Chapter V: ALL were required to present offerings and sacrifices. Deut. xvi. 15, (3)

[Footnote A: Perhaps it will be objected, that the preservation of the Gibeonites, and of Rahab and her kindred, was a violation of the command of God. We answer, if it had been, we might expect some such intimation. If God had strictly commanded them to _exterminate all the Canaanites_, their pledge to save themselves was neither a repeal of the statute, nor absolution for the breach of it. If _unconditional destruction_ was the import of the command, would God have permitted such an act to pass without rebuke? Would he have established such a precedent when Israel had hardly passed the threshold of Canaan, and was then striking the first blow of a half century war? What if they _had_ passed their word to Rahab and the Gibeonites? Was that more binding than God's command? So Saul seems to have passed _his_ word to Agag; yet Samuel hewed him in pieces, because in saving his life, Saul had violated God's command. When Saul sought to slay the Gibeonites in "his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah," God sent upon Israel three years famine for it. When David inquired of them what atonement he should make, they say, "The man that devised against us, that we should be destroyed from _remaining in any of the coasts of Israel_, let seven of his sons be delivered," &c. 2 Sam. xxii. 1-6.]

[Footnote B: If the Canaanites were devoted by God to unconditional extermination, to have employed them in the erection of the temple,--what was it but the climax of impiety? As well might they pollute its altars with swine's flesh, or make their sons pass through the fire to Moloch.]

[Footnote C: Suppose all the Canaanitish nations had abandoned their territory at the tidings of Israel's approach, did God's command require the Israelites to chase them to the ends of the earth and hunt them out, until every Canaanite was destroyed? It is too preposterous for belief and yet it follows legitimately from that construction, which interprets the terms "consume," "destroy," "destroy utterly," &c. to mean unconditional, individual extermination.]

[The original design of the preceding Inquiry embraced a much wider range of topics. It was soon found, however, that to fill up the outline would be to make a volume. Much of the foregoing has therefore been thrown into a mere series of _indices_, to trains of thought and classes of proof which, however limited or imperfect, may perhaps, afford some facilities to those who have little leisure for protracted investigation.]

THE

ANTI-SLAVERY EXAMINER NO 4.

THE

BIBLE AGAINST SLAVERY.

AN INQUIRY INTO THE

PATRIARCHAL AND MOSAIC SYSTEMS

ON THE SUBJECT OF

HUMAN RIGHTS.

Fourth Edition--Enlarged.

NEW YORK:

PUBLISHED BY THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY,

NO. 143 NASSAU STREET.

1838.

This No. contains 7 sheets:--Postage, under 100 miles, 10 1/2 cents; over 100 miles, 14 cents.

Please read and Circulate.

CONTENTS.

DEFINITION OF SLAVERY,

NEGATIVE,

AFFIRMATIVE,

LEGAL,

THE MORAL LAW AGAINST SLAVERY

"THOU SHALT NOT STEAL,"

"THOU SHALT NOT COVET,"

MAN-STEALING--EXAMINATION OF EX. xxi. 16,

SEPARATION OF MAN FROM BRUTES AND THINGS,

IMPORT OF "BUY" AND "BOUGHT WITH MONEY,"

SERVANTS SOLD THEMSELVES,

RIGHTS AND PRIVILEGES SECURED BY LAW TO SERVANTS,

SERVANTS WERE VOLUNTARY,

RUNAWAY SERVANTS NOT TO BE DELIVERED TO THEIR MASTERS,

SERVANTS WERE PAID WAGES,

MASTERS NOT "OWNERS,"

SERVANTS NOT SUBJECTED TO THE USES OF PROPERTY,

SERVANTS EXPRESSLY DISTINGUISHED FROM PROPERTY,

EXAMINATION OF GEN. xii. 5.--"THE SOULS THAT THEY HAD
GOTTEN," &c.

SOCIAL EQUALITY OF SERVANTS AND MASTERS,

CONDITION OF THE GIBEONITES AS SUBJECTS OF THE HEBREW
COMMONWEALTH,

EGYPTIAN BONDAGE CONTRASTED WITH AMERICAN SLAVERY,

CONDITION OF AMERICAN SLAVES,

ILL FED,

ILL CLOTHED,

OVER-WORKED,

THEIR DWELLING UNFIT FOR HUMAN BEINGS,

MORAL CONDITION--"HEATHENS,"

OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED.

"CURSED BE CANAAN," &c.--EXAMINATION OF GEN. ix. 25,

"FOR HE IS HIS MONEY," &c.--EXAMINATION OF EX. xxi. 20, 21,

EXAMINATION OF LEV. xxv. 44-46,

"BOTH THY BONDMEN, &c., SHALL BE OF THE HEATHEN,"

"OF THEM SHALL YE BUY,"

"THEY SHALL BE YOUR BONDMEN FOREVER,"

"YE SHALL TAKE THEM AS AN INHERITANCE," &c.

EXAMINATION OF LEV. xxv. 39, 40.--THE FREEHOLDER NOT TO "SERVE
AS A BOND SERVANT,"

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HIRED AND BOUGHT SERVANTS,

BOUGHT SERVANTS THE MOST FAVORED AND HONORED CLASS,

ISRAELITES AND STRANGERS BELONGED TO BOTH CLASSES,

ISRAELITES SERVANTS TO THE STRANGERS,

REASONS FOR THE RELEASE OF THE ISRAELITISH SERVANTS IN
THE SEVENTH YEAR,

REASONS FOR ASSIGNING THE STRANGERS TO A LONGER SERVICE,

REASONS FOR CALLING THEM THE SERVANTS,

DIFFERENT KINDS OF SERVICE ASSIGNED TO THE ISRAELITES
AND STRANGERS,

REVIEW OF ALL THE CLASSES OF SERVANTS WITH THE MODIFICATIONS OF
EACH,

POLITICAL DISABILITIES OF THE STRANGERS,

EXAMINATION OF EX. xxi. 2-6.--"IF THOU BUY AN HEBREW SERVANT,"

THE CANAANITES NOT SENTENCED TO UNCONDITIONAL EXTERMINATION,

THE BIBLE AGAINST SLAVERY.

