Chapter IX

IS THE SYSTEM OF RELIGION WHICH IS TAUGHT THE SLAVE THE GOSPEL?

The ladies of England, in their letter to the ladies of America, spoke in particular of the denial of the gospel to the slave. This has been indignantly resented in this country, and it has been claimed that the slaves do have the gospel communicated to them very extensively.

Whoever reads Mr. Charles C. Jones’ book on the religious instruction of the negroes will have no doubt of the following facts:

1. That from year to year, since the introduction of the negroes into this country, various pious and benevolent individuals have made efforts for their spiritual welfare.

2. That these efforts have increased, from year to year.

3. That the most extensive and important one came into being about the time that Mr. Jones’ book was written, in the year 1842, and extended to some degree through the United States. The fairest development of it was probably in the State of Georgia, the sphere of Mr. Jones’ immediate labor, where the most gratifying results were witnessed, and much very amiable and commendable Christian feeling elicited on the part of masters.

4. From time to time, there have been prepared, for the use of the slave, catechisms, hymns, short sermons, &c. &c., designed to be read to them by their masters, or taught them orally.

5. It will appear to any one who reads Mr. Jones’ book that, though written by a man who believed the system of slavery sanctioned by God, it manifests a spirit of sincere and earnest benevolence, and of devotedness to the cause he has undertaken, which cannot be too highly appreciated.

It is a very painful and unpleasant task to express any qualification or dissent with regard to efforts which have been undertaken in a good spirit, and which have produced, in many respects, good results; but, in the reading of Mr. Jones’ book, in the study of his catechism, and of various other catechisms and sermons which give an idea of the religious instruction of the slaves, the writer has often been painfully impressed with the idea that, however imbued and mingled with good, it is not the _true and pure gospel system_ which is given to the slave. As far as the writer has been able to trace out what is communicated to him, it amounts in substance to this; that his master’s authority over him, and property in him, to the full extent of the enactment of slave-law, is recognized and sustained by the tremendous authority of God himself. He is told that his master is God’s overseer; that he owes him a blind, unconditional, unlimited submission; that he must not allow himself to grumble, or fret, or murmur, at anything in his conduct; and, in case he does so, that his murmuring is not against his master, but against God. He is taught that it is God’s will that he should have nothing but labor and poverty in this world; and that, if he frets and grumbles at this, he will get nothing by it in this life, and be sent to hell forever in the next. Most vivid descriptions of hell, with its torments, its worms ever feeding and never dying, are held up before him; and he is told that this eternity of torture will be the result of insubordination here. It is no wonder that a slave-holder once said to Dr. Brisbane, of Cincinnati, that religion had been worth more to him, on his plantation, than a wagon-load of cowskins.

Furthermore, the slave is taught that to endeavor to evade his master by running away, or to shelter or harbor a slave who has run away, are sins which will expose him to the wrath of that omniscient Being, whose eyes are in every place.

As the slave is a movable and merchantable being, liable, as Mr. Jones calmly remarks, to “all the vicissitudes of property,” this system of instruction, one would think, would be in something of a dilemma, when it comes to inculcate the Christian duties of the family state.

When Mr. Jones takes a survey of the field, previous to commencing his system of operations, he tells us, what we suppose every rational person must have foreseen, that he finds among the negroes an utter demoralization upon this subject; that polygamy is commonly practised, and that the marriage-covenant has become a mere temporary union of interest, profit or pleasure, formed without reflection, and dissolved without the slightest idea of guilt.

That this state of things is the necessary and legitimate result of the system of laws which these Christian men have made and are still keeping up over their slaves, any sensible person will perceive; and any one would think it an indispensable step to any system of religious instruction here, that the negro should be placed in a situation where he _can_ form a legal marriage, and _can_ adhere to it after it is formed.

But Mr. Jones and his coadjutors commenced by declaring that it was not their intention to interfere, in the slightest degree, with the legal position of the slave.

We should have thought, then, that it would not have been possible, if these masters intended to keep their slaves in the condition of chattels personal, liable to a constant disruption of family ties, that they could have the heart to teach them the strict morality of the gospel with regard to the marriage relation.

