It is because I feel a deep and tender interest in your present and
eternal welfare that I am willing thus publicly to address you. Some
of you have loved me as a relative, and some have felt bound to me
in Christian sympathy, and Gospel fellowship; and even when compelled
by a strong sense of duty, to break those outward bonds of
union which bound us together as members of the same community,
and members of the same religious denomination, you were generous
enough to give me credit, for sincerity as a Christian, though you
believed I had been most strangely deceived. I thanked you then
for your kindness, and I ask you now, for the sake of former confidence,
and former friendship, to read the following pages in the spirit
of calm investigation and fervent prayer. It is because you have
known me, that I write thus unto you.

But there are other Christian women scattered over the Southern
States, a very large number of whom have never seen me,
and never heard my name, and who feel no interest whatever in me.
But I feel an interest in you, as branches of the same vine from whose
root I daily draw the principle of spiritual vitality—Yes! Sisters
in Christ I feel an interest in you, and often has the secret prayer
arisen on your behalf, Lord “open thou their eyes that they may see
wondrous things out of they Law—”It is then, because I do feel and
do pray for you, that I thus address you upon a subject about which
of all others, perhaps you would rather not hear any thing; but,
“would to God ye could bear with me a little in my folly, and indeed
bear with me, for I am jealous over you with godly jealousy.”
Be not afraid then to read my appeal; it is not written in the heat of
passion or prejudice, but in that solemn calmness which is the result
of conviction and duty. It is true, I am going to tell you unwelcome
truths, but I mean to speak those truths in love, and remember 1(1)v [Gap in transcription—2 linesomitted] 2
Solomon says “faithful are the wounds of a friend.” I do not believe
the time has yet come when Christian women “will not endure
sound doctrine,” even on the subject of Slavery, if it is spoken to
them in tenderness and love, therefore I now address you.

To all of you then, known or unknown, relatives or strangers, (for
you are all one in Christ,) I would speak. I have felt for you at this
time, when unwelcome light is pouring in upon the world on the
subject of slavery; light which even Christians would exclude, if
they could, from our country, or at any rate from the southern portion
of it, saying, as its rays strike the rock bound coasts of New
England and scatter their warmth and radiance over her hills and
valleys, and from thence travel onward over the Palisades of the
Hudson, and down the soft flowing waters of the Delaware and
gild the waves of the Potomac, “hitherto shalt thou come and no
further;” I know that even professors of His name who has been
emphatically called the “Light of the world” would, if they could,
build a wall of adamant around the Southern States whose top might
reach unto heaven, in order to shut out the light which is bounding
from mountain to mountain and from the hills to the plains and valleys
beneath, through the vast extent of our Northern States. But
believe me, when I tell you, their attempts will be as utterly fruitless
as were the efforts of the builders of Babel; and why? Because
moral, like natural light, is so extremely subtle in its nature as to
overleap all human barriers, and laugh at the puny efforts of man to
control it. All the excuses and palliations of this system must inevitably
be swept away, just as other “refuges of lies” have been, by
the irresistible torrent of a rectified public opinion. “The supporters
of the slave system,” says Jonathan Dymond in his admirable work
on the Principles of Morality, “will hereafter be regarded with the same
public feeling, as he who was an advocate for the slave trade now is.”
It will be, and that very soon, clearly perceived and fully acknowledged
by all the virtuous and the candid, that in principle it is as
sinful to hold a human being in bondage who has been born in
Carolina, as one who has been born in Africa. All that sophistry
of argument which has been employed to prove, that although it is
sinful to send to Africa to procure men and women as slaves, who
have never been in slavery, that still, it is not sinful to keep those in
bondage who have come down by inheritance, will be utterly overthrown.
We must come back to the good old doctrine of our forefathers
who declared to the world, “this self evident truth that all
men are created equal, and that they have certain inalienable rights
among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It is
even a greater absurdity to suppose a man can be legally born a
slave under our free Republican Government, than under the petty
despotisms of barbarian Africa. If then, we have no right to enslave
an African, surely we can have none to enslave an American; if it is
a self evident truth that all men, every where and of every color are
born equal, and have an inalienable right to liberty, then it is equally
true that no man can be born a slave, and no man can ever rightfully 1(2)r 3 [Gap in transcription—1 lineomitted]
be reduced to involuntary bondage and held as a slave, however fair
may be the claim of his master or mistress through wills and title-deeds.

But after all, it may be said, our fathers were certainly mistaken, for
the Bible sanctions Slavery, and that is the highest authority. Now
the Bible is my ultimate appeal in all matters of faith and practice,
and it is to this test I am anxious to bring the subject at issue between
us. Let us begin with Adam and examine the charter
of privileges which was given to him. “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.” In the eighth Psalm we have a still
fuller description of this charter which through Adam was given to all
mankind. “Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of
thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet. All sheep and
oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field, the fowl of the air, the fish of
the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas.”
And after the flood when this charter of human rights was renewed,
we find no additional power vested in man. “And the fear of you
and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and
every fowl of the air, and upon all that moveth upon the earth, and
upon all the fishes of the sea, into your hand are they delivered.”
In this charter, although the different kinds of irrational beings are
so particularly enumerated, and supreme dominion over all of them is
granted, yet man is never vested with this dominion over his fellow
man; he was never told that any of the human species were put
under his feet; it was only all things, and man, who was created in
the image of his Maker, never can properly be termed a thing, though
the laws of Slave States do call him a chattel personal; Man
then, I assert never was put under the feet of man, by that first charter
of human right which was given by God, to the Fathers of the Antediluvian
and Postdiluvian worlds, therefore this doctrine of equality
is based on the Bible.

But it may be argued, that in the very chapter of Genesis from
which I have last quoted, will be found the curse pronounced upon
Canaan, by which his posterity was consigned to servitude under his
brothers Shem and Japheth. I know this prophecy was uttered, and
was most fearfully and wonderfully fulfilled, through the immediate
descendants of Canaan, i.e. the Canaanites, and I do not know but
it has been through all the children of Ham, but I do not know but
prophecy does not tell us what ought to be, but what actually does
take place, ages after it has been delivered, and that if we justify
America for enslaving the children of Africa, we must also justify
Egypt for reducing the children of Israel to bondage, for the latter
was foretold as explicitly as the former. I am well aware that prophecy
has often been urged as an excuse for Slavery, but be not
deceived, the fulfilment of prophecy will not cover one sin in the awful
day of account. Hear what our Saviour says on this subject; “it
must needs be that offences come, but woe unto that man through
whom them come”—Witness some fulfilment of this declaration in the
tremendous destruction of Jerusalem, occasioned by that most nefarious 1(2)v 4
of all crimes the crucifixion of the Son of God. Did the fact
of that event having been foretold, exculpate the Jews from sin in
perpetrating it; No—for hear what the Apostle Peter says to them
on this subject, “Him being delivered by the determinate counsel
and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have
crucified and slain.” Other striking instances might be adduced, but
these will suffice.

But it has been urged that the patriarchs held slaves, and therefore,
slavery is right. Do you really believe that patriarchal servitude was
like American slavery? Can you believe it? If so, read the history of
these primitive fathers of the church and be undeceived. Look at
Abraham, though so great a man, going to the herd himself and
fetching a calf from thence and serving it up with his own hands, for
the entertainment of his guests. Look at Sarah, that princess as her
name signifies, baking cakes upon the hearth. If the servants they
had were like Southern slaves, would they have performed such
comparatively menial offices for themselves? Hear too the plaintive
lamentation of Abraham when he feared he should have no son to
bear his name down to posterity. “Behold thou hast given me no
seed, &c, one born in my house is mine heir.” From this it appears
that one of the servants was to inherit his immense estate. Is this
like Southern slavery? I leave it to your own good sense and candor
to decide. Besides, such was the footing upon which Abraham was
with his servants, that he trusted them with arms. Are slaveholders
willing to put swords and pistols into the hands of their slaves? He
was as a father among his servants; what are planters and masters
generally among theirs? When the institution of circumcision was
established, Abraham was commanded thus; “He that is eight days
old shall be circumcised among you, every man-child in your generations;
he that is born in the house, or bought with money of
any stranger which is not of thy seed.” And to render this command
with regard to his servants still more impressive it is repeated
in the very next verse; and herein we may perceive the great care
which was taken by God to guard the rights of servants even under
this “dark dispensation.” What too was the testimony given to the
faithfulness of this eminent patriarch. “For I know him that he will
command his children and his household after him, and they shall
keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment.” Now my
dear friends many of you believe that circumcision has been superseded
by baptism in the Church; Are you careful to have all that
are born in your house or bought with money of any stranger, baptized?
Are you as faithful as Abraham to command your household to
keep the way of the Lord? I leave it to your own consciences to decide.
Was patriarchal servitude then like American Slavery?

But I shall be told, God sanctioned Slavery, yea commanded Slavery
under the Jewish Dispensation. Let us examine this subject
calmly and prayerfully. I admit that a species of servitude was permitted
to the Jews, but in studying the subject I have been struck
with wonder and admiration at perceiving how carefully the servant 1(3)r 5
was guarded from violence, injustice and wrong. I will first inform
you how these servants became servants, for I think this a very important
part of our subject. From consulting Horne, Calmet and
the Bible, I find there were six different ways by which the Hebrews
became servants legally.

• 1.

  “If reduced to extreme poverty, a Hebrew might sell himself,
  i.e. his services, for six years, in which case he received the purchase
  money himself.” Lev. xxv, 39.

• 2.

  “A father might sell his children as servants, i.e. his daughters,
  in which circumstance it was understood the daughter was to be the
  wife or daughter-in-law of the man who bought her, and the father
  received the price. In other words, Jewish women were sold as white
  women were in the first settlement of Virginia—as wives, not as slaves.”
  Ex. xxi, 7.

• 3.

  “Insolvent debtors might be delivered to their creditors as
  servants.” 2 Kings iv, 1

• 4.

  “Thieves not able to make restitution for their thefts, were sold
  for the benefit of the injured person.” Ex. xxii, 3.

• 5.

  “They might be born in servitude.” Ex. xxi, 4.

• 6.

  “If a Hebrew had sold himself to a rich Gentile, he might be
  redeemed by one of his brethren at any time the money was offered;
  and he who redeemed him, was not to take advantage of the favor
  thus conferred, and rule over him with rigor.” Lev. xxv, 47–55.

Before going into an examination of the laws by which these servants
were protected, I would just ask whether American slaves have become
slaves in any of the ways in which the Hebrews became servants.
Did they sell themselves into slavery and receive the purchase money
into their own hands? No! Did they become insolvent, and by their
own imprudence subject themselves to be sold as slaves? No! Did
they steal the property of another, and were they sold to make restitution
for their crimes? No! Did their present masters, as an act of
kindness, redeem them from some heathen tyrant to whom they had
sold themselves in the dark hour of adversity? No! Were they born
in slavery? No! No! not according to Jewish Law, “for the servants
who were born in servitude among them, were born of parents who
had sold themselves for six years”: Ex. xxi, 4. Were the female
slaves of the South sold by their fathers? How shall I answer this
question? Thousands and tens of thousands never were, their fathers
never have received the poor compensation of silver or gold for the
tears and toils, the suffering, the anguish, and hopeless bondage of
their daughters. They labor day by day, and year by year, side by
side, in the same field, if haply their daughters are permitted to remain
on the same plantation with them, instead of being as they often
are, separated from their parents and sold into distant states, never
again to meet on earth. But do the fathers of the South ever sell their
daughters? My heart beats, and my hand trembles, as I write the
awful affirmative, Yes! The fathers of this Christian land often sell
their daughters, not as Jewish parents did, to be the wives and daughters-in-law
of the man who buys them, but to be the abject slaves of 1(3)v 6
petty tyrants and irresponsible masters. Is it not so, my friends? [Gap in transcription—1 wordflawed-reproduction]
leave it to your own candor to corroborate my assertion. Southern
slaves then have not become slaves in any of the six different ways
in which Hebrews became servants, and I hesitate not to say that
American masters cannot according to Jewish law substantiate their
claim to the men, women, or children they now hold in bondage.

