finiitrti, in its :^.*rESEnt aspcts niiii lUlnfiniis. A S E R M N PREACIIKI) ON FAST DAY, APRIL 0, 1854 AT CAMBRIDGE, MASS. WILLIAM A'7' STEARNS, D. D BOSTON AND CAMBRIDl : JAMES MUNROE AND COMPANY. 1854. )lnDrri|, in its ^ktmt iHsjirrts mil t\Mkm, SERMON I'REACIIED ON FAST DAY, APRIL 6, 185 4, AT CAMBRIDGE, MASS. ^ A' WILLIAM A'^.'^ STEARNS, D. B, vToFCoT; BOSTON AND CAMBRIDGE: JAMES MUNKOE AND COMPANY. 1854. "Never did there devolve on any generation of men higher trusts than now^ devolve upon us, for the preservation of this Constitution, and the harmony and peace of all who are to live under it." — Webster. " I have already intimated to you the dangers of parties in the State, with particular reference to the founding them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view and warn you, in the taost solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally." — Washington. " Thou hast multiplied the nation and not increased the joy." " Heu pietas, heu prisca fides! " " Discite justiciam moniti, et non temnere Divos." " £< incipient magni procedere menses^ 4 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by JAMES MUNROE AND COMPANY, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. SERMON. Matth'sw 7 : 12. THF.UEFORF, ALL THINGS WHATSOKVEK YE WOULD THAT MKX SHOULD DO TO YOU, DO YE EVEN SO TO THEM, FOB THIS IS THE LAW AND THE PROIMIETS. I HAVE not selected this text for the purpose of a logical development of the principle it contains, but only as the most appropriate sentiment I could think of, to stand at the head of a discourse, in which the relations of individuals and of large bodies of men to each other are to be brought under review. It is the second of those two great laws which pervade the entire universe of accountable mind, and sura up the whole of duty. It in- cites to sympathy towards those who are wronged, to a candid estimation of persons whose conduct we condemn, and an nnselfish course as respects all mankind. Really adopted it would moderate, in most cases, the violence of dispute, give a just balance to statements aflecting character, and while it takes nothing from an honest in- dignation against injustice, it would lead to that fairness and considerateness in dealing with others which com- mends itself to conscience and secures the approbation of God. In the spirit of this text, I propose to speak this morning of American Slavery in its Present Aspects AND Relations. I must forewarn you that my discourse is of unusual length, but as it is an unusual subject, and we shall have no service in the afternoon, I hope you will tolerate it. In the spring of 1834, on the day of our annual Fast just twenty years ago, I took occasion to present my views on the subject of slavery, at that time just beginning, not only to agitate the country anew, but to threaten the harmony, if not the very existence of our churches. The entire moral sentiment of the North was then, as it is now, opposed to it. As a possible means of alleviating the evil, or at least as furnishing opportunities for a can- did consideration of it, the benevolence of the Eastern States cherished the American Colonization Society, while for this or other reasons, it found considerable favor at the South. In these circumstances, a new and almost frenzied anti-slavery sentiment suddenly sj^rung up among us, not only outrunning public sentiment, but heaping anathe- mas upon the alleged tolerance of northern freemen, even more than upon the southern holders of slaves. The leaders of this movement were chiefly men who de- nounced slavery, the churches, the ministry, the Sabbath, and nearly all the positive institutions of Christianity to- gether. Its spirit was a fiery spirit, blazing up here and there in the community, inflaming the minds of many ex- citable, but not often the most judicious, members of our churches, and threatening to overturn the very altars of God. I observed its approaches towards my own con- gregation, and took the opportunity I have mentioned to offer such remarks as I thought might tend to the benefit of the people under my pastoral care, fortifying them against impending dangers, and preserving a Christian moderation among them. I then stood on the old anti-slavery ground of 1787 and 1820. I expressed my abhorrence of slavery as a system, and adopted as my own that strong language of Thomas Jefferson, which has since been so often quoted, who said that he trembled for his country when he re- mem^DCred that God is just, that the Almighty had no attributes which would take sides with us in opposition to this oppressed people, and uttered prophetic intima- tions of a possible change, at some future day, in the ascendency of races, and a terrible retribution. At the same time, I brought to view some apologetic circum- stances which might serve to mitigate the asperity of our feelings towards the South, and especially towards its godly ministers and Christians. I showed that undiscrim- inating invective, especially when uttered at such a distance from the scene of action, could have no possible tendency to remove the evil, while at home, nothing but strifes, the division of churches, and a spirit totalh^ anti- christian could be anticipated from it. I urged can- did reflection, moderation, charity. I proposed that we should present ourselves before our southern brethren with an open, benevolent countenance, with earnest but generous words. I was for coming to them with some such language as this : " Your flithers and ours were en- gaged in the accursed traffic of slavery together. You took more of the sinews and souls of men, we took much of the money for which souls and sinews were exchanged. Let us now make common cause, and in the name of hvmianity and of God, unite in good faith and in a fair participation of sacrifices, to limit the evil at once, and 6 take measures for its earliest practicable removal. Mean- while, we propose to fulfil our constitutional pledges to you — but we can, on no account, do any thing to in- crease or perpetuate a wrong which we believe is offen- sive to God, and which threatens the existence of the nation." After the lapse of time, during which great changes have taken place in the Old World and the New, and the nation has been shaken once and again by this subject as by an earthquake, my position is substantially what it was twenty years ago. I feel no more complacency in slavery, notwithstanding the compromises on which pubhc sentiment has been constrained to settle, and no more disposition to sympathize with them who would sunder the Union, or " drive the ploughshare through the churches," in rash attempts to remove it. Since 1834, though I have often found it necessary to make some public allusion to the subject, I have never devoted to it a single entire discourse. I have never mentioned it in my preaching on the Sabbath in a way to disturb, unnecessarily, the feelings of those who did not altogether accord with me, and rarely at all, except to pray that oppression may cease and universal freedom, education, piety and fraternity take its place. I present my views to-day on slavery, in some of its present aspects and relations, because I would contribute what little light I possess towards a just estimation of this terrible subject ; because also it may be well for a people and convenient for a minister that his position on such a question should be understood, and because recent events seem to call on those who occupy the high places of moral influence for an expression of opinion. Let it be understood, however, that I speak for nobody but myself. If my words should meet with your approbation, I shall be gratified. If they do not, while you accord to me an honest intention, you can correct by your own judgments whatever you think to be erroneous in mine. As a basis for intelligent remark, let us take a brief historical view of American slavery. When Jamestown was settled in 1608, slaveholding in