband and wife, parent and child, master and
apprentice, master and hireling;--that the relations of husband and wife,
parent and child, _were ordained in Eden for man, as man_, and _modified
after the fall_, while the relation of slavery, as a system of labor, is
_only one form of the government ordained of God over fallen and degraded
man_;--that the _evils_ in the system are _the same evils_ of OPPRESSION
we see in the relation of husband and wife, and all other forms of
government;--that slavery, as a relation, suited to the more degraded or
the more ignorant and helpless types of a sunken humanity, is, like all
government, intended _as the proof of the curse of such degradation, and
at the same time to elevate and bless_;--that the relation of husband and
wife, being for man, as man, _will ever be over him_, while slavery will
remain so long as God sees it best, as a controlling power over the
ignorant, the more degraded and helpless;--and that, when he sees it for
the good of the country, he will cause it to pass away, if the slave can
be elevated to liberty and equality, political and social, with his
master, _in_ that country; or _out of_ that country, if such elevation
cannot be given therein, but may be realized in some other land: all which
result must be left to the unfoldings of the divine will, _in harmony with
the Bible_, and not to a newly-discovered dispensation. These facts are
vindicated in the Bible and Providence. In the Old Testament, they stare
you in the face:--in the family of Abraham,--in his slaves, bought with
his money and born in his house,--in Hagar, running away under her
mistress's hard dealing with her, and yet sent back, as a fugitive slave,
by the angel,--in the law which authorized the Hebrews to hold their
brethren as slaves for a time,--in which parents might sell their children
into bondage,--in which the heathen were given to the Hebrews as their
slaves forever,--in which slaves were considered so much the money of
their master, that the master who killed one by an unguarded blow was,
under certain circumstances, sufficiently punished in his slave's death,
because he thereby lost his money,--in which the difference between
_man-stealing_ and _slave-holding_ is, by law, set forth,--in which the
runaway from heathen masters may not be restored, because God gave him
the benefits of an adopted Hebrew. In the New Testament:--wherein the
slavery of Greece and Rome was recognised,--in the obligations laid on
master and slave,--in the close connection of this obligation with the
duties of husband and wife, parent and child,--in the obligation to return
the fugitive slave to his master,--and _in the condemnation of every
abolition principle_, "AS DESTITUTE OF THE TRUTH." (1 Tim. vi. 1-5.)
This view of slavery is becoming more and more, not only the settled
decision of the Southern but of the best Northern mind, with a movement so
strong that you have been startled by it to write the pamphlet now lying
before me.
This is the _third result_ you have secured:--to make many of the best men
in the North see the infidelity of your philosophy, falsely so called, on
the subject of slavery, in the clearer and clearer light of the
Scriptures.
_Another Result of Agitation_.
4. The Southern slave-holder is now satisfied, as never before, that the
relation of master and slave is sanctioned by the Bible; and he feels, as
never before, the obligations of the word of God. He no longer, in his
ignorance of the Scriptures, and afraid of its teachings, will seek to
defend his common-sense opinions of slavery by arguments drawn from "Types
of Mankind," and other infidel theories; but he will look, in the light of
the Bible, on all the good and evil in the system. And when the North, as
it will, shall regard him holding from God this high power for great
good,--when the North shall no more curse, but bid him God-speed,--then he
will bless himself and his slave, in nobler benevolence. With no false
ideas of created equality and unalienable right, but with the Bible in his
heart and hand, he will do justice and love mercy in higher and higher
rule. Every evil will be removed, and the negro will be elevated to the
highest attainments he can make, and be prepared for whatever destiny God
intends. This, sir, is the _fourth result_ of your agitation:--to make the
Southern master _know_, from the Bible, his right to be a master, and his
duty to his slave.
These _four results_ are so fully before you, that I think you must see
and feel them. You have brought out, besides, tremendous political
consequences, giving astonishing growth and spread to the slave power: on
these I cannot dwell. Sir, are you satisfied with these consequences of
the agitation you have gotten up? I am. I thank God that the great deep
of the American mind has been blown upon by the wind of abolitionism. I
rejoice that the stagnant water of that American mind has been so greatly
purified. I rejoice that the infidelity and the semi-infidelity so long
latent have been set free. I rejoice that the sober sense North and
South, so strangely asleep and silent, has risen up to hear the word of
God and to speak it to the land. I rejoice that all the South now know
that God gives the right to hold slaves, and, with that right,
obligations they must fulfil. I rejoice that the day has dawned in which
the North and South will think and feel and act together on the subject
of slavery. I thank God for the agitation. May he forgive the folly and
wickedness of many who have gotten it up! May he reveal more and more,
that surely the wrath of man shall praise him, while the remainder of
wrath he will restrain!
_Declaration of Independence_.
I agree with you, sir, that _the second paragraph_ of the Declaration of
Independence contains _five affirmations_, declared to be self-evident
truths, which, if truths, do sustain you and all abolitionists in every
thing you say as to the right of the negro to liberty; and not only to
liberty,--to equality, political and social. But I disagree with you as to
their truth, and I say that not one of said affirmations is a self-evident
truth, or a truth at all. On the contrary, that each one is contrary to
the Bible; that each one, separately, is denied; and that all five,
collectively, are denied and upset by the Bible, by the natural history of
man, and by providence, in every age of the world. I say this now. In a
subsequent communication, I will prove what I affirm. For the present I
merely add, that the Declaration of Independence stands in no need of
these false affirmations. It was, and is, a beautiful whole without them.
It was, and is, without these imaginary maxims, the simple statement of
the grievances the colonies had borne from the mother-country, and their
right _as colonies_, when thus oppressed, to declare themselves
independent. That is to say, the right given of God to oppressed children
to seek protection in another family, or to set up for themselves somewhat
before _twenty-one_ or natural maturity; right belonging to them _in the
British family;_ right sanctioned of God; right blessed of God, in the
resistance of the colonies _as colonies_--not as individual men--to the
attempt of the mother-country to consummate her tyranny. But God gives no
sanction to the affirmation that he has _created all men equal_; that this
is _self-evident,_ and that he has given them _unalienable rights;_ that
he has made government to _derive its power solely from their consent_,
and that he has given them _the right to change that government in their
mere pleasure_. All this--every word of it, every jot and tittle--is the
liberty and equality claimed by infidelity. God has cursed it seven times
in France since 1793; and he will curse it there seventy times seven, if
Frenchmen prefer to be pestled so often in Solomon's mortar. He has cursed
it in Prussia, Austria, Germany, Italy, Spain. He will curse it as long as
time, whether it is affirmed by Jefferson, Paine, Robespierre, Ledru
Rollin, Kossuth, Greeley, Garrison, or Barnes.
Sir, that paragraph is an _excrescence_ on the tree of our liberty. I pray
you take it away. Worship it if you will, and in a manner imitate the
Druid. He gave reverence to the _mistletoe_, but first he removed the
_parasite_ from the noble tree. Do you the same. Cut away _this mistletoe_
with golden knife, as did the Druid; enshrine its imaginary divinity in a
grove or cave; then retire there, and leave our oak to stand in its glory
in the light of heaven. Men have been afraid to say all this for years,
just as they have been timid to assert that God has placed master and
slave in the same relation as husband and wife. Public sentiment, which
you once had and have lost, suppressed this utterance as the other. But
now, men speak out; and I, for one, will tell you what the Bible reveals
as to that part of the Declaration of Independence, as fearlessly as I
tell you what it says of the system of slavery.
_How Men are made Infidels_.
I agree with you that some men have been, are, and will be, made infidels
by hearing that God has ordained slavery as one form of his government
over depraved mankind. But how does this fact prove that the Bible does
not sanction slavery? Why, sir, you have been all your life teaching that
some men are made infidels by hearing any truth of the Bible;--that some
men are made infidels by hearing the Trinity, Depravity, Atonement,
Divinity of Christ, Resurrection, Eternal Punishment. True: and these men
find "_great laws of their nature,--instinctive feelings_"--just such as
you find against slavery, and not more perverted in them than in you,
condemning all this Bible. And they hold now, with your sanction, that a
book affirming such facts "_cannot be from God_."
Sir, some men are made infidels by hearing the Ten Commandments, and they
find "_great laws of their nature_," as strong in them as yours in you
against slavery, warring against every one of these commandments. And
they declare now, with your authority, that a book imposing such
restraints upon human nature, "_cannot be from God_" Sir, what is it
makes infidels? You have been wont to answer, "They _will not_ have God
_to rule over them_. They _will not_ have the BIBLE _to control the great
laws of their nature."_ Sir, that is the true answer. And you know that
_the great instinct of liberty_ is only one of _three great laws_,
needing special teaching and government:--that is to say, _the instinct
to rule; the instinct to submit to be ruled; and the instinct for
liberty._ You know, too, that the instinct _to submit_ is the strongest,
the instinct _to rule_ is next, and that the _aspiration for liberty_ is
the weakest. Hence you know the overwhelming majority of men have ever
been willing to be slaves; masters have been next in number; while the
few have struggled for freedom.
The Bible, then, in proclaiming God's will _as to these three great
impulses_, will be rejected by men, exactly as they have yielded forbidden
control to the one or the other of them. The Bible will make infidels of
_masters_, when God calls to them to rule right, or to give up rule, if
they have allowed _the instinct of power_ to make them hate God's
authority. Pharaoh spoke for all infidel rulers when he said, "_Who is the
Lord that I should obey his voice?_"
The Bible will make infidels of _slaves_, when God calls to them to aspire
to be free, if they have permitted _the instinct of submission to_ make
them hate his commands. The Israelites in the wilderness revealed ten
times, in their murmuring, _the slave-instinct_ in all ages:--"_Would to
God we had died in the wilderness!_"
You know all this, and you condemn these infidels. Good.
But, sir, you know equally well that the Bible will make infidels of men
_affirming the instinct of liberty,_ when God calls them to learn of him
how _much liberty_ he gives, and _how_ he gives it, and _when_ he gives
it, if they have so yielded to this law of their nature as to make them
despise the word of the Lord. Sir, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram spoke out
just what the liberty-and-equality men have said in all time:--"_Ye, Moses
and Aaron, take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy,
every one of them: wherefore, then, lift ye up yourselves above the
congregation?"_ Verily, sir, these men were intensely excited by "_the
great law of our nature,--the great instinct of freedom."_ Yea, they told
God to his face they had looked within, and found the _higher law of
liberty and equality--the eternal right--in their intuitional
consciousness_; and that they would not submit to his will in the
elevation of Moses and Aaron _above them_.
Verily, sir, you, in the spirit of Korah, now proclaim and say, "Ye
masters, and ye white men who are not masters, North and South, ye take
too much upon you, seeing the negro is created your equal, and, by
unalienable right, is as free as you, and entitled to all your political
and social life. Ye take, then, too much upon you in excluding him from
your positions of wealth and honor, from your halls of legislation, and
from your palace of the nation, and from your splendid couch, and from
your fair women with long hair on that couch and in that gilded chariot:
wherefore, then, lift ye up yourselves above the negro?"