But so it is, however. If we examine Mr. Jones’ catechism, we shall find that the slave is made to repeat orally that one man can be the husband of but one woman, and if, during her lifetime, he marries another, God will punish him forever in hell.

Suppose a conscientious woman, instructed in Mr. Jones’ catechism, by the death of her master is thrown into the market for the division of the estate, like many cases we may read of in the Georgia papers every week. She is torn from her husband and children, and sold at the other end of the Union, never to meet them again, and the new master commands her to take another husband;—what, now, is this woman to do? If she take the husband, according to her catechism she commits adultery, and exposes herself to everlasting fire; if she does not take him, she disobeys her master, who, she has been taught, is God’s overseer; and she is exposed to everlasting fire on that account, and certainly she is exposed to horrible tortures here.

Now, we ask, if the teaching that has involved this poor soul in such a labyrinth of horrors can be called the gospel?

Is it the gospel,—is it glad tidings in any sense of the words?

In the same manner, this catechism goes on to instruct parents to bring up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, that they should guide, counsel, restrain and govern them.

Again, these teachers tell them that they should search the Scriptures most earnestly, diligently and continually, at the same time declaring that it is not their intention to interfere with the laws which forbid their being taught to read. Searching the Scriptures, slaves are told, means coming to people who are willing to read to them. Yes, but if there be no one willing to do this, what then? Any one whom this catechism has thus instructed is sold off to a plantation on Red river, like that where Northrop lived; no Bible goes with him; his Christian instructors, in their care not to interfere with his civil condition, have deprived him of the power of reading; and in this land of darkness his oral instruction is but as a faded dream. Let any of us ask for what sum we would be deprived of all power of ever reading the Bible for ourselves, and made entirely dependent on the reading of others,—especially if we were liable to fall into such hands as slaves are,—and then let us determine whether a system of religious instruction, which begins by declaring that it has no intention to interfere with this cruel legal deprivation, is the gospel!

The poor slave, darkened, blinded, perplexed on every hand, by the influences which the legal system has spread under his feet, is, furthermore, strictly instructed in a perfect system of morality. He must not even covet anything that is his master’s; he must not murmur or be discontented; he must consider his master’s interests as his own, and be ready to sacrifice himself to them; and this he must do, as he is told, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward. He must forgive all injuries, and do exactly right under all perplexities; thus is the obligation on his part expounded to him, while his master’s reciprocal obligations mean only to give him good houses, clothes, food, &c. &c., leaving every master to determine for himself what is _good_ in relation to these matters.

No wonder, when such a system of utter injustice is justified to the negro by all the awful sanctions of religion, that now and then a strong soul rises up against it. We have known under a black skin shrewd minds, unconquerable spirits, whose indignant sense of justice no such representations could blind.

That Mr. Jones has met such is evident; for, speaking of the trials of a missionary among them, he says (p. 127):

He discovers Deism, Scepticism, Universalism. As already stated, the
various perversions of the gospel, and all the strong objections
against the truth of God,—objections which he may, perhaps, have
considered peculiar only to the cultivated minds, the ripe
scholarship and profound intelligence, of _critics_ and
_philosophers_!—extremes here meet on the natural and common ground
of a darkened understanding and a hardened heart.

Again, in the Tenth Annual Report of the “Association for the Religious Instruction of the Negroes in Liberty County Georgia,” he says:

Allow me to relate a fact which occurred in the spring of this year,
illustrative of the character and knowledge of the negroes at this
time. I was preaching to a large congregation on the _Epistle to
Philemon_; and when I insisted upon fidelity and obedience as
Christian virtues in servants, and, upon the authority of Paul,
condemned the practice of _running away_, one-half of my audience
deliberately walked off with themselves, and those that remained
looked anything but satisfied, either with the preacher or his
doctrine. After dismission, there was no small stir among them: some
solemnly declared that there was no such epistle in the Bible;
others, “that it was not the gospel;” others, “that I preached to
please masters;” others, “that they did not care if they ever heard
me preach again.”—pp. 24, 25.

Lundy Lane, an intelligent fugitive who has published his memoirs, says that on one occasion they (the slaves) were greatly delighted with a certain preacher, until he told them that God had ordained and created them expressly to make slaves of. He says that after that they all left him, and went away, because they thought, with the Jews, “This is a hard saying; who can hear it?”

