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i} Y Joseph Cltsby.
PALLY telegraph.
ABOLITIONISM :
lT g CHARACTER and influence.
J SRRMOX preached by Ret. Henry J. Van
!, in the W Presbyterian Church of
p, Sunday Evening, Dec. 9, 1860.
The First Presbyterian church, corner
Reinsen and Clinton streets, Brooklyn,
«•densely crowded last evening with a
I .rhlv intelligent congregation, who lis
.. ’ 4 with marked interest ami attention to
a discourse from their pastor, Rev. Henry
i. Van Dyke, on the Character and Influ
t ticeot Alfcditionisin from a scriptural point
■ view. In his opening supplication the
reverend gentleman prayed that Providence
would Meis our Southern brethren and res
train the progress of discontent among them
,t o, . 11l ,s!or might he made Christ’s ser
v.oit, and the servant Chris’t freeman, ami
_ ! pl ;h - r united ill Christian love
. o )( t church founded by Christ and His
\ „istL s in which there is neither Greek
. r J.-w, male nor female, bond nor free 4
til all are one in Christ Jesus. He also
,v< d tliatG >1 would bless the people o!
\ nhern States, restrain tin' violence
• ft , l ie ii men, provide lor those who, by
t , j -ati >n of the times have been thrown
• , mplovment, keep the speaker him
v -in teaching anything which was not
. .fdanee with the Divine will, and
the minds of his hearers of all
. c ami passion, so that they might
■„ uilluu! to be convinced of the truth.
|| x t( \t was chosen from Paul’s First
I ,; Mie to Timothy, sixth chapter, from the
f ir >t to tin- fifth verse, inclusive :
■ l.t*< many servants as are under the yoke count
"eir owu’iiarK-r- worthy of all honor, that the name
,f < and hi- do. trine tx- not blasphemed.
4 th. • th »t have b.di.-ving master- let them not
- 'hem >«■..ui-ethev are brethren; hut rather do
-
1 K..r. of th‘benefit The-e things teach and exhort.
if mm '. i it otherwise and consent not to
‘ vLe .l- even the words of our Lord Jesus
<. ' n'.d to the do< trine which is according to godli-
’4 ' H >- proud, knowing nothing but doting about
Ind te of word- whereof cometh envy
evil
-p, . , dirputiugr of men of corrupt mind®, and
It ■ <>f the truth, -tippo-fng that gain is godliness:
from such withdraw thyself.
[ f • p ..so, he said, to discuss the charac
ter and influence of abolitionism. With
th- tiew 1 have selected a text from the
Bible, and purpose to adhere to the letter
and -p.rit of its teaching. We acknowl
. in this place but one standard of mor
als, but one authoritative and infallible rule
; Luili and practice. Fur we are Christians
. • ; not Baptists to bow’ down to the dic
t.i .a of any man or church ; not heathen
I .- g.hers to grope our way by the feeble
g.uiiin ‘rings of the light of nature, not mod
: nil !. Is, to appeal from the written law
• I. iio the corrupt and fickle tribunal of
>.-i and humanity ; but Christians, on
w -• banner is inscribed this sublime
■luien.n —"To the law and to the testimo
ny” Il they speak not according to this
w ,r l it is because there is no light in them.
Lt rn.' direct yoar special attention to
the language of our text. There is no
r .in Dr dispute as to the m'aning of the
. -i.,i *■ cv.uit under the yoke.’
Ib. ii .Mr. Barm s, who is himself a distin
gui'htd abolitionist, and has done more
p ri ips, than any other man in this cotm
n. to propagate abolition doctrines,
i mils that ■ i tiie addition of the phrase un
rth<- vok« ’’ shows undoubtedly that it (i.
i. th.-original word doulos) is to be under-
■ 4 here of slavery. Let me quote an
■iii :■ -tim >nv on this point from an emi.
:nt S h divine, I mean Dr. Mcknight,
u , - ■ < xposition of the epistle is a stand
>’d w »rk in Great Britain ami in this conn
■ v, and whose associations must exempt
iiiui f; . n all suspicion of pro-slavery preju
-11 • intro luces his exposition of this
. i ipl> r with the following explanation :
“B i ails, the law of Mums allowed no Is
i r iit i • lie made a slave I>r life without
ins own consul, the Ju laizing teachers, to
mure slav. s to their party, taught that uil
the go>p. l likewise involuntary slavery
. .w \' I’his doctrim the apostle con
:• oi '.-d here, as in his other epistles, by
• opining C hristian slaves to honor and
>e\ their masters, wh> tie r th y w ere
:>“lie\< is or unln licvers, and by assuring
ftm >?iiv that if any person taught other
wise he opjiosed the w holesome precepts of
-a- Christ and the doctrine of the gospel,
winch in all points is conformable to godli
. s- or - >und morality, and was puffed up
wiia pride without possessing any true
■wledg, either of the Jew ish or Christian
o velalion.' Our learned Scotch friend
n g son to expound the passage in the '
t '.h»wing paraphrase, which we commend
’ > the prayerful attention of all whom it
may concern.”
1.-> wlm.. ot < hristian -lave- are under the yoke of
unbelievers p»y th.-ir own masters all respect and obe
d l e. that tho character of God whom we worship may
U'»t i«- < a uiuu tied, and the doctrine of the Gospel may
i. >t l>< evil sp >ken of as tending to destroy the political .
rights of mankind ; and those Christian slaves who have
ieviiig masters not de-pi>ethem fancy ing that I hey an'
t ieir equals because they are their brethren in Christ :
for though al! Christians are equal as to religious privi
-iaves are inferior to their masters in station.
