find “_great laws of their nature,–instinctive feelings_”–just such as you find against slavery, and not more perverted in them than in you, condemning all this Bible. And they hold now, with your sanction, that a book affirming such facts “_cannot be from God_.”
Sir, some men are made infidels by hearing the Ten Commandments, and they find “_great laws of their nature_,” as strong in them as yours in you against slavery, warring against every one of these commandments. And they declare now, with your authority, that a book imposing such restraints upon human nature, “_cannot be from God_” Sir, what is it makes infidels? You have been wont to answer, “They _will not_ have God _to rule over them_. They _will not_ have the BIBLE _to control the great laws of their nature.”_ Sir, that is the true answer. And you know that _the great instinct of liberty_ is only one of _three great laws_, needing special teaching and government:–that is to say, _the instinct to rule; the instinct to submit to be ruled; and the instinct for liberty._ You know, too, that the instinct _to submit_ is the strongest, the instinct _to rule_ is next, and that the _aspiration for liberty_ is the weakest. Hence you know the overwhelming majority of men have ever been willing to be slaves; masters have been next in number; while the few have struggled for freedom.
The Bible, then, in proclaiming God’s will _as to these three great impulses_, will be rejected by men, exactly as they have yielded forbidden control to the one or the other of them. The Bible will make infidels of _masters_, when God calls to them to rule right, or to give up rule, if they have allowed _the instinct of power_ to make them hate God’s authority. Pharaoh spoke for all infidel rulers when he said, “_Who is the Lord that I should obey his voice?_”
The Bible will make infidels of _slaves_, when God calls to them to aspire to be free, if they have permitted _the instinct of submission to_ make them hate his commands. The Israelites in the wilderness revealed ten times, in their murmuring, _the slave-instinct_ in all ages:–“_Would to God we had died in the wilderness!_”
You know all this, and you condemn these infidels. Good.
But, sir, you know equally well that the Bible will make infidels of men _affirming the instinct of liberty,_ when God calls them to learn of him how _much liberty_ he gives, and _how_ he gives it, and _when_ he gives it, if they have so yielded to this law of their nature as to make them despise the word of the Lord. Sir, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram spoke out just what the liberty-and-equality men have said in all time:–“_Ye, Moses and Aaron, take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them: wherefore, then, lift ye up yourselves above the congregation?”_ Verily, sir, these men were intensely excited by “_the great law of our nature,–the great instinct of freedom.”_ Yea, they told God to his face they had looked within, and found the _higher law of liberty and equality–the eternal right–in their intuitional consciousness_; and that they would not submit to his will in the elevation of Moses and Aaron _above them_.
Verily, sir, you, in the spirit of Korah, now proclaim and say, “Ye masters, and ye white men who are not masters, North and South, ye take too much upon you, seeing the negro is created your equal, and, by unalienable right, is as free as you, and entitled to all your political and social life. Ye take, then, too much upon you in excluding him from your positions of wealth and honor, from your halls of legislation, and from your palace of the nation, and from your splendid couch, and from your fair women with long hair on that couch and in that gilded chariot: wherefore, then, lift ye up yourselves above the negro?”
Verily, sir, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram said all we have ever heard from abolition-platforms or now listen to from you. But the Lord made the earth swallow up Korah, Dathan, and Abiram!
I agree with you then, sir, fully, that some men have been, are, and will be, made infidels by hearing that God, in the Bible, has ordained slavery. But I hold this to be no argument against the fact that the Bible does so teach, because men are made infidels by any other doctrine or precept they hate to believe.
Sir, no man has said all this better than you. And I cannot express my grief that you–in the principle now avowed, _that every man must interpret the Bible as he chooses to reason and feel_–sanction all the infidelity in the world, obliterate your “_Notes_” on the Bible, and deny the preaching of your whole life, so far as God may, in his wrath, permit you to expunge or recall the words of the wisdom of your better day.
_Testimonies of General Assemblies_.
I agree with you that the Presbyterian Church, both before and since its division, has testified, after a fashion, against slavery. But some of its action has been very curious testimony. I know not how the anti-slavery resolutions of 1818 were gotten up; nor how in some Assemblies since. I can guess, however, from what I do know, as to how such resolutions passed in Buffalo in 1853, and in New York in 1856. I know that in Buffalo they were at first voted down by a large majority. Then they were reconsidered in mere courtesy to men who said they wanted to speak. So the resolutions were passed after some days, in which the _screws_ were applied and turned, in part, _by female hands_, to save the chairman of the committee from _the effects_ of the resolutions being finally voted down!
I know that, in New York, the decision of the Assembly to spread the minority report on the minutes was considered, in the body and out of it, as a Southern victory; for it revealed, however glossed over, that many in the house, who could not vote directly for the minority report, did in fact prefer it to the other.
I was not in Detroit in 1850; but I think it was established in New York last May that that Detroit testimony was so admirably worded that both Southern and Northern men might vote for it with clear consciences!
I need not pursue the investigation. I admit that, after this sort, you have the stultified abstractions of the New School Presbyterian Church,–while I have its common sense; you have its Delphic words,–I have its actions; you have the traditions of the elders making void the word of God,–I have the providence of God restraining the church from destroying itself and our social organization under folly, fanaticism, and infidelity.
You, sir, seem to acknowledge this; for, while you appear pleased with the testimony of the New School Presbyterian Church, such as it is, you lament that the Old School have not been true to the resolutions of 1818,–that, in that branch of the church, it is questionable whether those resolutions could now be adopted. You lament the silence of the Episcopal, the Southern Methodist, and the Baptist denominations; you might add the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. And you know that in New England, in New York, and in the Northwest, many testify against _us_ as a pro-slavery body. You lament that so many members of the church, ministers of the gospel, and editors of religious papers, defend the system; you lament that so large a part of the religious literature of the land, though having its seat North and sustained chiefly by Northern funds, shows a perpetual deference to the slave-holder; you lament that, after fifty years, nothing has been done to arrest slavery; you lament and ask, “Why should this be so?” In saying this, you acknowledge that, while you have been laboring to get and have reached the abstract testimony of the church, all diluted as it is, the common-sense fact has been and is more and more brought out, in the providence of God, that _the slave-power has been and is gaining ground in the United States_. In one word, you have contrived to get, in confused utterance, the voice of the Sanhedrim; while Christ himself has been preaching in the streets of our Jerusalem the true meaning of slavery as one form of his government over fallen men.
These, then, are some of the things I promised to show as the results of your agitation. This is the “_tone_” of the past and present speech of Providence on the subject of slavery. You seem disturbed. I feel sure things are going on well as to that subject. Speak on, then, “in unambiguous tones.” But, sir, when you desire to go from words to actions,–when you intimate that the constitution of the Presbyterian Church may be altered to permit such action, or that, without its alteration, the church can detach itself from slavery by its existing laws or the modification of them,–then I understand you to mean that you desire to deal, in fact, with slave-holders as _offenders_. Then, sir, _you mean to exscind the South_; for it is absurd to imagine that you suppose the South will submit to such action. You mean, then, to _exscind the South, or to exscind yourself and others_, or to _compel the South to withdraw_. Your tract, just published, is, I suppose, intended by you to prepare the next General Assembly for such movement? What then? Will you make your “American Presbyterian,” and your Presbyterian House, effect that great change in the religious literature of the land whereby the subject of slave-holding shall be approached _precisely_ as you deal with “theft, highway-robbery, or piracy?” Will you, then, by act of Assembly, Synod, Presbytery, Session, deny your pulpits, and communion-bread and wine, to slave-holding ministers, elders, and members? Will you, then, tell New England, and especially little Rhoda, We have purified our skirts from the blood: forgive us, and take us again to your love? What then? Will you then ostracize the South and compel the abolition of slavery? Sir, do you bid us fear these coming events, thus casting their shadow before from the leaves of your book?
Sir, you may destroy the integrity of the New School Presbyterian Church. So much evil you may do; but you will hereby only add immensely to the great power and good of the Old School; and you will make disclosures of Providence, unfolding a consummation of things very different from the end you wish to accomplish for your country and the world.
I write as one of the animalcules contributing to the coral reef of public opinion.
F. A. Ross.
No. II.
Government Over Man a Divine Institute.
This letter is the examination and refutation of the infidel theory of human government foisted into the Declaration of Independence.
I had written this criticism in different form for publication, before Mr. Barnes’s had appeared. I wrote it to vindicate my affirmation in the General Assembly which met in New York, May last, on this part of the Declaration. My views were maturely formed, after years of reflection, and weeks–nay months–of carefully-penned writing.
And thus these truths, from the Bible, Providence, and common sense, were like rich freight, in goodly ship, waiting for the wind to sail; when lo, Mr. Barnes’s abolition-breath filled the canvas, and carried it out of port into the wide, the free, the open sea of American public thought. There it sails. If pirate or other hostile craft comes alongside, the good ship has guns.
I ask that this paper be carefully read more than once, twice, or three times. Mr. Barnes, I presume, will not so read it. He is committed. Greeley may notice it with his sparkling wit, albeit he has too much sense to grapple with its argument. The Evangelist-man will say of it, what he would say if Christ were casting out devils in New York,–“He casteth out devils through Beelzebub the chief of the devils.” Yea, this Evangelist-man says that my version of the golden rule is “diabolical;” when truly that version is the _word_ of the Spirit, as Christ’s casting out devils was the _work_ of the Holy Ghost.