The spirit of slavery never seeks refuge in the Bible of its own accord. The horns of the altar are its last resort--seized only in desperation, as it rushes from the terror of the avenger's arm. Like other unclean spirits, it "hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest its deeds should be reproved." Goaded to phrenzy in its conflicts with conscience and common sense, denied all quarter, and hunted from every covert, it vaults over the sacred inclosure and courses up and down the Bible, "seeking rest, and finding none." THE LAW OF LOVE, glowing on every page, flashes around it an omnipresent anguish and despair. It shrinks from the hated light, and howls under the consuming touch, as demons quailed before the Son of God, and shrieked, "Torment us not." At last, it slinks away under the types of the Mosaic system, and seeks to burrow out of sight among their shadows. Vain hope! Its asylum is its sepulchre; its city of refuge, the city of destruction. It flies from light into the sun; from heat, into devouring fire; and from the voice of God into the thickest of His thunders.

DEFINITION OF SLAVERY.

If we would know whether the Bible sanctions slavery, we must determine _what slavery is_. An element, is one thing; a relation, another; an appendage, another. Relations and appendages presuppose other things to which they belong. To regard them as the things themselves, or as constituent parts of them, leads to endless fallacies. Mere political disabilities are often confounded with slavery; so are many relations, and tenures, indispensible to the social state. We will specify some of these.

1. PRIVATION OF SUFFRAGE. Then minors are slaves.

2. INELIGIBILITY TO OFFICE. Then females are slaves.

3. TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION. Then slaveholders in the District of Columbia are slaves.

4. PRIVATION OF ONE'S OATH IN LAW. Then atheists are slaves.

5. PRIVATION OF TRIAL BY JURY. Then all in France are slaves.

6. BEING REQUIRED TO SUPPORT A PARTICULAR RELIGION. Then the people of England are slaves.

7. APPRENTICESHIP. The rights and duties of master and apprentice are correlative. The _claim_ of each upon the other results from his _obligation_ to the other. Apprenticeship is based on the principle of equivalent for value received. The rights of the apprentice are secured, equally with those of the master. Indeed while the law is _just_ to the former it is _benevolent_ to the latter; its main design being rather to benefit the apprentice than the master. To the master it secures a mere compensation--to the apprentice, both a compensation and a virtual gratuity in addition, he being of the two the greatest gainer. The law not only recognizes the _right_ of the apprentice to a reward for his labor, but appoints the wages, and enforces the payment. The master's claim covers only the _services_ of the apprentice. The apprentice's claim covers _equally_ the services of the master. Neither can hold the other as property; but each holds property in the services of the other, and BOTH EQUALLY. Is this slavery?

8. FILIAL SUBORDINATION AND PARENTAL CLAIMS. Both are nature's dictates, and intrinsic elements of the social state; the natural affections which blend parent and child in one, excite each to discharge those offices incidental to the relation, and are a shield for mutual protection. The parent's legal claim to the child's services, is a slight return for the care and toil of his rearing, exclusively of outlays for support and education. This provision is, with the mass of mankind, indispensable to the preservation of the family state. The child, in helping his parents, helps himself--increases a common stock, in which he has a share; while his most faithful services do but acknowledge a debt that money cannot cancel.

9. CLAIMS OF GOVERNMENT ON SUBJECTS. Governments owe their subjects protection; subjects owe just governments allegiance and support. The obligations of both are reciprocal, and the benefits received by both are mutual, equal, and voluntarily rendered.

10. BONDAGE FOR CRIME. Must innocence be punished because guilt suffers penalties? True, the criminal works for the government without pay; and well he may. He owes the government. A century's work would not pay its drafts on him. He will die a public defaulter. Because laws make men pay their debts, shall those be forced to pay who owe nothing? The law makes no criminal, PROPERTY. It restrains his liberty, and makes him pay something, a mere penny in the pound, of his debt to the government; but it does not make him a chattel. Test it. To own property, is to own its product. Are children born of convicts, government property? Besides, can _property_ be guilty? Can _chattels_ deserve punishment?

11. RESTRAINTS UPON FREEDOM. Children are restrained by parents, pupils, by teachers, patients, by physicians, corporations, by charters, and legislatures, by constitutions. Embargoes, tariffs, quarantine, and all other laws, keep men from doing as they please. Restraints are the web of civilized society, warp and woof. Are they slavery? then a government of LAW, is the climax of slavery!

12. INVOLUNTARY OR COMPULSORY SERVICE. A juryman is empannelled against his will, and sit he _must_. A sheriff orders his posse; bystanders _must_ turn in. Men are _compelled_ to remove nuisances, pay fines and taxes, support their families, and "turn to the right as the law directs," however much against their wills. Are they therefore slaves? To confound slavery with involuntary service is absurd. Slavery is a _condition_. The slave's _feelings_ toward it cannot alter its nature. Whether he desires or detests it, the condition remains the same. The slave's willingness to be a slave is no palliation of the slaveholder's guilt. Suppose he should really believe himself a chattel, and consent to be so regarded by others, would that _make_ him a chattel, or make those guiltless who _hold_ him as such? I may be sick of life, and I tell the assassin so that stabs me; is he any the less a murderer? Does my _consent_ to his crime, atone for it? my partnership in his guilt, blot out his part of it? The slave's willingness to be a slave, so far from lessening the guilt of his "owner," aggravates it. If slavery has so palsied his mind that he looks upon himself as a chattel, and consents to be one, actually to hold him as such, falls in with his delusion, and confirms the impious falsehood. These very feelings and convictions of the slave, (if such were possible) increase a hundred fold the guilt of the master, and call upon him in thunder, immediately to recognize him as a MAN, and thus break the sorcery that cheats him out of his birthright--the consciousness of his worth and destiny.