But there was one way in which a Jew might illegally be reduced
to servitude; it was this, he might be stolen and afterwards sold as a
slave, as was Joseph. To guard most effectually against this dreadful
act of manstealing, God enacted this severe law. “He that
stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall
surely be put to death.”Open note 1Back to note ¹ As I have tried American Slavery
legal! Hebrew servitude, and found, (to your surprise, perhaps,) that
Jewish law cannot justify the slaveholder’s claim, let us now try it by
illegal Hebrew bondage. Have the Southern slaves then been
stolen? If they did not sell themselves into bondage; if they were
not sold as insolvent debtors of as thieves; if they were not redeemed
from a heathen master to whom they had sold themselves; if they were
not born into servitude according to Hebrew law; and if the females
were not sold by their fathers as wives and daughters-in-law to those
who purchased them; then what shall we say of them? what can we
say of them? but that according to Hebrew Law they have been stolen.

But I shall be told that the Jews had other servants who were
absolute slaves. Let us look a little into this also. They had other
servants who were procured in two different ways.

• 1.

  Captives taken in war were reduced to bondage instead oof
  being killed; but were not told that their children were enslaved
  Deut. xx, 14

• 2.

  Bondmen and bondmaids might be bought from the heathen
  round about them; these were left by fathers to their children after
  them, but it does not appear that the children of these servants ever
  were reduced to servitude. Lev. xxv, 44.

I will now try the right of the southern planter by the claims of
Hebrew masters over their heathen slaves. Were the southern slaves
taken captive in war? No! Were they bought from the heathen?
No! for surely, no one will now vindicate the slave-trade so far as
to assert that slaves were bought from the heathen who were obtained
by the system of piracy. The only excuse for holding southern
slaves is that they were born in slavery, but we have seen that they
were not born in servitude as Jewish servants were, and that they
children of heathen slaves were not legally subjected to bondage
even under the Mosaic Law. How then have the slaves of the
South been obtained?

I will next proceed to an examination of those laws which were
enacted in order to protect the Hebrew and the Heathen servant; for
I wish you to understand that both are protected by Him, of whom it is 1(4)r 7
said “his mercies are over all his works.” I will first speak of those
which secured the rights of Hebrew servants. This code was
headed thus:

• 1. “Thou shalt not rule over him with rigor, but shalt fear thy God.”
• 2. “If thou buy a Hebrew servant, six years shall he serve, and in
  the seventh year he shall go free for nothing.” Ex. xxi, 2Open note 2Back to note ²
• 3. “If he comes in by himself, he shall go out by himself; if he were
  married, then his wife shall go out with him.”
• 4. “If his master have given him a wife and she have borne him sons
  and daughters, the wife and her children shall be his master’s, and he
  shall go out by himself.”
• 5. “If the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and
  my children; I will not go out free; then his master shall bring him
  unto the Judges, and he shall bring him to the door, or unto the
  door-post, and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and
  he shall serve him forever.” Ex. xxi, 5–6.
• 6. “If a man smite the eye of his servant, of the eye of his maid,
  that it perish, he shall let him go free for his eye’s sake. And if he
  smite out his man servant’s tooth or his maid servant’s tooth, he shall
  let him go free for his tooth’s sake.” Ex. xxi, 26, 27.
• 7. “On the Sabbath rest was secured to servants by the fourth commandment.”
  Ex. xx, 10.
• 8. “Servants were permitted to unite with their masters three times
  in every year in celebrating the Passover, the feast of Pentecost, and
  the feast of the Tabernacles; every male throughout the land was to
  appear before the Lord in Jerusalem with a gift; here the bond and
  the free stood on common ground.” Deut. xvi.
• 9. “If a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod, and he die
  under his hand, he shall be surely punished. Notwithstanding, if he
  continue a day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is his money.”
  Ex. xxi, 20. 21.

From these laws we learn that Hebrew men servants were bound
to serve his masters only six years, unless their attachment to their
employers, their wives and children, should induce them to wish to
remain in servitude, in which case, in order to prevent the possibility
of deception on the parts of the master, the servant was first taken
before the magistrate, where he was openly declared his intention of continuing
in his master’s service, (probably a public register was kept
of such) he was then conducted to the door of the house, (in warm
climates doors were thrown open,) and there his ear was publicly bored,
and by submitting to this operation he testified his willingness to serve
his forever, i. e. during his life, for Jewish Rabbins who mush have
understood Jewish slavery, (as it is called,) “affirm that servants
were set free at the death of their masters and did not descend to
their heirs:” of that he was to serve him until the year of Jubilee, 1(4)v 8
when all servants were set at liberty. To protect servants from
violence, it was ordained that if a master struck out the tooth or
destroyed the eye of a servant, that servant immediately became
free, for such an act of violence evidently showed he was unfit to
possess the power of a master, and therefore that power was taken
from him. All servants enjoyed the rest of the Sabbath and partook
of the privileges and festivities of the three great Jewish Feasts; and
if the servant died under the infliction of chastisement, his master was
surely to be punished. As a tooth for a tooth and life for life was the
Jewish law, of course he was punished with death. I know that
great stress has been laid upon the following verse: “Notwithstanding,
if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished, for he is
his money.”

Slaveholders, and the apologists of slavery, have eagerly seized
upon this little passage of scripture, and held it up as the masters’
Magna Charta, by which they were licensed by God himself to
commit the greatest outrages upon the defenceless victims of their
oppression. But, my friends, was it designed to be so? If our Heavenly
Father would protect by law the eyes and tooth of a Hebrew
servant, can we for a moment believe that he would abandon that
same servant to the brutal rage of a master who would destroy even
life itself. Do we not rather see in this, the only law which protected
masters, and was it not right that in case of the death of a servant, one
or two days after chastisement was inflicted, to which other circumstances
might have contributed, that the master should be protected
when, in all probability, he never intended to produce so fatal a result?
But the phrase “he is his money” has been adduced to show that
Hebrew servants were regarded as mere things chattels personal;
If so, why were so many laws made to secure their rights as men, and
to ensure their rising into equality and freedom? If they were mere
things, why were they regarded as responsible beings, and one law
made for them as well as their masters? But I pass on now to
the consideration of how the female Jewish servants were protected
by law.

• 1.

  If she please not her master, who hath betrothed her to himself,
  then shall he let her be redeemed: to sell her unto another nation
  he shall have no power, seeing he hath death deceitfully with her.

• 2.

  If he have betrothed her unto his son, he shall deal with her
  after the manner of daughters.

• 3.

  If he take him another wife, her food, her raiment, and her duty
  of marriage shall he not diminish.

• 4.

  If he do not these three unto her, then shall she go out free
  without money.

On these laws I will give you Calmet’s remarks; “A father could
not sell his daughter as a slave, according to the Rabbins, until she
was at the age of puberty, and unless he were reduced to the utmost
indigence. Besides when a master bought an Israelitish girl, it was
always with the presumption that he would take her to wife. Hence
Moses adds, ‘if she pleases not her master, and he does not think fit 2(1)r 9
to marry her, he shall set her at liberty,’ or according to the Hebrew,
‘he shall let her be redeemed.’ ‘To sell her to another nation he shall
have no power, seeing he hath dealt deceitfully with her;’ as to the
engagement implied, at least of taking her to wife. ‘If he have betrothed
her unto his son, he shall deal with her after the manners of
daughters, i. e. he shall take care that his son uses her as his wife,
that he does not despise or maltreat her. If he make his son marry
another wife, he shall give her her dowry, her clothes and compensation
for her virginity; if he does these three, she shall go out free
without money.’” Thus were the rights of female servants carefully
secured by law under the Jewish Dispensation; and now I would
ask, are the rights of female slaves at the South thus secured? Are
they sold as wives and daughters-in-law, and then not treated
as such are they allowed to go out free? No! They have all not
only been illegally obtained as servants according to Hebrew law,
but they are also illegally held in bondage. Masters at the South
and West have all forfeited their claims, (if they ever had any,) to
their female slaves.

We come now to examine the case of those servants who were “of
the heathen round about;” Were they left entirely unprotected by
law? Horne in speaking of the law “Thou shalt not rule over him
with rigor, but shalt fear thy God,” remarks “this law Lev. xxv, 43,
it is true speaks expressly of slaves who were of Hebrew descent;
but as alien born slaves were ingrafted into the Hebrew Church by
circumcision, there is no doubt but that it applied to all slaves;” if so,
then we may reasonably suppose that the other protective laws extended
to them also; and that the only difference between Hebrew
and Heathen servants lay in this, that the former served but six years
unless they chose to remain longer, and were always freed at the
death of their masters; whereas the latter served until the year of
Jubilee, though that might include a period of forty-nine years,—and
were left from father to son.

There are however two other laws which I have not yet noticed.
The one effectually prevented all involuntary servitude, and the other
completely abolished Jewish servitude every fifty years. They were
equally operative upon the Heathen and the Hebrew

• 1.

  “Thou shall not deliver unto his master the servant that is escaped
  from his master unto thee. He shall dwell with thee, even
  among you, in that place which he shall choose, in one of thy gates
  where it liketh him best: thou shall not oppress him.” Deut. xxiii,
  15, 16.

• 2.

  “And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year and proclaim Liberty
  throughout all the land, unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a
  jubilee unto you” Lev. xxv, 10

Here, then, we see that by this first law, the door of Freedom was
opened wide to every servant who had any cause whatever for complaint;
if he was unhappy with his master, all he had to do was to leave him,
and no man had a right to deliver him back to him again, and not only
so, but the absconded servant was to choose where he should live, 2 2(1)v 10
and no Jew was permitted to oppress him. He left his master just
as our Northern servants leave us; we have no power to compel them
to remain with us, and no man has any right to oppress them; they
go and dwell in that place where it chooseth them, and live just where
they like. Is it so at the South? Is the poor runaway slave protected
by law from the violence of that master who oppression and
cruelty has driven him from his plantation of his house? No! no!
Even the free states of the North are compelled to deliver unto his
master the servant that is escaped from his master into them. By
human law, under the Christian Dispensation, in the nineteenth century
we are commanded to do, what God more than three thousand years
ago, under the Mosaic Dispensation, positively commanded the Jews
not to do. In the wide domain even of our free state, there is not
one city of refuge for the poor runaway fugitive; not one spot upon
which he can stand and say, I am a free man—I am protected in my
rights as a man, by the strong arm of the law; no! not one. How
long the North will thus shake hands with the South in sin, I know
not. How long she will stand by like the persecutor Saul, consenting
unto the death of Stephen, and keeping the raiment of them that slew
him. I know not; but one thing I do know, the guilt of the North
is increasing in a tremendous ratio as light is pouring upon her on
the subject and the sin of slavery. As the sun of righteousness
climbs higher and higher in the moral heavens, she will stand still
more and more abashed as the query is thundered down in her ear,
“Who hath required this at thy hand?” It will be no excuse then
that the Constitution of our country required that persons bound to service
escaping from their masters should be delivered up; no more
excuse than was the reason which Adam assigned for eating the forbidden
fruit. He was condemned and punished because he hearkened
to the voice of his wife, rather than the command of his Maker; and
we will assuredly be condemned and punished for obeying Man rather
than God, if we do not speedily repent and bring forth fruits meet for
repentance. Yea, are we not receiving chastisement even now?