In these remarks on the perversion of the gospel as presented to the slave, we do not mean to imply that much that is excellent and valuable is not taught him. We mean simply to assert that, in so far as the system taught justifies the slave-system, so far necessarily it vitiates the fundamental ideas of justice and morality; and, so far as the obligations of the gospel are inculcated on the slave in their purity, they bring him necessarily in conflict with the authority of the system. As we have said before, it is an attempt to harmonize light with darkness, and Christ with Belial. Nor is such an attempt to be justified and tolerated, because undertaken in the most amiable spirit by amiable men. Our admiration of some of the laborers who have conducted this system is very great; so also is our admiration of many of the Jesuit missionaries who have spread the Roman Catholic religion among our aboriginal tribes. Devotion and disinterestedness could be carried no further than some of both these classes of men have carried them.

But, while our respect for these good men must not seduce us as Protestants into an admiration of the system which they taught, so our esteem for our Southern brethren must not lead us to admit that a system which fully justifies the worst kind of spiritual and temporal despotism can properly represent the gospel of him who came to preach deliverance to the captives.

To prove that we have not misrepresented the style of instruction, we will give some extracts from various sermons and discourses.

In the first place, to show how explicitly religious teachers disclaim any intention of interfering in the legal relation (see Mr. Jones’ work, p. 157):

By law or custom, they are excluded from the advantages of
education; and, by consequence, from the reading of the word of God;
and this immense mass of immortal beings is thrown, for religious
instruction, upon _oral_ communications entirely. And upon whom?
Upon their _owners_. And their owners, especially of late years,
claim to be the _exclusive guardians_ of their religious
instruction, and the almoners of divine mercy towards them, thus
assuming the responsibility of their _entire_ Christianization!

All approaches to them from abroad are rigidly guarded against, and
no ministers are allowed to break to them the bread of life, except
such as have _commended themselves to the affection and confidence
of their owners_. I do not condemn this course of self-preservation
on the part of our citizens; I merely mention it to show their
_entire dependence_ upon ourselves.

In answering objections of masters to allowing the religious instruction of the negroes, he supposes the following objection, and gives the following answer:

If we suffer our negroes to be instructed, the tendency will be to
change the civil relations of society as now constituted.

To which let it be replied, that we separate entirely their
_religious_ and their _civil_ condition, and contend that the one
may be attended to without interfering with the other. Our
_principle_ is that laid down by the holy and just One: “Render unto
Cæsar the things which are Cæsar’s, and unto God the things which
are God’s.” And Christ and his apostles are our _example_. Did they
deem it proper and consistent with the good order of society to
preach the gospel to the servants? They did. In discharge of this
duty, did they interfere with their civil condition? They did not.

With regard to the description of heaven and the torments of hell, the following is from Mr. Jones’ catechism, pp. 83, 91, 92:

_Q._ Are there two places only spoken of in the Bible to which the
souls of men go after death?—_A._ Only two.

_Q._ Which are they?—_A._ Heaven and hell.

* * * * *

_Q._ After the Judgment is over, into what place do the righteous
go?—_A._ Into heaven.

_Q._ What kind of a place is heaven?—_A._ A most glorious and happy
place.

* * * * *

_Q._ Shall the righteous in heaven have any more hunger, or thirst,
or nakedness, or heat, or cold? Shall they have any more sin, or
sorrow, or crying, or pain, or death?—_A._ No.

_Q._ Repeat “And God shall wipe away all tears from their
eyes.”—_A._ “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and
there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying; neither
shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed
away.”

_Q._ Will heaven be their everlasting home?—_A._ Yes.

_Q._ And shall the righteous grow in knowledge and holiness and
happiness for ever and ever?—_A._ Yes.

_Q._ To what place should we wish and strive to go, more than to all
other places?—_A._ Heaven.

* * * * *

_Q._ Into what place are the wicked to be cast?—_A._ Into hell.

_Q._ Repeat “The wicked shall be turned.”—_A._ “The wicked shall be
turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.”

_Q._ What kind of a place is hell?—_A._ A place of dreadful
torments.

_Q._ What does it burn with?—_A._ Everlasting fire.