Many of the foregoing conditions are _appendages_ of slavery, but no one, nor all of them together, constitute its intrinsic unchanging element.

ENSLAVING MEN IS REDUCING THEM TO ARTICLES OF PROPERTY--making free agents, chattels--converting _persons_ into _things_--sinking immortality into _merchandize_. A _slave_ is one held in this condition. In law, "he owns nothing, and can acquire nothing." His right to himself is abrogated. If he say _my_ hands, _my_ body, _my_ mind, MY_self_, they are figures of speech. To _use himself_ for his own good, is a _crime_. To keep what he earns, is _stealing_. To take his body into his own keeping, is _insurrection_. In a word, the profit of his master is made the END of his being, and he, a _mere means_ to that end--a mere means to an end into which his interests do not enter, of which they constitute no portion[A]. MAN, sunk to a _thing!_ the intrinsic element, the _principle_ of slavery; MEN, bartered, leased, mortgaged, bequeathed, invoiced, shipped in cargoes, stored as goods, taken on executions, and knocked off at a public outcry! Their _rights_, another's conveniences; their interests, wares on sale; their happiness, a household utensil; their personal inalienable ownership, a serviceable article or a plaything, as best suits the humour of the hour; their deathless nature, conscience, social affections, sympathies, hopes--marketable commodities! We repeat it, THE REDUCTION OF PERSONS TO THINGS! Not robbing a man of privileges, but of _himself_; not loading him with burdens, but making him a _beast of burden_; not restraining liberty, but subverting it; not curtailing rights, but abolishing them; not inflicting personal cruelty, but annihilating _personality_; not exacting involuntary labor, but sinking man into an _implement_ of labor; not abridging human comforts, but abrogating human _nature_; not depriving an animal of immunities, but despoiling a rational being of attributes--uncreating a MAN, to make room for a _thing_!

[Footnote A: To deprive human nature of _any_ of its rights is _oppression_; to take away the _foundation_ of its rights is slavery. In other words, whatever sinks man from an END to a mere _means_, just so far makes him a slave. Hence West-India apprenticeship retained the cardinal principle of slavery. The apprentice, during three-fourths of his time, was forced to labor, and robbed of his earnings; just so far forth he was a _mere means_, a slave. True in other respects slavery was abolished in the British West Indies August, 1834. Its bloodiest features were blotted _out_--but the meanest and most despicable of all--forcing the poor to work for the rich without pay three fourths of their time, with a legal officer to flog them if they demurred at the outrage, was one of the provisions of the "Emancipation Act!" For the glories of that luminary, abolitionists thanked God, while they mourned that it rose behind clouds and shone through an eclipse. [West India apprenticeship is now (August 1838) abolished. On the first of the present month, every slave in every British island and colony stood up a freeman!--Note to fourth edition.] ]

That this is American slavery, is shown by the laws of slave states. Judge Stroud, in his "Sketch of the Laws relating to Slavery," says, "The cardinal principle of slavery, that the slave is not to be ranked among sentient beings, but among _things_--obtains as undoubted law in all of these [the slave] states." The law of South Carolina says, "Slaves shall be deemed, held, taken, reputed, and adjudged in law to be chattels personal in the hands of their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators, and assigns, to ALL INTENTS, CONSTRUCTIONS, AND PURPOSES WHATSOEVER." _Brev. Dig._, 229. In Louisiana, "A slave is one who is in the power of a master to whom he belongs; the master may sell him, dispose of his person, his industry, and his labor; he can do nothing, possess nothing, nor acquire any thing, but what must belong to his master."--_Civ. Code_, Art. 35.

This is American slavery. The eternal distinction between a person and a thing, trampled under foot--the crowning distinction of all others--alike the source, the test, and the measure of their value--the rational, immortal principle, consecrated by God to universal homage in a baptism of glory and honor, by the gift of his Son, his Spirit, his word, his presence, providence, and power; his shield, and staff, and sheltering wing; his opening heavens, and angels ministering, and chariots of fire, and songs of morning stars, and a great voice in heaven proclaiming eternal sanctions, and confirming the word with signs following.

Having stated the _principle_ of American slavery, we ask, DOES THE BIBLE SANCTION SUCH A PRINCIPLE?[A] "To the _law_ and the testimony?"

[Footnote A: The Bible record of actions is no comment on their moral character. It vouches for them as _facts_, not as _virtues_. It records without rebuke, Noah's drunkenness, Lot's incest, and the lies of Jacob and his mother--not only single acts, but _usages_, such as polygamy and concubinage, are entered on the record without censure. Is that _silent entry_ God's _endorsement?_ Because the Bible in its catalogue of human actions, does not stamp on every crime its name and number, and write against it, _this is a crime_--does that wash out its guilt, and bleach it into a virtue?]

THE MORAL LAW AGAINST SLAVERY.