Verily, sir, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram said all we have ever heard from
abolition-platforms or now listen to from you. But the Lord made the
earth swallow up Korah, Dathan, and Abiram!
I agree with you then, sir, fully, that some men have been, are, and will
be, made infidels by hearing that God, in the Bible, has ordained slavery.
But I hold this to be no argument against the fact that the Bible does so
teach, because men are made infidels by any other doctrine or precept they
hate to believe.
Sir, no man has said all this better than you. And I cannot express my
grief that you--in the principle now avowed, _that every man must
interpret the Bible as he chooses to reason and feel_--sanction all the
infidelity in the world, obliterate your "_Notes_" on the Bible, and deny
the preaching of your whole life, so far as God may, in his wrath, permit
you to expunge or recall the words of the wisdom of your better day.
_Testimonies of General Assemblies_.
I agree with you that the Presbyterian Church, both before and since its
division, has testified, after a fashion, against slavery. But some of its
action has been very curious testimony. I know not how the anti-slavery
resolutions of 1818 were gotten up; nor how in some Assemblies since. I
can guess, however, from what I do know, as to how such resolutions passed
in Buffalo in 1853, and in New York in 1856. I know that in Buffalo they
were at first voted down by a large majority. Then they were reconsidered
in mere courtesy to men who said they wanted to speak. So the resolutions
were passed after some days, in which the _screws_ were applied and
turned, in part, _by female hands_, to save the chairman of the committee
from _the effects_ of the resolutions being finally voted down!
I know that, in New York, the decision of the Assembly to spread the
minority report on the minutes was considered, in the body and out of it,
as a Southern victory; for it revealed, however glossed over, that many in
the house, who could not vote directly for the minority report, did in
fact prefer it to the other.
I was not in Detroit in 1850; but I think it was established in New York
last May that that Detroit testimony was so admirably worded that both
Southern and Northern men might vote for it with clear consciences!
I need not pursue the investigation. I admit that, after this sort, you
have the stultified abstractions of the New School Presbyterian
Church,--while I have its common sense; you have its Delphic words,--I
have its actions; you have the traditions of the elders making void the
word of God,--I have the providence of God restraining the church from
destroying itself and our social organization under folly, fanaticism, and
infidelity.
You, sir, seem to acknowledge this; for, while you appear pleased with the
testimony of the New School Presbyterian Church, such as it is, you lament
that the Old School have not been true to the resolutions of 1818,--that,
in that branch of the church, it is questionable whether those resolutions
could now be adopted. You lament the silence of the Episcopal, the
Southern Methodist, and the Baptist denominations; you might add the
Cumberland Presbyterian Church. And you know that in New England, in New
York, and in the Northwest, many testify against _us_ as a pro-slavery
body. You lament that so many members of the church, ministers of the
gospel, and editors of religious papers, defend the system; you lament
that so large a part of the religious literature of the land, though
having its seat North and sustained chiefly by Northern funds, shows a
perpetual deference to the slave-holder; you lament that, after fifty
years, nothing has been done to arrest slavery; you lament and ask, "Why
should this be so?" In saying this, you acknowledge that, while you have
been laboring to get and have reached the abstract testimony of the
church, all diluted as it is, the common-sense fact has been and is more
and more brought out, in the providence of God, that _the slave-power has
been and is gaining ground in the United States_. In one word, you have
contrived to get, in confused utterance, the voice of the Sanhedrim; while
Christ himself has been preaching in the streets of our Jerusalem the true
meaning of slavery as one form of his government over fallen men.
These, then, are some of the things I promised to show as the results of
your agitation. This is the "_tone_" of the past and present speech of
Providence on the subject of slavery. You seem disturbed. I feel sure
things are going on well as to that subject. Speak on, then, "in
unambiguous tones." But, sir, when you desire to go from words to
actions,--when you intimate that the constitution of the Presbyterian
Church may be altered to permit such action, or that, without its
alteration, the church can detach itself from slavery by its existing laws
or the modification of them,--then I understand you to mean that you
desire to deal, in fact, with slave-holders as _offenders_. Then, sir,
_you mean to exscind the South_; for it is absurd to imagine that you
suppose the South will submit to such action. You mean, then, to _exscind
the South, or to exscind yourself and others_, or to _compel the South to
withdraw_. Your tract, just published, is, I suppose, intended by you to
prepare the next General Assembly for such movement? What then? Will you
make your "American Presbyterian," and your Presbyterian House, effect
that great change in the religious literature of the land whereby the
subject of slave-holding shall be approached _precisely_ as you deal with
"theft, highway-robbery, or piracy?" Will you, then, by act of Assembly,
Synod, Presbytery, Session, deny your pulpits, and communion-bread and
wine, to slave-holding ministers, elders, and members? Will you, then,
tell New England, and especially little Rhoda, We have purified our skirts
from the blood: forgive us, and take us again to your love? What then?
Will you then ostracize the South and compel the abolition of slavery?
Sir, do you bid us fear these coming events, thus casting their shadow
before from the leaves of your book?
Sir, you may destroy the integrity of the New School Presbyterian Church.
So much evil you may do; but you will hereby only add immensely to the
great power and good of the Old School; and you will make disclosures of
Providence, unfolding a consummation of things very different from the end
you wish to accomplish for your country and the world.
I write as one of the animalcules contributing to the coral reef of
public opinion.
F. A. Ross.
No. II.
Government Over Man a Divine Institute.
This letter is the examination and refutation of the infidel theory of
human government foisted into the Declaration of Independence.
I had written this criticism in different form for publication, before Mr.
Barnes's had appeared. I wrote it to vindicate my affirmation in the
General Assembly which met in New York, May last, on this part of the
Declaration. My views were maturely formed, after years of reflection, and
weeks--nay months--of carefully-penned writing.
And thus these truths, from the Bible, Providence, and common sense, were
like rich freight, in goodly ship, waiting for the wind to sail; when lo,
Mr. Barnes's abolition-breath filled the canvas, and carried it out of
port into the wide, the free, the open sea of American public thought.
There it sails. If pirate or other hostile craft comes alongside, the good
ship has guns.
I ask that this paper be carefully read more than once, twice, or three
times. Mr. Barnes, I presume, will not so read it. He is committed.
Greeley may notice it with his sparkling wit, albeit he has too much sense
to grapple with its argument. The Evangelist-man will say of it, what he
would say if Christ were casting out devils in New York,--"He casteth
out devils through Beelzebub the chief of the devils." Yea, this
Evangelist-man says that my version of the golden rule is "diabolical;"
when truly that version is the _word_ of the Spirit, as Christ's casting
out devils was the _work_ of the Holy Ghost.
Gerrett Smith, Garrison, Giddings, do already agree with me, that they are
right if Jefferson spoke the truth. Yea, whether the Bible be true, is no
question with them no more than with him. Yea, they hold, as he did, that
whether there be one God or twenty, it matters not: the fact either way,
in men's minds, neither breaks the leg nor picks the pocket. (See
Jefferson's Notes on Virginia.) Messrs. Beecher and Cheever will find
nothing in me to aid them in speaking to the mobs of Ephesus and Antioch.
They are making shrines, and crying, Great is Diana. Mrs. Stowe is on the
Dismal Swamp, with Dred for her Charon, to paddle her light canoe, by the
fire-fly lamps, to the Limbo of Vanity, of which she is the queen. None of
these will read with attention or honesty, if at all, this examination of
what Randolph long ago said was a _fanfaronade of nonsense_. These are all
wiser "than seven men that can render a reason."
But there are thousands, North and South, who will read this refutation,
and will feel and acknowledge that in the light of God's truth the notion
of created equality and unalienable right is falsehood and infidelity.
Rev. A. Barnes:--
Dear Sir:--In my first letter I promised to prove that the paragraph in
the Declaration of Independence, which contains the affirmation of
created equality and unalienable rights, has no sanction from the word of
God. I now meet my obligation.
The time has come when civil liberty, as revealed in the Bible and in
Providence, must be re-examined, understood, and defended against infidel
theories of human rights. The slavery question has brought on this
conflict; and, strange as it may seem, the South, the land of the slave,
is summoned by God to defend the liberty he gives; while the North, the
clime of the free, misunderstands and changes the truth of God into a
lie,--claiming a liberty he does not give. Wherefore is this? I reply:---
God, when he ordained government over men, gave to the individual man
RIGHTS, _only_ as he is under government. He first established the family;
hence all other rule is merely the family expanded. The _good_ of the
family limited the _rights_ of every member. God required the family, and
then the state, so to rule as to give to every member the _good_ which is
his, in harmony with the welfare of the whole; and he commanded the
individual to seek _that good_, and NO MORE.
Now, mankind being depraved, government has ever violated its obligation
to rule for the benefit of the entire community, and has wielded its
power in oppression. Consequently, the governed have ever struggled to
secure the good which was their right. But, in this struggle, they have
ever been tempted to go beyond the limitation God had made, and to seek
supposed good, not given, in rights, prompted by _self-will_, destructive
of the state.
Government thus ever existing in oppression, and people thus ever rising
up against despotism, have been the history of mankind.
The Reformation was one of the many convulsions in this long-continued
conflict. In its first movements, men claimed the liberty the Bible
grants. Soon they ran into licentiousness. God then stayed the further
progress of emancipation in Europe, because the spread of the asserted
liberty would have made infidelity prevail over that part of the
continent where the Reformation was arrested. God preferred Romanism,
and other despotisms, modified as they were by the struggle, to rule for
a time, than have those countries destroyed under the sway of a
licentious freedom.
In this contest the North American colonies had their rise, and they
continued the strife with England until they declared themselves
independent.
That "Declaration" affirmed not only the liberty sanctioned of the Bible,
but also the liberty constituting infidelity. Its first paragraph, to the
word "_separation_," is a noble introduction. Omit, then, what follows,
to the sentence beginning "_Prudence will dictate_," and the paper, thus
expurgated, is complete, and is then simply the complaint of the colonies
against the government of England, which had oppressed them beyond
further submission, and the assertion of their right to be free and
independent States.
This declaration was, in that form, nothing more than the affirmation of
the right God gives to children, in a family, applied to the colonies, in
regard to their mother-country. That is to say, children have, from God,
RIGHT, AS CHILDREN, when cruelly treated, to secure the good to which they
are entitled, as children, IN THE FAMILY. They may secure _this_ good by
becoming part of another family, or by setting up for themselves, if old
enough. So the colonies had, from God, _right_ as colonies, when oppressed
beyond endurance, to exchange the British family for another, or, if of
sufficient age, to establish their own household. The Declaration, then,
in that complaint of oppression and affirmation of right, in the colonies,
to be independent, asserts liberty sanctioned by the word of God. And
therefore the pledge to _that_ Declaration, of "lives, fortune, and sacred
honor," was blessed of Heaven, in the triumph of their cause.
