SUGGESTIONS 
 
 AS TO THE 
 
 ^ 
 
 ap 
 
 I flf %imm ^lakrg, 
 
 ADDRESSED TO 
 
 THE MEMBERS AND FRIENDS 
 
 THE CHUJiCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 
 
 BY 
 
 WM. H. HOLCOMBE, M.D. 
 
 MASOxV BROTHERS, 5 & 7 MERCER STREET. 
 
 1861. 
 
SUGGESTIONS 
 
 AS TO TUB 
 
 ry> * ♦ 
 
 flf %kkim ^laberg, 
 
 ADDRESSED TO 
 
 THE MEMBERS AND FRIENDS 
 
 THE CHUUCH OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 
 
 BY 
 
 WM. H. HOLCOMBE, M.D. 
 
 ^ |[^to |0rli: 
 
 MASON BROTHERS, 5 & 7 MERCER STREET. 
 
 18 Gl. 
 

 ADVEETISEMENT. 
 
 That the following Essay may not be condemned simply 
 because it is not understood, it is addressed "To the Mem- 
 bers AND Friends of the Church of the New Jerusalem," or 
 to all who read and appreciate the theological writings of 
 Emanuel Swedenborg. To such it is only necessary to say, 
 that the Essay is an attempt to vmfold, in some degree, the 
 great principle so constantly set forth and illustrated in the 
 writings of Swedenborg, viz., That there are j^rofound differences 
 in the interior life, or spiritual constitution, of different races of 
 men, which give rise to a necessity for the use of widely different 
 means for their regeneration. 
 
 The writer is aware that every idea in the following Essay 
 needs further illustration and amplification. But as it is, he 
 thinks it will interest the brethren, by the far-reaching char- 
 acter of its views. He does not dare to offer them as truth, 
 but simply as his lioncst conviction of what the truth is. He 
 will be satisfied if they elicit light from others, or cultivate 
 the spirit of charity. 
 
THE 
 
 SPIRITUAL PHILOSOPHY OF AFRICAN SLAVERY. 
 
 What a puzzle is man upon this 
 planet to the Christian philosopher ! 
 What varieties of form, color, habits, 
 and capacities ! What differences 
 in government, in religion, in lan- 
 guage, in private and public manners 
 and customs 1 All degrees and 
 shades of white, black, yellow, and 
 red ! Some progressing, some retro- 
 grading, — the most of them perfectly' 
 stagnant as to thought and life ! Is 
 there no thread to this labyrinth of 
 wonders — no key to these mysteries ? 
 It is commonly supposed that hu- 
 man nature is, and always has been, 
 the same everywhere — that all men 
 are fundamentally organized alike, 
 have similar affections and under- 
 standings ; and think and will in the 
 same manner under analogous or 
 identical circumstances. The same 
 influences, it is supposed, would pro- 
 duce about the same results every- 
 where, and at all times. Consequent- 
 ly it is argued tliat all men are 
 created equal, and ultimately de- 
 signed for our own type of civiliza- 
 tion, which it is their right to acquire, 
 and their duty to achieve. 
 
 Is this so ? Is this crude and 
 grossly material way of looking at 
 human nature satisfactory ? Does it 
 explain any thing ? Why are some 
 men white and some black, some 
 civilized and some heathen, some 
 progressive and some hopelessly tor- 
 pid ? How came the ancient civiliza- 
 tions to perish, and in what and why 
 did they differ from our modern sys- 
 tems ? Why does the Indian become 
 extinct, and why is the African en- 
 slaved ? These and a thousand simi- 
 
 lar questions can never be answered 
 by that philosophy, which supposes 
 that men are always equal and simi- 
 lar, and that the race has been ever 
 gradually developing upward, under 
 favoring natural influences, from 
 barbarism into civilization and Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 We have at last, by the mercy of 
 God, and the instrumentality of Swe- 
 denborg, a key to the spiritual phi- 
 losophy of history. There is no true 
 key to any thing but a spiritual key ; 
 for the sphere of causes lies always 
 in the spiritual world, and effects can 
 never be understood by studying 
 them only from their natural or ph3^s- 
 ical side. We can form no true con- 
 ception of the philosophy of history, 
 or of the causes and uses of African 
 Slavery, until we employ the key 
 which Swedenborg has given us. 
 
 The human mind contains three dis- 
 tinct or discrete degrees of life and 
 thought — the celestial, the sinntual, 
 and the natural, and all these are in- 
 serted, like casket within casket, 
 into the sensual-corporeal sphere, an 
 investment of time and space. We 
 are connected by these discrete de- 
 grees with the three great heavens 
 and their opposite hells, and we go 
 after death to that heaven or hell, 
 corresponding to the degree which 
 has been opened in us by our life in 
 tlie world. So that wc bear within 
 us fhe germs of three different natures 
 — so different, that they do not under- 
 stand, nor see, nor communicate with 
 each other hereafter, save by corre- 
 spondence. Human nature is not 
 therefore the same everywhere, and 
 
The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 at all times. Celestial, spiritual, and 
 natural arc very different forms or 
 forces, and call for very diflerent out- 
 ward surrounding's. 
 
 Swcdenborg says, that the first 
 created men on this earth were of 
 the Celestial type, had open intercourse 
 with the celestial heavens, had direct 
 influx from those heavens into the will 
 or voluntar}' faculty, and consequent- 
 ly felt, thought, and acted unlike any 
 people who have existed since. They 
 had interior respiration. The}' had 
 no literature, no science, and no 
 g'ovcriuncnts, in our modern sense of 
 those terms. Nature was an open 
 mirror to them ; they saw the divine 
 meaning in the g-reatest of things 
 and in the least ; they were child- 
 like, wise, and happy. Those who 
 became angels after death, now live 
 in the third or highest heaven, and 
 tlieir ruling love is love to the Lord. 
 
 In process of time, and by means 
 in this place unnecessary to detail, a 
 great change came over the human 
 race. Sin became general, and as 
 correspondences were in power, that 
 is, as interior changes were imme- 
 diately represented by corresponding 
 exterior clianges, its progress was 
 awfully destructive. Swedenborg is 
 not absolutely explicit upon this point 
 — but a fair inference is, that a vast 
 portion of the human race perished, 
 or were suffocated by the closure of 
 the interior respiration. In a few, 
 the spiritual degree of the human 
 mind was opened, and a new or spirit- 
 ual church was instituted in con- 
 nection with the second or spiritual 
 heavens. Those in whom the spirit- 
 ual degree could not be opened, and 
 who still had some celestial "re- 
 mains," left deeply stored away in 
 tlieir souls, sank into the sensual- 
 corporeal sphere, and have ever since 
 lived a savage life, but little elevated 
 above that of brutes. 
 
 Now is it not pretty certain that 
 the African races, our Indian aborig- 
 ines, and perhaps other dark-skinned 
 barbarians, are the descendants of 
 these old antediluvians ? Sweden- 
 burg plainly intimates as much i)f the 
 
 African. He says that the African 
 is of the celestial type. Grossly sen- 
 sual and barbarian as he evidently is 
 in his outward nature, the " remains" 
 which He imbedded in his spiritual 
 structure are of the celestial order. 
 He is organically connected with the 
 highest heaven and the deepest hell, 
 as no other man or race of men upon 
 this earth ever has been or can be. 
 Proofs of his innate celestial genius 
 are apparent in his ineradicable 
 childishness, — his light-heartedness, 
 simplicitj'-, credulity, and timidity, — 
 in his passion for music and dancing, 
 in his forgiving temper, and in that 
 beautiful willingness to serve, which 
 psychologicall_y distinguishes him 
 from almost all other races. 
 
 The man of the celestial heavens 
 is pre-eminently majestic and beauti- 
 ful — those of the opposite hells are 
 the most hideous and dreadful of all 
 the infernal monsters. The sins of 
 the antediluvians were represented 
 outwardly, and wroug'ht those ana- 
 tomical changes, which are attributed 
 by natural philosophers to climatic 
 and other influences. The black skin, 
 the woolly hair, the thick lips, the shal- 
 low skull, the flat nose, the offensive 
 smell, and other peculiarities ap- 
 proaching the animal tribes, Avere 
 imposed gradually on the antedilu- 
 vian form, as correspondences to the 
 brutalizing operations g-oingon with- 
 in the soul. Here is the key to all 
 the differences among men. The 
 external v/as then made to corre- 
 spond to the internal. It is only since 
 the closure of the interior degrees of 
 the human mind that a man can 
 smile and be a villain, or that he can 
 entertain wicked passions and not 
 become lurid red, or immerse himself 
 into false persuasions and not turn 
 disgustingly black. The science of 
 correspondences is the key to the 
 anatomy, the languages, the history, 
 customs, etc., of all races of men. 
 
 I think the aborigines of America 
 were also descendants of the celestial 
 men of the first church. All perver- 
 sions are of two kinds, — those of the 
 will or the affections, and those of 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 the understanding or the intellect. 
 Perversions of charity would be rep- 
 resented by a lurid red, copper or 
 bronze color, and perversions of truth 
 by a dark or black color. The sepa- 
 ration of faitli and charity was the 
 beginning of the end of the church. 
 Is it not curious that the vast black 
 and red races of the world lay for so 
 many centuries hidden away in two 
 I'emote, widely separated, and almost 
 unknown continents ? Did it not 
 represent the fact that the celestial 
 element was closed to, or eliminated 
 from, the psychological consciousness 
 of the rest of the race ? Were not 
 their discovery and exploration part 
 of the steps preparatory to the de- 
 scent of the New Jerusalem, and the 
 establishment of the New Zion ? Per- 
 haps we shall see presently why the 
 Indian is exterminated, and the Afri- 
 can enslaved. But before we specu- 
 late on those points, we must pursue 
 the thread of a general spiritual 
 philosophy of history a little further. 
 The spiritual church extended 
 throughout the most of Asia. The 
 influx from heaven then flowed direct- 
 ly, not into the wills, but into the un- 
 derstandings, of men. Thc}^ thought 
 spiritually, and lived well, because 
 they knew and loved truth. This 
 spiritual condition of human nature, 
 which was very unlike our natural 
 mode of life, was also transitory. 
 The downward course of man con- 
 tinued ; he at last ceased to think 
 spiritually, and became thoroughly 
 natural. The apiritual degree was 
 closed, and those in whom an order- 
 ly natural plane could not be open- 
 ed sank into the senHual-corporeal 
 sphere. We may safely say, that 
 the Hindoos, Chinese, Japanese, etc., 
 are descendants of those people, who, 
 from having been spiritual, became 
 sensual-corporeal. They difter from 
 Indians and negroes in being what 
 we call semi-civilized — but they are 
 totally stagnant and unprogressive. 
 Their religion, their philosophy, their 
 science, indeed every thing about 
 them, is fossilized, petrified, crystal- 
 lized. Why is it so ? 
 