_Q._ Who are cast into hell besides wicked men?—_A._ The devil and
his angels.

_Q._ What will the torments of hell make the wicked do?—_A._ Weep
and wail and gnash their teeth.

_Q._ What did the rich man beg for when he was tormented in the
flame?—_A._ A drop of cold water to cool his tongue.

_Q._ Will the wicked have any good thing in hell? the least comfort?
the least relief from torment?—_A._ No.

_Q._ Will they ever come out of hell?—_A._ No, never.

_Q._ Can any go from heaven to hell, or from hell to heaven?—_A._
No.

_Q._ What is fixed between heaven and hell?—_A._ A great gulf.

_Q._ What is the punishment of the wicked in hell called?—_A._
Everlasting punishment.

_Q._ Will this punishment make them better?—_A._ No.

_Q._ Repeat “It is a fearful thing.”—_A._ “It is a fearful thing to
fall into the hands of the living God.”

_Q._ What is God said to be to the wicked?—_A._ A consuming fire.

_Q._ What place should we strive to escape from above all
others?—_A._ Hell.

The Rev. Alex. Glennie, rector of Allsaints parish, Waccamaw, South Carolina, has for several years been in the habit of preaching with express reference to slaves. In 1844 he published in Charleston a selection of these sermons, under the title of “Sermons preached on Plantations to Congregations of Negroes.” This book contains twenty-six sermons, and in twenty-two of them there is either a more or less extended account, or a reference to eternal misery in hell as a motive to duty. He thus describes the day of judgment (Sermon 15, p. 90):

When all people shall be gathered before him, “he shall separate
them, one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the
goats; and he shall set the sheep on the right hand, but the goats
on the left.” That, my brethren, will be an awful time, when this
separation shall be going on; when the holy angels, at the command
of the great Judge, shall be gathering together all the obedient
followers of Christ, and be setting them on the right hand of the
Judgment-seat, and shall place all the remainder on the left.
Remember that each of you must be present; remember that the Great
Judge can make no mistake; and that you shall be placed on one side
or on the other, according as in this world you have believed in and
obeyed him or not. How full of joy and thanksgiving will you be, if
you shall find yourself placed on the right hand! but how full of
misery and despair, if the left shall be appointed as your portion!
* * * *

But what shall he say to the wicked on the left hand? To them he
shall say, “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire,
prepared for the devil and his angels.” He will tell them to depart;
they did not, while here, seek him by repentance and faith; they did
not obey him, and now he will drive them from him. He will call them
cursed.

(Sermon 1, p. 42.) The death which is the wages of sin is this
everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. It is a fire
which shall last forever; and the devil and his angels, and all
people who will not love and serve God, shall there be punished
forever. The Bible says, “The smoke of their torment ascendeth up
for ever and ever.” The fire is not quenched, it never goes out,
“their worm dieth not;” their punishment is spoken of as a worm
always feeding upon but never consuming them; it never can stop.

Concerning the absolute authority of the master, take the following extract from Bishop Mead’s sermon. (Brooke’s Slavery, pp. 30, 31, 32.)

Having thus shown you the chief duties you owe to your great Master
in heaven, I now come to lay before you the duties you owe to your
masters and mistresses here upon earth; and for this you have one
general rule that you ought always to carry in your minds, and that
is, to do all service for them as if you did it for God himself.
Poor creatures! you little consider, when you are idle and
neglectful of your masters’ business, when you steal and waste and
hurt any of their substance, when you are saucy and impudent, when
you are telling them lies and deceiving them; or when you prove
stubborn and sullen, and will not do the work you are set about
without stripes and vexation; you do not consider, I say, that _what
faults you are guilty of towards your masters and mistresses are
faults done against God himself_, who hath set your masters and
mistresses over you in his own stead, and expects that you will do
for them just as you would do for Him. And, pray, do not think that
I want to deceive you when I tell you that _your masters and
mistresses are God’s overseers_; and that, if you are faulty towards
them, God himself will punish you severely for it in the next world,
unless you repent of it, and strive to make amends by your
faithfulness and diligence for the time to come; for God himself
hath declared the same.

Now, from this general rule,—namely, that you are to do all service
for your masters and mistresses as if you did it for God
himself,—there arise several other rules of duty towards your
masters and mistresses, which I shall endeavor to lay out in order
before you.