some form was practised nearly the whole world over. To the early Virginia planters it was considered a neces- sity and a matter of course. They were at first supplied with bond laborers from the mother country. These were not negroes, but white men, convicts, captives taken in war, poor debtors, and other poor people who were either kidnapped for the purpose or induced to emigrate and serve in this capacity for a time. In all these cases the term of service was limited. But within the limits specified, the laborers were bought and sold as cattle. The jolanters soon found it for their interest rather to repress than to encourage this species of emigration, and had it not been for the African trade, the white bond- men would have become early amalgamated with the free population, and long before our Revolution, Vir- ginia would have been a free colony. The first introduction of negroes took place in 1620, a few months before the Plymouth Colon}- landed in America. They were brought over by a Dutch man-of- war, and twenty in number were ofiered for sale. Thirty years after this first importation of African slaves, there were not more of them in the whole Colony, than one to fifty white inhabitants. For slavery, as it now exists, we are greatly indebted to the avarice of Great Britain. In 1662, " a Company of Royal Adventurers of England trading into Africa" was constituted, for the express purpose of procuring negroes from Africa to be em- ployed on the plantations of the new world. The manifestos for subscriptions set forth that this trade was formerly attended with "profit and honor" to the nation; that his majesty's subjects had been disturbed in the trade by the people of other countries, and that his ma- jesty's dominions in America were suffering from want of a supply of this class of laborers. It was proposed to obtain three thousand negroes from the coast of Africa as soon as possible, and as many more, from time to time, as could be sold to the planters at reasonable rates. The main object was to improve colonial agriculture and increase English commerce, both with the coasts of Africa and America. A list of the Royal Adventurers has been preserved. It is a curious and mournful relic, considering the noble signatures it contains, of persons who seem to have been unconscious of the mighty wrong they were committing. It commences thus : — « The King's Most Excellent Majesty. The Queen's Majesty. His Royal Highness the Duke of York. His Highness Prince Rupert. The Duke of Albermarle. The Earl of St. Albans. The Earl of Anglesy, Lord Arlington," &c.* The trade was carried on with great vigor and profit for a series of years. Though many of the colonists were eager to obtain slaves, and many others engaged in the business from mere mercenary motives, yet it must be confessed that the colonial governments more fre- quently threw obstacles in its way, than favored it. No less than twenty-three acts were passed by the Virginia * See Declarations of the Company of Eoyal Adventurers, Lib. H., Col. legislatures, beginning in 1699, for the express purpose of limiting the importation of slaves, by the imposition of duties. But no acts of this kind ever met with the royal favor. On the contrarj'-, the commerce was stimu- lated to the hio-hest deerree. Lands were offered to settlers in the West Indies on condition that the proprie- tors would purchase and employ a prescribed number of slaves. The American colonists often remonstrated, and sometimes boldly and earnestly, against this traffic. They feared that this class of the population would be- come so numerous as to prevent a higher order of in- habitants from settling among them, and to jeopardize their own liberties. They seem also to have perceived that commerce in the souls of men w^as to some extent an outrage on human nature. In 1772, a very humble memorial was sent by them, beseeching the king, "to remove those restraints on his majesty's gov- ernors of the Colony, which inhibit their assenting to such laws as might check so very pernicious a com- merce ; " declaring also that the trade has long been considered one "of great inhumanity," and "under its present encouragement," retarding " the settlement of the colonies wdth more useful inhabitants," and dan- gerous " to the very existence of his majesty's domin- ions in America."* No answer, so far as can be ascer- tained, was ever given to this earnest and reasonable petition. The same relative feeling on the subject con- tinued down to the Revolution. In the Northern States, though many individuals engaged in this execrable traffic, public sentiment was still more strongly opposed to it. When Thomas Keyser and James Smith, " the latter a member of the church * See Walsh's Appeal from the Judgments of Great Britain. 2 10 in Boston/' brought a cargo of slaves to our shores in 1645, there was an universal outcr.y against them as malefactors and murderers. They were charged with the crime of manstealing, and the negroes were sent back at the public expense. Still in process of time, slavery found its way into the New England as well as the Southern States, and became to some extent domesticated among us. It is not unfair, however, to observe that through the whole country, public senti- ment rather repressed than encouraged this traffic in men, and that the New "World was far behind the Old in entailing the curse of slavery upon us. Grahame, the historian, in a pamphlet published at London in 1842, entitled "Who is to Blame?" disputes this fact. But after considerable examination, I think it capable of be- ing demonstrated. Mr. Jefferson was no falsifier, when in his first draft of the Declaration of Independence, he said, " He (the king of England) has waged civil war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty, in the persons of a distant people who never offended him ; captivating and carry- ing them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur a miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warflire of the Christian king of Great Britain : determined to keep open a market where men should be bought and sold, he prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce." I take occasion to say here as I may not have another so good an opportunity, that while it is not of import- ance to apportion the "exact measure of guilt connected with the African slave trade between this country and 11 Great Britain, the course taken, for some years past in England, respecting American slavery, whose popula- tion has been kept incessantly inflamed on the subject, by persons bearing the name but some of them having little of the spirit of Americans, can have no other ten- dency than to exasperate and produce retort. It is not in me to say aught maliciously of that noble nation. The father-land of our fathers — the country of Shakes- pere and Bacon, of Barrow and Milton, I am proud of her constitutional liberties, and her high position in the scale of powerful nations. Wilberforce and Clarkson are household words of honor among us. Every boyish heart in our school rooms has bounded with exultation, from the days of Cowper till now, at the words " we have no slaves in England" — "they touch our soil, that moment they are free." But the English populace should know what many of its cultivated minds suffi- ciently understand, that information ought ever to pre- cede the passing of judgments, and that charity and for- bearance, rather than insolence and invective are the mighty dissolvents of that deadly concretion which our parentage has entailed upon us, and under the miseries of which our nation has groaned from the beginning. At the time of the Revolution, the leading men of the South as well as of the North, almost universally looked upon slavery as involving a great moral wrong, an anomaly in our institutions, a dangerous political evil, and only to be tolerated for a time. It was in this state of public sentiment, that the