 All creation is by influx. All devel- 
 opment, in whatever sphere, depends 
 upon the direct stream of divine life 
 flowing into the human soul, and 
 representing itself outwardly in relig- 
 ions, philosophies, arts, sciences, gov- 
 ernments, etc. Now tlie African and 
 the Asiatic have celestial and spiritual 
 " remains" deeply imbedded in their 
 sensual-corptoreal life. Bu t the celestial 
 and spiritual planes of human life are 
 closed. The influx into those races 
 is not from interiors outward, and 
 hence there is no living progress, no 
 development, no civilization. The 
 church is the medium of connection 
 between the Lord and man, and even 
 outward nature. That clmrch at 
 pi'esent exists in the regenerate natu- 
 ral plane of the white race — through 
 which life flows outward and down- 
 ward to all men and things. Asia 
 and Africa can never awaken from 
 their spell-bound sleep, until spiritual 
 and celestial planes are reopened in 
 the church. Missionaries can do 
 nothing ; commercial intercourse can 
 do nothing ; external forces can do 
 nothing. Their " remains" must be 
 vivified. 
 
 The ancient nations which lived in 
 the natural degree of life, connected 
 by influx with the first or natural 
 heavens, were, probably, the Egyp- 
 tians, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, 
 Jews, etc. Of all these, the Jews 
 were the most sensual and corpo- 
 real, and the church established 
 among them was, not a living, but a 
 representative church. Men had 
 now ceased to think spiritually, and 
 became immersed in the senses. 
 The knowledge of correspondences 
 was lost, and idolatry and magic 
 were prevalent from their perversion 
 or abuse. The first, or natural 
 heaven was rapidly closing to man, 
 the nearest hell was opening wide, 
 and the whole race would then have 
 sunk into the mere sensual-corporeal, 
 into the sphere of the life of beasts, 
 and there perished, deprived of in- 
 flux from heaven, but for a most 
 astounding event 1 
 
 Our Lord, the Divine Man, the 
 
6 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 Creator of the Universe, the sole- 
 subsisting' and self-subsisting, de- 
 scended into this world in the human 
 form, executed judgment in the 
 world of spirits, cast out devils from 
 the human race, conquered the hells 
 and reduced them to temporary ex- 
 ternal order, and penetrated all 
 things, even the f^ensual-corporeal 
 sphere, Avith his divine presence. 
 He thereby saved the race from im- 
 pending annihilation, and reopened 
 the closed wa^'s to heaven. He is 
 now the Mediator, the Way, and the 
 Life. B}^ means of influx from him, 
 our sensital-corporeal is again re- 
 duced to order, and made obedient 
 to the higlier faculties. We have a 
 new natural, new science, new 
 rationality, new life. Into this new 
 natural, based on an orderly sensual- 
 corporeal, a new spiritual and a new 
 celestial may be inserted. The work 
 of demolition was ended ; celestial, 
 spiritual, natural, had all perished 
 or been closed by evil. The Avork 
 of reconstruction began ; natural, 
 spjiritual, celestial, will all be opened 
 again. " Praise the Lord, all ye his 
 hosts !" 
 
 The European races, and especial- 
 ly the Teutonic branches, have been 
 capable of receiving this new natural 
 plane with the greatest success. 
 Hence the church has been estab- 
 lished with them, and hence their 
 great civilization and power. Their 
 civilization differs from the ancient 
 forms in this. It has been devel- 
 oped from below, or without, by ob- 
 servation, experiment, and the culti- 
 vation of tlie senses. The old forms 
 were received from above by corre- 
 spondences, and were successively 
 crystallized or destroyed by the clos- 
 ure of ment;il planes. Ancient em- 
 pires, languages, etc., perished and 
 are dead, because men successively 
 ceased to live, think, and act in the 
 spheres of life derived from the three 
 distinct heavens, known as celestial, 
 spiritual, and natural. There can be 
 no retrograde or downward step in 
 modern progress, because our Lord 
 lives forever in his Divine Human- 
 
 ity, and the heavens are pressing 
 down to fill us with their life and 
 power, as fast as recipient vessels 
 can be prepared for their influx. 
 
 We may form some faint idea of 
 the vast and wonderful operations of 
 Providence, when wo consider the 
 fact that it has taken eighteen hun- 
 dred years to prepare the natural 
 plane of thought in the white race, 
 for engrafting upon it the life of 
 the spiritual and celestial churches. 
 All the events of history', etc., dur- 
 ing that period have been move- 
 ments preparatory to the Second 
 Advent, and the inauguration of 
 spiritual and celestial life in the 
 church. In the mean time, influx 
 was through the natural plane of the 
 white race. This influx, flowing 
 into the sensual-corporeal spheres 
 about it, caused the rise of Moham- 
 medanism, the crusades, and all the 
 historical events, discoveries, etc., 
 which have brought Europe and 
 Asia more closely together. In 
 another direction, it caused the dis- 
 covery and exploration of America 
 and Africa, and the strange events 
 which have transpired in the histor- 
 ical lives of the Indian and the 
 Negro. This is and must be • the 
 New Church mode of looking at 
 history. Effects are produced by 
 spiritual causes, operating solely for 
 spiritual ends. The ultimation of a 
 celestial church, as in the most an- 
 cient days, is the event to which all 
 creative energies in the world must 
 have conspired. 
 
 The Lord has revealed to us a 
 vast body of spiritual truth through 
 Swedenborg. These doctrines of 
 heaven are received by the spiritual 
 man through intelligence, and per- 
 C(!ived by the celestial man through 
 affection. These spiritual truths 
 correspond to celestial goods, and 
 are their recipient vessels. When 
 the charity and truth of this New 
 Church prevail indeed, all things 
 will' be reduced to order. There 
 will be no sin, no disease, no oppres- 
 sion. All social and political enig- 
 mas will have been solved. 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 Discarding the perplexities of de- 
 tail and grasping' only the large 
 facts, Ave may say for all practical 
 purposes, that three great races ex- 
 ist at present on the earth, with 
 distinctive spiritual peculiarities. 
 There is the white race, with the 
 natural or scientific plane of thought, 
 open and cultivated, and with the 
 capacity of becoming either spirit- 
 ual or celestial. Secondly, there is 
 the yellow, or Asiatic race, sensual- 
 corporeal outwardly, but capable of 
 becoming spiritual by an opening of 
 its interiors. Lastly, there is the 
 African, still more grossly sensual- 
 corporeal outwardly, but capable of 
 becoming celestial by the opening of 
 his interiors. Now influx being 
 through the Church established 
 among the white race, how are these 
 other races to bo brought into con- 
 tact with the white race, so as to be- 
 come truly recipient of the influx 
 from heaven ? Alissionary, commer- 
 cial, and military intercourse have 
 proved fruitless. The reason is, the 
 scientific or natural plane of thought 
 in those nations or races is not open 
 as it is in the European. Above the 
 sensual-corporeal sphere, which is 
 common to all, we have little or 
 nothing which communicates or 
 touches. They think, feel, and act 
 ^ differently from us in every thing. 
 There is an impassable gulf between 
 us. They do not understand us, nor 
 we them. The cause lies in our 
 organic spiritual differences. Those 
 who have studied the Negro, or the 
 Indian, or the Hindoo closel}', under- 
 stand what I mean by this strange 
 incommunicability of thought. 
 
 The African of the western coast is 
 thoroughly sensual-corporeal, a per- 
 fect barbarian. His fetichism is to 
 the perverted celestial, what Asiatic 
 idolatry is to the perverted spiritual. 
 His hereditary influx is derived 
 from the third, or deepest hell, and 
 no exertion of his volitional or intel- 
 lectual faculties can ever deliver 
 him from its bondage. But our 
 Lord, who, in preparing to establish 
 his celestial church, is reducing 
 
 those antediluvian hells to order 
 by powerful external restraints and 
 severe punishments, has prepared 
 also a way for the poor African's 
 (!scape. The coast African alone, of 
 all the races in the world, eats dirt, 
 and worships, with horrid rites, the 
 serpent — the t^'pe of the sensual- 
 corpoi'eal principle to which he is 
 enslaved. Why has the African been 
 subordinated to the white man ? 
 Why have his masters been changed ? 
 By African slavery the sensual- 
 corpjoreal principle of the African is 
 brought into obedience and subjec- 
 tion to the natural or scientific j^lane 
 of the white man's life. The white 
 man tvills and thinks for him, de- 
 termines his outgoings and his in- 
 comings, his food, his clothing, his 
 sleep, his work, etc. He compels 
 him to do uses under a rational and 
 scientific supervision. He makes 
 him obedient as a child, partly by 
 aftectionate control, partly by the 
 fear of corporeal punishment. What 
 is the result ? His sensual-corporeal 
 is adjoined as a servant to the re- 
 generate natural of the white man, 
 and receives influx through it. His 
 hereditary torpor is dissipated ; the 
 sphere of oi'der, justice, and active 
 use into which he is inserted is re- 
 pugnant to his attendant evil spirits, 
 and they measurably leave him. He 
 begins to feel, think, and act from 
 new motives, new influx. His sen- 
 sual-corporeal sphere is reduced to 
 order, and he acquires something 
 similar to the regenerate scientific 
 and rational life of the white man. 
 This serves as a basis, or vessel, for 
 the down-flowing of his innate celes- 
 tial "remains." They are vivified. 
 He exhibits the virtues, and, in part, 
 the graces of the child. He sings, 
 he dances, he is light-hearted, taking 
 no thought of to-morrow. He is 
 truthful and virtuous, faithful and 
 affectionate. He is passing through 
 the process which Almiglity God has 
 provided, and which will eventuate 
 in his true liberty and his final sal- 
 vation. "Bonds make free, so they 
 be righteous bonds." 
 
The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 Suppose he is prematurely libera- 
 ted from the control of the white man, 
 before the new basis for celestial 
 influx has been duly formed ? He 
 relapses into indolence, superstition, 
 vice, and barbarism. His natural or 
 scientitic plane of thought can not be 
 (ipened or cultivated, under the best 
 influences, beyond that of the white 
 child of ten and twelve years. Polit- 
 ical privileges and general education 
 would suffocate the only true life he 
 has, and leave in its place the poor 
 boon of imitating the white man in 
 those points where he has least pros- 
 pect of success. The celestial man 
 is alwaj'^s a child, and knows nothing 
 of politics. His knowledge and 
 science will come by intuition and 
 correspondence, and not by rule and 
 precept, by books and colleges. Little 
 do they know of the African or his 
 mission, who wish him to compete 
 with the white man in the studio and 
 the forum. He wants nothing at 
 present but wise discipline, and room 
 and opportunity for the outworking 
 of heavenly affections into an orderly 
 sensual-corporeal life. 
 