Gerrett Smith, Garrison, Giddings, do already agree with me, that they are right if Jefferson spoke the truth. Yea, whether the Bible be true, is no question with them no more than with him. Yea, they hold, as he did, that whether there be one God or twenty, it matters not: the fact either way, in men’s minds, neither breaks the leg nor picks the pocket. (See Jefferson’s Notes on Virginia.) Messrs. Beecher and Cheever will find nothing in me to aid them in speaking to the mobs of Ephesus and Antioch. They are making shrines, and crying, Great is Diana. Mrs. Stowe is on the Dismal Swamp, with Dred for her Charon, to paddle her light canoe, by the fire-fly lamps, to the Limbo of Vanity, of which she is the queen. None of these will read with attention or honesty, if at all, this examination of what Randolph long ago said was a _fanfaronade of nonsense_. These are all wiser “than seven men that can render a reason.”
But there are thousands, North and South, who will read this refutation, and will feel and acknowledge that in the light of God’s truth the notion of created equality and unalienable right is falsehood and infidelity.
Rev. A. Barnes:–
Dear Sir:–In my first letter I promised to prove that the paragraph in the Declaration of Independence, which contains the affirmation of created equality and unalienable rights, has no sanction from the word of God. I now meet my obligation.
The time has come when civil liberty, as revealed in the Bible and in Providence, must be re-examined, understood, and defended against infidel theories of human rights. The slavery question has brought on this conflict; and, strange as it may seem, the South, the land of the slave, is summoned by God to defend the liberty he gives; while the North, the clime of the free, misunderstands and changes the truth of God into a lie,–claiming a liberty he does not give. Wherefore is this? I reply:—
God, when he ordained government over men, gave to the individual man RIGHTS, _only_ as he is under government. He first established the family; hence all other rule is merely the family expanded. The _good_ of the family limited the _rights_ of every member. God required the family, and then the state, so to rule as to give to every member the _good_ which is his, in harmony with the welfare of the whole; and he commanded the individual to seek _that good_, and NO MORE.
Now, mankind being depraved, government has ever violated its obligation to rule for the benefit of the entire community, and has wielded its power in oppression. Consequently, the governed have ever struggled to secure the good which was their right. But, in this struggle, they have ever been tempted to go beyond the limitation God had made, and to seek supposed good, not given, in rights, prompted by _self-will_, destructive of the state.
Government thus ever existing in oppression, and people thus ever rising up against despotism, have been the history of mankind.
The Reformation was one of the many convulsions in this long-continued conflict. In its first movements, men claimed the liberty the Bible grants. Soon they ran into licentiousness. God then stayed the further progress of emancipation in Europe, because the spread of the asserted liberty would have made infidelity prevail over that part of the continent where the Reformation was arrested. God preferred Romanism, and other despotisms, modified as they were by the struggle, to rule for a time, than have those countries destroyed under the sway of a licentious freedom.
In this contest the North American colonies had their rise, and they continued the strife with England until they declared themselves independent.
That “Declaration” affirmed not only the liberty sanctioned of the Bible, but also the liberty constituting infidelity. Its first paragraph, to the word “_separation_,” is a noble introduction. Omit, then, what follows, to the sentence beginning “_Prudence will dictate_,” and the paper, thus expurgated, is complete, and is then simply the complaint of the colonies against the government of England, which had oppressed them beyond further submission, and the assertion of their right to be free and independent States.
This declaration was, in that form, nothing more than the affirmation of the right God gives to children, in a family, applied to the colonies, in regard to their mother-country. That is to say, children have, from God, RIGHT, AS CHILDREN, when cruelly treated, to secure the good to which they are entitled, as children, IN THE FAMILY. They may secure _this_ good by becoming part of another family, or by setting up for themselves, if old enough. So the colonies had, from God, _right_ as colonies, when oppressed beyond endurance, to exchange the British family for another, or, if of sufficient age, to establish their own household. The Declaration, then, in that complaint of oppression and affirmation of right, in the colonies, to be independent, asserts liberty sanctioned by the word of God. And therefore the pledge to _that_ Declaration, of “lives, fortune, and sacred honor,” was blessed of Heaven, in the triumph of their cause.
But the Declaration, in the part I have omitted, affirms other things, and very different. It asserts facts and rights as appertaining to man, not in the Scriptures, but contrary thereto. Here is the passage:–
“We hold these truths to be self-evident,–that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.”
_This is the affirmation of the liberty claimed by infidelity._ It teaches as a fact _that_ which is not true; and it claims as right _that_ which God has not given. It asserts nothing new, however. It lays claim to that individual right beyond the limitation God has put, which man has ever asserted when in his struggle for liberty he has refused to be guided and controlled by the word and providence of his Creator.
The paragraph is a chain of four links, each of which is claimed to be a self-evident truth.
The _first_ and controlling assertion is, “that ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL;” which proposition, as I understand it, is, that _every man and woman on earth is created with equal attributes of body and mind_.
_Secondly_, and consequently, that every individual has, by virtue of his or her being created the equal of each and every other individual, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, _so in his or her own keeping that that right is unalienable without his or her consent_.
_Thirdly_, it follows, that government among men must derive its just powers only from the _consent_ of the governed; and, as the governed are the aggregate of individuals, _then each person must consent to be thus controlled before he or she can be rightfully under such authority_.
_Fourthly_, and finally, that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, _as each such individual man or woman may think_, then each such person may rightly set to work to alter or abolish such form, and institute a new government, on such principles and in such form as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
This is the celebrated averment of created equality, and unalienable right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, with the necessary consequences. I have fairly expanded its meaning. It is the old infidel averment. It is not true in any one of its assertions.
_All Men not created equal_.
It is not a truth, _self-evident,_ that all men are created equal. Webster, in his dictionary, defines “Self-evident–Evident without proof or reason: clear conviction upon a bare presentation to the mind, as that two and three make five.”
Now, I affirm, and you, I think, will not contradict me, that the position, “_all men are created equal”_ is _not_ self-evident; that the nature of the case makes it impossible for it to be self-evident. For the created nature of man is not in the class of things of which such self-evident propositions can by possibility be predicated. It is equally clear and beyond debate, that it is not _self-evident_ that all men have _unalienable rights_, that governments derive their just powers from the _consent_ of the governed, and may be altered or abolished whenever _to them_ such rights may be better secured. All these assertions can be known to be true or false only from revelation of the Creator, or from examination and induction of reasoning, covering the nature and the obligations of the race on the whole face of the earth. What revelation and examination of facts do teach, I will now show. The whole battle-ground, as to the truth of this series of averments, is on the first affirmation, “_that all men are created equal_.” Or, to keep up my first figure, the strength of the chain of asserted truths depend on _that_ first link. It must then stand the following perfect trial.
God reveals to us that he created man in his image, _i.e._ a spirit endowed with attributes resembling his own,–to reason, to form rule of right, to manifest various emotions, to will, to act,–and that he gave him a body suited to such a spirit, (Gen. i. 26, 27, 28;) that he created MAN “_male and female_,” (Gen. i. 27;) that he made the woman “_out of the man_,” (Gen. ii. 23;) that he made “_the man the image and glory of God_, but the woman _the glory of the man_. For the man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man. Neither was the man _created for the woman_, but the woman _for the man_,” (1 Cor. xi.;) that he made the woman to be the weaker vessel, (1 Pet. iii. 7.) Here, then, God created _the race_ to be in the beginning TWO,–a male and a female MAN; one of them _not equal_ to the other _in attributes of body and mind_, and, as we shall see presently, not equal in rights as to government. Observe, this inequality was fact as to the TWO, in the perfect state wherein they were _created_.
But these two fell from that perfect state, became depraved, and began to be degraded in body and mind. This statement of the original inequality in which man was created controls all that comes after, in God’s providence and in the natural history of the race.
_Providence_, in its comprehensive teaching, “says that God, soon after the flood, subjected the races to all the influences of the different zones of the earth;”–“That he hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek the Lord if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he be not far from every one of us.” (Acts xvii. 26, 27.)
These “bounds of their habitation” have had much to do in the natural history of man; for “_all men_” have been “_created_,” or, more correctly, _born_, (since the race was “created” once only at the first,) with attributes of body and mind derived from the TWO unequal parents, and these attributes, in every individual, the combined result of the parental natures. “_All men_,” then, come into the world under influences upon the amalgamated and transmitted body and mind, from depravity and degradation, sent down during all the generations past; and, therefore, under causes of inequality, acting on each individual from climate, from scenery, from food, from health, from sickness, from love, from hatred, from government, inconceivable in variety and power. Under such causes, to produce infinite shades of inequality, physical and mental, in birth–if “all men” were created equal (_i.e._ born equal) in attributes of body and mind–such “creation” would be a violation of all the known analogies in the world of life.
Do, then, the facts in man’s natural history exhibit this departure from the laws of life and spirit? Do they prove that “all men are created equal”? Do they show that every man and every woman of Africa, Asia, Europe, America, and the islands of the seas, is created each one equal in body and mind to each other man or woman on the face of the earth, and that this has always been?
Need I extend these questions? Methinks, sir, I hear you say, what others have told me, that the “Declaration” is not to be understood as affirming what is so clearly false, but merely asserts that all men are “created equal” in _natural rights._
I reply that _that_ is _not_ the meaning of the clause before us; for _that_ is the meaning of the next sentence,–the _second_ in the series we are considering.
