them, and as teaching them so to recognise as brethren those who were among their slaves, as to make the relation quite a different thing." Very affectionately, my dear brother,

Yours, &c.,

R. FULLER.

LETTER VI.

TO THE REV. FRANCIS WAYLAND, D. D.

MY DEAR BROTHER

So far from being offended at your plainness of speech, I see in it only that smiting of the righteous which is a kindness, and receive it as a proof of the esteem with which you have always honored me. And you, in return, will suffer my boldness, when I ask you whether truth ever requires, or is advanced by, exaggeration, and whether the sweeping charge I am combating be not a manifest exaggeration, that must be abandoned, and which in effect you do abandon? I am not unmindful of the distinctions of charity you make in your third letter, and I know that charity covereth the multitude of sins. But no charity can devise a distinction by which a man may live knowingly in the commission of a sin of appalling magnitude, and be free from its guilt; no affection-not even selflove can invent a refinement by which one may inflict on others as great a wrong as can be con

ceived, and do it for their ben fit; all which I understand you several times to suppose. I will not, however, dwell on this matter. If you still adhere to your assertion, that slavery, in itself, and always, and everywhere, was, and is, a sin of appalling magnitude, then there is nothing left for us but to pray for each other, and to love cach other, and to recollect always the diffidence and forbearance becoming those who now "know but in part.' I write, and have written, with my health, as well as the patience of our readers, admonishing me to stop. But the subject is too important; and, moreover, a committee is soon to meet in your city, upon whose decision will depend the co-operation of Northern and Southern Baptists in any Christian enterprise. Of course Southern ministers are the proper missionaries to the colored population. If, then, the monstrous proposition be sustained, that they are all unfit to be employed in the Home Mission Society, and the proscriptive spirit of a few Northern enthusiasts thus annul a constitution under which our fathers have acted so long and happily, you readily foresee the consequences. Never again shall we assemble in any society. The spirit of fanaticism will exult in the accomplishment of its baleful plans. And one of the largest and noblest bodies of Christians ever constituted for the glory of God, will at once be broken into fragments-not hostile, I hope, but forever irreconcilable. That the

great enemy of Christ will exhaust all his devices to secure such a result, no one can doubt. He has suffered too much from our assaults, not to long for such ample revenge. But who can love

the Redeemer, or the heathen, without deprecating this disaster, and wishing to avert it? Nor do Ï see how disruption can be avoided, and peace and harmony permanently established, unless upon the basis that our associations are agents strictly lim ited in their trusts and operations, and never to be perverted by any of the principals into engines of inquisition and annoyance.

In this correspondence it only now remains that I notice one or two arguments advanced by you; gladly assenting when I can, and when I venture to dissent, doing so with reluctance.

(1.) And first, as to expediency, it is unnecessary to examine how far anybody might have a single grain of a scruple about all you advocate. But how can your theories shelter the apostles, if they were guilty of the conduct you attribute to them? Whether the word "expediency" be good English in the evil sense now generally attached to it, I need not inquire. It is very good American; and as such we will use it, meaning thereby a truckling and trimming so as to make the principles of right and wrong comply with circumstances. And now, thus defined, was there ever expediency more abominable than that practised by the apostles, if your supposition be correct? If they knew slavery to be a sin of appalling magnitude, it was their duty to condemn it. They were bound to dismiss all unworthy comparison between two evils, and, rejecting all evil, to do the will of God, and leave consequences to him. The abolitionists feel themselves under sacred obligation to denounce slavery, and rather tear society to pieces than rest while the horrid sin is committed on the earth.

My brother has "long felt that he owed a debt of humanity and charity to his Christian brethren at the South, both free and enslaved. He has desired to bear his testimony in favor of those whom he believed to be suffering the greatest injustice, and to bear it in the presence of those, many of whom he believes, through erroneous views of the teaching of the Scriptures, to be responsible to God for that injustice." And he feels this, I know, most sincerely and affectionately, although he has published against the idea that responsibility rests upon the North. What then? Were Jesus Christ and the apostles less compassionate and faithful? Consider, too, the office intrusted to the apostles. Their precepts and example were to furnish to all ages a pattern. Or rather, let me forget them, and say, that what they spake the Holy Ghost uttered, and what they did the Holy Spirit prompted; and we have seen what they spake and what they did as to slaveholders. And now, I ask, how could these apostles indignantly repel the thought of "doing evil that good might come"-nay, how can they escape the charge of having done evil by which evil has come-if you are right? If you are right they did evil, and evil such as no other men ever did evil to the slaves, they were faithless to them-evil to the Christian masters, they were faithless to them-evil to the churches, they were faithless to the churches-evil to the world around, they were faithless to the world— evil to the gospel, they were faithless to the gospel -in fine, evil to posterity, they were faithless to posterity, down to January, 1845, as this very discussion testifies.

(2.) You affirm, however, that although the apostles did not condemn slavery by express precept, they did so by the inculcation of truths that must abolish slavery. As to which allegation, occupying the ground I now do, it would be quite enough for me to reply, that no matter what truths the apostles taught, if they received slaveholders into the churches, and pronounced them "faithful and beloved," they put to silence the charge that slaveholding is always and everywhere a sin.

If you had said that the gospel, wherever received, at once eradicated the Roman system of slavery, and made the relation "a very different thing;" and if you had added, that everywhere the gospel requires of a master the moral and intellectual improvement of his slaves; I at least should have had no controversy with you. Then, too, while Christians at the South are enjoined to perform their solemn duty, the good and the wise through the Union might consult in the spirit of a prospective and far-seeing philanthropy, as to the designs of God for the African race. But the proposition defended by you has no connection with all this. Slavery is averred by you to be always, and every moment, a sin of appalling magnitude. And if this be so, I do not see how you can either respect the apostles, or censure the most vehement abolitionists.

The discrepancy between pious men, as to the teachings of so plain a book as the Bible, on the subject of slavery, is owing, I humbly apprehend, to our overlooking the obvious distinction to be made between the gospel, viewed as a civil code, and the gospel, viewed as a rule of Christian duty.