place, and take his lot with them. "A bas le Sénateur! There are other men who have as good a right to reign as you; and if we cannot bring you to a level by argument, we can do it by contumely and vituperation." This is the brief, but, I am pained to say that I feel constrained to believe, the true history of the matter.

Mr. Webster, forsooth, asking for underwriters in politics, and drumming up all Massachusetts to get them! Tell it not in Gath! It is neither true that he would ask for any such thing, nor true that his friends would condescend to devise and execute any such mea

sure.

Let those who are doing such deeds of violence against fact and truth, call to mind, that Athens, when she had banished her Aristides for six years, felt obliged to recall him before the end of that period, and to give him her highest confidence and her posts of highest honor. Let them call to mind, that when the immortal Æschylus, in one of his lofty and glowing tragedies, introduced a sentence replete with eulogy of moral goodness and integrity, every eye, in the assemblage of those very Athenians who once voted for his banishment, was filled with tears of emotion, and was spontaneously fixed upon Aristides, who was then present. And so will it be with us, if the impetuous zeal of the present hour is to march forward until it gains its ultimate end. We are full surely preparing for a future repentance.

In one word, no man who regards truth has any right to say, that Mr. Webster has procured his friends to prop him up, in the way of subscription to a paper commending his speech, or that he has enlisted me now in his service. He has not lifted one finger, in the way of accomplishing either object. And yet, in the way of helping to depreciate him, a respectable journal asks: How is it that his political Orthodoxy needs vouchers? What is the matter with it? What if Dr. Woods should be vouched for on the score of Orthodoxy, by an Association of Ministers in Boston, or elsewhere? Would it not seem passing strange, that he was in need of such vouchers?' Yes it would, I answer, in present circumstances. But suppose Dr. Woods were unjustly assailed in different quarters, and many things were laid to his charge without any foundation or good reason; would it be strange if Dr. Woods's friends, who best know him, should rally, and volunteer their united testimony to put down the false accusations? No, it would be strange if they did not do so.

J

Why then may not Mr. Webster's friends who have long been his neighbors and best know him, in a time of unrestrained and unmeasured obloquy, rally around him, and bid him God-speed in his patriotic and noble course? They may do so; they have done so; and they are none the less resolved to hold on in their course, by any false statements, so long as what they consider to be palpable injustice is done to him.

But enough of preface to my little book, unless the porch is to be larger than the building. I can only say, once more, that little if any of all this preface would have been written, had not the facts, now brought into view, contributed to throw light on the character of the times, and on the moderation and comity of some of those, whose opinions I expect to call in question. I must say, however, that I do not think the old proverb: "A man is known by the company he keeps," will apply, in the present case, to a large portion of those who dissent from Mr. Webster's views. It is an unblest, unnatural union—this union of these with those one of the matches not made in heaven, that has brought together such reputable men as I have described above (p. 14), and such as many of those are, who have loaded me with such favors as I could well dispense with, (see p. 8 seq.), and for which I am not specially grateful. But such is the doom of party spirit, when it runs high. We may and should regret it; but I see no way to prevent it.

One more remark, and I shall proceed to my main business. This is, that I have learned to suspect, that there is some distrust in the strength and goodness of their cause, when men begin to vituperate, to slander, and to satirize those, who are opposed to their views. I have seen some service, in my day, in the wars of pens, and sometimes felt obliged to act as well as to see. Long ago I learned by observation, a lesson that impressed itself deeply on my mind. Those who feel a sober conviction from serious and repeated examination, that the views which they cherish are well grounded, and will bear assault without any lasting harm, are very apt to keep quiet, and cool, even when listening to declamation and obloquy. Why not? They are in no real danger. It is for those who are afraid that their underpinning may give way, and bring down the whole superstructure upon them, to keep constantly on the qui vive, and to make so much noise and bustle as will turn the attention of the public to the commotion, rather than to the foundations of the

edifice whence the noise proceeds. One part expect to be heard for much speaking; another, for loud speaking; another, for their inge nuity in the formation of vituperative epithets; and another, for their skill in substituting fiction for fact. Some write for a reason as good as Voltaire assigned, for a false statement (which however was quite piquante) in one of his histories. When advertised of the matter by an acquaintance of his, who was surprised to see it, he very coolly replied: 'My dear Sir, I must be read. Some of these writers think in like way, and are well prepared to say: Si non cœlum ---Acheronta movebo. But all badinage apart-it is my sober conviction that very much less of excitement would now exist, did not the array of Mr. Webster's arguments appear so formidable. If he is willing to risk his reputation and honor, in uttering sentiments which every tyro in the Free Soil political ranks can refute, why then lassez faire. There is no need of attacking him. He is undoing himself as fast as his enemies could wish. But so? Do they believe all this? Not a word of it. It is the Paixhan guns that they fear, when directed against chinky walls and Citadels of mouldering brick.

do they feel

My preface is through. I advance, then forthwith to the first part of my main design. This is,

§ 2. To exhibit the attitude of Slavery as presented by the Old

Testament.