W .. r fore, let them serve their masters more diiliirent
: . i au-e they who enjoy the benefit of their service
• »>< ver- and beloved of God. “These thing- teach
> exhort the brethren to practice them." If any one
. h differently by affirming that under the gospel
- u.-s are not bound to serve their masters, but ought
’■ b ma,),, free, and does not consent to the wholesome
■r.tnatioments which are our Lord de-us Christ's, and
• "..!>< trine of the gospel which in all points is con
’“n.j>.e t<> true morality, he is puffed npwith pride and
- -th nothing either of the Jewish or the Christian
c 0..-. lh" ua. he pretends to have great know 1-
_• of both. I’>>. is d.-tempered in his mind about idle :
otis and debate of words which afford no founda
tiou for such a doctrine, but are the source of every !
i t ,in. evil speaking, unjust suspicion that the
- not -incereiv maintainetl. keen disputing# car-
• ou nmtrary to conscience by men wholy corrupted
oi. r mind- and destitute of the true doctrine or the
- who reckon whatever produces most money is :
tm (iv-t religion ; from all such impious teachers with- .
draw thyself, and do not dispute with them.
File L\t as thus c.xpoundeiiby an Amer
ican ;d>olitionist and a Scotch divine, (w hose
l. sinnony need not be confirmed by quo
tations from all the other commentators),
is a prophecy written for these days, and
wonderfully applicable to our present cir
cumstances. It gives us a life like picture
of abolitionism in its principles,its spirit and
its practice, and furnishes us plain instruc
tion in regard to our duty in the premises.
Before entering upon the discussion of the.
d'tctrine, let us define the terms employed.
Bv abolitionism w e mean the principles and
measures of abolitionists. And what is an
abolitionist ? He is one who believes that
slaveholdtng is sin, and ought therefore to
be abolished. This is the fundamental, the
characteristic, the essential principle of
abolitionism —that slaveholding is sin
that holding men in involuntary servitude
is an infringement upon the rights of tnan,
a heinous crime on the sight of God. A
man miy believe on political or com me r-
cial grounds that slavery is an undesirable
system, and that slave labor is not the most
profitable ; he may have various views as
to the rights of slave holders under the con
stitution of the country ; he may think this
or that law upon the statute books of South
ern States is wrong ; but this does not con
stitute him an abolitionist unless he believes
that slaveholding is morally wrong. The
alleged sinfulness of slaveholding, as it is
the characteristic doctrine, so it is the
strength of abolitionism in all its ramified
and various forms. It is by this doctrine that
it lays hold upon the hearts and consciences
of men, that it comes as a disturbing force
into our ecclesiastical and civil institutions
and by exciting religious animosity (which
all history proves to be the strongest of hu
man passions), imparts a peculiar intensity
to every contest into which it enters. And
you will perceive it is just here that aboli
tionism presents a proper subject for dis
cussion in the pulpit —for it is one great
purpose of the Bible, and therefore one i
great duty of God’s ministers in its exposi
tion, to show what is sin and what is not. ’
Those who hold the doctrine that slavehold- !
ing is sin, and ought therefore to be abol
ished, differ very much in the extent to
w hich they reduce their theory to practice.
In some this faith is almost without works.
Thev content themselves with only voting
in such away as in their judgment will
best promote the ultimate triumph of their
views. Others stand off at what they sup
pose a safe distance, as Shimei did when he
stood on an opposite hill to curse King Da
vid, and rebuke the sin and denounce di
vine judgments upon the sinner. Others
more practical, if not more prudent, go into
the very midst of the alleged wickedness
and teach “servants under the yoke’’ that
they ought not to count their own masters
worthy of all honor—that liberty is their
inalienable right—which they should main
tain, if necessary, even by the sheding of
blood. Now, it is not for me to decide who
of all these are the truest to their own prin
ciples. It is not for me to decide whether
the man who preaches this doctrine in brave
words, amid applauding multitudes in the
city of Brooklyn, or the one who in the
stillness of the night and in the face of the
law’s terrors goes to practice the preaching
at Harper’s Ferry, is the most consistent
abolitionist and the most heroic man. It is
not for me to decide which is the most im
portant part of a tree ; and il the tree be
poisonous, which is the most injurious, the
root, or the branches, or the fruit ? But I
am here to-night, in God’s name, and bv
His help, to show that this tree ofabolition
ism is evil and only evil, root and branch,
flower and leaf and fruit ; 4hat it springs
from and is nourished by an utter rejection
of the Scriptures ; that it produces no real
benefit to the enslaved, and is the fruitful
source otdivision and strife and infidelity
in both church and State. I have four dis
tinct propositions on the subject to main
tain—four theses to nail up and defend :
I. Abolitionism has no foundation in
the Scriptures.
11. Its principles have been promulga
ted chiefly by misrepresentation and abuse.
111. It leads, in multitudes of cases,
and by a logical process, to utter infidelity.
l\ . It is the chief cause of the strife
i that agitates and the danger that threatens
our country.