compromises of the Con- stitution were confirmed. Though compromises which ought to stand till the two great compromising parties mutually consent to their removal, they were never intended for all coming generations. They were framed 12 as the necessity of the times. The words "slave" and "slavery" were nowhere introduced into them. Mr. Madison, himself a slaveholder, o^Dposed the introduc- tion of those terms, on the ground that he did not wish to see an acknowledgment in the Constitution of the United States that there could be. property in men. Arrangements were made to put an end forever to the foreign slave-trade, dealing in which has long since been declared by our government to be piracy. In 1787, under the old confederation, an ordinance was passed excluding slavery from all the territory north- west of the Ohio River, that is all the territory over which the Congress of the United States then had any control. This ordinance securing that great territory to freedom forever, received the vote of every State in the Union. The entire South was in its favor, but a single individual and he a northern man voted against it. Here, then, we have the sentiment of the country, at the time of the Revolution, respecting slavery. Not many years, however, passed away before a change of feeling began to be apparent on the subject, especially at the South. In 1802, the rich cotton lands of Alabama and Mississippi were ceded by Georgia to the United States, and no proviso excluding slavery was applied to them. In 1803, the government of the United States purchased a vast territory from France, generally known as the Louisiana purchase. It included what are now the States of Louisiana, Arkansas and Mis- souri, and the extensive region of Nebraska and Kansas now in dispute. In 1819, Florida was ceded to the United States. These territories came in without re- strictions. They were specially devoted neither to slavery nor to freedom. The time for fixing their 13 future character by legislative enactment had not yet come. The first great contest between the North and South took place in 1819-1820. It arose on the question of authorizing Missouri to form a Constitution preparatory to admission into the Union, the North insisting that if received at all, it must be on conditions which would eventually put an end to slavery within its bounds ; the South demanding that no pledges of the kind should be exacted. The excitement was great ; it pervaded the country, and wore for a time a most threatening aspect. I have a most vivid recollection of it, though then quite young. This is not the time or place for details. Suffice it to say, the dispute was settled by a compromise, now known as the Missouri compromise. Missouri was to be admitted into the Union, without prohibition of slavery within her bounds, and as a compensation to the North, an additional clause was introduced into the bill, forever excluding slavery from all territory belonging to the Louisiana purchase, north of 36°, 30', north latitude. It is in these words: "And be it further enacted, that in all that territory ceded by France to the United States, under the name of Louisiana, which lies north of 3 6°, 30', north latitude, excepting only such part thereof as is included within the limits of the State contemplated by this act, slavery and involuntary servitude, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall be and is hereby forever prohibited." Missouri was received the following year. In 1845 the annexation of Texas took place, and nearly the whole of that immense country, in which slavery already existed was devoted under national 14 guarantees to the slave interest. All that part of it which lies south of the parallel 36°, 30', the line of the old Missouri compromise extended westward, was con- signed, bj permission, to slavery. Our last great accession of territory was the result of the Mexican war. It was obtained by conquest and purchase, and was added to the Union without restric- tion as to slavery. Congress, on this occasion, declined extending the Missouri compromise line any further towards the Pacific Ocean. California formed a Consti- tution for herself, excluding slavery, and was admitted into the Union as a free State. It was this and other questions connected with it, that shook the country so fearfully in 1850. It is now insisted that the legislation of that year is inconsistent with the legislation of 1820, and that be- cause California has been admitted as a free State, though a portion of its territory lies below 36°, 30', therefore the whole region of Nebraska, most of which is north of the designated line, and was secured to free- dom, for a consideration, thirty years before, should be opened to slavery. In other words that because Con- gress refused to sanction a new compromise, on the hue of 36°, 30', in 1850, therefore the old compromise of 1820, which had reference to an entirely different ter- ritory, has become inoperative and void, and ought to be annulled. Not to dwell on the fallacy of this reasoning at present, it is obvious that a very great change has taken place since the Revolution in public sentiment, especially at the South, on the subject of slavery. Then it was confessed to be an evil, its progress was carefully restricted; and its ultimate removal was anticipated and 15 desired. The same general feeling continued for sev- eral 3^ears afterward. Nor was it sentiment without practice. It Avas estimated by the distinguished editor of the Commentaries of Blackstone, Judge Tucker of Virginia,* that during the interval between 1782 and 1791, a period of only nine years, ten thousand slaves obtained freedom by voluntary manumission, in Vir- ginia, under authority of her legislature. Now, on the contrary, the system is often defended by southern pol- iticians as beneficial to the State, and sometimes by southern ministers of the gospel, as being sanctioned by the Old Testament and the New. Measures are taken to secure its increase and perpetuity. The desire for new lands, adapted to slave labor, is insatiable ; and to obtain them, men in high positions seem willing to run the risk of a civil rupture, which if it comes will deluge the country in blood. Three things have been chiefly instrumental in pro- ducino; this chano-e. First and foremost is the increased demand for cotton and remarkable success in its culti- vation. It is a noticeable fact that the first seeds of this great southern staple were sown in 1621, the year after the first twenty African slaves were sold in the Colony. The progress of the cotton crop was slow. In 1791 the whole export from the United States was sixty- four bags of three hundred pounds each.t According to the last Patent Office Reports, there were exported from the United States in 1821, 124,893,405 pounds; in 1849, 1,026,602,269 pounds; that is, above a thou- sand millions pounds more in 1849 than in 1821 ; or an increase in the surplus production of cotton, above the home consumption, of more than eight hundred per * Walsh's Appeal. t Am. En. 16 centum in twenty-eight years. The average crop at the present time is put down at three thousand bales of four hundred pounds each, or 1,200,000,000 pounds. It is thought that the production of this article and the de- mand for it must continue to increase for many years. There are immense regions of choice cotton land yet uncultivated, particularly in Georgia, Alabama, Missis- sippi and Texas, and a prospect that the exportation of this article will become constantly greater until its value reaches $300,000,000 per annum. This has been, is, and is to be, the grand staple of the Southern States. White laborers could not probably live on the cotton plantations of the remote South. Colored men from the free States would not go there. Manumitted negroes might not easily be controlled, in any considerable num- bers, or made to work, in this kind of agriculture. There is, therefore, a