But the Declaration, in the part I have omitted, affirms other things, and
very different. It asserts facts and rights as appertaining to man, not in
the Scriptures, but contrary thereto. Here is the passage:--
"We hold these truths to be self-evident,--that all men are created
equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain
unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are
instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of
the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or
abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation
on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to
them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness."
_This is the affirmation of the liberty claimed by infidelity._ It teaches
as a fact _that_ which is not true; and it claims as right _that_ which
God has not given. It asserts nothing new, however. It lays claim to that
individual right beyond the limitation God has put, which man has ever
asserted when in his struggle for liberty he has refused to be guided and
controlled by the word and providence of his Creator.
The paragraph is a chain of four links, each of which is claimed to be a
self-evident truth.
The _first_ and controlling assertion is, "that ALL MEN ARE CREATED
EQUAL;" which proposition, as I understand it, is, that _every man and
woman on earth is created with equal attributes of body and mind_.
_Secondly_, and consequently, that every individual has, by virtue of his
or her being created the equal of each and every other individual, the
right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, _so in his or her
own keeping that that right is unalienable without his or her consent_.
_Thirdly_, it follows, that government among men must derive its just
powers only from the _consent_ of the governed; and, as the governed are
the aggregate of individuals, _then each person must consent to be thus
controlled before he or she can be rightfully under such authority_.
_Fourthly_, and finally, that whenever any form of government becomes
destructive of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,
_as each such individual man or woman may think_, then each such person
may rightly set to work to alter or abolish such form, and institute a new
government, on such principles and in such form as to them shall seem most
likely to effect their safety and happiness.
This is the celebrated averment of created equality, and unalienable right
to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, with the necessary
consequences. I have fairly expanded its meaning. It is the old infidel
averment. It is not true in any one of its assertions.
_All Men not created equal_.
It is not a truth, _self-evident,_ that all men are created equal.
Webster, in his dictionary, defines "Self-evident--Evident without proof
or reason: clear conviction upon a bare presentation to the mind, as that
two and three make five."
Now, I affirm, and you, I think, will not contradict me, that the
position, "_all men are created equal"_ is _not_ self-evident; that the
nature of the case makes it impossible for it to be self-evident. For the
created nature of man is not in the class of things of which such
self-evident propositions can by possibility be predicated. It is equally
clear and beyond debate, that it is not _self-evident_ that all men have
_unalienable rights_, that governments derive their just powers from the
_consent_ of the governed, and may be altered or abolished whenever _to
them_ such rights may be better secured. All these assertions can be known
to be true or false only from revelation of the Creator, or from
examination and induction of reasoning, covering the nature and the
obligations of the race on the whole face of the earth. What revelation
and examination of facts do teach, I will now show. The whole
battle-ground, as to the truth of this series of averments, is on the
first affirmation, "_that all men are created equal_." Or, to keep up my
first figure, the strength of the chain of asserted truths depend on
_that_ first link. It must then stand the following perfect trial.
God reveals to us that he created man in his image, _i.e._ a spirit
endowed with attributes resembling his own,--to reason, to form rule of
right, to manifest various emotions, to will, to act,--and that he gave
him a body suited to such a spirit, (Gen. i. 26, 27, 28;) that he created
MAN "_male and female_," (Gen. i. 27;) that he made the woman "_out of the
man_," (Gen. ii. 23;) that he made "_the man the image and glory of God_,
but the woman _the glory of the man_. For the man is not of the woman, but
the woman of the man. Neither was the man _created for the woman_, but the
woman _for the man_," (1 Cor. xi.;) that he made the woman to be the
weaker vessel, (1 Pet. iii. 7.) Here, then, God created _the race_ to be
in the beginning TWO,--a male and a female MAN; one of them _not equal_ to
the other _in attributes of body and mind_, and, as we shall see
presently, not equal in rights as to government. Observe, this inequality
was fact as to the TWO, in the perfect state wherein they were _created_.
But these two fell from that perfect state, became depraved, and began to
be degraded in body and mind. This statement of the original inequality in
which man was created controls all that comes after, in God's providence
and in the natural history of the race.
_Providence_, in its comprehensive teaching, "says that God, soon after
the flood, subjected the races to all the influences of the different
zones of the earth;"--"That he hath made of one blood all nations of men
for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times
before appointed and the bounds of their habitation; that they should
seek the Lord if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he
be not far from every one of us." (Acts xvii. 26, 27.)
These "bounds of their habitation" have had much to do in the natural
history of man; for "_all men_" have been "_created_," or, more
correctly, _born_, (since the race was "created" once only at the first,)
with attributes of body and mind derived from the TWO unequal parents,
and these attributes, in every individual, the combined result of the
parental natures. "_All men_," then, come into the world under influences
upon the amalgamated and transmitted body and mind, from depravity and
degradation, sent down during all the generations past; and, therefore,
under causes of inequality, acting on each individual from climate, from
scenery, from food, from health, from sickness, from love, from hatred,
from government, inconceivable in variety and power. Under such causes,
to produce infinite shades of inequality, physical and mental, in
birth--if "all men" were created equal (_i.e._ born equal) in attributes
of body and mind--such "creation" would be a violation of all the known
analogies in the world of life.
Do, then, the facts in man's natural history exhibit this departure from
the laws of life and spirit? Do they prove that "all men are created
equal"? Do they show that every man and every woman of Africa, Asia,
Europe, America, and the islands of the seas, is created each one equal in
body and mind to each other man or woman on the face of the earth, and
that this has always been?
Need I extend these questions? Methinks, sir, I hear you say, what others
have told me, that the "Declaration" is not to be understood as affirming
what is so clearly false, but merely asserts that all men are "created
equal" in _natural rights._
I reply that _that_ is _not_ the meaning of the clause before us; for
_that_ is the meaning of the next sentence,--the _second_ in the series we
are considering.
There are, as I have said, four links to the chain of thought in this
passage:--1. That all men are created equal. 2. That they are endowed by
the Creator with certain unalienable rights. 3. That government derives
its just powers from the consent of the governed. 4. That the people may
alter and abolish it, &c.
These links are logical sequences. All men--man and woman--are created
equal,--equal in _attributes of body and mind_; (for _that_ is the only
sense in which they could be _created_ equal;) _therefore_ they are
endowed with right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness,
unalienable, except in their consent; _consequently_ such consent is
essential to all rightful government; and, _finally_ and _irresistibly_,
the people have supreme right to alter or abolish it, &c.
The meaning, then, I give to that first link, and to the chain following,
_is_ the sense, because, if you deny that meaning to the _first link_,
then the others have no logical truth whatever. Thus:--
If all men are _not_ created equal in attributes of body and mind, then
the _inequality_ may be _so great_ that such men cannot be endowed with
right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, unalienable save in
their _consent_; then government over such men cannot rightfully rest upon
their _consent_; nor can they have right to alter or abolish government in
their mere determination.
Yea, sir, you concede every thing if you admit that the "Declaration"
does _not_ mean to affirm that all men are "_created_" _equal in body
and mind_.
I will suppose in the Alps a community of Cretins,--_i.e._ deformed and
helpless idiots,--but among them many from the same parents, who, in body
and mind, by birth are comparatively _Napoleons_. Now, this _inequality_,
physical and mental, by birth, makes it impossible that the government
over these Cretins can be in their "_consent_." _The Napoleons must rule_.
The Napoleons must absolutely control their "life, liberty, and pursuit of
happiness," for the good of the community. Do you reply that I have taken
an extreme case? that everybody admits sensible people must govern natural
fools? Ay, sir, there is the rub. _Natural fools_! Are some men, then,
"_created_" natural fools? Very well. Then you also admit that some men
are _created_ just a degree above natural fools!--and, consequently, that
men are "_created_" in all degrees, gradually rising in the scale of
intelligence. Are they not "_created_" just above the brute, with savage
natures along with mental imbecility and physical degradation? Must the
Napoleons govern the Cretins without their "consent"? Must they not also
govern without their "consent" these types of mankind, whether one, two,
three, thirty, or three hundred degrees above the Cretins, if they are
still greatly inferior by nature? Suppose the Cretins removed from the
imagined community, and a colony of Australian ant-catchers or California
lizard-eaters be in their stead: must not the Napoleons govern these? And,
if you admit inequality to be in birth, then that inequality is the very
ground of the reason why the Napoleons must govern the ant-catchers and
lizard-eaters. Remove these, and put in their place an importation of
African negroes. Do you admit _their inferiority by_ "CREATION?" Then the
same control over them must be the irresistible fact in common sense and
Scripture of God. _The Napoleons must govern_. They must govern without
asking "consent,"--if the inequality be such that "_consent_" would be
evil, and not good, in the family--the state.
Yea, sir, if you deny that the "Declaration" asserts "all men are created
equal" in body and mind, then you admit the inequality may be such as to
make it impossible that in such cases men have rights unalienable save in
their "consent;" and you admit it to be impossible that government in such
circumstances can exist in such "_consent_" But, if you affirm the
"Declaration" _does_ mean that men are "_created_ equal" in attributes of
body and mind, then you hold to an equality which God, in his word, and
providence, and the natural history of man, denies to be truth.
I think I have fairly shown, from Scripture and facts, that the first
averment is not the truth; and have reduced it to an absurdity. I will now
regard the second, third, and fourth links of the chain.
I know they are already broken; for, the whole chain being but an electric
current from a vicious imagination, I have destroyed the whole by breaking
the first link. Or was it but a cluster from a poisonous vine, then I have
killed the branches by cutting the vine. I will, however, expose the other
three sequences by a distinct argument covering them all.
_Authority Delegated to Adam_.
God gave to Adam sovereignty over the human race, in his first
decree:--"_He shall rule over thee_." _That_ was THE INSTITUTION OF
GOVERNMENT. It was not based on the "_consent_" of Eve, the governed. It
was from God. He gave to Adam like authority to rule his children. It was
not derived from their "_consent_". It was from God. He gave Noah the same
sovereignty, with express power over life, liberty, and pursuit of
happiness. It was not founded in "_consent_" of Shem, Ham, and Japheth,
and their wives. It was from God. He then determined the habitations of
men on all the face of the earth, and _indicated_ to them, in every clime,
the _form_ and _power_ of their governments. He gave, directly, government
to Israel. He just as truly gave it to Idumea, to Egypt, and to Babylon,
to the Arab, to the Esquimaux, the Caffre, the Hottentot, and the negro.
God, in the Bible, decides the matter. He says, "Let every soul be 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 rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil.
Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and thou
shalt have praise of the same: for he is the minister of God to thee for
good. But if thou do that which 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. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for
wrath, but also for conscience' sake. For this cause pay ye tribute also:
for 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; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor." (Rom.
xiii. 1-7.)
Here God reveals to us that he has _delegated to government his own_ RIGHT
_over life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness_; and that that RIGHT is
not, in any sense, from the "_consent_" of the governed, but is directly
from him. Government over men, whether in the family or in the state, is,
then, as directly from God as it would be if he, in visible person, ruled
in the family or in the state. I speak not only of the RIGHT simply to
govern, but the _mode_ of the government, and the _extent_ of the power.
Government _can do_ ALL which God _would do,--just_ THAT,--_no more, no
less_. And it is _bound to do just_ THAT,--_no more, no less_. Government
is responsible to God, if it fails to do _just_ THAT which He himself
would do. It is under responsibility, then, to rule in righteousness. It
must not oppress. It must _give_ to every individual "_life, liberty, and
pursuit of happiness_," in harmony with the _good_ of the family,--the
state,--_as God himself would give it_,--_just_ THAT, _no more, no less_.
This passage of Scripture settles the question, From whence has
government RIGHT to rule, and what is the _extent_ of its power? The
RIGHT is from God, and the EXTENT of the power is _just_ THAT to which
God would exercise it if he were personally on the earth. God, in this
passage, and others, settles, with equal clearness, from whence is the
OBLIGATION to _submit_ to government, and what is the _extent_ of the
duty of obedience? The OBLIGATION to submit is not from individual RIGHT
to consent or not to consent to government,--but the OBLIGATION _to
submit_ is directly from God.
The EXTENT of the duty of obedience is equally revealed--in this wise: so
long as the government rules in righteousness, the duty is perfect
obedience. So soon, however, as government requires _that_ which God, in
his word, _forbids the subject to do_, he must obey God, and not man. He
must refuse to obey man. But, inasmuch as the obligation to submit to
authority of government is so great, the subject must _know_ it is the
will of God, that he shall refuse to obey, before he assumes the
responsibility of resistance to the powers that be. His _conscience_ will
not justify him before God, if he mistakes his duty. _He may be all the
more to blame for having_ SUCH A CONSCIENCE. Let him, then, be CERTAIN he
can say, like Peter and John, "Whether it be right, in the sight of God,
to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye."
But, when government requires _that_ which God _does not forbid_ the
subject to do, although _in that_ the government may have transcended the
line of its righteous rule, the subject must, nevertheless,
submit,--_until_ oppression has gone to _the point_ at which _God makes_
RESISTANCE _to be duty._ And _that point_ is when RESISTANCE will clearly
be _less of evil, and more of good_, TO THE COMMUNITY, than further
submission.
_That_ is the rule of _duty_ God gives to the _whole_ people, or to the
_minority_, or to the _individual_, to guide them in resistance to the
powers that be.
It is irresistibly _certain_ that _He who ordains_ government _has, alone,
the right to alter or abolish it_,--that He who institutes the powers that
be has, alone, the right to say when and how the people, in whole or in
part, may resist. So, then, the people, in whole, or in part, have no
right to resist, to alter, or abolish government, simply because _they_
may deem it destructive of the end for which it was instituted; but they
may resist, alter, or abolish, _when it shall be seen that God so regards
it_. This places the great fact where it must be placed,--_under the_
CONTROL _of the_ BIBLE _and_ PROVIDENCE.
_Illustrations_.
I will conclude with one or two illustrations. God, in his providence,
ordains the Russian form of government,--_i.e._ He places the sovereignty
in one man, because He sees that such government can secure, for a time,
more good to that degraded people than any other form. Now, I ask, Has the
emperor _right_, from God, to change at once, in his mere "_consent_," the
_form_ of his government to _that_ of the United States? No. God forbids
him. Why? Because he would thereby destroy the good, and bring immense
evil in his empire. I ask again, Have the Russian serfs and nobles,--yea,
all,--"consenting," the right, from God, to make that change? No. For the
government of the United States is not suited to them. And, in such an
attempt, they would deprive themselves of the blessings they now have, and
bring all the horrors of anarchy.
Do you ask if I then hold, that God ordains the Russian type of rule to be
perpetual over that people? No. The emperor is bound to secure all of
"_life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness_," to each individual,
consistent with the good of the nation. And he is to learn his obligation
from the Bible, and faithfully apply it to the condition of his subjects.
_He will thus gradually elevate them_; while they, on their part, are
bound to strive for this elevation, in all the ways in which God may show
them the good, and the right, which, more and more, will belong to them in
their upward progress. The result of such government and such obedience
would be that of a father's faithful training, and children's
corresponding obedience. The Russian people would thus have, gradually,
that measure of liberty they could bear, under the one-man power,--and
then, in other forms, as they might be qualified to realize them. This
development would be without convulsion,--as the parent gives place, while
the children are passing from the lower to their higher life. It would be
the exemplification of Carlyle's illustration of the snake. He says, A
people should change their government only as a snake sheds his skin: the
new skin is gradually formed under the old one,--and then the snake
wriggles out, with just a drop of blood here and there, where the old
jacket held on rather tightly.
God ordains the government of the United States. And _He places_ the
_sovereignty_ in the _will_ of the majority, because He has trained the
people, through many generations in modes of government, to such an
elevation in moral and religious intelligence, that such sovereignty is
best suited to confer on them the highest right, as yet, to "life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." But God requires that _that will
of the majority_ be in perfect submission to Him. Once more then I
inquire,--Whether the people of this country, yea all of them consenting,
have right from God, to abolish now, at this time, our free institutions,
and set up the sway of Russia? No. But why? There is one answer only. He
tells us that our happiness is in this form of government, and in it, its
developed results.
_The "Social Compact" not recognised in the Divine Institute_.
Here I pause. So, then, God gives no sanction to the notion of a SOCIAL
COMPACT. He never gave to man individual, isolated, natural rights,
unalienably in his keeping. He never made him a Caspar Hauser, in the
forest, without name or home,--a Melchisedek, in the wilderness, without
father, without mother, without descent,--a Robinson Crusoe, on his
island, in skins and barefooted, waiting, among goats and parrots, the
coming of the canoes and the savages, to enable him to "_consent_" if he
would, to the relations of social life.
And, therefore, those five sentences in that second paragraph of the
Declaration of Independence are not the truth; so, then, it is not
_self-evident_ truth that all men are created equal. So, then, it is not
the truth, in fact, that they are created equal. So, then, it is not the
truth that God has endowed all men with unalienable right to life,
liberty, and pursuit of happiness. So, then, it is not the truth that
governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. So,
then, it is not the truth that the people have right to alter or abolish
their government, and institute a new form, whenever to them it shall seem
likely to effect their safety and happiness.
The manner in which these unscriptural dogmas have been modified or
developed in the United States, I will examine in another paper.
I merely add, that the opinions of revered ancestors, on these questions
of right and their application to American slavery, must now, as never
before, be brought to the test of the light of the Bible. F.A. Ross.
Huntsville, Ala., Jan. 1857.
Man-Stealing.
This argument on the abolition charge, against the slave-holder,--that he
is a man-stealer,--covers the whole question of slavery, especially as it
is seen in the Old Testament. The headings in the letter make the subject
sufficiently clear.
No. III.
Rev. Albert Barnes:--
Dear Sir:--In my first letter, I merely touched some points in your tract,
intending to notice them more fully in subsequent communications. I have,
in my second paper, sufficiently examined the imaginary maxims of created
equality and unalienable rights.
In this, I will test your views by Scripture more directly. "To the law
and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is
because there is no light in them." (Isaiah viii. 20).
The abolitionist charges the slave-holder with being a _man-stealer_. He
makes this allegation in two affirmations. First, that the slave-holder
is thus guilty, because, the negro having been kidnapped in Africa,
therefore those who now hold him, or his children, in bondage, lie under
the guilt of that first act. Secondly, that the slave-holder, by the very
fact that he is such, is guilty of stealing from the negro his unalienable
right to freedom.
This is the charge. It covers the whole subject. I will meet it in all
its parts.
_The Difference between Man-Stealing and Slave-Holding, as set forth in
the Bible_.
The Bible reads thus: (Exodus xxi. 16:)--"He that stealeth a man
and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be
put to death."
What, then, is it to kidnap or steal a man? Webster informs us--To kidnap
is "to steal a human being, a man, woman, or child; or to seize and
forcibly carry away any person whatever, from his own country or state
into another." The idea of "_seizing and forcibly carrying away"_ enters
into the meaning of the word in all the definitions of law.
The crime, then, set forth in the Bible was not _selling_ a man: but
selling a _stolen_ man. The crime was not having a man _in his hand as a
slave_; but......in _his_ hand, as a slave, a _stolen_ man. And hence, the
penalty of _death_ was affixed, not to selling, buying, or holding man, as
a slave, but to the specific offence of _stealing and selling, or holding_
a man _thus stolen, contrary to this law_. Yea, it was _this law_, and
this law _only_, which made it _wrong_. For, under some circumstances, God
sanctioned the seizing and forcibly carrying away a man, woman, or child
from country or state, into slavery or other condition. He sanctioned the
utter destruction of every male and every married woman, and child, of
Jabez-Gilead, and the seizure, and forcibly carrying away, four hundred
virgins, unto the camp to Shiloh, and there, being given as wives to the
remnant of the slaughtered tribe of Benjamin, in the rock Rimmon. Sir,
how did that destruction of Jabez-Gilead, and the kidnapping of those
young women, differ from the razing of an African village, and forcibly
seizing, and carrying away, those not put to the sword? The difference is
in this:--God commanded the Israelites to seize and bear off those young
women. But he forbids the slaver to kidnap the African. Therefore, the
Israelites did right; therefore, the trader does wrong. The Israelites,
it seems, gave wives, in that way, to the spared Benjamites, because they
had sworn not to give their daughters. But there were six hundred of these
Benjamites. Two hundred were therefore still without wives. What was done
for them? Why, God authorized the elders of the congregation to tell the
two hundred Benjamites to catch every man his wife, of the daughters of
Shiloh, when they came out to dance, in the feast of the Lord, on the
north side of Bethel. And the children of Benjamin did so, and took them
wives, "whom they caught:" (Judges xxi.) God made it right for those
Benjamites to catch every man his wife, of the daughters of Shiloh. But he
makes it wrong for the trader to catch his slaves of the sons or daughters
of Africa. Lest you should try to deny that God authorized this act of the
children of Israel, although I believe he did order it, let me remind you
of another such case, the authority for which you will not question.
