E EM ARKS, 
 
 DISCOURSE ON SLAVERY. 
 
 G. W. BLAGDEN 
 
 BOSTON: 
 TICKNOR, REED, AND FIELDS. 
 
 M DCCC LIV. 
 
 n 
 

 TllUKSTON', TOnilT, AND EMEHSON, PKISTBK? 
 
 k 
 
EEMARKS. 
 
 E-ECEisT events induce me to publish a Discourse 
 preached to those whom I serve in the Gospel, on 
 our annual "Fast-Day," (April 8, 1847,) now nearly 
 seven years ago. 
 
 It was the request of some of my friends, that it 
 should be published, at that time. But, I declined 
 to comply with it, principally, from a great unwil- 
 lingness to enter into any public discussion on this 
 "vexed question ; " and partly, because, however fully 
 persuaded in my own mind of the substantial cor- 
 rectness of my views of it, — views not even then 
 hastily adopted, — I was desirous of letting time and 
 experience test their truth, and reverse any prejudices, 
 and allay any undue excitement, of which I might be 
 unconsciously the subject. 
 
 The progress of almost every day, since that time ; 
 and above all, the developments in our national 
 senate, w^hich drew forth the sentiments of the late 
 and lamented Webster, so nobly expressed by him, 
 on this subject, in 1850, — have confirmed me in the 
 opinions here expressed and enforced. 
 
 This whole question, to my mind, wears an aspect 
 far more solemn and responsible than a merely po- 
 litical one — greatly and deservedly important as that 
 is admitted to be. It is a question which, if I am 
 
 A 
 
not deceived, includes in it principles essential to 
 the best influence, if not to the vitality itself, of tlie 
 gospel I profess to preach. And hence springs the 
 interest I avow, and take, in its ultimate satisfactory 
 solution. 
 
 It is often, and properly urged, as one of the 
 corroborative evidences of the Divine origin of Chris- 
 tianity, that it works kindly, yet most effectually, 
 with all the institutions of human society established 
 by human law, wherever that law does not directly 
 and palpably clash with the Divine. Without ever 
 directly breaking them up, and producing sudden 
 convulsions, it surely infuses its purifying and ele- 
 vating principles into all of them, — reforming long- 
 established abuses ; correcting long-indulged errors ; 
 and, like a purer air introduced into a bad atmos- 
 phere, giving new health and vigor to whatever was 
 suffering from its effects. It is essential to the best 
 influence of the gospel, that this, its characteristic, 
 should be faithfully preserved by its friends in all 
 their efforts to promote it. But, in my own view, it 
 is not thus preserved, by assuming, in our efforts to 
 remove from our country the acknowledged evils of 
 southern slavery, and eventually slavery itself, that 
 it condemns as always and necessarily sinful, the 
 domestic relation of master and slave. Such an as- 
 sumption is contrary to fact. Its practical influence 
 has been, and is, to produce a course of speech and 
 action, in all who adopt it towards the south, 
 needlessly irritating ; and to lead to the conclusion, 
 already openly and somewhat virulently avowed by 
 some among us, that the churches, the clergy, and 
 
the Bible itself, must be cast aside, as faithless and 
 false to the highest and dearest interests of the hu- 
 man race, if they maintain such principles. 
 
 I know that it is often said, in reply to this, that 
 the system of southern slavery in the United States 
 is one entirely different from that which existed, by 
 the appointment of God, among the Jewish people. 
 But this, if admitted, by no means alters the prin- 
 ciples on which we ought to proceed in the removal 
 of all other systems of domestic servitude. And 
 besides, it cannot be denied that slavery among 
 the Romans, into the midst of which Christianity 
 came — and with reference to the conduct of masters 
 and servants, in which, it gave explicit directions, — 
 was, in many of its features, far more cruel than the 
 system now existing in our own land. And yet 
 the Saviour and His apostles never, in a single in- 
 stance, directly attacked that system ; but clearly 
 and fully condemned all the sins committed in it, 
 and fully inculcated all the virtues it demanded. In 
 this way, Christ infuses principles into society which 
 will surely arrest and eradicate all its evils, without 
 convulsing it. 
 
 This is the true principle for His preachers and 
 His disciples ever to keep in mind, and sustain among 
 men. If they do not, in my view, they are faithless 
 to one of the chief elements of the gospel, and open 
 the door to many evils, and very false ideas of gen- 
 uine liberty. 
 