Just after the Israelites were emancipated from their bondage in Egypt, while they stood before Sinai to receive the law, as the trumpet waxed louder, and the mount quaked and blazed, God spake the ten commandments from the midst of clouds and thunderings. Two of those commandments deal death to slavery. "THOU SHALT NOT STEAL," or, "thou shalt not take from another what _belongs_ to him." All man's powers are God's gift to HIM. Each of them is a part of himself, and all of them together constitute himself. All else that belongs to man, is acquired by the _use_ of these powers. The interest belongs to him, because the principal does; the product is his, because he is the producer. Ownership of any thing, is ownership of its _use_. The right to use according to will, is _itself_ ownership. The eighth commandment presupposes and assumes the right of every man to his powers, and their product. Slavery robs of both. A man's right to himself, is the only right absolutely original and intrinsic--his right to anything else is merely _relative_ to this, is derived from it, and held only by virtue of it. SELF-RIGHT is the _foundation right_--the _post in the middle_, to which all other rights are fastened. Slaveholders, when talking about their RIGHT to their slaves, always assume their own right to themselves. What slave-holder ever undertook to prove his right to himself? He knows it to be a self-evident proposition, that _a man belongs to himself_--that the right is intrinsic and absolute. In making out his own title, he makes out the title of every human being. As the fact of being _a man_ is itself the title, the whole human family have one common title deed. If one man's title is valid, all are valid. If one is worthless, all are. To deny the validity of the _slave's_ title is to deny the validity of _his own_; and yet in the act of making a man a slave, the slaveholder _asserts_ the validity of his own title, while he seizes him as his property who has the _same_ title. Further, in making him a slave, he does not merely disfranchise of humanity _one_ individual, but UNIVERSAL MAN. He destroys the foundations. He annihilates _all rights_. He attacks not only the human race, but _universal being_, and rushes upon JEHOVAH. For rights are _rights_; God's are no more--man's are no less.

The eighth commandment forbids the taking of _any part_ of that which belongs to another. Slavery takes the _whole_. Does the same Bible which prohibits the taking of _any_ thing from him, sanction the taking of _every_ thing! Does it thunder wrath against the man who robs his neighbor of a _cent_, yet commission him to rob his neighbour of _himself?_ Slaveholding is the highest possible violation of the eight commandment. To take from a man his earnings, is theft. But to take the _earner_, is a compound, life-long theft--supreme robbery that vaults up the climax at a leap--the dread, terrific, giant robbery, that towers among other robberies a solitary horror. The eight commandment forbids the taking away, and the tenth adds, "Thou shalt not _covet_ any thing that is thy neighbor's;" thus guarding every man's right to himself and property, by making not only the actual taking away a sin, but even that state of mind which would _tempt_ to it. Who ever made human beings slaves, without _coveting_ them? Why take from them their time, labor, liberty, right of self-preservation and improvement, their right to acquire property, to worship according to conscience, to search the Scriptures, to live with their families, and their right to their own bodies, if they do not _desire_ them? They COVET them for purposes of gain, convenience, lust of dominion, of sensual gratification, of pride and ostentation. THEY BREAK THE TENTH COMMANDMENT, and pluck down upon their heads the plagues that are written in the book. _Ten_ commandments constitute the brief compend of human duty. _Two_ of these brand slavery as sin.

MANSTEALING--EXAMINATION OF EX. XXI. 16.

The giving of the law at Sinai, immediately preceded the promulgation of that body of laws called the "Mosaic system." Over the gateway of that system, fearful words were written by the finger of God--"HE THAT STEALETH A MAN AND SELLETH HIM, OR IF HE BE FOUND IN HIS HAND, HE SHALL SURELY BE PUT TO DEATH[A]." Ex. xxi. 16.

[Footnote A: A writer in the American Quarterly Review, commenting on this passage, thus blasphemes. "On this passage an impression has gone abroad that slave-owners are necessarily menstealers; how hastily, any one will perceive who consults the passage in its connection. Being found in the chapter which authorizes this species of property among the Hebrews, it must of course relate to _its full protection from the danger of being enticed away from its rightful owner."_--Am. Quart. Review for June, 1833. Article "Negro slavery."]

The oppression of the Israelites in Egypt, and the wonders wrought for their deliverance, proclaim the reason for such a law at such a time. They had just been emancipated. The tragedies of their house of bondage were the realities of yesterday, and peopled their memories with thronging horrors. They had just witnessed God's testimony against oppression in the plagues of Egypt--the burning blains on man and beast; the dust quickened into loathsome life, and swarming upon every living thing; the streets, the palaces, the temples, and every house heaped up with the carcases of things abhorred; the kneading troughs and ovens, the secret chambers and the couches, reeking and dissolving with the putrid death; the pestilence walking in darkness at noonday, the devouring locusts, and hail mingled with fire, the first-born death-struck, and the waters blood; and last of all, that dread high hand and stretched-out arm, that whelmed the monarch and his hosts, and strewed their corpses on the sea. All this their eyes had looked upon; earth's proudest city, wasted and thunder-scarred, lying in desolation, and the doom of oppressors traced on her ruins in the hand-writing of God, glaring in letters of fire mingled with blood--a blackened monument of wrath to the uttermost against the stealers of men. No wonder that God, in a code of laws prepared for such a people at such a time, should uprear on its foreground a blazing beacon to flash terror on slaveholders. "_He that stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death."_ Ex. xxi. 16. Deut. xxiv, 7[A]. God's cherubim and flaming sword guarding the entrance to the Mosaic system!

[Footnote A: Jarchi, the most eminent of the Jewish Commentators, who wrote seven hundred years ago, in his comment on this stealing and making merchandize of men, gives the meaning thus:--"Using a man against his will, as a servant lawfully purchased; yea, though he should use his services ever so little, only to the value of a farthing, or use but his arm to lean on to support him, _if he be forced so to act as a servant_, the person compelling him but once to do so, shall die as a thief, whether he has sold him or not."]

The word _Ganabh_ here rendered _stealeth,_ means, the taking of what belongs to another, whether by violence or fraud; the same word is used in the eight commandment, and prohibits both robbery and theft.