I must prepare the way for this exhibition, by a few remarks on the positions assumed by the anti-slavery party (so called) of the present day.

One leading position, a thousand thousand times repeated, is, that slavery, on the part of the master is a crime of the first magnitude; a real malum in se; a crimen capitis; a misdeed to be placed by the side of murder, adultery, robbery, treason, and the like. Often is this position advanced without making any distinction between the case of an involuntary master of slaves, (one who has inherited them and cannot, without the most imprudent risk of doing them injury, free them immediately in the circumstances in which they are), and those who have trafficked in them, or been concerned with the piratical business of bringing them away from Africa. The bare possession is, as they assert, an outrage; the bare relation is in itself a

sin. Immediate repentance and the proclamation of their freedom are duties to be done without the least delay. Stolen goods, the fruit of robbery, they say, are not to be retained a single hour, after the man who has obtained them has come to a proper sense of his duty.

Is all this really so? Is this alleged malum in se, a case so entirely clear as it is said to be, in all its extent and in all its ramifications? Will the Scriptures bear us out in this position? For after all, this must be the ultimate test to which all sincere Christians are bound to appeal. A thorough Protestant, at least, professes to believe, that "the Scriptures are the sufficient and only rule of faith and practice."

We begin our investigation with the Old Testament. Our first object is to develop the matter as it there stands; our next will be to subjoin some remarks on this development.

Of the great antiquity of slavery no one can doubt. The curse of Noah that lighted on the progeny of the unfilial Ham, was, that Canaan his son should be a servant of servants unto his brethren, Gen. 9: 25. This language, uttered soon after the flood, shows plainly that slavery had an existence before the flood; for otherwise, it would not have been intelligible. No wonder it was so, "for the earth was filled with violence" (Gen. 6: 11); and slavery, for the most part, originates in violence, and has its deepest foundation in the simple but utterly unjust principle, that might is right.

Under many modifications, however, did slavery exist among the patriarchs of the Jewish nation. Abraham, "the father of the faithful," (when his nephew Lot was taken captive, his goods rifled, and himself carried off by marauding banditti), could bring into the field 318 armed and disciplined servants, born in his own great household, and make pursuit after the robbers, and disperse them, Gen. 14: 12-16. If one fifth be taken as the proportion among his servants of such men, viz. those who were capable of bearing and using arms, Abraham's family of slaves must have consisted of at least 1590 persons; somewhat larger, I think, than any like family among our fellow citizens of the South. However, we must call to mind here, that Abraham's relation to these slaves was somewhat different from that of master to slave among us. The patriarch resembled, in his mode of life, the Nomades who still roam over the very country from which he sprung. The Sheikhs among them often have under

their control a whole tribe; and this tribe stand in such relation to their Sheikh, as the serfs under the old feudal law bore to their master. Bodily service in the way of labor when needed, and special military service in predatory and warlike expeditions, were always at the command of the master. So, moreover, did the administration of justice, and the power of life and death, pertain to him. But in the East, where servitude everywhere prevails, the slaves, for the most part, are generally treated with less rigor, and more as human beings should be treated, than they are in most countries called Christian. Especially do the family-servants find much favor in the eyes of their master. It is a frequent custom now, among the Persians for example, to bestow legacies on this class of slaves, and nearly always (if they have behaved well) to give them their freedom. See how exactly the case of Abraham illustrates this. He had no child until he was 100 years of age; and in making arrangements for the disposition of his property after his death, (before the promise of a son), he had made the steward of his house his heir who was a slave of Damascene origin, one born as a slave in his own house, Gen. 15: 2, 3. When, therefore, the example of the patriarch is referred to as justifying modern slavery, it should be remembered, that what the Arabian Sheikhs now are to their petty tribes, Abraham was to his 1590 servants.

One striking circumstance respecting slavery, quite revolting to our occidental and Christian views, deserves mention here. If the mistress of the house was childless, a favorite female slave was selected by her, and offered by her to her husband, to take the place of a wife. In case of offspring, the children of this slave were regarded as the children of the real wife. The case of Sarah and Hagar fully illustrates this, as told in Gen. 16: 1—3; and it was as Abraham's son, that the blessing came upon Ishmael, Gen. 17: 20. And when Abraham was about to die, he bestowed gifts on all his sons born of his concubines, and sent them away free from the domination of his heir, Gen. 25: 5, 6.

Of Isaac, the patriarch's regular heir, we read that he "had in possession a great store of servants," Gen. 26: 14. When Rachel, the favorite wife of Jacob, Isaac's son, found herself childless, she, like Sarah, gave to her husband her favorite female servant, in order that she might claim the rights of a mother, and this slave bore to Jacob two sons, Gen. 30: 1-8. Jacob's other wife Leah, although