 Nor will it do to say, as I have heard some 
 intimate, that the Word of God is not intended to 
 inculcate permanent rules for our guidance in the 
 
 I 
 
more advancGcI stages of cirilization. But, that we are 
 to apply to such a system of shivery as exists in this 
 country, the principle that Paul applied to the men 
 of Athens respecting the past systems of idolatry, — 
 that the times of this ignorance God winked at, but 
 noAv commands all men every where to repent. This 
 may be permitted, and is indeed required, in reference 
 to evils directly specified, as those to which it is ap- 
 plied. But, if we presume to apply it to others, and 
 especially to those in regard to which other kinds of 
 directions are given in the Word of God, — we im- 
 mediately fall into the dangerous error of admitting 
 that there is an " inner light " — which a man may 
 follow — ^ brighter and clearer than that which di- 
 rectly emanates from the revealed rule of Heaven. 
 This I understand to be that dangerous doctrine of 
 the " higher law," of which so much has been said, 
 and which Webster, if I rightly remember, so justly 
 condemned in the United States Senate. He did not 
 mean, in my opinion, to intimate, for a moment, that 
 the Bible was not the law to which all should sub- 
 mit,. and which all should obey. But he reprehended 
 the principles and practice of those who, wise " above 
 that which is written," would fain improve on the 
 Scriptures themselves, in their zeal to destroy the 
 system of slavery. 
 
 Before leaving this bearing of the subject on the 
 fundamental principles of the Gospel in its progress 
 among men, I must add, that the habit, so prevalent 
 of attacking the relation of master and slave itself, 
 instead of the sins committed in it against God and 
 man, really betrays very superficial views of the 
 
exceeding evil of all sin. For, not in the relation 
 itself, but in the states of mind developed in it, does 
 iniquity essentially consist. And therefore, I most 
 deeply and sincerely fear, that in the sight of Him 
 who looketh not " on the outward appearance," but 
 " on the heart," there is as much of evil, to say the 
 least, often exhibited in the virtuperative and malign 
 language used by ultra anti-slavery men at the North 
 against their countrymen of Christian character and 
 standing, who do not agree with them in their peculiar 
 theories, as ever works itself out from the knotted lash 
 of a Southern slave-driver ! " Suppose ye that these 
 Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilseans, be- 
 cause they suffered such things ■? I tell you nay ; but, 
 except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish." 
 
 I close with the remark that there are, in my ap- 
 prehension, many persons in this community, who 
 really adopt the principles avowed and vindicated in 
 this pamphlet, but w^hose words in respect to slavery 
 are, perhaps, misunderstood, and certainly misapplied, 
 so as to inculcate very opposite doctrines, and a cor- 
 responding practice. Indeed, it has been one of the 
 lamentable facts on this subject in New England, that 
 many have been so deeply impressed with the enor- 
 mity of the sins and evils connected with slavery in 
 this country, that in their language, and sometimes in 
 their acts respecting it, they have given influence to 
 the principles of those ultra abolitionists among us, 
 some of whom would willingly disband the churches 
 of Christ, and disclaim the Bible itself as a rule of 
 
 faith and practice. 
 
 G. W. B. 
 Boston, March 1, 1854. 
 
DISCOURSE 
 
 COLOSSIANS, III. II. 
 
 " WHEKE THERE IS XEITIIER GREEK XOR JEW, CIRCUJICISIOX NOR CNCIR- 
 CUMCISION, BARBARIAN, SCYTUIAX, BOXD XOR FREE ; BUT CURIST 13 ALL, 
 AND IN ALL." 
 
 In the proclamation of the Governor, appointing 
 this annual Fast, he invites the people to pray to God, 
 "That He will restrain the limits of slavery in our 
 own, and in other lands, and hasten the time when 
 the interests and the happiness of the Master and 
 Slave shall be advanced by bursting the chains of 
 every bondman on the face of the earth." 
 
 We have accordingly united in prayer this morn- 
 ing, that God would be pleased to remove the many 
 and great sins and evils connected with the system of 
 slavery in our own and in other countries, and ear- 
 nestly and I trust sincerely and acceptably asked, that 
 He would break the arm of every oppressor, and let 
 the oppressed go free. 
 
 Whenever we offer such a petition, it is essential to 
 its efficacy, that it be offered intelligently and scriptu- 
 rally. And I have therefore felt it my duty, as the 
 whole subject has been brought so directly before 
 our minds by our Chief Magistrate, to direct your 
 2 
 
10 
 
 attention this morning, first, to the sins and evils 
 connected with the system of slavery in our coun- 
 try ; and secondly, to the scriptural principles which 
 should guide us in our prayers and efforts to remove 
 them. 
 
 The time^ has come, I think, when I may, with 
 propriety, speak directly, clearly, and fully on this 
 interesting topic. And in doing so, all I ask is, 
 that you will allow me to hope that you will be kind 
 enough to hear me patiently and candidly ; — and 
 then, like the noble Bereans, search the Scriptures, 
 whether the things I speak are so. (Acts 17: 11.) 
 