Moses, by direct command from God, destroyed the Midianites. He slew all
the males, and carried away all the women and children. He then had all
the married women and male children killed; but all the virgins,
thirty-two thousand, were divided as spoil among the people. And
_thirty-two_ of these virgins, _the Lord's tribute_, were given unto
Eleazar, the priest, "as the Lord commanded Moses." (Numbers xxxi.)
Sir, Thomas Paine rejected the Bible on this fact among his other
objections. Yea, _his_ reason, _his_ sensibilities, _his_ great law of
humanity, _his_ intuitional and eternal sense of right, made it impossible
for him to honor such a God. And, sir, on your now avowed principles of
interpretation, which are those of Paine, you sustain him in his rejection
of the books of Moses and all the word of God.
God's command _made it right_ for Moses to destroy the Midianites and make
slaves of their daughters; and I have dwelt upon these facts, to reiterate
what I hold to be THE FIRST TRUTH IN MORALS:--that a thing is right, not
because it is ever so _per se_, but because God _makes it right_; and, of
course, a thing is wrong, not because it is so in the nature of things,
but because God makes it wrong. I distinctly have taken, and do take, that
ground in its widest sense, and am prepared to maintain it against all
comers. He made it right for the sons of Adam to marry their sisters. He
made it right for Abraham to marry his half-sister. He made it right for
the patriarchs, and David and Solomon, to have more wives than one. He
made it right when he gave command to kill whole nations, sparing none. He
made it right when he ordered that nations, or such part as he pleased,
should be spared and enslaved. He made it right that the patriarchs and
the Israelites should hold slaves in harmony with the system of servile
labor which had long been in the world. He merely modified that system to
suit his views of good among his people. So, then, when he saw fit, they
might capture men. So, then, when he forbade the individual Israelite to
steal a man, he made it crime, and the penalty death. So, then, that crime
was not the mere _stealing_ a man, nor the _selling_ a man, nor the
_holding_ a man,--but the _stealing and selling_, or _holding_, a man
_under circumstances thus forbidden of God_.
_Was the Israelite Master a Man-Stealer?_
I now ask, Did God intend to make man-stealing and slave-holding the same
thing? Let us see. In that very chapter of Exodus (xxi.) which contains
the law against man-stealing, and only four verses further on, God says,
"If a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die under his
hand, he shall be surely punished: notwithstanding, if he continue a day
or two he shall not be punished; for he is his money." (Verses 20, 21.)
Sir, that man was not a hired servant. He was bought with money. He was
regarded by God _as the money_ of his master. He was his slave, in the
full meaning of a slave, then, and now, bought with money. God, then, did
not intend the Israelites to understand, and not one of them ever
understood, from that day to this, that Jehovah in his law to Moses
regarded the slave-holder as a man-stealer. Man-stealing was a specific
offence, with its specific penalty. Slave-holding was one form of God's
righteous government over men,--a government he ordained, with various
modifications, among the Hebrews themselves, and with sterner features in
its relation to heathen slaves.
In Exodus xxi. and Leviticus xxv., various gradations of servitude were
enacted, with a careful particularity which need not be misunderstood.
Among these, a Hebrew man might be a slave for six years, and then go free
with his wife, if he were married when he came into the relation; but if
his master had given him a wife, and she had borne him sons or daughters,
the wife and her children should be her master's, and he should go out by
himself. That is, the man by the law became free, while his wife and
children remained slaves. If the servant, however, plainly said, "I love
my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: then his
master brought him unto the judges, also unto the doorpost, and his master
bored his ear through with an awl, and he served him forever." (Ex. xxi.
1-6.) Sir, you have urged discussion:--give us then your views of that
passage. Tell us how that man was separated from his wife and children
according to _the eternal right_. Tell us what was the condition of the
woman in case the man chose to "go out" without her? Tell us if the Hebrew
who thus had his ear bored by his master with an awl was not a slave for
life? Tell us, lastly, whether those children were not slaves? And, while
on that chapter, tell us whether in the next verses, 7-11, God did not
allow the Israelite father to sell his own daughter into bondage and into
polygamy by the same act of sale?
I will not dwell longer on these milder forms of slavery, but read to you
the clear and unmistakable command of the Lord in Leviticus xxv. 44,
46:--"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou shalt have, shall be
of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and
bondmaids. Moreover, of the children of the strangers that do sojourn
among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you,
which they beget in your land: and they shall be your possession: and ye
shall take them for an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit
them for a possession; and they shall be your bondmen forever."
Sir, the sun will grow dim with age before that Scripture can be tortured
to mean any thing else than just what it says; that God commanded the
Israelites to be slave-holders in the strict and true sense over the
heathen, in manner and form therein set forth. Do you tell the world that
this cannot be the sense of the Bible, because it is "a violation of the
first principles of the American Declaration of Independence;" because it
grates upon your "instinct of liberty;" because it reveals God in
opposition to the "spirit of the age;" because, if it be the sense of the
passage, then "the Bible neither ought to be, nor can be, received by
mankind as a divine revelation"? _That_ is what you say: _that_ is what
Albert Barnes affirms in his philosophy. But what if God in his word says,
"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou shalt have shall be of the
heathen that are round about you"? What if we may then choose between
Albert Barnes's philosophy and God's truth?
Or will you say, God, under the circumstances, _permitted_ the Israelites
_to sin_ in the matter of slave-holding, just as he permitted them _to
sin_ by living in polygamy. _Permitted_ them _to sin!_ No, sir; God
_commanded_ them to be slave-holders. He _made it_ the law of their social
state. He _made it_ one form of his ordained government among them.
Moreover, you take it for granted all too soon, that the Israelites
committed sin in their polygamy. God sanctioned their polygamy. It was
therefore not sin in them. It was right. But God now forbids polygamy,
under the gospel; and now it is sin.
Or will you tell us the iniquity of the Canaanites was then full, and
God's time to punish them had come? True; but the same question comes
up:--Did God punish the Canaanites by placing them in the relation of
slaves to his people, by express command, which compelled them to sin?
That's the point. I will not permit you to evade it. In plainer
words:--Did God command the Hebrews to make slaves of their fellow-men, to
buy them and sell them, to regard them as their money? He did. Then, did
the Hebrews sin when they obeyed God's command? No. Then they did what was
right, and it was right because God made it so. Then _the Hebrew
slave-holder was not a man-stealer_. But, you say, the Southern
slave-holder is. Well, we shall see presently.
Just here, the abolitionist who professes to respect the Scriptures is
wont to tell us that the whole subject of bondage among the Israelites was
so peculiar to God's ancient dispensation, that no analogy between that
bondage and Southern slavery can be brought up. Thus he attempts to raise
a dust out of the Jewish institutions, to prevent people from seeing that
slaveholding then was the same thing that it is now. But, to sustain my
interpretation of the plain Scriptures given, I will go back five hundred
years before the existence of the Hebrew nation.
I read at that time, (Gen. xiv. 14:)--"And when Abraham heard that his
brother was taken captive, he armed his trained servants, born in his own
house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them even unto Damascus,"
&c. (Gen. xvii. 27:)--"And all the men of his house, born, in the house,
and bought with the money of the stranger, were circumcised." (Gen. xx.
14:)--"And Abimelech took sheep and oxen, and men-servants and
women-servants, and gave them unto Abraham." (Gen. xxiv. 34, 35:)--"And he
said, I am Abraham's servant; and the Lord hath blessed my master greatly,
and he is become great; and he hath given him flocks and herds, and silver
and gold, and men-servants and maid-servants, and camels and asses."
_Was Abraham a Man-Stealer?_
Sir, what is the common sense of these Scriptures? Why, that the
slave-trade existed in Abraham's day, as it had long before, and has ever
since, in all the regions of Syria, Palestine, Arabia, and Egypt, in which
criminals and prisoners of war were sold,--in which parents sold their
children. Abraham, then, it is plain, bought, of the sellers in this
traffic, men-servants and maid-servants; he had them born in his house; he
received them as presents.
Do you tell me that Abraham, by divine authority, made these servants part
of his family, social and religious? Very good. But still he regarded them
as his slaves. He took Hagar as a wife, but he treated her as his
slave,--yea, as Sarah's slave; and as such he gave her to be chastised,
for misconduct, by her mistress. Yea, he never placed Ishmael, the son of
the bondwoman, on a level with Isaac, the son of the freewoman. If, then,
he so regarded Hagar and Ishmael, of course he never considered his other
slaves on an equality with himself. True, had he been childless, he would
have given his estate to Eliezer: but he would have given it to his slave.
True, had Isaac not been born, he would have given his wealth to Ishmael;
but he would nave given it to the son of his bondwoman. Sir, every
Southern planter is not more truly a slave-holder than Abraham. And the
Southern master, by divine authority, may, to-day, consider his slaves
part of his social and religious family, just as Abraham did. His relation
is just that of Abraham. He has slaves of an inferior type of mankind from
Abraham's bondmen; and he therefore, for that reason, as well as from the
fact that they are his slaves, holds them lower than himself. But,
nevertheless, he is a slave-holder in no other sense than was Abraham. Did
Abraham have his slave-household circumcised? Every Southern planter may
have his slave-household baptized. I baptized, not long since, a
slave-child,--the master and mistress offering it to God. What was done
in the parlor might be done with divine approbation on every plantation.
So, then, Abraham lived in the midst of a system of slave-holding exactly
the same in nature with that in the South,--a system ordained of God as
really as the other forms of government round about him. He, then, with
the divine blessing, made himself the master of slaves, men, women, and
children, by buying them,--by receiving them in gifts,--by having them
born in his house; and he controlled them as property, just as really as
the Southern master in the present day. I ask now, _was Abraham a
man-stealer?_ Oh, no, you reiterate: but the Southern master is. Why?
_Is the Southern Master a Man-Stealer_?
Do you, sir, or anybody, contend that the Southern master seized his slave
in Africa, and forcibly brought him away to America, contrary to law?
That, and that alone, was and is kidnapping in divine and human statute.
No. What then? Why, the abolitionist responds, The African man-stealer
sold his victim to the slave-holder; he, to the planter; and the negro has
been ever since in bondage: therefore _the guilt_ of the man-stealer has
cleaved to sellers, buyers, and inheritors, to this time, and will
through all generations to come. That is the charge.
