INTRODUCTION.

IN attempting to justify or condemn any act or practice, it cannot be amiss, in the first instance, to ascertain whether the matter of the thing required or forbidden, is moral or indifferent. If it is moral, it cannot be optional with us either to do it or not. For example: speaking truth is moral and not indifferent, therefore it cannot be optional with us to either speak truth or falsehood; but the moral law binds us to speak truth, every man to his neighbor. If the matter of the thing be indifferent, as that of eating certain kinds of food, it may be either right or wrong, according to the circumstances. If the practice of slaveholding is of a moral nature, and not indifferent, the rule by which we are to judge of it must be the moral law, and not either human laws, customs, habits, temporal ease, peace or safety. That slaveholding, whether right or wrong, is moral and not indifferent, there can be no dispute; every person, then, who is seriously disposed to know his duty relative to the prac. tice, will compare it with the moral law, and form his judgment by that unerring rule; and any one attempting to investigate the subject, with a design to either justify or condemn it, must take the moral law for his chief guide. This method we shall adopt; that is, to open up the nature of the moral law, and lay it down as the foundation or rock upon which we purpose the following scheme of argumentation shall rest.

OF THE MORAL LAW.

By God's end in making motive to which he diindispensable duty and

The great end for which God made man was, that he should glorify God and enjoy him forever. man, we are to understand the proper rected him by his law, and made it his great privilege to attain.

The rule which God gave to man when he created him, and which still binds him to glorify and enjoy him forever, is called the moral law. The moral law is a transcript of the divine character; it forbids all sin, as being contrary to the holy nature of God, and binds all men to the performance of every duty relating to God, and every duty relating to men,

OF THE LAW OF NATURE.

The moral law is called the law of nature, because it originated in the will of God, was made known to man in his primitive state by a divine impression of it on his soul, and revealed in the great book of nature, which book of nature is no other than God's works of creation and providence, representing to the minds of mankind the relations in which they stand to God as his dependent creatures, and the various relations in which they stand to one another; all which show forth the will of God as a rule that binds mankind to perform all relative duties which they owe to God, and all relative duties which they owe to one another. For example--God's creating us, his preserving us, and giving us rain and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness, are moral reasons why we should glorify his name. And the relations of husbands and wives, parents and children, show the reciprocal obligations such persons are under to perform relative duties; and the necessary dependence of mankind upon one another as equals, for mutual protection, lays them under obligations to afford mutual protection to one another.

The moral law made known to man in the book of nature, and more perfectly in the volume of Divine revelation, corresponds exactly with the relations which God has established between himself and his ereatures, and with all the relations which he has established among his creatures; yea, these relations are so essential to the existence of moral obligations, that they are the very foundation of it; so that God's word as a written rule, when it requires duties that are purely moral, binds mankind only to the performance of such duties as arise out of these relations. Neither would it be consistent with the Divine character to require any acts of obedience from his creatures, which would contradict these relations that he has established. God has a sovereign right to form new relations, which might occason new obligations to duty —but no new relations made to exist, and authorised by God will ever be allowed to destroy or counteract the natural relations which he has already established or to prevent the duties which arise from them. If the relations which God has made to exist between himself and bis Creatures were to cease, and an those which he has made to ex. st among his creatures were dissolved. 2. mrk og would be at an end. Dery sim or crimina, BC of LIT Subert of the more, lam, is an atteNIE 30 DOSTOK some one or more of these poisons; te mexent which, zivi, nonahues have hOAT KIN pounder and abhangh such, nemales de in some instIves us sove neura zaiksons, yet the alimere end a such remakes is Je protect the innocent in the peaceable enjoyment a them

The fall of man occasioned a new relation to exist among mankind, which is that between civil rulers and their subjects. The ultimate end of civil government is the suppression of vice and the protection of the innocent, or in other words, to establish and defend these relations which subsist between God and his creatures, and the natural relations which exist among his creatures, but in no respect to change or dissolve them.

So sure as God has established these immutable relations, and has obliged his creatures to act agreeable to his will in their several relations, he must have granted inalienable rights to them, corresponding with their several relations and reciprocal obliga tions to duty; as the right to worship and serve God without being hindered by man, or any human authority, and the right of all conjugal, parental, and filial duties. Therefore, every law of man that contravenes those relations, and intercepts the right of doing any of those duties which naturally arise out of these relations, must be at war with the rights of man, and in open rebellion against the law of God.