The crime specified, is that of depriving SOMEBODY of the ownership of a man. Is this somebody a master? and is the crime that of depriving a master of his servant? Then it would have been "he that stealeth" a _servant_, not "he that stealeth a _man_." If the crime had been the taking of an individual from _another_, then the _term_ used would have been expressive of that relation, and most especially if it was the relation of property and _proprietor!_

The crime is stated in a three-fold form--man _stealing_, _selling_, and _holding_. All are put on a level, and whelmed under one penalty--DEATH[A]. This _somebody_ deprived of the ownership of a man, is the _man himself_, robbed of personal ownership. Joseph said, "Indeed I was _stolen_ away out of the land of the Hebrews." Gen. xl. 15. How _stolen?_ His brethren sold him as an article of merchandize. Contrast this penalty for _man_-stealing with that for _property_-stealing, Ex. xxii. 14. If a man had stolen an _ox_ and killed or sold it, he was to restore five oxen; if he had neither sold nor killed it, two oxen. But in the case of stealing a _man_, the _first_ act drew down the utmost power of punishment; however often repeated or aggravated the crime, human penalty could do no more. The fact that the penalty for _man_-stealing was death, and the penalty for _property_-stealing, the mere restoration of double, shows that the two cases were adjudicated on totally different principles. The man stolen might be diseased or totally past labor, consequently instead of being profitable to the thief, he would be a tax upon him, yet death was still the penalty, though not a cent's worth of _property-value_ was taken. The penalty for stealing property was a mere property-penalty. However large the theft, the payment of double wiped out the score. It might have a greater money value than a thousand men, yet death was not the penalty, nor maiming, nor braiding, nor even stripes, but double _of the same kind_. Why was not the rule uniform? When a _man_ was stolen why was not the thief required to restore double of the same kind--two men, or if he had sold him, five men? Do you say that the man-thief might not _have_ them? So the ox-thief might not have two oxen, or if he had killed it, five. But if God permitted men to hold _men_ as property, equally with oxen, the man-thief, could get men with whom to pay the penalty, as well as the ox-thief, oxen. Further, when property was stolen, the legal penalty was a compensation to the person injured. But when a _man_ was stolen, no property compensation was offered. To tender money as an equivalent, would have been to repeat the outrage with intolerable aggravations. Compute the value of a MAN in _money!_ Throw dust into the scale against immortality! The law recoiled from such supreme insult and impiety. To have permitted the man-thief to expiate his crime by restoring double, would have been making the repetition of crime its atonement. But the infliction of death for man-stealing exacted the utmost possibility of reparation. It wrung from the guilty wretch as he gave up the ghost, the testimony of blood, and death-groans, to the infinite dignity and worth of man,--a proclamation to the universe, voiced in mortal agony, "MAN IS INVIOLABLE."--a confession shrieked in phrenzy at the grave's mouth--"I die accursed, and God is just."

[Footnote A: "Those are _men-stealers_ who abduct, _keep_, sell, or buy slaves or freemen." GROTIUS.]

If God permitted man to hold man as property, why did he punish for stealing that kind of property infinitely more than for stealing any other kind of property? Why punish with death for stealing a very little of _that_ sort of property, and make a mere fine the penalty for stealing a thousand times as much, of any other sort of property--especially if by his own act, God had annihilated the difference between man and _property_, by putting him on a level with it?

The guilt of a crime, depends much upon the nature, character, and condition of the victim. To steal is a crime, whoever the thief, or whatever the plunder. To steal bread from a full man, is theft; to steal it from a starving man, is both theft and murder. If I steal my neighbor's property, the crime consists not in altering the _nature_ of the article, but in taking as _mine_ what is _his_. But when I take my neighbor himself, and first make him _property_, and then _my_ property, the latter act, which was the sole crime in the former case, dwindles to nothing. The sin in stealing a man, is not the transfer from its owner to another of that which is already property, but the turning of _personality_ into _property_. True, the attributes of man remain, but the rights and immunities which grow out of them are annihilated. It is the first law both of reason and revelation, to regard things and beings as they are; and the sum of religion, to feel and act toward them according to their value. Knowingly to treat them otherwise is sin; and the degree of violence done to their nature, relations, and value, measures its guilt. When things are sundered which God has indissolubly joined, or confounded in one, which he has separated by infinite extremes; when sacred and eternal distinctions, which he has garnished with glory, are derided and set at nought, then, if ever, sin reddens to its "scarlet dye." The sin specified in the passage, is that of doing violence to the _nature_ of a _man_--to his intrinsic value as a rational being. In the verse preceding the one under consideration, and in that which follows, the same principle is laid down. Verse 15, "He that smiteth his father or his mother shall surely be put to death." Verse. 17, "He that curseth his father or his mother, shall surely be put to death." If a Jew smote his neighbor, the law merely smote him in return; but if the blow was given to a _parent_, it struck the smiter dead. The parental relation is the _centre_ of human society. God guards it with peculiar care. To violate that, is to violate all. Whoever tramples on that, shows that _no_ relation has any sacredness in his eyes--that he is unfit to move among human relations who violates one so sacred and tender. Therefore, the Mosaic law uplifted his bleeding corpse, and brandished the ghastly terror around the parental relation to guard it from impious inroads.

Why such a difference in penalties, for the same act? Answer. 1. The relation violated was obvious--the distinction between parents and others self-evident, dictated by a law of nature. 2. The act was violence to nature--a suicide on constitutional susceptibilities. 3. The parental relation then, as now, was the focal point of the social system, and required powerful safe-guards. "_Honor thy father and thy mother_," stands at the head of those commands which prescribe the duties of man to man; and throughout the Bible, the parental state is God's favorite illustration of his own relations to the human family. In this case, death was to be inflicted not for smiting a _man,_ but a _parent_--_a distinction_ made sacred by God, and fortified by a bulwark of defence. In the next verse, "He that stealeth a man," &c., the SAME PRINCIPLE is wrought out in still stronger relief. The crime to be punished with death was not the taking of property from its owner, but violence to an _immortal nature_, the blotting out of a sacred _distinction_--making MEN "chattels."