 Tlie evils of slav(;ry, like those of all 
 human society, are many and formi- 
 dable, but they are not inherent in the 
 institution. They flow from the iin- 
 regenerate natural life of the white 
 man acting upon the sensual-corpo- 
 real sphere of the subjugated African. 
 Negroes may be made miserable, just 
 as wives and children are in the un- 
 regenerate domestic circle. But who- 
 ever believes in Providence knows 
 that the regeneration of the race is 
 steadily and surely progressing, and 
 the evils of slavery are not to be 
 removed by its abolition, which would 
 be a retrograde step in the economy 
 of God, but by the continued Christian 
 culture of both master and slave. 
 
 Is there no comfort or pleasure 
 to the Christian heart in the contem- 
 plation of the fact, now fully authen- 
 ticated, that there are at this time 
 four millions of black laborers in the 
 United States — better fed, better 
 clothed, more lightl}'^ tasked, more 
 humanely and sympathetically treat- 
 
 ed, and really happier and more con- 
 tented on the fair average than any 
 other four millions of laborers on the 
 face of the globe ? But what is this 
 to deeper and more significant 
 truths ? African slavery has convert- 
 ed more heathen to Christianity than 
 all the missionary efforts of all the 
 churches in all ages of the world 
 combined. Let the New Churchman 
 think of the additions which have 
 been made to the New Church in the 
 heavens from this source ! Let him 
 reflect upon their reactionary influ- 
 ence on the church and the world ! 
 Will not the celestial church become 
 ultimated upon earth just in propor- 
 tion as the African is elevated and 
 civilized? Will not the celestial in- 
 flux flow directly from the African into 
 the spiritual "remains" of the Asiatic, 
 and after awhile awaken that dormant 
 continent to the beauty and glory of 
 the New Church life ? There will be no 
 need to enslave the Asiatic, because 
 by the vivification of the celestial 
 "remains" in the African the highest 
 stand-point for divine influx into every 
 thing beneath it will have been at- 
 tained. 
 
 It would be pleasant for us, but it 
 is not necessary, to foresee clearly 
 the final issues of African slavery. 
 One thing is certain, however long it 
 lasts, however far it extends, and 
 whatever different phases it may 
 assume, — whenever the celestial "re- 
 mains" have been thoroughly vivified, 
 and divine influx resumes its old 
 channel from the inmost to the out- 
 most, correspondences will reacquire 
 their old power, and the external 
 again be made to correspond with the 
 internal. All the repulsive features 
 of the African will then disappear, 
 and his will be the most beautiful 
 and lovely of all the races in the 
 world. His political status, that 
 miserable bone of contention with us 
 poor naturalists, I shall not pretend 
 to prophesy. If he is true to his ce- 
 lestial genius, he will choose to be 
 " the servant of all." 
 
 While it is true that the posses- 
 sion of irresponsible power by the 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 unregCTierate man is fatal or injurious 
 both to himself and his inferiors, it 
 is equally true that, where there is 
 properChristian culture, slaveholding 
 is neither a sin nor a curse to the 
 master. The proper subordination 
 of the African is fraught Avith benefit 
 to himself, the church and the world, 
 and it is hard to believe that the 
 millions of the white race who are 
 involuntary agents in the work, are 
 to reap nothing but evil from the in- 
 stitution. It appears to me that the 
 white man derives much of the " ce- 
 lestial" in childhood by his contact 
 and dealings with the negro race. 
 The character of the southern man is 
 impulsive, credulous, generous, and 
 childlike. His emotional life pre- 
 dominates over the scientific and in- 
 tellectual spheres ; while the reverse 
 is the case with our northern brethren. 
 And he excels all other races in that 
 beautiful deference to woman, which 
 belongs to the celestial genius, and is 
 one of the best tests of a high civil- 
 ization. Slaveholding enlarges the 
 sphere of our duties and responsibili- 
 ties, and where these are met and 
 discharged in a lofty and conscien- 
 tious Christian spirit, the character 
 must of necessity be purified and 
 elevated by the experience. 
 
 The New Churchman will bear in 
 mind that the end of slavery is to 
 subordinate the sensual-corjwreal of 
 the African to the regenerate natural 
 of the white race, and so procure an 
 orderly basis for the descent of the 
 celestial. The spiritual causes at 
 work are no doubt the same as those 
 by which our Lord is pi'eparing the 
 way for the celestial church in us as 
 well as in the African, and reducing 
 the third or deepest hell to order. As 
 the force of hereditary influx from 
 that hell into the African is broken, 
 he will be more and more prepared 
 for the glorious destiny which certain- 
 ly awaits him. How long the dis- 
 ciplinary ordeal is to last we can not 
 tell. The wise and salutary control 
 of the white man will probably be 
 imposed upon the African throughout 
 all the tropical regions, in which, by 
 
 reason of correspondence, the celes- 
 tial church of the future will most 
 especially flourish. From this time 
 forth, if let alone, the institution will 
 go on, under the divine auspices, to 
 improvement and perfection, until 
 the relation of master and slave will 
 indeed be as tender, beautiful, and 
 sacred as that of parent and child. 
 
 Now, why are our aborigines, and 
 the Sandwich Islanders, the New 
 Zealanders, the Australians, etc., etc., 
 fading away before the encroach- 
 ments of white power and civiliza- 
 tion ? They will soon be all extinct, 
 one of the strangest and most melan- 
 choly facts, says Mr. Everett, in 
 human history. Now these people 
 are not enslaved. Their sensual-cor- 
 poreal principle comes into contact 
 with ours, but it is not subordinated 
 to our scientific and rational facul- 
 ties. They only learn our sensual 
 vices, and contract our diseases and 
 perish. The same influx which, flow- 
 ing through the natural plane of the 
 white man into the subordinated 
 sensual-corporeal of the Negro, makes 
 him the longest lived and most pro- 
 lific race in the world, flowing into 
 the disorderl}' sphere of the unsub- 
 dued Indian, exterminates him. The 
 same thing happens to Negroes when 
 they are released from the control of 
 the white man, and yet live within 
 his powerful sphere. Free Negroes 
 everywhere will ultimately die out 
 in the presence of white civilization. 
 The British Civilization Society will 
 depopulate Africa instead of enlight- 
 ening it. The safety of the Negro 
 lies, first of all, in his wise and 
 humane subordination in some form 
 to the white race. 
 
 It may be that our aboriginal 
 Indian, the most sullen, revengeful, 
 malicious, cruel, and implacable crea- 
 ture in the world, represents the 
 perversion of celestial good and its 
 consequent ineradicable falsities. 
 He may have no recipient vessels in 
 his mind (truths are such vessels) 
 for reformatory influXj and the sphere 
 of the celestial heavens, now begin- 
 ning to operate, may suffocate and 
 
10 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 destroy him. The Xcg-i'o being* per- 
 verted only as to celestial truths, in- 
 flux takes place into a g-ood will- 
 principle, and there is only need of 
 an orderly arrangement of all the in- 
 ferior planes and faculties for its 
 happy descent into ultimates. These 
 and many other curious points easily 
 sug'gest themselves to those ac- 
 quainted with the New Church psy- 
 chology. 
 
 From this new and spiritual stand- 
 point, can we not look down and 
 iuvcdjzQ some of the causes at work 
 in the great anti-slavery agitation of 
 tlie present time ? It is pronounced 
 good by the greatest and best author- 
 ities of the age. Statesmen, philoso- 
 phers, divines, and poets, vie with 
 each other in denouncing the institu- 
 tion of slavery as " the sum of all 
 villainies," and in laboring, not for 
 its amelioration and perfection, but 
 for its total abolition. Can it be 
 possible that all these great and 
 good men and women are mistaken ? 
 It is even so. They are unconscious- 
 ly involved in a vast vortex of the 
 most subtle and direful phantasies. 
 Devils and enthusiastic spirits con- 
 spire to thwart the operations of 
 Divine Providence, to prevent the 
 opening of the spiritual and celestial 
 planes of life, and to oppose the de- 
 scent of a celestial church in the 
 world. If they can liberate the sensu- 
 al-corporeal of the African race from 
 the control of the regenerating natu- 
 ral of the white race, the passage of 
 the celestial into ultimates is meas- 
 urably prevented. The African re- 
 turns to his barbarism or perishes in 
 presence of the white man ; the 
 material interests of the world arc 
 shaken to the centre ; revolution, war, 
 destitution, anarchy, are engendered ; 
 the heavens are closed, the hells 
 opened ; angels recede and devils re- 
 joice. The Abolition spirit is the 
 subtlest demonism of the age. Iiln- 
 thusiastic evil spirits have taken 
 possession of the reason, the imagina- 
 tion, the fancy, and almost the senses 
 of its devotees. And it is part and 
 parcel of a still more general eflbrt 
 
 of the hells to emancipate the whole 
 sensual-corporeal sphere of tlie race 
 from the control of the higher facul- 
 ties. 
 
 To accomplish this gigantic scheme 
 of evil, the hells have cunningly as- 
 sumed the livery of heaven. The 
 noblest instincts and passions of the 
 soul are enlisted in the mighty work. 
 The love of life and liberty, the hatred 
 of cruelty and oppression, pity for the 
 weak and helpless, sympathy for the 
 distressed and struggling, and the 
 generous spirit of self-sacrifice for the 
 good of others, have all been pervert- 
 ed from their true spheres and uses, 
 to vitalize and sanctify this mysteri- 
 ous movement of the hells. So blind- 
 ed are their human agents, that they 
 see little or no difference between 
 Garibaldi contending in Italy and 
 John Brown plotting in Virginia, and 
 regard the liberation of Negroes and 
 the emancipation of Russian serfs 
 as events occurring on the same 
 plane, and of equivalent value. I 
 know of nothing, save the grace of 
 God, which can dissipate these delu- 
 sions, but the New Church doctrines 
 of Order, Influx, Degrees, and Corre- 
 spondence, and their cautious appli- 
 cation to the philosophy of history. 
 