There are, as I have said, four links to the chain of thought in this passage:–1. That all men are created equal. 2. That they are endowed by the Creator with certain unalienable rights. 3. That government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed. 4. That the people may alter and abolish it, &c.
These links are logical sequences. All men–man and woman–are created equal,–equal in _attributes of body and mind_; (for _that_ is the only sense in which they could be _created_ equal;) _therefore_ they are endowed with right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, unalienable, except in their consent; _consequently_ such consent is essential to all rightful government; and, _finally_ and _irresistibly_, the people have supreme right to alter or abolish it, &c.
The meaning, then, I give to that first link, and to the chain following, _is_ the sense, because, if you deny that meaning to the _first link_, then the others have no logical truth whatever. Thus:–
If all men are _not_ created equal in attributes of body and mind, then the _inequality_ may be _so great_ that such men cannot be endowed with right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, unalienable save in their _consent_; then government over such men cannot rightfully rest upon their _consent_; nor can they have right to alter or abolish government in their mere determination.
Yea, sir, you concede every thing if you admit that the “Declaration” does _not_ mean to affirm that all men are “_created_” _equal in body and mind_.
I will suppose in the Alps a community of Cretins,–_i.e._ deformed and helpless idiots,–but among them many from the same parents, who, in body and mind, by birth are comparatively _Napoleons_. Now, this _inequality_, physical and mental, by birth, makes it impossible that the government over these Cretins can be in their “_consent_.” _The Napoleons must rule_. The Napoleons must absolutely control their “life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness,” for the good of the community. Do you reply that I have taken an extreme case? that everybody admits sensible people must govern natural fools? Ay, sir, there is the rub. _Natural fools_! Are some men, then, “_created_” natural fools? Very well. Then you also admit that some men are _created_ just a degree above natural fools!–and, consequently, that men are “_created_” in all degrees, gradually rising in the scale of intelligence. Are they not “_created_” just above the brute, with savage natures along with mental imbecility and physical degradation? Must the Napoleons govern the Cretins without their “consent”? Must they not also govern without their “consent” these types of mankind, whether one, two, three, thirty, or three hundred degrees above the Cretins, if they are still greatly inferior by nature? Suppose the Cretins removed from the imagined community, and a colony of Australian ant-catchers or California lizard-eaters be in their stead: must not the Napoleons govern these? And, if you admit inequality to be in birth, then that inequality is the very ground of the reason why the Napoleons must govern the ant-catchers and lizard-eaters. Remove these, and put in their place an importation of African negroes. Do you admit _their inferiority by_ “CREATION?” Then the same control over them must be the irresistible fact in common sense and Scripture of God. _The Napoleons must govern_. They must govern without asking “consent,”–if the inequality be such that “_consent_” would be evil, and not good, in the family–the state.
Yea, sir, if you deny that the “Declaration” asserts “all men are created equal” in body and mind, then you admit the inequality may be such as to make it impossible that in such cases men have rights unalienable save in their “consent;” and you admit it to be impossible that government in such circumstances can exist in such “_consent_” But, if you affirm the “Declaration” _does_ mean that men are “_created_ equal” in attributes of body and mind, then you hold to an equality which God, in his word, and providence, and the natural history of man, denies to be truth.
I think I have fairly shown, from Scripture and facts, that the first averment is not the truth; and have reduced it to an absurdity. I will now regard the second, third, and fourth links of the chain.
I know they are already broken; for, the whole chain being but an electric current from a vicious imagination, I have destroyed the whole by breaking the first link. Or was it but a cluster from a poisonous vine, then I have killed the branches by cutting the vine. I will, however, expose the other three sequences by a distinct argument covering them all.
_Authority Delegated to Adam_.
God gave to Adam sovereignty over the human race, in his first decree:–“_He shall rule over thee_.” _That_ was THE INSTITUTION OF GOVERNMENT. It was not based on the “_consent_” of Eve, the governed. It was from God. He gave to Adam like authority to rule his children. It was not derived from their “_consent_”. It was from God. He gave Noah the same sovereignty, with express power over life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. It was not founded in “_consent_” of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and their wives. It was from God. He then determined the habitations of men on all the face of the earth, and _indicated_ to them, in every clime, the _form_ and _power_ of their governments. He gave, directly, government to Israel. He just as truly gave it to Idumea, to Egypt, and to Babylon, to the Arab, to the Esquimaux, the Caffre, the Hottentot, and the negro.
God, in the Bible, decides the matter. He says, “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: for he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid, for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience’ sake. For this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God’s ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. Render, therefore, to all their dues; tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor.” (Rom. xiii. 1-7.)
Here God reveals to us that he has _delegated to government his own_ RIGHT _over life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness_; and that that RIGHT is not, in any sense, from the “_consent_” of the governed, but is directly from him. Government over men, whether in the family or in the state, is, then, as directly from God as it would be if he, in visible person, ruled in the family or in the state. I speak not only of the RIGHT simply to govern, but the _mode_ of the government, and the _extent_ of the power. Government _can do_ ALL which God _would do,–just_ THAT,–_no more, no less_. And it is _bound to do just_ THAT,–_no more, no less_. Government is responsible to God, if it fails to do _just_ THAT which He himself would do. It is under responsibility, then, to rule in righteousness. It must not oppress. It must _give_ to every individual “_life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness_,” in harmony with the _good_ of the family,–the state,–_as God himself would give it_,–_just_ THAT, _no more, no less_.
This passage of Scripture settles the question, From whence has government RIGHT to rule, and what is the _extent_ of its power? The RIGHT is from God, and the EXTENT of the power is _just_ THAT to which God would exercise it if he were personally on the earth. God, in this passage, and others, settles, with equal clearness, from whence is the OBLIGATION to _submit_ to government, and what is the _extent_ of the duty of obedience? The OBLIGATION to submit is not from individual RIGHT to consent or not to consent to government,–but the OBLIGATION _to submit_ is directly from God.
The EXTENT of the duty of obedience is equally revealed–in this wise: so long as the government rules in righteousness, the duty is perfect obedience. So soon, however, as government requires _that_ which God, in his word, _forbids the subject to do_, he must obey God, and not man. He must refuse to obey man. But, inasmuch as the obligation to submit to authority of government is so great, the subject must _know_ it is the will of God, that he shall refuse to obey, before he assumes the responsibility of resistance to the powers that be. His _conscience_ will not justify him before God, if he mistakes his duty. _He may be all the more to blame for having_ SUCH A CONSCIENCE. Let him, then, be CERTAIN he can say, like Peter and John, “Whether it be right, in the sight of God, to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye.”
But, when government requires _that_ which God _does not forbid_ the subject to do, although _in that_ the government may have transcended the line of its righteous rule, the subject must, nevertheless, submit,–_until_ oppression has gone to _the point_ at which _God makes_ RESISTANCE _to be duty._ And _that point_ is when RESISTANCE will clearly be _less of evil, and more of good_, TO THE COMMUNITY, than further submission.
_That_ is the rule of _duty_ God gives to the _whole_ people, or to the _minority_, or to the _individual_, to guide them in resistance to the powers that be.
It is irresistibly _certain_ that _He who ordains_ government _has, alone, the right to alter or abolish it_,–that He who institutes the powers that be has, alone, the right to say when and how the people, in whole or in part, may resist. So, then, the people, in whole, or in part, have no right to resist, to alter, or abolish government, simply because _they_ may deem it destructive of the end for which it was instituted; but they may resist, alter, or abolish, _when it shall be seen that God so regards it_. This places the great fact where it must be placed,–_under the_ CONTROL _of the_ BIBLE _and_ PROVIDENCE.
_Illustrations_.
I will conclude with one or two illustrations. God, in his providence, ordains the Russian form of government,–_i.e._ He places the sovereignty in one man, because He sees that such government can secure, for a time, more good to that degraded people than any other form. Now, I ask, Has the emperor _right_, from God, to change at once, in his mere “_consent_,” the _form_ of his government to _that_ of the United States? No. God forbids him. Why? Because he would thereby destroy the good, and bring immense evil in his empire. I ask again, Have the Russian serfs and nobles,–yea, all,–“consenting,” the right, from God, to make that change? No. For the government of the United States is not suited to them. And, in such an attempt, they would deprive themselves of the blessings they now have, and bring all the horrors of anarchy.
Do you ask if I then hold, that God ordains the Russian type of rule to be perpetual over that people? No. The emperor is bound to secure all of “_life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness_,” to each individual, consistent with the good of the nation. And he is to learn his obligation from the Bible, and faithfully apply it to the condition of his subjects. _He will thus gradually elevate them_; while they, on their part, are bound to strive for this elevation, in all the ways in which God may show them the good, and the right, which, more and more, will belong to them in their upward progress. The result of such government and such obedience would be that of a father’s faithful training, and children’s corresponding obedience. The Russian people would thus have, gradually, that measure of liberty they could bear, under the one-man power,–and then, in other forms, as they might be qualified to realize them. This development would be without convulsion,–as the parent gives place, while the children are passing from the lower to their higher life. It would be the exemplification of Carlyle’s illustration of the snake. He says, A people should change their government only as a snake sheds his skin: the new skin is gradually formed under the old one,–and then the snake wriggles out, with just a drop of blood here and there, where the old jacket held on rather tightly.