But by the second of these laws a still more astonishing fact is
disclosed. If the first effectually prevented all involuntary servitude,
the last absolutely forbade even voluntary servitude perpetual.
On the great day of atonement every fiftieth year the Jubilee trumpet
was sounded throughout the land of Judea, and Liberty was proclaimed
to all the inhabitants thereof. I will not say that the servants’
chains fell off and their manacles were burst, for there is no evidence
that Jewish servants ever felt the weight of iron chains, and collars,
and handcuffs; but I do say that even the man who had voluntarily
sold himself and the heathen who had been sold to a Hebrew master,
were set free, the one as well as the other. This law was evidently
designed to prevent the oppression of the poor, and the possibility of
such a thing as perpetual servitude existing among them.

Where, then, I would ask, is the warrant, the justification, of the
palliation of American Slavery from Hebrew servitude? How many
of the southern slaves would now be in bondage according to the 2(2)r 11
laws of Moses; Not one. You may observe that I have carefully
avoided using the term slavery when speaking of Jewish servitude;
and simply for this reason, that no such thing existed among that
people; the word translated servant does not mean slave, it is that
same that is applied to Abraham, to Moses, to Elisha and the prophets
generally. Slavery then never existed unto the Jewish Dispensation
at all, and I cannot but regard it as an aspersion on the
character of Him, who is “glorious in Holiness” for any one to assert
that “God sanctioned yea commanded slavery under the old dispensation.”
I would fain lift my feeble voice to vindicate Jehovah’s
character from so foul slander. If slaveholders are determined to
hold slaves as long as they can, let them not dare to say that the
God of mercy and of truth ever sanctioned such a system of cruelty
and wrong. It is blasphemy against Him.

We have seen that the code of laws framed by Moses with regard
to servants was designed to protect them as men and women, to secure
to them their rights as human beings, to guard them from oppression
and defend them from violence of every kind. Let us now turn to
the Slave laws of the South and West and eaxmineexamine them too. I will
give you the substance only, because I fear I shall tresspass too
much on your time, were I to quote them at length.

• 1.

  Slavery is hereditary and perpetual, to the last moment of the
  slave’s earthly existence, and to all his descendants to the latest posterity.
  

• 2.

  The labor of the slave is compulsory and uncompensated;
  while the kind of labor, the amount of toil, the time allowed for rest,
  are dictated solely by the master. No bargain is made, no wages
  given. A pure despotism governs the human brute; and even his
  covering and provended, both as to quantity and quality, depend entirely
  on the master’s discretion.Open note 3Back to note ³

• 3.

  The slave being considered a personal chattel may be sold or
  pledged, or leased at the will of his master. He may be exchanged
  for marketable commodities, or taken in execution for the debts or
  taxes either of a living or dead master. Sold at auction, either individually,
  or in lots to suit the purchaser, he may remain with his
  family, or be separated from them for ever.

• 4.

  Slaves can make no contract and have no legal right to any
  property, real or personal. Their own honest earnings and the legacies
  of friends belong in point of law to their master.

• 5.

  Neither a slave nor a free colored person can be a witness 2(2)v 12
  against any white, or free person, in a court of justice, however atrocious
  may have been crimes they have seen him commit, if such
  testimony would be for the benefit of a slave; but they may give testimony
  against a fellow slave, or a free colored man, even in cases
  affecting life, if the master is to reap the advantage of it.

• 6.

  The slave may be punished at his master’s discretion—without
  trial—without any means of legal redress; whether his offence be
  real or imaginary; and the master can transfer the same despotic
  power to any person or persons, he may choose to appoint.

• 7.

  The slave is not allowed to resist any free man under any circumstance,
  his only safety consists in the fact that his owners may
  bring suit and recover the price of his body, in case his life is taken,
  or his limbs rendered unfit for labor.

• 8.

  Slaves cannot redeem themselves, or obtain a change of masters,
  though cruel treatment may have rendered such a change necessary
  for their personal safety.

• 9.

  The slave is entirely unprotected in his domestic relations.

• 10.

  The laws greatly obstruct the manumission of slaves, even
  where the master is willing to enfranchise them.

• 11.

  The operation of the laws tends to deprive slaves of religious
  instruction and consolation.

• 12.

  The whole power of the laws is exerted to keep slaves in a
  state of the lowest ignorance.

• 13

  There is in this country a monstrous inequality of law and
  right. What is a trifiling fault in the white man, is considered highly
  criminal in the slave; the same offence which cost a white man a
  few dollars only, are punished in the negro with death.

• 14.

  The laws operate most oppressively upon free people of color.Open note 4Back to note ⁴

Shall I ask you now my friends, to draw the parallel between Jewish
servitude and American slavery? No! For there is no likeness
in the two systems; I ask you rather to mark the contrast. The
laws of Moses protected servants in their rights as men and women,
guarded them from oppression and defended them from wrong. The
Code Noir of the South robs the slave of all his rights as a man, reduces
him to a chattel personal, and defends the master in the exercise
of the most unnatural and unwarantable power over his slave.
They each bear the impress of the hand which formed them. The
attributes of justice and mercy are shadowed out in the Hebrew
code; those of injustice and cruelty, in the Code Noir or America.
Truly it was wise in the slaveholders of the South to declare their
slaves to be chattels personal; for before they could be robbed
of wages, wives, children, and friends, it was absolutely necessary to
deny they were human beings. It is wise in them, to keep them in
abject ignorance, for the strong man armed must be bound before we
can spoil his house—the powerful intellect of man must be bound
down with the iron chains of nescience before we can rob him of his
rights as a man; we must reduce him to a thing before we can claim 2(3)r 13
the right to set our feet upon his neck, because it was only all things
which we originally put under the feet of man by the Almighty and
Beneficent Father of all, who has declared himself to be no respecter
of persons, whether red, white or black.

But some have even said that Jesus Christ did not condemn slavery.
To this I reply that our Holy Redeemer lived and preached
among the Jews only. The laws which Moses had enacted fifteen
hundred years previous to his appearance among them, have never
been annulled, and these laws protected every servant in Palestine.
If then He did not condemn Jewish servitude this does not prove
that he would not have condemned such a monstrous system as that
of American slavery, if that had existed among them, But did not
Jesus condemn slavery? Let us examine some of his precepts.
“Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to
them,” Let every slaveholder apply these queries to his own heart;
Am I willing to be a slave— Am I willing to see my wife the slave
of another—Am I willing to see my mother a slave, or my father,
my sister or my brother? If not, than in holding others as slaves, I
am doing what I would not wish to be done to me or any relative I
have; and thus have I broken this golden rule which was given me
to walk by.

But some slaveholders have said, “we were never in bondage to
any man,” and therefore the yoke of bondage would be insufferable
to us, but slaves are accustomed to it, their backs are fitted to the
burden. Well, I am willing to admit that you who have lived in freedom
would find slavery even more oppressive than the poor slave
does, but then you may try this question in another form—Am I willing
to reduce my little child to slavery? You know that if it is
brought up a slave it will never know any contrast, between freedom
and bondage, its back will become fitted to the burden just as the
negro child’s does—not by nature—but by daily, violent pressure, in
the same way that the head of the Indian child becomes flattened by
the boards in which it is bound. It has been justly remarked that
“God never made a slave,” he made man upright; his back was not
made to carry burdens, nor his neck to wear a yoke, and the man
must be crushed within him, before his back can be fitted to the burden
of perpetual slavery; and that his back is not fitted to it, is manifest
by the insurrection that so often disturb the peace and security
of slaveholding countries. Who ever heard of a rebellion of the
beasts of the field; and why not? simply because they were all placed
under the feet of man, into whose hand they were delivered; it was
originally designed that they should serve him, therefore their necks
have been formed for the yoke, and their backs for the burden; but
not so with man, intellectual, immortal man! I appeal to you, my
friends, as mothers; Are you willing to enslave your children? You
start back with horror and indignation at such a question. But why,
if slavery is not wrong to those upon whom it is imposed? why, if
as have often been said, slaves are happier than their masters free
from the cares and perplexities of providing for themselves and their 2(3)v 14
families? why not place your children in the way of being supported
without your having the trouble to provide for them, or they for
themselves? Do you not perceive that as soon as this golden rule of
action is applied to yourselves that you involuntarily shrink from the
test; as soon as your actions are weighed in this balance of the sanctuary
that you are found wanting? Try yourself by another of the
Divine precepts, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” Can
we love a man as we love ourselves if we do, and continue to do unto
him, what we would not wish any one to do to us? Look too, at
Christ’s example, what does he say of himself, “I came not to be
ministered unto, but to minister.” Can you for a moment imagine
the meek, and lowly, and compassionate Saviour, a slaveholder? do
you not shudder at this thought as much as at that of his being a warrior?
But why, if slavery is not sinful?

Again, it has been said, the Apostle Paul did not condemn Slavery,
for he sent Onesimus back to Philemon. I do not think it can be
said he sent him back, for no coercion was made use of. Onesimus
was not thrown into prison and then sent back in chains to his master,
as your runaway slaves often are—this could not possibly have been
the case, because you know Paul as a Jew, was bound to protect the
runaway, he had no right to send any fugitive back to his master.
The state of the case then seems to have been this. Onesimus had
been an unprofitable servant to Philemon and left him—he afterwards
became converted under the Apostle’s preaching, and seeing that he
had been to blame in his conduct, and desiring by future fidelity to
atone for past error, he wished to return, and the Apostle gave him
the letter we not have as recommendation to Philemon, informing
him of the conversion of Onesimus, and entreating his as Paul the
aged “to receive him, not now as a servant, but above a servant, a
brother beloved, especially to me, but how much more unto thee,
both in the flesh and in the Lord. If thou count me therefore as a
partner, receive him as myself.” This then surely cannot be forced
into a justification of the practice of returning slaves back
to their masters, to be punished with cruel beating and scourgings
as they often are. Besides the word “δουλοϛ” here translated “servant”,
is the same as that is made use of in Matt. xviii, 27. Now it appears
that this servant owed his lord then thousand talents; he possessed
property to a vast amount. Onesimus could not then have been a
slave, for slaves do not own their wives, or children; no, not even
their own bodies, much less property. But again, the servitude which
the apostle was accustomed to, must have been very different from
American slavery, for he says, “the heir (or son), as long as he is a
child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all. But
is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father.”
For this it appears, that the means of instruction were provided for
servants as well as children; and indeed we know it must have been
so among the Jews, because their servants were not permitted to
remain in perpetual bondage, and therefore it was absolutely necessary
they should be prepared to occupy higher stations in society 2(4)r 15
than those servants. Is it so at the South, my friends? Is the
daily bread of instruction provided for your slaves? are their minds
enlightened, and they gradually prepared to rise from the grade of
menials into that of free, independent members of the state? Let
your own statute book, and your own daily experience, answer these
questions.