The incessant pains taken in the Old Testament to separate human beings from brutes and things, shows God's regard for this, his own distinction. "In the beginning" he proclaimed it to the universe as it rose into being. Creation stood up at the instant of its birth, to do it homage. It paused in adoration while God ushered forth its crowning work. Why that dread pause and that creating arm held back in mid career and that high conference in the godhead? "Let us make man in OUR IMAGE after OUR LIKENESS, and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle and over all the earth." Then while every living thing, with land, and sea, and firmament, and marshalled worlds, waited to swell the shout of morning stars--then God created man IN HIS OWN IMAGE; IN THE IMAGE OF GOD created he him." This solves the problem, IN THE IMAGE OF GOD, CREATED HE HIM. This distinction is often repeated and always with great solemnity. In Gen. i. 26-28, it is expressed in various forms. In Gen. v. 1, we find it again, "IN THE LIKENESS OF GOD MADE HE HIM." In Gen. ix. 6, again. After giving license to shed the blood of "every moving thing that liveth," it is added, "_Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed, for_ IN THE IMAGE OF GOD MADE HE MAN." As though it had been said, "All these creatures are your property, designed for your use--they have the likeness of earth, and their spirits go downward; but this other being, MAN, has my own likeness: IN THE IMAGE OF GOD made I man; an intelligent, moral, immortal agent, invited to all that I can give and he can be. So in Lev. xxiv. 17, 18, 21, "He that killeth any MAN shall surely be put to death; and he that killeth a beast shall make it good, beast for beast; and he that killeth a MAN he shall be put to death." So in Ps. viii. 5, 6, we have an enumeration of particulars, each separating infinitely MEN from brutes and things! 1. "_Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels."_ Slavery drags him down among _brutes._ 2. _"And hast crowned him with glory and honor."_ Slavery tears off his crown, and puts on a _yoke_. 3. _"Thou madest him to have dominion_[A] OVER _the works of thy hands."_ Slavery breaks his sceptre, and cast him down _among_ those works--yea, _beneath them_. 4. _"Thou hast put all things under his feet_." Slavery puts HIM under the feet of an "owner." Who, but an impious scorner, dare thus strive with his Maker, and mutilate HIS IMAGE, and blaspheme the Holy One, who saith, _"Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of these, ye did it unto ME._"

[Footnote A: "Thou madest him to have dominion." In Gen. i. 28, God says to man, _"Have dominion_ over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth," thus vesting in _every_ human being the right of ownership over the earth, its products and animal life, and in _each_ human being the _same_ right. By so doing God prohibited the exercise of ownership by man over _man_; for the grant to _all_ men of _equal_ ownership, for ever _shut_ out the possibility of their exercising ownership over _each other_, as whoever is the owner of a _man_, is the owner of his _right of property_--in other words, when one man becomes the property of another his rights become such too, his _right of property_ is transferred to his "owner," and thus as far as _himself_ is concerned, is annihilated. Finally, by originally vesting _all_ men with dominion or ownership over property, God proclaimed the _right of all_ to exercise it, and pronounced every man who takes it away a robber of the highest grade. Such is every slaveholder.]

In further prosecuting this inquiry, the Patriarchal and Mosaic systems will be considered together, as each reflects light upon the other, and as many regulations of the latter are mere _legal_ forms of Divine institutions previously existing. As a _system_, the latter alone is of Divine authority. Whatever were the usages of the patriarchs God has not made them our exemplars.[B] The question to be settled by us, is not what were Jewish _customs_, but what were the rules that God gave for the regulation of those customs.

[Footnote B: Those who insist that the patriarchs held slaves, and sit with such delight under their shadow, hymning the praises of "those good old slaveholders and patriarchs," might at small cost greatly augment their numbers. A single stanza celebrating patriarchal _concubinage_, winding off with a chorus in honor of patriarchal _drunkenness_, would be a trumpet-call, summoning from brothels, bush and brake, highway and hedge, and sheltering fence, a brotherhood of kindred affinities, each claiming Abraham or Noah as his patron saint, and shouting, "My name is legion." A myriad choir and thunderous song!]

Before entering upon an analysis of the condition of servants under these two states of society, we will consider the import of certain terms which describe the mode of procuring them.

IMPORT OF "BUY," AND "BOUGHT WITH MONEY."

