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Third. The bad character of slavery becomes yet more apparent, if we consider the manner in which it has chiefly originated and been sustained. Did God institute the relation of master and slave, as he did the conjugal and parental relations? It is not pretended. In what, then, did slavery have its beginning? Doubtless the first slaves were captives, taken in war. In primitive ages, the victors in war were considered as having a right to do what they pleased with their captives; and so it sometimes happened that they were put to death, and sometimes that they were made to serve their captors as bondmen. Thus slavery was at first the incidental result of war. But as time rolled on, the love of power and of gain prompted men to make aggressions on their weaker neighbors, for the very purpose of enslaving them; and, eventually, man-stealing and the slave-trade became familiar facts in the world’s history. Upon these has slavery, for centuries past, depended mainly for its continuance. And, although these feeders of slavery are now by Christian nations branded as piracy and strictly vetoed, they are far from being exterminated. Indeed, it seems to be well understood, that, if all commerce in slaves, foreign and domestic, ceases, slavery itself must soon become extinct.

Now if man-stealing be an act which the Word of God and the moral instincts of men do most pointedly condemn,–and I will attempt no demonstration of this here,–what shall we say of that which is its legitimate offspring and dependant? Far be it from me to affirm, that, circumstanced as our southern brethren are, it is just as criminal for them to hold slaves as it would be to go now to Africa and forcibly seize them. But, in the spirit of love, I would ask my slave-holding brother, Can that be a justifiable institution, and deserving to be upheld, which has so bad a parentage? “Do men gather grapes of thorns?” “Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?”

Fourth. There are, in the Scriptures, many clear indications that slavery has not the approbation of God, and hence has not the stamp of perpetuity upon it. Under this head, let us notice several distinct particulars.

1. Had God regarded servitude as a good thing, he would not, in authoritatively predicting its existence, have said, “Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.” What God visits men with as a curse cannot be intrinsically good and beneficial.

2. The judgments with which God visited Egypt and her proud monarch, for refusing to emancipate the Israelites, and for essaying to recapture them, when let go, and the wages which he caused his people, when released, to receive for their hitherto unrequited tolls, clearly evince that he has no complacency in compulsory, unrewarded servitude.

3. The same thing is indicated by the fact that God has, by statute, provided expressly for the protection and freedom of an escaped slave; but not for the recovery of such a fugitive by his master. “Thou shalt not deliver unto his master, the servant which is escaped from his master unto thee: he shall dwell with thee, even among you in that place which he shall choose…. Thou shalt not oppress him.” Now be it, if you will, that this statute had reference only to servants who should escape into the land of Israel from Gentile masters; does it not indicate a strong bias, in the mind of God, to the side of freedom, rather than that of slavery? And does it not establish the point, that, in God’s estimation, one man cannot rightfully be deemed the property of another man? Were it otherwise, would not the Jew have been required to restore a runaway to his pursuing master, just as he was to restore any other lost thing which its owner should come in search of? Or, to say the least, would not the Israelites have been allowed to reduce to servitude among themselves the escaped slave of a heathen master? But how unlike all this are the actual requirements of the statute. God’s people must neither deliver up the fugitive nor enslave him themselves; but allow him to dwell among them as a FREEMAN, just “where it liketh him best.” And, in this connection, how significant a fact is it, that the Bible nowhere empowers the master from whom a slave had escaped to pursue, seize, and drag back to bondage that escaped slave.