1. —abolttioxism has no foundation
in scrifture. — Passing by the records of
the patriarchal age, and waving the ques
tion as to those servants in Abraham’s fami
ly, "ho, in the simple but expressive lan
guage of Scripture, “were bought with his
money, ’’ let us come at once to the tribu
| mil of that law which God promulgated
amid the solemnities of Sinai. What said
the law and the testimony to that peculiar
people over whom God ruled and f>r "hose
institutions He has assumed the responsi
bility ? The answer is in the 25th chapter
of Leviticus, in these words:—
“And if thf brother that dwellcth by thee be waxen
poor and be fold unto thee, thou shall not compel him
to serve as a bond servant; but as a hired servant ami a
sojourner he shall be with thee, and shall serve thee un
tothe year of jubilee, and then shall he depart from thee,
both he and his children with him.”
So fur. vou will observe, the biw refers
to the children of Israel, who, by reason of
poverty, were reduced to servitude. It was
their right to be free at the year of jubilee,
unless they chose to remain in perpetual
bondage, for which case provision is made I
in other and distinct enactments. But not |
jso with slaves of foreign birth. There was
no year of jubilee provided for them. For
what says tlie law? Read the 4 1-46 verses
I of the same chapter.
| “Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids which thou
shalt have shall be of the heathen that are round about
| vou. Os 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 fat iilies
that are with you, which they beget in your land; and
they shall be your possess ion. And ve shall take them
as an inheritance for your children after yon to inherit ;
them as a possession; they shall be your bondmen for- I
There it is. plainly written in the divine
law. No legislative enactment; no statute
framed by legal skill was ever more explic
it and incapable of pervision. When the
abolitionist tells me that .slaveholding is sin,
in the simplicity of my faith tn the Holy I
Scriptures, I point him to this sacred‘record, '
and tell him in all candor, as my text does,
i that his teaching bluspemes the name of >
God and His doctrine. When he begins
todoat almut questions and strifes of words,
appealing to the Declaration of Independ
ence, and asserting that the idea of proper
ty in men is an enormity and a crime, I stli
hold him to the record, saying, ‘-Ye shall
i take him as an inheritance for your chil
■ dren after you to inherit them for a posses
sion.’’ When he waxes warm—as he al
ways does if his opponent quote Scripture
(which is the great test to try the spirits
whether they be of God—the very spear of i
Ithuriel to reveal their true character) —
when he gets angry, and begins to pour out
his evil surmisings and abuse upon slave
holders—l obey the precept which says,
“from such withdraw thyself, ’’ comforting
myself with this thought ; that the wisdom
ot God is wiser than men and the kindness
of God kinder than men, Philosophers
may reason and reformers may rave till
doomsday, they never can convince me that
God, in the Levitical law, or in any other
law, sanctioned sin; and as I know, from
the plain passage I have quoted; and many i
more like it that He did sanction slavehold
ing among his ancient people, I know, also,
■ by the logic of that faith which believes
the Bible to be his Word,that slaveholding
is not sin. There are men even among
professing Christians, and not a few minis- '
FRIDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 21, 1860.
ters ofthe Gospel, who answer this argu
ment from the Old Testament Scriptures by
a simple denial of their authority. They
do not tell us how God could ever or any
where countenance that which is morally
wrong, but they content themselves with
saying that the Levitical law is no rule of
action for us, and they appeal from its de
cisions to what they consider the higher
tribunal of the Gospel. Let us, therefore,
join issue with them before the bar of the
New Testament Scriptures. It is a histor»
ic truth, acknowledged on all hands, that
at tin* advent of Jesus Christ slavery exist
ed all over the civilized world, and was in
timately inter" oven with its social and civ
il institutions. In Judea, in Asia Minor,
in Greece, in all the countries where the
Saviour or his Apostles preached the Gos
pel, slaveholding was just as common as it
is to-day in South Carolina. It is not alleged
by anyone, or at least by any one having
pri'Wnsions to scholarship or candor,
■ that thR Roman laws regulating slavery
were even as mild as the very worst statutes
! which have been passed upon the subject
! in modern times. It will not be denied by
any lion< st and well informed man that
modern civilization and the restraining in
fill nce.s of the Gospel have shed ameliora
ting influences upon the relation between
master and slave, which was utterly un
known al the advent of Christianity. And
how did J. -us and his Apostles treat this
subject? Masters ami slaves met them at
every step in their missionary work, and
were even present in every audience to
which they preached. The Roman law
which gave the full power of life and death
into the master’s hand was familiar to them,
and all the evils connected with the system
surrounded them every day as obviously as
the light of heaven; and yet it is a fact,
which the abolitionist, does not oppoes be
cause he cannot deny, that the New Testa
ment is utterly silent in regard to the al
leged sinfulness of slaveholding. In all
the instructions ofthe Saviour —in all the re
ported sermons of the inspired Apostles—
in all the epistles, they were moved by the
Holy Spirit to write for the instruction of
coming generations—there is not one dis
tinct and explicit denunciation ofslavehold
ing, nor the precept requiring the master to
emancipate his slaves. Every acknowl
edged sin is openly and repeatedly con
demned and in unmeasured terms. Drunk
enness and adultery, theft and murder—all
the moral wrong which ever have been
known to alllict society, are forbidden by
name; and yet, according to the teaching of
abolitionism, this greatest of all sins—this
sum of all villainies—is never spoken of ex
cept in respectful terms. How can this be
accounted for?