God ordains the government of the United States. And _He places_ the _sovereignty_ in the _will_ of the majority, because He has trained the people, through many generations in modes of government, to such an elevation in moral and religious intelligence, that such sovereignty is best suited to confer on them the highest right, as yet, to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” But God requires that _that will of the majority_ be in perfect submission to Him. Once more then I inquire,–Whether the people of this country, yea all of them consenting, have right from God, to abolish now, at this time, our free institutions, and set up the sway of Russia? No. But why? There is one answer only. He tells us that our happiness is in this form of government, and in it, its developed results.
_The “Social Compact” not recognised in the Divine Institute_.
Here I pause. So, then, God gives no sanction to the notion of a SOCIAL COMPACT. He never gave to man individual, isolated, natural rights, unalienably in his keeping. He never made him a Caspar Hauser, in the forest, without name or home,–a Melchisedek, in the wilderness, without father, without mother, without descent,–a Robinson Crusoe, on his island, in skins and barefooted, waiting, among goats and parrots, the coming of the canoes and the savages, to enable him to “_consent_” if he would, to the relations of social life.
And, therefore, those five sentences in that second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence are not the truth; so, then, it is not _self-evident_ truth that all men are created equal. So, then, it is not the truth, in fact, that they are created equal. So, then, it is not the truth that God has endowed all men with unalienable right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. So, then, it is not the truth that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. So, then, it is not the truth that the people have right to alter or abolish their government, and institute a new form, whenever to them it shall seem likely to effect their safety and happiness.
The manner in which these unscriptural dogmas have been modified or developed in the United States, I will examine in another paper.
I merely add, that the opinions of revered ancestors, on these questions of right and their application to American slavery, must now, as never before, be brought to the test of the light of the Bible. F.A. Ross.
Huntsville, Ala., Jan. 1857.
Man-Stealing.
This argument on the abolition charge, against the slave-holder,–that he is a man-stealer,–covers the whole question of slavery, especially as it is seen in the Old Testament. The headings in the letter make the subject sufficiently clear.
No. III.
Rev. Albert Barnes:–
Dear Sir:–In my first letter, I merely touched some points in your tract, intending to notice them more fully in subsequent communications. I have, in my second paper, sufficiently examined the imaginary maxims of created equality and unalienable rights.
In this, I will test your views by Scripture more directly. “To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.” (Isaiah viii. 20).
The abolitionist charges the slave-holder with being a _man-stealer_. He makes this allegation in two affirmations. First, that the slave-holder is thus guilty, because, the negro having been kidnapped in Africa, therefore those who now hold him, or his children, in bondage, lie under the guilt of that first act. Secondly, that the slave-holder, by the very fact that he is such, is guilty of stealing from the negro his unalienable right to freedom.
This is the charge. It covers the whole subject. I will meet it in all its parts.
_The Difference between Man-Stealing and Slave-Holding, as set forth in the Bible_.
The Bible reads thus: (Exodus xxi. 16:)–“He that stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death.”
What, then, is it to kidnap or steal a man? Webster informs us–To kidnap is “to steal a human being, a man, woman, or child; or to seize and forcibly carry away any person whatever, from his own country or state into another.” The idea of “_seizing and forcibly carrying away”_ enters into the meaning of the word in all the definitions of law.
The crime, then, set forth in the Bible was not _selling_ a man: but selling a _stolen_ man. The crime was not having a man _in his hand as a slave_; but……in _his_ hand, as a slave, a _stolen_ man. And hence, the penalty of _death_ was affixed, not to selling, buying, or holding man, as a slave, but to the specific offence of _stealing and selling, or holding_ a man _thus stolen, contrary to this law_. Yea, it was _this law_, and this law _only_, which made it _wrong_. For, under some circumstances, God sanctioned the seizing and forcibly carrying away a man, woman, or child from country or state, into slavery or other condition. He sanctioned the utter destruction of every male and every married woman, and child, of Jabez-Gilead, and the seizure, and forcibly carrying away, four hundred virgins, unto the camp to Shiloh, and there, being given as wives to the remnant of the slaughtered tribe of Benjamin, in the rock Rimmon. Sir, how did that destruction of Jabez-Gilead, and the kidnapping of those young women, differ from the razing of an African village, and forcibly seizing, and carrying away, those not put to the sword? The difference is in this:–God commanded the Israelites to seize and bear off those young women. But he forbids the slaver to kidnap the African. Therefore, the Israelites did right; therefore, the trader does wrong. The Israelites, it seems, gave wives, in that way, to the spared Benjamites, because they had sworn not to give their daughters. But there were six hundred of these Benjamites. Two hundred were therefore still without wives. What was done for them? Why, God authorized the elders of the congregation to tell the two hundred Benjamites to catch every man his wife, of the daughters of Shiloh, when they came out to dance, in the feast of the Lord, on the north side of Bethel. And the children of Benjamin did so, and took them wives, “whom they caught:” (Judges xxi.) God made it right for those Benjamites to catch every man his wife, of the daughters of Shiloh. But he makes it wrong for the trader to catch his slaves of the sons or daughters of Africa. Lest you should try to deny that God authorized this act of the children of Israel, although I believe he did order it, let me remind you of another such case, the authority for which you will not question.
Moses, by direct command from God, destroyed the Midianites. He slew all the males, and carried away all the women and children. He then had all the married women and male children killed; but all the virgins, thirty-two thousand, were divided as spoil among the people. And _thirty-two_ of these virgins, _the Lord’s tribute_, were given unto Eleazar, the priest, “as the Lord commanded Moses.” (Numbers xxxi.)
Sir, Thomas Paine rejected the Bible on this fact among his other objections. Yea, _his_ reason, _his_ sensibilities, _his_ great law of humanity, _his_ intuitional and eternal sense of right, made it impossible for him to honor such a God. And, sir, on your now avowed principles of interpretation, which are those of Paine, you sustain him in his rejection of the books of Moses and all the word of God.
God’s command _made it right_ for Moses to destroy the Midianites and make slaves of their daughters; and I have dwelt upon these facts, to reiterate what I hold to be THE FIRST TRUTH IN MORALS:–that a thing is right, not because it is ever so _per se_, but because God _makes it right_; and, of course, a thing is wrong, not because it is so in the nature of things, but because God makes it wrong. I distinctly have taken, and do take, that ground in its widest sense, and am prepared to maintain it against all comers. He made it right for the sons of Adam to marry their sisters. He made it right for Abraham to marry his half-sister. He made it right for the patriarchs, and David and Solomon, to have more wives than one. He made it right when he gave command to kill whole nations, sparing none. He made it right when he ordered that nations, or such part as he pleased, should be spared and enslaved. He made it right that the patriarchs and the Israelites should hold slaves in harmony with the system of servile labor which had long been in the world. He merely modified that system to suit his views of good among his people. So, then, when he saw fit, they might capture men. So, then, when he forbade the individual Israelite to steal a man, he made it crime, and the penalty death. So, then, that crime was not the mere _stealing_ a man, nor the _selling_ a man, nor the _holding_ a man,–but the _stealing and selling_, or _holding_, a man _under circumstances thus forbidden of God_.
_Was the Israelite Master a Man-Stealer?_
I now ask, Did God intend to make man-stealing and slave-holding the same thing? Let us see. In that very chapter of Exodus (xxi.) which contains the law against man-stealing, and only four verses further on, God says, “If a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die under his hand, he shall be surely punished: notwithstanding, if he continue a day or two he shall not be punished; for he is his money.” (Verses 20, 21.)
Sir, that man was not a hired servant. He was bought with money. He was regarded by God _as the money_ of his master. He was his slave, in the full meaning of a slave, then, and now, bought with money. God, then, did not intend the Israelites to understand, and not one of them ever understood, from that day to this, that Jehovah in his law to Moses regarded the slave-holder as a man-stealer. Man-stealing was a specific offence, with its specific penalty. Slave-holding was one form of God’s righteous government over men,–a government he ordained, with various modifications, among the Hebrews themselves, and with sterner features in its relation to heathen slaves.
In Exodus xxi. and Leviticus xxv., various gradations of servitude were enacted, with a careful particularity which need not be misunderstood. Among these, a Hebrew man might be a slave for six years, and then go free with his wife, if he were married when he came into the relation; but if his master had given him a wife, and she had borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her children should be her master’s, and he should go out by himself. That is, the man by the law became free, while his wife and children remained slaves. If the servant, however, plainly said, “I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free: then his master brought him unto the judges, also unto the doorpost, and his master bored his ear through with an awl, and he served him forever.” (Ex. xxi. 1-6.) Sir, you have urged discussion:–give us then your views of that passage. Tell us how that man was separated from his wife and children according to _the eternal right_. Tell us what was the condition of the woman in case the man chose to “go out” without her? Tell us if the Hebrew who thus had his ear bored by his master with an awl was not a slave for life? Tell us, lastly, whether those children were not slaves? And, while on that chapter, tell us whether in the next verses, 7-11, God did not allow the Israelite father to sell his own daughter into bondage and into polygamy by the same act of sale?
I will not dwell longer on these milder forms of slavery, but read to you the clear and unmistakable command of the Lord in Leviticus xxv. 44, 46:–“Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. Moreover, of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they beget in your land: and they shall be your possession: and ye shall take them for an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession; and they shall be your bondmen forever.”