If this apostle sanctioned slavery, why did he exhort masters thus
in his epistle to the Ephesians, “and ye, masters, do the same things
unto them (i.e. perform your duties to your servants as unto Christ,
not into me) forbearing threatening; knowing that your master also
in heaven, neither is there respect or person with him.” And in
Colossians, “Masters give unto servants that which is just and
equal, knowing that ye also have a master in heaven.” Let slaveholders
only obey these injunctions of Paul, I am satisfied slavery
would soon be abolished. If he thought it sinful to flog and to beat
them with sticks and paddles; indeed, when delineating the character
of a bishop, he expressly names this as one feature of it, “no striker”.
Let masters give unto their servants that which is just and equal, and
all that vast system of unrequited labor would crumble into ruin.
Yes, and if they once felt they had no right to the labor of their servants
without pay, surely they could not think they had a right to
their wives, their children, and their own bodies. Again, how can it
be said Paul sanctioned slavery, when, as though to put his matter
beyond all doubt, in that black catalogue of sins enumerated in his
first epistle to Timothy, he mentions “menstealers”, which word may
be translated “slavedealers.” But you may say, we all despise slavedealers
as much as any one can; they are never admitted into genteel
or respectable society. And why not? Is it not because even you
shrink back from the idea of associating with those who make their
fortunes by trading in the bodies and souls of men, women, and children?
whose daily work it is to break human hearts, by tearing wives
from their husbands, and children and their parents? But why hold
slavedealers as despicable, if their trade is lawful and virtuous? and
why despise them more than the gentlemen of fortune and standing
who employ them as their agents? Why more than the professors of
religion who barter their fellow-professors to them for gold and silver?
We do not despise the land agent, or the physician, or the merchant,
and why? Simply because their professions are virtuous and honorable;
and if the trade of men-jobbers was honorable you would not
despise them either. There are no difference in principle and Christian
ethics, between the despised slavedealer and the Christian who buys
slaves from, or sells slaves to him; indeed, if slaves were not wanted
by the respectable, the wealthy, and the religious in the community,
there would be no slaves in the community, and of course the slavedealers.
It is then the Christians and the honorable men and women
of the South, who are the main pillars of this grand temple built to
Mammon and to Moloch. It is the most enlightened in every country
who are most to blame when any public sin is supported by public 2(4)v 16
opinion, hence Isaiah says, “When the Lord hath performed his
whole work upon mount Zion and on Jerusalem, (then) I will punish
the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his
high looks.” And was it not so? Open the historical records of
the age, was not Israel carried into captivity -0606B.C. 606, Judah -0588B.C.
588, and the stout heart of the heathen monarchy not punished until
-0536B.C. 536, fifty-two years after Judah’s, and seventy years after
Israel’s captivity, when it was overthrown by Cyrus, king of Persia?
Hence, too, the apostle Peter says, “judgment must begin at the
house of God.” Surely this would not be the case, if the professors of
religion were not most worthy of blame.

But it may be asked, why are they most culpable? I will tell you,
my friends. It is because sin is imputed to us just in proportion to
the spiritual light we receive. Thus the prophet Amos says, in the
name of Jehovah, “You only have I known of all the families of the
earth: therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.” Hear too
the doctrine of our Lord on this important subject; “The servant
who knew his Lord’s will and prepared not himself, neither did according
to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes:” and why?
“For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required;
and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the
more.” Oh! then the Christians of the south would ponder these
things in their hearts, and awake to the vast responsibilities which
rest upon them at this important crisis.

I have thus, I think, clearly proved to you seven propositions, viz.:

• First, that the slavery is contrary to the declaration of our independence.


• Second, that it is contrary to the first charter of human rights given
  to Adam, and renewed to Noah.
• Third, that the fact of slavery
  having been the subject of the prophecy, furnishes no excuse whatever to
  slavedealers.
• Fourth, that no such system existed under the patriarchal
  dispensation.
• Fifth, that slavery never existed under Jewish
  dispensation; but so far otherwise, that every servant was placed
  under the protection of law, and care taken not only to prevent all
  involuntary servitude, but all voluntary perpetual bondage.
• Sixth,
  that slavery in America reduces a man to a thing, a chattel personal,
  robs him of all his rights as a human being, fetters both his
  mind and body, and protects the master in the most unnatural and
  unreasonable power, whilst it throws him out of the protection of law.


• Seventh, that slavery is contrary to the example and precepts of our
  holy and merciful Redeemer, and of his apostles.

But perhaps you will be ready to query, why appeal to women on
this subject? We do not make the laws which perpetuate slavery.
No legislative power is vested in us; we can do nothing to overthrow
the system, even if we wished to do so. To this I reply, I
know you do not make the laws, but I also know that you are the wives
and mothers, the sisters and daughters of those who do; and if you really
suppose you can do nothing to overthrow slavery, you are greatly
mistaken. You can do much in every way: four things I will name.

• 1st. You can read on this subject.
• 2d. You can pray over this subject. 3(1)r 17
  
• 3d. You can speak on this subject.
• 4th. You can act on this
  subject. I have not placed reading before praying because I regard
  it more important, but because, in order to pray aright, we must understand
  what we are praying for; it is only then we can “pray with
  the understanding and the spirit also.”

1. Read then on the subject of slavery. Search the Scriptures
daily, whether the things I have told you are true. Other books and
papers might be a great help to you in this investigation, but they are
not necessary, and it is hardly probable that your Committees of Vigilance
will allow you to have any other. The Bible then is the book
I want you to read in the spirit of inquiry, and the spirit of prayer.
Even the enemies of Abolitionists, acknowledge that their doctrines
are drawn from it. In the great mob in Boston, last autumn, when
the books and papers of the Anti-Slavery Society, were thrown out
of the windows of their office, one individual laid hold of the Bible
and was about tossing it out to the ground, when another reminded
him that it was the Bible he had in his hand. “O! ’tis all one,” he
replied, and out went the sacred volume, along with the rest. We
thank him for the acknowledgement. Yes, “it is all one,” for our
books and papers are mostly commentaries on the Bible, and the
Declaration. Read the Bible then, it contains the words of Jesus,
and they are spirit and life. Judge for yourselves whether he sanctioned
such a system of oppression and crime.

2. Pray over this subject. When you have entered into your
closets, and shut to the doors, then pray to your father, who seeth in
secret, that he would open your eyes to see whether slavery is sinful,
and if it is, that he would enable you to bear a faithful, open and unshrinking
testimony against it, and to do whatsoever your hands find
to do, leaving the consequences entirely to him, who still says to us
whenever we try to reason away duty from the fear of consequences,
“What is that to thee, follow thou me.” Pray also for that poor slave,
that he may be kept patient and submissive under his hard lot, until
God is pleased to open the door of freedom to him without violence
or bloodshed. Pray too for the master that his heart may be softened.,
and he made willing to acknowledge, as Joseph’s brethren did, “Verily
we are guilty concerning our brother,” before he will be compelled to
add in consequence of Divine judgment, “therefore is all this evil
come upon us.” Pray also for all your brethren and sisters who are
laboring in the righteous cause of Emancipation in the Northern
States, England, and the world. There is great encouragement for
prayer in these words of our Lord. “Whatsoever ye shall ask the
Father in my name, he will give it to you”—Pray then without ceasing,
in the closet and the social circle.

3. Speak on this subject. It is through the tongue, the pen, and
the press, that truth is principally propagated. Speak then to your
relatives, your friends, your acquaintances on the subject of slavery;
be not afraid if you are conscientiously convinced it is sinful, to say
so openly, but calmly, and to let your sentiments be known. If you
are served by the slaves of others, try to ameliorate their condition as 3 3(1)v 18
much as possible; never aggravate their faults, and thus add fuel to
the fire of anger already kindled, in a master and mistress’s bosom;
remember their extreme ignorance, and consider them as your Heavenly
Father does the less culpable on this account, even when they
do wrong things. Discountenance all cruelty to them, all starvation,
all corporal chastisement; these may brutalize and break their spirits,
but will never bend them to willing, cheerful obedience. If possible,
see that they are comfortably and seasonably fed, whether in the house
or the field; it is unreasonable and cruel to expect slaves to wait for
their breakfast until eleven o’clock, when they rise at five or six. Do
all you can, to induce their owners to clothe them well, and to allow
them many little indulgences which would contribute to their comfort.
Above all, try to persuade your husband, father, brothers and sons,
that slavery is a crime against God and man, and that it is a great sin
to keep human beings in such abject ignorance; to deny them the
privilege of learning to read and write. The Catholics are universally
condemned, for denying the Bible to the common people, but,
slaveholders must not blame them, for they are doing the very same
thing, and for the very same reason, neither of these systems can
bear the light which bursts from the pages of that Holy Book. And
lastly, endeavor to inculcate submission on the part of the slaves,
but whilst doing this be faithful in pleading the cause of the oppressed.

“Will you behold unheeding, Life’s holiest feelings crushed, Where woman’s heart is bleeding, Shall woman’s voice be hushed?”

4. Act on this subject. Some of you own slaves yourselves. If
you believe slavery is sinful, set them at liberty, “undo the heavy
burdens and let the oppressed go free.” If they wish to remain with
you, pay them wages, if not let them leave you. Should they remain
teach them, and have them taught the common branches of an English
education; they have minds and those minds, ought to be improved.
So precious a talent as intellect, never was given to be wrapt in a
napkin and buried in the earth. It is the duty of all, as far as they
can, to improve their own mental faculties, because we are commanded
to love God with all our minds, as well as with all our hearts,
and we commit a great sin, if we forbid or prevent that cultivation of
the mind in others, which would enable them to perform this duty.
Teach your servants then to read &c, and encourage them to believe
it is their duty to learn, if it were only that they might read the Bible.

But some of you will say, we can neither free our slaves nor teach
them to read, for the laws of our state forbid it. Be not surprised
when I say such wicked laws ought to be no barrier in the way of
your duty, and I appeal to the Bible to prove this position. What
was the conduct of Shiphrah and Puah, when the king of Egypt
issued his cruel mandate, with regard to the Hebrew children?
“They feared God, and did not as the King of Egypt commanded
them, but saved the men children alive.” Did these women do right 3(2)r 19
in disobeying that monarch? “Therefore” (says the sacred text,) “GoaGod
dealt well with them, and made them houses” Ex. i. What was the
conduct of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, when Nebuchadnezzar
set up a golden image in the plain of Dura, and commanded all
people, nations, and languages, to fall down and worship it? “Be it
known, unto thee”, (said these faithful Jews) “O king, that we will not
serve thy gods, nor worship the image in which thou hast set up.” Did
these men do right in disobeying the law of their sovereign? Let their
miraculous deliverance from the burning fiery furnace, answer; Dan.
iii. What was the conduct of Daniel, when Darius made a firm decree
that no one should ask a petition of any man or God for thirty days?
Did the prophet cease to pray? No! “When Daniel knew that the
writing was signed, he went into his house, and his windows being
open towards Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a
day, and prayed and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime.”
Did Daniel do right thus to break the law of his king? Let
his wonderful deliverance out of the mouths of the lions answer;
Dan. vii. Look, too, at the Apostles Peter and John. When the
rulers of the Jews, “commanded them not to speak at all, nor teach
in the name of Jesus,” what did they say? “Whether it be right in
the sight of God, to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge
ye.” And what did they do? “They spake the word of God with
boldness, and with great power gave the Apostles witness of the resurrection
of the Lord Jesus;” although this was the very doctrine,
for the preaching of which, they had just been cast into prison, and
further threatened. Did these men do right? I leave you to answer,
who now enjoy the benefits of their labors and sufferings, in that
Gospel they dared to preach when positively commanded not to teach
any more in the name of Jesus; Acts iv.