Let Dr. Wayland whose work on mor
al science is taught in many of our schools,
answerr this question, and let parents whose
children are studying that book diligently
consider his answea. 1 note from Wav
land's Moral Science, page 213:
“The Gospel was designed not for one race or for one
time, but for all races and for all times. It looked not
to the abolition of slavery for that age alone, but for its
universal abolition. Hence the important object of its
author was to gain for it a lodgment in every part ofthe
known world, so that by its universal diffusion among
all classes of society it might quietly and peacefully
modify audsubdue the evil passions of men. In this
manner alone could its object—a universal moral revolu
tion—have been accomplished. For if it had forbidden
the evil, instead of subverting the principle;if it had pro
claimed the unlawfulness of slavery and taught slaves
to resist, the oppression of their masters, it would in
stantly have arrayed the two parties in deadly hositility
throughout the civilized world; its announcement would
have been the signal of servile war aud the very name of
the Christian religion would have been forgotton amidst
the agitation of universal bloodshed.”
We pause not now to comment upon the
admitted fact that Jesus Christ and his
Apostles pursued a course entirely differ*'
ent from that adopted by the abolitionists,
including the learned author himself, nor
to inquire whether the teaching of aboli
tionism is not as likely to pioduce strife and
bloodshed in those days as in the first
ofthe church. What wo now call atten
tion to and protest against is the imputation
here cast upon Christ and his Apostles. Do
you believe the Saviour sought to insinuate
his religion into the earth by concealing its
real design, and pr 'serving a profound si
lence in regard to the very worst sins
it came to <i< slroy? Do yon believe (ha]
when he healed the centurion’s servant,
(whom every honest commentator admits to
nave been a slave), and pronounced that
precious eulogy upon the master, “I have
not seen so great faith in Israel”—do you
believe that Jesus suflered that man to live
on in sin because he deprecated the con
cequenes of preaching abolitionism? When
Paul stood upon Mars’ hill, surrounded by
ten thousand limes as many slaveholders
as there "ere idols in the city, do you be
lieve he kept back any part of the require
ments ofthe gospel because he was afraid
of a tumult among the people? We ask
these abolition philosophers whether, as a
matter of fact, idolatry and the vices con
nected with it were not even more intimate
ly interwoven with the social and civil life
of the Roman empire than slavery was-
Did the Aposths abstain from preaching
against idolatry ? Nay, who doesnot know
that by denouncing this sin they brought
down upon themselves the whole power of
the Roman empir< ? Nero covered the
bodies ofthe Christian myrtyrs with pitch
and lighted up the city with their burning
bodies, just because they would not withhold
or compromise the truth in regard to the
worship of idols. In the light of that fierce
persecution it is a profane trifling for Dr.
Wayland or any other man to tell us that
Jesus or Paul held back their honest opin
ions of slavery for fear of “a servile war,”
in which the very name of the Christian re
ligion would have been forgotten.’’ The
name of the Christian religion is not so eas
ily forgotton ; nor are God’s great purpo
ses of redemption capable of being defeated 1
by an honest declarat ion of His truth every- |
where and at all times. And yet this phil- I
sophy, so dishonoring to Christ and his J
Apostles, is moulding the character of our
young men and women. It comes into our
chosols and mingles with the very lifeblood I
of future generations the sentiment that
Christ and his Apostles held back the truth, ;
and suffered sin to go unrebuked for fear of
the wrath of man. And all this to main
tain, at all hazards, and in the face of the
Saviour’s example to the contrary, the un- ■
scriptural dogma that slaveholding is sin.
But it must be observed in this connection
that the Apostles went much further than
to abstain from preaching against slave- 1
holding. They admitted slaveholders to
the communion of the church. In our text,
masters are acknowledged a«.“ brethren,
I faithful and beloved, partakers ofthe bene- j
j fit,” If the New Testament is to be receiv- |
ed as a faithful history, no man was ever re j
jected by the apostolic church upon the
ground that he owned slaves. If he abused
his power as a master, if he availed him-*
self of the authority conferred by the Ro
man law to commit adultery, or murder or
cruelty, he was rejected for these crimes,
just as he would be rejeted now for similar
crimes from any Christian church in our
Southern States. If parents abused or ne
glected their children they were censured,
not for having children, but for not treat
ing them properly. Aud so with the slave
holder. It was not the owning of slaves,
but the manner in which he fulfilled the
duties of his station that made him a sub
j ject for such discipline. The mere fact
that he was a slaveholder no more subject
ed him to censure than the mere fact that he
was a farther ora husband. It is upon the
recognized lawfulness of therelation that
all the precept -egulating the reciprocal
' duties of that relation arc based.
These precepts are scattered all throng
the inspired epistles. There is not one
command or exhortation to emancipate the
slave. The Aposfle well knew that for
the present emancipation would be no real
blessing to him. But the master is exhort
ed to be kind and considerate, and the slave
to he obedient, that so they might preserve
the unity of that church in which there is
no distinction between Greek or Jew. male
or female,bond or free, Oh, if ministers
ofthe Gospel in this land or age hail but
followed Christ, and, instead of hurling
anathemas and exciting wrath aginst slave
holders, had sought only to bring both mas
ter and slave to the fountain of Emanuel’s
blood; if the agencies of the blessed Gos
pel had only been suflered to work their
way quietly, as the light and dew of the
morning, into the structure of society, both
North and South, how different would have
been the position of our country this day
before God ' How different would have
been the privileges enjoyed by the poor
black*nan’s soul, which in this bitter con
test, has been too much neglected aud des
pised. Then there would have been no
need to have converted our churches into
military barracks for collecting firearms
to carry on war upon a distaht frontier. No
need for a sovereign State to execute the
fearful penalty ofthe law upon the invader
for doing no more than honestly to carry
out the teaching of abolition preachers, who
bind heavy burdens, and grevious to be
borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders,
while they touch them not with one of their
fingers. No need for the widow and the
orphan to weep in anguish of heart over
those cold graves, for whose dishonor and
desolation God will hold the real authors
responsible. No occasion or pretext for
slavehol ling States to pass such stringent
laws for the punishment of the secret in
cendiary and the prevention of servile war.