 Certainly on a topic of such vital interest to re- 
 ligion, and the moral as w^ell as political welfare of 
 our beloved country, a minister of the gospel ought to 
 have an opinion ; and is bound on any proper occa- 
 sion, and in a proper spirit to declare it. 
 
 First. The sins and evils of slavery, in this coun- 
 try, are great, extensively acknowledged, and widely 
 felt. 
 
 In no circumstances, and in no relation of life, can 
 man be safely trusted with so much irresponsible 
 power over his fellow-man, as that with which every 
 slaveholder is invested, in our Southern States; and 
 as that with which slaveholders were clothed in our 
 own Commonwealth not much more than sixty years 
 ago. 
 
 Wherever man wields this power, such is the tend- 
 ency of our nature, that he becomes greatly insensible 
 to many of the evils into w^hich he himself falls, and 
 which he may be constantly, and often unconsciously, 
 inflicting on others. 
 
11 
 
 111 the present case, and in respect to the evils en- 
 dured both by the master and the slave in our own 
 country, this is strikingly seen. 
 
 There is good evidence, that, in many cases, the 
 marriage relation is broken, by the unnecessary 
 separation of husband and wife, without regard to 
 law. In most, I believe in all of the Slave States, it 
 is an offence against law to teach the slaves to read ; 
 and although religious instruction is allowed to be 
 given, to any extent, by preaching and every other 
 form of speech, and is given happily, and with 
 blessed effects to a very great extent in such forms; 
 yet the Bible of course cannot be circulated and read, 
 and all that religious and intellectual improvement 
 •which results from such a blessing is withheld. 
 Children are often sold into bondage, at a great dis- 
 tance from their parents, and parents from their chil- 
 dren. Families are broken up. The most cruel pun- 
 ishments are sometimes inflicted, under the influence 
 of uncontrolled passions. Great facilities are afforded 
 for licentiousness, and little motive presented and 
 enforced for the doing of the good which Christians 
 have an opportunity to do to a large and increasing 
 mass of their fellow-beings. 
 
 The masters themselves are, in many cases, aware of 
 these sins and CAils, and groan under them. In 
 many instances they are doing what they can for 
 their removal. But in too many other cases, they 
 seem to be either entirely insensible to their exist- 
 ence, or they openly and passionately defend them ; 
 and virulently oppose all agitation of the question of 
 duty respecting this increasingly important subject. 
 
12 
 
 At the same time no reasonable man can deny, that 
 the system of slavery, in a number of the Southern 
 States is, as it respects the political economy of the 
 subject, entirely a losing one. While in its moral 
 effects, though it may possibly be favorable, in some 
 degree, to the promotion of a doubtful kind of chival- 
 rous and hospitable character in masters, yet its 
 tendency is to hurt essentially the promotion of a 
 vigorous and persevering tone of mhid; because it 
 brings manual labor of every kind into disrepute, 
 and tends to cherish the false idea, that the highest 
 moral and intellectual refinement may not be reached 
 by due care, in every department of human effort. 
 
 But I need not enlarge on the sins and evils 
 connected with the system of slavery, at present 
 existing in our native land. They form a theme for 
 passionate declamation and oratorical display, which 
 affords one of the best opportunities that has ever 
 been offered, for public speakers of warm feelings and 
 vivid imaginations to distinguish themselves. Too 
 many, I fear, have eloquently exposed and depre- 
 cated the evils, without troubling themselves to go 
 into that patient study of the whole subject, which 
 alone can lead to those proper distinctions between 
 things that differ, that can effect any permanent reme- 
 dy. This is the principal reason why it will be 
 profitable for us, this morning, to consider this sub- 
 ject; a subject which has seemed to me, for years, 
 to have been so prolific^in false and unscriptural, and 
 very dangerous modes of reasoning and acting in 
 many good men, that every one who would love his 
 country with a Christian patriotism, is bound to do 
 
13 
 
 all in his power to obtain for himself, and disseminate 
 among his fellow-citizens, correct views of it. 
 
 To do this, so far as I' may be capable of doing it, 
 I ask your attention, — 
 
 Secondly, — to the scriptural principles which 
 should guide us in our prayers and efforts to remove 
 the sins and evils we have been considering. 
 
 I say the scriptural principles which should guide 
 us, because, speaking as I do to a church and relig- 
 ious society, it is my wish to take only a religious and 
 moral view of the whole subject. This must, of 
 course, have its bearing on much that is political in 
 respect to it. But into the political part of it, it is 
 not my pro\-ince, even were I capable of it, to enter. 
 That should be left to other persons and places. 
 
 What, then, are the scriptural principles which 
 should guide the Christian churches and societies of 
 our land in their prayers and efforts to remove the 
 sins and evils connected with southern slavery 1 
 This is the question to which I ask your attention. 
 