But some of you may say, if we do free our slaves, they will be
taken up and sold, therefore there will be no use in doing it. Peter
and John might just as well have said, we will not preach the gospel,
for if we do, we shall be taken up and put in prison, therefore there
will be no use in our preaching. Consequences, my friends, belong no
more to you, than they did to these apostles. Duty is ours and events
are God’s. If you think slavery is sinful, all you have to do is to set
your slaves at liberty, do all you can to protect them, and in humble
faith and fervent prayer, commend them to your common Father.
He can take care of them; but if for wise purposes he sees fit to
allow them to be sold, this will afford you an opportunity of testifying
openly, wherever you go, against the crime of manstealing. Such
an act will be clear robbery, and if exposed, might, under the Divine
direction, do the cause of Emancipation more good, than any thing
that could happen, for, “He makes even the wrath of man to praise
him, and the remainder of wrath he will restrain.”

I know that this doctrine of obeying God, rather than man, will be
considered as dangerous, and heretical by many, but I am not afraid
openly to avow it, because it is the doctrine of the Bible; but I would
not be understood to advocate resistance to any law however oppressive, 3(2)v 20
if, in obeying it, I was not obliged to commit sin. If for
instance, there was a law, which imposed imprisonment or a fine
upon me if I manumitted a slave, I would on no account resist that
law, I would set the slave free, and then go to prison or pay the fine.
If a law commands me to sin I will break it; if it calls me to suffer, I
will let it take its course unresistingly. The doctrine of blind obedience
and unqualified submission to any human power, whether civil or
ecclesiastical, is the doctrine of despotism, and ought to have no place
among Republicans and Christians.

But you will perhaps say, such a course of conduct would inevitably
expose us to great suffering. Yes! my christian friends, I believe
it would, but this will not excuse you or any one else for the
neglect of duty. If Prophets and Apostles, Martyrs, and Reformers
had not been willing to suffer for the truth’s sake, where would the
world have been now? If they had said, we cannot speak the truth,
we cannot do what we believe is right, because the laws of our country
or public opinion are against us, where would our holy religion have
been now? The Prophets were stoned, imprisoned, and killed by
the Jews. And why? Because they exposed and openly rebuked
public sins; they opposed public opinion; had they held their peace,
they all might have lived in ease and died in favor with a wicked generation.
Why were the Apostles persecuted from city to city, stoned,
incarcerated, beaten, and crucified? Because they dared to speak the
truth; to tell the Jews, boldly and fearlessly, that they were the murderers
of the Lord of Glory, and that, however great a stumbling-
block the Cross might be to them, there was no other name given
under heaven by which men could be saved, but the name of Jesus.
Because they declared, even at Athens, the seat of learning and refinement,
the self-evident truth, that “they be no gods that are made
with men’s hands,” and exposed to the Grecians the foolishness of
worldly wisdom, and the impossibility of salvation but through Christ,
whom they despised on account of the ignominious death he died.
Because at Rome, the proud mistress of the world, they thundered
out the terrors of the law upon that idolatrous, war-making, and slaveholding
community. Why were the martyrs stretched upon the
rack, gibbetted and burnt, the scorn and diversion of a Nero, whilst
their tarred and burning bodies sent up a light which illuminated the
Roman capital? Why were the Waldenses hunted like wild beasts
upon the mountains of Piedmont, and slain with the sword of the
Duke of Savoy and the proud monarch of France? Why were the
Presbyterians chased like the partridge over the highlands of Scotland
—the Methodists pumped, and stoned, and pelted with rotten
eggs—the Quakers incarcerated in filthy prisons, beaten, whipped at
the cart’s tail, banished and hung? Because they dared to speak the
truth, to break the unrighteous laws of their country, and chose rather
to suffer affliction with the people of God, “not accepting deliverance,”
even under the gallows. Why were Luther and Calvin persecuted
and excommunicated, Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer burnt?
Because they fearlessly proclaimed the truth, though that truth was 3(3)r 21
contrary to public opinion, and the authority of Ecclesiastical councils
and conventions. Now all this vast amount of human suffering
might have been saved. All these Prophets and Apostles, Martyrs,
and Reformers, might have lived and died in peace with all men, but
following the example of their great pattern, “they despised the
shame, endured the cross, and are now set down on the right hand
of the throne of God,” having received the glorious welcome of “well
done good and faithful servants, enter ye into the joy of your Lord.”

But you may say we are women, how can our hearts endure persecution?
And why not? Have not women stood up in all the dignity
and strength of moral courage to be the leaders of the people, and to
bear a faithful testimony for the truth whenever the providence of
God has called them to do so? Are there no women in that noble
army of martyrs who are now singing the song of Moses and the
Lamb? Who led out the women of Israel from the house of bondage,
striking the timbrel, and singing the song of deliverance on the
banks of that sea whose waters stood up like walls of crystal to open
a passage for their escape? It was a woman; Miriam, the prophetess,
the sister of Moses and Aaron. Who went up with Barak to
Kadesh to fight against Jabin, King of Canaan, into whose hand
Israel had been sold because of their iniquities? It was a woman!
Deborah the wife of Lapidoth, the judge, as well as the prophetess
of that backsliding people; Judges iv, 9. Into whose hands was
Sisera, the captain of Jabin’s host delivered? Into the hand of a
woman. Jael the wife of Heber! Judges vi, 21. Who dared to
speak the truth concerning these judgments which were coming upon
Judea, when Josiah, alarmed at finding that his people “had not kept
the word of the Lord to do all after that was written in the book of
the Law,” sent to enquire of the Lord concerning these things? It
was a woman. Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum; 2
Chron. xxxiv, 22. Who was chosen to deliver the whole Jewish
nation from that murderous decree of Persia’s King, which wicked
Haman had obtained by calumny and fraud? It was a woman;
Esther the Queen; yes, weak and trembling woman was the instrument
appointed by God, to reverse the bloody mandate of the eastern
monarch, and save the whole visible church from destruction. What
human voice first proclaimed to Mary that she should be the mother
of our Lord? It was a woman! Elizabeth, the wife of Zacharias;
Luke i, 42, 43. Who united with the good old Simeon in giving
thanks publicly in the temple, when the child, Jesus, was presented
there by his parents, “and spake of him to all them that looked for
redemption in Jerusalem?” It was a woman! Anna the prophetess.
Who first proclaimed Christ as the true Messiah in the streets of Samaria,
once the capital of the ten tribes? It was a woman! Who
ministered to the Son of God whilst on earth, a despised and persecuted
Reformer, in the humble garb of a carpenter? They were
women! Who followed the rejected King of Israel, as his fainting
footsteps trod the road to Calvary? “A great company of people
and of women;” and it is remarkable that to them alone, he turned 3(3)v 22
and addressed the pathetic language, “Daughters of Jerusalem,
weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and your children.” Ah!
who sent unto the Roman Governor when he was set down on the
judgment seat, saying unto him, “Have thou nothing to do with that
just man, for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because
of him?” It was a woman! the wife of Pilate. Although
“he knew that for envy the Jews had delivered Christ,” yet he consented
to surrender the Son of God into the hands of a brutal soldiery,
after having himself scourged his naked body. Had the wife of
Pilate sat upon that judgment seat, what would have been the result
of the trial of this “just person?”

And who last hung the cross of Jesus on the mountain
of Golgotha? Who first visited the sepulchre early in the morning
on the first day of the week, carrying sweet spices to embalm his
precious body, not knowing that it was incorruptible and could not
be holden by the bands of death? These were women! To whom
did he first appear after his resurrection? It was to a woman! Mary
Magdalene; Mark xvi, 9. Who gathered with the apostles to wait
at Jerusalem, in prayer and supplication, for “the promise of the
Father;” the spiritual blessing of the Great High Priest of his
Church, who had entered, not into the splendid temple of Solomon,
there to offer the blood of bulls, and of goats, and the smoking censer
upon the golden altar, but into Heaven itself, there to present his intercessions,
after having “given himself to us, an offering and a sacrifice
to God for a sweet smelling savor?” Women were among that
holy company; Acts i, 14. And did women wait in vain? Did
those who had ministered to his necessities, followed in his train, and
wept at his crucifixion, wait in vain? No! No! Did the cloven
tongues of fire descend upon the heads of women as well as men?
Yes, my friends, “it sat upon each one of them;” Acts ii, 3. Women
as well as men were to be living stones in the temple of grace,
and therefore their heads were consecrated by the descent of the
Holy Ghost as well as those of men. Were women recognized as
fellow laborers in the gospel field? They were! Paul says in his
epistle to the Philippians, “help those women who labored with me,
in the gospel;” Phil. iv, 3.

But this is not all. Roman women were burnt at the stake, their
delicate limbs were torn joint from joint by the ferocious beasts of the
Amphitheatre, and tossed by the wild bull in his fury, for the diversion
of that idolatrous, warlike, and slaveholding people. Yes, women suffered
under the ten persecutions of heathen Rome, with the most unshrinking
constancy and fortitude; not all the entreaties of friends,
nor the claims of new born infancy, nor the cruel threats of enemies
could make them sprinkle one grain of incense upon the altars of Roman
idols. Come now with me to the beautiful valleys of Piedmont.
Whose blood stains the green sward, and decks the wild flowers with
colors not their own, and smokes on the sword of persecuting France?
It is woman’s, as well as man’s? Yes, women were accounted as sheep
for slaughter, and were cut down as the tender saplings of the wood

3(4)r 23

But time would fail me, to tell of all those hundreds and thousands
of women, who perished in the Low countries of Holland, when Alva’s
sword of vengeance was unsheathed against the Protestants, when
the Catholic Inquisitions of Europe became the merciless executioners
of vindictive wrath, upon those who dared to worship God, instead
of bowing down in unholy adoration before “my Lord God the Pope,”
and when England, too, burnt her Ann Ascoes at the stake of martyrdom.
Suffice it to say, that the Church, after having been driven from
Judea to Rome, and from Rome to Piedmont, and from Piedmont to
England, and from England to Holland, at last stretched her fainting
wings over the dark bosom of the Atlantic, and found on the shores
of a great wilderness, a refuge from tyranny and oppression—as she
thought, but even here, (the warm blush of shame mantles my cheek
as I write it,) even here, woman was beaten and banished, imprisoned,
and hung upon the gallows, a trophy to the Cross.