As the Israelites were commanded to "buy" their servants, and as Abraham had servants "bought with money," it is argued that servants were articles of property! The sole ground for this belief is _the terms themselves!_ How much might be saved, if in discussion, the thing to be proved were always _assumed_! To beg the question in debate, is vast economy of midnight oil, and a wholesale forestaller of wrinkles and gray hairs. Instead of protracted investigation into Scripture usage, painfully collating passages, to settle the meaning of terms, let every man interpret the oldest book in the world by the usages of his own time and place, and the work is done. And then instead of one revelation, they might be multiplied as the drops of the morning, and every man have an infallible clue to the mind of the Spirit, in the dialect of his own neighborhood! What a Babel-jargon, to take it for granted that the sense in which words are _now_ used, is the _inspired_ sense. David says, "I prevented the dawning of the morning, and cried." What, stop the earth in its revolution! Two hundred years ago, _prevent_ was used in its strict Latin sense, to _come before_, or _anticipate_. It is always used in this sense in the Old and New Testaments. David's expression, in the English of the nineteenth century, would be "Before the dawning of the morning I cried." In almost every chapter of the Bible, words are used in a sense now nearly, or quite obsolete, and sometimes in a sense totally _opposite_ to their present meaning. A few examples follow: "I purposed to come to you, but was _let_ (hindered) hitherto." "And the four _beasts_ (living ones) fell down and worshiped God,"--"Whosoever shall _offend_ (cause to sin) one of these little ones,"--Go out into the highways and _compel_ (urge) them to come in,"--Only let your _conversation_ (habitual conduct) be as becometh the Gospel,"--"The Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge the _quick_ (living) and the dead,"--They that seek me _early_ (earnestly) shall find me," So when tribulation or persecution ariseth _by-and-by_ (immediately) they are offended." Nothing is more mutable than language. Words, like bodies, are always throwing off some particles and absorbing others. So long as they are mere representatives, elected by the whims of universal suffrage, their meaning will be a perfect volatile, and to cork it up for the next century is an employment sufficiently silly (to speak within bounds) for a modern Bible-Dictionary maker. There never was a shallower conceit than that of establishing the sense attached to a word centuries ago, by showing what it means _now_. Pity that fashionable mantuamakers were not a little quicker at taking hints from some Doctors of Divinity. How easily they might save their pious customers all qualms of conscience about the weekly shiftings of fashion, by proving that the last importation of Parisian indecency now "showing off" on promenade, was the very style of dress in which the modest and pious Sarah kneaded cakes for the angels. Since such a fashion flaunts along Broadway _now_, it _must_ have trailed over Canaan four thousand years ago!

The inference that the word buy, used to describe the procuring of servants, means procuring them as _chattels_, seems based upon the fallacy, that whatever _costs_ money _is_ money; that whatever or whoever you pay money _for_, is an article of property, and the fact of your paying for it, _proves_ it property. 1. The children of Israel were required to purchase their firstborn from under the obligations of the priesthood, Num. xviii. 15, 16; iii. 45-51; Ex. xiii. 13; xxxiv. 20. This custom still exists among the Jews, and the word _buy_ is still used to describe the transaction. Does this prove that their firstborn were or are, held as property? They were _bought_ as really as were _servants_. 2. The Israelites were required to pay money for their own souls. This is called sometimes a ransom, sometimes an atonement. Were their souls therefore marketable commodities? 3. When the Israelites set apart themselves or their children to the Lord by vow, for the performance of some service, an express statute provided that a _price_ should be set upon the "_persons_," and it prescribed the manner and _terms_ of the "estimation" or valuation, by the payment of which, the persons might be _bought off_ from the service vowed. The _price_ for males from one month old to five years, was five shekels, for females, three; from five years old to twenty, for males, twenty shekels, for females, ten; from twenty years old to sixty, for males, fifty shekels, for females, thirty; above sixty years old, for males, fifteen shekels, for females, ten, Lev. xxvii. 2-8. What egregious folly to contend that all these descriptions of persons were goods and chattels because they were _bought_ and their _prices_ regulated by law! 4. Bible saints _bought_ their wives. Boaz bought Ruth. "Moreover Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, have I _purchased_ (bought) to be my wife." Ruth iv. 10.[A] Hosea bought his wife. "So I _bought_ her to me for fifteen pieces of silver, and for an homer of Barley, and an half homer of barley." Hosea iii. 2. Jacob bought his wives Rachael and Leah, and not having money, paid for them in labor--seven years a piece. Gen. xxix. 15-23. Moses probably bought his wife in the same way, and paid for her by his labor, as the servant of her father.[B] Exod. ii. 21. Shechem, when negotiating with Jacob and his sons for Dinah, says, "Ask me never so much dowry and gift, and I will give according as ye shall say unto me." Gen. xxxiv. 11, 12. David purchased Michael, and Othniel, Achsah, by performing perilous services for the fathers of the damsels. 1 Sam. xviii. 25-27; Judg. i. 12, 13. That the purchase of wives, either with money or by service, was the general practice, is plain from such passages as Ex. xxii. 17, and 1 Sam. xviii. 25. Among the modern Jews this usage exists, though now a mere form, there being no _real_ purchase. Yet among their marriage ceremonies, is one called "marrying by the penny." The similarity in the methods of procuring wives and servants, in the terms employed in describing the transactions, and in the prices paid for each, are worthy of notice. The highest price of wives (virgins) and servants was the same. Comp. Deut, xxii. 28, 29, and Ex. xxii. 17, with Lev. xxvii. 2-8. The _medium_ price of wives and servants was the same. Comp. Hos. iii. 2, with Ex. xxi. 32. Hosea seems to have paid one half in money and the other half in grain. Further, the Israelitish female bought-servants were _wives_, their husbands and masters being the same persons. Ex. xxi. 8, Judg. xix. 3, 27. If _buying_ servants proves them property, buying wives proves _them_ property. Why not contend that the _wives_ of the ancient fathers of the faithful were their "chattels," and used as ready change at a pinch; and thence deduce the rights of modern husbands? Alas! Patriarchs and prophets are followed afar off! When will pious husbands live up to their Bible privileges, and become partakers with Old Testament worthies in the blessedness of a husband's rightful immunities! Refusing so to do, is questioning the morality of those "good old slaveholders and patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."

[Footnote A: In the verse preceding, Boaz says, "I have _bought_ all that was Elimelech's * * * of the hand of Naomi." In the original, the same word (_kana_) is used in both verses. In the 9th, "a parcel of land" is "bought," in the 10th a "wife" is "bought." If the Israelites had been as profound at inferences as our modern Commentators, they would have put such a fact as this to the rack till they had tortured out of it a divine warrant for holding their wives as property and speculating in the article whenever it happened to be scarce.]