 Who values free institutions and 
 constitutional liberty more sincerely 
 than the southern patriot ? Who 
 has made more splendid sacrifices in 
 their behalf ? Who is readier at this 
 moment to lay down life and fortune 
 in the maintenance of equal rights 
 and liberal govcriunont ? AVho re- 
 joices more gladly that the serfs are 
 emancipated, and that Italy is free ? 
 The bondage of white man to white 
 man, or of black man to black man, 
 is fraught only with evil. It is insti- 
 gated by the devils, who, from the 
 love of self and the lust of power, 
 impose their own thoughts and wills 
 upon otliers in the hells. The church, 
 which is based upon spiritual free- 
 dom, can never be truly ultimated in 
 any given plane of life, until all res- 
 ident upon that plane are free and 
 equal. But, in the name of truth 
 and justice, is not the subordination 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 11 
 
 of the Nef^ro to the Avhite man a very 
 different thing- ? The Negro is a child, 
 org'anicall}' and spiritually a child — 
 not to be made a man of onr sort by 
 any amount of political or scientific 
 culture. The relation of master and 
 slave is for him a far better and hap- 
 pier one than that of capitalist and 
 laborer. lie can only think and will 
 for himself sensiially and corporeal- 
 ly : it is vastly to his advantage that 
 we should thiidv and will for him ra- 
 tionally and scientifically. His true 
 life and hope and liberty are to be 
 found under the patriarchal system. 
 Let us adopt him into our family. 
 Let us lead him firmly but tenderly 
 and wisely. Let us forbear with him 
 and forgive him, but let us also gov- 
 ern and correct him. Let us imbue 
 him with all the knowledges he can 
 
 truly use and enjoy, and grant him 
 every liberty and pleasure which is 
 rational and proper. Let us do for 
 him just what we would be wise in 
 asking him to do for us, if we were 
 spiritually and physically organized 
 as he is. We have a hard task to 
 accomplish, but with patience and 
 gentleness and humility and wisdom 
 from above it will be accomplished 
 at last. In the mean time, let us re- 
 gard those who oppose us, the accus- 
 ers of their brethren, loss in anger 
 than in sorrow. All this we may do, 
 etill believing that the worst eneni}'- 
 of the Negro, of his own race and 
 country, of the world and of the 
 church, is he who, by precipitate 
 and disorderly methods, would sun- 
 der the existing relation between 
 master and slave. 
 
 %xt ^Ebanans tk gtscciiiiants of i\t 3tnt^5iIllbians ? 
 
 In the preceding essay on the 
 " Spiritual Philosophy of African 
 Slaverj^," I ventured the assertion, 
 that the barbarians of the world, and 
 especially the dark-skinned savages, 
 are descendants of the antediluvians. 
 The New Church reader will perhaps 
 ask, What rational ground is there for 
 such an hypothesis ? 
 
 There are evidently three great 
 classes or types of men now existing 
 in the world. 
 
 1. Barbarians. — These people have 
 never invented an alphabet, and there- 
 fore have no literature, no science, no 
 theology, no rational government. 
 They lead the senaual-corporeal life 
 of animals, with merely the exterior- 
 natural, as Swedenborg calls it, of 
 human life. They do not accumulate 
 facts so as to cultivate the scienlific 
 
 principle ; nor have they the least idea 
 of the rational, winch is still more in- 
 terior. Consequently, they are totally 
 unprogressive. 
 
 2. Semi-civilized naiions. — We may 
 take the Hindoos as the most ancient 
 and best type of this class. They 
 have the most extraordinary litera- 
 ture, theology, government, habits, 
 customs, etc., thousands of years old, 
 and in a strangely crystallized or un- 
 progressive condition. They are per- 
 fect enigmas to us modern thinkers ; 
 nor is there any key to the mystery, 
 but the science of correspondences. 
 I assume that all such nations are the 
 descendants of the men of the Ancient 
 Church, and have been made unpro- 
 gressive by the closure of the qyiritual 
 degree of the human mind. 
 
 3 Modern civilized nations — With 
 
12 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 the scientific and rational faculties of 
 the mind in constant and progressive 
 activity. 
 
 It is the ineradicable fault of 
 modern philosophy to suppose that 
 there has been, from the beginning, 
 a reg'ular progressive development 
 of the human race from the savage 
 condition upward, into the light and 
 beauty of civilization. It presumes 
 that all nations were originally bar- 
 barous, with fetichism for tlieir first 
 and only theological manifestation. 
 From this stage they passed into a 
 semi-civilized condition, with poly- 
 theism for their religion ; and, lastly, 
 they became scientific and philo- 
 sophical, and, as to their theological 
 opinions, atheistic, deistic, or mono- 
 theistic. This corresponds to M. 
 Comte's three stages of human evo- 
 lution — the mythical, the metaphys- 
 ical, and the positive. 
 
 The Europeans, it is assumed, have 
 outstripped all others in the race of 
 civilization, on account of superior 
 organization of brain, and a great 
 number of favoring natural and ex- 
 ternal causes. And it is confidently 
 expected that the African and the 
 Asiatic will, finally, come up to the 
 same point of development, under the 
 influence of similar stimuli and sur- 
 rounding circumstances. 
 
 I can not here appeal, as I might, 
 to every department of human knowl- 
 edge and inquiry to refute this doc- 
 trine, that the savage is tlie primitive 
 man, or the seed out of which in due 
 time the civilized man is unfolded. I 
 will make a single quotation from a 
 distinguished Old Church authority, 
 and then pass on to a more strictly 
 New Cimrch, or Swedenborgian, view 
 of the subject : 
 
 " Were the savage the primitive 
 man, we should tlien find savage 
 tribes furnished, scantily enougii it 
 might be, with the elements of speech, 
 yet at the same time witii its fruitful 
 beginnings, its vigorous and healthful 
 germs. But what does their language 
 on close inspection prove ? In every 
 case, what they are themselves, the 
 remnant and ruin of a better and 
 
 nobler past. Fearful indeed is the 
 impress of degradation which is 
 stamped upon the language of the 
 savage — more fearful than that even 
 which is stamped upon his form. 
 
 " Yet with all this, ever aud anon 
 in the midst of this wreck and ruin 
 there is that in the language of the 
 savage, some subtle distinction, some 
 curious allusion to a perished civili- 
 zation, now utterly unintelligible to 
 the speaker ; or some other note, 
 which proclaims his language to be 
 the remains of a dissipated inherit- 
 ance, the rags and remnants of a 
 robe which was a royal one once. 
 The fragments of a broken sceptre 
 are in his hand, a sceptre wherewith 
 he (or rather his progenitors) once 
 held dominion over large kingdoms 
 of thought, which have now escaped 
 wholly from his sway." — Dr. Richard 
 Trench, on the Study of Wo7'ds, pp. 
 26 and 27. 
 
 Swedenborg asserts that there 
 were three great and distinct civili- 
 zations before the coming of Christ — 
 celestial, spiritual, and natural — con- 
 nected by influx, we may safely pre- 
 sume, respectively with the three 
 distinct heavens. The church is the 
 medium of life, and progress occurs 
 first and prominently on the plane 
 where the church is. The ancient 
 civilizations perished because the 
 celestial and spiritual degrees of tiie 
 human mind were successively closed. 
 Now is it not probable that barbar- 
 ism resulted from tlie closure of the 
 celestial plane, and that a barbarian 
 is a man spiritually organized like 
 a child, that is, leading a sensual-cor- 
 poreal life with celestial " remains" 
 stored away in his interiors ? 
 
 Does the New Churchman object, 
 that the whole human race perished 
 at the flood or closure of the celestial 
 plane, except the " remnant" in whom 
 the spiritual plane could be opened ? 
 and that all men thereafter are of 
 the spiritual or natural type ? I an- 
 swer, what then can Swedenborg 
 mean by saying that the African race 
 is of the celestial genius ? Does he 
 mean spiritual-celestial, analogous to 
 
Sfrican Slavery. 
 
 13 
 
 one half of the spiritual heavens ? I 
 think not, for the African would then 
 exhibit some token or trace, as the 
 Asiatic does, of having once enjoyed 
 a high degree of spiritual light. But 
 he is thoroughly sensual-corporeal, 
 and his "remains" are evidently ce- 
 lestial, nor has he ever had any thing 
 about him of which the spiritual could 
 be predicated. 
 
 The first men created on earth were 
 of the celestial genius. A celestial 
 church was established among them 
 which no doubt had its rise, culmina- 
 tion, and fall. There is no reason, 
 however, to suppose that every cre- 
 ated being had been brouglit into its 
 intimate communion before its dete- 
 rioration, nor that all, save the spir- 
 itual remnant, were suffocated by its 
 disappearance. The following from 
 Swedenborg appears satisfactory on 
 that point : 
 
 " By all which is on the earth ex- 
 piring, those are signified who being 
 of that church had acquired such a 
 nature, as may appear from this con- 
 sideration, that earth does not signify 
 the whole habitable globe, but only 
 those who are of the church, as was 
 shown above. Consequently there is 
 no particular flood here meant, much 
 less a universal flood, but only the 
 expiration or suffocation of those who 
 were of the clmrch, when tliey had 
 separated themselves from remains, 
 and thereby from the intellectual 
 things of truth, and from what ap- 
 pertained to the will of good, conse- 
 quently from the heavens." A. C. 
 662. 
 
 Swedenborg expressly declares 
 that this suff"ocation or closure of the 
 celedial plane in those of the Most 
 Ancient Church, and the opening of 
 the spiritual plane for the establish- 
 ment of a spiritual church, were 
 gradual processes. Those who had 
 extinguished remains by immersion 
 in lusts and phantasies no doubt per- 
 ished. No doubt also this process 
 would have gone on to the extermi- 
 nation of the whole race, for influx is 
 tln-ough the church alone. But with 
 the opening of the spiritual degree, a 
 crreat orsranic modification was in- 
 
 duced. Influx came through the spir- 
 itual into the natural and thence into 
 the corporeal. The sensual-corporeal 
 life of both men and brutes was main- 
 tained by the influx from the New 
 Church. The process of extinction 
 was arrested, but all, save the spir- 
 itual remnant, were left in a sensual- 
 corporeal condition, with some few 
 celestial " remains" deeply imbedded 
 in their structure — their sole hope of 
 future resuscitation. 
 
 This rationale of barbarism, accord - 
 ing to the New Church psychology, 
 seems to be eminently clear and beau- 
 tiful. It explains the mysteries of 
 savage life. It shows why the sci- 
 entific, rational, and spiritual degrees 
 have not been opened in his mind. 
 His "remains" are celestial, and not 
 till they are vivified, will his inferior 
 faculties develop. No influx or cre- 
 ative impetus has reached these re- 
 mains since the flood — for no celestial 
 church has existed. When inferior 
 things have been subordinated and 
 CO ordinated for the descent of the 
 celestial, then will those nations of the 
 celestial tj'pe who can receive the 
 new influx — especially the Africans 
 — reveal the mercy, and wisdom, and 
 power of God in a manner surpass- 
 ingly strange and beautiful. 
 