And what, I would ask in conclusion, have women done for the great
and glorious cause of Emancipation? Who wrote that pamphlet
which moved the heart of Wilberforce to pray over the wrongs, and his
tongue to plead the cause of the oppressed African? It was a woman,
Elizabeth Heyrick. Who labored assiduously to keep the sufferings
of the slave continually before the British public? They were women.
And how did they do it? By their needles, paint brushes and pens,
by speaking the truth, and petitioning Parliament for the abolition of
slavery. And what was the effect of their labors? Read it in the
Emancipation bill of Great Britain. Read it, in the impulse which has been
given to the cause of freedom, in the United States of America.
Have English women then done so much for the negro, and shall
American women do nothing? Oh no! Already there are sixty female
Anti-Slavery Societies in operation. These are doing just what the
English women did, telling the story of the colored man’s wrongs,
praying for his deliverance, and presenting his kneeling images constantly
before the public eye on bags and needle-books, card-racks,
pen-wipers, pin-cushions, &c. Even the children of the north are inscribing
on their handy work, “May the points of our needles prick
the slaveholder’s conscience.” Some of the reports of these Societies
exhibit not only considerable talent, but a deep sense of religious
duty, and a determination to persevere through evil as well as good
report, until every scourge, and every shackle, is buried under the
feet of the manumitted slave.

The Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society of Boston was called last fall, to a
severe trial of their faith and constancy. They were mobbed by “the
gentlemen of property and standing,” in that city at their anniversary
meeting, and their lives were jeoparded by an infuriated crowd; but
their conduct on that occasion did credit to our sex, and affords a full
assurance that they will never abandon the cause of the slave. The
pamphlet, Right and Wrong in Boston, issued by them in which a
particular account is given of that “mob of broad cloth in broad day,”
does equal credit to the head and the heart of her who wrote it. I 3(4)v 24
with my Southern sisters could read it; they would then understand
that the women of the North have engaged in this work from a sense
of religious duty, and that nothing will ever induce them to take their
hands from it until it is fully accomplished. They feel no hostility
to you, no bitterness or wrath; they rather sympathize in your trials
and difficulties; but they well know that the first thing to be done to
help you, is to pour in the light of truth on your minds, to urge you
to reflect on, and pray over the subject. This is all they can do for
you, you must work out your own deliverance with fear and trembling,
and with the direction and blessing of God, you can do it. Northern
women may labor to produce a correct public opinion at the North,
but if Southern women sit down in listless indifference and criminal
idleness, public opinion cannot be rectified and purified at the South.
It is manifest to every reflecting mind, that slavery must be abolished;
the era in which we live, and the light which is overspreading
the whole world on this subject, clearly show that the time cannot be
distant when it will be done. Now there are only two ways in which
it can be effected, by moral power or physical force, and it is for you
to choose which of these you prefer. Slavery always has, and always
will produce insurrections wherever it exists, because it is a violation
of the natural order of things, and no human power can much longer
perpetuate it. The opposers of abolitionists fully believe this; one of
them remarked to me not long since, there is no doubt there will be
a most terrible overturning at the South in a few years, such cruelty
and wrong, must be visited with Divine vengeance soon. Abolitionists
believe, too, that this must inevitably be the case if you do not
repent, and they are not willing to leave you to perish without entreating
you, to save yourselves from destruction; well may they say
with the apostle, “am I then your enemy because I tell you the truth,”
and warn you to flee from impending judgments.

But why, my dear friends, have I thus been endeavoring to lead you
through the history of more than three hundred years, and to point
you to that great cloud of witnesses who have gone before, “from
works to rewards?” Have I been seeking to magnify the sufferings,
and exalt the character of woman, that she “might have praise of
men?” No! no! my object has been to arouse you, as the wives
and mothers, the daughters and sisters, of the South, to a sense of
your duty as women, and as Christian women, on that great subject,
which has already shaken our country, from the St. Lawrence and
the lakes, to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Mississippi to the
shores of the Atlantic; and will continue mightily to shake it, until the
polluted temple of slavery fall and crumble into ruin. I would say
unto each one of you, “what meanest thou, O sleeper! arise and call
upon thy God, if so be that God will think upon us that we perish
not.” Perceive you not that dark cloud of vengeance which hangs
over our boasting Republic? Saw you not the lightnings of Heaven’s
wrath, in the flame which leaped from the Indian’s torch to the
roof of yonder dwelling, and lighted with its horrid glare the darkness
of midnight? Have you not the thunders of Divine anger, as the distant 4(1)r 25
roar of the cannon came rolling onward, from the Texian country,
where Protestant American Rebels are fighting with Mexican
Republicans—for what? For the re-establishment of slavery; yes!
of American slavery in the bosom of a Catholic Republic, where that
system of robbery, violence, and wrong, had been legally abolished
for twelve years. Yes! citizens of the United States, after plundering
Mexico of her land, are now engaged in deadly conflict, for the
privilege of fastening chains, and collars, and manacles—upon whom?
upon the subjects of some foreign prince? No! upon native born
American Republican citizens, although the fathers of these very men
declared to the whole world, while struggling to free themselves from
the three penny taxes of an English king, that they believed it to be
a self-evident truth that all men were created equal, and had an unalienable
right to liberty.

Well may the poet exclaim in bitter sarcasm, “The fustian flag that proudly waves In solemn mockery o’er a land of slaves.”
Can you not, my friends, understand the signs of the times; do you
not see the sword of retributive justice hanging over the South, or
are you still slumbering at your posts?—Are there no Shiphrahs, no
Puahs among you, who will dare in Christian firmness and Christian
meekness, to refuse to obey the wicked laws which require woman to
enslave, to degrade and to brutalize woman? Are there no Miriams,
who would rejoice to lead out the captive daughters of the Southern
States to liberty and light? Are there no Huldahs there who will
dare to speak the truth concerning the sins of the people and those
judgments, which it requires no prophet’s eye to see, must follow if
repentance is not speedily sought? Is there no Esther among you
who will plead for the poor devoted slave? Read the history of this
Persian queen, it is full of instruction; she at first refused to plead
for the Jews; but, hear the words of Mordecai, “Think not within
thyself, that thou shalt escape in the king’s house more than all the
Jews, for if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time, then shall
there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another
place: but thou and thy father’s house shall be destroyed.” Listen, too,
to her magnanimous reply to this powerful appeal; “I will go in unto
the king, which is not according to law, and if I perish, I perish.”
Yes! if there were but one Esther at the South, she might save her
country from ruin; but let the Christian women there arise, as the
Christian women of Great Britain did, in the majesty of moral power,
and that salvation is certain. Let them embody themselves in societies,
and send petitions up to their different legislatures, entreating
their husbands, fathers, brothers and sons, to abolish the institution
of slavery; no longer to subject woman to the scourge and the chain,
to mental darkness and moral degradation; no longer to tear husbands
from their wives, and children from their parents; no longer to make
men, women, and children, work without wages; no longer to make
their lives bitter in hard bondage; no longer to reduce American citizens 4(1)v 26
to the abject condition of slaves, of chattels personal; no longer
to barter the image of God in human shambles for corruptible things
such as silver and gold.

The women of the South can overthrow this horrible system of oppression
and cruelty, licentiousness and wrong. Such appeals to
your legislatures would be irresistible, for there is something in the
heart of man which will bend under moral suasion. There is a swift
witness for truth in his bosom, which will respond to truth when it is
uttered with calmness and dignity. If you could obtain but six signatures
to such a petition in only one state, I would say, send up that
petition, and be not in the least discouraged by the scoffs and jeers
of the heartless, or the resolution of the house to lay it on the table.
It will be a great thing if the subject can be introduced into your
legislatures in any way, even by women, and they will be the most
likely to introduce it there in the best possible manner, as a matter
of morals and religion, not of expediency or politics. You may
petition, too, the different ecclesiastical bodies of the slave states.
Slavery must be attacked with the whole power of truth and the
sword of the spirit. You must take it up on Christian ground, and
fight against it with Christian weapons, whilst your feet are shod with
the preparation of the gospel of peace. And you are now loudly
called upon by the cries of the widow and the orphan, to arise and
gird yourselves for this great moral conflict, with the whole armour
of righteousness upon the right hand and on the left.

There is every encouragement for you to labor and pray, my
friends, because the abolition of slavery as well as its existence, has
been the theme of prophecy. “Ethiopia (says the Psalmist) shall
stretch forth her hands unto God.” And is she not now doing so?
Are not the Christian negroes of the south lifting their hands in prayer
for deliverance, just as the Israelites did when their redemption was
drawing nigh? Are they not sighing and crying by reason of the
hard bondage? And think you, that He, of whom it was said, “and
God heard their groaning, and their cry came up unto him by reason
of the hard bondage,” think you that his ear is heavy that he cannot
now hear the cries of his suffering children? Or that He who raised
up a Moses, an Aaron, and a Miriam, to bring them up out of the
land of Egypt from the house of bondage, cannot now, with a high
hand and a stretched out arm, rid the poor negroes out of the hands
of their masters? Surely you believe that his arm is not shortened
that he cannot save. And would not such a work of mercy redound
to his glory? But another string of the harp of prophecy vibrates to
the song of deliverance: “But they shall sit every man under his
vine, and under his fig-tree, and none shall make them afraid; for the
mouth of the Lord of Hosts hath spoken it.” The slave never can
do this as long as he is a slave; whilst he is a chattel personal he
can own no property; but the time is to come when every man is to
sit under his own vine and his own fig-tree, and no domineering driver,
or irresponsible master, or irascible mistress, shall make him afraid
of the chain or the whip. Hear, too, the sweet tones of another 4(2)r 27
string: “Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.”
Slavery is an insurmountable barrier to the increase of
knowledge in every community where it exists; slavery, then, must be
abolished before this prediction can be fulfiled. The last chord I shall
touch, will be this, “They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy
mountain.”

Slavery, then, must be overthrown before the prophecies can be accomplished,
but how are they to be fulfiled? Will the wheels of the
millennial car be rolled onward by miraculous power? No! God
designs to confer this holy privilege upon man; it is through his instrumentality
that the great and glorious work of reforming the world
is to be done. And see you not how the mighty engine of moral power
is dragging in its rear the Bible and peace societies, anti-slavery
and temperance, sabbath schools, moral reform, and missions?
or to adopt another figure, do not these seven philanthropic associations
compose the beautiful tints in that bow of promise which spans
the arch of our moral heaven? Who does not believe, that if these
societies were broken up, their constitutions burnt, and the vast
machinery with which they are laboring to regenerate mankind was
stopped, that the black clouds of vengeance would soon burst over
our world, and every city would witness the fate of the devoted cities
of the plain? Each one of these societies is walking abroad through
the earth scattering the seeds of truth over the wide field of our
world, not with the hundred hands of a Briareus, but with a hundred
thousand.