I shall not attempt to show what will be
the condition ofthe African race in this
country when the Gospel shall have brought
all classes under its complete dominion.
What civil and social relations men will '
sustain in the times of millenial glory Ido
not know. I cordially embrace the current
opinion of our church that slavery is per
mitted and regulated by the divine law un.
der both the Jewish and Christian dispensa
tions, not as the final destiny of the enslav
ed, but as un important and necessary pro
cess in their transition from heathenism to
Christianity-—a wheel in the great machin
ery of Providence, by which the final re
demption is to be accomplished. However
this may be, one thing I know, and every
abolitionist might know it if he would, that
there are Christian families at the South
in which a patriarchal fidelity and affection
subsist b' tween the bond and the free, and
where slaves are better fed ami clothed ami
! instructed, and have a better opportunity
for salvation than the majority of laboring
people in the city of New York. If the
tongue of abolitionism had only kept silence
these twenty years past the number of such
families would be. tenfold as great. Fa
naticisin at the North is one chiefstumbling
block in the way ofthe Gospel at the South.
This is one groat grievance that presses to
day upon the hearts of our Christian breth
ren at the South. This, in a measure, ex- .
plains why such im n as Dr. Thornwell,
of South Carolina, and Dr. Palmer, of
New Orleans —nun "hose genius and
learning and piety would adorn any state
or station—are willing to secede from the
Union. They fuel that the influence of
| their Christian ministry is hindered, and
: their power to do good to both master and
l slave crippled, by the constant agitations of
! abolitionism in our national councils, ami
the incessant turmoil excited by the un
criptural dogma, that slaveholding is sin.
11. THE PRINCIPLES OF ABOLITIONISM HAVE
BEEN PROPOGATED CHIEFLY BY MISREPRE
SENTATION AND ABUSE.
Having no foundation in Scripture, it
does not carry on its warfare by scripture
weapons. Its prevailing spirit is fierce
and proud, and its language is full of wrath
and bitterness. Let me prove this by tes
timony from its own lips. 1 quote Dr.
Channing of Boston, whose name is a tower
ofstrength to the abolition cause, and whose
memory is their continual boast. In a
work published in the year 1836,1 find the
following words: —
“The abolitionists have done wrong, I believe ; nor Is
their wrong to be winked at because done lauatically or
with good intention# ; for how much mischief may be
I wrought with good designs ! They have fallen into the
j common error of enthusiasts, that of exaggerating their
i object, feeling as if no evil existed but that which .they
opposed, aud as if no guilt could be compared with that
: of countenancing and the upholding it. The tone of their
■ newspapers, so far as as I have seen them, has often been
; fierce bitter and abusive. They have sent forth their
| orators, some of them transported with fiery zeal, to
sound the alarm against slavery through the land, to
i gather together young and old, pupils from schools,fe
| males hardly arrived at years of discretion, the ignorant,
i the excitable, the impetuous, and to organize these in
: to associations for the battle against oppression. Very
I unhappily they preached their doctrine to the colored
i people aud collected them into societies. To this mix
i ed aud excitable multitude, minute heart-rending des
' criptions of slavery were given in piercing tones of’pas
eiou ; aud slaveholder# were held up as monster# ofcrnel-
I ty and crime. The abolitionist, indeed proposed to con
vert slaveholders : and for this end he approached them
with vituperation and exhausted on them the vocabulary
! of abuse. And he has reaped as he sowed.”
Such is the testimony of Dr. Channing,
given in the year 1836. What would he
have thought and said if he had lived until
■ the year 1860, and seen this little stream,
over whose infant violence he lamented,
| swelling into a torrent and flooding the
land? Abolitionism is abusive in its per- 1
i sistent misrepresentation of the legal prin- j
ciples involved in the relation between mas. !
j ter and slave. They reiterate in a thous- I i
and exciting forms the assertion that the 1
; idea of property in man blots out his man
hood and degrades him to the level of a
brute or a stone. “Domestic slavery,’’ says
Dr. Wayland in his work on Moral Science,
“supposes at best that the relation between
master and slave is not that which exists
between man and man, but is a modifica
tion at least of that which exists between
man and the brutes.” Do not these abo
litionist philosophers know that according
to the laws of every civilized country on
earth a man has property in his children
and a woman nas property in her husband?