Sir, the sun will grow dim with age before that Scripture can be tortured to mean any thing else than just what it says; that God commanded the Israelites to be slave-holders in the strict and true sense over the heathen, in manner and form therein set forth. Do you tell the world that this cannot be the sense of the Bible, because it is “a violation of the first principles of the American Declaration of Independence;” because it grates upon your “instinct of liberty;” because it reveals God in opposition to the “spirit of the age;” because, if it be the sense of the passage, then “the Bible neither ought to be, nor can be, received by mankind as a divine revelation”? _That_ is what you say: _that_ is what Albert Barnes affirms in his philosophy. But what if God in his word says, “Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou shalt have shall be of the heathen that are round about you”? What if we may then choose between Albert Barnes’s philosophy and God’s truth?
Or will you say, God, under the circumstances, _permitted_ the Israelites _to sin_ in the matter of slave-holding, just as he permitted them _to sin_ by living in polygamy. _Permitted_ them _to sin!_ No, sir; God _commanded_ them to be slave-holders. He _made it_ the law of their social state. He _made it_ one form of his ordained government among them. Moreover, you take it for granted all too soon, that the Israelites committed sin in their polygamy. God sanctioned their polygamy. It was therefore not sin in them. It was right. But God now forbids polygamy, under the gospel; and now it is sin.
Or will you tell us the iniquity of the Canaanites was then full, and God’s time to punish them had come? True; but the same question comes up:–Did God punish the Canaanites by placing them in the relation of slaves to his people, by express command, which compelled them to sin? That’s the point. I will not permit you to evade it. In plainer words:–Did God command the Hebrews to make slaves of their fellow-men, to buy them and sell them, to regard them as their money? He did. Then, did the Hebrews sin when they obeyed God’s command? No. Then they did what was right, and it was right because God made it so. Then _the Hebrew slave-holder was not a man-stealer_. But, you say, the Southern slave-holder is. Well, we shall see presently.
Just here, the abolitionist who professes to respect the Scriptures is wont to tell us that the whole subject of bondage among the Israelites was so peculiar to God’s ancient dispensation, that no analogy between that bondage and Southern slavery can be brought up. Thus he attempts to raise a dust out of the Jewish institutions, to prevent people from seeing that slaveholding then was the same thing that it is now. But, to sustain my interpretation of the plain Scriptures given, I will go back five hundred years before the existence of the Hebrew nation.
I read at that time, (Gen. xiv. 14:)–“And when Abraham heard that his brother was taken captive, he armed his trained servants, born in his own house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them even unto Damascus,” &c. (Gen. xvii. 27:)–“And all the men of his house, born, in the house, and bought with the money of the stranger, were circumcised.” (Gen. xx. 14:)–“And Abimelech took sheep and oxen, and men-servants and women-servants, and gave them unto Abraham.” (Gen. xxiv. 34, 35:)–“And he said, I am Abraham’s servant; and the Lord hath blessed my master greatly, and he is become great; and he hath given him flocks and herds, and silver and gold, and men-servants and maid-servants, and camels and asses.”
_Was Abraham a Man-Stealer?_
Sir, what is the common sense of these Scriptures? Why, that the slave-trade existed in Abraham’s day, as it had long before, and has ever since, in all the regions of Syria, Palestine, Arabia, and Egypt, in which criminals and prisoners of war were sold,–in which parents sold their children. Abraham, then, it is plain, bought, of the sellers in this traffic, men-servants and maid-servants; he had them born in his house; he received them as presents.
Do you tell me that Abraham, by divine authority, made these servants part of his family, social and religious? Very good. But still he regarded them as his slaves. He took Hagar as a wife, but he treated her as his slave,–yea, as Sarah’s slave; and as such he gave her to be chastised, for misconduct, by her mistress. Yea, he never placed Ishmael, the son of the bondwoman, on a level with Isaac, the son of the freewoman. If, then, he so regarded Hagar and Ishmael, of course he never considered his other slaves on an equality with himself. True, had he been childless, he would have given his estate to Eliezer: but he would have given it to his slave. True, had Isaac not been born, he would have given his wealth to Ishmael; but he would nave given it to the son of his bondwoman. Sir, every Southern planter is not more truly a slave-holder than Abraham. And the Southern master, by divine authority, may, to-day, consider his slaves part of his social and religious family, just as Abraham did. His relation is just that of Abraham. He has slaves of an inferior type of mankind from Abraham’s bondmen; and he therefore, for that reason, as well as from the fact that they are his slaves, holds them lower than himself. But, nevertheless, he is a slave-holder in no other sense than was Abraham. Did Abraham have his slave-household circumcised? Every Southern planter may have his slave-household baptized. I baptized, not long since, a slave-child,–the master and mistress offering it to God. What was done in the parlor might be done with divine approbation on every plantation.
So, then, Abraham lived in the midst of a system of slave-holding exactly the same in nature with that in the South,–a system ordained of God as really as the other forms of government round about him. He, then, with the divine blessing, made himself the master of slaves, men, women, and children, by buying them,–by receiving them in gifts,–by having them born in his house; and he controlled them as property, just as really as the Southern master in the present day. I ask now, _was Abraham a man-stealer?_ Oh, no, you reiterate: but the Southern master is. Why?
_Is the Southern Master a Man-Stealer_?
Do you, sir, or anybody, contend that the Southern master seized his slave in Africa, and forcibly brought him away to America, contrary to law? That, and that alone, was and is kidnapping in divine and human statute. No. What then? Why, the abolitionist responds, The African man-stealer sold his victim to the slave-holder; he, to the planter; and the negro has been ever since in bondage: therefore _the guilt_ of the man-stealer has cleaved to sellers, buyers, and inheritors, to this time, and will through all generations to come. That is the charge.
And it brings up the question so often and triumphantly asked by the abolitionist; _i.e._ “You,” he says to the slave-holder,–“you admit it was wrong to steal the negro in Africa. Can the slave-holder, then, throw off wrong so long as he holds the slave at any time or anywhere thereafter?” I answer, yes; and my reply shall be short, yet conclusive. It is this:–_Guilt_, or criminality, is that state of a moral agent which results from _his_ actual commission of a crime or offence knowing it to be crime or violation of law. _That_ is the received definition of _guilt_, and _you_, I know, do accept it. The _guilt_, then, of kidnapping _terminated_ with the man-stealer, the seller, the buyer, and holders, who, knowingly and intentionally, carried on the traffic contrary to the divine law. THAT GUILT attaches in no sense whatever, as a personal, moral responsibility, to the present slave-holder. Observe, I am here discussing, _not the question of mere slave-holding,_ but whether the master, who has had nothing to do with the slave-trade, can _now_ hold the slave without the moral guilt of the man-stealer? I have said that _that_ guilt, in no sense whatever, rests upon him; for he neither stole the man, nor bought him from the kidnapper, nor had any _complicity_ in the traffic. Here, I know, the abolitionist insists that the master _is_ guilty of this _complicity_, unless he will at once emancipate the slave; because, so long as he holds him, he thereby, personally and _voluntarily, assumes the same relation which the original kidnapper or buyer held to the African_.
This is Dr. Cheever’s argument in a recent popular sermon. He thinks it unanswerable; but it has no weight whatever. It is met perfectly by adding _one_ word to his proposition. Thus:–_The master does_ NOT _assume the same relation which the original man-stealer or buyer held to the African_. The master’s _relation_ to God and to his slave is now _wholly changed_ from that of the man-stealer, and those engaged in the trade; and his obligation is wholly different. What is his relation? and what is his obligation? They are as follows:—-
The master finds himself, with no taint of personal concern in the African trade, in a Christian community of white Anglo-Americans, holding control over his black fellow-man, who is so unlike himself in complexion, in form, in other peculiarities, and so unequal to himself in attributes of body and mind, that it is _impossible, in every sense_, to place him on a level with himself in the community. _This is his relation to the negro_. What, then, does God command him to do? Does God require him to send the negro back to his heathen home from whence he was stolen? That home no longer exists. But, if it did remain, does God command the master to send his Christianized slave into the horrors of his former African heathenism? No. God has placed the master under law entirely different from his command to the slave-trader. God said to the trader, _Let the negro alone_. But he says to the present master, _Do unto the negro all the good you can; make him a civilized man; make him a Christian man; lift him up and give him all he has a right to claim in the good of the whole community_. This the master can do; this he must do, and then leave the result with the Almighty.
We reach the same conclusion by asking, What does God say to the negro-slave?
Does he tell him to ask to be sent back to heathen Africa? No. Does he give him authority to claim a created equality and unalienable right to be on a level with the white man in civil and social relations? No. To ask the first would be to ask a great evil; to claim the second is to demand a natural and moral impossibility. No. God tells him to seek none of these things. But he commands him to know the facts in his case as they are in the Bible, and have ever been, and ever will be in Providence:–that he is not the white man’s equal,–that he can never have his level–that he must not claim it; but that he can have, and ought to have, and must have, all of good, in his condition as a slave, until God may reveal a higher happiness for him in some other relation than that _he must ever_ have to the Anglo-American. The present slave-holder, then, by declining to emancipate his bondman, does not place himself in _the guilt_ of the man-stealer or of those who had complicity with him; but he stands _exactly_ in that NICK _of time and place_, in the course of Providence, where _wrong_, in the transmission of African slavery, _ends_, and _right begins_.