Another encouragement for you to labor, my friends, is, that you
will have the prayers and co-operation of English and Northern philanthropists.
You will never bend your knees in supplication at the
throne of grace for the overthrow of slavery, without meeting there
the spirits of other Christians, who will mingle their voices with yours,
as the morning or evening sacrifice ascends to God. Yes, the spirit
of prayer and of supplication has been poured out upon many, many
hearts; there are wrestling Jacobs who will not let go of the prophetic
promises of deliverance for the captive, and the opening of prison doors
to them that are bound. There are Pauls who are saying, in reference
to this subject, “Lord what wilt thou have me to do?” There are
Marys sitting in the house now, who are ready to arise and go forth
in this work as soon as the message is brought, “the master is come
and calleth for thee.” And there are Marthas, too, who have already
gone out to meet Jesus, as he bends his footsteps to their brother’s
grave, and weeps, not over the lifeless body of Lazarus bound hand
and foot in grave-clothes, but over the politically and intellectually
lifeless slave, bound hand and foot in iron chains of oppression and
ignorance. Some may be ready to say, as Martha did, who seemed
to expect nothing but sympathy from Jesus, “Lord, by this time he
stinketh, for he hath been dead four days.” She thought it useless
to remove the stone and expose the loathsome body of her brother;
she could not believe that so great a miracle could be wrought, as to
raise that putrefied body into life; but “Jesus said, take ye away the 4(2)v 28
stone;” and when they had taken away the stone where the dead was
laid, and uncovered the body of Lazarus, then it was that “Jesus
lifted up his eyes and said, ‘Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard
me,’” &c. “And when he had thus spoken, he cried with a loud voice,
Lazarus, come forth.” Yes, some may be ready to say of the
colored race, how can they ever be raised politically and intellectually,
they have been dead four hundred years? But we have nothing
to do with how this is to be done; our business is to take away the
stone which has covered up the dead body of our brother, to expose
the putrid carcass, to show how that body has been bound with the
grave-clothes of heathen ignorance, and his face with the napkin of
prejudice, and having done all it was our duty to do, to stand by
the negro’s grave, in humble faith and holy hope, waiting to hear
the life-giving command of “Lazarus, come forth.” This is just
what Anti-Slavery Societies are doing; they are taking away the
stone from the mouth of the tomb of slavery, where lies the putrid
carcass of our brother. They want the pure light of heaven to shine
into that dark and gloomy cave; they want all men to see how that
dead body has been bound, how that face has been wrapped in the
napkin of prejudice; and shall they wait beside that grave in vain?
Is not Jesus still the resurrection and the life? Did He come to proclaim
liberty to the captive, and the opening of prison doors to them
that are bound, in vain? Did He promise to give beauty for ashes,
the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of praise for the spirit
of heaviness unto them that mourn in Zion, and will He refuse to
beautify the mind, anoint the head, and throw around the captive
negro the mantle of praise for that spirit of heaviness which has so
long bound him down to the ground? Or shall we not rather say
with the prophet, “the zeal of the Lord of Hosts will perform this?”
Yes, his promises are sure, and amen in Christ Jesus, that he will
assemble her that halteth, and gather her that is driven out, and her
that is afflicted.

But I will now say a few words on the subject of Abolitionism.
Doubtless you have all heard Anti-Slavery Societies denounced as
insurrectionary and mischievous, fanatical and dangerous. It has
been said they publish the most abominable untruths, and that they
are endeavoring to excite rebellions in the South. Have you believed
these reports, my friends? have you also been deceived by these false
assertions? Listen to me, then, whilst I endeavor to wipe from the
fair character of Abolitionism such unfounded accusations. You
know that I am a Southerner; you know that my dearest relatives
are now in a slave State. Can you for a moment believe that I would
prove so recreant to the feelings of a daughter and a sister, as to join
a society which was seeking to overthrow slavery by falsehood, bloodshed,
and murder? I appeal to you who have known and loved me
in days that are passed, can you believe it? No! my friends. As a
Carolinian, I was peculiarly jealous of any movements on this subject;
and before I would join an Anti-Slavery Society, I took the precaution
of becoming acquainted with some of the leading Abolitionists, 4(3)r 29
of reading their publications and attending their meetings, at which I
heard addresses both from colored and white men; and it was not
until I was fully convinced that their principles were entirely pacific,
and their efforts only moral, that I gave my name as a member to the
Female Anti-Slavery Society of Philadelphia. Since that time, I
have regularly taken the Liberator, and read many Anti-Slavery
pamphlets and papers and books, and can assure you I never have
seen a single insurrectionary paragraph, and never read any account
of cruelty which I could not believe. Southerners may deny the
truth of these accounts, but why do they not prove them to be false.
Their violent expressions of horror at such accounts being believed,
may deceive some, but they cannot deceive me, for I lived too long
in the midst of slavery, not to know what slavery is. When I speak
of this system, “I speak that I do know,” and I am not at all afraid
to assert, that Anti-Slavery publications have not overdrawn the monstrous
features of slavery at all. And many a Southerner knows this
as well as I do. A lady in North Carolina remarked to a friend of
mine, about eighteen months since, “Northerners know nothing at all
about slavery; they think it is perpetual bondage only; but of the
depth of degradation that word involves, that have no conception; if
they had, they would never cease their efforts until so horrible a system
was overthrown.” She did not know how faithfully some Northern
men and Northern women had studied this subject; how diligently
they had searched out the cause of “him who had none to help him,”
and how fearlessly they had told the story of the negro’s wrongs.
Yes, Northerners know every thing about slavery now. This monster
of iniquity has been unveiled to the world, her frightful features unmasked,
and soon, very soon will she be regarded with no more
complacency by the American republic than is the idol of Juggernaut,
rolling its bloody wheels over the crushed bodies of its prostrate
victims.

But you will probably ask, if Anti-Slavery societies are not insurrectionary,
why do Northerners tell us they are? Why, I would ask
you in return, did Northern senators and Northern representatives
give their votes, at the last sitting of congress, to the admission of
Arkansas Territory as a state? Take those men, one by one, and
ask them in their parlours, do you approve of slavery? ask them on
Northern ground, where they will speak the truth, and I doubt not
every man of them will tell you, no! Why then, I ask, did they give
their votes to enlarge the mouth of that grave which has already destroyed
its tens of thousands? All our enemies tell us they are as
much anti-slavery as we are. Yes, my friends, thousands who are
helping you to bind the fetters of slavery on the negro, despise you in
their hearts for doing it; they rejoice that such an institution has not
been entailed upon them. Why then, I would ask, do they lend you
their help? I will tell you, “they love the praise of men more than
the praise of God.” The Abolition cause has not yet become so
popular as to induce them to believe, that by advocating it in congress,
they shall sit still more securely [Gap in transcription—2 wordsflawed-reproduction]there [Gap in transcription—2 wordsflawed-reproduction] 4(3)v 30
the chief rulers in the days of our Saviour, though many believed on
him, yet they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the
synagogue; John xii, 42, 43. Or perhaps like Pilate, thinking they
could prevail nothing, and fearing a tumult, they determined to release
Barabbas and surrender the just man, the poor innocent slave to be
stripped of his rights and scourged. In vain will such men try to
wash their hands, and say, with the Roman governor, “I am innocent
of the blood of this just person.” Northern American statesmen
are no more innocent of the crime of slavery, than Pilate was of the
murder of Jesus, or Saul of that of Stephen. These are high charges,
but I appeal to their hearts; I appeal to public opinion ten years
from now. Slavery then is a national sin.

But you will say, a great many other Northerners tell us so, who
can have no political motives. The interests of the North, you must
know, my friends, are very closely combined with those of the South.
The Northern merchants and manufacturers are making their fortunes
out of the produce of slave labor; the grocer is selling your rice and
sugar; how then can these men bear a testimony against slavery
without condemning themselves? But there is another reason, the
North is most dreadfully afraid of Amalgamation. She is alarmed
at the very idea of a thing so monstrous, as she thinks. And lest
this consequence might flow from emancipation, she is determined to
resist all efforts at emancipation without expatriation. It is not because
she approves of slavery, or believes it to be “the corner stone
of our republic,” for she is as much anti-slavery as we are; but
amalgamation is too horrible to think of. Now I would ask you, is
it right, is it generous, to refuse the colored people in this country the
advantages of education and the privilege, or rather the right, to follow
honest trades and callings merely because they are colored?
The same prejudice exists here against our colored brethren that
existed against the Gentiles in Judea. Great numbers cannot bear
the idea of equality, and fearing lest, if they had the same advantages
we enjoy, they would become as intelligent, as moral, as religious,
and as respectable and wealthy, they are determined to keep them as
low as they possibly can. In this doing as they would be done by?
Is this loving their neighbor as themselves? Oh! that such opposers
of Abolitionism would put their souls in the stead of the free colored
man’s and obey the apostolic injunction, to “remember them that are
in bonds as bound with them.” I will leave you to judge whether the
fear of amalgamation ought to induce men to oppose anti-slavery
efforts, when they believe slavery to be sinful. Prejudice against
color, is the most powerful enemy we have to fight with at the North.

You need not be surprised, then, at all, at what is said against
Abolitionists by the North, for they are wielding a two-edged sword,
which even here, cuts through the cords of caste, on the one side,
and the bonds of interest on the other. They are only sharing the
fate of other reformers, abused and reviled whilst they are in the minority;
but they are neither angry nor discouraged by the invective
which has been heaped upon them by slaveholders at the South and 4(4)r 31
their apologists at the North. They know that when George Fox
and William Edmundson were laboring in behalf of the negroes in
the West Indies in 16711671 that the very same slanders were propogated
against them, which are now circulated against Abolitionists. Although
it was well known that Fox was the founder of a religious
sect which repudiated all war, and all violence, yet even he was accused
of “endeavoring to excite the slaves to insurrection and of
teaching the negroes to cut their master’s throats.” And these two
men who had their “feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of
Peace”, were actually compelled to draw up a formal declaration that
they were not trying to raise a rebellion in Barbadoes. It is also
worthy of remark that these Reformers did not at this time see the
necessity of emancipation under seven years, and their principal
efforts were exerted to persuade the planters of the necessity of instructing
their slaves; but the slaveholder saw then, just what the
slaveholder sees now, that an enlightened population never can be a
slave population, and therefore they passed a law that negroes should
not even attend the meetings of Friends. Abolitionists know that the
life of Clarkson was sought by slavetraders, and that even Wilberforce
was denounced on the floor of Parliament as a fanatic and a
hypocrite by the present King of England, the very man who, in 18341834
set his seal to that instrument which burst the fetters of eight hundred
thousand slaves in his West India colonies. They know that the
first Quaker who bore a faithful testimony against the sin of slavery
was cut off from religious fellowship with that society. That Quaker
was a woman. On her deathbed she sent for the committee who dealt
with her—she told them, the near approach of death had not altered
her sentiments on the subject of slavery and waving her hand towards
a very fertile and beautiful portion of country which lay stretched before
her window, she said with great solemnity, “Friends, the time
will come when there will not be friends enough in all this district to
hold one meeting for worship, and this garden will be turned into a
wilderness.”

The aged friend, who with tears in his eyes, related this interesting
circumstance to me, remarked, that at the time there were seven
meetings of friends in that part of Virginia, but that when he was
there ten years ago, not a single meeting was held, and the country
was literally a desolation. Soon after her decease, John Woolman
began his labors in our society, and instead of disowning a member
for testifying against slavery, they have for fifty-two years positively
forbidden their members to hold slaves.