most powerful inducement to dis- courage emancipation, increase the number of slaves and make the system of bond labor perpetual. Why should not the desire of improving one's worldly con- dition blunt the moral sensibility and pervert the judgment on this subject as it does on others? No doubt the cotton trade has had this effect. Another cause of the change, partly produced by the foregoing, is a desire of political preponderance. When slavery was looked upon as a temporary affair, there was no strong southern sentiment against emancipation, whenever a State should desire to attempt it. No mat- ter if two-thirds of the states should be free, the remain- der would have little to fear from national legislation. Now the slaveholding interest struggles, if not for decided ascendency, at least to preserve the balance of power. To meet the rapid growth of the free states, resulting 17 from the abundance of every thing necessary to support life, and from emigration, new cotton lands must be ob- tained, new slave states formed, and the numbers, in the Senate at least, from the slave states, be kept equal to the numbers from the free. It has become with the South, as they consider it, almost a struggle for national existence. This cause has been rendered more powerful by the excitement at the North on the subject of abolition. Besides that love of freedom and hatred of oppression, which pervades this section of the country, and which embraces rational views, and confines its philanthropic eflforts to practicable schemes, in reference to the slave, a wild f^maticism has sprung up among us. It has poured forth its floods of wormwood and gall indiscrimi- nately, in every form of invective which language can utter. The South has become alarmed; efforts for emancipation have been exchanged to efforts for self- preservation ; even the Christian sentiment of the South has said, the only course of safety for ourselves and our colored people with us, is in a firm and united conservatism which shall yield nothing to northern pres- sure till the temj)est has gone past. There are those also at the South who have been in- fluenced in this change of feeling by the degraded and miserable condition of the free blacks among them, and by the dangers which must result from having large numbers of them in their midst, associating freely with the slave population. These are the leading causes which have brought about such an unfavorable change in the feelings of southern politicians and southern Christians, in reference to the manumission of slaves. Of these several causes, the first ■ 3 18 mentioned, viz. the increased demand for cotton and its successful cultivation, stands foremost, and is at the foundation. This general review and exhibition of causes, prepares us for the question, in what estimation should American slavery be held ? Slavery may be considered by itself, or in connection with the evils which are generally inseparable from it. Considered by itself, is slaveholding necessarily and in all cases sinful ? In other words, is it not possible for a person to stand in the legal relation of master to a slave, without offending God thereby ? I am ready to answer in the affirmative, though in my opinion such an answer should neither lessen our abhorrence of slavery nor our desire for its removal. I can imagine many cases in which it would be clearly merciful, in accordance with the sentiment of our text, perfectly right, for a person to sustain this relation for a time. To say, that to hold a slave under any circumstances and for ever so short a period, is sinful, is to speak extravagantly and in a way which will never commend itself to the consciences of them who are thus denounced. Nothing is gained, but much lost by attempting to prove too much. The bat- tle is fought, in such cases, on a, remote abstraction or exception, and the available positions of the enemy are left unharmed. Let us concede, then, that it may be possible, under peculiar circumstances and for a limited period, for a person to stand in the relation of master to a slave, and for a body politic to uphold such a relation without committing sin thereby. If it were not so, we must condemn the practice of the patriarchs and the in- stitutions of Moses, as involving sin in the founder of the institutions and the authors of that practice. The cases 19 supposed, however, are only exceptions, and exceptions usually strengthen the general rule. We come then to slaveholding as a system. There are those who affirm boldly that slaveholding, even as a system for modern times, is sanctioned by the sacred Scriptures. This is not my opinion. But did it not exist under the old dispensation, and did it not re- ceive the approbation of God ? It existed, and was tolerated, and regulated by civil statute, but not com- manded nor as I think, strictly speaking, approved by the author of the Mosaic law. So polygamy existed, and was tolerated and regulated, but not commanded, nor really approved under the same law. As the latter was suffered, not because it was right in itself, but, as our Saviour teaches, on account of the hardness of men's hearts, or in other words, as the best thing that could be done under the circumstances, and among a people so long and thoroughly habituated to its prac- tice, so I suppose it was with slavery. It was not in- stituted as desirable in itself, but permitted in the cir- cumstances under limitations. It was not practicable at that moment to do it entirely away — it teas possible to restrain it, and mitigate its hardships, and overrule it for good. The lawgiver preferred practicabihty to ab- straction, to do the best thing which the circumstances allowed, rather than submit to a more unflivorable alter- native. But suppose for argument's sake that slaveholding was established, as a positive institution for the Hebrews, by the divine Lawgiver. Such a fact could not properly be adduced in justification of slaveholding for coming ages. The most which could be inferred from it is, that in certain peculiar circumstances existing in ancient 20 times, and within the limits of a single nation, the prac- tice could exist without the commission of sin on the part of those who engaged in it. The conclusion would be much too broad for the premises, if we should aver that because God authorised a system of slavery, several thousand years ago, for a particular nation, therefore, he had given his sanction to similar systems for all coming time. Morality is progressive, not indeed in its immu- table principles, but in its developments and applica- tions. Wars and fightings are wrong in themselves; they proceed from the unhallowed lusts of men, and before the termination of the Redeemer's kingdom on earth must wholly cease, and yet in an early age, and under peculiar circumstances wars and fightings, and these too not for defence but aggression, have been divinely required. To justify modern slavery by the slavery under the Mosaic law, as well as to justify offensive war in modern times by the " holy wars" of the Hebrews, we must show that the cases are parallel to each other, and that what was right in the one case would be right in the other. So much by way of con- cession. I do not, however, consider Hebrew slavery as an institution established for its inherent excellence, but as a vicious system, which it was necessary to tol- erate for a time. I look upon it as a malignant tumor on the body politic which could be checked, and in progress of years perhaps cured, but not suddenly re- moved without peril of life. What shall we say of the New Testament ? Did our Saviour any where, in so many words, prohibit or denounce slavery ? Certainly he did not. Did the apos- tles condemn it, in express terms ? They did not. It existed in their times, and in oppressive forms. It ex- 21 isted among the early Christians. Slaveholding, so far as we can learn, was not a barrier against admission to the churches, and