moral law to have any authority, further than it might be subservient to the civil law. Still it may be a point too nice for decision here, how far the obligations of the civil code may be relaxed by the supreme law of God. This we will not just now attempt to do. But, as we are addressing the consciences of men on Christian principles, we must maintain the complete supremacy of God's laws over all prescriptions of men. The true doctrine is that none, whether a majority or minority in the state, have any right to trample on the divine, or natural rights of others, in any way. If they do, they are accountable to God for the abuse of their power, and will be punished for this abuse here or hereafter. Nations shall be punished as nations, in this world only, and individuals as individuals, both in this world and the world to come.

11. It may be proper to inquire here, what persons are included under the denomination of slaves.

In an act of Maryland in the year 1663, chapter 30, it is declared, All negroes or other slaves within the province, and all negroes and other slaves to be hereafter imported into the province, shall serve durante vita, [during life;] and all children born of any negro or other slave, shall be slaves as their fathers were for the term of their lives." And all children of white free women and negro slaves, were also doomed to slavery, although this clause was subsequently repealed. The doctrine that "partus sequitur patrem "—the offspring follows the condition of the father— obtained in the province of Maryland till the year 1699

or 1700.

In the year 1715 the following law was passed in Maryland: "All negroes and other slaves already imported or hereafter to be imported into this province, and all children now born, and hercafter to be born, of such negroes and slaves, shall be slaves during their natural lives." Thus was the maxim of the civil law-"partus sequitur ventrem”—

introduced, and the condition of the mother, from that day up to the present time, has continued to determine the fate of the child. This barbarous and heathen maxim of the civil law-the genuine and degrading principle of slavery, placing the slave on a level with the brute animals-prevails universally in the slave states.

The following law of South Carolina has been adopted, in substance, by the other slave states: "All negroes, Indians-free Indians in amity with this government, and negroes, mulattoes, and mestizoes who are now free excepted-mulattoes, or mestizoes, who now are, or shall hereafter be, in this province, and all their issue and offspring, born or to be born, shall be and they are hereby declared to be and remain forever hereafter absolute slaves, and shall follow the condition of the mother." By this law, any person whose maternal ancestor, even in the remotest distance, can be shown to have been a negro, or an Indian, or a mulatto, or mestizo, not free at the date of the law, although the paternal ancestor at each successive generation may have been a white free man, is declared to be the subject of perpetual slavery. This is a degree of cruelty and avarice unknown in any other civilized country.

The following are the distinctions usually known among the mixed races: 1. The mulattoes, derived from the intermixtures of the whites and negroes. 2. The terceroons, being three-fourths white, produced from a white and mulatto. 3. The quadroons, produced from a white and a terceroon, being seven-eighths white. 4. The quintroons, being fifteen-sixteenths white, who owe their origin to a white and a quadroon. This is the last gradation, there being no sensible difference between them and the whites, either in color or features. Yet even these, and their descendants to the remotest generations, are deemed slaves. And the advertisements for runaways sometimes note that the runaway has sometimes been taken for a white man. Very

many of the slaves of the present day are properly white persons. And as nearly all the colored slaves are the children of white fathers, a very large number of the slaves of the south are the children, grandchildren, or descendants of these white masters, who have continued, generation after generation, to enslave their own progeny and the progeny of their own fathers, grandfathers, and remote ancestors!

Indians, too, may be held as slaves; but the cases of such are now so few, that, for our purpose, it is unnecessary to take this class of slaves into the account.

By the laws of many of the slave states, persons now free may become slaves. In Virginia, "if any emancipated slave, infants excepted, shall remain within the state more than twelve months after his or her right to freedom shall have accrued, he or she shall forfeit all such right, and may be apprehended and sold by the overseers of the poor for the benefit of the literary fund." In Georgia, a penalty of $100 is incurred by any free person of color for coming into the state; and "upon failure to pay the same within the time prescribed in the sentence, etc., he, she, or they shall be liable to be sold by public outcry as a slave." In Mississippi, every negro or mulatto found within the state, and not having the ability to prove himself entitled to freedom, may be sold, by order of the court, as a slave.

12. The present ground of the south is very different from what it was at the time of the American Revolution, and many years after. Few, if any, were then found to apologize for, much less maintain slavery. Neither the pulpit nor the press had any arguments to adduce for enslaving men. But the evil practice, in time, produced the justifying theories of recent years. Now grave divines teach that there is nothing immoral in enslaving men. That is, they may be stolen, or robbed, deprived of all their just rights, and unjustly punished with many grievous wrongs; and all

this has no moral evil in it! Times are changed, and mutable human beings change with the evil practices. Yet the truth remains, and will yet revolutionize the evil maxims and customs of the times.

CHAPTER II.

MORAL IDENTITY OF THE AFRICAN SLAVE-TRADE AND SLAVERY.

1. AMERICAN slavery is morally wrong or sinful in its origin—the African slave-trade; and this wrong is still continued in maintaining the present system, and is inseparable from it.

The African slave-trade has been pronounced piracy by the United States, and the greater part of the civilized world. And piracy, because of its immoral and sinful character, is one of the most atrocious systems in the world. Therefore, the African slave-trade is highly immoral, in all its leading characteristics. Hence, it is pronounced a capital crime-the same with murder in the first degree, or high treason, because it is punished with the greatest penalty, even that of death.

Now, it can be shown that American slavery partakes of atrocities similar or equal to those of the African slavetrade; and it must, therefore, receive the same sentence of condemnation. It is not necessary, in order to arrive at this conclusion, that we can find all the evils of the slavetrade, or those even in the same degree, in the system of American slavery. It is sufficient that we find enough to show a clear characteristic identity, whether we find the same number of atrocities, or find them in a greater or less degree.

2. A very brief survey of the origin of the trade may not be amiss.

Long before the discovery of America, the celebrated Portuguese navigator, Anthony Gonzales, in exploring the coast of Africa, had seized and carried home with him some Moors. These, however, Prince Henry, of Portugal, immediately ordered to be returned to their country. As an expression of gratitude, the Moors sent over to Portugal ten