And, in the first place, you are to be obedient and subject to your
masters in all things.... And Christian ministers are commanded to
“exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to
please them well in all things, not answering them again, or
gainsaying.” You see how strictly God requires this of you, that
whatever your masters and mistresses order you to do, you must set
about it immediately, and faithfully perform it, without any
disputing or grumbling, and take care to please them well in all
things. And for your encouragement he tells you that he will reward
you for it in heaven; because, while you are honestly and faithfully
doing your master’s business here, you are serving your Lord and
Master in heaven. You see also that you are not to take any
exceptions to the behavior of your masters and mistresses; and that
you are to be subject and obedient, not only to such as are good,
and gentle, and mild, towards you, but also to such as may be
froward, peevish, and hard. For you are not at liberty to choose
your own masters; but into whatever hands God hath been pleased to
put you, you must do your duty, and God will reward you for it.

* * * * *

_You are to be faithful and honest to your masters and mistresses,
not purloining or wasting their goods or substance, but showing all
good fidelity in all things...._ Do not your masters, under God,
provide for you? And how shall they be able to do this, to feed and
to clothe you, unless you take honest care of everything that
belongs to them? _Remember that God requires this of you; and, if
you are not afraid of suffering for it here, you cannot escape the
vengeance of Almighty God, who will judge between you and your
masters, and make you pay severely in the next world for all the
injustice you do them here._ And though you could manage so
cunningly as to escape the eyes and hands of man, yet think what a
dreadful thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God, who
is able to cast both soul and body into hell!

_You are to serve your masters with cheerfulness, reverence, and
humility. You are to do your masters’ service with good will, doing
it as the will of God from the heart, without any sauciness or
answering again._ How many of you do things quite otherwise, and,
instead of going about your work with a good will and a good heart,
dispute and grumble, give saucy answers, and behave in a surly
manner! There is something so becoming and engaging in a modest,
cheerful, good-natured behavior, that a little work done in that
manner seems better done, and gives far more satisfaction, than a
great deal more, that must be done with fretting, vexation, and the
lash always held over you. It also gains the good will and love of
those you belong to, and makes your own life pass with more ease and
pleasure. Besides, you are to consider that this grumbling and
ill-will do not affect your masters and mistresses only. They have
ways and means in their hands of forcing you to do your work,
whether you are willing or not. _But your murmuring and grumbling is
against God, who hath placed you in that service, who will punish
you severely in the next world for despising his commands._

A very awful query here occurs to the mind. If the poor, ignorant slave, who wastes his master’s temporal goods to answer some of his own present purposes, be exposed to this heavy retribution, what will become of those educated men, who, for their temporal convenience, make and hold in force laws which rob generation after generation of men, not only of their daily earnings, but of all their rights and privileges as immortal beings?

The Rev. Mr. Glennie, in one of his sermons, as quoted by Mr. Bowditch, p. 137, assures his hearers that none of them will be able to say, in the day of judgment, “I had no way of hearing about my God and Saviour.”

Bishop Meade, as quoted by Brooke, pp. 34, 35, thus expatiates to slaves on the advantages of their condition. One would really think, from reading this account, that every one ought to make haste and get himself sold into slavery, as the nearest road to heaven.

_Take care that you do not fret or murmur, grumble or repine at your
condition; for this will not only make your life uneasy, but will
greatly offend Almighty God._ Consider that it is not yourselves, it
is not the people that you belong to, it is not the men that have
brought you to it, but _it is the will of God, who hath by his
providence made you servants, because, no doubt, he knew that
condition would be best for you in this world, and help you the
better towards heaven, if you would but do your duty in it_. So that
any discontent at your not being free, or rich, or great, as you see
some others, is quarrelling with your heavenly Master, and finding
fault with God himself, who hath made you what you are, and hath
promised you as large a share in the kingdom of heaven as the
greatest man alive, if you will but behave yourself aright, and do
the business he hath set you about in this world honestly and
cheerfully. Riches and power have proved the ruin of many an unhappy
soul, by drawing away the heart and affections from God, and fixing
them on mean and sinful enjoyments; so that, when God, who knows our
hearts better than we know them ourselves, sees that they would be
hurtful to us, and therefore keeps them from us, it is the greatest
mercy and kindness he could show us.