the apostles have even set forth the recip- rocal duties of masters and slaves towards each other. Does it follow then, that the New Testament sanctions slavery? By no means. Does it not contain great principles which must eventually sweej) it from the face of the earth ? How can I admit the sentiment of our text, and yet deny liberty forever to my fellow men ? How can I love my neighbor as myself, and yet consign him and his posterity to hopeless bondage ? Is it not manifest, in the spirit and on the face of the gospel, that the religion of Jesus was intended for the elevation of all classes of men, bringing the human family into one great brotherhood, in which each should do to others as he would that others should do to him ? So the church in past ages has generally understood the will of Christ, and with all its corruptions, it has been the great defender and deliverer of men from their oppressors. So true is this, that an impression prevailed for a time in the American colonies, that a Christian could not be a slave, and that to baptize a bondman would be to give him his freedom. How then shall we account for it, that slavery is not forbidden in so many words ? We account for it from the fact that Christ was the wisest of reformers, and did not make direct attacks on governments and institu- tions, to defeat perhaps the very ends he had in view ; but contented himself with efforts to regenerate indi- vidual character, and to establish principles which in the course of their development, and in the progress of ages would regenerate society. Polygamy, indeed, he denounced in form, as the principles which must finally 22 destroy it, though they exist, were not so obvious; but despotism and slavery, both of which are abhorrent to the spirit of his gospel, he did not denounce in express words, but left them to the counter-working power and spirit of the principles of his religion. Come now to natural reason and conscience. Bring slaveholding to this bar. Does the law of our moral nature justify it? The idea of seizing upon a human being, an immortal man with all his capabilities, thoughts, feelings, created as he is in the image of God, the brother and in natural rights the equal of other men, and when charged with no fault, buying and selling, and working him as a brute — working him not for Ms advantage, but our own — is monstrous, and finds no countenance in the law written on the heart. But take slavery with its usual concomitants, and how immense its miseries! How it degrades the immortal man ! Bought and held as property, controlled for another's benefit, deprived of the means of education, denied the usual rights of a man, the marriage institution reduced to a nullity, liable to have his children torn from him by violence, exposed to the tyranny of an unreason- able master or mistress — how painful is such a condition to contemplate ! Tell me not of the fidelity and kind- ness of many a Christian slaveholder — tell me not how careful high-minded planters are to keep families togeth- er, and how well these dependent ones are often loved and treated. Undoubtedly many a mistress is as tender as a mother, and many a master bears in his bosom a compassionate heart. But look into the slave markets — see the manacled victims bound they know not whither ; cast your eyes over the cotton fields of Alabama and Texas ; inquire of the old men and old women for the 23 fate of their children ; see how the bloom of those young girls is consumed ; how those sick ones Hiint under urg- ings, if not the lash ; and how yonder happy family is all broken up in a day, by the coming in of some iron- hearted trader ; and towards a systeni under which such things are common, you can have no feelings but those of horror and disgust. I do not wonder at the intense abhorrence of it which exists among us. I confess that when I look only at one side of the case, when I have " considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun ; and beheld the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter ; and on the side of their oppressors was power ; but they had no comforter," I have " praised the dead which were already dead more than the living which are yet alive." The idea of droves of negroes, human beings, chained together two and two; of mothers bereaved of their children, into whose soul the won has entered — the curses and the lash — they fill me with grief and indignation ; the blood rushes to my heart, and my heart to my throat, with a sensation which is intolerable. I loathe such a system. Away with it ; it is a system of abominations ; how can the bright sun in the heavens look upon it without eclipse ! But are there no palliating circumstances which should inspire us with feelings of charity towards the South ? If there are, both common justice and the principle em- braced in our text require me to notice them. What we want on the subject is not indiscriminate censure, but the truth. Northern denunciations have too often been sweeping, hard and defamatory, tending to exasperate rather than convince. Candor in admitting all reason- able excuse gives your words power, where apologies fail. 24 There are such circmnstaiices. Slavery was not in- troduced into the country by the present generation of masters. It is an evil entailed upon them. They find it intertwisted with and grown in upon their national and domestic existence. They were brought up in it, and never have learned any other mode of living. Their climate, the nature of their soil, their methods of cultivation, the inferiority and dependence of the negro race, the affection which often exists between master and slave, have all a tendency to prevent the full action of conscience against the system. It must also be confessed that there are great difficul- ties in the way of sudden emancipation. What is to be done with these vast multitudes of semi-barbarians, unac- customed to liberty, uneducated, incapable of providing for themselves ? Are they capable of self-government ? Could they found or sustain political institutions? Would it be in the power of any police to control them ? What would become of them ? What would become of the white race in the anarchy and license which must follow? Is amalgamation possible ? If so, it must be the work of time. But is not the idea horrible ? Shall the man- umitted slaves be sent away by thousands to the free states ? Will the free states receive them ? Will Ohio, New York, Massachusetts receive them? Here is a difficulty — and it has seemed to many so insurmounta- ble, that though friends of emancipation, they have given up all attempts to secure it in despair. There are southern Christians, southern ministers of the gospel, of as much benevolence and piety as any of you, who con- scientiously think that immediate emancipation would be an evil and a sin ; perilous to the whites, and unjust and cruel to the bondmen under their care. They con- 25 tent themselves, therefore, with endeavors to ameUorate the condition of the slaves, to secure to them an in- crease of advantages, to prevent the violent sejDaration of families, to maintain the marriage institution in- violable among them, and to fit them -for a world where all are brethren, and into which slavery can never come. I have endeavored, in these remarks, to do justice to the condition and feelings of the southern masters. I know that there are humane and conscientious men among them — that many of this class are sorely pressed on this subject, by the circumstances in which the}^ are placed. They have no complacency in the slave s^'stem, and wish it could be annihilated forever. But they neither know what to do, not what to advise. Some of you, to be sure, at this distance, far away from the scene of embarrassment, pressed by none of these difficulties, out of the reach of any evils which might follow sudden emancipation, and called to make no sac- rifices and take no responsibility in the