 And the text, 1 think, includes in it all that is 
 necessary to a clear and satisfactory reply. 
 
 It declares, that in the new man, — or that regen- 
 erated state of mind produced by true obedience to 
 the gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, of 
 which the apostle was treating when he wrote it, — 
 " There is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor 
 uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: 
 but Christ is all, and in all." 
 
 And in teaching this, it does but repeat a truth the 
 apostle had before enforced in almost the same words 
 on the churches in Galatia; that in Christ there is 
 
14 
 
 neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, 
 there is neither male nor female : but men are all one 
 in Christ Jesus. (Gal. 3 : 28.) 
 
 NoAv I hold these passages to teach, beyond all 
 reasonable doubt, — especially when they are compared 
 with a number of other declarations of the Word of 
 God — that in promoting true obedience to the gos- 
 pel of Christ among men, and of course all those 
 political, social, and domestic reforms incidental to 
 its advancement, neither their natural, nor their 
 civil and social relations are ever to be suddenly 
 interrupted or directly attacked ; but Christian 
 preachers and churches are simply and carefully to 
 aim at the sins against God and man committed in 
 these relations. 
 
 You will notice that the text fairly implies that it 
 is, and will be, just as certain that the political and 
 social relations of which it speaks may, and probably 
 would exist under the gospel, as that the natural 
 relations of which it speaks would exist. It implies 
 it to be just as probable that there would be, under 
 the gospel, men who were bond, and men who were 
 free, as that there would be males and females, Jews 
 or Greeks, Barbarians or Scythians. And it just as 
 clearly affirms that the gospel, in its true nature and 
 influence, had nothing directly to do with either. 
 But all that it had to do was, to make every man to 
 whom it came, — whether bond or free, Jew or Greek, 
 Barbarian or Scythian, a new creature in Christ 
 Jesus : or, — to use the words immediately introduc- 
 tory to it, and with which it is immediately connected 
 — to make every one " put off the old man with his 
 
15 
 
 deeds ; and put on the new man, which " is renewed 
 in knowledge after the image of Him that created 
 him/' That is, it is just as possible for men to be 
 renewed in knowledge after the image of God, by 
 whom men are created anew in Christ Jesus unto 
 good works, when they are bond or free, as it is 
 when they are Jews or Greeks, circumcised or un- 
 circumcised. Barbarians or Scythians. 
 
 It is not at forms that the gospel mainly looks, 
 but at realities ; not at outward, natural, domestic, or 
 political relations, but at spiritual and eternal rela- 
 tions: not at the things which are Csesafs, but at 
 those which are God's ; not at the natural or conven- 
 tional relations men hold to one another, but at the 
 religious relations they sustain to God. If these last 
 be right, there is not the least ground for reasonable 
 doubt but that all the others either are, or shall be, in 
 due time, right also. 
 
 This, then, is the leading, the fundamental prin- 
 ciple, which should guide us in all our prayers and 
 efforts to remove the sins and evils connected with 
 slavery, here or elsewhere, — in this or other lands. 
 
 If faithfully followed out, it will imply and require 
 several things, and avoid a number of dangerous 
 evils, to which I now ask your attention. 
 
 It will imply and require, that in praying and 
 striving to remove the sins and evils connected with 
 slavery, Ave do not assert that the relation of master 
 and slave is, in all cases, and necessarily, a sinful one. 
 
 This, I am persuaded, has been a fundamental 
 error with multitudes on this subject. Appalled and 
 shocked as they have been at the many sins and evils 
 
16 
 
 connected with slavery, and detennined as they have 
 been to oppose and root them out, they have been 
 unable and unwilling to suppose for a moment that 
 slavery could ever exist, in any form or circumstances 
 without them, and therefore have loudly called slave- 
 holding, in all circumstances, a sin against God and 
 man. 
 
 And yet, nothing can be more unscriptural than 
 such a position ; nothing more at variance with what 
 a number of the most pious and gifted men have 
 believed, in the light of the Scriptures ; and few 
 things more prolific of many threatening evils. 
 
 The position that the connection of master and 
 slave is necessarily a sinful one, is unscriptural. 
 
 It is so, first, because God Himself, who cannot 
 look upon iniquity but with abhorrence, once posi- 
 tively recognised and appointed a system of slavery 
 among the Jews. And, however He may have suf- 
 fered long with certain practices among His ancient 
 people, which were not wholly agreeable to His will, 
 for the purest and best reasons, no one will have the 
 hardihood to affirm that He would ever have posi- 
 tively commanded any thing in itself sinful. 
 