And it brings up the question so often and triumphantly asked by the
abolitionist; _i.e._ "You," he says to the slave-holder,--"you admit it
was wrong to steal the negro in Africa. Can the slave-holder, then, throw
off wrong so long as he holds the slave at any time or anywhere
thereafter?" I answer, yes; and my reply shall be short, yet conclusive. It
is this:--_Guilt_, or criminality, is that state of a moral agent which
results from _his_ actual commission of a crime or offence knowing it to
be crime or violation of law. _That_ is the received definition of
_guilt_, and _you_, I know, do accept it. The _guilt_, then, of kidnapping
_terminated_ with the man-stealer, the seller, the buyer, and holders,
who, knowingly and intentionally, carried on the traffic contrary to the
divine law. THAT GUILT attaches in no sense whatever, as a personal, moral
responsibility, to the present slave-holder. Observe, I am here
discussing, _not the question of mere slave-holding,_ but whether the
master, who has had nothing to do with the slave-trade, can _now_ hold the
slave without the moral guilt of the man-stealer? I have said that _that_
guilt, in no sense whatever, rests upon him; for he neither stole the
man, nor bought him from the kidnapper, nor had any _complicity_ in the
traffic. Here, I know, the abolitionist insists that the master _is_
guilty of this _complicity_, unless he will at once emancipate the slave;
because, so long as he holds him, he thereby, personally and _voluntarily,
assumes the same relation which the original kidnapper or buyer held to
the African_.
This is Dr. Cheever's argument in a recent popular sermon. He thinks it
unanswerable; but it has no weight whatever. It is met perfectly by adding
_one_ word to his proposition. Thus:--_The master does_ NOT _assume the
same relation which the original man-stealer or buyer held to the
African_. The master's _relation_ to God and to his slave is now _wholly
changed_ from that of the man-stealer, and those engaged in the trade; and
his obligation is wholly different. What is his relation? and what is his
obligation? They are as follows:----
The master finds himself, with no taint of personal concern in the African
trade, in a Christian community of white Anglo-Americans, holding control
over his black fellow-man, who is so unlike himself in complexion, in
form, in other peculiarities, and so unequal to himself in attributes of
body and mind, that it is _impossible, in every sense_, to place him on a
level with himself in the community. _This is his relation to the negro_.
What, then, does God command him to do? Does God require him to send the
negro back to his heathen home from whence he was stolen? That home no
longer exists. But, if it did remain, does God command the master to send
his Christianized slave into the horrors of his former African heathenism?
No. God has placed the master under law entirely different from his
command to the slave-trader. God said to the trader, _Let the negro
alone_. But he says to the present master, _Do unto the negro all the good
you can; make him a civilized man; make him a Christian man; lift him up
and give him all he has a right to claim in the good of the whole
community_. This the master can do; this he must do, and then leave the
result with the Almighty.
We reach the same conclusion by asking, What does God say to the
negro-slave?
Does he tell him to ask to be sent back to heathen Africa? No. Does he
give him authority to claim a created equality and unalienable right to
be on a level with the white man in civil and social relations? No. To
ask the first would be to ask a great evil; to claim the second is to
demand a natural and moral impossibility. No. God tells him to seek none
of these things. But he commands him to know the facts in his case as
they are in the Bible, and have ever been, and ever will be in
Providence:--that he is not the white man's equal,--that he can never
have his level--that he must not claim it; but that he can have, and
ought to have, and must have, all of good, in his condition as a slave,
until God may reveal a higher happiness for him in some other relation
than that _he must ever_ have to the Anglo-American. The present
slave-holder, then, by declining to emancipate his bondman, does not
place himself in _the guilt_ of the man-stealer or of those who had
complicity with him; but he stands _exactly_ in that NICK _of time and
place_, in the course of Providence, where _wrong_, in the transmission
of African slavery, _ends_, and _right begins_.
I have, sir, fairly stated this, your strongest argument, and fully met
it. _The Southern master is not a man-stealer._ The abolitionist--repulsed
in his charge that the slave-owner is a kidnapper, either in fact or by
voluntarily assuming any of the relations of the traffic--then makes his
impeachment on his second affirmation, mentioned at the opening of this
letter. That the slave-holder is, nevertheless, thus _guilty_, because,
in the simple fact of being a master, he _steals_ from the negro his
unalienable right to freedom.
This, sir, looks like a new view of the subject. The crime forbidden in
the Bible was stealing and selling a man; _i.e._ seizing and forcibly
carrying away, from country or State, a human being--man, woman, or
child--contrary to law, and selling or holding the same. But the
abolitionist gives us to understand this crime rests on the slave-holder
in another sense:--namely, that he steals from the negro a metaphysical
attribute,--his unalienable right to liberty!
This is a new sort of kidnapping. This is, I suppose, _stealing the man
from himself_, as it is sometimes elegantly expressed,--_robbing him of
his body and his soul_. Sir, I admit this is a strong figure of speech, a
beautiful personification, a sonorous rhetorical flourish, which must make
a deep impression on Dr. Cheever's people, Broadway, New York, and on your
congregation, Washington Square, Philadelphia; but it is certainly not the
Bible crime of man-stealing. And whether the Southern master is _guilty_
of this sublimated thing will be understood by us when you prove that the
negro, or anybody else, has such metaphysical right to be stolen,--such
transcendental liberty not in subordination to the good of the whole
people. In a word, sir, this refined expression is, after all, just the
old averment that the slave-holder is guilty of _sin per se!_ That's it.
I have given you, in reply, the Old Testament. In my next, I propose to
inquire what the New Testament says in the light of the _Golden Rule_.
F.A. Ross.
Huntsville, Ala., Jan. 31, 1857.
The Golden Rule.
This view of the Golden Rule is the only exposition of that great text
which has ever been given in words sufficiently clear, and, with practical
illustrations, to make the subject intelligible to every capacity. The
explanation is the truth of God, and it settles forever the slavery
question, so far as it rests on this precept of Jesus Christ.
No. IV.
Rev. Albert Barnes:--
Dear Sir:--The argument against slave-holding, founded on the Golden Rule,
is the strongest which can be presented, and I admit that, if it cannot be
perfectly met, the master must give the slave liberty and equality. But if
it can be absolutely refuted, then the slave-holder in this regard may
have a good conscience; and the abolitionist has nothing more to say. Here
is the rule.
"Therefore, all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to
you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the prophets."
(Matt. vii. 12.)
In your "_Notes_," on this passage you thus write:--"This command has been
usually called the Savior's _Golden Rule_; a name given to it on account
of its great value.--_All that you_ EXPECT or DESIRE _of others, in
similar circumstances_, DO TO THEM."
This, sir, is your exposition of the Savior's rule of right. With all due
respect, I decline your interpretation. You have missed the meaning by
leaving out ONE word. Observe,--you do not say, All that you OUGHT to
_expect_ or _desire_, &c., THAT _do to them_. No. But you make the
EXPECTATION or DESIRE, _which every man_ ACTUALLY HAS _in similar
circumstances_, THE MEASURE _of his_ DUTY _to every other man_. Or, in
different words, you make, without qualification or explanation, the MERE
EXPECTATION or DESIRE which every man,--with no instruction, or any sort
of training,--wise or simple, good or bad, heathen, Mohammedan, nominal
Christian,--WOULD HAVE _in similar circumstances_, THE LAW OF OBLIGATION,
_always binding_ upon him TO DO THAT SAME THING _unto his neighbor!_
Sir, you have left out _the very idea_ which contains the sense of that
Scripture. It is this: Christ, in his rule, _presupposes_ that the man to
whom he gives it _knows_, and from the Bible, (or providence, or natural
conscience, _so far as in harmony_ with the Bible,) the _various
relations_ in which God has placed him; and the _respective duties_ in
those relations; _i.e._ The rule _assumes_ that he KNOWS what he OUGHT to
_expect_ or _desire_ in similar circumstances.
I will test this affirmation by several and varied illustrations. I will
show how Christ, according to your exposition of his rule, speaks on the
subject,--of _revenge, marriage, emancipation_,--_the fugitive from
bondage_. And how he truly speaks on these subjects.
_Revenge--Right according to your view of the Golden Rule_.
Indian and Missionary--Prisoner tied to a tree, stuck over with burning
splinters.
Here is an Indian torturing his prisoner. The missionary approaches and
beseeches him to regard _the Golden Rule_. "Humph!" utters the savage:
"Golden Rule! what's that?" "Why" says the good man, "all that you
_expect_ or _desired_ other Indians, in similar circumstances, do you
even so to them." "Humph!" growls the warrior, with a fierce
smile,--"Missionary--good: that's what I do now. If I was tied to that
tree, I would _expect_ and _desire him_ to have _his_ revenge,--to do to
me as I do to him; and I would sing my death-song, as he sings his.
Missionary, your rule is Indian rule,--good rule, missionary. Humph!"
And he sticks more splinters into his victim, brandishes his tomahawk,
and yells.
Sir, what has the missionary to say, after this perfect proof that you
have mistaken the great law of right? Verily, he finds that the rule,
with your explanation, tells the Indian to torture his prisoner. Verily,
he finds that the wild man has the best of the argument. He finds he had
left out the word OUGHT; and that he can't put it in, until he teaches
the Indian things which as yet he don't know. Yea, he finds he gave the
commandment too soon; for that he must begin back of that commandment,
and teach the savage God's ordination of the relations in which he is to
his fellow-men, before he can make him comprehend or apply the rule as
Christ gives it.
_Marriage--Void under your Interpretation of the Golden Rule_.
Lucy Stone, and Moses--Lady on sofa, having just divorced herself--Moses,
with the Tables of the Law, appears: she falls at his feet, and covers her
face with her hands.
This woman, everybody knows, was married some time since, after a fashion;
that is to say, protesting publicly against all laws of wedlock, and
entering into the relation so long only as she, or her husband, might
continue pleased therewith.
Very well. Then I, without insult to her or offense to my readers, suppose
that about this time she has shown her unalienable right to liberty and
equality by giving her husband a bill of divorcement. Free again, she
reclines on her couch, and is reading the Tribune. It is mid-day. But
there is a light, above the brightness of the sun, shining round about
her. And _he_, who saw God on Sinai, stands before her, the glory on his
face, and the tables of stone in his hands. The woman falls before him,
veils her eyes with her trembling fingers, and cries out, "Moses, oh, I
believed till now that thou practised deception, in claiming to be sent of
God to Israel. But now, I know thou didst see God in the burning bush,
and heard him speak that law from the holy mountain. Moses, I know ... I
confess.".... And Moses answers, and says unto her, "Woman, thou art one
of a great class in this land, who claim to be more just than God, more
pure than their Maker, who have made their inward light their God. Woman,
thou in '_convention_' hast uttered _Declaration of Independence_ from
man. And, verily, thou hast asserted this claim to equality and
unalienable right, even now, by giving thy husband his bill of
divorcement, in thy sense of the Golden Rule. Yea, verily, thou hast done
unto him all that thou _expectedst_ or _desiredst_ of him, in similar
circumstances. And now thou thinkest thyself free again. Woman, thou art a
sinner. Verily, thine inward light, and declaration of independence, and
Golden Rule, do well agree the one with the other. Verily, thou hast
learned of Jefferson, and Channing, and Barnes. But, woman,
notwithstanding thou hast sat at the feet of these wise men, I, Moses, say
thou art a sinner before the law, and the prophets, and the gospel. Woman,
thy light is darkness; thy declaration of equality and right is vanity and
folly; and thy Golden Rule is license to wickedness.