case, think yourselves capable of directing what should be done. You declaim loudly and denounce indiscriminately, and insist that every yoke shall be broken, though the heavens come down on our heads. But sober, wise and thinking men, Uving in the midst of. inherited slavery, are often at their wits' ends on the question, how shall we dispose of it ? I have endeavored, as I said, to do justice to the South. And I am willinsi: for the sake of the true men and patriots it contains — notwithstanding there are so many who hold on upon slaver}^ with a relentless grasp — to leave the odious system, for the present, in the states where it exists, and where Congress has 4 26 no power over it, to the wisdom and philanthropy found among those most immediately affected by it, trusting that the religion of Jesus, the progress of free prin- ciples throughout the earth, kind expostulation and argument, instead of insulting invective, from the North, together with other causes which Providence has already put in motion, will eventually secure the long wished for freedom. Let it now be noticed, on the other hand, that these palliations belong only to states in which slavery has already become a settled system. They do not apply at all to new territory whose virgin soil has never been polluted by the sweat of a slave, still less to lands which have been forever pledged by solemn agreement to freedom. They all have reference to a state of mind, in which slavery is realized as a national and social curse, l^ut to which no safe means of its removal are apparent. Slavery as a system, tolerated only from the necessities of the case, is an entirely different thing from slavery upheld as a desirable arrangement, to be extended and perpetuated. When you come to legis- late for the indefinite spread and perpetuati^ of it, the whole question is changed. Apologies have no rele- vancy. Just grounds of charity vanish. The spirit of the Revolution, which was a spirit of universal freedom, gives place to a spirit of semi-national despotism. The times of the first Pharaoh return upon us. The cu- pidity which tore the Africans from their home on another continent, and which is now denounced by all civilized nations under heaven, seems at this late day, by such efforts, to be more than half justified. Excuses become intolerable, and a solemn protest, in the name of justice and before God, is demanded by every right 27 minded patriot. Just so far as any man or class of men wish to extend slavery, whether from avarice or a desire for political predominance, they are to be looked upon as guilty of a mighty wrong, and provoking the ven- geance of heaven. I will not say that the vast acces- sions of slave territory which we have made since the formation of the Constitution, are all the result of a desire to perpetuate and extend the odious institution ; or on the part of the northern politicians, to secure favor in a quarter whence cometh promotion ; for it is the prerogative of another to judge men's motives. But I do say that just so far as individuals or masses have been actuated by such desires, treason has been com- mitted against the country, against humanity and against God. And well may we tremble when we consider the oppressions of the old nations and who it is that has dashed them in pieces. This brings me to recent events. A bill has recently been brought into Congress for the repeal of that com- promise law, by which the whole territory of Nebraska and Kansas was secured to freedom forever. The measure was hurried through the Senate, and passed by a large majority, and has just been arrested for a season in its passage through the House. It took the country by surprise, no one demanded it, no existing excitement was to be allayed by it, no man was prepared for it, the nation was struck mute before it. Scarcely yet has its outcry of indignation begun to be heard. But voices are coming up like the noise of many waters, saying : " Oh, do not this abominable thing which our soul hatetli ! " And the chorus of voices will swell on, till to the excited imagination of them who would perpetrate the wrong, the fingers of a spirit hand will be seen on 28 the wall, writing as of old, " thou art weighed in the balances and art found wanting." The object of this bill is to form those vast regions into territorial organizations, and in doing this, to repeal the Missouri Compromise Act, so far as the exclusion of slavery is concerned, from the country north of the par- allel of north latitude, 36°, 30', and thus to remove all hindrances to the ingress of a slave population. It is a great country, situated in the very heart of the North American continent, sufficient in extent for an empire, being in area, it is said, fifty times as large as the State of Vermont. It has a fine climate, is rich in agricultural resources, is capable of sustaining an immense popula- tion, and may have in time a very controlling influence on the destinies of the nation. It has, moreover, been secured to freedom by formal public arrangements, by a price agreed to and paid, for all coming time. It is now proposed to annul this compromise, so far as the freedom of these regions is concerned, and open them to slavery. The proposition has been brought forward without any seeming necessity for it. Territorial organizations are not needed there, and in the ordinary course of things, would not be for a considerable time to come. One large por- tion of the territory has been devoted to the Indians under solemn national guarantees. In all the rest of it, there are not, it is supposed, fifteen hundred inhabi- tants of any description, and not intelligent settlers enough to carry on the simplest territorial government. The bill is presented in every respect prematurely. It agitates the nation without any necessity. The whole country has been kindled into a blaze, not from any accident of fire, but as it were by an incendiary's torch. We have just passed through a great national crisis con- 29 nected with this terrible subject of slavery. It shook the whole country. It impeded the common action of legislation for successive Congresses, and stopped the wheels of government so far as its usual purposes are concerned, for the greater part of a year. It cost the lives of three statesmen, than whom America has never had three nobler sons, or at least hastened them to the grave. A chief magistrate of the nation fell before its exacting responsibilities. It was a time of recrimination, of passion. The ship of state labored in the storm, and its boldest pilots feared a wreck. Those awful days had gone past. Peace, fraternal regard, prosperity, were rapidly coming back. Nearly all the great questions res-pecting slavery as a national interest, seemed to be settled. To the surprise of the country and of the world, in an instant, at the waving of the wand of a single magician, the tempest has burst upon us again with redoubled fury. An act is threatened which, if con- summated, will give a blow to the Union from which, so far as human foresight can perceive, it will never recover. It is pretended that the compromises of 1850, contain a principle which contradicts and annuls the compromise of 1820. Miserable sophism! I do not profess to be a lawyer. I belong to the 3,050 New England ministers who do not understand public affairs; but common sense teaches me that the act of 1820, w^hich was from its nature irrepealable, a compact between two parties for so much present advantage on the one side, and so much future advantage on the other; the conditions of the compact having been completely fulfiled on the one side, and remaining to be fulfiled on the other, cannot be destroyed by the acts of 1850, passed long after the ir- 30 revocable fulfilment of all the conditions on the one side, and before the conditions had been fulfiled on the other ; Especially when no mention is made in the acts of 1850 of any repeal or possibility of repeal, or