The statutes of the State of New York and
of every other Northern State recognize and
protect this property, and our courts of jus
tice have repeatedly assessed its value. If
a man is killed on a railroad his wife may
bring suit and recover damages for the pe
cuniary loss she has suffered. If one man
entice away the daughter of another, and
marry her while she is still under age, the
father may bring a civil suit for damages
for the loss of that child’s sen"’- - ■ ' 'bn
pecuniary compensation is the uiii ? redress
the law provides. Thus the common law
of Christendom and the statutes of our own
State recognize property in man. In what
does that property consist? Simply in such
services as a man or a child may properly
be required to render. This is all that the
Levitical law, or any other law means when
it says, “Your bondmen shall be your pos
session or property and an inheritance for
your children.” The property consistsnot
in the right to treat the slave like a brute,
but simply in a legal claim for such servi
ces as a man in that position may properly
be requirCtlHo render. And yet abolitions
ists, in the face of the divine law, persist in
denouncing the very relation between mass
ter and slave, “as a modification, at least, of
that which exists between man and the
brutes.’’ This, however, is not the worst or
most prevalent form which their abusive
spirit assumes. Theirjnode ofurguingthe
question of slaveholding’ by a pretended
appeal to facts, is a tissue of misrepresentas
tion from beginning to end. Let me illuss
trate my meaning by a parallel case. Sup
pose I undertake to prove th£ wickedness
of marriage as it exists in the city of New
lork. In this discussion suppose the Bib e
is excluded, or at least that it is not recog
nized as having exclusive jurisdiction in the
decision of the question. My first appeal
is to the statute law of the state.
I show there enactments which nullify the
law of God and make divoice a marketable
and cheap commodity. I collect the atker
tisements of your daily papers, in which
lawyers offer to procure the legal separa
tion of man and wife for a stipulated price,
to say nothing in this sacred place of other
advertisements which decency forbids - me
to quote. Then I turn to the records ofour
criminal courts, and find that every day
some cruel husband beats his wife, or some
unnatural parent murders his child, or some
discontented wife or husband seeks the dis
solution ofthe marriage bond. In the next
place, I turn to the orphan asylums and*
hospitals, and show there the miserable
wrekcsof domestic tyranny in wives desert
ed and children maimed by drunken pa
rents. In the last place, Igo through our
streets and into our tenement houses, and
count the thousands of ragged children,who,
amid ignorance and filth,are training for the
prison and gallows. Summing all these
facts together, 1 put them forth as the fruits
of marriage in the city of New York, and a
proof that the relation itself is sinful. Iff
were a novelist, and had written a book to
illustrate this same doctrine, I would call
this array of facts a “Key.’’ In this key 1
say nothing about the sweet charities and
affections that flourish in ten thousand
homes, not a word about the multitude of
loving kindnesses that characterize the
daily life of honest people, about the in
struction and <lisciplinethat are training
children at ten thousand firesides for use
fulness here and glory hereafter ; all this
I ignore, and quote only the statute book,
the newspapers, the records of criminal
courts and the miseries of the abodes of
poverty. Now, what have I done? I
have not mistated or exaggerated a single
fact. And yet am I not a falsifier and
slanderer of lhe deepest die? Is there a
virtuous woman or an honest man in this
citv whose cheeks would not burn with
indignation at my one-aided and injurious
stat'-ments? Now, this is just what ab
olitionism has done in regard to slave
holding. It has undertaken to illustrate
its cardinal doctrine in works of-fiction,
and then, to sustain the creation of its
fancy, has attempted to underpin it with
an accumulation of tacts. These facts are
collected in precisely the way I have de
scribed. The statute books of slavehold
ing States are searched, and every wrong
enactment collated, uewsjraper reports of
cruelty and crime on lhe part of wicked
masters are treasured up and classified,
all the outrages that have been perpetrat
ed “by lewd fellows of the baser sort, ” of
whom there are plenty, both North and
South, are eagerly seized and recorded,
and this mass of vileness and filth collected
from the kennels and sewers of society is
put forth as a faithful exhibition of slave
holding. Senators in the forum, and minis
ters in the pulpit, distil this raw material
into the more refined slander “that South
ern society is assentially barbarous, and
that slaveholding had its origin in hell.”
Legislative bodies enact and re-enact
statutes which declare that slaveholding is
such an enormous crime that if a South
ern man, under the broad shield of the con
stitution, and with the decisions of the Su
preme Court of the country in his hand,
shall come within their jurisdiction, and
set up a claim to a fugitive slave, he shall
be punished with a fine of $2,000 and fif
teen years imprisonment. This method of
argument has continued until multitudes of
honest Christian people in this and other
lands believe that slaveholuing is the sin
of sins, thesuinofall villanies. Let me
illustrate this by an incident in my own ex
perience. A few years, since 1 took from
the centre table -of a Christan family in
Scotland, by whom I had been most kindly
entertained, a book entitled “Life and man
ners in America.’’ On the blank leaf was
an inscription, stating that the book had
been bestowed upon one of the children of
the family as a reward of diligence in an
institution.of learning. The frontispiece ’
was a picture ol a man of fierce coumen.-
ance beating a naked woman. The con
tents ofthe l>ook were profesedly compiled
from the testimony of Americans upon the
. subject of slavery. I dare not quote in
i this place the extracts which 1 made in mv
memorandum. It will be sufficient to say
that the book asserts as undoubted facts
i that the banks of the Missisippi are stud
ded with iron gallows for the panishment
i of slaves—that in the city of Charleston the
bloody block on which masters cut off the
; hands of disobedient servants may be seen
i in the public squares, and that sins against
i chastity are common and unrebuked in
' professedly Christian
Now in my heart 1 did not feel angry at
I the author of that book, nor at the school
teacher who bestowed it upon his scholar,
I for in Christian charity 1 gave them credit
' for honesty in the case; but standing there
a stranger among the martyr memories of
i that glorious land to which my heart had so
1 often made its pilgrimage, I did feel that
; you and I, and every man in America was
? wronged by the revilersof their native land
' who teach foreigners that hanging and cut
-5 ting off hands, and beating women, are
' the characteristics of our life and man-
i ners.