I have, sir, fairly stated this, your strongest argument, and fully met it. _The Southern master is not a man-stealer._ The abolitionist–repulsed in his charge that the slave-owner is a kidnapper, either in fact or by voluntarily assuming any of the relations of the traffic–then makes his impeachment on his second affirmation, mentioned at the opening of this letter. That the slave-holder is, nevertheless, thus _guilty_, because, in the simple fact of being a master, he _steals_ from the negro his unalienable right to freedom.
This, sir, looks like a new view of the subject. The crime forbidden in the Bible was stealing and selling a man; _i.e._ seizing and forcibly carrying away, from country or State, a human being–man, woman, or child–contrary to law, and selling or holding the same. But the abolitionist gives us to understand this crime rests on the slave-holder in another sense:–namely, that he steals from the negro a metaphysical attribute,–his unalienable right to liberty!
This is a new sort of kidnapping. This is, I suppose, _stealing the man from himself_, as it is sometimes elegantly expressed,–_robbing him of his body and his soul_. Sir, I admit this is a strong figure of speech, a beautiful personification, a sonorous rhetorical flourish, which must make a deep impression on Dr. Cheever’s people, Broadway, New York, and on your congregation, Washington Square, Philadelphia; but it is certainly not the Bible crime of man-stealing. And whether the Southern master is _guilty_ of this sublimated thing will be understood by us when you prove that the negro, or anybody else, has such metaphysical right to be stolen,–such transcendental liberty not in subordination to the good of the whole people. In a word, sir, this refined expression is, after all, just the old averment that the slave-holder is guilty of _sin per se!_ That’s it.
I have given you, in reply, the Old Testament. In my next, I propose to inquire what the New Testament says in the light of the _Golden Rule_.
F.A. Ross.
Huntsville, Ala., Jan. 31, 1857.
The Golden Rule.
This view of the Golden Rule is the only exposition of that great text which has ever been given in words sufficiently clear, and, with practical illustrations, to make the subject intelligible to every capacity. The explanation is the truth of God, and it settles forever the slavery question, so far as it rests on this precept of Jesus Christ.
No. IV.
Rev. Albert Barnes:–
Dear Sir:–The argument against slave-holding, founded on the Golden Rule, is the strongest which can be presented, and I admit that, if it cannot be perfectly met, the master must give the slave liberty and equality. But if it can be absolutely refuted, then the slave-holder in this regard may have a good conscience; and the abolitionist has nothing more to say. Here is the rule.
“Therefore, all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the prophets.” (Matt. vii. 12.)
In your “_Notes_,” on this passage you thus write:–“This command has been usually called the Savior’s _Golden Rule_; a name given to it on account of its great value.–_All that you_ EXPECT or DESIRE _of others, in similar circumstances_, DO TO THEM.”
This, sir, is your exposition of the Savior’s rule of right. With all due respect, I decline your interpretation. You have missed the meaning by leaving out ONE word. Observe,–you do not say, All that you OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire_, &c., THAT _do to them_. No. But you make the EXPECTATION or DESIRE, _which every man_ ACTUALLY HAS _in similar circumstances_, THE MEASURE _of his_ DUTY _to every other man_. Or, in different words, you make, without qualification or explanation, the MERE EXPECTATION or DESIRE which every man,–with no instruction, or any sort of training,–wise or simple, good or bad, heathen, Mohammedan, nominal Christian,–WOULD HAVE _in similar circumstances_, THE LAW OF OBLIGATION, _always binding_ upon him TO DO THAT SAME THING _unto his neighbor!_
Sir, you have left out _the very idea_ which contains the sense of that Scripture. It is this: Christ, in his rule, _presupposes_ that the man to whom he gives it _knows_, and from the Bible, (or providence, or natural conscience, _so far as in harmony_ with the Bible,) the _various relations_ in which God has placed him; and the _respective duties_ in those relations; _i.e._ The rule _assumes_ that he KNOWS what he OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire_ in similar circumstances.
I will test this affirmation by several and varied illustrations. I will show how Christ, according to your exposition of his rule, speaks on the subject,–of _revenge, marriage, emancipation_,–_the fugitive from bondage_. And how he truly speaks on these subjects.
_Revenge–Right according to your view of the Golden Rule_.
Indian and Missionary–Prisoner tied to a tree, stuck over with burning splinters.
Here is an Indian torturing his prisoner. The missionary approaches and beseeches him to regard _the Golden Rule_. “Humph!” utters the savage: “Golden Rule! what’s that?” “Why” says the good man, “all that you _expect_ or _desired_ other Indians, in similar circumstances, do you even so to them.” “Humph!” growls the warrior, with a fierce smile,–“Missionary–good: that’s what I do now. If I was tied to that tree, I would _expect_ and _desire him_ to have _his_ revenge,–to do to me as I do to him; and I would sing my death-song, as he sings his. Missionary, your rule is Indian rule,–good rule, missionary. Humph!” And he sticks more splinters into his victim, brandishes his tomahawk, and yells.
Sir, what has the missionary to say, after this perfect proof that you have mistaken the great law of right? Verily, he finds that the rule, with your explanation, tells the Indian to torture his prisoner. Verily, he finds that the wild man has the best of the argument. He finds he had left out the word OUGHT; and that he can’t put it in, until he teaches the Indian things which as yet he don’t know. Yea, he finds he gave the commandment too soon; for that he must begin back of that commandment, and teach the savage God’s ordination of the relations in which he is to his fellow-men, before he can make him comprehend or apply the rule as Christ gives it.
_Marriage–Void under your Interpretation of the Golden Rule_.
Lucy Stone, and Moses–Lady on sofa, having just divorced herself–Moses, with the Tables of the Law, appears: she falls at his feet, and covers her face with her hands.
This woman, everybody knows, was married some time since, after a fashion; that is to say, protesting publicly against all laws of wedlock, and entering into the relation so long only as she, or her husband, might continue pleased therewith.
Very well. Then I, without insult to her or offense to my readers, suppose that about this time she has shown her unalienable right to liberty and equality by giving her husband a bill of divorcement. Free again, she reclines on her couch, and is reading the Tribune. It is mid-day. But there is a light, above the brightness of the sun, shining round about her. And _he_, who saw God on Sinai, stands before her, the glory on his face, and the tables of stone in his hands. The woman falls before him, veils her eyes with her trembling fingers, and cries out, “Moses, oh, I believed till now that thou practised deception, in claiming to be sent of God to Israel. But now, I know thou didst see God in the burning bush, and heard him speak that law from the holy mountain. Moses, I know … I confess.”…. And Moses answers, and says unto her, “Woman, thou art one of a great class in this land, who claim to be more just than God, more pure than their Maker, who have made their inward light their God. Woman, thou in ‘_convention_’ hast uttered _Declaration of Independence_ from man. And, verily, thou hast asserted this claim to equality and unalienable right, even now, by giving thy husband his bill of divorcement, in thy sense of the Golden Rule. Yea, verily, thou hast done unto him all that thou _expectedst_ or _desiredst_ of him, in similar circumstances. And now thou thinkest thyself free again. Woman, thou art a sinner. Verily, thine inward light, and declaration of independence, and Golden Rule, do well agree the one with the other. Verily, thou hast learned of Jefferson, and Channing, and Barnes. But, woman, notwithstanding thou hast sat at the feet of these wise men, I, Moses, say thou art a sinner before the law, and the prophets, and the gospel. Woman, thy light is darkness; thy declaration of equality and right is vanity and folly; and thy Golden Rule is license to wickedness.
“Woman, hast thou ears? Hear: I, by authority of God, ordained that the man should rule over thee. I placed thee, and children, and men-servants, and maid-servants, under the same law of subjection to the government ordained of God in the family,–the state. I for a time sanctioned polygamy, and made it right. I, for the hardness of men’s hearts, allowed them, and made it right, to give their wives a bill of divorcement. Woman, hear. Paul, having the same Spirit of God, confirms my word. He commands _wives_, and children, and servants, after this manner:–‘Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord; children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing unto the Lord; servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God.’ Woman, Paul makes _that rule_ the same, and _that submission_, the same. The _manner_ of the rule he varies with the relations. He requires it to be, in the _love_ of the husband, even as Christ loved the church,–in the _mildness_ of the father, not provoking the children to anger, lest they be discouraged,–in _the justice and equity_ of the master, knowing that he also has a master in heaven: (Colossians.) Woman, hear. Paul says to thee, the man _now_ shall have one wife, and he _now_ shall not give her a bill of divorcement, save for crime. Woman, thou art not free from thy husband. Christ’s Golden Rule must not be interpreted by thee as A. Barnes has rendered it; Christ _assumes_ that thou _believest_ God’s truth,–that thou _knowest_ the relation of husband and wife, and the _obligations and rights_ of the same, _as in the Bible; then_, in the light of this _knowledge_, verily, thou art required to do what God says thou _oughtest_ to do. Woman, thou art a sinner. Go, sin no more. Go, find thy husband; see to it that he takes thee back. Go, submit to him, and honor him, and obey him.”
_Emancipation–Ruin–Golden Rule, in your meaning, carried out_.
Island in the Tropics–Elegant houses falling to decay–Broad fields abandoned to the forest–Wharves grass-grown–Negroes relapsing into the savage state–A dark cloud over the island, through which the lightning glares, revealing, in red writing, these words:–“_Redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled by the irresistible genius of universal emancipation”_.–[Gospel–according to Curran–and the British Parliament.]