You may perhaps fancy that, if you had riches and freedom, you could
do your duty to God and man with greater pleasure than you can now.
But, pray, consider that, if you can but save your souls, through
the mercy of God, you will have spent your time to the best of
purposes in this world; and he that at last can get to heaven has
performed a noble journey, let the road be ever so rugged and
difficult. Besides, you really have a great advantage over most
white people, who have not only the care of their daily labor upon
their hands, but the care of looking forward and providing
necessaries for to-morrow and next day, and of clothing and bringing
up their children, and of getting food and raiment for as many of
you as belong to their families, which often puts them to great
difficulties, and distracts their minds so as to break their rest,
and take off their thoughts from the affairs of another world.
Whereas, you are quite eased from all these cares, and have nothing
but your daily labor to look after and, when that is done, take your
needful rest. Neither is it necessary for you to think of laying up
anything against old age, as white people are obliged to do; for the
laws of the country have provided that you shall not be turned off
when you are past labor, but shall be maintained, while you live, by
those you belong to, whether you are able to work or not.

Bishop Meade further consoles slaves thus for certain incidents of their lot, for which they may think they have more reason to find fault than for most others. The reader must admit that he takes a very philosophical view of the subject.

There is only one circumstance which may appear grievous, that I
shall now take notice of, and that is correction.

Now, when correction is given you, you either deserve it, or you do
not deserve it. But, whether you really deserve it or not, it is
your duty, and Almighty God requires, that you bear it patiently You
may perhaps think that this is hard doctrine; but if you consider it
right, you must needs think otherwise of it. Suppose, then, that you
deserve correction; you cannot but say that it is just and right you
should meet with it. Suppose you do not, or at least you do not
deserve so much, or so severe a correction, for the fault you have
committed; you perhaps have escaped a great many more, and at last
paid for all. Or, suppose you are quite innocent of what is laid to
your charge, and suffer wrongfully in that particular thing; is it
not possible you may have done some other bad thing which was never
discovered, and that Almighty God, who saw you doing it, would not
let you escape without punishment, one time or another? And ought
you not, in such a case, to give glory to him, and be thankful that
he would rather punish you in this life for your wickedness, than
destroy your souls for it in the next life? But, suppose even this
was not the case (a case hardly to be imagined), and that you have
by no means, known or unknown, deserved the correction you suffered;
there is this great comfort in it, that, if you bear it patiently,
and leave your cause in the hands of God, he will reward you for it
in heaven, and the punishment you suffer unjustly here shall turn to
your exceeding great glory hereafter.

That Bishop Meade has no high opinion of the present comforts of a life of slavery, may be fairly inferred from the following remarks which he makes to slaves:

Your own poor circumstances in this life ought to put you
particularly upon this, and taking care of your souls; for you
cannot have the pleasures and enjoyments of this life like rich free
people, who have estates and money to lay out as they think fit. If
others will run the hazard of their souls, they have a chance of
getting wealth and power, of heaping up riches, and enjoying all the
ease, luxury and pleasure their hearts should long after. But you
can have none of these things; so that, if you sell your souls, for
the sake of what poor matters you can get in this world, you have
made a very foolish bargain indeed.

This information is certainly very explicit and to the point. He continues:

Almighty God hath been pleased to make you slaves here, and to give
you nothing but labor and poverty in this world, which you are
obliged to submit to, as it is his will that it should be so. And
think within yourselves, what a terrible thing it would be, after
all your labors and sufferings in this life, to be turned into hell
in the next life, and, after wearing out your bodies in service
here, to go into a far worse slavery when this is over, and your
poor souls be delivered over into the possession of the devil, to
become his slaves forever in hell, without any hope of ever getting
free from it! If, therefore, you would be God’s freemen in heaven,
you must strive to be good, and serve him here on earth. Your
bodies, you know, are not your own; they are at the disposal of
those you belong to; but your precious souls are still your own,
which nothing can take from you, if it be not your own fault.
Consider well, then, that if you lose your souls by leading idle,
wicked lives here, you have got nothing by it in this world, and you
have lost your all in the next. For your idleness and wickedness is
generally found out, and your bodies suffer for it here; and, what
is far worse, if you do not repent and amend, your unhappy souls
will suffer for it hereafter.