 And yet nothing can be more clear than the plain- 
 ness with which He said to the Israelites : — " Both 
 thy bondmen and bondmaids, which thou shalt have 
 shall be of the heathen that are round about you ; of 
 them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. More- 
 over, of the children of the strangers that sojourn 
 among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their fam- 
 ilies that are with you, which they begat in your 
 land: and they shall be your possession. And ye 
 
17 
 
 shall take them as an mhcritance for your children 
 after you, to inherit them for a possession ; they shall 
 be your bondman forever : but over your brethren, 
 the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over an- 
 other -with rigor." (Lev. 25 : 44-46.) 
 
 We know that it is often said, that this was an 
 arrangement of the Old Testament dispensation, to be 
 entirely done away with under the clearer light of the 
 gospel of Christ, as our Saviour abrogated polygamy; 
 and that it is folly to go back to the Levitical dispen- 
 sation with the hope of advocating slavery now. 
 
 But to this we reply, that independently of the 
 fact we have already cited, that while God was 
 pleased only to bear with polygamy for a season, 
 He positively instituted a system of slavery among 
 the Jews, which He never would have done, had 
 it been in all cases positively and absolutely sin- 
 ful. Independently of this, our Saviour did not abro- 
 gate slavery under the New Testament, as He did 
 abrogate the Jewish custom of a plurality of wives. 
 
 So far from this. His inspired apostle not only 
 teaches us in the text, that the relation of master 
 and slave, or bond and free, might be expected to 
 exist under His gospel, but He also repeatedly gives 
 directions to masters and slaves how to bear them- 
 selves towards each other, as fellow-disciples of the 
 same Redeemer ; saying to them among other things, 
 and in the very chapter from which the text is 
 taken — "Servants, (doixoi") obey in all things your 
 masters according to the flesh : not with eye-service, 
 as men-pleasers ; but with singleness of heart, fearing 
 God." (Ver. 22.) And then, in the first verse of 
 
18 
 
 the next chapter — " Masters, give unto your servants 
 that which is just and equal; knowing that ye also 
 have a Master in heaven." 
 
 No candid person will deny that the word " ser- 
 vants" here, and in most (if not all other) places in 
 the New Testament, means slaves. Nor will any such 
 person affirm that these slaves, though their form^ of 
 servitude differed in some respects from that which 
 prevails in our own country, at the present time, were 
 less exposed to cruelty than our own. _ 
 
 Both the Greeks and Romans had the power of 
 life and death over their slaves: and the punishments 
 to which they were subjected under cruel masters, 
 were far more severe than any which prevail in this 
 country. Their masters often extorted confession 
 from them by torture. " Whips and thongs were not 
 the most dreadful instruments of punishment. Burn- 
 ing alive, is mentioned as a punishment in the pan- 
 de^'cts and elsewhere." « The noses, ears, teeth, or 
 even eyes, were in great danger from an enraged 
 master. Crucifixion was frequently made the fate of 
 a wretched slave for trifling misconduct, or for mere 
 caprice."— ('See Slavery among the Greeks and Eo- 
 mans, in Biblical Repositori/, Vol. vi., p. 421, 422 ; 
 Voh v., p. 149, 150.) 
 
 Now if, notwithstanding all this, the inspired 
 apostles of Christ, (however they would have con- 
 demned and exterminated all such cruelties as these,) 
 nevertheless so far recognised the relation of master 
 and slave, as to direct and exhort them how to behave 
 in a Christian manner to one another, who will be 
 
19 
 
 so presumptuous as to say, that the reUition of bond 
 and free must be, in itself, and ahvays, sinful ? 
 
 We never read similar directions and exhortations 
 in the New Testament, addressed to a plurality of 
 wives of the same husband : and why 1 Because 
 after our Saviours prohibition of the practice of 
 polygamy, it became sinful. Surely, therefore, the 
 apostles would never have exhorted men how to be- 
 have themselves toward one another in a relation 
 which was, in its essential nature, sinful. 
 
 Accordingly, as has been already intimated, we find 
 many men, of the best characters, and most compre- 
 hensive minds, strenuously maintaining the i:)osition 
 here assumed; and, what is quite satisfactory, doing it 
 in circumstances different from our own, and in places 
 where it would not perhaps, by many, have been ex- 
 pected. 
 