Jamaica, sir, to say nothing of St. Domingo, is illustration of your theory of the Golden Rule, in negro emancipation. You tell the Southern master that all he would _expect_ or _desire_, if he were a slave, he must do unto his bondman; that he must not pause to ask whether the relation of master and slave be ordained of God or not. No. You tell him, _if_ he would _expect_ or _desire_ liberty were he a slave, _that_ settles the question as to what he is to do! He must let his bondman go free. Yea, _that_ is what you teach: because the moment you put in the word OUGHT, and say, all that you OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire_,–_i.e._ all that you _know_ God commands you to _expect _ or _desire_ in your relations to men, _as established by him,_–THAT _do to them_. Sir, when you thus explain the Golden Rule, then your argument against slave-holding, so far as founded on this rule, is at once arrested; it is stopped short, in full career; it has to wait for reinforcement of FACT, which may never come up. For, suppose the FACT to be, that the relation of master and slave is one mode of the government ordained of God. Then, sir, the master, _knowing that_ FACT, and _knowing_ what the slave, _as a slave_, OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire_, he, the master, then FULFILS THE GOLDEN RULE when he does that unto his slave which, in similar circumstances, he OUGHT to expect _to be done unto himself_. Now comes the question, OUGHT he then to _expect_ or _desire_ liberty and equality? THAT is the question of questions on this subject. And without hesitation I reply, The Golden Rule DECIDES _that question_ YEA or NAY, _absolutely_ and _perfectly_, as God’s word or providence shows that the GOOD _of the family, the community, the state_, REQUIRES that the slave IS or IS NOT _to be set free and made equal_. THAT GOOD, _as God reveals it_, SETTLES THE QUESTION.
Let the master then see to it, how he hears God’s word as to THAT GOOD. Let him see to it, how he understands God’s providence as to THAT GOOD. Let him see to it, that he makes no mistake as to THAT GOOD. For God will not hold him guiltless, if he will not hear what he tells him as to THAT GOOD. God will not justify him, if he has a bad conscience or blunders in his philosophy. God will punish him, if he fails to bless his land by letting the bond go free when, he OUGHT to emancipate. And God will punish him, if he brings a curse upon his country by freeing his slave when he OUGHT NOT to give him liberty.
So, then, _the Golden Rule does not_, OF ITSELF, _reveal to man at all what are his_ RELATIONS _to his fellow-men; but it tells him what he is to_ DO, _when he_ ALREADY KNOWS THEM.
So, then, you, sir, cannot be permitted to tell the world that this rule must emancipate all the negro slaves in the United States,–no matter how unprepared they may be,–no matter how degraded,–no matter how unlike and unequal to the white man by creation,–no matter if it be a natural and moral impossibility,–no matter: the Golden Rule must emancipate by authority of the first sentiments of the Declaration of Independence, and by obligation of the great law of liberty,–the intuitional consciousness of the eternal right!
No. The Rule, as said, _presupposes_ that he who is required to obey it does already _know_ the relations in which God has placed him, and the respective duties in those conditions. Has God, then, established the relations of husband and wife, parent and child, master and slave? Yes. Then the command comes. It says to the husband, To aid you in your known obligations to your wife,–to give you a lively sense of it,–suppose yourself to be the wife: whatsoever, therefore, you OUGHT, in that condition, to _expect_ or _desire_, that, as husband, do unto your wife. It says to the parent, Imagine yourself the child; and whatsoever, as such, you OUGHT to _expect_ or _desire, that_, as parent, do unto your child. It says to the master, Put yourself in the place of your slave; and whatsoever you OUGHT, in that condition, to _expect_ or _desire, that_, as master, do unto your slave. Let husband, parent, master, _know_ his obligations from God, and obey the Rule.
_Fugitive Slave–Obeying the Golden Rule under your version_.
Honorable Joshua R. Giddings and the Angel of the Lord–Hon. Gentleman at table–Nine runaway negroes dining with him–The Angel, uninvited, comes in and disturbs the feast.
Giddings has boasted in Congress of having had nine fugitive slaves to break bread with him at one time. I choose, then, to imagine that, during the dinner, the angel who found Hagar by the fountain stands suddenly in the midst, and says to the negroes, “Ye slaves, whence came ye, and whither will ye go?” And they answer and say, “We flee from the face of our masters. This abolitionist told us to kill, and steal, and run away from bondage; and we have murdered and stolen and escaped. He, thou seest, welcomes us to liberty and equality. We _expect_ and _desire_ to be members of Congress, Governors of States, to marry among the great, and one of us to be President. Giddings, and all abolitionists, tell us that these honors belong to us equally as to white people, and will be given under the Golden Rule.” And the angel of the Lord says to them, “Ye slaves, return unto your masters, and submit yourselves under their hands. I sent your fathers, and I send you, into bondage. I mean it unto good, and I will bring it to pass to save much people alive.” Then, turning to the tempter, he says, “Thou, a statesman! thou, a reader of my word and providence! why hast thou not understood my speech to Hagar? I gave her, a slave, to Sarah. She fled from her mistress. I sent her back. Why hast thou not understood my word four thousand years ago,–that _the slave shall not flee from his master?_ Why hast thou also perverted my law in Deuteronomy, (xxiii. 15, 16?) I say therein, ‘Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the servant which is escaped from his master unto thee: he shall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place which he shall choose, in one of thy gates where it liketh him best: thou shalt not oppress him.’ Why hast thou not known that I meant the _heathen slave_ who escaped from his _heathen master?_ I commanded, Israel, in such case, not to hold _him_ in bondage. I made this specific law for this specific fact. Why hast thou taught that, in this commandment, I gave license to all men-servants and maid-servants in the whole land of Israel to run away from their masters? Why hast thou thus made me, in one saying, contradict and make void all my laws wherein I ordained that the Hebrews should be slave-owners over their brethren during years, and over the heathen forever? Why hast thou in all this changed my Golden Rule? I, in that rule, _assume_ that men _know_ from revelation and providence the relations in which I have placed them, and their duties therein. I then command them to do unto others what they thus _know_ they _ought_ to do unto them in these relations; and I make the obligation quick and powerful, by telling every man to imagine himself in such conditions, and then he will _the better_ KNOW ‘_whatsoever_’ he should do unto his neighbor. Why hast thou made void my law, by making me say, ‘All that thou _expectest_ or _desirest_ of others, in similar circumstances, do to them’? I never imagined to give such license to folly and sin. Why hast thou imagined such license to iniquity? Verily, thou tempter, thou hast in thy Golden Rule made these slaves thieves and murderers, and art now eating with them the bread of sin and death.
“Why hast thou tortured my speech wherein I say that I have made of _one blood_ all nations of men, to mean that I have created all men equal and endowed them with rights unalienable save in their consent? I never said that thing! I said that I made all men to descend from _one parentage!_ That is what I say in that place! Why hast thou tortured that plain truth? Thou mightest as well teach that all ‘the moving creatures that have life, and fowl that fly above the earth, in the open firmament of heaven,’ are _created equal_, because I said I brought them forth _of the water_. Thou mightest as well say that ‘all cattle, and creeping thing and beast of the earth, _are created equal_, because I said I brought them forth _of the earth_, as to affirm the _equality of men_ because I say they are _of one blood_. Nay, I have made men unequal as the leaves of the trees, the sands of the sea, the stars of heaven. I have made them so, in harmony with the infinite variety and inequality in every thing in my creation. And I have made them unequal in my _mercy_. Had I made all men equal in attributes of body and mind, then _unfallen man_ would never have realized the varied glories of his destiny. And had I given _fallen man_ equality of nature and unalienable rights, then I had made the earth an Aceldama and Valley of Gehenna. For what would be the _strife_ in all the earth among men equal in body and mind, equal in power, equal in depravity, equal in will, each one maintaining rights unalienable? When would the war end? Who would be the victors where all are giants? Who would sue for peace where none will submit? What would be _human social life?_ Who would be the weak, the loving? Who would seek or need forbearance, compassion, self-denying benevolence? Who would be the grateful? Who would be the humble, the meek? What would be _human_ virtue, what _human_ vice, what _human_ joy or sorrow? Nay, I have made men _unequal_ and given them _alienable rights_, that I might INSTITUTE HUMAN GOVERNMENT and reveal HUMAN CHARACTER.
“Why hast thou been willingly ignorant of these first principles of the oracles of God, which would have made thee truly a Christian philosopher and statesman?”
_Fugitive Slave–Obeying the Golden Rule as Christ gave it_
Rev. A. Barnes and the Apostle Paul–Minister of the gospel in his study–Fugitive slave, converted under his preaching, inquiring whether it is not his duty to return to his master–Paul appears and rebukes the minister for wresting his Gospel.
With all respect and affection for you, sir, I imagine a slave, having run away from his master and become a Christian under your preaching, might, with the Bible in his hands and the Holy Spirit in his heart, have, despite your training, question of conscience, whether he did right to leave his master, and ought not to go back. And I think how Paul would listen, and what he would say, to your interpretation of his Epistle to Philemon. I think he would say,–
“I withstand thee to thy face, because thou art to be blamed. Why hast thou written, in thy ‘_Notes_,’ that the word I apply to Onesimus may mean, not _slave_, but _hired servant?_ Why hast thou said this in unsupported assertion? Why hast thou given no respect to Robinson, and all thy wise men, who agree that the word wherein I express Onesimus’s relation to Philemon never means a hired servant, but a _slave_,–the property of his master,–a living possession?
