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In regard to the first point we simply remark, it is morally impossible that God should permanently and generally abolish the original institution concerning property; because, as in the case of its coevals, the Sabbath and marriage, the reason for it is permanent and unchangeable, and “lex stat dum ratio manet,” the law stands while the reason remains. Moreover, there is not a word of such repeal in the Bible. That institution, therefore, is still a charter of rights for the children of men. Till it is assailed, more need not be said.

As to the second point, we believe that careful investigation will prove conclusively, that no special enactments are now in force which arrest or modify the institutions of Eden, in regard to any state or any persons. It will, then, remain demonstrated, that the legal system of slavery exists utterly without warrant of the Holy Scriptures, and in defiance of the authority of the Creator. The word of God is throughout consistent.

It is here freely admitted, that God can arrest the operation of general laws by special statutes. He can take away from men the right to hold property which he has given, and, if he please, constitute them the property of other men. It is, in this respect, as it is with life. God can take what he gives. If, then, he has given authority to individuals or to nations to hold others as property, they may do so. Nay, more; if their commission is imperative, they must do so. But such an act of God creates an exception to his own fundamental law, and, like all exceptions, conveys its own restrictions, and proves the rule. It imposes no yoke, save upon those appointed to subjugation. It confers no authority, save upon those specifically invested with it. They are bound to keep absolutely within the prescribed terms, and no others can innocently seize their delegated dominion. Outside of the excepted parties the universal law has sway unimpaired. It is in this instance as it is in regard to marriage. God permitted the patriarchs to multiply their wives; but monogamy is now a sacred institution for the world. So the supreme Disposer can make a slave, or a nation of slaves; and the world shall be even the more solemnly bound by the original institutes concerning property. It follows, without a chasm in the argument, or a doubtful step, that, when persons or States reduce men to the condition of chattels, without divine authorization, they are guilty of subverting a divine institution; and, since it is the prerogative of God to determine what shall be property, they are chargeable with a presumptuous usurpation of divine prerogative, in making property, so far as human force and law can do it, of those whom Jehovah has created in his own image, and invested with all the original rights of men.

The soundness of the principle contained in these remarks, both in law and in biblical interpretation, will not be questioned. In the light of it, let us examine briefly the justifications of slavery as derived from the Bible. Happily the principle itself saves the labor of minute and protracted criticism.

We first consider the curse pronounced upon Canaan by Noah. Admitting all that is necessary to the support of slavery, namely, that that curse constituted the descendants of Canaan the property of some other tribe or people, upon whom it conferred the right of holding them as property, yet even so this passage does not justify but condemns American slavery; for that curse does not touch the African race: they are not descendants of Canaan;[B] and it gives no rights to American States. In later times the Canaanites were devoted to destruction for their sins. The Hebrews were the agents appointed by Jehovah to this work of retribution. It was not, however, accomplished in their entire extermination. In the case of the Gibeonites it was formally commuted to servitude, and other nations occupying the promised land were made tributary. Thus the curse upon Canaan was fulfilled by authorized executioners of divine justice.