 Some barbarians appear doomed 
 to inevitable extinction, such as our 
 American Indians, the Australians, 
 the Bushmen, some wild tribes in 
 Ceylon and Malabar who live in trees 
 and are very little superior to apes, 
 the cannibals of Madagascar, some 
 hopelessly degraded races in Siberia, 
 Patagonia, and elsewhere, etc., etc. 
 Do they not all represent certain 
 great principles or qualities in the 
 Most Ancient Church, of which the 
 " remains" were becoming extinct ? 
 Were they not secured a low kind of 
 physical existence by the change of 
 influx as above mentioned, and will 
 not the incipient influx of the celes- 
 tial church ensure their destruction ? 
 
 Swedenborg speaks always well 
 of the Africans, and his description 
 of them, from a spiritual stand-point, 
 will hereafter be regarded as a strong 
 external proof of the reliabilitv of his 
 
14 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 own revelations. It is singular that 
 although Africa is west and south- 
 west of Asia and south of Europe, 
 Swedenborg says Africa in tlic spir- 
 itual or angelic sense means tlie East. 
 (Apoc. Ex. 21.) It was of course 
 correspondential, representing the 
 celestial state nearest the Lord. Its 
 first people must have been celestial. 
 In my former essay I intimated 
 my belief tliat the Africans are to 
 play a great part in the ultimation 
 of the celestial church and the regen- 
 eration of the world. It is more than 
 a curious coincidence tliat at the 
 time Swedenborg was revealing the 
 vast organic system of spiritual truth, 
 %vhich is the doctrine of angels, a 
 revelation was being made to negroes 
 in the interior of Africa. Of this re- 
 markable fact we have as j'et no ex- 
 ternal proof, but no New Churchman 
 doubts that Swedenborg's statement 
 will be verified, perhaps in some un- 
 anticipated manner. Notice this 
 passage from Swedenborg : " I have 
 heard the angels rejoice at this rev- 
 elation, because it serves to open a 
 communication ivith the rational prin- 
 cii^le in man, which has been liereto- 
 fore closed up with the universally 
 received dogma, tliat the understand- 
 ing should be kept in obedience to 
 ecclesiastical faith." T. C. R. 840. 
 Now if I understand this sentence 
 aright, it means, that we owe much 
 of our great emancipation from the 
 dogmas of the past to the quiet and 
 imperceptible influx into our rational 
 principle, of a sphere flowing from a 
 little obscure community in Africa, 
 whose celestial "remains" have been 
 vivified by the special implantation 
 of truth. What eflect then may we 
 presume the sphere of Christianized 
 Africans in the south to have on the 
 world and church at large ? The 
 natural man would scout such an 
 idea, because he knows nothing of 
 influx and correspondences. We 
 may owe all of our boasted civil 
 and religious liberty to the fact, that 
 the inmost celestial sphere of Africa 
 has here in America impinged upon 
 the rational-scientific sphere of the 
 European. Hence the whole world 
 
 is thrown into dire commotion about 
 African slavery. It is, indeed, the 
 question of questions. The whole 
 future of the cinirch depends on the 
 existence and Christianizationof this 
 institution. Devils and enthusiastic 
 spirits, by the agency of fanatics and 
 misguided good people, would thwart 
 the influx from the celestial by re- 
 storing the African to his original 
 barbarism. 
 
 It is curious and instructive to see 
 how spheres withdraw or approach, 
 and are correspondentially represent- 
 ed in history. The celestial is closed, 
 and Africa and America disappear 
 from the consciousness of the race. 
 The spiritual is closed, and Hindo- 
 stan, China, and Japan exist to the 
 Greek and Roman only b}^ tradition. 
 The natural is nearly closed, and the 
 Jew alone remains, thoroughly sen- 
 sual-corporeal — the ultimate form of 
 the ancient civilizations. The new 
 natural of ascending civilization is 
 formed in Europe, and spheres ap- 
 proach again. Asia comes into con- 
 tact with Europe by the crusades, 
 the career of Moor and Turk, and, 
 finall}'-, by the British domination in 
 India. Asia comes into contact with 
 Africa by the Moor and Arab impos- 
 ing the Mohammedan religion on al- 
 most all the tribes of Central Africa. 
 The celestial approaches, and Africa 
 and America are re-discovered. Af- 
 rica comes into contact with Europe 
 in America — and it will meet Asia 
 again on the same ground by the 
 emigration from China to our Pacific 
 Coast, and the importation of Coolies 
 into tropical America. The celestial, 
 spiritual, and natural will meet in 
 tropical America, and not until their 
 spheres have been fully subordinated 
 and co-ordinated will the New Jeru- 
 salem descend in all its fulness upon 
 earth, and the New Zion be estab- 
 lished. The Jew — the connecting 
 link between the descending and as- 
 cending civilizations will be the 
 
 last to be regenerated, and then the 
 triumph of our Lord, the Redeemer, 
 will be complete. 
 
 No one, I hope, will infer from 
 these remarks that I suppose the 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 15 
 
 celestial, spiritual, and natural, which 
 are discrete degrees, can possibly 
 exist upon the same plane. If the 
 celestial church had not fallen, wc 
 would have remained forever in con- 
 nection with the third heavens. If 
 the spiritual church could have per- 
 sisted, we might have been still con- 
 nected by influx with the second 
 heavens, and so on. But having 
 descended into the sensual-corporeal, 
 we become by the process of recon- 
 struction or regeneration only celes- 
 tial-natural or spiritual-natural. The 
 African will be celestial-natural, the 
 Asiatic spiritual-natural, the Europe- 
 an either. Our world, according to 
 Swedenborg, belongs to the corpo- 
 real sphere, and has place in the 
 cutaneous principle of the Grand 
 Man. For this reason the Word is 
 given here in so sensuous a form, 
 and our Lord became a sensual-cor- 
 poreal being on our planet. All 
 things are repeated or represented 
 in ultimates, and hence our descent 
 from the celestial to th'e sensual, and 
 our acquisition of a new basis into 
 which all tlie higher elements may 
 be inserted. 
 
 If I am not greatly mistaken, the 
 application of the doctrines of influx, 
 order, series, degrees, and correspond- 
 ence, in the light of .Swedenborg's 
 direct revelations, to the phj'sical, 
 moral, and historical study of man, 
 will be productive of great resiilts. 
 Physiologists, ethnologists, and his- 
 torians are collecting the facts, which 
 the New Church philosophy alone can 
 ever harmonize or explain. 
 
 Not only will the natural history 
 of man and the philosophy of history 
 be elevated into rational light, but 
 the moral government of God will 
 be vindicated from many objections 
 which have been urged against it. 
 God created no man a savage, or 
 black, or yellow, or hideous and de- 
 formed, or idiotic, or insane. Men 
 have made themselves and their chil- 
 dren so. God go%'erns the hells and 
 all states of human imperfection and 
 barbarism with infinite mercy. By 
 confining a vast portion of the race 
 for a definite and provisional period 
 
 to barbarism, he saved them from to- 
 tal annihilation. Those people view- 
 ed in spiritual light are children, and 
 they have unquestionably been saved 
 in heaven. The fears of orthodoxy 
 for their salvation are wholly gratui- 
 tous. In the fulness of time, when 
 His celestial church is ultimated, 
 these people, pi'eserved as a remnant 
 or seed for that very purpose, will be 
 the principal means and agents to 
 a perfect reorganization of society. 
 The end was foreseen in the begin- 
 ning and provided for. He has led 
 us by ways we knew not, and we 
 may be sure, that the wonders and 
 mercies of the past will be immeasur- 
 ably eclipsed by those of the future. 
 "The light of the moon shall be as 
 the light of the sun, and the light of 
 the sun shall be sevenfold." 
 
 Dr. Horace Bushnell, in his -work on 
 " Nature and the Supernatural," cites a 
 case in his own experience, of what he re- 
 gards as the possession of a spiritual gift in 
 an African, which may perhaps be referred 
 to the " vivification of remains." After 
 relating numerous fiicts in proof that 
 " miracles and spiritual gifts are not dis- 
 continued," Dr. B. proceeds : 
 
 '' I cite only one more witness ; a man 
 who carries the manner and supports the 
 office of a prophet, though without claiming 
 the repute of it himself. He is a fugitive 
 from slavery, whose name I had barely 
 heard, but whose character and life have 
 been known to many in our community, for 
 the last twenty years. He called at my 
 door, about the time I was sketching the 
 outline of this chapter, requesting an inter- 
 view. As I entered the room, it was quite 
 evident that he was struggling with a good 
 deal of mental agitation, though his manner 
 was firm, and even dignified. He said im- 
 mediately, that he had come to me ' with a 
 message from de Lord.* I replied, that 1 
 was glad if he had any so good thing as that 
 for me, and hoped he would deliver it faith- 
 fully. He told me, in terms of great deli- 
 cacy, and with a seriousness that excluded 
 all appearance of a design to win his way 
 by flattery, that he had conceived the 
 greatest personal interest in me, because, in 
 hearing me once or twice, he had discovered 
 that God was teaching me, and discovering 
 Himself to me in a way that was specially 
 hopeful ; and that, for this very reason, he 
 had been suffering the greatest personal 
 burdens of feeling on my account. For 
 
16 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of African Slavery. 
 
 more than a year he had been praying for 
 me, and sometimes iu the night, because of 
 his apprehension that I had made a false 
 step, and been disobedient to the heavenly 
 vision. During all this time, he had been 
 struggling also with the question, whether 
 he might come and see me, and testify his 
 concern for me ? 
 
 " I asked him to explain, and not to suf- 
 fer any feeling of constraint. In a manner 
 of the greatest deference possible, and with 
 a most singularly beautiful skill, he went on, 
 gathering round his point, and keeping it all 
 the while concealed, as he was nearing it, 
 straightening up his tall, manly form, drop- 
 pingout his Africanisms, rising in the port 
 of his language, beaming with a look of in- 
 telligence and spiritual beauty, all in a man- 
 ner to second his prophetic formulas — ' The 
 Lord said to me' thus and thus ; ' The Lord 
 has sent me to say ;' till I also, as I gazed 
 upon him, was obliged internally to confess, 
 ' verily, Nathan the prophet has come 
 again !' It was really a scene such as any 
 painter might look a long time to find- 
 such dignity in one so humble ; expression 
 so lofty, and yet so gentle and respectful ; 
 theair of a prophet so commanding and 
 positive, and yet in such divine authority, as 
 to allow no sense of forwardness or pre- 
 sumption. 
 
