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Rice. Instead of giving that generation the benefit of the fathers' wrong, and their own, He laid upon it the woes of both:-"Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers. That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar." "Verily, I say unto you all these things shall come upon this generation." Such is Dr. Rice's golden rule, and such its contrast with the teachings of Christ.

I now speak directly and distinctly to the question :What was this ancient Hebrew bond-service upon which, as precedent, the justification of modern slavery is built. The discussion which we now enter upon may seem dry to some, but this subject, at least, is not dry in itself; and I earnestly commend it to your consciences for a patient hearing, as in the sight of God.

The ground which they take respecting the Old Testament bond-service is succinctly this:

1. "That God did expressly give permission to his people under the Old Dispensation to hold slaves."

2. “That he could not have done this if slave-holding had been sinful in itself."

3. "That therefore, American slave-holding is not in itself sinful, and those who would treat it as sinful by setting church discipline against it are in error."

Now it would seem obvious, at a glance, that this reasoning carries some fatal defect in it. God gave the Israelites

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express permission" to borrow jewels from the Egyptians, expecting not to return them. Therefore, according to my brother's argument, it cannot be sinful in itself to borrow without intending to return.

So God gave permission to buy free laborers in Judea who had become 66 poor: If thy brother be waxen poor and be sold unto thee." Levit. xxv, 39. Therefore, according to my friend's reasoning, the Bible sanctions the buying of free laborers who have waxen poor in Ohio at this day.

How can he manifest such horror at taking a free man and reducing him to slavery; (which he seems almost to make a merit of condemning ;) when if his doctrine be true that Jewish bond-servants were slaves, then God permitted this very thing to reduce a freeman who had waxed poor to slavery? But I object formally to the sum total of the ground which they take.

I object to their main proposition: "That God did expressly give permission to his people under the Old Dispensation to hold slaves;" That it is equivocal; and that it is not true. I object to their second proposition to wit: "That slave-holding cannot be sinful in itself because God once permitted it;" as false, so far as derived from the first; and also as not true in the absolute sense in which they use it. And I object to their practical inference in favor of American slavery, as drawn from two errors, and like its parents, itself erroneous. And I further object to their whole position as essentially pro-slavery-and as meaning nothing unless it means to vindicate oppression from the Word of God.

I have objected to their main proposition; "That God permitted slavery, as equivocal. It may mean that God permitted slavery with approbation; or that He permitted it as He does murder, merely in the sense of not hindering it. Why not say, "justify" if he means it; and certainly you justify, in court, the man whom you pronounce "not guilty." If he proves slave-holding to be not sinful in itself; does he not justify it? Why then say " permit?" Why not say at once," God did expressly justify slavery under the Old Dispensation?" O, but that would not please the North. Well, then why not say that God "permitted slavery" merely in the sense of "not hindering," as he does other crimes; and this permission can give no possible sanction to Kentucky slavery? That, again, would not please the South. So the equivocal word" permit" is chosen, if not to please both North and South, at least, to displease neither.

The northern man takes up this Debate and reads from

Dr. Rice," that God expressly permitted slavery ;" and he understands it to mean, some such permission as he gave to recorded evils-that is, in the sense of not hindering a qualified slavery for temporary purposes; while the southern man will think that the same words mean, that the Bible justifies slavery, out and out. I deeply disapprove of an equivocal expression, selected to hit the whole United States' population right between wind and water—a word which lies midway between right and wrong-a phrase lodged in the vacuum of betweenity, on no side of nothing.

I have heard that there is a little prairie animal, of the gopher species, which has a northern and a southern end to his hole, so that in sultry and hot weather, when it is desirable to "raise the wind," if it blows north, he opens the south end of his burrow; and when south, the north end; and, besides the advantage of shifting his position to suit the wind, such an arrangement, in case of pursuit, is marvelously convenient for the purpose of dodging responsibility. [A laugh.]