"Woman, hast thou ears? Hear: I, by authority of God, ordained that the
man should rule over thee. I placed thee, and children, and men-servants,
and maid-servants, under the same law of subjection to the government
ordained of God in the family,--the state. I for a time sanctioned
polygamy, and made it right. I, for the hardness of men's hearts, allowed
them, and made it right, to give their wives a bill of divorcement.
Woman, hear. Paul, having the same Spirit of God, confirms my word. He
commands _wives_, and children, and servants, after this manner:--'Wives,
submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord;
children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing unto
the Lord; servants, obey in all things your masters according to the
flesh; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers; but in singleness of heart,
fearing God.' Woman, Paul makes _that rule_ the same, and _that
submission_, the same. The _manner_ of the rule he varies with the
relations. He requires it to be, in the _love_ of the husband, even as
Christ loved the church,--in the _mildness_ of the father, not provoking
the children to anger, lest they be discouraged,--in _the justice and
equity_ of the master, knowing that he also has a master in heaven:
(Colossians.) Woman, hear. Paul says to thee, the man _now_ shall have
one wife, and he _now_ shall not give her a bill of divorcement, save for
crime. Woman, thou art not free from thy husband. Christ's Golden Rule
must not be interpreted by thee as A. Barnes has rendered it; Christ
_assumes_ that thou _believest_ God's truth,--that thou _knowest_ the
relation of husband and wife, and the _obligations and rights_ of the
same, _as in the Bible; then_, in the light of this _knowledge_, verily,
thou art required to do what God says thou _oughtest_ to do. Woman, thou
art a sinner. Go, sin no more. Go, find thy husband; see to it that he
takes thee back. Go, submit to him, and honor him, and obey him."
_Emancipation--Ruin--Golden Rule, in your meaning, carried out_.
Island in the Tropics--Elegant houses falling to decay--Broad fields
abandoned to the forest--Wharves grass-grown--Negroes relapsing into the
savage state--A dark cloud over the island, through which the lightning
glares, revealing, in red writing, these words:--"_Redeemed, regenerated,
and disenthralled by the irresistible genius of universal
emancipation"_.--[Gospel--according to Curran--and the British
Parliament.]
Jamaica, sir, to say nothing of St. Domingo, is illustration of your
theory of the Golden Rule, in negro emancipation. You tell the Southern
master that all he would _expect_ or _desire_, if he were a slave, he must
do unto his bondman; that he must not pause to ask whether the relation of
master and slave be ordained of God or not. No. You tell him, _if_ he
would _expect_ or _desire_ liberty were he a slave, _that_ settles the
question as to what he is to do! He must let his bondman go free. Yea,
_that_ is what you teach: because the moment you put in the word OUGHT,
and say, all that you OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire_,--_i.e._ all that you
_know_ God commands you to _expect _ or _desire_ in your relations to men,
_as established by him,_--THAT _do to them_. Sir, when you thus explain
the Golden Rule, then your argument against slave-holding, so far as
founded on this rule, is at once arrested; it is stopped short, in full
career; it has to wait for reinforcement of FACT, which may never come up.
For, suppose the FACT to be, that the relation of master and slave is one
mode of the government ordained of God. Then, sir, the master, _knowing
that_ FACT, and _knowing_ what the slave, _as a slave_, OUGHT to _expect_
or _desire_, he, the master, then FULFILS THE GOLDEN RULE when he does
that unto his slave which, in similar circumstances, he OUGHT to expect
_to be done unto himself_. Now comes the question, OUGHT he then to
_expect_ or _desire_ liberty and equality? THAT is the question of
questions on this subject. And without hesitation I reply, The Golden Rule
DECIDES _that question_ YEA or NAY, _absolutely_ and _perfectly_, as God's
word or providence shows that the GOOD _of the family, the community, the
state_, REQUIRES that the slave IS or IS NOT _to be set free and made
equal_. THAT GOOD, _as God reveals it_, SETTLES THE QUESTION.
Let the master then see to it, how he hears God's word as to THAT GOOD.
Let him see to it, how he understands God's providence as to THAT GOOD.
Let him see to it, that he makes no mistake as to THAT GOOD. For God will
not hold him guiltless, if he will not hear what he tells him as to THAT
GOOD. God will not justify him, if he has a bad conscience or blunders in
his philosophy. God will punish him, if he fails to bless his land by
letting the bond go free when, he OUGHT to emancipate. And God will punish
him, if he brings a curse upon his country by freeing his slave when he
OUGHT NOT to give him liberty.
So, then, _the Golden Rule does not_, OF ITSELF, _reveal to man at all
what are his_ RELATIONS _to his fellow-men; but it tells him what he is
to_ DO, _when he_ ALREADY KNOWS THEM.
So, then, you, sir, cannot be permitted to tell the world that this rule
must emancipate all the negro slaves in the United States,--no matter how
unprepared they may be,--no matter how degraded,--no matter how unlike and
unequal to the white man by creation,--no matter if it be a natural and
moral impossibility,--no matter: the Golden Rule must emancipate by
authority of the first sentiments of the Declaration of Independence, and
by obligation of the great law of liberty,--the intuitional consciousness
of the eternal right!
No. The Rule, as said, _presupposes_ that he who is required to obey it
does already _know_ the relations in which God has placed him, and the
respective duties in those conditions. Has God, then, established the
relations of husband and wife, parent and child, master and slave? Yes.
Then the command comes. It says to the husband, To aid you in your known
obligations to your wife,--to give you a lively sense of it,--suppose
yourself to be the wife: whatsoever, therefore, you OUGHT, in that
condition, to _expect_ or _desire_, that, as husband, do unto your wife.
It says to the parent, Imagine yourself the child; and whatsoever, as
such, you OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire, that_, as parent, do unto your
child. It says to the master, Put yourself in the place of your slave;
and whatsoever you OUGHT, in that condition, to _expect_ or _desire,
that_, as master, do unto your slave. Let husband, parent, master, _know_
his obligations from God, and obey the Rule.
_Fugitive Slave--Obeying the Golden Rule under your version_.
Honorable Joshua R. Giddings and the Angel of the Lord--Hon. Gentleman at
table--Nine runaway negroes dining with him--The Angel, uninvited, comes
in and disturbs the feast.
Giddings has boasted in Congress of having had nine fugitive slaves to
break bread with him at one time. I choose, then, to imagine that, during
the dinner, the angel who found Hagar by the fountain stands suddenly in
the midst, and says to the negroes, "Ye slaves, whence came ye, and
whither will ye go?" And they answer and say, "We flee from the face of
our masters. This abolitionist told us to kill, and steal, and run away
from bondage; and we have murdered and stolen and escaped. He, thou seest,
welcomes us to liberty and equality. We _expect_ and _desire_ to be
members of Congress, Governors of States, to marry among the great, and
one of us to be President. Giddings, and all abolitionists, tell us that
these honors belong to us equally as to white people, and will be given
under the Golden Rule." And the angel of the Lord says to them, "Ye
slaves, return unto your masters, and submit yourselves under their hands.
I sent your fathers, and I send you, into bondage. I mean it unto good,
and I will bring it to pass to save much people alive." Then, turning to
the tempter, he says, "Thou, a statesman! thou, a reader of my word and
providence! why hast thou not understood my speech to Hagar? I gave her, a
slave, to Sarah. She fled from her mistress. I sent her back. Why hast
thou not understood my word four thousand years ago,--that _the slave
shall not flee from his master?_ Why hast thou also perverted my law in
Deuteronomy, (xxiii. 15, 16?) I say therein, 'Thou shalt not deliver unto
his master the servant which is escaped from his master unto thee: he
shall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place which he shall
choose, in one of thy gates where it liketh him best: thou shalt not
oppress him.' Why hast thou not known that I meant the _heathen slave_ who
escaped from his _heathen master?_ I commanded, Israel, in such case, not
to hold _him_ in bondage. I made this specific law for this specific fact.
Why hast thou taught that, in this commandment, I gave license to all
men-servants and maid-servants in the whole land of Israel to run away
from their masters? Why hast thou thus made me, in one saying, contradict
and make void all my laws wherein I ordained that the Hebrews should be
slave-owners over their brethren during years, and over the heathen
forever? Why hast thou in all this changed my Golden Rule? I, in that
rule, _assume_ that men _know_ from revelation and providence the
relations in which I have placed them, and their duties therein. I then
command them to do unto others what they thus _know_ they _ought_ to do
unto them in these relations; and I make the obligation quick and
powerful, by telling every man to imagine himself in such conditions, and
then he will _the better_ KNOW '_whatsoever_' he should do unto his
neighbor. Why hast thou made void my law, by making me say, 'All that thou
_expectest_ or _desirest_ of others, in similar circumstances, do to
them'? I never imagined to give such license to folly and sin. Why hast
thou imagined such license to iniquity? Verily, thou tempter, thou hast in
thy Golden Rule made these slaves thieves and murderers, and art now
eating with them the bread of sin and death.
"Why hast thou tortured my speech wherein I say that I have made of _one
blood_ all nations of men, to mean that I have created all men equal and
endowed them with rights unalienable save in their consent? I never said
that thing! I said that I made all men to descend from _one parentage!_
That is what I say in that place! Why hast thou tortured that plain truth?
Thou mightest as well teach that all 'the moving creatures that have life,
and fowl that fly above the earth, in the open firmament of heaven,' are
_created equal_, because I said I brought them forth _of the water_. Thou
mightest as well say that 'all cattle, and creeping thing and beast of the
earth, _are created equal_, because I said I brought them forth _of the
earth_, as to affirm the _equality of men_ because I say they are _of one
blood_. Nay, I have made men unequal as the leaves of the trees, the sands
of the sea, the stars of heaven. I have made them so, in harmony with the
infinite variety and inequality in every thing in my creation. And I have
made them unequal in my _mercy_. Had I made all men equal in attributes of
body and mind, then _unfallen man_ would never have realized the varied
glories of his destiny. And had I given _fallen man_ equality of nature
and unalienable rights, then I had made the earth an Aceldama and Valley
of Gehenna. For what would be the _strife_ in all the earth among men
equal in body and mind, equal in power, equal in depravity, equal in will,
each one maintaining rights unalienable? When would the war end? Who would
be the victors where all are giants? Who would sue for peace where none
will submit? What would be _human social life?_ Who would be the weak, the
loving? Who would seek or need forbearance, compassion, self-denying
benevolence? Who would be the grateful? Who would be the humble, the meek?
What would be _human_ virtue, what _human_ vice, what _human_ joy or
sorrow? Nay, I have made men _unequal_ and given them _alienable rights_,
that I might INSTITUTE HUMAN GOVERNMENT and reveal HUMAN CHARACTER.