 " It came out, finally, as the burden of 
 the message, that on a certain occasion, and 
 in reference to a certain public matter, I had 
 undertaken that which could not but with- 
 draw me from God's teaching, and was cer- 
 tain to obscure the revelations otherwise 
 ready and waiting to be made. ' Yes,' I re- 
 plied, ' but there was nothing wrong in what 
 I undertook to set forward.' It brought no 
 scandal on religion. It concerned, you will 
 admit, the real benefit of the public, in all 
 future times.' ' Ah, yes,' he answered, ' it 
 was well enough to be done, but it was not 
 for you. God had other and better things 
 for you. He was calling you to Himself, 
 and it was yours to go with Jlim, not to be 
 laboring in things more properly belon"-in"- 
 to other men.' I had given him the plea, by 
 which, drawing on my natural judgment, I 
 had justified myself in going into the en- 
 gagement in question. And yet, I am 
 obliged to confess to a strong, and even 
 prevalent impression, that my humble 
 brother was right. 
 
 " I thanked him for his message, and even 
 looked upon him with a kind of reverence 
 as we parted. I foutid, on inquiry, that he 
 was a man without blame, industrious, pure, \ 
 a husband and father, faithful to his office, ' 
 and always in the same high key of(Jhristian 
 living. But the people of his color, know- 
 ing him well, and having nothing to say 
 
 against him, could yet offer no opinion at 
 all concerning him. He was plainly enough 
 a strange being to them ; they could make 
 nothing of him. The most they could say 
 was, that he is always the same. 
 
 " I have since visited him, in his little 
 shop, and drawn out of him the story of bis 
 life. He became a Christian about the time 
 of his arrival at manhood, and gives a very 
 clear and beautiful account of his con- 
 version. And the Lord, he says, told him, 
 at that time, that he should be free, soul and 
 body. To which he answered, ' Yea, Lord, 
 I know it.' A promise that was afterward 
 fulfilled in a very strange and wonderful 
 deliverance. I observed that, in the ac- 
 count he gave me, he was continually say- 
 ing, in the manner of the prophets, ' the 
 Lord said,' and ' the Lord commanded,' and 
 ' the Lord promised,' and I called his attea- 
 tion to the fact, asking — what do you mean 
 by this? Do you hear words audibly 
 spoken ? ' Oh no.' ' What then ? Do 
 you think what appears to be said to you, 
 and call that the saying of the Lord ?' 
 ' Yes, I think it ; but that is not all.' 
 ' How then do you know that it is any thing 
 
 more than 's thought ?' ' Well, I know 
 
 it, I feel it to be not from me, and I can tell 
 you things that show it to be so ;' reciting 
 facts, which, if they are true, prove beyond 
 a question, the certainty of some illumina- 
 tion not of himself. ' Why, then,' I asked, 
 ' does God teach you in this manner, and not 
 me? I feel a strong conviction, sometimes, 
 that I am in the will, I know not how, and 
 the directing counsel of God, but I could 
 never say, as you do, ' the Lord said thus to 
 me.' ' Ah,' said he, ' but you have the. 
 means — you can read as I can not, you have 
 great learning. But I am a poor, Ignorant 
 child, and God does with me just as he can.' 
 Whatever may be thought of his revela- 
 tions, none, I think, will deny him, in his re- 
 ply, the credit of a true philosophy. What 
 can be worthier of God. than to be the guide 
 of this faithful, and otherwise dejected man, 
 making up for his privations of ignorance, 
 by the fuller and more open vision of Him- 
 self? 
 
 " And yet I should leave a wrong impres- 
 sion, were I not to say, that this Christian 
 fugitive, this unlettered body servant, now, 
 of Christ, as once of his earthly master, is 
 deep in the wisdom of the Scriptures, quotes 
 them continually with a remarkable elo- 
 quence and propriety, and with a degree of 
 insight which many of the best educated 
 preachers might envy. He also believes 
 that God has healed the sick, in many in- 
 stances, in immediate connection with his 
 prayers, giving the names and particulars 
 without scruple." 
 
17 
 
 Ijat 60fenmuntis|tst|.kptcir to % %inm §t\m? 
 
 The intelligent Swedenborgian can 
 hardly doubt the plausibility of the 
 hypothesis advanced in the two pre- 
 ceding chapters, viz., that barbarians 
 in general, and our imported Africans 
 especially, are descendants of some 
 degraded portion of the most ancient 
 church. They have celestial " re- 
 mains," and are capable of the celes- 
 tial life, when elevated above the 
 sensual-corporeal sphere into which 
 they are at present immersed. 
 
 That celestial life is unlike our 
 rational-scientific life, of which in our 
 ignorance and vanity we boast so 
 much. It needs no book-learning, no 
 colleges, no arts and sciences for its 
 development. We can not impose 
 our peculiarly natural civilization on 
 the Negro, save to his detriment. No 
 possible cultivation, after the methods 
 suited to our specific genius, can 
 evoke into life and vigor the dormant 
 seeds of the celestial nature slumber- 
 ing in the African bosom. The course 
 of his influx is from within outward, 
 from centre to circumference. What 
 he wants first of all is a proper basis, 
 an orderly and well-regulated sensual- 
 corporeal sphere, to serve as a recipi- 
 ent vessel for the down-flowing pow- 
 ers within him. He will procure 
 spiritual truths just as fast as he can 
 ultimate his celestial affections. 
 
 Now the Negro has a perfect and 
 inalienable right to whatever will 
 develop and make active his true 
 organic spiritual nature. If inter- 
 course with the superior races, com- 
 mercial relations, trade and treaties, 
 missionary efforts, and educational 
 enterprises can civilize the African, 
 
 rouse his dormant energies, cultivate 
 his mind. Christianize his heart, and 
 enable him to live an orderly, useful, 
 and genuine life, then African slavery 
 would have no excuse. But if all 
 this had been possible under the op- 
 erations of Divine Providence, Afri- 
 can slavery would never have had an 
 existence. Let all the world know, 
 that the Christians of the Southern 
 States are ready to turn abolitionists, 
 whenever it can be proven that the 
 material and spiritual interests of the 
 slave will be promoted by a state of 
 freedom similar to ours. 
 
 The Dutch and English have had 
 flourishing settlements for 200 years 
 in Africa, but in ten miles of their 
 borders the native is an irreclaimable 
 savage. The Portuguese have found- 
 ed flourishing colonies, and their 
 priests have baptized whole tribes 
 into the Catholic Church, but the 
 Africans under their influence are 
 wretched barbarians. The little col- 
 onies of Liberia and Sierra Leone, 
 fostered by white protection and 
 counsels, have shed no ray of light 
 into the darkness surrounding them. 
 Missionaries have patiently and zeal- 
 ously labored, but in vain. Dr. Liv- 
 ingstone, after years of enthusiastic 
 effort, has declared that commerce 
 and civilization must precede re- 
 ligion. The free Negroes of Hayti 
 are fast relapsing into barbarism and 
 idolatry. Those of Jamaica, although 
 under the strong military and civil 
 surveillance of Great Britain, have 
 sunk into idleness and pauperism, 
 and disappointed the hopes of phi- 
 lanthropy. The free Negroes of the 
 
18 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 North arc generally pests to their 
 neighborhoods, and enjoy the name 
 without the blessings of freedom. In 
 Canada it is even worse. The Negro 
 has no conception of the " dignity of 
 labor," or of the meaning of inde- 
 pendence. Mr. Wilson says that the 
 Negroes of the Guinea Coast have no 
 higher ambition than to be taken 
 into the service of the white man. 
 And our free Negroes are mere ap- 
 pendages to our civilization, not par- 
 takers of it. They are lackies, 
 waiters, hangers-on, body servants, 
 etc., and nothing more. The few 
 who pretend to preach, lecture, edit, 
 etc., are mere samples of childish 
 precocity, not types of national char- 
 acter. How many Negroes have 
 hewed their homes and fortunes out 
 of the rich and free western wilds, in 
 the sturdy spirit of the New England 
 pioneer ? None. 
 
 The African race has attained its 
 highest present point of development 
 in the Southern States, and in the 
 condition of slavery. It is more pro- 
 lific there than anywhere else in the 
 world, or than anj^ other nation in 
 the world. It may therefore be safely 
 presumed that the checks to popula- 
 tion, viz., deficient food, clothing, 
 and shelter, excessive laboi*, care, 
 crime, misery, and want, do not exist 
 in those States to any notable degree. 
 In physical, intellectual, and moral 
 character the American slave is far 
 superior to his African progenitor. 
 And this improvement is progressive. 
 Amelioration of his condition is con- 
 stantly going on, and he is constantly 
 also evincing more rationality and 
 virtue, more tact and taste, more 
 mechanical genius and mental power. 
 He has no vices but those he inherit- 
 ed from Africa, and he has super- 
 added virtues and graces entirely 
 unknown to that continent. His re- 
 ligious character is capable of the 
 most beautiful cultivation, and if our 
 Lord this day were to gather up his 
 jewels, how many would be found 
 among the faithful, humble, affection- 
 ate slaves of America 1 
 
 This change has been mainly effect- 
 
 ed by the firm but humane govern- 
 ment exercised by the white man 
 over the Negro. It is unlike every 
 system of slavery which has hereto- 
 fore existed, in this, that it is the 
 subordination of an inferior to a su- 
 perior race, and not a domination of 
 one part over another part of the 
 same race, or of one race over an 
 equal race. The New Churchman 
 should weigh well this distinction. 
 Things or persons on the same plane 
 or in the same series are to be co-or- 
 dinaled, while of things or persons 
 in different series or planes, the in- 
 ferior are to be subordinated to the 
 superior. This is the law of divine 
 order which prevails in the heavens 
 and in all worlds where sin has not 
 entered. Woe to that theology or 
 philosophy which fails to appreciate 
 its deep signification ! 
 
 _ Note well, however, that in this 
 system the celestial man is not 
 brought into bondage to the natural, 
 but that the aen&ual-corporeal sphere 
 of the African, which in its barbaric 
 state prevents the evolution of his 
 celestial " remains," is so subordin- 
 ated to the rational-scientific sphere 
 of the white man, that his celestial 
 nature obtains for the first time the 
 means of ultimating itself. The Ne- 
 gro thus acquires a sound natural 
 basis, somewhat similar to that of the 
 white race, into which his descending 
 celestial can be inserted. It is the 
 duty of the white man to give him 
 this basis in a wise and gentle man- 
 ner ; and it is the duty of the Negro 
 to submit to the disciplinary ordeal 
 which may be requisite in attaining 
 it. 
 