My friend's position seems to me to have a northern and southern end, so that the occupant can have the advantage of standing in either, as it suits the exigencies of his case. With his southern brethren, "God permitted slave-holding," is to mean, that he permitted it as a worthy practice of worthy men; but at the north end, only that God permitted slave-holding, as he directed wars of extermination against the Canaanites, or some like event, which ended long ago, with its divine license.

I object, therefore, to this half-and-half phrase "God permitted slavery"-that it is equivocal. When a southern man, like J. C. Postell, says, that the Bible justifies slavery, I understand him. Every body understands him. When an abolitionist says, that God condemns slave-holding, he is equally explicit. But when a man, somewhere between North and South, says, that "God permitted slavery," he may mean, that He permitted it as an evil; or he may mean, that He permitted it approvingly, as what was fit to be done.

Professor J. H. Thornwell, with his "Slavery-no-evil” doctrine, swallows this proposition of Dr. Rice, and finds it excellently palatable, that "God expressly permitted his people to hold slaves;" while the good pious northern lady who reads it, may wipe her spectacles and think-"Oh, well, God has permitted strange things, in old times; Dr. Rice does not go so far out of the way, after all."

That you may see what tone of sentiment, and what sort of principles prevail at the extreme South, and which meet and harmonize with northern opinion, in the sentiments of Dr. Rice, I will read from a southern religious paper, "The Alabama Baptist," the editor of which, replying to a Vermont paper, says:—

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"The editor of the Vermont Observer honors us with the sentiment, that we are in a fair way to become as rabid in support of slavery as the Index of Georgia.' We are much obliged to him for placing us in such good company. We came into this station with the determination that no one should surpass us in the ardor of our devotion to, and the boldness of our defence of, southern institutions, and we think we have fulfilled that determination. He says that we endorse the sentiment of George McDuffie- slavery is the best possible relation between the employer and the laborer, and we repudiate that old-fashioned doctrine, that all MEN are born equal.' THIS IS EXACTLY OUR POSITION: and we will state also that our motto is, DEATH to abolitionism, and confusion to the enemies of the South."

This main proposition of Dr. Rice will be palatable to that man, while at the same time the good old mother, in his church here, will not dream that her beloved pastor is defending slavery.

But I further object to their equivocal main position, that "God expressly permitted his people to hold slaves under the Old Dispensation," THAT IT IS NOT true.

I am fully aware that we are now in the Thermopyla of this discussion, and that the liberties not of Greece, but of mankind are bound up, not (I am thankful) in the ability

with which it is conducted, but in the principles of which it takes hold.

There are two chief sources of argument appealed to by Dr. Rice in support of his main position that God did expressly permit slavery to the Jews. The first is the authority of Divines and Commentators. The second is scripture itself. As to the first, he has asked, repeatedly, during this debate, as if he thought it conclusive of the whole subject, "Why have learned and godly men thought that God permitted slavery in the Old Dispensation if it be not true? Meaning, it would seem, that it must be true if good and wise men think so. Whereas the whole difficulty is solved by simply supposing that his good and wise men are in a mistake. There are several reasons why those wise and godly men have thought so. One is that Dr. Paley's definition of slavery has been adopted, even by anti-slavery men, instead of a true definition and hundreds of speculative minds have been misled by his definition instead of looking at the thing as it actually exists. Paley defines slavery to be merely, "an obligation to labor without contract or consent." That is, mere compulsory labor. And such labor is found in the Bible, and in every family, and prison, and press-gang, and poor-house. But children, and paupers, and prisoners, though compelled to labor are not slaves; for they have rights. Slaves have none. But actual, veritable slavery; viz: "men made property:"-bereft of self-ownership, marriage, property, liberty, for no crime; this is not in the Bible. This ownership of the blood and bones of human beings is not there.

2. Another reason why some classes of commentators have thought that slavery was in the Bible, is, that their opinions and feelings on the subject were influenced by the slave-holding spirit of the age. They have seen the Bible through slave-holding spectacles; and have interpreted Hebrew words by European and American practices. Successful commentators prove by their very success that they are more or less the exponents of the sentiments of the age in which they

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