“Why hast thou called in question the fact that Philemon was a slave-holder? Why hast thou taught that, if he was a slave-holder when he became a Christian, he could not _continue, consistently_, to be a slave-owner and a Christian,–that if he did so _continue_, he would not be in _good standing_, but an _offender_ in the church? (See Notes.)
“I say Philemon was the master of Onesimus, in the real sense of a slave-owner, under Roman law, in which he had the right of life and death over him,–being thereby a master in possession of power unknown in the United States. And yet I call Philemon ‘our dearly beloved and fellow-laborer,’ I tell him that I send to him again Onesimus, who had been unprofitable to him in time past; but now, being a Christian, he would be profitable. I tell him, I send him again, not a slave, (only,) but above a slave, a Christian brother, beloved, specially to me, but how much more unto him, both _in the flesh_ and in the Lord. Dost thou know, Albert Barnes, what I mean by that word, _in the flesh?_ Verily, I knew the things wherein the master and the slave are beloved, the one of the other, in the best affections of human nature, and in the Lord! therefore I say to Philemon that he, _as master_, could receive Onesimus _as his slave_, and yet as a _brother_, MORE _beloved, by reason of his relation to him as master_, than I could regard him! Yea, verily,–and I say to thee, Albert Barnes, thou hast never been in the South, and thou dost not understand, and canst not understand, the force, or even the meaning, of my words _in the flesh_; i.e. _in the love of the master and the slave to one another_. But Philemon I knew would feel its power, and so I made that appeal to him.
“Why hast thou said, that I did not send Onesimus back _by authority?_ I did send him back by authority,–yea, by authority of the Lord Jesus Christ? For it was my duty to send him again to Philemon, whether he had been willing to go or not; and it was his duty to go. But he was willing. So we both felt our obligations; and, when I commanded, he cheerfully obeyed. What else was my duty and his? Had I not said, in line upon line and in precept upon precept, ‘Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eye-service, as men-pleasers, but in singleness of heart, pleasing God’? (Coloss. iii. 22.) Had not Peter written, ‘Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward’? (1 Pet. ii. 18.) Onesimus had broken these commandments when he fled from his master. Was it not then of my responsibility to send him again to Philemon? And was it not Christ’s law to him to return and submit himself under his master’s hand?
“Why, then, hast thou not understood my speech? Has it been even because thou couldst not _hear_ my word? What else has hindered? What more could I have said, than (in 1 Tim. vi. 1-5) I do say, to rebuke all abolitionists? Yea, I describe them–I show their principles–as fully as if I had called them by name in Boston, in New York, in Philadelphia, and said they would live in 1857.
“And yet thou hast, in thy commentary on my letter to Timothy, utterly distorted, maimed, and falsified my meaning. Thou hast mingled truth and untruth so together as to make me say what was not and is not in my mind. For thou teachest the slave, while professing not so to teach him, that I tell him that he is _not_ to count his master worthy of all honor; that he _is_ to _despise_ him; that he is _not_ to do him service as to a Christian faithful and beloved. _No_. But thou teachest the slave, in my name, to regard his Christian master an _offender_ in the sight of Christ, if he _continues_ a slave-owner.
“Thou tellest him to obey _only_ in the sense in which he is to submit to injustice, oppression, and cruelty; and that he is ever to seek to throw off the yoke in his created equality and unalienable right to liberty. (See Notes.)
“This is what thou hast taught as my gospel. But I commanded thee to teach and exhort _just the contrary_. I commanded thee to say after this way:–‘Let as many servants as are under the yoke, count their own masters worthy of all honor, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed. And they that have believing masters, let them not despise them, because they are brethren; but rather do them service, because they are faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit. These things teach and exhort.’
“Thou, in thy ‘Notes,’ art compelled, though most unwillingly, to confess that I do mean _slaves_ in this place, in the full and proper sense; yea, slaves under the Roman law. Good. Then do I here tell slaves to count their masters, even when not Christians, worthy of all honor; and, when Christians, to regard them as faithful and beloved, and not to despise them, and to do them service? Yet, after all this, do I say to these same slaves that they have a created equality and unalienable right to liberty, under which, whenever they think fit, I command them to dishonor their masters, despise them, and run away! Sir, I did never so instruct slaves; nay, I did never command thee so to teach them. But I did and do exhort thee not so to train them; for I said then and say now to thee, ‘If any man teach [slaves] otherwise, [than to honor their masters as faithful and beloved, and to do them service,] and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of the Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness, he is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and DESTITUTE OF THE TRUTH, supposing that gain is godliness; from such withdraw thyself,’
“What more could I have said to the abolitionists of my day? What more can I say to them in this day? _That_ which was true of them two thousand years ago, is true now. I rebuked abolitionists then, and I rebuke them now. I tell them the things in their hearts,–the things on their tongues,–the things in their hands,–are contrary to wholesome words, even the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. Canst thou _hear_ my words in this place without feeling how faithfully I have given the head, and the heart, and the words, and the doings of the men, from whom thou hast not withdrawn thyself?
“Verily, thou canst not _hear_ my speech, and therefore thou canst not interpret my gospel. Thou believest it is impossible that I sanction slavery! Hence it is impossible for thee to understand my words: for I do sanction slavery. How? Thus:–
“I found slavery in Asia, in Greece, in Rome. I saw it to be one mode of the government ordained of God. I regarded it, in most conditions of fallen mankind, necessarily and irresistibly part of such government, and therefore as natural, as wise, as good, in such conditions, as the other ways men are ruled in the state or the family.
“I took up slavery, then, as such ordained government,–wise, good, yea best, in certain circumstances, until, in the elevating spirit and power of my gospel, the slave is made fit for the liberty and equality of his master, if he can be so lifted up. Hence I make the RULE of magistrate, subject, master and servant, parent and child, husband and wife, THE SAME RULE; _i.e._ I make it THE SAME RIGHT in the _superior_ to control the _obedience_ and the _service_ of the _inferior_, bound to obey, whatever the difference in the relations and service to be rendered. Yea, I give _exactly the same command_ to all in these relations; and thus, in all my words, I make it plainly to be understood that I regard slavery to be as righteous a mode of government as that of magistrate and subject, parent and child, husband and wife, during the circumstances and times in which God is pleased to have it continue. I saw all the injustice, the oppression, the cruelty, masters might be guilty of, and were and are now guilty of; but I saw no more injustice, oppression, and cruelty, in the relation of master and slave, than I saw in all other forms of rule,–even in that of husband and wife, parent and child. In my gospel I condemn wrong in all these states of life, while I fully sanction and sustain the relations themselves. I tell the magistrate, husband, father, master, how to rule; I tell the subject, wife, child, servant, how to submit. Hence, I command the slave not to flee from bondage, just as I require the subject, the wife, the child, not to resist or flee from obedience. I warn the slave, if he leaves his master he has sinned, and must return; and I make it the duty of all men to see to it, that _he shall go back_. Hence, I myself did what I command others to do: I sent Onesimus back to his master.
“Thus I sanction slavery everywhere in the New Testament. But it is impossible for thee, with thy principles,–thy law of reason,–thy law of created equality and unalienable right,–thy elevation of the Declaration of Independence above the ordinance of God,–to sustain slavery. Nay, it is impossible for thee, with thy interpretation of Christ’s Golden Rule, to recognise the system of servile labor; nay, it is impossible for thee to tell _this_ slave to return to his master as I sent Onesimus back; nay, thou art guarded by thy Golden Rule. Thou tellest him that, if thou hadst been in his place, thou wouldst have _expected, desired_ freedom, that thou wouldst have run away, and that thou wouldst not now return; that thou wouldst have regarded thy created equality and unalienable right as thy supreme law, and have disregarded and scorned all other obligations as _pretended revelation from God_. Therefore thou now doest unto him ‘_whatsoever_’ thou wouldst _expect_ or _desire_ him to do unto thee in similar circumstances; _i.e._ thou tellest him he did right to run away, and will do right not to return! This is thy Golden Rule. But I did not instruct thee so to learn Christ. Nay, this slave knows thou hast not not given him the mind of Christ; nay, he knows that Christ commands thee to send him to his master again. And thus do what thou OUGHTEST to _expect_ or _desire_ in similar circumstances; yea, _do_ now _thy duty_, and this slave, like Onesimus, will bless thee for giving him a good conscience whenever he will return to his obedience. Thus Paul, the aged, speaks to thee.”
So, then, the Golden Rule is the whole Bible; yea, Christ says it is-“the law and the prophets;” yea, it is the Old Testament and the New condensed; and with ever-increasing glory of Providence in one sublime aphorism, which can be understood and obeyed only by those who _know_ what the Bible, or Providence, reveals as to man’s varied conditions and his obligations therein.
I think, sir, I have refuted your interpretation of the Golden Rule, and have given its true meaning.
The slave-holder, then, may have a good conscience under this commandment. Let him so exercise himself as to have a conscience void of offence towards God and towards men.
Yours, &c. F.A. Ross.
Conclusion.
I intended to, and may yet, in a subsequent edition, write two more letters to A. Barnes. The _one_, to show how infidelity has been passing off from the South to the North,–especially since the _Christian death_ of Jackson; the other, to meet Mr. Barnes’s argument founded on the spirit of the age.
The End.