 The late Mr. Canning, in a speech delivered in the 
 British House of Commons in 1826, said — "It is 
 impossible, whatever may be men's wishes or feelings, 
 it is impossible to maintain, for a moment, that 
 slavery and the Christian religion are incapable of 
 existing together. They do exist together ; they 
 have existed together from the very first dawning of 
 Christianity ; they have existed together down to the 
 present time. The spirit of that religion, Christianity, 
 is to tame the proud, and to assist the lowly ; but it 
 does not do that by sudden changes, by the destruc- 
 tion of existing systems, by revolutions of danger and 
 of blood. It mounts the throne of all the Csesars, it 
 can comfort the poor captive in his cell, but it has 
 been preached in the streets of ancient Rome, at a 
 
20 
 
 time when servi crudantur was the ordinary process 
 of the forum." — "Neither the tenets of the Christian 
 religion, nor the spirit of the British Constitution, 
 call upon Parliament to abolish slavery, at the risk of 
 public safety, or private wrong." — {^See Canning'' s 
 Life, Vol. ii.^, p. 252.) 
 
 At an earlier time. Bishop Watson, who so well 
 defended Christianity and the Bible against Gibbon 
 and Paine, expressed similar sentiments. He said in 
 a speech delivered in the House of Lords — " God 
 cannot authorize injustice. But he did authorize 
 slavery amongst the Jews; therefore slavery is not 
 opposite to justice. Nor am I certain that slavery is 
 any where expressly forbidden by the letter of the 
 New Testament. Man-stealing is, indeed, expressly 
 forbidden to Christians, as it was, under the penalty of 
 death, forbidden to the Jews." — [Anecdotes of the 
 Life of Bishop Watson, p. 377.) 
 
 The celebrated historian, Prideaux, in writing of 
 the Jewish sect of the Essenes, says, in exposing their 
 errors — " They forbade marriage, which God had 
 ordained from the beginning, and absolutely con- 
 demned servitude, which the holy Scriptures of the 
 New Testament, as well as the Old, allow. — [Pri- 
 deaux, Vol. iii., p. 480.) And Calvin writes, in his 
 Institutes — "Why is it that the same apostle who, 
 in one place, exhorts to stand fast in the liberty 
 wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not 
 entangled again with the yoke of bondage, in another, 
 enjoins servants to ' care not for their servile con- 
 dition;' except, that spiritual liberty may very well 
 consist with civil servitude X ' In this sense,' he adds, 
 
21 
 
 *we are likewise to understand him in these pas- 
 sages, — "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is 
 neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor fe- 
 male." Again — "There is neither Greek nor Jew, 
 circumcision nor uncircumscision, Barbarian, Scythian, 
 bond or free, but Christ is all, and in all ; — in which 
 he signifies, that it is of no importance what is our 
 condition among men, or under the laws of what na- 
 tion we life, as the kingdom of Christ consists not in 
 these things." — (Calvin s Inst, Book iv., Chapter xx., 
 paragraph 1st.) 
 
 Other more modern instances of the same kind 
 might be cited, but these are enough ; * and they are 
 brought forward here to show that this view of the 
 teachings of the Bible has been taken by wise men, 
 and ripe scholars, in places and times remote from the 
 exciting causes which might warp our conclusions, in 
 this country, at this time, by the power of prejudice 
 and passion. The great reason, why this view of it 
 seems to me important to be taken by all of us is, 
 that it will give great advantages, and save from very 
 common and wide-spread dangers, in all our prayers 
 and efforts against the sins and evils of slavery. 
 
 Some of them, we shall now briefly name. 
 
 1. Such a position will powerfully commend itself 
 to' the consciences of the holders of slaves. 
 
 Say to the enlightened and conscientious person, 
 who sustains such a connection with any of his fel- 
 low men, — The system, under which you now live, 
 is one in which the sanctity of marriage is very 
 
 * See Note at the close of the Discourse. 
 
22 
 
 generally disregarded ; men are not tauglit to read 
 the Avord of God under it ; the nearest and dearest 
 family ties are often ruthlessly torn apart under it ; 
 licentiousness greatly prevails ; the most cruel pun- 
 ishments are often inflicted ; and above all, the spirits 
 of immortal and accountable beings, like yourself, 
 are very generally trodden down and crushed by it. 
 Say such things as these to him, and you commend 
 yourself to his conscience in the sight of God. lie 
 feels it. He laments it. He is ready to ask you, 
 What shall I do 1 He is, as many such even now 
 are in our country, ready for some kind of action. 
 
 But take the other course ; — and begin to say to 
 him, that just because he owns slaves, he is a heinous 
 and aggravated sinner against God and man; — ex- 
 clude him from your communion if he be a pro- 
 fessing Christian ; — close your pulpits against him, 
 if he be a preacher of the Gospel of Jesus Christ ; — 
 refuse his contributions to missionary or any other 
 benevolent societies, because you say they are the 
 price of blood, wrung from the arteries and veins 
 of fellow-men ; — refrain from bidding him God-speed 
 in his efforts to build up and multiply Christian 
 churches, because some in their communion are, 
 holders of slaves ; — take such positions and assert 
 and carry out such principles as these ; • — begin thus 
 to condemn as sinful an outward relation among 
 men, recognised by human law, as Christ and his 
 apostles never did, — instead of condemning the sins 
 committed in that relation, — and calling to repent- 
 ance for them, which they always did ; — proceed 
 in such unscriptural and unwise ways as these ; — 
 