Civil power in the hands of civil rulers, where they are not usurpers, is delegated to them from the people, who are the proper constituents of civil government. The people, prior to that delegation, have a right as individuals, and unorganised, to suppress crimes by punishing the guilty and protecting the innocent; but those duties, which would be very inconvenient for them to do in an unorganised state, or in their individual capacity, they, in constituting a civil government, delegate to representatives to perform in their name. But in this delegation they do not relinquish their rights, but only employ agents to do for them what would be inconvenient to do themselves.

The general rights of men may be distinguished into two classes. 1. Such as are capable of delegation. 2. Such as are incapable. Those rights which are capable of delegation, are the rights of protecting the innocent and punishing the guilty. These rights which are incapable of delegation are these private rights which have been defined, the defence and protection of which is the proper end of civil government; such as the right to serve God agreeable to his will, and according to the relations in which they stand to him, and the rights of private relative duties which they owe to one another, as the duties of husbands to wives, and wives to husbands, parents to children, and children to parents. Mankind cannot delegate to representatives or to others their own rights of duty to God, nor their own right to perform those private relative duties that they owe to one another, which have been described. If mankind, then, have no power to delegate to others their private rights, it would be still more unreasonable to attempt to delegate from their children the same rights, and equally unreasonable to attempt it with others that are not their children or descendants. There fore, all mankind have an inalienable right to serve God accord

ing to the relation in which they stand to him, and an inalienable right to do all relative duties to one another, without being hindered by any human authority, which rights imply all the characteristics of freemen, considered as subjects of civil government. In contending for freedom, in opposition to slavery, we design to plead for no more than those rights of duty to God, and rights of relative duties which mankind owe to one another. These views of the rights of man, are by no means at variance with a man's right to transfer to another his personal freedom, as respects his labor, for a time, or for life, which any man may sell as well as his other property, but it will condemn any attempt to sell his right of duty to God, or any private relative duties which he owes to mankind, both of which are inalienable.

QUERY.-Whether the civil law of any government can be the supreme rule of duty?

ANSWER.-The supreme rule of duty must be the moral law, but not the civil law, neither ought civil requisitions to be regarded, if found to be contrary to the moral law. If the civil law was the supreme rule, it would not admit the moral law to have any authority, further than it might be made subservient to the civil law.

2. It would suppose a people prior to their political constitution, or to the existence of civil law among them, to be without law; and that the representatives of a nation, while framing a constitution, and making laws to be above and out of the reach of all law, both divine and human, so as to have no moral rule to bind them, to make the constitution and laws good and just. 3. It would suppose the people to be obliged to adopt that constitution, and submit to the laws, however cruel and tyrannical.

4. It would suppose every constitution and laws, made by representatives, to be perfectly just, and the representatives themselves to be infallible men, for as sure as we admit a civil rule to be wrong, it supposes a law of higher authority which denounces it wrong. Or if we admit that representatives are fal lible men, it supposes a law that they are liable to transgress in instituting civil laws, which can be none other than the moral law. Therefore the civil law cannot be the supreme rule of duty to any people, but the supreme rule of duty is the moral law, which is before every law, and is that eternal and unchangeable rule, which is binding upon all men, to which every human law ought to be conformed, or else it is sinful. Says Cicero" There is not one moral law for Rome, another for Athens, and another for Sparta, but one moral law is equally binding on all nations."

These fundamental principles being laid down, we shall attempt an investigation of the subject proposed.

SLAVERY.

IN discussing this subject it will be proper,

I. To define slavery.

II. To give a brief history of servitude in general.

III. Show, by a course of argumentation, that slave. holding is condemned by the word of God, and contrary to the law of nature; and,

IV. Try to point out the duty of both emancipators and others in relation to the practice.

CHAPTER I.

I. SLAVERY DEFINED.

By slavery we do not intend such servants as might voluntarily bind or indenture themselves for any term, or for life, nor the subjects of kings or princes, who are fre. quently called servants, nor such servants as might bind themselves for any term; nor do we intend soldiers, who are often called servants, nor those who may have been or may be condemned for certain crimes and sold for servants, nor those who might have agreed to have been sold for a term of years, to pay their passage from one country to another, nor such as were taken prisoners in war and sold for slaves during life, which it appears was customary in ancient eastern countries, and among the