 To understand this subject more 
 fully, let us examine the nature of 
 government in general, not in a dry 
 political form, but in the glowing 
 light of the New Church. Let us 
 first refresh our memories with the 
 essential principle of government in 
 the heavens, according to which all 
 our earthly institutions should be 
 moulded. 
 
 After asserting that the forms of 
 government in heaven are infinitely 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 19 
 
 various, Swedenborg" g-oes on to say 
 of the governors or rulers : 
 
 " They are such as arc distin- 
 guished beyond others for love and 
 Avisdom, consequently sucli as from 
 a principle of love desire the good of 
 all, and from the wisdom by which 
 also they are distinguished, know 
 how to provide that the good they 
 desire may be realized. Persons of 
 this character do not domineer and 
 command imperiously, but minister 
 and serve. Neither do they account 
 themselves greater than others, but 
 less ; for they put the good of socie- 
 ty and of their neighbor in the first 
 place, and their own in the last. 
 The}^, nevertheless, are in the enjoy- 
 ment of honor and glorj^, they dwell 
 in the centre of the society in a more 
 elevated place than others, and in- 
 habit magnificent palaces. They also 
 accept this glory and that honor, not 
 however for their own sake, but for 
 the sake of securing obedience ; for 
 all in heaven know that honor and 
 glory are conferred on them by the 
 Lord, and that therefore they are to 
 be obeyed." {Heaven and Hell, 218.) 
 
 " A similar government in minia- 
 ture obtains also in every house. 
 There is in each house a master, and 
 there are domestics. The master 
 loves the domestics, and the domes- 
 tics love the master; the consequence 
 of which is that out of love they 
 mutuall}'^ serve each other. The 
 master teaches how they should live 
 and prescribes what they should do, 
 and the domestics obey and perform 
 their duties. To be of use is the de- 
 light of life among all. Hence it is 
 evident that the Lord's kingdom is a 
 kingdom of uses." {Heaven and HeU, 
 219.) 
 
 What a beautiful moral picture is 
 here presented ! Will the heavens 
 ever truly open and descend upon us 
 in this manner ? Think of it ! No 
 ambition, no lust of power, no pride 
 of place, no contempt of others, no 
 mi.ser}'- of the poor, no folly of the 
 rich, no envy, no jealousy, no deceit, 
 no corruption, no vanitj", no dissatis- 
 faction, no inalienable rights to claim 
 
 — but simple duties to ])erform, while 
 mutual love and humility reign su- 
 preme, and order, peace, and happi- 
 ness ensue ! This shining Utopia 
 surely beckons us in the shadowy 
 distance. Come it will, whoever 
 may doubt I It will be effected by 
 the Divine Humanity descending 
 through the Word and through an- 
 gelic spheres, and operating into the 
 remotest bounds of nature. On the 
 political or civil plane of life, two 
 great agencies are at work to pro- 
 mote this glorious revolution, viz., 
 the doctrine of political equality, 
 soon to be restricted to those of equal 
 race, and the patriarchal institution 
 of slavery, that curious modern ap- 
 proach to the end which was in the 
 beginning. 
 
 Swedenborg says, that the ante- 
 diluvians lived in families under a 
 patriarchal head, who representofl 
 the Lord, and was at the same tinie 
 priest and law-giver, being actuated 
 by the purest paternal love. There 
 was no political organization what- 
 ever, in our sense of the term. Wife, 
 children, and their wives and chil- 
 dren, and all the men-servants and 
 maid-servants, and their increase, 
 constituted the family or tribe, and 
 looked up to a common head. This 
 happy state of life, tj'pical of heavenly 
 order, began to perish when self-love 
 arose, and with it a disposition to ap- 
 propriate the property of others. The 
 military spirit was then engendered, 
 and families and tribes coalesced and 
 consolidated for mutual defence or 
 attack. The pure African has never 
 liberated himself from this miserable 
 political thraldom into which his an- 
 te-diluvian ancestors fell. By con- 
 tinued perversions and the ever-ac- 
 cumulating pressure of hereditary 
 impulse, his whole nature has become 
 thoroughly servile on one hand and 
 thoroughly despotic on the other. 
 His fetichism, his conjuring and 
 witchcraft, his serpent-worship, his 
 dirt-eating, and his thousand pecul- 
 iarities of manner and custom, 
 declare his awful and thorough deg- 
 radation. 
 
20 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 Notice now in this connection, 
 that, the African mind, properly 
 speaking", has never had a political 
 existence. Its sole political life has 
 been found in the perversions and 
 inversions of the patriarchal system. 
 If it could this day be miraculously 
 restored to its original stand-point, 
 ■whence it could work out its interior 
 organic life, it would neither know 
 nor learn anything of political rights, 
 privileges or principles. That whole 
 sphere of thought, so natural and 
 delightful to other races, is entirely 
 foreign to its nature. Negro at- 
 tempts at political organization, out- 
 side of the controlling or modifying 
 sphere of the white race, must neces- 
 sarily be failures and farces. When 
 we refuse the Negro political equality, 
 we deny him no right which he ever 
 possessed, or could ever of himself 
 obtain, and we withhold from him the 
 Means of inflicting great injury upon 
 himself and others. 
 
 With the opening of the spiritual 
 degree of the human mind, came the 
 establishment of priesthoods and 
 kingdoms and empires, with their 
 complex theological and political 
 forms and mysteries. There are 
 similar forms of society now existing 
 in the spiritual heavens. The divine 
 right of kings and priests in the first 
 part of this era was unquestionable, 
 simply because the priests and kings 
 acted and thought divinely. But all 
 that was changed. Evil became pre- 
 dominant in its two hateful forms — 
 love of self and love of the world. 
 Asia and Europe have been deluged 
 with blood, over and over again, by 
 the priests and kings struggling for 
 power and ascendency. All the re- 
 ligions of the earth have become cor- 
 rupted and perverted, and all the 
 governments have degenerated into 
 instruments of oppression and tyr- 
 anny. For every one of them, the 
 condemnatory handwriting has ap- 
 peared on the wall. They are break- 
 ing up and dissolving, either by in- 
 terior disintegration or by exterior 
 violence ; and the field of the world 
 is being made ready for the descent 
 of the New Jerusalem. 
 
 One of the greatest agencies in 
 achieving this desirable result is the 
 dogma of political equality. This 
 doctrine has transferred to the peo- 
 ple that divine right which had be- 
 come the opprobrium of kings. That 
 " all men are created free and equal," 
 and that government should exist 
 only by consent of the governed, are 
 now the most popular and progressive 
 doctrines in the world. AVhatever 
 doubts may be suggested as to their 
 philosophical truth, and whatever 
 difficulties may oppose their practical 
 operation, it is certain that they are 
 destined to revolutionize modern 
 society. They will be powerful at 
 least in destroying and effacing the 
 old order of things, and for that they 
 will deserve the gratitude of the 
 world. It is clear, however, to re- 
 flecting minds that these doctrines 
 have no reconstructive power, — and 
 that they would ultimate a perfect 
 anarchy, if we were not assured that 
 new and true principles were de- 
 scending from heaven, which will 
 finally govern the social and all 
 other spheres of human life. 
 
 Now we aiErm, without fear of 
 contradiction from any intelligent 
 New Churchman, that African slavery 
 is an institution which is to play an 
 important part in the reconstruction 
 of society upon true and heavenly 
 principles. African slaver}' provides, 
 as we have clearly shown, a channel 
 for the descent of celestial influences 
 into the world, such as have never 
 before been known or experienced. 
 Influx, we know, is quiet and im- 
 perceptible, like the action of sun- 
 light upon flowers, so that we could 
 know nothing of its operations but for 
 the revealed doctrines of the church. 
 But influx from heaven through re- 
 generating African slaves, as proper 
 mediums, is at this moment the in- 
 terior force which is co-operating 
 with the dogma of political equality 
 in the external sphere for the recon- 
 struction of society and the regener- 
 ation of mankind. We may separate ; 
 we may fight ; but the North and 
 the South are interiorly and indisso- 
 lubly united. The North is furnish- 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 21 
 
 ing- the true external basis into whicli 
 the interior life of the South is to 
 flow for the salvation of the race. 
 Oh, New Churchmen ! how can ye 
 fail to see the sublime and glorious 
 truth ? The North and South should 
 be related to each other like man and 
 woman, like faith and charity, like 
 external and internal. Who has 
 sown the seeds of discord in our 
 midst ? That old dragon, that hell 
 within the church, which preaches 
 faith alone and aspires to spiritual 
 dominion over the souls of men. He 
 musters strongly for his last battle. 
 The first beneficent effect of the 
 institution of African slavery toward 
 the regeneration of the Negro, is that 
 it ivithholds him from evils. The first 
 step toward the regeneration of the 
 white man, in whom the rational-sci- 
 entific plane is developed, and whose 
 mind can therefore be elevated into 
 heavenly light, is to abstain from evils. 
 The Negro can not abstain, because he 
 is not receptive of spiritual truth, 
 being in bondage to sensual-corporeal 
 cupidities and phantasies. He must 
 therefore be loithheld like a child, and 
 in this respect the white race is com- 
 missioned to hold provisionally a 
 parental relation toward him. The 
 master must prevent intemperance 
 in eating and drinking ; he must pro- 
 hibit polygamy and curb licentious- 
 ness ; he must punish lying and theft ; 
 he must guard against quarreling 
 and fighting, and withhold each from 
 encroaching upon the rights of others. 
 Punislmicnt may be requisite to ef- 
 fect all this good, and to that precise 
 degree it is righteous and proper. 
 Tho^ who can not be actuated by 
 love or persuaded by reason must be 
 controlled by fear. This principle 
 rules in our government of our own 
 children and in our own police reg- 
 ulations, and it is the principle upon 
 which our Lord through ministering 
 angels reduces the hells to order, and 
 contributes to the comfort and peace 
 of their inhabitants. It is unques- 
 tionably true that even severe cor- 
 poreal punishment, administered in a 
 spirit of justice and for good ends, is 
 
 serviceable in dissipating the thick 
 sphere of cupidities and phantasies 
 which surrounds and spiritually suf- 
 focates the undisciplined barbarian. 
 