Mr. Jones, in that part of the work where he is obviating the objections of masters to the Christian instruction of their slaves, supposes the master to object thus:

You teach them that “God is no respecter of persons;” that “He hath
made of one blood, all nations of men;” “Thou shalt love thy
neighbor as thyself;” “All things whatsoever ye would that men
should do to you, do ye even so to them;” what use, let me ask,
would they make of these sentences from the gospel?

Mr. Jones says:

Let it be replied, that the effect urged in the objection might
result from _imperfect_ and _injudicious_ religious instruction;
indeed, religious instruction may be communicated _with the express
design_, on the part of the instructor, to produce the effect
referred to, instances of which have occurred.

But who will say that neglect of duty and insubordination are the
_legitimate_ effects of the gospel, purely and sincerely imparted to
servants? Has it not in all ages been viewed as the greatest
civilizer of the human race?

How Mr. Jones would interpret the golden rule to the slave, so as to justify the slave-system, we cannot possibly tell. We can, however, give a specimen of the manner in which it has been interpreted in Bishop Meade’s sermons, p. 116. (Brooke’s Slavery, &c., pp. 32, 33.)

“All things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye
even so unto them;” that is, do by all mankind just as you would
desire they should do by you, if you were in their place, and they
in yours.

Now, to suit this rule to your particular circumstances, suppose you
were masters and mistresses, and had servants under you: would you
not desire that your servants should do their business faithfully
and honestly, as well when your back was turned as while you were
looking over them? Would you not expect that they should take notice
of what you said to them? that they should behave themselves with
respect towards you and yours, and be as careful of everything
belonging to you as you would be yourselves? You are servants: do,
therefore, as you would wish to be done by, and you will be both
good servants to your masters, and good servants to God, who
requires this of you, and will reward you well for it, if you do it
for the sake of conscience, in obedience to his commands.

The reverend teachers of such expositions of scripture do great injustice to the natural sense of their sable catechumens, if they suppose them incapable of detecting such very shallow sophistry, and of proving conclusively that “it is a poor rule that wont work both ways.” Some shrewd old patriarch, of the stamp of those who rose up and went out at the exposition of the Epistle to Philemon, and who show such great acuteness in bringing up objections against the truth of God, such as would be thought peculiar to cultivated minds, might perhaps, if he dared, reply to such an exposition of scripture in this way: “Suppose you were a slave,—could not have a cent of your own earnings during your whole life, could have no legal right to your wife and children, could never send your children to school, and had, as you have told us, nothing but labor and poverty in this life,-how would you like it? Would you not wish your Christian master to set you free from this condition?” We submit it to every one who is no respecter of persons, whether this interpretation of Sambos is not as good as the bishops. And if not, why not?

To us, with our feelings and associations, such discourses as these of Bishop Meade appear hard-hearted and unfeeling to the last degree. We should, however, do great injustice to the character of the man, if we supposed that they prove him to have been such. They merely go to show how perfectly use may familiarize amiable and estimable men with a system of oppression, till they shall have lost all consciousness of the wrong which it involves.

That Bishop Meades, reasonings did not thoroughly convince himself is evident from the fact that, after all his representations of the superior advantages of slavery as a means of religious improvement, he did, at last, emancipate his own slaves.

But, in addition to what has been said, this whole system of religious instruction is darkened by one hideous shadow,—THE SLAVE-TRADE. What does the Southern church do with her catechumens and communicants? Read the advertisements of Southern newspapers, and see. In every city in the slave-raising states behold the dépôts, kept constantly full of assorted negroes from the ages of ten to thirty! In every slave-consuming state see the receiving-houses, whither these poor wrecks and remnants of families are constantly borne! Who preaches the gospel to the slave-coffles? Who preaches the gospel in the slave-prisons? If we consider the tremendous extent of this internal trade,—if we read papers with columns of auction advertisements of human beings, changing hands as freely as if they were dollar-bills instead of human creatures,—we shall then realize how utterly all those influences of religious instruction must be nullified by leaving the subjects of them exposed “to all the vicissitudes of property.”