OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED.
"Cursed be Canaan, a servant of servants shall he be," etc. Gen.
ix. 25
"For he is his money," Examination of, Ex. xxi. 20, 21
"Bondmen and bondmaids" bought of the heathen. Lev. xxv. 44-46
"They shall be your bondmen forever." Lev. xxv. 46
"Ye shall take them as an inheritance," etc. Lev. xxv. 46
The Israelite to serve as a hired servant. Lev. xxv. 39, 40
Difference between bought and hired servants
Bought servants the most privileged cla.s.s
Summary of the different cla.s.ses of servants
Disabilities of the servants from the heathen
Examination of Exodus xxi. 2-6
The Canaanites not sentenced to unconditional extermination
INQUIRY, &c.
The spirit of slavery never takes refuge in the Bible _of its own accord._ The horns of the altar are its last resort. It seizes them, if at all, only in desperation--rushing from the terror of the avenger"s arm. Like other unclean spirits, it "hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest its deeds should be reproved." Goaded to phrenzy in its conflicts with conscience and common sense, denied all quarter, and hunted from every covert, it breaks at last into the sacred enclosure, and courses up and down the Bible, "seeking rest, and finding none." THE LAW OF LOVE, streaming from every page, flashes around it an omnipresent anguish and despair. It shrinks from the hated light, and howls under the consuming touch, as demons recoiled from the Son of G.o.d, and shrieked, "Torment us not." At last, it slinks away among the shadows of the Mosaic system, and thinks to burrow out of sight among its types and shadows. Vain hope! Its asylum is its sepulchre; its city of refuge, the city of destruction. It rushes from light into the sun; from heat, into devouring fire; and from the voice of G.o.d into the thickest of His thunders.
DEFINITION OF SLAVERY.
If we would know whether the Bible is the charter of slavery, we must first determine _just what slavery is_. The thing itself must be separated from its appendages. A const.i.tuent element is one thing; a relation another; an appendage another. Relations and appendages presuppose _other_ things, of which there are relations and appendages.
To regard them as _the things_ to which they pertain, or as const.i.tuent parts of them, leads to endless fallacies. A great variety of conditions, relations, and tenures, indispensable to the social state, are confounded with slavery; and thus slaveholding is deemed quite harmless, if not virtuous. We will specify some of the things which are often confounded with slavery.
1. _Privation of the right of suffrage_. Then _minors_ are slaves.
2. _Ineligibility to office_. Then _females_ are slaves.
3. _Taxation without representation_. Then three-fourths of the people of Rhode Island are slaves, and _all_ in the District of Columbia.
4. _Privation of one"s oath in law_. Then the _free_ colored people of Ohio are slaves. So are disbelievers in a future retribution, generally.
5. _Privation of trial by jury_. Then all in France and Germany are slaves.
6. _Being required to support a particular religion_. Then the people of England are slaves. [To the preceding may be added all other disabilities, merely political.]
7. _Cruelty and oppression_. Wives are often cruelly treated; hired domestics are often oppressed; but these forms of oppression are not slavery.
8. _Apprenticeship_. The rights and duties of master and apprentice are correlative and reciprocal. The _claim_ of each upon the other results from the _obligation_ of each to the other. Apprenticeship is based on the principle of equivalent for value received. The rights of the apprentice are secured, and his interests are promoted equally with those of the master. Indeed, while the law of apprenticeship is _just_ to the master, it is _benevolent_ to the apprentice. Its main design is rather to benefit the apprentice than the master. It _promotes_ the interests of the former, while it guards from injury those of the latter in doing it. It secures to the master a mere legal compensation, while it secures to the apprentice both a legal compensation, and a virtual gratuity in addition, the apprentice being of the two decidedly the greatest gainer. The law not only recognizes the _right_ of the apprentice to a reward for his labor, but appoints the wages, and enforces the payment. The master"s claim covers only the _services_ of the apprentice. The apprentice"s claim covers _equally_ the services of the master. The master cannot hold the apprentice as property, nor the apprentice the master; but each holds property in the services of the other, and BOTH EQUALLY. Is this slavery?
9. _Filial subordination and parental claims_. Both are nature"s dictates, and indispensable to the existence of the social state; their _design_ the promotion of mutual welfare; and the _means_, those natural affections created by the relation of parent and child, and blending them in one by irrepressible affinities; and thus, while exciting each to discharge those offices incidental to the relation, they const.i.tute a shield for mutual protection. The parent"s legal claim to the services of his children, while minors, is a slight boon for the care and toil of their rearing, to say nothing of outlays for support and education. This provision for the good of the _whole_, is, with the greater part of mankind, indispensable to the preservation of the family state. The child, in helping his parents, helps himself--increases a common stock, in which he has a share; while his most faithful services do but acknowledge a debt that money cannot cancel.