hidden principle tending to repeal of the act of 1820, and that if the acts of 1850 are contradictory (which cannot be shown, as they relate to a different subject,) to the act of 1820, the last in point of time, will be nullified by the first in point of time, and not the first by the last. The amount due the southern side of the agreement has been sacredly and entirely paid ; place the northern side on equal footing, and then we may talk of new bargains. It is like this: two boys have a jack-knife and a quart of shag- barks in common. They agree to divide. James takes the shagbarks and eats them; John takes the knife and keeps it. Some months after they come into possession of two or three pounds of nails and half a dozen kites. After a long dispute they agree upon what seems to them an equitable division, and both parties are satisfied. At length, as John one day is showing his knife, James cries out, "that knife is as much mine as it is yours ; the principle on which we divided last, destroys the bargain which we made first." " Give me back those shagbarks which you eat up," says John, " and then I '11 talk with you about the principle. If you do not, as you eat the shagbarks, I '11 keep the knife." I say to Congress, you must get Missouri out of the Union, yes, and two or three other slave states, before you can put yourself in a position to open Nebraska and Kansas to slavery, with- out the full consent of the North. My main objections to this bill stand on high moral grounds. First, it cannot pass without a violation of the public faith. I do not deny that Congress may 31 possibly have legal power to perpetrate the act. Con- gress is national, and is supposed to know no North and no South in its great measures. It may say, " I do and I undo, and none can hinder me." The lesral- ity, the constitutionality of such a position is a question for the Supreme Court, for Congress is not quite om- nipotent, even speaking politically. It is not a ques- tion, for me. So far as my present discourse is con- cerned, I agree that Congress has a legal power to an- nul its former action on the subject. But what is legal power compared with moral obligation ? Was there not an understanding between the North and the South on the subject of the Missouri Compromise, such as could not be violated between man and man without gross dishonor. And w\as not Congress privy to it, consenting to it, sanctioning it. So the compact was viewed at the time, and so it will be viewed forever. The South as well as the North looked upon it in this light. A passage which has been recently quoted more than once in the United States Senate, from Niles' Reo-- ister, published in Baltimore, March 11, 1820, giving the northern view of the case, is believed to express the general sentiment, at the time the act was passed. " It is true," says this writer, " the compromise is supported only by the letter of the law, repealable by the author- ity which enacted it ; but the circumstances of the case give to this law a moral force equal to that of a positive provision of the Constitution ; and w^e do not hesitate to say that the Constitution exists in its observance." The repeal of such a law, under the circumstances, involves then a violation of public faith, and must lead to the most perilous consequences. If this compact can be broken, all similar compacts can be broken. No new 32 compact can be made, with any certainty of its being fulfiled. Those legal enactments and moral under- standings by which the South is benefited, and which were granted for a consideration, may be repealed at any moment by the northern vote, and national guaran- tees to the North furnish no security to its interests, whenever a few northern representatives and senators can be induced, as from ambition or other reasons some of them often are, to aid the united action of the South. Should great occasions again occur, when compromise or civil war is the dread alternative, compromise will be impossible. No one will have confidence in it. Con- gress will have rendered itself powerless for good, in any such emergency. Public morality also will have become impotent, and we shall look upon each other as not to be trusted. There is a principle of morality involved in this bill respecting the remaining Indian tribes. A large section of the territory under consideration has been sacredly pledged to their .independent control and use. They have received it from the government instead of lands surrendered l)y them on the eastern side of the Missis- sippi. During the administration of President Jackson and afterwards according to his policy, nineteen tribes of them were constrained to leave their old haunts and the graves of their fathers, and take up their abode in the far off West. Many thought this at the time an act of oppression, and in violation of national treaties. The lamented Evarts plead powerfuUj' and with an intensity of injured feeling and effort, which some supposed cost him his life, in behalf of the perishing remnants of an older age. But the removal was justified, not only as a necessity, but as an act of merc}^, and the only means of 33 preserving a race which seemed to be melting entirely away. Their new home, far from the habitations of the white man, was to be free from his encroachments for- ever. But according to the principles of this new bill, the Indian must lose his nationality, or be driven on- ward, and we know not whither, towards the setting sun. All that he has done in fitting up his new home, all the progress he has made in civilization, all his hopes of stability and security, and of saving the remnants of his race, vanish in a moment. Despair awaits him. True this bill provides that no encroachment shall be made on Indian territory without Indian consent. But how much volition will the Indians have in the case ? About as much as a little child has, wdien the parent's mind is made up beforehand what that volition must be, and puts in requisition every art of coaxing, prom- ising, scolding and terrifying to bend it to his own. I well remember, that one of the agents in the former removal was directed to persuade the Indians to it, " by moving upon them in the line of their prejudices." And they will be moved upon again in the same way, and after much resistance, distress, savage fury, perhaps blood, they will yield, though it be to their own de- struction. One act of consent on their part will be sufficient; nor wdll years afterwards of regret, and grief, and rage, be of any avail. It w\as a noble declara- tion of President Harrison, in his Inaugural Address, when he said, " I can conceive of no more suljlime spec- tacle, none more likely to propitiate an impartial and common Creator, than a rigid adherence to the princi- ples of justice on the part of a powerful nation, in its transactions with a weaker and uncivilized people, whom circumstances havQ placed at its disposal." The 5 34 Indian is a doomed race. He is the remnant of a vast population which once overspread this continent. His proud spirit is broken, his council fires are going out, his blood will soon cease to flow in the veins of man. Let it be said thousands of years hence, when this na- tion shall exist, perhaps, as Eome, as Greece, as Egypt exist, only in history, that America was the protectress of this dependent race, and sacredly kept faith with its waning tribes till the last war-dance was ended, and the red man perished from the earth. The passing of this bill would imply an acknowledged change in national policy and feelings with regard to the permanence and increase of slavery. It would be saying to the world, that young America not only re- pudiates the old northern anti-slavery doctrines of the Revolution, but rejects as obsolete the almost united sen- timent of the southern patriots of a former generation. It has outgrown the fears, the humanity, the hatred of oppression which characterized the councils of