Abolitionists understand the slaveholding spirit too well to be surprised
at any thing that has yet happened at the South or the North;
they know that the greater the sin is, which is exposed, the more violent
will be the efforts to blacken the character and impugn the motives
of those who are engaged in bringing to light the hidden things
of darkness. They understand the work of Reform too well to be
driven back by the furious waves of opposition, which are only foaming
out their own shame. They have stood “the world’s dread 4(4)v 32
laugh,” when only twelve men formed the first Anti-Slavery Society
in Boston in 18311831. They have faced and refuted the calumnies of
their enemies, and proved themselves to be emphatically peace men by
never resisting the violence of mobs, even when driven by them from
the temple of God, and dragged by an infuriated crowd through the
streets of the emporium of New-England, or subjected by slaveholders
to the pain of corporal punishment. “None of these things move
them;” and, by the grace of God, they are determined to persevere
in this work of faith and labor of love: they mean to pray, and
preach, and write, and print, until slavery is completely overthrown,
until Babylon is taken up and cast into the sea, to “be found no
more at all.” They mean to petition Congress year after year, until
the seat of our government is cleansed from the sinful traffic of
“slaves and the souls of men.” Although that august assembly may
be like the unjust judge who “feared not God neither regarded man,”
yet it must yield just as he did, from the power of importunity. Like
the unjust judge, Congress must redress the wrongs of the widow,
lest by the continual coming up of petitions, it be wearied. This will
be striking the dagger into the very heart of the monster, and once
’tis done, he must soon expire.

Abolitionists have been accused of abusing their Southern brethren.
Did the prophet Isaiah abuse the Jews when he addressed to them
the cutting reproofs contained in the first chapter of his prophecies,
and ended by telling them, they would be ashamed of the oaks they
had desired, and confounded for the garden they had chosen? Did
John the Baptist abuse the Jews when he called them “a generation
of vipers,” and warned them “to bring forth fruits meet for repentance?”
Did Peter abuse the Jews when he told him they were the
murderers of the Lord of Glory? Did Paul abuse the Roman Governor
when he reasoned before him of righteousness, temperance,
and judgment, so as to send conviction home to his guilty heart, and
cause him to tremble in view of the crimes he was living in? Surely
not. No man will now accuse the prophets and apostles of abuse,
but what have Abolitionists done more than they? No doubt the
Jews thought the prophets and apostles in their day, just as harsh
and uncharitable as slaveholders now, think Abolitionists; if they
did not, why did they beat, and stone, and kill them?

Great fault has been found with the prints which have been employed
to expose slavery at the North, but my friends, how could this
be done so effectually in any other way? Until the pictures of the
slave’s sufferings were drawn and held up to the public gaze, no Northerner
had any idea of the cruelty of the system, it never entered their
minds that such abominations could exist in Christian, Republican
America; they never suspected that many of the gentlemen and ladies
who came from the South to spend the summer months in travelling
among them, were petty tyrants at home. And those who had lived
at the South, and came to reside in the North, were too ashamed of
slavery even to speak of it; the language of their hearts was, “tell it
not in Gath, publish it not in the streets of Askelon;” they saw no 5(1)r 33
use in uncovering the loathsome body to popular sight, and in hopeless
despair, wept in secret places over the sins of oppression. To
keep such hidden mourners the formation of Anti-Slavery Societies was
as life from the dead, the first beams of hope which gleamed through
the dark clouds of despondency and grief. Prints were made use
of to effect the abolition of the Inquisition in Spain, and Clarkson
employed them when he was laboring to break up the Slave trade,
and English Abolitionists used them just as we are now doing.
They are powerful appeals and have invariably done the work they
were designed to do, and we cannot consent to abandon the use of
these until the realities no longer exist.

With regard to those white men, who, it was said, did try to raise
an insurrection in Mississippi a year ago, and who were stated to be
Abolitionists, none of them were proved to be members of Anti-Slavery
Societies, and it must remain a matter of great doubt whether,
even they were guilty of the crimes alledged against them, because
when any community is thrown into such a panic as to inflict Lynch
law upon accused persons, they cannot be supposed to be capable of
judging with calmness and impartiality. We know that the papers of
which the Charleston mail was robbed, were not insurrectionary, and
that they were not sent to the colored people as was reported, We
know that Amos Dresser was no insurrectionist though he was accused
of being so, and on this false accusation was publicly whipped in
Nashville in the midst of a crowd of infuriated slaveholders. Was
that young man disgraced by this infliction of corporal punishment?
No more than was the great apostle of the Gentiles who five times
received forty stripes, save one. Like him, he might have said,
“henceforth I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus,” for
it was for the truth’s sake, he suffered, as much as did the Apostle
Paul. Are Nelson, and Garrett, and Williams, and other Abolitionists
who have recently been banished from Missouri, insurrectionists?
We know they are not, whatever slaveholders may choose to call them.
The spirit which now asperses the character of the Abolitionists, is the
very same which dressed up the Christians of Spain in the skins of wild
beasts and pictures of devils when they were led to execution as heretics.
Before we condemn individuals, it is necessary, even in a wicked
community, to accuse them of some crime; hence, when Jezebel
wished to compass the death of Naboth, men of Belial were suborned
to bear false witness against him, and so it was with Stephen, and so
it ever has been, and ever will be, as long as there is any virtue to
suffer on the rack, or the gallows. False witnesses must appear
against Abolitionists before they can be condemned.

I will now say a few words on George Thompson’s mission to
this country. This Philanthropist was accused of being a foreign
emissary. Were La Fayette, and Steuben, and De Kalb, foreign
emissaries when they came over to America to fight against the
tories, who preferred submitting to what was termed, “the yoke of
servitude,” rather than bursting the fetters which bound them to the
mother country? They came with carnal weapons to engage in bloody 5(1)v 34
conflict against American citizens, and yet, where do their names
stand on the page of History. Among the honorable, or the low?
Thompson came here to war against the giant sin of slavery, not with
the sword and the pistol, but with the smooth stones of oratory taken
from the pure waters of the river of Truth. His splendid talents
and commanding eloquence rendered him a powerful coadjutor in the
Anti-Slavery cause, and in order to neutralize the effects of these
upon his auditors, and rob the poor slave of the benefits of his labors,
his character was defamed, his life was sought, and he at last driven
from our Republic, a fugitive. But was Thompson disgraced by all
this mean and contemptible and wicked chicanery and malice? No
more than was Paul, when in consequence of a vision he had seen at
Troas, he went over to Macedonia to help the Christians there, and
was beaten and imprisoned, because he cast out a spirit of divination
from a young damsel which had brought much gain to her masters.
Paul was as much a foreign emissary in the Roman colony of Philippi,
as George Thompson was in America, and it was because he was a
Jew, and taught customs it was not lawful for them to receive or observe,
being Romans, that the Apostle was thus treated.

It was said, Thompson was a felon, who had fled to this country to
escape transportation to New Holland. Look at him now pouring
the thundering strains of his eloquence, upon crowded audiences, in
Great Britain, and see in this a triumphant vindication of his character.
And have the slaveholder, and his obsequious apologist, gained
any thing by all their violence and falsehood? No! for the stone
which struck Goliath of Gath, had already been thrown from the
sling. The giant of slavery who had so proudly defied the armies
of the living God, had received his death-blow before he left our
shores. But what is George Thompson doing there? Is he not now
laboring there, as effectually to abolish American slavery as though
he trod our own soil, and lectured to New York or Boston assemblies?
What is he doing over there, but constructing a stupendous dam,
which will turn the overwhelming tide of public opinion over the
wheels of that machinery which Abolitionists are working here. He
is now lecturing to Britons on American Slavery, to the subjects of a
King, on the abject condition of the slaves of a Republic. He is telling
them of that mighty confederacy of petty tyrants which extends
over thirteen States of our Union. He is telling them of the munificent
rewards offered by slaveholders, for the heads of the most distinguished
advocates for freedom in this country. He is moving the
British Churches to send out to the churches of America the most
solemn appeals, reproving, rebuking, and exhorting them with all
long suffering and patience to abandon the sin of slavery immediately.
Where then I ask, will the name George Thompson stand on the
page of History? Among the honorable, or the base?

What can I say more, my friends, to induce you to set your hands,
and heads, and hearts, to this great work of justice and mercy. Perhaps
you have feared the consequences of immediate Emancipation,
and been frightened by all those dreadful prophecies of rebellion, 5(2)r 35
bloodshed and murder, which have been uttered. “Let no man deceive
you;” they are the predictions of that same “lying spirit” which
spoke through the four hundred prophets of old, to Ahab king of
Israel, urging him on to destruction. Slavery may produce these
horrible scenes if it is continued five years longer, but Emancipation
never will.

I can prove the safety of immediate Emancipation by history. In
St. Domingo in 17931793 six hundred thousand slaves were set free in a
white population of forty-two thousand. That Island “marched as
by enchantment towards its ancient splendor, cultivation prospered,
every day produced perceptible proofs of its progress, and the
negroes all continued quietly to work on the different plantations,
until in 18021802, France determined to reduce these liberated slaves
again to bondage.” It was at this time that all those dreadful scenes
of cruelty occured, which we so often unjustly hear spoken of, as the
effects of Abolition. They were occasioned not by Emancipation,
but by the base attempt to fasten the chains of slavery on the limbs
of liberated slaves.

In Gaudaloupe eighty-five thousand slaves were freed in a white
population of thirteen thousand. The same prosperous effects followed
manumission here, that had attended it in Hayti, every thing
was quiet until Buonaparte sent out a fleet to reduce these negroes
again to slavery, and in 18021802 this institution was re-established in
that Island. In 18341834, when Great Britain determined to liberate the
slaves in her West India colonies, and proposed the apprenticeship
system; the planters of Bermuda and Antigua, after having joined
the other planters in their representations of the bloody consequences
of Emancipation, in order if possible to hold back the hand which
was offering the boon of freedom to the poor negro; as soon as they
found such falsehoods were utterly disregarded, and Abolition must
take place, came forward voluntarily, and asked for the compensation
which was due to them, saying, “they preferred immediate emancipation,
and were not afraid of any insurrection.” And how is it with these
islands now? They are decidedly more prosperous than any of those
in which the apprenticeship system was adopted, and England is now
trying to abolish that system, so fully convinced is she that immediate
Emancipation is the safest and the best plan.

And why not try it in the Southern States, if it never has occasioned
rebellion; if not a drop of blood has ever been shed in consequence
of it, though it has been so often tried, why should we suppose it
would produce such disastrous consequences now? “Be not deceived
then, God is not mocked,” by such false excuses for not doing
justly and loving mercy. There is nothing to fear from immediate
Emancipation, but every thing from the continuance of slavery.

Sisters in Christ, I have done. As a Southerner, I have felt it was
my duty to address you. I have endeavoured to set before you the
exceeding sinfulness of slavery, and to point you to the example of
those noble women who have been raised up in the church to effect
great revolutions, and to suffer for the truth’s sake. I have appealed 5(2)v 36
to your sympathies as women, to your sense of duty as Christian
women. I have attempted to vindicate the Abolitionists, to prove the
entire safety of immediate Emancipation, and to plead the cause of
the poor and oppressed. I have done—I have sowed the seeds of
truth, but I well know, that even if an Apollos were to follow in
my steps to water them, “God only can give the increase.” To
Him then who is able to prosper the work of his servant’s hand, I
commend this Appeal in fervent prayer, that as he “hath chosen the
weak things of the world, to confound the things which are mighty,”
so He may cause His blessing, to descend and carry conviction to the
hearts of many Lydias through these speaking pages. Farewell—
Count me not your “enemy because I have told you the truth,” but
believe me in unfeigned affection,