"Why hast thou been willingly ignorant of these first principles of the
oracles of God, which would have made thee truly a Christian philosopher
and statesman?"
_Fugitive Slave--Obeying the Golden Rule as Christ gave it_
Rev. A. Barnes and the Apostle Paul--Minister of the gospel in his
study--Fugitive slave, converted under his preaching, inquiring whether it
is not his duty to return to his master--Paul appears and rebukes the
minister for wresting his Gospel.
With all respect and affection for you, sir, I imagine a slave, having run
away from his master and become a Christian under your preaching, might,
with the Bible in his hands and the Holy Spirit in his heart, have,
despite your training, question of conscience, whether he did right to
leave his master, and ought not to go back. And I think how Paul would
listen, and what he would say, to your interpretation of his Epistle to
Philemon. I think he would say,--
"I withstand thee to thy face, because thou art to be blamed. Why hast
thou written, in thy '_Notes_,' that the word I apply to Onesimus may
mean, not _slave_, but _hired servant?_ Why hast thou said this in
unsupported assertion? Why hast thou given no respect to Robinson, and all
thy wise men, who agree that the word wherein I express Onesimus's
relation to Philemon never means a hired servant, but a _slave_,--the
property of his master,--a living possession?
"Why hast thou called in question the fact that Philemon was a
slave-holder? Why hast thou taught that, if he was a slave-holder when he
became a Christian, he could not _continue, consistently_, to be a
slave-owner and a Christian,--that if he did so _continue_, he would not
be in _good standing_, but an _offender_ in the church? (See Notes.)
"I say Philemon was the master of Onesimus, in the real sense of a
slave-owner, under Roman law, in which he had the right of life and death
over him,--being thereby a master in possession of power unknown in the
United States. And yet I call Philemon 'our dearly beloved and
fellow-laborer,' I tell him that I send to him again Onesimus, who had
been unprofitable to him in time past; but now, being a Christian, he
would be profitable. I tell him, I send him again, not a slave, (only,)
but above a slave, a Christian brother, beloved, specially to me, but how
much more unto him, both _in the flesh_ and in the Lord. Dost thou know,
Albert Barnes, what I mean by that word, _in the flesh?_ Verily, I knew
the things wherein the master and the slave are beloved, the one of the
other, in the best affections of human nature, and in the Lord! therefore
I say to Philemon that he, _as master_, could receive Onesimus _as his
slave_, and yet as a _brother_, MORE _beloved, by reason of his relation
to him as master_, than I could regard him! Yea, verily,--and I say to
thee, Albert Barnes, thou hast never been in the South, and thou dost not
understand, and canst not understand, the force, or even the meaning, of
my words _in the flesh_; i.e. _in the love of the master and the slave to
one another_. But Philemon I knew would feel its power, and so I made that
appeal to him.
"Why hast thou said, that I did not send Onesimus back _by authority?_ I
did send him back by authority,--yea, by authority of the Lord Jesus
Christ? For it was my duty to send him again to Philemon, whether he had
been willing to go or not; and it was his duty to go. But he was willing.
So we both felt our obligations; and, when I commanded, he cheerfully
obeyed. What else was my duty and his? Had I not said, in line upon line
and in precept upon precept, 'Servants, obey in all things your masters
according to the flesh; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers, but in
singleness of heart, pleasing God'? (Coloss. iii. 22.) Had not Peter
written, 'Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to
the good and gentle, but also to the froward'? (1 Pet. ii. 18.) Onesimus
had broken these commandments when he fled from his master. Was it not
then of my responsibility to send him again to Philemon? And was it not
Christ's law to him to return and submit himself under his master's hand?
"Why, then, hast thou not understood my speech? Has it been even because
thou couldst not _hear_ my word? What else has hindered? What more could I
have said, than (in 1 Tim. vi. 1-5) I do say, to rebuke all abolitionists?
Yea, I describe them--I show their principles--as fully as if I had called
them by name in Boston, in New York, in Philadelphia, and said they would
live in 1857.
"And yet thou hast, in thy commentary on my letter to Timothy, utterly
distorted, maimed, and falsified my meaning. Thou hast mingled truth and
untruth so together as to make me say what was not and is not in my mind.
For thou teachest the slave, while professing not so to teach him, that I
tell him that he is _not_ to count his master worthy of all honor; that he
_is_ to _despise_ him; that he is _not_ to do him service as to a
Christian faithful and beloved. _No_. But thou teachest the slave, in my
name, to regard his Christian master an _offender_ in the sight of
Christ, if he _continues_ a slave-owner.
"Thou tellest him to obey _only_ in the sense in which he is to submit to
injustice, oppression, and cruelty; and that he is ever to seek to throw
off the yoke in his created equality and unalienable right to liberty.
(See Notes.)
"This is what thou hast taught as my gospel. But I commanded thee to
teach and exhort _just the contrary_. I commanded thee to say after this
way:--'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. 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.'
"Thou, in thy 'Notes,' art compelled, though most unwillingly, to confess
that I do mean _slaves_ in this place, in the full and proper sense; yea,
slaves under the Roman law. Good. Then do I here tell slaves to count
their masters, even when not Christians, worthy of all honor; and, when
Christians, to regard them as faithful and beloved, and not to despise
them, and to do them service? Yet, after all this, do I say to these same
slaves that they have a created equality and unalienable right to liberty,
under which, whenever they think fit, I command them to dishonor their
masters, despise them, and run away! Sir, I did never so instruct slaves;
nay, I did never command thee so to teach them. But I did and do exhort
thee not so to train them; for I said then and say now to thee, 'If any
man teach [slaves] otherwise, [than to honor their masters as faithful and
beloved, and to do them service,] and consent not to wholesome words, even
the words of the Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according
to godliness, he is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and
strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings,
perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and DESTITUTE OF THE TRUTH,
supposing that gain is godliness; from such withdraw thyself,'
"What more could I have said to the abolitionists of my day? What more can
I say to them in this day? _That_ which was true of them two thousand
years ago, is true now. I rebuked abolitionists then, and I rebuke them
now. I tell them the things in their hearts,--the things on their
tongues,--the things in their hands,--are contrary to wholesome words,
even the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. Canst thou _hear_ my words in
this place without feeling how faithfully I have given the head, and the
heart, and the words, and the doings of the men, from whom thou hast not
withdrawn thyself?
"Verily, thou canst not _hear_ my speech, and therefore thou canst not
interpret my gospel. Thou believest it is impossible that I sanction
slavery! Hence it is impossible for thee to understand my words: for I do
sanction slavery. How? Thus:--
"I found slavery in Asia, in Greece, in Rome. I saw it to be one mode of
the government ordained of God. I regarded it, in most conditions of
fallen mankind, necessarily and irresistibly part of such government, and
therefore as natural, as wise, as good, in such conditions, as the other
ways men are ruled in the state or the family.
"I took up slavery, then, as such ordained government,--wise, good, yea
best, in certain circumstances, until, in the elevating spirit and power
of my gospel, the slave is made fit for the liberty and equality of his
master, if he can be so lifted up. Hence I make the RULE of magistrate,
subject, master and servant, parent and child, husband and wife, THE SAME
RULE; _i.e._ I make it THE SAME RIGHT in the _superior_ to control the
_obedience_ and the _service_ of the _inferior_, bound to obey, whatever
the difference in the relations and service to be rendered. Yea, I give
_exactly the same command_ to all in these relations; and thus, in all my
words, I make it plainly to be understood that I regard slavery to be as
righteous a mode of government as that of magistrate and subject, parent
and child, husband and wife, during the circumstances and times in which
God is pleased to have it continue. I saw all the injustice, the
oppression, the cruelty, masters might be guilty of, and were and are now
guilty of; but I saw no more injustice, oppression, and cruelty, in the
relation of master and slave, than I saw in all other forms of rule,--even
in that of husband and wife, parent and child. In my gospel I condemn
wrong in all these states of life, while I fully sanction and sustain the
relations themselves. I tell the magistrate, husband, father, master, how
to rule; I tell the subject, wife, child, servant, how to submit. Hence, I
command the slave not to flee from bondage, just as I require the subject,
the wife, the child, not to resist or flee from obedience. I warn the
slave, if he leaves his master he has sinned, and must return; and I make
it the duty of all men to see to it, that _he shall go back_. Hence, I
myself did what I command others to do: I sent Onesimus back to his
master.
"Thus I sanction slavery everywhere in the New Testament. But it is
impossible for thee, with thy principles,--thy law of reason,--thy law of
created equality and unalienable right,--thy elevation of the Declaration
of Independence above the ordinance of God,--to sustain slavery. Nay, it
is impossible for thee, with thy interpretation of Christ's Golden Rule,
to recognise the system of servile labor; nay, it is impossible for thee
to tell _this_ slave to return to his master as I sent Onesimus back;
nay, thou art guarded by thy Golden Rule. Thou tellest him that, if thou
hadst been in his place, thou wouldst have _expected, desired_ freedom,
that thou wouldst have run away, and that thou wouldst not now return;
that thou wouldst have regarded thy created equality and unalienable
right as thy supreme law, and have disregarded and scorned all other
obligations as _pretended revelation from God_. Therefore thou now doest
unto him '_whatsoever_' thou wouldst _expect_ or _desire_ him to do unto
thee in similar circumstances; _i.e._ thou tellest him he did right to
run away, and will do right not to return! This is thy Golden Rule. But
I did not instruct thee so to learn Christ. Nay, this slave knows thou
hast not not given him the mind of Christ; nay, he knows that Christ
commands thee to send him to his master again. And thus do what thou
OUGHTEST to _expect_ or _desire_ in similar circumstances; yea, _do_ now
_thy duty_, and this slave, like Onesimus, will bless thee for giving him
a good conscience whenever he will return to his obedience. Thus Paul,
the aged, speaks to thee."
So, then, the Golden Rule is the whole Bible; yea, Christ says it is-"the
law and the prophets;" yea, it is the Old Testament and the New condensed;
and with ever-increasing glory of Providence in one sublime aphorism,
which can be understood and obeyed only by those who _know_ what the
Bible, or Providence, reveals as to man's varied conditions and his
obligations therein.
I think, sir, I have refuted your interpretation of the Golden Rule, and
have given its true meaning.
The slave-holder, then, may have a good conscience under this commandment.
Let him so exercise himself as to have a conscience void of offence
towards God and towards men.
Yours, &c. F.A. Ross.
Conclusion.
I intended to, and may yet, in a subsequent edition, write two more
letters to A. Barnes. The _one_, to show how infidelity has been passing
off from the South to the North,--especially since the _Christian death_
of Jackson; the other, to meet Mr. Barnes's argument founded on the spirit
of the age.
The End.
End of Project Gutenberg's Slavery Ordained of God, by Rev. Fred A. Ross, D.D.
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