[Footnote B: This custom still prevails in some eastern countries. The Crim Tartars, who are poor, serve an apprenticeship for their wives, during which they live under the same roof with them and at the close of it are adopted into the family.]

This use of the word buy, is not peculiar to the Hebrew. In the Syriac, the common expression for "the espoused," is "the bought." Even so late as the 16th century, the common record of _marriages_ in the old German Chronicles was, "A BOUGHT B."

The word translated _buy_, is, like other words, modified by the nature of the subject to which it is applied. Eve said, "I have _gotten_ (bought) a man from the Lord." She named him Cain, that is _bought_. "He that heareth reproof, getteth (buyeth) understanding," Prov. xv. 32. So in Isa. xi. 11. "The Lord shall set his hand again to recover (to _buy_) the remnant of his people." So Ps. lxxviii. 54. "He brought them to his mountain which his right hand had _purchased_," (gotten.) Neh. v. 8. "We of our ability have _redeemed_ (bought) our brethren the Jews, that were sold unto the heathen." Here "_bought_" is not applied to persons reduced to servitude, but to those taken _out_ of it. Prov. viii. 22. "The Lord possessed (bought) me in the beginning of his way." Prov. xix. 8. "He that _getteth_ (buyeth) wisdom loveth his own soul." Finally, to _buy_ is a _secondary_ meaning of the Hebrew word _kana_.

Even at this day the word _buy_ is used to describe the procuring of servants, where slavery is abolished. In the British West Indies, where slaves became apprentices in 1834, they are still, (1837,) "bought." This is the current word in West India newspapers. Ten years since servants were "_bought_" in New York, and still are in New Jersey, as really as in Virginia, yet the different senses in which the word is used in those states, puts no man in a quandary. Under the system of legal _indenture_ in Illinois, servants now are "_bought_."[A] Until recently immigrants to this country were "bought" in great numbers. By voluntary contract they engaged to work a given time to pay for their passage. This class of persons, called "redemptioners," consisted at one time of thousands. Multitudes are "bought" _out_ of slavery by themselves or others. Under the same roof with the writer is a "servant bought with money." A few weeks since, she was a slave; when "bought," she was a slave no longer. Alas! for our leading politicians if "buying" men makes them "chattels." The Whigs say, that Calhoun has been "bought" by the administration; and the other party, that Clay and Webster have been "bought" by the Bank. The histories of the revolution tell us that Benedict Arnold was "bought" by British gold, and that Williams, Paulding, and Van Wert, could not be "bought" by Major Andre. When a northern clergyman marries a rich southern widow, country gossip thus hits off the indecency, "The cotton bags _bought_ him." Sir Robert Walpole said, "Every man has his price, and whoever will pay it, can _buy_ him," and John Randolph said, "The northern delegation is in the market; give me money enough, and I can _buy_ them." The temperance publications tell us that candidates for office _buy_ men with whiskey; and the oracles of street tattle, that the court, district attorney, and jury, in the late trial of Robinson were _bought_, yet we have no floating visions of "chattels personal," man-auctions, or coffles.

[Footnote A: The following statute is now in force in the free state of Illinois--"No negro, mulatto, or Indian, shall at any time _purchase_ any servant other than of their own complexion: and if any of the persons aforesaid shall presume to _purchase_ a white servant, such servant shall immediately become free, and shall be so held, deemed and taken."]

In Connecticut, town paupers are "bought" by individuals, who, for a stipulated sum become responsible to the town for their comfortable support for one year. If these "bought" persons perform any labor for those who "buy" them, it is wholly _voluntary_. It is hardly necessary to add that they are in no sense the "property" of their purchasers.[A]

[Footnote A: "The select-men" of each town annually give notice, that at such a time and place, they will proceed to _sell_ the poor of said town. The persons thus "sold" are "bought" by such persons, approved by the "select-men," as engage to furnish them with sufficient wholesome food, adequate clothing, shelter, medicine, &c., for such a sum as the parties may agree upon. The Connecticut papers frequently contain advertisements like the following: "NOTICE--The poor of the town of Chatham will be SOLD on the first Monday in April, 1837, at the house of F. Penfield, Esq., at 9 o'clock in the forenoon,"--[Middletown Sentinel, Feb. 3, 1837.] ]

The transaction between Joseph and the Egyptians gives a clue to the use of "buy" and "bought with money." Gen. xlvii. 18-26. The Egyptians proposed to Joseph to become servants. When the bargain was closed, Joseph said, "Behold I have _bought you_ this day," and yet it is plain that neither party regarded the persons _bought_ as articles of property, but merely as bound to labor on certain conditions, to pay for their support during the famine. The idea attached by both parties to "buy us," and "behold I have bought you," was merely that of service voluntarily offered, and secured by contract, in return, for _value received_, and not at all that the Egyptians were bereft of their personal ownership, and made articles of property. And this buying of _services_ (in this case it was but one-fifth part) is called in Scripture usage, _buying the persons_. This case claims special notice, as it is the only one where the whole transaction of buying servants is detailed--the preliminaries, the process, the mutual acquiescence, and the permanent relation resulting therefrom. In all other instances, the mere fact is stated without particulars. In this case, the whole process is laid open. 1. The persons "bought," _sold themselves_, and of their own accord. 2. Paying for the permanent _service_ of persons, or even a portion of it, is called "buying" those persons; just as paying for the _use_ of land or houses for a number of years in succession is called in Scripture usage _buying_ them. See Lev. xxv. 28, 33, and xxvii. 24. The objector, at the outset, takes it for granted, that servants were bought of _third_ persons; and thence infers that they were articles of property. Both the alleged fact and the inference are _sheer assumptions_. No instance is recorded, under the Mosaic system, in which a _master sold his servant_.