2?; 
 
 and what hold can you reasonably hope to have 
 upon the conscience of such men ] We might 
 almost ask with the Apostle Paul, on another sub- 
 ject, — " Doth not even nature itself teach you," — 
 "it is a shame .r' Imagine that the same amount of 
 time, talent, and passion which have been spent in 
 this country for some years past, in unscripturally de- 
 nouncing all men who live amid the evils of slavery, 
 had been spent in " reasoning with them out of the 
 Scriptures " respecting the sins and evils connected 
 with the system, and how much more good would 
 have been done ! How much more evil have been 
 prevented ! 
 
 It was my intention, in showing the evils from 
 which the view of slavery now advocated would save 
 us, as we pray and trust to remove the sins con- 
 nected with it, to speak of several dangers which 
 probably every one of you has noticed : — all as I 
 think, growing out of the single unscriptural position, 
 that slaveholding is always a sin against God and 
 man. But they can only now be briefly named. 
 
 It would save us from an unchristian and inconsis- 
 tent censoriousncss. To some forms of this, allusion 
 has been already made. I cannot but add to these, 
 the unchristian inconsistency of many of the citizens 
 of our mother country, — who with thousands of her 
 inhabitants starving to death, partly, if not princi- 
 pally through their own misgovernment of them, in 
 the relation of subjects, are disposed to exclude 
 many of our preachers of Christ from their pulpits, 
 and religious conventions, because they come from a 
 land where there are slaves, — who live in perfect 
 
24 
 
 moral as well as physical bliss, contrasted with many 
 of the ignorant and degraded among their own 
 countrymen ! 
 
 2. The position we advocate would save us from 
 acting on wrong religious principles. 
 
 It would lead us to feel and act as if we felt, that 
 the most awful sin against God is confined, pre- 
 eminently, to no relation of human society, recognised 
 by human law, but that it may, and alas, too often 
 does exist and operate in all of them. It is very 
 striking and instructive to notice how the single 
 false principle I have been trying to expose, has 
 operated in many of its advocates to run into re- 
 ligious error — and strive to overthrow the churches 
 of Christ, and the Christian ministry, — calling them 
 sometimes, "dumb dogs that will not bark;" hov\^ 
 it has led many of them to deny the moral obligation 
 of the Sabbath, and entirely to desert the public 
 worship of God ; and induced them willingly to 
 unite with all men, I may truly say, of all kinds of 
 character, if they would only agree with them, in 
 their one unscriptural principle, — that every man 
 who holds a slave is a sinner above all other sinners, 
 because he suffers such things. 
 
 We may rest assured, that there is something 
 radically wrong in any principles which produce 
 such effects as these. The view I have taken ex- 
 poses the error, and if we heed it, we shall, so far 
 as our influence may extend, save ourselves and others 
 from its evil consequences. 
 
 It was my wish to show, that this view will also 
 save from false ideas of political freedprn. 
 
25 
 
 But there is not time left me to speak of so 
 important a subject with sufficient care. I must, 
 however, call your attention to the fact, that the 
 whole tendency of the modes of reasoning into 
 which the error I would expose leads men is, to 
 attack existing human laws, ■ — in some cases, to try 
 and overthrow the very Constitution of the country. 
 And I would call your attention to the consistency of 
 such persons ; for, they stand to their principles. If 
 the relation of master and slave be, in all cases, a sin- 
 ful one, then it is not to be tampered with in the 
 Constitution, or any where else, — since " we ought to 
 obey God rather than man." — and should never " fol- 
 low a multitude to do evil." Their consistency there" 
 fore is, at least, to be respected. They fairly follow 
 out their own conclusions; while others, who admit 
 their premises, shrink from the consequences. 
 
 To such extremes men always will run, whenever, 
 wise " above that which is written," they are not sub- 
 missive to the true principles of the eternal Word of 
 God, For myself, I have no doubt, that the very 
 elements of those false views of what constitutes 
 true liberty, which produced the French Revolution, 
 are hidden, like a serpent in the grass, in the false 
 modes of reasoning produced by the error I oppose. 
 It is full of evil, in its nature and tendencies. 
 
 What, then, is the conclusion at which I would 
 arrive ? 
 
 It is, that in condemning the sins of men, and 
 calling them to repentance and to Christ, we are to 
 let the outward relations of society, as established by 
 
26 
 
 human law, alone, and faithfully condemn the sins 
 committed in those relations. 
 