t But we need not go to foreign lands
i for proof that abolitionism has carried on
r its warfare by the language of abuse.
j The annual meeting of the American anti
i slavery Society brings the evidence to
our doors. We have been accustomed to
r laugh at these venal exhibitions of fanati
t cisni, not thinking perhaps that what was
, fun for us was working death to our breth
ren whose propeity and reputation we
r are bound to protect. The fact is we
< have suffered a fire to be built in our
i midst, whose sparks have been scattered
« far and wide ; and now when the smoke
f of the conflagration comes back to blind
; our eyes, and the heat of it begins to
r scorch our industrial and commercial! in
? terests, it will not do for us to sayth t
> the utterances of that society are the ra -
I viuga of a fanatical and in significant few;
. for the men who compose it are honored
, in our midst with titlesand offices.
* Its president is a Chief Justice ofthe
’ State of New Jersey. 'l’tie ministers who
r havethiown over its doings the sanction
' of our holy religion are quoted and mag-
• nified all over the land as the representa
’ five men of the age ; and the man who
1 stood up in its deliberations in the year
1852 and exhausted the vocabulary of
, abuse upon the compromise measures,
, and the great statsmen who framed them
is now a Judge in our courts and the
1 guardian of our lives and our property.
. It will doubtless be said that misrepre
sentation and abuse have not been con
fined, in the progress of this unhapy con
test to the abolitionists ofthe North; that
. ’demagogues and self seeking men at the
“South have.been violent and abusive, and
that newspapers profesedly in the inter
ests of the South, with a spirit which can
be characterized as little less than diabol
ical, have circulated r very scandal in the
most aggravated and irritating form. But
suppose all this to be granted—what then.
Can Christian men, justify or palliate the
wrath :rid evil retaliation which it has
provoked from their neighbors ? If I
were preaching to-day in a Southern au
dience it would be my duty, and I trust
God would give rue grace to perform it,
to tell them of their -i ~s in this matter ;
and especially would it be my privilege as
a minister of the Gospel ot peace—a priv
ilege from which no false views of man
hood should prevent me—to exhort and
beseech them as brethren. I would as
sure them that there are multitudes here
who still cherish the memory of the bat
tle fields and council chambers where our
. fathers cemented this Union of States,
and who still stand by the compact of the
[ constitution to the utmost extremity.
I would tell the thousands of Christian
ministers, among whom are some ofthe
brightest ornaments of the American pul
pit, and the tens of thousand of Christian
men and women, towards whom, while
the love of-Christ burns in inc, my heart
never can grow cold, that if they will only
be patient and hope to the end, all wrongs
may yet be righted. I’hereforo I would
beseech them not to put a great gulf be
tween us and cut off the very opportunity
for reconcilation upon an honorable basis,
by a revolution whose end no human eye
can see. But, then, lam not preaching
at the South. I stand here, n, one ofthe
main fountain heads of t rn abuse we have
complained of.
I stand here to rebuke this sin, and ex
hort the guilty parties to repent and for
sake it. It is magnanimous and Christ
like for those from whom the first pi evo
cation came to make the first concessions.
Tiie legislative enactments which are
in open and acknowledged violation of
the constitution, and whose chief design
is to put a stigma upon slaveholding, must
and will be r. pealed. Truth and justice
will ultimately prevail; and God’s bless
ing and the blessings of generations yet
unborn will rest upon that party, in this
unhappy contest, who first stand forth to
utter the language of conciliation and
proffer the olive branch of peace The
great fear is that the retraction will come
tuo late: but sooner or later it will come.
Abolitionism ought to and one day will
change the inode of its warfare and adopt
a new vocabulary. I believe in the liber
ty of the press and in free<lum of speech ;
but Ido not believe that any man has a
right before God, or m the eye of civilized
law, to speak and publish what he pleases
without regard to the consequences.
With the conscientious convictions of our
fellow-citizens neither we nor the laws
has any right to interfere; but the law
ought to protect all men from the utter
ance of libellous words, whose only effect
is to create division and strife.
I trust and pray, and call upon you to
unite with me in th*- supplication, that
God would give abolitionists repentance
and a better mind, so that in time to come
’ they may at least propagate their princi
ples in decent and respectful language.
HI. ABOLITIONISM LEADS IN MtTLTITVDES
Of' CASES, AND BY A LOGICAL PROCESS TO
UTTER INFIDELITY.
On this point L would not ami will not
be misunderstood. Ido not say that ab
olitionism is infidelity. I speak only of
the tendencies of the system as indicated
in its avowed principles and demonstrate
ed in its practical fruits.
It does not try slavery by the Bible;
but as one of its leading advocates ha- re
cently declared, it tries the Btble by the
principles of freedom. It insists that the
word of God must be made to support
certain human opinions or forfeit all claims
upon our faith. That I may not be sus
pected of exaggeration on this point, let
me quote from the recent work of Mr.
Barnes a passage which may well arrest
the attention of all thinking men :
‘ There are great principles in our na
ture, as God has made us, which can nev
er be set aside by any authority of a pro
fessed revelation. If a book claiming to
be a revelation from God, by any fair in
terpretation defended slavery, or placed
it on the same basis as the relation of hus
band and wife, parent and child, guardian
and ward, such a book would not, and
could not be received by the mass of man
kind as a Divine revelation.”