10. _Bondage for crime, or governmental claims on criminals._ Must innocence be punished because guilt suffers penalties? True, the criminal works for the government without pay; and well he may. He owes the government. A century"s work would not pay its drafts on him. He is a public defaulter, and will die so. Because laws make men pay their debts, shall those be forced to pay who _owe nothing?_ Besides, the law makes no criminal, PROPERTY. It restrains his liberty; it makes him pay something, a mere penny in the pound, of his debt to the government; but it does not make him a _chattel_. Test it. To own property is to own its product. Are children born of convicts government property? Besides, can _property_ be _guilty_? Are _chattels_ punished?
11. _Restrictions upon freedom._ Children are restrained by parents, wards by guardians, pupils by teachers, patients by physicians and nurses, corporations by charters, and legislators by const.i.tutions.
Embargoes, tariffs, quarantine, and all other laws, keep men from doing as they please. Restraints are the web of civilized society, warp and woof. Are they slavery? then civilized society is a mammoth slave--a government of LAW, _the climax of slavery_, and its executive a king among slaveholders.
12. _Involuntary or compulsory service_. A juryman is empannelled _against his will_, and sit he _must_. A sheriff orders his posse; bystanders _must_ turn in. Men are _compelled_ to remove nuisances, pay fines and taxes, support their families, and "turn to the right as the law directs," however much _against their wills_. Are they therefore slaves? To confound slavery with involuntary service is absurd. Slavery is a _condition_. The slave"s _feelings_ toward it, are one thing; the condition itself, the object of these feelings, is _another_ thing; his feelings cannot alter the nature of that condition. Whether he _desire_ or _detest_ it, the _condition_ remains the same. The slave"s _willingness_ to be a slave is no palliation of his master"s guilt in holding him. Suppose the slave verily thinks himself a chattel, and consents that others may so regard him, does that _make_ him a chattel, or make those guiltless who _hold_ him as such? I may be sick of life, and I tell the a.s.sa.s.sin so that stabs me; is he any the less a murderer because I _consent_ to be made a corpse? Does my partnership in his guilt blot out his part of it? If the slave were willing to be a slave, his _voluntariness_, so far from _lessening_ the guilt of the "owner,"
_aggravates_ it. If slavery has so palsied his mind and he looks upon himself as a chattel, and consents to be one, actually _to hold him as such_, falls in with his delusion, and confirms the impious falsehood.
_These very feelings and convictions of the slave_, (if such were possible) increase a hundred fold the guilt of the master in holding him as property, and call upon him in thunder, immediately to recognize him as a MAN, and thus break the sorcery that binds his soul, cheating it of its birth-right, and the consciousness of its worth and destiny.
Many of the foregoing conditions and relations are _appendages_ of slavery, and some of them inseparable from it. But no one, nor all of them together, const.i.tute its _intrinsic unchanging element_.
We proceed to state affirmatively that,
ENSLAVING MEN IS REDUCING THEM TO ARTICLES OF PROPERTY, making free agents chattels, converting _persons_ into _things_, sinking intelligence, accountability, immortality, into _merchandise_. A _slave_ is one held in this condition. He is a mere tool for another"s use and benefit. In law "he owns nothing, and can acquire nothing." _His right to himself is abrogated._ He is another"s property. If he say _my_ hands, _my_ feet, _my_ body, _my_ mind, MY_self_; they are figures of speech. To _use himself_ for his own good is a CRIME. To keep what he _earns_ is stealing. To take his body into his own keeping is _insurrection_. In a word, the> _profit_ of his master is the END of his being, and he, a _mere means_ to that end, a _mere means_ to an end into which his interests do not enter, of which they const.i.tute no portion[A]. MAN sunk to a _thing_! the intrinsic element, the _principle_ of slavery; MEN sold, bartered, leased, mortgaged, bequeathed, invoiced, shipped in cargoes, stored as goods, taken on executions, and knocked off at public outcry! Their _rights_ another"s conveniences, their interests, wares on sale, their happiness, a household utensil; their personal inalienable ownership, a serviceable article, or plaything, as best suits the humor of the hour; their deathless nature, conscience, social affections, sympathies, hopes, marketable commodities! We repeat it, _the reduction of persons to things_; not robbing a man of privileges, but of _himself_; not loading with burdens, but making him a _beast of burden_; not _restraining_ liberty, but subverting it; not curtailing rights, but abolishing them; not inflicting personal cruelty, but annihilating _personality_; not exacting involuntary labor, but sinking him into an _implement_ of labor; not abridging his human comforts, but abrogating his _human nature_; not depriving an animal of immunities, but _despoiling a rational being of attributes_, uncreating a MAN to make room for a _thing_!