Wash- ington, of Madison, of Marshall, and of him, the gen- erous, far-seeing patriot of a later age, ever ready to make sacrifices for the peace of the Union — Henry Clay. To their minds, slaver}^ was a moral wrong, a social curse, a national disgrace. It was to be limited ; not extended, not perpetuated ; but as early as ma}^ be, re- moved. In a speech before the American Colonization Society, at Washington, in 1827, Mr. Clay said : "If I could be instrumental in eradicating this deepest stain from the character of our country, and removing all cause of reproach on account of it, by foreign nations ; if I could only be instrumental in ridding of this foul blot that revered State which gave me birth, or that not less beloved State which kindly adopted me as her son, 35 I would not exchange the proud satisfaction which I shoukl enjoy, for the honor of all the triumphs ever decreed to the most successful conqueror." In another speech, delivered on a similar occasion in 1829, in Ken- tucky, he exclaims : " Is there no remedy ? Must we endure perpetually all the undoubted mischiefs of a state of slavery, as it affects both the free and bond por- tion of these states ? What mind is sufficiently exten- sive hi its reach, what nerves sufficiently strong to contemplate this vast and progressive augmentation, [of the slave population] without an awful foreboding of the tremendous consequences ? " * In opposition to these great sentiments, now we say, let slavery come, let it cover our territories, let it exist as a part of our policy, and be perpetuated to the remotest generations. What might be the ultimate effect of the act contem- plated, this is not the place to divine. I believe in an Almighty Governor of nations. I have confidence, from causes already in operation and the high overrul- ino-s of Heaven, that even this bill would redound in the end to the advancement of freedom. Depend upon it, if passed it will be a bad move for the South. It w^as expected that the Mexican war would bring great accessions of power to the slave interest. But under the control of Him who turneth the councils of men into foolishness, the Mexican war gave the heaviest blow to slavery wdiicli it has ever received since the formation of the Constitution. What has been, might be, will be again. But through what convulsions the nation must first pass, God only knows. We certainly cannot be jus- tified if, by our supineness, we run the dreadful hazard. At the same time, we shall stand before the nations of * Colton's Life, Vol. I., p. 1?0, 100. the earth with unnumbered fingers of scorn pointed at us. One objection more to the jjassage of this bill. It will exasperate the North, and give intensity to agita- tion. It will add strength to that indiscriminate aboli- tion which has seemed to act from the beginning, without sense or reason, or any regard to consequences. The country w^ill have no rest under it. It will be fet- ters on the limbs of freemen. And whatever may be the consequences, American freemen can never be held in chains. The slave may be crushed under the heel of oppression, but the Norman Saxon will have liberty or perish in the struggle for it^ Slave labor and free labor cannot exist side by side. When you open those vast territories to a slave population, you effectually drive out the enterprising freemen. You shackle northern liberties. You say to the free agriculturists of New England, and New York, and Ohio, bow down, that we may go over; and the free agriculturists of New England, New York and Ohio, are not the men to lay their body as the ground and the street to them that go over. You also say to the Northern States, you must henceforth tolerate slavery, wherever it shall please to take possession, in every inch of territor}^ w^hich you now own, or may hereafter acquire. Under such a doctrine there will be agitations, and frenzied excitements, till the spirit of the old patriots triumphs again, or — I dare not contemplate the awful result. It was under such convictions as these that the names of more than three thousand clergymen were given as quickly as the mails could bear them, to a solemn pro- test in the name of Almighty God, against this act of peril and WTong. There are those who think that the 37 ministers of the gospel, knowing little of public affairs, should content themselves with feeding their quiet flocks, and leaving great national questions to those who have the ability to discuss them. But in what country do we live ? What blood is it that is rushing through our veins ? Are we not descendents of the non- conformists of England and of the outspoken old Pu- ritans of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay ? Are w^e not sons of those revolutionary sires, of whom the Italian, Botta, in his history of our great struggle for independ- ence says, that no one cause conduced more to success than the opinions and preaching of the American clergy? My paternal and maternal grand-parents were ministers of the gospel and faithful in their calling. The one defended the cause of liberty in the State councils of New Hampshire, stirred up his people in many a sermon to quit themselves like men, and sent his sons into the field ; the other shouldered his musket when he heard that the battle was raging on Bunker hill, and hastened to the scene of action, that as a surgeon he might bind up the wounds of the bleeding soldier, and as a minister of Christ, impart the consolations of religion to the dying patriot. If any standing on the high places of the nation for a time, make bold to ask me why such as / dare to express an opinion on public affairs, I answer : first, because I am a man, and honorable senators are no more. Second, because I am an American, and would not have my rulers, by ambitious compliances, become less. Third, because I am a minister of Christ, and w^hile I pay my taxes as a citizen and enjoy no more civil immunities than others, I have as much right to petition Congress, on subjects connected with my profes- sional interests, as the iron men, or the coal men, or the 38 merchants have to petition Congress on subjects con- nected with their employments. At no time in the history of the coimtrj^ have the ministers of the gospel been behind the foremost in patriotism antl efforts for the public good. Ordinarily, it is true, they are but little inclined to mingle in the strifes of political men. But there are times when inaction on public affairs is not, in their opinion, a virtue. They are not afraid to speak. In proportion as they bend lower before the Almighty, they stand the more erect in the presence of their fellow men. As citizens, they have as much at stake as others ; as teachers of morality, they have as much right to express opinions on questions of national right and wrong, as any in the land. As those whose office it is to pray and labor for the elevation of their race, and the times of universal brotherhood among men, the proper business of their life is made to suffer, when any public act degrades the nation or works moral injury to any class of the people. They are educated by the circumstances of their profession, to S23eak boldly, whether men will hear or whether they will forbear. They would sooner surrender their ministry than give up their liberty of speech. And when large bodies of New England clergymen speak in the name of the Almighty before the nation, let politicians understand, it is because they are confident that every attribute in His awful nature is on their side. Some have passed censure on the "Clerical Protest," so called, on the ground that it speaks in the name of God, or under acknowledged conviction of responsibility to Him, and of exposure to divine vengeance as the con- sequence of wrong doing. For the propriety of this style, I have nothing to say, except to refer those who pro- ?>0 fess to be shocked by it, to their own Jefferson, whose language on this subject is, if possible, more