This assumption, that men are capable
of judging beforehand, what is to be ex
pected in a Divine revelation, is the cock
atrice’s egg, from which in all ages here
sies have been hatched. This is the spi
der’s webb which men have spun out of
their own brains, and clinging to which,
they have attempted to swing over the
yawning abyss of infidelity. Alas, how
, many have fallen in and been dashed to
, pieces! When a man sets up tin* great
principles ofour nature (by which lie al
way s means his own preconceived opin
ions) as the supreme tribunal before which
even the law of God must betried—when
a man says “the Bible must teach aboli
tionism or I will not receive it,”he has al
ready cut loose from the sheet anchor of
faith. True belief says “ Speak, Lord,thy
sei vant waits to hear.” Abolitionism says
Speak, Lord, but speak in accordance
with the principles of human nature or
they cannot be received by the great mass
' of mankind as a Divine revelation.’’ The
fruit of such principles is just what we
, might expect. Wherever the seed of ab
olitionism has been sown broadcast a plen
tiful crop of infidelity has sprung up. In
lhe communities where anti slavery ex
citement has been most prevalent, the
power of the Gospel has invariably de
clined and when the title of fanaticism
begins to subside, the wrecks of church
order, and of Christian character have
been scattered on the shore. I mean no
disrespect to New England— to the good
men who there stand by the ancient land
marks and contend earnestly for the truth
- nor to the illustrious dead whose praise
is in all the churches, but who does not
know that the States in which abolition
ism has achieved its most signal triumphs
are at the same time the great strong
holds of infidelity in the land ? I have of
ten thought that if some of those old pil
grimfathers could come back, in the spirit
and power of Elias, to attend a grand cel
ebration at Plymouth rock, they might
well preach on this text; “It ye were
Abraham’s children ye would do the
works of Abraham.”
The effect of abolitionism upon individuals is*"*
no less striking and mournful than its influence
upon communities. It is a remarkable and in
structive fact, and one at which Christian men
would do well to pause and consider, that in
this country all the prominent leaders of aboli
tionism, outside of the ministry, have become
avowed infidels ; and that all our notorious abo
lition preachers have renounced the great doc
trines of grace as they are taught in the stand
ards of the reformed churches—have resorted
to the most violent processes of interpretation
to avoid the obvious meaning of plain Scriptu
ral texts, and ascribed to the apostles of Christ
principles from which piety and moral courage
instinctively revolt. They make that to be sin
which the Bible does not declare to be sin.—
They denounce in language such as the sternest
pi ophets of the Law never employed, a relation
which Jesus and his apostles recognized and
regulated. They seek to institute terms and
texts of Christian communion utterly at va
riance with the organic law of the church as
founded by its Divine Head ; and, attempting to
justify this usurpation of Divine prerogatives
by an appeal from God’s law to the dictates of
fallen human nature, they would set up a spirit
ual tyranny more odious and insufferable, be
cause more arbitrary and uncertain in its deci
sions, than Popery itself. And as the tree is so
have its fruits been. It is not a theory, but a
demonstrated fact, that abolitionism leads to in
fidelity. Such men as Carrison, and Giddings,
and Gerrit Smith, have yielded to the current
of their own principles and thrown the Bible
overboard. Thousands of humbler men who
listen to abolition preachers w I »and do like
wise. And whether it be the . raints of offi
cial position, or lhe preventing grace of God,
that enables such preachers to row up the stream
and regard the authority of Scripture in other
matters, their influence upon this one subject is
all the more pernicious because they prophesy
in the name of Christ. In this sincere and plain
utterance of my deep convictions I am only dis
charging my conscience towards the flock over
which lam set. When the shephard -eeth the
wolf coming he is bound to give warning.
IV.—ABOLITIONISM IS THE CHIEF CAUSE OF THE
STRIFE THAT AGITATES AND THE DANGER THAT
i THREATENS OCR COUNTRY.
Here, as upon the preceding point, I will not
I be misunderstood. lam not here as the advo
| cate or opponent of any political party; and it
i is no more than simple justice lor me to say
i plainly that I «io not consider Republican and
' Abolitionist as necessarily synonymous terms. .
; There are tens of thousands of Christian men
who voted with the successful party in the late
election who do not sympathise with the princi
ples or aims of abolitionism. Among these are
some beloved members of my own Hock, who
will not hesitate a moment to put the seal of
their approbation upon the doctrine of thia dis
course. And what is still more to the point,
there seems to be sufficient evidence that the
man who has just been chosen to be the head of
this nation is among the more conservative and
Bible-loving men of his party. We have no
fears that if the new administration could be
quietly inaugurated, it would or could aboh
tionize the government. There are honest peo
ple enough in the Northern Slates to prevent
such arcsuit. But, then, while this is admit
ted as a simple matter of truth and justice,
it cannot be denied, on tiie other hand, that ab
olitionism did enter with ail its characteristic
bitterness in the recent contest; that the result
never could have been accomplished without its
assistance, and tint it now appropriates the vic
tory in words of lidicule ami scorn that sting
like a serpent Let me give you as a single
specimen of the spirit tn which abolitionism has
carried on its political warfare, an extract from
a journal which claims to have a larger circula
tion than any other religious paper in the hand.
I quote from the New York Independent, of
September, 1856:
lhe people will not levy war nor inaugurate
a revolution, even to relieve Kansas, until they
have first tried what they can do by voting. Ts
this peaceful remedy should fail to be applied
this year, then the people will count the cost
[ Concluded on page 4. ]
No. 277