[Footnote A: Whatever system sinks man from an END to a _means_, or in other words, whatever transforms him from an object of instrumentality into a mere instrumentality _to_ an object, just so far makes him a _slave_. Hence West India apprenticeship retains in _one_ particular the cardinal principle of slavery. The apprentice, during three-fourths of his time, is still forced to labor, and robbed of his earnings; just so far forth he is a _mere means_, a _slave_. True, in all other respects slavery is abolished in the British West Indies. Its bloodiest features are blotted out--but the meanest and most despicable of all--forcing the poor to work for the rich without pay three-fourths of their time, with a legal officer to flog them if they demur at the outrage, is one of the provisions of the "Emanc.i.p.ation Act!" For the glories of that luminary, abolitionists thank G.o.d, while they mourn that it rose behind clouds, and shines through an eclipse.]
That this is American slavery, is shown by the laws of slave states.
Judge Stroud, in his "Sketch of the Laws relating to Slavery," says, "The cardinal principle of slavery, that the slave is not to be ranked among sentient beings, but among _things_--is an article of property, a chattel personal, obtains as undoubted law in all of these states," (the slave states.) The law of South Carolina thus lays down the principle, "Slaves shall be deemed, held, taken, reputed, and adjudged in law to be _chattels personal_ in the hands of their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators, and a.s.signs, to ALL INTENTS, CONSTRUCTIONS, AND PURPOSES WHATSOEVER." Brevard"s Digest, 229. In Louisiana, "a slave is one who is in the power of a master to whom he _belongs_; the master may sell him, dispose of his _person, his industry, and his labor_; he can do nothing, possess nothing, nor acquire any thing, but what must belong to his master." Civil Code of Louisiana, Art. 35.
This is American slavery. The eternal distinction between a person and a thing, trampled under foot--the crowning distinction of all others--their centre and circ.u.mference--the source, the test, and the measure of their value--the rational, immortal principle, embalmed by G.o.d in everlasting remembrance, consecrated to universal homage in a baptism of glory and honor, by the gift of His Son, His Spirit, His Word, His presence, providence, and power; His protecting shield, upholding staff, and sheltering wing; His opening heavens, and angels ministering, and chariots of fire, and songs of morning stars, and a great voice in heaven, proclaiming eternal sanctions, and confirming the word with signs following.
Having stated the _principle_ of American slavery, we ask, DOES THE BIBLE SANCTION SUCH A PRINCIPLE?[A][A]? To the _law_ and the _testimony_. First, the moral law, or the ten commandments. Just after the Israelites were emanc.i.p.ated from their bondage in Egypt, while they stood before Sinai to receive the law, as the trumpet waxed louder, and the mount quaked and blazed, G.o.d spake the ten commandments from the midst of clouds and thunderings. _Two_ of those commandments deal death to slavery. Look at the eighth, "_Thou shall not steal_," or, thou shalt not take from another what belongs to him. All man"s powers of body and mind are G.o.d"s gift to _him_. That they are _his own_, and that he has a right to them, is proved from the fact that G.o.d has given them to _him alone_, that each of them is a part of _himself_, and all of them together _const.i.tute_ himself. All _else_ that belongs to man is acquired by the _use_ of these powers. The _interest_ belongs to him, because the _princ.i.p.al_ does--the product is his, because he is the _producer_. Ownership of any thing is ownership of its _use_. The right to use according to will, is _itself_ ownership. The eighth commandment _presupposes and a.s.sumes the right of every man to his powers, and their product._ Slavery robs of both. A man"s right to himself is the only right absolutely original and intrinsic--his right to whatever else that belongs to him is merely _relative_ to his right to himself--is derived from it, and held only by virtue of it. SELF-RIGHT is the _foundation right_--the _post in the middle_, to which all other rights are fastened. Slaveholders, the world over, when talking about their RIGHT to their slaves, always a.s.sume _their own right to themselves_. What slaveholder ever undertook to prove his own right to himself? He knows it to be a self-evident proposition, that _a man belongs to himself_--that the right is intrinsic and absolute. The slaveholder, in making out his own t.i.tle to himself, makes out the t.i.tle of every human being to _himself_. As the fact of being _a man_ is itself the t.i.tle, the whole human family have one common t.i.tle deed. If _one_ man"s t.i.tle is valid, _all_ are valid. If one is worthless, all are. To deny the validity of the _slave"s_ t.i.tle is to deny the validity of _his own_; and yet in the act of making him a slave, the slaveholder _a.s.serts_ the validity of his own t.i.tle, while he seizes _him_ as his property who has the _same_ t.i.tle. Further, in making him a slave, he does not merely unhumanize _one_ individual, but UNIVERSAL MAN. He destroys the foundations. He annihilates _all rights_. He attacks not only the human race, but _universal being_, and rushes upon JEHOVAH.--For rights are _rights_; G.o.d"s are no more--man"s are no less.