 We are to condemn the sins, with the utmost faith- 
 fulness, — whether the sin be oppression, — or the 
 breaking up of the family state, — or the marriage 
 tie,— or the withholding of the Bible, — or religious 
 instruction from fellow-men, — or the failure to do 
 them good, in any form, as men may have oppor- 
 tunity. 
 
 In respect to these and all other sins against the 
 eternal laws of God, we are to " Lift up the voice like 
 a trumpet ! cry aloud and spare not ; and show God's 
 people their transgressions, and the house of Israel 
 their sins." 
 
 But, in doing this, we are to let all outward dis- 
 tinctions, recognised and established by human law, 
 whether that of king and subject, or master and 
 slave, alone. As Christian preachers of " Christ cruci- 
 fied," and Christian churches and societies, we have 
 nothing to do with them. 
 
 Neither Christ nor His apostles ever interfered 
 with them. 
 
 In the times of Timothy some thought differently 
 from this ; and therefore Paul said : — « Let as many 
 servants as are under the yoke count their own mas- 
 ters 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 ser- 
 vice, because they are faithful and beloved partakers 
 of the benefit. These things teach and exhort. If 
 any man teach otherwise, and consent not to whole- 
 
27 
 
 some words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 and to the doctrine which is according to godhncss, 
 he is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about ques- 
 tions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, 
 railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men 
 of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, sup- 
 posing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw 
 thyself" (1 Tim. 6:1-5.) Amen. 
 
NOTE. 
 
 Webster said, in his speech of March 7, 1850 : " At the in- 
 troduction of Christianity, the Roman world was full of slaves, 
 and I suppose there is to be found no injunction against ' that 
 relation between man and man in the teachings of the Gospel 
 of Jesus Christ or of any of His Apostles, The object of the 
 instruction imparted to mankind by the Founder of Christianity was 
 to touch the heart, purify the soul, and improve the lives of indi- 
 vidual men. That object went directly to the first fountain of all 
 the political and social relations of the human race, as well as of 
 all true religious feeling, the individual heart and mind of man." 
 {Webster's Works, Vol. 5, p. 330.) 
 
 The late distinguished German Biblical Scholar, and Ecclesias- 
 tical Historian, Neandcr, writes, in his work on the " Planting and 
 Training of the Church :".<_" In speaking of the various rela- 
 tions of life, in which men might be placed at the time of their 
 conversion, Paul lays down as a rule, that that event should pro- 
 duce no change in this respect. Christianity did not violently 
 dissolve the relations in which a man found himself placed by 
 birth, education, and the teaching of Divine Providence, but taught 
 him to act in them from a new point of view, and with a new 
 disposition. It effected no abrupt revolutions, but gradually, by 
 the power of the Spirit, working from within, made all things new. 
 The Apostle applies this especially to the case of slaves, which it 
 was more needful to consider, because, from the beginning, that 
 gospel which was preached to the poor found much acceptance 
 among this class, and the knowledge imparted to them by Christi- 
 anity of the common dignity and rights of all men, might easily 
 have excited them to throw off the earthly yoke. Likewise, in 
 this view, Christianity, in order not to mingle worldly and spiritual 
 things together, and not to miss its main object, the salvation of 
 the soul, did not presume to effect by force a sudden revolution in 
 
30 
 
 their condition, but operated only on the mind and disposition. To 
 slaves the gospel presented a higher life, which exalted them above 
 the restraints of their earthly relation ; and though masters were 
 not required by the Apostles to give their slaves freedom, since it 
 w^as foreign to their ministry to interfere with the arrangement of 
 civil relations, yet Christianity imparted to masters such a know- 
 ledge of their duties to their slaves, and such dispositions towards 
 them, and taught them to recognise as brethren the Christians 
 among their slaves, in such a manner, as to make their relation to 
 them^quite a different thing. 
 
 Paul, therefore, when he touches on this relation, tells the slave, 
 that though by the arrangement of Providence he was debarred 
 from the enjoyment of outward freedom, he should not be troubled, 
 but rejoice that the Lord had bestowed upon him true inward free- 
 dom. But, while he considers the latter as the only true freedom, 
 in the possession of which man may be free under all outward 
 restraints, and apart from which no true freedom can exist, he is 
 very far from overlooking the subordinate worth of civil freedom, 
 for he says to the slave, to whom he had announced the true, the 
 spiritual freedom, " But if thou mayst be free, use it rather ; " 
 (1 Cor. 7 : 21.) Which implies that the Apostle viewed the state of 
 freedom as more corresponding to the Christian calling ; and that 
 Christianity, when it so far gained the ascendancy as to form anew 
 the social relations of mankind, would bring about this change of 
 state, which he declares to be an object of preference." {Planting 
 and Training of the Church, Book III. Chap. 7th.) 
 
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