 The next step for the African's good 
 (we need not here consider the mo- 
 tives of the master) is to compel him 
 to do uses. The hereditary devil 
 which has possessed him for centuries 
 has imposed on his constitution an 
 almost ineradicable torpor. Sweden- 
 borg, in several places, speaks of the 
 sphere of the ante-diluvians as dread- 
 fully oppressive and paralyzing, — 
 taking away from its subjects almost 
 all faculty of thought and action. 
 It is this sphere which we have to 
 dissipate from the barbarous African, 
 and nothing but the strong power of 
 slavery, compelling him to do uses, 
 can effect it. Swedenborg tells of 
 wicked spirits who are confined to 
 hard labor for their food and clothes 
 until they see and acknowledge 
 their falsities and evils. Paupers 
 and vagrants are compelled to labor 
 in all civilized countries. Experience 
 proves that when the African is thus 
 withheld from evil and compelled to 
 do uses, his voluntary jDrinciple is de- 
 veloped, a new nature flows out, and 
 he is the most teachable, willing, 
 good-natured, light-hearted, affection- 
 ate, and happy creature in the world. 
 
 We hold it to be self-evident, that 
 God has created every man with a 
 specific genius and given him definite 
 faculties for its ultimation. It is not 
 only his right, but his duty to exercise 
 these faculties, for rights and duties 
 go always together. No man can 
 lawfully push another from his ap- 
 pointed place, and it should be the 
 aim of government to secure to each 
 and all the proper sphere for the 
 natural and perfect development of 
 character. Eights should be respect- 
 ed and their corresponding duties 
 enforced. The end in view in the 
 institution of slavery is the prepara- 
 tion of a natural basis for the out- 
 flowing of a beautiful celestial nature. 
 Whatever is necessary for this, the 
 African has a right to claim and the 
 white man is bound to give. If social 
 
22 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of 
 
 equality, competitive labor, political 
 privilc^jes, pliilosophical culture will 
 bring- the celestial " remains"' to light 
 out of the primitive darkness of the 
 barbarian's soul, let him have them ! 
 The North believes this, and charges 
 the South with barbarism and des- 
 potism for not coinciding in the 
 opinion. We think very differently, 
 and the New Churchman who knows 
 tvhat the celestial is, can not long be 
 deceived by the sophistries which 
 have been arrayed against us. 
 
 The celestial is best developed in 
 the family sphere, and in the exercise 
 of domestic and agricultural uses. 
 The house represents celestial good, 
 while the street, typical of com- 
 mercial and political life, refers only 
 truths. The town or city corresponds 
 to the sjjiritual, while the country 
 corresponds to the celestial. It is the 
 pre-eminent mark of the celestial to 
 be willing to serve. To serve, there- 
 fore, in domestic and agricultural 
 life is characteristic of the celestial 
 genius. The celestial genius needs 
 no books, no political organizations, 
 no philosophizing for its evolution. 
 It needs an orderly external, in which 
 the inferior is subordinated to the 
 superior ; — it needs an atmosphere of 
 cheerful duty and use, of simple 
 tastes, of sympathy and fidelity, of 
 reverence and gentleness, of justice 
 and mercy and love. In a well-reg- 
 ulated, cultivated Christian family, 
 the southern slave is bountifully sup- 
 plied with the means of calling forth 
 his peculiar and remarkable genius. 
 
 How long the institution is to last, 
 what modifications it is to receive, 
 and how it is to disappear i]i the final 
 and perfect order of things, we can not 
 clearly foresee. Providence has per- 
 mitted it, so far, for the good of all 
 parties, and has even made use of 
 our very evils for its benefit. Selfish- 
 ness brought the Negro from Africa ; 
 selfishness reduced him to order and 
 made him capable of uses ; selfish- 
 ness feeds and clothes and i)rotccts 
 him. If the Negro could not have been 
 made subservient to our interests, 
 we should long ago have turned him 
 
 adrift, driven him before us and ex- 
 terminated him, as we have done the 
 Indian. Such would le the issue of 
 abolition. This is melancholy', but 
 it is true. What we need now, is 
 not new conduct, but new motives. 
 The natural man leads an orderlj^, 
 useful life, from the hope of gain or 
 power or reputation. The spiritual 
 man leads the very same life, from 
 love to the Lord and the neighbor. 
 Spiritualize the motives of the slave- 
 holder and he becomes a regenerate 
 man, who, while prudently caring 
 fin- his own interests and for those 
 about him, is rendering incalculable 
 service to the church and the world. 
 
 In view of the organic constitution 
 of the Negro — of the facts and neces- 
 sities of the case, of the inexorable 
 march of history and progress, ac- 
 cording to universal laws of Divine 
 Providence not yet fully discovered, 
 and of the glorious ends to be attain- 
 ed, — is slavoholding a sin ? How 
 can a New Churchman of enlarged 
 views entertain the thought for a 
 moment ! 
 
 There is no need to recount the 
 Biblical argument for and against 
 slavery. One party contends, and 
 with great force, that the Bible rec- 
 ognizes its existence as one great 
 means and agency of human develop- 
 ment ; and if it does not plainly 
 sanction it, at least nowhere con- 
 demns it. The other side aflSrms that 
 the spiritual principles of the Chris- 
 tain religion demand its overthrow. 
 We, who interpret the word spirit- 
 ually, ought to attain a high theo- 
 logical and philosophical stand-point, 
 whence to discover the genuine tfuth, 
 apart from all appearances of the let- 
 ter or ratiocination of the understand- 
 ing. _ 
 
 It is said upon abstract grounds 
 that there can be no such thing as 
 the right of property in man. That 
 one man can own another in the 
 same sense as that in which he owns 
 a thing, is of course a wicked absurd- 
 ity. Slaves are not chattels, but 
 " chattels personal," that is, property 
 possessed of human rights, of which 
 
African Slavery. 
 
 23 
 
 uotliiug' can divest it. These rights 
 are food, clothing-, discipline, relig- 
 ious instruction, regulated labor, pro- 
 tection, sjunpathy, etc. We have no 
 property either in the souls or bodies 
 of our slaves. We simply have a 
 right to their labor and obedience, in 
 consideration of the immense benefits 
 we confer upon them. We have sim- 
 ply a right to hold them to an ap- 
 prenticeship for life, both for their 
 own and the public good. The ap- 
 prenticeship is for life, and not for a 
 term of years, because they are or- 
 ganically children or minors, and 
 can never take such care of them- 
 selves as we can take of them. 
 Spiritually speaking, man has no 
 property. Our proprium, or that 
 which is truly our own, is wholly 
 evil and false. What we possess is 
 given by the Lord, and it is given 
 only for use. If the Lord has seen fit 
 to adjoin the sensual-corporeal sphere 
 of the African, as a servant to ours, 
 . in order that we may infuse a new 
 and true life into it, and if we dis- 
 charge our stewardship faithfully and 
 well, it matters not by what names, 
 opprobrious or otherwise, men may 
 designate the relationship which ex- 
 ists between the two races. 
 
 But, says the abstractionist, you 
 violate the golden rule, "Do unto 
 others as jon would that they should 
 do unto you." This beautiful precept 
 of charity has been grossly misunder- 
 stood and perverted to party pur- 
 poses. Its true meaning evidently 
 is, that we should be in the continual 
 desire of doing good to all men, and 
 should treat others as it ivould be ivise 
 and just for us to he treated if ice were 
 in their i^laces. It has been tortured 
 to signify, that we should grant every 
 man his wishes, provided we imagine 
 that we would wish the same on a 
 change of conditions. The judge, 
 then, must pardon the murderer ; 
 the magistrate must release the 
 vagrant ; the creditor must absolve 
 his debtor ; the rich must give all to 
 \ the poor ; the employer must change 
 \ places with the employed ! Upon 
 this principle, which would destroy 
 
 all order and all society, it is de- 
 manded that the master shall liberate 
 his slave. Now, in the light of hea- 
 ven, the African ought to wish to go 
 through the disciplinary ordeal he is 
 now experiencing for his own good 
 and the good of others ; and we 
 ought to endeavor, by salutary meas- 
 ures suggested by Our superior wis- 
 dom, to cultivate his spiritual facul- 
 ties, until, as to goodness and truth, 
 he attains our own stand-point. Such 
 is the true law of charity as applied 
 to the Negro, and there is nothing in 
 the institution of slavery to retard, 
 but very many things to foster its 
 operation. We speak from much ob- 
 servation and living experience. 
 
 When we descend from universals 
 to particulars, or from the general to 
 the special, slaveholding is siniul or 
 otherwise, according to the animus 
 or spirit with which it is practised. 
 If the master gives his servant as 
 little as possible, stints him of food 
 and clothing, works him hardly, 
 treats him with indifference or sever- 
 ity, and cares little or nothing for 
 him except as a valuable beast of 
 burden, he commits the odious sin of 
 the capitalist [ov emploj^er, who re- 
 duces the wages of labor to the lowest 
 possible standard, and pursues his 
 business with the utmost selfishness 
 and unchristian disregard of the 
 rights, feelings, and happiness of 
 others. If the master imposes un- 
 reasonable tasks, exacts improper 
 services, inflicts undue punishments, 
 or violates any principle of charity 
 and justice toward his slave, he 
 commits grievous sins, which are by 
 no means limited to slaveholding 
 countries. If he is imperious and im- 
 placable, domineering and tyrannic- 
 al, miserly and cruel, — as many men 
 are, independently of local institu- 
 tions, — his whole moral nature ,i§ 
 tainted, and he is sinful in all the re- 
 lations of life. Such men have domi- 
 neered over wives and children and 
 dependents in all ages and countries. 
 Slavery did not bring them into ex- 
 istence. 
 
 If the slaveholder assumes his re- 
 
24 
 
 The Spiritual Philosophy of African Slavery. 
 
 sponsibilities witli a solemn sense of 
 their sacred character ; if he regards 
 bis slave with kindness and for- 
 bearance and sympatliy ; if he pro- 
 vides, to the best of his ability and 
 belief, for his physical comfort and 
 his moral and religious instruction ; 
 if he administers discipline with jus- 
 tice, and tempers justice with mercy ; 
 if he protects and guides and regu- 
 lates with a generous hand and a 
 loving heart, in infancy and sickness 
 and old age ; not only is his slave- 
 
 holding not a sin, but it is a blessing 
 to all around him, and comes back to 
 himself, as all blessings finally do, 
 in the cultivation of his religious life 
 and the development of his spiritual 
 nature. The unfoldings of the spirit- 
 ual world may possibly reveal the 
 fact, that this Christian slaveholder, 
 misunderstood and reviled as he now 
 is by his brethren in other countries, 
 had attained the sublimest point of 
 human civilization. 
 
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 BRIEF EXPOSITION OF THE DOCTRINES OF THE NEW 
 
 JERUSALEM 25 
 
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