[Footnote A: The Bible record of actions is no comment on their moral character. It vouches for them as _facts_, not as _virtues_. It records without rebuke, Noah"s drunkenness, Lot"s incest, and the lies of Jacob and his mother--not only single acts, but _usages_, such as polygamy and concubinage, are entered on the record without censure. Is that _silent entry_ G.o.d"s _endors.e.m.e.nt_? Because the Bible, in its catalogue of human actions, does not stamp on every crime its name and number, and write against it, _this is a crime_--does that wash out its guilt, and bleach it into a virtue?]
The eighth commandment forbids the taking of _any_ part of that which belongs to another. Slavery takes the _whole_. Does the same Bible which forbids the taking of _any_ thing belonging to him, sanction the taking of _every_ thing? Is it such a medley of absurdities as to thunder wrath against him who robs his neighbor of a _cent_, while it bids G.o.d speed to him who robs his neighbor of _himself_? Slavery is the highest possible violation of the eighth commandment. To take from a man his earnings, is theft. But to take the _earner_, is compound, superlative, perpetual theft. It is to be a thief by profession. It is a trade, a life of robbery, that vaults through all the gradations of the climax at a leap--the dread, terrific, giant robbery, that towers among other robberies, a solitary horror, monarch of the realm. The eighth commandment forbids the taking away, and the _tenth_ adds, "_Thou shalt not COVET any thing that is thy neighbor"s_;" thus guarding every man"s right to himself and his property, by making not only the actual taking away a sin, but even that state of mind which would _tempt_ to it. Who ever made human beings slaves, or held them as slaves without _coveting_ them? Why do they take from them their time, their labor, their liberty, their right of self-preservation and improvement, their right to acquire property, to worship according to conscience, to search the Scriptures, to live with their families, and their right to their own bodies? Why do they _take_ them, if they do not _desire_ them? They COVET them for purposes of gain, convenience, l.u.s.t of dominion, of sensual gratification, of pride and ostentation. _They break the tenth commandment_, and pluck down upon their heads the plagues that are written in the book. _Ten_ commandments const.i.tute the brief compend of human duty. _Two_ of these brand slavery as sin.
The giving of the law at Sinai, immediately preceded the promulgation of that body of laws and inst.i.tutions, called the "Mosaic system." Over the gateway of that system, fearful words were written by the finger of G.o.d--"HE THAT STEALETH A MAN AND SELLETH HIM, OR IF HE BE FOUND IN HIS HAND, HE SHALL SURELY BE PUT TO DEATH." See Exodus, xxi. 16.
The oppression of the Israelites in Egypt, and the wonders wrought for their deliverance, proclaim the reason for _such_ a law at _such_ a time--when the body politic became a theocracy, and reverently waited for the will of G.o.d. They had just been emanc.i.p.ated. The tragedies of their house of bondage were the realities of yesterday, and peopled their memories with thronging horrors. They had just witnessed G.o.d"s testimony against oppression in the plagues of Egypt--the burning blains on man and beast--the dust quickened into loathsome life, and cleaving in swarms to every living thing--the streets, the palaces, the temples, and every house heaped up with the carca.s.ses of things abhorred--even the kneading troughs and ovens, the secret chambers and the couches, reeking and dissolving with the putrid death--the pestilence walking in darkness at noonday, the devouring locusts and hail mingled with fire, the first-born death-struck, and the waters blood, and, last of all, that dread high hand and stretched out arm, that whelmed the monarch and his hosts, and strewed their corpses in the sea. All this their eyes had looked upon,--earth"s proudest city, wasted and thunder-scarred, lying in desolation, and the doom of oppressors traced on her ruins in the hand writing of G.o.d, glaring in letters of fire mingled with blood--a blackened monument of wrath to the uttermost against the stealers of men.
No wonder that G.o.d, in a code of laws prepared for such a people at such a time, should light up on its threshold a blazing beacon to flash terror on slaveholders. "_He that stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall be surely put to death_." Ex. xxii.